I GOT BLISTERS ON THESE FINGERS!

The past couple of games I've done a terrible job of taking enough pictures, and the sad part is this happened in the first game I played with my new Nihilators.

However, as this is dedicated to new Skorne players, either veterans coming to Skorne, or more likely, new players who were drawn to the lash, I'm going to make this post dedicated to the horrible pain of assembling Skorne models, with advice from what I've heard from others and what I recommend.

This entire post is brought to you by Nihilators, the most limp-wristed hunks of pewter that have ever been cast.

The first thing that you have to understand is that assembling these models will sting and hurt, because everything is covered in what look like tiny spikes. These will, in turn, slowly feel like someone is digging into your skin with a cleaver. What I recommend for dealing with that is trying to find a comfortable position and move the model around to make sure you can still apply pressure and at the same time. It can be tough to find, but anything to get to either less prickly parts of the Paingiver pear, or just to balance things so more surface area of the spike is against your palm/fingers.

That's logical though, and I don't have to go into too much detail on comfort. What I'll be talking about first is one we've all experienced as logical Skorne collectors. If you got the metal version of the Battle Box, or just realized Gladiators are great and bought a metal one, there is the critical flaw in the Titan Gladiator. The Titan Gap. A huge gap between the upper and lower torso that we all know and hate. It's exposed and ugly.
What you use is Green Stuff.
It's an epoxy modelling putty, and it is good for conversion work, or for putting together angry elephants.
What you can do is get the Green Stuff prepared into a donut, set down the Gladiator, and then blend and fill in the gap.

Savages are also difficult to assemble because of how poorly they want to fit together due to the flat surfaces on the arms and the arcane way the arms have to align in the most arcane ways. In all honestly, I recommend scoring the surfaces, holding on, and praying when you get around to actually gluing them. What I'd also recommend is carefully preplanning so the arms fit properly. Particularly the Savage with both hands holding different parts of the sword, which is one of the most insidiously ridiculous design choices that I've seen and had to deal with.

Speaking of ridiculous arms. Nihilators. Nihilators are one of Skorne's best tarpits and you will have a unit of them. And most of them are easy to assemble, and most of mine are durable and fine. But, Oh My God, who ever things that Falchions should only be attached to a model at a wrist is an imbecile who seems to have no understanding of physics. The Leader of the Nihilators, who I am here referring to as Hannibal

I wonder if he keeps his fava beans in that face mask...

That Wrist joint has way too much weight on it, and I offer no salvation to any sort of drilling in all the arms on your Nihilators. All your nihilators will cause you one or more problem. The ridiculous pain hooks that inflate their chests like steroids will hurt your fingers and the arms will never stay on. You'll have to break out a hand drill and pins to keep the arms decently on, and I am still working on getting one of those.

This serves as warning and advice for model assembly.
Welcome to the tortured peoples, the masochistic. They're creepy pain Buddhists. You knew this is what the faction's aesthetic and design philosophy is, you brought this suffering on yourself.

It's Strictly Business: Skorne vs. Mercenaries.

Unfortunately, this game doesn't have any pictures because my phone died.
This match has pushed me to start playing eHexeris instead of pMorghoul.
It was a 15 point game, and I was eager to go up against Mercenaries, as it's hard to find full on Mercenaries players.

Mercenaries (15)
Ashlynn D'Elyse
 - Nomad

Tactical Arcanist Core
Dannon & Blythe
Aiyanna and Holt

Viktor Pendrake
Reinhold Gobber Speculator



Skorne (15)
pMorghoul
  - Titan Gladiator
  - Cyclops Savage
  - Basilisk Krea

Swamp Gobbers


He won the roll to go to first, and he scattered everything pretty far around since it was mostly solos and small units. He had Dannon and Blythe prey the Savage.
I bricked up like I typically do, using the Krea and the Savage as a screen for the Gladiator.
Morghoul sat to the right of the Gladiator.

He puts Admonition onto Ashlynn, and tosses Quicken onto the Nomad.
The Tacticals walk forward getting no meaningful scatters out of their Firebombs
D&B get in position, along with Viktor Pendrake. Reinholdt stays in the back. The Nomad walks to the side.

Given that he has more board control, higher armor on an equal defense caster to my own, more focus, and a better spell suite, I was scrambling to figure things out, so I just continued to brick up, trying to not get alpha struck to any capacity. I let the Gobbers run up the side and pop smoke to block LOS to anything from the two arcanists, and I brick up and walk forward.

This being my first time dealing with Prey, I didn't realize to try to get the Savage to a safer place, maybe to the left instead of the right, and have him try to pick off the arcanist core.  The Krea was to the left of the Savage.

During his turn, D&B massacred my Savage thanks to stacking damage buffs and made the Krea their next target, which was quickly killed due to attack multitudes from Bull on his Backswing. The Arcanists failed a lot of to hit rolls, as did Viktor with his Bola. Some of the Arcanists/Aiyanna and Holt started wailing on, and missed, a gobber. The Nomad, having no good charge targets, just ran off to kill a Gobber.

