So, I made a new year's resolution to beat my last years painting. Today is the last day to take a look on that.
My new years resolution for 2011 had an extra clause: I was to go to a tournament using Circle of Orboros. I went to Ropecon warmachine/hordes tournament, so I succeeded there.
Now, a summary of my paintings:
Cryx:
Lord Exhumator Scaverous
Ripjaw
Reaper/Slayer/Malice/Erebus magnetised kit
3x Scrap Thralls
"Baselift", meaning repainting bases to look a bit nicer.
Mercenaries:
Ragman
Skorne:
Dominar Rasheth
Rhinodon
Cyclops Shaman
6x Cataphract Cetrati
4x Praetorian Swordmen
Aptimus Marketh
Extoller Soulward
Flayer Cannon
Circle of Orboros:
Wold Guardian
Woldwatcher
Reeve Hunter
Tharn Ravager Chieftain
Stone Keeper
Minions:
Thrullg
Totem Hunter
Lanyssa Ryssyll
Scenery:
Couple of barrel obstacles
Overturned pillar
Three pieces of craters
Pond
Other:
6x When Darkness Comes miniatures
6x Talisman miniatures
Now, last year I painted only two heavy warjacks/warbeasts and Wurmwood, that were on large base. This year I painted five.
Last year I painted only two medium based models too, but they were both warcasters: Lich Lords Venethrax & Asphyxious. This year I painted thirteen of them. Nice gain there.
2010 seemed to be the year of small based models, as I painted 25 of them. Now there will be some tough competition, let's see... Only fourteen of them this year. But as I had a nice surplus from medium based models, it seems that I painted quite a bit more Warmachine/Hordes models this year.
Other models, then.
Board-game sized playing pieces weren't written up in too much detail in 2010, so I guess that I painted around 20 Talisman & Touch of Evil miniatures.
This year I did only 12 of such pieces, but I'm quite sure that terrain pieces I did this year make up for at least 8 tiny miniatures.
I think I can say that I succeeded in my new years resolution.
I'll refrain myself from making a resolution for 2012, because looks like it will be quite a busy year. But I'd like to get to play Talisman & Touch of Evil a little more.
Saturday, December 31, 2011
Forming a tradition: Part II
Now to the second game of Warmachine I played yesterday.
I wanted to try a weird list with Scaverous. It went like this:
Scaverous
- 2x Slayer
- 2x Nightwretch
And opponent had almost the same list as earlier, except with a caster change:
High Exemplar Kreoss
- Reckoner
- Dervish
- Revenger
Paladin of the Order of the Wall
I lost the starting roll.
Kreoss had cast Lamentation and Defenders Ward was on Revenger.
First picture is probably taken from end of my third turn, where Reckoner had been taking pot shots at my heavy warjacks.
Revenger had charged Slayer that didn't have Death Ward on. Reckoner had also shot the same warjack earlier, but opponent rolled plenty of double 1's and triple 1's during the whole game to balance my last game's 6's somewhat.
Dervish had been thrown away with Telekinesis to prevent a charge. Both slayers did a combo-strike on Revenger, and I was lucky there, as first combo strike (hitting with seven on two dice) destroyed Revenger's shield. Second Slayer rolled a lucky hit with two dice too. Revenger lost movement and shield arm during the process.
Then things got absurd.
Kreoss forgot to use his feat, yet everything charged into melee.
It's a shame we had to proxy so much, because really. It was absurd:
Every single model there is still standing, even with just a couple of damage points.
Even Kreoss himself is banging at Slayer.
But as Kreoss had Lamentation on, Scaverous was left with only bad choices. He couldn't really use his feat and because Kreoss had charged in, Scaverous couldn't walk out of Lamentation range and start flinging spells through one arc node that wasn't engaged.
What I did was moving Scaverous away to a nearby hill and allocating focus to warjacks and hoping for the best. Revenger was destroyed, but Slayer loaded up with focus merely tickled Reckoner.
Nearly broken Slayer landed a solid hit on Paladin, who took three points of damage in. The bugger wasn't even in any stance at that moment.
Next round Kreoss didn't forget to use his feat, and all of my warjacks except one nightwretch (with arc node intact) were blasted by Reckoner & pals.
Scaverous was left with little choice. He started camping all focus and hoping to survive.
He did survive pretty long, killing Paladin in the process and doing little damage to warjacks.
And once he got a possible charge lane to Kreoss (full health) when he was engaged by Reckoner and Dervish and being surrounded by wrecks, Scaverous decided that this was where it all ends.
He cast Ghost Walk on himself and charged Kreoss on the oil barrels with 3 focus left.
First hit scored 5 points in. Second hit scored five points in. There was no third attack.
Kreoss then beat Scaverous personally in melee. Scaverous had only 6 hit points left, though, but Kreoss took them all away with just one glorious attack. Again, the one picture where every model is what it should, hasn't focused right. I guess it focused on the red die back there.
Oh well. Here is the last epic shot:
I wanted to try a weird list with Scaverous. It went like this:
Scaverous
- 2x Slayer
- 2x Nightwretch
And opponent had almost the same list as earlier, except with a caster change:
High Exemplar Kreoss
- Reckoner
- Dervish
- Revenger
Paladin of the Order of the Wall
I lost the starting roll.
Kreoss had cast Lamentation and Defenders Ward was on Revenger.
First picture is probably taken from end of my third turn, where Reckoner had been taking pot shots at my heavy warjacks.
Revenger had charged Slayer that didn't have Death Ward on. Reckoner had also shot the same warjack earlier, but opponent rolled plenty of double 1's and triple 1's during the whole game to balance my last game's 6's somewhat.
Dervish had been thrown away with Telekinesis to prevent a charge. Both slayers did a combo-strike on Revenger, and I was lucky there, as first combo strike (hitting with seven on two dice) destroyed Revenger's shield. Second Slayer rolled a lucky hit with two dice too. Revenger lost movement and shield arm during the process.
Then things got absurd.
Kreoss forgot to use his feat, yet everything charged into melee.
It's a shame we had to proxy so much, because really. It was absurd:
Every single model there is still standing, even with just a couple of damage points.
Even Kreoss himself is banging at Slayer.
But as Kreoss had Lamentation on, Scaverous was left with only bad choices. He couldn't really use his feat and because Kreoss had charged in, Scaverous couldn't walk out of Lamentation range and start flinging spells through one arc node that wasn't engaged.
What I did was moving Scaverous away to a nearby hill and allocating focus to warjacks and hoping for the best. Revenger was destroyed, but Slayer loaded up with focus merely tickled Reckoner.
Nearly broken Slayer landed a solid hit on Paladin, who took three points of damage in. The bugger wasn't even in any stance at that moment.
Next round Kreoss didn't forget to use his feat, and all of my warjacks except one nightwretch (with arc node intact) were blasted by Reckoner & pals.
Scaverous was left with little choice. He started camping all focus and hoping to survive.
He did survive pretty long, killing Paladin in the process and doing little damage to warjacks.
And once he got a possible charge lane to Kreoss (full health) when he was engaged by Reckoner and Dervish and being surrounded by wrecks, Scaverous decided that this was where it all ends.
He cast Ghost Walk on himself and charged Kreoss on the oil barrels with 3 focus left.
First hit scored 5 points in. Second hit scored five points in. There was no third attack.
Kreoss then beat Scaverous personally in melee. Scaverous had only 6 hit points left, though, but Kreoss took them all away with just one glorious attack. Again, the one picture where every model is what it should, hasn't focused right. I guess it focused on the red die back there.
Oh well. Here is the last epic shot:
Friday, December 30, 2011
Forming a tradition: Last games of WM/H in the great pine woods of Kuhmo
Last night I played a couple of Warmachine games at Kuhmo, where I am staying for the new year's eve.
About the same time last years we played two 15 point games against the same opponent. Hence tradition.
This time around, though, opponent had forgotten to take his miniatures with him and had only a couple of nearly finished models with him. This lead to... slight proxying, so, to avoid confusion I'm keeping pictures to the minimum.
We decided to play Kill Box scenario to restrict running away somewhat.
First game was Iron Lich Asphyxious vs Reznik, with following lists:
Asphyxious
- Reaper
- Cankerworm
- 2x Nightwretch
Necrotech & Scrap Thrall
Reznik
- Reckoner
- Revenger
- Dervish
Dartan Vilmon
I was amazed to win the starting roll. However, then I realised that actually a pattern continues. Lose 5 starting rolls, win one. Lose 5 starting rolls, win one.
Ah well, after running with every model except Asphyxious and casting Scything Touch on Cankerworm, opponent did a bold move.
Reckoner assaulted Nightwretch on top of a hill and scored a hit and dealt some damage. Now, I had Reaper so it wasn't actually that good move. But really, game would have probably looked a lot different if either of us had remembered Witch Hound special skill on Reznik.
The Nightwretch shot the Reckoner in question, and after that Parasite was cast upon it. Reaper advanced and shot its harpoon at Reckoner and dragged it to its death. Now, if Witch Hound would've been remembered, Reckoner would have taken only Parasite and then walked out of range of Reaper's harpoon.
Damage rolls weren't exactly awesome, but fully loaded Reaper and armor piercing Cankerworm with the earlier shot from Nightwretch were enough to eventually destroy it.
Well, next Revenger that had Ignite cast upon it charged Reaper and almost wrecked it, except no systems were broken.
Reznik used his feat, so Asphyxious wasn't able to allocate focus to warjacks. Which pretty much saved Protectorate's warjacks - Cankerworm and Reaper merely scratched Revenger.
But Asphyxious was out of Reznik's feat range, so he used one Nightwretch to fry Vilmon away. And I've written down what proxies what on the picture.
Reznik, to gain benefits from better cover than open ground, charged into melee with a nightwretch. I saw a little bit of opening there, so moved Nightwretch away that was wrecked by a free strike.
Asphyxious had allocated three focus to Reaper, but Reaper was engaged by what was left of Revenger. Asphyxious moved to engage Revenger, but then I was left with a funny little dilemma. Revenger still had its shield intact, though otherwise it was almost broken. To prevent the push-back effect of Revenger's shield, Asphyxious had to cast Hellfire to bring the shield down. Two Hellfires did the job, but in the process Asphyxious had to use his feat. Finally Revenger went down and Reaper was free to drag Reznik to his almost certain death.
Well. It didn't work out that well.
Reaper managed to damage Reznik with harpoon, but when Reznik was being dragged, he stumbled upon Dervish. Assassination failed.
Last Nightwretch walked to shooting range and managed to score a hit on Reznik. Damage roll was 6, 6.
Hero of the match: Nightwretch, there and then.
Well, Reznik isn't known for being a wuzzy.
He cast Engine of Destruction on himself and beat up Reaper and camped up four focus. Battle came into caster versus caster, with both casters having used up their feat.
Asphyxious charged into melee with Reznik after castin Scything Touch on himself.
Iron lich scored a hit and damage roll came out as 6, 6, 6.
End of Reznik.
Second write-up needs to wait it seems, as a friend came over.
About the same time last years we played two 15 point games against the same opponent. Hence tradition.
This time around, though, opponent had forgotten to take his miniatures with him and had only a couple of nearly finished models with him. This lead to... slight proxying, so, to avoid confusion I'm keeping pictures to the minimum.
We decided to play Kill Box scenario to restrict running away somewhat.
First game was Iron Lich Asphyxious vs Reznik, with following lists:
Asphyxious
- Reaper
- Cankerworm
- 2x Nightwretch
Necrotech & Scrap Thrall
Reznik
- Reckoner
- Revenger
- Dervish
Dartan Vilmon
I was amazed to win the starting roll. However, then I realised that actually a pattern continues. Lose 5 starting rolls, win one. Lose 5 starting rolls, win one.
Ah well, after running with every model except Asphyxious and casting Scything Touch on Cankerworm, opponent did a bold move.
Reckoner assaulted Nightwretch on top of a hill and scored a hit and dealt some damage. Now, I had Reaper so it wasn't actually that good move. But really, game would have probably looked a lot different if either of us had remembered Witch Hound special skill on Reznik.
The Nightwretch shot the Reckoner in question, and after that Parasite was cast upon it. Reaper advanced and shot its harpoon at Reckoner and dragged it to its death. Now, if Witch Hound would've been remembered, Reckoner would have taken only Parasite and then walked out of range of Reaper's harpoon.
Damage rolls weren't exactly awesome, but fully loaded Reaper and armor piercing Cankerworm with the earlier shot from Nightwretch were enough to eventually destroy it.
Well, next Revenger that had Ignite cast upon it charged Reaper and almost wrecked it, except no systems were broken.
Reznik used his feat, so Asphyxious wasn't able to allocate focus to warjacks. Which pretty much saved Protectorate's warjacks - Cankerworm and Reaper merely scratched Revenger.
But Asphyxious was out of Reznik's feat range, so he used one Nightwretch to fry Vilmon away. And I've written down what proxies what on the picture.
Reznik, to gain benefits from better cover than open ground, charged into melee with a nightwretch. I saw a little bit of opening there, so moved Nightwretch away that was wrecked by a free strike.
