DR's Vanguard Move

How to beat those cowardly High Elves?

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Maldor
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DR's Vanguard Move

Post by Maldor »

I was wondering what usage people have found for our DR's free 12" move under the new fast cav rules. I've been using it to redeploy them before the start of the game to throw off my opponent's deployment and set up a refuse flank. Has anyone had any success using it more offensively? Not being able to charge if you take the first turn prevents any immediate warmachine hunting, so I wonder if anyone has found it useful to purposely go second?
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Lord damian valar
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Post by Lord damian valar »

While you may not charge while having the first turn, you may still march. In an offensive list the other day against Dwarves I put two cheap units of DR on my flanks and at the end of turn one they were on his flanks, threatening his war machines (12+18 inch is a lot). Offcourse my main battle line also went forward 10 inch (potentially getting charges on his line my next turn).

This left my opponent with some serious choices. Use his warmachines to shoot at the cheap (85points) Dark riders who will charge next turn and overrun into the next machine or put some hurt on the battle line coming over the front.

In my opinion Dark riders still have their use in a druchii army. Giving your opponent many targets allways works for me.
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Timz
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Re: .

Post by Timz »

Lord Damian Valar wrote:While you may not charge while having the first turn, you may still march. In an offensive list the other day against Dwarves I put two cheap units of DR on my flanks and at the end of turn one they were on his flanks, threatening his war machines (12+18 inch is a lot). Offcourse my main battle line also went forward 10 inch (potentially getting charges on his line my next turn).

This left my opponent with some serious choices. Use his warmachines to shoot at the cheap (85points) Dark riders who will charge next turn and overrun into the next machine or put some hurt on the battle line coming over the front.

In my opinion Dark riders still have their use in a druchii army. Giving your opponent many targets allways works for me.


There's no such thing as a cheap dark rider.

5 T3 5+ save models for 85 points isn't cheap. Any player with war machines can afford a few archers to utterly negate Dark Riders.

He can get 10 crossbows for 110 points that'll wipe out an average 3 dark riders per turn (2 if you're way too far away to charge.)

You send two squads of dark riders at em, there's a good chance they'll win 170+ points for having killed your dark riders. And at least like a 50/50% chance the dark riders failed to earn any victory points.

A cheap cannon costs 5 more points than that squad of 5 dark riders. You should maybe be able to ensure 1 cannon is destroyed while your 2 DR squads are destroyed, but then you've lost twice as many points as the opponent has lost.

Furthermore, if it's a dwarf gunline list, he'll have at least 1-2 Master Engineers. For each one, he gets to pick a war machine and Entrench it, making it count as Hard Cover to shooting and Defended Obstacle in combat. A wounded Dark Rider unit will probably bounce off stubborn T4 dwarves with obstacle helping them.

Dark Riders against Dwarves also have the downside of being vulnerable to Anvil. Using the non-AP, he can snipe those Dark Riders instantly killing 2 of them. Using ancient power he can instantly kill 8 Dark Riders on average.

That's equal to having killed like 20 Spearmen.

DR are expensive And frail, which means anyone will be happy to kill them.
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Post by Allhailthemachine »

Ive been fairly vanilla in my approach to this move thus far.

A simple 12" along a flank to take up a good shooting position to take down or neuter the enemies small light fankers with shooting, only really moving when i have to to keep the shooting modiefiers down.

When they are delt with, its targets of opportunity all the way. Gunning down characters that think a 4+ look out sir will save them from shooting and declaring charges against running units to get them out of the game, that sort of thing. march blocking may realistically gone but the confusion and irritation they can cause the opposing player in this way is very real. Well untill they wise up and get to grips with 8th a bit better anyway.

As I arm them with xbs, warmachines are strictly off the menu and left to harpy or units or shades deal with in combat against the crew. If my opponent want to shoot at the dark riders with his warmachines then it does really nothing for him.

In this sense the fact you cant charge after the vanguard move really does not bother me so much. The only time i will even so much as recieve a charge with the dark riders is if they are otherwise of the table or i can do the enemy with a stand and shoot.
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Re: .

Post by Bitterman »

Timz wrote:DR are expensive And frail, which means anyone will be happy to kill them.


Agreed. I don't see much of a reason to even take them any more - and I used to take 5 or 6 per thousand points, now I'm struggling to have a reason to field them at all.

