2250 tourney coming up..., Help me choose -..-?

[Tauren]

Here's the List stats for starts:

2250 pts exactly
4 characters: 1 beastlord, 1 wargor, 2 bray shaman (801 pts)
Total Troop Deploys: 13 deploys (1449 pts)
14 Power Dice dice
7 Dispel Dice + 2 Scrolls


Tzeentch Beastlord - 300 pts
- Goretooth
- Dark pelt
- Heavy Armor, Great weapon, Shield

Tzeentch Wargor - BSB - 209 pts
- Staff o Darkoth
- Power Stone
- Heavy Armor

Bray Shaman - 151 pts
- lvl 2
- Bray Staff
- Chaos Armor
- Dispel Scroll

Bray Shaman - 141 pts
- lvl 2
- Bray Staff
- Dispel Scroll

Troops: 1449 pts

4x Tuskgor Chariot - 340 pts

Chaos Giant - 205 pts

3X Unit of 5 Chaos Warhounds - 90pts

6X Unit of Centigors - 114 pts
-Shields

2X (4) Minotaurs - 408 pts
- Tzeentch
- Great Weapons

Warherd 1 - 157 pts
- 10 gors
- 13 ungors
- Full Command

Warherd 2 - 135 pts
- 8 Gors
- 11 Ungors
- Full Command

This post has been edited by Tauren on Nov 5 2009, 08:28 PM

[Tauren]

So... I played a game against friend from the store. He was playing slaanesh chaos warriors (man do chaos warriors blow) and at 2250... I don't know, he doesn't have the army to support anything really amazingly robust but he had a relatively small army.

Anyways I massacred him. He brought wolfric. He came in. I about faced. I lead him on magic, and he blew his scroll. I face rolled 3 dice at staff of darkoth. I magically charged his big unit with wulfric, and by second turn wulfric was dead (the general) and his unit. From there it was just systematic picking apart of units. I used my giant as bait (although I should have stayed) and used him to lead two units into the open infront of my minotaurs and herd. I killed a charging giant with my super herd in combat. I used dogs to negate a unit of knights and hit them with magic missiles and a chariot. His magic was largely ineffective, either shot down or it miscast.

I felt terrible running 14 dice, it felt like overkill. I want to reduce it down to 10 but I would need to break the rules of the list and not take the same mark as my general on my minotaurs. I asked the tournament players and we shall see.

I would spend the points elsewhere to make up some more combat prowess. But other than that I have no clue -..-. 14 dice felt abusive. I got like 1-3 spells in each magic phase. By turn 4 we called it. I made a lot of good leadership rolls and my rolling was overall good. Saw 1 red fire punt out 5 strength 5 wounds. I like the lore overall, the magic missiles are a welcome change to my usual undivided/khorne army.

Any thoughts?

[decker_cky]

Play a few more games. 14 dice seems like a lot, but with tzeentch magic, you're inflating spells which fall flat on their faces a lot of the time.

Also...you mentioned that list was rather soft. What do you expect from other armies? In general, I'd say your list is solid but balanced, but if the group you're competing with plays relatively soft lists, you could soften yours (for example, make the BSB undivided or something and move the staff to a bray shaman).

[Tauren]

That's the thing. It's completely mixed breed.

Some players are very newbie and don't know how to play the rules or abuse them. Some don't know their armies but can bring two hydras.
We have atleast 1 dragon and 1 greater daemon flying about which scares me.
(high elves and daemons)
Then we have a chaos warriors player who I like as a player telling me my list was to rough because I got a magic charge off that annihilated a good 300 pts + his general.
I picked apart his army without a problem through use of redirects, running and etc.

I know there will be wood elves and their abilities, atleast a treeman I'm sure, which makes magical shooting extremely useful to drop dryads and counter their ranged. I know that there will be dark elves which I need something against. Same for the dragon's/greater daemons.

Just not sure what to do here...

The daemon player tells me he wants my toughest list, the chaos warrior player thinks my 14 dice is a little much. At the same time they are cool with giving me 5 wide min on my herds. So its up in the air really and I am waiting for more opinions from players. I just don't want to run into power armies and just lose, but I don't want my comp score to suffer a ton because of 14 dice which isn't that much. I should be running 16.

This post has been edited by Tauren on Nov 6 2009, 06:15 PM

[decker_cky]

How I'd deal with that is to explain some of the nasty magic items beasts have available. Explain how they get ranks. Explain that centigors move through woods.

Your opponent lost that unit because he didn't know you had a charging spell item. If you understand beasts have that available, you save a scroll for that.

[Tauren]

I suppose, that's the thing, I drew out the scroll. So anyways... I think I decided, I will go for the middle ground and drop a caster down to a wargor with a rune of the true beast. That way I keep 12 power dice, middle ground between asking them to break the rules so I don't have to take tzeentch mark on my minotaurs (To try and bring it down to 10 where I want it but keep my characters) then resolve the few extra points left elsewhere.

[Tauren]

The tourney was a solid turn out, some very hard lists. As with most of the tourney's at my store it seems like games run slow, finishing 4th turn in 2.5 hours is always a challenge, no matter how fast I am. In the end I found that the vulnerabilities of the list do in fact balance it. And basically the magic is a light shooting phase and some added tricks. I like the list after dumbing it down (lvl 4, lvl2 bsb, lvl 2 shaman, wargor with RotB)

It had answers for most things, tree man for instance get hit with a giant. Thumb with club makes me gitty with joy at watching big init 2 monsters die.

I have to realize the inherent weakness of the semi-super herd. While they may be a monster on a charge, getting charged by anything with serious attacks or killing blow is a danger. While I did well in 2 games with the army, in 1 it cost me the game. Watching my beastlord get beheaded by wardancers was hilarious. One of the things I need to realize is sometimes its better to back off and just shoot things with missiles. Don't ever charge into stupid situations. If you can just threaten and force them to come to you, do it. Better safe than 600 pts down.

[Arakh Tonguewhip]

Sounds like you found your army list right on time and learned some lessons as well. A pity that in a little bit more than 2 months your experience is for naught due to new army book...;-)

[Tauren]

There are armies in this game that will teach you more than any other armies. Those armies tend to be finesse, unforgiving. You learn from your mistakes because they really bite and the list has nothing to make up for it when you screw up. Beasts of chaos is one of those lists, so is Ogre Kingdoms and Wood elves. The more you play, the more you learn, the more you learn, the better a player you are, the better a player the faster you play until you hit a level where you know what you are doing quickly and effectively.