Warmaster Beach

8/10/2019 Warmaster Beach

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In addition to this, all missile units in atower may stand and fire at units that attackany facing of the tower that they occupy, The

only stands that cannot do this are those thatare already engaged in combat with anotherunit that has charged the tower. As you cansee attacking an undamaged tower full ofmissile troops is more than slightly suicidalin most cases!

Other than this, all the normal rulesregarding attacking fortifications stand. Forexample, if by some miracle the attackingtroops do manage to wipe out all thedefenders in a tower, then they do notreceive any advance charge move. The onlyoption available to them is to consolidate

their position and occupy the tower.

BREACHESWhen a breach is caused, either by thedestruction of a wall section, or that of atower, you should remove the relevant partof the fortification that has been destroyed(if possible) and replace it with a suitablemarker or model, for example, some loosesand would be ideal. The area that waspreviously occupied by the wall section ortower is then treated as difficult terrain. This

will obviously confer a -1 Command penalty

on any units that occupy the breach, but willgive them the bonus of counting as being indefended terrain when charged.

This also obviously makes it impassable toanything except infantry, but line of sightcan be drawn through the breach for thepurposes of either missile fire or forcharging through it to units on the otherside. Although, as stated, the only units thatcan move through the breach would beinfantry. The only exception is when agateway is breached, as this is just breakingthe door down and it then allows any unit tomove through it as if it were permanentlyopen (which it is, since the gate is probablylying in splinters somewhere).

In certain cases you will find that a breachcaused in a wall or tower will destroy standsfrom a unit, possibly even destroying a standin the middle of the unit, which wouldnormally not be possible due to theRemoving Casualties rules. Such casualtiesdo not cause drive-backs because unitsstationed on the ramparts in this way expectto take casualties in this manner.

When casualties of this kind end up with astand in the middle of their unit beingdestroyed then count those stands that are

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Bretonnians hurry to stop the enemy at a breach in their wall


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left intact as independent unitsuntil the end of the Combatphase in that turn. In the case

of units with more than threestands (such as Empire unitswith attached skirmishers), anystands still in contact withother stands from the sameunit count as a unit. In the caseof a four stand unit it wouldgive you a one stand unit and atwo stand unit.

At the end of the Combat phasethese split units must reform

just as if they had beeninvolved in a combat.

Nominate one stand to reformaround and place the rest ofthe stands from the unit intocontact with that stand. Youmay rotate the nominatedstand if you wish, but in mostinstances there will be no callfor this.

TROOPS ON RAMPARTSWhilst not strictly speaking a new rule to covera hole I thought that adding something aboutthis was appropriate. Basically, vertical distanceis ignored as far as unit formation is concerned,

however troops in such a formation count asbeing in an irregular formation.

You will find that the main reason for doingthis will be to force the attacker to spread hisattacks over several units, thus reducing thechances of losing whole stands. Anotherreason to adopt this kind of formation

would be to plug gaps left in wall sections bybreaches, as explained above.

BATTERINGThe following provides a slight modificationto the battering rules and a little clarificationabout when you can fire artillery at walls,towers or gateways.

Firstly, you cannot fire at wall sections ortowers that are in the process of either beingassaulted, or battered by your troops ie, if

you have any troops on a wall section, in atower, assaulting a wall section, assaulting a

tower or battering a tower, wall section orgateway. These are effectively counted as

being in hand-to-hand combat, as are anyenemy units on the same wall section ortower, which does of course make themineligible as targets for missile fire.

Regarding battering by battering rams andlog rams (rules for which later on). This nowcounts as a first combat round for the unitthat is using the battering ram in the Combatphase. Which means that if the batteringmanages to successfully cause a breach thenthis counts as destroying your enemy in thefirst round of combat. This will allow theunit to abandon their battering ram or logram and make an advance charge throughthe breach of up to 20cm.

Another clarification is that battering cannot

be done during your opponents Combatphase. Once a turn is quite enough thankyou very much! This also means that thebattering units are only eligible to be shot atby conventional missile fire in thedefenders turn they can only be targetedby boiling oil attacks in the attackers turn,

just prior to the battering attempt.

