Battle Report: Grissel vs eKaya 750

So my next playtest game was also against circle, this time against eKaya. The lists this time were:

Grissel Bloodsong
Winter Troll
Pyre Troll
Bouncer
10 Kriel Warriors + Standard & Piper + Caber Thrower
5 Champions
4 Long Riders
Fell Caller
Hero
Viktor Pendrake
Totem Hunter

vs

Kaya the Moonhunter
Laris
Megalith
Warpwolf
Woldwyrd
Dahlia & Skarrath
6 Wolves of Oberos
6 Tharn Bloodtrackers
3 Gatormen
Blackclad Wayfarer
Swamp Gobbers Bellows Crew

Deployment
My opponent won the roll and opted for me to set up and go first, we had a river with three crossings running down the board from my zone to his about 6 inches off center, a forest on the far left just past the midway point of the board, with a building in the middle and a few rock pieces scattered around for cover.

I opted to roll with the Long Riders on the left side across the river with the Kriel Warriors spread out evenly across the center of the board covering both sides of the river. The champions were deployed on the right along with the hero, while Grissel and the Fell Caller took up central position alongside the path of the river. The bouncer went with Grissel, the winter troll on the same flank as the long riders, and the pyre troll nearby the champions.

Circle player chose to deploy Kaya near the front along with all of the warbeasts, with the bloodtrackers (who chose the long riders as their prey) on his far right nearest the woods and the wolves on his left covering the ford across the river. Concentrating his forces on the smaller portion of the river, he deployed the gatormen to cover the river itself with Dahlia and Skarrath loitering towards the back along with the wayfarer.

Trollblood Turn 1
The fell caller used pathfinder on the Kriel Warriors, who ran across the river so that the entire unit was on the smaller section serving as a wide ranging road block in front of the rest of my army, with the Long Riders and Winter Troll running up behind them. The Totem Hunter ran up the river along with Pendrake and the Pyre Troll. Grissel used Hoof It on the champions before running across the ford followed closely by the Bouncer. The Champions and Hero ran up across the open ground towards the central building, intending to flank my opponent and box them in by cutting off any escape routes across the river. End of the turn, the Champions moved a few extra inches.

Circle Turn 1
The Warpwolf made a full advance towards the Kriel Warrior line and opted to go with +2ARM, followed by Megalith who cast eKaya's enforced evolution on the Warpwolf. Laris took up a position between the two heavy warbeasts with the Woldwyrd loitering around behind them. The wolves advanced to the flank of Megalith, keeping pace about 4 inches behind him, with the bloodtrackers doing the same on the opposite side with the Warpwolf. The gatormen moved to face the river crossing intending to intercept the champions, while Dahlia cast her anti orders spell. eKaya cast her stealth spell and waits towards the back of the army.

Trollblood Turn 2
Grissel runs across the ford and uses Hoof It on the Kriel Warriors, followed once more by her trusty bouncer. Seeing that the opponent has no intentions of splitting his forces, the Hero chooses to cross the river ready for where the main melee will happen. The Kriel Warriors pop their mini feat and run full out towards the warbeast line, with the shaman piper and caber thrower hanging towards the back while maintaining cavalry formation. The Long Riders run up behind them followed by the Winter Troll, with the Pyre Troll running up the river to close the distance on the enemy. The Champions run around the building, about twelve inches or so from the top most fording point (which is a stone bridge with lips high enough to count as cover), with the Totem Hunter advancing into a position where he still has cover if necessary but a line of sight towards anyone he can get close enough to. Pendrake similarly runs along the river bank ready to be available to assist the champions or the totem hunter as needed. Hoof it movement brings the Kriel Warriors right into the midst of the warbeast line, engaging every single one of them except the Woldwyrd.

