25pt eCaine vs eStryker

Whoever moves first...dies. 

Cygnar

eCaine

-Sentinel

-Squire

Arcane Tempest Gunmage with Officer

-Avenger

Black 13

Lanyssa Ryssyll

Reinholdt

Cygnar

eStryker

-Ol'Rowdy
-squire

Swordknights

Stormblades

Rhupert Carvolo

Alain Runewood

Black 13

A lot of proxies for this match. I originally wanted to play Nemo3 but my opponent was practicing for a 25point tournament and I have no idea how to scale Nemo3 down to a workable 25 point list without cutting the effectiveness of the list by 1/2. So I tried out a new caster and we played scenario #3.

This was a pretty screwed up scenario because a) we were both assassination casters with huge threat ranges, b)it had killbox, c)to score points, we pretty much needed to dominate the flags in the centre... Yeah, so the first caster who tried to dominate the flag would probably die. 

I got to go first so he chose the edge of the table with all the forests.

Turn 1

-I allocate 1 focus to the sentinel. All of my units run up as his army is still too far away to shoot.  I cast no spells as his units don't have any significant amount of stealth that would bother me. 

+He chooses to move his units up but he chooses to keep most of them behind the forest. The swordknights hide behind the left forest while the stormblades hide behind the right one. Ol Rowdy runs up and hides in a forest to gain concealment and Stryker goes behind him to take advantage of the affinity. Deflection is cast so that Stryker is an amazing armor 22 vs shooting. 

Turn 2

-Avenger gets snipe from the ATGM officer and gets boosted attack rolls on Ol'Rowdy. He hits and knocks down Ol'Rowdy but leaves Stryker standing because  of the affinity. Not that I would have gone for the assassination because armor 22 is still very daunting.  ATGM run up to contest the right(friendly) flag so that he can't control it next turn. Black 13 do the same to his flag (left). Caine moves and makes sure he's out of killbox while using the Sentinel, Reinholdt, Squire and ATGM to screen him from Stryker's assassination vectors.

+He gives 1 focus to Ol'Rowdy. It stands up and runs for free. He chooses not to charge because it's not in range. It runs next to the ATGM. Stormblades run through the forest. His black 13 move up but 2 of them are too far from the forest edge to see out. But the guy with the AOE 4 special attack can see out and he shoots at the ATGM. He misses though and the attack deviates...right into his stormblades. Ouch. Rhupert gives the swordknights fearless and tough and Runewood gives them pathfinder. They then run through the forest to the Black13. He originally wanted to charge but then I reminded him he was behind the forest and thus had no LOS. Stryker moves up and feats, he then uses his lightning storm to try and hit the ATGM near the flag. He boosts to hit, misses. It deviates onto Lanyssa and he then boosts again to kill her. He's now dry on focus. During feat activation, his sword knights gang up on the black13 and kill 1 of them and the stormblades and Ol'Rowdy kill several of the ATGM. eStryker moves into a forest to gain concealment.

Turn 3

-Squire gives eCaine an extra focus. Reinholdt gives eCaine an extra shot. I don't allocate any focus. Sentinel moves up and kills some of the stormblades screening Stryker. I roll a 3 for strafe and 3 stormblades die. Avenger gets boosted attack rolls, moves up to shoot Stryker. I need a 14 to hit and I do hit. Stryker is knocked down. ATGM move and shoot Stryker where possible. eCaine walks up and sees Stryker is within 12" and shoots. Stryker dies. 

Thoughts on game

So it was a pretty long shot targeting Stryker with the Avenger. I needed 14 on 3d6 to hit but then again, sometimes you just never think about the odds because you're confident it will work. This was one of those times. Once that was done, Stryker was basically dead meat for Caine.

The safer option would really have been to have the Avenger charge Ol'Rowdy to try and stall it and keep it engaged in combat and then have eCaine clear out the swordknights or stormblades and then have the remaining infantry tarpit Stryker. This is probably what I would have had to do if my opponent had kept most of his focus and cast deflection because armor 22 vs a mostly shooting list is quite hard to crack.