Fists of Death Part 2! The Punchining

Battle Reports! 

 

X1 Vs Ghostfleet (CID)

My List 

Xerxis1

-Tibbers

-Agonizer

Max Cetratii +CA

Min Arcuarii

Min Incindiarii

Max Reivers + UA

Tycom and Standard Bearer

Saxon Orrik 

So the first game is against Ghostfleet. Spooky Denny and her CID engine.  I win the roll and choose my side because I forgot that this list has more pathfinder than it will need, making all the pathfinder useless. I set up with my Incindiarii (played by the blank bases) in the middle of my Cetratii so I can close ranks on the shield wall while getting everything up the table.

He sets up some heavy duty spookiness

Round 1

He Sets up like shown above and runs everything crazy far while enjoying the fact that I only have a couple of sources of magic weapons. Xerxis gives the Cetratii the Push to the Limit Battle plan, Defenders Ward and charges the Wraith Engine. The Cetratii walk 7 inches in shield wall, coming base to base with the Objective and everyone piles in behind. 

The quite before the storm

Round 2

I don't remember If I feated at the bottom of last turn or this turn, The whole game gets kind of muddled. So the highlights are as follow. He walks forward charging some Blackbanes in who cant really do any damage but set a couple Cetratii on fire. He then spray a veantor with venom from an arcnode and kills like 6 of them because of how clumped they are and takes out the UA. I think this was also feat turn for him. He feated to counter the defensive part of my feat. Even still, With Vorkesh being well hidden he couldn't get parasite on the Cetratii, so Arm 24 withstood the brunt of his attacks. For my turn, I take out the banes that charged me and the fire either goes out or can't penetrate arm 22. On this scenario from the 2017 CID we can only score with warbeasts and warjacks or casters. With that in mind I use the Incindiarii to kill the arcnode in the left zone and Tibbers gets Lurched and walks to toe in on the right zone, while also trying to kill the arcnode on that side of the board. The Cetratii are jammed up and move around to kill stuff that has been thrown in front of them, same with the Arcuarii, some of them charging the Battle Engine. 

Round 3 

He clears a lane and goes for the assasination, with no arc nodes denny walks up andd casts scourge, targeting an Arcuarii to get it. Then CRAs with the riflemen and charges with the Wraith Engine. After all of the dust settles Xerxis is sitting on like 3 boxes. On my turn Xerxis Lurches Tibbers and then Tibbers tramples into melee with Denny and kills her.

You cant really see it but Denny is behind the Wraith engine and the Black proxy base is Tibbers trample position

Post game: Sacred ward Arm 22 against ghost fleet is kind of brutal. I didn't really mention the revenant crews because they couldn't do much. At dice -7 on the CRAs and more on the other attacks it was like having huge parts of your army just missing. That coupled with the fact that with scenario didn't have any scoring for units really gimped GF.

 Next Games are from a tournament I went to at Mox I took a variation of the above list and a Rasheth Winds list. First game was vs Fyanna2 Oracles, which I dislike a lot and am seeing everywhere.  But that's probably because of my lack of legion practice.

I win the roll to go first and take a very aggressive position on the board.  I find in general when you play against fast armies it helps, because it throws them off their alpha and it puts the player on his back foot mentally. He responds by spreading out so he can cover both zones.

I take out 2 warbeasts with some pretty hot dice,  while my opponent doesn't kill nearly as  much of my two units as he should have, really bad dice on his part. I also Feated which I feel was a mistake.

He charges in and eats most of the 2 units with 2 beasts a spray and some overtake. Fyanna feats and goes up to 3 CP

I Repulse the neraph, put carnivore on the Mammoth, enrage it and charge, not killing a single beast and missing most of my attacks which lets his beasts dodge out of the way. The Cannoner steps into the zone.  Not Pictured: The Brave Extoller who ran to contest the other zone

The extoller is shot and killed, the Mammoth is taken down by a PS 17 Armor piercing Angelius, cause dice +7 and Fyanna runs to the other zone to score the 2 needed to win. Rough game.

Next Game! X1 Vs Gunnbjorn

End of Turn 2 GunnBjorn went first, Pushed forward and I start building the Brick. A scatter kills both swamp gobbers. and Gunbjorn feats and gets in scoring position for 1 CP

I form my brick, Defenders ward on the Cetratii with the Reivers angling to pot some shots into Gunnbjorn next turn. Mountain King scream ineffectively.

Gunnbjorn gives up the flag rather than get in a shootout with the Reivers and Tibbers. By now I've wasted a bit of clock just dicking around. That and his defensive positioning really starts to wear on me.

I kill both shaman, most of his stone but cant secure the flag. With him having 5 mins of clock left and me at 43 secs. HE puts the whole dhunian knot into contest the flag and passes. I clock on the next turn.

   

The MK was a tough customer. It held the zone beautifully with the rock wall, and the ranged aspects of his list were just bad enough that I felt like i had to close faster than I wanted to. He also scored early and it threw me off. Had I taken it as a timer to try and kill the Mk in 2 turns I may have fared better but I took too aggressive of a position with the forest blocking me. I also didn't get Tibbers into the game until the very end... bad use of 22 points. All in all it wasn't a great game by me but a good game over all.


