#1 Vampire Counts vs. Lizardmen - Turns 5-6 & Post-Battle

Turns 1-2 for this battle can be found on this link:
http://proxytablegaming.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/vampire-counts-vs-lizardmen-turns-1-2.html

Turns 3-4 for this battle can be found on this link:
http://proxytablegaming.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/vampire-counts-vs-lizardmen-turns-3-4.html

Things weren’t looking particularly good for the Lizardmen at the start of turn 5 as my Skrox were seriously surrounded and my Cold Ones were fleeing.  My Stegadon was engaged with the Crypt Ghouls and a single Salamander remained.  On the plus the Saurus Warriors were looking at a below average charge on the Varghulf which they proudly completed.

I also took the opportunity (whilst Lucky-Sixes and Stat-Rat weren’t at the table) to take a bit of coaching from an onlooker.  John gave me the idea of trying to use the Salamander’s flames to take away Fredericko’s Regeneration and then following up with a shower of poisoned Skink Javelins.  It was a good strategy but it was only at this point that Lucky-Sixes remembered Fredericko’s Dragonbane Gem not to mention the Strigoi being close enough to get the Skeleton’s on ‘Look out, Sir!’ duty!

The Skeletons took a heavy toll for their devotion to Fredericko but ultimately the Strigoi escaped unscathed.

But only a single wound could be dealt to the Varghulf who did enough wounds back to force a steadfast test.

Leading up to Vampire Counts turn 5 there was some semi-secret communication going on between Lucky-Sixes and Stat-Rat that I couldn’t quite fathom at the time but I was later to find out that my fellow proxytablegamers were signalling that Lucky-Sixes was going in for the kill.  I was too busy trying to figure out how I could possibly keep the points for my Skrox units on the table to notice!

As it happened the solution presented itself with the Zombies declaring another rear charge on the Skrox allowing them to flee completely out of harm’s way!

I also delightedly accepted the charge from the Dire Wolves to my Salamander.

Whilst Saxon The Merciless went on a (blurry) one-Vampire mission to prevent the rallied Cold Ones from getting back into the fight.

And the remaining Skeletons with BSB Wight King Izarazul and Necromancer Toby The Half Zombie moved to goad the Stegadon.

Fredericko, meanwhile, put his running shoes on and sprinted over to the flank of the Saurus Warriors in a bid to help recover the Varghulf’s wounds with an Invocation Of Nehek.

But Lucky-Sixes changed his mind at the last moment and instead managed a wound on the Stegadon with another Fate Of Bjuna – this time we remembered to deduct the toughness!

Frustratingly the Saurus were still poking at the parts of the Varghulf that seemed most able to regenerate and were being killed for their troubles!

Whilst the Salamander was getting better and better as it put down the doggies with its attacks and an impressive sideways stomp!

Suddenly at the start of Lizardmen turn 6 things were looking much different.  The Varghulf needed to survive another round of Saurus attacks before Fredericko could help him.  The Zombies on the flank were too far away to help and the Skrox now rallied after their narrow escape.  The Cold Ones wanted nothing to do with Saxon The Merciless and swift reformed out of his line of sight whilst the Salamander and Stegadon were quite happy to take on what remained of the Skeleton Warriors.

The Salamander decided to see if Necromancers tasted as good as Skinks

They do!  And a timely 6 rolled on the Stegadon’s thunderstomp was enough to crumble the surviving Skeletons and Izarazul who respectfully wounded the Steg twice before he too turned into dust.

And finally the Varghulf was felled as Fredericko looked on.

In Vampire Counts turn 6 there wasn’t much Lucky-Sixes could do with only his two Vampires and a unit of Zombies remaining on the table.

Saurus had no interest in taking on Fredericko and decided their work was done.

At the handshake and the battles end Stat-Rat announced that Lucky-Sixes had become greedy in his attempt to floor the Lizardmen and it had backfired.  We counted up victory points and the Lizardmen had indeed achieved the win with a 1,748 victory points total to the Vampire Counts 1,348 – a difference of 400 points.

The Vampire Count survivors.

Lucky-Sixes says... “Well, what a battle. Gutted to have lost it really, when I thought I had a tabling in my sights! Although, looking back on it, I don’t think even if Fredericko did get into the Saurus he would have killed them, even with his amount of attacks, so his venture was a tad fruitless. Had a lot of fun with this battle, and a few different choices to what I would normally bring in a competitive list – but still looked like a list that could do a lot of damage! It was the first time I had used the Mortis Engine in a list, and I thought it brought a lot of synergy as well as an epic explosion when it died – we talked about this after, and we felt it is a great undead suicide bomber! Although it ended up killing off my own monsters lol…”

Most valuable...

