Round One: vs Sean Williams
Scenario: Spread the Net
In the scrum, we allow challenges to be issued in round one. Sean is a fellow Cryx player in the local meta. He recently has started really focusing on trying to improve his play, and I believe the results are showing. The lists he plays are very strong and he is getting very good with the Skarre1 Dark Host list. He ended up issuing a challenge to me and I accepted. Here are the lists we brought:
Mine:
[Asphyxious 3] Asphyxious the Hellbringer [+24] - Black Industries
- Nightwretch [0(7)]
- Nightwretch [0(7)]
- Ripjaw [0(7)]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
Machine Wraith [2]
Soul Trapper [1]
Black Ogrun Ironmongers [6]
[Venethrax 1] Lich Lord Venethrax [+26] - Slaughter Fleet Raiders
- Deathripper [6]
- Kharybdis [17]
- Scavenger [7]
- Scavenger [7]
- Satyxis Blood Priestess [4]
Axiara Wraithblade [0(6)]
General Gerlak Slaughterborn [0(6)]
Misery Cage [2]
Misery Cage [2]
Ragman [4]
Black Ogrun Smog Belchers (max) [15]
Blighted Trollkin Marauders (min) [9]
Bloodgorgers (max) [15]
- Jussika Bloodtongue [5]
The Devil's Shadow Mutineers [8]
Sean:
[Asphyxious 1] Iron Lich Asphyxious [+28] - Scourge of the Broken Coast
- Corruptor [14]
- Nightwretch [7]
- Nightwretch [7]
Axiara Wraithblade [0(6)]
Eilish Garrity, the Occultist [5]
Satyxis Raider Captain [0(4)]
Satyxis Raider Captain [4]
Severa Blacktide [0(6)]
Satyxis Blood Witches (min) [8]
- Satyxis Blood Hag [4]
Satyxis Gunslingers [7]
Satyxis Gunslingers [7]
Satyxis Raiders (max) [16]
- Satyxis Raider Sea Witch [4]
Satyxis Raiders (max) [16]
- Satyxis Raider Sea Witch [4]
[Skarre 1] Pirate Queen Skarre [+28] - Dark Host
- Inflictor [13]
- Stalker [8]
- Stalker [8]
- Skarlock Thrall [0(4)]
Bane Lord Tartarus [0(6)]
Darragh Wrathe [9]
Necrotech [2]
Scrap Thrall (3) [2]
Bane Knights (max) [15]
Bane Riders (max) [20]
Bane Warriors (min) [10]
- Bane Warrior Officer & Standard [0(5)]
Wraith Engine [15]
I was quite concerned about this matchup. I knew that my only choice was to drop Venethrax, as Lich3 with nine slayers is a bad look into either of his lists. Banes are made to melt heavies and they wouldn't care much about the unyielding bonus and his feat would make sure at least half my heavies left the board on a single turn. At the same time, I wasn't keen on putting all those jacks out for satyxis to feedback Lich3 to death. This meant slaughter fleet had to hit the board and it was all a matter of what he would drop into me.
I felt that if he dropped the satyxis theme, I matched up very well and a couple bloodgorgers can finish a unit of raiders. At the same time, the smog belchers would put up a cloud wall on one flank and I can really focus down one flank at a time. On the other hand, the bloodgorgers have a rough time going into banes. The math on getting to beserk and overtake through banes is not super favorable unless I get a mortality out there and on Skarre's feat turn getting any work done is tough. Further, my list does not have a good way to deal with the wraith engine until it actually attacks and loses incorporeal.
I have been trying to give Sean advice for some time now and we talked a week ahead of our game. I told him how I was viewing the matchup and that Skarre was the better drop into what I was playing. I also know that he has much more play experience with Skarre than the Lich1 list, and I usually will steer someone toward playing what they are more comfortable with unless it's a bad matchup. The end result was that I dropped Venethrax and he dropped Skarre1.
