Mitsuharu on Bat Reps - Learning Legion Thagrosh, Prophet of Everblight vs Vladimir Tzepesci, the Dark Champion

Hey guys welcome to my latest bat rep, and my first with Legion! Finally! This is likely the most I have looked forward to a game in a long time and I was pretty psyched to get models on the table. I was using my pThagrosh practice list that I wrote about in my last CitTM article:

Thagrosh, Prophet of Everblight +5

-Succubus -2

-Ravagore - 10

-Angelius -9

-Scythean -9

-Seraph -8

Nyss Shepherd -1

Nyss Shepherd -1

Forsaken -2

Deathstalker -2

Deathstalker -2

Max Legionnaires -6

Spawning Vessel -3

Objective - Fuel Cashe

I managed to get a game with Mike, who usually plays Trolls but was trying out Khador for the first time. His list consisted of eVlad with a wardog, a Destroyer, Juggernaught and Drago as well as the Great Bears, a unit of Widowmakers, a max unit of winter guard with UA and three rocketeers and Kovnik Joe, two Mortars and a Manhunter. Nick found us a scenario using http://www.rollforscenario.com/ and we got Fire Support. We rolled for first turn and I got a 6, giving me the first turn. 

I deployed with my battlegroup to the right of centre with my Legionaires and Spawning Vessel to the left. Mike set up with his battlegroup in the centre and his Winterguard package to my left. I then popped my Deathstalkers on either flank while his Manhunter and Widowmakers went on his flanks. 

On my first turn I had the Legionaires charge up the board, with three of them killing their brothers to fill up the pot, who then popped out a shredder. The battlegroup then ran up, with the Seraph using Slipstream to shift Thagrosh up slightly. The Deathstalkers advanced up the flanks and Thagrosh moved up, putting out tenacities on all of the battlegroup except the Angelius, casting Fog of War and giving Draconic Strength to the Scythean. 

On Mike's turn he ran up most of his army, the Widowmakers nestled up behind a wall, but were out of range to do any damage. The Manhunter ran into the forest for protection. The Mortar on my right flank advanced up to take a shot at the Legionaires, but it was half an inch short and deviated back, missing everything. The battlegroup ran up and the Winterguard used Bob and Weave and advanced. 

On my turn I had the Legionaires run up towards the Widowmakers followed up by the Spawning Vessel. The seraph used its animus and then moved across the Ravagore around the Obstacle, pushing the Ravagore two inches closer to the Widowmakers. The Seraph then took a Strafe into the Manhunter, killing him but nothing was in range for the second shot from the strafe. The Ravagore, now a bit closer, sacrificed movement to aim a boosted shot into the Widowmakers, killing three of them. The Angelius moved up to the edge of the forest, but was just short on its gun to hit the Destroyer, annoyingly. The Deathstalkers continued to move up the flanks. Thagrosh started his work as the tenacity fairy and started putting out the animus onto most of the battlegroup including himself. 

Mike had been hoping that his Widowmakers and Manhunters would have gotten more work done before dying and so moved the remaining Widowmaker back towards the Mortar and out of the way of the winter guard. The winter guard then moved up and used sprays from the UA to kill a handful of the Legionaries. The Juggernaught and Drago ran up towards my lines while the Destroyer took a shot at the Scythean, sticking a bit of damage on it. Vlad advanced up, out of kill box, hiding between the Great Bears. The mortar on my left took a shot at the Legionaires, but missed, scattering back to kill one of the pot, which was full of dead Legionaires at this point, and hit the Ravagore but failed to damage. 

I started my turn by reaving in all of my fury and taking my Vengence move to reposition the Legionaires to get them better charge lanes on the Winter Guard. The Seraph took a strafe shot on the Juggernaught, only rolling two this turn again, chipping the paintwork but doing minimal damage. The Ravagore then moved up and took a shot at a bundle of Winter Guard, catching a clump of them with the AOE. Only one failed their tough check, though, however the animus set the survivors on fire. The remaining Legionaires charged the closest winter guard and remaining Widowmakers, missing all but one attack thanks to poor dice rolls. The Pot then spawned a Stinger who moved up and sprayed but completely failed to kill anyone. The far right Deathstalker continued its extreme flank, killing the Mortar on that side. The Ravagore and Seraph were running hot and so the Shepherds took the fury off them. The Scythean then charged Drago, moving to also get the Juggernaught in melee. He then proceeded to hit Drago twice, triggering the Chain Attack, getting a hit on both the Juggernaught and Drago. When the smoke cleared and he was out of fury Drago was left with only a couple of boxes. Not wanting to fall shy on the piece exchange I flew the Angelius in to finish it off with an armour pierce charge, then the foresaken came up to take its fury off, giving her two. Thagrosh continued to dole out Tenacity to everyone and camp on a healthy stack of transfers. 

