BatRep Oct 12, 2021: Cryx vs Protectorate

 After a week of furious work at the painting desk, I was finally ready to roll out an almost entirely new Cryx force. Along with a Ripjaw joining Deneghra's battlegroup, it was the first time I'd be deploying Hellslinger Phantom, a pair of Brute Thralls, Skarlock Commander, & Necrosurgeon with Stitch Thralls. This was definitely going to be a challenge, as I worked to learn how to best use each of these model's unique abilities & try to find synergies between them.

Even though I finally had enough models painted up to field a proper Black Industries theme force, I opted not to take a req option, because Donna does not have the models painted that she needs to use any of the Protectorate theme forces. That said, we played a 25 pt game using Brawlmachine scenario #4 Singularity again; which we will likely to play for the next handful of games as we're still exploring more intermediate & advanced rules. 

Cryx (Me): Wraith Witch Deneghra + Slayer / Defiler / Ripjaw (25/28), Hellslinger Phantom, Soul Trapper, and a min unit of Mechanithralls led by a Skarlock Commander with 2 Brute Thrall weapon attachments. (25/25)

Donna (Protectorate): Grand Scrutator Severius + Indictor / Revenger (24/28), Exemplar Warder Elias Gade, Vassal Mechanik, Reclaimer Gatekeeper, Deliverer Sunburst Crew, and a full unit of Temple Flameguard. (25/25)

I won the starting roll & chose to go 2nd. Playing Cryx against Protectorate means that my chances of winning are highest with scenario, followed by assassination second, and finally with attrition being very unlikely for me. She's very good at keeping Severius safely out of range and making the most out of her buffs. Add to that how squishy most Cryx models are compared to the tanks that Protectorate fields and it's clear what my strategy should be.

Our play area is only 36x48. So, we cut 6" off of each of our deployment zones. It's just something we have to adjust for due to our limited space available. In order to compensate for the player going first, we deploy them on a line against the edge and adjust for those with medium or bigger bases by subtracting whatever amount they extend beyond the 1" adjusted deployment zone from their movement in the first round. It's not perfect or ideal, but it works for us.

Donna deployed with a tight formation. Severius and his battlegroup were to the right (from my vantage point) with the Mechanik in support. The Deliverer Sunburst Crew was in the middle with the Temple Flameguard & Reclaimer to the left. Lastly, Elias Gade was to the far-left and positioned just shy of the far-side flag thanks to his Advance Deployment. She set my Defiler as Gade's initial prey target.

With a scenario win primarily on my mind, I deployed in a much more spread out formation. Deneghra & her Slayer were in the middle with the Necrosurgeon & Stitch Thralls close by in support. The Soul Trapper & Defiler were about 10" to her left with the Ripjaw & Hellslinger Phantom positioned out to her right. Thanks to the Skarlock Commander granting them Advance Deployment, the Mechanithrall unit as positioned just outside of the near-side flag in a stacked line formation with the Brutes & Commander in the second line in support of the weaker, cannon fodder McThralls up front.

Donna moved Gade up to the far-side flag with the Flameguard & Reclaimer in support to his right. She marched the rest of her force pretty much straight ahead, keeping things tight, as she wasn't 100% sure of my intentions just yet. She closed out round 1 with Severius casting "Vision" on Gade & "Defender's Ward" on her Revenger. 

My initial plan was to move the Defiler & Deneghra up to harass Gade & the Flameguard, march the Slayer & Defiler up the middle to deal whatever Donna sends to score the zones, camp Hellslinger Phantom on the near-side flag, and rush the Mechanithrall unit around the right side of the house to flank Severius (or at least tie up someone trying to prevent my flanking attempt).

I tried to be conscious of her threat range & keep everyone safe going into round 2. Deneghra went incorporeal in her Control Phase thanks to her Wraith Walker ability. She moved up to get the Revenger in range to cast "Breath Stealer", preventing it from being able to charge the Ripjaw next round at SPD 3.

