Going into my last game I was 10 points behind the leader, who I got to face. We were roughly 5-6 people hovering around 60 battle points after 4 games, whereas Kaj (my opponent for this game) had an impressive 70 with a score of 20-0, 14-6, 16-4, 20-0. He also had a huge VP advantage, so in reality my only chance at winning the tournament would be to win this game 16-4 or better.
.::. Battle Report - SM #5 vs Dark Elves (ETC comp) .::.
My list:
Prince on Barded Steed, Heavy Armour, Enchanted Shield, Giant Blade, Dawnstone, Ironcurse Icon = 268
Loremaster of Hoeth, Book of Hoeth, Talisman of Preservation = 330
Noble BSB on Barded Steed, Dragonhelm, Golden Crown of Atrazar, The Other Trickster`s Shard, Dragon Armour, Shield, Lance = 163
Heavens Mage, Dispel Scroll = 110
Characters = 871
12 Silver Helms, Shields, Full Command = 306
5 Silver Helms, Shields, Musician = 125
5 Reavers, bows = 85
5 Reavers, bows = 85
Core = 601
20 White Lions, FC, BOTWD = 340
20 PG, FC, Razor Standard = 375
Special = 715
3 RBT = 210
Rare = 210
Army Total = 2397
His list:
Dreadlord, Dark steed, heavy armour, seadragon cloak, shield, Giant blade, Dawnstone, The
other tricksters shard - 277
Supreme Sorceress, lvl 4, Death, Ring of hotek, Dispel scroll - 295
Master, Pegasus, BSB, heavy armour, seadragon cloak, lance, Charmed shield, Talisman of
preservation - 211
Master, Pegasus, seadragon cloak, shield, lance, Armour of destiny - 184
Master, Pegasus, heavy armour, seadragon cloak, shield, lance, Cloak of twilight - 188
5 Dark Riders, X-bows, shields - 100
10 Dark Riders, X-bows, shields - 200
25 Darkshards, FC, Banner of eternal flame - 340
5 Harpies - 75
Bolt thrower - 70
Bolt thrower - 70
Bolt thrower - 70
Bolt thrower - 70
5Warlocks - 125
5Warlocks - 125
Totalt: 2400
// Pre-battle thoughts and deployment //
Upon realizing that his list has 80 shots + 4 RBTs in addition to 3 casters of which 2 have Doombolt + Soulblight, I quickly dismissed going for the win here. If I push, I will be surrounded, choked and shot to death. My one chance at a decent result is if he over-commits or otherwise make a mistake. I would have to harass him with magic + RBTs as much as possible and hope for some good rolls for Spirit Leech, Searing Doom and single bolts. So, from the get-go I gave up going for the win as, barring a T1 Cascade etc on his part, it simply isn`t possible. Unfortunately I had not met such a Dark Elf list in my practice games (only the Witchstar which I`ve faced twice: once with HE and once with CD) so I wasn`t sure how to deploy.
My initial thoughts was to split up and present semi-juicy targets for him, hoping for a turn or two of firing upon his advance. Apart from this I would have to brace myself and pray he couldn`t shoot down everything. Characters going with Lions was pretty much a given because of his Death snipes. The question was, how much could I keep alive?
I ended up with RBTs away from my main forces as I couldn`t have them blocking my LoS: while I had to play defensively I couldn`t risk giving him an opening either as his fighters are really strong and I need my space behind the hill I got.
Spells saw him roll a triple, giving him great flexibility. He picked all the snipes though (a mistake in my opinion relative to 3 casts of Soulblight) + D&D. I rolled something useless and swapped for Iceshard.
With his +1 from finishing deployment first, he got first turn (we had equally many drops so this was as close as it could get). This is truly terrible in this matchup as getting an extra turn of shooting is so extremely important.
// DE T1 //
Flyers advanced on their own. Fast cav cautious. Magic contained. Shooting killed a unit of Reavers and annoyingly, panicked a nearby RBT despite BSB re-roll.
// HE T1 //
Silver Helms wheeled around to hopefully put pressure on his back lines, or at least distract a unit/flyer for some time. I moved the Loremaster into PG to get arc and range to his general. Magic saw him contain it though, unfortunately. Shooting saw both RBTs miss despite being on short range.
// DE T2 //
Flyers charge RBTs. Warlocks move to counter Silver Helms. Magic sees Doombolt kill off my small Helms, I contain the rest. In combat, the RBTs die. One flyer reforms, the other tries to overrun into a second RBT (needing 9+) but fails. He is left stranded.
// HE T2 //
I figure that I have to move the Lions onto the hill to get the Loremaster where I need him. This means exposing them to fire, so I might as well move up the SH as well to present too many targets. I make a huge brainfart however as I forget that he has harpies, so instead of moving them cautiously they go full speed towards RXBs. I also make a mistake with the PGs arc, not making sure they cover the Lions` front.