Asphyxious had allocated three focus to Reaper, but Reaper was engaged by what was left of Revenger. Asphyxious moved to engage Revenger, but then I was left with a funny little dilemma. Revenger still had its shield intact, though otherwise it was almost broken. To prevent the push-back effect of Revenger's shield, Asphyxious had to cast Hellfire to bring the shield down. Two Hellfires did the job, but in the process Asphyxious had to use his feat. Finally Revenger went down and Reaper was free to drag Reznik to his almost certain death.
Well. It didn't work out that well.
Reaper managed to damage Reznik with harpoon, but when Reznik was being dragged, he stumbled upon Dervish. Assassination failed.
Last Nightwretch walked to shooting range and managed to score a hit on Reznik. Damage roll was 6, 6.
Hero of the match: Nightwretch, there and then.
Well, Reznik isn't known for being a wuzzy.
He cast Engine of Destruction on himself and beat up Reaper and camped up four focus. Battle came into caster versus caster, with both casters having used up their feat.
Asphyxious charged into melee with Reznik after castin Scything Touch on himself.
Iron lich scored a hit and damage roll came out as 6, 6, 6.
End of Reznik.
Second write-up needs to wait it seems, as a friend came over.
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Adventures of Sympathy Sam and Jennifer
Yesterday we played a couple of games of When Darkness Comes with two players.
We played the zombie shoot-up scenario and Last of the Tzimovars scenarios, and I guess playing other scenario than the first opened up some thoughts about the game's workings.
However, brief summary of the games.
Both Sympathy Sam and Jennifer were characters who sucked at combat and were slow, but good at persuasion, particularly at flirting.
Sam was better at medical skills and was a huge tank with defense/health of 5 and Jennifer was more dextrous.
This lead to a funny start - without weapons or victory points, neither character could beat any monster, no matter how good rolls might be. Whoops.
Also, Sam quickly found out that there was a Mega-Adversary in the town hall/jail with a perception roll. So characters quickly escaped.
But once Sam found a shotgun and a pistol and a wrench for Jennifer (Jennifer had hand-to-hand combat skill and Jennifer was horrible at searching things), things started rolling.
This scenario was played a bit wrong, which must be forgiven, since this was third game of WDC ever, and first for my friend. Somehow I had been thinking that you could buy 3 dice and 3 re-rolls per fight round, when in fact you could buy such things per your whole turn.
Well, it burned out victory points with our characters' measly attack skills, but at least made some victories possible.
In the end it happened so that Sympathy Sam killed the last of the five zombies. He scored only a couple victory points more than Jennifer, but still, he gained the attribute rise. Which went into dexterity, Sam was frustrated enough at banging at the doors and yelling someone to open them.
Anyway - after two good plays of the first scenario, I feel that it needs some sort of time restriction or something. Even with horribly slow characters once you hit around 10-15 victory points, you don't have to walk on the tip of your toes so much. I don't know how much this changes when there are more players, but at least when both players are low on speed, there's no real penalty to it.
Then, the Last of the Tzimovars scenario.
This scenario was pretty simple and straightforward, but it did involve some good rolls of 3 straight with only 3 dice with no re-rolls. Sympathy Sam raided the church and packed himself full of holy water and crucifixes and then rushed to the mansion of Tzimovars.
He had cleared whole outside of the building when Jennifer was just leaving the doctor's office... He had used a couple of vials of precious holy water though, which was a bit risky thing, since killing Mega-Adversary was required for victory.
Anyway, Sam came to Gun Shop and helped Jennifer find a crossbow for her and took one for himself, too. Then the duo found their way into the mansion itself. Jennifer started acting unsportingly. She started flirting with Sam's allies, and as she had persuasion 4 + 1 dice from flirt versus Sam's persuasion of 2 + 2 dice from flirt, she managed to steal them more often than not.
Only comfort for Sam was the fact that he had nailed five zombies, where Jen had killed none. But that was about to change, when Sam stumbled upon Mega-Adversary.
He tried to fight the queen of the Tzimovars, but didn't manage to kill it with 10 dice + 3 re-rolls. Jennifer came around to help, but her next round she attacked the Mega-Adversary. She decided to stake the Mega-Adversary, because that way she would benefit from 2 sets of 2 re-rolls without using victory points.
She used all her holy water and bought three dice with victory points and started rolling. After 4 re-rolls she had 6,6,6,6 on board, and Mega-Adversary needed 5 of kind to kill it. Last roll came out as 6. Now, thinking of that, had Jennifer failed there, both of our wimpy characters would have needed astonishing luck to bring the main antagonist down.
After that fight it was a race for victory points. Offensive power had dropped pretty much as we had no longer holy water around and crossbows were starting to run out of ammo.
Last real excitement came with the last vampire, who needed 4 of kind to be defeated.
Jennifer, being the drama queen, did the same she did with Mega-Adversary. Last possible re-roll came out as 5, when there were already three 5's on the board. End of Tzimovars and a victory for Jennifer.
Anyway, after four games it feels like there isn't enough "pressure" in the game. It might change with more players, and especially with different character builds, when you need to take more into account who seems the probable winner. But at least now I feel like there should be some element of urgency, when there are two slow characters playing it feels like they got all the time in the world to, well, kill supernatural monstrosities that are terrorizing civilians?
Still a good game though, and having played only two different scenarios I won't judge everything just yet.
We played the zombie shoot-up scenario and Last of the Tzimovars scenarios, and I guess playing other scenario than the first opened up some thoughts about the game's workings.
However, brief summary of the games.
Both Sympathy Sam and Jennifer were characters who sucked at combat and were slow, but good at persuasion, particularly at flirting.
Sam was better at medical skills and was a huge tank with defense/health of 5 and Jennifer was more dextrous.
This lead to a funny start - without weapons or victory points, neither character could beat any monster, no matter how good rolls might be. Whoops.
Also, Sam quickly found out that there was a Mega-Adversary in the town hall/jail with a perception roll. So characters quickly escaped.
But once Sam found a shotgun and a pistol and a wrench for Jennifer (Jennifer had hand-to-hand combat skill and Jennifer was horrible at searching things), things started rolling.
This scenario was played a bit wrong, which must be forgiven, since this was third game of WDC ever, and first for my friend. Somehow I had been thinking that you could buy 3 dice and 3 re-rolls per fight round, when in fact you could buy such things per your whole turn.
Well, it burned out victory points with our characters' measly attack skills, but at least made some victories possible.
In the end it happened so that Sympathy Sam killed the last of the five zombies. He scored only a couple victory points more than Jennifer, but still, he gained the attribute rise. Which went into dexterity, Sam was frustrated enough at banging at the doors and yelling someone to open them.
Anyway - after two good plays of the first scenario, I feel that it needs some sort of time restriction or something. Even with horribly slow characters once you hit around 10-15 victory points, you don't have to walk on the tip of your toes so much. I don't know how much this changes when there are more players, but at least when both players are low on speed, there's no real penalty to it.
Then, the Last of the Tzimovars scenario.
This scenario was pretty simple and straightforward, but it did involve some good rolls of 3 straight with only 3 dice with no re-rolls. Sympathy Sam raided the church and packed himself full of holy water and crucifixes and then rushed to the mansion of Tzimovars.
He had cleared whole outside of the building when Jennifer was just leaving the doctor's office... He had used a couple of vials of precious holy water though, which was a bit risky thing, since killing Mega-Adversary was required for victory.
Anyway, Sam came to Gun Shop and helped Jennifer find a crossbow for her and took one for himself, too. Then the duo found their way into the mansion itself. Jennifer started acting unsportingly. She started flirting with Sam's allies, and as she had persuasion 4 + 1 dice from flirt versus Sam's persuasion of 2 + 2 dice from flirt, she managed to steal them more often than not.
Only comfort for Sam was the fact that he had nailed five zombies, where Jen had killed none. But that was about to change, when Sam stumbled upon Mega-Adversary.
He tried to fight the queen of the Tzimovars, but didn't manage to kill it with 10 dice + 3 re-rolls. Jennifer came around to help, but her next round she attacked the Mega-Adversary. She decided to stake the Mega-Adversary, because that way she would benefit from 2 sets of 2 re-rolls without using victory points.
She used all her holy water and bought three dice with victory points and started rolling. After 4 re-rolls she had 6,6,6,6 on board, and Mega-Adversary needed 5 of kind to kill it. Last roll came out as 6. Now, thinking of that, had Jennifer failed there, both of our wimpy characters would have needed astonishing luck to bring the main antagonist down.
After that fight it was a race for victory points. Offensive power had dropped pretty much as we had no longer holy water around and crossbows were starting to run out of ammo.
Last real excitement came with the last vampire, who needed 4 of kind to be defeated.
Jennifer, being the drama queen, did the same she did with Mega-Adversary. Last possible re-roll came out as 5, when there were already three 5's on the board. End of Tzimovars and a victory for Jennifer.
Anyway, after four games it feels like there isn't enough "pressure" in the game. It might change with more players, and especially with different character builds, when you need to take more into account who seems the probable winner. But at least now I feel like there should be some element of urgency, when there are two slow characters playing it feels like they got all the time in the world to, well, kill supernatural monstrosities that are terrorizing civilians?
Still a good game though, and having played only two different scenarios I won't judge everything just yet.
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
New year starts with a bite
Just today I got to play Fury of Dracula again after quite a while.
Different from last time was that we had three players now.
I played the Dracula, and against two hunter players playing a hunter looked like a lot more fun than in just two player game!
Playing Count Dracula was also exciting, as it has always been. This time it was overly thrilling, when I was really lucky when it came to exposing Dracula's trail. It seemed that wherever the hunters went, they picked just the wrong space or when press revealed locations the hunters chose just the wrong cities that weren't part of Draculas trail.
However, the two party-pooper cards came along, both for Dracula and both for Hunters. Evasion and Hypnotism.
But luckily they both came during the same game, so there was enough excitement for both parties.
But hypnotism is quite harsh card when hunters have two resolve and one relentless pursuit or whatever the event was that acted like using resolve... At dawn hypnotism was used. At noon three hunters came at Dracula with stakes, sacred bullets and all such things blazing.
With five blood drops remaining, Dracula escaped to Marseilles.
Hunters had two guesses where Dracula went from four possible choices.
Van Helsing picked Marseilles.
Dracula met his fate embarrassingly with a knife in his back.
Different from last time was that we had three players now.
I played the Dracula, and against two hunter players playing a hunter looked like a lot more fun than in just two player game!
Playing Count Dracula was also exciting, as it has always been. This time it was overly thrilling, when I was really lucky when it came to exposing Dracula's trail. It seemed that wherever the hunters went, they picked just the wrong space or when press revealed locations the hunters chose just the wrong cities that weren't part of Draculas trail.
However, the two party-pooper cards came along, both for Dracula and both for Hunters. Evasion and Hypnotism.
But luckily they both came during the same game, so there was enough excitement for both parties.
But hypnotism is quite harsh card when hunters have two resolve and one relentless pursuit or whatever the event was that acted like using resolve... At dawn hypnotism was used. At noon three hunters came at Dracula with stakes, sacred bullets and all such things blazing.
With five blood drops remaining, Dracula escaped to Marseilles.
Hunters had two guesses where Dracula went from four possible choices.
Van Helsing picked Marseilles.
Dracula met his fate embarrassingly with a knife in his back.
Thursday, December 22, 2011
The Smell of Skewered Fat
Yesterday I played a game of Warmachine, or should I say a Hordes game.
A friend who was traveling in India had a better hotel there with a decent internet connection, so we had arranged a game to be played on Vassal. We had agreed on a 35 pointer. My list was:
Dominar Rasheth
- Cyclops Shaman
- Basilisk Drake
- Basilisk Krea
- Bronzeback Titan
Minimum unit of Beast Handlers
Maximum unit of Praetorian Swordsmen + Unit Attachment
Flayer Cannon
Extoller Soulward
Bloodrunner Master Tormentor
Feralgeist
And opponent had:
Epic Vayl
- 2x Angelius
- Typhon
Minimum unit of Raptors
Annyssa Ryvaal
Shepherd
Opponent won the starting roll. Again.
First picture is taken from the end of my first turn, and you can see a little bit of the nasty map layout there. It was somewhat difficult to navigate Skorne troops with a river in the middle, and it didn't help too much that I accidentally mixed up Krea and Drake when I was deploying.
But anyway.
You can see a horrible line-up in that picture too. But, let me ask people a question: How much it takes to kill a Bronzeback in one turn from full health? Here's what:
- Epic Vayl's feat (a damage boosted pow 15 Obliteration)
- Two P+S 14 Armor Piercing attacks with boosted damage rolls.
- 3x Typhon's pow 14 sprays.
But. Yeah. Though it looks impressive that one beast of yours took the combined efforts of a warlock and three heavy warbeasts, it still sucks to lose your Bronzeback at the start of round 2. To be honest, some of opponents damage rolls, in particular the armor piercing ones, rolled numbers that even a single dice could beat or at least tie.
So after opponent had removed too many points from my army list, it was my time to give some payback.
You can see the positioning of opponents beasts.
My plan was that if boosted, aimed hit from Krea's paralysis would hit the Angelius near her, Rasheth would use his feat.
Obviously Krea missed. So I decided to just try to destroy Typhon instead.
