Hi Guys,
I was at a tournament last weekend, and my personal result was a bit of a surprise. Not my final placing mind you, I came 9th out of about 35 players, unluckily only going 4-3 but picking up about 9 control points over the course of the weekend, so narrowly missing out on a good placing (I did win best of faction; Circle, though). My last couple of tournaments I came 5th and 6th, so in the bigger picture, not as much of an improvement.
The real shock was that the three games I played with my favourite caster (Kromac) were all loses, while my controversial second choice of Cassius resulted in my only four wins of the weekend. So that's 4/4 with Cassius, 100%! It wasn't really the case that I used him against the weaker players or easier draws every time, either. At least two of those games were against quality players and what I regarded as relatively difficult matchups.
For those of you who would like to see in much greater detail what actually happened, there is also my youtube page with slideshow commentary reports;
www.youtube.com/user/vaulsc
*** Kromac the Ravenous ***
^ Warpwolf Stalker
^ Warpwolf Stalker
^ Pureblood Warpwolf
^ Gorax
- Shifting Stones
- Stone Keeper
- Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew
- Blackclad Wayfarer
My Kromac list. I really hate playing with circle at 35pts, it's too difficult to make a good, well-rounded all-comers list for me, but this list I feel captures the core of what makes Kromac work for my own playstyle. You can afford to make a good trade with one of the stalkers while keeping the other alive. The pureblood synergizes well with the stalkers and essentially provides wraithbane as the answer to a lot of matchup problems that this list (or the alt list) would often be unable to answer. All of the beasts can use it as well as kromac himself.
The gobbers are essential for prowl and protecting Kromac, and the Blackclad is nice for capping points or triggering warpath with his spray, and the occaisonal hunters mark, although if I changed anything in the list it would probably be him - most likely swapping for another set of stones.
*** Cassius the Oathkeeper & Wurmwood, Tree of Fate ***
^ Warpwolf Stalker
^ Gorax
- [Min x4] Tharn Ravagers
- Tharn Ravager Chieftain [
UA]
- [Max x5] Tharn Wolfriders
- Shifting Stones
- Stone Keeper
- Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew
- [Min x4] Farrow Bone Grinders
- Totem Hunter
Here's the list that compelled me to make this thread. I have a hard time working out a second caster to be Kromac's sidekick, pBaldur, both kreugers, Morvahna are all good choices. But at the end of the day there is one problem that always plagues me most as a circle player, and that is a big wall of infantry with tough. It's a real issue - Terminus, trolls, rhupert, irusk... I find that pKreuger is nice there but he can't always reliably wipe out the whole unit of McThralls, or deal with enemy armour at the same time as he deals with their infantry. He's also a bit light on tricks - if it comes down to an attrition war in the centre over some objectives, i'm not confident that he'll win it if he's only cleared out a 10-man tough infantry unit and hasn't dealt with the rest of their army.
Cassius has a control feat, which is rare in circle. If you time it right, you're basically shutting down their next turn - something that only pBaldur and eKreuger come close to doing in Circle. But that's only if you use it defensively. The offensive use is to of course force them to re-roll tough rolls as they are knocked down in the forest, and to then move up with your forces and get kills that power up the Tree with soul tokens. That's what my list is about, so i've gone with only the Stalker/Gorax combo for beasts, freeing up maximum points for infantry and solos that have treewalker or hunter.
The max wolfriders are ideal - when the tree is teleported up and feats, they can keep up with it thanks to their massive movement. Then they can assault a curse of shadows prey target, which is devastating. You don't have to commit your stalker if they can do it, and of course they can light cav backward - especially good if the feat is still up to hide them.
The Tharn are another controversial choice, but with this style of Cassius play they aren't as awful as usual. The Mat9 charge is very nice, so with the feat you can reliably kill 5 bane thralls, and when the counter attack comes they are sitting at Def15. If you do lose them, you get souls. They're also relatively cheap for a med-based unit with UA.