In addition to this, any units with at leastone stand on the wall section or tower thatis being battered, may stand and fire at thebattering unit instead of using boiling oil. Ifthis causes the loss of a stand or the

destruction of the battering ram, then thebattering attempt is abandoned.

Empire troops assaulting a castle wall


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To summarise, attacking a wall section,tower or gateway in any way, whether that

be to assault or to batter it, effectively bringsthe attacking units into combat with thetroops on the ramparts of the particularpiece of the fortification. However, when theattacking unit is battering the fortification,the defender can only attack the batteringtroops (or battering ram) with S&S missilefire, or boiling oil attacks.

Units attacking units in a breach are notdrawn into combat with any units onadjacent standing wall sections. The reverseis also the case, in that troops assaulting a

wall section do not count as attacking troops

in adjoining breaches.

This is one instance where corner-to-cornercontact does not count. In addition, thismeans that units attacking breaches or wallsections in this way only have to spread outand maximise contact with adjacent troopsthat are also in a breach or on a wall section(whichever may be the case).

An example of thius would be if you have threewall sections, with an end-most sectionbreached. Now if all the sections are occupiedand a unit attacks the stand that occupies thebreached section, then the stands in theattacking unit could be placed behind oneanother, so that only one stand makes contact.However, if the stand in the breached sectionis part of the unit that is also on the adjacent

wall section, thenthe attacking unit

will have to assaultthat wall sectionand maybe the wallsection at the otherend of the wall inquestion if it hass u f f i c i e n t

movement to doso.

A unit assaulting themiddle wall section,then it must also

assault the other intactwall section as corner-to-corner contact doescount for wall sectionsof the same status (ie,breached or intact).However, it would notbe obliged to alsoattack the stand in thebreached section,unless it is from thesame unit as one of

the stands on the wall section that has beeninitially assaulted.

You can if you wish attack or assault all ofthe wall sections in question if the chargingstands have enough movement. But this isnot compulsory, apart from in the sort ofsituations outlined above.

FLYERS ATTACKING FORTIFICATIONSWhilst flyers may attack fortified targets inthe same way as infantry, hitting on 6s and

with no charge bonus. They may neveroccupy fortifications and thus if they win around of combat against troops infortifications, they may not pursue them for

a second round of combat and may eitherstand their ground, or fall back. Thedefenders, however, do still have to retreat.This may cause them to abandon theirdefensive position anyway.

However, flyers are unique in that they arethe only units that can actually attack unitsstationed in a tower without having to do sofrom the courtyard or adjoining ramparts.The normal rules for attacking towers stillapply though, so the defenders will notretreat and all the missile troops will be ableto stand and fire at the attacking flyers.

It does of course go without saying thatwhen flyers try to assault fortifications,then boiling oil attacks cannot be usedagainst them.

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Infantry pushing a battering ram

Archers protected by mantlets


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New Siege Equipment

EARTHWORKS

These are defensive works built by bothdefending and attacking forces in a siegeand sometimes in other situations as well.These are usually hastily constructed out ofearth (hence the name earthworks), logbarricades, upturned carts, barrels andgenerally whatever comes to hand.

In scenarios where it allows you to takeearthworks the following rules are used.Each section of earthworks purchasedcosts 15 points and is 40mm long and10mm wide, half the size of a standard

Warmaster base.

Unless otherwise specified in a particularscenario, earthworks are always deployedbefore the armies set up in the relevantdeployment zones, starting with thedefender deploying all his earthworks first,or dice off to decide if for some reason thereis no defined attacker and defender.Earthworks can be arranged together in

whatever formation is desired by thepurchasing player, a few examples areshown here.

Earthworks count as a linear feature thatconfers fortified status against missile fire for

any infantry or artillery deployed directlybehind them, or defended status against anyclose combat attacks directed against anyinfantry or artillery units placed directlybehind them. Obviously, this only counts onthe initial charge, as defended status cannotbe claimed in pursuit combat.

