Warmachine Battle Reports: Mercenaries (Drake MacBain) vs. Khador (Harkevich) Steamroller 2016 - Extraction

Here's today's Lists:

Warcaster: Drake MacBain
Warcaster Attachment: Sylys Wyshnalyrr
Warjack: Galleon
Unit: Nyss Hunters
Unit: Kayazy Assassins
Unit Attachment: Kayazy Underboss
Solo: Eiryss 2
Solo: Kell Bailoch
Solo: Harlan Versh
Solo: Orin Midwinter
Solo: Saxon Orrik

Warcaster: Harkevich
Warjack: Behemoth
Warjack: Black Ivan
Warjack: Destroyer
Warjack: Devastator
Warjack: Decimator
Warjack: Juggernaut

Drake MacBain pulled off a well played strategic with a strong attrition game vs. Zerkova 2 (read the battle report here) in his last game. Now he's up against a monster Warjack spam army and Harkevich's ability to get them up the battlefield quickly. Let's see how they do!

Top of Turn 1: Khador - Harkevich casts Mobility which gives all his battlegroup +2 SPD and Pathfinder. He then moves up behind his Bunker Objective. His entire battlegroup runs up 12" and sets up for the slaughter next round.

Bottom of Turn 1: Mercenaries - The Nyss activate first and move up to take a combined shot against the Devastator. They do a few damage but nothing significant. Saxon Orrik gives the Kayazy Recon so they can run into the forest which they do. All of MacBain's infantry has to be careful because the Harkevich army has the capability of putting out 7x POW 7 AOE 4 and 3x POW 8 AOE 3s. Kell Bailoch moves into the forest and does 3 damage to the Destroyer.

The Galleon moves up and sets up to drag in whatever comes close. Orin Midwinter and Kell Bailoch run up and set up to Control the top flag. Eiryss moves up and disrupts the Behemoth. Drake MacBain activates and gives the Nyss Fortune, the Kayazy Assassins Countermeasure, and Fail-Safe to the Galleon. He debates on popping his feat but doesn't realize how much work Harkevich and Broadsides can do.

Top of Turn 2: Khador - Harkevich debates if he should cast Mobility and get his guys up the field or if he should save it for Broadsides (All models in his battlegroup get to make a free ranged attack) to spread some AOE love. He decides to go with the Broadsides strategy. The Behemoth moves up and misses two drifts into Eiryss. The Juggernaut runs up and tries to block Behemoth from the Drag that the Galleon is going to do next turn. Black Ivan takes a shot at the Galleon but only does 3 damage because of the +2 ARM from Fail-Safe.

The Destroyer moves up and is able to drift an AOE on the Kayazy Assassins killing 3 of them. The Decimator moves up and gets two lucky shots on the Nyss. The Devastator moves up and is stuck in Rough Terrain.

Harkevich activates and casts Broadsides giving all his battlegroup an extra shot. Behmoth lands an AOE on Eiryss 2 but fails to kill her. Black Ivan does 2 more damage to the buffed Galleon and everyone else misses.

Bottom of Turn 2: Mercenaries - Drake MacBain upkeeps Fail-Safe on the Galleon and allocates him 3 focus. The Nyss move in and are able to do some damage to the Decimator with a combined ranged attack. Saxon Orrik gives the Kayazy Recon again and they charge one is able to charge into the Decimator and plinks him with a couple damage. The rest run up and try to engage the enemy Warjacks.

Orin Midwinter and Kell Bailoch set up to contest and Control the top flag next turn. The Gallon activates next and puts 3 shots into the Behemoth doing a couple to it. He then drags in the Juggernaut and is close to finishing him off but leaves him on 7 boxes.

Eiryss 2 moves up and disrupts the Behemoth again. Kell Bailoch does 6 damage to the Destroyer.

Drake MacBain activates and casts Jackhammer 3x which allows the Galleon to make 3 extra Melee attacks. It was easily enough to finish the rest of the Juggernaut that was Dragged in.

Top of Turn 3: Khador - It's kind of hard to tell who's winning right now.it, Eiryss 2 has been a huge problem and so have the Kayazy which have been blocking charge lanes to the Fail-Safe'd Galleon. If they keep this up, the Galleon will be able to Drag in a Jack every turn and pummel it to death. Eiryss can keep another one in check and Kell Bailoch and the Nyss with CRA can start picking off cortexes. It might be looking good for Khador and their low volume of attacks.

