Saturday, September 24, 2011

Thoughts of the first game

Thoughts after first try with first Ogre list (see http://jaeroler.blogspot.com/2011/09/first-taste-of-8th-ed-ogres.html)
1. Defeat in Blood and Glory scenario (not enough banners and not a good idea to have a banner on gnoblars). Insufficent fortitude when gnoblar unit with standard fled and general died
2. Mournfang failed to exhibit strong hitting and staying power despite a 2+ save which most likely is contributed to the way I normally roll my armor saves. On average per combat phrase, they killed 4-5 spearelves/witch elves and took 3-4 wounds (or one base) for the trouble. I trust they will do fine for others, just not for me until I get loaded dice!
3. I can imagine myself sipping my afternoon tea nonchalantly on my vintage chair as the leadbelchers shoot salvos after salvos trying to hit me! (My leadbelchers killed 2 Witch Elves I think)
4. Maneaters did not fire a single pistol shot, though they admirably killed a Hydra with their flaming melee attacks
5. One ironblaster blasted one Cold One Knight and a Chariot into smithereens with one shot. The other misfired and exploded into fireworks in the same turn lol
6. Scraplaunchers killed a few spearelves. I'm still keep them for their KB. Should have tried targeting the Knights for KB to bypass the armor saves.
7. Sabretrusks are marvelous (Gnoblar trappers should be amazing too). Redirected the Cold One Knights and Hydra to both flanks, away from me
8. Firebellies are amazing with their breadth attack in melee- could have been better if I'm not the one using them though. Ha!
9. Magic Defence test. Passed. Scrolled plus diced protected first turn. Hellheart-ed on turn 2 and enemy wizard became Lv 2 (lost 2 levels)
10. Unkillable dreadlord lives up to his reputation (stubborn, GW, 1+ armor, pendant) slays two of my firebellies while I scratch his armor for 3 turns (6 combat phases). Oh well, didn't expect him to really use it but next game I know how to deal with him! Then my Ogre double decker bus will go to town =)
11. MVP: Maneaters
12. MUP (Unvaluable): Leadbelchers, Mournfang
____________________________________________________________________

The eruption of the volcano silenced the battlefield littered with mounds of disembodied carcasses. Next to the Abyssal Wood, the burnt remains of a Hydra nested like a small black perch on the bodies of a bloodied Mournfang and an ogre missing its head in the drab of Calimshan port of pirates. Elsewhere, a pillar of fire and smoke rose from a small crater where an Ironblaster had misfired and exploded in a spectacular pryotechnic display.

The rout of the Flaming Hand tribe stopped momentarily as both fleeing ogres and the accursed Dark Elves all turned towards the ominous dark-greish cloud of dust and ash that ejected from the broken cone of Mount Mazama. In the middle of the blood soaked fertile plains of Mount Mazama, a red pendant shone brightly like a crimson star on the neck of a lithe figure in a delicate and bladed elven mail. The dark elf general tied his latest grisly trophies- the heads of two Firebellies to his belt with a savage grin and surveyed the battlefield. He had captured scores of Gnoblars with their pathetic standard made of Yhetee hide but his greatest prize lay next to the Wildwood beneath Mount Mazama, a ten-foot long Ironblaster. He dread recalling what happened after the loud splitting roar and an orange trail that tore across the sky into one Cold One Knight and the chariot behind him, blasting both into a shower of elfish and cold one limbs. No, he cannot leave now that his prize is within his reach. With a hand on the reins, he leapt dexterously onto a dark steed and waved his hands forward. The frenzied and voluptuous witch elves on his right stopped their feasting of the Leadbelchers and launched themselves toward the Ironblaster with a high-pitched scream that sounded mellifluous and yet malicious at the same time. The witch elves' scream was answered in turn by the low grunts of the Hydra with one head still clamping a struggling Sabretrusks. With the snap of the beastmasters' whip, the Sabretrusk was snapped into half and ravenously swallowed by two other heads.

The gauntleted hand of the dark elf general stopped in midair as a vent burst forth from Mount Mazama and gigantic shards of blackened rocks and pyroclastic flows engulfed the witch elves in a thick voluminous chalky cloud which burned their flawless white skin or crushed them into red paste. A viscous stream of orange-red lava streamed at a slow but menacing pace down the volcano from the vent, threatening to swallow the entire dark elf army. The dark elf general blinked beads of perspiration away from his eyes, unsure if they are the result of the sudden immense heat or the imminent destruction of his army. There is no time to waste, he turned and galloped towards his Corsair ships, holding his reins tightly in his clenched fist.

