For the second game of the Invitationals, which was essentially the semi-finals, I faced Torbjörn's Vayl2 again. Since last time he had ditched the Ravagore for another Carnivean, which I think is the correct thing to do as a Ravagore in Vayl2 feels like it's way too expensive. Anyway! This is a matchup where Sloan truly is key. I don't know if I like any other Cygnar caster into Vayl2. Possibly Nemo3 I guess. Anyway, this was one of the closest games I've had this year and a blast of a game so let's get to it!
:: Lists ::
Cygnar:
Cygnar - Firing Solution v4
Theme: Heavy Metal
4 / 4 Free Cards 75 / 75 Army
Armory - Steamroller Objective
Captain Kara Sloan - WJ: +28
- Squire - PC: 0
- Hunter - PC: 11
- Hunter - PC: 11
- Hunter - PC: 11
- Stormwall - PC: 39 (Battlegroup Points Used: 28)
- Lightning Pod
- Firefly - PC: 8
Captain Arlan Strangewayes - PC: 0
Journeyman Warcaster - PC: 0
- Hunter - PC: 11
Lieutenant Allison Jakes - PC: 0
- Hammersmith - PC: 12
Opponent:
:: Pre-Battle Thoughts & Deployment ::
The scenario was Outlast and I won the roll-off, electing to go second. The reason here is two-fold: The nature of this matchup means that it's hard for Vayl to reliably contest and thus I can possibly get a scenario opening. The second reason is that I don't gain a whole lot by going first, whereas going second means I get to choose my side and there's an awesome set of terrain pieces on one side.
:: Game ::
Vayl elects to feat top of 1 to try and clear Hunters. The one I thought I placed in cover does indeed not have cover from the angles a spawned Harrier can get. Luckily for me, Torbjörn's dice are terrible and he doesn't even kill a single Hunter.
With the threat of Vayl's feat gone I've suddenly gained a lot of space for Sloan! Torbjörn also forgot about the heavy metal +2" so while he did the math on his Carniveans not being in my threat range (Stormwall) he forgot this and didn't actually measure it. I contemplated feating to get one Carnivean out but decided against it since Sloan had no targets personally. I figured I'd just as well feat later. The Carnivean took ~20 ish boxes and the Firefly fried some infantry. Arlan repaired the damaged Hunter which hid out behind its friends in the wood.
Unfortunately for me the carniveans had a perfect angle for the damaged Hunter. By assaulting they would end up in cover in the middle and with the assault spray touching said Hunter. It thus went down and some solid dice actually enabled him to kill another one as well with some help from Vayl and a Bolt Thrower. Not good at all.
A pure game of attrition from here looked dicey. With two Hunters down and both Carniveans in cover with their animus up I was unlikely to win big in the center. Instead I decided to go for a scenario play: I could easily clear both zones and put Sloan in the left one for a 3-0 start. This would put some real pressure on Legion as contesting the left zone heavily could conceivably lead to the right zone suddenly becoming a scoring zone for me.
This meant exposing Sloan so I needed to take out the Bolt Thrower to leave Vayl without batshit angles. By covering Sloan's front with Junior's Hunter Torbjörn would be forced to deal with DEF20 I hoped.
Sloan feated and shot the wounded Carnivean to death on the first shot, putting the second into the Bolter for great justice and lots of damage. Stormwall then killed the jam and put some hurt into the last Carnivean. Junior's Hunter finished off the Bolt Thrower while Sloan's last Hunter tried to put the pressure on the remaining Carnivean further, sadly to no effect. I got my 3CP and was very eager to see what Legion would do.
After deliberating various assassination and scenario plays Torbjörn concludes that the most sensible option he has actually is to go for the Stormwall. He can get the Seraph's shots into it as well as the Carnivean charging and possibly the Naga shooting. This really can go both ways, but this time his dice were on point and the 'wall went down. He then flooded the left zone heavily.
I looked for ways to clear out the left zone and instantly win but the odds were quite frankly terrible. I had a massive lead on the clock though so I figured I could "pause" my scenario angle and play a turn or two for attrition as Torbjörn simply didn't have the time to find the optimal plays he needed to win such a close-fought game of attrition.
The Hammersmith killed off the Carnivean. Sloan and Junior's Hunter killed the Hellion. Sloan's Hunter tried to kill off the pot was but not successful.
