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Getting through that Chaos Armor

Posted: Mon May 07, 2012 8:27 pm
by Icing death
I have an upcoming league game against WOC. I have a hard time getting through his warriors blocks if I do not have mindrazor.


We are playing 1500. This is his list:

-Sorcerer Lord (Lore of Tzeentch):
lvl 4 upgrade, Mark of Tzeentch, Infernal Puppet, Talisman of Protection, Enchanted Shield

-Exalted Hero:
BSB, Mark of Tzeentch, Enchanted Shield, Rending Sword

-21 Chaos Warriors:
Full Command, Shields, Mark of Tzeentch, Blasted Standard


-16 Chaos Marauders:
Full Command, Mark of Tzeentch, Light Armour, Shields, Flails


-Dragon Ogre Shaggoth:
Additional Hand Weapon


-Chaos Warshrine:
Mark of Tzeentch


My Current 1250 List:

-Dreadlord
Pendant of Khaelth, Crimson Death, Blood Armor

-Bsb
-Armor of Darkness, Sword of Might

Level 2
-ToF, Lore of Shadow

-30 Spearmen
Full Command, Banner of Murder

-30 Spearmen
Full Command

-15 Crossbowmen

-War Hydra


I still need to add 250 more.

What should I change?

Icing Death

Posted: Mon May 07, 2012 9:09 pm
by Tyrannus deathbringer
Try Lore of Metal and toast those tin cans :twisted:

I would drop one of the spear blocks and get some heavy hitters like Execs, Black Guard w Razor/Murder or CoK in there.

For the extra 250 consider another Hydra, a RBT (unpopular on Dnet but work well vs Chaos Warriors n Knights) or some Chariots.

Posted: Mon May 07, 2012 9:19 pm
by Red...
Add in a unit of 7-8 Cold One Knights with either a leadership boosting banner or the razor standard, and Whip of Agony. A good charge from them will crack open even the heaviest of armoured foes.

Posted: Mon May 07, 2012 11:19 pm
by Dyvim tvar
You need some elite troops. You have lots of Strength 3 stuff that just doesn't cut it.

Black Guard with Banner of Murder work. Executioners do the job very well in a big block if you support them with a 5+ ward save from the Cauldron. Although they are Strength 3, Witch Elves have enough volume of attacks to do damage, but are inferior to Black Guard or Execs in this case.

Posted: Tue May 08, 2012 12:26 am
by Tyrannus deathbringer
I forgot to say you should have at least one sacrificial/redirector/skirmish unit in there.

Harpies are good (more so against Khorne), and against no-shooty armies like this Dark Riders (rxb, spears) can be great:

    i.e. Vanguard move into shooting range first turn, move out of LOS and shoot from close range other turns, combi charge in rear with spears later on.


Also, an alternative to my suggestions above (elites, RBT, chariots, etc) is to go SAS Shades:

- Death Squad: KB, RoK Assassin in shades with champion. Mission: Take out the Sorcerer. Hide in opponents deployment zone, charge Sorcs unit, assassin the Sorc using the champions challenge to tie up other enemy characters if necessary. (Obviously only a viable strategy if your opponent leaves an opening. The fact you may have a chance of killing either the Exalted or the Sorc against this list would tempt me!)

- Commando Squad: Manbane, Rending Stars Assassin in shades. Mission: Take out warshrine, spend rest of game walking along behind Dragon Ogre of Warrior block whilst pincushioning/ninja-starring them!

Posted: Tue May 08, 2012 3:20 am
by Meteor
Use soul stealer on them... S2 hit against each model no armour save. Sure you're wounding on 6's, but that's still a handful of dead Warriors, and it'll scale up with unit size too.

If you're dedicated, you can combine it with Shadow magic to go -D3 T before you do it, but that's not really necessary. Soul Stealer and maybe Black Horror since they both bypass armour.

Otherwise take a Dreadlord with the Giant Blade for S7 attacks. Wounding on 2's, -4 to armour save, even a 1+ Chaos Lord will be saving on 5's.

Basically, don't bother relying on your troops to take out Chaos Armour, they're there for SCR and the occasional ACR. Combat characters and Soul Stealer are your best weapon for high T, high armoured enemies. Find methods to negate their armour save entirely, it's the best method.

