WTC 2017 Solo Masters Game 4: Damiano vs Twins

For my third game, I faced Javier Fernandez with legion: Fyanna and Twins. I remember that Damiano works really well against Fyanna, and Ossrum isn't bad either. I didn't remember too much about twins, except that I had recently played Damiano against them at Ropecon in Finland, and was doing really well on attrition - although I was assassinated by not knowing the second assassination threat range (18" from Saeryn). So, I thought it might be better to play Damiano, as I won't be caught by the same trick again.

Javier's list:
Oracles
Twins
- Zuriel
- Seraph
- Protector
- Naga
- Raek
- Bloodseer
Throne
2 Helions
2 Spell Martyrs
Max hex hunters + Bayal

Javier won the roll off and chose to go second. I deployed symmetrically. He anchored the right flank with the throne and the right one with Zuriel.

I did a cautious advance (and shot off two hex hunters with a blast) with my trenchers, and also ran forward the rest of my force. My death march went on the right unit of halberdiers. This is a mistake; I haven't faced the throne and don't realize yet how good it is against my infantry. It should actually be clear that the halberdiers on the right have no chance to survive.

Javier jams my halberds with the hex hunters and runs Rhyas forward. Zuriel and Throne advance outside of charge ranges.

I contemplate trying to unjam with trenchers but the chaces are low, so halberdiers have to stay jammed (although re-cast Death March helps, as does the repo 5 from a coin). Trenchers do some insignificant attrition. Jacks prepare to attack either flank. Right halberds are jamming.

Throne kills almost all right flank halberdiers, Zuriel kills most left-flank halberdiers. Then Rhyas kills the red mangler. Protector contests my zone. Javier goes to 2 points, while I remain at 0.

I see that I absolutely have to kill Rhyas, as well as the Throne. I feat, and the right flank kills the throne. It's more difficult with Rhyas, as I need her knocked down, and she has a shield guard (protector). I try to kill him with my trenchers and Orin but leave him on one box. So, instead of knocking her down, I try to poke her with both the Bucaneer and the Nomad. They fail to kill her, and they get damaged a bit by riposte. Javier scores another point. Next turn, he just kills one trencher and goes to 5-0.

Analysis

I remembered later during the game one conclusion I already had about Rhyas: she should be shot, not killed in Melee. Attacking her in Melee is a trap.

In general, with the amount of infantry hate this list has, I feel that my Ossrum list would have been significantly better. With this list I am at a disadvantage on attririon.

Additionally, this scenario and with such terrain is exremely good for Twins. The threat of assassination makes it difficult to play aggressively, and so that favors the Twins scenario play. Bunnies would have made the game much more punishing for Rhyas, especially as I have stealth removal in that list (and the Crawler never has to get close unless I want it to).

WTC 2017 Solo Masters Game 3: Damiano vs Vlad 1

For my third game, I was facing Giovanni Arigoni with Khador. When I looked through his lists, I saw that he has a very strong Vlad1 list and was pretty sure he would take it. I was not sure how well Damiano would be able to handle this list but still chose to play him. It is possible that Ossrum would have been better, but I wasn't sure in his ability to kill four heavies, while he also has to be killing the BE and the hoarde of infantry. As for damiano, he has no problem killing 3-4 heavies on the feat turn. And as soon as I don't need a cloud wall, trenchers can become really good against rockets with sky-high defense and immunity to blasts (with the cautious advance order).

Additionally, I still have 0 solos in my Ossrum list, and this scenario can be very live against a gunline, if one has a solo to score own flag.

Like I expected, Giovanni chose Vlad1. His list was:

Winter Guard Command
Vlad
- 4 Marauders
Carriage
Kovnik Joe
3 x 6 rifles + 3 rockets
2 Mortars
1 Field gun

Giovanni chose to go second (because he is a gunline), and gave me the side with a shallow water piece near the building in the center. So, I chose the objective that gives me pathfinder. I realise now that I should have chosen it earler - but we both didn't remember to do so. Anyway, this is a good learning point: consider each side before the battle to realize if you need the pathfinder objective; otherwise, you might not take the objective you really want.

I put up Surefoot on the trenchers and Road to War, and advanced my forces. Trenchers dug in, cause otherwise the mortars might be able to do a number on them. Halberdiers advanced: more spread out on the right flank compared to the rest. Orin ran toward my flag, while Kell ran to the trench near opposing flag (not to score but to take a good point to threaten things going through the gap).

