AoS 3rd - Idoneth Deepkin discussion

[Drofnum]

23 hours ago, 13_rolls said:

Any feedback on this list? I'm shooting for a 1k list that has the building blocks of @vinnyt's style of 2k list he's been sharing. Namely, relying on the turtle, sharks, tidecaster, and eidolon, and less on eels.

Here's what I've got so far:

Allegiance: Idoneth Deepkin
- Grand Strategy: Hold the Line
- Triumphs: Inspired
Isharann Tidecaster (105)*
- General
- Command Trait: Master of Magic
- Artefact: Lliandra's Last Lament
- Lore of the Deeps: Steed of Tides
10 x Namarti Reavers (115)*
10 x Namarti Reavers (115)*
2 x Akhelian Allopexes (250)*
- Razorshell Harpoon
- Reinforced x 1
Akhelian Leviadon (380)*
- Mount Trait: Reverberating Carapace
*Battle Regiment

Total: 965 / 1000
Reinforced Units: 1 / 2
Allies: 0 / 200
Wounds: 57
Drops: 1

My thinking is the Tidecaster can flip the tides, and then take Lliandra's Last Lament to protect the double block of Reavers from battleshock. It can use Steed of Tides to help push off units while this smaller unit tries to take a side objective. Lastly, It could use master of magic to increase the odds of a disspell, if needed.

Since the list is lower in points, it could use the triumph Inspired to fire off +1 for the Reavers if they are blasting a ton of shots on the side of the board the hammers are not.

The Allopexes & Leviadon do their thing and hammer away.

The one-drop helps ensure I can go second and hope for the double turn / the opponent to move up aggressively before I strike hard on Turn 1, or if they hang back, I can also hang back a little.

Thoughts?

I think thats a good start at 1k.  Scaling up I think you definitely want to look at getting at least 1 unit of eels to run as screens, Ishlaen work great for that, if you're planning on running Reavers a Soulscryer or allied priest with Curse is amazing as well.

I think you'll do pretty well with this list at 1k though, seems like a great starting point.

[vinnyt]

On 11/16/2021 at 12:45 PM, 13_rolls said:

Any feedback on this list? I'm shooting for a 1k list that has the building blocks of @vinnyt's style of 2k list he's been sharing. Namely, relying on the turtle, sharks, tidecaster, and eidolon, and less on eels.

Here's what I've got so far:

Allegiance: Idoneth Deepkin
- Grand Strategy: Hold the Line
- Triumphs: Inspired
Isharann Tidecaster (105)*
- General
- Command Trait: Master of Magic
- Artefact: Lliandra's Last Lament
- Lore of the Deeps: Steed of Tides
10 x Namarti Reavers (115)*
10 x Namarti Reavers (115)*
2 x Akhelian Allopexes (250)*
- Razorshell Harpoon
- Reinforced x 1
Akhelian Leviadon (380)*
- Mount Trait: Reverberating Carapace
*Battle Regiment

Total: 965 / 1000
Reinforced Units: 1 / 2
Allies: 0 / 200
Wounds: 57
Drops: 1

My thinking is the Tidecaster can flip the tides, and then take Lliandra's Last Lament to protect the double block of Reavers from battleshock. It can use Steed of Tides to help push off units while this smaller unit tries to take a side objective. Lastly, It could use master of magic to increase the odds of a disspell, if needed.

Since the list is lower in points, it could use the triumph Inspired to fire off +1 for the Reavers if they are blasting a ton of shots on the side of the board the hammers are not.

The Allopexes & Leviadon do their thing and hammer away.

The one-drop helps ensure I can go second and hope for the double turn / the opponent to move up aggressively before I strike hard on Turn 1, or if they hang back, I can also hang back a little.

Thoughts?

1k is a totally different game than 2k but yeah, that list will slap people no doubt about it. Only change I would make would be to give the leviadon ancient since it's gonna be doing most of the heavy lifting in combat and you want to preserve that 2+ save at all costs. The rest doesn't really matter all that much. The tidecaster's warscroll spell is amazing and should probably be the priority to cast (along with mystic shield). It's 1000 points though so I have no idea what the meta is or how the game really shifts at that level. 

[13_rolls]

1 minute ago, vinnyt said:

1k is a totally different game than 2k but yeah, that list will slap people no doubt about it. Only change I would make would be to give the leviadon ancient since it's gonna be doing most of the heavy lifting in combat and you want to preserve that 2+ save at all costs. The rest doesn't really matter all that much. The tidecaster's warscroll spell is amazing and should probably be the priority to cast (along with mystic shield). It's 1000 points though so I have no idea what the meta is or how the game really shifts at that level. 

