Epic Hexeris (Lord Arbiter Hexeris) is more recent, having come on the scene in HORDES: Domination. Skorne players were almost universally pleased with the epic version of Sexy Hexy. Solid spell list (including such favorites as Black Spot and Ashen Veil) along with a feat that works extremely well against other Hordes opponents, eHexy can take a lot of options and make them work.
We'll be running this report using the extremely useful VASSAL program. You can click any picture to make it larger.
Major Victoria Haley
The List
Major Victoria Haley (eHaley) (50+5)
Squire
Thorn
Captain Arlan Strangewayes
Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages
Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer
Defender
Stormblade Infantry
Stormblade Officer and Standard
Stormclad
Lady Aiyana and Master Holt
There are some really neat tricks you can pull off in a list like this. eHaley's Temporal Acceleration gives a single friendly Faction model +2" of movement and one additional melee or ranged attack. Toss that on the Stormclad and give it a little extra kick from Telekinesis and you have a threat range of 14" (SPD 5 + 2" TA + 2" TK +3" charge + 2" reach). It should get one point of free Focus from being close to a Stormblade at the start of it's activation and potentially one more Focus if Arlan goes before the Stormclad. The charge will be "free" because of the 'jack marshal and you'll get up to two initial attacks and the TA attack (with enough focus to buy more depending on the situation).
As a side-note, one thing that museonminis suggests is 'jack marshaling the Stormclad to Sword Knights instead of Stormblades. Keep the Stormblades around to give out the free focus, but use the "Drive: Pronto" ability of the Sword Knights Officer to give it an extra full advance before you charge in. If you do that, your threat range goes up to 19"! If you hit the enemy model with Telekinesis as well, you are talking 21" threat.
The 'jack marshaled Defender has a potential 25" shot if you use Snipe as the Rune Shot. If he aims, that's still 20" (at a RAT of 8). The 'jack marshal can boost either the attack or damage roll and you can always try to use Arlan here for the free Focus instead of on the Stormclad.
Thorn is obviously going to be Haley's bonded 'jack. Her bond says one non-character warjack (she gets around the character restriction because Thorn has an affinity with her) that begins it's activation in her enormous control area gets +2" movement that activation. With that plus Thorn's Reaction Drive (arc a spell through him and he gets to advance 3") and Telekinesis, you are really playing some movement games. Plus he can have 4 focus since he's got her epic bond.
Once the range is shorter, the Defender just takes shots at targets as they arise, probably using Critical Brutal Damage instead of Snipe. Arlan moves over to help the Stormclad as he gets set up for a potential turn two charge on something valuable.
The Black 13th operate independently, looking for important solos and support staff. Lady Aiyana and Master Holt are there to hand out Magical Weapon if it's needed and +2 damage if it's not.
Haley waits on her feat until the best possible moment. If Stormclad goes up against something without reach and she pops it, Stormclad's target won't be able to fight back. It should also keep the Gun Mages and Defender safe for another round, although once the Gun Mages are locked in combat they're usually in trouble.
This is a very simple map I quickly created in VASSAL. It's not completely symmetrical which means there's some strategy involved in choosing sides. Each side gets a patch of trees near it's deployment zone and there's a LOS blocking barn on the left.
Because this is the inaugural Battle Report on COGS, this is just going to be a very simple "kill the caster" scenario. The 2013 Killbox rules will be used, although since there's no VP, if you're completely within 14" of the board edge, you just lose. This will not be our normal format going forward.
eHexy wins the roll-off for Turn One and decides to go first.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Deployment
eHexy chooses the bottom edge of the map. He wants his Reivers on that hill early and that was pretty much the only real deciding factor.
The Siege Animantarax goes right in the middle of his deployment zone, setting up first because of the rule for huge pieces. Only the Bloodrunners have Advanced Deployment so everything else gets set down now as well. The big beasts crowd around the forest, protecting eHexy (and the Gladiator's Rush should take care of any problems from the trees while moving), while the Venators go near the hill. The Krea goes on the opposite side of the Animantarax.
Major Victoria Haley Deployment
The first thing to consider here is the Defender and where to put it's 25" first turn shot. That's going to determine where everything else goes. My first thought was that putting the shot on the Animantarax is pointless since it's just as effective at 1 health as it is at full. But then again, any damage I do to a warbeast can just be healed up. I decided to hedge my bets and place it opposite both the Animantarax and the Bronzeback.
This means Arlan goes just beside him so he can bounce between the Defender and the Stormclad. eHaley sets up to the far left of her side (directions are specified according to the map view) in order to stay away from the big three. LA&MH set up on the far right in order to flank down that side and pressure eHexy at some point. The Black 13th start near them to provide additional support. Even with Brutal Damage, however, they don't have great odds at hurting one of the Titans.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Advanced Deployment
Decisions, decisions. The Bloodrunners would most likely get wiped out by the combination of the B13 and LA&MH before they got up into range of anything. They're going to be better suited on the left flank. The Reivers will be on a hill so they won't interfere with ranged shooting, and they'll be able to pressure eHaley.
With that done, here's the board layout:
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Turn One
Easy stuff first. The Bloodrunners run 12", angling towards that barn. No reason to let the Gun Mages get too many easy shots this early and their officer lets them ignore Stealth. The Venator Reivers also run to get up on the hill.
So then I start to plan how I want to use eHey's 7 Fury. Ashen Veil is the one upkeep I want to put out there, but I don't know who to put it on. I finally decide on the Bronzeback. It will take him up to an effective DEF of 14 for everything that doesn't ignore concealment. eHaley definitely can throw out Magical Attacks, so Arcane Reckoning is going on himself. That's going to be 5 of his 7 Fury for this turn and he'll jump camp the rest.
The Gladiator uses his Rush animus (because of the forest) on himself and then charges the Stormclad, obviously failing his charge. That's three Fury already on the board and the Gladiator is 9" up the board. Tiberion and the Bronzeback both run.
The Siege Animantarax also runs, as does the Krea, although he doesn't go his full 12". This leaves eHexeris and the Beast Handlers. The Beast Handlers go first and move up 6", removing one point of Fury from the Gladiator with Beast Manipulation (Condition). Hexeris is up last and moves up 6". As was the plan, he gives Ashen Veil to the Bronzeback and Arcane Reckoning to himself. The turn is over.
Major Victory Haley Turn One
Haley probably doesn't need to do too much directly this turn. She obviously doesn't like those Bloodrunners but since they have stealth, there's not much she can do about it directly. She could put Deadeye on the Gun Mages and hope to get a shot or two off on the one exposed Bloodrunner, or she could put it on the Defender instead.
She allocates zero Focus to Thorn. He's not going to need it this turn.
The Gun Mages activate first. They honest don't really care that much about getting shots off this turn. It's more important that they stay out of range of the Bloodrunners. The distance is slightly misjudged and they are indeed out of range this time.
Thorn goes next. He walks across the field behind the Gun Mages. Because of the bond, he's got a move of 8" but hardly needs it. Haley activates just after Thorn. This turn is going to be all about helping that Defender. She also parks herself behind the Gun Mages. She first casts Deadeye on the Defender. She then casts Temporal Acceleration on the Defender as well. Neither is an upkeep so she's fine stacking them. With the last of her 8 Focus, she casts Deceleration. While in her control area, friendly models get +2 DEF and ARM against ranged attacks. The Siege Animantarax and Reivers have just been nerfed.
The Squire moves on over closer to eHaley. Its ability to hand out Focus wasn't needed this turn but it'll be using it from now on.
We might as well do the Defender combo next. He's loaded for bear and let's see if it proves to be worth anything. Even with Snipe granting him 20" of range, we know that won't be enough. Arlan Strangewayes goes first and moves up. He then performed Power Booster as a Special Action. The Defender gains 1 focus point. The Defender then moves up. It chooses to use Rune Shot: Snipe. The Defender's Heavy Barrel now has a range of 20".
Because of Ashen Veil on the Bronzeback, it looks like the Siege Animantarax is the better target. The range is just over 16 inches. The RAT of the Defender is 6 and he'll get an extra die on his first ranged attack because of Deadeye. The first shot hits. POW of Heavy Barrel is 15, and we'll boost damage using the 'jack marshal ability. Animantarax is ARM 19. A terrible roll of 5 (on three dice) means it only takes 1 point. It also gains a rage token because of Cantankerous. The second shot doesn't get the additional die but hits anyway. The point of Focus is spent to boost damage again. 9 damage gets in and an another rage token is generated.
The Siege Animantarax chooses to use Hyper Aggressive and advantage 5" further up the field after the second attack.
Lady Aiyana and Master Holt choose to run this turn. There's no real danger of them getting hit by ranged attacks this turn so there's no need to take it slow and use Stealth. The Black 13 do the same, trusting that even if the Siege Animantarax did get into range, their own natural DEF plus that from Deceleration will keep them same.
The Stormclad gets a point of focus from starting it's activation near the Stormblades but it won't matter this turn. He uses either the focus or the 'jack marshal's ability to run (making sure he will be able to be within 5" of Arlan for a boost next turn). The Stormblades follow behind.
Turn one ends.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Turn Two
Hexeris takes back all 5 Fury on the board, filling himself up. If you look close at the last picture, it still shows him at 7 but just ignore that. He was at 2. He'll use 2 to upkeep both spells.
Measuring control, eHexy finds that his big beasts probably won't be in range to charge anything this turn. He needs to get things set up so that he can take a charge and survive as much as possible. It would be nice to arc a Black Spot into the Stormblades so the Siege Animantarax could do some damage, but there's little chance the Krea could get close enough. There's also the fact that the Reivers are probably going to absolutely nothing this turn.
The Bloodrunners run 12" towards the Gun Mages. They have no chance to get there this turn, but they apply some pressure to the Gun Mages and even Haley. Right behind them, the Reivers move up again. They want to get within 16" so they can use the mini-feat next turn to shoot at 16". Because of Granted: Reform, the Reivers actually have a move of 9" (6" before, 3" after) so they don't need to run or charge to get in that magic range band.
