|
Post by Azahul on Feb 25, 2019 2:02:30 GMT
Round Three - Standoff For the third round I was matched up against a player from my home meta who had also made the trip down south for this tournament. He had a Kreoss1/High Reclaimer pair, and we were both quite familiar with how this would go down. Sure enough, it ended up being High Reclaimer vs Arkadius, with HR running: High Reclaimer -Judicator Max Cinerators -UA Max Errants -UA Max Vengers Min Choir Severius0 -Dervish Gravus Warder Vassal Mechanik Deployment I won the starting roll and took first. I set up with my Gun Boars and Targ a little to the left, all of Arkadius's heavies skewing just a little right, and Mire and the Wrastler out on the left. I figured I'd reposition somewhat to respond to my opponent's deployment. He had his Vengers and Judicator on the left, Cinerators on the right, and Errants across the centre. Hutchuck ambushed. Both objectives are Stockpiles (not really enough rough terrain to be worth taking a Fuel Cache). Pigs Turn 1 The two Croaks walked and cast spells (Mire laid down a cloud and Kwaak put Enliven on my War Hogs). A Gun Boar ran up, Targ used Ancillary Attack on it, and I scattered and killed an Errant giving HR a soul. Every other model, including Arkadius, ran to claim as much of the board as they could. Protectorate Turn 1 My opponent ran his stuff forward, jamming both the left flank against a Hutchuck ambush and heavily screening the Judicator, and used the soul granted Focus to lay down three clouds. Pigs Turn 2 HR is on zero camp and I'm pretty sure I can get something in the realm of 4-6 boosted attacks on him, so I go for the assassination run. A Road Hog charges one of the Errants, getting an Assault Spray on HR. I boost the attack on HR, hit, and do 9 points of damage to him. The Errant gets hit and dies too, but my opponent uses Self Sacrifice to kill another Errant I could have used to get my second Road Hog an assault shot. I then hit and kill the Errant with my melee attack and he opts to let it die for real, which lets me trigger sprint on the Road Hog with my final Fury and move up into the cloud. Arkadius then activates and uses Maltreatment to get eight Fury. He hits HR with two Primal Shocks through the Road Hog and kills him. The proxy base there at the end was where I was going to be able to Feat my second Road Hog to using the Judicator as a charge target. That, in turn, would let me aim and spray through the first Road Hog at HR. And if that didn't work at least one of the two Gun Boars was going to be able to frenzy forward far enough to walk into the cloud and go for a shot on him. A bit dicey, needing to hit Def 14 with Rats in the 3-7 range, but I think we worked it out to be ~60% run. Since attrition into HR has traditionally been a 50/50, I'll take a 60% chance.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Feb 25, 2019 3:05:19 GMT
Round four - Invasion Skorne again for the second-last round. My opponent had a Makeda1/Morghoul2 pair, and since I spent much of the last round think that I should have dropped Arkadius (and because my opponent had Extollers in both lists) I went with Arkadius. He dropped Makeda1, running: Makeda -Mammoth -Agoniser -Titan Gladiator -Marketh Max Karax Legends of Halaak Min Paingivers Extoller Soulward Hakaar Mortitheurge Willbreaker Gobber Chef (proxied by a Cephalyx model in this game) Supreme Guardian Deployment My opponent won the starting roll. He set up with his Supreme Guardian and Karax on the right, Mammoth and Legends on the left. I skewed a bit heavy on the left, but in retrospect should have gone even harder with the second War Hog rather than putting it out on the right. Both objectives are Stockpiles because, again, not a lot of need for Pathfinder here. Skorne Turn 1 Makeda puts Quicken on the Supreme Guardian and everything runs up. Notably, the Legends all get themselves standing base to base with a Karax. Pigs Turn 1 I forget about Field Marshal Shield Guard (which feels like retribution for all these Sturm shenanigans...) and Arkadius uses Raw Adrenaline on a Gun Boar to set up a running Gun Boar plus Targ Ancillary Attack on the lead Legend. He also puts up Guardian Beast and Forced Evolution on the