gdnerd
Junior Strategist
Posts: 656
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Post by gdnerd on Apr 21, 2018 15:53:48 GMT
What is a puppet master arcane vortex trick? How do those two things interact? Arcane Vortex let's you spend a fury to cancel a spell targeting Mulg or a model within 3 of him. Puppet Master is a spell the knot can cast. You run him then target him or something near with Puppet Master so he can remove his only fury. Orion's feat is an additional damage die against models with focus / fury on them. If they don't get that bonus damage die their pow 13 guns don't do much to Mulg.
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Post by GrumpyBear on Apr 21, 2018 23:51:56 GMT
Oooooh. Thanks. I didn't get the Orion significance. I spent about 5 minutes trying to figure it out.
Plus Puppet had a 10 inch range so it's easy to apply!
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gdnerd
Junior Strategist
Posts: 656
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Post by gdnerd on Apr 22, 2018 5:40:52 GMT
Yeah it's a trick that doesn't matter a ton but it makes Orion really bad. Just spread to prevent ground pounders and you're good to go.
Played Kolgrima into Ossrum and lost, and almost lost to Axis because in runner runner games I didn't respect irresistible force. I think Jeff pushed my EBDT 8 inches through my cloud wall, then blinded harmed and killed it with Hammer Dwarves all because I didn't Earth's blessings. Axis got a free Mulg because I forgot to put a whelp in a crack to set up an unpushable triangle formation. Both times I had to pull the trigger on a spray assassination and it was... tough. Without the bomber the math isn't always as trivial.
Main lesson from this weekend is to fear and hate irresistible force battle groups and pack / Earth's Blessing correctly. Hopefully I take those lessons into the final day of Kingdomcon because I know there's at least 2 players who have it in their pair.
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bundeez
Junior Strategist
Posts: 325
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Post by bundeez on Apr 22, 2018 19:43:55 GMT
Even with the feat 3 Assimilators and a Monitor can't kill Mulg. Not even if Orion shoot him as well and if the Monitor crits (0,5 damage shy of killing him). It's just not that impressive Bummer about the 2 games. You have 2 Earthborns right? Seems to me that + Whelps should be enough to counter that. Or was it Axis Galvanizer spam this time?
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gdnerd
Junior Strategist
Posts: 656
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Post by gdnerd on Apr 23, 2018 3:16:17 GMT
It's not out of the realm, and I don't like leaving things to whether my opponent can roll slightly above average.
Played Kolgrima 3 more times in the finals today, beat Denny1 and lost to Axis and Ossrum (AGAIN). Ill post a more in depth batrep when I find some time.
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gdnerd
Junior Strategist
Posts: 656
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Post by gdnerd on Apr 24, 2018 2:28:37 GMT
Okay so I'm going to post my Battle Reports / Matchup Summaries for Kolgrima / Madrak separately rather than make a thread dedicated to my Kingdomcon performance. I played 12 games over the weekend so I'm going to condense each game to cliff notes about particular interactions that I felt important to understanding the matchup, key mistakes, et cetera. My Kolgrima list was the same one I posted ~a month ago:
Trollblood - Kolgrima
Theme: The Power of Dhunia 3 / 3 Free Cards 74 / 75 Army
Kolgrima Stonetruth, Winter Witch - WB: +28 - Trollkin Runebearer - PC: 0 - Mulg the Ancient - PC: 22 (Battlegroup Points Used: 22) - Troll Axer - PC: 10 (Battlegroup Points Used: 6) - Dire Troll Mauler - PC: 15 - Earthborn Dire Troll - PC: 14 - Earthborn Dire Troll - PC: 14 - Storm Troll - PC: 9
Janissa Stonetide - PC: 0 Troll Whelps - 5 Whelps: 0
Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes - Leader & 5 Grunts: 9 - Northkin Elder - PC: 3 Dhunian Knot - Leader & 2 Grunts: 6
This was designed initially to cover Cygnar and Skorne, or any other odd gunline skews I ran into during the course of the weekend (spoiler: I only saw Skorne a single time and they didn't have Winds of Death Rasheth) for Madrak1, but I discovered it had a lot of tools for Cryx, Mercs, and Convergence which I saw MUCH more of during the weekend.