The Siege Animantarax could try to sit and shoot, or he could charge into the fray. SPD of 5 isn't great but with reach weapons he should get into range of the Stormclad. Of course he'll only get the Club Tail attack (and two spear attacks) versus ARM 19. The choice is made. The Siege Animantarax charges the Stormclad.
There's no reason not to boost the to-hit roll with one of the rage tokens. MAT7 + 3d6 results in an easy hit. The attack will be at P+S 18 because you gain +1 STR for each rage token present when the attack was declared (thus before being spent for the boost). It's going to be dice-1 and the result is 11 damage to column 4, taking out the cortex. Both spear attacks hit as well. The P+S will be 11 as there is still one rage token left and they do benefit from Cantankerous. Both are dice-8 and bounce off.
The Siege Animantarax has the Weapon Platform rule allowing it to make both melee and ranged attacks in the same activation. It can now fire the Double Reiver at the same target or different ones. Technically, the Rapid Fire shots were supposed to be rolled at the beginning of this model's combat action. A 1 is rolled so the Animantarax gets 2 shots. It fires the first at the Stormclad needing a 9 to hit (because of Deceleration). It misses and takes the second shot at the same target. The second attack hits and will be POW 15 against an ARM of 21 due to Deceleration. 3 damages get through to column 2.
The Basilisk Krea activates and runs up behind the Animantarax. The Bronzeback runs, placing himself in a spot where Counter Charge may come into play against Stormblades. The Gladiator uses Rush on Tiberion and then fails a charge against Holt.
Tiberion uses the benefits from Rush and runs and gets just ahead of both the Gladiator and the Bronzeback, allowing space for the Bronzeback to potentially get off a Counter Charge.
The Beast Handlers are too far away to use their abilities to take away Fury so they run up to be better positioned next time (or act as distractions during the enemy turn). This means that eHexy is going to have 6 Fury sitting on the board. He also wants to get within 8" of the Krea to use the arc ability. He moves up just enough to be with CMD range of the Krae and also (more importantly) be outside the killbox. He uses 2 of his remaining 5 Fury to arc Bump onto Tiberion, overwriting Rush. He uses two more to move Ashen Veil over to the Siege Animantarax. It probably won't help (since it's DEF10 naturally), but maybe it will make Haley think a bit harder about dealing with the battle engine.
With that he's down to 1 Fury remaining and ends his turn.
Major Victory Haley Turn Two
This is the turn where we're going to see the power of eHaley's feat. No doubt about it. She is going to have to move up or else she'll lose on killbox, but she has a ton of options this turn and enough Focus to use them.
She'll deal with the Bloodrunner using Gun Mages plus Deadeye. The Reivers will retaliate, but there's little that she can do about that (outside of a well-placed Time Bomb, but that's a lot of Focus). Temporal Acceleration and two shots from the Defender (with Crit Brutal) should put a hurting on the battle engine, possibly even freeing the Stormclad to hunt a different target. If the battle engine is out of the way, the Stormblades will be freed up to fire off Storm Glaive blasts from 4" away, without fear of reprisal due to the feat. Lady Aiyana can increase the damage against one of the titans and the B13 + Master Holt might be able to do some damage to either the support staff or a titan.
So that's the plan (and it falls apart quickly). In the Control Phase, the Squire gives Haley an extra Focus, bringing her to 9. That's exactly enough for Deadeye, Temporal Acceleration, and Time Bomb, although that would mean the Gun Mages have to make a path for Thorn. She allocates no Focus this turn.
At this point, we find that eHaley is screwed in regards to activations. She needs to go first in order to get Temporal Acceleration on the Defender, but she also wants Thorn out there to arc Time Bomb through. Thorn can't move until the Gun Mages go, but the Gun Mages also want to wait for Deadeye. At the same time, Haley has to move forward or she'll lose via killbox. Haley also needs to be where the Defender is to make sure she catches all the titans with her feat. A relatively simple plan just got tricky.
The only way this works now is if the Gun Mages go without Deadeye. At least some models will be able to forfeit their move in order to get the aiming bonus. The three models in green forfeit their movements while the rest have to scramble to make room for Thorn.
Note that the Squire doesn't still have three accumulators left. Pretend that picture shows a two.
When aiming, the Gun Mages will have a RAT of 9 (RAT 7 without, obviously), and the Gun Mage Officer has an 8. The Bloodrunners have a DEF of 14 and Stealth won't mean a thing thanks to Tactics: True Sight from the Officer. When the sound of gunfire recedes, the entire unit of Bloodrunners is wiped from the field. Out of 7 shots, only one missed.
Thorn will activate next. Normally a SPD 6, the 'jack bond makes him a SPD 8" walking. He moves directly towards the Reiver pack and hopes that he'll be close enough for Time Bomb.
The initial idea was for Haley to move up around the Defender in order to get the most enemy models possible caught in her feat. She has to be far enough up because of killbox as well. Because she didn't cast Deadeye on the Gun Mages, she can use the "extra" two Focus to TK the Defender.
She starts her turn by casting Temporal Acceleration on the Defender. She then casts Telekinesis on the Defender, moving it two inches further (giving her the space she needs to move). Before she moves, however, she casts Time Bomb on the Reivers using Thorn as her arc node.
The Reivers have DEF 13 and she's got a FOC of 8. She is just barely in range of the center-front Reiver. She rolls a 9 so it's a hit. If she would have missed, the Squire was close enough to allow a reroll.
Time Bomb is a COST 4, RNG 10, AOE 4", POW 14 offensive spell. It has the side effect that a model hit (so anything touched by the template) suffers -2 SPD and DEF for one round. The side effect in this case doesn't matter, but it can be huge in other situations. Here, Haley is just trying to reduce the Reiver's numbers.
The ARM of a Reiver is 13. The model directly hit takes the POW 14 and it killed. The others take POW 7s. She kills a total of 4, including the Standard Bearer, but doesn't wound the Officer. 50% casualties causes a command check which they pass.
She then uses her movement to slide into the gap left by the Defender TKing forward and pops her feet (which catches everything except Hexeris), barely getting a toe out of the killbox. She's at 0 Focus left. The Squire runs after her.
Arlan Strangewayes activates next. He stays where he is and gives a point of Focus to the Defender with Power Booster.
The Defender is up. It remains stationary and aims. There's no firing into melee penalty when shooting at a battle engine, and it chooses Critical Brutal Damage as its Rune Shot. It will get two shots again thanks to Temporal Acceleration. With a RAT of 8 when aiming, anything but double 1s will hit.
The first shot is a hit with no crit. The Defender uses a point of Focus to boost damage. The SA takes 8 from the first shot. The second shot is also a hit with no crit. The damage is boosted with the 'jack marshal ability. The Siege Animantarax has 4 boxes remaining and the damage is dice-4, so an 8 on 3 dice is needed to finish him off. The Defender rolls a 9 and the Siege Animantarax is gone.
Epic Haley's feat states:
During your opponent's next Activation Phase, enemy models/units activating while in Haley's control area forfeit either their movement or their action during their activations, as their controller chooses. Affected models/units activate at the start of their controller's next Activation Phase in the order you choose. Temporal Shift lasts for one round.
Essentially, the enemy gets to move or attack and they do it in the order Haley chooses. The reason I bring it up here is because it dictates how the rest of this turn is going to go. Tiberion is the only enemy warbeast with Reach. The Stormclad can charge, get within 2" but outside of 0.5", and be safe from reprisal. The Stormblades don't have reach but they do have range 4" attacks. This round is going to be about doing damage while not taking any next turn.
It would be hard for the Stormclad to charge the Bronzeback without clipping Tiberion's reach. It's also extremely important to remember the Bronzeback has Counter Charge if the Stormclad instead went after the Krea. A Counter Charge puts the Bronzeback up in our face and that's the opposite of what Haley is trying to accomplish.
The answer to this problem is simple: activate the Stormblades first and move one into the gap between the Bronzeback and the Krea, preventing the Counter Charge from reaching the Stormclad once it moves. The Stormblades move...
And the Bronzeback, knowing that the gap will be too small to reach the Stormclad with his little stubby arms, Counter Charges into the Stormblade..
The Bronzeback, with MAT 7, hits the Stormblade by rolling a 7. There's no need to roll damage.
Three Stormblades (one of them the unit Officer) on the hill will be shooting at Tiberion. The Standard Bearer can actually shoot as well, because he is within 5" of the Leader (the one with the halberd on the left) and thus gains +2 RNG to his ranged attack. One Stormblade and the Leader have shots on the Krea.
One thing that almost caused serious problems here is the Standard Bearer's ability:
Storm's Eye - While this model is in formation, when a model in its unit directly hits a model with a ranged attack the ranged weapon used in the attack becomes AOE 3.
If the Bronzeback was just slightly closer, it would have been possible (although extremely unlikely) that he could have taken splash damage from one of the AOEs on the Krea and been damaged, letting him move via Hyper Aggressive. It was a very remote possibility but in the end it did not matter because the Bronzeback was more than the 3" AOE effect away.
On the left, with a RAT of 5 versus the Krea's DEF of 12, only one of the two shots hits. The POW is usually a 12 but it's increased by 2 because of the proximity to the unit Leader. Just because the unit has an Officer, that Officer is not the "Leader". He is the unit commander, but there is still a Leader in the unit as well.
POW 14 versus the Krea's ARM of 16 results in 7 points getting in. The four shots at Tiberion all hit, but only manage to do 1 point of damage. ARM 21 is a tough nut to crack and only two of the four were within the 5" required to get the +2 POW.
