9 replies to this topic

[Gimlisonofgloin]

I have posted one battle report as to the heroic ventures of the Dwarindane Throng in my local hobby stores ongoing tournament, and though I have not yet posted another battle against the dreaded elves of the woodline (In which the dwarfs came out utterly victorious) I am going to post todays battle against the Warriors of Chaos.

 

So in case you did not read my last posting my local shop has an ongoing tourney in which we start out with 1000 points plus a character with predetermined stats to be a representation of you as the general on the battlefield.  Each week has a different scenario and every two weeks the point value of the games go up 500.  If you win the scenario you get 2 hero points if you lose you get 1, there are various ways in some scenarios to earn extra points but a max of 5 can be earned each week.  every 5 hero points your character gets a significant upgrade.

 

This week I was only able to play one battle so far and it was against the feared WoC.  The scenario was a modified tower scenario from the rule book with the special rules that only the general ( your personal character) could occupy the building and when you did you got a hero point and could immediately move one unit (specified before the battle) to any table edge following the rules for ambushers.  So essentially they got a magical portal to ambush, pretty bad Test.  The objective was to win by points after 6 turns jut like a normal game, or to table the enemy.

 

His army 

His general/personal character (at the moment basically the same stats as an exhaled hero save only heavy armor and ld 7 but he does give his unit hatred)

 

Sorcerer Lord lvl4 magic w/ chaos familiar and scaly skin

 

Exhalted hero with halberd

 

14 warriors FC w/ two hand weapons and mark of Khorne (in a 6 man front with 3 floating int he back rank after the hero joined)

18 warriors FC w/ mark of nurgle 

10 war hounds with vanguard

20 marauders FC w/ flails and light armor

 

Gorebeast chariot

 

3 Skullcrushers  FC ensorcelled weapons

 

My list

Runesmith GW Shield 2 RoSpellbreaking

ME

 

27 Longbeards w/ shields standard and Musician in a 7x4 formation

20 DW w/ GW and shields and musician 

 

cannon w/ RoForging

Gyro w Vanguard

Gyro

 

OG w/ RoAccuracy and RoForging

OG w/ RoAccuracy

 

5 Rangers 

 

I tailored my list to try to do the best I could against Chaos.  I sacrificed the bsb hoping to not really see much combat with the two OG's and cannon going at it.  My strategy was to hole up in a corner and hope he was pretty focused on the objective and to shoot as much as I could out of play before anything could get me in combat.  

 

I wish i knew how to make those fancy diagrams some of you guys have because this would be so much nicer but alas i do not yet. maybe for the next battle.  

 

It was a 4x4 table with no terrain save the tower.  I deployed my gyros first, the one with vanguard on the front of my deployment zone and about 6" from the right table edge to counter his 10 dogs that were formed up opposite him.  then i put the other gyro on the other side of the tower where he had just placed his juicy marauders. then he placed the nurgle warriors opposite the first gyro so i placed the DW touching the bottom of the board and 2 inches from the left corner looking in toward the center of my edge (my idea was to block any chance he could get of putting his ambushers (which were his Skullcrushers) behind me since I was going to left him get to the tower and place the longbeards facing out towards the battle so if he pooled them into existence near me I could charge with either unit and hopefully kill or at least deter them long enough for the other to get there and shooting to still happen. I then placed my two OGs very exposed between the two unit but since he had no shooting I wasn't terribly worried. lastly my cannon went all the way to the bottom right corner of the table, opposite my forces so it could get flank shots on the crushers and hit the chariot right away.

 

Pregame

He won the roll but opted for me to have turn one which was fine by me.  My entire Throng burned with hatred against the Chaos scum as i rolled a 6 for ancestral grudge! I placed my rangers 14 inches from his dogs and 17 from his gorbeast in an attempt to draw their attention this way and in order to block his vanguard movement from the dogs, keeping them away from my cannon. he van guarded his dogs 2 inches forward (insert evil laugh here) and i van guarded my gyro up to hover next to the rangers peeping it for a bombing run at the dogs in the first turn.

