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Post by ForEver_Blight on Aug 6, 2018 15:26:32 GMT
So... I feel weird and also dumb. But I want to start some sort of life in the forum again so maybe this will do something for the week.
Local Steamroller event this past Saturday. I was 1 of 16. So nothing huge but it was just a local shop. I took 1 list I actually knew how to play and had reps with. But made up a completely off the wall list the thursday before to try and cover stupi Bearka SotN that I knew would be there.
The list I knew: Legion Army - 75 / 75 points [Theme] Children of the Dragon
[Bethayne 1] Bethayne, Voice of Everblight [+20] - Harrier [3] - Nephilim Bloodseer [8] - Nephilim Bolt Thrower [11] - Nephilim Bolt Thrower [11] - Nephilim Soldier [9] - Nephilim Soldier [9] Blighted Nyss Warlord [0(5)] Blighted Nyss Warlord [5] Blackfrost Shard [9] Blighted Nyss Hex Hunters (min) [9] - Bayal, Hound of Everblight [0(6)] Blighted Nyss Swordsmen (min) [9] Ice Witches [7] Spawning Vessel (min) [5]
The list I made up:
Legion Army - 75 / 75 points [Theme] Ravens of War
[Kallus 1] Kallus, Wrath of Everblight [+30] - Blight Wasps [8] - Harrier [3] - Harrier [3] - Raek [8] - Raek [8] Grotesque Assassin [0(4)] Strider Deathstalker [0(4)] Strider Deathstalker [0(4)] Wrong Eye [17] Blighted Nyss Raptors (min) [11] Grotesque Raiders (max) [12] Hellmouth [6] Hellmouth [6] Strider Blightblades [10] Strider Scouts [9] - Strider Scout Officer & Musician [4]
Now immediately - yes these are weird lists that probably look terrible from a meta perspective. Hello and welcome to the forum, you must be new here as we've not met. This is what I'm all about.
Bethayne brings magic weapons, sprays, hit and damage fixers. With Kiss and Disintegration I could (theoretically) hit pow 15 double weapon master Warlords and swordsmen. But the plan was to spread Kiss where I couldn't hit Disintegration. Kallus brings range, stealth, swarms of body, speed, volume of attacks, and a clock devouring feet.
Game 1 was against Retribution He had Issyria with a Hyperion and dawnguard. Or Helynna with 4 griffons, hydra, phoenix, chimera, and 2 manticore. Support staff to taste.
Bethayne gets dropped as I can't begin to crack the armor feat with Kallus. Little did I know Griffons have fleet and run 14 turn 1. I went first but my hexhunters got engaged on and for the rest of the game stayed that way. So I couldn't hit spells for crap. I should have just walked the hexhunters out and taken the free strikes. What I did was sit there and miss four 5's to hit shadowbinds... Turn 3 my opponent pops feat and relatively tanks on who to shoot and how the shimmy around my jamming models. I had already killed his objective but that was the only scoring done all game. Turn 4 I counter feat as I have nothing else to do and I knew the game was over, my opponent had 6 minutes to my 20. Game ends on clock. My opponent killed a single harrier. I killed a single Griffon. Not the best start for my "anti-armor" list.
Game 2 Cygnar with Kara SotT or Seige 2 gravediggers.
Both lists shoot my warlords and sworsdmen off the table. I've been there before and didn't like it. So I drop Kallus. Into the expected Kara Sloan (fancy, when you "complain" about something the opponent has they then pick that list. Must be coincidence.) So both units with ambush do so. Going first I want to eat up a ton of board space but true sight is dumb. Luckily he put more points into gunmages than he did jacks. Hunters hurt but arm 11 striders were gonna die anyways. He walks up too cautiously turn one hoping, as he said, to get 2 rounds of shooting. Turn 2 I ambush blight blades behind the Black 13 and grots behind 2 hunters and a GMCA. Everything I charged in the back arc died. Raptors and deathstalkers take out the Gun mage solos, UA, and few others. Kallus is hiding behind the objective and a tentacle to block LOS. His turn 2 he feats and takes shots with Kara and a Hunter on a hill against Kallus. Clears the tentacle and objective. Gets 2 shots into Kallus who was camping 4. Harriers still survived. I even gave him another hunter that was a 1/4 out just to be nice (I'm a sucker when some else starts having a bad time). Still no where close to putting me in a bad spot. Cygnar concedes.