right-side War Hog, then Repositions forward. The Gun Boar shot does five damage to the Mammoth. The rest of the list just runs up cautiously. The Forced Evo'd War Hog runs across to the left flank while the other one takes shelter behind the forest and a Caustic Mist from Mire. Skorne Turn 2 The Mammoth rolls two gun shots when returning fire on the Gun Boars, both both hit and spike damage to shoot a Gun Boar off the table. It casts Counterblast. The Beast Handlers heal all the damage. Makeda Feats, and the Legends just run up to block access to the Mammoth. The Karax mostly just kill each other to feed the Supreme Guardian. Pigs Turn 2 I struggle to decide if I should commit this turn, and eventually opt to go for it. Arkadius drops Guardian Beast. The Gorax Primals my Gun Boar, I give the Forced Evo'd War Hog Ghostly with the Witch Doctor, and Rage from Mire is given to both War Hogs. Kwaak gives both Road Hogs Enliven. Arkadius moves up and Primals both Road Hogs and Feats everything forward. The Gun Boar throws one of the Legends out of the way, losing his body from a Defensive Strike from one of the Legends but clearing a path and knocking down Marketh in the process. My two Road Hogs pile into the Supreme Guardian. The first one loses its Mind but plugs away doing a bit of damage and setting the Supreme Guardian on fire. My original plan was to Enliven off the Defensive Strike to get into the Agoniser, but no Mind kinda scuppered that plan. Instead the second Road Hog charges and kills the Agoniser and then Overtakes into the Supreme Guardian and rolls poorly for damage, leaving it on one health. The Forced Evo'd War Hog charges the Mammoth and gets hit by a Critical Pitch from the Counterblast (double 5s), flinging him back into the house behind him. That's probably a game losing move on the spot. My original plan, to trample over the last two Legends with the second War Hog to finish off a near-dead Mammoth, isn't going to work so I run the War Hog back somewhere where if it survives it can retaliate against the Mammoth next round. Oh also Hutchuck ambushed in on the right and failed to kill the Gobber Chef with either of his attacks. Skorne Turn 3 Some luck goes my way, as the Supreme Guardian burns to death. The Beast Handlers Enrage the Mammoth and the Gladiator. The two upright Legends kill my Primal'd Gun Boar, and then one of them kills the other to open a charge lane for the Mammoth. The Gladiator kills the knocked down War Hog. The Mammoth kills the other War Hog and casts Counterblast. Hakaar and the Karax get one of the Road Hogs down to about ten boxes. Marketh walks up behind the Road Hogs. The Willbreaker gives Tough to the Karax and positions himself to ensure he's the frenzy target of the left Road Hog. Pigs Turn 3 I need to dig deep for this turn. I have Kwaak Enliven the Gun Boar. Arkadius puts Crippling Grasp on the Mammoth, Primal on the Gorax, Forced Evolution on the Gorax, and then walks and repositions away to hide behind the forest on the left. The Gorax charges the Mammoth for free. The Counterblast attack misses. The Gorax rolls good and does about 40 damage to the Mammoth. Mire puts Rage on the Wrastler, who charges into the surviving Legend in the left zone. Boosts to hit with a Claw, kills the Legend, Overtakes into the Mammoth and finishes the job. Hutchuck kills the Gobber Chef. Skorne Turn 4 My opponent should be able to clear the Wrastler this turn with the Gladiator, but he gets a bit overeager. He charges the last Legend into the Wrastler, who is then enagaged leading to the Soulward shooting the Gorax instead. This triggers Enliven, allowing the Gorax to put himself in the way of the Gladitor. Makeda has to spend her Fury putting Quicken and Rush on the Gladiator so that it can walk around the Gorax and into melee with the Wrastler, but without Carnage or the free charge the Gladiator misses a few swings and leaves the Wrastler on something like three or four boxes. Hakaar and Marketh and the Karax bring down one of the Road Hogs on the right. Pigs Turn 4 The Gorax frenzies into the Soulward but leaves it alive. Arkadius advances, kills the Soulward with a Primal Shock, and casts Psycho Surgery to heal his battlegroup, and puts