 

Unfortunately I will have to finish this post with the actual game in a few hours as my wife just got home and of course she's going to want to hang out.  Don't worry it will be up by the end of the night my fellow Beard wearers!!

 

TO BE CONTINUED 

[Gimlisonofgloin]

My sincerest apologies for the delayed continuation, one tankard of Bugman's good stuff quickly escalated into several others...

 

So as I was saying he won the toss but elected to let me have the first turn.

 

TURN 1

Dwarf

My gyro that was hovering by the rangers flew forward to the opposite side of the dogs dropping its bombs on the way and scoring a resounding 10 hits against them.  Of the ten hits 7 of them wounded leaving him with a measly 3 dogs left which somehow miraculously held their ground. the other gyro moved just within range of his khorne warriors in an attempt to force a 12" charge from them and not let them march. That was the extent of my movement as I was pretty much where I wanted to be for the shooting phase.  Both OG's unleashed a satisfying volley of 14 shots from one and 12 from the other scoring about 10 hits and a solid 7 wounds on the marked of Khorne warriors. the cannon scored a direct hit on the chariot taking 4 of its 5 wounds from it in the first round. the rangers fired their crossbows at the remaining dogs scoring one hit but were unable to wound unfortunately. Fair enough they had done their job of blocking the vanguard from getting too close to my cannon. That was it for my shooting as one gyro was out of range and the other had charged.

 

WoC

In his first turn he attempted to hold back the khorne warriors but my plan worked for once and they failed to rally, blindingly charging forward 5 inches with the failed charge. He then charged my rangers with his Gorebeast who elected to stand and shoot scoring 3 hits and 1 wound which he failed to save! The rangers killed the chariot before it ever even saw combat!  His skull crushers marched forward to the opposite side of the tower from my cannon  blocking them from its view, smart. the rest of his units lumbered forward towards my corner, save for the dogs which failed their march block and moved 7 inches toward the cannon and rangers and his nurgle block with the Lord also moved that way.  The winds of magic were in his favor and he got 12 die giving me 6 Dispels.  He managed to pop off the spell that gave d3 + toughness to his marauders who ended up T6. and then he killed my Gyro by the dogs with 3 S5 wounds none of which were saved. I was unable to dispel anything as he was a lvl 4 wizard with the familiar.

 

TURN 2

 

Dwarf

In my turn 2 the gyro dive-bombed the marauders and was also in range to hit with the steam gun.  The dive bomb again scored 10 hits but due to their t6 only killed two. everyone else held with the exception of the long beard block angling slightly more towards the Khorne warriors.  The shooting phase saw the gyro taking down 3 more marauders and both OG's firing desperately at the Skull crushers scoring an astounding 18 hits and 7 wounds but all save one of the wounds was saved by the brass behemoths. the cannon attempted to hit the lord which he did but the look out sir was enough to make it only kill 2 nurgle warriors and not the Lord. The rangers managed to finish of the dogs with their shots and at this point they were my MVP's for only 75 points.

 

WoC

He was not in range for any charges  but moved everyone forward as far as they could, which in the case of the marauders and the skull crushers was not much as they failed their march blocks with the Gyro right next to them.  the marauders had his general in the unit and he was simply trying to get him into the tower as soon as possible but it would take him at least 2 more turns as he was just out of regular movement into it. The winds were angry at him this round and he rolled snake eyes for magic and was not able to get anything off.

 

Turn 3

Dwarf

At this point my gyro was still following and harassing the marauders and the rangers turned to face the approaching nurgle threat and defend their cannon to the last. the cannon was in range of the skull crushers now but only hit one scoring 2 wounds which was enough to kill one of them so I was pleased.  the Organ guns performed admirably with 16 shots between them and managed to kill another of the daemonic beasts of khorne.  The gyro then unleashed a stream of steam on the marauders and since they were back to normal T, 11 of them were engulfed in the heat and melted on the spot!

