I was able to attend a High Reward Steamroller at Mox Boarding House in Bellevue this last weekend, a format with an 8 person cap and a $25 buy-in price (which is a lot for an 8 man steamroller).
I took my tried and true pairing of Tanith and Wurmwood:
Tanith
-Warpwolf Stalker
-Pureblood Warpwolf
-Scarsfell Griffon
-Gorax
Una
-Scarsfell Griffon x2
Wrong-Eye
-Snapjaw
Lanyssa
Sentry Stones x2
Shifting Stones
Swamp Gobbers Bellow Crew
Obective: Fuel Cache
This is my Circle, Ret, and situationally Trolls, Mercs, or other dudespam drop. Scarsfell Griffons trade into squishy heavies really, really well, and they're not easy to kill on the backswing without significant investment.
My Wurmwood list is a bit of an oddball, with Brennos and Megalith being a module I haven't seen anywhere else. The idea here is that Brennos plus Megalith can literally shut down a colossal for an entire game. Brennos also has blessed naturally on his staff, and that has come up quite a few times for me now.
Wurmwood
-Cassius
-Warpwolf Stalker
-Brennos
-Megalith
-Gorax
Lanyssa
Gallows Grove
Sentry Stones x2
Shifting Stones x2
Min Bone Grinders
Gatormen Bokur and Shamblers
Swamp Gobbers Bellows Crew
Objective: Fuel Cache
The field was pretty non-diverse, with three Circle players all rocking Wurmwood and Tanith (one of the guys had the exact same Tanith list as I did!), two Ret players with Issyria/Kaelyssa and Rahn/Vyros 1, one Khador player with Butcher 3/Irusk 2, one Cygnar player with Haley 2/Caine 2, and one Skorne player running Rasheth with a billion Shamans/Zaal 2 with a billion immortals.
I was pretty nervous going into this event, I hadn't really stretched my competitive wings for solo events in nearly 4 months, and I was worried that I had lost any edge I once had.
Round one, I was paired with the Cygnar player. His lists were interesting, Caine 2 was running two Stormclads and Haley was running:
Haley 2
-Squire
-Stormclad
-Thunderhead
-Thorn
Journeyman
-Sentinel
Max Stormlances
Black 13th
Objective: Bunker
Ultimately, I had a very strong feeling he would drop Haley 2, and since there was so much Circle for me to drop Tanith into and this was a good chance to test Wurmwood into Haley, I ultimately dropped Wurmwood.
We were playing Extraction, and my opponent won the roll off and opted for first.
One side had a forest right in front of the middle deployment zone, and the other had a forest up and to the right. There was a wall on that side, a hill on the edges of the Scenario, and a cloud in the center with a trench on the far side.
I opted for the side with the more central forest and wall, hoping that the forest in his face would force him to split his army, and it did.
Cygnar Deployment:
The important things here are really just the forest and the wall and the trench. The cloud is going to go away most likely, and the forest here allows me to completely hide Wurmwood from his entire army. I lined up the Stalker across from the Lances since the game plan was to bait them with the Sentry Stones and then kill as many as possible.
Cygnar turn 1:
He's pretty aggressive here.
Arcane Shield goes onto the Stormlances and the Jr. moves up behind the forest. The Black 13th run and spread out to avoid Hellmouth. Thorn and Thunderhead run, the Stormclad gets TKed, and Haley puts up Deceleration, moving almost into the trench. The Sentinel runs.
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| As you can see, the sun was pretty bright and this would lead to issues for pics. |
Circle turn 1:
I go into the tank for a while and then decide that since I'm the one going second, I'd really like to just bubble up and force him to commit. If he does and feats, I counterfeat and get a control point most likely, which is a bad place for him to be.
I place my cloud, and Cassius runs. I try for an unboosted Curse of Shadows on the Stormlances and miss, then I Dark Path Cassius back and cast Wild Growth to continue my wall of LOS denial.
Bone Grinders murder eachother, as usual.
Everything else advances or cross runs to get into better position for next turn. I do like one point of damage to a Stormlance with a Mannikin spray.
Cygnar turn 2:
He thinks about it for a bit, and then measures from Thunderhead to the farthest up Sentry Stone, finding he can get within five of it with a TK. Thunderhead gets two focus, Jr. upkeeps Arcane Shield.
