After an exciting day 1 at the Harvester of Souls, I played some great games of Commander with some friends (Marchesa and Ur-Dragon for those of you who care what decks I tend to run), ate some excellent pizza, and was ready to go for round 4.
Once again, here’s my list if you haven’t read the last report.
Jaden Iwaasa – The Harvester of Souls 2022
Super-Heavy Detachment 1CP (Chaos Knights) [97 pl, 1830 pts.
Iconoclast House: Herpetrax
– Lord of War –
Knight Abominant [24 pl, 460 pts]: Volkite Combuster, Diabolus Heavy Stubber, Electroscourge, Titanic Feet, Balemace, Stratagem, Tyrannical Court, Aura of Terror, Stratagem, Corrupted Heirlooms, Veil of Medrengard, Favour of the Dark Gods, Blessing of the Dark Master, Psychic Powers, Winds of the Warp, Vortex Terrors
Knight Desecrator [22 pl, 440 pts]: Warlord, Stratagem, Warlord Trait, Knight Diabolus, Stratagem, Relic, The Diamonas, Diabolus Heavy Stubber, Reaper Chainsword, Titanic Feet, Favour of the Dark Gods, Mark of the Dread Knight
War Dog Executioner Squadron [9 pl, 170 pts]: Iconoclast Dreadblade, Precision Cruelty, 2x War Dog Autocannon, Diabolus Heavy Stubber, Favour of the Dark Gods, Mirror of Fates
War Dog Stalker Squadron [25 pl, 455 pts] x3: Stratagem, Corrupted Heirlooms, Helm of Dogs, 2x Avenger Chaincannon, 1x Daemonbreath Thermal Spear, 3x Diabolus Heavy Stubber, 3x Slaughterclaw, Favour of the Dark Gods, Beguiling Majesty
War Dog Stalker Squadron [17 pl, 305 pts] x2: Daemonbreath Spear, Diabolus Heavy Stubber, Reaper Chaintalon, Favour of the Dark Gods, Collar of Infernal Brass
Super-Heavy Auxiliary Detachment 0 CP (Chaos Knights) [9 pl, 170 pts]
Iconoclast Dreadblade: Bold Tyrants
– Lord of War –
War Dog Executioner Squadron [9 pl, 170 pts]: 2x War Dog Autocannon, Diabolus Heavy Stubber, Favour of the Dark Gods, Warp-Borne Stalker
Round 4 vs. Darryl (Thousand Sons, Duplicity)
I’ve played a couple of games with Thousand Sons so I had a vague understanding of what he was capable of doing, and we were finally back on a 5 objective mission.
This is what Darryl was running.
++ Battalion Detachment 0CP (Chaos – Thousand Sons)
Cults of the Legion: Cult of Duplicity
+ HQ +
Ahriman [9 PL, 3 Cabal Points, 180pts]: 12. Glamour of Tzeentch, 21. Presage, 23. Temporal Surge, Disc of Tzeentch
Exalted Sorcerer [7 PL, 3 Cabal Points, 120pts]: 11. Gaze of Hate, 11. Tzeentch’s Firestorm, Athenaean Scrolls, Inferno Bolt Pistol, Rehati
Infernal Master [5 PL, -2CP, 2 Cabal Points, 90pts]: 22. Weaver of Fates, 3. Capering Imps, 6. Malefic Maelstrom, Master Misinformator, Stratagem: Relic, Stratagem: Warlord Trait, Umbralefic Crystal, Warlord
+ Troops +
Rubric Marines [6 PL, 2 Cabal Points, 110pts]: Icon of Flame . Aspiring Sorcerer: 13. Doombolt, Plasma pistol . 3x Rubric Marine w/ inferno boltgun: 3x Inferno boltgun . Rubric Marine w/ soulreaper cannon: Soulreaper cannon
Rubric Marines [6 PL, 2 Cabal Points, 110pts]: Icon of Flame . Aspiring Sorcerer: 13. Doombolt, Plasma pistol . 3x Rubric Marine w/ inferno boltgun: 3x Inferno boltgun . Rubric Marine w/ soulreaper cannon: Soulreaper cannon
Rubric Marines [12 PL, 1 Cabal Points, 165pts] . Aspiring Sorcerer: 32. Pyric Flux, Warpflame pistol . 6x Rubric Marine w/ warpflamer: 6x Warpflamer
Tzaangors [4 PL, 70pts] . Twistbray: Tzaangor blades . 9x Tzaangor w/ Tzaangor blades: 9x Tzaangor blades
+ Elites +
Scarab Occult Terminators [21 PL, 1 Cabal Points, 440pts]: 2x Hellfyre missile rack . Scarab Occult Sorcerer: 31. Empyric Guidance, Inferno combi-bolter, Rites of Coalescence .
