http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/27.page JForum - http://www.jforum.net eButcher's Doom Reaver spam would make for an easier task in terms of working out what to do during a timed turn, as well as placing maximum difficult on my opponent, working around all of those threat ranged and potential tough rolls. There would also be some armies that just wouldn't be able to deal with it. As for the bad matchups, I went for a very jack-heavy pVlad list that could put in a featmove+arcing fire assasination, or simply take advantage of some heavy infantry army that had the tools to kill all the Doom Reavers - but not four jacks.

40 points - we used the new SR 2012 scenarios, but without re-inforcements - some people were signed up for the event before the new pack even came out.

As usual, if you want a more detailed, play by play version of events, with all of the pictures and audio commentary, view my commentary of the games and hear a tournament overview at www.youtube.com/user/vaulsc

There's also a review of some of the other armies in attendance as well as a talk about my own entry starting here - http://youtu.be/4pIls3WaM90

* VLADIMIR TZEPESCI, THE DARK PRINCE
- War Dog
- Decimator
- Decimator
- Destroyer
- Destroyer
- 4x Battle Mechanics
- Greylord Ternions
- Koldun Lord

* KOMMANDER ORSUS ZOKTAVIR
- War Dog
- Juggernaut
- Juggernaut
- Doom Reavers
- Greylord Escort
- Doom Reavers
- Greylord Escort
- Doom Reavers
- Greylord Escort
- Doom Reavers

Game 1 - pVlad vs eLylyth [process of elimination] http://youtu.be/IUMc-C8zuPg

*eLYLYTH
- Ravagore
- Ravagore
- Stinger
- Min Raptors
- Max Striders w/UA
- 2x Strider deathstalker
- Anyssa Ryvaal

I went along to the event having gone to the trouble of organising myself enough Doom reavers to crush everyone with eButcher's tier 4 list over 7 games back to back, but lo and behold, in the very first round i'm paired with his very worst matchup. His other list was Kallus, but I didn't want to risk having him charge me and create a whole bunch of new guys while still shooting me a whole lot. pVlad and windwall would be my best bet. However, to make matters worse there was a huge forest right throughout one of the control zones for process of elimination! Very infuriating.

I started out conservatively, trudging up the field with Vlad in the middle of the wind wall 'bubble'. His ravagores fired away at me regardless, chipping and corroding armour here and there. As the game began to go my way I got a little bit greedy, and turned one of my jacks around to fire at Anyssa Ryvaal, who had easily galloped circles around me and was shooting from the rear. However I forgot to keep a jack (bogged down) in the 'forest zone' and found myself down a control point mid-game. This meant i'd lose in the long term if I didn't get decisive.

My opponent made a few mistakes here and there, letting me get the lead on material. I saw an opportunity to feat and get my jacks into combat with his ravagores and Lylyth herself, but to do so I had to put up signs and portents as well as fuel them with focus. eElylyth easily survived thanks to some transfers, and then parried her way over to Vlad, feated, and shot him dead. Even windwall wouldn't have saved me - she was the only model in his army with a magical weapon. 0-1 start, not good.



Game 2 - pVlad vs eSeverius [Incoming scenario.] http://youtu.be/RV4EufVquJY

*Epic Severius
- Vanquisher
- Vanquisher
- Repenter
- Revenger
- min choir
- Vassal
- mechanic
- Knights Exemplar
- Max Cinerators

Shock and more frustation - the SECOND game i'm in and I STILL can't play eButcher. eSeverius' feat means that he can take over potentially six of my doom reavers, use them as solos for a turn, and berserk his way through all the rest of them. No thanks! I never thought anyone would play eSevvy at this event, and yet i'm playing against him round two. pVlad again. Only this time it's even more of a challenge. His army composition can outfight mine and grind me in an attrition war any day of the week.

After a turn of moving up and seeing his army coming at me from around a building, spliting his attack into two fork-pronged attacks, but taking care of two elements of the scenario while doing so, Vlad sits around firing the cool artillery emplacement. This does nothing but trigger the cinerators +2 movement, changing them from a trivial unit to one that could lose me the game. Oh joy!