Giovanni is able to kill two halberdiers on the right and one on the left with shooting. Heavies run around both sides of the building in the center. In general, Giovanni does not plan the turn enough to prevent locking his own battle engine.

For me, the left side is not very difficult to deal with: I use a cloud wall to cover my heavies here - but only after shooting the closest Marauder with Kell for 6 DMG and a CRA from trenchers. Additionally, IIRC the shooting from trencher grenadiers took out a few infantry models. The halberdiers on the left run very aggressively to contest the flag and also threaten the shooting models. On the left, I run a mangler behind the house and then screen him with a few halberdiers. I hug the linear wall and the house wall for better defensive benefits, and have two halberdiers engaged to make them more difficult to shoot as well.

Damiano lies on the ground. Orin walks to the flag and activates stealth.

Vlad feats. One marauder tramples to Kell and kills him along with a few halberdiers but also suffers two free strikes. Some of the shooting manages to kill two trenchers with an AOE. All but two halberdiers on the right are killed. No heavies run towards my flag, but one runs from right flank to left one. Most importantly, the battle engine is still locked up. I score a point.

I feat. Green Mangler gets three focus and pathfinder from objective. Red mangler gets three focus. I upkeep both spells. Trenchers cautiously advance around the marauder in left zone and do some shooting, taking out the left mortar and three rockets. Green mangler kills the marauder in left zone, triggering road to war for the nomad, which comes forward and gets a charge angle on the objective. He charges and the objective is left on 6 HP after the charge attack (can't make more attacks, as the buckler hand is reach 1"). Red mangler charges and almost kills the undamaged marauder in the center of the zone. Blue nomad walks to the already damaged marauder and whacks him, leaving on a handful of HP. Halberdiers charge (one on each marauder) and kill both. I score two points, going to 3-0.

Giovanni tries to come back on attrition and kills my mangler and does a bit of damage to the other mangler. However, he has no pieces to run to my flag, and is unable to get me away from his. So I score 1 point in his turn, and then one more in mine, immediately ending the game with a 5-0 victory.

WTC 2017 Solo Masters Game 2: Damiano vs Iron Mother

My second game at WTC this year was against Michael Christiansen, whom I had previously faced this year at some other tournament (most likely at Smogcon). Looking at his lists, I realized immediately that he will choose Iron Mother (the other list was Father), and I had faced a similar list already.

In general I feel that my Damiano list has an advantage playing into Iron Mother, especially when she has so few models. However, Mother always has an assassination plan on the table - so I need to be extremely careful with where I put my jacks, and where Orin is located in relation to them.

Michael's list:
Destruction Initiative
Iron Mother
- 2 Axioms
- Corrollary
- Diffuser
- Mitigator
Channeler Optifex
Optifex Directive
9 Free Elimination Servitors
3 Free Reflex Servitors

I won the roll off. A look at the table told me that there is no terrain to worry about - the table is pretty open. I chose to go first. It was clear where Axioms would go, so I placed my jacks there, flanked by Halberrdiers and screened by trenchers.

I advance, put up my upkeeps (Surefoot on Trenchers and Death March on left halberdiers) and cloud up the center, with my jacks safe behind the smoke wall, and Orin right behind their backs.

Convergence advances, being pretty careful on both flanks (utilizing the wall on the left to protect against charges). One Halberdier from the left unit is killed, triggering Vengeance.

As a result, I am able to kill most servitors on the left. By the way, I view killing elimination servitors as a high priority to prevent assassination late game. For that, before clouding up I was always shooting my grenades with trenchers. Of course, I create a cloud wall again, and of course Orin is kept within 3" of all my jacks.

Michael feats and does some serious attrition against my halberds on the right, killing all of them. There are fewer guns on the left, so three halberdiers survive. Trenchers are much more difficult to kill, though.

I feat. My heavies go and kill one axiom. It is most likely possible to remove both but I refuse to get greedy. I want all my jacks in the 3" bubble around Orin. Trenchers make a nice cloud wall. Damiano gets knocked down. I score 1 point from the central zone.

Mother struggles to do damage. All the halberdiers are dead, though. The optifex unit scores a point, and so do my heavies. 2-1

Trenchers with Deadaye finish most servitors and the Optifex Directive, with some help from Orin. I put three heavies onto the Axiom, leaving it on a handful of boxes. Orin is within 3" from all my heavies. Bucaneer knocks down Damiano. I score another point for a 3-1 lead.