7x Terminator: 7x Inferno combi-bolter, 7x Prosperine khopesh .
Terminator w/ Heavy Weapon: Heavy warpflamer .
Terminator w/ Heavy Weapon: Heavy warpflamerScarab Occult Terminators [21 PL, 1 Cabal Points, 445pts]: 2x Hellfyre missile rack . Scarab Occult Sorcerer: 31. Cacodaemonic Curse, Ardent Automata, Inferno combi-bolter .
7x Terminator: 7x Inferno combi-bolter, 7x Prosperine khopesh .
Terminator w/ Heavy Weapon: Soulreaper cannon .
Terminator w/ Heavy Weapon: Soulreaper cannonTzaangor Shaman [4 PL, 1 Cabal Points, 70pts]: 21. Temporal Manipulation
+ Fast Attack +
Chaos Spawn [3 PL, 69pts] . 3x Chaos Spawn: 3x Hideous mutations
Chaos Spawn [3 PL, 69pts] . 3x Chaos Spawn: 3x Hideous mutations
Tzaangor Enlightened [3 PL, 54pts]: Aviarch, Fatecaster greatbows . 2x Enlightened . . 2x Disc of Tzeentch: 2x Disc blades
++ Total: [16 Cabal Points, 104 PL, 3CP, 1,992pts] ++
We were playing The Scouring, a five objective mission with a secondary that requires players to scan objectives for extra points.
I won the roll and chose Defender so that I could, once again, make it hard for him to put relevant terrain on his half of the center. This ended up being massively important to the game.
Darryl chose Wrath of Magnus, Bring it Down, and Mutate Landscape as his secondaries. I went with Grind Them Down, Storm of Darkness, and Ruthless Tyranny.
I chose not to deep strike my Executioner because I wanted as many Damage 3 guns on the table as physically possible on turn 1. He was only starting with 2 CP, so if I could force him to use one or two here and there it would be very difficult to use the -1 damage stratagem on his Terminators.
Darryl set up some flanking moves on me, with the flamer Rubrics hidden really well in the center building there.
He won the roll off for first (which is a shame, I would have loved first turn in this matchup), and used a Stratagem to redeploy his unit of Flamer marines up close and personal with my War Dog Stalker carrying the Collar of Infernal Brass. Wanting to kill a literally immune to psychic damage late game model makes sense.
Round One:
Thousand Sons
Darryl moves things up about as far as they can move normally. Every single defensive buff on the table goes on the bottom side Terminators. In the end, they’re -1 to hit, -1 to wound, 4+ Invulnerable Save, and +1 to hit and wound.
His psychic phase largely doesn’t do damage to my things, as his advance placed unit of Rubric Marines does the psychic secondary action on the objective.
Thankfully, his flamers and the bolter shots he is able to get into the War Dog Stalker largely bounce off or are reduced dramatically by the dense cover he’s standing right behind. With that, the turn ends and it’s over to me.
Chaos Knights
Pretty easy movement phase here – I don’t really want to move forward with many things at all, but I do need to capture the center of the board and my Abominant is just the dude for the job.
