Meh, looking at destruction he has the following options if he wants to stick to various greenskins: 1) Get arrow-boyz, they'l outshoot your skinks, and the skinks are the main issue here. The rest he can chew through with some casualities, but the skinks constantly pelting his troops while he tries to kill your bastillidon makes things a bit difficult. 2) Get a warboss on wyvern so you can fly over stuff and eat the skinks 3) Get more of the various shamans, they seem to have the nasty habit of having area of effect spells which counters turtling fairly nicely 4) Get some grot spear chukka's, rock lobbers or doom divers to deal with the skinks. They don't have the same damage potential as the scraplaunchers against a large horde BUT they're basicly better in every other concievable way as far as siege machines go. They're actually surprisingly good for greenskin technology looking at them. Also, this would now quickly give him ranged superiourity as your skinks get annihilated. Also, they'd actually be usefull to deal with your other stuff, unlike the scraplauncher since they don't rely on fighting hordes. 5) Learn how to outmanouver you so he doesn't get stuck in a bottleneck while being pelted. Though this option might not be practically viable. Plenty of options, he just happens to have an army completly focussed on the wrong thing for dealing with yours. The scraplaunchers were a good idea in principle though.
Also, assuming your bastillidon & stegadon have the solar engine & skystreak bow respectivly his new list isn't going to change much unless he gets Lucky and manages to get some good casts in befre you shoot him. The moment those two get in range his weirdknob is dead and you're back to the missile supperiourity AND he has lost his mortal wounds & battelion. The bonus from the battelion should help quite a lot, but with only 1 weirdknob it's too easy to break the entire battelion apart. Hell, taking the battelion twice and dumping the maw crusha might end up being more effective.
The Maw-Krusha... yeah. We both realized it is actually way less dangerous than its huge point cost and figure suggest. But this is where his competitive attitude ends: he does not want to ditch it. It is his favourite model even when it is getting shot. Those other options: yes. The obvious choice is getting a Bonesplitterz Kunnin Rukk or basically every other good ranged option. I have no defense against that. Those artillery is all resin IIRC so I am safe. Maybe I'll go a bit more Saurus heavy when fighting the Ironjawz to make it more fun. He is pretty much through with Destruction and not very interested in building more Orruks. Next up: Our death stuff against either of our armies, and Nurgle vs. me. But reading their stats I fear it may get almost as frustrating for him...
What if you offer to build the Resin models for him? They should help him alot, but since they need to be protected from your shadowstrike they won't necesarly just completly stomp you. As for the Maw-Krusha, your army is essentially tailormade to deal with something like the maw-krusha. Sturdy behemoths to get it stuck on, a mobile army to kite him & lots of ranged weapons to fire at him while he tries to chase you. The only thing missing are units that are specialist monster slayers... It does have 1 advantage though, it can fly. Which would make it the only model in his current army that could actually reach your backline. If I were him I'd do the following: Dump the big-boss and make the maw-krusha the general - alternativly dump the maw-krusha. You're not fielding a large amount of heroes for them to stomp into the ground, so stick to one. Dump the balewind vortex - the battelion already gives extra range & this just paints and even larger bullseye on the weirdknob. With only 1 spellcast per turn & you having a bastillidon & stegadon & having a shadowstrike host that weirdnob is going to be shot into oblivion long before he can do much. Dump the warchanter - it's just kind of useless in this setup. His army doesn't need help actually killing yours, it needs help catching you. Get some of the stuff I mentioned earlier, preferably the siege stuff, but any combination should be an improvement. This also leads to an argument in favour of making him play with my magic rules; my rules don't have the same rule of 1, which would allow him to have multiple weirdknobs throwing feet of gork at you, I'm sure he can see the potential there Also don't worry there are some balancing checks in place.
