How not to play

I played a few games today at my LGS, and I wanted to write up an aftermath for one of them because I felt like it was really challenging, and while I did a lot of things well I also screwed up royally at points. I may end up putting together a full battle report later, but I just wanted to get my ideas down since I think it'll help me learn from the experience  The list I was playing was my typical Saeryn list with one exception: I was proxying my Carnivean as Proteus. I really want to like this guy since he's a character version of my favorite beast, and I thought he might do well in my Saeryn list since I have the Blackfrost Shard to help with the normal complaint that he's pillow fisted. For reference, here's the list:

Saeryn
-Proteus
-Scythean
-Shredder
-Shredder
Striders + UA
Blackfrost Shard
2 Spell Martyrs

My opponent was playing Cryx, and I'm starting to understand why everyone hates playing against them. While they don't have anything crazy powerful, each caster seems to be able to layer buffs in a way that makes fighting against them truly painful. This game against Epic Goreshade was no exception:

Goreshade the Cursed
-Leviathan
-Skarlock Thrall
Full Bane Knights
Min Bane Thralls
Min Bane Thralls
Min Bane Thralls
Bane Lord Tartarus

Hordes of infantry, my worst match up  Worse still, I know from the get-go I'm not going to be able to test out Proteus against heavies as there's only one. The Blackfrost Shard is also going to struggle to pull their weight since Ice Cage and Kiss of Lyliss  aren't going to be effective on single-wound infantry. Still, at least I have Blightbringer and Saeryn's feat, and it seems like a good chance to try to figure this match up out.

To the right side directly in front of my deployment zone is a hill with a forest on it, so I decide to do try a refused flank strategy by setting up my entire force in the right corner, causing his army to come at me piecemeal as the units directly across from me show up before the ones on the opposite side of the board. The forest should also help me block charges while I pick off a few guys from range. Or at least that was the plan until he put Occulation on the Bane Knights so everything but Goreshade, the Leviathan, and the Skarlock Thrall had Stealth. So much for my Striders making their points back... All told about 25 points of my army is functioning at half strength or less off the bat. Really wishing I had my Carnivean right about now!

Despite how horrendous the match up looks the Refused Flank worked pretty well. I Blightbringer the units that clump up near the right edge of the board to get around the forest, and keep my Striders up front so I can take shots and Reform back if he wanders too close. His Leviathan shoots out one of my Shredders, and though Tartarus wanders close to Proteus I can't punish him thanks to Sudden Death, an upkeep that grants him Countercharge. Since it triggers from 6" away, getting close enough to shoot him means eating a 4 dice blow, definitely not worth it. Have I mentioned I miss my Carnivean yet? I'm so flustered about what to do with Proteus now that he can't kill Tartarus that I forget to rile him when he ends his movement, leaving me short on fury and forcing me to cut.

Overall though things aren't that bad. He uses Vengence and walks a few Bane Knights through the forest to attack my Striders, but struggles to hit their high DEF. Meanwhile the forces from the far side of the board are reaching me by running, but they are close enough to Proteus that he can take several of them out. On the upside, my opponent moves Goreshade up to take advantage of his Elite Cadre ability, bringing him close enough for me to trample or charge the Scythean into him. To make things safer I feat first, but despite using Blightbringer and charging Saeryn in I can't quite clear a charge lane. Here's where I make my massive blunder. Rather than settling for a trample and using my feat to protect me, I try to Hellfire the last enemy out of the way, which fails to hit on snake eyes, leaving me with no fury. I end up trampling my Scythean, and he manages to seriously injure Goreshade with one fully boosted hit. I'm actually in great shape here: I'm all but immune to his army and his badly injured Warcaster is in melee with one of my heavies. Or at least I would be, except his Leviathan as Phantom Hunter and can see me through the forest. Though he boosts and rolls well I should be able to take the damage from the first shot - if I hadn't had to cut for 4 because I forgot to rile Proteus.

The loss doesn't feel any better in hindsight. Yes, it was a bad matchup, but the refused flank and my opponent's attempts to break it by playing aggressively gave me a great opportunity to win, and thanks to my mistakes I managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Ah well, there's always next time...

Hex Hunters Painted

What, 2 posts in 1 day!? Normally I try to space these out, but I'm really excited to finally show off my most recent painting project: the Hex Hunters!

I've been working on these guys for almost a month now - I'd forgotten how tough it was to paint an entire unit. I started out by batch painting the skin blue and the leather areas brown before breaking down and finishing each one individually, which ended up being a lot more fun. On the upside next on my plate is my Succubus, so I'm excited to move on to that, especially since its one of the few models I have left. Anyway, I've rambled enough for today consider the earlier post, so I'll just leave you with a picture of the Hex Hunters with the next Warlock I'm using for another site's battle report.

Enjoy, because they hopefully won't be this close again - I've already failed that abomination check once!

Learning from Losing

This past weekend Gamescape in San Francisco was hosting a tournament. This is the third one I've gone to there, and both the previous times had similar trends: I went 2-2, and got assassinated on turn 2 in game 2. My goal for this tournament was to win at least 3 games, while avoid getting assassinated. Spoiler alert: neither of these happened. Still, I think I learned a lot from the experiance, and thought I'd write up a quick summary to organize my thoughts.

