The subject then is as the title: Starting an army from scratch. In order to make this work I am going to make the following assumptions:
1. The player has a working knowledge of the core 7th Edition Fantasy Ruleset
2. The player has the resources to purchase an initial force of 1000pts, and can then add models to create a 2000pt army
3. The player has read the Dark Elf army book
4. Special characters will not be used as most tournament situations do not allow them anyway
The intention is then to explain the tactic of putting an army together in such a way as to learn how to use Dark Elves, whilst looking at the various tactics the selected units can employ during the game. My philosophy behind this will incorporate the principles of redundancy and balance.
PART ONE - Choosing the general
As we are starting with a small force of 1000pts we do not have to worry about Lord choices. We can come to that at a later stage when we upgrade to 2000pts.
So, Master - Death Hag - Sorceress? For a beginner to the army I would suggest we forget about using a Death Hag due to her liability from frenzy. We can cover that as a side issue at a later stage. For simplicity we are going to choose either a Master or a Sorceress, so let's look at the differences between the two.
IMO the Master is our General, the fact he has leadership 9 is the predominant reason, but also because he can be effectively equipped for a reasonably low cost. This means that the army can benefit from his ld, but he won't give away too many points if he dies. The Sorceress on the other hand only has leadership 8 and is easy to kill, being expensive too. There are ways of making her work but let's keep things simple. Ensuring we have the best possible leadership available for our army is the first tactic we are going to employ.
We will however be engaging the services of a Sorceress as that fits in with the principle of redundancy, meaning that our starting army will have characters active in the magic and combat phases.
Point of note: Redundancy means constructing an army list where units are able to work in conjunction with each other in different ways, and where the loss of any unit or character in the army, means it can still operate in an effective manner.
Regarding magic items for the characters, at this point level I don't think we need to spend too much. We are looking to understand the synergy of the army and basic tactics, so I would expect that our opponent would be sympathetic to our quest, and not use any uber combo against us whilst we go through our learning process.
Personally I like the idea of mundane armour and a magic weapon for the General, and most likely a single scroll for the level 2. So, as you can see we are deliberately limiting ourselves in certain ways as we put this starter force together. Once a few games have been played the list can then be tweaked as preferred.
So a Master with heavy armour, sea dragon cloak and shield, with the Sword of Might comes in at 105pts. The Sorceress comes in at 160pts as she has been upgraded to a Level 2. Leaving us 735pts to spend on troops. When the list is complete we can look at why I have chosen these particular items (as no doubts there will be lots of alternate suggestions ) as well as why I have chosen not to give them mounts... We now need to look at the guys which will do the fighting.
PART TWO - The others
The Battalion Box is a good starting point as it includes a good range of figures which most Druchii Generals will want to have available for choice. From this I think 10 Warriors with repeater crossbows and shields is a good start and they will have a musician. My next choice (additional models to purchase though) is 5 Dark Riders with repeater crossbows and a musician. These 2 units give us an effective missile base due to our good ballistic skill and the armour piercing nature of our crossbows. Both units have musicians for the all important +1 to rally when required.
Next up, and another purchase unfortunately, is a unit of 5 Harpies. These will fulfill many roles in our starter force, so as with Dark Riders, I believe it is important to come to grips with how to use these as soon a possible.
448pts left to spend on units with give static combat resolution(SCR) and added combat resolution(ACR). 180pts buys 20 Warriors with shields, full command and a War Banner for a whopping starting SCR of 3 ranks, standard & War Banner = 5. Plus a potential +1 for outnumbering if we are doing our job right. However, the Battalion Box does not include enough Warriors to put this unit together, so I suggest you use the 16 provided, plus the 2 spare rxb warriors and proxy the missing 2 with a couple of Corsairs for now. Your opponent shouldn't mind as long as you explain to him.
268pts left to spend so let's use the Cold One Knights that come in the Battalion Box. We will give them a standard bearer carrying the Cold Blooded Banner. Might as well get used tot he trials and tribulations of stupidity from the outset, then you can decide whether it's for you or not.
102pts left so waste not, want not we will buy 10 Corsairs. Our list tops out now at 998pts if my arithmetic is correct. For clarity, here it is:
Master(General) - heavy armour, sea dragon cloak, shield, Sword of Might
Level 2 Sorceress - dispel scroll
10 Warriors - shields, musician, repeater crossbows
5 Dark Riders - musician, repeater crossbows
20 Warriors - full command, War Banner, shields
10 Corsairs
5 Harpies
5 Cold One Knights - standard bearer, Banner of Cold Blood
... ... ...The first game
Ok then, as no one else has offered an opponent it looks like we have to fight Kel's Dwarves in our inaugral battle. This is what he has proposed:
Keledron wrote:Go on here's your first opponent Dwarves and I'lll use a similar methoodology 2 Thanes for me as I get 4 dispel dice and a combat orientated force of clansmen with a BSB to keep them going
Thane GW Gromil armour Rune of Stone(as 3+)
Thane BSB Gromil armour Rune of Stone
19 clansmen HA, Shields full command
19 Longbeards HA, Shield full command Rune of Battle(+1 CR)
12 handgunners with champion
1 canon with engineer (extra crew are always handy)
10 Slayers with a Giant Slayer
should be about 1000 points
We have to face high toughness, good armour save relenless troops combined with some minimal shooting. An interesting proposition and a challenge which we can readily rise to. So what tactics do we employ?
I always start by doing a quick analysis of the army in front of me, deciding briefly what I will most likely need to do to get control of the game. Now as we are theorising here I will be making a lot of assumptions simply to demonstrate tactical theory, so please don't shout me down for 'fixing' the game in any way
As it is a first ever game I would always suggest to the opponent that the terrain is deployed in a fairly neutral manner so as to have minimal effect on the game from an imbalance point of view. Therefore our table has a hill either side and in each deployment zone, a piece of difficult terrain either side and a wood either side.
Back to the Dwarf army then. The cannon is his only long range threat, and with Harpies and DRs on the board I know I have a chance to deal with it fairly early on so it shouldn't pose too much of a threat. The Handgunners could hurt, but as they are move or shoot they can be mitigated quite a lot so also shouldn't pose too much of a threat. Slayers just die very easily to missile fire so they are of no worry. The problem lies within the blocks and the 2 characters....
More to come