Monday 28 February 2011

Krueger the Stormwrath vs High Exemplar Kreoss

pKrueger vs pKreoss - 35 pts Outflank, Outfight, Outlast

Today's first game turned out to be against Menoth. I had decided on playing pKrueger and, just to be somewhat silly, I abandoned my favourite unit - the Druids of Orboros - and went with a small unit of Wold Riders instead. I do like them, but I haven't played them more than a couple of times and right now I like trying out my rarely played models. This is what my list looked like:

pKrueger
Druid Wilder
Feral Warpwolf
Woldwarden
Gnarlhorn Satyr
Wolf Riders
Shifting Stones
- Stone Keeper
Swamp Gobbers Bellows Crew

Krueger might not be the strongest option against the Protectorate, but this time I was quite pleased to see my opponent line up his troop heavy list. Of course, with Defender's Ward, Shield Wall, the Flameguards mini-feat and the Zealots' Monolith Bearer, all those POW 10's might not be enough to clear the board from enemy troops. My opponent's list looked like this:

pKreoss
Reckoner
Repenter
Revenger
Choir of Menoth
Holy Zealots (full unit)
- Monolith Bearer
Temple Flameguards
- Temple Flameguard Officer and Standard Bearer
Covenant of Menoth

We decided to play a scenario and my opponent suggested Outflank, Outfight, Outlast (even though we couldn't remember what it was called). We rolled for set up and I won, so I decided to go first.

A wall of Menites ready to rumble.  I really like this guy's black and white colour scheme.

On my first turn I just moved everything forward. The Wolf Riders got Lightning Tendrils and  moved up far on the flank. The idea was to be able to charge their prey - the Revenger - and have lightning arc to the Choir behind him.

The rest of my army rushed forward to be able to get to the control zones. They were hardly going to be close enough to get shot at, but I tried to gain as much concealment as posssible.

The Flameguard decided to make life miserable for the Wolf Riders. They didn't make it all the way, but with Reach on their spears they were able to mess with the Riders' charge lanes. On the other flank, his Zealots rushed forward to be able to get the second control zone.

In my second turn Krueger forced the Woldwarden, who got Bounding from the Wilder, to trample into the second control zone and cast Chain Lightning into the crowd of Zealots. I boosted to hit and when I rolled for additional hits I got a 6. Six Zealots were deep fried, but the Monolith Bearer survived with 2 boxes left.

Two of the Wolf Riders charged into the Flameguards but the dice fail me and in spite of multiple attacks and Lightning Tendrils I only killed a few of them. The third Rider charged the Repenter and killed a choir member with bouncing lightning. Then I activated Krueger who advanced, zapped a couple of Flameguards with his feat and cast Deflection.
Krueger's feat templates were used to block LOS and discourage his 'jacks from advancing in Krueger's direction. This is where I made my first mistake. I let one of the templates touch a small part of the Reckoner's base just to try to damage it a little. I boosted the damage roll and got 1 or to 2 points of damage through. In doing so I gave the Reckoner LOS through the cloud, which of course was a huge mistake.

My Gnarlhorn ran all the way up to the forest in front of Krueger. With it's Counter Slam and solid threat range I hoped to keep the Reckoner in a distance. That would have been an OK plan if it wasn't for the fact that the Reckoner could actually charge the Satyr. The Gobbers made a cloud of smoke in front of Krueger to prevent shooting.

The Feral and the Druid Wilder advanced cautiously behind the Woldwarden to stay out of range of the grenade throwing fanatics. The Shifting Stones and the Stone Keeper shifted into place behind some cover and took out another Zealot.
The Zealots moved up and threw their fire crackers at the Woldwarden, almost taking out his Spirit branch.
The Reckoner charged the Satyr and managed to get into melee range. He was less than half an inch from failing his charge, but was able to kill the Satyr with a few decent damage rolls. The Reckoner took the first scenario point of the game. A very frustrating mistake, since I not only lost a heavy beast, but a very useful animus.

The Flameguards combined their melee attaks and killed two of the Wolf Riders. Kreoss charged and killed the third one. That meant losing 14 pts worth of models in one round. Would this be too much for Krueger and his remaining army?
The Woldwarden took out the remaing Zealots, earning my first scenario point. The Swamp Gobbers had to move up into the control zone to contest the zone and prevent the Reckoner to get LOS to anything valuable. The Feral ran up towards my left flank to be able to get a charge lane to the Reckoner. Krueger cast Deflection again and saved some Fury.

The Revenger charged the Woldwarden but failed to do much damage, but prevented the Woldwarden from scoring another point at the end of his turn.

Kreoss, the Hierophant and the Repenter moved up behind the forest, not far behind the Flameguards. My opponent probably decided on putting some pressure on Krueger, but this actually gave me some time before Kreoss would get close enough to use his Feat.

The Reckoner moved a short distance into the woods and managed to shoot Krueger, who transfered the damage to the Woldwarden.

Payback time. The Feral warped for strength, charged the Reckoner and had no problem wrecking it. That meant I was going to score another point at the end of my turn. All I had to do now was to bash the Revenger to bits and nothing would be able to prevent me from scoring a third point with the Woldwarden.
Time for mistake number two. I activated the Woldwarden and got ready for . The first fist missed, but the second hit, doing some damage. Then my opponent was happy to inform me that the Woldwarden would be pushed back 1" by the Revenger's shield. It was not the first time I forgot that annoying ability, but I do hope it was the last. The Woldwarden cast Lightning Tendrils on itself and continued the hitting, but failed to destroy it.

Krueger cast Skyborne and Deflection, moved away from the Flameguard unit and saved three Fury for transfers. The Swamp Gobbers moved up between Krueger and the Flameguard unit to prevent LOS with another cloud. I was pretty confident the Flameguards wouldn't be able to get to him and Kreoss was behind a forest. The Revenger was far away from Krueger and tied up in melee with the Woldwarden. It seemed like I'd score my third point in the end of my opponents turn.

The Revenger tried to walk away from the Woldwarden and survived the freestrike with the arc node intact. Kreoss advanced into the forest between him and Krueger, activated his feat and started arcing bolts of magical fire through the Revengers arc node.

If Krueger survived I would win on scenario points. I let Krueger take some damage and transfered the biggest hit. I had one Fury left in case one of the Flameguards would actually get close enough to hit Krueger. The advanced into the smokescreen, killed the poor Gobbers and tried to get to Krueger. We measured the melee distance and I realised one of them could actually hit Krueger. The damage roll was pretty low so I let Krueger take the damage himself. With one Fury left on Krueger, my opponent realised he had ran out of ways to kill him and I won the game after getting scenario points from both the Feral Warpwolf and the Woldwarden.

A very close and exciting game!

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