There is yet another tournament coming up at Tower Games, and I'm able to make it out to this one. I'd considered playing Retribution for this one, but I have just a little too much work to do in terms of assembling models if I want 2 balanced lists. So I'll be playing Skorne. Specifically, I'll be playing my current favorite warlock, Makeda 3, and the warlock I learned the game with, Makeda 1.
Both these lists are taken (to one degree or another) from the internet. The Makeda 3 list is based on one by a PP Forum member who goes by Staks, and the Makeda 1 list is basically identical to the one Lord Tyrant Watt used at Templecon. I suppose I should be ashamed for netdecking, but frankly both these lists look fun enough that I don't care.
Makeda and the Exalted Court (*2pts)
*Molik Karn (11pts)
*Bronzeback Titan (10pts)
*Titan Gladiator (8pts)
*Cyclops Brute (5pts)
*Cyclops Brute (5pts)
*Cyclops Savage (5pts)
*Basilisk Krea (4pts)
Paingiver Beast Handlers (Leader and 3 Grunts) (2pts)
Agonizer (2pts)
I played a similar list (3 Brutes instead of 2 Brutes and a Savage) a little while ago, and had so much fun, I decided to try it for the tournament. The reason I'm running a Savage instead of a 3rd Brute is partly because I could only find one other Brute for sale, and also partly because even though I am extremely lazy about painting, I prefer to play with painted models, and my Savage is painted.
The Brutes and Savage stand in for infantry in a jamming/screening role. The Brutes typically need to be removed by a heavy hitter, which can be taken out by my heavies in the second line. They're also good at standing around in zones if they opponent doesn't want to expose the kind of thing that could deal with them. The Savage is a lot squishier than the Brutes, but it's also a lot better at offense. It can do a lot of damage, especially with Makeda's Feat making it hyper efficient.
The rest of the crew doesn't need much explanation. Molik is too good not to take with Makeda 3, and the Bronzeback and Gladiator are both solid heavies that let her make the most of her abilities. The Krea is there on top of the 4 potential Shield Guards in the list to shut down enemy shooting as hard as possible. The Agonizer is there for the extra defense against enemy beasts and 'jacks.
Archdomina Makeda (*5pts)
*Mammoth (20pts)
*Cyclops Raider (5pts)
*Basilisk Krea (4pts)
Cataphract Cetrati (Leader and 5 Grunts) (11pts)
Nihilators (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
Paingiver Beast Handlers (Leader and 3 Grunts) (2pts)
Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew (Leader and 1 Grunt) (1pt)
Extoller Soulward (2pts)
Mortitheurge Willbreaker (2pts)
This is another brand new list for me. I've played the Mammoth with Makeda 1 before, and it worked out really well, but I haven't tried this particular list out yet. It looks very solid though, and it's inspired my to actually finish getting my Mammoth put together (mostly - some of the parts will be pinned on or left off until the whole thing's painted).
The Mammoth is going to be the workhorse - er - elephant...triceratops...thing, and gives the list a lot of flexibility. The guns can do serious work against both infantry and heavies, and give the list a ranged element a lot of my Skorne armies lack. It's also the list's finishing piece, since it does such good damage in melee too. It can seriously threaten even heavies and colossi in melee, especially if they've softened up with gunfire or infantry.
The Cetrati are a very durable brick that usually takes some serious work to clear out. They can shrug off Mammoth blast damage so they'll be good for screening it. They're also surprisingly mobile with Makeda 1 due to savagery. This list has them advancing 10" in Shield Wall, after which they can make attacks. I debated swapping the Nihilators in the original list for Swordsmen, but I decided that with the Mammoth picking up so much of the anti-infantry load, I'd rather have a more dependable screen than offensive ability, and Nihilators bring that with Reach and Tough.
I don't have enough experience with these lists to know all my matchups yet. Right now, I think Makeda 1 is a good drop against Cryx, Circle, Legion, and Khador, since the Mammoth's guns give me good options against those factions. Makeda 3 will probably go up against Trollbloods, Convergence, and the Skorne mirror match. The other factions are up in the air. Either could handle Cygnar or Retribution, although I'm tempted to prefer Makeda 3 since that list is pretty shooting-resistant. I like Makeda 3's list against Protectorate, but I'm not wild about stuff like Self Sacrifice shutting down her Feat, or spell immunity in general limiting her actions. On the other hand, Makeda 1 has more tools, but Purification is not nice to her without Marketh around.
That's it, just more army lists. I'll probably do some quick writeups of my practice games, and a full report of all my tournament games, probably by sometime in the middle of next week. I always look forward to tournaments when I can play them, and I really look forward to writing the reports.
Thursday, March 20, 2014
Sunday, March 16, 2014
Battle Report: Issyria vs. eKaya, 50pts
I got in another 50pt game this past Friday, and I decided to try out Retribution's newest Warcaster: Issyria, Sibyl of Dawn. I talk about the list at some length in this post. For those who don't want to read all about it, the list was:
Issyria, Sibyl of Dawn (+6)
*Phoenix (10)
*Banshee (10)
10 Dawnguard Invictors (10)
*Officer and Standard Bearer (2)
10 Mage Hunter Strike Force (8)
*Strike Force Commander (2)
10 Houseguard Halberdiers (7)
*Officer and Standard Bearer (2)
*Soulless Escort (1)
Houseguard Thane (2)
Arcanist (1)
Arcanist (1)
It looks pretty balanced. It has a strong shooting game, and a very hard alpha strike with the Halberdiers. The 'jacks and Invictors are pretty good at melee in the second wave as well.
My regular opponent and co-blogger, Caleb, is just getting back into Circle Orboros after a long hiatus, and decided to run the following list.
Kaya the Moon Hunter and Laris (+3) - Call of the Wild Tier 4
*Warpwolf Stalker (9)
*Feral Warpwolf (8)
*Gnarlhorn Satyr (7)
*Gorax (4)
*Laris (-)
5 Warpborn Skinwalkers (8)
*Warpborn Alpha (3)
6 Druids of Orboros (7)
*Druids of Orboros Overseer (2)
3 Shifting Stones (2)
*Stone Keeper (1)
Druid Wilder (2)
This is a Tier 4 theme list, so all the heavy warbeasts have Advance Deploy and cost 1 point less. Additionally, Caleb will get +1 to his starting roll, and the Skinwalkers have Advance Move. As for the rest of the list, eKaya is plenty fast enough without having all her heavies AD. All three heavies are Spd 6, and can have an extra 4 to 6 inches of movement if they need it.
Since there are pictures, I should mention Caleb has a few proxies. The Feral is represented by a Wold Guardian. The Gorax is represented by a Wold Watcher. The Skinwalkers are represented by some Trollkin Warders, with Skaldi Bonehammer playing the part of the Alpha. Finally, Kaya is represented by Lanyssa Ryssyll, and Laris is represented by a Wold Stalker.
I didn't bring any proxies, although my army is still rocking its White Metal Silver and Unpigmented Plastic Gray color scheme until I get an actual scheme picked out.
And now, on to the game. We decided to play Incursion, since it was easy to set up, and we didn't feel like going back to the main floor and asking people to move so we could pull out the scenario box.
Deployment
Caleb won the roll-off, and decided to go first.
He deployed his Skinwalkers, the Wilder, the Gorax, Laris and Kaya in the middle-ish of his deployment zone.
I deployed in a pretty basic line. The Halberdiers went on the right, while the Invictors went on the left. The Phoenix went in the middle, while the Banshee went on the left behind the Invictors. Issyria deployed in the center, and the Arcanists deployed behind their respective 'jacks.
Caleb loaded his heavies and Shifting Stones into the center-left to oppose mine, and put the Druids on the right to support the Skinwalkers against my Halberdiers. Finally, I deployed the MHSF on the right to shoot those pesky druids.
After deployment, the Skinwalkers take their Advance Move 5" forward.
Circle, Turn 1
The Circle heavies and Skinwalkers ran forward cautiously. Caleb knew I had good range on my guns, and if he ran flat out, he'd be likely to pay for it. The Druids ran forward on the flank. The Lights and Wilder ran up to support the heavies. The Stones shifted up. Kaya put Forced Evolution on the Feral, and Shadow Pack on herself, and walked up to a few inches behind the heavies.
Caleb had put himself in a pretty good position. He was out of the threat range of anything but my MHSF. The Druids were in a little danger, but the rest of the army was safe behind its armor from their Pow 10 shots. I had no choice but to advance into Kaya's (frankly absurd) threat ranges. Hopefully, I'd be able to stick it out past the alpha strike and hit back hard enough to stay in the game.
Retribution, Turn 1
Issyria held onto all her Focus. The MHSF advanced and shot the Druids, but only hit twice (needing 8's I'd hoped for a little better), killing one Druid and doing 2 damage to the Overseer.
The Thane advanced, and used Desperate Pace on the Halberdiers, who ran to jam Caleb up and screen my heavies.
The Arcanists advanced, and handed out Focus with Power Booster, and the Myrmidons ran up to where I thought it would be tough to get to them. The Invictors ran up behind the Banshee. Issyria advanced, and put Inviolable Resolve on the Phoenix and Admonition on the Banshee.
I was well within Caleb's threat range here, but unfortunately, I didn't have much choice. I could only hope that my positioning was good enough limit the damage he could do enough that my counterattack would hurt. On paper, Issyria has serious trouble with attrition if she ever gets behind.
Circle, Turn 2
Caleb decided to drop Shadow Pack, since Issyria's feat gives True Sight, but Kaya upkept Forced Evolution.
The Druids all advanced, but didn't get quite within Stealth range of the Mage Hunters. Unperturbed, the Overseer cast The Devouring, a 4" AoE spell with a Pow of 8 +1 for every model in the unit. Unfortunately, he was unlucky with the scatter, and only killed one. The rest of the Druids tried to shoot the Halberdiers with Force Bolt, but were out of range thanks to the Soulless Escort's Mage Static ability.
The Skinwalkers charged in, but had a little trouble hitting the Mage Hunters and Halberdiers at Mat 6. They only killed 2 Mage Hunters. Laris ran up to just behind the Skinwalkers.
At this point, Caleb decided to go after my heavies. Kaya used her Feat, which allows her to force Warbeasts outside her CTRL, and allows them to teleprt back to within 3" of her after their activations. Then she channeled Dogpile through Laris onto the Phoenix, and hit.
The Gorax advanced, and cast Primal (+2 Str and Mat) on the Stalker, which the Shifting Stones teleported forward across the wall, and into melee with a Halberdier and the Banshee. Admonition doesn't trigger on place effects like teleportation, so my Banshee was out of luck. The Stalker warped for Strength, killed the Halberdier, and easily scrapped the Banshee, then teleported out next to Kaya and a Shifting Stone.
The Druid Wilder cast Primal on the Feral. Then the Feral Warped for Speed, and charged the Phoenix. It took all the Feral's attacks, but the Phoenix was also destroyed. Caleb decided not to teleport the Feral back, since that way, I'd have to deal with it.
Finally, Caleb saw an opportunity to really reduce my counterattack. The Gnarlhorn used its own Animus, Bounding, and slammed the Feral over 6 of my Dawnguard Invictors, killing them all despite their being Arm 17 from Defensive Line. The Gnarlhorn teleported back next to the Stalker.
Gross! Well, there went Issyria's ability to make any attacks of her own along with the Invictors' ability to Flank. Not to mention two 10pt Myrmidons. I really misjudged those threat ranges, and I really paid for it. I had two things going for me, however. First, the Feral and the Stalker would automatically Frenzy on Caleb's next turn due to Primal. Second, I did still have most of my infantry, and a Feat to make them hit at peak efficiency. The only question was, would that be enough?
Retribution, Turn 2
Issyria activated first, recast Inviolable Resolve on the Invictors, and Admonition on herself. Then she moved to get the whole army in her CTRL and popped her Feat, giving everybody True Sight (ignore Concealment Camouflage and Stealth), and an additional die on all attack and damage rolls, discarding the die of my choice.
The MHSF went next putting a little damage on the two Skinwalkers engaging them with CMA's, and killing 2 more Druids with extra-accurate aimed crossbow bolts, including the Overseer.
The Halberdiers used their mini-Feat to gain Gang, and charged the Skinwalkers, killing every one they could reach. Then they backed off, with Reform so the frenzying Stalker would attack Laris, and turned so that they could charge the Feral next turn if necessary. Then the Thane charged the remaining Skinwalker, but only did one damage.
The Invictors marched around the now knocked down Feral, used their Extend Fire mini-Feat for extra range, and pumped 3 CRA's into the Stalker, reducing it to 6 hit points.
The Arcanists looked at each other, shrugged, and milled around to stay out of my way, but get in the Feral's way.
That was...not so terrible. Damaging the Stalker was a huge boon. The Feral would be a serious problem next turn, but I'd freed up enough of the rest of my infantry that I was pretty optimistic about my odds of dealing with it. The Stalker was heavily damaged, and hopefully, I could finish both the wolves off, and come out ahead.
Circle, Turn 3
Caleb was suddenly faced with a dilemma. Kaya camped 3 Fury last turn to ward off any janky ranged assassination run I might have gone for, and had 6 Fury out on the table - 1 on Laris, 2 on the Gorax, and 3 on the Gnarlhorn. After some internal weighing of evils, Caleb decided to Leach from Laris and the Gorax, and let the Gnarlhorn take a Threshold check. It failed, and Frenzied into the Stalker, killing it. The Feral Warpwolf Frenzied automatically by standing up and walking at my Halberdier Standard Bearer - the closest model it could see.
Caleb was feeling a little desperate here, and decided to go for an assassination run. First, he needed to clear out my Halberdiers. The last Skinwalker killed the Thane to get rid of Inspiration. The Stone Keeper advanced, and killed one with a spell. Kaya advanced, and killed 2 more with her staff and one more with Muzzle. The three survivors took a Command check, but passed. The Wilder put Primal on Laris.
Laris charged at Issyria, but Caleb had forgotten about Admonition. (And I forgot to warn him beforehand, which I normally would do since it was his first game with circle in a looong time. But it was getting late, and I'd zoned out a bit.) So Issyria hopped away, unscathed. Laris used her Animus Spirit Shift to teleport back to Kaya and screen her as well as possible.
No pic for this turn, but Kaya was hugely exposed, and we just decided to finish it rather than take a break for pictures.
Retribution, Turn 3
I dropped Inviolable Resolve. Issyria advanced, cast Admonition on herself again, and cast Blinding Light at Kaya to reduce her Def by 2.
The Mage Hunters who weren't engaged either moved or aimed to shoot at Kaya, and reduced her to 2 hit boxes. The Invictors advanced, and finished her off with a single CRA.
Victory to the Retribution!
Thoughts
This was my first game with Issyria against an experienced opponent, and I definitely did some bungling. I went and lost both my heavies and half my Invictors by putting them too far forward on turn 1. I came back pretty well on turn 2, and not having to worry about any of the Circle heavies for a turn definitely helped. My target selection on turn 2 was good, and probably saved the game for me. There are a bunch of minor errors in positioning and deployment that made things harder than they needed to be, though. For instance, I probably should have deployed the Phoenix further out to the right, so that it could support the Mage Hunters a little better. And I could have jammed the Feral better on turn 2 with the by-then superfluous Arcanists.
The list was fun to play, and proved its ability to claw its way back into the game even after a lot of its options had been removed. Issyra's Feat is very good, and worked well with all the shooting. If I'd had even 2 more Invictors on that turn, I'd have killed the Stalker, and felt much better about my options. I need more games in with this incarnation of the list before I decide to swap anything around, but I'm definitely considering a few options. I'd really like some Mage Hunter Assassins to charge out with a 16" Threat under Crusader's Call and the hilarious accuracy and damage buff of the Feat. I'd also like another Arc Node in the list, probably a Chimera, but maybe a second Phoenix.
Caleb was coming back to Circle after a long stint playing only Trollbloods, and this was his first game with eKaya, so he made some mistakes as well. He planned his attack on turn 2 well, but didn't manage Fury or place his beasts after teleportation particularly well. He could have avoided killing his own Stalker by placing the Gnarlhorn differently, possibly getting it to Frenzy into a stone or the Wilder. I'm not convinced the Stalker should have gone after the Banshee, since it could have killed a lot of Halberdiers with Primal and Berserk, but on the other hand, the Banshee is pretty threatening at both melee and range.