Heat 1 Round 1 - Deneghra 1 Broken Coast - Recon II (Adam Bernstein)
This was my first match upon arriving. I had flown in late the previous night and did not get good quality sleep. Normally I don't make excuses for myself but considering the clown fiesta that was this game I think I can write it off as coming in cold. I let Barathrum get unnecessary countercharges on Bottom of 1 and 2, and forgot what scored rectangle zones which led me to not angling correctly to push his arcnode out of a zone which let him score 1 to my 0 on my bottom of 2, then he proceeded to score both flags and zones on his turn 3 with a single model kill. Womp womp. Apologies to Adam for what is one of the most embarrassing games of competitive Warmachine I have EVER played. The worst part is IMO the matchup is incredibly good for my Kolgrima list. Between Owl's Wisdom and Mulg's Arcane Vortex Deneghra should have a really hard time ever killing more than 1 heavy outside of her feat. Clouds are also painful for Satyxis. Oh well, onwards and upwards!
Heat 1 Round 2 - Axis Destruction Initiative - Spread the Net (Jason Tice)
At this point I was just playing to get some warm-up games in as unless something wacky happened only X-0 players in this heat would make the cut. I was paired up with Jason and he had Axis and Orion. I thought Axis was the far better choice but I don't think Madrak ever gets dropped into either. Being able to modulate those sprays on you and basically being guaranteed to hit me twice before I can engage sounds PAINFUL. There were two components to my victory here - firstly he spread his TEPs out SUUUUPER far to the flanks. This let me hold my feat until well after he feated (either turn after he feated or the turn after that). Secondly, he lined up both his Diffuser and Corollary in such a way that Mulg could toe into the forest to see only them (and nothing else in his army could see Mulg) and I sprayed both of them to death. This lead to a piece trade that went so absurdly in my favor that I think all I lost was a single heavy (some silly dice definitely helped exaggerate the situation).
Heat 1 Round 3 - Orion Destruction Initiative - The Pit (Aric Tetley)
I was amused to get dropped into CoC again, especially because they had the same pair (except Aric had single TEP and a bigger battlegroup for Axis). This time I got to see Kolgrima vs Orion. He won the roll-off to go first which was particularly annoying - he's a gunline that's hard to avoid thanks to Mage Sight and if he gets to bully the board there's not really anywhere to hide. I end up using the aforementioned puppet strings arcane vortex trick to run Mulg up as far as he can while staying in stone and out of charge range of his Warjacks. He tries to Magic Bullet the stone down but mis-measures one of his bullet dudes and only gets one shot at it (the stone toughs). It ended up not mattering because with all the shots of his gunline he would have fallen ~8 short regardless. I consider a line where with multiple throws I can land Mulg on Orion, but instead opt for a play where I kill most of his heavies and feat to bypass a desperation assassination from him (I think I score too?). He goes in on Mulg and concedes afterwards.
I think the Orion matchup is just bad to drop into this Kolgrima list because either he goes far enough up that I can threaten something or he stays far enough back that I can cloud wall and he can't Mage Sight. Combine that with my feat being a total time walk for him I expect to see only Axis from this pair configuration.
Heat 2 Round 3 - Ossrum Irregulars - Spread the Net (Jeff Everitt)
Coming into this game I was super nervous. Last time I had played Jeff, it was ~a year ago where he curb stomped me with pre-nerf Una2. I knew firsthand he was a monster of a player and TBH I haven't run a lot into Ossrum recently so I didn't know what to expect. Jeff in turn put on one hell of a show.
His Bulldoze plays were... insane. I didn't think he could hook around me the way he did but he yanked one of my EBDTs through my cloud wall 8" so he could Harm it and hammer it down. He would have gotten Mulg too but he forgot to account feat armor when marking damage and by the time we realized the bunny's movement wasn't out it was too late too fix. I played to my only out which was feating and clearing bunnies to go for an assassination the next turn. Unfortunately the assassination wasn't great dice (could only put sprays onto him and he was camping 2 at full health). I get close-ish but miss the final spray (needed an 11 on damage to kill him if I hit anyways so it was probably not happening but eh).
