Orcs vs Daemons of Nurgle: Battle through the puss

Once again I delve into the world of Age of Sigmar with my Orcs to see what they can do. In this game my greenskins must force there way past a legion of nurgle daemons and support the battle else where. The game is Breakthrough, lets see if my black orcs can do it.

The Battle Plan: Breakthrough

I have already posted a battle report using this battle plan, Breakthrough (click here to read it).

A quick rundown of the game, the attacker has to get ¼ or more of his models off the opposing players table edge to win, the defender has to stop this. All of the defenders units set up randomly and after 5 turns we roll to see if the game ends. If it ends before enough models have left the table, the defender wins.

We roll to see who gets to pick which role, and the daemons win, selecting to be the defender (as he thinks his force is too slow to move across the table quickly).

The Armies

Orcs and Goblins

Ironjaw BigMob:

• Black orc big boss - Slaughter-choppa
• 9 Black orcs – full command
• 5 Black orcs – Champion
• 5 Black Orcs – champion
• Giant

Black orc big boss - 2 choppas

Orc Warboss- Great waaagh! banner

Orc Great Shaman

15 Orc boys – full command, 2x choppa

15 arrer boys

Daemons of Nurgle

Daemonic legion

• Great unclean one
• 14 Plaguebearers
• 14 plaguebearers
• 14 plaguebearers
• 3 Blight drones

Herald of nurgle

Epidimus

3 Plague Toads

As I am the attacker I deploy all of my units first, and I spread them out in a line. I have all of my black orcs in the centre hopefully to punch though and just run off the table. On the right flank I have the arrer boys who aren't much of a threat but if they can get ignored they can just run for it. On the left I place the orc boys with the support of the giant as he should be able to get them out of trouble. The shaman and battle standard set up behind the black orcs to give them a little extra punch.

The defender has to deploy randomly and ends up with his great unclean one, edpidimus and two units of plaguebearers on my right. In the centre the plague toads sit and on the left the blight drones, herald and the other unit of plaguebearers deploy.

Deployment

The Battle

Round 1 – Orc priority

Bellowing his orders, the General uses the battle plan command ability and 1 unit can roll 2D6 for running and pick the highest. The shaman attempts to cast mystic shield on the large unit of black orcs but fails to cast it.

The big black orc unit runs forwards followed by the smaller ones and black orc heros. On the left flank the boys and giant run forwards while on the right the arrer boys move slowly forward readying their bows.

Arrows fly from the arrer boys at the plaguebearers in front of them, 2 shots hit their mark, but the daemons are very resilient and take no notice of the shots.

Nurgle

Laughing with mirth, the great unclean one uses grandfathers joy and casts mystic shield on the closest unit of plaguebearers.

The daemons move forward to block the advance of the orcs. On the left the blight drones fly forwards getting ready to charge the boys in front of them. Not sure what to do the plague toad riders hold back ready to block any holes next turn.

Charging though the ruins, the blight drones engage the orc boys and manage to rip 1 boy apart. However the orcs fail to do any damage with equally bad rolls.

Round 2 – Orcs retain priority

Again the shaman attempts to casts mystic shield, but manages to do it this time, improving the save of the large black orc unit. The black orc commander uses keepin' order to keep the black orcs in the fight, a I am expecting them to take a few casualties this turn.

All of the black orcs move straight towards the nurgle lines while the giant goes to support the boys before the drones can do any real damage. Not wanting to get stuck in combat, the arrer boys hold their ground and ready their aim.

Shots from the arrer boys fail to do any damage to the plaugebearers with their arrows only hitting none vital parts of the daemons.

Combat and all of the black orcs manage to charge into the daemon line while the giant aids the boys. In the centre of the table, the black orcs go first and manage to attack the plague toads but they are so very resilient, and I only deal 4 wounds, which isn't enough to kill one. On the left the blight drones attack the boys killing 6 of them, they attempt to damage the giant but fail. Not pleased with the assault the giant attacks next and kills a single fly. The rest of the black orcs fail to do anything and the daemons manage to do little damage. When the dust settles, 4 black orcs lie dead as do one or two daemons.

Battle shock and thankfully none of the black orcs flee, and the daemons gleefully laugh at the slaughter.

Nurgle turn 2

Again the great unclean one bellows out with grandfathers joy then casts plague wind, healing a plague toad and killing off a wounded black orc.

