nycfarmkid
Underboss
1210 Posts
    
Wadsworth, OH
 | | 12/10/2005 9:33 AM |
| If you know one of your likely matchups in a 500 point tournament is going to be Dark Naga + 2 Beholders how do you go about building a band to minimize the threat from them and still be able to handle the rest of the field? Here were some of my thoughts.
Epic Aspect of Kord x2
Inspiring Marshall x2
Satyr
Xeph Warrior x2
Ialdabode.
Idea would be to move the aspects to base the Beholders, use the satyr to win initiative, then pound them into rubble. Only problem I see is that a LE Beholder Band will probably be able to out activate most other bands and the Aspects could end up getting hit in the first round. Their save of 11 isn't a sure thing against the DC 19 Beholder Rays. If It is set up right, with two GMA's I might be able to get to the Beholders in the first round before the Aspects activate. I do not really know.
Another thought was:
Ghaele Eladrin x2
Clay golem x2
Aspect of Kord
Crow Shaman x2
Greycloak Ranger
-wolf
Idea here would be that I should take a few round for the Beholders to kill the Golems and i nthat time the Eladrins can really take them out with arrows.
A Similar Option would be:
Clay Golem x2
Storm Giant
Crow Shaman x2
Cleric of Corellon Larethian
Warchanter (to up saves)
Xeph Warrior
What do you guys think? | |
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bshugg
Underboss
1833 Posts
| | 12/10/2005 10:04 AM |
| Some constructs or undead is a great way to slow them down.
2 bands at our last event were designed with the beholder in mind:
2 Ghaele
2 Clay golem beholder shields
Aspect of Kord
filler
and:
2 Large Silver
2 Aspect of Kord
2 Couatl
Sword of heron.
Mielee
They either ignore most eye rays, or have insanely high saves and HP to not hardly be effected. | |
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nycfarmkid
Underboss
1210 Posts
Wadsworth, OH
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azuretide
Sergeant
407 Posts
| | 12/10/2005 10:59 AM |
| | Well probably the easiest way to take them out is use the hellspike prison with high initiative they shouldnt pose much of a threat on that map. I like gaele for this map too | |
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vudumumu
Sneak
83 Posts
| | 12/10/2005 11:10 AM |
| quote:
Originally posted by nycfarmkid
Which eye rays do the constructs ignore? i'm not entirely clear on that. I know in RPG they would be able to ignore most of them since they are considered spells, but it is not so in DDM.
Telekinesis, Slow, and Disintegrate would only affect them | | | |
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nycfarmkid
Underboss
1210 Posts
Wadsworth, OH
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Auramancer
Sneak
141 Posts
League City, TX
| | 12/10/2005 11:57 AM |
| | Don't forget the Warchanter. His Save +4 commander effect helps neuter Beholders. | |
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bshugg
Underboss
1833 Posts
| | 12/10/2005 12:16 PM |
| | Turn to stone, fear and inflict has no effect on them requiring them to basically roll a 19 or 20 to have any real effect on golems or undead. | |
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Damien the Bloodfeaster
Sergeant
885 Posts
Portland, OR
| | 12/10/2005 2:39 PM |
| A CE warband with a couple Zombie White Dragons works well. In addition to the usual construct/undead immunities, they are already slow, so the Slow eye ray also has no effect, leaving them vulnerable only to Telekinesis and Disintegrate (and they have the hit points to handle the latter).
After that, just build the best hard-hitting CE warband you can.
Here's one possibility:
Balor (epic) 326
Hezrou 80
Zombie White Dragon 37
Cultist of the Dragon 29
Cursed Spirit x2 22
Warrior Skeleton x2 6
500 points, 8 activations (more w. Cultist's summons)
Use the Warrior Skeletons and ZWD to screen; it's okay to sacrifice some activations to boost your initiative later on. If you can, try and take out the Dark Naga when you have a clear initiative advantage; the Balor should have no problem with this. | | | |
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warty_nosed_goblin
Underboss
1384 Posts
| | 12/10/2005 2:53 PM |
| | Epic Iron Golem, sure it'll take a while to get there, but he'll kill the beholders really fast. I'd pack my own beholder to help speed the golem up as well, then something with good init, maybe a human blackguard or lord soth... | |
Call me: W.N. Gobo!
originally posted by grim:
While he is clearly insane, he does have a point. | |
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Faragdar the Wise
Commander
3523 Posts
Albuquerque, NM, USA
| | 12/10/2005 3:28 PM |
| quote:
Originally posted by warty_nosed_goblin
Epic Iron Golem...