As you may have noticed earthworks servetwo functions for the defending player. Firstthey provide a front line of defence,something to soak up some of the enemyspower before he hits the fortress wallsthemselves. They also provide very good

speed bumps, slowing down andsometimes channelling the advance of siegeengines such as siege towers and batteringrams. However there is a way for the attackerto remove them.

To remove earthworks to make way for yoursiege towers and battering rams, a unit ofinfantry (and only infantry) must be adjacentto the earthworks at the beginning of theCombat phase and not already be engagedin combat. Then each stand in contact withan earthwork section gets its basic attacksagainst the earthwork (no charge bonuses,

as what the troops are doing is getting their

entrenching tools out). Any 6s that arerolled will destroy the earthwork that isattacked in this way. It is important that you

declare exactly which earthwork sectionseach stand is attacking, as each 40x10mmsection is effectively counted as a separateunit for these purposes.

LOG RAMSLog rams are effectively Battering rams but

without the added protection of anarmoured covering to shield the batteringunit. Log rams can be brought to bear muchmore rapidly than a Battering ram can be.The main disadvantage is, of course, the lackof protection, especially against boiling oilpoured on the battering unit by troops on

the ramparts above, or stand and fire fromthese units.

Attacking infantry units may be equippedwith Log rams. A unit that is equipped withLog rams may only make one move per turn,although it may abandon its Log rams at anypoint and is then unrestricted by this. Also,

when equipped with Log rams a unit maynot cross or move through any terrain whichis classed as difficult for movementpurposes, such as forests or earthworks.

If a unit equipped with Log rams is drivenback by enemy shooting or magic, then itcarries its Log rams with it unless forced toenter difficult terrain.

When a unit with a Log ram makes contactwith a fortress wall it will commencebattering in much the same way as aBattering ram. However, if as a result of aboiling oil attack or stand and fire from unitson the walls enough hits are inflicted toremove a whole stand then the batteringattempt fails as per the rules for usingboiling oil (treat it as if the defender had

rolled a 6 on the Boiling Oil table).

Orc mob with log ram


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LADDERSAlthough in the main rulebook it states thatall attacking units are assumed to be carrying

sufficient ladders and grappling hooks forfree here we have expanded upon this.Infantry units may only assault the walls of asfortress with a siege tower or by usingladders. It costs +5 points to equip each ofthe stands in a unit with ladders. Note: Unitsalready equipped with other siegeequipment, ie, siege towers, log rams,battering rams, mantlets, etc, cannot also beequipped with ladders this means that thebesieging general will have to consider whereand how he will launch his wall assaults.

Siege Equipment ListsThere are two distinct siege equipment lists;the siege equipment list and the siegeartillery equipment list. These lists work inthe same way, but access to them isdependant upon the specific restrictions of aparticular scenario. The scenario specialrules will specify exactly which lists may beused by which side.

Where siege equipment is allowed, any suchequipment is always purchasedindependently of the army list and isdeployed either as a unit in the case of some

siege engines or siege artillery; with anassigned unit for such things as batteringrams, log rams or siege towers; onto the

walls themselves such things as boiling oil;

or in the deployment zones with such thingsas earthworks.

Unless stated specifically in the particular

siege scenario that you are fighting, theamount of siege equipment available to eachside will be 25% of the relevant army total,rounding up to the nearest five points. Inaddition to this, only half of this may be spenton the siege artillery list, if this is actuallymade available to that army in the scenario.

For example, a 2,000 points army isattacking in a siege game. This means thatthe attacker may choose up to 2,000 pointsfrom whatever army list he is using, with thestandard 2 x min/max. In addition to this theplayer may also field up to 500 points of

siege equipment chosen from whicheversiege equipment lists are made available inthat scenario. If this includes the siegeartillery list, then only 250 points of this 500points may be used to buy siege equipmentfrom the siege artillery list.

Conversely, the defending forces wouldconsist of 1,000 points of troops, chosenfrom whatever army list is being used, usingthe 1 x min/max. In addition to this there

would be 250 points of siege equipmentchosen from whichever siege equipmentlists the scenario specifies as available to the

defending army.