I desperately pull an assassination attempt seeing that eSevvy is on zero focus, and i'm about to get stomped a turn later. Vlad feats, and the Destroyer moves up 8 inches, and then uses his arcing fire bombard to blast Sevvy at long range - however even with a boost AND signs and portents pseudo-boost none of the dice come up higher than 4. So he lives. I somehow wrangle a decimator into position so that he's 10 away from Sevvy, but further than 2 away from the revenger reach, while still drawing a line past his jacks. It shoots and gets him, for a measley win. 1-1 so far, almost embarrassed myself.



Game 3 - eButcher vs Barnabus [Guidons Scenario] http://youtu.be/Et5NvwHLbz4

* Barnabus
- IB Spitter
- IB Spitter
- Wrastler
- Max Gatormen Posse x2
- Bog trogs min

Finally, a situation where I can get eButcher out of the carry case. My opponent for this one smacked me down pretty good the last two events, so I was keen to get him now that the matchup favoured me a little more. Although I worried he might save his feat until the last minute and then use it on Butcher himself, before raining Spitter shots and spells on him, he used it turn two and cleared out my first wave of Reavers very well. This left Butcher in range to personally move up and kill four gators in one activation. He was literally one-shotting them.

This started the feat turn out with four tokens, but it went up to around 8-10 by the time the turn was done. I was ahead so comfortably that I actually let Barnabus live for about three more rounds, while I started to score control points. A nice, satisfying Butcher debut - in the end barnabus was on his own, I didn't have many models left but it only took a small handful of Doom Reavers to finish him. 2-1



Game 4 - eButcher vs eDeneghra [The Gauntlet scenario] http://youtu.be/0iu9Lrw-FVw

*Epic Deneghra
- Deathchicken arcnode
- Nightmare
- Scarlock Thrall
- Bane Knights
- Bane Knights
- 2x Machine wraiths
- Warwitch Siren

This round would be a little harder, my opponent for this one was the top seed, and playing one of those 'tier lists' that doesn't look a huge amount different from what you might see in such a caster's normal lineup - and this being one of the top 5 tournament casters of all time, as well.

However, after a little bit of careful movement in the first couple of turns, he went on the offensive turn two, but didn't feat with Deneghra. I was a little surprised - my expectation was that he would feat at this point, subjecting me to not one, but two turns of Bane Knights attacking me, and Denny using hellmouth on her own jacks in order to clear Doom Reavers. Instead what happened was that eButcher feated first, cleared out nearly all of her army, and used rage tokens to pit Fenris up against Nightmare - he rolled four sixes on his boosted, weapon master damage roll. The game was a little bit close up until that point, but with his best assassination tool gone, it was over.

When the feat turn finally came, and Deneghra stood four inches away from Butcher, all he could do was laugh and actually fire his gun. After that it was over, Denny had no army and Butcher was in charge range. My opponent revealed to me later that he was planning on saving his feat because he wanted to win on scenario by killing the doom reavers in the zone and teleporting the bigger stuff out. I guess he didn't factor in the lack of proper tools to achieve that goal, given that Butcher was given the initiative. 3-1



Game 5 - eButcher vs pSeverius [A Flag too Far] http://youtu.be/3yLL0Lgtrtw

* pSeverius
- Vanquisher
- Reckoner
- Blessing of Vengeance
- Max Templeflameguard w/UA
- Max Zealots w/UA
- Vassal
- Choir x4
- Heirophant

Turns out I had run into the other form of Severius, this one not as problematic for the Doom Reavers, but still significantly challenging. The main problems were that he had enough guns and ranged magic to snipe Butcher, and could easily use ashes to ashes on his own units to then clear out my Doom Reavers, while they ran up against the brick wall that is Zealots + Defenders Ward buffed Flameguard.

The crucial moment in the game came right before Butcher reached the enemy lines. I needed to break his wall of TFG, and collect enough rage tokens during the feat turn to move up and engage everything, if not just carve right through everything with Butcher and actually decapitate the Grand Scrutator. He had forgotten to use his feat, which would have otherwise meant that Butcher would have started that particular turn with zero focus. As it happened, I rolled a 1 for focus generation.