Next turn, I have the Titan Gladiator slam into an arcanist and try to knock down Ashlynn, but she had upkept Admonition and ran 3 inches away, and I kill myself an Arcanist. I have Morghoul pop feat and avoid D&B.

Viktor and Ashlynn do their best to kill the Gladiator but he is operating well, and Viktor misses with his Bolas again, Ashlynn pops feat, leaving my Gladiator with a lot less boxes, and making all my attempts fruitless during my turn to wail on him with my Abused Gladiator, as he ripostes my Gladiator to death.

I had Morghoul put Admonition on himself, being unable to reach Ashlynn to start trying to kill her I move him close to the center of the board and pop feat to keep from doing anything useful.

Viktor missed with the Bolas AGAIN, and I ended up being cock blocked for my next turn by Reinholdt who runs straight across the field base to base with Morghoul. I choose not to Admonition out of the way for fear of certain doom.

At that point I get killed mercilessly by Ashlynn who walks up and murdernates him thoroughly.

I pretty much went up against a better version of Morghoul that night. Better by leagues. I was sufficiently done with Morghoul at that point, having a pretty big W/L record with him at this point of  2 - 13.

Maybe it's the low points cost making his utility less apparent, but at the same time, I need to practice with someone more generally useful to get some more experience with winning strategies. Morghoul can't interact with opponents at all, and his low control area and squishyness makes him hard to use if you can't pinball out on low hit box infantry.

For a long, long time now, I'll be setting down pMorghoul until I get deeper into Skorne in terms of available points to play with.

Treatise on Morghoul: List Architecture and Building

Now, after all this break down and analysis and rambling from last time, let's get to list building with him. I'll structure this at 35 pts.

He wants to run a lot of beasts despite the 5 FURY. We have the Beast Handlers mitigate fury to what ever we need, he can take any excess and take advantage of it with Maltreatment. Which, if cleverly used, can allow him to take his 14 attacks on max fury, and by stealing fury from beasts you've already activated, can give you even more attacks. Further, he has 7 Warbeast points guaranteeing room for at least one heavy, or in some cases, an essentially free one (X-idons).

                             

Starting off with the beasts:

Titan Gladiator. This is definitely recommended. It's animus is a good source of Pathfinder, and a free Movement buff in a typically SPD 4 faction is always appreciated.

Taking a Titan Gladiator makes it easy to take a Bronzeback and is a perfectly valid decision, as it helps even more with Fury management, by guaranteeing successful Frenzy checks if it becomes necessary. Further, there's just an inherent synergy between the two.

What we want to make sure is a couple things in this list, beyond two fantastic heavies.

1. How does our list keep Morghoul safe?

1a. What is Morghoul weak to?

2. How does a beast heavy caster deal with multiwound infantry (since Morghoul can deal with single wound just fine)

3. How do we make sure the fury on the table is being used efficiently?

4. How do we fit in even more fantastic heavies to all of this?

I ask these questions because with Bronzeback and a Gladiator in the list, we can crack armor open easily, so no need to worry too much about armor skews. Except for things like ARM 20 8 Box infantry thanks to Shield Wall. That will come later.

Morghoul's weaknesses though are as follows:

Knockdown: His DEF 17 is what saves him from most attacks. If his armor is all that protects him, our caster is dead. Period.

Ranged Attacks/AOEs: Blast Damage can kill him, and aiming on most ranged attack oriented models can lead to him being hit more often than you think.

His own Control area: 10" isn't much. It's easy for him to over commit and die due to his tiny control area.

So we need stuff to: Protect Morghoul from Knockdown, Ranged/Blast Attacks, and something that allows his control area to be expanded.

What first comes to mind as answers to these are:

Knockdown: Cyclops Brute

Ranged/Bast: Basilisk Krea

Control Area: Mortitheurge Willbreaker.

The Mortitheurge Willbreaker is almost an auto-include in my opinion, just because it lets the beasts we've gviven hilariously huge threat ranges to, the capacity to still be forced out of our control area.

If you keep the also Auto-include for Morghoul Pain Giver Beast Handlers at a good angle, then they can rinse off all the fury you need.

The Cyclops Brute is useful for the Animus to protect Morghoul from Knockdown, and Shield Guard is also a good ability for keeping Morghoul safe.

If you want to toss in another heavy to take in the Shield Guard role, you could use Tiberion, but the Cyclops is lower on points, more utilitarian, and while he can't be slammed anywhere, Morghoul is still vulnerable, despite hiding behind it. It could work, I'd just need to try a couple games with it to see if it works.

The Krea is a good Utility beast with her gun locking down Run/Charge on key Beasts, lowering DEF to 7, and has an Animus that can keep Morghoul alive during AOE heavy turns.

