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You seem to be the ogre's bane! Very interesting summaries, and I'm very glad to see you having success with an army that is so very different (very mobile and with, you know, access to at least some magic ) than your dwarves.

To be fair, all progress I've made against Ogres has been on the back of failed panic checks. Some of that has been because I was trying to force it, some of that has been bad luck, and a lot of it has been the low points level- where Ogres (and most armies) can't afford a BSB. Also- I lost my first game against Ogres.

I expect to see the dynamics change notably when I kick up the points level.

Finally got to roll the Requiem out against some non-Ogres!

I had the same old list, randomizing onto Lore of Slaanesh- I don't recall the roll, but I was able to select one of my spells- ending up with Acquiescence, Hysterical Frenzy, Slicing Shards. I was running up against High Elves:

Mounted noble, sword of might, other stuff? in...
10-ish silverhelms, full command
Noble BSB, unknown equipment in...
24-ish swordmasters, full command, banner of swiftness
6 reavers, musician
Bolt thrower

We rolled up a scenario, and got Dawn attack (the random deployment one). This boded well for me- a fast army like mine should be able to cope with any deployment hiccups. The High Elves even had their swordmasters forced to one of the side zones. Unfortunately, I responded by having half my units get dumped into the same side of the board. Still vanguards go a long ways towards correcting that kind of problem.

My plan at the outset was to lay acquiescence on the swordmasters, knock out the cav with a favorable knight charge and either avoid the swordmasters or pick them apart with ranged attacks.

High(low)lights

- I didn't put a whole lot of thought into where my general should go. I dropped him in the Hellstriders, then realized I was going to use them to go after the bolt thrower. So along he went for a (failed) 16" charge that left him pointing the wrong way for half of his spells. And when the bolt thrower killed all the striders (and knocked his charmed shield off) he had to repeat, and go after it solo (where he took a wound for his efforts).

- I ended up letting the Elves stay tightly grouped by vanguarding *at them* and continuously changing my plan mid-way through the turn, putting Acquiescence on the silverhelms instead of the swordmasters. I made this even worse by setting up dual flees for the silverhelms, but then giving them random move, so I couldn't flee anyway.

- Despite some early goofs, I managed to get the crucial combat I wanted. Then I got greedy in the magic phase and tried to save dice to fireball off the last couple of reavers and as a result, got neither Frenzy on my knights, nor Acquiescence on the Helms + Noble (to strip their re-rolls). This meant on the decisive combat of the game, I had neither hex/augment in play, and so bounced.

- Perhaps the sole highlight was the chariot which chopped a bunch of swordmasters up, then cut the BSB down before getting run off.

- The tale of the sorcerer was particularly woeful: as mentioned before, I ended up sending him against the bolt thrower, which shot his shield off, then took a wound from him in combat (would have been two except for the luckstone!). He then flubbed the crucial magic phase, and in his hail mary attempt to save the knight combat, he charged right into a tree and died. Yikes!

Result: Massacre loss for the requiem! (Tabled killing only the enemy BSB and bolt thrower).

After game thoughts:For an army intended to make the enemy make some difficult decisions, I sure didn't do anything but give a bunch of obvious choices. Yeesh. If I had it to do over, I would have sent two units at the bolt thrower in case (as happened) the striders failed charge, then stretch the cav away from the infantry. Also, it might have been worth going for the character snipe or phantasmagoria in this game- some good potential in a small battle like this one.

On the subject of magic, I'm definitely more comfortable with Shadow in hand rather than Slaanesh. I think the latter is plenty powerful, but I'm tending to push forward rather than avoid, and if you're going to get stuck in early, Shadow is pretty nifty.

With his list, it does sound like you could have nabbed the bolt thrower then played keep away a bit. I'm surprised the bolt thrower was off on it's own where you could get to it, though!

Well, with only three other High Elf units, it was going to be accessible regardless. I think it was just set wide to threaten flank shots through the knights...

Just a note to say more in the pipeline. I have a blurb reports at 1K for the new Wood Elves and Ogres, a blurb report at 2K for Dark Elves, and a full photo report on tap at 2K for Lizardmen. Learning a lot of things, and pretty pumped to keep cranking on the army.

Due to schedule uncertainty, I haven't committed to Northstar or Alamo (which are both now full), but hope to make Merry Mayhem (a 2K, one-day) and then really get on board with things in 2015- Hopefully Waaghapaca (though it will be tough to get a ticket), BiTS or ACon, and hopefully one travel tournament- QCR, Alamo, or maybe something out East.

Excite. Also possible Eastern rampage!

- Salvage

Looking forward to it, RZ!

Do the next year plans depend on 9th edition at all? I.e. if it hits this fall?

Might be some minor changes, but I'm playing infrequently enough and with a new enough army that 8th isn't too stale for me these days. The main factor is the kids getting self sufficient enough to make me not feel like I'm really making it rough on the better half if I go out for a weekend of fun...