She followed up by casting Shadow Step to move back 3". This allowed her to move back out of the Flameguard's charge range going into round 2 & put her safely back out of Gade's crossbow range; since their magic damage would be a threat to her still. My idea was that Donna would be forced to give up the chance to score the flag if she chose to go after Deneghra next round.

After moving everyone else into position, I ran the McThralls around the outside of the building on the right of the battlefield. The stage was set for my plan to harass Gade & Severius to keep Donna honest while moving into place to start scoring next round.

As I'd hoped, Donna started round 2 by moving her Indictor to try to head off my Mechanithralls flanking attempt. Being only a SPD 4 jack, even with running the full 8", I knew he wouldn't be able to reach them hiding just outside of the building. She brought the Mechanik in support, knowing that even being a tank with 32 boxes, the Indictor was staring down the combined might of 2 Brute Thralls & a Skarlock Commander. The McThralls could definitely be a pain, but their P+S 10 Steam Fists aren't much threat to his effective ARM 21 thanks to his shield. Even with their Combo Strike ability potentially giving them a single P+S 13 damage hit, it was still dice -8 to crack his armor.

She kept Gade on the flag & moved everyone else forward to close the distance as best as she could. Getting the "Shield Wall" order, the Flameguard moved up into groups of 2-4 on either side of the tower. Her only real offense of the round was limited in quantity, but very effective. The Sunburst nailed a direct hit on my Slayer. While no one else was close enough to be caught in the 4" AOE blast, the Slayer took 8 damage to column 1, rolling 10 on dice -2; crippling his left arm in a single shot.

She ended her turn with Severius channeling "Immolation" through the Revenger twice on the Ripjaw. Both hit & did a total of 13 damage. The first hit for 6  to cripple the bone saw mounted on its head & the 2nd hit for 7 damage to cripple its arc node.

Starting my second turn, I decided to stick to my guns despite having 2 of my jacks taking hard hits leading into it. With the Slayer & Ripjaw both having weakened melee attacks now, I wanted to allocate a couple focus to each of them to boost rolls, but decided against it & only allocated 1 extra to the Slayer. I wanted to have a little bit of fun with Deneghra. In the past, I've played fairly timidly with her, but I wanted to get her into the mix early on. The plan was to move up, get some hits / spells off, & move back 3" by casting "Shadow Step".

Denny moved up attack the lead Flameguard with her Eclipse. The strike hit, but was unable to damage him, as he was sitting at ARM 17 thanks to "Shield Wall". Despite surviving the hit, the Eclipse's "Dark Banishment" ability moved the Flameguard within range for the Ripjaw to move up & attack. Deneghra finished her turn by casting "Breath Stealer" on the lone Flameguard.

I'd prefer to have charged it, but with only 1 focus on the Ripjaw & needed an 6 to hit, I needed the focus to boost the attack & damage rolls since the Ripjaw benefits from "Powerful Attack", allowing a single focus to boost both attack & damage rolls for an attack. Since he lost the "Shield Wall" bonus after being moved away from his unit, the moved Flameguard was sitting at base ARM 13 to the P+S 10 of the Ripjaw's bone saw. Needing only a 4 to take him out, the Ripjaw rolled 3 to do no damage and the determined Flameguard stood battered, but undefeated.

The Defiler moved out from behind the rock pile to take a sludge cannon shot at a Flameguard in hopes of catching Gade in the spray. The roll to hit the Gade needed a 7 & missed. I boosted the shot on the Flameguard. Needing an 8 to hit, I rolled triple 4s....but failed to take him out rolling 7 on dice -7 for damage. The one saving grace is that the critical hit put continuous corrosion on him.