Circle Turn 2
eKaya upkeeps forced evolution but doesn't bother upkeeping stealth. A bit surprised by the tactics of the Kriel Warriors, she opts to go first and pops her feat, but makes a major mistake by forgetting to discard her fury remembering only after activating two warbeasts later. As we are prepping for a tournament game I advise my opponent to stick to the rules and just deal with it rather than going back and dropping the fury even though it's way too late. With his options for spending fury limited, the Warpwolf goes after the Kriel Warriors engaging him, spending all his fury (he hadn't noticed his fury problem yet), killing three Kriel Warriors as I pass only one tough roll out of four before teleporting back to eKaya behind the infantry line. Megalith manages to kill one (doesn't spend any fury for extra attacks) before teleporting back behind the line as well, while Laris fails to kill any before again porting back behind the line. The Woldwyrd takes a shot but fails to kill any, opts to buy a second shot which kills a Kriel Warrior before he too teleports behind the line. The bloodtrackers ambuscade the Kriel Warriors, failing to kill any as the tough rolls are now rolling well, and the Wolves of Oberos manage to kill only the standard bearer, who passes the standard on to the dude behind him. Dahlia casts Skarrath's animus on one wolf, while Skarrath himself does the same on another, before the Swamp Gobbers drop a smoke cloud on top of the two of them.

Trollblood Turn 3
I have lost six Kriel Warriors, but they have performed their job admirably, holding the enemy line, forcing Kaya to waste her feat on the second turn, and even luring in both infantry units. Grissel activates first, advancing into a position to affect the entire army before popping her own feat, giving every unit hoof it and heroic ballad. She takes a pot shot at Skarrath with her handcannon, unfortunately missing him before casting the Winter Troll animus on a long rider and the bouncer. The Winter Troll casts his animus on the Caber Thrower before advancing and using his breath attack through the combat, missing both the wolf and the kriel warrior but killing one bloodtracker and one bone grinder. The Kriel Warriors advance into the middle of the infantry line and go with rapid strikes for three attacks per kriel warrior. One Kriel Warrior manages to kill two wolves on his own even though he requires eights to hit, while a series of combined melee attacks sees two blood trackers die. The caber thrower moves into the combat, using the caber toss special attack, missing one wolf, killing another, the Blackclad Wayfarer and manages to catch a gatorman with the tail end of the attack rolling enough to kill him outright. The piper uses instep for the unit to advance an inch, catching the rest of the wolves, killing all but one of the two who were in the cloud effect who retaliates and manages to kill the shaman (who went for a CMA against him missing three times needing sevens!). The long riders charge into the gaps created by the Kriel Warriors, killing the last remaining wolf of oberos. The champions advance to the river edge with the Totem Hunter sitting behind them, while the Pyre Troll advances to use the topmost bridge as cover with Pendrake sat behind him. The Bouncer runs up ahead of Grissel to interpose any possible charge lanes. Hoof It movement brings all the remaining blood trackers into combat with either Kriel Warriors or Long Riders all of whom have the Winter Trolls animus on them. The bouncer sits just outside of reach of Skarrath while the Champions begin to cross the river. The Hero sits behind the Long Riders ready as the third wave along with the Bouncer.

Circle Turn 3
His wolves wiped out to a man and his bloodtrackers all engaged, it isn't looking good for eKaya. The Bloodtrackers swing ineffectually at the Kriel Warriors and Long Riders, becoming stationary for their Troubles. The Gatormen drop their Swamp to try to keep the Champions occupied before charging one of the Long Riders, one of them taking a free strike from another long rider, leaving him on 1 wound. Between them they kill that Long Rider, but find themselves stationary thanks to the Long Rider they charged past (who they couldnt see to charge). Megalith charges into the Long Rider with freezer, managing to take him down. eKaya casts dogpile onto the Champions and the Warpwolf warps for +2 movement before charging the Champions, failing to land a single hit with two attacks and two purchased attacks before running out of fury. Skarrath kills another Long Rider while Dahlia casts his animus on the Warpwolf while the Swamp Gobbers center their cloud effect on him as well. Laris moves to look after the other flank along with the Woldwyrd.

