Mitsuharu on Bat Reps - Saeryn, Omen of Everblight vs Kreuger, the Stormlord & Lylyth, Shadow of Everblight vs Morvahna the Dawnshadow

Hey guys! Sorry about not posting a battle report from my game last week, but this week I have a double bill for you! I managed to get a game this week against one of our more irregular players who'd brought his circle to the LGS. I'm still playing with eLylyth and Saeryn as a pairing at the minute and he was playing with eMorvahna and eKreuger. We discussed the lists and I decided to play with Saeryn, since it's the list I'm most focused on playing. The build hasn't changed:

Saeryn +5

-Angelius -9

-Angelius -9

-Scythean -9

-Scythean -9

-Raek -4

-Shredder -2

Foresaken -2

Foresaken -2

Deathstalker -2

Deathstalker -2

Spell Martyr -1

Spell Martyr -1

Maximum Spawning Vessel -3

Objective - Fuel Cashe

I'm still looking to get more experienced with the list and I feel like I'm making some good progress. I think my last few games with her have really tightened up and I've made some solid plays and taken advantage of her cool tricks. 

Pre-Game

Andrew, my opponent, decided he would play eKreuger against me. His list consisted of the Stormlord himself accompanied by a Wilder, a Gorax and a Stalker, Una the Falconer with a Rotterhorn, two Gallows Groves, Dahlia and Skarath two Wayfarers, two units of shifting stones, a unit of Druids and Overseer and a unit of Bloodweavers. We rolled out scenario from the 2015 packet and got Fire Support. I won the roll to go first and, since there was cover outside of kill box on both sides of the table, I took first turn. 

Deployment 

Taking first deployment I placed Saeryn near the handy wall to hide behind, with the Angels on the flank opposite the Circle flag and my Scytheans opposite my own flag. The pot went more central. The Circle deployed heavily on the flank with my flag on it, with only the Bloodweavers near his flag. The Deathstalkers went near the forest. 

Legion Turn One 

I had a very simple first turn, running all of my beasts up the board, getting the Angels into the forest on the flank with the Deathstalkers and got the Scytheans up near my own flag and within range of the Fuel Cashe for next turn. The Raek made it up onto the hill. Saeryn moved behind the wall and put Respawn on an Angel and tenacitied it too. She also had Banishing ward up on herself and got Tenacity from a Shredder. 

Legion: 0 Circle: 0

Circle Turn One

On Andrew's turn one he decided to enact a daring plan to kill one of my heavies. Una and her Griffon along with the Wilder, gave the front rank of Druids acceleration, allowing them to advance and pull my Scythean up as well as create a cloud wall. The next part of the plan involved having Krueger move up and Gallows the Sycthean. Unfortunately when he moved up he couldn't get LOS to it through the Druids' clouds and so he had to TK himself up to barely get the line on it. He dragged it up and then the Stalker activated and charged, only just managing to kill it after some lacklustre damage rolls. This did leave Krueger sitting on no transfers and so one of the stones and the Tharn moved up to screen. 

Legion: 0 Circle: 0

Legion Turn Two

On my turn two I saw a decent chance to assassinate and decided to take it. I had the Deathstalkers move up to clear some of the more 'in the way' Tharn and then had both Angels move up and shoot the warlock. Boosted hit and damage left him on fire and pretty unhealthy. The Raek then advanced and jumped into melee with him, hitting with one tail and doing enough damage to leave him on a single wound. Saeryn moved further up to the wall and feated, trying to catch Krueger in a Blight Bringer but he was just out. The remaining Scythean charged the Stalker but only got a couple of points of damage on it. I ended my turn and fire didn't go out and the damage roll was enough to finish him off. 

Since the game had been over so quick we agreed to play again using our second casters against each other!

Pregame

This time I was playing my eLylyth list:

eLylyth +5

-Succubus -2

-Ravagore -10 

-Ravagore -10

-Ravagore -10

-Naga Nightlurker -5

-Shredder -2

Deathstalker -2

Deathstalker -2

Shepherd -1

Shepherd -1

Strider Rangers -6

Ranger UA -3

Swamp Gobbers -1

Objective - Bunker

I'm still not sold on the list but I gave it another try anyway. Meanwhile Andrew was playing eMorvahna which had a Gorax, Stalker and Wilder, two Gallows Groves and full Druids too, but also had a max unit of Skinwalkers and UA and max Bloodtrackers and Nualla, a single unit of stones with keeper, and then a couple of minions with the Swamp Gobbers and a Witch Doctor. We decided to keep our table set up the same and keep the scenario. This time I lost the roll for first turn and so Andrew chose to go first and took the side with the trench to deny the ranged defence. 

