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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Oct 5, 2017 9:49:50 GMT
Irusk2 vs Makeda2, Recon IISo I wanted to get a game into the new double ferox lists that are appearing since the release of the themes before an upoming tournament and my friend was happy to oblige! I picked my list and selected specialists from my Irusk2 + Strakhov2 without fully knowing what the Skorne list was up to except Irusk could remove tough... Jaws of the WolfIrusk2 +27 -Juggernaut -12 -Kodiak -13 -Kodiak -13 Greylord Forge Seer -0 -Destroyer -14 Yuri the Axe -0 Kayazy Assassins (Min) -9 -Kayazy Underboss -4 Kayazy Eliminators -5 Kayazy Eliminators -5 Kossite Woodsmen (Min) -7 Lady Aiyana & Master Holt -8 -Koldun Kapitan Valachev -4 Widowmaker Scouts -8 StockpileMasters of WarMakeda2 -Aradus Soldier -Gladiator -Krea Rhadiem Willbreaker Willbreaker Beast Handlers (Min) Ferox (Max) Ferox (Max) Swamp Gobber Cloud Dudes Tyrant Commander & Standard Tyrant Commander & Standard StockpileSet Up:My opponent won the roll and took first turn. I think I then chose the wrong table side looking back. In the middle of the board there was a forest slightly closer to me in between the two zones, edging into the zone on my left. There was also a hill centrally between the zones, closer to my opponents table edge. I had a building near my deployment zone on my left and a wall part way into the zone on my right. There was a wall fairly central on my opponents side, slightly more to my right and a building off to the left side of the board, between the flag and table edge there. There was also a forest near my flag. My opponents deployment was fairly symmetrical: ferox on each flank, Makeda and beasts fairly central and support following behind. After I deployed the solder advance deployed slightly off center towards my left flank. I deployed Irusk slightly to the right with a kodiak right of him. The destroyer was on his left and had the juggernaut central. The assassins took the middle (staying within ten of Irusk because I didn't know about no tough) and the other kodiak took their other side. Eliminators stayed behind on each side, Aiyana, Holt and Valachev were behind Irusk and the forge seer followed behind the destroyer. The widowmakers advance deployed into the forest on my right flank and Yuri deployed behind the central forest. The kossites ambushed. Turn 1:Commanders put up extra speed and the cats run up. They stay a little back on my right due to that various ranged things that could reach them. Beasts and support all run and Maekda cast Storm Rager on Rhadiem and runs, keeping the cats within ten. Irusk casts Fire For Effect on the destroyer, Solid Ground on himself and advances up towards my flag. Kodiaks and juggernaut run up and the destroyer follows behind. Assassins run up to clog space in front of Irusk so the cats can't land anywhere. Widowmakers snipe a couple points of damage on cats, support runs up and Yuri backs off out of threat range on my left. The eliminators do the same, just finding useful spots for later. Turn 2:Makeda takes in her fury. A couple of cats get into the kodiak on my left, doing a little bit of superficial damage before they reposition to get back inside ten of Makeda. The other cats do the same to the juggernaut, who I masterfully left just outside four of the objective. The tyrant commanders were supporting this and the willbreakers handed tough to the cats with the willbreaker on my left getting to my opponents flag. Rhadiem stays central, as does Makeda. The krea walks up behind the wall just to the right (as I look at it) of my opponents and sticks up it's animus. Irusk upkeeps both spells and the kossites ambush on my left flank, behind the willbreaker on the flag. Kodiaks start sticking attacks on cats along with some eliminators, killing a couple between the two units. Irusk casts advances, feats and Energizers up to the flag, only catching the ferox unit on my right flank. Widowmakers peg more damage into cats and the assassins use the feat to charge through the central forest, putting damage on a few more, possibly killing another one. The destroyer advances up and sticks some damage down and the juggernaut runs up, staying within four of my objective and out of threat of the two heavies. The kossites advance up and start sticking ranged attacks into the willbreakers back, forcing several more stay deaths and leaving it on one box. Aiyana and Holt just moved up a little and stealthed. Neither flag is contested. Khador: 1 Skorne: 1 Turn 3:Storm Rager is again upkept and Makeda cuts for a couple points due to all the stay deaths required last turn. She stays put and feats. The cats on my left kill and eliminator thanks to the feat and put a little more damage on the kodiak in the zone there. The beast handlers advance, prodding and enraging the soldier, who finishes off that kodiak, clearing the zone. A commander gives Rhadiem extra speed and he runs to engage the kossites. The other commander charges the juggernaut for a little damage and the cats bounce around, killing a couple of assassins. It's here that Iearn about no tough from the theme force. The krea advances up and sticks up paralytic aura again. Khador: 2 Skorne: 3 Irusk upkeeps both spells and hands out a focus or two. The destroyer puts a big hit into the krea. Kossites move to block line of sight to two members of the unit, who advance round and put a couple shots into the willbreaker, forcing another stay death. The eliminators near Irusk receive Battle Lust and take out another cat, and the assassins use their mini-feat to backstab another one or two. The juggernaut finishes off the krea with it's fist, then boosts an axe into a cat, making it stationary (and blocking landing zones for the heavies to reach it). The kodiak and widowmakers also pile attacks in, basically overwhelming stay death so that some cats have to die, or models are reduced to one box. The surviving eliminator on my left runs to contest the zone and flag and Yuri charges the soldier through the forest. He threshers the soldier for solid damage, plus a few cats, killing one that was further than ten from Makeda. Khador: 3 Skorne: 3 Turn 4:Storm Rager stays up and Makeda again has to cut for a couple, leaving her on nine boxes. Yuri is killed by a cat CMA, but due to the stationary ferox the soldier can't reach the juggernuat and my opponent doesn't want that ferox removed because it will help him next turn. The gladiator takes out the contesting eliminator. Another commander charges the juggernaut for a lttle damage and the last cat that can activate on that flank tries to hit an eliminator, but misses. Rhadiem manages to miss his armour piercing attack on a kossite, so one lives! Khador: 4 Skorne: 5 Irusk upkeeps Fire For Effect and drops Solid Ground before handing a focus to the juggernaut, sitting on five. The forge seer power boosts the kodiak. Kossites aim and put two shots into the willbreaker, forcing another stay death. The last three assassins (including the underboss) put attacks into cats where they can, forcing another stay death, but then killing a second cat. Irusk puts Battle Lust on the eliminators and Energizers. The juggernaut takes a freestrike from a commander, but nothing is lost, and the kodiak advances. The kodiak starts pummelling that same commander, killing it because stay death will be too costly now (Makeda's on two transfers now). Aiyana and Holt advance, Aiyana putting Kiss on the objective before Holt shoots it for a little damage. To destroyer aims, takes +2 damage on ranged attacks and shoots the objective, leaving it on three boxes. The blast catches Makeda and she takes a few more boxes while a beast handler is also blown up. The widowmakers finish off the objective. This lets the eliminators charge Makeda with Battle Lust up. After they've attacked she's still on a couple of boxes, but then the juggernaut walks up and hits the second boosted eight needed to connect, killing her since transfers were gone. Victory to Khador!That was tricky! The double ferox Makeda2 list is definitely legit and I imagine it will be popping up much more in the future. I didn't even know about the no tough part before it came up in the game! Balacing the long threat ranges of the ferox was tricky, but manageable. It's important to remember that if they go to maximum threat range they will: - Not be in stay death and/or feat range.
- Need a landing spot.
