Pass The Cheese: Wood Elves vs Skaven

Round 2: versus Skaven

This was actually versus United Legions of the Everchosen (to gain Reign of Chaos effects - I wasn't exaggerating about the cheese), but was, in reality, an all-ratmen army with a Verminlord special character.

Facing a big horde of low-toughness critters, I went into this battle with a confidence that reflected my ignorance of the Skaven army book.

Armies

The Grand Legion of the Everchosen - Skaven

The Abomination is a proxy Verminlord
The Rat Ogres are proxy Stormfiends
The Jezzail is a proxy Ratling Gun
The Skullcannon is a proxy Warp Lightning Cannon
The Clanrats are proxy Stormvermin
The Warlord, to be fair, is a Warlord.

• Warlord
• Verminlord Deceiver
• Chieftain (BSB)
• Warlock Engineer
• 37 x Stormvermin
• 1 x Ratling Gun
• 1 x Warp Lightning Cannon
• 3 x Stormfiends

Wood Elves

• Durthu, Eldest of the Ancients
• Glade Captain (BSB)
  Hail of Doom, Obsidian Trinket
• Spellweaver
  Lv 2 Life, Dispel Scroll, Talisman of Protection
• Shadowdancer
  Bow of Loren
• 10 x Glade Guard
  Musician, Trueflight Arrows
• 10 x Glade Guard
  Musician, Hagbane Arrows
• 10 x Glade Guard
  Musician, Starfire Arrows
• 7 x Wardancers
• 5 x Wild Riders
  Shields

Battle

Set-up was similar to my previous game: using the free wood to gunk up the battlefield, place the Glade Guard units on the back line and bunker down my spellcasters in the forest with the Wardancers.

Having an exiting grudge against Leofa, I was allowed two boasts, which I used for a general-killing theme (Assassination to nail his warlord - who was my best chance of wounding with the Talon of Kurnos; and Bodyguard to preserve my own - after all, what did he have to hurt Durthu?).

When you outnumber Skaven, something's not right.

Leofa went first and advanced across the field, placing his Stormfiend counter in the centre of my bowline. I'd never faced these before, but with my missile fire, wasn't particular worried by them.

What I did need to worry about, as I soon learned, was Cracks Call - a spell that would delete Durthu with a single failed Initiative test (of 2). So the story of my magic phase was getting constantly pummelled by his Warlock and Verminlord, because I needed to preserve all my dispel dice. The Wild Riders were the first to suffer: getting blasted off in their first turn.

Bouyed by this state of affairs, the Verminlord Skitterleaped into the middle of my army and proceeded to wreak havoc. On my first turn, I unleashed every arrow I had, but a combination of poor rolling and the effects of a storm spell meant I only got three wounds off him.

Flanked by Skitterleap. At least it can't get worse.

The Stormfiends arrived, scattered off to end up in front of Durthu, but didn't fancy their chances and scurried away to spend the rest of the battle gunning down my Glade Guard. As an aside, the support Ratling Gun blew itself up and the Warp Lightning Cannon never managed enough strength of accuracy to do anything of note.

You gotta be kidding me.

To add insult to injury in the magic phase, Plaguebearers were beginning to appear all over my battleline, as a result of the deamonic special rule, and start to chew up my Glade Guard units.

Story of my battle.

With my line in disarray, my Wardancers spotted a flank charge on the Verminlord and went in for a Hail Mary charge. It was here that I made a game-deciding mistake and forced through the wrong Shadow spell (I put Withering on the Verminlord, rather than Okkam's Mindrazor - my inexperience with the lore, but I Withering always works so well for archery, it never crossed my mind that what I rally wanted was super-strength Wardancers). I hit well, but didn't damage and despite winning the combat, my best chance for the battle was gone.

And now for irresistible ... Mindrazor!
No? Withering, then? See how that works out for you.

Once the Verminlord had Skitterleaped to other pastures, what remained of the Wardancers went into the flank of the Stormvermin, once again hoping for a lucky break (there was getting to be quite a Hailstorm of Marys) by denying them rank bonus and hoping he rolled high for the break test. But I didn't get it and the Wardancers were wiped out during the second round.

Fair to say, at this stage, I wasn't about conserving points.

Meanwhile, the Verminlord finally got off Cracks Call on Durthu (he'd actually made it once before, but I saved on a 1) and the treeman snapped like a twig. Game over for a thorough hiding.

This was my first taste of what you might call a 'proper' End Times army and I took a bit of a hiding. The magic was hard to live with once I knew the deck contained an auto-kill for Durthu and the appearance of daemons on every other magic phase wasn't helping. Even if I had been canny enough to force through Mindrazor, I doubt if I would have done any better than draw.

Result 2:18 (295 : 1900)

One win, one loss and on to Day Two!