A String of Games all involving theme lists - Tournament Report

Alrighty, yet more of the Fat Man shooting things. Feeling like I've lost the drive to be creative in any way, what with the impending theme dump, I haven't even bothered to change what I have in my bag for the last few weeks. Does seem to be working out for me, though. Having trouble imagining what will come out of the theme dump that will change that half of my pairing, but if something is there then we're going to be in a real good place.

This tournament was down in Waverly, NY - just on the border with Pennsylvania. There was quite the showing, with people from Syracuse, Binghamton, and Ithaca (where I'm from) traveling down to meet up with the guys that play out of Waverly.

For those who have been holding onto hope that themes aren't the end all be all, every one of my game was into a theme list...


Editing note:
Okay. So. Yes, the original title referenced 1- playing into many tier lists, 2- my blogs current title, and 3- a tragic part of history. It has been changed, because holy shit internet, it is totally fine that some people were bothered. And, hey people who were bothered, sorry 'bout that.

Longest Day - Tournament in Bethlehem, PA

Alrighty, I have a few write ups to do, and this is me starting out with the oldest one I can still remember well enough to do this with. This tournament was a 75pt standard SR down in Bethlehem, PA, about 3 hours and 15 minutes from where I live. Ever since I gave up smoking, doing these early tournaments that require a long haul has been kind of brutal on me, and I've generally done pretty frickin' bad. Right now I'm planning on chugging a bunch of energy drinks when I get there, hoping that will simulate being on my previous cocktail of stimulants. As is, though, I got my bags packed the night before, loaded my car, and went to bed early on a Friday night after having a relaxing time hanging out with my cats and watching TV.

I just dropped Rasheth the entire day, as my off-list was more for infantry spam and/or Cryx in general. So... the list!

GenCon - Batreps and Afterthoughts on Skorne

Prologue~

In the beginning...

I kinda thought I wouldn't do so great at GenCon. I went into it hoping to dick around with new themes, however, and brought a bunch of models that I didn't end up using. Yes - the Skorne book release was disappointing. I did, however, write my lists at 8:30 am for the first tournament, which started at 9am. This may have been a mistake, but my initial poor showing was definitely not a list issue.

Note: I will be doing battle breakdowns, but I'm going to keep them short. I played 15 or so games, and while I don't have pictures for all of them even the ones I do make this a bit of a slog. I'll go into  afterthoughts on where we stand currently afterwards.

Champions Tournament, Morghoul3, GenCon Prep

My last post mentioned a list of tournaments I had coming up, and the first of those came to pass this Saturday. It was a ton of fun with a lot of great people, and the TO from Rochester, NY came down to run it to make sure I could play - so Thanks a ton to Gail for all of her help (those on the West Coast might know her from her role as TO at KingdomCon).

I brought Morghoul3, and of course Xekaar, as my pairing. I haven't gotten much practice in with M3, since he's a bit infuriating to play into unless you're ready for it, and as such I wanted to get as much practice in with him as possible....

So, the list!

https://conflictchamber.com/#c9201bhS6U4x4C6N6vcvfF6C5V6c6d6hhV

Skorne Army - 75 / 75 points

(Morghoul 3) Dominar Morghoul & Escorts [+25]
 - Archidon [10]
 - Basilisk Krea [7]
 - Cyclops Shaman [8]
 - Aptimus Marketh [5]
Extoller Soulward [3]
Mortitheurge Willbreaker [4]
Swamp Gobber Chef [1]
Nihilators (max) [15]
Paingiver Beast Handlers (max) [7]
Praetorian Swordsmen (max) [13]
 - Praetorian Swordsman Officer & Standard [4]
Tyrant Commander & Standard Bearer [6]
Siege Animantarax [17]

I Hate Myself: My Month of Xekaar - Final

Well, it is finally over - my month of Xekaar has come to an end. I'm not entirely sure of the total number of games played, I lost count around 18, and I'm sad to say I didn't manage to take pictures or do write ups for most of them. Herein I'll be discussing my afterthoughts given my poor showing at the WMW qualifier in Rochester; I went 2-2, though I don't think I can pin any of that on Xekaar, and one of them I feel like Xekaar would've pulled through if I had dropped him. But first, a quick rundown of my games...


The List!


