11/7/15: Steamroller and MERCs Game!

Howdy!

So last Saturday I got to play in a Steamroller tournament for Warmachine/Hordes. I hadn't played in a while but luckily I've had practice with friends every time we played together. Lately I had been having the most fun with my Trollbloods using my newest version of my Doomshaper list, so I decided to bring the old blueskins to test my luck. My luck was absolutely terrible...

And just to clarify, it was simply luck that kept me from getting wins. Not how I played, or my opponent getting the best of me, just really crappy rolls at the worst times. All my opponents unanimously agreed that I had the win, if it weren't for my terrible rolls.

First game deployment against pSkarre

Sorry I didn't take many pics, I was concentrating on the game (timers give me heart palpitations). My opponent used his pSkarre list. When he saw my lists he didn't even look at it all and assumed it was pDoomshaper's theme list Runes of War, which is huge in the Meta and tournament scene. I, of course, told him it wasn't, which garnered a shocking look. I personally don't like net lists, not for the lack of originality but simply because every Meta is prepared to see it. What I like about mine is that it acts completely different than the Runes list with a similar build, and people simply don't see it coming. My friend Monty once told me that no one has ever mentioned seeing or playing my list before, and it hasn't lost... until now.

Well the game was going smooth on turn one. He pushed all his infantry to screen his army with his caster way in the back. I proceeded to trample through them and goad for 16" straight to the caster with Mulg. I had 3 attacks left, and if I hit then one more for the affinity, with boosted attack rolls from Wild Aggression. With a MAT 7 against DEF 16 I only needed 9s on 3 dice, and his armor was a mere 15 or so (no focus since he didn't think I'd be anywhere near him top of turn 2) with my STR 20. All I needed was one hit to pretty much seal the deal and get an extra attack in case. My first roll was three 1s. I quickly just got over it and rolled again, and again, and missed every one of them. Meaning I lost out on the affinity attack as well. I know that it's not impossible for that to happen, but man it stings. 

Well, this tactic of surprise assassinations really doubles down on the attempt, leaving my caster in the open and getting him killed immediately after. After the game he said that I should have had it, and that he's never seen the list before nor expected it to be that aggressive, which makes me somewhat proud that I can make an original list that disrupts a seasoned veteran's plans.

Wold War and Failure Number Two

So in comes the second round. I'm upset since I knew I should have had the last one, but I get over it for another chance at redemption. This time I'm paired up with Circle, particularly the Wold War theme list for Bradigus. I've read on it once, and it seemed like it was a powerful combination of abilities and denial. Naturally I played a lot more defensively than usual with my Mulg list. Although I knew of certain aspects of the list I had never once seen it in action so I didn't know what its strengths and weaknesses were. I still thought that perhaps my usual tactic should work, but this time I didn't opt for the turn two assassination as the slow moving army was slightly out of range for it.

Top of turn Three

We both had similar armies in terms of strategy, with high armored beasts going straight for the jugular. I decided that since his whole army is a battlegroup I'd try to stretch his resources thin by keeping my Champions very far away in the opposite zone. They can operate on their own effectively and contest or score a zone, and if he decides to dedicate any efforts to it his caster will have to stay within range for his control, either forcing him to keep everyone in range or abandon the zone. He slowly approached my army while I kept my beasts on the right. Once he was in range I had Mulg trample over near the caster, kill a shifting stone for Goad, then got right in range of Bradigus.

This is what it looked like when I stormed in

With Mulg having 4 fury left and the Affinity I had it. Bradigus only had 2 fury stored, so two attacks were going to get transferred. This left 3 attacks on ARM 16 (?) to do damage, which is plenty enough with STR 20. This leaves on average a total of 10 damage per attack. Three attacks getting through mean 30 damage on average, about twice his HP. The plan seemed solid, with plenty of redundancy for damage. And I only needed sevens to hit with free boosted attacks.

The first two he takes without transferring, leaving him down to 3 HP. He was forced to transfer the next two hits. On the last Affinity attack I rolled a 5 on three dice.

AAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHHH!

Needless to say I lost immediately after that.

I just couldn't believe it. It happened again. Lousy rolls killing solid strategy and ruining my list's potential. My list is still effective once you know what it does, it's just a lot harder to run the gimmick once they're ready for it. And I've beaten people before who knew what it did, especially in Kill Box where there's not many places to hide.