The Fire prophet, Mordak Flamespitter, Most fiery Firebelly of Mount Mazama stood at the vent, squinting at the black mass retreating to their dark ships. His fellow priests have been caught unaware by the malevolent dark elves but Mount Mazama has woken from its slumber, furious at the desecration of his priests. Standing next to Mordak is Pdreak Maneater who gripped a grisly and bloodied elven head with contorted features by her once sparkling obsidian hair. Pdreak held the decapitated head of the dark elf High Sorceress, savoring the elven blood that dripped into his mouth before swallowing it in one gulp. His Maneater crew had slayed the Hydra and the High Sorceress and her retinue only to find themselves without an opponent or treasure to loot. Trying his best to ignore the intense heat of the lava sliding near his boots, he can't help but grinned at the prospect of getting his huge ogre hand on the red ruby pendant that sparkled like a crimson star as the dark elf general turn to gallop away from the lava.

Immune to the intense heat of the lava sliding past his feet due to the blessings of the volcano god, Mordak bellowed and his personal guards marched out of concealed entrances of Mount Volcano. The volcano god's hunger needs to be satiated with the bones of every single heretic dark elf. Pdreak bellowed in reply. The pendant will be his.
___________________________________________________________________
Was mulling over the battle and the list and errmm, I end up writing a few paragraphs =) ___________________________________________________________________
Time to revise my list. While I see merit in the Mournfang calvary, I conclude that it doesn't work for me. Also a breakdown of the comparison between the Mournfang and the Maneater (280 points) as shown below:

4 Mournfangs vs. 5 maneaters (std, Banner of Eternal Flame, HA, 2 aHW)
a. Wounds: 12 vs. 15
b. Armour Save: 2+ vs. 5+
c.WS/BS: 3 vs. 4
d. Strength: same (S5)
e. LeadershipL 7 vs. 8
f. Move: 8 vs. 6 (can be mitigated with special rule, e.g., Scout, Swiftstride and Vanguard)
g. Attacks: 12 WS3 S4+ 16 WS3 S5 vs. 20 WS4 S5
h. Others: Special Rules for Maneaters
i. Others: Personalizability of Maneaters

Based on my limited experience of one game with the Ogres, I go with Maneaters over Mounrfangs, coupled with what i see as advantages (a, c, d, e, g, h and i) and the fact that rolling a 2+ or 4+ (against S5) armor saves is not my forte. I rather go for more elite bodies that can deal the hurt so a Maneater army so as to speak:

2500 Points Volcanic Expedition [REVISED]
HEROES
Firebelly, Lv 1, General, GW, Dispel Scroll, Ruby Ring
Firebelly, Lv 1, GW, Hellheart
Bruiser, BSB, Dragonhelm, HA, Sword of Swiftslaying, IF

CORE
8 Ogres, Std, Lookout Gnoblar
6 Ironguts, Std, Banner of Discipline, Lookout Gnoblar, Musician
3X10 Gnoblars

SPECIAL
3x1 Sabretrusks
2 Mournfang Calvary, HA+IF
4 Maneaters (ItP, Scout), 3 aHW
6 Maneaters (Stubborn, Poison), 3 OP, Std (BoEFlame)

RARE
2 Scraplaunchers
2 Ironblasters

Can't wait for next Saturday =)

Monday, September 19, 2011

Thawing


Time for the blog to thaw... it's been a looong time =)
Gorgeous photo taken from http://www.smarmoofus.com/?p=403


To cut to the chase, I hope the blog will motivate me to do the following:
1) Post at least one painted model every Saturday (even if it means I have to paint at Crazyrat's place lol)
2)Post my armylist or battlereport to review and improve (and adhering to our open list culture)

I have not been painting (counting down to four days) but here is my list for Saturday anyway.