So, what it takes to kill Typhon in one round from full health with Admonition on? It takes:
- Blood Mark from Rasheth (bringing Typhon down to arm 15)
- d3 flayer cannon shots (rolled 1)
- Pow 14 spray from Drake with damage boost
- Pow 12 Evil Eye from Cyclops Shaman with damage boost
- Pow 17 shot from Extoller with damage boost
... + something else.
The beast was left alive with one hit point. After Admonition triggered, Typhon moved closer to my lines. I saw a distant possibility in getting one Beast Handler into melee with Typhon and killing it in style with anatomical precision.
But it was not to be, the beast was way over walking distance.
One beast handler went and put a fury point on Angelius. Rasheth had cast Carnivore on beast handlers just for this purpose.
Well, because of the invincible Typhon, next turn was a slaughterfest.
Typhon killed Basilisk Drake, I guess they had a spitting contest. Shepherd had healed Typhon for 3, meaning it had 4 hit points left.
Now, Vayl throws oraculi on it, dealing 3 points of damage. Typhon was back to one health. Started to look like a game, where every model was hanging at one hit point at one point or another. Bronzeback was sitting at one wound left too before last spray from Typhon nailed it.
Angeliuses did some Refuge -shenanigans again (after just one game I find that spell really disturbing in the hands of Legion of Everblight). Extoller Soulward was a hero, because it survived three punches from Angelius (two were unboosted though and resulted in misses). Extoller was left alive with one hit point. Praetorians were all but destroyed by Obliteration from Vayl and the bows of blighted nyss.
Now, my turn was about the only turn I could try and win.
Praetorians ran into position to be used as arc nodes. Bloodrunner Master Tormentor happened to survive a free strike and tried to run far enough to get a back strike bonus against Vayl. However, she was left way out of Rasheth control area.
Rasheth used his feat and tried to murder Vayl with Breath of Corruption. Damage roll was 1, 1, 4. Nothing I shouldn't have expected already. But I can't blame everything on dice - opponent didn't roll much better than I did, but the armor piercing hits from angeliuses do quite a lot of damage even with poor rolls.
But, at least the beast handlers got his trophy and some title of being awesome. Typhon had one wound left and he hit the beast. Down with the Typhon! With anatomical precision!
Extoller continued to butcher the beasts, her stone is actually pretty potent weapon. Shame that the damage rolls were never too high.
Anyway, time for the last picture.
Extoller tried her best throughout the game, challenged the most fearsome of beasts, dealt damage to every one of them (heh, pun... look, pun!) and didn't die.
Finally Rasheth died to armor piercing hit from angelius. The hit dealt 16 points in, when Rasheth had only 14 left. Damage had come from a pathetic shoot from Annyssa and through cutting his own wrists... or logs... How did he ever even find an artery remains a mystery.
Hero of the match title goes to Extoller Soulward, though the one beast handler would be a good candidate too.
A friend who was traveling in India had a better hotel there with a decent internet connection, so we had arranged a game to be played on Vassal. We had agreed on a 35 pointer. My list was:
Dominar Rasheth
- Cyclops Shaman
- Basilisk Drake
- Basilisk Krea
- Bronzeback Titan
Minimum unit of Beast Handlers
Maximum unit of Praetorian Swordsmen + Unit Attachment
Flayer Cannon
Extoller Soulward
Bloodrunner Master Tormentor
Feralgeist
And opponent had:
Epic Vayl
- 2x Angelius
- Typhon
Minimum unit of Raptors
Annyssa Ryvaal
Shepherd
Opponent won the starting roll. Again.
First picture is taken from the end of my first turn, and you can see a little bit of the nasty map layout there. It was somewhat difficult to navigate Skorne troops with a river in the middle, and it didn't help too much that I accidentally mixed up Krea and Drake when I was deploying.
But anyway.
You can see a horrible line-up in that picture too. But, let me ask people a question: How much it takes to kill a Bronzeback in one turn from full health? Here's what:
- Epic Vayl's feat (a damage boosted pow 15 Obliteration)
- Two P+S 14 Armor Piercing attacks with boosted damage rolls.
- 3x Typhon's pow 14 sprays.
But. Yeah. Though it looks impressive that one beast of yours took the combined efforts of a warlock and three heavy warbeasts, it still sucks to lose your Bronzeback at the start of round 2. To be honest, some of opponents damage rolls, in particular the armor piercing ones, rolled numbers that even a single dice could beat or at least tie.
So after opponent had removed too many points from my army list, it was my time to give some payback.
You can see the positioning of opponents beasts.
My plan was that if boosted, aimed hit from Krea's paralysis would hit the Angelius near her, Rasheth would use his feat.
Obviously Krea missed. So I decided to just try to destroy Typhon instead.
So, what it takes to kill Typhon in one round from full health with Admonition on? It takes:
- Blood Mark from Rasheth (bringing Typhon down to arm 15)
- d3 flayer cannon shots (rolled 1)
- Pow 14 spray from Drake with damage boost
- Pow 12 Evil Eye from Cyclops Shaman with damage boost
- Pow 17 shot from Extoller with damage boost
... + something else.
The beast was left alive with one hit point. After Admonition triggered, Typhon moved closer to my lines. I saw a distant possibility in getting one Beast Handler into melee with Typhon and killing it in style with anatomical precision.
But it was not to be, the beast was way over walking distance.
One beast handler went and put a fury point on Angelius. Rasheth had cast Carnivore on beast handlers just for this purpose.
Well, because of the invincible Typhon, next turn was a slaughterfest.
Typhon killed Basilisk Drake, I guess they had a spitting contest. Shepherd had healed Typhon for 3, meaning it had 4 hit points left.
Now, Vayl throws oraculi on it, dealing 3 points of damage. Typhon was back to one health. Started to look like a game, where every model was hanging at one hit point at one point or another. Bronzeback was sitting at one wound left too before last spray from Typhon nailed it.
Angeliuses did some Refuge -shenanigans again (after just one game I find that spell really disturbing in the hands of Legion of Everblight). Extoller Soulward was a hero, because it survived three punches from Angelius (two were unboosted though and resulted in misses). Extoller was left alive with one hit point. Praetorians were all but destroyed by Obliteration from Vayl and the bows of blighted nyss.
Now, my turn was about the only turn I could try and win.
Praetorians ran into position to be used as arc nodes. Bloodrunner Master Tormentor happened to survive a free strike and tried to run far enough to get a back strike bonus against Vayl. However, she was left way out of Rasheth control area.
Rasheth used his feat and tried to murder Vayl with Breath of Corruption. Damage roll was 1, 1, 4. Nothing I shouldn't have expected already. But I can't blame everything on dice - opponent didn't roll much better than I did, but the armor piercing hits from angeliuses do quite a lot of damage even with poor rolls.
But, at least the beast handlers got his trophy and some title of being awesome. Typhon had one wound left and he hit the beast. Down with the Typhon! With anatomical precision!
Extoller continued to butcher the beasts, her stone is actually pretty potent weapon. Shame that the damage rolls were never too high.
Anyway, time for the last picture.
Extoller tried her best throughout the game, challenged the most fearsome of beasts, dealt damage to every one of them (heh, pun... look, pun!) and didn't die.
Finally Rasheth died to armor piercing hit from angelius. The hit dealt 16 points in, when Rasheth had only 14 left. Damage had come from a pathetic shoot from Annyssa and through cutting his own wrists... or logs... How did he ever even find an artery remains a mystery.
Hero of the match title goes to Extoller Soulward, though the one beast handler would be a good candidate too.
Monday, December 19, 2011
Influence Gone All Wrong or: What's Wrong with My Scaverous?
I happened to get a little extra free time today, and obviously it went into gaming.
However, everything came about so extempore that I really couldn't arrange a game with anyone in such a short time.
But Vassal helped me through these hard times.
I met a random, nice person there and we played a 25 point game there.
What is so wonderful about Vassal is that you get to play against army combinations you really aren't used to. Like this time. I have never played against Zaal, not in Mk1 or now in Mk2.
So, let's begin this story.
My list was:
Lord Exchumator Scaverous
- Ripjaw
- Cankerworm
- Reaper
Maximum unit of Mechanithralls
Necrosurgeon & Stitch Thralls
Skarlock
And opponent was playing:
Zaal & Kovaas
- Cyclops Raider
- Cyclops Raider
- Cyclops Shaman
Maximum unit of Nihilators
Venator Flayer Cannon
Ancestral Guardian
Extoller Soulward
Opponent won the starting roll. Mortenebra is acting as Scaverous, and Cyclops Savages are actually Raiders. Picture is taken from the end of first round.
Death Ward on Reaper was put to good use on opponents next turn, as Far Striked flayer cannon took shots at the warjack. Which was really something that impressed me. The utility of Far Strike and flayer cannon. I can't wait to try to use the same combo with Hexeris to start the feat chain...
As I was quickly taking look at Zaal now and then, I realised how good counter he is against Scaverous - Awakened Spirit helps to fight Scaverous' own feat, and obviously his mastery over friendly souls denies that one thing Scaverous thirsts the most.
Anyway, all I did mostly on my next turn was Scaverous casting Feast of Worms on the gathering of Nihilators. However... being a bit difficult to see how big that 4" template really is in playing board that's just pixels, I woefully underestimated the range.
Luckily I still got two nihilators down and a couple of damage points to the cyclops shaman.
Next opponent charges with nihilators. They decimate swathes of mechanithralls.
Cankerworm is mauled up rather heavily, too, and I think I've never seen it take damage in such an economic a way. It was left with only three damage boxes left after cyclops shaman and aiming cyclops raider had shot at it. One in cortex, movement and head.
Most of the mechanithralls just grew back.
Three came from Necrosurgeon and two from feating Scaverous with excarnates.
Cankerworm, loaded with focus, charges to Cyclops Shaman, attempting to armor-pierce it. However, it misses. Even with a boost.
Skarlock casts Icy Grip on nihilators, and then renewed mechanithralls charge them.
It's curious how difficult it is to hit def 11 models and, once knocked down, damage arm 15 with p+s 11 +3d6 and a second time at 11 +2d6.
And no, I haven't done complaining. As you remember, I had used Black Gate with Scaverous. That meant that my Cephalyx Overlords would pretty much be useless if I didn't get the boosted attack roll to bear!
So I used two Influences.
One on a nihilator that wasn't even in range for anything, and once on Ancestral Guardian that had a nihilator in front of it.
Well, the problem is, the Ancestral Guardian had Last Stand on it. So it made an attack and then it... died.
And Kovaas appeared. With 3 souls.
As it turned out, about 3-4 pixels more and Scaverous would have been out of its charge range.
But, he wasn't.
Zaal used his feat and cast Last Stand on Kovaas.
A broadside of shooting from every possible model + a charge from Kovaas with 3 souls and 5 ancestral rage tokens for use...
However, everything came about so extempore that I really couldn't arrange a game with anyone in such a short time.
But Vassal helped me through these hard times.
I met a random, nice person there and we played a 25 point game there.
What is so wonderful about Vassal is that you get to play against army combinations you really aren't used to. Like this time. I have never played against Zaal, not in Mk1 or now in Mk2.
So, let's begin this story.
My list was:
Lord Exchumator Scaverous
- Ripjaw
- Cankerworm
- Reaper
Maximum unit of Mechanithralls
Necrosurgeon & Stitch Thralls
Skarlock
And opponent was playing:
Zaal & Kovaas
- Cyclops Raider
- Cyclops Raider
- Cyclops Shaman
Maximum unit of Nihilators
Venator Flayer Cannon
Ancestral Guardian
Extoller Soulward
Opponent won the starting roll. Mortenebra is acting as Scaverous, and Cyclops Savages are actually Raiders. Picture is taken from the end of first round.
Death Ward on Reaper was put to good use on opponents next turn, as Far Striked flayer cannon took shots at the warjack. Which was really something that impressed me. The utility of Far Strike and flayer cannon. I can't wait to try to use the same combo with Hexeris to start the feat chain...
As I was quickly taking look at Zaal now and then, I realised how good counter he is against Scaverous - Awakened Spirit helps to fight Scaverous' own feat, and obviously his mastery over friendly souls denies that one thing Scaverous thirsts the most.
Anyway, all I did mostly on my next turn was Scaverous casting Feast of Worms on the gathering of Nihilators. However... being a bit difficult to see how big that 4" template really is in playing board that's just pixels, I woefully underestimated the range.
Luckily I still got two nihilators down and a couple of damage points to the cyclops shaman.
Next opponent charges with nihilators. They decimate swathes of mechanithralls.
Cankerworm is mauled up rather heavily, too, and I think I've never seen it take damage in such an economic a way. It was left with only three damage boxes left after cyclops shaman and aiming cyclops raider had shot at it. One in cortex, movement and head.
Most of the mechanithralls just grew back.
Three came from Necrosurgeon and two from feating Scaverous with excarnates.
Cankerworm, loaded with focus, charges to Cyclops Shaman, attempting to armor-pierce it. However, it misses. Even with a boost.
Skarlock casts Icy Grip on nihilators, and then renewed mechanithralls charge them.
It's curious how difficult it is to hit def 11 models and, once knocked down, damage arm 15 with p+s 11 +3d6 and a second time at 11 +2d6.
And no, I haven't done complaining. As you remember, I had used Black Gate with Scaverous. That meant that my Cephalyx Overlords would pretty much be useless if I didn't get the boosted attack roll to bear!
