The Cavalry Prince - List Design, Tactics, Battle Reports

[Francis]

I want to throw something out there that might get shot down, but do you guys feel that the star lance is that necessary on the BsB? I consider this character to be support first and foremost and as such I have been thinking of putting the OTS on him, allowing the Prince to keep his 1+ 1+ save and also giving him the Potion of Foolhardiness. My builds are like this:

Prince: Barded Elven Steed, Giant Blade, Dragon Armour, Enchanted Shield, Dawnstone, Potion of Foolhardiness: 282p

Noble: BsB, Barded Elven Steed, Sword of Might, Golden Crown of Atrazar, the other Trickster Shard, Charmed Shield, Dragon Armour: 170p

The prince does what he does best with 5 s7 asf attacks on the charge and the BsB now helps ensure those attacks will penetrate ward saves as well. The BsB is relegated to a support role, but does retain 3 s5 asf attacks in subsequent combat rounds. This is ofc far worse than the 3 s7 asf attacks he will get from the star lance, but it allows him to retain his asf attacks in subsequent rounds rather than being forced to use a gw (the viability of this depends upon whether you think rerolls to hit and 2+as is better than +1s and 3+as), the BsB is also rather well protected with a 2+ AS, Charmed Shield, Crown and a 6++ and 2++against fire.

Alternatively one could just go for the starlance, charmed shield and tOTS but that would leave your BsB a bit more exposed than he is with the Crown.

[Ferny]

Fwiw, i'm not convinced that the pheonix is /that/ vulnerable. Cannons, even laser guided ones, still need to hit, wound, roll high wound and fail ward saves. Coupled with high redain wounds. Still vulneracle but not too bad. Not that it necessarily impacts on your selection.

[Tetengo]

I want to throw something out there that might get shot down, but do you guys feel that the star lance is that necessary on the BsB? I consider this character to be support first and foremost and as such I have been thinking of putting the OTS on him, allowing the Prince to keep his 1+ 1+ save and also giving him the Potion of Foolhardiness. My builds are like this:

Prince: Barded Elven Steed, Giant Blade, Dragon Armour, Enchanted Shield, Dawnstone, Potion of Foolhardiness: 282p

Noble: BsB, Barded Elven Steed, Sword of Might, Golden Crown of Atrazar, the other Trickster Shard, Charmed Shield, Dragon Armour: 170p

The prince does what he does best with 5 s7 asf attacks on the charge and the BsB now helps ensure those attacks will penetrate ward saves as well. The BsB is relegated to a support role, but does retain 3 s5 asf attacks in subsequent combat rounds. This is ofc far worse than the 3 s7 asf attacks he will get from the star lance, but it allows him to retain his asf attacks in subsequent rounds rather than being forced to use a gw (the viability of this depends upon whether you think rerolls to hit and 2+as is better than +1s and 3+as), the BsB is also rather well protected with a 2+ AS, Charmed Shield, Crown and a 6++ and 2++against fire.

Alternatively one could just go for the starlance, charmed shield and tOTS but that would leave your BsB a bit more exposed than he is with the Crown.

I think 3 S7 attacks that ignore armour is too good to pass up. The BSB with tOTS allows rerolls of 3 models he's in B2B with, so only becomes really important against a lone character with a ward save. For everything else the Star Lance is much better, and we have arcane Unforging to maybe remove a ward save. Plus with Seredain's build the BSB has a 1+AS on the charge, 2+ in subsequent rounds, so is better protected than your set up, except for the crown. The golden crown doesn't seem that great because most hits would hopefully be saved by armour anyway.

[Macharius]

Seredain,

Have you considered upgrading the chariot to a sky cutter? People seem to be having success with them, and having the extra Move and Fly would even better support your cavalry or elite infantry. Not sure where to cut 10 points from, though.

[Francis]

Plus with Seredain's build the BSB has a 1+AS on the charge, 2+ in subsequent rounds, so is better protected than your set up, except for the crown. The golden crown doesn't seem that great because most hits would hopefully be saved by armour anyway.

Didn't catch the Dragon Helm when I read his list, mea culpa. That said I think the Crown is absolute ace and a great goal keeper. My build assumes that you want the OTS but you might be right that it is a bit situational.

[alenui]

Looking into it I think the crown is taken after armour as it is a ward and according to BRB you only take wards after failed armour saves. This makes it very cheap compared to lizardmen version which is 30pts. It might not be as intended and could well be FAQ'd but I think Seredain is right on this one(still disagree on wake of fire walk between worlds though ).

[Francis]

Looking into it I think the crown is taken after armour as it is a ward and according to BRB you only take wards after failed armour saves. This makes it very cheap compared to lizardmen version which is 30pts. It might not be as intended and could well be FAQ'd but I think Seredain is right on this one(still disagree on wake of fire walk between worlds though ).

