Unplugged GT - Wrap up

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Ptolemy
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Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#1 Post by Ptolemy »

Just wanted to do a gameplay wrap up of the Unplugged GT with some pics I took as well. No full length battle reports but rather my overall play, major turning points in each game.

-My list-

Prince - Giant Blade, Dragonhelm, Dawnstone, shield, heavy armor, barded steed
Archmage - Lore of Life - Level 4, Book of Hoeth, Talisman of Preservation

Noble - BSB - Sword of Might, Enchanted Shield, The Other Trickster's Shard, Luckstone, heavy armor, barded steed
Mage - Lore of Beasts - Level 2, Power Stone, Elven Steed

- Core -

13x Silver Helm Knights - FC
5x Ellyrian Reavers
5x Ellyrian Revers
5x Silver Helm Knights - FC

-Special-

24x Swordmasters of Hoeth - FC, BoTWD

-Rare -

3x Eagle Claw Bolt Throwers
1x Great Eagle
5x Sisters of Avelorn
1x Frostheart Phoenix

Game 1 - Grudge Match! vs Dwarfs

My opponent, Keith, is an awesome guy. We played at this tournament last year and he got the better of my Warriors at the time. This time, I was back with a War of the Beard Grudge match.

-His List-
2x Runesmiths (with 3x Spelleaters among them)
1x BSB (with the Shooting Ward banner)
2x Engineers

Big Unit of Stubborn GW longbears
Big Unit of Hammerers
2 small units of quarrellers
1 Gyro
2 Grudge throwers, 1 cannon, 1 Organ gun (all runed up)

- Summary: It was a wreck, frankly. His list was a total bugbear for me. He rolled the army wide hatred pre-game and I knew I was done. None of my blocks could outfight his with hatred. The hammerers would devastate the Swordmasters 1 on 1, just like the Silver Helms. I rolled Dwellers but he ate ALL of my first three spells with his Spelleaters. Basically I knew I could have easily sat on my table edge and taken an 8-12 but this was a grudge game with a fun guy so...screw it. I pushed forward and took a 0-20. Still a great time and he gave me a beer (at 11 am...nice).

Game 2 - Morathi Dark Elves - Chris

-His List-

Morathi
Dreadlord (Cav with Ogre Blade)
2x Masters (one bsb, one with Ring of Hotek)
2x 10 Witch Elves
10 Dark riders
10x Cold One Knights
2x 5 Harpies
2x 5 Shades
2x 5 Dark Riders
2x Kharybdis

His deployment, with the Dark knight unit already vanguarded forward and out of pic
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Image

My deployment
Image

-Summary: Smart use of the BoTWD, a few big luck swings and some good play both ways led to a solid draw. Morathi drew 3 death snipes and Doombolt. I had no choice but to bury the cavalry characters into the sides of the swordmaster unit. My opponent didn't seem to see this coming and was a little frazzled I think for what to do with his magic for the first two turns. The game saw some wild stuff, including Morathi getting Dwellers'ed off (bye bye, whore!), my 11 Silver Helms doing ZERO wounds on a charge on his 7 dark riders, breaking and getting run down in return, and my Prince skewering a Kharypdis single handed. It ended 10-10 with me getting three more points in scenario bonuses. Awesome Sundering game and a damn nice relief to see Dark Elves without Warlocks for once.

- Game 3 - Vampires - Lenny

- Vamp Blender Lord on Dragon
- 2x necros
- 2x foot vamps
- 2x dire wolves
- 2x minimal zombies
- 3x 20 skeletons
- 1x bat swarm
- 1x corprse cart
- 3x crypt horrors
- 5x hexwraiths
- 1x terrogheist

His deployment
Image
Image

Summary - A great game against a great guy (he got my favorite opponent vote). I think he was a little unused to a hard core tournament scene (this was an uncomped event, very rare for the NE USA) or at least his list wasn't the razor I expected from vamps uncomped. The game turned big when at the end of turn 2 (following a failed charge on his Vamp Dragon Lord by my bus), an upgraded Amber Spear took down the bloodsucker. The crumble took down the entire Dragon, the Terrorgheist, all the hexwraiths, the swarms, the dogs, half the horrors....you get how it ended from there. 24-0 me.

