Keeping your trousers up

I recently starting reading a blog from one of the guys on WargamerAU called Will Warcast for Cash. It is a very entertaining read and I encourage anyone to go have a read. In it the author makes an argument for why he does not like the pirates. Put simply, the argument is that there are too many points spent on solos to get the ship going and that invites easy and effective gameplay decisions from your opponent. I connected quite strongly with this flavour of argument since I had been thinking about the issues already. Really, you only need your support to keep your trousers up around your waist not your underarms. A drawstring, a button, a belt and braces are kind of excessive; you only need one.

Getting back to Warmachine and Khador, there comes a point where you have just spent too many points on support pieces. It is a really easy trap to walk into because a lot of the support pieces do some really cool things. For example, every Irusk1 list I build starts with a jack, Sylys, Reinholdt, Joe, Saxon and then I consider other things like Greylords or a Koldun Lord. If I put all these in then I have 13 points of support. It starts to pinch real quick. In list building it will usually mean I cannot get a second heavy or a second mainline unit of infantry. In game it leads to two bad situations. If you take a lot of support and rely on it and then you lose all your support then you don’t have enough stuff to compete. Worse is if your opponent manages to even just compete in a fight and grind out your mainline stuff then you have a caster and a bunch of support and support usually sucks at killing stuff.

The final point that I have been thinking about is that if I put too much support in then it stops my Warcaster doing his or her thing. Khador Warcasters are among the best in the game for supporting their army with spells such as Iron Flesh, Hand of Fate, Fury, Battle Lust, Superiority and so on. Maybe it does not stop them per se but it obscures their impact. I also want to put into this category those luxury items. Things like Winter Guard Rocketeers or even Eiryss or Gorman. I really should note before I go on that some factions (looking at you Trollbloods and Protectorate) have been designed to take a lot more support pieces. Part of it is that their support is just so good – Choir and Vassals would probably make it into every other faction’s lists with ease.

I’ve tweaked my lists that I hope to take to Wintercon to try and limit the amount of support and stuff that does not do a whole lot of work that I am running. Vlad2 has just the Koldun Lord and arguably the Dog and Eiryss2 (full list is now Vlad, Behemoth, Dog, Full Pikemen and UA, Doom Reavers and UA, Widowmakers, Koldun Lord running a Marauder, Yuri and 2x Manhunters and Eiryss2). For Vlad3 I have dropped Rocketeers and the Koldun Lord (full list is now Vlad, Beast, Spriggan, dog, full Winter Guard with UA, Joe, Doom Reavers with UA, Fenris, Saxon, the bears and Eiryss1). In both lists I have toyed with dropping the Doom Reaver UA for Gorman and a Koldun Lord respectively but I think I’ll stick it out because tough is irritating and making 2-3 tough rolls on a Doom Reaver is pretty awesome.

Painting update: I am about half way through my Pikemen so it is looking unlikely that I will be able to paint even one entire list in time. Sad times.

Battle Report: Vlad2 vs Stryker2

So it appears I will get to write this one up now. Hopefully I can get to a point where I know a good way to write these. I really want to add pictures because otherwise battle reports can get a bit dull.

The game was Vlad2 against Stryker2 at 50 points and the scenario w as Rally Point. Our lists were as follows:

Vlad2, Behemoth, Dog, Max Iron Fang Pikemen and Unit Attachment, Doom Reavers and Unit Attachment, Widowmakers, Koldun Lord marshalling a Marauder, Eiryss2, Gorman and the Great Bears.

Stryker2, Rowdy, Stormclad, Squire, Stormblades, Gun Mages with Unit Attachment, Min Storm Lances, 3x Stormcaller, Arlan, Rhupert, Lanyssa, Eiryss2 and the Journeyman Warcaster (Jr).

I won the roll and elected to go first. My pre-game thought process was that I wanted to keep Vlad back to make it harder for Stryker to get him, I wanted to try get some control points and I wanted to push for table presence with Doom Reavers while I shoot with my snipers and the Behemoth.

Deployment
I deployed everything centrally. He deployed centrally with his Gun Mages, Rhupert and Lanyssa on my left flank behind a forest and the Storm Lances on my right side. For my Advance Deployment I out the Widowmakers on the left with Eiryss and I out the Doom Reavers just to the right of my objective. His Eiryss hung out with his Gun Mages in the forest. The Bears are on my left side before I forget.

Turn 1
I ran stuff forward. I put Hand of Fate on Behemoth, Assail on Marauder and Transference on Vlad. The Koldun Lord power boosted Behemoth to run, the Marauder used his pseudo focus to run. I ran the Widowmakers behind a linear obstacle opposite the forest but I spread two out to avoid the Gun Mage CRA special blast thing. The Doom Reavers moved about 3-4 inches too few (I was worried about losing them to charge/run and feat).

He runs stuff forward casts deflection. Rhupert makes the Gun Mages have pathfinder, they move up and between them and Eiryss they kill two Widowmakers who promptly fail they command check. He also moves the objective int his zone. Arcane Shield is out on the Storm Lances who advance a bit but hang behind the objective and a linear obstacle to stop the Doom Reavers getting on them.

