Round 4: vs Nate Em
Scenario: Mirage
I was paired against Nate who brought legion to the scrum. I don't have a ton of experience against legion in mk3, and especially not against the primal terrors theme. Here are the lists we each brought.
Me:
[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]
Nate:
[Fyanna 2] Fyanna, Torment of Everblight [+28] - Primal Terrors
- Blightbringer [32]
- Golab [17]
- Ammok the Truthbearer [4]
Spell Martyr [1]
Spell Martyr [1]
Spell Martyr [1]
Blighted Ogrun Warmongers (max) [13]
- Gorag Rotteneye [0(6)]
Blighted Rotwings (max) [12]
Chosen of Everblight (max) [20]
Hellmouth [0(6)]
Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew [2]
[Thagrosh 2] Thagrosh, the Messiah [+25] - Oracles of Annihilation
- Naga Nightlurker [8]
- Neraph [12]
- Scythean [16]
- Scythean [16]
- Seraph [14]
- Shredder [4]
- Typhon [20]
Blighted Nyss Shepherd [1]
Blighted Nyss Sorceress & Hellion [0(6)]
Spell Martyr [1]
The Forsaken [0(4)]
The Forsaken [0(4)]
Farrow Valkyries [8]
I had heard bad things about primal terrors against Lich3, specifically that it's a bad matchup for Cryx. However, usually that conversation revolved around Anamag as the warlock instead of Fyanna. Those talks also discussed how Golab is almost never taken. Even still, I thought primal terrors could handle nine slayers and was likely to be his drop. I decided that I would need to play Venethrax into it. I wasn't thrilled about the matchup, but mortality is clutch against hordes in general and I thought it would be especially important against the chosen. Hopefully his feat and lamentation would be enough to swing things my way. We rolled and Nate won, electing to go first. Since my list lacks pathfinder, I chose the side of the table with less rough terrain to deal with.
Deployment: Nate deployed the warmongers centrally with Fyanna, the gobbers and Ammok behind them. The blightbringer went to their right and the chosen were to the right of the blightbringer. A spell martyr was on the far right flank. Golab was deployed to the left of the warmongers, with the rotwings to his left. The other two spell martyrs were out on the far left flank.
I deployed my arc node in the center of my deployment zone. Venethrax was to the arc node's left, with a scavenger to his left. Gerlack was behind Venethrax. The unit of bloodgorgers was placed out on the left side. To the right of the arc node, the smog belchers were deployed with Axiara, Ragman and the Devil's Shadow behind. Kharybdis was to the right of the belchers with the other scavenger to its right. Finally, the min unit of marauders was out on the right flank.
Nate deployed the hellmouth behind the house, where it would be most difficult for me to get any meaningful attacks on it. I deployed one misery cage on my side of the house and the second on the edge of the right circle zone and my rectangle zone. (I accidentally left the misery cages at home, so necrotechs were proxies for them.)
Top 1: Fyanna put admonition on Golab and iron flesh on the chosen, then moved forward. The chosen moved forward, with the front two standing just inside the right zone. The blightbringer stood to their left and the warmongers ran forward to stand to the left of the blightbringer. Ammok ran to be behind the warmongers and the gobbers took up position behind the warmongers and Fyanna. Golab ran to be just inside the left zone and the rotwings ran around and behind him. The hellmouth forgot to activate. The turn ended with 51 minutes on Nate's clock.
Bottom 1: His force largely out threatens me, so positioning and decent gun shots were going to be critical. Axiara moved forward and gave the smog belchers reposition. The smog belchers moved forward and took some shots. I believe the shots on the chosen all missed, but two hit the front group of warmongers. This triggered choking ash, which prevented the front three warmongers from behind able to run or charge. The smog belchers then repositioned back to stand behind their clouds. The right scavenger moved up to stand behind the forest, with Kharybdis standing just a little behind. I was keeping him outside of the chosen's charge range, hoping he could go in and do some work next turn. The marauders similarly moved forward very little to keep outside the chosen's charge range.
In the middle of the table, Venethrax cast lamentation and moved forward to stand just behind my objective. The arc node walked forward to be behind Venethrax. Ragman ran to stand next to Axiara and the blood priestess ran to be behind Venethrax. The Devil's Shadow stayed in the back lines and Gerlack stood behind the arc node, with the left scavenger just in front. The blood gorgers ran forward to threaten the left circle zone, but stayed outside the threat range of all his models over there. The turn ended with 46 minutes on my clock. For a turn where I mostly just moved forward, that's too long.
Top 2: Fyanna upkept both spells, which cost four due to being just inside Venethrax's lamentation aura. (Note: I believe we played that wrong. I think we were doubling it based on Fyanna being inside Venethrax's contol, but it is doubled for each spell that is inside his control. In this case, I think iron flesh would have cost double, but Golab was likely outside and so the total cost should have been three.) The hellmouth moved two tentacles forward and took some swings at the misery cage behind the house, but bad damage rolls left it with one box. The blightbringer moved up a little and took a shot at one of the middle smog belchers, boosting the hit roll. The smog belcher died and Axiara and Ragman died to boosted blast damage. I forgot that legion shooting does not care about clouds. The chosen repositioned in the right zone a little and the warmongers did similar work. The gobbers walked forward and dropped their own cloud in front of the warmongers. Golab and the rotwings stayed around the outside edge of the left zone. The turn ended with 40 minutes on Nate's clock.
Bottom 2: Now I had to go to work without two of my key solos. I was counting on Ragman for the ARM debuff and Axiara is just generally great. Venethrax upkept lamentation for free due to the blood priestess and then allocated a couple focus to the right scavenger. The left scavenger moved forward and killed one of the tentacles. The arc node walked forward just enough to get the chosen standing most forward in the zone within 10 inches. Venethrax activated, moved back a little and arced mortality onto the chosen. He also pulled the corpse off the misery cage to camp an extra focus. The right scavenger moved forward and killed the chosen that was targeted by the spell. Neither scavenger sprinted due to being inside the melee range of another model. The smog belchers moved forward and took some shots. The chosen were all affected by choking ash and I did not target the warmongers, as I did not want to grant Nate vengeance movements. The marauders moved forward to stand just inside the right zone and did a full CRA onto the chosen standing behind the wall. They hit, killed and set the next closest chosen on fire. Kharybdis continued to stand behind the forest on the right. The Devil's Shadow stood behind the cloud wall and the blood priestess moved back behind Venethrax. Gerlack stood a few inches to Venethrax's left. Finally, the blood gorgers received the press forward order. Two charged the remaining hellmouth tentacle, one charged a rotwing and the rest ran forward into the zone. The tentacle died as well as one rotwing, but the bloodgorger failed to hit the second one, ending the beserk chain before it really got going. The turn ended with 30 minutes left on my clock. We each scored our own rectangle zones, opening the scoring at 1-1.
Top 3: I kinda figured that this would be Fyanna's feat turn, and it would suck for me to get any work done on the bottom of turn 3. The chosen on fire took a few points of damage and Fyanna upkept admonition, but let iron flesh drop. The rotwings moved up and killed a bunch of blood gorgers, with the ones close enough to Golab being denied their tough rolls. Golab cast its animus, then moved forward and used overtake movement to kill several more. At the end of this, only 3 blood gorgers and Jussika were left alive. Golab then sprinted back to stand behind the front line of rotwings. The blightbringer took a shot at my objective, doing 8 damage but not killing anything with the blast damage. The warmongers charged in on the smog belchers, killing one while another made its tough check. Gorag and one warmonger charged and killed the scavenger that was forward in the right zone. The chosen advanced on the marauders and smog belchers, but only managed to kill one marauder. Fyanna moved forward and popped her feat, catching everything except the chosen. She also put iron flesh on the warmongers. The gobbers moved in front of Fyanna and dropped their cloud. The right spell martyr stood on the back edge of the right zone, while another stood on the back corner of Nate's rectangle zone and the third continued to stand behind the forest by the rotwings. The turn ended with 27 minutes on Nate's clock. He scored his rectangle zone to put me down 1-2.
Bottom 3: At this point, I was not terribly concerned about scenario as I was contesting most of the zones and I didn't think it would get too out of control. I wanted to take this turn to focus on attrition. The left zone was looking rough. I had hoped the blood gorgers would be able to beserk and overtake through the rotwings, but that was looking less and less likely. However, the right side was looking much better than I had expected. Venethrax upkept lamentation for free and filled Kharybdis with focus. The blood priestess activated first, as there was a cute interaction I wanted to try out. Ideally, I wanted to hit both the warmongers and chosen with mortality, but Venethrax couldn't handle that on his own. She attacked Morland in the back, hoping to kill which would allow her to cast a free mortality. She hit, but failed to do enough damage to kill. Venethrax activated, walking forward a little to kill the warmonger that was engaging the arc node. He then popped his feat, catching both beasts and Fyanna. He then pulled a focus off the misery cage and cast mortality on the warmongers, targeting Gorag who was not in combat. The smog belchers activated, killing one warmonger and putting some damage on another. The marauders received the press forward order. Most charged targets already in their melee range, but one was not engaged and ran around to stand behind the wall. One chosen was killed by the marauders. Kharybdis activated and used its four inch reach plus gang fighter to kill two chosen and a warmonger. Zira aimed and put a couple shots into warmongers, but failed to kill. The other Devil's Shadow members just stood still.
On the left side, The scavenger killed the remaining tentacle and sprinted back. The blood gorgers charged in on the rotwings, forgetting that Golab had admonition up. This allowed him to move back far enough to no longer be caught in Venethrax's feat. The bloodgorgers managed to kill two of the rotwings, but Fyanna's feat made sure I wasn't going to be chewing through the unit. Gerlack stood to block any potential charge lanes to Venethrax and also be protected by the scavenger's counter charge range. The turn ended with each of us scoring on our own rectangle zones, putting the score at 2-3. My turn ended with 16 minutes on the clock. I was starting to get concerned about clocking and wanted to try and speed up my future turns.
Top 4: Allowing Golab to admonition away from the feat range meant Fyanna would have some focus to work with this turn. She upkept iron flesh on the warmongers who took their vengeance moves and attacks. They killed a few smog belchers with their vengeance attacks. The blight bringer frenzied, killing a tentacle Nate had run next to it for just that purpose. The warmongers received the press forward order. One charged my arc node, but the scavenger used counter charge and killed it. Two more charged Kharybdis and Gorag charged one of the Devil's Shadow. Kharybdis took some damage but didn't lose any systems. Gorag beserked and killed two members of the Devil's Shadow and the blood priestess. The right spell martyr repositioned to stand in front of the blight bringer. Ammok stood next to the house. The rotwings and Golab killed all of the bloodgorgers except one. Fyanna recast admonition on Golab and also failed to kill that last blood gorger. Nate scored his rectangle and for destroying my objective, putting the score at 2-5. His turn ended with 14 minutes on the clock.
Bottom 4: I knew that I needed to start taking scenario more seriously now. I hoped I could start to gain ground on the right side. Killing the blightbringer would mean Nate owned the left side of the board while I owned the right. Of course, I wasn't going to be able to kill the blightbringer this turn. I hoped that I could setup next turn having Kharybdis and maybe Venethrax go in on it together. Venethrax dropped lamentation since he couldn't upkeep it for free any more. He again put focus on Kharybdis. Venethrax activated first, charging Gorag. He cast mortality on the warmongers again and then killed Gorag. Kharybdis killed the remaining warmongers. The smog belcher moved forward and shot the spell martyr in front of the blight bringer. The marauders ran towards the blight bringer, hoping to keep it from getting into the zone on Nate's next turn, but the water kept them from getting base to base, which is what was needed. The last bloodgorger stood up and killed a gobber and a spell martyr. Gerlack charged in an immediately failed to hit the first rotwing he attacked. The scavenger killed the spell martyr in the left zone and then sprinted back to the back edge. The last member of the Devil's Shadow ran to also stand on the back edge. The arc node walked forward to block Ammok's charge lane to Venethrax. We each scored our own rectangle zone and I scored the right circle, putting the score at 4-6. My turn ended with 8:26 on the clock.
Top 5: Nate decided that he had a solid assassination attempt here and thought it was a better play than continuing to press scenario. The hellmouth spawned a tentacle on my side of the house. Fyanna upkept admonition on Golab. Fyanna cast fury on the blightbringer. Golab and the rotwings killed the last blood gorger, Gerlack and the last Devil's Shadow member. The scavenger counter charged and killed a rotwing when they were charging in. The scavenger's defense kept it alive against the attacks that were incoming against it. One lone rotwing ran to be base to base with Venethrax. The tentacle charged and hit Venethrax, pulling him back to be at the corner of the house. Ammok walked around the arc node and missed an attack on Venethrax. The blightbringer charged Venethrax and missed the charge attack. He hit his first spike attack, doing a decent chunk of damage. He missed his second spike attack. He then bought and just hit his last attack, killing Venethrax to the box. The game ended with 3 minutes on Nate's clock. He scored his rectangle and I scored the right circle, putting the final score at 5-7.
Analysis: The assassination on Venethrax probably should not have been as close as it was. After the game, we realized that Venethrax should have been getting a plus two defense bonus from the house, but that would have been negated by the blightbringer's withering ash aura. Even if the assassination didn't happen, I don't know that I could have turned the game around enough. Dealing with Golab and the rotwings was going to be an issue, even if Venethrax and Kharybdis managed to bring down the blightbringer. I don't feel like I played poorly, but there are a few things I should have done differently, specifically at deployment.
The bloodgorgers aren't a good matchup into the rotwings. I needed the smog belchers to keep the chosen from charging in on me, but their aoe attacks would have been good. Also, putting the marauders on that side to try and catch rotwings on fire would have helped a bit. If I could whittle down a bunch of the rotwings so it's basically just Golab on that side it's a lot less scary. I also need to be more aware of things like the hellmouth. I didn't see that pull to put me in assassintion range of the blightbringer. I wish I could have gotten Kharybdis involved a little earlier, but I was very concerned with keeping him safe. I'm not sure if maybe trying for a crit spray on one of the early turns where it stood back would have been a decent plan.
Overall, I think slaughter fleet is a good theme for Cryx to drop into primal terrors. It has the tools to deal with lots of issues, especially if you bring a caster with mortality. That spell is just amazing. This was a really good game. I felt like I at least had a chance, even when things were going disastrously bad in the left zone. With a little better play, I think I could potentially turn this matchup around next time. As always, thanks for reading!
Scenario: Mirage
I was paired against Nate who brought legion to the scrum. I don't have a ton of experience against legion in mk3, and especially not against the primal terrors theme. Here are the lists we each brought.
Me:
[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]
Nate:
[Fyanna 2] Fyanna, Torment of Everblight [+28] - Primal Terrors
- Blightbringer [32]
- Golab [17]
- Ammok the Truthbearer [4]
Spell Martyr [1]
Spell Martyr [1]
Spell Martyr [1]
Blighted Ogrun Warmongers (max) [13]
- Gorag Rotteneye [0(6)]
Blighted Rotwings (max) [12]
Chosen of Everblight (max) [20]
Hellmouth [0(6)]
Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew [2]
[Thagrosh 2] Thagrosh, the Messiah [+25] - Oracles of Annihilation
- Naga Nightlurker [8]
- Neraph [12]
- Scythean [16]
- Scythean [16]
- Seraph [14]
- Shredder [4]
- Typhon [20]
Blighted Nyss Shepherd [1]
Blighted Nyss Sorceress & Hellion [0(6)]
Spell Martyr [1]
The Forsaken [0(4)]
The Forsaken [0(4)]
Farrow Valkyries [8]
I had heard bad things about primal terrors against Lich3, specifically that it's a bad matchup for Cryx. However, usually that conversation revolved around Anamag as the warlock instead of Fyanna. Those talks also discussed how Golab is almost never taken. Even still, I thought primal terrors could handle nine slayers and was likely to be his drop. I decided that I would need to play Venethrax into it. I wasn't thrilled about the matchup, but mortality is clutch against hordes in general and I thought it would be especially important against the chosen. Hopefully his feat and lamentation would be enough to swing things my way. We rolled and Nate won, electing to go first. Since my list lacks pathfinder, I chose the side of the table with less rough terrain to deal with.
Deployment: Nate deployed the warmongers centrally with Fyanna, the gobbers and Ammok behind them. The blightbringer went to their right and the chosen were to the right of the blightbringer. A spell martyr was on the far right flank. Golab was deployed to the left of the warmongers, with the rotwings to his left. The other two spell martyrs were out on the far left flank.
I deployed my arc node in the center of my deployment zone. Venethrax was to the arc node's left, with a scavenger to his left. Gerlack was behind Venethrax. The unit of bloodgorgers was placed out on the left side. To the right of the arc node, the smog belchers were deployed with Axiara, Ragman and the Devil's Shadow behind. Kharybdis was to the right of the belchers with the other scavenger to its right. Finally, the min unit of marauders was out on the right flank.
Nate deployed the hellmouth behind the house, where it would be most difficult for me to get any meaningful attacks on it. I deployed one misery cage on my side of the house and the second on the edge of the right circle zone and my rectangle zone. (I accidentally left the misery cages at home, so necrotechs were proxies for them.)
Top 1: Fyanna put admonition on Golab and iron flesh on the chosen, then moved forward. The chosen moved forward, with the front two standing just inside the right zone. The blightbringer stood to their left and the warmongers ran forward to stand to the left of the blightbringer. Ammok ran to be behind the warmongers and the gobbers took up position behind the warmongers and Fyanna. Golab ran to be just inside the left zone and the rotwings ran around and behind him. The hellmouth forgot to activate. The turn ended with 51 minutes on Nate's clock.
Bottom 1: His force largely out threatens me, so positioning and decent gun shots were going to be critical. Axiara moved forward and gave the smog belchers reposition. The smog belchers moved forward and took some shots. I believe the shots on the chosen all missed, but two hit the front group of warmongers. This triggered choking ash, which prevented the front three warmongers from behind able to run or charge. The smog belchers then repositioned back to stand behind their clouds. The right scavenger moved up to stand behind the forest, with Kharybdis standing just a little behind. I was keeping him outside of the chosen's charge range, hoping he could go in and do some work next turn. The marauders similarly moved forward very little to keep outside the chosen's charge range.
In the middle of the table, Venethrax cast lamentation and moved forward to stand just behind my objective. The arc node walked forward to be behind Venethrax. Ragman ran to stand next to Axiara and the blood priestess ran to be behind Venethrax. The Devil's Shadow stayed in the back lines and Gerlack stood behind the arc node, with the left scavenger just in front. The blood gorgers ran forward to threaten the left circle zone, but stayed outside the threat range of all his models over there. The turn ended with 46 minutes on my clock. For a turn where I mostly just moved forward, that's too long.
Top 2: Fyanna upkept both spells, which cost four due to being just inside Venethrax's lamentation aura. (Note: I believe we played that wrong. I think we were doubling it based on Fyanna being inside Venethrax's contol, but it is doubled for each spell that is inside his control. In this case, I think iron flesh would have cost double, but Golab was likely outside and so the total cost should have been three.) The hellmouth moved two tentacles forward and took some swings at the misery cage behind the house, but bad damage rolls left it with one box. The blightbringer moved up a little and took a shot at one of the middle smog belchers, boosting the hit roll. The smog belcher died and Axiara and Ragman died to boosted blast damage. I forgot that legion shooting does not care about clouds. The chosen repositioned in the right zone a little and the warmongers did similar work. The gobbers walked forward and dropped their own cloud in front of the warmongers. Golab and the rotwings stayed around the outside edge of the left zone. The turn ended with 40 minutes on Nate's clock.
Bottom 2: Now I had to go to work without two of my key solos. I was counting on Ragman for the ARM debuff and Axiara is just generally great. Venethrax upkept lamentation for free due to the blood priestess and then allocated a couple focus to the right scavenger. The left scavenger moved forward and killed one of the tentacles. The arc node walked forward just enough to get the chosen standing most forward in the zone within 10 inches. Venethrax activated, moved back a little and arced mortality onto the chosen. He also pulled the corpse off the misery cage to camp an extra focus. The right scavenger moved forward and killed the chosen that was targeted by the spell. Neither scavenger sprinted due to being inside the melee range of another model. The smog belchers moved forward and took some shots. The chosen were all affected by choking ash and I did not target the warmongers, as I did not want to grant Nate vengeance movements. The marauders moved forward to stand just inside the right zone and did a full CRA onto the chosen standing behind the wall. They hit, killed and set the next closest chosen on fire. Kharybdis continued to stand behind the forest on the right. The Devil's Shadow stood behind the cloud wall and the blood priestess moved back behind Venethrax. Gerlack stood a few inches to Venethrax's left. Finally, the blood gorgers received the press forward order. Two charged the remaining hellmouth tentacle, one charged a rotwing and the rest ran forward into the zone. The tentacle died as well as one rotwing, but the bloodgorger failed to hit the second one, ending the beserk chain before it really got going. The turn ended with 30 minutes left on my clock. We each scored our own rectangle zones, opening the scoring at 1-1.
Top 3: I kinda figured that this would be Fyanna's feat turn, and it would suck for me to get any work done on the bottom of turn 3. The chosen on fire took a few points of damage and Fyanna upkept admonition, but let iron flesh drop. The rotwings moved up and killed a bunch of blood gorgers, with the ones close enough to Golab being denied their tough rolls. Golab cast its animus, then moved forward and used overtake movement to kill several more. At the end of this, only 3 blood gorgers and Jussika were left alive. Golab then sprinted back to stand behind the front line of rotwings. The blightbringer took a shot at my objective, doing 8 damage but not killing anything with the blast damage. The warmongers charged in on the smog belchers, killing one while another made its tough check. Gorag and one warmonger charged and killed the scavenger that was forward in the right zone. The chosen advanced on the marauders and smog belchers, but only managed to kill one marauder. Fyanna moved forward and popped her feat, catching everything except the chosen. She also put iron flesh on the warmongers. The gobbers moved in front of Fyanna and dropped their cloud. The right spell martyr stood on the back edge of the right zone, while another stood on the back corner of Nate's rectangle zone and the third continued to stand behind the forest by the rotwings. The turn ended with 27 minutes on Nate's clock. He scored his rectangle zone to put me down 1-2.
Bottom 3: At this point, I was not terribly concerned about scenario as I was contesting most of the zones and I didn't think it would get too out of control. I wanted to take this turn to focus on attrition. The left zone was looking rough. I had hoped the blood gorgers would be able to beserk and overtake through the rotwings, but that was looking less and less likely. However, the right side was looking much better than I had expected. Venethrax upkept lamentation for free and filled Kharybdis with focus. The blood priestess activated first, as there was a cute interaction I wanted to try out. Ideally, I wanted to hit both the warmongers and chosen with mortality, but Venethrax couldn't handle that on his own. She attacked Morland in the back, hoping to kill which would allow her to cast a free mortality. She hit, but failed to do enough damage to kill. Venethrax activated, walking forward a little to kill the warmonger that was engaging the arc node. He then popped his feat, catching both beasts and Fyanna. He then pulled a focus off the misery cage and cast mortality on the warmongers, targeting Gorag who was not in combat. The smog belchers activated, killing one warmonger and putting some damage on another. The marauders received the press forward order. Most charged targets already in their melee range, but one was not engaged and ran around to stand behind the wall. One chosen was killed by the marauders. Kharybdis activated and used its four inch reach plus gang fighter to kill two chosen and a warmonger. Zira aimed and put a couple shots into warmongers, but failed to kill. The other Devil's Shadow members just stood still.
On the left side, The scavenger killed the remaining tentacle and sprinted back. The blood gorgers charged in on the rotwings, forgetting that Golab had admonition up. This allowed him to move back far enough to no longer be caught in Venethrax's feat. The bloodgorgers managed to kill two of the rotwings, but Fyanna's feat made sure I wasn't going to be chewing through the unit. Gerlack stood to block any potential charge lanes to Venethrax and also be protected by the scavenger's counter charge range. The turn ended with each of us scoring on our own rectangle zones, putting the score at 2-3. My turn ended with 16 minutes on the clock. I was starting to get concerned about clocking and wanted to try and speed up my future turns.