My War Dogs all move to get good lines on the only Terminator unit that isn’t hugging cover – AKA the one with all the buffs on it – and we move to the psychic phase.
The Abominant rolls like an absolute legend, making the Winds of the Warp check with a 10 and the Vortex Terrors check with an 11. This is hugely important as it denies part of Wrath of Magnus as Darryl only managed one Malediction here.
The shooting phase goes reasonably well, and I take half the Terminators off the board. I don’t actually bother shooting at anything else except the far side Chaos Spawn, which absorb some Chain Cannon and Stubber shots.
My fight phase is pretty expected, with two War Dog Stalkers with Reaper Chaincleavers making very short work of the unit of Rubrics. At the end of the turn, I scored three on Ruthless Tyranny, another three on Grind Them Down, and started a Storm of Darkness on the bottom side with my Executioner who wasn’t planning on moving anytime soon anyway.
Round Two:
I opt to head into Darkness on my Harbingers of Dread pathways, making models take Dread Tests or half their charges/shoot the closest thing depending on the circumstance.
Thousand Sons
The models continue the slow advance of blue-ness. Critically, Darryl cannot make it onto the center objective with his Terminators unless he casts the new version of Warptime on them (I can’t recall the exact name of the spell now). Fortunately for me, that particular power fails to land.
His mortal wound bomb Exalted Sorcerer starts putting the hurt on my Desecrator, and the buffs all go on the other side unit of Terminators now that the bottom unit is down to half ish strength.
Some unit or other does the psychic objective action on the top right objective, and Darryl launches into another shooting phase with gusto.
Unfortunately, his heavy weapons largely miss things, and my Collar of Infernal Brass War Dog Stalker survives another deluge of Bolter fire. Sadly though, my Desecrator eats it after sustaining 80% of an army worth of attacks.
Chaos Knights
I move up pretty aggressively after scoring my 12 points on Primary. I want to make sure everything relevant is within 12″ of the Abominant for next turn.
In my Psychic Phase, I once again roll very well and get both powers off, denying more points on Wrath of Magnus.
My shooting phase evaporates both units of Chaos Spawn and his dinged up unit of Terminators.
I opt not to charge Ahriman (hiding behind the bottom right building) with my very nearly dead Collar of Infernal Brass War Dog as I don’t want to lose the -2 to casting ability from his Dread Aura.
End of the turn I’ve scored another 3 on Ruthless Tyranny, 3 off Storm of Darkness, and another 3 off Grind Them Down.
Darryl has scored 4 on Bring It Down, another 3 on Mutated Landscapes, and only the minimum amount on Wrath of Magnus.
I start a Storm of Darkness with my Executioner on the top left objective.
Round 3:
I continue in the Darkness pathway of Harbingers of Dread, giving his models -1 to hit outside of 12 inches.
Thousand Sons
He moves up with most of his guys on the top of the board, but Ahriman zooms out of dodge like crazy to the other side of the top building.
During his Psychic Phase, the Exalted Sorcerer dumps some mortal wounds into my Executioner that is doing the action up top, leaving it on 4.
His shooting phase really showcases the power of Aura of Terror and Dread Tests though.
Every single unit that wants to shoot at either the Executioner or the Stalker instead shoots at the Abominant, who tanks all of the random s4 shots with aplomb.
Chaos Knights
I score another 12 on Primary, and start moving the Abominant onto the top right objective so that it can kill the pesky Exalted Sorcerer.
War Dogs move up as well, pushing the line of battle well into Darryl’s table half.
My psychic phase this turn whiffs completely, and my shooting phase manages to take out half the Terminators, another unit of Rubrics, and the Tzaangor Enlightened as well as the Shaman.
I charge the Exalted Sorcerer with the Abominant, who flicks the annoying little man off the table and unlocks his Favour all at once.
At the end of the round, I start a Storm of Darkness in the middle and score max on everything else. Darryl scores nothing on Bring it Down and then max on Wrath of Magnus.
