News from the North - Khador Wolves of Winter Battle Report II

Time for another Warmachine Battle Report!

Sorry, but no pictures for this one. I wasn't planning on writing this, so I didn't snap any photos.

Khador Vlad2 Wolves of Winter vs Grymkin The Wanderer - Bump in the Night on Steamroller 2017 Scenario 2: Standoff (All the Zones + Objectives).

Army Lists:

Khador Army - 74 / 75 points
[Theme] Wolves of Winter

(Vladimir 2) Vladimir Tzepesci, The Dark Champion [+27]
 - Devastator [14]
 - Kodiak [13]
 - Marauder [10]
Eilish Garrity, the Occultist [5]
Greylord Forge Seer [0(4)]
Koldun Lord [0(4)]
Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters (max) [19]
 - Koldun Kapitan Valachev [4]
Doom Reaver Swordsmen [13]
 - Greylord Escort [3]
Greylord Outriders (max) [20]

Grymkin Army - 75 / 75 points
[Theme] Bump in the Night

(Wanderer 1) The Wanderer [+28]
 - Cage Rager [14]
 - Crabbits (2) [7]
 - Gorehound [6]
 - Rattler [8]
Cask Imp (2) [1]
Glimmer Imp [0(4)]
Glimmer Imp [0(4)]
Lord Longfellow [0(6)]
Trapperkin [3]
Trapperkin [3]
Dread Rots (max) [12]
Hollowmen (max) [13]
 - Lantern Man [3]
Hollowmen (max) [13]
 - Lantern Man [3]
Mad Caps [4]
Death Knell [13]

Arcana: Divergent Path (Trump), Ill Omens, Labyrinth

Some Background Info:

My opponent is new to the Grymkin faction, but has some beautifully painted models. Many models, and the Wanderer, especially, are Alice in Wonderland inspired. His roadmarker tokens all have hand crafted wooden signposts which read, "This way", "That Way", and "Over There". This game was fun just because I got to look at all his cool paint jobs.

If you were following along on the last battle report I wrote, this game happened immediately after. Feeling like my army didn't have enough beef to it, I made a few quick swaps. I reached into my bag for a trusty Marauder (10pts). In order to afford the extra warjack, I pulled out a Doom Reaver unit (13) and added a Greylord Escort (3) to the one remaining unit to make up the 3 point gap and get me back to the 2nd free model breakpoint.

My opponent won the roll, and elected to go first. I chose to swap table sides, so I was sitting where my previous opponent was.

Scatter Terrain Method Fog Bank in the middle closer to my side than his side, and slightly to the left of center.

I chose the side of the board with rubble, a forest, and an Acid Pool a little further forward. My opponent's side had a house on his right flank, with a wall in front of it bisecting his right zone, and a Water Feature on his left side of the board.

Deployment:

Grymkin: (From my perspective) Both Hollowmen units on the flanks, Dreadrots in the middle. Lord Longfellow to the left, a Trapper and a Glimmer Imp on each side. Wanderer went in the middle, along with the Cage Rager, and the Mad Caps. He deployed a light warbeast to each flank, Rattler on my left, Gorehound on my right.

Khador: I used mostly the same strategy as the last game. I deploy the Outriders hard flanking to the right as far out as possible (they begin the game affected by Hand of Fate). The Devastator (With Assail) is Centrally deployed, and the Kodaik is to the left ready to run through a forest. Vlad (With Arcane Might) is next to the kodiak so it can vent steam and get his Might of Kings going. The Nyss take up the center along with the solos.

Khador AD: My Doom Reaver unit deploys behind the forest to the left.

The Game:

This report is going to be a short one. Mainly its meant to showcase what happens in the opposite extreme as the last battle report. This is what can happen when Wolves of Winter goes into a match that is favorable for it.

Grymkin Turn 1: Everything Aparates and runs up. The pumpkins take up residence in the dense fog in the middle of the board. They have to move up pretty far in order to give enough room for his battlegroup and such to be able to advance up the board. The Wanderer casts Star Crossed, and Fog of War, puts up a Dodge Animus for free. I can already tell this game is going to be miserable... Then The Wanderer advances forward, and places his road markers in a shifting-stones-like triangular formation around him. There are some more imps created, and some of the other solos burrow. He riles and runs to make sure he's got fury for the next turn.

