Battle Report 86 - Spokane Team Championship Round 1: Tanith (The Wild Hunt) vs. Vlad 1 (Winter Guard Command)

Prologue:

This event was the first (hopefully) annual Team Tournament for Eastern Washington. Four captains were chosen from among the meta, and those four captains drafted teams from among a pool of pre-registered participants.

I was chosen as Captain of Team Mom (long story, ask at your peril), and we had 12 other people sign up for the event, meaning teams of four.

My team consisted of myself (Tanith/Baldur 2), my roommate (Fyanna 2/Lylyth 3), a Khador player (Vlad 2/Irusk 2), and our lone trolls player (Doomie 3/Ragnor).

Scoring for the event was based on the number of wins per team as first tie breaker, total control points as second tie breaker, and army points destroyed as third tie breaker.

My strategy for this event was basically to force the other captains to play me if I could in the pairing stage and to get at least one good matchup for Khador or Trolls while trusting Fyanna 2 or Lylyth 3 to pose serious problems for basically any pairing in the game.

Round 1 this worked out, and I ended up across the table from my good friend Adam running Strakhov 2 with Legion of Steel and Vlad 1 in Winter Guard Kommand.

My lists were:

Tanith (The Wild Hunt)
- Loki
- Wyrd x3
- Moonhound x2

Reeves and CA x2
Wolves and CA

Fuel Cache

And:

Baldur 2
- Woldwrath
- Woldwrath
- Megalith

Sentry Stone x2
Stoneshaper x3

I knew my opponent could not drop Legion of Steel into Tanith. It's an all melee army based on single wound ARM spam with no less than three upkeeps. I also knew I could not drop Baldur 2 into his Vlad list easily since it had three Marauders in it.

This led to me picking Tanith and my opponent picking Vlad. I lost the roll, and my opponent opted to choose the side with the best defensive terrain.

Vlad 1
- Marauder x3
- Juggernaut x2

Rifle Corps (min) and 3 Rockeeteers x3
Field Gun
Mortar Crew

My opponent advanced moved his Jacks before I took a picture of his deployment, but they were basically all back 4 inches.

Circle turn 1:

I have to get up the table fast - those Jacks can run 16 inches on Vlad's feat turn, and I can only kill a couple of them per turn.

Fortunately, he is going to have to funnel all of his Winterguard into the middle or else risk losing half his army to ambushing Wolves.

Loki runs up, carefully staying just over fourteen inches away from his heavies (they're so fast!). Tanith puts Scything Touch on Loki and Admonition on herself, drops a fury, and advances.

Everything else runs up to just outside of shooting ranges on his Winterguard. I spread out the left side unit a LOT, carefully checking to make sure a 4 inch AOE from the Mortar can't clip more than a couple of them.

Khador turn 1:

Vlad casts Windwall, Feats, and charges into the trench. (Side note, I need a Pureblood in this list somewhere).

His Jacks all run at me. Greattt.

Winterguard move in, but the far left unit cannot get far enough away from the edge of the board...

That's a lot of Khador heavies in my face.

Circle turn 2:

I have to kill two heavies, preferably more, and all of the rockets this turn.

Time for an Ambush!

Wolves come in on the left side, and after Tanith leaches and upkeeps both spells, they charge in. Somehow, two of the Winterguard survive, but most die and I reposition to engage some of the other unit.

On the home front, the two Wyrds next to Loki's Marauder mostly kill it. Loki moves to the space between them, warps for no CRA's, and kills the mostly dead one before dinging up the second one.

Two big Reeve CRA's (they pop their mini feat) and a Wyrd nearly finish it, and the Moonhound walks up and puts him down.

Tanith moves up and out of killbox, pops her feat and channels Affliction onto the remaining Marauder.

She camps two, and the last unit of Reeves activate.

They move up, kill all six remaining rockets, and put 16 individual shots into the Marauder for 16 damage. That alone took nearly three minutes to roll out >< The Reeves on the right also pop their mini-feat. Lots of DEF 17 models.