- Leave Makeda exposed to retaliation.
From what I knew of the list beforehand I opted to remove a lot of the shooting via Behemoth in order to get an extra heavy while keeping all the anti-tough tech I could. Overall I think that worked out pretty well. Looking back, without tough Solid Ground doesn't add much in the match up. This saves Irusk an upkeep, so he can hand out more focus to the extra jacks. Plus without Behemoth the forge seer can hand out some more, so in this specific match up it seems to work out. Likewise Artifice isn't too useful, again saving focus for getting work out of heavies. I was impressed with the kossites this game. They kept the willbreaker honest (would have killed him against a different caster and actually would have killed it turn two here if one of the last two shots had hit and done a point of damage), cost Makeda a couple of transfers and distracted Rhadiem from the main fight. I think if I'd chosen the other table edge they would have been able to ambush into a forest near the opponents flag, which would have been far better due to treewalker from Yuri. Spekaing of which, he's far easier to justify in lists when he's one of the free options! I'm glad they changed that. Thanks for reading! Cheers, Dave
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Growl
Junior Strategist
Posts: 496
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Post by Growl on Oct 5, 2017 10:02:50 GMT
Awesome job! I've played against those cats before, but I think only a single unit, and they are very tough! I am going to need to check warroom now to figure out what stay Death is? It sounds terrible!
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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Oct 5, 2017 11:46:17 GMT
Stay Death is an ability on Makeda2. Basically she spends a fury point to stop a friendly warrior model from dying. So that's why I went with a list that could remove tough from them because normally: you kill one, it rolls for tough, if it passes, no knockdown, if it fails, Makeda spends a fury to keep them alive on a box. So with knockdown immunity and sometimes dodge from Rhadiem they become really annoying! I also switched to mostly melee because with the krea around they reach DEF15 ARM21 or something against ranged. Widowmakers and destroyer were fine I think (more on that below).
So at the end when I was going for the assassination my opponent started the turn (actually every turn) with five fury after upkeeping Storm Rager. He had to balance keeping models alive to block my models off and keeping some transfers. However the eliminators were always going to reach Makeda with Battle Lust, so at one point my opponent just had to let things start dying to keep transfers and this allowed the juggernaut to get to her too.
The kossites actually had a big effect on the game because Rhadiem was the only model who could go after them, removing dodge from the cats. They also constantly shot one of the willbreakers who was both scoring a flag and giving one unit of ferox tough, so was really valuable to my opponent. As such they kept spending fury to keep it alive, which reduced fury for keeping the cats going.
One thing I thought about was ditching one kodiak and Aiyana, Holt and Valachev to get Behemoth back into the list. I think he would need to play more aggressively than usual, which might not work out here.
Cheers, Dave
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zeffid
Junior Strategist
Posts: 163
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Post by zeffid on Oct 13, 2017 11:36:10 GMT
Hi, thanks for reporting. The last one was really valuable for me. I have great personal concerns on how to deal with Makeda's cats. And you gave quite some ideas. What I'm thinking of is that she has to keep Fury to stay death. But then she has to get it somewhere. So either she runs beasts hot and I forfeight some attacks to make her suffer. Or they are low on Fury and she has to pay boxes. This needs to be combined with ranged assasination treat for great effect.
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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Jun 8, 2018 11:02:00 GMT
Old Witch1 vs Gaspy2, Recon II
So due to work taking me out the country for five weeks and playing a heap of Shadespire I've not really played any Warmachine lately, but it was finally time to change that!
Old Witch1 was one of my favourite MKII casters, but always seemed a bit lacking in MKIII. However I think Sorscha0 finally gives her the last couple of tools she needs to work, so I was keen to get a game in with her. Given the lack of changes to her during the CiD I think it's safe to say she's fairly well set rules wise. I have a few variations of the same list with different winter guard set ups, am just going to play through them to see which I like most. Here's the lists:
Winter Guard Kommand Old Witch1 +18 -Scrapjack -Juggernaut -13 -Juggernaut -13 Kovnik Joe -4 Apprentice Sorscha Kratikoff -4 -Destroyer -14 Lady Aiyana & Master Holt -8 -Koldun Kapitan Valachev -4 Winter Guard Field Gun -0(4) Winter Guard Field Gun -0(4) Winter Guard Infantry (Max) -10 -Winter Guard Officer & Standard -4 Winter Guard Mortar -5 Winter Guard Rifle Corps (Min) -8 -Winter Guard Rocketeer (3) -6
Dark Industries (The prowl + cloud bane one) Gaspy2 -Cankerworm -AoE crabjack -Rapid fire crabjack -Spray bone chicken Machine Wraith 3 x Scrapthrall Tartarus Bane Knights (Max) Bane Riders (Max) Bane Warriors (Max) -Officer & Standard
I choose the repair objective. Can't remember what my opponent went for, but it never came up.
Set Up:
Terrain had a forest in the middle of the board between the two rectangular zones. There was a hill to my right near my flag, some rough terrain pretty much between my deployment and objective (slightly to the left of the objective) and a wall just edging into the zone on my left at a bit of an angle. There was a small obstruction on the outer edge of the right zone halfway up, a wall central on my opponents side near their objective and a forest near their flag on my left. I won the roll and went first.
I deployed a field gun on the left with the infantry just inside. Then a juggernaut followed by Old Witch in the middle with the mortar then her other juggernaut on her right. Scrapjack was next to the juggernaut with the destroyer to it's right. The rifle corps were next opposite the rectangular zone on my right with the field gun behind. Sorscha, Joe and A&H&V were all fairly central and behind everything. Opponent had Gaspy centrally with the bane riders, knights on my right and warriors on my left. AoE jack and bone chicken went to my left opposite the infantry and the rapid fire jack is towards my right. Tartarus is central and the machine wraith is ready to take his flag while the scrapthralls flank hard on each side.
Finally, Cankerworm ADs on my left behind the forest there before my three heavies advance move forwards.
Turn 1:
No allocation before Old Witch and her battlegroup apparate forward, Old Witch and Scrappy turning to see winter guard behind them. Old Witch casts Iron Flesh on the infantry, Weald Secrets on the rifle corps and Avatar of Slaughter on Scrappy before advancing into the rough terrain. A juggernaut runs up on either side of the central forest, the destroyer runs up on my right and Scrappy runs up behind the central forest. Unfortunately he can't go far enough to apparate into it so that he can see through it next turn. All the winter guard run up, as does A&H&V. I realize I've messed up with my solos, so Joe puts tough on the infantry before running across towards my right flank, getting within walking distance of the flag, but meaning he can't use speeches on the infantry before walking to the flag next turn. Sorscha casts Fog of War and advances up.
Gaspy puts Hellbound on himself, advances and puts down two clouds to link the central forest with his theme clouds on each side. The AoE jack shoots a winter guard, killing him and putting corrosion on 4 others. Once we work out Scrappy can't get through the forest next turn he's more able to run up with his infantry and riders. The rapid fire jack, chicken and Cankerworm all run up too, staying out of line of sight/threat range on my jacks. Tartarus and the machine wraith stay safe ready to support/grab the flag.
