Battle Report: Lord Arbiter Hexeris versus Iron Lich Asphyxious

Battle Report #1
Lord Arbiter Hexeris versus Iron Lich Asphyxious

Now is the time for my first official Pillers of Halaak Battle Report!

My regular Cryx opponent Mike, stopped by my apartment, to throw down on some games. After a warm up game where his Mortenebra list absolutely destroyed my Morghoul list (due to incredibly bad decisions on my part, I blame a month hiatus away from the game and lack of food and sleep), we went into a second match-up. I wanted to try the latest version of my eHexeris list, and Mike went with "whatever Asphyxious I find in my case first" which happened to be pAsphyxious. Mike is well practiced with this caster, so I knew I was in for a rough battle. With food finally doing it's job and a clearer head we got to it.

Here are our lists:

Mike:

Iron Lich Asphyxious +6 points
* Cankerworm 5 points
* Deathjack 12 points
* Nightwretch 4 points
* Ripjaw 5 points
* Skarlock Thrall 2 points

Bane Lord Tartarus 4 points
6 Bane Thralls 5 points
* Bane Thrall Officer & Standard 3 points
10 Mechanithralls 5 points
Necrosurgeon & Stitch Thralls 2 points
2x Warwitch Siren 2 points each
Withershadow Combine 5 points

Mahu:

Lord Arbiter Hexeris +6 points

* Bronzeback Titan 10 points
* Cyclops Brute 5 points
* Cyclops Raider 5 points
* Cyclops Shaman 5 points
* Titan Gladiator 8 points
* Titan Sentry 9 points

Agonizer 2 points
Extoller Soulward 2 points
4 Paingiver Beast Handlers 2 points
10 Praetorian Swordsmen 6 points
* Praetorian Officer & Standard Bearer 2 points

We rolled randomly for the Scenario and came up on Process of Elimination from Steamroller 2012. I won the roll to go first and opted to take it.

Here is my deployment. For this game, the savage proxies as the Raider, and the Kovaas proxies as an Extoller Soulward. I spaced the Shaman and the Raider 12" from each other to support each other with the Raider Animus, and the Soulward was centrally placed to give either of them or Hexeris Eyeless Sight. I then spaced the beasts evenly with the Swordsmen filling the gaps. The Sentry was my bonded beast.

Here is after my initial run. Shaman cast rush on the Sentry which then tramples forward. The Gladiator casts rush on himself followed by a trample. The Bronzeback Runs. The Raider runs over to start hunting for Tartarus. Swordsmen run forward. Hexeris activates, advances, casts Ashen Vail and dumps 5 Fury into the Agonizer.

The Cryx army advances. Tartarus swings out to the extreme flank to make it very hard to reach him. The Deathjack casts a Breath of Corruption to try and hit my front lines but is scatters wildly behind them and kills a Swordsman in the back.

Fortunately for me the Mechanithralls are in a premium charge range for a few of my swordsmen. I opt not to black spot them, because I was unsure if I could get to the second rank with side steps, and if I could, I would only be able to hit one other model anyways. The Shaman casts Snipe on the Raider, and the Raider advanced and killed the Skarlock (my only real option at the time). The Gladiator and the Sentry both run into position. Now here is where I made a mistake. My entire goal this turn was to kill Tartarus and jam a charge lane to the Sentry so that when the Banes charged, they would only be able to plate a couple, and the Sentry should survive this. Unfortunately, I though that the Sentry had set defense, which ultimately didn't matter, which you will see in a minute why. The Soulward gives Hexeris Eyeless Sight. Hexeris activates and boosts a to hit and damage Hellfire onto Tartarus, leaving him with 2 damage boxes. He then tosses an unboosted Black Spot on to the banes. He pops feat and does another boasted to hit and damage hellfire on to Tartarus, killing him. He sits on three after the turn. In hindsight, I should have started with an Ashes to Ashes on the Bane Closest to Tartarus, where I was guaranteed to hit Tartarus even if I rolled a 1, but any additional would have meant possible a few more dead banes, then popped my feat and finish Tartarus off with a Hellfire. It would have put me in a much better place. Hindsight is 20/20 and this is why you play practice games. I put to many resources into a single model. I also should have tossed a single Fury to the Agonizer after it activated to extend my agony range. When the Agonizer activated it was a 1/4" away from the death jack. All I really wanted to do was limit the Deathjacks casting potential. The rest of the turn saw the Brute cast it's animus on Hexeris and the Bronzeback advancing far enough to contest the zone, but stay outside of the Deathjack's effective charge range.

The Nightwretch aims and kills one of the blocking Swordsmen. The Warwitch Siren walks over to the Sentry and Shadowbinds it (god I hate that ability) which I forgot also puts a DEF debuff on the Sentry. Banes Charge, as predicted, only a few make it and the Sentry is only down to about half health. Now this is that I didn't expect. Asphyxious charges the Sentry, and between Shadowbind and Dark Shroud easily puts it down, then he Teleports to safety. The Necrosurgeon advances up and pop 3 fresh Mechanithralls beyond my front line of swordsmen. The Thralls already engaged clear out my swordsmen a little, and charge the agonizer doing minimal damage, as well as the Raider, who was stilling now with 4 damage boxes left and thankfully all it's aspects in play. The Deathjack munches a Swordsmen in the way and didn't advance any further for fear of the Bronzeback.