After examining the battlefield Harkevich sees an opening. He allocates 1 to the Destroyer and holds the rest. He then activates and casts Mobility. Black Ivan begins his turn and launches a Boosted POW 14 shot at Drake MacBain who thinks he's safe behind a forest. The shot hits and does 8 damage.

The Destroyer goes next and moves behind Black Ivan and proceeds to do the same thing and launches a RNG 14" Boosted POW 14 Arcing Fire shot at MacBain. He hits and does another 9 damage to him which is enough for a tough check.

MacBain rolls a 4 and is assassinated.

Final Shot - This was quite a quick game because MacBain didn't realize how much threat range Harkevich gives his Warjacks. With Mobility, Black Ivan, Behemoth, and Destroyer can threaten 20" with 4x Boosted POW 14 Arcing Fire shots and 3x Unboosted. It was just a miscalculation on how dangerous this list is.

Harkevich and his jacks had a huge problem with Eiryss and need a more reliable way of taking her out. She really locked Behemoth down for 2 turns and caused him to not do any work. Possibly Kayazy Eliminators would be a counter to her.

Drake MacBain should have also popped his feat on Turn 2. 5 grunts wouldn't have really changed the outcome but his feat was wasted anyway.

Overall it was an interesting match up. If MacBain could have stayed safe he might have had the toolbox to attrition the Jack Spam.

Warmachine Battle Report: Khador (Zerkova 2) vs. Mercenaries (Drake Macbain) - Steamroller 2016 Extraction

Today we have the reigning Queen of Cold, Zerkova 2, fresh from shattering Krueger 2 into tiny bits of flesh and ice (View the battle report here) vs. Radioactive Man himself, Drake Macbain.

Here's today's Lists:

Warcaster: Zerkova 2 + Doomreaver Guard
Warjack: Behemoth
Unit: Greylord Outriders
Unit: Greylord Ternions
Unit: Kayazy Eliminators
Unit: Winter Guard Rifle Corps
Unit Attachment: Winter Guard Rocketeers x3
Unit: Aiyanna & Holt
Unit Attachment: Valachev
Solo: Kovnik Joe
Solo: Eiryiss 1

Warcaster: Drake Macbain
Warcaster Attachment: Sylys Wyshnalyrr
Warjack: Galleon
Unit: Nyss Hunters
Unit: Kayazy Assassins
Unit Attachment: Kayazy Underboss
Solo: Eiryss 2
Solo: Kell Bailoch
Solo: Harlan Versh
Solo: Orin Midwinter
Solo: Saxon Orrik

Top of Turn 1: Khador - The Greylord Outriders activate first and run behind the Forest in a tiered formation. While they out threat the Nyss, they want to set up in case there's an opportunity for an assassination at the top of turn 2. Eiryss gets in the forest and waits to hunt down Kell Bailoch.

The Winter Guard Rifle Corp and Kovnik Joe move up the right flank while the Greylord Ternions get bogged down by some rough terrain. Behemoth runs up along with Aiyanna & Holt. Zerkova 2 casts Telgesh Mark on the Kayazy Eliminators and moves up with her bodyguards.

Bottom of Turn 1: Mercenaries - The Gallon activates first and moves up the field. Drake Macbane casts Fail-Safe on the Galleon which gives him +2 ARM. He also casts Fortune on the Nyss which allows them to re-roll a missed attack roll. Finally he casts Countermeasure on the Kayazy Assassin and moves up behind the Galleon.

The Nyss  move up into range of the two Greylord Outriders that overextended themselves and with the help of Kell Bailoch, they are able to put 2 of them down significantly reducing the threat of a feat assassination. Harlan Versh and Orin Midwinter move up slowly on the right flank hoping to catch the Rifle Corps next turn. The Kayazy Assassins get a little help from Saxon Orrik and are able to run through rough terrain.

Round 1 completed

Top of Turn 2: Khador - Zerkova upkleeps Telgesh Mark and allocates 1 to the Behemoth in hopes that he can drift a few AOEs on to the Nyss. She moves up and casts Occult Whispers giving Friendly Faction models an additional die on Magical attacks. The Greylord Ternions move up and are able to take out Eiryss 2 with some lucky shots. The Greylord Outriders, now down to 3, are able to line up some amazing shots and take out 5 Kayazy Assassins and a few Nyss. Eiryss 1 moves in and takes out a Nyss along with Holt.

