No picture for this battle. The report is 3 days late too.
My list: Nemo3 (tier 4), Finch, Stormwall, Dynamo, Thunderhead, Stormsmith Stormcaller, Mechanics (6), Silverline Stormguard (10).
My opponent: Doomshaper3 (tier 3), Glacier King, Earthborn, Mauler, Axer, Fire Eaters, Whelps, Krielstones (4+UA).
We played the SR2015 Outflank scenario. Henry won initiative, and in my opinion, especially given the scenarios and the lists, that dictated a huge amount of the battle. He jammed forward which put the Glacier King close to the center line. I moved forward cautiously trying to cover my heavies with Stormguard lined up to prevent charges, and my Stormwall on the other flank dropping pods hoping to block charges on that side. Then the Fire Eaters basically turned the entire game for Henry with assault charges, clearing stormpods and all the relevant Stormguard so that the rushed Earthborn was able to charge Dynamo. At that point the Glacier King was jammed pretty hard in the center of the board and Doom3's feat was up. My only real counterattack options were to pray for crazy dice and charge in, or go for the assassination, which is what I tried. Here's how that played out, with numbers commentary so that you can get an idea of what the math looked like between the two feats...
Doom3 was under the effect of both his feat and the stone's aura and the Glacier King's concealment area. This put him at effective 15/17, untouched at 16 boxes, with 1 less die on damage rolls and healing d3 after each hit. He also had 2 Fury on him for transfers.
Nemo allocates 2 focus to the Stormwall and Thunderhead each, which with Finch's bonus gives them 3 each.
First I charged with my Stormguard into the Fire Eaters. They got 4 hits, killing 1 of them. This allowed the leader to then drop the 5" AOE effect on Doomshaper (and his UA) that gives +2 to any lightning damage rolls against the affected models.
Next Nemo3 feats (granting an extra die on all lightning damage rolls) and moves just enough to have Doom3 in range for his lightning strike. He boost to hit (6 RAT vs 15 def) and hits, and then boosts damage (10+2+4d6-1d6, or 12+3d6, vs 17), and rolls 1-1-4, which then gets healed leaving Doom3 at full. Lightning bounces into the UA who gets snuffed handily.
Next Finch moves up and makes an attempt at Doom3 with her tuning fork but misses on the attack rolls (RAT 5 vs 15). If miraculously she had hit, it would have been effective 12+2d6 vs 17.
Next Thunderhead moves up and takes a boosted shot but misses (RAT 6 vs 15). If he'd hit, he'd have sustained attack, meaning he'd get 3 hits of effective 16+2d6 vs 17.
It was at this point that I actually just conceded the game, but here was the remaining of the potential attacks.
The Stormwall could then march forward, lining up on Doomshaper for the big guns, and take 2 shots. These not being lightning makes them unfortunate, but it was RAT 6 vs DEF 15, so my plan was to boost one but not the other, hoping for average rolls on the attack to hit both times. That would have been 2 boosted damage rolls of effective 16+2d6 each.
Lessons learned: Doomshaper3 is ball-busting. The Glacier King is super legit. And most of all, the Fire Eaters have assault with their 6" sprays which is a real flexible option for them. Perhaps the real takeaway though is that I'm just not prepared enough to deal with jam lists and I need a lot more practice against them. I will say that I really enjoyed playing Nemo3 and I'm looking forward to playing him more.
Bonus analysis: So yeah, failed due to key roll failure unfortunately. But let's look at the math overall. Assuming all average rolls (and rounding down 0.5's) for all of the above, and taking out Finch since on average she would miss, it turns into the following net damage amounts: 3, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4... for a grand total of 23 (not counting that the last d3 heal would not actually happen though). Even if one of the Stormwall big guns had missed, it still would have been 19. The assassination run plan was sound, but I needed slightly better than average dice, and for Doomshaper to not make a Tough roll. It was bad.
Now as a thought experiment, let's take out Doom3's feat, but keep Nemo3's feat. Those damage rolls suddenly turn into averages of 9, 6, 6, 6, 9, 9, for a total of 45.
Now let's take out Nemo3's feat but keep Doom3's feat in. The average damage rolls now turn into: 0, 0, 0, 0, 4, 4, for a total of 8.
