The Time of Beasts is at Hand - 2nd Place!

Bray Shaman Abramio called his herd forward

As stated in the previous blog article, Tau4Eva and I attended the Warhammer Fantasy tournament at Gamers Sanctuary yesterday. I used the list I posted on Friday which included the Herdstone. I was a little scared to use it because I wasn't sure I would use it correctly. I also included the Jagged Dagger, which allows me to grab power dice for each model my Great Bray kills in close combat. He cut down a ton of dudes... my magic phases were well powered.

The herd deployed for game one. The herdstone is seen in the center.

Game 1- Beastmen vs High Elves

The first game I was paired up with a friend of Rhellion's who was playing High Elves. "Oh, you get to play Teclis!" said Rhellion. Little did I know.

My opponent was pretty cool, and was very easy to play against even though Teclis basically rammed his game down my beastmen's collective throats. For those who don't know, Teclis + his usual build basically guarantees:

• 12 power dice
• very close to matching or exceeding your power dice in his dispel turn
• Every spell will go off with irresistible force, with no miscasts

I did my best, but I got Dwellers Below'd twice times on my my block (roll a S test or die) before I made it into combat. Luckily my characters didn't die but my horde went from 40 to 20 gors in two rounds, and I couldn't stop it, because it was irresistible force. The combat targets I went up against either had toughness 6 or shield of thorns (2d6 strength 4 hits in the magic phase against units in combat). It was really, really, really tough.

I did manage to get my razorgor into combat with Teclis' bow elves unit. I didn't get the charge off against Teclis, so he just kept slinging spells until my razorgor died. I did manage to get my minotaurs into combat. They lost to elves with great weapons, I think. My ungors lost to elves with a 4+ ward save.

My gor block did manage to kill a great eagle and run down some spearmen with a sorceress, so all wasn't lost. The first round was definitely really disheartening, though. It was an Adepticon primer so I can't fault the dude for bringing Teclis. I just wish he wasn't so broken, lol. I didn't even get to use my dispel scroll. I was tabled, earning 5 points for a loss.

Turn two in my game vs Chaos Dwarfs.

Game 2 - Beastmen vs Chaos Dwarfs

I was pumped for this matchup. I enjoy playing Jeremy (see his Chaos Warriors in a previous WHFB report) and I was excited to see what the Chaos Dwarfs could do. They received a new list in Tamurkhan and I haven't heard a lot about what they could do besides the usual "BROKEN". I was genuinely intimidated by the amount of shooting and war machines he had.

I lined up against Jeremy's army and he won first turn. He ran his tractors out in front of his army, while the rest stood back in his deployment zone. He had four shooty war machines and two gun units that could also fight in close combat. One of the war machines was literally a war train.

He managed to shoot up my guys with some black powder shots, then landed what I consider a really really nasty spell on minotaurs, killing four and making them flee (I was stupid and put my General outside of 12" of them). The spell caused a strength six hit on ever minotaur that did D6 wounds. It was nasty (and it had unlimited range!).

Jeremy had run his tractors forward to engage me. If they charged me, they'd do 2d6+2 strength 8 hits, right on my big horde of gor. I knew I couldn't let that happen, especially since the things were unbreakable. I'd be stuck in and never get out. They also did 2d6 "grind" hits if they were engaged at initiative 0.

I survived most of the rest of his shooting. I decided to charge his tractors with my horde of gor. Someone later on told me that since both of them were separate units, and I charged both, it would be a failed charge, but that doesn't seem to be the case - page 18 of the WHFB rulebook says if they can only charge against both targets, than they can do that. This was the case, as the horde was so large it would have clipped that unit too no matter what.

The ungors charged the flank of one of the tractors and a razorgor charged the flank of the other tractor. During the magic phase I rolled low, but the herdstone glowed blue and two power die were added to my power pool. I threw six die at Okkam's Mindrazor on my Gor horde and it went off with irresistible force. I rolled a miscast that brought down a strength 10 large blast on my gor, killing a bunch, wounding the shaman, but he managed to stay in the old world, not being sucked out.

This made my gor horde strength nine since they used their leadership as their strength. Insane. All of those attacks brought the tractors down with no armor saves. I advanced upfield, got to his shooters, brought down their BS with Miasma (didn't really even need the herdstone anymore since he blew up his level four caster using six dice on the previously mentioned SUPER NASTY HASHUT SPELL).

Near the end

From there on out it was pretty one-sided. I charged into his dwarfs and chopped them up. I managed to pull all the points possible for this one except "kill a model with a bound item or spell" since he didn't have one. I rolled out of this with 23 points, bringing my total to 28.

Game 3 - Beastmen vs Orcs and Goblins

By now I was back up in the middle of the pack. I was matched up against Ken who played Orcs and Goblins. He had a very old school army with a mix of pretty much everything. I felt like I had a good matchup, but he had quite a few things that could randomly go off and kill a lot of models, so I had to watch out.

I didn't take any photos of this one since it was very late and I was very tired, so I figured I would try out Battle Chronicler. This is a really awesome piece of software that makes battle reports easy. It even imports Army Builder files and builds the blocks for you.

