1500 Points vs High Elves

My second game ever with the Dwarves, I expected to be fighting Scott's Vampire Counts. Instead he brought out his High Elves.

The Dwarven Forces:

20 Warriors w/ Thane BSB (Ro Slowness, Ro Guarding) + Thane general (GW w/MRo Kragg & Ro Snorri, Ro Stone)
20 Longbeards w/ Runesmith (MRo Balance)
10 Thunderers
10 Thunderers
Cannon
Grudge Thrower
Organ Gun

The High Elf Forces:

15 Swordmasters w/Hero General
6 Silver Helms (w/Banner of ignore forests/woods)
1 Tiranoc Chariot
12 Sea Guard w/ High magic Mage
12 Sea Guard w/ Life magic Mage
2 RBTs

I essentially took my 1000pt list and added the Longbeards, BSB, and Runesmith.

The Battle:

Dwarves got the first turn, and the first GT shot destroys 9 Swordmasters. I didn't worry too much about the remaining 6 which advanced into my warriors (I later learned that 6 swordmasters are still too many). Moved one unit of thunderers onto a hill just in front of my deployment zone. Cannon does 2 wounds to an RBT, other shooting out of range.
The High Elf silverhelms moves through a wood and the chariot around woods, preparing to charge my thunderers on hill. The other High Elf units advance into firing range, lots of shooting at the Dwarven Thunderers.

The Longbeards move into a position to charge the silver helms/chariot if they overrun my thunderers on the hill. Those same Thunderers shoot the silver helms, GT fails to be of much use, cannon misses RBT, and the Organ gun blows up trying to finish off the swordmasters. Other thunderers shoot the seaguard.

In the High Elf turn, the silver helms and chariot charge the thunderers on the hill. Their stand-and-shoot brings it to only 2 silver helms left. The Chariot does minimal impact hits and Elven lances are rubber. Thunderers kill another silver helm in combat and the elves flee - dwarves give chase, the chariot is destroyed by woods and the remaining silver helm gets away.

The dwarven warriors w/BSB advance to just within 10 inches of the swordmasters. The longbeards on the flank are now way out of position as there is nothing on that flank to fight, so they try to march up to the Elven RBTs.
The thunderers finish of the last silver helm, cannon kills an RBT, GT kills a few random Sea Guard (was aiming for the Swordmasters).

The Swordmasters attempt to charge the Dwarf Warriors, rune of slowness prevents them from making it in (turns out to be inconsequential since high elves ALWAYS strike first...). Other elves line up to continue shooting my thunderers and canon crew.

The Dwarven warriors charge the swordmasters, lose the combat by 2 (due to massive casualties), and the BSB is killed, and so they run, getting away from the elves. Other shooting has been whittled down by elven shooting, my longbeards are still trying to get to the RBTs.

The swordmasters charge my GT, the rest of the elves set up a shooting gallery targetting my longbeards. The GT crew gets munched and they overrun towards my cannon.

The general's unit of warriors fails to rally and runs off the table. The longbeards realize they can't make it to the RBTs before the game ends, and try to back up a bit. The cannon pegs off the hero from the remaining unit of 4 Swordmasters (moral victory).

Shooting continues on the longbeards, cannon crew gets owned by the remaining swordmasters.

Result - solid victory or perhaps massacre for the elves - all I have left is half my longbeards + runesmith.

Lessons Learned:

• thunderers in 2 ranks on a hill can take a small cavalry charge
• High elves always strike first
• Swordmasters have 2 attacks each
• elves can win the shooting battle using RBTs against my thunderers
• magic was almost inconsequential with the MRoBalance vs 2 mages
• poor deployment on my part left the longbeards out of the game, if I'm going to spend that many points on them I need them to be in the thick of things killing stuff

Wow, Swordmasters used to just be good, now they are sick. If only my organ gun hadn't blown up it would have saved the game with only one decent shot at them. Also, had I kept my BSB alive I probably wouldn't have ran from the swordmasters. The Longbeards also could have been deployed to support the warriors, allowing just shooting to secure that flank... but I really didn't expect my thunderers to be enough to hold of the combined Heavy Cav and Chariot charge.