Game 131: Vyros2 vs Krueger2

Game 131 – Vs Paul Sheard – Circle – 11/1/18

My list:

Vryos, Incissar of the Dawnguard (Forges of War)

-Sylys Wyshnaylrr, The Seeker

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Aspis

-Aspis

-Imperatus

Arcanist Mechanik

Arcanist Mechanik

Arcanist Mechanik

House Shyeel Artificer

House Shyeel Magister

House Shyeel Arcanists

House Shyeel Arcanists

His List:

Krueger the Stormlord (The Bones of Orboros)

-Woldwarden

-Woldwarden

-Woldwarden

-Woldwyrd

-Woldwyrd

Celestial Fulcrum

Blackclad Stoneshaper

Blackclad Stoneshaper

Blackclad Stoneshaper

Blackclad Wayfarer

Gallows Grove

Gallows Grove

Shifting Stones

Shifting Stones

Sentry Stone & Mannikins

Sentry Stone & Mannikins

Paul and I have played the Vyros2 vs Krueger2 matchup before, resulting in a win to me, but since then Paul has played the list a whole lot more, the Wold CID changes have gone through, and the Wold theme has added something extra to the list, so this was set up to be a much tougher prospect than last time. Paul won the roll to go first and we got moving.

Paul runs up all of his forces, casting TK onto all three Woldwardens to get them 2” further forwards. The Celestial Fulcrum runs into a unit of Shifting Stones, before being ported forwards to basically the centre of the table, which is a pretty scary prospect. The rest of his forces do basic stone stuff up the table.

I have to find the balance between respecting Paul’s threat ranges and being so far back that I can just be pushed back by Krueger’s feat and giving up too much scenario presence, especially on Spread the Net. Vyros casts Deceleration, and fires out a Twister at a Mannikin, using the forest in the centre to add to a decent protective cloud wall. I block models in with others, stretching quite far back, so that if Paul wants to get the best pushes possible he is going to need to get very far up with Krueger.

Paul moves up and starts shooting into my forces, but his dice do some really horrible things to him and he gets barely anything done. Rolling boosted 8s or unboosted 5s become basically impossible for him and the decent rolls he do get are absolutely not where he needs them, just chipping a few points onto a couple of jacks. Krueger feats, pushing a section of my forces back, before pulling in a Griffon on the left and killing it. The turn had gone pretty badly, but one of the bigger issues was that it took nearly 25 minutes off his clock.

I need to take advantage of my luck in the last turn, but -2 speed on almost everything makes it tricky. My flanking Griffon on the right takes out the Gallows Grove, removing his flag scorer and a TK channeling option. My central jacks take out both of his Sentry Stones and the Blackclad Wayfarer, moving all of my forces towards the right to protect myself. Vyros feats to prepare to take advantage of anything Paul can pick off on his turn. I move into a 2-1 lead.

Paul takes full control of the left flank, killing off my contesting pieces over there, moving a Stoneshaper to the flag to score it. A Griffon gets pulled in and destroyed, and a number of my other jacks are turned around to reduce my options next turn. Paul levels up the score at 3-3.

With being up on clock, having last turn and more cheap contesting pieces I figure that I can just keep safe and grind out the game on attrition. I move my Magister to the flag, with a couple of Shield Guards nearby to keep her self. An Arcanist runs to contest the left flag, and 2 others stand within 16” to be ready to do the same in future turns. I move into a 5-4 lead.

Paul is extremely low on clock and just clears off the left flag, and after failing to shoot off the Magister, contests the right with a Stoneshaper. Score goes to 6-6.

I contest the left flag again, and kill the Woldwyrd on the right along with the contesting Stoneshaper. I am slowly pushing my line forward, pushing Paul back and taking command of the board. I move to an 8-7 lead.

Paul clocks at this point, and we consider the state of the game. With 3 turns remaining Paul is going to really struggle to keep hold of the scenario scoring as the line has pushed past the right flag. We call the game there as we have time for a second.

VICTORY

An interesting game for sure. Paul had a really unlucky turn 2 but realistically wouldn’t have taken out too much more of the support staff. From there the game was under reasonable control and he only really managed to get the Aspises off me, which I was pretty fine with. I’d feel much better going first against this, but it was great to see that I can handle tricky situations like this and still grind out a victory.

