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Multi-player free-for-all battles can be especially enjoyable, as they add a whole new political element normally not present in miniature games. This is a battle report of a 5 player free for all game. A section on designing these kinds of battles will also be available, as some special considerations must be taken to ensure the game starts off fairly balanced and to keep players from simply hanging back until the other players have weakened each other.

I will try to get the other players to give their own versions of events, I had some success with this in the Grand Battle.

The first turn was marred by chaos, as two of the players had figured on first turn wins. After a brief discussion, it was agreed that no one could win on Turn 1, and that gamers suck :)

Thane: I began with a cautious advance to hold at least the nearest objective, with the goal of taking the overgrown one in a turn or two. I wanted to move the archers up onto the nearest hill to cover the center hill, with the fire mage giving the unit fire arrows. With my Dwarven flank secured, I could then consolidate to either push across the elves or take the center hill.

Hamilton made this a bit easier by making a non-aggression pact, allowing him to move to secure the center hill without fear of harrassment from me. He sent a cavalry force towards Trevor, who cautiously advanced. I think he must have broke a light infantry unit on the first turn, but I wasn't paying close attention, because Mike made a strong move towards his two closest objectives. Justin seized control of one with his archers covered by treemen, and moved to contest the objective seized by the dwarves.

Justin: All comments at the end, didn't format his comments the same way.

Hamilton: "After a brief discussion, it was agreed that no one could win on Turn 1..."
Yeah, well, when you're outvoted four to one it doesn't matter how clever you are. My forces are all nice and symmetric, my cannon on the hill, and no one was paying attention to the fact that I had three fast units, each aimed at a different objective. Instead I got a lot of "wait, he has a cannon?" and "who said he could have the hill, again?" -- even when I was measuring the distances from my units to the goals.

Anyway we diced for initiative and I lost big time and moved last (as I had hoped), so the way I figured it was that someone would see my gambit and contest the hill. No one did, and so I perched my dragon on the hill and my cavalry on the two closest menhirs. The only person who could have contested me at that point (having already moved) was Mike, whose mage had earth-melded and who could have joined me out of combat on the hill, but after said discussion I decided I'd concentrate my forces on the left and keep the peace with Thane. Thus the game began.

Trevor: At the start of this game I realized something very important. I didn't want to fight the people directly next to me. I just wanted their objectives. A plan formed that was very clear to me, belittle the people on the other side of the map and try to start a grudge match with them, and brown-nose the people near me. Of course I wasn't counting on being so heinously attacked the first turn. Hamilton tossed a light cavalry unit right against my right flank, smashing an infantry unit. Cowardly commoners, they broke and ran even before their leader died. The rest of my troops kept moving steadily along to the center between two sets of prized objectives, casually ignoring them.

Thane: I continued my slow advance, taking firm control of my nearest objective. Mike, seeing the 2 cavalry units approaching his isolated Mithril Warriors, retreated them from the overgrown objective. Hamilton stayed true to his word, and moved his forces away from mine. My dragon moved to do a fly-by of Mike's gunners while they reloaded, but scored only a couple of kills.

Hamilton's Light Cavalry drove deep into Trevor's army, but this ran them into his paladin unit, which broke the light cavalry. A huge battle erupted between the Elves and Dwarves over the eastern stone objective. To my amazement, the Bear Cavalry endured the combined attacks of Elven Elite Cavalry and Pikes, even breaking the Elite Cavalry. This was the start of a very long engagement that I would eventually partake in.

Hamilton: The first turn, my cav attacked and (luckily) broke a unit of Trevor's medium infantry, pursuing after them into some paladins. The reason I did this was to keep them within 6" of Trevor's broken infantry and drive them off the board. All I had to do was go one round with Trevor's paladins -- ugly, but not bad. Right? Well, it was ugly, but 2 paladins vs 5 lancer kills is pretty even-steven -- more than even given the 200-some points of infantry it got rid of. I fled with my lancers and he didn't pursue out into my crossbow coverage. Later, Trevor was pooh-poohing the fact that I toasted his medium infantry (he had plenty of points in halberdiers, for one thing), but I've learned that a couple of small units really can turn a close battle -- I didn't commit the resources to make it a close battle, but if I had, I'm betting the 500+ points of infantry units that I vaporized would have ended up mattering.