Khador Turn 1: Vlad allocates 1 to Kodiak. I run my Doom Reavers to be completely within the forest. One or two might be within range of a Hollowman shot, but they won't be able to aim! I I advance cautiously with the rest of my force, knowing that the Hollowmen have the same threat range as the Outriders, I line them up just outside his range. This gives me two options for the following turn. I can either aparate the doom reavers so they're out of the forest and free to charge his left flank Hollowmen, or if he doesn't advance with his right flank, I can apparate the Outriders and spray his front lines, at least. Eilish activates and gives the Kodiak Puppet Master (just in case I spike the damage roll really high), then he teleports into the zone. Kodak Vents steam on Vlad, boosting damage to make sure it sticks, I roll 6,5,5 for a 12 damage result on Vlad! Puppet Master it is!!! I re-roll the damage, and I STILL spike it. This time it's only a 6,6,2 for a 10 damage result. Vlad spends a focus to reduce it to 5 damage. Thanks buddy! The Kodiak runs with the remaining focus 10". Vlad Activates and heals himself for 4 points with focus and camps 1, wandering up near the zone still wondering what hit him. Nyss take position near the front of my zone staying out of range of the nasty bag men.

Grymkin Turn 2: More stuff runs. Both Hollowmen units advance and take some shots, but I don't suffer any meaningful casualties thanks to my conservative moves up the field. The Wanderer performs basically the same actions as before, making sure that we'll have to track ALL the dice math!

Khador Turn 2: Vlad gets a free upkeep and pays for the other two. No Allocations. Doom Reavers Apparate. Spray ponies manage to stay outside Star Crossed and dig REAL deep on my right side with HoF. They even get themselves a Lantern Man, and reposition to relative saftey. One pony pushes really far forward and puts up Winter's Wind just to discourage anything from getting to the rest of the unit. During this activation, my opponent Triggers Ill Omens, further complicating all the dice math. Vlad activates and swaps Hand of Fate to the Nyss. Most either Aim, or retreat to get out of Star Crossed and fire a few CRAs into the bag men in the middle. Most importantly, between the Nyss and Eilish's Bleed later in the turn I'm are able to remove two Dread Rots which block a lane between my Devastator and his Death Knell, which is exactly 9.5 inches away from my Jack. The Devastator Slams the Death Knell and boosts the damage roll, resulting in very little but getting itself into my opponent's zone to contest. The Doom Reavers get into the hollowmen. I send in about half the unit and keep the rest in reserve. The kodiak Tramples forward and vents steam near the edge of the existing fog bank so as to extend the LoS blocking Terrain. The Marauder runs up behind it to be a second wave.

I think the Nyss activation alone took me about 15 mins that turn just to try to avoid all the bad math I could, and the sheer numbers involved. Rolling extra dice, dropping the highest, dropping the lowest, -1 attack rolls, +2 from CRAs, etc. etc.

By controlling my friendly zone Vlad scores 1 control point.

Grymkin Turn 3:
At some point during this turn, my opponent clocks himself. We decide to keep playing because he's still learning his army and I have very little experience with Grymkin so I would like to see more of what his army is capable of.

Now things on my side start to die. But it's not enough things. Attrition is really going in my favor thanks to my berserks, sprays, and CRAs.

At the end of his turn, I score my own zone again, 2-0.

Khador Turn 3:
Somewhere during THIS turn MY clock runs out. "Eh."
Higlights: Feated Doom Reavers, and Feated Nyss do work. One Nyss walks up to the wanderer and stabs him real good thanks to a combination of the Feat, Hand of Fate, and boosts from Arcane Might. I ended up killing two crabbits this round from the transfers and grinding away aginst some of the other stuff in the zone.

The highlight of the game came later in this round when a few of my Nyss hunters shot his Mad Caps to death. Little did I know the little buggers would go off like fireworks! My opponent rolled box cards on the distance and a 1 for direction. They shot 15" across the board and landed right on Eilish's head! Hilarious!

I scored another point at the end of the round, 3-0. We decided to call it here because we just saw more of a dice grind coming and it was getting late.