The problem in moving the Maw-Krusha is the following: That thing has a HUGE base. Quite often my friend finds himself in a situation where my line is too close to his troops to place the Maw-Krusha between his guys and my guys (in the movement phase he has to stay 3" away, so his base size+3.1" is the gap he needs), but the 14" move are not enough to hop over my line either, so he cannot attack it from behind. That means the only option (that I see) would be to run, but then he cannot charge (which of course is bad news as well, his charge does a lot of damage and if he doesn't use it he is a sitting duck waiting in plain sight to be shot). About reaching my battleline: As soon as we start playing with allegiance abilities and artefacts from the GHB I assume that won't be such a big problem anymore. The extra move from rampaging destroyers is pretty nice, and if he uses an ironfist instead of a weirdfist (which he did during our last games) he can reach my line in turn one, because those two movement bonuses stack, making that 2d6" of movement in the hero phase. During our last games I tried to mitigate that extra movement problem by charging him with a unit (like some Knights, or with the Terradons from the back of his line), denying him that movement (as it works like in the movement phase, so you can't be in melee). The Warchanter is mostly used for buffing the Maw-Krusha and he doubles as a bodyguard for the Weirdnob. The idea was at least denying my flyers the charge on the shaman. The problem with buffing Mr.Dragonguy is the following though: There is no way the Warchanter can keep up with it. Even when he runs, by round 3 the boss is out of his range. I wouldn't call it useless though, combined with the Warboss' Waagh those +1 on hits can really hurt, with quite some Ironjawz hitting on 2s all of a sudden. About the Warboss: Up until now my friend was using a Greenskinz Orruk Warboss (on boar) to get the Waagh, and either gave him a shield to make it more durable or gave it the banner for the second buff. But of course that breaks Ironjawz allegiance (in the future he wants to play without our houserule which is allowing Ardboyz as Destruction battleline), so he will replace that one with an Ironjawz Megaboss to still get that Waagh. On setup the Warboss is also used to try and make sure I don't get to his Weirdnob with my flyers. The reason for not using the Maw-Krusha as general is that he wants to use it for charging my line, and it probably isn't that wise to do that with his general, since by now he knows that every unit charging my line first is pretty likely do die. I killed that Maw-Krusha by concentrated fire in one round more than once. And yeah, as mentioned before: He isn't going to drop his newly acquired Ironjawz heroes, he loves them. Especially the Maw-Krusha, although we all know that it is almost as expensive as three units of Brutes, and those guys are good. About the Balewind: Well, if he uses the Weirdfist he probably doesn't need it, but his line of thinking was like this: - summon in round one (with many boys close so probably won't fail), pushing some of the boys forward three inches, then they get their bonuses from Rampaging Destroyers and their Ironfist movement. 2D6+3+4" makes 14" on average so that unit (or probably two units) have a pretty solid chance for charging me in round one. - use the double range (meaning 36") and the bonus on the cast to get that Foot of Gork to stomp the puny lizards. It is pretty likely something valuable is in range and will probably die. Last week I had my Skink Chief, Astrolith Bearer, and my Shadowstrike's Starpriest in range, all three of them died which ensured his victory. Four stomps, all rolling four or more damage were just too much for me. Granted, that was a LOT of luck. I was still shocked. About building the resin models for him: That's actually not a bad idea at all, I will suggest that to him. Might be interesting in the future as well, because other armies he's interested in also have a few resin models. ...which brings me to my next army to fight against Seraphon. Take a look at the following Nurgle list: Do you think it has a chance against one of my lists, and why? If it doesn't: What would you change? It is basically two Nurgle Demon starter boxes + a load of Plaguebearers + an unclean one and a beast. Epidemius would also be nice but you can't buy him right now it seems. My gripes with it: - all Demons. Some Seraphon units do an almost disgusting amount of damage against them and/or to stuff like lower their bravery. I might play double Basti, Starpriest and Slann, just to make their faces melt. ...well, melt even more that is. - Nurgle Demons only have one battleline unit (Plaguebearers), and those guys are a bit like our Saurus Warriors in how they become maximum effective only as units of 20+ models (which means 30). I don't know if building and painting 80 of them is any fun. - The only ranged units are the Drones. I love how they look. They can fly but their range is not exactly high, and neither is their move. - Great Unclean One's Command ability kinda sucks Since demons of Nurgle have no Battletome with cool allegiance stuff I assume we could use other stuff in as battleline. Unfortunately Blight Kings don't work, since they are only MORTAL NURGLE battleline... I don't know about their synergies but Blight Kings look pretty awesome.... well, depending on your definition of awesome of course. I wouldn't date them I guess. Allegiance: Chaos Leaders Great Unclean One (240) - General Herald Of Nurgle (100) Herald Of Nurgle (100) Battleline 30 x Plaguebearers Of Nurgle (300) 30 x Plaguebearers Of Nurgle (300) 20 x Plaguebearers Of Nurgle (200) Units 6 x Nurglings (160) 3 x Plague Drones Of Nurgle (220) 3 x Plague Drones Of Nurgle (220) 1 x Beasts Of Nurgle (60) Battalions Tallyband of Nurgle (100) Total: 2000/2000