Anyway, with my Spirit thoroughly crippled I got the bye on the third round. With the bye I got the opportunity to play the TO George in a game of Mercs, the high point of my day...

I brought my lovable FCC House 9 models while he used his USCR. I know how USCR works, as well as the fact that the Behemoth is near auto-take for most people (personally I'd attempt not using him simply because it's expected that you would). High armor is a problem for FCC without a Black Ops member, which is the situation I found myself in. I knew that my mobility was key to attaining a victory, and utilizing the FCC's corporate ability (in Mercs 1.0, not 1.9) to bypass his Suppression and Overwatch lanes. I used the Boomer, House Leader, Chem Engineer, Pack Rat and House Member and he used all but the Booster in his force. The picture above was at the bottom of turn 2, but it's similar to where everyone was deployed short of moving up the board. I set up the board with plenty of terrain and made sure it was asymmetrical in elevation to make things interesting. The amount of terrain surprised him as he's used to a lot less terrain, but I feel like the game is not nearly as interesting if there are huge lanes of fire, and the right abilities tend to just overtake the game if you have less terrain, so I built it a lot like an Infinity table. The rules state to ensure there are no open lanes from deployment zone to deployment zone - which is interesting as a lot of the official maps do just that - and I made it diagonal, which is a common thing in Infinity that really makes things interesting.

So he won the roll off on picking sides and deploying his first model. Naturally he chose the high side and gave me an unsure look, since he's able to deploy on top of the upper right building (which I did on purpose as the roof was fairly open and there were more walls and less open ground on the other deployment side). I assured him that it's okay to deploy on top, even if his models just dominate it is a fair thing to do and something I'd need to practice against anyway. I'm a huge believer in practicing terrible match ups in order to get better, as that makes playing even match ups much simpler.

He proceeded to capitalize on the leader ability by keeping everyone close to his leader, while deploying the sniper and behemoth on the same roof. These are sound tactics, but I believe the redundancy of a sniper and the Behemoth in the exact same vector doesn't create good fire lanes, as there is no crossfire. Granted, should something get in that lane it's gonna have a bad time. But if you simply avoid their lanes and stay out of LOS then you eliminate two models' effectiveness entirely. Being that he deployed the rest of his models in the center lane he limited the crossfire on my left side, making it the best side to approach for me. I love how this game effectively represents a real firefight, almost to the same extent as Infinity. It really does remind me of playing paintball, as the 3x2 table size is a lot like a speedball field, and the same tactics apply.

So I deploy my guys very spread out. On the right I put my Pack Rat and Leader. I do this because the Pack Rat can take a lot of punishment with his Medkits, and the leader may be able to Sweep the field and give the Pack Rat the leader bonus. Unfortunately her Caltrops are useless against a slow opponent like USCR, as there aren't many opportunities to control their movement when they're hardly moving already.

In the middle I deploy my Boomer. Being in the middle helps him react to either side efficiently. His weapon can single handedly control the center and break up clumps, and while loading he can hide out behind some cover. Controlling the center is important as it allows your flanks to aggressively move, but the center doesn't necessarily need to aggressively move at all. Once he's at the 50 (like the 50 yard line, Paintball term!) he's exactly where he needs to be. Moving further up would only be necessary if he's out of range of corner models, at which point he's bounding with his flank.

On the left and most important flank are my House Member and Chem Engineer. I've found this pair to be incredible together in Mercs 1.0, mostly due to the House Member's mobility and the Chem Engineer's MP of 3. The HM can bound with the Chem Engineer while the CE moves and fires and keeps pace. If he lands a hit he does permanent debuffs on the enemy model. If the opportunity presents itself and the way is clear he bounds as well and has a MP 4! That's one speedy flank.

Here we have the Chem Engineer covering the House Member's advance

So the game begins with him moving the majority of his models up the center to the ruined building, placing three of his models within one card of the leader behind cover. His Behemoth and Sniper then advance to near the building roof's edge to prepare to unleash hell. Almost all my models bound to the leader and speedily move up the board, with the House Leader moving up to the side of a building. At this point George notes how fast everyone's moving, but really most are MP 2 which is normal, and the bound makes them move another card. I don't believe he's seen anyone just bound entirely for the first turn, but I know the importance of setting up fire lanes as far forward as possible and most people won't set up suppression/overwatch on the first turn instead of moving. He could have done so with his Behemoth or Sniper, but since I don't move any models until the last activation it's hard to tell how effective it will be. 