Things I learned / Afterthoughts:

This is my fourth game with Wolves of Winter. This is exatly the type of army you want to see when you play it. An abundance of infantry, with few tough models. This is a good example of what can go right when you play this army. It's a shame this can't happen every time.

WoW is a delicate theme so far from what I've seen. Games can easily turn in the blink of an eye. Which, honestly doesn't give me much confidence including this army as a pairing. I simply think that I might have a place in No-Divide-And-Conquer Steamroller when the only time you play this army is when you see this type off massed light infantry or cryx swarm.

That's all for now, folks. Thanks for reading!

News from the North - Khador Wolves of Winter Battle Report

Time for another Warmachine Battle Report!

Sorry, but no pictures for this one. I wasn't planning on writing this, so I didn't snap any photos.

Vlad2 Wolves of Winter vs Zaadesh2 Imperial War Host on Steamroller 2017 Scenario 2: Standoff (All the Zones + Objectives).

Army Lists:

Khador Army - 74 / 75 points
[Theme] Wolves of Winter

(Vladimir 2) Vladimir Tzepesci, The Dark Champion [+27]
 - Devastator [14]
 - Kodiak [13]
Eilish Garrity, the Occultist [5]
Greylord Forge Seer [0(4)]
Koldun Lord [0(4)]
Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters (max) [19]
 - Koldun Kapitan Valachev [4]
Doom Reaver Swordsmen [13]
Doom Reaver Swordsmen [13]
Greylord Outriders (max) [20]

Skorne Army - 75 / 75 points
[Theme] Imperial Warhost

Skorne Army - 75 / 75 points
[Theme] Imperial Warhost

(Zaadesh 2) Lord Tyrant Zaadesh [+28]
 - Agonizer [0(6)]
 - Agonizer [0(6)]
 - Archidon [10]
 - Basilisk Krea [0(7)]
 - Bronzeback Titan [18]
 - Titan Gladiator [15]
 - Titan Sentry [15]
Swamp Gobber Chef [1]
Paingiver Beast Handlers (min) [5]
Paingiver Beast Handlers (min) [5]
Siege Animantarax [17]
Siege Animantarax [17]

Some Background Info:

My opponent is the best Skorne player in our meta, in my opinion. I've never beaten him when he plays Zaal2.

I won the roll and decided to go first. Decision because the last time I played him he went first and jammed both of his battle engines so far down my throat I nearly choked. In that previous game, even Karchev's damage output couldn't handle the battle engines, so I thought it would be best if I brought the fight to him.

Scatter Terrain Method Fog Bank in the middle closer to my side than his side, and slightly to the left of center.

He chose the side of the board with rubble, a forest, and an Acid Pool a little further forward. My side had a house on the right, with a wall in front of it bisecting the right zone, and a Water Feature on the left side of the board.

Deployment:

Khador: I deploy the Outriders hard flanking to the right as far out as possible (they begin the game affected by Hand of Fate). The Devastator (With Assail) is Centrally deployed, and the Kodaik is to the left ready to run through the water. Vlad (With Arcane Might) is next to the kodiak so it can vent steam and get his Might of Kings going. The Nyss take up the center along with the solos.

Skorne: Turtles on either side to get through the forest and rough terrain. The Beast Handlers were just inside the battle engines. Zaadesh2 and his battlegroup deployed centrally.

Khador AD: Both Doom Reaver units deployed centrally.

The Game:

Khador Turn 1: Vlad allocates 1 to Kodiak. Doom Reavers both run. One unit stays behind the cloud wall, and take up position on the fence in the right circle zone so I can apparate either one of them and charge the following turn. Outriders run up the flank, but because the Battle Engine can threat so far, I choose to try to bait it forward with 1 Outrider while the others stayed back behind the doom reavers and spread out a bit. Kodak Vents steam on Vlad, boosting damage to make sure it sticks, dealing 4 points; then Kodiak runs with the remaining focus 10". Vlad Activates heals himself for 3 points with focus and wanders up a bit to stay just behind my zone.

