I took the list out for a spin, and since I've faced Skorne the last three games, I had a crisis of faith when I saw nothing but Skorne at the tables. In the end a Merc player found me, and we had us a game of infantry-machine. Damiano Vs. pDenny, with a combined total of one heavy jack, and two light jacks on the table.
I felt pretty confident about the game, and lined up my hordes of infantry, only to realize that I was outnumbered. I won the roll to go first, and advanced everything up the field. the Ghost Raiders and Pistol Wraiths had a nice building to hide behind, across from Nyss Hunters and Steelhead Riflemen, and the Satyxis Raiders found another building further up the field on the other flank. The Bane Thralls took the center, facing up against a unit of Halberdiers. Gorman & Eyriss took out a few of the Satyxis (I forgot his grenade wasn't blast damage and ran to close), but then my turn two came around and the slaughter began.
Gorman was slain by the Raider Captain, and while Eyriss did survive she was locked down by Satyxis, Captain, and a Warwitch. The Pistol Wraiths began gunning down Nyss Hunters, and after the first hit, the boosted shots took care of any Nyss Hunter in the open. Ghost Raiders ran through the buildings and engaged the Nyss Hunters, Riflemen, and Halberdiers, and then my Bane Thralls charged. This is where I should have been paying attention, because due to Hawk with Sure Foot, Set defense (I was close enough to walk in, but noooooo I had to charge), and a couple of other effects, my Bane Thralls were rolling against DEF 18 and failed miserably.
In order to survive I charged a Bane Thrall in the back with Deneghra, and locked his army down with The Withering (also, that's the only Tough check I made in that game). Since Admonia then took care of his Vengeance upkeep, the center was more or less intact after his retaliation (lost about half the Bane Thralls though), and while the Nyss Hunters was magicked up by A&H, the Ghost Raiders scraped by with around half their numbers intact.
 |
| Yeah that's right... we're nine points biaaaatch! |
From there it was all down hill for him, and while it took me forever to grind through those Halberdiers, his flanks vanished to the Incorporeal horde on the left, and the Satyxis on the right. The Ghost Raiders were back up to eight members by turn four, but the Withershadow Combine sealed the deal. Disbinding from Admonia, Puppet Master on Maelovus, and since Damiano was within walking range (he came up to nuke Tartarus, to keep me from turning more Halberdiers), it was time to say goodbye.
 |
| I can reroll that "1", and keep the "5" you know... |
Deneghra cast just one spell during the entire game, and it missed, so mostly she just hid behind as much terrain, and as many models as she could find, and allowed her army to demolish him. With the amount of stealth and Incorporeal on the table, A&H just couldn't keep up, and the Ghost Raiders had three units engaged the whole game. The Pistol Wraiths absolutely raped his Nyss Hunters, taking down all but two of them in three rounds of shooting. In the end they both died, when they had no more Nyss Hunters to hide behind, and Holt killed them both in one round, but engaging to make Nyss Hunters roll MAT 6 against DEF 14, and then leaving and gunning them down in the next round, was fun.
So, maybe some minor tweaks are in order, but in general I was happy with the way the army performed. I had more questions about the Ghost Raiders from my opponent, but the mobility they offer, and the chaos they cause, is just to good a thing to pass up. A&H gave the Nyss Hunters magical weapons, but since they were only engaged by three Ghost Raiders, the rest of them were annoying as hell, and safely hidden behind Riflemen and Halberdiers.
______________________________________________________________
