Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you:
No adverts like this in the forums anymore.
Times and dates in your local timezone.
Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance.
Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely.
Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net.
If you are already a member then feel free to login now.
2013/11/19 19:10:09
Subject: 2500 Double-FOC Rematch - Jy2's Draigowing vs Grant Theft Auto's Deer Council Deldar II
Coming out later today in its entirety, the rematch between my Draigowing versus Grant Theft Auto's (GTA's) Deer Council Deldar. Our first game ended in controversy:
So this is the rematch to prove once and for all who the more dominant deathstar army is - Draigowing or the Seer Council?
For this game, we bumped it up to 2500 Double-FOC because the next Contest of Champions RTT will be at 2500.
Also, Grant is trying out the new Forgeworld Shadow Spectre Phoenix Lord. He is truly a nasty and amazing character. That guy....just wow. Nasty! Bah, Draigo don't care. Bring it on!
BTW, I have not beaten Grant's Deer Council in this edition yet. His army is probably the only army that has a winning record against any of my armies (not counting single-game series).
1. My opponent does get Fortune, though he gets it on the very last roll for his psychic powers.
2. Grant gets both 3-pt Scouring objectives in or near his deployment zone. I get the 1 & 2-pt objectives.
3. There is a large, LOS-blocking terrain in the middle.
4. My psychic powers include Misfortune and Precognition.
5. For Grand Strategy, I get 3 units. I then outflank 3 of my dreads.
6. I never even got the chance to fire off my Mindstrike missiles! Grant does an excellent job of keeping his Deer Council in combat at all times. Grrrrr.....
7. Grant gave me a handicap by forgetting to deploy his rangers. Actually, he forgot about them completely. Yeah! +1 VP to me!
We actually did a Frontline video report for this battle.
First off, I'd like to apologize for the chaos and the noise in the videorep. That was mainly because:
1. It was a busy day. We had 2 battles going on at the same time - my battle with Grant and InControl vs Spam Adam in a Team Zero Comp Challenge match. Thus, the noise.
2. We had to share cameras between the 2 game.
3. Also, we were on a time crunch (we had to leave by a certain time). Thus we decided to do the commentaries at the end of the Game turn instead of each Player turn. This will probably prove confusing and chaotic to the viewers.
Thus, even though I hadn't planned to write a battle report for this game, I've decided to supplement the videorep with a written BR as well in order to give more detail and some clarification to the game. But sorry, text only. No pictures as I didn't take any. Keep in mind that my written report mainly highlights the key points in the videorep. For best effect, watch the videorep first and then read my written report afterwards.
Ok, so without further ado, here's the link to the videorep:
BTW, I've gained a few pounds since my probably my last videorep, which has been a while now.
Seer council do get Fortune, but only on his last roll for psychic powers.
Coteaz gets Misfortune and Precognition.
Grand Strategy gives me 3 Scouting units. I then outflank 3 of my dreads.
I reserve half of my army, including the stormraven (with 5 paladins), the soladins (deepstriking) and the outflanking dreads.
BTW, Grant gets the 2 3-pt Scouring objectives in/near his deployment zone (we misplayed it somewhat as that shouldn't have happened).
I also make a huge deployment blunder. I forget to take into account his artillery and deploy my paladins all bunched up and just ripe for their pounding.
Grant forgets to deploy his rangers. Actually, he forgets about his rangers entirely, thus giving me +1 VP automatically.
VP's - GK: 1, Deldar: 0
Deldar 1
Spoiler:
Seer council turbo-boosts and mainly stick behind the LOS-blocking (BLOS) terrain.
Vehicles shift around.
One interesting thing to note was that one of his venoms use the central BLOS-terrain to try to snipe my Apothecary model (i.e. he positioned it such that it could only see my Apothecary). My Apothecary is lucky to survive with 1W remaining.
Then his entire army fires. It is actually his artillery that do the majority of the damage. Overall, he did 5W on damage, including 1W on Draigo and 1W on the Apothecary. His artillery probably did 3-4W themselves!