The next turn is when it got tricky. He set up overwatch with his Behemoth early on, but I cunningly triggered the shot with my Chem Engineer, with everyone else behind full cover. Being that he's forced to take the shot it caught his group of three models from the rear with no cover and promptly murderized two of them in one swoop! It then managed to miss my CE entirely. He now sees the drawback with having that massive guy and will be more careful with his placement in the future...

It seemed like it would be a good swing in my favor, but over the next few turns he managed to pick off my Leader, then Boomer, then Pack Rat in a fell swoop. The Boomer managed to pick off the remaining model in the clump before dying. What was left was the Chem Engineer and the House Member, who was fully into the enemy side and ready to flank the remaining Sniper and Behemoth. The CE managed to hit the sniper and blood him, along with debuffing him with the Irradiated Ammo, before succumbing to the Behemoth's rain of fire. His sacrifice managed to keep the House Member away from the cross hairs for one crucial round while he managed to dive into the shadow of the building out of LOS from the two enemies. George prepared against the inevitable climb and turned the sniper around to face the HM when he does. The HM won initiative, climbed the building and fired at the Sniper, killing him. The Behemoth had to spend his activation turning around to face the HM. The HM won initiative again in this fight to the last man, moved into the flank of the Behemoth, while managing to be in the back 180 of his arc, and shot at him. The attack certainly wouldn't wound, but it did force an armor break test which he failed, lowering his armor down to a still hefty 3. The Behemoth, however, can't move and shoot, and his movement is now zero, so the nimble House Member danced around to the rear arc, got within short range, and killed the Behemoth. It was a true David vs Goliath battle, and had an epic ending.

The final blow, ending in tremendous fashion

It was truly cinematic, and I had more fun with this game than I did with my previous two for WM/H that day. I really love this game, it boils down to maneuvering and real tactics more than out gaming - although some would disagree with me. It's one of my favorites, and I actually love it more than Infinity (but that game is still awesome). I wish it was more popular, but having two other people to play it is good enough for me. 

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the write up and pics, if you're feeling crazy give MERCs a try, at worse you will end up with awesome models to paint and be about $50 poorer. 

Works in Progress: Viktoria of Blood and Garden of Morr; New Trollblood List

Hello all!

I've been slowly chipping away at my paint log, although I'm still keeping in mind my mantra for 2015 and only painting what fancies me in the moment. Last week (or was it the week before?) I started painting Viktoria of Blood. I don't know what struck me, but I really wanted to paint some skin tones and do more work with Non Metallic Metal. I did, however, realize why I always put her off on the side - because I have some big plans with her model. I don't want to give it away, but it's something I've never tried before. I'm eager to take another step in my painting and modeling knowledge, and hopefully it doesn't prove too difficult or impossible to pull off. If it turns out the way I hope, then it's gonna blow minds. Or just look cool. Whatevs.

Anyway, here's my work in progress. I'll post a sort of step-by-step of how it's gotten here.

I started with my airbrush of course. After priming black (airbrush primer is one of the best things in life) I got a dark blue-grey and worked in my blocks of color for the NMM silver. I've always liked the way a blue-grey worked for metal, and when the model's fully painted you can hardly tell the blue tone is in there. It's a pretty versatile color as well. I've used it to shade white, I've used it to lighten up olive, and in this case I've used it for a blue tone of grey. It's a great way of achieving a neutral color like grey but making it visually interesting. It's one of my go-to colors, much like red or olive is now.

Once I block in the dark tones, leaving some of the darkest shades black, I lock in the highlights by airbrushing a light grey-blue mixed with the basecoat. Although airbrush can afford to paint light colors over dark and create a smooth gradient I still find it best to mix your steps together so you don't create an extreme change, although that technique also has its place. I wanted her shine to be more subtle. Once that highlight was in I added white to the mix and did a fine spray line where the light source would hit the armor directly. I took the basecoat grey-blue and lined the shading using blacklining techniques to create a deeper contrast where the overspray from the airbrush went. Then I edge highlighted with the lightest shade mix followed by pure white. You always want your edge highlight to be brighter than your highest highlight if you want to achieve a "pop" quality to your paintjob. You also want to use your mixes to create a gradual edge highlight, so the grey-blue basecoat highlights to edge the black, the midtone to edge the basecoat, etc. This helps with a realistic reflection of your light source.

