First tournament - first round draw Lizards

[20phoenix]

Playing in my first ever tournament and have drawn lizards in the first round. I've never played lizards before so i've been reading battle reports on Lustria and here to see what sort of things I can expect. Is there any general advice that is useful for playing lizards?

My list is below:

Eltharion on Stormwing - Lvl 2 (Beasts) 490

Archmage - Book of Hoeth, Golden Crown, Lvl 4 Heavens - 285

Noble on Upgraded Eagle - Lance, Dragon Armour, Reaver Bow, POS, Charmed Shield, BSB - 226

Archers x 10 - Musician - 110
Reavers x 5 - Spears and Bows - 95
Reavers x 5 - Spears and Bows - 95
Silver Helms x 6 - Musician, SB - 158
Silver Helms x 6 - Musician, SB - 158

Phoenix Guard x 20 - FC - 330

Eagle Claw x 3 - 210
Frostheart - 240

2397 points

[SpellArcher]

Typically, their magic will be strong. The Slann will have extra powers and may well be backed up by Tetto'Eko or at least a Skink Priest or two. You have no scroll 20phoenix so really need to watch out for them forcing a killer spell through. Book of Hoeth should help if they go for a spam phase. Offensively, it will be hard to push spells through, especially if they bring Cube of Darkness as well as the scroll but it shouldn't be impossible. The Slann can cast spells through the skink wizards, using their position for range and line of sight, watch out for this.

Expect a lot of Skinks, whether Skirmishers with Blowpipes, Cohorts with Javelins, possibly Scouting Chameleons. The Poison is dangerous, especially to your flyers (though armour helps) and Reavers. You have shooting that outranges them and Silver Helms are good against the skirmishers. Magic Missiles help here, Flock of Doom for example. Watch out for the flying cavalry, especially Razordons, which hit very hard. Heavens with it's Lore Attribute could help here.

They often bring really hard heroes on Cold Ones. Expect 1+ armour saves (with T5) and S6 or S7 attacks. Your flyers can fight them but magic matters a lot here, a Beasts buff for example can swing the combat. They'll almost certainly approach in Cohorts or Temple Guard to avoid being shot by RBT single bolts. The Frostheart can be bad news for Temple Guard. Get Eltharion in too and you could tear them up.

In general I'd try to use your range and not rush everything in. If the flyers work as a team they can deal with combat threats. Try to deploy bearing Scouts and Vanguards (from the flyers) in mind. Threaten Silver Helm charges to keep the Skinks back. Comet could be very good for you and the whole Lore, in combination with focused shooting, should be able to deal with sections of his line.

[John Rainbow]

Agreed with the comments from SA. I would also reiterate that lizards really struggle to deal with the Frost bird outside of magic. He can eat an entire unit of saurus by himself.

[20phoenix]

Would something like a refused flank with an attempt to drop a comet in the approach lanes be a valid tactic? Idea is to force them to take the longest possible route while my shooting whittles them down The reavers and helms would patrol the flanks of the formation and eliminate skink threats that get too close. Once solid threats make it across the board the PG can hold them in place while the flyers hit the flanks. Its highly dependent on terrain but I at least have some say in that as tables aren't prepared - terrain is placed by the players each game.

This is definitely one game where I regret not having a scroll!

[SpellArcher]

If you can get the Frostheart into combat with BSB within 12" he can take a lot of heat and still hold. As John says he's already good at killing infantry, for other things you can throw in support maybe.

In general yeah, I wouldn't engage all along the line, focus your efforts 20phoenix. You may get Comet off, you may not but it has a lot of potential. Harmonic Convergence could make your shooting bite harder. You may not want too many woods etc as they will hamper your fire.

Of course it depends what he brings. Stegadons for example you can target with single bolts or high strength MM's. Salamanders could be a threat to your cavalry.

Where's the tournament?

[20phoenix]

The tournament is in Cardiff, UK - called Tribute.

Spellwise I'm thinking Iceshard/Curse is good anti skink, Urannons anti-flyer and Harmonic/Comet good all round.
Chain lightning - maybe but depends on his list and what else I roll up
Ideally I'd like a fairly open field so my shooting is maximised bit nothing is ever ideal

[SpellArcher]

Good luck and let us know how it goes!

[20phoenix]

Thank you both for your advice!

[mcmulligan]

Good advice in here already, only addition I have is watch out for salamanders (if he brings them) and poison on your bird, Salamanders can wipe most of your units out in one shot, since you've gone for fairly small unit sizes.

