Kromac2 vs. Doomshaper3. It's apparently my favorite matchup.

  I've played several games with Doomshaper3.  Five of those have been into Circle, three of those into Kromac2 specifically.  Kromac2 is not the preferable matchup.  Lately, I've been dropping Grim2 or Doomy3, and against my opponent's Krueger2 or Kromac2, I dropped Doomy3 again and he brought Kromac2.

  Again, I've played this matchup a few times.  Most of my Doomshaper3 games, actually.  I played it Thursday against a friend, and we played over Destruction.  Because I forgot my Mountain King, I played out of tier with Rok and Lanyssa.  A rushed Rok charging a Hunter's marked Ghetorix goes a long way.  On my feat turn Rok killed Ghetorix and the objective, the Axer cleared a few things and Mulg killed the Gnarlhorn and the only gallows grove, then weathered Kromac2 on the next turn, admonitioning away from the Stalker with 14 boxes left.  Doomshaper charged Kromac2, getting the crit smite and KD, and Mulg finished the game.  It was also his first game with Kromac2 and he was still figuring out his list, though a Bounding Ghetorix is a major issue for me.  I'm afraid next time he'll have a Blackclad for that sweet +4'' charge range on his favorite reach heavy.

  This game, my opponent already had the Blackclads, but no Gnarlhorn.  His list was:

Kromac2
*Ghetorix
*Gorax
*Stalker
*Pureblood
*Rotterhorn
Druids w/UA
Stones w/UA

  Mine is the same that I've played 90% of my games with Doomy3.

Doomshaper3 Tier III
*Mulg
*Axer
*Mountain King
Max KSB w/UA
Max Burrowers
2x Whelps

  I roll the rolloff, elected to go first.  Scenario was Recon.  The grey zones are "Tall Grass".  It's apparently a thing.  Provides concealment, but is not rough terrain.

  Burrowers burrow.  Axer rushes Mulg, charges up.  Mulg runs to the right of my objective.  Doomshaper rushes Mountain King, casts Implacability, dumps the rest to the stone and charges forward.  KSB runs and pops aura.  Mt. King runs his full 16'' up the board.

  This almost costs me.  He begins by pushing Ghetorix forward with the Stalker.  The Druids move around and pop clouds, leaving a charge lane for Ghet.  The stones port around into a large triangle.  Kromac feats, getting up the board a bit and putting Awakened Spirit on Ghetorix. The right Blackclad charges a druid, kills it, casts Hunter's Mark at the King and falls short a good half inch, meaning that Ghetorix can't get there.  We measure it for kicks and giggles, and even with Hunter's Mark, Ghetorix is just out even with a push from the Pureblood.  Still, it almost got me.  He also didn't deploy his blackclads on the line and hung them back a bit, which bit him.  

  Anyways.  Stuff mills about.  Can't get to me this turn, and he doesn't want to lose much to me on my turn, so he hides Ghetorix behind druids and such along with his other beasts.

  I really want to kill Ghetorix.  I really feel like if I don't kill a heavy on my feat, I'm losing the game. I have to trade the offensive aspect of the feat for something.  Doomshaper moves to the zone by the objective, feats, and does Signs and Portents for infantry.  Implacability goes up, and Admonition goes on Mulg.

  The Burrowers move up and try to shoot out just one blackclad, but needing boxcars, I roll 11 twice but can't get it done.  Otherwise, I think I had range to Ghetorix with the King, but I just can't get there.  Not enough room to trample even, and Mulg is on the wrong side.  He probably had range to get to the Druid on the other side of the zone, and then goad over to clear a way for the King, but it seemed like a pretty ballsy maneuver that would lead Doomy wide open.  So instead, Axer moves up, rushes the King. The King assaults right, kills a stone and blackclad with the Assault spray, kills the Druid and then kills the Druid UA with the Killshot.  No teleporting at least.  Druids pass CMD from Mountain King being terror causing.  Mulg moves up.

  Ghetorix charges forward to the Burrowers on the left and kills one.  They pass CMD.  Pureblood sprays three Burrowers, but 2 tough.  Stalker gets lightning strike onto Kromac.  Kromac primal howls, kills one in front of him but it toughs, again.  So he hits, toughs again.  Third one kills it, leaving him on one transfer.  Burrowers pass CMD from both Kromac's terror, and casualties.  He runs to the wall near Ghetorix.  Druids move up and cloud, and the Rotterhorn goes into the zone.  Stalker runs up a bit and toes into the concealment.  Gorax does the same.  Stones teleport to block lanes to Kromac and contest the zone somewhat.

  Pull in fury, leave one on axer but it passes frenzy check.  My opponent isn't giving me any whelps.  Doomshaper moves to the other side of the objective, did not upkeep admonition.  Cast Implacability, and puts three or four to the stone.  Does free animi this turn.  Stones pop aura and do +1 STR.  Burrowers move up and do tarpit things but nothing hits.  Mountain King steps into the group of Circle models and sweeps with a free Amuck.  He kills the objective in one attack, the druid and hurts the bird.  I buy an attack on the stone keeper and boost the hit, killing him.  The killshot spray goes into Kromac but does nothing,  Axer moves in, boosts the hit on the bird and boosts damage, finishing him.  

  Mulg goes for Kromac, staying out of the Druid clouds, but cant dodge Primal howl.  He hits Kromac2, but never gets the crit, and forces only one transfer.  I killed the bird before attacking him, and he picked up a fury from that, so that was a mistake.  I do score 3 CP though.  1 for objective, 2 for dominating.

  Gorax primals the Stalker, and the stalker goes all in on Mulg at ARM21.  He leaves Mulg on exactly one box, and surrounded by whelps.  Kromac2 Lightning strikes himself, kills all of the Whelps and contesting Burrower for free with heart eater, kills Mulg and sprints into the zone.  Ghetorix moves over, clears out the burrowers around the last druid, and sprints into the zone too.  The Pureblood runs to engage the king.  Mulg was full on Fury, and so is the Axer and the King.  I have to pull the fury off the King, which means that the Axer will probably frenzy, blocking a charge lane to Ghetorix.

