Game 3 - Tomb Kings vs Empire 2400 points

Welcome to another text report for Game 3 of The Old World.

I was once again running the Tomb Kings from the generic list and Todd was running The Empire.

Todd's list:

++ Characters ++

Empire Engineer
(Hand weapon, Hochland long rifle, Light armour)

High Priest of Ulric
(Hand weapon, Heavy armour, Shield, Barded Warhorse, Spelleater Axe, 3x Obsidian Lodestone)

Wizard Lord
(Hand weapon, Level 4 Wizard, On foot, Wizard's Familiar, Battle Magic)

Captain of the Empire
(Hand weapon, Full plate armour, Shield, Battle Standard Bearer, War Banner, On foot)

Witch Hunter
(Hand weapon, Additional hand weapon, Light armour, Brace of pistols (Don't take pistol), On foot, Ruby Ring of Ruin)

General of the Empire
(Hand weapon, Great weapon, Full plate armour, General, On foot)

++ Core Units ++
25 Veteran State Troops

(Hand weapons, Light armour, Shields, Drilled, Sergeant (champion), Standard bearer, Griffon Standard, Musician)

25 Veteran State Troops
(Hand weapons, Light armour, Shields, Drilled, Sergeant (champion), Standard bearer, Musician)

10 State Missile Troops

(Hand weapons, Handguns, Light armour, Sergeant (champion), Sergeant (champion), Hochland long rifle)

4 Empire Knights
(Hand weapons, Lances, Shields, Heavy armour, Preceptor (champion))

4 Empire Knights
(Hand weapons, Lances, Shields, Heavy armour, Preceptor (champion))

++ Special Units ++

11 Inner Circle Knights
(Hand weapons, Lances, Shields, Full plate armour, Stubborn, Inner Circle Preceptor (champion), The Silver Horn, Standard bearer, Razor Standard, Musician)

Great Cannon Great Cannon

++ Rare Units ++

Helblaster Volley Gun

My list was as follows:

++ Characters ++

Tomb King 
(Hand weapon, Heavy armour, General, On foot, Flail of Skulls, Armour of the Ages)

Royal Herald

(Hand weapon, Light armour, Battle Standard Bearer, On foot)

High Priest
(Hand weapon, May be a Level 4 Wizard, Skeletal Steed, Staff Of Awakening, Hieratic Jar, Necromancy)

Necrotect 
(Hand weapon, Whip, Light armour)

++ Core Units ++

38 Tomb Guard 
(Hand weapons, Light armour, Shields, Have the Drilled Special Rule (one per 1000pts), Have the Nehekharan Phalanx Special Rule (one per 1000pts), Tomb Captain (champion), Standard bearer, Icon of the Sacred Eye, Musician)

5 Skeleton Horse Archers 
(Hand weapons, Warbows, No armour)

5 Skeleton Horse Archers
(Hand weapons, Warbows, No armour)

10 Skeleton Archers 
(Hand weapons, War Bows, No armour)

10 Skeleton Archers 
(Hand weapons, War Bows, No armour)

10 Skeleton Archers
(Hand weapons, War Bows, No armour)

5 Skeleton Horse Archers 
(Hand weapons, Warbows, No armour)

++ Special Units ++
3 Carrion
(Beaks and Talons (Counts as Hand weapons))

3 Sepulchral Stalkers 
(Hand weapons, Halberds, Writhing Tails, Petrifying Gaze, Heavy armour, Ambushers)

Tomb Scorpion 
(Decapitating Claws, Envenomed Sting, Bone Carapace (Counts as Heavy Armour),

 Ambusher)

Tomb Scorpion 
(Decapitating Claws, Envenomed Sting, Bone Carapace (Counts as Heavy Armour), Ambusher)

++ Rare Units ++

Casket of Souls 
(Hand weapons, Great weapons, Light armour)

Casket of Souls 
(Hand weapons, Great weapons, Light armour)

Screaming Skull Catapult
(Screaming Skull Catapult, Hand weapons, Light armour, May Have the Skulls of the Foe Special Rule)

Screaming Skull Catapult 
(Screaming Skull Catapult, Hand weapons, Light armour, May Have the Skulls of the Foe Special Rule)

The aim was to keep the rare choices the same as last game as they proved really effective. I'd also wanted to toy with a large infantry block, and what better candidate to choose then Tomb Guard? The basics of this list is from one I ran in a tournament many years ago under the 8th edition ruleset so I was keen to give it a try. I added in the Stalkers to confirm my suspicions if they are absolute garbage (spoiler alert - they are!). 

