Ended up playing against Trollbloods and the Miserable Meat Mountain list. I had heard really bad things about how hard this list was to play against and was a touch worried. I can't remember everything he had, but there were the standard issue Warders with a krielstone unit, Mulg the ancient an axer and eGrissel. Looking at the list there was just a ton of high armor and a lot of wounds.
My list:
Syntherion
Corollary
Assimilator
Cipher
Prime Axiom
Galvanizer
Diffuser
T.E.P.
OD
ADO
Attunement servitors
He lost the roll to go first, but I let him have first turn since I had decided to play more defensively.
He set up his warders and the stone unit in the middle, caster, mulg, Axer and rune bearer (aka Troll Moses) on my right side.
I tried to keep everything very centered as I already had the axiom and the TEP in the center of the board.
First turn.
Top: eGrissel uses dash and all of a sudden there are trolls all up in my space. Everything ran and he was coming fast.
Bottom: I move everything forward but did not run. Took a pot shot with the axiom but was out of range.
Second turn.
Top: Again with the dash and again with the running and also eGrissel popped her feat. Now he's literally on top of me. I have no space to charge and no way to not get sucked into a long drawn out slugg fest that I'm not sure I can win. That's why I did......
Bottom: I ran away. Or if you want to get fancy, I executed a tactical retreat. I could have killed somethings on this turn, but it would have left me in an awkward position and poised to get the brunt of a counter charge. So, I ran everything backward and hoped that he wouldn't have enough charge range to catch me.
Third turn:
Top: He did exactly what I needed him to. He moved his trolls in between two pieces of terrain and that clumped them up nicely. He didn't get the charge off and now he just had to wait to receive what I was going to give him.
Bottom: Swinging into action. TEP moves forward, drops out +2 damage dice and +1 shot for his servitor config. He loses 3 warders and 2 out of the stone unit. Damn theses things are tough. Speaking of tough, he would have lost more if he hadn't had that. Assimilator goes next and with hot shot up he takes out a couple more, totally wiping out one unit. Really starting to chew through the fat now. Syntherion is next and he blows his feat and recasts hot shot on the cipher. Cipher charges Mulg and takes a shot at the warders. Yeah, that was a wasted shot. POW 6 just isn't going to hurt these guys even on 3 dice. So he punches Mulg a couple of times to no real effect. Axiom activates and drops 3 more warders due to the fact he's awesome.
Fourth turn:
Top: Everything he has left moves up and begins swinging at my forces. Assimilator takes some heavy damage, the corollary almost dies, and Mulg leaves me only one box on the cipher. Most importantly eGrissel has moved up closer to the fray. He runs some guys to surround Syntherion and forces me to consider what I'm going to do next turn.
Bottom: Ok. So two of my heavies are hurt bad, I have a fresh Prime Axiom and a fairly fresh TEP. And a Warlock who is dangerously close to me with an open lane in front of her. My plan was simple. It was either going to be me or her. I dole out focus to the Axiom with the corollary since Synth is camping all of his in case he has to clear off the two guys on him. Declare my target, measure for range, and... she's in. Boost to hit with the tow cables and do my best Scorpion impression "Get over here!" and now have his warlock in my grasp. Take my free melee attack and put about half her damage on one hit. Take my accelespiker shots and finish the job. He rolls his tough check and passes. Take my extra melee attacks, kill her again, and passes tough. Spawn a reflex servitor, kill her again, passes tough. Move my diffusor over, shot hits, kill her again, passes tough. Move my TEP, flame the little bitch, passes tough. Second shot with the TEP, kill her again. This time it sticks. He made five tough rolls in a row on a model who shouldn't have lived through more than two of those attacks. Heres a couple of pics of the end.
An Axiom and battle engine in the list and you were worried about trolls with mulg as the only real heavy hitter?
ReplyDeleteGet the Axiom in the middle of that mess to ruin the block of trolls running at you. Don't run away!
Get some angles and lose the opti directive for some flanking angles. that way people worry about the axiom in the middle and the flanking flying girls. More threat options is more better.
Plus your caster can auto heal every turn, you don't need the unit of repairmen.