Ogres are coming to town!
After the thaw, it is time to feast...
http://hirstarts.yuku.com/topic/3295/Santa-ogre-s-coming-to-town#.TngHBs3hDgg

Ogre Kingdoms, 2497 points
LORDS
Slaughtermaster, Level 4 (Heaven or Beast), Power Stone, GoldSigil Sword, Dragonbane Gem

HEROES
Butcher, Level 1 (Maw), GW, Dispel Scroll
Hunter, Charmed Shield

CORE
16 Ogres, Std
10 Gnoblars, Std
36 Gnoblars, Std

SPECIAL
3 Leadbelchers
1 Sabretrusk
1 Sabretrusk
1 Sabretrusk
3 Maneaters, Std, Banner of Eternal Flame, Brace of Ogre Pistols (Sniper, Poison)
4 Mournfang Calvarly, HA, Ironfist

RARE
2 Gnoblar Scrapulaunchers
2 Ironblasters

Thoughts:
1. Wanted more Hunters and Leadbelchers, but when you also want to have the fattiest and angriest heavy calvary in the list. Someone has to go.
2. Anyways, it's also a way to try as many units as I want, barring the huge monsters which are too expensive.
3. So shooting consists of one vanguard S6, 3D6 S4 AP shots, 6 Flaming, Poisoned Sniper S4 AP shots, 2 S10 cannons, 2 S3 blast (yah, finally my own catapults. My preciouuusss!) and lots of crappy throwing weapons haha.
4. One Ogre bus to rule them all
5. Heaven Lore, because I have not used it before and my GUT instincts tells me to use it
6. 50% discounted Great Eagles to harress, redirect, hunt characters and warmachines
7. Sniping characters from the get-go.
8. Could have gone more shooty but I wanted to try other units first. May eventually have more crappy throwing weapons, more hunters (my Lonewolves with vanguard), more maneaters and more leadbelchers.

Saturday, September 25, 2010

Battle report: Mr T and his Lamborghinis

Introduction
Two games in a single day! What more can a gamer ask for?
Thanks to Crazyrat for testing my list for me. I still need to be more familiar with my list (and improve it with all your help).

2250 points pictched battle (hope to get the rulebook to start trying other missions)
Crazyrat used the same Woodelf list (I hope Mr T has finally retired the list for him)
High Elves
Lord
Mr. Teclis (cheesemaster)
Core
35 Spearelves, Champion, Standard, 5pts Pendant
2 X 10 Archers
Special
2 X 5 Silverhelms, Shields
8 Tiranoc Chariots (my Lambos)
Rare
2 RBTs
2 Great Eagles

Turn 1
1. WE deployed all the way back again-touching the end of the board. Treeman deployed all the way to the right flank away from Mr T (hmm... how many purple statues have I collected?)
2. WE archers shot HE archers and killed 4. They passed their panic.
3. WE Fast Calvary marched down let flank after vanguard move.
4. Chariots split 2-6 with 2 going down the middle while 6 flanking right.
5. Mr T cast Soulbright and reduced WE archers' Strength and Toughness
6. RBTs and 1 Archer unit shot at Soulbright-ed WE archers and killed 8.
7. Archers turned and shot at Fast Calvary killing 2. Unit passed panic test.
8. Eagle moved up to threaten WE mage and BSB in Eternal Guard bunker.

Turn 2
1. Treeman failed charge against closet chariot (needed 8 on charge roll).
2. Right flank remained stationary (could be the chariots?)
3. Wardancers moved up to stand between 2 eagles and their lords in eternal guard bunker.
4.WE mage on the left flank transformed into a Dragon taking a wound for IF miscast.
5. One HE Chariot and 1 eagle combined charged depleted WE archers and overrun into second archer unit behind.
6. Second Eagle flew to the right, landing to the flank of the eternal guard and expossed mage.
7. Chariots moved up out of Treeman's LOS. 2 chariots moved back to play hide and seek with Treeman. Archers and RBT shoot WE fast calvary reducing unit to champion who passed his morale (he is going to do so much damage).

Turn 3
1. Treespirits charged into Chariot, Great eagle (carrion) and archers combat and wiped out the eagle while the chariot wiped out the archer unit and overrun.
2. Champion of Fast Calvary charged HE archers (photo above) and wiped them out, overrunning into second archer unit.
3.Treeman continued to chase chariots as they retreated and taunt the old bark.
4. Mr T moves up in his huge bunker and sniped 1 wound from BSB and dispelled dragon transformation.
5. Silverhelms charged Mage whose transformation is dispelled. Mage fled out of range.

