Battle Masters Wargame with Peter Laing Figures

        I've been wanting to use my Peter Laing Medievals. Looking at different rule sets I found myself checking out Battle Masters, a board game that used miniatures and was card driven. It is a game of fantasy figures, the Army of Chaos full of Orcs and Goblins, vs the Imperial Army, with knights and a mighty cannon. Buying a used game can cost quite a bit. When I first learned of this game I did buy a set of the movement cards and downloaded the rules from the internet. I even was considering buying a copy of Battle Masters recently; the fact the "board" is actually a 4 foot by 5 foot mat changed my mind. The thought of crawling on the floor trying to keep Molly, my dog, from rampaging across the field, got that out of my mind.

     I finally just decided to use my Peter Laings. A quick green paint job on some of the Assyrians formed my Chaos army; Peter Laing Medievals formed the Imperial Army.

     The battle was joined yesterday.  I really don't see me playing too many games with these rules. But to be fair, my downfall is that I suck at shuffling cards! Any doubt on this fact was dispelled with this game. After "shuffling" the deck, the game commenced. The Chaos Army quickly crossed the battlefield with the Imperial Army barely moving.  At first the army of Chaos was living up to their name, thanks to the continual drawing of cards.  Eventually I got down to the clumps of Imperial Army cards, which let loose the Imperial knights. The knights quickly wiped out the Army of Chaos. I read several reviews that stated that the battles tend to go to the Imperial Amy.  After playing this game, I can see why. Four units of powerful cavalry verses one powerful unit and two light units.

The Army of Chaos, on top of the board, can be seen storming across the field. The Imperial Army stands and waits.

Between the Imperial archers (bottom left of picture) and Men at Arms, one Goblin wolf rider  unit is wiped out.

Unit of Men at Arms devastates a goblin infantry unit.

When an ogre card is drawn,  a special deck is used. It has 3 ogre move cards, 3 ogre attack cards. The ogre can flip all 6 cards before the next move takes place. Here is the start of the ogre rampage!

After wiping out a complete unit of Men at Arms, he damages another unit of Men at Arms, before going after the knights. The ogre is actually a Ceasar Miniatures plastic orc.

The tide of battle turns; the knights start their rampage.

One bold knight finally lays the ogre low! For each hit on the ogre, one of his cards are taken away. When all six cards are gone, he is dead. Luckily for the Imperial army, the ogre cards showed up after his demise.

At this point in the game the Chaos army only has two warrior units left; the Imperial army continued to draw knights cards.  The knights can be seen closing on the last of the Chaos forces. In the end the Chaos army was eliminated completely.

My next project is to try my hand at Battlelore, a Richard Borg fantasy Medieval board game.  Of course this is a card driven game........