The Centurion moves and shoots the Mannikin blocking the black Stormlance. Thorn shuffles to get LOS to Thunderhead.
Thunderhead gets TKed, and so does the Stormlance at the very top of the above picture.
Haley moves into the trench, no feat.
Thunderhead moves up and murders the painted Sentry Stone.
The Stormlances go in and murder the other Sentry Stone, actually doing a few damage to Brennos with eLeaps.
Black 13th move up and do nothing. The cloud goes away.
Circle turn 2:
I measure it out and I can get Megalith into Thunderhead, and I think I can kill 3 Stormlances. This is critical because the less models Haley gets to Alpha with on her feat turn, the better the game goes for me.
Shamblers get placed and one runs between the three stormlances that I don't expect Brennos to kill.
Cassius runs up.
Brennos charges in anddddd whiffs damage on the second lance, leaving it on one.
Wurmwood casts Curse of Shadows on Thunderhead and Hellmouths the Shambler to yank Stormlances closer together.
The Stalker goes in and kill two Lances, and then Sprints out into some Shifting Stones, who port him to the other side of Wurmwood.
Megalith charges in and kills Thunderhead with a fury to spare, so I throw an unboosted Stranglehold at Thorn, but miss.
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| The sun made picture taking impossible, so here's this Vassal diagram. Brennos is the green empty base. |
Cygnar turn 3:
Haley hems and haws. Because I've placed the Stalker so far back and within charge range of where Megalith is, Haley would have to expose herself a lot to Feat and catch him to prevent the countercharge if the Stormclad goes into Megalith.
Side note - when two control casters play, generally whichever one feats first without getting a monstrous attrition or Scenario advantage, they lose.
He loads up the Stormclad and drops Arcane Shield.
Haley casts Temporal Acceleration on the Stormclad and does not feat, camping four in the trench. The Stormclad assaults in and murders Brennos. The Stormlances kill the Bokur (sad!).
His Sentinel shoots Megalith and rolls fire for damage. The Black 13th come in and do some Brutal Shots at Megalith, rolling pretty hot as well and leaving him on half. Thorn runs away.
Circle turn 3:
I'm surprised he didn't feat here, and so I spend a few minutes rethinking my turn. I measure from Megalith to Haley and realize she's less than 15 inches away.
I've got ten fury thanks to Stormlances and the Bokur dying, and I can get my new Shambler leader within 3 of Haley, and one Gobber within 3 of Megalith.
I decide to go for it.
Shambler runs. Gobber runs. Shifting Stones port up in front of his Sentinel so that it can't get dragged with Hellmouth.
Cassius runs.
I arc a Hellmouth through Cassius a the Shambler, hitting, and pulling Haley in. I boost damage on her and roll 6, 5, 4, doing 8 damage even after he cancels out five with a focus.
I arc another Hellmouth at the Gobber, boosting to hit, and drag Megalith 3 inches closer.
Megalith heals a d3, and charges Haley. I opt not to boost the charge attack since she has set defense.
Here was my math:
She's got 7 boxes left (averages say she should have 11 left but hey, dice). I miss my first attack, boost the second needing a nine and hit, doing 5 damage after focus reduction (dice +3 = 10, minus 5 = 5). She's now DEF 13, and Megalith buys two more attacks and kills her.
Instead...I roll the hard 11 on the charge and murder her.
Yay!
Victory for the Druids!
Post Game Thoughts:
I actually had several plays open to me here. and I really like both the play I went with and the other option, which was to use a Hellmouth to drag the Sentinel out of control from the Jr. and away from the objective, Hellmouth a placed Shifting Stone to murder all of the Black 13th, and then Feat.
Port Wurmwood into the center ish part of the table so the forest covers literally everything, have Megalith blow up the objective from trample plus 3 bought attacks, and then have the Stalker control the flag for a point. Following turn,
I expect him to feat but get no points if I contest with a bunch of shamblers, and I don't actually know if anything was in range to contest the right hand flag, so I could possibly be at 3 points at the end of his turn.
I'd just need to Stranglehold both light jacks the following turn, possibly murdering Thorn with the Stalker, and keep Wurmwood safe before eventually killing off all of his models and winning on Scenario.
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