On Mike's turn he continued to whittle down my forces. The Winter Guard on fire all died as it didn't go out. Joe started by moving up and shooting at one of the Legionaires. Since the Legionaire was engaged he missed and ended up shooting one of his own Winter Guard in the back, but they passed their tough roll. The Winter Guard then took some shots and sprays into the Legionaries and the Stinger, killing two of the troops but missing the lesser with all of the shots. The Destroyer charged the Angelius but had trouble hitting its high DEF and only got one solid hit, which did a moderate amount of damage. Vlad then went and feated, affecting himself, the wardog and the Great Bears before running out of the way of the nearby beasts. The bears then activated and charged the Scythean, killing it with ease. 

On my turn I had the Ravagore move across the board and take an optimistic animus and shot at Vlad, but this missed despite the boost thanks to the feat bonus, deviating forwards to utterly miss everything, leaving a scather behind the caster. The Angelius took a double boosted Armour pierce hit on the Destroyer, doing a high amount of damage, but was then unable to damage it much more afterwards. The Foresaken also charged the Destroyer, but only managed a few points of damage to the high ARM Jack. The Seraph continued to plink shots into the Juggernaught, rolling a full 4 shots, boosting damage on all of them, but only doing a middling amount of damage to it. The Pot then produced a second Stinger, who joined the first in spraying over the Winter Guard, killing the UA and two of the Guardsmen between them. The Legionaires' Vengence and charges killed another couple of Guard, but Joe passed his tough to survive another turn. The Deathstalker on my left flank took out the other mortar, and the other one did a few points of damage to the objective. Thagrosh then moved up to the objective to get a line on the friendly flag to dominate next turn and then feated (not shown in the below pic) to put the Scythean back in play in front of him. 

Unfortunately at this point Mike had to call the game as he needed to leave to get home. This was a shame as I'd been enjoying the game and had wanted to play it out, but since we were new to our factions the game had taken a bit longer in the tank than usual and so it had gotten quite late. We discussed the game while packing up and Mike felt that I had a significant upper hand in attrition that he wouldn't be able to come back from, especially with me in position to dominate my own flag next turn. You can never rule out a Hail Mary assassination run with Vlad though!  

I thoroughly enjoyed playing Legion. I was slightly worried going into it that I'd be disappointed with them after building them up in my head so much. I really think that their play style is much better suited to my preferred approach and they're a much better fit for me. 

In terms of the game, retroactively I probably should have moved Thagrosh across into a position to dominate a turn earlier to allow me to start scoring sooner. I also probably shouldn't have taken the shot on eVlad in my final turn and continued to wear down the Winter Guard. Mike's remaining two Jacks were beat up enough to not pose too much of a threat to my beasts but I'd have enjoyed seeing where he went from there. I feel like I got to explore all of the models I had in the list pretty well. The Spawning Vessel is an awesome psychological tool since it really takes the sting out of your guys being butchered if you get to benefit from it later! 

This game has only whetted my appetite to play more Legion and I'm excited to get them back on the board! 

Hope you've all enjoyed my first foray into Everblight because there's plenty more to come!

As always check out the Facebook page and like for regular post updates, photos and more at www.facebook.com/Mitsuharuonminis 

-M

Mitsuharu on Bat Reps - Grand Scrutator Severius vs. Vladimir Tzepesci, the Dark Prince & Hoarluk Doomshaper, Shaman of the Gnarls

Hi guys, welcome back to the latest battle report. This week I actually managed to get two games in with my new pSeverius list that I wrote about in my CitTM article last week. For those who didn't read it or need a reminder the list comprised of:

pSeverius +6

-Heirophant -2

-Blessings of Vengence -7

-Reckoner -8

-Templar -8

Vessel of Judgement -9

Vassal Mechanic -1

Vassal of Menoth -2

Wrack -1

eEiryss -3

Gorman Di Wulfe -2

Saxon Orrik -2

Max Choir of Menoth -3

Max Temple Flameguard with UA -8

Objective - Bunker 

I was looking forward to giving it a nice test on the table. The first game I managed to play was against Mark and his Khador who I've played several times before. He was also trying out a new list, this time using pVlad. His list included Behemoth, a Spriggan, an Iron Fang Kovnik, a Koldun Lord, Kovnik Joe, a max unit of Assault Kommandos with a Flamethrower attachment, the Great Bears, a max unit of Winter Guard, and Aiyanna and Holt with Koldun Kapitan Valachev. We rolled off for scenario and got Fire Support from the 2015 scenario packet. I won the roll to go first and pre-deployed my Vessel left of centre and the battlegroup to the centre, with the TFG off to my right flank. Mark deployed his jacks and Vlad around the centre, while his units took up each flank. 

