Starving Crazed Weasels Miniatures and Wargames Page

Introducing the next series of articles

2011-06-28T21:59:00.000-07:00

I have long advocated for things to differentiate Warhammer. While the basic system is good, there are only so many times I can line up and play “kill them all dead”. That is a strategy that favors whoever is best at pure killiness or survivability.

Whether the model removal is accomplished through magic, war machines, massed missile fire or close combat specialty, the army that has the stronger kill factor wins that game every time.

If one army can stand out of range of the other and drop template weapons on them all day, it is an easy win. Likewise, if one army can cast devastating, unstopped magic on the other without fear of reprisal, it is again an easy win. And of course if an army of unstoppable, untouchable death merchants falls upon weak, unarmored troops, it is going to be a slaughter.

So the idea then is for troops who are vulnerable to shooting to stay out of sight, range, or both. Troops that are going to get devastated in close combat should try to keep distance between themselves and better warriors. And magic users should be sent to the bone pile asap, as defense against magic is seldom effective.

So every game tends to have many similar elements. The same order of targets, the same goals, and so forth. I try to mix it up as much as possible.

In 7th we were rolling on a campaign that I was finding highly entertaining. Armies of different sizes instead of “I have x number of points, you do” were replaced by “I have x number of points, you have y number”. It was quite entertaining.

I also loved the elements of one battle’s outcome impacting the next. Instead of having the same size unit all the time, forces were fluctuating. It kept the game fresh and interesting.

But with 8th, many of the elements no longer worked. Just having straight up fight after straight up fight tends to get stale, but there was a hidden gem within the 8th rulebook.

Enter the scenarios.

While flat out tabling the opponent still works, now there are other ways to win or lose a game. There are a host of new tactics and strategies available. Even list building is affected as the clever list-builder will take into account the need to provide a unit to start in the watchtower, plenty of fortitude for Blood and Glory, and even how to handle not having his troops where he wants them.

However, not everyone has a grasp on how the scenarios work. So over the next few days or weeks, the plan is to briefly address strategies you might find helpful in playing the various scenarios.

How much difference do the 8th Edition Rules make for playstyle after playing 7th?

2011-06-26T20:11:00.000-07:00

In some of the last posts I mentioned a few tactics that have altered for 8th edition from 7th. How much difference does that make when actually playing a game?

Lets take a brutally obvious and easy one. In 7th edition it was possible for a weaker unit to take out a much stronger unit simply by getting the charge and having a small amount of fortuitous dice rolling.

This was due to two rules; 1), Chargers strike first and 2) removing casualties that were struck rather than from the rear rank.

As a result it was always better to charge than to be charged. Glass cannon units were extremely deadly as they could wipe out the front rank of the enemy before it ever had a chance to attack, thus winning the combat by virtue of charging.

These days with the “remove casualties from the rear rank” and “strike in I order” rules in place the charge has less importance; Great Weapons no longer go ahead of “faster” weapons, even if your front rank gets wiped out the unit gets to fight and thus recover from a bad start, and troop speed actually matters.

Additionally, Steadfast has a huge impact.

This makes a huge difference. In 7th edition a block of 100 Skaven slaves was just 200 victory points donated to the opponent. At some point they would get charged, lose their front rank, and be testing on snake-eyes to not run. And that was against weak units like Empire State Troops or High Elf spearmen.

In 8th they are still going to lose that combat but will almost assuredly have more ranks than the opponent and thus have an excellent chance of staying around for multiple rounds, thus creating a morass that occupies a tremendous amount of space and alters the battlefield. They do not care about the casualties they are taking as they are likely Steadfast on close to LD 10.

Even if they never do a casualty to their tormentors, they have a respectable role and an important one. So these rules have a huge impact on how the game is and should be played.

These rules alone make infantry viable. All throughout 7th edition I never found value in taking even Chaos Warriors as more often than not it was just giving free points to the opponent…and Chaos Warriors are expensive.

Too many times I got charged by things like Grail Knight units, character-reinforced Cold One Knights, dragon-riders, Ogres…all of whom moved faster and thus had a near-guaranteed charge, did so many casualties that IF I got to attack back it was with my unit champion, and thus my expensive Chaos Warriors fled the field or were run down without ever raising a weapon in anger.

In fact, I cannot think of a single time in the whole of 7th Edition I was able to get the Chaos Warriors into an advantageous combat...I do remember them fleeing multiple times after having their front rank wiped out on the charge...the only time they even saw second rounds was against things with too few attacks (a Gorger) and when they were stubborn.

And that was with arguably the best infantry unit in the game. In 7th edition they were worse than useless; taking them was doing a favor for your opponent. In 8th they are close to a no-brainer; I say close because many people still argue huge blocks of cheap Marauders are better.

In 8th edition even a humble unit such as S3, 1 attack Night Goblin has at least a slim chance of doing some damage, and even if they cause no casualties, they are worth putting on the field which means stronger, harder-fighting troops such as Dwarf Warriors, Saurus Warriors, Chaos Warriors, etc. are not simply worth putting on the field but are often among the strongest choices in the entire list.

Some people have gone overboard the other direction; many people proclaim infantry is the king of the battlefield with cavalry and monsters not being worth taking. I disagree...but I "get" their reasons.

Another huge change was the way marching can occur. In 7th, just planting a single model within 8” of the opponent slowed their movement to a crawl. “Tactics” of flying cheap, pointless units behind the enemy line so they had to walk 4-7” per turn into the face of massive lines of missile fire was considered brilliant. If you could do it with a cheap, pointless model like a 15 point naked Skaven Engineer, so much the better.

Now by the simple expedient of passing a LD test troops can still march. To be sure, this is normally a virtual guarantee as most important units either have relatively reliable LD of 9 or 10 and/or a re-roll from a near-by BSB.

Yet the role of march blocking is still important as not every unit will be within range of the BSB, nor will the flanks always pass their tests. This means the march blockers are returned to their rightful role of support rather than game-dominating.

They still have a place. Sometimes even the chance of slowing that flank unit down is worth the allocation of forces to that side of the field. But now there is a defense against it. It means instead of say…automatically including 4 units of Chaos Warhounds to go march-block the enemy, now you have to decide if the vastly reduced role they play in screening and potential march-blocking is worth the points.

We could add swift reforms and combat reforms to the equation. It used to be that if someone hit the flank the unit would never turn to face them. Now there is the chance they will be able to do so which makes a great deal more sense aesthetically, logically, and from a game-play standpoint.

The negative to the reform if they lost the combat is an excellent deterrent to strategies that ignore flank charges, providing a defense against failed charges becoming THE deciding factor in a game. Those charges are still important as with the bonus for a flank charge, the fewer return attacks you are facing while still usually getting your own max attacks, you can often break a tougher unit with a well-timed flank attack.

At the same time, the clever opponent who hits the flank will also have a second unit hitting the target, thus pinning them in place and preventing the reform. This gives them the advantages of supporting attacks and the +1 combat resolution for hitting the flank that is denied the target. Thus the interplay between the charge zone arc and potential to combat reform becomes important as both generals attempt to maximize their own attacks while minimizing the number of attacks the face.

Even after combat the ability for most units to reform adds yet another level of control for the astute general. It prevents the ridiculous “I throw this 30 point unit in front of your powerful unit who then must stand facing away from my deathstar unit who will now wipe them out because they could not face me” maneuvers and makes for a better game.

It makes “speed bump” units still valuable but not vastly more powerful than their point values. Whereas in 7th, an astute player might drop a unit of harpies in front of a frenzied unit knowing they had to charge or get destroyed, then would over-run and either be out of the battle for several turns as it would take one full turn just to turn around, another to regain the over-run distance, and by then the battle would have moved away. Thus a 60 point unit could remove 300 or more points from the battle with no risk. The gain had no relation to the cost.

Now a move in the wrong direction still rightfully slows a unit down, but with the swift reform option, they can still get back in the action before the end.

Hopefully I will have time to write the second part of this post before heading on vacation...because there are plenty more changes that not only affect how the game is played...they affect how troops are chosen.

Does playstyle matter?

2011-06-24T19:53:00.000-07:00

I am looking somewhat forward to the comments on the post that will pop up two days before this one yet dreading them at the same time. I am virtually guaranteed to see lots of disagreement, but I stand 100% behind what is there.

Others may have success with the WoC, but the reason I have had success is indisputably because I figured out a method that worked with their strengths that match mine, and it works well.

At the same time, I have had a lot of success with other armies as well. I never did lose a game when playing with Wood Elfs (though that was 7th edition) and Dwarfs, even though they have vastly different playstyles than the WoC do. Nor did I ever lose with the Orcs and Goblins, though again that was only back in 7th.

Only with the High Elves have I hovered around 50% and, in fact, am probably under. Ironically, the army I have lost the second highest percentage with is the WoC. In sheer number of games, it is WoC I have lost the most with by a landslide.

The background then is that I play a lot of different armies. I have games under my belt with the Vampire Counts, Tomb Kings, Orcs and Goblins, Chaos Dwarfs, Dwarfs, High Elfs, Wood Elfs, Lizardmen, and Beastmen.

With such a wide divergence in armies, is there a wide divergence in my results? Sometimes.

With the High Elf army in 8th edition, it is mostly been my failure to correctly apply the rules that cost me an easy victory in one game and in the other I just plain got outplayed from list-build to final tabling.

With the Beastmen it was hardly a fair test of tactical acumen as the game was specifically set up to be a "soft game" between too lightly regarded armies and we deliberately did not play to completion.

With the Dwarfs it is a bit more complicated. I had a good plan with them each time and drove it to completion but they are so slow they are just too boring to play.

Some of the other guys have varied their styles within their own book. Fullur, for example, wavers between magic-heavy skink based builds and the occasional close combat build full of carnosaurs, Krox/Skink blocks, and Saurus.

Yet his results have been relatively consistent.

One of the points I made loudly and repeatedly in the prior post was the Warriors of Chaos work very well with my skill set. In every game I have ever played…Warhammer Fantasy, Warhammer 40K, Stars and Bars, Johnny Reb, various Napoleonic's….where there was an option for a small, elite force or a larger but inferior one, I have invariably preferred and done better with the small, elite, hard as nails force.

This is not to say I am incapable of working with other elements. I have had excellent success with the Wood Elf, Orc and Goblin (7th edition) and Dwarf armies, all of which run a different style. I have had modest success with the High Elf army, however.

All of this leads to an easy, obvious question; how much impact does the style of army and its interaction with player play style have on success? Can a good player pick up any army book and expect similar levels of success? Or will he have outlier results with particular books.

For example, if someone picks up the Vampire counts book and wins 90% of their games, can they then expect to pick up the Empire book and have the same success rate, plus or minus a couple percentage points? The armies function very differently.

The same question would hold true for say…the Dwarf army versus the Lizardman army. One relies on war machines and stuffing magic while the other has few war machines and pummels opponents with magic. Can the same player expect similar results with both armies?

In some cases the answer is a clear and distinct yes. Some people are so well versed in the game rules, strategies, and theories that they can bounce from one style to another with no ill effect on their game. Others are so bad it does not matter if they use Beastmen or DoC, they are going to lose.

For the vast majority of us, however, the army we use has a huge impact on our results. Sometimes it is simply because we believe in a particular strategy.

For example, in a recent game I had a Chaos Sorcerer on a dragon. Outside of perhaps the Great Bray-Shamans, Chaos Sorcerers are clearly the best close combat wizards any army has available*. Combined with being on a dragon rider, he had fearsome potential to output attacks. Yet when the chance arose to charge a smallish unit of Skaven Clan Rats, I only did it because the game had gotten out of hand.

It is a clear and obvious charge for anyone who believes in the Glass Cannon strategy (though the ridiculous ward save I tooled him up with somewhat contradicts more traditional glass cannon strategies). With the large number of attacks he is putting out, he is likely to win the combat and, barring ranks and Strength in Numbers Shenanigans, break them in one round.

Because of his rugged nature, he was quite likely to win a grind combat as well since they would struggle mightily to put wounds on him and he should do enough casualties to win the combat despite the SCR advantage possessed by the rats.

It is a charge I make one time out of ten, and that one time is because of extenuating circumstances. Yet it is something I estimate I win, whether they flee the first turn or not, well over 80% of the time. And that might be underestimating it…I just do not trust 9 attacks + thunderstomp to beat 3 extra ranks and a standard all the time. Should hit 6 attacks, wound 4ish, then need 2+ thunderstomps to go through and to me that is not a big enough margin for error.

For others, they are thinking that is an awesome margin for error and they are sending in the dragon every time. They are better at the strategy than I am, something I am aware of and frankly acknowledge.

I also acknowledge there are others better than I am at the Dwarf strategy of huddling around a hill shooting stuff, then having their warriors slam into the weakened troops that come across the field. All too often my close combat Dwarfs wander out from the protection of their guns. Sitting back patiently is not my strong suit.

Clearly, then, a glass cannon type army is one that requires a significant change in approach. For example the Beastmen army has elements that resemble this; the Minotaurs with Impact hits, large numbers of high S attacks but absolutely no defense are very much a glass cannon. Getting them to work requires some thought and planning.

And, demonstrably, I am not good at that, having allowed them to get wrecked by a charge before they ever got to swing. Sure, with some practice I might improve.

The thing about it is, no obvious solution has presented itself as yet. There are a few plans I have bounced around, but for the moment their glass cannon nature has them being one of the last things I take since it is a strategy I struggle to employ correctly.

They end up being for me what the Dark Elf Assassin was for Fixed Dice from a game into last edition; I love the look, love the model, love the potential, and never take it because they just die without doing anything.

At the same time, the remainder of the army is also well outside my comfort zone. The Gor are the best option for an “anvil” but are a very poor choice; they have literally no armor. At all. Their magic has potential but does not get them into combat quick enough unless I take the despised Lore of the Wild.

Their weapon skill is pedestrian, their strength below average (though not, perhaps, below the median score) and their leadership sub-par. Their monsters are wildly overcosted and suffer the same glass cannon drawback as the minotaurs; they hit hard but die easy.

I know there are ways to use them and use them effectively. What I do not know is if I have the gaming personality to do it. I am not a risk taker. Chancy combats, long-shot weapons, and so forth are not my forte.

Contrary to what people who do not get the way WoC are effective think, I am incapable of just shoving them forward ignoring everything else. (A bad strategy, by the way, the WoC are frequently accused of. I suspect there are people out there who do that. I am willing to bet they win some games…but not nearly as good a percentage as I do)

Yet if I were going to adopt such a strategy, the WoC would be the army I would do it with. The Beastmen are forced into it by having even less effective shooting than the WoC but combining it with armor-less troops.

So their apparently strongest strategy…throw hordes of troops straight forward and hope to win grind combats while somehow getting their glass cannon troops into combat unscathed…is one I am psychologically incapable of using.

The obvious take-away is I will not only struggle to play them well, I will struggle to enjoy using them as game after game sees them melt to shooting past the point of combat effectiveness or else play a mindless “Oh, my turn? March straight forward. Are we in combat? No? okay, go” game which I have no interest in.

This is not to say there are not other armies I can play around with. The High Elf army is not my typical style either. Low T, lightly armored, and full of glass cannon units; Swordmasters, Phoenix Guard, White Lions…and units that are far more specialized such as archers, spearmen, Dragon Princes, Repeater Bolt Throwers.

As much as target priority matters for the WoC…which contrary to the interwebz matters a great deal in a 6 turn game…it matters even more for the High Elfs. ASF great Weapons are great for the first turn…but leave anyone alive to swing back and the pretty little elf army gets some new make-up in the form of bloody necks as they get decapitated by the weakest of enemy troops.

Can a person used to using a sledgehammer get used to using a precision laser?

I keep using myself as the example but the same is true of every player. Learning to use a different play style can be extremely difficult. For the Dwarf player used to little or nothing happening in the magic phase to suddenly attempt to play a list revolving around using magic would be quite a shock. For a player used to using the narrow formations of the Brettonian lance formation to suddenly figure out how to effectively use the Empire detachments could cause migraines.

Which brings us right back to the initial question; how much impact does the style of army and its interaction with player play style have on success?

I would argue a great deal. Obviously an average player using the DoC is going to do better than they would using the Beastmen. But would it be a 10% increase in wins? 50%? 80% more wins?

Or does it matter what the strengths of that player are? For example, if they excel at choosing targets for shooting but consistently pick the wrong spell to cast at the wrong time, how well are they going to do going from the Wood Elf army to the Lizardmen?

Or if they have mastered the art of choosing the right spell but are so nervous about failed LD checks that they strive to avoid close combat, how well are they going to do with the Beastmen or Warriors of Chaos? Or if they are afraid to use the glass cannon but strong at using an anvil and hammer strategy, how are they going to do with the High Elf army…oh, wait, we have seen that one. It was not pretty.

Or if they are very strong at using predictable, dependable armies, how will they do if suddenly handed the Orcs & Goblins or Skaven to play?

Mindset, comprehension of strategies, comprehension of tactics, understanding of probabilities, willingness to attempt long-shot maneuvers are all elements that affect how a player will do with an army that does not reinforce his strengths. Naturally if the army suits his strengths as a player his results will be the best.

If he is adaptable he will still do very well.

But if an army does not suit his strengths and he does not adapt well then he will tend to struggle mightily.

All of these things are possible to overcome but not all are worth overcoming. If a player sits down to every game, looks across the table and thinks he has little to no chance will not enjoy the game and soon not wish to play.

I am reminded of a game from last edition where one guy took a list that was maxed out on War Machines; cannons, grudge thrower,organ gun, anvil of doom. The rest of it was shooting troops; thunderers, I think. Just seeing that across the table was discouraging and depressing for the guy who faced it.

I was depressed just watching another player using O&G try to cross a field with NO TERRAIN AT ALL against an army putting out over 100 armor piercing shots per turn in one of the early games we played.

Both games were over before they started and even if the side locked into losing those messes won…was it an enjoyable game?

So for someone who enjoys using hordes of low quality troops to overwhelm good troops with a bit of shooting mixed in, how much fun would it be to play a small number of guys? Or if a guy loves magic, how much will he like using the Dwarfs? Or if he is infatuated with shooting, will he enjoy using the Beastmen or Woc? Or if he likes close combat, will he like using a Wood Elf list? If he likes using small, hard troops, wil he enjoy using vast hordes of wimps?

It goes on and on. There are large numbers of possible outcomes, and in most cases, the enjoyment of the game comes down to the style of army he likes to play and play against.

There is probably someone out there hearing that Dwarf list and saying, “Smurf yeah! I want to play against that!”

More power to him. It is a list I would neither want to use nor face.

I do think it is funny that I have seen dozens of lists where the player talked about how strong a list they had made and how much destruction it could wreak in a particular phase and then later I find out that my lists, which I have deliberately avoided making the strongest ones I could, have been overpowered.

Perhaps I should shelve them forever and just use armies that do not fit my strengths. Then again…that just does not sound fun to me at all.

A lot of it is because I do not enjoy using horde units incapable of doing damage. (Okay, so certain O&G players swear by Night Goblins with nets...to me, they just are not a fun unit). I do not enjoy using armies with no save. I do not always enjoy using armies that have highly specialized units.

And obviously people do not enjoy facing an army that plays to my strengths. So that in turn retroactively makes it not fun for me.

I hear a female of intimidating girth warming her vocal chords.

Really unfortunate in many ways because this edition has been the best one I have ever seen in Warhammer, going back to 1995, but if it comes down to me having fun at the expense of others I just do not want to play. If both players do not enjoy the game then what is the point? Conversely, if it comes down to me playing but it being drudgery…again, I simply do not want to play.

So the trick is to find an army that is fun to play, balanced with our group, and in my possession.

Because yes...playstyle matters. A lot.

How to beat the Warriors of Chaos the way Darth Weasel plays them

2011-06-22T22:00:00.000-07:00

Our group is apparently pretty unique. Whereas the worldwide scene, both tournament and casual
play, is dominated by DoC, Lizardmen, Dark Elves and Skaven, our local group has
vastly different balance.

There is a feeling within some portions of our group that High Elves are better than Dark Elves, Warriors of Chaos better than Lizardmen and so forth with proven performers on the national scene, both in tournaments and in casual play as seen on the various race-specific forums, being less highly regarded locally.

This is not necessarily a belief held by all. In fact, when I was looking to see if someone had already written a "how to beat the Warriors of Chaos" I went to the race specific forums. Librarium. Warhammer Forum. Dakka Dakka. Bell of Lost Souls. Random blogs. And pretty much the answer was always the same; person A posts asking for advice on how to beat them, persons B,C and D say "what problem are you having? I have never lost to the Warriors."

Including a guy playing Beastmen insisting they are better in close combat than the Warriors...a concept I find laughable. So I decided to go ahead and do the work myself.

By the way, the different rankings of the armies as powerful is something you see in various pockets. I have seen claims for the Ogres, Beastmen, Bretonnians and Orcs and Goblins as being the most powerful in various areas. There are even a few claims of the old book TK being the best army in certain areas.

There are a variety of factors incolved. Player skill, rules neutering (banning stuff like Power Scrolls, altering the 6th spells in each lore to do 1 wound max, allow Look Out Sir rolls, or outright banned, limiting power dice, people breaking steadfast the same way they remove rank bonuses, etc.), perception, and again...playstyle.

It is obvious our play styles are far from standard as the results seen locally repeatedly contradict the
most commonly seen results across the Warhammer world via internet reports, including games within local groups, games at the FLGS, local tournaments, and major tournaments.

Recently it was intimated the reason the WoC in our group outperform their national and
international success rates is because they are overpowered and that I do not understand
how much their overpowered stats cover up my poor play. The explicit statement included an allegation that I do not know how powerful the stat lines and saves of the WoC are.

Naturally insulted by this to a degree I have seldom felt insulted in my gaming career, I said I would post a guide to beating them the way I play them. It is not easy, but it can be done. Nor should it be easy.

I think I play them pretty well, in fact,and the reason they win as often as they do has far more to do with my abilities in using the type of army than with the list.

In fact, on the two occasions I did not feel I played them well (both in 7th) I got tabled. In the one game in 8th when someone used the strategies I have always recommended to use against them, it was a draw.

(I should point out here that my way of playing them has shifted dramatically in 8th. in 7th I often would send fewer troops to do a job since 7th was really about "wipe out the front rank on the charge, run them down when they fail to roll Insane Courage and break". That had the same effect as the overwhelming force at point of contact that is the centerpiece of my 8th edition strategy.)

Note that the way I play them is generally considered sub-optimal if not outright bad by the wider Warhammer world.

I do not use the Chosen Star buffed by champion with Favor and the Terror banner to turn them into 3+ Ward monsters of untouchable destruction before the game begins.

I do not tool up Death sorcerers to snipe enemy characters.

I do not run multiple H-cannons. Often I do not even bring one.

I never take halberds with Chaos Warriors or flails with either Marauders or Marauder
Horsemen.

All of those are widely considered the premier ways to play them. Included with that is 6x3 Warriors with Halberds and khorne. 24 are seen as a waste and 12 are seen as too small.

I take “wrong size” units. Instead of 6x3 Chaos Warriors, I take sizes I like and trust...like 24 or 30...and typically run them 5 wide except occasions I am too lazy to switch the bases for the 12s they are painted in. Then I do run them 6 wide.

I do not take enough Marauders with mark of khorne and great weapons which are lolzawesomesauceofdoom. I do take them in about half my games, but often I do not. When I do, I take full command...which taking full command is something I also do with my Knight units, another habit widely considered a very, very poor choice.

I do not take the Warhounds. They are losing favor but still widely considered a near auto-take. I frequently see advice on the various forums for army lists to drop Knights and take 5 or 6 units of warhounds and more marauders. I do the opposite.

I do, however, routinely take sub-par choices such as the Dragon Ogre Shaggoth and Dragon Ogres, but not trolls which are again considered the premiere monster available to WoC. I happen to disagree with that, but I am clearly, blatantly in the minority. People are generally suggested to take blocks of trolls instead of knights, in fact.

I take the overpriced and just plain never seen in any other list I have observed Banner of the gods. Ever. I have looked for it. Nobody but me seems to ever take it. Not even once. I love its effects of making units within 6" stubborn. Most guys go either for Talisman of Preservation or some other ward protection for their BSB. I have yet to see a single other list with this item. I am sure they are out there...but I have never seen one.

The lists I take are pretty typically considered full of holes with the wrong numbers of the wrong troop types. My argument goes I understand their power, know what their best use is, and I use them extremely well. I know their strengths and maneuver to maximize those strengths.The argument against that is I play poorly and have super-powered, untouchable troops whose power I do not comprehend..

So either I have mysteriously discovered a secret formula to use these superpowered, unbeatable troops that has eluded GT tournament winning level players, casual players, and even GW itself, or our group takes lists that are too weak (a ridiculous assessment since most of the lists I face are not allowed at any "comped" tournament because they are considered "cheese", "broken" and/or bent beyond all reasonable levels and used only by "waac" or "win at all cost" players), or our group has really poor players. We know it is one of those three.

There is no room for it to be me emphasizing my troop strengths, covering their weaknesses, having good battle plans and executing those plans very well.

Ironically, in the game that sparked much of this, I was facing a dual Slann list…a list so ridiculously strong it is only ever allowed at ‘ard Boyz tournaments and is oft considered one of the three or four top lists from any book in all of Warhammer, comparable to Teclis in a horde with the Banner of the World Dragon, the DoC with…is it Skulltaker?...Skaven lists with multiple Grey Seers, power stones, double HPAs, and double Hydra Dark Elves.

Most people seeing dual Slann scream “bent” , “broken”, or “cheese”. But it was my list of Chaos Warriors, Chaos Knights, Marauder Horsemen, a Dragon Ogre Shaggoth, and a dragon-riding combat lord
(which the best WoC players pretty much agree is an egregious waste of points; the very fact that WoC heroes ARE basically equivalent to most other armies Lord-level characters means any non-level 4 Sorcerer lord on disc or else with death magic sniping is a horrific waste of points) that was broken because the troops are too hard to kill and kill others too easily.

One of the first things typically comped, by the way, is a Slann getting the extra power die. Right behind that is the Cupped hands to ignore miscasts. The only things comped as often are special characters, dual rares, Pendant of kaeleth on Dreadlord with Crown of Command, and the power scroll. I do see one WoC item being comped that frequently; the Infernal Puppet. I understand why they would. It is certainly a powerful item.

I can name a half dozen items off the top of my head just as dangerous but every army needs something shafted if you are going to shaft any specific army. Except the Wood Elves and beastmen...I have not seen either of them shafted for a while.

Okay.

So obviously I am a bit upset at having been told I am a bad player using an overpowered
list to cover my poor play and not realizing how strong the list is. Just as obvious, I
disagree. Strenuously.

Certainly I recognize the strengths of the Warriors of Chaos. They fit very well with the
type of army I have always preferred to play; they have high WS, S, T, A and good armor
saves. Per the series of articles just completed, the only thing I consider important not on this list is M. They can put out large numbers of attacks in a manageable frontage. They should live a goodly long while. They maximize the strengths in my style of play by providing forces that are good blocking forces and good blitzkrieg units.

That point is so important I am going to restate it. They fit very well with the type of
army I have always preferred to play.

In case it was not clear enough, they fit very well with the type of army I prefer to play
and, by extension, the type of army I am the best at playing. Naturally my results will be better with an army that plays to my strengths than one that does not.

I also recognize that I work hard to maximize those advantages. I seldom get them into a combat I am not a huge, prohibitive favorite to win. I ensure they are Stubborn with a re-roll, thus ensuring that on the rare occasions they lose a combat they have well over a 90% chance of not running which means they have to be killed to the last model, a feat admittably difficult to do. Much more difficult than beating them once and running them down.

I almost always out-point the opponent at the point of contact which tends to lead to very short combats, allowing me to get on to the next one asap which lets me get multiple uses out of arguably the best troops in the game, top to bottom.

As a result, I hit with overwhelming force, make short work of the out-manned defenders,
rinse, repeat.

That is what the Warriors of Chaos do well.

That is what I do well.

Great synergy there. The Warriors of Chaos book is designed to do the things I do well. Sounds like a vaguely familiar point.

The things I do well are the things the Warriors of Chaos book does well.

So when I have troops that are strong at performing the roles I do well employing I tend to have outstanding results.

I also see their weaknesses. Outside of the ineffective 6” throwing axes of the Marauder
Horsemen and the mis-firing H-cannon (which is an excellent War machine when it
works and has been very ineffective of me despite the high strength template it drops on
people) they have a zero inch range.

That means every turn in which they are not in close combat is a bad turn for the WoC. They
can potentially inflict some damage via magic, but that is hardly something they can rely
on and it seldom seems to work out. I routinely have opponents who spent 10% of what I
spent on magic out-perform me in the magic phase.

I must admit I have had a couple highly successful games using magic in 8th. One of the things I love about the new edition.

But every turn I am not in combat is a turn I am no closer to winning the game.

Thus the secret to playing the WoC well is therefore clear; get into combat as quickly
as possible at virtually any cost, make that combat as decisive as possible, and get into the next combat as
quickly as possible.

Ideally, the opponent takes turn one, moves within charge range, I get off a great charge on my first turn as a result and overrun into the next unit, thus keeping me in combat the ensuing turn.

Of course, few and far between are the opponents who will co-operate by moving in such a way as to
allow this behavior from me. They usually make sure there are turns between combats.

Of course, I also recognize another weaknesses of the WoC army. Typically, losing
1 Chaos Warrior is as bad as losing 2 High Elf Archers, points wise, when taking into
account the inevitable Mark added to the unit. And High Elf armies are supposed to
be “small and elite”. Yet they often dwarf the WoC in size, though not always.

The lack of range means armies which can stay out of close combat for any appreciable
amount of time can use their superior range to inflict casualties without fear of reprisal;
easier said than done, but possible.

This is because the WoC are noticeably slower than the majority of the armies in our
group; the Elf armies are 20% faster, skinks and ogres 50% faster, and cavalry armies
even faster than that, making the infantry options for the WoC theoretically easier to
outmaneuver than their tormentors.

This is exaceberated by the unit sizes I take, by the way. I routinely inhibit my maneuverability in favor of more rugged forces.

The 2d6 charge range helps, though that is one of the things that illustrates the unconventional way in which I play the WoC. If I need to roll an 8 on the dice, I am unlikely to attempt the charge unless other factors force me to. 9 is an "emergency charge only" and anything beyond that requires extreme desperation that dwarfs the emergency note.

Considering I need to be within 11" to make the "7" requirement happen, elf armies need to be within 12", M6 troops within 13", M7 (think most cavalry...except lots of cavalry is M8) 14", I am still slower and less maneuverable with my infantry than anyone but Empire, Saurus, and Dwarfs.

Also, the magic phase is far easier to maximize for many other armies than it is for the
WoC ; they do not build big pools of dice like other armies tend to do, the Slann ability to discard 6s
hurts them badly, they cannot throw more than 6 dice to guarantee that key spell, have no way of getting a free die added to their casting as several armies do, etc. The Infernal Puppet helps by making it painful when theenemies mis-cast and less painful when the Warriors do, but does nothing to help strengthen the Warriors ranged offense.

