Lord Drakon Battle Reports

This forum is created in support of the development of http://www.the-ninth-age.com/index.php?board/5-elves-of-darkness/

Moderator: The Dread Knights

User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Introduction
Greetings!

Returning back to the hobby means besides painting ofcourse also the most fun part: the battle. In the coming two months I will play with this list and try to learn it as good as possible. In this battle report log I can also think about and discuss about tactical issues. I will post a detailed explanation for the list as soon as possible. Then as invitation, it is in Eindhoven (Netherlands) therefore also close for those in Belgium! I hope I will see some of you there. Also, feedback is always welcome. Lets make this forum a little bit more active again ;)

Tournament rules
You win the tournament by getting victory points. It does not matter if you lose the battle or lose victory points yourself, it is about killing as much as possible. Further your general get buffs like +1T or 1+ ward save for every opponent he kills and should always challenge. At last you can score sacrifice points by using secondary objectives (kill your own unit, kill enemy general, kill enemy unit). By killing the enemy general you score 1000 points, by the other secondary objectives you double the amount of VP.

XIII Legion
This is the list I will bring to the tournament. As I quickly sent in my army list to score some possible bonus points I have not waited for feedback or tweaks to optimize the list. This was a mistake and as I progress I might sometimes field a more optimized form of the list.

Dread Prince, Cult of Yema, Headman’s Axe, Crimson Mail, Charm of Cursed Iron, Dragonfire Gem - 495
Cult Priest, Cult of Yema, BSB, Divine Altar, Light Armour, Gladiator Weapon, Obsidian Nullstone, Lucky Shield - 698

15 Legionnaires, Cult of Yema, Full Command, Spears - 270
15 Legionnaires, Cult of Yema, Full Command, Spears - 270
5 Dark Raiders, Cult of Yema, Musician, Repeater Crossbows, Shields – 250
5 Dark Raiders, Cult of Yema, Musician, Repeater Crossbows, Shields – 250

29 Dancers of Yema, Full Command, Rending Banner - 748
5 Raven Cloaks, Additional Hand Weapons - 180
5 Raven Cloaks, Additional Hand Weapons - 180
1 Dread Reaper - 180
1 Dread Reaper - 180

5 Dark Acolytes, Cult of Yema, Champion - 390

Total: 4091


Tactical List Explanation
A good general should always know his army. This is the first and fundamental step of commanding your deadly force. An optimized list under the command of a general unfamiliar with its list will likely result into defeat. Another gaming aspect is that you will play slow, making the game less fun for the enemy and can lead to frustration if battles are not ended on time. As returning gamer to Warhammer: 9th Age this is the step I am currently taking.

The list is build around a so-called death star, a strong combat unit reinforced by several characters. In my case those are the Dancers of Yema. As a Cult of Yema list my army is fast and can make good tactical use of the terrain as they have Strider. Because of the Altar they have the option to deploy 10x4 as a horde or 5x9 as an anvil. Both formations have their specific advantage, the first being damage output, the second ranks to maintain and negate steadfast while minimizing frontage. Their objective is to kill the enemy units in combat and use their mobility to outmaneuver the enemy. Because of character magical items they have MR (3) and 5+ ward save against Artillery.

To counter this the enemy will have ranged damage and chaff present, therefore the list offers support to win the chaff war. The raven cloaks are scouts and shooters. The raiders are re-directors and war machine hunters. The reapers are reliable artillery able to clear enemy chaff and kill heavy armoured units. Especially early game they are supported by the acolytes who have two deadly spells to inflict more damage. Although their magic potential is already present they are also good fighters and will overpower most chaff in combat.

Besides the death star and support the list includes two units of legionnaires. Although they are not able to stand a chance against enemy elite infantry and might even tremble against enemy core they will also overpower most enemy chaff. Because they are scoring units they can be used to get objectives, provide flank charges or redirect the enemy units.

Unit Discussion
The most important part of getting to know your army is to know your units, their statistics, their strengths and weaknesses. Although there exists some material on the 9th age forum, this is still a bare minimum and not enough to provide me with the information and expriences of others to teach me. Therefore I should start study and experience the units myself.

Dread Prince
Lord Drakon himself, is a deadly character that has 4 S7 attacks at I8 with multiple wounds (2). His armour is at the start of the game only 5+, but will get better with every kill. After four inflicted (unsaved) wounds he will have an armour save of 1+. Without ward save and a low armour save he is glass cannon and play testing should prove if he is able to survive combat against tougher foes. Against magic he does have a 4+ ward save. His LD10 bubble should make failed panic tests unlikely.

Cult Priest
The battle standard bearer with a bubble of 18" should make failed panic tests unlikely. She has a lucky shield for enemy cannon shots and a gladiator weapon that can be give her 3 S6 attacks. The altar itself has another 4 S5 attacks and 3 S3 attacks. With 5 T5 wounds and 5+ armour save with 4+ ward save she is difficult to kill. She provides both Impact Hits on the charge as ranks for the unit as support. As long as she stays alive the Dancers of Yema unit will be dangerous and able to change formation from horde to anvil. It adds fear and hex to enemy leadership tests (excluding break test). The altar also provides several blessings:

1. All units within 12" gain lethal strike. Units with lethal strike gain re-roll to wound (legionnaires against cavalry)
2. All units within 12" gain 5+ ward save against Artillery
3. All units within 12" can re-roll charge distance on chosen enemy unit

1. Use when facing high armour (knights) or regen saves (trolls) - Damage
2. Use when not in combat or planning to charge - Protection
3. Use in combination of Yema to make long charges - Manoueuvre

While the second blessing is negated by the enchanted item of the general (stupid purchase) and the first blessing is situational on the match up I do see a lot of use for the third blessing. As a cult of Yema army mobility is my comparative advantage the third blessing is able to maximize on that. All cavalry has M10 and could try long 20 or 21" charge into enemy war machines.

Legionnaires
Information will follow soon

Raiders
Do not expect them to kill anything with their RXB, however every kill is a bonus. They excel in redirecting the enemy while able to hunt enemy war machines. Possible to use for the odd flank charge, especially against enemy missile troops. Because of Yema they have M10 and can march & charge through terrain such as forests and ruins. They are able to block enemy movement through double flee blockades and especially middle to late game can function as harpies (sacrifice) to redirect enemy combat units at crucial moments.

Raven Cloaks
Especially when combined they can provide some serious fire power against low armoured troops, especially fast cavalry. They can block enemy vanguard and take positions near enemy lines, especially if they can hide in terrain it is 12". This can be of great use when the enemy has fielded war machines. Keep them always on more than 6" distance to prevent panic tests. When there are no prime targets left or certain enemy units needs to be put out of position also usable as bait.

Reapers
They are reliable long distance artillery able to clear chaff, characters, monsters and heavy armour.

Dancers of Yema
Information will follow soon

Acolytes
Information will follow soon

The Enemy
As soon a general has completed the first step of commanding his army, to know its units and tactical cohesion, roles and tricks it is as important to know your enemy. Without this knowledge the enemy will be easily able to deceive and trick you into bad match ups. According to the legendary Druchii Sun Tzu if you know yourself and know your enemy, you are ready for warfare. In this phase I will study each possible enemy and their strenghts and weaknesses according to my army.

Battle Reports
There is no better teacher than failure. This is only true however if you transform your failure into experience and learn from your mistakes. By writing down my battles I can reflect and look back to battles in hindsight. Especially as beginning general it opens up the possibility for experienced generals to give feedback and mention points that could be improved. But failure is not the only thing we can learn from. A devastating massacre caused by good Druchii play is extremely satisfying to read.
Last edited by Lord Drakon on Tue Feb 07, 2017 1:50 pm, edited 3 times in total.
User avatar
van Awful
Highborn
Posts: 690
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 10:23 am
Location: Ammerzoden, metropole at the Maas

Re: Bloodstorm March 26 Battle Practice Log

Post by van Awful »

I havent looked into 9th age for a while, but damn, these points per model are of the chart arent they?
i thought you might have forgotten the mount for your dreadprince..but no.

Eindhoven is close enough that i might pop in to have a look, im quite curious as how 9th plays out.

Good luck anyways
Nec spe, nec metu

I am an Extraordinary Druchii Gentleman
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Bloodstorm March 26 Battle Practice Log

Post by Lord Drakon »

van Awful wrote:I havent looked into 9th age for a while, but damn, these points per model are of the chart arent they?
i thought you might have forgotten the mount for your dreadprince..but no.

Eindhoven is close enough that i might pop in to have a look, im quite curious as how 9th plays out.

Good luck anyways

Nice, hope to see youbl there!
They doubled the points, I also have to get used to it haha
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Tactics

Post by Lord Drakon »

Tonight I have the chance to play against the legendary player DeGroteBaas, who I have only defeated once. I will play against his 2000pts Saurus Ancient lists for a tournament. Therefore I take a much smaller list with as main objective: to test the Dancers of Yema with Lord Drakon in combat. It is might not be a well tuned list (too much points in Prince, no scoring units) but I really want to experience the combat phase, so both Reapers and Raiders will try to make that possible by clearing chaff. I will write a battle report afterwards.

Dread Prince, Cult of Yema, Headman’s Axe, Crimson Mail, Talisman of Greater Shielding - 500

5 Dark Raiders, Cult of Yema, Musician, Repeater Crossbows, Shields – 250
5 Dark Raiders, Cult of Yema, Musician, Repeater Crossbows, Shields – 250

24 Dancers of Yema, Full Command, Rending Banner - 638
1 Dread Reaper - 180
1 Dread Reaper - 180

Total: 1998
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Tactics

Post by Lord Drakon »

Lord Drakon wrote:Tonight I have the chance to play against the legendary player DeGroteBaas, who I have only defeated once. I will play against his 2000pts Saurus Ancient lists for a tournament. Therefore I take a much smaller list with as main objective: to test the Dancers of Yema with Lord Drakon in combat. It is might not be a well tuned list (too much points in Prince, no scoring units) but I really want to experience the combat phase, so both Reapers and Raiders will try to make that possible by clearing chaff. I will write a battle report afterwards.

Dread Prince, Cult of Yema, Headman’s Axe, Crimson Mail, Talisman of Greater Shielding - 500

5 Dark Raiders, Cult of Yema, Musician, Repeater Crossbows, Shields – 250
5 Dark Raiders, Cult of Yema, Musician, Repeater Crossbows, Shields – 250

24 Dancers of Yema, Full Command, Rending Banner - 638
1 Dread Reaper - 180
1 Dread Reaper - 180

Total: 1998


I brought the small list against a balanced Saurus Ancient army: Carnosaur, Skink Priest, 20 Skinks with Kroxigor, 20 Saurus, 2 Weapon Beasts (Salamander and Razorback) and 3 Rippers. We played on a square battlefield with impassable terrain and forest at both flanks.

My goal was to kill the Weapon Beasts with my Artillery, get the Dancers of Yema into combat without heavy losses from shooting or magic and use the Raiders to redirect enemy units for deciding moments in the game.

I deployed central, with the Reapers on a nice hill in my deployment zone covering most of the field. Enemy deployed opposite to me, with rippers, weapon beasts and carnosaur at the flank. While I got first turn I made a mistake by shooting at the weapon beasts with single shots instead of multi-shot, I kept doing this throughout the battle, resulting in poor results of Artillery shooting. Enemy created magical beast in his second turn which killed my Artillery in next two turns, another mistake from me as I kept shooting with single shot while he has no armour.

My Raiders took the brunt of enemy shooting but also got decimated pretty soon. Even without BSB the high leadership of Lord Drakon kept the army disciplined in the face of panic tests. In turn 3 I could charge the enemy Salamander, which fled and redirected into enemy Rippers. They were killed just by the attacks of Lord Drakon and I redirected to face the Saurus in the centre.

In return the Saurus battle created an U with the Saurus in the middle and Carnosaur and Skinks at the flanks. As I wanted to test out the Dancers block (they have lost 5 to enemy shooting at this moment) I charged the Saurus and redirected the Carnosaur with last Raiders. In total they killed around 7-8 Saurus with great weapons, not enough to win with force and the Saurus hold their ground and killed 2 Dancers in return.

Unfortunately next turn he charged with skinks in the flank and razorback in the rear. Especially with +1 strength spell on the Skinks and 5+ ward on the Saurus. I did not killed enough Saurus and he won with 7 combat resolution. I fled and that was it. Complete massacre while I only killed enemy Rippers.

