Battle Report #44 - Caine2 vs Vayl1 (50)

:: Prologue ::

Time to give my Caine's Cohort concept a test run! It's been a while since I've played Caine and I cannot remember having played him at 50. At 35 he's obviously a monster and one of the problems I'm having with his transition to 50 is to make an army that actually helps him accomplish his thing: Attrition. While I don't imagine sending Caine into Legion, a test is better than no test. I think lots of players will go Vayl1/Lylyth2 in ADR season 3 and I know Haley2 of all sorts can deal with Vayl1 (of all sorts). Thus I got to try out Caine2 vs Vayl1!

:: Lists ::

Cygnar:

Captain Allister Caine - WJ: +5
- Squire
- Ace - PC: 7
Journeyman Warcaster - PC: 3
Alexia, Mistress of the Witchfire - PC: 4
Eiryss, Angel of Retribution - PC: 3
Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator - PC: 1
Gastone Crosse - PC: 3
Savio Montero Acosta - PC: 3
Stormsmith Stormcaller - PC: 1
Lady Aiyana & Master Holt - Lady Aiyanna & Master Holt: 4
Tactical Arcanist Corps - Leader & 2 Grunts: 4
Greygore Boomhowler & Co. - Boomhowler and 9 Grunts: 9
- Captain Jonas Murdoch - Murdoch 2
Rangers - Leader & 5 Grunts: 5
Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team - Lynch, Ryan & Watts: 4

Opponent:

Vayl, Disciple of Everblight - WB: +6
- Seraph - PC: 8
- Scythean - PC: 9
- Typhon - PC: 12
- Ravagore - PC: 10
- Raek - PC: 4
- Raek - PC: 4
Blighted Nyss Shepherd - PC: 1
Blighted Nyss Shepherd - PC: 1
Strider Deathstalker - PC: 2
Strider Deathstalker - PC: 2
Spawning Vessel - Vessel & 6 Grunts: 3

:: Pre-Battle Thoughts & Deployment ::

The scenario was outflank and I chose to go first because I had a feeling that getting up the table would be good. Having never played the army before I was kind of shocked with just how many utility solos I had running around. As a result I was a little unsure of what to do with all the power at my disposal. Furthermore Caine was deployed on a flank out of habit, he should most definitely have been placed more centrally. I had to proxy Ace (awaiting the model!) and Aiyana & Holt (Eiryss1/Stryker1) since I forgot the models at home. Boomies got the task of jamming what I assumed would be "his" circle.

:: Game ::

We start 31" apart. I ran the math and with Caine charging 10" ahead I'd still be too far away for him to try shenanigans, perhaps apart from a single Ravagore shot if he commits to this move with Slipstream and Leash. I'll take my chances as he needs 13+ to hit as the charge would still see me toe the hill. I cast Blur on Rangers who ran up, Acosta followed suit within 5" of a couple for Swift Vengeance, Boomies, Alexia and Eiryss on the opposite flank. B13th swept wide, TAC behind Caine and the rest stayed centrally with Ace in cover from the house.

The Legion response was... aggressive. I wasn't expecting such an all-out move this early, especially not with Vayl in the mix as well. A couple of Rangers died, Acosta should've died but survived and 2 boomies were taken out.

With Vayl1 behind the Seraph and Typhon my plan was clear: She was camping 2 fury. Upkeep True Shot on Caine, put 1 focus to Ace. Rangers run up. Can't get +2 RAT vs Vayl1 because of her innate ability if anything comes within 5" of her but Mark Target could still come in handy for Ace. It did exactly this as I rolled miserably for his boosted shot but the +2 RAT was just sufficient to hit the Typhon with Shadow Fire.

I had nothing exceptionally easy to put in Caine's way and I was pretty sure I needed the 3" from charging so Lynch was the sacrifical lamb. I put a bullet in the poor friend's back and then used feat (hits on friendly models do not increase the strength of his shots). With 5 focus, 1 initial remaining and reload Vayl was in for a hard time. I needed 6s to hit so it wasn't a sure thing with 2 fury remaining but it was sufficient.

Victory to the Swans!

:: Evaluation ::

A very quick game and my opponent has a new-found respect for Caine's threat projection. While Legion isn't meant to be Caine's drop at all (if it were I'd have made a number of list changes) this game gave me crucial insight to the list regardless. First of all, Ace is amazing. While this application of his abilities was trivial I kept visualizing angles for him, Long story short: He can do lots of interesting things. I also noticed how brutal Infiltrate would've been had I not been playing against an entire army which doesn't care about Stealth.

So, onto the concept of the list itself: Cohort (i.e. tons of self-sufficient models just like Caine himself). Choices like Gastone don't really shine in a matchup like this because it's almost trivial for a Ravagore to one-shot him off the table. The same goes for a number of my other choices and Legion is one of the few armies in the game who can do just that.

There are a couple of things I'm not sure about in the list which I'll be keeping an eye out for in playtesting: Not having ATGM (I believe they are sub-optimal for attrition purposes with Caine2) and taking Alexia2 over Alexia1. Alexia1 has a lot of models to get souls from here and it potentially provides me with inexpensive targets for Magic Bullet shenanigans. ATGM with snipe is a natural candidate for Magic Bullet, as the list stands currently there aren't too many good targets should I want to spam it. Furthermore as the list is meant as a Scyrah drop I'm not sure leaving them at home is a good idea. I'll tinker with list variants and see what I can come up with!

Lastly activating this many solos with a million different abilities require me to have a better overall understanding of what my opponent will be doing so that I am in position in time to get my combos off. A lot of this list's power stems from activating things at different points in time to set up chains that remove chunks of the enemy army at a time. In and of itself this isn't too hard considering how many times I've practiced activation order with Haley2, but the inherent problem in this list is real estate: It has a pretty large combined footprint and the table must remain open and uncluttered for Caine to work as well as he can. Standing tightly together is also far from optimal given the high-def, low-arm nature of choices like Aiyana & Holt, B13th etc.

I'm looking forward to playing more Caine2! Hopefully I can get enough games in to have him as a pair for Norwegian Masters because I believe this pair (Caine2/Haley2) is inherently easier to pair into various factions than my original one (Stryker1/Haley2).