Top 4: Allowing Golab to admonition away from the feat range meant Fyanna would have some focus to work with this turn. She upkept iron flesh on the warmongers who took their vengeance moves and attacks. They killed a few smog belchers with their vengeance attacks. The blight bringer frenzied, killing a tentacle Nate had run next to it for just that purpose. The warmongers received the press forward order. One charged my arc node, but the scavenger used counter charge and killed it. Two more charged Kharybdis and Gorag charged one of the Devil's Shadow. Kharybdis took some damage but didn't lose any systems. Gorag beserked and killed two members of the Devil's Shadow and the blood priestess. The right spell martyr repositioned to stand in front of the blight bringer. Ammok stood next to the house. The rotwings and Golab killed all of the bloodgorgers except one. Fyanna recast admonition on Golab and also failed to kill that last blood gorger. Nate scored his rectangle and for destroying my objective, putting the score at 2-5. His turn ended with 14 minutes on the clock.
Bottom 4: I knew that I needed to start taking scenario more seriously now. I hoped I could start to gain ground on the right side. Killing the blightbringer would mean Nate owned the left side of the board while I owned the right. Of course, I wasn't going to be able to kill the blightbringer this turn. I hoped that I could setup next turn having Kharybdis and maybe Venethrax go in on it together. Venethrax dropped lamentation since he couldn't upkeep it for free any more. He again put focus on Kharybdis. Venethrax activated first, charging Gorag. He cast mortality on the warmongers again and then killed Gorag. Kharybdis killed the remaining warmongers. The smog belcher moved forward and shot the spell martyr in front of the blight bringer. The marauders ran towards the blight bringer, hoping to keep it from getting into the zone on Nate's next turn, but the water kept them from getting base to base, which is what was needed. The last bloodgorger stood up and killed a gobber and a spell martyr. Gerlack charged in an immediately failed to hit the first rotwing he attacked. The scavenger killed the spell martyr in the left zone and then sprinted back to the back edge. The last member of the Devil's Shadow ran to also stand on the back edge. The arc node walked forward to block Ammok's charge lane to Venethrax. We each scored our own rectangle zone and I scored the right circle, putting the score at 4-6. My turn ended with 8:26 on the clock.
Top 5: Nate decided that he had a solid assassination attempt here and thought it was a better play than continuing to press scenario. The hellmouth spawned a tentacle on my side of the house. Fyanna upkept admonition on Golab. Fyanna cast fury on the blightbringer. Golab and the rotwings killed the last blood gorger, Gerlack and the last Devil's Shadow member. The scavenger counter charged and killed a rotwing when they were charging in. The scavenger's defense kept it alive against the attacks that were incoming against it. One lone rotwing ran to be base to base with Venethrax. The tentacle charged and hit Venethrax, pulling him back to be at the corner of the house. Ammok walked around the arc node and missed an attack on Venethrax. The blightbringer charged Venethrax and missed the charge attack. He hit his first spike attack, doing a decent chunk of damage. He missed his second spike attack. He then bought and just hit his last attack, killing Venethrax to the box. The game ended with 3 minutes on Nate's clock. He scored his rectangle and I scored the right circle, putting the final score at 5-7.
Analysis: The assassination on Venethrax probably should not have been as close as it was. After the game, we realized that Venethrax should have been getting a plus two defense bonus from the house, but that would have been negated by the blightbringer's withering ash aura. Even if the assassination didn't happen, I don't know that I could have turned the game around enough. Dealing with Golab and the rotwings was going to be an issue, even if Venethrax and Kharybdis managed to bring down the blightbringer. I don't feel like I played poorly, but there are a few things I should have done differently, specifically at deployment.
The bloodgorgers aren't a good matchup into the rotwings. I needed the smog belchers to keep the chosen from charging in on me, but their aoe attacks would have been good. Also, putting the marauders on that side to try and catch rotwings on fire would have helped a bit. If I could whittle down a bunch of the rotwings so it's basically just Golab on that side it's a lot less scary. I also need to be more aware of things like the hellmouth. I didn't see that pull to put me in assassintion range of the blightbringer. I wish I could have gotten Kharybdis involved a little earlier, but I was very concerned with keeping him safe. I'm not sure if maybe trying for a crit spray on one of the early turns where it stood back would have been a decent plan.
Overall, I think slaughter fleet is a good theme for Cryx to drop into primal terrors. It has the tools to deal with lots of issues, especially if you bring a caster with mortality. That spell is just amazing. This was a really good game. I felt like I at least had a chance, even when things were going disastrously bad in the left zone. With a little better play, I think I could potentially turn this matchup around next time. As always, thanks for reading!
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