With respect to the maw-krusha, yea it might be a bit huge to actually jump over into your backline if you position properly. But at least it potentially could, or it could try to flank the first unit, charge in its side, hopefully kill it quickly then go towards the next one instead of just doing a frontal charge. It might buy it a bit a range. As for the warchanter, it isn't an awefull unit in itself. It simly serves no purpose in this context. He doesn't need +1 to hit on 1 unit, he needs to catch your ranged troops at which point he easily murders them. As for using his warchanter and boss to protect the weirdknob. Since you're fielding a bastillidon, stegadon & a shadowstrike host you have enough ranged firepower that this won't be all that reliable a protection. The balewind would provide equal protection since it also stops anyone from charging his weirdknob. Pushing stuff forwards with the balewind is a decent enough tactic, except that getting in range in 1 turn won't solve all that much. None of your stuff has extreme ranges, his main issue lies with running into your Knights, being stuck for a turn, then running into your bastillidon, being stuck for a turn, then running into your stegadon, etc. etc. all the while being shot at. Unless he gains such an ungodly amount of movement that his battleline can actually reach the skinks he'l Always be at the same strategic disadvantage. Also, the foot of gork on the balewind is cute, but can only be done on turn 2. At which point your bastillidon, stegadon, terradon & potentially your troglodon should all be shooting at him. Even with the 36" range he'l need quite a bit of luck to hit multiple things for it to be a reliable tactic since he's unlikely to get more than one or two spellcasts if that many. As for wanting to use the cool heroes, yeah this sucks In fairness, as he starts to go towards larger armies he should eventually overrun you since you can't protect all your flanks at once. At least not without fortifications. As for nurgle list: That list will have the same issues that his orruks have but with the following added advantages disadvantages: They are a hell of a lot sturdier with their double save, regenerative powers & the plaguebearers protection from ranged attacks. They are significantly slower They seem to have less damage on the charge, but more in prolonged engagements. It's chaos daemons Now the added sturdyness might allow them to simple walk through your hail of fire and overwhelm you. Their slowness means that the moment the unclean one & the drones are down you've basicly won as the rest doesn't stand a chance in hell of actually catching you. So just run around in circles shooting at em. The lack of damage on the charge means they won't be rushing though your army, but it might work better in dealing with the one-man tar-pit that is a bastillidon. Them being chaos daemons might mean you'l horribly murder them with the handfull of bonusses that we have. With your current list I wouldn't be surprised if he wins due to how much more sturdy this list is. But making use of our anti-daemon stuff and altering your list a bit you should probably win. Especially chameleon skinks could be hilarious against this list. Once the unclean one is dead he'd have nothing that could catch em | Edit: To improve his list: get a plagueclaw or two for decimating your skinks and blightkings might make for a nice anchor in his battleline, making his stuff even more sturdy. Beyond that, not that much else to do with nurgle other than heroes maybe.
That one made me chuckle. I see your points I think. Concerning Maw-Krusha: I think he should try running it on the flanks instead of in the middle like he does now. That will keep some of the shooting off of him. As for the Nurgle: He is going to build something nurgly around Christmas I think, if we have finished Death until then, so we still have some time to think about that. Maybe he'll change his mind and go for Rotbringer instead Demons, or even for something more different, like Skaven Pestilens, or Khorne for all we know . We are both still learning about all those armies that exist, (that's a lot to learn for people who have no prior knowledge of Warhammer at all) and what their strengths and weaknesses and/or play styles could be. Comparing them with the only armies we know something about (our current ones) is very useful, that's what this thread is meant for. What really struck me already is this: Seraphon - while not the strongest army - seem to be pretty versatile. It is hard to build a list that beats everything (which is why we don't rule tournaments), but it seems there is some kind of recipe against almost everything if you know what is coming. Many other armies I looked at don't have that kind of options it seems.