Skorne Army - 75 / 75 points
(Xekaar 1) Beast Master Xekaar [+31]
 - Agonizer [6]
 - Basilisk Krea [7]
 - Titan Sentry [15]
 - Titan Sentry [15]
 - Titan Sentry [15]
 - Aptimus Marketh [5]
 Tyrant Zaadesh [4]
  - Cyclops Shaman [8]
  - Titan Gladiator [15]
 Paingiver Beast Handlers (max) [7]
 Paingiver Bloodrunners [9]

 Skorne Army - 75 / 75 points

Caster ADD, Broken Cameras, Tournament series. The last few months

So I haven't posted in awhile... this is in part to having some issues with my phone camera - hence the garbage quality of my pictures from CaptainCon. I just kinda stopped trying to make it work, so stopped getting material for battle reports. Without battle reports I'd just wind up being someone yelling at a wall. Not that I don't spend a good 15-20 minutes every morning yelling at a wall, what red blooded american doesn't do that? Just, it feels kinda pointless with how much terrain and positioning matters in this game to post about it without pictures.

So, what have I been doing? Fucking too much. I haven't been able to stick to a single caster, after putting Rasheth on the sidelines. That list became a bit too mechanical to run, and was frustrating for opponents in some matchups, so I tabled him. No reason to bring something dull to game night. Apart from that, though...

State of the Meta: A brief look at Skorne and our place in the world

State of the Meta

There have been several conventions this month (CC, LVO, SmogCon), and some pretty impactful yet small changes in the Una2 nerf. I've played... something like 8 WM/H tournaments since the errata, ranging from small 2 rounders to 4 round tournaments or more (I have a problem, please help), and thought I'd share some of my views on how things are shaping up for us at the moment.

A World Without Infantry

The title to this section is blatantly false. There is a lot of infantry out there, between people taking a unit or two just for list diversity or spamming to try and throw off the meta. I'm not sure what things look like in your area, but I keep seeing blast immunity as a big selling point to the infantry people are taking - either via dig in, Iron Flesh, or whatever that thing Satyxis have is called. Cavalry is the exception to this, but that mostly seems to be coming from Cygnar at this point (I think I played into Menoth cavalry once, though I do still play Ferox from time to time myself), where they seem to be skewing armor via AS.

What does this mean for Skorne? Well, personally, this keeps pushing me to crutch on Rasheth. BoC isn't blast damage, and it alone is great for denying infantry thanks to the 1 damage on entry. On the same vein I find Sentinels great - Very solid into Cavalry, and the scathers can really shut down single wound infantry. Either throw them out and hope it lands where you want it, or position your own models to shoot in the back. I had a game where I had sentinels pop two of my slingers, then hit 2 friendly heavies with BoC to form a wall of death for infantry.

But I don't want to play Rasheth! You cry, hypothetical person. Well, you're in luck! Infantry spam a la MK2 isn't going to come back - there just don't seem to be enough points for it thanks to the battlegroup size increase. In that same vein, Hexeris 2 has an absurd amount of personal infantry clearing that, likewise, ignores blast immunity, in Ashes 2 Ashes. Tack on blackspot and some ranged infantry of his own and you can wipe whole units easily - A flayer cannon can nearly wipe a unit of Storm Lances with BS on them, 2 of them should easily handle them. I also recommend Marketh for extra casting of A2A. 

The hydra is also really great into these infantry swarms, ignoring a lot of the tech people are using to deliver via sprays or just powering through them with volume of attacks, and the RFP really helps against recursion lists like High Reclaimer. I feel that drakes are missing a certain something, but I'm really hoping Chiron brings that to us this spring.

Reivers are really the champions for me right now, though. Rerolling missed CRA's really makes them shine, as you can more confidently do 2 man pods into high def infantry and get work done. Their range + reposition makes it trivial to get multiple rounds of shooting off, and CRA + Burst Fire makes them flexible enough to work against multiple model types, again also excellent against cavalry. Every infantry list includes a few heavies, and some might be nearly all large-based if they're using Cavalry, and reivers can contribute volume of attacks as well as quality attacks, as needed.

I'm going to throw a special shout out for Zaal2 + all the constructs. Shoving 30+ armor 22 infantry models down the field is a pretty fucking solid strategy. The only real thing that can handle it is area denial a la scatherspam or auto-point attacks like Tanith etc. P+S 13's with reach and magic weapons that are really hard to kill on approach give some really great quality attacks that can handle a variety of targets, and Zaal can run enough of them well enough that they really crank up that volume of attacks that handles most infantry you'll encounter today, as well. Even without the feat turn these guys can be arm lulno against shooting with a Krea, and when it takes jacks to shoot your infantry down you're in a pretty good spot. Doubly so when you have vengeance and a bunch of soultaking models on top of it.