Trevor: By turn two my glorious paladins had smashed the heathen cavalry and obliterated them. I could have sent my paladins galloping in to smash the rest of his army, but I was gentle and forgiving of his minor transgression (they were only infantry). We exchanged a little bit of bowfire, but nothing much happened. Mike, Thane and Justin had all engaged in melee between each other, and I figured it would be a good idea to make fun of them. That is to say they were quite a ways off, I wasn't in to much danger of a reprisal. However, I failed to see a unit of Elvish Archers on my flank. Justin's Archers were also looking a bit angry at me from making such gleeful comments about their master, so I decided to let them cool off a bit by restricting their sight with a fog cloud.

Thane: The Mithril Warriors, seeing their fate before them, chose to charge my cavalry. This was somewhat to his advantage, as I had to break the second unit of cavalry into a skirmish formation to fully engage the Warriors. The Champions and Legates from the units all traded 2 wounds each, but the cavalry inflicted significant damage and broke the Warriors, who had nowhere to flee after the skirmished cavalry unit made their morale test (a stunning feat, as anyone who's played with me this month will attest). My Archers got their Flaming Arrows while the Legionnaires advanced to screen the archers and support each other in case of attack. Hamilton turned his units on the central hill to face my Legionnaires and Unicorns, who moved up to the forest to strike at either central hill or the objective by the Elf/Dwarf battle. My dragon, having utterly failed to impress the (freshly reloaded) dwarven gunners, ran like a little girl for cover.

The Elf/Dwarf Battle continued fiercely. Trevor sent his unicorns pursuing after Hamilton's Fleeing Cavalry, while his other Light Cavalry engaged Trevor's Pikes. Hamilton's Cannon killed 6 (!) Paladins, earning him the respect of everyone in the game. I decline to fire flaming death into Hamilton's infantry, I'm so impressed. Oh, and we still had that agreement thingy.

Hamilton: I have got to paint more longbowmen! Crossbows are super-nice against heavies, but longbows are indispensible in these large multiplayer
battles. This turn Trevor was pissing me off pursuing with a teensy weensy group of unicorns (gotta paint mine). Plus I set up to go after him with peasants and cav, too bad I waffled like an idiot the next turn on that.

I am quite proud to say that one cannon shot (plus, for some infantry, some supporting longbow fire from my unit and Justin's)
evaporated a second unit of Trevor's infantry and killed SIX (6) paladins. Meaning I killed 8 through the course of the game, and they still went over and molested Thane later and took the hill to win the game with everyone (but my cannon, which Trevor shot up later) shooting at them with piddly little arrows. Figures. I should have charged his paladins instead of his pikemen with my later-proved-completely-useless lancers, so I could try and force a break test, but how was I to know?

Trevor: The despicable Hamilton and his tratiorous Fuedals were going to pay now. I chased his mangy cavalry back to his deployment area and smashed them repeatably with my noble unicorns. Oh the carnage from such beautiful animals! However I was not about to let their valiant heroism be a prelude to martydom, no they would continue to fight, for that is true valor! My water mage cast a fog cloud upon them concealing them from the watchful and hateful eyes of Hamiltons cruel archery center. But alas, he had already made devious and cunning plans with the elven Justin, whom was not happy about my previous merrimaking at his behalf! He brought up scores of archers and pagan treemen to my flank. Oh woe is me, things were looking frightening indeed! As tension mounted on my flanks things grew darker indeed. Hamiltons cannon of pure evil fired a solid lead ball straight from the depths of hell itself! It ripped a hole straight into my unit of brave and fearless paladins, killing half of them! Sure it hit a unit of infantry first, but the paladins! These were MY comrades, I spent many battles when I was younger smashing puny goblin and barbarians head with them! Oh there was going to be blood shed this day!

Thane: I rush my cavalry into the Dwarven Gunners, while my second cavalry unit reforms to prepare for an assault on Hamilton's center hill. Our truce still holds this turn. Meanwhile, my unicorns rush to engage Mike's Wizard who is near the big Elf/Dwarf battle. My dragon moves to flame that battle, eliciting some negotiation between the Elves and Dwarves as to who I should breath on. My young Dragon is not that sophisticated, so he just takes the closest target. My Unicorns kill the Earth Mage. The Dwarven Gunners are crushed.

Justin throws his Treemen against the Trevor's Pikes, who are still engaged with Hamilton's Light Cavalry. Hamilton continues to maneuver to secure the Center Hill, realizing that with two objectives securely in my hands, the hill would give me the game. Trevor's Unicorns attack Hamilton's Longbow with Wizard unit, while he also brings up a wizard on horseback to try to block the line of sight from Hamilton's artillery hill towards his units. Unfortunately (for him), Hamilton's Hatchling Dragon eats him.

Mike and Justin's battle goes on furiously, with his dragon dying but not before driving off the bears. Justin's Elite Cavalry assisted greatly in this, re-engaging after rallying. Mike's bears retreat around my unicorns, leading to a great deal of negotiating next turn, where I again learned the valuable lesson - never trust an Elf!

