Cygnar vs Retribution of Scyrah (eStrykver vs Issyria) 35pts - Battle Report

I actually got to play 2 games of Warmachine today, which hasn't happened in a long time. I'm back with Cygnar after the short Journeyman League with the Gators. I got my hand on some new models and planning on painting and playing a few tournaments this year, but I'll talk about that in another post. Let's focus on the battle at hand. My friend Emanuel made a list with Retributions latest caster Issyria and wanted to try her out. We played two games, he didn't change his list, but I ran eCaine in my first game and eStryker in the second. This is the report with Stryker. On to the lists.

Points: 35/35
Lord Commander Stryker (*6pts)
* Lancer (6pts)
* Ol' Rowdy (9pts)
* Squire (2pts)
Stormblade Infantry (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
* Stormblade Infantry Officer & Standard (3pts)
* 1 Stormblade Infantry Storm Gunner (1pts)
Sword Knights (Leader and 9 Grunts) (6pts)
Archduke Alain Runewood (3pts)
Eiryss, Angel of Retribution (3pts)
Journeyman Warcaster (3pts)

Points: 35/35
Issyria, Sibyl of Dawn (*6pts)
* Hyperion (18pts)
* Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker (2pts)
Dawnguard Invictors (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Dawnguard Invictor Officer & Standard (2pts)
Dawnguard Sentinels (Leader and 9 Grunts) (9pts)
* Dawnguard Sentinel Officer & Standard (2pts)
* Soulless Escort (1pts)
Arcanist (1pts)

Setup

I won the roll and wanted to go second. The scenario was from Steamroller 2013 and the one called "Into the Breach" (I think...). The one with a flag and a control zone. He deployed Hyperion in the middle of his side with Invictors and Sentinels on each side. I deployed with Stryker and the Jacks in the middle, Sword Knights across from Invictors and Stormblade across from Sentinels.

Turn 1

Retri - Stuff ran, Issyria cast "Inviolable Resolve" on the Sentinels.
Cygnar - Stuff ran, Stryker cast "Deflection". Journeyman cast "Arcane Shield" on Stryker. 

Turn 2

Retri - Issyria cast "Crusaders Call" and upkept her other spell and used "Ancillary Attack" on Hyperion. Hyperion activated and killed 7(!) Sword Knights with two shots, both got Critical Consume. Hyperion also shot the Lancer and destroyed both arms. Sentinels charged the Stormblades and killed three of them and did some damage to Ol' Rowdy who counter charged and killed a Sentinel. Invictors moved forward and did a CRA on the Journeyman, but left him alive with three boxes. They also tried to kill Runewood, but he used his Sac Pawn to transfer the hit to the Lancer.

Cygnar - Eiryss shot the Sentinels to remove "Inviolable Resolve". Stormblades and Ol' Rowdy charged into the Sentinels and killed 6 of them. Sword Knights charged into Invictors and killed three of them. Stryker moved up behind Ol' Rowdy and used his feat. Stormblades and Rowdy killed some more Sentinels, leaving only the UA alive. Sword Knights killed two more Invictors during the feat. 

Turn 3

Retri - Invictors killed the remaining Sword Knights. The Sentinel Officer and Escort charged Eiryss but missed with their attacks. Hyperion got 3 focus and charged Ol' Rowdy and wrecked both him and the Lancer without needing to spend all focus. Since the control zone was cleared he also scored a point. 

Cygnar - I had two choices at this point. Use Stryker and the Stormblades to try and kill Hyperion and play the attrition game, or go for the assassination on Issyria. I went for the assassination run. Stormblades charged and killed Sylys who was blocking the charge lane. Runewood boosted Strykers MAT. Stryker then cast "Velocity" to get into position and then charged. Overload with three dices only gave Stryker +5 STR and did 9 damage to him. The charge attack hit and killed Issyria with a single blow. 

25pts Steamroller Tournamnet

Well... that didn't go so quite as planned. For some reason *cough* I was hungover by the time the tournament started. Multiple bad plays and some poor dice rolls really did it for me. I didn't know what to expect but there were a lot of good players at the tournamnet. I'll give you just a quick recap of my four games.

