Legion of the Damned - how to lose at warmachine VII

So my last warm up game before valleycon was against Chris P and his Legion of Everblight. You will hear many words used to describe the Legion of Everblight..... over the top, over powered, cheesy, broken..... the usual rant people have when they think a faction is too strong (or they aren't good enough to deal with it)    

Well, I was not good enough to deal with the legion of this day…. So yes, they must be overpowered….. that or I’m not very good at this game (checks all time scorecard of 2-5)

 :(

 

But really, what is the Legion of Everblight? Well, they are a faction of bloodmagic bioengineered dragony lizard monsters supported by corrupted elves and ogres. The beasts are very nasty looking, all mouths and sharp pointy bits. I really like the bioengineered nature of Everblight and it contrasts nicely with the other dragon led faction of Cryx (With its necromantic steam tech)

THE GAME

Right, so I was up against Chris who was using Bethane as his caster. Now she’s a funny one as she comes with her own personal monster (kind of like alice cooper on the muppets that one time) and she can merge with it in game….. it’s a weird mechanic but Chris says he never uses it.

Her theme force is focused on magic users as her feat gives boosted attack and damge rolls to magic effects. So the army I was up against had two big monsters, a lot of stealthy mages and a bunch of other support units. 

Foolishly I decided to test out a completely new caster and list. This force was so spangly and new I don’t even have photos of some of the core models

THE LIST

Haley! She has temporal barrier which slows people down and a feat that gives everyone an extra attack! Surely this is a winning proposition!

Her theme list shaked out something like this

pHaley

Defender

Hunter

Lancer

Two units of 6 Long gunners

Long gunner officer and standard

6 Sword Knights

10 Precursor Knights

Precursor Knight officer and standards

The idea being that the Knights can tarpit (hold the line) well, the lancer could harass with it’s arc node and the big squads of gunners could do some damage….. well it was a theory at least,

THE GAME

It was the “three objectives across the middle of the table mission” which is a good one I think. I set up with a unit of gunners on each flank, sword knights on the right with the lancer. The Knights and the gun jacks were in the middle with Haley…. The cool thing about the Knights is they don’t block line of sight for my own shooters! THIS IS GOOD!

Right, lets move forward and get in position to start shooting at his infantry. I can totally hide inside Haley’s temporal bubble and delay his guys advance and pick them to pieces, then counter charge with my knights and get home in time for tea and crumpets

What do you mean all the infantry is stealthed?

What do you mean I totally forgot about Haleys temporal barrier and spent all my focus?

What do you mean that one spell you arc noded killed and entire squad of long gunners?

What do you mean I’m rolling 10s to hit in melee?

What do you mean that monster can fire through that forest and I can’t?

As the previous statements suggest, this wasn’t a close game. I didn’t push forward far enough and forgot haleys temporal barrier on the turn it would have been useful. Seriously…… dumbass move right there. Chris played clinically, and just rammed his forces down my armies throat, took the objectives and proceeded to do a little dance

Most of this is all down to me being a muppet…. If I wasn’t such a muppet I may have given him a  proper game (I’m not saying the result would have been different, just saying it would have been closer)

I would say I was forgetting stuff because I was trying to rush my turns to get used to the idea of playing timed turns.... but that's a cop out really. 

LESSONS LEARNED

Well for 10 points I’ll start with “when using Haley, remember when to use temporal barrier”….. that’s a good one

But there were a few gems to pull out here

• Eyeless sight, everblight has it and can shoot through forests
• Always take something to deal with stealth
• Lancers with arcane shield are Armour 21 Arc nodes……. That’s got to be useful
• Two units of long gunners aren’t that great. Probably better using one big unit with the Officer. 10” from the objective sounds like a good place to put them