Turn 2:
All spells are upkept, Sorscha hands two extra focus to her destroyer and Old Witch keeps the rest of hers after I work out I can't get a jack onto anything tasty. Three infantry die to the corrosion. Old Witch advances up centrally, puts down a Murder of Crows on my left connected to the central forest and feats. Scrapjack moves up slightly behind the forest so he can now apparate and see through next turn. The left field gun misses a warrior before the infantry run up into the zone on my left, getting two in range to contest the enemy flag. The mortar runs up and the other field gun aims and kills a knight on my right. The rifle corps advance up and start shooting knights too, killing around three I think. Joe then advances to my flag and puts tough on the rifle corps. The destroyer advances into the right zone and kills a knight, not rolling high enough on blast to kill any other unsurprisingly. Juggernaut on the left runs up behind the Murder of Crows and forest, toeing the left zone while the right juggernaut runs up just in charge range of the rapid fire jack.
Gaspy upkeeps Hellbound and hands two focus to the rapid fire jack. The riders run around onto my right flank behind the knights, who clump up and advance to just outside feat range. The rapid fire jack advances a little and rolls one shot. Boosting to hit and damage does six damage to the juggernaut on that flank. Scrapthralls run up both flanks staying outside of feat range. The warriors largely shuffle around, as does Tartarus before the machine wraith runs onto his flag, toeing the left zone. The AoE jack kills the infantry model nearest his flag and corrodes the other, but it's immune to the blast damage due to Iron Flesh. The bone chicken advances on that side and manages to miss the corroded model. Cankerworm hangs out in the forest on my left and Gaspy largely stays put, sticking his clouds back up to block line of sight to the rapid fire jack and make life difficult on my left. Nothing can reach my flag to contest.
Khador: 1 Cryx: 0
Turn 3:
I upkeep Fog of War, Avatar of Slaughter and Murder of Crows before Old Witch allocates two focus to Scrappy. Things apparate around with Scrappy heading to my right before (after?) the objective heals my right juggernaut. One my right the field gun and rifle corps kills a few bane knights plus the scrapthralls on that flank while the destroyer kills a rider. Joe hands out tough again and holds the flag. Aiyana puts magic attacks on the infantry and Holt shoots another bane knight before Valachev Zephyrs them back a bit, out the way. The right juggernaut charges a rider that got too close, killing it. The field gun on the left takes a cheeky shot at the bone chicken and manages to hit, knocking it down. The mortar shoots it too, leaving it with movement and arc node between the two weapon crews. The remaining infantry advance and CRA the machine wraith to kill it and clear the zone before a last one sticks another shot into the chicken, dropping movement I believe. They then reposition back, spreading out. The left juggernaut hangs out behind Murder of Crows, happy toeing the zone. Sorscha sticks Boundless Charge on Scrappy and hangs back in safety on one focus. Scrappy then charges into the last few bane knights on my right, finishing them off to clear the zone and somehow killing the last riders! Old Witch teleports him back with Unseen Path (dropping him into Fog of War range for stealth), puts Iron Flesh on herself and steps back a little.
Khador: 4 Cryx: 0
My opponent really needs to kill Joe, stop me scoring and ideally score something himself. Gaspy upkeeps Hellbound and keeps the rest. Tartarus charges the right juggernaut, doing good damage before the rapid fire jack takes out the three rifle corps blocking the way to Joe. Gaspy charges the same juggernaut as Tartarus, Parasites the destroyer and feats back seven knights. He leaves the juggernaut on ten boxes (both arms intact but nothing else) and teleports back. It take three knights to kill Joe (one misses, then he toughs, last does it) then the remaining four go for the destroyer. They don't kill it after some bad rolls. Cankerworm and the warriors get stuck into the left zone and infantry, leaving only two grunts, the officer and standard alive. The AoE jack toes the zone at the back corner, shielded by warriors. There's no solo or caster for the flag though.
Khador: 4 Cryx: 0
Turn 5:
Iron Flesh, Avatar of Slaughter and Fog of War are upkept before two focus is allocated to the central juggernaut behind the forest. It apparates into the forest, Sorscha casts Boundless Charge on it and it charges the objective, killing it easily.
Khador: 5 Cryx: 0
Victory to Khador!
That went well! As I said at the beginning, OW1 has always seemed to be missing something in MKIII and I think Sorscha0 is it. The free charge on her jacks is effectively the damage buff she's been missing, plus there's the obvious threat extension. It seemed like the additional threat range on both the infantry-mulching Scrappy and the heavy-killing juggernauts helped created a safe zone for OW to operate in. It's a slightly bigger zone than without S0 and seems to have helped a lot. The third heavy being fueled by someone other than OW also gave her a little more focus to play with, again what she needed. Fog of War is also handy for allowing a lot more freedom in placement for OW and Scrappy, letting Murder of Crows be used more aggressively instead of for concealment. Overall pleased with the combination!
The list itself performed well I thought, putting out serious pressure at range while also having the resources to deal with anything that comes too close. Combined with the control and movement tricks from OW meant the list felt solid to play. I didn't feel hideously outnumbered despite playing the caster with the least WJ points (I think..?) plus "only" getting eight free points. I'm happy with the jack set up plus A&H&V, but have a few more winter guard set ups to try out. Will see how the different options do and report back!
Thanks for reading!
Cheers, Dave
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Post by hocestbellum on Jul 23, 2018 14:04:18 GMT
Generally speaking I think people are overhyping Sorscha0, but I think that OW might do well with her for all the reasons you list. Between S0 and Apparition you end up with a 12" threat on most jacks, and Fog of War on the Prowlers is just good clean fun.
An interaction I'm quite looking forward to is Boundless Charge on the Old Witch herself; with AoS you're looking at a MAT 8 P 15 mincing machine with a threat range of 12.5, soul collection, and a teleport.
Also, whilst you are playing the caster with the least WJP, Scrapjack is probably worth at least 9-10 points.
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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Jul 25, 2018 4:50:04 GMT
Yeah I agree that Sorscha0 was blown out of proportion during CiD. I would like to see her CMD go up to match her CTRL and wish she had a handcannon so she could do something actively (given the apparent lack of a model, PP's comment in CiD that the model already had a blunderbuss seems suspect...). Unfortunately I can't see either of these happening due to the amount of complaining there was at the time. I don't rate PP's work on Khadors CiDs very highly in general to be honest, but that's another topic.
I was keeping an eye out for charging in with Old Witch for sure! Sadly there was no one to steal souls from, so Scrappy was always a better bet in this match. However OW getting a longer threat is another thing that opens her up for actual play.
And yeah Scrappy is a solid 10pts I think. Was more meant to be a comment on playing a list that didn't maximize free points, but I know where you're coming from.
Cheers, Dave
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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Aug 16, 2018 9:37:56 GMT
Strakhov1 vs The Heretic, Spread the Net
Time for an example of what happens when you are out of practice because work keeps sending you away...
Played a game against the same opponent as in the last one on here. Unfortunately the last game hadn't been that fun for my opponent, so I decided to play Strakhov no matter what so we got a more interesting game. Thought it'd be a challenge into certain Cryx builds, then found I was facing Grymkin instead! Here's the lists:
Jaws of the Wolf Strakhov1 +28 -Behemoth -25 -Juggernaut -13 -Spriggan -17 -Torch -18 Greylord Forge Seer -0(4) Greylord Forge Seer -0(4) Kovnik Andrei Malakov -4 -Kodiak -13 Yuri the Axe -0(6) Battle Mechaniks (Min) -3 Kayazy Eliminators -5 Kayazy Eliminators -5
Beast Theme The Heretic (Sacrifice, Labyrinth) -Cage Rager -Cage Rager -Crabbit -Crabbit -Frightmare -Rattler -Skin & Moans -Skin & Moans -Skin & Moans The Battle Engine Gremlin Swarm Gremlin Swarm Gremlin Swarm Gremlin Swarm
Set Up:
My opponent won the roll and chose first turn. After I picked sides, terrain saw a forest in the middle of the circular zone, a building in the middle of my rectangular zone, a hill centrally in front of my deployment zone and my flag on another hill. The opponents flag was also on a hill and they had a large patch of rough terrain in their rectangular zone and a trench centrally. I chose sides this way round so a gremlin swarm couldn't hide behind the house on my opponents side to shut that zone off.