Game 3 Cryx with Denny 1 Ghost fleet or Gaspy 3 BS Black industries
Kallus wants none of this so Bethayne again. He, however, chose poorly. Ghost fleet into as many sprays and battle wizards as the list has it was a pretty simple game. Made even more favorable to me by his turn 1 placement. Denny is within range of both both throwers. First boosted shot hits with crit knockdown and only pushes her an inch. Second shot boosts damage as well. Finally one hex hunter throws a hex bolt. 3 focus spent to reduce damage and Denny was only on 4 boxes. The rest of the game she never cast a spell, just healed off focus and camped high. Denny without her spell list is not a scary caster. From there it was cleaning up contesting models on mirage and scoring to 5.
Game 4 Trollbloods with Doomy 3 PoD or Calandra Kriel company
Doomy 3 was running double kings. Calandra was just tons of dudes. Kallus' Dark guidance fixes star cross a bit. But if he drops doomy it's piratically an auto-loss. I can't stop the healing and I can't hit with anything more that Pow 12 (base). So Bethayne again. But I knew it was a loss from the start. Trolls went first and devoured board space. Cloak of Ash Swordsmen did screw with the gunfighter infantry quite well. But I may have hit 1 in 5 attacks and that's a high end estimation. Though a flank warlod did one shot a light beast. It was all around a terrible showing. I tried to keep contesting and kill as many complete army points as I could. No real scoring till the last round at least. But with the feat and her reroll mechanic he never actually missed anything but the swordsmen the entire time. Ended with nothing but Bethayne on the table and a not-full pot. Trolls score 5 on the top of 5th round and that was game.
I was soooo freaked out about going to the finals table. I feel terrible that I couldn't really even put up a fight. But it was my first tourney (last on I tried I got a call first round for a family emergency). So I think that's a pretty good showing. But I'm still adverse to the competitive scene. But this is a great bunch of players and they just aren't bad sports like I've dealt with in the past.
So I have a new puzzle. I love puzzles. I spent an entire year on the Kryssa puzzle.
I want to keep doing well and do a bit better. I know where my lists fell apart and what I can and cannot cover. I won't be driving out of state to Nova or the like. But at least for the local (2 more SR events in 4 months I think) I will participate. Less corner case, more mad genius, less using bad things for the sake of proving people wrong.
So the thinking right now is Lylyth 1 PT or Fyanna 2 PT. At least there has been some initial fear of Fyanna 2 in the store since the CID. So I want to see if it's warranted. Lylyth just because she's in ADR and I've not played her since MK2. I will be testing Anamag to help local guys learn how to deal with her. I still know she is great at what she does and I may end up using her even if it I don't like popular stuff. Once I figure out which runs PT the way I want and does well. I get to start repping the crap out of it and trying to find the weaknesses to cover.
So I guess this is really a start to at least a 2 month brain storming session before the next local SR in October.
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twity
Junior Strategist
Posts: 179
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Post by twity on Aug 6, 2018 19:25:29 GMT
Congrats on your solid performance! I think there is serious value in bringing odd things to the table (see Bethayne) that you demonstrated when your opponent spent a lot of time thinking or didn't really understand what you brought to the table.
I for one hate the ogres (and medium based infantry in general) so I don't have experience with either of those two in it.
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Post by davycannonhound on Aug 7, 2018 5:29:15 GMT
I’ve played Fyanna in PT before and its quite a bit of fun. Golab likes her a lot and dodging ogrun are hilarious. I’d recommend chosen and warmongers. Throw iron flesh on the warmongers, hot swap fury between either the chosen and warmongers, the warmongers and golab, or golab and the chosen. The +3 def may seem wasted on ogrun but its really not. 15/16, 15/17, and 15/18 (warmongers iron flesh), 15/19 (chosen iron flesh) aren’t bad statlines, and as evidenced by striders 15 is decently hard to hit.
All in all I’d say Fyanna is just straight up our strongest caster. She’ll still want the seraph, angelius, and naga of course, but you should have at least room for 40pts of units.
