Round 4, Match 4 Murdoch vs. Psychotic Vampire

[Rising Leviathan]

Round 4, Match 4
Murdoch vs. Psychotic Vampire
Scenario:
Battleline
Map:
1
Deployment:
Murdoch top, Psychotic Vampire bottom
First round:
Psychotic Vampire has first turn.



Murdoch

Lords:
Orc Warboss
Additional Hand Weapon
Talisman of Preservation
Armour of Silvered Steel
Night Goblin Great Shaman
Level 4

Orc Big Boss
BSB
Great Weapon
Shield
Night Goblin Shaman
Level 2
Despell Scroll
Core:
39 Orc Big Un's
Full Command
Big Un's
Additional Hand Weapon
40 Night Goblins
Full Command
Nets
3 Fanatics
41 Night Goblins
Full Command
Nets
3 Fanatics
Spear Chucka
Spear Chucka
Spear Chucka
Spear Chucka
Doom Diver
Doom Diver
Rock Lobba
Orc Bully
Rock Lobba
Orc Bully


Level 4 spells: Sig, 3, 4, 6
Level 2 spells: Sig, 5

Hum, that's a lot of beasts "Forest ting make tasty lunch boyz, GIT EM!"

This will be an interesting match, I have a lot of units to take down high toughness, good armor but low count models, Caliban God doesn't have much of that. Then again, he doesn't have a whole lot of hitting power, lots and lots of staying but the Shamans transforming will likely be my biggest threat, outside of warmachine hunting harpies.

Deployment:
I'm going to try something new for me, and castle everything in the upper right hand corner of the map, having all my warmachines on the back board edge supported with my hordes in front of them, going **Night Goblins**Big'uns**Night Goblins. Hordes will be in a diagonal position to cut off the harpies as much as possible from reaching me. This is also done to prevent an ambush from taking any one unit off guard, or any flank charges as much as possible.

Tactics:
Harpies are priority number one, working from the most threatening to the least until they are taken care of. From there the Spearchuckas and Doom Divers will try to take out the chariot, while the Rock Lobbas will pick away at the Ungor herds. I don't have a lot of reason to advance to him, so I'll continue this until he gets to me. Harpies will trigger the fanatics if they get to close, which could be a blessing or a curse, so I will try to take them down before they get there. Being orcs, the best thing I do is just hit him as hard as possible when we finally clash, I assume he will be steadfast though.

Magic:
Power die: I will throw everything I can to cast a buffed curse of da bad moon using strength on my level 4. Power die left will be used to annoyance spells like itchy neusence to lower movement and infinitive and Gork'll fix it to reroll some sixes.
Despell die: I will do everything I can to prevent some Chimeras coming at me and throw it all at dispelling the transformation. Second most important will be dispelling the signature spell, wildform.



PsychoticVampire



Great Bray Shaman
Level 4
Talisman of Preservation
Level 4, Lore of Beasts
Notes: 4+Ward Save, Primal Fury
Heroes
• Bray Shaman
Level 2, Lore of Beasts
• Bray Shaman
Level 2, Lore of Beasts

• Wargor
BSB
Standard of Discipline
Shield
Heavy Armour
Gnarled Hide

• 50 Ungor Herd
Full Command
Spears

• 50 Ungor Herd
Full Command
Spears

• 50 Ungor Herd
Full Command
Spears

• 20 Ungor Herd
Halfhorn
Musician

• Tuskgor Chariot
• 10 Harpies
• 5 Harpies
• 5 Harpies



Spells:
Level 4,3,4,5
Level 2,1
Level 2,6

Deployment:
Left to right:
• 5 harpies
• 50 ungors, with level 2
• 50 ungors, with level 4 and BSB
• 20 ungors (in line with tower)
• 10 harpies (behind 20 ungors)
• 50 ungors, with level 2(with Kadon)
• Chariot (to right of woods)
• 5 harpies