My opponent deployed pretty centrally with everything: caster, heavies, battle engine and crabbits as close to the middle as possible, a light on each flank. I deployed Malakov and his kodiak on my left to aim towards my flag and the opponents rectangular zone. I had Behemoth, Torch and a forge seer slightly towards that flank too with mechaniks generally milling around behind that group. Strakhov was central with eliminators next to him, then the spriggan and juggernaut to his right, more eliminators, then the second forge seer on my right flank (the idea being to threaten a flare then magic AoE on any swarms going to his flag). Yuri advance deployed centrally behind the forest.
Turn 1:
Everything runs as normal really. Swarms stay central for now, a couple in range to run to his flag. The Heretic puts Fury on a skin & moans towards my left.
Yuri finds a spot just inside the forest where nothing can see him, and most other models run up. Strakhov puts Occultation on himself, Superiority on Torch and Sentry on Behemoth before advancing. The kodiak gets Redline and runs up, and Malakov advances. Jacks all move up, generally around 16" away so Heretic needs a 6 on any Gallows attempts to pull them into range. The eliminators move from center to the left and the right unit stays behind the juggernaut and spriggan who are base to base. Forge seers and mechaniks move up, ready to empower/repair if needed.
Turn 2:
Fury is upkept and the turn is largely spent re-positioning behind the forest as much as possible. The frightmare puts a shot into the juggernaut, doing a little damage and corroding it and the spriggan. The eliminators were outside the blast radius, so he was hoping to miss the juggernaut and scatter nicely. The rattler contests his rectangular zone way back, wary of the approaching kodiak. A gremlin swarm runs to his flag but the rest stay hidden. With Strakhov and the forge seers well spread out there's not much benefit to him running one to my flag or rectangle zone. A Fire Wall gets dropped right in front of Yuri.
The Sentry shot scatters harmlessly and everything is upkept. Corrosion stays up, so both jacks take a point of damage on my right. This is largely a re-positioning turn for me as well. The kodiak gets repaired then runs into the enemies rectangular zone, threatening the whole thing with Strakhov's feat but well out of threat range. Malakov runs to my flag and has two mechaniks and an eliminator within sac pawn range after everything moves and repositions (yay amazing theme benefit...). Behemoth gets a focus from the central forge seer and Overrun from Strakhov before advancing to draw sight to one of the crabbits. He hits and it's shield guarded, leaving the crabbit on 2 boxes and doing a little damage to some heavies (the first crabbit was in a trench). I fire the second shot at a cage rager next to the injured crabbit, doing some damage to the heavy and killing the crabbit to let Behemoth Overrun backwards. Jacks position centrally and on my right while the right eliminators run to contest the enemy flag and gum up the beasts a little on that flank. Forge seer on the right runs round the house.
Khador: 2 Grymkin: 0
Turn 3:
Fury stays up and the Fire Wall is dropped. A cage rager on my right moves up and kills an eliminator before The Heretic moves up and tries to Gallows the juggernaut through the rager. It only gets pulled 2" though, meaning the skin & moans won't reach it. It kills the other eliminator instead before the frightmare advances up to block access to the heavies and contest my rectangular zone, also killing the right forge seer. The three swarms also move up to try to block access to beasts. On the other flank models largely stay away from the kodiak and Behemoth, shuffling slightly to my right and contesting the rectangular zone still.
Khador: 3 Grymkin: 1
All spells are upkept and corrosion stays up on both jacks. After some measurements I allocate 1 focus to Torch and 2 to the kodiak. While I don't think I have a great plan I think I can get both lights, a cage rager, a skin & moans and the last crabbit while keeping a couple jacks safe from retaliation. Torch starts by charging the frightmare, killing it and sprinting into the right rectangular zone. The remaining forge seer allocates a focus to Behemoth (and I really wish I'd been more sensible with the other forge seer for some more focus). Strakhov then casts Overrun on himself and Behemoth before feating and charging a gremlin swarm.
**I mess up here and don't boost the attack roll, ending up missing both attacks on 7's. This leaves Strakhov high and dry with no real way for me to prevent a fully loaded skin & moans reaching him. So we rewind and I boost the charge attack, hitting and killing the swarm. This triggers Overrun on Behemoth to move him up slightly, then sprint on Strakhov to reposition to a safer spot behind the forest.**
**I mess up again and go with the kodiak first, charging the rattler and killing it. This takes my opponents zone, but also triggers Labyrinth. Behemoth is in range, so now he can only reach a cage rager and not the skin & moans with Fury on it.**
**Screw ups come in threes! I then charge Behemoth into the cage rager. However he leaves it alive on a couple boxes after some pretty below average rolling. So Overrun doesn't get triggered to move Strakhov further away.**
Back to thinking straight, the left eliminators charge the cage rager Behemoth went for, doing the last couple points to kill it. Not sure why I didn't activate them first... Yuri charges through the forest, killing the crabbit and damaging the central skin & moans and last cage rager. Both the juggernaut and spriggan charge the cage rager and leave it on 1 box, stationary and with spirit gone. I would have liked to finish it because Sacrifice is a thing from next turn now. Mechaniks move up and that's about it.
Khador: 6 Grymkin: 2
Turn 4:
Fury stays up. The stationary cage rager frenzies, amusingly killing a gremlin swarm for me (but shaking stationary). The skin & moans with Fury kills Behemoth and contests the rectangle with the kodiak in it while the central skin & moans puts some decent damage on the spriggan, removing lance and cortex. The central gremlin swarm moves base to base with it and does some more damage, stopping it healing. The Heretic moves up and kills both remaining eliminators and Yuri, though he has to buy an attack or two on Yuri after some poor damage rolls. Because of this he's left with no fury after casting Fury on the third skin & moans. After some debate he sends this skin & moans after Torch instead of the juggernaut, but misses a couple attacks due to Superiority. Only the first skin & moans was fully loaded, so damage from the second and third are about as expected.
Khador: 7 Grymkin: 3 (I think we mis-counted during the game and thought my opponent had 4.)
So the simple win is to run a mechanik to contest the enemy flag and score my flag and zone to go (we thought) 9:4. Looks like I could have just passed the turn to achieve this instead. However we decide to see if Strakhov can assassinate The Heretic, so read on for a terrible assassination run!
The kodaik is too far away for focus, but I upkeep Redline. Superiority and Occultation stay up (they're free afterall). I allocate 1 to the juggernaut. The kodiak charges The Heretic and does around 8 damage. Strakhov then goes, casts Overrun on himself and moves around into melee with the gremlin swarm. He tries to cast Superiority onto the juggernaut but the cage rage cancels it. He then kills the swarm, triggering Sacrifice to fully heal the cage rager and heal The Heretic. The juggernaut advances around the cage rager thanks to Overrun though, the freestrike not taking anything out. The juggernaut walks up to The Heretic, boosts the first attack not getting the critical but doing decent damage. Luckily the bought attack hits without a boost and finishes The Heretic.