Ill have more X1 Battle reports later.

Fists of Death Part 1

So I've been playing Warmachine Since 2012, when I moved to Seattle and decided against 40k. During that time I played Circle, then Ret, and then, after dropping Ret out of frustration, Skorne.  With the transition to Mk3 I dropped Circle for good and have been dreaming about Helynnas smooth head and Rahns control abilities.... I miss TK... I really do. Also there are few images as funny as a bunch of battle mages playing with a dire troll like its a beach-ball, just pushing him back and forth, you know you're not doing much damage and its pissed but who cares you have force powers! Anyway! I keep myself distracted so that I don't hear the siren song of pulling me in d3" at a time. As part of this, I decided to see how viable one of our old theme forces is without any theme bonuses. Since I can also practice Xerxis1 (who I am embarrassingly bad with) it seems like a win-win.

The First Finger : Xerxis

The man himself, since this is made with a mk2 theme list in mind its fair to say it wouldn't be possible without him. Although it might now that we have, Inviolable Resolve on Zaadesh2 and Zaal1.... This list also covers up some of what has been my biggest weaknesses with X1, LoS. The wall of medium bases mean Xerxis gets a nice hiding place that just isn't possible with our Karax, and can sometimes become the job of a war beast that you may need to be doing something else. While the Krea is an option, and a good one, it clashes with some of the other things Xerxis offers.

Which brings us to the second reason this list can still work, his Tactician rule. In a 20" bubble around Xerxis Friendly Faction Warrior (FFW) models can ignore other FFW models when determining LoS and move through each other if they have enough movement to move completely through. This is huge for this list. Xerxis makes his troops work like a well oiled machine with Cetratii holding the front line and everyone else charging through them or shooting them and dragging them in or setting them on fire. All the while staying safe from reprisal. This also brings me back to the war beast option, specifically the Krea, you cant move through it which can mess up your order of activation by having to clear a hole for it. It's not always a problem but in a list like this a sliver of LoS where you don't want it can be very bad.

Finally we have his defensive capabilities, Defenders Ward and his feat. I call his feat defensive because the list has plenty damage in it with the number of weapon masters you can bring, so you will want to pop your feat to make your brick harder to kill. I mean if you get the chance then yea destroy the world and live the dream of rolling 5d6 on damage but more often then not your better served using it to keep people alive.

The Second Finger: The Cetratii

The second most important part of this list is the Cetratii. With Tyrant Vorkesh you're looking at a 7 man unit of tough, steady medium bases that cant be targeted by spells to screen your entire army. With shield wall, an Agonizer and Defenders Ward they are all sitting at def 13 Arm 24. This makes it difficult for most things in the game to kill them in one go, with a pow 12 weapon master doing 2 damage on average on the charge and needing 8+ to hit because of Set Defense. They can take a surprising amount of punishment and still hit back. The downside to this is the fact that they are expensive, coming it at 24 points for a full unit with Vorkesh. Vorkesh also will usually be in the back until its time to break ranks. The Cetratii are also pretty slow, and can be kited very easily, though whether they will be taking a lot of damage is based on your opponents quality of shooting.

Finger the Third: Secondary Cataphract

Which brings us to the next part of this list. The none Cetratii Cataphracts of which we have 2 options. The Weaponmaster Arcuarii, or the Incindiarii, who set the world on fire in front of you. With the defensive stats being the same on both, it comes down to if you need the extra range, CRA, and carpet bombing ability that the Incindiarii offer. If you do make sure you get some good use out of it because the Arcuarii offer the option to drag models, and are weapon master on both the shot and their spear. They also hit harder than the Cetratii, making them a good second wave and helpful at clearing anything that tries to jam the Cetratii. Either way with each clocking in at 11 points for 4 models 2-3 is the max you'll want to take in your brick.

4: More Guns, Support and Other Models

After you fill your army with some medium bases, you're going to have points left over or your brick for these were going to look at some extra options for the list. PBH are an obvious choice. Thanks to Xerxis' tactician we have the option to use guns in our back line, where they can unload without fear of reprisal. A unit of Reivers with UA standing 3 medium bases back from the front line can still shoot anything almost 8" from your Cetratii, almost 12'' when you minifeat. Just enough to catch enemy models who dance outside the 10 inch threat of your Cetratii. Other options include the Ferox, because who doesn't like a 17" walking threat, or Swordsmen+UA, if you feel like you don't have enough dudes on the board and you really enjoy rolling 4 or 5 dice on the charge. Special mention must be made of the Tycom and Standard bearer and Saxon Orrik, who hand out pathfinder like its candy, which is nice because it allows Xerxis more options.

The Thumb: Beasts

Finally we come to the beasts. there are a lot of options but if you're really trying to make a fist type list you'll be using most of your points on units anyway. Lucky for us, Xerxis have a pretty decent WB point pool at 28 points. Enough for Tibbers and an Agonizer, which is what I'm going to suggest, Though the Archidon can be a decent choice because it gives Xerxis sprint and long leash mitigates his small control problems. The Despoiler is also nice for the free upkeep and does a surprising amount of damage with dark shroud, and everyone likes a arm debuff.