However, the highlight of this turn was my FNP. To say it was HOT!!! may be an understatement. Of the 24-25 Wounds that got through my armour saves, I FNP'd about 18-19 of them!!! That's a 75% success rate for what should have been only 33% saved. To think what would have happened had I not brought an Apothecary (or had he been able to successfully snipe my Apothecary)!
Grey Knights 1
Spoiler:
My army advances. I make sure to keep 18"+ away from his malediction powers, including Jinx.
I try to Misfortune his unit but it gets blocked by a re-rollable Deny save due to Fortune.
I get First Blood when my dread shoots down one of his venoms (the one who tried to snipe my Apothecary). He then loses 1 or 2 wracks in the explosion and they then run off the table, thus giving me an additional VP.
VP's - GK: 3, Deldar: 0
Deldar 2
Spoiler:
This is where Grant hits me with a power combo that I was totally not expecting. You can say he caught me with my pants down.
He moves his Phoenix Lord up to within 12" of my paladinstar. He then moves his Haemonculi's venom up as well.
He then pops the Crucible and because of his Phoenix Lord, I am forced to take my LD tests against it at 3D6!
I lose my Warlord - Coteaz - as well as 1 paladin. At least Draigo survived.
VP's - GK: 3, Deldar: 1
I think shooting does a few more wounds and kills a couple of paladins, maybe put another 1W on Draigo. The seer council then charges into my paladinstar and we remain locked in combat, with neither side doing much in assault. He probably beat me by 1 or 2 but I am Fearless due to Draigo.
However, what is important is that my Stormraven will not be able to target the seer council when it comes in.
Grey Knights 2
Spoiler:
Draigo uses Psychic Communion to bring in basically my entire army (only 1 dread failed to come in). I make sure to spread my entire army and deepstrike my soladins near his Scouring objectives.
5-man paladin unit deepstrikes from the stormraven. Their shooting - 8 psycannon shots against a serpent - did jack.
I kill 1 wave serpent and take off 1 HP from each of his other 2 serpents.
VP's - GK: 4, Deldar: 1
However, with all my dreads and Holocaust from the soladins, I fail to kill a single venom.
Lowlight of my turn - my dreads shoots at the Haemonculi's venom and pens it twice, only to have Grant make both of his flickerfield saves. My dread then charges it....only to miss all of my attacks.
I believe his seer council maybe kill 1 or 2 paladins and then Hit-&-Run out of combat.
Deldar 3
Spoiler:
Seer council prepares to multi-charge my 5-man paladin unit and a dread. He casts Horrify on the 5-man paladin unit. His plan? To kill the dread, force a morale check on my paladins and hope that they run off the table.
But what my opponent failed to see (thank goodness!) was that after casting Horrify, he could have just tank-shocked my paladins with his wave serpent! I was hoping he didn't see that and was I relieved when he didn't.
His shooting was rather inconsequential and didn't do much (remember he is down 1 serpent and 1 venom and has another serpent that is shaken). Somehow, he does manage to shoot down my Apothecary from my paladinstar (via terrain sniping once again).
Grant's low point of the turn - his seer council multi-charges both my dread and paladins. My paladins aren't Prescience but still managed to cause 7W with their Overwatch. Grant then roll's 6 1's for his Fortuned saves to lose 3 warlocks!
In combat, he reduces the dread to just 1 HP remaining. I cannot for the life of me kill his Fortuned warlocks in assault. Fortunately for me, his I7/8 Phoenix Lord/Baron catches my paladins in a sweeping advance and so they stay on the table.
Grey Knights 3
Spoiler:
My last dread comes in.
This turn was a brutal turn for my opponent. I shoot down all 3 of his venoms and another 1 serpent. All 3 of my soladins then assault his artillery units. I wipe out one of them (I believe his guys ran off the table).
In combat, the seer council finishes off my dread and Hit-&-Run out of combat with my paladins.