So the things the WoC fear are legion; things that remove armor saves, things that have
strong shooting, massed war machines, monsters, those who can dominate them in the Magic phase (defensively like the Dwarf, Empire and Lizardmen armies, or offensively like the High Elfs, Dark Elfs, Lizardmen, Beastmen and Empire), things that outmaneuver them, fair close combat fights and mobile enemies.

What I mean by “fair close combat fights” might need some description. Except the
Marauders, Dragon Ogres, Dragon Ogre Shaggoth, and Marauder horsemen, very few
things can stand up to the Warriors of Chaos one-on-one in close combat without magic assistance (debuffs like Mystifying Miasma, the oft-used Okkrams Mindrazor so many people are bragging about wiping o9ut entire units of Chaos Knight in one turn with, etc.)

Knights that get the charge and have multiple attacks, MAYBE Swordmasters, some monsters are about all that stand up one-on-one. Not much else.

So to make it fair, most armies need to combo-charge. They need to mass as many attacks
as possible and also have as many as possible be against my flanks or rear arcs to keep from
facing supporting attacks in return. Charging the Warriors in their front arc seldom is as helpful due to it giving them supporting attacks back. Those extra 5 - 10 attacks are monumental when I typically hit 66% and wound anywhere from 33-66% of those. It can routinely be 4 wounds dealt. That deals with any Static Combat resolution I would face right up to charge+3 ranks, though a banenr would still be ahead of me...

I can count on one hand the number of combo charges I have faced. Conversely, I would
need all my fingers, all my toes, and several spare digits to count the number of times I
have gotten combo charges off against opponents.

On a completely unrelated note; I can count on one hand the number of times I have lost
a unit to an opponents charge in 8th edition but would need all my fingers, all my toes and
several spare digits to count the number of times I have broken my opponent’s units on
the charge.

And there we get to the key on how to defeat the Warriors the way I play them.

Let me explain my strategy.

As a formerly excellent chess player (I am a pedestrian player today), I know the
principles behind the game; control the center to restrict the opponents movement and ensure you have more pieces you can bring to bear. As a result, I generally start my battle plan by putting a unit in the center that controls the action. Whatever else my opponent does, he must take that unit into consideration.

It might be a primarily defensive unit such as the big block of 3+ armor, 4+ ward save
chaos warriors I recently started using. Yes, they can still put out a good amount of attacks and will win most
combats…but they are defensive compared to a khorne-marked unit, for example which
will deal out more and higher strength attacks.

It might be a primarily offensive unit; a horde of Great Weapon wielding khorne marked
Marauders, for example. Or the Corn Scythes, the khorne-marked, great weapon wielding Chaos Warriors who still have aan above average save of 4+ and are dealing out 3 S6 attacks apiece. Lethal.

Whatever it is, it will be a unit powerful enough to draw attention and large enough to
control a sizable chunk of space.

Controlling a large area of space allows me to determine what I want to do on
each flank.

Typically I will overload one flank. The idea is to lock up the center, use a less deadly, more rugged unit to
delay the opponent on the “weak” flank, and roll up the entire enemy line with a massively overpowered attack via hook on the strong flank.

Typically this means I am charging knights and/or big infantry blocks consisting of considerably
less in points.

A classic example was the 7th edition game against Kev’s Ogres where I sent a small
block of Knights and a chariot to gum up the works on the left flank. I knew he would
eventually destroy them both, but as long as it took three turns I was fine.

My battle plan should be obvious; use the Knights to hold up his entire flank for at least 2 turns. If that fails, speedbump them with the chariot.

Meanwhile, a big unit occupied him in the middle while a couple of units of Knights
rampaged on his right flank. At every point of impact I had more points engaged in the
combats in the center and right.

On the left flank my blocking force was out-pointed in total but only a few points at a time could get to them; this, combined with their very rugged nature and my use of the terrain to anchor my line, meant they were ideally suited to fulfill their role. Had I put the Marauders over there, it would have been all over in one turn; by selecting the right unit to put over there, I actually delayed him 3 or 4 turns. He did eventually kill the Knights, Marauder Horsemen and Chariot. It took him like 5 turns, though.

So while he was making slow progress I was running down 2 and 3 units of Bulls per
turn. (This was abusing the "chargers attack first, if the front rank is wiped out they do not get to attack back" design flaw from 7th. I combined that with :if you hit a second combat in a turn that has not fought yet, you get to fight again" rule. Today I would never think of charging a unit of bulls with "just" 5 Knights in a typical situation.) The game ended up being tilted heavily in my favor.

By contrast, one of the few times I gave up a combo charge, it was to Liam’s Brets. He
slammed into a khorne-marked unit of Chaos Warriors. Mass carnage ensued. Warriors fell like flies to a dusting of fly paper. However,I had my BSB with the Banner close by, so they were stubborn. They held him in place, I then counter-charged his flank and won the fight. Other than being forced to give him the charge due to his having twice my movement capability, my plan worked to perfection. I had the back-up plan in place for just such an emergency.

It was a matter of having the right troops at the right place at the right time. Change even
the smallest detail in those examples and the games have a different outcome.

Against kev if my blocking forces were saving on 2 points lower (Chaos Warriors instead of Knights), they would have melted much quicker and he would have had my flank and rear. If I were not using my fastest, hardest hitting troops for my blitzkrieg move it would have taken too long.

Against Liam if I was not stubborn at the point of impact he would have swept them
away in one turn (barring Insane Courage roll) and not been there for me to flank charge
him in my turn.

Thus my strategy with the WoC should be pretty obvious; use my most rugged troops to
allow a small number of points to occupy large percentages of the opponents points while
I use overwhelming force in the combats I intend to win to ensure they are won quickly.

Lets look at examples, the following examples from all the 8th edition games I have played, regardless of army:

Classic 7th edition; I kill every model that could strike back at me every turn, thus being set up to take him down at my leisure.

In the inaugral game of 8th edition,
First, I attempted to charge his 5 mounted men at arms with my 10 medium cavalry Marauder Horsemen; I had equipped them with light armor and shield, giving them a 4+ save; I win that combat a fair amount of the time with my better weapon skill and save, banner and rank. I rolled a total of 4 and needed a 6 so failed the charge.

This is a charge where I have overwhelming superiority; I will have 15 attacks before he gets to strike back, then as many as 5 more if I make any of my 50% chance saves. I have a banner and rank. I am going to win this combat the vast majority of the time, even with my S3 guys.

Instead of moving my army forward, this blocked my advance so I made a modest advance that set me up to flank any of his units that charged my stubborn Chaos Warrior block.

A typical set-up; a small but rugged portion of my force placed on the left to occupy large portions of his force while I gain a 2-1 advantage on the right flank

He then charges my marauder horse with his men at arms horse but sees my trap and refrains from charging my Chaos Warrior block with his Grail Knights; he is between a rock and a hard place. Due to my BSB being nearby, he knows they are stubborn and thus will probably still be there after the charge, and next turn I will bring overwhelming force against his isolated Knights. I can charge with my own Knights, with another block of Warriors, and have backup knights besides. If he does not charge, another clear win for me as I do not face his S6 attacks. So whether he charges or does not, I am well set up to have more guys involved in the combat. I have it won before it starts.

After my marauder Horsemen wipe out his men at arms in one round of combat, I have a choice; I want them out of the way so I can bring my powerful center to bear so I charge into peasants behind knowing it is probably a suicide charge.

On the left, my Marauder horde charges his clan rats, to hold up that flank and to get out of the path of his plague furnace; my shaggoth charges his HPA to keep it from hitting something important like the knights and also because that is Shaggys role; take down high T targets. In the center I charge his peasants, comboing with the marauder Horsemen.

Only him rolling insane courage on the left saves him from a disaster over there; Had he rolled anything else, my Horde gets past all his units and is safe. Instead, I am locked in place to get roughed up by his Furnace.

In the center, my devastation of the peasants locks his Grail Knights out of combat. This leaves me with more guys locked in the combat.

His insane courage allows his plague furnace to hit my marauder Horde. I still have more attacks but they are Always Strikes last, my guys ar save-less and easy to hit and wound, comparatively.

10 Knights charge and kill Doomwheel. I have vastly more attacks. And more points involved.

The Knights overrun into some clan rats or plague monks or whatever. Forced charge.

My Warriors go after his Knights of the Realm.

His Grail Knights charge my Knight block that is engaged with his Plague Monks in the flank. Due to the small size of his Grail Knight Unit, I have more men involved in the combat.
The 23 chaos warriors remain after destroying his Knights of the realm.

I did not know what Queek did and let him charge me. He wrecked my Knights. My other Knights wrecked every war machine in his artillery park.

So to sum up; There were three combats where I did not have more men involved in the fight;
1) when I charged my Marauder Horsemen at his peasants to allow me to keep his knights from charging me, thus allowing me to outnumber him at every point of combat.
2) When he rolled insane courage and held me up longer than expected after I won a crushing victory.
3) When Queek was much, much stronger than I realized.

Outside of those, I had overwhelming superiority at every point of combat; it was usually two or three of my units teaming up on one of his. Almost without exception, my troops start with better S and usually, though not always, more attacks amd WS. Add more numbers of troops for me than he has and the outcome is academic.

Next game, versus Beastmen;

My Knights charge his Minotaurs needing an 8, this done to stop him from getting the impact hits. This is one of those rare situations where I chance that...though a bit more frequent with Knights since they have strider. But I try this charge with any troop I have for the exact same reason. Minotaurs are far too expensive for what they are and do, and a lot of that is because of their impact hits. By denying that, I turn a third of their points into waste. Well worth the risk as it tips the balance of power heavily in my favor.

I have higher I, higher WS, I think equal attacks, better armor saves and more models involved. By charging I eliminate the Minotaur advantage of impact hits.

Optical illusion means knights cannot get to bray Shaman and fail charge declared to get away from Doombull's impact hits. He would have allowed me to redirect the charge because he is a good guy. I refused because I need to learn from mistakes like that. 10 seconds of measuring tells me I am wrong.

Marauders forced to charge by failed LD to restrain Frenzy, charge Gor so Knights charge Ghorgon to protect the Marauders, Chaos Warriors combo-charge with the Marauders into the Gor unit.

I have more models involved in the combat. Easy win.

I break him this turn and game ends (Blood and Glory) with me successfully making exactly one successful armor save all game...and that did not matter as it was one of three wounds on my champion and he failed the other two. So not one model took advantage of my awesome armor. I cried a little bit.

Well, not really...

I either took away his advantage through timely charges or else flat out had more models involved in every combat. There was not one "fair combat" in the entire game.

High Elf V. Lizardmen, Watchtower scenario.
Dragon Princes getting shattered by shooting, make charge on Kroxigor to get S bonus and since they die to shooting next turn. If I have my full unit, I am happy about this charge. here, I am just trying to whittle him down and keep him away from the tower.

They were dead either way, so it was desperation charge hoping to do some damage on their way out the door.

Swordmasters v. Skinks in tower. Equal numbers of models, mine had infinitely superior stats. Also, this was the goal of the scenario, so SOMEONE was charging the tower this turn. It just happened to be the guys I know are most lethal.

His carnosaur charges my LSG. Though he got the charge, this fit my plans very well as I wanted to keep his Carnosaur away from the tower which was all that mattered; who owned the tower. I would be steadfast for quite some time, no matter how deadly his Carnosaur was.

My eagle charges his carnosaur. This was done because I noticed I could actually break his Carnosaur with a bit of luck; by declaring a challenge, it kept his Carnosaur from racking up SCR; my ranks, banner, the charge and rear bonus meant he actually would lose the combat even if he got max overkill on my champ. It was low-percentage chance that he would fail his LD, but a small chance is better than none, and it would lock his carnosaur in a pointless combat.

His Skink/Kroxigor charge my LSG. Clear win for him. Clear win for me in that it was not at the tower...except his Engine and Salamander and magic were killing so many Swordmasters every turn I was in deep trouble there, and he had no need of more troops...

Other skinks charge my RBT. Clear win for him. Only win for me is they were not poisoning more of my beleagured Swordmasters, but they did stop the RBT from shooting at his Krox more so a very prudent move.

His Saurus charge my 3 Swordmasters in Tower, game. Nothing I could do to stop it as his Engine and Salamander had whittled them down.

This battle I should have dedicated everything I had at the tower. It was a mis-match, I got the tower, through everything I had at keeping his units away from the tower and just got outnumbered, outmagiced, and had no answer for the Engine, Salamander, or his better magic. He outplayed me by a wide margin and well deserved the win.

Nevertheless, in what I considered the 1st key combat, I had overwhelming superiority. His skinks lose that combat 19 out of 20 times at least. Their goal is to keep one alive and pass break test. In THE key combat, he had overwhelming superiority; even if every one of my Swordmasters killed a Saurus with every blow, he would still have had full attacks back. He did to me what I typically do to others.

Dwarfs vs. Wood Elfs
Spend time keeping his treeman from getting the charge on me. I probably win the combat, but it is closer than I like. I want overwhelming superiority. So I just avoid the combat.

His Eagle charges my cannon; my fighty Dwarf Lord heads over to kill the eagle.

The Dwarf was in little if any danger from the Eagle and I had other troops moving that way in case I fluffed my attacks.

So the only close combat was one I win 9 of 10 times at least.

Warriors of Chaos v. Wood Elfs
Another Blood and Glory scenario.

His shooting wipes out large percentages of my screening forces which I actually included in this game; I cannot get to his main unit before the game ends which means I can only lose, not win, so I retreat out of range. No combat.

Since I cannot bring overwhelming superiority to the battle, I do not engage. At some point I need to math-hammer Treeman and Dryads v. Chaos Warrior flank.

High Elf v. Brettonia, Blood and Glory
Pegaus Knights charge RBT; Pegasus hero charges RBT.

Both clear wins for him. He wins these combats almost every time. Ironically, I won one of them...but he did not flee.

White Lions charge peasant bowmen, break them. White Lions win this even more often than the two attacks versus my RBTs. Too many high strength always strikes first high WS with re-roll attacks in his flank where he has maybe 2 or 3 attacks back. 99 of 100 times I win this. Easily.

White Lions flank charging peasant bowmen is a contest the way chocolate versus a rock is a contest. fair fights are for the noble and valiant, not High Elfs. know your place, peasants

White Lions charge rear of knights Errant to keep them from charging lone archer and over-running into LSG, and to get their banner.I need the banner and figure to win the combat most of the time; my ASF GW elites with multiple attacks, including supporting attacks, against just 3 single attack guys. I have overwhelming force here.

His grail Knights charge my LSG; I would stop this if I could. I could not. Normally he wins this easily, clear win on his part. Only flaw; his own Comet hits and does in so many Grail Knights he barely wins the combat. I am steadfast.

Solo archer charges to get out of way of Dragon Princes who flank charge Grail Knights locked in combat with LSG. The solo archer charge is simply to guarantee me having overwhelming force against his grail knights.

White Lions charge Knights errant. We already saw this is a clear, obvious advantage for me.

Swordmasters flank charge peasants to avoid trebuchet fire.

I had to get away from the Trebs. My only chance to draw or win the game. I did win the combat, but he passed his steadfast break test, then charged in with his own overwhelming force amd killed them. I was forced into a desperation charge, it gave me a chance, but ultimately this is the type of combat I avoid. Not a fair combat...I have the advantage...but he is unlikely to break.

Once more, except where I was outplayed or extenuating circumstances existed (gonna die anyway in one case, in the way of charge that mattered with model that did not) I consistently have more men, more attacks, and more Strength at the point of contact.

Beastmen v. Tomb Kings
Chariot horde magic-charges my Minos.

I thought I did everything I could to stop this. I could not. I faced more attacks and rightfully got my tail kicked.

The Minotaurs brace to face 13 impact hits and a boatload of attacks. they will not survive.

My Gor Horde flanks the Chariots.
I had vastly more attacks, this time.

His Bone giant and Ushabti flank and rear charge the Gor.
Could not avoid this. If my unit stayed in place for 2 turns I would have been able to add a Doombull, Ghorgon and couple of chariots to it...but there was a 20ish percent chance I would not last that long.

In this game I was hoist on my own petard when the chariots did to me what I try to do to others; inflicted overwhelming force at the point of contact.

My Gor did the same thing in return.

The Gor horde moves to wreak their bloody vengeance on the chariots.

In the first case, his chariots melted my Minotaurs like so much wheat to a scythe; the Gor then wreaked a terrible vengeance.

Warriors of Chaos V. Skaven

HPA charges Marauder Horsemen who had killed a couple Jezzails.
The Horsemen had done their job, stuffing shooting that would hurt my important units. A worthy sacrifice, and there was next to no chance the HPA would not obliterate them in one turn. he did.

Queek and Co. Charge other marauder Horsemen who had killed Warp Lightning cannon.
Again, the Marauders had done their job. I will trade that unit to get rid of WLC every day of the week. He generated overwhelming force and the Horsemen evaporated like a squishy snowball in death valley.

Knights charge weapon team which dutifully flees, redirect into flank of Queeks's unit, making it combo charge with my block of Chaos Warriors.

By the way...this is a typical example of having him in a no-win situation; if the Weapon team stays, I still charge the Warriors in. then I fight the Knight combat first, wipe out the Weapon Team something like 1,999,999 times out of 2,000,000 then charge into the flank anyway and get to fight twice. At least by fleeing he gets a vague chance of escaping and fighting again, while there is a 3ish percent chance I will fail my re-rollable LD redirect chance.

I end up with more models, each with more attacks and am able to challenge Queek out of the combat for all intents and purposes.

Will I trade a unit of Marauder Horsemen and a unit champ for a Warp Lightning Cannon, Queek and his unit? Yes. yes I will.

Small unit of Knights v. Small unit of Clan Rats
An exception to my usual rule; I did not have overwhelming force in this one. In fact, this is as close to a "fair fight" as I ever get on purpose. In this case it was to allow my more important strategy to develop and I figure to win the fight anyway. It is just closer than I like, but extenuating circumstances argue it is the right play.

This is one of those cases where I count on troop superiority; I have more attacks, better Weapon Skill, higher s, Higher T, better armor; my unit also cost pretty close to as much if not more than his.

Even though I am likely to win this, it is more a 65-35 proposition. I do not trust my dice enough to get into these combats very often as even with the Mathhammer advantage, I expect to lose when it will be most inconvenient.

Plague Furnace and Slaves combo-charge Chaos Warriors who are stubborn.

I was stuck there from having combo-charged Queeks unit and gotten appalling pursuit rolls. I am okay with it because I am stubborn. But more importantly because that particular unit cannot die.

This is the one where I save 4 of 17 wounds with my 3+ armor, 5+ parry save and say, "Well now. I had 21 Warriors about 30 seconds ago. Now I have 3. That 3+/5+ combo is not so good, is it then?"
Armor Saves are awesome for me.

I guess it can die after all. Easily.
Nevertheless, I was not overly worried; my BSB with the Banner of the gods was right there to keep them stubborn. Even with the massive casualties, they were not going anywhere.

He uses my strategy; combo charge to build sheer volume of attacks.

His clan rats charge my other Knights, kill 3, then are overrun.
My Knight unit took a beating and is down to I think 1 Knight at that point.

Shaggoth flank charges his slaves who are flanking my Warriors facing the furnace. My other Chaos Warriors combo into those slaves. My big block of knights charges the other flank of the furnace.
I now have more attacks involved in the combat. I am still stubborn in every case with a re-roll.

What is the best way to handle a combat that is too large? Add more troops!

I should point out...score one for units of 24. I still have 7 Warriors fighting.

Dragon rider charges one globadier in building. There is really no contest here. I have 8 more attacks + thunderstomp. I feel good about my chances...

His warlord charges shaggoth; hpa gets enough movement to careen into dragon rider.

I do not like receiving either of these charges but having brought overwhelming force to bear elsewhere, cannot avoid them. And really, the Warlord is just trying to take the Shaggoth out in one turn, because I am winning the combat by double digits regarless of what happens there.

His clan rats charge my Rampaging every turn H-cannon.

Having failed every LD test I remembered to take, I had no choice here. However, I am not overly worried; I am unbreakable with excellent T. He will have to win via attrition. Or die slowly. Either way, no real impact on the outcome of the overall battle. I still would prefer to avoid it...but LD9 just is not high enough.

Wulfrik led Marauder Horde charges couple jezzails. Such a laughable no-contest that kev flees them but is overrun.

Having died and come back, his HPA again charges Dragon Rider.
I killed him on my turn. I had no option here. Still, with this build I feel good about my chances.

After again killing it, Dragon Rider makes charge on Skaven rats,

I made this charge because the game was out of hand. I wanted to see what would happen with I think 9 attacks, Thunderstomp, and breath weapon. Answer; good things. Still, if the game is in doubt I do not make this charge as the combat could conceivably be too close for comfort. A combat, I should point out, I won by double digits. I am uncomfortable making that charge. Something to think about.

Knights charge swarms Virtually guaranteed victory; I have more attacks, am superior in every way. Easy call.

Knights charge storm vermin

This is another questionable charge that mathematically I probably win but is a charge I typically do not make. This game was out of hand so I made the charge.

So once again, we see in almost every combat I have more models involved. The WoC book starts me with more attacks per model but fewer models; in this game, I think it was his Storm Vermin that matched me attack for attack...but I managed to get more models into every combat that mattered.

More models with more attacks at better strength with better WS and equal or higher I is a formula for success.

Warriors of Chaos v. Lizardmen, Watchtower scenario
Knights charge 10 Saurus in Watchtower.

This was designed to wear down the Saurus without taking casualties on the unit I hoped to occupy the building with. 16 A hitting on 3s should hit 10.67 times, I should wound 7.11822, he should save just more than 1; My BSB attacks 5 times, hits 3.335, wounds 2, less than one save My horses then attack 5 times, hit 2.5 and wound less than 2, about one save. So the Knights actually performed at reasonable expectations. A casualty more or less would not have surprised me.

Terradons charge Marauder Horsemen; I flee.

Saurus charge marauder Horsemen I stand, die without doing an unsaved wound. In each case I faced overwhelming force.

Knights suicide charge temple guard to keep them out of the Tower.

I normally never make this charge. In this case, it was scenario driven trying to buy time for my unit in the tower without being attacked. Thus the long-shot charge was done to accomplish a purpose. And it did turn out to be a suicide charge as every Knight died within 4 turns. But they did the job I assigned them...removed the Temple Guard from being a threat to the tower. Of course, I later learned the TG were no threat to the tower...but the fact remains, I made an unusual charge to accomplish a specific goal and counted on delaying 2 or 3 turns, maybe 4 if lucky.

Shaggoth charges Terradons.

Done for a couple reasons; first, to keep them from dropping rocks on my unit in the building. Second, to hopefully distract the opponent from the Watchtower.

Dragon moves to attack Engine of the gods threatening Chaos Warriors in tower.

I figure to win this usually, though the T of the Stegadon and his probable high S attacks mean I would ask to see the book before contemplating this charge in a non=watchtower scenario. In this one, it was more important to stop the Engine from wrecking my guys in the tower and thus would make more chancy charges than normal.

Khorne Scythes into other Temple guard.

Turned out to be a great charge but not one I would normally make; too close to being a "fair fight". I want help here. My Knights side by side into the unit is more what I am thinking. But again, I wanted to keep the Temple Guard from assaulting the tower. So the charge was to achieve my personal goal for the game scenario. Game state requires altered choices.

Dragon Rider into razordon moved to protect Engine.

Easy charge. Razordon has little to no chancve against a Chaos Lord equipped for close combat riding a dragon. Maybe if he gets insanely lucky on the stand and shoot and rolls double 10...I will take my chances.

Overruns into Engine.
A little closer fight than I typically would make. Not really a desperation charge...but close. Done entirely to accomplish my goal of protecting the Tower at all costs. I really should look up Steg stats to see how dangerous it actually is. I still have those massively oversized models Mike made for the tournament in my head that were like a foot tall. Looking so impressive may have altered my perception of their stats.

Replace the word "may" with "unquestionably and irrevocably did" and you are closer the mark.

Shaggy charges 10 Saurus
I was going to die in one or two more turns to Skink poison shooting, having failed 3 of 3 3+ saves.. This doubled as protection against sure but pointless death with keeping away one of the few units left my opponent could threaten the tower with. Not normally a charge I would make. Not a unit that was a legit threat at this point, but I was looking ahead.

Krox block charges tower.
I am static, cannot stop this. Even though the combat was in my favor, clear win for him as it was taking a shot at the scenario goal.

Temple Guard charge BSB.
Only possible because I suicided Knights into Temple Guard and had to position him to keep the Knights and Shaggoth stubborn. When the Knights died on my turn, I was caught in a bad position. This was great for him because if I did fluff a LD check in the tower, it would allow no re-roll if the BSB died.

Knights charge in to support Shaggy v. the Saurus.
I now have close to overwhelming force and will have after combat reform.

Warshrine and H-cannon charge Temple Guard attacking BSB.
Trying desperately to save him and, more importantly, keep the Temple Guard occupied and away from the tower.

This game saw me make a lot of unusual charges. Not once did I have the overwhelming force I usually bring to any combat. These were done to accomplish my armies goals, not to crush units decisively.

And, atypically, I lost a couple combats. I lost more combats in this game than in the rest of 8th edition combined. I also took longer to resolve most other combats than I usually do, even where I had clear superiority, which reduced my overall army effectiveness from a pure destruction standpoint. But it was done in pursuit of the scenario goals, which I achieved.

I had one unit outperform expectations; the Corn Scythes; Great Weapon wielding frenzied Chaos Warriors against Temple Guard.

So we see a clear pattern emerging. I use my army to eliminate things which allow me no armor save, then ensure that in any given combat I am dishing out more attacks than my opponent. I almost always have more models involved in any given fight, even if I am outnumbered on the field.

I can be outnumbered 2 - 1 or 3-1 on the field, but at the point of impact I am going to have such a massive advantage that for my opponent to last more than one round they either need Insane Courage or to be Stubborn or Steadfast.

As can be seen quite plainly, except where forced by desperation or where out-played, I
have had overwhelmingly more force at the point of impact than my opponent. That is by
design. That is what you have to stop to beat the WoC the way I play them.

1) Stay as far back as possible to allow you to shoot as much as possible. Every inch you
move forward, even with your close combat troops, is an inch to my advantage. Even if
you are rolling BS1 S1 weapons, your shooting is more lethal than mine. And even if you have 2 attacks each at WS4, S4, T4 with a 4+ save my troops are more lethal than yours when battle is joined.

2) Do not maneuver or set up in such a way that a small blocking force can tie up large numbers of
your points.

If part of my plan...okay, the majority of my plan...revolves around winning unfair fights and part of my plan for that is to use a few points to tie up a lot of points while I gain mass power against minimal power, I win if you let me do that through deployment or maneuver.

3) Do not let me combo charge you.
Sometimes it is unavoidable. It happens to me sometimes. When it does I USUALLY lose the combat, but even then I have a plan to make my guys stubborn.So if you must let superior troops outnumber you, have a back-up plan to keep you around until you can turn the tables.

4) Do not let me get your units engaged in one-on-one combats. Very few units can match the Warriors of Chaos one to one in close combat. There is a reason Chaos Warriors cost more than any other infantry and Chaos Knights are more than double their points. Grail Knights, Blood Knights...who else is even close on a one-to-one basis? Fair fights are not your friend...because they are not fair. You want the combo charges.

This sounds like a reiteration of point 3. It is not. Sometimes my first unit is there to hold you in place. Sometimes you hit me first. Have a plan to make sure the next unit to hit is yours.

Of course, all that is easier said than done since my entire WoC battle plan is based on
maximizing the number of high WS, high S, high I attacks I can get onto your unit in as little
time as possible while minimizing the attacks you can throw at me...no matter how ineffective your attacks are.

If you are rolling the famous and hated (by the wisdom of the Internet) 100 slave block, you know going in you are unlikely to successfully wound a Warrior or Knight more than once every 4 - 5 turns. That is a good blocking force. Going in to win a combat there...not very good idea.

But it is a great back-up plan, because it will take those knights or warriors several turns to chop through the cheap, pointless seeming unit which gives you more points elsewhere to fight me with. And since they cost less than any unit I use except the Marauder Horsemen, it is advantageous.

Those are the types of edges to look for. Where can fewer points of yours hold up or damage larger point totals of mine?

It also means taking some weapons people seldom take. It was a happy, happy, happy
day for me when I heard I never had to face another Repeater Bolt Thrower. Its ability to
eliminate armor saves entirely instantly made it as despised as the lore of metal. Sure, it relies on 50-50 or worse die rolls...but it has more probability of doing damage when it hits than most other weapons.

I put all "no armor saves" weapons in this category. Any time you have access to one and do not put it in your list, it is a win for me. Same with weapons that struggle to wound due to being low S but have AP rule. Or high volume poison shots.

I am able to not mark my Knights with tzeentch and put the 5+ ward v. Shooting banner on them because they seldom get shot. If that changed I would have to change my build which chops their offensive capability by 33%.

6)Which brings me to my next point; do not disperse your attacks unless you have to. In all too many games I will have one unit of Knights that started at 10 and has 4 left, another that started at 5 and has one left. My matching 24 warrior blocks will each be under half strength.

I love it when my opponent shoots at multiple targets. They do enough damage over the course of a game to severely weaken me. In fact, if they concentrate their fire I lose entire units. But they do not, so they score few or no points despite having done far more than enough casualties to have wiped out half my army or more.

7) The hidden gem. Snipe my Battle Standard Bearer. So long as he is alive my important units will be stubborn on an 8 or 9 with a re-roll which means even if you win a combat by a lot, I will still be there. He is the lynch-pin of my battle plan. Kill him and I will be in a world of hurt. I lose my safety net, my feeling of invulnerability. Suddenly you no longer have to kill every model...just find a way to win the combat and over-run me. I would have run when the Furnace slammed 17 of my Warriors in one turn...if my BSB was dead. Instead, I was virtually guaranteed to be there the next turn.

That is the plan I use against enemy knights and it works exceptionally well. Except few of them are stubborn with a re-roll.

Note there is no magical formula. There are troops out there that, in the words of the people on the army-specific forums, all claim "make the Warriors of Chaos cry". I seldom see those particular troops in our games, though there are exceptions. I am fine with that.

8) Do not dismiss player skill out of hand. Yes, I have some very strong troops. I pay a price to have them; poor range, high cost per troop, slow army. I work around those things. Either I am exceptionally lucky (a point disputed by the sheer number of armor saves I fail that defy all statistical odds) or else I am actually a pretty good player by the standards of our group.

I would point out that in the tournament I went to, I technically won it. I could have won all three games had I desired, 2 by massacre, the other closer. Having played those guys and played our group, I think we have an above average group compared to the broader Portland scene. If our group went as a body, we would either take all 3 spots or at worst 2 of the top 3 if match-ups forced us to knock each other out.

So being a good player in a good group with an army that fits my strengths means you are going to have to work to win against me consistently.