Victory to Khador!
Thoughts:
Well, that was messy! Not played in a while and it showed! The more sensible plan on that final turn would have been to finish the cage rager, then get to work on the central and right skin & moans, ideally taking one of them out. Strakhov deals with the gremlin swarm after the cage rager is dead and before attacks start on the remaining beasts while the mechaniks get ready to start repairing whoever's left the following turn.
Of course, it looks like I was further ahead on scenario than we thought, so the win was there that way...
In the first two turns I think the only glaring issue was moving the right forge seer too far forward. In hindsight he could have happily sat behind the house and could then have either reached the gremlin swarm with an AoE (after the spriggan de-stealthed it) or power boost a jack. As it turned out I needed that extra focus to finish the cage rager and could have made good use of it in my turn 4 as well. Otherwise, Behemoth could have shot a cage rager twice on my second turn to try to kill a crabbit with two boosted POW7's instead of shooting the one in the trench and getting lucky with a 13. I didn't actually see the trench template until I'd moved because of models in the way, so was doubly lucky with getting the hit!
My feat turn was really messy with things done in the wrong order. First thing was boosting the attack roll with Strakhov, which should have been obvious. Meant I needed a boosted 7 followed by a boosted 5 or something like that. Not ideal odds and I'd have preferred a different play, but there were limited ways to get Behemoth moving. Another option was simply putting Superiority on him and having him go for the cage rager from the beginning, but I wanted the skin & moans. Once the plan changed due to me triggering Labyrinth (the only model it stopped from reaching it's target was Behemoth), there was no reason to send Behemoth in before the eliminators. The eliminators should have gone in first to soften it up to help ensure Overrun was triggered. I also didn't side step well, letting The Heretic reach all three models near him.
My fourth turn should have been very different as above...
Overall I'm happy with the list right now. I might try swapping Yuri for a widowmaker marksman to have an alternative Sentry target. There's pros and cons to this: it's no longer free to upkeep, but the free shot is arguably better than Behemoth's. Also I like having Yuri for playing around forests and as someone reasonably tough to go after distant flags. Will maybe try and see...
Otherwise I don't think I'll change anything. Happy with the jack load out, it brings a good range of abilities and options to the list. I might trying switching the juggernaut and an eliminator unit for a grolar, but not 100% sure on that. Probably worth a try though. Torch is definitely underrated I feel. The options with both sprint and Overrun available are great, plus he's better against models that are immune to knockdown. I think the two forge seers are mandatory to making the list work. I'm sure some folk would prefer Sorscha0 to Malakov1, but I like the fact I can play a jack further away from Strakhov. Sorscha concentrates the list more in the middle of the board, which I don't really like.
Thanks for reading!
Cheers, Dave
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Post by hocestbellum on Aug 16, 2018 12:58:11 GMT
Congrats on the win, even if it did take some do-overs! I would say that you need to back yourself a bit more, though:
"While I don't think I have a great plan I think I can get both lights, a cage rager, a skin & moans and the last crabbit while keeping a couple jacks safe from retaliation."
How is that not a great plan? That's almost half your opponent's army! And if you're safe afterwards, that's pretty much gg.
Regarding the list, I agree with you regarding Malakov/Sorscha. Strakhov's feat is a better Boundless Charge, Malakov still adds bonus speed to his jack, and crucially he adds STR too. One thing I would consider, though; putting a Kodiak on Malakov brings it up to 'Good in melee' with 2x P18s. Putting the Juggernaut on Malakov brings it up to 'Abandon hope, all ye'. Anything short of a Colossal is going down.
I wouldn't drop the Jugger and Eliminators to fit in a Grolar, I'd drop Torch. Mostly because you can do it without disrupting anything else in the list; the rest of your setup looks solid. I'm not sure that Torch is underrated; he's just really hard to get into lists. He only really gets played with one caster, after all, and Strakhov1 really likes the Spriggan as an assassin jack which eats into Torch's niche.
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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Aug 16, 2018 14:26:07 GMT
Thanks for the reply!
Regarding the plan: it was reliant on getting a boosted 7 to work and failing that would loose the game (like it did), so it felt a bit too all-in. I would have preferred a safer option, but couldn't see one. And while it would kill a lot of models it would still leave two skin & moans and a cage rager, who all hit hard and can take my heavies out. To me it would have been a better plan if it killed more heavies and less of the rest. Also if a jack had been able to start the Overrun chain that would have been nice. With some better positioning I think it would have been doable through Torch killing the frightmare to trigger Overrun instead of Strakhov going for a swarm. Not getting the forge seer killed for no reason would also have helped the focus strain.
Yeah I go back and forth on which jack to put on Malakov. Juggernaut is kill-more while the kodiak becomes a proper melee jack with two P&S18 initials. The kodiak being on Strakhov might be nice: Superiority turn 1, then it's set up to start placing clouds ahead of the support. That'd move the juggernaut to Malakov.
Dropping Torch is a really hard sell for me I'm afraid. This is actually a match up where he's the better assassination jack since The Heretic can't get knocked down. I really like his utility abilities, especially sprint. I wouldn't have thought of the spriggan as a prime assassin jack to be honest. Granted bulldoze is handy and 2" melee is always good, but the loss of MAT compared to Torch and the grolar makes me unsure.
I think I'm going to have to test the grolar instead of juggernaut + eliminators and try that but with a juggernaut on Malakov instead of a kodiak. The other option is to drop Yuri and make Malakov free, upgrading the spriggan to a grolar then probably using the 3 remaining points to turn one eliminator unit into widowmakers. Would again try that a couple times to move the kodiak and juggernaut on/off Malakov. So a few things to try out!
Cheers, Dave
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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Aug 27, 2018 7:53:50 GMT
Strakhov2 vs The Heretic, Invasion
Time to try out an idea I've had going around my head for a wee while. Here's the lists:
Wolves of Winter Strakhov2 +22 -Kommando -Kommando -Berserker -8 -Destroyer -14 Greylord Forge Seer -0(4) Koldun Lord -0(4) Saxon Orrik -4 Doom Reaver Swordsmen -13 -Greylord Escort -3 Doom Reaver Swordsmen -13 -Greylord Escort -3 Greylord Outriders (Max) -20 Kayazy Assassins (Max) -15 -Kayazy Underboss -4
Beast Theme The Heretic (Ruin, Labyrinth) -Cage Rager -Cage Rager -Crabbit -Crabbit -Frightmare -Rattler -Skin & Moans -Skin & Moans -Skin & Moans The Battle Engine Gremlin Swarm Gremlin Swarm Gremlin Swarm Gremlin Swarm
Set Up:
Scenario was Invasion and we both picked the repair objective. I won the roll and took first turn. There was a forest in the middle of the rectangular zone, a house on my side of the circular zone on my right, a hill in the circular zone on my left and a hill centrally in front of my deployment zone. Opponent has a trench centrally in front of their zone, some rough terrain between them and the circular zone on my left and another hill over on my right.
I deploy assassins on my left with the destroyer on their right. Strakhov is central and the berserker is on his right. The koldun lord is set up to run behind the house on my right and the outriders are further out to the right. Reavers advance deploy on my left and centrally. Upkeeps are: Quicken on outriders, Inviolable Resolve on assassins, Last Stand on the berserker. My opponent bricks up in the middle. Both lights are on my left flank opposite the assassins and other beasts are spread along the line with cage ragers more central.
