#142: RCGT Game 1 - Maggotkin of Nurgle Vs Clan Skryre 2500pts

The day had finally come. My army was fully based and mostly painted. I hadn't left anything at home.

I was starting the day on the right foot.

The night before, the Round One matchups had been announced, and I was facing down against Jemma and her Gautfyre/Arkspark Skryre list.

Clan Skryre Allegiance:

Arch Warlock (General, Cunning Creature)
Warlock Engineer (Vigordust Injector)
Warlock Engineer
6 Stormfiends (3 Warpfire Projectors, 3 Shock Gauntlets)
3 Stormfiends (3 Warpfire Projectors)
3 Stormfiends (3 Warpfire Projectors)
2 Warp Grinder Teams
2 Warpfire Thrower Teams
5 Skryre Acolytes
20 Clanrats
Warp Lightning Cannon
Clan Skryre (Warscroll Battalion)
Arkhspark Voltik (Warscroll Battalion)
Gautfyre Skorch (Warscroll Battalion)
Balewind Vortex (Endless Spell)

With the sheer mortal wound output, and her ability to completely bypass my To Hit debuffs, I was genuinely concerned going into this matchup. She had the killing power to just bulldoze straight past my Resilient saves and kill whatever I didn't zone out. I'd laid my army out on a table to see what was going to be the best way to deploy, and basically arrived at the conclusion that, to save my heroes and important elements, both units of Plaguebearers would be taking a punching turn one.

Gritting my teeth and preparing for the worst, I arrived at the event and prepared for my first game. And the scenario was Total Commitment!

This was the single best possible scenario for me, as Jemma was forced to drop her entire army on the board, meaning there would be no pop-up Stormfiends melting my face off. Instead, they would have to march across the board to get to me. I was confident that I had the speed to decide which of her units could even target things to a degree, and so my deployment looked very different to what I thought it would have to be.

 I deployed my army in two very distinct halves. With my opponent outdropping my by a long way, being a three-drop, I had the luxury of laying my army out to best benefit my game plan. My left side was my "offence side" complete with the Gnarlmaw, with the big unit of Pusgoyles, as well as the Great Unclean One and Lord of Afflictions to support them with command abilities, artefacts and spells. One of my units of thirty Plaguebearers also took up residence on the small pyramid in order to lock down my home objective.

My right objective was my "defence side", with the other unit of thirty Plaguebearers being backed up by the Lord of Blights, Festus and the Blight Kings. My two Jabberslythes took up residence in the centre of the board, so as to be of support to whichever side needed it most. Jemma deployed very centrally with most of her army, leaving Acolytes on my left side and Clanrats on my right. Her centre was VERY solid, but there weren't any objectives in the centre, so hopefully I could make the most of the space on each flank...

My opponent had given me first turn, as taking the first turn would have left her relatively short-ranged army with nothing to do. I wasted no time in seizing the opportunity to put some points on the board. I spent one of my command points on Spearhead of Contagion to launch the Pusgoyles across the table and massacre the five poor Acolytes cowering behind the stone blocks. I also cast Mystic Shield on them, but didn't bother with the Great Unclean One's command ability, as I was pretty confident that they didn't need the extra attacks just yet. The Lord of Blights did put Cloud of Flies on his unit of Plaguebearers though, who pushed up a little. This just gave me another sturdy barrier between my opponent's army and the objective. The two Jabberslythes pushed up the centre, staying just outside of Warpfire range, and making sure to put terrain between them and the Warp Lightning Cannon.  In a shock to no-one, the Pusgoyles butchered the Acolytes and claimed the objective for Nurgle, pushing me into a good position on the scoreboard. 

Retaliation was swift, as the nearby unit of Stormfiends turned their flamers on my Pusgoyles, before charging in to punch me! When the dust settled, two flies had been incinerated, and thanks to the two Warp Grinder Teams, the Skaven had clawed back the objective. For now...