The only problem with the epic Iron Golem is that the slow eye ray is almost certainly going to eventually ruin his day. A slowed epic Iron Golem isn't much better than a regular Iron Golem but 200 points more. | |
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nycfarmkid
Underboss
1210 Posts
Wadsworth, OH
| | 12/11/2005 11:50 PM |
| I had my first experience playing the bands below tonight:
2x Ghaele Eladrin
2x Clay Golem
Aspect of Kord
2x Crow Shaman
Greycloak ranger
-wolf minion
I really really really enjoyed playing this band. It fits my play style well. I was expecting to do a lot of damage with the Eladrins via ranged attacks, but I found more than anyhting else that their gaze atacks were used. At one point I think I was routing all but two of my opponent's figures. They routed a HRD, Balor, Eye of Gruumsh, and Orc Champion. The HRD they routed twice. I was impressed by that.
One concern I have for this band though, after seeing the eladins' relative incapability to hit those high AC's with their +11/+11 range attacks, was how do you handle fearless figures? There isn't much the Eladrins can do. Can this band stand up to a fearless warband? Frenzied Berserkers and LG bands kind of scare me. | |
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robbdaman
Underboss
2380 Posts
| | 12/12/2005 1:11 AM |
| Ghaele Eladrin isn't all that effective when there's one of her in there.
R~ | |
Champion of the Titan
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Knight of the
Round Table
Thenameless
Warlord
11730 Posts
The Fortress of Solitude
| | 12/12/2005 1:52 AM |
| quote:
Originally posted by nycfarmkid
If you know one of your likely matchups in a 500 point tournament is going to be Dark Naga + 2 Beholders how do you go about building a band to minimize the threat from them and still be able to handle the rest of the field? Here were some of my thoughts.
Epic Aspect of Kord x2
Inspiring Marshall x2
Satyr
Xeph Warrior x2
Ialdabode.
Idea would be to move the aspects to base the Beholders, use the satyr to win initiative, then pound them into rubble. Only problem I see is that a LE Beholder Band will probably be able to out activate most other bands and the Aspects could end up getting hit in the first round. Their save of 11 isn't a sure thing against the DC 19 Beholder Rays. If It is set up right, with two GMA's I might be able to get to the Beholders in the first round before the Aspects activate. I do not really know.
Another thought was:
Ghaele Eladrin x2
Clay golem x2
Aspect of Kord
Crow Shaman x2
Greycloak Ranger
-wolf
Idea here would be that I should take a few round for the Beholders to kill the Golems and i nthat time the Eladrins can really take them out with arrows.
A Similar Option would be:
Clay Golem x2
Storm Giant
Crow Shaman x2
Cleric of Corellon Larethian
Warchanter (to up saves)
Xeph Warrior
What do you guys think?
If you will surely be facing multiple Beholders, then the last option, which includes a Storm Giant should be out. Even with a Warchanter in there, if you roll low when it counts, you've just lost half your warband. | |
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nycfarmkid
Underboss
1210 Posts
Wadsworth, OH
| | 12/12/2005 9:22 AM |
| quote:
Originally posted by robbdaman
Ghaele Eladrin isn't all that effective when there's one of her in there.
R~
I have to disagree here. Against non-fearless figures she is very good, and if you spend the time to buff her up she is a capable archer. Her base is +11/+11 for 15 damage. Cats grace and legion's magic weapon get her up to +14/+14. If you can find a sacred cirlce, like on the Tomb of Queen Peregrin(sp) map, or you have smoke (blindsight lets her shoot through it and her target cant see the attacker granting a +2 bonus) like in the Hellspike Prison map (the only two epic legal maps aside from lost temple), then her attack can go up to +16/+16. Which has a decent chance of hitting Epic AC's. Even the new epic figures saves are not terribly high, in general, and al lthose moral saves will add up. Three large bases as blockers also means figures will have a hard time getting to her to hit her in melee.
quote:
If you will surely be facing multiple Beholders, then the last option, which includes a Storm Giant should be out. Even with a Warchanter in there, if you roll low when it counts, you've just lost half your warband.
If you use the two clay golems as shields for the Storm Giant then the Beholder rays will be more or less neutralized until the golems die, which should take awhile. | |
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rhane
Underboss
1412 Posts
| | 12/12/2005 9:34 AM |
| If you are running a CE warband, and know that Beholders will be common in the field, a Zombie White Dragon is almost a must. It is virtually beholder-proof. While shoehorning it into a 200 pt warband is dubious at best, it can be easily worth its points in 500.
VS. LG, there are a few options, though an LSD with save buffed to 19 seems like a great choice.
It looks like you're more interested in CG, though, and there's no clear winner there. If I was really worried about beholders, I'd try to work a Clay Golem in, though its going to hurt your overall mobility. | |
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Faragdar the Wise
Commander
3523 Posts
Albuquerque, NM, USA
| | 12/12/2005 10:10 AM |
| quote:
Originally posted by Thenameless
quote:
Originally posted by nycfarmkid
Clay Golem x2
Storm Giant
Crow Shaman x2
Cleric of Corellon Larethian
Warchanter (to up saves)
Xeph Warrior
If you will surely be facing multiple Beholders, then the last option, which includes a Storm Giant should be out.
