|
Post by Azahul on Mar 28, 2018 0:07:57 GMT
Had a quick Sturm and Drang vs Jalaam game on Standoff last night, with the Jalaam player running the following: Jalaam -Cannoneer -Cannoneer -Krea -Agoniser -Cyclops Shaman -Gladiator -Archidon Min Beast Handlers Min Beast Handlers Mist Speaker Mortitheurge Siege Animantarax Deployment I won the dice roll, and my opponent decided to let me deal with the water right in front of deployment. I set up the Meat Thresher there, put Skarath out on the right to run into the forest, Brine out on the left to hide behind the cloud effect there, and my Husks went into the water during my AD with Longchops over on the right to lurk with Skarath in the forest. My opponent set his Animantarax opposite Brine, which was exactly where I wanted it to be. Titans in a clump over on the right. We both took Stockpile as our objectives. Jalaam Preyed Sturm. Pigs Turn 1 Everything ran, with Polarity Shield going on the Meat Thresher (which took damage for +2 Speed), Vision going over on Skarath, and Deceleration went up. Dahlia put Haunting Melody on herself and Mist Walker on Skarath, so all the usual stuff basically. One Husk ran into the gaps between the LOS blocking terrain on each flank, the third one hanging back a bit in reserve behind the wall. Skorne Turn 1 The Cyclops Shaman walked up, cast Far Strike, and shot at a Husk for a whopping 1 damage. The Husk walked up, sprayed back at the Shaman, and did 5. The left-hand Paingivers buffed up the Archidon and sent it in to finish off the Husk (no Crit Pitch, sadly for my opponent). Jalaam shot and killed the right-hand Husk, taking two shots to do it. He put up Warpath and sat on a single point of Fury. The Mist Speaker gave the Animantarax Guidance, and it shot the left hand Bone Shrine down to one health with me opting not to use my Shield Guards. On the right hand, the Bone Shrine was dropped to two health by the Cannoneers. The Krea put up Force Aura, the Beast Handlers on the right removed some Fury, and the Gladiator simply walked up the field. Pigs Turn 2 There was a pretty obvious assassination run involving the Meat Thresher in front of me. Skarath tried to spray Jalaam because I had this vague hope I could bait out the one transfer early, missed the attack. Sturm activated, TK'd forward the last Husk, the Soul Slave, and the Meat Thresher so it could get LOS to Jalaam. Guidance went on the Soul Slave, who boosted a TK at Jalaam needing an 11. Missed that. Charged the Meat Thresher at Jalaam. Missed Jalaam. Did hit and kill the Husk, did about four points of damage, which Jalaam transferred. Orin threw a Chain Lightning at the Meat Thresher, bounced through Jalaam and the Mortitheurge and the Cyclops Shaman. Did a few points of damage to Jalaam, nothing to the Shaman, and killed the Mortitheurge by burning all three of his tokens. With Sturm on one transfer, I moved my Battle Boars in for Shield Guards and ran Brine across so that he could be in position for a follow-up assassination attempt next turn. Longchops sniped out a Beast Handler on the right, laid down a trap to cover Skarath, and repositioned back into the forest. Kwaak and Gub gave Skarath and the right-most Battle Boar Enliven. Good lord never have I wished for Eilish more. Skorne Turn 2 Stockpile healed Jalaam the damage he'd taken. The Shaman gave the Cyclops Rush, shot and killed the Soul Slave, allowing the Krea to Warpath out of the way of the Gladiator. Right-hand Beast Handlers Enraged the Gladiator, which walked in and trivially smashed the Meat Thresher (needing only a single Fury). A Cannoneer Warpathed forwards and shot my right-most Battle Boar, crippling its spirit. Just barely missed blast damage on Dahlia. I Enliven'd it into cloud effect. The second walked up, shot the Battle Boar, boosted to hit and then boosted damage on both the Battle Boar and Kwaak and Gub. Took out the Battle Boar's mind and left Kwaak and Gub on one health. Jalaam activated, aimed and tagged the Battle Boar for Grivious Wounds and boosted damage to kill Kwaak and Gub which Warpathed the Archidon forward. Cast the Krea's Aura, Feated, and camped one. The Animantarax came forward and shot down the left-hand Bone Shrine. The left-hand Beast Handlers Enraged the Archidon, which then charged Brine and left him on about half a dozen boxes. The Krea opted not to do anything, Agoniser wailed. Pigs Turn 3 Assassination round two time. Rorsh healed up Brine's body and used Diversionary Tactics to get him out of melee with the Archidon and into the flames. Battle Boars Primal'd both Skarath and Brine (the right-most Battle Boar just walked out of the way, being a useless lump at this point). Dahlia ran to get Jalaam in her control. The Mist Speaker gave Sturm Guidance. He charged the Archidon, TK'd Brine and Skarath forwards, attempted a boosted TK on Jalaam. Missed. Feated, so my opponent's Krea was now the only transfer target. Skarath charged Jalaam, boosted to hit the charge attack for 3d6, hit, proceeded to roll abysmally on his damage rolls and only ate through a transfer. Took Jalaam down to pretty low health at least. Brine charged in, boosted to hit the charge attack against the Paralysed Jalaam, got the Crit Knockdown, killed both Jalaam and the Krea with the transfers with just his initial attacks. Man, boosted 9s to hit were not my friend that game. Realistically I probably should have just played attrition on turn two, I could have just sat back and shot up the Titans outside of the Krea aura without any fear of retaliation and tried to whittle down my opponent's support. I was in a pretty reasonable scenario position had I been able to get Sturm into one of the circle zones, and with the ability to TK the Animantarax I was pretty confident that Brine would have been in a position to trash it without interference from the Agoniser. I'm still wrapping my head around the slow, steady pace of attrition with this list after so many years of Arkadius's brutal alpha strikes, which I think leads to me panicking and going for assassinations when I'd be better off hanging back and whittling my opponent down. The list does do work, it just does it very slowly. I might need to institute a self-ban on Turn 2 assassination attempts in my practice games to stop me from panicking and assuming a 60% assassination is more reasonable than whatever attrition play I have on offer. With any luck I'll be able to make another tournament on Saturday to get some more reps with the list as well.
|
|
|
Post by Gaston on Mar 28, 2018 0:15:29 GMT
That looks like a very wide deployment, why not more central/brick?
