Another Minions list and battle log thread.

I was not expecting to get a chance to play last night but circumstances allowed and although we didn't get to finish the game it was very interesting so I'm going to write about it. This was another crack at the new CID steamroller scenarios, in this case Spread the net.
Terrain was set up using the cluster method but an oversight by the person placing the terrain started with an area of dense fog in the centre zone, a trench occupied a large portion of the far rectangular zone and an area of rough terrain separated the circular zone and my near flag. A wall stood centrally alined a little outside my deployment zone with a forest sat in the top of the near rectangular zone, another forest was placed on the top right quadrant outside of all zones and the final piece was a cluster of crates that was near the mid-line between the legion deployment zone and the circular template. Apologies for no photos but I forgot to take any.


My opponent was using Legion so I would be using Sturm & Drang, he was using the twins Ryas and Saeryn, here's what I remember was in his list;

Saeryn & Ryas
Proteus
Angelius
Nephilim protector
Nephilim bloodseer
Black frost shard
2x Spell martyrs
War spears with CA
Hellmouth
2x Deathstalkers

My opponent won the roll-off and chose table sides. I realise that my initial evaluation of this scenario was wrong as I deployed Rorsh & Brine to the left flank so they could zoom up and threaten the far rectangular zone whilst Sturm & Drang were initially central with his beasts and slaughterhousers clustered around him, bone grinders went behind this centre front line and the brigands angled to the right rectangular zone. Alten would deploy on the right flank ready to walk up into the forest. My opponent put Saeryn down in the centre and Ryas more to my right flank, Proteus seemed to be tasked with guarding the left rectangular zone with the warspears filling up the centre. The nephilim were also quite centrally placed with the blackfrost shard behind the front line. The angelius was deployed on my right flank ready to advance up to my rectangular zone and the deathstalkers also went down on this flank with eyes on my poor brigands. The hellmouth went down behind the centre cloud in the circular zone with tentacles around it happy to abuse the clouds ability to limit my options for getting to it. I still chose the hellmouth as the brigands prey and my opponent picked a warhog as the prey of his warspears.


Turn 1:

Stuff runs, I'm a little leery of his threat ranges for the hellmouth and deathstalkers but the warhog that is not preyed gets polarity field and runs up within threat range of it, as a bit of thought I chuck a couple of slaughterhousers up far enough to perhaps tempt a tentacle. Brine is given vision and Sturm casts deceleration whilst advancing up leaving him on nothing but I'm safe from attack this turn. The brigands run forward hoping to use the forest to shield them from the deathstalkers but I'm not able to clump them tight enough up to prevent him getting line of sight to them. I do manage to run the battleboar up close enough to shield guard practically the entire unit but the razor boar I send up only covers the half that isn't likely to be seen. Bone grinders are at a bit of a loss and just stay behind the rest of the army. Rorsh & Brine rush up using diversionary tactics so that Brine is technically already within range of the hellmouth. Pendrake manage to fluke a couple of points of damage onto Brine to trigger pain response (since there are no threats that can get to Rorsh) and I pass turn.
My opponent is cautious, moreso than I would have liked with the bulk of his army but he knows that he doesn't want to risk anything he doesn't have to and is aware of my threat ranges. (He's fallen foul of them before.) The deathstalkers move up and can see brigands so the first one hits and is shield guarded by the battleboar before the other kills two brigands. Ryas and Saeryn put psychic vampire on themselves and occultation onto the angelius before advances up behind the forest on their side of the table. Spell martyrs move up, the only on the left goes into the trench and the other stays central. The protector stays within 3" of both sisters whilst the bloodseer rushes forwards up to the hellmouth. The hellmouth resists the temptation of the slaughterhousers and instead runs the tentacles to protect it from the threat of Brine. Proteus runs up to toe the left rectangular zone and across the table to the right flank the angelius advances only cautiously. The warspears run but not very far, they don't quite make it into the centre zone.

