Age of Sigmar 2nd Edition Battle Report (Video coming soon)

Hey Game Fans, we’re back with something we want to do a lot more of in the coming months. The Wook and i got together and played our first game of Age of Sigmar, 2nd Edition. The Warhammer Store in Lawrence, Kansas was kind enough to host our game and give us permission to film the game, so keep your eyes peeled for the video to get posted soon. Now i’ll be the first to admit that we don’t know what we’re doing and we’re learning the game as we go. We only managed to get halfway through the third turn, due to some time constraints and the needs of a tiny dog, but from our engagement, i have some thoughts. I’ll get to those after i put down the lists and go through what happened during the game.


1,000 point game, using the Blood and Glory Battleplan

My List

Slaan Starmaster (General) with the Great Rememberer and the Prism of Amontyk


Eternity Warden with the Blade of Realities


10 Saurus Guard (Full Command)


5 Saurus Guard


5 Saurus Guard


10 Skinks with Meteoric Javelins and shields


I took the Eternal Starhost which encompasses all three Saurus Guard units and the Eternity Warden. I am 30 points under my cap of 1,000.

The Wook’s List

Ogor Butcher (General) with Wild Fury (artifact unknown)


Ogor Bruiser carrying a Rune Maw Banner


12 Ogor Bulls


3 Iron Guts


3 Lead Belchers


He hits his 1,000 points on the nose and we’re off to the races.

Setup

You can see the setup in the video (coming soon) but basically, i have my unit of skinks stretched out to grab one objective and the rest of my army is corner deployed on the other objective. If i were smarter, I would have used my 10 strong block to wrap around one flank and cover the frontage and put both of my smaller units of Guard on the front and left flank to be ready for the Ogors.



The Wook was smart and lined up his leadbelchers against the Slaan because he wanted to bring the Wizard down. The rest of his army took the center and were more than ready to come rolling across the table down the center to kill me. All in all, a good plan.

Turn 1

I got the roll to take the first turn, and start off with a lot of repositioning. My Slaan activates his command ability to give everyone within 10 inches the Fly special ability and rerolling armor saves during the shooting phase. I bank 10 Celestial Summoning points instead of casting spells this turn, and my Saurus Guard box rolls forward 5 inches. The Skinks stretch their line out a little further to get in the 10 inch bubble of the General’s Command ability. There’s nothing in range in the shooting phase, and nothing to charge.




The Wook activates his Rampaging Destroyer’s ability and sends the small unit of Iron Guts around the flank to threaten one of my objectives (and the squad of skinks standing on it). The Bruiser tries to do the same thing but doesn’t get it off the ground. His Butcher tries to cast a mystic shield but the Frog Wizard shuts it down. His entire army rolls forward towards my line but his guns are about three inches outside of range. He does plant his rune maw in the middle of my Saurus Box, but it doesn’t get anyone.




At the end of turn 1, we both control 2 objectives and precisely 0 models have died. Turn two roll off goes in the favor of Team Lizard, and we start the second turn.

Turn 2

Turn 2 Kicks off with my hero phase, and i need to get better at my order of operations. First thing i should do is channel all of spell casting into Celestial Summoning points, and that puts me to 20 points. Then i should use my command ability to give everyone fly and rerolled saves against shooting attacks. Finally, i spend 18 points to summon an Engine of the Gods. Since we’re still in my Hero phase after i summon it, i use the Engine to see what happens. I roll a 14 and get to summon another unit. The flank with the Leadbelchers is suddenly very busy with a dinosaur and 20 skinks.


I pull the Frog Wizard box back 5 inches, because I want the Ogors to have to work harder to get here. The longer i can draw this out, the more units i can potentially summon between them and the Frog. The big unit of skinks and the Engine of the Gods strip two wounds off of the Leadbelchers in the shooting phase, and finish the wounded one and a buddy of his in close combat. The Ogors don’t do a lot of damage in return, but the Leadbelcher makes his battleshock test.




