The worst model to play against: ogres vs wood elves. A horror story

I played another game against wood elves on Saturday.  Normally I would write up a battle report about it, but I was just so frustrated by everything that happened that I figured I would just complain about it here.  Also, the battle was only 3 turns long before we called it and went to lunch, so there is that.

The main problem: The Twins.  I don't think this character was very well tested (if tested at all).  Fun thing about them:  If they ride their eagle (or whatever it is), they count as monstrous cav.  Which means they get the toughness and wounds of the mount.  So now these two are 3 wounds a piece at tough 4.  And you need to take out all 6 wounds in one go.

Do you have ANY idea how hard that is to do?  The game is based around whittling things down.  If they get into combat and challenge, there is no character in the game that I know of that can do 6 wounds in a single phase.  So you have to refuse the challenge, meaning that your best character goes to the back.  Then you have to hope that you have enough units left that can strike back and deal the requisite 6 wounds.  If you deal 5, who cares!  They are back to full in the next phase!

It seems like the only way to beat them is cannons or combat res.

So yeah, the main reason I haven't posted a battle report (yet, anyway) is because of the extreme frustration of watching these two terrors eat through half of my army.  I'll get around to it eventually, but for now....ugh.

In the course of the game, these two ate my hunter, my maneaters, and was going to have a good go at my tyrant and the ironguts before we called the game.  Naturally, they were at full wounds each time.

They would not be toughness 4 for a start.  If you check page 82 and 83 of the BRB.  It states that cavalry uses the riders toughness and wounds.  However, Mounstrous cavalry get a little bonus in that they use the highest wounds from riders or mounts wounds.  It does NOT say that they use the mounts toughness at all. 

E.G. This is why Hippogryths are toughness 3 for instance but have 3 wounds.

Mournfangs are lucky here in that mournfangs and ogres are tough 4 so it doesn't matter to us!

I hope that helps makes you feel better a least a little.

But understandably frustrating.

Hope this helps.

Kind regards Zolas.

They would not be toughness 4 for a start.  If you check page 82 and 83 of the BRB.  It states that cavalry uses the riders toughness and wounds.  However, Mounstrous cavalry get a little bonus in that they use the highest wounds from riders or mounts wounds.  It does NOT say that they use the mounts toughness at all. 

E.G. This is why Hippogryths are toughness 3 for instance but have 3 wounds.

Mournfangs are lucky here in that mournfangs and ogres are tough 4 so it doesn't matter to us!

I hope that helps makes you feel better a least a little.

But understandably frustrating.

Hope this helps.

Kind regards Zolas.

They FAQ'd it. It's supposed to be highest wounds and toughness. Unless they changed the FAQ again...

My mistake in that case apologies. 

http://www.blacklibrary.com/Downloads/Product/PDF/Warhammer/WARHAMMER-RULEBOOK-.pdf

Regards Zolas 

I'm not sure they are both T4 and 3 wounds equalling 6 wounds.

Indeed, the rules in no way explain how the heck you are supposed to resolve them when they're on the monstrous mount. They're clear - and seem to be designed for - the monster mount.

We were assuming they were either T3 and 4W or T4 and 3W when on the eagle but the rules are really not clear. Treating them as a single model with 6 wounds seems overly generous interpretation.

A wood elf FAQ would be nice. Along with all the other books in the last year.

We were basing our ruling on the fact that they are two characters that count as one model.  The standard rule for them is that as long as one lives, they both come back to full after each phase.  That means that they effectively have 4 wounds.  If you were to go first somehow (not a regular occurrence for us), you can reduce incoming damage by killing off one of them.

When they are on the eagle, they count as monstrous cav, so you can't kill the mount first.  Each would get three wounds, and now they effectively have 6.

I agree that they were definitely designed around riding the dragon.  I doubt any real thought was put into the character as a monstrous cav.  You can't separate them from the eagle, so for all intents and purposes, its a 6 wound model.  At least, so far as we can tell.

Well, they were like this before amusingly - nothing's actually changed in regards to this exploit. However, I have seen it argued that they only count as one profile on a Monstrous Cav Mount, since the Monstrous Cav rules state you only use the highest set of wounds on a split profile - so you can argue that the profile is split into three (both sisters and the eagle) and you only choose the highest wound profile for the single model, which is in this case three wounds.

So plink three wounds off and they die.


It'll be awkward to argue though, you'll have to word it better than me. If that won't fly, use cannons - as per the rules for any kind of rider, they'd all get hit and you could rip off a lot of wounds easily, leaving something like leadbelchers to finish them off.

As for combat... regardless of them growing back, any wounds caused, challenge or not, would surely still count towards combat res. An Ogre Tyrant could beat one to death and she might pop back up, but unless they're well supported it's not unlikely they'd flee. You'd have to be careful in how you position yourself though, I will admit it's not easy.



EDIT: I'm actually trying to work out how your opponent interprets their rules. As a Monstrous Cav rider, he's either treating it as two characters each with 3 wounds, or a single 'model' with 6 wounds. Though I've seen arguments for the former and they're typically played that way, the latter is way off and there's no rules to support that.

As a ogre and wood elves player myself, I played the twins a few days ago. Played them as 1 model with 3 wounds, which heals up every phase. Need some help from the GW team, to put the rules to their right, but 2 models with 3 wounds each or 1 model with 6 wounds is just bending the rules a little bit too much. I would love it, but no fair, because on the eagle, you can't kill the mount. On the dragon, 2 models with 2 wounds each is where the rules comes to their right. In my opinion, the twins on eagle should follow the rules for a monster. 2 separate models on a mount.