Spells

Hierophant - Cursed Blades, Desert Wind, Spirit Leech, Spiritual Vortex
WIzard Lord - Oaken Shield, Arcane Urgency, Curse of Arrows Attraction, Pillar of Fire

I won the roll off for first turn and really wanted to kill something before cannons took out my toys.

Deployment

Apologies as I didn't take a photo. From my left I had a Catapult, Horse Archers (scouted), Casket, Skeleton Archers,Casket, Skeleton Archers, Carrion, Skeleton Archers, Tomb Guard, Catapult, Priest, Horse Archers x 2 (Scouted).

From Todd's left he had a pair of cannons, Knights, Engineer, Helblaster, Handgunners, Knights, Swordsmen (w/General + BSB), Swordsmen (w/Wizard), Inner Circle Knights.

Tomb Kings Turn 1

During the command phase the Tomb King uses MWBD for +1 movement onto the Tomb Guard. The Necrotect applies his buffs to the unit and the Hierophant gets off Desert Wind onto the Tomb Guard and Cursed Blades off.

Light of Death does a single wound onto the Helblaster whilst the Skeleton Archers chip off the remaining wounds. Unfortunately my Catapults scatter away doing nothing at all.

Empire Turn 1

The priest fails his prayers. Oaken Shield is cast onto the Wizards unit. The Knights charge into the Horse Archers. I stand & shoot as a reaction killing a lone Knight. The remaining units push forward.

Arcane Urgency is cast onto the Inner Circle Knights allowing them to push up again dangerously close to my lines. The Ruby Ring is dispelled and Flame Vortex is miscast.

Todd's cannon lines up and destroys a Casket of Souls which explodes putting a wound onto the Carrion and both units of Archers. The second Cannon fails to bounce into the remaining Casket. Handgunners do 3 wounds into the Skeleton Archers.

In combat the Knights kill the Horse Archers and reform to face the Tomb King lines.

Tomb Kings Turn 2 

MWBD puts +3" movement onto the Tomb Guard. Cursed Blades, Desert Wind and Light of Protection all go off. All the Ambushers arrive. The Stalkers reinforce the flank to tackle the Knights. A Tomb Scorpion appears to tackle the knights whilst a second lines up the gunline.

The Horse Archers charge into the Cannon. I reform the Tomb Guard and shuffle a few things but quickly realise my Tomb Guard may not even get into combat if everything goes well for Todd.

Spirit Leech goes off onto the nearby Knights lining the Tomb Scorpion up whilst Spiritual Vortex is placed to drain some more leadership from enemy units.

Shooting takes down a single Knight and removes the Engineer.

In combat, the Horse Archers kill the cannon crew panicking the second cannon crew off the table.

Empire Turn 2 

The priest fails the prayer again.

The Inner Circle Knights charge into the Casket of Souls. Whilst the Knights charge the flank of the Skeleton Archers. Finally the Knights charge into the Tomb Scorpion.

Oaken Shield is miscast, resulting in a Dimensional Cascade killing 5 state troops, and wounding the wizard. Arcane Conveyance fails to cast.
Shooting kills 3 Skeleton Archers.

In combat the Knights do a single wound onto the Tomb Scorpion and take equal in return, drawing the combat. The second unit of Knights hits the Skeleton Archers leaving 3 remaining after combat resolution and reform after Give Ground.

The Inner Circle Knights steam roll the casket which detonates doing not much damage to anything. They reform to face the Stalkers.

Tomb Kings Turn 3 

MWBD gives the Tomb Guard +2" movement. The Necrotects ability goes off without a hitch and the Hierophant successfully casts Cursed Blades and Desert Wind.

The Horse Archers and Tomb Scorpion charge into the Handgunners whilst the Stalkers, Carrion and remaining Skeleton Archers charge into the Inner Circle Knights.

Spiritual Vortex is successfully cast (magical CD template). The first Catapult hits 5 Swordsmen who promptly panic (we learned at the end of the game that Todd's Empire General actually allows units to ignore panic.....) The second catapult then scatters, hitting the Knights and panicking them. Archery drops a single Knight.

In combat the Tomb Scorpion kills a Knight and pursues the last one off the table. The Horse Archers combined with the second Tomb Scorpion break the Handgunners. They flee away from the Horse Archers, I pursue. The roll, with swiftstride allows them to not only catch the unit, but destroy the already fleeing Swordsmen unit.

