What questions can we ask that other factions have a trouble answering?

[PG_jbarket]

Hey guys,

So, I recently read Jay from Chain Attack's article on tournament prep. In there, he puts forth the idea that all of your lists should ask a question that your opponent has to answer. If you look at their lists and see they don't have an answer to one of yours, there you go.

Yesterday, our shop had its first tournament. The Warmachine scene here is still very young, so we played single lists. A buddy of mine took a jack heavy pSev list, and there wasn't a person there with an answer to a DEF 12 / ARM 23 Avatar. If he had been a little more careful with placing pSev, and dealing with terrain, I think he would have swept the event.

Now, obviously in a multilist format it's a lot easier for people to have answers to problems, but it's made me rethink Trolls some. I'm trying to get an idea of what questions we can ask, and see what I can really do with some new list ideas.

The one thing that came to mind was a unit of Champs in B2B, under the KSB, with Iron Flesh on them (so a Borka only trick). At DEF15/ARM 20, that puts them both in the hard to hit and hard to kill range. The downside is that you're talking about a small number of troops.

Anybody else have some madness they'd like to suggest?

[PG_machine007]

Hello.

The champion combo isn't that amazing. I have done it before, but all it takes is one beast/jack to kill all the models or enough of the models in the unit. Knockdown hurts part of it too, and a lot of people have and love them some knockdown. I prefer the Maddy brick with Champs since sure foot will prevent them from being knocked down. Don't forget to add in a chronicler for concealment for shooting, or Janissa for a rockwall in front of them.

Its a good idea to have this mentality though. For Trolls, we really don't have a lot compared to some other factions. The ones I have used/seen off the top of my head:

Beast Brick (ARM 22-23 beasts with Janissa are just plain old fun!)
Super model count Jam (3+ units of full up medium based units, such as Kriel warriors, scattergunners, fennblades. Too much infantry for an opponent to move/kill.

It is typically a lot harder to deal with really high DEF than really high ARM, and that is one thing we don't really have a lot of. Having high DEF usually decreases the amount of attacks a person has overall since they don't want to risk missing and wasting an attack with somethat can boost.

[PG_jbarket]

Right. The only genuinely high def option I could think of was Iron Fleshed Nyss Hunters, but without the Bomber's Animus on them, they're one blast away from gone.

I hadn't considered the wall of troops. I guess it really does raise a lot of issues since medium bases take away standard options like trample.

[zor]

Surefooted Madrak Brick is difficult to answer.
Massed high arm multi-wound models with knockdown spells is another good one. pDoomy tier Runeshaper Brick.
Moderate Def, High Speed, Tough Models across the board is good as well...Jarl can create that.
Troll Beasts alpha-striking anything can be scary. Grim, eDoomy...
Burrowers can be difficult to deal with...
Massed High Arm-high Wound bricks are hard to deal with. Borka Family Reunion or Beast bricks.
A good tough rolling player will be difficult to deal with as that is pure attack denial. Make them work for you to have to take those tough rolls.

[Da-Rock]

pMadrick Brick is way better then a Borka brick as their defense can range from a base of 14 all the way to 20 (shooting only - Chronicler, Surefoot and Rock wall).

The downside is its not the greatest scenario list