#139: Toowoomba Remote League 1000pt Tournament - Game 3 - Maggotkin Vs. Daughters of Khaine

With two big wins so far, I was in the top bracket of the ladder, and I knew game three was going to be a tough match. In the last round, I ended up being matched against Daughters of Khaine. This was one army that I was fully expecting to face, and there were two in the top bracket.

Slaughter Queen on Cauldron of Blood (General)
Death Hag
30 Witch Aelves
30 Witch Aelves
2 Additional Command Points

This was going to be a tight game. My opponent, a gentleman named Cameron, had tabled his first two opponents by the end of turn two, so I knew I was going to be up against it. But I had a trick up my sleeve...

The scenario was Scorched Earth, so I knew that I needed to hold my opponent on his half of the board to stop him just swamping my objectives with superior numbers and burning my objectives. And with both of us sitting on four drops, that all-important first roll was going to be crucial, and would heavily influence how I was going to have to play the match. Thankfully for me, I won the roll off, deploying first and guaranteeing myself first turn.

I followed the tried and true deployment of a strong offensive centre and then Plaguebearers on each of my flank objectives. The table had some pretty serious terrain, which allowed me to obscure most of them, not that it would have mattered in this match up, as my opponent had zero shooting and a whole lot of angry ladies. 

Cameron dropped his Slaughter Queen on Cauldron on his centre objective, and a horde one each of his flanks. The Hag deployed on my right hand side, but was hanging off the side of the unit, unprotected by her kin. I think he may have spread out a little too far, as he found his units not "wholly within" the Cauldron's Bloodshield by only a handful of bodies. 

This game was going to either be a big win or a big loss, but I had a plan. The Great Unclean One successfully cast Glorious Afflictions on the left horde of Witches, while also dropping Soulsnare Shackles right in their face, so that the minute they stepped off their line, they'd be contending with the Shackles' movement cripple as well. This was something that I'd factored into the list well before the event, because while my list was strong, there were a few things that I simply couldn't deal with in 1000 points. Namely, Witch Aelf hordes and massive damage dealers like Skarbrand and the Stardrake. With the combination of Shackles and Afflictions, it gave me a way to essentially nullify a threat, not by killing it or injuring it, but by stripping its speed down to the point where even in a five-turn game, it would have no impact. 

With one unit of Witch Aelves put into a painfully debilitating position, and the Death Hag left very exposed, I knew I had to deliver the first punch and make it count. With a successful hero phase, I committed to a heavy first punch. Run rolls and charge rolls were on the very high side, allowing the Great Unclean One to slam into the Cauldron, and the Drones into the Hag and Witches. I managed to get two Drones into the Hag and delete her before she could have any significant impact on the game. I was stoked about this, as I managed to remove the source for Witchbrew, which would give me major headaches. I did only manage to kill a handful of Witches though, and was really concerned that I hadn't done enough. The Great Unclean One also managed to throw his considerable weight around, dropping the Cauldron down to six wounds. It was a start, but now it was the Daughters' turn...

In a stroke of not amazing luck, my opponent not only got the double turn on me, but dropped both additional command points on giving his Witches two Hero Phase pile in and attacks. This was the day before the FAQ dropped, and there was no limit on being able to stack command abilities. To counter my bad luck, my Drones survived four consecutive pile ins from the Witch Aelves, and rolled ridiculously on my saves. I still lost several bodies, but avoided completely losing the unit.

Utilising the new pile in rules, I slid my GUO 3" around the Cauldron to bring him back into range of the Locus for the Drones.

The the bottom of turn two, I managed to summon a Poxbringer, behind the front line (shown in the photo above), while the Drones finally started to put work in and cut through the crowd of berserker women! The GUO also managed to roll alright, suffering two wounds and inflicting another five, leaving the Cauldron on a single wound. Once again, he cast Glorious Afflictions on the other horde of Witch Aelves, who had only managed to move 8" total in turns one and two. 

My opponent once again won priority, and chose to spend his Command Point to let the Cauldron pile in and attack in the hero phase. Being turn three, the Avatar atop the Cauldron was automatically animated, and so the damage potential was much higher. He chose to do this, knowing full well, that the Cauldron was on borrowed time and a single wound, so I can't fault his decision. It was, however, his undoing. He did inflict a bunch of damage, but in return, Blubber and Bile inflicted three mortal wounds, and his Hag Narr save could only stop two. The Cauldron died, and with it, all the support for the nearby Witches. The remaining Aelves did what they could, but without buffs and nearby heroes, they simply couldn't drag down the surviving Drones. In return, the unit was mopped up, and I claimed a major win for my third game in turn three.

This was exactly the game I was planning for when I chose endless spells and spells for my GUO. I can say with complete confidence that it would have been a different game if I had to deal with all 60 Witch Aelves. As it were, I managed to stun-lock one unit into irrelevance, preventing it from having any impact on the game. This meant that I could focus wholly on the right side of the board. I was lucky to have gotten first turn, as it allowed me to pin my opponent on the back foot, and force the Daughters into a war of attrition, which is well and truly Nurgle's strength. That, and lightning fast speed, for reasons...

