Ard Boyz Qualifiers - 3k Daemons vs. High Elves / Dark Elves / Empire

[moob]

This weekend was Fantasy Ard Boyz, and I'm a big fan of 3,000 point games. With two lords, you see a lot of crazy stuff you don't normally experience in normal games. Pretty fun times.

Last year I played a fighty VC list but decided to jump on the daemon train this year.. especially since I have a bunch of daemons that I use in 40k.

Initially, I was planning on using a fighting leadership shenanigans list, with a Siren/Allure/Torment Keeper, the Masque, and a Greater Icon of Despair BSB.. but I asked the organizer how he rules for the interaction of that stuff and a general's leadership (Direwolf council FAQ has it as the unit gets the general's leadership and then the modifiers lower that). Thankfully I asked, since they ruled the general's leadership would override the modifiers.

So four days before the tournament, I quickly built a new list. This one still has some leadership-foo potential with the masque (who is just so awesome in general) and doom & darkness, but is basically a blaster list...


Characters:
Kairos Fateweaver (General)
Keeper of Secrets - Spirit Swallower, Level 4
The Masque
Herald of Tzeentch - Power Vortex, Winged Horror, BSB, Banner of Hellfire
Herald of Tzeentch - Master of Sorcery, Spell Breaker on a Chariot of Tzeentch
Herald of Tzeentch - Master of Sorcery on a Chariot of Tzeentch

Core:
10 Horrors
10 Horrors
10 Horrors
10 Horrors

Rare:
6 Flamers
6 Flamers


Basically a Tzeentch magic list with some flamer shooting... then the Keeper thrown in as the second mage to give me some extra non-flaming attacks for stuff like High Elves. I kept the Masque simply because lowering movement rates is almost as good as lowering leadership. Better in some cases, like when you're fighting Thorek dwarves. Who cares if they get to always march and then march/charge again if they're Move 1. :p

So with only 2 practice games under my belt, I went off.




Terrain was fairly standard across all the boards. It had around 2-3 pieces of terrain in each deployment zone. One or two small-ish woods/ruins near the 12" line and a hill near the back. Then another small piece or two in the middle of the board but off to the sides. Not too much and not too little terrain and in such a way that it was placed where it didn't clog up movement lanes.



The field wasn't as big as I expected, only 14 players. I thought it would be around 20, but I guess not everyone has a full 3k list to play. What surprised me more was that there weren't nearly as many daemons as I expected, and not a single vampire counts player... The breakdown was something like:
- 4 Daemons
- 2 Dark Elves
- 1 Chaos Dwarves (Huh?)
- 2 Warriors of Chaos
- 1 Lizardmen
- 1 Empire
- 1 High Elves
- 1 Orcs & Goblins
- 1 Dwarves



Sorry, I didn't keep copies of my opponent's army lists, so this is going from memory... They're all pretty close, just insignificant items and possibly some unit sizes are wrong.




Round 1


Special rules:
Each army gets a "Army Standard" (which should be the BSB by default). It makes the unit they're in stubborn, but otherwise doesn't affect gameplay. It's a bonus point if you capture your enemy's and another bonus point for controlling yours at the end.



Opponent: High Elves

Characters:
Tyrion (General)
Teclis
Korhil
Caradryan
Noble - BSB, +D6 combat res banner, steed & such

Core:
10 spearmen
10 spearmen
10 archers

Special:
25 Phoenix Guard - Full Command, Warbanner
8 Dragon Princes - Full Command, Immune to Fear & Terror

Rare:
6 Bolt Throwers



Spells:
- Both MoS heralds take lore of death.
- Kairos takes drain life, doom & darkness, and a bunch of magic missiles.



Assessment:
Well, not much magic defense (4+D3 dice with one eater scroll).. but his big power units are either immune to fire attacks, have high MR, or both. Well, I'll probably lose all of my core but not much else. I'll have trouble with Teclis in the PG, but otherwise I should kill most everything else except Tyrion. Probably a minor victory close to a major for me, barring some unlucky bolt thrower shots.


