Tag: 2300

SCUTTLIN’ REALM GAME 15: TRIDENT REALM

On By SalvageIn SCUTTLING REALMLeave a comment

Bottom table, baby! After getting housed by the Green Lady’s lackeys, my crabs plummeted to Table #22 to face off against some other downtrodden fish people. Coincidentally Table #21 also had a Trident Realm army on it, meaning that between the three of us we’d gotten 3 points total in Round 1. Gooooo Trident!

Trident Realm 2300

Naiad Ensnarer Horde – Liliana’s Tear
Gigas Horde
Depth Horror Horde – Healing Brew
Placoderm Regiment
Placoderm Regiment
Thuul Regiment
Thuul Regiment
Tidal Swarm Regiment
Tidal Swarm Regiment
Kraken
Kraken
Knucker
Thuul Mythican – Wings of Honeymaze
Naiad Envoy – Bastion (2)
Naiad Envoy

One of the awesome things about playing alongside the US Masters was seeing armies and players I know from the internet – and it’s even cooler to get to scrum against them! This round I faced the dude who runs the Unt l Somebody Loses An Eye, who I had just that morning been talking to about Wyrd’s game The Other Side. I really love his army and how much Mantic he crammed in there by thinking laterally and using Nameless from Warpath, and his big bads are great minis and BIG. Comp-wise it seemed good, certainly more balanced than mine but nowhere near the amount of shooting. ALSO:

KRAKEN COUNT = 5

Round 2 was Push, and the Scuttlers went first again, probably not by choice.

BATTLE

*crab sounds* Lots of advancing. Kraken play it cagey, content to project force, or at least the threat of it. My tokens are in the left Gigas (x2) and the left Kraken near the house; his are all in the central Ensnarer horde (x3). Heartpiercers ventilate a scouted Tidal Swarm for first blood.

*gribble sounds* Cautious response from Cthulhu and friends. Most relevant note is the Knucker begin to work that flank but not stepping into those right woods.

Central Gigas scoop up the central token and prepare to flex hard – tho Ensnarers and Placoderms aren’t the smashiest units, Thuul are lurking nearby. Lots of positioning happened on the flanks, inviting him to break the standoff, while Heartpiercers unload into the Depth Horrors hard left (5 damage) and the Tidal Swarm middle (1 damage).

The Gribble Realms let ‘er rip in the center, sending Ensnarers and Placos into Gigas for a proper anvil-off, with that annoying Tidal Swarm getting in the way of Kraken vengeance. His flanks increase the pressure, presenting me with plenty of bad options. Gigas hold easily (3 damage). The Depth Horrors also ate their healing brew.

Turn 3, time to take a risk (Spoiler: risks very rarely pay off with TR!) Gigas + Heartpiercers + Water Elementals slam into the central Placoderms, looking for that pop-n-spin. More Heartpiercers charge that Tidal Swarm, while yet more Heartpiercers riddle the Depth Horrors with harpoons, routing them. The right Kraken takes a deep breath and makes sure all those big bases are in his front arc, while the left Kraken (still with a token) invites the other Placoderms to have a go.

Anyway, that big combat in the middle doesn’t work out. Loads of damage (10+) but can’t land the double rout. Sad times ahead, gents. Those Hearpiercers totally rock the swarm tho.

Here we go! Thuul regiments mob the Water Elementals, with some Placoderm support for good measure. A Kraken slams into my right Kraken, with Knucker ready to toss in next turn. The Ensnarers have a go at the central Gigas, and those other Placoderm head in to poke at the left Kraken. His Gigas and Cthulhu-kraken head towards the center.

The Water Elementals are shredded by the Thuul wave, but other damage is negligible.

Scuttlin’ Turn 4, the grind increases, with some fortunate flanks. The central Gigas + Heartpiercers counter-charge their Placoderms, finishing them. The right Kraken grabs the flank of some Thuul, devouring them (this may have been a mistake? Or he expected to at least waver my Kraken but did the combats in the wrong order?) On the left, my other Gigas grab the flank of his other Placoderm, shattering them with the Kraken’s help in the front (this was certainly a mistake, he looked pretty crestfallen after missing that flank). The central Kraken mashed into the Ensnarers for respectable damage (6?) but whatever.

In shooting, Heartpiercers rock his Gigas, wavering them.

Gribble Realms options are dwindling, but there’s still mayhem to be had. Ensnarers counter-charge the central Kraken, Cthulhu + Thuul thunder into some poor Heartpiercers, and the right Kraken facetanks a Kraken + Knucker.

