Kavrae
Junior Strategist
Posts: 182 
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Post by Kavrae on Aug 3, 2017 16:20:55 GMT
At this point, I honestly cannot remember the last time I won a game. The closest I've gotten recently was timing out while beating a Doomshaper 1 Storm of the North army in attrition; though honestly, I had every advantage I could have in that matchup. As I'm more than a little stuck, I'm both venting and outsourcing for help here. What can I do to get out of this rut? Last few online matches (bit harder to show tabletop matches), with full reports in the links: Scaverous vs Baldurnightmareempire.wordpress.com/2017/07/17/lord-exhumator-scaverous-vs-baldur-the-stonesoul/He's learning how to play Circle while I'm testing if Scaverous can run the Dark Host theme. The one oddity here is trying Goreman via CID. Early on, Doomshaper's unable to touch any of my stuff. Banes are too tough and have much recursion while he lacks power on his infantry removal. I commit my feat turn to taking out one of his heavies and a stone, but completely fail to hit and break armor respectively. From there, he just slowly wipes out my troops until I have nothing left to threaten him with. Felt completely crippled after a wasted feat turn like that, but it also seemed like the best move at the time. Terminus vs Tanithnightmareempire.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/lich-lord-terminus-vs-tanith-the-feral-song/I will admit that I completely failed at deployment here. None of my "plans" panned out in the slightest. Mechanithralls on the right to block off a Warpwolf? Pointless. That aside, early on he breaks my left flank with an ambush. I counter with my own ambush, tie up his entire frontline with cavalry, and sit Terminus on ARM 26 feat + mortal fear. Things are looking damn good for me. Nope. He drags Terminus in with a clever setup, then Tanith pings him down to 1hp with auto-damage and her infantry crossbows. Terminus is alive! Surely I've got this. Nope. Don't think about trampling, so I can find no way to get to Tanith without dying to a dozen free strikes, and not killing her means 1 auto damage next turn anyway. Game over. Deneghra vs Siege 2nightmareempire.wordpress.com/2017/04/27/warwitch-deneghra-vs-major-markus-siege-brisbane/This is my current tournament army that I'm working towards, so I was hoping I could run it effectively. It ended up being a fast game. I control the early game by setting the pace with sacrificial revenants (only as many as I can guarantee reviving), then consistently wiping out his troops. Parasite + Revenants work on the trenchers. Hellslinger and Pistol Wraith make short work of the Rangers and more Trenchers. 3-man CRAs take care of solos. Everything is going great. Then I sit Deneghra behind a building with 0 focus, 20def, and stealth. Safe from most things in the game. But not this time. Trenchers get within 5" for debuff. Pops Siege feat. Dead in one Triumph shot. Game over. This is repeated over and over and over. (plenty more battle reports are posted preceding these). Stupid mistakes that result in a winning game coming swiftly to an end. Opponents' mistakes that I find it difficult to capitalize on. Very few even trades. Failed assassinations. Seems like I need to play my armies perfectly to stand an even chance of winning any games. Though it could also be that I'm missing a LOT more mistakes that I'm making. |
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Post by tiberius on Aug 3, 2017 16:31:22 GMT
I had a similar issue at the beginning of MKIII where I lost almost every game I played for months because I was still trying to play MKII. Now I have won decidedly the last 4-5 games so much so that I almost felt bad for my opponent. The last game being closer than most, but still, I was never really out of control of the game. Did I get better? Did he get worse? As far as what you can do to better your game, I am not sure. For me, its practice and knowledge. I definitely make mistakes, I am a very poor deployer and even worse at spacing when advancing. Oh look, I just lined up all those guys for your spray, how nice of me... The thing I always loved about this game was that it didn't have to be straight forward and you were not out until your warcaster was dead, as assassination was always a (sometimes cornercase) possibility. I understand you are frustrated. I am not sure what advice to give you. Sounds like some bad luck.
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Post by Cryptix on Aug 3, 2017 16:34:33 GMT
Could it be maybe you have the right list on the wrong warcaster? I had my Satyxis list under Goreshade2 until recently because I thought it worked better with him, but when I switched to Sturgis2 it worked much better and I paired it with my Aiakos2 armor cracking list instead.
