Lets chat: Beastclaw Raiders

[Turragor]

I looked on the brightside of all the issues destruction were having (just when I started my BCR army):

I didn't need to paint so fast.

It's rather freeing! I think so long as you aren't starting your first army, there's no real 'wrong' choices. Everything should have it's time in the sun. Ofc some things may find they spend more time in the sun than others.

 

[Kessler]

3 hours ago, heywoah_twitch said:

First of all :*(

No need to worry . I was/am an avid reader of the thread and it's great recource for all kinds of players. It's depressing only if one has plans to win all the major tournaments with BCR .

[hughwyeth]

44 minutes ago, Kessler said:

No need to worry . I was/am an avid reader of the thread and it's great recource for all kinds of players. It's depressing only if one has plans to win all the major tournaments with BCR .

Yeah I've just started with my BCR and it's my non-competitive list. It's nice to have a force you don't have to refine to some super efficient winning list and can just field fun models. That was what AoS was all about at the start!

[blueshirtman]

3 hours ago, Turragor said:

It's rather freeing! I think so long as you aren't starting your first army, there's no real 'wrong' choices. Everything should have it's time in the sun. Ofc some things may find they spend more time in the sun than others.

 

This may sound stupid, but what do you do if it is your first army. I started AoS with the raiders,  because they were the only army I could afford. Now after 5 months of playing am feeling as if I burned my money.  Am not just losing games, am getting wrecked , each new book 2/3 of the people at the store buy new stuff and their collections grow, so if something gets nerfed they have other stuff to play with. My raiders on the other hand get 0 new models, and I have a strange feeling that is going to stay that way. I can't even play in some events, because the army is based around monsters and heros, so if it is a 1000pts infantry bash I have 2 week of no playing, where everyone around me does.

[Kytlock]

This is my first army as well that I'll actually be playing. I still want to have fun, but obviously getting tabled isn't very fun.

[Turragor]

I'd not worry too much about bcr as a first army.

No one (unless they've a history with other game systems) gets their first army list and wins a tourney. 

If you had that as a goal you'd not buy bcr but you'd also not buy a dizzying variety of t1 faction lists. 

Most players aiming to win tournaments have bought and speed painted a specific list and they're not their first models (or they've borrowed an army). 

So what I mean is, if you wanted to win tournaments you'd do research and select something suitable for that goal. It's a different mindset to the starting hobbyist. Something to grow your hobby towards... If it's your thing 

Bcr is still a fun faction. And very character filled. Most of what that previously linked thread refer to applies to matched only.

Competent matched at that.

If you have a group with mixed skills and factions you will still be able to win with bcr. 

 

[hughwyeth]

10 hours ago, blueshirtman said:

This may sound stupid, but what do you do if it is your first army. I started AoS with the raiders,  because they were the only army I could afford. Now after 5 months of playing am feeling as if I burned my money.  Am not just losing games, am getting wrecked , each new book 2/3 of the people at the store buy new stuff and their collections grow, so if something gets nerfed they have other stuff to play with. My raiders on the other hand get 0 new models, and I have a strange feeling that is going to stay that way. I can't even play in some events, because the army is based around monsters and heros, so if it is a 1000pts infantry bash I have 2 week of no playing, where everyone around me does.

Is it possible to just not play there? That sounds like an extremely competitive atmosphere. I don't know anyone who buys an army because it's the new powerful thing to have. There's likely some other clubs where people aren't that competitive. 

[blueshirtman]

5 hours ago, Turragor said:

I'd not worry too much about bcr as a first army.

No one (unless they've a history with other game systems) gets their first army list and wins a tourney. 

If you had that as a goal you'd not buy bcr but you'd also not buy a dizzying variety of t1 faction lists. 

Most players aiming to win tournaments have bought and speed painted a specific list and they're not their first models (or they've borrowed an army). 

