Lucifer's Escapades. Battle report 15/5 with pics!

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Prince Luficer
Posts: 14
Joined: Fri Apr 25, 2014 11:17 am

Lucifer's Escapades. Battle report 15/5 with pics!

#1 Post by Prince Luficer »

Greetings fellow gamers. I have, after a great time lurking around, decided to start an army blog. I see it as a good opportunity to reflect on previous games and thus improve the way I play. I'm going to a tournament using swedish comp in a bit more than a month. The tournament is low comp, 5-9 so the lists will still be pretty nasty. I'm probably going to play 1 or 2 practice games this sunday, which I will try to make reports of.

Here is the list I'm planning to use:

Loremaster, sword of antiheroes, shield of the merwyrm, book of hoeth, 330, - 22

Noble, barded steed, battle standard bearer, dragon armour, star lance, halberd, charmed shield, golden crown, potion of foolhardiness, 170, -15
Mage, lvl 2, shadow, forbidden rod, 155, -13
Mage, lvl 2, shadow, dispel scroll, dragonbane gem, steed, 160, -13

6 Silver Helms, shields, musician, standard bearer, 158, -6
12 Archers, musician, champion, 130, -5
11 Archers, musician, champion, 120, -5
11 Archers, musician, 110, -5
5 Ellyrian Reavers, champion, musician, bows instead of spears, 105, -4

26 Phoenix Guards, full command, razor standard, 465, -29
14 Phoenix Guards, full command, banner of the world dragon, 290, -8

6 sisters of avelorn, 84, -6
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70, -7
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70, -9
1 great eagle, 50, -5

Bows: 49.5
forbidden rod, -10
banner of the world dragon, -20
dispel scroll, -7
book of hoeth, -25

2499
Komp 8.6

I have a decent amount of drops, of which only one or two are very important, which should make it possible to out deploy most opponents. The magic phase provided by a loremaster with the book and the shadow mages is very versatile and potentially very dangerous. Both the pit of shades and mindrazor spells provide great tools against units which might otherwise prove problematic (crypt horrors, terrorgheists, beasts of nurgle etc). There is hopefully enough shooting to deal with diverters and other fragile units, and I think the phoenix guards should be hard to crack in close combat combined with all the buffs and hexes I can throw out. A lot of the units are small and pretty cheap, which makes them great "sacrificial charges"-material. Something like "12 archers charges the arachnaroc spider praying for mindrazor-support", if the spell goes trough there is probably a dead arachnaric spider, while it it doesn't go through, it is not a very big loss.

The game on sunday will be against my friends "Malekith + doomfire warlocks + MSU dark elves"-list. A matchup which could be very interesting.
Last edited by Prince Luficer on Thu May 15, 2014 10:38 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Falahk
Posts: 145
Joined: Mon Oct 11, 2004 8:43 pm
Location: Falun, Sweden

Re: Lucifer's escapades

#2 Post by Falahk »

is it Lincon you are planing to attend?

as for the list the secound lvl2 mage (after the one with dispel scroll) might be a bit overkill, since you will probably run out of power dice before you run out of spells to cast
[url=http://swfbr.ipbhost.com/index.php?act=idx]SWFBR[/url]- Swedish Warhammer Tournament Calendar, Ranking and Forum
Prince Luficer
Posts: 14
Joined: Fri Apr 25, 2014 11:17 am

Re: Lucifer's escapades

#3 Post by Prince Luficer »

Yup, it's Lincon! It's a small world we live in :wink:
The reason I have the 2nd lvl 2 isnt to get enough spells to cast every magic phase. The loremaster works great in most circumstances by himself, but sometimes I need to be able to six dice mindrazor or pit of shades. The only reliable ways to get those spells is to have 2 lvl 2 mages. Or a lvl 4.