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Mar 28, 2018 0:26:32 GMT
That looks like a very wide deployment, why not more central/brick? Partly terrain (wanted Skarath in the forest out on the right and Brine in the trench out on the left) and partly because Polarity Shield basically requires you to keep some space around the Meat Thresher to avoid the "just charge something next to it" trick. It was probably a tad too wide though, since it put the right-hand Bone Shrine outside of my Control Area. I also wished I'd been able to get Sturm and Drang further forward, since the first Hyper Aggressive moves from the Husks were taking them well outside of Deceleration range. Sticking Sturm behind the water was definitely a bad move, and having him further to the left would realistically have required shifting the rest of the deployment more centrally.
|
|
|
Post by zwergenkrieger on Mar 28, 2018 16:24:00 GMT
Azahul: Thanks for the batreps, I highly enjoy your travel through Farrow Lands. I do not know a second person that is able to constantly win with low model count armies like you do over and over again. It´s unbelievable.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Mar 29, 2018 3:00:43 GMT
Azahul : Thanks for the batreps, I highly enjoy your travel through Farrow Lands. I do not know a second person that is able to constantly win with low model count armies like you do over and over again. It´s unbelievable. Huh, are battlegroup heavy lists not popular in your meta? I've always considered infantry heavy lists harder to play, once you have a decent number of models on the table it basically guarantees you'll start making positioning errors.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Mar 31, 2018 12:45:35 GMT
We have a team tournament locally in two weeks, so this weekend we organised a pretty hasty impromptu tournament just as a warm-up. Ended up being a three round event with about fourteen players in all. I'm still working out how to play my Sturm and Drang list, so I ended up bringing: Sturm and Drang -Battle Boar -Battle Boar -Battle Boar -Battle Boar -Soul Slave Rorsh -Brine Dahlia -Skarath Longchops Orin Midwinter Kwaak and Gub Mist Speaker Husk Husk Husk Bone Shrine Bone Shrine Gobber Chef Meat Thresher And Arkadius -War Hog -War Hog -Road Hog -Road Hog -Gun Boar -Gun Boar -Gorax -Gorax -Razor Boars -Targ Bellows Crew Witch Doctor Mist Speaker Hutchuck Bone Shrine Bone Shrine Round 1 - Spread the Net We're experiencing something of a surge of players swapping to Minions (mono-Blindwater so far), and so this was the first one of the day. My opponent was running Maelok and Jaga-Jaga. I was confident my opponent was going to drop Maelok. I've found it very hard to math out in my head what the upper limit is on attrition for the Sturm and Drang list, since thus far it's been able to handle basically everything I've thrown at it so long as I've played well enough. Probably isn't a harder attrition game than Maelok at the moment, so I wanted to see how that would go. Sure enough, my opponent dropped Maelok, with the following: Maelok -Blindwalker -Wrastler -Bull Snapper -Soul Slave Max Posse Max Posse Max Posse Max Posse Witch Doctor Witch Doctor Totem Hunter Mist Speaker Deployment My opponent won the starting roll of the game. His horde of Posse floods the board with Maelok and battlegroup central, nothing special. I stick my Meat Thresher out on the left, Skarath next to him, Rorsh and Brine and my Battle Boars skewing a bit further to the right. Husks go up to help jam the centre and far right. My Bone Shrines go into my zone on the right and onto the flag on the left. Gator Turn 1 Posse run up. Maelok casts Death Pact. Puts Soul Harvester onto a unit of Posse (I don't even remember which one, it wasn't exactly relevant this game). Pigs Turn 1 Polarity Shield on the Meat Thresher, Vision on Skarath, and from memory I had to TK my left-hand Bone Shrine because I derped and activated the Meat Thresher before Sturm's activation which meant I had to do some odd stuff to get LOS there. My opponent hadn't accounted for TK, so the far left Posse member was both outside Maelok's control and just inside the Meat Thresher's Control, so I was able to shoot it down to two health with the Meat Thresher and finish it off with Longchops. Husks ran up to get into the faces of the Posse. I stuck the "spare" one behind the building for later. The rest of my list didn't advance too far, trying to avoid the Posse threat ranges. Gator Turn 2 Posse charge in and start whaling on Husks. My opponent got a bit carried away, killing the leading two Husks and taking quite a lot of damage from Eruption of Flies and Carnivorous Swarms before he activated Maelok and buffed their armour. Only one Posse died, but there were a few left on two health out on the right and a smattering of damage in the centre. Posse also killed my right-hand Bone Shrine, while a single Posse charged my left-hand one and only managed one damage. The Totem Hunter killed the final Husk, but the explosion failed to break armour. Pigs Turn 2 I'm really wishing I had my Meat Thresher more central at this point, because I can already see my left flank collapsing and can't realistically see how I can hold the centre. Sturm stays in control and upkeeps both spells. The Meat Thresher gets a charge off on the left Posse and naturally misses the charge attack, killing two of the Posse in the end. Orin runs up to keep Mortality off of it. Skarath moves up and sprays the two Posse in the forest, failing to do damage on either because at this point a 6 on 3d6 is turning into a real feat. Meanwhile, a Primal'd Battle Boar is busy failing to kill the Totem Hunter, and Kwaak and Gub don't fair any better with their double Venom, leaving it corroded and on one health. Rorsh and Brine just move to the left so they don't get killed by the encroaching Posse. Longchops makes up for Skarath's failings and nails a Posse in the forest. Both my opponent and I go to 1 CP. The orange medium base behind the house is the Totem Hunter. Gator Turn 3 Corrosion on the 1 health Totem Hunter goes out. Maelok Feats and hits Skarath with Mortality, ending on 0 Fury. The Wrastler charges Skarath. Vision absorbs the bite/charge attack, and my opponent is forced to commit three more Posse to finish the snake off. If only I'd had Orin closer... My opponent gets some spectacular dice out on the right and chews through the Battle Boars pretty badly, though he only actually kills one. Totem Hunter charges Rorsh, forcing a transfer and doing four damage with the Buckler. The Bull Snapper walks into melee with the Meat Thresher and makes a single boosted damage attack, rolling a 17 and taking a big chunk out of the machine. The two remaining Posse on the left do a run-charge, one of them just running into the forest engaging the Meat Thresher while the other charges and kills the last Bone Shrine. My opponent gains 1 CP. Pigs Turn 3 So there is, sort of, an assassination run here. Maelok is on zero camp and inside the Meat Thresher's charge range. I just need to TK the Meat Thresher, get the Bull Snapper, one Posse, and the Soul Slave out of the way, and I can try and run him over. The Mist Speaker gives Guidance to Sturm, Sturm charges a Posse out on the left, lands TK on both the Snapper and the Posse. He Feats as well, for whatever good it will do. I then have Brine kill the Totem Hunter, allowing Rorsh to walk up and put two boosted POW 12s into the Soul Slave, followed by Longchops and Orin, and leave the Soul Slave on 2 health. And with that, this long odds run is well and truly off the table. The Meat Thresher kills a Posse and the Soul Slave and my opponent gains another CP. Gators Turn 4 My opponent just needs to score three this turn to win. The Wrastler with its one Fury kills