This was a real pickle - I had to decide whether to A) Run butcher back towards my deployment zone, let my army suffer some un-affordable casualties, and then head back in after some focus was available (and probably get feated on), or B) attacking and spending the only two focus left, feating, and hoping to somehow cripple his shooting or engage it in such a way that he couldn't disengage without taking a crippling free-strike.

Of course I had to go with B. Butcher wiped out all of the remaining TFG himself, had he rolled 7 focus he could have actually kept on going to Sevvy but this wasn't his day. I picked up a handful of rage tokens but couldn't engage the vanquisher with my juggernaut - only with Fenris. In the responding turn, he blasted me with two POW17's (vanquisher+choir+eye of menoth+ vassal) and then immolated me with his caster. 3-2



Game 6 - eButcher vs eKaya [Sacrifice Scenario] http://youtu.be/ed8qnWhP2qA

*eKaya
- Wilder
- Stalker
- Pureblood
- Gnarlhorn
- Druids
- Shifting stones + UA

As a circle player myself, I knew from looking at the lists and scenario that this would be just about un-winnable for my opponent. The scenario meant that he had to actually put models in the zone in order to prevent me from winning, so I could predict where they would have to finish their movement, and simply place my models accordingly to be able to charge them in those anticipated locations. Furthermore, eKaya's main strength is in sending all of her beasts into combat in a very fury-efficient manner, but then retreating back out of retaliation range. She simply couldn't do this though, because I only needed two control points to win.

Not only did the game play out exactly the way I expected, but the dice rolls also went my way as well, to the point where I felt really guilty. Butcher rolled 7 for focus, cast Fury on a Juggernaut, which charged his Stalker who was benefiting from forced EVO (so DEF 16), but I hit him with a crit freeze. I don't need to tell you how long it survived against repeated POW22's.

His alternative list was actually Grayle's tier, which would have been a lot more interesting. He might have been able to get some luck with his infantry and feat, moving around and swapping men with me until an assassination opportunity arose. Wouldn't have been much less one-sided, but anything would have compared to what we just witnessed. 4-2



Game 7 - eButcher vs pKreuger [Close Quarters Scenario] http://youtu.be/iil9g49ZUHs

* pKreuger
- Woldwarden
- Feral WW
- WW Stalker
- Gorax
- druids + UA
- shifting stones x2

Tier lists often generate a lot of mismatches, but this final game turned out to be best and most interesting of them all - my one-dimensional infantry-spam close combat list could tear his apart even with only a portion of the models I had fielded, but his heavily anti-infantry geared list could wipe out every Doom Reaver in my army before I could land the killing blow. However the deciding factor would be the Scenario - all I had to do was clear the zone, I wouldn't have to chase him to his board edge, a task that would have been near impossible given the constant electrocution.

I sent in two waves of doom reavers, picking off most of his druids and damaging his warbeasts, but the lightning just ripped through my men to the point where things were getting very close. I moved both of my jacks within stone-teleport range of his feral, knowing that he would be tempted. When I play circle, i'm always looking for an opportunity to scrap an enemy jack in one turn with primal, because it feels so good and helps you to gain the initiative in the game. However in this case he'd just be trading a 9-point beast for a 7-point jack, but more critically my jack wasn't needed strategically, whereas his feral was one of only two models capable of actually killing a focus-camping warcaster.

He went for it. After I lost my jack, butcher hacked at the Feral, gained cover from the wreckage, and feated. The Khador army pressed onwards, and soon it was only pKreuger, and two very badly damaged beasts holding the line - a warden and stalker. I was up two control points. He bravely fought on, healing where possible, and reducing me to the last two doom reavers. But even they were enough to finish the last few boxes on his beasts. As pKreuger followed up, there was nothing but two casters, two control zones, and a windswept battlefield strewn with the charred corpses of dozens of warriors.

Butcher waited a turn or two, but when that big roll for focus came, he ran headlong into Kreuger's zone. There was nothing that the stormwrath could do - even the tornado only threw Butcher an inch. As Kreuger's head spun high in the air after severance from the neck, dice down was called - my opponent and I had finished such a long, drawn out game literally five seconds before the time out. But even so, the control points I had collected, and the five wins, meant I was 5-2 and ranked 4th overall. Also, best of faction Khador! Not that i'll be playing Khador at a tournament again anytime soon...






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