2017 Ironjawz blog

[Chris Tomlin]

@Mike. c - Those Gore-gruntas look great. Awesome work!

[Durant]

You realy made tchem look dinamic, a thing the miniature lacks in my opinion. But not yours

[Mike. c]

Thanks a lot guys, glad you like them. 

[Mike. c]

Got the last 5 brutes done and got a game in today. The megabrutes unit is now complete, just waiting on the delivery of some ard boys to finish off my first 2k list.

Gamewise it was a bit unusual as I actually played at my local GW for once. This meant playing 1500 points on a 4x4 board with essentially no terrain (there was 4 pieces, 1 in each corner). My Opponent brought his storm cast and it was good to see what some of the new units did. We played gift from the heavens.

my opponent deployed and went first. With 10liberators in front of 10/15judicators which were in turn in front of two foot slogging heros. To the side he had a Lord aquilor and 6 vanguard  Paladors. He moved up so the judicators were in range and did some shooting to little effect. The gryph units disappeared to redeploy next turn.

I charged everything besides 10 brutes forward and got into combat turn 1 with 10 brutes 10 ard boys and 3 gore gruntas, into his liberators and judicators. I got the double turn and a megaboss charged into the fray as well.  My objective came down on my right near to the brutes I left behind and my opponents came down on his right near to my ard boys and megaboss that were fighting his judicators. 

In my opponents turn he brought on his gryph units more or less where they had started and charged into my gore gruntas. The rest of the game more or less involved my units killing his judicators and liberators while his gryph units rolled along my line destroying a unit a turn. I scored the objectives every turn and came away with a major win. In the end I only had my 10 brutes on my objective left, while my opponent had his 2 foot slogging heros and gryph units left. 

Not  much of a battle report as it turned into a big grind near his objective however I do have a few thoughts after the game. Getting into combat turn 1 and getting a double turn was great, really puts your opponent on the back foot from the start. I must remember to use battle brew/ gem of seeing even if I don't plan to be in combat; I keep forgetting to declare I am using the item and then find my megaboss misses and does nothing in combat. 

In terms of the stormcast I was really surprised by how much damage the gryph units can put out. -2 rend on the mounts and the ability to do a mortal wound on a to hit roll of a 6 is good. Especially when buffed by the characters so 6's also generate an extra attack; and that just in combat they also had their shooting attacks.The gryph units were also more resiliant than I expected. My opponent had the ability to get them to +2 save and at 5 wounds a piece they took some shifting. 

[Solaris]

Really cool force you have there! Nice to see you had some success playing them too =)

[Chris Tomlin]

@Mike. c - Army is looking great bro! Congrats on another win as well. If you can push forward and fight the battle in the opponents side of the board it definitely makes things trickier for them to get out and start scoring. That said, I am sometimes a little more conservative/defensive with my army dependant on the battleplan/match up.

Always declaring things even if not using them is great practice, almost just to build muscle memory so that you don't forget it in an important situation. Maybe write yourself a list that you run through each hero phase until it sticks. I find physically swigging some battlebrew (your choice of beverage!) is handy haha!  

[ZealousJ]

As someone just coming back to the hobby who is yet to properly decide on a faction and hasn't got a game in yet I have to say this blog is excellent. Inspiring stuff. It's casual tone, wonderfully painted and personalised miniatures, and easy to read battle reports are just the kind of thing I need to keep my interest up.

 

Thanks for keeping this up!

 

[Mike. c]

Hi guys, sorry for not posting for a few days; started the new job this week so been a bit busy. 

No real progress to show you unfortunately, still working on the last of the ard boys and have magnetised the whole army for transport.

Had another game last week against my mate Paul and his destruction army. We played 2k and the border patrol scenario (???), where you have 4 objectives worth different points. 

Paul had 2 thundertusks, 1 stonehorn, a cunning ruck of 30/40 arrow boys and 3 min battle line units. I had 2 megaboss, 2x10 ard boys, warchanter, shaman, 15 brutes, 10 brutes and a unit of gore gruntas.

Paul went first and had some terrible destruction moves which meant his units got in each others way and he didn't get where he wanted to be. His dice continued to be terrible in his shooting phase.

I moved up and scored the two middle objectives while engaging the 2 thunder tusks on one objective. I easily claimed the left objective and held it all game; while scoring the right hand objective due to having a greater number of models around it.

The first half of the game stayed like this with Paul having terrible luck and me getting ahead on points.

This changed in the second half of the game when Paul's frost lord started to make a real impact and my mega brute squad couldn't grind through the arrow boys quick enough. Paul also managed to get onto my home objective and rack up the points quickly.

In turn 5 the frost lord had destroyed most of my army and Paul was just ahead on points. I was hoping I would be able to pull it back by putting 10 ard boys into the frost lord to claim back my home objective and also hoping for a cheeky foot of gork to help the boys out. Unfortunately the boys failed their mystical terrain role and the shaman rolled a 1 for his destruction move meaning he couldn't move to see past the building he was hiding behind. 

In the end Paul won by a few a points and I got my first loss with the ironjawz (boo).

It was a really interesting and close game however I think it would be a completely different story had Paul had even average dice roles at the start of the game. The stone horn and thunder tusks are ridiculously good and 40 arrow boys are tough to chew through. Not sure what I would do differently or how to beat his army really, seems a tough match up.