Deployment:
He makes a major mistake with deployment that costs him any chance of victory or even holding me at bay. I win the roll and deploy first. I start by putting horrors evenly spaced across my front line. Doing this gives no indication to my opponent where I'm going to be putting all my characters (which is the true strength of the army).

He responds by kinda spreading out his spearmen and archers. He puts spearmen on the left, archers on the right center, and spearmen on the far right. Then he places the PG on the left.

I put flamers in some woods a little to the right of center. He puts down all the bolt throwers - 1 on the far left, the other 5 all clustered together on the far right. Notably a long distance from his PG.

I put other flamers in the same woods. He then puts his DP's on the left next to the PG.. Not sure why he has his combat units so far from his ranged units when I am so mobile with my power units.

Anyway, I place all my characters. Every one of them on the right. BSB in a unit of horrors, the rest all behind a hill on the far right.

He makes another mistake in that he puts Teclis in the 10 archers on the right near the bolt throwers... Then Korhil and Caradryan joins the PG for MR3, while the noble and Tyrion join the DP's for MR2.



He wins the roll for first turn and takes it.


HE 1:
He moves the DP's up a little and adds to the front rank (he clustered too much to fit all his command and characters in the front), so he didn't run forward. PG advance slightly, too, not getting too far ahead of the DP's.

No magic (Teclis chose light and I was >24" away).

Bolt throwers shot at the horrors that the BSB was in, and they were on fire. Ended up killing 8 of the horrors and wounding the BSB despite the 4+ ward save & long range.


DoC 1:
BSB says "good luck" to those two remaining horrors and joins another squad that had advanced up the full 8". Flamers march forward towards the bolt thrower cluster, and the two horrors hide behind them (from things not on a hill).

Magic isn't as strong as it will be next turn, since my BSB and horrors are either out of range or staring at MR2+ guys. The MoS horrors, Keeper, and Kairos get to cast, though. Kairos tries a Bolt of Change at Teclis but it gets eaten off of one of his heads (thankfully he has it on another, heh).

I do manage to get Doom & Darkness, Acquiesence (stupidity from KoS), and a magic missile on Teclis' unit. He's down to 3 archers, but passes his panic check [testing at 7].

No shooting since flamers marched.


HE 2:
Teclis goes stupid with Doom & Darkness still in effect.

He starts to wheel around with his combat units towards the opposite flank where all my power is. He shoots the BSB's horror unit down to 3, but the BSB survives. One tried a shot at Kairos, but the 3+ ward save discouraged that.


DoC 2:
Keeper charges Teclis & unit who have to hold since they're immune to psych while stupid. Chariot heralds and Kairos fly into the middle of his bolt throwers. The BSB leaves the horrors to join them (hiding from most bolt throwers behind Kairos). Flamers move forward, too.

Magic phase is devastating. He only gets 1 on his D3 from Teclis so has 5 dice with no scrolls. I flare, magic missile, and generally run amok. I kill 4 of the 5 bolt throwers and cast stupidity + doom & darkness on the nearby spearmen.

Flamers kill the 5th bolt thrower.

KoS kills teclis and the one spearmen who survived the flares in combat.


HE 3:
Spearmen go stupid. He starts to threaten my current position with the DP's after movement.


DoC 3:
Flamers move out of DP charge range. The Kairos + heralds fly near the PG & DP's but out of charge arcs. Masque runs over there, too.

Masque lowers the DP movement by 3. Heralds, KoS, and Kairos start flaring repeatedly (two MoS horrors have drain life for D6 S3 ignore armor, BSB has the flare banner, Kairos has the tzeentch flare + drain life, and KoS has the 2d6" range S3 ignor armor flare, too). Kill a bunch of DP's and a few PG's. Throw a magic missile from a herald at the last bolt thrower and kill the crew from that, too.

Flamers kill the spearmen that are on the right.




Remainder of the game:
He can't do anything anymore, he doesn't have the mobility to catch me nor the magic defense to stop me from casting.

