Kings of June Game 2 - Kill & Pillage! vs Goblins with Orc Allies

Trolls, trolls, and more trolls

For Game 2 I drew Tony & his greenskins. I've played Tony at every tournament I've attended so far, with a record of two losses and one extremely narrow draw (seriously, I needed a roll of 2+ to win the game). This time he was running his army as Goblins with Orc allies.

His List:

3 x Regiment Rabble

3 x Troll Hordes, one with Brew of Sharpness, one with Blessing of the Gods, one with Brew of Strength

Regiment Fleabag Riders with Maccwar's

4 x War-Trombone

2 x Big Rocks Thrower

Flaggit with the Boomstick

Wiz with Bane Chant and Inspiring Talisman

2 x Mincer

Giant

Orc Allies:

Regiment Gore Riders with Brew of Haste

Krudger on Winged Slasher with Medallion of Life

A fairly elite list, as far as Goblins go. Those troll hordes were going to be tough to deal with unless I could get into their flanks. 4 war trombones and 6 rolls of lightning bolt each turn were another headache. And then there was his flying Krudger. My main reaction on looking at this list was 'gross'.

Deployment 

Deployment

He chose sides. I had 2 more drops than he did, much to his surprise. With the terrain and placement of the pillage tokens, we were effectively playing on a 4'6" wide table. It lead to some tight deployment. Learning from last game, I made sure I had my spears matched up against his TC cavalry. I was mostly worried about his 3 hordes of trolls, 4 war-trombones, and his Krudger on a Winged Slasher. So a lot to worry about. Instead of using his Rabble as chaff, he seemed to be setting them up to take pillage markers. I thought he would put the allied Krudger near his allied Gore Riders, to inspire them. Instead he used his last drop to put it out on the far flank, where it would ultimately cause a lot of headaches.

Turn 1

Goblins Turn 1

He moved up, his Big Rock Throwers trying to snipe my knights.

Westhaven Turn 1

I also moved up, hoping to get my second wave perfectly positioned to counterstrike when he inevitably crushed my first wave. I backed my General up, nervous about getting charged by his Krudger. Took out one of his rabble units with some shooting, and put some wounds on his War Trombones. They were inspired by that flaggit though, so they held steady.

Turn 2

Goblins Turn 2

Oooofft. When the charge came it came hard. My halberd troops routed on my left, as you'd expect. My shield wall took 15 wounds but were only wavered, thanks to my very inspiring Wizard. To be honest I would have rather they routed. My Greatswords took 9 wounds, also holding thanks to inspiring. My spearmen couldn't hold against the double charge from the Krudger and the Fleabag riders. His war trombones took out my Hero as well.

Westhaven Turn 2

My wavered Shield Wall really gummed things up here. All I could do was shift my knights about in what was the most frustrating stage of the game. My spears were also wavered from the previous rounds shooting (thanks to the tromboners). It wasn't all bad. I double charged his giant and took it out, I put some hurt on his Fleabag Riders and Gore Riders, I put more wounds on his war trombones with my rifles, taking out one finally. But it wasn't the devastating counter that I needed. If my purple knights, swordsmen horde, and spears could have charged maybe it would have been enough.

Turn 3

Goblins Turn 3

He predictably routed my swordsmen horde and greatswords. He put a ton of wounds on my steam tank but it held. His Krudger ignored my General to go for one of my rifle troops in the backline. His war trombones peppered my purple knights.

Westhaven Turn 3

I double charged his center troll horde with my two knights regiments and routed it, thanks to getting a flank in. My rifles finally took off a couple more of his war tromboners. I thought I'd play funny buggers with my General and fly into his backlines instead of going toe-to-toe with a couple of mincers.

Turn 4

Goblin Turn 4

This was basically it for me. His trolls charged my Steam Tank and purple knights, routing them. The knights had a bunch of existing wounds from the war trombones so they didn't need much. In the biggest stinker of the day though his Big Rock Throwers ~both~ hit my orange knights, put 9 wounds on them, and they popped. His Krudger continued to clean up my rifle troops, and his remaining war trombone and lightning users took out my spears.

The rest of the game was basically to see if I would get completely tabled or not. We went to turn 7, and I was. 20-0 to Tony.

Result

This was the only time I've ever been completely tabled in KoW. It was pretty brutal. I got a little unlucky with my swordsmen wavering in the absolute worst place, and losing a regiment of Knights to his rock lobbers was just rude as hell.

But I also played pretty poorly. I wasted my greatswords and both spear regiments. I should have held in place Turn 1, letting him come all the way across the table to me. It would have given me at least 2 full turns of shooting before he inevitably charged me. Instead I made it a easier for him. My General did his job ok, tying up a lot of points of troops in a pointless game of ring-around-the-rosy. 