The Stormclad goes next. It does NOT gets a free point of Focus from being within 3" of a Stormblade. Because it has lost it's Cortex and the wording it that is is "allocated" 1 Focus, it does not gain it. Even if it could get the Focus, a crippled cortex prevents you from spending it. It will charge the Krea using the 'jack marshal ability. It is a close thing, but he manages to charge the Krea without hitting the 0.5" reach of the Bronzeback.
Note: Ignore the 1 on the Stormclad. I didn't catch the allocation thing until after I made the move.
Without the ability to spend a point of Focus to buy another attack, it becomes very unlikely that the Stormclad is going to do enough damage to the Krea.
A roll of a 4 means the Stormclad misses the Krea! That lack of a point of Focus is looking pretty important right now.
Lady Aiyana and Master Holt are up next. There is absolutely no reason for them to move. Lady Aiyana targets the Gladiator with Kiss of Lyliss. She rolls a 3 and it misses! Haley's side really could have used that +2 to damage rolls against that Gladiator this turn.
Master Holt fires both his hand cannons, needing anything but double 1s to hit thanks to aiming. Both hit but without that +2 damage, they are dice-7 for damage and the Gladiator only takes 3.
The Black 13th also could have really benefited from Kiss of Lyliss hitting. They'll stand still, aim, and use Brutal Damage on their guns.
As you can see from the grid, the damage wasn't spectacular. The rolls ended up such that 8 damage was lost because of the Kiss missing (the lowest rolled on the 3d6s was a 9).
And that is going to end Turn 2.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Turn Three
To be honest, that turn really couldn't have gone better. The Siege Animantarax was dead no matter what. It would have been nice to make Haley spend more resources on killing it, but it did a good job for a 9-point model. Being under the effects of her feat is going to make it really hard this turn to do anything productive.
After re-filling to 7 Fury, Hexeris drops Arcane Reckoning. At this point, eHaley gets to control the order of activations because of her feat. Because eHexy was outside of her feat area, he has to go last.
Haley chooses the Beast Handlers first. There's no reason to let them go later in the turn and use their Fury manipulation shenanigans. Hexy decides they're going to best be used to threaten the gunslingers in the east and jam the middle to prevent more Stormblades from getting up on the warbeasts next turn. They can't run because of the feat so they walk into position.
Haley lets the Bronzeback, Tiberion, and the Gladiator go next, in that order. It gets a little complicated for Skorne this turn. On his activation, Hexeris is going to pop his feat and try to use spells to reduce enemy numbers. He'll spend 7, pop his feat, and then re-fill to 7 using Fury on his own beasts (since there's no other targets to take things from). He'll want to save at least 1 for transfers, which means he'll need to spot 6 at the start of the next turn to fill up again. Overall, the math says he needs to be able to see 13 Fury on the board between all his beasts.
The Bronzeback walks and riles for 4. Tiberion walks, uses Bump on himself for 2, and Bump on the Gladiator for 2 more. The Gladiator walks and riles for 3.
EDIT: Tacticus from the PP forums pointed out that a mistake was made here. A warbeast can only use it's animus ONCE per turn.
Haley lets the Basilisk Krea go next. eHexeris's warbeast bond allows him to channel spells through the Krea like it was an arc node. However, you can't channel spells if you're engaged in melee, which the Krea is thanks to the Stormclad. The Krea has 14 boxes left, has ARM 16, and the Stormclad's Generator Blade will be P+S 19 and boosted if he hits. With a MAT of 7 plus 2 for a free strike bonus, it's almost assured he will hit.
Hexeris decides to take the risk. He walks the Krea out of melee. MAT 9 versus ARM 12 is a hit. The Electro Leap rule for the Generator Blade means the Bronzeback will take a hit as well. The Blade versus the Krea is dice+3 with 3 dice. They come up a 4, 5, and 6 and the Krea is dead. The POW 10 lightning that strikes the Bronzeback actually does a point of damage (on double 5s). Hyper Aggressive could kick off, but the Bronzeback is already base-to-base.
The only things left to go (other than eHexy) are the Venators. They'll forfeit their movement and use the mini-feat to gain +4" to their range. The Gun Mages have DEF 15 and the Reivers have a base RAT of 5. Even aiming that means they would need 8s. They instead decide to combined ranged on Thorn.
Thorn is just within 12" from the Officer (so the mini-feat wasn't necessary, but it would have been a wasted turn if it had been a millimeter further back). With the combined ranged, the effective RAT is 10. The attack easily hits. POW goes up to 14 which ends up being dice-4. A bad roll results in only 1 point of damage.
Hexeris is the only one remaining. Losing the arc node obviously hurts but it was a risk that had to be taken. He's still 2 big offensive spells at his disposal (Ashes to Ashes and Hellfire) and the Fury to use them. Ashes to Ashes is only range 8, which is troublesome. It looks like it's time to help clear some infantry away from the titans. He moves such that he can see a Stormblade through the gap between the Bronzeback and the Beast Handler.
Spending 4 Fury, Hexeris casts Ashes to Ashes on the Stormblade. He's not in melee, although the Beast Handler is very close, so he only needs a 5. He gets a 5 exactly. Ashes to Ashes also hits d6 nearest enemy models and, in this case, a 2 is rolled so the Stormclad and Stormblade Leader are also hit.
Against the original target, POW 10 + 2d6 ends up bouncing off when a 4 is rolled on the damage dice. Against the leader, an 11 is rolled and one Stormblade is done. Leadership falls to another one of the squad members. He boosts the damage against the Stormclad and it proves to be a wise decision as the dice come up 6, 6, and 3. 6 damage gets in and the Stormclad has lost his left arm.
Hexeris then does something he should have done before the Ashes to Ashes. He tries a Black Spot against the Stormblades, since he didn't kill his original target. He rolls a 4 and misses. Out of Fury, he uses his feat to re-fill.
Full on Fury again, Hexeris tries another Ashes to Ashes on the Stormblade. He hits but only gets 1 additional target from his d6 roll. This shows the frustrating problem that Ashes to Ashes can cause. The Stormblade dies with a good damage roll and the damage against the Stormclad is boosted again. An average dice roll means that only 2 damage points get in.
With only 2 more Fury left, Hexeris could be in some trouble. He keeps the 2 Fury for transfers. Overall, a very disappointing feat turn with Ashes to Ashes being a huge letdown and Black Spot failing to land.
Major Victory Haley Turn Three
This game could easily be over this turn... if it wasn't for the 2 potential transfers. Haley takes the extra point of Focus from the Squire and is sitting at 9. She allocates 0 to Thorn.
Thorn will go first and move up 8 inches (SPD 6 plus the bond effect). He ends up in melee with the Beast Handler.
Note: Again, there's yet another problem with a picture. Haley has 9 Focus, not 5. I really need to be more careful with these screenshots.
It's MAT 7 versus DEF 13. The spear misses but the shield attack hits. With P+S 9 up against a ARM 11, the Beast Handler is splatted.
Haley will go next. With her 9 Focus, she first casts Deadeye on the Gun Mages. She then arcs Telekinesis through Thorn into the Bronzeback. Even with the casting into melee penalty, it hits. This was risky because the Bronzeback was up to DEF 16 because of being engaged, but Haley has plans for every point of her Focus pool. The Bronzeback is placed away from the Stormclad facing the eastern board edge. This will prevent Counter Charge from going off if the Stormclad is forced to charge in.
Haley then tries to arc a Telekinesis into Hexeris. He is a DEF 15 against her FOC of 8. She'll need a 7. She rolls a 5 the first time. She uses the Squire to reroll, but the dice come up double 1s. Her initial plan was to Temporal Acceleration the Defender, but getting Hexeris spun around is more important. She attempts Telekinesis again, this time spending a point to boost her to-hit, and misses again! She rolled 1, 2, 3.
Thorn reacts with his Reaction Drive to advance 3", better clearing the lane between the Gun Mages and eHexeris.
Arlan Strangewayes is too far away from the Stormclad to repair it, so he settles for moving and giving a free point of Focus to the Defender again.
The Defender goes next. It will only get one shot this time because there's no TA on it. He'll sit and aim, use the point of Focus to boost his to hit, and use the 'jack marshal ability to boost damage if he hits. With a base RAT of 6, the Defender is an 8 when aiming. The dice are not kind to Cygnar though, and another 1, 2, 3 combo results in a miss.
The Gun Blades, affected by Deadeye, go next. They move to where the front five can use Critical Brutal Damage while the furthest 2 away use Snipe.
Note: Another picture problem. Time Bomb went away and it no longer in effect.
The rolls will be RAT 7 (RAT 8 for the Officer) against DEF 15. The Gun Mages will be rolling 3 dice and criticals will result in an extra die on damage. The first Gun Mage misses. The second hits with a crit. The damage is POW 10 versus ARM 16. It's dice-6 and the dice come up 13. Hexeris doesn't transfer. The next shot hits but does not crit. It does 4 more damage.
The Officer fires next and hits with a crit. Hexeris takes 2 more. One last Gun Mage gets to use Critical Brutal Damage. He hits, but it's not a crit and the damage is ignored. The last two Gun Mages have to use Snipe and both hit, but only for 2 more damage. Hexeris is surviving with 4 health left and two transfers.
The Black 13th go next. They remain where they are and blast away. Ryan fires her two guns and easily kills both of the Beast Handlers. The remaining member of the unit passes his check.
Lynch chooses Brutal Damage instead of Black Penny and fires at the Titan Gladiator. He hits by rolling exactly what he needed and he'll be POW 10 + 3d6 versus an ARM of 19. The dice come up triple 6s and 9 damage gets in on the Gladiator. He loses his Body aspect. Watts tries the same shot but only managed to do 2 more damage.
Lady Aiyanna and Master Holt are next to activate. They move up the flank, avoiding the Gladiator but trying to get close enough for shots on Hexeris.
Kiss of Lyliss is barely in range. Magic Ability 8 versus a DEF of 15 means she'll need a 7 on 2d6 to land it. She rolls double 1s.