Turn 4
1. Three chariots charged into wardancer unit and eagle charged into Eternal guard unit behind (so that when chariots break the wardancer and overrun into the eternal guard, i get a 'free' combat turn). Impact hits killed 10 while charioteers killed none so Eternal guard still has 2 ranks! Eternal guard lost combat but passed leadership (stubborn) and reformed.
2. The champion will wipe my second archer unit (sigh) and overrun into my pointy spearelves unit to be poked to death.
3. Eagle gets killed for his efforts even before it struck (initiative order below elves)
4. 2 chariots continued to retreat from treeman hee hee.
5. Mr T cast Purple Sun and rolled 2 on artillery dice so he turned the ruin into a purple statue (see the green template-Green Sun).
Turn 5-6
1. 1st picture shows the chariots-WE combat before they lost and were run down by the guard. They killed none with ASF and Mr T failed to dispell The Savage Beast of Horros cast on Eternal Guard unit (BSB and Mage in it) so 7+4 S7 hits later, 2 chariots turned into splinters.
2. 2 more chariots charged into eternal bunker with 2 characters trying to assassinate them (only killed the mage) and failed to hit/wound the BSB turned them into splinters too.
3. Mr T finished the job by sniping the BSB (I think).
4. Two Silverhelm units (1 finally chased mage out of board) turned and one unit charged remaining eternal guard which fled and redirected with a chariot into the treespirits, wiping them out, leaving only treekins.
5. 2 chariots still retreated from Treeman.
6. Mr T (last turn) walked out to snipe the Treeman with Soulbright, Caress of Lanipah and Fate of Bjuna (all on IF so nothing Crazyrat can do really.Cheesemaster did it again. Stinky!)
Aftergame thoughts
1. Mass chariots charge is devastating but i still want to think of ways to make it better
(e.g., what units to combine with flank charges with?
i. Chariots or ranked up units to remove steadfast and rank bonus, but which ranked units are cheap and fast enough to keep up with my army?
ii. I also do not really want to reduce the number of chariots in this army.
iii.Sigh, any ideas?
2. 8 Chariots are fun!
3. Death takes armies that centers on many characters apart easily. I wonder how it will perform against armies that focus on troops instead. Of course there is always Soulbright and Doom and Darkness.
4. Love the iPhone. Doing battle reports (and taking photos) have never been so easily.
5. Gonna play Beastmen (similar chariot style. Yeah)
Criticisms and ways to improve my strategies are greatly appreciated.

Battle report: Where are the dragons?

I chanced upon Stelek's list and couldn't resist testing it against Crazyrat. Full credit for the list goes to him. I definitely did not bring out the potential of the list but my thoughts (and Crazyrat's) below nonetheless.


Highlights
Turn 1
1. Woodelves deployed all the way back (touching the end of the board) waiting for me to come to him.
2. Mage transformed into a Black Hydra (which I did not dispell. Lack of experience here or pure stupidity)
3. Vampire Lord failed to cast Purple Sun through 'battery' and magic ended. Gulp

Turn 2-3
1. On th right flank, Woodelves fast calvary and Black Hydra charged Varghulf and cooked it (breadth weapon).
2. In the middle, Treeman charged into ghoul unit with Vampire Lord on foot and 1 Vampire. Ghast challenged and is stomped for its efforts.
3. Vampire Lord on foot once again failed to cast Purple sun, where the Treeman will proceed to stomp the Vampire hero (called challenge).
4. Wardancers and Tree spirits unit 1 marched down my left flank. Wardancers then charged the zombies and wiped them out after Vanpire Lord on steed's Purple sun was dispelled (no battery).
5. Two Ghoul units with a vampire hero each charged the tree spirits (failed to transform into dragons) and ran them down.

Turn 4-6
1. Vampire Lord on foot finally cast Purple Sun and turned Treeman into Purple Stature. He was then charged and stomped into dust by Fast Calvary and Black Hydra (then finally dispelled after Crazyrat clarified the dispelling rules, and killed by something undead and stinky. Ha!).
2. Second Vargulf was minced into pork chops in combat and I do not expect anything from them anymore (at least I painted one lol).
3. Army starts to crumble. One unit of ghoul with vampire that ran down tree spirt had its vampire hero charged Archers and was shot to death by stand and shoot (what was I thinking? Wait, I wasn't thinking...)
4. Mop up by Woodelves after vampires could not transform into dragons and remained unarmoured VPs for the taking. Massacred by Woodelves. Undead remained dead.