Totally we are versatile but sometimes too versatile! Biggest reason I went Rotbringer and one your friend may want to consider is they are not a "horde" army so less models needed to create a decent sized force something Nurgle demons and Skaven are not, fancy painting 120 plague monks? I didn't that's why I sold them and got Rotters
I am indeed quite hilarious. Anyways, his main approach with the orruks should be to surround you so you can't just use 1 unit as a tarpit while the rest shoots away at him. If he's basicly just doing a frontal charge with everything he's just making it easier for you Seraphon is quite versatile, mainly due to how much stuff we have. But the only things we truly excel at are summoning and magic, which is well, kinda ruined. In every other field we're about average, sometimes a bit above average. Also, because we have versatility we can actually use tactics & synergy between different types of units, which makes up for our relativly weak list. Your skinks aren't going to outshoot any real ranged troops, and our saurus warriors aren't going to win much if they're up against an equal value opponent. Combine the two and suddenly they can take on far more powerfull opponents because you now have a decent tarpit with decent support pelting away at anyone stupid enough to go into the tarpit. On the other hand, all the orruks essentially fullfill the same role: be sturdy melee guys. There's only so much you can do with that.
That brings up an interesting question, two actually: 1. Do you think that having terrain on the table would work more in his favour, or more in my favour? We are working on some terrain pieces right now, until now we seldom had more than one piece of terrain on the table. It would kinda limit my shooting, but also his movement. 2. Eternal + Shadowstrike, a list like the following one (just a rough sketch), how well would it work against the armies we talked about? Allegiance: Seraphon Leaders Skink Chief (60) - General - Golden Sickle & Blowpipe Saurus Eternity Warden (140) Skink Starpriest (100) Battleline 5 x Saurus Guard (100) ES - Seraphon Battleline 5 x Saurus Guard (100) ES - Seraphon Battleline 5 x Saurus Guard (100) ES - Seraphon Battleline 40 x Skinks (320) no batt. - Boltspitters & Star Bucklers Units 3 x Terradon Riders (140) SSS - Sunleech Bolas 5 x Chameleon Skinks (120) SSS 5 x Chameleon Skinks (120) SSS Behemoths Bastiladon (300) Troglodon (200) Battalions Eternal Starhost (80) ES Shadowstrike Starhost (120) SSS Total: 2000/2000
If the terrain is tall enough for him to hide behind it'l help him, or if terrain cover gives him a good enough save to be nigh on immortal. Otherwise it'l just help you by creating bottlenecks and making it even easier for you to buy to time to shoot at him. As for this list, it depends on how reliable his mortal wounds are. Saurus guard go down extremely rapidly against mortal wounds but an eternity host is hilariously difficult to kill otherwise. Possibly swap out the chief for a skink priest for re-rollable saves on all the guard. For skinks I'd probably go for blowpipes, especially against the slower nurgle, it could give you a second volley, whereas the javelins are only going to get 1 volley in while they're already in range. Also, at 40 skinks with a unit shielding them the short range on javelins might mean they can't even all hit if you're unlucky. Troglodon you might want to swap out for another basti or a stegadon. Anyway in short; this list is would be fairly amazing against that kind of army if they don't have much mortal wounds, the moment they have mortal wounds the saurus guard go down too quickly. Swapping them out with warriors might do the trick, but I wouldn't count on it given how much less sturdy they are.
1. AOS needs more terrain without it your on a straight kill mission, no wonder he is struggling how can he got out of LOS of your archers? you need buildings you can both hide behind or at least gain +1 save by being in cover, don't worry about making the terrain inspiring etc yet. 2. Solid list
Short battlereport from last Friday: Opponent was the same mixed Destruction list from above minus the Balewind Vortex, at 2400 points. I wanted to show that I can play a fun list without the "Skink Cheese" (Shadowstrike). I played a melee list, a Firelance plus a Thunderquake. It was.... interesting. ...to be continued...