Master Holt could obviously have used the damage buff assuming he hits. He's a RAT of 8 so he'll also need 7s on his dual hand cannons. He misses with the first but connects with the second. POW 12 + 2d6 is rolled against ARM 16 and Hexeris is forced to transfer 4 damage to the Bronzeback.
The Stormblades activate next and move up next to the wall of titans. They're all within 5" of the Leader so they'll all benefit from +2 to damage rolls. Because of that, they decide not to combine melee attack. The one on the far right hits the Gladiator and rolls outstanding, doing 7 damage. He's lost his Spirit now as well as his Body. Bump goes off and the Stormblade is shoved backwards 3".
The Standard Bearer on the far left (one of the few standards with a melee attack, it seems) easily hits and kills the last of the Beast Handlers.
One of the Stormblades decides to try to finish off the Gladiator. He hits and does 6 damage, more than enough. Two Stormblades are left against Tiberion. One hits but does no damage. The other misses with double 1s.
The very last thing Cygnar has is the Stormclad. It still can't get (or use) the free Focus because of it's cortex. It chooses to walk to within melee range of Hexeris. It uses the free boost from the 'jack marshal on it's to-hit roll and needs an 8. It hits! He chooses to Electro Leap the damage and the Bronzeback will be hit as well.
The hit on Hexeris P+S is 19 versus 16 ARM. It's dice+3. The dice come up with 5 total and Hexeris is forced to use his last transfer to shunt the damage over to Tiberion. The Electro Leap damage against the Bronzeback is not enough to harm him.
If only one of the three attempts at Telekineis (2 casts + reroll) would have hit this would have been game, but Hexeris is still hanging on.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Turn Four
It is nothing less than a miracle that Hexeris is still alive. If any one of those Telekinesis spell attempts would have hit, he would have been showing his backside to all that incoming fire and this game would be over. Not that it would have mattered, but in hindsight, Haley should have done the right flank move earlier in the turn and tried to get that Kiss on eHexy before all those other attacks took place.
Removing as much Fury as possible still only leaves Hexeris with 4. This is probably going to be the last turn no matter if he wins or loses, so Hexeris cuts himself for 3 to bring him up to his maximum of 7. He has one health remaining.
First things first. The Stormclad needs to die. Hexeris has a few tools to do it, but he chooses to activate the Reivers first. They choose to combine ranged against the Stormclad.
They have an effective RAT of 10 and a POW of 16, thanks to the Reiver's bonus against large model targets. The Stormclad is DEF 12 and only ARM 18 because he's lost the buckler on the left arm. The attack hits easily... but double 1s are rolled for damage! The VASSAL random number generator is really screwing up a lot of plans this game.
The Bronzeback will activate next. For 1 Fury, he puts his Train Wreck animus up on Tiberion:
Train Wreck - Target friendly warbeast's melee weapons gain Beat Back. Train Wreck lasts for one turn. (Immediately after a normal attack with a weapon with Beat Back is resolved during this model's combat action, the enemy model hit can be pushed 1" directly away from the attacking model. After the enemy model is pushed, the attacking model can advance up to 1".)
The Bronzeback is not within reach of the Stormclad. In fact, he's actually in the rear arc of the 'jack. He spends another point of Fury to put Beat Back on himself. He ignores the Stormclad and moves up between the Stormblades and the Gun Mages.
NOTE: Again, a warbeast uses his animus twice in the same turn. This is NOT legal.
He puts his first attack on the Stormblade Standard Bearer on his right. He needs a 5 to hit and rolls exactly that. P+S 17 means there's nothing left of the Stormblade after the attack is over. This also allows the Bronzeback to advance 1", even if the target is dead. He advances further over towards the Gun Mages.
The Bronzeback will boost his second attack (with the tusks) to hit the Gun Mage he is adjacent to. He needs an 8 on 3d6 and gets an 11, so there's one less Gun Mage on the field as well. He uses Beat Back again and moves to within striking distance of the backside of the Stormclad.
The Bronzeback then attacks with his remaining War Gauntlet. The War Gauntlet has 1 more POW than the tusks and that's why he saved it for the 'jack attack. Back Striking bonuses mean the Bronzeback is MAT 9. Back Strikes don't offer boosted damage or anything (unlike a Free Strike), but P+S of 17 and boosting damage should be enough to at least cripple the Stormclad. A total of 13 is rolled on the dice and the Stormclad's luck has run out.
The Bronzeback gets to move again via Beat Back but doesn't have enough movement to get to the other Gun Mages. Still, not a bad activation.
Tiberion goes next and declares a Trample, aiming directly towards the Defender. He runs over two of the Stormblades and Arlan. He will end up taking a Free Strike from the Stormblade on the right of the ones who were engaging him.
Tiberion misses the Stormblade Sergeant by rolling a 4. He only does a point of damage to the Officer, so he's still standing as well. He continues the poor rolling and misses Arlan as well! The important thing is that models contacted cannot make free strikes against the trampling model, so only the far Stormblade gets that shot.
The free strike hits and it will be P+S 15 (because the Leader is still alive) and automatically boosted. Tiberion will only be ARM 19 because you don't get shield bonuses against attacks that originate in your back arc (and free strikes say they do). The dice roll low yet again and come up 1, 2, 3. Tiberion only takes 2 damage.
Tiberion is forced to buy an attack with his Tetsubo, boosting the attack roll. A critical hit here would mean Critical Smite will go off, slamming the Defender into eHaley. Beat Back might allow Tiberion just enough movement to try to get some swings at her.
Critical Smite - On a critical hit, this model can slam the model hit instead of rolling damage normally. The model hit is slammed d6" directly away from this model and suffers a damage roll with POW equal to this model's STR plus the POW of this weapon. The POW of collateral damage is equal to this model's STR.
The dice are thrown and result in a 1, 6, 6. A crit! A 2 is rolled for the slam distance. He ends up on top of eHaley and the rule of least disturbance has to be used. Damage against the Defender will be a straight 2d6 dice roll (no need to boost) for 9 damage and knock down.
Haley is moved to the side and also knocked down. She takes a STR 12 + 2d6 damage roll that cannot be boosted. She is ARM 12 and ends up taking 7.
It is at this point that we run into a problem that required clarification from the forums. Tiberion has the rule:
Immovable Object - This model cannot be knocked down or placed. It can move or be moved only during its normal movement.
Beat Back movement does not take place during normal movement. Tiberion can NOT move closer! And because of how Haley had to move backwards (using the rule for least disturbance) he's definitely not in range to swing on her. This is extremely unfortunate. Out of frustration, the Bronzeback buys another attack, swings on the Gun Mage just to the left of him, boosts to hit, and misses.
Hexeris really only has one more chance here. He moves his full 6" and gets on top of the hill in order to be able to see over the top of Arlan.
Note: Ignore the orange circle on the right. That was the original location of Tiberion and I was using it to check for free strikes.
Since she's knocked down, Hexeris only needs to hit a DEF 5 (so avoid rolling double 1s) with whatever he chooses to cast. He's just in range of Hellfire, so that's going to be his spell of choice.
Hellfire costs 3 Fury and has a range of 10. It has a POW of 14 and is obviously an offensive spell. A model/unit hit by Hellfire must pass a command check or flee, but this doesn't mean anything to a warcaster (side note: this command check could be a really cool side effect when used on a unit affected by the Mortitheurge Willbreaker).
Lord Arbiter Hexeris fires off his first Hellfire. He rolls a 6 so he doesn't miss. As stated earlier, Haley is ARM 14 so this is straight damage. Hexeris boosts. A 2, 3, and 4 are rolled and she's only got 7 health left. This game is over!
I'm sure I made some mistakes in this game in terms of the rules too. I tried to take it slow and watch what I could, but it's hard playing on VASSAL, typing up a report, and looking up rules all at the same time. I probably should have started with a 35-point game instead of 50, but I like 50 point games.
Overall, I think eHexeris is very very good, the Siege Animantarax isn't great, and titans are titans. I wish I would have known about the Beat Back + Tiberion thing ahead of time, but it was better to catch it now than during a tournament.
I hope you enjoyed the first installment of Battle Report by COGS. Please feel free to comment.
Thorn
Captain Arlan Strangewayes
Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages
Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer
Defender
Stormblade Infantry
Stormblade Officer and Standard
Stormclad
Lady Aiyana and Master Holt
The Analysis
This is not your typical list (purposefully). I called it my "eHaley Gunslingers" list because I wanted to fit in as many gun mage style units and solo as I could. Haley herself is only running a single 'jack (Thorn) so she can utilize most of the rest of her focus on spell slinging. The Arcane Gun Mages 'jack marshal a Defender, so he can benefit from Rune Shot. The Stormblades marshal the Stormclad because of the obvious synergies there.There are some really neat tricks you can pull off in a list like this. eHaley's Temporal Acceleration gives a single friendly Faction model +2" of movement and one additional melee or ranged attack. Toss that on the Stormclad and give it a little extra kick from Telekinesis and you have a threat range of 14" (SPD 5 + 2" TA + 2" TK +3" charge + 2" reach). It should get one point of free Focus from being close to a Stormblade at the start of it's activation and potentially one more Focus if Arlan goes before the Stormclad. The charge will be "free" because of the 'jack marshal and you'll get up to two initial attacks and the TA attack (with enough focus to buy more depending on the situation).
As a side-note, one thing that museonminis suggests is 'jack marshaling the Stormclad to Sword Knights instead of Stormblades. Keep the Stormblades around to give out the free focus, but use the "Drive: Pronto" ability of the Sword Knights Officer to give it an extra full advance before you charge in. If you do that, your threat range goes up to 19"! If you hit the enemy model with Telekinesis as well, you are talking 21" threat.
The 'jack marshaled Defender has a potential 25" shot if you use Snipe as the Rune Shot. If he aims, that's still 20" (at a RAT of 8). The 'jack marshal can boost either the attack or damage roll and you can always try to use Arlan here for the free Focus instead of on the Stormclad.
