I played 100 games of Cryx!

It finally happened, I managed to go 100 hundred games before buying a new army. This is a grand occasion and as I look back on the 100 games I have many fond memories.

It has been 13 month since my first game. I participated in 3 tournaments, a 35 point, a 35 points with 20 point jacks and a double tournament. Won the first came second in the second and my team scraped the bottom with 2 timeouts and a loss in the last. I have painted 89 Cryx models. I also made some Charts to show fun statistics about my first 100 games of warmachine and Cryx.

Far to much warmachine over Hordes

Time made me enjoy the 50 point game more than other point sizes

I think that is damn good for the first 100 games

Most important statistic of all is, that over time I had 92% of FUN during the time spend playing and painting warmachine this past year.

I have long contemplated what my next faction should be, and due to the low representation of hordes factions, I decided to go for Trollbloods. I painted a test model, I am still unsure about what to do for the bases, but I am open to suggestions.

I am happy about most of this model, with the exception of the hat. When I looked at the models stats I knew he would be one of those models rarely used so ideal test model.

 

Finally, to all the opponent I have played, thank you. I have enjoyed this game a lot and so far I am not looking back at any other system. Hope you will join me for the next 100 games of warmachine!

50 point skarre queen of the broken coast tournament army list

I think I have found one of the army lists I will be using for the before mentioned tournament. I will go through the list and shortly justify why these where my choices.

Skarre queen of the broken coast (+6)

With black spot she can take high defense down to a more manageable level.

Death Jack (12)

Is great combined with Perdition Fate weaver and deathward. Also great without ;)

 Deathripper (4)

Is a much needed archnode to get of perdition, backlash, black spot and occasionally bloodrain.

Stalker (4)

I want to try putting some pressure on the enemy caster and with fate weaver the stalker can do just that.

Saxon Orrik (2)

Fixes the pathfinder problem.

 

 Bane Lord Tartarous (4)

 Increases the potentilal of the Bane thrall unit, and is a good target for fate weaver. Thresher!

 

Satyxis Raider captain (2)

 Increases the threat of the raiders, and is a great objective grabber. Also since the list lacks shooting she can clear out some charge lanes.

 Full unit of Bane Thralls with UA (11)

Takes care of heavy ARM such as colossals, and with tartarous and black spot they are effectively MAT 10 against that hard to hit unit.

Full unit of Satyxis Raiders with UA (10)

Punish any warcaster with a jack. With a backlash caster they become the best counter to aggressive colossals. 14 inch charge ;)

The Withershadow Combine (5)

Gives me the dispel option. They also have a few other trick going for them (understatement)

 Necrosurgeon (2)

This unit is in here to block charge lanes against skarre and to compensate for blood trade and the cost of fate weaver.

 

This list has a strong assassination game with the death-jack-bullet, a stalker and backlash. It can also do good in an attrition game but has the downside that I have nothing ranged apart from the random solo UA and spells. This might become the failing point of the list keeping me from getting the upper hand. I will try the list this Tuesday against Cygnar. It will also be my game Nr. 100 with Cryx since I started player about a year ago, but that will be the subject for another post. Still working on list Nr. 2 but I am unsure what to settle on yet.

As you can see I still need to do some painting for this one, but I think I will be okay. Just 5 models, I fear my other list will require a bit more painting.

Making lists for tournaments



 

During the past few months, I have taken part of a yearly Danish league called “The Imperator League” and it has been a joy. They have some simple rules such as, do not play against the same opponent twice, which has made me widen my circle of regular opponents a little. and i enjoyd that a lot. I also qualified for a tournament by ranking highest in points and 3ed highest in number of games.

You can find the score here: http://www.asgaard-games.eu/imperator-5/roster.htm

 The tournament one of the bigger in Denmark and since I did so well in the campaign I wanted to participate, which got me thinking on; what makes a good tournament army list? I found 4 important points. More are out there, but over the coming weeks I will try to find out which 2 lists I will bring using these 4 points as a part of reference as well as any other information I will obtain to give me an edge.

1)      A way to deal with terrain. Pathfinder units can do this for you but often a model that can give pathfinder (or better) to units that need it are a much better investment. Outside factions there are two models that come to mind who can do just that, the piper of Ord and Saxon Orrik. In Cryx we do not have access to the piper, but luckily we have some quite good casters with Ghost walk.

2)      A way to deal with big models. With Colossals being quite common in my local meta, I find that I need some way to deal with these big boys. This can be done by applying weapon masters, but I would always recommend bringing Gorman in at least one of your lists. As a Cryx player another way to deal with colossals are Satyxis Raiders with a Backlash caster. If I get the charge then they have the “theoretical” potential to deal 33 points of damage to the controlling enemy warcaster regardless of defensive stats.