Making a Fist

Skorne Army - 75 / 75 points

(Xerxis 1) Tyrant Xerxis [+28]
 - Agonizer [6]
 - Tiberion [22]
Saxon Orrik [4]
Cataphract Arcuarii (min) [11]
Cataphract Arcuarii (min) [11]
Cataphract Cetrati (max) [18]
 - Tyrant Vorkesh [6]
Tyrant Commander & Standard Bearer [6]
Venator Reivers (max) [15]
 - Venator Reiver Officer & Standard [4]

This is my starting list, I have 2 games with it that Ill be posting later, I like the high armor it offers, and the amount of pathfinder, which I feel is one of the lists biggest problems. It hits hard, has great Scenario pressure and it amazingly difficult to remove. Walk forward 7 inches and have everything else pile in behind. You can also throw the Reivers out on a flank to threaten their caster, or their support, as the case may be. So far I'm 1-1 with this list but we will get to that in Part 2 

Skorne Army - 75 / 75 points

(Xerxis 1) Tyrant Xerxis [+28]
 - Agonizer [6]
 - Tiberion [22]
Tyrant Rhadeim [9]
Cataphract Arcuarii (min) [11]
Cataphract Arcuarii (min) [11]
Cataphract Cetrati (max) [18]
 - Tyrant Vorkesh [6]
Praetorian Ferox (max) [20]

This list is still more of a WIP, mainly because I fee like Rhadiem isn't needed, but that def 15 cats with dodge just can really tie up your opponent something fierce. Which means we need to drop a unit of Arcuarii, to fit in our support and switch Defenders Ward to the Cetratii later in the game when we might need that 3 Fury. Its a lot of points that you're counting on to tie up the opponent while your brick runs across the field, but I feel like it might be doable. Alternatively have them hang back and then on the second turn walk and jump 15 inches somewhere your opponent wasn't expecting.

Skorne Army - 74 / 75 points

(Xerxis 1) Tyrant Xerxis [+28]
 - Agonizer [6]
 - Tiberion [22]
Cataphract Arcuarii (min) [11]
Cataphract Arcuarii (min) [11]
Cataphract Cetrati (max) [18]
 - Tyrant Vorkesh [6]
Cataphract Incindiarii (min) [11]
Cataphract Incindiarii (min) [11]
Tyrant Commander & Standard Bearer [6]

The last list is closest to what the fist was like in Mk2 taking into account that we don't have FA: U on Cataphracts. Just a whole lot of beef. Walk forward, deviate some shots, set everything on fire and then charge , or take the charge. We still only have one unit of Cetratii, because with Vorkesh they make a decent wall anyway. Just park yourself in the scenario or on a flag and wait. (It's not actually that simple, but it kind of is.)

Ok that's it for this post, Please let me know your thoughts on this list and Ill be back in part 2 with actual game play.

Tournament Report 4/30/17

Hey! We're back with another Tournament battle report. Seems to be the only way I can get these things done! Also by the way since this happened in April were counting this for 2 a month for April. Meaning I'll be trying to put 2 battle reports out this month. Work and school and life get in the way. I may have to stop those and commit to WarmaHordes full time. We'll see what my wife says.

Anyway, on to the battle reports! Went to another tournament at Mox Boarding House. 8 man tournament 3 rounds The lists I took were

List 1
Zaal2
-Cyclops Shaman
-Cyclops Raiders x2
-Basalisk Krea

Hakaar
Ancestral Guardian x3
Immortals with UA x2
Karax
Objective: Fuel Cache

Its an old standby, Its hard for a lot of lists to deal wit, has an insane amount of bodies and armor and I love it. Though I still need to work on recognizing when  Aura of Power is a better move than keeping all the fury and slinging spells.

List 2
Makeda1
-Desert Hydra
-Molik Karn
-Titan Gladiator
-Basalisk Krea

Paingiver Bloodrunner Master Tormentor
Willbreaker x2

Legends on Halaak
Min Paingivers

This list is the newer and is more about me practicing the Hydra and getting used to the different Makedas and Molik Karn, as you will see in game 2. I like the list a lot. The ranged hate is great, quicken allows me a spd 7 Hydra, meaning a 17 inch threat on my spray first turn. The willbreakers are there to help Makeda keep up with Karn, on top of the very useful puppet strings and less useful (in this list) tough. Of course this is all hindsight and reflection after playing the list.


 Alright, on to the Reports.

Game 1: Skorne Vs Ret.

List selection

My first opponent brought a Rahn list and an Elara list. Ive had experience playing this guy in the past and painful memories of him shooting Halbs across the table turn 2 to just melt Karn thanks to Elara. Molik refuses to leave the tray, so Zaal2 steps up. My opponent takes a look at my lists and ends up choosing Rahn.

Rahn
-Sylys
-Helios
-Chimera x2

Party Mittens x2
Magister x2
Artificer
-Hydra

3 arcanists
Objective: Fuel Cache

Deployment:

My opponent wins the roll and picks the side of the table with the wall, Helios is deployed centrally, with Rahn on the right, behind the objective, one unit of mittens on each side with the Arcanist and the Hydra on Helios' left with one Magister on each side. Arcanists huddle up behind Helios. I put Zaal just off center because of a forest,  one unit of immortals on each side of Zaal with karax clumped up in front of zaal, with the ancestral guardians and hakar in front of the warbeats.