Deployment: Sean won the roll and chose the side with the trench, allowing me to deploy first. I deployed the bloodgorgers on my far left flank with the marauders just to their right. Gerlack was placed behind these two units. Kharybdis was to the right of the marauders, with Axiara behind it. Next was Venethrax, who was relatively centered in the board. The smog belchers were to the right of Venethrax. One scavenger was on the right flank, next to the smog belchers (but still more towards the center of the board) and the other was behind Venethrax. The deathripper was behind the smog belchers. The Devil's Shadow was spread out across my back line and Ragman and the blood priestess were both near Venethrax. My hope was to have Venethrax get lamentation up and have him stand behind the house to discourage Skarre from casting dark guidance every turn. The smog belchers were going to create a cloud wall to protect the right flank and Kharybdis and the scavengers would have to do the work while staying safe behind the wall.
Sean deployed the wraith engine on the far right flank with the bane riders to its left. Darragh Wrathe was placed to the left of the bane riders. The necrotech was in the center, to Darragh Wrathe's left. To Skarre's left was the inflictor. The bane knights were on Skarre's left, with the bane warriors out on the left flank. Tartarus was in the middle of the bane knight unit. The necrotech was placed behind the inflictor. The skarlock and scrap thralls were hanging out in the center behind his lines.
I placed one misery cage in the center zone, behind the house. I pushed it a little to the left to leave room for Venethrax to stand. The other misery cage was placed out on the far right edge of my rectangle zone. I saw how the wraith engine was lined up and hoped that it would help me contest by providing another body in that zone.
Sean deployed one stalker behind each of his clouds.
Top 1: Venethrax cast lamentation and charged the wraith engine to get further forward. The smog belchers ran forward around the burning cloud. The right scavenger ran into the right rectangle zone and the other ran to be behind the smog belchers. Axiara ran to be next to the burning cloud and the Devil's Shadow all ran towards the right, staying towards the back. I was hoping they could put some pressure on the wraith engine. The arc node and Kharybdis both ran to be to Venethrax's left and the blood priestess ran up behind him. Ragman ran to a position behind the arc node. The blood gorgers ran forward, along with the marauders who ran around the rubble. Gerlack stayed behind the troll units, ready to get onto the flag next turn. My turn ended with 53 minutes on the clock.
Bottom 1: As one would expect, he essentially ran his entire force forward, while keeping things back out of charge ranges. Skarre ran forward, ending a couple inches outside the circle zone. After debating for a long time, the wraith engine moved forward a bit, but kept itself outside of range for the smog belchers to aim and shoot it. The bane riders ran forward, one standing in the right cloud, one on the hill, one behind the right flag and one behind the forest on the right. The final bane rider stood to the right of Skarre. Darragh Wrathe ran to position on the hill. The inflictor ran forward to stand just behind Skarre. The bane warriors ran forward, getting three into the left rectangle zone and the others positioned behind. The officer stood far back and the standard bearer stood further behind the officer. Tartarus ran forward to be a couple inches behind the acid pit in the left zone. The bane knights ran forward and grouped up into two pods of three and a pod of four with each pod standing base to base with each other. The necrotech ran behind the inflictor. The left stalker moved into the left cloud and the right stalker stood just inside the forest on the right. Finally, the scrap thralls all moved forward slightly and the skarlock thrall moved up and cast ritual sacrifice on one. Sean rolled a 2 for the additional focus. He ended his turn with 45 minutes on the clock.
Top 2: I knew he had kept his army out of any of my charge ranges, and I was going to have to eat the charge on the left. Venethrax upkept lamentation for free and held onto all his focus. The smog belchers went first, moving forward to take their shots and establish the cloud wall. It was after I moved the first two that I realized I failed to activate Axiara first and they would not get to reposition back behind the clouds. I took my shots and failed to damage anything. Kharybdis moved up to stand behind the left side of the wall. Both scavengers ran foward to stand behind the cloud wall. The Devil's Shadow ran into a group behind the burning cloud and the deathripper ran to stand behind them. Axiara and Ragman both ran forward to stand near Kharybdis. Venethrax camped all his focus and moved up to the building to project his lamentation aura. He also popped his feat, catching all Skarre's jacks so they could not be allocated focus. I knew next turn would be Skarre's feat turn and I hoped that preventing focus allocation could help blunt the damage his jacks would do. The marauders walked forward and took a pair of shots at different banes, but all the shots missed. The blood gorgers ran forward, putting two into the zone as a sacrificial offering and hoping to block charge lanes. I had forgotten that banes are ghostly and don't care about free strikes. Finally, Gerlack moved forward to stand on the left flag. My turn ended with 44 minutes on the clock.