Heat 3 Round 1 - Axis Destruction Initiative - Outlast (Aric Tetley)
It was a pleasure to play Aric again, he's a super chill dude and really smart at the game. This time knowing what to expect from Kolgrima he came in confidently with Axis and after I ineffectually spray his TEP and one of his heavies and feat under the guise of a partial cloud wall, he uses Irresistable Force to get a free Mulg which was... bad. I end up going for an emergency assassination which involves running my axer to stop a bunch of countercharges, rage an EBDT to throw a heavy into Axis and spray the bajeezus out of him. I spike a bit but he was only camping 1 I believe so the assassination happens on average dice pretty reliably between the SnP and Puppet Strings.
Finals Round 1 - Deneghra1 Broken Coast - Standoff (Adam Bernstein)
I got to play Adam again and this time I was ready with a full breakfast in me awake to play. This time I made no mistakes with Countercharge but did waffle on Krielstone position and it lead to a confusing state where I intended to place it within 10 of an EBDT I had put into his zone with Owl's Wisdom near an obstruction with Earth's Blessing (basically un-removable). Unfortunately my intent had gotten lost in jumping around across multiple ideas with positioning (100% my fault) and after a judge call to check it was out. Still, he was unable to kill it and with the help of a feat I was able to trade one flank of the board for an EBDT. I was worried he'd pull out a late scenario tiebreak end and decided to pull the trigger on the assassination. I screwed up some things and instead of casting Rush on Mulg with the Axer and moving the Storm Troll (with Parasite on it) to where Kolgrima could Owl's wisdom it off to get rid of Denny's armor bonus, I decided to use the Axer to kill my own storm troll instead. This then meant that when Mulg went to trample to where he could get on Denny (partially into a forest) a judge call had to be made on whether I had the distance (as he has Relentless Charge rather than native Pathfinder). I was in by a quarter inch and killed her pretty trivially. I'm fairly confident I could have made a long game play by shifting Mulg over to the other flank and spraying it down too but I don't like playing to turn 7 if I don't have to - a single mistake and you just throw the game.
Finals Round 2 - Ossrum Irregulars - The Pit (Jeff Everitt)
The one guy I REALLY didn't want to run into again, but I guess the theme of the finals was to be rematches. This time I came prepared with a strategy of using 3 heavies in B2B to keep Mulg safe. I spray down Alten Ashley and the prey granting model in the Idrians UA, put down a cloud and earth's blessing myself to stop bulldoze assassination shenanigans. Turns out he had an angle on the Krielstone with 2 bunnies and an Artillery and was able to shut it off and kill Mulg. I might have been able to play for honest attrition but I spent a lot of clock then we realized we had miscounted the # of focus on Ossrum and he had 1 more than I had been planning around - putting him well out of the most optimistic of assassinations, especially on his feat turn. I clear some zones for tiebreaks and call it there so I can get a break for the final round.
Finals Round 4 - Axis Destruction Initiative - (Aaron Allen)
I came into this a bit cocky admittedly - I had played into Axis pretty solidly twice this weekend so far and Aaron was a bit tipsy by his own admission. Unfortunately, he's just THAT good of an Axis player. I under-commit on a turn that means he can hold his feat and kill an EBDT (admittedly with some damage spikes from a TEP but that's to be expected when you're rolling 5 dice). His positioning for countercharges was also masterful for preventing me from landing heavies on his TEPs. Ultimately I get short on clock and embarassingly try to throw one of his heavies with an EBDT with mind and spirit out. We were able to resolve it by post-fact eating a whelp that was in eating range and forcing to get both aspects up but I'm really not happy that I made a play error like that. I tend to not get to short clock often because I like to go for the jugular whenever possible so I think I handle it poorly. My sub 5 minute game is just trash. Thankfully we had an amicable game regardless and I had a lot of fun taking Aaron's masterclass in Axis - hopefully I can get the better of him next time. The loss kinda sucked because I'm 90% certain it dropped me from 3rd to 6th but alas. Gotta be better if you want to place better.
Final Thoughts:
4-4 with Kolgrima for the weekend was pretty disappointing, but I would not blame it on my list building. The list is solid enough, it does lack some scenario staying power which is IMO not the worst. I think if I was a little better on my Whelp play (and actually brought the gobber tinker chef I can fit in) the list would feel a lot less scenario pressure and it seems pretty hard to lose on attrition unless your opponent has better mastery of their list.