Deployment 

Andrew deployed with eMorvahna and her beasts opposite her own flag with her battlegroup and the Druids alongside her. Then the Skinwalkers placed themselves centrally. I had Lylyth and her Ravagores deployed with the support staff in the middle of the board. The Tharn then AD'd in a line across the deployment zone and I put my Striders off on the flank opposite the Circle flag. 

Circle Turn One

The Circle started the game running everything up the board, having the Tharn spread out across the board, with the Skinwalkers behind them. The Druids and Gobbers provided a bunch of smoke for his advance and then had the support staff walk into the clouds. eMorvahna put Carnivore on the Skinwalkers and Fog of War on herself. 

Legion: 0 Circle: 0

On my turn I had Lylyth put Shadow Pack up on herself and then advanced up into the trench. She took a shot on a Bloodtracker and missed. So I bought a second, killing the Tharn but missing the snap fire. The Succubus put tenacity on her, moving up to behind the trench. The three Ravagores moved up and shot up the Bloodtrackers, killing three and leaving some scathers. The Naga also moved up and finished off a Bloodtracker too. The Shredder advanced and put Tenacity on the Succubus. The Deathstalkers failed to hit anything under Fog of War so the Rangers paired off to shoot Druids with CMAs and hunter. But they managed to miss all but one shot. Luckily they were able to reform back to relative safety. My Gobbers managed to pop smoke over Lylyth and the support. 

Legion: 0 Circle: 0

Circle Turn Two

On the Circle turn the Bloodtrackers ran around the Scathers and up to jam into my flanking battlegroup. The Skinwalkers also ran, plodding up the board more. The Druids continued up the board, dropping another load of clouds. The Gallows hopped up and allowed eMorvahna to channel a nuke, killing four of the Rangers. The support staff continued to advance, using the cloud from the Gobbers to hunker down and using the objective and the Stalker to cover eMorvahna. 

Legion: 0 Circle: 0

Legion Turn Two 

On my turn two I had Lylyth aim and shoot a Bloodtracker, killing one but missing the second from snap fire. I then feated and shot again, killing another tracker and Nualla with the Snap Fire. Killing Nualla meant the new leader was right at the back of the board and so the others were out of formation and couldn't attack. The Naga was able to move up without issues after that and kill another couple of Tharn. Between them the three Ravagores wiped out all but the leader of the Skinwalkers, leaving a bunch of Scathers in the middle of the board. The combined Striders continued to take shots but got very little done, killing a couple of Druids between them. 

Legion: 0 Circle: 0

Circle Turn Three

On the third Circle turn there were very few Circle models left on the table. Not that eMorvahna two cares. The turn was littered with order of activation problems. He started by having the stones port the Stalker up, with the animus up from the Wilder. Unfortunately this left the stone in eMorvahna's way. Because of this the Gorax moved up and used three Fury to kill it off after some bad boosted damage rolls. The Skinwalker leader and Bloodtracker leader both charged the Naga. The Tracker got the other two girls back in her command but only did negligible damage to the Naga. The Skinwalker was out of range on its charge. Now freed up eMorvahna advanced up to dominate the flag and burned all but one box of health to bring back the Skinwalkers and the Druids to jam up my side of the board, camping 5. The Stalker killed one of the Rangers and then advanced back with Lightning Strike. 

Legion: 0 Circle: 1

Post-Game

Unfortunately at this point we had to call the game before I could get into my turn since the store was closing around us. I feel like I was far enough up on attrition that I could have grinded the game out with more time, or perhaps a better option: I think if I took the free strikes on the two engaged Ravagores and the Naga I could get them and the other Ravagore along with Lylyth to get six shots into her for the game, or at least burn off the transfers and set her on fire. Potentially could've got Pin Cushion on too to really increase my odds. Unfortunately we can't know so we shook and agreed on a draw. I really enjoyed these games and felt a lot less overwhelmed than the other times I've played Circle previously. I'm looking forward to playing again next week!

