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AoS Blood and Glory game 5 VS Tzeentch

Discussion in 'Battle Reports' started by darren watson, Nov 21, 2017.

  1. darren watson
    Kroxigor

    darren watson Well-Known Member

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    After game 4 we are still top of the charts and I'm wondering when my good fortunes are going to turn on me..

    Game 5 Steve Lang's Tzeentch Total conquest.

    Going into this game I was feeling confident, I had played Steve already recently at the FacehammerGT and had gotten a comfortable victory in Duality of Death. I think my list has the tools to deal with Tzeentch and I already had a game plan (or at least I thought I did, during the game I completely forgot what I had planned on doing).

    Steve ran:
    Lord of Change with 27" dispel range and something else
    Changeling
    Gaunt Summoner with mates
    Tzaangor Shaman
    2 units of 10 Pink Horrors
    20 Tzaangor
    6 Skyfires
    280 odd summoning pool

    A recap of my list:
    Kroak
    Astrolith-Incandescent Retrices
    Starpriest-Light of the Dracotion
    Allied Celestant-Prime
    10 skinks x 3
    6 rippers
    Shadowstrike formation
    340 summoning pool

    So here was my plan from my musings the night before.. Deploy deep and out of range of any of the Tzeentch spells and the Skyfires with all my important units. If I'm lucky I will draw them out to grab an objective of kill some Skinks, meaning my Rippers in the clouds can get them. Give the first turn to them, as if they take any objectives I should be able to get them back easily enough with the Prime, Razordons, Rippers. In my turn summon a second Astrolith to counter the 27" range dispel of the Chicken, having the toad in this match up isn't as essential as other, as Tzeetnch are generally poorly armoured, so take casualties anyway. Go nuclear a few times with Kroak and bring down the Prime turns 2 or 3 to clean up.. I forget all this the moment I sit down to deploy..

    Steve wins the roll to decide deployment and promptly chooses the corner where there are some Arcane woods. Making his spells easier to cast and denying me the same privilege, fair play. 20 Tzaangor and 10 Horrors form a protective ring around the rest of his army, bar the second unit of 10 Horrors that are strung out as far forward as possible towards the centre of his long table edge. Big chicken is towards the front behind the protective horrors, behind him to Steve's left go the Changeling,Shaman and his Skyfire buddies. the Summoner is placed behind the Chicken to his right.

    After seeing how Steve has deployed my mind is jumping straight to the fact he's left a gap at the back where my Rippers can jump over the Tzaangor on a decent enough charge roll and hit the Skyfires and Shaman. I am naturally aggressive with this list and try and win within 2 turns, as this list is capable of that with a double turn more than most. My inexperience with the list though costs me here, I should have stuck with my original plan, the benefit of hindsight.. I deploy with 10 Shadowstrike Skinks and the Starpriest in the 3" part of deployment in front of an objective (originally to try and draw the Skyfires out of position). The other unit of Shadowstrike Skinks are deployed the other end as far up as possible on my right, with the last unit a little back from the objective in the middle of my deployment. Astrolith and Kroak are right in my bottom left corner.

    I begin with making I'd say the first error in a game strewn with errors on my part. I go first.. That enticing gap at the back of Steve's deployment is singing to me.. After the Astrolith plants his standard Kroak rolls 1 reroll. He teleports centrally with no hitch and pops up on his vortex outside of the big chickens 27" dispel range. At this point I make my next mistake and roll to use his damaging spells before summoning the second Astrolith. The extra 8" range and additional plus 1 is really useful against Tzeentch and that dispel range of theirs.. I start with his big AOE spell, goes off and roll 7 for it's range, so a total of 22". Not enough. I decide to use my reroll to hopefully change one of the 1's I've rolled and roll a 2. 24" range now. Not enough, kill a few Horrors. With the Kroak show wiffing I and realising how exposed Kroak is, I am forced to summon a unit of Rippers instead. I have to put pressure on the Tzeentch centre so the Skyfires can't advance on Kroak and hope for a decent priority roll. They come down facing the unit of Horrors that are stretching out. I then place their toad in the centre, then make my next mistake by placing it between the Horrors the Rippers are facing and the Tzaangor. No idea why, think I'm on tilt after buggering up the initial part of this hero phase. Being in the centre would have meant more hits on the Skyfires, as they were, or at least should have been, my main concern. Kroak then gets mystic shield and -1 to hit on him in case we get double turned and those Skyfires fancy a pop at him. At the end of what should have been a cracking hero phase, all the Tzeentch characters are alive, sad times. Both units of Horrors make some Blue Horrors form Splitting and use 1's from the destiny dice to go back up to 10 models.