Thorn is obviously going to be Haley's bonded 'jack. Her bond says one non-character warjack (she gets around the character restriction because Thorn has an affinity with her) that begins it's activation in her enormous control area gets +2" movement that activation. With that plus Thorn's Reaction Drive (arc a spell through him and he gets to advance 3") and Telekinesis, you are really playing some movement games. Plus he can have 4 focus since he's got her epic bond.
The Plan
The plan is simple to start but gets more and more complex as the game goes by. Haley gets to keep most of her Focus and utilize the 'jack marshals to move the big stuff around. The Defender's ability to fire 25" on turn one can come as quite a shock so we need to ensure that Arlan is close enough to give him the free Focus (by activating Arlan before the Defender, obviously).Once the range is shorter, the Defender just takes shots at targets as they arise, probably using Critical Brutal Damage instead of Snipe. Arlan moves over to help the Stormclad as he gets set up for a potential turn two charge on something valuable.
The Black 13th operate independently, looking for important solos and support staff. Lady Aiyana and Master Holt are there to hand out Magical Weapon if it's needed and +2 damage if it's not.
Haley waits on her feat until the best possible moment. If Stormclad goes up against something without reach and she pops it, Stormclad's target won't be able to fight back. It should also keep the Gun Mages and Defender safe for another round, although once the Gun Mages are locked in combat they're usually in trouble.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris
The List
Lord Arbiter Hexeris (50+6)
Basilisk Krea
Bronzeback Titan
Tiberion
Titan Gladiator
Siege Animantarax
Paingiver Beast Handlers (Leader + 3 Grunts)
Paingiver Bloodrunners
Venator Reivers
Venator Reiver Officer and Standard
The Siege Animantarax has sort of a bad reputation and some of it is deserved. The Double Reiver is a nice weapon with Rapid Fire and increased damage against medium and larger based models. The Spears are extremely wimpy and the Club Tail is nice, but you can't buy additional attacks with it. You can only boost the Club Tail melee attack or damage rolls and that's only if you've got rage tokens on you.
The Beast Handlers are there to try to manage Fury the best they can. The Bloodrunners are there for early game claiming/contesting objectives and being general nuisances. Venators are can damage and harass enemy units or bring the big hit with combined range.
The Bloodrunners will look for appropriate targets and either jam or pull Shadow Play tricks to get at back-line support staff.
Lastly, the Venator Reivers will park themselves some place nice and take shots at anything that comes close. If needed, they'll run to an objective or to intervene and help eHexy.
Bronzeback Titan
Tiberion
Titan Gladiator
Siege Animantarax
Paingiver Beast Handlers (Leader + 3 Grunts)
Paingiver Bloodrunners
Venator Reivers
Venator Reiver Officer and Standard
The Analysis
Three big titans form the core of this list. The Gladiators animus is too good to leave at home most of the time (+2" movement and Pathfinder). The Bronzeback and Tiberion put thing in the dirt quickly. The Krea is there for two reasons: Spiritual Paralysis and to act as eHexy's bonded warbeast. eHexy's bond allows him to channel spells through it while it is in his command range. Note: that's COMMAND not CONTROL. It makes a huge difference since eHexy has a CMD of 8.The Siege Animantarax has sort of a bad reputation and some of it is deserved. The Double Reiver is a nice weapon with Rapid Fire and increased damage against medium and larger based models. The Spears are extremely wimpy and the Club Tail is nice, but you can't buy additional attacks with it. You can only boost the Club Tail melee attack or damage rolls and that's only if you've got rage tokens on you.
The Beast Handlers are there to try to manage Fury the best they can. The Bloodrunners are there for early game claiming/contesting objectives and being general nuisances. Venators are can damage and harass enemy units or bring the big hit with combined range.
The Plan
A lot of what eHexy does is going to depend on his opponent. If the opponent can't handle fist-to-face, the trio is just going to stomp up the middle of the field and lay waste to anything they can. The Titan Gladiator will probably make up the second wave by himself after using his animus to help out the other two first.The Bloodrunners will look for appropriate targets and either jam or pull Shadow Play tricks to get at back-line support staff.
Lastly, the Venator Reivers will park themselves some place nice and take shots at anything that comes close. If needed, they'll run to an objective or to intervene and help eHexy.
The Map and Scenario
This is a very simple map I quickly created in VASSAL. It's not completely symmetrical which means there's some strategy involved in choosing sides. Each side gets a patch of trees near it's deployment zone and there's a LOS blocking barn on the left.
Because this is the inaugural Battle Report on COGS, this is just going to be a very simple "kill the caster" scenario. The 2013 Killbox rules will be used, although since there's no VP, if you're completely within 14" of the board edge, you just lose. This will not be our normal format going forward.
eHexy wins the roll-off for Turn One and decides to go first.
Deployment
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Deployment
eHexy chooses the bottom edge of the map. He wants his Reivers on that hill early and that was pretty much the only real deciding factor.
The Siege Animantarax goes right in the middle of his deployment zone, setting up first because of the rule for huge pieces. Only the Bloodrunners have Advanced Deployment so everything else gets set down now as well. The big beasts crowd around the forest, protecting eHexy (and the Gladiator's Rush should take care of any problems from the trees while moving), while the Venators go near the hill. The Krea goes on the opposite side of the Animantarax.
Major Victoria Haley Deployment
The first thing to consider here is the Defender and where to put it's 25" first turn shot. That's going to determine where everything else goes. My first thought was that putting the shot on the Animantarax is pointless since it's just as effective at 1 health as it is at full. But then again, any damage I do to a warbeast can just be healed up. I decided to hedge my bets and place it opposite both the Animantarax and the Bronzeback.
This means Arlan goes just beside him so he can bounce between the Defender and the Stormclad. eHaley sets up to the far left of her side (directions are specified according to the map view) in order to stay away from the big three. LA&MH set up on the far right in order to flank down that side and pressure eHexy at some point. The Black 13th start near them to provide additional support. Even with Brutal Damage, however, they don't have great odds at hurting one of the Titans.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Advanced Deployment
Decisions, decisions. The Bloodrunners would most likely get wiped out by the combination of the B13 and LA&MH before they got up into range of anything. They're going to be better suited on the left flank. The Reivers will be on a hill so they won't interfere with ranged shooting, and they'll be able to pressure eHaley.
With that done, here's the board layout:
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Turn One
Easy stuff first. The Bloodrunners run 12", angling towards that barn. No reason to let the Gun Mages get too many easy shots this early and their officer lets them ignore Stealth. The Venator Reivers also run to get up on the hill.
So then I start to plan how I want to use eHey's 7 Fury. Ashen Veil is the one upkeep I want to put out there, but I don't know who to put it on. I finally decide on the Bronzeback. It will take him up to an effective DEF of 14 for everything that doesn't ignore concealment. eHaley definitely can throw out Magical Attacks, so Arcane Reckoning is going on himself. That's going to be 5 of his 7 Fury for this turn and he'll jump camp the rest.
The Gladiator uses his Rush animus (because of the forest) on himself and then charges the Stormclad, obviously failing his charge. That's three Fury already on the board and the Gladiator is 9" up the board. Tiberion and the Bronzeback both run.
The Siege Animantarax also runs, as does the Krea, although he doesn't go his full 12". This leaves eHexeris and the Beast Handlers. The Beast Handlers go first and move up 6", removing one point of Fury from the Gladiator with Beast Manipulation (Condition). Hexeris is up last and moves up 6". As was the plan, he gives Ashen Veil to the Bronzeback and Arcane Reckoning to himself. The turn is over.
Major Victory Haley Turn One
Haley probably doesn't need to do too much directly this turn. She obviously doesn't like those Bloodrunners but since they have stealth, there's not much she can do about it directly. She could put Deadeye on the Gun Mages and hope to get a shot or two off on the one exposed Bloodrunner, or she could put it on the Defender instead.
She allocates zero Focus to Thorn. He's not going to need it this turn.
The Gun Mages activate first. They honest don't really care that much about getting shots off this turn. It's more important that they stay out of range of the Bloodrunners. The distance is slightly misjudged and they are indeed out of range this time.
Thorn goes next. He walks across the field behind the Gun Mages. Because of the bond, he's got a move of 8" but hardly needs it. Haley activates just after Thorn. This turn is going to be all about helping that Defender. She also parks herself behind the Gun Mages. She first casts Deadeye on the Defender. She then casts Temporal Acceleration on the Defender as well. Neither is an upkeep so she's fine stacking them. With the last of her 8 Focus, she casts Deceleration. While in her control area, friendly models get +2 DEF and ARM against ranged attacks. The Siege Animantarax and Reivers have just been nerfed.
The Squire moves on over closer to eHaley. Its ability to hand out Focus wasn't needed this turn but it'll be using it from now on.
We might as well do the Defender combo next. He's loaded for bear and let's see if it proves to be worth anything. Even with Snipe granting him 20" of range, we know that won't be enough. Arlan Strangewayes goes first and moves up. He then performed Power Booster as a Special Action. The Defender gains 1 focus point. The Defender then moves up. It chooses to use Rune Shot: Snipe. The Defender's Heavy Barrel now has a range of 20".
Because of Ashen Veil on the Bronzeback, it looks like the Siege Animantarax is the better target. The range is just over 16 inches. The RAT of the Defender is 6 and he'll get an extra die on his first ranged attack because of Deadeye. The first shot hits. POW of Heavy Barrel is 15, and we'll boost damage using the 'jack marshal ability. Animantarax is ARM 19. A terrible roll of 5 (on three dice) means it only takes 1 point. It also gains a rage token because of Cantankerous. The second shot doesn't get the additional die but hits anyway. The point of Focus is spent to boost damage again. 9 damage gets in and an another rage token is generated.
The Siege Animantarax chooses to use Hyper Aggressive and advantage 5" further up the field after the second attack.
