Of Puke and Poison

Tried a pick-up game of AoS today and ended up facing off against a fellow devildog and Iraq vet.  I brought my motley crew of savage orcs, forest gobbos, and river trolls vs. a the finest of Bretonnia - knights, peasants, and trebuchets.

Since we didn't know each other we played using the "small battle" guidelines from the Azyr Comp system so we could both show up to the store (Critical Hit Games) with relatively equal forces, and I think it worked out.  We played a normal battleline game, nothing fancy, so we could focus on the rules and armies. 

Quick battle highlights:

• The peasant archers are wicked!  They can fire a salvo of arrows that blacks out the sky, which in turn allowed my entire mob of savage orcs (except the lucky musician) to die in the shade in 1 turn of shooting.  My opponent and I agreed it was terrifying, but would have best been used against the trolls.
• Identifying and "breaking" special rules for units seems to be the best use of early shooting and magic.  By this I mean taking a unit from 20 to 19 or from 10 to 9 can seem pointless, but in reality it can drastically reduce a unit's effectiveness by denying special rules like re-rolls.
• Poison on the spiders is tremendous.  It's like poison and killing blow combined from the old WFB - I was shocked at how quickly a mob of spider riders dispatched a lance of Grail Knights with just their poison attacks.
• River Trolls are still the toughest things I've got.  Boost them with a mystic shield and inspiring presence and watch them pound away!

The pride of Bretonnia charges into the fray...the trolls slimed them shortly thereafter.