I played last night and got stomped by  Mega boss on MawKrusha, 1x3 of gore gruntas, and 1x6 of gore gruntas.

I couldn’t get anything through in the maw krusha with a 5+ ward it had.

I need to keep working on the buffs and probably should have stayed away from the thing. 

[vinnyt]

4 minutes ago, 13_rolls said:

I played last night and got stomped by  Mega boss on MawKrusha, 1x3 of gore gruntas, and 1x6 of gore gruntas.

I couldn’t get anything through in the maw krusha with a 5+ ward it had.

I need to keep working on the buffs and probably should have stayed away from the thing. 

I mean, that list just kills harder than anything deepkin can bring to the table. It's why I don't like 1k as a format. A lot of nuance is lost and the game boils down to "who can kill the fastest". 

6 translocating raptors with aetherwings will pretty much table any other 1k list. It's just how it goes. 

[DocKeule]

We don't have much to throw at a charging Hammer as a roadlblock tight now. (Like a block of 60 Clanrats or even 10 Pink Horrors that give the oppopnent 60 wounds to work through). 

Also the better saves and wards with a lot of newer battletomes (plus allout defense and/or mystic shield) is becoming a problem. At a tournament a few weeks ago I charges a Leviadon into a unit of bloodnights and I did not take a single model out. 

[vinnyt]

3 charging ishlaen popping All Out Defense is still a 2+ unrendable save and is probably one of the best roadblocks available. Hell, even a 3+ unrendable save is a very solid roadblock. You generally just need to isolate a hammer until high tide when you can slam into it with a ton of stuff and kill it immediately. 

The better saves and wards are why I'm really starting to go heavy on the sharks. 4 attacks at 2srr1/2srr1/-2/2 is unbelievably efficient and wins me most of my games. Two sharks with all out attack on turns 1 and 3 will pretty much remove most models. It's also another reason why the eidolon of the storm is fantastic. -2 rend and 3 damage on the charge is a big big deal. I find the turtle is best suited for hitting blocks of -1 rend infantry.

So, in summary:

Sharks and Eidolon for things on native 3+ saves or better

Turtle for monsters and stuff like phoenix guard/stormvermin 

Ishlaen for stuff like archaon until I can hit him with at least 1 shark unit and eidolon. 

 

I use a shark unit and eidolon as sort of my main roving goon squad to kill whatever they touch. They're super good at it and their combined profiles are almost always:

8 attacks at 2srr1/2srr1/-2/2

12 attacks at 2srr1s/2s/-/1

5 attacks at 3srr1s/2s/-2/3 

4 attacks at 3srr1s/2s/-1/1

2d6 attacks at 4srr1s/3srr1s/-/1

 

Those 3 models will do, on average, 15 wounds through a 2+, 22 wounds through a 3+, and 28 wounds through a 4+. 

[13_rolls]

4 hours ago, vinnyt said:

8 attacks at 2srr1/2srr1/-2/2

12 attacks at 2srr1s/2s/-/1

5 attacks at 3srr1s/2s/-2/3 

4 attacks at 3srr1s/2s/-1/1

2d6 attacks at 4srr1s/3srr1s/-/1

Can you be specific where all these buffs are coming from? I’m still learning the army and reverse engineering it is proving hard than I realized haha.

[vinnyt]

9 hours ago, 13_rolls said:

Can you be specific where all these buffs are coming from? I’m still learning the army and reverse engineering it is proving hard than I realized haha.

Sure thing! A lot of what makes deepkin good is the number of buffs you get and they can get confusing. 

So, to start, sharks are 3 bites at 3/3/-2/2. I take a decent amount of chip shooting (mostly reavers) to make sure that I get at least one wound through on the target which takes them to 4 bites. 

Fuethan lets you reroll ones on turns 1 and 3 when you reverse the tides (which I always do with a tidecaster general). So now we're at 4 bites at 3srr1/3/-2/2, But wait, fuethan also lets all mounts reroll ones to wound at all times. So, the sharks are now 4 bites at 3srr1/3srr1/-2/2.   

That's good but not perfect. So I always take an eidolon of the storm for a nice 18" bubble of flat out +1 to wound all the time for everything. So sharks are 4 bites at 3srr1/2srr1/-2/2. To complete the package, I pop all out attack on the sharks and we end up with 4 bites at 2srr1/2srr1/-2/2. 

Apply those same buffs to everything in the army (except the all out attack) and you end up with most everything hitting and wounding with huge damage. The mounted guys and eidolon don't get the reroll ones to wound since they aren't mounts (except for the eidolon cloak). These multiple overlapping buffs are why the battle reports I post here (and on my facebook page!) usually end around turn 3.