9) Select dfifferent magic. The Warriors of Chaos despise Okkrams Mindrazor. It eliminates their save and wounds on a 2. Numerous beastmen players point out the ease with which they obliterate units of Chaos Warriors and even Chaos Chosen after debuffing them via key spells, gicing their troops the advantages usually possessed by the WoC.

I can honestly say that currently, having played both books, I have no f3ear of the beastmen...their troop stats are laughable as credible threats to the WoC...but a spell here or there completely flips the combat and makes them dangerous.

The road map is laid out here.

And I think the claim I am a poor player should be laid to rest by an examination of the games, the moves made, and why they were made. I got the combats I wanted. I had advantages in most combats, despite being up against faster, more agile troops.

I have an army that fits my playstyle. I would do okay with other armies, but never as good because no other army provides the elements I thrive on. Maybe Brets.

There are other styles I fool around with...my High Elf army is going to be very dangerous soon. But I could take an extra 30% points and not do as well because I have never consistently played an army that does not match my strengths. Which they do not.

I like the Beastmen army, but it is a poor match for my playstyle and even though I can put together something on paper that looks great, because I am not good at covering the weaknesses of that army, it will have poorer than average results.

In theory the Dwarf army has certain synergy but their pathetic footspeed and poor, poor troops put the lie to it overall. they are too slow to make up for their good points.

So I will never be as successful with any other army as I am with WoC. But that has a lot to do with my skills at maximizing their strengths and minimizing their weaknesses. That is one point I am 100% confident in.

What stat is the most important? Drawing it all together

2011-06-20T18:10:00.000-07:00

It would be great after all this work to simply type out a formula such as "S=T>A>LD=M>WS>W>I>BS" but that would be inaccurate. Stat importance is a matter of much more than just raw numbers.

Honestly, I had some ideas over what would be the result. But I ws not certain. Hopefully the things written over the last couple weeks will help it all make sense.

You have done all the prep work. You built your list. You found an opponent. You scheduled a game, rolled up terrain and scenario, figured out your battle plan and it is time to run the game. How do you know when and where you should alter your battle plan?

The answer to that question lies within the topic we have been discussing for the last month or so. Knowing how the stats of your troops interact with the stats of your opponents troops lets you know which units you should use to target which units of your opponents.

It is unwise to compare them on a model per model basis. Otherwise, nobody would ever take a skeleton knowing the opponent had access to Witch Elfs. By the same token, nobody would ever take a Witch Elf knowing the opponent had access to Swordmasters. They might or might not take Swordmasters knowing Chaos Warriors existed.

It is the points values of each model and the synergy created within the army that help figure out which model should be taken when writing the list, and comparing the number of models you have and their stats that should guide your movements on the playing field.

Models have different costs, different strengths and different weaknesses. Those strengths and weaknesses can even change based on what else is accessible to the army as a whole. It depends on the use you have for a unit.

A unit intended to force the enemy to move in certain directions has as its most important component M. That exceeds all other considerations. It needs to get where it needs to be as quickly as possible. Ideally you are looking for fliers, closely backed up by fast cavalry and behind them by skirmishers with high M characteristics.

All of these can get where you need them quickly, have ease of maneuverability, and thus are going to impede the opponent when that is what you need to do. Much like the Russians traditionally use Old Man Winter, you trade space for time. Or, in this case, a relatively inexpensive model/unit to protect your own plans.

In 7th it was an easily abusable tactic called diversion where units were helpless to stop idiotic moves that removed them from the battle. In the vastly improved rules for 8th edition, units behave more intelligently. It is still an effective tactic, except now it saves a bit of time instead of breaking the game.

A unit intending to hold up the enemy for any length of time by contrast has two vital stats; T and LD (if you consider saves to be a stat, add that in.) A and S are nice bonuses. This unit will often be slow and ponderous, filled with models to absorb the inevitable casualties.

Hordes are ideal for this. many players dismiss hordes as "hard to maneuver" or "easy to flank attack", which the skillful player laughs and says, "And your point is?"

A tar pit or anvil type unit is not designed to be maneuverable, it does not care if it gets flanked and turns these theoretical weaknesses into strengths.

First off, when too many people overuse strategies such as the "refused flank", a properly used horde needs not worry about getting flanked and can occupy a surprisingly large number of enemy units for a great deal of time, allowing you to outpoint them at the point of impact.

Second, against a more standard battle line, a horde formation should have its own flanks protected by fast-moving, maneuverable, hard hitting units. Glass cannons can work well for this, best used in conjunction with the aforementioned speed bumps.

The point is, a unit, whether you are using 100 Skaven Slaves or 18 Chaos Warriors with Hand Weapon, Shield and mark of tzeentch, if it is a unit that wants to hold up the enemy for a long time it has as its most important stats T and LD. This is one reason Skaven Slaves are good at it...but Chaos Warriors are better. They die slower. (And kill more stuff on the way out the door).

It is also the reason something like a hundred Chaos Warhounds would be laughably bad. Between their low T and non-existent LD, they would flee instantaneously.

Units designed to win through wars of attrition...grind it out combats lasting numerous rounds...value A first, S second, T third and LD fourth. They want the capability of putting out high volumes of attacks in a small amount of time for the pure potential.

Glass cannons care about three stats only; I, A, S. Give them I5, 4 attacks each and S5 somehow and they are ecstatic. Add Always Strikes first and they are almost broken good. Add a good WS and they are the superman of the Warhammer field. Of course, if they attack the wrong unit...say the tar pit we discussed above, prior to softening it up they will lose, and rightfully so. You need to wear down that opponent first.

Naturally, you are not always able to get the ideal troop for any given job. No matter how much they whine, no matter how much they beg, no matter how much they plead, no matter how many times you feed them after midnight*, an elf is still not going to mystically develop a reliable T4, 5 or better. Sure, you will sometimes be able to buff them up with Wyssans Wildform, Flesh to Stone, or something similar...but counting on that turn after turn is a recipe for disaster.

So how do you determine the best unit when you cannot get a decent number on one or more of the key stats? Take the High Elf army as an example.

Designed to be an elite army, they have T3 across the board, seldom have better than a 5+ armor save if that and that only with upgrades, are expensive compared to units like Skaven Slaves, goblins, Chaos Marauders, Gor, Peasants, State Troops, Skinks and so forth.

Nor are they loaded with high S troops. They have a couple in units like the Swordmasters and Phoenix Guard, but these units are prohibitively expensive, costing the same as a Chaos Warrior before his mandatory upgrade yet with lower T and armor saves, though with higher LD.

It is easy for a High Elf army to maximize their glass cannon units. With Dragon Princes, they can even fit in some relatively durable units that can hit like a ton of bricks if they get the charge.

So what stat is most important for the High Elf armies that need an anvil?

They really cannot create a viable anvil from any unit outside their core. Points restrictions alone ensure that it must be from their core unit.

So the next thing we look at is what stats are most important for the job at hand. We know they will be at best lightly armored with a T3. This means they cannot accomplish a traditional anvil. The best unit they have to serve as an anvil would be either Dragon Princes or Phoenix Guard, but neither of those is practical for multiple reasons; it is using those units in a sub-optimal role for their stats, they are limited in size due to being Special choices, and they cost far too much to serve as anvils.

Spearmen would be a clear best choice if they did not have spears. Their light armor/shield and relatively low cost would allow them to fulfill the role using the parry rule to enhance their durability. But of course their having spears eliminates this possibility.

Thus the High Elfs find the most important stats for an anvil are by and large unavailable to them. Only LD is at a high level. Their best hopes therefore are adding a Noble with Crown of Command and excellent protection to keep him alive, and combining this with reducing the enemy threat as it comes in to keep the anvil alive longer.

Thus they need a powerful missile and magic phase. If they let sledgehammer units like ranked up Minotaurs, Cold One Knights, Tomb King Chariots ranked up, etc. then they are going to melt far too fast to effectively perform their assigned role.

So it becomes a matter of either going without the anvil or working around being without the key stats. There is a way of doing that; as mentioned before, put in a well-protected character with the Crown of Command and keep the BSB nearby to make them a re-rolling LD9 or LD10 unit. Give them enough bodies and they can hold up even the most determined buzz-saw unit for a few turns.

Obviously then different stats are more important for different roles. Yet there are some stats which clearly rise above others in importance.

Hitting on 3+ is nice but over the course of may games, both WS and BS will prove to be less useful than a high score in S, T, or A.

You have to fit these things in with your own play style. Take the Repeater Bolt Thrower, for example.

Numerous charts are available showing their value or lack thereof in comparison to say...10 Repeater Crossbows for the Dark Elf army (an easy comparison as they are exactly equivalent in points). Yet despite the math showing a clear winner, you will see several distinct camps;

-Those who swear by shooting the RBT as a single bolt.
- Those who swear by shooting the RBT as a volley.
- Those who swear by not even taking an RBT.
- Those who swear by the RxBs.
- Some who vary it by target; single bolt versus monsters, heavily armored troops, etc. and volley versus everything else, for example.

It will depend on the nature of the player which is the right way to go. Some people really like to gamble and take long shots...rolling 2 dispel dice hoping for double 6s, running 10 skeletons against a horde of Empire Greatswords and hoping to win, etc.

For this player, they are going to like the single bolt. For them the most important stats are BS and S.
For the player who hates to put their hopes in one die roll, the volley is better. they value the A stat. Or maybe even prefer the RxB line with its lower S.

So once more I have gone off on a tangent. Back to the primary topic.

If I were given the ability to max out one stat it would be S. If I were given a second it would be A, third would be T, 4th LD, then M, WS, I, and last of all BS.

The difference in importance is often negligible and can often be compensated for. But in my eyes, those are the important stats and a bit of why.

I am not dogmatic about it, I can certainly see where others might disagree. In fact, that is what I hope to see; people disagreeing with my assertions and explaining why. It will illuminate different strategies than the ones I use.

And be much less controversial than the post I am working on; how to beat the Warriors of Chaos the way I play them.

Hint; as was said at the close of the Charlie McCarthy/Edgar Bergen show; it ain't easy. And that ain't cause I suck.

* For those too young to have seen Gremlins, this sentence was intended as a homage to that flick. For those who have seen it, I hope you laughed.

What stat is most important? Leadership

2011-06-18T17:21:00.000-07:00

Your army is led by the prince of death (Why is it oft called the angel of death? In modern times are angels not regarded as sweet, kindly protectors?) wielding weapons too terrible for words. His very gaze slays dozens, the gesture of his hand wipes away hundreds, the sweep of his sword decapitates thousands.

Mithridates, Dealer of Death and Destruction atop Phangoria, Dragon of Demolition

Where he walks the blood of his victims forms mighty rivers, where his steed thunders are oceans of gore. Death itself flees from his martial splendor. He is good at what he does, and what he does is wield death and destruction unmatched.*

The only problem last turn he fluffed his attacks and is fleeing for his life. At this point, a single WS4, S3, 1 A model is more dangerous than he is.

See D-Pince be stubborn,. See D-prince fluff his attacks and fail LD. See D-prince run.

Failed leadership checks are what keep models with good WS, S and A from destroying this game. Otherwise it would be a simple matter to math-hammer out what units will win and just skip playing the game entirely.

There is a reason a LD7 unit is infinitely better than LD6 and LD 10 units are in a whole different world. They tend to stick around much longer.

LD checks are everywhere these days. Certain artillery weapons and spells cause them on units. Lost combats and large numbers of casualties sustained force them to be taken. Sometimes a models' own rules force it to take tests.

A couple of failed LD tests can really ruin your day, no matter how well you have played.**

Conversely, unexpectedly rolling insane courage can give you an unexpected bonus when your unit holds up that buzzsaw rampaging through your army at a frenetic pace.

Earlier in this series I talked about how typically most close combat units might only spend 4 - 6 rounds actually engaged in combat. Failed LD tests are the main reason why. These days there are some combats that last longer due to the new improved steadfast rules, items such as the Crown of Command and things of that nature.

Even with being steadfast, however, failed LD checks happen. They happen less frequently with the re-roll which leads to a game within the game as savvy opponents try to kill your army Battle Standard bearer while you strive desperately to keep him safe and where he needs to be.

So how important is LD? Here comes an answer you are probably tired of if you have read the entire series.

It depends.

How did you build your list? If one failed LD check destroys your day, you arguably did a very poor job of list building. (Or are the Vampire Counts general, or a Slann BSB in Blood and Glory...do the Tomb Kings still melt when their big guy dies? If so, include him.) Then again, your list may work very well in your environment and this just happens to be the chink in the armor.

Be that as it may, the more important a unit is, the more important LD is.

Example: a Warriors of Chaos army has a block of Knights to finish combats against weakened opponents, a modest frenzied Chosen unit with great weapons, a big block of tzeentch marked Chaos Warriors with shields, and 10 units of Chaos Warhounds serving as shooting cover.

Rund, dogs. Run!

LD is important for the Chaos Warriors primarily, the Chosen and Knights less importantly, and the Warhounds not at all.

If all the Warhounds run the Chaos player is still in excellent position to win the game. But if they lose their block of Chaos Warriors they have lost their ability to provide an anvil and control space. Indeed, failing a LD test and being run down could be a disaster from which they cannot recover.

The end result is the clever player will typically have ways to make his key units either steadfast or stubborn and keep his BSB nearby and protected for his important unit(s). This way, even modest LD levels have a good chance of holding their place in line and continuing their job.

The Ogre flank melts as unit after unit is wrecked in combat, fails LD and runs.

So how important is LD then? Obviously, I am arguing it is very important. However, there are ways of improving/altering LD to ensure your key units consistently operate with LD 8, 9 or even 10 while being stubborn through one means or another.

There will still be those unforeseen disasters when you fail the re-rolled LD 10 check. It happens. When it does, you feel the pain. Recognizing how important LD is, you should have done your work ahead of time to minimize the number of times it happens.

With that said, if your unit has high scores in the other key stats, you are probably winning your combats. With proper use of your general and BSB, you should minimize the impact of tests forced upon you by your opponent or self-inflicted through rules such as stupidity.

Properly handled, even low LD scores can be protected and have little impact. It is very important...but also relatively easy to deal with. Improperly handled, you will not even do well with LD11.

The biggest single factor that turns a good LD into a disastrous one is losing a combat by a massive amount. Hint; work to prevent that. I know, hard to do...but indisputably the key.

When it comes to LD, in the hands of a great player low LD is a problem but a minor one. In the hands of a poor player, high LD is nice to have but will not protect them.

Me'n Sguiggy thought the dragon looked hungry. We also remembered something important we need to do in the other direction....

In summation, LD is vital to your battle plan; make sure your plan includes keeping your LD high and used as seldom as often.

*Yes, I could write the fluff people chastise Matt Ward for. They are wrong...it is jolly good fun to write. No, it does not make sense or have any bearing on reality. Says the guy playing a game filled with magic and fantastic races.

** Unless, of course, you are immune to taking them. Naturally, most though not all units that do not have to take them are penalized in other ways such as crumbling.

What stat is most important? Attacks

2011-06-16T18:56:00.000-07:00

You have made the right moves, you get the cream of the crop of your warriors into combat, you withstood the furious assault of the hapless enemy, and at last it is your turn to strike. Tough, strong, courageous, you are going to carve a sea of red through the cowering pointy ears in front of you. Grabbing your mighty two-handed axe, you bring it up over your head and cleave through the helm of the sissy elf. Chortling madly, you ready it again...only to see a flurry of attacks coming back at you. What happened?

Almost from the moment the details of the rules to be found in 8th edition were released, the brilliant never to be contradicted, never wrong wisdom of the internet was that Dwarf armies would be awesome in the new edition. I looked at the book for about 40 seconds and consigned them to the "Eh. If their war machines hit or the other army is magic reliant, they will be okay. Otherwise they are pedestrian file."

This might seem curious to those who know me. After all, a decent WS, high T, and can have high S guy with above average saves and excellent leadership is nothing to be scoffed at.

Slow moving guys with 1 attack each are, however, something to be scoffed at. Units I cannot outmaneuver are few and far between, I can combo charge them to my hearts content with a very high degree of success, and if all else fails and they bring me to combat...they just are not that scary from an offensive standpoint. It is entirely because they have 1 attack.

Almost every other army has ways of getting multiple attacks. Sometimes it is frenzy. Sometimes it is extra hand weapons. Sometimes it is in their stat lines. The dwarf army has exactly one line unit with multiple attacks; Giant Slayers, the overpriced, dead before they get into contact or get to fight upgrades.

Fail.

Horded up Dwarf Warriors hitting Saurus 5 wide get just 24 attacks...if those Saurus have spears, 15 of them have 20 attacks at half the cost with better strength, equal T (assuming base stat lines).

Flee from my mighty archer attack, cowardly knights!

I dwell on this because it matters. No matter how awesome your guy is, the potential damage he can do is limited to the number of attacks he has. If he is WS 10, S10 and has 1 attack, he is arguably worse than a guy with WS4, S4, 3 attacks.

Additionally, the smaller a base you can fit a guy with a large number of attacks, the better off you are. We discussed frontage earlier. Massing large numbers of attacks over small frontages makes a unit insanely powerful.

Chaos Knights are nice with WS5, S5, and armor save 1+. Then again, Grail Knights have S4 if charged, S6 if charging, equal save and Ws, and a ward save to boot. But give Chaos Knights frenzy and suddenly 3 guys in the same space are dealing out 50% more attacks than the Grail Knights. Personally, I think Grail Knights are awesome...and to me, it is the extra attacks that make the Chaos Knights even better.

They simply have the ability to deal out so much damage in a narrow frontage it is ridiculous. It is what makes the Warriors of Chaos so strong in combat. Even if they run into relatively equal troops, they simply pile on more attacks and thus outperform their enemies.

It is one reason hordes can be powerful (other than the space control we discussed earlier). They start adding attacks to the pile, ramping up the number of potential wounds they inflict. It is also the reason Monstrous Infantry such as the various Ogres, Trolls, and so forth are so dangerous. 6 Treekin in 3x2 formation deal out 18 attacks over 120 mm. (Not including their stomp).

Obviously the potential or lack thereof is directly related to their WS compared to the opponents, their S compared to the opponent's T, and the dice. But you do not have to be any sort of math major to know 18 is more than say...5x5 Dwarf Warriors would get back 10 attacks. Who wins that one?

The importance of the number of attacks a model has is greatly affected by their quality. Night Goblins facing 5+ WS3, T3 infantry need 12 attacks to do 2 wounds. Saurus facing those same troops do 5 wounds in that same number of attacks. Obviously the Saurus benefit more from extra attacks than the Night Goblins do.

Of course, there are other factors to consider. The Tomb Kings ability to give a unit Killing Blow turns the humblest model into a credible threat against the most powerful man-size model. More attacks obviously benefits them greatly. Drop Wyssans Wildform on the humble Gor once or twice and they become merchants of devastation. Give High Elf spearmen Okkrams Mindrazor and watch Chaos Knights melt off the gaming table in a heartbeat with enough attacks.

Aha. We just discovered a key. In the modern magic era, most armies have the ability to alter certain stats. S, T, I, WS, M all come to mind readily. But very little affects the number of attacks you start the game with.

That means if you are locked into an army with low numbers of attacks, you need to be creative with bringing more attacks to bear in any given combat. The most common way is through making combo-assaults to bring higher numbers of Attacks into the combat, but this has a natural drawback in that it also allows the opponent to add more attacks.

The natural result is you should look for opportunities to ensure you bring as many multiple attack models to the game as possible. Carefully consider your play style; how many points is a model with 2 attacks worth as opposed to another model? I use example in case you have the option of equipping your model with extra hand weapons.

Of course, it also matters what the assigned role is for that unit. If it is a tar pit designed to die but taking a long time doing so, then a shield is worth many times more what another attack is. But if a unit is designed to inflict casualties then the extra attack is exponentially better.

In the end, how important is the number of attacks? For a close combat model, it is close to being more important than even Strength. More attacks equals more potential wounds. For models that are jack of all trades, it depends on how they use them.

Warhammer; What stat is most important? Initiative

2011-06-14T16:04:00.000-07:00

One of the major changes in the new edition is how close combat works. Formerly, if you got the charge you attacked first. Deadly great weapons on the charge were far more lethal as they could strike without worrying about their drawbacks. Poor quality troops getting the charge could, with a bit of luck, wipe out the front row of elite warriors and never face their vengeance. Initiative was irrelevant.

In the new edition, nothing could be further from the truth. Great weapons still strike last, even on the charge. In each round of combat between troops not wielding great weapons (or possessing the “Always Strikes First” rule) initiative determines who gets first shot.

This matters. If you are facing a guy with several high WS, high S attacks with a re-roll to hit and somehow manage to kill him before he gets to swing he does not matter. More realistically, if you are facing waves of troops of lower quality and you yourself are fragile, you have a better chance of not receiving your come-uppance if you take care of business when striking first.

So how important is a good I? I actually rank it fairly highly…but that is largely because most models with a high I also have decent to good WS and decent to good S.

For some models it is less important. A heavily armored, multi-wound character can get by with a lower I score because he can let most of the hits he takes bounce off his armor, and even if one gets through he is likely to be around to deal out some punishment.

By contrast, if a unit is a poor fighter anyway, they are unlikely to do much damage when they swing. If they get robbed of their attacks through inconveniences such as dying a horrible, grisly death before they get to swing, well, it probably did not matter much anyway.

Counter intuitively, this means I is less important the worse the other stats are. It relies more heavily on WS and S than most stats do. It only matters hugely between relatively equally matched models or between models with a slight advantage to one of them.

I think a classic match-up is Chaos Warriors versus. Temple Guard. Relatively close in points costs, they each have 2 base attacks, armor save of 4+, S4, T4, and save of 4+. Chaos Warriors hit on 3+ and are hit on 4+.

Warriors are required to take an upgrade, lets give them a shield as that is relatively common, and I think Temple Guard might have to take halberds, giving them S5. So those are our parameters.

First, based on I, 10 TG v 10 CW

CW 20 A, 13.34 hits, 6.67 wounds, 2.2 saves; 4.5 TG have 9 A, 4.5 hit, 3 wound, 2 save.

Round 2: 9 CW v. 4.5 TG; 18A, 12 hits, 6 wound, 2 save. 1 Saurus attacks back…does it matter?

Clearly, it is a rout.

Second, assume they had equal I

CW, same results; 10 Saurus, 20 attacks, 10 hit, 6.67 wound, 2.22 save, 4.45 dead

Round 2, 6.5 CW v. 4.5 Saurus

CW, 13 A, 8.67 hits, 4.33 wounds, 1.43 save; 4.5 TG, 9 attacks, 4.5hits, 3 wounds, 1 save

Round 3; 4.5 CW v. 1.5 TG

CW, 9 A, 6 hits, 3 wounds, 1 save; TG, 3 attacks, 1.5 hit, 1 wound, .33 save

Still a clear win for the Warriors, but now their numbers have been reduced by over half. They are down to 3ish warriors. Not enough to win a game on its own…but in conjunction with their (theoretical) magic advantage, it can swing a game hugely.

Just altering the I of the TG to match the Warriors, while it does not make them equal, it at least allows them to be a credible threat and do some damage on their way out the door.

So clearly, I is important between similar ability models. As shown by the above, S, T, and saves still mean more.

When the models have widely disparate abilities, it matters less. So yes, I is important…but not the most important stat.

Warhammer; What stat is most important? Wounds

2011-06-12T18:52:00.000-07:00

Wounds do not have a whole lot to talk about on the surface. The vast majority of troops have the same number; 1. Whether you are the mighty Grail Knight or the humble Gnoblar, you have one shot at life. Take a single unsaved wound and you are done for this game.

There are, of course, exceptions. Most characters,chariots, war machines, monstrous infantry and war machines have multiple wounds.

Count the wounds in this mess

It is indeed in the realm of wounds that monstrous infantry have their strongest advantage and that relates to the concept of frontage.

Not everyone has played a wargame for long, so if you just stumbled upon this in some random search, let me explain frontage.

Every model takes up a certain amount of space. A goblin, for example, is on a 20 mm base. A Troll has a 40mm base, so takes up twice as much space.

This matters hugely for how much potential damage you can deal within the realm of a specified distance. One of the reason frenzied troops are so powerful is they add so much power to such a small amount of space; if you have 5 troops on a 25mm base with 1 attack each, the most damage you can deal in 5” is 5 wounds. But give those troops 2 attacks each and you have doubled their potential output in the same amount of space.

By the time you get configurations like 5 Chaos Warriors with extra hand weapon and frenzy, you can pump out a whopping 20 attacks in the same space.

As a result, space considerations are important when considering damage output.

What does this have to do with wounds?

As a general rule, the models that have multiple wounds have multiple attacks. They also tend towards a higher toughness which helps their survivability.

Generally a high T, high W model will take fewer wounds in any one round which means they are more likely to still be there when it is their turn to strike, whether on that turn or the next go-round.

Each additional wound helps with this exponentially. A model with T4, 3 wounds can reasonably expect to last 2 – 3 rounds against even the most lethal opponent, and if he has something like T5, 6 wounds he is going to stand there for a long, long time.

So how many extra points are an extra wound worth? Is it as few as 10 or as many as 50? Some other number?

Unfortunately, I am going to drop back to my Texas Hold-Em stock answer; it depends.

If you have the choice between giving your model an extra point of T or an extra wound, for example, what is worth more?

I think it is clear from earlier postings I would rather have an extra W than WS or BS, but it is a closer thing when looking at S or T. Sticking around long enough to attempt even a task with a low probability of success is obviously superior to dying before getting to attempt a task with a high probability of success.

So which is better? For line troops (think monstrous infantry here) the extra wound is arguably better than S, worse than T as you will block more wounds with T than you will gain extra wounds. If you have monstrous infantry that one unit has W3 and the other W4, take the W4 even if it is 20 points more.

For characters, often they will be armed and armored well enough that the extra point of S or T will be more valuable in performing their assigned role.

And for all the guys with just 1 W…well, tough luck, bub. Next time, keep your head down, other guys in front of you and fight better.

Warhammer; What Stat is most important? T

2011-06-10T18:55:00.000-07:00

The Toughness (T) characteristic is closely related to strength. It is more malleable under the current magic edition than ever before with the easy access to buffs like Wissans Wildform, etc., but still more or less is the basic stat most of the time.

There is a much wider range of commonly seen Toughnesses. Monsters can play a large enough role in the battles that even difficult to wound targets often face a quiver full of shooting, thus calling the T characteristic in to play more often.

For line troops, the common T scores are 3 and 4. There are occasional 2s thrown in and Monsters frequently have T5 or even T6, with other targets having even as high as T10.

As we saw when looking at S, having T4 versus T3 is a huge boon. It often shifts how often a model is wounded by 16 – 33%. Just one point of T makes a huge difference. It is one of the real benefits the Dwarfs, Chaos Warriors and Knights, Gor, and similar troops have. Facing “typical” S3 strikes, they are wounded 16.33% less often which, as we saw with the extremely basic math-hammer of the S piece, can really add up over the course of a battle.

One issue with T is that typically the higher T a model is, the less chance it has a save. The new Arachnarok spider, Tomb King sphinx and the Beastmen models are all fine examples of this. If you penetrate their T defense, you inflict a wound as they have no save at all.

Naturally, there are some high T models that have an exception; The Shaggoth has a very nice 3+ save, as do many dragons, the Hydra has a base save and Regeneration, and the Abomination is all but unkillable* between T, save, regeneration, coming back again and again and again and again…

So exactly how important is T? As with virtually every other stat we have seen…”it depends”. A T4 Chaos Warrior is worth more than a T4 Dwarf Warrior or Saurus Warrior. Arguably, 16 of them are worth more than a T5 Shaggoth, even though the points costs are relatively equivalent.

But the reason he is worth more is because of his weapon skill and armor saves. His higher weapons skill means fewer enemies will strike him in the first place, and his3+ save (assuming hand weapon and shield) versus the 4+ for the Dwarf, mean he is more likely to survive. Saurus are theoretically nearly as good…they have the same S and T and base attacks, but their lighter armor and inability (?) to take shields for the parry save, combined with the higher weapon skill of the Chaos Warrior all combine to mean the Chaos Warrior gets hit less than the Saurus, resulting in his higher T being even more valuable to him than it is to the Saurus…for whom it is very valuable.

At the same time, for a Gor it is still very valuable…but not as valuable. Whereas a Saurus, Dwarf Warrior or Chaos Warrior who has their T4 penetrated will most likely still have some sort of save, the Gor is dead.

This does not mean the T4 is not valuable…arguably, it could seem even more valuable for the Gor as that is the sole means of defense…but it works better in concert with factors that combine to reduce the wounds.

Naturally, for the most part most armies do not get choices in T for their line troops. Elf and (non Chaos) human armies are T3, Dwarfs T4…but there are some armies that DO have a choice.

Lizardmen can choose between lot T skinks and T4 Saurus. Beastmen can choose between T3 Ungor and T4 Gor. Warriors of Chaos can choose between T3 Marauders and everything else.

But beyond that, many armies can choose in other slots between different T units; it might be a chariot versus a monster versus more basic troops. Obviously there are other things to consider, but how much should the T of your troop weigh into that decision?

For example, if you are filling your core slots for the Beastmen, you must choose between the T3 Ungor and the T4 Gor. Neither has armor, both are similarly equipped, WS, S. The Ungor are 2 points cheaper, the Gor are 1 point of T higher; how often should you take the Ungor?

It is actually a tough call. The Gor cost 19% more and are roughly 16% more resilient. So arguably the Ungor are the superior choice. However, other factors (LD, the difference in chance to run based on lost casualties in close combat due to the extra 16% casualties, etc) combine to make the Gor one of the best steals in any army book this side of Chaos Marauders…

Which brings up an interesting point. A Chaos Warrior with no mark and just the required upgrade will typically be 16 points. Marauders with no mark and no upgrades are 4 points. Are 4 Marauders worth 1 Warrior?

They will strike about 16% less frequently, wound 16% less often, and be wounded 16% more often…and only have twice as many attacks. Just for fun, lets see how much difference the T 4 makes.

160 points worth; 10 Chaos Warriors with Hand Weapon & shield versus 40 Chaos Marauders.I would go 10x1 with the Warriors and start in horde with the Marauders.

Round 1: Warriors strike first, 20 attacks, 13.34 hits, 8.898 wounds. Marauders have 31 guys in three rows able to strike back; 31 attacks, 16.5 hits, 5.445 wounds, 2.723 saves.

Round 2; 8 Warriors v. 31 Marauders. 16 attacks, 10.672 hits, 7.118 wounds. 24 Marauders strike back, 12 hits, 3.996 wounds, 2 saved.

Round 3: 6 Warriors v. 24 Marauders; 12 attacks, 9 hits, 6 wounds. 18 Marauders hit 9 times, 3 wounds, 1.5 saves. The first time I went in favor of the Marauders, this time in favor of the Warriors.

Round 4: 5 Warriors v. 18 Marauders; 10 attacks, 6.666 hits, 4.44 wounds; 14 Marauders, 7 hits, 2.33 wounds, 1ish save.