Thoughts
1. I forgot to take any pictures!
2. After my first spell (Purple sun) did not go off, even with the Power Scroll lol, things went down hill for me. In fact, I could not even transform (lore of Beast) once.
3. Without the 'dragons', the unportected vampires were cheap or pircy fodder for the taking.
4. Varghulfs were unimpressive the entire game. I will stick to Crazyrat's suggestion to switch to two Blackcoaches if I were to try the list again (with some modifiation). I think this list has potential and might be the list I'd use for my Vampire Counts because its crazy enough lol.
5. I think I need cheap redirectors too. Modifications in process.


Comments and suggestions appreciated. Thank you to Crazyrat for the game and Stelek for the inspiration.

Saturday, September 18, 2010

Battle report of the Desperate Alliance

This battlerep is long overdue (so memory's sketchy too) and is badly done. However, I learnt a lot from this game and would like to share my thoughts and also yours. My thoughts will be in italics (army lists not provided in detail due to lazy fingers lol).

The Battle of the Desperate Alliance
Daniel (1k Ogres) and DeFeng (Jaeroler's 2250 Dark Elves)
VS
Crazyrat's (1k Skaven) and me (2250 pansy High Elves)

Deployment (from left to right)
Giant, Leadbelchers (Bucher), Bulls (Tyrant), RBT, 25(?)Blackguards, 5 Drak Riders, 5 Harpies, 5 Cold One Knights (COK), 1 Cold One Chariot, 5 Harpies, RBT,40(?) Spearelves (Lv4 Sorceress, Lore of Metal), Chariot, 5 COKs, 5 Dark Riders

5 Dragon Princes (DP1), Tiranoc Chariot (TC1), TC2, TC3, 40(?)Clanrats (Fire thower), 20 spearelves (LV4 Archmage with Cheese Book, Lore of Shadow), 40 Plague Monks with Furnace (Priest, lv1), 20 Spearelves, 40(?)Clanrats (fire thrower), 4 X 1 Great Eagles, DP2, 15 Archers (Flaming), TC4, TC5, DP3, DP4 (5 Shadow Warriors in Building)


Turn 1 (Ogres and Dark Elves starts)
1. Everyone moved up.
2. Both Harpy units charged Shadow warriors in building (which was not allowed! Need to read rules again!). Shadow Warriors stand and shoot, and wiped out Harpy unit 1.
3. Dark Riders on right flank moved after vanguard move to shoot DP4. I rolled wonderfully so 2 died and the unit fled.
3. DP1 failed charge against Leadbelchers. Other failed charges too.
4. Magic saw Pendulum cast on Bulls, which failed to wound.
5. TC1 charged Giant (dealt 1 impact wound) and no thunderstorm means they danced cha cha for 3 turns =)


The ability of Shadow warriors or other scouts to take buildings should not be underestimated. Just look at how well they did against the harpies and the rules that protected them (only one assault per turn). Chariots are good against Giants, negating their thunderstorm!
Turn 2-3 (from left to right)
1.Bulls (Tyrant) charged the Clanrats who held on due to steadfast.
2. TC 2 dealt 1 impact wound against Butcher and they danced Cha Cha for 2 turns.
3. Blackguards charged into Furnace aka Green Bulldozer and got more than they bargained for. I think at least 15 died in the first round of combat.
4. Clanrats 2 charged into Harpy unit and overrun into COK(?).
5. RBT killed 1 eagle so 2 eagles charged and stomped it into matchsticks.
6. Last eagle moved to block the chariot.
7. My luck turned for the better when DP 3 (on the right) charged Riders (fled) and redirected to the COK. They then killed one, failed all armour saves and got wiped out by COKs' S4 handweapons.


