They shall not pass

With the COVID-19 situation, wargaming has been restricted to the ongoing Kings of War camapign between the Mhorgoth's Undead and the Basileans under Gnaeus Sallustis. This week the Undead assaulted Fort Balin in the north of the campaign area to secure a larger foothold.

My plan was a fairly simple one - to try for a draw that would leave me in possession of the Fort at the end of the game. So I packed the fort with big infantry units as possession was on Unit Strength. The front was covered by a crossbow horde with the dragonshard shield, giving them defence 6+ for a turn. Two wizards were in support. Some cavalry was deployed to stop the attackers simply turning by threating their flanks.  

For the Undead sieges are quite tricky games. Many units are Shambling and so can nt double. This makes them unsuitable for using the siege towers as they would take too long to reach the walls. so these were left to the Vampires and Werewolves.  

Soulreaver Vampire infantry

The first couple of turns saw me immediately charging on my right as I as I had the chance to destroy a siege tower and slow down the Undead's right. This cost the Knights their lives but bought me 3 turns and eliminated one of the three towers.  

Centrally the Zombie Trolls charged the gates and hacked through them in pretty short order. I was able to kills them with a timely sally from troops inside the fort, but the gates were breached. On my left the Vampires advanced with their tower but outpaced their skeleton flank guards and were quickly cut-down by my Elohi flying troops. They succumbed in their turn but two of the siege towers were now lost.  

As the final siege tower reached the wall, Undead forces tried to push through the gates with a Mummy regiment in the lead. The gate was a stalemate but the Werewolves gobbled-up the crossbowmen, only to be evicted themselves by some Ogre Palace guards storming the walls.

The final turn saw a couple of desperate ladder attacks that were easily repelled and the Fort was secure. All the Basilean units outside the walls died but they bought precious time and eliminated the threat of two of the siege towers.

Who ordered these ladders then? 

They shall not pass