Game 1 - vs Reznik (Menoth)

A Reznik list with a Reckoner and a Vanquisher with some standard Menoth support units. The only unit he played was Flame Guards with the UA. The scenario was Close Quarter and I played with my Rask list. I used my feat early to not get shot down by his jacks, the following turn he sent in some Flame Guards to jam my Gatormen. My Wrastler got the charge on the Reckoner and killed it without using all of its Fury. The following turn the Vanquisher killed my Wrastler and the Flame Guards got some insane dicerolls and killed all of my Gatormen. Couldn't do much rest of the game and Reznik got the charge on Rask and killed him.

Game 2 - vs eVayl (Legion)Stupid tier list with 3 heavy beasts, two Angelius and a Ravagore. I played with Baranabus and I almost won the game. It became a slugfest in the middle of the board and he only had an Angel with 4-5 boxes left and the Spawning-pot-thingy. In the end he made a last atempt to kill Barnabas with a summoned Stinger. He got a realy spike in the damage roll and killed him outright(!).

Game 3 - vs Clanadra (Trolls)

Never played against this caster before. Earthborn, Stormtroll, Pyg Burrowers and some strong solos. I chose to play with Rask this time again. Was a pretty one sided game. The Burrowers made more than 60% of their Tough rolls. I couldn't prevent him from getting the charge and killing my beasts and gators one by one.

Game 4 - vs Gorten (Mercs)

Not a Seaforged list. He played with Gorten, Driller, Forge Guards, Thor, ATGM and a Mule. I played with Barnabus just to be able to hide in the swamp pits. The only reason I won the game was due to a miss play by him. Me moved Gorten to the flank, away from his main force, which let me use Barnabus feat and knock down his entire army and kill most of it in one turn.

Conclusion

Don't play when this hungover kids. Some real advice would be practice, practice and practice. I haven't played in quite a while and almost everything I faced felt like something I've never encounterd before. Hopefully this next Journeyman League will help me get in shape with Cygnar once again.

My first Steamroller with Gatormen

 



Holy Crap! I haven't done an update on this blog for ages. Well, I haven't been playing that much Warmachine either. Finished my first Journeyman League last year with the Gatormen. Didn't have that much time to play games, but I painted most of the models.

Anyway, this weekend will be my first tournament of the yeah. It's just a small local tournamnet at 25 points, so I will bring my minions this time around. There will also be a new Journeyman League (slow grow) starting next week, and so I will probably return to Cygnar as they are my main force. I will try and make some battle reports this weekend, but don't expect a lot of pictures.

As far as lists go, they're pretty straight forward. I will play 2 lists, Rask and Barnabus, and they'll be something like this:

Points: 24/25
Bloody Barnabas (*6pts)
* Bull Snapper (3pts)
* Blackhide Wrastler (9pts)
* Ironback Spitter (8pts)
Gatormen Posse (Leader and 4 Grunts) (9pts)
Feralgeist (1pts)
25/25
Rask (*6pts)
* Bull Snapper (3pts)
* Blackhide Wrastler (9pts)
* Swamp Horror (8pts)
Gatormen Posse (Leader and 4 Grunts) (9pts)
Professor Victor Pendrake (2pts)

My Cygnar Army

Huh, it seems like I collected a pretty significant Cygnar force over the last year. And I almost painted every model I own, which is pretty unusual for me. I currently have a Hunter, Sentinel and Kraye on the painting table along with my newly started Minion force. But this is what I currently have in Cygnar that is painted.

Caster

pStryker
eStryker
pHaley
eHaley
eNemo
eCaine
Kara Sloan
Siege

Warjacks
Stormwall
Ironclad
Stormclad
Ol' Rowdy
Defender/Cyclone/Ironclad
Hammersmith/Avenger/Centurion
Charger (2 of them)

Hunter
Lancer

Units
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages + UA
Stormblade Infantry + UA + 3 Stormgunners
Swordknights
The Black 13th
Rangers
Tempest Blazers

SolosAlan Strangeweys
Journeyman Warcaster
Squire
Trencher Master Gunner
Stormsmith Stormcaller (5 of them)
Runewood

MercsGreygore Boomhowler & Co
Gorman di Wolfe
Rhupert Carlvaro
Reinholdt
eEiryss

Theory Crafting with Horse Power

For my next tournament I will most likely pick up Kraye and try out his tier list. I'm a huge fan of running jacks, so both Kraye and Darius seems to be my kind of casters. Another thing I like about Kraye is that he can run a solid tier list without Stormwall. Don't get me wrong, I love our big guy and I rarely leave home without him, but sometimes you just wanna play with something else. The list I want to try out is this one.

