Part 2

Blog of the underappreciated models part 2

After the success of part one, I have created a poll to ask you which unit or attachment (NCU’s are units as well) do you think is not good in your humble opinion.

The poll results made this a Lannister episode: The hound, the mad dog, and the boy king. Sounds like a song out of the books but it isn’t. Now technically the Nights Watch Captain was number 3 and not Lord Tywin’s mad Dog, but I’m going to move him to part 3 in order to Make this a Lannister only entry.

One last thing. In case it wasn’t clear, you can play any combination of unit with commander and attachment that you like. I’m not going over every possible combination and also tell you that you are wrong or dumb to use a certain combination. This is more about “I can’t seem to do anything with this model, I’m not using it anymore, it sucks!” “Well have you tried this?” approach.

 So if you have a combo that works, feel free to comment on this but this is more for the people who don’t want to use the model at all.

Let’s get started!

The Hound

First up is Sandor Clegane the Hound.

I’m not going to type the abilities anymore because you can read them unless I have to go into detail on a certain part. The first ability gives you a +1 to hit and Vicious in exchange for D3 Wounds. Is this a good trade people often ask? Well yes it is. Don’t look at how many extra models it makes your opponent lose compared to you. You should look at the ranks that he loses, because this will be the only factor in how many attack dice they will roll on their turn. There are 2 popular options in form of units for this fellow: The Halberdiers and the Warrior’s sons.

Let’s take a look at them both.

My personal preference goes to the Halberdiers. Here is the reason for it. Sandor kills your own men, they don’t lose attacks until you have lost 8 men. By the time you are losing dice you should have healed them with either fealty to the crown or by the [Wealth Zone]. The second reason why I like them more is because of the order Set for charge can be combined with The hound’s Fury. This was even before the new FAQ. So the enemy charges you in the front, you get 7 attacks hitting on 4-3+ with Sundering and Vicious. That is going to hurt! The third part why I like them over the Warrior’s sons, is that they cost 2 points less than the Warrior’s Sons. And with an army that has no free direwolves or cheap units except the mountain that rides, you want to keep the cost of infantry below the 10 points at all costs in games up to 40 points. By all means, if you play with your friends at the 50-80 point level, go nuts!

For the next part of his card we cannot talk about him without the tactics cards of his big brother.

 

With The Fury of the mountain, you can have 7 attack dice hitting on 3+ (reroll able if you charged), Sundering, Vicious with 5+ critical blow. This will decimate a lot of your opponents and will do more damage than whatever unit the mountain is in or the mountains men. Little tip: don’t use that card on the mountains men if you don’t have to, they already have critical blow, +1 to its effect is nice but it is better to give a unit that doesn’t have critical blow one on a 5+.

Orders to destroy is handy because in the middle of the game your opponent most likely will forget that this card is in there. Especially forgetting that your Halberdiers can charge because of this card and not just attack. 9 attack dice, hopefully rerolling, hitting on a 3+ with vicious and Sundering almost any Stark unit will hurt because of this so much that they have to heal in order to do any damage ever again. So do make sure that you use that zone before he knows what is happening. Even if you don’t need to heal, that is why this card is so deadly.

Overrun is so handy because if you play the Mountain, you are probably going to be outnumbered at this point of the current available models. You cannot have the Mountain that rides with you and so the cheapest unit you have cost 5 points and don’t fit much in a Clegane list. You are probably going to have a lot of 7-10 point units in there. With this card you can have an extra activation of sorts to destroy the enemy and pin then down. You already have the combat abilities to kill them and here is the twist. “Before rolling dice, this unit’s Melee Attack gains +1 to hit and Vicious. If it does, after this attack has been completed it suffers D3 Wounds.” The underlined part is exactly as the Hold the Line order of Brynden Tully. It has been FAQ’ed that the order lasts for the duration of the turn. So in that regard you can assume that The Hounds Fury also lasts for the turn. And you only suffer the D3 once. Seems like a very good trade off don’t you think?

Gregor Clegane, Lord Tywin’s mad Dog.

