Battle Report #20 - Stryker1 vs Lucant (50)

:: Prologue ::

I have long been wanting to play against Convergence. They were the only ones I hadn't faced thus far. While it's true that a lot of factions vary a lot from caster to caster, it's still a good start to at least have played every faction once. I didn't know much about them prior to this game but I had a feeling they would be grindy after looking through their units so I decided it was time to let Stryker get some game time again.

:: Lists ::

Cygnar:

Commander Coleman Stryker - WJ: +6
- Squire
- Stormwall - PC: 19
- Lightning Pod
- Stormwall - PC: 19
- Lightning Pod
Journeyman Warcaster - PC: 3
Stormsmith Stormcaller - PC: 1
Stormsmith Stormcaller - PC: 1
Storm Lances - Leader & 4 Grunts: 11

Opponent:

Father Lucant, Divinity Architect - WJ: +5
- Inverter - PC: 8
- Corollary - PC: 3
- Diffuser - PC: 3
- Cipher - PC: 9
- Galvanizer - PC: 3
- Mitigator - PC: 4
Enigma Foundry - PC: 3
Enigma Foundry - PC: 3
Reductors - Leader & 9 Grunts: 6
- Transverse Enumerator - PC: 2
Eradicators - Leader & 4 Grunts: 9
Optifex Directive - Leader & 2 Grunts: 2

:: Pre-Battle Thoughts & Deployment ::

My opponent told me that he usually won by attrition, when he won, and I decided to go for a scenario approach. We were playing Incoming and I won the roll-off. Because of my scenario focus I opted to go second. Stormwalls pre-deployed symmetrically on either side of the Fuel Cache in front of me. Convergence countered with Lucant + jacks centrally, reductors & foundries left and Eradicators right. I responded with Storm Lances on my right with Stryker between them and the Stormwalls. Stormcallers on either flank.

The 2D pieces behind my zone and around his objective are hills. The terrain piece in my zone is a trench. Convergence played with a couple of empty bases as proxy models. 

:: Game ::

Convergence opened with a bit of a cautious advance. Deceleration and Watcher went up.

I wasted no time taking opportunity of the open map and sent basically everything up full speed. The Storm Lances held back a bit in the middle to create a converging point (no pun intended) directly towards the fastest approach route for the Eradicators. Arcane Shield went up on both Stormwalls. I figured Lucant would be pressed on focus if he had to throw out Purification every turn, because unlike Vayl2 he can't feat to get it for free.

The Machines responded by advancing again. Deceleration went up again.

In this position I had an opening I didn't see properly: I could've sent both Stormwalls up, podded and disrupted more or less all the jacks that mattered with double triangulation. Instead I chose to stay and aim with them to clear some space and I tried to take out Reductors as well as his objective. The former didn't go too well but the objective was blown up and I held my own zone for a 2-0 start.

My opponent was feeling the heat and this was his time to commit. The Eradicators ran up but couldn't quite get within 2" of my Storm Lances. Lucant cast Purification and Deceleration and feated. Enigma foundry x2 raised the shooters back up. The Reductors caught a lucky break as they removed the entire left side of my left Stormwall.

A bit of an obvious counter-feat for me. I had to commit the Stormwalls to clear out the right zone and if I don't feat I risk losing both, which means it's game over most likely. I started with Earthquake on 3 Eradicators which allowed my Storm Lances to zig-zag charge without tanking free strikes and thus they got the damage output they needed to clear their part of the zone. The Stormwalls took care of the rest.

3-0.

Due to Stryker having cast Earthquake and the Stormwalls needing some focus to ensure they could do their job, the fully functional Stormwall was without Arcane Shield. This allowed Lucant to spread focus to his jacks while also casting Positive Charge. Going in against a Stormwall on Stryker's feat is a bit of a risk and I told my opponent I have never seen this paid off yet. Regardless he was in a desperate position given my lead and I can't blame him for trying. The 2 heavy vectors both engaged me with full focus, free charge due to beacon and positive charge. It doesn't get much better than that. I had around 20 boxes left after they were all done. At least the zone was contested.

I gave 3 focus to each Stormwall. The Lances charged out and cleared the zone. The right Stormwall turned around and wacked one heavy vector down, moving away to make space so the second one could charge the second heavy vector (for free, go fuel cache!), podding to clear out the last model blocking this path. The second Stormwall went in but I rolled snake eyes for 2 attacks and the vector survived, although it had lost its cortex and reach weapon system.

The wreck marker is the actual position of the Stormwall. The Stormcaller is placed there deliberately to free strike any running things trying to contest my zone. 

I was afraid of both Stormwalls going down. If he could accomplish this he'd still have to contest the zone somehow, with the 4-0 lead I was very close to winning and I suppose that was the biggest problem. Lucant with POW16 is quite strong with his focus and thus tons of attacks. However my opponent decided to go for the Stormcaller with a magic attack and then run the Reductors in to jam the zone with as many models as possible. The combination of electro leaps + earthquake probably makes this a losing play regardless but he rolled miserable for attack rolls, failing 3/3 attempts to meet my DEF13 with his FOCUS7, even boosting one of the rolls! At this point he simply conceded.

Victory to the Swans!

:: Evaluation ::

I think Stryker is the right man for the job here. He has marginally better threat ranges and control and the Storm Lances are painful to deal with for Convergence (at least this list). They really shone this game and being able to trivially remove Eradicators while they were affected by Lucant's feat was key to winning the game the way I did.

Stryker's main problem is his inflexible Stormwalls. Sure they can take a beating but they are so slow and little flexible. Double colossal is double colossal, but I'm seriously considering trying to get some kind of increased threat projection here. Lanyssa for example. The problem of course is points. Earthquake at least helps the list now and then, again as examplified here.

I probably should've walked with the Stormwalls T2 and spread out covering fire to keep the Reductors at bay. I should also have looked for openings to fry some disruption, instead I tried to utilize the Stormcallers to fry infantry which isn't really worthwhile here with the Foundries unless I can kill off an entire unit.

All in all though it was an enjoyable game which I managed to control fairly well. I've often had people commit to feated Stormwalls before and it usually ends up with the Stormwalls taking a ton of punishment, surviving and killing whatever's committed to taking them out. That's more or less what sealed the deal in this game as well and Stryker's proven he's capable of bringing an immovable object type of list which complements Haley quite well.

Lastly I'd like to highlight how important the Storm Lances were in this game and this just goes to show how extreme their damage output is if you can keep the entire unit alive and set up for them. I find mastering this unit to be very hard but when they go to town they are a stellar unit!