Battle Report: Mumakil of Far Harad vs Dwarves

I had the chance to go to the Chicago Battle Bunker last evening to get some more games in with my Mumakil of Far Harad army. I got a chance to play against Kevin aka ‘Drunken Mick’ on the AWC LOTR Forums. Kevin was part of the Adepticon Team Champions for this year’s tournament. He’s a crafty player with a knack for building low might high death toll armies. He brought out the Dwarves tonight led none other than Dain (aka Superman in some circles). He had around 40 dwarves which included a mixture of Khazad Guard, Iron Guard, a ton of shield warriors and 12 pesky Dwarven Bowmen. After first rolling ‘To the Death!’ as a scenario we decided to re-roll and ultimately settled on Domination. This is easily one of the two hardest scenarios for my Mumakil army. It obviously favors high model count armies that can be in a lot of places at once. When I’ve got 14 models, all deployed on the Mumak, then I obviously can’t be!!

Here’s a photo of our basic deployment areas:

The game started with the evil side winning priority three turns in a row. The Mumakil started a steady advance towards the center of the board turning a bit towards the top right objective (the tower). The dwarves fanned out with a contingent of iron guard and dwarf warriors marching towards the tower, a contingent of warriors headed south to the wooden fort. Dain and several warriors, Khazad Guard, and Iron Guard moved towards a central position mostly hidden from view behind a large rock. I also decided that one Mahûd warrior should deploy and guard the one objective in my territory. The early turns saw a bit of uneventful bowfire from the dwarven block of 12 archers.

I wanted to trample some of the stout legged warriors without fear of Dain’s retribution. I was also going after the Archers as best as I could as I really felt they were my biggest threat. However, after I’d committed a move towards the tower I decided that I probably should hang back a bit more and get the Dwarven warriors to spread out. I did shoot a couple poisoned blowdarts and much to my surprise I killed two Khazad guard (sixes followed fours!). I took that good fortune and did an about face to back to the center of the board.

The next shooting phase was a fateful turn. DM managed to get off several shots from his dwarves and scored two hits on the Mumak (also needing those same sixes and fours). Much to my chagrin, the might beast took two wounds. My first roll for stampeding came up 4! Even with all the will my commander had, it wouldn’t be enough. The Mumak was stampeding the next turn!! So as expected, this next turn would be pivotal to outcome of the game. Kevin directed the stampeding towards the protected position of the dwarven king. After the trample things got ugly! I had to roll d6 to see if any models fell from the howdah. I dropped the first dice for the commander – 1. Oops. I used his first point of might to save his life but that was a very ominous sign indeed. One more Mahûd fell to his death while the others survived. The Dwarven King charged in with his fearless Khazad Guard and any IG that passed their test and were within range. The dwarves won the day and put a couple more wounds on the Mumakil. I survived those stampede tests but knew I was pinned in now.

The next turn, good won priority so I called a Heroic Move with the commander. Dain countered but I won the roll-off. The Mumak trampled ahead targeting Dain. Several models were trampled by the Str 9 attacks but Dain held strong. I only got one wound on him (not saved by fate) but I knew I was stuck for some time with the chances of the Mumak being able to move low for quite some time. Dain won the fight against the charging Mumak without scoring a wound.

The next few turns were spent with the archers firing into the Howdah and Dain and the elite dwarves pinning the Mumak in place. I started deploying Mahûd warriors to try and pull off some of the Dwarfs in the fights. However, the Mahûd and Mumakil couldn’t win the fights at all. The commander took the final wound from bowfire. To top it off, at least 2 Mahûd warriors plummeted to their death trying to dismount! I’d lost 3 warriors to falls from the Howdah alone!

As can be expected, I lost the battle of attrition was broken by the combination of falls from the fights on the ground. In some ways, I was broken much earlier than Kevin would probably have liked. He wasn’t even close to contesting the last objective (at least 3 turns). However, with no Mahûd heroes on the board, my warriors were going to run away very quickly. In an attempt to wrestle a draw out of the scenario, I poured all my remaining models out of the howdah and engaged the dwarves. My models were one turn from reaching the objective closest to them and if the fights went well, I had a slim chance to contest or win that objective which would secure a draw.

At the end of the turn after I’d been broken. I picked up the dice to see about the end of the scenario. The result…….. 2. The scenario ended with a Minor Victory for Kevin (3 objectives).

It was a fun game that taught me a lot about playing against Dwarves with this army. The game itself really turned on the stampede that occurred after Kevin and I each rolled wounds on models that needed 6s and 4s! Once he got me into to position to charge me with Dain, I really wasn’t in a position to get my trample going. It certainly didn’t help that I had to burn a might point to even stay alive on the Howdah!!  The game reinforced to me that Dwarves are tough.  Strength 3 Bows are tough and the Mumak is not as immune to wounds as I’d hoped!

Here’s a couple more photos of our battle: