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September 2019 Scrum - Round 3

Round 3:  vs Jordan Bollin
Scenario:  Spread the Net

Round 2 of the scrum, my opponent had to concede due to scheduling issues.  This put me at 1-1 going into round 3.  I was paired up against Jordan Bollin, one of the local Skorne players.  Without even looking at his lists, I knew the only way he wouldn't drop Zaal2 into me was if he didn't include Zaal2 in his lists.  Given that this scrum is a three list event, I was fairly certain Zaal2 would be one of his lists.  We each brought the following options as our lists:

Me:
[Skarre 3] Skarre, Admiral of the Black Fleet [+27] - Scourge of the Broken Coast
 - Kraken [35]
 - Satyxis Blood Priestess [4]
Axiara Wraithblade [0(6)]
General Gerlak Slaughterborn [0(6)]
Ragman [4]
Black Ogrun Ironmongers [6]
Blighted Trollkin Marauders (max) [15]
 - Jussika Bloodtongue [5]
Bloodgorgers (max) [15]
Satyxis Blood Witches (max) [13]
 - Satyxis Blood Hag [4]
Scharde Dirge Seers [0(6)]

[Deneghra 2] Wraith Witch Deneghra [+28] - Black Industries
 - Barathrum [15]
 - Deathjack [23]
 - Deathripper [6]
 - Deathripper [6]
 - Malice [15]
 - Slayer [10]
 - Slayer [10]
Hellslinger Phantom [0(7)]
Necrotech [0(2)]
Necrotech [0(2)]
Necrotech [0(2)]
Warwitch Siren [4]
Cephalyx Overlords [8]
Mechanithralls (min) [6]
 - Brute Thrall (3) [0(6)]

[Skarre 1] Pirate Queen Skarre [+28] - Black Industries
 - Ripjaw [7]
 - Stalker [8]
 - Stalker [8]
 - Stalker [8]
 - Skarlock Thrall [0(4)]
Aiakos, Scourge of the Meredius [0(4)]
 - Stalker [8]
 - Stalker [8]
Darragh Wrathe [9]
Scrap Thrall (3) [2]
Soul Trapper [1]
Cephalyx Overlords [8]
Mechanithralls (min) [6]
 - Brute Thrall (3) [0(6)]
Wraith Engine [15]
Wraith Engine [15]


Jordan:
[Makeda 3] Makeda & the Exalted Court [+25] - Disciples of Agony
 - Archidon [10]
 - Battle Boar [7]
 - Cyclops Brute [8]
 - Cyclops Brute [8]
 - Molik Karn [19]
 - Titan Gladiator [15]
 - Aptimus Marketh [0(5)]
Paingiver Bloodrunner Master Tormentor [4]
Swamp Gobber River Raider [1]
Swamp Gobber River Raider [1]
Tyrant Zaadesh [4]
 - Agonizer [0(6)]
 - Basilisk Krea [0(7)]
Paingiver Beast Handlers (min) [5]
Paingiver Bloodrunners [9]
Paingiver Bloodrunners [9]

[Zaal 2] Zaal, the Ancestral Advocate [+29] - The Exalted
 - Agonizer [6]
 - Agonizer [6]
 - Basilisk Drake [8]
 - Basilisk Krea [7]
Abidan the Keeper [0(5)]
Ancestral Guardian [5]
Extoller Novitiate [0(2)]
Extoller Novitiate [0(2)]
Extoller Novitiate [0(2)]
Extoller Soulward [3]
Hakaar the Destroyer [0(6)]
Immortal Vessel [3]
Immortals (max) [13]
 - Extoller Advocate [3]
Immortals (max) [13]
 - Extoller Advocate [3]
Supreme Guardian [16]
Supreme Guardian [16]

[Xerxis 2] Xerxis, Fury of Halaak [+28] - Disciples of Agony
 - Agonizer [0(6)]
 - Agonizer [0(6)]
 - Basilisk Krea [0(7)]
 - Desert Hydra [35]
 - Titan Gladiator [15]
Bog Trog Mist Speaker [4]
Swamp Gobber River Raider [1]
Swamp Gobber River Raider [1]
Farrow Valkyries [8]
Paingiver Beast Handlers (min) [5]
Siege Animantarax [17]
Siege Animantarax [17]

Once I actually reviewed his lists, I was 90% sure he would drop Zaal2.  The extra 10% is because I know Jordan is tired of playing Zaal2 all the time and is starting to hate playing that list.  I also know he currently has a man crush on Xerxis2 and has had an absolute blast in every game he dropped that list.  In looking over my options, I knew I would be forced into Skarre3.  I had to assume he would drop Zaal2 and I feel like Skarre3 gives me the best game into that matchup.  If he ended up switching it up on my and dropping Xerxis2 instead, I was still pretty ok with how the game would go.  Skarre3 is my generalist caster and I am still trying to get more reps with her just to knock the rust off.  As expected, the matchup was Skarre3 vs Zaal2.  He won the roll and chose to go first.

Terrain consisted of shallow water on my left flank, just outside the deployment zone.  There was a forest in the left half of the circle zone.  A cloud and rubble overlapped the far rectangle zone.  Another piece of rubble and a trench overlapped the near rectangle zone.  Finally, there was a wall and two acid pools on the far side of the board.  The wall was sticking out of one side of the circle zone.  One acid pool was centrally located and the other was behind the right flag. 

I chose the side I did because I did not want to deal with running around the acid pools.  I hoped that they would either force him to burn early souls to go incorporeal, or slow his advance a little as he maneuvered around them.  I also felt the forest, acid pool and rubble formed a bit of a choke point on the left side, which would force more souls to be used to get through them.  Hopefully, that would leave either fewer immortals in the unit (as he might kill them for extra souls) or he would not be able to grave mist and go incorporeal, either slowing him down or allowing me to hit a bit more accurately.

Deployment:  Jordan deployed one supreme guardian just to the left of center and put the black based unit of immortals around it.  To the left of that cluster were the krea and the drake out on the flank.  To the right of that cluster, Jodan deployed Zaal2 on the front line with Hakaar to his right and the immortal vessel to Hakaar's right.  Behind them went Abidan and the ancestral guardian.  To the right of the immortal vessel went the white based immortals surrounding the second supreme guardian.  Each supreme guardian had an agonizer behind it.  The novitates were spread out across his back line and the extoller soulward was centrally in the back.

My initial plan was to deploy Skarre on the right and the kraken on the left.  Skarre would attempt to score the near rectangle every turn and the kraken would try to get deep enough to contest the far rectangle.  When I saw how Jordan deployed his SGs, I decided to flip that plan.  I felt I needed the kraken across from the SGs in order to deal with them.  Due to this, my deployment ended up with Skarre on my left flank.  The marauders were to her right and the bloodgorgers to their right.  The kraken was on the right with the iron mongers to the right of the kraken.  The dirge seers were clustered in the center in the back.  Gerlak was behind the blood gorgers.  Axiara was in the back to the right of Skarre and the blood priestess was behind Skarre.  Ragman went on the front line between the two unit of trolls.  Finally, the blood witches were kept off the board to ambush.  The new plan was to have Skarre and the priestess on the left flag with the marauders acting as a buffer.  The blood gorgers would attempt to screen the kraken, which would park in the right rectangle.

 

Top 1:  Jordan opened his turn by running the right SG forward, ending its movement to the left of the acid pool.  The white based immortals mostly ran to the left of the SG, but three of them went the long way around the acid pool.  Zaal2 put vision on the left SG, cast aura of power, dropped some fury and then charged the kraken.  The left SG then ran forward, ending it movement in the center acid pool.  The krea and drake ran to stand just forward of the left SG, with the immortals mostly filling in behind them, with the exception of the one unit member that remained more central to gain the AG's movement bonus.  Abidan ran to stand just inside the circle zone and the immortal vessel ran to stand to Abidan's right.  Hakaar and the AG ran forward, behind Zaal2.  Both agonizers ran to stand behind their respective SGs.  One novitate ran to stand behind the black unit of immortals on the left, another ran to stand behind the central grouping of models and the third ran behind the right SG.  The extoller moved to be in the back, near Zaal2.  Jordan ended his turn with 48 minutes on his clock.

