Alrighty then, first batrep for this site. My opponent has Helynna and Issyria, considering my current 2 list is one teched to the brim for anti guns and one that well, isn't, the drop was pretty obvious. Coven vs Issy!
My opponent said to me before we started he was trying out Destors & Hypnos, Destors I don't really mind, I think the Coven are naturally strong vs Cavalry, but Hypnos is definitely something of an issue. He can shoot on my feat turn and is naturally spell warded.
Issyria
-Sylys
-Hyperion
-Hypnos
-Chimera
3 Dawnguard Destors
Elara
-Discordia
Arcanist
Arcanist
I won the roll for initiative and opted to go first, because on the table we had I didn't think there was a good side for him. Deployment looked like this:
So my opponent, having a colossal, naturally took the side that didn't have a giant rock in the middle of it. Thankfully for me combined with Fuel Cache & VoM I had the option for a massive LoS blocking wall once Issy's feat was gone, which was nice. It also gave me a sweet base of operations for the Egregore. Additionally, my opponent couldn't threaten the far side of the forest, which I could exploit. I deployed fairly symetrically, with the Coven being on the side that could hide safely behind the wall of LoS blocking, the idea being that later in the game one of them might run onto the flag. The 2 stalkers on the outside are on the Coven, the 2 on the inside are on Aikos.
On my turn one I had Helleana put up Occultation on the left unit of Raiders, Infernal Machine on the right hand stalker and advance. Aikos put up Escort and advanced. Stuff generally ran, until Selene advanced and put up a VoM, to begin construction on fort Cryx. The Stalker with IM was able to run far enough to make a real nuisance of itself behind a forest.
Well, this kind of play normally gets some reaction from my opponents. It feels a lot like going 2nd vs Haley2. So, my opponent opts to timidly advance, after asking all of my threat ranges. I explained my Stalkers could walk 9 then leap, and yet my opponent advanced a couple inches with Elara. Going to definitely punish that. IR went up on Disco and Admonition on Hypnos.
Wellp, it was time to pull the trigger and roll some dice. The IM Stalker got allocated 2, as did the one that was able to leap behind Elara. I dropped VoM because I'd be feating this turn. Kept Occultation on the far unit of Raiders though because potentially a few of them would be really wide, and I didn't have much to do focus wise this turn due to Arcane Vortex. My node ran up and I put Curse of Shadows onto the Destors. The Stalker jumping at Elara got Ghost Walk & Puppet Master from the Combine. Ghostly Stalker walked through a rock and jumped behind Elara, despite some poor dice and Puppet Master not really helping, he was able to put Elara down with all his focus. The Infernal Stalker walked up, leapt to be 1" from a pair of Destors and shanked them both. Otherwise stuff ran and the Coven feated. I jammed Hyp with a Stalker to contain the amount of damage it could do to my Raiders. Ragman moved to threaten the entire zone with Death Field.
So, my opponent was in a bit of a bind here. He also realised he had forgotten Sylys, so I naturally let him put him down. He allocated out 1 to both Hyp and Hypnos and then had a think. Issy feated and Ancillaried the Hyp,which promptly rolled 6,6 to hit then 6,6 for damage on the stalker engaging it. Then she walked and reactivated Disco. I pointed out that you can't Ancillary then walk, rather than accept a take back, my opponent elected to Velocity to get there, leaving Issy on 0 focus after she cast Admonition on herself. Eek. Hyp advanced into his now clear lane (grumble) and rolled a crit with the Starburst Cannon onto my Stalker (further grumble), leaving it on 4 boxes and killing 4 Raiders around it. It died to the little guns, but every other shot missed. Hypnos took a FS for 0 dmg form my Stalker to walk into its butt and punched the little guy to death. The Destor flailed ineffectively at Satyxis and Discordia (now able to walk after being reactivated in mk3) engaged my Stalker.
Well, it's certainly go time. The Stalker with IM got 2, I kept IM and CoS (so I could get more raiders into jacks for feedback, if need be). The Combine put Ghostly on the big unit of Raiders on the right, and Puppet Master onto Morgaen. The Egregore ran back into Perfect Conjuction, and a Deathripper ran to be within 6" of the IM'd Stalker and 8" of Issyria, but outside of 6" to not trigger Admonition. Morgaen crit a Stygian Abyss into Issyria, blinding her (how's that feel, nerd) and dealing 11 damage with a boosted roll and putting Ghost Walk onto the Stalker. Then my Machine Wraith advanced up to Hypnos, my opponent elected not to trigger Admonition, hit him, dealing 0 damage, but moving him so that Admonition was very awkward (or so I thought), then missing his attack on Issy (boo!). After that my Stalker walked up to just outside of 1" from Issy, who promptly flew over the Arcanist I'd intended to box her in with. Woops. Thankfully she couldn't go far enough that I couldn't still get her in melee, whew. Stalker leapt in and sliced her head off. Even if I hadn't been able to get the Stalker into melee, I only had to deal 4 damage to various Warjacks with my Satyxis & Ragman, which shouldn't have been too difficult considering I could get 8 into Hyperion.
Whew, some thoughts:
This list in testing seems incredibly solid against gunlines. It falters somewhat vs higher armour, but it's not too bad with Ragman & a strong feat to set up. Thankfully it exerts so much scenario and assassination pressure that it normally balances out due to forcing my opponent to make unfavourable trades. Also, Coven are very mean to Journeymen Warcasters, between Stalkers & Stygian Abysses. Had my opponent played more conservatively with Elara on turn 2 I still think I would have been in a strong position to start really forcing scenario on my turn 3, and I probably would have put real pressure over the course of the game onto Issyria with Feedback. Doesn't seem like a bad matchup at all for the list, which is great. I'm getting some real games tomorrow, which is good, although I may not be able to get terrain....
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