eCaine - 'Ol Rowdy, Squire, Rangers, Boomhowlers + Murdoch, Gun Mages + Dude, pAlexia + Risen, Aiyanna + Holt, TAC, Anastasia, Piper, Reinholdt, Taryn
Objective: Effigy of Valor
Round 1 I went into my Wife's angry elves as she did us a solid to even out the numbers, wasn't a great representation of what I like to go on about here so I'll leave that report be, functionally Boomhowlers hold up a line of jacks by not failing tough rolls and I cruise to a scenario win on outflank.
Mid round was an unexpected social challenge, think I did all right though I will never fall in love with half remembered Mk 1 combos or Drop Zone Commander.
Round 2, Hades-killer-of-innocent-Brutes-who-are-jammed-in-place.
eZaal - 2x Aradus Sentinel, Raider, 2x Willbreaker, Nihilators, Tycom, Slingers, Immortals, Makedas frustrated step father (Hakaar), Paingivers
Objective: Arcane, Armory, Bunker, Effigy, Fuel or Stockpile. Definitely one of them. Okay, not Stockpile, I haven't seen that one even mentioned outside Ashlynn silliness.
Caine Deploy: Winning the roll, I picked first so that I could unfold without anything to important being immediately capped by the Aradus. Unlike the prior game I also deployed my Rangers, though only because Zaidois reminded me about them.
Zaal Deploy: It's somewhat of a tradition that someone be proxying at a slam, in this case the Aradus are the Ponies. Slingers/immortals on the left, Nihilators on the right.
Caine 1: Everything runs up, the Rangers take over the hill on the right, as eyeballing off the flag to deployment line placement they are out of range of Nihilators running and engaging. I keep Caine and the other stuff I care about an inch or so out of the Aradus max threat range (AD line deployment, sp 3, Range 10, add 4 for snipe, no speed buffs in the list). Boomhowlers run around and spread out, I expect to lose maybe two of them to Aradus shots which will give Alexia a corpse for Murdoch to charge and pop his mini-feat next turn. Heightened Reflexes goes on Boomies, Blur on TAC.
This unpacked at about the same speed as when I do Mercs, so happy with that.
Zaal 1: The Aradii get Sniped, Tranference goes up and everything moves up. The Aradus go for long odds scatters rather than confirmed hits on the Boomhowlers, so that was annoying. The Boomhowler next to Ol' Rowdy explodes, and a pair of Gun Mages suffered the same fate.
Caine 2: Pull off the Squire, Caine moves up and Magic Bullets a Ranger then kills a few Nihilators, lastly he teleports backwards toeing into the Kill box. Aiyanna/Holt move up behind the hill, she stealths and he kills a Nihilator. One Ranger advances forward to point at enemy models, the rest mostly shoot Nihilators, doing fairly well. I crank the Magic Bullt roll on the Tycom, leaving him on a box, so one Ranger finishes him off. A few Nihilators do live.
Boomies run into their usual suicide positions. The Gun Mages kill a slinger, woo! All the support junk hides behind TAC clouds.
Zaal 2: The Nihilators engage the forward Rangers and kill one. The Immortals flatten the front row of Boomies in a fashion that makes me sad, because some days Tough just doesn't pull through. Zaal puts down Mage Sight, but Arcing Fire only ignores intervening models so Caine doesn't die horribly to the Aridus. The left bug wings Alexia, but only does a few boxes. The right one blats a poor cloud dwarf. The Slingers maul the Objective. Zaal also feats this turn.
For whatever reason I didn't read Mage Sight then and there like I should have done, I was under the impression it let you ignore LoS for models, which it doesn't (Forest/clouds/stealth yes, models no). At the time I thought I literally had no way to keep Caine alive from an Aradus shot, when I definitely had options I didn't explore as soon to be witnessed.
Caine 3: I drop my upkeeps, Caine moves up and Magic Bullets himself twice to pop the Raider for a mighty pair of Boxes, then Gate Crashers back, Ol Rowdy runs in front of him and the Dorfs put clouds out beside him to at least make him cast Mage Sight. The Gun Mages each blat a Slinger. What Risen I get jam a little, the Boomies also charge up and Rage Howl, making the Slingers run away. Rangers damage all the Nihilators that remain, but three drag through on tough rolls, so Taryn pops a couple more to leave only one survivor.
Tactical screw up here of that Boomhowler I kept forgetting way in the back row. Whoops.
My long term plan had been to wait out the feat, use Caine's feat to plink Zaal to damage the Aradus via Transfers then attrition out. The Boomhowlers and most of their Corpses were expended poorly however, and then I thought Mage Sight was going to get me killed horribly so I was just hoping Hadois did something horrificly dumb to give me the win.
Zaal 3: Zaal has 15 Fury on his activation. Spell kill time!
Hakaar/Immortals clear the way. Zaal charges forward, stopping half an inch of Rowdy Coutnercharge range (Wouldn't kill but would make me feel better). He puts down Mage sight to see Caine. At this point he realizes Alexia is in Arcane Interference Range and everything costs double. He can afford one full boost Sunder Spirit and one with a boost to hit.
They land and Caine goes paste.
Me on the right.
I thought I was screwed no matter what here, but now I've done the basic step of actually reading the cards I don't think that's the case. Mage Sight and Aradus puts this to Skorne list advantage, but my Table side gave me an excellent Obstruction to hide behind. I survive the Aradus by putting Caine base to base with the Obstruction and Ol'Rowdy in front of him out of Blast range, The Cloud Dwarfs spread out in a max command triangle and cloud important models to reduce the efficacy of Mage Sight. Aradus/Hakaar are a problem, I think I still have to wait out the feat then will struggle to kill all those models without losing Ol' Rowdy halfway, so that likely goes poorly for me. Will have to think on that.
That's three games, at this point I think I'll drop Murdoch as I want him in the Styker list. Mage Sight and double Ret haven't been friendly to the TAC, so I'll keep them for now. Other drops may or may not be Taryn and Anastasia, putting in some combination of eEiryss/Journeyman/Acosta and/or Goblin Tinker filler point.