Turn 2
I am pretty bummed about the Widowmakers failing command. I wanted them to aim and start thinning out the Gun Mages because I didn't want the Gun Mages killing Doom Reavers or Pikemen, I wanted them tied up. Anyways, I upkeep all my spells and put 2 on Behemoths sub-cortex. Behemoth walks up and tries to take a shot at a Gun Mage, I am out of range so it scatters but I get lucky and it hits Rhupert, I boost, he dies. I take another shot, get lucky it scatters, hits Lanyssa, I boost, she dies. I might have tagged someone else as well I'm not sure. Eiryss aims shoots the other Eiryss in a forest and misses (we both totally forgot about stealth which was funny). The Bears move up to sit behind the linear obstacle in base to base. I activate Vlad, feat for 6 Doom Reavers then dominate my objective and move it into my zone. I send the Doom Reavers in thinking I can get 3-4 onto Stormclad. I was wrong. I get two on Stormclad, three fail charges and one runs to engage the Storm Lances. The first Doom Reaver does 5-6 damage, the second dials it to 11 and does something like 15-18 leaving the Stormclad with 5 or 6 boxes and not the Cortex. He passes his abomination checks with other stuff. The Pikemen Shield Wall and get into position. I forgot to put anything in his zone which was a mistake.

He has super Doom Reavers clogging up his table space but I think he didn't realise the feat buffs their defences so much. He spend his turn killing Doom Reavers. His Plan was to repair Stormclad, swing and arc lightning onto them. This doesn't work when Arlan rolls box cars for his repair check so now he has two focus on Stormclad with crippled weapons. Sad times. After a bunch of skill checks from Stormcallers, Rowdy, Storm Lances, Stormblades he as killed all the Doom Reavers and the UA. His Gun Mages slowly walk rough the forest do the Mage inferno order on the bears kill the one that gives pathfinder, force a tough on another (which he makes) and does 4 to the last Bear. Eiryss moves up and shoots Behemoth. He scores a point.

Turn 3
I upkeep my spells. Between the Widowmakers and the Bears I kill a few Gun Mages and Eiryss. Behemoth is power boosted and shoots and kills some Stormblades I think. I Hand of Fate the Pikemen and send them in and mini feat, I kill some stuff I think, I knock out Rowdys weapons, I do 13 to the objective and I clog up the zone. Gorman runs int his zone to control it. Vlad sits on 2 focus (I either boosted something with Transference or paid to upkeep Hand of Fate even though Eiryss stripped it). My Eiryss runs into the middle of stuff and gets within 5 of his jacks. I score 3.

His turn, he kills some pikemen, he kills Gorman, he kills a bear but he has to go for it because his jacks will die next turn and I am ahead on control points and board position. Arlan rolls an 11 on his repair check so he has to run Rowdy 11" from Stryker, positive charge him, velocity top lad taking two Pikemen freestrikes (which do 5 or 6 damage but no critical knockdown), somewhere along the way he shot the dog which toughed. He gets 3 attacks on Vlad after overloading for +7 he misses, hits for lots leaving me on 5 then misses and he feats and his feat attack misses.

Then Vlad with 8 focus casts Martial Paragon and boosts hit and damage and its over. I've got a few thoughts that I will put down sometime later.

Rolled some dice

The last month has been very busy for me (hence the silence) but yesterday afternoon I got to play two games. Both were against a good friend of mine and I rocked Vlad2 in both games and I had a great time. I won the first game (50 points against Stryker2) and I won the second game as well (35 points against Feora2). The second game is kind of a fake win since we were running out of time so my opponent just went for a Judicator trample to Vlad but took two freestrikes from super solider Iron Fang Pikemen. I don't think I was a lock for the win but I was probably just ahead.

I plan on writing a bit of a more detailed battle report tomorrow. I didn't take any pictures so it will probably be a bit text heavy perhaps. All in all, I really liked the way the lists (particularly the 50 points one) played. I bunched up a bit preventing my Marauder getting to the fight and I didn't push my Doom Reavers far enough forward so they clogged up my lines (and missed some charges) because of that. Yet I still played it the way I designed it. I attritioned and looked for opportunities to score control points. That was what brought Stryker to go for it and I survived.

The one thing that I was thinking about the games (particularly the 50 point game) was that it is really hard to distinguish how much luck played a role. Finishing a game you won tends to feel as if you were not lucky and it is all skill but I am trying not to do that. I can remember several rolls that I guess could be attributed to luck that greatly influenced the game. I got two lucky scatters on turn 1 with Behemoth - sure it is lucky but I was shooting that way trying to get some thing (this is a moment of luck I engineered I think). I spiked a damage roll on a feated Doom Reaver against his Stormclad meaning that while only two guys got on him he only had 5 boxes left. He failed skill checks for Arlan to repair on consecutive turns making it much harder for him to clear out my dudes.

So I don't know. I think with luck a huge part of success is making the most of it when it comes around. You also have to be putting yourself in situations it can occur. I think it all comes to playing the game with a really aggressive mindset. Play to beat your opponent; even when you win because they went for it and failed it was probably your play that engineered the situation.