Need some general advice - extreme lists

[Manse]

I've been playing for a few months now but still really don't have a large number of games under my belt. Having said that I think I'm at least decent for a beginner. I've begun to run into an overall problem I'm at a loss to fix.

My primary opponent is Khador and he's a fan of focusing extremely in one area when he builds lists (heavy armor, large number of blast weapons, etc). There are two list cores where he's downright scary:
- eSorcha with winterguard with weapon attachments and Kovnik Joe
- Karchev with about 90% of his points into warjacks

Now my trouble is that these are pretty solid combos, Karchev is scary and eSorcha's winterguard are a really pain. Each requires you to bring a decent amount of the right counters or you're in trouble.

If I bring a balanced list with a fair bit of anti-infantry they are practically useless against Karchev. If most other casters take a pure jack list they at least run the risk of their opponent's infantry swarming up and overtaking their caster. Gun Mages aren't really keeping Karchev awake at night in terror.

If I bring a balanced list without a signifiant amount of AOEs, I feel like I'm in the hole against the winterguard.

It almost feels like I have to guess which extreme he's going to run, run my own extreme, and hope it works out.

I would love a bit of advice on how to deal with these lists but am also interested in your thoughts on extremely lists against balanced lists. It's really a downer to deploy and find that 15 of your 35 points are ineffective against the majority of your opponent's force. What do you do to combat this? Am I the only one running into this?

Thanks guys

[Griffin745]

I love stormsmiths for this kind of problem, take 3 and triangulate! You'll fry infantry alive OR and this here is the kicker, disrupt his warjacks. Giving you the time to get at his caster with something big.

Ooo! And the cyclone! 2 open hands for locks, throws and all kinds of shinannigans and 2 (yes thats right folks...2!) miniguns. Can't go wrong with that in theory. But I haven't played with mine yet, just picked it up today and got it all made up so might be a bit biased.

Other than that I wouldn't like to say too much really, I've no idea what you take or own or anything.

HA! had to edit because I forgot to finish the post. I was too excited about my cyclone.

[Dino-Czar]

Karchev doesn't much care if his jacks are disrupted though, thats the thing. Unearthly Rage and Berserkers/Kodiacks mean focus is kind of unimportant.


The Haleys and the Nemos both come to mind as solution casters for your situation. If you have the Thunderhead and support it with long gunners you've got a good core going to handle both extremes.

[Griffin745]

You know what, I'd never seen that spell before, just looked it up now and...oh my giddy aunt.

[Ysthrall]

Just a (late-night) thought, have you tried Long Gunners? Infantry clearance vs Winterguard, CRA for damage vs Karchev's jacks?

Gun mages and Stryker for pushback seperation of the Karchev block and then EQ?

pHaley for Chain Lightning spam on the winterguard or scramble on the jacks?

Hope you find a solution, thats a nasty couple of lists to fight.

[Manse]

Thunderhead is definitely a solid thought. I'm wary about spending 12 points on anything that's going to get crushed in a turn against another heavy but perhaps his flexibility will be worth it.

I hadn't thought of longgunners against either list. I own a full unit + ua but rarely field them. I've not had too much luck with them moving up and shooting and really being very effective. I suppose the suppressing fire template placed near terrain could really put winterguard in a bind.

Anybody else running into pure jack Karchev lists that finds it frustrating? I just can't get over that anything I bring that can't tackle arm 18+ I might as well have left at home. It almost feels like he fielded a 35 point army and I fielded a 20 point. The fun drains from the room (and least in my mind).

[phreaker187]

We can chew up Karchev fairly well with the Nemo's. Voltaic Snare of either version grinds their whole line to a stand still. And with pNemo you can eat his infantry spam for breakfast with Chain Lightning.

He's a little hard to run, but a lot of fun.

[Dark Fledgling]

Stormguard are capable of dealing with lots of infantry with electro leap, and if they spread out can not only force karchev's heavies to trample but they can get plenty of free strikes off with reach. If you do get to charge his jacks, CMA will make the difference. Give them your upkeep of choice, blur vrs range, arcane shield vrs AoE and they can hold your foreground.
They also have ranked attack so your long gunners or whatever can chill behind them and shoot freely.

