Or – how many soul bursts can we trigger?
Part 2
You can see the list I used in part 1 of this article HERE – but otherwise, lets get into the games from KRAGS Sudden Encounters 2017!
Game 1 is randomly matched and end up facing one of the local gaming stores owners, Paul from Get Ya Hobby On.
Paul was running a high risk army – Daemons, composed of nothing but the Omniscient Oracles (Kairos Fateweaver plus 2 Lords of Change) as well as the Heralds Archaic (9 Level 1 Heralds of Tzeentch). Pauls plan was to simply summon and summon units – he started with 28 power dice BEFORE we rolled for the warp charges! I got to pick my powers for the spirit seer this game thanks to the warlord trait and picked Word of the Phoenix and Invisibility. The roll off saw me win to see who went first.
I elected to let Paul go first and then null deploy. On the face value, this was a risk. I was banking on the fact Paul would not risk his lords of change with not blessing support so the chances of summoned units was diminished. I also knew the heralds could not join a unit until his turn 1 which meant I had a chance to kill them (he had deployed them in 3 units of 3). Paul then proceeded to fail 3 separate summoning casts on 7+ dice each time (though avoided any perils in the process).
The Ulthwe strike force deployed just the 2 units of scatbikes and killed 3 heralds with ease in my turn 1. For the loss of 1 unit of them in Pauls T2. The rest of my army blazed onto the table and the killing began in earnest. It’s at this moment I begin to see just how dangerous soulburst can be.
Paul rallied as best he could but as he had summoned just 1 unit of daemons across 6 attempts on 2 separate turns meant the ynnari were able to run roughshod across the daemon lines and rapidly reduce the warp charges. Kairos got smacked in the face by the wraith cannons on the wraithguard and the 2 lords of change died to mass scatter lasers and then a charge from the wraith knight. I removed the last daemon model from the table at the bottom of turn 4. Max win to the Ynnari.
Game 2 saw me matched with another chaos list – World Eaters Chaos Marines.
Jayden was a champ through this game but ultimately the game was all but over as we set up. The mission was hammer and anvil and his biggest gun was a plasma pistol. While he did get a free move at the start of the game and his main 15 strong unit (plus Kharn, a lord with extra movement relic and a 3 man cyclopia cabal) and even managed Magnokinesis in Turn 1, the chaos marines were lit up with a huge volume of fire and then charged by reavers and the wraith knight.
Jayden took the beating on the chin and with a great display of sportsmanship. He did everything he could to draw the game out and avoid being tabled but the mobility of the Ynnari saw me kill the last Chaos model on turn 4. Max win to the Ynnari.
Game 3 and yet another chaos army – more daemons run by a very good local player Travis. Both times we have met prior at tournaments, Travis has seized on me and then punished me badly. Both those games I lost and I was looking to start evening the odds.
Of course Travis seized on me again!
Travis knows his stuff – Kairos and a Lord of Change (omniscient oracles) plus a small Heralds Archaic on discs, then a CAD with a big units of screamers, the Masque of Slaanesh and 2 units of blue horrors. The screamer star with the Heralds carried the paradox, the grimoire of true names and numerous spells including cursed earth… 2++ rerollable saves to deal with.
Travis started strong and turns 1 and 2 were massively bad for me. My wraithknight was D weaponed out while my own D shots (4 of them) either missed or did nothing before he died. My reavers bounced off the lord of change and I lost the unit in his turn. Things looked bleak.
My decision at this point was centred around preservation rather than anything else. The bikes all picked up and moved using soulburst and fled to the far left flank where the Ulthwe strike force was killing blue horrors. The wraithguard and my lone warp spider exarch stayed to block and hold up the screamer star. I got lucky and Kairos periled when he D weaponed the wraith knight and then grounded himself. My wraithguard introduced him to wraith cannons and Kairos went back to the warp. In the end, the wave serpent and the wraithguard single handedly held up the screamer star and killed the Lord of Change as well as scoring one of the objectives. All the while the jet bikes killed horror after horror while I had the brimstone unit locked in combat with a warwalker they could not hurt. This meant I could in my turn 5 with just 2 minutes to go, turbo boost out and claim and contest every objective. The drought was broken – I got lucky I will admit and need to come up with a plan to deal with the screamer star in future games but regardless, this game was awesome. 13-7 win to the Ynnari.
Game 4 and I got the match I was dreading… Ynnari vs Ynnari.
Matt Bell (aka Belly) has written for ObSec recently as well as coming on the pod cast to discuss this very army. He placed 4th at the national Masters 40k event for 2016 so it’s safe to say this game would be tough and complex.
It’s hard to articulate just how messy this game was – with soulbursts triggering soul bursts triggering soul bursts… we got 3 nested soulbursts down at one point. We both knew that the game would likely be done and dusted by turn 3. It was awesome to have some tokens Matt had brought to keep track of the soul bursts!
As it turns out we were right – with Matt conceding at the bottom of turn 3 with just 2 units of his warp spiders left on the table (all be it surrounded and unable to escape). He had lost his wraith knight to mine (thanks to a tactical 6 on the D chart) and through careful movement and line of sight, I was able to trim the scatbikes he had down to reduce the damage I faced in return.
It was about 30 minutes later we realised he had forgotten to roll for his webway portal with wraithguard! While they might have landed and almost certainly killed a unit, the mobility of my army would have seen the wraithguard with their D-Scythes isolated and picked off over the next turn or 2. Max in for my Ynnari.
With the 4 games complete I had 73 out of the possible 80 generalship points which won me the generalship category and thanks to my painting score, I also won the event overall!
I feel like the Ynnari list is one that most players could make work but the order of operations and triggers is vital to getting the most of the soul burst mechanic which means a better player could take advantage of mistakes that might be made with this. It also encourages a hyper aggressive playstyle to really max out the use of soul burst where I could see players over extending and not thinking about the range of soul burst and then having units die for nothing.
Don’t get me wrong, the Ynnari are a fantastically powerful force – but they are not unbeatable and they do require planning and thought.
Thanks to the boys at KRAGS for a great day of gaming and especially to Gavin for all his hard work getting the event together. If you are a Perth local – you should check out KRAGS on a Friday night for casual gaming at the club or you can check our event calendar for future events.