the Battle Boar in the central zone. The combined efforts of six Posse kill the right-hand Battle Boar. A Witch Doctor gives the Blind Walker Ghostly and it runs through the building into the rectangular zone. My opponent is almost out of clock, but he deigns to spend the time killing Orin and Rorsh and a few other odds and ends before ending the game just a couple minutes shy of clocking out, going to 6 CP and winning the game. Ok, I think I've hit the limit on what this list can attrition through. There were definitely some major mistakes during the game, I lost Skarath for no work and could have kept him alive better had Orin been nearby, the Meat Thresher should have gone through the left-hand Posse faster than it did and probably should have been more central, but I feel like the game is definitely an uphill slog. My gut impression is that it isn't a super good match-up for Arkadius either, but on the flipside I got pretty good at playing Arkadius into Meat Mountains and the like in Mark II and my list is basically just a few Razor Boars short. Might need to test it out, otherwise I think I may have a gaping hole in my match-ups where Minions, Skorne, and Trollbloods are concerned.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Mar 31, 2018 13:20:56 GMT
Round 2 - The Pit II Losing round one is always a bit frustrating from a practice perspective, but luckily I got to play up this round. I matched up against a Ret player with an Issyria gunline/Vyros2 'jack spam pair. Arkadius was the obvious pick, since he could comfortably handle the Vyros build and had the threat ranges to play ball with Issyria. My opponent picked Issyria, with the following: Issyria -Hemera -Harpy -Harpy -Harpy -Sylys Stormfall Archers Stormfall Archers Max Nyss Hunters Arcanist Mechanik Arcanist Mechanik Arcanist Mechanik Skeryth Issyen Arcantrik Force Generator Deployment My opponent won the roll-off. He had the Nyss on his left and the Force Generator on the right, so I set up both Gun Boars on the left flank and skewed my heavies to the right. I did stick one Bone Shrine behind the house to try and ensure that later in the game I'd be able to pull my opponent forward into my threat range if he wanted to clear the zone, but couldn't get any similarly convenient placement with the remainder. Hutchuck chose to ambush. Ret Turn 1 Inviolable Resolve went on the Arcantrik Force Generator. Admonition went on Hemera. My opponent ran his stuff up. Pigs Turn 1 My Gun Boars advanced and fired some shots, landing well short of the Nyss. One did scatter favourably though, so I was able to kill a single Nyss Hunter. My stuff mostly advanced cautiously, not wanting to enter the range of the battle engine. I did have the brilliant idea of running my right-hand Road Hog behind the forest, thinking I'd be able to give it Pathfinder with the objective and then Feat it at the AFG to get it into a relevant position later... totally forgetting that the battle engine can't be charged. Karmic payback for my Meat Thresher/Sturm combo. Forced Evolution went on the right-hand War Hog, Aggravator went up. Ret Turn 2 The Battle Engine dropped the right-hand Bone Shrine in a single shot. Fired its second shot at the out-of-range War Hog to try and drift a rough terrain template somewhere relevant. Landed right on top of the forest instead, clipping a Gorax for one damage. On the left, the combined efforts of the Nyss and Stormfall Archers left the other Bone Shrine on one health... and a single Nyss within 8". The rest of the list hung back out of retaliation range. Pigs Turn 2 I declare I'm ambushing Hutchuck in, and then somehow forget to actually place him on the board. I channel Crippling Grasp onto the Nyss Hunters through the Bone Shrine. My left-hand Razor Boar receives Primal, and I plug my opponent's objective with my Gun Boar (killing a Stormfall Archer in the process) The Razor Boar finishes it off. The other Gun Boar kills the remaining contesting Nyss. On the right my Razor Boar moves into the forest. Rest of my list hangs back, but I do send up the leader of the Bellows Crew to drop a cloud in the zone. I go to 3 CP. Ret Turn 3 My opponent's turn for a counter punch. His battle engine guns down my objective. His Harpy on the right walks up and shoots my Razor Boar there, knocking him down, leaving him on one health, and pushing him out of the zone. Hilariously though, he then rolls snake eyes for the second shot, so the Razor Boar lives. The Stormfall Archers and Nyss again struggle to kill my Bone Shrine and the lone Gobber in the zone, but Hemera is able to scatter an AOE to remove the Gobber and one of the right-hand Stormfalls gets a beat on the Bone Shrine and finally kills it. Skeryth charges and kills the other Razor Boar in the left-hand zone. My opponent goes to 3 CP. Pigs Turn 3 I remember to ambush Hutchuck in this time. This will probably be Feat turn. I have a Gun Boar shoot Issyen straight off his horse with a brilliant damage roll. Hutchuck takes out two Stormfall Archers on the far left. My other Gun Boar softens up the Harpy in the left zone. I Raw Adrenaline it with Arkadius and Feat my army up the board (and here is where I discover the flaw in my "hide a Road Hog behind a forest and rely on being able to see the Battle Engine to get it out" plan). My right-hand Road Hog gets a spray off on a line of Nyss, kills two, punches a Stormfall Archer to death, and Sprints to engage the remaining Nyss. My other Road Hog walks into the forest and sprays out, catching two Stormfall Archers. It boosts to hit both, misses both. My War Hogs go in, each killing a Harpy, the one on the left overtaking to kill Skeryth, the Forced Evolution one on the right removing all bar one of the remaining Stormfall Archers too. I run my Bellows Crew Gobber, Mist Speaker, Witch Doctor, and the right-hand Gorax up to create a slightly haphazard wall of screening models in front of my four camp Arkadius, lined up so that there's no way for the battle engine to slam one of them over Arkadius, and figure that's probably enough to eat whatever attacks my opponent has left. I go up another 2 CP. Ret Turn 4 My opponent hunts for an assassination, can't find one. Issyria Feats. Hemera gets loaded up with focus and damage buffed by the Arcanist Mechaniks, goes in against my central Road Hog, fails to kill it. The Arcantrik Force Generator shoots my right-hand Gorax off the table. I go up another 2 CP. Pigs Turn 4 All my heavies bar the Forced Evolution'd War Hog frenzy, since Arkadius can only afford to leach from one of them. This gets my last Razor Boar killed, but also clears the last Nyss and gets Hemera to Admonition out of the central zone. I run a Gorax into the left zone, guaranteeing that I'll win the game at the end of the turn, and clear one Mechanik with Hutchuck, give my War Hog Primal and have it kill Hemera and the remaining Mechaniks, and get one swing on Issyria, which misses. I score another 3 CP to win the game. Not a huge amount to discuss there. Arkadius plays into a favourable match-up, where he can bully with his threat ranges and control the scenario. The slow pace of the game suited me well too, since it meant I never felt pressured to really overextend Arkadius and risk an assassination until my opponent had basically run out of attacks to threaten me with.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Mar 31, 2018 13:47:18 GMT