So what I mean is, if you wanted to win tournaments you'd do research and select something suitable for that goal. It's a different mindset to the starting hobbyist. Something to grow your hobby towards... If it's your thing 

Bcr is still a fun faction. And very character filled. Most of what that previously linked thread refer to applies to matched only.

Competent matched at that.

If you have a group with mixed skills and factions you will still be able to win with bcr. 

 

I didn't expect raiders to win tournaments, I picked them because I couldn't afford any other army to play with. I knew they were not the highest of tier, and did expect to be trashed by someone with a better list and better skill. My problem is that right now am also losing to people who are playing their 3-4th game, which counting the demo games means am losing to people that play for the first time. And I did not expect them to be that bad, durning my "research" everyone kept saying they were solid tier 2, enjoyable when you learn how to play etc Now am not puting me being a table top anti talent out of the question here, but losing against someone who is playing his first game is not fun.

I don't get the character filled argument at all though. Sure there are huserkals in my army and they are on monsters, which is the to go way of playing characters, but other armies seem to run just as many monster/big model characters and have points for support dudes, while I even if I wanted have 0. No casters, no cavelery "cheap" buff hero, no priests/shamans even if in the fluff they clearly are mentioned. All other armies seem to have an option to either horde it up and swarm objectives, or do a brutal alfa strike. And again I maybe playing Raiders wrong, as in move them wrong way etc, because the models I use are the same as other have in their list, save for me not using ally. Maybe it is that, but our army is neither good in melee, has close to 0 range, no magic, it is technicly "resilient" but I have not yet faced an army which either ignores our models, because they have 80-100 models on the table or just kill me with a combination of range/casters follwed by a charge of 1-2 bloodthirsters.

And for the Xth time, I could be doing something wrong with the list. It is just that the last game made me really jaded. Played against a dude who played a real army for the first time in his life, 10 year old with the appropriate attention spam and all I manged to kill in his list was an auric runefather, and only because he wanted to end the game fast. What is worse he seemed to be just bored durning the game, as if I was wasting his time, he could spend on playing someone with a real army.

 

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Is it possible to just not play there? That sounds like an extremely competitive atmosphere. I don't know anyone who buys an army because it's the new powerful thing to have. There's likely some other clubs where people aren't that competitive. 

Not really there are two stores in my city, and only one runs AoS games, the other just sells the model and has no game space.  The closest club I know of, is in another town 2  hours trip away from where I live. And it is not that people buy whole armies, they buy 500-1000pts to play around in mini store events or try them out as ally, and while for some people this does end with them selling their main army and switchign to a new one, most do not. It does seem to help people with list feeling a bit stale, I guess. But to be honest considering I won 0 games and tied 2, due to my opponent leaving sooner, I do not know how it feels when your army wins so much you want to change it up.

[Turragor]

By character filled i meant full of charm. A cool theme. 

Does sound like your environment is a bit  competitive. 

You can find other ways to enjoy matched games (improve your losses, target specific units for destruction) and view them as practice. 

Or go for open play perhaps. 

[Malakree]

Slight topic switch but I had a thought on the thundertusk for you guys.

Would it be better if they changed the thundertusks breath attack to.

Roll 6 dice, any which beat or equal the roll listed in the wound table inflict a mortal wound.

2+/3+/4+/5+

Would stop it tanking so hard so quickly and still give the potential 6 across all wound values. 

[annarborhawk]

14 hours ago, blueshirtman said:

  Am not just losing games, am getting wrecked , 

This shouldn't be the case.  BCR is not 1st tier, but there are some very good match-ups for it.  Yes, certain lists (and definitely some GHB scenarios) are very bad for BCR. But some of the time you should be running into scenarios/lists where you wreck your opponent in a  couple of turns.  Not sure what your list is, but in general you should be storming across the board and in their face right away.  Thundertusks (which are a must of course) should be in a second line dishing out 12 mortals (if you run 2 of them, which you should). Often they can snipe the key support pieces that make the opponent's list work, take a unit below a threshold # of models to debuff it, or severely weaken a monstrous model so it is killed by the charging stonehorn(s) and mournfangs.

