Greetings lords and ladies, I recently got back from playing my first battle on TOW, and my first WHFB game in about twenty years! I am so chuffed to get back to shuffling my wood elves around after finding a game store to play at and a pleasant group of folks to play with.
anyway, we played at 1000 points on a table arrayed with a variety of terrain: a decent-sized pond in the left corner of my opponent's deployment zone (treated as difficult terrain), a low central hill, a large ruined half-tower (treated as an obstacle) on left of my deployment zone, a small mausoleum with a low wall on the right of my deployment zone, a large skeleton in my opponent's deployment zone across from that roughly, and a small wood in the right corner of my opponent's deployment zone.
my opponent fielded a High Elf list consisting of a dragon wizard guy, 20 lothern sea guard with command, 12 sword masters with command, and two bolt throwers. the wizard had some sort of magic weapon (which, it turns out, they never got to swing) and a lvl 2 upgrade, with the curse of arrow attraction and curse of cowardly flight out of battle magic.
my list was a lord on stag with a spear and the helm of the hunt and a charmed shield, a unit of five wild riders with full command and the hunter king banner (which I did not make use of because sea guard are spooky) and no shields because blocking is for chumps, 6 glade guard with a musician, 9 glade guard scouts with hagbane tips and a musician, five sisters of the thorn with full command (who took fireball, what an absolute steal of a unit, my goodness), a lvl 2 elementals branchwraith who rolled the rusty spell (never used) and swapped flaming sword for tree singing (always used, what a good spell), and nine dryads with a champ (who are incredibly tough it turns out).
I slapped my wood roughly diagonally opposed to the large skeleton, and after deployment, the board state was something like this:
I'll do the battle report narratively since it's a bit late but I want to get it down before I forget.
The High Elf army began the battle by moving forward with the Sea Guard to take the bottom of the low hill and approach within volley range of the Wood Elf forces, but between the distance and underbrush, they could only take shots at the dryads and the branch wraith close by, whose literal wood bodies proved too tough for the volley of arrows they absorbed. The dragon finished drinking from the shallow pond and swooped to the other side, eyeing the arrayed wood elf archers hungrily, and the bolt throwers began to fire salvos into the wood elf ranks, but cover and distance protected their targets, especially lucky on the right flank, where the sisters were aided by the mausoleum's low wall. The Swordmasters legged it overland, intent on putting their swords to work on the venison-riding sisters opposite them, confident that their magic would just roll off of them.
The Wood Elf first turn saw the archers in front of the Wild Riders, who had been acting as a screen (and, probably, their minders), so as to let them run rampant the next turn, while the sisters of the thorn on the right flank advanced forward and targeted the sea guard with a spicy fireball, roasting five of them (the sea guard, ever the pride of ulthuan or whatever, did not care). the scouting glade guard hunkered down in the ruined tower ambushed the advancing dragon, chipping off several wounds with their poisoned arrows, and the stag lord put another arrow into it's gleaming hide for good measure. The dryads gamely sprinted up and took the other side of the hill across from the sea guard, leaving the branchwraith in the lurch - she ducked into the forest for cover and dedicated herself to horticulture, planting a new tree each round for the rest of the game.
The second turn saw a mighty charge into the scouting glade guard, who failed their terror test and were summarily devoured by the dragon, who ended it's rampage within licking distance of the glade lord - and within range of the suddenly aware and absolutely berserk wild riders. the bolt throwers and lothern sea guard continued to blast the cuss out of the wood elf lines, eliminating several dryads and nearly clipping a lady off her deer, if not for her ward save (4+ is very good, it turns out!)
the second turn saw the ferocious combo charge into the dragon by the glade lord, the wild riders, and even the glade guard, who somehow didn't panic when their more skilled compatriots perished in front of them. they were there largely for moral support, because between the lord and the wild riders, the dragon was absolutely dumpstered under the crushing weight of armor-rending attacks at speed, which was fortunate because none of the elves except the glade lord had brought any armor to the party, and even he had just the hat, and they would have therefor all died. the plucky glade guard turned to face the remaining high elves in great spirits.
the third turn saw said plucky glade guard eat a ballista bolt and panic through the lord and the wild riders, but the former was far too stoic and the latter were far too frothy. the other bolt thrower finally clipped a sister off her steed, and the lothern sea guard continued to use the dryads as archery targets, thoroughly pincushioning them and dropping all but the champion, who resolved to hiss like an enraged goose to demoralize them. the swordmasters continued to advance menacingly towards the sisters of the thorn, salivating as visions of sausages and rich stew filled their imaginations (no doubt).
the next WE turn saw the remaining plucky glade guard rally miraculously, the stag lord surge up the field towards the sea guard, the wild riders hurtle towards the bolt thrower near the pond like a bat out of hell, and the sisters continue to attempt to set fire to the environs whilst playing keep-away from the hangry swordmasters. the branch wraith continued to plant trees in strategic locations, growing a large wood between the stag lord and the sea guard to block arrows.
In the declining action of the game, the High Elves took what victories they could - the lothern sea guard's champion cut down the remaining hissy dryad in a duel and took the central hill in triumph, while the bolt thrower near the forest kebab'd another sister. the other bolt thrower fired a volley into the advancing wild riders and discovered that they were, indeed, completely unarmored and absolute mad lads.
The final Wood Elf turn saw the wild riders ignore the stand and shoot from the ballista crew and smash them flat, presumably whilst screaming Meatloaf lyrics. the stag lord, not to be outdone, and despite being only protected by a shiny hat and pure manliness, plowed through a hail of arrows into the forest of sea guard spears, blew them apart like bowling pins and rode the remainder down. at this point, the High Elves packed up their pointy hats and booked it, and we called the game.
in all, a great first showing! there were a few rules things we probably didn't get right, particularly the question of whether a dragon, having charged and mulched panicked unit, could use it's breath weapon in the shooting phase (we weren't sure and decided no, but in retrospect it probably could have), but it was a great deal of fun and I was really pleased with the effectiveness of the wild riders and the archers, who were perennial underperformers in 8e. Killing a dragon on their first outing was an outstanding outcome, even if it was just a wee dragon (if such a thing exists), and poison shots are worth every single point.
the Stag Lord is something I've wanted to field since 8e, and I'm glad he pulled his weight. the sisters of the thorn are absolute menaces and I am sure they will be priority targets for my opponents from here on out.
I'm really glad to get back into this game and this hobby, it's an absolute blast!