Round 5; 4 warriors v. 14 Marauders, 8 attacks, 6+ wounds; 8 marauders hit 4 times, 1.33 wounds, 50% chance to save

Round 6; 3 warriors, 6 attacks, 4 hits, 3 wounds. 5 Marauders, 2.5 hits, .83 wound, this time will say saved.

Round 7; 3 Warriors, 6 attacks, 4 hits, 3 wounds; 2 Marauders, 1 hit, .33 wound.

So in 8 rounds, the Warriors kill the Marauders. Lets re-run this with one change; we will drop the Warrior T to 3, equal with the Marauders.

Round 1: 10 Warriors v. 40 Marauders.

20 A = 13.34 h = 8.898 w. 31 A = 16.5 hits, 8.25 wounds, 4 saved.

Round 2: 6 Warriors v. 31 Marauders; 12 A = 9 hits = 6.67 wounds. 24 Marauders have 24 A, 12 hit, 6 wound, 3 saved.

Round 3: 3 Warriors v. 24 Marauders: 6 attacks, 4 hit, 3 wound. 21 Marauders, 21 A= 10.5 hits, 5.25 wound, 2.5 saves. Lets be charitable and keep the Warrior alive.

So in 4 rounds the Warriors die having done half as much damage.

How important is T4? Even in the case of the Chaos Warrior, an elite, hardcore close combat death machine, it is vital, vital, vital. Losing just one point changes the outcome from a close (losing 70% of the unit) fight to a devastating loss.

Of course, these examples ignore things like failed LD tests after combat, upgrades, etc., but they should fully demonstrate the power of higher T.

So how important is T overall? It ranges towards the top. It can keep your guy alive long enough to do what he came to do.

* not true…but fun to say.

Warhammer; What stat is most important? Strength

2011-06-08T23:14:00.000-07:00

Strength (S) generally applies only in Close combat. Obviously, there are exceptions…primarily characteristic tests…but generally speaking, S only applies once you have exercised your M and WS options (or your enemy kindly exercised their M option to bring your might within reach).

Being reliant on these other two stats is a strike against the importance of strength, but it is more than compensated for by the value of planting a wound on the opponent. It is time for a classic tangent.

At its root, Warhammer is all about putting wounds on the opponent. With the exception of the Watchtower scenario, every mission can be achieved best by doing massive carnage to the opponent. Even that scenario is easy to win if you kill every soldier the enemy has.

The ability to inflict casualties on the opponent is paramount to any goal you wish to achieve. It clears out troops from the watchtower, breaks their morale in Blood and Glory, and earns points by wiping out units and forcing the various tests on the enemy for lost combats, etc.

Causing a casualty also reduces their potential to inflict mayhem on you as well. In short, inflicting casualties in the maximum volume possible while minimizing the damage you receive is the fulcrum on which the balance of power in a Warhammer game swings.

To be sure, there are other ways to do damage; failed LD checks have wiped out more than one army, crumbling is an issue for the undead, some weapons and spells require no roll to wound so S is irrelevant…but the majority of the time, in order to inflict a wound, you need a decent S statistic.

The most common S totals are 3 and 4. This means most troops wound most targets on a 3, 4, or 5. There are more than enough ways to get S6 even (lances on the charge, great weapons on base S4, buffs to units) that these days it is quite common to see S5 and S6.

How important is it to have the high strength? Ignoring things like poison, killing blow, etc, it is vital. Actually hitting an opponent is something even the best line troops do just a handful of times per game. Lets take an elite Chaos Warrior as an example.

Starting with 2 attacks, it is not uncommon to see them with Frenzy through various means giving them 3 attacks per turn. It is not uncommon to be in combat by turn 2 these days. Assume they can win a combat in 2 turns (usually less, occasionally more), then another turn to get into combat. You are now on turn 5. This combat should be against a weaker unit and is unlikely to last 2 turns.

Even S6 does nothing if you roll 4 "1"s in 4 tries...

So in a typical game, a Chaos Warrior might get to fight 6 times (that is a lot, but not unheard of). They will therefore expend 18 attacks in a game. Normally, they are going to have a higher WS than their opponent, so expect to hit 2 out of 3 times. That means they have just 12 tries in an entire game to wound an opponent. (I am fudging the numbers upward…it is unlikely they will reliably get that many attacks in a game but I want them to seem even deadlier than they are).

Remember, this is an elite fighter with a large number of attacks. Change that to a High Elf Spearman and the number drops to just 6 attacks in the same span of time! Most troops have 1 or at most 2 attacks, hit less often and thus have correspondingly fewer opportunities to wound an opponent.

The natural assumption then is that S is quite important. Limited opportunities to wound means it is quite important to actually deal a wound when you get the opportunity. A quick look at the tables leads us to see that S5 is the target (wounding a typical T3 on the best possible, 2+, the new FAQ notwithstanding) and S6 the holy grail as you seldom encounter anything higher than T4.

I will argue S is actually so important I personally would rather take a Great Weapon on a high I guy that makes him strike last but be likely to wound when he hits than I would have average strength and strike first. I have not actually math-hammered it, so lets try.

Lets take 10 Marauders versus 10 State Troops. The Marauders are frenzied. Should be equal WS, S, T, and the State Troops have light armor and hand weapon.

First, using hand weapon/shield; 20 attacks, 10 hits, 5 wounds, <1 saved (I think State Troops have light armor?) = 4 wounds per round. State troops then attack, 5 attacks, 2.5 hits (round to 3), 1.5 wounds.

Second, using great weapon; State troops attack first, 10 attacks, 5 hits, 2.5 wounds. 15.5 attacks, 7.25 hits, 6.039 wounds, none saved.

Actually, Marauders might have higher weapons skill which would skew it more in their favor than the above.

In that case, in my opinion, the Great Weapons are a clear win (Note; I think people who use flails are making a huge error and I discount their use entirely. Poor, poor choice.)

But what about a tougher opponent? Lets look at Saurus Warriors. In this case, however, remember that Saurus cost about twice what a Marauder in that configuration would which can skew things somewhat.

The Saurus have S4, T4 whereas both are 3s for the Marauders. I believe Saurus have a 4+ scaly skin? Or maybe that is with shield. Either way, assuming that is their save.

First, hand weapon and shield; 20 attacks, 10 hits, 3.33 wounds, 1.665 saved. Lets say 18 attacks back, 9 hit, 6 wound.

Second, Great Weapon; Saurus attack first, 20 attacks, 10 hit, 6.66 wound; 6 attacks back, 3 hit, 2 wound, 1 in 6 saves.

In this case, it is a clear win for the hand weapon combination.

So what if they run into a monster? I happen to know Shaggoth stats off the top of my head so we will go with him.

Dragon v. H-Pit Abomination: A classic battle of S

First, hand weapon, shield; Shaggoth attacks first, 5 attacks, 3 – 4 hit, it is unusual for him not to wound, so nearly 4 casualties per turn. Only room for 4 guys to attack back, 8 attacks, 4 hit, less than 1 wound as they need 6s.

Second, Great Weapon; ; Shaggoth attacks first, 5 attacks, 3 – 4 hit, it is unusual for him not to wound, so nearly 4 casualties per turn. Only room for 4 guys to attack back again, 8 attacks, 4 hit, 2 wound, 1 in 6 saves.

Clear win for the great weapon.

One final one; lets look at Dwarf Warriors. They have identical WS and base S, but T4 like the Saurus.

HW/Shield for each; marauders attack first, 20 attacks, 10 hit, 3.33 wound, 1.65 saved outright. 8 dwarfs attack back, 4 hits, 2 wounds.

GW for Marauders, HW/Shield for dwarves. Dwarves attack first, 10 attacks, 5 hits, 2.5 wounds. 18 attacks back, 9 hits, 6 wounds, 1 save. (I went 18 attacks for easy math).

GW for both; Marauders get 20 attacks, 10 hits, 6.66 wounds, 1 saved. Dwarfs get 10 attacks, 5 hit, 3 – 4 wounds.

Lastly, HW/shield for Marauders, GW for dwarfs. We saw above this is 1.5 wounds to the dwarfs, 8 attacks back (for easy math), 4 hits, 3ish wounds.

So as you can see, it matters a great deal who you are facing how valuable it is to give up I to get S. But as a general rule, the greater potential to do a wound is quite worthwhile.

I will also argue that a higher S is more valuable than a higher WS or BS. The worst case scenario to strike an opponent is 1 in 3 as 5 is the most you will need (acknowledging the rare exceptions than can require a 6). But if you have low S, you only wound one in 6 times.

There are more combinations of dice rolls that allow mass carnage inflicted needing 5s than there are needing 6s. Thus, the potential for unusually large numbers of successful hits one rolls needing WS or BS is greater than the potential for unusually large numbers of successful hits when needing 6s.

Thus, when selecting troops, if you have a choice between one with WS1, S10 and WS10, S1 the choice should be obvious; go with the S10.

That is a ridiculous comparison of course, but it applies just as much when comparing WS3, S4 to WS4, S3. In my opinion, S is more important than WS or BS.

Warhammer: What stat is most important? Ballistic Skill

2011-06-06T19:23:00.000-07:00

On the surface Ballistic Skill (BS) is similar to weapon skill in that is determines how often you strike your opponent. Naturally, the higher number you have as a stat the more likely you are to hit and therefore how much damage you can potentially deal out in a single go.

Once you get past that, however, it is vastly different. Unlike WS, you control most of the factors which affect your chances of hitting your target. Range, movement, whether your opponent has cover all matter when it comes to figuring out how likely you are to hit.

Clever use of movement can deny cover and close (or add) range, but at the cost of the shot being more difficult*. Of course, it can also put your precious missile troops right where they want to be...at risk of being in close combat.

As a result, determining the best course of action to maximize your shooting relies on a good battle plan, clever maneuvering, and then your bs.

The side note is that many missile weapons only have S3. So even if you hit your target, you often will either see your shot bounce off the target harmlessly or even see it deflected by the most humble armor. This can be extremely frustrating.

Of course, at the other end of the spectrum are stronger weapons; S4 handguns, Bolt Throwers which allow no armor skill, etc.

The net result is shooting has a wide range of effectiveness and different weapons have to be used in different ways. It is one of the ironies of Warhammer that sometimes it is counter intuitive which missiles are best used against which targets. One example would be skinks.

Their short range, low S javelins, for example, require them to be exactly where they do not want to be; close to monsters like a Sphinx, for example, which can thunderstomp them to death in a flurry of high S auto hits. Yet the lack of armor on the Sphinx means their poison is very deadly to the Sphinx...and the close range, low S nature means they are much less valuable against the inexpensive skeletons.

So how important is a high BS? As with so many things in Warhammer, the answer is, "it depends". What is the role of that troop? How reliably can they deliver the shots when and where they are needed?

In 8th edition the amount of time a unit can reasonably expect to have viable targets and opportunity to fire is seldom going to be more than 2 or at most 3 turns per game. As a result, they need to maximize the damage they do in that short period of time.

At some point in the future I might write a piece on target selection, which matters hugely. But for now, I am going to stick with determining how important BS is.

On the one hand, it is less reliant on M than WS is since by definition it has a range greater than base to base contact.

However, it is more reliant on other factors which are more controllable than WS and one that isn't. The fact that most shooting is low S means the probability of doing a great deal of damage is generally limited. There are of course numerous exceptions;

Units that use poison, weapons giving S4 and/or armor piercing, units that can put out ridiculous numbers of shots.

But by and large, even the best missile troops are going to, at best, thin the numbers they or their close combat compatriots will face when the lines smash into each other.

It is important to use it well, and for some armies it is more important than others, but in 8th edition, BS is important but not the most vital.

* Not including the variety of weapons that ignore movement or other factors. And Tomb Kings.

Warhammer; What Stat is most important? Weapon Skill

2011-06-04T18:23:00.000-07:00

One of the most poorly kept secrets in the history of wargames in general and Warhammer in particular is Weapon Skill and how it determines the to-hit roll.

Short summary; higher weapon skill, you hit 66% of the time. Weapon skill lower by half on up to equal you hit 50% of the time. If the enemy weapon skill is double +1 higher than yours, you hit 33% of the time.

In other words, the best warriors hit precisely twice as often as the worst warriors (with exceptions granted for the extremely rare instances that can reduce to hit rolls to 2+ or increase them to 6+. They are so rare as to not warrant any further discussion here.)

Mush has been made of the new Tomb King ability to bump Skeleton WS by 4 points. Is this really a big boost?

From one standpoint yes. With wound charts guaranteeing any hit has a 17% chance to inflict a wound, doubling the number of times you successfully hit an opponent is going to increase your potential damage output exponentially.

And that word potential is THE key word here.

One key element that makes Warhammer work is statistical outliers. By this I do not mean when you cheat the dice and hit 5 times in 10 tries needing a 4+ (which is actually less than 50% likely to happen. There are 60,466,176 potential outcomes of rolling 10 dice; far less than 30, 233,083 of them will have 50% hit and 50% miss). What I am referring to is when you need a 5+ and hit that 7 times in 9 dice.

Of course, we are more likely to remember the failures. It is human nature. We can all remember times we needed 3+ to save and failed 4 of 5 (an event I can recount having happened to me numerous times) but we conveniently dismiss the times we have needed 5+ or better and saved 4 out of 5, even though those events have most likely happened a relatively even number of times. We tend to emphasize the spectacular failures in our minds and, when we remember the spectacular success, it is more rare in our memory.

Nevertheless, the reason weapon skill matters is potential. If we strictly went by probabilities Warhammer would be a very boring game. However, because we have times when 10 With Elves sweep in against 20 Night Goblins and somehow only get 2 wounds through while the Night Goblins somehow hit 8 times and see all of those wound, we continue to have an interesting game.

When it comes to weapon skill, we are more likely to have those spectacular successes where 14 out of 15 attacks hit if we start with a higher than normal Weapon Skill.

I know that is a basic, basic assertion but it may not have reached some of the more luck-reliant players in Warhammer.

If your weapon skill is say..5, you are going to need a 3+ to hit most of the time. If your weapon skill is a 3, you are going to typically need a 4+ to hit and if your weapon skill is 1, you typically need a 5 to hit. Again, basic assertion, but there are more potential rolls that include 10 of 10 dice showing a 3 or higher on each one than combinations that show 5 or higher.

Thus, there are more potential opportunities to inflict a wound with a higher weapon skill.

Which brings us back to the percentages discussed earlier. How important is it to select troops with a higher weapon skill?

I typically use the Warriors of Chaos book as it is the one with which I am most familiar. In that book, a common debate is which is better; trolls or ogres? I myself never take either; I like the dragon ogres. And I do that specifically because of the weapon skill being one pip higher.

Ironically, I cannot think of a single time that made my Dragon Ogres more difficult to hit. They are typically hit on a 4+ by line troops and a 3+ by elites. However, it often means they are HITTING on a 3+ instead of on a 4+. The extra 16% chance to hit...well, okay, more like 10% when you factor in the times it has no effect...is worth the extra points to me (plus they just look so much cooler).

From a mathematical standpoint, this is a mistake. The extra points in a typical unit would provide me with an additional 25 great weapon wielding marauders. In other words, making the selection is a points waste...from a strictly mathematical point of view.

However, with the role I designate the Dragon Ogres for, it is worthwhile for the POTENTIAL it gives them. They are more frequently going to hit that low WS monster with a majority of their attacks.

Which brings us back around to the original question; how important is weapon skill? It depends on what the role of that model is. If your model has a high probability of dealing damage when it connects with an attack then weapon skill is actually very important. Being 16-1/2 or 33% more likely to hit and give yourself a chance to wound is a huge deal.

Conversely, if a model is designed for roles other than close combat, then a higher weapon skill is at best of marginal value. If your skirmishing peashooters of destruction melt when hit in the face in close combat in the desert by a snowball then a higher weapon skill is far less useful than...say...higher movement or better playing skill to keep them from getting into that combat in the first place.

High weapon skill is nice, and it can be broken down by percentages. How valuable a high weapon skill is is directly proportional to how likely a model is to do damage when in combat....and how likely it is to live long enough to swing.

But it is not the most important stat.

Warhammer: What is the most important stat? First up, Movement

2011-06-02T21:06:00.000-07:00

When you sit down to look at a roster in Warhammer, one of the things that jumps out at you is the sheer amount of information. How many times have you seen a roster sheet with "M WS BS S T W I A LD" plastered across the top?

For the experienced Warhammer player, it is very easy to get a general feel for it. We know the baseline that has been established is the Human stat. If the line you are looking at is equal to it, you have a rough idea of that model's capabilities. If slightly higher you will have a rough idea of how often you will win against that model and how often you expect the minor upset of losing to it.

Even a lowly Gnoblar can expect to deal the occasional wound to a might Dragon, for example, but it is an unusual event that always comes as a surprise. But even a Gnoblar will roll a 5 to hit one in 3 attempts, and of those hits 1 in 6 will score a wound. As a general rule, 4 of those wounds will be saved (assuming 3+ scaly skin) which means actually scoring a wound is not something you expect to do, but you will always accept that unexpected bonus.

But what is the most important stat? Lets go through them one by one and do a bit of examination.

First up is movement. Ranging from 3 to 9, there is a wide range of movement. What dwarf has not bemoaned being doubled up by the sneaky skinks who run circles around them, never provide a valid target, and cannot be drawn into combat?

Of course, most models and units can double their base rate through marching, though this comes at the price of limited maneuverability. Still, it does allow them to traverse the field much more quickly.

In the end, most models that will do the bulk of the fighting are infantry and range between 3 and 6. Most models that value the charge are much quicker in their movement, with cavalry and units wanting to deal impact hits at the forefront.

The new, improved charging rules rightfully make it less certain those units will get the charge, though properly played they are still far more likely to achieve their goal.

There are ways of getting around it, however. You can defend an obstacle, lock down the chargers with a unit that can sustain the casualties, then grind down the units that count on the damage done by the charge, and so forth.

Even if you do not control who gets the charge, you can control where the combat occurs and who is involved if you have superior movement.

Click on me to see all the glorious stuff he discusses

Take this scene for example. On the left are Chaos Knights, movement of 7, who have charged into some skinks, movement 6. Behind the trees and in the flank of the Chaos Warriors are some more skinks with a Kroxigor in the second rank (this game was played during 7th edition, but the principles still hold true) and ahead, but to the left of them are some ranked up Skinks.

If the Lizardman player so chooses, the skinks will not engage in close combat ever again in this game. Their superior movement means they can stay out of range of the Chaos Warriors. There is only one other Chaos unit on the table and they are too far away to protect the forwardmost unit.

If they ever close in combat the Chaos Warriors will not just win the combat but will absolutely CRUSH the skinks well over 90% of the time. They are stronger, tougher, better armored, better weapon skill, and have more attacks. So the Chaos Warriors will hit more often, wound more often, and save more often. Thus it behooves the Skinks to use their superior movement to avoid combat.

Meanwhile, the knights will almost assuredly overrun the skinks on the left and take 2 - 3 turns to get back in to the battle. They will therefore be unable to protect the Warriors and use their superior movement to force combat.

Generally speaking, the faster force will therefore be allowed to choose which units fight. Movement can and should be used to ensure you are getting your units into the combats you want them in. If your tooled up Chaos Warrior unit slams into a Night Goblin horde and somehow loses the combat, you live with that result.

By contrast, if you let your Chaos Warriors get charged by Grail Knights you should not be surprised to see your troops disappear under an avalanche of S6 attacks and are probably going to lose that combat most of the time.

Clearly it is important to pick your fights. Movement is the way to do that.

Thus, IN A VACUUM, the movement characteristic is the most vital. In truth, there are ways to control space that allow slower moving forces to bring faster forces to battle.

I have mentioned hordes before. On the internet, many people have dismissed hordes, pointing out that most units that can horde are units that do no damage. The general argument goes, "With a horde you get x number of extra low ws, low s attacks that do less than one wound per round according to mathhammer".

All true. All irrelevant. The horde unit can be used more effectively to control space than it can to actually deal damage.

Lets say you want your Black Orcs to be able to beat face on a unit they desperately do not want to get charged by....say, an Always Strikes First impact causing Tomb King Chariot unit. (I assume their magic would let this happen...if nothing else, they could get the I10 spell off. Might be something that cannot be done, but the principle of a unit you do not want to get charged by holds...say ranked Ogre Bulls)

That Tomb King unit is going to absolutely buzzsaw through the Night Goblin unit, winning most combats by double digits. Of course, the properly built and played Night Goblin unit designed for this task will have decent leadership, steadfast, and a re-roll from the nearby battle standard bearer which means even after taking 30 casualties, they are still there.

Now the Black Orcs can sweep around the flank and get into combat with the chariots/Ogre Bulls/impact unit of doom despite having slower movement.

It does require some skill and the knowledge of how to protect your flank chargers from getting flanked themselves. And obviously the example of Night Goblins versus chariots assumes a field where you can somewhat direct where the chariots are going to go through use of terrain and deployment.

But it is a powerful tool in the hands of slow moving armies. It is one method to minimize slow movement.

And it is a demonstration that movement is important but not the only important factor. After all, if you somehow double the speed of Gnoblars but that is all you have...they are still going to lose to any half-decent troop anyway. Great movement with poor troops helps, but it does not make them good troops.

Steadfast: We have been playing it wrong

2011-05-31T08:11:00.000-07:00

At least, I have been playing it wrong. I have been playing it like the old Stubborn rule. I.e. You may test on the UNIT'S unmodified leadership. This is not the Steadfast rule.

The Steadfast (and by extension the NEW Stubborn rule) says, "Steadfast units can always take Break tests on their unmodified Leadership (or the General's unmodified Leadership if the testing unit is in range of his Inspiring Presence special rule - see page 107). "

And just for completeness, the new Stubborn rule reads, "Stubborn units are always steadfast, whether or not they have more ranks than their enemy (see page 54 for details)."

Therefore a unit with Ld 6 which is steadfast and in range of its Ld 10 general would roll on an unmodified 10 when they lose the combat.

Prove It: Basketball, Warhammer, and Chihuahuas

2011-05-27T17:26:00.000-07:00

"Prove it."

This was a common phrase when we were playing Horse or Pig, the final shot was too difficult for the person about to be eliminated and they had already missed their first shot.

So instead of attempting it a second time, knowing they would miss it, that person would calculate the chances and decide there was a greater chance of their opponent missing the shot than the eliminatee had of making it.

So instead of chancing it, they would go to the time-honored "prove it card."

The amazing thing is...typically the person challenged to prove it would. If it was a twisting, turning, spinning reverse off the opposite foot, they would calmly and complacently throw it up and watch it go in the basket, thus allowing them to label the loser a horse.

Or if it was a long bomb they almost always watched the basketball swish through nicely and cleanly. It was as inevitable as rain in Oregon, lies from politicians, or me purchasing the new Weird Al cd when it is released.

There is a reason this worked. Most basketball players have a comfort zone. If one person has better range, they will step outside their opponents' range when time for that key shot. Conversely, if they make their living in the paint then a difficult lay-in will be a piece of cake for them but virtually impossible for their opponent.

And if one player has better range and is also comfortable with the most spectacular work around the basket, they would win nearly every time.

So what does this have to do with Warhammer?

There was a Warhammer event in Portland not too long ago that was a little bit off the beaten path. I suspect it owes a fair amount to one I have seen mentioned from the United Kingdom. Essentially, you take a smallish army and play each opponent twice. The first time you use your own army, the second your opponent's.

The idea behind this is that this will determine the better player by comparing the outcomes of the two games. It is also an oft-suggested resolution among the Starving Crazed Weasels.

The problem with the concept is similar to the problem with resorting to "prove it" in a game of Horse.

Though the army list might be the same, the results will seldom be equal.

For example, my standard finishing move in Horse started with a right hand dribble, 360 degree double pump lay in with the left hand.

It could trip people up many places...the dribble, spin, double pump, or especially using the left hand.

Often when that was the challenge shot, I would have to walk the victim through the steps several times and even then they seldom got it correct. Did not matter because it was even more rare that they made the shot.

Army construction often has a similar principle. Picking up a list and seeing "47 dudes with weapons, 18 different dudes with piercing eyes, firm jaw and a lock of wavy hair, and dude with a staff" might tell you what is in the army but not why.

A lot of times it has to do with play style. For example, a player who works to minimize casualties and protect themselves from shooting and magic through judicious entry into close combats will struggle to play a shooting based High Elf army well (why you would make a shooting based High Elf army is an open question).

By contrast, the person who relies heavily on magic to buff their troops, move them around the field, etc. will struggle mightily to do well when handed a Dwarf list, even if it has Thorek and a host of war machines.

Two players with the same list will not have the same results. I am a fine example.

Give me a list I put together and I will typically know which unit is supposed to perform which role. I have a sense of how long my troops will last before being swept aside...or sweeping aside their opponent.

Hand me the identical list, but put together by someone else and odds are good I will struggle with it and, in fact, will lose the majority of the games I play with it, even against inferior lists.

But there is something else to consider. When we played previously back in the last millenium, I used a Bretonnian list. Great armor saves, great mobility, and a beastly dragon rider.

When we restarted, I took to the Warriors of Chaos like a Beagle to rabbit hunting.

They fit my style very well. They are rugged, fast (the way I build lists), and reliable.

I tend to find when I use other styles of lists that I am less successful not only in the game, but in figuring out how to use the troops to hand.

It is not just that the troops die in droves...I do that with the Warriors. I cannot count the number of times my 5 strong Knight unit has lost 3 of 5 members to a 4 wound barrage or my Chaos Warrior unit has been shredded by a trebuchet or scraplauncher.

Ironically, losing 3 knights is much more costly than losing say...22 Lothern Sea Guard as I did not too long ago in just one turn. I have lost far more in potential combat ability by losing 60% of my frontage than I have by losing 0% of my frontage.

But the plan for how to use them changes. One thing I have noted in my list-building is that regardless of what troops are available, I know what roles I want my troops to play and often shoe-horn other troops into that role when my preferred troop is unavailable.

Thus in recent games with both the High Elf and Beastmen army I have had uncomfortable moments when key troops were in the wrong place. Once I lost a Watchtower game to the Lizardmen because of it when I planted deadly but too few in number Swordsmen in the Watchtower instead of the larger, less lethal but much sturdier Sea Guard block. (Arguably I would have lost it anyway, but that made the outcome certain.)

It is a mistake probably nobody else in the Starving Crazed Weasels would make. This is largely because they tend to mix up the army styles they build more frequently than I mix my builds.

I seldom take Chaos Marauders or Chaos Warriors in any numbers larger than the bare minimum because when I look at them I tend to maximize their disadvantages and minimize their strengths.

I like a mobile army. Typically facing one of the various Elven armies, Skaven, Lizardmen and Ogres, I find that M4 is just too slow. 20 - 33% slower than the opponent, the blocks of Marauders and Warriors all too often fail to get where they need to be when I need them to be there.

Conversely, Chaos Knights, Marauder Horsemen, Shaggoths, and Dragon Ogres are fully capable of following Nathan Bedford Forrests' dictum to "get thar fustest with the mostest".

My brothers, Kev and Liam have mastered skills that I envy. They all make much heavier use of infantry than I do and are far more effective with it. Whereas my Marauders, Chaos Warriors, Lothern Sea Guard, and other miscellaneous blocks of infantry often see little to no meaningful combat, they seem to get their infantry blocks into combat almost every game*.

As an interesting side-note, the use of infantry blocks is more of a finesse tactic where the majority of my tactics revolve around blunt force trauma. I also find it is quite difficult to go from blunt force trauma to the tactics of parry and thrust required to play fragile troops well, whereas I do believe it is easier to adjust finesse tactics to bft. But not always.

I think the last Watchtower game was a case in point. In the magic phase, I would have immediately gone the blunt force trauma route of throwing max dice at the power spells every turn and most likely ended up with two dead Slann due to miscast before they could ever have gotten through my Temple Guard with Chaos Knights, Chaos Warriors, etc. if the roles were reversed....in fact, that is what I did with my magic phase.

I am willing to bet they would have taken Pandemonium as one of their spells and spent more time trying to get that cast than Infernal Gateway. I believe this because both brothers are better at finesse, long-term thinking like that than I am. They use those tactics far more often and effectively than I do.

Yet I have also seen them commit the bft style attacks as well. Both use Cold One Knights (one for Lizardmen, the other for Dark Elves), chariots, and "glass cannon" characters quite well.

I am not always certain the reverse is true. The most finesse I use is heavy use of blocking forces and the occasional diversionary attack.

I am far better at the blunt-force tactics that result in bringing overwhelming force into any given combat...and, indeed, if you go back and read through a typical battle report, you will find that most combats I get involved in see me allocating far more points at any given point than the opponent.

I find that all of us in the group have different strengths and weaknesses. At the risk of angering someone, I will suggest some things of that nature I see;

Liam is the best at avoidance and casualty minimizing. He does this through keen analysis of defensive positions and using mobility. His greatest weakness is the occasional lack of aggression.

Kev is great at spotting the right moment to attack a weak point in the enemy lines. His weakness tends to be rotten timing on lousy dice rolls. Whereas he will make a ridiculous number of 6+ saves, at the key moment his war machines will all blow themselves up, he will fail the re-rollable 10+ leadership test, etc.

Fullur is great at movement and thinking ahead. His weakness is being unwilling to press his advantages.

Fixed Dice is an extremely strong player. I would argue he has the best list-building skills of any of us, His greatest weakness is he occasionally will put a lot of points into a model, then be unwilling to use it for fear of losing those points.

I would say my greatest strength is getting the right troops into the right combat at the right time. My greatest weakness...and there are many...is a fear of losing ANY model, even a little 4 point pointless guy.

I will go out on a limb here and say that those who are used to using finesse tactics will do better at adopting to using better troops than someone used to using high quality, resilient troops will do with good quality, fragile troops.

Someone used to using hordes, on the other hand, might do more poorly with an elite army than someone with an elite army would do with hordes. Empty space can be scary.

The key point, though, is tournaments/games where you switch armies might be a "truer" test of skills...but it is not a true test of skills that have been developed.

I love the thought of the Empire army detachment system. I would love to build an army revolving around a Steam Tank, couple units of knights, block of swordsmen with handgun detachments.

And I am willing to bet the first few games would be disastrous for me. I would commit the wrong troops at the wrong time, probably have the wrong units in the wrong places and could get taken apart by 60% of the points in the hands of someone who knows what they are doing.

Plain and simple, as much as I like the idea of the detachments, I have not developed the skills needed to use them effectively.

I have, however, developed the skills to use the Warriors of Chaos effectively.

Here is an example; There is a lvl 4 Wizard on disc, block of 18 Chaos Warriors with shield, mark of tzeentch, horde of Chaos Marauders with Great Weapons and mark of khorne, 2 5 man units of Chaos Knights, one with mark of tzeentch and banner of rage (always frenzied), the other with mark of khorne and war banner, 3 dragon ogres and a dragon ogre shaggoth. Last but not least, there is an exalted hero on Chaos steed with the banner of chaos, giving him terror and making every troop within 6" stubborn. Where do you place the bsb?