 

[annarborhawk]

2 hours ago, blueshirtman said:

 

And for the Xth time, I could be doing something wrong with the list.

OK, blueshirtman, what exactly are you running, and how are you using them?  After reading your second post, I suspect you may be missing something. It really should not be going this badly.  Even when I play BCR against a bad match-up, at minimum I am killing lots of stuff, even if I have no chance at winning the scenario. I may know I'm going to lose after seeing my opponent's list and rolling for scenario, but when that's the case I make sure to at least make my opponent take a bunch of his models off the board. 

[blueshirtman]

8 hours ago, Turragor said:

Or go for open play perhaps. 

Wish I could, I don't even know if I would be able to write a PG description of what people here think about something else then matched play.

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Often they can snipe the key support pieces that make the opponent's list work, take a unit below a threshold # of models to debuff it, or severely weaken a monstrous model so it is killed by the charging stonehorn(s) and mournfangs.

That is what I normally struggle with. Either the list has something like 90-100 slayer dudes, which I can't kill fast enough, but they can kill me. Objectiv games vs them are an auto lose, to a point where people didn't want to play against my army, if objectives are the main win condition.

The other armies are either some sort of order soup, always think screening skinks, or KO dual ship lists, It feels as if I do the best against KO, I still lose maybe it is because the people that play KO at my store are all very new players. So I get to do more stuff durning the game, vs more expirianced players I just get run over, plus with them there is also the problem of their collections being big, so they can make a list to beat my list, why I can't do the same.

Against people with chaos soups, specially of the tzeench kind I just stoped trying to play. Vs lizards I played only 2 games, armies felt like order soups but with monsters and more skinks then usual order soups play here.

There is two guys who have destruction armies, but they never play with them. Two guys have death, but they only play it in events or when they prepare for events, so they don't play against me.

 

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OK, blueshirtman, what exactly are you running, and how are you using them? 

I have 2 thundertusks, and 12 mfangs. I try to screen the thundertusks so they don't get alfa charged, but it doesn't always work, if someone summons a bloodthirster in my back I generally lose thes creen of mfangs, and the rest to spells in two turns, and not always back to back turns. If I go first and my opponent has shoting, and I have yet to play an army without either shoting or very strong magic, I try to counter deploy, but most of the time this means they swarm objectives. I try to counter charge, get boged down and then get slaughtered fast or slow, depending if my opponents get two turns back to back.

[AthlorianStoners]

11 minutes ago, blueshirtman said:

Wish I could, I don't even know if I would be able to write a PG description of what people here think about something else then matched play.

That is what I normally struggle with. Either the list has something like 90-100 slayer dudes, which I can't kill fast enough, but they can kill me. Objectiv games vs them are an auto lose, to a point where people didn't want to play against my army, if objectives are the main win condition.

The other armies are either some sort of order soup, always think screening skinks, or KO dual ship lists, It feels as if I do the best against KO, I still lose maybe it is because the people that play KO at my store are all very new players. So I get to do more stuff durning the game, vs more expirianced players I just get run over, plus with them there is also the problem of their collections being big, so they can make a list to beat my list, why I can't do the same.

Against people with chaos soups, specially of the tzeench kind I just stoped trying to play. Vs lizards I played only 2 games, armies felt like order soups but with monsters and more skinks then usual order soups play here.

There is two guys who have destruction armies, but they never play with them. Two guys have death, but they only play it in events or when they prepare for events, so they don't play against me.

 

I have 2 thundertusks, and 12 mfangs. I try to screen the thundertusks so they don't get alfa charged, but it doesn't always work, if someone summons a bloodthirster in my back I generally lose thes creen of mfangs, and the rest to spells in two turns, and not always back to back turns. If I go first and my opponent has shoting, and I have yet to play an army without either shoting or very strong magic, I try to counter deploy, but most of the time this means they swarm objectives. I try to counter charge, get boged down and then get slaughtered fast or slow, depending if my opponents get two turns back to back.

