A Call for Reinforcements Quick Session Report:

My wife and I sat down to play A Call for Reinforcements, the final scenario in the Creatures expansion.

I had been looking forward to playing this expansion, as it had the widest mix of all the previously released expansions mixed together into one glorious scenario (and I would love to see more of this style of scenario).

My wife took the Standard camp, while I played the Pennants. We also added our heroes - mine a rogue called the Masked Bastard of Mercia, while hers was a warrior, aptly named Slasha (though she would have little to do with the disaster that followed).

In this scenario the Standard player gets the Rock Elemental, as well as any one other creature. As the Pennant player, I would only receive one creature, so I took the Ice Drake. With all of this mingled together we would be playing with elements from Battlelore, Scottish Wars, Dwarven Battalion, The Hundred Years War, Goblin Marauders, Heroes, Dragons, and of course the Creatures expansion.

I began work on my right flank, using my Long Bowmen, combined with the fast moving Ostrich Riders to rain arrows on her Archers and Dwarven Spearmen before they had a chance to respond. My wife tried to move her units on that flank up to engage me, but between the range of the Long Bows and the ability of the Ostrich Riders to move and fire she took quite heavy losses. Across the board she was moving her units closer, while I held back using my ranged advantage to try and weaken her units before we engaged.

In the middle of the field her Spearmen were advancing steadily, rather than use the Cavalry Charge card I had in hand I decided to get my dragon into the action. I had been rolling more lore than anything useful throughout the previous engagements, and spent several turns ordering the dragon out of section to fly over her units and try and ice them. Over the next four turns or so I must have rolled about 20 dice trying to get some lore, to little avail - I rolled Lore aplenty in combat, but my Dragon wasn’t fit enough to gulp air while breathing as well as deliver it’s ice breath on the huddled soldiers below.

My wife played several cards into the middle section, allowing her to bring up her Hydra as well as engage my heavy cavalry with her spears. The result was devastating - my heavy cavalry fell quickly.

A Foot Onslaught from my side of the field sought to even the balance, and while I managed to weaken many of her units I just didn’t get the break throughs I was hoping for - too much energy spent on my dragon, and not enough on causing damage. My Goblins rushed into the fray, they caused some small havoc - I was able to snag two banners - but my wife managed to roll enough banners to send many of them packing - panic losses caused the death of several of my weakened units.

Finally my wife managed to summon the Rock Elemental, and in a totally devastating turn across the board with the Battlelore Card, she managed to destroy three of my units, bringing her an easy victory.

Battlelore is one of my all time favourite games, it was great to be able to mix so many expansions and fantastic effects into one game. I am looking forward to Bearded Brave and Horrific Horde - where the Call to Arms cards included will allow even more fun. Despite the fact I lost and lost badly, I had a great time. Slasha was victorious without even lifting her sword, while the Masked Bastard of Mercia, who saw some fierce action in the middle of the board, was forced to yield the day... but he’ll be back, he’ll retreat to the hinter lands, lick his wounds and plot his revenge.