50pts, Kallus (Legion) vs. pGrim (Trollbloods)

It was a busy weekend. Not quite tournament, but a lot of games. I had a second game with my Legion opponent from the batrep I posted Saturday morning, and I was fortunate enough to get 2 more games in later Saturday. There's a eMadrak vs. Reznik, and a proxy-heavy eDoomy vs. the new Menoth caster, Reznik2. We'll go chronologically though here. My legion opponent had another list he wanted to try, and that was Kallus. If you're unfamiliar with Kallus, it's because he's got a common Cryx problem. He's a decent caster in a faction of amazing ones. You rarely hear of Kallus when there is Lylyth2, Vayl1, Vayl2, Thag1 and Thag2, so on, so forth. No matter your playstyle, there's a legion caster that does it aggressively and competently. Kallus is also an infantry caster in a beast-heavy faction, a fight that the twins Rhyas and Saeryn have as well. The goal of these batreps aren't to brag about how good I did, or he did, but so that A) You can point out my mistakes and say hey, jedi, you suck at reading the rules, and B) You can learn about these two casters and when someone drops them on the board across from you, you're not completely clueless. I can count on one hand the times I've fought Harbinger, but thanks to Marx's batreps, I've kinda got a clue as to whats going on.

So, Kallus. He's also male, which I think is unique to him and Thagrosh in Legion... so there is that. For starters, he grants unyielding (+2 ARM for engaged models) to friendly models in his CMD. His four spells are Flashing Blade (Selective Thresher attack), Ignite (+2 Damage and crit fire), Eruption (POW14 AOE that stays in place) and Dark Guidance (Extra dice to attack rolls for faction models.). His feat grants +2 DEF to soulless models, and friendly warrior models killed in his control area become incubi. So, units hit accurately, with some decent damage, and expect a lot of bodies on feat turn. He tarpits crazy well.

Kallus
*Carnivean
*Scythean
Beast Mistress
*Shredder
*Shredder
*Shredder
*Shredder
Nyss Shepherd
Nyss Legionairres w/UA
Nyss Hex Hunters w/UA
Spawning Vessel

I dropped pGrim. I had no idea if that was a good idea or not, but I wanted to vary my casters up a bit. Jarl wouldn't have been bad for this list, but I felt like pGrim would be ok. My pGrim list is pretty janky though. See, I just got Mulg, and I really wanted to use him, I didn't even care if the list was functional, I just wanted him in there. So yeah. pGrim can do work too. One gun is RNG13 and adds +2 SPD for a beast charging the target hit, and the other gun is a RNG8 snare gun that KDs a target. His spells are great too. Cross Country gives Hunter and pathfinder to a unit/model. Marked for death removes incorporeal and stealth and drops DEF by 2. Lock the Target, if it damages the target, will prevent any running, charging, special attacks and all that on the model, and Return Fire is a cost 1 spell that lets a model fire if anything I have is targeted. I also realize I just got that wrong, and though the model the spell is on has to be targeted. That means... well, idk if it would have changed anything, I don't think he shot at me. But yeah. Good to know. Anyways. I really like the Earthborn on pGrim, but since I had Mulg, I reaaally wanted to use him instead. Besides, SPD4, +3 for Charge and +2 for Reach, plus another 2'' for Grim's rifle, and I can sling a SPD4 Beast out for a threat range of 11''. Add in Mulg being wounded and he's Relentless, adding in +2SPD to that. So yeah.

pGrim
*Mulg
*Bomber
*Impaler
Fennblades w/UA
Long Riders
Chronicler
Sons of Bragg

I won the rolloff, chose to go first. Fenns to one side, beasts to the other. My opponent matched me exactly and we set off.



First off, the beasts ran and generated fury up to 3. pGrim put Cross Country on the Long Riders, Return Fire on the Bomber and camped 3. The Fenns ran 12'', the Chronicler put "Tales of Mist" on them (concealment and can't be targeted while KD). Sons of Bragg move up and do +4 tough like the Boomhowlers. Long Riders sprinted for the woods.



Did you know that Hex Hunters are crazy fast? SPD7. I moved 12'' up the board and these losers sprint 14'' and tie me up. Crazy fast. And they didn't kill any fenns either. The least they could have done was give me Vengeance, but no.

The Legionairres move up and clump together, taking advantage of Defensive Line (+2 ARM B2B), and the Beast Mistress moves up and between her and her little army of miniature t-rexes, spams 8 Shredder animuses, Tenacity. +1DEF and ARM. Not bad. 11pt module, but seems neat.

The two beasts move up. Kallus moves up and gets Ignite on the Hex Hunters, in fact, I think he did that first.



No vengeance and my Fenns are tied up. Exactly what I didn't want. I really hoped I was far enough out of range of getting tied like that, but no. So I think about it for awhile, pull in fury and upkeep Cross Country. My Long Riders push farther into the woods, setting up for the flank attack next turn. Mulg walks up, and crunches a Hex Hunter engaging the far left Fenn.

The Impaler far strikes the bomber, and walks around Mulg. The Sons of Bragg move up, fervor (+2 to hit in melee and ranged, +2 damage), and Tor very carefully sprays the three Hex hunters engaging my next Fenn, kills all three, and the spray doesn't even touch my Fenn.

Then the Bomber shuffles forward, and chucks a bomb at the Hex Hunter UA, who is stealthed. Which is cool, I'm down with that. The blast deviates PERFECTLY back and to the left, and kills a couple of Hex Hunters, and leaves 1 box on the UA. Not bad. Bomber throws again, obviously misses because of Stealth, drifts AGAIN PERFECTLY back and to the right this time! Kills four hex hunters, leaving the UA and two in the front, all three promptly failing CMD.