I didn't even realise that it was discussed at all. It is clearly a ward save and ward saves are taken after armour saves. The way I see it and play it, the wounding hit is only suffered after all other saves are taken. As such the wardsave from the Crown kicks in after the armour save has failed to save the character. Otherwise the Opal amulet would be in the exact same situation as the crown since that item states "wound suffered" and the BrB states that wounds are suffered after the to wound roll. This would make both the OA and the CoA into overprized charmed shields.

[Seredain]

Have you considered upgrading the chariot to a sky cutter? People seem to be having success with them, and having the extra Move and Fly would even better support your cavalry or elite infantry. Not sure where to cut 10 points from, though.

Macharius, I like the idea of riding these chariots safely behind your lines and then just throwing them over at a surprise target: lots of fun to be had there! But I'm happy to stick with the Tiranoc in my list. It does the same amount of damage but it's 25 points cheaper (Tiranocs are 15 points cheaper than they used to be). When push comes to shove, that's a lot of points to spend if you're just looking to use one of these contraptions as an all-purpose utility unit. Also, the Tiranoc is nice and small whereas the Skycutter is visible from basically anywhere: since it has only 4 wounds at T4, that strikes me as a one-way ticket to Pincushionville.

I can see sky cutters working well in full-on attacking armies, or armies with lots of other desirable single-model targets (like phoenixes). Running them in pairs as a fully flexible strike force might be cool too - Tethlis seems to have had some good results with them like this so his thread is worth a look if you're interested in running them.

Francis, if you're looking to max out on your prince's power for the purposes of challenges etc, that BSB build works very well indeed. I think you should feel free to run with it and have some confidence that your prince can beat down most enemy targets all by himself. It's actually the path I started down myself (since the OTS was toted by my old BSB), but as Tetengo said, the Star Lance is just tremendous all-comers, especially when you can switch to a great weapon and still have the 2+ save. The prince might be more potent in a challenge in the OTS build (although his dragon armour ward will be sueless), but the unit's killing power is significantly better with the star lance BSB. Against most enemy units, 3 rr Str 7 no AS attacks are better than forcing the ward re-rolls with a character who will otherwise be far less capable of putting wounds on the baddest stuff. Your BSB build has great utility, and against lots of rank and file he'll be just fine, but at the moment I'm finding it hard to turn down 7-8 Str 7 ASF attacks with every charge! POW! Also, since our BSB's aren't as tough as they sued to be, I think it's more important that they be able to do well in a challenge (where you want to hide them from strong enemy rank and file, but only on the basis that they'll survive whoever takes the challenge!). The Star Lance helps a lot here. Against monsters, enemy cavalry, monstrous cavalry and so on, it obviously kicks arse and is very cheap for it. Now that we have BotWD to pound on daemons, enemy ward save issues will tend to be restricted to characters. Hopefully, with my decent magic phase, I can ping them with Unforging. It's not reliable now it's random, but it's something and at least it comes with some damage-dealing.

I think the OTS build is viable, though. Sword of Might, Dragon Helm, OTS and Luckstone would work pretty well if you're looking for an improved armour save. Yet another tough choice for us here! Give it a go and see how it works for you? Having the re-rolls every round will do just fine against most rank and file, and with the extra 5 lances we get in the charge with the large bus, we'd be within our rights to think that our attacking power on the charge is good enough as is.

Looking into it I think the crown is taken after armour as it is a ward and according to BRB you only take wards after failed armour saves. This makes it very cheap compared to lizardmen version which is 30pts. It might not be as intended and could well be FAQ'd but I think Seredain is right on this one(still disagree on wake of fire walk between worlds though ).

I didn't even realise that it was discussed at all. It is clearly a ward save and ward saves are taken after armour saves. The way I see it and play it, the wounding hit is only suffered after all other saves are taken. As such the wardsave from the Crown kicks in after the armour save has failed to save the character. Otherwise the Opal amulet would be in the exact same situation as the crown since that item states "wound suffered" and the BrB states that wounds are suffered after the to wound roll. This would make both the OA and the CoA into overprized charmed shields.

Haha, luckily I'm not running a fire phoenix eh?

Some very good points here guys... Alenui: the rulebook description of ward saves is maybe important in a way I hadn't considered. Here's the wording:

"Sometimes a model has both an armour save and a ward save. Where this is the case, the model takes its armour save as normal.

If the armour save is failed... then the model takes its ward save." This helps us, yes? Certainly the Crown is much, much better if you can have a pop at the armour save first.

Francis - your point strikes another blow for the Crown I think. On page 51, under 'Saving Throws', the rulebook says that, in respect of armour saves, the controlling player "rolls a D6 for each wound suffered by his troops". In this description, the wound is clearly 'suffered' before armour saves are even rolled. And yet this doesn't prevent the overriding rule for ward saves ensuring that the Opal Amulet (which as you say "bestows a 4+ ward save against the first wound suffered by the bearer" - page 503 BRB), rolls its save after armour saves. The Crown bestows a 2+ ward save. Surely, therefore, it works after armour saves?