So I used two Influences.
One on a nihilator that wasn't even in range for anything, and once on Ancestral Guardian that had a nihilator in front of it.
Well, the problem is, the Ancestral Guardian had Last Stand on it. So it made an attack and then it... died.
And Kovaas appeared. With 3 souls.
As it turned out, about 3-4 pixels more and Scaverous would have been out of its charge range.
But, he wasn't.
Zaal used his feat and cast Last Stand on Kovaas.
A broadside of shooting from every possible model + a charge from Kovaas with 3 souls and 5 ancestral rage tokens for use...
Saturday, December 17, 2011
Two player Rummikub
This evening went playing Rummikub with a friend.
Writing detailed texts about the happenings within game would be somewhat... retarded.
But maybe I could write down some thoughts about the game with only two players.
We played five rounds, and to be honest, the scoring system pretty much sucks with only two players. Also, the nature of the game changes somewhat too, as the board doesn't change all that rapidly.
This leads to plenty of situation, where if the other player has to draw an extra chip, you probably have to do that too.
It's still not bad style of playing, but scoreboard is quite useless.
Writing detailed texts about the happenings within game would be somewhat... retarded.
But maybe I could write down some thoughts about the game with only two players.
We played five rounds, and to be honest, the scoring system pretty much sucks with only two players. Also, the nature of the game changes somewhat too, as the board doesn't change all that rapidly.
This leads to plenty of situation, where if the other player has to draw an extra chip, you probably have to do that too.
It's still not bad style of playing, but scoreboard is quite useless.
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Story of a Saeryn that cast no Blight Bringer
Now, today I had a chance to play against Legion of Everblight, which is somewhat rare around here.
We had a 25 point game, and my list was:
Scaverous
- Reaper
- 2x Helldiver
- Nightwretch
- Deathripper
Maximum unit of Mechanithralls
Necrosurgeos & Stitch Thralls
Warwitch Siren
And opponent had:
Saeryn
- Typhon
- Scythean
- Harrier
- Shredder
Forsaken
Shepherd
2x Spell Martyrs
First of all, all the pictures are somehow quite dark, so excuse me for that. Maybe it doesn't actually matter, as the shaded area is the one with unpainted miniatures *cough*
I lost the starting roll again.
First picture is taken from the end of my first turn, where Death Ward was cast on Reaper and Mechanithralls had been ghost walking through the forest.
Things looked just fine at that point.
Saeryn wanted to use her feat, so two big beasts came towards my front lines. I was thinking that nice, at least they weren't engaging things too much. Typhon had Banishing Ward and Scythean had the... uh, name escapes me, the resurrection spell.
Typhon tried to spray at Reaper but didn't really do anything.
Well, then was my turn to try dodging two heavy warbeasts that I couldn't target with melee attacks.
I had grand plans and all, but none of them really came to fruition.
I ran mechanithralls to engage the shredder in attempt to draw the inevitable blight bringer out. I might have actually lost only one mechanithrall, who was maybe out of range of the surgeon.
Then Scaverous decided to use his feat. I wasn't the best placed Black Gate, maybe, at least when the damage rolls were so poor and I didn't get Saeryn under it.
Anyway, telekinesis was cast on Scythean so Nightwretch could take an aiming bonus against it. One telekinesis was cast on the Nightwretch too, Feast of Worms with a damage boost on Scythean (with only couple of damage points in). With the lone remaining focus he cast Death Ward on himself.
This time I was clever enough to measure that Scythean couldn't just walk into melee with Scaverous and beat him up. However, this resulted in Saeryn not getting under Black Gate either, so it was a win some, lose some situation.
Nightwretch did very little to Scythean. Damage rolls, as I said, were horrible.
Reaper dragged Typhon into melee with it in attempt to tie up those sprays of doom. It just hit and did one point of damage. Problem "solved" at the cost of 7 points.
That was all I could do.
What opponent did next was something I would've expected a turn ago.
First, Scythean runs into melee with Scaverous. I thought I was cool with that.
Harrier ran and engaged Nightwretch, and Typhon expectedly wrecks the Reaper, at the same time engaging Deathripper.
Shredder frenzied, by the way, and failed to hit a mechanithrall with a boosted attack roll.
Saeryn moved into melee with a mechanithrall. She didn't attack.
Pfft.
Saeryn hides herself best from my retaliation by hiding within my troops...
Oh, Scaverous and Scythean are placed a little funnilly, because three scythes just couldn't fit into two front arcs that supposed to be in base-to-base contact.
Well, I was confident I could deal with the Scythean, though it would take most of my remaining army to do that.
Warwitch Siren managed to Shadow Bind the harrier and rolled absurd damage to it, and helldivers ate shepherd and did four points of damage to Forsaken. Now, when I'm writing this, I see this as a sign of things to come.
Deathripper did some real damage to Typhon, and then it was my attempt to get rid of the hulking beast in front of my warcaster.
Scaverous himself cast ghost walk on mechanithralls and unleashed remainig focus as attacks at Scythean. Damage rolls were good, but the beast didn't go down. It was left around five hit boxes.
But no worries! Three mechanithralls got into contact with it, two of them in the back arc.
Things looked nice when first mechanithrall hit and scored damage enough to left it with two damage boxes.
Then, first mechanithrall on the back arc. Rolls 1, 2. That's a miss.
Second mechanithrall. Rolls 1, 3. That's a miss, too.
So... crap. Crap crap crap. The word pretty much echoed in Scaverous' ancient skull.
Now, then it was opponents turn.
Everything else looked good, but then it was time to resolve whole sorry Scythean affair.
First boosted attack, hit and gave 4 points in. So it was kinda exciting.
Second boosted attack, hit and damage was boosted too. Roll was 2,2,3 and Scythean was left with only one fury left to force. But this triggered blood bath.
Last fury was used for attack roll boost. So, Scaverous had 7 damage boxes left. On averages he would die.
You can see the card and the roll in the picture included:
We had a 25 point game, and my list was:
Scaverous
- Reaper
- 2x Helldiver
- Nightwretch
- Deathripper
Maximum unit of Mechanithralls
Necrosurgeos & Stitch Thralls
Warwitch Siren
And opponent had:
Saeryn
- Typhon
- Scythean
- Harrier
- Shredder
Forsaken
Shepherd
2x Spell Martyrs
First of all, all the pictures are somehow quite dark, so excuse me for that. Maybe it doesn't actually matter, as the shaded area is the one with unpainted miniatures *cough*
I lost the starting roll again.
First picture is taken from the end of my first turn, where Death Ward was cast on Reaper and Mechanithralls had been ghost walking through the forest.
Things looked just fine at that point.
Saeryn wanted to use her feat, so two big beasts came towards my front lines. I was thinking that nice, at least they weren't engaging things too much. Typhon had Banishing Ward and Scythean had the... uh, name escapes me, the resurrection spell.
Typhon tried to spray at Reaper but didn't really do anything.
Well, then was my turn to try dodging two heavy warbeasts that I couldn't target with melee attacks.
I had grand plans and all, but none of them really came to fruition.
I ran mechanithralls to engage the shredder in attempt to draw the inevitable blight bringer out. I might have actually lost only one mechanithrall, who was maybe out of range of the surgeon.
Then Scaverous decided to use his feat. I wasn't the best placed Black Gate, maybe, at least when the damage rolls were so poor and I didn't get Saeryn under it.
Anyway, telekinesis was cast on Scythean so Nightwretch could take an aiming bonus against it. One telekinesis was cast on the Nightwretch too, Feast of Worms with a damage boost on Scythean (with only couple of damage points in). With the lone remaining focus he cast Death Ward on himself.
This time I was clever enough to measure that Scythean couldn't just walk into melee with Scaverous and beat him up. However, this resulted in Saeryn not getting under Black Gate either, so it was a win some, lose some situation.
Nightwretch did very little to Scythean. Damage rolls, as I said, were horrible.
Reaper dragged Typhon into melee with it in attempt to tie up those sprays of doom. It just hit and did one point of damage. Problem "solved" at the cost of 7 points.
That was all I could do.
What opponent did next was something I would've expected a turn ago.
First, Scythean runs into melee with Scaverous. I thought I was cool with that.
Harrier ran and engaged Nightwretch, and Typhon expectedly wrecks the Reaper, at the same time engaging Deathripper.
Shredder frenzied, by the way, and failed to hit a mechanithrall with a boosted attack roll.
Saeryn moved into melee with a mechanithrall. She didn't attack.
Pfft.
Saeryn hides herself best from my retaliation by hiding within my troops...
Oh, Scaverous and Scythean are placed a little funnilly, because three scythes just couldn't fit into two front arcs that supposed to be in base-to-base contact.
Well, I was confident I could deal with the Scythean, though it would take most of my remaining army to do that.
Warwitch Siren managed to Shadow Bind the harrier and rolled absurd damage to it, and helldivers ate shepherd and did four points of damage to Forsaken. Now, when I'm writing this, I see this as a sign of things to come.
Deathripper did some real damage to Typhon, and then it was my attempt to get rid of the hulking beast in front of my warcaster.
Scaverous himself cast ghost walk on mechanithralls and unleashed remainig focus as attacks at Scythean. Damage rolls were good, but the beast didn't go down. It was left around five hit boxes.
But no worries! Three mechanithralls got into contact with it, two of them in the back arc.
Things looked nice when first mechanithrall hit and scored damage enough to left it with two damage boxes.
Then, first mechanithrall on the back arc. Rolls 1, 2. That's a miss.
Second mechanithrall. Rolls 1, 3. That's a miss, too.
So... crap. Crap crap crap. The word pretty much echoed in Scaverous' ancient skull.
Now, then it was opponents turn.
Everything else looked good, but then it was time to resolve whole sorry Scythean affair.
First boosted attack, hit and gave 4 points in. So it was kinda exciting.
Second boosted attack, hit and damage was boosted too. Roll was 2,2,3 and Scythean was left with only one fury left to force. But this triggered blood bath.
Last fury was used for attack roll boost. So, Scaverous had 7 damage boxes left. On averages he would die.
You can see the card and the roll in the picture included:
Friday, December 9, 2011
PVA glue pond, or an excuse for an update
Been playing less, and been painting less, but somehow I had a short spree at easy terrain... err... painting and even a little bit constructing?
I got the craters as freebies from a small trade some time ago. I think they were from manufacturer called "pegasus" or something like that. Anyway, I messed them up with a little bit of sand and a few ruined statue pieces. I think they look nice enough on table, though matt varnish still shines a bit too much.
Anyway, the terrain piece I can tell more about is the PVA glue ponds.
I cut a little pond from some sort of plasticard and slowly build up the banks with milliputty that had been left in excess in other projects.
Then I glued some sand to the banks and painted the bottom of the water dark blue.
There are two layers of PVA glue there, both of which were colored a little. I tried to make some swirlywhirly out of the paint mixed with PVA to create even some illusion of water.
It doesn't look too fancy, but that is a fine example what you can do pretty easily with not too much materials involved. Surely beats a blue scrap paper?
I got the craters as freebies from a small trade some time ago. I think they were from manufacturer called "pegasus" or something like that. Anyway, I messed them up with a little bit of sand and a few ruined statue pieces. I think they look nice enough on table, though matt varnish still shines a bit too much.
Anyway, the terrain piece I can tell more about is the PVA glue ponds.
I cut a little pond from some sort of plasticard and slowly build up the banks with milliputty that had been left in excess in other projects.
Then I glued some sand to the banks and painted the bottom of the water dark blue.
There are two layers of PVA glue there, both of which were colored a little. I tried to make some swirlywhirly out of the paint mixed with PVA to create even some illusion of water.
It doesn't look too fancy, but that is a fine example what you can do pretty easily with not too much materials involved. Surely beats a blue scrap paper?
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
When Christmas Comes
I just came home from playing a game of When Darkness Comes with a friend. That makes it two player experience, then.
This time around the game lasted a bit longer than first.
Actually we managed to finish the first scenario, so I can evaluate the game a bit more.
Both our characters were horrible at lockpicking, speed and medical. Because of that the game lasted longer than it usually would have, I think. The countless tries at lockpicking and healing were a bit hilarious at times.
However, one the ranged weapon specialist found a pistol and the hand-to-hand fighter found a wrench, winning battles started to go steadily enough. So much in fact that it ruined some of the tension in the game. But maybe that was because both characters had Defense/Health of 4, which allowed lots of tries with 5-6 attack dice against adversaries before things looked critical. A couple of times characters got down to 1 health, but even then it was a solo fight without assistance from another player.
Maybe we were just lucky to find such good weapons, but really, killing off the zombies was actually easier than surviving guardsmen at library. Those guys were pro bouncers, throwing once a lone player out, and next turn both of us. That resulted in one of the players getting three failure tokens, which kinda made me the victorious player.
So, once players get some weapons, it seems the hardest challenge is dealing with failure tokens and stuff like that.
But, really, need to get some more games in, and obviously some more complex scenarios.
This time around the game lasted a bit longer than first.
Actually we managed to finish the first scenario, so I can evaluate the game a bit more.
Both our characters were horrible at lockpicking, speed and medical. Because of that the game lasted longer than it usually would have, I think. The countless tries at lockpicking and healing were a bit hilarious at times.
