As I mentioned in my previous post, there were 2 other Circle players in this event. One of them had lost round one to my Khador buddy, and the other had won round 1 vs. Issyria playing Wurmwood.
We also had the Skorne player winning his first round, so I was slated to get either Khador, Skorne, or Circle.
Out of the three, I really didn't want to play against Khador since 1) he's my good friend and we'd both commuted quite a ways to get to Mox and 2) his lists were the ones I felt I had the worst matchups into.
The stars shined on me and I was dropped into the Circle player who was running a Wurmwood list with 4 heavies and the exact same Tanith list as me!
Unsurprisingly, we both picked Tanith, and we both played:
Tanith
-Warpwolf Stalker
-Pureblood Warpwolf
-Scarsfell
-Gorax
Una
-Scarsfell x2
Wrong Eye
-Snapjaw
Lanyssa
Sentry Stones x2
Shifting Stones
Swamp Gobbers Bellows Crew
He won the roll off and opted to go first on Incursion. I picked the side that would give me the best protection from his heavies thanks to a nicely placed forest and away we went.
He deployed skewed to the right because of the forest, with only Sentry Stone unit 1 and Wrong Eye/Snapjaw over there.
Looking at his deployment, I immediately decided this game was going to be a Scenario game. If he wants to keep contesting that far left flag, he's going to have to sacrifice something to keep contesting.
If that something is Wrong Eye and Snapjaw, then his army doesn't get Star-Crossed and I'll massively win that fight barring goofy dice. If he decides to move them central like he needs to for them to be a big impact on the game, then I get to kill one unit of Sentry Stones and run Lanyssa to control that flag for a few turns.
I deploy very centrally with that in mind.
Bad Guy Tanith Turn 1:
He does exactly what I normally do, Scything Touch on a Griffon and Admonition on the Pureblood.
Una casts Guardian Beast and everything runs up. He tries to bait me with a single Mannikin out of the left unit, but I'm not going to take it.
Good Guy Tanith Turn 1:
Well I do...pretty much the same thing! Except that I get to actually make attacks this turn.
I kill one of my own Mannikins on the right and get a spray into the Scarsfell he has with Scything Touch, cranking the damage a bit and doing 10.
I put my Griffons out of charge range of his Griffons by a sliver, except one which I'm happy to give him if he wants to heal the hurt Griffon and then commit his Scything touch model to somewhere it's not going to do much except maybe kill another Griffon. I'd also put Evasive on the one Griffon he could get to, so if he misses an attack, I get to capitalize.
I DO NOT take the bait, leaving his Mannikin on the left alive, and just generally make a beeline for the hill, staying out of his charge ranges with everything.
His Lanyssa is way off to the side, and I can already feel him shifting his momentum right and abandoning the left flag. He's going to have a hard time contesting meaningfully on the center next turn as well without giving me a really good charge target.
Wrong Eye has Star-Crossed up, but one transfer instead of Submerge. There are enough things around that he can target other stuff with sprays and still get to him.
An important note here - My Tanith stays central after casting Scything Touch on a Griffon and Admonition on the Pureblood, whereas his Tanith is already scooting off to the side.
Bad Guy Tanith Turn 2:
He upkeeps all of his spells and goes to work. Tanith heals the one Griffon and moves over again before it charges in, boosting hits and killing my Yellow Griffon. Darn.
He moves another Griffon up to the flag so that if I don't contest he gets to score.
His Pureblood warps Spell Ward and sprays my unpainted Sentry Stone, leaving it on one.
His Mannikins have a hard time hitting Star-Crossed 10s and kill one Mannikin of mine.
Good Guy Tanith Turn 2:
It's time to score!
I upkeep my spells and start my turn. Tanith moves first, advancing to 10 inches away from his Pureblood and boosting a shot at it, connects, and then whiffs damage and only does 1.
The Gorax moves up and Primals the Grey Scarsfell.
It charges into the Pureblood, who tries to trigger Admonition. I remind him he is Shadow Bound, and the Pureblood goes nowhere. The Griffon kills him handily.
Side note - this list is designed to trade Griffons for heavies, and this is the first time I've ever pulled it off thanks to other attempts getting diced, and it felt pretty awesome to have it work.
The Grey Sentry unit activates, gets more Fury, caps the flag and Sprays the left hand Sentry Stone itself down to 2 boxes. A forest is made for Tanith to hide behind.
The Pureblood moves up and finishes off the Sentry Stone with another Spray.
The Blue Griffon moves up and headbutts the bad Griffon, then buys an attack and does some damage.
Una moves up, shoots him a few times, and then gets ported back with the Shifting Stones.
The Painted Stone unit rolls 3 fury, places a Mannikin contesting the right flag and in the bad Griffons back arc. A forest is made to complete Tanith's wall, and the Mannikin boosts damage on a Spray, killing that Griffon dead.
I can't get anything over to the far left flag, but Lanyssa runs for next turn.
Star-Crossed goes up again with Wrong Eye right in the middle of the table.
I get one point.
Score 1-0
Advantage Good Guy Circle
Bad Guy Tanith turn 3:
The remaining Sentry Unit sprays down the Grey Stone on my side and kills the contesting Mannikin.
The Stalker gets Admonition put on him, and Tanith advances.
The Stalker charges in and murders the Sentry Stone.
He spends the activation of Una, a Griffon, and Snapjaw to kill the Grey Griffon.
The other Griffon charges but fails to kill my Blue Griffon.
Lanyssa caps his flag. Star-Crossed and Submerge go on Wrong Eye, but he's really far away from anything important.
His Shifting Stones go wayyy back, and the leader model is in the middle. I'm still not sure what the intent was here.
He gets one point.
Score 1-1
Tied Game
Good Guy Tanith turn 3:
My central placement of Tanith is about to pay off once more. She upkeeps Admonition and then moves around Wrong Eye to the hill. She shoots the Stalker, boosting hit and damage, and making him Shadow Bound.
Wrong Eye moves up to cap the flag, casting both Submerge and Star-Crossed. Snapjaw charges in and murders the Stalker.
Lanyssa runs to the far flag. The Pureblood advances and sprays at the Shifting Stone behind Wrong Eye, boosting hit and damage on him, doing enough to kill! And then he toughs. Darn!
Stalker runs up.
Between Una and the Blue Griffon getting Primaled, the other Griffon dies.
I get two more points and contest with the Shifting Stones.
Score 3-1
Advantage Good Guy Circle
Bad Guy Tanith turn 4:
We measure it out and he can't contest the far flag with anything, but he wants to murder stuff so he charges in and kills Wrong Eye. Stuff runs futilely.
I get another point.
Score 4-1
Advantage Good Guy Circle
Good Guy Tanith turn 4:
I'm not a fan of rubbing a win in, so I just activate everyone and do nothing, getting a fifth control point and the win.
Score 5-1
Victory for the (good) Druids!
Post Game Thoughts:
So Tanith is really good, and this game basically came down to where we both placed our Tanith's. My central placement allowed me to get around Admonition and murder his relevant models without any retaliation of note.
The other thing that I did which he did not was place Wrong Eye in such a way that Star-Crossed actually mattered, and it did matter.
Really interesting matchup, and a very good game.
Skorne had won against Khador, so I was in for a rough time in the finals...
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