Some people would say there is no right or wrong answer. To me, there is a blatantly correct answer (and one I never use).

The Chaos Warriors have a 3+ armor save, 5+ parry save. They are there to occupy any enemy for a long, long time. They are unlikely to win combats on their own. The Chaos Marauders have no save whatsoever, are T3 and modest weapon skill. However, they will dish out a large number of S5 attacks.

Everything else in the list is fast enough to force the combats it wants to get into...which, theoretically, means they will WIN those combats the vast majority of the time.

Thus the BSB is clearly designed to hang out close to or within one of the infantry blocks which, themselves, are designed to work in concert with each other.

Coming up with that scenario and how each unit should be used took me about a half second. Yet time and again, I have looked through some of the other army books, found absolutely no army I wanted to put together...but when I see some of the lists put together by the Starving Crazed Weasels, I know how it will operate in their hands, know I could not use the list that way, and know they made a good list that works for them.

So when I see "prove it" tournaments, I know before I ever set out I have no interest in doing that. I know how good I am with the type of lists I like to take...and how poorly I would fare with just about any other.

In fact, I am willing to wager that if anybody in the Starving Crazed Weasels ever takes me on in a game where we switch lists, they will wipe the floor with me. I will almost guaranteed get tabled. Every time. Regardless of scenario, list, etc.

I also know my dog will still love me.

* One exception to this is hordes. I like to think I have quickly and effectively mastered the use of hordes. Properly protected on the flank, they can occupy so much space they can effectively force the opposition to accept battle. And being a horde, I will almost always have the advantage of numbers, and being the Warriors of Chaos, even the Marauders are almost always the equal of if not superior to the opponent's base troops. Smaller blocks of infantry have oft proved to be wastes of points, but hordes have been awesome for me.

Interestingly enough, the very immobility of a horde, considered a weakness by some, are, in my opinion and experience easy to turn into one of their greatest strengths.

My new favorite toy

2011-05-25T10:50:00.000-07:00

In my game against Kev, I was a little disappointed to not be able to take Galrauch. Since then some tweaking has gotten him glued together....but I may not take him anyway.

Since he checks in at a hefty 616 points (why they did not make it 666 since they did that with his stats I do not know), he is pretty tough to fit in anyway.

With the WoC, your lack of shooting creates a big hole. You need magic to take care of two roles; shooting and magic. So getting an effective magic phase is pretty much vital to making the army work, particularly against the vast percentage of armies which currently do not allow armor saves.

So the investment is not just Galrauch, it is the inevitable back-up wizard with the Infernal Puppet to protect against the inevitable mis-cast(s). Unlike the mis-cast proof Teclis/Slann, one bad roll can really ruin your day, so the Puppet is a necessary level of protection.

With my love of magic, it is hard not to take a wizard. With my love of dragons, it is tough not to take a wizard. Galrauch fulfilling both roles meant he was a great choice.

Until the game this past weekend.

As a general rule, I am not fond of putting a wizard on a dragon, even a wizard in Chaos armor. Too squishy.

But...throw the Talisman of Preservation, give him the tzeentch mark, and suddenly you have a 3+ ward save.

Nice.

He managed to stand up to multiple rounds of combat with the H-pit abomination throwing 13, 14, 15 attacks at him. With the back-up wizard Puppeting his mis-casts to a 7, he is in good shape to survive.

Thing is, he becomes a real power-house in combat. The wizard is weak compared to a Chaos fighter-character...or a Doombull, or Bretonnian fighter-character...but put him up against rank and file, between his efforts, the dragon thunderstomping and hacking, and he can deal out a world of hurt.

So he is mobile to get his magic where it needs to be, tough to kill, and deadly when he gets into combat. He fulfills my desires for both wizard and dragon presence. And he is just fun to play.

So he will be a temptation to use in just about every game. The problem is...he can only be fit into games 2800 points plus...so he will not always be around. But it is a build worth remembering.

Funny thing is, I then started thinking. As fun as this is, what would happen if I put together a build to go warmachine/monster hunting? I do not have a lot of faith in this build to consistently do well.

But put a chaos lord up there...how would it look? So I started toying around with various builds. And I found one that may make an appearance at some point.

The Chaos Lord would have 5 WS8 S7 attacks that will go first against all but a handful of enemies. He will have a 1+ save with 3+ ward. Then the dragon will have 6 WS6 S6 attacks, a thunderstomp, and if played right, will save his breath attack.

If everything hit 100% (unlikely, but possible) that is 5 S7, 12 S6 and 12 S4 attacks. Oh, and for a lark if the game is big enough, I gave him the Word of Agony option, another D6 S4 hits. That is a lot of potential output, and he is pretty rugged.

Sure, some things (Pendant of Kalith (sic) comes to mind) shut it down, but it is a force to be reckoned with. Since nobody in the group is currently playing dwarves and our Empire player has abominable luck (1 shot in 3 games I know of...and that after we made him re-roll a mis-fire because it had gotten too ridiculous) I am not really afraid of the cannonball to the face.

Of course, the other problem with this build is it shafts my magic phase. I can spam a couple low-levels, though. Might be fun.

The other downside is it means I pretty much want to play games 2800 points range whereas there is a certain movement afoot in the group to play smaller games. Hmm...

3500 Warriors of Chaos versus 3500 Lizardmen, Watchtower Scenario

2011-05-23T09:48:00.000-07:00

After the experiment with the wizard on the dragon, I wanted to try an actually Chaos fighter lord on dragon. With the Ogre Blade, mark of tzeentch, Enchanted Shield and Talisman of Preservation he ends up having a 1+ armor save, 3+ ward, 7 S5 attacks, 6 strength 6 attacks, dragon breath and thunderstomp. He should do a number on infantry blocks and is quite capable of going after war machines, tough monsters, etc.

I actually like this build so much I am going to name him. Mithridates will make a come-back, and the dragon will be called Phangoria. Look it up. It is funny.

So when we decided to play an all-night game prior to me flying out to Nebraska, I was hoping it would be big enough to try him out.

We ended up rolling for size and 3500 came up. Score! Of course, fitting him him meant I would be susceptible to strong magic. I would have at best a level 2 wizard....

With over 700 points tied up in one character, I put in my normal BSB, a couple of level 2s marked with tzeentch, one with dispel scroll and the other with infernal puppet.

After fiddling around with points I ended up with a block of 20 chaos warriors with shield and tzeentch, a 14 warrior with khorne and great weapons and 2 marauder horsemen with throwing axes. I also had an h-cannon, warshrine, dragon ogre shaggoth, and 5 man and 10 man knight units. Whoops...due to points I had to drop the 10 man down to 5.

I like this build. If it is a straight up fight I just need to push forward and get into the right combats...hold them up with my 3+ save, 5+ ward Warrior block and blast the flanks with my hard hitting units while the Shaggoth and Dragon go after hard targets.

If blood and glory I have 4 units with banners, the BSB and my general. And if the Watchtower, if I get to set up in it, 20 Chaos Warriors with 3+/5+ re-rolling on an 8 are going to be hard to shift. I can use my other units to keep them from getting attacked.

Time to set up the field.

The field ended up being a bit...well, I thought at the time we had kind of blown the set-up. The center of the table was kind of crowded but there was little or nothing affecting the deployment zones. Too much of the terrain was next to each other. After the scenario, though, I think it was quite well set up. Had a nice impact on mobility.

They were taking a dual slann list. One had Life (?), the other metal. They had I think 3 other 10 man saurus blocks, a bik skink/kroxigor block and a couple units of skinks. Also the Engine and another stegadon.

As is typical for me when I see such a list, I immediately start thinking of its strengths. This army is quite well set up to crush my Warriors. I despise the lore of metal. It essentially removes my army wide strength of armor. Wish I had some lore that did not allow enemy armies their specialty....that removed ASF for high elfs, hatred for dark elves, cold blooded for lizardmen, etc. Saving grace is they have to be cast successfully. Downside is...with +2 to cast and the Slann abilities to add a die to every spell...I could be in a world of hurt.

Add to that the Engine allowing no armor saves and they have the potential to do a large amount of unstoppable damage that I can do nothing about. I just have to hope I can minimize that.

It used to be the Saurus would not bother me. I used to argue that they would sub-par and over-cost, that they did not do enough damage against weaker troops (say...empire state troops) and were as weak as state troops against stronger troop choices like Ogres. If there is one thing the Warriors are strong on, it is high quality troops.

Ironically, it was my brothers who convinced me the Saurus are better than I believed and a threat even to the warriors. So I am concerned. The skinks will cause me lots of saves which I tend to fail in large quantities, the Saurus outnumber me and their temple guard seem to be a valid threat to even my Warriors, they will dominate the magic phase and I could be in trouble.

I roll a 5 to snag the tower. I am happy. I already have my plan formed. I am going to throw my tough block into the tower, then tie up his other units and hope the game ends on turn 4 with me having 1 or 2 Warriors left in the tower.

I know that is all that matters. I can lose every guy I have except one. As long as I have one guy left but he is in the tower I will win. So that is the plan.

Then they spoil my plan by rolling a 6. "Fortunately" the only unit they have to put in there is a 10 Saurus block. I figure to be able to kill them...but will I be able to then occupy the tower?

I throw the 2 Marauder Horsemen units on the right as a feint. Everything else I plant right around the tower. My bog block of 20 is directly opposite the tower. The 14 khorne great weapons are to their left, the 5 man knights to their right in front with the 10 behind, the Shaggoth right of that and the cannon out to the side to get a line of sight. I plan to drop it on the Metal Tempe Guard/Slann unit hoping to get lucky.

I get to go first.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 1
I want to soften up the tower and do not want to use my Warriors to do it. I want to keep them protected as long as possible. I think it will take 2 turns to wipe out the Saurus in the tower. I also forget the rules....I start moving other units to block him off from entering the tower after I clear it out. If I can tie up his infantry units in combat then I will have time to occupy it on my turn. Otherwise, I figure I will kill his garrison off on my turn, then he will occupy it with a temple guard unit on his turn and that will be game.

The Knights make it into the tower, the big warrior block moves close hoping to be able to occupy it on turn 3, the khorne warriors move up on the building's left and the dragon flies in that direction.

I roll a whopping 11 dice for magic. I throw 6 at Infernal Gateway at his Metal slann. I want irresistible force. I will take my chances with the mis-cast. That is the most dangerous thing he has on the table to me. I am going to concentrate on it.

I roll a total of about 21, he rolls all his Dispel dice and stuffs it. I have 5 dice left and nothing to do.

Shooting; I center the template on the Metal Slann. It scatters off a couple inches. I then roll a "1" for the guy under the template and a 2 to wound the slann. Even though he loses 5 or 6 Saurus...I am disappointed. So far this turn has not gone well. Both units of Horsemen combine to get zero hits on their respective targets (I had moved them to throw shots at his terradons and a small Saurus block).

The tower battle goes very well, however. My 5 frenzied knights do what 5 frenzied knights do and wipe out all 10 saurus before they even get to attack.

The good news is...the tower is now empty. The bad news is...my knights are in the way of my warrior block getting into the tower.

Lizardman Turn 1

His terradons and saurus charge my marauder horsemen. I flee the terradons...and he overruns them. My other unit stands and shoots at his Saurus, do no damage and die in close combat.

The Metal Slann Temple Guard marches but outside the parameters of the building. The Engine moves up close to the building. The other Slann unit advances on what I call the left side of the building. Unbeknownst to them, they are playing right into the battle plan I formulated.

The old saw is "battle plans never survive contact with the enemy". They had no way of knowing this...but they were actually doing exactly what I would have begged them to do. By those moves they gave me the chance...albeit a slim one...of getting off suicide charges on both units. Clever movement of my BSB would mean I could tie them up with hard to kill, stubborn units.

They then rolled I think a 3 or 4 for the winds of magic. I breath a huge sigh of relief. They first attempt throne of vines. I do not even hesitate, I let it go. I know it protects them from miscast but it does not hurt me. I am saving all my dice to stop anything that lowers my armor save permanently or is damaging with no save.

My plan works as I have enough dispel dice to stop their casting.

Their stegadon bow misses. The skinks they put into the tower next to the watchtower then shoot at my dragon, one poison hit which I duly fail. After all, I only had a 3+...I am bound to fail one of 3 of those, might as well get it out of the way early.

So overall, the first turn was excellent for me. I already think the game comes down to one die roll which I will attempt post haste.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 2
The door is open. If I can get my Knights out of the way I will shove my Warriors block into the tower and then thrown everything I have at keeping him from assaulting it. I will save all my dice to protect the tower in the magic phase.

I declare the key charges. My knights with the zteentch mark and banner of rage charge the temple guard. This will come as a surprise to just about everyone...but I actually would not have done this in any other scenario.

As awesome as my knights are, I think they will severely reduce the Temple Guard unit but will eventually die. I want to combo-charge this unit. However, in the Watchtower scenario, the only thing that matters is occupying the tower. If I fail my swift reform roll, I need to keep him out of the tower.

Meanwhile, Shaggoth charges the terradons who also choose to flee. They go a long, long way.

On the left I advance my khorne warriors toward his other temple guard block.

It is now time for THE most important roll in the game. If I can swift reform the Knights, I will move them out of the way and shove my warrior block in the tower.

The charges succeeds, the swift reform...passes. I get my 3+, 5+ save, 20 man block into the tower. I now have a strong advantage.

Meanwhile, their positioning means I cannot get the dragon out of range of the skinks, but I fly him behind their lines anyway, aiming to charge the Engine next turn. I need to kill that thing off at all costs, because they have it perfectly positioned to kill off a few Warriors every turn.

I roll a 5 or 6 on the winds. After a brief debate, I dispel Throne with all my dice. Probably should have tried Infernal on his engine.

The h-cannon scatters away, doing no harm.

My knights on the right do a few casualties and lose one of their own.

This next turn will be key. He will charge with his Temple Guard, do a few casualties, I will do a few. I actually figure I am about 85% likely to win the combat, I just need to withstand the attrition because that is what this has become; a war of attrition. I think they will work to wear down my block with repeated suicide charges and the Engine. Will I be able to hold out?

Lizardmen Turn 2
I get a huge shock. They do NOT charge the Temple Guard into the tower. Instead they move up between the tower and the Bane Tower or whatever it is. They move the razordon to block my Dragon charge on the engine and a jungle swarm hoping to also block. The skink/kroxigor block swings around the tower.

They roll another low number on the Winds. He then fluffs Throne and I dispel his Metal spell. The Burning Alignment rolls a low number, does in one of the knights fighting his temple guard.

In combat I kill his champion again (came back to Throne prior turn I think?) and he kills another knight. I do almost no other casualties as they make every save.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 3
On the left I charge my khorne warriors into his Temple Guard. I believed they had made a mistake by not charging the tower last turn. (We had quite a debate about this post game. They had a different strategy than I would employ that they believed...and still believe in...which has some merit. If I knew then what I know now, I might not have charged...but I doubt it.)

This actually contradicts one of Napoleons dictates; "Never interrupt the enemy in the course of making a mistake." However, it also comes into whether they were making a mistake. And it completely comes down to point of view.

For the strategy they had adopted it was not a mistake. It was only a mistake if they had the same battle plan I would adopt in their place...which they would not. So while for me it would have been a mistake to not charge the tower, for them it was the correct play. Confused? Check out my post-battle meanderings for a more thorough discussion.

Behind his lines I charge Mithridates and Phangoria into his razordon. The stand and shoot is appalling as he rolls 2 hits and a misfire, eating a skink. He does no damage.
On the right Shaggoth charges his terradon who flee. A long way.

On the left he does in a couple of warriors and I then do in 14 of his temple Guard. Wow. that was..unexpected. It is also more what I used to think of Saurus.

He was striking first with I think 13 S5 attacks plus whatever the Slann does (read "nothing"). His S5 reduces my save to a 6+. The damage done was quite modest. The khorne warriors, however, were devastating. Over 20 attacks needing 3s to hit, 2s to wound with a -3 are going to put a hurt on anyone. Him saving I think zero of them did not hurt.

On the right I do in a couple of his temple guard. I think he did not do any back, but he might have.

Mithridates and Phangoria do their thing, killing the razordon and over-running into the engine.

So this was a stupendous turn for me. I am in position to get some help to my Knight block on the right which is whittling down his temple guard, I am going to kill his life Slann in oneish more turns, I am a turn or two from ending the Engine's burning alignment, and the Shaggoth will stall his 10 Saurus block on the right. Even if he hammers Shaggy, 10 Saurus are not going to win this game for them.

Oh, think this was the turn I gave him a 3+ save with the Warshrine. So he is going to be pretty tough.

Lizardmen Turn 3
He moves some skinks up behind the Saurus on my right. His Terradons fail their rally test and fly off the field.

He again rolls abominably on the Winds...maybe a 3? 4? Their plan to regrow the Temple Guard on my left flies out the window. They do not have enough to Throne AND a metal spell. They cast a metal spell. I would need double 6s to stop it (might have been Dwellers Below, come to think of it...it was either that or Final Transmutation. Either way, all 20 of my Chaos Warriors take a test and die on a 5 or 6. That should drop them to about 12...I had lost a couple to Burning Alignment already).

I burn my Dispel Scroll. Burning does a wound to the dragon, takes down another knight, wounds one of my wizards.

In the shooting phase he hits the shaggoth twice with poison. Needing 3s to save, I take both wounds. Ugh.

I kill his skink priest in a challenge, then put a couple wounds on the Stegadon who wounds the dragon back. I now have 3 wounds on him. Just now occurred to me I forgot to roll on the Eye chart. Irrelevant, but would have been fun.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 4
Shaggy charges his Saurus. The cannon and Shrine move forward. Magic is pointless. I have nothing to dispel, nothing to cast.

Close combat is my specialty of course. The ancient stegadon dies, his Life Slann/Temple Guard block dies, I do a couple wounds to his Saurus with Shaggy (and take one back). The game is really over at this point. He does not have enough juice left to dislodge my essentially untouched tower-holding warrior block and I am devastating him everywhere else.

He does finish off my Knights, though. They did their job, whittling him down to maybe 5 or 6 Temple Guard left. Maybe less.

Lizardmen Turn 4
A little movement, another failed magic turn. His Kroxigor block did get into combat with the tower. I killed his skink champ in a challenge, put 2 or 3 wounds on kroxigor but think he did not get anything through.

I think this is the turn he charged my BSB who was left in the open when my knights died. I had been using him to keep Shaggy and the Knights stubborn. His positioning left him open.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 5
The knights charge in with Shaggy, my cannon and shrine finish off his other Saurus, he kills my BSB on his way out the door. The game is really over at this point so we call it.

Wrapping up
First off, what went right?

I think I came up with a really solid battle plan. The only mistakes I felt like I made were irrelevant. My Marauder Horsemen are in the list to go after Repeater Bolt Throwers, Stone Throwers, Jezzail Teams, Cannons. He had none. I threw them away going after irrelevant targets. They were not speed bumping units.

But it was at worst a minor mistake. I am not sure I want them in front of his tempe guard anyway as they would occupy space I would rather have for other units.

I had superior fortune in killing off his Saurus in turn one and then being able to occupy it myself with the block I wanted in there. There was very little chance I would fail my swift reform. I was trying on a re-rollable 9 due to Mithridates and the BSB. Had he kept just one Saurus alive, the game might have gone much different. As it was, I accomplished my goal in turn two and was able to put my plan into effect.

From this point on, my battle plan worked to perfection. I was able to occupy every unit he had that could assault the building and whittle them down to where they would be no threat to my warriors. I threw everything I had into stopping anything that could really hurt me. I got rid of his Engine's burning alignment, seldom had to stop metal magic and had plenty of dice to do so.

In the last couple of turns I made up for early bad fortune. The first couple of turns I was failing every save, he was making a lot of saves, my attacks other than the first tower assault were poor. I think it was 4 times I hit with 5 attacks, needed 2s to wound and did 2 wounds.

But most important of all, they rolled abominably for the winds of magic every turn. I think 6 was the most dice they ever got. They had based their strategy around crushing me with metal magic and regrowing their units. They never got enough dice to do both and spent their dice on Throne, leaving no dice for Magic.

Late in the game my dice were much better. They more than made up for the earlier pathetic rolls.

What went wrong?
Well...these are nothing but nit-picking. My shooting was horrific. The cannon scattered every turn, it never hit the Slann that was its target and was again ineffectual....though it was pretty awesome in close combat.

I did not know the correct rules or might have played slightly different. For whatever reason I was thinking you could not occupy the tower if you killed everyone in it. Otherwise I might have assaulted the building with my Warriors early on.

As mentioned above, early in the game I was failing every save. The shaggoth failed the first 2 3+ saves, the dragon failed all 3 3+ saves he attempted, my 5+ ward never saved anyone from the Burning Alignment.

All in all, it was a highly entertaining game against my brothers.

Now, on to the big controversy. Strategy.

Let me preface this by saying this; one of the things that makes Warhammer go is that different people make different strategies work. My take on this is not "right" or "wrong", it is MINE. By the same toke, their strategy is not "right", it is not "wrong", it is THEIRS.

Their strategy would not work for me. My strategy would not work for them. Whatever else you take away from the following, THAT is the key principle.

In the Tower scenario, only one thing matters. Who has a model in the tower when the game ends. Nothing else matters. Who killed what? Does not matter. How many saves did I make? Irrelevant. Did I get off an epic charge? Who cares. Do I have a model in the tower and is the game over? Button made of win.

If the roles are reversed, I am going to throw everything I have at the tower. I know going in that if I have Skinks, Saurus Warriors, or even Temple Guard and am facing Chaos Warriors...with or without the 3+ armor save, 5+ ward save...that I am going to lose the vast majority of combats. I am going to lose many more models in EVERY combat.

Math-hammer time.
10 Temple Guard with Halberds v. 10 Chaos Warriors with hand weapon/shield and tzeentch.
Chaos attacks first; 21 attacks hitting on 3s, 14 hits. 7 wounds with a -1. He saves, I want to save base 3+ save, 4+ net, he takes 3.5 - 4 wounds per turn.

21 attacks back (assuming champions are alive). 10.5 hits. 3 - 4 wounds, I save 2 -3 with armor alone. So he may or may not do a wound in any given assault (by the way, after this game I am back to believing what I used to believe; Saurus cost too much for what they are).

So honestly, I am going to win over 90% of the times this combat takes place.

At the same time, take the Knights versus Temple Guard grind. I wore him down over the course of several turns and he wiped out my unit (with the assistance of the burning alignment). There was one turn where I think I failed 3 saves (only to make my only ward save with that unit in the game).

THAT is the turn my strategy revolves around. I want the charge where I have the statistical outlier. 18 of my attacks hit, 12 of them wound, my opponent saves 2.

Is it likely to happen? No. But I think it is my BEST CHANCE. Burning alignment is still taking off one or 2 models a turn. Reinforcements are theoretically available to me. My opponent has to hope to hold on. I can do this with multiple units. My first one dies horribly after 2 or 3 assaults? I send in the next unit.

This strategy requires me to protect the units I plan to tag-team the tower. I sacrifice the Terradons, small Saurus blocks, and skink blocks to keep my Temple Guard units available to charge the building every turn until the game is over or my guys are all dead.

Conversely, if I take the strategy they adopted and plan to kill everything in the building with magic and the burning alignment, I am going to fire everything I have at it.

When they rolled low on magic, I thought they got distracted. Throne of Vines is nice...but it does nothing to whittle down the numbers in the tower. If I were trying their strategy, instead of casting throne I would have been max dice at Final Transmutation or Dwellers below every turn. (Or Comet of Cassandora if they had it). If I lose my Slann to a mis-cast it is bad...but not as bad as going a turn without attacking the unit in the building.

Every shot I can muster, no matter how unlikely, is going to be aimed at the building. The 10 skinks in the building next door are going to be pot-shotting the building, even knowing I need 7s or more and am unlikely to do a casualty. But every casualty I do is just one small nick of attrition that is irreplaceable.

As it was, from my standpoint they got distracted. Burning alignment was taking 1 or at most 2 warriors per turn. Since I had 20 of them, that meant they needed 10 - 18 turns to get the job done with burning alignment.

I never had a Metal spell affect that unit. Each turn they had other things they attempted. We disagreed after the game on whether that was the right move. They believe they made the correct move, I was far more worried about the metal spells that could quickly and seriously reduce the number of Warriors I had available to defend the tower.

So it felt like I I was not facing a concentrated assault against the building. To me things like the Throne, shooting at my Dragon/khorne warriors were distracting them from the most important point of contact.

The thing is...I am in complete agreement with them on one point. Regardless of whether you go the magic/burning alignment route or the assault/assault/assault route, once I got that block into the building they were very, very unlikely to ever move them out. I suspect I win that game 98% of the time.

The question before us is what is more likely to win those 2% of the games. So for your amusement, I present the two strategies we discussed and let you choose for yourself.

Their strategy was to do a couple wounds with burning alignment and try to get a few more each turn with either Final Transmutation or Dwellers Below.

This has the probability to do several wounds a turn. I think it has an excellent chance of being successful and, in my belief, is best supported by throwing as many shots as possible in support. The hope is to use Burning Alignment, shooting, and magic to do 4 - 5 wounds a turn, then assault with the Skink/Kroxigor unit when it has been whittled down to a handful of warriors.

Weaknesses are if you roll low for Burning Aligment, Winds of Magic, or cannot get a spell through or cannot get your shooting into position.

Conversely, the strategy I would probably adopt would be combining Burning Alignment with assaults. This would also rely on having a secondary target; killing the BSB.

The goal here is to win that one combat and have them fail the Leadership roll. It is unlikely to work. As we saw above, neither Saurus nor Temple Guard are going to do very many casualties in an average combat.

However, if you have played Warhammer for long, you have seen the untouchable unit of doom fluff their attacks and the sub-par unit roll unbelievably well. I have seen night goblins take out iron-breakers, for example.

I have also seen LD 9 Dwarves with a re-roll have 3 units run in one turn.

And that is what I am shooting for. I want to wear down the Chaos Warriors, hoping that Burning Alignment and my Temple Guard will take down 2 to 3 Warriors per turn and, if I am lucky, win a combat and have them fluff the roll.

Once the Chaos Warriors get into the building, the game is going to be won by Chaos the vast majority of the time.

The question is what someone believes gives them the best chance to climb the mountain.

Both plans have merit. The magic approach will almost assuredly do more damage over the course of the game if allowed to happen. It then requires assaults that rely on finishing off a weakened unit or getting that failed Leadership test.

The assault plan wants to do more casualties in one turn and get more chances at failed Leadership tests. It requires getting lucky and winning assaults you are unlikely to win.

Again...neither is likely to happen. Both are long-shots. It just depends on the mind-set of the person playing it which works better for them.

Run the numbers and you will find what all three of us already know; no matter which way you go, once the Warriors take the building, it is all but game over. So the moral of the story is this; if you engage in the Tower scenario with the Warriors of Chaos, do everything you can to keep them from getting into the tower.

Send squads to stand between their units that can occupy it. You will die, but they will not be in the building. If they get in the building, throw absolutely everything you have at them every turn as soon as possible, as often as possible.

And if those things fail, distract them while you move the tower into your deployment zone and hope he does not notice....

Tavern Talk: Tournament play, comp, and what should be

2011-05-18T21:23:00.000-07:00

Warhammer is first and foremost designed for a couple of friends to get together and have almost a co-operative experience rather than play a game. This basic concept is often poorly understood and that leads to a huge misunderstanding of what Games Workshop does with their rules sets.

This basic truth is easy to see if you simply read their material as it pervades every aspect of their printed material. This is easy to see when in the main rule book it states, "You can simply use all the models in your collection, but most players...." (Island of Blood rulebook p. 2)

It is demonstrated by "the most important rule". It is demonstrated by the way battle report after battle report in their flagship magazine points out blatant changes/abuses of the rules in order to play a specific scenario they invent.

This truth also leads to problems when it comes to setting up tournaments. Since the books are designed almost more in terms of a co-operative endeavor than a true test of strategic and tactical skills, the rule set and various army books are full of exploitable holes.

One fine example would be the Dark Elf book. It has long been derided for its "over powered, under priced Pendant of Kaelith, Ring of Hotek, and Hydra" while others blast the Warriors of Chaos book for its "broken Infernal Puppet and H-cannon". Still other hate the Lizardman book for the talents granted a tricked out Slann while for others it is the trebuchets of the brettonians, war machines of the Dwarfs, Book of Hoeth of the High Elf army and so forth.

Virtually every army has exploitable options. This makes forming a balanced army difficult.

Consider the Wood Elf player who brings an army of Dryads, Glade Guard and Treekin, only to see them melt to the guy who brings 2 Hydras at the same point level. The Wood Elf player will be at a sever disadvantage and likely lose.

Many tournaments seek to proactively prevent this by making broad limitations such as "no double rares".

Fair enough. For many gamers, that is a preferred approach. They should have a right to game as they wish. So, however, should those who prefer to bring good units instead of poor units.

These limitations tend to have numerous and unfortunate side effects. For example, one tournament I attended in 7th edition had the "no special character, no dragons, max 6 levels of magic" rule. yet a local Lizardman player showed up with dual Engine of the Gods and a Slann who stole the opponents dice and stored them. Pity the poor Warriors of Chaos player who could not muster enough high strength attacks to deal with all that. And the Wood Elf player was completely hamstrung.

The set of restrictions created a problem.

8th edition tournament restrictions tend to have the same result. Some vocal players dislike magic so eliminate entirely the 6th spell from every lore along with making it so you can never use more than 12 power dice in an entire magic phase nor use the power scroll. Then they complain because death stars are too difficult to deal with.

The irony that the 6th lore spells are a powerful deterrent to death stars escapes them. So does the point that building a variety of army styles leads to minimizing the power of the big spell. Instead they remove a powerful strategy and thus create a powerful new archetype that fundamentally shifts the tournament metagame.

There is room for such modification but there should be more tournaments that actually follow the rules of the game.

I actually have looked at going to a large number of local tournaments but typically choose not to, and it is almost always because the comp restrictions remove my interest in playing.

I happen to like using Wulfrik, as just one example. Unfortunately, he is a 'special character' which almost every tournament specifically disallows. As soon as I see special characters are disallowed, my interest level plummets. The irony is I take him in maybe a quarter of the games I play.

By the same token, when I see "maximum 12 power dice in a magic phase" I am done with that tournament as well. If I am creative enough to build an army that finds ways to build my power dice that high it means I have sacrificed my capabilities in other departments to have a powerful magic phase. Having that strategy pre-emptively removed is something I simply do not find interesting.

As a result, I seldom play in tournaments. I would much rather have a game with my local group where I can take the models I want in the quantities I want and have a good game.

The funny thing is I often build armies that would benefit greatly from playing in a comped environment. With the High Elf army I have yet to take Teclis. With the beastmen I take an army that uses almost all core and no special characters. With the Dwarfs I do not take the Anvil of Doom or set up a gunline.

But I would rather play where my fellow players can take "all their toys" than play in an environment where I could not bring, say...two h-cannons for the Warriors of Chaos if the mood struck me.