Caleb's eKaya list was very cool. Her Tier gives some excellent benefits without preventing Kaya from taking the models she really wants to take. I might try to get a second set of stones in there, but otherwise, it looks very solid. Once Caleb starts getting the Circle playstyle down again, that list is going to serve him well.
Something else I noticed while writing this up is that I tend to narrate my opponent's turns in the present tense, and my own turns in the past tense. Weird.
Issyria, Sibyl of Dawn (+6)
*Phoenix (10)
*Banshee (10)
10 Dawnguard Invictors (10)
*Officer and Standard Bearer (2)
10 Mage Hunter Strike Force (8)
*Strike Force Commander (2)
10 Houseguard Halberdiers (7)
*Officer and Standard Bearer (2)
*Soulless Escort (1)
Houseguard Thane (2)
Arcanist (1)
Arcanist (1)
It looks pretty balanced. It has a strong shooting game, and a very hard alpha strike with the Halberdiers. The 'jacks and Invictors are pretty good at melee in the second wave as well.
My regular opponent and co-blogger, Caleb, is just getting back into Circle Orboros after a long hiatus, and decided to run the following list.
Kaya the Moon Hunter and Laris (+3) - Call of the Wild Tier 4
*Warpwolf Stalker (9)
*Feral Warpwolf (8)
*Gnarlhorn Satyr (7)
*Gorax (4)
*Laris (-)
5 Warpborn Skinwalkers (8)
*Warpborn Alpha (3)
6 Druids of Orboros (7)
*Druids of Orboros Overseer (2)
3 Shifting Stones (2)
*Stone Keeper (1)
Druid Wilder (2)
This is a Tier 4 theme list, so all the heavy warbeasts have Advance Deploy and cost 1 point less. Additionally, Caleb will get +1 to his starting roll, and the Skinwalkers have Advance Move. As for the rest of the list, eKaya is plenty fast enough without having all her heavies AD. All three heavies are Spd 6, and can have an extra 4 to 6 inches of movement if they need it.
Since there are pictures, I should mention Caleb has a few proxies. The Feral is represented by a Wold Guardian. The Gorax is represented by a Wold Watcher. The Skinwalkers are represented by some Trollkin Warders, with Skaldi Bonehammer playing the part of the Alpha. Finally, Kaya is represented by Lanyssa Ryssyll, and Laris is represented by a Wold Stalker.
I didn't bring any proxies, although my army is still rocking its White Metal Silver and Unpigmented Plastic Gray color scheme until I get an actual scheme picked out.
And now, on to the game. We decided to play Incursion, since it was easy to set up, and we didn't feel like going back to the main floor and asking people to move so we could pull out the scenario box.
Deployment
Caleb won the roll-off, and decided to go first.
He deployed his Skinwalkers, the Wilder, the Gorax, Laris and Kaya in the middle-ish of his deployment zone.
I deployed in a pretty basic line. The Halberdiers went on the right, while the Invictors went on the left. The Phoenix went in the middle, while the Banshee went on the left behind the Invictors. Issyria deployed in the center, and the Arcanists deployed behind their respective 'jacks.
Caleb loaded his heavies and Shifting Stones into the center-left to oppose mine, and put the Druids on the right to support the Skinwalkers against my Halberdiers. Finally, I deployed the MHSF on the right to shoot those pesky druids.
After deployment, the Skinwalkers take their Advance Move 5" forward.
Circle, Turn 1
The Circle heavies and Skinwalkers ran forward cautiously. Caleb knew I had good range on my guns, and if he ran flat out, he'd be likely to pay for it. The Druids ran forward on the flank. The Lights and Wilder ran up to support the heavies. The Stones shifted up. Kaya put Forced Evolution on the Feral, and Shadow Pack on herself, and walked up to a few inches behind the heavies.
Caleb had put himself in a pretty good position. He was out of the threat range of anything but my MHSF. The Druids were in a little danger, but the rest of the army was safe behind its armor from their Pow 10 shots. I had no choice but to advance into Kaya's (frankly absurd) threat ranges. Hopefully, I'd be able to stick it out past the alpha strike and hit back hard enough to stay in the game.
Retribution, Turn 1
Issyria held onto all her Focus. The MHSF advanced and shot the Druids, but only hit twice (needing 8's I'd hoped for a little better), killing one Druid and doing 2 damage to the Overseer.
The Thane advanced, and used Desperate Pace on the Halberdiers, who ran to jam Caleb up and screen my heavies.
The Arcanists advanced, and handed out Focus with Power Booster, and the Myrmidons ran up to where I thought it would be tough to get to them. The Invictors ran up behind the Banshee. Issyria advanced, and put Inviolable Resolve on the Phoenix and Admonition on the Banshee.
I was well within Caleb's threat range here, but unfortunately, I didn't have much choice. I could only hope that my positioning was good enough limit the damage he could do enough that my counterattack would hurt. On paper, Issyria has serious trouble with attrition if she ever gets behind.
Circle, Turn 2
Caleb decided to drop Shadow Pack, since Issyria's feat gives True Sight, but Kaya upkept Forced Evolution.
The Druids all advanced, but didn't get quite within Stealth range of the Mage Hunters. Unperturbed, the Overseer cast The Devouring, a 4" AoE spell with a Pow of 8 +1 for every model in the unit. Unfortunately, he was unlucky with the scatter, and only killed one. The rest of the Druids tried to shoot the Halberdiers with Force Bolt, but were out of range thanks to the Soulless Escort's Mage Static ability.
The Skinwalkers charged in, but had a little trouble hitting the Mage Hunters and Halberdiers at Mat 6. They only killed 2 Mage Hunters. Laris ran up to just behind the Skinwalkers.
At this point, Caleb decided to go after my heavies. Kaya used her Feat, which allows her to force Warbeasts outside her CTRL, and allows them to teleprt back to within 3" of her after their activations. Then she channeled Dogpile through Laris onto the Phoenix, and hit.
The Gorax advanced, and cast Primal (+2 Str and Mat) on the Stalker, which the Shifting Stones teleported forward across the wall, and into melee with a Halberdier and the Banshee. Admonition doesn't trigger on place effects like teleportation, so my Banshee was out of luck. The Stalker warped for Strength, killed the Halberdier, and easily scrapped the Banshee, then teleported out next to Kaya and a Shifting Stone.
The Druid Wilder cast Primal on the Feral. Then the Feral Warped for Speed, and charged the Phoenix. It took all the Feral's attacks, but the Phoenix was also destroyed. Caleb decided not to teleport the Feral back, since that way, I'd have to deal with it.
Finally, Caleb saw an opportunity to really reduce my counterattack. The Gnarlhorn used its own Animus, Bounding, and slammed the Feral over 6 of my Dawnguard Invictors, killing them all despite their being Arm 17 from Defensive Line. The Gnarlhorn teleported back next to the Stalker.
Gross! Well, there went Issyria's ability to make any attacks of her own along with the Invictors' ability to Flank. Not to mention two 10pt Myrmidons. I really misjudged those threat ranges, and I really paid for it. I had two things going for me, however. First, the Feral and the Stalker would automatically Frenzy on Caleb's next turn due to Primal. Second, I did still have most of my infantry, and a Feat to make them hit at peak efficiency. The only question was, would that be enough?
Retribution, Turn 2
Issyria activated first, recast Inviolable Resolve on the Invictors, and Admonition on herself. Then she moved to get the whole army in her CTRL and popped her Feat, giving everybody True Sight (ignore Concealment Camouflage and Stealth), and an additional die on all attack and damage rolls, discarding the die of my choice.
The MHSF went next putting a little damage on the two Skinwalkers engaging them with CMA's, and killing 2 more Druids with extra-accurate aimed crossbow bolts, including the Overseer.
The Halberdiers used their mini-Feat to gain Gang, and charged the Skinwalkers, killing every one they could reach. Then they backed off, with Reform so the frenzying Stalker would attack Laris, and turned so that they could charge the Feral next turn if necessary. Then the Thane charged the remaining Skinwalker, but only did one damage.
The Invictors marched around the now knocked down Feral, used their Extend Fire mini-Feat for extra range, and pumped 3 CRA's into the Stalker, reducing it to 6 hit points.
The Arcanists looked at each other, shrugged, and milled around to stay out of my way, but get in the Feral's way.
That was...not so terrible. Damaging the Stalker was a huge boon. The Feral would be a serious problem next turn, but I'd freed up enough of the rest of my infantry that I was pretty optimistic about my odds of dealing with it. The Stalker was heavily damaged, and hopefully, I could finish both the wolves off, and come out ahead.
Circle, Turn 3
Caleb was suddenly faced with a dilemma. Kaya camped 3 Fury last turn to ward off any janky ranged assassination run I might have gone for, and had 6 Fury out on the table - 1 on Laris, 2 on the Gorax, and 3 on the Gnarlhorn. After some internal weighing of evils, Caleb decided to Leach from Laris and the Gorax, and let the Gnarlhorn take a Threshold check. It failed, and Frenzied into the Stalker, killing it. The Feral Warpwolf Frenzied automatically by standing up and walking at my Halberdier Standard Bearer - the closest model it could see.
Caleb was feeling a little desperate here, and decided to go for an assassination run. First, he needed to clear out my Halberdiers. The last Skinwalker killed the Thane to get rid of Inspiration. The Stone Keeper advanced, and killed one with a spell. Kaya advanced, and killed 2 more with her staff and one more with Muzzle. The three survivors took a Command check, but passed. The Wilder put Primal on Laris.
Laris charged at Issyria, but Caleb had forgotten about Admonition. (And I forgot to warn him beforehand, which I normally would do since it was his first game with circle in a looong time. But it was getting late, and I'd zoned out a bit.) So Issyria hopped away, unscathed. Laris used her Animus Spirit Shift to teleport back to Kaya and screen her as well as possible.
No pic for this turn, but Kaya was hugely exposed, and we just decided to finish it rather than take a break for pictures.
Retribution, Turn 3
I dropped Inviolable Resolve. Issyria advanced, cast Admonition on herself again, and cast Blinding Light at Kaya to reduce her Def by 2.
The Mage Hunters who weren't engaged either moved or aimed to shoot at Kaya, and reduced her to 2 hit boxes. The Invictors advanced, and finished her off with a single CRA.
Victory to the Retribution!
Thoughts
This was my first game with Issyria against an experienced opponent, and I definitely did some bungling. I went and lost both my heavies and half my Invictors by putting them too far forward on turn 1. I came back pretty well on turn 2, and not having to worry about any of the Circle heavies for a turn definitely helped. My target selection on turn 2 was good, and probably saved the game for me. There are a bunch of minor errors in positioning and deployment that made things harder than they needed to be, though. For instance, I probably should have deployed the Phoenix further out to the right, so that it could support the Mage Hunters a little better. And I could have jammed the Feral better on turn 2 with the by-then superfluous Arcanists.
The list was fun to play, and proved its ability to claw its way back into the game even after a lot of its options had been removed. Issyra's Feat is very good, and worked well with all the shooting. If I'd had even 2 more Invictors on that turn, I'd have killed the Stalker, and felt much better about my options. I need more games in with this incarnation of the list before I decide to swap anything around, but I'm definitely considering a few options. I'd really like some Mage Hunter Assassins to charge out with a 16" Threat under Crusader's Call and the hilarious accuracy and damage buff of the Feat. I'd also like another Arc Node in the list, probably a Chimera, but maybe a second Phoenix.
Caleb was coming back to Circle after a long stint playing only Trollbloods, and this was his first game with eKaya, so he made some mistakes as well. He planned his attack on turn 2 well, but didn't manage Fury or place his beasts after teleportation particularly well. He could have avoided killing his own Stalker by placing the Gnarlhorn differently, possibly getting it to Frenzy into a stone or the Wilder. I'm not convinced the Stalker should have gone after the Banshee, since it could have killed a lot of Halberdiers with Primal and Berserk, but on the other hand, the Banshee is pretty threatening at both melee and range.
Caleb's eKaya list was very cool. Her Tier gives some excellent benefits without preventing Kaya from taking the models she really wants to take. I might try to get a second set of stones in there, but otherwise, it looks very solid. Once Caleb starts getting the Circle playstyle down again, that list is going to serve him well.
Something else I noticed while writing this up is that I tend to narrate my opponent's turns in the present tense, and my own turns in the past tense. Weird.
Thursday, March 13, 2014
Theorymachine Issyria List, 50pts
I picked up Issyria a few days ago, and I've been theorymachining her pretty fiercely since then. I'll be trying this out as soon as I can make it in to my local game store, so hopefully there will be a report in the near future.
Issyria, Sibyl of Dawn (+6)
*Banshee (10)
*Phoenix (10)
10 Houseguard Halberdiers (7)
*Officer and Standard Bearer (2)
*Soulless Escort (1)
10 Mage Hunter Strike Force (8)
*Strike Force Commander (2)
10 Dawguard Invictors (10)
*Officer and Standard Bearer (2)
Houseguard Thane (2)
Arcanist (1)
Arcanist (1)
Synergy with Issyria
I chose a pretty significant portion of the list specifically to combo with something Issyria does. I picked the MHSF not only because they're a great unit , but also because they benefit hugely from her Feat. Issyria's Feat gives a significant boost to damage and accuracy, and Phantom Seekers ensure that nothing within 12" can hide from the Strike Force.
I chose the Houseguard Halberdiers and Thane to synergize with Crusader's Call. The Halberdiers can charge 13" (a 15" threat) with Desperate Pace and Crusader's Call, then Reform 3" further forward if they charge successfully. That will make it easier to get a significant first strike on most enemies with them. If they use their mini-feat on the same turn as Issyria's Feat, they'll hit very hard and very accurately that turn. If I wait, they'll have 2 turns of high damage in a row. Halberdiers are also a good target for Inviolable Resolve if I want to use Shield Wall.
The Banshee has its excellent Force Cannon for Issyria to use Ancillary Attack on, and the Phoenix is there as an Arc Node in addition to being an all-around great 'jack. I think channeling Blinding Light will be a big part of Issyria's playstyle, since it makes her troops more accurate, and blocksenemy shooting, one of Retributions big vulnerabilities.
Finally, I decided she needs a unit with some late game presence. I went for Invictors because mine are fully assembled, and because they'll be able to contribute on her Feat turn by shooting even if they're hanging back. In the late game, they can charge in and flank with the Phoenix and Banshee as a melee force. They can easily be replaced with another second wave unit or warjack, like Dawnguard Sentinels or Imperatus, or a lesser second wave investment and a Chimera as a backup arc node.
Teams and Jobs
Team 1: Halberdiers, Houseguard Thane
The Halberdiers will be my early jamming and alpha strike unit, and the Thane will keep them fearless and give them Desperate Pace. They're fast on the run, and have a long threat range on the charge, and can advance after charging in to jam.
Team 2: Invictors, Banshee, Arcanist, Issyria
This will be the second wave team. The Banshee and Invictors are supporting fire in the early game, and second wave melee in the late game. They'll also keep Issyria safe, and she'll be helping out with extra shots from the Banshee's slam cannon. This team is significantly slower than the Halberdiers and Mage Hunters, and a little slower than the Phoenix, so it should be easy to keep them in a supporting role.
Team 3: Mage Hunter Strike Force
The Strike Force is my troubleshooting team as usual. They'll keep warcasters and warlocks honest, and shoot out infantry, support and warjacks. They can also jam in a pinch, although they're not very good at it. They can also give supporting fire to the Halberdiers to clear out the enemy's front line so the Halberdiers can charge into the back.
Team 4: Phoenix, Arcanist
This is the support team for the front line Mage Hunters and Halberdiers. The Arc Node will let Issyria put Blinding Light on anything I need to stop from shooting or want an accuracy bonus against, or let her put Inviolable Resolve on anything I want more armor on or a unit which fails a Command check. The Phoenix is also a great backup model for either the Halberdiers or the Strike Force. It can deal with light infantry easily, and put serious damage on heavies as well. It also has a good threat range between Reach and Crusader's Call.
The Plan
I'll start by putting Inviolable Resolve on the Phoenix, and Admonition on the Banshee. The Phoenix, with its regenerating force field, gets a lot out of a +2 Arm buff. The Banshee should be slightly behind other models, but it will help my back lines stay in the game longer if they can't be charged easily.