Exactly what siege equipment can be takenwill depend on what siege equipment is

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High Elves assault a Bretonnian fortress with ladders


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SIEGE ARTILLERY LIST

SIEGE EQUIPMENT LIST

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allowed in the scenario. Earthworks areavailable to both the attacker and thedefender, as are siege engines.

Regardless of what equipment lists areavailable in a particular scenario they allhave to be bought out of the same siegeequipment allocation for an army. So usingthe first example of the defending force

with a 250 points siege equipmentallocation, if they had access to both theearthworks and the siege defendersequipment lists then they may spend up to250 points on either or both of these lists.The same is obviously true for attackers.The only difference will be whatequipment is available and almost certainly

the total points allocation, since attacking

armies will almost always be larger thandefending ones.

The only other rule to bear in mind when

using these equipment lists is that you maynever spend points from your army totalon siege equipment, or for that matterspend points from the siege equipmentallocation on units for your army. If youdont have enough siege equipment to usethe total equipment allocation then thosepoints are wasted.

All equipment is available to all armies of allraces in Warmaster for siege battles, with theonly exception being Bombards which maynot be used by Elves of any kindred, orBretonnians.

Type At

tack

Hits

Arm

our

Comm

and

UnitSize

Points

Min/M

ax

Earthwork Fieldwork Special 40x10mm 15 /

Boiling Oil M Special 1 5 / *1or Rock Dropper

Log Rams M Special 1 5 / *2

Ladders M Special 1 5 / *2

Sow M 3 3+ 1 5 / *2

Mantlets M Special 10 / *2

Siege Tower M 3 3+ 1 10 / *2

Battering Ram M 3 3+ 1 10 / *2

SPECIAL RULES

*1 Defenders Only Only the defenders in a siege may use these.

*2 Attackers Only Only the attackers in a siege may use these.

Special

Type At

tack

Hits

Arm

our

Comm

and

UnitSize

Points

Min/M

ax

Mangonel Artillery 0/4 3 0 1 80 /1

Bombard Artillery 0/4 3 0 1 90 /1 *1

Trebuchet Artillery 0/6 4 0 1 120 /1

SPECIAL RULES

*1 Bounce Shots from a Bombard bounce like cannons. May not be used by Elves of any

kindred, or Bretonnians.

Special


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Siege Scenarios

1. RACE FOR THE WATCH TOWER

The self-proclaimed Count Braken, leader ofone of the many small princedoms of theBorder Princes, owed much of his success tothe chance discovery of a vast hoard of goldand gems. These riches were discovered inan old Goblin-infested, ruined fort in thefoothills of the Vaults mountain range.

Since that chance discovery the Count hasused his new found wealth to rebuild thefort, employing the latest (if expensive)techniques straight from Tilea. He also usedhis money to expand his princedom andsoon trade was flourishing.

Little did the Count realise that a clan ofDwarfs living in the Vault Mountains werethe descendants of those who lived in thefortress in ancient times. Soon tales of theCounts success fell upon Dwarf ears. TheCount was outraged when gruff Dwarfenvoys arrived at his court demanding thatthe riches he had liberated by handed overto them. The Dwarfs were thrown out of theCounts court empty-handed and vowingrevenge. Before long the dispossessedDwarf clan had mobilised and weremarching upon the Counts castle.

When the Count heard of the Dwarfs on themarch he quite sensibly sent out a scoutingforce. The commander of the scouts decidedto occupy an old watch tower on the border

of the Counts domain so that they couldrelay information when the Dwarf army hadbeen spotted. When the scouts had nearly

reached the old watch tower they wereshocked at how quickly the Dwarfs hadmarched from their mountain dwelling. Therace was on for the scouts to reach the watchtower in time to light the beacon and warnthe Count at Braken Keep.

This battle was fought between the vanguardelements of the Dwarf army, commanded bythe Dwarf Lord Grimbold and the scoutingforce sent out from Braken Keep under thecommand of Hauptman Anders.