Not sure how well Hellmouths work with her.
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Post by snotling on Aug 7, 2018 8:13:51 GMT
Fyanna is strong, no doubt. But Anamag and Kallus1 are quite a bit better imho.xD Especially in mirror.
Amamag in Primal terrors just doesn't give a damn about def. And she has way more tools. Grievous wounds, hex blast, mat fix. She can also use more of her toolkit, because of the free spell each turn.
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rivers
BattleBox Champ
Posts: 57
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Post by rivers on Aug 7, 2018 11:26:30 GMT
She doesnt give a damn about ARM either, really. Anamag is the honey badger of Legion, clearly.
I also have used Fyanna in PT and do like it, but not sure on the list yet. Golab should have been her character, honestly, she runs him way better than Anamag could ever hope to, so I think he stays. Have tried the vultures with her as well and had some success since they can help a little with DEF which unlike Anamag she can't fix quite as easily (Gorag of course helps but only in his corner of the fight), have annoyingly high DEF on feat, and if finisher is rolling Fury isn't actually too bad on them, and on early turns they dont get removed by wandering AOE if you put Iron Flesh down (swapping it to the second wave Ogrun later). Overall she probably has the least copy/paste PT list of any of our warlocks who wants to try to run it, which I also like. I would try more variations but most of my stuff in various states of construction, painting, and disrepair at the moment for a variety of reasons so I only have a few lists I can run without models falling apart mid game.
Also I would disagree that Kallus1 is universally better than Fyanna. He's good but only in pretty specific situations, especially the Ravens style Kallus.
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Post by ForEver_Blight on Aug 7, 2018 12:04:09 GMT
I agree Fyanna has the capable toolset. Def 15 is more than enough to be royally annoying. Dodge or Vengeance, which would you like to trigger?
But last night one of the guys is going to NoVa and wanted specific experience into Anamag. He built the list according to what he saw as common or likely to be at the tournament... I have to say it confirms that I don't like Anamag and I'm still very close to being against PT altogether. Granted the matchup sucks. It's his dreamer beast brick list. Arcane vortex can literally shut down just about everything Anamag wants to do. No Gallows. If you're too close then no Fury's strength on that unit. Once he's full of corpses you can never strip them off. A single Skin&Moans under Manifest destiny has an average chance to one round the blight bringer. So even the slightest damage from another source is enough to ensure it's death. Crabbits mean the BB can never shoot a beast without wasting it's turn. It was just all around unpleasant.
Faults I find with Anamag are all personal preference though. Gallows is cute but I'd rather have a speed buff. But then again that's what hellmouths are for if your opponent isn't explicitly taking the time to consult me on how to angle everything to guarantee nothing can be pulled. So give and take I guess. But with Anamag and to an extent PT as a theme, too many eggs are in one basket. Taking a BB means you only really get to pick three 5 man units. Once you've lost 2 or 3 in a unit things go downhill quite quick. So It's maybe just not the best fit for me and my playstyle.
Immediate complaint about PT (as I've yet to run a full ogrun boat) is the glaring lack of tactician. Holy cow is it annoying trying to get that many medium bases through terrain and into models. That was just a nightmare. Granted it's something that comes with experience. Still annoying.
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rivers
BattleBox Champ
Posts: 57
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Post by rivers on Aug 7, 2018 12:46:11 GMT
Yeah I HATE that we didn't get a solo that offered tactician or something similar. It seems like just about every other "heavy infantry" theme has a way to mitigate tripping over itself (or doesn't have to bunch up in a brick quite like PT does - Maelok gators come to mind as they get to just spread out quite comfortably). It's not insurmountable but it's definitely another glaring "PP kind of half-baked legion as usual" tic on my gripe list for the way they're handling the faction at the moment.
Gorag should have been a character solo with tactician in CMD for Ogrun, and the Warmonger UA should have been FA2 (or 3, whatever warmonger FA is) still with No Quarter, and maybe some other small bonus. That way there's actually a reason to run more than one unit of warmongers because honestly without the minifeat I don't know if they're really worth it. Or there could have been a cavalry solo. Or a small ogrun caster unit (3 models or something, like ice witches) that gave ghostly or incorporeal or something cool. ANYTHING to help positioning that other similar themes get to have.
