Juris
Junior Strategist
Posts: 578 
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Post by Juris on Mar 29, 2017 22:18:27 GMT
His feat gives his army a 4" speed buff while charging models in his command, pathfinder and a free charge. ruin threats 15" the rest threat 12", more with overrun. doomies threat 15". It should basically skip through one round of shooting when executed properly. I wonder why you ask this though.. did you not know what his feat was? I know what his feat is but I assumed that fail-charging for an extra 4" with your feat turn to (hopefully) engage key shooters was not the extent of the proffered tech. If it is, I'd say, yea...for sure play Vlad1 instead. Consider that Doom Reavers can run to engage from 14" away, so they only gain 1" there. A Khador Jack threatens to engage from 9" away when running (11" if it has Superiority on it), 10" if it's Ruin (12" if Ruin has Superiority). If Strakhov feats, he adds 3" to any of those preceding numbers. That's not very impressive, particularly considering that Strakhov needs to have the enemy model within his 12" control area in order to effect that; which is scary for him. Also consider that Vlad1 brings Wind Wall, which is better than Occulation, for keeping a caster or model alive against Cygnaran shooting (neither is a complete prophylactic). I just don't see Strakhov as being the strongest choice here, and I definitely don't see him as any stronger than Vlad1 or 2. Edit: Also, consider that charging something to engage it is very clunky. If you don't have pathfinder, you can't go over walls. You can't go through other models. You can't go around buildings etc. You must go in a straight line. You must have LOS to charge the model in the first place. It's like trying to hammer a nail with a broad sword; you can kind of do it, but it's way more trouble and more than a little dangerous. |
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Post by kovnikninehouse on Mar 29, 2017 22:49:43 GMT
Strakhov1 himself has pathfinder so if there is a forest that he can camp in to feat he is much safer than vlad1
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Juris
Junior Strategist
Posts: 578
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Post by Juris on Mar 29, 2017 23:23:20 GMT
Strakhov1 himself has pathfinder so if there is a forest that he can camp in to feat he is much safer than vlad1 You're joking right? Vlad1 and Strakhov both have the same baseline stats (15/16), but the best that Strakhov can do for himself is be stealth. If he feats and wants to not be within 12" of the closest enemy model, then he has to spend at least 2 focus for Overrun (and another for upkeeping occultation, if that's the plan), so he can camp at most 3 or 4 focus. Vlad1, on the other hand, does not need to be within 12" of enemy models to tie them up. He can cast Blood of Kings to sit at DEF18/ARM19 and still camp 3. He can cast Wind Wall so that non-magical ranged attacks automatically miss him, and camp 4. Or he could cast both and camp zero. Nearly all of those scenarios are far more survivable than Strakhov. |
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Post by Voodoogk on Mar 30, 2017 0:07:22 GMT
Vlad1, on the other hand, does not need to be within 12" of enemy models to tie them up. He can cast Blood of Kings to sit at DEF18/ARM19 and still camp 3. He can cast Wind Wall so that non-magical ranged attacks automatically miss him, and camp 4. Or he could cast both and camp zero. Nearly all of those scenarios are far more survivable than Strakhov. Dude.. if every time someone comes up with something that might be worth trying you come in here and assume you know how it's going to go down, I'm going to stop defending your motivations when loud chris lays into you. I asked Sand if he had tried it, you asked for an explanation of what you apparently already knew. This is a somewhat irritating discussion. Have him try it, stop destroying everything before you get a chance to play it. In your head there is zero way for khador to win against cygnar, I know thats not true.. so keep it constructive please. What I really draw exception to is the condescending comments like "You're joking right?" and asking questions you know the answers to. This turns it from a fun discussion into one I feel like you are deliberately baiting. |
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Post by sand20go on Mar 30, 2017 2:45:44 GMT
