Kings of War 3rd Edition: #034: Abyssals vs Northern Alliance [Push]

Intro and Lists:

After well over a month of repeated misses due to a myriad of personal and scheduling issues on my side of things, forum-goer Cartwright and I were able to finally connect again for some more games! He was playing his fearsome Northern Alliance again, and ran the following for our first game of the day:

Some Snow Foxes are around to disrupt my movements, as usual. Dwarf Clansmen are around to play the scenario, and regiments of Pack Hunters could do the same while pressuring with their bows. Two Hordes of the monstrous Snow Trolls are around to do the heavy fighting, and with Regen and CS2 should be able to do grindy combats particularly well. Two new and potent Cavern Dwellers appear, which have served me and my Varangur very well before, and seem very nice monsters. Supporting those miniature giants is an actual giant, armed with a cleaver to get the wonderful titan-on-titan combats we all like to see. Leading the force are his usual duo of Lords on Frostfangs, plus a Snow Troll Prime. As-ever, my opponent brought a very strong-looking list! He's also made some upgrades and additions to things, and more units are getting the winged hussar treatment. The army is looking quite good these days!

Unfortunately, my schedule was still proving to be quite insane, even with an open day. I was hoping to get the Herd in a semi-sensible state, but I quickly realized that exploring a brand new army was going to be too tall an order on my brain right now, so instead I threw together some Abyssals lists exploring some regimental MSU play, and exploring my ranged attack options. As it turns out, we were both messing around with Troop vs Regiments on some ranged units, and so decided to run the regiments lists against the troops lists for some added variation in the match-up. Since my opponent had regiments for this game, I ran my list with the troops of Flamebearers, which was the following:

This list was the more experimental of the two for my lists on the day, downgrading my Flamebearers to the smaller troop-size, and using the points I saved to pick up some more melee-focused options. Up to test for me are:

• Abyssal Guard with Sacrificial Imps. The regiments are costly, but with Regeneration and Fearless, they seem viable, so we'll see how they do. I had the points, so gave Imps to both. Hopefully, Fearless will let take a big hit, the poor Imps will let the regenerate a few a few more wounds, and the unit come out on top in some combats.
• Flamebearer Troops. My opponent is wary of the Flamebearers and all the focus-firing I tend to try. As troops though, they have a few less attacks and a bit less Nerve. Will the downgrades be noticeable at all, or will these still perform well?
• Oathbreakers. I have a lot of infantry, so I figured these should be brought along too. Will Rally help with anything, like perhaps buffing the aforementioned Flamebearer troops?
• Tortured Souls. I still don't have a great feel for these yet. Lacking Nimble, they just aren't as quick and threatening as I'd like them to be. They are not a forgiving unit so far, so I need to try and use these better in my games. We'll see how they do this time.
• Abyssal Fiends. I think these have a lot of potential, especially in a MSU-style list. At just 175 points, these can inspire, fight, and even shoot a bit, providing a lot of flexibility for a list, and should pair particularly well with any Flamebearers nearby.
• Seductress with Enthrall. This was a secret technique I stumbled upon. Often, my Abyssals lists feature Flamebearers, and often, I am forced to go first. With the 18" range and 5" move, I can't quite shoot anything first turn. This should hopefully let me draw something out 2" from the enemy lines, and be able to shoot it first turn.
• Regimental MSU.  Important units for this army like Flamebearers and Abyssal Guard top out at the regimental size, so I think this playstyle might still have some potential, especially in more casual play. We'll see how some troops do, and how this playstyle works for the Abyssals!
• Battle Report Template. I finally sat down and finished off a reporting template, to hopefully help me with my note-taking. Unfortunately, I left my large foam die behind, so I'm breaking even for my game-tracking aids. My opponent stuck a die in the ruins to help track and I tried to take notes with the template. We'll see how things go.

I had a small edge in both drops (17:14) and Unit Strength (26:24), but no serious threats. My opponent noted that I had a lot of stuff, but no single unit was all that threatening. My units would need to work together for any wins, which is in line with how MSU plays generally.

