This was my first game at the gaming club "Ars Belli" in Mainz. I must admit that I did not really have more time to prepare for this game than I had for the first. The meeting was on a sunday, and I did not know until saturday if I would have time to go. Accordingly the list was patch work again, but at least I managed to finish painting my warlocks on the evening before the game. I still had to field some unpainted models though...

Warlord with heavy armour, desolate blade, enchanted shield and the foul pendant
Fully equipped warlock except for pistol, storm daemon, dispel scroll
Fully equipped warlock except for pistol, 2 dispel scrolls
Master moulder with light armour and whip

29 clanrats with musician, standard and ratling
29 clanrats with spears (this time I stuck with WYSIWYG), musician, standard and ratling
23 stormvermin with shields, full command and warbanner
10 night runners with slings
2x2 giant rat packs
3 rat swarms

5 gutter runners with poisoned handweapons
4 rat ogres with packmasters
7 jezzails

Models in army: 148. Unpainted: 4 packmasters. WIP: 7 jezzails, 4 stormvermin.

My opponent was Roger ("EvilGit"), a full blooded greenskin. He played a regular ork horde, so no Grimgor's 'ardboyz or flashy appendix list. I don't know all of the magic items he took, but in general this list should be correct:

Black orc warboss on wyvern
Goblin shaman
Nightgoblin shaman with double doo-dahs

16 big 'uns with 2nd hand weapon and full command
16 orcs with 2nd hand weapon and full command
2x20 night goblins with handweapon, shield and 3 fanatics each

8 boar boyz with full command
orc chariot
2 bolt throwers

2 giants

Three models that cause terror - outch! This was going to be tough...

Deployment

In the center of the gaming board there was a hill, on its left (my view) was a rock and a tower, on its right a wood. Roger placed a unit of night goblins on each flank. On the left side of the hill he set up his boar boyz, the chariot and one bolt thrower, behind the hill and on its right stood a giant, the second bolt thrower, big 'uns, the second giant and finally the regular orcs. Roger hid the wyvern behind the hill and the shamans moved about the orc regiments.
On my side the giant rats took to the flanks again even though I did not trust them with taking on the night goblins on their own. On the left flank they were joined by the jezzails who had a fine view on the center of the battlefield. Then came the clanrats with handweapons and the stormvermin, the rat swarms and gutter runners sculced around some bushes, then the rat ogres, clanrats with spears and night runners. My general joined his bodyguard of stormvermin, each of the warlocks joined a unit of clanrats and the master moulder got ready to help herding the rat ogres into battle.

Turn 1

I won the dice roll and chose to go first. I advanced a little with my right flank and with the giant rats on the left, but nothing more. In the magic phase Roger dispelled the storm daemon and one warp lightning before the second roasted some orcs, but the unit passed its panic test. In the shooting phase my jezzails took away one wound from a giant.

In Roger's turn the night goblins on the left side squabbled (i.e. they did nothing this turn) and everything else advanced. The wyvern went into hiding behind the rock between hill and tower. In the magic phase I let his first spell pass because I expected a lot more dice and spells (don't ask - I don't understand it myself now). And 1d6 strenght 4 hits can't be that bad anyway, can they? 6 hits and 5 wounds later I thought otherwise... The remainder of the magic pahse was uneventfull because Roger missed to rolls and I was left with all of my dispel dice. Hm.

Turn 2

I carefully probed my way forward with all of my units, especially to set up my swarms and gutter runners. On the right flank my night runners moved forward in a hint of bravery to lure the fanatics out of hiding, only to learn that a unit that triggers fanatics cannot move any further after it did so. Not a single inch. Why on earth do I have an orc army book at home? In this case it meant that of the night runners 12" only 2" were left. Great.
In the magic phase the storm daemon burned out, but at least I was able to reduce both giants to one wound each. During shooting the night runners incapable of killing a fanatic while a ratling killed the other. But the main event was the jezzails finishing of the left giant.

Roger kept advancing in true orc fashion. The boar boyz now threatened the clanrats with handweapons as well as my stormvermin while the chariot advanced towards the tower. The wyvern flew only a short distance and went into hiding behind the turret - again no chance of getting a clean shot at him!

Turn 3

Time for heros: The swarms and gutter runners attacked the remaining giant and my stormvermin and clanrats prepared for the boar boyz' attack. [At some point during the game my night runners and the giant rats on the right flank fled because of fanatic hits and panic, but apart from that not much happened on the right flank for the remainder of the game. The night runners rallied later, but I forgot the move them.]
Magic and shooting killed 5 boar boyz (that passed their panic test) and a couple of fanatics. Everything else was either dispelled or led to nothing. During close combat of all things the swarms (who had only contact with one base) took the giant's final wound. But instead of falling into the orc regiment behind him like a good lad the giant squashed three gutter runners beneath himself before they could even attack. At least the big 'uns panicked and fled.

Roger charged the clanrats with his remaining boar boyz and brought the chariot into position for a charge in his next turn. The orc regiment charged the swarms and the wyfern flew right in the middle between the jezzails and the clanrats on the left. Because both his shamans fled in panic caused by the fleeing big 'uns (who themselves rallied) Roger had no magic this turn.
During close combat the boar boyz were unable to create a match for the furry horde of clanrats. A good roll for persuit and the clanrats would be out of range of the wyvern's terror. And what did I roll? Snake eyes.

So what. I've still got my general in range for that terror test.