    I move all my Skinks up to the objectives for some quick scores. The Starpriest moves up to get his auto unbind in range of the Chicken. Rippers in the sky come down behind the Tzaangor to try and capitalise on the gap left at the back and I bring down the Prime in my bottom left to place a mini bomb in the middle of those Skyfires, in case the Rippers don't roll well for their charge (upon reflection another mistake, he's so good in this scenario late game! What am I doing?). Shooting see's The Tzaangor Shaman reduced to 3 wounds, a Skyfire death and a couple of wounds off the Chicken from the Prime, with a further couple of wounds from the Skinks on the Chicken thanks to some hard staring from the Starpriest. Rippers roll well enough to fly over the Tzaangor and get 1 on the Shaman, 2 on the Skyfires and 3 on the Tzaangor, with the other Rippers failing to engage the Horrors. I'm looking at my toad placement and shaking my head as I start rolling a shed load of dice.. Shaman dies, 5 saves for the Skyfires and 2 are saved, failing to bring down a second Skyfire (bloody toad) and 7 Tzaangor are no more. Return hits see a Ripper brought down. Happy days, at least the Fires are hampered for a turn. But there really should have been another dead. A few more Tzaangor run away and Steve is ready for his turn.

    After using his big chicken's command ability Steve casts Bolt of Change on the Starpriest to draw out his auto unbind. Kroak dispels the vortex the Gaunt summoner attempts but fails to stop the mystic shield on the fires.

    The Tzaangor and Skyfires are pinned by the Rippers. The Horrors in front of the smaller unit of Rippers move up to engage, with the other Horrors and Chicken moving forward towards my bottom left objective and within 27" of Kroak. Changleing follows behind the Chicken as well within 9".

    Shooting from the Horrors see a couple of Skinks die on my bottom left objective, Rippers take no damage from the other Horrors and the larger unit of Rippers takes a pounding from the Skyfires shooting.

    Only charge for Steve is his unit of Horrors charging my Rippers and rolling far enough to also engage my Skinks on my top right objective. Skyfires finish off my unit of suicidal Rippers and I am left with conundrum.. If I elect to fight the Horrors, they will split into blue Horrors. Potentially outnumbering my Skinks within 6" of the objective and gaining Steve 2 points. I reluctantly elect to not attack with my Rippers, with the Skinks moving away from the combat thanks to wary fighter.

    Turn ends 3-1 to me, but those 5 remaining Fires are now free and that Chicken is within 27" and reasonably healthy, I am hoping I don't get double turned..

    I get double turned..

    Steve starts with Bolt of Change on my Prime after popping his command ability and then drops him with an Arcane Bolt. Bugger. Kroak wiffs stopping both these spells and Steve's damage rolls are on fire, a sinking feeling is setting in. Then he completely outplays he.. In our game at the Facehammer GT he had deployed his Changeling in my army and lost him after my Starpriest had pre-game moved right next to him thanks to the Shadowstrike formation. So when I saw his deployment in his own half, I'd just put it down to him keeping him alive. Clever Steve has something else in mind though.The Changeling pops up on a vortex safely thanks to destiny dice and can now cast Infernal Gateway 36".. Didn't see this coming at all. It is something I should have known about, would have known about if I'd gotten to practice games against meta lists, but my gaming group don't do net lists and I rarely use Kroak outside of tournament games. Bugger, Kroak is outside of the 27" for unbinding but not outside of this 36" from the Changeling.. A very easy thing to counter early on with better placing after the teleport and summoning an Astrolith rather than an extra unit of Rippers. Kroak takes 6 wounds. (later we realise the Chicken had taken 6 wounds himself and decide the spell would have been wounding on 4's rather than 3's, to Steve's credit he says Kroak should be placed back on the table as later in this turn I rolled a 5 for his does he die test). My resolve is shaken though that sinking feeling isn't going away. My list doesn't let you make mistakes.