The Halberdiers get Desperate Pace first turn and run to jam and set up charges. The MHSF move up into position to shoot next turn.
Issyria will have plenty of Focus to Velocity forward a bit if she needs to. This list wants to go first so it can get as far forward as possible, and alpha strike on turn 2. Issyria wants to use her Feat at the top of turn 2 to inflict heavy damage on the opponent's army, and I want her to get far enough forward to catch the lead Halberdiers if they charge. I want to use turn 2 to wipe out the opponent's front lines with shooting and try to get the Halbs into the second wave. After that, I'll go for scenario, and try to keep the pressure up with my own second line models and continued jamming from the Halberdiers and whatever else survives the enemy counterattack.
That's it. Hopefully it'll all work out on the table. Issyria seems strong on paper, but I'm seeing a lot of mixed results on the forums.
Issyria, Sibyl of Dawn (+6)
*Banshee (10)
*Phoenix (10)
10 Houseguard Halberdiers (7)
*Officer and Standard Bearer (2)
*Soulless Escort (1)
10 Mage Hunter Strike Force (8)
*Strike Force Commander (2)
10 Dawguard Invictors (10)
*Officer and Standard Bearer (2)
Houseguard Thane (2)
Arcanist (1)
Arcanist (1)
Synergy with Issyria
I chose a pretty significant portion of the list specifically to combo with something Issyria does. I picked the MHSF not only because they're a great unit , but also because they benefit hugely from her Feat. Issyria's Feat gives a significant boost to damage and accuracy, and Phantom Seekers ensure that nothing within 12" can hide from the Strike Force.
I chose the Houseguard Halberdiers and Thane to synergize with Crusader's Call. The Halberdiers can charge 13" (a 15" threat) with Desperate Pace and Crusader's Call, then Reform 3" further forward if they charge successfully. That will make it easier to get a significant first strike on most enemies with them. If they use their mini-feat on the same turn as Issyria's Feat, they'll hit very hard and very accurately that turn. If I wait, they'll have 2 turns of high damage in a row. Halberdiers are also a good target for Inviolable Resolve if I want to use Shield Wall.
The Banshee has its excellent Force Cannon for Issyria to use Ancillary Attack on, and the Phoenix is there as an Arc Node in addition to being an all-around great 'jack. I think channeling Blinding Light will be a big part of Issyria's playstyle, since it makes her troops more accurate, and blocksenemy shooting, one of Retributions big vulnerabilities.
Finally, I decided she needs a unit with some late game presence. I went for Invictors because mine are fully assembled, and because they'll be able to contribute on her Feat turn by shooting even if they're hanging back. In the late game, they can charge in and flank with the Phoenix and Banshee as a melee force. They can easily be replaced with another second wave unit or warjack, like Dawnguard Sentinels or Imperatus, or a lesser second wave investment and a Chimera as a backup arc node.
Teams and Jobs
Team 1: Halberdiers, Houseguard Thane
The Halberdiers will be my early jamming and alpha strike unit, and the Thane will keep them fearless and give them Desperate Pace. They're fast on the run, and have a long threat range on the charge, and can advance after charging in to jam.
Team 2: Invictors, Banshee, Arcanist, Issyria
This will be the second wave team. The Banshee and Invictors are supporting fire in the early game, and second wave melee in the late game. They'll also keep Issyria safe, and she'll be helping out with extra shots from the Banshee's slam cannon. This team is significantly slower than the Halberdiers and Mage Hunters, and a little slower than the Phoenix, so it should be easy to keep them in a supporting role.
Team 3: Mage Hunter Strike Force
The Strike Force is my troubleshooting team as usual. They'll keep warcasters and warlocks honest, and shoot out infantry, support and warjacks. They can also jam in a pinch, although they're not very good at it. They can also give supporting fire to the Halberdiers to clear out the enemy's front line so the Halberdiers can charge into the back.
Team 4: Phoenix, Arcanist
This is the support team for the front line Mage Hunters and Halberdiers. The Arc Node will let Issyria put Blinding Light on anything I need to stop from shooting or want an accuracy bonus against, or let her put Inviolable Resolve on anything I want more armor on or a unit which fails a Command check. The Phoenix is also a great backup model for either the Halberdiers or the Strike Force. It can deal with light infantry easily, and put serious damage on heavies as well. It also has a good threat range between Reach and Crusader's Call.
The Plan
I'll start by putting Inviolable Resolve on the Phoenix, and Admonition on the Banshee. The Phoenix, with its regenerating force field, gets a lot out of a +2 Arm buff. The Banshee should be slightly behind other models, but it will help my back lines stay in the game longer if they can't be charged easily.
The Halberdiers get Desperate Pace first turn and run to jam and set up charges. The MHSF move up into position to shoot next turn.
Issyria will have plenty of Focus to Velocity forward a bit if she needs to. This list wants to go first so it can get as far forward as possible, and alpha strike on turn 2. Issyria wants to use her Feat at the top of turn 2 to inflict heavy damage on the opponent's army, and I want her to get far enough forward to catch the lead Halberdiers if they charge. I want to use turn 2 to wipe out the opponent's front lines with shooting and try to get the Halbs into the second wave. After that, I'll go for scenario, and try to keep the pressure up with my own second line models and continued jamming from the Halberdiers and whatever else survives the enemy counterattack.
That's it. Hopefully it'll all work out on the table. Issyria seems strong on paper, but I'm seeing a lot of mixed results on the forums.
Monday, March 10, 2014
Battle Report: Makeda 3 vs Baldur 1, 50pts
Another month, another post I guess? I really need to be getting in more games. Anyway, I played a game this past Friday. I'd seen a neat list on the PP forums for my current favorite Warlock, Makeda 3, so I decided to give a similar list a try. No pictures unfortunately, because my cell phone was almost out of power, and the camera just kills it.
Makeda and the Exalted Court (+2)
*Molik Karn (11)
*Bronzeback Titan (10)
*Titan Gladiator (8)
*Cyclops Brute (5)
*Cyclops Brute (5)
*Cyclops Brute (5)
*Basilisk Krea (4)
4 Paingiver Beast Handlers (2)
Agonizer (2)
The Brutes are basically standing in for infantry in a screening/jamming role. They have strong defensive stats at 13/17 with a Shield and Set Defense to make them even tougher to get through. Standard anti-infantry attacks will mostly bounce off. The plan is that anything that takes out a Brute needs to be able to take out a heavy. When it does, the heavies in the second row can take it out instead. Otherwise, the list is very standard for Makeda 3. Molik, Bronzeback, Gladiator and Krea are making up the backbone of most of my lists with her. The Agonizer is great defense against both beasts and 'jacks. The original list ran a Sentry instead of the Gladiator, and dropped the Krea for max Beast Handlers and Orrin or a Willbreaker. I'll probably give that list a try sometime in the near future.
My opponent, Luke, was playing pBaldur.
Baldur the Stonecleaver (+6)
*Warpwolf Stalker (10)
*Feral Warpwolf (9)
*Wold Warden (9)
*Winter Argus (5)
*Gorax (4)
10 Tharn Bloodtrackers (8)
*Nuala the Huntress (2)
3 Shifting Stones (2)
*Stone Keeper (1)
3 Shifting Stones (2)
Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew (1)
Gatorman Witch Doctor (3)
This seems like an all-comers list with a lot of synergy, good mobility, and a solid denial Feat. There are enough heavies in the list to give it a good trading game against other heavy armor lists, and the Stalker and Bloodtrackers can kill a lot of infantry without much trouble either.
We decided to play a Scenario, and rolled up Outflank. It has two 12" circular zones on either side of the table center. Controlling a zone is worth 1 point, and dominating a zone is worth 2.
My opponent won the roll-off, and decided to go first, so I chose the table edge with a wall to screen my advance on turn 1.
The Circle beasts went mostly in the middle of the table, but leaned a little toward the right zone. I deployed in a fairly tight brick between the two zones, aware that my opponent could switch his positioning very quickly with the placement of the Shifting Stones and Bloodtrackers in Advance Deploy. He placed the Shifting Stones in front of his heavies and the Bloodtrackers in front of the right zone. Apparently, he'd be going all-out for it.
The Bloodtrackers select my rightmost Brute as their Prey.
Circle, Turn 1
Much of the list runs. The Bloodtrackers get across the center line to try to keep me out of the zone. The Stones shift up in overlapping triangles, and the Warpwolves run into the middle so they can teleport out next turn.
Baldur walks up, and casts Solid Ground on himself (friendly models in his CTRL cannot be knocked down, and do not suffer blast damage) and Stone Skin on the Bloodtrackers (+2 Str and Arm, -1 Spd and Def), then casts Rapid Growth to put a forest completely around himself. The Gobbers walk up and make smoke, and the Witch Doctor gives Tough and Undead to the Bloodtrackers with Zombify. The Winter Argus runs into the left zone, apparently to contest it.
Standard stuff, but talk about early scenario pressure. I need to get into the right zone this turn, because I won't have much room to maneuver if the Bloodtrackers continue to jam me and Baldur Feats to slow me down.
Skorne, Turn 1
Again, there's a lot of running. I don't have guns in the list, so there isn't much else to do. The Gladiator Rushes the right Brute so it can get into the zone across some difficult terrain. The right and left Brutes run into either zone (the right one engages some Bloodtrackers), and the center Brute runs up to claim the middle.
The heavies walk, run or trample to a few inches behind them, ready to counterattack if they have the opportunity. Makeda puts 5 Fury on the Agonzer, and issues a Run order. She runs to just behind the wall, and her Guardians run to just ahead of it. The Krea activates Paralytic Aura and charges up to protect my models from those Weapon Master javalins.
The Agonizer uses Gnawing Pain, and runs up to be both within the Krea's Aura and within 2" of at least one of the Exalted Court.
And that's it. My Brute would be lucky to survive the next round, but hopefully, I'd be able to counterattack effectively, and get some models into the right zone to contest. Unless the Warpwolves suddenly went for the left zone, which seemed unlikely, the battle would hinge on the right.
Circle, Turn 2
Baldur upkeeps all 3 spells, and between the Sones removing Fury and Baldur Leaching, there are no Threshold checks for Circle.
Baldur starts off by casting Lighting Strike on the Feral Warpwolf (to give it Sprint and let it move away after killing something), and forfeits his movement to teleport into a forest in the right zone. Clearly, the battle will be fought for control of the right after all. Then, after a little Control Range measurement, Baldur Feats to try to keep me out of the zone once my Brute dies. (Baldur's Feat gives friendly models in his CTRL Cover, and his CTRL is rough terrain for enemy models. Enemy models never have Pathfinder while in his CTRL for one round.)
The Bloodtrackers advance and throw a lot of javalins, but between Paralytic Aura and my having 5 Shield Guards at my disposal, they don't accomplish much more than 2 damage to an Exalted Guardian. Their Reform puts a few of them between my central models and the right zone. The Witch Doc move up and Zombifies them.
The Wold Warden move up and switches Stone Skin onto the Feral Warpwolf with Geomancy, and one set of Stones teleports the Feral into melee with my Brute in the right zone. The wolf warps for +2 Strength, but is in the Agonizer's Gnawing Pain Aura, and leaves the Brute alive by one point.
The next set of Stones teleports the Stalker to within Reach range of the Brute. It warps for Strength, casts Lightning Strike on itself, and finishes off the Brute. Then it sprints back to the Stones. The Bloodtrackers switch their Prey to the Gladiator. The Gorax advances to just behind the Stalker.
The Swamp Gobbers run to jam my central models and keep them out of the right zone. Meanwhile, the Winter Argus skirts around the edge of the left.
I really need to get into the zone this turn, and kill the Feral, which is exposed. Fortunately, my Gladiator is in a good position to do both, and if I can get other models in, so much the better.
Skorne, Turn 2
I have no upkeep spells in play yet.
The Agonizer uses Gnawing Pain again, and moves up behind the central Brute. The Krea moves next to the Agonizer, uses Paralytic Aura, and misses the Stalker with a Spiritual Paralysis shot.
Makeda's unit activates. She casts Vortex of Destruction on herself to boost all damage rolls against enemies in her melee range. The Exalted Guardians advance to just ahead of the Agonizer and Krea, and kill one of the Swamp Gobbers. Makeda advances into melee range of the Feral Warpwolf, and takes two swings, but misses both. Disgusted, I leave her on 2 Fury, and cast Fate Walker.
The Paingivers advance, and use Enrage on both Brutes and the Gladiator, and Condition on the Krea to remove all Fury from her. The Brute in the left zone charges a Shifting stone that had moved into it, and destroys it. The central Brute charges a jamming Bloodtracker, and kills 2 with boosted attack rolls.
The Gladiator charges the Feral, but utterly flubbs its damage rolls, and leaves the Feral alive on 2 hit boxes even with Vortex of Destruction. Molik and the Bronzeback advance into position to counterattack next turn.
Makeda takes her end-of-turn Fate Walker movement to retreat back behind my beasts.
Not the greatest turn, but the Gladiator is in the right zone, and won't be that easy to remove. However it's my only model contesting right now. I'm annoyed that the Feral is still alive, since killing it would have given me a huge leg up in attrition.
Circle, Turn 3
Baldur upkeeps Solid Ground, but drops Stone Skin and Rapid Growth.
Baldur activates first, and moves to within 6" of the Feral, and casts Primal and Stone Skin on it. The Feral warps for Strength, and kills the Gladiator. The Bloodtrackers switch their Prey to Molik Karn.
The Witch Doc Zombifies the Bloodtrackers again. The Bloodtrackers take some shots at my Agonizer, Central Brute, and Exalted Guardians, but don't do much. A few also shoot at the Paingiver who'd Enraged the Gladiator, but they all miss with bad rolls. They used Reform to continue to jam me, and hook around toward Makeda and the Paingivers.
The Wold Warden moves up, and recasts Stone Skin on the Warpwolf Stalker, then the Gorax moves next to it, and casts Primal (+2 Mat and Str, but automatically frenzies next turn) on the Stalker. The remaining full unit of Shifting Stones teleports the Stalker right into the middle of my central group. Finally, the Stalker itself activates, warps for Strength to become P+S 22, and kills both Exalted Guardians, the Agonizer, and the Krea.
The Winter Argus attacks the Cyclops Brute in the left zone, but misses. The last Swamp Gobber moves around to screen the Stalker from the Bronzeback, but the Bronzeback Counter-Charges. It misses the Gobber, but puts itself in a good position to charge the Stalker next turn.
Luke ends his turn, and scores 2 points for Dominating the right zone.
I actually feel ok about this. At minimum, I need to take out the Stalker and the Feral, and contest the zone, but once I do, the attrition game will be all in my favor.
Skorne, Turn 3
Makeda Leaches, and upkeeps Vortex of Destruction. My central Brute has one Fury left over, and Frenzies despite being Thr 9. It attacks the Stalker for light damage.
I have Makeda activate first. First, she casts Train Wreck on Molik Karn to give him Beat Back. Then, she Feats (this turn, when a model in her Battlegroup destroys one or more enemy models with an attack, either put a Fury on Makeda or remove a Fury from a model in her Battlegroup), and moves into melee range of the Feral. She takes it out in one swing, and uses Blood Boon to cast Eliminator at a nearby Bloodtracker for free. She hits and kills the Bloodtracker, and Eliminator lets her move 2" into melee range of the Stalker and another Bloodtracker. She kills the second Bloodtracker, and casts Fate Walker, leaving her on 1 Fury.
The Paingivers move up and Enrage Molik, the Bronzeback, and the Brute in the right zone. The Brute does some damage to the Winter Argus, but doesn't kill it. The Bronzeback puts Train Wreck on itself, charges past the Swamp Gobber, who misses with its free strike, and kills both the Stalker and the Swamp Gobber. It uses its Beat Back movement from Train Wreck to advance toward the Right Zone.
After a little contemplation, I decide to try something risky with Molik. If it works (and it's likely that it will), I'll be able to get Molik right into Baldur's back lines. If it doesn't work, I'll lose the game.
I have Molik charge the Winter Argus. He needs an 8 to hit, but I miss with a 4. I boost after the roll using Future Sight, but only add 3. Not good. Molik takes his second initial attack, and rolls another 4. I boost the hit again, and this time get a 4. The Argus dies, and Molik takes a 3" advance into melee range of the Stone Keeper. The Stone Keeper and a few Sentry Stones die horribly, and Molik Beats his way Back to the Gorax. Rather than buy attacks against the Gorax, I just cast Fate Walker.