Round 4:
I continue into Darkness, giving everything -1 to hit my models in combat.
Thousand Sons
The Terminators move on up with the intention of fighting my forward Stalker which is body blocking for my Executioner.
The Psychic Phase is down to perhaps three casters now, one of which is Ahriman who mostly has defensive tech.
Unfortunately, my War Dog Stalker who has been tanking the entire opposing force thanks to the Collar succumbs to a couple of Bolter shots and dies, ending the action in the middle of the table.
The Terminators and Ahriman both charge my Stalker, who lives convincingly thanks to the -1 Damage Stratagem.
The good boy hits back and kills a couple of Terminators.
Chaos Knights
I score 8 without the center objective, and kick things into movement. Largely speaking, models move towards the few remaining dangerous models.
The Stalker in combat falls back, and since I’m quite flush with CP I splurge on exploding sixes for the War Dogs into the Terminators.
They all die.
So does Ahriman.
Then, my Nurgle Stalker (bottom right) sneaks around to the back of the Tzaangor unit and…kills two? Kills two.
Still, enough run away that Darryl isn’t controlling that objective anymore.
At the end of my turn, the only remaining alive models are 3 Rubric Marines hiding in the center building, the Infernal Master (same position) and 5 Tzaangors locked in combat with my War Dog.
I start a Storm of Darkness in the middle of the table.
The Rest of the Game:
My Stalker wins the fight with the Tzaangors, and the Infernal Master can’t run away far enough. I end up killing everything on the table in the final round, maxing out most of my secondaries, and maxing Primary as well.
Post Game Thoughts:
This was a really interesting matchup, and one that I was unsure I was favored in off the bat. The sheer density of t7 and t8 bodies was really problematic once the lines closed, and being able to use my own -1 damage stratagem in melee was also clutch against the D2 weapons the Terminators lug around.
I felt like I was correct to be very passive for the first couple of turns, and then to switch and move completely aggressively rounds 3, 4, and 5. The sheer amount of D3 or higher shooting the list puts out was also a significant problem for Darryl, as any failed saves on his Terminators often meant instant death.
This is a game I’d like to try a couple more times before making a definitive statement, but it definitely felt like I was advantaged into it.
With that, on to round 5!
Round 5 vs. Drew, Adeptus Sororitas (Blood Rose)
Ah Sisters, the entire reason I have a deep striking Executioner.
Drew was running this little number, and once again we found ourselves on a six objective map.
Battalion Detachment 2CP (Adepta Sororitas)
Order: Bloody Rose
-No Slot-
Repentia Superior [3pl, 40pts]
Hospitaller [3pl, 50pts]
-Agents of the Imperium-
Ephrael Stern and Kyganil [6pl, 120pts]
-HQ-
Morvenn Vahl [14pl, 280pts] Warlord
Cannoness [5pl, 105pts -2cp] Inferno Pistol, frag and krak grenades, Relic: Blade of Saint Ellynor, Saint in the making: Righteous Rage WLT, Blessings of the Faithful: Word of the Emperor
-Troops-
Battle Sister Squad [3pl, 55pts] x4, Boltguns, Frag and Krak grenades, Sister Superior, Boltgun, Chainsword
Battle Sister Squad [3pl, 55pts] x4, Boltguns, Frag and Krak grenades, Sister Superior, Boltgun, Chainsword
Novitiates [4pl, 75pts] x9, Auto Pistols, Frag and Krak grenades, Novitiate Superior, Boltgun
-Elites-
Celestian Sacresants [8pl, 112pts] x7, Anointed Halberds, Bolt Pistols, Frag and Krak grenades, Sacresant Superior, Anointed Halberd, Bolt Pistol
Sisters Repentia [6pl, 98pts] x7 Sisters Repentia [6pl, 98pts] x7
Sisters Repentia [3pl, 56pts] x4
Dogmata [4pl, 65pts, -2cp] Hymn: 3. Psalm of Righteous Smiting, Relic: Chaplet of Sacrifice, Saint in the Making: Blazing Ire WLT