Bottom 2: He knew this would be his feat turn and took some time to plan things out accordingly. By preventing his jacks from getting focus allocation, I was able to prevent any thoughts of trying to assassinate Venethrax. Skarre activated and her additional focus from the previous turn brought her to eight total. She moved forward slightly and used all eight to cast dark guidance inside Venethrax's lamentation range. She also popped her feat, taking six damage. She feated on both her stalkers, the wraith engine, two of her bane riders and herself. The wraith engine ran forward into the right rectangle zone. The right stalker moved forward and jumped behind the cloud wall, using its initial attacks to kill two of the smog belchers. The left stalker walked forward and jumped to get behind the blood priestess and misery cage. The stalker proceeded to kill both of those targets. The bane riders activated and received the press forward order. Two charged and killed smog belchers while the remaining three ran into their positions. Darragh Wrathe moved over onto the right flag. The skarlock cast ritual sacrifice again, and once again rolled a 2 for the additional focus. The bane knights ran forward, putting a pair forward base to base and then forming two groups of three and a group of two. Tartarus walked forward a couple inches. The bane warriors activated and received the press forward order. One ran around the left edge of the blood gorgers to contest the left flag. The rest charged bloodgorgers. The two bloodgorgers put in the left zone died and the officer and standard bearer continued to hang back. The inflictor walked to stand just inside the left zone and the necrotech stood behind a cloud near the inflictor. Sean ended his turn with 24 minutes on the clock. Sean scored two control points (right flag, left zone) and I scored none. Scoring opened with me down 0-2.
Top 3: This was going to be a rough turn to try and get any work done. Since the wraith engine was still incorporeal, I decided I would have to ignore it for at least one turn, as I had no chance of killing it at ARM 23. Venethrax upkept lamentation and allocated two focus to Kharybdis and two to one of the scavengers. Venethrax activated and burned all his focus trying to kill the stalker next to him. He took out its cortex, but left it alive. The blood gorgers received the press forward order. All the bane warriors except the officer and standard were killed. The two bane knights that stood farther forward than the rest also died. Gerlack continued to stand on the flag. The marauders moved up and took a couple shots. The bane knights were again missed, but Tartarus took a couple points of damage and got lit on fire. The last smog belcher moved forward and took a swing at the bane rider engaging it, but failed to do any damage. The unpainted scavenger moved forward and did a little damage, but failed to kill it. The primed scavenger attacked the stalker in front of it, but only took out one arm system. The Devil's Shadow took shots at the same stalker and put a couple more points of damage on it, but it remained functional. Axiara charged a bane rider and killed it, then became incorporeal. Kharybdis killed the other bane rider standing near Axiara. The death ripper ran near Venethrax to try and prevent a landing zone for the functional stalker to jump into. My turn ended with 23 minutes on the clock. I scored the left flag and Sean scored the right flag, putting the score at 1-3.
Bottom 3: Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture after this turn, so I am going to try and recall from memory as best I can. Skarre allocated two focus to the functional stalker. The skarlock cast ritual sacrifice to reroll the additional focus die and rolled a four this time. (note: I have since read an infernal ruling that this does not work this way. The spell would have been cast, but it does nothing and you do not get to reroll your additional focus die). Skarre activated and the additional focus gave her enough to cast dark guidance inside the lamentation zone again. She moved forward a little more, into the circle zone. The wraith engine did nothing, as Sean wanted it to remain incorporeal. The stalker without a cortex tried to attack Venethrax, but only did a few points of damage. The bane riders ran to try and block charge lanes. The first one ran to stand in front of Axiara and triggered counter charge on Kharybdis, which killed the bane rider. The remaining two ran to stand next to Skarre. Tartarus charged and killed a bloodgorger, creating a new bane warrior. The bane warriors popped their mini-feat and brought two more back into play. The inflictor walked forward and killed a marauder and blood gorger. The bane knights ran, with one running through a hole I left in my lines to contest the left flag. The rest formed a wall to try and protect Skarre. Darragh Wrathe continued to stand on the right flag. Finally, the functional stalker walked a little and jumped to be next to Venethrax. The primed scavenger triggered counter charge on the stalker and killed it. (note: this was also played incorrectly. Counter charge is triggered at the end of movement, before the jump takes place. In this case, I do not believe it changed the final outcome, but it's good to keep these rules correct for future reference). Sean ended his turn with 8 minutes on the clock. He scored two more points (right flag, left zone) and contested my flag to prevent me from scoring. This put me down 1-5.