I kill off the spearmen, kill all the DP's plus the noble with flares (Tyrion survives), and break the PG on the bottom of 6. Notably, they don't hit anyone so Caradryan doesn't "die" and explode on someone despite giving up all his VP's.


He's wounded my BSB (145) and gotten two horror squads below half (2x6 for a total of 265 VP's. I've killed everything but Tyrion (40 and am in all 4 table quarters for a total of 3,000 VP's.

Difference of 2,735 for a massacre.

I had my general alive and control of my standard. He had his general but not control of his standard for a wash.

22-0.



End Assessment:
Well, without anything to reliably catch my flying guys, he had to rely on his bolt throwers and teclis to get VP's off me. He could have run the DP's after my horrors and killed a couple units of those for some VP's, but didn't realize how mobile I was I guess.. had he castled his PG and spearmen a bit more, and preserved Teclis in the PG unit, it might have been a little closer - but overall, an easy match-up for me.

There were actually 2 other massacres despite the 14 player field and ludicrous requirements, and both scored over 22, so I was getting paired down to someone with a minor victory but all 4 bonus points.







Round 2


Special Rules:
Orkiness. Totem in the center of the board.. non-immune to psych units within 12" roll for animosity. Miscasts within 12" of it roll on the O&G chart (which is ugly).


Opponent: Dark Elves

Characters:
Crone Hellebron (General)
Dreadlord - Not sure exactly.. 3+ armor, regenerate, str 5 weapon. No inverse ward, though.
Shadowblade
Sorc - Level 2, 2 scrolls
Sorc - Level 2, 1 scroll, sacrificial dagger

Core:
5 Dark Riders - repeater bows
20 Spearmen - Full command
10 Repeater Bowmen
15 Witch Elves - Full command, armor pierce banner, champ had +d3 attacks

Special:
20 Black Guard - Full command, ASF banner
20 Executioners - Full command, some magic banner
5 Cold One Knights - Full command, some magic banner

Rare:
Bolt Thrower
Bolt Thrower
War Hydra


Spells:
- Both heralds again take lore of death (a great lore, btw, with 2 magic missiles, doom & darkness, steal soul, and doom & darkness without really high casting values).
- Kairos takes spirit of the forge for the cold one knights, cleansing flare, drain life, and a bunch of magic missiles with a few of them being flaming for the hydra just in case.




Assessment:
No Ring of Hotek. I think that about sums it up.



Deployment:
I deploy mostly the same way. Horrors spread out, flamers in some woods. BSB, though, hides with the greater daemons and chariot heralds because of shadowblade.

He puts his ranged guys on a hill in the center of his DZ. Knights are just to the right of that, with spearmen right nearby. His dark riders are on the far right. The other infantry (black guard, executioners, and witch elves) are on the left of the hill with the hydra flanking them.

My characters are on the left.

Hellebron joins the executioners, Dreadlord in the black guard, sorc in the bowmen, and one in spearmen.

Shadowblade isn't in my units, he informs me.

I get first turn.



DoC 1:
Horrors on the left move up, BSB flies into one of those units. Horrors on the left move up barely a little, flamers advance up the center. Masque stays in some woods this turn.

Characters fly up on the far left flank.

Magic doesn't do too much, with my horrors out of range, along with my BSB.. but I am able to pull two of his scrolls.



DE 1:
He starts to advance with everything, the CoK running as far forward as possible towards the two horrors opposite them.

Magic gets stuffed, since he has 6 power dice to my 13 dispel dice.

Bowmen kill 3 horrors. The bolt throwers shoot at the KoS but do nothing.



DoC 2:
I charge the KoS at the witch elves. Not really sure why, but I do. Guess I like combat, since my main army is a blitz list. They have to hold being frenzy.

My characters fly over his infantry blocks.

Masque dances at his CoK lowering their leadership by 1. Not good enough to reliably get them stupid, especially since Doom & Darkness fails to go off. Magic is awful this round - I fail to cast A LOT. I do manage to draw his last scroll, and kill off one bolt thrower.

Flamers shoot at the CoK and between the two units wipe them out.