As always thanks for reading, and don't forget to check out the Facebook page and 'like' for regular post updates, photos and more at www.facebook.com/Mitsuharuonminis 

-M

Mitsuharu on Bat Reps - Learning Legion Thagrosh, Prophet of Everblight vs Kromac, Champion of the Wurm

Hi everyone and welcome to the latest bat rep. This week I decided to change up my list slightly from the one I used last week. I just got (and painted) the BFS as my Facebook followers will have already seen and so I wanted to try them out. To fit them in I dropped one of the Shredders and the Gobbers from the list and swapped out the Foresaken for Shepherds, freeing up the necessary 5 points for them. This left my list as:

Thagrosh, Prophet of Everblight +5

-Succubus -2

-Angelius -9

-Angelius -9

-Carnivean -11

-Naga Nightlurker -5

-Shredder -2

Shepherd -1

Shepherd -1

Max Warspears -8

-Warspear Chieftan -2

Black Frost Shard -5

Objective - Fuel Cashe

This week I managed to get my game in against Andy who's been using Circle and beat me in round two at the last tournament with his Bradigus list in a long grinding game. This time he promised not to drop the Runecarver and instead played a proxy of the new Circle caster, eKromac! His list was pretty beast heavy with Ghetorix, a Gorax, a Rotterhorn Griffon, a Shadowhorn Satyr and a Warpwolf Stalker in the battlegroup, along with a Druid Wilder, a Wayfarer, a unit of Druids with UA, and two units of Shifting Stones, one with UA. We rolled for Scenario and got Incursion from the 2015 packet. I lost the pregame roll but Andy wanted to pick board edge and so I still got first turn. I deployed with my Warspears on one flank along with the BFS and the Carnivean while the Angels took the other. Andy deployed centrally with his Druids out in front. 

I started my turn by running everything up the board taking advantage of defensive terrain, using Thagrosh and the Succubus to put out defensive Animi on the beasts and had Thagrosh cast Fog of War and put Draconic Blessing on the Warspears. 

On Andy's turn the circle pretty much followed suit, advancing up the board behind Druid cloud cover. Kromac used his Howl and gave the Stalker a free animus with his spells. 

I was feeling a bit conservative on my turn and was leery of moving into his threat ranges so only advanced slightly. The Warspears advanced towards the Druids who were their prey and hit every single cloud with great accuracy, unfortunately not quite catching the Druids in their centre, though. The Carnivean advanced up and sprayed a Druid, unable to harm him because of hippy magic, but catching a stone and Ghetorix behind him. I hit the stone and boosted to kill it and then double boosted the hit on Ghetorix to put a handful of damage on him. The BFS advanced to the edge of the hill and got stelthed near the flag. The rest of the army shuffled forwards into better positions for next turn and Thagrosh advanced into the trench and he and the Succubus put out a bunch of animi again. 

On Andy's turn the Druids scattered, getting out of everyone else's way, popping out some more clouds, one heading to contest the flag to my left. Kromac then advanced up and popped his feat. The now freed up Ghetorix charged the Carnivean, warping snacking to RFP the heavy, meaning I couldn't feat it back and he healed some of the damage taken by Ghetorix last turn. Then he used Sprint to advance across and tie up the Warspears. On the other side of the board the Warpwolf Stalker charged an Angelius but thanks to Tenacity he was only able to connect once, not doing enough to finish it off. The rest of the force advanced up the board more, then the Wayfarer advanced up to control the flag to my right scoring the first point for Circle. 

On my turn the Warspears activated and all but one of them declaring charges on Ghetorix, the other going into a Druid, hoping to cause them to break from the Terror. The Druids braved it out and the Warspear that charged them failed his assault and charge against the Druid's high DEF. All three of the charges against Ghetorix that I'd managed to get missed and the other attacks only did a couple of points of damage. The wounded Angel took an Armour Pierce into the Stalker, boosting the attack and damage dice and cranking the roll to put a chunk of damage on it. It bought a second attack hoping for the hard roll, freeing my fury to boost damage, but missed. The second Angel then charged in, getting B2B with the flag and finishing off the Warpwolf with its armour pierce attack and repulsing to push away the Wayfarer. The Naga tried to take out another of the stones this time from the other unit, but didn't quite manage to finish it. The Blackfrost Shard charged the Druid to my left, killing him with a lucky to hit roll on the first attack and controlling that flag. The Shepherd accompanying the dead Carnivean ran across the board to the other flank and the rest of the beasts. Thagrosh and the Succubus then pumped out tenacities on every model in range of them. This put us on one control point each. 