VP's - GK: 9, Deldar: 2
Deldar 4
Spoiler:
He kills Draigo with shooting this turn.
VP's - GK: 9, Deldar: 3
All his dire avengers (and serpent) shoot at my 5-man paladin unit.....he only manages to kill 1 guy.
Grey Knights 4
Spoiler:
Grant is hoping that I would put my stormraven in Hover mode to try to shoot down his seer council. I don't fall for it.
I move towards the Scouring objectives.
Instead, I shoot down his last wave serpent and the unit of wracks who were attached to his Haemonculi.
VP's - GK: 11, Deldar: 3
In assault, I wipe out 1 unit of artillery and send the other unit fleeing (they would not regroup). A soladin then attempts to charge his Haemonculi but die to Overwatch (he only had 1W left).
VP's - GK: 13, Deldar: 4
This game is quickly becoming a route by the paladins.
Deldar 5
Spoiler:
Grant concedes this turn. He had horrible luck with his psychic powers, losing 2 warlocks (Conceal and Protect) to Perils. Also, 2 of his farseers also Perils.
He is way behind in VP's. I've got my henchmen and 2-3 paladin units on Scouring objectives. The rest of Grant's troops are out of position to grab any objectives (and probably won't survive next turn as I plan to multi-charge them with my 5-man paladin unit). The most he can do is to split up his seer council to contest my objectives, and then I've still got a chance to kill them. With that, we end the game.
Total Domination by Draigowing!!!
Grey Knights 5
Spoiler:
Sorry, but the game ended on top of 5.
This message was edited 8 times. Last update was at 2013/11/22 00:07:12
You had a pretty bad turn in the last one with half your Paladins and Draigo wiped out in a single round of shoooting. Considering he's got the new Phoenix Lord I can't really see a better turnout for the Draigowing if he tries to pull off the same trick again.
2013/11/19 19:41:28
Subject: 2500 Double-FOC Rematch - Jy2's Draigowing vs Grant Theft Auto's Deer Council Deldar II
Valkyrie wrote: You had a pretty bad turn in the last one with half your Paladins and Draigo wiped out in a single round of shoooting. Considering he's got the new Phoenix Lord I can't really see a better turnout for the Draigowing if he tries to pull off the same trick again.
Exactly, which was why our 1st match was so controversial. He shouldn't have gotten Jinx off, which then reduced my paladins to 3+, which then led to the death of Draigo, Coteaz and over half the squad in just 1 turn.
But not just that, my game 1 was plagued with bad dice. My reserves trickled in. I failed 2 LD9 tests on my paladins against the Crucible, Grant made every single cover/flickerfield save on all of his vehicles and my soladin makes a charge against his serpent only to die to Perils before he could even strike.
I was hoping for more even dice in this game. Just average dice should make this game much more competitive.
Looking forward to seeing this one play out. Draigowing has such a tough time against mobile armies (even when supported by fast troops like Necrons and Eldar Jetbikes), so it's always interesting to watch players leverage the different advantages/disadvantages of such a top-heavy list.
Should be a good learning experience for my own Paladins in any case, especially since one of my best opponents plays fast Eldar as his main army. Though I have to say a lot of our games turn out like your first match there!
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2013/11/19 19:49:21
Xca|iber wrote: Looking forward to seeing this one play out. Draigowing has such a tough time against mobile armies (even when supported by fast troops like Necrons and Eldar Jetbikes), so it's always interesting to watch players leverage the different advantages/disadvantages of such a top-heavy list.
Should be a good learning experience for my own Paladins in any case, especially since one of my best opponents plays fast Eldar as his main army. Though I have to say a lot of our games turn out like your first match there!
Yeah, Draigowing has a tough time playing against fast armies like eldar and necrons. That's why, for my balanced Draigowing army, I run psyfleman dreads instead of dreadknights. I like their reach and psychic protection much better.
Grant Theft Auto wrote: Jy2 I actually had one more unit of rangers in the list but I forgot to bring them out, wouldn't have changed the outcome though
Oh, ok...no wonder.