Posted: Tue May 08, 2012 10:33 am
by Omnichron
Lots of options, although I would count the executioners out from those. For so few points, you can't really put half of your army into just one unit (Which you need to make the execs effective).

After several engagements against WoC (probably 50% of my test battles), I would go with either black guards or cold one knights. Add a master or lord with them to have pendant+soulrender or use combinations of dawnstone and crimson death/whip of agony/soulrender to be able to punch through armor and survive any challenges.

I've also used witch elves with banner of murder with alot of success against the typical frenzied halberd warriors (Although they won't be that good againts the heavy armored tzeentch option, but most likely awesome against the rest of that army).... When you look at all those options mentioned here, you see that there's really one important aspect going on with them, Initiative 6. Warriors of Chaos have an initiative of 5, and you will take alot of casualities if you strike at the same time. Make sure that you lower his numbers to more managable levels, and that he don't get to strike you much. He can't field huge numbers of warriors, while you can field several small hard hitters against him.

Also, lore of metal is kinda the natural choice against WoC. If you want something more alround'ish, Shadow is the best... Dark Magic sucks against WoC most of the time.

Posted: Tue May 08, 2012 5:07 pm
by Cold73
I agree with most that you do need some elites.
I prefer Black Guard with the Murder Banner for that.

I do agree that metal is an excellent choice againt Warriors of Chaos.
But don't underestimate the power of Dark Magic. No Armour Saves with Black Horror or Soul Stealer is excellent.

Black Horror on his unit of WoC will on average kill about 7 of these.....that is a hard blow to overcome especially in games this small.

Posted: Tue May 08, 2012 6:03 pm
by Icing death
Thanks for the advice everyone. I'll take a unit of black guard with the banner of murder.

I really like the lore of shadows because getting pit of shades or okrams mind razor partnered with miasma does wonders.

He switched the shaggoth out for 6 tzeentch knights with full command as he was over in rare by a few points.

Updated list. Its only 1416. What should I spend the rest of the points on?


Dreadlord w/ Pendant of Khaleth, Crimson Death, Blood Armor - 215

Sorceress Level 2 w/ Lore of Shadows, Dispel Scroll, Tome of Furion - 175

Master w/ Battle Standard, Armor of Darkness, Sword of Might - 145

36 Spearmen w/ Full Command, Banner of Murder - 256

12 Crossbowmen - 120

20 Black Guard w/ Full Command, Ring of Hotekr - 330

War Hydra - 175

Posted: Tue May 08, 2012 6:16 pm
by Tyrannus deathbringer
Some great advice from Omnichron above.

WoC are my in-house opponents/alternative army so I can break down what works for me against them.

Know your enemy

WoC will rumble forward and try and crush you in h-t-h, backed by powerful magic, monsters & heroes. Expensive high armour, high stat troops supported by solid lightly armoured inexpensive troops. Little to no shooting save warmachines.

Strengths:
Marauders - decent, hard hitting combat troops, v cheap.
Dogs - fast irritation units
Mounted Marauders - as with Marauders but can shoot.

Warriors/Chosen - armoured h-t-h killing machines
Knights - fast armoured h-t-h killing machines

Monsters - various

Warmachines - force multipliers/heavy fire and CC ability

Weaknesses:
Light troop weaknesses - T3, low armour, I4 core vs I5 core.

Heavy troop weaknesses - high points cost, limited mobility (Warriors/Chosen) vs Elves, armour vs Lore of Metal, I5 elite vs I6 elite.

Monsters - in most cases, low I.

Warmachines - not a lot!

Strategy

Shooting/magic attrition as they trundle implacably towards you, redirect/outmanoeuvre once they try and engage. Aim to split their battle lines by presenting multiple targets, stretching play across the breadth and depth of the board; attempt to isolate their units piecemeal and then break them down with combined assaults.

Tactics
Using the rock-paper-scissors approach to aim for favourable match ups:

Vs Light troops:
RXB shooting, magic missiles, HB Corsairs
Higher initiative multi-attack close combat (SSS Corsairs/WE/Spear formation); aim to wipe out as many of them before they can attack as possible.

