The Ninja Hut: August 2011

It's really digging the Storm Strider as I've gotten more experience with it.In my last game it survived a Full focus Stormclad's charge (he didn't get base to base so one got two swings before being repulsed out of melee), then fried it good with boosted damage rolls before Epic Striker finished it with one hit. A big part of what makes the Strider so good to me it how people don't want to attack it or if they do go out on a limb but fail to alpha it, they get punished. It's just a versatile model that seems to always have something relevant that it can do.

A lot of different casters bring different tricks that really help it out. I love it with Darius with his repair ability (but his feat doesn't work on it) and his Crane. The Crane is a place effect so it works on the Strider and it's a place "with in" 1", but not "completely with in". So this allows you to place the Strider almost 6"s away, it's like a triple telekinesis. With Epic Haley, you have Temporal Acceleration, Telekinesis, and Defection to buff you Strider. Epic Nemo gives it Polarity shield which greatly increases it survivabilty and it's 360' on the Strider too. Caine can Snipe it and give it some Deadeye love, while prime Haley has Temporal Barrier, Arcane shield (although you should always have Jr. in the same list as the strider anyway), and her Feat. I'm really looking forward to using the Strider with Siege and it should rock the house on his feat turn and clever use of explosivo can up the carnage you first blast causes each turn.

While I judged during Saturday’s 50 point Steamroller, I played in Sunday’s 35 point Steamroller. Here is my story.

I played two lists, a Darius and a E-Haley list. Both used the Storm Strider to achieve ranged supremacy and both casters added something big to the Striders effectiveness.
Here are the lists.

Army Name: Darius
Cygnar
35+5 points, 12 models

Captain E. Dominic Darius +5 points
* Hammersmith 8 points
* Ironclad 7 points
* Thorn 8 points
* Squire 2 points

Journeyman Warcaster 3 points

Captain Arlan Strangewayes 2 points
Storm Strider 9 points
Stormsmith Stormcaller 1 point

* * *
Army Name: EHaley 35
Cygnar
35+5 points, 19 models

Major Victoria Haley +5 points
* Thorn 8 points
* Squire 2 points

Journeyman Warcaster 3 points

Storm Strider 9 points
Stormsmith Stormcaller 1 point
10 Sword Knights 6 points
* Sword Knight Officer & Standard 2 points
** Centurion 9 points

Round One: I played a Retribution player running Ravyn, with a Chimera, Invictors Marshaling a Griffon, Full Mage Hunter Striker force with UA, Stormfall, and Battle Mages. I think he had a Arcanist or two. This Army was gorgeous and had a sweet Diorama display with a little water fall and river. I wish I took pictures on Sunday, but I was more focused on the Tournament. Anyway, I should have lost this game, I played horrible, I choose my Jack heavy list to fight MHSF and also forgot to deploy my Half Jacks. (I forgot to pull them from my figure case and had a Judge run out to my car to get them). However as bad as I played, Darius is a tank and my opponent was an old MK1 player that knows how to bring the pain, but not in MK2, so I was able to slowly take him apart once he started to make small misplays. Also the Storm Strider was able to wreak Havoc on his Mage Hunters once I started to arc into half jacks that ran up to the MHSF. I was able to have my Hammersmith fight his way deep into his army, getting the caster kill. Darius’s Feat allowed my jacks to recover mid game (although Thorn got alpha’ed turn two).

Round Two: I played E-Haley here aginst a Cryx player using P-Denny, Nightmare, 2 Defilers, Machine Wraith, Tarterus, full Bane Knights, Min Mechthralls, Necro Surgion, and some other stuff, maybe a War Witch or Skarlock.
The Storm Strider was MVP here, with Haley casting Deadeye, Temporal Acceleration and sometime TK on it, it was everywhere doing everything. Thorn charged into the Knights, letting Haley Arc a arcane bolt into the Machine Wraith, then the Sword Knights pronto up the Arcane shielded Centurion. While the strider spat out lightning death.
The Strider was able to survive a charge from Nightmare, but got fully loaded on power tokens. He was then TKed, Dead eyed and Accelerated to walk up to Denny and blaster her off the table. I think that six man Mechanithrall was pretty amazing, as I killed like over 12 Mcthralls that game. Overall, Haley’s Feat on turn two and the Strider shooting every turn allowed me to really take his army apart before he could do much damage.