Strakhov1 himself has pathfinder so if there is a forest that he can camp in to feat he is much safer than vlad1 You're joking right? Vlad1 and Strakhov both have the same baseline stats (15/16), but the best that Strakhov can do for himself is be stealth. If he feats and wants to not be within 12" of the closest enemy model, then he has to spend at least 2 focus for Overrun (and another for upkeeping occultation, if that's the plan), so he can camp at most 3 or 4 focus. Vlad1, on the other hand, does not need to be within 12" of enemy models to tie them up. He can cast Blood of Kings to sit at DEF18/ARM19 and still camp 3. He can cast Wind Wall so that non-magical ranged attacks automatically miss him, and camp 4. Or he could cast both and camp zero. Nearly all of those scenarios are far more survivable than Strakhov. Couple of things. Strak has resourceful so assuming he feels like it matters I am guessing Occultation goes on himself and Superiority on a Jack in his battle group so those are free upkeeps. It isn't clear to me unless he is going for the kill why Overrun WOULDN"T be cast on a jack that is in charge range that is "fully loaded" and thus allowing, if that is the proper move, Stark to get back out of town. So he casts Overrun on key jack and if need be, fail charges 9. THe murder jack goes and wrecks something (perhaps after dinging it a bit with infantry. Strak then overuns BACKWARDS 6, meaning that his total advance was 3 inches 9=(9-3). Now the interesting thing is Strak vs. Vlad. Not sure. I can see valid arguements either way. I think what I need to test hard is Vlad1's ability, with the alpha, to go into something like, for example, Amon and wreck enough jacks that, after he subsequently sings battle and wrecks them, whether the 9 rockets make mincemeat of what Amon has left. No CRA makes vlad a sad puppy when facing the munk but some of those rockets probably can aim and joe can give a speech and I will take my chances with S&P (or BOK). Plus scenario. Kreoss could be "hard" but it feels like that with proper spacing that I can have a nice round of shooting on his even with 6 bloody AOEs from the Redeemers...and of course that also helps with reducing the pop and drop problem. |
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Post by Voodoogk on Mar 30, 2017 4:09:15 GMT
Strak has resourceful so assuming he feels like it matters I am guessing Occultation goes on himself and Superiority on a Jack in his battle group so those are free upkeeps. It isn't clear to me unless he is going for the kill why Overrun WOULDN"T be cast on a jack that is in charge range that is "fully loaded" and thus allowing, if that is the proper move, Stark to get back out of town. So he casts Overrun on key jack and if need be, fail charges 9. THe murder jack goes and wrecks something (perhaps after dinging it a bit with infantry. Strak then overuns BACKWARDS 6, meaning that his total advance was 3 inches 9=(9-3). Now the interesting thing is Strak vs. Vlad. Not sure. I can see valid arguements either way. I think what I need to test hard is Vlad1's ability, with the alpha, to go into something like, for example, Amon and wreck enough jacks that, after he subsequently sings battle and wrecks them, whether the 9 rockets make mincemeat of what Amon has left. No CRA makes vlad a sad puppy when facing the munk but some of those rockets probably can aim and joe can give a speech and I will take my chances with S&P (or BOK). Plus scenario. Kreoss could be "hard" but it feels like that with proper spacing that I can have a nice round of shooting on his even with 6 bloody AOEs from the Redeemers...and of course that also helps with reducing the pop and drop problem. Yeah you basically have the gist. overrun of course can be cast twice leaving him on 0 camp, one of the jacks can go a really long way and the other one can provide strakhs back up move. |
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Post by kovnikninehouse on Mar 30, 2017 9:38:22 GMT
I might not have been completely clear with my post about putting Strak1 in a forest. His feat does not need line of fire so if he can ether be on the complete other side or sit back 3" he can be very safe.
Now I am not saying Vlad1 is better or worse but I am saying Strak1 has game into cgynar as does Vlad1. The only thing is lots of people play Vlad1 so everyone has had more exposure to him so they might have know/build knowing they may face him.