Poison is always good, but especially for LM who have few other answers for monsters. The only other thing on the board that could threaten your bird is a death slann (not overly common) and a d3 impact hit Ancient Steg. They need the charge for that though, so just don't let yourself get bogged down in a pit of saurus if you see a steg lurking. The lack of war machines for the LM is definitely in your bird's favour.

[20phoenix]

Well skinks are fun......

Guy turned up with skink spam and TG with Kroak and high magic slann. Came very close to killing off the temple guard but the scar vet survived the Eltharion onslaught with one wound then apotheosis brought him back from the brink. Ended 20-0

Second game versus Empire was also a close run thing as Eltharion miscast on three dice when he was likely to clean up a hellblaster and the mages unit but got cascaded instead. The following turn his mages unit fled from magic damage and hung onto the edge of the board by millimetres. 15-5 loss.

The final game of the day was the craziest of all. Watchtower scenario and my Archers were cleared out of the tower turn 1 by a big unit of Swordmasters. I ignored them until turn 4 when I killed off his star dragon with Eltharion. We whittled the unit down to two Swordmasters, BSB and archmage by turn 6, managed to earn the extra turn. I had killed everything else on the board and it came down to 3 Phoenix Guard against 1 SM for possession of the tower. The SM survived.... Still a 14-6 win but probably should have been 20-0.

Great day though and its goblins up first tomorrow.

[SpellArcher]

It's a strong tournament, sounds like you're fighting hard!

Magic on fighting characters can backfire sometimes. I had a game in 7th where I had two dice to throw up a 5+ Ward on my BSB's unit. My foe was out of DD. BSB Miscast and blew his own unit up, then unit was incinerated by Flamers (no 5+ Ward!).

Good luck today.

[20phoenix]

Day 2 and more stories to tell.....

My goblin opponent failed to show so I faced Dark Elves instead. Another race i'd never played and all my homework overnight out of the window! First game was blood and glory.

First turn of shooting lost me my frostheart as next door reavers getting wiped out forced a panic test and the phoenix failed the Ld10 roll! We struck back well enough, nearly wiping his dark riders and most of a witch elf unit. Turn 2 combat was pretty crucial as Eltharion flank charged the depleted witch elves with a possible overrun into the flank of his generals unit of executioners who were themselves charged in the front by the Phoenix Guard. There was a manticore on the executioners left flank that could flank charge back the following turn which one of my silver helm darts was going to charge but they failed. Eltharion wiped the witch elves but was two inches short of getting in the executioner combat. The Phoenix Guard laid waste to the executioners, killing ten forcing them to flee and catching them, breaking his fortitude in the process! (BSB, general and standard were all in the unit). Eltharions failure unfortuntely left him to get shot up by four bolt throwers and he eventually copped it. In fact from that point my army pretty much got tabled but theres three stories of heroism to tell. My unit of ten archers holding my mage got charged by five warlocks. The warlocks wiped the archers but took four warlocks down in return. The mage stepped up and stabbed the final warlock After Eltharion died the Phoenix Guard got hammered by the bolt throwers, failing a panic test in consecutive turns to prevent them charging one of the bolt throwers and getting safe behind a building. In turn six the lone champion had fled into a forest with ten shades, four dark one riders, two multi shot bolt throwers all fluffing their shots on him before the third bolt thrower delivered the coup de grace! The mage, all on his own ang getting harassed by warlocks and dark riders was well protected by the BSB who prevented charges on him and gave some cover for the shooting. The final turn saw him balanced on the edge of the table with the BSB parked in front of him who took a charge from some hero that charged out of the dark riders. He clung in there but died in the final combat leaving the archmage as the sole survivor. Was a highly entertaining 13-7 loss.