So with this in mind we have

pMorghoul       (-7)

Titan Gladiator   (8)

Bronzeback     (10)

Cyclops Brute    (5)

Basilisk Krea      (4)

Troops:

Max. Handlers    (3)

Solos:

Mortitheurge       (2)

So we have 25 out of our 35 pt. list done, and answered our first question.

Next, how are we going to deal with Multi Wound infantry?

This is answered in different ways at different times.

Is it Shield Walled infantry?

I like to put Admonition onto a heavy, and strike near the edge of Shield Wall lines, breaking a hole open in a unit, and having it swivel around when one of the members of the unit is in 6" during his turn, sticking a heavy  behind their lines.

Is it just normal High ARM, Multiwound infantry?

Then we either must combat with infantry of our own, or find a beast that can do that.

The last thing we want is our beasts to get caught in a tarpit, because what'll happen is what happened to actual Mammoths in the real La Brea tarpits. A slow, slow death.

So we have a couple of options:

Try to poke a hole in it

Find a way to ignore it, creating wasted points on his part, giving us an advantage

Fight Infantry with Infantry

Or find a way to smash it into paste.

We can Admonition/Beat Back our way through it

We can use an Archidon to fly straight over the multiwound infantry, and giving a heavy Sprint is a good way to get out of a tarpit anyhow.

We can toss out a unit of Nihilators to act as a screen for our beasts, and as a way to gain more board control. Possibly you could include a unit of Gatormen with a task master.

Or you could toss in a Rhinodon to deal with it.

The poor, poor Rhinodon. Dismissed by the community, but having a secret, masochistic use with pMorghoul. Since it can be Abused and Enraged to get good threat ranges, and suddenly get POW 17's and 18's, it can do a good job taking out High ARM infantry walls, plus it's Animus makes Slams easier to pull off for cheap amounts of Fury in comparison.

So we have the answers:

Movement tricks and Flying

Nihilators/Gatormen

or Rhinodon.

Some of this is a matter of taste. I like the idea of Yo-Yoing Bronzebacks to create a Molik Karn with tusks (what's not to love?), the Rhinodon is a cheap and simple answer while sticking to a beast heavy theme.

Nihilators/Gatormen w/Task masters are good self sufficient walls of churning death, and can easily take up a lot of board space.

So for this role of Screening Unit/Anti-Infantry we are definitely investing 7-8 points. Which is quite a huge sum. We need something that can keep our heavies safe for a turn, soak up some hits, block some charge lanes, while still providing utility.

Since most of our lights in this list are not exactly screening material, and more utility material with a key purpose later on, I'd recommend not screening with those. Therefore, I think we should take the infantry  route.

For 5 points we can get 6 Nihilators.

For 8 points, we can 10 Nihilators, or 3 Gatormen Posse w/Task Master.

One is a wall of Tough, Reach SPD 6 Infantry, that can die in droves and there is no regret. They can cover the board out to a lot of angles, and serve the purpose of either clearing up that first wall of infantry, or taking attacks from opposing heavies. It can be a total of 6-10 boxes of Warrior models.

The Gatormen, like most of Morghoul's list, brick up. They don't cover as many areas, but can hold a central position really well. They are conceivably 24 boxes of medium base, Tough infantry, with Reach and the capacity to take a shot and quickly move toward and eat infantry. They are much MUCH better under Rasheth, but they can still do work here.

If you really want to get in more Gatormen, you could drop the Krea to fit in a Max unit + Taskmaster, to get 40 boxes of centralized screening, but that's a lot of points put into a unit Morghoul can't interact with.

However, Gatormen can't be trampled, making them more effective against heavies and as a good meat grinder for infantry.

Morghoul has a lot of issues when it comes to board control, beyond his feat. He wants to brick up and walk a lot of the time, having a slow moving first turn, and then exponentially increasing threat ranges and speed on his beasts. However, you can't trust a wall of infantry to always screen your important beasts when heavies can just trample through them. In most cases though, if you spread out your infantry well, they'll be farther up the board relative to the rest, and your opponent can't trample through all of them.

So I'll say a max Unit of Nihilators for now, and definitely experiment around with the system to get everything worked out nicely.

With that, we have 2 points left, which can just have an Agonizer in it to help make life harder for your opponent.

So in total, my recommended pMorghoul list for beginners and new Skorne players is:

pMorghoul

Gladiator

Bronzeback

Krea

Brute

Max. Nihilators

Max. PGBH

Agonizer

Mortitheurge

All adding up to 35 pts.

I will be experimenting around with this format, while also getting to know eHexeris over the next couple of weeks. As I'll soon be able to afford some infantry.

So break out the pain whip, bring your beasts and have fun experimenting around with this list, and variations, in your games.

