BR: Twins of Khorne Vs Righteous Fury

Last Saturday I had the pleasure of playing Blake and his Bretonians again. I met Blake in the Lone Wolf last year where his one vote gave 3rd players choice to Aaron's Vampire Counts army and his defeat of me in round 5 gave him Best General and me 3rd best general.

Blake is an excellent player who knows his tactics very well. I knew it would be a tough match-up. Since he was the home player he would have 2300 points. Since I failed the scenario 4 objective I was -100 points, so only had 2150 points.

This scenario involved a Phoenix. The object was to grab a phoenix egg. Not an easy task. In the 8 or so games already reported, only 1 egg had been grabbed. I knew it would be tough, but I wrote the scenario, and the eggs were vital for becoming a "chosen" in round 8. So I decided for better or worse, I'd grab an egg.
I devoted 1 knight unit and one hero to the task.

Then I for some reason decided to try my resource flankers, and sent another knight unit around to be my flankers. This had the cumulative affect of fighting his 2300 points with less than 1500 points.

My army looked like:
Exalted hero of Khorne on chaos steed, shield, Great Fang, Troll hide
Exalted hero of khorne on chaos steed, enchanted shield, rending sword, dragon wand

4 units of 5 chaos knights, standard, mus
4 units of 5 marauder horsemen, flails, mus
2 units of 6 centigors, LA, sh, spears, mus
1 unit of 5 DoW fast cav, bows, shields

His army:
General with lance of always hit.
BSB
Pegasus hero w/virtue to never be outnumbered

9 knights of the realm, full command
9 knights of the realm, fc
8 KotR, fc
8 KotR, fc
5 Grail knights, fc
Trubechet
5 Fast cav w/bows,spears, mus
3 pegasus knights, champion
22 Grail Retinue with full command

Turn 1a: Twins of Khorne: He prayed and so I decided to go first. My Centigors didn't drink so everyone moves up.
I throw 10 axes at the phoenix, do a couple wounds but he makes everyone of his ward saves.

Turn 1b: Evil Bretonians: He charges his Grail knights into my Centigors. I figure he will destroy them, but if he holds, I have a nice flank from my general and knights and if he does overrun I have a flank from my 2nd centigors. So I hold.

The rest of his army moves up. In shooting, his trebuchet deviates just enough to glance a knight and kill him. A knight I would sorely need later.

In combat, his grail knights only manage to kill 3 centigors. With my attacks I kill a grail knight. The centigors break. This causes the marauders in front of my general to panic and run. The centigors get away from the 4" pursuing grail knights but run into the knights of the realm and cause my 2nd centigors to panic and flee almost to the table edge.

Here is the setup after turn 1:


and the other half of the board:



From the first picture, my right to left you have:
pegasus knights by the graveyard and wall. Then a unit of 9 Knights.
Grail knights in the woods, then 9 more knights. Next to them are 8 knights with the general and the BSB with knights.
On my side you can see the fleeing centigors. The other centigors have already been wiped out.
Then my general with knights of khorne. They have the monastery on them, so gain a 5+ ward save. Then you can see a unit of marauders in front of his fast cav and the fleeing marauders behind them.

From the 2nd picture you can see his Pegasus hero behind the BSB unit. Trebuchet on the hill and then Grail retinue. On the hill is the phoenix in his nest.
On my side, you can see knights on the hill. They have stable so move 8". In front of them are my Dogs of war fast cav. Then 2 marauder units by the phoenix. And finally a unit of knights with hero in front of the phoenix.

Turn 2a: The glorious and good Twins of Khorne: I had a choice to take on the Knights of the realm or go for the grail knights. Grail knights it is. I feared the KotR would flee, leaving me setup for his general's unit to charge me.
And while I wanted to put a wound on the phoenix first, I decided not to wait any longer and charged in.

I rolled for my monastery and it stays on for this turn. Sweet. I roll for my flankers to come on, nope.

The fleeing marauders failed to rally but only go about 5 inches and stay on the table. But the centigors, who are right on the table edge rally. Whew!!