    Tzaangor move to consolidate around the objective they are protecting, Horrors and Chicken move to charge the Skinks on my bottom objective with Skyfires joining them with Kroak in their sights. Chicken is now within 18" of Kroak eek.

    Shooting see's the Skyfire's completely wiff their attacks at Kroak thanks to his -1 to hit and Mystic Shield. No Skinks die either from the Horrors, thanks to being in cover and some poor hitting/wounding rolls.

    Skyfires charge into the bottom unit of Skinks and roll high enough to engage the poor Starpriest as well. All die. another stand off at the top of the table between the Horrors and Rippers there and Steve's turn ends 4-3 after I roll a 5 for Kroak's dieing test..

    My turn starts with the discussion about Kroak taking those 6 wounds from the wounded Chicken and he's placed back on the table and Steve was happy he;'d used 3's instead of 4's for determining how many wounds Kroak had taken. If it was even 1 less, he would have survived with a roll of 5.

    Phew.. I knew something didn't feel right.. We are still in this, if the Kroak show turns up and we can win priority back!

    It does turn up. all the destiny dice are pretty much used up and Kroak rolls better than the Chicken, good Kroak. Changeling and Gaunt die, Chicken goes down to 5 wounds. Sadly, the Skyfires only lose a 2 wounds and only 1 is removed and the 2 units of Horrors and Tzaangor only lose 1 each as well. Astrolith teleports over to the top objective. If I can take out the remaining 9 Horrors in 1, only 10 Blue Horrors will be deployed when they split (there's 90 odd points left in his pool as some Blue Horrors were made from the other unit at some point and got burned by Kroak's finally turning up.) and I will still have enough on the objective to score. He'll also be further away from those Skyfires later in the game.

    No real movement, the 10 Skinks in the top charge the 9 remaining Horrors. Now it's my turn the Rippers are free to swoop again and between them and the Skinks kill the 9 Horrors who split into 10 Blues. A Ripper is in range though, so the turn end 5-4 to me.

    Game is probably decided on this priority roll and..


    We lose it..

    The Chicken Infernal Gateways Kroak and despite being on 5 wounds causes 6 wounds on him, damn Steve and his damage rolls.. Kroak later rolls another 5 for his test and dies... Fires move on to Shoot the Skinks on my bottom right objective kill 2. Horrors move onto the bottom left objective. In the top I elect to move Skinks away form combat and not attack with the Rippers. 6-5 to Steve

    I move my bottom Skinks further into cover as far away from the Fires as poss. In the top Astrolith joins the fight and we wipe out the Blue Horrors. Now there are 10 Brims.. 6-5 going into turn 4...

    I still think I can pull off the comeback of the century if we can win a priority roll..

    We lose another priority roll..

    Skyfires move up to be closer to the bottom left Skinks and be able to shoot the Rippers in my top right corner. Kill 2 Rippers and then fail there charge on the Skinks hiding in the woods, it was an 8 to charge and without destiny dice Tzeentch can fail things. Good. Remaining Ripper and Astolith kill a load of Brims. 7-6

    I teleport my 10 Skinks over to the bottom left objective, there is only 3 Horrors there with the Chicken floating about. If I can get a cheeky charge and then retreat off it I will get a cheeky 2 points. If I win priority finally, I'll get another mitigating the 2 points he will get back after he charges in the Chicken.. Skinks might even survive the combat as the Chicken is wounded. I have no other outs, so go for it. Skinks to kill any horrors from shooting and fail their charge. Brilliant.. I do Kill the Brimstones though. 8-7