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npe
Junior Strategist
Posts: 221
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Post by npe on Aug 3, 2017 21:10:04 GMT
One thing I like to do is play "friendly" games where I explain to my opponent exactly what I'm going to try to do and they do the same. Also we allow unwinding of the game state after a mistake. Part of what makes warmachine hard is that mistakes accumulate and can make the game really miserable if you're always playing behind.
That said I find 50ish thralls (biles, carrions and mcthralls) in Infernal machines with a sepulcher and two necrosurgeons can make for really fun and forgiving lists. I know you're still building your collection, but thralls are often really cheap on bartertown.
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kuarnix
Junior Strategist
Posts: 145
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Post by kuarnix on Aug 3, 2017 22:33:12 GMT
It sounds like you are getting caught in little mistakes - I find when that happens, it's time to drill down and practice with one 'caster and list for a while.
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npe
Junior Strategist
Posts: 221
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Post by npe on Aug 4, 2017 1:35:07 GMT
It sounds like you are getting caught in little mistakes - I find when that happens, it's time to drill down and practice with one 'caster and list for a while. To add to this, playing solitaire on vassal is a good way of seeing how to handle different situations. |
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Post by Gamingdevil on Aug 4, 2017 8:03:06 GMT
It does sound like a few minor mistakes often cost you the game, which is normal in Warmachine and part of the fun (it's never over until your caster is actually dead), but you will get better at that. It's actually pretty common to get Denny 1 killed and losing that way, apart from Stealth, she is very fragile.
Also, are you always playing with a list pairing in mind or just play whatever you want into whatever they want? That's perfectly fine, but if you play an uphill battle, you will be more likely to lose. Your Terminus vs Tanith for instance, seemed to be heavily in favour of Tanith, where he had plenty of ranged presence to pick off your chaff giving you too few Sacrificial Pawns for Terminus.
When I'm testing a new list, I usually play it into whatever as well, figured there's no experience like playing it into a bad matchup anyway, but I never expect to win it. For the rest, even outside of tournament games, I have at least a pairing in mind and try to balance which one I'm going to play.
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Kavrae
Junior Strategist
Posts: 182
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Post by Kavrae on Aug 4, 2017 13:34:43 GMT
Thank you for the replies.
As far matchups: we've been going through a cycle. I'm trying every warcaster, unit, and theme list under Cryx. I wanted to get experience with everything before settling on my primary lists (which I have settled on finally). Meanwhile he was doing the same with Cygnar and then recently changed to Circle. This means it's almost always blind matchups, and we rarely know who has the advantage going into it. Though we will occasionally try to set up intentionally interesting matches (like Terminus vs Darius). With Terminus vs Tanith for example, we actually thought I had a major advantage going into it due to a lack of responses to the caster himself. Until she applied the "auto 1 damage" debuff and we realized just how devastating that was when she has infantry that can shoot twice. I honestly was not upset with that one because it was so funny.
For tournaments and local games, I'm settling down with a Dark Host list (almost finished) followed by a Ghost Fleet list once I can build up the funds (3 min units and a max unit of infantry are hell on the bank account). I'm going to practice these two as often as I can and put any further experiments on hold. I think they cover a pretty good variety of matchups, with mass RFP being the only shared weakness I'm aware of. While I believe that based on playstyle I would be better off with the Sepulcher + Thrall list that NPE mentioned, I'm financially further away from that list than anything else. I also have a soft spot for using my Wraith Engine after painting it and it fits in both Dark Host and Ghost Fleet >_>
Overall though... this all sounds right. More practice on my primary lists to eliminate stupid mistakes will probably help the most. Both lists also need a lot of practice to stay within the timers, since they both have a lot of moving parts that can take forever to move.
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Post by TheGhost on Aug 4, 2017 14:39:36 GMT
What does your primary list look like?
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Kavrae
Junior Strategist
Posts: 182
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Post by Kavrae on Aug 4, 2017 15:05:21 GMT
Lich Lord Asphyxious - Dark Host
Cankerworm
Stalker
Scavenger
Defiler
Wraith Engine
Bane Lord Tartarus - Free
Machine Wraith
Machine Wraith
Bane Riders (max unit)
Bane Warriors (Max unit)
Bane Warriors UA - Free
Bane Warriors (Max unit)
Bane Warriors UA - Free
I think the only thing unusual about this army is that I have a Scavenger instead of two Stalkers. I did this because, while it's more "tethered" to the warcaster, it can be a brutal combination. Stalker starts the fight, Scavenger finishes it as an effective weapon master. I've tried Knights instead of two Warriors, but they never really did much for me without some type of major threat extension.