Game 130: Elara2 vs Scaverous

Game 128 – Vs Duncan Harradine – Cryx – 5/1/18

My list:

Elara, Death’s Shadow (Defenders of Ios)

-Siren

-Siren

-Siren

-Chimera

Houseguard Thane

Arcanist Mechanik

Arcanist Mechanik

Eilish Garrity, the Occultist

Stormfall Archers

House Vyre Electromancers

Max Houseguard Halberdiers

-Officer & Standard Bearer

Max Houseguard Halberdiers

-Officer & Standard Bearer

Max Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters

His List:

Lord Exhumator Scaverous (Black Industries)

-The Withershadow Combine

-Deathjack

-Erebus

-Stalker

-Ripjaw

-Ripjaw

Iron Lich Overseer

-Seether

Machine Wraith

Machine Wraith

Cephalyx Overlords

Croe’s Cutthroats

First game of the New Year sees me up against Duncan and his Cryx. He has a Scaverous list and a Goreshade3 Scourge list. A huge part of the reason I have Elara in my pair is to take out Cryx so I drop her, with Duncan playing Scaverous. He wins the first turn and we get moving.

Duncan puts up Soul Harvester on the Stalker, and Death Ward onto Deathjack. The Character heavies and Arc Nodes advance centrally with Deathjack behind the central forest. The infantry run up the right with Croes shielding the Overlords. The Overseer and Seether move up the left, threatening that zone.

If I feat this turn I can get 7 Halberds into Deathjack, which at Dice-5 should take it out. I decide that’s worth it and throw them in. Killing the jack with the 5 from the first unit. The right unit of Halberdiers charge into the Croes and kill a few of them. The rest of my forces get up the table and prepare for Duncan’s assault next turn.

Duncan retaliates and tears through my Halberdiers on the right flank with Feat boosted Overlords and the remaining Croes, who then Reposition further into my lines. On the left the Machine Wraith it TK’d to be able to charge a Siren, walking it forward into the Seether’s range, who easily destroys it. The Scavenger clears a few more Halberdiers and Erebus, having had Death Ward cast on it, charges though to get deep into my lines, but unfortunately leaves Scaverous’ control to do so.

I lost more than I thought but still have a decent amount to retaliate with in my turn. Balancing Focus is tough though, and I face the fact that I’m not going to be able to take out Erebus. I power up my Siren on the left, charge into the Seether and take it out. Eilish removes Death Ward and Teleports back to safety. The Halberdiers try to clear out the last Croes but roll horribly and just end up blocking up my own lines. The Nyss then have to just take out the Croes and can’t push in deeper as I hoped, leaving my very bunched up. Nobody scores at the first opportunity.

Duncan is now in a strong position and like any good player doesn’t let up. Clearing out my remaining infantry on the right with a Feast of Crows, Sprays and remaining Croes, clearing out the right zone to score with a Ripjaw. Erebus moves back into control and deals some damage to the Siren and the left Ripjaw deals some damage to the Siren on the left. Duncan moves to a 1-0 lead.

I realise that the game is up, and so just clear up what points I can, with Elara taking out the Stalker personally. I end my turn knowing the game is done.

Duncan doesn’t mess around; TKing Erebus around into Elara’s rear, hitting her to make her Stationary before killing her with bought attacks.

DEFEAT

This feels like a decent enough match up for Elara, even with me going second, but it is difficult to see exactly where this game got away from me. I still think that Feating turn 1 to remove Deathjack was worthwhile but maybe I should have held back further with the rest of my forces to use my 13” threat ranges to keep him back. My second turn was a disaster but the game felt like it was getting away by then anyway. More experience needed with Elara and hopefully I will be able to understand games like this a bit better.