Round 3 - Outlast Minions again! Jaga-Jaga/Maelok again, in fact. "Perfect", I think, "I'll get a chance to test Arkadius vs Maelok and see if I actually do have a medium-based infantry hole in my match-up that I need to worry about." But noooo, my opponent drops Jaga-Jaga instead, running: Jaga-Jaga -Dracodile -Bull Snapper -Soul Slave Max Croak Raiders Max Croak Raiders Totem Hunter Sacral Vault Sacral Vault Deployment I win the first turn. Which would feel a lot better, if AD on Croak Raiders didn't effectively cost me my Turn 1 run theme benefit. Anyway, I deploy more or less symmetrically, matched by my opponent, ending with one Bone Shrine on my flag in the middle. I was initially tempted to just stick both there, but figured I'd try and bait some Croaks forward with the left-hand one and get some early attrition there. Pigs Turn 1 I attempt to scatter some shots into the AD line, but don't get lucky. Aggravator goes up, Forced Evolution on the left-hand War Hog to prep it for going into the Dracodile, and run up to sit just out of range of the Croaks. Gators Turn 1 Left-hand Croaks shoot down my Bone Shrine. Right-hand Croaks run up. The Dracodile casts Floodwaters and charges up. Jaga-Jaga puts up Battle Host and gives the Totem Hunter Grave Wind. Pigs Turn 2 Hutchuck ambushes in. I figure there's about a 50/50 shot of me dropping the Dracodile with my War Hog and guns, so decide to go for it. The Witch Doctor gives Ghostly to the Forced Evolution'd War Hog, I primal it with the Gorax, and I have a Gun Boar clear an intervening Croak. Arkadius applies Raw Adrenaline to the left-hand Road Hog and Feats. My army rushes up the board, and Arkadius channels Crippling Grasp onto a right-hand Croak that got just a bit too close to the Bone Shrine.. The War Hog goes into the Dracodile, drops it to two boxes. I try to finish it off with my other Gun Boar, but don't break armour. My left-hand Road Hog charges a Croak to assault the Dracodile, kills the Croak with the spray, misses a second Croak also under the spray, and fails to break armour on the Dracodile. Punches a third Croak out of frustration and sprints to engage the Sacral Vault. My War Hog out on the right charges out of Arkadius's Control and Overtakes through a couple of Croaks, allowing my second Road Hog to spray the Dracodile and Totem Hunter. Totem Hunter survives on fire and on two health, spray fails to break armour on the Dracodile. Somewhat frustrated at this point, I have Targ Ancillary Attack a Gun Boar, hit the Dracodile, and hard roll a 10 on 2d6 to kill it. Phew. Rest of the turn mostly just involved engaging/killing more Croaks on the left with a Razor Boar, Gorax, and Hutchuck. Gators Turn 2 Fire on the Totem Hunter stays up but I can't roll the 6 I need to kill it. Signs and Portents goes up on Jaga-Jaga, and my opponent shoots both War Hog off the board and drops the left-hand Road Hog to half health. Totem Hunter spikes high and kills the Bone Shrine on the flag, then kills the Mist Speaker with its Buckler and sprints to engage my Gun Boars. Over on the left, my opponent accepts three free strikes as he tries to disengage from Hutchuck, the Razor Boar, and the Gun Boar, and loses three Croaks as a result. My opponent scores 1 CP. Pigs Turn 3 One Gun Boar frenzies into another, my left Road Hog frenzies on the Sacral Vault, my Gorax on the left frenzies at the Razor Boar and misses, my Gorax on the right passes its threshold check. Arkadius attempts to needle the Totem Hunter, misses, gets pushed back. This forces me to have my right-hand Gorax (now with only one Fury on it) walk over and Primal a Gun Boar to kill the Totem Hunter, which I thankfully manage. The last Fury is spent to put up Counter Blast. Ancillary Attack from Targ hits the Bull Snapper for something like nine damage and takes out its mind. The Witch Doctor gives the right-hand Road Hog Ghostly and it charges out at a Croak, the spray killing two Croaks and allowing it to redirect its attacks into Jaga-Jaga. It does something like seven damage to her, which she opts not to transfer. My Bellows Crew goes into the left-hand zone, so I score 2 CP. Gators Turn 3 Jaga-Jaga cuts for Fury, casts Signs and Portents, makes two attacks on the Road Hog engaging her. The Sacral Vault then comes up and leaves the Road Hog alive, but barely. A Croak throws a flaming dart into the melee, hits, leaves the Road Hog on fire on one health. The other croaks kill the Razor Boar on the right. The Sacral Vault on the left reduces the other Road Hog down to about eight boxes. The Bull Snapper charges at my Bellows Crew, positioning itself in melee with my Gun Boar to contest both my flag and the left zone... but dies to the Counterblast punch. My opponent gains 1 CP. I gain 2 CP. Pigs Turn 4 My Road Hog burns to death. My Primal'd Gun Boar frenzies and kills a Bellows Crew. I try to work out the best way to play this out, running a Gorax up to jam the right-hand Sacral Vault, and looking on the left to work out how best to destroy the Sacral Vault there. Then I think to ask my opponent how Jaga-Jaga is health-wise. Turns out she's down to five boxes. The remaining Gun Boar walks up and shoots her and kills her. Since my round one opponent went undefeated, I did pretty well ranking wise. More strangely, I find myself in the position where I feel I need to practice more with Arkadius. That's... not a common sensation for me, but the meat mountain match-up is one I've always struggled with a bit but that I haven't really tried to attrition through since WWFF came out (I have just straight up assassinated people playing it a few times though). Not sure if Overtake is enough, but that's principally why I want to see how it plays out.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Apr 4, 2018 0:50:21 GMT
So, traditionally I try to avoid playing Arkadius too often in friendly games. He's got a bit of a rep locally that has some people treat the prospect a bit like facing pre-nerf Haley2. I think, however, that I've become a bit too rigid in viewing him largely as an answer to battlegroup heavy lists and an assassination out. So I've decided to sit down and play him into as much of the field as possible to properly feel out where his limits are, particularly now that Bone Shrines mean that getting Crippling Grasp out onto valuable targets is at least possible. In spite of that, I ended up playing my first game of the night against Ossrum. Probably should have requested my opponent drop his Damiano Kingmaker list, but we've played Sturm and Drang vs that four times in the last two weeks at this point so he felt like a change of pace. Can't really blame him. He was running in Irregulars, with the following: Ossrum -Gunner -Gunner -Gunner -Gunner -Blaster -Blaster -Driller -Driller Max Forge Guard Aiyanna and Holt (though around about Turn 3 we realised he'd forgotten to deploy them) Eliminators Eilish Garrity (proxied with Sylys in this game) Orin Midwinter Kell Bailoch Hammerfall Siege Crawler Deployment Terrain ended up being exceptionally skewed, which provided my opponent with a real dilemma when he won the roll off. He finally opted to go first, because going second into Arkadius is never a good idea. I let him have the table side with all the hazards. He deployed his Crawler on the left, a Driller central, a Driller on the right, and the bunnies and Forge Guard scattered among them. I deployed more or less symmetrically, with a Road Hog close to Arkadius for Raw Adrenaline and the Gun Boars flanking him on the other side. Kell was deployed centrally, and I placed my Bone Shrines a little more spread out than I really wanted to so that he couldn't just snipe Kell and double tap one of them from the beginning of the game. I forgot to take a picture. Merc Turn 1 Ossrum put Snipe on Kell and Fire for Effect on the Siege Crawler. Kell walked up behind the objective and took a pot shot at the right-hand Bone Shrine for three damage. Everything else just ran. Pigs Turn 1 I had a Razor Boar cast Still as Death and charge up the field, giving Arkadius a Maltreatment target. Forced Evolution went on the left-hand War Hog in preparation for going into the Siege Crawler. Aggravator went up, and Arkadius walked