The second game of the evening was against Jon (aka Dancingmonkey) and his Cryx. There was quite a contrast in the make-up of both armies with mine troop heavy and Jon's 'jack heavy.
My force saw Feora leading the following:
Jacks: Devout and Revenger
Units: a Choir (full strength), Zealots (full strength with Monolith Bearer), Exemplars Errant (full strength) and Temple Flameguard (x 8).
Feora came up against Mortenebra who led:
Jacks: Nightmare, Harrower, Deathripper, Defiler and Cankerworm.
We played using the Bodyguard scenario, which meant neither of us had to mess around with capturing objectives and simply go for a 'caster kill.
We rolled for set up and first turn. I won the roll and opted to go first. For set-up, I placed my Zealots to the left of my deployment zone and my Flameguard, 'jacks and Feora on my right. If Jon had wanted to get a 'caster kill, he would have to come down my right-hand side. This would be ideal as my Zealots could just run around the hill in the centre of the board and out flank the Cryx force. Jon set all of his force on my right except for Cankerworm, who was placed in the centre of his deployment zone. After that, I had my Errants advance deploy on the hill in the centre of the table facing the right. What I wanted was a gauntlet for Jon to run down, coming through crossbow fire before hitting the Shield Wall of my Flameguard. With set-up finished we went to turn one.
TURN ONE
A quiet turn for both players. I set about a general advance. The Errants moved slightly further up the hill followed by the Revenger. The Flameguard did the same while staying in tight formation. Feora and the Devout kept pace with the Flameguard and stayed behind them. The Zealots ran halfway across the battlefield in order to skirt the hill. At this point Feora had decided to sit on all of her Focus, giving her DEF 15 and ARM 23!
Jon moved his Harrower towards my Errants, Nightmare towards my Flameguard and Cankerworm towards the oncoming Zealots.
TURN TWO
The Zealots continued running. In fact they reached the opposite deployment zone and found the the Cankerworm sitting in a shallow pond. They couldn't do anything more as they collected their breaths and thier thoughts. The Errants decided to use their crossbows to open fire on the Harrower. This didn't prove to be particularly effective as only a handful of points worth of damage was casued. The remaining units all stayed where they stood. Once again, Feora kept all of her Focus.
Jon took the offensive line by having the Cankerworm, Harrower and Nightmare charge the Zealots, Errants and Flameguard respectively. Cankerworm held up the rushing Zealots by killing three. The Harrower laughed off the pitiful display of shooting and charged into the Errants. Only two of the Exemplars fell as a result, but had used Bond of Life to keep engaged with the Harrower. Jon was only building up the carnage as he loaded Nightmare with Focus in order to cut a path through the Flameguard towards Feora. Five of the Flameguard fell leaving only three to guard their leader.
TURN THREE
After the witness the slaughter of the rightous Menites, I decided to take action. The Monolith Bearer used Greater Destiny, so that his followers could disengage from the Cankerworm without harm and do waht they do best. Once at a safe distance (within range, of course) they launched their Firebombs. Cankerworm exploded as it was subjected to seven POW14 blasts. The Errants didn't fare so well. Those that could engage did resonable damage but not enough to seriously hurt the Harrower. Not even the Revenger, who decided to help out and charged the Harrower from behind, could take down the enem Helljack. This left the small matter of the Nightmare. The Flameguard went forward to engage with a combined melee attack and did as much damage as they could, which turned out to be not much. The Devout charged in as well, again just causing minor scratching. After watching her forces do so badly, she decided to show them how to do things. She cast Engine of Destruction, which boosted her own decent stats (+2SPD, +4Strength, +2MAT), and threw herself at the Nightmare. While causing considerable damage, the helljack remained on its feet.
There wasn't much for Jon to do as he had Feora in sights (melee range). All he needed was for Nightmare hack Feora to pieces. Which it did, despite Feora sitting on two points of Focus.
END OF GAME
Jon was kind enough to point out that in the last turn, Feora should have bought extra attacks with her two remaining Focus. This could have finished off Nightmare allowing me to regroup slightly. Other than that, the Zealots could have made it accross the table to Mortenebra and try to soften him up. The Errants may have taken out the Harrower with numbers and then gone on to support the Zealots. Also, while drawing up some notes on the train (the batteries in my camera had already run out), I realised one very important thing I should have done. In the second turn, the Errants decided to fire their crossbows at the Harrower. I remember measuring to see if they were in range, that the distance between them and the Helljack was nine inches. CHARGE RANGE! 10 Errants (or maybe only as many as can fit around the Harrowers base) with Weapon Master and charging would have caused 4d6+10 damage each! That would have put a bit of pressure on Jon at that point and made the game a bit closer. The cagey start made it look the the game was even, but in the end two well place 'jacks controlled the game.
Thats just another thing that I will have to remember for other times.
