Dragon Rampant in Middle-earth: walk through and play test

So this month we are taking a closer look at Dragon Rampant, which is Dan Mersey's fantasy miniatures wargames rules variant of his original and successful medieval wargame, Lion Rampant. This should be the first of a series of articles just exploring some of the rules mechanics while also playing through a sample battle on the table top.

In this article I look at just the army building phase and the initial set up of a battle scenario. By way of background I'm looking for a streamlined set of battle rules that can work with almost any fantasy army that can resolve a game in around three hours and is not too much of a brain ache to play. The author suggests an army of 24 points per side, so that is what we are aiming for this time.

Here we have a couple of hypothetical Middle-earth armies I'm knocking together using my Lord of the Rings collection.

The Good Guys

Rangers of the North (Dunedain) x6 - classed as Elite Foot - added bows for +2pts - 8pts total. This is the most expensive unit in the Good army and there are only six of them. I'm expecting great things from the rangers.

Knights of Arnor x6 - standard heavy cavalry with lances, no modifications - 4pts

Cardolan light cavalry x6 - light cavalry - upon reading through the unit profiles for light cavalry in the game, these do seem pretty interesting as a unit. No modifications - 4 pts.

Arthedain foot guard x12 - heavy foot - my army leader stands with this unit. Again, no special rules for these guys. 4pts. Note that you need to always nominate one unit as your leader's unit, effectively the command unit. You don't NEED to have an actual leader figure, but in this case I do have one.

Eriador militia/fyrd x12 - light foot upgraded with short range missiles (spears and short bows) - 4pts.

So that's my 24pts spent. You can build larger or smaller armies in Dragon Rampant, but this gives you an idea of the sort of human army you can muster for 24 points. It is not a skirmish force per se, but nor it is a massive army.

I roll for my leader's personality - I'm going to call him Duke Earald of Fornost - and he comes up Wise, a warrior renowned for his strategic insight. He gets -1 from final total when dicing to see who is the attacker/defender in a given fight. I'm guessing therefore that it is better to be the defender in this game.

The Bad Guys

Uruk-hai Scouts x12 - bellicose foot - no enhancements. 4pts. Bellicose foot seem to be a more aggressive type of infantry. It fits the personality of the fighting uruks very well.

Armoured Uruk-hai x12 - bellicose foot - armour enhancement to Armour 3 (+2pts). 6 pts total. This is the toughest evil unit in the battle.

Orcs of Gundabad x12 - light foot (mixed weapons enhancement at +2pts). 5pts.

Wargs of the Wild Heath x6 - lesser warbeasts - 4pts.

Orcs of Gundabad x11 + 1 Wizardling. Light foot with +2pts for accompanying Wizardling (low level wizard). This is also the army leader, the wizard Talion, a treacherous servant of Sauron, wearer of a Ring of Power and a future Nazgul in the making.

So Talion is not a full-fledged Gandalf-level spellcaster, so only gets three spells. I rolled randomly for them, but you can choose - I got Almighty Prod (Wrath of Angmar), Stronger Shields, and Power Bolt (Dark Curse). They all fit nicely with the theme of this army. 

Talion has NO cavalry which could mean that his army is vulnerable to the enemy light horse, but he does have those wargs, so that could be of some assistance. I may need to conserve them, as when using wolves in the past, I have tended to throw them out early, using them to worry and disarray the foe, but they usually get killed off fairly early in a battle. This has certainly been the case when they get deployed in Frostgrave!

I roll for Talion's core personality trait and get a Patient leader.

The Battle

Now on to the battle. First off, I rolled up Death Chase as the scenario. I rolled for attacker/defender and it looks like Duke Earald of Fornost is going to be defending, as he is ambushed on his way home from the wars. Again, as I'm running this solo, I also rolled for Glory objectives, which are extra missions you can take on as a player to score more VPs at the end of the battle.

Earald goes for a single 2pt quest - Smite Their Champions - he will get 2 VPs if he can destroy the armoured uruk hai, the toughest enemy unit. They are a notorious regiment, and their loss in this battle would undermine Talion's plans for the North.

Talion is feeling a bit more bullish and opts for The Gods Have Listened (no more than one battered unit in the battle at any time), for +3pts, My Arrows Are Deadlier Than My Spears (slay more enemy with missile fire), for +2 pts and They Shall Taste Our Blades (at least one turn with 3 damage inflicted) for +1pt. So the bad guys have a potential 6pts up for grabs.

So there we have it. Next time we will set up the ambush in the wilds of Eriador and see how things progress from there.