The Battle for Helms Deep

Okay, so a few weeks ago I gathered my gaming friends together to celebrate my birthday with a big War of the Ring (WOTR) game on my helms deep board.

I actually did the same thing last year for my 24th birthday but forgot to take any pictures of it, so after get the terrain down from the attic and dusting it off, I got the camera out. So, considering that I haven't posted anything in a long time, I figured that I might as well upload them all here.

This is not going to be a battle report but the captions will hopefully give some idea as to the shape of the game. I also never posted a picture of the complete fortress after I finished building it, so here's one...

My Helms Deep terrain board.

The Board is set.

The War of The Ring rules were used- with a few changes to allow for seige warfare.

The Battlements gave a +3 bonus to the defender. Also attacking models gain no additional dice for charging or supporting whilst attacking up a ladder. The Gate was 'Very hard to kill' and defense 8.

Too expensive to use as individual heroes Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli played as 'The Three Hunters'.

Haldirs elves held the Deeping Wall.

To win, the Good side needed to kill 75% of the Uruks companies. However, whenever an evil company was destroyed a dice was rolled, on a roll of a 6 it returned from the evil board edge!

Destroy the world of men- The Evil side could win in one of two ways. They could destory 75% of the defenders companies or kill any two of Aragorn, Theoden or Gandalf.

The Game begins with a free volley of shouting for the Good side.

At the beginning of every turn a dice is rolled and the turn number added to it. If the result equals 10 or higher Gandalf arrives.

If the uruks can get the bomb to the culvet in the wall then it automatically explodes (following the usual bomb rules from the rulebook).

Pikes cannot be used during the first turn in which Gandalf arrives.

The attack begins.

After a few hours of play the first wave has been completely destroyed. However, the second wave has breached the wall and has a foot-hold on the ramparts.

Gimli and Legolas are both killed in the explosion, but Aragorn stands alone defending the breach.

The Uruks prepare to storm the gap in the wall.

At this point in the game the Gate has yet to break (despite taking three would counters).

The Uruks take the wall.

When all seemed lost, Gandalf arrived!

The Pikemen manage to get themselves lined up just in time.

Can the Riders turn the tide?

The Riders of Rohan crash into the rows of pikes (which have no effect this turn).

Many dice are rolled.

It doesn't take long for the Uruks to be over-run.

In a desperate gamble, the Uruks attack the gate with the siege ballista and hit!

The Uruks storm through the shattered gate and are able to complete their objective before the riders could finish them off.

Victory to the Evil side!

This was a very close fought battle, with the players constantly trying to figure out who was winning.

Early on the Uruks took huge casualties from the masses of arrow fire but these were mostly aimed at the lightly armoured orcs and scouts in the first wave. By the time the Fighting Uruk-hai reach the walls the defenders had already used some of their might points and their companies were somewhat depleted.

Argueably the most heroic moment was when Haldir charged from the wall to protect Aragorn, after the bomb had exploded, and was killed by beserkers.

In the end the riders where unable to do enough before the Uruks killed 75% of the defenders. Had the game continued to the death, it could have possibly been a different result.