First game of Dragon Rampant

I picked up Dragon Rampant at Vapnartak this year after reading many postings on various forums about how well the game played and how you could literally use anything you had in your collection.  Needless to say I thoroughly enjoyed reading the rules and my mind lit up with all the possibilities for gaming, principly as being perfect for warband scale Lord Of The Rings games, however the proof is in the pudding as they say so it was time to have a game.

We opted for a generic fantasy setting for this initial venture with the Forces of Darkness raiding the woodland realm of the Forces of Nature in a straight army vs army battle.

The battle lines were drawn

The Forces of Darkness advance from the Blasted Heath on the border of the Woodland  Realm

After marching to defend their borders the Green Lady blasts the evil Mouth of Darkness with Nature's Fury removing three Strength Points from him

The Black Guard advance towards a gap in the tree line but must traverse through rough ground to do so and the woodland is not undefended!

The Dryads halt at an obstacle while the Treeman keeps himself covered with the rocky outcrop

The Black Guard Attack the Eagle and wound it however they struggle from here on out due to teh rough ground

Meanwhile the Mouth of Darkness Befuddles the Green Lady over the course of the next few turns basically shutting her down, "Take that you meddlesome witch"

The Dryads Wild Charge the armoured Troll who had been slowly making his way forward

The Black Guard began to think they had chosen the wrong route!

After dealing equal damage to each the Dryads retreated and were then Wild Charged by the Castellans while the Treemen didn't seems to want to move from his safe spot until...

... he came bounding out to punish the Castellans for severely injuring his wards

 However all did not go to plan and he received quite the beating which forced him to retreat straight into the Wild Charge of the Cursed Men who had been making their way around the outcrop

In the ensuing combat I forgot to take some pictures but all did not go well for the Forces of Darkness, the Black Guard were slain by the Eagle which then flew straight into The Mouth of Darkness and forced him to rout which in turn saw the Troll run from the battlefield.  Unfortunately this brought the Forces of Darkness under half their number and the Castellans decided to retreat back to their Darkened realm than continue on fighting however the Cursed men were not to be broken (being Undead) even though they were the last unit on the table.

The Cursed Men continue to hack away at the Treeman even after their dark masters had returned to whence they came

However theirs was a lost cause and the Treeeman saw them return to the ether leaving the Forces of Nature battered and bruised yet victorious

We had a great time though there was some book flicking going on during the game and mistakes were made, both tactically (the Black Guard should have never attempted to fight on the rough ground) and rules wise,  next time a quick reference sheet should make things run much smoother but overall the game played very well and we'll certainly continue to play it for the foreseeable future.

Phil