Lady Aiyana and Master Holt choose to run this turn. There's no real danger of them getting hit by ranged attacks this turn so there's no need to take it slow and use Stealth. The Black 13 do the same, trusting that even if the Siege Animantarax did get into range, their own natural DEF plus that from Deceleration will keep them same.
The Stormclad gets a point of focus from starting it's activation near the Stormblades but it won't matter this turn. He uses either the focus or the 'jack marshal's ability to run (making sure he will be able to be within 5" of Arlan for a boost next turn). The Stormblades follow behind.
Turn one ends.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Turn Two
Hexeris takes back all 5 Fury on the board, filling himself up. If you look close at the last picture, it still shows him at 7 but just ignore that. He was at 2. He'll use 2 to upkeep both spells.
Measuring control, eHexy finds that his big beasts probably won't be in range to charge anything this turn. He needs to get things set up so that he can take a charge and survive as much as possible. It would be nice to arc a Black Spot into the Stormblades so the Siege Animantarax could do some damage, but there's little chance the Krea could get close enough. There's also the fact that the Reivers are probably going to absolutely nothing this turn.
The Bloodrunners run 12" towards the Gun Mages. They have no chance to get there this turn, but they apply some pressure to the Gun Mages and even Haley. Right behind them, the Reivers move up again. They want to get within 16" so they can use the mini-feat next turn to shoot at 16". Because of Granted: Reform, the Reivers actually have a move of 9" (6" before, 3" after) so they don't need to run or charge to get in that magic range band.
The Siege Animantarax could try to sit and shoot, or he could charge into the fray. SPD of 5 isn't great but with reach weapons he should get into range of the Stormclad. Of course he'll only get the Club Tail attack (and two spear attacks) versus ARM 19. The choice is made. The Siege Animantarax charges the Stormclad.
There's no reason not to boost the to-hit roll with one of the rage tokens. MAT7 + 3d6 results in an easy hit. The attack will be at P+S 18 because you gain +1 STR for each rage token present when the attack was declared (thus before being spent for the boost). It's going to be dice-1 and the result is 11 damage to column 4, taking out the cortex. Both spear attacks hit as well. The P+S will be 11 as there is still one rage token left and they do benefit from Cantankerous. Both are dice-8 and bounce off.
The Siege Animantarax has the Weapon Platform rule allowing it to make both melee and ranged attacks in the same activation. It can now fire the Double Reiver at the same target or different ones. Technically, the Rapid Fire shots were supposed to be rolled at the beginning of this model's combat action. A 1 is rolled so the Animantarax gets 2 shots. It fires the first at the Stormclad needing a 9 to hit (because of Deceleration). It misses and takes the second shot at the same target. The second attack hits and will be POW 15 against an ARM of 21 due to Deceleration. 3 damages get through to column 2.
The Basilisk Krea activates and runs up behind the Animantarax. The Bronzeback runs, placing himself in a spot where Counter Charge may come into play against Stormblades. The Gladiator uses Rush on Tiberion and then fails a charge against Holt.
Tiberion uses the benefits from Rush and runs and gets just ahead of both the Gladiator and the Bronzeback, allowing space for the Bronzeback to potentially get off a Counter Charge.
The Beast Handlers are too far away to use their abilities to take away Fury so they run up to be better positioned next time (or act as distractions during the enemy turn). This means that eHexy is going to have 6 Fury sitting on the board. He also wants to get within 8" of the Krea to use the arc ability. He moves up just enough to be with CMD range of the Krae and also (more importantly) be outside the killbox. He uses 2 of his remaining 5 Fury to arc Bump onto Tiberion, overwriting Rush. He uses two more to move Ashen Veil over to the Siege Animantarax. It probably won't help (since it's DEF10 naturally), but maybe it will make Haley think a bit harder about dealing with the battle engine.
With that he's down to 1 Fury remaining and ends his turn.
Major Victory Haley Turn Two
This is the turn where we're going to see the power of eHaley's feat. No doubt about it. She is going to have to move up or else she'll lose on killbox, but she has a ton of options this turn and enough Focus to use them.
She'll deal with the Bloodrunner using Gun Mages plus Deadeye. The Reivers will retaliate, but there's little that she can do about that (outside of a well-placed Time Bomb, but that's a lot of Focus). Temporal Acceleration and two shots from the Defender (with Crit Brutal) should put a hurting on the battle engine, possibly even freeing the Stormclad to hunt a different target. If the battle engine is out of the way, the Stormblades will be freed up to fire off Storm Glaive blasts from 4" away, without fear of reprisal due to the feat. Lady Aiyana can increase the damage against one of the titans and the B13 + Master Holt might be able to do some damage to either the support staff or a titan.
So that's the plan (and it falls apart quickly). In the Control Phase, the Squire gives Haley an extra Focus, bringing her to 9. That's exactly enough for Deadeye, Temporal Acceleration, and Time Bomb, although that would mean the Gun Mages have to make a path for Thorn. She allocates no Focus this turn.
At this point, we find that eHaley is screwed in regards to activations. She needs to go first in order to get Temporal Acceleration on the Defender, but she also wants Thorn out there to arc Time Bomb through. Thorn can't move until the Gun Mages go, but the Gun Mages also want to wait for Deadeye. At the same time, Haley has to move forward or she'll lose via killbox. Haley also needs to be where the Defender is to make sure she catches all the titans with her feat. A relatively simple plan just got tricky.
The only way this works now is if the Gun Mages go without Deadeye. At least some models will be able to forfeit their move in order to get the aiming bonus. The three models in green forfeit their movements while the rest have to scramble to make room for Thorn.
Note that the Squire doesn't still have three accumulators left. Pretend that picture shows a two.
When aiming, the Gun Mages will have a RAT of 9 (RAT 7 without, obviously), and the Gun Mage Officer has an 8. The Bloodrunners have a DEF of 14 and Stealth won't mean a thing thanks to Tactics: True Sight from the Officer. When the sound of gunfire recedes, the entire unit of Bloodrunners is wiped from the field. Out of 7 shots, only one missed.
Thorn will activate next. Normally a SPD 6, the 'jack bond makes him a SPD 8" walking. He moves directly towards the Reiver pack and hopes that he'll be close enough for Time Bomb.
The initial idea was for Haley to move up around the Defender in order to get the most enemy models possible caught in her feat. She has to be far enough up because of killbox as well. Because she didn't cast Deadeye on the Gun Mages, she can use the "extra" two Focus to TK the Defender.
She starts her turn by casting Temporal Acceleration on the Defender. She then casts Telekinesis on the Defender, moving it two inches further (giving her the space she needs to move). Before she moves, however, she casts Time Bomb on the Reivers using Thorn as her arc node.
The Reivers have DEF 13 and she's got a FOC of 8. She is just barely in range of the center-front Reiver. She rolls a 9 so it's a hit. If she would have missed, the Squire was close enough to allow a reroll.
Time Bomb is a COST 4, RNG 10, AOE 4", POW 14 offensive spell. It has the side effect that a model hit (so anything touched by the template) suffers -2 SPD and DEF for one round. The side effect in this case doesn't matter, but it can be huge in other situations. Here, Haley is just trying to reduce the Reiver's numbers.
The ARM of a Reiver is 13. The model directly hit takes the POW 14 and it killed. The others take POW 7s. She kills a total of 4, including the Standard Bearer, but doesn't wound the Officer. 50% casualties causes a command check which they pass.
She then uses her movement to slide into the gap left by the Defender TKing forward and pops her feet (which catches everything except Hexeris), barely getting a toe out of the killbox. She's at 0 Focus left. The Squire runs after her.
Arlan Strangewayes activates next. He stays where he is and gives a point of Focus to the Defender with Power Booster.
The Defender is up. It remains stationary and aims. There's no firing into melee penalty when shooting at a battle engine, and it chooses Critical Brutal Damage as its Rune Shot. It will get two shots again thanks to Temporal Acceleration. With a RAT of 8 when aiming, anything but double 1s will hit.
The first shot is a hit with no crit. The Defender uses a point of Focus to boost damage. The SA takes 8 from the first shot. The second shot is also a hit with no crit. The damage is boosted with the 'jack marshal ability. The Siege Animantarax has 4 boxes remaining and the damage is dice-4, so an 8 on 3 dice is needed to finish him off. The Defender rolls a 9 and the Siege Animantarax is gone.
Epic Haley's feat states:
During your opponent's next Activation Phase, enemy models/units activating while in Haley's control area forfeit either their movement or their action during their activations, as their controller chooses. Affected models/units activate at the start of their controller's next Activation Phase in the order you choose. Temporal Shift lasts for one round.
Essentially, the enemy gets to move or attack and they do it in the order Haley chooses. The reason I bring it up here is because it dictates how the rest of this turn is going to go. Tiberion is the only enemy warbeast with Reach. The Stormclad can charge, get within 2" but outside of 0.5", and be safe from reprisal. The Stormblades don't have reach but they do have range 4" attacks. This round is going to be about doing damage while not taking any next turn.
It would be hard for the Stormclad to charge the Bronzeback without clipping Tiberion's reach. It's also extremely important to remember the Bronzeback has Counter Charge if the Stormclad instead went after the Krea. A Counter Charge puts the Bronzeback up in our face and that's the opposite of what Haley is trying to accomplish.
The answer to this problem is simple: activate the Stormblades first and move one into the gap between the Bronzeback and the Krea, preventing the Counter Charge from reaching the Stormclad once it moves. The Stormblades move...
And the Bronzeback, knowing that the gap will be too small to reach the Stormclad with his little stubby arms, Counter Charges into the Stormblade..
The Bronzeback, with MAT 7, hits the Stormblade by rolling a 7. There's no need to roll damage.
Three Stormblades (one of them the unit Officer) on the hill will be shooting at Tiberion. The Standard Bearer can actually shoot as well, because he is within 5" of the Leader (the one with the halberd on the left) and thus gains +2 RNG to his ranged attack. One Stormblade and the Leader have shots on the Krea.