around the front of his Gun Boars before hitting the right-hand one with a Raw Adrenaline needle, then repositioned forwards into the Trench. The Gun Boar then ran up to about 9" in front of Targ and just in range of Kell. Targ walked up and Ancillary Attacked it to pop Kell. My Bellows Crew dropped a cloud in front of Arkadius. The Forced Evolution'd War Hog ran onto the hill on the left, my other War Hog ran into the cloud on the right, and the rest of my army ran up aiming to stay out of charge range of anything. Mercs Turn 2 Ossrum Feated and put Bullet Dodger on himself. The Forge Guard ran up, leaving a space for the Siege Crawler to walk into. It took both big gun shots at the left-hand Road Hog, failing to get off a Critical Stagger but removing about half the Road Hog's health, and then fired its smaller gun at the War Hog on the hill. Missed all the shots needing to hit a Def 16. The bunnies on the left focussed their fire on the War Hog then, allowing it to Hyper Aggressive a bit further forward and crippling the War Hog's mind. On the right, the Gun Bunnies mostly shot up the Gun Boar that killed Kell, removing about half its health. Pigs Turn 2 I upkeep both my spells. Hutchuck Ambushes in, throws a Rust bomb on the Blaster behind the wall on the left zone, and charges it to engage both said Blaster and the Gunner. Is one damage short of crippling the Blaster's Head. My Gorax on the left Primals the War Hog there. Targ runs out onto the right to let me Herd my Razor Boar and Gorax there. The Gorax Primals the Razor Boar, who runs out behind the Eliminators. Arkadius activates, channels an unboosted Crippling Grasp through the Bone Shrine into the Forge Guard, needles the left-hand Road Hog for Raw Adrenaline, Maltreats the left Gorax, then casts Psycho Surgery. Finally, he Feats, putting the War Hog into the Siege Crawler and a whole mess of Warbeasts into the lead Gun Bunny on the left. On the right, the frenzy attack from the Road Hog knocks down the Gunner. The Primal'd Razor Boar out on the right kills an Eliminator, the Frenzying Gorax fails to hit the other one. The Forced Evolution'd War Hog activates first, beating the crap out of the Siege Crawler. A single snake eyes to hit leaves it alive on six boxes. The left-hand Razor Boar accepts a free strike from the Gun Bunny to get out of the way of the Road Hog, which then also takes a free strike from the bunny to charge the end of the Forge Guard. The spray covers seven of the Forge Guard, kills six of them, and allows the Road Hog to Overtake through a seventh Forge Guard into the Siege Crawler to kill it, then Overtake back into the Gun Bunny and cripple its head. Over on the right, the War Hog walks into melee with the Driller and tears out its Cortex with Aggression Dial and three boosted damage rolls. The Road Hog whales away at the downed Gun Bunny, leaving it alive but bereft of a head. The Gun Boars shoot and kill two of the surviving three Forge Guard. My Bellows Crew walks up and clouds in front of Arkadius. My Mist Speaker does the same thing. My Witch Doctor runs behind the Mist Speaker to body block in case the Mist Speaker gets killed. I gain 1 CP for controlling my zone. Mercs Turn 3 Ossrum casts Irresistible Force and loads up the intact Driller. The bunnies pump themselves out of melee with all of their combatants save Hutchuck, where the Blaster bumps him out of melee with the Gunner but has to content to then sitting there unable to do anything. The freed up Gunners now shoot the disengaged War Hog on the left and, in spite of it Hyper Aggressiving into melee with Driller for Def 18, are able to hit and kill it. This allows the Driller to go in and kill the left-hand Road Hog. The Eliminator on the right walks over the Gorax and hits him in the but with a combo strike for a single point of damage. The damaged Gunner there mostly just moves in to tie up the Road Hog and Gun Boar. The near-dead Driller misses its Drill attack on the War Hog and does a few points of damage with the clamp. I gain another CP for controlling my zone. Pigs Turn 3 My remaining War Hog has room to walk in and trash my opponent's objective, so I can get to 4 CP this turn, 5 if I clear one of the zones. After checking, my Bellows Crew doesn't have range to run into the right zone, and I can't get Arkadius there either without running him, so I decide to try for the left zone where I just need to dislodge the Driller and a damaged Gunner. My surviving Road Hog frenzies and kills the engaging Gun Bunny, and my Gorax kills the last Eliminator. This allows my two Gun Boars (and it does take both) to shoot Orin. I charge my Mist Speaker at the damaged Gunner in the left zone, miss, charge my Witch Doctor in, hit and kill with the charge attack. Arkadius activates, throws Crippling Grasp onto the Driller, Forced Evolution and Primal onto the Gorax, and gives him a poke with a Raw Adrenaline needle to get him angry before Repositioning back into the rectangular zone. Hutchuck activates, walks around the Gun Bunnies, and throws a Rust Bomb onto the Driller. The Gorax then charges in and rolls like the blazes, downing the Driller in three hits. The Bellows Crew scores the left zone. War Hog Aggression Dials, walks up, smashes the Objective. I go to 5 CP. Turns out I incidentally cleared the right-hand zone too, so I probably could have just run Arkadius in there and walked a Warbeast into. Don't recall if he was close enough, but he probably could have managed it.
|
|
|
Post by Gaston on Apr 4, 2018 1:18:53 GMT
Ahem....Bone Shrine analysis?
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Apr 4, 2018 1:23:53 GMT
Game two of the night was into some actual infantry. My opponent was running Gaspy1 in Scourge of the Broken Coast, with the following: Asphyxious -Defiler -Defiler -Leviathan -Blood Priestess Max Raiders -Sea Witch Max Raiders -Sea Witch Max Blood Witches -Blood Hag Raider Captain Raider Captain Saxon Orrik Deployment My opponent won the starting roll, so I gave him the table side with an Acid Pool in the middle. That split his army in two, with one unit of Raiders on the right, and basically everything else in his list on the left. He ambushed the Blood Witches. I set up both War Hogs on my left to square off against his only heavy, and kept Arkadius and all the guns in the middle. Sat a Bone Shrine on my flag, the other in the left zone. Cryx Turn 1 Everything ran. Gaspy hung well back and sat on a hill to avoid being kill boxed. He stopped just short of 8" from the Bone Shrines for most of the Raiders, save only for one that hid from the Shrine behind a cloud. Pigs Turn 1 I mostly jammed myself up staying out of melee threat ranges. The Mist Speaker did go forwards to give Guidance to the left hand Shrine so that Arkadius could land Crippling Grasp onto the left unit of Raiders. He also stuck Forced Evolution on the War Hog that went into the burning earth and put Guardian Warbeast on himself, camping one with Maltreatment and the Bone Shrines. Cryx Turn 2 The Blood Priestess killed one of her own Satyxis to strip Crippling Grasp. Raiders charged in and killed my Shrines after Gaspy failed to kill one with Hellfire and the Leviathan failed to shoot the other one dead. One of them on the right triggered Counter Charge from the Razor Boar, which I went for without really thinking about it. Hit and killed the Satyxis though. Three more charged the Boar, and left it on one health. Both Raider units used their Force Barrier prayer again. Blood Witches ambushed in on the left flank and ran to gum up the works. Pigs Turn 2 I upkept both spells, ambushed Hutchuck in. Hutchuck killed two Blood Witches with a Quake bomb and the Hag with his charge attack, so solid contribution there. I had the Razor Boar on the left kill a Satyxis, giving me a Fury to Maltreat