Category Archives: WarMachine

DOGC Wins Championship at NETT!!!

Posted by Anthony on

For the second time in as many months DOGC found themselves crowned victorious at the end of a hard fought team tournament. This time it was the prestigious New England Team Tournament; the long standing New England Privateers event, the first of it’s kind and dates back nearly ten years to the very beginnings of Warmachine. The victorious team was comprised of Anthony Ferraiolo, Alex Buganski, and Shane York; below are the summary battle reports of the games that lead them to the title…

Coming off their team tourney win in New Jersey, one of the three players from the top team in Jersey would not be available for this event, Dan Berger, and it was the first time in a year Bergz would not participate as part of DOGC’s top team. Alex Buganski would step up and take his place alongside Shane York and Anthony Ferraiolo. Shane and Anthony were winners at the event in North Jersey, both going X-0 at that event, however it was hard to imagine them pulling that feat off again, so Alex would have to step his game up if they were going to win back to back team tournaments. Here is a look at the lists:

Anthony’s Lists (captain):

eMorvahna – Feral, Woldguardian, Ravagers (full) w/ UA and WA, Skinwalkers with UA, Wolves of Orboros w/ UA, Shifting Stones w/ UA and Gallows Groves (x2)

Kromac – Stalker (x2), Pureblood, Gorax, Wilder, Woldstalkers (x2), Shifting Stones w/ UA, Gallows Grove, Lord of the Feast, Swamp Gobbers

On his lists: “this was my first competitive event with eMorvahna, and I’m doing things much differently with her than what most have seen win on the national scene. No Stalkers, no Reeves, no Warwolfs, no Gorax, no second unit of stones. It’s really a completely different list; however my teammates gave me confidence that I’m on the right track. For me this is about taking full advantage of the Feat, and setting the line of engagement up the field, and using all of her abilities to put my opponent in a discouraged position in scenario while always threatening assassination. Since I was playing eMorvy for the first time competitively, I thought it best to make sure I had the Warlock I was most confident in with me, and that’s Kromac. His build was tried and true down in Jersey, and he has been a staple of my competitive pairings since I attended TempleCon last year; plus he fits her weak spot against Cryx better than anything I can put on the table.”

Alex’s Lists (1st Lieutenant):

eStryker – Ol’ Rowdy, Stormclad, Squire, Stormblades w/ UA and Gunner (1), Precursor Knights (full) w/ UA, Black 13th, Stormblade Captain (x2), Junior, Madelyn Corbeau

eCaine – Centuirion, Squire, Stomblades w/ UA and Gunners (2), ATGM w/ UA, Rangers, Junior, Arlan, Reinholdt, Eyriss, Ayianna and Holt

On his lists: “I wanted two obvious assassination casters so that people would have to take into consideration that I could kill them from across the board. My lists were designed to be able to attrition and take scenario or switch gears and open holes for the assassination . That was why I went with the units I did. They can deal with both infantry and heavies. They hit hard and they have high MAT. I also wanted to be able to support my army apart from my casters which is why I went with the solos I did. Also, always having my opponent worried about assassination lets me focus on scenario”

Shane’s Lists (2nd Lieutenant):

Rask (tier) – Wrastler, Bull Snapper, Bog Trogs (full) x3, Bog Trogs (min) x1, Croak Hunter x5, Witch Doc x2, Totem Hunter

Barnabus – Spitter x3, Posse (full) x2, Bog Trogs (full), Thrullg, Witch Doc

On his lists: “Most Blindwater lists have issues against mass weaponmaster so I felt Rask could shore up that weakness as well.  Since Rask with CMA’s and Fury can handle Gargossals I decided to skew Barnabus”

With that settled, now to see how the dice rolls went…

Round 1: vs Game On

Scenario: Supply and Demand

Synopsis: The team we faced was from a meta in Maine, and in their pre match huddle they saw nothing in the pairings that made them feel they wanted to Feat, especially in the first round. As such, both teams rolled off and neither team featead.

In the Captains match, Anthony was facing off against another Circle player sporting Kromac, and he decided to drop eMorvahna feeling she is strongest the mirror match. She was able to set the line of engagement deep across the board. The retaliation was limited on turn 2, and when turn 3 was over Ghetorix and the Stalker were both dead, leaving Kromac with only one heavy and already bedhind on scenario being locked out of the zone. On the next turn eMorvahana was able to Feat and create an overwhelming board imbalance taking over scenario. Kromac made a last ditch effort to counter Feat and destroy as many things as possible, however it was a blaze of glory as he was killed on the following sequence resulting in a table wipe for Anthony and max CPs. Strong start.

Shortly thereafter 1st Lieutenant match, Alex was closing out his game as well. eStryker never got his hands dirty in his match versus Skorne. He was able to take most of the infantry off the board with ranged attacks on turn 1 and 2. Then as Mammoth attempted to keep scenario alive, however the Stormclad and Ol’ Rowdy were there to answer. In response Molik Karn took out the Stormclad but Rowdy proved too much for him as well, leaving the B13th to clear the remainder of the zone, and declare scenario victory. With the match already one, both players turned to see how Shane was fairing.

In the 2nd Lietanants’s match Shane was matched up against Cygnar. His opponent was playing Stryker2, a list we are all intimately familiar with as Alex plays him A LOT!  Shane liked Barnabus shooting in this match up. It gives lots of options on ways to get to Stryker. I was able to hold him at bay with some water in the zone funnelling his troops into my Barnabus shooting list. The Bog Trogs ambushed in and killed his Stormclad which was a huge boon for the Minions. With the Turtles shooting able to whittle down the Cygnar troops, they were forced into a last ditch assassination. With that failing and Stryker no longer in base with Rowdy, Shane was able to feat and have Barnabus close the deal; DOGC sweeps the opening round and advances.

Round 2: vs Regular Team

Scenario: Incursion

Synopsis: In what would ultimately be their toughest match of the day, the DOGC would face off against some familiar and unfamiliar foes that they had faced last year NETT. While the team name was the same, only two members were returning to pair off against each other this year, one on each side; Anthony and Andrew.

In the 2nd Lieutenants match Shane was pitted in a tough matchup drawing Khador eButcher Doom Reaver spam. Shane had faced off against the 6 unit version before and felt like his Rask list would do well there; however his opponent had 9 units (yes, that’s not a typo!). There was a large obstruction on one board edge. Luck was going to be a factor in this one and both players knew the roll to go first was key. Shane’s opponent won the roll and got well past the flags by turn two. Shane had banked on the side without the obstruction staying put to contest him on scenario and had it well cleared before it disappeared! There wasn’t much he could to hold eButcher back. Ultimately Khador won on scenario but only had 21 Doomreavers left, as Shane had killed 35 of them and dismounted Fenris while keeping his Berserker disrupted.  It wasn’t the win he was hoping for but was a better showing than he thought when the luck factors didn’t go his way. With that he turned to his two teammates to see if they could bail him out.

The 1st Lieutenants game was winding down at that point, and Alex looked to be in a strong position. This game wanting to take the pressure off of his Divide and Conquer requirements, he dropped eCaine in this game vs pButcher. At first the matchup seemed like a poor one for eCaine, however at second glance, Butcher could not get his army across the table fast enough, as the Cygnarian gun line was able to eat the units coming at him, while Eyriss was able to keep Beast disrupted and at bay. When the gap finally closed, the Precursors were able to get a bead on Beast, use their mini feat and scrap the character jack swing the game heavily in Cygnar’s favor. However there was still a Spriggan lurking, to which the the ATGM pushed him off a flag to allow Cygnar to score again. Caine then spent two turns clearing out the remaining Winter Guard, and leaving only a few Khadorian pieces on the battlefield. On the next turn Butcher came forward and used his Feat to scrap the Centurion but Eyriss nearby prevented him from scoring. Then Caine was able to shoot Holt off the table forcing Ayianna to flee allowing another CP to be scored, and the game be won on scnario. Alex had even the match at one game a piece, however looking at Anthony’s table the situation was just not good.

It’s fitting the captains match would be the deciding factor in this one. Anthony and Andrew had faced off last year in the final round of NETT and that was a pretty lopsided match that left Andrew eager for redemption. He advised after the match was over that if DOGC had feated out of the matchup he was going to feat back into it as he wanted to take down big A. Looking at the scene late in the match Anthony, playing eMorvahna, had lost nearly all of his army, down to about a dozen models total on the board, and what was even more grim news was that he had already used his Feat, so this was really it. Andrew, playing Saeryn, however had nearly all his pieces still in play, including all of his heavies who were all still fully functional and barely touched. Scenario was not in play yet, however it was definitely late in the game. Saeyrn was walled off by her beasts between herself and eMorvahna, with about a foot and a half of space between them. She was camping a Fury, with Banishing Ward up on herself and under the effects of Tenacity thanks to a nearby Shredder. This was likely the last turn for eMorvy and spectators began to surround the table as this match had run long, Anthony knew that it was time to put together the most qualified assassination run he could. After a good 3-4 minute pause, Anthony put the pieces together and went to work. Using the Stones to Teleport the Feral into an Angelius, who warped Strength and threw it at Saeyrn, successfully knocking her down. Then the damaged Woldguardian and lone remaining Skinwalker cleared a path for Morvahna to get within spell shot range of Saeryn. Morvahna activated moved to draw the best line she could on Saeyrn; and after a judge ruling in favor of eMorvahna, she was able to draw LOS. First cast a Purify to remove Banishing Ward and two Sunder Spirits later Saeryn (who had taken some damage earlier) was dead! A real nail biter to close this match out, and advance DOGC. These teams did not know it at the time, but they would go on to finish first and second in the standings.

Round 3: vs Rowdy Titans

Scenario: Into the Breach

Synopsis: Another team DOGC is familiar with as they had paired off at TempleCon earlier this year. The matchups were a bit shuffled this time, as they feated to get a different matchup in the Captains spot. In the 1st Lieutenants match Alex was pitted against a familiar foe from Massachusettes who he plays regularly when he’s at college during the school year. The matchup was Cygnar vs Cygnar, Alex dropping eCaine versus eStryker someone he was obviously familiar with. With both players being very familiar with the others armies, it was predicting to be a cagey match where they both stayed out of threat range. The piece trade was started by eStryker who committed his a Stormclad to kill Eyriss. Alex responded by having his Knights counter charge and scrap the Stomrclad. Being that the Precursrs were keeping Stryker from being able to score, they had to be dealt with, so he committed everything he had to killing them, including committing Stryker forward to do it. Alex pondered a few different options then decided it was best to go for it now as he would likely spend the rest of the game running from Stryker otherwise, and used a reload from Rienholdt, popped Feat and poured 10 shots into Stryker. It took all ten shots, but when the clouds cleared, Stryker had gone down in a hail of gunfire, despite being on a fullfocus camp. DOGC up 1-0, and looking strong.

In the 2nd Lieutenant match, Shane was matched up against one of the two Skorne players.  Knowing his opponent had Xerxis in his stable Shane felt forced to drop Rask. His opponent indeed dropped Xerxis, meaning Shane felt good about the call he made.  Rask was able to pin the Xerxis force back pretty far and keep him out of the zone for a very long time. He continually sent things in to sacrifice to keep me from scoring the zone but those things weren’t attacking.  I was finally able to attrition him out and dominate the zone. Xerxis was sent at the flag as a last ditch effort but it wasn’t enough, Shane won on scenario securing the third round victory for DOGC.

Anthony’s game finished about the same time as Shane’s, so he was not aware of the status of that game at the time he was playing so it was full go. His match was against Sam, the only player who managed a win against DOGC last time their two teams matched up. This time he was playing Skorne, and looking at the fact that Anthony had now played eMorvahna twice he was comfortable knowing that he was very likely to play Kromac in the match. As such he dropped eHexeris whom he felt was his strongest play wanting to leverage Ghost Site on the Mammoth and destory the beasts at range. The plan seemed viable, as he fed his two units up the board early to draw out the Stalkers. Anthony efficiently applied his resources to wipe both units, and the Mammoth was able to successfully shoot one Stalker off the table. Anthony was then able to deliver the Lord of the Feast to the opposing lines who Skorne had underestimated. With Reach and engaging lots of the opposing lines, he was able to force eHexy to have his beasts deal with him, but it took more than they anticipated. As such it allowed Kromac’s force to score the zone, seizing early CP. Skorne had to respond by having Mammoth crash the zone to stop scoring and attempting to deal with the remaining heavies in the zone; but opting not to boost attack rolls proved to be a vital error. Kromac responded by going into beast form, and using his feat to take the Mammoth down to only about a third of it’s life. The healed Pureblood now finished it off, and the Stalker was allowed space to charge the remaining light beasts leaving only Hexy and a few support pieces. Sam responded with a qualified, long shot, assassination run, however it ultimately fell short allowing Kromac to dominate a second time, and win on scenario. DOGC had swept their opponents for the second time in three rounds.

Round 4: vs Team Temple

Scenario: Ammunition Run

Synopsis: This round was longest team huddle had all day. DOGC was in the undefeated match, and there was only one other undefeated left. The pair down match had Regular Team paired up and we knew that there was a real chance they would win that match and make this round the championship round. So in assessing the matchups the conversation was centered around whether to feat or not. None of us felt uncomfortable in their current matchup. Anthony was pitted against J-Wow and Khador, Alex against Derek and a likely eLiche game, and Shane was staring at Zach and Retribution whom he was very comfortable against. The one conclusion that came out of it, was that Shane didn’t want to face Cryx so if we got that match we might choose to feat out of it, but otherwise we weren’t going to change anything. Alex should have been fine w/ eCaine versus Liche and Anthony was very comfortable playing against Liche and Cryx in general as he had Kromac itching to take the table and satisfy his Divide and Conquer stipulation.

On the dice to decide who was going to Feat, DOGC lost the roll and advised they were not feating. Team Temple promptly feated in response moving Zach and Retribution up to the top spot, and prompltly sending Derek and eLiche to face Shane leaving Alex with J-Wow and Khador. Shane acknowledged that this meant Alex and Anthony would likely have to carry the day if they were going to win this round, as Minions have a hard time with Cryx in general and specifically have a hard time with eLiche. Away they went.

Shane’s game was unfortunately an ugly one and he opted to go with Rask, and sure enough Derek dropped eLiche. Shane was able to hold Derek back for a very long time and Death Clock began to come into play. On turn 3 Rask had a chance to dominate the zone but a tough Bane Thrall stopped that. After that it went downhill quickly.  It took Derek 8 turns to finally dominate the zone for the win, however the games that Anthony and Alex were in were coming to a conclusion, fingers crossed.

Alex dropped eStryker versus pIrusk, and the matchup was one he was comfortable in, fearing the Doom Reaver spam more. Irusk ran into position first turn, and Alex responded by keeping his opponent beyind max threat and having the B13th leave a Mage Storm in an inconvenient spot to make the IFP move around it. Irusk in turned feated to get into the zone and prepare of impact. Stryker advanced his force and took out the objective, then used his Feat to clear the zone, allowing Stryker to advance in and dominate early, scoring 3 quick CP. Irusk assessed the situation, eye balled the range as best he could and decided it was go time. He loaded up Beast with focus, dropped Superiority on him, and declared a charge on Stryker. To be sure of an accurate measurement, a judge was called and it was ruled that Beast was short, leaving him waiving in the breeze. On the followup turn, Beast was scrapped by Stryker, and the remainder of the force cleared what was left from the zone to dominate again and win on scenario 5-0.