[Francis]

Surely, therefore, it works after armour saves?

This is my understanding as well and the only one that makes sense in my mind. Now bear in mind that a ruleslawyer may claim that: "yes the Armor save are taken first then the Crown wardsave but if the AS is passed then the crown is still wasted and used since the first wounding hit has already been suffered".

To this I would claim that: first this is way to complicated and GW tries to implement simple rules and therefore it is clearly not the way the rule is intended to function. Further it would also apply to the Opal Amulet since wounding hit and Wound suffered to all intents and purposes are the same if you read the BrB. The most important argument against this way of playing the item however is stated in the very introduction to saving trows on page 43 of the BrB, I quote:

"Each wound may be cancelled if the controlling player makes a saving throw".

Cancelled to me implies that the wound is no longer suffered after a save has been made. As such by the time a hit that was saved by the armor reaches the Crown the hit is no longer the first wounding hit, it has been cancelled out. Therefore the crown may be used at a later time against a hit that actually penetrates the armor, or in other words: are the first wounding hit to reach the crown's protection.

Thinking about this item has made me realize that the order in which one rolls to wound and save in GW games is completely bonkers. Any realistic system would first roll to hit, then the mystical energy that protects you (ward save) would kick in, then you need to penetrate the armor and then finally you roll to wound a model.

[giovy85]

Seredain, indeed a very inspirational topic, i love your army composition! I'm trying to build an army list based on helm busses, but without a prince. looking for further play testing, can i ask you the possible weakness of a list like that?
2500 points
archmage, 4 level, book, shadow go with archers or w lions
mage 2 level, khaine ring, dispel scroll beast or high go with archers or w lions
noble bsb, h armour, shield of merw, crown, sword of might go with w lions
noble bardes steed, star lance, pot of fool, lucky stone, dragon helm, shield go with elm bus n1
noble barded steed, h. armour, h. lance, pot. of strengh, dawn stone, enchanted shield go with helm bus n 2
9 helms full command
9 helms, full command
15 archers, mus
20 white lions, full command, banner of the world dragon
2 lion chariots
1 lothern skycutter
2 rbt
2 great eagles
5 sisters of avelorn
thank you!

[Crixia]

List Edit

Prince – Giant Blade, Dawnstone, Other Trickster's Shard, Heavy Armour, Shield, Barded Steed - 276
Archmage – Level 4, Book of Hoeth, Talisman of Endurance, Ironcurse Icon, High Magic - 310

Noble BSB – Star Lance, Dragon Helm, Luckstone, Potion of Foolhardiness, Great Weapon, Heavy Armour, Shield, Barded Steed - 170
Mage – Level 2, Dispel Scroll, High Magic - 145

13 Silver Helms – Full Command, Shields - 329
18 Archers – Musician - 190
5 Silver Helms – Shields - 115

20 Swordmasters – Full Command, Banner of the World Dragon - 340
12 White Lions – Standard, Gleaming Pennant - 171
1 Tiranoc Chariot - 70

5 Sisters - 70
5 Sisters - 70
2 Repeater Bolt Throwers - 140
2 Great Eagles - 100

2496 points

Hello, I'm fairly new to High Elves but I can't help notice you run a lot of swordmasters and few White Lions. Wouldn't it be better to run more WL rather then SMs, sure the 6++ is great but your losing attacks. If you switched out 10 SMs for WL, wouldn't you be doing more damage? Even in horde formation your still losing 10 attacks with the 20 SMs since you only get 1 attack with your supporting ranks. Sure your losing 1 Weapon Skill which isn't a big deal, but your exchanging that for Strength, besides WLs still have 5 WS so your going to be hitting with 3 against most foes.

[Macharius]

Against most units, the SM will be more dangerous because they get two attacks base. This is especially important now that HE don't get rerolls on hits anymore.

[Seredain]

As Macharius said, the swormasters' greater number of attacks and higher weapon skill mean they kill more against the greater number of enemy units (tough heavy cav and armoured monsters being the particuar exceptions). This trend becomes much more pronounced when the opposing unit has WS 5, at which poi t swordmasters become much better at killing anything but the very heaviest stuff. Without re-rolls, fighting WS 5 troops renders the lions vulnerable to sways of terrible luck. WS 6 delivers kills more reliably.

In terms of attacks, the lions benefit disproportionatily from Martial Prowess, but that doesn't mean they kill more stuff. Their principle qualities stay with Stubborn and shooting resistence; but if you're running a Book High Wardmage and Banner in the unit, what need of lion cloaks? After that, I suppose the principle rule is: 'don't lose combat'...

