Time for another battle report. I thought i would do something a bit different this time and focus on analyzing a loss. I played a match up and right now im not sure if it is a bad match up or if i just played it poorly. Lets see what we can find out!
Lists
Circle Army - 75 / 75 points
[Theme] The Bones of Orboros
[Krueger 2] Krueger the Stormlord [+27]
- Megalith [20]
- Woldwarden [14]
- Woldwarden [14]
- Woldwyrd [9]
- Woldwyrd [9]
Blackclad Stoneshaper [0(3)]
Blackclad Stoneshaper [0(3)]
Blackclad Wayfarer [0(4)]
Bog Trog Mist Speaker [4]
Sentry Stone & Mannikins [5]
Sentry Stone & Mannikins [5]
Shifting Stones [3]
Celestial Fulcrum [19]
Minion Army - 74 / 75 points
[Theme] The Blindwater Congregation
[Maelok 1] Maelok the Dreadbound [+28]
- Blackhide Wrastler [16]
- Blind Walker [10]
- Bull Snapper [0(5)]
- Gatorman Soul Slave [0(5)]
Feralgeist [2]
Gatorman Witch Doctor [4]
Gatorman Witch Doctor [4]
Totem Hunter [0(6)]
Gatorman Posse (max) [16]
Gatorman Posse (max) [16]
Gatorman Posse (max) [16]
Gatorman Posse (max) [16]
Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew [2]
The battle
I forgot to take pics some rounds but this is what happened in short. We play Spread the Net and i get to go first. We deploy fairly reasonably, though i do not do symmetric deployment (never really do that with this list). The board is fairly varied with a huge forest in the middle for me (i like that, but he would have hated that) and a hill centrally for him. My flag has a wall in front of it which is super nice.
Circle turn 1
I run forward, taking as much space as i dare, and that is pretty much. Just for the record, the little round obstacle in the zone is an obstacle, not an obstruction, so any one can move through it and see over it.
Gator turn 1
He runs up pretty far too, and does not feat. His caster is in the muddle on the hill. All of his Gators get concealment. His Bullsnapper hides behind the forest in his zone. We had a talk about that last game where he sort of forgot that his Bullsnapper could score defensively, and since it serves few other purposes...
Circle turn 2
In this pic several things have happened. I try to polish off his front rank with shooting and geomancy Gallows. It fails MISSERABLY. My mannikins kill his Totemhunter with charges (he had preyed them) and the rest of my army kill exactly 2 gators... Despite going full out with everything. Krueger goes late, he gets Rebuke up on the Gators on the hill, shoots a bit and then feats to push back and slow down the gators. The pic was taken after he had activated his west squad of gators. One of them had been dragged forward but not killed, and he charged the Waywatcher standing next to the Fulcrum. The rest had run forward a bit.
Gator turn 2
This turn i forgot to take pics, but he kills my Manikins on the east with Gators, and since 3 gators were outside my feat, he could run and contest my zone. He could not contest my flag though. He scores his zone with his Bullsnapper and his flag with his FG. He decides NOT to feat this turn either, and he revives a Gator in the middle, cause why not.
2-1 to minions.
[MISSING PIC]
Circle turn 3
My plan here is to do as much work as possible, while TKing his beasts so they cant really get to my beasts (they can trample to get there, but i think it is the best protection i cen hope for. My dice work... poorly. One Warden with 3 fury and POW 18 fails to kill a single gator in walking distance to by rolling an impressive amount of 4s to hit. My second Warden goes in against two Gators, and TKs the Blindwalker around. He kills a Gator with his initials. Megalith decides to be brave and walks up and punches 2 gators after having TKed the Wrastler around. I do some shooting with Shrimps and Fulcrum, but DEF 14 is actually significant. I miss the fire shot despite aiming, and went for a crit against the west unit leader (could prevent charges) but fail. Krueger has to back off a bit and does very little this turn. I score my flag and i contest his stuff.
2-2
Gator turn 3
No more pics now, but this will be over soon...
