|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 17, 2017 19:00:17 GMT
I ran my Dark Elves in a 2500 point match against my friend's Vampire Counts this past Saturday.
My DE list:
Lords: Beastmaster (general) (Manticore, Iron-hard skin, Blind Fury, Cloak of Twilight, Chillblade) - 445 pts Supreme Sorceress - (Lv4, Talisman of Pres., Dispel Scroll) - 290
Heroes: Master - (BSB, Armor of Destiny, shield) - 147 Master - (Cold One, Sword of Might, Gambler's Armor, Shield, Sea Dragon Cloak) - 133
Core: 12 Dark Shards (Standard, Musician) - 164 30 Corsairs (Full Command, Additional Hand Weapon, Banner of Eternal Flame) - 370 5 Dark Riders (Shields, Repeater Crossbows, Full Command) - 95
Special: Repeater Bolt Thrower - 70 Repeater Bolt Thrower - 70 5 Shades (Additional Hand Weapons) - 90 War Hydra (Firey Breath) - 180
Rare: Kharibdyss - 160 Kharibdyss - 160 5 Doomfire Warlocks - 125
Total: 2499
|
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 17, 2017 19:03:20 GMT
Not totally sure about his VC list. I got the Dark magic spells, Word of Pain, Doombolt, Soul Stealer, Arnzipal's Black Horror. No roll of doubles. He had a Lv4 Necro and a Lv2 Vampire. His Vamp had Invocation and Hellish Vigor. His Necro had Invocation, Gaze of Nagash, Raise Dead and Curse of Years. We rolled up Meeting Engagement and deployed as seen. My Corsairs and Shades didn't show up and he had 1 unit of Wolfs and his Varghulf not show up.  Turn 1 I got first turn and moved up as seen  In magic I rolled double 6's. Not bad, but the problem here was my range. I only had 1 spell from my Lv4 that could be cast on one unit of Skeletons (Word of Pain) which I immediately got off without him even attempting to dispel. I next cast Doombolt from my Warlocks on that same unit and he let it go off as well. (I was attempting to draw out some dice, but he was waiting on Black Horror.) Now I got to my last 6 dice and rolled a total of 21. He rolled a 22. Dang. Shooting took off a few more skeletons out of that one unit to the right and both Bolt Throwers missed his Mortis Engine. No Close Combat. He shuffled around a little bit for his movement, content in letting me come to him as he casts magic. In his magic phase he rolled a 6 and 1 for a total of 7. He cast Raise Dead (raised 14) which I let go off because I wasn't too worried about them chaffing me up and since it'd give me something for my Dark Shards and Dark Riders to shoot at if nothing else, plus I wanted to save more of my DD for stopping Curse of Years and Invocation, which I do and end his magic phase.  No shooting and no close combat. |
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 17, 2017 19:03:47 GMT
Turn 2 Neither of our units arrive on the table. I charge. My Doomfire Warlocks, Master on Cold One, and Dark Riders all hit his Zombies that he just raised. My 2 Kharibdyss and War Hydra all successfully charge his Skeleton bus on the left. My Beastmaster flys up to their left to protect their flank from a unit of 2 Spirit Host but stays within 3" of the Kharibdyss on the left to give him an additional D3 attacks. Magic didn't do much other than get a Doombolt off on his right unit of skeletons again. I draw out his dispel scroll with my casting of Black Horror again though. Shooting took out more Skeletons and missed his Mortis Engine again (he was behind a forest and long distance). Close combat saw the Zombies pop, and I reformed my Master to start heading for his backfield, while my other two units remained where they were, preparing for the remaining Skeletons to charge. The monsters did the monster thing and destroyed his left Skeleton unit. The War Hydra used his Firey Breath in this combat.  