Top 4: I forgot to take a picture because I was so focused on the assassination run on Skarre. Venethrax let lamentation drop and loaded Kharybdis to max focus. Venethrax activated and cast terminal velocity, then tried to go to work on that damaged stalker again, but failed to kill it. I ran the last smog belcher to contest the right flag. I decided to have Axiara charge Skarre so she could get forward and apply gang fighter for Kharybdis. After Axiara I was going to do some cleanup around the board to try and get more control points and army points. However, Axiara decided that she was done with this game and finished Skarre with her charge. The game ended with 17 minutes on my clock. No points were scored after the assassination, putting the final control points at 1-5.
Analysis: We will start with the completely obvious: Skarre1 sucks to play against. Unless you have a list dedicated to super armor cracking, not much is going to get done on her feat turn. It's almost like she gets two alphas against most lists. For Sean, he is developing as a player and I thought he largely did well. Keeping the wraith engine incorporeal was a solid play in this matchup, as I was never going to really get enough attacks to kill it until it attacked first. His plays to run banes to contest the left flag were good and I did not see them coming. His biggest flaws were keeping Skarre so far forward and burning all her focus to cast dark guidance. After the game I told him he really didn't even need to cast dark guidance this game, as with the exception of my caster and a couple solos I didn't have anything with DEF greater than 12. There are other things he could have done differently, but I am going to start focusing on my own play at this point, and there's plenty of things to correct there.
First, I've said it in previous battle reports, but my play with Axiara is atrocious. I am effectively using her as a piece that grants tactician. I need to remember her battle plans, especially when running the smog belchers. She always needs to activate before them and grant reposition. Second, if I am going to run an army full of counter charging jacks, I need to pick my spots for them better. The two counter charges I did were not necessarily bad plays, but the Kharybdis counter charge opened the spot for Sean's stalker to try and come in on Venethrax. I got lucky that my scavenger was able to destroy it. My play with the Devil's Shadow was ok, but I really didn't get much work out of them this game. I needed them to be threatening the wraith engine, but they probably wouldn't be enough on their own to kill it. I probably could have used them better. I'm not sure about how to use Kharybdis best. I feel torn between wanting to go for crits on his spray and just having him go to town and kill stuff. In this game, not spraying worked out for me and I feel like the spray is there for very situational cases. I'm not a huge fan of trying to rely on crit effects and I'd rather just kill something.
On the side with the trolls I thought I did an ok job, if you ignore the scenario piece. I really needed to get more into the zone on each of my turns so Sean couldn't clear it out and score. I also needed to be more aware of the ability of banes to run past everything to contest my flag. I should have been scoring that left flag every turn, but I left holes open for him to get into range to contest. Credit to Sean for seeing that play and running with it when I left it open.
Finally, Venethrax himself. All he did was upkeep lamentation and try to kill a stalker. I didn't cast mortality once and I forgot to pull focus off the misery cages. Venethrax continues to be a caster that I find difficult to use. When I built this list, I was thinking that I would upkeep lamentation for free and ignore his other spells except for mortality. Part of my issue was that Venethrax kept needing to try and deal with a stalker right next to him, but the rest of my army should have been able to help out with that more. It's only one game, but I am very concerned about this list and whether it can do what I was hoping. I'm starting to lean towards the idea that Venethrax needs to be in either infernal machines or black industries. He needs a spell slave and Deathjack for additional mortalities / dead weights every turn. I will see how this list continues to play out, but I suspect that after this scrum Venethrax will not be playing in slaughter fleet for me anymore. Thanks for taking the time to read. I will be back next week with my round two battle report!