However, one the ranged weapon specialist found a pistol and the hand-to-hand fighter found a wrench, winning battles started to go steadily enough. So much in fact that it ruined some of the tension in the game. But maybe that was because both characters had Defense/Health of 4, which allowed lots of tries with 5-6 attack dice against adversaries before things looked critical. A couple of times characters got down to 1 health, but even then it was a solo fight without assistance from another player.
Maybe we were just lucky to find such good weapons, but really, killing off the zombies was actually easier than surviving guardsmen at library. Those guys were pro bouncers, throwing once a lone player out, and next turn both of us. That resulted in one of the players getting three failure tokens, which kinda made me the victorious player.
So, once players get some weapons, it seems the hardest challenge is dealing with failure tokens and stuff like that.
But, really, need to get some more games in, and obviously some more complex scenarios.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Death count: 1 mechanithrall
Today I played a game of Warmachine.
I wanted to give another try to Scaverous, him being all new and dandy for me.
It was a 35 point game against Khador, scenario being Capture the Flag.
My list was:
Scaverous
- Nightmare
- Defiler
- Ripjaw
Minimum unit of Mechanithralls + Brute Thrall
Withershadow Combine
Cephalyx Overlords
Skarlock
Ogrun Bokur
Ragman
Opponent was playing:
Sorscha
- Beast-09
Maximum unit of Winterguard Infantry + Unit Attachment
Maximum unit of Man-O-War Bombardiers
Widowmakers
Kayazy Eliminators
War Dog
Kovnik Joe
So, opponent won the starting roll. There is this slight proxy there, as eliminators aren't really released yet.
First picture is taken from the end of my first turn, and I tried this time not to crop the picture too much so that all of the board and terrain would be visible in at least one picture.
Widowmakers took nasty position up on the hill, and I had dedicated the unit of mechanithralls to contest my flag. Bad match-up there.
Opponent came a little bit forward and took pot shots with all models that could do so. One widowmaker sniped the mechanithrall that's in the topic there, and one man-o-war did one point of damage to Defiler.
When it was my turn I got a bit over-excited with Nightmare.
Nightmare was loaded with 3 focus, and had Telekinesis cast upon it. Admonia had also upkept Death Ward on it. Skarlock cast Ghost Walk on it. And then it charged Beast-09. Well, it did tear everything else down except column 1, meaning it had only open fist intact.
Now, the over-excitedness came from the fact that when I was "cheat-measuring" distance to Beast-09 from Scaverous, Beast was about 1 inch away from the maximum distance of Scaverous' control area.
So, Scaverous cast Telekinesis on himself and measured again, this time making it absolutely clear Nightmare could charge Beast.
Well, that play with a spiffy spell cost me a warcaster.
Because:
Then came Sorscha, then came Sorscha's feat, then came 2x razor winds at focusless def 5 Scaverous, and last came the hand cannon.
Then came 4x man-o-war bombardier cannons. Didn't need the last cannon shot, as Scaverous was nailed at the fourth one.
I wanted to give another try to Scaverous, him being all new and dandy for me.
It was a 35 point game against Khador, scenario being Capture the Flag.
My list was:
Scaverous
- Nightmare
- Defiler
- Ripjaw
Minimum unit of Mechanithralls + Brute Thrall
Withershadow Combine
Cephalyx Overlords
Skarlock
Ogrun Bokur
Ragman
Opponent was playing:
Sorscha
- Beast-09
Maximum unit of Winterguard Infantry + Unit Attachment
Maximum unit of Man-O-War Bombardiers
Widowmakers
Kayazy Eliminators
War Dog
Kovnik Joe
So, opponent won the starting roll. There is this slight proxy there, as eliminators aren't really released yet.
First picture is taken from the end of my first turn, and I tried this time not to crop the picture too much so that all of the board and terrain would be visible in at least one picture.
Widowmakers took nasty position up on the hill, and I had dedicated the unit of mechanithralls to contest my flag. Bad match-up there.
Opponent came a little bit forward and took pot shots with all models that could do so. One widowmaker sniped the mechanithrall that's in the topic there, and one man-o-war did one point of damage to Defiler.
When it was my turn I got a bit over-excited with Nightmare.
Nightmare was loaded with 3 focus, and had Telekinesis cast upon it. Admonia had also upkept Death Ward on it. Skarlock cast Ghost Walk on it. And then it charged Beast-09. Well, it did tear everything else down except column 1, meaning it had only open fist intact.
Now, the over-excitedness came from the fact that when I was "cheat-measuring" distance to Beast-09 from Scaverous, Beast was about 1 inch away from the maximum distance of Scaverous' control area.
So, Scaverous cast Telekinesis on himself and measured again, this time making it absolutely clear Nightmare could charge Beast.
Well, that play with a spiffy spell cost me a warcaster.
Because:
Then came Sorscha, then came Sorscha's feat, then came 2x razor winds at focusless def 5 Scaverous, and last came the hand cannon.
Then came 4x man-o-war bombardier cannons. Didn't need the last cannon shot, as Scaverous was nailed at the fourth one.
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Scaverous digs his own grave
Yesterday I played a 35 point game of Warmachine.
Now, having finished Scaverous, I decided to take him as my warcaster for the first time.
I was against Harbinger of Menoth.
I also wanted to test Ragman around, so my list came arounda little bit weird:
Lord Exhumator Scaverous
- Reaper
- Harrower
- Nightwretch
Minimum unit of Satyxis Raiders + Sea Witch
Withershadow Combine
Ogrun Bokur
Ragman
Skarlock
And opponent had:
Harbinger of Menoth
- Templar
- Templar
Maximum unit of Temple Flameguard + Unit Attachment
Minimum unit of Choir of Menoth
Minimum unit of Exemplar Vengers
High Paladin Dartan Vilmon
Vassal of Menoth
Saxon Orrik
A word of proxy: Zealots are in fact Temple Flameguards, their unit attachment being monolith bearer (officer) and errants standard bearer (flameguard standard bearer). Also, Vilmon is an exemplar errant and Saxon Orrik an allegiant.
Opponent won the starting roll. We were playing a scenario to speed up the play, as we had a deadline when we needed to have it all finished up.
In the end both had forgotten the scenario and in hindsight it looked like the winning player scored 1 scenario point, losing player none.
Anyway, there's not much to tell from first picture, except it's taken from the end of Cryx's first turn. Second turn the brutality began. Crusader's Call, Saxon Orrik's reconnaissance and guided hand on Vengers, they came and beat up Harrower. Now, they nearly wrecked it, but funnily enough, every other system went down except the weapon systems. So that trade-off didn't work too well.
However, I didn't realise even myself how little Harrower cares about a broken Cortex in situations like these.
First, Skarlock went to engage one Venger and cast Icy Grip on them.
Then Ragman advanced and put up Death Field. One Thresher later Harrower was loaded up with three souls.
Then Reaper got to do its thing. It dragged one Templar away (choir had been singing no spells on jack). It did take everything else in my army to wreck the templar, but eventually it succeeded with Satyxis who used their Power Swell.
Next... For some reason I didn't expect Crusader's Call and Orrik's reconnaisance to work onb warjacks. Well. A menite warjack that's threatening from 11" away is indeed a bit scary. Now, add there beat back...
I had also assumed always that beat back forced you to move to the direction of "beat". Now I know better. Now I understand why Bronzeback's animus is cool.
So, Templar walzed through Harrower and Maelovus and took a couple of hits at Reaper. Lucky for Cryx, it had Death Ward on it, so no systems actually broke down. I guess that with Death Ward or no, something would have gone down if Templar didn't miss one of its attacks.
All menites rushed forwards and killed what they could, down went Admonia and Ogrun Bokur and plenty of Satyxis. On top of that Harbinger had used her feat.
Now, it was a harsh turn. But I thought that it would not be the end of everything, as I had a small plan to get rid of the second Templar.
First, Ragman put up Death Field. Then Scaverous used his feat and placed Templar within melee range of a Withershadow member, facing so it wouldn't gain its shield bonus. Then Ragman was placed with Telekinesis a bit closer to action.
Scaverous had allocated 3 focus to Reaper and upkept Icy Grip on Temple Flameguard, so he had only one focus left. He advanced close to Templar and tried to beat it with a damage boost. Sadly though he didn't punch through its back armor, despite Dark Shroud bonuses.
Now, Tremulus and Reaper wrecked the warjack well enough. Satyxis scored a hit on Vilmon, who suffered three points of damage or something like that.
Then it was opponents turn, and, well, I ran out of troops. Vilmon and Flameguards totaled Reaper and Flameguards butchered all of remaining Satyxis. Guided Hand is a nasty spell.
Next turn I had Ragman, Scaverous and Nightwretch left.
Had I remembered Martyrdom, I might have done things differently. I considered running Nightwretch up and shooting two unboosted Hellfires at Harbinger, but she had a couple of focus left and it would have needed quite lucky rolls to actually finish her. So Scaverous upkept Icy Grip on Flameguards.
Scaverous advanced up to nice formation of Flameguards and Vilmon and threshered them. However, Vilmon was saved with martyrdom from Harbinger. In the end Scaverous decided to remove Vilmon from play with Excarnate, but it left him with only one focus.
So, come hell or high water.
Harbinger charged Scaverous herself and humiliated him in melee. Though, actually the final kill came from a boosted Cataclysm.
Anyway, good game, and it's always epic when it comes down to final showdown between the warcasters.
But next time I think I won't try to make Satyxis + Ragman to work, Ragman did nothing for Satyxis, though he seems sweet with placement effects from telekinesis.
Now, having finished Scaverous, I decided to take him as my warcaster for the first time.
I was against Harbinger of Menoth.
I also wanted to test Ragman around, so my list came arounda little bit weird:
Lord Exhumator Scaverous
- Reaper
- Harrower
- Nightwretch
Minimum unit of Satyxis Raiders + Sea Witch
Withershadow Combine
Ogrun Bokur
Ragman
Skarlock
And opponent had:
Harbinger of Menoth
- Templar
- Templar
Maximum unit of Temple Flameguard + Unit Attachment
Minimum unit of Choir of Menoth
Minimum unit of Exemplar Vengers
High Paladin Dartan Vilmon
Vassal of Menoth
Saxon Orrik
A word of proxy: Zealots are in fact Temple Flameguards, their unit attachment being monolith bearer (officer) and errants standard bearer (flameguard standard bearer). Also, Vilmon is an exemplar errant and Saxon Orrik an allegiant.
Opponent won the starting roll. We were playing a scenario to speed up the play, as we had a deadline when we needed to have it all finished up.
In the end both had forgotten the scenario and in hindsight it looked like the winning player scored 1 scenario point, losing player none.
Anyway, there's not much to tell from first picture, except it's taken from the end of Cryx's first turn. Second turn the brutality began. Crusader's Call, Saxon Orrik's reconnaissance and guided hand on Vengers, they came and beat up Harrower. Now, they nearly wrecked it, but funnily enough, every other system went down except the weapon systems. So that trade-off didn't work too well.
However, I didn't realise even myself how little Harrower cares about a broken Cortex in situations like these.
First, Skarlock went to engage one Venger and cast Icy Grip on them.
Then Ragman advanced and put up Death Field. One Thresher later Harrower was loaded up with three souls.
Then Reaper got to do its thing. It dragged one Templar away (choir had been singing no spells on jack). It did take everything else in my army to wreck the templar, but eventually it succeeded with Satyxis who used their Power Swell.
Next... For some reason I didn't expect Crusader's Call and Orrik's reconnaisance to work onb warjacks. Well. A menite warjack that's threatening from 11" away is indeed a bit scary. Now, add there beat back...
I had also assumed always that beat back forced you to move to the direction of "beat". Now I know better. Now I understand why Bronzeback's animus is cool.
So, Templar walzed through Harrower and Maelovus and took a couple of hits at Reaper. Lucky for Cryx, it had Death Ward on it, so no systems actually broke down. I guess that with Death Ward or no, something would have gone down if Templar didn't miss one of its attacks.
All menites rushed forwards and killed what they could, down went Admonia and Ogrun Bokur and plenty of Satyxis. On top of that Harbinger had used her feat.
Now, it was a harsh turn. But I thought that it would not be the end of everything, as I had a small plan to get rid of the second Templar.
First, Ragman put up Death Field. Then Scaverous used his feat and placed Templar within melee range of a Withershadow member, facing so it wouldn't gain its shield bonus. Then Ragman was placed with Telekinesis a bit closer to action.
Scaverous had allocated 3 focus to Reaper and upkept Icy Grip on Temple Flameguard, so he had only one focus left. He advanced close to Templar and tried to beat it with a damage boost. Sadly though he didn't punch through its back armor, despite Dark Shroud bonuses.
Now, Tremulus and Reaper wrecked the warjack well enough. Satyxis scored a hit on Vilmon, who suffered three points of damage or something like that.
Then it was opponents turn, and, well, I ran out of troops. Vilmon and Flameguards totaled Reaper and Flameguards butchered all of remaining Satyxis. Guided Hand is a nasty spell.
Next turn I had Ragman, Scaverous and Nightwretch left.
Had I remembered Martyrdom, I might have done things differently. I considered running Nightwretch up and shooting two unboosted Hellfires at Harbinger, but she had a couple of focus left and it would have needed quite lucky rolls to actually finish her. So Scaverous upkept Icy Grip on Flameguards.