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Juris
Junior Strategist
Posts: 578
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Post by Juris on Mar 30, 2017 17:04:12 GMT
Vlad1, on the other hand, does not need to be within 12" of enemy models to tie them up. He can cast Blood of Kings to sit at DEF18/ARM19 and still camp 3. He can cast Wind Wall so that non-magical ranged attacks automatically miss him, and camp 4. Or he could cast both and camp zero. Nearly all of those scenarios are far more survivable than Strakhov. Dude.. if every time someone comes up with something that might be worth trying you come in here and assume you know how it's going to go down, I'm going to stop defending your motivations when loud chris lays into you. I asked Sand if he had tried it, you asked for an explanation of what you apparently already knew. This is a somewhat irritating discussion. Have him try it, stop destroying everything before you get a chance to play it. In your head there is zero way for khador to win against cygnar, I know thats not true.. so keep it constructive please. What I really draw exception to is the condescending comments like "You're joking right?" and asking questions you know the answers to. This turns it from a fun discussion into one I feel like you are deliberately baiting. Who is loud Chris? Truly, I dont need protection from someone "laying into me," whatever that means or is supoosed to refer to. I'm certainly not "coming in here assuming I know how its going to go down." I AM providing the perspective of a Cygnar player in your theory-machining of a particular problem matchup. I thought that my post was objective and clinical in analysing the propositions. Obviously, as with anything, theory is theory, and tabletop experience is necessary to test hypotheses. I considered the arguments for why Strakhov was a good anti-Cygnar list in theory with an open mind; after considering the idea, I disagreed and explained why. You don't have to accept my conclusions in this theory session, you certainly don't have to stop having fun. You don't even need to want me here, that's fine (just trying to help sand20go out). As for the "you're joking, right?" comment. Let's face the fact: Strakhov is less survivable than Vlad against an enemy who can frequently ignore or remove stealth. It's not even really a debatable topic. So no, I didn't know the answer to the question I asked. Particularly when the post I responded to was a short and unsupported claim like "put Strakhov in a forest, he'll be more survivable than Vlad." Truly, I thought it was a joke, but in case it wasn't, I spelled out why. Frankly, your hostility right now shocks and dissapoints me. I'll just back out of this conversation and leave you to it. Good luck. |
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Post by Voodoogk on Mar 30, 2017 18:50:01 GMT
I still think you're a cool person Juris, and I'm sorry I hurt your feelings, but it's a lot easier to be negative than it is to be positive. And that's what you're doing here. Not only that but you're coming across as particularly condescending this time, and I thought a long time about calling you out on it because I like you quite a bit. We're talking about a whole caster here, to say he's just worse than vlad1, our most straightforward easy mode caster, is a mistake a lot of new khador players would make. Vlad1 is great, he has some really good abilities, he makes armies perform way better than they should. It is however a misconception to think that he should be running a ton of jacks just because his feat is good for them and he has 7 focus. Better Khador players than me will tell you that you shouldn't run him solely as a jack commander. Strakhov totally can be run that way though.
Strakhov has movement abilities all game long, he can be farther back from the action than vlad, he can be stealth, he can camp more than vlad... and living in fear with vlad by casting bok every turn is equivalent to just hiding him in the back behind a forest somewhere (where strakh beats him as well because he can at least walk through the forest with pathfinder). What I'd really like to see from you one day is giving Sand a list that can beat you and telling him how to use it. From what I can see here he's been bashing his head against you for years. It's not like you're the greatest player the world has ever seen, you dont win every tournament when you come up here (you are in the top 5-10% though in socal, don't think I'm trying to say otherwise). But Sand see's you as this invincible juggernaut of a player, so help him out instead of just tearing down everything anyone recommends trying against you.
Strakhov is about getting the alpha, and scenario. Cygnars guns can out threat even his feat at times, but they'll give up scenario to do so. realistically his feat means he can attack (not engage) your army with nearly his entire army the second you step into the zone. This isn't something Vlad can do at all, he can maybe get a few jacks into you, but realistically it's not going to be more than 2. Vlad's better with an army thats at least half guns, strakhs better with melee, which is the one area that cygnar does a little worse than khador. So timing the feat correctly, getting your entire army into melee, can't help but be good for khador. Vlad's going to have half his army trying to out gun cygnar.. which seems like a worse plan to me even with snp.
