What to do against jack heavy Karchev

[raincaller]

One of my good friends runs a extreme jack heavy Karchev list based at around 35 points ends up being or something similar.

Karchev
wardog
beserker
beserker
beserker
kodiak
kodiak
mechanics

everything already runs/and or charges for free plus under unearthly rage kodiaks are pretty grim at tossing other heavies around. and all of these guys have at least a base 3 attacks with UR up they are hitting a large % of the time. What would be your way of dealing with them? He almost never has to allocate focus either so disrupting them is neg.

rain

[Techcasualty]

Haley
squire
hunter
hunter


jr
hunter
hunter

arlan
hunter

3x storsmith

:D

[raincaller]

:eek:
lol
very true

[whats82]

Eiryss
Gorman
Stormsmith

[raincaller]

I am not sure what disruption in going to accomplish unearthly rage gives his entire battlegroup boosted attack and damage rolls, beserkers already charge for free and usually your getting the powerslide feat turn so everything charges for free any way there is no focus allocation going on to begin with.

[Fryerdan]

but then a cluster of hunters will plap heavy jacks in a hurry.

[raincaller]

I just see a bunch of lights getting trashed hard tho as soon as karchev tosses 3 beserkers into them. Besides taking an extreme hard counter is there a more balanced way to deal with this? or does this really require taking 7 hunters

[Ender101]

I think Cap'n Kraye could work against such a force. He offers mobility to light 'jacks and the Hunter wouldn't do badly against such an army. There's a ton of things you can do, but I would try to whiddle away at his army with some light jacks before hitting him hard with a Stormclad.

Captain Jeremiah Kraye -6
Squire 2
Hunter 6
Hunter 6
Stormclad 10
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages 6
Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer 2
Defender 9

Techcasualty's suggestion of using Haley a squire also seems like a good idea, using her prime incarnation you can repeatedly cast Temporal Barrier to keep them from charging. But instead of the hunters you might want to consider the Arcane Tempest Gunmage UA marshalling a defender or two and blastin' away at his 'jacks. This would be expensive, but it could also be effective. Sword Knights are also effective vs. 'Jacks so you consider some of those. If you do this you might consider adding in Stangewayes.

Captain Victoria Haley -5
Squire 2
Lancer 6
Hunter 6
Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator 1
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages 6
Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer 2
Defender 9
Sword Knights 6
Captain Arlan Strangewayes 2

Either way, in close combat your probably in trouble, so I would try to avoid it with your 'Jacks and try and take them out from a range, or leave it in the capable hands of your melee troops.

[whats82]

Yes, he doesn't need to allocate a lot of focus, but there's usually a need to allocate some focus to buy the extra attacks to finish a model off. Even beast 09 with boosted attack and damage on his axe and fist doesn't reliably kill a heavy, you'd need something like kodiak with 3 base attacks for that to happen. Disruption is cheap and it annoys him, it won't be his demise but it will increase the chance of your jack surviving to counter attack.

[raincaller]

that's the beauty of the kodiak with Unearthly rage you dont need to kill the jack getting the chain attack off is easy with boosted mat 6. then toss it into something else with boosted attack as well having one of your heavies droped on your Warcasters head is no beuno. tossing them also clears charge lanes for your other heavies. I can see where disruption is useful when karchev is using non-3attack jacks beast especially. The guy i play tends only to use beserkers and kodiaks so i tend to have anything that they touch either knocked down and stomped on or tossed into another model that then gets stomped on. we usually 50-50 and i tend to have a great time playing it, but trying to deal with 5 heavies is rough sometimes lol.

[knight_actual]

disruption on karchev himself.

At his highest def, eyriss hits him on a 6.

dead eye that, or reduce his def and it's a sure shot... and karchev is just like any other character jack w/o focus.

[raincaller]

yes disrupting him does work, though when ever eyriss is on the field you get a karchev brick with sidearms your not ever going to see him and he will just march up the battle field add in concealment from a couple kodiak farts it can be tough to hit and you most likely not have los, the brick however is a bit easier to deal with and usually you can get the charge in on them. its all entertaining i do like seeing peoples ideas. thanks so far

[admanb]

Run eStryker. He doesn't have enough models to block charge ranges, he has to be close to the front lines, and even ARM19+focus dies to POW15+3d6STR, especially when you don't have to burn focus on velocity and boosting to hit.