[Steverlion]

Greeting oh oracle of the cavalry prince, I have been playing my own variant of your old list but at 2k the last few games and been doing ok with it (1 win, 1 loss). Any thoughts? Archmage

High Magic, Level 4 Wizard
Prince
Heavy Armor Shield
Dawnstone Giant BladeThe Other Trickster's Shard barded steed

Noble
Great Weapon , Heavy Armor Shield
Battle Standard
Banner of the World Dragon
Elven Steed with Barding


17 Archers
5 Ellyrian Reavers
Mud spears & Bows
Silver Helms shields full com

5 Shadow Warriors walker reaverbow
12 Sword Masters of Hoeth blade lord
15 White Lions of Chrace full com

Eagle Claw Bolt Thrower
Eagle Claw Bolt Thrower
Great Eagle

10 Sisters of averlorn

So far I have played against an ogres player and managed the classic prince kills tyrant in 2 rounds and then funds down a unit once I got rid of his ward save with arcane unforging (I live how much people save dispel dic for convocation and pretty much let everything else through). My second game I got rather careless and unlucky allowing the helm bus to be charged by 4 khorne chariots with glittering robes I couldn't stand up to so much st 5 and the prince and bsb which is all that was left failed a double 1 test. Earlier in the game I was silly with my redirectors and could have led around his blood crushers for at least 2 turns. With a failed restraint test. Next time I should take some pics and try a proper battle report.

[PadForce]

Seredain do you have a battle lined up? I dont play a cavalry bus list but the way you play your list in general I find very helpful so I am interested to find out how your style has transitioned to this new book.

[Crixia]

As Macharius said, the swormasters' greater number of attacks and higher weapon skill mean they kill more against the greater number of enemy units (tough heavy cav and armoured monsters being the particuar exceptions). This trend becomes much more pronounced when the opposing unit has WS 5, at which poi t swordmasters become much better at killing anything but the very heaviest stuff. Without re-rolls, fighting WS 5 troops renders the lions vulnerable to sways of terrible luck. WS 6 delivers kills more reliably.

In terms of attacks, the lions benefit disproportionatily from Martial Prowess, but that doesn't mean they kill more stuff. Their principle qualities stay with Stubborn and shooting resistence; but if you're running a Book High Wardmage and Banner in the unit, what need of lion cloaks? After that, I suppose the principle rule is: 'don't lose combat'...

Makes sense, I usually value S over WS. I also realized after I posted that SMs would still have the same amount of attacks. In fact SMs would probably have more attacks with the first rank providing 2A and the rest providing 1A, rather then the whole unit providing 1A each.

[Talan-Alavian]

First a big thanks and kudos to you Seredain, for you in depth (and verry flavour rich) writings on your tactics and list designs! It made me think about list building and making it a game on its own. On the other hand, DAMN you Seredain for giving me sleepless nights and horrible moments were i almost drown in my own sweat! All kidding aside, keep it up!

In one of you in depth revieuws you talk about the Lothern Skycutter :

Also, the Tiranoc is nice and small whereas the Skycutter is visible from basically anywhere: since it has only 4 wounds at T4, that strikes me as a one-way ticket to Pincushionville.

I thought this is actualy a plus point of these new mobile warmachine hunters, flankers, fastcav hunters, msu impact hits, ... If you take into acount your musings about the Frostheart phoenix these guys pose a new vieuw on target saturation for a cannon. Ok the points are not on there side to be targeted very fast by warmachines. But that depends on the way you use them. Throw them into the face of a cannon quickly and they buy your Phoenix some more time to get into favourable combat. No cannons in the game means they can do the same as a Tiranoc, but faster, with a bigger range, and faster to go were you need them. For 25 points more you could actualy get a failsafe net for a Phoenix. But thats another 25 points less of sleep at night.

Cheers!

[Seredain]

Chaps,

Apologies in advance if I'm a little sluggish with my replies for a few days - I'm on holiday and only have access to my phone. Posting with this thing is a complete pain in the... head.

Crixia, that's exactly it - against most stuff the extra 7 attacks, plus WS6, will ensure that swordmasters killl more enemy models that white lions even without Str6. When they're both hitting on 3's, lions take over at T4, 4+AS, but against WS 5, swordmasters have a distinct advantage - a very important consideration for my main melee unit since I need it to take on enemy elites and win rather than just stick.

Seredain, indeed a very inspirational topic, i love your army composition! I'm trying to build an army list based on helm buses, but without a prince. looking for further play testing, can i ask you the possible weakness of a list like that?
2500 points
archmage, 4 level, book, shadow go with archers or w lions
mage 2 level, khaine ring, dispel scroll beast or high go with archers or w lions
noble bsb, h armour, shield of merw, crown, sword of might go with w lions
noble bardes steed, star lance, pot of fool, lucky stone, dragon helm, shield go with elm bus n1
noble barded steed, h. armour, h. lance, pot. of strengh, dawn stone, enchanted shield go with helm bus n 2
9 helms full command
9 helms, full command
15 archers, mus
20 white lions, full command, banner of the world dragon
2 lion chariots
1 lothern skycutter
2 rbt
2 great eagles
5 sisters of avelorn
thank you!