I do understand where people are coming from who demand comp. Many people want to build armies susceptible to the 6th spells without needing to fear them, for example. Others want to build armies incapable of dealing with a double Abomination list. They want to build these armies and still have a chance to win. They believe copmp provides them with such a field. They have every right to play in that environment.

However, with few exceptions the existence of comp that I do not care for means my Warhammer playing will continue to be in the comfort of home. Or, more accurately, in my brother's garage.

4k Warriors of Chaos versus 4k Skaven

2011-05-14T23:45:00.000-07:00

As always, click on the pictures to expand them (and also let you see the stuff cut off by being to the right of what shows)

Lately I have been doing a lot of experimenting. After dozens of games with the Warriors of Chaos, I pretty much know their ins and outs. I like the way they play. I like playing with that army. But I also like to switch it up so I have had a couple games using dwarfs, a couple using High Elfs and even my debut appearance with the Beastmen.

Kev and I wanted to play a big game, and the only army I could do that large without proxying was back to the one I love best, the WoC. I do not mind proxying within reason...frankly, with our groups financial resources and time commitments, it is pretty much a must to keep the game going. But if I can play with or without it, I will go the one route almost every time.

This is mostly for me...so I can keep straight in my own mind which models are where as that determines my tactical options.I tend to forget stuff sometimes and it becomes problematic when I make key mistakes because I forgot which of my units I meant to do something with.

Well, the first time I put the list together, I centered it around Galrauch. I love dragons, but seldom used them in 7th edition as they tended to be pretty over powered. In 8th, I feel fine about using them as they are not nearly as strong (?).

Unfortunately, one of my old bugaboos came back to strike that plan down; modeling. I hate metal models with a passion. Almost impossible to glue together without pinning...which I have yet to successfully do. So I tried to magnetize the wing...and it fell off this morning. So I had to retool the list.

Changing it around to keep a dragon in cost me my beloved Dragon Ogres. On the other hand, I think it came up with a build much stronger than the one with Galrauch.

I knew kev would bring either the Ogres or Skaven. If the Ogres, then I would basically just keep everything within 6" of my BSB and try to keep him from getting impact hits on the charge. If he brought Skaven I would try to get my unit of Chaos Warriors into his H-pit Abomination along with the Shaggoth and hope, and try to stay away from the Doomwheel and Plague Furnace.

He brought the Skaven. then we rolled a classic; the Battle line. I have not played this set-up in 8th yet, so even though it is "old", it is kind of new, too...

I feinted with my set-up, planting some Marauder Horsemen on my extreme right flank. With their Vanguard move and their role as Fast Cavalry, they could get where I needed them when I needed them. Their entire job was to go after anything he had like the Warp Lightning Cannon (present), Jezzails (present), or miscellaneous weapon teams I did not want hitting my knight (present, present, present, present).

By the time we were done setting up he had the Doom Wheel on my extreme left, Jezzails on the right, and kind of spread across the field. I packed in the center. The plan was drive up the middle and, depending on how the battle was going, use a block of tzeentch-marked, hand weapon and shield Chaos Warriors to hold him up while my Knights did the heavy lifting.

Warriors of Chaos....ASSEMBLE

I won the role for first turn. This made me happy.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 1
Perception matters when playing Warhammer. For example, in my various games I have;
1) thrown everything I had at the Abomination, had it kill my character designed specifically to kill the HPA, finally killed it by focusing over 1k points on it...only to have it come back and kill my Shaggoth and a few other things. I fear the HPA
2) Had weapon team after weapon team remove my armor saves. I fear them.
3) Had Queek single-handed wreck a 10-man unit of Knights. I fear him,
4) Had the plague furnace wipe out everything it touches. I fear it.
5) Had the Doomwheel do mass carnage and only be stopped by a lucky charge with my Knights. I fear it.

So my perception of the Skaven is their specials are unkillable, they do not let me have armor saves, and they are good at putting down the WoC.

So my goals were to keep him from shooting as much as possible, take every shot I could at his tough stuff with magic, and keep as much as possible stubborn.

My Marauder Horsemen thundered forward, one unit planting itself in front of the Jezzails, the other in front of his Warpfire Cannon. I then rolled 12 for power dice.

Usually first turn magic is not so helpful. In this case I had flown my dragon riding General/Lord Wizard up close to him hoping to get lucky and Infernal Gateway his Plague Furnace away. But then I remember the damage Queek has done...Infernal on his Storm Vermin.

I roll 6 dice, do not get irresistible, and he chooses to feedback scroll it. I get 11 hits, strength 7. Oh, I wish those were reversed...anyhow, I put down 9 Storm Vermin. This is already one of the 2 or 3 best magic phases I have ever had.

I then get off Pandemonium, his attempt to Dispel fails. I then use my last dice for Flickering Fire at the Warp Lightning Cannon, he again rolls low and I wound it 3 times. Wow. I got everything off. That is the best magic phase I have ever had. And it will only get better.

Time for shooting. I often forget about my throwing axes. I prefer them to javelins because, though their range is shorter, their strength is higher. When I hit I want to wound. And hit I do. All 5 hit the Warp Lightning cannon. Only 1 wound sticks....but that, combined with the Flickering Fire, is enough to get rid of the Warp Lightning Cannon. I do a happy dance.

On the right my shooting is equally good as I hit the Jezzails 4 times, do 2 wounds and he flees. Lots of shooting I will NOT be facing in turn one. I do not even care when the H-cannon scatters wide of anyone.

We both agree this was a tremendously successful turn for me.

Skaven Turn 1
His doom wheel careens towards me a whopping 14". Feeling jealous, the HPA manages a 13" move which crashes into my Marauder Horsemen. Some Storm Vermin come along for fun.

Queek charges my Marauder Horsemen. I am about 4" from him. I can flee, be within range of my BSB, recover and shoot next turn. For one of the few times I can recall, instead of standing, I flee. And my plan falls apart when I flee 7", he charges 11". Oops.

Oh, well, they cost 71 points, they got rid of his deadly 90 point Warp Fire Cannon. I will take that trade. And now Queek is where I want him...not charging me.

His Weapon team with the giant propeller tries to charge the Shaggoth. I am not familiar with that weapon...I thought it was another shooter, but I guess it would have done massive damage. Failed charge is good for me. the jezzails rally. He makes a general advance, time for magic.

He tries wither. I dither about it for a while, counting and recounting his power dice and my dispel dice. With a Dispel Scroll in my back pocket, I stop it.

He attempts Cracks Call...doubles! Miscast! I use Infernal Puppet to modify it to a dimensional cascade, his level 4 disappears, and to add insult to injury...I dispel the spell.

His doomwheel then mis-fires and rolls 15". That takes it off the table. We cannot find rule and decide to make it same as pursuing off table. He is having horrific luck so far...though the 14", 13" and 15" moves on 3d6 kind of tell you he is rolling high...just at the wrong times.

So as you can tell, we were uncertain about one rule. I was dead wrong about another. I had in the back of my head you could not shoot on the turn you garrison a building. You can. His Globadiers unleashed on my Dragon-riding Wizard. Fortunately, of his 13 globes, only 1 wound got through, and that to my Dragon. But it was an unexpected, terrifying wound.

My T6 meant nothing, the ward on my rider was pointless. His globes could put me down with ease.

In close combat, his HPA impact kills 1 Marauder Horsemen, his Assassin another, then he rolls Avalanche of fists, gets 12 hits, 9 actually hit (needing 4s), 6 wound, bye-bye all my fast cavalry in one turn. He is actually winning at this point, 142 points to 90.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 2

I have lots of choices. I am the Warriors of Chaos...there is really only one answer. Charge! This turn I remember to test leadership for my cannon. He fails. And rampages....3". Triple ones. I roll an unbelievable number of those.

I also manage just 3 power dice.I channel another.

As I charge, he chooses to flee with his weapon teams. My Knights fly through and redirect onto his storm vermin. I combo-charge his Queek unit and am uncertain what to do with the dragon. I had declared a charge on that unit, but by choosing a different order kept him out of the combat, I should have flown him away from the globes. I erred.

I get Infernal off with irresistible on the Globadiers. I again roll 11 hits, this time at S8.; 9 Globadiers are no longer with us. I feel better.

My knights in his clan rats on the left do what Knights do, he dies in droves, though he does kill one Knight. He flees, I chase. He runs 6", I chase....5". Grr.

My other Knights and Chaos Warriors also do well. I challenge with my unit champ; Queek fails to kill him when I parry save, everyone else dies, Queek flees, I pursue, and a feared model is no longer with us.

At this point I am feeling pretty good. He is down his general, his BSB, rats are fleeing, and I control the center of the field.

Then again, he still has the Plague Furnace, Doom Wheel, and HPA...all of which I struggle to wound.

Skaven turn 2

I knew I had given my flank with the Chaos Warriors. I hoped to run further. Then again...with a 3+ armors, 5+ ward, I should last a while. I just want to keep his Furnace busy while I wipe out everything else.

His fleeing rats leave the table, the Furnace charges into the Warriors, slaves combo charge me, the Doomwheel moves a more modest amount.

He gets a big number for Withering on the Warriors. I do not dare chance it, I burn my scroll. He then mis-casts with the seer thanks to Pandemonium, I modify it to reduce levels, he is now a level 0. Magic is ruling for me.

The Doomwheel fires and I lose a Chaos Warrior. Well, that is not a terrible outcome. It could have been much worse. For two turns I have lost just one Chaos Warrior total to his Doomwheel.

Well, he gets 6 Impact hits, 5 wound, and my vaunted armor save/ward save combo saves....zero. Zip. Nada.

*Sigh*. I finally get saves...good saves...and whiff on them all. Then his shroud attack wounds 6 more, this time I save....1. 10 Warriors down before I have lifted a weapon.

But the Warriors step up to the plate. I kill 8 of his slaves. None of his plague monks. His slaves get 1 wound through, but this time I save it. then his wrecker ball of doom gets 10 S5 hits off, 7 of them wound, and I save just 3.

Well now. I had 21 Warriors about 30 seconds ago. Now I have 3. That 3+/5+ combo is not so good, is it then?

My BSB being right there lets me stay, being stubborn and all. So, uh...some good news, I guess.

Meanwhile, he had also charged my knights with his rats. I allocate one attack to his unit champ, kill it. Then I do 8 more wounds. The horses kill 4 more. His 20 attacks hit 13 times, wound 7, and I save 5. So yeah...3 knights dead already. Out of 5. He flees, I overrun.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 3
I had about as good of turn one as could be believed, beginning to end. Then his plague furnace and clan rats turned it around. I have a badly damaged unit of knights, an all but dead unit of warriors...who I had counted on holding him up for three or four turns...I was reeling.

It gets even worse when the H-cannon fails his test again and pounds forward about 6". I just have not had good success with that thing.

My Knights, being frenzied, and my Warriors, being dead, combined to now give me a path to attack his Plague Furnace. I had really mixed emotions about this. The furnace is unbreakable, does massive casualties throughout combat, and I have no faith in my ability to take it down no matter how much I throw at it.

Ah, smurf...charge. In go the knights. Shaggoth flanks the slaves. Chaos Warriors flank the slaves. They are going down. The dragon rider charges his last globadier. Might as well.

I remember to roll Wulfrik and his 47 marauders on, they come behind his recovered jezzails.

I roll 3 for power dice again. I whiff on Infernal. I cast Purple Sun towards his Doomwheel but it falls short by 24". Well...it was a long shot, but I had little else to do.

My Sorcerer lord takes care of business and the Globadier heads for the bone pile.

His shroud attack does what it does...kills 2 knights, a chaos warrior and a slave. My BSB kills the Seer on the bell. I am happy.

The knights do 7 wounds. The Chaos Warriors, with little left to attack, swing at the Furnace and manage a wound. Those facing the slaves then kill 4. His Plague monks manage 7 wounds and this time my armor works great, saving 6 of them and my ward the 7th.

The furnace then whacks the warriors thrice, I save none, many more dead.

His slaves explode, killing one of the fresh block of warriors and 2 plague monks.

Skaven turn 3
He charges the Shaggoth with some warlord guy. His clan rats charge the H-cannon. His HPA slams into my general on a dragon. And then his feared shooting phase opens up.

His doomwheel is out of range, but the jezzails kill a Chaos Warrior. then his weapons teams with the templates each kill 9 Marauders. 18 guys killed in a heartbeat. *GULP*

I am really not liking this right now. His bell could kill my knights, warriors, and other warriors on its own. A 2 or 300 point model is tying up well over 1000. His 230ish point A-bomb is something I expect to kill my 700 point Dragon/Wizard in a couple of turns. I am unsure how the rats/cannon combat will go. And I have nothing left to deal with his doomwheel. I cannot withstand another turn of that lethal shooting with my Marauders.

On the other hand, I have a clear lead at this point. I have the situations I try to set up; I have vastly more force involved in 2 of the 3 combats from a points standpoint. I have an unbreakable unit hopefully holding up another unit for a while. And I have a clear magic advantage.

Close combat is a little better. His assassin and clan rats cannot wound the h-cannon. The cannon kills a couple rats.

His HPA only gets 2 impact hits, 1 wounds, and I ward save that. The Talisman of Preservation/mark of tzeentch combination to give me a 3+ ward is going to be HUGE. I get a wound through with my wizard, even though I get just 1 hit. Wow.

He then gets the flailing fist result, and rolls a whopping 13 attacks. 5 wound....and I ward save all of them. The Dragon hits all 6 times, 4 of them wound, he regenerates two. In just one turn I put 3 wounds on him. I start to feel hope.

The plague furnace kills another knight and warrior with its shroud attack. His Warlord wounds the Shaggoth 3 times, but I somehow save 2. Saves aplenty.

My BSB then wounds the Furnace 2 more times, the knights kill 11 plague monks, my Chaos Warriors kill the last 4 0plague monks, the Shaggoth wounds the Bell, and then I thunderstomp his warlord, but he saves one of the two wounds. The Furnace then hits the big block of warriors 8 times, I take 6 wounds and save just 3.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 4

I move my Sorcerer on disc towards the HPA. I have a vague idea of using the flaming attack on the HPA to stop the regeneration.

My Marauders charge the jezzails who flee but are over-run and I hit his rat ogre thing which dies easily.

I then get Infernal off with irresistible. I do 10 S10 hits. I wound him 9 times. This will be it for the HPA...until he regens 7 of them! He still has 1 wound left. I just...can...not...kill...that...stupid...thing.

The great part is I modify the mis-cast to a 7. He is hit by the template. He is wounded by the template. Do I even need to mention he regenerates it? Stupid unbreakable, unkillable beast.

Meanwhile, the H-cannon decides to get rid of his annoying assassin but can only wound it once, losing a crewman in return.

The Sorcerer then wounds the HPA twice and...wonder of wonders...IT DIES! YES! Victory is mine! There is n stopping me now. It is gone and...what? He rolled a 6? It comes back...with 2 wounds...an inch away and ready to get more impact hits since he gets next turn...NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

There is no stopping that stupid thing.

The bell wounds my Shaggoth. He has no plague monks left. My BSB wounds the Bell twice and the Knights finish it off. Shaggy kills his warlord.

Take that, Skaven rats!

Skaven turn 4

Skaven turn 4
The HPA charges back at my wizard on the dragon. His Doomwheel kills the last Chaos Warrior of my big block with its shooting.

I save his only impact hit. I which at him. He gets the "Avalanche of flesh" attack. Does the HPA ever do a reasonable number of attacks? I fail the I roll but ward it. He hits 7 more times, 6 of which wound, 5 of which I save. The Dragon then puts him down again, doing the 2 necessary wounds.

And he...comes back. As Rat Swarms, this time. Much better.

His Assassin kills another crewman. The Cannon kills the assassin.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 5

Okay, at this point I am feeling pretty good. His doom wheel is not as tough as the Furnace, which I took down. Sure, I had to use 10 knights, an exalted hero, a shaggoth, some magic, and 31 Chaos Warriors...but I took it down.

I mean, sure, I was throwing as many as 23 S5, 49 S4, and 5 S8 attacks at it for multiple turns...but I took it down. Sure, I lost over 20 chaos warriors and a handful of knights...but I took it down. Sure, I....ah, smurf, who am I kidding. I am not confident in my ability to take down the Doomwheel in the next 2 turns.

At the same time...he cannot do near enough damage. I have wiped out almost his entire army.

The Dragon decided to leave the swarms for the knights, flew over them at his weapon team...which fled. I redirected onto his clan rats. The Knights charge the swarm.

And here comes the whiff factor. The BSB puts 4 wounds on the swarms...but the knights under perform. Completely. Four wounds. Wow, really? Fortunately, the horses do just as much, 4 more wounds, the swarm melts.

The cannon kills another storm vermin after he saves half the wounds.

Now we will see what a Chaos Sorcerer on a Chaos Dragon can do against ranked up Clan Rats. This is the type of situation I typically avoid...I like to combo charge and bring overwhelming force. I do not like things that might be close combats or risking 695 point models without being pretty sure I have the advantage.

However, the game kind of got out of hand a bit. He has done a lot of damage, but it has been spread out. So he has very few points at this juncture. So even if I get hammered, it makes it arguably a better game...and if not, it does not really matter a lot.

Well, all three of the Wizards attacks kill. He strikes before the dragon, but only wounds 1 time, which I duly save. Then the Dragon kills 5 with his breath, 3 with base attacks and 4 with his thunderstomp.

Totally epic. I did a whopping 14 casualties in one round...he cannot stand, I pursue off table, his non-fleeing weapon team breaks. I am duly impressed by the power of the dragon.

Skaven Turn 5
He fails to rally anything, his weapon teams flee off the field.

Shooting will be bad; Shaggy is the closest to his doomwheel, and is immune to the effects,. He tries to restrain. Fails. He fires...or rather, mis-fires. He takes 6 S6 hits. His doomwheel blows itself up.

His last weapon team mis-fires...blows up.

He does manage to put a wound on the H-cannon, though, so at least that went right.

Warriors of Chaos Turn 6
My Knights, being frenzied, must charge. The Scree slope forces dangerous terrain tests. My BSB duly rolls a 1, I do not ward save it. The others all pass.

He kills a Storm Vermin, in a challenge my champ kills his, my other knights kill 2 more, he kill the last Chaos Dwarf, then the cannon kills 4 more. He breaks, runs, flees table.

Skaven Turn 6

Conclusion
Well then. On the one hand, I am really not fond of tabling my opponent. On the other hand, I think Kev takes it better than anyone. And he thought it was an enjoyable game, so I am not going to dwell on that aspect too much.

What went right?

Well, first off, my plan worked beautifully. His force ended up being split into distinct elements whereas mine was almost all centered and working in concert. As a result, I had 2-1/2 - 1 points advantages at almost every point of contact. This spread my casualties out very well to where I lost just three units despite taking dozens of casualties. Meanwhile, I got rid of some dangerous guys without taking much damage. Queek, I am looking at you here.

Second, I played very well. I can count on one hand the number of mistakes I made: forgot to use the warshrine on turn 1 (minor, not really relevant), forgot to roll LD test for the Cannon on turn one and to roll for Wulfrik on turn 3. I was able to minimize his shooting which let me get into hand to hand before he could whittle me down to manageable sizes.

Third, I had a fair amount of good fortune with lots of irresistible without being harmed by mis-casts, whereas his mis-casts cost him his level 4 and level 2 wizards. I also made a pretty fair number of saves. Of course, that meant he had a lot of attempts to wound me...but that is kind of the point of playing an army based around good saves. To make them. I am often disappointed when I either do not get to attempt saves or fail abnormally large amounts. This game I made a lot of saves and I enjoy that.

Fourth, he had some timely very bad fortune...like his low impact hits, his weapons teams mis-firing on command and his being struck repeatedly by miscasts that were devastating.

Regardless, this was an extremely entertaining game. In retrospect, it was a demolition beginning to end...but for about 4 turns it felt like I was fighting uphill. We had epic, grinding combats that lasted multiple turns. We had crushing charges and stellar defenses.

One great moment was when I smurf-slapped his HPA with 10 S10 hits and laughingly said, "You only need to regen 7 to survive" only to see him do just that. What a great, memorable moment.

Or seeing said A-bomb come back with wounds once and then again as a swarm. It began to feel like I would never be rid of that thing. I just did not know how weak swarms are.

Which leads me to another point. I often point out that person x or y is a better player than I am. Part of that has to do with research.

I don't.

I cannot tell you how many times in the game I had to ask wounds, strength, abilities, etc. of the various Skaven rats. I had no idea they even had a close combat weapon team. As he pointed out, the team had a giant propeller blade...I just thought it was another gun of some sort.

I also had no comprehension of the sheer destructive power of the template guys who nearly wrecked my Marauder horde.

Yet some guys in the group know the 'enemy army" nearly as well as they know their own. This is a valuable skill as it allows you to dictate who you want to fight against who, and when you want them to do so.

Looking back, I should have had everyone attacking the Bell, not the Monks (or Furnace...I actually think it was a screaming bell, not a plague furnace...) from turn one. But thinking I could not touch it, I let it live much too long. Once I got around to attacking it, I killed it in relatively short order. Not knowing the Skaven book very well altered in-game decisions.

So studying the opponent is a valuable tool for improving play. Not knowing them is a handicap. Though not necessarily a game-breaking one. It just makes it a bit tougher.

Overall, this was a very, very entertaining game. I was on pins and needles for 4+ turns....which in a 4k game means for about 5 hours. Great game, great time, thanks for the match, Kev.

Only one thing left to do; Survivor group photo

Beastmen v. Tomb Kings

2011-04-26T23:10:00.000-07:00

Some of you may have been watching the slow but steady progress of my Beastmen army painting. Obviously my updating of it is a bit behind as I have completed a chariot, several heroes and the minotaur since then.

In fact, I have painted all the models I exchanged my once-well loved Wood Elf army for. So I was kind of wanting a game with them. My brother Ken came through, accepting a challenge for a Beastmen v. Tomb Kings battle.

It would be an epic battle between two of the lowest-regarded books currently.

Now, on the one hand this is advantageous for me. I have found a build for the Beastmen that looks like it would be both fun and effective. On the down side...I do not yet have the models to put it together.

On the other hand, there is a certain disadvantage. Back in 1995 I was unquestionably better at Warhammer than my brothers. Of course, back then I also had a lot of power gamer/waac type stuff in me. My Brettonian list involved a Lord character on dragon, a few archers, and the rest Grail Knights. It was all but untouchable in that edition and pretty stupid of me.

I would no longer argue I am the better player. In fact, if you had to pick one player in our group who I believe is currently the best, it would be Ken.

Part of that revolves around his list building. He mixes up his lists so well that I often have no idea what he will bring. This is not always true for the rest of us.

With me, for example, you know my WoC list will revolve around Knights. Everything else is just filler. Same with Liam's Bretonnians.

Kev's Skaven will always have the Plague Furnace, HPA, and Doomwheel with miscellaneous other stuff filling in around it.

Fullur will bring boatloads of skinks, some temple guard, slann, and a stegadon.

Ken does the best job of any of us of changing up his lists.

Then he deploys them well, maneuvers them with talent, and tends to maximize his advantages.

In short, any time I can win against him I figure I have done exceptionally well. In our group, I always feel I had to play well to come out on top. But with him I feel like I cannot make any mistakes and win. Which is good.

Well, anyway, I started to build a form of the list I am working towards building overall. But then something happened. I decided I really, really, really wanted to try a doombull. This already throws me off trail because it costs me that LD9 re-rollable big block I typically center my beastmen lists around.

So I decided to take it a step further. I went with a Gorebull as my bsb, costing myself another dip from LD8 to LD7.

Instead of multiple mobile blocks of Gor I horded 53, planting the Gorebull with Banner of the Beasts. To fill my core I upped my chariot plans from 0 to 3.

Going against prevailing wisdom I took a grand total of zero bestigor. I then fought prevailing wisdom by taking the vastly over-costed, nigh-defenseless Ghorgon. Then I followed up by taking 5 minotaur without doing the "plant a bunch of characters in there so the rank and file attack but do not get hit" mino-bus thing.

I had challenged him to a "soft" game between two low-ranked books. I felt like this was in the spirit of that. I "only" took 2 bray-shamans and a great bray-shaman instead of the 5 or 6ish I initially planned. I did come with a plan, though.

I expected him to take the special character who gave his entire army poison and figured to be facing blocks of skeleton archers hitting on 5s, doing wounds on 6s against my unarmored, no-save guys. So I was going to be flying towards him, hoping to get into combat on turn two as many people claim they unfailingly manage. With minimum 7" moves, this seemed possible.

The big Gor block should be steadfast for quite a while, so re-rolling on LD7 and tying up his expected Tomb Guard and/or Skeleton blocks. Meanwhile, my Chariots and Minotaur would sweep up the flanks close by, charging in to benefit from their impact hits to do some real damage.

It was really the Doombull and minotaur I was centering my battle plan around. Much like the Wood Elf Wardancers, Dragon Ogre Shaggoth, Galrauch, and the Chaos Knights I had mighty expectations for them.

We rolled up Battle for the Pass, a scenario I had yet to play. With no less than three @#$%^ mysterious forests hanging out, I had to think about my plan. I decided to put the massive Gor block in the center. My BSB would go here, and by turn 2 everyone would be within range of the banner. My three chariots went on my left, my Ghorgon and minos on the right.

As we set up, I began to see the first flaw in my plan. He had a couple chariot units. A casket. Not one guy on foot in unit form. Gulp. No stomp/thunderstomp for me. Already the Wardancer debut loomed in my head for the minos and the Shaggoth for the less-anticipated Ghorgon debut.

He set up one chariot unit on each flank and, wonder of wonders, had no hill in his deployment zone for his casket. I caught a break.

Beastmen Turn 1

I marched my gor forward, then made mistake one. Remember, the whole plan was to get everyone close to the banner. That means the Chariots should have circled behind the Gor. Instead I...moved them forward.

I then rolled snake-eyes for magic. With the Herdstone and a couple channels from the Arcane Ruins I got up to 5 or 6 magic dice. No point to any spell at this point so it did not really hurt me.

Tomb King 1

He has no ability to march. Still, he advances full speed. magic phase, I let him move everything forward since I want us in close combat ASAP. I try to stop his bowfire via magic but take a wound to a mino anyway.

Beastmen 2

I realize I had erred in turn one so turn my chariots to get close to the banner, then twitch the minos over to get in range. This turn probably should have been full advance, but I took the time to correct for my turn 1 error. Also, if he did full advance, then I stopped his magic I could charge in with my minos, get some nice impact hits and brutalize him.

I then miasma his chariots on my left flank, dropping their movement by 3. I want them out of the battle. I get Wyssans wildform on teh gor just in case he gets into them with Ushabti or Bone Giants. He then uses some TK item to auto-stop my pit of shades on his left side chariots.

Tomb King 2

He moves his chariots forward to where my minos will charge next turn. I have been saving my Dispel scroll for this turn. I am going to stop his charge so I get the charge and the impact hits.

Then I misunderstand his magic phase. I think I have to stop 8 attempts at the movement spell. After I stop the first, I think there are still 6 to go (notice the addition issue there) and, figuring I cannot stop them all, decide to try to stop the bonus attack and/or Casket.

So now his chariots boosted by a couple heroes slam into my minos. I then fluff my dispel roll and he gets the bonus attack. His Tomb King? Prince? wounds the mino champ, the other guys put 2 wounds on the rank and file. I have lost a mino already.

Meanwhile, on the other flank he gets off a few potshots at my chariots, wounding one.

His chariots are fierce, slapping down 13(!) impact hits, doing 8 wounds and killing the rest of my rank and file. In the obligatory challenge, his TK kills my mino champ.

So...yeah. Unlike the legendary fluffed Wardancer epic debut charge of failure, more like the Shaggoth debut of disappointment...all 5 minotaur died without ever getting to swing.

We later talked about it quite a bit and decided I should have taken the challenge with my Doombull, thus guaranteeing the champ could attack and my Doombull probably kills his TK. But my thought process was the Doombull's massive number of attacks should wreak havoc on his chariots.

He did. He hit 8 times, wounding 5, he saves none. He then wounds me back once which I save. I have the stubborn hat and BSB. I pass exactly on my LD8.

Great, epic charge. That is the type of charge I love. And he executed it perfectly, outplaying me badly and doing incredible quantities of damage.

Then again...the Doombull brutalized him right back, really doing a number on his poor chariots. So great, great combat.

Honestly, at this point I was thinking I was doomed. The Gor were there to withstand something like that chariot charge via re-rolls and steadfast, thus allowing the Minotaurs to sweep in and do damage. I had little faith in the Gor to do enough damage to make up for the 345 points just swept away.

Beastmen 3

My Ghorgon charged headlong into the front of his chariot line while my Gor flank him. My chariots irresolutely move back to pseudo-protect the Bray Shaman herdstone/Arcane Ruin magic park.

This will be the key turn. I need some big magic. Slap a Miasma or two on the chariots, a Wyssans and/or Okrans Mindrazor on the Gor and I can really do some work.

OR....I can roll snake-eyes for magic for the second time in the battle. then channel just 2, so I only have 6 magic dice for the key turn.

*sigh*

well, I start with an enfeebling foe with three dice, hoping to draw out his Dispel Scroll, then either wyssans or Mindrazor. Instead I get irresistible force, lose 2 levels and only accomplish reducing his S by 1. I then fail to get enough force for Wyssans. Epic fail.

Oh, the humanity. Wait, beastmen. Oh, the bestiality...wait a second...lets go back to the first. It was not a good moment for my morale.

This time I accept his challenge with my Doombull. He gets always strike first with some magic item, needs 4s, attacks 5 times and 4 of them hit. Then, needing 5s to wound, he wounds me 3 times. Needing a 5 to save, I save 1. I then hit him 5 times, wounding him back 3 times, he saves that same one.

The Ghorgon is more successful, with 5 hits, 3 wounds.

Then...the power of the Beast-Banner strengthened Gor.

Due to the length of his two ranks deep chariots, I get all 10 in contact. With the front row having frenzy from the Gorebull and extra hand weapon, that gave me a whopping 50 attacks; 30 from the front row, 10 from each of the next two. Slightly less/more as my Great Bray-Shaman and Gorebull replaced 2 of those.

Anyway, I hit 27 times and wound 13 times, he saves just 2. I end up winning even more epically than he did (by 19)! and he disappears to combat resolution. I follow just 7". Bad, bad position for me to be in.

Tomb King 3
His bone giant flank charges my Gor. His Ushabti rear charge them.

I try to dispel his bonus chariot move and fail to do so. They will be on my magic park next turn. Fortunately, he fails his charge this turn so moves only 4" extra.

I debate a long time about his righteous smiting ushabti attack on my gor. Ultimately, I make the single best decision I have made all game. I decide the point of a horde is to absorb casualties and still attack. I save my dice for the casket.

His Ushabti manage just one wound. I stop his giant from getting it when he rolls poorly, then stuff the casket again.

My Gorebull BSB makes way to face the Giant. I hit and wound 3 times. I am impressed. Everyone left is initiative 3 so will attack simultaneously.