Turn 1:
The outriders take apparition to move a total of 24" up the board wide on my right flank. The central doom reavers run up mostly behind the central forest. On the left doom reavers and assassins run up, staying out of direct fire range of the frightmare. Jacks run up, berserker to the right of the forest and destroyer to the left before support moves up. Strakhov and ko. take stealth and run up.
My opponent largely runs up too, staying out of doom reaver charge range where possible. A cage rager comes forward on my right before The Heretic arcs a Hex Blast at the berserker. It's well out of range, but the scatter hits three doom reavers behind the forest, killing two. Otherwise it's a generally cagey turn due to the doom reaver threat ranges.
Turn 2:
Upkeeps stay up and no focus gets allocated. I think about sending the reavers in from behind the forest, but instead take a move conservative approach. They stay behind the forest while the reavers on the left get fully into the zone there, spreading out reasonably well. The assassins then enter the zone behind them. Outriders put a little damage on a skin & moans on my right before repositioning backwards, all in the zone. The koldun lord runs into that zone as well, staying behind the house. Strakhov and the kommandos use reposition, move up and put down two clouds to extend the forest on my left before Strakhov feats and they back up behind the clouds. The berserker runs up on my right again and the destroyer runs up behind the clouds.
My opponent comes in to contest the zone on my left with the frightmare, two gremlin swarms and a crabbit. The frightmare puts an AoE out, getting corrosion on a reaver and two assassins with the scatter. A cage rager and skin & moans go into the right hand zone before The Heretic arcs Rebuke into the outriders (did not know he had that, oops!). The other heavies brick up in the middle, partially covered by the forest. No ones scores.
Turn 3:
I upkeep spells and allocate nothing, the central doom reavers using apparition to go into the central forest and a reaver and assassin die to corrosion. The forge seer gives the destroyer a focus and it advances to shoot a central cage rager. The shot is shield guarded by a crabbit and the boosted damage leaves it on a box. Saxon gives the central reavers pathfinder and they advance through the forest. After the UA sprays one gremlin swarm in the middle is dead. A reaver attacks the other, killing it and berserking onto the cage rager. The other three reavers also hit the cage rager and I actually do more damage than expected. This changes my plan with the other reavers, who now charge three into that rager (one in melee with the one box crabbit), the UA into the other crabbit and two into the frightmare, also engaging another gremlin swarm. I fluff rolls everywhere! The three on the cage rager do a total of about six damage, one reaver misses the frightmare and the other does less than ten damage. The only saving grace is the UA one-shotting the crabbit. The assassins run/charge to finish the frightmare and engage the rattler who's lurking behind with counter-charge up. On the right the outriders advance in, putting up some Winter's Winds and trying to be awkward for the two heavies there before the berserker runs into the zone, threatening them both for next turn. At some point The Heretic triggers his arcana, choosing the central doom reavers as prey.
Retaliation is painful! The central cage rager kills three reavers engaging it (we misplayed the battle engines anti-tough bubble, so the reavers weren't rolling tough) before a skin & moans comes in and kills the last one. The Heretic charges the two outriders engaging the cage rager on my right, killing them both and putting Rage on the cage rager. He then puts a fire wall down to be awkward on my left, protecting the left skin & moans from assassins following it's planned move. The battle engine then charges the central reaver UA, killing it. Prey moves to the outriders. The skin & moans on my right kills all three outriders engaging it easily, moving prey to the berserker. The Raged cage rager then kills the berserker easily, moving prey to the assassins. The final skin & moans goes and kills the three reavers who failed to hurt the cage rager in the middle before the rattler (way out of control range) kills a few assassins and the last two reavers on the left. I think my opponent missed two attacks this turn, both with the rattler. Solos etc all move about to be a pain.
Turn 4:
So the games gone now. My disastrous reaver charges (think I should have prioritized better) meant I didn't do enough damage. I drop all upkeeps. Strakhov casts Last Stand on his own unit and they charge the cage rager that killed the berserker. They kill it easily, so stick some damage on the battle engine as well before Stakhov and his kommandos die. As an side, I actually used the Overtake battle plan!
Victory to Grymkin!
Thoughts:
So the result didn't go the right way, but the main aim was to test if the list idea had some legs to it. I think it does and the problems were largely down to user error. I think I could have saved the feat for a turn. I could also have kept the outriders back to keep them safe from Rebuke, or at least force the cage rager into threat range of the berserker if he wanted to tag them with Rebuke. Also I think I could have played the reavers better on the left. Make sure the gremlin swarms die and the assassins threaten anything else that comes into contest. Instead they spread too thin and didn't achieve much.
I've made a couple changes to the list, next battle report to follow soon. I'll post that one up, then do a quick rundown of where I am with the list.
Thanks for reading!
Cheers, Dave
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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Aug 27, 2018 9:11:12 GMT
Strakhov2 vs The Dreamer, Standoff
Made some changes to my list after the last game and was keen to try it out. Here's the lists:
Wolves of Winter Strakhov2 +22 -Kommando -Kommando -Devastator -14 -Marauder -11 Fenris -9 Greylord Forge Seer -0(4) Cylena & Nyss Hunters (Max) -19 -Koldun Kapitan Valachev -0(4) Doom Reaver Swordsmen -13 -Greylord Escort -3 Doom Reaver Swordsmen -13 -Greylord Escort -3 Greylord Outriders (Min) -12
Beast Theme The Dreamer (Sacrifice, Terrain-Generating-One) -Cage Rager -Cage Rager -Cage Rager -Crabbit -Crabbit -Gorehound -Gorehound -Gorehound -Skin & Moans -Skin & Moans Battle Engine Gremlin Swarm Gremlin Swarm Gremlin Swarm Gremlin Swarm
Set Up:
There's a house pretty central on the board. There's a forest on my right partially in the circular zone there and there's some rubble towards the back of my rectangular zone, slightly left. There's also a hill on my left flank. On my opponents' side there's a trench towards the middle, a forest on his right and nothing else comes into play I don't think. I win the roll for first turn.
I deploy the outriders on my left with the devastator and forge seer to the right of them. Strakhov and ko. are slightly left of center and the marauder is central. Fenris is next to the marauder and the nyss are on my right flank. Doom reavers advance deploy in front of the outriders on my left and slightly right of center to move between the house and forest. Upkeeps are: Quicken on nyss, Inviolable Resolve on outriders and Last Stand on the marauder. Opponent deploys The Dreamer centrally, two gorehounds towards my right and one towards my left. Cage ragers are spread out centrally and the skin & moans are on each flank. Gremlin swarms, crabbits and the battle engine follow behind.
Turn 1:
The normal running. The nyss get way up on my right and the outriders use apparition to get well up on my left, well hidden by the forest there. Doom reavers advance up across the board, those more central threatening to apparate out from behind the house next turn. Fenris runs up behind the house and the jacks run up. Strakhov and ko. plus the forge seer all run up too.
The gorehounds take the lead with the heavies following up behind. The Dreamer puts up an Artifice on my right, touching the house and messing with the doom reavers there. Swarms etc all follow up behind.
Turn 2:
Upkeeps stay up and I apparate the central doom reavers to the right of the house. The nyss advance to max range on a cage range and 9 of them put a CRA into it. It's shield guarded by the crabbit, killing it. They then Zephyr backwards a little, all staying in the circular zone. The right doom reavers charge through the Artifice thanks to Fenris, three of them charging while the rest hang back. One kills a gremlin swarm that got too close before berserking onto a gorehound. Sadly the other two charges can't finish off that same gorehound. On the other flank I charge two reavers into the gorehound there, doing decent damage but not killing it either. The rest spread out in both units. The outriders pull in slightly more centrally while staying in the zone and the devastator runs up to be in the left circular zone and my rectangular zone. The marauder runs up, starting to head round the left of the house. Stakhov moves up, puts a cloud wall to the left of the house, feats and repositions backwards. Fenris stays behind the clouds and the forge seer runs up.