Now let’s talk about his Big Mean brother, Gregor Clegane.

-“OMG he is 3 points and you don’t get a direwolf with him!!! Also, I can’t use the Mountain that Rides either!!”

All is true but there are some good things he can do in a Lannister list. First of all, he increases you Combat potential.

-“But Lannisters are not good at combat and should focus more on fear based tactics!”

No not really. If you think that Lannisters are not good at combat, you never looked at the Knights of Casterly Rock or The Mountains Men have you? With his Inhuman Strength he gives your unit 2 additional dice ALWAYS and on ALL ranks! Not to mention they get Sundering as well.

-“But his uncontrolled Rage! My opponent can provoke a charge from me and I have to make that!”

True but not completely. You can only declare a charge you within range and within line of sight. If your opponent is within 11” of you, take a look if you have a NCU available and if the [Manoeuver Zone] is still vacant. If it is, claim it. Now you manoeuver 5” towards him and then you are at 6” away from him which you always make. If you think your opponent will not fall for this, then you have to make some weird changes. Block your line of sight by sending other troops in front of Gregor so he can’t see any enemies. When he is in charging range, shift the unit and prepare for the assault. If you don’t have enough units to spare (which is a possibility), then use another facing for the end of turn 2. With this technique you must be the first player at the beginning of the game. In this manner, you move your unit closer at the last activation so you are within charging distance and be able to make it as your first activation on round 3. If you are not the first player in round 1, then keep an eye out for the [manoeuver Zone] or activate him as soon as you can. Make sure you use Pycelle to Weaken any enemy that comes close to Gregor. And try to zap them as well with the [Crown Zone] in order to make them easier to destroy or weaken them enough that they won’t do as much damage to Gregor’s unit.

What is a perfect benefit of having a negative ability on him? Well, nobody is going to zap his powers from him anytime soon. Not by an objective or other means so you will keep your sundering and 2 additional dice for as long as you want. 

Now, which unit do you put him in? I see only 1 that is worth the 3 additional points (at this moment in time that is)

Off course, they are named after him for a reason. 10/8/6 3+ to hit, 4+ def, 7+ moral, Critical Blow, Vicious and Sundering. With those abilities and dice, not much will live after being assaulted by this unit. Not to mention that there are some commander tactic cards that will make sure you wipe out a complete unit. With Cersi influencing the enemy and then attacking them, with a minus 4 to their morale, what can survive this? Even units like the Flayed men might not take this punishment unharmed. With Hear me Roar and Fealty to the crown, this unit will heal and do more damage each time you kill at least one of the enemies models. And I’m going to assume you are going to kill more than 1. Also, try to get a vulnerable condition token on your victims as well. Pycelle excels at this by claiming the [Tactics Zone], Starks most likely want to get rid of the Weakened token then a Vulnerable Token.

Now, about which commander do I speak of? Well, this guy:

Joffrey Baratheon

I’m going to talk about him first and then I’m going to resume talking about Gregor in this guy’s army.

Let’s take a look at Joffrey’s Attachment card.

Jesus, why would you ever play with this guy? …… A special Bodyguard unit, you say?

For 6 points, this is a great unit.

-“But I can’t heal them! EVER!”

True, but you don’t lose any attacks with them either. Grant, you want to heal units but with their moral and Defence save and the fact that they don’t take penalties to Morale and never become panicked, you can say that they won’t die easily. Do be careful of any Sundering units that try to flank you or units that have attacks that never let you use Defence saves. This includes special abilities like traps. Do remember that they are fast for 3+ save unit. Keep them away from serious combat until you have weakened your opponents enough or already engaged them with another unit. If this unit ever has to make a Panic Test, they cannot lose more than 2 Wounds. That by itself is extremely powerful and some armies won’t be able to function near Joffrey’s unit.

Not to mention that this unit has a special card as well.