Ok, list fixed.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2013/11/19 22:07:40
Why do you think the phoenix lord is so scary? Isn't he strength 7 AP 2 or something, so while scary, is easily tankable with Draigo leading from the front. One question about him, can he Ghostlight by himself? Meaning if he gets all 3 hits (not unlikely) will he be firing a single strength 10 AP 1 hit into a dread?
2013/11/19 22:46:17
Subject: 2500 Double-FOC Rematch - Jy2's Draigowing vs Grant Theft Auto's Deer Council Deldar II
Ghostlight seems to have changed to "number of hits" rather than "number of models firing" according to Forge World's 6th Ed Update, so yeah, he could easily put out S8+ Ap1 shots at BS7.
2013/11/19 23:21:09
Subject: 2500 Double-FOC Rematch - Jy2's Draigowing vs Grant Theft Auto's Deer Council Deldar II
ALEXisAWESOME wrote: Why do you think the phoenix lord is so scary? Isn't he strength 7 AP 2 or something, so while scary, is easily tankable with Draigo leading from the front. One question about him, can he Ghostlight by himself? Meaning if he gets all 3 hits (not unlikely) will he be firing a single strength 10 AP 1 hit into a dread?
He's fearless. He has Hit-&-Run. He's Eternal Warrior so is great for tanking S8 hits. He forces you to take LD with 3D6.
Overall, he is just a great force-multiplier for the seer council. By himself, he's ok...but when you consider how much better he makes the unit - and also as redundancy for the Baron's Hit-&-Run and Fearless by the Shard of Anaris - that's his true value, not by how many AP2 hits he can put out, but by how much better he makes his unit.
There is also a brutal combo here that caught me totally by surprise - his 3D6LD tests and the Crucible of Malediction. That was like a punch to the groin when he pulled that combo on my paladins.
BTW, we played it as yes, he can ghostlight by himself.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2013/11/19 23:21:57
What wargear gives the far seers ap2? I thought they could only take witch blades or singing spears which neither are ap2 or am I totally missing something because I'm still new to eldar lol.
2013/11/20 00:40:58
Subject: 2500 Double-FOC Rematch - Jy2's Draigowing vs Grant Theft Auto's Deer Council Deldar II
Chancetragedy wrote: What wargear gives the far seers ap2? I thought they could only take witch blades or singing spears which neither are ap2 or am I totally missing something because I'm still new to eldar lol.
These are from the Iyanden supplement. I believe one is a lance weapon that is only AP2 on the turn they charge. The other I think is an AP2 weapon that gives him +1S for every turn he kills something, maybe? Not too familiar with the supplement.
I predict a very narrow victory for the knights, due to Grants lack of firepower to take out all those dreads before they take out a good chunk of his army.
Friendship is like peeing on yourself: everyone can see it, but only you get the warm feeling that it brings.
2013/11/20 02:45:19
Subject: Re:2500 Double-FOC Rematch - Jy2's Draigowing vs Grant Theft Auto's Deer Council Deldar II
Very well played. I was surprised to see you were able to corner his wave serpents in that back corner there. Nailed down 3 troops in fast transports with only a couple of units.
I wasn't exactly clear from the video though, from Turn 2 to 3, how did you take out so many of his venoms? Was that just from the Dreadnoughts? Also what happened to the rest of the Vaul's Wrath batteries before you assaulted them? I would have thought they might have killed off your Soladins in anticipation of the assault move. (I know my soladins only ever survive if I hide them far from the fight). Same for the henchmen, were they just hidden really well or did the Eldar not hunt them down?
Also, the overwatch-ownage by the Paladins was fantastically lucky, but would that combat have really turned out that differently with the extra 3 bodies?
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2013/11/20 04:10:55
Serpents can be killed just like any other vehicle, especially after they use their serpent shields offensively. That's one thing I knew my opponent would have to do in this game - fire his serpent shields. Thus, to me, the serpents are just another AV12 vehicle and my dreads can take care of those.