Giovy, I like it! Fantastic mobile hitting power, decent enough ranged (though I think I'd take High Magic on your level 2 to help out here with the extra missile and the ward saves), and the lion block adds a solid centre. Excellent.

Weaknesses? I'd say that, since we have no way to generate power dice, there's a chance that your Lvl4 will eat most of the power dice and leave your Lvl2 with little to do. The Book helps a lots here, but you need to be careful using it with the expensive Shadow spells because you're more likely to throw that first 6 with each cast and start risking miscasts when you use the re-roll. It's another reason to take High on your support mage I think - with its relative cheapness and +1 to cast, this guy's likely going to have more to do than if he's trying to cast a 10+ Beasts spell every turn.

As for the main caster - what do you see him doing with his Shadow magic?

I'd normally pick on the skycutter but, in this list, with lots of attacking units and good saturation against cannons, I think it works. Cannons are a potential problem for you, maybe, unless you're happy to live without the eagles acting as redirectors and throw your skycutter in as support. Your attack is nice and fast, but armies with machines are likely to ping your chariots off pretty sharpish unless you get to them first or take shooting defence. Have you considered Light or High on your main caster? Light has good shooting resistence while High has Walk Between Worlds - gold dust for aggressive units (especially when they can't march), and Apotheosis is good for healing all those multi-wound models.

I'd understand if you wanted to keep the Shadow/Beasts setup, just make sure you have a think about what exactly you want from your magic phase before committing yourself. Do you want it to maximise your strengths or minimise your weaknesses? Which of these would be more useful against the kind of armies you're likely to face? All this stuff is just tweaking, mind - in all I think it's a great list.

Talan-Alavian You're absolutely right about skycutters in that, yes, they can see everything and then charge more stuff. The fact that they fly means you'll be able to park them safely behind your combat units and charge them over when you're ready. Being able to set up charges like this means you don't necessarily give your intended target away as you would moving a land chariot to one side of an accompanying unit - this is useful.

The fact remains though that being highly visibly and pretty fragile unit makes it very vulnerable to basically every ranged attack in the game. Unless you're playing against Warriors or Beastmen, then, I don't think parking skycutters behind your lines is the way to go - not unless you've got ways to outshoot or silence the enemy machines. I see them being good aggressive strike units, perhaps working in pairs, or as you say, working with a list that has lots of other cannon targets (dragons, phoenixes etc). In a list like mine, where I want a chariot to perform all-purpose support duties (combo charges yes, but also backline guarding, anti-chaff counter-charges etc), a Tiranoc does the job just fine but saves me 25 points. That's a Ring of Fury on my second mage - an important item - and some sleep saved to boot!

Steverlion would you mind adding a little more detail? Size of silver helm unit, archmage items, army points limit etc? It'll be easier for to give feedback once I've got the whole picture! Perhaps your archmage has no items at all?? I'll say straight off though that I love the Reaver Warrior unit - that's going to keep people headaches...

Padforce, I had my first set of games this weekend just gone. Very interesting indeed and gave me lots to think about. I took a few photos so I'll put up some summary reports shortly.

In the meantime, thanks for the kind comments guys - much appreciated.

Cheers,
S

[Steverlion]

Whoops couple of mistakes lol, I agree with you posting from a phone (especially one with an over active auto correct) is a pain in the head. The list is 2k, I've stayed with 8 helms for now as I believe it's still at a level where I can Lose the helms and not feel the pinch too hardships happens a lot in the old book. No my archmage has no magic items as The Lord points in this list are 497 not even enough for a fire or war machine ward. I'm not sold on the world dragon banner in my 2 games with it I've not needed to use it so the 50 point would have been better spent on bulking up bsbs defence or a couple more sword masters, it might stick around for a few more games as there are daemon and chaos players in my group. I had moment of awesome when my opponent tried to bubble cast enchanted blades +1 to hit ap and magic attacks on 4 chariots that had combo charged my helms I thought I don't care what you roll I'm not dispelling that 2+ ward vs all your attacks thank very much, then it turns out you can't bubble it bugger! One glittering scales later they all had a 1 up save and I lost 7 helms in one round he made the 2 5+'s he needed and I break and lose bsb & prince.
I need to not worry about fleeing a charge. They can take a knock but not that great. Random rules question could I have fled the 4th chariot or must I flee as my first reaction? As in 4 chariots charge I hold,hold, hold then flee? Thanks for reading.

[mattruh]

I am curious to see what you would do with a 2000 point limit now that we have our 8th edition book.

[daid13]

You can flee any charge whether you have already been charged or not.

[mattruh]

Based on the the list of Steverlion, which in turn is based on Seredain's old 2k list, I present the current list I am assembling. It has been built to use what I have on hand, which is a unit of Phoenix Guard, a new battalion box and the Island of Blood.

Lords-496
-Prince-276-Heavy Armor, Shield, Barded Elven Steed, Giant Blade, Dawnstone, Other Trickster's Shard
-Archmage-220-level 4, either High, Life, or Shadow...not sure which yet.