On Andy's turn the Rotterhorn charged up the board, killing one of the BFS and then used its scream to kill the other two, clearing and controlling that flag. Kromac advanced up to the flag and put up Carnage and Howl and took a swing at a Warspear, but missed it with a double 1. Ghetorix then decided to show him how it was done and proceeded to kill the other 5 Warspears singlehandedly. The Shadowhorn charged the Angelius on my far right flank and rolled exactly enough to kill it. The Gorax charged the other, injured Angel but rolled poorly and didn't do much damage at all. The Druids continued to pump smoke and the Wayfarer moved back into the flag and sprayed down a Shepherd, putting Andy on 3 control points to my one. 

At this point two things were very clear. Firstly I was about to lose on scenario and couldn't contest effectively. Secondly Kromac was way upfront and was only camping one Fury. Hail Mary time then. The engaged Warspear moved away, taking a fatal free strike from a Kromac keen to prove he did know what he was doing and he was just unused to Rathrok, ok? I wasn't especially bothered about it since he wasn't achieving anything useful anyway. Then Thagrosh charged Kromac and boosted the attack. He connected and knocked Kromac down to only a couple of damage boxes with a fantastic damage roll. He then bought a second and missed the boosted attack roll. And the third. And the fourth. Humph. Not ideal. I moved on to the Shepherd who healed a little bit off the Angelius and then had the Succubus give it Tenacity. The Angelius then charged Kromac for the Armour Pierce of doom, taking three free strikes along the way. Only the Gorax connected but did exactly enough to cripple Spirit, meaning I couldn't boost or buy extra attacks, meaning that, with one transfer, he was safe. I moved the shredder up to contest the flag in a final effort of defiance. 4-1 and I was engaged by Ghetorix and Kromac on no camp. Kromac finished off Thags, but took a few swings to get there, which is something, meaning a Circle assassination victory. 

This was a fun game and I felt fairly confident going into the final assassination that I had a reasonable, albeit not great, chance to steal the win. I'm really unfamiliar with Circle so it was nice to get some practice against them as I think they're probably one of the factions I know the least. 

In terms of my gameplay, retrospectively I made some glaring mistakes that cost me the game. Learning experiences though, right? First off I was far too cautious moving up the board. I'm used to playing trundling Menoth and so I'm not used to moving up as far as I can with Legion. I should have moved much further and taken more real estate in the early turns. The Warspears should really have run to engage the Druids turn two and locked up his front lines and generally made a nuisance of themselves gumming up the Circle. This is something I can definitely do better in the future. The other major mistake that I only realised looking back was that I'd completely forgotten Death Shroud, which would have meant that my Angel that died would have survived the turn and that the vital Gorax free strike wouldn't have removed my spirit on the charge with the other one, which would have had a huge impact on the outcome if I'd been more on the ball. Obviously I've only got myself to blame and Andy took all the opportunities I handed to him like a good Circle player. Luckily he's a fun guy to play against and so I can't feel too bitter about the loss as it was an enjoyable game!

I feel like this game was particularly useful in helping me recognise some of the flaws with my play using Legion and hopefully I'll be able to capitalise on them in my upcoming games!

As always thanks for reading, and don't forget to check out the Facebook page and 'like' for regular post updates, photos and more at www.facebook.com/Mitsuharuonminis 

-M

Mini Thoughts - Gargantuans Wave 2

So, just like they hint-dropped at Adepticon, PP's SmogCon announcement was the next evolution of Gargantuans! More good news! And unlike the recently announced Colossals, these are pretty much all brand new beasties, not just variants on the old models. For anyone who hasn't seen it yet the video on the Gargantuans is here: http://privateerpress.com/privateer-press-prime-video-channel/gargantuans-evolved. 

Anyway here's my run down of the new Gribblies:

Glacier King

First up on the docket was the latest Troll model, the Glacier King. Horluk's newest buddy is a mountain king that's been in the fridge too long, and come out all badass. As well as a typical 'big fist' (yeah literally) he has something called 'Wind Thrower'. Possibly a crit freeze spray? Maybe not, have to wait and see on that one, but the fists definitely do have some kind of freeze ability. Its animus 'frozen ground' is a knockdown effect, and it sounds like it affects models within so many inches of it. Assuming that this Gargantuan has the same medicore MAT as its predecessor I'm sure auto hitting in melee will be a nice touch. Also it'll give any troll caster access to a small range knockdown effect too, which can be all kinds of useful. Just ask anyone who's seen pKreoss. On top of that it has an ability called 'snowfall' that grants concealment around it. While this might have a cost or a trigger, anything that can help a troll brick across the board with fewer casualties will always be appreciated. 