A Treatise on Morghoul pt. 1 Musings on Morghoul

In my most recent match, I realized that along with my capacity as a player I need to change the models that I use to make pMorghoul shine. So today, I'll be doing some List Crafting to try to figure out what I need to update and what fellow Skorne players that like how pMorghoul operates could run him. Over the next couple of days, I'll be examining what pMorghoul can do, what he wants to use, and what he should use in a list.

To do this, we obviously need to take Morghoul apart piece by piece and figure him out. We'll be pretty orderly about this and break down his card front to back, to give an order to it.

Stat-wise, the first thing that jumps out at me is the SPD 7 and MAT 8. More than anything SPD 7 just because I spend half my day trying to figure out how to get SPD 4 to reach it's target. the MAT 8 Speaks of his capacity as a melee caster. DEF 17 and ARM 13 give an illusion of survivability, by giving him the capacity to survive by the skin of his teeth, since any hit that he receives will probably leave him down half his boxes. This also means that I need to be worried about AOE's and Blast Damage, since you can Boost Blast Damage, making even POW 7's of Blast Damage work at 3d6 - 6; giving him about 4 pints of damage PER AOE. Hell, he will be at serious risk if anyone ever gets him stuck with Continuous Fire. POW 12's WILL kill Morghoul with enough application. Especially

He has 2 pretty weak looking initial attacks at P+S 9, so given him being structured as something of what looks like an Assassin style caster, he will have a special trick probably later on to make these useful.

His 5 FURY really holds him back from doing a lot on the field, and means we really have to work hard to make sure that Fury is well maintained on the board. So, for any Spells that he has, we'll need to do everything in our power to not have him use his Fury too much in any given round. He'll probably bounce 1 or 2 spells in a round, to keep one Transfer on himself.

Now, no Caster is complete without Special Rules, and his is a fun wall of text.
Anatomical Precision allows him to always get some use out of his Attacks, and he is able to both control fury on the board in the traditional Skornish way by harming his beasts with Maltreatment. It also lets him always have some form of transfer fury at the end of his turn. Overtake lets him move one inch when he destroys a warrior model, and Sprint lets him take a Full Advance when his activation. Perfect Balance keeps him safe from Free Strikes, Backstrike Bonuses and CM/CRA's. Further, if he's Knocked down, if he survives the turn, he can stand up without missing out on Move or action.

Finally, his weapon gives him 2 attacks whenever he buys one, and he can hit beasts to add or remove fury, giving him a capacity to mess with your opponents Fury management, but if he does make contact with your opponents beasts, there is an honest problem there that should be remedied immediately.

His Spell list is interesting, short, and to the point. Torment, is a RNG 10 POW 12 that stops your opponent from Transferring Damage and stops Tough checks on an individual model. This solidly cements him as an assassin caster. Interesting note: His Charge range is exactly 10", as is his Control area. So, if this spell is able to connect with it's target and your battlegroup is in 10", then you have at a basic level gotten things well positioned. Screening and such is more of a context oriented matter, but all this means you have the decent chance of having a very successful charge available.
Abuse is simple, and spammable. It gives +2 STR and SPD. It makes our threat ranges stronger, our beasts bigger, and combined with Enrage can turn our most pillow fisted beasts (Any of the X-idons we have) and makes them able to wreck properly, while still keeping niche utility.
Admonition is one of my favorites in his list just because it gives a lot of slow pieces interesting ways of getting into position, and surprising your opponent. When an opponent's model ends it's movement within 6" of the target model, you get a Free Strike free 3" advance.
This is spell makes me really like Morghoul. It lets us be tricky like an assassination caster has to be. It let's me surprise my opponent and give a chance to react to what he does.

His feat, Pain and Suffering, stops your opponent from Spending Fury/Focus or Forcing his beasts.
That is huge. It is a beautiful piece of one turn board control. It is one turn that you can play to completely negate your opponent's plans and give all his pieces a hard reset since he can't cast Animi, and has to drop his Upkeeps. It's a good way to make sure your opponent's pieces are vulnerable. Further, the question of whether you are going against Hordes or Warmachine Armies is whether the feat can be used offensively or not. Warcasters would have to camp their focus, making them harder to kill with Morghoul, even if he automatically gets one point of damage in. However, against Hordes, it leaves Warlocks unable to transfer on feat turn, allowing you to buy multiple attacks and rip them apart one point of damage at a time with a theoretical 14 attacks.

It can be used defensively, but given pMorghoul's aggressive play style, he wants to use it to keep an opponent from responding to a harrowing assault. It will keep him from buying attacks, from casting spells, and lets you take a lot of risks, though you have to be careful of your opponent's charge ranges, as they can still charge if outside of that 10" bubble.

So, he's an Assassin caster that wants to keep everything he uses nearby, while having to decide on when and how to boost threat ranges on his beasts with no real spells to help warrior units. Seems pretty simple.