I also experimented with the brown pants. In all my years of painting there are two things that always stumped me: black cloth and brown everything. I've still got to figure out black cloth. I joke with a friend that every time I've painted brown it has been a completely different recipe, and I've yet to find one I truly like. Well, this one is close!

I did a GW Doombull Brown basecoat, leaving no black. I gradually mixed in Elf Flesh and highlighted until i was at maybe 50/50. Then I did a heavy GW Devlan Mud wash. I like it alot, but I fear it will only work with heavily folded cloth, I don't know how it will look on any flat surfaces as I don't like to end with a wash too much anymore. I'm still searching for that perfect brown recipe, because I'm always running across leather on models!

At this step I've blocked in the colors for the hair and vest, and finished the skin tone. The vest is going to be a lot brighter, and I don't work with blond hair too often. The skin is my usual recipe that I have developed over the years. Over a black basecoat I use my GW Foundation Paint of Tallarn Flesh to get a good even coverage. The old Foundation Paints are some of my favorite in the range and it's a shame it's out of production. Because my skin tones are really light and I thin the paints very much I use this step to eliminate tedious layers of painting my actual tones. I usually have to do the same over a white basecoat as well, as flesh is one of those colors that goes on patchy and you can see all the overlapping layers until you've done about 3 coats.

Once that coat is on I paint about 2-3 coats of old GW Dwarf Flesh until the coverage is even. This is a kind of peachy/orange skin tone, like a sunburn or something. I then gradually mix in GW Elf Flesh to work the highlights until I get to 100% Elf Flesh. I then start adding in small amounts of white to get a good amount of highlight.

When painting skin it's important to do a very gradual succession of highlights. Skin doesn't reflect light like most surfaces do. It already has a tone itself, light just reveals it in different ways. So you cant just block in parts of the skin, which makes it look like an anime or cartoon. I see this a lot, especially around the faces or muscles, where it's essentially a blackline. Now, I still do this from time to time (see my Killjoy as an example) so I'm the first to break my rules. But I find that a subtle blend tends to be more successful than only using 2 or 3 layers.

Here I started doing the hair. I won't talk much about it, as I hate it. It looks like a porcupine. I think I'm going to paint over it. In the next step I tried fixing a spot on the bangs and got my color mix all wrong and now it haunts me. I hate painting blonde!

Here's where I'm at right now. I've painted NMM Gold on the sword and scabbard. I've painted the hilt with a purple/blue mix. I originally painted the scabbard with the same purple/blue mix, but I didn't like the way it turned out so I painted over it with my olive mix standard, which is dark olive gradually highlighted with light grey in the mix. NMM Gold is kind of like my new Brown and I haven't painted it the same once since I started it. I also painted the white cloth flowing from the hilt and on the scabbard.

I've got a few tidbits left for her, including my new technique, but I'm holding off on her right now until I get the mojo back.

Another WIP:

The Garden of Morr!

I've had this terrain piece for a while, and the kit is beautiful. It's pretty versatile too, and the modular footprint is good for several games. I started painting it on a whim, and just airbrushed grey over black and drybrushed white. The roof was basecoated a dark blue the I added white for a light blue, I may add more for a highlight. I stopped there, but really it's about done. I just need to pick out some details and paint the rust on the metal.

Well, that's about where I'm at in the hobby life. I'm still working on more things creatively, including some Malifaux-centric videos. I've been playing a lot lately, mostly Warmachine with a few buddies. I've made a new Trollblood Beast list on accident when I played a few weeks ago and I'm discovering that it's actually really good. Out of 5 games I've played with it I've gotten top of turn 2 assassinations twice, and I've won all the games with it so far. I'm sure it has some glaring weaknesses. 

• Epic Doomshaper
• Mulg
• Earthborn Dire Troll
• Dire Troll Mauler
• Troll Axer
• Champions
• Min sized Krielstone
• UA
• Whelps
• Janissa Stonetide

I'm sure it's been tread before. Essentially it's a Mulg Delivery System - or Mulg Missile. eDoomy can get him a minimum of 12" charge with reach. If Mulg gets hurt, 14". If he charges something and kills it, 16"+ per fury. I've gone over a lot of it in the much earlier log of beast tactics.