Dogmata [4pl, 65pts] Hymn: 1. Refrain of Blazing Piety
-Fast Attack-
Zephyrim Squad [8pl, 110pts] x6, Bolt Pistols, Power Swords, Frag and Krak grenades, Zephyrim Superior, Bolt Pistol, Power Sword, Zephyrim Pennant
Zephyrim Squad [8pl, 110pts] x6, Bolt Pistols, Power Swords, Frag and Krak grenades, Zephyrim Superior, Bolt Pistol, Power Sword, Zephyrim Pennant
Seraphim Squad [4pl, 80pts] x2, Bolt Pistols, x2 Hand Flamers, Frag and Krak grenades, Seraphim Superior, Bolt Pistol, Chainsword
-Heavy Support-
Retributor Squad [9pl, 196pts] x3 Boltguns, x4 Multi-melta, Frag and Krak grenades, Retributor Superior, Boltgun, 2x Armourium Cherubs
Retributor Squad [6pl, 150pts] x4 Multi-melta, Frag and Krak grenades, Retributor Superior, Boltgun, Armourium Cherub
-Dedicated Transport-
Sororitas Rhino [4pl, 80pts] Stormbolter
-Total-
[110pl, 2000pts, 2cp]
All the Dice went off the rails for the starting roll this game, and I ended up both as attacker and going first.
We were playing Recover the Relics, a six objective map with a strange score 1 for 4, score 2 for 8, score more for 12 set up. It also has the most Knights friendly secondary portion of the scenario, giving a point for each unit destroyed per round.
Terrain setup mattered very little in that the center of the table was completely unimportant and screening your own objectives was the obvious thing to do.
Drew took Defend the Shrine (bottom left), Sacred Grounds, and Bring it Down.
I took the familiar trio of Grind Them Down, Ruthless Tyranny, and Storm of Darkness.
I unfortunately only have two pictures of this game. Brains were focused and positioning was important and the phone largely just stayed in my pocket the entire time so I could give the match – and Drew – my full attention.
The picture below is kind of the entire game in a nutshell though.
Every turn, I sacrificed a model on the altar of one or two the forward two objectives and the big knights slowly marched up the center until they arrived into the fight.
The bottom left objective was Drew’s chosen objective for Defend the Shrine, and I was able to stop him from scoring it for multiple turns once the Abominant got there.
Crucial moments this game largely came in rounds 4 and 5, where the Aura of Terror caused all the characters on the table to fail charges with the Dread Tests, as well as kept a backline War Dog Executioner alive due to forcing an entire unit of Retributors to shoot the Abominant when it had Blessing of the Dark Master unlocked.
Drew pulled off a sneaky Deep Strike to force Sacred Ground through for max on turn 4 after I had to move a War Dog off the back objective to get in range of targets, and even managed to score 12 on his final turn by killing a couple of key War Dogs.
But it wasn’t quite enough. My endless marching forward and relatively easy maxed out Primary, combined with keeping his Defend the Shrine so suppressed gave me the win in a very close, very excellent game.
Final Thoughts:
The Event:
Every single event that I have gone to run by the fantastic team at The Gamer’s Haven in Spokane has been incredible. If you are in the area, or even if you’re not in the immediate area, this place is an incredible community and their events are top notch.
The venue – a gymnasium across the street from the store – was fantastic for the purpose, and the judge team was responsive, knowledgable, and very approachable. Their next big event is called The Storm and it’s late spring 2023 – I plan on attending and I’d highly recommend checking it out.
My Games:
I had lovely opponents every round, to the point where I had to roll a die for ranking sportsmanship because I just couldn’t choose. I’ve been really enjoying the variety of strong factions in the game presently, with each of the games that I played requiring dramatically different tactics and prioritizations for targeting and timing.