Giving them a free maneuver in order to make a unsuspected charge, or get them the hell out of a certain combat is very good. Not to mention that the other abilities make sure you put enough damage into your opponents that they are too weak to fight back. This one time Swiss army knife is handy to find your opponent’s weak spot and get you advantage out of it. Bad morale? Vicious and panicked. Okay Defence save? Critical blow and Sundering. A good fighting unit with a good save but you are waiting for a unit of Knights or The mountain’s Men to flank them (with Gregor)? Make them vulnerable and weakened so they won’t be able to kill you when they attack and then get decimated in the flank.

Now, let’s take a look at his Tactics Cards.

 

“You Will Obey Me!” Is a good one to use for Gregor and his men. Yes he will be Weakened but 12 dice hitting on 2+, reroll able by the charge, 6’s will be 2 hits, Sundering, Vicious. It is not unlikely to have 14 hits with this attack. This means on average you just killed a unit of Berserkers. Believe me, that will hurt a Stark Player. Even if they use Last Stand on you, this is something that they won’t see coming as often as you might think.

“Traitors! I Will Have Their Heads!” This one is very powerful because you can make a unit Panicked and then target a completely different unit with the panic Test. You might want to set up a Panicked unit that you are going to attack with Gregor or another Vicious unit and then target a completely other unit that is annoying you. Best part is, this is not your activation. This is a free thing. So after this is done, you can now charge that unit, make them do another test by claiming the [ Crown Zone] or heal a unit etc. This is handy if you need to prepare your battlefield positioning but want to do some damage at the same time. If your opponent is trying to lure your Gregor Clegane unit with a heavily damaged unit, this might even kill them before you have to try and charge them.

“I Am The King!” This card will keep your precious kings guard unit alive and well. You can play this AFTER you have rolled your defence dice. Meaning, you can see if you need to intervene or not. Remember, Losing 2 or 3 Kings Guard is no reason to panic. This also means that you can play Wealth of the rock first to help block some of those hits, and then see that you still have to many wounds. Or in case of the “Don’t allow Defense saves” you can still block those wounds. Even if you didn’t roll those dice, you can still use the trigger.

Now we all know that an unit becomes panicked after these cards and some become weakened and vulnerable. You do realise that Joffrey’s unit cannot get Panicked and you have got 1 point attachments that kill a model if you do not make a panic test in order to make it? Other tokens like weakened might be annoying but this all depends on what unit gets which token. Weakened Guardsmen will not affect you that much as weakened mountain’s men. And even so, 3+ to hit is no joke even if you have to reroll successes.

Let me know in the comments what you guys think and if you agree or disagree with my writing.

Also, the watch captain will be featured in the next blog but what will the others be? Let me know who do you want. This can be NCU’s and actual combat units as well!

Part 1

The blog for the underappreciated models

Part 1

Let me first thank you all for you overwhelming support for this. I will do my very best to ensure that you will get your times well spend reading these posts.

In each of these I will try to balance this by trying to do 1 of each of the factions. Little spoiler, I’m going to wait with the nights watch and free folk until I have a better understanding on these factions because I haven’t played many games with them.

Second part is that English is not my native tongue. I use a spelling checker from Microsoft Word to get rid of as many spellings mistakes as possible but I hope grammatically this all still makes sense. (I’m not using a translation program)

That all being said, let’s get started.

Stark

First we start with an underappreciated Stark Model: Greatjon Umber, Fierce Bannerman.

This is the 3 point attachment version.

His abilities are: Order: Fury of House Umber

When this unit makes a Melee Attack, after Attack dice are rolled:

This unit may re-roll any dice. Hits from rolls of 6 do not allow Defense Saves. This unit suffers D3 Wounds after this attack is completed.

Onslaught:

If this unit is targeted by [The Combat Zone], it may make a free Charge Action instead of an Attack action.

So, Onslaught is very straightforward. You can charge after or before you have done your activation. This is very useful in Fast and Charging heavy lists with commanders that use this. Robb Stark is one of the best that use these kind of tactics.

The other ability is handy because this is AFTER the attack dice are rolled. So you can actually see how many 6’s you rolled and then say “Yes this is worth de D3 wounds”. This is especially true if you have Critical Blow. Because this makes you have 2 hits that do not allow Defense saves for each 6 you roll.