The Winter Guard Rifle Corps launch a combined ranged attack to the Galleon and only do about 6 damage total. The Rocketeers try to drift 3 AOE shots into Harlan Versh but fail to finish him off. Behemoth tries to drift 2 into Harlan Versh but also fails to kill him.

Bottom of Turn 2: Mercenaries - Drake Macbain upkeeps Fortune and Fail-Safe. He lets Countermeasure drop on the Kayazy Assassins because they've taken too many casualties. The remaining Kayazy Assassins charge up and kill off the last of the Greylord Ternions. Harlen Versh has 3 shots and uses them all to aim at the Rifle Corps and makes 3 kills. Orin Midwinter unleashes a bolt of electricity and manages to make it leap 3 spots killing a group of Rifle Corp.

The Nyss with Fortune combine together to finish off the last of the Greylord Outriders. Saxxon moves up and kills Aiyanna while Kell Bailoch snipes out Behemoth's #4 column.

A fully loaded Galleon does more work on the Behemoth with his shots and puts the hurt on him. Drake Macbain stays back behind the Galleon to make sure there's no chance to assassinate him and pops his feat rolling a 6. He uses his 11 True Grit "can't be killed" tokens and puts them on 3 Nyss, Kell Bailoch, Saxon Orrik, 3 Kayazy, Harlan Versh, Orin Midwinter, and Sylys.

Round 2 completed

Top of Turn 3: Khador - It's getting pretty grim for Zerkova 2 and company. Most of her assassination weapons were blown away. Eiryss 1 is able to work her way around the back and snipe out another Nyss. The Kayazy Eliminator is able to jam up Harlan Versh while the Rifle Corps try to do some work on the Galleon before it's too late but without much luck.

Zerkova's Doomreaver Guards move in but fail to take out the 2 Kayazy Assassins because of True Grit. Holt fails to do anything significant because of True Grit. True Grit really destroyed any hope Zerkova 2 had for an assassination run.

Bottom of Turn 3: Mercenaries - Drake Macbain upkeeps Fail-Safe on the Galleon and Fortune on the Nyss. He allocates 2 to the Galleon. The Nyss move up and take out Holt while the Kayazy Assassins finish off the Doomreaver Guard. Harlan Versh is able to easily kill the Kayazy Eliminator jamming him up because of the extra die he gets against models with Upkeeps (Telgesh Mark). Orin Midwinter launches another bolt arcing to 3 more models killing 2 Rocketeers and a member of the Rifle Corp.

Saxon kills some more Rifle Corp along with Kell Bailoch leaving the unit with 3 models. Gallon unleashes a barrage of shots on Behemoth taking out his Cortex.

Round 3 Complete

Top of Turn 4: Khador - Kovnik Joe activates and gives the Rifle Corp For the Motherland and they are able to kill Orin Midwinter. Zerkova goes and moves up in desperation. She pops her feat and casts Occult Whispers. Valachev is able to take out 3 of the Kayazy Assassins and Zerkova casts Telgesh Mark on the last Rifle Corp grunt. Behemoth shoots at the Galleon but has no luck. Eiryss 2 continues moving around the back and takes out another Nyss.

Bottom of Turn 4: Mercenaries - Drake Macbain loads up the Gallon and Upkeeps Fortune on the Nyss for free. The Nyss then activate and get Eiryss 2 to 1 life. Kell Bailoch aims and snipes another 6 damage off of the Behemoth. Drake Macbane swaps out Forntune and puts it on the Galleon and then takes a shot at the Rifle Corp killing the last grunt.

The Galleon then activates and kills off the last Rocketeer and uses his harpoon to Drag in the Behemoth and finishes him off easily.

Top of Turn 5: Khador - Sensing the impeding doom, Zerkova 2 moves up and dominates the flag. She camps her full stack hoping for a miracle. Eiryss 2 moves in and shoots  down Kell Bailoch. Kovnik Joe moves up and shoots at Macbain and does no damage.

Top of Turn 5: Mercenaries- Drake Macbain upkeeps Fortune and fully loads the Galleon. The Galleon then activates and boosts a Harpoon shot on Zerkova and sucks her in. He does 5 damage on the boosted shot. He then stabs her with his Harpoon doing a massive 15 damage instantly killing her.