Scenario: Spread the Net
In the scrum, we allow challenges to be issued in round one. Sean is a fellow Cryx player in the local meta. He recently has started really focusing on trying to improve his play, and I believe the results are showing. The lists he plays are very strong and he is getting very good with the Skarre1 Dark Host list. He ended up issuing a challenge to me and I accepted. Here are the lists we brought:
Mine:
[Asphyxious 3] Asphyxious the Hellbringer [+24] - Black Industries
- Nightwretch [0(7)]
- Nightwretch [0(7)]
- Ripjaw [0(7)]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
- Slayer [10]
Machine Wraith [2]
Soul Trapper [1]
Black Ogrun Ironmongers [6]
[Venethrax 1] Lich Lord Venethrax [+26] - Slaughter Fleet Raiders
- Deathripper [6]
- Kharybdis [17]
- Scavenger [7]
- Scavenger [7]
- Satyxis Blood Priestess [4]
Axiara Wraithblade [0(6)]
General Gerlak Slaughterborn [0(6)]
Misery Cage [2]
Misery Cage [2]
Ragman [4]
Black Ogrun Smog Belchers (max) [15]
Blighted Trollkin Marauders (min) [9]
Bloodgorgers (max) [15]
- Jussika Bloodtongue [5]
The Devil's Shadow Mutineers [8]
Sean:
[Asphyxious 1] Iron Lich Asphyxious [+28] - Scourge of the Broken Coast
- Corruptor [14]
- Nightwretch [7]
- Nightwretch [7]
Axiara Wraithblade [0(6)]
Eilish Garrity, the Occultist [5]
Satyxis Raider Captain [0(4)]
Satyxis Raider Captain [4]
Severa Blacktide [0(6)]
Satyxis Blood Witches (min) [8]
- Satyxis Blood Hag [4]
Satyxis Gunslingers [7]
Satyxis Gunslingers [7]
Satyxis Raiders (max) [16]
- Satyxis Raider Sea Witch [4]
Satyxis Raiders (max) [16]
- Satyxis Raider Sea Witch [4]
[Skarre 1] Pirate Queen Skarre [+28] - Dark Host
- Inflictor [13]
- Stalker [8]
- Stalker [8]
- Skarlock Thrall [0(4)]
Bane Lord Tartarus [0(6)]
Darragh Wrathe [9]
Necrotech [2]
Scrap Thrall (3) [2]
Bane Knights (max) [15]
Bane Riders (max) [20]
Bane Warriors (min) [10]
- Bane Warrior Officer & Standard [0(5)]
Wraith Engine [15]
I was quite concerned about this matchup. I knew that my only choice was to drop Venethrax, as Lich3 with nine slayers is a bad look into either of his lists. Banes are made to melt heavies and they wouldn't care much about the unyielding bonus and his feat would make sure at least half my heavies left the board on a single turn. At the same time, I wasn't keen on putting all those jacks out for satyxis to feedback Lich3 to death. This meant slaughter fleet had to hit the board and it was all a matter of what he would drop into me.
I felt that if he dropped the satyxis theme, I matched up very well and a couple bloodgorgers can finish a unit of raiders. At the same time, the smog belchers would put up a cloud wall on one flank and I can really focus down one flank at a time. On the other hand, the bloodgorgers have a rough time going into banes. The math on getting to beserk and overtake through banes is not super favorable unless I get a mortality out there and on Skarre's feat turn getting any work done is tough. Further, my list does not have a good way to deal with the wraith engine until it actually attacks and loses incorporeal.
I have been trying to give Sean advice for some time now and we talked a week ahead of our game. I told him how I was viewing the matchup and that Skarre was the better drop into what I was playing. I also know that he has much more play experience with Skarre than the Lich1 list, and I usually will steer someone toward playing what they are more comfortable with unless it's a bad matchup. The end result was that I dropped Venethrax and he dropped Skarre1.
