Lord Xalys
11-24-2009, 05:54 AM
Hello there, my fellow Iosans!
The fourth instalment is here, this time covering the enigmatic Nayl. I seem to have a habit of writing about the more seemingly iffy models, don?t I? Beside having a really cool model (dig the ?I strike thee down?-pose), Nayl provides quite an unique psychological factor for your opponent to deal with. Let?s find out why and how, shall we?
Here we go!
Nayl
?Your soul will be dead even before your body: fear nothing further.?
http://privateerpress.com/files/products/nayl.png
Stats
Nayl has a pretty good statline for a 2 point solo. His SPD and MAT of 7 are quite good, and on par with the Mage Hunter Assassin. His DEF/ARM ratio is the same as a Stormfall Archer, which is passable for light infantry. Nayl won?t be hit on average rolls by MAT5 models, but anything above that (or capable of boosting) should be able to take him out regardless of his 5 hitpoints. Ironically enough, a spectacularly dying Nayl could exactly be what you need at some point. Regardless, this elf has some tricks up his sleeve to get across the board fast and relatively unharmed (see Skills & Abilities).
Weapons & Attacks
Nayl has but one physical weapon, but it is a rather good one. The two-handed sword has a base P+S of 13, has Reach and is a Magical Weapon. Combined with Nayl?s very decent MAT of 7, this weapon can even dent a heavy ?jack on average charge rolls. It circumvents some exotic defenses (such as Incorporeal, Impervious Wall and Greater Destiny) by being Magical and Reach gives Nayl a basic threat range on the charge of 12?. Not too shabby I say.
Skills & Abilities
Nayl has multiple abilities, some of which are geared to get him to the enemy largely unscathed to perform the ultimate sacrifice: Arcane Annihilation! No, not yet, let?s talk about his more basic abilities first.
- Nayl is Fearless, and one of few Retribution models to be so. This means Nayl can engage, tie up and/or take out models that cause Terror or Abomination without flinching;
- He also has Stealth, so the enemy will have a hard time picking him off with ranged attacks;
- Flinging spells at Nayl will be all but useless, as he cannot be targeted by them due to Spell Ward (including your own, but you don?t want Nayl anywhere near your army anyway);
- Being what he is, Nayl is Soulless, meaning those pesky Cryxians won?t get a soul token for when they do kill him. Taking down Nayl will be a hairy prospect at best though;
- To top it off, Nayl has Advance Deployment. Coupled with his defensive abilities and good threat range, this elf is comparable to a heat seeking missile? with a devastating warhead.
And this is where it gets interesting? Nayl has a unique passive ability called Arcane Annihilation. Whenever this soulless solo is destroyed by an enemy attack, all models within 8? lose their focus/fury points and cannot cast spells, channel or use their animi for one round. Arcane Annihilation is potentially devastating and game-changing? and your opponent knows it (hopefully for him). This makes Nayl a psychological factor which simply cannot be ignored. The probably inordinate amount of resources that your opponent will divert to take out Nayl should already cover his points cost. If he happens to shank something with his sword or actually manages to use his arcane nuke, all the better, but you should not focus on it too much.
In this Nayl resembles Circle?s Lord of the Feast (at least in his MKI iteration), which is also a solo with terrifying potential that is almost never realized? but really cannot be left to his own devices either. Even if the blast is totally wasted, you will probably have messed up the activations and preconceived attack vectors of multiple models/units.
You can create a ?damned if you do, damned if you don?t scenario? by engaging a target with focus/fury (or a target within 8? of one) and give it these great choices:
- whack Nayl and lose focus/fury;
- divert another model/unit to whack Nayl and lose focus/fury;
- walk away and eat a free strike from Nayl (at POW13+3d6 with an effective MAT9);
- do nothing and get shanked by Nayl (best option it seems, oh the irony);
- do nothing, let Nayl walk away and free strike him (thus possibly losing focus/fury);
- do nothing, let Nayl walk away and let him engage a more important target.
Although I already stressed the fact that Arcane Annihilation should not be something your entire battle plan revolves around, you thus would do well to spot and exploit situations that warrants his use.
Against Warmachine armies, the obvious targets are focus-camping warcasters. While our faction may have a smattering of Arcane Assassins (ignoring unspent focus), the total evaporation of a ?caster?s focus pool is much better (and lets models without Arcane Assassin become a far larger threat). Secondary targets will be models that can use focus to ward off attacks or use other (out of turn) abilities, e.g. Menite ?jacks.