- Game 4 - High Elves - Aaron

-List-
AM - Book, Golden Crown, Heavens
Handmaiden (general) - Reaver Bow, Pot of Strength, Charmed Shield
BSB - Ring of Fury, halberd, Shield of the Merwyrm, Warrior Bane

18 archers
3x 5 Ellyrian Reavers
6x Silver Helms
25x PG with Razor Std
25x WL with BoTWD
2x RBTs
2x GEs
15x Sisters

After the critical combat of round 2.
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His sisters, shooting with impunity through the VERY wild woods
Image

Summary - Great game against a strong player who knew how his list works. I'm not historically great in same-race matches, but this was by far my best played game. Its worth noting that all tables have optional magical terrain rules the players could agree to use. He offered, I accepted but it was terrible for me. I had a football sized building on my side of the table that was a haunted manor and he had a huge wood that were Strength 6 Wild woods that he was happy to shoot through, especially with the game being meeting engagement deployment.

I deployed like an utter idiot. I knew I had to get my cavalry (with the Other Trickster's Shard) in the PG, despite the Razor Std. Ideally, I'd have the Frostheart in there as well to rob the PG of rerolls. The Swordmasters are tailor made nightmares for the White Lions, being able to shred them at twice the pace the WLs can shred in return. Stubborn wouldn't matter if the Lions couldn't survive to see another of his movement phases.

But, he wasn't an idiot and deployed well, forcing my cavalry to deploy on the lake in my deployment zone, preventing marching, making charing really risky and his first turn allowed him to clog up my knights with an eagle (whom, if I charged, i'd have to take yet another set of terrain checks). My only option was to send in the frostheart solo against the PG, knowing I'd lose every combat. BUT, with the Prince and BSB there, I'd expect to lose by no more than 2 and that meant a LD7 reroll ld check. Not a guarantee, but the gamble I had to make. It paid off. I was able to hold the PG for two rounds, shoot away the eagles/reavers in the way and get the Swordmasters into his Lions (with me having Earth Blood going to boot). My knights made a successful turn2 charge against his PG, smashing them (I turned 7 successful wards into failures) and running them down. The Swordmasters killed off all 24 White Lions in two phases of combat (killing 15 the first phase and losing only 3 in return). With only his AM left in the Lion unit, he broke and ran, being run down the following turn. At this point, in a typical game, I'd have just pushed it all forward and have done with it. BUT, his remaining blocks were behind the Strength 6 Wildwood. My Phoenix was on full wounds because of Life magic, but two movement phases in the Wildwood could just kill it. I went for it anyway. The pic below shows that set up (assume the eagle the phoenix is fighting is already dead and has reformed towards his line).

The whole board after round 2
Image

My bus went for his sisters (needing an 8 and failing) while my phoenix got his archers who broke (despite steadfast), which JUST got the phoenix out of the wild wood. However, the Phoenix took a wound from landing in the wood, another from leaving it and two more cheeky ones from the combat. Sitting on one wound, out in the open, he was surrounded.

Image

Despite EVERY shooting going his way, he survived, making 4 5+ wards. But, then I screwed up. On my turn, I chose to charge the near bolt thrower (after redirecting off of the fleeing archers who left the board). I should have gotten the far one, so I could overrun off the board and be safe from his shooting. My Phoenix didn't survive the second round of shooting, despite my best efforts. We lost track of rounds at that point so we decided that was turn 6 and the game ended with a solid 17-5 to me (bonuses from scenario included).

Game 5 - Warriors -

Summary: I'm not going to say too many details about this game as there isn't much point. The player, I think, was genuinely hyper-friendly (emphasis on hyper). However, I really had a bad time. The game was chaotic, with the player screaming, looking for fist bumps, high-fives at every turn and paying no attention to some very important and basic rules of warhammer. He seemed to get very grumpy after his Skullcrusher charged my Swordmasters (with BoTWD) and didn't seem to understand what the banner did. I did hand him my list, told him they had the banner, and told him to ask any questions he needed. In the end, after watch him pivot chariots like it was a Tokyo Drift race, arrange warhound units ON TOP of buidlings (forget the 1" rule, that may as well have not existed), constantly picking up failures and treating them as successes, I sort of turned off as a player. If I'm not having fun, I lose interest.