Turn 1 Skorne

Immortals run up the sides, Karax run up the middle. Zaal puts vision on Hakaar, casts Aura of power and walks up behind his objective. Ancestral Guardians run to stay near Hakaar and to get around the forest sitting in front of the deployment zone. The Cyclopes and Krea run to get into position to shoot things.

Turn 1 Ret

Rahn keeps all the focus, The jacks power up and off they go. Chimeras
 apparition and run.  Rahn walks up, puts Polarity shield on Helios and attempts to Chain Blast a Karax before I warn him that they have Girded. He switches to Force Hammer killing 2 Karax and starting the soul train. A soul gets put on each Advocate. Everything else runs.


Round 2

Skorne Turn 2
 Zaal upkeeps Vision and lets AoP drop. Immortals go Incorporeal and run and charge to engage party mittens on both sides. The ancestral Advocate engages the chimera, but not base to base ( First mistake, throwing away my UA very early) The karax walk up in shield wall. The ancestral guardians run up. The cyclops shaman and Raiders take a couple of potshots at Helios and to very little effect. Zaal walks up, forgets to feat and doesn't drop any fury. between that, the force aura and casting snipe twice I'm 1 over on fury. This is gonna hurt.

Ret Turn 2

Sylys upkeeps Polarity shield and gives Rahn arcane secrets. Chimeras apparition then the turn starts. Rahn feats. Luckily one unit of the party mittens is engaged because between Rahn and one unit of spells my opponent manages to take out about half of both units of immortals and a few karax. Souls go on the ancestral guardians and zaal starts collecting for himself. Helios kills another 3 immortals, puts up 2 fields then the right side chimera kills a couple of karax, the left side chimera is unable to get anywhere to do much. The Hydra aims and puts a pow 17 shot into Hakaar, for 3 damage, thank you ghost shield. With over half my army gone he passes the turn.

Skorne Turn 3

Leech the fury, Krea fails her fury check and takes a bite out of an ancestral guardian. Zaal is sitting on 14 fury, and hes angry! Hakaar takes his righteous vengeance, to smack Helios, and is then pushed back. Zaal takes his righteous vengeance to walk up. The vengeance of the immortals kills the Artificer and a 4 party mittens. With polarity shield Helios is going to be a pain to do anything to but were going to try and figure something out. I move Hakaar so hes B2B with a karax to keep him from getting pushed and we go to town. After 5 attacks, with aura of power, I've taken out his shield and like 7 boxes of the actual warjack.... In for a penny, in for a pound. The immortals walk up and take some more attack on Helios doing a few more boxes. The karax CMA and take out half of the chimera. An ancestral guardian finishes him off. Zaal walks into my cloud, pops feat with me forgetting to heal anything, camping 6 and I pass the turn.

Ret Turn 3
Sylys upkeeps Polarity shield and they power up, Rahn keeps the focus and off we go. he runs his other chimera over toward Zaal, Hits Zaal with the TK, then Tk's the Chimera out of way of Helios. The arcanist then Empowers Helios who walks up, shoots Zaal with his gun to get him in range and then punches him 5 times at straight dice. Unfortunately my opponent rolls low and I take one attack for 8 damage and transfer the other 4 to my full health beasts, all of whom are almost dead after those 1 transfer apiece. As the final attack is transferred my opponent clocks himself and I win.

GAME 2 Skorne VS Khador

Makeda1 VS Vlad2

Vlad2
-Conquest
Full Winter Guard Boat
Kovnik Joe
Kayazy Eliminators x2
Man O War Shock Troopers
Saxon Orik

There was other stuff in the list but I cant remember what it was.
UGH Khador... I hate Khador. Well I guess not hate, Just I don't play enough of it and I have no idea what most of it does. So lets get right into it. He wins the roll to go first and chooses first. I take my side with a wall.

Round 1

Khador Turn1

He runs everything up, Conquest in the center Vlad2 on his left behind him, The shock troopers and the kayazy set up to go after my flag, and the winter guard swarming the side with his flag. Vlad puts up hand of fate, and his version of aura of power and walks.

Skorne turn 1

So my PGMT appiritions forward, and I notice if i hit her with quicken shell be in range of Saxon Orrik and a few winter guard. I have the hydra run, trying to stay just out side of the Conquests threat range and forget about the PGMT and move makeda up and put up sandstorm and force aura. The gladiator and molik karn run, molik karn making it to the wall and the gladiator making it within the force aura. The krea runs to block LoS to Makeda. Realizing I forgot the PGMT I opt to run her to engage the winter guard and hopefully tie up some of them. The Legends run up.

The one picture I remembered to take all day.

Khador Turn 2

My opponent measures a few things, mumbles to himself and then starts his turn. He upkeeps HoF via great power, upkeep keeps the aura and then has Orrik walk aroud the PGMT and kill her to disengage the Winterguard. The winter guard then move up and CRA into the hydra doing about 6 points of damage between them. Then the rockets shoot the poor guy for more damage. The conquest joins in the fun and puts some shots into the Hydra as well, also dropping a creeping barage in front of the Legends. Vlad activates and feats, hitting the Eliminators and 1 of the shock troopers. The Elminators go in combo striking up to pow 16, at dice -3 on the charge they manage to murder the hydra.