Vs Warriors/Chosen
RBT fire.
Stubborn unit in the front, elite in the side (obviously the more heavy troops you can simultaneously combine against them the better).
Magic buffing/debuffing or templates.
Warded COB-backed ASF Hag Execs (I5) are a good anvil, without them any unit that you think will not run away first turn (SoD spears for example). CoK, Black Guard or Witches in the side (I6). CoK charge S6 and natural S4/mount attacks is great, AP standard BG (S4, 2A) and AP standard Witches (S3 poison, frenzy), probably in that order of preference.
Chariots (I6) at 100 pts are a useful flanking tool as well.
Also feel free to just speedbump, redirect and run away from Chosen Star type units.

Vs Knights:
RBT/Magic.
Expensive so our Knights plus helpers (Harpies/Dark Riders).

Vs Monsters:
Witches (poison), Executioners, BG, Magic buffed shooting/debuffed monster, Hydra, etc.

vs Enemy Heroes:
Magic Snipe/Hero Hunt/Assassinate the Sorcs and/or break with CR.
Tie up enemy combat characters with champions and try and win on CR and/or tool up our combat characters as suggested above.

vs Warmachines:
Ignore till the end of the game or try and take out with Shades and Manbane RS Assassin/Flying Combat Character.

Druchii Rare:
"Clash of the Titans" Hydras - gives your opponent a headache due to its power, speed, regen and breath weapon but WoC are well equipped to take it out in h-t-h.
and/or
RBT - not generally recommended on D.net but always at least get their points back for me vs WoC. i.e. 200 pts 2 RBT = 12 S4 AP shots per turn. Warriors/Chosen/Knights do not like. Moreover your opponent has to consider aiming resources at them thus giving you another factor in stretching his battelines.


Druchii Magic Strategy:

I tend to either go for:
Magic Offense List (i.e. 1+ L4, Sac dag, FF, ToF, PoD, etc) - mutually assured destruction; try and match or overpower your opponent.
or
Magic Defense List (i.e. Lv1/2, Dispel Scroll, Feedback scroll, etc) - saved points go on Hero/Assassin to take on enemy mage or cause general havoc.
{ps Turning your opponents tooled up Wizard into a frog is priceless :P}

Druchii Magic Tactics:

vs Light troops - Fire is a great lore. Long range and high damage brings the pain from early on in the game. Also can hurt his heavies.
vs Heavy troops - Metal is a no brainer. Having trouble cutting through Chaos Armour? Liquify it with the signature spell, turn it to rust, turn it to gold!...Lore of Metal really is your friend here. Also can protect your own troops.
All round choice - Shadow with its speciality of buffing/debuffing works against all of light/heavy and monsters.



This Match Up:

So that's some general advice vs WoC, according to my experience. In regards to your game it looks like your opponents setup is a "Warrior Star" through the middle supported by marauders and flanked by the Dragon Ogre Lord.

I would swap the Murder banner for the Standard of Discipline on your Spears, give the Murder Banner to whatever elites you can field (Im not sure of what models are available to you). Drop the other 30 Spears for said elites.

Add one skirmish unit and think about an RBT or chariot for those extra 250 points (or use them on your elite unit and/or another small unit of elites).

I havent faced a Dragon Ogre Shaggoth before but it is hurtable at T5. I would probably attempt magic buffed shooting/debuffed stats, before engaging it in h-t-h though.

Good luck, and let us know how you get on :D

Posted: Tue May 08, 2012 7:17 pm
by Tyrannus deathbringer
:lol: updated whilst I was posting. Why not try a RBT to shoot at those Knights? Enjoy your game :P

Posted: Wed May 09, 2012 5:09 am
by Icing death
Once again, thanks with all the swift responses and help! :)

Well the problem is, even though I would like to put the Banner of Murder on the Black Guard, I have to fill out my minimum core. I am at 376 and the minimum is 375. I have no idea on what to do. Any suggestions?

Posted: Wed May 09, 2012 6:42 am
by Lord tsunami
very nice post tyrannus :)

Posted: Wed May 09, 2012 8:34 am
by Omnichron
Good roundup there Tyrannus.

As for the banner of murder, if you want them on the spear elves, you can always take the razor standard on the black guard... they are limited to a banner of 50 pts, and so the razor standard would work great.

RBT's would work nicely on the WoC... it's one of the few armies it won't be killed quickly, although I'm not sure that the str 4 shooting is good enough for the points.