Skorne Turn 1: Beast Handlers whip up the Battle Engines. Battle Engines move forward. The one on the right kills two Greylords, hard rolling the 8s each time. I'm sad. The other BE takes a good sized chunk out of the Kodak. Zaadesh and the battlegroup move forward to flank his objective. The Titan Sentry and Bronzeback are the furthest forward to either side of the objective. The Archidonand the rest are not far behind ready to counter charge anything that engages his front line. Zaadesh casts Battle Charge and puts up a cloud between the fog bank terrain and his objective, effectively blocking much of the central doom reaver's LoS to many of his models (even with Apparition).

Khador Turn 2: Here's where things go south. The central Doom Reavers apparate into the fog bank so they can charge out of it. Vlad pays for all his upkeeps, and hogs the rest of his focus. The remaining Outriders advance and try to spray the battle engine (Only thing in reach). They deal no damage and reposition a bit. Vlad activates, swaps HoF to the Nyss, walks into my zone and feats. I get the minimum 4 models, and go all in on the central doom reaver unit. Doom Reavers charge the battlegroup mostly. One on the left charges the unit of beast handlers hoping to remove them all, but Zaadesh counter charges himself and kills the feated doom reaver before he can do anything. One on the right charges the Sentry and dies to a counter charge from the Archidon (but makes a tough roll). The remaining doome reavers charge the Sentry, and the Bronzeback. Once the dust settles, I've dealt no damage with the entire unit of Doom Reavers. It was a combination of dice, debuffs from the screaming baby titans, and great positioning on his part forcing me into bad charge lanes, and where I couldn't get that much work done, or just got countercharged. One feated Doom Reaver even rolls snake eyes on his charge to add insult to injury. Nyss move into the fog bank, shoot some things, then Zephyr back behind it. Ternion advances to behind the fog bank and uses Wind Ravager to try and deter the left BE. Right unit of Doom Reavers try some charges, or run to bog down the battlegroup and the right battle engine, or set up for a later turn. Devastator runs forward, Kodiak Runs but can't get to the Battle Engine, just trying to zone it out.

Skorne Turn 2: Zaadesh's Feat turn. Between his own flashing blades, and the battlegroup, he's able to remove all my doom revers contesting his zone. The Siege Animatarax on the right side kills three doom reavers and two more Outriders(!!!). The Siege Animatarax on the left kills the Kodiak. The rest is all just positioning. He doesn't bother contesting my zone. We both score 1 point.

At that point, I forfeit. The feat was spent. I had two Doom Reavers, one Outrider, and my only remaining Jack was a Devastator. Facing down an unscratched Skorne Heavy Battlegroup and two Battle Engines with full health, I didn't see the point in rolling it out.

Things I learned / Afterthoughts:

This is my third game with Wolves of Winter. Two previous games were played under Old Witch 2 with a different army comp. In previous games, I went HAM on Doom Reavers taking 3 to 4 units. This game, I cut back on that to include a more combined arms element: The Nyss.

In each game, I felt that the army is a bit anemic, or as people have been saying online: "It has a bit of a glass jaw". My experiences so far back that up: You're already starting with a low model count because of the premium you're paying for your specialist infantry/mercs. There's usually a point in the game where you end up losing a few too many models and you can't punch back hard enough to see the game through.

Gone are the days of the Mad Dogs of War when you had a seemingly endless amount of Weaponmasters which could be dumped in waves on your opponents. Without several waves of Doom Reavers, the few units you can bring typically don't last long enough to have the impact they need to carry you to victory. These days, Butcher2 is not highly regarded, but you can run all the Doom Reavers you want with a different 'caster. Though, being able to bring a power hitter of a caster doesn't quite make up for the 50% reduction of Fell Blades in the army.

For this specific game, my opponent remarks that I spent my feat too early. However, previous games against his double battle engine setup have shown me that if I were to wait any longer, I wouldn't have much board space to fight for. Perhaps he's right, but it just wouldn't have felt very good if I had done nothing with my two units of Doom Reavers for another whole turn.

I'm going to keep testing and do some more iterations on this army because I still think that it has some game into certain armies and factions (Cryx, Grymkin, maybe others). I don't think this match was a favorable one, but it's a good indication of exactly how wrong things can go with this army.

Next up: 

I make some changes to the army on the fly with what's in my bag and rerack against The Wanderer (Grymkin)!