Skornifest Destiny: Skorned Earth

Errata, Tournaments, Cons, Conclusions

So, I managed to get a few games in before my first post-errata tournament rather quickly. My first go-to was trying Makeda2 with double swordsmen and anti-ranged delivery equipment (krea, shaman). I played a few games with it, enjoyed the crap out of it, then dropped it. Played a few games with Hexy2, enjoyed gutting my opponents' support and backlines with Ashes, then dropped him.

Then it was time for the first tournament I'd be attending...

Filthy Casual: Tournament Report

I went to a nearby town for a laid back 1 list steam roller event. Wound up being a 10 man 3 round event, and I had a ton of fun. We're working on bringing the 2 meta's into closer contact, since we're only ~45 minutes apart, and this weekend had 5 people (myself included) make the trip down, and we've had a few of them come up for tournaments as well. I really like the feeling of community this game has to it, and look forward to making more trips to see the guys down there.

THE LIST:

http://conflictchamber.com/#b91b6QeocQ5G6N6J6J6p6F5V6v6H6x6x

Skorne Army - 75 / 75 points

(Hexeris 2) Lord Arbiter Hexeris [+27]

 - Scarab Pack [10]

 - Despoiler [18]

 - Titan Gladiator [14]

 - Aptimus Marketh [6]

Venator Flayer Cannon Crew [5]

Venator Flayer Cannon Crew [5]

Venator Reivers (max) [15]

 - Venator Reiver Officer & Standard [4]

Paingiver Beast Handlers (max) [7]

Extoller Soulward [3]

Hakaar the Destroyer [7]

Void Spirit [4]

Void Spirit [4]

ARCANE FUCKING WONDER BABY!

TempleCon Afterthoughts

So, I went to TempleCon last month. Sorry for the silence, been a bit busy with work ramping up, and after having a 2 con month I've tried to dial back my gaming until my brain recovered. I had a pretty horrible showing at TempleCon, and below I'll try to break down the gist of my experiences...

Champions Lists:

http://conflictchamber.com/#b91b3VeG5D5D5G6N6v6v5V6C6h

Skorne Army - 74 / 75 points

(Morghoul 1) Master Tormentor Morghoul [+30]

 - Aradus Sentinel [16]

 - Titan Cannoneer [17]

 - Titan Cannoneer [17]

 - Titan Gladiator [14]

 - Aptimus Marketh [6]

Extoller Soulward [3]

Extoller Soulward [3]

Paingiver Beast Handlers (max) [7]

Nihilators (max) [15]

Tyrant Commander & Standard Bearer [6]

Looking Back on GenCon

Well, I went to GenCon. I played a total of 13 games at various events there, and wound up with the not-so-stellar record of 6-7 overall, with three of those wins coming from Saturday's Champions event. 3-6 in the IG and Master's heats, which was educational, at the very least. I will say this, though, that with the exception of Hexeris 1 who I only played once and with a subpar list, I never felt that any of our warlocks were bad, nor did I dislike the performance of any of our models. None of my losses came down to dice, but rather simply to being outplayed.

I am a rather new player who, through a tendency towards obsessiveness and proclivity towards quick learning got pretty decent, fast. I still make plenty of mistakes when it comes to threat recognition and target selection, and on scenario play. At GenCon, a small number of mistakes was enough to put me in the lower tier, easily, and playing against and watching high-level players was an unusual experience, like finding out that I've been playing this game in the dark the entire time and discovering there is a light switch on the wall. Maybe next year I'll bring a headlamp, and in a few years I'll figure out where the g'd light switch is, but at least now I'm aware that there is one.

Below I'm going to run through some of the models I ran and my experiences with them. Most of these did not see a ton of games, but I brought most of them because I had a positive experience with them previously and thought they were worth the trip.

WMW Qualifier Decompression

I'd like to start with a shout out for those who are keeping things positive in the Skorne boards and forums, and elsewhere. There is a lot of doom and gloom, but several people are doing well with the faction (e.g. Paul Leatherby looks like he's going places with Skorne in MK3, and is shaping how I think about my anti-ranged game). There are also the big names in Skorne (Trevor, Watt, and Hornacek) who seem to be finding plenty of positives in the faction.

Now onto the actual post:

Last weekend I went to a WMW qualifier in Rochester, NY, and have been going over it in my head ever since. I wanted to do a post on it, but have been up in the air with my thoughts since then on list tweaking and am finally starting to settle down on my second list. I'll be doing a quick overview of my games, and then discussing my list pairing process afterwards.

The lists I brought: