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

Mitsuharu on Bat Reps - Learning Legion Thagrosh, Prophet of Everblight vs. The Harbinger of Menoth

Hey gang, welcome back to another battle report. This week I managed to get a game in with one of the developing players in our local meta. I decided this week to give my 'competitive' Thagrosh list from CitTM a try. It was made up of:

Thagrosh, Prophet of Everblight +5

-Succubus -2

-Angelius -9

-Angelius -9

-Carnivean -11

-Naga Nightlurker -5

-Shredder -2

-Shredder -2

Foresaken -2

Foresaken -2

Max Warspears -8

-Warspear Chieftan -2

Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew -1

Objective - Fuel Cashe

This is a potentially very hard hitting list that can take advantage of Thagrosh's spells and abilities well, so I was interested in trying it out. Liam, who I was playing, had constructed his list on the fly, as he had been better prepared for a 35 point game. He was also playing Menoth, which meant that in addition to my overall experience edge I was also intimately familiar with his faction too! The list that he built was Harbinger with two Repenters, a Templar, a Vanquisher, a Heirophant, an Exemplar Seneschal, a Paladin of the Wall, the Covenant of Menoth, a maximum choir of Menoth, a maximum unit of Cinerators and a maximum unit of Errants. The game we were playing was Close Quarters and I won the roll to go first. I deployed with most of my force to the right of centre, while the Menoth bunched up in the centre of the board. I had the Warspears Prey the Cinerators. 

On my turn I ran everyone up the board, with Thagrosh, the Succubus and the Shredders putting out defensive spells and animi across the board. The Orgrun got Draconic Strength and then the Gobbers let out their cloud to cover Thagrosh and the Naga and I hunkered down to take Harbinger's feat. 

On his turn Liam had most of his stuff run forwards, taking a big chunk of board space. The Harbinger then feated and charged up the board, contacting the back of her heavy jacks before she got too far, catching my army in her feat. 

On my turn I couldn't do very much without taking a POW 14. So I didn't. The Carnivean stood still to aim and took out a couple of the Errants, boosting to hit against all four hit. Similarly the Angelii took pot shots at the nearest Cinerator, but despite their poor defence one missed and the other failed to crack armour. Thagrosh kicked out a couple more defensive animi without moving forwards. The Warspears shuffled to the right of the board, getting more distance around the forest on that flank then the Gobbers made another cloud. 

On his turn Liam had the Errants move up and take some shots at the Angelius and Carnivean with their crossbows but didn't hit the Angelius and didn't wound the Carnivean. A couple of them did manage to wound the Warspear UA but not enough to kill him. In his rush to get the Errants up the board he'd forgotten to allocate any focus this turn and so simply had the heavy jacks advance up the board, with a Repenter missing a shot on the Angelius and the Vanquisher deviating a shot that hit the Angelius but did no damage. The Cinerators and the Paladin continued plodding up their flank. Harbinger moved up to just behind her Jacks and used Purification to clear off my spells. 

On my turn I had the Carnivean advance onto the nearby hill and had him spray the Errants, killing a couple. The Foresaken moved up and used its blight bomb to hit all of the Errants but only succeeded in killing one or two. Thagrosh moved up and put Draconic Strength on an Angelius and put Fog back out. The Naga moved up and took a shot at Harbinger but missed. The Angelius then charged Harbinger through the forest, but thanks to Awe he missed the boosted armour pierce charge attack as well as the second attack he bought. Not what I wanted. The other Angelius charged a Cinerator but missed its charge attack too. The Warspears trudged up towards the Cinerators. Meanwhile the Foresaken jogged up and ate up the Cinerator Angelius' Fury. 

On his turn Liam put two focus on the Templar, and one each on the Repenters. He then started with Harbinger, using Purification to clear off my defensive abilities and then cast crusader's call. The positioning of the jacks meant that while I had reach on Harbinger her 0.5" melee couldn't get the Angelius back. The Templar then took a swing on the Angelius but missed all three of his attacks. The Vanquisher also took a swing but missed too. The dice were not friendly this game. The Repenter to my left charged the Carnivean, hitting but failing to damage his high ARM. On the other flank the other Repenter sprayed on the Angelius engaging the Cinerator but missed. The Cinerators then charged the Angelius, getting two on it in addition to the one already engaging it. Two of them hit its high DEF and did a reasonable amount of damage, crippling body and most of mind on the beast. The paladin tried to charge it too, but positioned to take a free strike that killed him. The choir moved up and put passage on the jacks since he'd forgotten to use battle at the start of the turn. 

On my turn I had the Naga advance to clear out the two Errants contesting my flag. Thagrosh moved up to dominate the flag and put Draconic Strength back on the Angelius and then threw out some Defensive animi. Then the Angelius went and this time it managed to hit the boosted armour pierce attack. With Harby not camping anything this reduced her armour to 7, putting me at dice +9 for the attack. I boosted the damage roll and killed her with the single attack, winning the game. 