This was just the number of wounds inflicted by the monster's attacks. They were all gone after crumbling. His turn, he charged in his Spirit Host to my Beastmaster and sent his Vampire Lord, Wright King, and 10 Black Knights into my monsters. Uh-oh. His right remaining Skeletons charge my Doomfire Warlocks. I hold. This is where things go bad. His Mortis Engine sends out some sort of attack that manages to hit my Doomfire Warlocks, killing one. In magic, he casts Curse of Years on my Dark Riders, which I let go off, hoping that he'd roll poorly and not roll a 6 since there were only 5 in the unit. Plus, they were mostly chaff anyway, and I wanted to save my other dice to stop Invocation and Hellish Vigor on his Knight deathstar. CoY goes off and he manages to roll 1 six. Dark Riders are now down to 4. I stop the rest of his magic. No shooting. Close combat. Okay, let me just go ahead and rip this bandage off quickly. His Vampire Lord attacks 1 of my Kharibdyss'. Dead Kharybdyss. His Wright King attacks. No wounds. His Black Knights attack, splitting up evenly between the two. Each monster takes 1 wound, but the War Hydra manages to regen his wound. I attack back and manage to kill 3 Knights. He wins, but with my general right beside them, I make my Ld test. My Beastmaster puts 3 wounds on the Spirit Host and the Manicore does the rest. My Doomfire Warlocks roll horribly and only kill two Skeletons. (To be fair, he was rolling regen saves from his Mortis Engine like a BOSS! I think he made 1, 6+ armor save and 3 6++ regen saves!) The Skeletons hit back and go to town, killing 3 of my last 4 Warlocks! I lose combat and don't pass my Ld roll and wind up fleeing! He doesn't catch me, but the damage is done by this point. To make things worse, my Master on Cold One fails his panic test with a roll of 10 and runs directly away from that combat!  |
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 17, 2017 19:07:34 GMT
Turn 3 Both of our additional units arrive on the table. I rally my Doomfire Warlock, but my fleeing Master fails (AGAIN!) and runs toward the edge of the table, stopping 1" away! I charge my Beastmaster into a unit of Wolves threatening my Monster's flank, taking him just far enough for them not to benefit from his Inspiring Presence. Big mistake on my part. I move my Corsairs (who just arrived on my side behind the Monsters) up their 5" movement value. I move my BSB out of his unit of Dark Shards, placing him right in the middle of the Corsairs, Dark Riders, and Dark Shards, in order for all of them to benefit from his reroll. The Dark Shards move up to block the Skeletons from charging my last remaining Doomfire Warlock. Magic. I roll low. 3 and 1 - no channels. I throw all of my dice at removing Curse of Years. Dispelled. Shooting. My Dark Riders, Dark Shards and 1 Bolt Thrower take off a few more Skeletons. The other Bolt Thrower shoots at the Mortis Engine and puts 1 wound on it. My Shades (who have popped up by his Necromancer bunker) only manage to put 1 wound on his zombies which he saves with his Mortis Engine regen buff.  Close combat. Okay, well, basically his Vampire and Knights win combat against my monsters and make them test on a Ld of 5 (after CR modifiers). They run and are chased down. My Beastmaster easily kills the wolfs and reforms to face the blocks in his backfield.  His Mortis Engine goes off again and kills a few of my Dark Shards ( 3?) and my last remaining Doomfire Warlock. He charges his Vamp and Black Knights into my Corsairs and his skeletons into my Dark Shards. (I forgot to Stand and Shoot.) He also decides to charge his Mortis Engine through the forest that it's been hiding behind all this time at the flank of my Dark Riders. I elect to flee with them and roll a whopping 3"! He (of course) rolls insanely high and runs them down! (His Black Coach has been sitting in his backfield, inching closer and closer to my Master that has been fleeing, gaining more and more of it's buffs - it was about to buff 5 by this point, but eventually gets to the max buffs (6) before he charges it into combat. Magic. His turn to roll high on the winds of magic. 6 & 6. He starts off by casting Curse of Years on my Dark Shards with IF. It goes off, but only kills maybe 1 Dark Shard? He rolls for his miscast result, but has to roll twice on the table and I get to choose the result I want him to take because of the Blasphemous Tomb Upgrade on his Mortis Engine. He rolls a 10 and 11. Of course he does, and winds up only losing 1 level on his Necromancer, losing CoY in the process. I manage to stop the rest of his magic phase, but use my Dispel Scroll in the process. No shooting. Close combat, he crushes my Corsairs and pursues them off the table, waiting unit his next turn to come back at that point. My Dark Shards do the Elf thing and kill a bunch of Skeletons and he crumbles some more.   |