The Gor hit the bone giant 4 times, but can muster just 1 wound which he saves. I hit the Ushabti 12 times, doing 4 wounds, of which he saves just 1.

The bone giant goes after the Gorebull. This was the chance I took. If he kills him, I will lose my LD re-roll. Fortunately, he whiffs all but one attack which fails to wound. The Ushabti do markedly better on my r&f gor, hitting 8 times and killing 7. He then stomps pretty good but the thunderstomp rolls just 1, so he kills just 4 more gor.

Still, he wins handily between his 11 wounds, charge, flank and rear. But I am steadfast and pass. I fail the reform roll by...well, bt the one point of LD difference between a Doombull and Beastlord.

At this point I have one chariot that will flank charge his Ushabti next turn. The other two will be moving to protect my two bray Shaman. That means he is likely to get 2 of my three chariots and the 2 bray-shaman in the next couple of turns.

Meanwhile, I need the Gor to hold off his Bone Giant long enough for the Ghorgon to sweep around the back and hit the Ushabti and the Doombull to go after his Bone Giant.

One bad roll kills by BSB and gives a good chance of my gor fleeing before that can happen. One good roll kills his Bone Giant and lets me concentrate on his Ushabti.

It is late, his kids want to watch The Sorcerers Apprentice, and this game has given us a great time.

He got off an epic charge. I got off an epic charge. I offer a draw. He accepts. I think it is a fitting end to this game.

He held an early advantage. I held a mid-game advantage. The dice could turn it into a massacre for either of us. I had a great time, I would just as soon reflect on it.

Reflections
Well, as usual for me, a unit I looked forward to rolling out was a huge disappointment. But this one was different.

With the Wardancers, I will never not believe I played them correctly. I softened their target, charged the right unit at the right time and fluffed the rolls, only to run into some very good rolls.

With the Shaggoth I simply experienced one of the problems of running into a shooting heavy army with a lightly armored model and died to shooting.

With the Chaos Knights, I played them correctly and they inflicted mass carnage.

With my highly anticipated Minotaurs I simply got out-played. He out-maneuvered me to get the charge, then I took the challenge with the wrong model and thus died bloodily and deservedly. this was not a unit fail. It was combo player fail and opponent superior play. Mostly it was his better use of magic, so I do not feel badly about their performance. I am simply not good enough to stop the plan he developed and executed.

Meanwhile, the herdstone park performed outstanding. As he commented at one point, "you rolled snake-eyes for magic and have 6 dice." Yep. And it mattered. I think slowing his chariots on the left flank for that one turn made a huge difference.I think having enough dice to at least ATTEMPT Wyssans on the key turn despite rolling snake-eyes was huge.

And the Gor with Beast banner...hitting the flank, rolling all those dice...oh, I LOVED that. Still think I would have been better served with units of 20 and 30 for assistance if we had rolled Blood and Glory or Watchtower.

But there is something about rolling 50 S4 attacks that is just plain awesome.

Overall, I am going to declare my initial foray with the Beastmen a smashing success. I enjoyed the game, it was much more involved than sometimes I get with my Warriors of Chaos, and every turn except the first brought excitement.

Thanks too, to Fixed Dice for a most entertaining game.

On a completely unrelated note...Fullur, you should come to painting Friday. Come early. We will go by Performance Bike. Let you try riding a...well, different type of bike. I see why you drive to work. You should try it on a more comfortable bike.

All fear the Beastmen!

List Building: A Matter of Blocks

2011-04-07T21:54:00.000-07:00

There was a faint possibility I might be able to catch a game against fellow Starving Crazed Weasel Kev on Thursday night. However, we had not previously discussed the PRECISE size of the game.

So I went way back in the time machine to when we first re-started Warhammer.

For the first few games I would painstakingly construct 3x5 index cards for each unit with their stat lines, equipment, etc. On each card I would highlight stuff that might need to be remembered such as armor saves, weapons conferring Always Strikes Last, any magical banners or items and so forth, thus allowing me to tell at a glance where things stood.

The original plan was to keep these in a file so that at the drop of a hat I could construct an army just by pulling out the appropriate cards.

Unfortunately, soon after this the army books changed from Hordes of Chaos to Warriors of Chaos, my unit sizes kept switching and I got confused as to which ones were up to date and which were hold-overs from the Battle for Skull Pass rules versus actually using the appropriate army books.

Now that the composition rules have changed, I am giving serious consideration to attempting the modular build system again.

Basically it would revolve around making cards for the commonly taken units I make.

Example;
12 Chaos Warriors with Hand Weapon, shield, full command, mark of tzeentch.
5 chaos knights with full command, mark of nurgle, banner of rage
5 chaos knights with full command, mark of khorne, war banner
50 Chaos Marauders with full command, great weapons, mark of khorne
5 Chaos Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes, musician, light armor.
Exalted Champion on chaos steed, mark of nurgle, banner of chaos
Level 2 w.Dispel scroll
Level 2 w/tzeentch, puppet, steed
Level 4 w/tzeentch

I use these often enough that I would be able to build a list in 5 minutes.

"Want to play 1600?"
"Sure." Hasty calculation tells me I need 400 points of core. Either the Chaos Warriors and 2 Marauder Horsemen units or the Marauder horde and 2 Horsemen would work...so would a larger block of Warriors (with or without the Horsemen).

Then drop in the ever-present Knights (and soon returning Shaggoth and Dragon Ogres) and I have my list built.

Want to play 2400? No problem. 600 points of core is easily filled by the Marauder Horse, Marauder Horde and one Chaos Warrior blocks. Now I can "modular up" my Knights to a unit of 10 and unit of 5 and I am almost there.

In short, if I sit down for just one evening and put in the work I could easily have in place a modular army building system that, with but minor tweaks could assemble an army of virtually any size in moments.

Of course, in the case of the Warriors, that is largely true because of my familiarity.

But the system would be easily converted to some of my more seldom played forces. Say I decided to play the dwarfs. I probably should since they fit me so well. Slow moving, portly, constantly grumbling...I think I might just be a really tall Dwarf.

Anyway, instead of having locked in units like I do with WoC, I might more have slots such as this:
"Full command:x points"
"Option for Great Weapon: +x points/model"
"Option for Hand Weapon /Shield: +x points/model"
Base cost: x points/model"

Now, the observant among us will point out "Isn't that pretty much what the army book does?"

First off...shut up.

Second...yes and no. In this case, by having the 3x5 index card with appropriate things highlighted (as:4+) and knowing I need x points of core, I can simply grab the card, throw it on the table and not have to write out all their stats/important things. A scratch paper lets me fiddle with the points and meanwhile I will save time by not having to look at units I never take such as Quarrelers, Slayers, etc.

But realistically, I would be trying to build them in ROUGHLY 250 point blocks. This makes the 25% thing pretty easy to manipulate.

So take a unit such as Thunderers. I routinely give them shields and a musician (and recently even standards). I also tend to take them in 10-man units due to frontage plans. Throw down an index card for that and I am well on my way to being ready to fill my core.

Do the same thing with blocks of 20, 25 and 30 Warriors and I am set.

Also, since my character builds tend to be pretty similar, I could have them pre-made and ready to go.

It would not take much time to make these lists for the High Elf and Orc and Goblin armies, either. In just an evening I could make the index cards.

This would allow me to play virtually any army at virtually any size in 5 or 10 minutes without ever picking up the army book.

A little bit of prep work would thus result in a LOT of enhanced play enjoyment.

The sad part is...I suspect a person who knew how to work Excel could probably make this up so even the cards would be extraneous. I suspect a person using them solely for their own use (or possibly their small gaming group) would not run afoul of the notorious G-W legal beagles for any copyright issues.

But that person is not me. So for now, modular, pointed, highlighted index cards seem like a wise way to go.

Check out this battle about half way down for a couple glimpses of the index cards in action

High Elf Versus Brettonians, Blood and Glory

2011-03-19T23:21:00.000-07:00

Liam and I set up a game at 2900 points. Why 2900 you ask?

I looked at the models I had and started there. 10 Swordmasters. 17 White Lions. 5 Dragon Princes plus I could use 5 Silver helms as unit filler. 2 Repeater bolt Throwers.

Throw in some Wizards with various items to ensure a big magic phase. Figure out I needed 475 points in HERO level characters.

Decided to try the horde of Lothern Sea Guard. Had I remembered I had a chariot...that would have appeared as well.

Check out the spears poking through from the second rank. Good times.

Anyway, we rolled the scenario and three consecutive times came up with meeting engagement. That has been Liam's last two games and one of those was with me so we re-rolled until we got something different. Ended up being Blood and Glory.

I had a BSB, banners in the Swordmasters, White Lions and Sea Guard so I was in good shape with 6 points there. He had a whopping 11 banners. Unlikely to win via scenario rules...I would need points.

I knew he had double trebuchets. One of the reasons I seldom play High elfs is because they do not really suit my play style. I try to keep my casualties low, make sure the troops engaged have the capability of doing something and are therefore worth taking.

Against S5 templates I have no save and am wounded on twos. Horrible, horrible match up. On the bright side, I do have two units with either S5 or S6 so his 1 or 2+ armor saves can be hit by those, plus the RBTs will theoretically allow no armor save because I plan to penetrate ranks after I take out his Trebuchets.

Well, I set up the White Lions in a forest to my left. It was a mysterious Forest, but I thought I would play against type and not treat it as impassable terrain as I usually do.

On the other side of the forest I planted my LSG unit (and later all my characters went in this unit) with another Mysterious Forest to the right and the Dragon princes angled to flank anyone who hit the LSG in the front.

Above this set-up were my small block of 12 Archers, then one RBT on the ground to the right of the second Mysterious Forest, another on a building with Swordmasters there to protect it.

This was a badly flawed set-up. I was thinking the RBT had S10 when they single-shot. Their assigned task was to take out his Trebuchets. The Swordmasters I set up hidden by the building, but I faced them wrong so they would take two turns to threaten any upcoming unit.

I would have been better off putting a RBT to either side of the LSG and concentrating on the Knights. Not knowing my own stats is inexcusable.

HE Turn 1

I march the White Lions on the left. Cannot remember the Mysterious result but it ended up having no effect.I make a lesser advance with the archers. Across the field I am looking at Knights flanked by Knights flanked by Knights...so...yeah.

Time for Magic. I get max dice. Throne succeeds. I then put Flesh to Stone and one Wyssans on the LSG. He dispels the second Wyssan. So here you see my battle plan. Now I have as many as 50 S4 attacks with re-roll to hit and T6.

Even charging Knights are only wounding on a 4. Now I have a tough, rugged army.

Of my 35 shots 5 wounded...a little low, I should have wounded with about 9. He then proceeded to save all of them but one. So about one wound light by math.

My RBTs targeted his Pegasus Knights because it was at this point I figured out the lower S thing. The first one missed, the second saw its hit discarded by the Enchanted shield.

The theme begins.

Brettonian Turn 1

His Pegasus Knights and hero fly towards my RBT on top of the building. I am not worried...I am on a building, so untouchable by fliers.

Well...actually not. Turns out I invented that rule in my own head. For some reason I was thinking Cavalry, fliers, and monsters could not attack garrisons. I was wrong. Not knowing the rules is not good.

Anyhow, he maxes out on Magic dice as well. He dispels Throne and Flesh to Stone.

Now, the clever reader instantly says Rules Error. Flesh to Stone is an Augment spell that lasts until the casters next magic phase. If it is successful it cannot be dispelled, stopped, removed, etc.

Now...I built this army specifically around having these Augments on my units. I know he will probably get all the charges based on his superior movement. No big deal...I took Okrams Mind Razor with one Wizard along with Wand of jet.

On the key turn I will be using the Power Stone, Wand of Jet, and power Scroll hiding out on my wizards to have him facing a S8/T 6 or 7 Always Strikes First mass attack unit.

And now, by not knowing my own rules, I changed my entire strategy.

Not once in the entire battle did I A) use the aforementioned magic items, B)remember to use the Lore of Life attribute or C) use the strategy I built the army around.

Anyhow, I block his Iceshard and Comet, in both cases only tying him because the High Elf Archmage adds +1 to Dispel.

The first Trebuchet scatters. So far, so good.

The second one kills 18 of 21 possible LSG when it hits.

T4 not as good as T6. Instead of wounding on 5s he was wounding on 3s.

His peasants then kill 5 of my small archer unit.

HE Turn 2

Again my White Lions march on the left. Next turn they can charge the trebuchet on that flank.

This time he dispels Throne, I get Wyssans off and I then Miscast with Flesh to Stone, putting a wound on each of my Wizards and losing the rest of my power dice.

He is moving a big block of Peasants up towards my second RBT so I weirdly break my own rule of concentrating fire and unleash everything...RBTs, LSG, at them. The RBTs kill 4 and the LSG kill 6.

The RBT never hit again in the entire battle.

On the bright side, the remaining 7 archers put a whopping 5 wounds on the Questing Knights and he only saves 4.

Brettonian Turn 2

His Pegasus Knights charge my RBT on the building. His Pegasus Hero charges the other one. Everyone else...knights, the peasant horde...advance on the LSG.

Magic all gets shafted. he again dispels Wyssans. Both Trebuchets hit, though one partially scattered. I lose another 15 LSG this turn. I have now lost 33 of them to two turns of shooting.

His peasant bowmen shoot down 6 more of the small archer unit, leaving just one who stands.

I wound the Pegasus hero once in a minor upset, he kills a crewman. I pass my test.

On the building I wound him TWICE, but he saves the first with armor and ward saves the second. But he whiffs. Drawn combat. Go-go gadget garrison!

HE TURN 3

He dispels most things, I get regrow off, put back three LSG.

The White Lions charge....the peasants. Why? Why? Why?

The Trebuchet is RIGHT THERE. It is the correct target.

Another play error. I really erred time and again in this game.

Well, the White Lions did what high WS, S models with re-rolls do and slew 9 peasant bowmen. They do none in return and break. His Treb fails LD test so will not shoot for a turn. I fail LD test to combat reform and chase the Peasants but do not catch them.

Brettonian Turn 3

He announces charges on my LSG with Grail Knights and...knights Errant? Knights of the Realm? I stand and shoot his Grail unit, wounding twice but he saves them both. He then fails both charges. His other knight unit charges my lone archer and I elect to flee. I do not want him overrunning into my LSG.

His magic is good, getting the Comet off irresistibly.

High Elf Turn 4

The unit that charged the lone archer presents its rear to my White Lions who charge it. The lone archer...rolls insane courage. Worst possible result for me.

He is now blocking my Dragon princes who, instead of charging, are now trapped behind ONE model.

Tired of playing poorly, I elect to play unbelievably badly. The idea is with the BSB and Crown of Command, I am Stubborn on a re-rollable 9. I am effectively unbreakable.

Yet for some inexplicable reason I break off my wizards and run them into the nearby Mysterious Forest. Oh, by the way...the Crown of Command was on my Archmage, not my BSB. So now my unit is not stubborn.

My shooting and magic all fail. Now my non-stubborn unit is facing 20+ S6 attacks with T3 and no Stubborn. I am probably going to need Insane Courage to stick around.

On the bright side, the White Lions kill 4 knights plus their champ, forcing him to flee and I pursue.

Brettonian Turn 4

This time his Grail Knights make the charge. He rallies everyone else.

And then the Comet hits. And r9olls 9". All my Wizards are now individual units and three consecutive times he rolls 13 hits. 3 dead wizards.

He then kills his Pegasus Hero (which had wiped out my RBT)kills 6 Grail Knights and 6 LSG. I will take the LSG/Grail Trade...

Which frees up his Trebuchets to kill 7 Swordmasters.

In the challenge his one guy kills my champ, I wound his character 5 times, he saves them all. Nobody runs.

High Elf 5

The solo archer has to get out of the way of my Dragon Princes, so he suicide charges the freshly rallied Knights as the White Lions, thinking I need to get that banner, rear-charge the unit next to them. The Dragon Princes then flank his Grail Knight/Champ.

My Dragon princes lay waste to his Grail Knight. My LSG do wound his hero 5 times, but he saves them all. Still, he breaks, I run him down.

The archer, to the surprise of nobody, dies, but the White Lions wound his Knights Errant 10 times, killing 6 of them. He kills 3 back, breaks, I run him down as well.

Bretonnian Turn 5

He begins a strategic retreat. We debated calling it, but a hasty points calculation discovered I was ahead. He would need to do lots of damage with his Trebuchets so we played it out.

12 White Lions die to Trebuchet.

High Elf 6

I do flank charge him with my Swordmasters on his peasants. He can treb me to death anyway with just 3 left. I actually win the combat, he has to test on a 6...and that is what he rolls.

Brettonian Turn 6

His Pegasus Knights charge my Swordmasters, I do a wound or so, he kills them all.

His trebuchets cannot finish off my LSG, leaving like 2...but I fail my re-rollable 9 LD test. I roll a 5, am about 5-1/8" from table edge but declare them off anyway and he gets the win via scenario rules.

Retrospect
Honestly, at this point I was pretty disgusted with the High Elf army. I built the army around Augment spells but at this point was thinking...they would never be in effect when they mattered. People would just dispel them on their turn.

Furthermore, all the shooting was very ineffective. Yes, I had 35 shots at first but just did one wound. S3 is still S3 and against armored troops with a back-up ward, that does nothing.

But after thinking about it...oh, how wrong I was. I had all the tools to not just win that game but win it handily.

With better set-up I would have gotten the Dragon Princes and Swordmasters into multiple combats. My LSG would have had 25 or 30 guys around between taking fewer wounds and using the Life attribute. My Wizards would have been alive. I would likely have had S9 on the key turn by using the tools I built into the army.

Furthermore, the shooting was much more effective than I gave it credit for. I just failed to focus my shots and it was my tactical errors that reduced the effectiveness of the shooting.

He outplayed me in set-up, in knowledge of key rules, and garnered a well-deserved victory.

And it was the best kind of game; enjoyable throughout and led to me rethinking a couple of things. Playing different armies is good...

Reflecting on High Elf versus Brettonia

2011-03-15T22:07:00.000-07:00

Saturday I had a fun game against Liam. I was using the High Elf army again against his Brettonians. Worked on the battle report last night but was having some issues with the Picasa-blog interface, so that report has been delayed a couple days.

Meanwhile, a few observations from the game.

When I built my list, it was done in my standard style. I love Knights so took a unit and, in light of my habit of failing or not even getting ridiculously large numbers of saves, I decided to take 10. I also mounted my BSB, planning to put him in that unit so they could lose a guy and still have a rank bonus.

That is one thing that makes a huge difference. When a lance of 10ish Brettonian Knights loses a model it loses little to nothing in terms of effectiveness. No single casualty ever cost him a rank bonus.

But when my beloved Chaos Knight 5 man units lose a model, they lose 20% effectiveness. 5 man units are simply too small when facing things like double trebuchets, 50 man Repeater Crossbow hordes, Jezzails, Engines of the gods, Waywatchers, etc.

Sure, there might be just one or two wounds suffered in crossing the field...but that is 20 - 40% effectiveness lost.

Liam took 2 I believe 2 casualties to his Grail Knights before getting them into combat. I think that cost him 1 attack and maybe a rank bonus?

He did take about 4 wounds to his knights total in crossing the board...but I made the same mistake I have benefited from others making, spreading my fire across units so I reduced the effectiveness of none of them.

So first off, units need to be bigger for WoC to deal with the loss of effectiveness. Second, I need to concentrate my fire.

I also took 10 Swordmasters...all I have painted...and 17 White Lions with a champ giving the unit magic attacks...all I have painted. I also took two Repeater Bolt Throwers.

It is an "all-comers" list...I need to be able to deal with Lizardmen, Ogre Kingdoms, Skaven, Empire, Dark Elfs, Wood Elfs, Brettonians, Tomb Kings, maybe even Vampire Counts or Orcs and Goblins.

So I put in some flaming and planned to use the Swordmasters and White Lions to deal with stuff like the Hydra, the Plague Furnace/Doomwheel/Abomination, etc...anything with high T.

The irony is I did not want to use the White Lions. 1 attack each just does not cut it.

After all this, I still had points I had to put into core units. There just are not any core units I really want to use since they are all pretty ineffective.

So I horded 50 Lothern Sea Guard, then spammed level 1 mages with Shadow and Beasts. The idea was to have the stubborn, re-rollable 9 LD Sea Guard blast everything in sight with 35 shots per turn, get into combat with some buffs from Wyssans Wildform and Life (my level 4) and then have the Dragon Princes and Swordmasters blast the flanks to build combat resolution.

So the list design is simple; 4 total wizards buffing the LSG and keeping it stubborn, everyone else to protect/atack the flanks. Oh, and the RBT to deal with hard to damage stuff.

During the game, however, several things went wrong.

First off, the amount of space 10 wide, 5 deep + 5 heroes takes up a LOT of space and when you roll large quantities of terrain...sometimes it is not possible to set up to protect the flanks with cavalry as forests might be in the way.

Second...if you pay the points for a mount...REMEMBER TO USE THE MOUNT. Instead I forgot the BSB had a horse and put him unmounted in the LSG.

Third...if you build your army around the idea of having a re-rollable stubborn horde unit full of buffs, make sure you can run that strategy and make sure your tactical decisions do not remove it.

Case in point; On the first turn, I buffed the unit with Wyssan and Flesh to stone. Thus when his dual Trebuchets went off, I would have good survivability; T6 troops survive much better than T3. But we made a rules error and let him dispel both buffs.

This was 7th edition thinking. They cannot be dispelled. They are not remains in play spells.

It changed my tactics in subsequent turns. Knowing I would never have the buffs on the unit when he shot or charged, I refocused my magic elsewhere and it became ineffective. So half of the strategy I built the army around was shot down immediately. And having launched 35 shots to do zero wounds...forgetting I had given the Ellyrian Longbow to my BSB and never using it in the game...I thought there was no way to touch the various Knight units he had.

It was also at this point I discovered the RBT did not have S10 as I was thinking. So instead of firing at his Trebuchets as I planned, I shot at his Pegasus Knight, only to see him have some 2+ shield that discounted the shot.

So my first turn saw a great deal of my strategy shot out of the water, partially through rules error and partially due to poor tactical decisions. I have mentioned others splitting their fire...I did the same thing all game long, cnging my mind as to what the target should be from turn to turn.

But the biggest error I made was not knowing what equipment was on what person and/or not using it at the right time.

Case in point 1) NEVER using the S5 bow.
Case in point 2) Never using the Wand of Jet, Power Stone or Power Scroll. I had the dice to use. But the plan was to use Mind Razor on the LSG when they got in combat, guaranteeing it through use of the Power scroll, to have the unit buffed with double Wyssans using the Wand of Jet and Power Stone to provide the extra magic dice punch, and use most of my magic dice for a key Stone to flesh/regrowth combo that would mean on the key turn when his Grail Knights charged in I would have S9, T6 troops striking first with a re-roll to hit.

But I changed magic focus knowing he would just dispel them the turn he charged because I did not know the rules, ended up never using any of those items, and then made a far, far worse error.

Case in point 3) Perhaps the most egregious mistake I made. Not knowing who had what item. I built the list around taking a charge from any and all comers with heavily buffed and, more importantly, STUBBORN with re-roll LSG.

This would let me side-smash him with my stronger units and I had no fear I would be running away. I was effectively unbreakable.

Until I forgot the Crown of Command was on my Level 4 Life Wizard, not on my BSB. So I fled my wizards out of the unit...I still am not sure why I did that....which removed the Crown of Command. And since the unit would have T3 against charging S5 and S6 knights...I was looking at losing 15 - 20 models. Insane Courage is rare.

Instead of rock hard anvil my ignorance of rules, lack of knowing who had what in my own army, and forgetting how the army was built turned it into a marshmallow.

Only his ill-timed Comet of Cassandra saved me from disaster.

I could have saved myself from the final disaster. After I wrecked his peasants, the correct move was to crush his trebuchet. Cutting his firepower in half was the single best thing I could do to help myself. Instead I saw the tempting target of his knight unit.

Now, on the one hand charging them was fun. It was destructive as my White Lions absolutely destroyed them. Arguably, it was a fine decision as it gained me a banner in the Death and Glory scenario.

Realistically, however, it was a poor decision. The dual trebuchets were chewing my LSG to pieces. If it broke I lost and since he started with ELEVEN banners, taking out a second banner did not help all that much.

Taking out a second trebuchet would have halved the damage my key unit was taking. I saw a shiny target that might make sense in a last man standing scenario but meant nothing in this one. They were a tempting, shiny soft target. But they were the wrong target.

I had assigned that unit the role of taking out the trebuchet. I had the chance of doing so. I chose a different target. Bad move.

All of this is just prelude explaining these things which will improve my army and play. In truth, after the first couple of games with the High Elfs I really was looking at them as an extremely sub-par list.

The truth is, I was hamstrung by sub-par list design and sub-par play. If I just correct the following things, that list actually can compete with a lot of things.

1) Know the rules.
Having a good plan can easily be invalidated if it is illegal or if it is legal but you forget a key rule that makes it effective.

2) Know your strategy.
Make your tactics fit in with your strategy.

3) Do not panic.
Bad tactical decisions can wreck good strategy.

4) Do not get distracted by unimportant side issues.

I had all the tools in place to compete with a pretty stout, tough Brettonian list. I just mis-used or did not use them at all.

Upcoming Tournaments

2011-03-12T20:21:00.000-08:00

So I have been doing some research. Lets all talk about who would be interested in which tournament.

1) $10.00 entry fee, 2500 points, Guardian Games, Portland Saturday, March 19th. No special characters, armies do NOT have to be fully painted

2) Entry fee is $25 dollar PURCHASE, Saturday, April 9th, at Borderland Games in Salem. Special Characters allowed, bonus points for thematic armies. Link has info on those, scenarios, and also bonus points for how the army is painted. Seems like somewhat more advanced tournament.

3) One we are unlikely to do, but linking to WoW seems nice. We would be late and leave early because of church. $10.00 entry, some VERY strict comp, small games, but very laid back.

Any interest in any of these or other tournaments if I find them? Which one(s) interest you and why? Should I keep looking them up?

Warhammer Tactica: How to rule with cavalry in 8th edition

2011-03-08T19:42:00.000-08:00

Cavalry was, in many ways, King in 7th edition. With superior movement, enhanced strength on the charge and little to no fear of being attacked in return, the only things cavalry feared were unbreakable units and flying monsters.

A typical cavalry battle included a furious charge, most or all of the opposing front rank being wiped out, and thus the opponent already losing the combat before their turn to strike ever arrived.

With the advent of 8th edition, the mindset changed. People dismissed cavalry as chaff, unworthy of being taken. After all, they no longer got to attack first due to charging, their advantage in charge distances diminished, and steadfast meant they can be…and are…drawn into multi-turn slugfests with steadfast infantry. They then can be taken out in wars of attrition.

People who dismiss cavalry out of hand are often simply stuck in 7th edition thinking. They are trying to use cavalry in the same role as it was used in that time frame and thus miss out on a great deal of the strength of cavalry.

Lets start with the movement. The swift stride rule still presents an advantage in charge difference for cavalry. To start with, a typical cavalry base Movement is roughly 3” greater than its foot-slogger counterpart.

Second, rolling 3d6 and choosing the best 2 will typically result in better movement than simply rolling 2d6 and accepting the result. The average result in charge distance for cavalry thus starts with two advantages and, occasional outliers due to atypical dice rolling aside, almost always going to result in more distance on the charge thus allowing them to project their force further.

Example: Take a typical infantryman, say an Empire Greatsword with M4 versus his cavalry counterpart. The battle line having been maintained, they both start 11” away from the enemy.

The infantry needs to roll a 7 on 2 dice, a fairly typical result most players “expect” to make. And they will about 58% of the time. Which means slightly more than 4 in 10 times they will fail.

The cavalry, however, has 3 dice to roll needing to total just 4” on any two to accomplish their charge. (Note that later I will argue the charge may not be a good idea anyway). Even without rolling 3 dice, they would have an 83% chance of accomplishing the charge, and that percentage is only improved by being able to roll 3 and discard 1.

Thus it is vastly easier for the cavalry to drive home the charge due to their better base movement and extra die. However, they are also more likely to be in the position to make the charge already.

Infantry moves over 40% slower, on average, than cavalry. The further they are moving, the larger the gap in range.

Example: The Empire marches their battle line forward for 2 consecutive turns, trying to get at the Dwarf battle line 36” away. The infantry moves 8” away, leaving them still 28” from the Dwarf lines. The cavalry, meanwhile, has advanced 28” which virtually assures them of being able to charge the enemy line now just 8” away.

Obviously there are times this will not be a good approach. Most times this will not be a good approach as unsupported cavalry not called Chaos Knights will have a difficult time taking out a stout infantry block.

But it is a powerful option. It also ensures cavalry has the means to set up flank charges for when the slower-moving infantry DOES get to the enemy battle lines.

Thus we clearly see the blatantly obvious; cavalry still has a massive mobility advantage over infantry.

The problem is, many people still attempted to use cavalry the way it was used in 7th. Get there first, charge in, wipe out the front rank, and expect to see the enemy run. But 8th edition infantry tends to A) stay in place due to being steadfast or else have something like the Crown of Command.

Furthermore, they still get to attack back. On the turn the cavalry charged. This leads people to see cavalry get bogged down, worn down by losing a knight or two a turn while doing no damage, and get seen off.

A change in thinking is in order.

Cavalry still has two massive advantages besides their mobility. First, they often are equipped with lances or spears that give them a nice strength advantage on the charge that tends to lead to inflicting large numbers of casualties.

Second, they are heavily armored which tends to increase their survivability.

The best-armored foot troops typically have a 3+ save and that is limited to a handful of troops such as Chaos Warriors and the increasingly rare Gromril Armor/Shield combo for Dwarf armies.

More typically heavy armor and shield is giving a 4+, and most infantry units have even worse armor. Compare that to the 2+ cavalry routinely achieves. Even against S5 troops they are saving 50% of the wounds inflicted!

So how to use a fast-moving, hard-hitting, rugged unit?

All too often the answer has been to send them unsupported into ranked infantry and be disappointed with the results. The correct answer is to use them in conjunction with your own infantry.

When two infantry units clash, it typically is a war of attrition unless the steadfast unit somehow wins the combat. Most steadfast units either have very high leadership, re-rolls, or both, thus making them very difficult to budge.

Cavalry gives your own unit a way of turning that combat into a decisive win. This works best with armies with inexpensive infantry. Chaos Marauders, Empire State Troops, Brettonian Men at Arms are all fine examples.

First you bring an infantry block of your own that either is already large enough on its own to have the steadfast rule or else is close enough in size that a good round of combat might flip it.

Then you use that mobile, fast moving cavalry to hit the steadfast unit in the flank. Several things are going to happen.

First, you are going to get attacked back. That is the reality of 8th edition. Even your most elite, strike first, hard-hitting units are highly unlikely to do enough damage to one-turn annihilate even Skaven slaves even if they do an unsaved wound with every attack and save every wound done in return.

