I chose a little different approach this time around regarding listbuilding. I obviously want Vlad1 for the Gauntlet Rounds, but he doesn't fit in very well with Sorscha2 and Butcher 3, and in this edition of IG I have to play him during the preliminaries if I want to play him in the Gauntlet Rounds, so I want a good list for him.
In the end I went for Vlad1, Sorscha1 and Butcher3 as I felt this lineup covered enough matchups for me and also gave me all the tools I required if I were to advance to the Gauntlet Rounds. Also all the lists have a purpose.
This is what they looked like:
Vlad1
-Conquest
Kovnik Joe
Gobber Tinker
Winter Guard Infantry
-UA
-3x Rocketeers
Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters
-Koldun Kapitan Valachev
Alexia1
Great Bears of Gallowswood
Seem familiar? Well, it's pretty much my Sorscha2 list, with a few exceptions only now it's piloted by Vlad and it works really quite well.
Sorscha1
-Spriggan
-Sylys Wyshnalyrr
Kovnik Malakov
-Behemoth
Eiryss1
Alexia2
Widowmaker Marksman
Kell Bailoch
Dougal McNaile
Widowmakers
min Greylord Outriders
Aiyana & Holt
I tried this list out with a couple of games before the Iron Moot and really liked how it played. It works wonders into Cryx.
Butcher3
-Ruin
-Juggernaut
-Juggernaut
-War Dog
Koldun Lord
Eiryss2
Raluk Moorclaw
-Vanguard
Ragman
Gorman di Wulfe
Boomhowlers
Widowmakers
Same Butcher list as the day before.
Game 1 vs. Alexander Nilsson (Denny2) - Incoming
I picked Sorscha because I had 3 good matchups against his Denny2, Goreshade3 and Skarre1 lists. He ended up going for Denny2 and his list looked something like this;
Denny2
-Deathripper
-Deathjack
-Skarlock Thrall
Gorman di Wulfe
Warwitch Siren
Pistol Wraith
Pistol Wraith
Bane Thralls + UA
Blood Witches + UA
Bile Thralls
something more that I don't remember
He wins the roll and takes first turn. He deploys Denny centrally with the Bane Thralls to my right together with the Warwitch Siren and the Deathripper. The Blood Witches, Pistol Wraiths and DJ go to the left.
One thing about this list is it's very easy to deploy. I basically put everything centrally, except the stuff that has AD. All the snipers go to the left to counter the Blood Witches, while Eiryss hangs out in the middle.
Round 1:
Alexander runs his stuff up and Denny advances about 6" which is quite enough to get penetrated by a Disruptor Bolt.
This is bottom of 1. Sylys runs up to the wall. Sorscha charges him and Wind Rushes forwards to catch Denny and a whole lot of banes and other stuff in her feat. I then cast Tempest on a poorly placed Bile Thrall (you can see the Tempest-shaped hole in the picture) that also hits the Bane UA and 2 more banes. Luckily, I kill the UA meaning the banes don't shake stationary the next turn.
Dougal moves up behind Eiryss and minifeats. Eiryss then go and tag Denny with her lovely Dirsuption Bolt. To add injury to insult she also rolls boxcars on the damage roll, getting Denny down to 8 boxes.
Malakov casts Redline on Behemoth who tramples up and has some amazing scatters. First shot scatters onto the Skarlock Thrall and I boost damage to kill him. Second shot scatters onto the Bane Standard Bearer, so I boost damage and kills him too.
Outriders run up for some spraying action next turn if necessary, and my snipers takes some shots on the Blood Witches and kill a couple. Kell kills a Pistol Wraith, just 'cause.
Round 2:
Alexander can't really do much at this point. Deathjack waddles up a bit and a couple of Blood Witches run to engage my snipers, but thats about it.
Sylys gives Sorscha Arcane Secrets, she the Charge a Bane near Denny and boosts a Tempest at Denny, also boosting damage and killing her.
If you don't know the threatranges of this list it is truly devastating and this is also why I love it. It almost feels like I'm cryxing harder than the Cryx player considering level of unfairness :P
Game 2 vs. Mathias Groth(Kreuger2) - Incursion
Sorscha2 is normally my Circle drop, so I dropped Vlad here. He'll do. I think Mathias got the big 3 in Circle, Brad, Morv2 and Kreuger2 but ended up with Kreuger, a strong pick considering the scenario.
Kreuger2
-Ghettorix
-Stalker
-Gorax
Una
-2x Rotterhorns
Druids + UA
Swamp Gobbers
Shifting Stones + UA
Gallows Grove
maybe something else
I win the roll and choose to go first.