This was an interesting game where both of us seemed to have pretty bad luck with our dice throughout. I like the list, but I think I deployed the Warspears poorly as they ended up having no impact on the game itself. I also learned that the Succubus doesn't have fearless, despite being a godless four-armed dragon woman herself and apparently can't get too close to a forsaken without crying like a little baby Nyss girl and then running away. Not that I'm bitter or anything. 

I'm looking forward to using this list again next week and seeing if I can get some more use out of all of the pieces in there. 

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

Cogs in the TheoryMachine

Hi all, and welcome back to the latest installation of Cogs in the TheoryMachine! Following the Valentines Massacre results from a week ago, I decided I needed to get more practice with some of the more traditionally tournament viable casters for the faction. I'm pretty ok with my eFeora play, and I got a decent run through with both pSeverius and pKreoss when I started playing Menoth. The caster I really wanted to get to grips with, though, was Harbinger.

I don't think that there would be any argument that she's one of the best casters in Menoth, and probably the game as a whole. Having said that she can be tricky to play, and I have very limited experience playing with her. In fact if you skim back through the archives I took her to a Tournament at the Outpost last year with a single practice game and got fairly consistently schooled using her against more experienced oppenents. To overcome this I've decided that now is the time to get a handle on her starting by playing her for the next few weeks until I feel confident enough with her. 

The list

The Harbinger of Menoth +5

-Heirophant -2

-Reckoner -8

-Devout -5

Minimum Choir -2

Wracks -1

Vassal of Menoth -2

Maximum Exemplar Errants with UA -10

Exemplar Errant Seneschal -2

Rhupert Carvolo -2

Covenant of Menoth -2

Minimum Holy Zealots with UA -6

Maximum Exemplar Bastions -8

Dartan Vilmon -3

Paladin of the Order of the Wall -2

Objective: Fuel Cache

The idea with this list is all control and denial. The Errant package (Max Errants with UA, Seneschal, Rhupert and Covenant) is designed to be a massive pain for my opponent to get rid of while also dishing out a reasonable amount of damage to clear zones etc. with Hunter Quick Work shots from charging weaponmasters. The Zealots are also in the list for zone control, jamming and obviously super-fun bomb throwing japes. The Bastions form a second wave to counter attack whatever's left from the rest of the grind in the list, adding in a hard to shift force that can polish off any troublemakers. The Devout is in the list to offer squishy Harbinger some protection from ranged, while the Reckoner is there to handle any heavy ARM that comes up. The support package is the deluxe edition with choir, wracks, vassal and a Heirophant. Then finally Dartan and his little brother are in the list to offer an immovable object to sit on flags and in zones and simply not die. Add in all of Harbingers cool native abilities (Awe for the pseudo DEF buff, FOCUS 10 for... being awesome, and obviously martyrdom) and the list becomes hard to kill and pretty heavy hitting on the retaliation. 

Test Game 

Ok. Full disclosure: I did actually already use this list and I was going to write it up as a bat rep... but the game went long and the store was literally closing around us at the time, so it didn't end properly and I didn't feel like it reflected how the game was going. I played against a Legion list that included pThagrosh with a Carnivean, Angelius and Scythean, along with a max unit of Legionnaires, a max Spawning vessel, the Black Frost Shard, a Foresaken, a shepherd and a Throne. We played Two Fronts from the 2015 Steamroller. 

My list out attritioned throughout the game, wiping out swathes of Legion models, including killing all the heavies (and one twice). The Reckoner in particular was very effective, using Enliven and Assault to dodge charges from a heavy and then one round it in the next turn. The Errants did a great job of making a nuisance of themselves while also whittling down the Legionaries. I wiped out the majority of the force and survived a couple of long shot assassination attempts along the way. By the last real turn his force was a Harrier with one box, a shredder, the Throne, Thagrosh, a mostly dead Carnivean and the Blackfrost Shard, while I had only lost about half the Errants along with all the Zealots, and only had a single model (the Harrier) stopping me from controlling the opposing zone.

I was in a commanding position and could easily have gotten Harby to a safe position from which I could continue to attrition and ultimately win on scenario, which is what I would have done normally, but as the store was closing and we had to get finished, I instead went for the cool option of charging the Throne with Harbinger to remove the last big threat. I used a boosted Cataclysm and a couple of melee attacks to hurt it and then poured damage onto it, and the Reckoner killed the Carnivean. The Throne was left on 1 box when I was done, and so I allowed him to take his turn, and he managed to kill Harbinger using every model he had left on the table to pull it off. It's a shame that we didn't have more time to be able to play the game out properly as I feel if I played it safe I was in a strong position to win the game within a couple more turns. More importantly I felt that this game gave me a good chance to play around with her abilities and use them effectively in a real game. 

I'm really looking forward to having a another practice with her to hone my experience a little further. I'll be sure to tell you all about it as it happens!

Stay tuned for more, and don't forget to like Mitsuharu on Minis on Facebook for more updates!

-M