Artefacts of Kyron Campaign Battle #3

The third battle in the ongoing KoW campaign saw the Kin and Men fighting to take control of three artifacts left by the god Kyron. The artifacts need to be carried by a unit and bestow benefits to the units carrying them.

Sword of Striking – unit gains Elite rule for melee
Armour of Recuperation – unit gains regen 6+ , this does not stack if unit already has regen
Banner of Kyron – unit gains inspiring

The size of armies was increased to 2250 points as more troops joined the campaign and I took the chance to make a few changes to my force. I felt I needed a little more long range punch and also a bit more close range face punching. I drafted in some Lycans who I wanted to use as I really liked the models and also a Horde of Crossbows with extra range.

The opposing Kingdom of Men decided to stick with their previous basic composition but added extra cavalry leading to an army which had plenty of reach in the charge phase.

The KoM General searching for even more troops !

The artifact tokens ended up being evenly spread across the table with each side putting a big push on their right hand flank and not contesting the left. Due to the Men's units being cheaper they had a greater holder force on the Kin's right.

The Kin army

The massed KoM cavalry

KoM centre

The battle itself proved to be a bloody affair, at least for the Kin as the Men unleashed some devastating ranged attacks and pushed forward with their mounted troops.

The Kin also pushed forward and due to the speed of the Lycans turn one saw a fight break out for the middle token. The Kin's long range fire also wavered the mighty Oliphant with the Kin fast troops ready to charge in on turn 2. On the Kin's left flank things looked more critical as the mass of KoM cavalry moved quickly forward.

As the centre was the scene of a fierce fight we ruled that both sides would be busy trying to kill each other rather than trying to wrestle the artifact free. On the KoM right they took control of the Sword and the Kin moved forward on their right to take control of the Amour.
At this point things went badly wrong for the Kin, in rapid succession they lost the Reaper Guard Regiment, Blade Dancer and Gargoyle troops and Shadows Regiment all without loss to the KoM forces. The KoM also shut down the Horde of Crossbows with their Air Elemental and the Lycans followed soon after. This allowed the KoM to seize the Standard of Kyron as well.

As the Lycans were about to be overwhelmed the Kin right started to make progress and managed to wipe out the Oliphants and the Regiment of Sergeants facing them and then threaten the infantry towards the centre.

Some more accurate ranged fire managed to wipe out another Regiment of Reaper Guard and only the onset of night ( well lunch in fact ) allowed the Kin to slip away with one artifact. Many Kin had perished in the battle and despite it only lasting 4 turns a lot of ground had been covered especially by the KoM cavalry.
The KoM made it three wins in a row so far in the campaign and as such get to choose the field of battle for the next game. This will see the opposing armies foraging for supplies either in the woods or plundering the local farmlands.


I also managed to get a game of SAGA in during the last week with Mick using the Attack at Dawn scenario. This uses tokens to represent the difficulty of identifying the enemy forces on a misty morning and the idea is to decide on the best time to reveal them. Hidden forces cannot fight or shoot ( or be shot at ) but if you stray to close to the enemy ( or they to you ) then your forces are automatically revealed.
The game itself was really interesting to play but did not make for great photos.

We also kept the force composition secret ( in a change to the rules in the book ) and the Normans fielded no Knights but lots of mounted Warriors and shooting levies in a change to their previous lists. The Byzantines went with less shooting and got badly handled by the Norman archers, so more thinking required by me for the next game.