At the same time Anthony’s game was coming to an end. In full disclosure, Zach admitted that it was the game versus Anthony that caused Team Temple the most angst. None were really familiar with eMorvahna at this point, and the list he is playing is not very similar to what is currently out there in the meta, so nobody was comfortable going into it. Derek didn’t want to walk into a game versus Kromac when the lay up was available versus Minions, leaving it to Khador or Ret. Boostable ranged attacks is still the best way to bring down eMorvahna so Zach stepped up and said he wanted the match. He had two lists, and one owas Ossyan the other was Rahn. He looked at the pairings and realized that Anthony had only played Kromac once, this being a Divide and Conquer (2) five round event, that meant that if Anthony did not drop Kromac he would be suicided in the 5th round (if there was one) into playing him. As such, he opted out of dropping Rahn afraid of Beastial and dropped Ossyan. Anthony made a pre-round decisoin to go for eMorvahna as he felt that was the best matchup, given that Ossyan could be really bad for Kromac and Rahn was playable. This is what Zach expected. What neither player expected was for the camera to be pointed at the final table. Tectonic Craft Studios prepped some sweet terrain for the game and by happenstance both players had fully painted armies. What a sweet recording opportunity.

With all but the championship to be determined, Zach and Anthony squared off. Zach had Shatterstorm up right away and made good use of it firing onto the 8 box Ravagers early. Fog of War from Morvahna proved to be somewhat problematic but not before 3 models were RFP early. Zach ran his Halbadiers forward to keep the line of engagement up the board and away from his ranged units. The Ravagers, thanks to corpse tokens, were able to clear most of the Halbs off the board, and this allowed Zach to respond by getting Shatters Storm on two pieces now, rotating from Storm Falls to the AFG. But Fog of War was even more problematic now that most of the Circle infantry was engaged. Zach then opted to use Discordia to try and take out the Woldguardian who had come forward to scrap the objective the turn prior. Doing some quick math in his head he realized that he probably wouldn’t get it done with three focus, he decided to try to slam him out of the zone, when that failed, the game was looking poor. The Guardian then scrapped the Character jack, and the game quickly went downhill from there. Circle scored more CPs, and pushed the line of engagement way forward with eMorvahna’s feat now that the Halbs were clear, she put a whole slew of Ravagers into the Ret gun line, meaning none would be shooting. the Feral advance to a wall about mid board on the R flank as the WoO pushed foward and the Skinwalkers had taken control of the L flank.Next turn was a formality as Ossyan made a desparate attempt to Feat and clear anything improtant but was unable. Circle scored the zone again on the Ret turn, and eMorvahana was able to walk in on the final turn to dominate the zone for the win and the NETT championship!

What a hugely successful day for DOGC! They had no easy matches and two of their opponents finished 2nd and 3rd meaning that they had battled the best the tournament had to offer and still emerged victorious! Honorable mention to DOGC Tres that was in the would be semi-final match against Team Temple and had they won it may well have been another DOGC vs DOGC final to determine a team tourney championship.

The NETT being arguably the most recognizable team championship this side of the WTC marks another huge tournament witn for DOGC! What a great event by Paul and Craig, they are long standing pillars of the community, and we all enjoyed some post title celebration and couldn’t be prouder to be the first to bring the trophy back to CT!

DOGC Dominates Team Tourney for Redemption in Jersey!!!!

Posted by Anthony on

Last month DOGC sent two teams down to North Jersey for a Team Tourney event, and ultimately they found each other in the final pairing competing for the top spot. Over 30 particpants, and as per usual great competition in the NJ Metro area, not to mention a new great venue for DOGC. It was the first team tourney title for DOGC, and here is a recap from the team that ran the table to the top spot….

The team of Anthony, Berger, and Shane were paired together for this event; Berger and Anthony were returning members of the team that suffered a controversial final table loss last year in Jersey. Shane is a new DOGC player who was also in Jersey for the event last year, but not a teammate in that match. Here is a view of their lists:

Anthony’s Lists:

Kromac – Stalker x 2, Pureblood, Gorax, Wilder, Woldstalkers x 2, Stones w/ UA, Gallows Grove, LOTF, Swamp Gobbers

pBaldur – Woldwrath, Ghetorix, Stalker, Bloodtrackers (full), Stones w/ UA, Witch Docter, Swamp Gobbers

On his lists: “I really wanted to play Woldwrath, and feel that pBaldur is the best fit for him. The list has performed extremely well, and serves as my anti range list, that dominates scenario more than any other Circle list I play. Woldwrath has proven to be better than I really thought he was, and much better than my opponents thought as well. The new Kromac build has made it really exciting for me to play again, and has proved to be a really perfect pairing with Baldur. I don’t have to worry about facing ranged lists as much, and he handles infantry spam fo Baldur. I’m loving the inclusion of the LOTF in the build, and the Pureblood is a difference maker despite what the haters say.”

Berger’s Lists:

eLylyth – Ravagore, Bolt Thrower, Naga, Typhon, Succubus, Striders w UA, Strider Deathstalker, Foresaken x 2, Blackfrost Shard

Saeryn – Angelius x 2, Scythean, Bolt Thrower, Raek, Shredder, Succubus, Striders w UA, Foresaken x 2, Gobbers

On his lists: “eLylyth is for the attrition and ranged match ups. Some factions struggle against her. Even her sub-par match ups like Menoth are not terrible.Saeryn is a melee master.  I took her to combat brick lists that have low model counts and high armor. She covers eLylyth’s bad match ups well and is a scenario powerhouse.”

Shane’s Lists:

Barnabus – Spitter x 3, Posse (full) x 2, Bog Trogs (full), THrullg x 2

Rask – Wrastler, Spitter, Snapper, Bog Trog (3xfull, 1xmin) Croak Hunter x 2, Totem Hunter

On his lists: “With the large number of Cryx opponents I am used to seeing in New Jersey, including Pants Off, Dance Off (who was too scared to show!) I decided I needed the ability to deal with them in both lists.  Most Blindwater lists have issues against mass weaponmaster so I felt Rask could shore up that weakness as well.  Since Rask with CMA’s and Fury can handle Gargossals I decided to skew Barnabus.”

Round 1: Chemical Reaction

The scenario in the opening round was Chemical Reaction. We looked at the matchups in a quick team huddle and nobody felt that there was a need to get out of their matchup. Neither team decided to feat. Anthony’s game was the finished first; he dropped pBaldur vs Rahn with three huge bases including Hyperion. Rahn’s list couldn’t do much to Baldur’s list on the way to engagement, Baldur used the Feat to buy the alpha, took out Hyperion and a Cricket in one turn, scoring 3 points on turn two. It was too much too fast for Rahn, as his he had lost most of the teeth of his army and Anthony had won on scenario 5-0 by the end of turn 3, not losing a point.

Berger’s game came to an end shortly after. Berger dropped Saeryn right away, due to comfort level with eLylyth he wanted to get Saeyrn down as soon as possible, against Menoth he felt comfortable. His opponent dropped Amon. Early concerns for Berger subsided as when he was able to take out the objective on turn three and clear both zones to earn 4 points. The rest was a formality.

WIth the round already won Shane executed a scenario victory with Rask vs pHaley. Rask’s combo of Feat plus Ambush was too much for Haley to bare, causing her to lose too many models and as such she was unable to recover. At that point Shane was able to lean on scenario and win 5-0 by dominating his own zone repeatedly. DOGC sweeps the opening round to advance.

Round 2: Incursion

The second round scenario was Incursion, and would be a clash of teams that could have easily been a battle for the title. Between the two teams they had five masters qualifiers, two masters winners, and one Warmachine Weekend qualifier; however most of those achievements were on the part of DOGC’s opponents.

The first game to end was Berger, he faced off against Charlie from the team that defeated DOGC in the final pairing last year in Jersey. Berger dropped Saeryn vs a Kharchev jack wall list that included Conquest. Seemed like the strong play for Berger, however, despite two turns of alpha with Saeyrn’s Feat he was unable to do enough damage to the immense amount of jacks on the table. Kharchev was able to finally retaliate and ultimately lead to Berger only having his Warlock left, Dark Omen Loss in the opening match of Rnd 2.

With DOGC down a match, Shane was facing Lee, reigning NoVA Con champ, who dropped eMadrak and Shane dropped Rask again, trying to use his ability to spread the table to get a favorable spin on which flag would disappear. He also opted to bring in two Witch Doctors from his Specialists. Shane chose wisely as eMadrak was unable to handle the models coming from every direction and the Feat plus Ambush combo paid dividends again as he was able to stop retaliation and ultimately attrition down to a 5-0 win.

That left the whole match down to Anthony versus Paul in a rematch of their match in the third round of this years Masters at TempleCon. Anthony got the best of Paul in that match, Paul was definitely seeking redemption. He is primarily a Circle player, so there would be no typical Circle surprises, with vengeance in his eyes Paul dropped Damiano and Anthony chose to go to pBaldur again due to all the guns in both of Paul’s lists. This one was a hotly contested game that attritioned way down, trading units and heavies for several rounds. Anthony was able draw first blood on scenario lean from there. With a crowd gathering around the table due to the cagey match running long, the dust eventually began to the settle; it was a nearly untouched Woldwrath that was camping a flag w Baldur that would win the battle as a few Croes Cutthroats and Halbadiers could do nothing about it. Baldur turned in another scenario win, but he and Damiano traded about 6 or 7 turns before the end. Anthony delivered in the clutch and DOGC wiped the sweat off their brow having survived to advance to round 3.

Round 3: Into the Breach

This round the feat became much more a consideration as there was more on the line and each matchup was more critical. DOGC won the Feat roll forcing their opponents to decide first. They opted to Feat to force Anthony to play Circle, Berger vs Menoth, and Khador vs Shane. After a rather long deliberation of the matchups DOGC decided to Feat in return, and hand Circle to Shane and Khador to Anthony, as Berger felt good about his Menoth matchup being there are a ton of Protectorate players in Dark Omen. As such they entered into battle.

This round, Anthony once again finished first. Circle does handle massed infantry well, and he reached for Kromac for the task against Khador. His opponent dropped pSorscha with two character heavies, Beast and Behemoth. His opponent was deceived into thinking he was safe from a Stalker who seemed to be at the far reaches of Kromac’s CNTL area, but did not suspect a Wilder to come running across the table to help deliver a Stalker who was able to Warpath his way to Sorscha and end it on the top of turn 3.

With that game over unexpectedly quick, DOGC had a decisive lead. Berger’s game was quickly turning sour however; he elected to play chicken with his opponent and dropped eLylyth trying to pull the list double cross, it didn’t work as eFeora dropped in return, which is about as bad as it gets. Lylyth was set on fire by Zealots in turn three, and as the game attritioned down, it didn’t go out due to eFeora’s Caustic Presence and eventually Lylyth succomed to the Fire damage.

Shane was left to play for the fate of the title hopes for DOGC, against Will a great player from Australia and the reigning War Store Weekend Champ. Shane’s opponent was one listing eMorvahna, which was part of the pre round strategy as she is susceptible to RNG assassination. Thus Shane dropped Barnabus and his three Spitter list. With two Witch Docters in Shane’s list, it became an issue quickly for eMorvahna to get into a rhythm or heal. That allowed Barnabus to do a favorable piece trade and attrition her force down, and made the Feat perilous for Morvahna given the lack of healing options. As such she was forced to play a game she didn’t want to. Losing all the Ravagers early made the game easier for Shane, as he was able to start dominating in turn two and lean on scenario the rest of the way. In a long cagey game that came down to the round time, Shane was able to take it on CPs as the buzzer sounded, literally! After a quick review with the judges to check the instant replay, it was DOGC onto the finals!

Round 4: Rally Point

In what would now be the final table event of the day, Dark Omen found itself facing…. Dark Omen? Yes indeed! In what was easily the biggest victory of the day for DOGC, having both their teams run the gauntlet of a great tournament with a strong field and have not one but two teams ultimately playing in the final match to bring home the top prize; no matter who won the bout DOGC had won the day! With DOGC already having used their Feat, it was up to DOGC Too, who opted to Feat and swap Walter and Bryan to get a Legion vs Legion matchup with Berger and Menoth vs Minions matchup vs Shane.To the surprise of none Bryan and Berger, Legion vs Legion, came to end the quickest. This time Bryan played list chicken with Berger and it failed when Berger dropped eLylyth vs Bethayne. However in a show of early confidence, Berger decided not to have Lylyth camp the wall where she should have (due to trying to keep a beast in her CNTL area next turn). Bryan feeling the pressure of an uphill battle, decided to Feat and go for the win on top of turn two. Two Spell Martyrs ran to position, under feat Bathayne hit Lylyth with two Gallows, pulling her forward two times, and forcing her to lose all her transfers. Typhon took position to clear some models then a Scythean slammed Typhon over Lylyth thanks to her being a half a foot closer in MKI textbook assassination tech. With Lylyth on the ground all that was left was the crying as Hex Hunters moved up to seal the deal.

With that one quickly in the books, and DOGC Too looking strong in the championship match upset. The next game to complete was the top table of final table with Riker pitted against Ant. Riker opted to play eKreoss over Harbinger in the final match, in thoughts that Ant would drop pBaldur as he had in a previous tournament when they faced off in the final round. Oddly it’s a reasonably good matchup for Circle (who typically doesn’t have much versus Harby) thus Riker opt to play some list chicken against it, however Ant successfully pulled the double cross wanting the additional magic weapons on the table going with Kromac instead. The game was a truly well played contest on both ends. Kromac took control of the game early collapsing one side of the board that Kreoss flooded with infantry using the Woldshrimp, LOTF, and Pureblood. On the other flank Kreoss aggressively countered with two Reckoners on a Stalker at ranged, despite four shots, was unable to bring him down. However in a return of fortune, Circles three heavies were only able to scrap one of Menoth’s on the following turn, allowing Kreoss to Feat in retaliation dropping both Stalkers. Good news for Cirlce was that the Avatar and remaining Reckoner were both in poor shape, the Gorax was able to finish off Avatar and Pureblood took out the Reckoner. Kromac used his Feat and Rift spam to crowd control Kreoss, start scoring points and turn the tide back in his favor. With Kreoss being nearly pinned in place and unable to contest. Circle would win the battle, and now the final match was all tied!

Oh the drama, as Shane and Walter faced off to determine the championship. In what would clearly be an attrition match, Walter had options with Kreoss 3 and High Reclaimer. The latter is the matchup that most are not ready for, unfortunately for Walter his DOGC teammates have all seen it many times. Ultimately Walter opted not to use Kreoss as they are a poor match against Gator Posse in most cases, and so it was High Relcaimer, and Shane opted for Rask once again expecting that High Reclaimer would be his match, playing the card of unfamiliarity on Walter by using the Bog Warlock. It was another attrition war, after a Rask patented Ambush and Feat, Reclaimer found himself two turns later down most of his army but full on souls. With the game tilting in the wrong direction and a seemingly mistake by Shane to leave his beasts out of CNTL and unable to transfer Walter decided to go for the glory, and the championship. The unfamiliarity of Rask would ultimately cost Walter his qualified assassination run thanks to Call to Sacrifice. Rask was surrounded by Bogs, and was not going to die this turn. Reclaimer went down in a blaze of glory as the Bogs around Rask were nearly all destroyed. Rask was able to respond in kind with some help from a Croak Hunter the game was ended, Team Championship for Dark Omen!

What a day for DOGC! Top two teams in a highly competitive event is a great showing for the club, and doing it in Jersey after a near miss last year, all the better! Anthony took home the Executioner Award for most CPs scored on the day, and most importantly Dark Omen made some new friends along the way. Great event, great day, and great win! The first team title for DOGC, and they are clearly back in a grove with three titles in as many tournament attempts. Eyes focusing now on the NETT coming up next month!!!

Result from Local SR 4/22/2013

Posted by darkomenclub on

Our newest local PG Dan ran a Steamroller yesterday down at Gaming ETC in Stratford. Shane one of our newest members won the event. We have the standings below and some Pictures from the Event.

Ranking Player Name SoS CP AP
1 Shane York 9 5 101
2 Will Boutwell 10 13 120
3 Matt J 9 1 100
4 Patrick McKeon 6 11 83
5 Mean Jean 9 14 67
6 Bo D 8 7 99
7 Armando 7 8 64
8 Joshua DePena 6 1 50
9 Daniel Riker 10 6 50
10 Eric Treff 8 2 81
11 Jeff Omundson 7 9 13
12 Mario 7 5 42

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2013 CT Invitational Result

Posted by darkomenclub on

Hey Guys Here are the results for the 2013 CT Invitational that happened today.  A big Thanks to Shane for hosting us today, pictures will be coming later!