My final game was against Vampire Counts, another race I knew nothing about which was quite costly as not knowing the Terrorgheist rules cost me the phoenix turn 1 again! He rolled crazy high on a -3 leadership spell which i let him have expecting spirit leech to come after which I was prepared to dispel (turned out talking to him after he was 2" out of range or he would have). I thought I was out of the woods but then the terrorgheist shrieked.........dead bird. We then had a great shooting phase as the bolt throwers removed the terrorgheist and took down a vargheist. Eltharion and a unit of silver helms took one unit of three vargheists down in combat and overran into his mages zombie unit with the helms clipping a ghoul unit. The Phoenix Guard charged a unit of direwolves, wiped them and overran into the second vargheist unit. It was suddenly looking rosy...... and then the turn three magic phase happened. Mannfred had charged into the Eltharion combat and he rolled an 11 v 6 magic phase. He opened with a five dice purple sun, I tanked for a bit and decided to let it go fearing the combat debuffs more than the "six for death" rolls. Opened with a six for Eltharion.........I rolled poorly for the Phoenix Guard too but they still had numbers. Stormwing and the helms got rolled over and suddenly I was staring down the barrel again. A great shooting phase followed though as the bolt throwers and reaver bow noble plowed into Mannfred, taking him down to two wounds and killing his mount forcing him to take cover in the zombie unit. With that unit now threatening my fire base my archmage fled the archers to take cover behind the hill. On the right flank a silver helm dart and some flanking reavers were locked down in combat with a unit of ghouls, eventually killing them in turn 4 and headed back to the centre to help out. My other reaver unit were doing a fantastic job of redirecting his grave guard, keeping them out of any combat until turn 4 when I had to throw the reavers under the bus to prevent the grave guard flank charging my noble who was embroiled in a fight with the Phoenix Guard and the second unit of ghouls. The ghouls got wiped but so did the reavers meaning that the grave guard went into the noble and phoenix guard anyway.With the archmage dying to a magic missile I failed to dispel and the BSB/Phoenix Guard dying to the grave guard I called it turn five, prematurely as it turned out. I thought briefly after we had called it and realised I could likely preserve the points from the helm dart and lone reaver from the right flank which would have been enough to earn me a 19-1 instead of a 20-0 but hey ho. Very swingy game but was great fun and my opponent was excellent, earning my most sporting vote and an invite to our gaming group since he was local and was interested in playing 9th age! The lack of knowledge cost me big time in this one but its all a learning curve! Interested to hear peoples thoughts on that purple sun decision.

Finished with 55/60 with one win, four losses which is one more win than I expected considering the sub optimal list and lack of experience. Even more so when 3/5 of my opponents were races I had never played. Three out of the four losses hinged on a couple of key moments which went against me and was only steamrolled by one opponent (arguably the dark elves too but mitigated my losses by breaking his fortitude first). The tournament was excellently run and its a shame that this was their last hurrah. Our gaming group are now looking to take up the baton though as we switch to 9th age. Once the rules have settled down a bit and we have more experience of the system we'll be looking to run a tournament ourselves but we've got a lot to live up to!

[SpellArcher]

My goblin opponent failed to show so I faced Dark Elves instead.

Joy! Still, at least he brought combat blocks. PG are really good vs DE but even they have limits. Great combat vs the Warlocks!

It's a tough call on the Purple Sun, what else was the Vamp player lined up to cast? Mannfred can be vicious.

It was a strong field and it's always difficult fighting armies you don't know the full rules of. As you say 20phoenix, one win is not bad under the circumstances, I've had events with no wins before!

[20phoenix]

You'll have to forgive me as I dont know the spell names but he used the -ST/-T debuff throughout the game and the one that really concerned me was -3 leadership. I suspected i'd lose combat by a few due to static combat res but would likely hold due to testing on Ld10 base with reroll from the BSB.

The big area for me to work on after this I think is deployment. At least one experienced player said after a game when I asked him for feedback that he thought the deployment was weak. Other than that I think I mostly got the right units in the right combats so the in game decision making seems fine. There were errors here and there but a lot of them were down to rules knowledge.

[Prince of Spires]

Personally I would have let the -3 LD pass if I would have been LD10 with a reroll. Depending on other spells / amount of PD available / situation on the field of course. At LD 7 with a reroll, you still have a good chance of passing your LD test (76%). -1S/T is likely to have a much bigger impact on the outcome of a fight. It's effectively -1 to wound and +1 to wound for your opponent and it has a potential impact on armour saves. It can easily compensate for the 3 wounds / LD points extra. In fact, with the extra S and T you might very well win the fight instead of lose it.

As for letting go purple sun, it's a well documented effect that saying / thinking "anything but a 6" generally results in a 6 being rolled

Rod

[20phoenix]

Letting Purple Sun go through left me 6v6 on PD with the BoH reroll as well. My fear with -3 LD is that it wasnt Ld10 steadfast/stubborn so losing the combat by 2-3 with static combat res would mean I would be taking panic tests at 4/5ish. Not pretty.

I have a similar rule to you - if you remember some rule or extra attack that you forgot to make and your opponent generously lets you do it you will always fail it. Its law