Forced Evolution on the Wrastler. He ends up camping one, Maltreated from the Gorax. The last Road Hog kills Hakaar and tries to Overtake off a Karax into Marketh but... can't quite hit a Karax. Hutchuck runs up behind the clump back there. Mire spends three Fury healing the Wrastler and moves into the forest, casting Rage on him. The Wrastler kills the Gladiator and the last Legend, snacking heals him up to about 10 boxes. Kwaak tries to kill Marketh with Venoms but can't hit. Skorne Turn 5 Makeda casts Carnage and backs up to kill the Gorax. Two Paingivers charge the Wrastler, one misses, one hits and does a damage and adds a Fury to the Wrastler. Marketh and the Karax don't really do much of anything to the Road Hog. Pigs Turn 5 Kwaak kills the last two Karax. The Road Hog kills Marketh and does a whopping four damage to the objective. Hutchuck walks over and tries to get the last two Paingivers with a Quake bomb but misses. Targ and the Witch Doctor manage to kill one Paingiver between them, the Wrastler eats the other and gets back to 12 health. Mire summons a cloud to screen the Wrastler from Makeda, though she's close enough to walk into melee. Arkadius casts Psycho Surgery and toes the zone. At long last, someone scores a Control Point. The score goes to 1-0 in my favour. Skorne Turn 6 The Paingivers charge in and kill Targ, contesting the zone. Makeda charges and kills both the Road Hog and Hutchuck and gets Kwaak with a spell I think. Pigs Turn 6 The Witch Doctor kills the last two Paingivers. Arkadius runs and hides behind the forest. The Wrastler positions itself to charge the objective next turn. I score to bring the score to 2-0 in my favour. Skorne Turn 7 Makeda walks over and tries to kill the Wrastler with a spell. She leaves it on one box. I score again, so the score is 3-0 in my favour. Pigs Turn 7 I move Mire and Arkadius up. The Wrastler charges and eats Makeda. What a game. Some ridiculous dice here and there just kept throwing curve balls all the way through, starting with the Crit Pitch on the Mammoth's counterblast and carrying on from there. I think I recovered pretty well, though I really should not have Primal'd the Gorax. I think I could have had Mire Rage him instead, and I would have really needed the Gorax the following round had the Gladiator killed the Wrastler.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Feb 25, 2019 3:36:48 GMT
Round Five - Spread the Net This was kind of my worst case scenario for the finals. If we'd rolled Recon II I'd be waaaaaay happier, but I knew at this point that I was playing into Circle (a Wurmwood/Iona pair, and this was the player who conceded midway through the Iona vs Sturm game back at CanCon so it was clear what he was going to be playing). That meant Sturm and Drang, having to play at their most brickiest, on a scenario where that was probably a losing proposition. My opponent was running: Wurmwood -Ghetorix -Shadowhorn Satyr Max Blood Pack Max Blood Pack Max Ravagers -Chieftain Min Wolf Riders Shifting Stones Boil Master and Spirit Cauldron Lord of the Feast Wolf Rider Champion White Mane Gallows Grove Deployment My opponent won the starting roll and opted to choose table sides, grabbing the side with a big forest and leaving me with a hill. He set up his Blood Pack units on each flank, the Wolf Riders out on the right flank (including the Champion), and Ravagers in the middle. I set up the Dracodile aiming to contest my zone and the central zone, Skarath and Dahlia and the Gobber Chef on the left to gum up the works there, and Brun and Lug out on the right to try and hold off the Wolf Riders. Pigs Turn 1 I had Sturm cast his spells and charge up the board. Dahlia and Brun cast their respective upkeeps and moved up. I ran everything up, building the bunker behind the Dracodile. Circle Turn 1 The Stones ported Wurmwood forward. The Ravagers went for a run, but only after moving them all up did my opponent realise his Chieftain was pinned between Ghetorix and the Bloodpack and that he'd run the front two Ravagers out of formation. Wurmwood went for a Stranglehold on the Dracodile, which I allowed through. He boosted damage but couldn't crack the Arm 22. Wurmwood took three damage from Arcane Void, and