What I changed was putting Janissa in it with the EBDT. Troll players love this combo, I had just never done it yet due to not having an EBDT. Well, this is actually the first time I played with it even though I got one months ago. It's awesome.

The beasts are in the front blocking most fire to the brick with Armor 22, and Mulg Armor 23. If the wall is in front of them then their def gets a bump up to 14, not too shabby. Behind them is Doom with a bodyguard of Arm 20 Champs. I usually keep Doom on the side behind Mulg to bait out Protective Fit, but also so that when he needs to pop his feat he is free to go first without screwing up the order of operations, and usually the feat turn is on turn 2 when the opponent is caught off guard thinking he's safe. I've done a permutation of this before, but adding Janissa really changed things up for me.

In a list like this it's easy to get dependent on the one trick pony. This one is a turn two assassination. Most of the Meta is going to be ready for it, it's just that if I go first it will be hard to avoid - much like the Molik Missile lists out there. The turn two game ender is mostly there for those who don't know about Mulg and eDoomy together. But for those that do, Janissa can be the wrench in the plans for them. People can block tramples with big bases, or hide their casters out of range. Janissa can open up those lanes as well as provide cover and armor. I played a friend in 3 back to back games, and on the last one when he thought the trample was completely blocked by two Khador jacks, I cleared a way for Janissa and she popped in the gap to slide those jacks over and Mulg trampled past them to the caster. It was beautiful!

Problems with this list: It's tiny. I will be outnumbered. Hopefully the high armor and sheer amount of wounds will mitigate incoming damage, but I've played a game where he killed my axer first and I lost a lot of speed because of it, not to mention pathfinder. I'll have to make sure he's behind the three heavies now. Also, people who ignore LOS can target Janissa and the stone bearers, which is no bueno. Lastly, slippery casters like Ashlynn or Caine may stop Mulg in his tracks. We'll see how this list pans out.

One last negative, I no longer can have Janissa in my Madrak list, so my def 16/18 arm 20 champs got knocked down a peg to just def 14. I also have to fill that gap. It's a problem for later.

Well, this post went in all kinds of directions. Hopefully I'll finish Vik soon and post the pics!

Epic Doomshaper/Beast Heavy List Tactica

Hey guys

I've thought about making posts in regards to Tactica that I've discovered throughout my days playing wargames. I figured I'd start with some advice I gave someone.

About a little over a month ago I had a PM from another forum user in DakkaDakka. He asked this:

Hey Sub (My username is SubParNinja), i m angling to start up a W/H army soon, and i really like the troll bloods look, and from the very few games ive seen at the lgs play style. i was hoping to get some advice on a good place to start for a TB's force. i noticed youve given some posts youve made on the forums so i thought id ask! Not really asking for you to build me a list or anything, I'm more hoping to get some info about a good place to start for competitive play... i.e is more beasts, good combos, best lock etc. atm im leaning toward a war beast heavy style but im not sure how good that is, or what to really round it out with. also is the batlle box worth it ? or should i just buy what i need as i need it? thx a ton for any help you can give me !

This was my reply:

Thanks for messaging me. The battle box is awesome for the brick style player, i.e. making tough durable trolls that are hard to kill and hit like a ton of bricks. Even though it doesn't come with a heavy beast it comes with one of the toughest warlocks Madrak, whose feat is near useless in small games but if you leave any fury on him he is extremely hard to assassinate in one turn, plus you get one of the best upkeep spells known to trolls with Surefoot. What's even better is you get the axer, which if you plan on going heavy on beasts then he is an auto-include. His animus Rush gives +2 SPD (not movement, mind you, which is AWESOME) and pathfinder, which any good army should have the ability to give pathfinder to as many units as possible. The Impalers are so-so, although I've always loved them for their ability to slam at range with a P+13 as well as reach for support. Their animus tends to be self serving most of the time, although if you use a warlock with a ranged weapon then they are priceless (Madrak with a 12" thrown Rathrok fully boosted with an aim bonus has killed many unguarded casters). That's the battlebox in a nutshell, not the best but it is the way I started out and it is one of the best boxes for growing out an army to its fullest potential. Most boxes have something that doesn't grow well with the army or caster, and the trolls have one that ONLY works for growing. 

Now onto building your specific army. I've always wanted to build a warbeast heavy list, and since I mainly run Madrak it's not highly recommended seeing as how he tends to support infantry more. You can make him support beasts, but with the lowest fury on the totem pole it quickly stretches your resources to the brim. 