Conclusion:
Magic remains game changer, especially these small point games. Reapers should not to take the big reward / big risk gamble on enemy T4 or T5 single monstrous beasts, save the single shot for heavy armour monstrious mounts or deep ranks. Prince is really nice both in combat and with his leadership. I did not liked the great weapons with Dancers as I am used to flails and really do not like to lose hits, however I am not sure if because of Saurus damage output that would have been even worse for me. I took the gamble of routing the Saurus, which failed, but I should also be aware that Saurus are a brick wall. Raiders killed nothing but took some hits for the Dancers and made a crucial block late-game. However at this point level I think two units of Legionnaires had been more suitable.

Lessons:
I made the deliberate choice to field a single combat unit combined with a list to win the chaff war. This is also what my normal 4100 points list looks like. In most to all battles I will play with the list the enemy will try to create an U formation to encircle my unit and defeat it with counter-charges. My objective is to learn how to prevent that. A should further experiment what the Dancers can do or take in combat and learn to play much more focused on terrain, as with Yema I have speed and terrain as my advantage. My next battle will be against DeGroteBaas again, although then normal points.

To be continued!
User avatar
Marchosias
Assassin
Posts: 594
Joined: Fri Apr 26, 2013 7:53 am

Re: Lord Drakon Tactics

Post by Marchosias »

Thanks for the report! Nice to see you on the battlefield again. :)

Some random remarks:
- If you are worried about your block being encircled, you can try to deploy it a bit to the flank. After a skewed deployment, some enemy units will be quite near while others quite far away which might (in theory) allow you to deal with one of them at a time. Of course, the enemy will probably back away with the near ones and march at full speed with the others. :)
- Did you have stronger ranged presence? Seems the SA had only some low-range skinks. If so, you should have maybe stayed back, shot with your reapers and crossbows and wait for him to come to you. If nothing else, it is difficult to create a U formation while going forwards.
- Alternatively, you could try to get something in the list that is good at pinning things in place. Hydra, chariots, smaller units of dancers. If they can charge the enemy and stay in the fight for a while, it will allow your block to win the crucial combat without getting countercharged. Of course, this costs points.
- The general consensus is that dancer's can't kill a thing. Against many foes, the best approach will be to create a column with many ranks, get lots of static combat resolution + kills from your lord and break the enemy in combat. Pity the lord can't be a fleetmaster. :(

Hope you will crush him next time! :)
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Tactics

Post by Lord Drakon »

Marchosias wrote:Thanks for the report! Nice to see you on the battlefield again. :)

Some random remarks:
- If you are worried about your block being encircled, you can try to deploy it a bit to the flank. After a skewed deployment, some enemy units will be quite near while others quite far away which might (in theory) allow you to deal with one of them at a time. Of course, the enemy will probably back away with the near ones and march at full speed with the others. :)
- Did you have stronger ranged presence? Seems the SA had only some low-range skinks. If so, you should have maybe stayed back, shot with your reapers and crossbows and wait for him to come to you. If nothing else, it is difficult to create a U formation while going forwards.
- Alternatively, you could try to get something in the list that is good at pinning things in place. Hydra, chariots, smaller units of dancers. If they can charge the enemy and stay in the fight for a while, it will allow your block to win the crucial combat without getting countercharged. Of course, this costs points.
- The general consensus is that dancer's can't kill a thing. Against many foes, the best approach will be to create a column with many ranks, get lots of static combat resolution + kills from your lord and break the enemy in combat. Pity the lord can't be a fleetmaster. :(

Hope you will crush him next time! :)


Thanks for the feedback! Great to see you posting on the forum, any plans for returning to the battlefield yourself Miss your reports!

I got the same feeling about the best approach fielding them deep, give them movement banner + killy characters in front. However, I do not see why I should not take 29 Legionnaires with Yema and movement banner instead for much fewer points. Its a shame I can't change the list anymore but positive is that it forces me to stick with it and learn how to best field it.

Good point about deploying at the flank, they have the speed, especially with banner of speed to outmanoevre the enemy or catch up. Also most forests are placee around flanks in my experience.

I found my ranged presence weaker as I failed to kill his shooting while the artillery got taken without much trouble by the enemy. However I feel that if I had used the multi-shot and prioritized the magical beast the RBT could have survived and have strategic dominance of the field.

Great ideas for some list building after more battle experience.
User avatar
Marchosias
Assassin
Posts: 594
Joined: Fri Apr 26, 2013 7:53 am

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Marchosias »

Well, the reason I do not write report now is the same as with everyone - I finished the school and got a job. :) I should probably return to it for a while at least as I am quite rusty but... not enough time and too many other distractions. :)

Dancers do have at least one advantage over spearmen: they don't give up combat resolution as easily. That helps a lot if your plan is to break the enemy without actually killing anything.
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Greetings!

Welcome to my first XIII Legion Bloodstorm Slaughterfest battle report. I started playing Warhammer in 2015 with the 8th edition and also did some 9th age since the end of Fantasy Battles. Now after a long time away from the hobby I am returning and enjoying the sensation of building and fielding an army into battle! I use my battle reports to be to reflect on my battles, the mistakes and successes. While its great to make them and especially read them back after some time, the benefits of sharing it online is also the feedback you can get from the community. Hereby I welcome you all to give all the criticism and feedback you can think of and join me in my comeback to the hobby.

This battle was against Leon, a great Vermin Swarm player living in Rotterdam and we always manage to have epic and absolutely bloody battles. We are both training for the Bloodstorm Slaughterfest tournament March 26 where you can only win by scoring as much victory points as possible, so to KILL a lot of enemy units. Also, your general always needs to challenge and when he slays an opponent in challenge he gets a cool blessing from Khorne. As I found Vermin Swarms always as destructive to my soft elves I was looking forward to this game.

I brought my Dread Elves with Roman theme, the (not yet) dreaded XIII Legion

XIII Legion List
Dread Prince, Cult of Yema, Headman’s Axe, Crimson Mail, Charm of Cursed Iron, Dragonfire Gem - 495
Cult Priest, Cult of Yema, BSB, Divine Altar, Light Armour, Gladiator Weapon, Obsidian Nullstone, Lucky Shield - 698
15 Legionnaires, Cult of Yema, Full Command, Spears - 270
15 Legionnaires, Cult of Yema, Full Command, Spears - 270
5 Dark Raiders, Cult of Yema, Musician, Repeater Crossbows, Shields – 250
5 Dark Raiders, Cult of Yema, Musician, Repeater Crossbows, Shields – 250
29 Dancers of Yema, Full Command, Rending Banner - 748
5 Raven Cloaks, Additional Hand Weapons - 180
5 Raven Cloaks, Additional Hand Weapons - 180
1 Dread Reaper - 180
1 Dread Reaper - 180
5 Dark Acolytes, Cult of Yema, Champion - 390
Total: 4091

Image

Vermin Swarm List
Plague Prophet, Putrid Plate, King Slayer, Plague Pendulum - 690
Chief, Battle Standard Bearer, Crown of Scorn - 190
Assassin, Lethal Strike, Strength Potion - 380
45 Slaves - 170
34 Rat at Arms, Champion, Standard - 200
34 Plague Brotherhood, Champion, Standard, Aether Icon - 255
7 Plague Disciples - 130
1 Meat Grinder - 40
1 Rat Swarm - 140
1 Ratling Gun - 150
8 Grenadiers - 180
7 Gutter Blades, Ambush, Scouting - 248
1 Catapult - 170
1 Dreadmill - 250
1 Abomination - 400

note: picture of his beautiful army will follow soon

Pre-Game Thoughts
A solid Vermin Swarm list, three big units of which two are dangerous in combat while the other is as dangerous because he can lock you down and keep shooting. Especially his Assassin is nasty because he has a higher initiative than my Dread Prince and with the potion will very likely kill him in a challenge. I always fear Vermin Swarm shooting, although I have learned to prioritize my shooting on 1. weapon teams 2. artillery 3. other shooting and also experienced that Vermin Swarm blow themselves up more often than other species. The grenadiers looked scary on paper, same for disciples. I figured that my main combat block should be able to kill off the A-bom so he was first target in combat where the Prince could up his armour save to take on either the priest or assassin. I hoped the gutter runners would delay in their ambush and then hope the RBT would be able to scare them off because they died. Therefore my battle plan was as following, deploy the main combat block on a far flank opposite his A-bom to outmaneuver the opponent while focusing the first turns to take out his shooting.

Deployment
Because my list is a Cult of Yema list I try to examine the terrain every game I will play

Terrain
We made a nice battlefield with hills around all corners and several forests in the middle. Also note the ruins at the flank (now made with battle report logo) and the building in the centre which we counted as impassable terrain. I rolled highest to choose a side and chose the deployment side where the ruins were present as all my units either have strider or are scouting skirmishers. As an Cult of Yema list terrain has become really interesting for me as they are able to support my units instead of hamper them. Benefits of terrain are ofcourse the cover the provide, both soft and hard, but also the surprise it might provide. While the enemy is aware my units are Cult of Yema there might be a single moment he forgets that my chariot and cavarly can charge through forests or my legionnaires do not lose steadfast.

Image

The opponent wins the deployment roll and places his Swarms at the left flank of the board where I react with the placement of my Dark Raiders. We both laugh about this basic thing of the deployment phase and I remember from a game I recently lost how important the deployment phase is and the drops you have in your army. It is the same in the game, especially the movement phase, chaff is essential and provide this great extra depth to the game. He then deploys his catapult at far right hill in the corner where I react with another unit of Dark Raiders in the right centre. Because he wanted to have one turn less of my shooting he deployed his army at once, at the right flank. I deployed the big block at the far right opposite his catapult and A-bom and Reapers central. Especially the scouting phase provided me with some great options in the forest and the ruins. Because of his first turn I deployed my Acolytes and Legionnaires less forward.

Vermin Swarms - Turn 1
The game starts and the countless rats push forwards. While the central two combat blocks move up some inches the Slaves marches up in order to close the gap between the building and his battleline to prevent any Dark Raiders slipping through. The A-bom moves up to block the Raven Cloaks from charging the Catapult while the Doomwheel moves towards the Dark Raiders while the Swarms run away as fast as possible to redeploy where there are going to be needed. I really like the fluffy tiny rule of them by the way, that they are so small they can just run through their own units. The Ratling gun moves up a little to be able to shoot the Acolytes.

Image

Without magic he quickly goes to his shooting phase and starts with his Catapult. While I had expected him to try kill the BSB on Altar or at least a lot of Dancers of Yema he aims for the Acolytes and lucky for me fails to wound. Then his Ratling gun aims and wound four! but they save two with their 4+ ward saves. They pass their leadership test after a BSB re-roll and all is save. Then the Doomwheel shoots at the Dark Raiders but only at strength 3 and kills 2, but I save the armour save of one. I made average saves and survived the first shooting phase without any trouble, nice!

Dread Elves - Turn 1
Aware that I am lucky to have survived the enemy shooting without a lot of casualties my aim is to take out a much enemy shooting as possible this turn. I advance forwards aggressive with all my units. My battle plan is to break through his right flank with my combat unit while blocking his left flank to create an unbalanced battle plan where I can push through from the flanks. This will force him to either face my combat block and therefore provide his flanks to my 15 spear blocks or go after the spears and provide rear/flank to the Dancers of Yema. I was not sure yet how to handle the enemy Assassin which could kill my general but got a little plan. By sneaking the Raven Cloaks behind the A-Bom towards the Catapult he was likely to attack them in his round. As I thought units with random movement are not able to overrun I could then attack his A-Bom with the combat block in my second round and overrun behind enemy lines. The Acolytes moved up to be within range of a possible Doombolt (The Grave Calls it is called now).

In the magic phase I get 7 - 4 for the winds of magic and channel another dice. I roll 5 dice for casting Doombolt on his Disciples and sacrifice two legionnaires to make it strength 6, this was more of testing out sacrificing instead of real tactical advantage, but a Dark Elf is not a Dark Elf without sacrificing at least some models of his own each game. Unfortunately I roll very low (11) but just get if off. While he still has the scroll he makes the gamble to use his four dice, but lucky for me he fails to equal the roll. I do a lot of hits and kill all his Disciples at once! To destroy an enemy unit in your first round is always great. I really liked this because with normal shooting they would be difficult to kill but a single doombolt cleared them without too much effort. I am very happy I invested in the Champion because although expensive, strong magic missiles in your magic phase can solve a lot of problems for you.