Second, what you are trying to do is take away their steadfast. Charge too early and you will do massive casualties but not remove enough ranks to keep them from being steadfast. Charge too late and your own unit may have run by now.

But charge at the right moment and your cavalry becomes what it should be designed for; a shock unit that hits so hard the unit that was effectively unbreakable loses steadfast, takes so many casualties that their ensuing break test will require insane courage or close to it, and runs.

Third, by charging at the right moment you are going to keep that juicy strength bonus by being able to charge again.

Fourth, even if you get bogged down, you should have advantages in saves so be taking fewer casualties than most infantry forces, though of course there are exceptions.

There are defenses against this maneuver of course. There are always ways of protecting the flanks or having a unit that is stubborn. Of course, there are ways of dealing with flank protectors and often ways of removing stubborn, so do not get too caught up in the extraneous details.

Start by figuring out what cavalry is good at, then using cavalry for that instead of remembering what it used to do and being upset it is not that anymore.

Warriors of Chaos v. Wood Elfs

2011-03-02T21:41:00.000-08:00

Fresh off the Dwarf v. Wood Elf game, Liam and I decided to play another one. I had a ready made 1k WoC list, gave him an extra 2560 points and while he built his list I rolled up a magical, mystical field.

There were two Dwarf Ale houses, 3 sections of Ghost fence, an Altar of Sigmar, a Khainite shrine...plenty of terrain, a field built to look like someplace people would live.

My list is full of weaknesses, and on purpose. I have no magic defense, I put in some Chaos Warhounds...a unit I almost never take because they are so bad...and even a 10 man unit of marauders with full command and khorne.

That is a horrible build. They are there so I will have three units, so they should either have some of the guys from the larger block to give me two more reasonable sizes or else be bare of excess points.

But that sort of makes up for having Knights and a Lord level guy on a Juggernaut.

We rolled up Blood and Glory. I knew all I had to do to win was break his Glade Guard unit. He would have to break three of my units to win via scenario rules.

He had to set up a unit first and put it on my right flank. I put the dogs on my left flank, hoping to influence him to split his forces. He did not fall for it, putting his Dryads in the forest on my right flank. Inexplicably, I then put everything on the left anyway.

Battle plan: Marauders will sweep around the right using the houses for cover, then the small Marauder unit to absorb some bow fire, then get out of the way of the big Marauder unit.

Meanwhile the dogs would be a meat shield for the knights on the left, sweeping between the buildings. With any luck, the dogs would charge, get shot, flee, leaving my Knights a free shot at his Glade Guard.

Horrible deployment. I should have set up my Marauders on the left side of the right flank to head for the Dryads, allowing the dogs/Knights to head straight for the Glade Guard.

I forgot how slow infantry is and did not start my Marauders in time, having them hang out for a turn. I think I decided to go all or nothing, planning the Knight charge for the win or loss

The Marauders were first through the gap. In one turn he shot down 6 of the leading unit. The time lost getting them behind my other unit to save their points meant my Marauders did not have time to get to him even if I marched every turn. Time for plan B.

I sent the dogs on ahead. I kind of hoped he would flank them with the Dryads. He would win the combat easily, over-run, and perhaps the Dryads and Marauders could battle while I tried to withstand the inevitable hail of arrows.

He had no plans of leaving the steadfast-making confines of the forest, though. And he shot all 5 dogs down in one turn.

At this point both units of marauders were moving backwards. After he hit the unit with irresistible Dwellers, killing one Knight but not getting either character, it was obvious I could not reach him. I ran behind the building to avoid shooting.

He had set up a perfect situation. He had a wide open field of fire. If I did allow the Dryads to flank me, I would also be hit by the Treeman, who would be stubborn and re-rolling thanks to his BSB. That would keep me from combat reforming. It would also mean I could lose the battle but could not win it.

I turned and headed for the hills, having taken irresistible Dwellers twice (he receiving one wound each time).

I MIGHT have gone in if it were just the Dryads/Treeman. But with Dwellers in play as well...I retreated, giving him the 30 point advantage.

This was a short, entertaining and relatively bloodless battle. I probably should have made him charge with his Dryads and/or Treemen. Would have been interesting to see what happened. But..I did not.

I do think the Wood Elfs are a great army for Liam. He likes setting up defensively, which is near ideal for the Wood Elf army. So that was definitely a win for the day.

2500 Dwarfs v. Wood Elfs

2011-02-27T22:38:00.000-08:00

Recently I have been watching a lot of How to Train Your Dragon, Despicable Me, Toy Story 3, Iron Man, and Iron Man II. I know all the movies quite well by now, so it allows me to free part of my mind to do other things.

One thing to do is something I generally consider pure drudgery. Put together army lists. So I did. I pretty much have standing lists at virtually any point level for my beloved Warriors of Chaos. I know what units I like to use and those go in regardless of how weak they are considered this edition.

But I want to mix it up a bit, play some other armies. So I sat down and made Wood Elf lists for 1k, 1500k, 2k and 2500.

Then I did the same with the Dwarf army. I even made a couple different versions at some of the point levels.

Obviously I am making "all comers" lists. These are not lists specifically designed to fight any of the armies I routinely have as potential opponents: Lizardmen, Skaven, Dark Elf, Ogre Kingdoms, Bretonnians being the most likely, with Empire, Beastmen being next most likely and the seldom-seen Tomb Kings and Orcs and Goblins bringing up the rear.

My good friend Liam stepped up to the plate and asked if I would mind if he played the Wood Elf army. I laughed at the irony of me finally getting around to building a list and then someone else getting interested and hastily agreed. I would play the Dwarf list v. his Wood Elf list at 2500.

I have two units of 10 thunderers apiece, 2 cannons and an Organ Gun. Not all that much shooting. The Cannons both have the Rune that makes their shots flaming and are there explicitly to deal with Hydras, HP Abominations, Stegadons, and anything else that has high T, multiple wounds.

The organ gun is there because I thought a Grudge Thrower might be a bit too much shooting.

Leading my army with a noble means I can have core Longbeards and to me the extra S is well worth it. So my line troops all end up with the parry save and S4 but are going to be outnumbered.

We rolled up the Meeting Engagement and he planted a big unit of glade guard in a tower in one corner, 5 or 6 treekin next to them, some Dryads in a forest next to them, about 14 more glade guard, and on the far right flank a Treeman.

Lately I have A) not been able to play much and B) been lackadaisical about my deployment. Since I really count on my Knights, Dragon Ogres, and Shaggoth with WoC, deploying on the wrong flank is no big deal. I simply take a turn and a half to get where I want to be. It is lazy, it degrades my playing and usually makes the game tougher for me.

That is not a mistake I can make with the Dwarf army. But I did. I made sure to set up over 30" from his big glade guard block, and starting on my left put my Ironbreakers, planted my cannons one on each side of the organ gun and looking at his treekin, guarded their flank with side by each units of thunderers, then the miners, then on the far right flank my Longbeards. Only my Rune Lord showed up late.

Mistake #1. My miners should have come on via their ability per my initial plan. But...having played the Wood Elf army, I know the power of their shooting. The thought of coming behind the building, taking 28 S4 shots, charging, him testing on re-rollable steadfast, taking another 20 - 25 shots, charging, him testing on re-rollable steadfast...I chickened out and posted them.

Mistake #2. In the wrong spot. It extended my line even further so my General and BSB-reinforced Longbeard horde was on my far right flank. Where his Treeman could flank them in turn...

He then dropped a scout on my back line. I had forgotten the new scout rules. Or that people use scouts...

WE TURN 1

He flies his eagle out behind my Longbeards and makes a slow advance in general. He rolls almost no PD, I forget my Rune Lord is not on the table and steal one, he has just 3 PD now and gets something irrelevant off which I dispel on my turn.

His lone scout unleashes the Hail of Doom at my center most Thunderers. He gets 13 shots, 12 of them hit and 7 wound. I save just one. Not a problem, I have a 9. And roll an 11. I am about 1" outside of BSB range...remember that mistake in planting the Miners there? Costly.

They break and run towards the center of the field. His Glade Guard then shoot the other thunderer unit, causing 3 wounds, but I save 2.

This is funny because if it were my Knights with a 1+ save I would fail 2 of 3. Or all 3. Because on the rare occasions the Knights get hit with a weapon that actually allows an armor save I routinely fail 90%. Not usually relevant since 90% of the time when they get hit they are not allowed a save anyway.

But because I have a 5+ save...I save 2 of 3. Whatever. Dwarf armor for the win.

His Waywatchers then hit the Ironbreakers 7 times, can only muster 2 wounds. Here I have a 3+ save...and fail them both. Bwoohahahha.

I should point out...my thunderers that got hit with Hail of Doom were in range of all his shooting. He did 9 casualties this turn. That Thunderer unit still had 4 guys in it at this point and ended the game with 1, so he got no points.

Strategy suggestion; armies with shooting need to concentrate their fire. Wiping out that unit would be a great way to go. And would force other panic tests, which I have already shown I can fail with ease.

Dividing fire helps your opponent more than it helps the person firing. By having the wounds spread out, I was able to absorb a lot of punishment throughout this battle without the damage adding up as quick as it might have.

Dwarf Turn 1

Dwarfs are good at holding grudges.I have no charges, the Thunderers rally, much to the surprise of no one and start walking towards their own lines.

The other unit advances to get within 24". So they march as far as they can.

The Longbeards measure. If I march forward, I am about 1/4" short of being past Treemans line of sight. So I reform to accept his charge.

I debate what to do with the cannons. But the whole point of them is NOT to take shots at Glade Guard in buildings or the open, Dryads I have no fear of, or even Waywatchers. No, I had a great target in the Treekin. That was the proper shot.

One cannonball later, he had one dead Treekin and two wounds on another. Would have been one wound, but he reminded me flaming doubles the wounds.

I only shot one cannon...I moved the other to guarantee my Organ Gun had a clear shot at his Hail of Doom scout. I PROBABLY had one anyway...but because I made such big bases for scenic purposes, I wanted it to be clear. (as you can see, the bases are designed with "scenes" in mind. An Arachnarok Spider could not be bigger...)

The Organ Gun unleashed the full 10 shots, and 7 wounded. One dead scout. It was now imperative for him to finish off my Thunderer unit or I would have enough points for a victory right there.

Wood Elf Turn 2
His Eagle wants to march but he rolls boxcars. He just flies behind the longbeards. His Glade Guard realize they will take no part in this entire battle, so they exit the building.

At this point I notice I forgot to bring on my Rune Lord...which is when I realized I had illegally stolen one of his 4 PD. Fortunately my inadvertent cheating would have no real effect on the game.

He makes a slight advance, gets Throne of Vines off. I save the only wound his Waywatchers shooting does, save the one wound his small Glade Guard unit is able to lay out.

I think this was partially due to his inexperience with the Wood Elf army. I, knowing how slow Dwarf armies are, would probably have moved to just within 15" to get that key additional S point with the Glade Guard and Lethal Shot with the Waywatchers, knowing they can retreat 5" per turn and still fire with no penalty whereas the Dwarf army can only advance 6" per turn total!

I suspect he also knew his 30" Longbows out-ranged my 24" Thunderers. However, by this point I had 9 and 4 thunderers...so it might have been worthwhile to have a closer range duel. Maybe not. Hindsight is 20-20 and I know how it turned out...

Dwarf Turn 2

This time I bring on my Rune Lord straight away. I am not much bothered by his Eagle. I have no clue what he is planning, I kind of hope he charges one of my units. Any of my units. I will be so far ahead based on static combat resolution alone that I am almost guaranteed points for the eagle. Unless he charges by whittled-down Thunderer unit...

The Longbeards tweak their line to prepare to move if the Treeman ever is no threat. The Miners advance.

I easily Dispel Throne of Vines.

The cannons both roar and two more treekin go down. The Thunderers only have the Waywatchers in range and that extra -1 ensures my firing is worse than worthless. Gunpowder costs gold...gold that could be used in that Dwarf Alehouse on my left flank!

Wood Elf Turn 3

I was a championship chess player at one point. Won plenteous awards. Mostly because the other guy might see two or three moves ahead, but I would see ten, fifteen, twenty moves ahead at times.

I am not that guy anymore.

It is on this flight of his eagle that I realize...he is going to charge my cannon. Next turn. This is bad.

He disengages his Level one wizard from the Treekin unit to hide behind the building, inches forward marginally.

He rolls a 6 and 5 for the Winds of magic. I steal one, add 2 for my Rune Lord...he has 10 power dice, I have 8 Dispel.

He is out of range for Dwellers. He gets Throne with Irresistible, and Throne protects him from the miscast. That means I have so many Dispel Dice he has no chance of getting anything off.

I should point out...I had the Rune of Spellbreaking unused at the end of the game. He never had a single spell in use when it mattered. Magic v. Dwarves is an exercise in futility.

He unleashes his big block of Glade Guard on the cannon, but only gets 1 wound through. I do not save.

His 13 Glade Guard wound my block of 4 Thunderers 3 times, I save zero. Down to one guy. That guy is worth 150 points to one of us...

His Waywatchers shoot at my big block of Thunderers and I save the only wound.

Dwarf 3

I, uh...I need to do something about that Eagle. I advance a bit on my right flank. This will prove to be a mistake. Had I marched this turn and both turns 4 and 5 as well on turn 6 to get a charge off. If not marching...i should get back behind the hill. Like my one Thunderer starts to do.

I do charge my Thane with flaming and a couple strength modifiers to help the cannon. But I am going to be too late. Not thinking about the eagle might cost me.

My cannons do finish off his Treekin unit. He is now in a big hole. I have the points for them and the scout. he has zero points and has not advanced any close combat troops. He will not have enough time to shoot any of my units into non-existence barring some bad break tests.

The Organ Gun only gets off I think 4 shots and does one wound to the eagle. My Thunderers manage to kill a Waywatcher.

Wood Elf Turn 4

The Eagle charges my cannon. He gets 11 PD, no magic off successfully.

His 28 Glade Guard volley for the first time; 24 shots, 11 hits, 2 wounds, 1 save. That cannon has lost 2 guys now. But I do have an Engineer there...

His other Glade Guard unit kills 2 Thunderers and the Waywatchers get another. I am losing that shootout for sure, even with him being S3 and me having armor!

The Eagle can only slay one cannoneer, but he has done his job..he silenced half my artillery!

Dwarf Turn 4

My thane needs a 10 to make it into the cannon battle...and I roll...a ten! Yes!

Everyone else starts moving backwards. Make it as hard as possible for him to shoot me. I cannot reach him even if I march the rest of the game.

My cannonball at his Level 4 in the big glade guard unit gets ward saved.

His Eagle uses its initiative to kill the two cannoneers. He has points! My Thane then kills his Eagle.

Wood Elf Turn 5

His Waywatchers kill another thunderer, his Glade Guard get 2 more. My guys are getting thin.

His big unit of Glade Guard hits my last cannon 17 times. Needing sixes, he gets six wounds on me. Needing sixes, I decide to be unreasonable and save two of them...but not enough. He doubles his point haul, wiping out my second cannon.

Dwarf 5

Run! Get out of sight of those horrible woodie bows. They are sticking arrows in everything!

The only unit not moving directly away is my Ironbreakers, heading towards the Dwarf Ale House.

Wood Elf 6

He advances to take one last stab at points. Every shot he has goes against the Organ Gun. 1 wound goes through but it is not enough.

Dwarf 6

I basically just take a group photo of my survivors.

I mistakenly give him points for the unit of Thunderers with one guy left, making it look closer than it was at 534-395. But because the one guy survived and there are no half points, the actual score was 534-245.

Recap

This was two guys who have not played all that much lately using armies they are not overly familiar with and playing them poorly.

I mentioned some mistakes in set-up. Now lets go over mistakes during the game.

1) I should have marched my close combat troops forward. I would have taken more casualties...bit horded up Longbeards v. Waywatchers or Glade Guard is a match up I like. So are max-ranked Ironbreakers v. Glade Guard.

I should have sent my Miners after the Treeman and swung my Longbeards behind them. But I forgot how slow 6" a turn is. By the time I realized it, it was too late.

Initial deployment and 2 or 3 turns of letting one Treeman hold an entire flank turned this game into a shooting skirmish.

2) I was never sure what to do with my Thunderers. I should have moved them forward twice or gotten them behind the hill. They were never going to wipe out an entire unit sniping away needing 4s, 5s and 6s to hit. Instead I risked them to no purpose.

3) I ignored the one viable threat he presented for far two long. My Thane should have been close enough to deal with the Eagle the turn he arrived, not the next turn. I should have protected my cannon better.

4) When it became obvious the Treeman and Longbeards were just going to move back and forth, I should have gotten my BSB towards the center along with my General to give a re-rollable LD 10 bubble instead of a one-shot 9. It did not cost me...but it could have. Just because the results were good does not mean the play was.

Things I did well;

1) I chose the correct target with my Cannons. Shooting the Treekin completely away was total win. There was no point to using my big guns to pot-shot away 2 or 3 glade guard or Dryads per

turn. Target selection +1

2) I saved points by getting my Thunderer out of harms way ASAP.

From where I sit, things Liam might have done better:

1) The big block of Glade Guard should have exited maybe one turn sooner.

2) I think he dispersed his fire a bit more than he should have. Had he finished off one Thunderer unit, then turned everything (including the big GG unit) on the second one, we might have had a draw.

3) He took a Treeman, Treekin, and Dryads. None of them every advanced on me. Having close combat troops you are unwilling to put in close combat may or may not be prudent.

If he marches his Treekin towards my Ironbreakers, I might not have them weakened enough with cannon fire. His Treeman and Dryads, if they combo charge the Ironbreakers, MIGHT be okay...maybe not. I may have played it the same way.

4) When the Treekin were getting plunked by laser guided cannon fire, he probably should have run them behind the building to save the points.

What he did well

1) His inital setup was excellent. His shooting troops were protected, he put his guys where they should be, and got me to make some mistakes in my own deployment.

2) He shot. Every turn. He took some shots at causing panic.

3) He thought about whether it was worth the Treeman getting hit with a cannonball just to strangle-rrot attack and made the right decision.

4) He chose the right spell to attempt every time. That they never got to remain in play is irrelevant. He made the correct plays.

All in all, as battles between he and I tend to do, it was mostly a war of maneuver and little bloodshed. If we played it again...I think that would change.

First, my miners would go outside of the Longbeards and go after the Treeman. This means my Longbeards would go after his Waywatchers. I probably wipe them out and his small glade guard as well. But I do not go into the forest after his Dryads. Not sure why...

Second, my left wing would also advance. I would take on his big block of Glade Guard, with the cannons hopefully rendering his Treekin insignificant.

All in all, a fun game I enjoyed a great deal.

Answering a rules question

2011-02-25T22:31:00.000-08:00

A couple weeks ago Fullur and I had a rules question: namely, would Harmonic Convergence remain in effect of his caster died due to miscast.

P. 36 of the rule book specifically addresses this.

Once in play, such spells cannot be dispelled, and remain in effect even if the caster is slain...

So there you go. Clean, crsip, concise. Score yet another one for the new 8th edition rules. Far and away the best ruleset GW has put out yet.

Tavern Talk: List building

2011-02-20T15:48:00.001-08:00

When I sit down to build a list, it is typically something I try to get done as quickly as possible. There are certain parts of the hobby I enjoy. Those are playing the game and talking about it with my friends.

Then there are certain parts of it I do not enjoy. Generally, that means everything else. Specifically it includes setting up and taking down the game, painting, assembling figures, and list building.

So typically when I set out to build a list I have a general idea of what I want to concentrate on. For example, in the list for the game pictured (a 7th edition list) I had just completed painting the Dragon Ogres, the Marauder Horsemen on the gray horses, the chariot, and modifying a Brettonian into my Standard Bearer.

As a result, I wanted to include those elements. I always include a unit of Knights because I love magic and knights. By the time you put in a few knights, some dragon ogres, a chariot, the requisite wizard, and a chariot, you have eaten up close to 1000 points. I believe that one was probably a 1500 point game.

Since I found Marauders in 7th edition to be worse than completely useless since they seldom ever got to attack, it was an easy choice to make it an all-cavalry force.

At that point my list is built and I simply need to figure out how to use it on the field.

When I build a list, this is a pretty typical example. I seldom take into account who my opponent is. In fact, I generally go somewhat out of my way to avoid knowing which army my opponent will use since then it is a truer test of my abilities.

I do, however, put in a battle plan along with my list.

For example, in the above list, the Knights would go straight up the middle while the Marauder Horsemen would guard the flanks. The Chariot and Dragon Ogres would lag slightly behind, planning to either attack anyone who flanked the Knights or, more likely, when the knights swung towards one flank or the other, they would combo charge on the appropriate flank while either the Marauder horsemen or remaining unit would serve as a blocking unit.

Every list I build has similar elements. I find a unit or concept I want to build around, fill it up, then when I have fit in the things I enjoy using, I fill in the "required" slots.

Case in point; I really like my troops to be reliable. As a result, the Crown of Command has quickly become a staple on those (extremely) rare occasions I do not take the Warriors of Chaos item the Banner of the gods.

However, one army (the Dwarves) has a second version, the Master Rune of Kingship. Add the Master Rune of Gromril and the Rune of Resistance and your General will make whatever unit he joins Stubborn.

Add a Thane with the Crown of Command and a BSB and suddenly your battle line is full of T4, LD 9 or 10 re-rollable stubborn troops. The ultimate in reliability short of the crumble-prone undead.

Depending on what points level you are playing, you can still have more than sufficient shooting to soften up the enemy before they crash into your nigh-impenetrable rock of a line.

Of course, despite the improved charge ranges, the Dwarf army is still enough slower (25- 50% slower than virtually any other army) that you need a solid plan.

Set up an Organ Gun between Dwarf Warriors and Dwarf Longbeards with cannons and Thunderers added as appropriate and you have a rock-hard, deadly army. The list built itself. It simply requires a few tweaks for points.*

In short, to build a list, I do the following.

1) Find a concept to build the list around.

2) Build a battle plan around that concept.

3) Include the pieces to fulfill that concept.

4) Add required things such as core troops.

5) Fiddle with the points until they fit.

*Note it DOES leave the army susceptible to magic, but this is somewhat deliberate. I like to always build in a weakness the savvy opponent can exploit.

Watchtower Battle, High Elf versus Lizardmen

2011-02-05T11:39:00.000-08:00

As a general rule when playing wargames, I have gone with armies that fit my tactical acumen. Typically that means mobile, hard-hitting, rugged warriors.

Space marines in 40K. Bretonnians, Warriors of Chaos in Warhammer.

From time to time I branch out...in 40K I used to be developing an Eldar army. Man how I loved the Warp Spiders. Great fun to play with. I loved some of the stunts I could pull off with them.

In Warhammer, I have experimented with Wood Elf, Orc and Goblin, Dwarf, Chaos Dwarf, and Lizardmen armies, but pretty much always come back to the WoC. Except for their lack of shooting, they are the perfect army for me. My preferred tactics work well with them.

Too well. I end up becoming rather predictable. By the time the second or third unit for each side has been set up, I more or less know when and where combat will be joined. I know what I want to happen and am able to get the guys I want to the place I want.

It does not ALWAYS work...but the percentages are with me.

So I wanted a more flexible army that fought in a different style.

So not too long ago I painted up most of a High Elf army and a month or so ago my brother and I started a 1k game between my High Elf and his Lizardman army.

When we first started playing warhammer Fullur was struggling. Tactics eluded him a bit, he struggled with force composition...but he kept using the same race and has progressively gotten better and better to where now he is likely to win any game he starts to play. His recent record has been among the top records in our group. This is something I am ecstatic about...

Anyhow, we rolled up the Watchtower scenario and I won the right to place a unit in there. Unfortunately, poor army building meant the unit I WANTED to put in there...my Lothern Sea Guard...was too large. So I put nothing in instead.

I deployed to get as much shooting at him as possible while he deployed to get his Skink block at the tower quickly with the Saurus coming up behind.

We played the first few turns a couple months ago, so memory might be hazy, but what I recall is

He killed 3 of my Dragon Princes with his Razordon. I tried to bring them back with regrowth, not realizing I only got 1 per 2 wounds...so when I rolled a 3, I only brought back one. They were slain by the kroxigor the next turn.

Meanwhile, his skinks got into the tower. But the next turn my Swordmasters charged in. This just in; elite High Elf Always Strike First with superior weapon skill, re-rolls to hit and needing 2s to kill versus...well...skinks...just might be a mis-match.

It was one of those epic charges I love so much about fantasy battle. Fortunately for me, I was on the right side of it. I do not think his skinks even got to swing back before they were mowed down and I took the tower.

This allowed my Wizard Lord to hurl Purple Sun at his Saurus block, killing just 5 or 6, but enough to force a break test...which, amazingly he failed, but only ran 4". Next turn he somehow failed to rally...and again fled just 4".

Meanwhile, his Carnosaur riding Scar-vet charged into my big block of seaguard. I challenged with my champ, he killed him with a few points of overkill, my ranks & banner won the combat.

Over the next few turns this combat would get more and more involved as my Eagle charged the back of his Carnosaur, his Terradons charged the rear of my eagle, his Kroxigor unit tried to reach the combat. Failed its charge, my Repeater Bolt Thrower

Each turn he would kill my champ, on my turn I would get my champ back with a successful Life casting..it was a real meatgrinder.

Back at the watchtower his salamander ate its handlers and got the result where it just shoots at the nearest enemy every turn...my Swordmasters in the building.

All game I had avoided shooting at his Engine because I did not want to remind him it could use Burning Alignment. Instead I shot his kroxigor unit, whittling them down to 1 krox. He was wheeling another skink unit through the forest to get at my Repeater bolt thrower.

Finally his krox made it into the combat. I actually did a wound with my spearmen, my eagle killed his last terradon, he whiffed his attacks. Then he remembered his stomp...it killed a Sea guard...and by that thin a margin, his Carnosaur stayed in the fight. Without that one extra wound he would have broken.

His Krox did break. By now, however, the Skinks were into my Bolt thrower and now he started using burning alignment.

Then came the fateful moment.

He cast Chain Lightning at my Swordmasters. He was using a level 2 and rolled poorly. I used my Level 4 and the same number of dice...and failed to block it.

It did several casualties.I then rolled under his total, so he got harmonic convergence off on his carnosaur.

Then Burning alignment hit hard. Then the Salamander ripped mighty gashes through others. I was left with just 2 Swordmasters and my level 4...having started the turn with 9 or 10 Swordmasters and the level 4.

He killed my champ with his carnosaur.

My turn; I tried regrowth with most of my power dice...and rolled poorly. He dispelled it. I used the last of my dice trying the transformation of kadon...and he dispelled it.

For all intents and purposes, it now came down to me hoping to roll a 5+ at the end of the turn to end the game.

In close combat his skinks finished off my warmachine crew. Harmonic convergence was cast with irresistible. He took a s10 hit...and rolled a 1. Ha ha ha ha nice! But then he failed the roll to keep his wizard around and died anyway.

We were not sure if Harmonic stayed in play after caster died, so we ruled it did. (It was a typical Starving Crazed Weasels rules discussion; he argued it did not since that would favor me and I ruled it did since it would favor him. Since I am bigger, older, and my flatulence reaks worse...I won the debate.)

It then made it so all his carnosaur/veteran attacks hit...and meant any that failed to wound would get a reroll. He tore a mighty hole through my Sea guard. Still, I was steadfast...oops. Broke. Got run down.

I was now down to 3 Sowrdmasters and a Wizard against a Kroxogor, a Scar-vet on Carnosaur, 15ish Saurus, 10 or so skinks, a salamander...

Yeah, so...I rolled a 2 and the game continued.

He charged in with his Saurus, killed me, and for the first time I can remember I got tabled.

I have come close twice against the dark elves, but each time had a couple irrelevant models left. This...this was devastation.

The thing is, the game completely turned on turn 4 when all his magic went off and mine all got stuffed...but I lost the game earlier than that.

Plain and simple, I got out-played.

I know WHY I put the Swordmasters in the tower...their S5 could hurt the Saurus I expected him to attack with. The S3 Sea Guard? Not so much.

BUT I needed to stick my largest, most resilient unit in the tower. that would be the Sea Guard. Instead I tied them down in a pointless battle they had little chance in. Basically they needed to get the Carnosaur to fail a LD8 check on 3 dice...a highly unlikely occurrence. Sure, I won combat after combat...but I was using my resources improperly.

Meanwhile, he concentrated more than sufficient force at the only place it mattered...the building. Even if I got lucky against his Scar vet...it distracted me from defending the tower.

His use of magic was outstanding. Mine? Not so much. I should have done regrowth a turn earlier, concentrated on buffs instead of Purple Sun...or even gone the Transformation route to kill his Carnosaur/Scar vet thus allowing my Sea Guard to help out around the tower.

I got outmaneuvered, out-strategized, and just generally outplayed.

That meant when just a couple small things did not go perfectly for me, I had no chance to recover. He, meanwhile, when things went wrong (Saurus breaking twice without seeing combat, his handlers getting eaten, his Kroxigor failing a charge and then breaking) had the right troops in the right location so those failures did not matter.

Well done, Fullur. I look forward to our next game!

Watchtower Scenario, 1500 High Elf v. Lizardman

2010-11-20T23:55:00.000-08:00

PAINting: Update

2010-10-04T06:51:00.000-07:00

All pictures should expand if you click on them.

Not too long ago I was talking about my backlog and wanting to finish up the High Elfs I had so I could start on the Island of Blood models.

Specifically, the issue was the Silver Helms, a unit so bad it rivals the Forsaken for outright not just uselessness, but counter-productive to take.

Still, they had to be painted...and now, as you see here, they are.

I will never argue they are a spectacular looking unit...then again, I will never claim anything I paint is spectacular looking. A shaky hand and lack of skill see to that. But they are a unit that, circumstances permitting, I would not be embarrassed to put on the table.

I also decided to magnetize and base the Repeater Bolt Thrower (Eagle Claw).

I also made a base for what would be a 50-strong unit of Lothern Sea Guard. 35 shots per turn and a potential of 50 attacks...unlikely, but possible (51 if unit champ gets 2, do not remember at moment), albeit just S3, plus I think it is kind of a cool look with the mix of spears and bows.

I also painted a unit of Swordmasters from the Island of Blood. There is actually a difference between that unit and the ones above.

I went deeper into the color bank, using I think 9 different colors...though admittedly that includes 2 blues and 3 purples.

They fit well with the Dragon Princes, who I believe were the group I had previously invested the most time and energy in painting.

I also finished up the hero models.

So overall I think it is a decent looking army. Now the issue is putting together a list I actually want to play. I have been toying with a list that revolves around a Level 4 Life mage and a level 1 or 2 Beast mage. In theory, I could then end up with the center unit (the 50 lothern) rolling in with S4, T7...of course, that relies on the Winds of Magic being strong, my opponent being unable to stop anything and forgetting to dispel it on his own turn...

In other words, it is a BAD army list. But at the moment, it is the only one I can come up with...

And on the bright side, all the high-profile painting is done. Time to get a list built and get down to playing!