Since I was really trying to win, I decided to go with my two best casters, Saeryn and Epic Thagrosh. I know I'm supposed to be sworn off them for the next few months, but I really don't feel comfortable enough with any of my other Warlocks to take them to a tournament and expect to win. I played my standard lists:

Saeryn, Omen of Everblight
* Carnivean
* Scythean
* Shredder
* Shredder
Blackfrost Shard
Blighted Nyss Striders
* Blighted Nyss Striders Officer & Musician
2 Spell Martyrs

Reinforcements:
Nephilim Soldier
The Forsaken

Thagrosh, the Messiah
* Carnivean
* Scythean
* Shredder
* Shredder
* Shredder
* Shredder
Full Blighted Nyss Hex Hunters
2 Spell Martyrs

Reinforcements:
Nephilim Soldier
The Forsaken

My first match was against Alex, the player who assassinated me last tournament with Rahn's feat. This time though, he was bringing Skorne. As it was a control zone scenario (SR 2012 #9, Outflank, Outfight, Outlast), I went with Saeryn, as her feat is pretty mean for controlling zones. He went with Master Ascetic Naaresh:

Master Ascetic Naaresh
* Molik Karn
* Bronzeback Titan
* Archidon
Full Nihilators
Min Paingiver Beast Handlers
Tyrant Commander & Standard Bearer

Reinforcements:
Min Venator Reivers & UA

I'm really annoyed with myself for this game, since I was hungover and made numerous misplays which cost me the game. I was doing well early on since his Archidon failed a charge against my Carnivean by less than half an inch, allowing me to retaliate by killing it with my Scythean before moving him into the right zone and feating while the Striders held off the Iron Fleshed Nihilators and Venator Reivers on the left. However, that turn I forgot to activate my Carnivean, whose spray would really have helped next turn. He responded by feating as well for the armor, and had Molik Karn go after the Blackfrost Shard, but he rolled terribly to hit and end up stuck out front. My Scythean then dropped the Bronzeback to 13 hp - if only I had just a little more damage, say from the Carnivean's spray, I'd be ok taking hits from it since Spiny Growth would have a pretty good shot of knocking out an aspect if he tried to kill me. To make matters worse, I also forgot about my reinforcements, and the Nephilim Soldier definitely could have crippled out the BB even with +3 ARM. As it stood I had my Carnivean move up to finish it off, but ended up leaving Molik Karn unscathed - a costly mistake, as he then trampled up to Saeryn and finished her off. So much for not getting assassinated...

My next match was against the Blindwater Congretation, played by Ben, the guy whose won all the other tournaments I've been to at Gamescape. Though he won the first round and I lost, he was paired down and I was paired up, giving me hope that if I did well I could still place. He decided to go with Caliban the Gravewalker's Theme Force, Bad Religion:

Calaban, the Gravewalker
* Blackhide Wrastler
* Bull Snapper
Full Gatormen Posse
Min Gatormen Posse
Min Farrow Bone Grinders
Wrong Eye & Snapjaw
Gatorman Witch Doctor
Feralgeist

After losing because I was unfocused last game, I tried to put my all into this game. Unfortunately, my dice disagreed. Going with Epic Thagrosh, I had my Carnivean charge behind an obstacle to spray Snapjaw while under Spiny Growth and Dragon's Blood. He tried to respond by charging past it and attacking me with his reach tail, but POW 14 meant he just ended up leaving himself exposed while doing very little damage to me. This is where things went wrong. Despite only needing 6's, my Scythean missed 3 of his 6 attacks. Not a big deal, I sent two Shredders up to finish the badly wounded Snapjaw. Even with boosted damage at dice-9, all 4 attacks failed to do a single point of damage. I had Thagrosh spray into the melee, reducing SJ to 2 HP and setting him on fire. Thinking I had him, I then had my Carnivean walk over and throw the beast at Wrong Eye. To make sure I finished him, I boosted the damage roll...and only managed an 8 when I needed a 9 for the kill. He responded by putting Parasite on my Carnivean and killing it with Snapjaw, as well as damaging my Scythean badly. Realizing I needed to go for the assassination, I ran my Shredders and Scythean up into Calaban under Manifest Destiny and my feat - and failed to do even a single point of damage across all 4 beasts. So much for MD helping out bad rolls. I almost had another shot when he poured almost everything he had into my Scythean. He was finally forced to sacrifice a gator to his Witch Doctor, and even then only managed the kill since Parasite was up. While I'm really annoyed at my dice for betraying me so badly, it was nice to play a solid game against a really good opponent.