 

Bottom 1:  Skarre cast dash, deceleration and put draconic blessing on the marauders.  She then moved forward into the water, but kept both units of trolls in her control.  The marauders ran forward mostly ending to Skarre's right, but a few started to move in front of her to get around the forest.  The blood priestess ran around the water to the left and stood 6 inches from the flag.  Axiara and Ragman stood near each other behind the marauders.  The kraken ran forward, staying outside threat range of the right SG.  The blood gorgers ran and filled in space to the kraken's left.  The iron mongers ran up behind the kraken.  The dirge seers remained clustered centrally in the back and Gerlak stood in the back line of blood gorgers.  My turn ended with 52 minutes on the clock.

 

Top 2:  Jordan started with the left SG taking a point of corrosion damage.  Zaal leached fury and upkept vision and aura of power.  The immortal vessel ran forward to stand to the right of the forest for channeling purposes.  The right SG ran forward to stand behind the wall.  The white based immortals ran forward, taking up space between the SG and one just got into the near rectangle zone.  The immortal UA stood next to the flag and activated grave mist.  A novitate ran forward to stand between the SG and immortal UA.  The left SG ran forward and stood partially overlapping the forest, behind the immortal vessel.  The black based immortals ran forward and mostly crowded into the area between the forest, could and rubble on the left, except for one member who was left to the left of the right SG.  The UA activated grave mist.  Two novitates ran to stand at the back of the black based immortal unit.  The two agonizers each put up gnawing pain and ran to stand behind the two SGs.  Hakaar ran to stand behind the left SG and the krea ran to stand behind Hakaar.  The drake ran to position to the left of the krea and Abidan stood to the right of the krea.  The ancestral guardian ran to be behind the right SG.  The extoller soulward gave guidance to Zaal who moved up behind the right SG and channeled an annihilation at a marauder through the immortal vessel.  The marauder was hit, but not damaged.  The blast damage killed Ragman.  Zaal then popped his feat.  Jordan ended his turn with 29 minutes on the clock.

 

Bottom 2:  At this point, I felt like I had a pretty big clock advantage and that I could potentially use that as a victory condition.  I also knew I was going to get very little done this turn, as Zaal's feat is effectively a time walk into my list.  I debated whether I wanted to use the kraken to kill the single immortal contesting the near rectangle zone.  I decided I would not be able to kill enough of the unit to blunt the vengeance attacks that would come my way.  Skarre dropped draconic blessing, as I was hoping to use the marauders to light immortals on fire without damaging them.  The blood witches ambushed in on the right side.  Skarre activated first and cast dash and deceleration.  She then moved over to the right to be outside potential charge range of the left SG and black based unit of immortals.  Axiara moved behind the water and gave the marauders reposition 3".  The marauders walked around the forest and took some throws at the immortals.  One managed to connect, setting 4 of them on fire.  The iron mongers backed up.  The kraken backed up to be outside the right SG's charge range, but keeping it inside its own threat range.  The blood gorgers walked forward.  One died to the SG's defensive strike, but another took a single swing at the immortal vessel, but failed to do any damage.  Gerlak stood to the left of the kraken.  The blood witches ran to tie up the white based immortal unit as much as I could.  Three members of the unit ran around the acid pool and the blood hag stood next to the acid pool, keeping everyone in range and hoping she would be safe there.  Finally, the dirge seers ran to stand to the right of the kraken.  I ended my turn with 36 minutes on the clock.  Astute observers will note that I failed to activate the blood priestess, who started the turn in easy range of the near flag.  Due to this mistake, no scoring took place.

 