DAMN.

Skorne Turn 2

That was unexpected... A lot of hot dice for my opponent but still, wow. I immediately consider whether an agonizer would have made an difference, then try and figure out how to salvage this. After surveying the board for a bit I notice a Karn sized hole next to his caster. It takes about 29 minutes of measuring and thinking to get a plan together. I move both my will breakers up and put puppet strings on Cidaar and Valgesh. The legends get a run charge order. Cidaar charges the Eliminator hanging out in front of the wall across from karn. In the back arc I need 8s and thanks to puppet strings I get it. Valgesh and J'deth charge through the creeping barrage, Valgesh takes 4 damage and J'deth takes 1. Valgesh proceeds to kill 2 winter guard and sidestep out oof the way and J'deth kills 1 and dies to a free strike. With the lane clear I take a second to wonder if I should activate Makeda first for Carnage. I decide that 6 attacks needing 8s is better than 4 attacks need 6's... I move up the Paingivers and enrage Karn. Charge the winter guard and make it, hit and kill, sidestep to the conquest and hit for a second sidestep...into melee with Vlad and out of Makedas Control range. No bought attacks for me. I could have fixed this by having the will breaker walk forward a few inches but Hindsight is a bitch. Makeda walks up to get karn in range and casts jack hammer. 6 attacks later, 4 of which miss, Vlad2 has 9 boxes left and his Kayazy are sharpening their blades.

Khador turn 3

Vlad takes a righteous vengeance move to move to the edge of karns mele range. The winterguard rockets drop on makeda with me shield guarding 2 of them and then a CRA and the kayzay eliminators activate and put makeda in the ground with combo strikes.


Game 3

Skorne Vs Khador.

Welp when it rains it pours... More Khador. At this point I look at it as me getting the practice I desperately need against them.Time to see how zaal does against them

Khador
Vlad2
-Behemoth
Shock troopers with CA
Greylord spray cav dudes (max)
on foot greylord spray man
Cavalry with pikes (Min)
Saxon Orik
Kayazy Eliminators x2

I think that's it, I cant remember the rest of the list. This one was a slog. I went first, with my opponent giving me the side with the forest right in front of my deployment zone. I put Zaal just to the right of the forest with Hakaar right next to him and an AG near each unit of immortals with one int he middle, war beasts go in back and we get ready to start. My opponent puts all his cav on my right and behemoth on the left, Vlad goes right behind the shock troopers next to the Elminators.

Skorne Turn 1

Everything runs up trying to get around the forest. Karax run forward and make it to the edge of the zone with the Immortals trailing behind. Zaal walks up and puts vision on Hakaar and AoP. Hakaar runs and so do the AGs.

Khador turn 1

Cav runs into position to charge into the right zone next turn, and Behemoth walks up and shoot 2 immortals off the board. (one soul to each unit of immortals.) The shock troopers head toward the left zone and the eliminators run up behind. Vlad walks up and puts up his version of AoP and ends his turn.

Skorne Turn 2

Left unit of immortals takes vengeance, walking forward but not really getting anything into range. They then run forward to try and edge the shock troopers out of the zone. The right unit of immortals gets a run/charge order and runs through the forest to engage the Cav.  The karax walk up the middle to be a lot of bodies that mess with people. Hakaar walks with an AG to kind of split the zone. the other 2 AGS standing in thier own zones about mid zone. Zaal walks up, drops 2 fury and Feats catching everything but one immortal. The cyclops walk up and begin shooting shock troopers to little effect. The krea catches Zaal in her bubble at which point I realize I'm over on fury.

Khador turn 2 

Vlad isn't playing around. He upkeeps aura of power, and feats getting 6 models, The 4 eliminators and 2 shock troopers. The Greylords charge Immortals and manage to kill the 3 engaging them with battle wizard allowing them to kill 2 more as well as 6 karax. The min Cav kill a couple more immortals but cant get unjammed.  One unit of eliminators charges an AG and together manage to kill it. The other 2 kill the AG in the other zone with some help from 2 shots from Behemoth. Combo striking pow 16s are scary.  The defensive strike form one AG takes an eliminator with him and the shock troopers move up in shield wall.

Skorne turn 3

Well I'm glad I remembered to feat on the right turn. Zaal takes his righteous vengeance to walk forward, and hakaar misses a swing on an eliminator. After last turn Hakaar is full up on souls and my remaining AG has 1. The immortal UAs got one each and 7 went to Zaal. To start the turn i take vengeance against the shock troopers just hanging out in the zone in shield wall killing 1. The immortals in the other zone manage to kill 3 of the Spray cav and all of the pike cav between vengeance and their activation. Zaal activates walks into the zone and kills both eliminators and a cav model with  a sunder spirit. Hakaar goes after 2 shock troopers in shield wall but fails to kill either. The AG charges the last cav in the zone. A Raider runs into the other zone and I go up to 2.