  So now we have an issue.  The Axer frenzies and does some damage to the Mountain King but not horrible.  I don't think the King can kill Kromac on 3 transfers and needing even just 9s to hit.  I don't think he got Primal howl in there.  I certainly wasn't confident in it.  But if I can remove Ghetorix, and the druid, Kromac doesn't contest.  The other option to sprint to the flag and hope that I can tie him up but I have even less confidence in that.

  So my KSB activate, do +1 STR and shuffle around to hit the Druid and Ghetorix to no avail.  Then Doomshaper3 charges Ghetorix, boosts the hit and gets the Crit Smite.  I slam him 3'', but because it's a medium base slamming a large, I only slam him 1.5'', which barely leaves him in the zone, albeit KD, but still out of reach of the Mountain King.  The damage does ok, but not much.  So I amuck the King, and then blow the last 5 fury on Strangleholds.  The first damages him, but the second boxcars on him.  The effects don't stack, but at this point I'm nickel and diming him him to the point where I hope an assault/killshot will finish him. 

  The leftover burrowers on the left walk over, and pickaxe him because I'm desperate, but even at dice -9, inflict four or five points on him.  Then the guns.  The first two don't do much, but the last one boxcars again and actually kills Ghetorix.  At that point, the King walks in and sweeps the Druid, hits, kills, and that's game.  I dominate for 5CP.  

Thoughts on the game:

1.  I don't like relying on the King to finish the game.  Especially against things like Primal Howl or druid clouds.  However, his ability to remove support from the game has been key several times and I really missed him in the game I played without him.

2.  Should have upkept Admonition on Mulg.  I still don't think he'd of survived but it would have been nice to make it a bit more difficult.

3.  I need to be more careful with that first move.  Sure I can run 16'', but if I had lost the King to Ghetorix turn 1, it'd of been a bad deal.  Even at ARM23 (KSB and tier benefit), Ghetorix is hitting at dice even on feat.  Granted, average dice and I think the King still survives since he doesn't get the second initial but it's still tight.  Not something I want to bet on.

4.  He did feat too early too.  If it'd been later, like when he ran into the zone, there'd of been issues.  Both of our feats seemed somewhat wasted but mine was definitely a timewalk.  Just not much he can do against it.  

EDIT:  5.  I wrote this late at night and forgot about one of the major points in the game.  The biggest issue with D3 is that he doesn't speed his army up outside of Tier Turn 1, and being outthreated forces him to feat defensively.  If he feats defensively, he loses the offensive power of the feat which is absolutely needed for med-high DEF models, E.G., any Circle beast with Primal Howl, or worse, Primal Howl and Druid clouds.  MAT3 Mulg is unhappy, and MAT1 Mountain King is nearly unusable.  My opponent exploited this pretty well and just timewalked it, losing like, a druid and a stone to my feat.  Pretty decent.  After that I felt like I was on my back foot attrition wise.  I was able to clear the zone and score the first three points which applied solid scenario pressure, but I was only just barely able to kill Ghetorix, and idk if the King would have killed Kromac.  I don't think so.  Granted, I would have tried the same crit smite from Doomshaper to knock Kromac down and my chances go way up, so it's there, but still.  If I had failed there, it was game.  

  Against a list that out threats me, I think I want to go second.  Let them run, I get my positioning exactly how I want, but out of threat range even if it means everything is just basically walking.  Next turn, I clear the zone, score first and score 3 pts, and now he can't clear me out of the zone on my turn during feat, meaning I can probably finish it and dominate for the last 2.  That's the idea.  

Overall, fantastic game.  Seemed pretty close to the end, but I don't know that either was favored as much.  I don't like Blackclads handing out Hunter's Mark, and he played it very well leveraging his threat ranges.  I think this game convinced him to pull the Pureblood for a Gnarlhorn just for Bounding and the Counterslam.  Counterslam isn't particularly useful in this matchup but Bounding is brutal.  Something I was glad he didn't have.

Doomshaper3 has more options than meets the eye.  This is the second game that Crit Smite from Doomshaper has been the key moment.  He's mat5, but with Fury 7, he can try it like four times.  When I need it, I need it, and he delivers so far.  

Hope you enjoyed the batrep.  Kind of surprising to see 2 out so close to eachother, but this wasn't hard to write up.  Pretty straightforward, low model count.  Enjoy the holidays!

50pts Kromac2 vs. Doomy3 Tier III When an unstoppable object meets an implacable battlegroup

  This has been a pretty decent book for Circle and Trolls both.  I'm pretty sure Trolls won though.  This is the second book in a row I think they've won.  HWM and Fire Eaters have radically changed what Trolls can do (mainly Fire Eaters) and this book has possibly broke the EE/RoW pairing that's been so prevalent for awhile.  On top of that, we got Dhunia's Knot.  While Doomy3  is amazing, I don't know that he plays a different game than RoW does.  It's still a timewalk feat turn, but he does a lot more for his battlegroup.  We'll talk about him in a minute.  Dhunia's Knot is what changes a lot of what Trolls can do.  If that's not your cup of tea, feel free to skip to the batrep.  The next three paragraphs are Dhunia's Knot.

DHUNIA'S KNOT

  If you haven't read the rules yet, the Knot does three things.  They allow rerolls on threshold checks.  They can heal models that they are b2b with, and they have puppet master.  Puppet Master is a RNG10 magic action/attack that gives one reroll for attack rolls, damage rolls or cmd checks.  If you miss the charge, need a seven and roll a 5 + 1, reroll the 1.  If you hit, and roll snakes eyes, reroll.  It's great.  It can affect solos, beasts, units.  You only get to reroll one, and only one model in the unit gets to do it.  So, Grim2 can't get puppet master on Krump's gun, AND the mortality attack, you just use it for whichever one you need the most.  If you use it as an attack, you can land it on an enemy model and force them to reroll any of the same things.  They're Magic 5, so that's less reliable.  They're mainly support.  But 3 models for 3 pts...  and the ability is friendly.  You really need Victor's KD shot?  Reroll.