Deployment: Sean won the roll and chose the side with the trench, allowing me to deploy first. I deployed the bloodgorgers on my far left flank with the marauders just to their right. Gerlack was placed behind these two units. Kharybdis was to the right of the marauders, with Axiara behind it. Next was Venethrax, who was relatively centered in the board. The smog belchers were to the right of Venethrax. One scavenger was on the right flank, next to the smog belchers (but still more towards the center of the board) and the other was behind Venethrax. The deathripper was behind the smog belchers. The Devil's Shadow was spread out across my back line and Ragman and the blood priestess were both near Venethrax. My hope was to have Venethrax get lamentation up and have him stand behind the house to discourage Skarre from casting dark guidance every turn. The smog belchers were going to create a cloud wall to protect the right flank and Kharybdis and the scavengers would have to do the work while staying safe behind the wall.
Sean deployed the wraith engine on the far right flank with the bane riders to its left. Darragh Wrathe was placed to the left of the bane riders. The necrotech was in the center, to Darragh Wrathe's left. To Skarre's left was the inflictor. The bane knights were on Skarre's left, with the bane warriors out on the left flank. Tartarus was in the middle of the bane knight unit. The necrotech was placed behind the inflictor. The skarlock and scrap thralls were hanging out in the center behind his lines.
I placed one misery cage in the center zone, behind the house. I pushed it a little to the left to leave room for Venethrax to stand. The other misery cage was placed out on the far right edge of my rectangle zone. I saw how the wraith engine was lined up and hoped that it would help me contest by providing another body in that zone.
Sean deployed one stalker behind each of his clouds.
Top 1: Venethrax cast lamentation and charged the wraith engine to get further forward. The smog belchers ran forward around the burning cloud. The right scavenger ran into the right rectangle zone and the other ran to be behind the smog belchers. Axiara ran to be next to the burning cloud and the Devil's Shadow all ran towards the right, staying towards the back. I was hoping they could put some pressure on the wraith engine. The arc node and Kharybdis both ran to be to Venethrax's left and the blood priestess ran up behind him. Ragman ran to a position behind the arc node. The blood gorgers ran forward, along with the marauders who ran around the rubble. Gerlack stayed behind the troll units, ready to get onto the flag next turn. My turn ended with 53 minutes on the clock.
Bottom 1: As one would expect, he essentially ran his entire force forward, while keeping things back out of charge ranges. Skarre ran forward, ending a couple inches outside the circle zone. After debating for a long time, the wraith engine moved forward a bit, but kept itself outside of range for the smog belchers to aim and shoot it. The bane riders ran forward, one standing in the right cloud, one on the hill, one behind the right flag and one behind the forest on the right. The final bane rider stood to the right of Skarre. Darragh Wrathe ran to position on the hill. The inflictor ran forward to stand just behind Skarre. The bane warriors ran forward, getting three into the left rectangle zone and the others positioned behind. The officer stood far back and the standard bearer stood further behind the officer. Tartarus ran forward to be a couple inches behind the acid pit in the left zone. The bane knights ran forward and grouped up into two pods of three and a pod of four with each pod standing base to base with each other. The necrotech ran behind the inflictor. The left stalker moved into the left cloud and the right stalker stood just inside the forest on the right. Finally, the scrap thralls all moved forward slightly and the skarlock thrall moved up and cast ritual sacrifice on one. Sean rolled a 2 for the additional focus. He ended his turn with 45 minutes on the clock.
Top 2: I knew he had kept his army out of any of my charge ranges, and I was going to have to eat the charge on the left. Venethrax upkept lamentation for free and held onto all his focus. The smog belchers went first, moving forward to take their shots and establish the cloud wall. It was after I moved the first two that I realized I failed to activate Axiara first and they would not get to reposition back behind the clouds. I took my shots and failed to damage anything. Kharybdis moved up to stand behind the left side of the wall. Both scavengers ran foward to stand behind the cloud wall. The Devil's Shadow ran into a group behind the burning cloud and the deathripper ran to stand behind them. Axiara and Ragman both ran forward to stand near Kharybdis. Venethrax camped all his focus and moved up to the building to project his lamentation aura. He also popped his feat, catching all Skarre's jacks so they could not be allocated focus. I knew next turn would be Skarre's feat turn and I hoped that preventing focus allocation could help blunt the damage his jacks would do. The marauders walked forward and took a pair of shots at different banes, but all the shots missed. The blood gorgers ran forward, putting two into the zone as a sacrificial offering and hoping to block charge lanes. I had forgotten that banes are ghostly and don't care about free strikes. Finally, Gerlack moved forward to stand on the left flag. My turn ended with 44 minutes on the clock.
