Sacred Ground - Vikings vs. Anglo-Danes SAGA AAR

I didn't go to Salute this weekend. This is not so much a case of I didn't want to go (I did), couldn't find the time (I could have), didn't want to go on my own (I'm sure I could have found or at least rented a friend) or that I didn't know where it was on (I did). My problem stemmed from one single, yet quite significant problem...

Rather than dwell on that I went to Nug's place and played a game of SAGA instead...

Prior to this we were just one game of the way through our five game mini-campaign. Nug and his Vikings had won the first one narrowly, beating my Anglo-Danes in a pretty much stand up fight. We both suffered a few casualties that carried through into the second game and which were to prove influential.

The second game was the Sacred Ground scenario with the Vikings as attackers having been victorious in game one. You can see the setup below and please excuse the crappy phone photos...

View from the Anglo-Danish side

Nug's Vikings comprised a Warlord, 4 x Berserkers, 4 x Hearthguard and four lots of 8 x Warriors. He was missing a four warriors and a single Hearthguard as casualties. My Anglo-Danes comprised a Warlord, 4 x Hearthguard, two lots or 4 x Hearthguard with Dane-axes, two lots of 8 x Warriors and 12 x Levies with bows. I was missing a warrior, a levy and two Hearthguard with Dane-axes.

Viking right

Viking left

Anglo-Danish left

Anglo-Danish right

The idea with Sacred Ground is to accrue points for occupying each of the three terrain features. Nug's Vikings went first and immediately occupied the wood on their right. He held back on his left. My response was to occupy the field also on my right and make a play for the central hill.

Keep off our land you long haired gits!

The next few turns consisted of the two sides slogging away attempting to overcome the other by weight of numbers. Neither side really had the upper hand until two things started to come into play - my Anglo-Danish Hearthguard got whittled down and eventually killed off, having started smaller to begin with. Nug also deliberately avoided my Levies, who without and special rules and no SAGA dice are looking more and more rubbish by the day. I rapidly ran out of SAGA dice altogether and eventually was overcome.

We're not dead, we just can't stand up on this sodding slope...

The final insult was rolling up casualties to carry over into the third game. I managed to roll three snake-eyes on three dice (feck!), meaning almost half my Dane-axe Hearthguard will be staying in and drunkenly throwing axes at blonde barmaids up against a wall or some such. Nug also knocked off half his Viking Berserkers so that may ease my worries a little. Or not. Can't help but think I may be 3-0 down pretty soon...

There Adam, an AAR. Happy now? :-)

Cheers,
Millsy