Luck, dudes.

The Chronicler moves up and puts Hero's Tragedy on the fenns (If a warrior model hits, after the action is resolved, he's KD). The Fenns minifeat (Legionairres are Fearless I think so no worries there), and charge into the Swordsmen. Between the +1 DEF, +1 ARM on most of them, Unyielding, and Defensive line, these dudes are ARM20. I manage to kill 2 of them, and that's it, but still. Now my Tarpit is where I want them to be, and not vice versa.




So, the tarpit didn't work. My opponent is in damage control somewhat, but not too bad. The terms aren't his, but he's still doing ok, and my Fenns are going to struggle to do anything. He drops Ignite, and moves his Legionairres around, opening lanes and getting better positions. He doesn't want to kill a Fenn and get KD quite yet, but he'll take the Vengeance to shuffle.

The Carnivean starts off, and moves forward, spends a fury, and pushes the Scythean forward an inch, which I have never seen before. Kallus moves up, feats, and puts Ignite on the Scythean. He also casts Dark Guidance, which is an awesome spell. So now, the Scythean can't charge, run, anything, but he can move, and with Reach, has it. So he walks up, and I warn him. "Hey, Mulg has protective fit."

"Right, where he walks in and makes an attack."

"Yeah, everytime you hit."

"That's stupid."

So he changes his mind, and walks towards Mulg instead. He manages to kill Mulg, which is really sad, and has a bit to spare, so he swings at Grim, and I transfer to my Bomber, and kills it's spirit. And that's it for the Scythean.

The Legionairres charge, and three of them go after pGrim, hoping to finish him, but they're just out, by a hair's breadth, all three of them. The rest of them annihilate the Fenns that were engaging them, and then mini-feat with Iron Zeal, which stands them all back up and gives them +4 ARM, as if they needed it.

Also, the Spawning Vessel gets enough souls, and spawn ANOTHER shredder, and sends it careening into pGrim. Maybe that's what damaged the Bomber, I don't remember. But pGrim was pretty engaged at the end of the turn.



So now it's my turn. I lost Mulg, I'm losing Fenns, but I think I'm still ahead. However, I love assassinations, so I work through some pretty basic order of activation math. I have my Impaler, my Bomber, and maybe a few charge attacks with the Fenns, and I think I can kill Kallus, who's sitting on 2 transfers. I have easy access to Knockdown, I have my feat (-3DEF and SPD for enemy models in my Ctrl), so it's not too bad. Unhappily, my Bomber is engaged by one of the Legionairres that charged pGrim, and pGrim is engaged by a Scythean and Shredder. So, I pull in fury, cut for one or whatever I need, and upkeep Cross Country. The Long Riders charge, three of them at the Carnivean, and 2 at the Scythean, slamming him into the wall and knocking him down, leaving him on very little. The other three inflict mild damage to the Carnivean, but don't reach impact range, so no slam.

Happily though, pGrim is no longer engaged, by the Scythean, but I still have the Shredder, and I'd like the Scythean to be dead too. Tor assaults the Shredder, Wrathar with reach slips in behind him, and Rhudo runs over and makes faces at the Scythean who was out of his melee range. The Sons do Fervor again, and between Tor's spray, and the three attacks, murder the Shredder, freeing Grim finally.

Almost there. I debate about activating my Fenns first, but I go ahead and open with Grim. He spends 2 to farstrike himself, aims, feats, and I seriously debate about boosting. I need a 5. They say to boost if you absolutely need this to hit, but for a 5? If I had a fury left, I could far strike the Bomber, and which I really need to do sincethe Impaler doesn't have enough to farstrike them both. So, I finally get brave enough to roll it.

I get a 7.

KDs Kallus. He then spends a fury to heal the Spirit on the Bomber so that he can force him, and puts Farstrike on him. Now, with the Fenns, I want to charge, but he reminds me that Kallus has Unyielding, so I pass, and focus on the Legionairre engaging the Bomber instead, and manage to kill him, creating an incubi which I kill with another Fenn. Think that was the only incubi I created too lol.

The Impaler starts off, throws, connects, and does a crazy amount of damage. My opponent decides to keep it. I have 2 attacks left with the Bomber, and he has 2 transfers. Game over. I don't have much of a choice, but at the least, I might kill off the two beasts and keep Grim alive. So the bomber hits, boosts damage. POW16 is dice even, and Kallus transfers 15 or 16 damage to his Carnivean, leaving him at 5 boxes. The Scythean is at 4. I buy a second shot, hit, and boost damage again, and get another cranked damage roll. Easily enough to kill the Carnivean and Scythean both and have enough left over to polish off Kallus.



Thoughts on the game.

1. My dice were on fire, and not just damage rolls, but my deviations. Those bomber deviations were amazing, and perfect. I couldn't have aimed them better.
2. The list was a recommendation from another Legion player, who plays the Hex Hunters behind the Legionairres. I think this was the first time my opponent had tried this one, and I benefited from the unfamiliarity. The other way to do it is to tie the Legionaires into the front lines, and feat. Then, I struggle to kill them, when I do, I deal with Incubi. On his turn, he has left over legionairres, a bunch of Incubi, and a full unit of hex hunters with Battle mage. I suffer up to 4 waves of attacks, which is pretty brutal. Fenn Blades with Vengeance mitigates it some, but not that much.
3. I really like pGrim, but mainly because he lives and breathes assassination... and I like that.

Anyways, hope you guys learned something! Point out problems, errors, comments, crits, you name it.