Some other important points:

If you're playing the style of list I like, you absolutely have to reverse the tides. Deepkin lose wars of attrition so you need to be in combat early and killing stuff before they can get juiced up.

The rerolling ones to hit only work on turns 1 and 3, NOT on turn 2 (high tide). This is mildly irritating and I've thought about flexing in an akhelian king for more reliable rerolls but it just doesn't seem worth the points. 

But yeah, your opponent really can't stop you from layering these buffs if you pay attention to how you set the army up and plan your movement. When that happens it's absolutely unstoppable. Getting the double turn into high tide should essentially be an automatic win for you. Making your opponents play in fear of losing the priority roll really messes with a lot of people and is a huge benefit of playing deepkin.  

 

[13_rolls]

23 hours ago, vinnyt said:

if you pay attention to how you set the army up and plan your movement.

It seems like you’d want all your sharks (2x2, 2x2, and the mathlaan) death starring, ya? Turtle can go do it’s own thing, defensive eels, reavers, and thralls screening and hammering if given the chance?

[vinnyt]

Sort of! It really depends on your opponent. 

Ok so here's more information than you could possibly want. 

Deployment vs a slow army with decent magic:

Spoiler

Here I put 2 sharks and the turtle into deepstrike since I can see that my opponent left his back flank open. I know I have to alpha strike him down before he puts down a bunch of buffs so I stack the eidolon fairly centrally to ensure his aura covers the table. I put a shark unit at the bottom to push the left flank if I need to but also to push the center with the eidolon because of how fast the sharks can go. The eels are central but will push opposite whatever side the turtle/sharks come on in order to delay/block whatever my opponent has on that flank. I believe he ignored the eels who went and ate a wizard in this game. Reavers are deployed up in order to eat any shooting they may have if I don't go first and to push up and try to snipe wounds off of stuff that I want the sharks to eat. 

 

Against a shooty army:

 

Spoiler

This is before his pregame move and since he gets to determine who takes the first turn, I had to deploy pretty defensively. In case he elects to go first, I need to have my whole army screened from his shooting. Lengthwise eels and reavers guarantee he's gonna be wasting shooting into those units instead of my hammers. I didn't run the soulscryer here so you see that the Eidolon and turtle are pretty central with the sharks off on the flanks (still within aura range). Again, you're fast enough to really push wherever you see openings, which is exactly what I did here when I was given the first turn. Sharks can automatically go 20" and charge on the first turn in my list, which is just a truly heinous threat range. 

 

Vs a tanky army

Spoiler

A very important aspect of AoS 3.0 (in my opinion) is the ability to project force across multiple objectives. Pressuring every objective forces your opponent to either split up to try and fight you for every one of them, or they just give up and play defensively, losing them them the game. 

Here I again put the eidolon and turtle in the center with sharks on the left flank and also behind the turtle. this means I can easily attack an objective with really any number of those hammer units. Without trees, my opponent is actually very slow and only has 2 hammers (kurnoth and durthu) that can threaten me. I also knew I was going to give him the first turn and hoped that he would overextend to try and capture objectives before I pinned him in his backfield. 

Spoiler

And that's exactly what he did, teleporting the kurnoths to the bottom objective, away from the majority of the fight and leaving me an opening to move the sharks 20", charge, and kill his Warsong Revenant. Then I consolidated power onto the mid and upper objective with the turtle and other sharks able to push wherever they need to go. Since the Eidolon has cloud of midnight, I really don't care if he gets multi charged by durthu and stuff since they won't hurt him and then I can eat everything turn 2 when I fight first. 

 

vs a shooty quick army

Spoiler

Deployment is 24" away so I know I'm outside his threat range while also within my threat range. Eidolon and turtle are central for auras and I deploy soulscryer and one shark unit off the table. I give my opponent turn 1 since he really has to come to me or else I'll be able to easily make it to him and dictate the flow of combats. The Soulscryer adds even more reliability to the army, especially since most people loooove to have a big blocking unit of -1 rend infantry which is the tortle's favorite snack. Sharks were set up off table and also on left side because I knew I would erase that greatsword unit with the sharks. I also wanted to ensure that the phoenix lord would have to tread lightly because sharks absolutely can rip through a lot of his wounds. 

 

Spoiler

And sure enough, I was able to stop the phoenix guard piling in and then hit his entire army with the turtle and eidolon. +3" to charge is absolutely insane value. 

 

And finally, a fighty castle 

 

Spoiler

Same story. Central Eidolon and turtle for auras with flanking sharks and more sharks off screen. Eels are opposite initial flanking sharks but are fast enough to go wherever they need to be. Eidolon can be super aggressive with cloud of midnight and basically cost my opponent a turn by himself. 