The Endless Gift once again saved my GUO from imminent death, as Slaughter Queens and Avatars are actually really stabby (who would have thought, from such a wholesome group of psychotic worshippers of the god of murder).

With that win, I was sitting on three major wins, which was podium territory, and it ended up coming down the Kill Points. Despite only losing one unit of Plaguebearers all day, it was all about what I killed. And game two against Nurgle, where I got zero kill points, cost me dearly. I ended up landing in third place, which I was stoked with.

The tournament itself was fantastic, as the Failed Charge crew ran their first big event. It was open to walk ins, and where they were expecting 14-18 players, thirty people ended up showing up and competing.

Thanks for reading,
Gabe

#138: Toowoomba Remote League 1000pt Tournament - Game 2 - Maggotkin Vs. Maggotkin

After a close-fought win in round one, I found myself facing off against James, another player who had made the trip up from Brisbane, and his Maggotkin.

Harbinger of Decay (General)
Horticulous Slimux
Festus the Leechlord
5 Blight Kings
5 Blight Kings
5 Blight Kings

While my army was focused solely on the daemon side of the army, James had chosen to go with the mortal elements, and was going to pose some serious problems. Blight Kings are no joke, and the Harbinger only makes my job harder. The scenario was Knife to the Heart, and I knew that it would be all but impossible to shift him off his objective, so it would come down to kill points and the minor win or loss. Having suffered from caution in Game 1, I made the decision, when presented with turn one, to go straight on the offensive.

 Leaving my two units of Plaguebearers on my own objective, confident that they would be able to, at the very least, contest my objective should something launch an assault on it. As part on my own assault, I cannonballed across the board with both the Drones and the Great Unclean One. My hope was to do as much damage as possible before the Harbinger of Decay was able to get his command ability up and give them another layer of protection from harm.

Despite my most valiant (or nefarious, depending on your perspective...) efforts, I wasn't able to kill off any units. I cut my way through a few Blight Kings, but was unable to wipe any units out with my initial alpha strike. The kings proved to be quite unpredictable, with some failing to have any impact and others triggering their blighted weapons to push through an obscene number of wounds. Thankfully, his lack of rend and my wound negations meant that retaliation was quite minor. 

In what I thought was a horrendously unfortunate turn of events, James double turned me, and piled into the chaotic melee with everyone but Festus. While the Great Unclean One only had three Kings to contend with, the Drones were beset on all sides by Kings, Slimux and the Harbinger. Three Drones were hacked down in exchange for very little damage in return. I did manage to pop a one for battleshock and return a Drone to the unit, which was a bonus, but my attack was blunted. And I needed to pull something incredible out of the bag.

Then I saw it... the path to victory. My opponent had made a single mistake. Between Horticulous and his Contagion Points, he'd planted several trees in order to create a healthy flow of summoned units, but in his haste to hamstring the unit of Drones, he had over-reached with his army, leaving only Festus guarding his objective.

At the bottom of turn two, I retreated with the Drones, flying over the heads of Slimux and the Harbinger, and used my command point from that turn to ensure I ran 6". This got all four Drones within 6" of the objective, but out of combat. With only Festus to contest the objective, I claimed it with ease.

The third battle round began, and as I was holding both objectives, I immediately won a major victory.

This was a bit of a cheeky win, and I don't think my opponent or I really expected it to only go to turn three. Both of us were kind of expecting it to come down to kill points, but even then, the combat was an absolute grind! Both armies were shrugging off damage, and the Wheel was busy healing every Nurgle unit on the table! I'd managed to get two units of Blight Kings down to a single, wounded model each, but didn't get a chance to finish them off, as the game ends immediately when victory conditions are met. I think if James had summoned Plaguebearers over Gnarlmaws, this game would have been a very different story, because he could have stacked numerous, high-quality bodies onto that objective, while keeping pressure on the front line. As it was, I managed to pull off a crafty play that ended up paying off!

 I was stoked to land another major win, but with not a single unit being destroyed from either player's army, it had left me in a difficult place, as I'd have to pull something special out for Game 3 to catch all the other players on two major wins and tons of victory points.

And when the Game 3 draw was announced, I was facing Daughters of Khaine...

This would put my army to the test.

Until next time, thanks for reading,
Gabriel

#137: Toowoomba Remote League 1000pt Tournament - Game 1 - Maggotkin Vs Legion of Night

After making the pilgrimage up the range to Toowoomba, I was ready to play my first three games of AOS2! Going into it, I honestly had no idea what the player pool would look like, as the only Toowoomba players I had faced were members of the Failed Charge Podcast crew, who were the event organisers. I was going into the day blind a little bit, but after putting Clan Pestilens on the display shelf for a breather, this left me with a couple of options. I ended up settling on Maggotkin, as I had a few events later in the year that I was planning with them. Besides, it's a super strong book...a nice change from the less diverse armies that I had been playing; widely considered to be far from the top tier of armies.

