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What to do Against Sylvaneth that just won't come out of the woods


stekr

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Hi,
I keep getting my AoS (see what I did there?) handed to me when playing against a local Sylvaneth player.

The last couple of games he deployed his woods either on or right next to objectives. I lost first turn because of the battalion he plays, and once I got to my turn I was looking into the barrel of two  wyldwoods on two different objectives. How would you handle an opponent thats firmly dug in and you have to fight him on his terms?

In a 1k match he brought:

Branchwraith
Treelord Anchient
Drycha Hamadreth
Branchwych
Tree revenants
Dryads

I'd like to know what you guys would bring to the table and how you'd counter the list

 

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If you play Stormcast then a Knight-Heraldor would have a field day by turning the forests against him.

As for other armies, the line of sight blocking rules don't affect flying units so if you're army has strong flying ranged units you could snipe out the heroes (skyfires with destiny dice would be perfect for this).

If you have neither then it's definitely tough. Any bonuses to unbinding to stop magic from waking the trees, coupled with combat monsters and heroes (don't have to worry about dying on an unlucky charge to the trees) to charge in would do alright I think.

That said, it may just be a case of playing scenerios with more spread out objectives. At most the Slyvaneth player can get out 4 blocks of trees in turn one which would require him using an artefact, spell, allegiance ability and 50/50 chance on tree lord. He'd be limited to his side of the board for placement however.

Given that he's taken a mega-battalion in 1k I can't imagine he has too many units so even if gets all 4 out he's going to struggle to capture more than 2 objectives himself so you could just ignore him and capture the other objectives and rack up more points than him.

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I feel like I faced this exact same list last weekend. Magic heavy, and summoning in new dryads each turn?

I didn't win vs that one, but I feel it was mostly due to me trying to avoid the woods... You really can't anyway, and those matchsticks snap kind of easily in close combat. Just send in more dudes than you need to, seeing as you'll likely lose some going in.

Do you have any recursion or assassins? Once you kill the caster that's bringing in more dryads you'll be able to start tipping things in your favour. 😉

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7 hours ago, Yoshiya said:

[..]

If you have neither then it's definitely tough. Any bonuses to unbinding to stop magic from waking the trees, coupled with combat monsters and heroes (don't have to worry about dying on an unlucky charge to the trees) to charge in would do alright I think.

[...]

Unfortunately the woods can awaken even if a spell is unbound, it only requires a successful cast if I remember correctly.

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7 hours ago, Waiyuren said:

I feel like I faced this exact same list last weekend. Magic heavy, and summoning in new dryads each turn?

I didn't win vs that one, but I feel it was mostly due to me trying to avoid the woods... You really can't anyway, and those matchsticks snap kind of easily in close combat. Just send in more dudes than you need to, seeing as you'll likely lose some going in.

Do you have any recursion or assassins? Once you kill the caster that's bringing in more dryads you'll be able to start tipping things in your favour. 😉

the thing is.. I did try to fight in a Wyldwood, (mostly because I had to, because 2 of the 3 objectives were in the forest after his turn 1) and I faced 20 dryads which gave my models a -1 to hit. I simply could not fight my way through them.

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7 minutes ago, Lucky Snake Eyes said:

I've got a couple of sylvaneth players in my area that pull these shenanigans. I play LoN so i have a lot of flying wizards and beat sticks to snipe out durthu and tree lords so my infantry stand a chance.

I think Flying might be key here indeed.. Tzeentch does have access to some nice Flying Ranged units and heroes so I will try that next time, thank you

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Just now, stekr said:

I think Flying might be key here indeed.. Tzeentch does have access to some nice Flying Ranged units and heroes so I will try that next time, thank you

Skyfires and lord of change are the bane of sylvaneth, last tournament i was at a tzeench player practically walked through a sylvaneth player with just a lord of change and 6 skyfires. Durthu never saw it coming...

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From a SC perspective anything with an indirect Area of Effect attack, like Dracoths, Star Drake, Knight Azyros, Comet, Heraldor. Most Endless Spells can obviously nip into a wood without worrying about dying or LOS.

You could take Castellant, Heraldor, 2 Units of Libs, 3 units Tempestors. If you just pick the same spot with Heraldor and the Fulminators to shoot that's potentially 8D3 Mortal Wounds a turn that require no LOS, barring any special saves. They don’t need to see anything apart from terrain or where they’re shooting so can spread fire in the wood without issue. And you get 4 goes with 2D3 each so if you say kill the Branchwraith with the Heraldor you still have 3 other chances if you set up right. If anything comes on in reserve or out the trees you’ve got 24 regular shots with the tempestors to whittle them down.

Literally just made that up so not saying it's gospel, and it’s obviously very specifically designed to combat the army you mention rather than being multi-purpose but just food for thought. 

Other big damage bomb is Incantor with comet. Give her Staff of focus which makes comet a 5 to cast and does +1 MW to all MW’s a spell causes so if his units are clumped you could quite feasibly do 20+ MW across them in that turn alone.

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7 hours ago, Nos said:

Other big damage bomb is Incantor with comet. Give her Staff of focus which makes comet a 5 to cast and does +1 MW to all MW’s a spell causes so if his units are clumped you could quite feasibly do 20+ MW across them in that turn alone.

Staff of Focus was FAQed to not work with Endless Spells

Quote

Q: If a Wizard has an ability that increases the number of mortal wounds inflicted by the spells they cast, does this ability also apply to the abilities of any endless spells that the wizard casts? A: No.
 

 

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10 hours ago, stekr said:

Not looking to destroy the dude though,
just want to bring something to the table that can counter
his strengths a bit better than my current setup.

I wouldn't be too afraid of that though. Because unless you have all the models to make the switch immediately you will do so piecemeal anyway. Also that's, for me, one of the fun things of a rivalry. He has a build you struggle against, you update, he needs to respond and all the while you have challenging games and build out your collections.  

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As a Sylvaneth player myself, I think that one of the best ways to beat them is to focus on their key pieces - monstrous heroes, like TLA, Durthu or Drycha. Sylvaneth are not synergetic like Khorne or Stormcast for example, but the models I mentioned are very important for the overall play style. Once you remove "key players", the rest of the army struggles a lot. Undercosted but powerful units, like Evocators, are very good for this  - even without buffs, they can destroy more expensive stuff. You will probably loose some of your own troops in the process, but the battle should be much easier later. At some point you simply have to go into the woods - however, keep in mind that terrain setup and placement of your troops can affect where Sylvaneth player will drop his forests. 

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Of absolutely zero use to the OP, and admittedly going against the prevailing 'streamlined' rules ethos, but damn reading this makes me want to have optional rules for attacking scenery (and to add another unasked for level of complexity, modifiers for fire damage etc).

"Oh so your soldiers made from bark are hiding out in a bunch of trees, hmmm what shall I do? I know let's see if we can turn that into a lovely big bonfire shall we."

 

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10 minutes ago, Kirjava13 said:

Indeed, I cannot help but think that my Arch-Warlock's response to this dilemma would be, 'bring up the warpfire throwers!'

Followed by a unit of Clanrats with little green stuff modelled marshmallows on the tips of their spears.

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