Shadowblade reveals in the WE's. We roll off to see who goes first and the KoS wins. Excellent, that should be that. He attacks 6 times needing 4's and then 2's. Oops, no hits at all. Shadowblade, who popped his strength potion, hits 4 and wounds 3. I fail all 3 ward saves.

Hrm. He has 2 ranks, banner, mass, and 3 wounds. That's a total of 7 I lost by - with only 2 wounds left. My BSB is nearby, but I still need a 3 to not pop. My first roll: snake eyes. Well, guess that works. Makes up for my horrendous magic phase.


DE 2:
He continues to advance, but has no charges. His shooting kills another 3 horrors from a second unit - both still at 7 and counting as mages.

Shadowblade wins the roll off to see who goes first this time, and causes another wound - down to 1 remaining. The KoS kills shadowblade with 2 wounds and goes back up to 3 left from Spirit swallower. He still has 2 ranks, banner, mass, and 1 wound winning by 5. I again roll low for my instability and stick around.



DoC 3:
Well, no more scrolls, only 4 dice, and no ring of hotek to worry about. I start casting with impunity.

Magic wipes out the other bolt thrower, kills every black guard (leaving just the dreadlord), kills 6 witch elves, and a few black guard. KoS also gets off his reroll spell.

Flamers start burning down the spearmen with his mage in it.

Combat sees the KoS kill 5 of the WE's, but they hold. He's full wounds again.



DE 3:
Dreadlord now has 360 sight and charges a herald on chariot.

Magic and shooting do nothing.

WE's get killed off by KoS. Dreadlord causes a wound to the herald, and it's a draw after mass.



DoC 4:
This is effectively the last turn of the game...

Magic kills off the bowmen + sorc, hydra, and 17 of the executioners. Flares also kill off the dreadlord in combat with the herald.

Flamers wipe out the spearmen + sorc inside of it.


He's now got only hellebron and the 3 executioners left, who have been reduced to move 2 by the masque. My opponent calls it.



He wounded a herald [the one with the scroll] for 82 points, he was effectively tabled with my in all quarters + killing his general for 3,500 VP's.

Difference of 3,418 for a massacre with all four bonus points.

24-(-1)


End Assement:
It really was summed up in the pre-game assessment. He didn't have magic defense in just 3 scrolls and 4 dice. Nor did he have the mobility to catch me nor the firepower to shoot me down... He needed the ring of hotek and a few more bolt throwers to have a chance.






Round 3

Special Rules:
If your general can see your opponent's general (or his unit) and can make a charge, it must. Additionally, it must issue/accept a challenge to/from the enemy general.


Opponent: Empire

Characters:
Karl Franz - Ghal Maraz, on a dragon
Arch Lector - Speculum, 1+ save, some weapon or another, on a War Alter
Wizard - 2 dispel scrolls
Wizard - 1 spell eater scroll
Captain - Aldred's Casket of Sorcery, maybe some other stuff, on a Royal Pegasus

Core:
5 Knights - regular, not inner circle
5 Flagellants - champion
10 Militia guys - not sure what type
10 Crossbowmen

Special:
5 Pistolliers - Outrider, Musician
Great Cannon
Great Cannon
Great Cannon

Rare:
Steam Tank
Steam Tank
Steam Tank



Spells:
- I briefly consider taking metal on the MoS heralds, but decide not to since the spirit of the forge needs a 12 to cast and they're only L2's. Probably a mistake, since it's also got a 2d6 s4 magic missile for his other stuff. I stick with death for the flares to try and hurt karl franz through his MR and kill his knights... and if I get lucky, wound a STank or two since it ignores saves and can hurt T6.
- Kairos takes spirit of the forge in case he ever gets KF out of position, then cleansing flare, drain life, and a bunch of magic missiles. I toy with the idea of taking flaming sword of rhuin in case he gets stuck fighting Karl, but I figure my opponent will just save dice to dispel that so don't bother.



Assessment:
Uh oh. This is a strong list played by a very good player. I've gone up against him repeatedly in the past and been crushed in I believe it's now 5 times straight, heh. He's also the person that decimated me in the 2nd game in the Fantasy Ard Boyz semi-finals last year.

