As you may have noticed I've been
having issues with gun line armies, in particular Haley1, Haley2
ones. A couple of people have suggested that Deneghra2 is the answer
to Cygnar and with her new theme list out I decided to give it a go.
Using Keith (from Muse on Minis) idea of one max unit and two min
ones for drudges I took the following lists:
Wraith Witch Deneghra
- Nightmare
- Nightwretch x2
- Skarlock Thrall
Cephalyx Mind Slaver & Drudges (max
x1, min x2)
Cephalyx Overlords x2
Mechanithralls (min x2)
- Brute Thralls x3
Necrosurgeon x2
Warwitch Siren x2
Ragman
Asphyxious the Hellbringer
- Deathjack
- Erebus
Mechanithralls (min)
Necrosurgeon x2
Satyxis Raiders (max + UA)
Satyxis Blood Witches (max + UA)
Gorman Di Wulfe
Ogrun Bokur
Satyxis Raider Captain x2
Game 1, Incursion, vs Matt Rowan, Cygnar
I have played against Matt before but
not for ages so it was great to see him again and play against is
Cygnar. Matt had Kraye with him and had paired him with Stryker2.
Both of which I felt fine to use Deneghra2. After all I had come to
the tournament to practice her. Matt then rolled a dice for his
caster to my horror and came up with Kraye for me to face. I lost the
starting roll but Matt wanted a particular side so I still got to go
first.
Using the tier 4 bonus I got Marked for
Death on the Nyss hunters, Pursuit on the gun mages and Curse of
Shadows on Gallant. Matt put the Nyss on the left, gun mages on the
right with three hunters in front. Gallant and the sentinel went in
the centre with Kraye. My first turn and the drudges ran forward. I
put the max unit in the middle and the other two on the flanks.
Everything else moved forward scooting around the building in front
of me.
Matt used Kraye first to cast Guided
Fire and ride-by-attack a drudge who lived. Then the hunters went and
shot at the right hand nightwretch who was putting his toe in a
forest. But very little damage was caused, I think because they
mostly missed. Gallant moved forward, followed by the sentinel who
only shot once with his chain gun :( After all that the Nyss moved up
but did little damage to the drudges and the same happened with the
gun mages on the right. Then the right flag went away.
I didn't upkeep Pursuit as it wasn't
doing much for this game but the other spells stayed on their targets
while Deneghra went Incorporeal. Drudges ran forwards again and tried
to tie up what they could. Nightmare moved to the central flag and
based it. The skarlock went and cast Ghost Walk on the right hand arc
node, the warwitch siren gave it a point of focus and then it ran to
be infront of the gun mages. Deneghra then cast Hellmouth on the gun
mages and left two of them alive to fail a command check. She then
moved slightly left and the mechanithrall unit with the brute thralls
bunkered up around her.
A few bits of focus went to the hunters
and Gallant at the beginning of Matt's turn and with the Nyss he
killed a fair few of the central drudge unit. The sentinel tried to
finish them off but with one shot again not much happened. Gun Mages
rallied and the hunters did something. I think they took out the arc
node on the right hand nightwretch, but not much else. Gallant then
trampled to the central flag to take a wack on Nightmare who shrugged
off the couple of hits. I score 1 control point from controlling the
left flag (nightwretch and the Overlords were both there)
My turn and with both spells upkept I
gave Nightmare three focus to remove Gallant. It only took one.
Deneghra feated and caught the hunters, Kraye, sentinel and the Nyss.
The Overseers on the left flank moved away from the flag and killed
all but one of the Nyss who then went down to the drudge's blades. In
the middle the drudges engaged the hunters and sentinel to stop them
shooting and that was about it. I'm now up to three CPs.
Matt can't move much now, the squire
and the gun mages were out so they mostly dawdle around the back
field as one runs to contest the central flag. The hunters clear off
the drudges engaging them with their axes as the sentinel does the
same with his shield. Other than that not much happens so I score
another control point.
I don't go for army points killed, I
just end my turn to score the fifth control point to win.
Things learnt:
With the drudges up front it is hard
for normal models to get through that line of tough troops,
especially when normal blast damage won't do it. Then anything solid
that gets past them is eaten up by mechanithralls, Nightmare or
Deneghra herself. I pressed forwards because Matt wasn't able to get
enough on Deneghra for assassination purposes and that allowed me to
take control of the scenario.
