Saga AAR: The (dumb) luck of the Irish

I completed my Irish warband for Saga on the same morning I played it in its first game. That's often how I roll. The Irish warband was one of the insta-armies that I originally created for another project, but found that I could easily convert to a Saga warband by some rebasing and painting a few more figures/units. Not actually instant, but close.

To get an Irish warband out of them, I needed rebase everything I had based for Pig Wars and paint 12 slingers—which I've had sitting unboxed and untouched for a long time. The original figures I painted for Pig Wars are all Old Glory minis, but OG doesn't make Irish slingers—despite the fact that the ancient the Irish were profligate rock-flingers because the surface of Ireland is about 72% rock.

So, I used the Irish slingers produced by Crusader Miniatures instead. I also needed to paint another six Old Glory warrior figures to complete my warband of three warrior units, two hearthguard, and one levy slingers.

I brought them down with me to Silver King on Wednesday and took on Gary Griess and his Anglo-Danes. This was to be my farewell (for now) attendance at the bi-weekly meet-up. As I recently posted, I'm going back to the salt mines after a three month hiatus. As I have done with most of my games, I brought some new terrain with me also. I have two (of ultimately three) large resin-cast hills. One of which got in the game, but didn't feature much.

Hill three is pending. I've got a post planned about them soon. No, really. It'll show up.

Gary's A-Ds were organized as a hearthguard-heavy force with the bare minimum of warriors and some bowmen to annoy people from afar. I was a bit intimidated by all that axe-wielding menace and wasn't sure how my warband would hold up. Mine were two 4-figure hearthguard units (javelins), three 8-figure warrior units (javelins), and one 12-figure levy unit (slings).

We played the Feasting and Pillage scenario from Book of Battles. I was the first player and we set up terrain that gave us each pretty good defensive positions, but left a large space of open ground in the middle (as is pretty much required by the scenario rules). Having the first move, I used the maneuver rule to get my units close the the objective markers.

Gary moved his units into or near the defensive terrain. I didn't really think of activating the Sons of Dana ability, which would let me take a shot from unseen hooligans at his troops moving near cover. There are several opacities of mine that I can cite. I was just lucky not to suffer much from them.

The Irish are a shooty kind of warband with Saga abilities that maximize their effect. I didn't make near enough use of them. However, on my second turn, I did move my warriors up and launched my javelins to the discomfit of one of Gary's hearthguard skulking in the woods.

For some unclever reason, I thought moving one of my warriors over the steep hill was a good idea. It wasn't. Unlike the Picts (especially the Picts) and the Welsh, the Irish have no Saga abilities that let them fly over uneven terrain. Those poor schmoes had to trudge over the hill moving Short (S) every turn.

If  hadn't sent one of my warriors on the slow route, I could have concentrated them and taken advantage of Saga abilities that reward massed shooting, namely Sidhe, where by nullifying the shooting of one unit, all others shooters at the same target get a +1 to their shooting.

I secured one objective marker on turn 2 and surrounded another. I didn't want to be burdened by it in case I wanted to move more than S, which is the movement restriction for schlepping around an objective marker. In retrospect, I ought to have grabbed it when I could.

Gary was having none of it. He came on pretty strong in the center moving his 6-figure hearthguard unit against my marker-schlepping warriors. He hit them hard and they lost more than half their number while inflicting only one casualty.

Rules avoidance instance #1: It turns out that according to Book of Battles page 17, Gary was entitled to grab the objective marker my warriors possessed after beating me. I had assumed that they had to destroy the unit to take its marker. So, they kept it. C'est la guerre.

My big break came in my turn when I activated the Fir Bolg ability for my slingers using a rare die. It addied three dice to my shooting for a total of seven dice, and made all 6s count as two hits. I rolled five 6s for 10 hits and Gary couldn't save even half of them. His formidable hearthguard unit disappeared under a pile of Irish stones. It was probably the luckiest I've ever been at shooting. 