Woo, I get a 12" vanguard move, which I can use to... get in a position to charge, but not dare to knowing what will happen if I do?

I'd love to be proven wrong (for a start it'd make filling up that 25% Core easier) but I'm just not seeing it as of yet.
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Post by Lord damian valar »

There's no such thing as a cheap dark rider.

5 T3 5+ save models for 85 points isn't cheap. Any player with war machines can afford a few archers to utterly negate Dark Riders.

He can get 10 crossbows for 110 points that'll wipe out an average 3 dark riders per turn (2 if you're way too far away to charge.)


Not true. Since I am on his flank already this xbow unit has to move to be able to shoot my dark riders and in many cases he cannot even do that very well, because his own line is in the way, possibly granting my DR a cover save. But lets say he can manouvre pretty easily and then shoot at the dark riders. 10 shots with 5s to hit and then 3 to wound is about 1 dark rider dead and he must expose his flank to the rest of my army coming up in front of him. On top of this he is not shooting at my executioners or blackguard with 4s to hit and 3s to wound.

I am not saying dark riders are cheap, but an 85 point unit is cheap and expandible if you can force your opponent to make choices he would rather not make. Even better, in this edition he must kill them all to get any victory points, so if he does kill 3 or so, simply move away and he has wasted his shots on the unit.
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Timz
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Re: .

Post by Timz »

Lord Damian Valar wrote:
There's no such thing as a cheap dark rider.

5 T3 5+ save models for 85 points isn't cheap. Any player with war machines can afford a few archers to utterly negate Dark Riders.

He can get 10 crossbows for 110 points that'll wipe out an average 3 dark riders per turn (2 if you're way too far away to charge.)


Not true. Since I am on his flank already this xbow unit has to move to be able to shoot my dark riders and in many cases he cannot even do that very well, because his own line is in the way, possibly granting my DR a cover save. But lets say he can manouvre pretty easily and then shoot at the dark riders. 10 shots with 5s to hit and then 3 to wound is about 1 dark rider dead and he must expose his flank to the rest of my army coming up in front of him. On top of this he is not shooting at my executioners or blackguard with 4s to hit and 3s to wound.

I am not saying dark riders are cheap, but an 85 point unit is cheap and expandible if you can force your opponent to make choices he would rather not make. Even better, in this edition he must kill them all to get any victory points, so if he does kill 3 or so, simply move away and he has wasted his shots on the unit.


Not true. He gets to deploy first, his archers can easily be positioned where you are not threat to his cannon at all without him shooting you.

Your Dark Riders cannot accomplish a single thing without putting themselves in danger. They can't shoot and they have no combat res.

The cost of Dark Riders means even if there was a -1 to shoot them (and there isn't) they'd be worth shooting more than random black guard.

It's not a discount if you spend 170 points on two squads to achieve nothing.

A unit of 14 Executioners costs the same points. If you charge them up the flank and he shoots them. Then he's not shooting at your other units of Black Guard and Executioners! Look, I can use that faulty logic too.
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Post by Setomidor »

10 shots with 5s to hit and then 3 to wound is about 1 dark rider dead


Actually it's 1.8. :P And then you are assuming 5's to hit. If he gets first turn (which he is likely to as you probably have more units), your Dark Riders 12" in front of the Dwarf line will find themselves on the wrong end of Thunderers' barrels (averaging 3.3 kills from 10 shots).

I cannot see much use for Dark Riders either unfortunately. Everything they do is better done by Shades or Harpies instead.

Shades can deploy last and ensure that they're out of sight from enemy shooting (recall that you can deploy scouts _anywhere_ outside 12" even in the enemy deployment zone), they can shoot better than Dark Riders without paying additional 35 pts to do so, and are also comparable in close combat (10 WS5 Hatred S3 vs. 5 Hatred WS4 S4 + 5 WS3 S3. Five shades with extra hand weapons are the same price as five riders WITHOUT crossbows.

Harpies can screen your other units from some of the incoming missles, offering Hard cover to the infantry units and a -1 modifier if they target the harpies themselves. They can also limit the damage from War Machines, as thet can only target things in sight.
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Post by Timz »

Good point. I didn't realize how much better Shades are than naked DRs.