As for your fear of loosing the thunderhead, if you hold him back for the second wave then he wont get scrapped so soon. Then again, you can always give him arcane shield and stick him up front.

-DF

[bouncymischa]

Currently, my bets "all-comers list" is a combination of Trenchers and Long Gunners working under Siege, with appropriate support. It does a pretty good job massacring infantry (an AOE heavy list isn't going to do much against Trenchers that are constantly Dug In and Long Gunners that are under Fox Hole), and Sieges Feat turn combined with POW 14/15 guns and big CRAs is usually enough to put a serious dent into armor. I will admit, I haven't run it against a true Karchev brick, though, so it might still get overwhelmed.

[knight_actual]

These corner lists need to be met with equal force.

Bring Siege and use his fox hole to protect pEyriss. This shuts down karchev completely. - doesn't matter what else you bring really.

Against the mass troopers list, for now, chainlightning will fry all of em. I recommend pNemo - 3 chainlightnings will do those winterguards in rather quickly. If you must, just run a storm anything up right next to them and their def 17 now no longer matters. (chainlightning bouncing off of the storm somthing - on average 2 CL will axe 7 winterguard- say some are tough, but no matter, now they're KD and your followup shots virtually auto hit.) Likely, Sorcha also runs beast 09 as well. Just use voltaic snare to shut that down as well. maybe 2 lancers recommended.

AOEs will kill these massive winterguard units as well. so black 13th works. Siege also works - just load up a bunch of guys with the aoes, pop feat, and fire away - every WG touched falls. His feat will also be good to take down khador jacks as well, but be mindful of beast 09 moving up faster at you because it's shot. Force hammering it first may be a good idea... and disrupt it for good measure. So obviously siege will we focus strapped - try not to put many jacks on him.

ps.

let me elaborate on my animus against this type of list. I'm advocating bringing out every single powerful thing you have access to to deal with these lists. These lists are designed specifically to make your take-all-comers-everyone-has-fun list fail - 99% of the time. They are designed with the page 5 mentality of no holding back in mind. To that end, bring eyriss, black 13th, and every dead-borken thing you have access to. It'd only be sporting not to dissapoint your opponent who looks to be a subscriber of page 5

[Mutton]

A point on Karchev: the big 4 'casters (eHaley, eCaine, eStryker, Siege) all make mincemeat out of him. The two assassins can kill him pretty easily, while Siege is your go to man for enemy 'jacks and eHaley just board control shenanigans him to death.

[Dino-Czar]

Dominate against Karchev lists is teh lawls.

[knight_actual]

Karchev with drago, 09, and behemoth do not fear domination tho.

[Mutton]

Karchev with drago, 09, and behemoth do not fear domination tho.

They fear getting TKed apart then a 4 focus Stormclad with TA comes charging down...

[knight_actual]

true - eHaley murderizes Karchev's threat ranges.

[Dino-Czar]

Karchev with drago, 09, and behemoth do not fear domination tho.

True. Any reason you think these are an issue? OP doesn't mention them.

[veragor1206]

I've run into a similar list that pops up at our gaming group once in a while. The list features PVlad, 2 manhunters, Yuri, Drago and the rest is all Beserkers. At first it was pretty intimidating staring down that many heavies. I was fielding EHaley and found the best way to win was with board control. You can pretty much forget about wiping out 4-5 heavies, because before long Vlads popped his feat and they're knocking on your door. The trick is to go for a direct warcaster assault, which still isn't easy when Vlad sits on focus and casts Blood of Kings :) EHaley makes things pretty easy though, she can open charge lanes and give some nice shooting angles. I like Defenders and the new Cyclone with her. A bonded Defender has a threat range of 23" and can be Temporal Accellerated and given 4 focus! That can put a nice dent in even the toughest of warcasters. . . Bye Bye Karchev!!

[bouncymischa]

True. Any reason you think these are an issue? OP doesn't mention them.

Dominate only works on non-character warjacks. So if Karchev has taken a list comprised only of character jacks, Dominate is useless against it.