I wish I could be more useful to sand but I don't play against you all the time. I do about as well as you in large tournaments, but cygnar has always been one of my least played opponents, so it's not just a "I don't play against Juris that often" kind of problem either. It seems like the best coach I could give him would be you, but you're pointing out his miss steps while not writing any plays that work for him. And don't get me wrong, thats a hard thing to do, I struggle with it myself against my less experienced opponents. But I also don't come into every forum they look for help on and shoot down every option. Realize the issues a constant devils advocacy can create, try to mix in creativity and positivity. A lot of learning to overcome someone in this game has to do with finding tools that work with your frame of mind, and it helps to come at those angles from a positive light in the first place. That way you can try to make them work when they inevitably get smacked down the first time.
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Post by sand20go on Mar 30, 2017 19:55:50 GMT
I still think you're a cool person Juris, and I'm sorry I hurt your feelings, but it's a lot easier to be negative than it is to be positive. And that's what you're doing here. Not only that but you're coming across as particularly condescending this time, and I thought a long time about calling you out on it because I like you quite a bit. We're talking about a whole caster here, to say he's just worse than vlad1, our most straightforward easy mode caster, is a mistake a lot of new khador players would make. Vlad1 is great, he has some really good abilities, he makes armies perform way better than they should. It is however a misconception to think that he should be running a ton of jacks just because his feat is good for them and he has 7 focus. Better Khador players than me will tell you that you shouldn't run him solely as a jack commander. Strakhov totally can be run that way though. Strakhov has movement abilities all game long, he can be farther back from the action than vlad, he can be stealth, he can camp more than vlad... and living in fear with vlad by casting bok every turn is equivalent to just hiding him in the back behind a forest somewhere (where strakh beats him as well because he can at least walk through the forest with pathfinder). What I'd really like to see from you one day is giving Sand a list that can beat you and telling him how to use it. From what I can see here he's been bashing his head against you for years. It's not like you're the greatest player the world has ever seen, you dont win every tournament when you come up here (you are in the top 5-10% though in socal, don't think I'm trying to say otherwise). But Sand see's you as this invincible juggernaut of a player, so help him out instead of just tearing down everything anyone recommends trying against you. Strakhov is about getting the alpha, and scenario. Cygnars guns can out threat even his feat at times, but they'll give up scenario to do so. realistically his feat means he can attack (not engage) your army with nearly his entire army the second you step into the zone. This isn't something Vlad can do at all, he can maybe get a few jacks into you, but realistically it's not going to be more than 2. Vlad's better with an army thats at least half guns, strakhs better with melee, which is the one area that cygnar does a little worse than khador. So timing the feat correctly, getting your entire army into melee, can't help but be good for khador. Vlad's going to have half his army trying to out gun cygnar.. which seems like a worse plan to me even with snp. I wish I could be more useful to sand but I don't play against you all the time. I do about as well as you in large tournaments, but cygnar has always been one of my least played opponents, so it's not just a "I don't play against Juris that often" kind of problem either. It seems like the best coach I could give him would be you, but you're pointing out his miss steps while not writing any plays that work for him. And don't get me wrong, thats a hard thing to do, I struggle with it myself against my less experienced opponents. But I also don't come into every forum they look for help on and shoot down every option. Realize the issues a constant devils advocacy can create, try to mix in creativity and positivity. A lot of learning to overcome someone in this game has to do with finding tools that work with your frame of mind, and it helps to come at those angles from a positive light in the first place. That way you can try to make them work when they inevitably get smacked down the first time. Couple of things here. A) I would not Female Dog about Juris. It is important to understand (I haven't seen his LA play) that Juris puts a LOT more time into this game than I do. Say 4 nights a week versus 1. So losing to Juris, while occassionally frustrating, isn't