Hamilton: Now I am deciding that Trevor's going to take way longer to win the game than Thane, plus I only barely trusted him to begin with (I'm sure I wound him with those words), so in response to him advancing with his javelineers I turned to reinforce my hold on the prize. Trevor's unicorns continue to piss me off, killing the rest of my broken lancers and pestering a mage and some remaining archers. My remaining lancers, punched in the gut by Trevor's sturdy halbardiers, run like little girls (little girls on really fast horses).

Thane says I munched a wiz this turn, but that was actually later. I didn't fight anything with my dragon this turn, I was just putting it in a place where I breathed on the wizard in the forest on the far upper left corner. Trevor's other wizard joined up with the paladin unit, maybe not this turn but in the next couple before he started moving them up towards the center hill.

Trevor: Hamilton decided at this point it would be good to throw another unit of cavalry against my infantry, but this time he chose poorly. Before hand he was fighting untrained light infantry, now he was fighting highly trained, highly armored heavy infantry. And they had big pointy objects instead of little swords! The Pikemen held Hamilton's foolish charge and beat them back with bravery and determination without suffering a single casualty. The Elvish host through it's pagan Treemen at my valiant pikemen as well, but they held off the impotent attack as easily as the calvary.

Thane: The broken Dwarven Bears leave me with a critical decision - Do I break Mike utterly by sending a unit to keep them broken, or leave them with the promise from Mike to continue to use them against Justin if they should rally. Justin Promises not to aim his archers at my Dragon, which being a more immediate threat, I agree to drive off Mike's Bears in return. This is immediately rewarded by elf treachery, as he turned his longbows on my Cavalry unit that moved to the base of the center hill.

I, on the other hand, give Hamilton fair warning, before either of us had moved, that our non-aggression pact was over. I move my legionnaires to face off against his medium infantry and artillery hill, and bring my other cavalry unit around to support the elf-betrayed unit who were facing off against Hamilton's massive Peasant unit. Trevors and Hamiltons longbows go after my Young Dragon, scoring several hits which bounce off his tough hide (I think he saved seven hits that turn). My Dragon, Archers, and Legionnaire unit punish Hamilton's Medium Infantry with missile fire, but fail to break them. My other Legionnaire unit breaks a crossbow unit on the artillery hill.

Trevor exchanges his Pike unit that is engaged with the Treemen with his Paladins. They form a pact to attack me instead though, and I believe they disengage without fighting.

Justin's Elite Cavalry and Pikes envelope Mike's last combat unit of pikes, but fail to break them. In fact, his pikes inflict significant casualties.

Hamilton: Poor Mike. First he tied up all his resources on two separate fronts where they eventually got munched (although he really did a number on Justin's elves, he got hosed by Thane). Then Thane goes to extreme ends to delay the real confrontation with me for another turn and put Mike thoroughly out of the game. Thane is nothing but honorable in ending the alliance with me, however, so I can't actually fault him. Thane shot me up a bit, but it takes more than that to break a 40-man unit. I don't recall Thane being all that surprised, though -- maybe he just likes kicking me around.

Trevor also decides this turn to beat up on my broken lancers, and in return I eat his mage with my dragon -- like I said, I think I gave as good as I got with Trevor, or maybe better given some very sweet lucky dice rolls.

Trevor: With my last light infantry unit battered and fleeing I had no choice but to forge a true alliance with the Eleven nation. Justin had acknowledged the fact that I was indeed superior on that flank and would crush him like a worm should he oppose me! He saw the light after this round, oh he did indeed. My Paladins interceded at the behalf of the pikemen and charged headlong into the pagan treemen (the pikemen fought hard and were indeed tired. I reward bravery of my troops unlike the other cowards!), however at this point neither side wished to fight the other. All of our malice was directed towards the dog-like Hamilton who had deceived the Elvish Host. Their general acknowledged this and we both turned are flanks and marched towards the helplessly engaged Hamilton.

Thane: Mine and Hamilton's forces fully engage over the center hill. I have to break my second unit of cavalry to get them into combat with the huge Peasant unit. Hamilton Distracts my Dragon with his Hatchling Dragon. Unfortunately, this keeps him airborn against the combined fire from Elven and Medieval Longbows, and my dragon falls, while the little Hatchling remains, wounded but still a factor.

My unicorns avenge the Elven Treachery by charging through the objective stones into an Elven Longbow unit, breaking them without taking significant casualties. My Legionnaires advance to point blank range with their pilla, leaving the my Archers a clear shot to the Light Cannon.

