Tarpit Tactica: Kriel Warriors

[nosrek]

A Foreword

For those who have followed "Opening Strategy: Parting The Red Sea", you know I have not been following through with my promised content. However I wanted to try to give you and other troll faithfuls a little something that will hopefully help you make better use of your Kriel Warriors. Somnicide is helping me refine/edit some of the original content I spewed on the subject, so this post will evolve a bit over the next week or two. My hope is that it will become a good bit of reference material for future troll players.



General Overview

I recommend players begin using a min unit of KW's with 3 cabers and the unit attachment. This is a much easier unit to marshal and all of my examples will be using this size of a unit. In the future I will update the post to include the full unit.

This tactica is based on 2 main theories;

1. Jamming 101
2. Caber Delivery System (CDS)

Combining these two strategies will help you get the most out of your KW unit, lets get into some basic deployment.



Deployment



Ok the gist here is the 3x3 deployment with the unit attachment hanging out in the back, pretty standard. However, I want you to pay special attention to the position o the caber throwers. This is important for success with the CDS, this deployment will facilitate your turn 1 running and ensure your cabers are delivered.



Turn 1



Ok so what am I doing here? Well I am maximizing take up, your grunts exist to one day become a caber, this is Kriel Warrior tactics 101. Your front caber has three grunts ready and willing to die for the caber cause, this formation/strategy has proved time after time to ensure my leading caber is ready to charge turn 2. There is nothing quite like making your opponent kill one guy 4 times (oh and they get tough rolls). The two cabers to either side are roughly 3-4" behind the leading caber, each have their own grunt ready and willing to die for their cause (this is my precautionary tactic because there is not point losing a caber to a stray shot). The leader is roughly 6-7" behind the leading caber, he and the piper will counter charge he who strikes down the mighty caber. The standard is simply collection buffs and keeping everyone steady.



Final Thought

Using a min unit with 3 cabers and the UA is pretty easy when you are going about it like this. However you really need a second infantry unit to soak up some attention. Some examples of a good choice for that secondary unit would be; scouts, burrowers, long riders, fennblades, etc.

[nosrek]

This post will hopefully give you an idea of how to put it all together. This is also a taste of the evolution of the red sea strategy.



Basic Deployment



Consider your terrain and scenario requirements, and then determine roughly where your caster needs to be to support his army and have an effect on the battle field. Here is an example of how I am running my current Prime Madrak 35 point list. Burrowers act as flankers and they cover my right side. My kriel stone unit will also be covering my right side, along with the Pyre to ensure Madrak is covered. On my left I the rune bearer and fell caller positioned to support Madrak and the Kriel warriors. Next is my KW’s, this formation optimizes take-up and alpha/counter striking. The Earthborn is on the far left, almost at the edge of Madrak’s control area. I have really liked this positioning, I use it to ensure good use of elemental communion (as people tend to put terrain on the edges instead of in the middle) and it will make it difficult for your opponent to get your heavy, as well as ensure a caber is close at hand for adaptation goodness.



Turn 1



(Note: the earthborn is the one with his art turned off)


Now turn 1 we want to move into a jamming position, get our caster roughly 8-9” up the table (especially with KW’s you want to only be moving your caster 8-9” max) and try position our army to take up lots of space and make the opponent feel your presence on the table. With burrowers I try to do a turn 2 burrow as much as possible, I find they do a great job staying above ground turn 1, the stone helps them not hate blast damage so much, and the chronicler gives them a little extra survivability. Plus they are a great threat and if my opponent chooses to focus on them, then hey my KW’s are untouched and ready to unleash the pain. Now much of this is specific to my army, but you should see the concepts I am using here;

1. Spread out and cover all your bases, we have medium bases and pretty big command ranges, take advantage of it and you won’t be tripping over your own dudes as much

2. Don’t worry about covering your warlock so much turn 1, especially if you have found some terrain. Even without terrain your caster can handle a few pot shots, sometimes not even be scratched by them, each bullet spent on your caster is one less taking out your infantry.

3. Keep your support up front and in the game, some people will opt to cap what support you have, let them. I always have more than one way to skin a cat, losing one piece does not make or break my list (except for the caster of course) and you only need support pieces for the first 3 turns usually. The fell caller is the only piece I will actually try to protect (with this list I have sure foot and the stone, which is enough usually), however if I over protect him, he loses his usefulness, keep this in mind as its a difficult balancing act.

[PG_thegreatblah]

I like it, and totally stole it.

I would note that when I deploy My Kriel Warriors I have a tendency to put them all the way across my front line with instead of in a block or in two rows only.

[Brettman008]

Nice write-up. Once concern I have though is if your unit leader gets killed you're going to have command bubble issues. Thoughts?

[underwaterviuw]

Nice write-up. Once concern I have though is if your unit leader gets killed you're going to have command bubble issues. Thoughts?

I actually just had this issue this weekend at a tournament. Under Jarl, I moved my Kriels in a wide arc along one flank to absorb the enemy infantry, only to get ambushing Sword Knights (one of Magnus' theme lists) charging behind me; as a result, the Kriels ended up spread pretty thin and he was able to knock off the unit leader and piper when they were left unprotected. So I ended up placing the leader so that the Kriels engaged with the Swords were out of CMD. I couldn't attack with them (or make free strikes), but they were in the way, blocking charges. Through good tough rolls they were able to hold out and eventually get back into formation. I looked at it less as panicking and more like "Hey, what do we do now?" har har...

Anyway, point is, even if they weren't killing the enemy to death with gigantic strength power fight hits, they made a nice bubble for Jarl and the Bomber to move into with relative safety.