Changing to knights, means that he will be even harder to take down... I had a nightmari'ish battle against those knights once, and even your BG's will struggle against them. It would be good to reconsider using metal lore now ;)

Posted: Fri May 11, 2012 3:48 am
by Icing death
So I ended up playing with this list:

Dreadlord w/ Pendant of Khaleth, Crimson Death, Blood Armor - 215


Sorceress Level 2 w/ Lore of Shadows, Tome of Furion - 150


Master w/ Battle Standard, Armor of Darkness, Halberd- 134


36 Spearmen w/ Full Command, Banner of Murder - 256


12 Crossbowmen - 120


18 Black Guard w/ Full Command, Ring of Hotek, Razor Standard - 349


War Hydra - 175

Reaper Bolt Thrower - 100

Total: 1499


My level two got: miasma, enfeebling foe, and withering.

Turn 1.
Hydra charged knights. Uneventful magic, killed one warrior in shooting. Hydra whiffed in combat, ran away, got run over. Awesome. He garrisoned his marauders and wizard in tower. Moved warriors behind building. Ring of hotek caused him to miscast, I rolled a one to wound him. -.-

Turn 2.
Black Guard charged his warriors, I failed. I failed to cast withering, magic phase over. Bolt thrower killed two knights! He positioned his knights to flank charge my black guard.

Turn 3.
Black Guard charged his warshrine. Moved spearmen up to charge maruaders. I forgot to dispel pandemonium, and my wizard rolled doubles. He altered the roll of miscast by 3 and made it power drain. My level 2 became a level 0. Shooting wiped his knights. Failed to do anything to warshrine, he kills two black guard. He poistions warriors to flank charge my spearmen. He gets treason of tzeentch on spearmen. Only loose 3!

Turn 4.
Charge maruaders with spearmen. Shoot everything at warriors killing two. I do one wound to warshrine. Spearmen make marauders flee, but we assume I cannot pursue because their is a building in the way. His marauders rally. He fails charge with warriors. I do another wound to warshrine.

Turn 5.

I free reform and run away from his warriors with spearmen. Shooting kills one more warrior. I kill his warshrine! He marches towards spearmen with warriors. Maraders and wizard get back in tower.

Turn 6.

I move crossbows in between warriors and spearmen. Shooting kills two warriors. He charges crossbowmen. I stand and shoot, killing 4 warriors! He kills all crossbows but one. I flee and roll a 7, he pursues and rolls a 6!

Result: I won by 175! I should not have charged the black guard into the warshrine as I wasted my unit there for half the game. The bolt thrower was my MVP and it made is poinst back and more.

Thanks for the help guys!!

Posted: Fri May 11, 2012 1:08 pm
by Tyrannus deathbringer
Thanks for the write up Icing Death, and congratulations on the victory.

I'm glad the Reaper didn't fluff it's shots...otherwise I'd be looking pretty silly right now :P

Omnichron wrote:
RBT's would work nicely on the WoC... it's one of the few armies it won't be killed quickly, although I'm not sure that the str 4 shooting is good enough for the points.



I agree that RBT are suboptimal for their points, especially in comparison to our other rare choice. However I always take at least one against WoC, and always consider them for my lists.

For example, at 100 pts a Reaper only has to kill around two Chaos Knights (with Mark & lances) to make it's points back. It should on average do that or the equivalent.

My last game was a small battle against WoC in which I had one RBT. This choice had the following effects:

    My opponent deployed his Knights and his unit containing his Sorceror General on the other side of the board from my Reaper, out of LOS. His Warriors were placed in the middle behind terrain partially blocking LOS.

    My opponent advanced his large unit of dogs towards my Reaper from turn 1. The dogs got separated from his battleline, exposing their flanks, were Fireballed by my Lv1 Sorceress General, and then eventually crushed in one turn CC without casualties when they were charged by one of my units as they got close to charging the RBT.

    On the other side of the board, the rest of his army were funneled behind terrain and got in each others way as they attempted to keep away from the Bolt Throwers shooting area.

    Over the course of the whole game the RBT killed two Chaos Knights, a couple of Warriors and a couple of Marauders, more than making back its points.