Orcs and Goblins

General: Ken

• WRM 5 Goblin Wolf Riders, Wolf Rider Mob
• NGM 60 Night Goblins, Night Goblin Mob
  + Night Goblin Boss, Musician, Standard, Fanatics, Fanatics, Fanatics
• BM 20 Orc Big'Uns, Boyz Mob
  + Orc Boss, Musician, Standard
• BB1 Goblin Big Boss (Battle Standard Bearer), Big Boss
• BB2 Orc Big Boss, Big Boss
• GS1 Orc Great Shaman, Great Shaman
• G Giant
• ST Goblin Doom Diver Catapult, Shooty Things
• SH 10 Night Goblin Squig Hoppers, Squig Hoppers
• BB3 Night Goblin Big Boss, Big Boss
• GS2 2 Goblin Great Shaman, Great Shaman
  + Arachnarok Spider
• S 2 Snotlings
• PW Snotling Pump Wagon, Pump Wagon

Deployment

  

This mission started us both very close to the center of the board with a few units coming in from reserve if they rolled a one at the beginning. I put my herdstone central and put my two level one casters behind a hill so they couldn't be seen. For this match, the herdstone was crucial. It added two power dice every round, combining with the power dice I gained from my shaman chopping up orcs.

Turn 1 - Orcs and Goblins

 

Turn 1 - Mughoof's Herd

Turn 2 - Orcs and Goblins

 

Turn 2 - Mughoof's Herd

I moved across the board at the beginning and got shot quite a bit. My minotaurs were stuck on the right flank where they really couldn't do a whole lot. They charged the snotlings, wiping them out, and then were stuck reforming, only to be charged in the rear by squig hoppers. Eventually they wiped out them too and did nothing the rest of the game.

 

Turn 3 - Orcs and Goblins

  

Turn 3 - Mughoof's Herd

  

In the center my gors + great bray + bsb + beastlord charged his orc big'uns. I forgot how tough those guys are. They have a nice armor save and strength four, which was bad against my armorless gor. One of the battle points of the mission was to kill the enemy general with your general or his unit, though, so I had to kill the orcs and his general with the gor unit. I directed all of my attacks at his general with my beastlord and a few gor attacks. After a round of combat we were tied in combat. 

In the second round of fighting my gor horde finally won combat. My shaman, BSB, and Beastlord were doing a ton of wounds and the general finally died. The orcs ran but didn't make it off the board even though he had deployed his whole army near the edge and hadn't advanced. I reformed the gor horde to face the arachnarok.

On the left flank my ungor took some shots from goblins and wolf riders. They charged into the doom diver and annihilated that, then overran into an Arachnarok. I knew the ungor wouldn't survive that - especially once they got charged by the giant the next turn - but I wanted them to hold that stuff up while my gor took down the general.

Turn 4 - Orcs and Goblins

  

Turn 4 - Mughoof's Herd

  

The gor herd eventually took down the arachnarok with static resolution because I charged it in the flank. I made a huge mistake in challenging - he accepted with his shaman, and the whole arachnarok + all riders + shaman got to attack my champion, and I couldn't attack the thing back. I surely would have slain it. 

I still managed to win by combat resolution and the thing broke and ran. I ran it down, straight into the giant night goblin mob on the hill. Through this whole battle I was using the bray shamans at the back to miasma the models I was fighting to make it easier. They were the key to this victory - making sure I could win the fights. The big'uns were a lot tougher than I thought they would be. 

Turn 5 - Orcs and Goblins

 Turn 5 - Mughoof's Herd

  

During turn five I'm in mop up mode. The characters in the gor unit couldn't be killed and they chopped up anything and everything. I had reformed to face the giant and big'uns. I knew the giant would charge me so I was ready for it. 

Turn 6 - Orcs and Goblins 

 Turn 6 - Mughoof's Herd

In turn six he charged in with his giant and boyz. The giant didn't do a ton to the gors, killed a few, but I held on. The razorgor and minotaurs charged in and the game was finished. I managed a tabling and got enough points to boost my total to 53, which put me in second place by one point. Built with Battle Chronicler.

 

MVPs and Goats
I guess they're all goats, heh. MVPs were definitely the gor horde with the characters in it - they just chopped up anything and everything, and even killed some models in the first game where I got tabled. The beastlord was able to beat down a lot of models and the great bray shaman provided Mindrazor just when I needed it. A few times he killed a few models which added power die to my pool, which is amazing for 10 points (plus he can take a magic weapon too!).

The herdstone also worked out really well in games two and three, providing me the dice I needed to get superior magic. The minotaurs were definitely the goats. I had set myself up for a let down, but they just didn't do enough. I suppose they soaked fire, which was great, but I would have liked to have seen them do something great in at least one game.

In game one they got run off by high elf infantry, in game two they took damage in turn one, fled, then did nothing the rest of the game after reforming. In game three they killed snotlings. It may have been the placement I used. I think if I didn't take minotaurs it would have been bestigor, so it isn't a big deal - would have been another large footprint unit that might not do a lot.

All in all another great tourney. Thanks GS! I'll have to add a lot of weapons and Beastmen markings to the herdstone.