Steadfast works wonder here to hold units until the 'hammer' drops on them. Hammer and Anvil ya. Great Eagles did their job, giving Dark Elves only one shooting turn. I couldn't go after the other RBT because of the lack of space (too many units). In a one-to-one game, I am confident that 4 eagles will wipe out any artillery least by 2 turns. Made a mistake of not charging Shadow Warriors out into the left RBT. Plague Furnace is unbreakable and stinks of more cheese than my book. As Raymond pointed, magic and RBTs (and maybe Eagles) rather than committing any unit to its doom. Dumb of me on hindsight not to send one eagle to assassinate the DE sorceress too (whose unit moved up)!

Turn 4-6 (okay, battlerep's really imprecise lol)
1. Green Bulldozer (Plague unit) steamrolled Blackguards and moved into better position to charge Bulls, which they did.

2. Giant finally wrecked Chariot and charged into Plague unit's flank. These 3 units survived the game!

3. Spearelves with Archmage turned to cast Mindrazor on Archers which was charged by a Cold One chariot (failed charge), Dark Riders (Stand and Shoot then mauled them to death with S8 close combat attacks). COK dare not commit due to S8 Archers (using the spell defensively).

4. High Elf Spearelves charged into Chariot (wrecked it with Mindrazor) and overrun into Dark Spearelves with Sorceress and killing her in the next turn.

5. Crazyrat's on a crazy (if I may say) roll as the Warpfire(?) unit on the right throws the appropriate Artillery distance and flames a lot of Dark Spearelves, COKs and the chariot over a few turns. Finally it killed itself on the last tun (Misfire). A fitting end for a rat indeed lol.

6. Island of Blood Alliance (Rats and High Elves) won mostly because Plague-Green Bulldozer is a huge point denial, and Dark Elves lost his general, Blackguard unit, banners and a couple of expensive MSUs (COK and Chariots).


Magic did not do much for me because I rolled 1 and 1 and 2 and 1 in two turns. I guess I would require the Banner of Sorcery and a slow and more defensive Phoenix Guard unit (less paper armour Dragon Princes and Chariots I guess). I hope this game showed at least one thing that is needed for Calvary (and MSUs) to perform-Maneuvering space. What was not reported was Dragon Princes' immune to flaming attacks ability that protected them from Searing Doom and its ability (with the chariots) to lead opponents to redeploy backwards, thus giving me more time to outshoot and outmagic my opponents. Still they faced an uphill task against huge blocks of infantry like DF's 40 Spearelves (e.g., steadfast). I did not get the chance to do my Calvary and Chariot combo too because of the lack of space but I am sure it would have helped alot.


Any suggestions, comments or criticisms (in terms of strategy, and not my horrible battlerep haha)?


Friday, September 3, 2010

2250 High Elf List 1

Thanks to DF who posted an open list, I decided to follow suit.

2250 High List

Lord
Archmage, Level 4, Book of Hoeth (Death)
Heroes
Mage, Level 2, Seerstaff (Shadow)
Noble, BSB, Dragon Armour, Great Weapon, Banner of World Dragon (Thanks Crazyrat!)
Core
3 X 10 Archers
16 Lothern Seaguard, Full Command, Flaming Standard
Special
13 Phoenix Guards, Keeper, Standard, Banner of Sorcery
2 X 7 Swordmasters
Rare
3 Repeater Bolt Throwers
3 Great Eagles

Let's see how this works out. Mr T is on vacation (OP la) and his apprentice, Eoloran is here to with the Book of Hoeth (less cheese please, okay, maybe still quite cheesy. Sigh.)

Can't wait to playtest this list =)

Saturday, July 10, 2010

A long hiatus

It has truly been so long since I last posted an entry. Sigh I have been really busy with work and lazy with my hobby.

No post means no progress and that makes me a sad wolf. I will try to motivate myself with this blog and upload more photos to chart my progress. To begin, these are some photos to show all my 'black' and WIP miniatures.

Hopefully they will look different soon =)

Krom's wolves
Wolf brothers and tanks guarding the Fang. The ones I use are not in the picture as they are in my army case (ready to descend upon our enemies)
High Elves
There are more elves hidden somewhere. Hopefully I can get them painted up and published in time to come =)
Btw, is there anyone who is interested in getting the Skaven from the Warhammer 8th ed. starter box? I am only interested in the elves and the book lol.
Orcs and Goblins
Awaiting Shrek and Fiona (giants), and many more warmachines to join the Waagh!