Khador turn 3

Behemoth shoots some more Immortals. Not to be outdone Vlad runs to the other zone. Shock troopers try to clear the zone of the raider and immortals but can't do it. They do kill Hakaar. An Eliminator kills the Immortal UA and the other runs into the right zone with me. He then charges his on foot greylord at the AG who kills it with a defensive strike and he passes the turn.

Skorne Turn 4

The krea and the shaman insert themselves  to form a wall of meat between my zone and anymore of his models. Zaal activates and spends 3 boosted attacks killing the eliminators in my zone and then I quickly pass the turn. 4-0

Khador turn 4

With just the shock troopers left he cant get any models into my zone, he kills my 3 beasts between shots from Behemoth and the Shocktroopers and at the end of his turn he goes up to 2 and I go up to 6, with just Zaal and an AG left on the board.


I end the day 2-1 and head home to the wife with a headache from lack of food. Got to start eating more at tournaments. My Zaal list performed as it should and I really like this makeda1 list. I probably need more practice with it, but it feels promising. I also feel like I could hot swap X2 in and it would still be really good. Anyway next time Ill be writing some battle reports for M3, or Mogirls as I like to call him. (Shut up, I'm clever.) Hopefully culminating in me taking him to a tournament later this month. As always comments are appreciated.

Mammoth WIP 2

And were back! Its been days, with me adding more simple green after not seeing any more progress.

A watched pot never boils, so we have to sneak a peek....

 Success!

Before scrubbing

Finished scrubbing the arm

Man the paint is really in there...

One final shot before I say its good enough. Hopefully the primer will cover the red.

We have done it. I ended up just dumping the whole bottle of simple green in and letting it sit for almost a week total. Looks like it worked...ish.

Time to dry and prime.

Mammoth WIP

So now that the Seattle open is behind me I'm taking it easy and getting started on fixing up a model Ive been avoiding since I got it. My Mammoth.

This is not what my Mammoth looks like.

 No I got mine in trade and while my the person I got it from was obviously enthusiastic they didn't seem to know about primer. Or they thought it looked better without primer... I don't know, I didn't ask.

Either way were hitting it with Simple Green.After a search on the internet told me Simple Green may melt away details I decide to dilute it to a 3:1 ratio with water.

I needed something to weigh down the torso of the mammoth... More on that later

We're going to leave it alone over night and see what were working with.


In the mean time some ideas about the mammoth just in general. With a point cost of 38 points its a central piece in a list whenever you bring it. The Mammoth was the best Gargantuan in Mk2 and in MK3 its still pretty strong, though I think the changes to the Mountain King and a few troll casters may have dethroned it (Horgle2 springs to mind). With Assault, Pathfinder, some high pow initials and 5 fury, its taking out just about anything you charge with it. That being said I have a problem committing my Gargantuan to the fight sometimes. Luckily the Mammoth has something for that,  RNG 12 POW 15 ROF D3+1 AOE 3 shots anyone? I love this gun, I cant tell you how many times this gun, bulldoze and an extoller soulward have won me the game.

Seattle Open

 Hello and welcome to No Line of Sight, a weekly or twice a month battle repor and hobby blog. My name is Zach and Ive been playing Skorne off and on since mid Mk. Ive also played Ret, Circle and got a couple of games with Menoth. So I mainly focus on Skorne and maybe Ret in the future with the release of Gyrrshyld the Forgiven. Anyway On to the battle reports, This week its 4 for 1!


Last Saturday both myself and James competed in the Seattle Open Hosted at Mox Boarding House in Bellevue, Washington. 67 people showed though we had drops through out the day. My lists were:
List War Room Army
Skorne - Zaal2 ranged stealth
Theme: No Theme Selected 75 / 75 Army
Fuel Cache - Steamroller Objective
Zaal, The Ancestral Advocate - WB: +29

• Cyclops Shaman - PC: 8 (Battlegroup Points Used: 8)
• Cyclops Raider - PC: 9 (Battlegroup Points Used: 9)
• Cyclops Raider - PC: 9 (Battlegroup Points Used: 9)
• Basilisk Krea - PC: 7 (Battlegroup Points Used: 3)

Hakaar the Destroyer - PC: 7
Ancestral Guardian - PC: 5
Ancestral Guardian - PC: 5
Ancestral Guardian - PC: 5
Immortals - Leader & 9 Grunts: 15

• Extoller Advocate - PC: 4

Immortals - Leader & 9 Grunts: 15

• Extoller Advocate - PC: 4

Praetorian Karax - Leader & 9 Grunts: 11

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Skorne - list 2
Judge Jury and Executioner
75 / 75 Army
Makeda & the Exalted Court - WB: +24

• Makeda & the Exalted Court (Cont.)
• Molik Karn - PC: 19 (Battlegroup Points Used: 19)
• Basilisk Krea - PC: 7 (Battlegroup Points Used: 5)
• Titan Gladiator - PC: 15

Paingiver Bloodrunner Master Tormentor - PC: 4
Immortals - Leader & 9 Grunts: 15

• Extoller Advocate - PC: 4

Paingiver Bloodrunners - Leader & 5 Grunts: 9
Praetorian Karax - Leader & 9 Grunts: 11
Venator Slingers - Leader & 5 Grunts: 8
Paingiver Beast Handlers - Leader & 5 Grunts: 7

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My Zaal2 list is an old stand by with a new twist. I like the ability to threaten just about anything, anywhere on the board with the Cyclops Raiders and Mage Sight. Krea is more there for the animus than the gun although it did come in handy in one game and makes me think I need get better with positioning of the krea, maybe play it a little more forward. Outside of that its a pretty standard zaal2 immortal spam list although I like the karax because they can get up the board faster, set the line and die to feed the zaal2 machine.