Not necessarily. If you block well with the Clay Golems, you probably won't have to worry about the Storm Giant sucking up an eye ray until several rounds into the match. With a Storm Giant, I'd be loads more worried about Archmage bands. If you think you'll see multiple Archmages, then this Storm Giant band is risky. If, however, Beholders have pounded the Archmage out of everybody, you could risk it. | |
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Champion of Myopic Half-Orcs
Winner, WBC X | |
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DragonVenom
Sneak
111 Posts
| | 12/12/2005 11:28 AM |
| quote:
Originally posted by Faragdar the Wise
quote:
Originally posted by Thenameless
If you will surely be facing multiple Beholders, then the last option, which includes a Storm Giant should be out.
Not necessarily. If you block well with the Clay Golems, you probably won't have to worry about the Storm Giant sucking up an eye ray until several rounds into the match. With a Storm Giant, I'd be loads more worried about Archmage bands. If you think you'll see multiple Archmages, then this Storm Giant band is risky. If, however, Beholders have pounded the Archmage out of everybody, you could risk it.
A huge amount depends on the field of battle. If you are using maps, then the new Hellspike map (the one with the smoke) is very bad for Beholders. (And very good for Archmages.)
If you expect to face Beholders, you still have to have a plan in case they win terrain initiative and get to use the Tomb map, but at the last tourney I was at, no Beholders were used at all and I think the Hellspike map scared them away. With that map in the mix, a multi-Beholder band may win a skirmish or two, but has little chance to win the tournament. Consequently, nobody who might have been serious enough to own 4-5 Beholders was foolhardy enough to play them.
So the mere existence of the Hellspike map makes multi-Archmage bands a lot stronger. Archmages have Blindsight, so they are not hindered by the smoke and Beholders' Anti-Magic Eyes don't work to protect them from spells cast from the other side of the smoke. This means Archmages can snipe at Beholders with impunity until the Beholders get through the smoke, and even then clever positioning leaves the Beholders vulnerable.
The smoke makes Beholders vulnerable to a lot of other kinds of bands too.
On another note, be careful about your Crow Shamans with the Ghaeles. If you cast Snake's Swiftness, even on your own Ghaele Eladrin, you would have to save against the Ghaele's Gaze Attack. If you are just going to use the Snake's Swiftness on an Aspect of Kord, then go ahead, but don't cast it on your Ghaele Eladrin!
DV
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nycfarmkid
Underboss
1210 Posts
Wadsworth, OH
| | 12/12/2005 11:59 AM |
| quote:
On another note, be careful about your Crow Shamans with the Ghaeles. If you cast Snake's Swiftness, even on your own Ghaele Eladrin, you would have to save against the Ghaele's Gaze Attack. If you are just going to use the Snake's Swiftness on an Aspect of Kord, then go ahead, but don't cast it on your Ghaele Eladrin!
I never really thought about that. I had always thought that you could ignore friendly gaze attacks. Anyone else know anything about this? If thats the case then this band loses some flavor for me, since I wouldn't be able to buff the Eladrin's at all without risking a morale check. | |
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Faragdar the Wise
Commander
3523 Posts
Albuquerque, NM, USA
| | 12/12/2005 12:43 PM |
| quote:
Originally posted by nycfarmkid
I had always thought that you could ignore friendly gaze attacks.
Nope. Check the glossary entry for "gaze". Buffing spells that have range "touch" or "your warband" don't trigger the gaze, though, so buffing spells are generally going to be okay. | |
"Before God we are all equally wise - and equally foolish." - Albert Einstein
Champion of Myopic Half-Orcs
Winner, WBC X | |
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nycfarmkid
Underboss
1210 Posts
Wadsworth, OH
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NightMoor
Sergeant
448 Posts
| | 12/12/2005 5:34 PM |
| | Pardon me, but isn't Ghaele Eladrin a Unique figure? Therefore meaning you can't take more than one of her? | |
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nycfarmkid
Underboss
1210 Posts
Wadsworth, OH
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One_Wing
Sergeant
494 Posts
London
| | 12/13/2005 3:01 AM |
| Helmed Horror x 4 180
Beholder x 2 166
Dark Naga 41
Lord Soth 98
Beholders can't kill four helmed horrors. four helmed horrors can kill beholders. So can other beholders, who are safely behind a fire screen.
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Thousands of Zulu's, behind You!
Proud member of PK's team low tier beasting; CG for ever!
Champion of the Dragon Disciple | |
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