Battle Report: Circle Orboros vs. Cryx

I played Tony finally at my LGS on Tuesday. I came prepared to play 50 points of Baldur the Stonesoul's Theme Force. Tony only really has enough for 35 points and I'm more than willing to pair down my list to make it work. I'm very happy with my 50 point list so I thought it'd be difficult to slim the list down. It turned out not to be the case. I ended up dropping the Woldwarden, Shifting Stones, and Lord of the Feast from my 50 point list to make it 35 points.

Hour of Reckoning
Baldur the Stonesoul
* Megalith
* Woldwatcher
* Woldwyrd
Celestial Fulcrum
Druids of Orboros w/Overseer
Shifting Stones w/Stone Keeper

This fulfills the list requirements for Tier 4, giving the Fulcrum Advance Move, Shifting Stones (and Gallows Groves if I had them) 20" deployment, cheaper Woldwatchers and Woldwyrds, and +2 SPD to Megalith on turn one. If I was going to make changes to the list, I would possibly change the following things: Drop the Fulcrum for a Wold Guardian/Woldwarden and/or drop the Stone Keeper for a Gallows Grove. I'm not sure 100% on those changes, but they are things I want to test out.

I'm very impressed by the current lists handling of infantry. Between Crevasse and the Fulcrum's many attacks, I was able to eliminate a ton of infantry quickly and easily. Megalith hits pretty hard but I don't think I have enough answers to deal with a lot of heavies at the same time. This is why I'm thinking about adding in the Wold Guardian/Woldwarden. They'll provide another heavy that can do a bunch of damage.

I played against Tony Iron Lich Asphyxious list he created on the fly. We didn't know it, but it was eligible for a Theme Force to give the Mechanithralls AD. I'm not sure if this would have changed his game plan, but it might have.

Iron Lich Asphyxious
* Reaper
* Slayer
* Cankerworm
* Nightwretch
* Nightwretch
Bane Thralls (10)
Mechanithralls (10)
Skarlock Thrall

I won the roll to go first so I setup first as well. I deployed Megalith to the left of my Fulcrum, with Baldur and the Woldwyrd to the right of the Fulcrum. These were all centrally on the table. Tony deployed his warjacks on my left with some Bane Thralls with Asphyxious, Mechanithralls, a Nightwretch, and the Skarlock to the center/right. A hill was in the center of the board nearer to my side with a forest to the right. To the left of the hill was a building. In the center of Tony's deployment was a 5" diameter impassable pillar that he had to move around. For Advance Deployment, I put my Shifting Stones in front of Megalith and the Druids of Orboros and Woldwatcher to the right of my army. Tony deployed the Cankerworm behind the building.

Turn 1 we both advance forward. I run forward quite a bit to hold the line between the building, hill, and forest. I learned here that placing the Shifting Stones in front of Megalith was a bad idea. I should have placed them in front of Baldur so he could cast some spells and be teleported.

Turn 2 I wreck his Nightwretch near Asphyxious as he moved it too far forward. I can't really hit anything else. I also wrecked his Cankerworm as he ran it in to block my Shifting Stones. I placed my rock wall in front of the hill to prevent charges at my stuff. He runs forward with all of his stuff to try to clog me down.

End of my turn 2

Turn 3 I ended up spending a lot of the time clearing out a bunch of his Bane Thralls and killing all of his Mechanithralls. I recast the Rock Wall directly in front of Asphyxious as he had moved to within 8" of Baldur to prevent the charge and then backed Baldur out of threat range along with feating. I didn't charge Asphyxious with Baldur yet because Asphyxious was sitting at ARM 23 and Baldur was only P+S 16 with 7 attacks. I didn't think I could kill him that turn. His turn 3 didn't accomplish much except hurting the Fulcrum a bunch with a Slayer, killing a few Druids of Orboros with Asphyxious, feating with Asphyxious, and then teleporting into Baldur's melee range as well as tying up the Fulcrum with Asphyxious.

Turn 4 was endgame. I spent the beginning parts of my turn killing the Slayer, the remaining Bane Thralls, pushing the Reaper back, killing the Skarlock, and trying to hurt the Nightwretch. It turned out that none of that mattered as the Woldwatcher headbutted the Iron Lich down and Baldur used 5 attacks to eliminate him. Baldur was P+S 17 and Asphyxious was ARM 21 (camping 5 focus).

A view of the endgame

Things I learned in the battle:

1. Use the Shifting Stones to teleport Baldur early on so I can cast spells and not feel like I'm stuck in the back.
2. Baldur hits pretty hard at P+S 17, he can probably kill a warcaster at P+S 16 if the warcaster wasn't camping everything.
3. The Druids of Orboros Overseer doesn't have Forcebolt. I tried to get in position to use that once and it turned out to be worthless.

All in all, I'm very happy with the Theme Force and can't wait to play it more. Baldur the Stonesoul is fast becoming one of my favorite Circle Warlocks.