Hammer Time

OK, I know it's been over a year since I posted, but I've been busy!  I've even get a full unbound army painted (pictures to follow at some point) but, right now, I'm posting a quick battle report with my newly completed Ossyan theme force.  I'm going to try to post up at least one battle report a week to keep me posting...  Stuff...  To this blog.

Today's list is...

Ossyan
 - Hypnos
 - Banshee
 - Sylys Wyshnallyr
3x Arcanist
2x 10 Riflemen + UA
4x 4 Stormfall Archers
2x Heavy Rifle Teams

And it went up against;

Karchev
 - The Behemoth
 - Beast-09
 - Torch
 - Devastator
 - Kodiak
6 Mechaniks

The scenario was Gauntlet, and I won the roll-off but chose to go second.

DEPLOYMENT

Karchev's deployment was...  About as subtle as a deployment with 6 Large based minis can be.  Legs is the Behemoth and the chassis with no limbs is Torch.

SPOILER : This turns out to be an effective foreshadowing...

I deployed with Ossyan, the 'jacks and their support facing off against Karchev's battlegroup, the two Heavy Rifle teams and Riflemen Unit 2 (the ones on the right) deployed to cover the centre objective, and Riflemen Unit 1 (left) set up to flank round the side of the massive building.  The two units of Stormfall Archers were set up in the middle left to go where they were needed.

Thanks to the theme force benefits, Hypnos started with Admonition, the Banshee started with Quicken and Ossyan started with Chronomancer.  You read that right.

TURN 1

Karchev moves up and uses Tow to drag the Devastator, Torch and the Behemoth up before casting Sidearms.  Torch uses his cloud centred on himself and Beast-09 and the Kodiak run up behind him, with the Mechaniks up behind him.

At this point, Karchev is DEF 109,695,149,741,097 and immune to knockdown.

The Ret army moves up, with nothing in range to shoot, the turn is over quickly.  So quickly, I forget to activate Sylys and the third Arcanist before passing the turn back.

TURN 2

Karchev and his cronies move up in formation, with Torch using his cloud slightly behind him.  The Behemoth fires off two shots at the Banshee and manages to take some chunks out of the ground and the hill.

The Arcanist bravely cowering behind the brick wall gives Hypnos a point of Focus, who then walks up and takes a pot shot at the Behemoth, hitting it before boosting for damage, doing a few points.  Ossyan arcs an Arcantrik Bolt at the Behemoth, also hitting but not doing enough damage to bother boosting.  He then walks up, feats and fires at Torch, catching him and doing a few points of damage.  The Heavy Rifle teams and Riflemen Unit 2 open up on the Behemoth leaving it damaged enough for two Stormfall Archers to finish it with Brutal Shot before turning on Torch.

 On the flank, Riflemen Unit 1 CRA Beast-09, taking out the axe and reacquainting me with the Hyper Aggressive ability.  Not wanting to bother TRYING to hit Beast-09 while he's in melee, the Stormfall Archers take some shots at Torch, leaving him on 2 points of cortex.

TURN 3

The Mechaniks fail pretty much all their repair rolls, but manage to get Beast-09's axe back online.  Torch walks up and fires his flame thrower through the Stormfall Archers, incinerating two and missing Ossyan.  Karchev pops his Feat, casts Unearthly Rage and sprays at Ossyan through Torch, missing everything.  The Spriggan charges the Banshee and is half an inch out.  Beast-09 charges the flanking Stormfall Archers, Threshers and murders everything within 2".

It's at this point we realise I have nothing in either control area, and am facing down a virtually undamaged Karchev who is 1 up on CPs.  Balls.

Ossyan puts three focus on the Banshee, and an Arcanist activates to put one on Hypnos.  Ossyan moves back, fires at Torch, hits and does no damage.  He then Arcantrik bolts it, hits and does no damage.  Hypnos moves across to cover Ossyan and Void Locks the offending barely mobile trash pile.

That's right - in three shots, I didn't dent it once!  On the plus side, it's blocking Karchev's charge lane.  Right?  Right?

The Banshee does some damage to the Kodiak's legs and hull, and the firing squad on the right start doing some damage to Karchev.  The Stormfall Archers move into Khador's scoring zone so I don't lose.

Not wanting to let Karchev heal (not even a little bit...), the Riflemen on the flank go round the side and pick off some of the Mechaniks

TURN 4

In the turn of Wrestling ninja attacks, the Devastator throws Torch at Hypnos, knocking them both down and, crucially, leaving Torch on 1 Health.  Torch gets up and uses his flame thrower, missing.  Beast-09 Threshers and kills a few more Riflemen.  The Kodiak throws the Banshee at the Heavy Rifle team, getting a bunch of Riflemen and killing the lot.  While he couldn't get a direct charge lane at Ossyan, Karchev "warped for speed" and charged an Arcanist, killing it with his fist and getting a free swing at Ossyan, fully boosted...

...Does 15 damage on a 16 health 'caster.

The last two Mechaniks charge the Stormfall Archers and whiff hilariously.

After cleaning my chair and changing boxers, I assign three Focus to the Banshee (one to Shake off the Knockdown) and drop Quicken.  The Riflemen walk up, use Whites of their Eyes and do a full CRA into Karchev, followed by the Banshee doing a fully boosted Hail Mary shot - hitting Karchev EXACTLY on 16 - and knocking him down and, more importantly, out of melee.  The two Heavy Rifle teams take Karchev down to 8 health, a charging Arcanist manages to get 16 on his damage dice (oh yes...) for another 5 and...

Ossyan walks up and stabs Karchev.

In the face.

Like a boss.

THOUGHTS
The much-maligned Chronomancer does me well with Ossyan.  One focus from an Arcanist means I can use Hypnos and the Banshee's guns more effectively - where the damage is a bonus to their special rules - and keep more focus for Ossyan himself.  Also, with Ossyan himself, it means I can see if it's worth boosting with his attacks, leading to at least one or two extra camped focus a turn.

I'm considering switching out the Stormfall Archers for a Daemon and a fourth Arcanist.  Hellmouth with Chronomancer and Ossyan's Feat should do a LOT of damage in the right hands ("Oop!  Didn't kill him?  BOOST!  MUAHAHAAA!  Die!  DIE MY DARLINGS!"), and I've only had grief with the Stormfalls getting in the way of each other, while a third Heavy 'jack should do something more noticable.

Lastly, yes.  I got VERY lucky with a few rolls in this game but, honestly, looking back I couldn't say I'd do anything different.