Game 2, Balance of Power, vs Benji Hanson, Protectorate of Menoth
Benji is a club mate and as such knew
of my plans for today, in fact I had tried out a Deneghra2 list
against him the previous weekend (he won). Still, I wanted to
practice Deneghra2 so I automatically reached for her. Benji had
Kreoss1 and Feora2 for his casters and I expected (and got) Feora2 to
be picked. As I won the roll I deployed first to push those drudges
forward.
This time around Curse of Shadows went
on the judicator, Marked for Death on the Choir and Pursuit on the
reckoner. Errants went middle right, bastions far right and
cinerators left. I kept the same set-up as last time and ran
forwards. Though I was careful about how I placed Nightmare and the
drudges around him.
Benji moved up the errants and took a
couple of shots at the drudges to take one or two down. Judicator put
a few of them on fire as well. Everything else pretty much ran to get
up the board.
I ran a drudge behind the errant
seneschal and then used it as a beacon for Hellmouth, removing a
couple of errants from play. (Forgot to mention, Marked for Death was
dropped.) The max unit of drudges also did their best to hurt the
errants and did ok at it. Nightmare had moved forwards thanks to
Pursuit and stuck around there rather than move forward. Other than
that it was my second line that advanced forwards but that was about
it.
Benji loads up the reckoner with some
focus and sends it into Nightmare. Who then dances away thanks to
Pursuit (though the free strike took off the right arm) and Benji
can't even use assault as he has stealth thanks to his affinity.
Errants try to deal with the drudges but tough makes it slightly more
difficult than normal. The judicator sends firey death around the
board killing a few things. Finally the bastions and cinerators run
forwards again.
Feat turn I feel. Deneghra goes
incorporeal, loads up Nightmare and moves into the central zone to
feat, catching most things, excluding three of the bastions.
Hellmouth takes out another three errants as well. Nightmare fails to
destroy the reckoner so some mechanithralls sort it out as the
Overseers spray both the bastions and cinerators. Drudges spend most
of their attacks on the errants and also on the seneschal, doing
enough damage to override his large self sacrifice ability. I score 2
control points.
Benji can't move much, I missed the
choir and three bastions with my feat but everything else stands
still and tries to hit what they can. A few drudges die because of
this but not much else happened. Benji had a clever idea though, he
used Fire Step to get Deneghra in Feora's control range and attempted
to move fire onto her. But being incorporeal stopped that. I score
another 2 control points and then just end my turn straight away to
win.
Things learnt:
Drudges are great Hellmouth targets
what with being DEF 11. The biggest thing was that Pursuit doesn't
allow you to ignore free strikes so I have to watch out for that in
the future.
So lets stop here and look at this
new theme list. It's good. The fact that a load of people are talking
about it and know what it involves stands to that. I know that Kaya2
got a new theme list in the same No Quarter but I can't tell you
what's in it or if anybody has been speaking about it.
Why is it good though? The drudges
don't enter into it. All they do is jam up and provide bodies for the
mechanithralls coming behind. That's great and all but I can use
satyxis, pirates or other mercenaries for this purpose and they'll do
some real damage on the way. The two units of Overlords are great,
especially when they are three points per unit. Infantry clearance in
a great package there. The real power of this theme list is the
upkeep spells starting the game on the enemy. Having those three
spells out on the board on their preferred targets is a godsend.
Before this theme list came out you could count the number of times
Pursuit was cast by Deneghra on one hand. But now you can use it to
get a massive advantage for an early feat, manoeuvre Deathjack for a
Hellmouth and retreat or advance Nightmare around a corner ready to
eat a caster or some important piece of the enemy. That's leaving out
Curse of Shadows for a free strike ignoring ARM debuff or Marked for
Death for helping your guys to hit.
Everybody who had talked about the
theme list had mentioned it's weak to Purification or Eiryss2 (or
similar). I don't disagree but I'm going to skip over that. This
theme list isn't going to be a major part of my Cryx line up at the
moment. I have good match-ups against most things out there on the
tournament scene, but as I've shown on this blog gun lines can shoot
me down in a major way. Dan Cunningham only lost with Kreoss1 in the
Invitational because that helldiver rolled fire for damage rolls.
Lewis and the way he plays both Haleys are going to take me down in a
major way. The major players out there have their Cryx game plan and
unfortunately this theme list matches up fairly well with what they
expect to play against.
No comments:
Post a Comment