Next time I'll be posting about what pMorghoul wants to use in a list, and build a 35 point list in the next article. Here's a sneak preview: He wants to use a lot of beasts.

Thanks for reading, and may Pain, Misery, and Agony befall your foes in a manner too horrifying to consider.

Crushed by the Copycat...

This Thursday I went up against another Skorne Player. Another, PURPLE Skorne player.
I'm glad that I managed to retroactively inspire my fellows before I even arrived in this meta. It's a proud moment to know that my genius ripples across the universe to my local store. It even inspired him to kick my ass! It's a noble, proud time to know that I can inspire indirectly so, so well.

This round was a list of mistakes, and realization on the value of some of my models. I forgot some of my own lessons because I showed up really late to game night, and it had been a week, but I also made some legitimate issues. I hadn't screened my heavy properly, misused and misactivated some pieces, and made poor use of Morghoul again in a similar way to what happened against Circle. Also, I did Pop feat this game, it just didn't make any use due to Caster Cowardice, as I'm now calling it. It's when you keep your caster out of the fray to the detriment of the caster's utility. It also made me realize that there is greater utility in a different 1pt Minions piece that can cover my major issues, which I'll cover in my post game thoughts.

My Skorne: 20pts
pMorghoul (-7)
Titan Gladiator
Cyclops Savage
Cyclops Savage
Basilisk Krea

Min. Handlers
Swamp Gobbers
Agonizer


EEEEEVIL (but incredibly similar) Skorne

Xerxis
Tiberion
Bronzeback

Mortitheurge Willbreaker
Max. Handlers


Deployment

He won the roll and went first. My first thought during set up was realizing that I was outclassed in terms of damage potential in that he was packing two incredibly durable heavies with a specialized beast for holding center ground and manipulating the field.I also quickly realized that none of my anti-shooting defenses would work. The Cloud could only really block LOS, but otherwise the Krea's animus would have no value this game. I realized to win I'd have to get the most work out of my heavies, tying up key pieces, and trying to out position him.



That didn't happen. At all.





First Turn:

Simple first turn. He ran. I ran. He tossed Defender's Ward onto Tiberion, and ran everything forward.
I tossed Admonition onto the Gladiator, tossed 3 fury into the Agonizer, and walked Morghoul up 7", ran the Gladiator up 8", walked the krea and riled it for 1, and did the stupid thing of running both of my Cyclopes to opposite ends of the field pretty much to try and draw multiple angles. This left my Gladiator exposed which made the second turn almost as painful as being assassinated this early on would be...



Second Turn:

He ran everything up again. Upkept the same spells. The joy of SPD 4, it makes two turns feel like a really long single turn!

 Knowing I'm not in range to Alpha Strike him, and any steps forward I make would leave me in charge range, I just inch forward equal to my Speed. What I should have done in hind sight was Abuse and Rush him, drop Admonition and just wail on Tiberion as much as I could. However I didn't, and had him walk 4" and upkept Admonition. Morghoul ducked to the lower side near the cloud, out of Caster Cowardice.



Third  Turn:

Countercharge... I'm playing Skorne, as a Skorne Player, and I forgot about Counter Charge. He puts up Inhospitable Ground and killed my ONLY source of Pathfinder. This is going to be a long, slow game...
I spent my turn, run Morghoul up to the left (just like my game against Circle), abandoning one of my Savages who is enraged, and makes the one charge attack. My Agonizer uses the -2 Warbeast Damage Scream, and the Gobbers stay where they are and pop cloud, as they have no use due to Trample attacks being a thing. The Krea moved and tried to shoot Tiberion and hit so he can't run or charge.
We had a rules discrepancy on how Enrage mixes with Paralysis, so if anyone could answer that in the comments it'd be helpful. Morghoul pops feat and puts Admonition on himself.



Fourth Turn:

The Cyclops Died. No surprise. Inhospitable Ground was cast again by Xerxis, and he bunched up in the back corner.

The Beast Handlers whipped the Bronzeback to try to over pump my opponent's Fury Management. The Cyclops was Abused and tossed at Tiberion to try and get some damage in on it, but he was out of Morghoul's control area and couldn't be forced for more attacks. the Agonizer walked over and used the -2 Damage scream which did nothing this game. the Gobbers walk over slightly and pop cloud again.




Turn 5 + 6:

The Bronzeback killed a lot of Beast Handlers. Tiberion kills the Krea and a Gobber. Xerxis kills the Cyclops. Inhospitable Ground I believe was dropped.

Morghoul cuts for 4, and upkeeps Admonition and charges, making mince meat of some of his Handlers, and I clock in a hit or two for a total of 4 damage on Xerxis before I Sprint up the field.

I fell for the following trick before, and it got me again.
He moves his Mortitheurge up in front of Morghoul, I didn't Admonition away. Tiberion slams it into me. Knocks down Morghoul, Xerxis feats, and One hit kills me on 4 dice at P+S 20.