Maybe try mixing up a new list? A nice, solid list could be something like: 

1 Frostlord on Stonehorn 

2 Huskards on Thundertusk

1 Fungoid Cave Shaman 

6 Mournfangs 

3 Yhetees

4 Frost Sabres

Havjng the Stonehorn as a distraction/beatstick adds survivability to the rest of your list as Stonehorn’s still command a bit of respect and attention. 

Use the shaman as a cheap mystic shield bot, adding to units save (usually the Stonehorn) as needed. 

The sabres are a cheap screen unit that are fast and can be used to lock an objective or contest it if need be. If you can’t find or don’t like the models than fenrisian wolves are always a good alternative. 

Yhetees are good to accompany thundertusk and use them as a sort of bodyguard.

this is a 2000 point list but does scale well.

[Malakree]

2 hours ago, AthlorianStoners said:

1 Fungoid Cave Shaman 

Unless you are playing malign portents he's only moonclan so a normal BCR army (not MP) couldn't ally him.

[AthlorianStoners]

17 minutes ago, Malakree said:

Unless you are playing malign portents he's only moonclan so a normal BCR army (not MP) couldn't ally him.

I wasn’t aware the heralds were limited or only malign portents games for the avoiding allies limitations. 

Azyr has him as a listed ally option as well.

[Malakree]

3 minutes ago, AthlorianStoners said:

I wasn’t aware the heralds were limited or only malign portents games for the avoiding allies limitations. 

Azyr has him as a listed ally option as well.

Yeah I know, specifically it's that Harbringers can be allied in for any of their Grand Alliance. The 4 heroes only gain the "Harbringer" keyword if you are playing Malign Portents though, thus if you aren't playing it he's just a random Moonclan model and obeys all of those normal rules.

Basically blizzard ensuring that Ogors still don't have access to a cheap wizard....

[PlasticCraic]

They don't have access to a cheap one - but they do have access to a good one.  The Butcher is awesome and can has Ogor keyword synergy.

blueshirtman I am sorry to hear you're having bad experiences.  The more detail you've gone into, the more it seems to me that you're playing in a very competitive meta where most things you are facing are bad matchups.

One thing that might help is allied Gubutsters Grots?  Those high volumes of low quality attacks will work just fine against poor armour saves (Skinks).  And you will be able to screen off your units, and block out Summoning lanes.

[Kytlock]

Here's the list I plan on running as a first army.

 

Frostlord on Thundertusk - Blade of the All-Frost, Everwinter's Master

2 Stonehorn Beastriders - Blood Vulture

Mournfang Pack of 4 - Gargant Hackers

Mournfang Pack of 4 - Gargant Hackers

Icefall Yhetees 

Frost Sabres (2)

 

Comes to 1980 points. I like the Fungoid Cave Shaman. How would I be able to run him? Is he only for Malign Portents games?

[annarborhawk]

4 hours ago, blueshirtman said:

 

I have 2 thundertusks, and 12 mfangs. I try to screen the thundertusks so they don't get alfa charged, but it doesn't always work, if someone summons a bloodthirster in my back I generally lose thes creen of mfangs, and the rest to spells in two turns, and not always back to back turns. If I go first and my opponent has shoting, and I have yet to play an army without either shoting or very strong magic, I try to counter deploy, but most of the time this means they swarm objectives. I try to counter charge, get boged down and then get slaughtered fast or slow, depending if my opponents get two turns back to back.

Sounds like maybe you are not playing them as true alpha-strike.  That's what BCR are.  No holding back for counter-charges with BCR. You don't have enough models or wounds to sit out any attacking.  

I play BCR purely for fun, and only in match play, and I think I win around 50%. It's almost always a landslide victory or defeat, decided fairly early.  