/rant off
As for Anamag and her wider meta impact, yeah, I actually think she has plenty of pretty bad matchups, which is why sometimes the "let me practice with my tailored list" stuff can be off-putting. In a 2 list scenario, you might actually have a better second list to handle that dreamer setup, so it's not necessarily realistic. Good for him to know it works but it also sours your take on your warlock as a side effect which sucks. Arcane Vortex definitely makes that fight hard but I don't think it's unwinnable, and you could always use hellmouth tentacles to put the shots where you want. Sure you're not denting a beast but really the damage from BB shots are just gravy in Anamag PT, it's the Ogrun that do all the work when you have at least +4 STR a turn (provided you dont get Arcane Vortex'd).
She's a good warlock, but besides Chosen I always got the impression that other factions weren't super scared of her besides like...Trolls.
Also I agree, hate Gallows. Would have rather had anything else as a threat extender. Even casted for free.
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Post by davycannonhound on Aug 7, 2018 21:59:43 GMT
Yeah I HATE that we didn't get a solo that offered tactician or something similar. It seems like just about every other "heavy infantry" theme has a way to mitigate tripping over itself (or doesn't have to bunch up in a brick quite like PT does - Maelok gators come to mind as they get to just spread out quite comfortably). It's not insurmountable but it's definitely another glaring "PP kind of half-baked legion as usual" tic on my gripe list for the way they're handling the faction at the moment. Gorag should have been a character solo with tactician in CMD for Ogrun, and the Warmonger UA should have been FA2 (or 3, whatever warmonger FA is) still with No Quarter, and maybe some other small bonus. That way there's actually a reason to run more than one unit of warmongers because honestly without the minifeat I don't know if they're really worth it. Or there could have been a cavalry solo. Or a small ogrun caster unit (3 models or something, like ice witches) that gave ghostly or incorporeal or something cool. ANYTHING to help positioning that other similar themes get to have. Honestly I think the lack of Tactician is one of the few things that balances PT. Hitting at MAT 12 and P+S 18 is damn near impossible to defend against, so out-maneuvering the opponent is really your only option. Of course, we have Hellmouths to screw that up, but its not like PT becomes this blob of enemies melding through each other and destroying whoever they touch. Its more like a race to see who can get to the enemy first, and if you're in the way then oh well, there's always next time (Vengeance). Honestly I'd say PT is our best theme, because the free points generation and the bonus actually match up for once (vengeance helps some of the stuff free points come from), and the 2" deployment buff helps with lack of speed (though with No Quarter, the Rotwings, and the Chosen, there's not actually that much of a lack of speed). All in all, I'd say PT is a GOOD, but balanced theme. If lack of Tactician is the only real complaint other than "its not my style", then I'd say we're better off for it as a faction.
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danx
Junior Strategist
Posts: 120
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Post by danx on Aug 8, 2018 9:05:37 GMT
Game one. Hex hunters stuck in melee - isn't usually terrible. I think with Ice witches you could have given them puppet master, then made some attacks. Shadowbinding the gryphons then makes them a lot worse, and -3 def means you can spell them again. If you have cloak of ash on them, you won't hit the hex hunters anyway.
I've played many games were shadow binding Def 10 would win me the game, and I miss. Its really saddening.
RE the lack of Tactician, we have a lot of stuff that flys - which is better than tactician. Its why I nearly always run rotwings in PT (Mainly 2 units with Kallus1) but with Anamag and Fyanna I like to take a unit too. They fliter around and fit in the gaps. Golab also flys, and I've ran a neraph too. If we had tactician the flight would be less important to us, so I think not getting it is the correct design decision. (Tactician would be powerful but we don't need it)
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Post by piedpiperwtf on Aug 8, 2018 11:44:03 GMT
Gorag should have been a character solo with tactician in CMD for Ogrun, and the Warmonger UA should have been FA2 (or 3, whatever warmonger FA is) still with No Quarter, and maybe some other small bonus. That way there's actually a reason to run more than one unit of warmongers because honestly without the minifeat I don't know if they're really worth it. I know he's a UA but he doesn't have to be played as such, once that first unit oc mongers is delivered he can easily be retreated to a position that the -2 def can be utilized until you need him to clear some models.