On my first turn I put a focus on each of my jacks and then had Sevvy place Eye of Menoth on himself and Defender's ward on the TFG, who also got pathfinder from Orrik. After which everything ran up to varying degrees, since I was concerned about his threat ranges. Eiryss ran into the forest and Gorman advanced to throw out smoke. Sevvy and his Heirophant moved up behind the wall, annoyingly still inside the kill box. 

On the other side of the board things went quite similarly. Behemoth received one from Vlad and then everything ran up, with the Koldun Power Boosting the Spriggan allowing it to run, ending behind the objective. 

On my turn it was time to start killing things. The Templar moved up and away, freeing the Vessel to move up and zap the Winter Guard, killing two. The Blessings of Vengence ran over towards the winter guard too, allowing Sevvy to move up, out of the kill box and then arc an Ashes to Ashes onto the Winter Guard, killing another handful, though one passed his tough check. The TFG got pathfinder from Orrik, and then advanced up with shield wall and iron zeal to make them DEF 15 and ARM 23 with Set Defence. The Reckoner advanced up to take a shot at the Spriggan, damaging the paintwork but little else. Eiryss moved over to shoot the Spriggan but rolled a 2 after I stupidly said 'anything but double ones'. Gorman moved up and threw out smoke again. 

Mark was prepared to retaliate. He advanced Vlad up to just behind the Behemoth and cast Signs and Portents to improve his rolls. The Assault Kommandos advanced through the difficult terrain and shot at the TFG but failed to hit most of them, with only one hit, taking no damage but getting tagged with a flare. Following that the Great Bears charged in with Backswing but only managed to kill one Flameguard. The Spriggan moved up and used its targeting to hit Eiryss, robbing her of Stealth and then killed her with his second shot. The Kovnik then tried to charge the Objective but was just too short. Aiyanna and Holt moved up, the elf was too far to nail Kiss on the Vessel and Holt pinged a couple of shots of it. The Winter guard got an additional attack die from Joe and then moved up with most of them taking shots at Sevvy, but the first one missed despite having 4 dice, drop the lowest, the rest of them only doing a couple of points of damage between them. 

On my turn I realised that Vlad had moved up to get out of Kill Box and was camping nothing. I allocated one each to the Reckoner and BoV, and upkept EoM but let DW drop. The Vessel moved up and fired its zap at the Winter Guard and managed to kill 3 of them. The Reckoner then advanced up and boosted a shot into Vlad to get the flare on him. This shot was dice damage but I only rolled a 3. I'd been hoping for more and now I wasn't too sure on my ability to finish him this turn. But then I remembered my Vassal, who had to move around my poorly placed choir and used Ancilliary attack to get another shot, thanks to Flare I was able to hit again and rolled a much bigger load of damage. BoV then ran across the board to get Vlad into his LoS, allowing Sevvy to arc a boosted Immolation into him, finishing him off, netting me an early assassination win. 

This was a short game and as we discussed after the game Vlad's positioning could have been better to block me out a bit more. I rolled quite low on my Ashes to Ashes and Admonisher bounces but it was still awesome blowing up his winter guard. The TFG with Defender's Ward demonstrated how indestructible they can be when everything lines up for them. 

Since the game had ended quite early in the night our (brand new) PG Dave asked me if I wanted to have a game against his Trolls. I agreed, congratulating him on the future win. He was playing a pDoomy list which was (shockingly) a tier 4 Runes of War list made up of pDoomshaper, Mulg, an Earthborn, a Mauler and an Axer, a max unit of Krielstones with UA and 4 units of Runeshapers with Jannisa. Dave won the roll to go first on Incursion and took the first turn. He deployed two units of Runeshapers on each flank, with the stones and battlegroup central. I deployed with most of my army off to my left flank, with the Vessel and the Reckoner on the right flank, Sevvy and support left of central and the TFG on the far left with Orrik. 

Dave went first and ran his Runeshapers up the board followed up by the battlegroup and the stones, with Doomshaper and the Trolls throwing out some defensive animi, and Doomshaper putting Banishing Ward onto one of the Runeshapers. Jannisa threw out a wall in front of the battlegroup. 