Scaverous advanced up to nice formation of Flameguards and Vilmon and threshered them. However, Vilmon was saved with martyrdom from Harbinger. In the end Scaverous decided to remove Vilmon from play with Excarnate, but it left him with only one focus.
So, come hell or high water.
Harbinger charged Scaverous herself and humiliated him in melee. Though, actually the final kill came from a boosted Cataclysm.
Anyway, good game, and it's always epic when it comes down to final showdown between the warcasters.
But next time I think I won't try to make Satyxis + Ragman to work, Ragman did nothing for Satyxis, though he seems sweet with placement effects from telekinesis.
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Brutal life and undeath of a nameless Warwitch Siren
I was inspired to try out Witch Coven + Erebus combo again because of last comment I got in this blog. This time it was a 35 point game, and I was facing Cryx.
Well, I knew I was facing Cryx. I think I was suffering from some kind of mental illness when I was constructing my list, because it was:
Witch Coven of Garlghast
- Erebus
- Corruptor...!
- Deathripper
- Ripjaw
Cephalyx Overlords
Cephalyx Mind Slaver and Drudge Thralls... maximum unit!
Warwitch Siren
Necrotech & Scrap Thrall
Skarlock Thrall
I try not to tailor my lists against a faction even when I know which one of them I'm going to fight. Of course I try not to take outright bad choices that just don't have any kind of use against a certain faction. I cannot explain, however, how the heck did the Corruptor sneak in. I mean, it's a bad helljack in so many ways, but especially against Cryx it loses even the few tricks it might have... And now, in hindsight, I'm not all that disappointed at its performance during game!
Then, opponents list had:
Iron Lich Asphyxious
- Harrower
- Deathripper
- Defiler
- Cankerworm
Minimum unit of Bane Knights
Minimum unit of Bile Thralls
Bane Lord Tartarus
Skarlock Thrall
I won the starting roll this time around. First picture is taken from the end of opponents first turn, and, well, what can I say. A couple of lucky deviations from Breaths of Corruption knocked off the head from Ripjaw and nailed two of cephalyx overlords and a drudge grunt. And I was left with decisions on how to remove the opposing defiler. I didn't really feel I could go and smack it in melee, as there was a line of bane knights and a host of bile thralls waiting up for a counter attack.
Knowing well the threat that was Tartarus I wanted to dispatch him first.
However, with first Stygian Abyss cast on Tartarus, it was shadow bound and even with a damage boost it took no damage. Then I aborted my plan to kill him and took another fully boosted Stygian Abyss at the enemy arc node, hoping for a critical, which never came.
Ripjaw went to pit stop at Necrotech. Corruptor took an aimed shot at the defiler and boosted attack roll and damage roll. With aiming bonus it scored just the minimum to hit the sneaky bonejack. Resulting damage roll wrecked it.
On opponents turn the shadow bound Tartarus cursed at the deathripper in front of him. Being bind with one's one shadow doesn't stop him or her cussing like a sailor, it seems. Emboldened by Tartarus' harsh words bane knights wreck the deathripper.
Bile thralls advanced close, but not really close enough to get rid of easily.
Now, I figured it was my time to use Coven's feat.
First the remaining Cephalyx Overlord advanced as far as possible and sprayed two bile thralls dead. They needed to be removed, as even just one could really mess up everything even during Coven's feat...
Skarlock killed one more with Stygian Abyss.
Drudge Thralls charged one (Hey, they did something useful, right?). Stygian Abyss cast through Ripjaw killed one, and finally Corruptor nailed the last one. (See, that's two important things it had done during game!
Then warwitch siren tried to spray the nice line of bane knights to death (or at least to corrosion), but was too greedy and targetted wrong guy, which resulted in getting two under and about three "not-just-under". And she missed one of the knights too, killing only one, which is the worst possible kill count when it comes to triggering vengeance.
Now, warwitch siren's sad story doesn't end here.
Next turn, Tartarus activates, walks next to Warwitch, curses her and scores a hit despite Nightfall and kills the witch.
So, in essence, the siren just triggered vengeance, because Tartarus made a bane knight out of her.
Bane knights advance and try to beat up Erebus a little, failing to do that. Breaths of Corruption that were slinged from just outside the range or Nightfall took a couple of drudges with them. Nodeless deathripper bit one drudge away too and aiming Harrower with its ghost shot deleted the lone remaining cephalyx overlord.
On my next turn Erebus did a nice killing spree of 4 bane knights. However, I would feel a bit more impressed, if one double 1's wouldn't have caused it to miss one critical thrall, when kill count would have been 5. The reason why this buggers a little is the fact that there were 4 knights within normal melee range to start with. Overtake only made my attacks angled a bit differently, not exactly raised it's kill count. Ripjaw and Necrotech killed the last bane knight the Erebus couldn't, and Skarlock killed the last of the unit. Which was nice, as it was having a straight enough line to one of the witches...
Last, corruptor tries to shoot at Tartarus, scores a hit but does only three or so damage. So, the banes delayed me yet another turn, though opponents forces were spread rather thin.
Tartarus charges my skarlock, getting both Erebus and Corruptor easily inside the thresher. Six points to Corruptor and seven to Erebus. One random Breath of Corruption lands straight on the Cephalyx Mind Slaver. Hello, my remaining Cmd 4, no-CMA drudges!
If I thought that mopping up Tartarus with Corruptor and the one nodeless Deathripper with Erebus would finally get me to chewing the juicy center that was... umm... an Iron Lich? Doesn't exactly sound juicy. Anyway, to answer the question, I was all kinds wrong.
"A view for kill" by Cankerworm.
I had to dedicate most of my forces again to a random target. Because two Stygian Abysses didn't make a critical hit and not enough damage either, the Corruptor was brought forward within 5" of the worm. While it didn't break Canker, it was severely damaged. Drudge thralls tried to form a meatwall, which was really the best use of drudges now with their officer gone.
Cankerworm took the highway, but Corruptor was relentless and pursued it (with Infernal Machine on it) to take a one final shot at the Cankerworm. And killed it. Damn, there! Think of it! Corruptor wrecking two bonejacks, bile thrall and Tartarus! And only Tartarus in melee, too. You can't ask Slayer to do the same!
Okay, well, I'm still not sold on the price tag of Corruptor, but I guess it's not insta-lose model either, given (or making) right circumstances.
The game had been going on for a really long time already, and mostly it felt like cat & mouse with neither knowing who was the cat and who was the mouse. Asphyxious took more losses, but he still hadn't used his feat and Harrower was doing just fine on the hill, shooting at random targets.
Anyway, eventually I got a charge off with Ghost Walking, Infernal Machined Erebus against Harrower and Erebus left it with only a couple of points remaining in Cortex. Opponent resigned, as it was getting late and while Asphyxious with unused feat is always a dangerous asset, it's quite unlikely to score the win in such a situation, even when it's quite doable to lenghten the game a lot.
Last picture, taken just as Erebus almost destroyed Harrower and before Asphyxious teleported off the board... Awesome game, though I still find it a bit difficult to breathe, as the whole board is still reeking with the remains of the 10+ Breaths of Corruptions cast during the game.
Well, I knew I was facing Cryx. I think I was suffering from some kind of mental illness when I was constructing my list, because it was:
Witch Coven of Garlghast
- Erebus
- Corruptor...!
- Deathripper
- Ripjaw
Cephalyx Overlords
Cephalyx Mind Slaver and Drudge Thralls... maximum unit!
Warwitch Siren
Necrotech & Scrap Thrall
Skarlock Thrall
I try not to tailor my lists against a faction even when I know which one of them I'm going to fight. Of course I try not to take outright bad choices that just don't have any kind of use against a certain faction. I cannot explain, however, how the heck did the Corruptor sneak in. I mean, it's a bad helljack in so many ways, but especially against Cryx it loses even the few tricks it might have... And now, in hindsight, I'm not all that disappointed at its performance during game!
Then, opponents list had:
Iron Lich Asphyxious
- Harrower
- Deathripper
- Defiler
- Cankerworm
Minimum unit of Bane Knights
Minimum unit of Bile Thralls
Bane Lord Tartarus
Skarlock Thrall
I won the starting roll this time around. First picture is taken from the end of opponents first turn, and, well, what can I say. A couple of lucky deviations from Breaths of Corruption knocked off the head from Ripjaw and nailed two of cephalyx overlords and a drudge grunt. And I was left with decisions on how to remove the opposing defiler. I didn't really feel I could go and smack it in melee, as there was a line of bane knights and a host of bile thralls waiting up for a counter attack.
Knowing well the threat that was Tartarus I wanted to dispatch him first.
However, with first Stygian Abyss cast on Tartarus, it was shadow bound and even with a damage boost it took no damage. Then I aborted my plan to kill him and took another fully boosted Stygian Abyss at the enemy arc node, hoping for a critical, which never came.
Ripjaw went to pit stop at Necrotech. Corruptor took an aimed shot at the defiler and boosted attack roll and damage roll. With aiming bonus it scored just the minimum to hit the sneaky bonejack. Resulting damage roll wrecked it.
On opponents turn the shadow bound Tartarus cursed at the deathripper in front of him. Being bind with one's one shadow doesn't stop him or her cussing like a sailor, it seems. Emboldened by Tartarus' harsh words bane knights wreck the deathripper.
Bile thralls advanced close, but not really close enough to get rid of easily.
Now, I figured it was my time to use Coven's feat.
First the remaining Cephalyx Overlord advanced as far as possible and sprayed two bile thralls dead. They needed to be removed, as even just one could really mess up everything even during Coven's feat...
Skarlock killed one more with Stygian Abyss.
Drudge Thralls charged one (Hey, they did something useful, right?). Stygian Abyss cast through Ripjaw killed one, and finally Corruptor nailed the last one. (See, that's two important things it had done during game!
Then warwitch siren tried to spray the nice line of bane knights to death (or at least to corrosion), but was too greedy and targetted wrong guy, which resulted in getting two under and about three "not-just-under". And she missed one of the knights too, killing only one, which is the worst possible kill count when it comes to triggering vengeance.
Now, warwitch siren's sad story doesn't end here.
Next turn, Tartarus activates, walks next to Warwitch, curses her and scores a hit despite Nightfall and kills the witch.
So, in essence, the siren just triggered vengeance, because Tartarus made a bane knight out of her.
Bane knights advance and try to beat up Erebus a little, failing to do that. Breaths of Corruption that were slinged from just outside the range or Nightfall took a couple of drudges with them. Nodeless deathripper bit one drudge away too and aiming Harrower with its ghost shot deleted the lone remaining cephalyx overlord.
On my next turn Erebus did a nice killing spree of 4 bane knights. However, I would feel a bit more impressed, if one double 1's wouldn't have caused it to miss one critical thrall, when kill count would have been 5. The reason why this buggers a little is the fact that there were 4 knights within normal melee range to start with. Overtake only made my attacks angled a bit differently, not exactly raised it's kill count. Ripjaw and Necrotech killed the last bane knight the Erebus couldn't, and Skarlock killed the last of the unit. Which was nice, as it was having a straight enough line to one of the witches...
Last, corruptor tries to shoot at Tartarus, scores a hit but does only three or so damage. So, the banes delayed me yet another turn, though opponents forces were spread rather thin.
Tartarus charges my skarlock, getting both Erebus and Corruptor easily inside the thresher. Six points to Corruptor and seven to Erebus. One random Breath of Corruption lands straight on the Cephalyx Mind Slaver. Hello, my remaining Cmd 4, no-CMA drudges!
If I thought that mopping up Tartarus with Corruptor and the one nodeless Deathripper with Erebus would finally get me to chewing the juicy center that was... umm... an Iron Lich? Doesn't exactly sound juicy. Anyway, to answer the question, I was all kinds wrong.
"A view for kill" by Cankerworm.
I had to dedicate most of my forces again to a random target. Because two Stygian Abysses didn't make a critical hit and not enough damage either, the Corruptor was brought forward within 5" of the worm. While it didn't break Canker, it was severely damaged. Drudge thralls tried to form a meatwall, which was really the best use of drudges now with their officer gone.
Cankerworm took the highway, but Corruptor was relentless and pursued it (with Infernal Machine on it) to take a one final shot at the Cankerworm. And killed it. Damn, there! Think of it! Corruptor wrecking two bonejacks, bile thrall and Tartarus! And only Tartarus in melee, too. You can't ask Slayer to do the same!
Okay, well, I'm still not sold on the price tag of Corruptor, but I guess it's not insta-lose model either, given (or making) right circumstances.
The game had been going on for a really long time already, and mostly it felt like cat & mouse with neither knowing who was the cat and who was the mouse. Asphyxious took more losses, but he still hadn't used his feat and Harrower was doing just fine on the hill, shooting at random targets.
Anyway, eventually I got a charge off with Ghost Walking, Infernal Machined Erebus against Harrower and Erebus left it with only a couple of points remaining in Cortex. Opponent resigned, as it was getting late and while Asphyxious with unused feat is always a dangerous asset, it's quite unlikely to score the win in such a situation, even when it's quite doable to lenghten the game a lot.
