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So I'm gonna be playing against my GW store manager with my Dark Elves against his Empire army. From what I've gathered it's built around 40 handgunners, a load of halberdiers and a Helblaster and a couple of cannons (I think). I know he also has a level 4 wizard using lore of heavens as his magic ordnance.

So I've been looking through my Army book for good anti-gunline measures and came to the conclusion that Magic is gonna be what will get me up the board into combat with his handgunners without leaving half my elves splattered on the board. I'm running a level 3 supreme sorceress (Shadow) with the pendant of khaeleth and Tome of Furion and a level 2 (Dark) with a Focus Familiar. The shadow signature spell will allow me to reduce his ballistic skill from well outside his handgun range, rest of the time it's the usual stuff with her.

With the Dark Sorceress I'm gonna be using Chillwind (and hopefully Bladewind or Word of Pain). With the extra 6 inch range from the Focus Familiar she'll be able to sit outside their range in her bunker of RXBows and hit them with any of those spells. Chillwind will cause D6 S4 attacks and if they take any wounds then they can't shoot the next turn so that's the one I'm really wanting to get off. So I'll try to lure him into using up his dispels on other spells then hit him with a really cheap spell which can completely shut down the shooting of one of his units.

For his artillery I'll be using Shades to take out the crews and then they can harass the other units in his army.

All the while my other units (Black Guard, Corsairs, Executioners) keep advancing up the board as quickly as possible until I can close him down in close combat and finish him off.

Thoughts?

Deploy in lines so that he hits less models with his templates. Ward up the Corsairs, and use them to screen the rest of your army so his BS shooting is less effective.

Also, the Cloak of Hag Graef/Dawnstone pegasus hero will make him cry.

On a side note, why are you taking xbows as a bunker if you're planning on not putting them into range? Warriors do that job cheaper...

tmarichards wrote:Deploy in lines so that he hits less models with his templates. Ward up the Corsairs, and use them to screen the rest of your army so his BS shooting is less effective.

Also, the Cloak of Hag Graef/Dawnstone pegasus hero will make him cry.

On a side note, why are you taking xbows as a bunker if you're planning on not putting them into range? Warriors do that job cheaper...

For Crossbows over Warriors, whilst the handguns will ideally be out of range, it doesn't mean the rest of his army will be. If I'm managing to dominate the magic phases then I might move them forwards to shoot as well as attack with magic. It all depends on the dice. Also when he sees my sorceress is managing to (hopefully) nullify his whole handgunner regiment he'll have to do something to stop her. He might advance with the Halberdiers which would give me a couple of rounds of shooting at them at least. With their low armour save it should be pretty effective.

Yeah, That was my plan with the corsairs, to use them as a bulletshield.

Depending on how much of the table he takes up you could run shades, 12 inches toward his flanks have that turn up 2nd or 3rd turn of the game, to shoot them he would have to turn his gunline away from your main army, if he leaves them there the shades will go to town.

Tough to really advise without seeing lists though x3

Dark Riders, if you can field at least 3 or 4 units of them (what's the point value?) will make gunlines very vulnerable. 12" vanguard, 18" regular move and you are at their flanks or rear by turn 1, and charging into them or the machines.

Plus that kind of speed will usually force him to react while your other elements get into position.

I'm pretty sure Corsairs can take cloaks that make them harder to shoot. I also would take a kitted out Sorceress and something like a Hydra to draw his fire.

Shadowbrand wrote:I'm pretty sure Corsairs can take cloaks that make them harder to shoot. I also would take a kitted out Sorceress and something like a Hydra to draw his fire.

Yup, corsairs have Sea Dragon Cloaks (+1 to armour save in close combat, +2 to armour save vs shooting) and light armour as standard. Which makes them the only non-Lord/Hero unit apart from Cold One Knights, Hydra or Chariot that will still get an armour save against handgun shots.

I've got two sorceresses, one (who is the general) kitted out with the best ward I can get against this type of army (I have to roll equal to or under the strength of the attack which wounds her, with a roll of 6 always failing) on a dark steed. This means that if he tries to cannon snipe her she will only be hurt if I roll a 6 on her ward save and riding a dark steed will make it pretty hard for him to target her with his handguns as they're move or fire, whilst she's free to move around the field buffing me and hexing him with Shadow magic. The second sorceress bunkers in with a unit of crossbows and hurls out hurt and hexes from Dark magic.

Hydra is a given, never leave home without it

You're over complicating the Sorceress quite a bit.

With such long ranges, you really don't need the mobility of a Dark Steed, and she'll work much better for cheaper by just staying on foot in a unit of 20 Warriors. This not only means that she doesn't need a ward save (as she get's a 2+ LOS), but it also allows you to abuse the Sacrificial Dagger for 6pt power dice.