Artifice is upkept by a cage rager. The Dreamer advances and shoots two reavers on my left, making them stationary before casting Manifest Destiny. The beasts all work to clear the five doom reavers in the opponents zone. This allows the gorehounds on my right to both move into the zone inside the Artifice for prowl, one engaging the three reavers there. The one on my left now charges past the stationary reavers, killing their UA and contesting the left zone. The last three gremlin swarms move up in front of the central cage ragers to block the marauder from charging in too easily. We each score our own zones.
Khador: 1 Grymkin: 1
Turn 3:
I drop Last Stand and Quicken and allocate two to the marauder. The right doom reavers apparate out of melee with the gorehound there. I need to be careful here to minimize arcana nonsense. The forge seer gives a focus to the devastator, who walks up and head butts the gorehound on my left. Stakhov puts a boosted gunshot into it to kill it and puts Inviolable resolve on the marauder while his friends drop clouds. They all then reposition backwards into my rectangular zone. Sacrifice is triggered, healing the gorehound on my right. With arcana out the way the doom reavers on my right charge back in on both the gorehounds there. They do really well and manage to kill both. The nyss advance and put a ten man CRA into the nearest cage rager, unfortunately not doing much damage (two I think) at dice-1. Fenris charges a gremlin swarm, killing it and missing the berserk attack onto another swarm. However the second attack hits and kills before the next berserk attack hits and kills the final swarm. He then repositions back into one of the kommando clouds. This allows the marauder to charge the objective, but sadly he leaves it on eleven boxes. I score both circles and by rectangular zone.
Khador: 4 Grymkin: 1
Artifice of Deviation is dropped. The Dreamer shoots two reavers on my right, getting the crit on one who walks over and kills Valachev and making both reavers stationary. She also cast Manifest Destiny. It takes a cage rager and skin & moans to kill the marauder, clearing the zone again. The second skin & moans goes into the devastator, doing reasonable damage and killing the two previously stationary reavers on that flank. The cage rager on my right toes the right circle and kills a stationary reaver there. The last cage rager charges Fenris and uses beat back to move closer to my zone. However he cranks the charge roll and dismounts Fenris, who lands outside it's melee range. It puts a couple attacks into the devastator, sadly finishing it's cortex and an arm with the last attack. We each score our zones.
Khador: 5 Grymkin: 2
Turn 4:
No upkeeps to keep going and I can't allocate. Still got a couple arcana to play around though. The last doom reaver on my left apparates forward. Strakhov and the kommandos advance and put gunshots into the objective, taking ti down to eight boxes after Strakhov's shot is shield guarded, almost killing the crabbit. They reposition back into my zone. Fenris and the doom reaver that apparated on my left can see the objective and between them they take it out, contesting the rectangular zone in the process.
Khador: 7 Grymkin:2
Victory to Khador!
Thoughts:
That went much better that time! Not sure I would have done much differently. Possibly keeping Last Stand on the marauder when it charged in to try to take out the objective and the cage rager it could reach.Then again it was contesting with Inviolable resolve that turn which is probably better. Maybe not drop Quicken off the nyss then. That's about it though really.
I feel the list definitely benefited from the changes I put in. The nyss in particular were a lot better than the assassins, giving the list more ranged presence. Originally I was worried by the minimum unit of outriders, but actually felt they were fine. They were still a harassing unit, but now they cost 12pts instead of 20. With only the doom reavers worrying about pathfinder I could get Fenris in the list instead of Saxon and I think he added a lot more overall. The jack load out was pretty decent, and I think I could place my upkeeps on them instead of the outriders. Something about Last Stand on a devastator tickles my fancy and Inviolable Resolve on the marauder is nice too.
Next step is to try the list again, switching the forge seer for a koldun lord to see how that plays. After that I think it's just down to fiddling with the battlegroup. A berserker (Last Stand) plus spriggan (Inviolable Resolve) combination could work and costs the same points as the existing battlegroup. I also want to try the destroyer in place of the devastator when paired with the marauder. Finally there's the triple berserker/mad dog battlegroup, but I'm really not sure on that one. I think the final battlegroup will determine the koldun lord/forge seer debate. Any thoughts on battlegroup would be appreciated!
Thanks for reading!
Cheers, Dave
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Post by welshhoppo on Aug 27, 2018 19:27:30 GMT
Good work, but man the individual parts of that list are expensive. I'd be so worried about something dying. But you seem to play a lot of Grymkin so it probably works out.
Last Stand on your berserkers is good value for money, as they can take out expensive heavies by themselves, but they still need a focus or 2 to get the job done.
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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Aug 28, 2018 8:32:19 GMT
Thanks for the reply!
Yeah it's costly. However I'm somewhat banking on the greylord adjunct being our Christmas model and what we've heard about PP's plans regarding CiD for those models. They've already said some models in the theme are too expensive, so I'm hoping the points will drop relatively soon when they put the adjunct through CiD.
I was speaking to my friend and basically it feels like playing without free points right now. The theme benefits are solid and the models feel generally fine overall, so it just needs some points adjustments here and there and maybe a little look at a few abilities. One thing I would like to see is the ternion become allowable as a free option in the theme as per some of the other themes (Crucible Guard springs to mind). Then drop Fenris by a point and reavers by a point or two and that goes a long way already. I'm not sure if outriders need anything, but will be keeping a close eye on the tharn light cav during the coming CiD. If they stay close to how they are just now I'd imagine outriders will change a little too. Ternion are fine (maybe 6pts?) and the koldun lord is too (though changing his axe to dispel instead of crit dispel gives him a nice unique job that he can do more reliably). Forge seer I'm undecided on. I think it's great in lists where you can marshal something to it well, but otherwise somewhat lacking. Even just changing Winters Wind with magic attacks for a single jack would be great for Khador and open up some options. I think a Cygnar solo has that ability already?
One of our local players has been playing Grymkin lately, hence several games against them! Next game is against Skorne, so should have something a bit different up by the end of the week.
Cheers, Dave
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Post by thebuoyancyofwater on Aug 30, 2018 9:31:57 GMT
Strakhov2 vs Zaal1, Spread the Net
Time for a fairly short game, but a good test of Strakhov2 running Wolves of Winter. Here's the lists:
Wolves of Winter Strakhov2 +22 -Kommando -Kommando -Berserker -8 -Spriggan -17 Fenris -9 Koldun Lord -0(4) Cylena & Nyss Hunters (Max) -19 -Koldun Kapitan Valachev -0(4) Doom Reaver Swordsmen -13 -Greylord Escort -3 Doom Reaver Swordsmen -13 -Greylord Escort -3 Greylord Outriders (Min) -12
Immortals Theme Zaal1 -Cyclops Brute -Krea -Titian Cannoneer Supreme Guardian Ancestral Guardian Ancestral Guardian Ancestral Guardian Extoller Soulward Hakaar Beast Handlers (Min) Immortals (Max) -UA Immortals (Max) -UA
Set Up: My opponent wins the roll and I choose sides. Upkeeps are: Quicken on nyss, Inviolable Resolve on spriggan and Last Stand on berserker. I had a hill to my left near my flag, some water on that flank, a cloud fairly central just edging into the circular zone and there was another hill in my rectangular zone. My opponent had a wall partially in their rectangular zone, a small hill reasonably central, some more water off to their left and I think another cloud near their flag. There was a decent sized obstruction in the circular zone, slightly to my right and into my opponents board half.