On my turn I moved up a bit (Spoiler Alert: not nearly far enough!) the Vessel moved up, trying to get in range of the Runeshapers but was too far away. The TFG turtled up into Shield Wall and shuffled up the board. Orrik ran up the board. The jacks ran up to get some more board. Just like last game Sevvy put out DW on the TFG and EoM on himself again. Gorman advanced up and popped smoke. Eiryss, not wanting to waste her a second time, ran across and back. 

Dave then ran his Runeshapers up, with one unit camping on the flag and the other screening them, setting him up to score next turn since I hadn't moved up far enough to properly contest the flags. The battlegroup and Doomshaper advanced further up, behind a wall Jannisa threw out, putting out the defensive animi again. Finally Doomshaper feated. 

On my turn I needed to clear the Runeshapers off the flags. I upkept both my spells and put one on each of my heavies. The Vessel stood still to aim and then shot the nearest Runeshaper, arcing to 3 others, forcing a passed tough on the initially hit model, but killing the other three that got hit. BoV moved up, across the wall to line up for an Ashes to Ashes. Sevvy arced into the Troll on the flag, killing two, and he then moved towards the Vessel to keep the Reckoner in EoM. Eiryss aimed and shot Banishing Ward off the Runeshapers. The Reckoner then advanced to the side and shot the Runeshaper on the flag, who passed a tough check, but I used an ancilliary to clear him off finally. The Templar advanced into the maximum reach range on one of the Runeshapers and killed it, before using Beat Back to back away. The TFG moved up, with three clumping into the nearest Runeshaper, with the rest moving up and using Iron Zeal. The three on the Runeshaper did a bunch of damage but didn't finish it off this turn, but did set it on fire. Gorman threw black oil onto another of the Runeshapers. 

On the following turn the Runeshaper on fire died. The remaining regular Runeshaper on my left flank advanced up to throw a rock at the TFG, but with all their buffs it missed and the blast wasn't enough to hurt them. Doomshaper moved up and put Transmutation on himself and then advanced to get Sevvy into his Control area and then purified, clearing off his own buff. This left Doomy exposed, but he then moved up his battlegroup to hide him, with the Earthborn getting onto the flag, putting out his Defensive buffs again, and having Jannisa drop a wall. The Runeshapers on my right flank moved back up into the flag, then chucked rocks to kill my choir near the Reckoner. The blinded Runeshaper stumbled away from Gorman, presumably trying to get the black oil off himself only to walk into the Mauler who hefted him back at Gorman, killing them both. Dave ended the turn, scoring two points. 

On my turn, and with the scenario pressure high, I allocated one to the Reckoner and a full three to the Templar. Sevvy, with a little help from the Heirophant got my upkeeps back out on himself and the TFG, and moved slightly off to the side. The Vessel stood still to aim and shot the Runeshaper in the forest, with the Admonisher allowing it to kill both models on that flag. The Reckoner then ran over to control the flag on my right. The TFG advanced up to the left flag, planning to attack in groups of three, but the first group killed the Runeshaper. The Mauler was also contesting the flag and so I charged in with the Templar, getting lucky with the dice and one-rounded it, using the Beat Back to move slightly further away. I ended the turn and gained 2 points, while Dave secured his third. 

 

Dave went into some serious consideration at the start of his turn, measuring Doomshaper's control area multiple times to check if the Earthborn would be in charge range of Sevvy. He decided he wasn't but had another plan to get at him. Mulg activated first, charging the Templar to get out of the Earthborn's way, trashing my heavy, but not moving in to contest the flag, despite being able to goad. The Earthborn then activated and charged a choir member thanks to rush, goading from the kill into Sevvy and, thanks to fortune, smushed him into the dirt securing Dave the win. 

I thought this game went better than I expected it to and I ended with 3 control points to 4 (the Reckoner was on the right flag so would be inert when Sevvy died) which was ok, but as Dave pointed out he would have moved his stone up to contest my left flag and I would have had a hard time clearing his trolls out thanks to self-sacrifice on the stone, but I did have a high volume of attacks from the TFG and so I might have managed to close it out, but we'll never know. I held back way too much in this game and should've been contesting the flags much earlier. I let Dave lock me out of Scenario and then failed to take opportunity to come back in and contest when I did have the chance. 

Both of these games were great fun and I feel like they helped put the list through its paces. I'm excited to get it on the table at the tournament, but I should have another practice game battle report next week first. 

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-M