Warriors will also give you the ld10 general if you give them the Sacrificial Dagger.

I disagree about the hydra being a given, but that's because in general I just don't consider them worthwhile.

Hydras are good because of that 4+ regen, which makes cannons cry. And in combat they just decimate T3 squishies. 2D6 Breath Weapon hits, 7 attacks, 4 attacks from the beastmasters, and D6 thunderstomp hits.

Yeah, you could be unlucky with a Regen but for a monster it is rediclously undercosted and extremely effective.

Grey Templar wrote:Hydras are good because of that 4+ regen, which makes cannons cry. And in combat they just decimate T3 squishies. 2D6 Breath Weapon hits, 7 attacks, 4 attacks from the beastmasters, and D6 thunderstomp hits.

Yeah, you could be unlucky with a Regen but for a monster it is rediclously undercosted and extremely effective.

6 attacks from the beastmasters actually. 2 base +1 from their Beastmasters Scourge as it counts as an additional hand weapon. And they're all armour piercing

The issue with the hydra is that it rarely gets into combat with the right thing, as they're fairly easy to kill.

It's certainly undercosted, but there are simply more efficient ways to spend the points.

tmarichards wrote:The issue with the hydra is that it rarely gets into combat with the right thing, as they're fairly easy to kill.

It's certainly undercosted, but there are simply more efficient ways to spend the points.

How does it not get into combat with what you want it to? With a 6 move and monster maneuverability how are you not getting ideal targets?

It's more a point of, against Cannons it's hard to get the Hydra into combat, period.

I wouldn't say that. The chance of a cannon ball one shotting a Hydra is 13.8%

Exceedingly poor chances, and this assumes 100% accuracy. With accuracy factored in the chance is even lower.

Vulcan wrote:It's more a point of, against Cannons it's hard to get the Hydra into combat, period.

What Grey Templar said. Overblown cannon fear plus people not knowing how to properly use and support monsters equals "OH NO THE CANNONS WILL OWN ME."

Pffft.

This should not be a tough matchup for you. You are on the right track with the shades but try to fit in two units of 10 rather than one of 15 if you can find the points, the extra threat will mean a lot more than you might think. The handgunners should be no problem. Set your army up one inch further back from the 12" line, this will mean that his handguns are just out of range if he goes first and if you go first just move your repeater xbows and do some damage to those handguns before he gets a chance to fire, sure handgunners have alright damage output for the points but they are extremely squishy.

Yeah, I play ogres. Monsters out the Wazoo.

You think Cannons would pwn my army. But they are laughably ineffective. A cannonball has only a 55% chance to kill a single Ogre. And the kicker is that if it fails to kill a model the ball stops bouncing. And if I have Trollguts up on my Ogres it becomes a practically nonexistant threat. BS based shooting is more effective then cannon balls and bolt throwers because the latter can be stopped if their chain of events is broken.

Cannons are, quite honestly, way over blown. They only are worth the fear when talking about way overpriced character mounts like Dragons, which is because they are expensive and expose so many points(mount and a character) to an easy kill. A cannon ball vs a monster is just a carrot on the end of a pole. It is just as likely to bounce off, and 2-3 rounds of shooting at a monster usually does end up in it being dead.


Hydras have Regeneration going for them, which most other monsters don't. That alone makes it viable, and that it can be run in 2s and 3s creates redundancy.

It's not just cannons though is it? Light magic, Fire magic, death magic, shadow magic and metal magic, along with flaming S4 close combat or shooting and any war machine in general, means that it's going to die a good chunk of the time.

It'll still fo huge damage if it's get into combat, but more often that not anyone who's not a bad player can kill or even 2 without breaking a sweat, at which point you've basically given away 175 points for no return.

tmarichards wrote:It's not just cannons though is it? Light magic, Fire magic, death magic, shadow magic and metal magic, along with flaming S4 close combat or shooting and any war machine in general, means that it's going to die a good chunk of the time.

It'll still fo huge damage if it's get into combat, but more often that not anyone who's not a bad player can kill or even 2 without breaking a sweat, at which point you've basically given away 175 points for no return.

So by your logic, the magic that is good at killing EVERYTHING makes a specific thing null and void? Come on. No kidding fire magic or death magic is good at killing a Hydra, but it's just as good at killing other things. The argument that hydras can die, and they certainly can, but any other element of your army can die just as easily (some times more easily in the case of Cold One Knights vs Lore of Metal, or mass infantry vs Dwellers, sometimes less easily such as S4 against Knights, or Metal vs Witch Elves).