Axiom takes down a mangler. The zones are not contested, so I score one more for 4-1

All I need now is to kill the Chaneller optifex to clear the left zone. Then I can run there with Damiano, to score two points total. I run the Nomad over and use two of Orin's tokens to kill the Optifex with a leap (it was already on one box from my previous turn). Damiano runs to the zone and I win 6-1.

Analysis

In this match up, my most important model keeping my heavies safe from Backlash is Orin. While looking at the photos now, I realize that at some points he was not being kept totally safe. He should always be out of LOS of a potential jack entering my clouds after killing trenchers to act as a node for Mom, and outside of 4" AOE blast area from my jacks.

Other than that, I think I have not made any mistakes here.

I must say also that this match up is much more difficult when Mother uses either some assimilators or some TEP-s instead of two axioms.

WTC 2017 Solo Masters Game 1: Ossrum vs Mordikaar

This year, I participated in WTC 2017 Solo Masters. Unfortunately, we were not able to gather a team in Estonia and to go to the team event instead.

Me and my friend chose flights in such a way as to get back on Sunday, and were ready to forfeit the last game. However, when getting to the place and then later consulting with the hotel, we understood that the travel time to airport is way too long, and so we had to skip the two last games, which is sad. So, here come the report of only four games that I played.

I had two lists:

Damiano Kingmakers
- 2 Manglers
- 2 Nomads
- 1 Bucaneer
- 2 x 10 Halberdiers
- 6 Trenchers + UA + 3 grenades
- Free Kell and Orin

Ossrum non-theme
- 4 Blasters
- 4 Gunners
- Avalancher
Crawler
Aiyana & Holt
2 Artilleries
(When Irregulars drop, I will add here free Eiryss 1, Kell and Alten)

For game one, I was paired against Fred Lafont with Skorne. There were no murder kitties in the pairing, and I thought that Ossrum should be able to play reasonably well on attrition here. To add to that thought, I decided I do not want to have to go into his lists with my melee forces (he is too fast).

Fred chose Mordikaar. His list:

Winds of Death
Mordikaar
- 6 Archidons
Siege Amaranthax
Extoller
Willbreaker
Max reivers + UA
4 beast handlers

I lost the roll for first turn, and chose the side which constricts my deployment less (the other side has a lake in the middle). Deploying-wise, I placed my Crawler against the Skorne BE, and bunnies against the unit in the middle.

His forces advance, with the Archidons hugging the wall. I decide to feat turn 1 (because there is no way to avoid archidons if I want to have my pieces anywhere where they matter). Crawler, Avalancher and the artillery start working on the Skorne BE, which loses some boxes and also gets crit staggered. Gun bunnies start working on one Archidon.

The skorne BE comes in and the infantry advances a bit, while the archidons spread around the flank. Very little damage is dealt to my bunnies, although they are knocked down. The damaged archidon (the one that was hugging the flag previously) gets behind the wall, while another one takes his place. Mordikaar feats.

I kill the batle engine with my Crawler, avalancher and two artilleries. While doing so, I make two mistakes:
1. I don't Kiss it with A&H first
2. I re-cast FFE on an artillery with my three focus (I dropped snipe from avalancher and allocated two to bunnies to stand up), because I forget that the melee bonus against shooting doesn't apply to huge bases.

I also clean up the unit in the middle with my spray bunnies, and remove one archidon with some spray bunnies and some gun bunnies.

Next turn, came the assassination that I totally didn't see coming. It works the following way:
1. The opponent measures how many archidons simultaneously can get within 6" of my caster; all that can, do this. Before running, they rile for two, getting each to 3 fury.
2. Mordikaar starts casting Essence Blast on each of them, boosting DMG (pow15) on my caster; after a beast does this, it is removed from play, hence granting mordikaar the focus needed for the next essence blast.

Analysis

This is the classical case of a game where knowing what the opponent's list does is very important. Essentially, whatever was happening in the center of the table was almost just a distraction for the main plan: assassination. Had I known that, I would have kept focus on my caster instead of re-casting the FFE. Also, it would have been a good turn for Ossrum to run in the direction opposite from the archidons.

On a positive side, I now know one more trick that is really able to catch you if you're not aware of it.