[knight_actual]

Run pNemo with pEyriss, and guns.

if he bricks up, then freeze 2 of his jacks. now karchev has to walk around all of them. at speed 6, he's getting no where fast.

Run Siege with Eyriss - sink his Front jack, disrupt - happy ending. (also with fox hole - eyriss becomes behemoth proof)

eHaley - dominate one to walk away and hit karchev - time bomb, then disrupt karchev. maybe telekenisis one around for the luls. even w/o eyriss - just feat, and force the jacks to go first. or dominate one of the jacks to triangulate karchev to eliminate one from the equation.... time bomb so karchev is speed 4 on the tow. Besides karchev getting crit freezed by a juggy ice axe would just be too sweet.

[raincaller]

ehaley would definitely be for the lulz. your jack is in the way plz move kthanks.. BOom

[halffiend]

ECaine can do it on his feat turn, provided your dice don't abandon you. He kills most casters with four shots. It will take seven or eight to do in the mighty Karchev.

[Dark Fledgling]

Or you could take pStryker and just use earth quake to knock them all down on their butt the whole time. Throw in rowdy and maybe a stormclad and some blades and you got plenty of anti jack power.

Stryker
-Lancer
-Ol' Rowdy
-Stormclad
-Squire
Stormblades
-UA
Eiryss
Journeyman

'Blades can scrap a jack in one turn on the assault easily, Two arcane shields give your jacks better then khador armor and coupled with Strykers feat makes karchevs entire army cry.
Both the 'Clad and Rowdy can scrap jacks no problem and also bring tremor to the equation. To cap it all off you can throw snipe on Eiryss now and then easily arc earthquake on Karchev's *** so Eiryss can disrupt him from 23" away.
But really, it's all about the two 4" AoE knockdown templates you can throw out each turn.

Alternatively you could dust off that old Darius + 3 Centurions list and see if you can out khador him O.o?

-DF

[Agamemnon]

You could be a complete spambot and put Kray down with 6 hunters and 2 SS.

He would never have to cast a spell. Just hand out one focus to each jack to boost damage. You should be able to box 2 jacks a turn. You would be crazy mobile and nigh unengageable.

[phreaker187]

Eyriss is probably your best 3 point solution. Moving around his SPD 4 jacks is a lot easier than when they have "super full throttle" on.

[mrhuettel]

let's face it - most of us do not own six hunters (i have three which i consider a little uber...).

what always made my day with karchev are eiryss and stormsmiths, as most others already pointed out. enemo with reinholt can leave some nasty lumps of jacks on the field - two galvanic shots at the jacks and they're in trouble. other than that, take a thead and just play jack-bowling -throw them around the table and destroy plans and movement patterns of your opponent while keeping the thead alive with fail safe.

karchev himself is a nice target for hunters - especially with the atgm ua and a combination of snipe and the additional jack marshal damage or strangeways for an extra focus to boost with crit brutal damage.

indeed, karchev jack heavy lists are nasty, but the swan has all the means necessary to cope with that: hit'em hard from the distance (hunter, defender) and disrupt'em (eiryss, nemo, stormsmiths) and smash'em around (hammersmith, ironclad, rowdy) or combine all three (thead).

still: take nemo, most favourably in his epic incarnation or haley for the hyper-dominance.

[raincaller]

DF the problem I see with the pstryker list is sidearms. Everything touching Karchev is immune to knockdown the karchev brick has 5 heavies in b2b with him you will never get LOS and they are all def 14-16 depending on if the kodiaks are adding in their steam vents which gives everyone concealment. A defender on boosted rolls will not be tagging one of the jacks 100% of the time.

both nemo's can Galvanic bolt/snare up this brick easily and ehaley or siege can deal with it well ( they are two of our best casters). I don't see pstryker doing well unless the karchev player has no idea how to read sidearms.

eyriss is definitely our mvp when it comes to disrupting karchev himself tho a person with 1/2 a brain will either give her a jack to sit on her or deny her LOS with his large based models. Though if thats happening there is probably other things you can do.

[Agamemnon]

I dont have 6 hunters either but it would be a list that would be stright forward enough to play. No upkeeps needed no tricks just very straight forward damage.

If the Khador player is wanting to run a specialized brick that doesnt cover every base then just stand on that one premis. His main problem in playing against that list requires eyriss to disrupt him. That is easily handeled by blocking line of sight or just having one jack drop another jack on top of her.