One thing that almost caused serious problems here is the Standard Bearer's ability:
Storm's Eye - While this model is in formation, when a model in its unit directly hits a model with a ranged attack the ranged weapon used in the attack becomes AOE 3.
If the Bronzeback was just slightly closer, it would have been possible (although extremely unlikely) that he could have taken splash damage from one of the AOEs on the Krea and been damaged, letting him move via Hyper Aggressive. It was a very remote possibility but in the end it did not matter because the Bronzeback was more than the 3" AOE effect away.
On the left, with a RAT of 5 versus the Krea's DEF of 12, only one of the two shots hits. The POW is usually a 12 but it's increased by 2 because of the proximity to the unit Leader. Just because the unit has an Officer, that Officer is not the "Leader". He is the unit commander, but there is still a Leader in the unit as well.
POW 14 versus the Krea's ARM of 16 results in 7 points getting in. The four shots at Tiberion all hit, but only manage to do 1 point of damage. ARM 21 is a tough nut to crack and only two of the four were within the 5" required to get the +2 POW.
The Stormclad goes next. It does NOT gets a free point of Focus from being within 3" of a Stormblade. Because it has lost it's Cortex and the wording it that is is "allocated" 1 Focus, it does not gain it. Even if it could get the Focus, a crippled cortex prevents you from spending it. It will charge the Krea using the 'jack marshal ability. It is a close thing, but he manages to charge the Krea without hitting the 0.5" reach of the Bronzeback.
Note: Ignore the 1 on the Stormclad. I didn't catch the allocation thing until after I made the move.
Without the ability to spend a point of Focus to buy another attack, it becomes very unlikely that the Stormclad is going to do enough damage to the Krea.
A roll of a 4 means the Stormclad misses the Krea! That lack of a point of Focus is looking pretty important right now.
Lady Aiyana and Master Holt are up next. There is absolutely no reason for them to move. Lady Aiyana targets the Gladiator with Kiss of Lyliss. She rolls a 3 and it misses! Haley's side really could have used that +2 to damage rolls against that Gladiator this turn.
Master Holt fires both his hand cannons, needing anything but double 1s to hit thanks to aiming. Both hit but without that +2 damage, they are dice-7 for damage and the Gladiator only takes 3.
The Black 13th also could have really benefited from Kiss of Lyliss hitting. They'll stand still, aim, and use Brutal Damage on their guns.
As you can see from the grid, the damage wasn't spectacular. The rolls ended up such that 8 damage was lost because of the Kiss missing (the lowest rolled on the 3d6s was a 9).
And that is going to end Turn 2.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Turn Three
To be honest, that turn really couldn't have gone better. The Siege Animantarax was dead no matter what. It would have been nice to make Haley spend more resources on killing it, but it did a good job for a 9-point model. Being under the effects of her feat is going to make it really hard this turn to do anything productive.
After re-filling to 7 Fury, Hexeris drops Arcane Reckoning. At this point, eHaley gets to control the order of activations because of her feat. Because eHexy was outside of her feat area, he has to go last.
Haley chooses the Beast Handlers first. There's no reason to let them go later in the turn and use their Fury manipulation shenanigans. Hexy decides they're going to best be used to threaten the gunslingers in the east and jam the middle to prevent more Stormblades from getting up on the warbeasts next turn. They can't run because of the feat so they walk into position.
Haley lets the Bronzeback, Tiberion, and the Gladiator go next, in that order. It gets a little complicated for Skorne this turn. On his activation, Hexeris is going to pop his feat and try to use spells to reduce enemy numbers. He'll spend 7, pop his feat, and then re-fill to 7 using Fury on his own beasts (since there's no other targets to take things from). He'll want to save at least 1 for transfers, which means he'll need to spot 6 at the start of the next turn to fill up again. Overall, the math says he needs to be able to see 13 Fury on the board between all his beasts.
The Bronzeback walks and riles for 4. Tiberion walks, uses Bump on himself for 2, and Bump on the Gladiator for 2 more. The Gladiator walks and riles for 3.
EDIT: Tacticus from the PP forums pointed out that a mistake was made here. A warbeast can only use it's animus ONCE per turn.
Haley lets the Basilisk Krea go next. eHexeris's warbeast bond allows him to channel spells through the Krea like it was an arc node. However, you can't channel spells if you're engaged in melee, which the Krea is thanks to the Stormclad. The Krea has 14 boxes left, has ARM 16, and the Stormclad's Generator Blade will be P+S 19 and boosted if he hits. With a MAT of 7 plus 2 for a free strike bonus, it's almost assured he will hit.
Hexeris decides to take the risk. He walks the Krea out of melee. MAT 9 versus ARM 12 is a hit. The Electro Leap rule for the Generator Blade means the Bronzeback will take a hit as well. The Blade versus the Krea is dice+3 with 3 dice. They come up a 4, 5, and 6 and the Krea is dead. The POW 10 lightning that strikes the Bronzeback actually does a point of damage (on double 5s). Hyper Aggressive could kick off, but the Bronzeback is already base-to-base.
The only things left to go (other than eHexy) are the Venators. They'll forfeit their movement and use the mini-feat to gain +4" to their range. The Gun Mages have DEF 15 and the Reivers have a base RAT of 5. Even aiming that means they would need 8s. They instead decide to combined ranged on Thorn.
Thorn is just within 12" from the Officer (so the mini-feat wasn't necessary, but it would have been a wasted turn if it had been a millimeter further back). With the combined ranged, the effective RAT is 10. The attack easily hits. POW goes up to 14 which ends up being dice-4. A bad roll results in only 1 point of damage.
Hexeris is the only one remaining. Losing the arc node obviously hurts but it was a risk that had to be taken. He's still 2 big offensive spells at his disposal (Ashes to Ashes and Hellfire) and the Fury to use them. Ashes to Ashes is only range 8, which is troublesome. It looks like it's time to help clear some infantry away from the titans. He moves such that he can see a Stormblade through the gap between the Bronzeback and the Beast Handler.
Spending 4 Fury, Hexeris casts Ashes to Ashes on the Stormblade. He's not in melee, although the Beast Handler is very close, so he only needs a 5. He gets a 5 exactly. Ashes to Ashes also hits d6 nearest enemy models and, in this case, a 2 is rolled so the Stormclad and Stormblade Leader are also hit.
Against the original target, POW 10 + 2d6 ends up bouncing off when a 4 is rolled on the damage dice. Against the leader, an 11 is rolled and one Stormblade is done. Leadership falls to another one of the squad members. He boosts the damage against the Stormclad and it proves to be a wise decision as the dice come up 6, 6, and 3. 6 damage gets in and the Stormclad has lost his left arm.
Hexeris then does something he should have done before the Ashes to Ashes. He tries a Black Spot against the Stormblades, since he didn't kill his original target. He rolls a 4 and misses. Out of Fury, he uses his feat to re-fill.
Full on Fury again, Hexeris tries another Ashes to Ashes on the Stormblade. He hits but only gets 1 additional target from his d6 roll. This shows the frustrating problem that Ashes to Ashes can cause. The Stormblade dies with a good damage roll and the damage against the Stormclad is boosted again. An average dice roll means that only 2 damage points get in.
With only 2 more Fury left, Hexeris could be in some trouble. He keeps the 2 Fury for transfers. Overall, a very disappointing feat turn with Ashes to Ashes being a huge letdown and Black Spot failing to land.
Major Victory Haley Turn Three
This game could easily be over this turn... if it wasn't for the 2 potential transfers. Haley takes the extra point of Focus from the Squire and is sitting at 9. She allocates 0 to Thorn.
Thorn will go first and move up 8 inches (SPD 6 plus the bond effect). He ends up in melee with the Beast Handler.
Note: Again, there's yet another problem with a picture. Haley has 9 Focus, not 5. I really need to be more careful with these screenshots.
It's MAT 7 versus DEF 13. The spear misses but the shield attack hits. With P+S 9 up against a ARM 11, the Beast Handler is splatted.
Haley will go next. With her 9 Focus, she first casts Deadeye on the Gun Mages. She then arcs Telekinesis through Thorn into the Bronzeback. Even with the casting into melee penalty, it hits. This was risky because the Bronzeback was up to DEF 16 because of being engaged, but Haley has plans for every point of her Focus pool. The Bronzeback is placed away from the Stormclad facing the eastern board edge. This will prevent Counter Charge from going off if the Stormclad is forced to charge in.
Haley then tries to arc a Telekinesis into Hexeris. He is a DEF 15 against her FOC of 8. She'll need a 7. She rolls a 5 the first time. She uses the Squire to reroll, but the dice come up double 1s. Her initial plan was to Temporal Acceleration the Defender, but getting Hexeris spun around is more important. She attempts Telekinesis again, this time spending a point to boost her to-hit, and misses again! She rolled 1, 2, 3.
Thorn reacts with his Reaction Drive to advance 3", better clearing the lane between the Gun Mages and eHexeris.
Arlan Strangewayes is too far away from the Stormclad to repair it, so he settles for moving and giving a free point of Focus to the Defender again.
The Defender goes next. It will only get one shot this time because there's no TA on it. He'll sit and aim, use the point of Focus to boost his to hit, and use the 'jack marshal ability to boost damage if he hits. With a base RAT of 6, the Defender is an 8 when aiming. The dice are not kind to Cygnar though, and another 1, 2, 3 combo results in a miss.
The Gun Blades, affected by Deadeye, go next. They move to where the front five can use Critical Brutal Damage while the furthest 2 away use Snipe.
Note: Another picture problem. Time Bomb went away and it no longer in effect.