  So what Dhunia's Knot does is change how much we take so many corner case models out there.  Paralysis isn't bad on the Night Troll.  Mat5 sucks.  Rerolls.  A better instance is the War Wagon.  The War Wagon has an AOE5 quake, which is fantastic, except it's RAT5.  With Puppet Master, it's a lot less of a Lynchpin move.  It's not as much of a 9pt gamble.  Grim2's biggest downfall is the same lynchpin issue that Mortality is.  If you miss Mortality, it can be the game.  Rerolls make that attack far far more dependable.  I'm still working through the models with somewhat corner case abilities that Puppet Master brings back to consideration.  The War Wagon is the first.  Night Troll gets another shot.  The Thumper, anything with any kind of crits, Rok's critical Freeze is much better, etc.  They're great for solos.  Pendrake goes up quite a bit.  The new guy, Hutchuck becomes incredible, especially with Lynus and Edrea (All 3 become a Grim2 staple for me, btw).

  Before this Batrep, I did a quick 35pt game into Borka2 with Grim2.  Borka2 brought 2x axer, Mulg, Janissa, max Fenns w/ UA and a Fell Caller.  Grim2 had Rok, Pyre, Fire Eaters, Fell Caller, Max Fenns w/UA and a Runebearer.  And of course, Dhunia's Knot.  It was amazing.  It turned the reliability of Grim2 way up.  I landed Mortalities, charge attacks.  I rolled 8s and 9s when I needed them.  I rolled an 11 when the Pyre fired at the Fire Eaters, and rerolled that with the Dhunia's Knot.  Instead of killing the Fire Eater, I did 2 pts instead.  As the game dwindled, I lost my Fenns, Fire Eaters, lost Rok, and hadn't killed any of his beasts.  Left with the model count I did, I was rerolling low damage, missed attacks.  Medium value attacks became high value attacks simply because of dice.  Knotted Fell Caller finished a damaged Mulg, and Grim2 killed Borka2.  Dhunia's Knot is amazing.  They won't go in every list, but they're still very good.  In fact, it was joked about that Madrak2 could drop to one beast, cut for fury every turn, and DK could just heal him and help fish for crits.  They're good, amazing, and a reason that Doomy3 has to consider not playing in Tier.  That brings us to:

  DOOMSHAPER3, PROPHET OF DHUNIA

  Is he S-Tier?  Don't know.  He's got the same old man stats, he still has Goad, and he picked up Field Marshal: Hyper Regeneration.  Battlegroup wide, automatic D3.  His spell list is Admonition, Stranglehold, Repudiation (Haley3's idea of Purification), and 2 new ones.  Unminding.  Offensive Upkeep that I can land on the other warbeast.  They lose 2 fury, 2 thr, and I can cast their animus.  The other new spell is Implacability.  Not an upkeep, cost 2.  Battlegroup cannot be knocked down, slammed, pushed, pulled.  The kicker here is that Admonition is normally circumvented by being Knocked Down, but it with Implacability, that's not going to happen.  This means that Mulg is much more difficult to kill.  It also means that no more ATGM just pushing me around and knocking down my beat stick.

  It gets better.  The Feat is additional dice battlegroup attack rolls, so you could still boost to 4 dice.  But wait, there's more.  There's also a dice less damage on your battlegroup for both melee damage and ranged damage.  After every attack, my beast heals D3.  It's essentially a +5 ARM feat between the -3.5 damage and +1.5 healing.  So Mulg charges in with 3d6 MAT7, kills a beast, then sits at ARM23 with EBDT animi and stone, with a dice less damage and healing  Essentially ARM28.  

  We're not done yet.  Doomy3 is a unit, so he gets the little scroll bearer guys too.  They have 3 effects that can be activated one at a time, once per game.  The first is essentially Signs and Potents for infantry.  The Second is essentially Lamentation for one round.  The third is essentially battlegroup wide Awakened Spirit (Free animi).  Ever wanted to rush Mulg, and then do runebreaker when he gets there?  How about rush Rok, then primal?  Your Winter troll can go in with primal, then cast freezer on himself at the end of it.  It's pretty stupid good.  

  One more deal.  He's already very good.  He has a tier too.  It's not a stupid tier.  Mulg, Non character Warbeasts, whelps, Pyg units and KSB.  Tier I grants +2 ARM on turn 1. Tier II gives +2 SPD on turn 2.  Tier III is +1 for the starting roll.  Tier IV is 2 gargs or more and they go down 2 pts each.  I'm not in for Tier IV, but I'm still debating losing Janissa, Rok, and the new Dhunia's Knot for Tier III.  The extra 2 ARM from EBDT and Janissa's wall is super nice, but +2 SPD and +1 to the roll is ballbusting for scenario.  Right now, I'm leaning towards Tier, but mainly because Rok is crucial to my Grim2 list.  Don't laugh.  Or laugh.  This is a blog post, not a cop.

  THE ACTUAL BATTLEREPORT

  Of all the matchups Doomshaper3 seems to be less decent into, Kromac2 is what comes up for debate.  Pagini doesn't think a correctly piloted list under Kromac2 can be beaten by a living model list.  That was pre-Doomy3.  It's still rough, but Kromac2 is still someone I don't want to particularly face with D3.  That being said, it's what Circle should absolutely drop into him.  I went to the LGS to play D3, or a Dhunia Knot Grim2 list, but mainly D3.  The Scenario was whatever the two horizontal zones are, except we forgot the objectives...  Which would have changed a few things too, but by the time we realized it, we were too late.  

Kromac2

*Wilder

*Ghetorix

*Stalker

*Pureblood

*Winter Argus 

Gallows Grove

Druids w/UA

Stones w/UA

Stones

  Fairly standard Kromac2 list.  I beat a similar one with Runes, but only barely.  The cumulative -4 MAT is a major issue for MAT5 gargantuans.  Speaking of which.