Image

On to shooting. My priority number 1 was to clear the Ratling gun, and with some luck take out the Catapult now he is only T4. As the Raven Cloaks used as bait for the A-bom had no other choice they shot at the Catapult, inflicting the first wound. The Raven Cloaks in the Ruins inflicted three wounds on the Ratling Gun and killed it, great! Then combined fire of the RBT on the Catapult: 12 shots hitting on 4+, 6 hits wounding on 4+ and I just killed it with another 3 wounds. So both the Ratling gun and Catapult cleared in my first turn, amazing shooting phase while just rolling average. Combined with the magic phase already 3 units destroyed! Both units of Dark Raiders get a bonus kill at the Slaves and Plague Monks unit, just to annoy :P

Vermin Swarms - Turn 2
The Slaves needs to push forward anyway so charge the Dark Raiders. I flee and he tries to redirect, but fails. Unfortunately he then rolls the same amount as my flee distance so catches them, even while blocked by the other unit of Dark Raiders, hmm. I am not sure this was good use of the Dark Raiders. While he does not have to protect his Catapult anymore he charges the Raven Cloaks with the A-Bom, logically because he can overrun of the table as I discover too late. His Gutter Runners appear on the table and move towards a Reaper while his Doomwheel advances through the forest to get into my flanks. He retreats his Rat at Arms a little to prevent a long charge from the Dancers of Yema and runs as fast as possible with his Rat Swarms towards his lines.

Image

In his shooting phase he gets lucky with his Gutter Runners on the left RBT and kills it with a lot of poisioned shots but completely fluffs his Grenadier shooting on the Acolytes.

In combat the A-Bom easily kills the Raven Cloaks without much effort or damage in return and overruns off the table to my horror. We search in the rules to be sure but they also overrun. Hmm, what to do now?

Dread Elves - Turn 2
I still want to kill that A-bom first and push through enemy lines clearing him so decide to wait for another turn as he needs to come back next turn without being able to move, so I just move up a bit and shuffle for more line of sight. I was doubting between charging the Grenadiers with the last 3 Acolytes or gambling another 5 dice Doombolt and opted for the second option because of possible stand and shoot that could go wrong. Therefore I moved them out of charge ranges. The Raven Cloaks in the Ruins turn around to shoot enemy Gutter Runners but I make a mistake by leaving them inside the Ruins instead of close range. The left unit of spears were send to block the Slaves while I send the last unit of Dark Raiders as redirector to be charged by the Plague Bearers as they have frenzy and therefore must overrun and lose another round of movement. I am not sure this early sacrifice was too soon, but eventually played out well.

Image

I get another great roll for magic: 9-5 and use 5 dice for Doombolt on his Grenadiers and have a high roll, but he scrolls it.

In the shooting phase the Raven Cloaks miss their shots and the Reaper only kills a single Gutter Runner, not enough! A small bonus is that the Raiders kill another monk.

Vermin Swarms - Turn 3
Instead of charging the Legionnaires with his Slaves and moves his unit 1" away while his Plague Brotherhood charges the Dark Raiders. His Rat Swarms reach his own lines while the A-bom returns on the table. Grenadiers turn to finally kill a Acolyte with their shooting while the Doomwheel advances to charge the Legionnaires in the rear or take out the last RBT, Gutter Runners move up. Things are actually not looking that well for the Dread Elves at this moment

Image

Fortunately he now shoots on average with his Gutter Runners and only inflict three wounds on the Reaper, so it lives! The Doomwheel kills two Legionnaires and although the Grenadiers finally inflict a wound on the Acolytes, I made the 4+ ward save. Good result.

As suspected the Dark Raiders are killed with impact hits, but the unit of pendulum needs to overrun and therefore takes it out of position. If this was worth it we will see later on and I am also looking forward to your feedback on this matter.

Dread Elves - Turn 3
The combat block of 1 Dread Prince, 1 BSB on Altar and 29 Dancers charge the A-Bom. They are fielded here as a bus, so 5 wide, in order to break steadfast from enemy ranked units, so only a single Dancer in base contact. Two legionnair units also move out of reach of the Plague Monks, one charges into the Slaves to do this, hoping on a lucky fail of steadfast. The Raven Cloaks now get into short range of the Gutter Runners while the Acolytes move for another doombolt shot on the Grenadiers.

I roll 7 - 4 for winds of magic and cast another 5-dice Doombolt on the Grenadiers. This time it goes through and I kill them all at once, great! Second unit destroyed while still dangerous in combat for rear or flank charge.

Image

This time the Reaper really shines and inflict 4 wounds on the Gutter Runners, who flee until just 1" off the table edge. It leaves the Raven Cloaks only in front of the Doomwheel which they fail to wound.

In combat the Legionnaires inflict 5 wounds while the Slaves kill 2 in return, Slaves loses combat but hold their ground. In the combat against the A-bom impact hits inflict 1 wound, then Lord Drakon (Dread Prince) another 2 but (2) so 4 and the BSB with her Gladiator Weapon and Lethal Strike of the Altar finishes him off. I combat reform to face the Assassin with Rat at Arms and Grinder and hope for the best. Odds are changing into my favour now I feel

Vermin Swarms - Turn 4
The Assassins and his unit charges into my big combat block and makes it. I get lucky and enemy Doomwheel explodes! Very nice indeed. The Plague Brotherhood unit reforms and the Rat Warms moves to redirect my unit of 15 Spears.

Image

Without shooting we go straight to the combat phase where my general unfortunately needs to challenge his Assassins. The Skaven fail their fear, a really nice bonus from the Yema Altar by having to roll 3 D6 and discard the lowest. Unfortunately this does not stop the Assassins which still inflicts 2 wounds with his potion of strength. With only a 3+ armour save Lord Drakon has no chance and the deadly Assassin inflict 5 wounds because of multiple wounds rule, killing the general! The other combat is uneventful as both the BSB and Grinder fail to inflict any damage and the 2 Dancers might have killed a Rat at Arm but I forgot. He wins combat and I fail my steadfast leadership 9 test..... But the re-roll saves it. Pfewww. I realize I need more Dances of Yema into combat so combat reforms into 7 wide. Spearman and Slaves kill each other and get a draw.

Dread Elves - Turn 4
The Legionnaires charge the Rat Swarms while the Acolytes and Raven Cloaks position to kill a lot of Plague Monks.

I get a high magic roll of 11 - 6 and try another Doombolt, but the enemy dispells it with his 6 dice.

Image

The shooting phase is much more successful though, and the combined shooting of the Reaper Bolt Thrower and Raven Cloaks kill 8 Plague Monks.

In the big combat the now dreaded Assassins strikes again, and inflicts three wounds on the BSB on Divine Altar. Contrary to last round however he is now only S4 so that should not be a problem so I first roll my armour saves: 1, 1, 1 oke no problem then my 4+ ward save: 1, 1, 1 :shock: NOOO! Multiple wounds make it a total of 7 wounds and BSB also dies under the deadly blade of the Assassin. I realize now by looking at the list she still had a Lucky Shield, but it would have made no difference I guess. But then something unexpected happened. The Dancers of Yema, the Druchii Gladiators, the Most Bad Ass unit the Dread Elves ever had, were clearly annoyed that they had been used as static combat res outside of combat. Because both Lord Drakon and the BSB had died they could now finally strike and took their flails. They easily kill the Grinder and another 6 Rat at Arms while only they pass all saves in return. Enemy unit holds on steadfast however, but this is perfect. Spears easily kills a Swarm and therefore destroy the other by combat resolution. In the meantime the Slaves had slowly killed enough Spears in the other combat that they lost combat and run, captured by the Slaves

Vermin Swarms - Turn 5
We became confused by the epic battle and though this was our last turn, turn 6. The Slaves charged the last RBT to score its points while the big block marched towards the heroic Dancers of Yema for an epic final battle if the Assassin and his unit would flee.

Image

Shocked by the last combat the Assassin tried to save his ass and unit by killing enough Dancers, but fluffed his attacks and the Dancers made their 4+ ward saves. This time it was time for the Assassin to die, so the 6 Dancers tried to kill him, while the other 9 used their flails on the unit. Now the Dancers really showed who know how to fight. Against the 6 attacks on the Assassin, 5 hit on 3+ and 5 wound on 3+ but then the Assassin rolls his ward saves: 4, 4, 6, 5, 4 :shock: However the Dancers do now care and inflict 9 hits on 2+ and 9 wounds on 2+ on the Rat at Arms = 100% wounding rate! The poor Rat at Arms lose their nerves and flee, unfortunately they escape the wrath of the Dancers of Yema. In the other combat Slaves easily kill the RBT off.

Dread Elves - Turn 5
Final turn, I doubt between multi-charging the Plague and do it, but save the Acolytes to hopefully finish the fleeing Rat at Arms with Assassin and they do! Finally! Then the 26 or so Dancers of Yema charge in the front and both Raven Cloaks and Legionnaires in the flank of the Plague unit.

Acolytes try another Doombolt on the Slaves for the last time but they dispells it.

Image

Now, the final battle. I get to strike first. The Dancers kill 11, the Cloaks kill 4, the Legionnaires kill 3 and suddenly the unit is nearly dead, only 8 Plague Monks left. In return 3 Legionnaires die so I lose the second rank to break steadfast, all 5 Cloaks die and the combat character is only able to kill 2 Dancers of Yema so I win combat. However he still has LD9 steadfast with BSB. He rolls... 11! the re-roll... 11! YES! They flee and I try to capture. He rolls another 11 and I roll.... 11!!! YES. Oh no, he reminds he of the +1 for Skaven fleeing so he just escapes my Dancers. We shake hands after another epic and bloody game, very close.

Result
We calculate victory points and I scored 3225 against 2900.
A 10 - 10 draw.

Post-Game Thoughts
A great game and very close to complete annihilation of the enemy army (4091 points) minus the unit of Slaves of which I am very happy. All my units did something and although with mistakes I think my overall battle plan had worked. Even the Raven Cloaks that were killed in his second turn picked off that crucial wound of the enemy Catapult or those Dark Raiders inflicting several wounds on the enemy with shooting before being used as redirectors. As always I was impressed with the Dancers of Yema, but that is because I used their flails again instead of great weapons. Always use flails, as because they lost the attacks they need all their attacks to actually hit and wound, and most of the time this will be 2+ to hit and 2+ to wound. In the future I am going to field them 7 wide and 6 deep. I feel I was lacking in the chaff game, but I also managed to kill off his shooting and redirected while the final battle was still me multi-charging his big block so maybe I did it right. Lord Drakon himself needs to kill some average troops or have higher initiative than all his opponents before he can enter battle, as he is really glass cannon because of his bad build (not able to change anymore). Enemy Assassins was absolutely rocking this game by killing both the general and BSB while escaping death several times. I was very lucky that the Doomwheel blowed up, otherwise it could have become a big loss.

MVP
The MVP's this battle were the Acolytes. They killed a unit of Disciples, Grenadiers and captured the fleeing unit of Rat at Arms with the deadly Assassin inside, just to get revenge. They survived several rounds of shooting, while all enemy shooting was directed at them. Their M10 is amazing combined with their 4+ ward saves. I did not used them in combat yet as in most cases their Doombolt was more dangerous and it was still deadly. I was lucky without any miscasts while using 5 dice every time though.

Image

Sacrifice for Khaine
Lord Drakon himself is going to be sacrificed to Khaine after his battle. Although he inflicted four important wounds on the Abomination he was easily slain by a simple Vermin Assassin, this is something Khaine really dislikes! I hope he will get to shine in next battles. My most important lesson about him that he is real glass cannon without any ward save or armour save not yet upgraded to 1+.

Image
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

I hope someone enjoyed the battle report! Next sunday I will go to the tournament and I know my first enemy.

Deamon Legions

1065 - Scourge of Wrath, general, supreme aspect, eternal fury, blade of grief, iron hide, obsidian horn
380 - Harbinger of Wrath, BSB, aspect, eternal fury, war standard

830 - 30 Slaughterers, full command, aspect: onslaught
599 - 4 Crushers, full command, aspect: onslaught, aether icon
544 - 4 Crushers, full command, aspect: onslaught
368 - 6 Hellhounds, aspect: onslaught
310 - 5 Hellhounds, aspect: onslaught
Clockwork
Highborn
Posts: 624
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2011 7:57 pm

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Clockwork »

I think that I read these on T9A but I am very much enjoying them and looking forwards to more :)
User avatar
Marchosias
Assassin
Posts: 594
Joined: Fri Apr 26, 2013 7:53 am

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Marchosias »

I sure am enjoying your reports. :) And after having met demons for the first time in T9A today, I am quite interested how did you go against them (the tournament was today, I think?). That scourge of wrath is insane. :shock:
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Great to hear guys, oke I will start making them from now again. When doing regular reports again it might also become easier/faster to make them (again). I was planning to make battle reports of the tournament three games, BUT:

Unfortunately I did not made pictures of the battles at the tournament after I screwed up big time in my first game against Deamons. I did this because I thought you measure charge distance closest to enemy unit but enemy argued it was the most far model which made somehow sense and because I did not played too much last months I just agreed only to second-guess it after the battle when I had been wrecked because of that single not so smart action combined with not so amazing deployment. After it the game also felt unreal as it could have been so different.