Despite the fact that this scenario is a siegerelated one, none of the siege rules actually

apply to it as it is not strictly speaking a siegescenario, merely the prelude to a siege.Therefore the Dwarfs have no siegeequipment built yet but may assault Empiretroops within the tower as described earlier.

Historically, the forces consisted of1,000 points of Empire troops and 1,500

points of Dwarfs. However you can, ofcourse, use any armies that you wish and anypoints values that you like, so long as theattacker has 50% more troops than the other.

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EMPIRE ARMY

Woods

Woods

Watchtower

80cm

DWARF ARMY

MAP 1 RACE FOR THE WATCH TOWER


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The aim of this battle is for the Empireplayer to get a unit to a terrain feature in themiddle of the table which represents the

watch tower and hold it for an entire turn, atwhich point the game will end with a victoryfor the Empire general. To count asoccupying the watch tower, there must be aunit of at least two stands inside the terrainfeature throughout two consecutive playerturns. What this means is that an Empireunit must enter the watch tower in one turn.Then it must remain within the watch towerthroughout the entirety of the followingDwarf turn and the following Empire turn.

If the Empire army withdraws prior to this,either due to reaching its break point, or

through the death of its general. Then theDwarfs automatically win the game. If theDwarfs withdraw through reaching theirbreak point or the death of their general,then the Empire automatically wins.

There is no turn limit for this scenario, inaddition to this Victory points are completelyignored in this scenario. The only thing thatmatters is who breaks first, or if the Empirearmy manages to hold onto the watch towerfor two consecutive turns, which results inthe beacon being lit and the warning to thedefenders of Braken Keep being sent.

The deployment zones, table set-up anddeployment of the armies are the same as fora normal battle. Both sides set up indeployment zones 80cm from each other,

with the army with the most units deployingthe first unit and then players alternatedeploying units. Of course if you wish to setup the armies using any form of hidden set-up, this is fine.

The only special thing about the table set-upin this battle is that there should be somekind of scenery piece placed in the exact

centre of the battlefield to represent thewatch tower. In addition, no terrain shouldbe setup within 20cm of the watchtower, torepresent the relatively clear ground that

you would find around such a structure.

2. A RIDE FOR HELPCount Braken soon became aware of the

Dwarf army, either from spotting the litbeacon on the horizon days ago, orbecause of the large army of Dwarfs thatsurrounded his keep and were toilingaway at building defensive earthworks.Knowing the Dwarfs excellent reputationfor conducting sieges the Count realisedthat he would need some help and fast!He would have to get a messengerthrough the Dwarf lines and request helpfrom his neighbours.

Upon choosing a relatively weak spot in theDwarf lines, the Count decided to send

some of his bravest cavalry led by his ownson, Gert Braken, for aid. They would, ofcourse, have to burst through the Dwarflines and run the gauntlet of missile andartillery fire to escape not a simple task!

Despite the fact that this is a siege relatedscenario, it uses the normal game rulesrather than the additional siege rules,

with one exception.


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If the Dwarfs won the previous scenario,they receive additional points to spendsolely on the earthworks siege equipment

list. These earthworks may be deployedwithin the Dwarf deployment zone prior tothe setup of any troops. This ought to cometo 100 points of earthworks and representsthe extra time the Dwarfs would have toprepare their siege-works.

This battle is fought between the Dwarfvanguard army and a small Empire cavalryforce. The Dwarf army is 1,000 points.

Whilst the Empire army consists of threeunits of Knights and an Empire General,

with no other equipment or troopsavailable.

You can, of course, use armies other thanthose in the scenario. However, if you do sothen the army that replaces the Empire armymust consist of a General and between oneand three units of cavalry, all of which mustbe bought out of 450 points (unless you areusing a Dwarf army, in which case this mustbe Rangers). You may not purchase anymagic items.

The table set-up and deployment are thesame as for a standard battle. In other

words, deploy terrain by whatever methodyou desire, then deploy the two armies in

deployment zones 80cm apart from eachother, starting with the Dwarf playerdeploying all of his army first, then theEmpire player deploying his small force.