Shooting doesn't do anything, so onto combat.
My general's unit totally wipes out the grail knights. The Great fang counting for 3 of them. So my general's unit overruns and rolls 17". This will hit his knight unit in the flank. But then we remember his panic checks, and the knights I'm about to hit panic and flee. But the ones I want to flee closer to the middle hold strong.

Since he fled from the panic and not the charge I don't get to wheel that way, and instead run 17" into no where land.

Since the phoenix nest counts as an obstacle, I lost all my charge bonuses. Since my hero and phoenix had the same initiative, he let my hero go first. 5 swings gave me 4 hits and 3 wounds. He saves 2 of them. But the rending blade goes off. 2 wounds, damn, was hoping for 3.
The phoenix then gets pissed and kills off 2 knights. My last 2 knights attack and get in 2 wounds. He makes one of the ward saves. So he is down to only 1 wound left. Uggh, if I'd rolled 3 wounds on the rending sword, the egg would already be mine.

Turn 2b: The misguided Brets: His far right KotR charge some marauders who flee and are run down. His fast cav charge my dogs of war fast cav. His pegasus knights charge my centigors. I stand and shoot and he is just out of range so he stops just in front of my centigors. I do a wound on the stand and shoot.

his hero on pegasus charges a unit of marauders who flee and he is just short of hitting the next marauders.

His fleeing knights rally and turn to face my generals' knights flank.

Shooting does nothing and onto combat.
His fast cav takes down 2 of my DoW fast cav. But with their 6 attacks back kill 3 of the fast cav. I win by 2 and he rolls insane courage to stay.

The phoenix combat is another matter. I do a wound with my hero and he makes his ward save. His phoenix does 2 wounds but I make both saves. I then do a wound with my knights and he makes the ward. Uggghhh!!

Turn 3a: The Glorious Twins of Khorne: I roll for the Monastery and again it stays with me. Good, I will need it. But again my flankers fail to come on.

My centigors are drunk, and the mad mean kind. They go frenzy and swear to avenge their brothers. They charge into the pegasus knights who take it.

My khorne knights on the hill can charge either the hero on pegasus or the BSB unit. I opt for the lone pegasus hero along with a unit of marauders. He opts to flee. Since we have the same unit strength he rolls and flees from the marauders. This is really bad for him and my marauders catch him and get between his BSB and Grail retinue unit. More importantly my knights continue to face the front of his knights.

Both my fleeing marauders rally. One can't move, but the other can and runs back in front of his BSB unit. Throwing their axes they kill a knight and take out a rank.
My generals unit has no option but to turn around and face the full unit of knights of the realm.

Here is a pic before we get into combat:


In combat, the Centigors kill all but 1 pegasus knight and he kills 1 centigor back. He breaks and I run him down. With a decent overrun, they are in a great position to counter charge his Knights of the realm, if my general can hold.

The fast cav combat, we each kill one, and again the lone fast cav holds with insane courage.

Finally the phoenix combat. I do another wound to him, and again he makes his ward save. The phoenix then adds another knight to his pile of copses. And my last knight fails to wound. Its a drawn combat. But I cannot lose my last knight. The hero cannot pick up an egg by himself.

Turn 3b: The easily duped Brets: The knights on the far right charge into my generals unit. The knights on my side of the board charge my marauders who flee of the board. He moves his knights around to get more angled towards the phoenix.
He moves up his grail regalia.

In combat I fail to kill the last fast cav as he makes his 6+ armor save, and he does a wound, but I save it. He then rolls a 3 to hold. Geez!!

In the phoenix combat, my hero again wounds the big evil bird twice, and he makes both ward saves!!! NOO!!!!! he then promptly eats my last knight leaving the hero alone. I lose combat, and fail my insane courage and flee the nasty bird. That one hurt.

In the big combat, the knights charge in and the champion challenges. My hero gladly accepts and after brushing aside the one lance that hit his chaos armor, he killed the lowly champ twice over. His knights do manage to kill a knight with me failing the only monastery roll I had. I lose combat by 1, so lose my frenzy, but roll a 7 and hold. Whew!! That was huge.

This ends part 1 of this climatic battle. Coming soon part II.
Will those stupid flankers ever decide to show up?
Will anyone be able to get a phoenix egg?
Will that lone fast cav bring about my doom?

All thes questions and more will be answered soon.

Until next time...