Tier 4 - Mobile Strike Force
Captain Jeremiah Kraye (*6pts)
* Hunter (6pts)
* Hunter (6pts)
* Sentinel (4pts)
* Centurion (9pts)
* Cyclone (9pts)
* Stormclad (10pts)
Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team (4pts)
Rangers (4pts)
Rangers (4pts)
I still need to buy another pack of Rangers, but the rest I already got. Hunters always work best in pairs, and with Krayes Guided Fire you only need to drop 1 focus for boosting damage. A single Hunter can do decent damage to a Heavy, but two are more likely to cripple a system before it can enter combat. The Sentinel is just there to give Kraye the much neede Shield Guard, and perhaps block a charge lane and in some rare cases it might even get a chance to clear some low armor infantry.

Stromclad is the beast heavy Cygnar got, and with Full Tilt and Krayes feat he can go on a really long assassination run. Centurion is there for much of the same reasons, or as a second heavy warjack for my opponent to deal with. Cyclone is my choice for clearing infantry, placing covering fire, and the odd chance of doing a double-handed throw. There is never a wrong choice to bring the Black 13th to handle flanks, using Mage Storm and just being one of the best units in the game. The only drawback of using them is that I can't use them in any other list I might bring to a tournament.

I'll try to get some games next week and see how well this list will work.

FUSK Steamroller tournamnet battle reports

Emanuel is tries to find a way to kill pDenny

Me and two friends went to a Steamroller tournament this weekend. It was just a small one with 10 guys, all good friends. I didn't take that many pictures so this will just be another short recap of what happened in the games that I played in. 

Game 1 vs Circle

Morvahna the Autumnblade (*6pts)

* Gorax (4pts)
* Feral Warpwolf (9pts)
* Warpwolf Stalker (10pts)
* Woldwarden (9pts)
Shifting Stones (2pts)
Shifting Stones (2pts)
Tharn Bloodweavers (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
Warpborn Skinwalkers (Leader and 4 Grunts) (8pts)
* Warpborn Alpha (3pts)
Druid Wilder (2pts)
Gallows Grove (1pts)

I'm pretty sure this is the list he played with, I could be wrong with a point or two. His other list was basically the same one but with Moshar instead. The scenario was Close Quarter and I played with eNemo Tier 1 list. I feated on turn 2 but didn't get much out of it. I couldn't reach his heavies even though I used Energizer I was a few inches short on my charges. Instead I fell upon a wall of Skinwalkers and started bashing. On his turn he sent his Stalker on the Stormwall and got some insane dice rolls and did 54 boxes of damage, then the Feral did the killing blow and killed the Stormblade with even more insane rolls. Not much I could do at that point. He won by scenario since I couldn't send in any units to contest with him.

Game 2 vs Cygnar

Captain Allister Caine (*5pts)
* Ol' Rowdy (9pts)
* Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker (2pts)
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer (2pts)
Greygore Boomhowler & Co. (Boomhowler and 9 Grunts) (9pts)
Horgenhold Forge Guard (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
Lady Aiyana & Master Holt (4pts)
Rangers (5pts)
Eiryss, Angel of Retribution (3pts)
Journeyman Warcaster (3pts)
Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator (1pts)
Stormsmith Stormcaller (1pts)
Taryn di la Rovissi (2pts)

My first game ever against my own faction. His other list was eStryker with Stormlances and some other stuff that I don't remember. I choose Siege since I wanted foxhole as protection from eCaine. The scenario was Incursion. We both deployed so that our Boomhowlers would have a slug fest at one control point. The middle flag was the one to go away so we had to split up our forces. I got an early point from the uncontested flag from the left where he didn't have any units except for his "super solos" and eCaine. For some reason I forgot about Taryn and her Shadow Fire, and I thought that Siege would be safe behind the Stormwall. He shot the Stormwall with Taryn and then went for the assassination with Siege. On his last shot with eCaine he got just enough damage to kill Siege.