I deploy Conquest centrally, Nyss to the right and Winter Guard, followed by Alexia to the left.
He deploys like Kreuger always does.
Round 1:
I run at him with reckless abandon, Boundless Charging Conquest to get him further up.
He does Kreuger stuff, setting up the cloud wall on his central hill and running all his stuff up behind it. Kreuger decides to get a little feisty in order to get Stormwall further up the table and charges up + Telekinesis to end up in one of the Druid clouds.
Round 2:
Well, I am definatley in range for a Throw, so I go for it. He's only camping 2. It's amazing how far you can get this throw under pVlad btw. Feat + Signs & Portents helps alot!
So Vlad puts up S&P, Gobber runs, Conquest throws him and nails Kreuger with the little guy and his cart. The Nyss then go and pewpew Kreuger dead. Signs & Portents really helps there as well.
So 2 quick assassinations, looking good so far!
Game 3 vs. Jeppa Resmark (Lucant) - Fire Support
So now I get to face Jeppa and his mighty CoC. Jeppa was a member of last years WTC team but have had less opportunities to play this year. His lists was also quite interesting breaking some new ground in the CoC listbuilding department. I must say I quite like it. It's mostly about stripping away support and taking more dudes and jacks, this is his Lucant list:
Lucant
-Corollary
-Inverter
-Inverter
-Diffuser
-Conservator
-Conservator
Obstructors max
Obstructors max
Reductors max
Accretion Servitors
I pick Vlad, because I can't play Butcher3 into the Watcher shenaningans he can pull and Sorscha1 feels.. maybe ok, but Vlad felt much better.
I win the roll and take first turn in order to present a threat to his infantry from the get go. I deploy Conquest centrally with WGI and Alexia to the left and Nyss to the right. Jeppa deploys with his battlegroup centrally and one unit of Obstructors on each flank. The Reductors hang out behind the jacks.
Round 1:
I run up as far as I can with both units and Conquest gets Boundless Charge and charges up.
Jeppa correctly decides to Shield Wall his Obstructors turn 1. Since he has no recursion he can't afford to loose that many by running them up. He casts Deceleration and Watcher and runs up his heavies, mostly staying out of my melée threat.
Round 2:
I can maybe Feat + Boundless Charge into 1 of his heavies, but that would be a poor trade for me, so I go for some shots instead. Conquest crits his big cannon on one of the Inverters and gets the Corollary, Lucant and a couple of Obstructors as well, doing some damage to Lucant and the Inverter and alot of damage to the Corollary.
Nyss go for a big CRA on one of the Conservators and WGI go for CRAs into Obstructors, killing 1 or 2.
Jeppa moves up yet again, still in Shield Wall and Lucant feats to delay my feat.
Round 3:
I make sure to keep my distance and shoot some more into his heavies, doing minor damage thanks to Feat and Deceleration. Nyss and WGI both go for big CRAs to be able to do anything at all.
Jeppa goes for my Objective this turn with a Conservator and kills it. a couple of Obstructors gets to the Winter Guard, still in Shield Wall, and kill 1 or 2 with CMAs. He once again moves up to threat my Conquest.
Round 4:
One of is Inverters are pretty damage by this point and Jeppa has positioned so that I only get that one if I charge in with Conquest, which makes me think that I can shoot it to death instead of serving him Conquest. However, this is clearly a mistake, as I can't really back off more now he is going to be in charge range, at least with a Hunters Mark and I can't get to the Diffuser. Which in turn means I will get nothing out of Conquest, instead of at least 1 heavy, but well played to Jeppa for this setup. I go for the shots and fail to kill it. Alexia goes into the Conservator that killed my Objective but rolls really poorly and needs the help of Joe, shouting Bears Strength and a bunch of charging Winter Guard AND a charging Thrall Warrior. It finally goes down though. Other Winter Guard go for charges on Obstructors and kill 3 more. One Great Bear and the Nyss also charge in and kill the other Conservator and a couple of Obstructors.
Jeppa obviously takes the opportunity I have given him, Positive Charge goes on one of the Inverters and he then charges Conquest with both his Inverters, but leave it on 3 Boxes. 2 Obstructors charge in and finish him though. Since my Winter Guard charged last turn he kills a bunch of them and a single Obstructor kills Alexia. The Nyss holds up nicely, but I'm afraid he will be able to clear my flag soon if I can't clear up my left flank. We are both pretty short on time though, but I have a slight advantage.
