7th Ed. PLEASE help me avoid further humiliation...

[Foodlord]

Hmmm… wondered if anyone could give me any advice: got utterly rolled by a WoC army on Tuesday, some bad dice rolling, but that cant be all of it! (2250pts)

Lizards (me!)

Slann (Becalming, focus of myst)
15 TG

Priest EoTG, Wardrums, lvl 2 (no scrolls, BIG mistake)

2x18 saurus, full command

4x 12 skink skirmishers

5x terradons

6x CoC



WoC

4th LVL Wizard Lord, Mounted, in unit of 5 Knights
2nd LVL Nurgle Sorceror in 20-strong WoC unit
Second unit of 6 knights
2x 6Mounted Marauders
2x 6warhounds
Giant
Hellcannon


He got first go and things went very badly from the off. A unit of Skinks was routed by a treachery spell, which in turn ran through the terradons: they failed their LD and flew right off the table before they’d done anything!
He shut down magic phase after magic phase of mine, partially with a spell that made me miscast on any double, and partially with lots of dispel scrolls.
An entire unit of saurus ran off the table because the giant shouted at them (literally), and the hellcannon went mental, charged across the table, and ended up killing my TG (which were still well in my table half), the steg crew went to one spell, which also left the steg with one wound and the priest with 1 wound. With most of his troops mounted, he ran circles round me… I killed 2 units of Marauders and all the dogs, but that’s about it.
Utter humiliating defeat.
I know I should have had more dispel scrolls (thought I’d have enough with DD, but I massively underestimated Chaos magic), and maybe I had too many skinks, but what else did I do?!? Help! I want to beat him next time…

 

[The Hunted]

First off: do not get demoralized. Get back into the game, and beat the snot out of him next time
Second: The best teacher is experience. After that it's analysis (either by yourself, or you and your oppoennt), after that it's probably internet resources and even after that is strategy books. But we don't go that far for now
Third:
Your slann needs The Focused Rumination. Even with your enemy having nasty anti-magic items; 2 dice spells don't go wrong that often. So, pick a lore with cheap spells and go for loads of 1(+1 bonus) PD castings.
A slann becomes just so much more potent with this ability, it's worth every bit of it.
You already have becalming, which is very powerfull; do NOT forget it!
You can put a dispell scroll on the slann (so you can keep the wardrums [solid item]) and/or even the diadem of power if you really want those dispel dice!
The (Edit) cupped hands is also strong, then you can confidentaly cast a spell on more dice once a game.
Mind you, your slann becomes ever more expensive with every item. So you do want to protect him!
(adding 1 more TG helps by giving you an extra rank. That gives you 3 ranks, banner, BSB, possibly outnumber, possible wounds. Pretty sweet.

Keep your lighter troops (skinks, terradons) near your general. This will prevent them from panicking most of the time. Just within 12" is enough, also remember this when removing casualties. If you know for sure that the, for instance, outer left-most Terradon is withing Ld range; remove the other one.
Also, the units that are nearer to your general could protect him by redirecting the enemy threats.

The list itself is fine, but could use more tweaking. I (personally, mind you) don't like the 2nd Spear block. 5 terradons in a single unit is simply too much (3-4). And the absence of Salamanders makes the fellow cry
These guys are just deadly versus your opponents support units. Terradons>Marauder horsemen
Terradons, skinks and Salamander > Dogs
skinks > giant (need some help from general for terror)
12 skink skirmishers can be dropped to 10. Saving some points right there.
(post the list in the army list section for 'real' reviews)

What i'm trying to say is this:
4 units of skinks is fine. They are amazing suport, but they cannot do everything and are pretty easily taken care of (if your opponent really focuses on them). So, you need some other support who can fulfill other roles. Terradons and Sala's come to mind here.
Also: If your skinks (or support in general) are dead; those saurii blocks are sitting ducks for multiple units of cavalry.
So, all your opponent needs to do is kill your skinks within anywhere between 1-3 turns. And then move in and flank.

On to your enemy:
His list is pretty small.
His 20 WoC should be ignored and avoided. Skinks (chameleons or normal) are very good at this. These guys are simply too powerfull.
Then, the only real threats are 2 units of knights. I'm sure you can come up with something to counter these. Redirecting, magiccing, EotG pulse, Salamander...etc. Charging an ancient stegadon the CoC and any other hammers/heroes helps too.
Enemies support is dealt with by your own, help your support somewhat by putting magical death-rays (of any form ) into your enemies support. 10 skink skirmishers can beat 1-2 dogs/horsemen!
Finally: A scar-vet on cold one is very usefull. He can smash knights (Burning blade of chotec, or even Sword of might), and protect your units from magic missiles with the magical shield (Edit: Shield of the mirrored pool)
He can also hunt enemies support units, mage hunt and in dire circumstances: march block.

So, I am pretty sure you can work on this for a while. Get some ideas out of it (I doubt if you can use them ALL, but still). Remember to post us how you do next time,

Good luck!

The Hunted

Edited for item names

 

[Stegadeth]

First off, most of it was bad luck. Fleeing sucks, but it happens.

The Hunted is right about most things. I am not sure Salamanders are the right choice against WoC because so many times they have Frenzy which negates the panic check a Salamander can cause. At least the Razordon can stand and shoot if it gets charged and S4 shooting isn't terrible against Marauders. I would add one more Temple Guard to flush that out to 5 wide by 4 deep. The 4th rank is nice. If you were to make your Slann your BSB, give him the War Banner and give the TG a Standard Bearer you are looking at +7 CR (if you outnumber and US 19 in 2250 is strong!) before you even do a wound.

