Facing down the Retribution – Irusk vs Ossyan

Here’s some Warmachine to stave off the torrent of Warhammer stuff I’ve been posting rencently (I’m sorry Dan!). Nothing major but I was down maelstrom this week and had a game against Retribution, my first game against them I might add and even though it was nothing major as the guy was just starting out with them I was eager to see what they were like, as you all know, I am in the process of building a Ret army myself. So I thought I’d do a very quick Battle report and then talk about what I though about my first encounter with the elves.

My opponent  was using Ossyan the new Wrath caster, I rated him pretty well after reading his rules so I was eager to see what he could pull off! I would be playing my standard Irusk list.

Lord Arcanist Ossyan
– Sylys Wyshnalyrr
– Discordia
– Manticore

Full Dawnguard Invictors
– UA
– Souless Escort

Stormfall Archers

Stormfall Archers

Ghost Sniper

Ghost Sniper

Arcanist

Narn, Mage hunter assassin

Fane Knight Skeryth Issyen

I won the dice off and decided to go first. I set up central with the Kayazay on my right. He deployed the invictors slightly to the right with Ossyan and Discordia. The manticore, Arcanist, ghost snipers and stormfalls took the left flank. Skeryth and Narn set up on the far right ready to sweep round.

My first turn consisted of running forward and casting my upkeep spells. He responded by manouvring forward and with snipe on the archers proceeded to take out 3 kayazay and a winterguard.

Second turn Behemoth moved forward and with his bombards too out most of the stormfalls. The winterguard bobbed and weaved forward taking some speculative sprays at the Invictors but only managing to get through the armour of one. The kayazay continued to run up his flank. and engaged a few models. Ossyan then loaded up the Maticore with focus and moved up to feat, catching Behemoth. the 2 remaining stormfalls managed to put 12 damage onto behemoth and I feared I was going to lose him to the boosted firepower of the Manticore but here my opponent made his worst mistake in my opinion, he opted to boost with the arcanist and try to charge the Behemoth…he was 1/2″ out…when I asked him why he didn’t shoot he said he believed that he had more chance in combat. Effectively if he had reached Behemoth he could of done some damage however between him, the ghost sniper and a few invictors they could easily of taken Behemoth giving him the jack advantage. So behemoth walked away with some damage but no disabled systems. The invictors and skeryth try but fail to hit the winterguard as did Discordia.

I started my turn by loading up behemoth thinking he could get the assassination on Ossyan. Aiyana harmed the Manticore and Behemoth beat it into the ground before putting both boosted shots onto Ossyan. The first one missed but the second one took him down to a handfull of boxes. The winterguard advanced and cleared out a few Invictors but their high armour proved tough to crack. In retorspect I should of combined shot in pairs and not tried to spray. A lucky rocket does take out Wyshnalyrr however. The kayazay chew up the remains of the right flank and make for Ossyan. Both the Spriggan and the bears go into Skeryth but due to horrible rolls fail to even dismount him!

In his turn Ossyan moves away whilst focusing Discordia to trample forward through the winterguard to engage the Behemoth. He takes hull boxes but nowhere near enough to disable big B’s systems. The Invictors cover ossyans escape, blocking of the kayazay from him and put a MASSIVE 10 man combined shot into the Behemoth but fail to damage due to an unlucky roll.

At this point it was just a case of mopping up. The behemoth moves round Discordia after Aiyana had harmed it trying to get into range of Ossyan but after scrapping the jack Ossyan is just out of range and the scatter misses him. Holt opens the gap in the Invictors though and after Irusk feats for the +2 rat, the winterguard filter through and shotgun the caster to death.

In all not an amazing game but my opponent was starting out with elves and wanted to see what the WGDS and Behemoth were like. I think he was impressed 😉 some bad luck and bad tactical choices lost my opponent the game but such is the way with warmachine. It’s all a learning experience.

So what did I think to the elves?

I was pretty pleased with Ossyan‘s as his spell list does give him alot of options and his feat is very potent when combined with an army where every model has a shooting attack. Im certain that had he decided to shoot the Behemoth it would of been lights out for him. My opponent didn’t use his chronophage cannon but I’m sure some very potent combos could be discovered using it.

The Manticore is a very solid jack for Ossyan due to his ROF3 Pow 12 gun. Combined with Ossyans feat the damage potential is very high. He can also mix it up in melee and with quicken  he can fly across the battlefield.

Discordia was ok but I don’t think her potential is exploited in this list. The spray is good but  without a way to lower the winterguards defense it was ineffective. The blast shield also helped but I don’t think it was necessary due to the Invictors already high armour. A manticore with another arcanist would be much more effective in my opinion.

Wyshlanyrr is almost an auto include with ossyan due to his 4 upkeep spells. Nuff’ said.

The Invictors were good, their high armour does make them fairly survivable and their utility provides alot of options as well as benefiting form the all important feat.

Stormfall archers, now these guys did cause me some worry as the potential 8 aoe’s from the 2 units could seriously hurt my forces hence why Behemoth was put in to take them out. They did prove to be very effective, their multiple shot types giving them alot of flexibility. I will be sure to pick some of these up at a later date.

The rest of the army sadly did not have much effect on the battle which was a shame as they are ALL very good in their own right and I will talk about them more in the future as most of them will feature in my Arcanika series but in this game I didn’t get much info for them.

All in all I was pleased with Ossyan he made me think twice about alot of things and has quite a few tricks up his sleeve. With some tweaks and some more practice He will serve my opponent well! As for my first encounter with the Retribution, well I enjoyed it and their radically different play style entertained me and will only motivate me more to get mine on the table!

So there you go guys, not much I’m afraid but it does bring up a few interesting points and I hope you guys enjoyed reading it. Comments, as per usual, are welcome below if you have anything to add about Scyrah, the battle or the units discussed.