then ported back to Cassius. Everything else ran forward, with the Gallows Grove porting onto my opponent's flag. Pigs Turn 2 I was in danger of getting locked out of scenario but there wasn't a lot I could do about it. I considered putting the Dracodile inside the threat range of Ghetorix just to kill the Gallows Grove, but Lord of the Feast and the Wolf Rider Champion were still over there near the flag. Instead I moved Skarath and the Dracodile up and they each killed a Blood Pack unit from each flank with their sprays. Mire summoned a cloud for the War Hog to run and hide behind but otherwise my bunker followed faithfully behind their big Dracodile. The Gobber Chef ran onto my flag, because there was no way he was going to be able to cross the open field between him and my opponent's zone to contest next round without my opponent getting one salvo of shots on him. Circle Turn 2 The White Mane moved up on the left, giving Veteran Leader to the Blood Pack. The four archers there moved up and opened fire at the Gobber Chef and Skarath. Every single one rolled the 7 they needed to hit, killing the Chef with the first shot and doing about eight damage to Skarath all up. The Wolf Riders and Blood Pack on the left moved up and contested my zone, taking a couple of shots at Lug to no avail. The Ravagers mostly stayed where they were, save the Chieftain. The Shifting Stones ported Wurmwood forward. He cast Spiny Growth, summoned a forest way out on the right flank to screen the Gallows Grove, and Feated. My opponent scored his zone and flag, making the score 2-0 in his favour. Pigs Turn 3 I was going to be locked out of the scenario pretty hard at this rate, but I could at least close the gap a little this turn by scoring my flag with Dahlia and my zone. More importantly, my War Hog was inside TK and walk range of Ghetorix, so I could take my opponent's heaviest hitter off the table. I did Brun and Lug and the Dracodile first, using Brun's Blunderbuss to kill the contesting Bloodpack member, a Charge and Return combination on Lug to get rid of the Wolf Rider, and the Dracodile walked into the forest and killed the two leading Ravagers and open a path for the War Hog. Mire gave the War Hog Weald Secrets, Eilish gave him Puppet Master, and a Battle Boar used Primal. The War Hog walked up to Ghetorix and used Aggression Dial. He missed the Gore Attack, I used Puppet Master, rolled a double 5 to hit and knock him down and a double 6 for damage. And then continued to roll hot, killing Ghetorix in three more swings. The War Hog then used Overtake to get into a Ravager, who he killed with another swing. After that the only thing in range to Overtake into was Wurmwood. The War Hog went in and took his swing. Wurmwood opted to save his transfers in case I had other attacks, and ended up on 9 health. Suddenly I had an assassination run that straight up had not existed at the start of the turn. Sturm advanced to get the Shadowhorn in his control range. He Feated, Primal'd and TK'd Skarath. Dahlia gave Skarath Mist Walker. Skarath walked into melee with Wurmwood and killed him. Ok, so I got super lucky there. On any other scenario I'd typically feel ok to good against Wurmwood, but Spread the Net is very hard for Sturm and tips things solidly into Wurmwood's favour. That assassination run only became possible because of ludicrously hot dice from the War Hog. Even with my Feat, a P+S 18 Skarath was going to struggle to kill an Armour 22 Wurmwood... although now that I'm thinking about it if I'd done Sturm and Skarath first I may have actually managed it. He'd only have been Armour 20 and I'd have had five swings at dice minus two. Not unreasonable. Too used to Wurmwood opponents killing their own stuff and being Armour 23 all the time I guess.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Feb 25, 2019 4:02:58 GMT
Pending the PP website going back up and the various TOs involved actually reporting the points earned, I believe this qualifies me for the Iron Gauntlet.
Excuse me while I go plane ticket shopping.
|
|
|
Post by qc on Feb 25, 2019 6:52:31 GMT
Big CONGRATS! Time to bring Farrow into right place! Crush them ; )
|
|
|
Post by tontonkal on Feb 25, 2019 8:53:07 GMT
Well done!