Between Turns 2-3, I had 5 dreads (well, actually 4 dreads). It isn't too hard to kill 3 venoms (I already killed 1 on Turn 1 for First Blood) with 2 turns of shooting. That's practically 8 psyflemans shooting at them! And then there's my stormraven who was also firing at his vehicles with TL-multi-meltas and TL-lascannons. The odds are on my side. I believe I might have also assaulted one of his venoms with my dread (not counting the failed charge against his Haemonculi's venom).
Vaul's battery just isn't efficient shooting at soladins. The most they can do is 3 wounds assuming all 3 shots hit and then I've got a 2+ 2W model that they need to kill. He's better off shooting at my paladinstar, where he stands a chance to hit multiple models. As a matter of fact, I think that is how he killed off my Apothecary - with barrage sniping.
Henchmen was hidden on objective all game. My opponent couldn't reliably kill them off with just 1 unit shooting because of the way I positioned them so he basically ignored them in favor of shooting at a much more dangerous unit - my paladinstar. In order to wipe them out, he'd actually have to fire at least 2 units at them and that is very poor target priority if he did so.
Overall, killing the 3 warlocks didn't really make much of a difference. Had I not killed them, he probably would have finished off my dread on his turn rather than on my turn, but it didn't matter as my paladins failed their morale test anyways but was caught in a sweeping advance by his I7/8 HQ.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2013/11/20 04:29:22
jy2 wrote: Serpents can be killed just like any other vehicle, especially after they use their serpent shields offensively. That's one thing I knew my opponent would have to do in this game - fire his serpent shields. Thus, to me, the serpents are just another AV12 vehicle and my dreads can take care of those.
Between Turns 2-3, I had 5 dreads (well, actually 4 dreads). It isn't too hard to kill 3 venoms (I already killed 1 on Turn 1 for First Blood) with 2 turns of shooting. That's practically 8 psyflemans shooting at them! And then there's my stormraven who was also firing at his vehicles with TL-multi-meltas and TL-lascannons. The odds are on my side. I believe I might have also assaulted one of his venoms with my dread (not counting the failed charge against his Haemonculi's venom).
Vaul's battery just isn't efficient shooting at soladins. The most they can do is 3 wounds assuming all 3 shots hit and then I've got a 2+ 2W model that they need to kill. He's better off shooting at my paladinstar, where he stands a chance to hit multiple models. As a matter of fact, I think that is how he killed off my Apothecary - with barrage sniping.
Henchmen was hidden on objective all game. My opponent couldn't reliably kill them off with just 1 unit shooting because of the way I positioned them so he basically ignored them in favor of shooting at a much more dangerous unit - my paladinstar. In order to wipe them out, he'd actually have to fire at least 2 units at them and that is very poor target priority if he did so.
Overall, killing the 3 warlocks didn't really make much of a difference. Had I not killed them, he probably would have finished off my dread on his turn rather than on my turn, but it didn't matter as my paladins failed their morale test anyways but was caught in a sweeping advance by his I7/8 HQ.
I agree, although I guess I should clarify what I meant:
About the serpents, I was actually more surprised that they didn't just run away. Keeping them clustered up next to your paladins meant that when you inevitably killed them, all three of his troops were staring down some angry terminators rather than a Scouring objective.
As for the venoms, I think this is one of the biggest benefits of Draigowing - it becomes more and more efficient at higher points values. Since the paladinstar doesn't get bigger or buffer as the points go up, everything else goes to scoring and shooting. I just mentioned the apparent damage output since I was surprised at how devastating those Dreadnoughts were (and I wasn't sure if you were supplementing them with other meaningful shooting). 16-20 Twin-Linked S8 shots is really pretty damn lethal!
Regarding the batteries though, each one should have 4 gunners with BS4 shuriken catapults. With 8 quasi-rending battle-focused S4 shots, those batteries should still have posed a threat to a lone soladin (or even shoot and back up). I do agree that sniping out the apothecary was a good play, but he was basically throwing away fire at your paladinstar even when there were more immediate, vulnerable threats in his back-line.