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Post by ForEver_Blight on Aug 8, 2018 11:58:36 GMT
Game one. Hex hunters stuck in melee - isn't usually terrible. I think with Ice witches you could have given them puppet master, then made some attacks. Shadowbinding the gryphons then makes them a lot worse, and -3 def means you can spell them again. If you have cloak of ash on them, you won't hit the hex hunters anyway. I've played many games were shadow binding Def 10 would win me the game, and I miss. Its really saddening. RE the lack of Tactician, we have a lot of stuff that flys - which is better than tactician. Its why I nearly always run rotwings in PT (Mainly 2 units with Kallus1) but with Anamag and Fyanna I like to take a unit too. They fliter around and fit in the gaps. Golab also flys, and I've ran a neraph too. If we had tactician the flight would be less important to us, so I think not getting it is the correct design decision. (Tactician would be powerful but we don't need it) I understand completely on both accounts. I just didn't think at the time I would need to puppet master 2-3 hex hunters to not miss 5's. Dice happen.
As for Rotwings; most of the lists I have that I want to test have at least 1 min or max unit. My Kallus 1 list also has 2 max in it like yours. But this list was something designed by my opponent to simulate what he thinks he'll see at Nova. So not my personal list. Thus the grump about how it played.
Question for the masses - I'm hating being anchored/tied to the Blightbringer more and more as I put him on the table in PT. Is anyone else starting to forgo the thing and use real beasts? The Fyanna list is taking Golab and an Angel. I'm thinking of doing the same with the Lylyth 1 list. He's still a great threat late game once he's up the board. But turn 1-3 or even 4 he's trying shooting my own models to get templates out or just trying to get within 6 of where I want other things to be. To me that's too much investment and not enough work.
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rivers
BattleBox Champ
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Post by rivers on Aug 8, 2018 13:35:47 GMT
I don't know, I think the MAT12 POW18 is more of a problem with Anamag than anything else. Some of our other warlocks can achieve similar skews in PT, but Anamag is the only one who does BOTH so effortlessly. Vayl1 has to be 9 inches from whatever she wants to hit that hard or accurate, and we all know how risky that can be. Thagrosh1 can only get one unit at a time (2 with hot swapping I guess) to the high POW levels, but has no MAT fixing. Fyanna also lacks a MAT fix to go with Fury and it's expensive to swap. Bethayne gets to some pretty scary levels too, but you probably dropped your blightbringer to fit enough beasts to enable flank (and then have the order of activation puzzle to maximize it), so you lose a +2 STR buff there. I could keep going but It's only really Anamag that does it so safely and effortlessly. So in regards to if Tactician would break PT, I think just like the anti-chosen crusade we dealth with in CID, maybe it's her that is out of line. Also, yes we have flying things and rotwings in particular are in the theme, but the Orgun themselves don't fly and they're what are going to get tripped up, so I don't know how relevant that is. It's far less about his aura tbh, and more that the second unit of ogrun doesn't get No Quarter and thus gets to the game late or probably dies before it can because it got shot or something faster got to it first. Maybe that's not too horrible, but every time I just say I'd rather bring something else, and then I end up with the same cookie cutter list. Plus I already play with him back to utilize the aura and to be honest this just reinforces that he would have probably been better off as a solo (and have a generic UA) to encourage use of more warmongers after the first unit. As for the Blightbringer ForEver_Blight , I'm still crutching on it pretty hard personally, because I tend to fear that the ogrun really need it to get enough work done especially since you can expect to at least lose a few bodies on the way, and every body is incredibly important with such "elite" infantry as the backbone of the army. I also don't quite experience the same issue getting him or the templates where I want but maybe that's just luck into the right opponents. That said I do have a few lists I have yet to test that don't include him though, Kallus2 in particular I have one that forgoes the BB to bring some cheap, fast melee beasts to set stuff on fire and then have Battle Lusted Chosen charge things down. It's probably trash, but it SOUNDS fun (15" threat on essentially Weapon Master POW15/14 since Battle Lust affects the mount attack). Also I'm not suggesting PT is a bad theme. In terms of it's design it's our most coherent theme in terms of power and build structure compared to other "better" factions. I just think as usual it feels like something is just not quite there. Additionally because there are so few ogrun models and the way the benefits play out, I really dislike how every list I try to make looks identical no matter how hard I try.