Those Heartpiercers turn to jelly, but otherwise Kraken hold like the towering anvils they are.

Scuttlin’ Turn 5, check out that big horde-sized hole … Gigas + Kraken in the front and another titan in the flank splatters the Ensnarer horde, and leaves one Kraken loaded up with 4 (!) tokens. My other Kraken swings into the Knucker, because at least it can’t regen? But he wavers it anyway! Beast.

In non-Kraken news, the central Gigas back up 3” after combat but can’t escape Lord Cthulhu … And my other Gigas charge and dismember an Envoy, shortly after 30 Heartpiercer rounds waver his Gigas again. Man, I hate when my Gigas waver too.

Kraken violence continues, as my central Gigas are charged by Thuul and flanked by Cthulhu, and my beleaguered right Kraken is flanked by his other Kraken. While the Gigas crunch beneath Cthulhu’s feet (who scoops up their token), my Kraken survives on 14 damage! Wavered but still holding, which was his only goal this game. Also his Gigas rotate to face their destructor.

Scuttlin’ Turn 6, scenario time go! The Kraken carting around 4 tokens plows into the enemy half, while the other central Kraken gets out of LOS but prepares to punish if there’s a Turn 7. My right Kraken furiously regenerates 8 damage and keeps looking at the Knucker in a show of disrespect for his Kraken. Then Heartpiercers pincushion Cthulhu but he cares not for their barbs.

In what would be the end of the game, Cthulhu and his Thuul minions pounded into some Hearpiercers but honestly I think they held. I don’t have a shot of it, however I think my hero Kraken on the right finally ate it. (KRAKEN COUNT = 4)

SCUTTLIN’ WIN (17-4)

BUT with so many tokens on his half (5!) this was a pretty serious win for the Scultting Realm. The flanks he offered up in Turn 4 certainly helped, but I’mma give credit to my right Kraken holding up his own titanic flank for FAR longer than he ought to have. I was far more patient than I usually am – I mean, not in that middle combat I guess, tho it wasn’t massively risky – and his delay really gave me the time I needed to wreck the flank and center.

Up Next: Dwarfs

SCUTTLIN’ REALM GAME 14: ORDER OF THE GREEN LADY

On By SalvageIn SCUTTLING REALMLeave a comment

The US Masters tournament for the 2019 Kings of War season was held at Tioga Downs Casino in Western NY, just shy of three hours west of me. More awesomely, there was a side tournament held at the same time in the same room, conveniently called The Best of the Rest. It followed the same rules, points values and scenarios, but blessedly was only five games and not the grueling six of the Masters.

While I very much didn’t fancy my chances, I felt I owed it to the crabs to give them at least one more event before packing them away for the inevitable Clash of Kings buffs at the end of the year (Wyrmriders, I’m looking at you guys!) This also meant I would finish painting more of the army’s stockpile instead of, you know, never getting back to it.

Trident Realm 2300

Water Elemental Horde
Gigas Horde – Chalice of Wrath
Gigas Horde – Staying Stone
Naiad Heartpiercer Regiment
Naiad Heartpiercer Regiment
Naiad Heartpiercer Regiment
Naiad Heartpiercer Regiment
Kraken
Kraken
Kraken
Depth Horror Eternal – Inspiring Talisman
Naiad Envoy – Lute of Insatiable Darkness
Naiad Envoy – Bastion (2)

Despite proving scientifically that Kraken are speedy yet pillowfisted pseudo-anvils (aka not hammers), I still wanted to bring all three of the big guys, particularly as I had just finished painting their big little brother, the Deep Crab from Mierce (the Kraken are Mierce’s three Scuttling Nucránca). At some point in my testing I abandoned trying to make Wyrmriders work and had switched to a Water Elemental horde for my unlocks and facebeating purposes. It’s sad when 18 CS1 attaks is your hammer but, well, Trident are like that. Also being natively Def 5+ and Strider (and Regen 5+) are groovy things, as well as putting him roughly in line with the Kraken’s abilities, which is aesthetically nice as all four minis look related.

I kept all the Heartpiercers in, since I made the army around them originally, afforded some anti-wavering tech for the Gigas (being wavered is the worst, especially when you don’t have regen or heal) and grudgingly gave the Eternal true inspiring. It’s always a bad feel to upgrade self-inspo for 20 pts but I really wanted him in there – the only two games I’d won of 3E so far had been because of him – and needed the third inspiring.