Bone-grinders, awesome with Cassius but I know i'm not breaking any new ground here, they're already a popular choice with him. It's not just 2 points for 4 souls, they can increase his spell range by 2inches (which in my mind makes him less desparate for gallows groves), and the icing on the cake is that in this list, I only have two warbeasts, both with two excellent Animii, if I lose one I can still use the animus if I have a bone grinder left!
The Totem Hunter. He's a reasonable solo, I usually go for something better in-faction for that 3 points, but he makes the grade here for one reason only - he has hunter. When that feat turn comes, he can still charge (if he doesn't want to leap) and then sprint back into the forest. And if they have tough, it's unlikely to trigger and deny the sprint.
Note that pretty much everything in the list is great against a CoS target. You can also use a bone grinder as a nice Hellmouth ''anchor".
Game Summaries
1 - Kromac vs eSkarre - Overrun
*** eSkarre
- Deathjack
- Leviathan
- Nightwretch
- Max Satyxs Raiders +
UA
- Raider Captain
- Necrosurgeon & stitches
- Scarlock thrall
I was too afraid to open with Cassius for this one, as his other caster was pDenny. Logically, my opponent was never going to go with pDenny because she's so weak against Kromac, but I was nervous that he might try to double-bluff me or something. Also, the satyxsis are very quick even without charging, I knew I wouldn't be able to move the tree up very far without them attacking it. They avoid wolfrider javelins quite well with force barrier, and eSkarre's spell list would no doubt cause me problems if I wasn't shutting her down with Bestial.
The game turned out well, with me pulling into an advantage when he left one of his raiders next to his deathjack, allowing me to charge it, triggering his admonition... only for me to move 3" right after it thanks to the warpath trigger from killing the raider! Gold. Anyway, due to poor rolling I couldn't even wreck the DJ, the Stalker failed, and the pureblood I sent in after it still couldn't kill it.
Later on, it came down to attrition, and we were left with just eSkarre hiding in a corner with a single crippled Nightwretch in combat with Beast form Kromac and a Gorax. Dice down was called early (for some reason the first round was shortened) and he'd already gained a control point thanks to having taken the first turn and making me stay back due to his feat. First game loss.
2 - Cassius vs Scaverous - Process of Elimination
*** Scaverous
- Bonechicken x2
- Bane Thralls (min)
- Crowes Cutthroats
- McThralls (max)
- Necrosurgeon & stitches
- Darragh W
- Ogrun Bokur
- Warwitch Siren
- Gorman
This one turned out to be a walk in the park, not so much due to the matchup but partly because my opponent was a bit newer, and wasn't up to speed with what Cassius could do. His other caster was Terminus, just the man I had built Cassius to try and deal with, but even so his Terminus list would have been harder to stop than Scaverous in this case.
I teleported the tree up turn one and feated. Everything else ran aggressively. It meant that he couldn't move into the two control zone strips, or see my army. After that, the Tharn barrelled into his Cutthroats, wiping them out and shifting the prey target for the wolf riders over to other things. Cassius hellmouthed the McThralls and denied the necrosurgeon any tokens. I picked up a control point very early, and when Scaverous came out to try to assassinate me with the feat, my 3 transfers were more than enough, and it was a simple matter of just scoring in the other zone.
3 - Cassius vs Grim Angus - Demolition
* Grim Angus
- Mauler
- Impaler
- Max Fennblades +
UA
- Krielstones +
UA
- Min Champions
- Fellcaller
- Jannissa
The Demolition Scenario is AWESOME for Cassius, and i'm not sure anyone realises it yet. If you teleport the tree up and feat, they can't easily get to within 4" of the objective to contest it. Alternatively, if you just kill everything within 4" on the following turn and then feat, Cassius can place a 5" AOE that causes knockdown, and therefore a point of damage to everything in the template!! So in this game, that's exactly what happened. The fennblades caught by the blast who passed their tough roll against the damage then had to take a second roll...
Either way it was nice for Cassius here. He didn't have a bomber in his list, so I got off kinda light. Grim obviously is able to shoot the tree if he wants, or give cross-country to things that can then charge it. But in this case I was up in his grill with the Wolfriders and Tharn as of turn two. With his whole army in combat and having to re-roll tough, with the demolition charges going off every turn it was quite decisive. I actually ended up grabbing 3 control points this game when I finished it by throwing Grim out of the zone with my gorax.
