Rethinking the Empire post Home Con

Alrighty, so Home Con has been and gone. I've spent the last few weeks kinda avoiding the hobby. Not on purpose of course...more just taking a mental break to refresh.

I had 2 games 2 weekends ago with my Helves and Empire vs WoC. These games were very much dominated by the WoC lvl4 IFing turn 1 both games (game 1- sucked into warp, game 2-became a lvl1). The Empire game was a lot closer than the High Elf game when my horde Whitelions wiped out the 2hw Korn Warriors in 1 round (the Kwar charged me), then took out the Tznch warriors the next. Whitelions are nasty and should be avoided at all costs. At this rate my 2 boxes of Phoenix Guard are going to be spending alot longer on the sprue waiting for an armybook upgrade to justify their inclusion in an army. Swordmasters are still awesome-even if just from the threat factor. Lore of shadow and High Magic on the lvl2 is an awesome combo. The threat of drain magic means I can get the hexes off easier as dice are held back. My Star Trek fanboi credentials were tarnished though when wraith of Khaine only killed 1 doggie all game...

The Empire game was rather interesting. One of my Halberd blocks took a pounding early on, so reformed to bus only to get the discman in the rear. Careful use of lore of light and challenges meant that unit survived (holding lvl4, BSB and wpriest!). But damn can a WoC hero with the breath weapon rip through units! The other unit was lost to the Tzch warriors in a prolonged grind, but I cleaned up everything else for a comfortable win.

Last weekend was the Auckland tournament with the weird comp that I did not attend. I got a game or 2 tomorrow where I test my "revised" Empire list that rifts off the lessons learned and observed at Home Con + with the Ogres now a "real" consideration.

The list I'll be trialing:

Alector:Walter, GW, AOMI, VHS                    286
lvl4: shadow, seal of destruction, ruby ring, dragon bane gem     285

BSB: FPA, Opal Amulet, ch.shield, ICI,                 108
W.Priest: HA, fencers "hammers"                    129
Captasus: FPA, sh, Dhel, SoMight, Dstone            160

38 Halberds: FC                            210
38 Halberds: FC                            210
2x5 FCompany Detach                        50
30 Flagellants                            300
10 xbows                            80
2x5 5 archers detach                        80

2 Cannons                            200

Stank                                300

2398

So some choices are aesthetic (dual hammers W.Priest is the most bad ass model ever...other than Fabio Valten), others are obvious (2 cannons).

I've opted to gross myself out and take stanky walter for a number of reasons that were mainly motivated by dropping the 2nd unit of Flagellants.
I found that 600 points in very squishy models can be awesome!, but if someone has the ability to stay out of combat and just simply shoot them = massive points liability. This happened vs Pete's Skaven, and Jack's Empire, and I forsee it vs any Lizardman/Delf/woodie list I come across.

Bringing in the Walter gives me loremaster 6 dice monkey of cool-freeing up my lvl4 for shadow. The last wee while I've stopped using the area of affect lore of light spells (other than pha's turn 1/2). This is due to me becoming more selective in my combat decisions, and from using shadow with High elves (ie forcing me to focus on 1 combat at a time). Shadow gives me the tools to deal with the things my Empire really struggle with (ARMOUR)...with mindrazor and also Pit for the big scaries (Im looking at you Ogres!).

It also ties up points in a hard to get place.

To counter the "focus on 1 thing at a time" I've added more chaff....skirmishing chaff. this means I should always catch the manglers + a little bit more token shooting (woot!) that is not to be underestimated;  my archer detachments in 7th were fantastic at killing Greater Demons...

Also early game I have 2 magic missiles/turn to throw at opponents + pit if I have it. This + the shooting = clearing out the chaff and keeping the pressure up.

WHY NO ROCKET BATTERY????????????
For the same reason I dropped the mortar. I dont want to spend points on an Engineer to baby sit it + it's more free points for stuff that gets past my lines/comes on from behind. With 2 cannons, magic missles and shadow = dont really need "another" template. It also stops me feeling bad having Stanky walter...Jack was very correct when stating that walter, stank, engineered Rocketbattery, 2 cannons is a very, very strong empire build starting point! I like to sit just behind the "max" build out of principle.


Anyway, looking forward to gaming tomorrow and also vs Pete....if you're reading this...NO TAILORING!