I faced off against the excellent Paul Brooksbank's mixed Order faction of Seraphon and Wood Elves in a 1000 pt game of Take & Hold at my local gaming club

this is what he had

1 Saurus Old Blood on Carnosaur

20 glade guard

10 Saurus Warriors

8 Glade Riders

5 Saurus Cav

And I made a slight tweak to my Seeds of Hope 1000pt force by downgrading Skrolk to a regular Priest and taking 10 less Plague Monks and replacing them with a Plagueclaw.

1 Corruptor

1 Plague Priest

1 Plague Furnace

20 Plague Monks , foetid blades

10 Plague Monks, woe staves

1 Plagueclaw

I took the command trait that allowed +1 to hit against Order within 10" of my general, to buff my Plagueclaw with, and two Crown of Conquests to give me Inspiring presence on both of my Plague Monk units. He took a bravery buff and something that gave his General +1 damage on his melee weapon.

Set up

This game I was much more concious of my Plague Furnace moving fast and covering ground, so I set up my Monks accordingly, giving it a tasty 10inch movement bonus by crowding them around it on deployment. I messed up by putting my Corruptor more than 13inchs away from anything, so he was out of range to do most of his Skaven command abilties in the Hero phase, but I soon moved him into the right place on turn 1.

Again I got to dictate the first turn by dropping my formation all in one go, making 5 drops in total. I gave him the first go hoping he would move up into range for a turn 1 charge, which worked out pretty well. He rushed his Glade Guard forward on my LHS supported by the Carnosaur, in a hope to get them into range for a shooting attack. They got one wound off on the Plagueclaw which was pretty underwhelming.

Pestilens Turn 1

I used my movement bonus to move my Furnace up 14" and easily within charge range of the Glade Riders who had fallen for my devilish plan, and I rolled something like an 11 for the charge so it went hairing into them, taking out 3 of them on the charge and tarpitting them which worked out pretty well.

Turn 2

I dont have it pictured, but he advanced his 5 Saurus Cav onto the ruins in the center of the table but opted to hold them there, so I charged in with my plague Monks and took them out with something like 52 attacks on the charge , re-rolling to hit and wound . He shot everything he had at the Plague Furnace and took a few more wounds off it, leaving it on 3 wounds left. The Plagueclaw took out a few Glade Guard but they passed their battleshock.

Turn 3

I was in the ascendency by this point after wipng his Saurus Cav out and grinding his Glade Riders down, the Saurus Oldblood had been hanging back using his sunbolt gauntlet shooting attack thing as it seemed weary of charging into my Corruptor and Monks , so capatilising on this I got a couple rounds of Arcane bolts off into it over 2 turns then I got off a charge with my Corruptor straight into him. He was on 6 wounds left and my Corruptor was undamaged and on full health, so I was confident that supported with the ten Monk, he would make short work of it.

But this is where I royally screwed up and made a mistake which almost cost me the game.

Somehow, I got distracted by my Plaguemonks failing a charge, which never normally happens as they get a re-roll to charge buff from the formation synergy. I rolled a 5 first roll, which was enough to get in, but decided to try and roll higher so I could get more Monks into contact, but I re-rolled a 4 and the charge failed!

Then, and this is the REALLY dumb thing, I elected to fight with my Plague Furnace first INSTEAD of the Corruptor, completely forgetting I had that combat going on. So I gleefully squashed the remaining Glade Rider under the wheels of the Furnace, then my celebrations were short lived as I turned with horror to realise he was going to attack with his Saurus Oldblood on my General! He should've really died in that combat and it would've served me right for being such an asshat, but 9 wounds later and his life was hanging by a thread and things were suddenly swinging back to Order's advantage, with my Furnace also only on 3 wounds left.

Turn 4

I think It took two rounds of combat to finish off my Corruptor and by end of turn 3 he was toast, I think I got one or two wounds off back on his Saurus taking it up to 8 wounds off. I think this turn he also got a couple more wounds off on the Furnace leaving it with only 1 wound remaining. I think I took out 9 Glade Guard in a shot form the Plagueclaw too which helped a bit against the shooting. He was able to make a sweet charge with his Saurus, getting into range of both the Furnace and the Monks, and by splitting his attacks between both, he took out both units with ease. Then my Plague Priest walked up to him at the start of my turn 4 and used his Pestilent Breath attack and Belched a cloud of bright green breathe into his face giving d3 mortal wounds and finished him off. Pretty sweet way to kill him and that was the only thing my Priest did all game!

Turn 5

I had made a mistake by hanging back with my Monks in the center, and the Glade Guard were able to whittle them down with shooting. I should've rushed them across the battlefield toward the Saurus in the center and covered as much ground as possible. I stupidly thought they were going to get shooting cover but obviously with a save of '-' they didn't get the bonus and got shot to pieces by the Elven archery. His last chance to win the game on points was to take out that unit in the centre, as I was slightly ahead by about 80 points, which my sloppy generalship almost allowed on turn 5, but fortunately the Glade Guards poor rolling and the Saurus warriors failing their charge gave me the game.

What should have been a crushing Major victory for me turned into a narrow win down to some dodgy choices I made around turn 3, which I will learn from!

So far that takes me to P:8 W:3 L:5 with my Pestilens , slowly starting to improve!

The main thing is I can now play a game of AOS without having to keep looking things up constantly and am confident with the rules. I just need to become more tactically astute and cut out the silly mistakes, and I'll be laughing all the way to the Plague Altar.