 

[Mike. c]

Another game today vs Daz and his stormcast. Apologies if the pics are difficult to follow, Daz is trying to decide if he wants to run stormcast or tzeentch and so there are a few proxys in this game.

I ran my usual 2 megaboss, warchanter, shaman, 2x10 ard boys, 15 brutes, 10 brutes and 3 goregruntas with the iron fist formation. 

Daz ran a lord-aquilor, relictor, vena tor, 2x5 liberators, 5 judicators, 10 retributors, 5 protectors, 3 prosecutors, 6 Longstrike crossbows and a gryphhound with the Hammerstrike formation.

We rolled up take and hold. Deployment was as follows with the paladins behind the house actually off the table. I gave the first turn to Daz.

in his first turn daz moved up slightly with the liberators and judicators. He used the relictor to lightening chariot the venator forward who promptly shot off my shaman who was stood in arcane terrain. In my turn I piled everything forward except my ard boys who consolidated around my objective. The 10 brutes multicharged the two units of liberators and then had the judicators pile into them. This combat continued for a few rounds.

turn two saw Daz bring down his paladins near my mega brute unit and teleport the lord-aquilor and longstrikes to my left flank. The longstrikes with the help the venator then shot off 1 megaboss. The retributors failed their charge but we're then able to pile in to the brutes after I had piled into the successfully charging protectors. In my turn not a lot happened we just continued to fight out the combats.

Turn 3 came around and my megaboss went into help the mega brutes, my other brutes cleared up the liberators/ judicators and my goregruntas charged the gryphound. Daz teleported his aquilor and longstrikes near my objective and charged the aquilor into combat with them. The longstrikes finished off the other megaboss.

Turn 4 saw my brute units head towards the prosecutors and kill them. I also realised at this point I didn't control his objective as I only had the 3 goregruntas there and I needed 5 models to claim it.

Turn 5 Daz teleported away from my objective and put all his shooting into what was left of my mega brutes and killed them. This denied me any hero phase movement as I had no characters left and no iron fist boss. Because of this my other remaining brutes failed to reach the goregruntas and claim me both objectives. The ard boys also got taken down to 1 man remaining.

In the end it came down to points. I killed 1240 points while Daz killed 1280 giving him the minor victory.  

Really good close game but I must learn to pay more attention to the details of the scenario as I may have been able to win the gameturn 4 if I hadn't gone after the prosecutors with all my brutes but had gone to the objective instead.

[Mike. c]

Managed to get the last of the ard boys painted.

Can now field a full unit with hand weapon shield and a full unit with two hand weapons.

That also means my full 2k list is painted!

Means I can stop worrying about having the army painted for my first aos tournament next month  (AGOM). Also managed to get signed up to my second tournament this month and will be attending Blackout later in the year.

[Mike. c]

Had another game against Daz and his stormcast last night, and I have to say I struggled.  Daz was running a stardrake and two units of fulminators list which with so little mortal wound output I couldn't deal with.  

We played the mission with an objective in each corner and I suffered a minor loss with Daz controlling 3 objectives to my 1 at the end of the game. 

Turn 1 Daz managed to charge the stardrake across the board and into my unit of 15 brutes and over the course of a few turns took them off. I even threw in a battle brewed megaboss to help them who also got dealt with easily. After these the drake then ate 10 ard boys who were guarding one of my objectives. I really don't know how I would deal with this in future the 0+/1+ armour re-rolling 1's and healing wounds on a 7 just meant nothing got through to it. Rend 1 didn't hurt it only stopped it healing and there doesnt seem to be enough -2 rend in the army. I tried a  foot of gork to get some mortal wounds through but the fact the drake can alter spell rolls up/down by 1 meant I couldn't even get the spell off. Any ideas how Ironjaws deal with stardrakes?

On the other side of the board it was a better game, I got the charge off on the fulminators meaning they didnt cause me too much trouble. They held me up for a while but didn't do too much damage. However them holding me up for a while meant the stormcast won the war of attrition as the judicators kept firing into me while I was stuck in combat. 

Rain of stars and the knight heraldors ability also snuck a few wounds off here and there and managed to take out a few of my characters. 

Overall I am struggling to know what to do with the ironjaws now. Having played a few games I think the brutes are awesome but the army seems to solely rely on them.  The megaboss can be good, but for me at least is too often hit or miss. I am also finding that my unit of 10 brutes with 2 hand weapons is just as useful as the 15 brutes with 2 inch reach weapons as they don't need babysitting by a warchanter and can still usually get all 10 in. 

The ardboys are beginning to seem like a bit of a waste, in this game particular they just sat on my objectives all game and meant it felt like I played 360 points down. I probably should have thrown them forward with everything else however the movement of the stardrake, fulminators and the lightning chariot spell meant I didn't feel comfortable leaving my objectives unguarded. 

I am also finding that I don't get the most out of my characters as 1 megaboss, a shaman and a warchanter are usually babysitting the unit of 15 brutes ensuring they get +1 to hit, re-roll 1's to hit and are mystic shielded. Beginning to seem like all my eggs in one basket.  

Any ideas how to improve my list/ gameplay? my list at the moment is

2x megaboss, warchanter, shaman, 15 brutes with 2" reach weapons, 10 brutes with 2 hand weapons, 10 ard boys with shields, 10 ardboys with 2 hand weapons, 3 gore gruntas and the ironfist formation.