No rest for the wicked! Time to start playing Dragonlists again
.::. Battle Report - 2400 vs Empire (ETC comp) .::.
My list:
Prince on Star Dragon: Dragonhelm, Star Lance, Crown of Atrazar, The Other Trickster`s Shard, Shield = 598
Noble BSB on Barded Steed, Banner of the World Dragon, Dragon armour, Shield, Lance = 178
Noble on Barded Steed, Enchanted Shield, Heavy Armour, Ogre Blade = 134
Mage L2 on Steed, Scroll = 155
Mage L2 on Steed = 130
Characters = 1195
16 Silver Helms, Full Command & Shields = 398
5 Reavers = 80
5 Reavers, bows (swap) = 85
5 Reavers, champ = 90
Core = 653
3 RBT = 210
Frostheart = 240
2 Eagles = 100
Rare = 550
Army total = 2398
His list:
Grand Master, General, Runefang, Charmed Shield, Luckstone, Potion of Speed = 255
LVL 4: Life, steed, Scepter, Crown
LVL1: Heavens, steed, scroll = 102
Captain: BSB, barded steed, FPA, GW, dawnstone, tots
16 IC Knigths: FC, Decipline = 445
6 Knights, FC = 162
5 Demis: musician, standard, Gleaming pennant = 315
Great Cannon = 120
Great Cannon = 120
Hurricanum
Steam Tank = 250
// Pre-battle thoughts and deployment //
Empire is a tough matchup for a Dragonlist, but without Light it`s not terrible. I have to beware Dwellers to not blow my scroll too early on. My thoughts going into this was to use my amazing chaff advantage to force advantageous fights and stay clear of the stubbornbus until I could combo-charge it without fear of being countered, or simply ignore it. With a total of 5 chaff units, I could also put pressure on his artillery, I was hoping.
Spells saw me roll up double drain, apotheosis and walk between worlds. He got Earthblood, Throne, Flesh, Dwellers. This guy is used to playing Tomb Kings (I faced him in my last game before Indian Summer), so he told me he considers Dwellers a killing blow vs my Dragon, which I can understand given his massive use of Sphinxes.
The chaff drops allowed me to place the monsters after all his artillery was down, a central hill provided me with all the cover I would need.
With +1, he went first.
// Emp T1 //
Stank moves up towards my bus. Small knights stay behind to protect the cannon. Demis move slow as well. Magic sees me dispel Throne, no other spells were really relevant at this point.
Shooting: Stank misfires and takes a wound. A cannon kills a Repeater, the other misfires and blows up.
// HE T1 //
His stank is placed so that he cannot pivot towards my Dragon if I go up as much as I can. I could barely get out of sight of the other cannon as well, but had to leave a tiny bit of the base which he could hit. Magic sees him dispel Walk Between Worlds and my other spells are useless. Shooting sees the last 2 RBT put 2W on the Stank, so he`s now 50-50 to misfire.
// Emp T2 //
He commits the Knights and start wheeling Demis. Stank moves a little further up. Bus reforms to go into Lifebloom range of the Stank, but he forgets actually moving them after the reform. Magic sees me dispel Flesh to Stone on the stank. He lands Iceshard on the Dragon. Shooting sees the Cannon fail to hit my Dragon.
Forgot to take a picture
// HE T2 //
Dragon into 7W-Stank, Phoenix up to the wall, Reavers with champ towards cannon, Reavers conga-blocking demis and bus, Eagles move up to be useful later, shooty Reavers move to block bus as well. Magic saw double Drain remove Iceshard (first was dispelled). Shooting saw RBTs kill a Demi. Combat saw Stank down to 4W.
// Emp T3 //
Double charge on conga-blocking Reavers. Knights move towards RBT. Demis charge Reavers as well. Magic sees my scroll go, but he gets one spell through and the STank is lifebloom`d back to 5W. Shooting sees his Cannon have a tough choice: try and grapeshot my Reavers or try a perfect bounce to avoid the wall blocking the Phoenix. He chose the first and dealt 3W, panic was passed. In combat the Stank goes down to 3W and the Reavers disappear. He reforms.
// HE T3 //
Reavers charge Cannon, Phoenix moves to his rear, bus reforms and backs a bit to stay clear of demis, Eagle blocks bus in case Dragon kills Stank. 2nd Eagle lands nearby, ready to help out if need be later on. Magic sees his scroll come out to dispel WBW, though to be honest I don`t know what he was afraid of. RBTs kill another demi. In combat the Star Dragon knocks down the stank. Reavers kill cannon and reform towards center.
// Emp T4 //
Knights charge RBT but 2 fail DT and they panic, fleeing away. Demis move up to threaten my bus. Magic, I dispel throne with all my dice and he Dwellers my Dragon, killing the Prince but "failing" his killing blow, luckily for me. Shooting - there`s nothing left, which is a relief to me.
// HE T4 //
The Demis force me to deal with his 2 combat blocks one at a time, given their position they can mutually support eachother. I start off with a charge on them from the Dragon and he flees. I then decide to send everything into the bus: let the grind begin! Magic sees Drain go through on him. Shooting sees RBTs deal a wound or two to the Demis I believe. Chaff ran after Demis to block them out T6 if need be.
In combat I kill a lot, including his BSB who made way to my Frostheart (who was S7). Lucky for me, but he holds on stubborn. He does no significant damage.
// Emp T5 //
Both units rally and we go to magic. I stop throne with all dice as my monsters hurt him on 2s anyways and I don`t count on the rest doing a lot. He gets regen up as well, but I still win combat and he holds on stubborn.
My BSB eventually rolls snake eyes from the BOTWD, but the Frostie and SD grind so well that he eventually loses his crown and fails his break test (at this point, in the very last turn of the game, he had only 3 models left in the unit: L2 mage, Grand Master, Champion). I catch him and the game is over. His Knights were chaffed out T6 and RBT reduced his Demis to 1 model, giving me points for them. Given the demise of his Grand Master and the bus in T6, it`s a
20-0 victory to the High Elves!
// Evaluation //
I managed to execute my plan very well this game, which was a huge relief. My opponent is very solid with his TK but this is one of his first games with Empire so he made a few mistakes which I was able to capitalize on easily: abandoning the cannon with the small knights early on gave me complete board control by T3.
I said previously that I was looking to go back to my initial list designs when I wrote this list, and boy did that pay off: the 5 chaff units this game were absolutely brutal. He had no ways of dealing with them (fairly typical for Empire and their biggest weakness in my opinion) and they just completely shut him down 24x7.
One of my main lessons from Indian Summer was the importance of skipping the early aggressive spells from High Magic in favour of having more combat-worthy spells. That lesson was worth its weight in gold as doubling up on Drain Magic allowed me to largely negate the advantages of Life. Furthermore, Apotheosis saved the Phoenix which ended the game on 1W and helped providing the kills and CR necessary to breaking him.
The Star Dragon is back and I`m thoroughly enjoying playing it! On that note, I would like to point out that in the now-popular discussion of Flamespyre vs Star Dragon, this game would`ve been completely different without the biggest gribbly we can get our hands on: I could not have sent it into the Stank and expect it to kill it anytime soon, nor could I have sent it into a grind without the rider vs Knights with so many buffs and potentially disastrous damage output.