Doomshaper3

*Mulg

*Mountain King

*Axer

Whelps

Whelps

Max KSB w/UA

Max Burrowers (Pyg unit gives Tier III)

  The Mountain King gets everything he wants in this list.  He gets boosted attack rolls, survivability, even more healing, and blocks LOS to Doomshaper really well.  I think D3 is really good for the King, and the Mountain King brings a good ranged game to the table with the 10'' spray.

  I lost the rolloff, and picked the side with the forest.  I immediately decided to go into the right zone, and would fail to score it as soon as I planned to.  Because it's my zone.  Without the objectives, I treated the game like Outflank.  It's not outflank.  Everything deploys centrally, and I put 3 whelps in play.

  

  Kromac2 stuff runs forward.  Awakened Spirit goes on the Stalker, and Aggravator goes up.  Druids move up and puts clouds down and countermagic.

  Burrowers burrow.  Mt. King runs 12'' up.  He's capable of 14, but I didn't want to feat turn 1 defensively when I could just hang back a few inches and stay out of melee range from the Stalker.  Mulg runs up to the same line, Axer in behind him.  D3 moves up, puts Admonition on Mulg and puts Implacability out.  No feat, no scroll things.  The rest of his Fury goes onto the KSB, which pops aura and runs.  

  Kromac2 upkeeps Awakened Spirit and drops Aggravator.  Druids move up.  Normally this is the drag phase of the game where they bring Mulg in close enough to kill, but Implacability prevents that.  So they counter magic, cloud up.  His spacing isn't perfect, so there are gaps, but it's still enough to stop most of my charges.  He's back far enough that I don't think I can get Mulg into anything worthwhile.  The other stuff files in behind.  Stones push hard, the grove gets in behind the wall.  Kromac2 camps everything.

    Pull in fury, upkeep Admonition... and implacability.  Which isn't an upkeep.  It needs to be cast every turn.  I had fury every turn, so it would have been cast every turn, but it would have mattered if he'd had purification.  Burrowers come up though.

  I was told a few games ago that I need to focus a lot more in gameplay.  Not so much on the game and ignoring other situations, but in killing specific things, accomplishing specific goals.  Not just killing everything.  The problem models here are the stones, groves.  The Stalker and Ghetorix are capable of killing things without involving the caster, but the stones bypass Admonition, and the tree will kill my healing.  So, the burrowers pop up in good positioning.  I have LOS to a few stones, and 2 of them I can hit with aiming.  I put 3 each to a stone from each unit.  

  D3 pushes in behind the King, feats.  The scroll does the Signs and Portents for the burrowers.  Stone pops aura and runs to keep everything in feat, and does +1 STR.  Mt. King assaults the Winter Argus.  This unfortunately puts me into the clouds for -2 MAT, but I do get the assault.  Misses the druid, the argus, but I boost on the tree, and kill it.  I miss the charge attack on the dog (Need a 12 I think).  I then swing and use the rest of my fury on killing the Stalker.  I miss twice, hit the last two times and at Dice +3, I leave it on two, three boxes.  

  Mulg walks and Runebreakers on the Pureblood and Druids nearby.  Axer walks up, trying to keep interference between Kromac2's army and Doomshaper3.  Whelps follow around.  Burrowers put 3 models in the enemy zone to contest, and the other ones shoot 2 stones, one from each unit and it takes all three each, but they kill them both.  No porting, no healing removal.  

  My mind was still on outflank, and I thought I scored a point here, but because it's not outflank, and this is my own zone, I score nothing.  I also have 7 fury on the table and 2 on D3.  Something has to roll frenzy next turn, and I can't afford to lose either heavy.

Kromac upkeeps awakened spirit on the Stalker.  The druids aren't able to countermagic.  A few do clouds, a couple shoot the burrowers and kill a few.  One wanders into the zone.  Blackclad runs to the corner of my zone.  The stones port around, trying to block charge lanes.  The Pureblood sprays on the burrowers and kills two more, can't damage Mulg.  Which is a shame, I wanted a whelp.  Kromac2 walks towards his zone, but is just short.  Stalker forces for regen, casts his animus for free, kills a Burrower and sprints behind the wall.  Ghetorix charges a burrower, it toughs.  He kills it, toughs, kills it.  They fail CMD to terror on Ghetorix.

  Mt. King is THR6 and Mulg is THR10.  I take all of the King's fury, and Mulg rolls a 3 for threshold, passing.  I upkeep Admonition.  Mt. King tiptoes up, twists to catch the druid in front of him, the druid to his right, and the Argus (which did nothing last turn) in a sweep, while staying out of the clouds..  Spend 1, spend another for Amuck.  He kills both druids.  He does 18 damage to the Argus, boosts the killshot on the Stalker.  I need a 5 to kill the Stalker.  I roll a 4.  He lives.  Another turn.  I should have boosted.  

  Mulg walks up, kills a stone, kills the Druid UA.  Both the King and Mulg are at 5 fury each now.  The Axer walks in, boosts the hit on the dog and connects, and kills it.  Doomshaper creeps into the zone, strangleholds the Blackclad and kills it.  KSB moves up, pops aura.  Whelps run to be relevant.  I score 1 CP.

  Kromac upkeeps Awakened Spirit.  Stones in the left zone move over, and toss a rockhammer at my Burrower in the zone (who failed CMD again).  He toughs.  Kromac walks up, casts Carnage and then kills him.  Tough.  Kills him again.  Feats.  

  Druids move around, kill more burrowers.  Pureblood charges Mulg.  I expected that.  It's PS14 base, but he warps for Str and has feat, so he's PS18.  I don't want to weather that, so I walk back.  I'll still take a stalker charge though.  

  Except, I move back to the left a bit to be closer to the left zone, and that leaves me in walking range of Ghetorix.  Ghetorix comes in, hitting at dice +1 w/ feat against Mulg.  He hits every time, needing not snakes I think.  Yeah.  Mat9 w/ Carnage into DEF11.  He rolls almost perfectly average rolls.  Sixes and Sevens over five attacks since he's out of range of the bite attack.  I have 9 unused whelps, so I pop a whelp with every attack.  Three are near, one with annoyance range but not melee.  This doesn't make him miss any.  Then, with the Stalker in the distance, I pop two whelps at the edge of 2''.  He has only 2 activations left.  The stone on the right, and the Stalker, so there's no way to kill the whelps.  That's good, because Ghetorix leaves Mulg on 2 boxes.