Spoiler

And that's exactly what happened. My opponent was too bunched up and ended up getting trapped by the eidolon for a turn while the turtle munched through basically everything. The Eidolon also then retreated and charged and murdered a ton of stuff. Even though the left sharks died, which was real bad, That unit of 6 minotaurs, the doombull, a smaller unit of 3 minos, and a summoned unit of 3 minos were all functionally removed from the game due to the amount of blocking I did with the sharks and reavers. You'll also notice the ishlaen have moved to the center. Thats so they can further block off the left flank if need be (I ended up not needing them since all the BoC on the right side died on the next turn).

 

Reactive deployment is super duper important and there's really no standardized way to go about it. I guess the trend for me is to either put the turtle and eidolon centrally with a shark unit on the opposite side of my deepstrikers, or to deepstrike the turtle and some sharks while still keeping the Eidolon central for aura maximization. The whole army is insanely fast, so you can be a little more aggressive in how you deploy. 

[13_rolls]

On 11/22/2021 at 5:23 AM, vinnyt said:

The Soulscryer adds even more reliability to the army

Is the Soulscryers reliability a result of its +3 to charge?

On 11/22/2021 at 5:23 AM, vinnyt said:

especially since most people loooove to have a big blocking unit of -1 rend infantry which is the tortle's favorite snack

Is the turtles favorite snack -1 rend because 12 of its attacks are -1 rend?

On 11/22/2021 at 5:23 AM, vinnyt said:

And sure enough, I was able to stop the phoenix guard piling in and then hit his entire army with the turtle and eidolon. +3" to charge is absolutely insane value. 

It seems like with the list, you can either grab an extra unit of Ishlaen or the Soulscryer. I see you have experimented with both. I can see the value of Ishlaen allowing more blocking/tanking of damage. The Soulscryer gives you deep strikes and the charge buff. Any thoughts on which is a better choice? Or is it opponent dependent? I like the idea of having deep strike to mess with armies that charge straight at you, or scenarios where you can flank / get objectives in their territory. Also expands options for battle tactics relying on being in the opponents territory.

On 11/22/2021 at 5:23 AM, vinnyt said:

My opponent was too bunched up and ended up getting trapped by the eidolon for a turn while the turtle munched through basically everything. The Eidolon also then retreated and charged and murdered a ton of stuff.

Do you generally slam the Eidolon into something very threatening, for example a Maw Krusha? I can see throwing it at something big and popping cloud of midnight. In that case, the Eidolon wouldn't be able to attack though, so how do you benefit both from its ability to waste a turn while still outputting damage? Do you just wait until the next turn to retreat and charge? I can see sending in some eels with it to really hold down an opponent. Some thoughts about how to use the Eidolon and Cloud of Midnight would be awesome.

You mention earlier in a post that you bring Born From Agony (+2 Wounds) on the Tidecaster, and Master of Magic (re-roll dispell, amongst other things). That's 2 command traits - did I miss how you were making that happen?

@vinnyt This post is fantastic, thanks a ton! 

Edited November 23, 2021 by 13_rolls

[vinnyt]

Soulscryer reliability is because of the +3" to charge

 

Turtle's favorite snack is -1 rend infantry because he ignores -1 rend with the ancient trait which makes him super duper survivable. Infantry also tends to have worse armor saves so my -1 rend fins that do a ton of damage can put in more work. 

 

It's pretty opponent dependent but I only play take all comers lists so I prefer the soulscryer. Could go either way.

 

Eidolon and Cloud lets you take risks and not be punished for mistakes. Annihilators deepstrike and charge him? Pop cloud so he takes no damage, retreat out of combat, and then charge them. Immediate 570 point swing in my favor (I keep 330 points of Eidolon and kill 240 points of annihilators). If my opponent bunches up I can charge him into a soft target, kill a bunch of infantry, and now my opponent has to decide if he wants to countercharge me and risk wasting that combat phase with a hammer, only for me to retreat out and pick a new target, or leave me alone, in which case I keep the cloud and can still retreat out of combat and then pick a new combat. Unleash hell from raptors? Pop cloud in charge phase and charge right in. That also shuts down unleash hell from that unit for anything else in my army. The list goes on and on. It's extremely useful. I never charge the eidolon into a combat where I then pop the cloud. I make my opponent have to play around it. 

 

And yes, I used to take +2 wounds, but found that master of magic was better so now only take that. 

