Karchev1 (WinterGuard Kommand) - 6x Marauder, 2x Juggernaught, WGI (Min) + 3x Rocketeer, 2x WG Mortar, Kovnik Joe
vs
Strakhov2 and bros (Legion of Steel) - Conquest, Black Dragon IFP + UA, IFP + UA, Uhlans (Min), Markov, IFP Kovnik, Great Bears,
Scenario is Take and Hold, so Control Point rush isn't a huge concern. I win the roll, select first to get up the board. I have a large hill on the left, a blob of water in the centre and a wall on the right, not super near my flag.
On the Strakhovy side there's a wall on the far left that does nothing notable, a cloud/forest combo in the centre and a hill on the right near my flag.
The most relevant terrain is the water, which I lack pathfinder options for and the forest which will block LoS to reasonable effect if needed, though it I think it pans out as more about denying karchev that enabling the IFP list.
Going in was a test of if Strak can pull the resources to do enough to stop the jack wall with Precision strike and strategic Last Standing.
Deployments are not super exciting, I split the Juggers either side, have a line of Marauders, Karchev in line for my friendly flag with the various Winter Guard behind him.
Opposition wise the Black Dragons are on the left, Conquest central, normal IFP on the right and an Uhlan unit on the extreme right.
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Round 1: Both sides proc their advance moves, I do three marauders spread across the line, while the opposing Pike units both come forward.
I have proxies for daaaays.
Three Marauders and one Jugger run up toward the Strakhov flag, one Marauder gets stuck behind the water, one of the Advance moved fellas gets into the wet and slimey stuff.
Karchev puts Road to War initially, Battle Charged isn't going to be super relevant this early stage and isn't super hard to put up.
Winterguard move up and hang around in a block behind Karchev.
The Black Dragons get Inviolable Resolve, move up and form Shield Wall triangles. They are sure to stay back out of Road to War charge range. The Conquest runs up to be behind the forest, the right oatmeal based diet IFP get Quicken and copy the Black Dragon plan. Uhlans form their own triangle on the extreme right. Strakhov and groupies end up behind the cloud.
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Karchev 1: My basic plan is to feed in a few Marauders to pull elements out and set up the friendly scoring. I drop Road to War for some Possuming.
On the left, one Marauder runs up to just barely contest the left flag, Marauders and Juggers then go behind him in a spread out pattern, including the Marauder who was behind the water.
On the right, Karchev doesn't really move to keep his control area constant with my left flank placements. He's outside of the Conquest threat range, some of the Quickened Pikemen can get into him so to counter that I put a marauder/Juggernaught in front of him. I've got plenty of Sac Pawns relative to opposing guns, so I drain his focus to cast two Eruptions to force hard decision for the vanilla ice cream IFP. The first scatters forward like a boss and implodes a triangle, that was unexpected but glorious. The other scatters to the left, so the IFP have a corridor to get through but not an ideal one.
Lastly, the IFP futz around, the three Rocketeers move out to my right edge and explode an Uhlan. The Mortars shoot at the Conquest, one does nought, the other does about 5 or so damage. There's no repair on the opposing side either, so begin the plinking!
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Strakhov 1: The Alpha strike comes in. The Black Dragons and normal IFP both pop their mini feats and charge in, they do scattered damage, badly hurting a Mauler on the left and Jugger on the right (Jugger also gets crit knocked down). The left injured Mauler then gets finished off by the Great Bears.
Strakhov moves up, pops feat, does his AP shooting into a Mauler before Repositioning back. The Conquest toes into the forest for Line of Sight, shoots one of the left side Maulers but rolls poorly, fails on the crit fishing boost to hit.
Back on the right the Uhlans go into the knock downed Jugger and put more damage on him, he just has his left arm, movement and some armour boxes at this point. They then Repo back a bit.
At some point a WGI Rocketeer dies this turn, though I don't recall what did it.