So, I always include at least one versus WoC. Against other armies I also consider their inclusion as they have the following strategic and tactical effects:


    Affect enemy deployment

    Affect enemy use of terrain

    Affect enemy movement

    Enemy must commit resources to combating them

    Threaten kills, inc. of elite troops, lone characters & wounds off monsters from long range

    360 degrees fire arc.

    Can be combined with RXB, magic missiles and other RBT to create crossfires and killzones.



No other option in the Dark Elf armylist has precisely these qualities; qualities with synergise very well with the rest of our army.

It's these tactical options which lead me to consider their use in any list I create.

Posted: Fri May 11, 2012 4:20 pm
by Zenith
How do you deploy one,

if you set one up at a flank, i cant shoot good enough, because of your units walking in its way.

Posted: Fri May 11, 2012 4:50 pm
by Icing death
@Zenith, in the game I just played, I placed the Bolt Thrower on a hill.

I forgot to mention that he was so frustrated with my Bolt Thrower that he cast Infernal Gateway on it and got an 11, instantly killing it! :P

@Tyrannus Deathbringer, the RBT was a brilliant idea and I will be using it more in my lists. Thanks for the help sir!

Icing Death

Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 3:15 am
by Red...
For example, at 100 pts a Reaper only has to kill around two Chaos Knights (with Mark & lances) to make it's points back. It should on average do that or the equivalent.


Firstly, what self respecting Woc Player takes lances rather than ensorcelled weapons? +5 points for +1S on the charge (S6) but -1S on every other turn (S4) compared to ensorcelled weapons (S5 constantly) and the loss of magical weapon status.

More importantly, killing those two chaos knights is harder than you make out. Against naked knights (e.g. without the 5+ ward save versus shooting banner) the maths works out at:

Single shot: hits on 3s at 24", wounds on 2s, no armour save = 0.555' wounds per turn.
Multi shot: hits on 3s at 24", wounds on 4s, 3+ armour save = 0.666' wounds per turn.

That means to kill the two knights you need to make your reapers points back, you need between 3 to 4 turns of uninterrupted shooting at short range with your reapers. That's a long long time against a unit that has a march of 14" and a possible charge of up to 19".

Throw in the banner of 5+ ward save versus shooting and you're looking at even lower figures (0.37 wounds per turn for single shotting: between 5 and 6 turns of uninterrupted fire at short range needed for the two kills, and 0.444 for multishotting: between 4 and 5 turns of fire needed for two kills).

Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 4:23 am
by Taijushue
the wounds per turn for the single shot is only if they have one rank and your hitting in the front.

you could save the rbt to deploy till later or deploy your army so that you can get a flank shot on the knights

or he could run a unit of 10 knights.

if you hit one model you have 0.5555 wpt at close range, if there are 2 ranks or flank shot with a single bolt even at long range;

hit on 4 wound on 2
then wound on 3
you have a wound per turn ratio of 0.69

if at close range its 0.9259

i believe my math is right but i have had a lot to drink tonight so i might be a little off

Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 10:53 am
by Red...
Do bear in mind that once they are in combat you can't shoot at them, and Knights try to get into combat quickly. The amount of time you have to shoot at them will be very limited. There are much better ways to deal with knights than reapers, honestly.

Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 12:58 pm
by Tyrannus deathbringer
Red,

I'm happy with the performance of my Reapers vs Chaos - that's all that matters to me :D

I've also broken down the reasons why I consider using them in my other lists. I know that different people have different likes/dislikes/experience/playstyles and so on; I'm not trying to persuade, just share my particular experiences.

Turned out to be decent advice to Icing Death in this particular instance, no?

Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 4:42 pm
by Red...
Indeed, and I'm sharing the disadvantages to complement your useful outlining of their advantages. We both add value, so no worries ;)

Posted: Sun May 13, 2012 3:25 am
by Demetrius
I do like Bolt Throwers, and they are amazing against high point models (they shine against HE/WEs). I think they actually work best in an offensive army, because if you put constant pressure on the opponent, he doesn't have time to deal with the 2 bolt throwers in your back field. Which is why I also find they survive a lot of games for me, denying my opponent 200 VPs, plus gaining whatever they killed :D

Posted: Sun May 13, 2012 9:55 am
by Meteor
You need Harpies, at least a unit of 5 in all future lists. Disruption for a well timed charge or stalling one is more important.