 

WoC 

The remaining skull crusher charged the nearest OG and made it while the Warriors of Khorne charged into the Shieldbeards ranks and the Nurgle warriors charged headfirst into the rangers who managed to take down one with the stand and shoot. again the gods were displeased with him and he rolled a 3 for magic then managed to get one spell off that decreased the rangers WS and I by 1 this round. close combat saw the rangers hold their own actually killing one of the nurgle warriors thanks to hatred of them, and only losing 2 of their own rank. They managed to hold where they stood.  The OG stood no chance against the monster and was slain outright.  The monster then overran into my ME who looked at it with no fear in his eyes.  The remaining warriors of knorne, even with their 4 attacks each and 6 wide formation only managed to kill 3 Shield beards thanks to the parry save bonus and the shield beards, seeing their brethren fall and a hatred igniting in their hearts, mowed down the entire remaining unit and the hero in one fell swoop of dwarf steel!

 

Turn 4

Dwarf

the DW charged the last monster attempting to come to the aid of their friend and the longbeards marched toward the tower in the center. The gyro managed to finish off all but two of the marauders who again miraculously held their own and did not flee.  The remaining OG did not fire as it was looking like I was going to wipe out his entire army before I got a chance to put my general in the tower and get the bonus point. Combat resulted in the dedicated ME falling to sword of the brutal chaos knight on his monster but the warriors in their rage managed to put 7 wounds on the creature of which only 3 were saved and they rejoiced as the beast fell. the rangers finally lost their ground when they saw another of their fellow dwarfs fall and turned to flee only to be cut down in their retreat.  They served more then their original purpose and were invaluable for the game.  

 

WoC his general finally made it into the Tower and the remaining nurgle warriors with the Lord charged the cannon. As he was too far for magic to do much of anything save boost his T he did just that but it was irrelevant anyways as they cut down the crew before they had a chance to retaliate.

 

TURN 5/6

At this point the marauders were killed by my gyro and the general was killed by my shield beards who then raised my general to the tower scoring me the extra point and his last 3 nurgle warriors with the Lord were so far away we called the game as it would have taken 2 turns to get him close enough to do magic even.

 

My personal thoughts.

The OGs with accuracy and that ME were spectacularly important this game as they whittled down his forces enough to not be too bad by the time he was able to charge. 

 

The cannon almost killing the chariot in the first round was amazing and I will never go to battle against Chaos without one.

 

The real winners of this game though were the Gyros and the Rangers.  The gyros coming up with almost 40 kills between them and blocking 5 different march attempts which kept crucial parts of his forces out of the fight or another turn. And the Rangers coming in at 3'7" 140 lbs and 75 pts were MVP x1000! Starting by blocking the vanguard from his dogs to my cannon and enabling my vanguard movement followed by killing the chariot before it saw combat, taking the remaining dogs out of play like the scoundrels they were and then holding their own against a far superior row for long enough for me to kill his whole army.  AMAZING.

 

I would love any comments and advice on what you thought I did poorly or correctly and what I can do for next time including what you think I should add next battle or take out as this strategy probably won't work on him again!  

Thanks for reading fellow warriors!

[TaxiForBiggins]

Good job and congrats.

I bang on a ton about small ranger squads, I can't imagine leaving home without them. I'm getting married in 2 weeks, maybe I should put them in my pocket to make sure all my plans go smoothly.

I struggle to imagine a scenario where twin OGs + cannon can't ensure a victory vs A soft WoC list like this, especially considering only 1 terrain piece. Certainly we have a very favorable matchup vs WoC to begin with.

Good move with the cannon, I like to do that too. Nothing overtly wrong from what I can see (except no BSB ). I see you asked about diagrams in another thread, will you add them here ?

Keep us posted on the campaign.