The Makeda3list is a bit more... experimental. I've only been playing her since the beginning of March. I really like her and see a lot of potential but I'm having trouble getting all the pieces together.

First Game:

Makeda Vs Butcher3

Apologies in advance because I can't remember everything in some of these list.

Butcher3
- Ruin
2 other heavies

Iron fang pikemen
Widowmaker unit
Kel bailoch
Saxon orrik
Widowmaker solos?
Gobber tinker

KhadorTurn 1
My opponent wins the roll to go first and I opt for the side that doesn't have a forest and rough terrain covering the deployment zone. He sets the IFP in a shieldwall with Saxxon Orrik of to the side to give pathfinder with butcher, his dogs and warjacks run up the board with Kell Bailoch taking out 2 slingers and the widowmakers takes out a bloodrunner or two.

Skorne Turn 1
Everything runs Makeda put Hand of Fate on Molik karn and drops 1.

Round 2

Khador turn 2
IFP walk up in shieldwall and take a few more bloodrunners off the table. butcher moves up and puts silence of death on the IFP and uses energizer so hes on 1. The rest of his army moves up.

Skorne turn 2
Hes left a big opening that karn can land in right in front of the butcher. Makeda upkeeps HoD. The slingers aim and hit butcher with a flare, here was my first mistake, always make sure your entire unit takes potshots, regardless of what their main objective for activating was, ESPECIALLY IF ITS THEIR WARCASTER AND YOU'RE GOING FOR THE ASSASSINATION. Its just prudence. the flare brings butcher down to Def 14 with his guard dog, who I wouldn't find out about til later because I don't play against Khador outside of tournaments.

So the gladiator rushes Karn, makeda feats, the PGBH enrage Karn and get B2B for prodding. Karn charges and sidesteps off an IFP and doesn't quite have the distance from sidestep and overtake to make it to Butcher3, so he takes a second attack on another IFP to get closer to butcher and make it into melee with the Butcher. Need 7's to hit, buy an attack and rolla  6, decide to future sight and do 10 damage. Butcher3 drops shunts 5 of that. Second attack rolls a 3 and final attack hits and leaves butcher on 1 box.

Round 3

Khador turn 3

Butcher gives one focus to Ruin and uses vengance and his destroyer to kill Molik Karn. Butcher charges a slinger and uses Impending Doom to get Makeda, a slinger, a couple of immortals and one of her exalted into range. Flashing blade, feat and buy attacks leaves Makeda on 1 with a dead gladiator and a krea with 3 boxes. Ruin comes up and finishes the job.

Analysis:
Man I love playing Makeda3, she can be very hit and miss but when she works, she works. Sadly this isnt a case of her working. I'm actually 2-4 for using her, over all, not in the tournament I need to figure out a good MAT fixer for her. This list tries to use the slingers and krea for it but not sure its working low RAT on both means boosting and aiming to hit. Outside of that I really need to practice more against Khador.


Game 2

Zaal2 vs pThags

Thagrosh in theme with free upkeeps and appiritions
-3x Carniveans
-Scythean
-Shredder
-Naga Nightlurker
birthing pot
2x forsaken
Succubus
3man unit

I win the roll to go first, and my opponent chooses to take the side of the table with a big forest to hide behind. I set up with the plan of just running until I'm clear of the forest and water.

Round 1

Skorne Turn 1
I run everything and make it an average of 4 inches up the table on everything but the Karax who I positioned away from forests or rough terrain. Hopefully they'll get up the board and ty up things so the rest of my army can get where they need to go. Zaal walks and casts Aura of Power and Vision on Hakaar.

Legion Turn1
He runs everything up with the one of the Carniveans assaulting instead of running killing a couple of Karax. 1 Soul goes on each of the UAs for the Immortals. The 3 man unit walks up and one ice bolts another Karax. He sets up in the forest and Thags near his objective and moves the Scythean up. The pot trundles forward and his support moves around.

Round 2

Skorne Turn2

With a soul on the Immortals I can get them in the game. So they vengeance forward to get all the way out of the forest and then the first unit spends a soul to go incorporeal and charge the Scythean and one of the three carniveans. High rolls, Aura of Power, and a little help from an ancestral guardian allows them to take out the Scythean and a Carnivean.  The second unit takes out a Carnivean and the 3 man unit. Zaal2 moves up and drops a mage sight on the immortals in the forest so I have LoS to Thags, throws out a sunder spirit to burn off some focus and pops feat. Cyclopes take some pot shots at the pot, I think I'm clever, and leaves it on one box.