I end my turn, and Molik and Makeda do their movement. Molik moves into the right zone to contest it, and Makeda retreats into melee with some Bloodtrackers (much safer than having them shoot at her), camping 3 Fury.
I score 1 point for controlling the left zone.
I am holding on well. If Molik stays in the zone, I'm in a very good position. Even if he doesn't, my remaining high-Arm models will be hard to kill. The Gorax has a great Animus in Primal, but it's only a light beast, and the Wold Warden is pretty pillow-fisted, and can't be targeted by Primal.
Circle, Turn 4
Baldur upkeeps Solid Ground.
The Wold Warden advances to try to Chain Attack: Smite Molik to make him easier to kill. However, I Counter-Charge with the Bronzeback, putting it just inside the right zone. The Wold Warden decides to slam the Bronzeback out of the zone instead. It boosts with its attacks, and succeeds, putting the Bronzeback 1" away and out of the zone again.
Baldur casts Stone Skin on the Bloodtrackers, and stays in his forest. The Witch Doc Zombifies the Bloodtrackers again. All the Bloodtrackers shoot at Molik, one dying to a free strike by Makeda. They damage Molik badly despite his being in melee, and reform to screen Baldur and hem in Makeda so she can't move.
The two surviving Shifting Stones find a new purpose by teleporting into the right zone to contest it.
Finally, the Gorax puts Primal on itself, advances, and finishes off Molik Karn. The Bloodtrackers switch their Prey to Makeda.
Luke ends his turn, and scores 2 more points, putting him at 4, and one away from a scenario victory.
I can't screw up this next turn. I need to get the Bronzeback and central Brute into the zone, and kill off Baldur's remaining beasts. Then I'll pick off the remaining Bloodtrackers and Baldur himself.
Skorne, Turn 4
I upkeep Vortex of Destruction. The left Brute frenzies, and kills one of the Shifting Stones contesting the left zone. Makeda forces the Bronzeback to stand up.
Makeda casts Ground Zero, killing one Bloodtracker, and pushing the other two away, then retreats to a safer location.
The Paingivers advance, and Enrage both the Bronzeback and the central Brute. The Bronzeback charges, and kills both the Wold Warden and the Gorax. The Brute charges Nuala, and kills her and another Bloodtracker.
I end my turn. I'm now in control of the game despite being 4 points down. There are 3 Bloodtrackers left, along with the Witch Doctor, 2 Shifting Stones from different units, and Baldur himself. Luke will be hard pressed to get rid of my two Arm 19 warbeasts, both sitting at almost full health.
Circle, Turn 5
Baldur drops Stone Skin and Solid Ground, hanging on to all 6 Fury.
The Witch Doctor Zombifies the Bloodtrackers, who put a few points of damage on the Bronzeback. Baldur then charges the Bronzeback, staying exactly 2" away. Luke had planned to use Weight of Stone to reduce the Bronzeback's Spd to 1, which would make it impossible to reach Baldur. However, he had forgotten about Hyper Aggressive, which let the Bronzeback walk an inch toward him when he hit. Baldur buys 4 more attacks to try to finish the Bronzeback, but only takes it to a little under half health. With his last 2 Fury, he puts a forest next to Makeda with Rapid Growth so she won't be able to charge him next turn.
Skorne, Turn 5
Makeda upkeeps Vortex of Destruction. The right Brute passes its Threshold check.
The Paingivers advance, and one of them heals the Bronzeback's broken Mind and Spirit with Medicate. Makeda runs next to Baldur, then the Bronzeback activates, and finishes him off.
Victory to the Skorne!
Thoughts
I played a pretty solid game throughout. I did get a little overexcited with the Brutes and Intuition, which lets them make an opponent reroll an attack roll against them. Because of that, a Brute Frenzied on turn 3 when it should have been able to run into the zone, and really prevent Luke from scoring on turn 4. Otherwise, my positioning was good, and I used the Brutes to draw out Luke's heavy hitters just as I'd planned. Molik's wacky trip across the table was a serious risk that almost lost me the game. I should have charged a Bloodtracker in the right zone, and killed as much in there as I could. I usually try to play it safe, but this time I was a sucker for awesome shenanigans. I'm pretty lucky it worked out, especially after Molik's first initial attack missed.
The list ran very well. The Brutes were great, and definitely proved tougher than an equivalent point value of infantry. They also killed or damaged one or two models per turn, which isn't bad when the heavies and Makeda can do so much on their own. Having a Krea and 5 Shield Guards made shooting almost irrelevant in the early game. I'll probably run Makeda 3 with a list like this one for a couple of weeks (or months if I continue to go so long between games), since it's so much fun. Thanks to PP Forumite Staks for posting it. Now I just need to get myself some more Brutes (2 of the ones I used were proxied).
Luke also played well. Going hard for the right zone was a good move, and could have won him the game. Between the speed of the Bloodtrackers and Baldur's Feat, I was worried I'd be shut out of the scenario entirely. He did forget about Counter Charge a couple of times, and also forgot about Hyper Aggressive on his last turn, but otherwise didn't make many mistakes. He had some bad luck on his 2nd turn when his Feral Warpwolf failed to kill the Cyclops Brute. If it had been able to do that last point of damage and sprint away, Luke would have been in a significantly better position.
His list had a lot of synergy. The Bloodtrackers were a very threatening presence. Between Stone Skin making them Pow 11 Weapon Masters with their javalins and Solid Ground making them immune to blast damage, as well as immune to knockdown (with Tough from the Witch Doctor), they jammed me hard, and threatened a lot of my models into the late game. If my list hadn't been so good at countering ranged attacks, they would have done a lot more damage. I'm not entirely sure what the Winter Argus adds to the list besides an Arm buff for Baldur. It does make him much more difficult to kill if he exposes himself to danger, but 5 points is a lot to pay for it. Taking out the Winter Argus would let Luke upgrade the Wold Warden to Megalith (assuming Megs wasn't in another list for a tournament), and have 3 points left over for something else. I'm no expert in Circle though, so it's possible it does more than provide a good animus. This game, it contested the left zone, and forced me to divert models to deal with it.
Makeda and the Exalted Court (+2)
*Molik Karn (11)
*Bronzeback Titan (10)
*Titan Gladiator (8)
*Cyclops Brute (5)
*Cyclops Brute (5)
*Cyclops Brute (5)
*Basilisk Krea (4)
4 Paingiver Beast Handlers (2)
Agonizer (2)
The Brutes are basically standing in for infantry in a screening/jamming role. They have strong defensive stats at 13/17 with a Shield and Set Defense to make them even tougher to get through. Standard anti-infantry attacks will mostly bounce off. The plan is that anything that takes out a Brute needs to be able to take out a heavy. When it does, the heavies in the second row can take it out instead. Otherwise, the list is very standard for Makeda 3. Molik, Bronzeback, Gladiator and Krea are making up the backbone of most of my lists with her. The Agonizer is great defense against both beasts and 'jacks. The original list ran a Sentry instead of the Gladiator, and dropped the Krea for max Beast Handlers and Orrin or a Willbreaker. I'll probably give that list a try sometime in the near future.
My opponent, Luke, was playing pBaldur.
Baldur the Stonecleaver (+6)
*Warpwolf Stalker (10)
*Feral Warpwolf (9)
*Wold Warden (9)
*Winter Argus (5)
*Gorax (4)
10 Tharn Bloodtrackers (8)
*Nuala the Huntress (2)
3 Shifting Stones (2)
*Stone Keeper (1)
3 Shifting Stones (2)
Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew (1)
Gatorman Witch Doctor (3)
This seems like an all-comers list with a lot of synergy, good mobility, and a solid denial Feat. There are enough heavies in the list to give it a good trading game against other heavy armor lists, and the Stalker and Bloodtrackers can kill a lot of infantry without much trouble either.
We decided to play a Scenario, and rolled up Outflank. It has two 12" circular zones on either side of the table center. Controlling a zone is worth 1 point, and dominating a zone is worth 2.
My opponent won the roll-off, and decided to go first, so I chose the table edge with a wall to screen my advance on turn 1.
The Circle beasts went mostly in the middle of the table, but leaned a little toward the right zone. I deployed in a fairly tight brick between the two zones, aware that my opponent could switch his positioning very quickly with the placement of the Shifting Stones and Bloodtrackers in Advance Deploy. He placed the Shifting Stones in front of his heavies and the Bloodtrackers in front of the right zone. Apparently, he'd be going all-out for it.
The Bloodtrackers select my rightmost Brute as their Prey.
Circle, Turn 1
Much of the list runs. The Bloodtrackers get across the center line to try to keep me out of the zone. The Stones shift up in overlapping triangles, and the Warpwolves run into the middle so they can teleport out next turn.
Baldur walks up, and casts Solid Ground on himself (friendly models in his CTRL cannot be knocked down, and do not suffer blast damage) and Stone Skin on the Bloodtrackers (+2 Str and Arm, -1 Spd and Def), then casts Rapid Growth to put a forest completely around himself. The Gobbers walk up and make smoke, and the Witch Doctor gives Tough and Undead to the Bloodtrackers with Zombify. The Winter Argus runs into the left zone, apparently to contest it.
Standard stuff, but talk about early scenario pressure. I need to get into the right zone this turn, because I won't have much room to maneuver if the Bloodtrackers continue to jam me and Baldur Feats to slow me down.
Skorne, Turn 1
Again, there's a lot of running. I don't have guns in the list, so there isn't much else to do. The Gladiator Rushes the right Brute so it can get into the zone across some difficult terrain. The right and left Brutes run into either zone (the right one engages some Bloodtrackers), and the center Brute runs up to claim the middle.
The heavies walk, run or trample to a few inches behind them, ready to counterattack if they have the opportunity. Makeda puts 5 Fury on the Agonzer, and issues a Run order. She runs to just behind the wall, and her Guardians run to just ahead of it. The Krea activates Paralytic Aura and charges up to protect my models from those Weapon Master javalins.
The Agonizer uses Gnawing Pain, and runs up to be both within the Krea's Aura and within 2" of at least one of the Exalted Court.
And that's it. My Brute would be lucky to survive the next round, but hopefully, I'd be able to counterattack effectively, and get some models into the right zone to contest. Unless the Warpwolves suddenly went for the left zone, which seemed unlikely, the battle would hinge on the right.
Circle, Turn 2
Baldur upkeeps all 3 spells, and between the Sones removing Fury and Baldur Leaching, there are no Threshold checks for Circle.
Baldur starts off by casting Lighting Strike on the Feral Warpwolf (to give it Sprint and let it move away after killing something), and forfeits his movement to teleport into a forest in the right zone. Clearly, the battle will be fought for control of the right after all. Then, after a little Control Range measurement, Baldur Feats to try to keep me out of the zone once my Brute dies. (Baldur's Feat gives friendly models in his CTRL Cover, and his CTRL is rough terrain for enemy models. Enemy models never have Pathfinder while in his CTRL for one round.)
The Bloodtrackers advance and throw a lot of javalins, but between Paralytic Aura and my having 5 Shield Guards at my disposal, they don't accomplish much more than 2 damage to an Exalted Guardian. Their Reform puts a few of them between my central models and the right zone. The Witch Doc move up and Zombifies them.
The Wold Warden move up and switches Stone Skin onto the Feral Warpwolf with Geomancy, and one set of Stones teleports the Feral into melee with my Brute in the right zone. The wolf warps for +2 Strength, but is in the Agonizer's Gnawing Pain Aura, and leaves the Brute alive by one point.
The next set of Stones teleports the Stalker to within Reach range of the Brute. It warps for Strength, casts Lightning Strike on itself, and finishes off the Brute. Then it sprints back to the Stones. The Bloodtrackers switch their Prey to the Gladiator. The Gorax advances to just behind the Stalker.
The Swamp Gobbers run to jam my central models and keep them out of the right zone. Meanwhile, the Winter Argus skirts around the edge of the left.
I really need to get into the zone this turn, and kill the Feral, which is exposed. Fortunately, my Gladiator is in a good position to do both, and if I can get other models in, so much the better.
Skorne, Turn 2
I have no upkeep spells in play yet.
The Agonizer uses Gnawing Pain again, and moves up behind the central Brute. The Krea moves next to the Agonizer, uses Paralytic Aura, and misses the Stalker with a Spiritual Paralysis shot.
Makeda's unit activates. She casts Vortex of Destruction on herself to boost all damage rolls against enemies in her melee range. The Exalted Guardians advance to just ahead of the Agonizer and Krea, and kill one of the Swamp Gobbers. Makeda advances into melee range of the Feral Warpwolf, and takes two swings, but misses both. Disgusted, I leave her on 2 Fury, and cast Fate Walker.
The Paingivers advance, and use Enrage on both Brutes and the Gladiator, and Condition on the Krea to remove all Fury from her. The Brute in the left zone charges a Shifting stone that had moved into it, and destroys it. The central Brute charges a jamming Bloodtracker, and kills 2 with boosted attack rolls.
The Gladiator charges the Feral, but utterly flubbs its damage rolls, and leaves the Feral alive on 2 hit boxes even with Vortex of Destruction. Molik and the Bronzeback advance into position to counterattack next turn.
Makeda takes her end-of-turn Fate Walker movement to retreat back behind my beasts.
Not the greatest turn, but the Gladiator is in the right zone, and won't be that easy to remove. However it's my only model contesting right now. I'm annoyed that the Feral is still alive, since killing it would have given me a huge leg up in attrition.
Circle, Turn 3
Baldur upkeeps Solid Ground, but drops Stone Skin and Rapid Growth.
Baldur activates first, and moves to within 6" of the Feral, and casts Primal and Stone Skin on it. The Feral warps for Strength, and kills the Gladiator. The Bloodtrackers switch their Prey to Molik Karn.
The Witch Doc Zombifies the Bloodtrackers again. The Bloodtrackers take some shots at my Agonizer, Central Brute, and Exalted Guardians, but don't do much. A few also shoot at the Paingiver who'd Enraged the Gladiator, but they all miss with bad rolls. They used Reform to continue to jam me, and hook around toward Makeda and the Paingivers.
The Wold Warden moves up, and recasts Stone Skin on the Warpwolf Stalker, then the Gorax moves next to it, and casts Primal (+2 Mat and Str, but automatically frenzies next turn) on the Stalker. The remaining full unit of Shifting Stones teleports the Stalker right into the middle of my central group. Finally, the Stalker itself activates, warps for Strength to become P+S 22, and kills both Exalted Guardians, the Agonizer, and the Krea.
The Winter Argus attacks the Cyclops Brute in the left zone, but misses. The last Swamp Gobber moves around to screen the Stalker from the Bronzeback, but the Bronzeback Counter-Charges. It misses the Gobber, but puts itself in a good position to charge the Stalker next turn.
Luke ends his turn, and scores 2 points for Dominating the right zone.
I actually feel ok about this. At minimum, I need to take out the Stalker and the Feral, and contest the zone, but once I do, the attrition game will be all in my favor.
Skorne, Turn 3
Makeda Leaches, and upkeeps Vortex of Destruction. My central Brute has one Fury left over, and Frenzies despite being Thr 9. It attacks the Stalker for light damage.
I have Makeda activate first. First, she casts Train Wreck on Molik Karn to give him Beat Back. Then, she Feats (this turn, when a model in her Battlegroup destroys one or more enemy models with an attack, either put a Fury on Makeda or remove a Fury from a model in her Battlegroup), and moves into melee range of the Feral. She takes it out in one swing, and uses Blood Boon to cast Eliminator at a nearby Bloodtracker for free. She hits and kills the Bloodtracker, and Eliminator lets her move 2" into melee range of the Stalker and another Bloodtracker. She kills the second Bloodtracker, and casts Fate Walker, leaving her on 1 Fury.
The Paingivers move up and Enrage Molik, the Bronzeback, and the Brute in the right zone. The Brute does some damage to the Winter Argus, but doesn't kill it. The Bronzeback puts Train Wreck on itself, charges past the Swamp Gobber, who misses with its free strike, and kills both the Stalker and the Swamp Gobber. It uses its Beat Back movement from Train Wreck to advance toward the Right Zone.
