Conquest is a game I recently got into at the behest of a friend. I am a notorious game jumper, though, and decided why not. To be clear, there are two different versions of the game. This is the skirmish version of the game, Conquest First Blood. There is also the more rank-and-flank version of the game, Conquest Last Argument of Kings. I am more keen to play that version (because of my Song of Ice and Fire the Miniatures Game background), but alas no one in the group wants to try that version as of yet. My chosen faction is Nords, the stereotypical Viking aesthetics. What got me, though, wasn’t the Vikings but the werewolves, and giant wolves that come along with them.
Here is the list I ended up running. It was only my second game and I was just playing with the few models I’d purchased so I knew it wasn’t going to be the most competitive, however, I believed there was decent synergy here for me to do decently well. I chose to go with the blooded just because I haven’t run him yet but also because being able to put a free unit into reserve seemed really good, plus he removed the feral keyword from the doggos which cmon that’s the reason I’m playing the game here. As an aside, if you have no idea what any of these keywords or abilities do, rest assured, neither do I! Just enjoy the ride and if you really care the app is really accessible to look things up. Anyway, I ended up bringing the bow chosen because they were an absolute power house in my first game, as well they should be at 235 points for five of them. The trolls I brough because I had just painted them (stay tuned for the painting update on that), and the Huskarls were because they kinda defensive with their shields.
As you can see in the first photo, I didn’t start with much on the board because I have two things in reserve so it already seems like I’m on the back foot a little. Also, I don’t know the game well enough yet to know what scenarios we were playing but I do know that the purple diagonal dots were objectives, we couldn’t sit on the one closes to our deployment zones and got more points for the furthest one and more points for having more than one.
Here is my opponent’s beautifully painted force. As I learn the game I will include here what they had but for now all I can say is that the minotaur scared me to death, but what I really should’ve been afraid of is the commander and the two officers he had in those hoplite units.
This was my first and second activation of the game. I am a point player, I always will be. I will ignore the blood lust to sit on an objective any day of the week. My opponent would go on to activate the commander which gave his minotaur a movement boost, then his two units of hoplites which could copy the commander’s ability to give out a movement boost. All-in-all this led to one fast cow. Luckily, even with a 16 inch movement he failed the charge and just decided to march with his last action to ensure next round it wouldn’t happen again.
Second round things got bloody. But started off with a little bit of a durdle. My Bow chosen and fenr (the big wolves) came on the board in round two. I thought this would end up being much cooler than it ended up being. The units end up coming in from the reinforcement zone. Where this zone is depends on the scenario. Well in this scenario the reinforcement zone was the back of the board…. So, not wanting to overcommit my other units too early, I chose to bring on the chosen and fenr for my first activations. This lead to the both units just doing a double march. If I had started with them on the board they would definitely be doing some damage right now but instead they ended up just sitting in the back, not even able to get on an objective.
During this time whilst I was twiddling my thumbs in the back field my opponent was making moves that mattered… Here you can see his hoplites charging into my trolls and blooded. The trolls are actually a really good unit that get an additional roll before assigning wounds to try and prevent more damage. As you can see they didn’t prevent much…. My blooded tried to get revenge but only dealt one or two wounds. Also this turn my huskarls moved up the left flank to try and take the back objective but tried to stay behind the building to not get sniped. Apparently his range units ignored the terrain anyway so this was pointless but luckily I took only one wound from the attack. Also notable, the second unit of hoplites charged into the Fenr and definitely wiped them from the table with above average rolling.
The minotaur ended up getting all the way around my single troll and had the movement to charge my bow chosen in the back. Once again his dice failed, though, and the bow chosen lived to fight another day.
I believe I’ve combined a few events that actually happened in round three but regardless as this point I was pretty far behind. on points because with him wiping out my unit of trolls he actually was able to take this objective from me and left me with no objectives.
Short story, short, A the end of round three or four I ended up losing 16-0. My Huskarls never died but they also never made it to the back point. The beat pack died, the trolls died. I still had my blooded, and my bow chosen but they weren’t scoring me points.
My opponent, however, was gracious enough to go into another half a round because I was on the verge of wrapping some conflicts up. My blooded took out the a decent chunk of hoplites. He actually hits like a truck, however, in this game you only assign wounds to the models you’re actually next to, not the whole unit. So, the first time I hit like a truck it was just to the office and I rolled poorly, the second time I finished off the officer, the fourth time I was able to reposition to be next to three hoplites and wiped them out but this lead to two off on the side to easily take the objective if they wanted, as well. Also wrapped up in this extra round was the bow chosen who surprisingly pack a punch. You’d think a bunch of archers would suck in melee but man did they deal some wounds. Let it be said, though, the minotaur is definitely lacking in defense, and the bow chosen darn well better be good in all forms of combat for how many army building points I spent on them! Overall impressions as I wrap up. I think the Nord army rule is basically useless. It gives small buffs if you sacrifice whole models, which is a major feel bad if you take elite-ish units like I did. Using my special abilities to go into reserves probably just out-right lost me the game although I can see the benefit depending on the reinforcement zone. I truly probably lost this game in list building, though, his list had major synergies and whilst I thought mine might it most certainly didn’t play like it did. All of that being said, I enjoyed myself because everything I love about this game still holds true, the minis are amazing and paint up awesomely, and the game is super quick with this one clocking in at just 58 minutes of game time. Most importantly, though, I got to kill an afternoon hanging out with old friends and making new ones and I’ll take an absolute thrashing every once in a while if it means I get to do that.
~Kole