Overall I was not playing that great the tournament and made a lot of deployment and movement mistakes so I ended up in the lower tier. Overall the Dancer Deathstar was very very tough in combat and in my last battle went absolutely crazy. I will give some feedback per unit and short summary of the games but as mentioned no full battle reports as also busy next month.

About Deamons, I think when played right I could have wrecked his list as he had no shooting, no magic and I was faster than him with most of my units. But I had the same strategic list advantage against my second opponent Bretonnia and also kind of gave the victory away by some important errors or miscalculations. Even the third against Lizardmen was clearly going to end up like the first battle when the Dancers of Yema saved my ass and destroyed 3/4 of his list in combat.

Oke. Actually. They were all nice games with lots of nice stuff happening. I will make the battle reports with chronicler next week and then when time post them one by one on the forum.

Maybe I will discover that the big error in Game 1 was actually much more minor/major then now thought and I think you will especially like to see Game 3 where something can look really (I mean really) hopeless but you go for it and discovers fortunes favours the brave and you end up tabling the enemy. Game 2 against Bretonnia was also very exciting with lots of possible turning points.
Clockwork
Highborn
Posts: 624
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2011 7:57 pm

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Clockwork »

I wouldn't beat yourself up about it too much. I spent all of 6th edition thinking that you couldn't fight in combat after a stand and shoot reaction after someone told me so (it kind of made sense because the models are busy reloading or something I guess?).
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Clockwork wrote:I wouldn't beat yourself up about it too much. I spent all of 6th edition thinking that you couldn't fight in combat after a stand and shoot reaction after someone told me so (it kind of made sense because the models are busy reloading or something I guess?).


Haha oke you are right. shiz happens. I had a lot of fun each game and enjoyed my opponents (got 8 out of 9 sportmanship points) so sometimes you should not mind the results that much I guess. Let's work on what actually happened then.

I really liked the list I took with me. As the strategy is kind of similar to my 8th edition Witchstar list I was familiar with how it worked but now ofcourse with nice 9th age tweaks. Therefore I will keep playing this concept (single big reinforced combat unit) some more.

However the general fluffed his attacks all challenges and was killed in the first round of every combat, I will leave him at home. Secondly in my second and third game I was really overpowered in the magic phase, so I need better magical defense. Unfortunately I fluffed my own magical phases with low dices or disasters. Further I could use cheaper redirector(s) instead of the 250 points Dark Riders so either a unit of Harpies or Medusa is a good addition.

As 4500 is the standard point for lists I updated the 4092 list based on last months experience (5-6 battles).

Prince, Cult of Yema, Horse, Light Troops, Heavy Armor, Lucky Shield, Skullsplitter, Amulet of Spite, Ring of Fire, Great Weapon - 632
Cult Priest, Cult of Yema, Battle Standard Bearer, Divine Altar, Paired Weapons, Gladiator Weapon, Ring of Shadows, Hardened Shield, Potion of Speed - 730

14 Repeater Auxiliaries, Musical, Shields - 328
9 Dark Raiders, Champion, Standard Bearer, RXB, Shields - 398
5 Dark Raiders, RXB - 200
5 Dark Raiders, RXB - 200

29 Dancers of Yema, Full Command, Rending Banner - 748
5 Harpies - 130
1 Dread Reaper - 180
1 Dread Reaper - 180

5 Dark Acolytes, Yema, Champion - 390
1 Kraken - 360

Total: 4490 points

List rationale
Oke, so 400 points of which you also have to expand core is not that much! However I think I have succeeded in keeping the list strategy the same while improving its magical defense and adding a sacrificial unit while maintaining its shooting and combat power. However by expanding my core with a unit of 14 Repeater Auxiliaries I might leave one units of Raven Cloaks at home, as my war machine hunting and shooting capabilities are already good. By doing this I can find enough points for a second support combat unit, which the original two units of Legionnaires could only offer in several circumstances. For this I will use the Kraken.

Then the Oracle. Although there are a lot more players without magic and Crown of Scorn of Aether Icon and miscasts hurt a lot my experience is that those that bring magic and have enough power dice to cast their spells it really affects the game balance with buffs or magical damage etc.. I really like the Divination signature because it works so well with the Ring of Shadows (-2 to hit) or negating the +1 to hit modifier by using the Flails on Dancers of Yema. While I can give her another spell from Divination for another missile I find the Ring of Fire item more interesting for same point costs. Also Divination attribute is really nice (3D6 LD tests). Combined with the Acolytes I should have an interesting magic phases while having a strong magical defense in return. Channeling is also done 4+ so 50/50. On average 6 extra dice per game.
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Introduction
Greetings!

After the positive feedback both on the forum and in person I decided to spend energy again on detailed battle reports, I will try to do them for all my battles to come this year. Because it is a lot of coding and formatting to get a nice lay out I made a format now so I can just change the text of the report instead of making it from scratch every time (why did I not do it earlier :P). My next three battle reports will be about my first tournament this year, the Bloodstorm Slaughterfest! I ended up place 30/36, so not worthy of a Druchii general, but the battles might enjoy you nonetheless. I scored 15323 victory points compared to #1 that scored 25763.

About the tournament. 4016 points, your general always needs to challenge when he can and when he slays an opponent in a challenge he gets a blessing from Khorne (from +1 ward save to +1 T to Deamonic Rules). Further you can only score points by victory points, killing as much of the enemy as you can! Each game you can choose a scenario:
- Kill enemy general with yours in challenge and get +1000 VP
- Nominate enemy unit and get double points of that unit when killed (2x VP + normal VP)
- Nominate friendly unit and get double points of that unit when killed (2x VP)

Therefore there was no need for scoring units and ofcourse everybody brought their killy characters.

Bloodstorm.nl are always great tournaments (my only ones so far :oops: ) where they reward sportmanship the most and you get a actual piece of cheese when you bring a really hard list so everybody laughs at you.

Friendly list
I brought my Dancing Star list, 29 Dancers of Yema with a BSB on Divine Altar with the Ring of Shadows. The general with Headsman Axe and Crimson Mail was also in that unit. It is supported by two units of 15 Legionnaires with spears and full command able to break steadfast and take out weak enemy units. Two units of Dark Raiders provide the redirectors while there is a strong shooting phase with two units of Raven Cloaks and two Reaper Bolt Throwers. Finally they are reinforced by Dark Acolytes with champion who bring some magic to the field.

While I have tried several sort of lists since I play Warhammer, the concept of a single extremely deadly combat unit supported by one or two support combat units while the rest of the list is based on board control, chaff, magic and shooting, is still the concept I feel most familiar with. While in 8th edition this were the Witch Elves with Cauldron, I feel the Dancers of Yema (with flails) with Altar come very close to their abilities. I know how the list works, and feel confident with it. Unfortunately I have not played so much so I am a bit rusty, also unfamiliar to all minor changes in the rules of the 9th age.

Enemy list
The Deamon Legions brought a mighty Scourge of Wrath with lots of toys. He commanded a robust but very deadly combat force of Wrath. 30 Slaughters with BSB (+1 A and S on the charge), two units of 4 Crushers and two units of Hellhounds. Only 6 different units but all great WS, extra attacks on the charge and multi-wounds besides the Slaughterers.

Pre-game thoughts
When the first round got announced a week before the tournament I was first a bit scared for my opponents list but it could so obviously win combat against all my units but one. But then I realized he had no magic or shooting whatsoever and I was faster with at least my cavalry. After some shooting kills on the Hellhounds I figured the Legionnaire units should be able to take them out. Although I misinformed myself about the Scourge (a single monster/deamon) I made my battle plan. My Dancers should be able to kill his Slaughterers without too much effort, same for enemy Crushers. I was planning to deploy the Dancers opposite an enemy units of Crushers to upp the armour save of the general, then get into the Slaughters. Dark Raiders would double block in the meantime while Shades, RBT and Acolyes will kill some Crushers and Hounds from a distance by circling around them. I could win this battle without losing even a single unit when played right!

Deployment
The enemy won the roll for deployment and picked his own side. Dark Acolytes have their two basic spells. Hellhounds have 2+ ward save against magic so the Crushers are the prime target this game. Both Breath of Corruption (6+) and The Grave Calls (12+) should be excellent spells this game.

We both had a small forest in our deployment zones, in my case interesting for the RBT for no cover for enemy purposes but otherwise not interesting benefits. At the right side of the battle is a big piece of impassable terrain where the enemy can find some cover, but could also be easily locked down by either double blocking Dark Raiders or Legionnaires against weakened unit of Hellhounds (at least I thought).

Image

I first react to his drops with my Dark Raiders as usual in the centre and decide to go for central deployment where my chaff would take the flanks and to inflict some kills on his flankers. Spears opposite enemy Hellhounds and Dancers opposite unit of Crushers and Slaughterers. RBT both get a nice position that flankers would costs some time to reach and Acolytes go opposite flanking unit of Crushers. Actually it was a great deployment that could have turned out perfect. However I do make a mistake with placing my scouting Raven Cloaks other than I had planned. While the Acolytes could have taken care of the unit of Crushers on their own and Cloaks were more needed at the other flank with Hellhounds to inflict some wounds before they would reach the Legionnaires they can now advance without opposing chaff / shooting units of myself. Other than that rather major mistake I am happy how I deployed. Especially after the battle I had the feeling I could have better castled up to maximize my ranged attacks superiority, but I think the great joy of playing with Dark Elves is outmaneuvering the enemy while shooting him to little pieces and I would been in that position when played patiently (and deployed scouts right).

Turn 1 - Deamon Legions

I made a mistake in the battle report. In my vaguard phase I pushed both my Dark Raiders forwards to double block the enemy Hellhounds. In his turn he charged my first unit of Dark Raiders that ofcourse flee but I roll very low and he rolls high and captures them. This is the second time I lose one unit without any gain, where the rules for double blocking different in 8th edition or am I just unlucky and should I get even further away (now already 6-8")? The rest of the Legions as advance, especially at both flanks. In the centre the opponent is logically a bit way of a Dancer-Star countercharge.

Image

Unfortunately I mess up big time, otherwise the opponents turn descriptions could be very brief without any magic, shooting and possibly favorable combats :D But I don't so they will be interesting haha.

Turn 1 - Dark Elves
Because the Hellhounds have advances so far they are able to charge any of the RBT so my Legionnaires charge his Hounds. Just before I want to conclude my Charging phase I suddenly see that enormous opportunity! The flank of Hellhounds is only 12" away from the Dancer-Star! Even better, when they overrun they overrun into the enemy Crushers with 4-5"! BAM! Then counter-charge from Slaughterers can easily be redirected by last unit of Dark Raiders. So I also charge with Dancer-Star needing a 6", which should be durable especially with Altar re-roll. Unfortunately the opponent argues I need to measure it from the model furthest away of his unit which somehow makes sense and they need to wheel so I need to roll a 12 to make it... I roll 9 and 8 so fail... and suddenly present my flank to both his Slaughterers and Scourge with no way to escape! I was angry on myself to be so impulsive with the charge, and as you can imagine even more when I realized after the game I had made the charge after all and this whole battle would have been different in my favour (I assume). Ah well, everyone makes mistakes as Clockwork wisely said. I will just go further as it was indeed a mistake to charge his Hellhounds. The Dark Raiders still redirect the enemy Slaughterers so give the Dancing-Star another turn. Looking back while writing this report I see my confusion as I advance with my Legionnaires at right flank instead of retreating and giving me another round of shooting + counter-charge on his Hellhounds. Same for my right flank. Acolytes advance as normally outside enemy line of sight but I sacrifice my first unit of Raven Cloaks to redirect his Crushers? I would say both moves at the flanks are not either patient or wise so I likely panicked after the Dancer-Star mistake.

I get a Breath of Corruption off an inflict 3 wounds on the Crushers.