For the henchmen, I guess the angle of the camera didn't really show how they were positioned. It looked like a venom might have been able to drop back there with some wracks to clear them out and take the objective, but I'm not sure if the range would have actually worked out. I'll just take your word for it
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2013/11/20 04:53:17
Serpents didn't didn't run away for several reasons:
1. He was hugging the edge due to my outflanking dreads. If my dread came in on the other flank, then it would've been out of range to shoot at his serpent.
2. He didn't want to give my dreads a shot at his serpent's rear armor.
3. He needed to be in the lower half of the table edge to have a shot at my paladins due to BLOS terrain.
4. On the turn my reserves came in, I shot down 1 serpent and shook (maybe even stunned, I don't quite remember) his other serpent. Thus, probably 1 serpent at most would have been able to get away.
Thus the positioning of his serpents was limited, though I agree with you. If it was me, I'd have split off the serpents in probably 3 different directions before my reserves came in and positioned them closer to the objectives.
Yeah, the more support you can add to a deathstar build, the more balanced it actually becomes. IMO, the key is to try to balance our your deathstar army with good supporting units - the more the better. Thus, they become better when the points go up as the army becomes less reliant on the deathstar itself and more self-sufficient.
As for the batteries, 8 shots, 5 hit, 2.5 wounds. That's not good odds against a soladin. It's a lose-lose situation for the artillery anyways IMO.
For my henchmen, this was how I positioned them:
I positioned them in a way such that from 12:00 or 9:00 direction (where my opponent's army was), there would always be at least 1 model out of LOS. Thus, he'd have to shoot 2 units at them to wipe them out. All that firepower just for a 12-pt unit (unless I fail morale).
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2013/11/20 05:25:41
double force org at 2.5k and he didnt have 6 wraithknights...for shame!
2013 Nova Open Tournament Champ- 2014 Las Vegas Open Best Tau Player/13th overall 2014 NOVA Open Second to One 2015 Las Vegas Open Best Tau Player/10th overall
thanatos67 wrote: double force org at 2.5k and he didnt have 6 wraithknights...for shame!
Wow....6 WK's and a seer council!!!
Is that even possible?
Anyways, you'll be happy to know that since this game, he's moving to a build more similar to Matt. Right now, he's borrowing 2 of my WK's for his army and used them to great success at a tournament already.
Farseer - bike, shard, spear
Farseer - bike, spear
8 warlocks - bikes
4x3 jetbikes - with a cannon in 2 squads
6 wraith knights
Baron
5x kabalite warriors
Is like 2494 or something. Certainly doable if a tad rediculous ;p
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2013/11/20 18:49:35
2013/11/21 15:37:30
Subject: 2500 Double-FOC Rematch - Jy2's Draigowing vs Grant Theft Auto's Deer Council Deldar II
Chancetragedy wrote: Farseer - bike, shard, spear
Farseer - bike, spear
8 warlocks - bikes
4x3 jetbikes - with a cannon in 2 squads
6 wraith knights
Baron
5x kabalite warriors
Is like 2494 or something. Certainly doable if a tad rediculous ;p
Ouch. That's pretty bad.
But frankly, I wouldn't run 6 WK's. I'd drop 1 for another another 2x3 jetbikes and 2x5 warriors in venoms (with Grisly Trophies). I'd also give at least 1 (or maybe even 2) of the WK's the suncannon.
It would suck to play against this list in Big Guns, unless, of course, the opponent was running double-FOC Deldar venom-spam.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2013/11/21 15:38:09
HOT!!! 
That's a 75% success rate for what should have been only 33% saved. To think what would have happened had I not brought an Apothecary (or had he been able to successfully snipe my Apothecary)!
.....Bay Area Open GT 2013 - Best Tyranids 
.....LVO GT 2014 Team Tournament - Best Generals
(Gallery)
, 