Which brings me to my next point. The battle didn't go too well :(
I have thought about it, and I think a bit more space controlling units. With that in mind the small unit of phoenix guards with BotWD is out. Instead I've decided to put in 2 small units of dragon princes. I've also changed the core setup so that I replaced two of the archer units with a bigger unit of 9 silverhelms to go with my bsb, and a small unit of spears to serve as a bunker or mindrazor dart. This freed up enough bow space to squeeze in another bolt thrower. I've also replaced the lvl 2:s with a lvl 4. This causes a bit of a drop in comp score. I hope it's worth it as the points saved makes it possible to squeeze in some extra treats.

All in all. Here is the modified list. I think it should be a lot more flexible and mobile. Although I will surely miss the BotWD when playing against deamons.

Loremaster, sword of antiheroes, shield of the merwyrm, book of hoeth, 330, - 22
Archmage, lvl 4, shadow, dispel scroll, 245, -48

Noble, barded steed, battle standard bearer, dragon armour, sword of might, enchanted shield, dawnstone, 170, -15

9 silver helms, shields, full command, 237, -9
14 archers, musician, champion, 160, -7
12 spearelves, musician, standard bearer, gleaming pennant 133, -3
5 Ellyrian Reavers, champion, bows instead of spears, 95, -4

27 Phoenix Guards, full command, razor standard, 480, -29
6 dragon princes, 174, -10
5 dragon princes, 145, -10

5 sisters of avelorn, 70, -6
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70, -7
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70, -9
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70, -12
1 great eagle, 50, -5

Bows: 50.5
dispel scroll, -7
book of hoeth, -20

2500
Komp 7.7

Edit: I realised I hadn't removed the lvl 2:s from the list.
Prince Luficer
Posts: 14
Joined: Fri Apr 25, 2014 11:17 am

Re: Lucifer's escapades

#4 Post by Prince Luficer »

Ok! Time for a very lazy battlereport. It's the first time I'm using battle chronicler and I don't have time do do more pictures than the deployment I'm also pulling it out of my memory so it's probably not very accurate. However, I played a game against my friends dark elves a couple of days ago! It was an msu shadow list with a lot of repeater bolt throwers to support it.
Something like:

Lvl 4 shadow, 4+ ward, scroll
BSB on foot, 2+ armour, 4+ ward, cheap magic sword

13 witch elves, flaming banner, full command
10 witch elves, musician
10 witch elves, musician
10 witch elves, musician
5 dark riders

15 black guards, razor standard
15 black guards, lichebone pennant
5 harpies
8 shades

4 reaper bolt throwers

komp 8.6

My list was:
Loremaster, sword of antiheroes, shield of the merwyrm, book of hoeth, 330,
Noble, barded steed, battle standard bearer, dragon armour, sword of might, enchanted shield, dawnstone, 170,
Mage, lvl 2, shadow, forbidden rod, 140,
Mage, lvl 2, shadow, dispel scroll 145,

9 silver helms, shields, full command, 237,
13 archers, musician, champion, 150,
13 archers, musician, champion, 150,
5 Ellyrian Reavers, champion, 90,

15 Phoenix Guards, musician, standard bearer, banner of the world dragon, 305,
14 Phoenix Guards, musician, standard bearer, 245,
5 dragon princes, 145,
5 dragon princes, 145,

1 repeater bolt thrower, 70,
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70,
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70,
1 Eagle, 50

komp 8.2

Deployment:
Image

The battle was a complete bloodbath! I cleared up the right flank with my bolt throwers, silver helms and dragon princes. I tried to halt the left flank with shooting, magic and dragon princes. And the middle of the board turned into a very drawn out grinding between his black guards and my phoenix guards (after I had shot and chopped through the witch elf screens). His bolt throwers were on fire and killed all but one of unit of archers (including killing my mages, who were both on 1 wound left after a miscast, ouch...), killed half the other archer unit, and wiped out the dragon princes on the right flank after they had killed his witch elves and dark riders.

After the grind in the middle all that was left there was my BSB, 4 silver helms and 2 of his Doomfire warlocks. My BSB and silver helms were also shot to death by his bolt throwers.