Hero-170
-Noble-Great Weapon, Shield, Heavy Armor, Barded Elven Stead, BSB, Banner of the World Dragon

Core-506
-17 Archers-187-Light Armor (Archmage Here)
-8 Silver Helms-214-Full Command, Shields
-5 Ellyrian Reavers-105-Musician, Bows

Special-491
-Tiranoc Chariot-70
-15 Phoenix Guard-255-Full Command
-12 Swordmasters of Hoeth-166-Bladelord

Rare-330
-Eagle Claw Bolt Thrower-70
-Eagle Claw Bolt Thrower-70
-Great Eagle-50
-10 Sisters of Avelorn-140

Total-1993

I am thinking of dropping the Banner of the World Dragon for the Star Lance and full command for the Swordmasters. I am also thinking of dropping the Other Tricksters Shard, Heavy Armor, and Shield on my prince for an Enchanted Shield on Dragon Armor.

[sparkytrypod]

hey seredain, where are those new reports you mentioned in your last post...!!

come on now, yoor holidays should be over now, back to your real job, wrting battle reports and theoryhammer!

[SpellArcher]

I'm reliably informed that normal service will be resumed shortly.

[Stormie]

Get a pad or something, making so many huge posts on a phone would send me insane!

[Seredain]

Get a pad or something, making so many huge posts on a phone would send me insane!

True dat bruv. Phone-reps are the highway to hell. Even a pad would suck pretty hard. I use the pc in my living room. Keyboards are amazing.

hey seredain, where are those new reports you mentioned in your last post...!!

come on now, yoor holidays should be over now, back to your real job, writing battle reports and theoryhammer!

Haha, I haven't even been on holiday yet! That's in a few weeks... No, I've been doing an application process to turn from a trainee solicitor into an Actual One (basically it's the same as before but people can now sue you for negligence). Since I've been holding down the actual job at the same time, it's made life somewhat... 'intense', as the nun said to the bishop.

I've got a couple of weeks respite now, so let's talk elves.

On the way

SA and I have been shooting the shingle today about our current lists and changes we're thinking of making to our main fighting lords. Believe it or not, I've changed my character setup yet again. Before we get there, though, we've got some games to look at. I haven't even started writing these, and I don't have many pictures, so I'll go with summary reports. Luckily, they were each completely different types of battle against completely different armies, so I learned a lot. First up, Wood Elves...

Be right back.

[sparkytrypod]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RnKXiQzgbm0

sounds intense alright, it can be tough to find 2-3 hours to have a game when you are working long hours, I know the feeling!

however the above video sums up my reaction to your return..!

[Seredain]

So let's get into the games. I don't have many pictures, and we've got lots to discuss on list edits, so I'm going to rattle through these games at a fair pace. The list edits are the result of encountering a few problems in these games and my wondering how to solve them. See if you can spot where my mind is going...

My List (2400)

Seredain
Prince – Giant Blade, Dawnstone, Enchanted Shield, Potion of Foolhardiness, Dragon Armour, Barded Steed – 282

Lecalion
Archmage – Level 4, High Magic, Book of Hoeth, Talisman of Endurance, Ironcurse Icon – 310

Caradath
BSB – Star Lance, Dragon Helm, Golden Crown of Atrazar, Great Sword, Heavy Armour, Shield, Barded Steed – 170

Acheron
Mage – Level 1, High Magic, Dispel Scroll, Ring of Khaine’s Fury – 135

13 Silver Helms – Full Command, Shields – 329
15 Archers – Musician – 160
5 Silver Helms – Shields – 115

18 Swordmasters – Bladelord, Standard, Banner of the World Dragon – 304
10 White Lions – Standard, Gleaming Pennant – 145
1 Tiranoc Chariot - 70

5 Sisters – 70
5 Sisters – 70
2 Repeater Bolt Throwers – 140
2 Great Eagles – 100

2400 points

Game 1 – Wood Elves

Lord - Bow of Loren, Arcane Bodkins
Level 4 - Item of extra dice vs big spells
BSB - Hail of Doom Arrow, cheap magic bow

19 Glade Guard, Musician, Standard
10 Glade Guard, Musician
10 Glade Guard, Musician
8 Dryads
8 Dryads
5 Glade Riders, Bows and Spears
5 Glade Riders, Bows and Spears

10 Wild Riders - Full Command (I think)
6 Treekin
Great Eagle
Great Eagle

Spells

My opponent got Dwellers, Throne, Stone and Awakening of the Wood.

Lecalion had: Soul Quench, Hand of Glory, Walk Between Worlds and Tempest.

Acheron had: Drain Magic, Soul Quench x 2 (Ring of Fury)

So, my first game with new High Elves and facing a balanced wood elf army here, featuring a large block of archers with a lord (Bow of Loren, Arcane Bodkins), Life archmage (Extra dispel dice against spells cast on lots of dice) and BSB (Hail of Doom Arrow), predictably deployed in the very middle of the table. Close by, West, were two small units of archers and, further West (beyond my left flank), 5 glade riders and 8 dryads. East, opposite my right flank, stood another 8 dryads, 6 Treekin and a block of wild riders.