In fairness, despite ALL of that, I lost because of my mistakes. I had his Daemon Prince and a unit of two daemonic mount 3+ tzeentch heroes locked up with my Swordmasters. I made a challenge mistake with my AM, which eventually (took awhile) get her killed when I needed the magical support. Finally, we had a roughly 9 battle point swing happen when my Prince solo charged his remaining 4 skullcrushers (it was a 5 man unit, my SMs killed one and they broke.) We SHOULD have pulled the banner of the Skullcrusher unit when they broke, but I forget and he didn't. Either way, my Prince won the combat but he was steadfast. In the next round, despite being T5, my prince took 2 wounds (he claimed he rolled 4s on the wound rolls only after he had rolled and snatched them up before I could see them, but clearly forgot my prince was buffed by Flesh to Stone). I did three in return but his banner (....) and musician gave him the draw. My prince rolled a 10, broke an was run down. The scenario awarded 4 battle points if I killed that Skullcrusher unit. So it would have been 415pts for the Crushers, another 4 battle points for the scenario and my general would have lived. Bleh. I lost 16-4.

Like I said, it could have all been good natured sloppy play (I don't know the guy at all), which is ultimately my fault. If I needed a tighter game to be played, I should have enforced it. Lesson learned.

-Tourney Summary -

In the end, the tourney was an awesome time. I was thrilled to get Best Appearance and never expected to get a Sportsmanship award at all. I had a great time playing pretty much everyone and couldn't have asked for a better weekend. I would have liked to have represented a bit better against the damn Dwarves but like Caledor III, I was a little to impetuous and the guns got me.

- Jay
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Curu Olannon
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Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#2 Post by Curu Olannon »

Vs Dwarfs - I`m struggling to see why this is such a bad matchup for you. Can`t you just send all the characters in the Swordmasters and march up? Despite having hatred against everything I think you should win with the cavalry attached. I also don`t think it`s possible to get 3 spelleaters on 2 runemsmiths. The most you can manage is 2.

The DE list was soft, but DE overall aren`t soft. I am surprised that you didn`t get more than 10-10 here, given that Morathi died. What did he kill to make up for this?

HE mirror seemed like a very interesting matchup. In a nutshell he ran a somewhat similar list to what you used to field with our old book. Good job on getting such a big win though. I can`t help but wonder if he`d been better off with more RBTs which would`ve allowed him to hang back more. With Heavens this makes Comet even better as well.

The WoC game is a pity. I hate when that happens and it would be a very interesting matchup to see if he had played properly and you had been motivated and focussed :)

I`m interested in hearing your take on the list now in hindsight of the tournament, as I have a few thoughts but would like to hear your evaluation first. Are you going to continue with such a list, or will you try something completely different?
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Ptolemy
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Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#3 Post by Ptolemy »

Curu Olannon wrote:Vs Dwarfs - I`m struggling to see why this is such a bad matchup for you. Can`t you just send all the characters in the Swordmasters and march up? Despite having hatred against everything I think you should win with the cavalry attached. I also don`t think it`s possible to get 3 spelleaters on 2 runemsmiths. The most you can manage is 2.
He had 3. I may have the list off. Its the only one I did have a copy of after the event.

Without hatred, I agree, the two characters in the SMs would have worked. Understand he went right into a corner and cornered up. On the way in, I am still taking hyper accurate artillery fire. I ended up losing like 10 models in the unit anyway from all the shooting (mundane and not).

