This Week in the Gnarls League, Part 3

vs Danny, part one.

Last week I was in a three-way tie for first in league, and on Monday I got in the first game of this week against one of the people I was tied with: Danny and his Cryx.  My first few trips to the FLGS for Thursday night Warmahordes I played against new or inexperienced players (which seems to apply to 50-60% of the regulars), including what was one of the first handful of games Danny played.  A nice guy who's eager to learn, I've kept an eye on Danny since then to see how he develops.  This game was the first since that initial game months ago and was a good opportunity to see first-hand how Danny has progressed (after a trip to Templecon no less).  We played at 50 points and I fielded the same Aby list I played last week (Typhon, Carni, Seraph, Angelius, Raek, 4 Shredders, 2 Forsakens, and a Shepherd).  I was concerned about facing 50 points worth of Cryx infantry, but fortunately the reality was slightly different as Danny fielded eSkarre with the Deathjack, Defiler, max Bane Thralls with UA and Tartarus, max Satyxis with UA and their solo, Darragh Wrathe, two Pistol Wraiths, and Saxon Orrik.  Our scenario was Whirling Gauntlet, which proved to be interesting.

vs Danny, part two.

The game was a tight one.  Unsure of how the Satyxis would perform, but none too happy with their innate high DEF, my first priority was to cripple the unit.  I gunned down the UA with the Angelius and then took a big chunk out of the rest of the unit before turning my attention to the Banes.  I was careful to stay out of their charge range but didn't account for the extra range that Tartarus gives them and ended up taking a charge from them anyway.  With a little help from the Deathjack (who finally did something) they took out my Carnivean and Angelius (who refused to tank at DEF 17 for most of the week).  During all that destruction I noticed eSkarre had crept rather far forward.  When the Whirling Gauntlet again cut through Danny's army and knocked down his Defiler, I saw that I needed to remove a single Bane to open up a charge lane for Aby.  While I didn't manage to kill the Bane, which made its Tough roll, I did knock it down.  One flying charge later and eSkarre was on the ground with Aby standing over her.  Danny had been cutting Skarre ruthlessly for upkeeps, plus her feat, and by the time I went in for the kill she was at half life (if not lower).  I meant to ask Danny why he kept cutting as he wasn't starved for Focus but forgot over the course of the week.

vs Ron

Next up was Ron on Thursday.  Though this was my first game against him, I'm relatively familiar with his collection through his blog (Miniatures armies, huge time sink), so I had to do less guessing for this game than previous 50 pointers.  I ran the same Aby list while Ron fielded Strakhov with the War Dog, Torch, Beast 09, the Great Bears, min IFP with UA, min Kayazy with UA, Kayazy Elminators, max Shock Troopers, a Widowmaker Marksman, and Reinholdt (because he had a point left over and I had Reinholdt in my bag).  The scenario was Most Pit. Like when I played Steve last week, I knew Ron's army at least as well as he did.  Despite this I still managed to walk more or less right into Strakhov's feat, which cost me Typhon and the (still refusing to tank) Angelius.  As with Danny, this game turned when Ron left his caster too close to the action (which is all but unavoidable with Strakhov).  It took a little bit of surgery and Slipstreaming, but I was ultimately able to get the Raek and Aby in against Strakhov.  When they couldn't seal the deal, I had to bring in the Carnivean to bat clean-up.  Ron played well enough, spreading his net wide for a good feat charge, but ultimately couldn't do enough damage on the feat turn to keep my gribblies at bay. 

vs Paul

My final game was against Paul and his Troll list.  I played with Paul in my first ever team game, though he was running Cygnar at the time, and I'd seen his Trolls on the table in the past few weeks so I had an idea of what to expect.  We played Occupy at 35 points.  My Aby list was the same from last week (Typhon, Carni, Seraph, 3 Shredders, 2 Shepherds, 2 Forsaken).  Paul ran an eDoomie brick of doom list with Mulg, an Earthborn, an Axer, a Runebearer (Trollses), Janissa, max Krielstone with UA, and the league Whelps.  I'm familiar with the basic concept of the list (clump up, Janissa puts a wall in front, everything in range of the stone), if not particularly familiar with eDoomie.  My basic plan was to spread out so that the brick either had to separate or else focus on a single target at a time instead of catching multiple pieces at once.  The lack of knowledge about eDoomie, combined with my plan of spreading out, nearly cost me the game real early.  Paul had warned me that his list was built to slingshot beasts forward, but when I had Mulg on Aby in turn 2 I was still surprised.  Fortunately Aby is a tough nut to crack (DEF 19 when B2B with the bonded Seraph and with Tenacity) and Mulg couldn't finish her off.  Even more fortunately, Mulg and his five Fury ended up between a pair of Forsaken.  After a pair of glorious 7 dice Blight Bomb Shrouds, and a bit of work by Aby, Mulg was down and Paul was distraught.  From there I was in the driver's seat, but I nearly threw it all away on the urging from my PG (who was eager for a team game as he also plays Legion).  I took an ill-advised run at Doomie and came up short, but Aby again managed to not get killed long enough for the Carnivean to come in and mop up.  Of note, the Angelius finally did some good evasion tanking in this game and held up the Earthborn for the whole match.

vs Ron again, this time at 15 points.

While the above was my last game that counted, I did play another on Thursday night.  After having put on reckless speed to finish the game against Paul, I found that my PG didn't have an opponent in mind for the team game he was so eager for.  It was soon too late to have any hope of getting in a team game, so I filled the remaining time with a 15 pointer against Ron.  I pulled out pVayl for this one, with a Carni, Seraph, and Shredder.  Ron took Strakhov with Beast 09 and Torch.  This one was over when I tried making a 15 point list, and despite barely budging from my deployment zone I still got charged at the top of turn two.  My two objectives for this game were (in order) to get a game in for Ron's third and to try and figure pVayl out a little bit.  The first I managed easily, the second not quite so much.  I did get to see how Incite looks on the table (pretty nice, especially with Chiller), so it wasn't a total loss.

I held a pretty healthy lead on the league for most of the week, though as results from the rest of Thursday and the weekend are updated that lead will be much smaller and possibly non-existent.  Despite playing larger games this week, I haven't been maximizing points through scenarios (some are worth more than others at equal points), which may be my undoing.  While I maintain a healthy level of skepticism, if I can manage one more solid week I have a good shot at finishing atop the league standings.  After a 3-0 record this week (in games that counted for me), I'm at 7-2 for the league, which is a mighty fine mark.  Over those games I've gotten to know my Aby list(s) very well, to the point where I don't need to check cards for stats, which is a first for me.  I'm having a hard time putting together a 25 point list for her though, so there's a real possibility I'll be running a different caster (and list) for the league finale tournament this weekend, which would be a real shame.  In happier news, I primed my objective markers this morning (WIP shots still to come) and hope to get them painted up on Wednesday.