But in the end it was his 54(!) Piercing 1 breath attacks that sunk me. I just had no answer to it.

Tournament Report, Kings of Dave 4

I usually run my army (mostly old WHFB Empire models) as Kingdoms of Men, but for a tournament over the weekend I decided to run them as League with KoM allies. It was a 2500 point no comp 4-game swiss tournament in Canberra, Australia.
My List:
KoM Allies:

• Horde Arquebusiers with Brew of Keen Eyeness
• Troop Mounted Scouts with Mace of Crushing
• Cannon
• Hero, Mounted with Blade of Slashing

League:

• Horde City Spear Militia
• Regiment House Guard
• Regiment City Militia
• Regiment Household Knights with +pathfinder
• Regiment Household Knights with +nimble
• Halfling Iron Beast
• Halfling Howitzer
• Army Standard Bearer, mounted, with healing charm
• Halfling Sorcerer with wings of honeymaze
• Halfling sorcerer with inspiring talisman
• Duke on Ancient Winged Aralez + ensorcelled armour
• Duke on Ancient Winged Aralez + brew of haste

Like I said, I usually run KoM, but I wanted to try out three changes in particular.
I wanted to see if the Halfling Iron Beast was more useful than a KoM Beast of War.
I wanted to see how annoying two windblast (7) casters could be, over bane chant wizards.
I wanted to see if the Duke on Ancient Winged Alarez' were worth the extra points over the KoM General on a Winged Beast.
My opponents were:
Game1: A very punchy Orc army, with some goblin chaff and war machines allied in. (Kill, big Loss) I deployed in a pretty tight 'castle' formation, around my shooters on a hill. My shooting did ok, but he was into me by turn 3, and who knew that getting caught in melee with orcs was a bad idea? I should have deployed out wider I think. He used terrain and goblin chaff very well to protect his flanks, and once his morax regiments got stuck in it was all over. This was one game where I really wished my Halfling Iron Beast was a Beast of War. The Orcs chewed through it quickly anyway, and despite the high number of attacks, hitting on 5s just sucks.
Game 2: A very shooty elf army, with some FoN allied earth elementals (Kill & Pillage, Win). If my iron beast was a dud last match, he was the star of this one. My opponent had two sea-guard hordes, and they just could not get through my Iron Beast's armour in time. My heavy artillery took care of his earth elementals, and my 2 Dukes were able to keep his dragon lord contained.
Game 3: A pretty standard undead army. (Loot, Draw) This was a very cheeky draw for me. By the end of the game I had killed ~900 points of his, while he had killed ~2100 points of mine. I only had the regiment of House Guard and the Iron Beast left. Unfortunately for him my House Guard had one of the loot tokens, and my Iron Beast was screening the other one (if I had played my last 2 turns better I could have actually picked it up and snuck out with a win). Lesson here is to always play the objectives hey. Also shambling legions and hordes are slow af to pick up objectives hey.
Game 4: a ~very~ shooty Twilight Kin army. (Dominate, Loss) The most frustrating game by far. He managed to waver a bunch of my units through a combination of his bolt throwers and perfect nerve rolls. Any lower and I would have held steady, any higher and I would have got the inspiring re roll and almost certainly held steady. I managed to desperately cram a lot of stuff in the centre, and windblast his stuff out. If the game had ended turn 6 it would have been a draw, but it went to turn 7, and he was able to kill one of my Dukes in the scoring zone, and push his units deep into the zone (so I would have needed perfect rolls to blast them out again).
So, would I have been better running KoM over LoR? As you'd expect, some games yes, some games no. The windblast sorcerers were very terrain and scenario dependent. We played 2 kill scenarios in this 4 game tournament, but if we had played more objective type ones, they would have been more useful. I also played 2 games on a board that had no difficult terrain (to push things into), so I'm not sure I can draw a line under this experiment yet.
The Iron Beast was tough, and hung around for 3 out of 4 games. I was disappointing in combat, but at least it made it into combat hey. My Beast of War is usually shot off the table before it can get in. Iron Beast was excellent against low CS/Piercing opponents, the Beast of War would be much more useful against high CS opponents. So it depends on your local meta hey.
The Dukes were pretty cool. I only used their heal spells a couple of times over the 4 games, but the iron resolve was awesome. You pay 35 extra points (over a General on a Winged Beast) for 1 extra attack, TC 1, Heal (4), and Iron Resolve. I think that's a good deal, and it was handy having a couple of points dense units to help me score on dominate. But if you're playing in a comped system (disordered flyers lose fly, flyers score 50% on invade/dominate), I think the General on a Winged Beast would be better.