Christmas Loot: One thing

Well... it's this time of year in which all good bloggers share the treasure trove of models they accrued during the Christmas holiday.  Reading blogs has illustrated how important holiday gift giving is to most gamers.  This year, I too, received some Privateer Press.  My vast addition to my treasure trove: Rhupert Carvolo. Yeah, I only got one thing this year, but that's life sometimes.  Real life is more important than gaming....yeah I said it.  Thus, I made this one small addition to my collection.

That said, I think Carvolo is a huge addition to my Menoth army in terms of what he brings to the table.  He is a veritable tool box of useful abilities from granting tough to pathfinder.  I think that Carvolo's best use is in buffing our tarpit units, namely Temple Flameguard.  He provides Temple Flameguard with all they need to get into position, jam a section of the table, and hold it for a long time or cause your opponent to allocate an inordinately large portion of their army to getting rid of this unit.

Pathfinder goes great lengths towards getting your Flameguard to where they need to go.  It also lightens the deployment burden on terrain heavy tables.  These all help a great deal in providing pressure on your opponent to deal with your army instead of actualizing their own plans.

I will be the first to admit that I don't see tons of merit in Carvolo's +1 DEF and terror song.  Terror is highly situational and statistically unviable.  The +1 DEF can be helpful, but only with high DEF units/models.  Of course, it becomes much stronger with a caster that can throw out defender's ward.  The best unit for this particular song, in my opinion, would be a unit of Daughters of the Flame. If DW is cast on them followed by the dirge of mists, you are looking at an insanely hard to hit 18 DEF!  Yikes.

Lastly, you have the bread and butter of Carvolo.  Heroic call grants fearless and tough.  This really makes Flameguard shine as their primary missions are usually to tarpit and hold objectives.  In shield wall, you are looking at DEF 13, ARM 17 with tough.  Throw in the UA and for one turn you are getting DEF 13 ARM 21 with tough.  If you are like me and like to play Flameguard with pSevy, you can bump those stats up to 15 and 19/23 respectively with DW.  Then on that magical 5+ they stay put to annoy your opponent for another round.  Insanely good.

The obvious answer to this situation is to kill off Carvolo and with a CMD of 8, he has to stay close to your units to help them out.  His stats are great, so screening and hiding behind terrain are going to be a must.  If you can accomplish that, you will dramatically increase the effectiveness of our infantry, Temple Flameguard being the biggest recipients, in my opinion.

Now, I have to get Carvolo glued together and painted.  Since he is a Merc, I really want to make him look different from the rest of the army to show that status.  My pEiryss and Gorman both have a lot of green, a color which doesn't appear in my red and white Menoth army.  This provides a bit of visual contrast for the army, so it isn't constantly a sea of similar colors.  I'm thinking of painting in greens and blues for Carvolo and I love some of the models out there that are showing him in simulated plaids.  So, hopefully, he will be up on the table soon and ready to play shortly thereafter.

Thanks for reading.

Why'D You Pick That? Vanquisher Heavy Warjack

Howdy folks!  I'm back with another installment of my series on why I choose the models I have for my Menoth army.

This time around I am going to talk about the Vanquisher Heavy Warjack.  It's generally accepted that our best all-around Warjack is the Reckoner, which I don't generally disagree with all that much.  However, I really have been enjoying the Vanquisher.  It provides a lot of utility to our army in the way of shooting and anti-infantry ability.  So, let's break it down.

My Vanquisher, ready to rumble.

The Vanquisher will strike most players immediately as an obvious choice for clearing infantry out.  The Flame Belcher cannon is a flaming, continuous fire 4" AOE at POW 14.  This will effectively kill most infantry and solos outright despite armor and defense buffs.  The large AOE means that even on misses, clumps of infantry will get hurt badly and at very least, they will be set on fire. The POW 14 also means that you will have a bit of warjack damaging ability.  With a boost to damage you can even put a significant dent in heavies, though there are better targets for this gun.  The fact that the gun is a 4" AOE also means that you don't have to fear those high defense and stealth models so much.

If that weren't enough, Vanquisher's blazing star melee weapon is P+S 16 and has thresher meaning that if this 'jack can get into melee range of several infantry models, he will start clearing the field quickly.  I like pairing him up with a Vassal of Menoth so that I can get into melee, clear some models out, and then use Ancillary Attack to get off an out of activation shot on additional models that might have been previously blocked.

If that weren't enough, I think that the Vanquisher could be a sneaky heavy killer.  It couldn't necessarily take out a heavy warjack on full damage, but it could certainly finish one off with a complement of focus.  With a choir buff (which you will take if you play any competitive Menoth list), you are looking at P+S 18 for the blazing star.  On average dice you will take about 6 boxes per hit on a heavy.  With boosting, you can take out whole columns and then some.  Not to mention that it can handle most warbeasts which typically are looking at slightly lower ARM stats.

I am really seeing the Vanquisher come into its own in my current 35pt eFeora list.  The lists looks like this:

eFeora +6
- Redeemer (bonded) -6
- Vanquisher -8

Avatar -11
Min Choir -2
Full Temple Flameguard +UA -8
Visgoth Rhoven and Honor Guard -4
Vassal of Menoth -2

The bonded Redeemer get continuous fire on all of its shots and with some focus from Feora, can pump up to 3 shots out in its activation.  The Vanquisher will normally merit the use of the Vassal as I mentioned above.  This means it can fire twice per turn early in a game or make additional melee attacks if need to clear out infantry.  The Flameguard provide me with some tough denial ability while the Avatar is my main beatstick.  Rhoven is there to provide an option against stealth and protect my backfield.

So, there you have it.  The Vanquisher is a spiffy warjack and one that I find shines time and again as a reliable staple for my Menoth lists.

What are your thoughts?  Is the Vanquisher capable of playing an all-around role?  Do you mainly use it as an infantry clearer? Is that a better option in the current meta where we are beginning to see a lot more infantry?  Let me know.  Thanks.