4 - Cassius vs Maelok - Diversion
*** Maelok
2x Gatormen Posse
- Wrastler
- Ironback Spitter
- Bull snapper
- Thrullg
Here's where it gets a little harder for Cassius. Gators are quite nice in an attrition war, especially with Maelok. Also this particular player is a regular tournament opponent for me and I know he's quite good with them from previous experience (
eKaya vs Barny loss to me, Mohsar vs Maelok loss to me,
eButcher vs Barny win to me... but that's
eButcher).
His other caster was Barnabus, and I was sure he'd go for him. But he told me later that he was afraid of my high
MAT charges against Iron flesh, and he only had one posse in that list. We both agreed Kromac was not the right choice - he can't kill enough of them to win an attrition war, and when they start attacking the warbeasts, it's slaughter.
The match began with some bad luck for me. I sent the Wolfriders around to my left flack to deny one of his Posse units access to the scoring flag for the Gatormen. With curse of shadows on them, and prey kicking in, I was getting hits on my throws, and needed 11's on three dice to kill a Gator per shot. But with five throws I only got a single kill!! I didn't use assault because I was afraid of failing a command check against terror.
This meant that he started tearing up the wolfriders on that flank. On the other flank, going for my flag, were the Tharn and Totem hunter against his other Posse - this time with the +2
ARM/undead buff. So no heart tokens. With the help of the totem hunter I started to get the upper hand over there, but Maelok was reviving a gator per turn. I committed my Stalker in on his Wrastler, destroying it, but over time I was losing the attrition war. My only glimmer of hope was when I use the charge/run order to run a single Ravager through the posse (thanks curse of shadows) to his zone, and then use hellmouth on one of the gators to draw two of his friends away from the flag - picking up one point. Hellmouth even killed the thrullg in the process! So no more hitting his own gators for the dispel.
It came down to one final play, and this could not have been done with any other caster but cassius. In fact this is one of my top 5 Warmachine/Hordes plays of all time, it's Champagne Cassius.
1 - Cassius upkeeps Curse of Shadows on the Gatormen.
2 - The Totem hunter runs directly 14" to the enemy zone, through the Gator he was engaging.
3 - A farrow bone grinder runs through the Gator line, sitting behind them with his back to Cassius.
4 - My gorax primals himself, charges one of three Gatormen contesting my flag, boosts hit and damage, killing him (he was on 1 box from being revived)
5 - Cassius activates, hellmouths the bone grinder (needing 4's on 2 dice), dragging the remaining two Gators away from the flag, and then casts unseen path on the tree, placing it base to base with the flag. 2
CP win.
5 - Kromac vs Durgen - Incursion
** Durgen Madhammer
- Driller
- Max Nyss Hunters
- Max Kayazy w/Underboss
- pAlexia
-
eEiryss
- Aiyanna & Holt
- Dougal McN
Terrible matchup for me! Durgen has a horrific infantry spam, and his other list is Ashlyn (I knew he wouldn't go for that one). Although on a roll with Cassius, I knew if I went with Cassius it would be a matter of trying to kill 10 Kayazy with Hellmouth - not always easy, takes at least 2 turns, and puts Cassius in some risky situations, and all the while dealing with the Nyss hunters
CRA shooting me and the Kayazy engaging my stuff with primed. Oh, and Durgen carpet bombing my low-
ARM, expensive infantry.
Kromac's only hope here was to get in some very decisive berzerk wild aggression with the stalkers, but unluckily for me it was the middle flag that dissappeared after the first turn, so I had to split the two heavies very far, forcing Kromac forward a little to keep them in control range. I gave it my best shot, even picking up a control point before he did, but ultimately my stalkers were worn down, and Kromac went down in a hail of fire from holt, dougall, durgen and alexia.