[EnternalVoid]

Take a look at this list and the line of thought. As already stated both Haley and Nemo *bother versions* have tools that can help handle either list. This is just a slight variation of one I have take against the Khador I play against *one is almost pure eSorcha with winterguard and the other prefers the Butcher, Irusk, and Karchev*. It might help give you ideas on how to approach the problems. *Add in real fast that often I might not know which one I will be fighting on a given day*

eHaley
-Stormclad - 10pt
-Lancer - 6pt
Squire - 2pt
B13th - 4pt
Stormblades - 5pt
6x Swordknights- 4pt
Junior -3pt
3x Storm smiths - 3pt
eEyriss- 3pt

Against the eSorcha lists you have eEyriss’s ability to remove upkeeps. With a deadeye cast on her she is likely to hit the Iron-fleshed bobbing and weaving Winterguard. With the sudden loss of their very rough 17 defense, to a much more manageable 14, they can start being picked part. This list lacks the sheer volume of fire that a Gunmage+UA or Longgunner units can spit out, but it does so to give you other tools. Even so with a deadeye on the B13th you should be able to clip some winter guard. Add into this that the Stormclad can even fire its shot and get an arc into another, and the Stormsmiths, and you can suddenly get a decent showing.

The small unit of Swordknights are sadly meat shields to an extent. With Arcane Shield, Defensive Line, and Deceleration they can get up to Armor 21 against shooting with Defense 15. At that point blast is meaningless, as our Winterguard grape shots. At which point even the normal blunderbuss shots are not sufficient to crack that armor and if they combine in sets of two to get pow14, even average rolls will not kill a sword knight as they will need an 8. Once in combat, with Arcane Shield, Winterguard need an 11 to kill a sword knight in Defensive Line. Last game I played against the eSorcha winter guard list this came up. While I lost 3 of my 10 Swordknights on approach, 3 tied up a jack and the other 4 held the large unit of Winterguard in spot for several turns. While he eventually dragged them down it took him so much time I was able to pick apart the unit with other attacks. Even if they do take Widowmakers you can at least weather a turn of shooting to help you get into position. At the very least they can run 12" to tie things up when it comes time.

The thing here is to be careful of eSorcha’s assassination run. With Cyclone and reach she has an impressive distance she can cover with out even needing to charge. With a charge it only get worse. Even with eHaley’s set defense she only needs a 11 to hit. Once my opponent had realized he had lost his main unit of winter guard he had worked his way into an assassination run on me, luckily it failed due to the positioning of a wall but I had to keep it in mind the whole time with Haley as I tried to get into a better position. Luckily with eHaley’s control + the squire, and a lancer you should be able to get your spells where needed.

Against Karchev, Time Bomb will be your friend. If he groups them up you can catch multiple targets in a single casting. The -2 Speed keeps them from charging, and with the 4 sources of disruption in this list you can try to keep any one jack from being to dangerous. With her feat you can also shut down his offense for one turn and prevent the slingshot with Tow by making Karchev go last. The key will be the properly tearing open a whole to get to Karchev. With the Stormclad as your bonded jack is has a movement of 7”. Add another 2” from Temporal Acceleration and it means your jack can move 9” and still have 2” reach. So with out a charge you are looking at 11” threat. In addition you could always Telekinesis the jack another 2” to get it into position. So if you can even get a small crack to Karchev, you can shoot him with eEyriss to strip him of his focus and possibly Sidearms before the Stormclad goes in. If he has a Bokur or wardog you should try to kill them before going for the assassination if all possible.

As the Stormclad is also your bonded jack, it can be given 4 focus. Note the rules on page 246 says it can be allocated 4 focus, not that the warcaster has to allocate the 4 focus like Nemo’s Supercharge. So eHaley can give it 3 focus and the Stormblades can supply the 4th. If Karchev is stuck with defense 12 and 19 armor, you should do serious damage to him. You will have a tough time killing him unless you roll well or preferable you have already gotten a little bit of damage in at some other point. Still he will be hurting and if you turned him around with a Telekinesis and then used your feat, he might have a hard time destroying your Stormclad before you can get another swing at him.

[MajorGilbear]

Against the eSorcha lists you have eEyriss’s ability to remove upkeeps. With a deadeye cast on her she is likely to hit the Iron-fleshed bobbing and weaving Winterguard. With the sudden loss of their very rough 17 defense, to a much more manageable 14, they can start being picked part.High DEF + low ARM is best dealt with using things that don't need to hit, or which ignore a lot of the buffs. Chain Lightning, SS strikes, and even AOEs and Suppressing Fire templates are all more effective.