I love slingers. Kevin Smyth advises me that I need a second slinger unit for my Irish. I may have to follow that advice. 

With no enemy to catch them—and fearing the mighty slingers—my warriors were well on their way to exiting the board with their loot.

On my right, Gary got aggressive in a more successful way. I had nabbed the objective marker with my hearthguard and both hearthguard and warriors had flug javelins at Gary's warlord who suffered two fatigue due to using his resilience. I was feeling rather pleased with myself.

However, Gary triggered Lord of War for his warlord, who had two fatigue on him, then charged him into my hearthguard unit. This ability allowed him to shed all his fatigue and bumped his armor to 6. 

In the resulting scrum, Gary's warlord obliterated my hearthguard at no loss to him other than one fatigue from having fought a melee. He also captured the objective marker my hearthguard had.

Rules avoidance issue #2: Lord of War is a nice ability, but having triggered it, you can't activate your warlord again for the rest of the turn. I.e., Gary couldn't have charged him into my hearthguard. Again, c'est la guerre.

After this slaughter, Gary charged a fresh hearthguard unit from the woods into my warriors. 

There was much loss on both sides with each of us inflicting four casualties on the other. This put me to half strength, but wiped out Gary's hearthguard. Like the slingers slinging death in the center, this result was a stroke of luck. Nevertheless, it left me at a loss. There was no way my diminished warriors were going to beat Gary's warlord and recapture the objective marker.

I made a bold attempt to skewer Gary's warlord with javelins—having finally gotten the Trudgers of Erin to the other side of the hill—but to no effect. He took another fatigue by using his resilience, but it wasn't enough to stop him and he began his retreat with his loot intact.

On my left, I secured the heretofore unmolested third objective marker with my mighty slingers. Gary had no one there to contest me for it.

Elsewhere, we both started withdrawing our units, neither of us holding onto hope that we could steal back a lost objective marker or do any further damage without risking more to ourselves. Because victory is largely based on survival points, it didn't make sense to play with fate.

When the dust had settled at the end of turn 6, Gary was pretty beat up. He'd lost two whole hearth guard units (10 figures total) and another three figures (of four) from a third unit. He'd also lost his one warrior unit, which started as a unit of four (he'd exchanged four warriors for two hearthguard) and got pummeled into nothing by the Irish slingers.

I'd lost one unit of hearthguard and one unit of warriors plus another seven warriors and a single slinger. I had also carried one objective marker off the board and had possession of another. Gary had possession of one objective marker. Total score after counting survival points and points for objectives: Gary at 16 and me at 30. It was a nice result for what may be my last Wednesday Saga game for some time to come.

Irish Threefer

Painting Irish for Saga is kind of a 3-in-1 opportunity. I originally intended to use the Irish I had as Scotti for Age of Invasions. These are from the Old friends, new enemies... section of the book. I've been working on eight hearthguard figures that are Viking-y types with Danish axes. But the factions mostly use the same troop types and use the same battle board. The Irish for Age of Vikings can use hearthguard with axes and have an axe-wielding warlord, but can also be identical in composition to the Scotti.

However, Age of Vikings includes the ferocious Norse-Gaels. By adding axe-armed hearthguards and an axe-armed warlord, there they are. Sadly, the Norse-Gaels don't have slingers and their only levy is javelin armed. Given that any or all warriors can be javelin armed, there's no sense (in my mind) of burdening your warband with levy who are no better at shooting than your other rank and file. I have enough axe-armed Irish warriors to replace my slingers (sigh) and give myself a fierce warband of two 4-four figure hearthguard units with axes, three 8-figure warrior units with javelins, and one 8-figure warrior unit with axes. Alternately, I could make all the warrior units javelin armed.

I'm well along with adding the figures to make Norse-Gaels—including Somerled the Destroyer as my warlord. I'll need to find a way to get them in a game now that Wednesdays are closed to me.