The rolls will be RAT 7 (RAT 8 for the Officer) against DEF 15. The Gun Mages will be rolling 3 dice and criticals will result in an extra die on damage. The first Gun Mage misses. The second hits with a crit. The damage is POW 10 versus ARM 16. It's dice-6 and the dice come up 13. Hexeris doesn't transfer. The next shot hits but does not crit. It does 4 more damage.
The Officer fires next and hits with a crit. Hexeris takes 2 more. One last Gun Mage gets to use Critical Brutal Damage. He hits, but it's not a crit and the damage is ignored. The last two Gun Mages have to use Snipe and both hit, but only for 2 more damage. Hexeris is surviving with 4 health left and two transfers.
The Black 13th go next. They remain where they are and blast away. Ryan fires her two guns and easily kills both of the Beast Handlers. The remaining member of the unit passes his check.
Lynch chooses Brutal Damage instead of Black Penny and fires at the Titan Gladiator. He hits by rolling exactly what he needed and he'll be POW 10 + 3d6 versus an ARM of 19. The dice come up triple 6s and 9 damage gets in on the Gladiator. He loses his Body aspect. Watts tries the same shot but only managed to do 2 more damage.
Lady Aiyanna and Master Holt are next to activate. They move up the flank, avoiding the Gladiator but trying to get close enough for shots on Hexeris.
Kiss of Lyliss is barely in range. Magic Ability 8 versus a DEF of 15 means she'll need a 7 on 2d6 to land it. She rolls double 1s.
Master Holt could obviously have used the damage buff assuming he hits. He's a RAT of 8 so he'll also need 7s on his dual hand cannons. He misses with the first but connects with the second. POW 12 + 2d6 is rolled against ARM 16 and Hexeris is forced to transfer 4 damage to the Bronzeback.
The Stormblades activate next and move up next to the wall of titans. They're all within 5" of the Leader so they'll all benefit from +2 to damage rolls. Because of that, they decide not to combine melee attack. The one on the far right hits the Gladiator and rolls outstanding, doing 7 damage. He's lost his Spirit now as well as his Body. Bump goes off and the Stormblade is shoved backwards 3".
The Standard Bearer on the far left (one of the few standards with a melee attack, it seems) easily hits and kills the last of the Beast Handlers.
One of the Stormblades decides to try to finish off the Gladiator. He hits and does 6 damage, more than enough. Two Stormblades are left against Tiberion. One hits but does no damage. The other misses with double 1s.
The very last thing Cygnar has is the Stormclad. It still can't get (or use) the free Focus because of it's cortex. It chooses to walk to within melee range of Hexeris. It uses the free boost from the 'jack marshal on it's to-hit roll and needs an 8. It hits! He chooses to Electro Leap the damage and the Bronzeback will be hit as well.
The hit on Hexeris P+S is 19 versus 16 ARM. It's dice+3. The dice come up with 5 total and Hexeris is forced to use his last transfer to shunt the damage over to Tiberion. The Electro Leap damage against the Bronzeback is not enough to harm him.
If only one of the three attempts at Telekineis (2 casts + reroll) would have hit this would have been game, but Hexeris is still hanging on.
Lord Arbiter Hexeris Turn Four
It is nothing less than a miracle that Hexeris is still alive. If any one of those Telekinesis spell attempts would have hit, he would have been showing his backside to all that incoming fire and this game would be over. Not that it would have mattered, but in hindsight, Haley should have done the right flank move earlier in the turn and tried to get that Kiss on eHexy before all those other attacks took place.
Removing as much Fury as possible still only leaves Hexeris with 4. This is probably going to be the last turn no matter if he wins or loses, so Hexeris cuts himself for 3 to bring him up to his maximum of 7. He has one health remaining.
First things first. The Stormclad needs to die. Hexeris has a few tools to do it, but he chooses to activate the Reivers first. They choose to combine ranged against the Stormclad.
They have an effective RAT of 10 and a POW of 16, thanks to the Reiver's bonus against large model targets. The Stormclad is DEF 12 and only ARM 18 because he's lost the buckler on the left arm. The attack hits easily... but double 1s are rolled for damage! The VASSAL random number generator is really screwing up a lot of plans this game.
The Bronzeback will activate next. For 1 Fury, he puts his Train Wreck animus up on Tiberion:
Train Wreck - Target friendly warbeast's melee weapons gain Beat Back. Train Wreck lasts for one turn. (Immediately after a normal attack with a weapon with Beat Back is resolved during this model's combat action, the enemy model hit can be pushed 1" directly away from the attacking model. After the enemy model is pushed, the attacking model can advance up to 1".)
The Bronzeback is not within reach of the Stormclad. In fact, he's actually in the rear arc of the 'jack. He spends another point of Fury to put Beat Back on himself. He ignores the Stormclad and moves up between the Stormblades and the Gun Mages.
NOTE: Again, a warbeast uses his animus twice in the same turn. This is NOT legal.
He puts his first attack on the Stormblade Standard Bearer on his right. He needs a 5 to hit and rolls exactly that. P+S 17 means there's nothing left of the Stormblade after the attack is over. This also allows the Bronzeback to advance 1", even if the target is dead. He advances further over towards the Gun Mages.
The Bronzeback will boost his second attack (with the tusks) to hit the Gun Mage he is adjacent to. He needs an 8 on 3d6 and gets an 11, so there's one less Gun Mage on the field as well. He uses Beat Back again and moves to within striking distance of the backside of the Stormclad.
The Bronzeback then attacks with his remaining War Gauntlet. The War Gauntlet has 1 more POW than the tusks and that's why he saved it for the 'jack attack. Back Striking bonuses mean the Bronzeback is MAT 9. Back Strikes don't offer boosted damage or anything (unlike a Free Strike), but P+S of 17 and boosting damage should be enough to at least cripple the Stormclad. A total of 13 is rolled on the dice and the Stormclad's luck has run out.
The Bronzeback gets to move again via Beat Back but doesn't have enough movement to get to the other Gun Mages. Still, not a bad activation.
Tiberion goes next and declares a Trample, aiming directly towards the Defender. He runs over two of the Stormblades and Arlan. He will end up taking a Free Strike from the Stormblade on the right of the ones who were engaging him.
Tiberion misses the Stormblade Sergeant by rolling a 4. He only does a point of damage to the Officer, so he's still standing as well. He continues the poor rolling and misses Arlan as well! The important thing is that models contacted cannot make free strikes against the trampling model, so only the far Stormblade gets that shot.
The free strike hits and it will be P+S 15 (because the Leader is still alive) and automatically boosted. Tiberion will only be ARM 19 because you don't get shield bonuses against attacks that originate in your back arc (and free strikes say they do). The dice roll low yet again and come up 1, 2, 3. Tiberion only takes 2 damage.
Tiberion is forced to buy an attack with his Tetsubo, boosting the attack roll. A critical hit here would mean Critical Smite will go off, slamming the Defender into eHaley. Beat Back might allow Tiberion just enough movement to try to get some swings at her.
Critical Smite - On a critical hit, this model can slam the model hit instead of rolling damage normally. The model hit is slammed d6" directly away from this model and suffers a damage roll with POW equal to this model's STR plus the POW of this weapon. The POW of collateral damage is equal to this model's STR.
The dice are thrown and result in a 1, 6, 6. A crit! A 2 is rolled for the slam distance. He ends up on top of eHaley and the rule of least disturbance has to be used. Damage against the Defender will be a straight 2d6 dice roll (no need to boost) for 9 damage and knock down.
Haley is moved to the side and also knocked down. She takes a STR 12 + 2d6 damage roll that cannot be boosted. She is ARM 12 and ends up taking 7.
It is at this point that we run into a problem that required clarification from the forums. Tiberion has the rule:
Immovable Object - This model cannot be knocked down or placed. It can move or be moved only during its normal movement.
Beat Back movement does not take place during normal movement. Tiberion can NOT move closer! And because of how Haley had to move backwards (using the rule for least disturbance) he's definitely not in range to swing on her. This is extremely unfortunate. Out of frustration, the Bronzeback buys another attack, swings on the Gun Mage just to the left of him, boosts to hit, and misses.
Hexeris really only has one more chance here. He moves his full 6" and gets on top of the hill in order to be able to see over the top of Arlan.
Note: Ignore the orange circle on the right. That was the original location of Tiberion and I was using it to check for free strikes.
Since she's knocked down, Hexeris only needs to hit a DEF 5 (so avoid rolling double 1s) with whatever he chooses to cast. He's just in range of Hellfire, so that's going to be his spell of choice.
Hellfire costs 3 Fury and has a range of 10. It has a POW of 14 and is obviously an offensive spell. A model/unit hit by Hellfire must pass a command check or flee, but this doesn't mean anything to a warcaster (side note: this command check could be a really cool side effect when used on a unit affected by the Mortitheurge Willbreaker).
Lord Arbiter Hexeris fires off his first Hellfire. He rolls a 6 so he doesn't miss. As stated earlier, Haley is ARM 14 so this is straight damage. Hexeris boosts. A 2, 3, and 4 are rolled and she's only got 7 health left. This game is over!
Post Game Analysis
I thought for sure eHaley had this one on turn three. If she would have hit with the Telekinesis the first time, she could have spun him around. The Defender would have hit, for one, and that would have been enough. I don't remember the rolls but it's possible the Gun Mage that missed might have hit too. Alternatively, she could have spun him such that Lady Aiyana and Master Holt got the bonus, but she ended up rolling double 1s and he had good odds to hit anyway.I'm sure I made some mistakes in this game in terms of the rules too. I tried to take it slow and watch what I could, but it's hard playing on VASSAL, typing up a report, and looking up rules all at the same time. I probably should have started with a 35-point game instead of 50, but I like 50 point games.
Overall, I think eHexeris is very very good, the Siege Animantarax isn't great, and titans are titans. I wish I would have known about the Beat Back + Tiberion thing ahead of time, but it was better to catch it now than during a tournament.
I hope you enjoyed the first installment of Battle Report by COGS. Please feel free to comment.
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