I did have a bit of regret going into these games, as a couple days before I realized that I should just give the Water Elementals brew of strength, as they were the lute target 90% of the time … and spoilers, my lute didn’t work 50% of the time. Also CS2 would just fit the model better.

Anyway, while I was sorta ok with Scuttlin’ Realm 2.0, my goal for the event was just two wins. You know, doubling my record for the new edition.

Order of the Green Lady 2300

Order of the Brotherhood Regiment – Banner of the Green Lady, Blade of Slashing
Order of the Brotherhood Regiment – Sir Jesse’s Boots of Striding
Men-at-Arms Retainer Horde
Men-at-Arms Retainer Horde
Order of Redemption Regiment – Brew of Strength
Order of the Forsaken Horde – Maccwar’s Potion of the Caterpillar
Pegasus
Pegasus
Exemplar Redeemer – Winged Unicorn
Exemplar Redeemer – Winged Unicorn
Unicorn – Wings, Lightning Bolt (5), Heal (5), Shroud of the Saint
Unicorn – Wings, Lightning Bolt (5), Heal (5), Boomstick

Table #1 baby! Fun fact: I watched this army play my Round 4 opponent the night before the tournament kicked off, as I liked both armies a lot. Smart list with six extremely useful flyers. I obviously didn’t realize how great Exemplar Redeemers are, very reminiscent of pegasus vamps, which are one of the flyers I respect the most in the game. Except these regen, and headstrong, and CS2, and etc.

Round 1 was Dominate, and the Scuttlers kicked things off. Grudgingly.

BATTLE

Battlelines! Most relevant notes are the Redeemers stacked on the left flank and the ultra-hammer Order of the Redemption in the second wave on the right flank.

Headed into Order Turn 2. Turn 1 I must have advanced, without being able to shoot my 18” guns, then he advanced, lightninged some Heartpiercers, who regened and returned fire at the offending Unicorn. Worth noting that my dice were ice cold at this point and my brain extremely fuzzy from no sleep / being out of practice (I mean, check out that 10AM Monster :X)

Despite leaving a Kraken over there to intercept one of them, both Redeemers are able to hop my lines. I am well and truly fakked. (The TO walked by at this point, watched the heroes fly over the Kraken, looked at me and shook his head …) Some Brotherhood knights run over some Heartpiercers while the Unicorn zzaps that other unit more, wavering them. Pegasus either try to get in the way or prepare to later.

As it turns out, the Kraken is able to get into those rampaging Brotherhood, and combo-charges with some luted-up Gigas. Since this game has already gone sideways, I go hyper-aggressive on the right, sending 42 CS1-2 attaks into the Men-at-Arms. I know it’ll cost me the right Kraken but I want to break up his lines and start grinding. Heartpiercers pump rounds into the same Unicorn and the right Pegasus, for minimal results.

Both combats fail, despite the odds being in my favor / the best this army can muster. The knights may have wavered (then headstronged out of it) but the Men-at-Arms I couldn’t manage the rerolled rout. Bad times ahead.

The Order responds by jumping on all three Kraken: Brotherhood knights + flank Redeemer + rear Redeemer on the left, both Men-at-Arms in the center (including an ensnare-free flank), and more Brotherhood knights into a flank on the right. Heartpiercers are plowed into by Forsaken and Pegasus, while lightning wavers the central unit a second time. If there’s a silver lining, it’s that the Men-at-Arms holding has blocked the Order of the Redemption from descending.

After combat, all three Kraken drop in one turn!! But, uh, the Heartpiercers hold.

In Scuttler Turn 4, those left Gigas finish off the Brotherhood knights and turn to face the Redeemers, knowing they’re about to go rear charge somebody. The engaged Heartpiercers counter-charge, grounding the Forsaken (!) and killing the right Pegasus (!!). The free unit shoots the wounded Forsaken, praying for that waver. Finally, the Water Elementals swing at the Men-at-Arms again, who have been very healed at this point, and the right Gigas chunk some damage into the other Men-at-Arms, knowing they’re dead soon.

This is midway through combat in Order Turn 4. The Forsaken drop their Heartpiercers, that Redeemer in the center has just murdered some other Heartpiercers, the Water Elemental horde is vaporized by the Order of the Redemption (and a few relevant wounds from the infantry horde), but somehow the Gigas hold Men-at-Arms to the front, Redeemer to the flank and Pegasus to the rear! You can also see the Eternal on the right flank had snuck a flank charge on those Brotherhood knights, then was counter-charged here for really a lot of damage on 4+ then 3+.

Scuttler Turn 5, the Gigas turn around and eat the Pegasus in their rear, then turn back around. The Eternal nimblers out and hacks into the Order of the Redemption. And the remaining Heartpiercers try to finish off a wounded flyer (probably the Forsaken in the Gigas’ flank).

The central Gigas are torn apart, while the other Gigas hold a Forsaken charge and the Heartpiercers likewise repulse the fresh Redeemer. The Eternal is shredded by the Order of the Forsaken, while Unicorns rapidly heal the damage to the Men-at-Arms.

Turn 6 and I’m desperately trying to kill something else. The Gigas swing like champs but botch the rout roll on the Forsaken, while the Heartpiercers cutely slap two wounds on their Redeemer but whatever.

Those offending Heartpiercers are cratered by the Order of the Redemption, and I’m pretty sure the Gigas were torn down with excellent dice from the Forsaken. I end the game with just the Envoys kicking.

SCUTTLIN’ LOSS (1-20)

Amazingly I was able to kill enough to earn 1 point! Oh right: we’re playing Blackjack, which uses 14/7 for wins/loses and then modifies that based on how well you won the scenario, and then further by attrition difference.

Given all those flyers and how poorly my list handles them – if it’s a single dragon, I can just shoot it to death, but multiple smaller fliers is really difficult – I kind of felt the outcome was inevitable. Having those early combats where I applied fairly overwhelming force just peter out was sad, but my dice weren’t there for me, plus Trident simply don’t have the combat power to make any match up a sure thing.

This army would go on to win Player’s Choice, and the dude was a pleasure to finally face after seeing him around for years.

Up Next: Trident Realm Civil War

INCOMING CRABS 🦀

On By SalvageIn SCUTTLING REALMLeave a comment

Or rather, they arrived a while ago, but haven’t been batrepped for unknown reasons … Bloodfire is still on hiatus while I explore fresher avenues, however I wanted to give some coverage to my current army, plus those that come after this one, and this seems like a decent, agnostic place to do it.

So welcome to the new, expanded, ad-free blood-fire.com!

CRABS (FEB 2020) – Big boys by Mierce, tiny lads by Khurasan, token Hadross dude by CMON

Late September 2019, I finished up a new crab-themed Trident Realm army, just a couple days before the Crossroads GT (which was a 2250 point KOW 2E team event). I played a practice game the night before against a team mate, crushing his new Nightstalkers with the fury of a bunch of crustaceans (GAME 1: NIGHTSTALKERS). And with practice out of the way – I had literally never played the army before! – we got a few hours sleep and headed into the event. The list I took for that first outing:

Trident Realm 2250 (2E)
Naiad Heartpiercers Regiment
Naiad Heartpiercers Regiment
Naiad Heartpiercers Regiment
Naiad Heartpiercers Regiment
Gigas Horde*
Gigas Horde*
Kraken
Kraken
Kraken
Naiad Envoy – Aura of Heroism (2), Banner of the Griffin
Depth Horror Eternal – Inspiring Talisman
Depth Horror Eternal – Orcish Skullpole
Naiad Wyrmrider Centurion – Fire-Oil
*King Crabs

As captain of Team Cuddle Time II, I was vaguely in charge of working out which armies would go up against each other and/or what scenarios they would play, so I had some control over who and what my crabs faced. My goal for the team was to put myself into harder armies but ideally with better scenarios for my Trident … which was total conjecture since I didn’t really know what they could do! Here’s the briefest of recaps:

GAME 2: ELVES

NWC and Kraken doing terrible things to Elf Archers!

 

Couldn’t tell you what the mission was or how things broke down, but holy hell I won! Biggest revelation was that massed heartpiercers are really good at killing big monsters, as his dragon was deleted in a couple turns as it tried to harry my flanks and rear.

GAME 3: KINGDOMS OF MEN

Kraken resolutely face-tanking a charge from a Knight horde!

Knight-heavy (like 2x hordes + regiments + flying heroes) men largely controlled this game, however through the magic of ensnare + hindering the crabs were able to bog down his momentum and smash their way to an inconceivable draw.

GAME 4: BASILEANS

Another fast army, this time 2x Elohi, 2x Uh-Elohi, 1-2x Knights, token foot troops, Gnaeus Sallustis annnnnd the mega-dragon (who is now just the normal dragon). I should have gotten wrecked, however he was extremely caught up in the dance a Kraken and his dragon were having in some woods, where I kept turning or stepping into and out of wood templates and he had to keep over-analyzing LOS and what was going on over there, all while taking continual Heartpiercer damage. Preposterously I won this one too!

GAME 5: UNDEAD

Crabs busting ghosts!

Dawn of Day 2, and while Team Cuddle Time II wasn’t doing stellar (our Varangur player was getting paired up against very hard armies, and pretty consistently getting smashed for his troubles), my Trident Realm was on a real tear! Up against Undead next, a rather standard 2E affair with some hordes, some knights, some wraith troops, some barrow wights, a dragon, etc. Lowlight was a Kraken getting trapped by Wraiths and dismantled – one troop to the front, then more to the flank, then another to the rear! But otherwise the dragon was shot down and the punchy crabs punched hard, with a somewhat lucky Gigas + Gigas + Eternal charge into a fresh horde that helped me roll his flank up and maul through the rest of the Undead line. Another win!

GAME 6: UNDEAD

“Craaaaaab meeeeeeaaat”

Final round of the tournament, and another Undead grinder for me. Main difference here is the abundance of zombies and zombie trolls. I was in control of this game early on, thanks to shooting, but I still remember how, instead of waiting for Turn 3 to engage, when the zombie trolls had been shot off, I jumped the guns and sent the Kraken all in Turn 2, which got most of them killed – including one to multiple wraith troop charges, again. Once the big hammers were down, I scrabbled as best I could but was overrun, earning the armies first loss.

All told, it was a pretty heartening first six games with the scuttlers! Really quite unexpected … although a bit tarnished as the 3E changes for Trident Realm had been previewed the day before the event, and it was clear that almost all the units I was using were going to lose their COK19 bumps. I had a feeling 3E was about to get bumpy for my new army.

Some KOW-less weeks later, the new edition hit, confirming some particularly distressing developments:

  1. Heartpiercers became irregular, making my 2E list illegal and ensuring I will always hurt for unlocks
  2. Heartpiercers lost ensnare, pathfinder and 2 attaks, for the benefit of steady aim, which gutted the reason I based an army around these little, mobile tarpits happy to grab a 24 attak flank when able
  3. Gigas went up to a larger base, making them unwieldy but more importantly meaning I had to paint more of them and rebase the unit (they also lost 1 CS but gained 1 Def and kept their King Crabs Sp, so meh; the added nimble has yet to matter for me)
  4. Kraken lost 3 attaks, severely hurting their abilities as hammers, ironically at the same time as they gained +D3″ charge range

At first I added a Wyrmrider horde for a third hero unlock, but man they suck now. In my first 3E game I lost against Ogres (GAME 7: OGRES):

Then over Wintermas I leant my brother my Ratkin, who brutally beat me at dominate (GAME 8: RATKIN), but then the next day I narrowly squeaked out a win in raze (GAME 9: RATKIN):

With a 3E win under my belt at last, I took on my clubmate’s Abyssals (GAME 10: FORCES OF THE ABYSS), losing again but at least keeping it close:

Meanwhile, my buddy had finally relented to my arm twisting, picked up a load of Mantic minis and smashed through a Northern Alliance army in record time. In short order he hit 2300 points and found himself facing crabs every other week or so. While I won the first match (GAME 11: NORTHERN ALLIANCE), and his first game of full size Kings –

– Trident’s pillowy fists would come up to haunt me, as I lost both of the next two games (GAME 12: NORTHERN ALLIANCE & GAME 13: NORTHERN ALLIANCE). Including this gem:

Aye, that’s a Kraken (with 2 loot tokens) being flanked by Huscarls (with 2 loot tokens) and Half-Elf Berserkers. While the Kraken is in that predicament because I rolled double ones, the North did not repay the favor 😥 Nor did I ever get those 4 loot tokens away from the Huscarls.

Which brings us up to last week! February 22-23 was the US Masters here in New York, and there was a side GT called the Best of the Rest for, well, the rest of us who wanted to scrum and soak up that Masters vibe. I took my freshly reduxed crabs with me and ended up taking a lot of photos with the intent to blog. So strap in, tournament report inbound!

Side Note: Since I’m covering reports for different armies on this blog now, you’ll be able to use the new Category feature >> to more easily select which army you want to follow. Though I do tend to avoid bouncing between armies, it could happen!