When the battle was done, his units left were:

2 shades
2 doomfire warlocks
4 bolt throwers

My units left were:
1 archer
5 archers
5 ellyrian reavers
1 eagle
3 repeater bolt throwers

So it all ended in a draw. A very exciting battle! Next time I will take some pictures to help me write a proper battle report.


Thoughts about the list:
The magic phase is fantastic! All the buffs and hexes goes really well together with the phoenix guards. Unfortunately I lost both of the shadow mages to a crazy turn of shooting so I lost both the forbidden rod and my scroll. Those items would probably have helped me a lot during the grind in the middle. The loremaster still makes for an impressive magic phase alone though.

I also like this MSU style a lot. It is very easy to outdeploy your opponent, and the mindrazor spell makes all units into threats against monsters and cavalry units. 3 bolt throwers and 26 archers also provide a decent shooting phase.

I think the unit of 9 silver helms is a bit of a waste. 6 is probably enough for what I want the unit to be able to do (bodyguard for the bsb, taking on small support units). If I reduce the unit to 6 and change the rest of the core a bit, I can fit in one more unit of ellyrian reavers, which means I can drop the eagle, whose points I can use to beef up the phoenix guard units (full command and flaming banner comes to mind) and put the gleaming pennant on one of my dragon prince units.

I'm also switching the forbidden rod into a power stone. It's a lot more flexible as it allows the mage to join any unit instead of being stuck with the banner of the world dragon PGs, and it is possible to use it at the end of the magic phase. It also makes my comp score go up by a bit.

So: modified list. I think this is the version I'll be taking to Lincon :)

Loremaster, sword of antiheroes, shield of the merwyrm, book of hoeth, 330, - 22

Noble, barded steed, battle standard bearer, dragon armour, sword of might, enchanted shield, dawnstone, 170, -15
Mage, lvl 2, shadow, power stone, 140, -13
Mage, lvl 2, shadow, dispel scroll 145, -13

6 silver helms, shields, standard bearer, musician, 158, -6
13 archers, musician, champion, 150, -5
13 archers, musician, champion, 150, -5
5 Ellyrian Reavers, champion, 90, -4
5 Ellyrian Reavers, 80, -6

15 Phoenix Guards, full command, banner of the world dragon, 305, -8
15 Phoenix Guards, musician, standard bearer, banner of eternal flame, 255, -8
5 dragon princes, standard bearer, gleaming pennant, 160, -10
5 dragon princes, 145, -10

1 repeater bolt thrower, 70, -7
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70, -9
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70, -12

Bows: 49
dispel scroll, -7
book of hoeth, -25
banner of the world dragon, -25
power stone, -4

2498
Komp 8.6
Prince Luficer
Posts: 14
Joined: Fri Apr 25, 2014 11:17 am

Re: Lucifer's escapades

#5 Post by Prince Luficer »

Battlle Report! :D

I had a practice game against one of my friends yesterday. We are both going to Lincon in a couple of weeks and wanted to try out our lists. And even though I didn't take pics every single turn (got to work on that) I took enough to illustrate what happened.

My list:
Loremaster, sword of antiheroes, shield of the merwyrm, book of hoeth, 330,

Noble, barded steed, battle standard bearer, dragon armour, sword of might, enchanted shield, dawnstone, 170,
Mage, lvl 2, shadow, power stone, 140,
Mage, lvl 2, shadow, dispel scroll 145,

6 silver helms, shields, standard bearer, musician, 158,
13 archers, musician, champion, 150,
13 archers, musician, champion, 150,
5 Ellyrian Reavers, champion, 90,
5 Ellyrian Reavers, 80,

15 Phoenix Guards, full command, banner of the world dragon, 305,
15 Phoenix Guards, full command, banner of eternal flame, 255,
5 dragon princes, standard bearer, gleaming pennant, 160,
5 dragon princes, 145,

1 repeater bolt thrower, 70,
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70,
1 repeater bolt thrower, 70,