Turn 2:

I stick with Sturm and upkeep my spells. I'm very cramped and tightly packed with a lot of my force so manoeuvring is going to likely get awkward. I'm way too far away to threaten anything except with Brine who isn't quite able to get to the hellmouth because of the net of tentacles in front of it. so this turn is pretty much just positioning as nearly all the legion beasts are over 20" from Sturm so feating is also pointless. The brigands advance and dig-in at the start of the turn to get out of the way. Alten takes a pot shot at a warspear before retreating back into the forest. The preyed warhog is still too close to the warspears so runs deep into the right hand zone so it can clear out anything my opponent puts in there. I resist the urge to send in Rorsh & Brine, instead sending them further up and around the left flank. The rest of the beasts move to threaten and guard my infantry from enemy ranged attacks with shield guards. The slaughterhousers are easily within range of the warspears assault shots but if they do go for this bait it'll bring them into range of the polarity fielded war hog.
My opponent realises a mistake with his positioning as Ryas doesn't have any warbeasts with fury in her control range meaning the bloodseer is left with fury on (causing it to frenzy and kill a tentacle) and Ryas has to cut for 2. Both spells are upkept and the twins go early and position to threaten the zone with Ryas whilst Saeryn stays safe behind the cluster of crates. The warspears advance and take shots at the slaughterhousers (advancing because the placement of the cloud meant he would have fewer shots had he tried to assault) and although their aim was true deceleration played an absurdly significant part in stopping damage getting through and only one fell to the ground having made a tough roll. Tentacles were sent in to kill the knocked down slaughterhouser and tie up the rest. The deathstalkers tried their luck but shield guards foiled their plans, one sacrificed itself to contest the right rectangular zone. The angelius, proteus and protector all stayed well back, although proteus moved closer to the centre near Ryas. The blackfrost shard continued to reposition themselves, taking a long route up the right flank but still staying very far back.
Legion scores a point.


Turn 3:

I can see a quite nice path to causing some respectable damage here but my plans are limited because of how far back my opponent has kept his beasts. Drang takes control and I have to drop my upkeeps. The brigands activate and most aim whilst shooting at the warspears, this kills 2 of them and leaves one knocked down. The preyed war hog activates and eats the deathstalker. The battleboar puts primal onto the other one (that's toeing the circular zone) and backs off. Drang advances up a little and casting killing ground and drops a couple of fury to camp two. The war hog aggression dials and charges for free into the warspears, my opponent doesn't make any tough rolls and the hog overtakes his way to the hellmouth with just his initials. The first bought cleaver kills the gaping maw and I am now engaging Ryas, a spell martyr and proteus with the hog. The remaining two fury are spent hitting proteus doing okay but not spectacular damage. Pendrake advises Alten on the vulnerabilities of legion beasts and the monster hunter advances up to shoot proteus, the swirling melee isn't enough to throw his aim and proteus takes 5 damage to his spirit, had I thought about where my earlier damage had fallen I could have crippled his mind but alas the legion beast would be fully functional for the next turn. Brine also committed this turn and was sling-shotted into the bloodseer and last warspear, with the help of his animus he brought himself to full health by eating both of them. Rorsh contested the zone and engaged the spell martyr. The razor boars ran around to get in the way as did the slaughterhousers.
I scored a point.
My opponent reconciled himself that he felt confident of being able to kill Brine, Rorsh and the warhog so long as he was careful. His turn slowed down a bit after the reminder that the warbeasts had retaliatory strike but he had ways around that. The deathstalker continued it's hunt and killed two slaughterhousers, the blackfrost shard tried and failed to stick harm onto the warhog due to the melee penalty and instead hit Proteus. (Amusing but not helpful.) The other two tried and failed to kill slaughterhousers with ice bolts. The angelius advanced and poked slaughterhousers to get it further over towards his warlocks but was determined to stay ouf of threat range of the brigands. (I had unwisely switched prey over to the angelius because I forgot about occultation). Ryas took advantage of acrobatics and just walked past the war hog to engage it and Brine before killing Brine and half killing the war hog. Saeryn tried flinging a blood rain into Rorsh but being in melee in a trench proved too difficult to hit and it scattered off harmlessly. Still paranoid about retaliatory strike the protector activated and slammed the war hog. No damage was done but it knocked it down. Proteus then activated and advanced up to try and finish of the war hog and kill Rorsh, he managed to drag Rorsh in but missed the next attack and ended up spending all his fury making sure the war hog died. Rorsh lived! (A petty victory but I'll take it.)
We both score a point since he has the centre zone and I the right hand rectangular one. (Score now 2-2.)


