Battle Report #376: Stryker3 vs Baldur2

:: Prologue ::

Following the game vs Wurmwood my opponent wanted to give Baldur2 a try. Interesting!

:: Lists ::

Cygnar:

(Stryker 3) Lord General Coleman Stryker [+28]
 - Stormwall [39]
Storm Lances (max) [20]
Storm Lances (min) [12]
Trencher Infantry (max) [16]
Journeyman Warcaster [4]
 - Firefly [8]
Rhupert Carvolo, Piper of Ord [4]

Opponent:

Baldur2
- Megalith
- Ghetorix
- Woldwrath
Gobber Chef
Blackclad Stonething
Lanyssa
2x Sentry Stones
Shifting Stones 

:: Pre-Battle Thoughts & Deployment ::

Same map and scenario. This time Baldur goes first. Weeell, again I have to spread out to make it hard for him to deal with Lances. That can be arranged. The Stormwall needs to move up centrally and I need the Trenchers alive.

:: Game ::

Circle runs up.

No Roots on Megalith so I decide to try and shoot him. Neither shot connects. True, Rock Wall was up but I boosted. I can haz dice. Lances are wide on both flanks, Trenchers centrally. Due to his aggressive move with the Mannikins I decided I had to kill them all. I started with the Firefly which failed its boosted 6+. These jacks must be blind, too bad it's not Eyeless they have... In any case this meant Trenchers had to get work done, I took care to activate them so that I could dig in and avoid a large part of the AOE5 shot from the Woldwrath.

Baldur keeps on coming, but he realizes rushing up the middle probably won't work out too well and as such shifts towards my left side.

It's too little, too late. I have a big positional advantage. His "clever" move to put Megalith outside of the Lances' LoS meant that the 'wall could get to it. I figured I could sacrifice my colossal to take him out because it would require both the Woldwrath and Ghetorix to kill me in return. This would open up the game a ton for me in terms of CP.

Feat turn it was then and Rhupert providing Trenchers with March let them take out a Sentry and start jamming the Woldwrath. Unfortunately the one Trencher who was in range of a Shifting Stone failed (!) to kill it at PS14 4 dice. This abysmal display meant Ghetorix could be ported and as such my plan to clusterfuck up the Stormwall was basically void.

In any case the Lances secured both flanks and I went to 2-0.

Abysmal dice are not reserved for me: After clearing out the jam a bit with the last Sentry Stone the Woldwrath -and- a primalled Ghetorix failed to kill my Stormwall. Not sure what the odds are on this. The 'wall was down to 2 boxes, but no weapon systems unfortunately. Baldur feated, definitely a turn too late. Both flags were contested.

I cleared out the flanks and the contesting models, 4-0.

Whatever Baldur could put up on the right flank to contest would die (if indeed anything was available) so we called the game here.

Victory to the Swans!

:: Evaluation :: 

Baldur2 vs Stryker3 with these lists actually felt like a really close and interesting game. Baldur struggles to spread out as well as Baldur does, which means that Baldur has to commit to two flags and play for attrition so that the scoring on the last flag won't be happening quickly enough to lose the game on CP.

Indeed, I had lost the attrition in this game. The Woldwrath was unharmed and Ghetorix had taken ~5 boxes or so. However the position meant that Baldur had to throw away key pieces instead of sending the durable ones up.

Trenchers with Stryker are baller. I might have to get a second unit of them...