On the other side of the board, things were beginning to get ugly. The unit of six Stormfiends barrelled into my lines, and then realised that my To Hit modifiers were able to pretty much shut down the damage potential of the Shock Gauntlets. Two Stormfiends did manage to punch the Jabberslythe to death, which resulted in nine mortal wounds bouncing back at them, killing one of the Warpfire Fiends. All things considered, I didn't think it was going too bad!

After having lost my second Jabber to magic and shooting, I was keen to keep momentum going in my favour. Skryre is one of those armies where, if you present them with the smallest opportunity, they can swing the entire game on its head! With that in mind, I launched my whole left flank foward, using the Gnarlmaw and the Great Unclean One's bell to make sure my Plaguebearers pushed right up onto the objective. I made the decision to charge the Warpfire Fiends on the objective with my Plaguebearers, as it would prevent them from shooting my Lord of Afflictions, but I kept him nearby for that Witherstave aura! The GUO hung back and waddled over to my objective in case push came to shove, and I needed to summon something to hold down my backline. My remaining Pusgoyles, got the hell out of dodge, and retreated toward the handful of heroes and war machine at the back of the board. In my opponent's turn, one Blightlord was shot to pieces, while the other was crippled on only two wounds, but he didn't have a degrading profile, and I was confident he could kill the squishy support pieces on his own. The kill didn't come cheap, however. In their haste to kill the flies, the Warp Lightning Cannon overloaded its reactor, and blew itself to smithereens in a single stroke of bad luck on the Skaven's part. Excellent. 

Much to my surprise, a plucky Engineer decided enough was enough, and charged in. What was an Engineer going to do in combat, I thought. Well, as it turned out, he pushed through just enough wounds to finish off the Pusgoyle unit, saving himself and his fellow wizards from a messy death. 

Things on the other side of the board were getting very messy very fast! The two Warpfire Throwers and the Engineer managed to inflict enough mortal wounds to drop the Plaguebearers below 20 before the combat phase, which meant that the Shock Gauntlets were unhindered by debuffs, and their crackling fists went to work, obliterating Plaguebearers en masse. With only a handful remaining, my objective was starting to look a little exposed. 

That was, until I spent a metric ton of Contagion Points to summon 20 Plaguebearers on again to cover my objective in bodies. The remaining Stormfiends charged once more into the fray killing Plaguebearers in droves, but this time, they were faced with the combat prowess of Blight Kings and the Lord of Blights, and were finally cut down, bagging me a sizeable chunk of kill points. 

On Jemma's backline, I'd managed to cause her no end of troubles with the Plaguebearers pinning down the Stormfiends, the Witherstave preventing them from building any momentum in combat, and both Warp Grinder Teams falling to the Lord of Affliction's Festerpike! With a measly four Plaguebearers left in the unit, it was still enough to stop her from claiming the objective back, and I won the game with a solid lead on the scoreboard! 

I got supremely lucky in this game. If it were any other scenario, I would have been in a real spot of bother, but luckily for me, all my little ducks lined up in a row, and the matchup and scenario played very heavily in my favour. Jemma was a stellar opponent, and is always a delight to play. We're now 1-1 after my pummelling at BrisCon, so we'll see how this friendly rivalry plays out! 

With a major win, and a healthy chunk of kill points, I was moving up through the tables! 

Until next game, thanks for reading,

Gabe

#141: The Road To RCGT - Gabe's Maggotkin of Nurgle List Breakdown

With list submission having been and gone for the event, I figured it was a good time to break down my list for one of the iconic Brisbane Age of Sigmar events; the Redland City Grand Tournament.

Now, when I approach an event, the evil part of me wants to keep my list a complete secret in hopes of blindsiding my way to victory, but two things stand in the way of that. Firstly, when it comes to the hobby, I can't keep things under wraps to save my life (see super-secret Chaos Dwarf army that was a secret for all of three days). The second, and more important reason, is that as I'm about to go over all the army lists going to the event for the list review live streams this week, I thought that I'd disclose my list and my thoughts behind it first. That way, everyone knows what I'm bringing before I know what they're bringing.