Even so with a deadeye on the B13th you should be able to clip some winter guard. I'm not sure I'd waste the FOC to Deadeye the B13 just to pop a couple of Winter Guard; these types of builds often feature Kovnik Joe, and he should be their prime target. Ryan's template should be dropped over the UA. Now, without Joe and B&W, the unit loses a lot of its potential.


The small unit of Swordknights are sadly meat shields to an extent. With Arcane Shield, Defensive Line, and Deceleration they can get up to Armor 21 against shooting with Defense 15.I'd consider dropping a SS and buying either PKs or SBs. If you go with SBs, you can choose to threaten heavy armouor as well if you want, and with AS and Deceleration get to DEF14/ARM20 which is still pretty good. If you go with PKs, they get to similar stats, can also threaten heavier stuff, and save your AS for something else in your force. Both PKs and SBs will have better odds in melee too, as they have +1 MAT over the SKs.


Against Karchev, Time Bomb will be your friend. If he groups them up you can catch multiple targets in a single casting. The -2 Speed keeps them from chargingI think that with twice the FOC of Karchev, a Jack-heavy list of her own would be aces; thanks to Echo she gets to copy Karchev's spells if she wants to. And she can still cast Time Bomb as you suggest.


with the 4 sources of disruption in this list you can try to keep any one jack from being to dangerous.Disrupting his Jacks will not help as they generally rely on his battlegroup spells. With FOC 5, Karchev will rarely have much FOC left to allocate anyway.


With her feat you can also shut down his offense for one turn and prevent the slingshot with Tow by making Karchev go last. The key will be the properly tearing open a whole to get to Karchev. With the Stormclad as your bonded jack is has a movement of 7”. Add another 2” from Temporal Acceleration and it means your jack can move 9” and still have 2” reach. So with out a charge you are looking at 11” threat. In addition you could always Telekinesis the jack another 2” to get it into position. So if you can even get a small crack to Karchev, you can shoot him with eEyriss to strip him of his focus and possibly Sidearms before the Stormclad goes in. If he has a Bokur or wardog you should try to kill them before going for the assassination if all possible.All very true.


As the Stormclad is also your bonded jack, it can be given 4 focus. Note the rules on page 246 says it can be allocated 4 focus, not that the warcaster has to allocate the 4 focus like Nemo’s Supercharge. So eHaley can give it 3 focus and the Stormblades can supply the 4th. Um, what? I thought Nemo can allocate up to 5 FOC instead of the usual 3 to any warjack one per turn - but he isn't forced to, or forced to allocate any minimum quantity.


Still he will be hurting and if you turned him around with a Telekinesis and then used your feat, he might have a hard time destroying your Stormclad before you can get another swing at him.I dunno, many Khador players turn him around anyway in order to get maximum use out of Tow. The DEF penalty is academic anyway, as most things that will hurt him are unlikely to struggle to hit DEF12 any more than DEF10.

I don't mean to shoot your post down either, but there were just some things there that I wanted to reply to - hence chopping it up into quotes.

Generally, I think Siege, eHaley or pNemo are your best choices against either list. I also think that you need models that can be flexible between anti-Jack and anti-infantry roles, which probably means Defenders, Stormclads, SBs+UA, Long Gunners and possibly SG. You should also include Lancers, SSs, Junior and the Squire. Ironclads, B13, Rangers and PKs may be helpful, but you'll need to have a real plan for them.

[Dino-Czar]

Dominate only works on non-character warjacks. So if Karchev has taken a list comprised only of character jacks, Dominate is useless against it.

Again, true. But since the OP didn't bring up character jacks, and I assumed he could read, I didn't feel the need to point it out.

[Manse]

Wow thanks for the thoughtful replies, they definitely give me a lot to think about. I'll run a few of these suggestions and see how it works out.

Overall I think you are correct Knight_Actual, holding back and playing something "interesting" isn't going to work.


Again, true. But since the OP didn't bring up character jacks, and I assumed he could read, I didn't feel the need to point it out.