Conversely, my opponent had many scary things! The two hordes of regenerating Snow Trolls will each take a lot of effort to remove, and should resist chip damage well. Along these same lines, the Cavern Dwellers will be a serious threats in melee, and will quickly Lifeleech back any ranged chip damage I do manage land against them. On top of all this, he has a Frost Giant. Fighting against any of those scary units will need to be swift and decisive.

Deployment and Table

We were playing out at his home, and my opponent had a table and terrain set up by the time I arrived. As usual for us, the ruins were Height 9 blocking buildings, the forests were Height 6 Difficult Terrain, fences were Height 2 Obstacles, and Hills were Height 3. 

View from the left.

Left-to-right my opponent had the Pack Hunters with Bows, Lord on Frostfang, more Pack Hunters, Snow Troll Prime, both units of Dwarves, the Frost Giant, the Snow Trolls with both tokens screening some Snow Foxes, and a Cavern Dweller. A ruin broke up his line, and flank had another Lord, more Snow Trolls screening more Foxes, and the second Cavern Dweller.

View from the center.

I definitely did not have a great idea how to deploy my list. Running a more MSU-style list, I wanted to keep two Flamebearers near each Seductress, and that was about as far as I got for planning...

Out on the left, I had two Tortured Souls, Gargoyles, and some Abyssal Guard. Centrally, we have a Seductress, two troops of Flamebearers, Abyssal Fiend, Oathbreakers and Lower Abyssals on the hill. then two more Flamebearer troops, the second Seductress, Abyssal Guard, Abyssal Fiend, and Tortured Souls screening Gargoyles.

View from the right, against a very scary Northern Alliance flank.

We had rolled up Push for the Scenario, and got 2 Loot Tokens apiece. I chose to spread my tokens out, one with the Abyssal Guard on my far-left, and one with the Lower Abyssals. My opponent chose to have his central Snow Trolls unit carry both of his scenario tokens. We will score 1 point per token at the end of the game, or 2 points for any token carried on our opponent's starting half of the game board.

My opponent won the roll off and made me go first, intending for me to miss out on a round of my Flamebearer shooting. Mwahaha!

Top of Round 1: Abyssals

Over on the left, the Tortured Souls move up 12", using the hill to hide from the bowmen of the Northern Alliance. The Gargoyles move up and pivot, thinking they might need to intercept stuff in the middle soon. Unfortunately, this blocks out the Abyssal Guard a bit, and they cannot move too far, though this does keep them out of range of the bowmen.

I could have been more aggressive with the Guard, but they also had the token, so I was wary of just throwing them forward unsupported.

My center and right all move up 5", as I don't really know what to do. The Northern Alliance list is scary, and I don't think I have the means to be extremely aggressive.

A cautious center, trying to spring some sneaky traps. 

The Seductresses hatch their plan, drawing out a Cavern Dweller and a unit of Dwarves with their Enthrall moves. Their accompanying Flamebearer troops fling fire. A few damage lands on the Dwarves, but only 1 damage slips in onto the Cavern Dweller. It is not as impactful a surprise as I would have liked, as his units are all so sturdy. I am forced to pass the turn.

The trap is... sprung?

Apologies to my opponent for being underprepared though. As we found out at the end of the day,  the Enthrall spell only has an 18" range. The Seductress on the right is probably fine and in range, but the one on the left should be a few more inches up. I ran into some subscription issues with the Companion, and haven't had the time to get them sorted. While I was able to do up some free lists for the games, the special rules detail and spells and such were not included there in the free versions, and my memory failed me on the range of the spell. I thought it was longer, and should have looked it up and confirmed prior to trying to cast it. Thankfully, the other castings were done closer, and this should be the only error with the spell's range from the battles on the day, and now I know for next time.

Bottom of Round 1: Northern Alliance

Over on the left, the Pack Hunters and Lord on Frostfang remain in the woods, but all shuffle around slightly, with the hunters moving forward to get into range. Both Pack Hunters loose their bows at the nearest Flamebearer unit, scoring just two damage but will Waver them.

Turns out the Bow-version does not have Steady Aim? Their damage output suffers a bit this turn.

The Snow Foxes hop over to help screen and interdict for their respective Snow Troll units, and the Northern Alliance lines start moving up. The Cavern Dweller cannot make any charges this turn, but moves up to threaten some next turn. Since the Abyssals in the center are predominately infantry, the varied units of the Northern Alliance are free to move up as far as they wish without much fear.