So, without much more waffling on, let's jump into it...

In an attempt to be a little more competitive in this Handbook cycle, I've chosen Nurgle to be my main tournament army for the immediate future. It's a super strong book, and is a nice change from Clan Pestilens, which started to feel very restrictive toward the end of it's table run. Not only that, but I've already got a massive Nurgle army that is, for the most part, very quick to paint. So with my army chosen, I moved onto selecting a 2500 point army. 2500 feels like a lot of points, but I can tell you, that number quickly dissolves!

Heroes are always my first port of call in any army, and this was no different. My first pick was a Great Unclean One with a Bell and Flail. GUO's are a really solid pick, with their huge reservoir of wounds and healing mechanics, two casting and unbinding attempted, and a really solid command ability. I'm a huge fan of the Daemon spell "Glorious Afflictions", which only casts on a 5+ and halves the move, run and charge of a unit, and most importantly, stops it from flying.

Backing him up on the arcane front is Festus the Leechlord. His signature spell is invaluable in an army with little rend, and he also gives me a candidate to cast Blades of Putrefaction. He's surprisingly tough for a foot character, with six wounds and his healing mechanics.

The third hero was the Lord of Afflictions. When I first read the book, the LoA really didn't jump out at me, but after playing him a few times, he's incredibly versatile. He has all three keywords (MORTAL, ROTBRINGER, DAEMON), which means he has his pick of any traits or artefacts he might want. He's not going to kill a Stardrake, but he can be relied upon the beat down smaller heroes or units, and he's pretty tough to get rid of, with 8 wounds, a 4+ 5++, a heal each hero phase, and the Discharge and Incubatch for added annoyance.

I weighed up whether to leave it there or not, but in the end, I decided to add a fourth hero. And it was actually a pretty easy choice. The Lord of Blights' command ability is ridiculously good, and it didn't take much deliberation to settle on putting him in the list.

With my command structure sorted, I moved on to battleline. Needing four battleline for a 2500 point army, I started off my purchases with two units of thirty Plaguebearers. In a big unit, they're tough as nails, and with the LoB's command ability, this is only accentuated. They make great screens, objective grabbers and catchers for incoming alpha strikes, and putting sixty on the table is enough to make anyone second guess the killing power of their army.

For my third battleline, I took a unit of five Blight Kings. They're such good value, and give me a unit that can move behind my Plaguebearers and stop up any weak points in my line. They also gain a shooting attack if they're near the LoB, and while it's not much, sometimes sneaking one wound through can be the difference between winning and losing a game.

My fourth choice was by far the hardest. My initial thought was to run a cheap unit of Marauders, leaving plenty of points to pour into a unit of 6 Drones, which has fast become a staple of Nurgle armies. However, after a long deliberation, I decided to go with a less popular choice. By electing the Lord of Afflictions my general, I killed two birds with one stone by including a big unit of Pusgoyle Blightlords. They become Battleline under the LoA, and also fill the role of fast moving unit that can reach out and touch just about anything on the board. I know that Pusgoyles are a polarising unit (people either love them or hate them), but I was keen to give them a chance. With 7 wounds per model, a 4+ save and a 5++ Resilient wound mitigation, each model rivals that of heroes from other armies! They're also not too shabby in combat. Sure, there is a distinct lack of high-rend attacks, but they can still push through a horrific number of saves. And with three attack profiles each, with every second dragging a bell, they make great use of the GUO's Command Ability, as well as Blades of Putrefaction. In a practice game, they managed to drop a full-health Rogue Idol down to one wound with barely any buffs on them, so I know they have potential. That potential does require a bit of luck with the dice, though...

With four heroes and four battleline, I was quickly running out of points. My biggest concern was damage output. While I had an army that could rival any in resilience, I really wanted an answer to big scary units; something I could reliably send in and kill everything it touched. And so I went with a bit of a renegade choice...

I allied in two Jabberslythes.