Legion turn 2
Thags moves up and feats and starts clearing out and immortals popping clouds, he feats bringing back the Scythean and is sitting on no Fury. The pot makes a shredder and between the two of them they manage to take out 2 immortals. The Carnivean takes out a few more Immortals and the Scythean takes out a few more dropping about 7 total with their souls going to Zaal2

Round 3

Skorne Turn2

Zaal upkeeps Magesight, drops Aura of power and vision, takes a righteous vengeance movement. Immortals take their vengeance and put a bit of damage on Thags and then Zaal2 activates and charges Thagrosh, smacking him into the dirt with fury left to spare.


Analysis:
Zaal2 loves to see beast spam across the table, a very limited number of high quality attacks means that you will get bogged down with the Karax stopping your advance while fueling the Zaal2 soul train and setting up the counter punch from the incorporeal Immortals. Put the Ancestral guardians in strategic places so they can stop tramples and you have a good road block and 3rd wave from the Guardians and Hakaar.

With that I am 1-1 and in brighter spirits moving on to my next game.

Game 3

Zaal2 vs Issyria
 Issyria
-Hyperion
-Chimera

Sentinels and UA
MHSF+ eyriss3
2x HRT
Agian I can't remember my opponents entire list This game was odd and a lot of fun. I get second and my opponent sets up with Issy behind Hyperion and the MHSF go in front. The dawn guard go off on the right side of the board to contest the flag. I set my immortals in a long line wanting to stay out of range of Hyperions sparklebusrt cannon. I put the shaman behind one unit off to my left, krea behind the karax on the right, and Zaal behind the middle unit with his 2 cyclops on his right looking to get a bead on Issyria. In retrospect I should have put the karax opposite of Hyperion since crit consume doesn't work on models with girded but I forgot and was more worried about the crit consume.

Round 1

Retribution Turn 1

Everything runs forward with the Sentinels angling for the flag and the MHSF and Hyperion getting into position to threaten my flag. Issyria puts IR on the sentinels and admonition on the chimera. There was a brief rules moment of whether or not the chimera can arc spells onto itself but the Warroom app settled it in his favor. With that he ends his turn.

Skorne Turn 1

Everything runs up with the ancestral guardian on the right taking the lead and the cyclopes running to get a better shot at Issyria.

Round 2

Retribution turn 2

Issyria upkeeps both spells and allocates no focus. MHSF and Hyperion put shots into the left unit of immortals taking out 3 of them and some karax. Giving me souls to spread where I need them. One goes on the unit of immortals that will get vengeance adn the others go on Hakaar to keep him from getting shot to death and to the far right ancestral guardian. Chimera walks up to range on both raiders and Issyria hits both of them with blinding light gimping them for a turn. Sentinels move up behind the chimera. HRT shoot one of my raiders to add insult to injury.

Skorne Turn 2

Righteous vengeance for Hakaar and vengeance gets  both into charge range of Hyperion and one soul and a charge later dings up Hyperion pretty badly and a charge from Hakaar puts Hyperion on about half his boxes. One of the cyclops run to engage the chimera, He decides to admonition back and an ancestral guardian charges him and buys attacks until hes dead. Zaal moves forward into the cloud from fuel cache and feats.

Round 3

Retribution turn 3

Issyria loads up Hyperion and feats. She has to float into melee with Hakaar and an immortal to get blinding light onto Zaal2. Hits and then velocitys out of melee range with 1 focus. He opts to take the free strikes and the first does 10 damage and he drops that to 5. I roll hot on Hakaars free strike with a 16 and end the game.

Analysis.

Me and my opponent spoke after that and he said that he had been too focused on getting Hyperion to trample up to Zaal and hit him at straight dice. I think that Issy may have been fine where she was and Hyperion should have started sweeping and buying attacks to get some breathing room. but im unsure what I would have done if Hype had gotten to Zaal, two hits at straight dice under issys feat would have been bad for him. 2-1

Game 4

Makeda3 vs Elara

Elara2
- Sphinx
-Sphinx
-Discordia

Halbs+UA
Riflemen+UA
Arcanists
Houseguard thane

Truthfully I don't remember much about this game ( I'll try to get batreps up within a couple days from now on) but Ill give you a quick rundown.
-He goes first
-we both run turn 1
-Second turn elara puts scything touch on a Halbredier, feats and they get desperate pace and charge Karn taking him and an exalted guardian out of the game.15" threat range! Elara sits on her flag.
I take 20 mins trying to figure out how to assassinate Elara before realizing that the soulless with the halbs messes up my plan. Still I'm stubborn, upkeep Hand of death, pop feat and charge a halb with Makeda, hit, blood boon the only 2 halbs within range of eliminator  and only kill one,leaving me short and forcing me to buy another attack to get into melee with Elara. 2 attacks later I end my turn and Elaras 3 heavies knock Makeda down and kill her. 2-2

Rough game, after this anyone not 3-1 or better was cut and I head home for an early night and dinner with the wife. Check out My buddy James at MacDaddy Minis for more bat reps from someone who made it past the cut off point.

All in all a fun day, I gotta figure out some better Mak3 lists because she is a lot of fun. A bigger battlegroup to start. I'll have more Makeda3 dojoing in the future. Also this is my first blog post in a while so comments and feedback are appreciated.