We played my third (Rich T's second) game of Hell Dorado at the club tonight. It was a straight up "getting to know the rules properly" bash between the Saracen and Demon starter boxes on a 30"x24" table, deploying on the short edges with a 20" no mans land between the deployment zones.
Rich T aka McKranky was playing the Demons, I took command of the Saracens. He had the Domination at the start of the game and made me set up first. I took advantage of the fact that we weren't playing any particular scenario and deployed so that my guys were all able to support each other well. The Demons deployed in a line with the Infernal Ambassador wide on the left flank and Asaliah sheltering behind the lines. The Damned of Sloth used Advanced Deployment to deploy 4" in front of their deployment zone.
Turn one was relatively uneventful, the Demons rushed forwards to capture the centre of the table while the Saracens held off just outside their ten inch charge range so that they wouldn't get to charge in turn 2. The Hashashin and the Pillar of Faith with shield lobbed a couple of throwing daggers with little visible effect as the Infernal Ambassador cancelled out all of my attempts to use Vae Victis or Vae Soli. Asaliah summoned a Haborym lemure and imbued it with the Believer's Plague spell.
At the end of turn one I realised that I would be better off using all my permanent command abilities than continue trying to get Vae Soli or Vae Victis past the annoying Infernal Ambassador. Before I could act however Rich T elected to activate his Succubus who was just outside her charge range. He activated her permanent command ability to give her +2 movement and +2 CBT, used her other ability to make her Def 6 vs males and charged her into my hapless Hashishin. She promptly dealt him a hefty amount of damage and inflicted him with Pain2 which causes him to suffer the effects of being wounded for two turns... Needless to say Rich wasn't impressed when I pointed out that being a Fanatic that actually made him better
I only managed to inflict meagre two points of damage in return and suffered yet another point of damage due to her Ricochet ability...
My own guys were too closely packed to let me move Nazir up to heal the Hashashin so I spent most of the rest of the turn shuffling them around to let him through. Both Pillars used their permanent abilities to buff themselves and Nazir let off his special ability to give all my guys +2DEF for their next fight. The Hunting Panther charged the Succubus inflicting four points of damage and the Slowed Down state in return for three points of damage, The Hashashin took her down to just two points of life remaining and I then sent in the Suicide Bunnies (otherwise known as Sanctified Warriors
) The first one managed to miss completely despite having 8 CBT! All he needed to finish her was a single six and he nerfed utterly
He paid for his incompetence with his life as she gutted him alive with five hits! The second Warrior bided his time and struck wisely, finishing her off and absorbing all bar two points of the return damage with his PR. The rest of the Demons ran up into charge range for next turn, apart from the Damned of Sloth who were looking like they might get to the fight sometime next year. The innocuous looking little Lemure ran around the right flank, ready to unleash his spell next turn...
Turn 3 and the Demons still held the Domination. A couple of Damned of Wrath charged the wounded Sanctified Warrior and the Hunting Panther, finishing them both off. There went my mighty Lemure hunter
On the bright side my kitty hit with all five CBT dice and immobilised its target so that it had no zone of control, -3DEF, and would not be able to attack in combat until its next turn
The Hashishin promptly put it out of my misery! The Lemure moved in towards my flank, threatening the two Pillars of Faith. I wasn't having any of that - with FOI 4 my Pillar with Shield would be crippled by the little so-and-so - cue the charge of the Suicide Bunny Sanctified Warrior!
Rich's attempt to free up the diminutive terror with his Infernal Ambassador backfired as he came within the Reach 2 range of my Pillar with Halberd. Over two rounds of combat the mighty warrior smashed the vile (and annoying!) Demon to the ground and finished it off with an overhead swing of his mighty weapon
Just to spite me Rich unleashed his Lemure's spell, obliterating the hapless Sanctified Warrior in contact with it. The last Damned of Wrath charged my Pillar with Shield and bounced off, taking a hefty wound in the process. The last surviving Sanctified Warrior then countercharged and finished him off before Asaliah could heal him up. I charged the last Damned of Wrath with my Djinn but failed to dent it much. Asaliah moved up into close range of the wounded Damned of Wrath and healed him with her Aura of Regeneration.
Turn four looked like a mopping up exercise. The Damned of Sloth could all charge this turn but their Slow ability meant that they would take a fair amount of damage before striking. Nazir prodded his Nubian slave into action and ordered him to slay the Damned of Wrath, the Djinn then used an aura to give Muslims within 4" +1 CBT. The Hashishin, Pillar with Shield and Pillar with Halberd all managed to get on to Asaliah and left her with one last point of life despite her using her permanent command ability to heal 8 life points. One of the Damned of Sloth went down to concerted attacks but the last one to move made up for his lateness by guarding Asaliah's back, his zone of control preventing me from sneaking my last Sanctified Warrior in for the kill.
As the dust cleared the rebel angel was staring defeat squarely in the face. With a clap of thunder she flew aloft and retreated from the field.
We learnt a lot of lessons in this game, chief among them being that Damned of Sloth are too slow in a head to head bash. They may be good in scenarios, but they really blow if you need to get across the table with them in four turns... The rest of the Demons are so fast that they easily outstrip them, but they need their tarpit abilities to hold up the fights.
Rich T learnt that you really need to build combos with your models supporting each other to increase your chances of doing greater damage and to increase their surviveability. Even the incredibly nasty Succubus couldn't stand up to a concerted assault from four models when they were rolling 5 dice with a bunch of rerolls every time...
The Saracens were fantastic when they supported each other and performed pretty much how I wanted them to, although I need to practice moving so I don't obstruct the important stuff
The key with using them seems to be mastering their multitude of Auras and abilities to buff them to silly CBT, DEF, and PR levels
The Demons were interesting to play against. The Ambassador is a right royal pain, and Asaliah's abilities can keep healing stuff up no matter what you do. Next time we'll play a scenario where I can't sit back, and see what the Damned of Sloth can really do...
Auteur
