The Kinslaying: Wood Elves vs Host of the Eternity King

Round 4: versus Host of the Eternity King

My final battle of the WoffBoot was an elven civil war between my Wood Elves and a HotEK list of mostly Dark Elves, supported by a Frostheart and led by Allarielle, Incarnate of Life.

It was commanded by Kasfunatu, who I am very good at losing to in these tournaments, but I went in confident that I had a plan. Unfortunately, I don't think it was a good plan.

Armies

Host of the Eternity King

• Alarielle, Incarnate of Life
• SorceressLv 1 Shadow, Dispel Scroll, Ironcurse Icon, dark steed
• 14 x Darkshards
  Full command, Flaming Banner, shields
• 9 x Dark Riders
  Musician, Repeater crossbows, shields
• 5 x Doomfire Warlocks
• 1 x Frostheart Phoenix
• 1 x War Hydra

 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

My deployment was another one where I felt I'd positioned too closely and too squarely to the enemy forces. My Wild Riders were off on the extreme right, facing the Doomfire Warlocks, but I did not Vanguard, as I wanted to give myself to option to charge. As before, they ended up taking the long way around the battlefield, as it tended to keep them alive for longer.

For once I got the first turn, and was able to put my plan into action: shoot everything at the Darkshards in the hope of wiping them out and leaving Allarielle vulnerable to my combat units (or better yet, dead from arrows).

Sadly, my bowfire accuracy let me down this round and, even with Allarielle's bubble effects of Regeneration and Ward Save, I struggled to remove little more than one rank. My best chance of shooting had been spent with nothing to show for it.

40 shots + seven casualties = oh dear.

In the magic phase, my pitiful Lv1/2 wizards generally got bossed around by the Lv5 Incarnate, and that was before I had to encounter the Shadow, Death and Dark. magic from the other Sorceress/Warlocks. I did managed to get a boosted Miasma on his Dark Riders, to hopefully shut down any shooty/avoidance shenanigans from them.

Kasfunatu duly obliged and took the direct route with the Dark Riders: sending them directly against the Starfires with the Phoenix in support.

It goes without saying that Stand And Shoot did naff all.

When they were run down, attentions turned to the Hagbane unit, which was also sheltering my BSB. Before that unit was also thunderstomped into the ground, my one consolation was that my BSB was able to kill the Sorceress in a challenge.

You know, I might actually have done okay without the Frostie there,

On the other side of the field, my Wardancer bunker was obliged to leave the safety (and casting boost) of the forest, because Allarielle kept threatening with a boosted Awakening of the Wood (and surely Wood Eves should get some kind of immunity to that - I ask you!). They took up residence in the central swamp, which wasn't about to awaken at all.

I held back Durthu on the first turn, which I think was a mistake – he should have been marching forward to pressure Allarielle’s bunker from the get-go. So he moved forward on the second turn, and by the third I was in a position to hit the Darkshards with Durthu on one flank, and the Wild Riders (finally turning up somewhere useful) on the other. Kasfunatu reacted to this by placing the Hydra in front of Durthu, and blasting off all but one of the Wild Riders with magic.

Undaunted, I declared a charge with the Wild Rider – not on the Darkshards in front of him, but into the rear of the Hydra. I backed this up with a frontal charge from Durthu. Although Kasfunatu had set it up so I wouldn't get to overrun, wiping out that monster would give Allarielle something to think about.

At this point, Kasfunatu played his trump card: he measured Durthu’s change distance for me and said “don’t roll a 4.” Curse uttered, I went and rolled a 4. The treeman staggered to a halt and the lone Wild Rider was left to contemplate the backside of a War Hydra all by himself.

YOLO!

Fortunately, I was able to cast a Throne of Vines+Flesh to Stone on the Wild Rider, so with a new Toughness of 7, there was a chance he’d make it through. Sure enough, he did one wound to the beastie and took none in return.

The Hydra broke and fled – and the Wild Rider failed to catch him! (having stone flesh probably slows you down a bit). In Kasfunatu’s next shooting phase, the combined effects of the Darkshards took down the Little Wild Rider That Could.

And the fleeing Hydra is STILL blocking the Darkshard flank!

Over by the swamp, the Frostheart charged what remained of the Wardancer bunker, stomped the Lifesinger (the only one without a 3++ Ward) and ran the unit down. So there goes two-thirds of my magic.

"I don't think we have a dance for this one."

I foolishly did not return the favour: my one surviving unit of Trueflights spent their turn shooting down the last of the Dark Riders, rather than the untouched Warlocks. And so I was left exposed to the full lores of Dark and Death … most notably a Purple Sun of Xereus at Durthu (another Initiative-based instant-kill – it’s Cracks Call all over again!). I blocked the first attempt and threw Durthu into combat with the now-rallied Hydra.

But is this enough Durthu, I wonder?

I was confident of damaging the War Hydra, but concerned about its Regeneration. And there was only one thing in my spell deck that could produce Flaming effects – a Great Fire Dragon! I cast the boosted Transformation of Kadon with Irresistible Force (with miscast effects that hit all my spellcasts – although both my mages were dead or dragons, so I got away with it). Away we go with Dragon Durthu!

For when Regular Durthu is not enough

The excitement of my jumping up and down was sadly not matched by the combat – both War Hydra and Dragon-Durthu whiffed their attacks, and I only put on a single wound from my breath weapon. But Kasfunatu rolled boxcars for his break test, the Hydra broke and was run down by the Dragon.

Back in my deployment zone, the Frostheart had turned its attentions to the Trueflights, gobbling them all up in one turn.

"Damn, I hope he'd forgotten about us."

Meanwhile, the Warlocks had pursued Dragon-Durthu and fired off another Purple Sun (Dragons have an even lower Initiative than Treemen, so I’d actually made him more vulnerable). He failed the test and was blasted by the sun.

You are BOTH useless!

I’d done some damage, but taken a tabling.

Final Result: 1:19
(470 : 1860)

A very fun and crazy match. Kudos to Kasfunatu for giving me a great game (and for having a handy Fire Dragon model to lend me).

In hindsight, I think my plan needed to be completely reversed: if I'd thrown everything at the chaff and support elements, I reckon I could have cleared them away (as well as getting rid of Purple Sun), and then turned my attention to Allarielle. Ah well, there's always a rematch,

And so ends the rebel alliance of my Wood Elves, crushed under the nimble heels of the Eternity King. Two wins and two defeats is a pretty good record for a WoffBoot, and those were some good games.