Warmachine Batrep: Xerxis vs Rahn

Tyrant Xerxis

Chad and I played a good old 50 point Kill Box game Tuesday night.  Chad's list was allegedly taken from PG Lord Tyrant Watt's 2011 tournament list, with the exchange of a unit of Cetrati for Tiberion, the new character tyrant introduced in Wrath.

Tyrant Xerxis
- Aptimus Marketh
- Basilisk Krea
- Cyclops Shaman
- Tiberion
- Tyrant Sentry
Agonizer
Cataphract Cetrati (leader+5)
Nihilators (leader+9)
Paingiver Beast Handlers (leader+3)

My list remained the Rahn list I've been playing the past few weeks:


Adeptis Rahn
- Manticore
- Phoenix (x2)
Arcanist (x2)
Dawnguard Sentinels (leader+9+UA)
- Soulless Escort
House Shyeel Magister
House Shyeel Battle Mages (leader+5)
Mage Hunter Assassin (x2)
Narn



Setup

Retribution won the roll-off and opted for Skorne to go first.  Chad setup centrally, in the trademarked Xerxis death ball, and his nihilators spread out along the right flank almost to the board edge.  I setup denied-flank left across from his nihilators – thought I'd make Tiberion exercise a bit to reach me.  Battle mages setup slightly right for the flank.

Strategy

His intention to stay in his death star is all-too obvious.  My plan was to clear off the nihilators early to gain "air superiority" around his death star, then begin to flank my assassins left and my battle mages right.  With the extra bodies and speed, I should be able to get angles on his death star and start stripping out the support elements.  At least, that was the plan.

End of Turn 1

Early Game

Everything went according to plan during the early game.  Phoenixes advanced firing Halo cannons into the nihilators and allowing Rahn to drop three Chain Blast spells on their heads.  By the second turn, when the death star arrived at midfield, there were only a couple left alive.

Turn two saw Rahn activate his feat with the intention of using the battle mages' Force Bolt attack and Rahn's telekinesis spell to tear cetrati out of position and allow sentinels to charge in and kill them.  Phoenix halo cannon fire managed to set the shaman and two of the nihilators on fire.  Unfortunately, I'd forgotten a piece of terrain in the board center was a forest, and my sentinel charge  wasn't the best, so we were only able to kill one of the armored buggers (plus the odd paingiver).  And I'd gotten too aggressive with Narn.  It wasn't looking good.

End of Turn 2

Mid Game

Chad activated Xerxis' feat and made me pay for my bad unit placement.  Narn and four of the sentinels fell.  It should have been more, but the dice were deeply against Chad during this game.

My turn 3 started as a mess and got slightly better.  The agonizer was now just close enough that I was unable to allocate focus to my warjacks or use their arc nodes.  I was heavily engaged at the front line, with Xerxis' feat active and the full suite of Skorne defensive buffs active (Defender's Ward, Paralytic Aura, etc. etc.).  In the analysis, I entirely forgot my sentinels' Vengeance move.

So, first thing: an assassin ran in and decapitated the bloody agonizer.  The Phoenixes used arcanist focus to wing a couple cetrati.  Sentinels banged on, but there's only so much P+S 12+3d6 can do against ARM 24.  Rahn arced a few more Chain Blast spells through the left-flank phoenix, finishing off Marketh and a pair of paingivers.  The battle mages flanked around the forest and had a field day with the Skorne utility pieces, clearing out the remaining paingivers and the basilisk krea.  And at the end, I forgot to activate my magister.

End of Turn 3

Late Game

Tiberion advanced and munched a Phoenix.  "All too easy," I heard him whisper.

Xerxis advanced into a big pile of Retribution: a Phoenix warjack, three sentinels and a mage hunter assassin.  He decided to kill the DEF 15 assassin first, but the dice were against him.  Twice he missed with boosted attacks.  He bought a third attack, boosted with his last fury, and finished the job.  Leaving him standing sans-fury in front of a Phoenix warjack and three sentinels.  Whoops.  He then remembers Xerxis' Overtake ability and backs out, leaving the sentinel UA's threat range.  He's at DEF 13, ARM 20.  I'm MAT 8+2, P+S 12+4d6.  Dice come up 6, 5, 5, 2.  Ten boxes to Xerxis.  Ouch.  The remaining cetrati quickly advance into the gap to give their leader some cover.  The Sentry advances into my phoenix, but MAT 5 is against Chad tonight and he only manages to bring down its force field.

Hey, look: I put down a Vengeance marker this time.

Middle of Turn 4

My turn.  Three focus to the Phoenix; three focus to the Manticore.  Arcanists cast Concentrate Power on Phoenix and Manticore.  Magister activates and bounces Whip Snap off Tiberion to get the Manticore into a better charge lane.  Vengeance move (done earlier) plus sentinel activation kills the cetrati protecting Xerxis.  Rahn casts Force Blast to knock the Sentry four inches backward.  Phoenix advances, boosts to hit, boosts to damage: game over.

Game over, Xerxis

Lessons Learned

Somehow I always forget the value of having enough bodies in this game.  Even with this relatively 'jack-heavy Retribution list, I had enough warm bodies to engage the death star, flank the death star, and force Chad to make tough decisions about what he could block.  It meant his support was vulnerable, and once they were gone, armor and defense values plummeted.  Flanking the death star won the game.

Cetrati are spectacularly hard to kill.  Next time I may line up my myrmidons against them rather than throwing weapon master medium infantry against them.  A little analysis shows Retribution needs to put four sentinels on the charge against each cetrati to get a kill. (For those interested, here are the calculations: MAT 7 hits DEF 13 72% of the time.  P+S 12+4d6 does four points on average against ARM 22, and they have eight boxes each.  To make that happen, two guys need to hit for average, so three guys need to swing, and you'd probably better have a fourth in there to cover a bad roll.)  And of course you'll need more than that on Xerxis' feat turn when they go up to ARM 24.

Rahn continues to amaze me with his versatility.  Tons of focus, movement shenanigans, good damage at range, charge protection, AoE protection.  He's got it all.  Tons more to learn, though, so I'll be continuing with this list for some time yet.

We had a good, long chat about Chad's list after the game, and reflected on these points.  Despite easily munching a 10-point myrmidon in one activation, Tiberion did not give anything particularly wonderful to this list.  We thought Xerxis would have been much better off with another full unit of cetrati to bulk up the death star, block charge lanes, and give more CMA punch.

Thanks for the game, Chad.  Always a good time.