I always run a frostlord on stonehorn as general - even after the nerf.  He's incredibly rangy, and can charge something important on turn 1, drawing fire away from midfield thundertusks. You definitely don't want to waste mournfang (very good hammers in their on right) on picket duty.  They should be trying to get the charge in on turn 1 also.  

So my typical list:

frostlord - stonehorn - tokens of everwinter  / everwinters master

huskard - thundertusk

thundertusk riders

butcher - cauldron (mystic shield the frostlord)

4x mournfang

4x mournfang

Yes, that's only 12 models.  So obviously a big reason it cant be competitive in a tourney.  

Basic plan, however,  is stonehorn deploys in center, runs forward. Mournfang on either flank advance.  Thuundertusks (deployed last - across from mortal wound targets) usually go after key support solos, enemy general, or occasionally one will remove/reduce screen from stonehorn target. BTW,  Frostlord eats token on turn 1 because BCR push all their chips in on turn 1.  

Assuming I don't roll 1's for either thundertusk, the frostlord does reasonably well, and at least one unit of mournfang makes it in, my opponent will be pretty well reeling by the end of my first turn.  If they hit hard enough back (50% of the time), well I wont have enough models to survive a 5 turn game, but the other half the time if I get a good second shot in, I have reduced the enemy to the point that I can actually win many of the scenarios.

Duality of death is best, obviously.  But even some of the others are doable if you gut your opponent by end of 2.

So I don't know. Maybe you're doing it right but your particular meta is a bad match-up for BCR. I suspect though you may be playing with some caution.  If so, throw all that out and just charge!

[annarborhawk]

14 minutes ago, Kytlock said:

Here's the list I plan on running as a first army.

 

Frostlord on Thundertusk - Blade of the All-Frost, Everwinter's Master

2 Stonehorn Beastriders - Blood Vulture

Mournfang Pack of 4 - Gargant Hackers

Mournfang Pack of 4 - Gargant Hackers

Icefall Yhetees 

Frost Sabres (2)

 

Comes to 1980 points. I like the Fungoid Cave Shaman. How would I be able to run him? Is he only for Malign Portents games?

Personally, I don't like the lord on the thundertusk. He's a combat beast who is better suited for a combat mount, the stonehorn.  A huskard makes better sense on a thundertusk to keep that mortal wound output at 6 instead of d6.  I also prefer 2 thundertusks to 1 stonehorn rather than the other way round. 12+ mortals on turn 1 (2 from vultures) can remove key pieces, giving us a fighting chance. 

 

EDIT: anyway, obviously magnetize the mount heads and saddles so you can try it various ways..  

[Noomanator]

What are people's thoughts on the Braggoths Beasthammer battalion? It seems to me that a consistent problem with BCR is our god awful 4+ to hit across the board with no way to buff it outside of an unreliable butcher roll. The hammer makes 2 units of mournfang hit on 3's and gives a buffed stonehorn to boot. Plus gruntas are much more appealing post ghb 2017 with the price drop!

[annarborhawk]

7 hours ago, Noomanator said:

What are people's thoughts on the Braggoths Beasthammer battalion? It seems to me that a consistent problem with BCR is our god awful 4+ to hit across the board with no way to buff it outside of an unreliable butcher roll. The hammer makes 2 units of mournfang hit on 3's and gives a buffed stonehorn to boot. Plus gruntas are much more appealing post ghb 2017 with the price drop!

I don't have the models for it so never ran it, but I think the problem for me is that it wouldn't leave enough points for 2 thundertusks. And for me, you need those thundertusks to have a chance of competing.   (It bugs me when people complain about the near-auto 6 mortals, but won't acknowledge the many disadvantages BCR armies come with).  Without thundertusks, we're left with a below-average, low-model count, elite melee only army. 

