Second Battle of the Hygrian Altars

Fifth battle of the Twilight Prince campaign!

My freeguilders have now climbed up to 1000 points in their second Matched Play battle of this campaign. This game was all about inflicting the most wounds on the enemy by killing their models. My (bad) luck was with me, as always, and I got paired with Blades of Khorne.

Yay?

1000p of Freeguild Guard, roughly 90 models, against a ton (pun intended) of Khornates. Sounds like a challenge!

Let's see how it went down...

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"So, the wizard was correct after all," Captain Oswald Wesley observed as the horizon filled with muscular barbarians crying out their devotion to Khorne.
"These buggers may be seeking to occupy these altars we just claimed. Or they just want our skulls. What do you reckon, Audrey?"
"Sir, I think–"
"Marvelous! So do I," he cut in, interrupting the young sergeant beside him.
"Our battleline must hold either way, we cannot let them get to the scholars now as they're planning their next move."

The freeguilders had formed up in ranks all along the width of the opening ahead of them. The barbarian horde was getting closer by the moment. Their charge had to be halted here, lest Fersen and Rosengart be overrun back at the altars behind the human formation. A small detachment of soldiers had been left to protect the scholars as they tried to find out the next logical step in their quest for the freedom of Zul'Nok the Traveller's brother.

"See that the men are ready, sergeant. I want all arquebuses and arbalests pointed in the direction of our foe, ready to loose a volley at my signal," Oswald instructed, and Sergeant Audrey ran off to fulfill the command.
"This will be a bloody day indeed..." the Captain muttered to himself as the junior officer had gone.

The barbarians were drawing closer, their blood-curdling warcries and shouted taunts now clearly audible. Some of the halberdiers shifted on the spot uneasy, while several militiamen were weeping openly in terror. How inexperienced and unprofessional, thought Wesley.

"Stand your ground, men! Remember, three things make the Puffington Empire great: faith, steel and gunpowder! We have the entire sacred trio, while our foe has nothing but their crude weapons of rust-spotted iron!" he roared as he walked up behind the militia, drawing chuckles from the ranks. Humour and confidence calmed then nerves of men, the Captain knew.

As the Khornate army closed in, everyone could clearly see that their weapons were finely wrought and sharp as the wits of an aelf. No rusty iron, but true tools of destruction, made of fine steel and tempered with daemonic pacts. Fortunately there was very little time for the men to stop and think about this, as Wesley barked the command that would initiate the battle:

"First rank, FIRE!"

The front row of the freeguilder battleline crackled and puffed, covering the ground ahead of them in swirls of thick smoke. The first rank stepped back, yielding their positions to the second rank that stepped forward and unleashed a similar barrage. Guns banged and crossbows thrummed, showering the Khornate army with projectiles from bolts to bullets.

The Bloodreaver flock running at the fore of the charging horde bore the brunt of the volley. Half-naked barbarians stopped dead in their tracks, their chests and bellies punched open by gunshots or pierced by bolts. The survivors leaped over their fallen fellows, only to topple themselves as the next barrage struck home. The entire warband of a full score of warriors was reduced to a field of dead and dying men, just several feet short of the lines of the freeguilders.

On the right flank the Pistoliers rode in to meet the Blood Warriors protecting the horde's leaders. They rode in, unloaded their pistols at point-blank range and galloped back to a safe distance, leaving two dead barbarians in their wake.

The Khornate army would not be so easily driven off, however. The barbarians and their strange war monsters began circling around the freeguilders flank, forcing the halberdiers on the left to adapt their formation and face the new threat.

The Blood Warriors on the right ran after the Pistoliers, catching them and gutting one of the horses. As the young rider fell from the saddle, he was decapitated by a single praticed stroke from one of the Blood Warriors. The remaining horsemen fired their weapons at close range, their bullets tearing through two of the fearsome barbarians in retaliation.

A maddening chant was coming from the ruined farmhouse in front of the freeguilder lines, an unholy prayer to the Blood God that made the ears of righteous men bleed as they heard it. Suddenly one of the militiamen screamed and fell to the ground, boiling blood pouring out of his mouth and ears. He was dead before anyone had time to run to his aid.

"Hold the line, men! We've thinned their ranks already, now we must weather the storm that follows!" Wesley barked out, trying to steady the battleline as the enemy closed in. Soon the armies would clash in numbers.

Then the charge came. From behind the great rock on the left, full half of the Khornate army swung in with a hideous Khorgorath at the fore. The giant beast's shoulders sprouted bony tentacles that licked out to pierce one of the halberdiers, dragging him out of the line before the charge hit home. 

To the front, two leaders of the barbarian horde smashed into the ranks of the militia even as more men fell to the prayers of the distant Slaughterpriests, their blood boiling in their veins. The leaders were both gigantic men, with an assortment of peculiar weaponry: the other wielded a flaming anvil at the end of a length of chain, while the other carried a vicious-looking axe and a huge hammer.

The handgunners saw the militia's peril and turned their guns to the charging Khornate leaders, unleashing a hasty volley. The bullets ripped into the towering man wielding the flaming anvil, taking him to the ground just before he reached the freeguild lines.

"HOLD!" Wesley cried out.

The carnage was terrible. The Khorgorath slammed its enormous mawed fists into the halberdier ranks, crushing men and ripping them apart like dolls. The Skullreapers whirled in with their daemon-bound swords, striking off heads with each strike. The freeguilders were wavering under the assault.

The lonely Aspiring Deathbringer carved a bloody path through the militia ranks, his axe drinking deep of Averbury blood, his hammer caving in many feather-hatted skulls. The irregulars mobbed around the Khornate leader in an attempt to overwhelm him, but anyone who stepped in for a strike was cut down where he stood. The Deathbringer was living up to its ominous name.

On the right flank the Pistoliers managed to get rid of the final Blood Warrior, their pistols riddling the barbarian with holes. Theirs was not the only freeguilder success on the battlefield, however, as the halberdiers steadied their ranks and put up a proper fight. Soldiers bunched together to bring their long-hafted weapons to bear against the Khorgorath, inflicting terrible wounds upon the beast. Even the Skullreapers got their share, as heavy-bladed halberds cut through their armour and brought down two of the daemon-worshippers

Fighting was fierce and casualties piled high, but a victor was starting to emerge...

"Push them back, men, PUSH THEM BACK!" Oswald encouraged his men, sensing that the momentum of the enemy charge was fading. The men obeyed to an admirable degree, driving the foe back, step by step. Eventually the Khornates decided to preserve their numbers and withdraw, knowing they would not get through to the altars anymore. They fell back beyond the horizon, harried by Pistoliers and arquebus-potshots half of the way. The freeguilders were left victorious on the field!

Captain Wesley looked around him, tallying up the cost of their triumph. Less than twenty men dead, with at least twice as much casualties for the Khornates. Excellent.

The scholars would be thrilled to hear of this.

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A Major Victory for the Free Peoples!

All thanks to my army's gunline capabilities. Whew. Fighting Blades of Khorne in a game of pure kill-tally can be brutal... except when you happen to have a full freeguild regiment packed to the brim with guns, bows and holdthelines. If you are reading this, my dear Khorne opponent, I apologise once more.

Shooting is the only thing my army doesn't do on a straight-up 4+/4+/-/1 statline!