Kommandant Irusk: Nyss Hunters

What could make Nyss Hunters better? I've been running them with Warwitch Deneghra quite a lot, but when I decided to include them in my Khador force as my main unit, I made a list of abilities I needed available to them.

I quickly decided to include Valachev, since he brings access to Friendly Faction abilities, which includes Kommandant Irusks incredible feat: Undying Loyalty.

• Increased defenses: Iron Flesh, Inhospitable Ground, and Undying Loyalty.

Defense eighteen Nyss Hunters with 4+ Tough and immunity to knockdown. That sounds awfully hard to remove, and adding cover or concealment turns them into a unit that fears nothing but blast damage. In such a small game, a single round of near immunity could easily turn the game, and occasionally Inhospitable Ground will completely deny the opponent a charge.

With Zephyr the Nyss Hunters can walk into range and fire, followed by a three inch retreat. That's a long way to charge for an enemy unit (potentially fifteen inches), and considering that non-pathfinder units will have to deal with Inhospitable Ground while doing it, I suspect the Nyss Hunters will stick around for quite some time.

• Increased offense: Battle Lust, Undying Loyalty, Rust Bomb, and Kiss of Lyliss.

I would like to introduce you to something horrible: Nyss Hunters on Battle Lust. Going against a Warjack with Rust and Kiss on it, they will inflict about thirty damage each (5d6+13) on a charge, and with Undying Loyalty they'll be MAT 8 while doing it. Rust bomb isn't available against beasts, but they tend to be less armored anyway, and Black Oil will solve the problem with high defense heavies.

Ranged attacks won't benefit much, but a well placed Kiss and a couple of combined attacks should clear out a chunk of infantry, and retaliating is quite hard. The only problem is, that the Nyss will have to go without Iron Flesh on the round they engage, but since it will probably be my feat round as well, I think the losses will be acceptable.

• Disengaging: Zephyr

Most of the time I would probably just swing at them if someone managed to engage, but occasionally it's useful to either move further into a unit without taking free strikes (reach models, or layering), or disengage models to shoot, while a few remain to swing at the models he ran in to engage.

I'm looking forward to seeing if this holds true in actual play, but the theory sounds very powerful. The main flaw is the vulnerability of Valachev, so keeping him safe should be a priority.

Kommandant Irusk: Beast-09

I remember the first time I encountered Beast-09. It left quite an impression on me, and Terminus had to roll three consecutive Tough checks to survive it (nobody ever came that close before, and nobody has ever been that close to killing him since).

Beast-09 holds a special place of terror in my blackened little heart, making him an obvious choice for my single Warjack with Kommandant Irusk, but I must admit that putting down eleven points of Warjack in such a small game is daunting.

Kommandant Irusk has the Superiority spell, which increases SPD, MAT, and DEF by two, making Beast-09 a seriously scary piece of work, and with the Murderous imprint and Thresher he can wipe out just about anything. It also makes him immune to knockdowns, which is nice as he needs all the Focus he can hog when going in.

If he's damaged by an enemy attack he gets to advance unless already doing so (walking six inches due to superiority), directly towards the offending model, making it a pretty bad idea to shoot him unless you can seriously injure him, and if he's within Gorman's cloud he's a defense fourteen model with armor twenty, so an opponent will have to make some serious effort to cripple him.

Beast-09 is a horribly expensive model in such a small game, but having a centerpiece like that will be a novel experience, and maybe I'll find his flaws while I'm at it (and his Axe is on the list for my Cankerworm project, so it would be nice to find something).

Kommandant Irusk

I think I've found the first list I'll be testing: Kommandant Irusk. I'm not sure how Khador players manage to keep him alive, but I guess that's part of the challenge.

It's a twenty five point list, and I know just the Cryx player to challenge. Superiority on Beast-09, and Iron Flesh on the Nyss Hunters (and access to Battle Lust). Irusk would then pop Inhospitable Ground, and Gorman will attempt to keep him alive with clouds.

Kommandant Irusk

- Beast-09

- Sylys Wyshnalyrr

Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters (Cylena and 9 Grunts)

- Koldun Kapitan Valachev 
Lady Aiyana & Master Holt

Gorman di Wulfe

Sylys is just there to allow him both Battle Lust and Inhospitable Ground in the same round, while upkeeping both his spells. I think I have all the aspects covered, and I own most of the models, so unless I think of something better, I'll be giving this a shot.