Against Hordes armies, as far as can be deduced with only their MKI rules, Arcane Annihilation can be much more brutal: not only are warlocks naked without fury points for transferring, you can also deprive warbeasts of their built-up fury and thus indirectly disrupt the ?lock?s fury management in the next round. With a little luck your opponent will run his ?beasts hotter to compensate for such a possible massive fury loss. Do keep in mind that you don?t want Nayl blast off the fury of a ?beast that has more targets to shank/shoot, as it is then emptied (and can buy further attacks or boosts).
A word of advice: Arcane Annihilation is completely indiscriminate, so you can thoroughly screw over your own models as well! Woe to the player who has his Nayl thrown back into his lines, with e.g. a fully powered Hydra or focus-camping ?caster in the blast area. Remedy: keep Nayl far, far away from your own troops. He is a loner, so use him as such. He doesn?t have Advance Deployment and SPD7 for nothing.
Synergy & Sample Tactics
The choices of an opponent dealing with the threat of Arcane Annihilation described above can become even more limited under Vyros, where you could have Hallowed Avenger on a ?jack trailing Nayl. When the elf bites it in the opponent?s turn, the ?jack can subsequently charge in and whack a target that just got its focus/fury blown clean off (or any other suitable target). The attack roll of this charge is unboostable though (it?s not the ? jack?s activation after all), so pick your target wisely. A more risky, but also potentially more profitable way to use this interaction is getting Nayl killed in your own turn. Seeing as how the ?jack in question shouldn?t have focus (it needs to be within 5?of the dying model for the spell?s effect to trigger, so well within the blast area), Vyros? feat turn will be the best moment to try and pull this off: you end up with the focus/fury-less target mentioned above, and the same unboostable charge attack roll, but also with a ?jack that might have gained a focus point to spend during its own activation (and has already made a free charge).
Ravyn doesn?t have much apparent synergy with Nayl, but she can certainly use this free-roaming Mage Hunter solo. Apart from drawing attention away from the ranged elements in her army, Nayl can be the leading element of a feat turn assissantion by Ravyn and everything else that can shoot the ?caster/?lock: blow off the focus/fury and unload with all guns in range (boosted attack rolls).
Rahn can increase Nayl?s threat range with Telekinesis, but only indirectly by casting it on his target (Spell Ward prohibits targeting Nayl). Force Field also keeps Nayl somewhat safer from AOEs. And no, few if any ?casters/?locks will want to be focus/fury-less while Rahn can draw a magical bead on them with his spells?
The fourth instalment is here, this time covering the enigmatic Nayl. I seem to have a habit of writing about the more seemingly iffy models, don?t I? Beside having a really cool model (dig the ?I strike thee down?-pose), Nayl provides quite an unique psychological factor for your opponent to deal with. Let?s find out why and how, shall we?
Here we go!
Nayl
?Your soul will be dead even before your body: fear nothing further.?
http://privateerpress.com/files/products/nayl.png
Stats
Nayl has a pretty good statline for a 2 point solo. His SPD and MAT of 7 are quite good, and on par with the Mage Hunter Assassin. His DEF/ARM ratio is the same as a Stormfall Archer, which is passable for light infantry. Nayl won?t be hit on average rolls by MAT5 models, but anything above that (or capable of boosting) should be able to take him out regardless of his 5 hitpoints. Ironically enough, a spectacularly dying Nayl could exactly be what you need at some point. Regardless, this elf has some tricks up his sleeve to get across the board fast and relatively unharmed (see Skills & Abilities).
Weapons & Attacks
Nayl has but one physical weapon, but it is a rather good one. The two-handed sword has a base P+S of 13, has Reach and is a Magical Weapon. Combined with Nayl?s very decent MAT of 7, this weapon can even dent a heavy ?jack on average charge rolls. It circumvents some exotic defenses (such as Incorporeal, Impervious Wall and Greater Destiny) by being Magical and Reach gives Nayl a basic threat range on the charge of 12?. Not too shabby I say.
Skills & Abilities
Nayl has multiple abilities, some of which are geared to get him to the enemy largely unscathed to perform the ultimate sacrifice: Arcane Annihilation! No, not yet, let?s talk about his more basic abilities first.
- Nayl is Fearless, and one of few Retribution models to be so. This means Nayl can engage, tie up and/or take out models that cause Terror or Abomination without flinching;
- He also has Stealth, so the enemy will have a hard time picking him off with ranged attacks;
- Flinging spells at Nayl will be all but useless, as he cannot be targeted by them due to Spell Ward (including your own, but you don?t want Nayl anywhere near your army anyway);
- Being what he is, Nayl is Soulless, meaning those pesky Cryxians won?t get a soul token for when they do kill him. Taking down Nayl will be a hairy prospect at best though;
- To top it off, Nayl has Advance Deployment. Coupled with his defensive abilities and good threat range, this elf is comparable to a heat seeking missile? with a devastating warhead.