First I'll start with warlocks. Although it can be argued that you can run a lot of beasts with any warlock, it is not heavily debated that epic Doomshaper is best suited for the job. He literally is the best warlock for a beast heavy army, no contest. All his spells are centered toward beasts, and his feat just as much. He even has an affinity for the beast of all beasts Mulg. He also has a fury of 7 making it easy to manage your beasts and casts support spells. 

Now if you're taking eDoomy you will take Mulg. No questions asked. If you don't you are doing yourself a grave disservice. They go together like root beer and ice cream. 

So before I go onto beasts I will tell you about certain units that go well with a beast heavy army. First off the Kriel Stone Bearer Unit, full sized if possible with the Unit Attachment. This unit is a must have in almost any TB force. A +2 armor goes a very long way from making units average to hard to kill. If your beast was hit and damaged 8 times a KSB in range decreases damage by 16 points. That is HUGE. Couple that with the ability to regenerate and break out the wine my friend 'cuz that's some good cheese. The UA for them is also priceless for 1 point. It not only adds one more model to increase the fury vault and range, it stacks on another ability that makes the unit become a toolbox. You can either make stealth units no longer stealthy (not so great considering the close range, but you never know!), you can make your units immune to continuous effects (huge, huge, HUGE against Cryx and Menoth) or you can give every model in the aura a +1 strength (by far the most useful of the three, again making units go from average to awesome), ALL FOR 1 POINT. Keep in mind to protect this unit, usually keeping them in the back, because troll armies only succeed based on their support, and any smart player knows to kill these off first. You'd be surprised, though, how long they last because you will be presenting a lot of other immediate threats. 

Actually, now that I think about it, this is the only auto-include unit that I know for beast heavy armies. You can put other units in, but ultimately they would be taking points away from other support models and beasts. 

Onto solos... Unquestionably, without a doubt, you will need at LEAST one unit of Troll Whelps. This two point solo has saved my ass every game that I have ever used them. Always keep them off the table when deploying. Always remember to pop them out when a beast is damaged. One trick to keep in mind is when a jack or beast charges a beast of yours. After their first attack gets through you pop out a whelp within 1" of your beast and 1" of their beast/jack. This will make the rest of the attacks at -1 to hit, which coupled with +2 armor from KSB harder to kill. If your beast survives the onslaught then they have something to eat to help regenerate, although you will most likely be using them for comfort food to get rid of unwanted fury. Since they don't start off on the table your opponent will tend to forget about them, so when you charge in and have over 20 fury on the table he will think "Man this guy is screwed next turn" but then you use 1 or 2 of your whelps and POOF no threshold checks. Priceless. 

Another priceless solo: Janissa Stonetide. When I started using her I couldn't imagine life without her. She is the perfect defensive tool for any army and has a surprising offensive tool too. Keep her close to your caster to put up a wall about 0.5" away from him on a vulnerable side. Walls have a special rule that says you can't charge over them and you can't end your movement on top of them, effectively closing off any charges short of reach. If a reach unit does get the charge the target gets a +2 def in melee. If you're going against a gargantuan putting a wall 3.5" - 4" in front makes them impossible to get close because of its large base size! Her tectonic shift is great for late game. Sometimes you'll get an opportunity to move close to a warcaster's bodyguard unit and shove them 3" to the side for an assassination run, or move the caster 3" to the side or closer. Very rarely will you want to use her axe, although it is an armor piercing weapon, her other two abilities make it seem not as useful. 

Other solos are okay, but not auto-include like those two. 

Beasts: 

As I said earlier the first beast you will buy is Mulg, no questions. He's essentially a Mauler on crack with a big stick. At first his stats don't seem too off the wall he can get ridiculous with animi. He gets an extra attack for Doomshaper's Affinity, if your warlock gets damaged (and hopefully transferred) he gets a free advance. If he's damaged by an enemy attack he gets +2 speed next turn. Plus he heals and has critical smite. Couple that with the axer's animus to increase his speed another +2 with pathfinder and eDoomy's feat to have a +3 speed to charges, slams, etc., as WELL as eDoomy's Goad ability, you get what used to be a SPD 4 snail to a potential 14" charge with REACH, and if he kills something (which he will) ANOTHER 2" MOVE!!!!Trample to the caster FTW! 