I have an advantage in getting the charge, but if I don't get it, my characters are both dead. We are talking a minimum of 8 attacks directed into each character (assuming he has two in contact with three ranked horde). Thats 6 hits, 2s to wound at S7 Armor Piercing (from the runesmith in the unit). Bye Bye Cav characters. I don't like the numbers even at S6 with me charging. And, with nowhere else to put my Life mage, her 4+ ward wouldn't likely survive a single round. Hatred was the problem there. Also, in the end, he is stubborn, I'm not. His Hammerers are superior in every way to my SMs. Its a bad choice IMO.
Curu Olannon wrote:The DE list was soft, but DE overall aren`t soft. I am surprised that you didn`t get more than 10-10 here, given that Morathi died. What did he kill to make up for this?
That failed Silver Helm charge was huge. I should have broke him fairly easily and gotten his 10 Dark Riders and Dreadlord. Instead, I lost my 320ish point Helms. Neither of us lost much after that. Alot of back and forth with lots of points left on the board at the end. I got Morathi in trade, we both picked off small stuff.
Curu Olannon wrote:HE mirror seemed like a very interesting matchup. In a nutshell he ran a somewhat similar list to what you used to field with our old book. Good job on getting such a big win though. I can`t help but wonder if he`d been better off with more RBTs which would`ve allowed him to hang back more. With Heavens this makes Comet even better as well.
He didn't get Comet,or I was doomed. I was packed into one spot for about three turns turning my botched deployment into something salvagable. One more turn (I think there WAS one turn left, but I couldn't say for sure) and it would have been a full
20-0 no problem.
Curu Olannon wrote:I`m interested in hearing your take on the list now in hindsight of the tournament, as I have a few thoughts but would like to hear your evaluation first. Are you going to continue with such a list, or will you try something completely different?
This was the hardest environment (comp wise) you'll find in the NE USA. We don't do uncomped Warhammer, generally. I think the only Max-Compete lists I played were the Dwarf list and the Warriors list. The HE list was the next most competitive, followed by the DE and the Vamp last. Artillery is a problem, as normal for my list. The Phoenix performs wonderfully against anything that isn't a cannon (which are becoming LESS common as people move towards the elves). There were 9 of the 79 armies there being Daemons....I didn't draw even one. Bleh. I wish.

The cav bus is great....though I think I need MR in it. MR would allow me to have the characters stay in the unit when facing a huge Death magic threat. The beast caster has proven to always be useful. Maybe I need to pull back a little in some areas (like the second helm unit) and get another noble with MR3 in the bus to add a little ongoing combat punch with a Great Weapon.

Also....let me just say that I'm sold on the Swordmasters. I have NEVER seen them lose a combat that WLs wouldn't also lose. I also don't think that being stubborn when you are losing massive casualties on 13 pt models is THAT good (its good, but not THAT good). I'm not advocating SMs over WLs, just that they aren't clearly inferior in my mind, ESPECIALLY with wood elves having enchanted arrows all over that ignore lion cloaks.

I'm also toying with the idea of a second Knight bus in the list...but thats wild dreams...
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Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#4 Post by Curu Olannon »

Vs Dwarfs - how can he have that much shooting? I`ve only had a few games (well, it`s actually more than a few but not with HE anyhow) but I haven`t had a problem getting favourably into combat against them. That being said, I have never been up against more than 2 scrolls of which only one is an eater. I just don`t see how he gets points to field all those things, it seems closer to 2800 from your listing. I`m quite familiar with 2400 Dwarf lists are we`re preparing for a team tournament and intend to take them. In a nutshell, you get 600 core, 800 wms and gyros (which seems to be about right for your posted list as well) which leaves 1000 for characters, hammerers, irondrakes etc. At worst, I have seen 2x30 Warriors + 30 Hammerers with 2x BS5 OG and 2 Cannons, or 30x Longbeards + 30x Hammerers with Irondrakes instead of the second OG (which hurts us elves a LOT).

The 2 games I have played with a comparable list to yours vs Dwarfs have both seen the Loremaster shine. Though one was an 0-20 loss, it should`ve been a win but I made a huge mistake. The second one was a massacre and only clever play by my opponent meant I couldn`t get beyond 15 points (that, and a failed L10 rally test but that does happen once in a while). I can see the magic being a key difference here though, and of course me having PG instead of a Phoenix.

Leaving the SM vs WL at bay for now, I would strongly recommend you try out Death for your L4 and add Obsidian Lodestone. I would also consider dropping the Phoenix in favour of more shooting and maybe that third Noble (I don`t know where else you`d get the points). This is a list development I`ve been contemplating myself and I might get time to try it out. In a nutshell, the list (for me at least) would look like this:

Prince Dragon Armour 1+ re-roll S7 steed
AM scroll MR3 Death L4 steed
Noble TOTS Star Lance steed
BSB Crown of Command Dragonhelm Luckstone