6 - Kromac vs pButcher - Restoration
*** pButcher ***
- Beast 09
- Max Kayazy w/Underboss
- Greylord Ternions
- Aiyanna & Holt w/Valachev
- Mechanics + Manowar
UA
- Koldun Lord
- Saxon Orrik
- Sylys Wishnalyr
A game against one of my most regular practice opponents, and we both knew i'd be forced to play Kromac again. His other list was pVlad, but Kromac had a better chance against pVlad and was definately better equipped to deal with Butcher's assassins thanks to wraithbane.
However the major dissapointment came when I teleported a Stalker directly into combat with Beast '09, fully buffed with Warp Strength, Wild Aggression and Primal. That's 5 attacks at dice damage and 1 at -2, so a reliable average of 40 boxes of damage. I did about 15... double 1's, 1's and 2's, it was enough to make any circle player sick.
The rest of the plan was fine, with the other stalker, pureblood, kromac all killing 7-8 assassins between them. But when he's able to just kill the Stalker engaging Beast with Butcher's charge and feat, then repair Beast with his mechanics, and charge Kromac with Beast, there's nothing you can do.
7 - Cassius vs pKreuger - Close Quarters
My opponent had pKreuger and
eKaya. He's a Cryx player just starting Circle, and I can appreciate that
eKaya and pKreuger make a good combo on paper, dealing with armour and infantry respectively, but in reality neither of them deal with solid, balanced lists that well. They also don't have the tools that other Circle casters do on scenarios, so taking them both together is inviting problems at a steamroller tournament.
That aside, I felt like he was likely to take
eKaya given that the scenario wasn't going to be winnable within a few turns, and that her beasts could out-threat Kromac's thanks to dogpile, so long as he didn't give me any warpath triggers, which was very doable.
Cassius on the other hand could probably handle
eKaya, since he wasn't likely to clear my infantry out that well, and the wolfriders would murder one heavy per turn. Against pKreuger it would be a matter of spreading out to avoid the feat templates - the druids wouldn't be a problem though.
And that's how it turned out. He took first turn and moved up, I ran and feated in my own first turn. The druids can't force bolt move the tree, so I was safe, and his turn two didn't achieve anything - to my surprise he chose to save his feat. I had carefully spread everything widely apart.
My turn three wiped out his druids, shifting the rider and totem hunter prey targets to the skinwalkers, who suffered a curse of shadows, before cassius retreated back to my side of the table. The wolfriders moved in and killed half of the skinwalkers. He tried to retaliate but this only resulted in him committing his Feral, which I then stomped on with the Stalker I had been holding back outside of 11" until that moment came. Kreuger continued to fight everything off but finally died to my Stalker (who had primal'd into the feral, frenzied into a ravager, then primal'd again killing the gorax/warden... then frenzied into Kreuger with a 15+ on damage).
Conclusion
Cassius obviously isn't one of the top Circle casters, he doesn't come near to the versatility and power of Kromac, eKreuger and pBaldur. He's still got a lot of bad matchups, obviously legion, some gunlines with hunter, mass high defense infantry. I don't think i'll run him with Kromac again, especially not in a 2 list format and probably not at 35pts. But I feel like he's got a lot of subtle potential, so long as you clearly identify his strengths and really build to optimize them.
1 - The feat. You have to be prepared to capitalize on whatever you tried to preserve, if you use it defensively. This means positioning aggressive pieces ready to attack after you've wasted the enemy turn. Or, waiting until their control feat goes up so that you don't suffer the consequences. The other way you want to use it is to mitigate tough. Make sure you've got treewalker or hunter, or a way to attack them while the tree is close enough to collect souls, and get the tough models in command range. Camp transfers that turn, and make sure you've got an escape route.
2 - Curse of Shadows. Take accurate troops with him, and you won't need as many heavies as you normally would. It's so good with wolfriders, but there's no reason why you can't run bloodtrackers or wolves with him.
3 - Hellmouth. It's not just about the direct damage, or the remove from play. The drag move is why it's worth the 4 fury to cast. You should ALWAYS be looking for situations where you can get a control point with the movement, or dragging their caster into threat range of a heavy, or dragging one of your heavies into range of something you want to kill. Plan early, by positioning your stones or expendible troops such as bonegrinders in locations where they can move into position for this next turn.
Thanks for reading,
- Luke 'Vaul' B