Graveyard Photos and Thoughts:


The way I lost was particularly painful. It was incredibly frustrating to lose at the Attrition game so poorly. It felt like I forgot everything that I learned. I would have just replayed this game from the beginning rather than fix any particular Tactical missteps.The Cyclopes should have been screening my Gladiator by running at a slight angle. Then I should have Abused/Rushed them and charged up to hold off Tiberion and the Bronzeback for a turn.

The big debate I'd have is whether to have them try to focus down and double team a particular heavy or to each hold off one.
I'd be screening Morghoul with the Krea. Then the target not engaged by the conceivably Enraged and Abused Gladiator next turn would be shot by an Aiming Krea to keep it from moving too far. Most importantly out of all this MORGHOUL WOULD SIT IN THE MIDDLE. He'd be screened, but still.
He has a very small control area, so he needs to be well screened, and able to consistently be involved in what's going on to well, he is squishy but he is not Issyria or the Harbinger.
He has no control area and wants to be up next to his beasts. He cannot hide despite his frame as an Assassin caster.
Don't let his squishiness keep you from giving him the placement so he can use his Control area.

 Most of my support pieces didn't really help. The Gobbers were USELESS. I did some research and realized that as 1pt. filler I'd be better suited by a Feralgeist to get more mileage out of my beasts.

Further, I've realized that I am running just too many light beasts for higher points values and need to pick up some of the Skorne staple heavies for the purpose of having the necessary pushing power.

I suffered from ridiculously poor positioning, and being out board controlled by my opponent. It was a bad, bad game from the first second and shows that I still have a lot to learn, in the departments of list building, and more importantly tactics.

If I could have redone this game, I'd have had the Cyclopes run at less of an angle, shield Morghoul with the Krea, and set Admonition on one of the Cyclopes instead, used that as a way to bait around the Bronzeback, or as a way to keep the Gladiator safer. Then, I would have had both of the Cyclopes charge at both of them, and then having the Gladiator smash the Bronzeback before it can smash back.
Then, I'll have the Krea and the Gladiator be able to focus on Tiberion. Morghoul would have been better positioned by being closer to the middle to take advantage of the feat far better than it had been used.
Even then, beyond getting a unit of Infantry soon, I plan on investing in a Bronzeback so I can run a bigger heavy punch than I've been able to with support oriented lights and a single heavy.

This match was an eye opener on the capacities that Skorne has for someone who owns few of the models at this point, but also was a good way to show what I lacked when faced with such massive armor skew.
For any new players, or new Skorne players, realize that if you don't have at least one game that makes you reevaluate what you have, and any problems you have in the game, then you won't be able to get better.

Soviet Replacement Battle #28791

Given that I missed game night last week due to work, I’ve decided to post up my Khador Report, some of the details may be missing due to the age of the story, but this one is a lesson on positioning, and how quickly the game can change so quickly based on one bad move. I still didn’t pop feat, which I have decided to change very VERY soon.

This is also the Largest points game I’ve played, setting everything I own down onto the table, and with a 4^th of my army being support pieces I was very nervous, but this managed to work out beautifully. Mostly due to the forest that was on my edge of the table. If that forest was not there, this match would have gone TERRIBLY. This also, was a match where Bricking up managed to work very well for me, and while I had issues moving it around, it managed to work out. Also, I got to really let Morghoul stretch his claws and sever a beautiful amount of arteries, which made me glad, because it allowed me to learn how to answer a very big question of board control with a surprising ease.

20pts. of Khador vs. Skorne

Khador:

pScorscha

Spriggan

Widow Makers

Widow Maker Solo

Ironfan Pikemen + UA + Kovnik

20pts of Skorne

pMorghoul

    Titan Gladiator

    2 Cyclops Savages

    Basilisk Krea

     Min. Pain Giver Beast Handlers

     Swap Gobbers

     Agonizer

The Khador player won the roll to go first. I took the picture a little late so that individual Ironfang on the far right should not be where it is. I did my best to brick up and put the important Support Pieces where they should. I had the Gobbers take front position, learning from the game where they accomplished nothing. The Paingivers stayed in the back but in range of each of the Beasts, and let the savages team up on the left flank to deal with the Widowmakers as need be. The Gladiator took point and I planned on having him ram head on into the Spriggan. This first turn I really planned on just trying to avoid/tarpit the Pikemen, as I knew that if they accomplished much or tied me I’d be spending my turns making out fury to tear through High Armor Infantry.

Turn 1:

Everyone runs. I got the picture here a little late so he was already starting his turn 2.

He just lets everyone run up, and maintains the same position on everything. Tosses down Fog of War with Scorscha.

I shift the brick to more of an ellipse, and do my best to keep everything safe from his Widowmakers and the Spriggan’s Lance Gun. I put Admonition on the Gladiator who is hiding in the Forest, to gain the benefits of Cover due to terrain. 