17 Helms
2x5 Reavers

Big unit of elites with BOTWD

4 RBT
Sisters, points permitting

It`s a rough draft but you get the idea. Overall I find Life very hit-or-miss, when it hits it truly is powerful, when it misses you may as well leave the mage at home. I do find Death on the other hand to always have a useful spell at hand. You can never go wrong with the combination of D&D + Soulblight for armies with high I, and anything barring BOTWD-HE fear snipes to some degree. You can probably free up points to include a backup mage if you`d like to as well, possibly also with Ring of Fury ;)
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Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#5 Post by Ptolemy »

Curu Olannon wrote:Vs Dwarfs - how can he have that much shooting? I`ve only had a few games (well, it`s actually more than a few but not with HE anyhow) but I haven`t had a problem getting favourably into combat against them. That being said, I have never been up against more than 2 scrolls of which only one is an eater. I just don`t see how he gets points to field all those things, it seems closer to 2800 from your listing. I`m quite familiar with 2400 Dwarf lists are we`re preparing for a team tournament and intend to take them. In a nutshell, you get 600 core, 800 wms and gyros (which seems to be about right for your posted list as well) which leaves 1000 for characters, hammerers, irondrakes etc. At worst, I have seen 2x30 Warriors + 30 Hammerers with 2x BS5 OG and 2 Cannons, or 30x Longbeards + 30x Hammerers with Irondrakes instead of the second OG (which hurts us elves a LOT).
I found the list. Here it is.

Runesmith - Rune of stone, 2x Rune of Spellbreaking, Rune of the Furnace
Thane - Master Rune of Grungni
Runesmith - Rune of Fire, Rune of Stone, Rune of Spellbreaking x2
2x Master Engineer

30x Longbears w GWs - Rune of Stoicism
10x Quarrellers
30x Hammerers
Gyrocopter
Cannon -Forging
Grudge Thrower - Penetratingx1, Accuracy, Forging
Grudge Thrower - Penetrating x1, Accuracy, Burning
Organ Gun - Accuracy
12x Rangers

So, basically I had it correct before. I confused the rangers for a second unit of quarrelers, 1 less spelleater.

I'll comment on the list changes later, gotta think them through.
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Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#6 Post by Curu Olannon »

2 Spelleaters make more sense and highlights one of the weaknesses of our L4s compared to the Loremaster: there are currently 3 armies in the game with dual scrolls (not counting SCs) and when your entire strategy revolves around big spells (Life is possibly the worst trickle-lore there is since at any one point your opponent can stop one spell and largely negate your threat projection) this hurts a lot.

Taking so many casualties going in sounds crazy to me. All his WMs are runed up so targeting your SMs with them seems like a bad idea, given your cavalry unit. That said, a bigger unit would be able to handle the casualties better. If you can hit home with 21 SM (not unlikely with a bigger starting size) you will win a straight-up fight vs Hammerers despite Hatred, and with characters attached it becomes a massacre. Taking out the Runesmith is top priority of course but he can`t tank any better than his fellow Hammerers so it shouldn`t be a big problem.

I think this match illustrates a lot of the weaknesses I have adressed in the past month with a typical combined-arms approach: the bus needs to be bigger, you have to commit to your one elite unit and magic needs to cover some weaker spots. As I said in another thread I know that Furion had some success last year with a similar list, sporting Life L4, but I really can`t see it being better than Death or even a Loremaster. Maybe it was previously, but given the current meta (yours uncomped meta seems largely the same as what I usually encounter) I think is far, far better if you go for the L4. Take your game for instance. You launch a 3D6 Spirit Leech at a scroll caddy. He`s one point down, what does he do? Let it go and take a 33% risk that he dies? Scroll it? Fine, that leaves Purple Sun for later! If it goes through and he doesn`t die, follow up with caress. The flexibility of this lore is subtle, as people think of Death as a one-hit wonder lore when in fact you have very strong in-built redundancy that will help you out regardless of what you`re up against: even HE with BOTWD fear Soulblight followed up by Doom and Darkness, depending on your list`s backup of course. Speaking of D&D, LD9 Dwarfs also hate this spell as it makes it very, very shaky to pass LD tests.