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gordo
Junior Strategist
My star is green?
Posts: 548
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Post by gordo on Aug 8, 2018 15:19:46 GMT
Also I'm not suggesting PT is a bad theme. In terms of it's design it's our most coherent theme in terms of power and build structure compared to other "better" factions. I just think as usual it feels like something is just not quite there. Additionally because there are so few ogrun models and the way the benefits play out, I really dislike how every list I try to make looks identical no matter how hard I try. Yuuuuup. PT was basically the nail in my coffin for my Legion, who are now building dust-snowmen on my shelf they have been there so long. It's not that you can't make a good PT list, it's just that there is pretty much a clear "one best way" to do it and there was so little done to address my problems with the faction. That and I'd rather not have to buy two units of the outrageously expensive Chosen. But eh... Clearly there's some good lists out there, just nothing that ever worked for me or didn't seem done better by another faction. That aside, I still think PT is our best theme and probably the best choice for the majority of our casters.
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Post by ForEver_Blight on Aug 8, 2018 17:20:06 GMT
That aside, I still think PT is our best theme and probably the best choice for the majority of our casters. *I am not here to throw salt...but*
Most coherent theme; yes. But what is being said is my exact problem with it. You don't build a PT list around a caster's mechanics/spells/strengths/weaknesses. You build a ("cookie cutter") PT list and then just pick the caster that sucks the least or mathces your personal playstyle. So at the same time it's the worst design and the best. It's never going to be super interesting to build, but can always fit exactly what you want it to be for you personally. If that makes any sense to anyone other than me.
*end of salt*
In terms of model count, yes it's low. We don't have suppression tankers or wagons. But limited counts are kind of the norm any more. At least the 2 major units in the theme are granted the specific benefit of the theme. So unless you're going full Chosen or Rotwing you will benefit. It's not like CotD where you roll a one to go first and your opponent rolls a 3 or higher; immediately loosing a theme benefit.
Both units are also good for the most part. Yes I would give up berserk for near anything else. I mean the only time I've ever used it was when the dude finally gets the kill he slaps his buddy in the back of the head for near auto-kill damage. We're never going to tank like Shocktroopers. Warspears kinda hit like Demo but without the crit suddenly-weaponmaster bit. Maybe we get some Ogrun bowmen somewhere in the distant future. IDK.
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gordo
Junior Strategist
My star is green?
Posts: 548
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Post by gordo on Aug 8, 2018 17:33:37 GMT
That aside, I still think PT is our best theme and probably the best choice for the majority of our casters. *I am not here to throw salt...but*
Most coherent theme; yes. But what is being said is my exact problem with it. You don't build a PT list around a caster's mechanics/spells/strengths/weaknesses. You build a ("cookie cutter") PT theme and them just pick the caster that sucks the least or mathces your personal playstyle. So at the same time it's the worst design and the best. It's never going to be super interesting to build, but can always fit exactly what you want it to be for you personally. If that makes any sense to anyone other than me.
*end of salt*
In terms of model count, yes it's low. We don't have suppression tankers or wagons. But limited counts are kind of the norm any more. At least the 2 major units in the theme are granted the specific benefit of the theme. So unless you're going full Chosen or Rotwing you will benefit. It's not like CotD where you roll a one to go first and your opponent rolls a 3 or higher; immediately loosing a theme benefit.
Both units are also good for the most part. Yes I would give up berserk for near anything else. I mean the only time I've ever used it was when the dude finally gets the kill he slaps his buddy in the back of the head for near auto-kill damage. We're never going to tank like Shocktroopers. Warspears kinda hit like Demo but without the crit suddenly-weaponmaster bit. Maybe we get some Ogrun bowmen somewhere in the distant future. IDK.
Yep. Hence my Legion stays on the shelf and I continue to play Skorne. Sad but at least I have options.
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