So there I was, playing this list: Allegiance: Order Leaders Saurus Scar-Veteran on Cold One (100) - General - Trait: Reckless - Artefact: Obstinate Blade Saurus Oldblood on Carnosaur (320) - Artefact: Obstinate Blade Skink Priest (100) - Priestly Trappings Skink Starpriest (100) - Artefact: Phoenix Stone Battleline 5 x Saurus Knights (120) - Lances - Seraphon Battleline 5 x Saurus Knights (120) - Lances - Seraphon Battleline 5 x Saurus Knights (120) - Lances - Seraphon Battleline Units 2 x Razordons (120) 3 x Skink Handlers (40) Behemoths Troglodon (200) Stegadon (260) Bastiladon (300) Battalions Thunderquake Starhost (120) Firelance Starhost (60) 100 points spare (thought about getting a Balewind) Total: 2080/2180 And to be honest, I expected him to win. Because the last two times I played a Firelance it was a bad joke, failing charges, sitting there getting killed. I made the general reckless, to have a better chance for a succesful charge, and I set up my units far enough away to make my opponent's charge in the first round unlikely. He got initiative and used Rampaging Destroyers and the ironfist to go as far as he could. All of his units made good progress but failed to charge me (it was 10+ inches for everyone). The only one making the charge was the Maw-Krusha on the left flank, where I had my Thunderquake standing around. The Razordons failed their roll to make the attack of opportunity, the fat orruk guy did two damage on the Basti (with the charge) and killed the Stegadon in melee (dammit I wanted to use that -3 rend on him...) but then he was standing in front of the Troglodon, the Bastiladon and the Razordons, who did 6 damage on him. My Thunderquake was acting Savage of course. So now I had them where I wanted them. I forgot my Balewind Vortex for some reason... and also failed both the mystic shield AND the Priest ritual. My Firelance and my general advanced as far as possible. In the Shooting phase everyone shot the Maw-Krusha and that went well, he was going down. I charged with everyone who could and all charge rolls went well enough. Two barely did, but on the good side this time. I attacked and my friend failed a LOT of saves. But with all 15 Saurus Knights I did exactly ZERO mortal wounds. There were no sixes. Statistically I should have gotten at least two or three, doing six mortal wounds. But it didn't matter, the normal damage was enough. to kill some of the Ardboyz. In turn my friend's forces didn't hit too well, he only killed one Knight and damaged two. I had charged as densely as possible, leaving some of his boyz in a situation where they stood in each others ways and couldn't hit me. The enemy Aleguzzler did eight damage on my Oldblood on Carno (my General) but the Obstinate Blade did horrible damage on him. He got eleven wounds. In the middle he lost some Ardboyz and one Gore-Grunta. In the battleshock phase my friend had a major problem: The Savage Boarboyz faced the Carno and they had lost three boyz to wounds from the Knights, so he would have needed a low roll. He rolled a six... all in all he lost seven of his ten Boarboyz that round. We rolled for initiative and I won the double turn. I advanced, putting the Basti and the Troglodon into the melee, breaking his flank and plowing into his artillery. I failed my casts again, but the Carno shot the Aleguzzler who fell onto some Ardboyz, killing two, and then charged his heroes in the backfield, while my Troglodon and Bastiladon killed the artillery and my Knights continued to do some damage on the Ardboyz. At this point my friend was ready to concede the game, but I pursuaded him to finish my turn in the second round because I wanted to see whether the Firelance would stand melee with his boyz. They lost a few guys but it worked. My friend gave up the game in his hero phase. Now, he had some very bad luck. The last times I played a Firelance they failed, and even now I wasn't happy about how much space this formation needs. But he Scar-Vet on Cold One was pretty nice this time, hitting those Gore-Gruntas hard.
Judging from this the following went wrong for him: He still had his scraplaunchers, you have no hordes. These points are now largely wasted His maw-crusha went of on his own and was thus easy to focus. There was noone drawing away fire from him. Luck seemed to have heavily favoured you, with battleshock going your way and his aleguzzler falling on his stuff, him failing a large amount of saves. Also it looks like his weirdknob did nothing? He seemed to have screwed up his positioning given that his boyz stood in eachothers way. Admittadly he did have considerably more models than you given that you're heavy on the large stuff. But some of it should've been fighting the behemoths and not all of it should be on the Knights. I would say 75% luck, 25% him making mistakes
Yeah we talked about it as well and agreed that his tactical mistakes were - charging with the Maw-Krusha alone. He thought if he didn't charge then my Stegadon would charge him, doing terrible damage. And he wanted to kill/bind my behemoths. - playing his scraplaunchers. He fully expected me to play Skink heavy and since he is convinced that his other Orruks suck so much he didn't even bring them. I disagree. 240 points of Greenskinz would have been better in that case. About the Weirdnob: since he got the first turn he was still out of range and then I got double turn so when he got to play the Weirdnob half of his boyz were already dead. And yeah, the rest was luck. Knights are glass cannons and they worked well in this case.