[blueshirtman]

Quote

 

1 hour ago, annarborhawk said:

I don't have the models for it so never ran it, but I think the problem for me is that it wouldn't leave enough points for 2 thundertusks. And for me, you need those thundertusks to have a chance of competing.   (It bugs me when people complain about the near-auto 6 mortals, but won't acknowledge the many disadvantages BCR armies come with).  Without thundertusks, we're left with a below-average, low-model count, elite melee only army. 

 

Specially when most other armies avarge, more then 12 MW per turn, sometimes even without specialising in it.
Thank you everyone for the tips. I did try to play the Raiders more aggresive, but that was just losing me games, because people kept deploying out of range and giving me first turn.  I also don't have access to other units listed by people, and am not going to buy a separate book just to use the butcher. But I didn't really wanted to off topic. My main point was that it is well possible for Raiders being unfun as a first army. I think the only way to really have fun with any table top or ccg, is to have enough cash to invest in to something that is good from day 1, and being able to deal with a possible meta shift. If your boxed in to one army, you can end up in a really bad spot, because the army will still cost a lot, and there will be 0 chance to resell it.
 

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One thing that might help is allied Gubutsters Grots?  Those high volumes of low quality attacks will work just fine against poor armour saves (Skinks).  And you will be able to screen off your units, and block out Summoning lanes.

 

Could be, I don't really have a way to check if it would work. In the end losing over and over again is bad, but what is really irking me is not being able to play in half the events. Last month we had two 1000pts over whole wee events, one with just infantry armies and one with just heros, but not mounted <_<. the other two were a noob event, I couldn't participate because it was escalation event, and the last one which I could actually take part in was death+order vs destruction and chaos. Order death had 20k pts we had 12k, we got some rules to balance it. Event was nice, but the rules allowed us to recycle infantry and foot hero units,  our main general deployed my army as a meat shield and they died durning our opponents turn 1. Then I had to wait for 7 hours for the game to end, to be told that all participants will get pins with their faction on it, but not destruction, because they did not order any. So I more or less stood at the store for 7 hours doing nothing, when others were picking up their participation awards from all the months events. But the top of it was when the store owner offered me the wooden spoon, and told me to smile for the store event photo. Actually got me angry, and I though it was impossible with the drugs I take

[Turragor]

32 minutes ago, blueshirtman said:

Specially when most other armies avarge, more then 12 MW per turn, sometimes even without specialising in it.
Thank you everyone for the tips. I did try to play the Raiders more aggresive, but that was just losing me games, because people kept deploying out of range and giving me first turn.  I also don't have access to other units listed by people, and am not going to buy a separate book just to use the butcher. But I didn't really wanted to off topic. My main point was that it is well possible for Raiders being unfun as a first army. I think the only way to really have fun with any table top or ccg, is to have enough cash to invest in to something that is good from day 1, and being able to deal with a possible meta shift. If your boxed in to one army, you can end up in a really bad spot, because the army will still cost a lot, and there will be 0 chance to resell it.
 

Could be, I don't really have a way to check if it would work. In the end losing over and over again is bad, but what is really irking me is not being able to play in half the events. Last month we had two 1000pts over whole wee events, one with just infantry armies and one with just heros, but not mounted <_<. the other two were a noob event, I couldn't participate because it was escalation event, and the last one which I could actually take part in was death+order vs destruction and chaos. Order death had 20k pts we had 12k, we got some rules to balance it. Event was nice, but the rules allowed us to recycle infantry and foot hero units,  our main general deployed my army as a meat shield and they died durning our opponents turn 1. Then I had to wait for 7 hours for the game to end, to be told that all participants will get pins with their faction on it, but not destruction, because they did not order any. So I more or less stood at the store for 7 hours doing nothing, when others were picking up their participation awards from all the months events. But the top of it was when the store owner offered me the wooden spoon, and told me to smile for the store event photo. Actually got me angry, and I though it was impossible with the drugs I take

Thats just not a cool community for you at the moment! I sympathise profusely.