Event Details on his blog here

Player Group/Store Wins CPTotal ApTotal
Will ClockWork Comics 4 16 178
Anthony Dark Omen 4 16 169
Josh The Battle Standard 3 8 136
Shane Bye 2 7 154
Andrew Press Gang 1 5 116
Matt Flagship Comics and Games 1 2 112

DOGC has first player qualify for Masters!!!

Posted by Anthony on

This past weekend at TempleCon, in Warwick, RI our own Anthony Ferraiolo completed an incredible run to be the first Dark Omen member to qualify as a Masters player. He put together his Battle Reports for the Standard Issue Tournament on Saturday where he qualified…

As I reflect on qualifying for my first Masters this past weekend at TemleCon, the largest Warmachine event in the world, I feel that I would be remiss if I didn’t start by thanking my teammates and friends. Without the constant encouragement, practice, and support I would not have been able to accomplish this. TempleCon, one year ago, was my first ever Con. After my friends and I played against the best in the world we decided, despite only having about a year in the game, that we wanted to form our own Warmachine clique to compete at a high level; like so many other great metas around the world. So we did, and one year later, to the day, we were celebrating our first Masters appearance!  I feel that this is not so much about my performance this weekend as it is about all the players in DOGC, and the community that supported us. THANK YOU!

Now to the Battle Reports:

For those of you that have read/followed the DOGC Battle Reports leading up to TempleCon you would know that the lists I have been working on were Terminus and eSkarre, and that is exactly who I ran all weekend. The lists were the same, (and are now publicized by MattieK), but in case you haven’t seen them:

Terminus
Seether
Satyxis Raiders x10 w/ UA
Mechanithralls x10
Necrosurgeon
Bane Knights x10
Witherwshadow Combine
Pistol Wraith
Bane Lord Tartarus
Darrage Wrathe
Madelyn Corbeau

eSkarre
Kraken
Deathjack
Nightwretch
Satyxis Raiders x10 w/ UA
Necrosurgeon
Necrotech
Pistil Wraith x2
Ragman

My lists had been a work in progress up until the final week of the event. I had settled on them and was playing at a relatively high level, confident in both their strengths and weaknesses. My strategy for TC was to view my opponents list, and if I felt that it was a good matchup for eSkarre, I would play her, if not, I would play Terminus. Sounds remedial, but it was really that simple. She really is a poor play against competent ranged, and she is not nearly as survivable on her feat turn as many people think. I would consider what my opponent had played before each match, and what lists they had available. But ultimately my strategy was fairly simple to execute. Now to the games!

I played a TON of highly competitive games this weekend, and the lists/scenarios I played against started to run together in my memory, but I will do the best I can:

Round 1: vs Khal (Toronto, Canada)
Scenario: Supply and Demand
Opposing List:
Borka
Mountain King
Earthborn
Mauler
Slag Troll
Axer
Kriel Stone w/ UA
Trollkin Champion Hero

Recap: So Khal is a player from a surprisingly large contingent of Canadian players that made the 9 hour trek down to TC. His crew organized the first ever Canadian Masters! As such, I was certain I was in for a formidable match. He sported a Grim list (I believe) and his Borka List. With Bombers in one list, and a Borka list with a big POW 16 Spray that I could not stop from firing, and the ability to scrap a Kraken with Rage, Acid Touch, and the Stone I felt that Skarre was not the right play, thus based on my pre-game strategy, it was Terminus for me.

I lost the starting roll and my opponent chose to go 2nd; for deployment I had a lot of terrain on the table w/ Forrest on my near L and far R, and wall in the dead center of the battlefield. I put the Mechanithralls on the side of the near forest (my L); I figured it best that they were delayed early rather than later when trying to engage. I put the Knights on the R so they could go right through the terrain if need be. Raiders in the middle as per usual. My opponent put the Mountain King dead center, Mauler on the L (as I look at him) with the Slag Troll, and the Axer on the R w/ Borka, Stones and Champion.

On the opening turn I moved up to threaten the middle of the board w/ the Raiders, and ran everything else up in support, w/ Terminus in the middle of it all w/ Malediction up. My opponent ran the MK forward but not in the zone, and put the Slag Troll up front to start the piece exchange, with the Mauler slightly in front of the MK but in the zone.

I took the dice back and opted to make this my minifeat turn w/ the Raiders, charging the Slag Troll and the Mauler. While I was able to remove the Slag Troll from the table, I was also able to do a lot of damage to the Mauler as well, and pin back the Gargantuan, not too bad. The rest of my MechThralls were ready for a counter charge, as were the Bane Knights. My opponent moved forward the Axer and Threshered some Raiders out of the way to allow the MK to get into the zone, and the Mauler fought back, reducing the Raider unit even more. He brought the Champion thru the woods to threaten my support hiding behind, and made the mistake of killing a lone Bane Knight, triggering Vengeance.

The next turn was going to be crucial to the outcome of the game as I had to deal with the MK; I decided to charge everything into the Gargantuan and was able to get him down to about single digit boxes with most of the Mechanithralls and remaining Raiders, used the Bane Knights to charge the objective, and stones, with a few swings on Borka. I had Terminus left. I knew if I did not take out the Mountain King everything was going to die as he could heal back up to full. I used the Pistol Wraith to clear a few MechThralls so Terminus could get b2b and used both attacks to try and clear him off. With the Stones aura gone (by self sac), and Malediction up I was dice minus very little and the charge attack took the Gargantuan down. Unfortunately with all the models clogged in the middle i was not able to get the Seether in too far to clog the path and was concerned about the Terminus well being at this point, but removing the Mountain King was paramount. I moved up Darrage Wrathe to further protect him w/ Beyond Death. Then braced for Borka’s counter assault, which would likely be for the game; I did score a CP for destroying the objective.

Khal didn’t hesitate, now knowing the game was on tilt for him w/out the Mountain King. He topped off, put Rage on Borka, and put up the Stones ST buff. He was POW 19 and sucked a free strike on the way into Terminus, unable to charge was a good thing for me. He put up Mosh Pit, and KD Terminus on the first swing, but wasn’t able to do much damage, he only had one attack boosting to hit and damage. The Mauler activated ate a bunch of Whelps and healed, put Rage on himself and took three more free strikes on the way in which despite the heal took out his Body and Spirit again. He was outside the Stone Aura so was only POW 19 and under the effect of Beyond Death which wouldn’t be enough against a full camp Terminus. I took the dice on my turn to clean up. Used Tartarus to Curse Borka and put him under Dark Shroud, then the Bane Knights moved to lock Borka in place so he couldn’t stumble. With no Fury, and being at DEF 12 and ARM 13 due to all the debuffs, he didn’t survive the Knights, despite a tough roll. On to round 2!

Round 2: vs Craig (California, USA)
Scenario: Into the Breach
Opposing Lis:
Kromac
Ghetorix
Stalker
Feral
Gorax
Woldstalkers x2
Shifting Stones w/ UA
Shifting Stones
Gallows Grove x2
Wilder
Gobbers

Recap: In my second round match I drew Circle which is always somewhat relieving for me because I’m so familiar with them, I don’t sweat the pairing as much. Going into the matchup I also knew that I was going to play eSkarre, as I can really neuter their shenanigans with her feat, and nothing they do really catches me by surprise. My opponent is a regular tourney player from California and a great opponent. This would go on to become the most epic game I’ve ever played, given the stakes, and the twists and turns it would ultimately take.

My opponent had eKaya and Kromac, ultimately he chose Kromac and this is a matchup i’m very comfortable with as he is my main Circle Warlock and I had already played my eSkarre list against Circle the night before and it worked out fine. Circle beast heavy lists are very capable of killing Terminus and I find it to be a relatively poor matchup for him, so eSkarre was never not going to get played. I won the starting roll this time, and my opponent opted to go first. I had a building of sorts to the R of  my deployment zone, and a wall to my L so I put the Kraken in the middle, w/ Skarre near the wall so she could advance up to it, and the Nightwretch in between the two, with all the support behind and the Pistol Wraiths flanking my deployment. I put the Raiders amidst the building ruins, and Deathjack on the opposite side of the Linear at the very R end of my deployment opposite a forest on my opponents side of the board. Kromac deployed essentially across from Skarre, w/ the majority of his battlegroup on the L side (as I stood) ready to jump the zone) supported by one unit of Woldshrimp and the Stalker on the other side of his deployment across the forest from Deathjack supported by the second unit of Woldshrimp and the Gallows Grove.

I opened the game with the Raiders moving to threaten the zone but not too far in total, put a Pistol Wraith and Ragman in the ruins on the L of my deployment area behind the Raiders, and had Skarre put Death Ward on Kraken and move to the linear obstacle, supported by a Pistol Wraith and Necrosurgeon with the Nightwretch moving forward as well. I had DJ put Admonition on himself and moved him behind the wall as well. Kraken took an erroneous shot at their lines to let them know he meant business, scattered onto the Gobbers and killed one! Kromac’s force inched up as well on the opening turn; the Warlock put Inviolable Resolve on Ghetorix and Warpath on himself, camping the final few in case of another long shot from the Hellblaster Cannon. He moved the battlegroup up, save for the Stalker (who was not near him), into the Stones to threaten Teleportation, and the Stalker toed into the far side of the forest outside of 3” LOS, and in Prowl.

On the second turn I could see this match was going to be cagey. I gave one to the Kraken and camped the rest. I moved the Raiders in an extreme flanking maneuver, to the far L side of the board (as I stood) walling them off in the zone between the ruined building (on my side) and a wall (on the other side), with the zone in the middle. I was very happy with the placement. Deathjack remained back, as I was afraid of Kromac triggering Warpath on the Stalker moving him 3” forward and having LOS to DeathJack so I camped the wall, and stayed w/in 4” of the Flag. I could have moved him forward and used Admonition but I wanted to save it, and not have to recast. Kraken took another long Hellcannon shot and this time took out a non Stealth Shifting Stone, a subtle yet super important piece off the board. I turned the dice back over to my opponent. Kromac was going to start to engage, Zephyr’d the Woldshrimp on the side of the board with the zone forward starting to shoot the Raiders. They clipped one, and triggered Warpath on the Feral, moving into the zone and then it went on to kill a couple more Raiders. Blood drawn but nothing serious at this point. He did inch the Stalker forward and had Kromac put Wild Aggression on him, as well as casting Beastial for the first time. DJ and the Stalker now had LOS to each other, but I did not want to go into the forest and get stuck there for a turn, plus I wasnt’ sure I would be able to make it w/ the difficult terrain.

I took the dice back and was still not in a position to do a lot, but he did have the other unit of Stones available for the Raiders to reach. So I opted to use their minifeat and charge into them and the Feral. I took out two stones, and did a good amount of damage to the heavy beat, 12-15 pts or so. Now with both unit of Stones no longer able to Teleport, I opted to run Deathjack into the game in front of the Kraken, at extreme threat range of the Feral and Ghetorix, with Raiders in between. With Beastial up I was not going to be able to arc on that side of the board anyway, I opted to use the Nightwretch to contest the Flag, and used the wall as best I could remaining w/in 4” of the Flag.The Pistol Wraith on my L ran from behind the ruins across the zone and up against the wall on my opponents side of the board across from the Woldshrimp unit. Kraken opened fire on the Woldshirmp and plucked a few, then took a Hellcannon shot on the Wilder and did 4 damage from the blast, then I used the other Pistol Wraith to finish off the Wilder. I turned the dice back over to my opponent waiting to see how he would respond. Kromac was not going to get aggressive as most of my army was not accessible, so he did not take the bait on sending a heavy across the board at DJ. He instead opted to use the Stalker to kill the Nightwretch. With no more Wilder, he had to come forward a bit to keep the Stalker in his CNTL to force him appropriately. He decided to not upkeep Inviolable Resolve on Ghetorix, and but kept the other two spells in play. He moved forward to make sure he could force the Stalker, but only just enough. Then took the free charge on the Stalker into the Nightwretch, put Lightning Strike on himself, and warped for ST. He destroyed the bone chicken then and Sprinted back to the woods. The Woldshrimp came forward and took the Pistol Wraith off the table. The Feral and Ghetorix moved foward and continued to close the ranks on the Kraken but only slightly, not wanting to give up the alpha, and continued to take apart the Raiders, who were holding up rather well. The Woldshrimp on that side failed to hit the Pistol Wraith, who was still causing problems, by contesting and shooting at the rear ranks.

As my turn started, I realized that Craig had brought Kromac too far forward, he was within range of a Perditioned Deathjack. Craig didn’t see it but I had Skarre move to the R end of the wall (out of Beastial range) and cast Perdition at the Woldshrimp, killed one, and moved the Deathjack forward, with full focus. I then Feated, putting it on DJ, Skarre, the Stalker, Necrosurgeon and one Raider making charges on the Kraken difficult, I then moved Admonition to Skarre, typically the feat turn is the best turn to rotate that spell to her. I didn’t think it would matter, as Kromac was only sitting on two Fury, I charged DJ in, MAT 8, 7 attacks, +4 on damage. I hit the charge attack, did 20 damage, which transferred to Ghetorix. I missed the second, hit the third which he took, I missed the fourth, and hit the 5th which was transferred. With two attacks left, Kromac had 6 boxes and no Fury remaining; I needed 7’s to hit, opted to take two chances instead of one boosted, and missed them both… :(. (As i’m sure you might be questioning, Deathjack at this point, was outside of Skarre’s CNTL area so I could not use Seas of Fate. I disappointed obviously, but was still in good shape as I was under Feat and his battlegroup was very damaged. Ghetorix, was locked in, and the Feral had a number of Raiders in front of him. My opponent handled this about as well as he could have. He boxed Deathjack in so he couldn’t move before attacking. Used Ghetorix and the Woldshrimp to spring the Feral; snacking as he went to heal. Kromac then feated (crazy I know), took 1 damage point, cast Wild Aggression on the Feral and swapped to Beast form, so he could jump to place 5” away avoiding a free strike from DJ, well done. The Feral then braved the charge past the remaining Raider in the path, she whiffed and he crashed home on the Kraken taking out his entire L side. He then ran the Woldshrimp that were near Skarre straight back behind the forest so they could not be Perdition targets again; leaving the tree as the only contesting model on the flag.

I took the dice back knowing that I was still in control of the game. I should likely finish off Ghetorix w/ DJ, and get the Feral w/ Kraken after a heal from the Necrotech and help from Ragman. That would leave the Stalker versus both heavies, DJ on full boxes, and Kromac w/ only 5 left. Sounds like a plan; I started w/ Necrotech, who got enough to get the L arm back up. Then Ragmen was up, gets Death Field cast. Kraken’s turn, he goes to town on the Feral with full focus and leaves the Feral on 1 box… :/. I have recourse still, but Deathjack is next. This should be easier, w/ 5 attacks, Ghetorix had healed to about half, so I should not have an issue finishing him off. Five attacks later, and Ghetorix had taken… 1 wound. That’s correct, one friggen wound! I missed four attacks and rolled snake eyes on damage (dice -1) for the one I did hit. Now all three heavies were available. This is not good. I charged the remaining Raiders into the Feral’s rear, and finished him off thanks to Deafthfield and CMA. I opted not to use the last Raider to go near Ghetorix out of fear of not making the CMND for the Terror check, she couldn’t do enough damage anyway. I used Skarre last to take a shot at the Gallows that was not more than 5” from me, and took it out, to score the first CP of the game. At this point, I took stock in the game state,  it was a contest that I had clearly had well in hand not long ago; then the past two turns the dice had just taken it away from me, and now it was a matter of time before I was going to lose. I’m not one to ever complain about dice, as this is a game of chance, as any game of dice is. Even if there are negotiable odds, it’s still chance; if I didn’t want dice involved I would play Chess. However it is what it is. My opponent was great about it and promised me a beer… or two, after he was able to finalize the game. On his turn he took care of business, Ghetorix under Primal took the boots to Deathjack, turning him into scrap, with a little help from the Gorax. Then Kromac moved up to cycle Wild Aggression back onto the Stalker. He charged in and finished off the Kraken. He finished his turn by running the Woldshrimp forward and contesting the Flag again.

