Game 3 - against the Nightstalkers player
Scenario: Capture the Giant, 200 pts
I took the Dambuster Sentinel (with Buckler and Lucky Charm), Riverguard Sentinel (Lucky Charm, Bodkin Arrow), Water Elemental (Lucky Charm), the Riverguard serving as a company hunter (Long Bow), 3 Riverguards (one of them as a healer, another the grizzled veteran) and 2 Naiad Initiates. If I remember it well, my opponent’s party included Butcher Fleshripper (Battle potion, Buckler), Reaper Souldrinker (Buckler, Lucky charm), 2 Shadowhounds, 2 Spectres, 3 Reapers, 1 Horror.
The first round we both tried to spread out our parties a bit, so the giant could not hit too many models when she (we used a female model with a frying pan) moved. The nightstalkers were more careful and stayed quite away, sending only the spectres closer to the center to shoot. My shooting proved more successful as the riverguards managed to put 3 wounds in total on the giant against one scored by the nightstalkers, so I won the round. I also advanced more to the center with my models to keep closer to the giant if she moved into opponent’s half. The disadvantage of this strategy was that I could not keep my models completely off the possible giant’s paths.
The picture shows the situation at the beginning of the second round after the giant moved in the direction of my water elemental accompanied by 2 naiad initiates. In fact, it should have stopped its movement on my models, so we decided to stop it just in front of the elemental. One of the naiads was killed by the mighty giant, while the other miraculously survived and the elemental took (fortunately) just one wound. In response, the elemental charged the giant hoping to score some wounds, but in total (including its heroic effort) scored only 3. The giant was also charged by both shadowhounds whose attacks were vicious thanks to a support from a nearby Horror. In fact, I tried to pull the Horror away when it took a place near the giant, but did not succeed with the Tounge Lash ability of my Dambuster. The rest of my party concentrated their ranged attacks on the opponent and I managed to knock down one Spectre and my grizzled veteran Riverguard killed another one despite not rolling particularly well on my attacks. On the other hand I rolled amazingly well on the armor saves for the giant, so the opponent managed to put only one wound on the giant with his shadowhounds (4 melee actions in total with a plenty of dice). Another round won.
Unfortunately, at the beginning of the third round the giant went again across my group of models that was placed in front of the central bog and included the Dambuster Sentinel and two Riverguards. It was really a bad luck as all other possible paths of the giant would not put my models in danger. As it was, both Riverguards were killed (one had already 1 wound from opponent’s shooting) and the Dambuster suffered one wound. I tried to shoot at the giant with no luck, followed it with a charge by the Dambuster (again no wound scored!) and charged again with a Riverguard in a despair later in a round, managing to score 1 wound. It turned out I made a serious mistake not saving a power dice in a previous round to clear a fatigue from my water elemental. It was standing in a relative safety of a difficult terrain and I anticipated an engagement by the two shadowhounds that were nearby (and also fatigued) after attacking the giant previous round. However, my opponent used the Dread ability (I have completely forgotten about it!) on one of them and the elemental failed its nerve test making him useless for the whole round. The opponent then proceeded to walk with both shadowhounds around an obstacle to get into contact with my naiad and approached the static water elemental with his Butcher. He also charged the Giant with a souldrinker (scoring 2 wounds) and my Dambuster with a Reaper, scoring 1 wound. The Dambuster relatiated, knocking the Reaper down. It looked I would loose the round 1 to 2 but at the end of the round the Dambuster’s toxins put another wound on the giant (but did not managed to kill the knocked down reaper), so the round result was a draw.
In the fourth round the giant ran away ending in between the tower (impassable terrain) and left the edge of the board. The opponent’s model were not able to reach it there but I managed to score a wound on it with my grizzled veteran, so it was another round won for me. Unfortunately, I lost my Water elemental attacked by a Butcher that used the Battle potion in this attack, scoring several wounds and later finishing the elemental with an heroic effort. I also lost the naiad in a combat with the two shadowhounds and somehow could not shoot down opponent’s spectre with my hunter and the Riverguard Sentinel who suffered 2 wounds in the shootout despite being stealthy and in cover of a forest. The Dambuster Sentinel killed off the knocked down Reaper and lashed its toungue on the Souldrinker. Unfortunately, the Souldrinker then scored 2 wounds on the Dambuster, he managed to be steady but failed both nerve tests needing to roll 4 at least once. Once again the same bad luck with my leader as in the previous game.
In the fifth (and last) round the giant finally went across two opponents warriors, killing one of them. The shadowhounds killed my riverguard hunter, the butcher killed my riverguard sentinel while only my riverguard veteran managed to run away into a potential safety. My opponent managed to engage him with a Reaper (run and fatigue walk) but as there was no 6th round the grizzled veteran was the only one from my party who survived the butchery of Nighstalkers and the giant. The following picture shows the situation at the end of the game with my surviving veteran and a reaper engaged with him hiding behind the fence at the tower doorsteps.
Well, so it is another scenario victory but I do not feel quite well about it as the game was quite dicey and chaotic. My opponent almost completely destroyed my party and scored much more xp points than me. I should add I was extremely lucky when rolling on the casaulty table, 5 of my models have recovered fully (though 2 of them had to be ransomed after being captured), only the riverguard healer ended up with a severed arm, being completely crippled and unusable now. If I did not roll so well for the casaulties this win would feel more as a loss for the company …
The grizzled veteran passes one of his xp on the riverguard sentinel, so he is promoted to rank 1 now (and also become a second healer) with Ra improved.
Finally, an interesting note. After the 3 games, I am the only one with 3 wins. However, the other 3 players (including the Brotherhood player who lost all his games) all of them have already rank 4 party while I got to rank 3. It looks that going for the scenario objective is often risky and winning a scenario translates into more losses and less experience points. In this game it was my 4 xp (2 for kills, 1 survival, 1 because the opponent had a higher rank party) against something like 12 xp my opponent harvested. This looks like serious disproportion considering I won the game. Is it really intended.
Congratulations and thanks to those who managed to read through this rather lengthy report.
I think vanguard gets it about right, nothing beats the shock of a grunt shooting down a command model thanks to an eight train for the grunt and straight ones for the leader! Rare enough to be really enjoyable!