unexpected or unexplained. So like last time I totally brain farted on Calamity and left an Argus where he could get "Calamitied" and forgot about the push back shot from Ace so Butcher 3 would lose cover. That is the thing....to beat Juris with Khador I think you have to know HIS army near as well as you know YOURS because we are not "asking cygnar questions" but rather have to understand Cygnar stuff and then plan according and with "wierd" things ("oh yeah, Ace has push back - so I should put an Argus butt hugging Butcher so he can't be pushed out of cover") B) I do think that Khador vs. Cygnar is a pairing which I think PP still hasn't REALLY figured out and probably is at the deep structural level of the game - using slow BASELINE speed to balance Khador and expense to balance Cygnar. The problem is that with minimal tools to slow down shooting (consider Khador with a caster who has field marshal Stealth and how broken THAT would be) Khador HAS to weather the approach before getting to melee where the advantage radically shifts. That means that to the extent to which Cygnar maximizes damage of shooting (Nemo 3) and/or control (Haley 2) it means it takes slow bricky khador even LONGER to get to swans. It honestly is my LEAST favorite part of a I go; You go game. Because it can take a Long'ish time for the shooting player to resolve play and for the other guy they are largely irrelevant to the exercise. I would love to see a future theme or model CID'ed in Khador that flat out gave electricity immunity either in bubble/feat/or upkeep. It would be interesting to see how that shifted things. Funny that Khador's principal anti-stealth for many years was blast damage and they do have go to ground now as a pretty common tech (meaning spray ponies are more valued....) C) Obviously MK3 has helped. We can "spam" cheap jacks. 2-3 might get shot off board but not necessarily all 7. Don't get me wrong. This isn't Female Doging about cygnar. D) Funny - this isn't a thread about Cygnar. It was about the SECOND list. As noted here (and elsewhere?) I fell pretty decent about Cygnar with my B3 list. Even more so with 2 bokurs. Even more so when someone mentioned the "fun" trick of putting the target (Ruin?) that dynamo likely wants to shoot at >2 inches but <3 from a shield guard to largely shut down the "multi-first" shots. E) And thus my conclusion - for what i WANT my second list to do Vlad 1 with 6 rockets, the fun carriage and 3-4 Juggers seems just about perfect. Would I play it into Cygnar? Not in a fat chance unless someone didn't bring dudes be gone. Even then I doubt I would unless I could get 3 hills and laugh at RAT 5 Lances. Even then probably not. But into MENOTH with the three juggers that works. Sure he can sing Passage. So I feat and Send the Juggers on a 12 inch threat and wreck some things. Then he battle's back. Then I shoot the shit out of the rest of them. Bit worried (not much) about the iridians digging in but the WGI can help and/or there are only SO many things he can kill and while 3 man CRAs are not GREAT into the Iridians (need 9s) not horrible. It isn't GREAT against Cryx but if we really start to see the pirate boat I can always go out of theme and drop the fun carriage for a set of Spray ponies (indeed, might be good also if the Iridians are going to be mucking things up) |
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Post by Voodoogk on Mar 30, 2017 23:24:28 GMT
I run a similar (more shooting oriented) list for vlad 1 a lot. It's weakness is always going to be stealth/menoth/shieldguard/sacpawn. 3 juggernauts is not going to make up the problem of having half of your army's abilities being ignored for most of the game. and as you said the way to fix that is to go out of theme, but when that costs sacpawn and probably 14 points of free models, the cost of outriders is something like 40 points.. hard to justify. I think you can count on wg with joe and snp being a match for idrians though, provided you can get them in range with jack screen or windwall. I think your issue is he's not going to have to battle to kill you with things like knights exemplar and vengers.
Does your b3 list have snipers? one of the axioms I've learned with a constant menoth opponent is they hate widowmakers. But even without them, my B3 has been my best menoth drop really. I don't really try to get fancy with him, just make sure you trade up on your jack fights, try to get 2-3 jacks with butcher himself and usually you have the tools to come out on top. Note I said tools though, it comes down to play with menoth every game... almost to the point that I'm not sure caster/army matters as much as just knowing the game better than they do. The Khador Menoth match is interesting because you're playing with an army that doesn't like a lot of tricks, and you're playing against an army that doesn't allow them. So against a good player it's almost always going to come down to a grind.