Bottom 2: He knew this would be his feat turn and took some time to plan things out accordingly. By preventing his jacks from getting focus allocation, I was able to prevent any thoughts of trying to assassinate Venethrax. Skarre activated and her additional focus from the previous turn brought her to eight total. She moved forward slightly and used all eight to cast dark guidance inside Venethrax's lamentation range. She also popped her feat, taking six damage. She feated on both her stalkers, the wraith engine, two of her bane riders and herself. The wraith engine ran forward into the right rectangle zone. The right stalker moved forward and jumped behind the cloud wall, using its initial attacks to kill two of the smog belchers. The left stalker walked forward and jumped to get behind the blood priestess and misery cage. The stalker proceeded to kill both of those targets. The bane riders activated and received the press forward order. Two charged and killed smog belchers while the remaining three ran into their positions. Darragh Wrathe moved over onto the right flag. The skarlock cast ritual sacrifice again, and once again rolled a 2 for the additional focus. The bane knights ran forward, putting a pair forward base to base and then forming two groups of three and a group of two. Tartarus walked forward a couple inches. The bane warriors activated and received the press forward order. One ran around the left edge of the blood gorgers to contest the left flag. The rest charged bloodgorgers. The two bloodgorgers put in the left zone died and the officer and standard bearer continued to hang back. The inflictor walked to stand just inside the left zone and the necrotech stood behind a cloud near the inflictor. Sean ended his turn with 24 minutes on the clock. Sean scored two control points (right flag, left zone) and I scored none. Scoring opened with me down 0-2.
Top 3: This was going to be a rough turn to try and get any work done. Since the wraith engine was still incorporeal, I decided I would have to ignore it for at least one turn, as I had no chance of killing it at ARM 23. Venethrax upkept lamentation and allocated two focus to Kharybdis and two to one of the scavengers. Venethrax activated and burned all his focus trying to kill the stalker next to him. He took out its cortex, but left it alive. The blood gorgers received the press forward order. All the bane warriors except the officer and standard were killed. The two bane knights that stood farther forward than the rest also died. Gerlack continued to stand on the flag. The marauders moved up and took a couple shots. The bane knights were again missed, but Tartarus took a couple points of damage and got lit on fire. The last smog belcher moved forward and took a swing at the bane rider engaging it, but failed to do any damage. The unpainted scavenger moved forward and did a little damage, but failed to kill it. The primed scavenger attacked the stalker in front of it, but only took out one arm system. The Devil's Shadow took shots at the same stalker and put a couple more points of damage on it, but it remained functional. Axiara charged a bane rider and killed it, then became incorporeal. Kharybdis killed the other bane rider standing near Axiara. The death ripper ran near Venethrax to try and prevent a landing zone for the functional stalker to jump into. My turn ended with 23 minutes on the clock. I scored the left flag and Sean scored the right flag, putting the score at 1-3.
Bottom 3: Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture after this turn, so I am going to try and recall from memory as best I can. Skarre allocated two focus to the functional stalker. The skarlock cast ritual sacrifice to reroll the additional focus die and rolled a four this time. (note: I have since read an infernal ruling that this does not work this way. The spell would have been cast, but it does nothing and you do not get to reroll your additional focus die). Skarre activated and the additional focus gave her enough to cast dark guidance inside the lamentation zone again. She moved forward a little more, into the circle zone. The wraith engine did nothing, as Sean wanted it to remain incorporeal. The stalker without a cortex tried to attack Venethrax, but only did a few points of damage. The bane riders ran to try and block charge lanes. The first one ran to stand in front of Axiara and triggered counter charge on Kharybdis, which killed the bane rider. The remaining two ran to stand next to Skarre. Tartarus charged and killed a bloodgorger, creating a new bane warrior. The bane warriors popped their mini-feat and brought two more back into play. The inflictor walked forward and killed a marauder and blood gorger. The bane knights ran, with one running through a hole I left in my lines to contest the left flag. The rest formed a wall to try and protect Skarre. Darragh Wrathe continued to stand on the right flag. Finally, the functional stalker walked a little and jumped to be next to Venethrax. The primed scavenger triggered counter charge on the stalker and killed it. (note: this was also played incorrectly. Counter charge is triggered at the end of movement, before the jump takes place. In this case, I do not believe it changed the final outcome, but it's good to keep these rules correct for future reference). Sean ended his turn with 8 minutes on the clock. He scored two more points (right flag, left zone) and contested my flag to prevent me from scoring. This put me down 1-5.
