Game 42: Helynna vs Vlad1

Game 42 – Vs Marc Williams – Khador – 17/06/17

My list:

Magister Helynna (Forges of War)

-Sylys Wyshnaylrr, The Seeker

-Hyperion

-Hydra

-Chimera

-Manticore

-Manticore

-Manticore

Arcanist Mechanik

Arcanist Mechanik

Arcanist Mechanik

House Shyeel Artificer

House Shyeel Magister

His List:

Vladimir Tzepesci, The Dark Prince (Winterguard Kommand)

-Juggernaut

-Juggernaut

-Kodiak

-Marauder

-Marauder

Kovnik Joe

Min Winterguard Rifle Corps

-Rocketeer

-Rocketeer

-Rocketeer

Min Winterguard Rifle Corps

-Rocketeer

-Rocketeer

-Rocketeer

Min Winterguard Rifle Corps

-Rocketeer

-Rocketeer

-Rocketeer

Mortar Crew

Field Gun

This is the first game of a 2 day event at Element Games in Stockport. The event had an unusual (for the UK at least) set up in that day 1 would be a 3 round Steamroller. The top 8 would qualify for the finals on day 2 and the rest would be arranged into 8 man Steamroller pods. Due to their only being around 30 attendees, this meant that a number of 2-1 players would get through to the Sunday finals, and the first tie-break for this was to be Strength of Schedule (something that feels inappropriate in a 3 round event but there you go)

My first round matched me up against Marc Williams and his Khador. He was running Vlad1 and Zerkova1 and experience told me which would be dropped into me. I chose Helynna, he dropped Vlad and we got started, with Marc winning the roll and choosing to go first.

Marc ran up with all his troops, spreading them out between the 2 huge forests that dominated the centre of the table, with Vlad using Blood of Kings to get into an aggressive position behind a wall.

I ran up with everything under Deceleration and then used Rhythm of War to reposition out of most threats and behind a forest. Hyperion was in range of 2 jacks if they used Vlad’s feat and Boundless Charge.

Unfortunately between some rocket shots and charges from both jacks Hyperion did go down (the maths put it slightly in Marc’s favour, but not by much). The rest of Marc’s turn is repositioning, moving jacks onto flags and jamming me with a Marauder.

Whilst in a bad position I do not feel that I am out of the game. I need to kill a 2 or 3 heavies this turn and then feat in order to take the shooting as well as possible. Losing on scenario is a big risk but I should be able to hold him off long enough to get into contesting ranges. I start by activating Helynna to move the Juggernaut into range of the right Manticore, and then activate an arcanist, forgetting to both Feat and cast Deceleration. This effectively ends the game and I go on tilt super hard. My jacks are able to remove two jacks and put a big hole in another, but bad dice means I am unable to get to the centre Juggernaut and the flag. At the end of my turn I run the Chimera away from the flag, essentially conceding the game.

Marc did what he had to do, moving models to the flags and killing my models where he could to score VPs for tie-breaks; ending his turn and willing 5-0 on scenario

DEFEAT

No by any means my proudest performance on a Warmachine table. I don’t think I’ve tilted that hard in a very long time and I must apologise to my opponent for that. I do think I was still in the game after losing Hyperion, but not feating or casting Deceleration ended the game. At least there was still plenty to play for in the event, and Marc was a strong player in terms of my Strength of Schedule, so there was still a decent chance of making the top8 for Sunday.