2498
Swedish Komp 8.6

His list was something like:

Dreadlord, 1+ reroll armour save, giant blade, dark steed
Dreadlord, 1+ armour, 4+ ward, ogre blade, dark steed

BSB on dark pegasus, lance, 1+ armour, 4+ ward
level 2 death, scroll
level 2 death, ring of hotek

20-ish Darkshards, full command, flaming banner
20-ish Darkshards, full command
10 Dark riders, full command, light armour and shields, (bunker for characters, as well as good for keeping the comp score up)

5 harpies
5 harpies
cold one chariot

5 warlocks
5 warlocks
komp 7.9

We rolled which scenario we were going to play (Lincon has 3 different ones in addition to the normal battleline). We got a scenario where you got 150 victory points for each unit worth at least 150 points with a banner completely inside the opponents deployment zone at the end of the game. Also as I've got a komp-score lead by 0.7 points I was ahead 140 VP from the start (usually it would just be 70 VP, but this tournament is different as it's a low-comp tournament, between 5 and 9, regularly it's between 10 and 15 or something like that).

Pre-battle thought:
I don't really like my opponents list. Yes, it can shoot quite a lot and it's got 2 doombolts, 2 dreadlords on dark steeds and a bsb on dark pegasus. All of which are nasty. But I think the 24" range on the darkshards makes it way too easy to dodge the shooting. And as the mounted characters are the only real close combat units in the game (aside from the warlocks which are just good against other support units, not dedicated close combat units), it's really hard to take on anything but support units.

Against my list that's kind of okay as I've got a shitload of support units. But he can't afford to get stuck anywhere due to the threat of okkham's mindrazor. His death magic not very useful as I've got the banner of the world dragon and his shooting is pretty easy handle as I've got iceshard blizzard and 2-3 mystifying miasmas.

So I reasoned that If I could just keep my squishy stuff out of range from his darkshards, keep my units in places preventing chain overruns from his mounted characters and warlocks and keep his magic down to just getting one nonboosted doombolt through per turn I should be fine, as I'll be able to shoot and magic a lot of his stuff to death as well.

Magic: I got miasma and okkhams on my lvl 2 with the scroll, and miasma and withering the lvl 2 with the power stone. Very good spells!
He got 2 spirit leeches, doom and darkness and soulblight. Possibly the best spells he could get against my list. (3 soul blights!)

Deployment: I decided to concentrate my force to the left flank as his list would be really nasty if his characters and warlocks were to be able to charge my support units without any threats of countercharges, or chances for me to pass my break tests with the help of the bsb. All my characters are deployed in the BotWD unit.

He deploys his darkshard units to be able to shoot at my phoenix guards (everything else is out of reach) and his dreadlords and a unit of warlocks to support them. The other unit of warlocks deploys on the other flank. He gets the first turn. I'm used to opponents going first against this list as I have so many drops.

Picture of dark elves turn 2 post movement, premagic
Image

DE Turn 1:
He moves up with his warlocks within doombolting distance of a unit of dragon princes, keeing his giant blade drudd in the unit to support them. His unit of dark riders with bsb and ogre blade drudd moves into the forest within character charging distance of one of my bolt throwers. The other unit of warlocks moves up to threaten a bolt thrower, while still being in hard cover from all other shooting.
In his magic phase he gets a doombolt though on my dragon princes, killing 3.
His shooting kills 1 phoenix guard (one unit of darkshards marched, the other one moved so it was hard for him to hit)

HE turn 1:
I retreat with my dragon princes and move my bolt thrower out of charging range from his dreadlord+bsb (they would be able to get a couple of nasty overruns). I move into magicking distance of his giantblade drudd + warlocks unit. My ellyrian reavers on the right flank keeps out of charging distance from his second unit of warlocks.

