Saturday, May 20, 2017

Battle Report 99 - May Masters Round 2: Vindictus (Exemplar Interdiction) vs. Fiona the Black

Prologue:

My opponent had Ossrum and Fiona, and I felt like Sevy was probably the right drop here. He has a great play into Ossrum since he basically has no magical guns, and he has a ton of infantry clear for Fiona.

But...I came to play Vindictus, so Vindictus I played. Spoiler alert, this was a terrible idea.

Fiona the Black
- Sylyss
- Nomad x2
- Freeboater

Wrong Eye
- Snapjaw
Dahlia
- Skareth

Idrians
- CA
Commodore Cannon Crew
Alexia and the Risen

And I played Vindictus:

Vindictus
- Reckoner x2

Gravus
Knight Exemplar Seneschal
Wrack

Vengers x2
Exemplars x2
- CA x2
Choir (min)

I won the roll off and decided to go first.



Prey went onto Vindictus, and away we went. 

Menoth turn 1:

I already felt pretty far on the back foot here. Fiona has a spell to give a unit a better version of the Errants Self-Sac, she can give something magical guns to get through my Feat, and she has a ball-busting feat.

Add to that Star-Crossed and I was in for some serious trouble.

I put Defenders Ward on the left unit of Vengers and put True Path up, hiding Vindictus behind the cloud from Fuel Cache.

Everything ran, staying outside of Idrian charge ranges.


Mercenaries turn 1:

Broad strokes, this was a complicated turn.

Idrians put a big CRA into a Venger and leave it on one box. The Commodore cannon finishes it off.

Everything runs up, and the Idrians get the self-sac spell.

I was expecting a Feat here, but he has not and suddenly I'm on the back foot.

Star-Crossed is up.


Menoth turn 2:

Star-Crossed seriously messes with me here, as Vengers need sixes to hit the impact attacks on Idrians.

Gravus goes in and gets the hit off on an Idrian, dispelling the upkeep self-sac.

As a result, I only get one charge into Snapjaw and a couple of charges into the Freeboater.

On the right, I get four charges into the Nomad, but I roll trip 1's on a charge and leave it on 7 boxes.

I move up models to control flags in case he decides not to contest.

I popped my Feat here.


Mercenaries turn 2:

Through a complicated series of killing his own Idrian leader model to promote to a new leader, he is able to contest the right flag.

All of my right hand Vengers die, and the left flag is narrowly contested by a Risen.

Fiona moves out of killbox and pops her feat.


Menoth turn 3:

I spend a ridiculous amount of effort killing the two contesting models, control both flags, and prepare to lose most of my models.

Star-Crossed and Fiona's feat mean that I can't get anything done at all.


Score 2-0
Advantage Menoth 

Mercenaries turn 3:

He creates a Risen, which charges the left Reckoner and does 12 damage. Skareth sprays down four KE's on the right, including the CA.

His Nomad easily kills the left hand Reckoner, and the Freeboater finishes off Gravus and a Venger.

By this point, my opponent is down to about three minutes on his clock.


Menoth turn 4:

I pop mini feat with the left unit of KE, charge in and...do almost nothing. The Nomad takes about 1/3 damage, the Freeboater even less.

I can't clear the right flag either, and I begin to start playing for clock by spacing out contesting models everywhere.



The Rest of the Game:

Several turns go by in quick succession here, and I didn't have time to take pictures.

I send contesting models in every turn, running Vindictus away with Defenders Ward up, and eventually my opponent clocks himself with only a Reckoner and Vindictus left on my side.



Post-Game thoughts:

Wow. This was a horrible matchup, just absolutely atrocious. The list doesn't really have straight up MAT buffs, and Star-Crossed and dice manipulation just wrecked my ability to do anything.

Also, Dahlia is a big, big problem for this list, as she straight up prevents my threat ranges from being absurd, and that's kind of the point.

I always feel a little scummy playing for time, but this game literally came down to me forcing my opponent to make a bunch of attacks in order to have a chance at winning the game on Scenario.

Also, I kept Vindictus really, paranoidly safe, and that was more or less the key.

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