I personaly like the idea of cant catch me over disrupter bolt. It has a lot more wiggle room and isnt easily countered.

It would be fun if (and I know you can't do it) you could dominate a Kodiak and then throw Karchev in front of his jacks so you can just kill him.

Heck take Centurians and dont worry about them being slow. Use the sheild with 4" advances. Without a charge damage will be cut significantly.

[Reemule]

Haley
squire
hunter
hunter


jr
hunter
hunter

arlan
hunter

3x storsmith

:D

I can't see this killing any of his jacks. You severly hurt one jack. The Others rush forward. Its getting repaired from the mechs, You hurt the next jack. It falls back the newly repaired jack is back in the line and charging you, and its getting repaired.

One can never say never, but I think not only would I have a hard time winning with this as a cygnar player, I think if I had the described Khador Army I would have a hard time losing to this.

[Reemule]

You could be a complete spambot and put Kray down with 6 hunters and 2 SS.

He would never have to cast a spell. Just hand out one focus to each jack to boost damage. You should be able to box 2 jacks a turn. You would be crazy mobile and nigh unengageable.

Optamistic much?

[CyrDraconis]

Pure theorymachine, but at a glance I'm thinking Siege and his boys. Keep a Lancer handy to toss out Magesight and take care of Kodiak steam clouds (plus Forcehammer pinball shenanigans), and if the positioning is right, Foxhole can drop 'jacks out of the way. Fill the list to your taste, but the brick there is all melee - in short, start with "guns, fire at will!"
One, maybe even two Hunters wouldn't go amiss; Siege likes a Defender, salt with your preferred 'clad for melee backup. Longrifles for CRA, and maybe Stormblades if you bring their 'clad. I wouldn't worry too much about 'saving' Siege's feat for Karchev himself, if you can use it to get rid of his buddies.

[Dark Fledgling]

DF the problem I see with the pstryker list is sidearms. Everything touching Karchev is immune to knockdown the karchev brick has 5 heavies in b2b with him you will never get LOS and they are all def 14-16 depending on if the kodiaks are adding in their steam vents which gives everyone concealment. A defender on boosted rolls will not be tagging one of the jacks 100% of the time.

You absolutely right, I forgot about no knockdown on sidearms. Either way though, when those jacks charge you, they will no longer be in base to base with karchev. The +5 arm feat still protects vrs that charge and the blades still scrap heavies. Instead just play the upkeep game at first, snipe, arcane shield and even blur perhaps. Although I think the lancer isnt necessary anymore so you can probably find a better use for 6 pts.

-DF

[WickedGood]

I may be missing something but I think it would actually be pretty easy with eStryker 2 different ways:

1. IronClad Beat down: eStryker 4 iron clads, old rowdy, squire. bond ol rody to stryker. pull focus from squire, Cast positive charge on ol rowdy, allocate ol rowdy 3 focus, allocate 1 focus each to two of the iron clads:

Charge all three ol rowdy on one beserker, the two others on another beserker. Ol rowdy with pos charge is boosted to hit first attack on an effective mat of 10. I think the beserker with sidarms is at 13 at that point so darn near an auto hit. At pow 20 you are doing 13 points of damage to the beserker on the first hit. Swing with the fist for free at pow 16 and you have 5 points. 3 more swings with the hammer at an average of 9 points and you wreck it in the 2nd swing most of the time and the thrid swing can go on one of the other beserkers.

The other iron clads do not have as good of a chance to hit but at effective 9 vs 12 now(he looses +1 becuase of ol rowdy's kill) they should do just fine. You have two charge attacks at that point each producing 13 points of damage with positive charge, swing with the fists for another 10 and the other beserke is wiped.

Now at this point you have two choices go for the kill with strykers feat or let him beat the crap out of your jacks. Personally I would let him kill those three jacks. His next trun he has to kill your three jacks with his remaining forces as well as protect from estrykers assasination run. It can actually be done If he does, you then cast positive charge on one of the irnclads, pull a focus from the squire, allocate three focus to one thunderhead and 2 focus to the other and charge again with these guys. Again you should completely wreck two jacks. Pop Strykers feat at this point and you will lay severely hurt his last jack. Now stryker sets up for the next turns assasination run.