An interesting note from the tournament - as far as I know there was not a single Nemo player the entire weekend. The storm was functional but not instrumental to any games due to that. It might even be right to swap it out again. I'm looking at turning one of the EBDTs into a Bomber again or a Brawler perhaps and get some better solo options in the list. In particular I want to give Lynus and Edrea a whirl because Applied Knowledge with Kolgrima sprays to stationary a heavy while removing its cortex/spirit sounds interesting. Also a unit for scoring that I don't mind throwing away in later stages of the game (and Wind Barrier can basically be Incorporeal in the right matchups). Unsure if there will be any changes in time for Seattle Open week after next or Lock and Load in June but I'm tentatively happy with this list.
I could also see myself going back to Gunnbjorn if Cygnar disappears - I think he can do good work into a lot of the things Kolgrima was Covering but would handle Ossrum better and CoC probably a decent bit worse (I'd have to play it out, maybe you can force enough shots to just kill Axis / a TEP through Shield Guards and everything). Grim1 could also be an interesting option. Irregardless I'll continue to tinker while I improve myself as a player in general. I think I've got a ways to go still in terms of piloting skill - I can pretty reliably qualify for Masters final days but I want to start winning them and be a serious contender for WMW / do WTC in the near future. It's going to take a fair amount of time, frustration and introspection to get there but I'm confident I'm moving in the right direction.
I'll post the Madrak reports either later tonight or later this week, typing this all up ended up being longer and more tiring than expected (the miniature heat wave I'm experiencing here in NorCal also isn't helping).
I want to say thank you all to the people who have participated here on the forums on facebook for theorycrafting and helping me pick apart how things work / question assumptions I make in play and list building. The community is a very helpful tool in my arsenal as I work towards being a better player. Also, thank you for reading this godawful giant block of text!
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Post by deviantcad on Apr 26, 2018 13:20:14 GMT
Thanks for taking the time to write all of this up. Especially when I can't get as many games in as I would like it let's me at least keep dojoing till the next week. Keep up the great work.
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bundeez
Junior Strategist
Posts: 325
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Post by bundeez on Apr 26, 2018 16:29:43 GMT
+1 Thanks for the insights Surprised you didn't meet any Cygnar, which probably is the primary reason for playing Kolgrima. I don't quite see why Gunnbjorn might take her place. Isn't she just better in many aspects with her larger toolbox?
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gdnerd
Junior Strategist
Posts: 656
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Post by gdnerd on Apr 26, 2018 16:56:54 GMT
deviantcad yeah I really like reading other people's dojoing because no matter how much you play you will never get good coverage across the whole field in just local play / practice. There's 13 soon to be 14 factions and each of them has somewhere between 3 and 6 tournament popular lists you need to prepare for. I think there's literally no local meta that can represent this appropriately. So reading other people's thoughts really helps get a picture of the whole shebang. bundeez yeah it was a weird tournament. The three big Cygnar players I expected to show all didn't and the one Cygnar player I even saw playing all weekend didn't have Nemo. TBH I knew it was a possibility people would cool on Cygnar anticipating the nerfs but didn't want to risk it. Gunnbjorn runs a Mountain King better and therefore can be a tougher brick to crack. He also has RFP. His assassination is comparable and his volume of fire is superior IMO. Kolgrima has her utility from cloud wall, owls wisdom, and can assassinate with low pieces better than gunny (hell she can basically do it by herself entirely the same as Mulgs threat if they're in 15 of her). It's definitely a trade-off but I'm giving it serious consideration.
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Post by Big Fat Troll on Apr 27, 2018 5:22:54 GMT
deviantcad yeah I really like reading other people's dojoing because no matter how much you play you will never get good coverage across the whole field in just local play / practice. There's 13 soon to be 14 factions and each of them has somewhere between 3 and 6 tournament popular lists you need to prepare for. I think there's literally no local meta that can represent this appropriately. So reading other people's thoughts really helps get a picture of the whole shebang. bundeez yeah it was a weird tournament. The three big Cygnar players I expected to show all didn't and the one Cygnar player I even saw playing all weekend didn't have Nemo. TBH I knew it was a possibility people would cool on Cygnar anticipating the nerfs but didn't want to risk it. Gunnbjorn runs a Mountain King better and therefore can be a tougher brick to crack. He also has RFP. His assassination is comparable and his volume of fire is superior IMO. Kolgrima has her utility from cloud wall, owls wisdom, and can assassinate with low pieces better than gunny (hell she can basically do it by herself entirely the same as Mulgs threat if they're in 15 of her). It's definitely a trade-off but I'm giving it serious consideration. Gunny is also easier to play and I think that still matters even at a high level when it's easy to make crucial mistakes.