Round Three: I played a Nemesis of mine, Benjamin from Oakland. We first meet at Kublacon and later at we battled at Lock and Load in the Iron Arena. He was running a Khador list with P-Vlad. Ben’s a great guy and a fun opponent that brings an A game. His list was something like P-Vlad, Spriggan, Behemoth, Gun Carriage, Widow Makers, Man Hunter, and Dragoon. Maybe some other solos I’m forgetting like maybe a War dog or the Gobber. I think I won initiative and started of with my Strider being craned by Darius (it’s a place with in 1” effect, so my Strider was getting a 6” placement effect going) then Rolling up and shooting up the Gun Carriage some and arcing around a bit doing little of then chunking away at the Carriage. The rest of my team moved up to scenario objectives and held ground. Thorn was able to charge and finish of the Carriage on Turn two and Disrupt the behemoth, the Strider was craned again and now was able to shoot up the Widowmakers. The Hammer smith was able to charge the Behemoth, but lacking much focus slapped it around some then launched him towards vlad. When the Hammer Smith advanced after the slammed Khador jack, this triggered the Dragoon who charged the Hammer smith. This caused an odd cluster as the behemoth ended up battling Thorn while the dragoon tried to punish the arcane shielded hammer smith. The Spriggan tried for an assassination run on Darius but was about a half inch short on the charge, this last move left both scenario objectives uncontested and in my control and I won on Scenario on my turn. This was a very hard fought game, once again tough jacks with Armor buffs can often survive long enough for Darius’s feat to give them a back breaking full heal.

The only Pictures I took on Sunday where the set up for the championship game.

Round Four: I played Darius again. This time I played against E-Severius’s Menoth cannon brigade. Severius was being played by Brandon from the Central Coast. He got fastest caster kill yesterday aginst E-Graspy with a bulked out version of the list I had to fight.
I think it was E-Sevi, 2 Reckoners, Vanquisher, Blessing of Vengeance, 2 Vassals, Book, Full Choir and Wracks. His plan was simple, shoot my warcaster a lot. I went second and he advanced towards my army, the only real terrain was a huge 5’ or 6” wide building between us, so he advances with his army ready to flow around the building but using it to protect his caster some and anchor his jacks. My first turn Darius did spells and Craned the Strider up 6”s, then it walked up 5” and killed a Vassel and 4 out of 6 Choir. The Ironclad played body guard for the Strider. The Hammersmith and Thorn cover the other side of the building. A Storm smith runs up the the corn of the building, out of LOS. His Turn, he focuses only on my caster, having his Arc node cruse up to blast me with a Hexblast, but getting stopped because he walked into the Storm Smith’s melee reach. Reckoner 1, get’s Choired and with 3 focus, assaults up and shoots Darius for 11 point, then the Vassal gives it a second show that does 4. The Vanquisher also shoots under Choir but does minor damage. The Second Reckoner can’t get Los so shoots my Iron clad or something. My Turn, I mistakenly advance the Storm Smith to engage all his jacks, but the Blessing then triggers his defensive strike and kills him. The I allotted 2 Focus to the Hammer smith, but Screwed up my LOS for the Strider, meaning the only real target was the Reckoner near the Vanquisher and Blessing, this did some decent damage (7or 8 points overall) but did jack on the electro leaps. The Hammer Smith charged the Reckoner and unfortunately scrapped it with it’s chain attack, and didn’t get to use beatback to engage the other two jacks, so never got to spend the two focus I allotted. I had Thorn charge the other Reckoner and disrupt it. I killed his second Vassel, somehow, but can’t remember if it was from the Storm Strider or something else.

His Turn, he goes for my caster again and managed to kill him by a point or two. If I have camped one Focus instead of allotting to the Hammersmith, I would have survived and I could have crushed what remained of his army, but blessing Defensive Strike opened a hole in my defenses I was hoping he’d have to waste activations to remove and the Hammersmith not getting beat back form a Chain attack because it’s not a normal attack also threw off my plan. It was a nail biter of a game for both of us. Darius almost pulled it off, with craning the Strider around allowing for incredible range and aiming options. Also Darius is a beast to bring down, If Sevi hadn’t been aggressively knocking Arcane shield off with Hex blast, He wouldn’t have died. Brandon was a great opponent and he told me he had over 50 matches with this list, so I think he deserved it more then me with maybe 5 games with my list before the tournament.

I had a blast at the Bay Area Open and I want to thank Tyson, Johnny, and Mike Z for helping to run it.