The Slayer used its first focus to charge the Revenger; attacking with its fully-functional right Death Claw. It hit, but only did 3 damage after rolling 8 on dice -5. Boosting the left Death Claw strike to hit did no damage. Neither did the Tusk attack that hit to end the Slayer's activation. Between its shield & "Defender's Ward", the Revenger was sitting at ARM 21 and it was proving too much for the Slayer to crack consistently.

The Necrosurgeon moved behind Deneghra, sending her Stitch Thralls to form a wall in front of Denny to ward off the Flameguard potentially charging her with a CM-attack next round. The Soul Trapper moved into position in hopes of grabbing some souls next round, while the Hellslinger Phantom took 2 shots at the Revenger. Even with RAT 8, both wraithstorm pistol blasts failed to hit. The +4 DEF from the Revenger being melee with Slayer made it an 8 to hit & neither roll was over 6.

The Skarlock Commander issued the "Press Forward" order to send as many of the McThralls as possible charging into the Indictor & Mechanik. Both Brute Thralls & 1 Mechanithrall were out of range of the charge due to the other McThralls. So, they ran up to position themselves to attack next round after some of their brothers would undoubtedly fall to the Indictor's banisher and shield. 

Have I mentioned how Donna & I tend to get so into the game play, immersed in the story playing out on the table before us, that we forget simple things at times? This includes rules that we absolutely know by heart at this point & have used many times in the past. Case in point: 2 of the 3 Mechanithralls hit, but failed to do any damage, because I rolled low on the 2d6 they both rolled for damage...because I was so excited to have him surrounded, I completely forgot that they got a boosted roll for the successful charges. I didn't realize it until after I was rolling the charge attack roll for the one McThrall on the Mechanik; which missed thanks to rolling snake eyes. Lastly, the Skarlock Commander hit the Indictor charging in with his fell spear. The spear did 4 damage to column 6; rolling 15 on dice - 11 at 3d6.

Round 2 ended with me scoring 2 points to Donna's 1 point. I scored 1 for the Hellslinger Phantom on the near-side flag & 1 for the Ripjaw scoring the rectangle zone. Donna's lone point came from Gade on the far-side flag.

Looking back on it a day later, I realized that I should have popped Denny's feat at this point. I have been notoriously bad about forgetting to use her feat, because I get caught up jumping to the next activation. Going into last night's game, I made a point to keep this in mind, but I was holding on wanting to use it later when Denny could also be incorporeal from Wraith Walker. This was a bad call on my point. I need to better recognize what her feat isn't a precious gem to hold onto until the "perfect" time...which may never come if I don't use it soon enough. 

To kick off round 3, Donna moved 3 of her Flameguard in for a CM-attack on the Defiler. They hit & did enough damage to thrash my bone jack; leaving it alive, but barely hanging on. The rest of the Flameguard moved in to attack the Ripjaw, Necrosurgeon, Stitch Thralls, & Deneghra. The Necrosurgeon & all 3 Stitch Thralls fell quickly. The Ripjaw, like his brother bone jack before him, got walloped, but held on. Deneghra took a strength 6 hit, but was able to discard a focus to only suffer a single damage. Elias Gade activated next to pick off the Defiler & Soul Trapper in back-to-back crossbow shots. The Ripjaw was named as Gade's new prey.

The Sunburst Crew turned to get the Mechanithrall unit in their sights. They hit and burned away 2 of the McThralls, as well as hitting the closest Brute Thrall for 3 damage. The Mechanik & Indictor both survived unscathed. It was at this point that I realized I failed to use her feat when I should have.

Finally, Severius moved to get the Slayer in range & LOS to cast "Immolation" twice. The first blast scorched column 3 to cripple his movement. With the Slayer's base DEF reduced to 5, the second blast hit on anything but double 1s and crushed his right arm to cripple his second death claw. He then used his feat to reduce Deneghra's FOCUS to 5 and nullify her ability to cast spells as long as she's in his control range. 

We each scored 2 points to bring the score to 4-3 in favor of Cryx.