Now this time, I think my list can handle his. Kairos can make some pretty short work of the steam tanks (not killing them, but disabling them)... the only problem is the mission special rules. I can't afford to lose Kairos, especially in the early turns, but that's exactly what happens if he ever sees Karl Franz. This is a huge problem for me. I change my thinking from trying to win this game after I see the rules and start planning on how to not lose.

I also am cursing myself for not looking up the missions ahead of time, else the Keeper would have been the general.



Deployment:
Standard as before... horrors spread out, flamers hidden in woods. Notably, he finishes first so I get to put Kairos down after Karl is on the board, which is a huge advantage for me.

He puts KF in the center but a little off to the left. The STanks are pretty much all within 12" of him. Lector is on the left. Cannons are spaced evenly out on the back of his board edge. Crossbow and militia are on the right, pistolliers and flaggies on the left. Knights kinda in the center.

He wins first turn and takes it.



This game is too hard to describe, because almost all of it is dependent on precise positioning and facings... so I'll just have to summarize.


Phase 1:
He advances slightly with his STanks and Karl. His captain flies up and tries to steal a spell from my BSB but fails. Even if it worked, the flare banner is what's important.

Keeper has sight on his position and declares a charge on him. He holds, wanting the KoS out in the open. The heralds move up to do some magic missiles and such, too. Kairos stays way away from Karl (if he gets within 20" of him, Karl will fly to Kairos and force the big bird to charge him). He's also always facing in the opposite direction of where Karl is.

I kill the captain and the peg breaks, while I restrain. I'm easily in charge range of Karl, and I'm very questionably in a charge range of a STank. I hope that I'm not.

My big plan to win this game is to have Karl charge my keeper and cut him off the top. Not really a great chance, but possible. Even just doing 2 wounds to him (which would be average) would be huge.. since it would then only take 1 flare wound with my heralds to take him off and give Kairos free reign.

He successfully generates 5 steam points on the STank closest to the KoS and declares a charge with it and Karl at the KoS. With a held breath, we measure the STank distance... 14.5", damn. They both make it in. Hopefully it will only do an average number of wounds (12 hits, 6 wounds, 4 failed saves) that I'll still get to swing. Hell, I could even survive with some luck considering I have spirit swallower.

His shooting pops a herald's chariot, but otherwise doesn't do much.

STank gets 12 hits, but 8 wound, and I fail enough to have the KoS die before he can swing. Ouch, painful.


I try to get him with some flares anyway, but on turn 2, the first spell I cast after I finish with the horrors miscasts and ends the magic phase. That's pretty much the deathblow on my chances of winning. It's time to try and stem the flow of lost points and get what I can to keep it a draw.


Phase 2:
I can't stop his STanks / Karl, as they run over all of my pink horror units and also get a unit of flamers. The last unit of flamers survives.. I have around 5 volleys of shooting from the flamer units at the knights, but can only drop 2 so they are still above half.

The arch lector uses the war alter to shoot off a cleansing flare. I roll 3 dice to stop it but get double 1's and it goes off. It wounds my BSB and causes 3 wounds to the Masque... the masque didn't like that and failed all 3 of the 3+ wards and died. Not what I needed!

One stank did a drive by on the herald that lost its chariot. The herald wasn't wounded when the stank drove up and the engineer shot at it with its pistols. Two hits, two wounds, and both 4+ wards failed. Another stank tried to do the same to my other herald, but only one hit was randomized to the herald (who of course failed his save for half points, too!) I had even laughed at them having pistols earlier in the game - serves me right :p

On my side, I killed off 2 of the cannons with flares and magic missiles, killed 3 of the pistolliers, 4 of the flagellants, both enemy wizards, the militia, and half the crossbowmen. I really couldn't do much else since he was very careful with his positioning of Karl Franz. I was never able to get a shot at a STank with Kairos that wouldn't immediately result in Karl assuming said STanks position forcing me to charge.

He played very well, using the mission to his advantage. After all was said and done, we calculated what we had remaining.