Trollblood Turn 4
Sensing that victory was drawing near I move to cripple as much of the enemy force as I can. Grissel uses heroic ballad on the Kriel Warriors before casting flaming fists on both the hero and the remaining long rider (who happens to be the leader). The Kriel Warriors advance so two of them are engaging Megalith while the remainder autokill the four stationary bloodtrackers. The piper uses in step to create a gap big enough for the long rider Kithkar to get a line of sight to Laris, he chooses to go for it and manages to land his impact attack, inflicting a respectable ten damage points. His charge attack also hits, inflicting nineteen more damage, taking out Laris by himself. The Hero charges the Gatorman Bokur killing him with his first attack before finishing off the last Gatorman who had one wound left. The Pyre Troll takes a shot at Skarrath boosting his attack roll and getting the critical fire, the AoE also catches one swap gobber and Dahlia, setting them both on fire. An unboosted damage roll only does one damage to Skarrath, but boosts against the Gobber kills him and inflicts eight damage to Dahlia, who wisely chooses to transfer it to Skarrath. The fell caller finishes his trek up the river to give pathfinder to the Champions, who advance across the river and swamp (leaving two champs in base to base engaging the Warpwolf) killing a bone grinder and building up damage on Skarrath, choosing to pass on the remaining three attacks when Skarrath was left on two wounds, the two Champions with the Warpwolf choose not to attack the effectively DEF18 Warpwolf who gets to attack back if they miss! Pendrake walks up and uses dismember on the Totem Hunter who charges Skarrath, rolling enough to almost one shot him by himself before also killing Dahlia, earning himself two totem tokens.

Circle Turn 4
Left with only Megalith (swamped by what will be wave after wave of Kriel Warriors), a Warpwolf (stuck with Champions), a Woldwyrd, eKaya, one gobber and two bone Grinders (failed command check) against my entire army my opponents chooses to forfeit. A crushing victory for the Trollbloods!

Thoughts
Grissel: Once again proved to be a very effective caster, she was never in any danger through the whole battle and constantly forced my opponent onto the defensive. Did nothing more than throw around a few animi and some fell calls but then again was never really called upon to do much more than that.

Pyre Troll: Besides being present for burning fists, he only got to make one ranged attack but the one he made was worth it. If all the models who had been set on fire hadn't been killed already, then there was good chance they would have as they were all fragile models.

Winter Troll: OK I have used him in three seperate games now, and he has caused total carnage and destruction in every game so I cannot see where the hate for him comes from (except the awful pose of the model itself). He was single handedly responsible for the deaths of four out of the six blood trackers and my enemy was constantly wary of his animus being throwned around on my troopers. I think he has definitely made the list over the Impaler for Grissel.

Bouncer: Never had to be called into action all game, he sat there blocking charge lanes to Grissel and just looked big and scary. Didn't have to do anything but was always there if needed.

Pendrake: The totem hunter didn't need dismember, but it was nice to have it there ready in case it was needed. Pendrake didn't do much all game but again he never really needed to.

Totem Hunter: Killed both Skarrath and Dahlia though the Champions were easily capable of finishing off Skarrath by themselves. This had left him in a well protected position where he could easily have moved on up to engage Megalith from behind or possibly even eKaya and continued racking up the tokens. Seemed to justify his points value in this game.

Fell Caller: Spent the entirety of this game just throwing around buffs, but the terrain setup meant that Pathfinder was needed almost every turn, so his activities were limited just because of the terrain factor.

Hero: Killed the Gatormen and was (like the Totem Hunter) in a position to charge the Megalith next turn who was being swamped by waves of Kriel Warriors. Between the two of them, I felt confident that Megalith wouldn't have survived another turn.

Kriel Warriors: The real stars of this battle, they got in the way and kept my opponent bogged down for the entire match, everywhere he turned the Kriel Warriors were there and they just would not die. At the end of the game, I still had 3 Warriors, plus the Standard and Piper (the caber was one of the three surviving warriors) so my opponent scored zero VPs for them. For their points value they were absolutely superb, I would run them with Grissel every time.

Long Riders: Only killed the odd trooper or two, but ARM18 and 8 wounds combined with reach and tall in the saddle makes them ideal candidates for the Winter Troll animus. Driving into the heart of the enemy's army on my feat turn meant sacrificing three of the four long riders, but Freezer on them meant they could not be ignored. The leader killing Laris by himself was just the icing on the cake.

Champions: Didn't get to do much, but they sucked in the Warpwolf into their own brand of Tarpit. The DEF18 trick with counter attack made me choose not to retaliate, but the Bouncer's animus on the guy he was engaging meant that next turn he had one attack maximum to drop him before being pushed out of melee range and at the mercy of the unit in its entirety without the benefits of the gobber cloud or Skarrath's animus, and that would not have ended well for him.