2nd way. estryker thunder head extra stuff - cast positive charge on thunderhead. Thunderhead moves forward and throws jack out of way. E Stryker charges and boosts for 3d6. At an average of pow28 (15+3d6boost +2 pos charge) + 2d6 for a total average of 35 versus Karche's 19 you are doing 16 points a smack. his charge attack plus two hits should be enough. Karchev's def of 12 + 4 of 16 means you probably need to take 4 swings to get him. Guess what 7 focus (1 from the squire), 2 for pos charge, 1 focus for the power attack for the thuderhead leaves you 4 focus which is an extra attack for bad luck, plus his feat attack giving you lots of extra room.

[Agamemnon]

Optamistic much?

OK maybe that is being a little optamistic you should be able to complety box one and put a serious hurt on the other. Dice minus 4 with three dice for damage is pretty awesome. Then after the shot they move.

Kray just concentrates on staying out of range. As long as he doesnt cast spells he can run every turn anywere he needs to.

We are talking 6 ap shots a turn... at 14 inches.. against def 10. Your dice would have to hate you if you didnt win against that specific list. I just cant see hunter spam not takeing that list to the cleaners.

I would definalty give it a try. I may pick up another hunter just for such tomfoolery....

[WarLordofStorm]

nemo and sword knights

[Agamemnon]

nemo and sword knights

Really..... why??

[Kuarnix]

I play a lot of Karchev with lots of heavy 'jacks. There are few warcasters I like to see on the field less than eStryker; he's one of the few that not only out-threats Karchev (not the powerslide, but Karchev's actual charge range) AND has the ability to destroy him, even if he's overboosting for ARM 25. Take eStryker, bait an opening, and go in for the kill.

[Malfunction]

As mentioned before you can do pStryker knockdown, with disruption so jacks can not shake.......

[Sharp]

The Darius solution of out heavy-ing him always makes me chuckle.

Centurions can walk forward and activate their shields and set up for the counter charge. Then, it's a slugfest (make sure to keep Darius from charge lanes). And slugfests make Darius rub his hands in anticipation.

[tneva82]

disruption on karchev himself.

At his highest def, eyriss hits him on a 6.

What if he has Bokur around with warjack or two protecting Bokur by covering LOS?

I don't run Karchev myself without Bokur around specifically because of Eiryss's disruption bolt...

Stormsmith disruption then doesn't work because disruption rule applies to warjacks which Karchev isn't. Only warjack specific rules that apply to Karchev are the ones modifying damage or manner it is applied to apply to Karchev. And even if it would apply it would only remove focus on your turn as Karchev isn't allocated focus to anyway nor does he channel spells.

So you need to kill Bokur before Eiryss works against Karchev and Bokur is likely screened by something(it's not like Karchev list is short of large based models to screen one medium base model...) and you have 1 shot before Karchev sends in warjacks amidst you.

eStryker now. That's something I DON'T want to face with Karchev. Going to be cat&mouse trying to avoid Karchev not getting charged by that monster.

Hunters are also going to make mess in large amounts but that's somewhat specialised counter as been mentioned. Not that good idea for tournaments perhaps.

[leo_neil316]

If we're talking about tournament lists at 50 points Ehaley is......

Okay, Ehaley is just a given these days but -specifically- if he bricks up he's an easy target for timebomb and that kills karchev's threat range (karchev and all his jacks at -2 speed and no charging), the combination with temporal shift just about stops him dead.

Thorn two defenders and a bonded stormclad on haley is expensive but a good all round battlegroup, two defenders only need two focus to put some big holes in a khador heavy, TA lets you get in another shot, and even if it's expensive (six of haley's eight focus for the boosted damage roles aswell) if you save it for the feat turn (to slow him down) your sorted.

Other turns you pop timebomb on the brick (4) dominate a jack and make it hit another jack (3) and give one to a defender, arlan gives another defender one and both hit the jack that just got whacked by it's friend.

If he doesn't brick up you TK karchev forward and spin him around and stick a TA'd TK'd 3 focus bonded stormclad up his rectum, the 18" threat range on that trick means you can pull it off before karchev enter's haley's squire enhanced control range (if the stormclad is infront of her).

Bring arlan and stormblades around to provide focus for speedy-gone-stormclad.

That's 39pts out of 55 spent, stick the rest on utility stuff like the black 13th, rangers, ATGM/U.A, J.R, stormblade U.A etc to provide some anti-infantry and so on and so forth, we all know the drill.

Seems like a good all comers list that can take on karchev to me. Thoughts from karchev players?