This is a scenario of Games Workshop's Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game, the third in the 2019 edition of Scouring of the Shire.
Based on my previous report you might expect me to tackle the book's second scenario , not the third. But that scenario requires Lotho Sackville-Baggins, and GW hasn't released that model yet. Sure, I could use a substitute, but I figure I might as well tackle the scenarios that I do have models for -- and there are plenty of them -- and then I can always come back to rest when the models are out. I'm not playing them in campaign mode, anyway.
This scenario is a reworking of a scenario from the 2004 version of the Scouring of the Shire, which I've reported a couple of times before. Some of the special rules were kept; Maggot's dogs begin in sentry mode, cause Terror, and Maggot himself won't enter until the alarm is raised, and only then on a 5+. And the recent rains affect the Ruffian's bows and so they hit only on 6+ rather than the usual 5+.
But there are couple of tweaks also. Evil now gets an extra Ruffian, which is a nice boost given that the victory conditions involve exiting the board, and there are more bows. But Good's also been helped; Exiting three Ruffians is a draw (not an Evil win), and Maggot is much more formidable in this edition of the game, now having Strength 3 and Attacks 2 (vs 2 and 1).
This edition also updates the Sentry rule. Sentry movement is no longer tied at all to Priority, and the amount of movement on non-extreme results has been averaged out. It's not clear which side this helps.
(Click on any image to see an enlargement.)
The Good forces are Farmer Maggot with his three dogs (from left to right) Grip, Wolf, and Fang. The Ruffians have three bowmen, one whipman, and two regular ol' thugs.
Only the dogs begin on the board, within 6" of the scarecrow. The Ruffians will enter from the east edge (the far edge in the image).
Good always begins narrative scenarios with Priority. But since the dogs are sentries, they can't move where they wish. Well, Wolf can, as his sentry roll is '6'. So he dashes into the woods. Grip stays put, while Fang, controlled by the Evil player, wanders away.
The Ruffians enter from the eastern edge, the three bowmen in the north and the three others to the south.
Good Priority, 4-1.
Fang wanders again, and Wolf can again move freely and so continues his dash towards the Ruffians in hopes of raising the alarm early. Grip stirs himself and moves 3" towards the woods.
The Ruffians break into two groups, the archers moving northwest (2nd image, where you can barely see Wolf on the left) and the other making their way along the south edge of the board (3rd image, also having fuzzy Wolf in the background).
Good Priority, 6-1.
Good thinks this is another one of those situations where one would rather not have Priority, as it would be advantageous to seeing where the Evil models go so as to have a better chance of raising the alarm. Too bad.
This time Fang gets a normal move, while Wolf and Grip stay put. This allows the Ruffians to continue their advance.
All three dogs are visible in the last image, but you have to look closely!
Good Priority, 5-4.
The sentry dice heavily favor Good, with both Fang and Wolf moving as normal and Grip moving 3" towards the bad guys, who move so as to be just over 6" away from the hounds.
Good Priority, 6-3.
Wolf holds his ground, while the other two dogs move 3". The Ruffians, unable to avoid raising the alarm, Charge. While moving to engage, the Ruffian with a whip lashes out at Grip and kills him! The southern flank is undefended now and the three Ruffians there high-tail it towards the exit edge of the board.
Thing work out better for Good in the north, where two of the Ruffians fail their Courage tests and stay in place, while the lone bowman brave enough to Charge loses his Combat and he goes down to Fang's teeth and claws.
Evil Priority, 2-1.
Evil gets Priority for the first time in the game. In the north, one archer has the gumption to Charge Fang, while the other decides that a sure movement towards the edge is better than having to make a Courage test and (probably) staying in place.
In the south, the Ruffians jump the fence, the whipmaster continuing his run of luck and, rolling a '6', having the fence not slow down his movement one whit.
Maggot doesn't enter this turn, but Good is still delighted when Fang chomps the Ruffian brave enough to engage him.
With two models down, every Ruffian now has to make it off the board to win.
Good Priority, 3-3.
Fang and Wolf Charge into the last bowman. Maggot still doesn't enter, so the other Ruffians continue their run to the board edge.
The lone Ruffian gets his '6' in combat but so do the dogs and they win on Fight value. The Ruffian goes down to Fang and Evil can now no longer win.
Evil Priority, 5-4.
Having Priority, the Ruffians rush forward, with the edge of the board now very close. The dogs leave the corpses of the Ruffians in the north to come back to aid Maggot, who finally decides to show up. But the dogs are still a considerable distance away and there are fences in between which will likely slow them down.
Good Priority, 6-3.
Maggot moves to engage the dangerous and lucky whipster -- no ranged attack for the Ruffians this turn! -- but is surrounded by the remaining two thugs. He trusts in his new Attack 2 attribute to save him, but his Duel roll is an unlucky snake-eyes. So the Ruffians easily win, and Maggot suffers the four Wounds needed to guarantee that his Fate cannot save him.
With nothing in their way and the hounds far off, the three Ruffians can easily stroll off the board to a drawn game.
I like the changes to this scenario. Especially the upgunning of Maggot, even though it did him no good here. If using the old Sentry rules, the early Priority rolls heavily favoring Good would probably have seen the alarm raised even earlier; the new rules worked well to prevent that.
The low model count, Attack, and Defense values make this scenario wildly variable as every model counts and every model is quite vulnerable to Wounds. Had Maggot won his Combat, he wouldn't have required crazy luck to wipe out the Ruffians before the game ended. But it's also easy to imagine the Fang dying in his first combat, too, which probably would have meant an Evil victory.
I think the scenario works well for what it is. It looks great and is very thematic.