My third game was against Cryx, led by Lich Lord Terminus:

Lich Lord Terminus
* Harrower
Full Bane Thralls
Full Revenant Crew
Min Blackbane's Ghost Raiders
Bane Lord Tartarus
Captain Rengrave

While this was a reinforcements match, he forgot to bring his in, so I don't remember what they were. I ended up playing Epic Thagrosh, meaning the battle featured two large based casters, both the highest-ranking individuals available to their armies. This battle was tricky because he had two units that could revive themselves. I managed to snipe out Blackbane and Tartarus early, but unfortunately my Carnivean missed a crucial shot on the Revenant Crew leader, meaning a large portion of the unit would come back next turn and worse, my Carnivean was pretty far ahead of the rest of my army. Fortunately, my opponent misjudged how fragile he was and sent Terminus in, who barely managed to scratch him thanks to Dragon's Blood and Spiny Growth. In return, the Carnivean ate his face. I'm really starting to love the DB/SG combo - I can't wait to try it on the Archangel, even if thats going to be 30+points!

My final game was against a Retribution player with possibly my worst matchup: lots and lots of infantry:

Lord Arcanist Ossyan
* Chimera
Full Dawnguard Sentinels
* Dawnguard Sentinel Officer & Standard
Full Houseguard Halberdiers
* Houseguard Halberdiers Officer & Standard
Full Mage Hunter Strikeforce
* Mage Hunter Commander
Ghost Sniper
Ghost Sniper
Arcanist

3 full units, complete with UAs. Man I wish I had Kallus right about now. Lacking that, I used Saeryn, hoping some well-placed Blightbringers would help turn the tide, particularly if I would get rid of his Sentinels, his best way of dealing with my heavies. This was a bloody matchup: I managed to deal some pretty serious damage as he moved his force up the board, but Quicken helped them arrive mostly intact, and he did pretty decent damage to my Scythean with the few remaining Sentinels and some Halberdier CMAs when I forgot to feat. Still it allowed me to drop a massive Blightbringer that killed ~8 models. The Blackfrost Shard ended up doing pretty well, as without any heavy targets to Ice Cage/Kiss of Lyliss, they ran around picking off annoying models with Weaponmaster and Ice Bolt, including both Ghost Snipers and the Arcanist. Eventually it was down to my Carnivean, half a unit of Striders, and my Spell Martyrs against the Chimera and Mage Hunters. Unfortunately he was able to use his feat and all the firepower he had left to finish off my heavy, which pretty much sealed my fate as I was out of beasts. Looking back I really should have run my Shredders into his force for Blightbringer as they advanced, as not only would I have done decent damage, but I also would have prevented him from charging my Scythean with so many models at once. Its been a while since I've played Saeryn, and not using her for so long taught me a few things. Of the casters I play, she is by far the worst once her beasts are gone. Thagrosh, Kallus, and even Lylyth can fight pretty well on their own, but Saeryn has terrible combat stats, and can no longer use Blightbringer without a beast to target.

So I ended up going 1-3, my worst record yet. On the upside, I learned a lot about my force and what to focus on; I'll definitely remember to practice, particularly with bringing in reserves, before next time. I'm also realizing that while Saeryn used to by my #1 caster, I think that title has been passed to Epic Thagrosh. The +4 ARM combo is so potent that often, my opponents will just ignore the beast that has it. In the meantime, I'm probably going to set both these casters aside until the next tournament. After all, if avoiding Saeryn helped me figure out Epic Thagrosh, maybe setting them both aside will help me figure out my other Warlocks!

Return to PAX

Hope everyone's enjoying their labor day weekend - at least those of you in the U.S. anyway. I'm taking a bit of breather after coming back from PAX. It was kind of a double header for me, since I used to live up in the Seattle area and got to see a bunch of my old friends and gaming buddies.

Friday evening I went to Gamma Ray Games and had a pretty solid match against one of the Cygnar players I used to battle frequently. I'm particularly proud of the match since I've been having a lot of trouble with Cygnar lately. My guys just get shot up before I have a chance to engage, and I've been starting to think about picking up some Ravagores or one of the shootier casters like Epic Lylyth or Epic Vayl to help, but I decided to try another tack first: driving my army forward to win on scenario. I actually managed to pull it off  this game; he realized near the end of one of his turns that the only model he had in the zone was out of command (and thus not contesting), so he tried to send Epic Caine at me for the assassination even though I had 6 fury on Epic Thagrosh. He realized he couldn't even use the last of his focus to teleport out since otherwise I would just end my turn immediately and take scenario. This was after he decimated my Hex Hunters on the first few turns. Gun Mages are brutal when they can see through Stealth.

I also managed to pick up some new additions. First up is a model I've been planning on getting for a while, the Succubus:

I'm really excited to have her since she should really help with my lower fury Warlocks like Kallus and Rhyas, who often don't have enough fury to upkeep, cast spells, and save some for transfers. She not only helps with upkeeps, but also lets me put Tenacity on my casters for a little more survivablility, which is something I've always struggled with.

The other thing I picked up isn't directly related to my army, but still kind of cool:

 Its a really good book, and I'd highly recommend it to anyone interested in the Iron Kingdoms. The combat system feels really familiar, since its basically the same as Warmachine/Hordes. While I'm probably going to end up as a player in a game, I kind of want to run my own. While the enemies section is a bit thin, I'm thinking that almost any model from WM/H can be used since the stat line is almost the same. It'd be cool for my Legion to have some more heroic adversaries to consume!