Great Unclean One (General, Bell/Flail, Grandfather's Blessing, Endless Gift, Glorious Afflictions)
10 Plaguebearers (Battleline)
10 Plaguebearers (Battleline)
6 Plague Drones
Soulsnare Shackles (Endless Spell)

This sat me at 1000 points on the dot. I would have preferred to run 20-man Marauder units instead of the Plaguebearers, but I simply didn't have them painted and ready for the event. The GUO and Drones is a pretty staple combination in the army, allowing them to dish out a ton of hits with a huge threat range!

But the real utility in the army comes from the fusion of the Glorious Afflictions spell ( the target's move characteristic and run and charge rolls are halved, and the target unit cannot fly) with its 21" range, and Soulsnare Shackles, which cripples movement once again. The idea behind this was as an answer to such craziness as Stardrakes, Witch Aelf hordes and Bloodletter Bombs. These two spells would allow me to essentially shut a unit down, and put it in a position where it had little to no impact on the game until I was good and ready to deal with it. But you know what they say about the best laid plans.

But I digress...

After arriving in Toowoomba, consuming enough coffee to jumpstart my brain, and shaking a few hands, it was time for round one. I found myself facing off against a gentleman by the name of Gary, with his Legion of Night army.

Mannfred (General)
20 Skeleton Warriors
5 Dire Wolves
5 Dire Wolves
Terrorgheist

The scenario was Shifting Objectives, which meant we were both going to have to be on our toes to come out on top. My deployment was pretty standard, with my tree on the centre lane, and a unit directly opposite each objective. In hindsight, I think the tree was positioned poorly, and clogged up the Drone's lane, but what's done was done. We rolled to see which objective was the "big" one, and the right objective was the priority. I took first turn, and basically pushed my whole army onto the centreline. The Bell and good run rolls meant that I got where I needed to be, and scored maximum points as a result. I made the mistake of holding back with my Drones, instead of pitching into the Skeleton horde, and pinning my opponents numbers far from the objectives.

And my opponent made me pay for that mistake...

The skeletons poured into the Drones, managing to flood the objective with bodies, and claw away ownership. On the left, I was confident that the five Dire Wolves wouldn't be able to grind down the Plaguebearers, but on the right, where the objective was worth three points, Mannfred committed his considerable weight to the conflict and smashed the Plaguebearers into oblivion, firmly claiming the area for Death. His Terrorgheist also showed up on my backline, and screamed at the GUO, who had taken a wound from Manny's magical barrage. Fortunately, his high Bravery stopped the scream from having any impact, and the Terrorgheist failed the 9" charge. What my opponent HAD managed to do was catch me on the back foot, and completely shut down my Contagion Point generation. Uh-Oh...

The main objective shifted to the middle one (not the left as I had hoped), and my opponent got the double on me. The Terrorgheist attempted to make life difficult for the GUO, starting to put some serious hurt on him (which he was able to almost completely heal back at every possible chance). But the real problems were just beginning in the middle of the table. Mannfred, having dispatched the Plaguebearers, turned his attention to the Drones, cutting down three and crippling a fourth with the help of some furious Skeletons. All I could do was hope that the Drones would stay alive long enough to grind down the Skeletons. I threw the Shackles over near Mannfred, and while they failed to have any effect on Manny or the Skeletons, they did do two mortal wounds to the drones. Just perfect...

At this point, the game was getting tight! We were both just on the edge of our seats, knowing full well, that things were on a knifes edge. I had spent the first two turns on the ropes, getting pummelled, but momentum began to shift back toward Nurgle. The GUO managed to not only dispatch the Terrorgheist, but also send a Plague Wind through the Drones and into the Skeletons, healing and killing as it blew. The Plaguebearers on the left lost a single model to the dogs, rolled a 1 for Battleshock, and replenished their numbers to solidify their position on that objective. And the Drones, with added attacks from the GUO's Command Ability, finally ground down the last of the Skeletons. 

What really put the nail in my opponent's coffin (pun fully intended) was the main objective swinging back to it's original position on the right flank. With the Skeletons depleted, and Mannfred having taken a few wounds over the course of the battle, despite his armour and healing, I decided it was time to make my big play for victory. The last remaining Drone (they really took a beating) was unaffected by the shackles this turn, and retreated over the top of Manny and onto the objective, claiming it away from Death. The Plaguebearers on the left objective finally put their plagueswords to the last undead dog, and the GUO, who had healed back every single point of damage suffered earlier in the battle, took the fight to Mannfred, punching the Mortarch of Night until his army and vampiric healing could save him no longer! 

The game ended with a firm victory for the minions of Nurgle, but it was far from a sure thing until the dying moments of the game! The battle swung back and forth many times, with every dice roll being vital to winning or losing. Gary was a fantastic opponent, and he won my Best Sport vote! 

Having only lost 120 points in the Plaguebearers, and killing 940 points worth of my opponent's army (one pesky unit of dogs escaped my clutches!), I found myself sitting on the top tables, unsure of what new terrors I would face next... The kill points from this game in no way reflected just how ridiculously close this game was! 

Thanks for reading, and check back in soon for game two!

Gabe