[13_rolls]

12 minutes ago, vinnyt said:

Soulscryer reliability is because of the +3" to charge

 

Turtle's favorite snack is -1 rend infantry because he ignores -1 rend with the ancient trait which makes him super duper survivable. Infantry also tends to have worse armor saves so my -1 rend fins that do a ton of damage can put in more work. 

 

It's pretty opponent dependent but I only play take all comers lists so I prefer the soulscryer. Could go either way.

 

Eidolon and Cloud lets you take risks and not be punished for mistakes. Annihilators deepstrike and charge him? Pop cloud so he takes no damage, retreat out of combat, and then charge them. Immediate 570 point swing in my favor (I keep 330 points of Eidolon and kill 240 points of annihilators). If my opponent bunches up I can charge him into a soft target, kill a bunch of infantry, and now my opponent has to decide if he wants to countercharge me and risk wasting that combat phase with a hammer, only for me to retreat out and pick a new target, or leave me alone, in which case I keep the cloud and can still retreat out of combat and then pick a new combat. Unleash hell from raptors? Pop cloud in charge phase and charge right in. That also shuts down unleash hell from that unit for anything else in my army. The list goes on and on. It's extremely useful. I never charge the eidolon into a combat where I then pop the cloud. I make my opponent have to play around it. 

 

And yes, I used to take +2 wounds, but found that master of magic was better so now only take that. 

Tournament dec 4… practicing as much as I can beforehand! Your advice has been invaluable in rocketing my prep :).

[vinnyt]

no problem! I love this army and play it a lot haha. It definitely requires some practice though, but when it all comes together it's a thing of beauty! 

[13_rolls]

Alright @vinnyt I have much learning to do... this was still a mostly rules learning game on both side - we got through 1 round, but I think I blew the game in deployment. I played Iron Jawz.

Deployment I tried to mostly adhere to your tips, but I may have poorly setup my screens. I also didn't protect my corners. I had no idea where to put the darn ships. My Thralls were outside of 12" for my turtle buff, and the Sharks also were out of range of it. I had a tidecaster way on the back right corner to flip the tides and give off chip damage.

He used Mighty Destroyers to move 12" with his mawkrusha (orange) in his hero phase
He used Fast ’Un to move his Megaboss (red) on mawkrusha in his hero phase
He then made a move + charge to get into my Thralls with the megaboss
Then he used Get ’Em Beat (3+ from a warchanter went off) on his Mawkrusha and was able to easily get into my sharks, he rolled a 15 on 3D6...
Because of Smashing and Bashing he was able to use the Gore-gruntas which followed the mawkrushas, and then lastly his other MawKrusha attacked the reavers/thralls.

I responded with what I could using Unleash hell with the reavers and did some chip damage. My eels and thralls got wiped before I could attack.
My Eidolon got sucked within 3" from the Megaboss, and it was stuck in combat.

At this point I was pretty hosed. My deployment failed me I think. I moved my sharks up, the eidolon retreated, I tried to anchor his Gruntas in the middle since I knew I wanted to at least move off to the right towards his territory. I positioned my Reavers within 9" to get off more shots. I moved the turtle up thinking I would try to run away from the Megaboss, not sure if that was smart. I essentially wanted to flip the table. There's not much I could see doing at that point really.

I did some damage with shooting on the Mawkrusha, took out 1 gore-grunta in the middle, and did some chip damage to the Gruntas on the top right objective, thinking I would charge them with sharks next turn.

This is end of turn 1:

I did win the double, and since we were out of time, I just rammed the turtle and eidolon into the megaboss, as well as the reavers shooting - I actually was able to kill it despite a 5+ ward from the amulet on the darn thing. It took a lot to take it out.

The sharks made their move + charge and were about to attack when we had to call it because of time. I would have been tabled next turn maybe from the mawkrusha + gruntas, it would have been interesting.

Any feedback is greatly appreciated!

[DocKeule]

Some rumors predict a IDK vs Fyreslayers release in April including a Battlebox.

[JackStreicher]

23 minutes ago, DocKeule said:

Some rumors predict a IDK vs Fyreslayers release in April including a Battlebox.

Well. If the only thing new in there is a hero for each faction then I'll happily skip it.

[vinnyt]

ok, @13_rolls definitely a tough game. The new orruks are real scary and the 2 mawkrusha lists are no joke! 

 

What scenario were you playing? You seem to be deployed super far up and boats have to be wholly within your territory. You can use them as "anchor" points on the sides of your deployment to make landing flyers on top of them challenging to help slow down the orruk alpha strike. 

 

Against an Orruk deployment like that ( I don't know how many drops he or you had), I would recommend a refused flank deployment if you know he is going first. Make it difficult for him to get both the Grunta units into combat on turn one. 