Ogor Turn 2 has the Iron Guts finish taking the objective away from my skinks who ran for their lives on my turn. The big block of Bulls come down the center of the board and are probably 1 turn off of being able to charge me. The Bruiser moves over to support the Leadbelcher and the Butcher takes up a middle ground position to support the Bruiser/Leadbelcher side and still be able to help out the Bulls. The Butcher casts Voracious Maw, and eats two skinks out of the big unit. The Leadbelcher and the Bruiser get some work done this turn and strip 5 wounds off the engine of the gods. Unfortunately, the combination of the Engine and the Skinks bring the last two wounds off the Leadbelcher and kill the Bruiser.




Turn two, we’ve traded objectives, but the Ogors are really close to making contact.

Turn 3 (conclusion)

I win the roll off again, and i decide to go first. My Hero Phase consists of banking 10 more Celestial Summoning points (that’s back up to 12) and making things fly again. My 10 man skink team moves into position to shoot the big block of Bulls coming down the center of the board. The Engine of the Gods and the Skinks come down their hill towards the Butcher. The Frog Defense Force ™ readies for the charge of the Ogors.




I cause a wound to the Bulls with the Skink shooting, and the Engine of the Gods plus the larger group of Skinks cause a couple of wounds on the Butcher. Both units charge the Butcher and the smaller unit of Skinks has a plan so cunning that it can’t possibly fail. They charge the 12 man unit of Bulls. One of these plans works out pretty well. The Engine of the Gods and the larger unit of skinks bring the Butcher down. I made a tactical mistake because i forgot the Ogor weapons do 2 damage, and should have had the smaller unit of skinks go first. Their cunning plan was to use their wary fighters ability to withdraw out of combat on the other side of the Ogors and run for their lives towards an unguarded objective. They died to Ogor Clubs. The Engine of the Gods and its skink screen did kill the Enemy general though. This was where we had to call the game because of a small dog needing its owner, but we have been theorycrafting how that would have gone for his turn 3.

My thought is that he spends that turn moving his Iron Guts and his Bulls into position to hit the larger unit of Saurus Guard and the 5 man unit on the left flank. They charge in, and then things get very tricky.

The math of the situation looks like this.

Bulls hit on 4s, wound on 3s, and have 3 attacks each. 12 of them hitting that big block of Saurus Guard results in 18 hits, and 12 wounds. Because they have low rend, my Star Drake Shields and the Star Host gives my Saurus a 3+ save. I save 8 of those wounds and still take 8 damage. My Saurus are only 1 wound models, and that’s 80% of the unit gone. My small block of Saurus hit back, they hit on 3s, wound on 3s with their halberds. 15 attacks, 12 hit, 8 wound. Bulls have a 5+ (ish save) and the halberds are rend -1. Because they haven’t moved this turn, they are a D3 damage each. The Bulls save 2, and take 6D3 wounds, which averages down to 2 or 3 dead Bulls. The Iron Guts hit back, and probably wipe the small unit of Saurus Guard. That leaves the 2 survivors of the big unit to hit, and they might bring down another Bull.



The net result is that i lose two units of Saurus Guard for some damage to the Bulls. Oh, and there are Ogors in my security fence. The best trick i can hope for is to win the roll off to go first and summon reinforcements and hope that the Eternity Warden, whatever was summoned, and the rest of my army can envelop the Ogors before the kill the Starmaster. I don’t like my chances.



The Wook is pretty sure that even with the damage taken, i can summon and teleport units to grab all four objectives, but that victory condition means i have to survive the mauling the Ogors are going to do for the next two turns. I don’t think that’s going to happen, and he pulls out a minor victory by killing everybody.

Thoughts on Age of Sigmar 2nd edition

I like this game a lot. It’s fun. Once we get past the setup, it plays pretty quick. The Ogors still hit like trucks and i have to play tactically to make sure they don’t get close enough to do the job in close combat. Other factions we’ll be trying out will play differently and that’s going to be fun. I want to play more games and really dig into the matched play options. Endless Spells look like a lot of fun, and i want to tinker with the Realm specific rules. It’s a fun game at launch that we could sit down and play a game with our old 8th edition Warhammer Fantasy armies and still get a lot of mileage out of the game.



We probably got some rules wrong, and yes, i know i need to finish painting my army. It’s been super hot and that’s kept a paint brush out of my hand. When they’re done, they’re going to look neat. Huge thanks to the folks at Warhammer Lawrence for letting us film our game. Game On, Game Fans.