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Post by sand20go on Mar 30, 2017 23:46:50 GMT
I run a similar (more shooting oriented) list for vlad 1 a lot. It's weakness is always going to be stealth/menoth/shieldguard/sacpawn. 3 juggernauts is not going to make up the problem of having half of your army's abilities being ignored for most of the game. and as you said the way to fix that is to go out of theme, but when that costs sacpawn and probably 14 points of free models, the cost of outriders is something like 40 points.. hard to justify. I think you can count on wg with joe and snp being a match for idrians though, provided you can get them in range with jack screen or windwall. I think your issue is he's not going to have to battle to kill you with things like knights exemplar and vengers. Does your b3 list have snipers? one of the axioms I've learned with a constant menoth opponent is they hate widowmakers. But even without them, my B3 has been my best menoth drop really. I don't really try to get fancy with him, just make sure you trade up on your jack fights, try to get 2-3 jacks with butcher himself and usually you have the tools to come out on top. Note I said tools though, it comes down to play with menoth every game... almost to the point that I'm not sure caster/army matters as much as just knowing the game better than they do. The Khador Menoth match is interesting because you're playing with an army that doesn't like a lot of tricks, and you're playing against an army that doesn't allow them. So against a good player it's almost always going to come down to a grind. 1) Menoth v. Butcher 3. I think this almost entirely hinges on presence (or absence) of the Book. I DO have snipers - and so I have some ways of dealing with it. But you REALLY want to be able to impending doom with Butcher to get the things to you. It can take up to 8 shots to get ride of the book if he has Rhovan's 2 dudes and another. With Harby even WORSE. So while I really do agree that absent the book you are golden, WITH it advantage turns to the zealot faction. 2) 3 Jacks. I don't agree. There are 2 issues. First, do your juggernaughts (because honestly we are talkign Juggers for the best 12 point jack EVER) do enough work on THEIR turn to make a difference. That means cortex removed, systems wrecked, outright jacks destroyed. If not, big problem. But if they get AT LEAST their points back (or more) than we are good. Why? Because it will be hard for menoth to get YOUR juggers destroyed WITHOUT singing battle. So if he does THAT then you have those 6 massive rocket shoots, and the CRA's to further destroy what your juggers did not. Sure, are their tricks? Yes. It isn't a done deal by any means. If he can retaliate on your jacks effectively and STILL sing passage you are horribly screwed. But I think this is OK. At the BAREST of BAREST you hopefully removed the jack screens effectively on your turn and can go shoot choir while you wait for passage to drop. 3) Again Menoth dude spam I think I have come down on the side of at least SEEING if Vlad1 and WGI can hit things hard enough and often enough to force Harby to be careful. It isn't at all for certain but at some point she has to get worried about Marytering too much - and having to blow most/all of her stack the next turn to heal back up. |
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Post by CodFather on Mar 31, 2017 7:48:31 GMT
Biggest issue I see with vlad1 into menoth is amon. Amon hits hard enough to take the alpha from your jacks, kill your jacks in response and still sing passage on his jacks. So unless you can kill the choir, I think you're boned.
And with the meta how it is, the likelihood of seeing amon in a competitive menoth pairing is pretty high.
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Post by smoothcriminal on Mar 31, 2017 10:47:15 GMT
Book is not the only problem against Amon for B3. There's also a no push allowed upkeep.
I've yet to see a Khador list that would be favored going into Amon. You can win, but it's always a struggle.
Vlad1 is weak even against Reclaimer and gets completely crushed by their jackspam, he's a bad Menoth drop.
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Post by sand20go on Mar 31, 2017 13:46:39 GMT
Book is not the only problem against Amon for B3. There's also a no push allowed upkeep. I've yet to see a Khador list that would be favored going into Amon. You can win, but it's always a struggle. Vlad1 is weak even against Reclaimer and gets completely crushed by their jackspam, he's a bad Menoth drop. The upkeep is why you send Ruin in as well. Now it depend on Which jack has it on them and how they are positioned but it can be knocked off. Disagree about Vlad1 but we will see - remember (post 1) what I need is something to take on the jank (and that is what it is) of our current Menoth meta players who are playing Reclaimer 2 with 36 errants (and the partner in menoth crime that has Harby with 18 knights exemplar). You have to have volume of attacks. Sadly no iffs ands or butts about it. Amon matters and surely will at KC is what it is (and I think the right approach there is to remember that Amon has to play a bit like Hark - bricked up. Try to win on scenario by forcing him to divide and hard flanking. Sad part about Menoth is that we have the best anti-menoth drop in the game (Kossites killing Choir) but fitting them in for that specialized roll is tough. Wish this seasons ADR was a bit better..... |
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