Image

Shooting inflict another 2 wounds on the left flank Crushers while the Dark Raiders kill two Slaughterers.

The charging Legionnaires fluff their attacks, the Hellhounds kill 5 and win combat. Although they have steadfast and fail both my leadership tests and they run! Cowards! They are captured and eaten alive by the Hellhounds, who can now easily charge my RBT next turn.

Turn 2 -
The second turn and things are looking good for the Deamon Legions with this crazy Dark Elf. As he told me later he has prepared himself for a typical game against Dread Elves, being outrun and shot to pieces, so it was a nice change of game than he had expected! He was able to charge with all his units, already in turn 2! Flanking Crushers charged Raven Cloaks, SLaughterers charges Dark Raider redirectors. Hellhounds charged RBT while the other Hellhounds charged the spearman and ofcourse his Scourge of Wrath and Crushers charged into the Dancer-Star.

Image
The Crushers easily killed the Raven Cloaks while the finish off the second Crusher. The Hellhounds easily killed the RBT. The Slaughters easily killed the Dark Raiders. Luckily the second of Legionnaires was better trained and killed two of the evil beasts and won combat. At this points my army was already halved from 10 to 5 units. Then the major battle. It could be an amazing moment for Lord Drakon himself as the enemy had 6 wounds with only 5+ ward save against his 4 multi-wound S7 attacks. He drank his potion of speed so could strike before his majestic opponent. He needed 3's to hit and 3's to wound. Could he make himself immortal? He rolled.. 4,4,5,6... No hits. Umpf. The Scourge killed him without even trying and got the 3+ overkill. Was this the end then? Already in turn 2? :( Fortunately I had forgotten the Dancers for a moment because just after losing my general they got to strike against the enemy Crushers. In combination with the BSB they killed all but 1! The eyes of the Deamon Legion general has spurred open wide of unpleasant surprise while we counted the combat resolution. He lost big time! As I understood even big enough to lose his Scourge and Crushers after all! However he rolled low on the LD tests and the Wrath got 3 wounds while the Crusher was left with 1 wound. Dancers have I said I love you guys? In the battle itself it already felt hopeless but now I see how close it actually was they killed off the enemy Scourge of Warth just by combat resolution.

Turn 2 -
Somehow I think my Acolytes and Raven Cloaks best chances are in combat with the 2 enemy Crushers?? They charge the enemy Crusher and I am sure the enemy must have smiled inside after these charges. Other units are already in combat or war machines.

I try to get Breath of Corruption off but it is dispelled by his Crown of Scorn

Image

Nearly no units within sight of the last RBT but it succeeds to kill the first Hellhounds on the central unit by inflicting two wounds.

The Acolytes do a lot of hits and wounds actually, and after saves killed another Crusher. Unfortunately the Shades fail to inflict some more wounds. The last Crusher kills three shades in return. He does not lose any wounds here? In the major combat unfortunately the Dancers had killed too much without real result last turn. While the champion is sacrificed for the enemy Scourge I can only inflict a single wound on the last Crusher and therefore win with only 1 on combat resolution without inflicting any more wounds on his Scoure. The right flanks Hellhounds and Legionnaires keep each other in check by both inflicting wounds.

Turn 3 -
His Hellhounds advance as fast as possible to save the last Crusher against the combined combat of Acolytes and Cloaks while his main block of 28 Slaughterers charge into the front of the Dancer-Star.


Image 7 - 6 - 3 - 2 -

Unfortunately now the Dark Acolyes fluff their attacks and only inflict a single wounds while the last Crusher kills two Raven Cloaks. I lose combat and they flee. Without any mercy the Crusher captures them and feeds them to his mount. Again the Hellhounds and Legionnaires at the right flank keep each other in check but then the major battle happens. Unfortunately I need to accept his challenge of the Scourge with my BSB which he kills without too much effort now after having received two blessings from Khorne. However.. the Dancers have only lost several models to this point and have 25 left. They kill 17 Slaughterers! 6 are killed in return by the remaining Slaughterers and BSB. Combat Resolution! I inflict 17 wounds. He 7 for challenge + overkill with BSB, 6 dead Dancers. 3 for BSB, standard and war banner, 1 for charge and 1 for flank. I lose with.. 1.. and he has fear. Because of wide formation without BSB I do not have steadfast anymore. I need to roll on LD6.. and fail! Then to capture, first the Slaughterers roll not enough but the mighty Wrath captures them. Game over. Only the several Legionnaires and a single RBT alive.

Turn 3 - Dread Elves
The last Crusher is only with 2 wounds left, while the Scourge has 3 wounds left. Hmm. I need to try it! The RBT shoots a single bolt at the enemy Scourge but fails to inflict a wound.

Image

In combat the last Legionnaires, maybe 6 or 7 fluff their attacks while the last 2 Hellhounds inflict above average wounds and the Legionnaires break from combat, only to be run down by the evil Hellhounds.

Turn 4 - Deamon Legion
Having devoured the whole Dread Elves but one all his deamonic units turn their sights towards the crew of the Bolt Thrower. I can imagine that crew had to be a bit scared at this point.

Image

Turn 4 - Dread Elves
Realizing they are dead anyway they hope to score some crucial points by killing off the last Crusher with multi-shot. They hit 5 times, and wounds 4 times! Unfortunately the enemy passes three ward saves and he lives.

Image

Turn 5 -
While the Deamonic Horde, bloodied most mostly intact starts their final charge the crew members close their eyes and scream: for khaiiiiine!!.....

Image

They could not much be said about the last combat other than it was short.. very short..

Result
Defeat! The Dread Elves have been massacred! While the enemy scored 4296 he was unable to sacrifice his own unit of Slaughteres so got no bonus points besides killing my general and BSB ofcourse. My objective was also to kill his Slaughterers but I miserably failed. We calculate my victory points. Only 1 unit Crushers dead, 899 points or something. Ouch, not a good start.

Post-Game Thoughts
Although my Scouts should have been deployed at the other flank I am actually happy with my deployment. Vanguard move of the Dark Raiders was not needed and a waste of the unit, double flee does not work anymore (for me). Further what can I say? I am pretty sure I could have won big time when I would have made that charge and overrun. With only 4" for overrun into the Crushers I think that would have been a likely situation. But looking back to this battle it was actually much closer than I thought because of the Dancers of Yema being amazing in combat. However reflecting on my moves on the flank were both unwise and panicky I think. Even while doing that big mistake I should have been in the position to play much more effective on the flanks scoring me more points.

MVP
Dancers of Yema!
Image

Sacrifice for Khaine
Lord Drakon, failing all his attacks. Worthless scum!
Image
User avatar
Marchosias
Assassin
Posts: 594
Joined: Fri Apr 26, 2013 7:53 am

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Marchosias »

Thank you for the report! And fingers crossed with your resolution to document every game - it is time-consuming but if you do it will be appreciated. :)

To the battle: I think you identified the crucial moments quite well. I just think your opponent should have allowed you to take back that charge with dancers at least. Even assuming he was right about the rules, he won because you didn't know the rules, not because any tactics which I think is not as fulfilling. I just want to say that I fully understand if you feel angry.

One comment to Turn 2 where your dancers got charged by crushers + scourge of wrath. I think the special tournament rules hurt you there. If possible, I think it would have been wiser to challenge with the champion instead:
- your general would have hopefully killed some crushers -> more CR for you and better armour for him
- champion gives up less CR than a general if killed as he (she?) has only 1 wound
- the general would have challenged in the next round when the demon would have been injured already and without hatred and thunderous charge bonuses.
Pity it wasn't allowed. :)

I am thinking about your deployment. Yours was probably not that bad but you had to deal with the whole demon army at once. There were four units in the centre with their eyes on the dancers that could have tried to flank charge you after some manoeuvering. An alternative approach would have been to decide not to scout with the raven cloaks. If you did so, by the time you placed your DRs, shades and acolytes (who are all fast and can redeploy easily), your opponent would only have the scourge remaining. You would then be able to put everything slow to one side of the table and make half of his army irrelevant for the first turns.
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Marchosias wrote:Thank you for the report! And fingers crossed with your resolution to document every game - it is time-consuming but if you do it will be appreciated. :)

To the battle: I think you identified the crucial moments quite well. I just think your opponent should have allowed you to take back that charge with dancers at least. Even assuming he was right about the rules, he won because you didn't know the rules, not because any tactics which I think is not as fulfilling. I just want to say that I fully understand if you feel angry.

One comment to Turn 2 where your dancers got charged by crushers + scourge of wrath. I think the special tournament rules hurt you there. If possible, I think it would have been wiser to challenge with the champion instead:
- your general would have hopefully killed some crushers -> more CR for you and better armour for him
- champion gives up less CR than a general if killed as he (she?) has only 1 wound
- the general would have challenged in the next round when the demon would have been injured already and without hatred and thunderous charge bonuses.
Pity it wasn't allowed. :)

I am thinking about your deployment. Yours was probably not that bad but you had to deal with the whole demon army at once. There were four units in the centre with their eyes on the dancers that could have tried to flank charge you after some manoeuvering. An alternative approach would have been to decide not to scout with the raven cloaks. If you did so, by the time you placed your DRs, shades and acolytes (who are all fast and can redeploy easily), your opponent would only have the scourge remaining. You would then be able to put everything slow to one side of the table and make half of his army irrelevant for the first turns.


It is great to have you following and replying the reports, also shout out to Clockwork on the 9th age forum. These discussions teach me a lot. I especially found out I did not play the basics of chaff well, so that will need improvement. I agree on the deployment, Omnichron once stated that the beauty of playing with an army is applying 75% of your force on 25% of the enemy. I will put more thought to my deployment phases. I also improved the list and build it into 4500 tournament standard.

Prince, Raptor, Beastmaster, Heavy Armor, Shield, Ogre Sword, Dragonscale Helm, Amulet of Spite, RXB - 634
Cult Priest, Cult of Yema, Battle Standard Bearer, Divine Altar, Paired Weapons, Gladiator Weapon, Ring of Fire, Banner of Speed - 730

14 Blades of Nabh, Champion - 372
14 Blades of Nabh - 352
5 Dark Raiders, RXB - 200
5 Dark Raiders, RXB - 200

21 Dancers of Yema, Full Command, Stalking Standard - 562
6 Raptor Knights, Champion, Standard, War Standard - 382
5 Harpies - 130
5 Raven Cloaks, AHW- 180
1 Dread Reaper - 180
1 Dread Reaper - 180

5 Dark Acolytes, Yema, Champion - 390


For now I will write up the report of the second battle, to follow in a couple of hours!
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Introduction

Greetings,

This is the report about the second battle on the Bloodstorm.nl Slaugherfest, the first report can be read somewhere back in this threat. I had just been massacred by the Deamon Legion and just before the end of the break discovered that it was because of a rule mistake which is always upsetting. However, the past was the past and I wanted to make a come back! I had to play against the royal knights of the Kingdom of Equitane of Mario Scheper! A great opponent that I had met before on the Bloodstorm tournaments. Because of my two units of Legionnaires with spears and Dancers that could also pick spears I felt a warm feeling going through my body. It was time to kill some Bretonnians!


Friendly list
The same list throughout the tournament I brought my Dancing Star list, 29 Dancers of Yema with a BSB on Divine Altar with the Ring of Shadows. The general with Headsman Axe and Crimson Mail was also in that unit. It is supported by two units of 15 Legionnaires with spears and full command able to break steadfast and take out weak enemy units. Two units of Dark Raiders provide the re-directors while there is a strong shooting phase with two units of Raven Cloaks and two Reaper Bolt Throwers. Finally they are reinforced by Dark Acolytes with champion who bring some magic to the field.

Enemy list
Mario brought a Duke on Hippogryph, Paladin BSB, Damsel with 3 learned spells of Divination that led 9 Knights of the Realm, 8 Knight Aspirants, 8 Grail Knights, 6 Knights of the Quest, 3 Pegasus Knights and 10 Peasant Bowmen into battle. A compact knight army, very fast and heavily armoured.

