So i have an outdoor summer saurus savagery battle coming up my opposition is starborne. Very strong possibility of kroak, trog and lots of chargers. This is basically what i have to work with as far as troops. 1 slann 2 old blood carnasaur 1 old blood 1 astro-boy 2 skink starpriest 10 skink blowpipe 10 skink blowpipe 10 warriors club 10 warriors spears 6 aggradons (knights on bigger base) 6 aggradons (knights on bigger base) 6 kroxigor 1 stegadon 2 spawn of chotec I may have a unit of old school fb saurus and one skinks as well. Should i be looking to one drop, punch in the face or maybe look for the counter. one obc and one aggradon possibly two are auto include. Slightly tempted to take the spelleater even though its not ecconomical. thoughts?
I just saw this. Hopefully it's not too late. So most Starborne lists are focused on doing mortal wound magic to your forces while screening with inexpensive skinks. They are highly mobile and can use that to waste your time with their skinks while they blast you with mortal wounds and score objectives and battle tactics. To counter the mortal wounds magic, you have a few options: 1) Unbinds - you are Seraphon too, and have lots of Unbinds, many with bonuses unlimited range. You probably won't invest in magic nearly as much as a Starborne list, but you should be able to make life difficult. You may want to take the Andtorian Acolytes battalion so you gain the advantage with primal dice, or at least don't have a disadvantage if your enemy takes it too. 2) Zoning - an important truck to fighting Starborne is zoning. Starborne can only teleport in 9" from your models on the first turn, and has limited (albeit long) range with those spells. If Kroak or a Troglodon drop in outside of 7" to cast Celestial Deliverance at +6" range, they can get that spell 9" past your front line. So keep your key units more than 9" back from your front line and make sure they can't teleport closer than that. If they're playing Dracothion's Tail, wizards can drop in at 9" or 7", but can't cast that turn. But beware of the double turn. Also remember that as things are written right now, the Spacefolder's Stave can be declared in the movement phase and applied to a teleport in the following hero phase. 3) Slaughter of Sorcery - Starborne is dependant on wizards and the Astrolith Bearer for their Cosmic Node zones, their CPP generation and their MW damage. Each time you take out a wizard or Astrolith, they get substantially weaker. And many Starborne lists lean so hard into that play style that they don't have sufficient screening to protect their wizards. Use that to your advantage. As Starborne loses wizards, it gets progressively weaker. Seraphon doesn't have the best shooting to kill those wizards, and all but Kroak and the Troglodon are protected by Look Out Sir, so you'll have to kill the wizards mostly with melee or endless spells. If you don't have the endless spells, you'll want to focus on being able to reach those wizards. Heavenly Frenzy can help increase your threat range, and flying can help you bypass terrain or get over screens. Don't overlook the Starmaster's Gift from the Heavens ability. It's very good and opponents often don't see it coming. Give the gift of flying Aggradons. Of course, in all this, don't ignore scoring points or preventing your opponent from scoring points.
That's a pretty good pool too work with. The 12 Aggradons are great hammers that will cut through most of what Seraphon has pretty quickly with a little buffing. Buff them with Koatl's Claw's +1 to wound on charge, All Out Attack, Serpent Staff and Empowered Celestite. They are equal or better with clubs against everything Seraphon has except the Bastiladon. Even with Mystic Shield or All Out Defense, Seraphon only gets to 3+ saves, where clubs and spears break even. And the Star Priests' Serpent Staff, which is best used to buff the Aggradons of everything you have, buffs clubs better than spears. Let's do an analysis: 6 Aggradon Lancers with Clubs charging into Lord Kroak with All-Out Defense, 6+ Ward from an Astrolith Bearer and 5 Saurus Guard to bodyguard for him. Kroak has 18 wounds and the Saurus Guard have 10. As you attack Kroak, ⅔ of the wounds will go to the Saurus Guard, and their 6+ ward will negate ⅙ of those. The ward means you must deal 12 wounds to the Guard before they stop soaking up damage from Kroak. To deal 12 wounds to the Guard, you must deal 18 wounds to Kroak, after save rolls. Kroak has a 4+ save; 3+ with All-Out Defense, but your Aggradon will be at -1 and -2 rend, depending on the weapon profile, or better with Empowered Celestite. Because there are variables here, let's save that analysis for later and just note that we need 18 wounds to get to Kroak after saves to eliminate the Guard, and Kroak will have taken 6 wounds that the Guard missed. If we want to guarantee Kroak's death, we need to deal 12 more wounds, but for those Kroak will not have the Guard. He'll have the Astrolith's 6+ ward though. So on effect, we will need about 15 more wounds, after Kroak's save rolls. That's 33 wounds we need to deal, after saves. That's a lot, but we can get close with 6 Aggradons. Against Kroak's 3+ save with All-Out Defense, 6 Aggradons with clubs will average 14.89 wounds. Add in +1 to wound on the charge from Koatl's Claw and it's 18.61 wounds. That's enough to finish off the Guard, but not enough to guarantee Kroak dies. All-Out Attack will boost it to 23.7 wounds. Serpent Staff takes it to 28.31. Empowered Celestite gets it to 30. That's a lot of wounds. It will finish off the Guard and on average leave Kroak with 15 allocated wounds. If Kroak takes 15 wounds, he has a 98.15% chance of dying. That will probably do it. It's probably overkill. But be aware that falling a little short of 30 wounds, and getting 28 wounds, leaves Kroak with a 10% chance of survival instead of a 2% chance. That's still low, but 5x better for Kroak. But to be safe, before the attack, your could soften him up with MW from an endless spell or shooting from the Stegadon, if it has the Skystreak Bow.
Other things of interest: I feel the Spawn of Chotec will be useful against Starborne's screens. Particularly for the Stream of Fire moreso than the Glob of Flame Acid. They can toast a screen and then charge to finish off a unit. Stegadon is great for taking and holding objectives and is your best shooter with the bow or can take out screens with the fire throwers. The Starpriests don't have many good targets for Serpent Staff among those units, but the Aggradons are good ones, especially if they have clubs. I would highly recommend getting a Starseer. They are way more than 20 points better than the Starpriests, which are overpriced. The Carnosaur is great, and bringing him as the general makes him better, and makes your Aggradons battleline. The two commands each phase is super good!
So I ended up facing SOB in a strange twist 2 gate breakers, the king and a mob. My army Koatls claw Repel corruption Warlord:spell lore *gen. Slann Cmd: wrath of aeons Item: crystal skull Spell: telepathic summon, blizzard Saurus old blood carnasaur Astroboy 2x10 skinks blowpipe and club 20 warriors spears 2x6 Aggradon spear Highlight of the match: So I staggered my aggradons in an off set sideways formation to screen and additionally score extra attacks with spears through the gaps , taking advantage of the 42mm base width and the 2” reach of spears while allowing a second unit to be engaged to pump rage. Made sense since I was playing giants and a strong chance of remaining in combat. I managed to have two units of aggradons pump to +1 rage , slann hit with a blizzard popped a 3spell skull wrath of aeons with a unit of 17warriors a unit of 3 aggradon(second unit not wholly) and Carnasaur. Obliterated King Brodd on the left flank screened with my aggradons once the left flank was open to run in capture objectives and steal a win. Right flank was a skink screen that lasted a breathe