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 17, 2017 19:27:14 GMT
Turn 4 My Master on Cold One rallies! I charge with my Beastmaster into a unit of Fell Bats.  I also charge the Mortis Engine with my BSB who is by himself. My Shards do nothing this whole game. In Magic, I manage to dispel CoY and try to use my remaining 5 dice to cast Black Horror on his Necromancer bunker. He throws everything at it and stops it. My shooting from the Bolt Throwers picks off 2 more Black Knights. Close Combat, my Beastmaster kills the Bats and reforms to stare down his Necromancer bunker. My BSB goes to town and puts the last 3 wounds on the Mortis Engine, killing it and blowing it up in the process. Pretty much everything is away from them at this point, except for my Dark Shards and his Skeletons. It kills all but 3 of my unit and Sorceress. He loses some more Skeletons. My BSB (with the Armor of Desitny) makes all of his saves. In his turn, his Vamp and Knights come back on the table. He charges his Varghulf and 1 Spirit Host into the back of my last remaining shade. He turns his last unit of Wolfs so that he could get a rear charge off on my Beastmaster if he holds me in combat with his bunker. His bunker turns to face my inevitable charge from my Beastmaster. His Black Coach (now fully buffed and can fly) makes a long-bomb charge off against my Master on Cold One and kills him from Impact Hits alone. In magic he gets off one Invocation on his Black Knights and brings back 4 of them. Close combat, my Dark Shards kill all but 1 of his Skeletons (Are you kidding me?!?) My Shade dies a horrible death to the Varghulf in his back. |
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 17, 2017 19:48:57 GMT
Turn 5 I move my BSB into combat with the last remaining skeleton and my Dark Shards.  I charge my Beastmaster into his Necromancer bunker. Magic is ineffectual. Shooting takes off 2 Black Knights from one Bolt Thrower and the other shoots 2 remaining Wolfs from another unit off the table, trying to get points. Close Combat. My BSB kills the last Skeleton! Yay!  My Beastmaster challenges his Necromancer, who refuses and moves to the back. My Beastmaster kills 3 Zombies with his attacks and then uses his ability to boost the Manticore's attacks by D3, and the Manticore's Blood Rage boosts his attacks by another D3, resulting in 10 Manticore attacks. 10 more dead Zombies. Thunderstomps. More dead Zombies. The rest crumble.  (This guy is a terror against infantry!) VC turn He charges with his Vamp Knights into my first Bolt Thrower, His Black Coach make ANOTHER long-bomb charge into the flank of my Dark Shards/BSB/Sorceress unit, killing the remaining 3 Dark Shards from Impact Hits. He also charges his Varghulf and last Spirit Host into my Beastmaster hoping for CR. (He held his last unit of Wolfs back for some reason. I think he was a little intimidated from the thrashing the Zombies took.) Magic was ineffectual since his Necro couldn't cast for having refused my challenge, and his Vampire was only a level 2. Close combat. His Vamp kills my first Bolt Thrower and overruns into my second one. My Beastmaster allocates his attacks on his Necromancer, killing him, and all of his Manticore's attacks on his Varghulf, killing him. The Spirit Host does nothing and crumbles.   My Beastmaster reforms to face his Wolfs and his Black Coach and crew manage to put a few Killing Blows through on my BSB and run down my sorceress. At this point, I concede the game since I only had my Beastmaster left on the table (He had around 1000 points in that one Vampire Knight unit) and there was no way I could catch him with 1 turn left in the game. Even then it wasn't in my favor.  (Sorry for the blurry pic!) Win for the VC! |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 17, 2017 20:03:45 GMT
Nice batrep! I'm getting ready to start working on my own Dark Elves so it's nice to see other battle reports out there.
Nice to see those mantic zombies! Love those models they look so much better than GW.