and freeing up the leftmost War Hog somewhat. Arkadius activated, slung Crippling Grasp onto the right flank Raiders, and managed to give Raw Adrenaline to the right flank Road Hog on the second try. I opted to save my Feat and just huddled in the trench. The one health Razor Boar, with only spirit intact, boosted an attack onto one of the Raiders engaging him. Hit, killed, and snacked for one health to restore mind. Bought an unboosted attack on another Raider, hit, killed, snacked for another one health to get Body back. Champion. My right flank Gun Boar walked into melee with the Raiders and killed two of them, giving me room to charge my Road Hog far out onto the right (with an application of Ghostly from the Witch Doctor and Full Boar for speed) to get five of the Crippled Raiders in his fully boosted Assault Spray, including two in the back arc. Killed four of the five. Over on the left, one of my Gorax punched and killed a couple of Blood Witches. The Gorax from the right flank walked over to hand Primal out to the leftmost War Hog. Said War Hog proceeded to walk and overtake his way through seven of the left flank Raiders, including their Sea Witch. In the centre, my other Road Hog walked up and sprayed the two Raider captains, one on my opponent's flag and the other in the fog bank. Hit both, but with unboosted damage rolls left the one on the flag on two health and on fire. I only needed to kill one more Raider to score my own flag though, so I ran the Mist Speaker onto it and had my remaining Gun Boar walk up and shoot at the Crippled Raider contesting. Missed. Targ attempted a second shot with Ancillary Attack. Missed. Almost scattered onto the near-death Raider Captain, but was short by about half an inch. I held my remaining War Hog back for a counter-punch next turn and ended my turn. My opponent went to 1 CP. Cryx Turn 3 My opponent went for an assassination run. Charged the two remaining Crippled Raiders in. The Sea Witch charged my right flank Gun Boar, who had Counter Blast up, and died to the punch. The other Raider charged my Mist Speaker, did about two damage. Raiders do not like -2 Strength. With Counter Blast gone though, my opponent could run his Defiler on the right up to get a bead on Arkadius. My opponent went for an assassination run with his Feat, needing 12s to hit. Hit the first two spells, doing three damage to Arkadius and stripping his one camp. Missed the last boosted Hellfire. With that plan gone, the Blood Witches killed Hutchuck and did a small amount of damage to the left Gorax. One also charged my Razor Boar, missed both attacks. Cankerworm did an armour piercing attack to my Primal'd War Hog and then backed up. The Leviathan shot him a couple of times. Saxon ran up to jam. My opponent went to 2 CP. Pigs Turn 3 Ordinarily I'd have played attrition, since I'd be able to clear basically the rest of my opponent's army this turn. It was getting late though, so I went for an assassination. My Primal'd War Hog frenzied on Saxon, he passed his Tough check. There were a few other frenzies here and there, killing some more Satyxis. My right flank Razor Boar frenzied into my Mist Speaker, but didn't break armour. Ghost Walk, Forced Evolution, and Primal went on my centre Road Hog. Raw Adrenaline too, because I derped and forgot that I was about to Frenzy it into Saxon and cause Raw Adrenaline to expire anyway. So I did all of that, Repositioned Arkadius onto the flag. Had a perfect charge line straight through the Priestess and remaining Defiler to get to Gaspy. Missed the spray, boosted to hit the charge attack, got the Crit Knockdown, killed him on the last attack. It's pretty entertaining that after all the games I play with Arkadius, I still massively undervalue him into infantry. I usually think of him in terms of being able to clear 1-2 units ok, but struggling into infantry heavy lists. I don't think I've even really tried post-WWFF, so getting that Overtake chain off with the Primal'd War Hog was something of an eye-opener. I'm hoping to test him into Kingmaker next week, if all goes well. If I can play through that... sadly, I think that will lead me to drop my Sturm and Drang list from the pair. I love that list to bits, and love playing it, but it's fixing a problem Arkadius already appears to have in the bag.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Apr 4, 2018 1:25:00 GMT
Ahem....Bone Shrine analysis? Let's put it this way. Last night I cast Crippling Grasp four times. I don't think I've cast Crippling Grasp four times in all of pre-Bone Shrine Mark 3. I love them
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Apr 11, 2018 1:31:11 GMT
So one of the tools in Arkadius's kit that I've traditionally neglected has been Raw Adrenaline. Usually, it gets used if I realise I happen to have a good opportunity for it, and I often try to combine it with Targ for an extra fully boosted Gun Boar shot, but I rarely deliberately position for it with an eye to where Arkadius will be in respect to my beasts, particularly my Road hogs, a turn or two ahead. I lined up a couple of games yesterday with my increasingly regular Kingmaker's opponent, because the fully boosted sprays would be vital in that match-up, to try and get to grips with this skill. As a reminder, the lists are: Arkadius -War Hog -War Hog -Road Hog -Road Hog -Gun Boar -Gun Boar -Gorax -Gorax -Razor Boars -Targ Bellows Crew Bone Shrine Bone Shrine Hutchuck Witch Doctor Mist Speaker Damiano -Nomad -Nomad -Nomad Max Halberdiers Max Halberdiers Max Trencher Long Gunners -UA Max Trencher Infantry -UA -2 Trencher Rifle Grenadiers Kell Bailoch Orin Midwinter Stannis Brocker We rolled up Breakdown for the scenario. My opponent won the starting roll, opted to go second because the terrain would otherwise have made life very difficult for him. We were planning on getting in a second game and reversing table sides/starting player anyway. Deployment My opponent went for his usual deployment. Halberdiers on the flanks, both Trencher units in the middle, two Nomads on one side, one Nomad with Stannis and Kell on the other, Damiano and Orin with the Trenchers. I set up with my two Road Hogs flanking Arkadius, both Gun Boars on the right, and largely allowed the left to fend for itself with the War Hog there. Pigs Turn 1 Everything ran up, a lot of it hugging the central forest to minimise early shooting. I put Forced Evolution on the left War Hog (actually meant for it to go on the right one, since it was squaring off against two Nomads, but my brain did a bad) and Aggravator up. For some reason I was randomly scared of some Trencher Infantry CRAs going into Arkadius so the Bellows Crew ended up running in front of him. Mercs Turn 1 Kell walked up and shot the Bone Shrine for three damage. Damiano cast Sure Foot on the Trencher Infantry and decided to camp his stack in case of an assassination attempt. Trencher Infantry walked up and Dug In with Cautious Advance, the Sniper took a potshot at the Bone Shrine on the right and decided to roll for damage, failing to break armour. Everything else ran up, the Long Gunners using their mini Feat to dig in. Pigs Turn 2 Hutchuck Ambushed in. I dropped Aggravator. Gorax on the left Primal'd a Razor Boar. Gorax on the right Primal'd the War Hog. Both Razor Boars moved up, the right-hand one casting Still as Death. I ran one of my Gun Boars to briefly engage the leading Trencher Infantry, took about four damage from the Free Strike after backing up, to strip Dig In from him. The Bellows Crew got out of Arkadius's way and dropped a cloud. Arkadius then activated, gained a Fury from Maltreatment, took a Fury from a Bone Shrine, got Cursed, needled both Road Hogs, boosted a Crippling Grasp into the Trenchers and hit, Feated everyone forward, then Repositioned back behind the cloud. The