His Soul Slave gets Mortality up on Megalith, and 3 charging Gators plus a couple of walking Rebuked ones just manage to kill him. He could have Sac Striked with a witch Doctor to finish it off. His Blindwalker walks up and gets his animus on, and Maelok gets Mortality on the forward Warden. He feats too, allowing 2 Gators to charge through Manikins and one non-charging one to get there and leaves him on 5 boxes. The Feralgeist charges in and gets the 12 on damage needed to finish me off... On the west side, his snapper can charge one manikin and a gator can walk up to the other so he clears his zone, though he did not contest my flag.
3-3
Circle turn 4
Attrition and scenario are hopeless, but he is camping 0, so i guess ill have to assassinate?
I can place Krueger with teh stones to TK a gator to get LoS to Maelok and TK him around too. Then i can shoot him with a shrimp, the Fulcrum and some Manikins. The Warden and wyrd that can NOT shoot at the caster can instead try to save Fury for Krueger by shooting down the Gator Blocking LoS. He is on the hill and has concealment though, and ARM 20 against shooting. I unload at him with all those, and the waywatcher (hoping to knock down) but he is still alive after everything. Krueger TKs him and the caster needing an 8 and a 10 boosted, but cant shoot as he in in melee with Gators. The wyrd aims and has to take a chance at hitting the 6s needed, and misses the first two. the third one can be boosted to hit and does no damage despite boosting. The Fulcrum boosts the spray to get a crit but fails and ends up doing like 5 damage in total. Game over as Krueger is in the middle of a bunch of gators camping 0.
What could have been done differently
Lots and lots of things could have been better. Obviously dice, but i cant really change that, and i do not think i made many bad calls with when to boost. Turn 2 went totally OK imo, except the dice. I stayed back, tried to polish off the front and didnt expose any key pieces. I could possibly have been more aggressive with Krueger, so i caught even the three gators at the east flank so he couldnt have contested my zone. He has no assassination to speak of and i was camping 2, so i did not have to be so afraid. Rebuke was really nice as it allowed me to ignore a unit.
My turn 3 was worse though. TKing his beasts was probably not idiotic, but it did leave Megalith too exposed. Maybe i could have TKed the Blindwalker with the Warden, but left the wrastler for another turn and stayed back with Megalith. He was so far up, that his Soul Slave could easily reach with Mortality AND several Rebuked Gators could reach him. I could perhaps have stayed further back, throwing one Gator at another to neutralize both, and then TK him back to be safer from retaliation? He only killed 2 guys anyway. The east Warden who failed to kill the gator in my zone should definitely have thrown that Gator at one of his pals near the flag, rather than just trying to kill him. It might very well have killed the Gator anyway, and it would have cleared the zone and knocked down a gator who then couldnt have charged my other Warden. That would also have given my east Wyrd a knocked down target to shoot and possibly kill. This was my chance to inflict real damage as his feat was not yet up, and i did too little by far. The west zone was also poorly handled. I contested with two manikins but kept the third back. I didnt remember incorp from his feat so the bullsnapper reached the far west manikin with ease. If i had placed my third manikin in the zone too, he would have been forced to hit it with the Gator, and who knows? maybe he misses a 6. A spare manikin is not super valuable in this match up.
If all that works, i can score an extra point, making it 3-2 on my turn, and then 4-2 on his turn. It wont allow me to win on turn 4 unless he really messes up i think, but it gives me way more of a scenario game. It could also leave me with 2 heavies that would have been hurt, possibly crippled with Mortality, but i think one of them could have been functional for turn 4. Maybe i can hold out another round with TKs and do a little bit of work?
My assassination was a long shot, but i couldnt really do anything else. The goal here would be to not be in a position where i have to assassinate. I still think the match up is poor for me, but Rebuke, the feat and me going first should have let me do more in it. Throws are probably more valuable than i give them credit as it neutralizes the knocked down gators, possibly allowing my beasts to live another turn and do more work. My low POW makes a long grind unlikely though so i have to either get a better assassination, or score faster some how.
What do you think of this match up? Straight up a job for Bradigus, or can a more skilled circle player win it?