These horrific monsters not only look like scrotums with wings and a face, but they have one of the most volatile warscrolls in the game. They're dangerous to kill, they're dangerous not to kill, and they can't be ignored. The first real drawcard on these monsters is their Aura of Madness. At the start of my hero phase, I roll a dice for every enemy model within 6" of a Jabber. On a 6, that model is, for all intents and purposes, turned off. No moving, no casting, no attacking, charging or piling in. It's like a piece of old school Mystical Terrain that I can fly around! I saw this used to great effect when a Jabberslythe turned off a Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon for a double turn, so he stood there for two full turns of the game drooling and staring into nowhere. While hardly dependable, it's incredibly powerful when it does go off. And it's not restricted to single models. It can turn off an entire unit!

The second, and more important rule for the Jabbers is Spurting Bile Blood. For every wound inflicted (not to be confused with 'Suffered', as a Jabberslythe can only ever suffer 10 wounds, but may have any number of wounds inflicted on it) on the Jabberslythe, I roll a dice. On a 4+, the unit that inflicted the wound suffers D3 Mortal Wounds. This is my answer to everything scary that I don't really want to fight. I can throw them into combat with Prince V, Morrsarr Guard, basically anything that is going to push through a huge volume of wounds on them, then watch them inevitably die in an explosion so big, it will herald in a nuclear winter. Again, this is not restricted to single models, so a unit of buffed up Witch Aelves with Mindrazor on them that HAVE to attack are going to do a tremendous amount of damage to themselves that not even their Hag Narr save can protect them from.

With the last chunk of points, I purchased Soulsnare Shackles and Quicksilver Swords, as well as two extra command points. This army has three exceptionally good command abilities, and I really wanted enough points to make use of them.

The only thing left to do was distribute my command trait and one artefact. I put Avalanche of Flesh on the Lord of Afflictions, giving him an extra 2" to both his runs and charges, making him even more mobile. I also slapped the Witherstave on him. Thanks to the fact he rides a Drone, he has access to the Daemon artefacts, and the Witherstave is ridiculously good. It affects all enemy units (not models) within (not wholly within) 12" of the bearer, and they must re-roll all 6's to hit, which severely hampers abilities that need an unmodified 6 To Hit or even a 6+. Brutal. I thought about putting it on the GUO, as he is far harder to kill, but the LoA is far more mobile, so I can make sure it's exactly where I need it to be, without having to worry about leaving room for the GUO or getting blocked by screens. It also means that I have three heroes eligible to hold objectives in one of the scenarios where wizards and heroes with artefacts can claim.

Probably the biggest strength of this army is it's ability to completely shut down a hyper aggressive assault. A unit of thirty Plaguebearers with the LoB command ability on them are -2 to hit in combat and -4 to hit in shooting. Combine that with the truly massive Witherstave Aura, and the hardest bit about killing this unit is landing a blow. Because modifiers happen after re-rolls, it just mitigates so much incoming damage.

Let's say a unit hits my line. They hit on a 3+ with re-rolls To Hit. Re-rolls happen before modifiers, so despite the -2 To Hit in combat, they're only re-rolling 1s, 2s, and of course, 6's from the Witherstave. After the re-rolls, the modifiers kick in, meaning only 5s and 6s are actually hits. Then they have to wound, and I have to fail armour saves and Disgustingly Resilient saves.

Tough...

As...

Nails...

Of course, there are plenty of ways around this for a savvy general, and I'm counting on my opponents doing everything they can to crack the combo before they go in. But who knows... It might save my bacon!

What do you think of the list? Rock solid or am I setting myself up for disappointment? I think that while it has immense staying power, it will struggle to cleave its way through an opposing army, as it still kind of feels that it lacks serious killing power across the army. It's easy to focus on what it can do, and forget what it can't, so there will be plenty of practice games between now and the event. It's probably the most competitive army list I've taken to an event in over a year, and I'm hoping to go at least 3 win out of 5 games, but we'll see. The most carefully laid plans rarely survive contact with the enemy.