Overview: Zerkova 2 had a much harder time vs. ranged than expected. Most of her assassination tools were picked off early by Galleon, Nyss, Kell Bailoch, Harlan Versh, and Orin Midwinter. She has very few options of delivering her team safely and has to rely on being out of range. The Greylord Ternions could have thrown up clouds but it wouldn't have helped much with all the accurate guns on the Mercenaries side.

Zerkova 2 should have sensed the problem with the Gun Line and used her feat to take care of it instead of waiting and waiting for the assassination shot to open up which never did.

The Mercenaries did a great job of prioritizing targets by taking out important models that would cause them problems. Fail-Safe was amazing on the Galleon making him tough to deal with. A key moment was when Harlen Versh was able to trigger Purgation on the Kayazy Eliminators with Telgesh Mark. They were the last chance Zerkova had to arc node an assassination.

Overall there were many mistakes made by Zerkova 2 and her crew and Macbain was able to capitalize for the attrition/assassination win.

Khador vs. Mercs - Butcher 3 vs. Drake MacBain (35 Points)

Tonight was the second time I delved deep into the world of miniature table top wargaming, or as normal people call it, playing with my little plastic friends. Rob, the owner of Table Ready Terrain (tablereadyterrain.com) found me on Facebook and challenged me to a 35 point Steamroller 2015 match up.

For this game we played Outflank which has 2x circular zones that can be controlled for 1 point or dominated for 2.

Rob from Table Ready Terrain getting ready to deploy after winning the starting roll.

For my list I decided to bring Khador and flex my Butcher 3 muscles. He is definitely a fun caster to play but has his share of bad anti magic match ups.

Khador - Butcher 3 - Butcher Unleashed

Warcaster: Butcher 3  (-4)
Warcaster Unit: War Argus
Warcaster Unit: War Argus
Warcaster Attachment: War Dog (+1)
Warjack: Ruin (+10)
Warjack: Juggernaut (+7)
Unit: Kayazy Assassins (+8)
Unit Attachment: Kayazy Underboss (+2)
Unit: Aiyana & Holt (+4)
Solo: Saxon Orrik (+2)
Solo: Widowmaker Marksman (+2)
Solo: Ogrun Bokur (+3)

Butcher is the driving force in this list. He won't start the fight but he sure will end it. The goal is to use the Juggernaut to initiate a piece trade and end that transaction with Butcher smashing face. The Kayazy are MAT 9 with Gang and DEF 16 in melee. They are there to jam while Aiyana & Holt are there to assist them against higher ARM. The Ogrun is just for security because Butcher sometimes gets shot off the table. Shield Guard allows him to dodge a silver bullet.

Mercenaries - Drake Macbain

Warcaster: Drake MacBain  (-4)

Collosal: Galleon (+18)

Unit: Press Gangers (+6)

Solo: Bosun Grogspar (+2)

Solo: Wrong Eye(+9)

Warbeast Snapjaw(+9)

Warbeast: Bullsnapper (+3)

Solo: Master Gunner Dougal MacNaile (+2)

Rob brought a Galleon ARM skew list. MacBain's Fail Safe (+2 Armor, Warjack doesn't suffer crippled effects) and the Bullsnapper's Spiny Growth (+2 Arm) brings the ARM total of the Galleon to an impressive 23. The Press Gangers are there to jam and buy time while the Galleon drags heavies to their scrap metal death.

Rob wins the roll and elects to go first

Rob casts Fail Safe on the Galleon and runs everyone up. He ends his turn with casting Spiny Growth on the Galleon making his ARM total 23.

On my turn I run most of my units up but I cast Energize with Butcher 3 to get my battlegroup and Warjacks up 3 more inches. I almost screw everything up because I forgot that Ruin had Abomination instead of Terror which forced command checks on my Kayazy and Ogrun Bokur. Lucky for me they both passed. 

After that debacle I offer up the Juggernaut to the Galleon hoping he'll spend a turn killing it while I set up Ruin and Butcher for a counter attack. I tried to block the Juggernaut from being dragged by some Kayazy and the War Argus but forgot the Galleon had blast damage on his rapid fire guns.

End of Turn 1

Rob upkeeps Fail Safe on the Galleon and allocates it 3 focus. He then charges in with his Press Gangers but unfortunately isn't able to kill any Kayazy. He then activates Galleon and after a 3rd party confirmation and a laser line check, he is able to drag the Juggernaut to his death. He ends the turn casting Spiny Growth on the Galleon.

Yes! He took the bait! Now I just have to close the deal... but wait... am I too far? Uhh... I think I'm just a hair shy from Ruin and Butcher wreaking havoc on him! I activate Aiyana & Holt and cast Kiss of Lyliss on the Galleon but I'm about a half inch too far and miss. I am able to kill the Bullsnapper with Holt though which really helps. My plan was to get the -2 ARM Debuff on Galleon and charge in Ruin to remove Fail Safe, then finish him off with the Butcher. Unfortunately, I have to activate Butcher first and cast Energizer to make sure I am in charge range for everyone.

Butcher then charges and I roll incredibly bad on 6 hits, not damaging any systems. I have 3 focus left after popping my feat and I have a decision to make. Should I spend the 3 and take a shot at killing the Galleon and then set myself up to be Ganged by MacBain? No. I decide to camp the last 3 focus. 

I activate Ruin and he charges in with 3 focus. I almost forgot about Dispel on his weapon but that was crucial to remove Fail Safe. After Ruin's activation, Galleon has a crippled Left Side but still has his massive Trident.

I pop the Kayazy mini feat and charge them through the Press Gangers and get a couple shots at the Galleon only doing about 5-6 damage to him. I run the War Dog and Ogrun Bokur to help the Butcher against his final stand and end my turn. 

I do end up moving into position and scoring 1 point for controlling one of the zones.

Mark 1 - Rob 0

Mercenary Turn 3

Rob goes in the think tank for quite a while. He's trying to decide the best way to handle the situation. The War Dog is a huge problem for him as it bumps Butcher's defense to 16. In the end he decides to allocate 3 to Galleon and smash away. He boosts to hit on all of his shots and hits 2 out of 3 leaving Butcher on 6 health. He then buys 3 Jackhammer shots needing hard 10s to hit and misses them all.

He moves his Press Gangers in and try to take out the Kayazy but fail. He also tries to charge Bosun Grogspar at Butcher but eats 2 free strikes from the Kayazy and dies. Wrong Eye and Snapjaw are able to handle Ruin and leave him a steaming pile of wreck marker. MacBain, sensing impending doom, moves back since the scenario is not Killbox and ends his turn.

Mark 2 - Rob 0

On my turn, instead of risking being left wide open after killing the Galleon I decided to wipe out the Press Gangers instead. Those nasty pirates tough the hell out of their rolls and force me to use everything I've got. In anti-climactic fashion I am able to kill over half his unit forcing him to make a tough check. They fail and there's no one to contest the zone. I simply toe the zone with Butcher and dominate for 2 points and have Aiyana & Holt with the Widowmaker Marksman control the other bringing my total to a game winning 5 points.

Mark 5 - Rob 0

End of the Game - Khador Victory by Scenario

Overall a very good game. It could have gone either way with just a simple dice spike. Rob did a hell of a job almost killing Butcher. I got pretty lucky on making the call to camp the 3 focus instead of trying to finish off the Galleon because without it, Rob would have had exactly enough to kill Butcher.

Final Thoughts

I made a couple of huge mistakes this game. My first mistake was thinking Ruin had Terror instead of Abomination and forcing myself to make command checks on both my own Kayazy and Ogrun Bokur.

The second mistake is that I placed 2 Kayazy base to base with the Juggernaut trying to stop the drag, forgetting that the Galleon had AOE which wiped them out like nothing when the attack targeted my easy to hit Juggernaut.

I wouldn't change too much of the list at 35 points. If I were playing this in a two list pairing for Steamroller I might take out Aiyana & Holt so I can get better use out of them in another list. I'm pretty comfortable with the Kayazy and their mini feat really catches a lot of people off guard and is hard to plan for. I could try Iron Fang Black Dragons but that isn't my play style. I could also switch for some Nyss Hunters but lately I haven't had too much luck with them other than just being a contesting jam unit. I might put in the Widowmakers instead to help clear a path for Butcher and his Jacks.

I do love Butcher 3 and his pups. There's a tournament at GMI Games on Saturday and if I go I'll most likely play him with either pVlad, pSorcha, or Old Witch. There's a lot of Trolls in the Inland Empire meta though so I need heavy hitters.

Till next week!