So which units would we want to use with him? The best and cheapest is of course the Sworn Swords. With their Stark Fury and his Fury of House Umber, they will pack a serious punch. But you do take 2D3 Wounds in return. So only use his Fury if you see enough 6’s. 2 would probably be enough to use this but do not hesitate if you have 3 or more. Do be careful, if you are weakened, your opponent can still make you reroll after this.

Another good unit are the Tully Sworn Shields, but you take Rodrick Castel with you as an NCU. He gives you Critical Blow and with their 7/6/4 on 3+ they have enough attacks do make it hurt.

Now with Rodrick you can make almost any of your Stark units this death machine so why the Sworn Shields? Well because of their Shield order (When this unit is attack from the Front, after Attack dice are rolled: Automatically block D3 Hits.) you can compensate the D3 Wounds a bit each time your opponent attacks you in return. And also, who would expect a unit of Sworn Shields who just marched to assault you through the Tactics Board? They are pretty sure going to forget that you have that ability and think that you are setting up to receive a charge. This will be even more likely if you claimed an objective with them.

Lannister

Now let’s take a Lannister model under this scope. One that is unpopular online but a favorite in the Organized Play Scene is Tyrion Lannister: Halfman.

His order is :Superior Tactician:

When an Opponent plays a Tactics card:

Roll a die. On a 5+, cancel the effect of that Tactics card. You may discard a Tactics card to re-roll this die (this may be repeated).

Many people online seem to forget that if you use this version of him, you have both his commander Tactics cards and the regular Lannister Tactics cards at your fingers. For instance, you have counterplot in your deck that makes you do the same thing but on a 3+ (reroll able if you have the [crown zone]. If your opponent uses a Tactics card that you HAVE to STOP, if you have Counterplot in your hands, then use it. If you have it but the card isn’t that important to stop, use Superior Tactician instead. If you don’t have Counterplot but must stop the card, you can try to discard some other cards to make you reroll the effect.

But I need those cards, I don’t want to sacrifice them!

Well lets go over his tactics cards to discover something.

First up: Adaptive Tactics: Start of any turn:

Place this card at the bottom of your Tactics Deck and return 1 discarded Tactics card to your hand. If you control the [Tactics Zone], 1 opponent must also randomly discard 1 Tactics card.

With this card you can sacrifice your tactics cards more easily because you can get them back. Second good thing, your discard pile is open. If you get through your deck, all your cards are in an open pile that you can grab with this card, and your deck becomes 2 versions of Adaptive Tactics that you keep getting to get the right card at the right time.

Cunning Ploy: When a friendly Combat unit activates:

Instead of this unit performing an action, 1 previously activated combat unit may perform 1 action instead (this unit still gains an activation token). If you control [tactics zone], opponents may not play Tactics cards this turn.

Because of this card, Tyrion wants 1 or 2 cheap units (the mountain that rides comes to mind but a normal unit of Guardsmen with no attachment just sitting on a objective at your side will be good enough as well). One of the best units to keep activating is a 6 point unit of Lannister Crossbowmen. Combine this with the [Combat Zone] you can shoot 3 times at the same opponent if needed in 1 turn.

Delay Orders: When an enemy would activate a combat unit:

That enemy must choose a different Combat unit (if able).

If you control the [Tactics Zone], you may choose the unit that must activate instead.

This is very useful in terms of controlling objectives but also to disrupt your opponents plan. Let’s say that if you can choose to activate the Tywin’s Mad Dog (Gregor Clegane) before he was in position to charge because he hasn’t had the time to use the [Manoeuvre Zone], he might be forced to do an almost impossible charge action. This is also with other units that were waiting for you to come closer.

Now we all know that the best NCU for him is Varys. His ability with the Intrigue and Subterfuge Tactics card, you now almost neuter your opponents army every turn.

The unit I would put this version of Tyrion would be a regular 5 point unit of Lannister Guardsmen. So he can lay back on the battlefield and claim objectives. Do be careful with outflanking units or other fast paced units (Dire wolves and cavalry).

Neutral

I can’t really talk about Tyrion without mentioning Bronn The Sell sword.