Trolls hate elimination servitors. Those get rid of the stone carriers easily.
Cypher drops rough terrain template to slow the trolls advance.
Cypher shoots and the charges? How is that possible shoot or melee not both unless special rule- virtuoso, assault etc.
Knowing what I know now, I might have done it differently, but still, they were like armor 21 or 22 with the stones up and the casters feat and they were going to be POW 12 or 13 weapon master on the charge, plenty enough to wreck a colossal. Angels don't work well with Syntherion and can't be taken at all in his tier list which is what I was using. Yes, he can auto heal every turn, but it's only a D3 and my opponents do way more than that in a turn, not to mention they give my guys pathfinder and magic weapons if need be. The Cypher had weapon platform from Syntherions feat. That's how he charged and then shot.
ReplyDeleteElimination servitors! ARM 20+ means nothing to a gun that does an auto 1 point of damage on 1 wound models. That then forces tough rolls, cripples the stone keepers bubble and forces trolls to bunch up more or ditch the stone bubble. That is what those guys do right? An auto on point of damage? Use that! Plus those servitors are an annoyance and can block lanes/ are great harassment.
DeleteLet them tie up and deal with the colossal. That lets you move other models to threaten his warlock. Get the Axiom in there. It is made to wreck stuff. Plus if they do mob and wreck it then they are bunched up to be spray template to death. You have open hands on that guy. Use them. Tow cable Mulg or warders two you to pummel or just hurl back at the approaching masses.
If you are afraid to get your melee models into melee than you will not do well. Very little in this game survives a round or two of melee, or sometimes shooting. Worrying about losing models or taking damage will lose you games.
Get that cypher dropping rough terrain templates as your enemy advances. Board control is as if not more important than damage.
A D3 a turn is enough to keep stuff running. You only need one or two boxes to stay functional. Plus throw that warjack resurrection spell on an important piece you want to have back. The Directive is situational at best. Unless there are a ton of incorporeal models in your area, magic weapons are pretty useless. Pathfinder is helpful, but not if you are just going to turtle up or avoid terrain anyway. More points spent on better stuff. That or throw them into the fray to mess up the enemy or cause another speed bump. If the enemy doesn’t have overtake, then that can force then enemy to waste resources wiping out a unit that wasn’t doing much anyway.
Lose the two lights for another cypher or the macrohammer/pummeler jack. You look to be going melee oriented, so why waste the points on those two light jacks? That or if you are taking them use them as speed bumps. Let them get wasted while you move up or around. Let the warders waste a turn dealing with them.
Tier list and two big point models are hamstringing you a bit. If you are running a big slow block get something on the flanks to threaten. Angels might not sync, but they can and will threaten back strikes, can ruin a caster/lock, will force the enemy to hold back a unit, etc.
I have seen two players in my area run this same tier list and do almost what you are doing too. They had a rough time of it eventually. Just frustrating to see another person falling into the same routine. Do you all have a website or a message board or something? Look outside the box. Tiers are fun, but they aren’t always the best option. If this is your local scene then what do I know. Running Convergence like you do will probably win you all the games. But it is your game and you know better I’m sure.
Sorry, my humors were out of balance at the end there.
Best wishes.
Amul Amut
Ok. Couple of counters to your points. I wasn't dropping rough terrain with the cypher since he was out of position to place it effectively and my opponent had ways of gaining pathfinder so it wouldn't have been necessary. The two light jacks have their purpose, they just didn't have a chance to perform it this game. The galvanizer is there to either repair or to build up hits for the synergy chain, at 0 points it works well. The diffuser is there to aid in my mobility. His beacon shot gives me +2" of movement. I was not in range to do anything turn one and that was the only turn his weapon was worth anything. I appreciate the pointers, I do, but it sounds like you don't even play this faction. If you did you would know that what you are suggesting doesn't really work. Unfortunately, with it being a limited release faction, most of the combinations have already been tried. If I were using Iron Mother then yes, elimination servitors would be in my list. Backlash and ES's floating around make for a real quick caster kill. The ADO is the only sketchy thing in this list and he's only 1 point which doesn't really gain me anything when I take him out.
ReplyDelete