The Northern Alliance pushes up, threatening some Round 2 charges.

My opponent takes extra care on the right, moving the Snow Foxes in-line with the edge of the Snow Trolls to prevent the Abyssal Guard from charging them too, should the Tortured Souls opt to fight. It is very smart positioning from my opponent. The Lord and Cavern Dweller hang safely back from any major charges, ready to counter-attack as-needed, should I wish to start anything.

Top of Round 2: Abyssals

I decide to commit my Gargoyles to some fights, hoping to disrupt my opponent's movement a bit, buy time for my shooting to do more, and force some positional decisions from my opponent next turn.

In got the Seductress and Gargoyles over on the right.

On the right, the Gargoyles charge the Snow Foxes, and thankfully, will shred them. The Seductress charges into the Lord on Frostfang to delay him for a turn while the Abyssal Guard futz around in the forest. They and the Abyssal Fiend and Tortured Souls here are ready for combat in round 3.

A few small-but-ill-advised combats to kick things off.

On the left, I do similar things. The Seductress charges in to disorder a Pack Hunter regiment. The Gargoyles flank charge the Snow Troll Prime, who easily holds. I can't remember if the Prime actually had a charge next turn or not. I don't think he did, so I think I was being a bit foolish here. In that case, the better play would have been to hit the flank of the Hunters along with the Seductress, and try to just remove that unit.

The Tortured Souls slowly start to swing around on the left, and the Abyssal Guard meanders around holding the token. Unfortunately the Souls didn't have the height to see over the hill to contribute to combats this turn.

Still, all of the combats will buy some time for the Flamebearers to try things. Each pair will back up, and throw into their same unit. On the right, the duo deal another 1 to the Cavern Dweller, bringing it to 2 damage total, though by backing up, I do deny it a charge next turn. On the left, the Dwarves are brought up to 9 damage total and are Wavered, with the Fiend adding a damage or two with his Fireball against the unit.

Bottom of Round 2: Northern Alliance

The Northern Alliance counter-attacks. A regiment of Pack Hunters counter-charge the Seductress, and are joined by the Lord on Frostfang. I forget that the Seductress has Ensnare, but I doubt that would have made a difference. She will be routed. The Hunters will change facing to see both units of Tortured Souls, and the Lord will do the same, but being taller then the hill, can also see my plodding Abyssal Guard.

The Seductress gets double-teamed... or something. I feel like there is a joke to be had here...

The other regiment comes to the aid of the Snow Troll Prime, flanking the Gargoyles, though despite Pathfinder, we discover that they should be hindered from Obstacles. Still, that's a lot of attacks in the flank, and the Gargoyles are not tough and will be easily scattered.

Occupying the attention of about 5x their points value, the Gargoyles take some hits! 

The center of Northern Alliance line secures the silly central obstacle, looking to draw out some hindered charges from the Abyssal infantry. The Ice Giant is able to hit the Oathbreakers with a frost breath, freezing them. I thought Frozen was just a keyword for other special abilities, but I learn than it has it's own effect, and reduces the speed of a unit, meaning the Oathbreakers actually cannot make any charges next turn since nothing is in range now. My center might be in some trouble...

I've retreated to the hill, but that is a lot of pressure coming in.

The pesky Snow Foxes opt for a long charge into the Lower Abyssals, landing some damage and will disorder them. It's a clear charge, and probably better than a hindered one through the woods against the Flamebearers, which might not result in any damage at all.

The scary flank barrels through the chaff.

Over on the right, the Lord trounces the Seductress, and I again forget that she has Ensnare. He makes a large overrun move. The Snow Trolls counter-charge the Gargoyles, and are joined by the Cavern Dweller. The Gargoyles are easily broken with so many attacks, and the Cavern Dweller makes a huge overrun move as well.

Top of Round 3: Abyssals

With the huge overrun by the Cavern Dweller, I am able to triple charge the Snow Trolls on my right with the Abyssal Guard (hindered), Abyssal Fiend and the Tortured Souls. I do some great damage for the situation, and get the Trolls up to what looks like 11 damage, but they are Inspired and the Nerve check isn't there, and they haven't a care in the world facing down three of my most "scary" units. On the plus-side, the Cavern Dweller is denied a charge here, so I've been doing an alright job of avoiding those so far.