So it is my turn, and I feel the loss of the Sentry. Not all is lost at this point, a Soulwarded Hexeris casts Black Spot in the Banes, casts the Brutes animus on himself and sits on a few. The Brute Advances and kills both Mechanithralls, but is unable to hit a black spotted Bane. The Bronzeback advances and casts Beat Back on the Shaman. The Shaman fails miserably and kills only two banes, but is able to free the Raider up because the Bane in melee with the Raider passed a tough check, (if everything went according to plan, the shaman would have beat backed over to the right and I wouldn't have had to commit the Gladiator). The freed Raider aims, kicking in his ability to ignore stealth, and kills a Bane, the Black Spot attack triggers and a boost to hit and kill takes out the Warwitch Siren. Faced with the prospect of being charged by 4 Banes, I felt I had to commit the Gladiator. I knew that Asphyxious could pull the same trick again and kill the Gladiator, but I felt with positioning, I was probably going to lose it anyways (damn you Shaman) from the Banes if I didn't kill them, so Gladiator slams a forward, and follows up into melee range of 3 more. Black Spot plus buying an attack easily ended them. The Agonizer tries to position around the Thrall it was in melee with and sings "no focus" agony again, and guess what, he is still out buy a 1/4". The Swordsmen UA charges and thankfully (in the only actual luck I had this turn) puts the Necrosurgeon in the ground. The remaining Swordsmen just jam the Deathjack. Paingivers pull fury off where they need to and two of them block LOS to Hexeris encase a Asphyxious magic feat wants to end this game. Luck wasn't on my side, I could have done way more damage if I could rolled better on my to hit rolls with the Brute and Shaman. At least the Bane UA was out of the picture.

The Banes activated and the one in combat with the Raider failed to hit. Only one could see the Shaman to charge and caused minimal damage. The one that could ran over to the Gladiator to get Dark Shroud on it. The Withershadow knocked off Black Spot and Puppet Mastered the Cankerworm. The Canker worm charged and put a decent amount of damage on the Gladiator with it's armor piercing attack (armor piercing + dark shroud + puppet master = fun?). Asphyxious charges the Gladiator and puts him down, grabs his soul, and teleports to safety again. Deathjack and the Ripjaw free up the Machinthralls. The mechanithralls charge and kill the Agonizer and charges the Bronzeback, just cranking damage with Scything Touch and a Combo strike. The stitchthralls move forward to block the Bronzeback from getting to the Deathjack. A powerboastered Nightwretch finishes off the Raider.

So I am thinking I can get the Bronzeback into the Deathjack by way of beatbacking off stitchthralls. Unfortunately, I don't feel comfortable trampling over there because I just won't have any fury left to really damage the Deathjack. If I can kill the four in the way, I might be able to do it. Hexeris goes and casts a boasted Ashes to Ashes into the clump of Thralls, if I roll a 3 or more, I might be able to do this. I roll a 1! Yes! Yes! That's exactly what I needed. So I spent 5 fury to kill 2 Thralls. At this point it wasn't worth risking the Bronzeback, so he two hand tosses the Thrall in base contact with him into the last thrall, killing both of them. I try and free up the Shaman to charge the Canker worm, but between failure on the Brutes part, and failure on the Paingivers part, the shaman just tosses attacks on the last bane in base contact with it. The Soulward moves up to give Hexeris minimal protection. Two turns of absolute failure on my dice's part is losing me this game. At least I have the zones still contested, I was going to make him kill my army and pray for an opening.

Thralls and the last Bane finish off my Brute. The Withshadow Combine finish off my last two beast handlers and puppet master the cankerworm. The Nightwrech shoots at my Bronzeback causing minimal damage, Mike was baiting me to Hyper Aggression towards the Deathjack, but I was raised no fool. The Deathjack casts a spell and kills the soulward. Asphyxious charges and kills the Shaman, teleporting away again. The Cankerworm charges Hexeris causing minimal damage.

So now, I get excited. Mike still hasn't popped his feat, and Asphyxious is sitting on zero focus. I measure my control area, and find that I am in a perfect spot for Hexeris to charge Asphyxious. With 4 boasted to hit attacks, needing 8s, and at dice minus 2, I think I got this. I might be able to pull this win out of my ass. The Bronzeback charges the Cankerworm easily wrecking it with needing to spend all 4 fury. Hexeris charges, but has to take a free strike from a Thrall who misses. I am here, I can do this, I can win....

Ha Ha, no. With four boosted to hit attacks, I miss twice, and leave Asphyxious with 5 damage boxes left. A few poor decisions and my dice just saying no, lost me the game, even after the perfect Hail Mary was presented to me.

At this point with a beast at full fury and a very pissed off Asphyxious, who still has his feat, I call it.

I learned a lot from this game, and I really like this particular list, especially since it was built with character restrictions in mind. I am not sold on the Bronzeback just yet, but I feel some more playtesting and this list might work out. I fall into it occasionally, and the biggest trap I found with eHexeris is over committing to try and get that feat turn first strike. Like I said, there was one critical mistake I feel I made, that instantly put me in an uphill battle for the rest of the game. A battle I felt that with decent die rolls, I may have been able to come back from, but my dice decided against it, it is what it is. I was still happy with this game. It was a sufficient test for my list, Mike played well and gave me better insight into my activation orders. This is actually the first game I fielded a Soulward and the Raider, and I must say, I am very impressed with both. The only reason I haven't fielded a Soulward before was lack of actually finding the model in state, but I most definitely will be grabbing one as soon as possible. It opens so much for our casting warlocks, especially both Hexeris'.

At the end of the day, I basically over committed, and used my feat wrong, but like I said, this is why we test our lists. Even Templecon winners lose games due to mistakes.

Hope you found this enjoyable!