Game 7 - 2000 vs. A Different Dark Elf Player
Date: November 22, 2013
Opponent: Dark Elves
Point Value: 2000
Scenario
awn Attack
Overview
This is an opponent I've played a number of times with my Tomb Kings, but we've not matched up with his current book and my new army. I was looking forward to our game as he's always a real pleasure to game with.
As always, I was going to play aggressively, especially since he did not have a Cauldron Bus.
My army:
Same one.
1 Oldblood on Carnosaur with Loping Stride - Armor of Destiny, Dawnstone, Sword of Battle, Shield
1 Skink BSB - shield
1 Skink Chief - Ripperdactyl, Shield of Ptolos, Potion of Toughness, Spear, Light Armor
1 Tetto'Eko
24 Cohorts - FC
12 Skink Skirmishers
24 Saurus - Full Command
5 Kroxigore
1 Bastiladon - Solar Engine
1 Troglodon with Divining Rod
His army (sort of) :
Morathi on Dark Pegasus
A BSB somewhere I think, tucked away.
3 units of 5 Dark Riders
A block or two of spearmen
2 Hydras
12ish RXBs
12ish more RXBs
2 Bolt Throwers
Summary of Events
Tetto'Eko allowed me to vanguard 3 units, in addition to the Ripper Chief. I chose the Saurus, the Kroxigor, and the General, all of which were deployed centrally. My army as a whole did not get hosed by Dawn Attack except that the Troglodon got stuck way out on my left flank, away from everything.
We had one of those swamps that kills D6 models at a pop in the center of the table. That would be fun later.
With Vanguard, I moved the Saurus up to the side of the Swamp, denying him his desire to deny me the ability to cross over the Swamp with the Krox. The Krox got right up to the swamp with Vanguard and then swam across it neatly with their first move. No D6 dead models for me, thank you very much!
I also zoomed the Chief deep into his lines, past his shooters, in turn 1. He would be ready to take out a bolt thrower next turn if he could survive the hail of shooting about to come from his dark riders and the RXBs (who would be moving if they wanted to shoot me, giving me a little help). In his turn, the Shield of Ptolos proved its worth, protecting my Chief from all his bolts.
I also got some help on the magic front when Morathi miscast a spell early and lost her Purple Sun, her Black Horror, and one other spell. All she had left was the Toughness-based Death snipe. Of course, I repaid her to an extent by making sure Tetto killed several of his own cohorts each turn with miscasts. Once again he did almost nothing in the magic phase all game.
I can't remember exactly what killed the Troglodon this game. I think it was Morathi in combat, actually. It might have been some RXB shots. Either way, it died before it had any impact on the game.
The Troglodon did much better than Tetto in magic, darn near killing Morathi with a laser blast and keeping pressure on his dispel dice. By the time the game was over, he had distracted several of my opponent's units rather nicely.
Backing up though, the Chief did nail the bolt thrower and overran off the table, keeping him safe for a while.
Skinks blew away some dark riders (killing all 5 in one unit with one storm of darts at one point) and then moved to duel with his flanking stuff (bolt thrower, RXBs I think). They did fine and eventually died.
The cohort shots were also useful at pressuring Morathi at one point, but did not kill her.
The Kroxigor/Saurus/General brigade mixed it up with a spearmen block and executioners. That was cool. I lost the Saurus, but it took time. The Krox paid dearly for my stupid choice to field only 5 of them. I took attacks from the Executioners, losing 3 models before I swung. In return I had only 6 attacks, but with PF and stomps, I still killed about 7 or 8 Executioners. Imagine if I had one or two more Krox. The Krox fled and were eventually killed by a Hydra. The Carnosar died, as he does, but this still left the general to fight, which he did. After so much else died, he stood there killing spearmen at a rate high enough to ensure I would not run.
The swamp in the middle did claim one victim during the game. A hydra tried to charge but failed his roll, leaving him in the swamp, where he was sucked down into the bog. Burp.
Result:
Closely contested game, but still a loss for Lizardmen.
Post-game Thoughts and Unit Evaluations
Skink Skirmishers
I think you just can't go wrong having some of these in the army. They don't cost a ton, are very flexible, and help fill Core. I understand those who favor javelins or blowpipes and can see the uses for each. I'll probably add some javelins at some point.
Skink Cohort
This unit is only there to house Tetto'Eko. If he goes away at some point, they will too. In fact, they are likely to be gone before that, as I'll explain in the notes on the next Report. They just don't really add anything unique.
Bastiladon
He was a plucky little contributor this time! I still say there's no reason at all not to spend the modest amount of points on him at all point levels. If he were more, maybe I'd have to think about him, but right now, he's just right.
Troglodon
This was one of those games (as was the previous game) where if I were not dedicated to making him work, I would find myself a little closer to agreeing with others that he's not so great. The thing is, I've had him do enough in other games, and feel like it was Dawn Attack that got him killed in this one, that I just can't give up on him. The model is too cool, even if I did break the oracle's back pole last night.
Kroxgor
What was I thinking when I dropped a model from this unit. Never again. Six is the minimum unless I go with exactly three for some specialized role, which I don't see myself doing. I reduced the size to find points at 2000. Dumb. Then again, playing such small games is not exactly a genius move either. I really don't like 2000 point games.
Saurus
I need to keep in mind that 8th is set up to reward large units. This unit was too small. I need to get it to at least 30. Hmm...methinks the cohorts are about the mutate...
PF on S4 models really helped me eat into some Dark Elves last night. People can say what they want about the handling of the PF rules. I have no trouble rolling some bigger dice for the front rank. The drawback of having to chase enemies also has not hurt me yet.
This unit may not be a world-beater like Nurgle warriors, but it's solid.
Skink BSB
I made some re-rolls. Yay me.
Chief on Ripperdactyl
He was helpful this game. He took out a bolt thrower and drew lots of attention. I definitely need to play with him some more to get used to how to take advantage of such great movement (again, coming from TK it feels almost like cheating to move a model 20 inches). That said, if I had to cut points to add Kroxigor, he would be gone.
Tetto'Eko
What a shining turd he is turning out to be. He looks great at first, but he's a stinker. I had a comet come down at 3 markers and it killed only my Bastiladon (I may have said earlier it died to something else, but now I remember what actually did him in). He killed several of his own escorts. His spells did almost nothing, even when I had 12 power dice and the opponent had only a L1 Morathi. It's stuff like this that reminds me why TK are so frustrating to play - magic can be such a disappointment. Lucky for us, we don't count on it to win games for us - or at least we don't
have to count on it. If it were not for the Vanguard thing, I would have already gone back to 2 L1 casters.
Oldblood on Carnosaur
Dang it, I WILL make this beast work. Like the Troglodon, the model is just too cool not to. He does draw the attention of the enemy, so he's helping the rest of the army that way, and he gets the Oldblood deep into enemy territory quickly. Even when he dies, he keeps his VPs until the Oldblood bites it, so that's a perk if you like to play points-denial games. I just really need to figure out how to keep the beast alive longer.
It was pretty cool to see the Oldblood hold off an entire unit on his own though.
TTFN.
Thanks for reading!