The Savages take flank on the left and right due to not having space in the beginning of the forest. The Krea pops animus keeping my Agonizer, and Savages and Gladiator safe. I use the Krea to screen my Caster, who is toeing the Gobber cloud, with the Beast Handlers hanging in the back as mild expendables. I forgot to put Fury into the Agonizer, to my Chagrin, but I had to use a lot of Fury this turn due to castings of Abuse to make my Gladiator hoof it fast enough.I twisted it around to keep my support pieces safer and less spread out so that the Widowmakers are as purely useless as possible. My opponent’s poor rolls this game honestly don’t help.

Turn 2:

The Khador player Upkeeps Fog of War and starts trying to take some shots at my stuff. He misses a lot with his Widow Makers, but manages to take down one of my Beast Handlers. The Spriggan fires at my Gladiator but doesn’t do anything particularly spectacular due to the buff stacking given by the Krea and the Forest, and shitty rolls. The Pikemen advance further.

My turn: Admonition is put onto Morghoul, and he puts Abuse onto the Gladiator. The Gladiator puts Rush on himself and slams the Spriggan, unfortunately moving outside of Morghoul’s tiny control area. I also send out one of the Cyclopes to deal with the Widowmakers and engage 2 of them, preventing them from firing on anything in particular. One Widow Maker dies, and two of them are engaged. 

Everyone else scoots over to the right, hiding in the forest, and benefitting from the Krea’s fantastic animus. I’m mostly scared of the Iron Fang Pikemen at this point because I hadn’t really figured out what to do with them this turn, other than a vague and fatalistic notion of tossing Morghoul at them since Pikemen are 1 Box infantry, and he can ricochet off them and deal with this tarpit with his bare claws. The Gladiator Slams the Spriggan just a little too far out of Morghoul’s Control Area after he put Rush on himself. I’m too prone to using Slam attacks rather than charges due to wanting to save Focus, but due to Morghoul’s small control area it’s not the wisest idea. I just need to soak that One Focus so that my Threat Ranges don’t extend past my caster. I forgot to pop smoke with my Gobbers. The Agonizer has been outpaced, becoming nothing more than 8 boxes of nothing due to no Arc Nodes being anywhere. The Agonizer is pretty useless against Khador. It doesn’t start getting useful anytime soon.

Turn 3:

The Ironfang pikemen charge in. This Triggers Admonition. I have Morghoul run backward, which was completely unnecessary and didn’t help Morghoul at all, as it caused issues for him trying to establish a ricochet charge. Fortunately, one of my Gobbers dies so it isn’t really a problem. Scorscha Dashes off to the side behind the wall. The Widowmakers try to toss out some shots, but are completely ineffective. 

My turn: The Gladiator fails it’s Frenzy check. It wiffs miserably on hitting the Spriggan. The Savage, to be useful, charges up and kills the Spriggan. The Paingivers Enrage the Krea and the Savage. Morghoul charges in and bounces around, dealing 1 point of damage to each of the Pikemen, accidentally dealing 1 damage to a multibox Kovnik rather than to the more useful targets. He clears the unit of single point infantry. He then sprints through the forest popping out on the other side. This one move cost me the game. The remaining Savage and Krea play clean up on the one or two models in the Pikemen unit, expertly removing them all in a single turn. This was my proudest and Stupidest moment in the entire game.

 I had it. I had cleared out the tarpit unit. I had let Morghoul show off the sheer levels of badass that Warlocks can attain, and had just been able to feel a rush of balls to the walls power tearing down an ENTIRE UNIT in ONE TURN. IN MELEE. It felt really good. But I messed up on running Morghoul to his limits and ran him too far through that forest. Leaving him totally exposed.

Turn 4:

Scorscha Casts Cyclone, then Advances, and fills my exposed Morghoul with Spammed Razor Wind. Killing him.

Kill Shot: 

Discounting casters I've decided to include a new point in my reports called "Kill Counts", where to clarify what happens in the rounds I post pictures of removed models at the end of the match for both sides. 

Thoughts:

Wow. That was a really rapid end. It was a series of badass one turn executions. Whether they be Ironfangs or ‘Locks. I got what I wanted out of this round on a visceral, simplistic level by managing to run Morghoul hot and buy a ridiculous amount of attacks. On a play level, I feel as if I had managed to play my brick pretty well, but if I didn’t have that forest than I would be by far worse off. Not to mention I have to give a very honorable mention to my local Khador player getting Terrible Rolls this game. Everything he fired missed horribly. It kept half his army from being really useful, which made my time A LOT easier.

I need to learn the importance of the Control Area, as I slam instinctively, due to it being the Gladiator’s shtick, always leaving him in a place where I can’t give him any maintenance. I haven’t had much experience with the Beast Handlers, so I need to plan ahead more on if the charge is at all as helpful at times as it otherwise would be. It’s about balancing out for that strange mixture of risk and preparing for failed die rolls. 