Storm Raptor

Next up was the Storm Raptor. And bird is the word. Described as 'Krueger's best friend' this little lightning pigeon is the latest addition to Circle. This is the fastest Gargantuan so far, at SPD 7, and with Flight this beastie can whip across the board pretty fast, ignoring terrain along the way. On top of that it has some combination of animi and special abilities that allow it to give boosted electrical attack and damage rolls. Meaning that this thing synergises like crazy with a bunch of other circle guns. Also giving Krueger access to an animus that can boost electrical attacks is just... I mean... Wow. 

Blightbringer

Now here's the one I'm most interested in. Legions new beastie, the Blightbringer. To be honest it's not... Exactly what I was expecting. It looks a lot more bug-like than the majority of Everblight's roster to date. It seems that this gargantuan is more of a utility piece like the new colossals. All they said was that it was constantly spewing ash that could take on a number of abilities. These include causing magic in the area to fail (limited range no spells? Or maybe even a nice little upkeep removal. Kinda AOE Banishing Ward?). Concealment to nearby models. I'm assuming some kind of Ashen Veil? I suppose there's enough prowl in Legion that it could have an extra layer there. And finally one that reduces 'defence and health of enemies' so maybe it'll be like Belphagor's animus or Saeryn's spell of the same name? Interesting. The way they're speaking about the Blighted Breath also imply it's an inherent ability, meanning that its animus is still unknown (more on that later). Those claws look pretty handy too!

Desert Hydra 

Typhon has effectively shown the world three heads are better than one. And what's better than three heads? Five. That's right. They've been talking about it in the fluff forever but it's finally on the tabletop. Skorne's new Gargantuan is the Hydra. Desert Hydra to be precise, although I'm not up enough on my extraordinary zoology to know how many sub-species of Hydra there are. Much like its younger cousin Typhon, the Hydra has the 'multiple heads' special rule. Meaning five heads get 5 initial attacks. That's five Sprays. Or Five Bite attacks. Or any combination of the two. And Five sprays off a huge base? That covers some ground. 

Oh, that's the other thing. There's a model for it. A very nice model. I mean, sure, it looks like a real pain in the ass to assemble and paint, but look at it. Worth. It. Other than the five heads thing (as if that's not enough for you) they didn't really go into much else about it. Its animus wasn't discussed either (I'm getting to it). This looks like a nice little addition to the Skorne forces (pending actual rules obviousl)y. 

Animi

I said I'd get to it! So you might have to bear with me a little on this one. First off the animi of the Blightbringer and Desert Hydra were conspicuous in their absence. Strange not to mention them when they did for the other two. However they also spoiled this art of the Blightbringer:

Now, when Exigence hit everyone was a bit confused by the Warbeast packs. I mean they sucked. I read dozens of articles and forum chains trying to figure out how they were supposed to work. It seemed like they were set up to fail. They didn't do anything that their factions couldn't do better, elsewhere already. Surely PP in their wisdom and foresight must've had a plan? But we couldn't see it. Maybe this is why. We didn't have all the pieces. Put these things together and maybe, just maybe the Blightbringer has something to offer Blight Wasps? Maybe it can spawn them? Or convert enemies into them? The art certainly indicates a link anyway. And from there I don't think it's too much of a leap to think that maybe the Hydra can do something similar for the Scarabs? Obviously this is all just speculation but it seems to make sense to me at least. 

Other Stuff

In addition to the Gargantuans the video had another little sneak at the end. A few flashes of something just as exciting but much less clear. A Gator with candles on his face? Epic Calandra? Some kind of imp gremlins? A Grotesque? Kromac? With Rathrok?!? If that's PP's way of apologising for the recent errata to Circle affecting Kromac then... 

Looks like there's some pretty exciting stuff coming our way in the next year or so. And I for one, can not wait. 

I'll leave you with one final image:

*slow respectful applause*

Don't forget to like Mitsuharu on Minis on Facebook for regular updates!

-M