frenzies killed a couple of enemy infantry and Kell Bailoch. On the left, Hutchuck walked up and tossed a Rust Bomb onto the Nomad there. My Forced Evolution'd War Hog used Aggression Dial, Irresistible Force, and bulldozed out of Arkadius's control area and into the Nomad. Killed the Nomad on its initial attacks, used Overtake to get back into control, killed a couple of Halberdiers with bought attacks. Over on the right, an Assault Spray from one Road Hog killed two Trenchers and a Halberdier, set another two Trenchers on fire. That opened a path for my other War Hog to charge the Nomad there, taking about four damage from a Trencher's free strike. Smashed the Nomad pretty with two attacks to spare, ended up killing a Trencher infantry and engaging a Long Gunner. The other Road Hog walked up and took its spray through a mix of Trencher Infantry and Long Gunners, killing one or two from each unit and missing Orin. Big, big turn. Dropped me to about 20 minutes on the clock. Mercs Turn 2 Damiano activated, loaded up the remaining Nomad, upkept Sure Foot on the five remaining Trencher Infantry, and Feated. Halberdiers and Stannis failed to kill the War Hog on the left thanks to Forced Evolution (a couple of the Halberdiers were busy fighting the Gorax, knocking out its Body), so the Nomad had to go in and finish him off. Two big Long Gunner CRAs followed by a Trencher Infantry charge killed one of the Road Hogs in the middle. Halberdiers on the right killed the other War Hog. Pigs Turn 3 The Primal'd Razor Boar frenzied. I upkept Crippling Grasp. Decided to play cagey for a round. Gave Ghost Walk to the Road Hog, had Arkadius walk up and Raw Adrenaline him (also putting Forced Evolution on the Road Hog and casting Guardian Warbeast on himself), cleared off some engaging Trenchers with the right-hand Gun Boar, then made an assault charge to spray a handful of Long Gunners and a Trencher Infantry. Redirected the charge attack into another Trencher Infantry before sprinting back behind the forest to take cover from the Nomad. Over on the right, the Razor Boar and Gorax cleared the two Halberdiers in the zone. Ran the Bellows Crew to score it. On the left, the Gun Boar shot the one Halberdier left contesting the central zone, put Counterblast up on itself. Hutchuck ran behind Stannis to engage him and some Long Gunners. I went to 2 CP. Mercs Turn 3 With nothing else to do, Stannis loaded up the Nomad and had it kill Hutchuck. Stannis and the Halberdiers worked together to kill the left-hand Gorax. The remaining Trencher infantry, now bereft of Sure Foot, ran to engage the zones. The Long Gunners shot the central Gun Boar down to a couple of boxes, finished him with Orin Midwinter (chain lightning also bounced through the Road Hog and Witch Doctor, boosted damage on both Gun Boar and Witch Doctor to kill them both). Pigs Turn 4 Almost out of clock at this point. The Razor Boar on the right and frenzied, killing the one Trencher contesting that zone. Only three Halberdiers on the left were actually contesting the zone there, and I could get Arkadius into the zone pretty easily. Killed one Halberdier with the Razor Boar, overtook, triggered Defensive Strike from Stannis and lost Spirit and Body to the attack. Also ended up providing the in melee benefit to the Halberdiers. Oops. Didn't matter luckily. My Gun Boar aimed and shot into the cluster, killed all three remaining Halberdiers. The Road Hog used Full Boar, walked through the forest, punched the last Trencher Infantry to death. Sprinted back behind the forest for the heck of it. Arkadius walked into the left zone. I went to 5 CP to win.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Apr 11, 2018 3:50:12 GMT
For game # 2, we basically swapped the terrain around rather than physically move our armies and my opponent took the starting turn. Deployment The only really notable change on deployment was that the Trencher Infantry ended up split by the forest, and I reacted to Kell's placement on the left by having my two Bone Shrines sit centre and right. Mercs Turn 1 My opponent ran his stuff forward. Sure Foot went on the Trencher Infantry and Damiano cast Road to War. The Nomads on the right were forced to run through the burning earth. Pigs Turn 1 Everything ran up, hanging back out of the threat range of the Nomads and Halberdiers. I ended up putting Forced Evolution on the left War Hog again, but this time it was intentional in the hope that I could disable the Nomad there and keep the War Hog alive with the Def 14. I also cast Guardian Warbeast instead of Aggravator this time, figuring it would allow me to play more aggressively with Arkadius and that I largely didn't want to be making Hyper Aggressive moves with the threat ranges the way they were. Mercs Turn 2 With the threat of my War Hogs in play, my opponent felt forced to pull his Nomads back so that they could survive as a counter-punch. The Trencher Infantry swung left with a Cautious Advance and put a CRA into the left flank Razor Boar, hurting it quite badly. Kell tried to finish him off, but at Def 17 in the Trench he proved just a bit too hard to hit. The Long Gunners advanced, put about five damage into the right flank War Hog, and used their mini Feat to Dig In. One of the right flank Halberdiers was able to charge the Bone Shrine there, doing two damage. Both Halberdier units angled to face towards the board edges, anticipating Hutchuk's arrival. Pigs Turn 2 I opted not to Feat. Instead, I decided to whittle down my opponent a little. Arkadius upkept his spells and used Raw Adrenaline on both of the Road Hogs, which required him to buy an attack. Threw Crippling Grasp onto the right-flank Halberdiers. The Witch Doctor gave one Road Hog Ghostly, allowing it to Full Boar and charge a Trencher Infantry and catch five Long Gunners in its spray. Three Long Gunners and the Trencher Infantry died, two Long Gunners were knocked down and on fire. Melee attacks killed another Trencher, allowing the Road Hog to sprint back almost to its starting position (Overtake is a pretty great addition to the Sprint Distance) and letting Targ then use Ancillary Attack to kill two of the right-hand Halberdiers. The combined efforts of the Gun Boar and other Road Hog on the left killed a couple of Trencher Infantry and Halberdiers. Hutchuck ambushed in and killed two Halberdiers with a Wild Shot before running behind my opponent's line where he would realistically need to dedicate the Nomad there to have any chance of killing him. My War Hogs mostly hung back, the one on the right killing a single Halberdier and the one on the left just lurking behind the ranged Warbeasts. Mercs Turn 3 Fire went out on both Long Gunners, stayed up on both Nomads but did nothing. My opponent upkept both his spells and loaded up the left Nomad. He didn't really have any good targets to make Feating worthwhile, so he went for Hutchuck with the Nomad and killed him. Stannis charged the Razor Boar on the left and managed to miss his attack roll. Trencher Infantry and a single Halberdier charged the Gun Boar on the left, dropping it down to about six or seven health, and the rest of their units killed the Razor Boar. The remaining Long Gunners shot my right-flank Razor Boar to death. The other Nomads basically hung back where they were, waiting for an opportunity to do something. Pigs Turn 3 I dropped Forced Evolution, upkept Crippling Grasp and Guardian Warbeast. There were a couple of Frenzies, killing a Trencher Grenadier on the left with the Gun Boar there and sending my Gorax on the right into my other Gun Boar for a couple of points of damage. I cleared the right-hand zone of Halberdiers with a Gun Boar shot and my War Hog, staying out of the threat range of the Nomad there. I then ran my Swamp Gobbers to take that zone. Arkadius used Raw