[Gimlisonofgloin]

Congrats on the wedding and I would recommend finding a place to hind them in her wedding dress for the full potential!  Yes I would love to add the diagrams but I can't seem to find a program that is compatible with apple.  As far as the Bsb goes I was really banking on the fact that hopefully he wouldn't really make it into much of a combat phase and the bsb wouldn't really be needed. I figured I could get another OG fully runed for the price of a reasonably runed bsb with rune banner. So i elected for that seeming as I wanted it to be a big shooting game for me.  

[TaxiForBiggins]

Hmm, you mac kiddies really throw spanners in the works!

 

Any diagramming tool will do (even office et al), or just get different coloured pens and draw, then take a photo. Battle chronicler CAN run on mac, with some effort. http://battlechronic...m/docs/faq.html <- last question

[Gimlisonofgloin]

We mac users enjoy a little chaos now and again indeed. I will for sure look for something to make it work and if not ill draw out some pictures as you suggested.  In the mean time I posted the most recent scenario and what I'm considering for a list in the Barracks if you're at all interested in taking a peek.

[kelvenmore]

Great job.    Critique sound tactics,  great use of the gryo/rangers.  I find getting the first turn is very important so we can level the playing ground with our warmachines.  Adding rangers might also help slow down the advancement.  Something I'll have to try out.

Yesterday I played a WoC player I found I spent too much energy ridding myself of the Skullcrusher I'm wondering how you neutralized them.

Edited by kelvenmore, 06 August 2014 - 03:05 AM.

[Gimlisonofgloin]

Thank you and yeah its really hard not to focus on them as they can be so devastating to your infantry if they make it into combat.  I always take 2 OGs when Im fighting chaos and sometimes I will give one penetration and an ME instead of accuracy so that you're hitting on S6.  The way I deal with them is I allow two rounds of shooting at them with the OGs and focus my cannon fire elsewhere on bigger targets, unless there are no other targets.  Those Skullcrushers are not only extremely devastating in combat but if you kill them its such a huge dump of points that the enemy has to put in them.  So I always shoot at them with the OG's for two rounds possibly three if the rest of the map is looking ok still.  This kills a unit of three about a third of the time and the rest of the time it kills all but one so that you can charge it with a medium sized unit and handle it accordingly.  

 

The savior to us, and something I think is actually insane, is that the jugs only have t4 so you can hit on 3+ with the regular OG and then they only have the 4+ armor which isn't nearly as bad as it could be.  Though i do often take penetration for the 2+ to wounds and the -4 AS because if you get one round of good hits in then you can pretty much kill them outright.  

 

In 1500 pt battles and lower if they bring Skullcrushers generally they are going to be the most formidable thing so I also try to redirect with gyros and rangers when possible just to give my OGs another round of shooting at them or an infantry block.  This can and often does, end up giving you a flank shot with your cannon on them and if you can get one cannonball to hit all three. Boom you sir are in a happy place.  

 

If you want to be crazy and fight them hand to hand then your best bet is going to be a BIG block of hammerers but expect to lose 10-15 every round of combat so you have to make them at least 8 wide so you can get as many attacks in as possible and then if you have a runesmith with you can hit on S6(7 charge) and AP thats a big armor cracker right there.  You could also try slayers using GWs again you will lose all of them fast but their deathblow should kill a few of them and any left over defiantly wont run.  IBs could do it but it would be really really tough.

 

Overall though I personally think OGs with accuracy and an ME are the best course of action as you get the most consistent shots on them and don't risk losing any of your own beards. Plus they're s5 AP, what more could a dwarf want in life?

[TaxiForBiggins]

BTs kill skullcrushers

[kelvenmore]

True BT is a good option but its hard to get a hit. GT might work too.


Thanks for the pointers. I ended up using the og to reduce his size by half then finishing him off with my Longbreards and Hammerers. Him having to challenge saved my hide and caused him the battle