Warmahordes Tourney

This is my first tourney in 2 years. I took 2 Cygnar lists featuring the new Avenger. Too bad it wasn't allowed since the official cards aren't out yet. Talk about impacting my plans. I scrambled to change my list, swapping the Avenger with a Defender. Tactics had to be modified on the fly. Not a great start to the day. It was only to get worse. At least the players weren't jerks. There were 2 Circle players (both ended up placing 1 and 2), an Everblight, a Cryx, a Merc (Daiymo), and my Cygnar.



Here's the list that I played for the first 2 games. The opponents were Circle and Tier 4 Cryx.

Cygnar
Theme Force: Wrecking Crew Tier 3
35+5 points, 28 models

Captain E. Dominic Darius +5 points
* Ironclad 6 points
* Stormclad 9 points
* Squire 2 points

Journeyman Warcaster 3 points
* Defender 8 points

Captain Arlan Strangewayes 2 points
10 Sword Knights 6 points
* Sword Knight Officer & Standard
6 Sword Knights 4 points

Here's the list I played against the last opponent, Everblight.

Cygnar
35+6 points, 20 models

Commander Coleman Stryker +6 points
* Avenger 9 points
* Ol' Rowdy 9 points
* Sylys Wyshnalyrr, The Seeker 2 points

Journeyman Warcaster 3 points
* Hunter 6 points

Captain Arlan Strangewayes 2 points
Harlan Versh, Illuminated One 2 points
6 Sword Knights 4 points
6 Sword Knights 4 points

Some of the quick thoughts on tourney play are: 1) don't forget your special rules, 2) Beasts aren't nearly as scary as Heavy 'Jacks, and 3) Hordes has as many unique rules as Warmachine, good luck knowing them.

Let's start with the first opponent, Circle. He eventually won the tourney. We got about 3 turns before a caster kill ended my game. He sneaked in a teleport from one forest to another to whack Darius. This was also my first exposure to excessive fury usage. As a WM player, your caster typically has a finite amount to dispense. Hordes warlocks removes fury from their Beasts so he usually has 6 or more to use. This was the first of the improbable for the day. Prior to the caster- kill, his unit of 6 infantry models proceeded to wipe put 9 of 12 ARM19 Sword Knights. Each knight killed gave the Circle infantry another attack. The Circle player has never seen it work so effectively. He stayed away from my 'Jacks and I didn't play aggressively enough.

Game 2 was against the Cryx player who wiped out his first opponent (Circle) but lost because he moved Goreshade into the woods and got caster-killed. Needless to say, this wasn't going to be fun. Most of the army was stealthy, 2 Wraiths couldn't be killed without magical weapons, half the infantry was tough, and the other half was respawning every live model he killed. Too bad Darius only had 1 magical weapon, on the Jr. Caster. The Stryker list would have been better, bigger templates and more magical weapons. Cryx decided to take me apart piecemeal, using up all but 5 min of the clock. His special feature of the day, saving 9 out of 11 (honestly, I stopped tracking at 11 times) of his Tough rolls. This after complaining about someone winning a tourney by making 22 Tough rolls. I wasn't sympathetic at that point. He ended up placing 3rd.

The last game was with Everblight. This should have been a win, but then those pesky rules popped up. His infantry were all 8 wounds, his beasts were of small, medium, and large base types. It was a rude surprise when you charge a small base model and end up in a 13 wound tarpit and losing infantry faster than you can manage. Even Ol' Rowdy couldn't hold up to the Hordes shenanigans. Rowdy blew up a heavy beast in 1 round, and then smashed a small beast in a counterstrike, but died to the warlock getting 4 boosted strikes and a charge off at him. Stryker tried to hold on and time out for a draw, but then died to a charge by a heavy beast. There might have been a chance for my own caster kill, but the Everblight feat was to bring back a dead beast (WTF?). I did end up taking down a large number on Infantry and Beasts, but drowned under the number of wounds that they could soak up.

So my hard earned lessons: Hordes players don't like heavy melee 'Jacks. Their infantry is too squishy, even the multiple wound ones. They look for caster kills as quickly as possible, or take the scenarios because of their movement. Cryx needs to be beat with magical and AoE weapons. More 'Jacks, the better. The other option is to use Blaize. She's best equipped to tackle Cryx sneakiness. Don't let the fear of Hordes Warlocks passing damage on to their beasts bother you, keep hitting them and indirectly kill the beasts. Shooting is incredibly powerful against Hordes infantry and Beasts. The Beasts typically can't take more than 2 Rowdy hits on a charge while most 'Jacks take 3 to be disabled. The Hordes fury system makes their Warlocks into superheroes, so their armies are more delivery systems for that awesome Warlock Alpha Strike.