Deneghra went incorporeal with Wraith Walker & chose not to allocate any focus. Down -2 FOCUS from Severius' feat, she chose to keep it all to do as much damage as possible to the Flameguard. 

My Slayer moved slightly to the left, staying in melee with the Revenger, but just breaking the plane of the rectangular zone. Not knowing how much longer my Ripjaw would survive, I wanted the Slayer in position to score the rect zone if it became necessary. He swung on the Revenger, but failed to hit or do damage with either death claw or his tusks. Hellslinger Phantom fired 2 shots at the Revenger; hitting on both, but again failing to get through his ARM 21.

What was left of the Mechanithrall unit was finally ready to do some damage. One Brute Thrall who was out of the Indictor's melee range moved around to his back arc. She hit with a Steam Fist Combo Attack at POW 19, I was finally able to get through to do some respectable damage. The other Brute Thrall did the same from the front, along with the Skarlock Commander casting "Dark Fire" successfully. Between the 3 of them, they did enough damage to cripple the Indictor's left arm & nullify his shield bonus. Of the Mechanithralls left, 1 hit the Indictor, but failed to damage him. Another one took out the Mechanik, who hadn't been much of a factor up to this point in the game. 

Deneghra then moved back to get just outside of Severius' control range, cast Hellmouth, boosted to hit, & swallowed up 4 of the Flameguard that were surrounding the Ripjaw. She finished her activation popping her feat granting incorporeal to the Slayer, both Brute Thralls, & the Skarlock Commander. 

The round ended with me scoring 2 more points (near-side flag & rect zone) to Donna's 1 point (far-side flag). Going into round 4, the score was Cryx 6 - Protectorate 4.

Round 4 saw a lot of back & forth. On her turn, Donna came out swinging hard with Severius casting "Immolation" to burn away the Ripjaw. Severius then cast "Immolation" again, this time on the Slayer. She rolled double 5s to hit with a crit; doing 4 more damage & putting fire continuous effect on the jack from the damage roll.

The Indictor finished off the injured Brute Thrall with his banisher & it's magic damage. He bought another attack with the banisher & hit the other Brute Thrall for 7 damage; leaving it hanging on by a thread.

The Sunburst Crew repositioned inside the circular zone & took aim at a Brute Thrall. The Brute Thrall was immune due to incorporeal, but the blast damage burned away the remaining Mechanithralls caught in the AOE. The blast damage wasn't enough to hurt the Indictor. The Reclaimer used the one soul he had picked up earlier to cast "Obscuring Haze"; protecting himself inside a cloud. 

She ended her turn scoring 2 points (Gade - far-side flag, Sunburst Crew - circular zone). I scored 2 points as well (Slayer - rect zone, Hellslinger Phantom - near-side flag), bringing the score to 8 - 6 with Cryx leading.

The fire effect on the Slayer survived the expiration check & did 2 damage to him. Deneghra moved into the circular zone & lashed out at the Revenger & last Temple Flameguard casting "Venom" & "Hellmouth", respectively. The Flameguard fell easily, but the Revenger only took a couple damage. Denny ended her activation holding on to 1 focus to protect against whatever Donna decided to throw at her next round. Had I done the math, I'd have realized the game wasn't going to get to round 5, but I missed it until we started adding things up.

The Slayer swung in vain at the Revenger. With both death claws crippled, it was a futile effort. Back to back poor rolls for damage saw the Indictor take another 5 damage between a steam fist combo strike from the Brute Thrall & the Skarlock Commander casting "Dark Fire". Hellslinger Phantom missed 2 more shots at the Revenger; still unable to get past the +4 DEF bonus from it being in melee with the Slayer.

Round 4 ended with me scoring 3 points with Deneghra in the circular zone, the Slayer in the rect zone, & Hellslinger Phantom on the near-side flag. Donna scored another point with Gade on the far-side flag. Going up 4 points (11-7), Cryx took the win as round 4 came to a close.