Back To The Battle Report - White Dwarf 120
Let us take a moment to drift back to December 1989.
White Dwarf issue 120 brought to light an example of peak late-eighties majesty in A Gathering of Eagles. Written by Peter Morrison, it was a pure window into the wild, unpolished, wonderfully swingy era of 3rd Ed WHFB.
Played and recorded in the days before balanced tournament packets or optimized net-lists, this was Roy Mackenzie’s Wood Elves vs Robert Darbyshire’s Orcs and Goblins. The process made even better by a mutual agreement to throw some of the strangest things in the monstrous compendium at each other until someone cried.
When you look at the army lists detailed, you realize instantly that 1989 was a completely different planet.
Roy’s Wood Elves didn’t just bring bows; they brought a deeply terrifying aviation club. We are talking about two separate Level 20 Heroes mounted on War Eagles. That is a tactical bombing wing*. And because the late-eighties fluff allowed for some magnificent cross-pollination, the Elves also rolled up with a unit of seven Zoats—centauroid reptilian wizards sporting double-handed weapons and a casual Level 15 Spellcaster command element.
Meanwhile, Robert’s Orc and Goblin horde looked like a traveling circus that had robbed an armory.
The greenskin roster boasted two "Man-Mangler" Stone Throwers, two "Skull Crusher" Stone Throwers, a Snotling Attack Wagon, a unit of mercenary Ogres, and a completely unbothered Level 25 Orc Hero named "A Gaffer". It is a beautiful, chaotic wall of text.
The tactical grand design, beautifully illustrated by the classic Gary Chalk art, was simple. The Orcs set up a living wall to protect their heavy artillery while hoping their swift-moving Wolf Riders could harass the Elven flanks.
Then the game actually started.
The Wood Elf archers took a massive forward stride and began raining an absolute curtain of arrows down upon the greenskins. But the real tragedy began when those two War Eagles swooped out of the gray sky like feathered lightning. They slammed right into the artillery lines, causing the crew of one Skull Crusher and a Man-Mangler to immediately abandon their posts, fleeing the field “with their bony little arms wrapped round their equally bony heads”**.
Sensing total victory, the Elven General threw caution to the wind and ordered his archers to charge the Orc Wolf Riders.
This is where the dice gods remembered they were playing Warhammer.
To the absolute dismay of the pointy-ears, disordered Goblins on giant wolves are still Goblins on giant wolves. In the resulting maelstrom of combat, the poor sword-armed Elves were utterly outclassed, failing to inflict a single casualty before being savaged and pushed back for their hubris. Suddenly, with the Ogres pushing forward and a Skull Crusher stone arcing over the lines, things were looking distinctly black for the Elves.
But as the battle report moves into its final act, the airborne Elven heroes decided they had witnessed enough comedy.
The General and his second-in-command dove their War Eagles straight into the main Orc regiment containing the enemy General, an Army Standard, and a wizard. In a display of pure, unadulterated hero-hammer, the Elven Lord's Frostblade instantly lopped the head right off one of the Wolf Rider heroes, scattering his retinue in a panic***. The main Orc block, suddenly realizing that giant predatory birds with magic swords were a bad workplace environment, failed a panic test and departed the battlefield by the shortest possible route.
The final nail in the greenskin coffin? The Zoat wizard casually strode forward and cast Wind Blast, systematically turning the remaining, isolated Goblins into target practice for the surviving archers****.
By the end of the report, the shattered remnants of the greenskin army laid down their arms and surrendered to the jubilant Elves.
Reading A Gathering of Eagles today brings back a profound sense of what the hobby used to be. It wasn't about competitive balance or strictly defined army archetypes. It was about the narrative joy of seeing a giant telepathic lizard-horse help two guys on massive eagles bully a bunch of panicking goblins off a table.
It had grit, it had incredible hand-drawn diagrams, and it had that irreplaceable, slightly madcap energy that defined the Old World's golden era.
They don't make them like this anymore.
* A Level 20 Wood Elf Hero on a War Eagle in 1989 cost roughly the same points as a small terraced house in Nottinghamshire.
**A masterclass in tactical military reporting from Peter Morrison here. Truly captures the noble martial tradition of the Goblin race.
*** Imagine being a legendary Orc chieftain, surviving decades of brutal tribal warfare, only to get your head turned into a frozen ice cube by a posh elf riding a giant pigeon.
**** Because nothing says "glorious fantasy triumph" quite like an ancient, mystical reptilian centaur using magical wind to blow a three-foot-tall goblin into an open field so your buddies can shoot him.