The daemons of nurgle encircle the black orcs and on the left the herald and his unit of plaguebearers move towards the giant.

Combat and the great unclean one charges into the black orc big boss with two choppas while the daemons charge the orcs closest to them. On the left the herald and plaguebearers charge into the giant.

In combat the great unclean one splits the black orc big boss in half with his sword and thrashes at the black orcs with his chains, killing 1. The black orcs strike back but fail to do any damage to the great unclean one and the toads are too resistant. Most of the black orcs fall to the toads. On the left the herald misses the giant and gets kicked in return, taking 2 wounds. Swinging its club the giant kills a further 3 plaguebearers. The noxious daemons attack back dealing 2 wounds to the giant. However the blight drones do better and kill off the orc boys. On the right the black orcs and daemons do very little to each other.

Battle shock and no one runs some how.

Turn 3 – Nurgle take priority

Again the great unclean one attempts to cast plague wing, but fails to do it.

Movement and one of the plaguebearers who are in combat with the black orcs on the right break off, and go after the arrer boys as they are still a large unit. Free from combat the blight drones moves towards the centre.

In this combat phase the orcs really feel the pain, with the daemons killing off all of the black orcs this turn while taking very little in return. I believe this turn is when Epidimus maxes out his army wide buff, making them all very dangerous. All I have left are the arrer boys, the giant and my heros.

Orcs turn 3

The shaman casts mystic shield on the black orc hero.

Running forwards, the arrer boys make a brake for his bored edge but they need another 2 turns to reach it. The heros move towards the great unclean one.

With little left to do both the orc warboss and black orcs big boss charge the great unclean one, ready to kick in some daemon.

The black orc swings first and his great axe bits deep into the great unclean one, and deals 4 wounds to the monster. Not wanting any more damage the great unclean one kills the orc warboss who hasn't attacked yet. On the left the giant attempts to kill off the herald of nurgle but fails, his club kills off 2 plaguebearers though. The daemons attack the giant back reducing him to 2 wounds. Unwanted attention from the plague toads is focused on the black orc bigboss fighting the greater daemon, they are within 3 inches so move towards him and attack, but only deal 2 wounds.

Turn 4 – Orcs power though and take priority

The arrer boys keep moving. Trying to stop the arrer boys being chased, the shaman moves towards the free unit of plaguebearers.

The shaman charges the daemons.

Straight to combat and the black orc swings again dealing 4 more wounds to the greater daemon, but he takes the full fury of the daemon who kills him. On the left the giant fails to do any wounds and finally gets cut down. Using his staff the shaman hits a daemon but only rips off a chunk of flesh, not enough to kill it, and unfortunately gets killed for his trouble.

Nurgle turn 4

With only the arrer boys left, the daemon army focuses its attention on them. The greater daemon casts plague wind and kills 2 of them.

The plaguebearers charge the arrer boys and kill most of them, and the rest just run away with battle shock.

With no models leaving the table, Major victory to the Daemons.

Post-Battle

Those daemons are so much harder to punch though than I expected. Having a second save against everything stops me from being able to just push them over and with the boosts that Epidimus gives all nurgle models it just makes them even harder to shift. When this applies to monsters and models with multiple wounds it just makes the army a nightmare.

The ironjaw mob formation was really good, the extra +1 to wound is crazy when it makes every one wound on 2+. However my lack of models shops me from being able to use it properly, so I will not use it again unless I some how get some more black orcs. Regular orcs, not so great when used in units of 15. The arrer boys just didn't do anything and the regular boys just got held up and slowly ground down. I think they need more models in each unit.

However my deployment was probably what caused me to lose. If I had stacked one flank and maybe some units in the centre to hold his units up, I might have been able to blow down a side and slow down any units trying to stop me. Especially as the command ability you get when your the attacker to help run further. Live and learn though, next time I will remember that.

If I was to change my list I would probably reduce the arrer boys to 10 and add some guys to the boys mob making them 20 models. I feel a rock lobber would add to the list as well, as it can target models I can't see, and it will give the arrer boys a job to protect them.

With this game the only balancing factor we had was telling each other a rough model count and what we are using which helped to judge what we would need. However it still didn't work as I really didn't kill many of his models while he tabled me. In the future we are going to try some of the other ways of roughly balancing forces available online. One in particular we are looking at is the A system. It looks like it should work quite nicely. So if any of you have used it before I would be interested in hearing your views.