Turn 4

Time for panic and terror tests: Jezzails use the general's leadership and stand their ground. The ratling uses the general's leadership, may use the mother regiment's rank bonus and stands. The clanrats get to use the general's leadership and stand. The stormverim with general hold their ground as well. Puh, that was a close call. But with leadership 10 (except for the jezzails) it's not a big surprise either.
The clanrats make a reform to make sure the chariot is not in their flank, the stormvermin advance a bit, the warlocks leave their regiments to take aim at the wyvern and the clanrats with spears advance towards the close combat in the center. But what can I say - 2 warlocks, 7 jezzails and one ratling (that blew up) were only able to take away one or two wounds from the wyvern and one wound from the black orc warboss, and the chariot was still standing, too. Not good.
The close combat in the center continued and Roger remembered that he had two handweapons with his orcs and thus more attacks.

Now it was Roger's turn again. The big 'uns charged the swarms, the chariot the jezzails (stand and shoot) and the wyvern charged a warlock with the latter deciding it was better for him to flee. Roger chose not to change targets into the stormvermin and got the warlock, which left the wyvern standing with his rear right in front of my stormvermin. This was too good to be true!
For this short moment of drooling I was punished immediately when the clanrats failed their panic test for the eliminated jezzails and ran right into the charge lane. Didn't I have leadership 10? Too bad that doesn't help when you roll a 5 and a 6...

Turn 5

The turn started with a panic test for the stormvermin because of the fleeing clanrats - wait, where did I just see that 5 and 6 again? Grrr! So much for that great plan, and on top of it half of my army was on the run. Now all I could do was sweeping up the pieces. So I guess it's time for heros again! The rat ogres charge the wyvern's flank (snake eyes for the to fear reduced terror test - so it does work after all) and the clanrats with spears join the fray in the center by charging the orc regiment's flank.
In the magic phase the remaining warlock toasts a mere two of the remaining three boar boyz (who had of course rallied) and the second ratling made a whooping "FUMP!" and shot into the woods instead of the night goblins. It must have been around this time that I forgot to move my night runners past the night goblins.
During close combat I ruefully remembered that it's sufficient to have one unit that provides a rank bonus in a multiple close combat, which meant that the clanrats flank charge in the center did not add up to much. The swarms were finally wiped out which made me loose the combat. The clanrats fled of course, were run down and their ratling charged in the process. The rat ogres prooved to be equally incompetent when they were unable to wound the wyvern (just like the rest of my army before despite of a large amout of hits) and lost the combat. That they fled should not come as a surprise when you take a look at their leadership, nor should it be surprising that they were caught and run down by the flying wyvern.

Roger reordered his troops. The chariot who had left the table while overrunning the jezzails returned, the big 'uns moved into position and the night goblins charged the night runners that should have been standing in the night goblins' rear by now - or was that in turn 6? No matter what, Roger sweapt the remainder of my army.

Turn 6

At least the remaining clanrats as well as the stormvermin with the general rallied. The remaining warlock was once more incapable of roasting the single survival of the boar boyz.

Roger makes a final charge with the single boar boy and the chariot on my stormvermin and kills 4 of them. In return my stormvermin make fools of themselves when they cannot do anything against he boar boy, the stormvermin champion does no harm against the chariot and my general only put a slight dent into the chariot (one wound or something like that). Thanks to the warbanner and ranks I still win the combat, they flee and I'm able to gain a couple of victory points.

Result: 1637 : 1035 victory points, i.e. with a 602 difference it is already a major vicotry for Roger.

Resume

It was an thrilling and most importantly very relaxed game. Roger was a fine opponent and we both had a lot of fun. The game was in the balance several times and was close on several occasions. This really asks for a rematch!

I admit that I was tempted to add a third warlock or ratling as consequence from this game. At least for now that won't happen for the simple reason that I don't own those models, but one thing after the other.

Roger and I agreed after the game that the game was decided by my failed leadership tests. For someone who is used to loosing half a dwarf army to terror in a single turn that's not a big surprise but still extremely unsatisfactory. But in my opinion the fact that the game came down to a couple of dice rolls also meant that more things must have gone wrong.

For starters I realized that I'm lacking practice heavily - it really showed that I had not played a game of Warhammer Fantasy in quite a while throughout the whole game. I did not put enougth thought into the fanatics, waisted the giant rats on the left flank instead of ignoring the night goblins on that flank, sent my clanrats with spears into a close combat they could not win and forgot to move my night runners. With the exception of the clanrats' charge no major mistakes, but if you sum it up it's definitely too much.
Shooting and magic worked well for the most part, but it wasn't enougth to be reliable. When I was finally able to see the wyvern I bit out my front teeth at its toughness 5 and armour. How on earth am I supposed to take on a "real" dragon if I can't even take down a baby wyvern? On the other hand three warlocks would be extremely dull and a third ratling would "only" provide me with strength 4 and 15" range. Apart from that I'm not sure if I did not focus too much on the giants with my shooting and magic - those two giants plus the wyvern really intimidated me. I was surprised how easily that one giant was taken down in close combat, but that combat could have taken a different route just as well even though I had the gutter runners standing at the ready with their poisoned handweapons.
Charging the wyvern with the rat ogres was risky but not hopeless. I really think they should have taken down the wyvern, but never mind. Still I'll probably split them in half for the next game and leave the master moulder at home. He is a rarely used yet very stylish skaven character and (in my case) a nice conversion, but in a gaming situation he doesn't really have any effect.
That spears and slings are too expensive for what they do was no news to me. As always I did not use the spears at all and the slings were mostly ineffective. For the time being I'm going to keep them because of WYSIWYG, but once I've finished painting the jezzails and giant rats' packmasters a third regiment of clanrats (this time with handweapons again!) will have top priority, with 10 night runners with second handweapon that are waiting to get painted being a very close second.

Roger's resume

Chapter 3 - what kind of army list is that???