As for my deployment, I correctly guessed (albeit it was a bit of a punt), that my opponent would be loading up his big archer unit with all of his characters. Why? Well, his deployment seemed so generic (shooty centre, wide spread of units across both flanks), that I got the impression he wasn’t necessarily analysing that carefully how he wanted to deploy against my particular army. So, happy to leave those 8 Western dryads stuck out in the middle of nowhere, I deployed a missile base left (15 archers, 5 sisters) in cover of a wood and my heavy infantry in the centre (to get forward and chop up the large archers). My cavalry deployment is where I got tricky: my 5 helms went East (my right) and the large helms went centre-left. Once my opponent had dropped his large archers (centre), I put Seredain and Caradath in the small helms (covered by the building from the arcane bodkins), and proposed to put them through the smaller elite units on my right flank. The big helms, I figured, were in enough numbers to smash through the glade guard infront of them.



High Elves Turn 1

I won turn one (woop!) and bombed it forward, both units of helms setting up charges for next turn, and the mage-led swordmasters running straight for the main unit of glade guard. Ah, swordmasters charging at bowlines - who'd have thought it? The white lions and tiranoc chariot moved up to the building to give me options if my opponent chose to advance all his eastern units to close down my prince and BSB. He wouldn't, but I wasn't to know that.

Magic was brilliant in a properly High Magic way. My opponent was most worried about Tempest (fair enough), so he allowed it when I romped my swordmasters into his face with WBW. I then fired off a hail of magic missiles. He stopped one of them, but the 4d6 which made it through cut the large glade guard unit in half. At the end of it, the swordmasters were toting a cool +3 ward save.

Shooting was also good. A hail of arrows and bolts scythed off both enemy eagles and (brilliantly), panicked the eastern glade riders off the board. Excellent.



Wood Elves Turn 1

The Western glade riders and dryads marched up to begin encircling my left flank (fine). On my right, the wild riders and treekin redeployed to reinforce the threatened centre, while the eastern 8 dryads angled themselves to force an awkward overrun if my knights made it into combat. Of course, not backing up made it more likely I would make it into combat, so this was (again) fine be me.

And then payback happened. Here's a question for you: what happens if you put 2 casters into a large swordmaster unit against an opponent with Life magic? 6 dice dwellers (for which I had the scroll ready) went through irresistibly and wiped out about 2/3 of my unit. It was bad rolling. Thankfully, neither of my casters got sucked under. In part, this was probably because of the tourney rules, which forbade characters being one-shotted by these spells. Odds on, however, I would've lost a caster here and frankly, having put two Str3 characters into a Str3 elite unit, I fully deserved to.

And then came the arrows. Loads of them. The swordmasters went to work with their jedi tricks and stopped most of them (with the massive helm from Shield), and the Banner of the World Dragon shrugged off Hail of Doom Arrow and the Bow of Loren. Even so, I only had about 6 swords left at the end of the turn. Ouch.



High Elves Turn 2

My knights wanted to settle the score. Unfortunately, without their leader, the helms proved incompetent and couldn't roll a 6 or 7 on 3d6 to hit the nearest glade guard (annoying - as my opponent had carelessly given me an overrun into his wild riders). Damn. Seredain's knights were better, though, and made it into the dryads. This round, they'd carve all of them up in one go and reform to face the treekin. To make sure the treekin didn't go anywhere in the meantime, I hopped an eagle infront of them. Meanwhile, my mages bugged out of the rapidly dwindling swordmasters and retreated to the white lions, who'd moved up to receive them.

Magic was a bit underwhelming: I got 3 more spells off (Hand of Glory, 2 x missiles), but one missile did bugger all damage to the big glade guard and only killed 2 or 3. Arse. I did kill a treekin with that other missile, though, and my shooting went great guns again. The glade riders on my left were halved (i.e I killed 2 or 3 and can't remember which), and I panicked one of the small glade guard units off the board.



Wood Elves Turn 2

The wild riders didn't have a charge on against my big helms what with glade guard being in the way, so they moved around to face my left flank. Nearby, the dryads continued their long slog toward my archers, and the glade riders came in to shoot my western sisters (killing 1). More arrows and Awakening plowed into the swordmasters: I failed a load of ward saves but the Banner kept them in it - just. 2 were left standing.



High Elves Turn 3

Now lots of stuff died. The big helms ran over the glade guard infront of them. Seredain's unit of helms (front) and the grizzled swordmasters (flank) tore into the treekin. They fled and the swords (still alive) ran them down. Magic (and a bolt thrower) ripped into the glade guard again, but some poor wound rolls left one character alive on 1 wound. My eastern sisters then killed the last of the glade riders and my archers and last repeater tore a rank off the wild riders.