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Karchev 2: The IFP aren't super worth trying to kill this turn with the various buffs up and the Conquest has stayed far enough back to not be in Road To War murder range. I plan to pick off non-IFP units, jam the left unit and kill the IFP Kovnik on the left to let the Sunder knockdown spray nullify a good chunk of the vanilla IFP unit.
I load up one of the left Marauders, who goes into the Great Bears. tough and 7's to hit cause me some grief, so I only kill one and end up charging another Marauder in to kill another one, though I ensure that he engages the right most IFP to limit the odds of Black Dragons trying to come over to the right side where I feel I have less Jack models to pull through with.
The Jugger on this side hangs back to be the next wave, the other Marauder on this side runs most of the way through the water, pinching off the Conquests ability to get a landing spot near Karchev with the flag and to threaten the Colossal with Weaponmaster feated death if he doesn't back up.
On the right, the Juggernaught gets up and lumbers forward, blocking IFP line of sight so a Marauder can charge and kill the remaining pair of Uhlans.
The Rocketeers get boosts to hit, then alongside the Mortars they try to kill the IFP Kovnik. It doesn't work out, they would have been vastly better spent just plinking the Conquest some more.
Karchev tries to spray, achieves nought. He throws an Eruption toward the Black Dragons, hoping again to deter the unit from coming across. It scatters forward, ends up in the middle of the IFP lines, kills nought but is placed annoying for Strakky.
Last I have a Marauder on the right with an extra focus on it going into the Vanilla IFP, gets into Melee with three of them and chews them up and spits them out like they were sauerkraut.
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Strak 2: Around the Strakhov flag the Black Dragons wrap around the two Marauders engaging them alongside the single remaining Great Bear. They attack the more damaged of the two, leave it with just its left arm and movement remaining as well as being knocked down. The other Mauler is untouched.
Strakhov and boys move back a bit, wing the Marauder in front of Karchev, mess it up quite a bit then reposition into the backfield, again out of Road to War murder range. Markov also runs in the backfield to the back right of the field.
On the right, the regular IFP do those weird side charge that happen in warmachine mosh pit melees. They do some damage and knock down the Jugger and a Marauder. Maxed out Conquest then charges in, kills the Juggernaught and two Marauders on the right, essentially clearing that flank off all jacks that started over their.
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Karchev 3: I'm down to three and a half jacks at this point, but feel no attrition pressure. The conquest is eminently killable, after that based on the previous rounds I don't have to fear the damage output of the opposing list all that much.
On the left, the damaged Marauder, his healthy bro and the remaining Juggernaught make attacks into Black Dragons, they kill the last Great Bear and otherwise stomp around. I'll never score meaningfully on that side, neither will Strakhov.
On the right, the Mortars and WGI CRA's kill off the IFP Kovnik, remaining Vanillarites and Markov.
Karchev then feats and charges the Conquest, he burns his Fury stack to leave it on half a doxen boxes, a fully loaded Marauder then goes in and one shots it while blocking the Strakhov charge on Karchev.
I go to 1 CP, clock is also very much on my side at this point as I've made many less attacks over the course of the game, though this turn was long and narrowed the gap considerably.
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Strak 3: Strakhov and bros shoot the Marauder that killed the Conquest, as Karchev has three Sac Pawn targets in his vicinity. The IFP Standard Bearer runs in to contest.
The Black Dragons on the left take out the healthier of the two marauders Cortexes.
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Karchev 4: I'm ahead on all relevant victory vectors, so I just do some screwing around. karchev puts up Road to War, hangs on the flag. WGI kill the contesting IFP standard bearer, allowing the Conquest Marauder to advance and charge Strakhov. I roll absolutely unreasonably and kill him through Focus camp (Trip 6 for the charge damage, trip 6 to hit the other initial attack).
It......ain't Strakhov's game. Sac Pawn lets Karchev drop his focus pool doing whatever he wants with his ease, Eruption was amazing being cast without consequence. I never felt the need for Countercharge, reach was firmly present on the opposing side whilst distances simply weren't an issue once I had contesting range on the Strakhov flag.
