Battle Report #279: Haley3 vs Ossyan

:: Prologue ::

Time for a rematch. We played identical lists, scenario, map, everything!

:: Lists ::

Cygnar:

Major Prime Victoria Haley - WJ: +25
- Haley Past
- Haley Future
- Grenadier - PC: 9 (Battlegroup Points Used: 9)
- Grenadier - PC: 9 (Battlegroup Points Used: 9)
- Thorn - PC: 13 (Battlegroup Points Used: 7)
- Ironclad - PC: 12
Journeyman Warcaster - PC: 4
- Charger - PC: 9
Ragman - PC: 4
Rhupert Carvolo, Piper of Ord - PC: 4
Storm Lances - Leader & 4 Grunts: 20
Trencher Infantry - Leader & 9 Grunts: 16

Opponent:

Lord Arcanist Ossyan - WJ: +28
- Discordia - PC: 18 (Battlegroup Points Used: 18)
- Imperatus - PC: 22 (Battlegroup Points Used: 10)
Arcanist Mechanik - PC: 2
Ghost Sniper - PC: 3
Mage Hunter Strike Force - Leader & 9 Grunts: 16
- Mage Hunter Strike Force Commander - PC: 4
Mage Hunter Strike Force - Leader & 9 Grunts: 16
- Mage Hunter Strike Force Commander - PC: 4
Stormfall Archers - Leader & 3 Grunts: 9
Stormfall Archers - Leader & 3 Grunts: 9

:: Pre-Battle Thoughts & Deployment ::

The first game taught me that I have to taunt out MHSF mini-feat by clouding up the Lances. I also don't need to commit clouds on both flanks I think. I can taunt out MHSF not using mini-feat on my weak flank by presenting a couple of juicy targets, e.g. Thorn and Ironclad. If he goes all in to try and spike/ping them off chances are it'll cost him too much. Because of this I move the Trenchers a little further to my strong flank.

:: Game ::

I skew a little further right and put Thorn at just beyond 18" and the Ironclad likewise (from MHSF on the left flank). Tac supremacy and Dirge on Trenchers, Shield on Lances.

Strike Force on the right go for Lances. A very peculiar move but they had Shatterstorm so my opponent was hoping to stop the recursion madness I suppose. The ones on the left took the bait of targets in open terrain but missed Thorn and I dodged away with little damage done. At least this time the jacks were a little more offensively placed and the left MHSF Commander (which did not use his mini-feat) was sitting far behind at DEF18 (quicken + concealment).

I decide to go for a solid alpha on the right flank by sending the remaining Lances into the MHSF and feating to start working on the Imperatus. Unfortunately I am unable to cloud up the Lance leader so I fear he might be dead. Better planning might've allowed me to keep him alive. I Dominate Imperatus towards me, Past has fueled Grenadiers and together with the Charger and Future they blast Imperatus apart. 9 boosted POW13s and 2 boosted POW12s hurt a ton.

The feat is no-where near as good as last game but taking out Imperatus is a huge blow.

Retribution responds by feating with Ossyan. Discordia takes out the Lances jamming the Strike Force (poor repositioning from me to allow this). The Lances are all taken out. He scores in the right zone (though in hindsight I think his unit was too small to do so). In the left zone however it's just a mess as my opponent brainfarts and gets tunnel vision on Thorn. He misses a couple of times and I Dodge my way over to Discordia. He keeps trying to shoot me despite Thorn being DEF21 and misses a lot, taking 20 (!) or so boxes off of Discordia in the process.

Thorn + Grenadiers take out Discordia. I made a grave mistake with Future in my previous turn as she's not within 6" of the right zone. I could possibly have made a charge/run trick here but decided that I consider it extremely unlikely for my opponent to score more than 3 points anyway. I keep clearing up infantry models following Discordia's demise and the cloudwall is put up again.

Thorn is not killed because Thorn is Thorn. He does lose Cortex though. The right zone is cleared, so 0-3.

I clear as many models as I can and swarm the right zone with my own.

Ossyan can't clear all this and due to a positioning mistake from me (the second Grenadier didn't run B2B with the right one) he had an angle for Prime. It was an extreme longshot though and it didn't pay off.

Victory to the Swans!

:: Evaluation ::

A better game than first as Retribution is now able to set up for a proper counter-strike once I go in. The positioning of Imperatus and Discordia give them away too easily though and the decision to try and shoot Thorn wastes an insane amount of potential. I mean sure, Thorn is a pain, but sometimes you have to accept that all pains cannot be dealt with explicitly.

What Ossyan needs to do here is probably try and take out the Trenchers. Haley's game thus largely revolves around trying to keep said Trenchers alive I think, or alternatively make him pay dearly for doing so. Dirge, deep positioning, other, aggressively positioned pieces are key here. I didn't cast Distortion a whole lot as the Strike Force units are the primary threats early game. Late game it is awesome though, no doubt.

A great couple of games and I think we both learned a lot. We agree that Ossyan is up here but his positioning game is surprisingly hard to master. Throwing the Strike Force under the bus is something he probably needs to do, but in doing so he has to get the right targets and set up for effective piece trades and retaliation.