Looking forward to seeing list changes and thoughts around it :)
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Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#7 Post by Swordmaster of Hoeth »

Hi Ptolemy,

Thanks for the write up! I will try to comment on your games at some stage but just wanted to ask if DE player you had a game against was Chris O'Brien with his "Kraken" list? He is posting his reports on warhammer.org.uk

http://warhammer.org.uk/phpBB/viewtopic ... 2&t=123566

Cheers!
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Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#8 Post by Ptolemy »

Swordmaster of Hoeth wrote:Hi Ptolemy,

Thanks for the write up! I will try to comment on your games at some stage but just wanted to ask if DE player you had a game against was Chris O'Brien with his "Kraken" list? He is posting his reports on warhammer.org.uk

http://warhammer.org.uk/phpBB/viewtopic ... 2&t=123566

Cheers!
It was. Chris is a great guy. In the past, his Skaven general 'Ratticus' led a crushing victory over my old 7th ed High Elves. If any discrepencies exist in our reports, trust his. He keeps detailed notes during the game. It was a hoot.

@ Curu

- I do like the idea of the Loremaster, but I want to ensure you realize my Level 4 is on foot. Its not in the cav unit. Also, I ALWAYS default Throne to Earth Blood and I haven't looked back. My wins have gone up exponentially since doing this. I've found the BOTWD makes most miscasts fairly negligible. Also, the upgrades on the spells is rarely necessary (T5 and 5+ regen often being 'good enough'). Regrowth going to D6 models would be nice, but if you have Throne as one of your spells, and Dwellers as another, you have only two realistic Spell options in CC. This means you only have two of the Earthblood, Flesh and Regrowth combo and I find you need all three in most games to control the combat phase. I've been very pleased with the results over all.

- I do want to try the Loremaster with the Book of Hoeth and a defensive kit (shield of the Merwym, Crown, etc)

- I really should have taken pics of the Dwarf game. He and I are buds from old tournaments and I was too busy cracking jokes. He deployed everything in a 'forward corner', meaning it was the corner of the board but he was up in the deployment zone. I had to use the cover of a building to ensure my cav wasn't simply shot to pieces by all of his artillery if he got first turn. It was blood and glory deployment so there was no real want to hide the cav from the Organ Gun turn 1. he had his stubborn long beards arrayed in a long column on the side of his army. Suffice to say, there was no path to the guns and no where a flyer could fit on a charge (he's good at that). He dedicated his Organ gun to the cavalry and put everything else on the swordmasters. Two direct hits with a grudge thrower still hit 16-21 models. Thats two-three dead per hit.

Do that twice a turn for two turns and those 24 Sms start to thin out. Even straight up....30 hammerers with Hatred vs 24 Swordmasters (assume no magic buffs) is a bad match up. Horde vs horde formation, I take 25 casualties in 1 round of combat. Thats the WHOLE unit. Yes...I go first...so in reality I'll do about 15 casualties and his remaining 15 models and kills about 16 of mine. I've got 8 models left, he's got 15. Combat is roughly even, he holds on stubborn and basically breaks the back of my unit in the next turn.

I also have my AM in there...so thats a 320 pt model that is guaranteed dead. Yes, in trying to kill her he leaves more Swordmasters alive, but its a trade a stubborn unit will take every time.

- Death is clearly strong...but I'm bored of it. I played it ad nauseum for an entire year with my Warriors. I'm done with it. It doesn't interest me any more.

- In terms of changes...I am looking to free up some points (thinking about how) to get some MR in the bus (which is much more of an issue currently). The Phoenix is bad in some matchups but amazing in others. Its also my showpiece model. People were coming from across the room to see the giant jade/violet bird towering above the battle. From a painter-first perspective, he's in.

- Dwarves are historically strong against armor. An infantry list like I played against in game 4 would do better against this dwarf list than mine would. However, I'm commited to the bus unit for now. I go where my painting takes me. The loremaster is my next logical try, I think.
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Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#9 Post by Curu Olannon »

Good points. I know your L4 was afoot ;) will address in more detail tomorrow. What do you think about Light?
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Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#10 Post by Curu Olannon »

Loremaster with defensive kit - I`m a big fan of the Talisman of Preservation. However I also believe the Gem of Sunfire is a very interesting choice on him as it makes fireball a LOT better vs War machines and Searing Doom is suddenly critical to stop against Dragons (first among which is the Star Dragon which I believe can otherwise be a huge problem for combined arms lists to handle) and even 4+ troops, depending on their role. Stopping a Dwarf gyro can be very important. The beauty of this item is that you can activate it AFTER rolling for hits. A setup with it could be Book, Gem, Shield, which leaves just enough points for a small magic weapon to benefit from the shield.