Wood Elves Turn 3

Nothing doing: the last living character tried to run into hiding (not gonna happen hombre!), and the dryads and wild riders both failed charges. Next turn it was board clearance time.



But we ran out of time. I'd been up until 5am getting my crunk on, and I'd got lost on my way to the tourney (unrelated). So we had to call it or else there'd be no time for sandwiches. Damn. Ah well, it'd turned out pretty well.

Next up! Warriors of Chaos

P.S. If anyone has any tips on how to get battle chronicler pictures saved at a higher resolution, please tell me for the love of Jeebus!

[SpellArcher]

This game particularly interests me because I played this opponent in my third game of the same event. I believe he actually had three small units of archers Seredain! I tend to feel the list falls between two stools. On the one hand he's got strong (but not awesome) shooting plus Dryads/Eagles, staples of both the shooty and combat MSU builds. But I'm not sure the block of Treekin (2x3 might be better) plus the cavalry fit that well. He lacks Treemen and characters that can fight which means shooting/avoidance is probably the name of the game.

I too found that he deployed pretty much 'by the book'. Not stupidly but lacking the flexibility to counter specific threats perhaps. In contrast your deployments continue to surprise me sir! Running the Swordmasters straight into the arrow storm was brave but it paid off here. I did something very similar in a game against Tomb Kings. I imagine his combat units were down before you deployed the big helms (which they could have countered) left and the characters with the small unit? I really like the latter move. With no war machines and the archers to one side, this almost gave you an extra combat unit, the tank characters being a real menace for his fighting units.

The big first magic phase seemed to be key for reducing the big archers and getting enough Ward up to ensure the Swordmasters survived. I too had to deal with a six-diced Dwellers but no IF vs me, so was able to stop it. How do you feel about deploying the mages in retrospect? You didn't seem happy but what were the other options?

In particular, your opponent didn't seem able to get his combat troops into action to stem your breakthrough. Partly due to eagles and being out-deployed I guess. He tried to remedy this by re-deploying the Wild Riders (as against me) but with limited effect. What do you feel he should have done?

[Seredain]

Great comments SpellArcher - thanks.

Haha, the archers! Crikey that's something to miss. They can't have had much of an impact on the game for me to have completely forgotten about them! But now you mention it, I do recall that my big helms ended WE Turn 3 facing south-east: I think because they'd won an overrun into these archers in my Turn 3, routed them on WE Turn 3 and reforming to face the last wood elf character trying to make a run for it. This would also explain why my swordmasters were whittled down to 2 in spite of the Banner of the World Dragon. Incidentally, that flag deserves some praise. A 50 point item saved me 290 points in swordmasters. Bargain.

I think my swordmaster deployment was controversial but useful. I needed my mages burning glade guard as soon as possible and I needed my largest elite unit to close down the static parts of his army quickly (which would incidentally put paid to those annoying arrows). Shield of Saphery and Walk Between Worlds allowed both these aims to go hand in hand, and I wasn't too worried about putting my casters into combat as my opponent's characters weren't potent combat fighters. It wasn't for me to know at the time that Turn 2 would see a couple of nasty swings of Fortune - a lazy failed charge from the helms and, simultaneously, an irresistible Dwellers which went on to wipe out most of the swords. Without one of those events, I could have been in combat with, and therefore neutralizing, a good portion of the wood elf shooting phase before it could have another crack at withering my elites to death.

You're right to pick up on my mages' deployment. In hindsight I can understand why I did it (I wanted to all-but guarantee the 3+ ward for the swords against those massed arrows, and I wanted to get all my magic missiles into range as soon as possible), but it was sloppy play against a Level 4 Life caster toting Dwellers. I could just have easily have put one of the casters in the lions and spread the risk (albeit I still had to worry about my archmage getting Dwellered, of course).

As for my opponent's list... I don't know. I had better magic, better combat units, and even the shooting phase wasn't one sided (especially when magic was accounted for). Having said that, my opponent had enough harrassment units that he ought to have been holding my knights up for at least a turn, and he had enough combat units to put my soft parts under pressure. In the end, I don't think he was expecting me to be that fast with that many units: two cavalry units and the swordmasters all in his face on Turn 2 was a lot to handle. He made an understandable choice in attempting to scramble a defence against the teleporting swords, but this let my characters in through the back door without any resistance at all. Certainly this is one reason I like that 2nd heavy cavalry unit: you never know when you're opponent's going to leave a gap open for these guys to carry the characters in. As for the wild riders, I don't know what they could've done. I might have deployed them beyond the woods and attempted to steam into my archers. This would've given my helms something else to think about other than running straight into his glade guard. Still, my opponent wasn't counting on my characters deploying where they did (after his combat drops, as you say), and the rapid advance of the swordmasters really closed down the space he was trying to redeploy into. I agree that treemen would have given me a lot to think about here - they'd pretty much force me to counter with the prince and so would probably make my deployment more predictable.

Thanks again,

S