I’m going to focus on putting him on units of the Neutral, Stark and Lannister faction, but I’ll mention him with some potential Nights watch units as well.

Let’s start with his ability that I’m guessing most of you will know but for the newcomers who didn’t had the chance of buying him, here we go:

Extra Incentive: While you control the [Wealth zone], this unit gains +1(SPD), rolls +2 Attack dice, and gains +2 to Morale Test rolls.

He is 2 points so in the middle to most people but I call it cheap.

You can put him in a Bolton Cutthroats unit but even with 5+ morale I don’t think that he will last long in there but will do a bunch of damage. The only problem is that for 1 points you can have the dreadfort captain that will do more morale damage to other units than Bronn does with 2 extra dice on the unit he is attacking.

The better unit of the neutral faction he can be put on right now (21^st of may 2019) is the Bastard’s girls. Why? Well give them 3+ moral, 6 SPD, on range attack 6-6-6 and on melee it is 8-8-5. Combine him with this unit if you use the High Sparrow as your commander and you will not be disappointed.

If you play Stark, he is a bit more trickier to use because of the fact that you need to control the wealth zone. In case you do use him, don’t use him on the Beserkers, that would be wasting him. In theory, Bronn works with almost everyone else. Remember that you can never use all of his abilities at the same time anyway, unless you charge. You can use him with the Sworn Swords in order to use more attack dice, same is with the bowmen. The drawback is that they still have a 4+ to hit, not counting Stark Fury. But Bronn will shine the most with Umber Greataxes or Tully Sworn Shields. Same as you use Robb’s attachment, their speed will increase the most. In both cases, having 10-8-8 or 9-8-6 will help a lot. But I must remind you, with Brydon Tully, Unyielding Knight, you have almost the same all the time you started the turn engaged and not if you control a zone you don’t care about.

Now let’s talk about the faction he is the most welcome with: House Lannister. The guardsmen even become a fast, steadfast killing machine with Bronn. Don’t believe me? Okay, let’s go over theirs stats with him combined. If you control the [wealth zone], the stat line would be: 5SPD, 8-7-5 on a 4+ in melee (that is better than sworn swords without using Stark Fury). 3+ defense, 5+ morale so meaning that Lannister Supremacy will more likely than not be triggered if your opponent does attack. With these stat line you should attack with these guys more often than you would normally defend. 5+ morale is better than the auto pass by killing a model that the captain gives. Especially because that is an Order that people are going to try and trigger. With the Lannister halberdiers he could be good their main problem is their 4+ to hit, not the fact that they need more dice. Same can be said about the guards but they have another way of dealing damage. For 1 point less you have the assault veteran or for the same points The Hound and his ability will do a lot more damage than 2 dice can do. Next unit are the Mountain’s men. Upping their speed and dice is fun, their moral as well but for 1 point less you have the dreadfort captain. And for 1 more the feared Mad Dog Gregor Clegane himself but I’ll leave him for another blog so I can use him there. So you can use him in this unit but there are better attachments. Now the best in my opinion: the crossbowmen. Why? Well having a 9-9-5 on a 3+ attack with 14” range (we count the 2” shift in this), they are a pain. Combine this with Tyrion as your commander, it is not unthinkable you get to shoot a unit 3 times with them in 1 round. (you will have to claim the [combat zone] as well) With sundering, that is a pain. I don’t have Pyromancers but with only a 6+ save I don’t think he will live long with them. But I you play a “Blitzkrieg” style and try to get as much damage in before you die. But this unit has not much staying power even with a 5+ morale for 9 points. You can have expensive troops, but they must survive in order to benefit from these expansive costs.

With the Nights watch, the best unit to put him in right now is the Sworn Brothers. You can put him in the veterans or the ranger hunters but you are paying a hefty price for him. If you do use him on veterans, consider using Donal Noye as an NCU in order to increase your defensive skills and try to use the Sword in the darkness on a different unit. This makes your opponent choose between taking the Combat zone and the Wealth zone. And they normally can’t take both.

What do you guys think?

Let me know in the comments.