Barbarian Battle Tactics

by Thane Morgan

Barbarians are a fun army to play. They walk the line between order and chaos, evil and good, so you can make you barbarians everything from the noble savage to near bestial minions. You can make a army with lots of unicorns, fairies and pegasi one week, then switch to one allied with minotaurs and ogres and spiders the next. In addition, they can also become a good chunk of a Medieval or Marrian army, acting as light infantry or auxiliary units, allowing you to basically have a second army by purchasing just a few core units.

Barbarians are generally a mass army, depending more on numbers than the quality of their troops. Only one unit has an armor over 2, the elite cavalry. They do have access to skill 3 troop types in their elite cavalry and infantry scouts, but due to their low armor and magic resistance, taking large numbers of these troops can be very costly if the are attacked by enemies with missile or magic.

The scouts can be very effective when deployed from infiltration. There are two basic approaches to this - use a couple of archer units deploying in the mid-game to pick off weak units or keep fleeing units running, or to use several units of infantry, perhaps with a bow unit or two, to open up a second front on the enemies weak flank. There are of course other ways of using infiltrating units, and often simply having non-deployed infiltrators will keep your enemy hesitant to commit his troops out of fear of their eventual deployment. Another good tactic is to deploy them when an enemy has left an expensive missile or artillery unit alone without support.

Barbarian Units

Barbarian Warriors - the basic grunt of the barbarian army, these guys are very cheap. I like to run them in groups of 24 plus a lesser hero, an inexpensive unit that requires 7 casualties to take a morale test, is very maneuverable in a 5 by 5 block, and inflicts a healthy -4 morale penalty on enemy units. But don't count on this unit in toe to toe combat against more elite armies. They have a decent chance of lasting one round, but counting on two or three rounds is probably asking too much of them. The barbarian hero is somewhat vulnerable to dying anyway, so simple character combat can result in your unit running. For this reason, you want to operate these units with at least one partner who can flank your enemy when engaging. Flanking is what gives a mass army its power, and with some good maneuvering you can easily get a -6 to -10 morale penalty on an enemy unit - even if you lose one of your blocks, you still have the flanking block to pursue the broken enemy and cover the retreat of your unit.

You can also use these units without any heros leading them, but you do become much more vulnerable to being broken by missile fire that way. But, since it drops the cost of the unit by 1/3 or so, it may well be worth it in some cases. The disadvantage is that you will not be able to kill enemy heroes as easily, robbing yourself of a good way to force a break test and generally allowing enemy unit +2 to their morale which might otherwise not be there. Also, broken units are much less likely to rally without a hero in them.

The basic warrior block is also a great candidate for Chaos spells like Aura of Chaos and Berserk - spells with high risk but high payoff when things go right.

2 Weapon Warriors - These guys are all about offense. Use the warrior blocks to protect them from missile fire on the way in. They make nice support troops, as they can rack up kills to help force a morale test from casualties where a warrior block might not be able too. These are ideal to use against creatures with fixed saves like elementals and dragons, where paying for strength is pointless, but you do want extra attacks.

Javelins - There are two kinds for the barbarians, those with effective shields that make good line troops, and those without that make good skirmisher and harassment troops. Those without shields may through their javelins on the run, while those with shields carry heavier javelins that can be used for hand to hand combat. A light javelin unit is great to run behind a cavalry unit and in front of a line unit, where they are generally protected from enemy bow fire, but can advance to harass the flanks of the enemy from the gap created by the cavalry. They can also make good protectors of your missile units from infiltrators and flyers, surrounding such units with a thin skirmish line capable of making those expensive units pay for getting in too deep.

Heavy Javelins are great to anchor a flank, or to advance between two regular warrior units. The one thing you don't want to do with these is use them to follow up behind another unit which is likely to break, as enemies pursuing into the heavy javelins effectively negate 2 special abilities, the missile attack and the first strike from long weapons.

Bowmen - These are fairly inexpensive missile troops. I generally deploy them in groups of 20 with a lesser hero or air wizard for leadership.

Scouts - Scouts can be used as infiltrators, as described above, or as elite troops without infiltration. In the latter case, it is good to give them the support and perhaps cover of basic warrior units, as they are going to be targeted by enemy archers if given the chance. Though having higher skill, they still have no strength, so these are very good units to augment with magical weapons or strength. Because they will be targeted by missiles, these are second in line after your missile troops to get guardian wind spells.

Cavalry - Barbarians have a decent selection of cavalry, including a medium cavalry unit which can be very powerful. The regular sword-armed cavalry is less expensive than some army's infantry, and they make great reserves and support units to add morale penalties. I generally run cavalry in units of 16 plus a hero, though sometimes I'll run a much larger unit for the joy of having a -6 morale penalty unit with a 16" move. With elite cavalry, always run a greater hero with them, as the unit is too expensive to let the hero die in one turn of combat with an enemy hero.

I generally operate regular cavalry unit in pairs - either one backing up the other when playing defensively, or one ready to flank what the other attacks when going on offense. In the former case, a unit of non-lance armed cavalry is a great back up to catch pursuers of the lead unit should it break. They can also skirmish and surround an enemy you expect to break, to prevent their flight.

Horse Archers are a great all around unit, as they can move 8" and still fire. They also can absorb 2 wounds each, and generally handle themselves well in combat.

Spells

As was stated above, the barbarians are very flexible in spell choices, with air, chaos and nature at their disposal. Nature is a great choice, as the Strength spell makes up for one of the areas lacking in barbarian armies, and giving cavalry Pathfinding can allow them to quickly get around an enemy flank which was thought to be secured by a large forest. Chaos is good for all those cheap units that you are willing to take a risk with - a unit of barbarian warriors or even light cavalry with swords are great choices for spells like Aura of Chaos and Berserk - you can make a weak unit much more formidable very quickly, and if it back fires, you haven't lost too many points. Access to Air magic lets you defend your troops with Guardian Wind spells, excellent for protecting elite troops and archers. Nature can also let you protect such troops by creating forest cover, but this is somewhat more limited than Guardian Wind.

Selecting the magics you want to use should be taken into consideration with the army you want to build. If you are going to run a lot of cheap troops, take some chaos and nature to buff them up. If you are taking a missile heavy army, take some air magic to protect them from missile fire.

Sample Units

These are some of the units I commonly run.

24 Warriors (or Scouts) + Hero

20 Javelins + Hero

24 Javelins with shields + Great Hero (and sometimes with a Shaman)

20 Archers (or Scouts with bows) + Hero or Shaman

25 Berserkers

16 Light Cavalry + Hero

16 Light Cavalry with Lance + Hero

16 Elite Cavalry + Great Hero

16 Horse Archers + Shaman on Unicorn

© 2007
Thane's Games