Spoiler

The thralls should have been back a little bit to benefit from the tortle, but it probably wouldn't have mattered. I'm very surprised to hear that you lost all the eels in one round of combat since they're on a 3+ unrendable save. And yeah, that's a mawkrusha sized spot in front of the sharks :(. Just one of those lessons everyone learns sometime. 

If he engaged the eidolon and focused all his attacks on the eels, you should have been able to pile in with the eidolon and smack him a little on his first turn. The turtle should also have charged in to the mawkrusha on your turn one and tried to destroy it. Between the free chip damage on your turn from the eidolon and the turtle + eidolon charge on your turn 1, I'm confident the mawkrusha would have died. Then on your turn 2 you can charge and kill the other mawkrusha like you described with the turtle and eidolon and now it's his pigs vs the turtle and eidolon. Looking at the board state, one unit of gruntas was too far away to get into your goon squad and with the tides flipped, his turn 2 would have meant that anything he charged into you/was engaged with would die since you're always fighting first. It was certainly an uphill battle, but the double into turn 2 gave you a very real chance. You just have to be extremely aggressive with deepkin, even if you've taken a ton of damage. Isolate one big thing at a time and kill it. Don't engage his whole army at once. 

Spoiler

But yeah, you were in a super tough spot after that alpha strike. That's why I like the soulscryer so much. You can hold back some real counterpunch off the table turn one and let him kill chaff, then come after him with the meat of your army. 

His turn one would have been killing thralls and maybe eels. Then your turn one the soulscryer comes in with leviadon and sharks, killing a mawkrusha while the eidolon goes after a pig unit. You win priority and murder the other mawkrusha and pig unit and you win the game. Deepkin is a super aggressive punch/counterpunch army. If stuff isn't engaged it needs to be zoning out the enemy's counterpunch. 

But your ideas were totally correct and your post game analysis was spot on! IJ is a tough matchup too. 

[13_rolls]

1 hour ago, vinnyt said:

What scenario were you playing? You seem to be deployed super far up and boats have to be wholly within your territory.

Feral Foray. I believe it's WW my territory since that ends on the mid line. I think maybe it's not outside of 3" from other terrain though. I need to remember that.

1 hour ago, vinnyt said:

Against an Orruk deployment like that ( I don't know how many drops he or you had), I would recommend a refused flank deployment if you know he is going first. Make it difficult for him to get both the Grunta units into combat on turn one. 

I was a 3 drop (hunter of the heartlands for my 2x2 sharks, battle regiment for the rest). He was a 1 drop. I had to do some googling, but this seems like a refused flank or declined flank and makes a lot of sense to me :). All of the other notes about moving back makes sense. I always am surprised how far stuff can move.

1 hour ago, vinnyt said:

I'm very surprised to hear that you lost all the eels in one round of combat since they're on a 3+ unrendable save.

I could be wrong, but I think the darn eels were outside of the tortle, so they were on a 4+ unrendable. I may have dorked up the rules when I was saving, it's possible I was in shock when the maw krusha arrived 😂.

1 hour ago, vinnyt said:

you should have been able to pile in with the eidolon and smack him a little on his first turn.

SIGH. Yea that's a great point. I totally didn't pile in and attack w/ the Eidolon.

1 hour ago, vinnyt said:

The turtle should also have charged in to the mawkrusha on your turn one and tried to destroy it. Between the free chip damage on your turn from the eidolon and the turtle + eidolon charge on your turn 1, I'm confident the mawkrusha would have died.

My fear with committing with the turtle was even if I killed the megaboss on mawkrusha (red) which had an amulet of destiny on it as well, the mawkrusha next door would have slammed into me with all those gruntas. Is the turtle going to survive that kind of damage? I suppose the eidolon could have retreated and charged which would have helped. Running away with the turtle might be a bad idea, as I lost out on a lot of combat in the first two turns because of that mentality.

1 hour ago, vinnyt said:

You just have to be extremely aggressive with deepkin, even if you've taken a ton of damage. Isolate one big thing at a time and kill it. Don't engage his whole army at once. 

The turtle needs to cleanly engage in combat every phase it seems like, not using it for a whole combat phase seemed like a mistake.

1 hour ago, vinnyt said:

 Then your turn one the soulscryer comes in with leviadon and sharks

Is it of no concern to lose the +1 to save on the screens while the turtle is in reserve? I suppose the flexibility makes it worth it. Those thralls are probably dead anyways. The eels are then a 4+ (unless I use all out defense). Probably fine if the plan is a hard counter punch?

Thanks a ton @vinnyt I feel more and more confident every time I touch the army or list. Hoping to get a few more games in before tourney day :).