The exact list was:
Blessing: Favour of the King
Duke, general, grail oath, virtue of valour, hippogriff, shield, king slayer, crusader’s helm, talisman of roland - 740
Paladin, BSB, barded warhorse, lance, lucky shield, the oriflamme - 337
Damsel, wizard master, divination, 3 spells, barded warhorse, gem of fortune,
shielding scroll - 435

9 Knights of the Realm, full command - 496
8 Knights Aspirant, full command - 432
10 Peasant Bowmen - 140

8 Grail Knights, full command, war standard - 730
6 Knights of the Quest, full command, hedge knights - 390
3 Pegasus Knights, skirmish - 390

Pre-game thoughts
His general had a lot of nice buffs but I mainly remembered it was only T5 with 4 wounds and re-roll 2+ AS. With my STR7 I just needed to inflict 2 wound and I could kill him! I was happy to see no Trebuchets so I the only thing I had to fear was his Divination magic. His Quest Knights had vanguard and scout so I needed to make sure the deployment zone was closed. Further than that I was not too scared by his units of Knights as I felt I had the right tools to massacre him! Especially in the movement phase I could dance around him with my chaff.

For my objective I choice the kill the enemy general for +1000 points beside the normal points for killing him


Magic
He got spells 0, 2 and 4. No magic missiles, yes! He could give his units distracting and hard target, +2 WS and I and Immune to Psychology. My acolytes had their basic spells Breath of Corruption and The Grave Calls. I was especially hoping to get a lot of Breath of Corruptions this game!


Deployment
We rolled for deployment and could get the side with a nice in the deployment zone.

Terrain
In the centre of the battlefield there was a large big wall that we counted as impassable terrain and at both sides there was a forest. I could make a great protected corner and was planning to outdeploy him to several units would need some time to reach the other flank. If I could then concentrate most of my forces on one of his flanks I would be able to take him out.

Image

The deployment phase worked and especially his Knight Aspirants were out of position. I won the roll for vanguard but made a mistake by first moving the deployment bait Dark Raiders towards the centre. He reacted with his Quest Knights forwards. I pushed the Dark Raiders as far possible forwards to possibly get in the flank of the enemy archers.

Turn 1 - Dread Elves
I did not screwed the roll to start and got first turn. I decided to maximize the deployment advantage and push forwards with my troops. The Dark Raiders got into position to threaten to rear of the Question Knights but also the flank of his Archers, protected by the cover of the forest. Acolytes got besides the flank of Questing Knights for some nice magical damage and because he needed a long charge (10 or 11) for the Raven Cloaks they stayed to shoot without moving penalty.

I roll very low for the magic phase and while he channels. Combined with a low roll he easily dispels the Breath of Corruption. No magic for me yet.

Image

The shooting phase is more successful and I kill three Questing Knights with the combined fire power of the RBT, the normal RXB shots fail to penetrate the armour. He saves his panic test unfortunately.

Turn 1 - Kingdom of Equitaine
But then I discover my mistake, his Questing Knights can just slip through my forces in my backfield to charge the Bolt Throwers next turn. Hmmm, this should not have been possible! His forces try to fix the deployment gap and deploys so he could charge anything that comes too close. Knights Aspirant and Pegasus Knights advance as fast as possible but will not be able to charge anything the next turn. He does make a major mistake with deployment his general a little to close to my big block. Or was this a trap?

He gets a great roll for magic and gets aura hard target and distracting through which I tried to dispel with all my dice. With his other dice he gives his general immune to psychology and stubborn.


Image

The worthless Yeoman Archer try to kill some Legionnaires but fail to hit anything.

Turn 2 - Dread Elves
His general is only 13" from my big unit and I conceive it as a major mistake from his side so I charge. However I did not consider the actual situation I have to admit. He was stubborn, had the same WS and also distracting so my Prince needed 5's to hit. At that point I was eager to kill him because there was another nice opportunity. My Dark Raiders could charge into his Yeoman Archer and overrun into the Knights of the Realm, preventing a counter-charge! As I counted on overrun into his Grail Knights and 2 x 15 Spears to charge the turn after I was smelling quick victory! The other forces surrounded the Questing Knights to turn them into a bloody mess. There is a mistake in the diagram but one of the units of Cloaks got into their front so they could not charge the RBT next turn if they survived.

Unfortunately magic does nothing again this turn

Image

12 artillery bolts and 30 repeater bolt shots obliterate the Questing Knights and the threat to the artillery has been destroyed for now.

We start with the general vs general combat. I now realize I need 5's to hit and start to realize this could be easily be a big mistake. I roll and hit.. nothing. Because he actually made a real mistake already preparing for another loss because he also lost his general very soon in his first battle my opponent looks to my with surprise. He rolls his dice and inflict exactly three wounds, enough to kill Lord Drakon yet again. Grrr. Why. Do. I. Do. This. But then I realize I still have a lot of CR with the charge, BSB, standard and ranks. Only to be remembered he has Stubborn and he easily passes his LD turn. Hmm. Not good. The rest of the plan works well with the Dark Raiders charging through the forest into the Yeoman while only losing 1 in combat and with overrun into the flank of the Knights of the Realm.

Turn 2 - Kingdom of Equitaine
Because his general stopped the advance it was now his turn to bring some pain to the table and charges his Grail Knights with Damsel into the Dancers of Yema block. His Knight Aspirants marches passes the impassable terrain to threaten my backfield while the Pegasus Knights move to charge the Dancers in the flank next turn.

He again overpowers me in the magic phase and gets another aura distracting off. Negating the Ring of Shadows because they originally also had WS5 like the Dancers.

Image

Luckily I could sacrifice my champion this turn to his general but I needed to win combat in order to survive this battle! Combined power of the Dancers and BSB kills 3 Grail Knights while they finish off 5 Dancers in return. I must remember for next time, Grail Knights are good against Dancers! Especially because they have divine attacks. His general easily slays my champion and he wins combat. But I hold on re-rollable LD9 because of steadfast. The Dark Raiders fail their attacks and two are killed in return, but then their horses suddenly kill two knights hahaha. I lose combat because of his standards but pass my panic test.

Turn 3 - Dread Elves
My turn 3 and I still have my two units of 15 spears available to make a difference! Unfortunately my mind is off and I just combo charge them in the front of the Knights of the Realm. I could have charged the flank of the Grail Knights with one instead or waited with another to get into the flanks of the Knights of the Realm next turn. Unfortunately I don't. Because of these spears now within reach of the 12" Altar I choose the Lethal Strike blessing. The rest of army prepares for incoming Knight Aspirants. I do make another mistake I see now with the Dark Acolytes. I could come into magic position to damage the Pegasus Knights and bait them away from the flank of the Dancers but I could also get to Knights of the Realm flank. Oh well.

I roll very high for magic but nothing is in range.

Image

Especially the RBT do some nice damage again and kill 3 Knight Aspirants.

Now it was time to bring the pain of the spear! In the big combat the BSB needs to accept the challenge and survives on just two wounds. Because of the Lethal Strike blessing I use spears on my Dancers of Yema because of the re-roll to wound and no armour saves. This was a big mistake, as suddenly wounding was much harder and I only rolled a single lethal strike, so only one Grail Knight dies. Much better would be ofcourse just flails with the nice extra of a lethal strike on a 6. I do however kill enough to get him Damsel into close combat. His last Grail Knights kill again 5 Dancers. I lose but still has steadfast on LD9 and hold. Then the other combat. Because the frontage only 5 Legionnaires get to strike, what a waste of me! The re-roll does nothing and I only kill two knights while he inflict four wounds in return. A draw.

Turn 3 - Kingdom of Equitaine
The Pegasus Knights charge into the flank of the Dancers. Instead of going for my shooting he makes the wise choice to move his Knight Aspirant into charge range of the combats next turn.

He gets +2 WS and I off combined with distracting on the Grail Knights.

Image

Now he gets to strike first and kills another 4 Dancers. My BSB finally inflict a wound on his general which is now left on 2 wounds, but his general finishes her afterwards. Suddenly the unit is a lot smaller and has no BSB anymore! They do kill his Damsel. Another three Dancers die while they kill one Pegasus Knight in return. I see I messed up some damage counters in the report but now 2 Grail Knights and 2 Pegasus Knights are still alive. It is too much for my Dancers of Yema with now LD7 because of his fear and they fail their leadership test. He pursues with both the Grail Knights and general while the Pegasus Knights reform to rear-charge the Legionnaires next turn. He easily catches them right in front of my shooting. In the other combat the Legionnaires kill another two Knights of the Realm while his BSB and Knights finishes off the last Dark Raider and 3 Legionnaires. He does so little wounds on the Legionnaires because I keep making insane 6+ AS saves. He hold on steadfast.

Turn 4 - Dread Elves
I decide to go all in on the General with magic and shooting. I could still have saved the battle to this point because I see now the Dark Raiders could have rear-charged the Knights Errant with Dark Acolytes blocking them and get within within range of Pegasus Knights to magical missiles or do something else useful. Raven Cloaks move closes towards the Grail Knights?

Low magic roll and I fail to do anything useful

Image

The RBT do solo shot on his general, hit, one wounds, and inflict 2 wounds! Enough to kill him and get revenge, nice!

The Legionnaires keep slowly killing the Realm of the Knights unit while his BSS keeps keeping the stalemate by killing enough Legionnaires, I do think he lost combat now and then but saved with re-roll LD test.

Turn 4 - Kingdom of Equitaine
His Knight Aspirants and Pegasus Knights charge the rears of both Legionnaires units to save his BSB and finish them off. The Grail Knights charge the Raven Cloaks who stand and shoot (I think it might have been wiser to flee instead) but fail to penetrate the armour of the last knights.

Image

Both Knight Errants and Pegasus Knights inflict several wounds on the Legionnaires who kills off another Knight of the Realm. They lose combat and run! All his units pursue and take them down. They could have played a much more heroic role in this battle if I had played them more wisely I think. Grail Knights kill all Raven Cloaks with ease and choose to remain where they are. We are both at the assumption this was already his turn 5 but it was actually turn 4. It is really those prolonged combat that messes my orientation of turns! This is the second time I do this. I really need to take something with me to count the turns.

Turn 5 - Dread Elves
Assuming it is the last turn I go all in for the Grail Knights.

Magic fails yet again. I do not remember if it was really this bad that I could not cast a single spell or I just forgot several phases.

Image

RBT makes themselves immortal by finishing off the last Grail Knights scoring another 730 points.

Turn 5 - Kingdom of Equitaine

The small remains of his army turn to face me knowing he has won the battle and there is nothing I can do about it anymore. Unfortunately I could try but I only see it now.

Image

Result
The enemy had to kill my Dancers of Yema so got another 1400 bonus points besides the 3000 he killed and 200 for both general and BSB. I killed his general, damsel, questing + grail knights and archers while his knights of the realm got below 25%. 4600 vs 2800. Another loss! But not a massacre fortunately and at least I scored some points...

Post-Game Thoughts
Ouch. This time there is no mistake made in the rules I can blame for the loss! Deployment phase was great was I was too much on the offensive mindset, go go go like an Orc general instead of cunning tactics of the wise Druchii general. While the attack could have been great with those Dark Raiders in the flank stopping the counter-charge needing 5's to hit with 4 attacks are not such great odds, especially with him having stubborn. Again with the shooting advantage I could have taken it more slowly and wisely. I do not remember if magic was really that bad but it seems I did not get a single spells off, while his buffs greatly supported his units I remember. I see now I wanted to capitalize on the deployment win too much and lost my patience and my mind in many cases. Until the latest rounds I had opportunities that I missed and I think my list would have been great to take out his list. Unfortunately just another reinforcement that behind a good list needs to be a good general which I was not this and last game. Ah well I had a lot of fun and it was a exciting game!


MVP
The Reaper Bolt Throwers showed what they can do when in a good spot without threats and alive all game! They killed 5 Questing Knights, 3 Knight Aspirants, 1 Duke on Hypogriff and 2 Grail knights scoring me almost all my points.

Image

Sacrifice for Khaine
Oh Lord Drakon.. Again you died miserably in the first round of combat and messed up the battle. Ofcourse a little fitting as the personification of myself ;)

Image
Clockwork
Highborn
Posts: 624
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2011 7:57 pm

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Clockwork »

Do KoE still get the conditional 5++ vs S5+? If so taking spears over GW may not have been a bad idea.

As a counter to your feedback, consider what would have happened if you didn’t charge the General. If you look at where he is standing at the end of KoE T1, it would have been very easy for him to hop over the impassable wall and out of your arc. That puts you in a pretty bad position as you either need to turn your Yema Dancers to face it, exposing their flanks to the Knight units (and nothing stops him hopping over the whole unit again out of arc). But if you ignore the General he doesn’t need to worry about his only cc counter and is free to cause havoc in your back lines. Not good either way! By charging him, you at least pinned the model in place and denied the flier it’s greatest strength (mobility). Of course the magic didn’t help you but I don’t think it was a bad idea in principal.