Magic sees the scroll come out to stop Spirit Leech. Rest is contained. In shooting, I keep up my misses and the flyer lives to kill me.
// DE T3 //
Flyer charges RBT to run off table. Warlocks chaff Lions, and this is a brilliant move because they score 5-6 wounds on average, so if I want to clear them I risk losing the Lions as he`ll have 3 turns left of shooting and they`ll be exposed. Harpies block Helms. Magic: can`t remember. Shooting kills 7 Helms (this should tell you a thing or two about how much firepower his list really sports), panic passed.
// HE T3 //
With the PG being angled wrong I leave the Warlocks alone. My hope pretty much boils down to magic bringing me a few points home, perhaps the PG can survive if I`m lucky. Helms charge Harpies. Magic sees IF Spirit Leech target his Lord... He rolls a `1`, I need 4+ to kill him and get a 4! Quite lucky on my part, and possibly my only points in this game. Miscast drains dice but is otherwise contained by BOTWD.
In combat I fail to kill more than 2 Harpies. He breaks, I restrain. I should`ve pursued to ensure the points, but I didn`t have an overview at this point (which was also a mistake, I even brought a book which I used to note points during the game for making clutch decisions in cases like this).
// DE T4 //
Flyer returns to the table and goes outside of PG arc. Other flyer charges congalined Helms. Magic sees D&D land on Helms. Shooting kills Lions, but at this point I learn an important lesson: when BS shooting targets a unit with characters having mismatching footprints, you can allocate one hit to each character! This is HUGE for my survivability in this game (p.99 BRB for those of you wanting to look it up) and I start (ab)using it to the fullest potential. His Harpies rallied as well.
In combat the Helms break, he catches me.
// HE T4 //
The PG were correctly re-positioned in my last turn. I charge the Warlocks in the flank. I reform Lions, move back and position Loremaster to have the flyer who broke the Helms in my front arc.
Magic is 7v5. I want Earthblood + Searing Doom, and with his Scroll gone I figure he HAS to let Earthblood through. I quickly look up the percentages, with the BoH a Loremaster has an 89% chance of casting Earthblood on 2D6. I roll snake eyes, thus needing a 5+ on the re-roll. I fail to cast and with broken concentration I can`t even attempt Searing Doom. Iceshard from L1 is dispelled.
PG breaks Warlocks but I fail to run him down. I only caused 2 casualties as well, so he can easily rally.
// DE T5 //
Warlocks rally. Magic and shooting combined kill all 10 remaining PG. I am now left with only WL + characters.
I have 2 turns left. All his characters are in units, so it boils down to Spirit Leech and magic missiles vs his RBTs. Throughout the game, I never had more than 7PD so it wasn`t a lot to work with, the same held true for the last 2 turns. With Hotek he could contain my attempts and I managed no more points. With me allocating 2 hits to Prince/BSB for each unit he shot with, he couldn`t bring the Lions down either. In the end though, the sad reality of the situation was painfully obvious as I had points only for his general, whereas he had annihilated the better part of my army: a
6-14 loss for the High Elves. Had I ran down the Harpies with the Helms, it would`ve been 7-13 and if I had taken the time to do the calculations (which I should`ve as we played fast and had lots of time on our hands), I would`ve realized this.
// Evaluation //
Out of all the lists I could face in my immediate vicinity for the 5th game, this was undoubtably the worst. I had another, way softer DE list, DoC, Empire and bus-HE. All of these are good matchups compared to this. In this game, while my opponent player a more solid game than me, I really don`t believe my list has a chance. I think that on average, a good DE player should look at this as a ~700vp win, a 13-7 under these conditions. Good play by the HE might result in 8-12 or even 9-11, but I really don`t see HE winning this. You can`t push and he has superior magic + shooting.
I did consider deploying Lions + characters in the other corner for a long while, since he commited the RXBs prior to my drop with them. I don`t think this would`ve been better as although his RXBs would`ve been less effective, it would be easier for him to mop up the rest while keeping his characters outside of my Loremaster`s 24" threat range. With more practice I could`ve managed a tighter deploy and early-game play, but it`s important to remember that the few points I did get was lucky as well, so in the end I think a 6-14 is a fair result here. It highlights the list`s weaknesses very well which I elaborated on prior to the tournament. It`s a decent list, no doubt, but suffers from being M5-push based in nature which you just cannot work with at a high level of play. You either have more mobility than M5 or you have enough ranged threats to force your opponent to come to you.
Thus my results at SM ended up with a 66/34 BP split, which sent me down from 2. => 12. place out of 102. Just outside of my top 10 ambition, but "only" 2 battle points which I should`ve managed with more solid play. Kaj ended up with a massive 84BP, 10BP ahead of the runner-up, a true testament to his play and list strength in this tournament.
My opponent ended up placing 1/102. Congratulations, Kaj! List musings and tournament analysis coming up!