A desperate triple charge, but no luck breaking the unit.

In the center, the Oathbreakers back up while the Lower Abyssals thankfully break the Snow Foxes and then do the same, trying to delay. The Flamebearers flit around the table, trying to move and block things and and frantically throw into the Giant, collectively dealing 9 to it, which isn't bad at all considering the circumstances.

The center retreats some more, with surprisingly good damage landing on the Frost Giant.

The Abyssal Titan charges in against the wounded Dwarf unit, and smashes them. The Fiend will change facing to eye up the Snow Troll Prime and Pack Hunters, and is just out of the charge arc of the Dwarves. Phew!

Even with a clear charge, double Tortured Souls can't break the Pack Hunters.

Out on the left, the front of Pack Hunters is outside of the woods, and I opt to send both regiments of Tortured Souls in against them. The Hunters should be wavered, but are still around, to my dismay. The Abyssal Guard moves up a bit again, slowed because I keep pivoting them around and being very indecisive with the unit.

Bottom of Round 3: Northern Alliance

The Lord on Frostfang charges the Abyssal Guard, looking to bully my other token, but he is unable to break them. The Prime charges the Abyssal Fiend, but only deals 2 damage. The Pack Hunters shoot into some Flamebearers, dealing 6 and wavering them, while the Dwarves make a hindered charge into another troop of Flamebearers, and rout them. 

It's not a good sign if the Dwarves make it into your ranged units...

The Giant charges the weaker Lower Abyssal regiment, but is only able to slip 2 new damage onto the unit. Wielding the Cleaver, only 1 additional attack was rolled up, and the die just did not treat the Frost Giant well at all.

The Frost Giant proves to be all bluster.

The Snow Trolls carrying both loot tokens charges one Flamebearer troop while the Cavern Dweller runs around and into a second troop hiding in the forest. Both troops are obliterated, and my shooting abilities are greatly reduced.

The retaliatory charges are not as devastating as I thought they'd be.

Out on the right, the Lord charges the Abyssal Guard, with the Snow Trolls counter-charging the same unit. Fortunately for me, the dice are ice cold, only 8 damage is done, and the unit holds. Unfortunately for the Abyssals, the Cavern Dweller here chances facing, ready to pounce next turn. It seems I cannot evade the monster forever...

Top of Round 4: Abyssals

The Abyssals regenerate some wounds and try to continue the fight, but things aren't looking good for me. My shooting is essentially gone, and don't think I have a list to piece trade well.

On the right, the Abyssal Guard counter-charges the Lord, taking him up from 1 damage to 4, which was disappointing at the time, but not too far below the typical results as it turns out. I've only got CS1 and the Lord is Defense 5, after all. The Fiend and Tortured Souls charge the Snow Trolls, with the latter getting into their flank now, thanks to some shuffling to center last turn. Thankfully the unit is routed! Unfortunately, the Cavern Dweller is right there and quite eager to contribute.

Mid-combat during the Top of Round 4.

Something is going to have a rear charge into the Fiend, and I give the rear to the Cavern Dweller. I think this is a mistake in retrospect. The Lord is going to take a penalty for disengaging and entering a different combat, so I shouldn't just give the Cavern Dweller such an ideal charge. Still, no matter what I do here, I think I've lost this flank. This is just nitpicking my play.

Awkward positioning for the Abyssals.

Centrally, I have a flank charge into the Frost Giant, who is already wounded. I should be able to break him, but feel that if I do so, I am trading both units for the giant. Since the Giant is already wounded, and I am feeling quite behind now, so I opt for more of a longshot play, charging downhill with the Oathbreakers and into the Dwarves, and hoping for some hot dice on 3's and 3's, but I do not roll well and only land a few damage against them, and only a few more on the Frost Giant as well, who isn't even Wavered.

Some desperate combats. I am outmatched here.

Over on the left, the Abyssal Guard countercharge the Lord, with a unit of Tortured Souls hitting him in the flank. The Lord is brought up to 12 damage, but merely wavered. The other unit of Tortured Souls hits the Pack Hunters again, routing the unit this time.