From here the pictures were a little lacking due to time issues and a really, really tense game. Torbjörn went for Junior's Hunter which he got with the Bloodseer. The Firefly and Hunter in the right zone were eventually killed as well.
We were down to 3-3 suddenly and Torbjörn had the Seraph, a Shepherd and a Forsaken contesting my zone. Junior killed the Shepherd, Jakes killed the Forsaken and Sloan shot the Seraph. The Hammersmith was fully loaded and ready to kill the Seraph should Sloan fail, but she rolled a spectacular damage roll (cue "boom headshot!") and killed it outright (it had taken some damage previously). I ran the Squire over to the other zone and thus won 5-3 on CP.
:: Evaluation ::
What. A. Game! This was so tense and close with multiple clutch plays, annoying mistakes and really hard positions to evaluate throughout. The game kicked off with a mistake from me. I think all Hunters need at least concealment vs Vayl2. Given the terrain here I could have given them cover as well with the building on the left flank. Most Legion players always save the powerful stuff for assassinations. However using feats etc to clear Hunters vs Sloan is a legit play I think. Indeed this game ended up being extremely close and I think that was largely due to me losing 2 Hunters early on. What if I had lost all 3? I wonder if I had could have kep the hurt Hunter from T1 alive by having him more than 3" into the forest.
The Stormwall going down was a big, big pain. It shows how strong the Carnivean is. It really is terrifying for Cygnar. I'm not sure what the math is here. The Seraph averages 2 shots which translates to 8 boxes with Blessed. Carnivean is 5x dice off 1 which is 30. On top of that we have charge and 2x dice off 3 which is another 11,5 so roughly 50 boxes in total, assuming no misses. The volume is too much for Odds Machine. It might be a coin flip, it might be 70 or 30, I really don't know. The fact of the matter is that it died, and when it did I was more than a little happy I had the Hammersmith. The reason this guy is in in the first place is that in most matchups things go south sooner or later and stuff gets into melee. When it does, the Hammersmith is so much more valuable than a 5th Hunter.
Towards the end of the game I was able to dissect his list faster than he could dissect mine. It was unbelievably close though and I believe that with more time for Legion, I probably would have lost. A very good game and a nail-biter towards the very end!
Theme: Oracles of Annihilation
3 / 3 Free Cards 75 / 75 Army
Vayl, Consul of Everblight - WB: +28
- Carnivean - PC: 19 (Battlegroup Points Used: 19)
- Naga Nightlurker - PC: 8 (Battlegroup Points Used: 8)
- Nephilim Bloodseer - PC: 8 (Battlegroup Points Used: 1)
- Nephilim Bolt Thrower - PC: 11
- Carnivean- PC: 19
- Seraph - PC: 14
Blighted Nyss Sorceress & Hellion - PC: 0
The Forsaken - PC: 0
Blighted Nyss Shepherd - PC: 1
Blighted Nyss Shepherd - PC: 1
Blighted Nyss Hex Hunters - Leader & 9 Grunts: 15
- Bayal, Hound of Everblight - PC: 0
Spawning Vessel - Vessel & 6 Grunts: 7
:: Pre-Battle Thoughts & Deployment ::
The scenario was Outlast and I won the roll-off, electing to go second. The reason here is two-fold: The nature of this matchup means that it's hard for Vayl to reliably contest and thus I can possibly get a scenario opening. The second reason is that I don't gain a whole lot by going first, whereas going second means I get to choose my side and there's an awesome set of terrain pieces on one side.
:: Game ::
Vayl elects to feat top of 1 to try and clear Hunters. The one I thought I placed in cover does indeed not have cover from the angles a spawned Harrier can get. Luckily for me, Torbjörn's dice are terrible and he doesn't even kill a single Hunter.
With the threat of Vayl's feat gone I've suddenly gained a lot of space for Sloan! Torbjörn also forgot about the heavy metal +2" so while he did the math on his Carniveans not being in my threat range (Stormwall) he forgot this and didn't actually measure it. I contemplated feating to get one Carnivean out but decided against it since Sloan had no targets personally. I figured I'd just as well feat later. The Carnivean took ~20 ish boxes and the Firefly fried some infantry. Arlan repaired the damaged Hunter which hid out behind its friends in the wood.