If you realised the 5s to hit before declaring challenges you could have tried accepting with the champion. He gets max CR 5 while you win with static CR6 (charge, 3 ranks, banner, bsb). In his turn if he challenges with the General then accept with the Prince and kill him as now hitting on 4s; and if he challenges with a champ you can accept with the Altar, Prince attacks General normally (if in B2B), everyone else goes all in on Knights for CR.

Or you could even have declined the challenge in the first round and let him try to beat up some Dancers – it is not likely that you will lose combat as you have a static CR of 6, but even if you do you are steadfast Ld10 or L9rr. That will preserve your Champion for accepting a challenge in his turn if needed.

Having seen the Axe in action it really feels like it would work better on a Nabh General as the hatred helps with fluffing. Of course that is addressed in your new list.

Would the Aether Icon have helped to dispel some of those magic buffs?

Were you firing MS or single shot with the RBTs?
Clockwork
Highborn
Posts: 624
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2011 7:57 pm

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Clockwork »

Having looked at the pictures again I just wanted to clarify part of my post above.

It was by advancing your Dancers in T1 that you opened up the "blind spot" to their right that the Gernaal could exploit. Once they wer in that position they had to charge or risk the two alternatives I posted above.

But as you surmised, had you held back a bit T1 there wouldn't be a blind spot but instead the centre o f the battlefield becomes a "no mans land" for the General that he can't enter without being countercharged. The impassable then works against him by forcing a traffic jam or isolating his units.
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Introduction
Greetings!

Again I had messes up a battle I knew I could be winning based on the lists, as they were good match ups. I did scored some points last battle so I hoped there would be a possibility to at least end up in the middle tier with a big win. I had to stay at the same table so the same terrain and my third and last opponent was Saurus Ancients. Hmm. Because one of my regular opponents (DeGroteBaas) is a Saurus Ancient player and he usually defeats me I knew how painful they can be to my forces. However I also exprienced that there is nothing really Saurus Ancients can bring against the Dancer Horde and they are exceptionally good Caiman and Saurus killers.

Friendly list
For those that read this battle report without looking at the first two battles here is again my list: 29 Dancers of Yema with a BSB on Divine Altar with the Ring of Shadows. The general with Headsman Axe and Crimson Mail was also in that unit. It is supported by two units of 15 Legionnaires with spears and full command able to break steadfast and take out weak enemy units. Two units of Dark Raiders provide the re-directors while there is a strong shooting phase with two units of Raven Cloaks and two Reaper Bolt Throwers. Finally they are reinforced by Dark Acolytes with champion who bring some magic to the field.

Also note the important changes to this battles than the normal battles.
- General must always challenge and accept challenges
- You can only score by victory points
- Each kill in challenge gives you blessings of Khorne

Enemy list
The enemy brought a Firstborn on Alpha Carnosaur, Cuatl Lord with 4 learned Pyromancy spells (not good!), 20 Saurus Warriors, 15 Skink Braves with Caiman, 2 x 10 Skink Hunters, 5 Caimans, 16 Temple Guard and 3 Pteradon Sentries. No War Beasts, yes! If there is 1 thing I absolutely hate are War Beasts, as my regular opponent brings always a lot of them and uses them to great effect normally. However a LVL4 Pyromancy caster is really something I have not much tools for to tackle. I knew his magic phase was going to hurt.

His exact list was:
Firstborn Warlord, alpha carnosaur, halberd, shield - 810
Cuatl Lord, BSB, Pyromancy, 4 spells, ancient plaque, unconquerable will, shielded soul - 810
20 Saurus Warriors, full command, serpent totem, war standard - 510
15 Skink Braves, full command, caiman, poisoned javelins - 390
16 Temple Guard, full command, totem of mixcoatl - 549
5 Caimans, champion, great weapon - 450
10 Skink Hunters - 180
10 Skink Hunters - 180
3 Pteradon Sentries, fire bola - 216

Pre-game thoughts
While the LVL4 fire mage was something I could note survive too long there nothing actually that could take on the Dancers. My experience is that Dark Raiders are great in taking out skink units and the RBT should be perfect to take out the enemy Carnosaur from a distance. Especially when wounded my general should be able to take him out. Acolytes would go hunting on the Pteradons. I could do this. At least that is what I hoped...

I don't remember exactly which spells the enemy got. At least a lot of magic missiles and also #6, a horde killer as on 4+ he killed a model. Hmmm. This battle I would not have the ranged attack superiority as before.

Deployment
I got to pick a side again and picked the same deployment zone as last battle, especially with the great hill for the RBT.

Although I explained about the Yema upgrade this time I think it was actually really useful as the enemy might forgot the rule with the deployment phase and his first turn. Again a big wall in the middle and now he did not had any flying or cavarly units besides his Carnosaur but then the RBT could get some nice shits.

I reacted with my Dark Raiders to his Skinks, Acolytes to his Pteradon Sentries, Legionnaires to his Skink + Caiman and Saurs unit. I also used my Cloaks this time in the normal deployment phase to get another drop. Dancers opposite his Temple Guard and Caimans and RBT both on the hill again. The enemy had a 3+ for deployment I think when I scouted. I opted to deploy close to his lines but thi. is likely to have been a mistake because it allowed the Pteradon to vanguard far forwards while he would likely had first turn. My Dark Raiders both move forwards, especially the right unit into the forest for some cover.

I pick my unit of Dancers as my objective to get killed this turn and be able to score 2x their points,

Image

He indeed wins the first turn, I am still unaware about the incoming danger.

Turn 1 - Saurus Ancients
The enemy does not declare any charges and advances. Especially his Pteradon Sentries that vanguarded can fly over my Raven Cloaks and get behind my lines to take out the RBT the next turn and easily overrun in the next one. Stupid of me! Especially in this last battle. But that is not all as he can also drop rocks on the Raven Cloaks who have no protection and are only 5 man. He kills two and I need to make my panic test... If they flee they might start chain reaction because BSB is too far away.. But they hold! Pfew. Ah well, at least next turn I might be able to blow them to pieces with combined magic and shooting.

Image

He gets an average magic rolls and directly casts a magic missile on the Dark Raiders which I dispell. Then another one on the Dark Raiders while I have no dice left and his attribute to the other Dark Riders. He kills four of the right unit and three of the central unit nearly destroying them at once. Luckily the experienced veterans hold their panic tests, determined to not be destroyed that easily. However there is only a single Dark Raider musician now protecting my far flank and two Dark Raiders in the centre. I am losing my units fast!

Fortunately the Skink Hunters fail to finish off that last Dark Raider in their shooting phase, needing 7's. I think he actually inflicted a wound but I saved the 4+ armour save.

Turn 1 - Dread Elves
Already losing my chaff very fast and the RBT in a delicate position I need to get to his Quatl Lord fast before it is too late! Also the Pteradon Sentries must die this turn or I am fu*ked. In normal cases it would be wiser to save your points of the Dark Raiders but this was Slaughterfest so the only way you could get points is to destroy enemy units. So I thought f*ck it, get them! and both the Dark Raider units charged the Skink units. I mentioned the opponent looking to me as if I am a fool, probably thinking 'charging through a forest, that guy is crazy, easy win LOLOLOL' and the central Dark Raiders indeed needed to make a 20" charge but I had used my Altar blessing for a re-roll on them. Ofcourse he directly gets a stand and shoot but one unit (flank) is still in the forest, long range, stand and shoot and they all miss. The other unit (central) is not and he gets two poisons on them, but I save them. Oke, imagine this for a moment. They have been deleted to a single or two man, charging a unit of 10 skirmishers. As soon I starts rolling he calls me on the dangerous terrain tests but I remind him to the Yema upgrade. Then the central unit first: I roll 10, yes! He stops me and says how can it is possible I make it and I remind him they also have M10. I told this in the army presentation phase but he must have forgot (or first time Dread Elves) and thus it was the first time the Yema fast cavarly deception worked. The other lone Dark Raider also made it into the enemy unit. The Dancers advanced as far as possible with one unit of Legionnaires at its flank while the other Legionnaires pushed forwards to take out the Skink Braves. The Acolytes and Cloaks prepared to obliterate the Pteradons like they had done so succesfully with the RBT last game several times.

I roll 11 for magic! Nice! However enemy also gets a lot of dispell dice so need to draw out some of his dice. I decide to first five-dice Breath of Corruption and then try the Grave Calls. This was a huuuge mistake! As I rolled two 6's and another 6's for the miscast roll. The champion survives but the unit blows itself up, only the ward saves saving the the lives of the champion and another acolyte. However, they fail their panic test and flee off the table... Bye bye breath of corruption.. Ofcourse I should have first tried the Grave Calls for cases like this! Again I am lucky the Raven Cloaks pass their panic tests but I could have easily routed that flank for a second time again. Oh oh oh.. This was not going well at ALL!

Image

Combined firepower of the Raven Cloaks and RBT still kill one Pteradon and inflict a wound (or 2?) on the other one. I am not sure how many wounds they had, I believe two. Not enough to kill them outright or scare them off the table. This battle was absolutely not going in the direction that I wanted it to go and I prepared for another massacre..

However, they say fortune is with the brave and this is exactly what my lone Dark Raiders proved. First the central combat. Both the Dark Raiders as their horses easily killed four Skinks while they only killed a single Raider in return. They have to make their panic test with -4 and flee, catched by the heroic Dark Raider. The lonely Dark Raider at the flank and his horse also kill two skinks while none of the Skinks penetrates his medium armour. With -3 also they flee and are catched by the brave Dark Raider. Both skink units are destroyed and I still have both units to redirect, great! However.. What are they going to do against another turn of fire magic..?

Turn 2 - Saurus Ancients
Not minding the eventual loss of his worthless Skinks he charges the Pteradon riders into the first RBT. He asks me what other ranged attacks I still have and it is only the two units of Raven Cloak, only 8 in total. He smiles evilly and realizes he has me in his grip. He retreats his Saurus and Temple guard so get out the charge range of the Dancers while moving the Caimans and Carnosaur into a great flanking position.

He has a low roll but still enough to get his #6 off the unit of Dancers.. All of them getting a S3 hit.. 11 die. Only 17 left No, no, nooo! This is not good!

Image

In the shooting phase he tries to kill some Legionnaires with the Skink Braves but fails to inflict any damage.

Without too much trouble the Pteradons kill the first RBT and overrun into the second. There goes my chance to inflict some damage on his general before he reaches my general.

Turn 2 - Dread Elves
What can I do.. My army is absolutely getting massacred. I already lost two Artillery, Dark Acolytes, 1/3 of Dancers, 1/2 of unit Cloaks and both Dark Raider units only have a single model left.. I must charge with the Dancers to make a change killing that bloody Quatl Lord. Legionnaires also charge Skink Braves. They make it. The Dancers need a 9 to make.. I first roll a 5.. and an 8.. shiz! Right in the face of his Saurus, Caimans, Temple Guard and Carnosaur. I can redirect the Saurus but the other Dark Raiders does not get far enough. Odss are already getting better with Caimans, Temple Guard and Carnosaur as his general needs to challenge my general. Also his Temple Guard need to roll a 10" to make the charge so more likely is only the Caimans and Carnosaur in combat. I move my Legionnaires to the flank of the Dancers to flee and hope the Carnosaur fails his redirect roll, but still bait him into combat. The Cloaks move closer within range of the Pteradons but far enough to prevent overrun.

Image

The Legionnaires easily dispatch the Skink Braves by killing all of them except for the Caiman! He only kills one Legionnaire in return and has to flee but I combat reform to get into the flank or rear of the Saurus warriors. I kill the second Pteradon with the RBT crew and he inflict two wounds, but the RBT holds.

Turn 3 - Saurus Ancients
The enemy takes the bait and charges his Carnosaur into the Legionnaires who flee and he makes the redirect roll into the Dancers. The Caimans and Temple Guard also charge into the Dancers, but he fails to make to charge with his Temple Guard. His Saurus charge the Dark Raider redirector. His Caiman from the Skinks rallies.

He gets another #6 off again on the Dancers. I wonder if this is possible because they are in combat but he says it is a hex so can also inflict damage in combat. I discover later this was ofcourse not possible but he is able to kill another 10. Only 7 left..