You invested heavily in monsters what are your thoughts? I'm a fan of both monsters types but I don't know if I'd take that many unless the game was much larger. Seems like the list needs some RnF/steadfast breakers for grinding out the enemy in combat.
Keep it up!
|
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 17, 2017 20:56:08 GMT
Oh - I LOVE the monsters! BUT (1) they were facing an unbelievably hard Vampire model who could pump out the wounds AND he was mounted (so no Thunderstomps), (2) that particular build benefitted from the Beastmaster's special rule, so it is good to keep them close (though I probably should have split them up a bit, attacking different targets - like 1 Kharibdyss into his Mortis Engine), and (3) against VC, the Kharibdyss's Abyssal Howl didn't have any effect. If I had been facing another type of army, where Fear and Terror could affect them, then I think the Kharibdyss would have been much more powerful. They are all rather cheap monsters and spread out between Special and Rare. That helps. I love the Beastmaster, though the Cloak of Twilight didn't have any effect on this game. Against an army that has more potent shooting or magic missiles, then it'd probably be good. I've purposefully avoided buying up a horde of Witch Elves, because that seems to the go-to for so many DE players and I'd feel the need to include an Altar for them to benefit from. I'm working on building a Black Dragon as well as a Dark Pegasus right now so that I can have access to as many DE monsters as possible. I know it probably isn't the MOST potent list I could make with DE, but its fun and I like to change things up a bit.  |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 17, 2017 21:04:48 GMT
I'm in the pro witch elf camp  In all fairness though I want them because they're an iconic dark elf unit and I happen to have ALMOST enough of the raging heroes blood vestal models from an ebay purchase that I made to make a unit of 28 (I ended up sacrificing some cold one knights to make a unit of 28 instead of 21, I'll need to buy 4 more). No cauldron though, my ladies will have no save  At least until 2500 points. Or maybe 3000 haven't decided yet. I think you would have been better off using your chaff to negate his black knights (hopefully) while taking apart the rest of his army with your monsters and using your better mobility to your advantage. Kudos for going with the monster theme, it's a great looking one! You should also add some harpies, they'd be keeping with the theme! |
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 17, 2017 21:55:44 GMT
Nice to see those mantic zombies! Love those models they look so much better than GW. Lol, a work of warning: Really watch what you buy off eBay! My friend here won a bid for 100 Mantic Zombies and when he got them, the seller had stuck them on a movement tray with some sort of cement! Litterally! Not even ranked up in any sort of uniform order! (Probably a KoW player) |
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 18, 2017 2:51:31 GMT
I do have 5 Harpies on the way too. I'm not sure how I feel about my 2 year old girls and boy looking at them naked though. I might try green stuff-ing something over their nakedness.
|
|
|
|
Post by mahbruck on Jul 18, 2017 4:05:58 GMT
Great report there. The Beastmaster is, well, a beast indeed. I like this army much more than the overdone Witch hordes. I love the (new) corsairs and would like to make them work (no cauldron preferably).
|
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 18, 2017 13:35:24 GMT
Yeah, that's what I'm trying out. I want to see if I can make them work with something other than the "norm". I love the idea of the Corsairs as well. I'll keep tweaking them and ultimately see what they can do.
|
|
|
|
Post by frozenfood on Jul 19, 2017 7:41:12 GMT
Cool minis and cool board. Is the board a mat or something you made yourself?
|
|
|
|
Post by mottdon on Jul 19, 2017 14:52:00 GMT
I cut a 6'x4' board (really good quality to prevent warping) and bought a FAT mat. It was totally worth every penny! Models and movement trays just glide over it. No more wrinkling of fabric. It is basically one giant mouse pad. It has a rubber backing so it doesn't slide and is weighted and comes with it's own carry case so that you can roll it up, carry it by the shoulder strap and store easily in a corner of a closet.
There are SO MANY to choose from as well!
I'm going to be cutting my board down the middle, attaching both sides with hinges and making a braced frame to provide rigidity. It will be able to fold up so that I can store it out of the way. The frame will also contain dice, etc.
That's the plan anyway.
|
|
