They were 35 point games with Steamroller scenarios, and I played following list in both of the games:
Goreshade the Bastard & Deathwalker
- Nightmare
- Seether
- Cankerworm
Maximum unit of Satyxis Raiders + Sea Witch
Bane Lord Tartarus
Satyxis Captain
Necrotech & Scrap Thrall
First game was against:
Karchev the Terrible
2x Kayazy Eliminators
Maximum unit of Man-o-War Shocktroopers
Minimum unit of Battle Mechaniks + Officer
2x Manhunters
Epic Eiryss
Khador got the first turn, and picture is taken from the end of Cryx's first turn. And, uh. Second turn shows the ridiculousness that Tow is. Karchev took additional movement and ran. Though juggernauts had run way ahead of Karchev, he still managed somehow to tow them even further by taking additional movement from turbine and running.
If I'd only been just a little more careless, it'd easily been a caster kill, again.
Anyway, I lost my cankerworm, and kayazy eliminators on the leftern flank started to rapidly diminish satyxis' ranks.
It was about this time when I realised that six points from opponent (eliminators + Eiryss) were tying up 19 points there. And the 19 points didn't manage to get rid of them! At least not in a timely manner.
I was thinking that I'd probably lose to attrition already because of that weird blunder of throwing more than half of my list to one flank. I tried to do some kind of assassination, which turned out to become just an ordinary wrecking day.
First Necrotech went and build a scrap thrall from the wreck of Cankerworm. Then Goreshade cast Shadowmancer and charged the juggernaut that dared to destroy Asphyxious' precious little toy. Goreshade would have a lot to explain...
Anyway, with last focus Goreshade bought additional attack and hit scrap thrall. Resulting blast killed both eliminators, which was way more than I had hoped for.
Then Goreshade uses his feat. Then his feat charges awkwardly, to not get into way of Nightmare. First Bane Lord Tartarus had activated and charged a lone Manhunter to curse Karchev or something.
Three bane thralls that were dedicated to the juggernaut in melee with Goreshade didn't destroy the khadoran warjack, despite initial softening up by Goreshade. This is where I had to change my plans. Nightmare charging at Karchev would've been too unsure, and if Khador would start its turn with a warjack next to focusless Goreshade... no, not good. Nightmare just walked up, getting both warjacks within his reach. Three focus were more than enough to reduce both jacks to scrap.
But still... I felt outnumbered.
Next turn Karchev single-handedly gets rid of one particular Nightmare, and afterward everything runs to block as much potential threats to Karchev as possible. One manhunter charges Goreshade and removes about half of Goreshade's hit boxes.
And then... I was outnumbered.
It was all or nothing now, everything had to be geared towards an assassination. I measured Goreshade's control range so that I knew he'd have enough threat to charge Karchev if I could get a mechanik, possibly a man-o-war and one of my bane thralls away.
Things started looking bad when bane thralls failed to do anything, though the one I mentioned moved away from Goreshade's charge lane.
However, Bane Lord Tartarus saved the situation and charged so that the mechanik and man-o-war died, thanks to a ridiculous damage roll. Shame that thresher attack didn't do much to Karchev himself.
Anyway, now Karchev was inside Dark Shroud and Goreshade had full 7 focus, and even Deathwalker was in position to debuff Karchev.
Goreshade charged and unloaded full 7 focus to the man in the machine, and it was last possible attack that finally destroyed the metal hulk, and it wasn't even an excessive destruction - only two points over Karchev's remaining hit boxes.
Somehow I suspect things would have been a little different if I wouldn't have moved most of my troops to contest my own zone... What the heck was I thinking?
Game 2:
Second game was against a following list:
Epic Irusk
Maximum unit of Assault Kommandos + 1 Flame Thrower
Great Bears of Gallowswood
Greylord Ternion
Widowmakers
Epic Eiryss
Gorman diWulfe
Orin Midwinter
I actually felt quite good about this match-up. My whole list was protected against shooting pretty damn well, and opponent had lots of shooting. I did, however, underestimate how fast Assault Kommandos with Tactical Supremacy would be.
First picture is taken from the end of Khador's first turn. This time Cryx got the start... and since Irusk had come so far forward, I decided to launch Satyxis all over the place. Literally they spread everywhere on the board.
I did a slight mental fart with Nightmare, though. I counted up it's threat range of 11" and then added Reach on top of it. So... I tried to charge Juggernaut with it. Charge fell so short that I had to stop and wonder what on earth just happened. I had planned that I would charge in and then yank Nightmare right back with Soul Gate, but situation turned so that I had to cover my mistake with that spell.
Anyway, then it's opponent's turn and something happened that gave the title for this post.
Great Bears of Gallowswood charged Cankerworm, and Volkov did... Uh, I can't even say it... I'm still in the stage of denial. No, let's face it... he rolled five sixes in one go. True, one of the dice was for location, but still. Five sixes? I guess I should be happy that it didn't happen on actually important pieces such as Nightmare.
Irusk used his feat and cast Rift on Seether. Suddenly... just suddenly things looked really bad. Random shooting and melee attacks all but cleared my infantry, and then I realised that two heavy warjacks wouldn't be able to destroy them all. And even further, Cryxian standards of ARM 17 and the damage grid of a light warjack on heavies started to worry me. Assault Kommandos with Battle Lust would most probably just destroy Seether on next turn, and Nightmare was inside Irusk's feat, so it'd probably end up just getting charged next turn without being able to reach anything useful.
First Bane Lord Tartarus attempts to get rid of Great Bears and fails miserably. He completely misses one and kills two, but Yarovich passes a Tough roll. So... 2/3 of Bears still standing. I think that sealed the deal here - I would try to go for assassination, again. Goreshade wasn't in Irusk's feat, so he charged as far as possible, camped all focus and used feat.
Two of the feated thralls manage to walk up to Irusk. Two attempts to finish Irusk who had already taken in a horrible amount of damage from a lucky hit by Satyxis last turn. Both missed, though.
Then I realise I hadn't moved Deathwalker yet. Luckily her movement isn't enough to bring Irusk to the debuff aura. Would have sucked quite a bit if a successful desperate assassination would have been undone just because of that...
Anyway, then I just had to hope for low rolls next turn.
First Gorman goes and throws the oil on Goreshade. Mmkay, well, he still has def 11, arm 23. I still might survive.
Eiryss, however, is so stealthy that she isn't seen in any of the pictures. That's because she has been residing just out of picture, on the hill to the right.
Suddenly it was def 11 arm 16 situation. I guess I should have spent the focus for Shadowmancer, but I was quite sure Eiryss wouldn't be able to bring Goreshade to her range.
Greylord Ternion shoots Goreshade with their spray attacks and do some damage in. Then Assault Kommandos fail their Terror check against Goreshade and situation became... interesting. Juggernaut trampled over a bane thrall that luckily had survived, and Juggernaut rolls damage very badly against Goreshade. He is left with one hit box and almost everything had activated.
All, but Widowmakers.
All, but Widowmakers with Sniper to deal exactly one point of damage. Finally one of them scores a hit, and it's game over.
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