Round 5:
I start the round off with clearing up the left flank with my remaining WGI and I feel fairly certain the flank will hold for now.
The Nyss then go and charge some more into the rightmost Obstructors and kill a bunch more.
I don't know if I'm too used to Sorscha2s feat (I certainly believe I am) but I fully expected 2 Great Bears to be enough to kill his two Inverters. In fact, I was so certain of it that Vlad casually walks up to the damaged one, puts up Signs & Portents and kills it himself. The two Great Bears charge the other Inverter, but does indeed no kill it. I did leave it without an Induction Node and the reach weapon though, however, too late I realise Jeppa has an Accretion Servitor perfectly placed about 6" behind his Inverter. I can already see what is coming.
He Bodges the Inverters Induction Node, gets 3 from the Corollary and Lucant even charges up to give him Positive Charge. The two Obstructors that finished Conquest does a CRA and kills off the Great Bear that blocks the Inverters path, it then charges Vlad, knocks him on his ass with the Macropummeler and kills him dead :(
That's what I get for being so cocky....
I keep kicking myself when I think back on that game, mostly because this outcome was easily avoidable. Vlad did not need to go into his heavies. Like at all. He has no business there, especially when I have a time advantage and an (ever so slight) attrition advantage. I could comfortably sit back with Vlad and play on the clock if I wanted to. Secondly, I could easily have killed the Accretion Servitor with my WGI, however I activated them before the Great Bears and when I realised it was there and how important it was I had nothing left to activate that could get to it. I could also have taken out the Macropummeler with my last attack from the Great Bears. I actually had the choice. I went with the other weapon becuase I though "well he can only attack once with that one", but it's the wrong choice. If I'm knocked down his other weapon kills me, crippled or not. I'm going to blame that one on clock pressure, but that was terrible play. And lastly, and perhaps most importantly, I should have charged Conquest into his damaged Inverter in Round 4. Then the whole situation would have happened away from Vlad, and more importantly he is another heavy down. That means he probably must charge in with Lucant as well if he wants to oneround Conquest.
So, all in all a pretty long list of mistakes on my part, but again, I can't take anything away from Jeppa. He played the matchup (whitch is good for me) perfectly and the clutch Accretion Servitor placement in the end was a great play.
Great game buddy, keep up the good work! And props on your lists, I really like them! :)
I actually still had the chance to qualify for the Gauntlet Rounds since we weren't quite 64 players, so on I went and in round 4 I faced....
Game 4 vs. Stefan Benediktsson (Denny2) - Destruction
So, once again I get Stefan in the last round, which is unfortunate, but at least I get a chance for revenge!
He drops a fairly standard Body & Soul and I drop Sorscha1
I win the roll and choose to go second. It's really good to go second vs. B&S with this list. Normally, the Denny player wants to run her 14" up the board when going first, but if they do they will embrace certain death against this list and if they don't, well then you have some space to play with.
Round 1:
Stefan does exactly what I want him to do and runs up far with Denny, thinking Pursuit on Eiryss will protect him. He does make sure to stay outside of 14" of her though, so I can't forefit movement and still shoot him with Dougal minifeat. He is graceful enough to not even block LoS to Denny, so I'm going to go for it.
Just as in the first game Sylys runs up, Sorscha charges him and Wind Rushes to feat on Stefans entire Battlegroup. Eiryss then activates, advances and, since his stuff can't advance from being Stationary, Pursuit does absolutely nothing. Denny eats the Disruption Bolt, Behemoth then tramples up for free with Redline and shoots Denny dead.
Absolutely love this list.
So I end up 3-1 with a slight possibility to advance, since Jeppa went on to the Gauntlet Rounds, but alas, SoS is not on my side and I end up 9th.
Still, I had alot of fun and played some really sweet games. They started handing out prizes for fastest assassination during this tournament, so I naturally collected 3 out of 4 of those :P
All in all the weekend was awesome, I had loads of fun and the prize support was great! They were basically handing out blisters for achieving certain goals, and also for taking down one of the "big five". Both Mikkel and Stefan was on the list and I went home with a classic Spriggan, a Bombardier Bombshell, another Vlad1 (I'm currently working over my Khador and giving them a facelift) and Rhupert for another project.
The venue was a big step up from last year, having the event, your room and your food in the same place makes it all very convenient. The food was really good as well.
And as usual it was really great to meet everybody!
This is the highlight of the year as far as tournaments in Sweden goes and i fully recommend it!