Behemoth is dangerous as is Beast-09 but oddly enough I find them managable. Typcially I'm putting out as much damage as humanly possible in a single turn against any Khador heavy in order to wreck them immediately. If anything I'm happy to see him play such expensive 'jacks. Turning 13 points into a wreck marker is extremely satisfying.

[snowydude]

2 words for dealing with those 2 styles
knock down and disruption

hey look KD disrupted khador warjacks.. whats that 4 inch threat range? lawls!

[knight_actual]

Karchev and his jack buddies cannot be knocked down.

[WarcasterKramer]

There is always eStryker - add three dice to his strength and charge Karchev - on average you should add 10 to your strength, that is a p+s of 25 and with the squire, that would be 7 focus. If he's towing his jacks around, use one of your heavies to slam it into Karchev, knocking them both over and use Stryker's spell to get him into charge range and charge

or

use pstryker a lancer and stormsmiths. Earthquake to knock over jacks through lancer, then disrupt with stormsmiths, repeat the next turn, and the turn after that. They can't shake off if they are disrupted.

OH! and make sure to run Eryiss in your list no matter what you're running - disrupting the caster can really hurt.

[knight_actual]

Allow me to re-iterate the fact that Karchev and his jacks will almost always be non-knockdownable.

also, Karchev, if he expects an alphastrike from Stryker will be def 15, armor 25(?)

[EnternalVoid]

Mostly for MajorGilbear

Actually the best way to deal with High Defense+Low armor is to reduce their defense. At that point they become manageable defense and low armor So anything in your army can deal with them rather than only a few choice pieces. The problem with Chain Lightning and AOEs is it is all about randomness. I have had games where I hardly get more than one or two extra leaps from Chain Lightning. Also Cygnar is not know for its AOEs. Sure you could take mercs to get the number you might need, but I can also take eEyiss and just deadeye her, that way their defense drops to a much more manageable level were basic shooting and attacks can now hit them.

I am not sure you got the general Gist of this MajorGilbear. His problem is that his opponent uses both of these lists and he has felt that unless he builds certain list for each, he can?t handle them. Making a list designed around AOE spams to deal with Infantry will fail against Karchev. And from the sounds of it his group is one of those where they don?t inform their opponent which caster they are taking till both people set their armies down. So he knows he is facing Khador, but does not know if he is facing a eSorcha winter guard list, or a Karchev. So he has to take into account each possibilities and be able to face each. He really wants ideas on how to make a list to handle both and possible the next list that his opponent comes up with.

Please tell me that you are not serious about the B13th thing about dropping the template on Joe. Ignoring his ability to pass the shot off to a winterguard within 3", which means the template would not be touch him think about this, Joe only has to be with in 9? of one model in the unit. He in fact could be all the way back next to a mortar and still be giving his speeches to the Winterguard unit on the front. For Ryan to shoot her template at him, she needs to be within 10? of him. Even if he is not 9? away from the unit, you would have to be standing mixed up in the front line to even hope of getting a line of sight. And gunfighter lets you use your guns in combat, it does not let you shoot out of combat if you are stuck in melee. So unless your opponent gives you Joe?s head on a platter it is not that easy. The UA in turn should also be pretty far back, as it has no reason to be in the front or middle. So again it is not easy to target, and in a eSorcha list should have Defense 17 most of the time. The reason I said pick off some of the unit is because they could do it from 14? away and take out the front runners fairly easily. At that point your opponent just lost several of the fodder, the B13th have 17 defense and are far enough away your Winterguard that remain likely can?t just move and CRA them easily, and they also can?t get within 5? of eEyriss to shoot her with their blunderbuss. It is attrition. Sure if you get a shot at Joe or the UA you should take it, but you have to figure your opponent is not going to make it easy.

Echo can?t copy Karchev?s spells, it can only copy Offensive Spells, IE ones that have the OFF part checked at the end. Karchev has one offensive spell and that is Eruption, trust me he is not casting that one much. As for disrupting Karchev?s jack I have this to pose to you. Him casting Unearthly Rage, and getting all those boosts, how many attacks does he get? One for each weapon, correct? A Juggernaut will not take down a stormclad when it is reduced to only one hard attack and a slightly weaker one. Will it hurt, yes, but if it had another focus or two then it would have been REAL bad. The difference between . So yes, with Karchev?s spells he might not give out much focus to his jacks, but that one or two points he might have given to one of his jacks could well be the difference between him scrapping your jack this turn or you getting another round with them. It also keeps them from charging or trampling save on his Feat turn. And being disrupted also prevents him from trampling into base to base with eHaley and buying more attacks. It is about limiting options.