After a little contemplation, I decide to try something risky with Molik. If it works (and it's likely that it will), I'll be able to get Molik right into Baldur's back lines. If it doesn't work, I'll lose the game.
I have Molik charge the Winter Argus. He needs an 8 to hit, but I miss with a 4. I boost after the roll using Future Sight, but only add 3. Not good. Molik takes his second initial attack, and rolls another 4. I boost the hit again, and this time get a 4. The Argus dies, and Molik takes a 3" advance into melee range of the Stone Keeper. The Stone Keeper and a few Sentry Stones die horribly, and Molik Beats his way Back to the Gorax. Rather than buy attacks against the Gorax, I just cast Fate Walker.
I end my turn, and Molik and Makeda do their movement. Molik moves into the right zone to contest it, and Makeda retreats into melee with some Bloodtrackers (much safer than having them shoot at her), camping 3 Fury.
I score 1 point for controlling the left zone.
I am holding on well. If Molik stays in the zone, I'm in a very good position. Even if he doesn't, my remaining high-Arm models will be hard to kill. The Gorax has a great Animus in Primal, but it's only a light beast, and the Wold Warden is pretty pillow-fisted, and can't be targeted by Primal.
Circle, Turn 4
Baldur upkeeps Solid Ground.
The Wold Warden advances to try to Chain Attack: Smite Molik to make him easier to kill. However, I Counter-Charge with the Bronzeback, putting it just inside the right zone. The Wold Warden decides to slam the Bronzeback out of the zone instead. It boosts with its attacks, and succeeds, putting the Bronzeback 1" away and out of the zone again.
Baldur casts Stone Skin on the Bloodtrackers, and stays in his forest. The Witch Doc Zombifies the Bloodtrackers again. All the Bloodtrackers shoot at Molik, one dying to a free strike by Makeda. They damage Molik badly despite his being in melee, and reform to screen Baldur and hem in Makeda so she can't move.
The two surviving Shifting Stones find a new purpose by teleporting into the right zone to contest it.
Finally, the Gorax puts Primal on itself, advances, and finishes off Molik Karn. The Bloodtrackers switch their Prey to Makeda.
Luke ends his turn, and scores 2 more points, putting him at 4, and one away from a scenario victory.
I can't screw up this next turn. I need to get the Bronzeback and central Brute into the zone, and kill off Baldur's remaining beasts. Then I'll pick off the remaining Bloodtrackers and Baldur himself.
Skorne, Turn 4
I upkeep Vortex of Destruction. The left Brute frenzies, and kills one of the Shifting Stones contesting the left zone. Makeda forces the Bronzeback to stand up.
Makeda casts Ground Zero, killing one Bloodtracker, and pushing the other two away, then retreats to a safer location.
The Paingivers advance, and Enrage both the Bronzeback and the central Brute. The Bronzeback charges, and kills both the Wold Warden and the Gorax. The Brute charges Nuala, and kills her and another Bloodtracker.
I end my turn. I'm now in control of the game despite being 4 points down. There are 3 Bloodtrackers left, along with the Witch Doctor, 2 Shifting Stones from different units, and Baldur himself. Luke will be hard pressed to get rid of my two Arm 19 warbeasts, both sitting at almost full health.
Circle, Turn 5
Baldur drops Stone Skin and Solid Ground, hanging on to all 6 Fury.
The Witch Doctor Zombifies the Bloodtrackers, who put a few points of damage on the Bronzeback. Baldur then charges the Bronzeback, staying exactly 2" away. Luke had planned to use Weight of Stone to reduce the Bronzeback's Spd to 1, which would make it impossible to reach Baldur. However, he had forgotten about Hyper Aggressive, which let the Bronzeback walk an inch toward him when he hit. Baldur buys 4 more attacks to try to finish the Bronzeback, but only takes it to a little under half health. With his last 2 Fury, he puts a forest next to Makeda with Rapid Growth so she won't be able to charge him next turn.
Skorne, Turn 5
Makeda upkeeps Vortex of Destruction. The right Brute passes its Threshold check.
The Paingivers advance, and one of them heals the Bronzeback's broken Mind and Spirit with Medicate. Makeda runs next to Baldur, then the Bronzeback activates, and finishes him off.
Victory to the Skorne!
Thoughts
I played a pretty solid game throughout. I did get a little overexcited with the Brutes and Intuition, which lets them make an opponent reroll an attack roll against them. Because of that, a Brute Frenzied on turn 3 when it should have been able to run into the zone, and really prevent Luke from scoring on turn 4. Otherwise, my positioning was good, and I used the Brutes to draw out Luke's heavy hitters just as I'd planned. Molik's wacky trip across the table was a serious risk that almost lost me the game. I should have charged a Bloodtracker in the right zone, and killed as much in there as I could. I usually try to play it safe, but this time I was a sucker for awesome shenanigans. I'm pretty lucky it worked out, especially after Molik's first initial attack missed.
The list ran very well. The Brutes were great, and definitely proved tougher than an equivalent point value of infantry. They also killed or damaged one or two models per turn, which isn't bad when the heavies and Makeda can do so much on their own. Having a Krea and 5 Shield Guards made shooting almost irrelevant in the early game. I'll probably run Makeda 3 with a list like this one for a couple of weeks (or months if I continue to go so long between games), since it's so much fun. Thanks to PP Forumite Staks for posting it. Now I just need to get myself some more Brutes (2 of the ones I used were proxied).
Luke also played well. Going hard for the right zone was a good move, and could have won him the game. Between the speed of the Bloodtrackers and Baldur's Feat, I was worried I'd be shut out of the scenario entirely. He did forget about Counter Charge a couple of times, and also forgot about Hyper Aggressive on his last turn, but otherwise didn't make many mistakes. He had some bad luck on his 2nd turn when his Feral Warpwolf failed to kill the Cyclops Brute. If it had been able to do that last point of damage and sprint away, Luke would have been in a significantly better position.
His list had a lot of synergy. The Bloodtrackers were a very threatening presence. Between Stone Skin making them Pow 11 Weapon Masters with their javalins and Solid Ground making them immune to blast damage, as well as immune to knockdown (with Tough from the Witch Doctor), they jammed me hard, and threatened a lot of my models into the late game. If my list hadn't been so good at countering ranged attacks, they would have done a lot more damage. I'm not entirely sure what the Winter Argus adds to the list besides an Arm buff for Baldur. It does make him much more difficult to kill if he exposes himself to danger, but 5 points is a lot to pay for it. Taking out the Winter Argus would let Luke upgrade the Wold Warden to Megalith (assuming Megs wasn't in another list for a tournament), and have 3 points left over for something else. I'm no expert in Circle though, so it's possible it does more than provide a good animus. This game, it contested the left zone, and forced me to divert models to deal with it.
Tuesday, February 4, 2014
Supreme Aptimus Zaal vs. Jarl Skuld, Devil of the Thornwood at 50pts
So, another long hiatus, but I'm hoping to get reports in on the regular starting this month.
I decided to go with an out-of-tier Supreme Aptimus Zaal list, since I have a little less experience with him out of tier:
Supreme Aptimus Zaal (+5)
*Bronzeback Titan (10)
*Titan Gladiator (8)
*Aptimus Marketh (3)
*Kovass (-)
10 Nihilators (8)
10 Immortals (8)
Tyrant Commander and Standard Bearer (3)
Paingiver Beast Handlers (2)
Hakaar the Destroyer (4)
Ancestral Guardian (3)
Ancestral Guardian (3)
Ancestral Guardian (3)
This is a little different from the tiered Zaal list I've been running. The main difference is including 2 melee heavies instead of the battery of ranged beasts I've been using. The idea is that after the infantry and Ancestral Guardians (AG's from here on out) have done their work, my opponent will have two very solid melee heavies to deal with, and not much left that can deal with them. The other difference is that I have some ways to hand out Pathfinder in the Gladiator and Tyrant Commander. Overall, this is the preferred way to play Zaal, so I'm optimistic.
My frequent opponent and co-blogger, Caleb J, was running Jarl Skuld with the following list:
Jarl Skuld, Devil of the Thornwood (+6)
*Dire Troll Mauler (9)
*Troll Impaler (5)
*Rune Bearer (2)
10 Trollkin Fennblades (8)
*Officer and Drummer (2)
5 Trollkin Warders (8)
3 Trollkin Long Riders (7)
Horthol, Long Rider Champion (5)
Fell Caller Hero (3)
Trollkin Champion Hero (3)
Stone Scribe Chronicler (2)
Fennblade Kithkar (2)
This looks like a pretty attrition-y troll jamming list. It's going to be fast between Quicken and Tactical Supremacy, and there are a lot of Tough, multi-wound models around for me to slog through. It has decent, though not great, options against both high-Def and high-Arm, and overall I'd call it a pretty good scenario list, especially with Jarl's Feat potentially buying another turn.
Deployment and Scenario
We were too lazy to play a scenario though. In the future, I really think we should, because I think they're more fun (and especially in this case, so Caleb's list could showcase its strengths). But Tower's Scenario box (where spare packets, zone cutouts, and timers are located) was a whole 6 or 7 feet away, and we could not be bothered. Oh well.
I won the roll-off, and decided to go first. I wanted to be able to claim as much maneuvering room as possible against Jarl's speed. Plus, if we had been playing a scenario, I wouldn't have wanted to be jammed out of it on turn 1.
I set up in a two-part cluster in the center of my side of the table. Each infantry unit went on one side, supported by two AG's (the Immortals got Hakaar, since I'd have much better options for Righteous Vengeance with the Immortals being able to get out of the way with normal Vengeance). The Warbeasts, Zaal, and my other support went in the middle, so I could send them wherever they were needed.
Caleb deployed in the long blue line I've come to know and love. The Fennblades and Kithkar set up to oppose my Immortals, while the Long Riders opposed the Nihilators. The Warders deployed just behind the Fennblades as backup, while the Warbeasts deployed near them and to the center to maybe do something about my warbeasts. Jarl and the Rune Bearer deployed at the front of the army near the Long Riders, and the Champion Hero deployed close behind.
Turn 1, Skorne:
Nearly everything ran. Zaal put Awakened Spirit on the Gladiator and Last Stand on one of the Ancestral Guardians with the Nihilators, walked forward, and gave each AG (including Hakaar) a Soul Token.
The Tyrant Commander used Overcome on the Nihilators to let them run through the forest. Marketh put Inviolable Resolve on the Immortals to take them to Arm 19. Everything else ran.
Turn 1, Trollbloods:
The Rune Bearer walked forward, and used Harmonious Exaltation on Jarl. Jarl put Quicken on the Warders and Tactical Supremacy on the Fennblades, then charged up behind a low wall.
The Fennblades and Kithkar ran 12" up, and the Warders ran up right behind them. The Stone Scribe Chronicler walked up, and put Hero's Tragedy on the Fennblades so that any of my warrior models who killed them next turn would be knocked down.
The Fell Caller used Overcome on the Long Riders to let them run through a forest, which they then proceeded to do. They didn't run their full 14" because Caleb didn't want them to be in the Nihilators' threat range.
The Mauler and Impaler both ran, ending up . The Champion Hero ran.
Finally, the Fennblades took their Tactical Supremacy move, and walked 3" toward the Immortals.
So, there was a looming jamming threat, but it wasn't too bad. I'd have the first strike in, and Immortals backed up by Ancestral Guardians are pretty good against infantry. More interestingly, Jarl was far forward - ahead of a lot of his troops, and on a largely unsupported flank. I couldn't reach him on the next turn, but maybe I could set something up.
Turn 2, Skorne:
Zaal upkept Last Stand on the sacrificial AG and Awakened Spirit on the Gladiator.
The two titans ran up a little cautiously. I wasn't scared of most of the trolls, but I didn't want the Mauler or the Long Riders getting a first strike in on my beasts. The Beast Handlers ran up behind them, trying to stay out of the way. Zaal advanced, and put another Soul Token on all the AG's again.
The leading Immortals charged the Fennblades, while the back lines spread out to make the most of their Vengeance attacks next turn. Two Immortals killed their targets, so the Fennblades would have some Vengeance of their own to do. Fortunately, they were more than 5" from the Fennblade Kithkar, so there would be no Righteous Vengeance. The AG and Hakaar moved up into the middle of pack for additional support. Marketh advanced, and put Inviolable Resolve on the Immortals again.
The Tyrant Commander put Overcome on the Nihilators again, so they could get through the woods. One charged a Fennblade (it Toughed), and the rest ran. The idea was to get as close to Jarl as possible so that support couldn't screen him with much depth. He could still retreat, but I'd still be setting the battle line far forward on his flank, and starting to wrap around his Fennblade jam.
I was reasonably well set up. The Immortals would probably hold the Fennblades, and the Nihilators were a serious thorn in Caleb's flank. If Caleb didn't do something about them, they'd be able to clean up their side of the table, and go after Jarl.
On the other hand, Caleb's turn would initiate the grinding phase of the game, which trolls are traditionally good at thanks to Tough, and Zaal can sometimes struggle with, thanks to Last Stand killing whoever had it on them at the end of the turn.
Turn 2, Trollbloods:
The Fennblades crashed into the Immortals with Vengeance, but only one got through that Arm 19. Meanwhile, Jarl upkept his spells.
The Mauler wasn't interested in killing a couple of Nihilators only to be charged by a Titan, so it backed off. The Fell Caller used Overcome on the Long Riders again so they could charge the Nihilators. Then it moved up and sprayed over 2 Nihilators and the Last Standed AG. It knocked down one of the Nihilators, and did a couple points of damage to the AG.
The Rune Bearer used Harmonious Exaltation on Jarl again. Jarl cast Magic Bullet on himself once, and forfeited his move to aim. His first shot caused a Nihilator to pass its Tough check, but killed a second with the Magic Bullet. His second shot killed its target, and he took a 2" Swift Hunter move to end behind the wall, still fairly exposed. He also Feated, laying down 5 4" AoE clouds which granted Pathfinder and the ability to move through friendly models for the Trollbloods, and a -2 to attack rolls for living enemy models in the clouds.
Two of the Long Riders charged the Nihilators, and one charged the Last Standed AG. Between impact attacks and initials, the Long Riders reduced the Nihilators to the last 4, but one of them died to the AG's Defensive Strike. The Champion Hero charged in next, killing another Nihilator as well as the Last Standed AG, which spawned a Kovass.
The Impaler advanced, and tried to Critical Smite the Bronzeback. It hit, but didn't crit, and did 2 damage to the Bronzeback, which used Hyper Aggressive to advance 4" toward it.
The Fennblades killed 2 more Immortals thanks to their high Arm, and one more Nihilator. Horthol tried to trample over an Immortal to reach the non-character Ancestral Guardian near him, but failed to break the Immortal's Arm 19 with his impact attack, and failed the charge. The Fennblade Kithkar charged my one surviving lead Immortal, and finally killed it off.
The Warders tried to run to screen Jarl, but weren't in a good position to do so, and only one got sort-of between him and the Kovass.
Caleb was not in a good place here. Jarl was very exposed, and easily within my Kovass' walking threat. Both the Fennblades and the Long Riders would be eating a lot of attacks in my turn, and that would leave just the Warders and the Mauler to handle my heavies, not to mention whatever other infantry survived. The smart play was probably to grind the game out, and focus on clearing out Caleb's remaining tools.
But that is way less fun than trying to kill Jarl with a ghost.
Turn 3, Skorne
First, the Immortals and Hakaar took out a bunch of Fennblades in the Maintenance Phase. Zaal upkept Inviolable Resolve and Awakened Spirit.
So first, can I kill Jarl with the Kovass?
Zaal advanced, used his Feat to turn all those dead Nihilators into boosts, and cast Last Stand on the Kovass. Now the Kovass would be Mat 8 Pow 14, and would be rolling up to 4 dice on all its attack and damage rolls if I chose to boost them with Ancestral Rage tokens. Zaal also cast Train Wreck on the Bronzeback.
The Kovass advanced and used Thresher to kill the Fell Caller, force the Warder near Jarl to pass a Tough check, and force Jarl to transfer 14 damage to the Mauler. The second attack forced Jarl to transfer 12 damage to the Impaler. The third attack, the Kovass rolled 18 damage, which finished off the Mauler, and blew 2 damage back onto Jarl, who was now out of transfers. The fourth (and final) attack disabled Jarl, and forced a Tough check.
