Oathmark Pelennor Fields

I had another great day today at a friends house playing a very large game of Oathmark. This was very fun battle of the Pelennor fields based on events from the book rather than the film. It was nice to see all the different factions of Gondor and to see Aragon come in with the rangers towards the end.

 It was quite a close battle but the Lord of the Nazgul with his black breath was a very hard unit to beat. In the end we ran out of time and on adding up the victory points, the forces of evil won out.

Riders of Rohan pour onto the field. The first three units engaged infantry and trolls head on with good results. They had two attack dice each and sowed merry havoc among the foul folk of Mordor. However, it was the supporting fourth unit that managed to hang back then inflict devastating results in two flank attacks that made the day for me. It reminded me a lot of Chess with a queen in reserve. You know you are going to get flanked and attacked in turn so you have to bide your time until the right moment occurs to attack. The unit was eventually lost but not before it had swept two large orc units from the field. It’s the weighing up of the sacrifice that felt very chess like.

It was a glorious battle to behold with two huge forces on each side. All the figures were plastic historical ones adapted into the various fictional units. There were of course lots of plastic fantasy orcs, goblins and trolls too. I especially loved the Arab heavy cavalry painted up as Haradrim, they looked the business!  It’s a tip I made note of if I ever get around to gaming the last stand of Dain Ironfoot.

 

Bowmen of Lake Town

These two bases will equate to two ranks in Oathmark.

 

Bodyguard of Bolg

These bases have waited a long time for their flock and now with a breath of relief, I can say they are done! We someone please kill that bear!

 In Oathmark these orcs will be classed as ‘warriors’ for they have large shields, which stops them being ‘Linebreakers’. I could field them in two groups of two ranks like this, or combine them into a four rank juggernaut of unstoppable death. 

Well, I say unstoppable, having recently played a game against Elven archers I’m not so sure.

Cheering Dwarves

These four bases will make a unit for Oathmark. Being Dain’s army from the Iron hills, all these Dwarves will be classed as warriors for the game, tough and armoured veterans.

This Dwarven battle line has withstood numerous fierce attacks and has survived. They now cheer and jeer their retreating foes.

What’s getting him down?

Head to head, the newly arrived Dwarves meet the heavily armoured orcs. The cheering Dwarves look confident but will they stand...

It proved a bit more tricky than I had first imagined to put these bases together. I arranged the first two bases then left them overnight, so I could take another look at them the next day with fresh eyes. It took a lot of moving around figures and repositioning before I stuck them down. The casualties really helped the narrative and were well worth it.

I also had eight figures left over from long ago and these were put into another two stands. This way a full unit for Oathmark was obtained with four bases ( four ranks).

 

Dwarven warriors

This horn blower turned out quite nice, his horn arm is from a Gripping Beast Dark Age warriors box set, but looks the part on this dwarf. I drew some designs on it with a detailing pen.

I am quite pleased how these casualties turned out. I bought a pack of resin Dwarf casualties off of eBay. They are quite small and maybe meant for GW gaming. However, being resin they were quite brittle and could be snipped with the cutters easily. I took off the heads and replaced them with Oathmark plastic heads, this brought them into scale with the others. 

I enjoyed making this axe holder, simple to do but quite rewarding when you get to paint it.

Along with the Dwarf casualties, I ordered a pack of orcs too. These are a good size and fit in straight away without any tweaking. These will be added to the bases to help give the impression of a hard victory.

More converted Oathmark Dwarves, these have hammers from GW knights. It was these poses that gave me the idea to do a cheering base.

The true face of war.

An old Citadel Dwarf casualty.

I found my pot of GW blood the other day, I’ve been waiting to use it for years. The results are good and very realistic. I tried to be really sparing with it but things happen.

Another converted guy with a GW knight’s hammer. I like the look of him, he looks like he means business and that hammer has seen some action. I cut notches into it with a knife to give it a well used look. The Dwarf has probably given it a name...

 This figure is a GW sculpt. I liked the horn so had to cover his musket with a green stuff cloak.