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Before starting in on basing my censers and breakers for DakkaCon I figured I’d accept the challenge from the HE player and feed my rat-things to his lumberjacks. My list was a little tweaked from last time, with a slightly more tricksy BSB …

SKAVEN 2500

L: Warlord - warlock-augmented weapon, charmed shield, talisman of preservation; bonebreaker
L: Warlord - ogre blade, armor of destiny, dragonbane gem, shield; bonebreaker

H: Assassin - weeping blades, potion of strength
H: Chieftain - BSB, banner of the under-empire, shield
H: Engineer - level 2, dispel scroll
H: Engineer - level 2, condenser

C: 30 Clanrats - full command, shields, ratling gun
C: 30 Clanrats - full command, shields, ratling gun
C: 30 Clanrats - full command, shields, ratling gun
C: 34 Slaves - pawleader, musician

S: 6 Gutter Runners - poison
S: 6 Gutter Runners - poison
S: 6 Plague Censer Bearers
S: 6 Plague Censer Bearers
S: 6 Poison Wind Globadiers

R: Hellpit Abomination
R: Warp Lightning Cannon

He’s been retooling his elves throughout 8th, and had landed on a fighty build that wasn’t going the boring route of depending on a level 4 to pull him through. Good on him, I says

HIGH ELVES 2500

L: Prince - 4/5+ save, level 1 wizard (DEATH), dispel scroll, great weapon

H: Noble - BSB, 2+ rerollable save, great weapon
H: Mage - level 2 (METAL), steal a power die crystal

C: 36 Spearelves - warbanner, full command
C: 10+ Archers - musician
C: 10+ Archers

S: 24 White Lions - banner of sorcery, ironcurse icon, full command
S: 18 White Lions - banner of eternal flame, full command
S: 18 Sword Masters - full command
S: Tiranoc Chariot
S: Tiranoc Chariot

R: 2 Eagles

MAGIC

Scroll Engineer - warp lightning, crack’s call
Condenser Engineer - warp lightning, scorch

Prince - spirit leech
Mage - searing doom, enchanted blades

TERRAIN & DEPLOYMENT

We rolled up Battle for the Pass, which I hadn’t played in a while. Though I’d miss the flank shenanigans it would also give me some more leeway for shooting, though frankly my skaven don’t get very mean until you’re at arms length, especially without the catapult.

We used my Mundane Terrain Chart to generate up some terrain: D6+4 = 6 pieces = 1 wall, 3 ponds / rivers, 2 woods! No LoS blockers!



Engineer (scroll) joined the clanrats at top, breaker general + BSB (in second rank) joined the next clanrats, engineer (condenser) joined the slaves for miscast absorption, and the LT breaker joined the last clanrats in order to use them as a launching pad into the flaming white lions. Note that the gutters in my deployment zone were placed instead of scouted, to see were his flaming lions were going. Also, the assassin is here deployed in the third clanrats, but in reality he was hidden there and never revealed himself

On the elf side, the BSB rode with the big white lions, the mage joined the musician-less archers, and the prince rocked out with the other lions.

Skaven easily won first and took it away!

BATTLE
Turn 1


General advance, with a slow 4” on the hellpit’s part. Magic saw an IF warp lightning fry 3 sword masters and 5 slaves (), shooting poisoned an eagle to death with gutter stars and the WLC overshot the lions.



Elves moved up, with mage jumping into spear blob. Enchanted blades (arrows) went on the top archers, who downed 3 censers.

Turn 2


Forgetting that the archers would still get ASF vs. their I5, the gutters rear-charged some elves, lost 4, killed 1 and held on a push (no musician = no tie breaker). The central censers also flipped out and had to charge the sword masters, so rushed in, choked 3 to death and then were diced. Otherwise the HPA trundled 7” and prepared to receive the charge, some other things moved up, magic was nothing with a 1-1 winds roll, the WLC overshot the other lions, a ratling gun did 1 wound to the lower tiranoc and another did a stunning 4 to the fatty lion squad.



The white lions took a deep breath and charged the hellpit, while an eagle zipped in to the gutters to avenge its mate, and the sword masters charged the globadiers, who fled (and nobody cared enough to panic). Magic was shut down (scroll burned against the Death snipe on the LT), and shooting dropped another censer. In the fight nobody cared about, the archers fluffed, the gutters fluffed, the eagle pecked 1 rat-thing and everybody ignored the gutter that went running for the table edge. In the main event, the white lions double-failed their fear test and suddenly it was on. Hitting on rerolled 5+ was too hard for the lumberjacks, and after regen-ing the 2 wounds it was dealt the hellpit slammed 13 S6 attaks into them (hitting on 3+ is nice!), which combined with a 2 t-stomp crushed 10 to jelly. The elves held.

Turn 3


The LT breaker pulled his favorite Not So Sneaky Trick and solo-charged the flaming white lions, and the 2 remaining censers tried and failed to help out the hellpit with his (bloody) white lions. Magic was again a non-event with a 2-1 winds roll, but shooting was suitably delicious: a ratling gun took down a rank of spear-elves (6), and the other 2 combined to splatter 9 sword masters across the field. The WLC made up for its 10” deviations in the first 2 turns by hitting a chariot with S10, vaporizing it. The mayhem continued when LT pulverized a champ (won by 1 with charge, lions held), and the hellpit took 2 wounds, killed all 10 remaining lions, t-stomped the BSB for 5 wounds (all saved on rerolled 5+!), and pursued over him as he committed seppuku. (It seemed like the HPA ought to get a pursuit roll since his enemy wasn’t wiped out in combat but as a result of failing a break test, but since BSBs auto-die I’m not sure if this was right.)