Games this year: 1
My list: Nemo3 (tier 4), Finch, Stormwall, Dynamo, Thunderhead, Stormsmith Stormcaller, Mechanics (6), Silverline Stormguard (10).
My opponent: Doomshaper3 (tier 3), Glacier King, Earthborn, Mauler, Axer, Fire Eaters, Whelps, Krielstones (4+UA).
We played the SR2015 Outflank scenario. Henry won initiative, and in my opinion, especially given the scenarios and the lists, that dictated a huge amount of the battle. He jammed forward which put the Glacier King close to the center line. I moved forward cautiously trying to cover my heavies with Stormguard lined up to prevent charges, and my Stormwall on the other flank dropping pods hoping to block charges on that side. Then the Fire Eaters basically turned the entire game for Henry with assault charges, clearing stormpods and all the relevant Stormguard so that the rushed Earthborn was able to charge Dynamo. At that point the Glacier King was jammed pretty hard in the center of the board and Doom3's feat was up. My only real counterattack options were to pray for crazy dice and charge in, or go for the assassination, which is what I tried. Here's how that played out, with numbers commentary so that you can get an idea of what the math looked like between the two feats...
Doom3 was under the effect of both his feat and the stone's aura and the Glacier King's concealment area. This put him at effective 15/17, untouched at 16 boxes, with 1 less die on damage rolls and healing d3 after each hit. He also had 2 Fury on him for transfers.
Nemo allocates 2 focus to the Stormwall and Thunderhead each, which with Finch's bonus gives them 3 each.
First I charged with my Stormguard into the Fire Eaters. They got 4 hits, killing 1 of them. This allowed the leader to then drop the 5" AOE effect on Doomshaper (and his UA) that gives +2 to any lightning damage rolls against the affected models.
Next Nemo3 feats (granting an extra die on all lightning damage rolls) and moves just enough to have Doom3 in range for his lightning strike. He boost to hit (6 RAT vs 15 def) and hits, and then boosts damage (10+2+4d6-1d6, or 12+3d6, vs 17), and rolls 1-1-4, which then gets healed leaving Doom3 at full. Lightning bounces into the UA who gets snuffed handily.
Next Finch moves up and makes an attempt at Doom3 with her tuning fork but misses on the attack rolls (RAT 5 vs 15). If miraculously she had hit, it would have been effective 12+2d6 vs 17.
Next Thunderhead moves up and takes a boosted shot but misses (RAT 6 vs 15). If he'd hit, he'd have sustained attack, meaning he'd get 3 hits of effective 16+2d6 vs 17.
It was at this point that I actually just conceded the game, but here was the remaining of the potential attacks.
The Stormwall could then march forward, lining up on Doomshaper for the big guns, and take 2 shots. These not being lightning makes them unfortunate, but it was RAT 6 vs DEF 15, so my plan was to boost one but not the other, hoping for average rolls on the attack to hit both times. That would have been 2 boosted damage rolls of effective 16+2d6 each.
Lessons learned: Doomshaper3 is ball-busting. The Glacier King is super legit. And most of all, the Fire Eaters have assault with their 6" sprays which is a real flexible option for them. Perhaps the real takeaway though is that I'm just not prepared enough to deal with jam lists and I need a lot more practice against them. I will say that I really enjoyed playing Nemo3 and I'm looking forward to playing him more.
Bonus analysis: So yeah, failed due to key roll failure unfortunately. But let's look at the math overall. Assuming all average rolls (and rounding down 0.5's) for all of the above, and taking out Finch since on average she would miss, it turns into the following net damage amounts: 3, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4... for a grand total of 23 (not counting that the last d3 heal would not actually happen though). Even if one of the Stormwall big guns had missed, it still would have been 19. The assassination run plan was sound, but I needed slightly better than average dice, and for Doomshaper to not make a Tough roll. It was bad.
Now as a thought experiment, let's take out Doom3's feat, but keep Nemo3's feat. Those damage rolls suddenly turn into averages of 9, 6, 6, 6, 9, 9, for a total of 45.
Now let's take out Nemo3's feat but keep Doom3's feat in. The average damage rolls now turn into: 0, 0, 0, 0, 4, 4, for a total of 8.
Games this year: 1
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