So- a break for a family vacation and the crushing hobby realities of trying to parent small children have delayed things, but... here's the first of a few promised blurb reports (with photo report to follow).

1000 points vs. Wood Elves

I talked Aaron into busting out his Wood Elves so I could see the new book in action. He brought-

Level 3, Lore of Death, Elven steed, Dispel scroll
10 Glade Guard- Trueflight
10 Glade Guard- Trueflight
5 Wild riders- standard, musician
5 Sisters of the Thorn
9? Waywatchers
Great Eagle

I randomized on to Lore of Slaanesh and ended up with: Lash*, Acquiescence, and Pavanne (and of course the Ruby Ring). Entertainingly in our 1,000 point game, we ended up with 5 lores- Death, Beasts, Life from the Wood Elves, and Slaanesh and Fire from Warriors.

We rolled up Battle for the Pass, which I don't feel necessarily favored one or the other of us, since we were both maneuverable. Right off the bat I felt some serious pressure- basically the only things I had that wouldn't evaporate from shooting (or even combat- marauder cav into 10 glade riders is bad news with ASF) were the knights, sorceror and the chariots. And that itching sensation in the back of my head was my memory trying to tell me that, yes there is *indeed* a no armor save arrow- and the way watchers had 'em...

Highlights and lessons learned

- I think I made a mistake by leaving a gap open in the backfield for the waywatchers. I could have easily covered it with packs of hounds, that could then vanguard back into line, but instead, 9 waywatchers dropped in behind. I was thinking "Oooo, there's some easy VPs", but...
- To deal with said Waywatchers, I turned around the knights and vanguarded the sorcerer and one unit of cav back. Even if this had gone well (it didn't), it was still going to mean a ton of shooting as I turned around to head back to the rest of the army.
- Magic is fickle (I know everyone else already knows this, but hey, I've been playing dwarfs). I passed a chance to solo charge the sorcerer out of a unit into the waywatchers, thinking I'd get the job done with some spells instead. Unfortunately, Aaron dispelled lash, fireball failed to go on 2 dice, and they were all still standing at the end of the phase (Hurrk!). I did pin the WWs in place with an Acquiescence.
- The knights continued to demonstrate that at 5 strong, minor swings in dice can be disastrous. Nothing way out of line, happened- they suffered one shooting phase from waywatchers (losing 2), charged said WW (lost another in combat), failed to catch said WW, lost a 4th to normal arrows, and the last one got judo-chopped by a great eagle. Again, none of these were particularly grotesque swings in dice- but when it comes to knights, a couple 1s on armor saves can add up very fast.
- I was kept in it by the Level 3 miscasting her first spell and the Sisters killing off their last two members with a minor casting (see third bullet point, above), though they did give a crucial wound back to their general via Shield of Thorns' lore attribute!
- The chariot got squandered, charging the Sisters plus Level 3 twice, who simply fled and returned (though this basically put the game on a Ld 9 rally test twice). Unfortunately, with resources turned around to deal with waywatchers (see second bullet point, above), the Wild Riders got the flank of the chariot, which was very much game over for what was one of my power pieces for the game.
- My general got to have a moment of glory, killing off the Wild Riders (in combat!), and coming a dispel scroll away from wiping the enemy general with Pavanne (probably the first and last time that spell will ever be scrolled in the history of Warhammer), but it was for naught and I was tabled!

Result: MASSACRE LOSS Didn't add it up, but I was tabled, getting only the Wild Riders and Sisters in return. I think I took a tough match-up and made it worse with some bad decisions and no concrete overall strategy- which should probably have been "Keep the Waywatchers in front, then push forward, sacrificing everything to get the knights, chariot, and sorceror in".

Looking forward to trying again- one of the problems with my army is that I'm developing it so slowly that other books are coming along that do the same thing only better (Dark Elves, Wood Elves, ?High Elves?). I have a feeling that the Elf game is going to be a real challenge and is going to need a lot of practice!

Tough game, seems those elves have more than just tricks up their sleeves...

are you thinking of expanding to cover some of your bases? and if so what were you thinking?

I can see a real use for a block of warriors (forsaken?!?!) marching up the field behind your fast stuff to finish off the anything that is too heavy for 5 mounted guys to handle, or perhaps a spawn or two to help saturate the field with units and divide incoming fire...

I do think I could've played it a lot better, but it still would have been tough.

I've got some more built, still sticking with cav right now. The next 1000 points more than doubles the knights and gets a fighty character in too. If I had a good idea for a second chariot conversion, I might add another of them in.

Slaanesh Forsaken might have some legs on 'em- swifstride move 6 can keep up with the rest of my boys pretty well I'm thinking. There's also a decent output of attacks there...