Justin and Trevor march towards the center hill as Hamilton and I fight. My Cavalry breaks his Peasants, but my Legionnaires take significant casualties from his Medium Infantry. Justin and Mike continue Mauling each other.

Hamilton: I manage to extricate my wizard from the unicorn fight. My noble hatchling dragon throws himself between Thane's young dragon and my troops, and kills it with Jason's honorable assistance (and pointy arrows). Happily my dragon lives through the turn to pester Thane more later. My peasants break for no good reason (see lessons learned). My cannon situation is looking grim as Thane advances on a hill that has no defense, but I figure it's done its job, so WTF. I rallied my broken lancers this turn and prepared to set about killing Trevor's archers, something I should have done long before (um, somehow).

Trevor: The Marrian Army was already tearing Hamilton's army to tiny little pieces, as mine would have had he not conscripted the aid of the naive Elvish Host to help him. My Army moved into position, the Paladins anxious to charge. My archers moved to take the objective on the left, while my sturdy and resilient heavy infantry moved to borrow the right objective from the Elvish Host. I would give it back to them after I was done with it. Allies are allies. The battle was quickly won after that, my paladins charged gloriously onto that final objective and slaughtered all those that opposed them. The Elves made a move on the hill, but I was not worried, they would see my way was Right.

Thane: I should have won the game this turn, but I blow it. Badly.

A cavalry unit chases the fleeing peasants, then gets hit by Trevor's Paladins. My other Cavalry unit takes the center hill while Hamilton's Hatchling Dragon flies overhead, afraid to challenge my control of the hilltop. Here is where I screw up. Marrians which fail their morale tests may take casualties as fearless units instead of fleeing, but only when they are in Rank and File formation. I foolishly adopt a skirmish formation, thinking it will reduce the damage the Hatchling's breath weapon could do to me. They take a few casualties from Elven bowfire, forcing a morale test, which they fail by 1 point. Had I remained in RaF, I would have lost a model and won the game. Because I skirmish, I must flee and the game slips from my hands.

Meanwhile, my legionnaires on the artillery hill take control. My Unicorns on the other side come help relieve Mike against Justin, attacking the rear of the Elite Cavalry unit. This pretty well guarantees Justin will not be able to win, as he would have to survive great odds to grab the eastern objective, and would have to go through Trevor with one unit of Treemen and Longbows to take the NW objective.

Hamilton's Medium Infantry continues to beat on my Legionnaires, but they do kill his mage.

Trevor's Paladins defeat my skirmished Cavalry.

Hamilton: OK, this turn I was starting to decide whether I cared who won, because I was no longer a contender but nevertheless still a force to be reckoned with. I was pretty heavily engaged with Thane at this point, though, and decided it best not to return my attentions to Trevor. Fortunately Thane didn't scoop us all this turn because of his cav breaking. I attacked Trevor's archers and killed one small unit out of three. As it turns out I should have stayed on the prize and not pursued, so I could attack another group immediately the following turn.

Trevor: The rest was just minor maneuvering to keep Hamilton's last ditch effort to prevent me from gaining control of the objectives. His returned cavalry swept past my archers, killing few, but in their blood-lust and stupidity they charged PAST the hill and had to turn about afterwards. The glorious Paladins pounded an inferior grouping of Marrian Cavalry near the center objective. Those cowards of course immediately broke formation and fled like dog-like women.

Thane: My cavalry flees, while Hamilton's Hatchling harasses them from overhead. Justin's Pikes claim the center hill while his Treemen face off against the Paladins in dying delaying action. Hamilton's Medium infantry crush the last of the legionnaire unit they were facing, while my other Legionnaire unit moves to make a stab at the center hill.

Mike's Pikes and my Unicorns kill off the last of Justin's cavalry and pikes. Justin surrenders.

Hamilton: My hatchling chases after Thane and he gives me the opportunity to turn around and march on the hill by backing out of the fight with my infantry, but I don't (should I have? dunno what that would have done. Interesting to consider, though -- probably even with a mage and lord my med. inf. would have gotten quickly chewed up by the heavyweight units coming in). I should have actually engaged with one or the other of Thanes cav to kill some more and drive them back (or vape the unit if I dropped it below 1/4th), but I didn't. My bad. Still I prevented their recovery this turn, basically putting Thane seriously out of commission. In the process, though, along with advancing my infantry on Thane's archers (and having my lancers pursue the turn before and unable to be used temporarily), I put myself well out of position to do anything the next turn to prevent Trevor from winning or even delay him.