The victory conditions for the scenario arequite simple. The Empire player must get atleast three stands and his general off the

table via the Dwarf s table edge, or break theDwarf army. Any other result ends up with avictory for the Dwarfs.

3. SIEGE OF BRAKEN KEEPThe Dwarf throng of Lord Grimbold hadprepared their defences and after a fewprobing attacks to test the Keeps defenders

were now in a position to mount a full scaleassault. The brave men of the Empire had

waited inside the castle watching the Dwarfsconstruct siege weapons and rams for theirfinal assault on the castle. Count Braken wastrapped inside his castle without knowing

whether any help would come.

This is the final and most important attackon Braken Keep, therefore it is all ornothing. The Dwarfs will stop at nothing tocapture the walls, and the men of theEmpire will sell their lives dearly to defendthe castle.

The most important piece of terrain on thetable is of course the fortress itself, which if

you have a large enough table should beplaced in the centre. If not then along one ofthe table edges. Ideally you should have six

wall sections (of 40mm length) and a towerper full 500 points of the defending army,plus the gateway. This will give you areasonable balance between having enough

walls that thedefender has to bestretched a bit inholding them all andnot having too muchthat the defender willfind it impossible tomount an effectivedefence. Other thanthis set up terrain as

you see fit, with thethe exception thatthere should be noterrain within 30cmof the fortress walls.

You may place afew fields, roadshedgerows and theodd isolated smallbuilding if you like,but these ought to bekept to an absoluteminimum.

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EMPIRE

DEPLOYMENT

ZONE

Braken Keep

80cm

DWARF DEPLOYMENT ZONE

MAP 2 SIEGE OF BRAKEN KEEP


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This battle was fought between a Dwarfarmy of 2,000 points and an Empire army of1,000 points (you can of course use different

points values, but the proportion mustremain the same in siege the attackershould outnumber the defender by at leasttwo-to-one). The battle could easily befought between any two armies.

The two armies may choose siegeequipment with a value of up to 25% of theirmain list. This is in addition to the armiesthat have been chosen as normal, as per theusual rules for siege battles as detailedelsewhere in this issue of Warmag.

The attacker may buy siege equipment fromthe Attacker Siege Equipment list, the Siege

Machine Equipment list, the Siege Artillerylist and the Earthworks list.

The defender may buy siege equipmentfrom the Defender Siege Equipment list andthe Earthworks list. Before the armies setup, place any necessary earthworks, ordefenders siege equipment within therelevant deployment zones. This is done inan alternate way, starting with the defenderplacing his first earthwork or piece ofdefender equipment first (such as boilingoil, for example).

Once this has been done, the two armies areset up. First of all the defender places all ofhis units within his deployment zone, whichall the area inside and including thefortifications and up to 15cm outside of thefortress walls.

Then, once the defender has deployed all hisunits, the attacker places all of his units andsiege equipment within his deployment zone,

which consists of all the area 60cm outsideof the defenders deployment zone.

The battle starts with the attacker takingthe first turn. The battle also lasts for a

random number ofturns, break points areignored (however thedeath of a general isnot).

At the end of each turnstarting on Turn six,roll a D6, adding theturn number to theresult. If the total is 11or more, then the gameends immediately.

However if you playedthe previous scenario

A Ride for Help this may be modifiedslightly. If the Empire player won thisscenario, by getting the message through,

then start rolling for the end of the game onTurn five instead of Turn six, as thereinforcements to lift the siege will arrivesooner.

The winner is determined by using Victorypoints, but do not count Victory points forcasualties. Rather, allocate Victory points forcontrolled sections of the castle, as shownbelow.

Section Points

Wall 50Tower 150

Gateway 100Courtyard 200

Control of each section is determined bywho has the greatest number of stands inthe area. If the number is equal, no Victorypoints are allocated for that section.

Destroyed walls, towers and gateways earnno Victory points for either side. In additionto this if an army general dies before or onTurn six, then that side automatically loses.If a general dies after Turn six, then use the

Victory Points table above and ignorecasualties for victory calculation. Whichever

side has more Victory points is deemed tohave won, there are no draws in a siege.

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