Image

Because of the tournament rules my general needs to challenge his, and finally does something! He inflict a wound, with multi-wound two. Then the BSB, killing one Caiman, the altar itself killing another one. Then 8 attacks from the Dancers. 8 hits. 8 wounds. BAM! Only a single Caiman left on a single wound! He kills 2 in return. The general just dies by his general, preventing his Carnosaur making any overkill. I inflict 16 wounds! He loses combat terribly and needs to make snake eyes on both of them and they flee! The Dancers pursue the last Caiman into the Temple Guard while catching him! WOW! Suddenly the battle situation has changed COMPLETELY into my favour! The RBT crew kill the second Pteradon so only 1 remains. Saurus ofcourse easily kill the Dark Raider.

Turn 3 - Dread Elves
The Legionnaires rally and face towards the fleeing general on Carnosaur hoping he will not rally and they push his over the table edge next turn. I keep my patience and move the Legionnaires towards a close rear-charge of the Saurus next turn. Raven Cloaks move within short range to finish off the last Pteradon. Last Dark Raiders runs towards the Caiman to finish him off.

Image

Raven Cloaks shows who is the boss and finish the last Pteradon with their deadly bolts. Dark Raider hits and fails to inlict a wound on the Caiman.

Impact hits inflict only 2 wounds, BSB and Altar kill 5. But then strike the 5 remaining Dancers! 6 hits. 6 wounds! 13 dead Temple Guard and only 3 survive! They do kill another 2 Dancers, 3 left! He passes his LD test on stubborn and high LD of the Quatl lord.

Turn 4 - Saurus Ancients
At this point the situation has become quite hopeless for the enemy, in just a single turn! He charges the Saurus into the flank of the Dancer unit with last 4 Dancers and full health BSB. His general unfortunately rallies while his Caiman moves towards the rear of the Legionnaires.

He does not get any magic off this turn

Image

In combat the last 4 Dancers kill the enemy Quatl Lord while the BSB kills the remaining Temple Guard. His Saurus is only in close combat with a single Dancer but his attacks are enough to finish them off, scoring me my objective! I lose combat but only by one and pass my LD test!

Turn 4 - Dread Elves
The Legionnaires charge the rear of the Saurus Warriors. I calculate the combat resolution of my unit of Legionnaires against his Carnosaur. I have a champion so he can only inflict 4 wounds. I have two ranks, charge and banner so also 4. Then musician should force him to make a LD test. Fortune is with the braves and they all shout with some fear Chaaaarge!!! into the Alpha Carnosaur. Raven Cloaks and Dark Raider get into shooting position of the last Caiman.

Image

Combined shooting of the Raven Cloaks and especially last Dark Raider (2 hits and 2 wounds!!!) finishes off his last Caiman.

BSB and altar kill several Saurus warriors, Legionnaires also do some kills. Saurus in return only get 5 wounds on the BSB, of which I save 2 and kill a single Legionnaire. They lose combat with a big difference, flee, and I catch them with the BSB! Then the final combat between Legionnaires and his general. I realize my mistake! Because when he kills the champion I only have a single rank so only 3+ instead of 4+. But his general only inflict 3 wounds!!! :shock: I win combat because of the musician. He rolls for his leadership... 5, 5, 6 :shock: HE FLEES! I pursue.. He rolls.. 5 I roll.. 8!!!!! YEAAAH I catch him general and have massacred his complete army! The heroic Legionnaires can not believe it, but they did it!

Turn 5 - Saurus Ancients
VICTORY!

Image

The remaining Dread Elves move victoriously over the battlefield, glad they could complete this tournament with such an amazing comeback.

Result
I get 4095 for his list, 200 for general and BSB and 1400 for the sacrificed Dancers! 5696 points! He gets 2400 points and showed me his objective: also the Dancers so also he gets 1400 extra + 100 for killing the general for a total of 3900 points. What a blood bath..

Post-Game Thoughts
I did absolutely not expect this outcome after the first turns with being blown to pieces by his fire magic, Acolytes blowing themselves up and Pteradons taking out the RBT so easily. That bait of the Legionnaires in the flank of the Dancers was the turning point I think, as it baited the enemy into combat while better would have been to for example sacrifice the Caimans while blasting my unit to pieces with his fire magic. I did get extremely lucky with for example those Legionnaires in the final combat and ofcourse the Dancers performed really really well, as they always do! Ofcourse the Dark Raiders also did excellent work this game, same for the Raven Cloaks as scavengers killing those last units. Legionnaires at the left flank also did excellent work with the Skink Braves and then into the rear of the Saurus. Overall they all did great!

MVP
Heroes of the hour and of the tournament; the Druchii Gladiators, the Warrior Elites; the Dancers of fu**king Yema!
Image

Sacrifice for Khaine
Ofcourse it was also my own mistake but this time the Acolytes really messed up!
Image

So this is also the last battle report of the tournament. I ended up very low even with this last win, mainly because of my first battle. I had a great time and feel confident when played well I could have ended up in the high tier or even win it! So more practicing with my new improved list and a new chance with a new tournament! Thanks for reading and feedback is always welcome!
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Bloodstorm Slaughterfest Unit Performances
In my triple game unit performance reflections I do not take any tactical mistakes or other army wise decisions into account. I just calculate the amount on victory points their killed and grade them accordingly:
- = This unit was a disaster! There needs to be a crucial change in playing this unit otherwise he can be placed back on the shelf
+ = This unit underperformed, improve your play with them
++ = This unit performed average and could be a great mainstay in the army
+++ = This unit won you your battles, they are your best performers, keep them by all means!

The battle reports can by read individually or together in this same threat.

Dread Prince:-
Cost: 495 Killed: Nothing = 0 points

The general fluffed all his attacks. Especially in a tournament where generals always needs to challenge so are likely to be in combat with each other he was very disappointing. I would advise to take Nabh on him to prevent these fluffs and then 4+ ward save instead of Crimson Armour as he is so fragile in the first round of combat. I guess when he is better protected he can be a beast, but he performed poorly in most of my battles with him.

Cult Priest - ++
Cost: 700 Killed: 2 Crushers (252), 1 Grail Knight (91), 2 Caiman (180), 10 Temple Guard (343), 18 Saurus Warriors (459) = 1325 points

Especially because I was playing the Ring of Shadows wrong (all in contact get -1 WS) I don't think I find the Ring of Shadows worth the points. The BSB and Altar is a great addition to the Dancers of Yema unit and can inflict some serious damage on non-character troops. Espcially re-roll to charge blessing is of great use.

2x 15 Legionnaires ++
Cost: 540 Killed: 4 Hellhounds (232), 6 Knights of the Realm (330), 1 Firstborn Warlon on Alpha Carnosaur (810), 2 Saurus Warriors (51), 12 Skink Braves (312) = 1735

They actually performed OK, it is mainly because of their lucky win against the Carnosaur they tripled their worth this tournament. Worth considering taking a unit of 25-30 Legionnaires or even two of them in the future.

2x 5 Dark Raiders +
Cost: 500 Killed: 20 Skink Hunters (360), 4 Slaughterers (108), 10 Yeomen Bowmen (140), 2 Knights of the Realm (110), 1 Caiman (78) = 796 points

They only performed three succesfull redirectings did a great job taking out the enemy softer shooting units. Ofcourse Dark Raiders are a unit that is not build specificly to take out victory points to they get 2 stars and are a main stay in the army. I think can become much more effective when I start learning how to use them properly. Their performance is the last battle was epic, but also the charge in the Equitaine battle could have been heroic when other unit would have overrun.

28 Dancers of Yema +++
Cost: 748 Killed: 2 Crushers (252), 17 Slaughterers (459), 1 Damsel (435), 1 Pegasus Knights (130), 3 Grail Knights (273), 6 Temple Guard (205), 3 Caiman (270), 1 Quatl Lord (810) = 2834

I love them. Their 4+ ward save is often underestimated and it is really their flails that might have kept them on par or even slightly improved them since 8th. Because of their flails I often find them having a 100% attack/ratio. Even while 3/4 was blown to pieces with only 7 Dancers left in the last game they killed 1285 points! They scored four times their worth.

2x 5 Raven Cloaks +
Cost: 360 Killed: 1 Crusher (120), 1 Questing Knight (65), 1 Pteradon Sentry (72) = 257 points

My Cloaks underperformed this tournament but this might also have been lack of targets. I also did not played them that well. I will leave one unit on the shelf for now.

2x Dread Reapers +++
Cost: 360 Killed: 1 Hellhounds (58), 5 Questing Knights (325), 3 Knight Aspirants (162), 1 Duke on Hypogriff (740), 2 Grail knights (182), 2 Pteradon Sentries (144) = 1611 points

Especially in the second game the RBT showed what damage they can inflict when in a nice position and able to shoot all game long! They killed more than four times their worth and will be absolutely be a mainstay in my army. I will need some more practice with their deployment though.

Dark Acolytes -
Cost: 390 Killed: 2 Crushers (240) = 240 points

The Acolytes really under performed this tournament! They could have been great game changers in all battles but managed to kill only 2 Crushers. They made crucial mistakes to get into combat with elite combat units or not be into range within right moments. A big magic phase might also be a problem as what happened in game 3. I hope the Ring of Fire might add that extra spell to make the magic phase more interesting. Normally they always perform outstanding I will not be leave them out yet.
User avatar
Marchosias
Assassin
Posts: 594
Joined: Fri Apr 26, 2013 7:53 am

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Marchosias »

Again, thanks for the reports!

Game 2

Charging the general: I would have not done it. Even if he flew over your lines, he would have been exposed to your shooting. If he went for the backline, you would have won some time to defeat the units; if not, the resulting fights would have not been that different (of course, flank charged legionnaires would have not been happy). Hard to say though.

The flank charge of dark raiders on peasants: seems quite risky. There was a very high chance they would be steadfast, they were under BSB, probably under general as well. The chance to actually break them seems to have been rather low. If you were unlucky, it would have meant KotR charging the flank of your dancers which I don't think they would have handled.

Pity you did not flank charge the grail knights. Could have been tasty, especially since the legionnaires would have probably been allowed to target the damsel. Well, happens. :)

In the turn you were destroying the knights of the quest, I would have probably sent the DR1 somewhere closer to the fights, just to have them in handy in case they would have been needed. My DR usually kill nothing anyway, the lost shots would have probably been of less consequence than the lost ability to redirect. Also, it seems from the diagramm the knights of the quest would have been able to charge your artillery if they survived, is that the case? Was it possible to redirect with raven cloaks just to be sure?

Also, Equitanians should not be allowed to take divination - the combination of good armour, free ward saves, distracting and leadership on 3d6 is just too much. :) OK, just kidding. :)

Game 3

The combination of vanguard and certain first turn is quite strong and has surprised me a few times myself. Question is if you had a reasonable way to prevent this - you would have needed to deploy something a bit further back which given your opponent's ranged advantage would have other drawbacks.

When reacting to the pteradons, maybe you were able to position the acolytes so that the charge on RBT would have been impossible. They can't charge if they have nowhere to land. I am not sure about this but it is somethimes worth considering. The table edge would have been your friend here.

Awesome charges by your dark raiders! Risky but probably worth trying. Given the fire magic, their life expectancy was very short anyway. Also, seems skirmishers are no longer stubborn in forests - now I know so thanks. :)

I don't like your move when you protected the flank of dancers with L2. You know, had you not fled it would have been a reasonable decision. Or if you wanted to bait the charge, you could have moved them to the north where they had a chance to be useful in the following fights. After the flee, they were in a position where they had little options. Of course, if you believe your opponent would have declared different charges had you not played this mind game, that is an argument.

Good thing your opponent made the mistake with casting into combat. You would have not scored your objective otherwise. :)

Epic result against the caimans! I suspect you were rolling quite above the average but still. By the way, do you know there are no more snake eyes? If you lose by 9 and are not steadfast, you autobreak since there is no way to roll 1 on 2 dice and rolling 2 is not enough.

Charging the lord: :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock:
Originally I considered this a serious mistake. On the other hand, you had nothing to lose thanks to the special rules of the tournament so why not. Good thinking! Also, you are awarded the price for the craziest dice rolling of the year. :)

So, that would be it for now. Again, thank you very much for the reports! I really enjoyed them and I even learned a thing or two. :)
User avatar
Lord Drakon
Malekith's Best Friend
Posts: 1028
Joined: Tue Jun 04, 2013 4:25 pm
Location: Delft

Re: Lord Drakon Battle Reports

Post by Lord Drakon »

Ah we played that wrong I think! Skirmishers are still stubborn in forests! Or at least I do not remember is was difficult to break them, could also have been the he just failed his LD on stubborn but I guess we played like there were not stubborn. I will react to yours and clockwork further comments later on.

I hope to get a game going with my new list soon!
Post Reply