pReznik +6
-Heirophant -2
-Crusader -6
-Vanquisher -8
Avatar of Menoth -11
Min choir -2
Vassal of Menoth -2
Vassal Mechanic -1
Max TFG with UA -8
Min Zealots with UA -6
Wracks -1
Gorman Di Wulfe -2
eEiryss -3
Saxon Orrik -2
Madelyn Corbeau -2
Objective - Effigy of Valour
I was umming and ahhing about whether I should swap out Gorman for Anastasia Di Bray for a while. Ultimately though I decided that Black Oil would be more beneficial than Espionage, since the body of the list is not designed to do loads of damage but instead to jam. On the other hand a Black Oiled heavy is still a real upset. I decided on Effigy of Valour to make sure that the TFG would be less likely to flee and ruin their jam. Obviously the solo package is geared towards delivering Reznik to the opponent's caster.
My opponent was playing a pMadrak build. Most of his games so far have been at the 35 point level and so (he told me) the list he played was an expanded version of one of his 35 point lists he'd bulked up to 50 points. It consisted of pMadrak with an Impaler, Bomber and Mulg, a max unit of the Krielstone with UA, a unit of Runeshapers, and two max units of Warders. We were playing Two Fronts from the 2015 packet (for anyone keeping count I promise I am randomising the scenario each time. I have no idea why Two Fronts keeps coming up). I won the roll to go first and set up with Reznik just to the left of the centre of my deployment zone with the TFG and Orrik on my left flank, the jacks and support staff centrally and to the right of centre, and the zealots and Gorman on the right flank. On the other side of the table the Trolls all set up more centrally.
I took my first turn, using Orrik to give pathfinder to the TFG to allow them to run into the zone despite the intervening forest, and everyone else ran up the board, meanwhile Reznik put Ignite on the TFG and Iron Agression on the Avatar.
Things went very similarly on the other side of the board, with the Fell Caller putting pathfinder on one of the Warder units, allowing them to advance through the forest, with everything else running forwards as well.
I continued to move up the board on my turn. The Flameguard and Zealots moved into their respective zones, using their mini feats to secure stronger defensive positions. Gorman moved into the zone and threw Black Oil at Mulg, hoping for a lucky deviation, but went off to the middle of nowhere. My Jacks moved up the board, trying to stay out of Mulg's threat range while also trying to nudge the Avatar close enough to get the alpha on him later. Reznik moved across into my zone, behind the Flameguard along with Madelyn Corbeau and Orrik.
The Trolls then took their turn, and started to tentatively attack my army. The Warders on my left flank charged my TFG, but only two of them were able to get in, and both missed their attacks thanks to Set Defence. The bomber threw at the TFG also, but only hit one of them, with the blast damage not being able to crack their Iron Zeal/shield guard armour. On the other flank the Runeshapers intentionally missed a choir member in my backfield, managing to get a lucky scatter into my zealots, with the first blast killing two zealots and rolling exactly enough to kill Gorman as well. Mulg, the stones, Madrak and the Fell Caller all shuffled up the board, with the Warders on my right just toeing into the zone. On my turn I retaliated by having the TFG CMA into the two warders, killing both of the trolls who'd connected. Eiryss took a shot down a crack between the Impaler and bomber and hit Madrak to strip him of Sure Foot. The Vanquisher (who'd been allocated 1) moved up to start my run on Mulg. My plan was, with battle, to hit him with a boosted POW 16 from the gun. I needed 4s to hit... The deviation when I rolled 3 didn't hit anything. I was not sure of my threat range on Mulg with the Avatar, but with the Vanquisher missing I decided it wasn't worth risking being out. Instead the Avatar just nudged up slightly to be definitely in next turn. The Zealots moved up, throwing bombs at the Warders and Mulg. One of the blasts hit the Warder but failed to do enough damage. The other two zealots hit Mulg, not doing much damage. Importantly, however, the Stone had moved up right behind Mulg, meaning it was caught in the blast and died. The positioning of the rest of the unit wasn't ideal, however, and he was forced to self-sacrifice a regular grunt, then the second blast forced him to kill the UA to keep the stone alive. Reznik moved back up in the zone.
Because this was a Menoth vs Trolls game we'd both been really hesitant to commit, which is why so little stuff had died so far. This turn was when the trolls came into it. Madrak started the turn by feating and throwing his axe at a zealot. He rolled snake eyes and failed to hit. The warders on my left started eating through the TFG thanks to the feat, however he made a real error and overtook past the melee range of one of my flameguard, dying to the free strike. The other two warders' killing spree didn't last as long thanks to poor dice, but did manage to get another couple dead. The Impaler took a boosted shot at the Vanquisher, hoping for the crit, he hit but not crit, and did a couple of points of damage. Mulg then charged the Vanquisher and scrapped it, filling up on Fury. The Warders on the other flank then killed all the zealots under feat apart from the Monolith, who was knocked down to 1 box, ending that spree. The Bomber moved into stealth range and threw at Eiryss, but failed to hit her high DEF, the deviations failing to kill anything.
The first big commitment had happened and now the game was heating up. The Vassal gave Enliven to the Avatar, who rolled 3 focus and charged Mulg. The Avatar managed to kill Mulg handily and still be able to take an additional Attack on one of his other beasts. The TFG moved into the remaining Warders in my zone and did a reasonable amount of damage, but didn't kill them. The Crusader moved into the objective but despite Battle only managed to bring it down to 2 boxes. Eiryss was in melee with a warder and so wasn't able to shoot and needed ridiculous dice to even do a single point of damage in melee. Orrik gave pathfinder to Reznik to allow him to move right across the zone, choosing to run, followed up by Madelyn and the Hierophant.
The bomber was locked up by the Avatar and so couldn't shoot at Reznik on the Troll turn. Hoping to remedy this three of the warders charged Avatar, the first one failing to damage, and the second one only doing a couple of points of damage, activating enliven, allowing me to move out of their threat, but keep the Bomber in melee with him. The rest of the warders took a few boxes off the Crusader. On the other flank the other warders took attacks on the TFG again. The runeshapers continued to move up, finishing off the monolith bearer. The Bomber activated and took a two handed throw on the Avatar, to my surprise, chucking it into Eiryss, killing her. The stone moved up to keep the coverage, and then Madrak advanced directly towards Reznik, throwing Rathrok at him. This critical hit, but failed to damage. This set up Reznik to apply sword to face. On my turn I had the TFG kill one of the Warders (who was potentially in the way) Avatar paid one to stand up and then used the rest of his stack to kill the bomber. The crusader beat on a Warder and finished off the Objective to score a point. Reznik then activated and charged Madrak. Madrak had been upkeeping sure foot, meaning I got the extra dice for purgation. I used my feat to wipe off his 5 fury, hit Engine of Destruction with Harmonious Exaultation and bought attacks until there was nothing left of his caster.
I had a really great game, and I always enjoy playing with Reznik since he's always fun. The Avatar with Iron Agression is offensive and Reznik is awesome to play with. Next week I will likely be playing Harbinger again (with a very slightly different list) and I'll be sure to write it up for you next week!
As always don't forget to like Mitsuharu on Minis on Facebook for regular updates!
-M
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