Ragnarok 2016

A few weekends ago I had the pleasure of attending Ragnarok 2016, a SAGA tournament in Melbourne hosted by the League of Ancients. This was a really terrific event, with a laid back atmosphere, and a great venue.

The tournament was held on the Sunday, as it was timed to coincide with League of Ancients regular monthly meeting, held on the third Sunday or each month. The wife and I stayed in Melbourne for the weekend, and she did some shopping while I played toy soldiers. A win-win weekend away!

I had wanted to take an Anglo-Saxon warband led by Alfred the Great, but the Northern Fury sourcebook that contains the Anglo-Saxon list is currently out of print and my copy didn't make it to me before the event. So I went with plan B, which was a Viking warband led by Harald Hardrada and including 8 Varangians. I had wanted to include 12, but in the week before the event Studio Tomahawk released a new FAQ/Errata and reduced the maximum unit size for Varangians from 12 to 8. Oh well, them's the breaks!

My warband was:

Harald Hardrada
8 Varangians
2 x 8 Warriors
4 Berserkers

Game 1 was against Pip's 'Anglo-Danish' warband. Pip had elected to take Hereward the Wake ('the wake' meaning 'the watchful') as his warlord. Hereward unlocks Flemish Mercenaries for your warband, and gives them access to the AD battle-board abilities. The Flemish Mercs natural defensive abilities (armour 5, and always counting as being in hard cover) coupled with the naturally defensive flavour of the Anglo-Danish battle board makes these warriors formidable to say the least.

Our scenario was Clash of Warlords, which is basically a straight up battle with the condition that you lose the game if your warlord dies. Pip made the mistake of deploying one of his units of Mercenaries far off to his right flank, and since Flemish Mercs can only move S, I was pretty confident they were out of the game. In the picture below you can see the table as it lies after the first turn. You'll have to forgive the photos, the lighting wasn't great and I was using my phone.

I deployed centrally, hoping to get a big haymaker in and knock out Pip's warlord early in the game. Pip deployed Hereward surrounded by two units of Mercenaries. I had hoped to be able to draw Hereward out by placing my warlord at M of him, while being outside of S of his bodyguards. But Pip was a canny opponent and kept Hereward well shielded. I made the mistake of charging Harald and his Varangian bodyguard into some Flemish Mercs with a loaded battle board, and the result was from my 21 attacks, I landed 17 hits. Of which Pip saved 16. Now sure, he had some pretty good abilities loaded, but still! 16 saves from 17 hits! The picture below shows my Varangians and Warlord having bounced off the Flemish shieldwall, fatigued and isolated. Oh dear.

Needless to say, my haymaker swing come unglued pretty quickly and the game evolved into a cat-and-mouse match with each of us trying to pin the others warlord down. In the end, our warlords dealt each other their death-wounds in the same combat, and the game ended in a draw. The picture below shows the board on my final turn. From here, the Berserkers (behind the spear armed Bondi warriors) were moved up and charged into Hereward alongside Harald, both of whom were slain in the ensuing combat.

Due to the constraints of the dice and the need to win this round or have my warlord slaughtered in the next, the Berserkers had to accompany Harald. In the end, I used Valhalla on them and sacrificed three of them for extra attacks. It turned out to be overkill, and also fatal for Harald since he had only a single 'bodyguard' on whom he could redirect a wound, and as a result Harald fell, turning a potential win into a draw. Well played Pip! In hindsight I probably could have kept Harald back from the fray and just let the Berserkers do their thing, but I got caught up in the theme of the game and the heat of the moment, and so Harald went in swinging!

Game 2 was against Steve's Scots. Our scenario was a pure victory points knock-em-down and drag-em-out game. Steve deployed in a solid line of warriors with hearthguard support, which gave me pause. Any unit that I isolated and picked on would probably be destroyed, but would also leave my units isolated and surrounded. You can see our deployments in the picture below.

As it turned out, I managed to get a triple activation going in my turn which resulted in the destruction of a Scottish Hearthguard and Warrior unit, and also left his warlord within Warlord's Pride range: when a warlord activates for a 'move' and he is within a single move of the enemy warlord, then he MUST engage the enemy warlord. Due to some lucky positioning on my part, Steve's warlord was unable to activate any of his units for a Side by Side move, which is where the warlord drags a friendly unit with him to fight in the combat. You can see the situation in the picture below. Steve's warlord, if activated, must engage my warlord. His hearthguard are too close to my Varangians to do anything except charge them, and his warriors are too far away to accompany his Warlord.

Nevertheless, the ensuing Scottish counter-attack was bloody. Steve's warlord was slain, and his warriors defeated and forced to withdraw. The Vikings took heavy casualties, with only a handful of models surviving, but a handful was more than the Scots had remaining and with the death of last of the Scottish warriors, the Scots lost their ability to generate SAGA dice, and therefore lost the game. NB: When your warband is unable to generate any SAGA dice, then you automatically lose the game.

Game 3, the final round, was the Feast for Crows multiplayer scenario vs Christian's Jomsvikings and Tylers Saracens. Clearly two separate bands of Norse mercenaries fighting for the Byzantines, with their own grudge to settle! Early game sees my Varangians take out a unit of Saracan HG, but then become entangled with an unwinable war of attrition against Bedouin mercenaries. Among their other abilities, these can activate for as many times as they want, for free, until they are exhausted. And if you end a move within M of them (and did not engage them in combat) then they get a free move (which also allows them to throw javelins).

Importantly they CAN'T make this free move when exhausted, so the owning player needs to be careful not to leave them exhausted in his own turn or they can be caught and killed.

The Saracens and Jomsvikings slug it out, and by the end of the 7th turn there is only a handful of models left on the board, with the Saracens being ever so slightly ahead in points. Tyler finishes on 23 points, I'm on 20, and Christian on 17. As the game was finishing I realised there was a priest in the building you can see in the picture, and my Varangians had spent many turns just sitting outside the building doing nothing when they could have been inside butchering the priest! Oh well, something to remember for next time!

Overall I think the Vikings finished in fourth or fifth place, from a field of 14 or 16 or something like that. I forget exactly. I was happy with my performance, and can see where I made mistakes and where I will need to pay attention in the future. I also met lots of great people, played three fantastic games, and got to use some models I'd never used before. And the wife got to do lots of shopping and we got a nice weekend away in the city, so everyone was happy! I'll definitely be marking this one on my calendar for next year, and hopefully I can drag a few of the local gamers along with me as well.

Final thoughts:

1 - Ragnarok is cool.
2 - The League of Ancients seem like cool guys.
3 - Don't take unnecessary risks with your warlord.
4 - Be well aware of what all the pieces on the board are, and where they are.