How to deal with Gyrocopter

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Deamon
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Joined: Fri Dec 19, 2014 4:09 pm
Location: Quebec, Canada

How to deal with Gyrocopter

#1 Post by Deamon »

I would be curious to know how you guys deal with gyrocopter when you're fighting Dwarf.

There's a very strong Dwarf player at my club. Here's an idea of his list :

1 big block of hammerers with the banner that give stubborn to everything within 12"
1 big block of warrior with GW
1 big block of long beard
2 runesmith with spell breaking runes
1 cannon
1 grudge thrower
2 organ gun
4 gyrocopters

I never managed to beat him and after runngin some simulation and doing some mathhammer, I realized I used some poor tactics and often send the wrong unit to get the job done. So I revised my list and I'm now planning to lock the Hammerers wit my PG, the warriors with my WL while the SH bud flank them and I'll try to keep the LB away with chaff. Assuming my own chaff (reavers and eagles) can put enough pressure on his warmachines, my block should make it to combat with enough body to destroy the warriors and then combo charge the hammerers before dealing with the long beards. Since he hide his organ gun between his blocks, this should allow me to deal with them too. I also switched from High Magic to Lore of Death to snip the banner that make his hammerers and warrior stubborn.

All of this looks good on paper but my day could be ruined by a gyro throwing itself in my path. I'm pretty sure I can keep 2 of them busy with my eagles (he's going to keep 1 on each flank to protect his warmachines) long enough to reach combat. This mean I must deal with 2 gyros. I have 3 RTB, each has about 44% chance to wound a gyro so I should average 1 gyro down per turn.

My question is : How do you deal with Gyros? I tried, Great Eagles and Reavers but they all die IF they can catch it. RTB are not really reliable either (I only have 3).
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RE.Lee
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Location: Warsaw, Poland

Re: How to deal with Gyrocopter

#2 Post by RE.Lee »

Let me start of by saying that the Gyrocopter is a great addition to the Dwarf army, allowing it to (finally) participate in the movement phase (along with Strollaz). Having a mobile threat when fighting Dwarves is a welcome change, even if it is difficult to deal with.
Personally I try to shoot the buggers down with my RBTs, I usually have a 2vs2 situation, so thats a bit easier but still. Magic is a decent counter as well (they don't lock down the phase as much as they used to), spells like Amber Spear or Searing Doom work nicely. Setting up countercharges is a surprisingly viable option - a properly positioned 5 of DPs will scare them off for a while.
cheers, Lee

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Tullarion
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Location: Seattle, WA USA

Re: How to deal with Gyrocopter

#3 Post by Tullarion »

I have recently started a Dwarf army, and I can tell you, the gyrocopter is my favorite unit in the book. To go from using eagles to gyros is an exponential increase in capability. They are also the single greatest threat to elves that Dwarfs can produce. Bolt throwers, magic, massed shooting, and lucky charges with cav are your best bets, although they are very good at fleeing, and they often want you to charge them.

Phoenix guard are very good against Dwarf infantry, as they outclass and outlast even hammerers and ironbreakers, and you can expect to win combat vs equal points. They are also quite resilient to the gyro's steam gun, despite being small based infantry. Eagles can't do more than delay gyros in combat... and they are much more necessary to take out warmachines, and to chaff dwarf infantry units, so I wouldn't use them for that. I think a good plan would be to rush into combat as quickly as possible to give the steam cannons the least chance to get hits. Also, silver helms are pretty resilient to the steam cannon, both with base size and armor.
Ferny
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Re: How to deal with Gyrocopter

#4 Post by Ferny »

1. Deployment - make sure you have good threat zones so they can't land freely
2. Keep threat zones at the fore of your mind when you move up as well
3. Number one target for shooting, magic missiles etc.
4. Charge with cavalry at long range. If you move up aggressively with cav and they fly over them you can have a 'back rank' of infantry to charge them.

However, this is all easy to say in isolation. The problem is that you either want to advance aggressively or not at all vs dwarfes, and the steam gun making you split the difference is bad news if they have a gunline. Bottom line - they're a great unit and even better against elves...there's a reason you are having trouble with them :wink:
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Curu Olannon
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Re: How to deal with Gyrocopter

#5 Post by Curu Olannon »

Gyros are single handedly what makes Dwarfs a hard matchup for Elves.

While Denmarks ETC-list from last year (7 gyros...) is a true pain and pretty much impossible to come out ahead against, less gyros also make for a very hard game. Their flexibility is their strong suit, vs Elves their continuous template damage do quite a bit and if you need to throw them away they're not that expensive.

Anyway, how to counter them. Depends on what army you play. Setting up threat arcs with fast units such as flyers and cavalry as well as keeping good fire lanes for RBTs is usually a good place to start. It's all about zoning them! Short of this, there's not much that can be done about them. Since they're Dwarven, they don't need to march test either. The good thing is, if you can neutralize them quickly you stand a pretty good chance at controlling the board.
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