So… what to do, what to do, what to do. Kromac is sitting on three Fury at the moment, after not upkeeping anything, and casting Wild Aggression. I have a Pistol Wraith that is behind him, and Skarre left, w/ Ragman, a Necrosurgeon and a Necrotech. Since he had to come forward to buff the Stalker, he was completely in the open. I have no jacks left, my only recourse at this point was to to try and finish Kromac off. As such, I moved the Pistol Wraith forward, keeping him in Kromac’s back arc, and was able to tag him twice! Were my dice finally going to come around? I did five damage each time, meaning he had to transfer both or die, the last hit splashed a couple of damage back onto Kromac; three left. Skarre was left, she had full focus, a gun and a spell list. Here we go: first the Hand Cannon shot, hits!!!! I rolled boosted damage on him, did enough to cause the last transfer, killing Ghetorix, and causing splash back damage again. Now down to a box, I cast Blood Rain on him, hit!!! Damage roll… GOT HIM!!!!! Don’t call it a comeback :D. After I picked myself up off the mat (literally and figuratively) I was moving onto round 3.  Most epic game (for me)… ever.


Round 3: vs Zak (Massachusetts, USA)
Scenario: Fire Support
Opposing List:
Harbinger
Reckoner x2
Vanquisher
Knights Exemplar Errants x10 w/ UA
Zealots w/ UA
Bastions x5
Vassal
Mechanik
Choir x3

Recap: I looked at my opponents lists, and saw that he had played Harbinger in both of his previous two games, my suspicion was that he would likely do the same in this match, either way in both lists, he had double Reckoners. This was not a match up I wanted Skarre in, Purification is pretty horrendous for her and with those long range guns, I really wanted no part of that; so it was back to Terminus for me. Of course my opponent dropped Harbinger, who I have become used to seeing at this point.

I lost the starting roll, and my opponent opted to go first. He set up his battlegroup all to the L center (as I looked at the board) supported by the Bastians with his Zealots on the R. The Errants would set up front and center. There was terrain mostly in the middle horizontal line of the board, with ruins on the L and woods on my R. I decided to put the Bane Knights on the L to deal w/ the Ruins and my opponents battlegroup supported by the Seether, and the MechThralls on the R to deal w/ the Zealots, as they would be fronted by the Raiders allowing the Mechanithralls to navigate the woods..

My opponent went first and moved out aggressively, Feating on the opening turn, opting to pin me back as far as possible. This is a strong tactic and one that I am not unfamiliar with, so I toed around the edge of Harbinger’s CNTL area, ran the Raiders to the extreme R flank, and edged the rest of my force forward to the outside of her feat. I ran the Seether to the ruins, and decided I would have Terminus support the Banes to deal with the opposing battlegroup. I was comfortable in my position, as Harbinger would not be able to score this upcoming turn and both sides of my force were properly supported.

Harbinger’s fwp turn went reasonably well, both Reckoners took Assault shots on the Seether, and the Vassal allowed for one more; my opponent caught some hot dice and took him down to half boxes right away. Not good for me, but I’ll take it as the Seether is serving his roll correctly, and still alive to have a fwp turn. He activated the Errants and started to fire on the Banes, killing one and triggering Vengeance. On the other side of the battle, the Zealots triggered their minifeat and ran forward. Not a lot of blood drawn, but I’m ready to start counter assaulting. I took the dice back, and in response to the Zealots, I ran the Raiders to complete the extreme flanking maneuver to the far side of the battllefield deep into my opponent’s half of the board, to about ¾ of the way across threatening the objective and the rear of the zealots as well as the flank of Harbinger. I ran the Mechanithralls in to engage the Zealots and camped the Necrosurgeon behind the trees setting up the McThrall factory next turn, protected nicely by a piece of terrain to hide her Stitch Thralls in while they collected corpses. On the other side of the board, I crashed home with the Banes, and did a number on the Errants. I moved my support and Terminus to back up their efforts, affording them Tough and Curse, as well as Beyond Death. That entire side of the battlefield was locked in melee. With the early game clearly in Harbinger’s favor, I felt that the game was at a pivot point, ready to turn in my favor.

My opponent was frustrated on the main side of the battle by all my Banes Reach weapons clogging his lines; he was not able to do much and really unable to get his Bastions into the mix the way he wanted. He did clear a couple more Banes, but was facing down counter assault from more Banes and the support next turn. The Bastions were able to finish off the Seether on the near side of the wall, leaving a nice piece of difficult terrain to clog things up more. On the other side of the battle he turned the Vanquisher away from the main scrum to help deal w/ the Raiders, dropping a pie plate on a few to set them on fire. The Zealots started to dig their way out of the McThralls, but that was a losing proposition, as they were only fueling their own demise. I took the dice back ready to start stepping on Harbinger’s throat. I mini feated the Raiders and charged into the Objective, Zealots and Vanquisher. They took out the Objective for the first CP of the game, and had took the Zealots down a few models. The McThralls did a number on the Zealots as well, and there was only a one or two left when they were done. On the other side of the board, Terminus continued to close ranks on Harbinger. Tartarus activated first, and charged into the Reckoner threshering four Errants, making three more Bane Knights, who popped up behind the line of the jacks and Bastions. They activated next, and took apart the rest of the Errants, and started to do major damage to the Reckoners, also leaving the Bastions all tied in. With one Reckoner ready to go down, I decided to commit Terminus to finishing the job, as there was a Mechanik lurking in the background close enough to start repairing it next turn. The combo of Dark Shroud from BLT and Malediction from Terminus allowed him to swing once and finish the heavy jack off. I finished my turn by moving Darrage Wrathe forward to get Beyond Death up, and then turned over the dice to my opponent feeling good about my spot.

Harbinger assessed the board and it was apparent the flank on the R (from my view) was collapsing rapidly, and the main battle front was falling with one ‘jack now gone and another in severe shape. The Errants were all but eliminated, save for the standard bearer,, and only a couple of Bastions remained. Zak thought it was time to try and salvage the game with an assassination run. He gave the Rekoner full focus, and walked it up, hit then proceeded to roll HUGE damage, triple box car… :/. Really!?!? Sad part is, that this was not the first time that has happened to me in a Terminus v Harbinger game; apparently, here we go again. Good news is the followup attack missed leaving Terminus at half his damage boxes. Harbinger was next and was not able to get super close due to the Banes clogging the way, and dropped a POW 15 Cataclysm on Terminus, not doing any damage. Phew! I was not concerned until those trip 6’s dropped, ultimately it was okay, and Harbinger died to Vengeance attacks the beginning of my next turn. Winning round 3, now Masters clearly within my sights, just one victory away!

Round 4: Tom (California, USA)
Scenario: Incursion
Opposing List:
eLiche (2)
Nightwretch
Defiler
Bane Knights x 10
Bane Thralls x10 w/ UA
Blood Witches x10 w/ UA
Bile Thralls x6
Tartarus
Wrong Eye & Snapjaw

Recap: Mirror matches are simply never fun. My opponent was sporting eLiche and pDenny. I knew with little doubt that he was going to play eLiche; he had played both lists to that point, but had played Liche twice; given that a spot in the masters was at stake I knew that his horse was eLiche in this match. That list was one of the two that I really don’t have a good answer to, the other being a double Stormwall list. I considered my options, I knew that eLiche would have little trouble with Kraken, based on his feat, and while the Biles wouldn’t be a huge issue, they were still an effective way to deal with the one unit of infantry I had in the list. That left the entire game on Deathjack to win, and I wasn’t comfortable with that. To be honest, I wasn’t comfortable w/ my Terminus match up either. I don’t play Biles with him, and given I have 40 models in the list, I would expect to get purged off the table. So neither was really preferable, and in that situation, I fall back to what I’m most comfortable with, which is Terminus. So I dropped my Terminus list and away we went.

I won the starting role, and opted to go first. There was ruins on the L side of the battlefield just out front of my deployment zone, and a hill out front of the R side of my deployment zone. A small forest on the L side near my opponent’s deployment zone and a wall on the R also near his zone. I put Terminus in the middle as per usual w/ the Mechthralls on my R and the Bane Knights on my L so they could easily navigate the ruins. The Raiders AD out in front on the hill on the R of my board. My opponent put Liche just behind the wall so he could move first turn and camp there. The bone chicken was next to him on his L (as I looked at the table), with the Bane Knights to the L of the them and the Bane Thralls to the R. WE&SJ were supporting the Bane Thralls, and the Witches were on the far L of the board, across from my Bane Knights. In the middle of his deployment was a conga line of Biles separating the arc node from the Bane Knights, in a single file line going directly back towards his own table edge.

On my opening turn, it was standard fare, I put Malediction on Terminus and charged him up the board, and surrounded him by the MechThralls and the Banes. I moved the Raiders to a tentative position middle of the board, on the far side of battle, on the hill out of threat range of the Bane Thralls. The Seether ran up along side Terminus, and I turned the dice to my opponent. On the opening turn, he ran the bone chicken into Excarnate range of the Raiders near the hill, and then activated Liche and did just that; successfully casting then popping a Bile and purging three Raiders from the table. He then put Hellbound on himself; and was very aggressive with the rest of his army, as his Feat allows him to be, and forced his army down my throat. The Witches as expected moved to front my Knights and did their mini feat to prevent the alpha. Liche’s force was in a strong position.

I surveyed the table, and could see that this battle already looking bad before it had really begun. I could not stand toe to toe w/ Tom’s list, based on my build, and decided instead that I would try to put some quick damage on Liche and see if I could get him on his heels. So I started w/ the Raiders, figured they would likely be purged from the table next turn anyway, so charged in and mini Feated sending four at the Nightwretch; my hope was to get a few points of Feedback damage on Liche. Plan executed well, I did two to Asphyxious and was able to scrap the bone chicken after a few CMAs. I also fronted the Bane Thralls, taking a few of them down. With Liche at the wall, I was within spray range of him w/ Terminus after a move. Liche was on little camp, so I decided if I could get a decent roll, He would be well below half right away and that would change the landscape of the game, forcing him backwards and neutralizing his feat. So I did, and caught good dice, doing another 10 damage to him, putting Liche down to only 6 boxes. I did forget that he was suffering Corrosion continuous effect, but realized it in the middle of my next turn. I was satisfied at this point, and engaged the rest of his force crashing around Terminus to thwart any effort to get to him this turn, killing what could be killed. Finishing w/ the Seether blocking off the charge lane from Snapjaw if Liche was able to clear the area in front of him with purging. With that I turned the dice back over to my opponent, hoping I had bought myself some breathing room on his Feat; if so I could begin to apply my resources next turn. Liche went first, backed straight away from Terminus, and dropped his Soul Reaper on the Raiders clumped in front of the Bane Thralls. After upkeeping Hellbound, he camped the rest leaving him on ARM 22. The Biles did there thing and netted him another five (or so) souls, and freeing the Bane Thralls to mix it up and get more in the game. Snapjaw was not able to get free from behind the infantry, and only inched up. The Witches crashed home on the Bane Knights but did minimal damage as they could not get thru the Reach in most cases. Overall it was a rather moot turn for Liche, which made me feel like my plan was working.

In taking the dice back, I surveyed the setup, and after very little deliberation it was apparent I could go for the game this turn; I was relatively surprised that Tom didn’t get Liche further away with a Teleport. The plan was rather simple, use Puppet Strings to cheese out the dice on another spray from Terminus, and use my Feat if it didn’t work. I could fuel Terminus up with Witch souls which could be easily snatched by my Banes and McThralls all mixed in. I could secure his position with the wall and negate charges as I would have Big T in everyone’s back arc. It was actually a relatively low risk assassination attempt. At this point I remembered the Corrosion, too little too late for the prior turn, but it made me feel a lot better about what I was about to do. So I used the Vengeance attacks from the Knights to clear what needed to be cleared in front of Terminus. Trampled the Seether into Snapjaw so he would not be a factor next turn. Then activated the Combine to put Puppet Strings on Terminus, and moved him up to the wall were Liche once was, and sprayed him again. Boost to hit, and damage. Got the hit, and on the damage I rolled a 6,1,1 so I opted to use the re-roll on the two ones, and… BOOM a 5 and 3, which means another 6 damage… wait count it again… yup 6 damage FTW!!!!!!  GOING TO MASTERS!!!!


It certainly took a moment to realize what just happened, then I was swamped by my teammates from all around so it became real right away. I have to say receiving lots of love from all the players at the Con, as anybody who has ever tried to qualify knows how difficult it is, was probably the best part of the whole thing.

A number of people have asked me since this weekend how I was able to qualify with only a year of tournament experience. You have to be a good player of course, but it’s more than that. You also have to have a reasonable draw, the dice have to cooperate, and you need to have stamina for days… literally. I played 12 games in 3 days, which may or may not sound like a lot, but I promise you by itself that alone is taxing, add in the pressure of each game that mounts as the days build, plus the combined 30+ hours of standing, and people draped all around you while play, especially as the rounds go later. It is a mental exercise like not much else I have experienced in my life.

If qualifying to play in a Masters is something that you want to try and go for, my #1 piece of advice is that you definitely need a meta that shares the same goal. I cannot say enough about my DOGC friends. Not only do we push each other in our practice sessions, but this weekend, they truly supported everything I was doing. Staying after their events were over to watch me play. Making sure I had water and food so I didn’t starve, and generally knowing you have ‘fans’ supporting you makes you play that much better. The second piece of advice I can offer, is to not be intimidated by the scene. We all just like to play games, roll dice, and push models around a table. Of course there is more on the line than that, but it seems to me what holds a lot of good local players back is the assumption that other players are ‘better’ than them or they are generally afraid to put themselves in the arena for fear of failure. Just enjoy the games, put yourself out there, play lots of games, and don’t feel like you have to reinvent the wheel to have a chance. Play what works for you, and don’t try to do what somebody else is doing, unless it’s what you want to do. It’s a game above all else, if you’re not enjoying yourself then don’t play. Find what you like to play and play it, if you get comfortable with what that is, the wins will come. If you want to play better in big events, then put yourself in big events and play, how else is it going to happen? If you get your teeth knocked in, you learn and get better. I learn way more from losses than I do from wins. I’m pretty sure most players who are honest with themselves will tell you the same thing.

Of the other reflections from TempleCon this weekend, the biggest one is in regard to dice. I never have felt much sway of dice on my game play in one game or another. I have always felt that players saying ‘i got diced’ or ‘they diced me’ was a quasi cop out on a game they probably made other mistakes that allowed you to be in a position to be ‘diced’. After my second round game with Craig in Standard Issue, it did feel like the dice had gone way past uncooperative, and I wanted to start making that excuse. What I learned though, is that solid tactics still prevailed, in spite of epic bad dice. I think what bad dice do is lead to bad play or a self fulfilling prophecy that you ‘feel’ like you’re ‘supposed’ to lose the game so you play in a manner that facilitates that. If the dice won’t cooperate, don’t simply hand the game the game over, play it until it’s completion. Finish what you started, and make your opponent win the game. If you’ve played a solid game to that point, there may well come a point where the dice have a chance to come around again or your opponent simply makes a grave mistake. That’s what happened to me in that 2nd round, and if I gave up on the game, I would not have been playing in Masters on Sunday. It’s a dice game, and I encourage you to always remember that. Rolls go good and bad; play each game the best you can, never assume anything ‘will’ or ‘won’t’ happen, and never concede a game willingly because of dice, make your opponent win the game, don’t simply lose it for them.

