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Faragdar the Wise
Commander
3547 Posts
    
Albuquerque, NM, USA
 | | 10/12/2006 7:56 PM |
| I played my 4th and 5th games of Dreamblade in a small tournament, today. I definitely still have a lot to learn, which will only come with practice, I'm sure. What I could use help with, though, is warband building. I went 1-1 before dropping (had to get home), but I was in a position to win the 2nd game, had I not made a poor decision on my last move. Here was the band I ran:
Runetagged Brawler
Ardent Zungar
Lunar Handmaiden x2
Pearlthorn Castle
Twilight Scout
Steelborn Lion
Hawk-eyed Instigator
Knight of Tomorrow x2
Axemorph Demon
Bladehound
Blind Spikemauler
Boneclan Hunter
Dreamreef Marauder
Greenlife Dryad
I think it's useful to report on the games with this band and give my assessment of the figures as a result of those games. Then, I hope others will suggest how I could improve the band. An obvious choice would be a Scarab Warcharm in place of a Lunar Handmaiden, but I don't have one. I also think I would much rather have two Bloodthirsty Redcaps instead of the Blind Spikemauler and Boneclan Hunter, but I'm not sure about that because of previous bad experiences with Skeever Hatchlings. I don't have any Bloodthirsty Redcaps, though, so I'd have to get some anyway.
First game was against a mono-madness band. I won that in a come-from-behind victory. I actually won it never spawning the Axemorph Demon. (The one round where I had an opportunity, I cleverly forgot my spawn points from destroyed creatures.) I was able to keep my opponent on his side of the board after giving up three rounds. I decided to avoid combat, for the most part, and concentrate most of my forces near the center of the board until I had enough creatures in the game to win battles decisively, at which point I began to do so. I destroyed or disrupted everything on my side and kept control of the center. Eventually time was called with me up 5-3. I might have lost if my opponent had been more aggressive with his Jack-in-the-Box. The Dreamreef Marauder was a big factor in this game. Using advance and skirmish, I was able to use him to seriously disrupt my opponent's back field, especially after disrupting creatures into positions where they had to face the shark one on one.
2nd game was against a valor/fear band. It wasn't exactly a "chessmaster", but it had a lot of the elements. Particularly annoying were the Voodoo Manipulator and Thunder Sultan, especially since, in 11 or 12 rounds, we rolled, at most, one no-spawn round. I got the Axemorph Demon out relatively early in that game, but the Voodoo/Thunder combo kept him out of the action until close to the end. I never played my Greenlife Dryad because the spawn points would have benefitted my opponent more than me. My opponent jumped to a 4-0 lead by constantly pushing me out of advantageous positions. I didn't make a come back until destroying his Jack of Blades and getting my Hawk-eyed Instigator and Bladehound into combat together. Then I finally rolled enough blades to advance my Axemorph Demon into the fray and enemies started to drop. At the end, I had the advantage of position and numbers and I had closed until the score was 5-4, but I got timid when he spawned a power 10 Carrion Spiker, and I failed to tie up my opponent's Knight of Autumn Gate for fear of losing the advantage of numbers. What I missed was that he could advance that Knight to join a Knight of Tomorrow and then skirmish either one into his 4-cell to win the round and the game. Live and learn.
The Bladehound was a beast in both games. I was surprised by the power of that common mini, which I only pulled out of a starter yesterday. I also had pretty good luck with the Dreamreef Marauder. I found that he allowed me to concentrate my forces in the middle but still have an efficient, high-powered creature to harass the periphery. I shied away from "loner" creatures until this tournament, and I was actually fairly pleased with the result of putting him in. Are there better choices, though? Of course, the Hawk-eyed Instigator was an MVP, and the Axemorph Demon was brutal when I got him into play. The Pearlthorn Castle helped me keep control of the center of the board.
So, any helpful comments on this band? | |
"Before God we are all equally wise - and equally foolish." - Albert Einstein
Champion of Myopic Half-Orcs
Winner, WBC X | |
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XAos
Underboss
2413 Posts
London
| | 10/13/2006 2:40 AM |
| I'm not sure anyones an expert on warband design yet, but a few points you should look at in your warband.
1) Dryad; All the units with energise are basically a short term waste of spawn points to get a long term increase. i.e. for 2 or 3 turns after you spawn them. The warband will be weaker than your opponents. So you need to be sure you'll get an eventual profit to compensate for that short term loss. From your warband I only see one mini that needs energise (Axemorph Demon) which doesn't seem enough profit to justify the initial loss. It's possible that warband could exploit energise to spawn two creatures a turn instead of one (it has a lot of spawn-3 to 6 creatures) But then you would run out of figures. A "weenie horde" could work, but it needs some way to continue using spawn points after it "spawns-out" e.g. {regenerate, Unspeakable freak} Which this warband doesn't have. The way to test this is to play a few games against yourself & see how the spawn-curve works in practice.
2) Dreamreef Marauder; Personally I don't use "loner" creatures except in limited games. In constructed games they prevent using powerfull combos of blade abilities. They might become more usefull with the buzzclaw, since they can combo with non-blade abilities (e.g. Spur)
3) Bloodthirsty redcaps. Individually these are poor (the bloodthirsty ability kills them) If you spawn multiples of them, they become more reliable. Particularly good with blade abilities which increase damage (crit, warpstrike etc) The Skeever seems harder to use, because they are expensive to spawn multiples. (for 3 extra cost you get only 1 extra attack)
4) If I were building a Valor/Passion warband. The one figure I'd consider essential is the Samurai. It reduces the worst weakness of any passion figure, i.e. dying before it get s a chance to attack.
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Faragdar the Wise
Commander
3547 Posts
Albuquerque, NM, USA
| | 10/14/2006 1:01 AM |
| I'm not sure you're wasting spawn points bringing out a Greenlife Dryad. Energize ability aside, she's not bad for her spawn cost. Granted, though, I should probably look to get a better return on the extra spawn points she brings, though I didn't run out of creatures in either of my battles. If I had a Shard Troll or Flame Harrower, they could use the extra spawn points. Are either of them good to use? I'd also love to have a Forgeblind Punisher to try him out. He could take the place of Dreamreef Marauder, I suppose. As far as adding high spawn cost creatures, the only passion or valor creatures I have left at the high end are 2 Inscribed Axebeasts. Maybe I should be using them, though, if this band is going to have to play come-from-behind all the time.
Like I said, though, the shark was better than I expected. I deliberately used him in a role where I didn't care that he couldn't generate blades. Instead, he was the target of advance and skirmish blade abilities, which gave him lots of extra attacks.
Wish I had Samurai, because I agree with you. I haven't pulled any, though, and nobody local wants to trade any. I suppose I should just e-bay for them. | |
"Before God we are all equally wise - and equally foolish." - Albert Einstein
Champion of Myopic Half-Orcs
Winner, WBC X | |
|
XAos
Underboss
2413 Posts
London
| | 10/16/2006 4:14 AM |
| Samurai is only a common, so it should be cheap on ebay. The postage will be most of the cost.
I havn't played either the shard troll or the Flameharrower. So I can''t be sure. But they both are fairly fragile & expensive for thier stats.
There abilities look as if they could become strong in the right combo, but I don't currently think there is a strong combo for them.
My favourite passion units at the moment are Heartsblood Temple & Bloodthirsty Redcap. Baxar's war has some very good passion units.
{Buzzclaw, Unsated Ragedrake}. I am certainly going to buy 3 Buzzclaws.
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