  The Stalker charges Mulg, but fails charge.  Stone ports to the left to stop Mulg from charging at Kromac.  He does not contest the zone.  I go to 2CP.

    I pull all the fury off of Mulg and the Axer, and the King eats a whelp to manage his.  Upkeep Admonition.  Mulg heals 2 pts with Hyper Regneration.  Mulg eats 5 whelps and heals 9pts.  He walks to the side of Ghetorix and headbutts him, boosting the hit.  That leaves me 3 fury, 4 attacks with Doomshaper's affinity.  I leave Ghetorix KD and with three or four boxes.  KSB blocks charge lanes to Doomshaper and the zone, pops Aura.  Mt. King walks up, takes a free strike from the lone druid (who never roll CMD even though the King is terror causing.  I forgot.  I remembered that Ghetorix has terror, and it caused my Burrowers to flee, but I forgot my model had it.).  The druid does no damage.  The Mt. King moves up, animus and sweeps.  I kill my second to last burrower, who passes his CMD check, and I kill both the Stalker and Ghetorix, leaving Kromac and the Pureblood.   I boost the Killshot and kill another druid.  Doomshaper walks up, puts out the Lamentation spell, and boosts a Stranglehold into the druid near my zone at DEF18.  I need an 11 and miss.  Axer runs into his zone to contest.  I go to 3CP.

  Not killing the Druid means that the game will not end next turn since he has an easy way to contest.  However, the pureblood doesn't have range to charge.  Kromac can't do it, and he's not sure he can survive the next turn anyways.  He won't kill Mulg, because Mulg will admonition away, and while he may or may not kill the Mt. King, (he will with Kromac and the Pureblood), Mulg will probably kill Kromac.  At the very least, the Axer can probably clear the opposite zone since nothing would have killed him, and the King will killshot what's left, and I'll go to 5 CP.  We go ahead and call the game since there doesn't seem to be a favorable outcome for him in any way whatsoever, and the store closes in 30 minutes and I have 2 boards worth of models (My grim2 list was the next table over) to clean up.  

Thoughts on the game:

1.  Doomshaper3 is stupid legit.  Admonition on Mulg with Implacability is really the crux of the match.  So many Doomshaper1/2/3 games are decided by how early Mulg dies and what got traded for it.  Admonition/Implacability really hurts what is able to manage and/or kill Mulg.  On top of that, the list is incredibly accurate for a turn, and virtually unkillable.  Doomshaper3 has a ton of adaptability on top of that.  Repudiate, Unminding, and the scrolls are all problem solvers that won't come up every game, but when they do, they are amazing.  

2.  The Mountain King.  I don't think he was MVP this game, but he was really close.  He should have killed the Stalker twice.  It would have been nice, and I would have been a lot less worried about where I admonitioned him, and it would have been farther from Ghetorix.  However, having Killshot every turn, and/or assault gives me a lot of answers for solos/support that have to die.  The Wilder was never safe, and the Tree died turn one.  It was a way to kill a stone too if I needed to.  Killshot was great.  The boosted attack rolls give him what he needs for a turn.  He and Mulg tag team very well in this list.  Mulg kill single hard targets, and Mt. King kills lots of things with boosted sweeps.  It's good.

3.  Mistakes.  I didn't force any CMD checks on druids.  They should have had to make at least two. Terror and Casualties.  Second, I admonitioned into walking range of Ghetorix.  Dumb.  I also went after the wrong zone.  I'd of won easy by doing the same thing in the other zone, and done better either way if I had remembered the objectives.  

4.  Mistakes for him.  Admonition was unavoidable.  Not sure where to go with that one.  He didn't contest a few times when he could have.  Kromac never did much.  He certainly could have primal howled a bit more.  Druids/Primal Howl is rough on Mt. King, and Mulg doesn't like it either.  Kromac2 never threatened my stuff though, and Ghetorix wasn't facing me on the turn I went all in on the right side so he didn't have a good charge lane.  Being 2 boxes from killing Mulg was the game breaker.  Without Mulg, I don't know if I could have won that game.  It's very possible that Mt. King can't kill Ghetorix.  Against Primal Howl, he almost definitely cannot kill Kromac2.  This is where the GK would be nice, but Killshot/Assault is a ranged attack or two that doesn't take from my melee attacks.  So there's that.  

5.  Overall, good game.  Much closer than it looks looking at the board.  I lost all of the Burrowers, but that's it.  6pts trade for winning the game.  The burrowers killed 2 stones and tarpitted.  That's it, but killing the 2 stones is what stops Admonition being worked around.  So pretty important.  After that, they were fleeing til the last turn of the game.  

  So, hope you enjoyed the article.  It's a lengthy read, but we're excited to see Doomy3 and what he can do.  Kromac2 vs. D3 is a matchup that bears more practice, I think he can be hard on D3, and I'm glad it was my first game.  I enjoyed it.  Hopefully you enjoyed this.  Any comments, crits or insults are welcome.  

  

50pts Mohsar (Circle) vs. eMadrak (Trollbloods)

I've been wanting to play trolls for a long time. They were my second choice in factions, but I had the opportunity to pick up Circle first. Didn't really care for circle, but still wanted trolls. I finally picked up a bunch after the first of the year, and have been itching for the two weeks I've had them to get them on the table. Happily, there's a league in place too, so I'm getting points for them, painting, playing, all of it. Good stuff.

My opponent had just finished a grueling pMorvahna vs. pKreoss game, and was up for another one, and dropped Mohsar. I hate Mohsar. My options were pGrim or eMadrak. That's who I'd brought with me. The map had two large forests on it, and the clear choice was pGrim's list of the Earthborn, Fenns, Nyss, and Boomies (among other things) but I reeeeeeeaaaallly wanted to play eMadrak. So Madrak it was. His list originally had a bomber in it, but I already had the earthborn on the table from a quick 15pt league game (I lost against Butcher2), so I subbed him into the list instead of the bomber.