Another reflection from this weekend is about poor matchups. I would argue that I faced a number of them in my 12 games, namely Harbinger, whom I saw multiple times, and eLiche. Bad matchups are going to happen, and the same rule applies as it does with dice. Uphill battles exist with any build; you need to have a plan on how you’re going to deal with it. I wouldn’t just offer over the game because the matchup is not one you want to face. Play the game, and again make sure your opponent has to play well to win. Be able to understand why that matchup beats you, do the best you can to avoid falling for the usual tricks and traps. I have found that often times your opponent knows it’s a favorable matchup, the same as you expect it to be unfavorable, and often will get impatient because they want to hurry up and win an ‘easy’ game. That leads to mistakes and/or sloppy play, and very few games at all are auto lose for any combination in my experience. If games were played on paper, we’d have no reason to paint the models!

Overall, the experience I had this weekend was a great one, and I hope it’s one I will have a chance to live again. I finished strong in Masters going 2-1, and finishing among the top 8 players in the Con. I can’t wait to go at it again, I hope to see you all across a table soon, and wish you the best in your own gaming endeavors be it Masters, or open play night at your LGS!

Two wins in two weeks for Anthony and DOGC

Posted by Anthony on

This past weekend (January 19th) DOGC continued to make the rounds on the regional tourney scene in preparation of TempleCon, and Anthony stayed hot winning for the second time in as many weeks; this time in Rhode Island at The Temple. The win is not only Anthony’s 6th, but represents DOGC’s 4th win in the month of January (most ever), and their 16th win throughout the Northeast in this, the inaugural year! Here is the battle report review from Anthony’s side of the table…

Before I get into my game notes, I want to say thanks to Temple and Grant for hosting the event. Despite the mounds of TempleCon paraphernalia piled around the store, we were able to have a pretty sweet event! Thanks to Tom for dragging himself out of bed to moderate the day, and a VERY big congrats to J-Wow on successfully walking the plank… I mean getting married :); AND to Roger for moving into his first home, but still making time to stop by and say hello to his geek fam! Now onto the table top review…


As I continue to count down to TempleCon with my friends and teammates, I’m trying to put in as much table time as possible before then. As such, I’m playing in my second tourney in as many weekends, and this time I have a 50 pointer to sink my teeth into. It’s important given most of the events to this point have been 35 points, and all the events i’m registered for at the Con are 50s.


The event was a 2013 SR Beta with Specialists to prep for TC. Noting that, here are my lists:

eSkarre
Kraken
Deathjack
Nightwretch
Satyxis Raiders w/ UA (x10)
Pistol Wraith (x2)
Necrosurgeon
Necrotech
Ragman                                                


Terminus
Seether
Satyxis Raiders w/ UA (x10)
Bane Thralls w/ UA (x10)
Mechanithralls (x10)
Necrosurgeon
Withershadow Combine
Bane Lord Tartarus
Darrage Wrathe
Madelyn Corbeau
Saxon Orrik

In both cases my Specialists was the the Satyxis Raider Captain. I really have not hashed out what I want in my sideboard at this point, however, if I ran into a list that had a major KD effect, I thought it was good to be able to swap her in to make sure my Raiders can still do their job effectively. It didn’t come up in the event, but it turns out there was a Barnabus player in the midst, so it might have been important had it come up. My lists continue to develop as we arrive closer to the event. The major news on this front is that my Terminus list will change for the first time since it’s inception, moving the Bane Thralls out in favor of the Bane Knights reducing the need for Saxon and allowing me to get a Pistol Wraith in the list. I REALLY like this switch, however for this event the Knights were not ready, and as such I went with my standard kit. For the Skarre list, I find that I have MUCH more freedom at 50 than 35, as the Kraken is quite restricting at the lower point levels, however the list really starts to hum when I can put the Raiders in, and give the DJ a bit of a buffer. Onto the opening round…

Round 1: vs Mercs
Scenario: Close Quarters
Opposing List:
MacBain (!!!!!!!!!!!)
Mangler
Nomad
Kayazy Assassins w/ Underboss
Nyss Hunters
Boomhowlers (Specialist swap for WE&SJ)
Kelll Bailoch
Rhupert
eEiryss
Stannis Brocker
Wyshnylrr

Recap: For those of you that have been to, or frequent, The Temple, Charlie is a fixture at their events, and everyone should have the Charlie experience at least one time when playing there! It was my first time playing him in a competitive event, as such I was excited to dial it up in what I expected would be a really great game against an animated opponent.

Charlie was only playing one list, as any MacBain player would appreciate, so my list selection was made a bit easier. I REALLY wanted to play Skarre in this matchup, however, I could not resist all those juicy souls w/ Terminus, so I opted to play big T. At the announcement of specialists, I was not opting to play any, and Charlie decided to swap Boomhowler in for Wrong Eye and Snapjaw. More souls for me, but an interesting choice that would change the ebb and flow of the game.

I won the deployment roll and opted to go first, setup Terminus front and center, with Banes on his L and MechThralls on his R, Satyxis AD out front in the center, and the Seether was deployed w/ the Mech Thralls on the R, with support in the rear. First turn I cast Malediction as per usual and pushed everything to the middle of the board, but not too far forward, all to about the 24” mark. MacBain setup in the rear of his force, with the battlegroup on his R (my L) flanked by Kell, Boomhowlers middle R (as he looked at the board) and the Kayazy middle L and Nyss far L (all my R) supported by Stannis and Eiryss. he pushed Eyriss forward to cover supported by Stannis, and Kayazy were a bit tentative, with Boomhowlers pressing forward supported by the two Jacks, all camping the scoring flag on his side of the board. Kell fired a couple worthless shots. Iron Agression was the Nomad and Fail Safe on the Mangler and lastly the Nyss pulled an extreme flanking maneuver pushing to my far R.

I took the dice back and opted to not feat this turn as I really couldn’t crash home and with the 4+ Tough from Boomies (the only thing really in range) I didn’t want to waste my feat in a game w/ so many tough rolls. As such, I charge/ran the Raiders into melee, and was able to get two into combat with Eiryss, losing a third to a Defensive Strike from Stannis (bastard!). However a CMA from the whips was able to catch dice and put Eiryss into the dirt. On my R side I decided to run the MechThralls at the Nyss, and stalemate them on the far side of the board, and moved my Banes up to square off against the Boomies that were now locked in melee w/ the Raiders. Charlie started his turn and contemplated for a bit (presumably considering his Feat), and ultimately decided not to do it. Instead he would spend his turn to wade thru my Raiders, cried 4+ Tough again on his turn, pushed his Jacks up to support the Boomhowlers with each heavy flanking a side of the unit. Stannis pressed forward to clear MechThralls, and the Kayazy continued to lurk in the rear, presumably saving their mini feat for late game shenanigans. Nyss cleared MechThralls but were unable to do a lot of damage due to the spread formation and engagement. Important note, Charlie ran out of time on his turn and was not able to get Rupert’s full activation done, but opted not to use his extension for one half solo activation (a wise choice), but that also meant no +1 DEF and Terror for Boomhowler.

With MacBain not feating, I decided it was my turn to feat with Dragon’s Call. I activated Terminus put the feat up and camped the flag preparing to score my first scenario point and set the rest of my force to work. I used remaining Raiders to grab a couple, and now with the charge lanes clear, I used Saxon to give pathfinder to the Banes to allow them to crash home on the Boomhowlers. Then activated the Seether who took out Stannis, and the turned on the MechThrall machine w/ the Necrosurgeon making three new Thralls and charging into the Nyss again. All in all, I was able to score a point w/ dominating my own flag, and had gathered a half dozen souls to push my ARM to 30. Charlie stated at the beginning of his turn that he would be using his extension. He upkept both spells and gave three focus to the Nomad. He proceeded to work thru Banes and get them down to about half. Then took the Kayazy and charged the Seether getting 6 into melee range, and taking it down to just a few boxes. The Nyss continued to work thru the MechThralls, and tried to close on the Flag to contest but were unable to get into range. Then MacBain feated and marked 7 models: Rhupert, Boomhowler, Underboss, 3 Trolls, and one other Kayazy.

With my feat turn now expired and MacBain safely out of range, it appeared as if Charlie had successfully weathered my feat. Looking over the board I noticed that my Seether was in b2b with a half dozen Kayazy, had no movement, and I was facing his rear arc. I considered the options and realized I had an opportunity to live the dream with Annihilator!!!! First time in the multi year history of playing Terminus I was going to be able to blast this spell off. Since I had a pile of Focus, I was casting at an effective 8, needing an 11, so I didn’t boost and hit, SCORE!!! 6 souls from Annihilator!!!! Charlie didn’t appreciate what just hapened but for those Terminus players out there you can imagine how glorious moment was for me. I then decided to abandon the flag and force MacBain’s hand  by pushing Terminus into easy threat range, moved up Terminus and engaged the Trolls by charging the Nomad and taking a chunk out of him. I continued to use the McThrall machine to hold off the Nyss for yet another turn. I moved the Withershadow up to defend the flag if it became an issue, brought Darrage Wrathe forward to cast Beyond Death. Tartarus was finally able to get into the mix, threshered and did some damage to the Mangler and added a couple Banes to the unit. With the jacks now exposed the remaining Banes scrapped the two heavy jacks. Turned the dice over now that I was firmly in control of the game.

MacBain decided to brace for impact as the Event round timer was ticking low. The Nyss were starting to break thru the McThralls, as they only had a few left, however, the left one on the board, and were unable to shoot down the Necrosurgeon thanks to Sac Pawn. The Withershadow ensure that at least for this turn they would not be able to score the zone no matter what they did. Boomhowlers failed their Abomination check at the start of the turn so were useless this turn, and at that MacBain camped the rest and turned the dice back over.

I knew the game was over, so I decided to try and be tidy with my turn, and mop up as many points destroyed as possible. Use the Banes to get the debuff on MacBain, then killed some more trolls and Kayazy, also finally Kell was put into the dirt. As I declared my charge on MacBain which would have  gotten Terminus to b2b with his flag (which MacBain was never able to do himself) and end the game; the round clock expired before I was able to do the deed and I won on tiebreakers.

 

 

 

Round 2: vs Trolls
Scenario: Into the Breach
Opposing List:
eDoomshaper
Earthborn
Mulg
Bomber
Mauler
Axer
Stones w/ UA
Runebearer

Recap: In the second round I played someone I had not previously known, C, who had taken a leave of absence from the game after MKI, and has recently come back to the tourney scene. He was playing Doomy and Gunnbjorn; and had already played Gunnbjorn in the first round. Given this was a Divide and Conquer SR, I presumed he would be playing his Hoarluk list; as such I thought it was not the best idea to put Terminus back on the table with so many hard hitting heavies in his build and access to Wild Agression, a SPD buff feat and all the tools that Doomshaper has. Thus, I opted to reach for eSkarre. Turns out I made the right decision.

I lost the starting roll, and my opponent opted for me to go first. That is a sign to me that he was unsure of what I was capable of and wanted to see my deployment. I deployed my Kraken to the L center of my deployment zone, with the Nightwretch on the centerline, Skarre next to it on the R of the centerline, next to the Necrosurgeon and the support pieces bringing up the rear with the Pistol Wraiths deployed on either end of my setup on the front of my deployment line. My Raiders were AD out front of my deployment to the R, and DJ in front of the Kraken. My opponent had an obstruction out front of his deployment zone which made for interesting choices. He deployed all his beasts to his R (my L) meaning all his beasts were on one side of the board; it appeared his strategy was to force me to fight all of his army with half of mine, and use the obstruction to protect and wall him off from half the board.

On the opening turn I ran forward, decided to use the obstruction to allow my Raiders to advance up the field deep and own one side of the board and allow my feat to buy me two turns of fighting his main army and then allow my Raiders to close around the obstruction. I ran the PWs forward, and pushed the Kraken as far forward as I could. I didn’t press DJ that far forward for fear of an early feat and eating Mulg to the face, so I kept him parallel with Kraken. I could not afford to lose a heavy with that many big beasts across the table. Skarre put Admonition on the Death Jack and Death Ward on the Kraken. My opponent then activated to respond and moved Doomy to behind the Obstruction putting Refuge on Mulg and dumping Fury onto the Stone, and which ran in support behind him. The beasts ran forward making an almost diagonal line to from my L to my R but ending on the centerline of the table pointing to his side of the table edge.

I took the dice for turn 2, and he was clearly out of melee threat range, but as I looked closer Doomshaper had no Fury on him. He had moved forward enough to be in range of my guns, and while my LOS was not immediately accessible, I could move and garner shots to possibly end the game right now, or at least put a lot of pressure on him. I gave three Focus to Kraken, and one to Nightwretch. I activated the node first and ran him into range of Doomy. I then activated Skarre, and arced Blackspot onto Doomy and succeeded. Then I feated and put DJ, Skarre, both Pistol Wraiths, and Doomy under the feat. I wasn’t in range of the beasts w/ Skarre or I would have tagged Mulg. Next I activated the PW farthest from Doomy so I could move thru everything in the way to get a bead on the Warlock. He tagged him twice and put about 5 damage on him, and my opponent took the opportunity to use Protective Fit and moved Mulg toward my army also in threat RNG of Kraken. As such, I opted to switch gears. In the event that the assassination effort failed, and now that I could reach Mulg I decided I would take him off the table. I activated Ragman and used Death Field, then put the Kraken to work charging him to within his 4” melee RNG. Unfortunately the dice didn’t cooperate and Mulg was still standing there. I had to start damage control, so the last Pistol Wraith activated and Death Chilled the Earthborn. The Raiders ran around the obstruction to threaten the stones next turn and force Doomy’s hand from both sides, but I extended the unit out and used two Raiders to jam up Mulg as best I could, by running them round the near side of the obstruction. Lastly I ran the DJ up into the battlegroup’s grill to block Warlock in. I wasn’t as pleased with my turn I’d hoped I would have been, but I turned the dice back to him.

My opponent decided to focus the entirety of his efforts on taking out the Kraken. With Mulg still standing he was able to heal and go to town on Kraken. Doomy upkept Rampager on Mulg, and healed him, then moved to a far point on the board, to protect himself from the followup turn with DJ. Mulg activated first, spent his initial attacks to clear the Raiders, then used Goad to move into melee reach of Kraken. He bought attacks and had taken the the Colossal to below half. Mauler activated pug Rage on himself and charged the Kraken. However, the dice didn’t cooperate and he left the Colossal with a few boxes; justice for what happened when I tried to take down Mulg! The Bomber and Axer ran to protect the Warlock, and prevented any direct assault on him.

Now onto turn 3, I was fortunate to still have the Kraken standing. Skarre gave three focus to both the Colossal and DJ, upkeeping all three spells thanks to Blood Trade. This was going to be Deathjack’s turn to shine, but first I had to get the Kraken back into action. I started w/ the Necrotech and was able to repair all damaged systems, then Ragman put Deathfield back up. I started with Death Jack, who was next to Mulg, and was able to put him in the dirt easily. Then he used Perdition to move into melee range of Mauler, using the rest of his attacks was able to kill his second heavy of the turn! Now it was time for Kraken to mop up, with his systems back in action, he was able to scrap the Earthborn, taking out the third heavy of the turn. The Raiders now were able to circle the Obstruction and take out all the unit members of the stone, save for the stone itself. Lastly, w/ no threat to Skarre, I moved her up to dominate the Flag taking a CP. My opponents position was clearly compromised at this point. He took the dice, and tried to manage damage control as best he could. He used the Bomber to charge the DJ, but thanks to Admonition. He followed up w/ a second charge from the Axer, and did some damage to character ‘jack. However, it was minimal; other good news was he continues to contest the zone, and camped enough Fury to make an assassination run possibly tricky if I wasn’t careful.

Taking the dice back, I gave the Kraken two focus, DJ had two Souls which turned into Focus and I allocated another so that he was full on Focus again. I again upkept Death Ward and Black Spot using Blood Trade then cycled Admonition to Skarre, in case things went wrong and continued to camp the zone. I activated the Necrotech again to continue to heal the Kraken. Ragman cast Death Field again and Kraken then activated performing a two handed throw on the Bomber into Doomshaper. Seas of Fate made hitting a breeze. As such I was able to buy two attacks with focus on the Axer and put him into the dirt. Then DJ activated moving up to Doomy who was now KD, and despite three transfers and a tough roll was able to dispatch the Warlock and end the game.