Now that is an extreme example. In reality you will reliably be able to get a 12" charge with reach, which is nothing to scoff at, especially considering that there is NOTHING in the game that Mulg can't kill in one turn. NOTHING. Slap Wild Aggression on him from Doomy on turn 1 and see the carnage as Mulg now charges for free and has boosted melee attacks! That is about as efficient as it gets in regards to kill output. That means he should only be spending fury to buy more attacks, since boosting damage is inefficient when he's got a P+S of 20 (19 base with 1 from KSB). If he doesn't need the axer's animus then use the Mauler's for an additional +3 strength/damage. CRAZY! 

That brings me to the next auto include: the Mauler. Single handed the model that made me play TB. He has two open fists for all power attacks, an awesome Animus that makes any beast a killer, the best chain attack in the game, and a great looking model (at least the old one). He should be there to pump out an animus to Mulg, but if not then charging and killing something and throwing it into other things. I always boost this guy's initial attacks to get the chain attack for a free power throw, with his high strength he should be able to throw something far and into another jack/beast. Having two knocked down jacks greatly affects the caster's next turn to be efficient with focus and will hinder the retaliation significantly. It's not quite as crushing against hordes, but it is still significant nonetheless. He tends to really shine when coupled with Madrak, but he fits with any caster, especially a beast heavy eDoomy army. 

After that there's the Axer. Bring him for the wickedly powerful animus and thresher attacks. One thing that beast armies can have issues with is going against swarms of infantry. With the Axer having thresher that no longer is a problem, since he can pump up his speed with his animus then attack a butt load of models with reach and thresher. I've killed whole units with this guy. If you need to you can cast Wild Aggression on him for boosted Melee attack rolls for his thresher, and that will guarantee some blood. One way to do so is activate Mulg first, who should have Wild Aggression on, then activating eDoomy to cast Wild Aggression on the Axer. This way you can take care of heavy hitters and swarms of infantry. His main goal, however, is to allow eDoomy to use his animus as much as possible in the early rounds. If eDoomy uses his feat, then uses 6 fury to cast Rush on 3 different beasts, those beasts have a huge charge range of SPD+3+5 with pathfinder! Hell, you don't even have to charge. Hide behind forests so that your beasts can't be charged. Your enemy may even do the same thinking that you won't have LOS to them either. Then you pop the feat and cast Rush and just Trample through the forest and start striking. These are the kind of combos that make Trolls ridiculously better than their stat lines suggest. 

Now those are the must have beasts. One other beast to keep in mind is the Bouncer, although this is optional. Having the bouncer around means having a high armor beast with a reach/chain weapon. He is a bodyguard, mostly there to keep popping his animus on the caster to prevent unforeseen melee assassinations as well as to shield guard from shooting assassinations. Nothing too great, but between him and Janissa it's some pretty good insurance considering almost everything else in your army will be far out front stuck in some heavy melees. 

Another beast to consider is the Mountain King gargantuan. For all the combos I've mentioned already, they become, pun intended, gargantuan with him. +2 SPD/Pathfinder, Wild Aggression, feat, KSB +2 arm, etc. He may be a bit unwieldy and easily manipulated by the enemy, but that would have a great shock factor to have Mulg, a Mauler, then A MOUNTAIN KING. Even though he sprouts his own troll whelps, bring a unit anyway. You will see your enemy's frustration once they do all that damage then you eat 10 whelps at once to heal for 10-30 damage. 

Lastly think about the Earth Born Dire Troll. He is actually more like an auto include, but I honestly prefer the Mauler over the EBDT. If you do bring the EBDT you bring along his awesome animus. If you cast the animus on Mulg with the EBDT right next to him and Janissa's wall behind them with the KSB aura, the two of them can get a 22 and 23 armor. If they happen to be next to difficult terrain they get +2 speed. It's great to have him, and with Janissa it becomes less table-dependent to field him, so if you have the points I'd field him. He's also good at assassinations since he adapts the POW of any weapon in B2B with him (perhaps MULG or an enemy warcaster!). Plus he's one of the coolest looking models in the game. 

There you have it! I've thought about this kind of army for a long time now, I've just never gotten around to building it since I haven't even finished painting my Madrak force. 

Hope this helps!


That's it for my first tactica. It's not to structured, mostly concentrating on a beast heavy army. Maybe for next time I'll write one for pMadrak.