Which Jarl passed.
Ok, time for my backup plan.
The Immortals activated, and finished off the Fennblades, freeing up the Bronzeback. Then Marketh activated, and put Last Stand on the Bronzeback.
Now, this was probably neither necessary nor very smart. The plan was to use Beat Back to get the Bronzeback into Jarl, and I didn't really need the extra attack die (against Def 12) or the extra damage die (against a half-dead Impaler and an 8-hit-box Warder). In fact, I kind of wanted things to live past the first hit, since I wasn't sure that 2 Beat Back moves would get me into Jarl, and if I failed, the Bronzeback would die at the end of the turn.
But eff it. I had a Bronzeback and I had Last Stand and I wanted to watch things splatter.
The Paingivers Enraged the Bronzeback, which charged the Warder it could reach. The Warder passed its Tough check, and the Bronzeback pushed into the Impaler. The Impaler didn't have Tough, and therefore splattered most satisfyingly. The Bronzeback didn't quite have melee range on Jarl after this move, but did have it on the now knocked-down Warder, so used its last initial attack to get into melee range of Jarl (the Warder Toughed again, go figure).
Jarl was knocked down himself and camping zero, so Caleb had to pass 5 Tough checks in a row to save him.
He passed the first 2.
Victory to the Skorne!
Thoughts
I didn't make any terrible mistakes, and otherwise played pretty well. Sending the Kovass after Jarl was the right thing to do, but after Jarl Toughed, focusing on Caleb's army was the safer move. I could have wrapped up the attrition battle, and had a guaranteed good position rather than the somewhat iffy Bronzeback assassination run (very iffy considering that if the Warder had failed its Tough check, the Bronzeback would have been able to splatter the Impaler, and then exploded itself. Next time, no Last Stand).
I'm very happy with the list. The models fit together a lot better than they do in the Immortal Host list I've been working with. The Gladiator and Bronzeback make a very solid second wave, and I definitely liked having the two Reach units holding down my flank. I did miss the shooting I usually bring with my Immortal Host list, but this time the synergy and speed of the army more than made up for it. The ability to deal with rough terrain also added a lot.
I might drop one of the AG's and Bronzeback for Tiberion or Molik Karn and a 2-point solo (though there are so many to choose from). Tiberion can Shield Guard for Zaal, and is very solid. Molik with Last Stand and Zaal's Feat will kill just about any 'caster Molik can reach, and Molik is very squigly. I definitely appreciate the Ancestral Guardians though. Defensive Strike served me well, and Zaal's ability to load them up with souls makes them very reliable. The three AG's and Hakaar always do solid work when I field them together.
Caleb only made one major mistake, and that was overextending Jarl on turn 2. If he'd retreated with Jarl, I wouldn't have had such a good run at him. In general, playing a little more conservatively, both with Jarl and with the Fennblades, would have served Caleb better this game. We weren't playing a scenario, so there was no pressure to jam me out of board space, and no reason to play with Jarl so far forward.
Caleb also said he's thinking of dropping the Trollkin Champion Hero from the list, which I think is a good idea. Even though Jarl's army can be a little too fast to brick up effectively, I think a Kriel Stone Bearer would be a good replacement. Jarl can charge it up over the first two turns, and use it mainly for the beasts, the Long Riders, and the Warders. The Fennblades will run way outside the bubble, and they don't really benefit much from the +2 Arm anyway.
As always, thanks for reading. I hope to have the next report up sooner rather than later.
I decided to go with an out-of-tier Supreme Aptimus Zaal list, since I have a little less experience with him out of tier:
Supreme Aptimus Zaal (+5)
*Bronzeback Titan (10)
*Titan Gladiator (8)
*Aptimus Marketh (3)
*Kovass (-)
10 Nihilators (8)
10 Immortals (8)
Tyrant Commander and Standard Bearer (3)
Paingiver Beast Handlers (2)
Hakaar the Destroyer (4)
Ancestral Guardian (3)
Ancestral Guardian (3)
Ancestral Guardian (3)
This is a little different from the tiered Zaal list I've been running. The main difference is including 2 melee heavies instead of the battery of ranged beasts I've been using. The idea is that after the infantry and Ancestral Guardians (AG's from here on out) have done their work, my opponent will have two very solid melee heavies to deal with, and not much left that can deal with them. The other difference is that I have some ways to hand out Pathfinder in the Gladiator and Tyrant Commander. Overall, this is the preferred way to play Zaal, so I'm optimistic.
My frequent opponent and co-blogger, Caleb J, was running Jarl Skuld with the following list:
Jarl Skuld, Devil of the Thornwood (+6)
*Dire Troll Mauler (9)
*Troll Impaler (5)
*Rune Bearer (2)
10 Trollkin Fennblades (8)
*Officer and Drummer (2)
5 Trollkin Warders (8)
3 Trollkin Long Riders (7)
Horthol, Long Rider Champion (5)
Fell Caller Hero (3)
Trollkin Champion Hero (3)
Stone Scribe Chronicler (2)
Fennblade Kithkar (2)
This looks like a pretty attrition-y troll jamming list. It's going to be fast between Quicken and Tactical Supremacy, and there are a lot of Tough, multi-wound models around for me to slog through. It has decent, though not great, options against both high-Def and high-Arm, and overall I'd call it a pretty good scenario list, especially with Jarl's Feat potentially buying another turn.
Deployment and Scenario
We were too lazy to play a scenario though. In the future, I really think we should, because I think they're more fun (and especially in this case, so Caleb's list could showcase its strengths). But Tower's Scenario box (where spare packets, zone cutouts, and timers are located) was a whole 6 or 7 feet away, and we could not be bothered. Oh well.
I won the roll-off, and decided to go first. I wanted to be able to claim as much maneuvering room as possible against Jarl's speed. Plus, if we had been playing a scenario, I wouldn't have wanted to be jammed out of it on turn 1.
I set up in a two-part cluster in the center of my side of the table. Each infantry unit went on one side, supported by two AG's (the Immortals got Hakaar, since I'd have much better options for Righteous Vengeance with the Immortals being able to get out of the way with normal Vengeance). The Warbeasts, Zaal, and my other support went in the middle, so I could send them wherever they were needed.
Caleb deployed in the long blue line I've come to know and love. The Fennblades and Kithkar set up to oppose my Immortals, while the Long Riders opposed the Nihilators. The Warders deployed just behind the Fennblades as backup, while the Warbeasts deployed near them and to the center to maybe do something about my warbeasts. Jarl and the Rune Bearer deployed at the front of the army near the Long Riders, and the Champion Hero deployed close behind.
Turn 1, Skorne:
Nearly everything ran. Zaal put Awakened Spirit on the Gladiator and Last Stand on one of the Ancestral Guardians with the Nihilators, walked forward, and gave each AG (including Hakaar) a Soul Token.
The Tyrant Commander used Overcome on the Nihilators to let them run through the forest. Marketh put Inviolable Resolve on the Immortals to take them to Arm 19. Everything else ran.
Turn 1, Trollbloods:
The Rune Bearer walked forward, and used Harmonious Exaltation on Jarl. Jarl put Quicken on the Warders and Tactical Supremacy on the Fennblades, then charged up behind a low wall.
The Fennblades and Kithkar ran 12" up, and the Warders ran up right behind them. The Stone Scribe Chronicler walked up, and put Hero's Tragedy on the Fennblades so that any of my warrior models who killed them next turn would be knocked down.
The Fell Caller used Overcome on the Long Riders to let them run through a forest, which they then proceeded to do. They didn't run their full 14" because Caleb didn't want them to be in the Nihilators' threat range.
The Mauler and Impaler both ran, ending up . The Champion Hero ran.
Finally, the Fennblades took their Tactical Supremacy move, and walked 3" toward the Immortals.
So, there was a looming jamming threat, but it wasn't too bad. I'd have the first strike in, and Immortals backed up by Ancestral Guardians are pretty good against infantry. More interestingly, Jarl was far forward - ahead of a lot of his troops, and on a largely unsupported flank. I couldn't reach him on the next turn, but maybe I could set something up.
Turn 2, Skorne:
Zaal upkept Last Stand on the sacrificial AG and Awakened Spirit on the Gladiator.
The two titans ran up a little cautiously. I wasn't scared of most of the trolls, but I didn't want the Mauler or the Long Riders getting a first strike in on my beasts. The Beast Handlers ran up behind them, trying to stay out of the way. Zaal advanced, and put another Soul Token on all the AG's again.
The leading Immortals charged the Fennblades, while the back lines spread out to make the most of their Vengeance attacks next turn. Two Immortals killed their targets, so the Fennblades would have some Vengeance of their own to do. Fortunately, they were more than 5" from the Fennblade Kithkar, so there would be no Righteous Vengeance. The AG and Hakaar moved up into the middle of pack for additional support. Marketh advanced, and put Inviolable Resolve on the Immortals again.
The Tyrant Commander put Overcome on the Nihilators again, so they could get through the woods. One charged a Fennblade (it Toughed), and the rest ran. The idea was to get as close to Jarl as possible so that support couldn't screen him with much depth. He could still retreat, but I'd still be setting the battle line far forward on his flank, and starting to wrap around his Fennblade jam.
I was reasonably well set up. The Immortals would probably hold the Fennblades, and the Nihilators were a serious thorn in Caleb's flank. If Caleb didn't do something about them, they'd be able to clean up their side of the table, and go after Jarl.
On the other hand, Caleb's turn would initiate the grinding phase of the game, which trolls are traditionally good at thanks to Tough, and Zaal can sometimes struggle with, thanks to Last Stand killing whoever had it on them at the end of the turn.
Turn 2, Trollbloods:
The Fennblades crashed into the Immortals with Vengeance, but only one got through that Arm 19. Meanwhile, Jarl upkept his spells.
The Mauler wasn't interested in killing a couple of Nihilators only to be charged by a Titan, so it backed off. The Fell Caller used Overcome on the Long Riders again so they could charge the Nihilators. Then it moved up and sprayed over 2 Nihilators and the Last Standed AG. It knocked down one of the Nihilators, and did a couple points of damage to the AG.
The Rune Bearer used Harmonious Exaltation on Jarl again. Jarl cast Magic Bullet on himself once, and forfeited his move to aim. His first shot caused a Nihilator to pass its Tough check, but killed a second with the Magic Bullet. His second shot killed its target, and he took a 2" Swift Hunter move to end behind the wall, still fairly exposed. He also Feated, laying down 5 4" AoE clouds which granted Pathfinder and the ability to move through friendly models for the Trollbloods, and a -2 to attack rolls for living enemy models in the clouds.
Two of the Long Riders charged the Nihilators, and one charged the Last Standed AG. Between impact attacks and initials, the Long Riders reduced the Nihilators to the last 4, but one of them died to the AG's Defensive Strike. The Champion Hero charged in next, killing another Nihilator as well as the Last Standed AG, which spawned a Kovass.
The Impaler advanced, and tried to Critical Smite the Bronzeback. It hit, but didn't crit, and did 2 damage to the Bronzeback, which used Hyper Aggressive to advance 4" toward it.
The Fennblades killed 2 more Immortals thanks to their high Arm, and one more Nihilator. Horthol tried to trample over an Immortal to reach the non-character Ancestral Guardian near him, but failed to break the Immortal's Arm 19 with his impact attack, and failed the charge. The Fennblade Kithkar charged my one surviving lead Immortal, and finally killed it off.
The Warders tried to run to screen Jarl, but weren't in a good position to do so, and only one got sort-of between him and the Kovass.
Caleb was not in a good place here. Jarl was very exposed, and easily within my Kovass' walking threat. Both the Fennblades and the Long Riders would be eating a lot of attacks in my turn, and that would leave just the Warders and the Mauler to handle my heavies, not to mention whatever other infantry survived. The smart play was probably to grind the game out, and focus on clearing out Caleb's remaining tools.
But that is way less fun than trying to kill Jarl with a ghost.
Turn 3, Skorne
First, the Immortals and Hakaar took out a bunch of Fennblades in the Maintenance Phase. Zaal upkept Inviolable Resolve and Awakened Spirit.
So first, can I kill Jarl with the Kovass?
Zaal advanced, used his Feat to turn all those dead Nihilators into boosts, and cast Last Stand on the Kovass. Now the Kovass would be Mat 8 Pow 14, and would be rolling up to 4 dice on all its attack and damage rolls if I chose to boost them with Ancestral Rage tokens. Zaal also cast Train Wreck on the Bronzeback.
The Kovass advanced and used Thresher to kill the Fell Caller, force the Warder near Jarl to pass a Tough check, and force Jarl to transfer 14 damage to the Mauler. The second attack forced Jarl to transfer 12 damage to the Impaler. The third attack, the Kovass rolled 18 damage, which finished off the Mauler, and blew 2 damage back onto Jarl, who was now out of transfers. The fourth (and final) attack disabled Jarl, and forced a Tough check.
Which Jarl passed.
Ok, time for my backup plan.
The Immortals activated, and finished off the Fennblades, freeing up the Bronzeback. Then Marketh activated, and put Last Stand on the Bronzeback.
Now, this was probably neither necessary nor very smart. The plan was to use Beat Back to get the Bronzeback into Jarl, and I didn't really need the extra attack die (against Def 12) or the extra damage die (against a half-dead Impaler and an 8-hit-box Warder). In fact, I kind of wanted things to live past the first hit, since I wasn't sure that 2 Beat Back moves would get me into Jarl, and if I failed, the Bronzeback would die at the end of the turn.
But eff it. I had a Bronzeback and I had Last Stand and I wanted to watch things splatter.
The Paingivers Enraged the Bronzeback, which charged the Warder it could reach. The Warder passed its Tough check, and the Bronzeback pushed into the Impaler. The Impaler didn't have Tough, and therefore splattered most satisfyingly. The Bronzeback didn't quite have melee range on Jarl after this move, but did have it on the now knocked-down Warder, so used its last initial attack to get into melee range of Jarl (the Warder Toughed again, go figure).
Jarl was knocked down himself and camping zero, so Caleb had to pass 5 Tough checks in a row to save him.
He passed the first 2.
Victory to the Skorne!
Thoughts
I didn't make any terrible mistakes, and otherwise played pretty well. Sending the Kovass after Jarl was the right thing to do, but after Jarl Toughed, focusing on Caleb's army was the safer move. I could have wrapped up the attrition battle, and had a guaranteed good position rather than the somewhat iffy Bronzeback assassination run (very iffy considering that if the Warder had failed its Tough check, the Bronzeback would have been able to splatter the Impaler, and then exploded itself. Next time, no Last Stand).
I'm very happy with the list. The models fit together a lot better than they do in the Immortal Host list I've been working with. The Gladiator and Bronzeback make a very solid second wave, and I definitely liked having the two Reach units holding down my flank. I did miss the shooting I usually bring with my Immortal Host list, but this time the synergy and speed of the army more than made up for it. The ability to deal with rough terrain also added a lot.
I might drop one of the AG's and Bronzeback for Tiberion or Molik Karn and a 2-point solo (though there are so many to choose from). Tiberion can Shield Guard for Zaal, and is very solid. Molik with Last Stand and Zaal's Feat will kill just about any 'caster Molik can reach, and Molik is very squigly. I definitely appreciate the Ancestral Guardians though. Defensive Strike served me well, and Zaal's ability to load them up with souls makes them very reliable. The three AG's and Hakaar always do solid work when I field them together.
Caleb only made one major mistake, and that was overextending Jarl on turn 2. If he'd retreated with Jarl, I wouldn't have had such a good run at him. In general, playing a little more conservatively, both with Jarl and with the Fennblades, would have served Caleb better this game. We weren't playing a scenario, so there was no pressure to jam me out of board space, and no reason to play with Jarl so far forward.
Caleb also said he's thinking of dropping the Trollkin Champion Hero from the list, which I think is a good idea. Even though Jarl's army can be a little too fast to brick up effectively, I think a Kriel Stone Bearer would be a good replacement. Jarl can charge it up over the first two turns, and use it mainly for the beasts, the Long Riders, and the Warders. The Fennblades will run way outside the bubble, and they don't really benefit much from the +2 Arm anyway.
As always, thanks for reading. I hope to have the next report up sooner rather than later.
