Vlad3, the soapiest prince in the Iron Kingdoms

Vlad3, you look at his card and you feel underwhelmed. The feat is kind of unimpressive. The spell list is nice but Infernal Machine feels like poor mans Superiority and if you wanted Hand of Fate you would have played Vlad1 or Vlad2. Dash gets your threat range up but Vlad2, Strakhov and everyone  with Boundless Charge can do that in bigger bursts. You finally realise the interactions between all in the saddle, blood quenched and flashing blade but you think that just chewing through tightly packed infantry is not really enough because, after all, the Winter Guard can go in every list and lots of armies have undead infantry or lots of beasts and jacks. But he is on a horse, so you will buy him anyway.

I went through this exact process and now I am pretty sure I understand what Vlad3 brings to the party and its soap. He is slippery and, if used correctly, cleans out all the irritating dirt. To put it plainly, he and his army is very hard to pin down. You can see this in the way Vlad himself does business. He can make attacks before he moves, mid-move and also after he has done moving. On feat turn he then can get out. He also can get himself protected from non-magical guns. His feat is very Circle-esque with side-steps and sprints. It all comes down to Dash. This is the spell I intend to leverage and it is not the +1 speed but the immunity to free strikes that has me excited. To understand why you need to understand a little of my introduction to this game.

My first game was Irusk1 against Stryker1 in a 15 point affair. Apart from learning the rules I discovered that being tied up was lame and that casters can kill lots of infantry in a turn just by buying attacks. I also sent Beast in did damage to a Lancer and a Hunter, lost my cortex and had the hunter back out and shoot me again! The next game was 15 points against Kraye where I got jack bulleted, teaching me that a long way away is not far enough. The third was 25 points and Parry weas my bane. I tried tying down a Hunter and Kraye and it just didn't happen. Pursuit also hindered me but the final straw was Kraye waltzing away from lots of Winterguard and a Spriggan and two shooting Irusk.

So from day 1 I have had respect for Parry. If you read the PP Forums most people seem to be using Kayazy or Man-o-War (or the theme force with lots of cavalry) with Vlad. This is strange to me. The all-cavalry thing I get from an aesthetic perspective but from a gameplay and effectiveness stand point it looks weak. Kayazy are the last unit I would put with him. If you want Kayazy you would be better off with pretty much anyone else but Vlad2 or Irusk1 or either Butcher scream out for them. That is because these guys make Kayazy hit like a truck. What Vlad3 does is yet your guys into position and immunity to free strikes wants guns. Sure you can push further in with Parry but it seems mediocre. I think guns is where it is at and specifically sprays. This means Winterguard. There is some nice interaction going on here. Firstly, walking out of combat to spray bunched up infantry is glorious but backing up 7 with an 8 inch ranged gun seems pretty fun too.

The Winter Guard with Joe and Bob and Weave is just survivable enough to not disappear to a stiff breezes and, contrary to widely held belief, they offer a lot more than defence 17 with Iron Flesh. I value their offence far more because they are accurate and POW12 (or 10 spraying) and under Hand of Fate they are hit accurately enough to take out everything with pseudo-boosted boosted attacks (can CRA if needed) and pseudo-boosted POW12s go through heavy infantry quite fast too (Cetrati under Xerxis feat or Champs under the rock are no easy feat but against that sort of armour the jacks can come into their own).

I am trying to keep other models in the list with some utility in terms of staying out of the mire. All the infantry can walk out of combat but I have included Saxon as well to stop a literal mire keeping them at bay. For jacks I will take Beast and Torch. It is a tough call for Torch (see the other days post) because Spriggan has bulldoze that plays into the theme but I have decided that the combination of that spray with Virtuoso and Gunfighter gets the effect I want a bit better. Beast is there as a heavy hitter and also because hyper aggressive triggering for a 6" advance turns out to be a slippery moment all in itself. I also like both jacks rocking MAT7 which means they can get up to 9 but generally don't need HoF on them.

I hope to run the list this coming weekend but it depends on people's availability. It seems very sound from my thinking. The plan is once again to try attrition and grab points and if an assassination comes up to take it. We shall see.

Situationally Brilliant - of Torch and other niche things

I've been away this weekend and, during the drive, I thought a bit about my two lists and options I have with them. I am pretty happy with Vlad2 but Vlad3 has all kinds of options. I would like Rocketeers, I would like a Koldun Lord and I am unsure about Eiryss1. In the end the only change I am going to make is to drop the Spriggan for Torch. Yes, Torch the oh so hated of jacks. 

I kind of get why people really don't like him. He promises so much conceptually but never really delivers. Part of this is his predecessor, the Decimator, who possesses the coolest looking weapon in Khador but is a pretty junk jack. Torch is an expensive melee jack with some cute options. He looks completely badass but if you compare him side by side with other jacks in his point range, well, let us just say it becomes hard to justify him. This seems to be because his three signature abilities are a lot more corner case than others. Take Spriggan, Reach is a massive deal, Bulldoze is useful most games because it opens up options and the grenades/flares have enough utility to do good work.

Torch has Relentless Charge which feels redundant with most casters because of Boundless Charge but let me tell you that I think pathfinder on heavies is in the same ballpark as reach. Big claim, I know. Most tables I play on have several pieces of terrain and most Warmachine armies end up providing at least on irritatingly located wreck marker. I want to use Torch as a second line jack so this should be pretty useful. 

Torch has his immunities. People say these are either useless 99% of the time or game breaking against Legion, Menoth and Cryx. Both parties are wrong. Even though the immunities are a non factor against Cygnar, Khador, Retribution etc etc you have to look at them in the spectre of tournaments as whole entities rather than games and also what they get you when they work. Tis second element is why the second party is wrong. Cryx have little corrosion type attacks that they use against jacks. Menoth and Legion have fire or corrosive boostable guns. Fun times. It does not break the game but it does allow your jack to get to the fight. I am going to run Torch with Vlad3 to give multiple options for ranged defence. I already have Wind Wall and Beast has hyper aggressive so is gives me a nice little package of options. For example, an opponent with a ravagore/reckoner, do they shoot Beast because they cannot target Vlad because he Wind Walled to keep him and Fenris safe but know that if they don't wreck him he will hyper aggressive 6" forward each shot? Most likely they use the naga for magic guns (if I remember his animus correctly) but you get the point.

The third ability is his smoke bombs. I don't foresee these being super useful because speed 4 just isn't enough but I think it will be a nice surprise. I don't know why but I got a good feeling.

I guess the main point is this; if you don't take things because they won't be useful in every game then you don't get the enhanced value that they do give in other games. Besides, it is not as of he is completely useless. Sustained attack, a buffed stat line, a boostable spray that has continuous fire (albeit short ranged) and an open fist are all rules/abilities that give game influencing options when they come up. So I'm going to take him with an open mind so that even though I don't now quite what he will do in any game, I know my mind is waiting for moments of opportunity. 

I'll report back with results in due course. Hopefully, I will get to attend two events in the next month.