 

Round 3: vs Skorne
Scenario: Supply and Demand
Opposing List:
eHexeris
Bronzeback
Gladiator
Sentry
Reivers x10 w/ UA
Paingivers
Agonizer
Gatorman Posse
Thrullg
Extoller

Recap: At the final table I faced a formidable opponent that I have had the opportunity to play before in my SR tour of the Northeast, Derrick; many of you may have run into him if you have been on the tourney scene yourselves. He is a strong player who has come within a game of qualifying for Masters at TempleCon that past few years, moreover his main faction is Cryx and his main Warcasters are the two that I am currently playing! As such I was in for a hard contest for sure. In my list selection, Derrick had suicided into his last round list, by playing his pMakeda list in the opening two rounds, therefore he was forced to play his eHexy, which in all honesty worked out to his favor, as it was a reasonably strong answer to anything I put on the table. I thought it over intently, and given his access to Black Spot and Ashes to Ashes, along with his feat and his beast load out, I thought Terminus was a poor choice again, and opted to reach for eSkarre for the first time at a final table.

I won the starting roll and opted to go first. We were on the same table that I was playing on the round before, and again my opponent chose the side with the obstruction protecting their deployment zone. I set up with Kraken to one side opposite of the obstruction and Skarre to the R of the Colossal and the Nighwretch to the the Kraken’s L, all the support around the battle group. I AD the Raiders to the L side opposite of the obstruction this time and DJ directly across from the obstruction. Derrick set his Warlock behind the obstruction, and the beasts all to the one side of said obstruction as my last opponent did (on my L), and had the Posse take the R side of the board with the Thrullg.

On the opening turn I pushed the Raiders to over midline, with Deathjack near them, and running the PW’s to just behind the Raiders flanking Kraken; also ran the Nighwretch into the mix. Skarre once again put Death Ward on the Colossal and Admonition on Death Jack. Derrick took the dice and decided he was going to grab ahold of this game with both hands, sent his bonded Sentry out front, put Locker on him, and ran the Posse out around to the side of the obstruction (my R). Then activated his other two heavies moving them to threaten counter assault on anything that came near the Sentry; Hexy then went into action, started to sling spells at the Raiders. He missed an unboosted Black Spot, then opted to use his feat to pour two Ashes to Ashes into the Raiders, getting them down to about half. Lastly the Reivers took two CRA shots killing two more Satyxis, leaving only four in the unit.

I took the dice back, having my Raiders thoroughly decimated, thankfully w/ Inspiration RNG of Skarre so command wasn’t an issue. I knew this was my feat turn, and I wanted to return the favor of moving a unit off the table; I gave three focus to Kraken and Deathjack each, then moved the Nightwretch forward into threat range and activated my Warcaster. Arced Black Spot into the Reivers successfully, then feated, protecting DJ, Skarre, the Nightwretch, and both Pistol Wraiths. I set the PWs to work, and the dice didn’t cooperate as I had hoped, ‘only’ getting 5 Reivers between the two of them. Kraken did decent, taking out another 5 Reivers thanks to Black Spot. The remaining Raiders popped mini-feat and charged, three at the Sentry, and the last one at a remaining Reiver, was careful to leave room for Deathjack. They ignored the shield and did some damage to make DJ’s job easier, also took out another Reiver and a Pain Giver. Deathjack then charged the Sentry and took him out with his initials and one extra swing. Then he used Perdition to advance into the Gladiator and swung one more time doing a healthy amount of damage, grilling both the Bronzeback and the Gladiator. Feeling good about my turn I returned the dice to my opponent. There wasn’t a lot for him to do this turn thanks to my feat; the Reivers were decimated, Pain Givers were fleeing due to the Abomination nearby and the Posse were not in range of anything, so they ran to camp the zone and threaten my support. Bronzeback used Trainwreck to kill some Raiders, and then Derrick put down his dice.

Turn 3 I knew the Bronzeback was going to take DJ, but not before I got his Gladiator. I gave Kraken three as he was going to have to engage the Posse and Thrullg, I didn’t give any to DJ as he was sitting on a free one from the Soul he garnered in the last turn by killing the Sentry, plus his customary two. I was comfortable with that being enough, and decided to keep the rest on Skarre to avoid some squirrely Ashes to Ashes coming my way. DJ dispatched of the Gladiator, leaving Hexy with only one beast. Kraken successfully engaged the Posse, killing three, plus a successful Kill Shot on the Thrullg taking him off the table. Now he was full on Corpse tokens, and ready to be a beast the rest of the game. On my opponents turn, as I expected he charged the Bronzeback into Deathjack, I triggered Admonition, to move him backwards, out from behind the obstruction, and Derrick wisely used his Counter Charge ability to make sure he was able to scrap Death Jack. He did indeed take out my character jack, however an important interaction there was now the Bronzeback was not behind the obstruction and in threat RNG of the Kraken thanks to the Admonition and Counter Charge swap. Derrick was aware so he swung his two Gatorman posse to the side of Kraken to use their medium bases to block his path to the Bronzeback. To make matters worse he was able to get the Agonizer with Spiritual Affliction up near enough to the Kraken to deny him focus on the upcoming turn. It was officially a chess match with the Bronzeback and Kraken being the keys with the tournament on the line.

I took the dice back, and still had both Pistol Wraiths and the Nightwretch who was now engaged by Hexeris. Bronzeback was sitting in cover left by DJ, and Kraken had 16 boxes of Posse in front of him. I upkept Death Ward, and couldn’t allocate to the Colossal, so I decided not to use Blood Trade and gave my Necrosurgeon a chance to catch up on healing Skarre. The Bronzeback was so close but so far. I wanted to use the Pistol Wraiths to kill the Posse, but they were engaged and had a ton of boxes. I did have some souls to spend but it was going to be ugly. Instead I thought it better to use their activation to try and Death Chill the Titan who was a healthy defense himself, however I was close enough to use Gunfigheter on him. Before I started shooting, I noticed that I had one Raider left on the board and she was w/in melee of the Bronzeback, so I decided to take her swing first in the event I was able to get the crit, he would be KD. Turns out it was an astute play, as I got the crit and KD him. I used my first Pistol Wraith to Death Chill him, and he was effectively neutered. Now that he was under control I decided to not be greedy and risk Skarre to kill the Posse, who were at the far extent of her threat RNG. The remaining Pistol Wraith took out the Agonizer and Kraken’s activation was used to remove both remaining Posse.  Lastly I activated Skarre and cycled Admonition onto her. The game was feeling firmly within my grasp at this point. Derrick activated, and decided to back his Bronzeback up behind the obstruction and heal him. He scrapped the Nightwretch, and took a boosted Ashes to Ashes onto the Pistol Wraiths and was able to take both of them out; a successful recovery turn for Skorne, the game was clearly not over.

We were pacing well, but I knew the Round timer was starting to wane, so again I gave Kraken three, and did not use Blood Trader to upkeep as Necrosurgeon wasn’t getting good rolls on the heals. Kraken moved to destroy the objective and allow me to start scoring points. I finally got a roll from the Necrosurgeon and had Skarre nearly back to full health. Hexy’s hand was now going to be forced, the Bronzeback ran back into the game and healed some more and was getting back up to full at this point. Derrick ran some remaining schwag into Kraken’s way making it hard for him to reach Bronzeback without removing them; also contesting the zone.

This, all of a sudden, was a hugely important turn, if I wasn’t able to kill the two models in the way, I was in danger of losing a big chunk of my Kraken to a Bronzeback charge which I may well not be able to recover from. I upkept both spells with Blood Trader and gave three to Kraken. I measured CNTL RNG with Skarre and had both models in her gun and spell range. She stood still and shot one remaining Reiver and used Perdition to remove the last Pain Giver. Kraken now had a runway to the Bronzeback, which allowed me to successfully put the Titan into the dirt. Another CP, and Skarre was safely behind her Colossal. With only about 4 models left on the board, Hexy decided to go out in style and charge the Kraken, but alas couldn’t scratch the surface. He was standing in front of the Colossal with no Fury and nothing to do with it even if he had some. With my turn being a formality thanks to CPs and his Warlock flapping in the breeze, Derrick conceded a really well fought game, and I took down my second tournament in as many weeks!


In review of the event and my games, for the second week in a row the 2013 scenarios feel much more prevalent, in each game, than they did in 2012 especially if you’re playing a control/attrition style. That game plan dictates that the game will typically become close and late game the CPs start to go fast and furious when each side runs out of contesting pieces. This seems to be the result of Casters/Locks not being able to contest themselves.

I still have not been able to get into the flow of reinforcements. The Raider Captain, as I noted earlier, was the only piece I had listed and I’d probably leave her in for sure, but I have to find 8 more points to include. I’m tinkering around with it a bit more and trying to tailor each sideboard to what I feel like the lists ‘poor’ matchups are. For example, I don’t like playing my eSkarre list against a competent ranged list, and would typically reach for Terminus; however, if I’m forced into that matchup, I’d like to have some help in that regard, so a Bokur is likely to find himself into the sideboard given that weakness. I think in future builds even for my other factions, I’m going to try to build my sideboards that way, and while that may seem obvious, it’s a bit more of an art than you might think if you haven’t contemplated this yet. Considering what you would remove from the list is ultimately as important, possibly even more important, than what you would slide in. It’s not reinforcements and it kept feeling like it was when I was building it out. I’m not sure it’s going to be as big a player in the SR scene as it might feel right now, but learning how to manage it is going to important, because TOs are going to take it out for a test drive for sure.

In regards to my on the table work, eSkarre has come along nicely. There are two big contradictions I have found with what is generally thought to be true about her. First, she feels a lot like playing one of my Circle ‘locks, there are MANY things that can clip her on the feat turn. She is really a great Warcaster for sure, but I think the feat gives people a false sense of reality and typically if your using her abilities you’re likely doing half the work for your opponent by bleeding her down. Players running their own models in front of her, and ricochet damage into her, sprays, throws, now Tramples (as of the newest errata). Moreover, it seems to be a sense of pride for players to take ill advised assassination attempts on her during the feat simply for bragging rights. Typically on that turn she is going to have about ⅓ of her health gone by definition, so a moderately designed assassination effort will do the deed in many cases. Second, I have read a lot that people feel she loses a bit at 50; to me, with the Kraken, she actually gains quite a bit. Perhaps her traditional build in the pre-Colossal era, if you’re playing the character jack spam, she might be better off at 35, but given the state of the game today, I really would encourage players to try her with Kraken if you haven’t already. My list really hums at 50, and I’m having much more success with her at 50 than I originally thought. Fair warning tho, she scales up quite a bit from other Cryx casters, and she might be a noob stomper, but competent players will find her easy to dispatch if you’re not super careful.

Regarding Terminus, I feel the new Kill Box Artifice raises his game for 2013. He was going to be a player as a meta tilter anyway, but knowing you have to essentially always be in his threat range is a scary proposition. You will likely see him more this year, IMHO.  Additionaly, while you don’t see it in this BR, the inclusion of the Bane Knights over the Thralls has been an eye opening experience, and the Pistol Wraith inclusion is just gravvy. The list flows much better than it used to and the ancillary benefit of a huge threat range (16”!!!) that I honestly didn’t see untill I had them on the table, is just redonk. They don’t support the list the way the Thralls did, but these guys have a much bigger role to play game in and game out. They do much more than bat cleanup, and give me a very strong win condition that I did not previously have. The PW also is another mechanism to mitigate real threats to Terminus, not to mention adding a magic weapon.

All in all it was a sweet event, with good comp, and it’s always good to see Grant and the crew at Temple. Looking forward to taking my win streak to TC and press my luck! Hope to see everyone on February 1,2, and 3rd….

A.

DOGC Wins again in January

Posted by Anthony on

This past week (January 12th) at Dragon’s Den in Poughkeepsie, NY, Anthony won his 5th event as a member of Dark Omen (in the last ten months); it was his 7th final table, and as he gears up for TempleCon here is a Battle Report review from his side of the table…

I have participated in two prior events at Dragon’s Den and have fallen short, so as I ramp up for TempleCon, I really wanted to make a strong showing in my last event there before the big dance. Special thanks to Stan for running another really great event, and making some sweet objective and linear obstacle markers for the participants! Also thanks to Dragon’s Den for being a great host as always, looking forward to seeing our ugly mugs on your store page!

Regarding the event, as I have said in 2013 I’m intending to play Cryx in all major events; so as we move closer to TempleCon I want to have them on the table as much as possible. I will likely take a break from them after, for a bit, but for now, they are my faction for competitive play. The event was a 35 pt, 2 list required, 2013 SR Beta; here are the lists I ran:

eSkarre
Kraken
Deathjack
Nightwretch
Necrosurgeon
Necrotech
Pistol Wraith

Terminus
Seether
Satyxis Raiders x10 w UA
Mech Thralls x10
NecroSurgeon
Withershadow Combine
Darrage Wrathe
Madelyn Corbeau
Saxon Orrik

The list I have been working hard on is the eSkarre list. She is a new Warcaster to me, and I have had a hard time with her survivability, and taking advantage of the intricacy of her playstyle. Much more unforgiving than other Cryx Warcasters. I really wanted to play the Kraken with her, and I’m enjoying it. I’m finding that he is not often removed from the game and it’s really great to have him around late game. Additionally I have never before played Deathjack (I know, blasphemy as a Cryx player) and I’m liking the interaction of the two. I keep an arc node in there to not put pressure on DJ to get my early game debuffs up, and extend Skarre’s threat, w/o having to extend Skarre herself. The Necrotech and Necrosurgeon are auto includes to me; nobody takes a Colossal w/o a way to repair it, and Skarre definitely bleeds herself all game long, the Necrosurgeon is paramount, IMHO. The last few points I have toyed with, but have begun to settled on the Pistol Wraith. He does crazy good work under Black Spot, and her Feat allows him to stay around when filled up on souls.

The Terminus list is nothing new to you if you’ve read my battle reports in the past. I’m a Terminus player, and especially when I’m playing something new, I need my second list to be something very reliable. Additionally, in my experience eSkarre is very susceptible to competent ranged lists, and has a low model count; Terminus is polar opposite in both regards. It makes for a really nice pairing. Now onto the games, as always I’ll do my best on the opposing lists…

Round 1: vs Jeff
Scenario: Support by Fire
Opposing List:
pKreoss
Reckoner
Redeemer
Heirphant
Vassal x2
Choir
Zealots full w/ UA
Vessel of Judgement

Recap: In the opening round, I was facing two Menoth lists, both that had lots of guns, so to me the choice was easy, noting my commentary on my lists, this was not a match-up I wanted for eSkarre, so Big T it is. Turns out I made the right choice, as Jeff chose to roll w/ Kreoss. I would not have been in a good place w/ her. Jeff is a competent player who I have seen in all the events I have attended at Dragon’s Den. He pushed his position quickly, and had the Zealots out front, on my R, and the Reckoner and Redeemer in the middle w/ the Vessel facing my L flank. On my end I decided to layer my approach, with the Raiders out front, and run them right at the Zealots, having the MechThralls batting directly cleanup, w/ Terminus centermassed amidst the Thralls, w/ all the support in the rear, I pressed forward as far as I could after casting Malediction.

On the next turn, pKreoss decided to use his feat and wipe the Raiders from the board, which was to be expected; he was able to get all of them in his feat. The Zealots used their damage buff and went to town on the Raiders, leaving only 2 or 3 in the unit; they did pass their command check. He also was able to clip a few MechThralls, but nothing significant. There were two mistakes, the first was not using the mini-feat from the Zealots, the second was leaving Kreoss out of the Kill Box giving my two early CPs (under the new SR beta it is no longer auto lose). I believe that Jeff thought my stuff was out of range, perhaps getting a bit too greedy. About half of Mechthralls were in the feat and could not charge. I figured with Darrage Wrathe and Death Ride, I was able to get the rear ones just close enough to get back in the game. So I took the dice, activated Wrathe moved everyone up, and then let Terminus take over the game. Now in range, Terminus put his Feat up, cast Ravager on himself, and charged the Zealots. Blowing thru about 5, that were clumped to have close range on the Raiders. Then the Necrosurgeon activated to bolster the ranks of the Mech Thralls and I was able to get a few more into charge range. I brought Saxon up to pathfinder them over the linear obstacle in the middle of their charge lanes, and unleashed them on a few remaing Zealots and the Objective. They took out the objective, and added a few more souls to Terminus tally, Dragon’s Call had him camping at ARM 29, bearing down hard on the opposing force; when the dust settled I had 3 CPs.

Kreoss was now officially in a really bad spot. He had to leave the kill box, and was going to be in range of Big T, no matter where he went. He opted to pour every bit of damage he could on him, and run Kreoss to the farthest possible point from Terminus, hoping to maximize free strikes in the charge path. His attempts to damage the Liche Lord were futile, as he was already in god mode, and was unable to block the landing area with the Vessel. I took the dice on my turn, and made sure to maximize CPs before I closed the game out. I activated the Seether, took out the last objective, and ran the Withershadow to control the flag, ran Saxon up to take control of the other flag, then activated Terminus to charge Kreoss. It only took one focus and two swings to end the game; the extra steps taken earned maximum CPs for me. A good start to the day.

Round 2: vs Alex
Scenario: Destruction
Opposing List:
eStryker
Ol’ Rowdy
Squire
Precursor Knights x 10 w/ UA
Sword Knights x10 w/ UA
Black 13th
Journeyman
Runewood
Rhupert
Madelyn Corbeau

Recap: Alex is a common opponent for me, and I’ve watched his development over the past 18 months as a Warmachine player. He has found his wheelhouse with this eStryker list, having just won the last tourney he played in at The Battle Standard, and his second tournament win in his last few events. He was representing an eHaley list as his second option, but I knew w/ little doubt, he was going to be playing Stryker. As such, I decided this was the round to play eSkarre, as his force was heavily melee oriented, and Admonition on eSkarre would make it difficult for Stryker to ever get to her and Vadar. This game ended up being one of the more epic contests I’ve played recently.

I won the roll, and opted for second as there was a slight advantage on the other side of the table with a well placed piece of cover closer to the action, so that was the spot for Skarre. Alex took the dice, and put Stryker and Rowdy in the center of his setup, the Precursors on his R (my L) with the B13th and Rhupert behind them, and on the other side of his deployment was the Sword Knights with Runewood and the Journeyman trailing. The SK took their elite cadre move then ran first turn, coming nearly to the middle of the board. Everything else ran and lagged a bit behind, not before Jr put Arcane Shield on Rowdy. I took the dice on my turn, gave one to Kraken who was L of center, gave one to Nightrwretch who was center massed. DJ was center behind the piece of cover that was just outside the center scoring zone just in front of my battlegroup. The Necrotech was behind the Kraken, and ScrapThrall was on on my deployment line L of the Kraken, Pistol Wraith was also on the L of the Kraken, and the Necrosurgeon was adjacent to Skarre, with the Stitches surrounding them both. I ran the Nightwretch at the Sword Knights, in order to have Skarre arc Black Spot onto them, and was successful; thanks to Seas of Fate I didn’t need to boost. Put Death Ward on the Kraken, and positioned her on a hill to the R of my deployment zone. I activated the Pistol Wraith who promptly took out four Sword Knights. Then the Kraken took his aim, started firing his Flayer cannon at the Knights, proceeding to take his Black Spot attacks with the Hellblaster and poured those onto Runewood. Was able to splash him with some damage. There were only a few Knights left. DJ put Admonition on himself and moved forward into the zone, out of threat range of everything on the board.

Next turn Alex took his opportunity to charge w/ the remaining Sword Knights at the Nightwretch, using Runewood he buffed them and they did enough damage to take out the all important arc node, but was otherwise unarmed. He positioned the Precursors as a roadblock for Death Jack to Stryker, ran Madelyn to a safe spot in the woods on the L corner of the table (as I looked at it) just off the zone, kept the Journeyman back, and put Rowdy within 6” of DJ, threatening the counter charge. Used the B13 to drop Magestorm to drop LOS to Rowdy and the Prescursors right in front of DJ. The only thing in the zone was Rowdy. I took the dice, and knew this was feat time, as I’m sure Alex did too. I took the damage to upkeep all three spells. Gave one to the Nightrwetch and one to Kraken. Started with the Necrosurgeon and was able to heal all three damage, I didn’t want to wait as I knew I was going to move Skarre out of their range and not be able to heal her, after feating. I then activated the Pistol Wraith who took out more SKs, and was full on souls again. The Kraken was able to move up, finish the Sword Knights and use Kill Shot to hit Journeyman with some damage. The Sword Knights now gone allowed the Nighwretch to take a boosted damage attack on the Monolith nearest him. Then the Scrap Thrall charged in did his POW 16 charge attack to the monolith. DJ activated next, and threw Rowdy out of the zone stuck behind the objective, and pinned the Precurors out of the zone. Skarre activated last, feated, and moved into the zone to get more of the Cygnar force in range. I opted to feat on DJ, Skarre, and the three B13. Blocking those gunshots, in retrospect, was a rather important move, as it prevented him from taking highly accurate shots at my support, before I was able to get them engaged.

Alex took the dice back, and was trying to prevent damage the following turn. He moved Rowdy back in the zone, and after he moved, I used Admonition on DJ and to get out of AOE KD attack I assumed was coming. The rest of the Precursors moved into bodyguard Stryker who was now full on the L side of the zone, right in the middle of the board, with Rhupert and Madelyn behind the full unit of Precursors. The Journeyman decided to come forward and take a fully boosted shot at the Pistol Wraith, and his poop RAT left him short on the dice. On my turn I knew this would be decisive, I gave one to the Nighwretch again, and three to DJ, upkept Death Ward by taking damage, and buckled up for my turn. I activated the Nighwretch, thanks to Seas of Fate was able to hit the Journeyman without boosting, which allowed me to boost damage, and take out the Journeyman. I then activated DJ, w/ Rowdy now back to ARM 20. I was able to kill him with two focus still on DJ. I used those two to put Admonition back on him. The Pistol Wraith then used boosted damage rolls to take out the Objective closest to the R side (for me). Which allowed the Kraken to get into the zone, and start killing Precursor Knights. Necrosurgeon attempted to heal Skarre, to little avail. The Necrotech stood next to Kraken, and blocked space and LOS to Skarre over about an 8” area.

Cygnar turn started by Stryker taking his Corbeau move toward the short side to avoid the wreck marker left by Rowdy; after the advance was over, I triggered Admonition on DJ to block his path to my side of the battlefield, as it was now cluttered with Precursors and DJ. He opted to use the rest of his turn to kill DJ. Which he did, and Stryker finished the job by taking a mini Vadar, one die of damage, then using his feat to gain the extra attack to finally put him in the dirt. On my turn, I took the dice back, gave three to Kraken, and he went to town on the Precursors, using a Kill shot to take out the Squire, and leaving only a few Precursors. Pistol Wraith came foward and mopped up two more, tucked behind a wall just off the zone. I moved Skarre to the far opposite corner of the very edge of the lower R corner (as I look at the board) directly diagonal from Stryker who would have to circumvent Kraken if he was going to try to get to Skarre who was as far as she could be from him.

As time started to wane down now, Stryker moved to start to shrink the gap between him and Skarre, and the Gune Mages tried to take out the Pistol Wraith, only two could shoot, and both shots were missed, thanks to DEF 18. Now getting the dice back, I gave three more focus to Kraken, one to Nightwretch, and stopped taking damage to upkeep Death Ward. as I wasn’t healing enough and needed to try and catch up, leaving her with two focus. The Nightwretch took a boosted damage shot on the only Monolith left, and Kraken took to swing on it at dice plus 1, and one shot it. Then started swinging on Precursors, and took a kill shot that took out Rhupert, and the remaining B13th. As time became crunched, I saw that my opponent only had Stryker and Corbeau left, neither of which were in the zone, and I had two CP for Objectives destroyed, and I was controlling the zone for a 3rd. I failed to realize that the scenario only called for four (4) CPs, not five (5), as I could have simply moved Skarre forward and dominated for the final two CPs.

Alex started his turn with only two activations left. Opted to Vadar to kill the Kraken, and did enough damage to take him down to half about ¾ done. At that point, with less than a minute left, I gave Kraken 3 focus Power Striked him out of the zone, boosted the attack and damage roll, I rolled pretty high, but barely paid attention, as I moved Skarre into the zone, to dominate and score what I thought was the final two CP to win, with less than 30 seconds to spare!!! Both Alex and I forgot the new SR rule that Warcasters and Warlocks don’t contest, so it didn’t matter that I pushed him out, either way was a tremendous game. Max CP earned again, and near tabled my opponent in points destroyed.

Round 3: vs Pat
Scenario: Supply and Demand
Opposing List:
Darius (Tier)
Stormwall
Centurion
Rangers x2
Stormsmith x2

Recap: Here we are again, Pat and I at the final table again in Poughkeepsie. Last time we played, Pat was able to pull out his first DOGC career tourney victory, needless to say I was seeking revenge! Pat had two lists eligible for this round, and opted to go w Darious. Knowing he had both lists available and after reviewing each, it was clear there were plenty of guns available to him in either list, which meant I was opting for my Terminus list.

With the center scenario in play, I opted to go first, and get as far forward as I could before Stormwall could get covering fire down. There was a wall on my side of the board just outside the control zone. I opted to put my Raiders off to my R flank and try to divide Stormwalls attention between them and the McThralls. On my opening turn I ran the Satyxis to mid board still on the R flank threatening the Rangers on that side of the board. Then I ran the McThralls into the nearest edge of the zone, and brought Terminus to my side of the linear obstacle after casting Malediction. Darius took advantage of his Tier benefits by dropping all three pods after trampling 10” forward. The two units of Rangers were flanking either side of his deployment line, and he moved them up. The Rangers nearest the Raiders were able to clip a couple of girls, and then braced for impact. Darius activated last and put Fortify on Stormwall

I took the dice back and knew I had to take advantage of Stormwall trampling and not dropping covering fire. As such I pounded home with some McThralls and a couple of Raiders, doing some Feedback damage to Darius, and doing nominal damage to the Colossal. The remaining Raiders engaged and took out all but two of the Rangers on my R flank, and Terminus took the opportunity to get into the zone, surrounded by MechThralls, and his support. With all the Tough rolls around me I wasn’t worried about Stormwall attempting to get to Big T. Just to be sure I moved the Seether into the zone to make it difficult for Stormwall to fit any place easily. Darius took the dice, and started the precision execution of removing my pieces. He used his Stormsmiths to take out a few Raiders, and MechThralls. Then he trampled the Centurion foward off the R edge of my zone, protecting his objective, w/ Polarity Shield up, also preventing the Raiders from circling to the rear of his lines w/o taking free strikes. Stormwall dropped covering fire to force me to move McThralls away from him, and prevent new ones from getting to him. Lastly he moved a few Rangers forward and was able to get close enough to Saxon to remove him from the board. With nothing in the zone, I scored a control point at the end of his turn.

As I took the dice, I contemplated camping the zone to Dominate for two more and trying to get to his objective to score another one. After thinking it over, I knew if I did that, he would simply move Stormwall into the zone, and even if I made a run at him, I would have a very hard time removing him thanks to Darius feat. Additionally the Rangers on the far side were dwindiling and if I didn’t feat this turn I wouldn’t have another opportunity to gather any souls. As such, I went that route, started with Terminus, put Ravager on him, and charged a small group of Rangers in the woods off the L of the zone. I took all four tasty souls, and was nicely behind the forest they were in out of LOS of Stormwall. Then my McThralls started to clip away some additional souls for Terminus, even the Withershadow got into the fun grabbing another couple of souls. All said and done Dragon’s Call had netted me 8 souls, and I was camping on ARM 30. The remaining Raiders on the Far Side charged into the far R of Stormwall, the Centurion, and the objective. I usd my mini-feat and did a bit of damage to everything, good for a couple more points of Feedback on Darius. Lastly, I walked Seether thru the Covering fire and did some more damage to Stormwall. I still controlled the zone for CP #2, feeling good about where I was I turned the dice over to Pat. He decided he had to get into the zone, as I suspected he would. Used the a Stormsmith to clear the three McThralls in front of Stormwall out, and made room for him to toe in the zone. He decided to not use his guns this turn and sweep attack on the models on his L side. Centurion also got in the mix, on full focus, he charged the Seether, and did a bunch of damage, but was unable to scrap him or take out any meaningful systems; but the zone was contested. Lastly, Darius activated and fully healed both his jacks with his feat (boo…)

On my turn, surveying the battlefield, Pat was getting low on clock and everything had gone accordingly to plan at this point. I now had 12 focus and was relatively out of the game, being on the far L flank. I had two choices, charge Stormwall and see what I do with Big T and the rest of my McThralls, since covering fire was not down this turn, or face tank Darius who is already damaged, and dare him to go for it with Stormwall and the Warcaster. I liked that option better. I started with the Seether, I threw Centurion out of the zone, to force him to spend two focus to get back to me. I charged the Stormwall with about 8 McThralls, combo striking for a bunch of damage on him, taking him down to a little less than half. I cleaned up the last Ranger with Withershadow, and then ran Terminus to behind Stormwall out of Reach and into melee range with Darius. I was able to get a few more Raiders engaged to the Centurion. Dice back to Pat, Darius was looking at the Abomination at ARM 30, and decided that he no longer felt compelled to save his Colossal, and moved the Fortify to Darius (more on that later), and camped the rest. Stormwall took some shots on some support pieces but was unable to hit needing 8’s, and the Centurion got some hot dice hitting with both his attacks on the Raiders clearing his path for next turn.

I received the dice back, I had four and half minutes left and Pat had flipped the clock back to me with only 28 seconds left on his own clock. I looked at Darius, he was ARM 23 at the time, now that I was down to my usual allotment of Focus (6), even with my debuff, I decided that it was not worth it to blow and assassination run on Darius if the dice didn’t cooperate; in my experience dice minus 5 is a tricky proposition on damage with a Warcaster that has a good amount of damage boxes. As such, I decided to take the Stormwall out this turn. I used my Corbeau move to move Terminus backwards into melee range of Stormwall to get him in Malediction debuff range, and now the unbuffed Colossal was a paltry ARM 17. The McThralls activated and were able to scrap the Stormwall, leaving a huge wreckmarker. As I myself was getting low on time, I didn’t do much else with the turn, and took CP #3 before turning the dice back over to Pat. Darius was out of options and all but conceding the match. He gave a focus to the Centurion, who ran into the zone next to the Seether, and Pat clicked the clock back over to me with 8 seconds left on his time.

Knowing it was over, I opted not to swing on Darius again and risk losing a game I had been in strong control of, moved Terminus back into the zone then clicked the clock back to Pat; with only too little time left, his clock went dry, and Terminus declared another tourney victory!

After reviewing the game, as we always do, we talked about meaningful activations when a clock is running down and ultimately realized that Pat had an illegal buff on Darius. Fortify is for a battlegroup Warjack, and could not have been put on Darius (obviously changing how I handle that decision to assassinate). Good news is that the game ended as it should have, and we didn’t lament any unfortunate oversight that changed the outcome of a final table at a SR, at that we shook on a great game and another fun tournament at Dragon’s Den…

In some reflections of the event, I realized a few things that are really important going into SR 2013 season. The Scenarios originally seemed like they would be ‘hard’ to win needing so many CPs, however, the interaction of Dominating and Warcasters inability to contest makes for an unexpected quick sequence of events that scores points. My feeling, walking away from this experience, is to take the opportunity score points in most cases, even above removing models in certain situations. I would suggest keeping the scenario on the forefront of your mind all the time, and consider how you can score each turn when scoring is available.

Additionally, make a concerted effort to know what your opponents stuff does, even if you don’t know, look at the card. Unless you’re 100% sure you know what something does, check again. It would have been an uncomfortable end if that misuse of Fortify had cost me the game; both for my opponent and me. Oversights happen, we all do it, try to mitigate it as best you can.