Everything hits air against the Inner Circle Knights whilst they wallop the marrow out of me. Everything crumbles and they reform to face the impending Tomb Guard block.

After charges

After combat

Empire Turn 3 

Prayer fails again. Oaken Shield is dispelled. The Knights fail to rally and keep galloping.
The Inner Circle Knights charge into the Tomb Guard.

Urgency casts allowing the block of infantry to move again. Pillar of Fire casts in order to effect something next turn (white artillery dice - still can't find our templates!!).

In combat, my Tomb Guard champion is killed in a challenge. 5 Tomb Guard are destroyed and in response I drop a pair of Knights. Phalanx rule kicks in and the unit doesn't budge.

Tomb Kings Turn 4

MWBD adds +1 Initiative onto the Tomb Guard. Arise! brings back all the Tomb Guard and I use the Hieratic Jar to bring back all of the Skeleton Archers. The Necrotects ability goes off without fail and the usual spells of Desert Wind and Cursed Blades is cast. Spirit Leech fails to cast.

The Catapult hits the Swordsmen killing 4. After a failed panic test they flee through the Skeleton Archers killing 2 more via dangerous terrain checks. Shooting kills another 4 from the Horse Archers. The second war machine misfires.

In combat another challenge proves useless to both parties. The Empire lose a single Knight whilst I take no damage in return. The Knights are pushed back 2" and I follow.

Empire Turn 4

Swordsmen fail to rally and run 5". The Knights rally to face the Tomb Scorpion.
Prayer fails because of -2 LD.

In combat the Tomb King kills the priest gaining some overkill from the Flail of Skulls. 3 Knights are killed from the Tomb Guard finally breaking the unit. The Tomb Guard catch them and destroy the unit.

Tomb Kings Turn 5 

Desert Wind and Cursed Blades goes off as per usual.

The Horse Archers charge the rear of the fleeing unit whilst the Tomb Scorpion charge the front running them down. The Skeleton Archers charge the rear of the Knights.

In combat the Skeleton Archers are able to kill 2 Knights and take a single casualty. They break and catch the unit.

Result - Tomb Kings victory.

Conclusion

Well despite only being game 3, we're still learning heaps and no doubt picking up incorrect rules as we go along. Firstly, the game would have been rather different had Todd has read his rule (Hold The Line!) before the game started, but not to worry.

From the top. I don't think I deployed the Tomb Guard very well. For such a massive investment in points, they should have been front and centre beating down several units over the course of the game. However, that aside, it was still a victory and they did get into combat eventually.

Losing the Caskets early on was a good lesson but one of those things I will really have to get use to when facing enemy warmachines. Deploying the Catapults for indirect fire only seems like the way to continue forward, and although I didn't write about it specifically, I think on two occasions the Skulls of the Foe ability caused some havoc regarding panic checks/break tests.

Stalkers. Garbage. You pay for a shooting attack that is just utter crap. I kept re-reading the weapon profile to see if I'd missed multiple shot or something other rule but no, not there. I'll sub them out for Chariots in future games. It's not like I was expecting them to single handedly turn the combat against the Knights, but I was expecting them to do something other than die.

The Tomb Guard block was ok. Sure, it was going to do exactly what it set out to do, but I would expect that of any 1000+ point unit in the game currently. Was 40 models overkill? Yes. The same thing could have been achieved with 30 or potentially even 25 with the Hierophant behind me healing 4+D3+D3 (Staff of Awakening) every turn and then perhaps a double turn with the Hieratic Jar. I only got 2 cleaving blows all game which was sad.

The Tomb King was a little lacking despite being S8 and multiple wounds in the combat for the first round. The -1 AP just feels like a kick in the teeth.

I'm yet to have a clean strategy in combat when tackling units. Do you just purely go for damage output and ignore characters/challenges? Are they of significant importance or are they just purely matchup dependent? Although I had 3 characters in my front rank, Todd kept trying to hammer the unit plebs themselves.

Horse Archers. These guys continue to uphold the legacy of Khemri. With the Reserve special rule they're amazing at getting into annoying positions for opponents where they simply can't be dealt with. They're cheap and very good at what they do. Big fan. Because Skeleton Horsemen were never crash hot in previous editions, I never looked at them. With some changes in the current game, I may have to revisit them and see if they have potential.

Tomb Scorpions did the usual tricks but I can't help but feel they're lacking a single wound.

That's all for now. Thanks so much for reading.