Unfortunately for me the carniveans had a perfect angle for the damaged Hunter. By assaulting they would end up in cover in the middle and with the assault spray touching said Hunter. It thus went down and some solid dice actually enabled him to kill another one as well with some help from Vayl and a Bolt Thrower. Not good at all.
A pure game of attrition from here looked dicey. With two Hunters down and both Carniveans in cover with their animus up I was unlikely to win big in the center. Instead I decided to go for a scenario play: I could easily clear both zones and put Sloan in the left one for a 3-0 start. This would put some real pressure on Legion as contesting the left zone heavily could conceivably lead to the right zone suddenly becoming a scoring zone for me.
This meant exposing Sloan so I needed to take out the Bolt Thrower to leave Vayl without batshit angles. By covering Sloan's front with Junior's Hunter Torbjörn would be forced to deal with DEF20 I hoped.
Sloan feated and shot the wounded Carnivean to death on the first shot, putting the second into the Bolter for great justice and lots of damage. Stormwall then killed the jam and put some hurt into the last Carnivean. Junior's Hunter finished off the Bolt Thrower while Sloan's last Hunter tried to put the pressure on the remaining Carnivean further, sadly to no effect. I got my 3CP and was very eager to see what Legion would do.
After deliberating various assassination and scenario plays Torbjörn concludes that the most sensible option he has actually is to go for the Stormwall. He can get the Seraph's shots into it as well as the Carnivean charging and possibly the Naga shooting. This really can go both ways, but this time his dice were on point and the 'wall went down. He then flooded the left zone heavily.
I looked for ways to clear out the left zone and instantly win but the odds were quite frankly terrible. I had a massive lead on the clock though so I figured I could "pause" my scenario angle and play a turn or two for attrition as Torbjörn simply didn't have the time to find the optimal plays he needed to win such a close-fought game of attrition.
The Hammersmith killed off the Carnivean. Sloan and Junior's Hunter killed the Hellion. Sloan's Hunter tried to kill off the pot was but not successful.
From here the pictures were a little lacking due to time issues and a really, really tense game. Torbjörn went for Junior's Hunter which he got with the Bloodseer. The Firefly and Hunter in the right zone were eventually killed as well.
We were down to 3-3 suddenly and Torbjörn had the Seraph, a Shepherd and a Forsaken contesting my zone. Junior killed the Shepherd, Jakes killed the Forsaken and Sloan shot the Seraph. The Hammersmith was fully loaded and ready to kill the Seraph should Sloan fail, but she rolled a spectacular damage roll (cue "boom headshot!") and killed it outright (it had taken some damage previously). I ran the Squire over to the other zone and thus won 5-3 on CP.
Victory to the Swans!
:: Evaluation ::
What. A. Game! This was so tense and close with multiple clutch plays, annoying mistakes and really hard positions to evaluate throughout. The game kicked off with a mistake from me. I think all Hunters need at least concealment vs Vayl2. Given the terrain here I could have given them cover as well with the building on the left flank. Most Legion players always save the powerful stuff for assassinations. However using feats etc to clear Hunters vs Sloan is a legit play I think. Indeed this game ended up being extremely close and I think that was largely due to me losing 2 Hunters early on. What if I had lost all 3? I wonder if I had could have kep the hurt Hunter from T1 alive by having him more than 3" into the forest.
The Stormwall going down was a big, big pain. It shows how strong the Carnivean is. It really is terrifying for Cygnar. I'm not sure what the math is here. The Seraph averages 2 shots which translates to 8 boxes with Blessed. Carnivean is 5x dice off 1 which is 30. On top of that we have charge and 2x dice off 3 which is another 11,5 so roughly 50 boxes in total, assuming no misses. The volume is too much for Odds Machine. It might be a coin flip, it might be 70 or 30, I really don't know. The fact of the matter is that it died, and when it did I was more than a little happy I had the Hammersmith. The reason this guy is in in the first place is that in most matchups things go south sooner or later and stuff gets into melee. When it does, the Hammersmith is so much more valuable than a 5th Hunter.
Towards the end of the game I was able to dissect his list faster than he could dissect mine. It was unbelievably close though and I believe that with more time for Legion, I probably would have lost. A very good game and a nail-biter towards the very end!
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