And thanks again for those battle reports, super interesting to see how you play the dracodile. And your anti LotF bunker method is priceless lol
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Feb 25, 2019 10:08:06 GMT
Haha, I'm quite proud of it. I've been getting slowly better at actually pulling it off too. Even as recently as that game against Kromac2 on the previous page I was occasionally doing something dumb like putting Lug somewhere within 3" of Sturm with no Shield Guard able to chain Lord of the Feast back to the bunker. The two games at this event though I pretty consistently kept him from being able to contribute. The first game he did eventually get into Skarath, which I could have probably have avoided by putting the Shield Guard within range of my objective but not within range of Skarath himself, but when you have Vision on your heavy copping a hit from Lord of the Feast isn't too bad. Not like I didn't kinda run away with that game anyway...
|
|
|
Post by apoc2148 on Feb 25, 2019 14:41:36 GMT
Nice work! I can just see the LoTF sending his bird out during the second game and the bird just coming back to him with a sad face after the shield guard chain.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Feb 25, 2019 22:39:20 GMT
Well, in the second game (the finals one) Lord of the Feast never attacked. Took one look at the bunker and just sat around looking despondent. Which is almost as good as getting Shield Guarded so many times that the Raven gets disorientated and gives up.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Feb 27, 2019 1:33:51 GMT
Hehe, so I played a game last night into Baldur1. I actually meant to take this week as an opportunity to play something a bit wacky and different. I feel like my approach to the game, i.e. to find a list I like and then to grind out games with it for months at a time until I have it down pat, doesn't always make for the most riveting blog (what's he playing this week? Arkadius. Next week? Arkadius. The week after? Arkadius. Or Sturm, apparently). But I got busy and ended up just bringing what I had in my bag. Played Sturm vs a Baldur1 list in Devourer's Host with a Storm Raptor. And hoo boy did I play badly. He put me under a lot of pressure turn one, and terrain wasn't really my friend, and I ended up killboxing myself on the second round and just straight up handing my opponent the game. Sadly I only took a few pictures, and I straight up forgot to upload them before leaving the house for the day, but man am I glad that I waited until after the weekend to start playing like that Anyway, I have a few silly lists I want to experiment with now that the major tournament season is over for the next couple of months. I'll probably move back to your regularly scheduled Arkadius/Sturm and Drang programming in a fortnight or so, but now I'm strongly eyeing something stupid like this: Midas -Boneswarm -Boneswarm -Boneswarm -Boneswarm -Boneswarm -Boneswarm -Soul Slave Valkyries Valkyries Valkyries Min Bone Grinders Boil Master and Spirit Cauldron Boil Master and Spirit Cauldron Lanyssa Mire -Wrastler Bone Shrine Bone Shrine That or I'll corner someone and make them play Company of Iron with me. I've been wanting to play an Agata-led warband of Slaughterhousers and Valkyries for a while.
|
|
mazog
Junior Strategist
Walking and talking
Posts: 748
|
Post by mazog on Feb 27, 2019 2:27:19 GMT
It looks like you are pretty well set for corpses there, but razor boars get two corpses tokens for the same points as the bone swarm. I have doubts about the value of mat 5 pow 12 countercharges, though. I guess it depends on whether you want the pots to be feeding Midas or the bone swarms.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Feb 27, 2019 3:06:04 GMT
I think the pots principally focus on the Boneswarms. Midas has reliable access to 7 Fury and will be upkeeping Death March for free (probably on himself) and has a free Battle Lust on a stick if necessary. By the time I expect him to actually need corpses, I expect a few Boneswarms will have died anyway.
|
|
mazog
Junior Strategist
Walking and talking
Posts: 748
|
Post by mazog on Feb 27, 2019 12:09:19 GMT
Sensible enough. I was thinking he presented a fair personal assassination threat with a load of corpses.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Feb 28, 2019 23:46:06 GMT
If you ever have a turn where you need Midas loaded up, you can get him to the maximum number of corpses he can spend in a round pretty reliably with two Cauldrons. If both of them roll a 1 on their respective d3s and they have no other corpses to give and Midas had no corpses himself to start with then he'll only have 9 Fury to play with, assuming the Bone Shrines are still alive. And even then you can top him up if a Warbeast has died and he still has his Feat by Feating them back in front of him and taking his initial melee attack on the Warbeast to kill it. Or just run a near-dead Warbeast in front of him. Or charge and kill an enemy Warbeast. Point is, if an assassination run presents himself, I'm pretty confident Midas will be going in with a full Fury load.
|
|
|
Post by apoc2148 on Mar 1, 2019 12:33:10 GMT
Out of curiosity, what would the assassination run look like for Midas? Hex blasts? Battle-lusted Valkyries? Overtaking boneswarms with rage? All of the above?
|
|