Trevor: The Elves were at first trying to contest the hill from me, but their general acknowledged my superiority and RIGHT to that hill and laid down their arms. For the Elven Host serves Justice, not Evil like Hamilton's vile army. Half of my archers, not to be fooled by Hamilton's ploy to get behind my archers protecting the objective, formed a ring about the base of the objective to prevent him from interfering from my plans.

Thane: With Justin out of the way, Trevor is free to take the center hill with his paladins (he would have been hitting the Elf pikes in the rear anyway). He secures the northern two objectives, using one archer unit to delay Hamilton's Light Cavalry unit that somehow got behind his lines while I wasn't looking, while the other archer unit claims the NW objective. My Legionnaires are unable to get the paladins into pilla range, and they are just outside of my Fire Shaman's Flamestrike spell. With that, Trevor has two Stones and the Center Hill, winning the game.

Hamilton: Wow, look at how empty the middle of the board is! Trevor uses the archer unit I wasn't smart enough to attack in Turn 8 to defend the archers I could have been attacking this turn, and in a way that prevents me from contesting his only tentative hold on a victory condition. Kudos, Trevor.

Trevor: With no one to stop them (except a pesky dragon who died immediately), my paladins took the final objective, with these two pieces of ancient runes and the high ground claimed as my own *I* became the true victor. The other contenders in the battle laid down their weapons and returned home in shame. So is the penalty for fighting against the mighty Feudals.

Justin's Version: First off, I had a pretty decent starting position: quick access to 2 stones and the center hill. I decided to take the hill to my right (your left) with my longbows and Treemen, send the elite cav, one unit of pike, and the other longbows to deal with the dwarves for the other nearby stone, and keep one pike unit and the champ-on-dragon as reserves. All went well until I engaged Mike's Bear cav unit. This unit had about 50 wounds, at least as many attacks, armor 4 and magic resist 4. I seriously underestimated it. I took way too long breaking it, partly because my elite cav broke after the first turn of engagement because the Dwarf King-on-Bear killed my Wizard in one turn before he could cast any spells (I rolled an 11 when I needed a 10!?!?!).

That Dwarf flank ended up being the thorn in my side that killed me. I never broke through. Mike had a unit of Pikemen with TWO (2) Champions that would not break. I poured most of my resources into it, to no avail. (That 2 hero thing is something I will use in the future.) I suppose the gods of Arcana were rewarding my SLIGHT treachery with utter defeat (I agreed not to shoot at Thane's dragon that turn, and I kept my word. I simply shot at a different target of opportunity.) I think that if I had broken the Dwarven flank that I would have been able to hold both stones near me and maybe I could have taken the center. Let it be known that from this day forward there will be an undying enmity between my Elves and all Dwarven peoples!

Hamilton: Some lessons learned...
Strictly speaking, after we decided that no one could win on the first turn I should have petitioned to redeploy my forces so that I could put all my cavalry on the side in support of my newly formed objective -- beating up on Trevor. Since I didn't, and since I didn't entirely trust Thane to uphold his deal without some matching forces on our line, I ended up hitting Trevor piecemeal. I think I gave as good as I got throughout the game on both fronts, but without my dragon eating his mage and a swell shot from my cannon, Trevor would have just been laughing at me. He kinda was anyway in the end.

Learn this lesson, and learn it well (I wish I could after multiple punishments, but I don't actually play many games): pick an objective and devote all your resources to it in concert. Piecemeal attacks, pursuing meaningless units, wishy-washy lack of faith in agreements, divided fronts -- all of it will end in tears. If I had devoted more resources to Trevor and had the same few lucky shots, I *may* have been able to route him and still be a contender for the win. With any luck, good or bad, I should have been able to take him down with me and pave the way for Thane to win (not that he needed help until he started
shooting his own horses).

Another lesson: 50 peasants don't need a leader, they need mob mentality. This is the first time I had played my peasant mob in earnest, and if they hadn't lost their leader the 9 casualties they took wouldn't have forced a break test. They would have possibly hung on for another two or three turns before being at half strength took its toll.

Another lesson: Most units really benefit from leaders. I have been in the habit of taking units of (say) 25 infantry or 12 horsemen and not including a leader (partially because I don't have many hero figures painted), but that leader really helps in both unit magic saves, morale tests, and kills. Seems like a truism, but they're well worth the points -- don't leave 'em out!

Another lesson, as a side note -- people were pissing and moaning about Thane being a backstabber, but I didn't see any of it. Even if he hadn't verbally warned me he was ending our arrangement, he wasn't attacking me wantonly, but instead when his other problems had been worked out and I was the main thing remaining in his way. With enemies like that, who needs friends?