Warwitch Deneghra - Ghost Fleet
Deathripper
Nightwretch
Stalker
Scavenger
Wraith Engine
Captain Rengrave - Free
Hellslinger Phantom - Free
Pistol Wraith - Free
Revenant Crew of the Atrementous (Min Unit)
Revenant Crew Rifleman x3
Revenant Crew of the Atrementous (Min Unit)
Revenant Crew Rifleman x3
Revenant Crew of the Atrementous (Min Unit)
Revenant Crew Rifleman x2
Blackbane's Ghost Raiders (Max Unit)
Pretty much a cookie cutter ghost fleet list, but reusing the Stalker + Scavenger combination instead of the standard double Stalker. Still bugs me that I can't finagle the points to get a 9th rifleman without dropping the Blackbanes to a min unit.
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Post by Gamingdevil on Aug 4, 2017 15:15:42 GMT
Pretty much a cookie cutter ghost fleet list, but reusing the Stalker + Scavenger combination instead of the standard double Stalker. Still bugs me that I can't finagle the points to get a 9th rifleman without dropping the Blackbanes to a min unit. You have to make a choice: - lose the Wraith Engine
- have 8 Rifles and 10 Ghost Raiders
- have 9 Rifles, 6 Ghost Raiders and 1 Cannon Crew
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Kavrae
Junior Strategist
Posts: 182
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Post by Kavrae on Aug 4, 2017 15:42:20 GMT
Pretty much a cookie cutter ghost fleet list, but reusing the Stalker + Scavenger combination instead of the standard double Stalker. Still bugs me that I can't finagle the points to get a 9th rifleman without dropping the Blackbanes to a min unit. You have to make a choice: - lose the Wraith Engine
- have 8 Rifles and 10 Ghost Raiders
- have 9 Rifles, 6 Ghost Raiders and 1 Cannon Crew
That's exactly the problem I came up with as well. Bit of an annoying dilemma, and I can see merit in all three variations. I opted for the second for a greater Incorporeal presence and to utilize my Wraith Engine. |
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Grimolf
Junior Strategist
Posts: 246
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Post by Grimolf on Aug 4, 2017 16:47:46 GMT
I'm facing the same drought of wins, Kavrae. My problem has been that I haven't been getting many games in recently (life happens) and I have a tendancy to jump around with casters to try different things. It's fun to try different casters, and I enjoy building different lits for different casters. However, I pay the price for not really knowing what each caster can do. That was tough when I played my first couple of games with Scaverous. Everyone says he's great, but I couldn't accomplish anything with him. After a couple of games I started to get a feel for what he could do ... and then I moved on to try Asphyxious3. Stupid, I know, but I wanted to try something different. Whenever I go back to a caster I have played a bunch and understand I do way better. It sounds like you're getting the games in, but not sticking to a caster and really getting practice with that caster. I know I'm going to have to focus on a couple of lists I really like, but right now I'm enjoying trying stuff out, but the price is that I'll lose lots of games.
EDIT: The one casters I've stuck with recently is Aiakos2. I enjoy playing him, but he's like walking the razor's edge. Some games he's great and everything works, others you get totally smashed. My local meta is wise to his threat ranges now, which also makes him a little more difficult to play.
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Post by lordsizzlor on Aug 12, 2017 5:01:13 GMT
2 thoughts for ya.
1. How good is your opponent. Unlike some games it's hard to luck into a win vs a really good opponent. Take heart in knowing that losing to a really practiced player will really help you win vs other peeps.
2. Practice a single list more. It's even a good idea to play a couple dry runs and practice moving your list solo.
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Kavrae
Junior Strategist
Posts: 182
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Post by Kavrae on Aug 15, 2017 14:43:24 GMT
2 thoughts for ya. 1. How good is your opponent. Unlike some games it's hard to luck into a win vs a really good opponent. Take heart in knowing that losing to a really practiced player will really help you win vs other peeps. Online/Vassal? We started at the same time, but he's gotten in about twice as many games. Tabletop? Most of my opponents have played since Mk1, with many of them playing 40k before that. So experience is... a bit skewed. |
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