I had:
Kairos (625)
Wounded BSB (145)
Wounded Tzeentch Herald [chariot was okay] (130 )
Flamer squad (210 )
---
1,110 remaining


He had:
Karl Franz w/dragon (700 )
Arch Lector on alter (295)
3 of 5 Knights (115)
1 Flagellant (30 )
2 Pistolliers (52)
1 Cannon (100 )
3 Crossbowmen (40 )
Steam Tank (300 )
Steam Tank (300 )
Steam Tank (300 )
---
2,232

Difference of 1,122 - Draw!
Wait, no, he had 2 quarters to my 1 for 1,222... doh.

Minor loss. We both had +1 for our generals alive. He had +1 for his most expensive unit (Karl) and I had +1 for Kairos being in his DZ.

15-9.



Despite the minor loss in the third round, with only 14 in the field combined with what it took to get a massacre, my two early scores let me hold on to first place.

I finished with 55, the empire player had 54, and a kroak+slaan+engine list had 51.



It was a good time with a really tough game at the end. While I wasn't able to take that one (or more like, acheive my goal of a draw, heh), it was enjoyable. I'm looking forward to the semi's!

[Allonairre]

DO't know if this will help but with the Steam Tanks and Dragon being a large target you could position yourself behind your units without enough space to land a dragon base and still see them to cast, this may risk an overun move reaching him though.

Hope it helps, congrats on the good results though.

[Mastershake]

The problem wasn't Karl Franz charging Kairos, but rather that the mission would've forced Kairos to charge Franz if he'd been able to. Essentially if he'd looked in the steam tanks direction, Franz would've lept 20" into his charge arc and Kairos would've been forced to charge and declare a challenge, and promptly been beaten senseless (Franz can be pretty fierce)

[Digger]

Despite saying its too hard to describe the match, i find them very well written :p

You summed it up well
also, good summary of what went wrong there, i tottaly do not understand what the high elf player was thinkig during deployment

one question though:
How is a 1k difference a draw? Isnt that like a big slaughter kinda victory? (draw only goes up to 500 pts difference)

[moob]

@Allonairre: As Mastershake mentioned, the scenario special rule would have forced Kairos to charge Franz if he ever saw him. It stated your general must charge the enemy general if possible, and also issue a challenge. The challenge part was big, else I could have tried charging the keeper in at the same time and have him fight Karl (which is still a risk, but wouldn't have taken Kairos mostly out of the game).

Thanks for the tip, though.


@Digger: I meant a turn by turn description, but thanks!

And the 'Ard Boyz scenarios didn't use the standard rulebook point values for determining who won, they had custom requirements for their levels of victory:
- <1,200 difference: draw
- 1,200-1,900: minor victory
- 1,900-2,600: major victory
- 2,600+: massacre

[Allonairre]

I knew about the charge challenge thing, but I am not especially familiar with the Demons themselves, I wasn't sure if Kairos was a flyer or not.

You could do the same thing but out of a wood, where Kairos is grounded so can't charge through his own troops.

I can't beleive that you managed to keep over 20" and Line of sight between you and Karl for the entire game, that is quite a feat in itself.

[sirisaacnuton]

Originally Posted by moob

Initially, I was planning on using a fighting leadership shenanigans list, with a Siren/Allure/Torment Keeper, the Masque, and a Greater Icon of Despair BSB..

Did you consider adding Enrapturing Gaze to the Keeper and keeping the Ld set up? I've been testing it (and testing against it) and it seems pretty strong. It doesn't allow quite as many shenanigans for things like Terror tests, but once things get to CC you can take the general out of the picture and go back to Ld-fu. In a recent playtest game, that combo allowed the Keeper to fend off being killed by a Bear's Angered Skulltaker long enough to kill it.

The KoS just seems so fragile without Allure/TB protection, and I hate to take a Keeper without Siren Song just to give him Soul Hunger. What's the take on Enrapturing? I do hate losing the Banner of Hellfire in my testing games, but that Keeper set up with support has seemed pretty strong, even when playtesting with the same ruling you got (our round 2 will be run like that).

[moob]

That's pretty much how I've been going. I went back to the Siren Song KoS. Spirit Swallower is nice, and it certainly helped against the DE, but I only made that charge because I could regain the wounds in combat. Otherwise those Witch elves would have just been flared down with the rest..

When I play leadership-foo lists at 2,250, I use a Keeper with Siren, Torment Blade, Allure, and Soul Hunger (reroll wounds in round 1). Since the prelims, I've swapped back to the above KoS but replacing Soul Hunger with Enrapturing Gaze.. so even with a nearby general, it won't matter.

I'm not sure if I'm going to stick to Tzeentch daemons with the siren/enrapture KoS or go completely back to the previous list I had (which had a thirster instead of kairos, KoS as a level 1, and 2x6 flesh hounds & skulltaker instead of all the points in tzeentch heralds). My only concern with the leadership list is that STanks don't care, heh. Though I think it might do better against a slaan+kroak list.. the ability to have 6's not count on one wizard (Kairos) really is a pain. And the leadership list certainly doesn't care about rings of hotek.

[sirisaacnuton]

That does sound nasty pretty nasty. In terms of STanks, I think Kairos can handle them pretty well with Bolt+Spirit of the Forge, but it would depend on how much magic defense they have.

From what I've seen, the big question is probably which list fairs better against Daemons, VC, and EotG spam (though I suppose you'll have to contend with at least one harsh Empire list). That's the one place I really feel torn about the Keeper...I love the lore and what he can do, but it feels like a big hit losing the Banner of Hellfire for Icon of Despair, and yet I couldn't see his Ld stuff doing anything against ItP armies without both the Banner and Masque. Otherwise he's just a big monster with 7 attacks (*cough* BT). It may not do enough against ItP even with the banner...

[moob]

Nah, it works well even against ItP as long as they're not unbreakable like the temple guard-slaan stuff (or vampires). Don't forget it still messes with the break/instability tests.

Lets take a thirster as an example. Figure on your turn, you masque a thirster for an average -2 LD while getting in his arc with the keeper (and having the icon of despair near the KoS). On enemy turn, you siren in the thirster.

Now you strike first, 7 attacks hits with 3.5, wounding on 4's nets 1.75 wounds (I have soul hunger at 2,250 which would put it up to just over 2.5, but need enrapturing gaze for 3k). S6 armor pierce denies the 3+ save and he only gets a ward.

If he fails a single ward, he now needs two LD checks at -4 (testing on 5) to swing. That's not very likely... so on to combat res! You have a wound, mass is a wash.

He's instability testing on a 4. On an 8+ he's dead. If he doesn't pop on the charge, he'll die on your turn most likely.


Even Kholek, who makes paste of thirsters, is likely to fail, too. Now he starts with mass, but you hit him on 3's and he only gets a 6+ save. You get two wounds on him and he'll break / run away on his turn. If you dont' catch him on the pursuit, you immediately charge him again on your turn and gone.


STanks will take forever to kill. So long that the other ones will come smash you, heh.



Meta wise:
- Tzeentch-based is better against the STank-empire list I'll likely see.
- Both beat vampires (I've played vamps against these things enough), so that's a wash.
- Dark elves really depend on the composition. Tzeetch-based REALLY doesn't want to go up against a big shadestar with the ring of hotek and MR 3+. It'll be a very bad day... Or even any solid DE list that has the ring of hotek in a high MR unit.. but the thirster+KoS list will run it over.
- High elves can't really stop the flying circus from staying out of the charge arc of the DP's and casting drain life until they're all gone.. but the leadership stuff works well on them, too, so it's a wash.
- EotG/Slaan/Kroak I'm not sure. I've never played against it. I went against a 3 EotG + Slaan + Saurus lord with the tzeentch list, and it was tough.. add in Kroak and I'm not sure if I could stop it.


Have you went up against the EotG spam with slaan to steal 6's off Kairos' casting and Kroak's flaring? How'd you handle it? What lores did you choose for the sorcery heralds?