The Envoy across the Water (Forgotten Ruin)

It was a story as old as time. Tiger Troop had just settled back into the camp and were drying out their feet when the L.T. announced that they needed to move out immediately. The goblin envoy was in trouble on Fastbeck Island and specifically asked for them. The only good news was that local fishingfolk were going to transport them there, so that they would not need to traverse the ancient, damp and crumbling tunnel that connected the north of Corner Plains with Fastbeck Island.

An ancient church huddles in the landscape against the inclement weather

In other important news, Sergeant Harding would be accompanying them, and because he was there, they would get additional support in planning the mission. It turned out that Orc warbands had ambushed the envoy and stolen important documents. The envoy was in hiding near where the Orcs were based and it was Tiger Troop's responsibility to rescue him and recover the documents. Simple! Well, apart from the Orcs, of course, who would certainly object to this being done.

It was probably just as well that they had not had time to dry out their boots after the last patrol. Fastbeck Island was a swampy, damp hellhole. They would be wading through the mire on this one and damp feet would be the least of their worries. The only real consolation was that it was now spring, so the water would be less icy and they would not be slogging through snow. Mud was a luxury compared to slogging through icy water and snow.

The mission area was a mix of low-lying marshes, broken ground and low rises with scrubby bushes and not a lot else. A single ruined building from before the cataclysm stood on a hill. The layout suggested an old church, but there was not enough left of it to be certain. The envoy was probably in the church, and his bag had been thrown into some bushes nearby.

Harding took charge of B-Team and set out to secure the troop's flank. Pan took A-Team and headed off in to the ruins of the church. The Orcs ahead of them seemed to be fairly run of the mill, except for two, who were larger than the others and much better armed and armoured. Fortunately, the group of Orcs they were with seemed to be distracted by some tale that the two were telling, while the archers near them seemed more intent on charging into melee than shooting Tiger Troop. This worked in the team's favour. As the archers charged, B-Team mowed them down.

Meanwhile, Pan had secured the envoy's bag and was racing around the church looking for the envoy, with A-Team covering her as Orc spearmen charged and were mowed down as quickly as their bow-armed compatriots.

As Pan confirmed that she had secured the envoy, the large Orcs finished their story and became aware of the noise of gunfire around them. They charged B-Team, losing a spearorc as they did so. B-Team began the process of a fighting withdrawal, staying just ahead of the Orcs as they retreated to the RVP. The Orcs were almost on top of B-Team when Vesela opened up with the Team Support Weapon and Selcuk dropped a grenade in the middle of the mob of Orcs. Bits of Orc blew everywhere.

A mob of light spearorcs was charging as fast as it could towards B-Team, but Tiger Troop was already boarding the boats before they got anywhere near. Mission complete, they returned to base, were debriefed and prepared to kick back for a while.

Conclusion

That was all a bit easy again! The dice placed the objectives near each other, and the complication was that one of them would move each turn. As it turned out, Pan got the first objective on the first turn and the other one obligingly moved towards her, so she nabbed that one on turn three. After that, it was just a case of retreating off the table. I diced for game end, and the game ended the second that Pan did that.

On top of that, the archers suffered War Rage and charged every turn instead of shooting. It's meant to be random each turn, but the archers got the first two rolls, the spearorcs died on turn two due to the application of massive firepower and the other orcs were unaware until too late in the game for them to be picked. Even the reinforcements arrived too far away to do anything about Tiger Troop.

There were a couple of tense moments when I rolled nothing but 1s on a turn for the effects of hits, and thus bullets bounced off Orcish hides, but the Orcs were not close enough to be a serious threat at that point.