Deeply disheartened, the pansies threw caution to the wind and called out some unfortunate charges: sword masters into a ratling gun (stand-and-shoot killed 1, then they failed the long charge), chariot and eagle into the hellpit. Magic actually searing doomed a ratling gun off the table, then the mage’s adopted archers killed the last censers and the other archers shot the other ratter. When face-smashing time returned, the prince gallantly challenged the second-in-command bonebreaker, got 1 wound past his 3/2+ save, but then died neatly to the beast’s return attaks. The breaker held on the -1 (musician). The hellpit took no wounds from impacts, high cheek bones, horse hooves or beaks, decided to feed (3 to chariot, 2 to eagle = just short of both!), then broke them both and caught the chariot (1-1-1 flee roll).

Disgusted by my dice and his evaporating army, the HE player called it.

SKAVEN MASSACRE

Not a lot of post-game analysis to give, as in a lot of ways he was right, my dice were pretty excellent - with the notable exception of magic, but I could care less about that His own magic lores didn't do much to help him out, and with 10-12 power dice each phase he certainly had an advantage that he couldn't capitalize on with any spells I cared much about.

Next up, DakkaCon!

- Salvage

Nice report- the diagrams were good ones. Looks like the key point in the game occurred during deployment- the hell pit ending up away from the flaming white lions (who faced LT Bonebreaker instead!)

Good luck at Dakkacon- hope to see some reports come on out of there.

RZ

Wow, that was pretty horrific. I had just gotten done saying how your dice usually hate you, and you still manage to do alright with your Skaven in another thread, then roll over here and see you suddenly able to roll what you need pretty much every time you need it. I don't know anything about the relative strengths of the match up or lists, but wow, I just don't see what he could have done differently. It is kind of horrifying that he didn't even make your lines as such, and only the white lions that attacked the HPA even made it past half field. Just... wow.

Yea, my dice have been ramping up over the last few games, and I can only assume this or my games with you, Wehrkind, this Friday will be the peak - which means sad things at DCon itself When the dice are cruel, an army based around pushing your luck can be pretty depressing. When the dice are on fire, the army is still depressing, just not for me

I actually was completely sure he'd rock my face off with this build, but I caught a few breaks that made things easier:

1) My dice were there when I needed them, and then some. Magic sucked pretty hard but I've written that out of my armies' strategies, so if magic becomes a heat-sink for my bad luck, that's awesome. (It should be noted that his dice were not nor are they ever really 'bad', as attested to by his ability to roll 5+ saves and wards like nobody's business. He just had a couple flops that, while statistically expected, shown against all the solid gold I was throwing.)

2) His magic lores weren't going to do him much good vs rats, with the exception of perhaps Doom & Darkness or various Death terrors he didn't get. Going big with Metal #6 might have been an option as well.

3) He seriously overestimated the range of my guns and deployed over 24" from me, or perhaps he was still playing in a 7th edition HE mindset, where you've got the firepower to make the other guy come to you. If he had blitzed all his combat units forward, he could have overloaded my scant ranged resources and made me commit with clanrats, which inevitably brings dead rats and me kvetching about how terrible my core troops are

4) Hellpit survived 20 white lions + BSB, thanks to that double-botched fear test. Maybe I overestimate lion damage output, but they've flipped over the hellpit before in a single turn. With them falling, there wasn't much he could do on that flank, and his flaming lions - which he had the opportunity to load into that flank and go after the abomination, as it hit the table before them - were off being smacked around by the flame-screw LT.

Honestly, I think these particular 'fighty elves' are more geared to fight the same warriors I've been facing recently, hence more lions and more anti-armor / anti-scary character magic.

Cheers for the comments lads. Will have my camera with me at DCon, so at the very least you might get token shots of painted things

- Salvage

So it's the rats that are coming to DakkaCon, then? Looking forward to seeing them in action

The HPA cleaned house! Would've rather seen him chopped to pieces by the unit with the flaming banner, if I'm honest

Hehe, if the trend of my basement holds true, Friday will end with a few of your dice lost or embedded in the walls, and a minor loss for me Then again, it isn't the chaos lads you are bringing, so probably the same will be true but with major losses for me

I did notice that magic just never seemed to happen, which probably is the best thing for your list. I am still knocking around the idea of super light magic lists in WoC that just focus on pounding face instead of all that hand waving mumbo jumbo.

Remind me to bring my camera too, and then remind me to take it out of my pocket. Perhaps I will hang it round my neck in fact... though I think I actually prefer your diagrams to pictures. Very clear, and easy to tell what is what as opposed to blurry pics of models you don't recognize anyway.

I didn't realize the Flaming Lions set up AFTER the HPA... that was a serious mistake too. If that monster had been brought down in a round or two you would have had a much more difficult fight on your hands.

Looking forward to this weekend, where the rats can kick around Chaos lads of a different stripe!