I’m very happy with my play overall. I can definitely identify mistakes in every game, and I’m looking forward to trying to make them get smaller and smaller as I refine my play patterns.
Warhammer is enjoying a period of incredibly good balance at the moment, and I’m excited to keep playing.
My List:
I really like my list. I think the War Dog layout is pretty close to exactly correct, and I’ve really liked the Abominant as an “anti-warp ritual/psychic interrogation” bot that also happens to get incredibly tanky and turn entire games around with Aura of Terror.
I think that double Executioner is a must in the current meta of “Terminators and Harlequin Bikes and other three wound things”. I am as of yet unconvinced that the Karnivore is a requirement when you can make any of the other War Dogs hit on 2s with a 1 CP stratagem.
I’ve now tried out the Brigand version of the list and I just am unconvinced by it. The mass amounts of Thermal Spears is really nice into some very specific lists, but I’m mostly concerned about blobs of resilient 3 wound things at this point and the Autocannons are both way longer range and also more consistent about dealing with things like Terminators.
Here’s some numbers from unitcrunch.com looking at one Autocannon Dog vs. the Brigand against a baseline unit of Terminators with nothing but Armour of Contempt.
Obviously this is kinda unlikely to be the case as Terminator bricks tend to have some defensive buff or are in cover. Here’s where they are both in cover and have -1 to hit applied to them.
In both cases the Autocannon is a tiny bit worse statistically (though only just), and you get more opportunities to use it with the longer range. It’s also much more useful against Marine type units as each hit that goes through is an auto death.
Going Forward:
Since list lock for The Harvester, we’ve had the exciting news that the Magaera is now an Abhorrent class model. This is a huge deal, as the Magaera is our most versatile knight chassis, and retains something of the 8th edition stats that a big knight kinda misses in that it’s still MOV 12. It also ignores cover natively and has a 5+ Invulnerable save in melee.
I have some silly ideas for a double Magaera list, with an Aura of Corruption Stalker to make the Lightning Cannons wound T8 things on 4s and everything else T4 and lower on 2s.
This does, unfortunately, lose a War Dog as the Magaera is still a whopping 500 points baseline, and we want to load them up with the defensive Favours, but the War Dog we lose is probably an Executioner and the Lightning Cannons, Rad Cleansers, and Plasma Fusils probably make up for the lack of two autocannons.
I also really want to try the Abaddon list, but my lack of desire to convert three more War Dogs is probably going to stop me from doing that for a while. This also puts the brakes on a single big knight (I think the Magaera is probably the best choice now) and ten or eleven War Dogs.
Meta Predictions
I would be flabbergasted if Knights get nerfed in the upcoming balance dataslate or hit with point changes in the next Chapter Approved. If anything, I could see Storm of Darkness complete at the end of the game so it’s technically possible to score 15 on it, and maybe some point reductions on Tyrant class models.
Leagues of Votann are going to be a serious issue for Knights, and might require some dramatic shifts away from the big guys for a while. I could see the 11+Abaddon build doing quite well into the leagues if you lean on enough shooting models to take out important pieces like their bikes and Berserkers.
I think we’re well placed to fight things like Necrons, who can really struggle if we turn off Objective Secured on round 4, Sisters thanks to our excellent primary presence, and the non Haywire Cannon Harlequins. It’s a little early to comment on Daemons, and I haven’t gotten much experience into Tyranids, but my intuition is that these matchups are probably where we would struggle the most.
Oddly, I have had some really difficult games into Death Guard lately. Mortarion has been a massive pain in the neck, and I’ve yet to really develop an answer into him that I like.
Conclusion:
In any case, this has been an exciting first year of Warhammer for me, and I’m thrilled to end it on such a positive note. I have really loved playing Chaos Knights as my starting army, and I’m excited to try out something different for a few months before LVO this coming January when I will inevitably swap back to Knights to chase after best painted.
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