Kriel Warrior MVP moments:
-Bomber moves up and throws a bomb at a Caber that's engaged by four enemy models, hits. Blast damage takes out all the enemy infantry. Caber makes his tough roll, and is not KD.
-Magnus gets antsy and decides to spear a Kriel Warrior with his armor piercing sword. Oh NO! I failed my tough roll. My Kriel Warrior dies...and Magnus is KD, because they had Hero's Tragedy on them. Bomber moves up on my turn, and it's good game. It MAY have been the same Caber that got the bomb thrown at him.

[nosrek]

I like it, and totally stole it.

I would note that when I deploy My Kriel Warriors I have a tendency to put them all the way across my front line with instead of in a block or in two rows only.

Glad to hear you stole it, I hope your endorsement will help many others to take the leap and give it a shot. As to why my deployment is how it is, most of my armies have 30+ models at 35 pts. I also generally play terrain heavy. This usually means I have narrow gaps I can flood through. Between our AD units and this formation my deployment is pretty simplified, but man that 7" deployment zone in SR2012 is rough at times (one reason why i choose second a lot).

Nice write-up. Once concern I have though is if your unit leader gets killed you're going to have command bubble issues. Thoughts?

He starts with the tough questions right out the gate, I like that.

My simplest and shortest answer would be, applaud your opponents cunning.

My more useful answer would be;

This is very difficult to achieve for two main reasons.

1. Turn your attention to the caber in the front and center position with three grunts, the grunt directly behind the caber is your optimal choice for a field promotion. His central position allows you to keep everyone within his 8" command bubble.

2. If I were to be deployed on the 10" line (because I love going second with trolls in SR2012) my leader would be 16-17" up the table. Now I won't say its impossible for my opponent to snipe this one KW, but it is highly unlikely. If it does happen, revert to my short and simple answer.

Turn 2 you will no doubt be more compact since you are charging and setting up for a counter charge with your second wave, so this is less of an issue. These things do happen however, I for one have been subject to this form of self abuse time after time while evolving the red sea strategy.

In the initial red sea strategy I relied on one unit to spread the board and tie my opponent up. You Brettman008 have zero'd in on the one major flaw of that strategy. A smart opponent can determine which models will be out of command range and flood that side of the board after eliminating the leader who was the glue holding your defenses together.

This is where my post about balancing support and offense comes in. By finding a balance in my lists I can generally have two offensive units in a 35 pt list. This has been my current solution for maintaining a large footprint on the table without screwing my units over by losing a leader.

[Brettman008]

Thanks for the explanation and I'm really looking forward to reading your thoughts on good 35 point troll lists. It is a tough level for me as I find it hard to balance armor cracking and high defense hitting in a single list at that point level.

[PG_rowanty]

I like it, I've been looking for ways to incorporate these squishy buggers into more lists lately...

[nosrek]

Thanks for the explanation and I'm really looking forward to reading your thoughts on good 35 point troll lists. It is a tough level for me as I find it hard to balance armor cracking and high defense hitting in a single list at that point level.

In the second post, the list I use for the example is actually what I feel to be my strongest 35 pt troll list.

I still am unsure on the battlegroup though. I cannot chose between EBDT and Pyre or Mauler and Axer. Both do really well for me though I tend to lean hard on my axer because he is so dang good, especially in a pMaddy list.

I feel that list covers all my base needs and I love the options it gives me offensively. For example my KW's can achieve a max mat of 13 in this list, but I don't have to go to those heights because I can simply slam a model over the high def enemy. My KW grunts can achieve a max pow of 17(18 w/Mauler) if I needed them that high. My cabers can reach pow 20(21 w/Mauler). Burrowers are a swiss army knife between aggro generation, mobility, survivibility, and offensive capabilities. In this list my burrowers can max out at mat 12, but wee commonly mat 8 with two swings. This makes them my premiere high def infantry clearing squad. I know some people want them killing khador heavies, but honestly I take them to disrupt, clear infantry, and take down casters. From time to time I manage to clean up a damaged heavy, but I don't try it unless I need that heavy dead.

Now generally I feel I need Runeshapers to have a competitive list because sometimes you need those magic weapons. In this list I rely on my ksb elder, anything he cant handle I do my best to counter strategically.

Burrowers I feel are our best counter to control casters. They can burrow and keep the pressure on while the rest of your army pulls their pants up.

So my thoughts on a good 35 pt troll list is quite simple, utility. For that reason alone I feel eGrissel might be the new companion list to the pMad.


@rowanty, I wish you success with the caber delivery system, I hope maximizing take ups helps with the squishy

[PG_rowanty]

I actually tried out the caber delivery system last night, worked wonderfull,y smashing all the of Menoth light warjacks around. (even managed to smash a light into Kreoss for 7 damage) After that the unit devolved into a tough-rolling tarpit with the opponent's flameguard which lasted nearly to the end of the game. Meanwhile my two impalers, axer and pMadrak were cleaning up what they could from the relative safety of Sure Foot (effectively taking away Kreoss' feat. All in all it was a rousing success. We were playing Battle Boxes + 9 points so it was the perfect timing for testing out the system. Keep up the good work fellow trollkin.

[GermanJoe]

CDS?

It works!!!

Thanks a lot for this tactic!

[PG_somnicide]

This is absolutely fantastic! The last couple of weeks were kind of, er, stone breakers here at work in IRL. But this afternoon I will be touching base with you.

[Iscariotxiii]

I would like to mention that your flag carrier is to close to the front. He only needs to be in command. And with piper that's 11 inches. I usually have my piper so far back because of this that my opponent has no option of killing it.