Game 129: Vyros2 vs Mordikaar

Game 129 – Vs Richard Beech – Skorne – 30/12/17

My list:

Vryos, Incissar of the Dawnguard (Forges of War)

-Sylys Wyshnaylrr, The Seeker

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Griffon

-Aspis

-Aspis

-Imperatus

Arcanist Mechanik

Arcanist Mechanik

Arcanist Mechanik

House Shyeel Artificer

House Shyeel Magister

House Shyeel Arcanists

House Shyeel Arcanists

His List:

Void Seer Mordikaar (Masters of War)

-Cyclops Brute

-Basilisk Krea

-Despoiler

Tyrant Rhadeim

Eilish Garrity, the Occultist

Max Cataphract Cetrati

-Tyrant Vorkesh

Min Paingiver Beast Handlers

Max Praetorian Ferox

Max Praetorian Swordsmen

-Officer & Standard Bearer

Tyrant Commander & Standard Bearer

My final game of 2017 saw me face Rich Beech, with his Skorne for the first time. He wanted to try out the armour cracking potential of his Mordikaar list and so dropped it into Vyros 2. Rich won the first turn and we got moving.

The Skorne forces run up the table, with Hollow being put out onto the Praetorian Swordsmen to feed Mordikaar’s souls should they die. The cavalry run up the left flank with the Swordsmen up the right and the beasts and Cetrati down the centre.

Even without Makeda2 at the helm I have been trained to fear cats, and so I reposition my forces over to the right, hoping to tempt some of the cats in so that I can deal with them bit by bit. Not needing Deceleration in the matchup I cast out a couple of Twisters into the Swordsmen, taking out 3 of them with a  good scatter.

Rich half looks at an Essence Blast assassination run, but decides that it is too unlikely, so opts to Feat and get his models up in my face. The Cetrati Shield Wall and advance up, and the Swordsmen press further up but hold back out of my threat ranges. The Cats and Rhadeim leap in and remove one of the Aspis, before moving back behind the central building.

Despite Mordikaar’s Feat being up I make a plan to get ahead in the game. Synergy is built up with Griffons charging on the right and boosting attack rolls, before 2 Griffons on the left each charge and remove a Ferox (even with feat up I only need 6s to hit with Synergy). This opens up a path for Imperatus to advance up, kill a cat with a boosted attack and Side-Step up to Despoiler, killing it with the 3 remaining attacks. Nobody scores as all the zones are contested, but I feel that I have made a good step ahead.

Rich tries to strike back but without being able to charge and with Dark Shroud being taken off the table a lot of his models are a bit pillow fisted into ARM18 jacks. Imperatus is reduced to a handful of boxes and a couple of Griffons are pretty beaten up, but no jacks go down and Rich is unable to clear the right zone. Mordikaar Revives 2 Ferox but with only 1 box they shouldn’t be difficult to remove again next turn.

I need to capitalise on my good position and start getting ahead on scenario. I was a bit tentative with my support last turn and so this turn isn’t as efficient as it could be. Regardless I am able to completely clear out the left of the cats and light beasts and grind through all but 2 of the Certati. The turn is a real example of how strong Vyros2 can be in later turns of engagement, and the Skorne forces really crumbled under the pressure. I score the left zone to take a 1-0 lead.

The Swordmen us their Power Swell mini-feat and come into my jacks on the right, taking out an Aspis and a Griffon. The remaining Cetrati do some more damage into the Griffons but don’t take any more out. Eilish gets into the zone to contest, allowing Rich to level the scenario at 1-1.

Clear-up time now. I remove Eilish from my zone and run up an arcanist unit to allow Vyros the freedom to leave it. My forces cascade round, removing basically all of the remaining threats from the table, with only the Standard from the TyCom, 2 Swordsmen and a Paingiver left at the end of the turn. I score the left and central zones to lead 3-1

Rich realises that the game is up, and simply tries to finish Imperatus off with Essence Blasts through his remaining models. Phoenix Protocol had been triggered in a previous turn leaving him on decent strength and the attacks don’t do enough. With no models left to contest I score twice more to lead 5-1

I end my turn immediately to win 7-1 on scenario.

VICTORY

With 6 losses in my previous 6 games against Rich it was nice to finally get one over on him. This feels like a decent matchup for me, but being able to unpick his feat turn and remove Despoiler to take Dark Shroud off the table was a really big deal. I’ve played this Vyros list a lot now, and my familiarity with it coupled with Rich still learning a new faction helped me turn the streak around.

129 Retribution games is pretty decent for 2017, my New Year’s Resolution is to get at least 150 in 2018, and again play each caster at least once. I’m building nicely to my event in February and a few more practice days like today should put me in a good spot for it.