Top 3:  Three of the four immortals that were on fire died.  Then Jordan measured to confirm that while I kept the kraken safe from the right SG, it was definitely in threat range of the left SG.  Jordan debated for a minute whether he should go after the kraken, as my positioning meant it was well outside of Skarre's ability to allocate focus, but he ultimately decided that was the plan.  Zaal leached fury and upkept aura of power and vision.  The immortal vessel took a free strike to move outside the blood gorger's melee range, but only took a couple points of damage.  It then failed to kill the blood gorger.  The krea moved back to stand next to the right SG and put up its animus.  The drake walked around the left SG and sprayed to kill the blood gorger.  Hakaar charge the blood gorger standing in both the circle and near rectangle zone.  The first attack failed to break armor, so he used a fury on Zaal to boost the second damage roll and killed the blood gorger.  This left the path clear for the left SG to charge the kraken.  Its thresher attack only killed two blood gorgers, because of tough rolls and also killed an immortal from the white based unit.  It then destroyed the kraken.  The black based immortals used a soul to go incorporeal and walked into the forest, getting the entire unit into the circle zone.  The unit killed a single marauder that was contesting the circle zone.  The left agonizer using gnawing pain and ran through the forest to get as close to the more forward SG as possible.  The white based immortals received the press forward order.  One had a charge angle on the blood gorger contesting the circle zone, while the rest mostly turned to attack the blood witches engaging them.  The immortal hit and killed, but the blood gorger succeeded at its tough roll.  The other immortals only managed to hit and kill a single blood witch.  The other agonizer put up gnawing pain and stood behind the back SG, to the left of Zaal.  The novitates ran to positions to spread their tough bubbles around the board.  The extoller soulward ran towards the far rectangle.  Finally, Zaal started his activation with 3 fury.  He channeled a sunder spirit at the blood gorger contesting the zone.  He hit, then used his last fury to boost damage.  The blood gorger succeeded its tough roll again.  Jordan's turn ended with 9 minutes on his clock.  Due to the string of toughs from that one blood gorger, no scoring occurred.

 

Bottom 3:  At this point, I knew that clock was my best path to victory.  Even though I failed to score the flag, with the score still at 0-0 I was in a position where I could start putting scenario pressure on Jordan and force him to burn time trying to make scenario work.  The turn opened with the two moves that would put scenario pressure on Jordan.  The marauders used vengeance to position, but the attacks failed to kill anything.  Skarre camped all her focus and ran to the far rectangle.  The blood priestess finally moved forward onto the near flag.  The marauders walked into position.  The melee attacks failed to kill any immortals, but a couple did a CRA onto the nearby novitate and killed him.  I then saw one opening to put additional pressure on Jordan.  The blood witches activated.  The ones that were already engaged remained in place.  The three that were on the far side of the acid pool charged Zaal and the blood witch ran to apply dark shroud.  With no fury for transfers, the attacks from the blood witches managed to kill Zaal.  The turn ended with 21 minutes on my clock and I scored my 2 control points.

 

Analysis:  Neither Jordan nor myself were particularly happy with our play in this game.  My mistakes have already been largely called out in the narrative.  I failed to move the blood priestess onto the flag after setting her up to specifically do that on turn 2.  I also correctly measured the threat distance and appropriately positioned the kraken in regards to one SG, however I failed to consider the other huge base.  Further complicating the issue was that with both Skarre and the kraken wanting to play wide, the kraken was outside of allocation range.  Jordan potentially could have ignored the kraken as without focus it would not have been very effective the following turn.

Aside from the egregious blunder with the blood priestess, my scenario play was ok.  I was not going to be able to contest the far rectangle easily on bottom of 2 without changing much of the rest of my plan.  I think not killing the one immortal in the near rectangle on bottom of 2 was correct.  Scoring that one point would not have been worth triggering vengeance.   Potentially I could have put more in the circle zone to both contest it and block the SG's charge lane onto the kraken.  Jordan didn't have a ton of options for clearing that zone that wouldn't block his own charge lane, so that is a second way I could have kept the kraken alive for another round.

Going into Zaal2, I expect the immortal vessel to run forward and channel a spell somewhere in my lines on turn 2, but I need to be better with positioning so I don't give away solos like Ragman to blast damage.  I have a really tough time with this matchup.  I think my list has some of the tools needed to play into Zaal2, but I need to be much better at playing it.  Not losing the kraken makes the rest of the game feel much better.  I might even end up trading the kraken for an SG, but that might need to be an acceptable trade.  If there is only one huge base on the other side of the table, I think I can manage to play scenario and / or clock.

While this was a win, I can't say I feel great about how I played.  There are two major mistakes that I made and they could have very well cost me the game.  That said, my current goal is to generally improve my scenario play and awareness.  I did better here in that I put things into position and started considering scenario scoring at deployment.  However, I still missed scoring points and if Jordan had put a warbeast in the far rectangle zone I don't know how quickly I get something back there to contest.  It's something I want to continue to work on and will be the real focus of my play for the forseeable future.

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