Again, it boils down to HOW you use the Hydra. If you bomb one out on its own, without doing any work to divert, distract or nullify the threats to it, then you are using your hydra poorly and it deserves to die. Saturate your opponent with targets, for example, my usual 3k list is built around target saturation. If they shoot the 2 hydras, the dragon, Cold One Knights and Witch Elves get them. If they shoot the Dragon, the Hydras get them. Plus I also disrupt my opponent with Dark Riders and a lot of em (5 units of 5 in my usual list) and I can assure you from experience that folks who rely on war machines or fragile gunlines will panic when Dark Riders are behind their lines in turn 1. They may open up on the riders, which is all well and good because that means my chompy stompy stuff gets to the line. Or they may try to ignore the riders, which is just as fine because then I have my pick of the litter for vulnerable war machines, flanks, rears or any other targets of opportunity. Do my riders take a beating? They sure do, but it plays into the overall strategy. Target saturation, redundancy and contingency plans are your friends.

Grey Templar wrote:I wouldn't say that. The chance of a cannon ball one shotting a Hydra is 13.8%

Exceedingly poor chances, and this assumes 100% accuracy. With accuracy factored in the chance is even lower.

Assuming the Empire guy is running only one cannon, and only gets one shot. He can take 3, and will usually get two rounds of shooting before they Hydra makes it to combat. That makes a cumulative chance of 82% that the hydra will never see combat.

But I agree, target saturation helps.

Vulcan wrote:

Grey Templar wrote:I wouldn't say that. The chance of a cannon ball one shotting a Hydra is 13.8%

Exceedingly poor chances, and this assumes 100% accuracy. With accuracy factored in the chance is even lower.

Assuming the Empire guy is running only one cannon, and only gets one shot. He can take 3, and will usually get two rounds of shooting before they Hydra makes it to combat. That makes a cumulative chance of 82% that the hydra will never see combat.

But I agree, target saturation helps.

Assuming you only offer one target for the cannons to shoot at. And, as I've said before, if you do that, and leave the hydra completely without support or disruption, you deserve to lose it.

There's only so many targets you can give them if you're going to a tournament though- double hydra is a pretty big points sink, and dragons aren't optimal.

On the other hand, you can spend the points on plenty of other choices that will perhaps never do as much damage as a hydra has the potential to do, but will also never give up their points as easily as hydras frequently do.

I am gonna use Shadowblade on one of my mate's Empire cannons. He can hide in enemy units. Just reveal him in your turn 1, and BOOM there's one cannon down.

IHateNids wrote:I am gonna use Shadowblade on one of my mate's Empire cannons. He can hide in enemy units. Just reveal him in your turn 1, and BOOM there's one cannon down.

That is a lot of points to invest to destroy a cannon. After he wrecks that cannon, you're going to have a 300 point, two wound character on foot stranded behind your enemy's lines. Not the best trade-off in my opinion.

Wait a week and then play him.

/thread

(State Troops w/ the exception of spearmen had an across the board price hike of 1 point per model. Doesn't sound like much, but his bricks of infantry are going to cost him much more.)

It's actually debatable whether Shadowblade can infiltrate warmachine crews anymore. In 8E, there are no longer separate rules for the machine and the crew, they are all considered one model. Obviosuly SB can't replace the whole warmachine...

Ok, if that is the case, I'm gonna need to think of something else.

@helium: once the cannon is wrecked, you can run across his side of the board to his other cannon, or into the back of the handgunners unit. If you can top this off with some shades, the Empire has to do one of three things:

1/ignore your guys behind his lines, meaning he loses the big guns

2/kill them, meaning the rest of your army gets closer

3/split his fire, meaning that neither the infiltrators or the rest of your army is taking a lot of damage

IHateNids wrote:Ok, if that is the case, I'm gonna need to think of something else.

@helium: once the cannon is wrecked, you can run across his side of the board to his other cannon, or into the back of the handgunners unit. If you can top this off with some shades, the Empire has to do one of three things:

1/ignore your guys behind his lines, meaning he loses the big guns

2/kill them, meaning the rest of your army gets closer

3/split his fire, meaning that neither the infiltrators or the rest of your army is taking a lot of damage

The problem with that is that Shadowblade is way too fragile to make that work. He's T3 and 2 wounds and no decent save. The empire would probably need just one unit to shoot at him out in the open to bring him down. The net result is a loss, given Shadowblade's HUGE points cost.

if shadowblade is on his own then yes it is a huge waste, but I am saying it is him and shades. And who said anything about being in the open? I'm assuming that all the cannons will be in one corner

Even in a unit, regardless of what that unit may be, Shadowblade is a waste.