Ballistic skill 5, 2 shots Armor-piercing.

-1 to be shot for skirmishing.

Can shoot while marching to get in charge range (and if they start 12" away, that means one turn shooting, then charge next turn.)
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Lord damian valar
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Post by Lord damian valar »

Look, I can use that faulty logic too.


Euhmm Timz, Im not trying to pick a fight or anything ok? And I do agree that my beloved DR are less usefull then before, just looking for ways to keep them on the table, thats all...


And indeed, shades can be very capable it seems. Also ideal for staging them in the many buildings that pop up in this edition. Question: can you deploy them in a building in the middle of the board? Or do you have to put them next to it and then move in on your first turn?
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Post by L1qw1d »

they can start in a Building.

I tried Vanguard, and basically ran a bit and repositioned a unit of 10 so that I got closer to the midpoint, but on the far left of the table (the actual Flank guys my opponent had were actually on the Right side). I tried to sneak up on him, and it SORT of worked... >.> That's as Offencive as I got.

I think it's brilliant tho mainly because as he moves forward, he kinda NATURALLY brings himself into range, so you CAN shoot, or force a choice of fighting and then being flanked, or force them to follow a feigned flee.

If you use this w/ say 2 units, you can use 2 Vanguards- one break left, one break right. You have a small cage that can reform freely, or just cover flanks and shower them with bolts if they don't get attacked
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Post by Brad »

This special free move used to be fantastic against O&G many editions ago when it was a full march move - move up to the Night Gob units and release the fanatics, right in front of their lines, before the first turn has even begun. Many laughs ensue.
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Post by Sturguard »

Has anyone else had any problems utilizing the scout option with shades? Granted I played against Orc and goblin (But I would think skaven, TK and even dwarves might be similar) but we only played 1500 pts and there was no advantageous spot I could put my 6 shades without him being able to a. charge them or b. shoot the crap out of them. So, I essentially had to place them just a bit in front of my battle line (in front of some cold ones I relegated to the flank). On turn one he cast a MM at them and killed 5. Fortunately the one survived, then helped the cold ones charge some squig hoppers, then while the CO held, the single shade ran them down. Anyhow, maybe the results would be different if we were using a ton of terrain.
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Post by Dalamar »

Buildings and forests are scouts' friends. Don't just put them out in the open.

In Buildings they are harder to hit and stalwart
In Forests they are slightly harder to hit and stalwart.

Magic Missiles are their bane but that was always the case.
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Post by Sturguard »

Unfortunately any terrain in which I placed the shades (outside of my own deployment) had goblins within first turn charge and seeing he got first turn, I was forced to abandon any sort of strategic scout move. Goblins can easily stretch from one side of the board to another.
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Post by Dalamar »

That depends on amount of goblins. I suppose you should run from a horde, but Shades should have little trouble dispatching say, 10 wolf riders. Stand and Shoot + going first in combat = dead goblins.
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Post by Sturguard »

I think if I had first turn and could have used the CoB it would have been different, but 10 squig hoppers with 2 str 5 attacks each seemed a bit too much to ask. The setup was definitely in his advantage, If I got close enough to shoot the hoppers, his 20 night goblins with bows would have had something to shoot- now if I had had first turn, if would have been different. I think his shortbows were out of Generals range, I could have setup close and shot him and if I got one over average perhaps caused a panic test, then if the hoppers charge, I think between the stand and shoot and having 2 hand weapons (plus cauldrons bonus) I could have wiped them out as well. However, thanks for the thoughts, maybe I dismissed the scenario as out of hand when it wasn't.
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Post by Dalamar »

You can't stand and shoot against hoppers... you can't flee against hoppers.

If a unit moves in a compulsory movement phase your only possible reaction is Hold! if it happens to charge (even if you're already fleeing)
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Post by Lord damian valar »

Shades in a building are very nice. My opponent dit not succeed at keeping his frenzied chaos knights in check and had to charge them. Alas my stand and shoot did nothing to them, but then they dismount and fight on foot, with only a 3+ AS. Since I is the same we struck at the same time and I killed two of them. He then killed all my shades but one and that one was steadfast (inside building you are allways steadfast) keeping his knights there another round. After he finally dispatched the las shades his knight block still stood front to the building and needed a lot of time to get on the move again.
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