Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Game Night: One Win, One Loss

I got over to my FLGS tonight to play some Warmahordes and got in two great games.  The first was against the local pressganger, a Skorne Player.  We played a 25pt. Killbox game.  Again, since I am learning quite a bit, we played pretty loose and my opponent was super cool about the game while still not pulling any punches.  He had:


eHexeris
-Titan Bronzeback
-Titan Cannoneer
10 Nihilators
4 Paingivers
Agonizer

I took:
pSeverius
-Reckoner
-Vanquisher
min Temple Flameguard +UA
min Choir
Covenant
Vassal
pEiryss

This game was a fun one despite facing a vastly more skilled opponent.  The game hinged around a critical setup in the middle of the field where I moved up my Reckoner to receive the Bronzeback.  I gave the Reckoner enliven and cast vision on him along with using the covenant to prevent knockdowns.  Unfortunately, my opponent had his Nihilators close enough to get a few into combat with him.  They were able to do damage to him triggering enliven and then the Bronzeback came in and tore him apart.  This signalled a huge shift from things looking to go in my favor to significantly in my opponent's favor.  I didn't have anything to jam up lanes to pSevvy at that point and so went in for a desperate assassination attempt on Hexeris and simple couldn't convert.  The Bronzeback summarily beat down my Vanquisher and then threw him into pSevvy for the kill. 

I learned a few things in this game though.

1) pSevvy really has some nasty spells.  Defender's Ward and Eye of Menoth are huge. 
2) Consequently, a unit of Flameguard with Defender's Ward and shield wall is annoying.  Adding iron zeal makes them horrendous to get rid of.
3) Ashes to Ashes is deceptively good, but suffers from low POW.
4) pSevvy really likes an arc node.  I kept wishing I had my Revenger out to play.

Game 2 was another killbox scenario.  My second opponent was open to a 35pt. game. 

He took the following Cygnar army:

Kara Sloan
- Defender
- Hunter
- Hunter
Gun Mages with officer
-Cyclone
Reinholdt
Harlan Versh

I took another pSevvy list:

pSevvy
-Reckoner
-Vanquisher
Avatar
min Choir
max Flameguard + UA
Covenant
Vassal

This game was interesting to say the least.  Turn 1 saw my opponent move up and wait.  Chiefly, he swung his two hunters around on my right flank which diverted me a bit.  In my turn 1, I moved up and tried to potshot his hunters.  My Vanquisher missed, but deviated onto a gun mage.  My Reckoner shot a nasty shot into one of the Hunter severely damaging it.  Otherwise, I put up Eye and Defender's Ward on the Flameguard where they held my left flank facing off against the Defender, many of the gun mages and Harlan.

In my opponent's Turn 2, he popped Sloan's feat and went to town on my Avatar.  Unfortunately, I lost him.  However, it took the whole turn.  My only other casualties were a couple Flameguard. In my turn, through some snazzy movement, I was able to charge the damaged Hunter with Reckoner and destroy it.   My Vanquisher dropped a template on the other Hunter and did a few boxes of damage and set it on fire.  My Flameguard were able to get into combat with Harlan, but couldn't charge his gun mages due to some cover fire from the Cyclone.  They ended up doing 2 damage to him.

In turn 3, he began to go to work on my Reckoner and while really damaged, it survived and still posed a threat.  It was at this point though that my support began to get whittled down.  I lost 2 of 4 choir and my Vassal.  It was looking harsh, so I knew I needed to work something out quick.  In my turn, I moved my Reckoner out to tie up his Hunter, but didn't accomplish much with my club arm damaged.  My Flameguard, charged a few gun mages and killed one I think.  pSevvy stepped though and did some real damage by casting Ashes to Ashes on his Cyclone and using it to blast 4 gun mages including the officer.  I also popped feat which would make my opponent's next turn really hard.  Finally, my Vanquisher got lucky and missed a shot on the last gun mage which deviated onto Reinholdt and Sloan.  Reinholdt died and Sloan took something like 2 damage and caught on fire. 

At turn 4, my opponent started to feel the pressure.  He knew he had to do some damage to pSevvy.  Everything moved up to try and kill him.  Sloan plinked off about 7 boxes, his Cyclone stepped up and rolled all 6 of its shots and left me on a single box!  At that point, with the failed assassination Sloan was hung out for my Vanquisher to charge in and smash her face with his blazing star.  Victory to Menoth.

This game was sweet.  I could not believe that last turn.  The Cyclone needed 8's to hit and couldn't do much since Sloan had no focus.  It was a nail-biter.  I think he hit 3 or 4 out of 6 shots, but not being able to boost meant that he had a hard time getting past ARM 14 + 2 camped focus.  It was tough seeing the Avatar go down in turn 2, but seeing him withstand so much damage including out of activation shots due to Sloan's feat was awesome.  By soaking damage, he really saved my bacon.  Again, my Flameguard were aces.  At one point, I had Defender's Ward, Shield Wall and Iron Zeal up.  I think they had DEF 15 ARM 23 and that simply made them heinous to do anything to. 

Warmahordes is really growing on me. I love the fluidity of the gameplay.  Having so many options available in an army, different combinations of activations, and synergies from multiple effects really adds to its depth. I got a real sense of how out-of-my-league I was in playing despite making some decent decisions along the way.  This game is really going to be a sweet learning experience. 

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
That.Was.Awesome.
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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