Last picture, taken just as Erebus almost destroyed Harrower and before Asphyxious teleported off the board... Awesome game, though I still find it a bit difficult to breathe, as the whole board is still reeking with the remains of the 10+ Breaths of Corruptions cast during the game.
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Hellaena charges into melee!
Today I played two small games of Warmachine.
I played my Cryx against Khador. They were 15 point games.
Opponent played both times with same list, which was:
Butcher
- Destroyer
Minimum unit of Iron Fang Pikemen + Unit Attachment
Widowmakers
War Dog
First game I played with Asphyxious for a change (Iron Lich version).
Asphyxious
- Reaper
- Cankerworm
- Nightwretch
Bane Lord Tartarus
Necrotech & Scrapjack
Opponent won starting rolls in both games and let me start in both games.
First, I realised how outnumbered I was. Luckily I had Breath of Corruption around and Tartarus with thresher attack.
First picture is from the end of opponents first turn, where Iron Flesh was cast on pikemen. Destroyer took a shot at Nightwretch, but it landed short. However, it deviated so that both Nightwretch and Asphyxious was under.
And it was four points in to Asphyxious there and then.
On my next turn Asphyxious casts a Hellfire on a charge line blocking widowmaker.
Widowmakers failed their command check, and they failed it on every turn until the end of game.
Then Cankerworm, loaded with three focus, charged in. Armor piercing did a lot of damage, but to exactly worst of columns: number 3. So nothing broke. With two focus left Cankerworm bought an attack with Replicator, hit, and boosted damage. The damage roll was crazy, something like 4, 5, 6 or something. And that resulted in the loss of cortex and melee arm for the warjack.
On opponents turn Butcher himself wrecked Cankerworm with ease.
Iron Fleshed pikemen advanced in shield wall.
On my turn Tartarus cursed the pikemen and charged them, engaging three. Two of them died.
Nightwretch repositioned itself so that Asphyxious could cast Breath of Corruption on a gathering of two pikemen, one of them being the officer. Both damage rolls were boosted and both pikemen died.
I tried everything within my power to kill the standard bearer, but failed.
Ah well, but then. The latter picture is quite imposing, really. It's a bit hazy, yet you can see an intimidating silhouette of a khadoran warjack... AND Butcher!
Butcher decided it was best to use his feat. Fury was cast on remaining pikemen and then he slapped Tartarus dead. Butcher did an amazingly horrible damage roll, highest number was 3 and it was the only 3. Yet undamaged Tartarus died.
Two pikemen who could charge Reaper left only harpoon intact.
Oh, and aiming Destroyer scored a hit on Necrotech, killing it. As blast damage doesn't gain an additional die under Butchers feat, nothing else was to be expected.
But expect the unexpected. Asphyxious was dealt two more damage by Destroyer's blasts.
Then it's Asphyxous' turn to use feat.
First, I needed to disengage Nightwretch. I tried something a little bit risky, and allocated it two focus.
Then it went and bit the engaging pikeman with attack and damage roll boosted. After that Asphyxious cast Hellfire on the Butcher's dog. It's somewhat curious how one dog draws so much fire from the opposing side...
Then Asphyxious charges the pikemen and kills both of them with remaining focus. Now as I figured this would be the last turn I saw Butcher without Iron Flesh on himself, I decided to use Asphyxious' feat. With the focus Asphyxious cast a boosted Parasite on Butcher and tried to do some damage with a breath of corruption just for kicks. Didn't do anything.
Opponent then takes an aggressive stance.
Destroyer shoots Reaper to bits and Butcher charges Nightwretch. Butcher rolls damage poorly again and Nightwretch is left with only one box remaining in cortex. After that Butch casts Iron Flesh on himself.
Asphyxious had two souls from earlier turn which were turned into focus now.
So, really, either Asphyxious killed Butcher now, or he died trying. Sustained attack fortunately helps in such situations, but still, one focus went to upkeep Parasite and he was left with eight.
First attack misses even with boost.
Second attack hits with a boost and deals 7 points in with a damage boost. Four focus left, I decided that if I rolled good damage next I would go all for it, but if I botched Asphyxious would teleport away.
I rolled rather high and proceeded to make last attack, where Butcher eventually died.
Game 2:
I played second game with Witch Coven of Garlghast with following list:
Coven
- Erebus
- Ripjaw
- Deathripper
Pistol Wraith
And if I felt outnumbered the last time, now the feeling was overwhelming.
But, still. As I said earlier, opponent gave me the start again. First picture is taken from the end of my second turn, where Occultation has been cast on Erebus and Infernal Machine on Deathripper. Pikemen were obviously Iron Fleshed again.
Last game had instilled some sort of a fear in me about that particular Destroyer, so I thought it best to screen the witches with Veil of Mists. Just in case, as the witches don't quite take such hits quite as well as Asphyxious.
Second picture is from the end of my next turn. For some reason Butcher tried to shoot the Pistol Wraith down with Obliteration. It didn't work, actually.
I reply by shooting the war dog with pistol wraith. Now, if pistol wraiths are fallen ghosts of skilled and overly proud duelists, I find it a bit curious that there the enemy warcaster is throwing spells at him, yet the wraith shoots down Butchers dog.
Anyway, Deathripper positions its arc node so that the witches try to shoot Butcher down with stygian abysses. Second shot did critical shadow bind and all was well. Last focus was used to cast Infernal Machine on Erebus and Nightfall was used.
However, I had positioned my troops a little bit too close so the darkness wasn't that much of a boon to me.
Opponent activated Butcher first, who cast Iron Flesh on himself, Fury on Iron Fange Pikemen and used his feat too.
Widowmakers happened all to be within 5" of Ripjaw.
So they got aiming bonus and wrecked Ripjaws arc node and weapon system.
Pikemen advanced at different targets and despite -2 MAT & RAT from Nightfall they destroyed most of Deathrippers damage grid (though arc node was still working just fine) and killed pistol wraith.
Pikemen engaging Erebus missed their attack, though.
And then you'll see something you won't see every day and as an afterthough, I should have lost (or not, if you want to support wacky moves...)
Anyway. What I planned: Upkeep Infernal Machine, cast Ghost Walk on Deathripper, give 3 focus to Erebus, cast Veil of Mists on Erebus & pals, cast one attack roll boosted Stygian Abyss at Butcher to lower his defense. After I had cast Ghost Walk on deathripper I realised that I actually needed 11 focus to do all this.
So.
I aborted my plan and just cast Veil of Mists to allow a charge for Erebus.
Now, I couldn't get Erebus to ignore free strikes as witches had only one focus left.
The usual "A heavy warjack with MAT 9 at opponents warcaster's face" mentality got me to charge one of the pikemen with a witch. Attack roll boost later the pikeman was dead.
Then Erebus charged Butcher, which was where I realised that Butcher currently had arm 21. Combo-strike was "only" P+S 22. And Butcher had defense 17, Erebus MAT of 9.
I really had only one chance here, because one of my witches was sitting in the middle of enemy army and I had one P+S 22 attack to finish off Butcher.
Luckily I had managed to damage Butcher earlier and the damage roll was more than enough to kill Butcher, but damn that was risky. I needed something like 10-11 with 3 dice to kill him. Those are odds that usually wouldn't make you want to risk one of your witches unless it was a last ditch attempt...
I played my Cryx against Khador. They were 15 point games.
Opponent played both times with same list, which was:
Butcher
- Destroyer
Minimum unit of Iron Fang Pikemen + Unit Attachment
Widowmakers
War Dog
First game I played with Asphyxious for a change (Iron Lich version).
Asphyxious
- Reaper
- Cankerworm
- Nightwretch
Bane Lord Tartarus
Necrotech & Scrapjack
Opponent won starting rolls in both games and let me start in both games.
First, I realised how outnumbered I was. Luckily I had Breath of Corruption around and Tartarus with thresher attack.
First picture is from the end of opponents first turn, where Iron Flesh was cast on pikemen. Destroyer took a shot at Nightwretch, but it landed short. However, it deviated so that both Nightwretch and Asphyxious was under.
And it was four points in to Asphyxious there and then.
On my next turn Asphyxious casts a Hellfire on a charge line blocking widowmaker.
Widowmakers failed their command check, and they failed it on every turn until the end of game.
Then Cankerworm, loaded with three focus, charged in. Armor piercing did a lot of damage, but to exactly worst of columns: number 3. So nothing broke. With two focus left Cankerworm bought an attack with Replicator, hit, and boosted damage. The damage roll was crazy, something like 4, 5, 6 or something. And that resulted in the loss of cortex and melee arm for the warjack.
On opponents turn Butcher himself wrecked Cankerworm with ease.
Iron Fleshed pikemen advanced in shield wall.
On my turn Tartarus cursed the pikemen and charged them, engaging three. Two of them died.
Nightwretch repositioned itself so that Asphyxious could cast Breath of Corruption on a gathering of two pikemen, one of them being the officer. Both damage rolls were boosted and both pikemen died.
I tried everything within my power to kill the standard bearer, but failed.
Ah well, but then. The latter picture is quite imposing, really. It's a bit hazy, yet you can see an intimidating silhouette of a khadoran warjack... AND Butcher!
Butcher decided it was best to use his feat. Fury was cast on remaining pikemen and then he slapped Tartarus dead. Butcher did an amazingly horrible damage roll, highest number was 3 and it was the only 3. Yet undamaged Tartarus died.
Two pikemen who could charge Reaper left only harpoon intact.
Oh, and aiming Destroyer scored a hit on Necrotech, killing it. As blast damage doesn't gain an additional die under Butchers feat, nothing else was to be expected.
But expect the unexpected. Asphyxious was dealt two more damage by Destroyer's blasts.
Then it's Asphyxous' turn to use feat.
First, I needed to disengage Nightwretch. I tried something a little bit risky, and allocated it two focus.
Then it went and bit the engaging pikeman with attack and damage roll boosted. After that Asphyxious cast Hellfire on the Butcher's dog. It's somewhat curious how one dog draws so much fire from the opposing side...
Then Asphyxious charges the pikemen and kills both of them with remaining focus. Now as I figured this would be the last turn I saw Butcher without Iron Flesh on himself, I decided to use Asphyxious' feat. With the focus Asphyxious cast a boosted Parasite on Butcher and tried to do some damage with a breath of corruption just for kicks. Didn't do anything.
Opponent then takes an aggressive stance.
Destroyer shoots Reaper to bits and Butcher charges Nightwretch. Butcher rolls damage poorly again and Nightwretch is left with only one box remaining in cortex. After that Butch casts Iron Flesh on himself.
Asphyxious had two souls from earlier turn which were turned into focus now.
So, really, either Asphyxious killed Butcher now, or he died trying. Sustained attack fortunately helps in such situations, but still, one focus went to upkeep Parasite and he was left with eight.
First attack misses even with boost.
Second attack hits with a boost and deals 7 points in with a damage boost. Four focus left, I decided that if I rolled good damage next I would go all for it, but if I botched Asphyxious would teleport away.
I rolled rather high and proceeded to make last attack, where Butcher eventually died.
Game 2:
I played second game with Witch Coven of Garlghast with following list:
Coven
- Erebus
- Ripjaw
- Deathripper
Pistol Wraith
And if I felt outnumbered the last time, now the feeling was overwhelming.
But, still. As I said earlier, opponent gave me the start again. First picture is taken from the end of my second turn, where Occultation has been cast on Erebus and Infernal Machine on Deathripper. Pikemen were obviously Iron Fleshed again.
Last game had instilled some sort of a fear in me about that particular Destroyer, so I thought it best to screen the witches with Veil of Mists. Just in case, as the witches don't quite take such hits quite as well as Asphyxious.
Second picture is from the end of my next turn. For some reason Butcher tried to shoot the Pistol Wraith down with Obliteration. It didn't work, actually.
I reply by shooting the war dog with pistol wraith. Now, if pistol wraiths are fallen ghosts of skilled and overly proud duelists, I find it a bit curious that there the enemy warcaster is throwing spells at him, yet the wraith shoots down Butchers dog.
Anyway, Deathripper positions its arc node so that the witches try to shoot Butcher down with stygian abysses. Second shot did critical shadow bind and all was well. Last focus was used to cast Infernal Machine on Erebus and Nightfall was used.
However, I had positioned my troops a little bit too close so the darkness wasn't that much of a boon to me.
Opponent activated Butcher first, who cast Iron Flesh on himself, Fury on Iron Fange Pikemen and used his feat too.
Widowmakers happened all to be within 5" of Ripjaw.
So they got aiming bonus and wrecked Ripjaws arc node and weapon system.
Pikemen advanced at different targets and despite -2 MAT & RAT from Nightfall they destroyed most of Deathrippers damage grid (though arc node was still working just fine) and killed pistol wraith.
Pikemen engaging Erebus missed their attack, though.
And then you'll see something you won't see every day and as an afterthough, I should have lost (or not, if you want to support wacky moves...)
Anyway. What I planned: Upkeep Infernal Machine, cast Ghost Walk on Deathripper, give 3 focus to Erebus, cast Veil of Mists on Erebus & pals, cast one attack roll boosted Stygian Abyss at Butcher to lower his defense. After I had cast Ghost Walk on deathripper I realised that I actually needed 11 focus to do all this.
So.
I aborted my plan and just cast Veil of Mists to allow a charge for Erebus.