As for the Dwarf game. Your cavalry does not have to hide in my opinion. If he is shooting them, he is not shooting the rest, and you won`t lose LoS in one round of shooting. Swordmasters can deploy single-rank at which point it becomes largely useless for him to target them with GTs. Double ranks work well also. That means a GT on average will hit ~5 models, which is roughly half a model dead per GT shot. In reality you are looking for your other support elements to kick in here and do some damage as well, either magic in terms of Dwellers or shooting in terms of thinning Hammerers prior to combat. Do note however that if 20 SM get through with both cav characters, we`re looking at 31 * 0.67 * 0.67 + 4 * 0.9 * 0.84 + 3 * 0.9 * 0.84 = 13.9 + 3 + 2.3 ~ 19 dead Hammerers before he gets to strike. In return you suffer ~22 * 0.75 * 0.84 = 13 casualties, which is bad, but you`ll still kill the Hammerers in the next round of combat, ready to charge again. This is all theoryhammer though and ingame decisions play a huge role, as does variance (in particular with spell destroyers). In essence without a battle report it´s hard to tell, and given that you have Life magic and a Phoenix I think one needs to go down to winds and casting decisions to make an analysis thorough enough, which is obviously asking for way too much.

I think you should keep the Phoenix if you like it, but that also means that your support will be lacking or the elite unit will very often feel just too small. An option is to ditch the elites entirely and stick the BOTWD on the cavalry instead, adding more shooting so that you have a cavbus, shooting, magic and frostheart. Note that I say bus and not star, with "only" a Prince and Archmage/Loremaster + BSB and scroll caddy, you have ~300 points "left" from characters to put into shooting such as Sisters, Handmaiden or even Archers.
- Dwarves are historically strong against armor. An infantry list like I played against in game 4 would do better against this dwarf list than mine would. However, I'm commited to the bus unit for now. I go where my painting takes me. The loremaster is my next logical try, I think.
In a nutshell I think going for Cavbus + BOTWD elite unit + frostheart suffers from stretching the points too much. I take it you are committed to the cavalry and the frostheart, but are you truly committed to the elites as well?
Retired from Warhammer. Playing Warmachine & Hordes (Cygnar).

Follow me on Courage of Caspia, my blog.

Warhammer blogs from 2011-2015:

:: Path to Glory - High Elves Army Blog ::
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lost user 21
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Joined: Tue Jul 22, 2014 9:22 pm

Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#11 Post by lost user 21 »

This is Jay's game #5 opponent

Like to defend myself a little.. little shocked when I read the battle report to be honest. I like to hit a few points...
A] I played 4 games before hand, 2 of my opponents game me favorite opponent vote and another voted me 2nd favorite opponent. Last tournament before this, I scored full sports points from my opponent. [Crossroads Springbreak]
B] At no time, did me and Jay have a rules question come up in the game. Not a single time was a Judge asked to rule on anything. I like to point out at times, 3 different Judges where over watching our game. It was 1st best Army Appearance versus 3 best Army Appearance. They clicked a ton of photo's of the game, so did Jay himself.
C] My so called Tokyo Drift Chariots did not hit Combat till turn #4, Chaos core Chariots have M8 & swift charge. At no point in our game, did Jay ever say anything of my movement of my models. [nothing at all]
D] "constantly picking up failures and treating them as successes" Have no clue where that is from, I can recall only once. Him saying he did not see the roll. So I rerolled the whole dice roll. My Daemon Prince needed 2's to hit and 2's to wound. My exalted Hero's needed 3's to hit and 2's to wound. [little stone skin on or not, thanks to S7] Jay again never asked me once to slow down or say anything about how I rolled or picked up the dice. If he communicated better? I would have.
E] Jay did lose interest early, the writing was on the wall early in the game. My Unbreakable Nurgle DP tied him up. Then my 2 Tz Hero's acting as one unit, hit the flank. I tried over and over again to engage Jay, doing my best to make the game as fun as possible for him. Trust me, I tried. I played the same way against Jay, as I did my first four opponents.
F] making it sound like I cheated, to save a 30 point Warhound unit? [please] Then saying I might or might not have forgot the 1" rule. Once again neither of these things where brought up in the game. [ZERO] War Beast can garrison a building, also I lined them up, so you could see them better and not forget about the unit.

