My copy of the expansion arrived today. And while I haven't had a chance to get it on the board, I wanted to do a quick run through on what was included.

"Scottish Wars: A Dwarven Perspective" is a larger expansion of the same size as the BattleLore: The Hundred Years' War - Crossbows & Polearms. It is important to note that while this has the dwarven units, it is primarily a medieval expansion. They give rules again on the Medieval-only Lore deck. In addition, the Dwarves are meant to represent the Scots, pure and simple. Most of the battles feature William Wallace and Robert the Bruce as their Commanders. Of course, you can still play it strictly as a Lore-based adventure as well.



The Scenarios cover a period from 1297 to 1346. They include Stirling Bridge, Falkirk, Bannockburn, Dupplin Moor, and Neville's Cross.

4 unit types are included:
* 2 (units) I.D. Cattle Riders
* 2 I.D. Clan Chiefs
* 4 I.D. Spear Bearers
* 4 Mounted Knights
I.D. = Iron Dwarves



Nothing new has been introduced with the Spear Bearers. We get the same Specialist Cards as with BattleLore: Dwarven Battalion Specialist Pack. A couple of the scenarios included (and we get 5 scenarios) use all 4 Spearbearers.

Cattle Riders, even though they are blue Mounted units, they can only move 2 hexes and battle. Nothing special about Battle so they still toss 3 dice. The Specialist Card allows you to switch out up to two Dwarven units and replace them with the same amount of Cattle Riders. They come with normal blue cavalry banners.

For those of you familiar with the Imperial Japanese Army in Memoir '44 - Pacific Theater, these are the Clan Chiefs in BattleLore. It is a complete unit (not an embed) that has 4 figures per unit. It is a blue unit that rolls 3 dice. It may move up to 2 hexes AND still battle in Melee. Also, it is "figure-dependent": when it has all 4 figures, it gets to roll one extra Battle Die. (so with 4 figs, 4 dice; with 1-3 figs, only 3 dice). They have their own new banner symbol which is zoomed in on the hilt of a sword. There is also one other "bonus" to the unit when it is at 4-figures: it is the first Bold2 unit in the game. It can ignore up to 2-flags when standing alone. But this is only valid when it has all 4 figures. At 3 figures, it drops back down to Bold1.

There are two version of the Specialist Card. The first allows you to ADD one Clan Chief in a section that ONLY has I.D. units. It must be adjacent to one unit already there. The second version allows you to SWITCH-OUT up to ANY 2 units and replace them with the same amount of Clan Chiefs. You are only allowed to do this if the final result is a section that contains ONLY I.D. units (in other words, you can switch out two human units to get the Clan Chiefs if that replaces all the remaining human units). It is assumed the Section only refers to your side of the battlefield - your opponent's field is excluded. One question to ask though is if this is going to be strictly enforced in Reluctant Allies (I would suggest a rule that if all of your units in one section are all Dwarven then the Clan Chiefs can enter the battle). Otherwise, this may be another Specialist Card casualty in the Epic series.

Finally, there are the Mounted Knights. These guys aren't Dwarves as I think most of you know already. They are a special unit and carry their own unique weapon. As Mounted Knights, they are Bold. So you can send them out to sortie on their own and they can ignore one flag and possibly battle back.

Their special weapon is the Knight's Lance. Melee only and hits on the targetted unit's helm color. It also hits on the Sword on Shield but for no special effect. Also, there is a defensive bonus to this guy - he ignores one Sword on Shield (SoS) against him. So when going against regular foot units, the foot units usually miss on the first SoS and now they will miss on the 2nd as well. So in most cases, he is going to ignore at least 1 flag and possibly 2 SoS. Only red helms are going to get through to this guy since he is a Red Mounted unit (which of course means he moves 2 hexes and tosses 4 dice).

He comes with a new banner type, although it may be a bit difficult to distinguish. It looks like the regular cavalry with the long sword. However, the silohuette is much smaller as it is scaled to accomodate the long lance. Next to each other, they are easy to see the difference. In the heat of battle, not so sure. But the miniature sculpt is different as well. The Specialist Cards allow you to SWITCH-OUT up to ANY 2 units adjacent to any Green Unit and replace them with the same number of Mounted Knights. So it is going to be important to place your units in pairs when using Call to Arms. Seems like Vantage Point may be a good companion card to ensure that you get a 2nd unit adjacent to Green units and then switch those new units out with the Knights to have them up front to do the most damage early.


(image by Aingeru)

Excellent, CF. Thanks for the breakdown as I was wondering about the details of this expansion.

Thanks for the very complete preview. The "Clan Chiefs" sound reasonable as a body--as late as Culloden these were the leading fighters in the Highland Charge, though I could also see using them two to a unit as the "front rank" yielding the same effect but taking the first casualties in that unit.

The lance-armed Knights are a much-needed fill to the Heavy Cavalry void. I'm a little surprised they don't get a "first shock" attack immune to Battle Back representing the reach of the lance in the initial charge.

I'm more surprised--as well as mildly amused--that they continue the "Sinister Curse" of mounted miniature figures in certain games going all the way back to the old 3M "Feudal" in which mounted figures are left-handed! This would not have happened as ancient and medieval troops were required to fight right-handed so that formations could present consistent protection using their shields (the exception was Anglo-Danish Huscarls who wielded their five-foot-shaft axes two-handed using a left-hand swing to reach past the defender's shield protection and impact the right arm, body, or head/neck area).

Glad to see the Scottish Wars getting representation and the schiltrons making their appearance.

Hopefully the future will offer on-field Leaders. Looking forward to true Fantasy armies in 2008, too.

Thanks for the post. I have been waiting for a long while to see what was in this expansion.

Interesting. If the trend continues the dwarves awesome bold1 ability might be balanced by weaker cavalry. Sounds like an interesting way to create some racial distinction.

I wasn't that interested in this expansion, but the historical scenarios might sway me. Thanks for the write up!