Magic: 7 vs 4
1 cast spirit leech on his giant blade drudd with 3 dice. He has one more point of leadership, but no save against wounds caused. He dispels with 4 dice.
I proceed to cast iceshard blizzard with 2 dice on the giant blade + drudd unit, lowering their Ld (worth a shot as they're outside bsb bubble and I may be able to force 2 panic tests) .
I cast burning gaze on the unit same unit with one dice. Getting it through but not killing anything.
Last, I one dice mystifying miasma on the closest unit of darkshards, lowering their BS by 2.

DE turn 2:
He tries to charge my bolt thrower with his doomfire warlocks. He needs to roll a 10 which he doesn't. He should just have moved up instead to be able to threat more units next turn.
He overcommits with dark riders, placing them withing charging distance of my dragon princes. His BSB flies to join his darkshards making the move even worse. He really overestimated his S6 drudds ability to kill dragon princes.

The warlock unit with giant blade drudd moves up to threaten my archers and silver helms. Now within short range of archers and a bolt thrower and no cover from the other bolt throwers. A (very) bold move!

Magic: He kills the bolt thrower furthest to the right with a doombolt.
Shooting kills a phoenix guard. ( move and shoot on one unit and miasma on the other unit)

HE turn 2:
I charge his dark riders with my dragon princes and my archers (would have gotten a very good combat with the archers corner to corner due to terraint). The archers however fail to charge rolling 3 when needin to roll 4. The combat is still very managable though :)
I move my phoenix guards and cavalry units to get clear shots at his giant blade doomfire warlocks.

Magic: 11 vs 7.
Spirit leech on his giant blade drudd goes thorugh! It scores 2 wounds! :D
Iceshard blizzard on his dark riders is dispelled. Mystifying miasma goes through, but only lowers his WS by 1 so it doesn't matter (2 would have made a huge difference!)
The other miasmas doesn't go through, but I manage to get a wyssans wildform through on the dragon princes, always something...
Shem's burning gaze on warlocks is dispelled.

Shooting.
13 archers not moving and within short range as well as a bolt thrower within short range + another bolt thrower manages to kill 1 warlock. We are not impressed....

In close combat i completely maul his dark riders, taking only one casualty in return, making up for the shooting phase! He loses by 5 points, breaks and is run down. 1 Dreadlord down!

Image

De turn 3
Dreadlord + warlocks charges my silver helms.
Flaming banner crossbows charge my dragon princes.
In his magic phase I use a scroll to prevent him getting any soulblights though on my dragon princes.
Shooting kills 2 phoenix guards.
In combat he kills all but 1 of my silver helms, which stands on snake eyes! Awful for me! As that means He will finish the combat in my next combat phase, Thus getting a reform making it possible for him to charge other units (bolt throwers and dragon princes)



The rest of the battle was pretty straightforward. I pushed with my phoenix guard units against his darkshards + sorceresses + chariot + bsb. My magic fried his harpies and due to some really bad break tests and a horribly mistimed failed stupidity test all those units except for the chariots were killed. The failed stupidity test was really his fault though as he had forgot to keep the chariot inside the BSB bubble.
Image

On the other side of the battlefield his gaintblade drudd warlocks were grinded down in combat against dragon princes and archers, and as I managed to move my last bolt thrower out of his charge arc, once they broke through the archers I managed to single shot his dreadlord with my last bolt thrower, killing him. Yay!

Here's the last, post battle picture
Image


Post battle thoughts:
He had some really bad luck at the end of the game failing very important break tests. But I felt that at that point he had kind of already lost. He could not prevent the phoenix guard push against his darkshards without losing a lot of points after I had fried his harpies (iceshard blizzard is amazing for that purpose!) Those bad rolls just ensured he lost more points than was necessary.

I felt that this was a good match up for me. The only problem was that if he had played a better game it would have been pretty hard for me to get a meaningful amount of points from him. In this case he made a couple of very crucial mistakes. On the other hand, as mentioned earlier, if I play a tight game it will be hard for him to take any points as well, and I think I have the edge.

The more I play this list, the more I like it, and I really look forward to the tournament! :D
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