Nemo?s Supercharge ability says ?During your Control Phase, this model can allocate up to 5 focus points to one warjack in its battlegroup that is in its control area.? So the 5 focus can only be allocated during the control. In turn the Bonded Jack rules on page 246 just say the jack can be allocated 4 focus, it did not say it has to be from the war caster or during the Control Phase. Thus eHaley can give 3 and the Stormclad can get the 4th one from the Stormblades. Nemo?s Supercharge says HE has to allocate the focus, thus it can?t come from anywhere else. Sure he can choice not to give it all 5, but you can?t get more focus from the Stormclad being near the storm blades.

Once you hit him with one Time Bomb, he is going to rethink the Tow maneuver till he needs it. All it takes is getting hurt once doing it for them to re-evaluate their tactics. Perhaps after the first time, he instead only uses Tow to get into Alpha Strike position on Feat turn? The other reason to Telekinesis him is to break up Sidearms if he is using it. Having 12 defense is one thing, having +1 or +2 defense from Sidearms, +2 defense from the wardog making for Defense 15-16 Defense in Melee.

I get what you are trying to say with your post, but I might as well make clear my reasoning.

[MajorGilbear]

@ EternalVoid:

Thanks for taking the time to reply to my points.

I do understand that the OP wants a list that can deal with BOTH a Karchev Jack force and an eSorscha Winter Guard list. You can still build for both with similar models; for example, Seige has Groundpounder himself and can give Explosivo to Long Gunners, and both do well against Karchev and friends even outside his feat turn. I did also make some suggestions about Casters, Jacks, units and solos, but specificity can be hard when you don't know what the OP's model collection is.

As for the B13, I'm assuming two things:

1) That you don't just rush them at the enemy to rack up quick/cheap kills, but rather that you work them into a good position the first couple of turns so that you can be in a position to do some decisive damage.

2) That you drop the template on the WG, not Joe (as I did explain in my earlier post). If you can take out the Officer, Bob & Weave is gone. The officer is usually kept towards the back of the unit, and Joe behind them all. If you take out the UA and some nearby models with Magestorm, there is a good chance that Joe will no longer have WG fodder within 3", and that the other members of the B13th can cap him. If he is further than 3" away from WG, you should be able to manoeuvre to a suitable place and catch him using Long Shots. Finally, if you do decide to drop a Magestorm on Joe, you can target a model about 1.5" away and because he wasn't targeted directly, he can't pass off the shot to a WG.

I understand what you mean by Nemo's 5-FOC allocation now, but it wasn't that clear in your earlier post (and why it confused me).

And you are absolutely right about eHaley's Echo, it's a detail I always forget. Truthfully, I find her spell list excellent and rarely find myself with lots of spare FOC for replicating enemy spells; also, there isn't often that much I ever want to replicate either.

I'm still not confident of the real value in disrupting Karchev's jacks, but I do think that for 1pt each, you may as well include SSs. Hell, I can't remember he last list I built without one.

I also think that pEiryss would be good against Karchev, as the threat of losing his FOC for a turn is enough to keep him cautious, and a cautious Karchev player is far easier to deal with. Against the first list, pEiryss may be less useful, but she's still a good model that can put damage on key models.

I agree with you on Time Bomb too (I didn't ever disagree), and I think that your suggestion for Telekinesis is sound now that I see your logic (I didn't consider the Wardog).


As I said, I didn't meant to pull your post apart or anything, but there were some comments that didn't make sense to me and which I wanted to address. Now you've explained them better I can see (and agree with) more of your logic. Hopefully, it's helped the OP as well.

[Griffin745]

I might be missing something here, but why can't Karchev and his 'jacks not be knocked down? I've never played against him but can't see anything written that would prevent it.

[MajorGilbear]

His spell "Sidearms" is what stops him being knocked down.