[vinnyt]

After you take a hit that hard on his turn one you have to aggressively counterpunch or you lose anyways. The turtle probably wouldn't survive that charge if he had priority but he could charge you anyways with how the turtle was placed had he won priority. You might as well go all out aggro for the change to win the game versus play super defensively and lose anyways  

 

Screens aren't gonna survive anyways, even with +1 to save. You need need need need need to have the eels in the turtle aura for 3+ unrendable saves. Like that is absolutely mandatory for them. You can't count on all out defense because he can roar you and the eels weren't in hunters. If they are, then you really don't need the turtle aura for them anyways since they'll be on a 3+ unrendable.

I didn't see a second unit of sharks on your board but they should have absolutely gone all in on your turn one or two against either the boars or the mawkrusha. 

 

Countercharging the eidolon in is an automatic response because he kills the mawkrusha, gets countercharged by the mawkrusha and boars, pops cloud of midnight, and now it's your turn and he's completely wasted that combat phase That's what I mean when I say he wastes combat phases for your opponent. 

 

No problemo! Just keep practicing! That was a really tough game regardless. 

[13_rolls]

29 minutes ago, vinnyt said:

I didn't see a second unit of sharks on your board but they should have absolutely gone all in on your turn one or two against either the boars or the mawkrusha. 

There was a unit of sharks alllll the way on the right side of the table. I was running them up the right to try to take the back right objective. Perhaps a poor decision? The left-hand side sharks were eaten immediately by the mawkrusha (orange).

29 minutes ago, vinnyt said:

Countercharging the eidolon in is an automatic response because he kills the mawkrusha, gets countercharged by the mawkrusha and boars, pops cloud of midnight, and now it's your turn and he's completely wasted that combat phase

Ahhhhhhhh that's genius - yup, that was the play. OKAY. I am ready for another attempt, I'll report back.

I hope others are getting value from this discourse as well!

Edited November 24, 2021 by 13_rolls

[boyadventurer]

On 11/24/2021 at 2:19 PM, 13_rolls said:

I hope others are getting value from this discourse as well!

I only recently emerged from the depths to start up IDK and @vinnyt's posts have definitely helped! I already feel more confident about what to do with them than the Lumineth I've had for a year now!

I'd love any additional advice there might be for Forgotten Nightmares. I assume you'd either want Namarti to be the target if you're facing volume of fire, or the Ishlaen vs quality (higher rend) shooting?

Edited November 26, 2021 by boyadventurer

[DocKeule]

Generally Ishlaen and if possible withing the Leviadon's bubble. Their main job is to tank damage even if they can chip off a wound here and there. 

With Namarti - Thralls are a glass hammer so you want to get them at least into their first melee engagement as unharmed as possible. On Reavers I am frankly still not sold at all. I have 20 and haven't run since 2018.
 

[vinnyt]

21 hours ago, boyadventurer said:

I only recently emerged from the depths to start up IDK and @vinnyt's posts have definitely helped! I already feel more confident about what to do with them than the Lumineth I've had for a year now!

I'd love any additional advice there might be for Forgotten Nightmares. I assume you'd either want Namarti to be the target if you're facing volume of fire, or the Ishlaen vs quality (higher rend) shooting?

I actually tend to do more of a multi-layered approach. You can look at some of my previous comments to see how I like to deploy (the only time where screening really matters for deepkin). 

 

In short, I usually put the namarti up front because I don't really care if they live or die and I don't run too many eels. In my tournament list I have 3 eels I use to go after wizards or to charge into big hitters to tie them up (2+ unrendable save on the charge within the turtle aura). Using the eels for shooting screens is super reasonable if you run a lot of them. I just find that the eels are too important to get chipped down by shooting, especially if my opponent has mortal wound shooting. 

7 hours ago, DocKeule said:

Generally Ishlaen and if possible withing the Leviadon's bubble. Their main job is to tank damage even if they can chip off a wound here and there. 

With Namarti - Thralls are a glass hammer so you want to get them at least into their first melee engagement as unharmed as possible. On Reavers I am frankly still not sold at all. I have 20 and haven't run since 2018.
 

Reavers are great because they're movement 8 objective grabbers that reroll runs and produce value from range. Using them to chip one or two wounds off stuff before you hit them with sharks is absolutely incredible and they can do a surprising amount of damage when buffed (even without curse). 30 shots at 4srr1(fuethan first turn)/3s (eidolon)/-/1 does 2/4/6/8 damage through a 2+/3+/4+/5+ save profile and is also a great anti-gotrek approach that doesn't really require a lot of resource allocation. Even doing 1-2 wounds to him is very very impactful. Plus, forcing opponents to spend CP in the shooting phase is big value with deepkin because generally there are 3 things every opponent wants to do against the list that I bring and AoD in shooting means they gotta make a tough choice later. 

