End Of Year HOTT

I haven't played HOTT for ages, so I squeezed in a quick game yesterday evening. Once again my trusty Elves found their way onto the table, but they were opposed by the Ratmen, an army not seen that often on this blog.

The Ratmen attacked, and fielded 1 x Warband General, 4 x Shooters, 2 x Lurkers, 2 x Beasts and 8 x Hordes.

The hordes and beasts were massed on their right flank, whilst the shooters covered the centre.

Against them the Elves had 1 x Magician General, 2 x Spears, 4 x Shooters, 1 x Behemoth, 2 x Riders

The Rats advanced, whilst the Elves were content to sit tight and shuffle their troops around.

The Ratman hordes spread out ready to attack, at which point the Elves made a short advance and unleashed a volley of arrows into their ranks.

This broke up the Ratman line a little, and blunted their first attack, which was driven off with some beasts being casualties.

The Elves now attacked in the centre, rushing the Ratman shooters. The Ratmen did better here, pushing back or holding their opponents.

The Ratmen went for an all-out attack, looking to score a breakthrough which could be exploited by their superior numbers.

Once again they drove back the Elven centre, with the Elves' treeman ally being reluctant to take on the musketeers opposite him.

In the centre the Ratman general charged into the fight. He and his fierce bodyguard swept away a group of Elven spears.

The Elves attacked ...

... and lost their treeman. But they were now very much in a better position overall.

The Ratmen had lost most of their hordes on the right, as well as both groups of beasts. A shooter fell in the centre, and the army was close to breaking. Their general charged the second group of Elven spears, but was driven off. The loss of another shooter saw their army break.

The Ratmen might have been better off if they'd sat tight and used the woods on their side of the board to funnel the Elves into the centre. However with shooters, beasts and lurkers in play, the Elves would have been stupid to have attacked such a position and there wouldn't have been much of a battle. A better Ratman attack would have been to put the hordes in the centre and simply to have matched the Elven shooters with their own. This would have been a bit 50/50 in terms of outcomes, but the beasts could have provided useful support. Still, it was late in the day, and my brain wasn't in the right place for cunning plans. And the Ratmen suffered for it.

Apologies for the weird photos; I got a new lens for my camera at Christmas and thought I'd try it out. I need some practice.