Also, Cycling upkeeps late game is an artform :). Remember to move your buffs around, especially as they expire. Things like Admonition mean different things early in the game than late.

Lastly, not in a game that I played, but in events I have played in recently, I have seen some player disputes (not hostile) where the people involved tried to work something out, and one person was left with an unsatisfactory feeling. I always urge you to simply get the TO involved, and be willing to live with the decision they make. I promise you’ll feel better about the results of discrepancy when it’s all said and done (even if it doesn’t go your way).

Looking forward to another sweet tourney season, hope to see you across a table soon!

First DOGC win of 2013!!!

Posted by Anthony on

DOGC prodigy Alex Buganski won his 2nd career event at the Battle Standard in Manchester, CT during his Christmas break from school last week. Here is the battle reports in the man child’s own words… 

 

On Sunday 1/6 I participated in the 35pt Steamroller at The Battle Standard in Manchester CT. For the event I brought eStryker and eHaley but it wasn’t divide and conquer so I played eStryker all 3 rounds (editor’s note: 2 list required in a four round event, based on player pool, means that Alex would have had to play eHaley in the fourth round if there was one, in this case the event ended at 3 rounds therefore he was not required to) .
 
The list was:
eStryker
-Ol Rowdy
-Squire
Stormblades/UA/Gunner (blades)
Min Precursor Knights w/UA (PKs)
Jr.
Runewood
Madelyn
Black 13th
 
Game 1: I played against Eddie who was playing Legion. He brought pVayl with Typhon, Ravagore, Scythean, Full Pot, 2x Shepards, Deathstalker and min Brigands. The scenario was (SR 2013 beta: sacrafice); a flag on my left and a zone on my right, 2 pts if you dominate the zone and 1 if you dominate the flag. He went first and set up his Ravagore and deathstalker on the my left and everything else in the middle. I set up my blades on the left, Rowdy, Stryker and support in the middle and the PKs and Black 13th on the right. He walked/trampled his beasts. I ran my blades into position to charge the Ravagore and everything else walked with the PKs toeing the zone. He took out 3 Stormblades with the deathstalker and Ravagore but the scather template would prevent a full out charge on the Ravagore who moved out of range anyway. He tried to damage my PKs but couldnt hit, then Rhupert boosted defense with Typhon’s counter assault imminent, who also stayed out of the zone. He popped out a Shredder by killing his Brigands and moved it into the zone. My turn I assaulted the deathstalker and killed her with the Blades. I used the Black 13th to kill the Shredder and then moved the Shield Walled PKs in and Stryker and Rowdy getting myself two points. The next turn he tried to kill Rowdy with the Scythean, moving Vayl to up cast her buffs and feated. Rowdy was at Arm 23 so the Scythean, still at dice -4, couldnt take him down. He used his feat movement to put the Pot into the edge of the zone, Vayl behind it Typhon to its left, the Scythean next to him and the Ravagore off to the side. On my turn the Blades took down the Ravagore and the Knights took out the Scythean. Ryan used her Mage Storm to clear the pot but it popped out a Stinger so I couldnt score because I couldnt get to it. I then activated Stryker, feated and moved him behind the Magestorm (from B13). Rowdy moved in next to him. I got 3 Knights and a Blade into Typhon and got some damage on him. His turn, He hit Typhon with an AOE spell to kill some of the guys and then moved Vayl around the Magestorm within 6 inches of Stryker. He then used the Stinger to kill some more around Typhon who then charged Stryker through the Storm. Fortunately Magetorm did enough damage to take out his Spirit and needing 11s couldnt hit Stryker. I get the dice back in my hand knowing I can end it now. I use Runewood and Jr to kill the Stinger. Then Stryker kills Typhon, Velocity for 2, Overload for 8, buy, boost to hit and roll at +10. Bye Bye Vayl (… :D)
 
Game 2: Game 2 was against Andrew playing eKreoss Tier 4. The scenario was Incoming. I set up the same as before and he had a unit of Knights Exemplar (KE) on each side, Errants in the middle, Bastions on my right, Fire of Salvation and Gravus on my left and Kreoss in the middle. I went first, ran the Blades toward my zone, walked the rest of my force and sent a Mage Storm toward his lines. He put Sancrosanct on the KE opposite my blades and Inviable Resolve on the Errants. He ran everything. I used my blades to kill his KE, sacrificing all but 3 who stayed in the back of my zone for contension. I picked off some of the other unit of KE with the Black 13th and some Errants. He rolled through my stormblades with Fire and Gravus, which I expected, but left one alive so I still contested. He ran his other KE into my PKs and put the Bastions into his zone in one long line. The Black 13th stood still and killed the KE, I needed the Brutal Damage more so than the Black Penny, and freed my PKs. My Pks mini-feated and charged the Bastions, wiping them off the table and securing me two points. Rowdy killed most of the Errants and Runewood killed the Seneschals. I used Stryker’s feat to position Rowdy and Stryker together but out of charge range of Kreoss. He ran the last two Errants into his zone as well as Gravus, contesting. He then ran Kreoss into my zone after killing Runewood and the last Stormblade getting himself 3 points. I decide to go for scenario, good choice on my part in the end, killed the Errants with the PKs, knocked Gravus off his horse with Rowdy and killed him with Stryker. I also ran Madelyn into my zone denying him points so I got the last 3 points that I needed and won on scenario.
 
Game 3: I played against Matt C. He was running pKreugar with a Stalker, Feral, Gorax, Stones, Druids and Bloodweavers. I set up the same as before, he set up Bloodweavers on left and everything else center-right. He ran everything first turn and I walked everything on my turn. I used my Black 13th to kill some Druids and cause a check which they failed. He charged into my Blades with the weavers who had lightning tendrils. He ran the Stalker over towards the flag on my left. The Stormblades killed all of the Weavers as well as killing the objective so i could score on the flag. Rowdy was given full focus and sent into the Stalker but I flubbed some of the damage rolls and left him at 3 boxes. Stryker ran to the flag and feated. My PKs ran to kill a Galows Grove and set up around the flag on my right, His Feral had destroyed the objective but I was still contesting. On the feat, Rowdy re-positioned to face his Feral and killed the Stalker, the Stormblades moved into base-to-base around Stryker to prevent shenanigans and I scored 2 CPs. Kreugar feated and killed the Black 13th and most of the PKs but he left the Officer alive. He then charged the officer but was out of range. However, the movement still carried him to the flag. The Feral charged Rowdy, with Lightning Tendrils and Warping strength still at dice -4, and after 7 attacks Rowdy was still standing. He then ran his Gorax to contest the flag I was sitting on. I get the dice in my hand and realize that I can easily try and kill Kreugar but first I needed to kill the Gorax. Well the Stormblades took care of that pretty quickly and then Stryker moved across the board but first I had to kill a Stone in the way. So I charge the Stone, killed it and then Velocity to Kreugar. I overloaded with two dice and rolled a 7. Bought an attack, boosted to hit, rolled at Dice + 8 and so Kreugar went down.
 
 
The event ended after three rounds, with three undefeated players, and Alex dominated the event on Control Points and total Points Destroyed, taking home first place! Grats to Alex for his 2nd win and to DOGC for their first win of 2013!!!

 

Battle Report from a Recent Win

Posted by darkomenclub on

Dark Omen went to Dragon’s Den for a tournament a few weeks ago. Congrats to our local PG Steve won. We forced to write down some words about the event though he forgot to take pictures.

Alright, this was a 2 list required, 50 pt tournament using SR2013 beta. I went second every time. Wrote down opponent lists as best i could remember them.
My 2 Lists

List 1
Haley2
2x Stormwall
Squire
Journeyman WarCaster
Black 13th
Min Field Mechaniks
Lady Aiyana + Master Holt
2x StormSmith StormCallers

List 2
Siege
StormWall
Squire
Journeyman Warcaster
Eiryss2
Min Field Mechaniks
Full Horgenhold Forge Guard
Rangers
Reinholdt
Storm Strider
3x Storm Smiths

Game 1 Vs Mark
I took my Haley2 list. Mark took
Ferora2
Reckoner
Redeemer (bonded)
2x Vanquisher
Min Choir
Eiryss1
Full Zealots w/ Monolith Bearer
Lady Aiyana & Master Holt
Reclaimer
The Covenant of Menoth
Vassal Mechanik
Vassal of Menoth

The scenario was supply and demand. Opponent had Ferora2 and second list was Harby. I went with Haley2 to counteract scenario and get some practice with this list only played one game with it before and I normally don’t play haley2 only a short stint with the stormbringers tier list last year templecon.
Deployment: left to right zealots, support blob and caster jacks far right eiryss1. I had B13, StormWall, Haley2 and support StormWall , A+H
Turn 1: Menoth Run up towards zone, zealots to my left with reclaimer nearby, Ferora2 going for wall with Aiyana and Holt behind, then redeemer, Vanquisher 1, reckoner, Vanquisher 2, Eryiss1 on far right flank. Support stuff jacks mostly behind the jacks.
Turn 1: I move up, StormWall on left (bonded) goes up behind my objective place covering fire, mage storm to block zealots. The Other Stormwall this one tries some shots a little short (mental note that is the bonded one that can do that) covering fire towards Eryiss1, and pod in way of his jacks. Haley2 feats catching Vanquisher 2, reckoner and zealots. Deceleration goes up, arc shield on Haley2 and she camps a few as well behind a wall.
Turn 2: Zealots move up, Redeemer rockets fly catch Haley2 and bonded Stormwall on fire. Vanquisher 1 and reckoner toe in zone close to each other near the enemy objective, Enliven on reckoner. Zealot’s reposition a little.
Turn 2: Second Stormwall gets magical weapons from my A+H again, pops some shots into Vanquisher 2, didn’t quit move up enough for pod where I wanted it. Haley2 uses TK to get the objective out of way, full focus and TA on bonded Stormwall. Goes in after the reckoner getting free charge from my objective and Vanquisher 1 plus the enemy objective are in melee range as well, throw my pod down to try to block reckoner (doesn’t work), charge attack hits, it triggers enliven, my mistake about positioning didn’t box it in enough since I wasn’t closer, vanquisher 1 dies. MageStorm towards some zealots, I think I disrupted the redeemer as well.
Turn 3: Menoth Goes, Harm on Bonded StormWall, Vanquisher2 shoots it, Reckoner goes in, and zealots who also greater destiny blast it and StormWall is Destroyed, Lynch dies, maybe stormcaller 1 and well.
Turn 3: Reclaimer dies to b13.StormCaller2 pops eyriss. A+H harm Vanquisher2 pops some back field piece and shot into the vanquisher I believe. Haley Focus to stormwall2, decelerate and camp. Stormwall goes up to reckoner and Vanquisher2. Reckoner dies.
Turn 4: Ferora2 move over to cast ignite on Vanquisher2, hamr on stormwall, zealots and Vanquisher go, he is left with about ½.
Turn 4: Ryan get the mother of magestorms killing most if the zealots after wyatts take out monolith bearer. StormWall gets full focus and Temporal acceleration, Haley2 leaves the wall to pop a shot at something, tk self back behind it. Field Mechink gets some repairs in on stormwall. Storm Caller and A+H pester Vanquisher2, I believe I cast Arcane Shield on it and then he goes after ferora2, and that was game. (Lost superstructure the from walking into the mage storm)

A win with 0 CP, 45ap to 0 cp 20 ap

Vs Anthony
I took my Siege List. Anthony took
Skarre1
2x HellDiver
Skarlock Thrall
Full Bloodgorgers
Gerlack Slaughterborn
Full Mechanithralls
Necrosurgeon & Stitch Thralls
Full Satyxis Raiders w/ Sea Witch
Satyxis Radier Captain
Full Soul Hunters
Wraith Engine

The scenario was Close quarters, I went with siege instead of the excepted haley2 match up to get the armour punching I expected to need in close quarters against skarre1’s feat as I figured he would expect haley2.
Deployment: Wraith engine + raider on my far left, cav on my far right, bloodgorger center left, Mechanithralls on center right. Skarre with necrosurgeon and a pair of helldiver in center.
I had left to right rangers, StormWall, forgeguard, siege and posse, storm strider and solos.
Turn 1: Cryx ran up, Opponent’s mistake here was forgetting to go incorporeal with wraith engine.
Turn 1: 2 Focus to Stormwall. Ranger run 1 into in raider out if formation to tag the wraith engine, rest go center with one near the soul hunters. Stormwall advances drops covering fire and pop into raiders to block, some good damage rolls on wraith engine almost taking it out. Siege ground pounds killing a raider I believe or that was a stormcall kinda fuzzy on that on. Forgeguard move on either side of storm wall. Storm Strider moves up to shoot at the soulhunter, kills 4 of them. Eryiss2 and stormcall try to get last one , caller was ¼ inch or so out of range and Eryiss2 failed, leaving them both an easy meal for the cav. Arcane shield to stormwall
Turn 2: Raiders wing far around forest and behind my lines wraith engine goes incorporeal and engages stormwall, mechtrall charge rangers ge tone while rest run in, bloodgorger run up to block area to skarre. Soulhunter gets his kills and move toward the strider. Helldiver runs and skarre1 feats, necro heals her 3. She was camping 5 or 6. Baiting me to go for it.
Turn 2: Siege declares it go time, he feats after reinholdt reloads him, Siege feats ground pounds 3 or 4 trolls with some Mechanithralls to clear way for stormwall, his second shot finished the wraith engine. Forge guard clear up lines a little rangers do some stuff, strider gets the soulhunters and some thralls. Stormwall charges skarre, boost hit, Pow leave her at 1, boost second fist and finished the job.

A win with 0 CP, 29 ap to 0 cp 4 ap

VS William
I took my Siege List again, Will lits was
Lylyth1
2x Carnivean
Naga Nightlurker
Typhon
Succubus
2x Shepherd
Strider DeathStalker
Striders w/ UA
Forsaken

This scenario was incoming, Will had a Vayl2 list as well and that plus Lylyth1 feet scares haley2 so siege comes out to play again.
Deployment: Center-ish was Carnivean 1 and 2 with typhon. strider on my right flank in the zone, and naga leftish. For me left to right StormWall, siege posse forge guard, strider , then eriyss2 and some rangers in some woods.
Turn 1: Legion advances forward. Striders remain cautious of rangers.
Turn 2: StormSmith run into my zone, stormwall tramples up and throws pod. Strider advances up near forest on right, rangers stay in it for stealth. Dwarves run forward with Arcane shield, rest advance.
Turn 2: Striders try to work on dwarves but fail, and didn’t quite get to within stealth range to shoot rangers, got one stormsmith with artillery. Carniveans get up with spiny growth and typeon in zone. Lylyth1 a little further back.
Turn 2: Eryiss2, removes spiny growth from carvien 1, Rangers kills some strider to clear dwarf path. Siege feat pop feat gets carviens 2 and some striders with ground pounder and hit him with second shot. 2 Dwarves get on typhoon losses spirit. Stormwall advances Carnivean 1 dies too big guns. (17 on feat damage roll), forsaken dies to cyclone cannon. Stormstrider hit other Carnivean (no body and mind) and the objective, leaps get succubus and shepherd and leave 2 striders.. Aracen shield to siege who was camping as well. Striders left engaged by dwarves.
Turn 3: Lylyth1 advances feast, cast wraithbane 2x on both beast, unfortunately he forgot about the taken out branches. Carnivean and typhoon try to to best, some dwarves and rangers die and another stormsmith. He scores 1 CP for dominating his zone.
Turn 3: Focus to stormwall, ranger advance into zone, pop spell martyr shoot Lylyth1, Stormwall advance shoot lyth and that is game and I score 2 points for controlling zone.

A win with 2 CP, 61 ap to 1 cp 2 ap

We do not have round 4 based on the results of the other game so I won an had a great time. I don’t get to get out to many evens I don’t run so big thanks to my fellow PG Stan for running the event and now I have a copy of SDE.