Tactics:
• Harpies: the unit of 10 will fly within range of both goblin units to draw out fanatics, in a line they should be long enough to do this. The other two units fly up the flanks, moving into position to be out of charge arcs and in charge range of the rock lobbas next turn, with the fanatics already out, there will be little to stop them.
• The rest of the army will advance, with this many war machines, I can’t afford to hang back.
• Hopefully, his own fanatics should delay him, I will also try to cast curse of aranheir on the orcs, making open ground dangerous, which they fail on a 1 or 2 should make them worry about moving.
• The two 50-ungor blocks on the left will move up on the left of the tower, the 20 man unit will move into the tower, the other 50-ungor block and chariot will move up on the right of the tower, this gives his 3 units tough charge decisions, if he hangs back, I will charge, getting into combat asap, the three large blocks will engage a unit each, the other units will move to flank.
• The harpies will kill the rock lobbas asap, then the doom divers if any are left, then the spear chuckas, I don’t really need them to do more than kill the rock lobbas quickly though, that’s what damages my blocks.

Magic:
• Until combat: Cast, in order of importance: amber spear on rock lobbas/doom divers, curse of aranheir onto orcs, wildform onto generals unit.
• When in combat: First turn, 6 dice at turning level 2 into a chimera (if hes used his scroll already), to the unit he’s fighting, after that wildforms on fighting 50-ungor units, unit fighting orcs first.

Dispell: curse of the bad moon is the priority, then buffs if in combat, or damage spells against harpies if not.

Overall: Get into combat while my units are still large enough for weight of attacks and hatred win.

Voting ends in 72 Hours.

Regards,

[Esco Thomson]

I really like the Beastmen list, and I would vote if I thought the ending point could happen...but I just don't:

"Overall: Get into combat while my units are still large enough for weight of attacks and hatred win."

That sums it up for me, I just don't think that the units will be large enough to win.

O&G

[Marnepup]

Hmmm...it looks like the unit of ten harpies will only be drawing the fanatics out of the nearer night goblins unit, due to the diagonal deployment...happy accident for O&G. Also, only one unit of five will be close enough, again, due to corner castle deployment, to go warmachine hunting...without a graphic, I can't tell whether those five will be able to jump the enemy lines and have room to land...but if they do, I don't see them having the desired effect quickly enough. Even without fanatics, I'm not convinced that 40 night goblins is inferior enough to 50 ungors to auto-lose....and I do expect the O&G artillery to do its job...one last impact of the corner castle deployment will be that the beastmen will have trouble maneuvering their blocks to get at the enemy in good order...With a starting numbers advantage of less than 50%, and fully eight warmachines throwing stuff at them as they advance, I don't see how the beastmen can make their numbers count...For an unusually clever (er, lucky?) deployment plan (for an ork!), I vote Greenskins. The beastmen tactics for dealing with the warmachines and fanatics simply have the wind taken out of them by planning against a more conventional (line up and WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!!) enemy deployment.

[Digger]

I've been trying to find an excuse to make the beastmen horde win this out, but i cannot find it...
- Lucky for him the magic seems quite effective taking out war machines with the Spear.
- Unlike Marne, i can see the harpyline take out both stacks of fanatics, because he's allowed to use his measuringthingy during movement.
- Although the doomdivah's will do the trick, 4 spearchukkas shooting at skirmishers for 3 turns will take out what? 3-4 harpies? Thats pretty much a waste of their shots, while there's a chariot for the taking. Or a unit of 20 ungors who could make a nice starting point for a panic chainreaction.

- Close combat will be a different story. The night goblin netters make the ungors S2. With Bigúns backing up thats going to break them up, or if the wildform comes through, even the fight a bit. But Wildform is on the dispelpriority right next to Khadon.


Assuming the rock lobbers did average damage, the ungors are in a tough position to win it, The characters +chariot are pretty much on their own trying to win this war.

O&G win!

[andre]

Essentially, the O&G have a much more reliable way of whittling down the beasts before combat with all their warmachines. I dont see the beasts being able to take the combats as easily as they think, and theres no real counter to the big un horde... Would be tight, but the greenskins should take it 3 times out of 4.

[Rising Leviathan]

Murdoch takes a 4-0 win.

Regards,