If you haven't already seen, I'll be breaking down the other armies at the event in a List Review Live Stream on Tuesday and Wednesday night, so tune into Facebook and hang out with me! :)

Thanks for reading and I'd love to know your thoughts on my army.
Gabriel

ALLEGIANCE: NURGLE
Lord of Afflictions (General, Avalanche of Flesh, Witherstave)
Great Unclean One (Glorious Afflictions, Bell & Flail)
Lord of Blights
Festus the Leechlord
30 Plaguebearers (Battleline)
30 Plaguebearers (Battleline)
5 Blight Kings (Battleline)
4 Pusgoyle Blight Lords (Battleline)
Jabberslythe (Allies)
Jabberslythe (Allies)
Soulsnare Shackles (Endless Spell)
Quicksilver Swords (Endless Spell)
2 Extra Command Points

#140: Tale of Four Gamers - 1000 Point Mark

Well, it's been another frantic month of painting for myself and my three adversaries, with some stunning results! After last month's "First 500", two of the participants have changed armies completely, but not wasted any time in making up for the lost time. So without too much more waffling on, here are the four armies at the end of month two!

Gabriel:

I'll get mine out of the way first.

Now, the first thing you're probably noticing is that my army is not quite 1000 points yet... Far from it, in fact. I only managed to hit 700 points fully painted this month, with another twenty Ard Boys on the painting desk to fill out the unit to thirty. I did, however, add a Warchanter and three Gore-Gruntas to the army!

I actually really enjoyed painting the Gruntas. They're probably my favourite models from the range so far, mostly because they offer a little variety in textures and colours that the armour-clad infantry just don't have. They also have nice big armour panels to allow me to practice more freehand and get those tags and strips down to a fine art. The two "rank and file" piggies are also awaiting their shoulder pads, complete with weathering and freehand, but... well... it was a slow month on the Ironjawz front. What this means is, I've got a LOT to paint next month to keep the pace! 

Liam:

Having started the challenge optimistically with Brayherd, Liam quickly realised that a horde army may not have been the wisest choice considering the time constraints. And so he made the bold move to go back to the drawing board, and start a brand new army from scratch. 

While it's undeniably character-heavy at this stage, considering the timeframe, I don't think anyone is holding that against him! Packing in two units of Blight Kings, this mortal Nurgle force is playing no games. A Rotbringer Sorcerer, Lord of Plagues and Gutrot Spume make a formidable bodyguard for Kazyk the Befouled...

...and some muscle was added to the list with this trio of Plague Ogres! Leaning heavily into some of the less common elements of Nurgle, I can't wait to see what Liam comes up with next month! It's sure to be suitably revolting.

Alistair:

Having also jumped ship for calmer seas, Al left Stormcast in his wake to work on a hyper-aggressive Idoneth army. With the intricate model range matching Al's impressive skills with the brush, it's no wonder that these have turned out incredibly. There are more eels than you can poke a harpoon at, and the shipwrecks have come up a treat. 

But without question, the Eidolon of Mathlaan is the centrepiece of his entire army. 

He's absolutely done the model justice, and it's going to look amazing leading the charge from the depths to pillage and raid the land of the dry. 

Blake:

Leading the challenge without question, Blake has added yet another amazing conversion to his Death army in the form of a towering Scarab Beetle, adorned with skulls and burdened with a Casket of Souls. 

In game, he's using it as a Mortis Engine, and no one is complaining. The model itself is both morbid and majestic, and fits the style of his army perfectly. He's also added two Dreadblade Harrows, heavily converted to fit the aesthetic, as well as another ten skeletons to give him his minimum requirements for battleline. 

The army of Death is growing at an alarming rate, and now that the armies are getting to the size where they can take to the battlefield, I dare say more than a few skulls will be claimed for Nagash yet.

I hope you enjoyed a peek at the armies as they prepare for war. Which is your favourite, and what two forces do you want to see face off first? 

Thanks for reading,

Gabriel