My opponent's list:

Mohsar (tier)
*Feral Warpwolf
*Feral Warpwolf
*Gorax
*Gorax
*Scarsfell Griffon
*Scarsfell Griffon
Woldstalkers w/UA
Woldstalkers w/UA
Stones w/UA
Lord of the Feast

Right off the bat, two things here. I hate Mohsar, and I hate the LotF. Mohsar drives me nuts. As a normal Kraye player, the ability to plug charge lanes with a 4'' AOE ARM18 pillar that requires a minimum PS/POW14 attack before you can even target it is incredibly frustrating. I hate Mohsar. The LotF, I hate even more, believe it or not. I've had that guy plow into my lines and wipe infantry units out, only to sprint away again. That guy is a pain. My answering list was the following:

eMadrak
*Runebearer
*Earthborn
*Stormtroll
*Axer
Full Fenns w/UA
Fennblade Kithkar
Full Champions w/UA. Baldi is proxied by my Boomhowler. I didn't feel like spending 18$ on a UA after I spent 20 buying the Krielstone UA and Runebearer...
Min Krielstone Bearer w/UA
Fell Caller Hero

I vassaled a list similar to this several times before I bought these models. I normally have the Sons of Bragg in here instead of a Stormtroll, but my SoB aren't here yet, so I tried the Stormtroll. I love the model, wanted to get it into play. The Axer is a solid choice with Madrak, simply for the reach and animus. The Earthborn, not so much. He's an awesome beatstick, but I'd normally have the Mauler instead, or the Bomber. A Bomber/Pyre or Slag makes sense to me because a Bomber can get into PS17 with the Pyre/Slag animus, or pump 2 P0W16s into the enemy per turn, three on feat turn. But, this is what I tried instead. In the future, I may do Impaler, Bomber, Slag, just to cover my bases and have a decently rounded battlegroup, but that's not what I had today.

I rolled a 6 for deployement, and set up first. My fenns went on the right, having the easiest access to pathfinder, so therefore, I decided to have them deal with the forest nearest me there. The Champions set up opposite with my battlegroup in the middle and Kriestones behind.

He dropped the stones and LotF on my left with a Feral to deal with my Champions, put the Shrimp on the rightside to shoot up my Fenns, and his battlegroup across from mine, and off we went.



Everything ran. Fenns tucked in behind the trees and screened the beasts. Battlegroup ran and riled. Moses gave Madrak a discount on spells, which he used to do Warpath, and dumped the rest of his fury to the stone. I could already see an issue here, and was really wishing I'd brought pGrim. I had 0 hunter to look through the forest, and while I could do pathfinder, the Fenns were going to struggle to accomplish anything. On top of that, I was being funneled quite easily into a bottleneck that could be filled with 4'' pillars quickly and efficiently. Awesome.



All his stuff ran too. Mohsar moved up, and gave me four pillars to deal with. The LotF seemed content to sit in the forest for another turn.



I'm looking at his spellcard as I write this report (Warroom's great when it loads within the hour). He did not cast Mirage on anything, which really surprises me. That's an awesome spell. But he didn't cast it. The pillars were an issue though. My Champions could crush them with ease, EXCEPT, they're PS11. Because they are structures, attacks can't be declared unless it's a minimum of PS/POW14. This means that my completely capable Champions were stuck. Awesome.

Madrak upkeeps Warpath. I have exactly 3 models in my 50pt list that have a >PS/POW14 attack. The Axer, Madrak, and the Earthborn. Madrak is ranged, but he can only get one. So, Moses gives him a spell discount. My Champions shuffle around and look at the LotF unhappily. So, the Axer moves up and cuts down a pillar. Madrak chucks an axe, knocks another one down, and puts Blood Fury on the Fenns. The Fell Caller drops pathfinder on them, and then they ....minifeat... which gives them Pathfinder anyways... So I should have given them Warcry. Lesson possibly maybe learned.

Three Fenns charge the Warpwolf, and three run to engage the Woldstalkers, while all the others hang out in the woods. Of the three that charge the wolf, one misses, the other two do respectable damage.

The Earthborn steps into the woods, the Stormtroll moves up, and the Krielstones run up and pop Aura, with the Elder gives no continuous effects, for what it's worth. I just read the thread in the Trollblood forum about sins players have done with trolls, e.g., stupid stuff (Like giving the Fenns pathfinder with the Fell Caller on the turn they minifeat). One of things I knew not to do was give my opponent easy access to abuse Grim Salvation. If you're not familiar with Grim Salvation, if Madrak takes any damage, he automatically kills a model within 1''. Only after he's out of models does he start doing transfers. This makes him near impossible to assassinate, but at the same token, you can easily lose a Fell Caller, Runebearer or Kithkar to this. One guy said that someone picked up Madrak and two-handed threw him into a unit of Champions. By putting a box or two of damage on a KD madrak, they wiped out a whole unit of Champions instead. So keep that in mind. In my case, I put two Bearers within 1'', and kept everything else away from him.



Mohsar pulls in his fury, and then Jedianakinsolo learns about Zephyr. Those Woldstalkers that I so craftily engaged last turn have a 3'' move (On top of their normal 6'' move) that they do, ignoring freestrikes, before they shoot. Kinda nuts. Well, they Zephyr around a bit, and proceed to annihilate my Fenns. They kill six of them I think, leaving the UA and a few on the Warpwolf. I got 1 tough roll out of that group that died to the Zephyrs, and I was glad I was fearless that turn. The Warpwolf spent his activation beating up on Fenns, though 2 of them toughed. The Gorax finished them off though, and the second Gorax kills another fenn that somehow the Shrimp missed. Mohsar drops his pillars, blocking my chargelanes, and shoots my Stormtroll. He lands behind him, and gets a Krielstone bearer and the Stormtroll in his arc. He misses the Stormtroll somehow, but kills the KSB.

I can take that. Much better than losing an entire unit of ATGM or something to that freak.