    I finally win a priority roll.. however.. If I elect to go first I can get a maximum of 4 points, ending on 12. Steve can then very easily get these back off me with the Chicken and Skyfires.. and would likely score 5 in return. ending on 12 and beating me on kill points for the minor victory..
    I don't do damage limitation, I have come to win, I don't play for minor loses. If there's a chance for a victory I will take it.
    So despite finally winning a priority I have to give it away.. Chicken kills 3 Skinks with Arcane Bolt after wiffing Infernal Gateway, good start. 4 remaining Skyfires kill another 3 Skinks in the woods leaving them on 5.. they now have a 6 inches charge on them and.. they make it. Also the trees are deadly and.. they pass all the tests. thanks to the trees only 2 Fires are in.. 1 is rolled for the discs attacks, they then fail to hit. Guys on top attack, they than fail to hit! all this with rerolls as well! Beaks then.. both hit and wound, I promptly fail both 5 up saves.. FFS, so close, if one had passed, he wouldn't have gotten 2 points and I could have got this.. Skinks were almost heroes. Brimstones all die. Turn ends 11-8..

    One last try! My one remaining Ripper rolls a 6 on his teleport! He's going straight for the Skyfires. Plan is kill one, don't die and get the 2 points back.. Other Skinks retreat and the unit over the other side move into to take on the other Horrors. Shooting and they kill nothing.. GRRRR.

    Ripper charges and heroically kills a Skyfire! Then heroically dies. Other Skinks and Horrors flail around but we out number them, so it doesn't matter. It comes down to this... If the Skyfires roll a 6 for BS there will be 2 models to my 3 Skinks and I'll get 2 points back. Justice I feel for the lack of priority rolls..

    I don't remember what it was, but it wasn't a 6..

    Game ends 11-10


    My luck at B&G has finally run out and the dream of a Seraphon podium is over.

    I lost this game though. Steve out played me and adapted well from our first encounter. My inexperience with the list cost me here. If the Prime had come down 1 or 2 turns later I think this would have been a different result. Lessons learned. If I had stuck with my original plan on how to play non Changehost Tzeentch I could have pulled this off. Gutted as well, how cool would that Rippers last heroic charge have been if it had worked!

    Going into game 6 we are down but there is who is going to the masters 2017 still to play for. I'm currently 6th in the UK but that could change as this is my last tournament of 2017, so a top ten position will hopefully help me get there.. Last game is against Fyreslayers.. Great, my armies second to worst match up in Knife to the Heart to boot..

    TBC
     
    Last edited: Nov 21, 2017
  2. Seraphage
    Stegadon

    Seraphage Well-Known Member

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    Breath taking battlereport, thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and wisdom of the loss.
    This is always the most important thing one can gain along with a tournament victory !
     
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  3. darren watson
    Kroxigor

    darren watson Well-Known Member

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    Happy to share, thanks for reading
     
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  4. Aginor
    Slann

    Aginor Fifth Spawning Staff Member

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    Thanks for posting!
     
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  5. Xasto
    Terradon

    Xasto Well-Known Member

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    I was on the edge of my seat the whole report! Great game!
     
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  6. Arawn
    Saurus

    Arawn Member

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    Very nice report!! Thanks for sharing!!
    I played the first version of your list (with 3 rippers and the Bastiladon) VS a Change host this weekend, it went very well, nice victory. But as you said, the list doesn't let you make any mistake, a bad deployment can make you lose quickly.
    Thanks as well for the idea of summoning a sencond Astrolith, never thought about stacking his bonuses before !! :)
     
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  7. Crowsfoot
    Slann

    Crowsfoot Guardian of Paints Staff Member

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    Great report again, shame on the loss and lets hope you can do well against the Fyreslayers and secure a top 10 finish.
     
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