Adrenaline on the centre Road Hog, put Forced Evolution on him in case I wasn't going to be able to sprint him back, and got out of the way. Ghost Walk was given to the Road Hog again, who charged forward to catch most of the remaining Long Gunners in his spray. Killed all bar three, including sadly the only model in the Road Hog's melee range. Was really hoping I'd either miss or that one would make his Tough check. Ah well, Road Hog was hung out to dry. Over on the left, my Road Hog caught two Halberdiers and two Trenchers in his spray. Killed one from each unit, plus another Trencher with melee attacks. My Gorax managed to kill two Halberdiers as well. I gained 1 CP. Mercs Turn 4 Fire went out on one Nomad, did three damage to the other one. Damiano upkept both spells and loaded up the left and central Nomads. Damiano activated, walked into the forest, and Feated. The centre Nomad went into the Road Hog with Forced Evolution, had to boost to hit, didn't roll super hot on damage. A handful of Trencher infantry piled in there and killed the Road Hog. Road to War allowed the left-flank Nomad to move back up and charge the Road Hog there, following on the heels of some of the surviving Halberdiers. Mat 6 proved to be the bane of the attack, leaving the Road Hog alive on 1 health. Orin had to walk up, Chain Lightning the Nomad in the back, bounce through a Halberdier and onto the Road Hog, and boost damage to kill the Road Hog. The one Nomad remaining on the right walked into the zone to contest it, and the remaining Long Gunners aimed and shot down the two Bellows Crew members so I would need Arkadius to score it. Pigs Turn 4 I upkeep Guardian Warbeast, Primal up both my heavies, and have my central Gun Boar shoot the clump of three Trenchers who had charged the Forced Evolution'd Road Hog the previous turn. Hit, kill all three, my opponent only fails the tough check on the middle one. Arkadius received Ghostly from the Witch Doctor and walks into the forest, puts Crippling Grasp on the central Nomad, puts Forced Evolution on the right flank War Hog, Feats, and repositions back behind the forest. The Nomad on the left goes down to the Primal'd War Hog. The central Nomad drops to the initial attacks of the other War Hog, who then overtakes into the remaining Nomad and does a real number on it with the remaining attacks. Targ adds an Ancillary Attack to the equation to leave the Nomad on four boxes, its Cortex neatly torn out. My other Gun Boar clears the middle zone. I go to 2 CP. Mercs Turn 5 Fire doesn't go out on the Nomad. I roll something like an 11 for damage, doing the four points required to kill it. Damiano, Stannis, and whatever Trenchers are left pile into the Forced Evolution'd War Hog and do some chip damage to it. At some point in this process he procs Guardian Warbeast, allowing me to move my left flank War Hog to a spot where it will frenzy into something of my opponent's instead of my own Gun Boar. The last Halberdier on the right charges and kills my Mist Speaker. He hasn't contested the middle zone, so I go to 3 CP. Pigs Turn 5 The War Hogs frenzy, do about seven damage to Damiano and few points to Stannis. The right flank Gorax takes a free strike from a Trencher Long Gunner to get within 8" of the Halberdier. I throw out a Primal Shock with Arkadius, kill the Halberdier, and walk and reposition to take the right zone. With my Gun Boar controlling the centre, I gain two more CP to win. Some really interesting games there. I was really pleased at how much more work I got done with Raw Adrenaline once I actually started planning for it, managed to melt a lot of infantry across those games. I still have no real idea what to pair with Arkadius at the moment though. Barney1 would probably be a logical choice as a Haley3 answer, or else going with Midas as an anti-armour skew to bully people out of dropping Gaspy3 with alll the Slayers. Choices, choices... Well, not really choices. Barney1 is out, in spite of a local offering to convert me up an army of spitting clamjack hogs so that I wouldn't have to actually use Ironback Spitters Midas it is I guess.
|
|
|
Post by Azahul on Apr 14, 2018 11:43:16 GMT
Team tournament time! Today I played in a three person event as part of an all Minions team. My compatriots were leaning a bit more on the scaly side, with a Rask super friends/Calaban gunline on the one hand, and a Maelok Posse spam/Jaga-Jaga gunline on the other. I took the following lists: Arkadius -War Hog -War Hog -Road Hog -Road Hog -Gun Boar -Gun Boar -Gorax -Gorax -Razor Boars -Targ Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew Bone Shrine Bone Shrine Hutchuck Mist Speaker Witch Doctor And Midas -Splatter Boar -Splatter Boar -Splatter Boar -Splatter Boar Max Brigands -Warlord Max Brigands -Warlord Slaughterhousers Slaughterhousers Valkyries Valkyries Min Bone Grinders Hutchuck Basic idea of the pair was to play Arkadius into everything and scare opponents out of dropping armour lists with Midas. Round 1 - Recon II I ended up paired against a Cryx player with Gaspy2 Dark Host and Denny2 Black Industries. I dropped Arkadius, my opponent dropped Gaspy. His list was: Asphyxious -Desectrator -Desectrator Max Bane Warriors -UA Max Bane Warriors -UA Max Bane Knights Max Bane Knights Darragh Wrathe Bane Lord Tartarus Soul Trapper Soul Trapper Machine Wraith Deployment I won the starting roll. The set up for this tournament had each table sporting a different, set scenario, and I'd basically asked to be placed on the Recon II one since Arkadius could win on scenario in a single round really easily there. It was almost enough to tempt me to take second turn... but then I remembered that I was playing Arkadius. Anyway, with my opponent's infantry I deployed with my Road Hogs and Gun Boars and Targ all in a cluster in the middle. There was basically no rough terrain on the board, just some rubble on the left, so I wasn't particularly pressured in how I set up. My opponent deployed pretty much symmetrically. Bane Knight units on the flanks, Bane Warriors in the middle, Desecrators mixed in with the units and Gaspy in the middle of the army. Pigs Turn 1 Everything ran. The Road Hogs used Full Boar and ran. Targ ran to get them in Herding range. Arkadius spent four Fury healing their damage and ran. Cryx Turn 1 The Bane Warriors advanced and chopped themselves up into bits. The Desecrators helped. Gaspy walked forward and feated six Bane Warriors back onto the field, dropped some clouds and teleported back camping 1. Three Bane Warriors charged each Road Hog. Every attack hit (in spite of Tartarus being just outside of Veteran Leader range), both Road Hogs died. The Bane Knights ran up a bit. A single Soul Trapper ran up to screen Gaspy. Pigs Turn 2 Gaspy was 18" away from a War Hog and there was an easy Bane to Overtake off of. Primal, Guidance, and Ghostly went onto the War Hog. A Razor Boar ran into the cloud. Arkadius activated, put Forced Evolution on the War Hog, Primal Shocked the Soul Trapper to death through the Razor Boar, and Feated his battlegroup forward. The War Hog splattered the Razor Boar on its Frenzy attack, using it to optimise its Frenzy so I wouldn't frenzy on any weird angles and lose distance that way. The Gun Boars frenzied up and into the War Hog, doing a couple of damage each. Each Gun Boar then activated, walked into the clouds, and shot at Gaspy. One scored a direct hit on Gaspy, did about four damage through his one camp and forced a Tough check on the Bane Warrior UA. The other Gun Boar chose to shoot the knocked down UA directly, boosted damage on Gaspy, rolled a 16 and dropped him down to 4 health. The War Hog charged the Bane, killed it on the charge attack, overtook into Gaspy and boosted an attack roll to hit and kill him. "Arkadius is broken" is always so nice to hear
|
|