Now, I couldn't get Erebus to ignore free strikes as witches had only one focus left.
The usual "A heavy warjack with MAT 9 at opponents warcaster's face" mentality got me to charge one of the pikemen with a witch. Attack roll boost later the pikeman was dead.
Then Erebus charged Butcher, which was where I realised that Butcher currently had arm 21. Combo-strike was "only" P+S 22. And Butcher had defense 17, Erebus MAT of 9.
I really had only one chance here, because one of my witches was sitting in the middle of enemy army and I had one P+S 22 attack to finish off Butcher.
Luckily I had managed to damage Butcher earlier and the damage roll was more than enough to kill Butcher, but damn that was risky. I needed something like 10-11 with 3 dice to kill him. Those are odds that usually wouldn't make you want to risk one of your witches unless it was a last ditch attempt...
Friday, October 28, 2011
Total change of "meta": recommended!
Played a game of Warmachine today.
It was against an exchange student in my town of residence, and despite it being against Protectorate of Menoth (which I've played against most) it was something I had never seen before.
First of all, he was playing Vindictus.
Anyway.
My 35 point list:
Dominar Rasheth
- Rhinodon
- Cyclops Shaman
- Basilisk Drake
- Basilisk Krea
Full unit of Praetorian Swordmen + Unit Attachment
Minimum unit of Beast Handlers
Aptimus Marketh
Master Tormentor
Orin Midwinter
Totem Hunter
And opponent was playing:
Vice Scrutator Vindictus
- Reckoner
- Devout
Minimum unit of Choir of Menoth
Maximum unit of Holy Zealots + Monolith Bearer
Minimum unit of Exemplar Vengers
Rhoven & Honor Guard
Vilmon
Paladin
Vassal of Menoth
Opponent won the starting roll, and first picture is taken from the end of my first turn. Now, a word needs to be said about a couple of proxies. Exemplar Errant with standard acts as if he's Vilmon, Rhoven is a hierophant & two exemplar errants and the paladin threw his armor and weapon away and looks like Allegiant.
Well, picture is small and hazy and not too much to tell about the first round, except that Totem Hunter chose Vengers as its prey.
Second picture is taken even farther away and is even smaller, but it's there mostly to illustrate the situation, as trying to take impressive pictures from unpainted miniatures with my less-than-awesome photoshooting skills is a quest in vain.
Anyway, this is the round I understood how awesome spell True Path is. Vengers rushed in and trampled a couple of praetorians under their hooves, and zealots walked 8" and threw their bombs away, knocking out body & spirit from basilisk drake. They used their minifeat of near-invulnerability. Tons of bombs landed on random targets too, but didn't roll enough to kill anyone.
Vengers had Defender's Ward on them, so I really, really wanted to remove them from board or at least neutralize well enough.
Though I must admit that I may have used excessive force when I enraged the Rhinodon and charged one of the vengers, destroying it outright.
Then Basilisk Krea shoots a paralyzing gaze at the venger in the back. Hits.
Aptimus Marketh tries to fry one venger with Sunder Spirit and deals a couple points of damage.
Then cames all kinds of hilarious dice rolling. Praetorians had Carnivore on them so were hitting on 6's. However, both were sitting on armor 21.
You would think that getting a hit on 6 and rolling at least 12 even once, or less with more hits, but it just didn't happen. First Venger was left alone. Then four combo-strikes were done on the paralyzed knight. Now he... he was left with one or two hit points.
Luckily Totem Hunter came and finished the non-paralysed one, but still... it relly didn't work as planned.
Next I became overfixated on killing the lone venger. I shot a boosted Drake spray at it - nothing. I shot a boosted sunder spirit on it with Rasheth (through a "meat node" - nothing. Even Cyclops Shaman tried to stare it down, but nothing. Not a single time I rolled over 10 with three dice.
At least Orin Midwinter fried a couple of zealots.
Now, to be honest, next opponent showed what exemplars are capable of.
As was to be expected, Reckoner charged Rhinodon and nearly skewered it. It had something like six or seven points remaining after the beating. It would have probably killed it, but it had to take care of of the Cyclops Shaman too. Which was quite killed after getting mauled by... uh. After getting mauled by Holy Zealots. Stop laughing!
High Paladin Dartan Vilmon charges in with his holy blade of magic and might. Well he misses with double 1's.
Cassian, feeling it his duty to protect Vilmon and maybe gain a little bit more honor by slaying the huge beast confronting the epic paladin charges in. Misses with double 1's.
Ancillary Attack finishes off the beast, however. Trust only Reckoner.
Now, losing a couple of my beasts did hurt. Also, during whole fight Vindictus had made good use out of Devout's spell barrier, which meant no unsporting Blood Mark shenanigans.
On my turn praetorians used their minifeat and mopped up a whole swath of enemy troopers after Totem Hunter killed the lone remaining exemplar venger.
Basilisk Drake and Aptimus Marketh both tried to do their best in getting at least some important system broken from the Reckoner, but failing miserably.
However, it would have meant 4 points more damage in if I had activated Rasheth first and cast Blood Mark on it before those attacks.
But at least I had one transfer point.
Next I lost every swordman except the standard bearer.
I lost my basilisk drake too.
It really started to look rather grim.
I figured out only one way I could "win", and I'm quite glad I didn't win because of that, because it wouldn't have felt like a victory at all when you look at that picture...
So, I ran the lone standard bearer as far as possible close to Vindictus. This was first round when spell barrier from Devout wasn't on.
After vengers bit the dust Vindictus had cast Defender's Ward on himself and he was sitting behind cover, so he had defense value 21 against spells. My fury of 8 required me to roll at least 13 with three dice to get a spell off... Blood Mark being that spell.
Well, it didn't get off.
Then Rasheth cast Blood Mark again on Reckoner with one fury left for transfers.
Funnily enough, almost all the proxy models are present in this "Finish Him!" picture. After cutting and getting random damage in Rasheth had 17 damage boxes. First palading that charged dealt exactly 17 points damage in, so off to Reckoner they went, breaking off one of its arms and movement.
Then Vilmon charges in and rolls a bit more nicely, which means "not killing" Rasheth. He had three damage boxes left when Cassian finished him.
If I nominated a central miniature for this game, it has to be the Reckoner. It just shrugged off everything I threw at it and in turn killed three warbeasts. Or did it kill all of them? I don't remember the fate of basilisk krea any more.
Anyway, it was a good game with a fresh take (for me) on Protectorate of Menoth!
It was against an exchange student in my town of residence, and despite it being against Protectorate of Menoth (which I've played against most) it was something I had never seen before.
First of all, he was playing Vindictus.
Anyway.
My 35 point list:
Dominar Rasheth
- Rhinodon
- Cyclops Shaman
- Basilisk Drake
- Basilisk Krea
Full unit of Praetorian Swordmen + Unit Attachment
Minimum unit of Beast Handlers
Aptimus Marketh
Master Tormentor
Orin Midwinter
Totem Hunter
And opponent was playing:
Vice Scrutator Vindictus
- Reckoner
- Devout
Minimum unit of Choir of Menoth
Maximum unit of Holy Zealots + Monolith Bearer
Minimum unit of Exemplar Vengers
Rhoven & Honor Guard
Vilmon
Paladin
Vassal of Menoth
Opponent won the starting roll, and first picture is taken from the end of my first turn. Now, a word needs to be said about a couple of proxies. Exemplar Errant with standard acts as if he's Vilmon, Rhoven is a hierophant & two exemplar errants and the paladin threw his armor and weapon away and looks like Allegiant.
Well, picture is small and hazy and not too much to tell about the first round, except that Totem Hunter chose Vengers as its prey.
Second picture is taken even farther away and is even smaller, but it's there mostly to illustrate the situation, as trying to take impressive pictures from unpainted miniatures with my less-than-awesome photoshooting skills is a quest in vain.
Anyway, this is the round I understood how awesome spell True Path is. Vengers rushed in and trampled a couple of praetorians under their hooves, and zealots walked 8" and threw their bombs away, knocking out body & spirit from basilisk drake. They used their minifeat of near-invulnerability. Tons of bombs landed on random targets too, but didn't roll enough to kill anyone.
Vengers had Defender's Ward on them, so I really, really wanted to remove them from board or at least neutralize well enough.
Though I must admit that I may have used excessive force when I enraged the Rhinodon and charged one of the vengers, destroying it outright.
Then Basilisk Krea shoots a paralyzing gaze at the venger in the back. Hits.
Aptimus Marketh tries to fry one venger with Sunder Spirit and deals a couple points of damage.
Then cames all kinds of hilarious dice rolling. Praetorians had Carnivore on them so were hitting on 6's. However, both were sitting on armor 21.
You would think that getting a hit on 6 and rolling at least 12 even once, or less with more hits, but it just didn't happen. First Venger was left alone. Then four combo-strikes were done on the paralyzed knight. Now he... he was left with one or two hit points.
Luckily Totem Hunter came and finished the non-paralysed one, but still... it relly didn't work as planned.
Next I became overfixated on killing the lone venger. I shot a boosted Drake spray at it - nothing. I shot a boosted sunder spirit on it with Rasheth (through a "meat node" - nothing. Even Cyclops Shaman tried to stare it down, but nothing. Not a single time I rolled over 10 with three dice.
At least Orin Midwinter fried a couple of zealots.
Now, to be honest, next opponent showed what exemplars are capable of.
As was to be expected, Reckoner charged Rhinodon and nearly skewered it. It had something like six or seven points remaining after the beating. It would have probably killed it, but it had to take care of of the Cyclops Shaman too. Which was quite killed after getting mauled by... uh. After getting mauled by Holy Zealots. Stop laughing!
High Paladin Dartan Vilmon charges in with his holy blade of magic and might. Well he misses with double 1's.
Cassian, feeling it his duty to protect Vilmon and maybe gain a little bit more honor by slaying the huge beast confronting the epic paladin charges in. Misses with double 1's.
Ancillary Attack finishes off the beast, however. Trust only Reckoner.
Now, losing a couple of my beasts did hurt. Also, during whole fight Vindictus had made good use out of Devout's spell barrier, which meant no unsporting Blood Mark shenanigans.
On my turn praetorians used their minifeat and mopped up a whole swath of enemy troopers after Totem Hunter killed the lone remaining exemplar venger.
Basilisk Drake and Aptimus Marketh both tried to do their best in getting at least some important system broken from the Reckoner, but failing miserably.
However, it would have meant 4 points more damage in if I had activated Rasheth first and cast Blood Mark on it before those attacks.
But at least I had one transfer point.
Next I lost every swordman except the standard bearer.
I lost my basilisk drake too.
It really started to look rather grim.
I figured out only one way I could "win", and I'm quite glad I didn't win because of that, because it wouldn't have felt like a victory at all when you look at that picture...
So, I ran the lone standard bearer as far as possible close to Vindictus. This was first round when spell barrier from Devout wasn't on.
After vengers bit the dust Vindictus had cast Defender's Ward on himself and he was sitting behind cover, so he had defense value 21 against spells. My fury of 8 required me to roll at least 13 with three dice to get a spell off... Blood Mark being that spell.
Well, it didn't get off.
Then Rasheth cast Blood Mark again on Reckoner with one fury left for transfers.
Funnily enough, almost all the proxy models are present in this "Finish Him!" picture. After cutting and getting random damage in Rasheth had 17 damage boxes. First palading that charged dealt exactly 17 points damage in, so off to Reckoner they went, breaking off one of its arms and movement.
Then Vilmon charges in and rolls a bit more nicely, which means "not killing" Rasheth. He had three damage boxes left when Cassian finished him.
If I nominated a central miniature for this game, it has to be the Reckoner. It just shrugged off everything I threw at it and in turn killed three warbeasts. Or did it kill all of them? I don't remember the fate of basilisk krea any more.
Anyway, it was a good game with a fresh take (for me) on Protectorate of Menoth!
Monday, October 24, 2011
"Who's the Dragon Lord now, punk?"
I finally finished painting all of new characters for Talisman.
As I have made it into some sort of a tradition to post the painted characters here, here they are:
As I said earlier their level of detail is amazing when comparing to most other Talisman figures. Also, their size too.
Especially the Dragon Rider is somewhat... big. Not that the Minotaur needs to be in any kind of a shame there. Fire Wizard with his dragon tail cloak and a huge pyroblast makes him a lot larger than standard human sized figure in Talisman range.
Even the normal sized characters compare in size to other large human characters in earlier expansions.
To illustrate their hugeness I assembled a picture where is every released Talisman figure this far. Keep in mind that these models are in the back row!
Anyway.
Still waiting for a game of Dragon expansion.
As I have made it into some sort of a tradition to post the painted characters here, here they are:
As I said earlier their level of detail is amazing when comparing to most other Talisman figures. Also, their size too.
Especially the Dragon Rider is somewhat... big. Not that the Minotaur needs to be in any kind of a shame there. Fire Wizard with his dragon tail cloak and a huge pyroblast makes him a lot larger than standard human sized figure in Talisman range.
Even the normal sized characters compare in size to other large human characters in earlier expansions.
To illustrate their hugeness I assembled a picture where is every released Talisman figure this far. Keep in mind that these models are in the back row!
Anyway.
Still waiting for a game of Dragon expansion.
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