Now, on to the big thing: he only has 5 Dispel Dice. At most he has 6 scrolls. You want to draw out the scrolls as early as possible. My advice is to bring a Slann with Becalming, Focus of Mystery and Focused Rumination and give him Cupped Hands of the Old Ones and the Bane Head. Now at least one miscast can be given to a wizard within line of sight. You also get an extra die per cast. I assume you went Lore of Metal. Lore of Beasts could be fun against this army as well with so many mounts but Lore of Metal is more offensive.

Start of the game, Bane Head on his General. Start your magic phase with the EotG. He can't dispel anything it does. If your priest has an offensive spell, use it! Your opponent is likely to let most buffing spells go off but portent of Far might get him to use a scroll or at least dice later if used on a unit in CC. He might even throw some dice at second sign of amul. If you get Uranon's I'd throw three dice at it to make it harder to dispel with dice and to increase your chances of double sixes or ones (Cupped Hands, yay!). Your Slann should now use Rule of Burning Iron on the General with 1 + 1 free dice. Silver with 2 + 1 free dice Spirit of the Forge with 1 Slann +2 Pool, +1 free dice. Barring some really poor rolling you should get a couple of scrolls out off a magic phase like that.

Now, you could change the list some. Magic is the bane of WoC. If you added a level 2 priest with plaque of Tepok for the extra spell to increase your chances of getting an offensive spell from Heavens you can draw out more scrolls.

Those are some quick thoughts on tactics including composition.

 

[walach]

as said above, magic seems quite a nice option vs WoC (which is probably why they have some decent anti magic themselves!); i would agree with what's written above, and i would think about taking the rod of the storm too - an extra unexpected uranon's thunderbolt in the right place can really help with those knights!

of course you'll probably do what i do, and roll a 1 for it....

 

[The Hunted]

as said above, magic seems quite a nice option vs WoC (which is probably why they have some decent anti magic themselves!); i would agree with what's written above, and i would think about taking the rod of the storm too - an extra unexpected uranon's thunderbolt in the right place can really help with those knights!

of course you'll probably do what i do, and roll a 1 for it....

Odd, I seem to always get a 6 when using it!

Anyways.

Stegadeth is right about the Salamanders. But I find them usefull against any opponent (and any army for that matter...). If you charge the salamander into some support withing range of your Slann, he will be in for a pretty tough fight. Anyways, the shooting aspect of the guy is pretty nice vs knights; but you need a bit of luck to pull it off. In other words: do not count on it.

As said, TG+1=3 ranks. Warbanner on Slann is very handy and powerfull indeed, although; a dispell scroll costs the same...
The use of magic is very well explained by Stegadeth. He is just sooo right

I now realize that all we are saying is this:
Do not get into close combat with him, unless it is fully on your terms.
That pretty much wraps it all up

The Hunted

 

[Stegadeth]

I now realize that all we are saying is this:
Do not get into close combat with him, unless it is fully on your terms.
That pretty much wraps it all up

My most played opponent is WoC. Nothing could be more true than what The Hunted says here. To be quite honest, I would avoid any Close Combats as long as I could unless I could bring a couple of units to bear on him.

 

[Bibamus]

ues the rod of storm lyestarday against DE COK, i allready drained his DD and 2 scrolls and was happy i get a burning alignment and uranons thunderbolt on the knights... guess what? he had MR 1 and roleld a 6 for the dispell and burning alignment casued 1 hit that failed to wound...

also, use lore of metal vs WoC and i would never leave home without Focus of Rumination... is just so good and makes the Slann near unstopable in the magic phase

about close combat... unless its a steg or 2 charging, prefferably in the flank/rear i say avoid it.

salamanders aren't that useless, -3 to armor save means they can kill quite a few warriors and tzeench and nurgle WoC are still affected by panic, unmarked ones aswell

 

[Foodlord]

Guys, thank you SO much for the advice and support (esp. The Hunted and Stegadeth: loads of useful stuff in there!)! I need to think out my magic phase more carefully and definitely re-jig my list: think I went for too many troops and didn't think about the heroes / itms / slann properly. Might have to go and buy some salamanders too!
I'll re-post my list on the appropriate thread, and would welcome any more advice.
Thanks again folks, I'm now itching to have another crack at him

 

[Stegadeth]

Guys, thank you SO much for the advice and support (esp. The Hunted and Stegadeth: loads of useful stuff in there!)! I need to think out my magic phase more carefully and definitely re-jig my list: think I went for too many troops and didn't think about the heroes / itms / slann properly. Might have to go and buy some salamanders too!
I'll re-post my list on the appropriate thread, and would welcome any more advice.
Thanks again folks, I'm now itching to have another crack at him

You're welcome and I hope it works out for you. You really should thank my opponent for kicking my butt last weekend (ok so it was a really friendly game since he was testing a tourney list I let him get away with some major things to see how it played out for him). Fear not, last week he learned what was great about his list. This week he will learn what is bad about it. Oh, as a quick post script that will help you some:

Rule of Burning Iron can be cast on a model engaged in Close Combat.

From the spell description in the BRB this is hard to figure out because it doesn't specifically say this like the rules say it is supposed to. However, FAQ 2 makes this clear in the second question under the Lores of Magic subsection. This is extremely important if your opponent uses movement spells to get his general's unit engaged in Close Combat as soon as possible. It helps to make sure your Slann is positioned at the correct angle to see him as well!

Best of luck!