Top 4: I forgot to take a picture because I was so focused on the assassination run on Skarre. Venethrax let lamentation drop and loaded Kharybdis to max focus. Venethrax activated and cast terminal velocity, then tried to go to work on that damaged stalker again, but failed to kill it. I ran the last smog belcher to contest the right flag. I decided to have Axiara charge Skarre so she could get forward and apply gang fighter for Kharybdis. After Axiara I was going to do some cleanup around the board to try and get more control points and army points. However, Axiara decided that she was done with this game and finished Skarre with her charge. The game ended with 17 minutes on my clock. No points were scored after the assassination, putting the final control points at 1-5.
Analysis: We will start with the completely obvious: Skarre1 sucks to play against. Unless you have a list dedicated to super armor cracking, not much is going to get done on her feat turn. It's almost like she gets two alphas against most lists. For Sean, he is developing as a player and I thought he largely did well. Keeping the wraith engine incorporeal was a solid play in this matchup, as I was never going to really get enough attacks to kill it until it attacked first. His plays to run banes to contest the left flag were good and I did not see them coming. His biggest flaws were keeping Skarre so far forward and burning all her focus to cast dark guidance. After the game I told him he really didn't even need to cast dark guidance this game, as with the exception of my caster and a couple solos I didn't have anything with DEF greater than 12. There are other things he could have done differently, but I am going to start focusing on my own play at this point, and there's plenty of things to correct there.
First, I've said it in previous battle reports, but my play with Axiara is atrocious. I am effectively using her as a piece that grants tactician. I need to remember her battle plans, especially when running the smog belchers. She always needs to activate before them and grant reposition. Second, if I am going to run an army full of counter charging jacks, I need to pick my spots for them better. The two counter charges I did were not necessarily bad plays, but the Kharybdis counter charge opened the spot for Sean's stalker to try and come in on Venethrax. I got lucky that my scavenger was able to destroy it. My play with the Devil's Shadow was ok, but I really didn't get much work out of them this game. I needed them to be threatening the wraith engine, but they probably wouldn't be enough on their own to kill it. I probably could have used them better. I'm not sure about how to use Kharybdis best. I feel torn between wanting to go for crits on his spray and just having him go to town and kill stuff. In this game, not spraying worked out for me and I feel like the spray is there for very situational cases. I'm not a huge fan of trying to rely on crit effects and I'd rather just kill something.
On the side with the trolls I thought I did an ok job, if you ignore the scenario piece. I really needed to get more into the zone on each of my turns so Sean couldn't clear it out and score. I also needed to be more aware of the ability of banes to run past everything to contest my flag. I should have been scoring that left flag every turn, but I left holes open for him to get into range to contest. Credit to Sean for seeing that play and running with it when I left it open.
Finally, Venethrax himself. All he did was upkeep lamentation and try to kill a stalker. I didn't cast mortality once and I forgot to pull focus off the misery cages. Venethrax continues to be a caster that I find difficult to use. When I built this list, I was thinking that I would upkeep lamentation for free and ignore his other spells except for mortality. Part of my issue was that Venethrax kept needing to try and deal with a stalker right next to him, but the rest of my army should have been able to help out with that more. It's only one game, but I am very concerned about this list and whether it can do what I was hoping. I'm starting to lean towards the idea that Venethrax needs to be in either infernal machines or black industries. He needs a spell slave and Deathjack for additional mortalities / dead weights every turn. I will see how this list continues to play out, but I suspect that after this scrum Venethrax will not be playing in slaughter fleet for me anymore. Thanks for taking the time to read. I will be back next week with my round two battle report!
Those smog belcher dudes got fucked in the mouth. But you are dead on that dark guidance wasn't needed. The turn he cast it for 8 focus, my penis got cold.
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