A Griffon flies in and kills my UA and one of his buddies, while the other bird just moves up. The other Warpwolf moves into the stones, and that's turn. Pretty decent.



First off, I forget the Vengeance from the Kithkar, but I upkeep Warpath and pull in my Fury. The Champions get off a charge finally, and murder the Blackclad I forgot he had, but that's all they get. I completely forgot to ever get them Base to Base once for the extra ARM. My Stormtroll steps back and boosts a hit at the LotF, and boosts damage, but at dice-5, fails to rolls the 12 needed to kill him, coming 3 boxes short. But he does move far enough back for the Earthborn to step away from the Griffon and take 2 damage from the FS. The Earthborn smacks both pillars and crunches them. The Kithkar finishes the LotF (Activating Warpath and letting the Earthborn move back into the Griffon in case I feat), and Madrak moves up to put the Axer's animus on the Axer, as well as Blood Fury. The Krielstones pop aura and move up, spacing themselves again.

Then I gamble, the way I normally do, and charge the Axer into Mohsar who's sitting on one transfer. Needing an 8 to hit, I miss. I wack the Stalker and Gorax with the Thresher attack, but miss Mohsar. I buy, boost to his, and deal him 8 pts of damage, and that's turn for me. I really thought I had a decent chance on assassination, but DEF14 with MAT6 and only 3 fury to play with... Yeah. I set my dice down and wait for a Warpwolf to end Madrak.



Mohsar cleans the pee out of his clothes and pulls in his fury. My opponent commented that he wished he'd feated last turn to hurt that charge, but it worked out. The Stalker warps for strength and uses all four fury to crunch the Axer. The Gorax on the left charges into my Champions and kills one, while the Stalker teleports in the Stone's activation, to engage 2 of my Champions, and kills them both. The two griffons trample Madrak, and between attacks and Grim Salvation, they kill three of the KSBs. All game long, that KSB did work. The Earthborn, Madrak, Kithkar and Stormtroll shrugged off attack after attack, sitting at ARM18-20, easy. It was great.

The Woldstalkers push in, and one unit trys to kill the Kithkar, but again, sitting at ARM18 with 8 boxes, they really struggle to kill him, and at DEF14 with Concealment, they need 8s to hit. He pulls through on one box. The second unit of Woldstalkers runs to get into the action and screen Mohsar. The last Gorax tears into my Earthborn, but at ARM20, only does a few boxes of damage. Mohsar activates and drops a bunch of Pillars again, and feats. He stacks two pillars between Madrak and Mohsar, and another two between my Champions and him. I had considered charging Madrak into the Woldstalkers, and using Tide of Death to reach Mohsar, but 1) The pillars could be an issue, but more importantly, 2) Tide of Death requires living models, not constructs. If you're not aware of Tide of Death, it's where Madrak can spend a point of fury to move an inch and attack again. This is hilarious because the Ragnarok axe he's carrying around gives him a point of Fury for a living model he kills. This literally allows him to just carve his way through entire armies by himself. It's great.

But, there's no way it's happening, especially without the Axer's animus.



With Mohsars feat, I couldn't pull fury off of my Stormtroll, but he passed his threshold check. My champions lead off. I wanted Blood Fury on them, but I didn't have a way to get it to them. Conveniently enough, when the Warpwolf teleported, he left his back arc exposed to my unit leader and one champion, while the other champion was already engaging the Gorax. The two by the warpwolf turned around and hit him four times, taking him down to just below a third of health left, while the last Champion did the same to the Gorax. The Kithkar charged the Woldstalker on the Earthborn's flank, and killed it, triggering Warpath. The Earthborn used it to step around the Gorax, and took a freestrike of 2 more points of damage, but he still had the Gorax engaged, and the Woldstalker behind them that you can't really see in the picture above.

See, I had a plan, but it was all in the order of activation. I could do some serious hurt this turn, but I had to do it right.

The Kithkar still had a second attack, and even though he'd managed to engage all of the Woldstalkers in front of him, he hit the Gorax, and hurt him decently. PS13 Weaponmaster is nothing to sneeze at. Stormtroll shuffled over and swung at a Scarsfell, but MAT5 vs. DEF14, he missed.

The fell caller put Warcry on Madrak, and swung at the Griffon, missing once, doing decent damage with the second attack. The Runebearer gave Madrak a discount again on spells, and Madrak gave himself Blood Fury, and stepped around the pillar to engage both Scarsfell. With 3 fury left, he swung at the griffon on the right 1 with his initial, bought one more, and bought another to swing at the second griffon, taking both down to seven or eight boxes each. Then, he feated. He killed the one on the right, and forgot to take a fury for it, leaving him with one. The Fell caller finished the other one. The two champions, still benefiting from the back arc strike, murdered the Warpwolf, but sadly, the other Champion was out of feat range. The Kithkar swung at the Gorax again and missed, but killed the shrimps still in his melee range. The Earthborn hit the Gorax with a back arc bonus, taking him to four boxes left, and killed the Woldstalker in front of him. The Stormtroll missed again.

The feat altogether killed two Scarsfell Griffons and a Warpwolf, and took two Goraxs down to just barely breathing, while annilating most of two units of Woldstalkers. In one turn, I went from being behind about 20 pts, to being slightly ahead, but I still had one more activation. Between Warpath and Feat, the Earthborn had successfuly set himself up a charge lane to the last Warpwolf. He took it, boost to hit, and cranked the damage roll, dealing 13 damage to the wolf. With his second initial, he crunched the Woldstalker, and called it a day. I already had 2 fury on the Stormtroll, 2 on the Earthborn, and was camping on one. The Earthborn was in perfect positioning, and I reeeeeallly didn't want him to frenzy, and if my Stormtroll frenzied, he might kill me, so I left it at that. By killing the Warpwolf, I'd pretty nearly ended the last serious threat to my Earthborn's base ARM20, and unless he could put an assassination attempt together, I had a decent chance at pulling this game out of the gutter.

Incidentally, this was a league game, and we did the scenario that looks like Incursion, but it's not, but we proceeded to ignore it.