Monday, December 16, 2013
Battle Report: Kaelyssa vs eDoomshaper 50pt
I managed to get a game in this last Friday (yea, ok it was like a week and a half ago, but I take a long time writing these) vs my busy and elusive compatriot, pGrexy.
pGrexy's Army: Kaelyssa 50pt
Kaelyssa, Night's Whisper (*7pts)
* Banshee (10pts)
* Phoenix (10pts)
* Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker (2pts)
Dawnguard Invictors (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Dawnguard Invictor Officer & Standard (2pts)
Dawnguard Sentinels (Leader and 9 Grunts) (9pts)
* Dawnguard Sentinel Officer & Standard (2pts)
Mage Hunter Strikeforce (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Mage Hunter Commander (2pts)
Arcanist (1pts)
Arcanist (1pts)
Mage Hunter Assassin (2pts)
Mage Hunter Assassin (2pts)
The potential for assassination in this list is downright silly. Between the Assassins, Strikeforce, Phoenix, and Kaelyssa, I'm going to have my hands full protecting Doomy from a grisly death. My potential advantage -- 3 high-ARM, high-HP, rampaging monsters of Dire Trolls -- is slightly negated by the sheer number of infantry and those Sentinels, who he can keep back and use to really demolish my Dire Trollsonce they commit to the front line of infantry. Kaelyssa is the real wild card here, as her spells and feat can be a tremendous advantage to keeping me on my back foot -- Arcane Reckoning or Banishing Ward on anything my spellcasters (Runeshapers, Lanyssa, Janissa, and Doomy) try and go for, Phantom Hunter on the Mage Hunger Strikeforce (that's just gross), and the feat to blunt my potential charges on any turn it would be advantageous for Doomy to feat. Toss in 2 heavies with good melee damage AND range weapons (not to mention that damn Arc Node, but Kaelyssa's offensive spells are FAR more dangerous to Warmachine armies), and this list is terrifyingly well constructed.
Caleb's Army: eDoomshaper 50pt
Hoarluk Doomshaper, Rage of Dhunia (*6pts)
* Troll Axer (6pts)
* Earthborn Dire Troll (10pts)
* Mulg the Ancient (12pts)
* Rok (11pts)
* Trollkin Runebearer (2pts)
Krielstone Bearer and 3 Stone Scribes (3pts)
* Krielstone Stone Scribe Elder (1pts)
Trollkin Runeshapers (Leader and 2 Crew) (4pts)
Janissa Stonetide (3pts)
Lanyssa Ryssyll, Nyss Sorceress (2pts)
Troll Whelps (2pts)
I love this list. I have rarely played it, but I love it. The three most dangerous melee Heavies in Trollbloods, enough spellcasting and magic weapons to make me laugh in the face of incorporeal and certain Menoth builds, and enough speed boosts to seriously annoy even Circle and Cryx players. Hell, even Mulg can charge 14" on feat turn without a lot of effort (4" move, charge, feat, Rush, Hunters Mark), and the Earthborn can potentially go 3" farther than that!
My biggest issue is going to be protecting Doomy - he's a fragile little bugger, and there's a unit of phantom-seeker-able MH Strikeforce on the table, not to mention two assassins!
Deployment and Scenario
We rolled the Incursion scenario, so 3 flags went up in the middle of the board - one of which would disappear on turn 2, which made deployment interesting. We bandied about various tactics for dealing with this scenario, and ended up ignoring a good chunk of it and deploying effectively across from each other between the right 2 objectives.
pGrexy won the roll and elected to go first. He deployed roughly in a line (from my right to left) as follows: Phoenix and an Arcanist (aka Mr Coffee), Invictors w/ UA, Sentinels w/ UA, Kaelyssa and Sylys behind them, and finally the Banshee and the 2nd Mr. Coffee. In response, I deployed (from right to left) the Runeshapers, Rok, Doomy and the Runebearer*, the KSB and Janissa behind them, Mulg, the Axer behind him, Lanyssa, and the Earthborn on the far end. The whelps started off the table, as per usual when fielding a melee oriented battlegroup. Finally, the Strikeforce deployed roughly in front of the main army, while the two assassins went way out on my left flank, angling to take that flag if necessary (assuming it didn't disappear) and get a flank in on Doomy.
Terrain was important, but largely ignored - there was a forest on my side next to the Earthborn, and another forest just to the right and behind the center objective (from my POV), plus a hill on my right just outside the deployment zone. Beyond that, the other terrain didn't figure much into the game (and to be honest I kinda forgot what else was there...).
Turn 1: Retribution
The Strikeforce moved up first and fanned out, leaving plenty of room for the mass of infantry to follow. The Assassins ran up my right flank, aiming to claim the objective next turn and wait for an opening. The rest of the infantry and jacks effectively just ran forward, clustering up next to a forest just his side of the center objective, with the Phoenix moving a bit farther to put him just behind the Strikeforce. Kaelyssa put Banishing Ward and Arcane Reckoning on the Phoenix and Strikeforce, respectively, effectively curtailing any ideas I had for easily dropping Runeshaper-AOEs on them next turn.
Turn 1: Trollbloods
Not much to do but advance - the Axer put Rush on Mulg and charged forward, the Runebearer advanced and put Harmonious Exaltation on Doomy, who then dumped 5 fury onto the KSB and charged the Phoenix (for the extra 3" advance - he was WELL short). Janissa followed him forward and plopped a lovely wall directly in front of him (more to prevent charges than anything else, thanks to Phantom Seeker) while Mulg ran straight forward down the middle, Rok ran up the right side angling for the Phoenix, and Earthborn moved up to the left, taking up a position conveniently 2" in front of a forest (yay movement buffs!) for next turn. The KSB put up it's buff (adding no-continuous-effects from the Elder - none of them were really going to matter much this game), moved up and angled to the right - I figured Rok, Mulg, and the right flank would need the armor boost a bit more. The Runeshapers moved up the right, and threw 3 AOE's at long range at the Strikeforce - or rather, in the direction of the Strikeforce and Phoenix thanks to the upkeep spells on both that either didn't allow me to target them, or put the AOE on the Runeshaper when they inevitably missed. Thanks to some clever LOS shenanigans, I plopped the 3 AOEs directly in front of the unit - and they then mostly scattered away, killing... 1. Meh, I tried.
The rightmost objective then proceeded to disappear, bothering neither of us much since we were already ignoring it.
Turn 2: Retribustion
After some decision making, pGrexy upkept Arcane Reckoning but dropped Banishing Ward, and dumped some fury on the Phoenix. The Strikeforce moved up and to the left, fanning out in front of the Earthborn. The Strikeforece, mini-feated Invictors, and 2 Mage Hunter Assassins proceeded to move up and/or shoot everything they had into the relatively unprotected Earthborn, killing it. The Banshee moved forward in a forest to alongside Kaelyssa, who then shot a spell or two at the cluster of Doomy and the Krielstone scribes, without much effect. The Sentinels moved up alongside the Invictors, creating a rather effective 2nd line that was going to be tough to breach. (There was some divided shooting here that I don't remember, but the Earthborn was the only casualty). Kaelyssa ended the turn by Feating - effectively putting me on the back foot for the next turn.
Turn 2: Trollbloods
With the Earthborn down and a rather imposing wall of un-chargeable infantry in front of me, the only choice here was to feat and take as many of them down as possible with tramples. Luckily, the infantry were clustered fairly close together, meaning I'd have to Goad a lot less and could focus on buying more attacks or just trampling. It was at this point that pGrexy pointed something out that I had been doing wrong - when Goad is used on Rok, he can move without breaking his Berserk chain. I had previously been going on the assumption that each time he moved, he would have to buy another attack to start up the chain again - apparently I was wrong, and it just kept going until he missed or ran out of targets/fury to Goad.
pDoomy advanced up, putting Kaelyssa just within his control range, feated, and put Wild Aggression and Primal on Rok. Rok then proceeded to walk forward 8" and goad his way through 14 enemy models (7 Strikeforce, 5 Invictors, and finally 2 unlucky Sentinels), advancing a total of nearly 8-10 inches to sweep the area in front of Kaelyssa nearly clean of models before ending up in front of the Phoenix.
Huh.
The Axer put Rush on Mulg, and walked up and killed an Assassin, putting himself between the remaining assassin and Doomy in the process. The Runebearer used his once-per-game ability to put Wild Aggression on Mulg, who then trampled 12" to an Invictor in front of Kaelyssa (killing an unlucky Strikeforce on the way), killed it easily, Goad'ed up to Kaelyssa, and smashed her to pieces with 2 hits.
Victory to the Trollbloods!
Thoughts
We both played a pretty strong game, and I was impressed with how both of our armies have a lot of internal cohesion. Dealing with 3 very deadly heavy Warbeasts is hard to do in the first place, but pGrexy's army had a pretty good shot of it, especially after taking out the Earthborn so soon. If it hadn't been for the insane amount of shenanigans Rok got up to, I would have been jammed up something fierce on the next turn. I would not have liked facing this army with a normal, balanced list - between the Invictors with Sentinel backup, advance-deploying Strikeforce, and AOE's, I would have had trouble getting into the fray intact.
The reasoning for taking out the Earthborn was sound - 3 heavies is a bit too much danger to leave unchecked, especially with Goad, and he can easily take down 1 each turn, first from shooting and then in melee once I engage and those Sentinels can get to work. Since it was outside the Krielstone Aura this turn due to my mistake, the Earthborn was the logical choice to take out first - it would have had yet another innate speed boost, and was poised to trample 15" on the feat turn, nearly straight across or through the first line of infantry (maybe 8-10 infantry, if I'd done it right -- likely killing all of them too, with Wild Aggression up). I don't think either of us thought that Rok could do what he did, and it only worked so ludicrously well because pGrexy clustered his models together quite a bit, allowing Rok to kill 3-4 models with each Goad move. Trampling and the +3 speed from eDoomy's feat also effectively negated the main bonus from Kaelyssa's feat.
I really like this list, and as a first real foray into eDoomshaper, it went very, very well!
*note to self: 'Doomy and the Runebearers' is an awesome name for a band. Need to look into that more.
pGrexy's Army: Kaelyssa 50pt
Kaelyssa, Night's Whisper (*7pts)
* Banshee (10pts)
* Phoenix (10pts)
* Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker (2pts)
Dawnguard Invictors (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Dawnguard Invictor Officer & Standard (2pts)
Dawnguard Sentinels (Leader and 9 Grunts) (9pts)
* Dawnguard Sentinel Officer & Standard (2pts)
Mage Hunter Strikeforce (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Mage Hunter Commander (2pts)
Arcanist (1pts)
Arcanist (1pts)
Mage Hunter Assassin (2pts)
Mage Hunter Assassin (2pts)
The potential for assassination in this list is downright silly. Between the Assassins, Strikeforce, Phoenix, and Kaelyssa, I'm going to have my hands full protecting Doomy from a grisly death. My potential advantage -- 3 high-ARM, high-HP, rampaging monsters of Dire Trolls -- is slightly negated by the sheer number of infantry and those Sentinels, who he can keep back and use to really demolish my Dire Trollsonce they commit to the front line of infantry. Kaelyssa is the real wild card here, as her spells and feat can be a tremendous advantage to keeping me on my back foot -- Arcane Reckoning or Banishing Ward on anything my spellcasters (Runeshapers, Lanyssa, Janissa, and Doomy) try and go for, Phantom Hunter on the Mage Hunger Strikeforce (that's just gross), and the feat to blunt my potential charges on any turn it would be advantageous for Doomy to feat. Toss in 2 heavies with good melee damage AND range weapons (not to mention that damn Arc Node, but Kaelyssa's offensive spells are FAR more dangerous to Warmachine armies), and this list is terrifyingly well constructed.
Caleb's Army: eDoomshaper 50pt
Hoarluk Doomshaper, Rage of Dhunia (*6pts)
* Troll Axer (6pts)
* Earthborn Dire Troll (10pts)
* Mulg the Ancient (12pts)
* Rok (11pts)
* Trollkin Runebearer (2pts)
Krielstone Bearer and 3 Stone Scribes (3pts)
* Krielstone Stone Scribe Elder (1pts)
Trollkin Runeshapers (Leader and 2 Crew) (4pts)
Janissa Stonetide (3pts)
Lanyssa Ryssyll, Nyss Sorceress (2pts)
Troll Whelps (2pts)
I love this list. I have rarely played it, but I love it. The three most dangerous melee Heavies in Trollbloods, enough spellcasting and magic weapons to make me laugh in the face of incorporeal and certain Menoth builds, and enough speed boosts to seriously annoy even Circle and Cryx players. Hell, even Mulg can charge 14" on feat turn without a lot of effort (4" move, charge, feat, Rush, Hunters Mark), and the Earthborn can potentially go 3" farther than that!
My biggest issue is going to be protecting Doomy - he's a fragile little bugger, and there's a unit of phantom-seeker-able MH Strikeforce on the table, not to mention two assassins!
Deployment and Scenario
We rolled the Incursion scenario, so 3 flags went up in the middle of the board - one of which would disappear on turn 2, which made deployment interesting. We bandied about various tactics for dealing with this scenario, and ended up ignoring a good chunk of it and deploying effectively across from each other between the right 2 objectives.
pGrexy won the roll and elected to go first. He deployed roughly in a line (from my right to left) as follows: Phoenix and an Arcanist (aka Mr Coffee), Invictors w/ UA, Sentinels w/ UA, Kaelyssa and Sylys behind them, and finally the Banshee and the 2nd Mr. Coffee. In response, I deployed (from right to left) the Runeshapers, Rok, Doomy and the Runebearer*, the KSB and Janissa behind them, Mulg, the Axer behind him, Lanyssa, and the Earthborn on the far end. The whelps started off the table, as per usual when fielding a melee oriented battlegroup. Finally, the Strikeforce deployed roughly in front of the main army, while the two assassins went way out on my left flank, angling to take that flag if necessary (assuming it didn't disappear) and get a flank in on Doomy.
Terrain was important, but largely ignored - there was a forest on my side next to the Earthborn, and another forest just to the right and behind the center objective (from my POV), plus a hill on my right just outside the deployment zone. Beyond that, the other terrain didn't figure much into the game (and to be honest I kinda forgot what else was there...).
Turn 1: Retribution
The Strikeforce moved up first and fanned out, leaving plenty of room for the mass of infantry to follow. The Assassins ran up my right flank, aiming to claim the objective next turn and wait for an opening. The rest of the infantry and jacks effectively just ran forward, clustering up next to a forest just his side of the center objective, with the Phoenix moving a bit farther to put him just behind the Strikeforce. Kaelyssa put Banishing Ward and Arcane Reckoning on the Phoenix and Strikeforce, respectively, effectively curtailing any ideas I had for easily dropping Runeshaper-AOEs on them next turn.
Turn 1: Trollbloods
Not much to do but advance - the Axer put Rush on Mulg and charged forward, the Runebearer advanced and put Harmonious Exaltation on Doomy, who then dumped 5 fury onto the KSB and charged the Phoenix (for the extra 3" advance - he was WELL short). Janissa followed him forward and plopped a lovely wall directly in front of him (more to prevent charges than anything else, thanks to Phantom Seeker) while Mulg ran straight forward down the middle, Rok ran up the right side angling for the Phoenix, and Earthborn moved up to the left, taking up a position conveniently 2" in front of a forest (yay movement buffs!) for next turn. The KSB put up it's buff (adding no-continuous-effects from the Elder - none of them were really going to matter much this game), moved up and angled to the right - I figured Rok, Mulg, and the right flank would need the armor boost a bit more. The Runeshapers moved up the right, and threw 3 AOE's at long range at the Strikeforce - or rather, in the direction of the Strikeforce and Phoenix thanks to the upkeep spells on both that either didn't allow me to target them, or put the AOE on the Runeshaper when they inevitably missed. Thanks to some clever LOS shenanigans, I plopped the 3 AOEs directly in front of the unit - and they then mostly scattered away, killing... 1. Meh, I tried.
The rightmost objective then proceeded to disappear, bothering neither of us much since we were already ignoring it.
Turn 2: Retribustion
After some decision making, pGrexy upkept Arcane Reckoning but dropped Banishing Ward, and dumped some fury on the Phoenix. The Strikeforce moved up and to the left, fanning out in front of the Earthborn. The Strikeforece, mini-feated Invictors, and 2 Mage Hunter Assassins proceeded to move up and/or shoot everything they had into the relatively unprotected Earthborn, killing it. The Banshee moved forward in a forest to alongside Kaelyssa, who then shot a spell or two at the cluster of Doomy and the Krielstone scribes, without much effect. The Sentinels moved up alongside the Invictors, creating a rather effective 2nd line that was going to be tough to breach. (There was some divided shooting here that I don't remember, but the Earthborn was the only casualty). Kaelyssa ended the turn by Feating - effectively putting me on the back foot for the next turn.
Turn 2: Trollbloods
With the Earthborn down and a rather imposing wall of un-chargeable infantry in front of me, the only choice here was to feat and take as many of them down as possible with tramples. Luckily, the infantry were clustered fairly close together, meaning I'd have to Goad a lot less and could focus on buying more attacks or just trampling. It was at this point that pGrexy pointed something out that I had been doing wrong - when Goad is used on Rok, he can move without breaking his Berserk chain. I had previously been going on the assumption that each time he moved, he would have to buy another attack to start up the chain again - apparently I was wrong, and it just kept going until he missed or ran out of targets/fury to Goad.
pDoomy advanced up, putting Kaelyssa just within his control range, feated, and put Wild Aggression and Primal on Rok. Rok then proceeded to walk forward 8" and goad his way through 14 enemy models (7 Strikeforce, 5 Invictors, and finally 2 unlucky Sentinels), advancing a total of nearly 8-10 inches to sweep the area in front of Kaelyssa nearly clean of models before ending up in front of the Phoenix.
Huh.
The Axer put Rush on Mulg, and walked up and killed an Assassin, putting himself between the remaining assassin and Doomy in the process. The Runebearer used his once-per-game ability to put Wild Aggression on Mulg, who then trampled 12" to an Invictor in front of Kaelyssa (killing an unlucky Strikeforce on the way), killed it easily, Goad'ed up to Kaelyssa, and smashed her to pieces with 2 hits.
Victory to the Trollbloods!
Thoughts
We both played a pretty strong game, and I was impressed with how both of our armies have a lot of internal cohesion. Dealing with 3 very deadly heavy Warbeasts is hard to do in the first place, but pGrexy's army had a pretty good shot of it, especially after taking out the Earthborn so soon. If it hadn't been for the insane amount of shenanigans Rok got up to, I would have been jammed up something fierce on the next turn. I would not have liked facing this army with a normal, balanced list - between the Invictors with Sentinel backup, advance-deploying Strikeforce, and AOE's, I would have had trouble getting into the fray intact.
The reasoning for taking out the Earthborn was sound - 3 heavies is a bit too much danger to leave unchecked, especially with Goad, and he can easily take down 1 each turn, first from shooting and then in melee once I engage and those Sentinels can get to work. Since it was outside the Krielstone Aura this turn due to my mistake, the Earthborn was the logical choice to take out first - it would have had yet another innate speed boost, and was poised to trample 15" on the feat turn, nearly straight across or through the first line of infantry (maybe 8-10 infantry, if I'd done it right -- likely killing all of them too, with Wild Aggression up). I don't think either of us thought that Rok could do what he did, and it only worked so ludicrously well because pGrexy clustered his models together quite a bit, allowing Rok to kill 3-4 models with each Goad move. Trampling and the +3 speed from eDoomy's feat also effectively negated the main bonus from Kaelyssa's feat.
I really like this list, and as a first real foray into eDoomshaper, it went very, very well!
*note to self: 'Doomy and the Runebearers' is an awesome name for a band. Need to look into that more.
Thursday, December 5, 2013
New Project, New Posts: Mercs!
So, I'm the first to admit that I've pretty much not done squat on this blog for a while, and I feel bad about that. So, from here on out, I'm planning on doing at least 1 post a week - be it battle report, tactics update, or army list post. To help this along, I'm also starting Mercs! (entirely coincidental)
There are 3 main reasons I'm getting into Mercenaries:
1. Horgenhold Forge Guard - I've wanted to use these guys since I started playing Warmachine!
2. General Ossrum, the Earthbreaker, and Gun Bunnies - technically that's three in one, but shaddup you...
3. Variety - Khador, Circle, even Trollbloods are all pretty static in playstyle. Between Contracts, Rhulic/Human/Iosan/Nyss/Pirate models, and Gun Mages/Kayazy, just about everything plays a little bit different. Plus, I can make use of Harlan Versh again - I love that guy!
The first stop on my Merc Trek is Searforge - more specifically, General Ossrum, who has just about everything I want in a warcaster, and a great tier list to boot!
State of War - Ossrum's Tier
The tier list is pretty simple - only Rhulic models, 2 or more ranged units, 2 or more solos, and 3+ warjacks in the battlegroup. For those, you get (in order): 1 unit gains Advanced Deploy, 1 Trench Template (and 1 more for each additional 2 units), Start the game with Ossrum's upkeeps already cast, and Warjacks in the battlegroup gain +2 speed during round 1.
Ossrum 15pt - Searforge Commission
General Ossrum (*5pts)
* Ghordson Basher (7pts)
* Wroughthammer Rockram (8pts)
Herne & Jonne (3pts)
Thor Steinhammer (2pts)
There are 3 main reasons I'm getting into Mercenaries:
1. Horgenhold Forge Guard - I've wanted to use these guys since I started playing Warmachine!
2. General Ossrum, the Earthbreaker, and Gun Bunnies - technically that's three in one, but shaddup you...
3. Variety - Khador, Circle, even Trollbloods are all pretty static in playstyle. Between Contracts, Rhulic/Human/Iosan/Nyss/Pirate models, and Gun Mages/Kayazy, just about everything plays a little bit different. Plus, I can make use of Harlan Versh again - I love that guy!
The first stop on my Merc Trek is Searforge - more specifically, General Ossrum, who has just about everything I want in a warcaster, and a great tier list to boot!
State of War - Ossrum's Tier
The tier list is pretty simple - only Rhulic models, 2 or more ranged units, 2 or more solos, and 3+ warjacks in the battlegroup. For those, you get (in order): 1 unit gains Advanced Deploy, 1 Trench Template (and 1 more for each additional 2 units), Start the game with Ossrum's upkeeps already cast, and Warjacks in the battlegroup gain +2 speed during round 1.
Ossrum 15pt - Searforge Commission
General Ossrum (*5pts)
* Ghordson Basher (7pts)
* Wroughthammer Rockram (8pts)
Herne & Jonne (3pts)
Thor Steinhammer (2pts)
For some reason, the 15pt list is the one I have the most issues with. This is also the list that is most in flux, as it's in the running to be the first list I build to.
Ossrum 35pts - State of War Tier 3
General Ossrum (*5pts)
* Grundback Gunner (3pts)
* Ghordson Basher (7pts)
Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corps (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corps Officer & Standard (3pts)
Herne & Jonne (3pts)
Horgenhold Forge Guard (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
Ogrun Bokur (3pts)
Thor Steinhammer (2pts)
* Grundback Blaster (3pts)
Ossrum 35pts - State of War Tier 3
General Ossrum (*5pts)
* Grundback Gunner (3pts)
* Ghordson Basher (7pts)
Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corps (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corps Officer & Standard (3pts)
Herne & Jonne (3pts)
Horgenhold Forge Guard (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
Ogrun Bokur (3pts)
Thor Steinhammer (2pts)
* Grundback Blaster (3pts)
Gotta love them gun bunnies, and in this list I've got the whole Hen-and-Chicks. The Basher, Gunner, and Forge Guard are there to deal with problem high-ARM models, while the High Shields under Snipe (and CRA if necessary), Herne and Jonne, and the Blaster dish out damage to infantry. Herne and Jonne or the Blaster can deal with Kayazy or other High-DEF models, while the Bokur can client to Ossrum and help keep him and Thor alive. I'm on the fence about bumping the Blaster up to the battle group - on the one hand, it works better with focus and would give me the tier 4 bonus; on the other, it's more of a load on Ossrum's already stretched-thin focus. Time will tell here.
I worry how it'll deal with Heavy Jack/Beast spam, but at 35pts that might not be as much of a problem with the Forge Guard and CRA-ing High Shields. Heck, even the Bokur can do some serious damage to a jack if it gets near his client, however that's inviting trouble if I'm letting a jack get that close to Ossrum. If it turns out I do need more heavy crackers, it's a simple matter do give Thor the Basher and swap the Gunner and Blaster for a Driller. I'd love a Rockram, but to do so I'd also have to drop the Basher and Gunner and add 2pts of something else - which, given my choices and tier restrictions, invariably has to be Lord Rockbottom. Honestly, not a bad call with 3 units running around, but I want to see how the Basher and bunnies perform first.
I worry how it'll deal with Heavy Jack/Beast spam, but at 35pts that might not be as much of a problem with the Forge Guard and CRA-ing High Shields. Heck, even the Bokur can do some serious damage to a jack if it gets near his client, however that's inviting trouble if I'm letting a jack get that close to Ossrum. If it turns out I do need more heavy crackers, it's a simple matter do give Thor the Basher and swap the Gunner and Blaster for a Driller. I'd love a Rockram, but to do so I'd also have to drop the Basher and Gunner and add 2pts of something else - which, given my choices and tier restrictions, invariably has to be Lord Rockbottom. Honestly, not a bad call with 3 units running around, but I want to see how the Basher and bunnies perform first.
Boosting up to 50pts is actually pretty easy:
Ossrum 50pts - State of War Tier 3
General Ossrum (*5pts)
* Grundback Blaster (3pts)
* Ghordson Earthbreaker (19pts)
Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corps (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corps Officer & Standard (3pts)
Herne & Jonne (3pts)
Horgenhold Forge Guard (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
Tactical Arcanist Corps (4pts)
General Ossrum (*5pts)
* Grundback Blaster (3pts)
* Ghordson Earthbreaker (19pts)
Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corps (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corps Officer & Standard (3pts)
Herne & Jonne (3pts)
Horgenhold Forge Guard (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
Tactical Arcanist Corps (4pts)
Lord Rockbottom (2pts)
Ogrun Bokur (3pts)
Thor Steinhammer (2pts)
Ogrun Bokur (3pts)
Thor Steinhammer (2pts)
So, we lose 2 bunnies (the Basher and the Gunner) but gain an Earthbreaker (!!!), TACs, and Rockbottom (with now 4 units on the table, it becomes a bit more useful that they not run, and that extra spray is kiiiiinda nice at 50). The Tactical Arcanist Corps is an interesting unit, and I'm very tempted to have one stick around Ossrum and put up a cloud effect every turn, which would really skyrocket his survivability. Their addition also bumps the number of units in the army to 4, meaning it generates another trench template per the Tier 2 benefit. The inclusion of the Earthbreaker means the list won't make the tier 4 benefits - there are literally no available points for even a 2nd gun bunny unless I want to drop the High Shields to a min unit.
Therein lies the main problem with this list - short of new Rhulic models coming out in Vengeance, this is pretty much the only iteration of this list I can field. Every model available in Ossrum's tier (that I'm interested in anyway) is being used. This does leave Gudrun, Brun and Lug, the Ogrun Assault Corps, and the Horgenhold Artillery Corps, but from what I can tell all of these aren't really up to the level of the units already in the list.
At this point, these lists are pure speculation -- I'm not certain that the benefits of State of War/Searforge outweigh the (somewhat crippling) model restrictions, but I'm going to do some proxying and see what works and what doesn't. Regardless, I want (and intend to regularly use) 90% of the models in the 50pt list, be it in Searforge or Highborn Covenant. Speaking of which...
Highborn Covenant
I REALLY like the Highborn Covenant contract, probably as much as the Ossrum Tier. The reason is simple - OPTIONS. Gun Mages, Rhupert, Versh, Aiyana and Holt, Gastonne Crosse, Lanyssa Ryssyl, Eiryss2, Gorman (my abject hatred of facing this dirty little bastard is not strong enough to prevent me using him in kind. Juicy, Black-Oil-Grenade Hypocrisy), etc, etc. Here's a rough idea of the 50pt Highborn list, again with Ossrum:
Ossrum 50pts - Highborn Covenant
General Ossrum (*5pts)
* Ghordson Earthbreaker (19pts)
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer (2pts)
* * Mule (8pts)
Horgenhold Forge Guard (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
Tactical Arcanist Corps (4pts)
Gorman di Wulfe, Rogue Alchemist (2pts)
Harlan Versh (2pts)
Rhupert Carvolo, Piper of Ord (2pts)
Thor Steinhammer (2pts)
This list has some notable differences from the tier list, notably the inclusion of Gun Mages with a Mule, as well as Gorman, Versh, and Rhupert Carvolo - all of which are a lot more useful with other casters than a lot of Ossrum's Tier. The Gun Mages are just plain better than High Shields, and adding in a Mule (a great target for Fire for Effect, since it can also get snipe or crit-brutal from the gun mages) really bumps up the ranged threat, forcing my opponent to do something about them and possibly opening up nice opportunities for the Forge Guard and Earthbreaker.
The most appealing thing about choosing Highborn over State of War is the options it opens up - I can drop the Mule for a Vanguard and Eiryss2, swap around the TACs for Aiyanna and Holt, or even little things like swapping Versch for Macnaile. The tier list is veeeery stagnant - what's there is there to fill a requirement, with very few exceptions, and that doesn't make for very fluid list building if I wanted to shift gears later on.
Needless to say, this is going to be a loooong term project, and I'm still playing Trollbloods in the meantime. I've also started playing Flames of War with the Tower Games league, so expect some posts on that in the near future!
Therein lies the main problem with this list - short of new Rhulic models coming out in Vengeance, this is pretty much the only iteration of this list I can field. Every model available in Ossrum's tier (that I'm interested in anyway) is being used. This does leave Gudrun, Brun and Lug, the Ogrun Assault Corps, and the Horgenhold Artillery Corps, but from what I can tell all of these aren't really up to the level of the units already in the list.
At this point, these lists are pure speculation -- I'm not certain that the benefits of State of War/Searforge outweigh the (somewhat crippling) model restrictions, but I'm going to do some proxying and see what works and what doesn't. Regardless, I want (and intend to regularly use) 90% of the models in the 50pt list, be it in Searforge or Highborn Covenant. Speaking of which...
Highborn Covenant
I REALLY like the Highborn Covenant contract, probably as much as the Ossrum Tier. The reason is simple - OPTIONS. Gun Mages, Rhupert, Versh, Aiyana and Holt, Gastonne Crosse, Lanyssa Ryssyl, Eiryss2, Gorman (my abject hatred of facing this dirty little bastard is not strong enough to prevent me using him in kind. Juicy, Black-Oil-Grenade Hypocrisy), etc, etc. Here's a rough idea of the 50pt Highborn list, again with Ossrum:
Ossrum 50pts - Highborn Covenant
General Ossrum (*5pts)
* Ghordson Earthbreaker (19pts)
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer (2pts)
* * Mule (8pts)
Horgenhold Forge Guard (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
Tactical Arcanist Corps (4pts)
Gorman di Wulfe, Rogue Alchemist (2pts)
Harlan Versh (2pts)
Rhupert Carvolo, Piper of Ord (2pts)
Thor Steinhammer (2pts)
This list has some notable differences from the tier list, notably the inclusion of Gun Mages with a Mule, as well as Gorman, Versh, and Rhupert Carvolo - all of which are a lot more useful with other casters than a lot of Ossrum's Tier. The Gun Mages are just plain better than High Shields, and adding in a Mule (a great target for Fire for Effect, since it can also get snipe or crit-brutal from the gun mages) really bumps up the ranged threat, forcing my opponent to do something about them and possibly opening up nice opportunities for the Forge Guard and Earthbreaker.
The most appealing thing about choosing Highborn over State of War is the options it opens up - I can drop the Mule for a Vanguard and Eiryss2, swap around the TACs for Aiyanna and Holt, or even little things like swapping Versch for Macnaile. The tier list is veeeery stagnant - what's there is there to fill a requirement, with very few exceptions, and that doesn't make for very fluid list building if I wanted to shift gears later on.
Needless to say, this is going to be a loooong term project, and I'm still playing Trollbloods in the meantime. I've also started playing Flames of War with the Tower Games league, so expect some posts on that in the near future!
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