And this is where it gets interesting? Nayl has a unique passive ability called Arcane Annihilation. Whenever this soulless solo is destroyed by an enemy attack, all models within 8? lose their focus/fury points and cannot cast spells, channel or use their animi for one round. Arcane Annihilation is potentially devastating and game-changing? and your opponent knows it (hopefully for him). This makes Nayl a psychological factor which simply cannot be ignored. The probably inordinate amount of resources that your opponent will divert to take out Nayl should already cover his points cost. If he happens to shank something with his sword or actually manages to use his arcane nuke, all the better, but you should not focus on it too much.
In this Nayl resembles Circle?s Lord of the Feast (at least in his MKI iteration), which is also a solo with terrifying potential that is almost never realized? but really cannot be left to his own devices either. Even if the blast is totally wasted, you will probably have messed up the activations and preconceived attack vectors of multiple models/units.
You can create a ?damned if you do, damned if you don?t scenario? by engaging a target with focus/fury (or a target within 8? of one) and give it these great choices:
- whack Nayl and lose focus/fury;
- divert another model/unit to whack Nayl and lose focus/fury;
- walk away and eat a free strike from Nayl (at POW13+3d6 with an effective MAT9);
- do nothing and get shanked by Nayl (best option it seems, oh the irony);
- do nothing, let Nayl walk away and free strike him (thus possibly losing focus/fury);
- do nothing, let Nayl walk away and let him engage a more important target.
Although I already stressed the fact that Arcane Annihilation should not be something your entire battle plan revolves around, you thus would do well to spot and exploit situations that warrants his use.
Against Warmachine armies, the obvious targets are focus-camping warcasters. While our faction may have a smattering of Arcane Assassins (ignoring unspent focus), the total evaporation of a ?caster?s focus pool is much better (and lets models without Arcane Assassin become a far larger threat). Secondary targets will be models that can use focus to ward off attacks or use other (out of turn) abilities, e.g. Menite ?jacks.
Against Hordes armies, as far as can be deduced with only their MKI rules, Arcane Annihilation can be much more brutal: not only are warlocks naked without fury points for transferring, you can also deprive warbeasts of their built-up fury and thus indirectly disrupt the ?lock?s fury management in the next round. With a little luck your opponent will run his ?beasts hotter to compensate for such a possible massive fury loss. Do keep in mind that you don?t want Nayl blast off the fury of a ?beast that has more targets to shank/shoot, as it is then emptied (and can buy further attacks or boosts).
A word of advice: Arcane Annihilation is completely indiscriminate, so you can thoroughly screw over your own models as well! Woe to the player who has his Nayl thrown back into his lines, with e.g. a fully powered Hydra or focus-camping ?caster in the blast area. Remedy: keep Nayl far, far away from your own troops. He is a loner, so use him as such. He doesn?t have Advance Deployment and SPD7 for nothing.
Synergy & Sample Tactics
The choices of an opponent dealing with the threat of Arcane Annihilation described above can become even more limited under Vyros, where you could have Hallowed Avenger on a ?jack trailing Nayl. When the elf bites it in the opponent?s turn, the ?jack can subsequently charge in and whack a target that just got its focus/fury blown clean off (or any other suitable target). The attack roll of this charge is unboostable though (it?s not the ? jack?s activation after all), so pick your target wisely. A more risky, but also potentially more profitable way to use this interaction is getting Nayl killed in your own turn. Seeing as how the ?jack in question shouldn?t have focus (it needs to be within 5?of the dying model for the spell?s effect to trigger, so well within the blast area), Vyros? feat turn will be the best moment to try and pull this off: you end up with the focus/fury-less target mentioned above, and the same unboostable charge attack roll, but also with a ?jack that might have gained a focus point to spend during its own activation (and has already made a free charge).
Ravyn doesn?t have much apparent synergy with Nayl, but she can certainly use this free-roaming Mage Hunter solo. Apart from drawing attention away from the ranged elements in her army, Nayl can be the leading element of a feat turn assissantion by Ravyn and everything else that can shoot the ?caster/?lock: blow off the focus/fury and unload with all guns in range (boosted attack rolls).
Rahn can increase Nayl?s threat range with Telekinesis, but only indirectly by casting it on his target (Spell Ward prohibits targeting Nayl). Force Field also keeps Nayl somewhat safer from AOEs. And no, few if any ?casters/?locks will want to be focus/fury-less while Rahn can draw a magical bead on them with his spells?