However, I got pompous with Morghoul about how far he could move, and just lost all sense in the power rush. I should have stayed in the forest.

I also lost my Gladiator BY AN INCH, pretty much consigning him to uselessness due to sitting on 4 Fury that he would never be getting rid of due to terrible positioning.

This battle really showed how important my positioning is round by round, and that a good brick for some casters works better than others.  

Argus and Kaya and Ferals, Oh My!

This week, I finally managed to take up a round against Circle of Orboros. Oh God, was I unprepared to face Circle. I resorted to my standard brick strategy of Clumsy Frontwards Elephant, Flanking Cyclops in the second line, and a nougat filling of Krea and Morghoul.

This is NOT what you do beginning Skorne players. This is NOT THE GOOD GAME PLAN.

In my frantic state I missed the deployment picture, and due to circle being more an army of Roadrunners than Wile E. Coyotes like I expected, I may forgot some of the details in the rounds.

15pts of Circle Orboros vs. Skorne
Lists:
Me:
pMorghoul (-7)
Titan Gladiator (+8)
Basilisk Krea  (+4)
Cyclops Savage (+5)
Cyclops Savage (+5)

Opponent:
eKaya + Lyas
Winter Argus
Winter Argus
Feral Warpwalker

Deployment:

The Circle player won the roll to go first.

He set up Kaya on the Hill, the Warpwolf to my left, Laris to next to her, and flanked by the Winter Argi on the far left.

Turn 1:

He’s Gotta Go fast. And Runs all his stuff at tremendous speeds that I am not AT ALL used to. Going up against Trolls and Khador since I started this blog made me soft. Frantically, to keep myself from being boxed in in open terrain, and knowing pretty much all of Circle’s models have Pathfinder, I shift and slightly unpack the brick, moving it to the left. I put Admonition on the Gladiator. I Abused the Krea so it could walk. I ran up the Cyclopes and kept Morghoul in the back.

Turn 2:

Kaya activates and puts Muzzle on the Gladiator. So, he can only move left to right. She then pops feat. Here is where I made the biggest blunder. One of her Argi ran up and triggers Admonition. 

I don’t act on it thinking there’ scarier stuff that’ll be close I should move away from. He crits on the spray, leaving my Gladiator stationary. He then suffers an unmerciful beating from all of his beasts, leaving it a quick one turn yo-yo of death leaving me demoralized, frantic, and confused.

My turn. I’m freaking out, and as always forgot to pop feat. Though given where Morghoul really could have moved, this was probably one of the safer places to keep him.

Morghoul kept Admonition on himself, and I did my best to survive, knowing that most of his High Def models were out of my hitting capacity, and as most of them have been heavily/moderately damaged by spray attacks.

Turn 3:

He kills the two Cyclopes pretty handidly. enough times, and the other with the Argus near near the bottom. He walks the Winter Argus in range of admonition, which allows me to scoot up to use him as a screen from the Warpwolf  next turn, and Laris runs up to my side of the field.

My turn: I really don’t do anything this turn, once again forgetting to feat, and spending all my fury that I had on attacks rather than saving for transfers.

Turn 4:

Lyas runs up and Kaya pops Lyra’s animus, and shoots Morghoul to death.

Thoughts:

In all of my battle reports or games, I have NEVER feated. This is my First and most noobish problem. I guess I’m too busy looking at his spell card to remember, and probably due to me not knowing the extent of my opponent’s models, that I feel hesitant. For instance, Kaya has a spell that allows for no forcing to be required for run/charge actions. But she has to spend fury to use it. Regardless, I would have survived had she not been able to spend fury the turn prior. 

       

      My positioning in relation to the Orboros alpha strike was terrible and I need to really learn how to screen against someone who has such a strong upperhand in the threat range department. The Titan Gladiator is my bread and butter, so I have to ensure that it is able to do it’s job with ease. Talking with my opponent afterward, I’ll be more considerate of my opponent’s speed and depending send the Cyclops Savages to an early grave in the front lines.   

      

     When set in a situation you can’t understand, you have to also stay cool headed, or otherwise you’ll make absent minded mistakes, like I made plenty of. Also, you always have to feat.

Skorne has the capacity to take a good alpha strike to the nose and keep on fighting, so we need to exploit that as well as we can.

       

      Positioning wise I pushed for cover thinking that would keep me safe from the sprays but that was more my own ignorance of the rules. I should have marched up the middle into the “forest” templates we had near the front to make it safer for me.  Further, if there is any chance to avoid the brunt of an assault, always take the out.

This battle was a series of displays of ignorance and poor judgment, always friends in losing battles.

If you play against circle, you’ll have to be careful, fellow Skorne player, and put more emphasis on our tough capacities than our speed buffs.