Turn 4:

I go back to Sturm, I can't get to Ryas or any of his beasts this turn with melee but I can feat on all the beasts. Rorsh activates and walked up to Ryas and does diversionary tactics, boosting the damage on Ryas and dealing 4pts for her, she kept one transfer back and is grateful for it now. Rorsh then saunters off back to the spell martyr and contests the left zone. Sturm activates and puts polarity field on himself, vision on the warlord and TK's Alten forwards so he that if I advance him forwards I can see proteus behind the cloud. I then feat. A razor boar charges into a blackfrost shard member but misses, the last slaughterhouser forfeits combat action to advance and engage whilst the brigands split their attentions between the protector, a spell martyr and blackfrost shard, I kill one member of the unit and (with the help of beast lore) deal a decent amount of damage to the resilient light. The war hog runs back towards the centre and the battle boar advances up to help cover the brigands from the threat of the deathstalker and angelius's gun. Alten manages to cripple both mind and spirit on proteus, although I am needlessly cautious with them in light of the impact from my feat.
I score a point to bring the score to 3-2.
My opponent leeches fury and doesn't upkeep anything. Ryas moves to keep the cloud between her and the farrow whilst proteus mopes about toeing the zone. The deathstalker is again thwarted by a shield guard from the razor boar this vexation sees both remaining blackfrost shard kill it. The angelius shoots and kills Alten (who I forgot to reposition back, otherwise he might have close enough to a shield guard) and passes turn. I both score another point but have to called time on the game because the shop is closing.



Game review:

The game was very interesting and fun. The twins are better than I think most people give them credit for although they do present some unique fury management issues. I am not sure how to call it regarding which side was in the better position, although the twins still had their feat whereas I had used mine but the crux of the matter was that neither of us was going to win quickly via scenario or assassination/attrition. Although he had 2 heavies still, having dropped occultation the brigands could now see the angelius and shoot it, whilst I had lost nearly half the unit by now I still had the warlord and Pendrake and the angelius doesn't like half a dozen or so POW 14's to the face. A lot of what-ifs to be honest but despite the appearance of scenario looking live we both struggled to gain much of an advantage. I'd have liked to finish the game and will be looking for a re-match if I get the chance. I really like the combination of pack hunters and overtake from Drang, it makes war hog truly frightening consumers of medium infantry.


Scenario review:

Seeing as it's under development it seems worth adding a little review of the scenario. Looking back at the game I feel that I badly misjudged where I should have applied pressure in this scenario as, instead of having S&D's beasts protect and hold my near rectangular zone I should have pushed them all up on the left flank so S&D could have controlled the flag and instead let Rorsh & Brine operate on the right flank to defend and hold that zone. This would have pulled my infantry more to the left where the rough terrain would have caused me more problems than it would the legion player and on top of that there was practically no line of sight blocking scenery there at all but with all beasts counting as shield guards on the way in the threat from his solos was greatly mitigated. In theory it's possible to score 4 points in a turn on this scenario but in practice I suspect players will struggle to score more than 2 unless they are a very strong control caster and/or already very far up on attrition. I like it enough to want to play it again but I'm still a bit sceptical about it. It doesn't feel very winnable in 7 turns.