My opponent deploys fairly symmetrically: an immortal unit on each side, the supreme guardian in the middle and Zaal to the supreme guardians right. The cannoneer and brute are on the right with an ancestral guardian and the krea, Hakaar and remaining ancestral guardians are on the left. Beast handlers and extoller follow behind. Seeing where the cannoneer is I deploy the nyss on my right with the obstruction between them and the supreme guardian and cannoneer. The spriggan is to their left, Strakhov and buddies are central, then the berserker on their left. Fenris is next to the berserker and the outriders are on my left flank. The koldun lord is central too. I advance deploy doom reavers opposite both rectangular zones.
Turn 1: The immortals all run up, staying out of doom reaver threat range. Zaal puts Inviolable Resolve on the supreme guardian and Last Stand on the immortals on my left before advancing up. The supreme guardian runs up the center and otherwise the various beasts and solos all run up.
I check threat ranges and doom reavers run up but stay out of melee threat of the immortals and supreme guardian. The berserker makes a beeline straight for the supreme guardian while Strakhov and Fenris stay out of direct fire range of the supreme guardian and cannoneer. Outriders flank fairly hard on my left and the nyss also advance up to threaten next turn. Finally the koldun lord runs up and slightly to my right. He's spotted a nice spot behind the obstruction.
Turn 2: Upkeeps stay up. The supreme guardian advances up near the central obstruction, toeing the circular zone. It takes a shot at the berserker but misses due to elite DEF11. The scatter clips Fenris, setting him on fire but doing no damage. Both immortal units run up and spread out. A couple from each unit lead the way to engage some doom reavers from both units while the rest all spread out behind. Hakaar and the two ancestral guardians run up on my right and the last guardian runs up on the left. The cannoneer advances into the rectangular zone on my left and boosts a shot into the berserker, doing about eight damage. Krea animus goes up on my right, Zaal advances up but doesn't do much from what I recall and support follows behind.
Upkeeps stay, fire goes out on Fenris and the doom reavers on my right apparate forward. Time to see who much I can kill! the spriggan charges the lead immortal on my right, positioning itself in my rectangular zone and the central zone. The charges kills, then the guns manage to take down another immortal on that flank. The nyss activate and advance up, using a mix of range and melee attacks to clear some more immortals out the way for the doom reavers before using Zephyr to dodge back out the way. Unfortunately there's one still in the road. Strakhov and his buddies go next. Strakhov advances and shoots the immortal in the way on my right before feating. One kommando drops a cloud and the other kills an immortal blocking the left doom reavers in melee. They then reposition around in the middle zone. The reavers on my right charge into the immortals and after they're done there's two left in the unit, plus the UA and Hakaar are dead, creating Kovaas. On my left the outriders advance up and spray the immortals, partially clearing them off the reavers there and taking out the UA before repositioning out the way. Fenris advances, kills another immortal before repositioning onto my flag. The reavers then go and after they've finished there's one immortal left in the unit. The berserker runs at the supreme guardian again and the koldun lord advances up near the obstruction before using Wind Ravager (catching the supreme guardian). I score my flag and rectangular zone while everything else is contested. Seventeen immortals, two UAs and Hakaar killed in turn two! Not bad.
Khador: 2 Skorne: 0
Turn 3: Vengeance doesn't do any harm. Upkeeps stay up. The final immortal on my left tries to kill an outrider out of spite, but actually misses so dies to Last Stand. Zaal feats and moves to my right to cast Last Stand on the Kovaas. The guardians on my right then clear out enough doom reavers so that Kovaas can charge the spriggan through part of the obstruction, also getting Strakhov in melee. With Last Stand and the feat it kills Strakhov.
Victory to Skorne!
Oops! Been a while since I played against Zaal1 and it showed there. Strakhov needed to be about two inches further back to be safe. His feat would have still affected everyone that mattered, so there was no need to be so far up. Without the assassination my opponent was going to really struggle with scenario due to the speed of my list, so I think I would have taken it over the next few turns.
I think I could have changed my strategy on the right as well. Instead of going all in with the reavers send a couple forward to ensure the UA dies while the rest hang back more while still finishing off most of the rest of the unit. Hakaar would still have been around, but I think it could have proved tricky to stay safe from the reavers, nyss and spriggan. Just an alternative option really though.
I was very happy with the list overall! This felt like the best set up I've used so far. Everything did it's job well and there didn't seem to be any dead weight in there. The theme benefits are really very good, apparate every turn gives a lot of flexibility and the list is really fast! The only issue right now is it feels like playing down a few points. Basically it feels like you've paid for the free solos and are missing the actual free models from the list. Hopefully this will change when the greylord adjunct goes through CiD. Right now it certainly feels playable though.
Now I've got a few games in with the list, here's a quick rundown of the theme and models:
Wolves of Winter: I am really liking this theme actually! The starting benefit is nice and lets you play upkeeps wide on the flanks if needed, but the real money is the turn by turn apparition. This is really flexible for the list and opens up quite a few options each turn. On the theme benefits I'd like to either see ternion become allowable as free options like combat alchemists, or (this might be too good) drop the free points bracket to 15pts like Sons of the Tempest instead of the current 20. Strakhov2: Is working as intended in the list really. His upkeeps are great for the nyss and battlegroup, plus he supports the reavers nicely with his feat. Berserker: Overall I'm happy with the changes following CiD. In this list it does it's job of threatening something important via Last Stand. Has to be dealt with, but doesn't really matter what happens to it, so win-win! And if it actually reaches it's target that's a bonus. Spriggan: Inviolable Resolve on this was excellent, giving a tough heavy that could hold zones while still being able to participate in the game. As an aside I was convinced the spriggan had sturdy, but Warroom says steady. Which is even better with Inviolable Resolve! Fenris: Has been solid and I've preferred him over Saxon. I think he's a point too expensive but otherwise he feels fairly spot on. Handing out relentless charge instead of silence makes a lot more sense on him. Koldun Lord: Think I prefer the koldun lord to the forge seer. Wind Ravager would have been very relevant in this game moving forward and MA:8 Ice Cages and sprays are really good. I'd like to see crit. dispel changed to straight dispel on his axe though. Nyss Hunters & Valachev: They are much better in the list than the assassins were. Quicken and Zephyr give the unit a massive threat range (24" ranged threat) and they're generally very self sufficient and adaptable. Doom Reaver Swordsmen & Greylord Escort: Have been doing well! Obviously they die hard into some match ups, but that's why there's two lists. DEF13 ARM17 with tough, feign death and rise is a nice combination to have available for them. A point or two off and I don't really see them needing anything else. Greylord Outriders: A min unit is fine for the list. Thought it might be too few originally, but actually think the three of them work fine for flanking and clearing. Not sure what I'd change with them in CiD, if anything. Maybe just drop them to 11/18pts or something.
So a short battle report, but I believe I have found the list set up I'll be running for the next while with Strakhov2. I've got an idea for a list to pair with this (waiting on Sorscha0 like the rest of Khador) and I should get to try it either this weekend or next week, so expect some more reports soon.
Thanks for reading!
Cheers, Dave
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