3)      Bring dispel options. The some of the best combinations in the game rely on upkeeps, so removing those makes taking out that awful combination much easier. Some has it easy by being able to bring Eiryss but in cryx we do not have it as easy (with this part not in general). Withershadow combine can use unbinding, the blood witch UA has dispel on their weapons, and we have some casters with Hexblast.

4)      A way to deal with high DEF. Bile thralls are the best cryx option for this, but Dark guidance on Skarre1 can do it, and getting some AOE’s rolling can also be a solution. The nasty high DEF relies on buffs like iron flesh, and that can be resolved by bringing your dispel options, so if you have a DEF debuff, buff to MAT or just plain old gang going you have a fair chance of getting a hit as long as you got the dispel option handy.

 

Release the Kraken!!!

Why would you have an amphibious colossal stay on the deck of your ship? For the sake of consistency on the bases, that’s why!

Yesterday I finished painting my own colossal the Kraken. Normally I hate painting models of this size but this time I managed to finish it before growing bored with it. The quality of the paintjob suffered a little due to my unwillingness to repaint anything on the model but I am happy with the result anyway.

 

I have been playing with the kraken for a while now and I have used the following casters:

1)      pGoreshade – offers Shadowmancer (buff: dark shroud), Hexblast (Offensive: Dispel) and the Deathwalker (breathtaker: living models gets -2 STR -2 DEF). Against those models where it matters it is quite possible to gain dark shroud by applying bane thralls reducing the relevance of shadowmancer. Hexblast and breathtaker makes it possible for the kraken to take out some high DEF infantry even with a DEF buff.  Poor choice for your kraken.

2)      eGoreshade – Offers Phantom hunter (Buff: Ignores LOS, concealment and cover) curse of shadows (Debuff: -2 ARM, can advance through enemy models, cannot make free strikes) and Hexblast (Offensive: Dispel). This enables the kraken to take out important soloes and try for the enemy caster. Curse of shadows combined with dispelling of potential buffs and a well-placed bane thrall makes the kraken able to take out enemy colossal. Curse of shadows can also be used to get out of a tar-pit and into a caster without having to miss out on its initials. Performed well – needs more research

3)      Witch coven – Offers Infernal machine (Buff: +2 MAT, +2 SPD), curse of shadows (Debuff: -2 ARM, can advance through enemy models, cannot make free strikes) and their feat: nightfall (Debuff: -2 MAT, -2 RAT, LOS reduced to 5). This increases the krakens threat to 14 inch, and with nightfall you can place it quite aggressively without fear of too many charges. The increase in MAT brings the kraken to a solid MAT 8 increasing the efficiency of Sweep. Nightfall is also the only way I have found in which you can deny line of sight to a colossal. Curse of shadows is even better with the movement increase offered by infernal machine. A good choice for your kraken.

4)      eSkarre – Offers it Death ward (Buff: +2 arm, I pick column), Seas of fate (Passive: boost after seeing result) and black spot (debuff: - 2 def, kill gives additional attack ignoring ROF). This makes the kraken mode focus efficient, able to take more punishment and a beast as a ranged model. Hypothetically it can get 6 shots with its Hellblaster (range 16, AOE 4, POW 14) as each successful shoot from its flayer against a unit hit by black spot grants an additional attack, but not necessarily from the same weapon. This is a good choice for your kraken.

I have found a few tricks that I would like to share with you about using the kraken.

1)      Keep it second wave most of the time – The Kraken is an expensive model and losing it early will cripple your army.

2)      Stay away from weapon masters – These models, when getting the charge, can take out big chunks of your kraken. It may look tasty to get some corpse tokens, but it is rarely worth it if it leaves you open to more than 3 weapon masters.

3)      In any list, no matter the caster, use both shooting and melee to get the most of the Kraken.

4)      When going into melee with a different colossal, stay more than 2 inch away from it. Then run infantry in base to base with the enemy colossal to keep it in place. This forces the enemy to spend a load of resources removing these infantry models before it can strike back. A favorite is satyxis raiders since shooting them will be close to imposible, and if they place models in melee to take them out, they will likely stand in the way for the lesser colossal and its melee potential.

5)      It is okay to sacrifice the kraken to win. When people see a Kraken within reach of their caster, it is easy to forget about the mission objective and focus all of the power they have on taking down the big guy, leaving you with a sweet win out mission.

6)      Use it to control zones. With a 12 inch long zone just place the kraken on your edge. It is quite hard to remove it, and if they put anything into the zone to contest, you know the kraken can charge it with its 12 inch charge range.  

While I still need to tryout more casters and play styles with the kraken, I find that it offers some something that I missed before getting it. It is by no means an auto include but can (in my local meta) be used competitively. So Cryx casters, take out your krakens for a spin, I know I will.