My opponent was pretty floored. Between my Champions being tied up for half the game behind pillars, my Fenns being obliterated, and my KSBs nearly gone, and my Axer dead, he was running an easy 25pt lead. Follow that up with actually killing half of my Champions, and he was sitting pretty decent. That all changed on feat turn. I'd killed 4 of his 6 beasts, and taken the last 2 down to single digit boxes. The thing that worried me was the Gorax sitting near Madrak. I had one transfer, and the final KSB stone dude, and that was it. On top of that, I had blood fury up on him, so he was -2 DEF, for a total of 12. The chances were pretty slim, but a Primaled Gorax in my face still didn't excite me. I did, however, had him engaged by my Kithkar, and a FS from the Kithkar would almost certainly kill him. It still worried me though.

The Gorax on the left frenzied, but missed or failed to kill my Champion engaging him. The Stones ported forward, and the UA shot my other Champion that was sitting at 6 boxes left, and cranked the damage roll, killing him. The Gorax on the right passed up on the assassination run and charged my Kithkar instead, killing him. No worries. That 2pt Solo earned his pay this game. Tied up and nearly killed a Gorax by himself, killed the LotF, and half a unit of Woldstalkers? That guy was a boss.

Mohsar drops Sunhammer (Beasts advancing automatically take D3 damage), moves back into the woods and puts a pillar between him and the Earthborn. The shrimps gang up what's left of them and put shots into the back of the Earthborn, doing maybe a total of 8 damage.



There's a lot of things I want to try. I want to put a shot with my Stormtroll into the Shrimp and watch the D3 electro leap. I want to see my Champions finish the Gorax, but I hate it too when people take their time ending a game that's got a definite outcome. So I hustle it up. Madrak moves up to keep the Earthborn's charge within control range, and chucks a PS15 axe at the Pillar. Boost damage to be sure, and it's gone. Blood Fury on the Earthborn to be sure, and call it a turn. Earthborn charges into Mohsar, boosts to hit,

Misses.

Boost second initial, hit, boost damage. Roll four dice with Bloodfury and punch Mohsar into the dirt.



Thoughts on the game:

1. This is my first real tabletop game with trolls. I've vassaled them several times, trying to get used to the playstyle, so I can't say this is my first game with trolls, but man, I loved putting them on the table. That was fun. If you're curious about the paint scheme, I've got it here: http://diceotfirstdegree.blogspot.co...hlighting.html
Fielding them was fun though. I loved it. The buffing, the animi, but fury mechanic, all of it. The feat/warpath interaction, all of it. So much fun. A very welcome change from Cygnar. I love Cygnar, but I definitely enjoyed Trollbloods.

2. I screwed up a lot. I never once roll regeneration with my trolls. I forgot to get fury for Madrak killing the Scarsfell. I literally made the Fell Caller put Pathfinder on a unit that would automatically get it anyways... I dropped an eMadrak list against Circle... I also confused the heck out of myself on the first assassination attempt. I kept trying to figure out an order of activation that would let me clear out the pillars, make sure the Axer got range on the charge, allow him to be within Madrak's control, AND do all that without Madrak having to do anything until after the Axer's activation so that I could feat and get another attack on Mohsar if needed.

It was impossible, quite literally, and had I realized that, I would have used Madrak to move up, drop both Sand Pillars, put the Axer's animus on the Earthborn, and kill the LotF, triggering Warpath. The Earthborn would have moved up, the Axer would have charged and killed off the Griffon between the Earthborn and Mohsar (If needed. It's possible Warpath would have been enough of a lane), and Earthborn would have ended the game 2 turns early. Unfortunately, none of that clicked until after I'd already thrown away my Axer.

3. I say thrown away my Axer, but if he hadn't have gotten into the Warpwolf's face, it's quite possible the wolf would have torn into my Earthborn, and that wouldn't have been good.

4. I'm not sure why nothing had Mirage, or why Sunhammer wasn't up from turn 1, assuming it was an upkeep. D3 damage every turn on my beasts in his control area is annoying. Not as bad with regeneration, but still annoying.

5. Mohsar is still hated. The LotF isn't as big of a deal. ARM16+ 8 boxes on EVERYTHING makes him much less of a threat. Mohsar was a pain though. My Champions were unable to do anything for two turns, and only 1 did anything on turn 3. Pillars everywhere forced Madrak and Earthborn to juggle attacks and waste activations for anything to accomplish anything. And losing my Fenns turn 2 was brutal. Those little Woldstalkers are good. Happily, after the forest forced my Fenns to commit to a suicidal charge, it pretty much prevented the Woldstalkers from doing anything meaningful for the rest of the game. .

6. Madrak is a blast. For only 3 spells on his card, that was fun. All the buffing, all the fell calls, all the options... I enjoyed it. I like this faction, and I'm looking forward to getting it out there more.

7.  It's since been pointed out that A) Blood Fury is not a Warbeast capable spell, so the Earthborn should have only been rolling 3 dice.  I'm not too worried about it since he was going to crush Mohsar with 3 dice, but it's good to know.  Secondly, Rush is the opposite, a Warbeast-only spell, so while I never did cast it on Madrak, I wanted to, but I'm glad I didn't.

8.  There was a lot of pathfinder in the list, and I really didn't need the Axer.  Madrak himself can provide Pathfinder to everyone, so it's not a big deal.  I think I'm going to swap out battlegroups.  I got the Axer in the list for reach, but the Impaler has it as well, at one less PS.  If I drop the Stormtroll and bring a Slag instead, I can get that +2 STR on him, and take him up to more respectable PS15, which is great.  I don't want my light beasts handling anything bigger than medium-based infantry and light warbeasts/jacks.  The Stormtroll did very little this game, and is meant for infantry clearing, but between the Fenns, Champions and Feat turn, that's not an issue as much.  The Bomber would make more sense as well, since he's capable of doing work from behind the front lines, whereas the Earthborn just hung around till the last couple of rounds.  He made his points, sure, but it was the same kind of stuff the Bomber could have done. On top of that, my normal list has the Sons of Bragg, which I'll have next week, so there's that too.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoyed the batrep!