More messy combats on the left, with the Abyssals failing to break through.

Centrally, the Abyssal Fiend rolls hot, I think landing all 7 damage from his attacks onto the Snow Troll Prime. The Prime took some earlier damage as well that wasn't entirely regenerated back, and remains on the field, but is wavered. 

Bottom of Round 4: Northern Alliance

The Pack Hunters with their wits about them come to the aid of their nearby Lord, catching the Tortured Souls in the flank and decisively rout them. 

Things are falling apart here too for the Abyssals.

In the center, the Snow Trolls flank the Oathbreakers, easily breaking them. The Giant and Cavern Dweller crush the Lower Abyssals, with the latter hitting their flank, and absconding with their token.

... and the center for the Abyssal line is finally swatted down.

I survey the table, and while there are a few combats I might be able to win on my turn, none are particularly noteworthy. I also don't really have a way to win the scenario in the coming rounds, so I concede to save us some time.

My Abyssal Guard is still on my side of the board, and I've lost my other token, so it is a commanding 6-1 victory for the powerful Northern Alliance as we call the game. Congrats to my opponent on the well-deserved win! 

Game Conclusions

The Giant didn't really deliver for my opponent in regards to actual damage output, but it's longer charge range kept my infantry hesitant and boxed in. Everything else worked pretty well for my opponent and his list. The Cavern Dwellers were very scary, and ended the game healthy. Smart play with a good list led to a commanding victory for my opponent here. Well played!

I did not have a plan going into this game, and it showed as the rounds went on. I don't think I deployed well, due to not having a lot of experience with the playstyle and this army. I think I needed to mix in the slightly speedier elements in with the infantry for a more combined-arms approach: a few infantry regiments of mediocre ability is not going accomplish much, even together. The scenario did me no favors either. With my goofy list, I didn't have anywhere safe to drop the tokens, so opted to spread things out. But with shooting troops, the tokens ended up on combat units, though none of these were really defensive units. I then hesitated to commit those units to combats. So that was not a good plan from me for the scenario. I also think I was too eager to throw away all of my Gargoyles and Seductresses, and lost all of those very early for very little gain. I had some neat ideas in the list, but also had some very poor execution. 

Testing Conclusions

• Abyssal Guard with Sacrificial Imps. I forgot about the Sacrificial Imps entirely! This is why I don't take upgrades. Neither unit was used well nor really contributed much to the game.  
• Flamebearer Troops. The downgrade was indeed quite noticeable. The lower Nerve meant any damage taken but them in real danger, and I was lucky they stuck around as long as they did. They did a little better than average with their damage output, but it was not crazy hot, nor enough to swing the game. Splitting them into two groups of two troops made sense with how the list was built, but I just didn't have the firepower needed to focus fire things down and to make these little battle groups actually threatening.
• Oathbreakers. These are essentially special Abyssal Guard, and were not used well either, and the Rally made no difference in the violence that unfolded. The conditional Vicious is a bit of a waste of a rule, but I still think the unit can still find a home in some lists. 
• Tortured Souls. In my head these are flankers and outriders, but with only Speed 7 and no Nimble, it is hard to use them as such. I'll need to continue to play around with these more, as I am still struggling to use these well. 
• Abyssal Fiends. These were a bright spot in the list. They couldn't carry the rest of the list, but performed well themselves.
• Seductress with Enthrall. Huzzah! The secret technique worked! Unfortunately, I didn't have the units to focus fire well, nor the firepower to make the technique pay off. I then threw them into combats they probably should not have been in. These were not used well.
• Regimental MSU. The playstyle is hard. Deployment is very important for this style and I didn't do that well here. A few more tries with the list and I might have been able to put up a better fight. I still think there is some potential here, so we'll give it a few more tries.
• Battle Report Template. I wrote a note for every round and almost one for every player turn, and generally kept on track. The report was pretty quick to write-up, though with my schedule it took a little more time to clean up and post. Not a bad first outing, and we'll keep trying it out.

We played a rematch with different lists, and that report will be up soon. Thanks to my opponent for fitting these games in, and congrats on the win!