Khador turn 2:

My opponent decides he needs to assassinate or lose here. He allocates two to his Juggernaut.

I'm a little curious as to how he is planning on making this work, since I have Admonition on Tanith (see the token on he picture above?), and then I remember that the Field Gun knocks down.

Then I also remember that it can only move four inches and I am pretty sure I am still safe.

My opponent has Vlad cast Signs and Portents. His right side Winterguard all CRA the Reeve in the way of his Juggernaut.

He moves up his other unit and take a pot shot at another Reeve, which I Shield Guard with Loki.

His Field Gun is indeed out of range, and he shoots at my Argus, missing.

At this point, I move the Admonition token and the Fury in front of Tanith to be sure it is visible.

My opponent activates his Marauder and kills a couple Reeves.

His right hand Juggernaut kills a couple more.

"Hey would you mind moving that token for me so I can put the Juggernaut in front of Tanith please?" (Side Note - he asked me to put this in the battle report, I would not do it to be mean, Adam and I are good buds)

I move the Admonition token out of the way for his Juggernaut to move up.

"Trigger Admonition, scoot three inches to the right".

The deflated Juggernaut kills a bunch of Reeves and the Woldwyrd.

Circle turn 3:

The Fury is pulled, the spells are upkept.

The Argus moves up and kills a Rifleman.

Loki warps Strength, rolls pretty hot, and kills the Juggernaut without assistance (I was counting on a couple of big CRAs to finish him off).

The right hand Reeves and the Wyrd kill the Marauder with a bunch more individual shots.

The other Wyrd kills a pair of Riflemen.

The left unit of Reeves kills off most of the remaining Riflemen.

The two living Winterguard from the Ambush annoyingly tie up half the unit of Wolves, but there are enough to charge over and kill the Field Gun and engage the Mortar.

Tanith moves up to the flag and re-casts Admonition.

I get one point.

Score 1-0

Advantage Circle

Khador turn 3:

The two remaining Winterguard run to contest. Joe kills a Wolf.

The Juggernaut kills the Argus and a Reeve, and then Vlad casts Blood of Kings on himself and charges Loki. He misses his charge attack and camps his three.

Score 1-0 

Advantage Circle

Circle turn 4:

I upkeep Scything Touch and Admonition.

First tie breaker is Wins, Second is Control Points, so even though I think Vlad is dead here, I decide to mop up the flags a bit.

Wolves kill Joe and Mortars and one Winterguard.

Wyrds kill the other Winterguard.

The right unit of Reeves run to form a lovely flower shaped clump around the flag.

Loki warps Strength and Headbutts Vlad, needing a boosted 11 to hit. He connects. His last two attacks barely scratch Vlad's paint.

Tanith activates, casts Affliction on Vlad, and my opponent concedes, scoring me three more control points for my team.

Victory for the Druids!

Post-Game Thoughts:

With my opponent remembering Admonition, this game gets much worse as I believe Loki just dies. I still think I can kill off two more heavies the next turn by upkeeping and then recasting Affliction, but without the heavy beast there it gets much harder.

The Reeves having Hunter made a BIG difference this game, as I was able to snipe out the rockets from the trench without worrying too much about it. 7s to hit and 6s to kill isn't too bad when you get to take 44 shots a turn.

Another interesting point - I had forgotten how strong a bunch of infantry can be on attrition. When your opponent gets down to lower and lower numbers of attacks, he just cannot kill enough fast enough to get ahead on Scenario. This was one of the main tenants of Mark 2, and it is something I had forgotten.

My team had done well, having had Fyanna take down Issyria, Vlad 2 scenario out Iron Mother, and Ragnor sadly killboxing himself against Haley 2, for a round 1 score of 3 wins and 12 control points, with about 300 army points (122 from my game).

I lost two 40 mm bases and 8 30 mm bases this game, as well as winning it for a grand total of 120 reps of push ups and sit ups for Warmachine Fight Club. Ouch.

On to round two!