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bundeez
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Posts: 325
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Post by bundeez on Apr 27, 2018 11:17:09 GMT
Fair points about Gunnbjorn but what lists are you running then?
I completely agree that the MK with him is amazing and does a lot of stuff, but is that enough to carry the rest of the army/game to a victory? POD with a Gargantuan is bound to lose on scenario ever so often. I love the idea of it, but didn't quite make it work back at the start of mk3 when I tried it out. Jason Flanzer ran him as well at that time (WTC Netherlands) with I believe:
Trollbloods Army - 75 / 75 points
Captain Gunnbjorn [+28] - Dire Troll Bomber [19] - Dozer & Smigg [18] - Mountain King [36] Dhunian Knot [6] Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes (min) [6] - Northkin Elder [3] Trollkin Highwaymen (max) [15]
Non-Theme back then ofcourse and with a ranged unit to maximize the value of Snipe. This list compared to your Kolgrima list is just inferior imo.
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gdnerd
Junior Strategist
Posts: 656
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Post by gdnerd on Apr 30, 2018 18:18:56 GMT
I love how in my absence this has become a gunnbjorn thread ;p
This is what I was running at the end of last year and I was quite happy with it:
War Room Army
Trollblood - Gunnbjorn
Theme: The Power of Dhunia 3 / 3 Free Cards 74 / 75 Army
Captain Gunnbjorn - WB: +28 - Trollkin Runebearer - PC: 0 - Dozer & Smigg - PC: 18 - Dire Troll Bomber - PC: 19 - Mountain King - PC: 36 (Battlegroup Points Used: 28) - Troll Axer - PC: 10
Troll Whelps - 5 Whelps: 0 Northkin Shaman - PC: 0 Northkin Shaman - PC: 4
Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes - Leader & 3 Grunts: 6 - Stone Scribe Elder - PC: 3 Dhunian Knot - Leader & 2 Grunts: 6
THEME: The Power of Dhunia ---
GENERATED : 04/30/2018 11:17:08 BUILD ID : 2061.18-02-21
It had some scenario footprint issues and was really tricky to play the Ghost Fleet / Skarre1 Dark Host pair but it had promise. If not for Nemo3 I'm not entirely sure I'd have changed from him to Kolgrima.
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bundeez
Junior Strategist
Posts: 325
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Post by bundeez on May 1, 2018 9:13:19 GMT
Haha sorry, don't mean to steal away the the thread from Kolgrima But they fill the same spot more or less in a pairing, so just interested in the discussion for either caster. With only a Gargantuan and 2 expensive shooting heavies (as the meat of the army) I am very interested to see how your list plays out on the table. Very low hitting output with few but strong guns. How do you avoid getting jammed, lose on scenario or alpha'ed to death?
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Post by allinontrolls on May 1, 2018 14:03:59 GMT
Their are several reasons I am not a big fan of gunny in the current meta and why I would prefer kolgrima.
- mountain king. I really like the idea of an anker piece in a list like the gk with madrak but with gunny u have to comit the mk to get work out of him the only protection is your wall which is really really good but could be not enough sometimes do not forget the mk is always seen by your opponent which is not a problem if you got a wall of champs
- scenario is even worse for this list than kolgrima. Ur pieces are all high valuable and it's always tough if you even loose one of it.
- the current meta their is a lot of really hard hitting shooting lists out their and a lot of list s try to counter that . This will bring some list chicken into our pairing.
- Cloud walls. Their are so many cloud walls out their. Shooting without eyeless sight will struggle.
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Post by macdaddy on May 1, 2018 14:19:39 GMT
gdnerd why would Nemo3 make Gunny sad? Is it just because of the spark noding?
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