Ok, so quick command point sidebar:

Usually I like to go second which means I get 3 and my opponent gets 2 CP. I never assume I get an extra CP and I always assume they get 1 per battle round. On their turn my opponents usually use 1 cp for -something-. Can be AoA on shooting to ensure they clear a screen, can be auto run 6, can be whatever, but usually they use 1 cp. I also usually use 1 cp- redeploy or battleshock for namarti, or whatever.

This means that on turn 2 I'll be at 3 CP and my opponent will be at 3 CP. They're gonna want to use redeploy, all out defense in combat, and battleshock immunity. If the reavers can cheekily force them to pop a CP in the shooting phase, then that means they're forced to make a BIG sacrifice later on in the turn. I find that even experienced opponents are pretty bad at managing command points. 

I know exactly how I'm going to use my 3 CP at the start of my turn. One goes to auto run something 6" since I can still charge and it guarantees me board control. One goes into rerolling a failed charge and the last one goes into All out Attack. If I don't need the failed charge CP then it'll go into All out Defense or Battleshock immunity if I lose a shark in combat. It's super rare to lose a second shark to battleshock (need a 6 on the BS test), but it does happen and is absolutely a feelsbad moment. 

 

[13_rolls]

Played a game against Nurgle last night and felt like I took a nice step forward in how to use the infamous @vinnyt list :). Few questions as a result of that game..

Run and Charge (or shoot)

On 11/27/2021 at 10:04 AM, vinnyt said:

One goes to auto run something 6" since I can still charge and it guarantees me board control.

I found that during turn 1 I was a bit stuck on what unit to run (and subsequently charge OR shoot). The OR is the hard part in that rd 1 ability when flipping the tides. The sharks seem most logical to not shoot since they can move 20" and then charge, giving a ton of board control. But this means they can't shoot which makes them reliant on some other shooting to chip the unit they're going into for the bonus from Bloodthirsty Predators. The turtle has a nice profile on both shooting/melee, but it only moves 10" so behind the screens I felt like it couldn't really open up and run that far anyways.

Grand Strategy

Amazingly my game was tied, all the way through battle tactics. It came down to me taking Hold the Line and not getting it because, well, as you stated "I don't care if they live or die." Turns out, I did since the grand strategy does matter. Which GS are you all finding works well? Vendetta/Prized Sorcery seems appealing since my Tidcaster hides far away and uses Arcane Corrasion, it might survive in most games - even against shooting where Forgotten Nightmares is in effect, it would make it hard to shoot the general off the board. Of course, deep strikes would basically give this away if my tidecaster was left in a corner and zapped off. Beast Master feels relevant because the turtle is so hardy and frankly I think if I lose it I'm going to have a hard time winning anyways?

Soulscryer Seeker of Souls

I noticed the rule says you *must* add +3 to all units within 3, and they *must* land within a half inch of whatever enemy unit is selected for +3 to charge. I would have pulled other units into that charge I didn't want to, and it removed some flexibility around which units I splitting up on a specific objective. Is the Seeker of Souls sort of a one-time thing early game before all the units get junked up together?

Not enough bodies on objectives

My namarti did a great job screening, lasting at least 2-3 rounds. But it was very hard with sharks flanking either side to have enough numbers to take objective from Plaguebearers (which were fairly buffed up from abilities + hero synergies). The mathlaan ended up with a unit of sharks and the soul scryer + 10 thralls (which were slowly dying off) but it still wasn't enough to take the objective once the thralls were deleted - Sharks (2x2), Mathlaan (2), Soulscryer (1), and say 5 thralls (5) is still only 12 bodies. They had at least 15-20 with only a unit of Pleaguebearers and a few cavalry there (the fly things).

How quickly should the turtle get involved?

I set up with my namarty in front, the eels behind, and then the turtle behind. The issue was, my turtle (aside from shooting) really didn't get involved into turn 3. It was too far back, and sort of blocked out of moving up efficiently. It got onto a central objective and just sorta hung out because other units were not within charge yet. Is that okay? Ultimately, late-game, the turtle helped me climb way back and delete a bunch of other monsters and such so it was fine, but it felt like I was building a wall that the enemy had to churn thru before I could really do anything. (combined w/ the above question of not being able to capture the flanks without enough bodies, it set me back a bit)

Turtle + Eidolon "Goon Squad"

No questions, just wanted to say WOW, I finally saw the goon squad in action last night as I deleted half a GUO and Bloab Rotspawned in a turn. My opponent was like "um, that turtle is quite good isn't it." 😂