Now what Jay forgot to add in..
A] when Jay forgot to shoot with a unit, I offered to let him do so.
B] I let the game end after 5 turns, I offered it to him. This is when he had zero magic defense and I could have run up the points with my Death casting Nurgle DP.

My last point is this, yes I was dumbfounded with my Skullcrushers hit his unit. I was not forced to charge. [due to a failed frenzy roll] I charged because I did not know, he had the Banner of World Dragons. Yes, he handed me his list. I handed it right back, I have dyslexia. So I asked him, like all my other opponents to tell me. What on there character and magical items in there list. It's just easier for me this way. But I did not act like a jerk to him, I was just surprised. I would have not charged my magic weapon carrying Skullcrushers into the unit. There was no reason to do so, maybe this set the tone of the game for him? But there was no malice on my part. If Jay had communicated better to me, I would have tried my best to make him happy and work with him. By the way I am not a serious Warhammer player anymore. Now I play in spurts and just got back into the tournament scene again myself last year. The last thing I want is for any opponent to have a bad game against me. These are kids toys and I got back into the hobby to have fun, not ruin a opponent time at a event.


George O'Connell
lost user 21
Posts: 2
Joined: Tue Jul 22, 2014 9:22 pm

Re: Unplugged GT - Wrap up

#12 Post by lost user 21 »

"You are completely right, of course. The only thing is that if I had won (or even just scored 1 more tourney point) in the last game I would have won this tournament's version of their top award, which is the Complete Hobbiest. Its a great concept. They take Battle, Sports and Paint and give each category equal weight. The player with the highest total wins it. I missed it by 1/100th of a point (Gah!). But thats fine. More motivation to play better, hand out more beers and make cheats play tighter. All to the good!"


Is this about sour grapes? You think that YOU should have won Complete Hobbyist award? You got to be kidding me? Your throwing me under a bus over a award, You felt you deserved to win? Talking about 1/100th of a point? Used the search engine to find the above quote! :lol:

Now on to the rest of the story forum. Tell the forum Jay, who won the Complete Hobbyist award? :wink:

Also his version of a close game? That came down to the end is shocking to me. It was a 16-4 blowout, after 5 FULL turns. We did not play the last turn, because I was just having fun and had no desire to try and table my opponent in a meaningless game. We where not at the top tables and I could have cared a less if I won or not. I had no clue, I even had a outside chance at the Complete Hobbyist award.

Him thinking that if his Lord survived & ran down the Crushers, he would have been close or could have won? Boggles my mind people!
A] 3 Monster Cav makes the unit stubborn
B] General & BSB gives me re-roll of 9
C] even if he won, I break combat and he catches me? I have 5 Death Spells to kill his 1W Lord? His army been decimated, round 6 would have just been clean up. He had nothing on the board that could do any damage. Both Mages [dead], BSB [dead], Sword Masters [dead], 1 unit Silver Helms [Dead], 2-3 Bolt Throwers [dead] & Frostheart Phoenix down to a couple wounds.
D] 6th turn I was in great position to score battle points, not him

I do not know, how he came up with 1/100th of a point. As I do not know the formula used?
A] he took 1st in painting & I took 3rd overall
B] he scored full sport points +8 extra & I scored full sport points +7 extra
C] in battle I scored much higher, heck if we played the 6th turn? I could have scored even more in battle. He scored 55 battle points & I scored 71
D] I finished 8th overall & he finished in 31st place

His version of a close game, was not very close in my book. Him saying his Sword Masters [Lv4 Mage] tied up my Nurgle DP & 2 Tz Hero's with S7, 3+ ward save & T5. I had Soulblight & Doom & Darkness in my hip pocket people. I will end up winning that a ton of times. Yet, he felt in his BR. [that was a good thing]
I kept the Nurgle DP in the challenges. To free up the two S7 Tz Hero's to attack the unit. Turn #1 I used the two Hero's as 1 unit, to give the Nurgle DP hard cover versus the Bolt Throwers. Once my list ties you up with the Unbreakable Nurgle DP? That unit is in for a big hurt.

Just wanted my 2 cents thrown in...


George O'Connell
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