Game 3 vs Cryx

Warwitch Deneghra (*5pts)
* Deathripper (4pts)
* Deathripper (4pts)
* Nightmare (10pts)
* Skarlock Thrall (2pts)
Bane Knights (Leader and 9 Grunts) (10pts)
Bane Thralls (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Bane Thrall Officer & Standard (3pts)
Bile Thralls (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
Bane Lord Tartarus (4pts)
Bloat Thrall (2pts)
Pistol Wraith (3pts)
Pistol Wraith (3pts)

He played with something like this. The list above is 53pts, and I could be wrong on something. The Scenario was Process of Elimination and I played with eNemo and my wall of warjacks. He ran forward with his units and cast Crippling Grasp on my Stormwall to prevent it from reaching his army. Instead I cast Polarity Shield on it and placed him in the zone to my left. On the other side I had the rest of my army, and my Chargers and Stormcallers killed a bunch of Bane Knights before they could wreck my jacks. I also got the Alpha Strike on the Nightmare and killed it. It turned out to a really long attrition game and he spent a lot of time bashing both my Stormwall and Centurion without doing any real damage even though he gave them -7 ARM during his feat turn. In the end he lost by death clock (I still had 16 minutes left on my clock).

Game 4 vs Legion

Rhyas, Sigil of Everblight (*6pts)
* Nephilim Soldier (5pts)
* Angelius (9pts)
* Scythean (9pts)
Blighted Nyss Grotesques (Leader and 9 Grunts) (6pts)
Blighted Nyss Swordsmen (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Blighted Nyss Swordsmen Abbot & Champion (3pts)
Blighted Ogrun Warspears (Leader and 4 Grunts) (8pts)
* Warspear Chieftan (2pts)
Blighted Nyss Shepherd (1pts)
Succubus (2pts)
Warmonger War Chief (3pts)

First time I faced Rhyas, Nephilim Soldier, Swordsmen, Grotesques and Ogruns... a lot of first time things here. Scenario was Destruction and I played Siege again. He ran his army very far due to Dash from Rhyas. I moved into the zone with the Boomhowlers and waited to get charged, and charge he did... with Rhyas feat. He got some swings on Stormwall which let him get to Siege and do some damage to him. I managed to clear away the threat from Siege and gave him Arcane Shield and played very defensively with him. On the next turn he got into combat with Siege with his flying units and got Siege down to 2 boxes of health. I used my feat and cleared away most of his army in one turn but Siege was still not safe. The next turn Rhyas saw her chance and charged (stupid acrobatics) straight trough Stormwall and into Siege. With 26 ARM he turned out to be a hard nut to crack as he only did 1 damage to Siege, leaving him with a single wound. Stormwall turned around and without a single focus he smashed a damaged Angelius with one fist and then hit Rhyas with the other and killed her with a single blow since she had no beasts left to transfer to.

Conclusion

It's really hard to play against a bunch of stuff you've never seen before. I did some really dumb mistakes in my two first games that cost me both games. I got to aggressive in the first game which cost me my Stormwall and Stormclad. And in the game against eCaine I could have just cast Foxhole and camped since the only way for him to kill Stormwall was with eCaines feat. Against Cryx I played pretty good and didn't do anything stupid and didn't give away anything for free and in my last game I just got lucky.

In my next tournament with Cygnar I'm planning on bringing Kraye with his tier list.

Siege vs Butcher3 (quick bat-reps)

My buddy Viktor got his hands on the limited Butcher model a few weeks ago. I haven't had the "pleasure" to play against him yet, but today I got my chance. I know he can remove tough and pull models towards him and use flashing blades to clear away a huge amount ofinfantry. Still I went with Siege in this match up, cus I need the practice.

I removed Jonas Murdoch and two Stormcallers to get enough points for the Black 13th unit. He played a somewhat different list. I know he will add eAlexia to his list, but until he gets her he plays with a Drakhun instead. The rest of his list is pretty standard Khador. Winter Guards, Black Dragon Pikemen, Widowmakers, Greylords, Greatbears, Bokus, Corbeau and some other solos.

In the first game we played Incursion. I started by running up my force and he did the same. The next turn I got a bit greedy with Siege and moved him a bit to far ut the table. I screened him pretty good with the Boomhowlers but it didn't help much. Corbeau and Energizer got Butcher really far up the board, and then he charged a troll and used his spell to pull models closer to him. He got into range of Siege and only needed three flashing blades to finish the job.

Second game we played Into the Breach, same lists. I went first once again and we both ran with our armies. I spent way to much time and unit to try and kill his Drakhun who was almost in combat with my Gun Mages. Trolls buildt a wall of tough in the control zone. As I played with Siege further back he went for scenario score instead. Butcher charged into the trolls and used his feat to make them flee, then proceeded by killing a bunch of them before using his feat and camping his focus. He had placed his Devastator next to Butcher, so I saw a small chance of getting the kill. Siege activated and cast Force Hammer to slam the Devastator into Butcher. Stormwall got a clear charge path and could finish the job.