“Looking at the Vampire characters as my most valuable. Fredericko because of his killy nature, and with the Potion Of Strength (which wasn’t used) he can kill anything and did in the battle. Also my other Vampire character, Saxon, purely for his magical prowess against the fabled Slann. Two double sixes when I needed it most, off minimal dice may I add, meant he performed over and above my expectations for what I essentially had as a bonus character!”

Least valuable...

“2 candidates for this. Firstly the Vargheists. They did their flanking well but when It came to the combat against the Saurus they crumbled under the pressure (yes – pun intended!). that was a case of newly painted models fluffing what they’re good at and I'm sure it’ll happen again with other newly painted models so not too fussed about this. To be honest, I would still pick them in the future I think, mainly because of their mobility and ability to kill off chaff quickly, as well as providing a good flanking unit to the army.

The other least valuable unit in this game was my Dire Wolves – and this was purely down to the way I used them. I have used them before many, many times and already know that they are simply awful in combat. So instead of charging them in, I know that they should be used as re-directors at best. Despite my knowledge of this, I charged them into the Salamander, during a period where I needed them to keep units busy and for this I suffered. So actually, instead of them being least valuable, I guess it is actually me – the general! Lol”

What you would have done differently...

“As I’ve mentioned, the end game went all wrong for me. I liked my deployment, I liked how it was going, and until the end when a revelation of grandeur entered my greedy, greedy mind I actually felt I played it quite well – along with lucking out in the magic phases. The obvious thing for me to have done, would be to have left the Varghulf to its doom, placed the Dire wolves in front of the Salamander, put Fredericko in front of the Stegadon (with his Potion Of Strength) and charged the Skinks with the Skellies unit. Alas I didn’t do any of these things and went for the kill, to my own dismay. Ah well, live and learn.”

Final Thoughts...

“Happy with how the battle went up until the last moments, but I had lot of fun with it and enjoyed the twists and turns throughout. So a good first battle to be a part of. I especially enjoyed playing on a wonderfully constructed GW table, and there was a good atmosphere in the Warhammer HQ – met some good, fun people and had a great time, I would recommend it to all.”

The (blurry) Lizardmen survivors.

Hyper-G says… “Obviously I was extremely happy to have achieved the victory.  I felt like I’d set up my army well and despite getting bogged down in the middle of the battle and suffering some... interesting... dice rolls in Lucky-Sixes’ magic phases I’d pulled it off pretty well.  Taking 23 hits out of a possible 24 on my Slann (and forgetting to deduct 8 for his toughness) from two castings of Fate Of Bjuna that I’d chosen to allow through had been pretty intense.  Even more so as Lucky-Sixes had twice followed it up with irresistible forces that had damaged him little with two power drain miscast results.

Even Lucky-Sixes had agreed that those rolls had been quite something but in the end when he and Stat-Rat had thought he was moving in for the kill I didn’t consider my Lizardmen quite finished and they duly delivered.”

Most valuable…

“My most valuable unit selection could easily go to a few units as the Saurus dealt with their fair share of action and the Salamanders also performed pretty well between them.  However, with no cannons on the battlefield it’s the Stegadon that gets my pick as it not only crunched through the Crypt Ghouls and Skeletons but also provided a useful target for Lucky-Sixes’ final Fate Of Bjuna.  Fortunately it didn’t suffer like the Slann did and that allowed the Saurus to finally do away with the Varghulf without it recovering wounds from a Lore of the Vampires spell.”

Least valuable…

“Least valuable has to go to the rightmost Chameleon Skinks although it wasn’t really their fault.  They were just in the wrong place at the wrong time taking a Doom and Darkness and a Terrorgheist  Death Shriek.”

What you would have done differently…

“In hindsight I shouldn’t have sacrificed my leftmost Chameleon Skinks by moving them so close to a charge from the Black Coach although they had managed to slow down the Varghulf at least.  Forgetting the Slann’s toughness to deduct from the Fate Of Bjuna would have been terrible had I not passed so many ward saves the first time around.  Other than that I was pretty happy with how it had gone.”

Final Thoughts…

“I’m delighted that this battle turned out to be a full 6-turn thriller that could have gone either way right up until the end.  It really was so difficult to predict which way it was going to go.  There were shocks all round and some solid performances that would make the Old Ones proud of their children!”

Stat-Rat says…“What a great game! The perfect way for us to start our battle reports, and our first time at Warhammer World itself. Lots of outrageous rolls, big luck swings and great to watch. 

I must admit it all looked fairly ominous from a Lizardman point of view once the Slaan had been killed. Their destructive bus unit of Saurus were over on the left flank making veeery slow work of the Varghulf, and Freddie was in his element killing everything in sight.

I think the sense of occasion must have got to Lucky-Sixes at this point. Usually he is by far the most pragmatic of us, but today he went for a spectacular victory. This enabled Lizardmen to boss the last couple of turns and snatch victory away from VC.

Great game, Great Day, Great Scott!!

…Squeak…”