That's interesting.  What's it's damage output like however?

The damage output was decent.  I think it was 4 str 5 attacks on the charge and another 3 str 4 attacks from the eagle?  With the typical elf rerolls, of course.

Someone else will have to confirm that, though.  I don't honestly remember much beyond "they ate all my stuff".

Just a point for thought: the Stonehorn, thundertusk, ironblaster, and nearly every chariot from other armies, arachnarock spider are multiple models on a single mount, but they only get a single set of wounds or toughness, the highest.  Dwarf on a shield is similar.  The difference is in that for a separate character and monster mount is that you can target one or the other.  If you cannot target and kill any of the models individually, GWs policy has always been that the get the highest of the characteristics, but they don't ever add as far as I can recall (but I am sure someone can come up with exceptions to this)

Further Edit:
Actually, it says specifically in the rules/FAQ that characters on monstrous cavalry are treated as a single model and use the Highest characteristic (toughness and wounds) for the WHOLE MODEL.  It makes no distinction with regards to how many riders.  But it very clearly rules out *adding* wounds together.  The only instance where characters and mounts have all the wounds of each is specifically outlined in the monster section, and it specifically states that rules for characters on monsters do not follow those for monstrous cavalry, and further that each can be attacked separately. 

If the troop type argument doesn't hold with your opponent, and they insist that the wounds somehow add, then you would have to treat it as a monster, and the rules clearly state that monsters and riders can be attacked separately.

Sorry Lawgnome, I think you were had (probably not maliciously).

Stonehorn, Thundertusk, Ironblaster, Chariot and Arachnarok spider aren't good examples, but your point is there.  Those are all normal models and from a completely different unit type (being Chariots or Monsters and not involving Characters).  Dwarf Lord on Shield Bearers is right on the money though, although the 2 Dwarfs are treated as a mount.  Them's Mountin' Dwarfs

I honestly have no idea how the hell to interpret their rule, because the policy has always been that Army Book rules take precedence over BRB rules

Well, in the old rules you treated "monstrous cavalry" mounts for characters like monsters, not that unit types existed then. So when they were originally written, you would randomise hits between the two riders and the eagle and the rules make sense. Seems to me when the new book was written the author didn't even think about how it would work with the 8th ed monstrous cavalry rules.

I'm not going to get into much of a discussion about what the rules should be because not only do I not know how to resolve such a mess of a rule, I don't think the author even had a rules as intended resolution in mind when the book was written! But I really don't see any rule argument that legitimately gives them 6 wounds.

Either they count as a single figure, in which case the highest wound number is used. So 3. Or they count as two figures on one base (like a ridden monster). In which case they would have 2 wounds each, or possibly 3 but that seems fishy that a monstrous mount would add its wounds to both riders.

The possibilities are:
2x2 wounds (army book overrides rulebook in this case)
3 (highest wounds on the model per the MC rules)
2x3 (both riders benefit from the MC rules)
4 wounds (both riders get their wounds and count as a single model, which is higher than the MC mount's wounds)

Indeed, I think the only thing we can rule out is they don't count as a single model with 6 wounds because that implies you treat them as separate characters for the MC rules and then combine them as a single model and there's no rules justification for that.

Do you have ANY idea how hard that is to do?  The game is based around whittling things down.  If they get into combat and challenge, there is no character in the game that I know of that can do 6 wounds in a single phase.

Oldblood on a coldone with Piranha blade, dragonbane gem, charmed shield and Potion of strength = 250 points... In my last tourney he did:
Did 9 wounds on a Arachnarok spider in one go.
Did 3 wounds on Chaos BSB with ward save on a juggernaut in one go.
Did 6 wounds on OG Trolls in one go.

Then there are Blender VC Lords and guys like Konrad, who with a little bit of magic help can do 25-36 wounds on Ogres per combat round.

There are also dwellers, Throgg, double Ironblaster, Stonehorns, Mournfang etc.

Just saying they are not that hard.

One Cannon ganks them both in one shot and they have no wards and no LOS, outside of ludicrously large warhawk rider units.  They can't fight their way out of a wet paper bag and have no static resolution.  Seriously, sack up and decline the challenge and let the rank and file models send them packing, if they even see combat.  If they don't, then the bird version is a 300 point two S3 shot model.  Hardly game breaking.

And to add to Henning's list, any Greater Daemon packing the Eternal Blade will send them packing, the Ramhorn Shenanigans Minotaur Lord will eat them alive, focused shooting brings them down pretty fast, even randomizing between the two parts, and any two magic missiles have a pretty solid shot at skunking them.  As someone who played the Sisters in both this and the prior book, I can safely say that they die pretty easily.

One Cannon ganks them both in one shot and they have no wards and no LOS, outside of ludicrously large warhawk rider units.  They can't fight their way out of a wet paper bag and have no static resolution.  Seriously, sack up and decline the challenge and let the rank and file models send them packing, if they even see combat.  If they don't, then the bird version is a 300 point two S3 shot model.  Hardly game breaking.

And to add to Henning's list, any Greater Daemon packing the Eternal Blade will send them packing, the Ramhorn Shenanigans Minotaur Lord will eat them alive, focused shooting brings them down pretty fast, even randomizing between the two parts, and any two magic missiles have a pretty solid shot at skunking them.  As someone who played the Sisters in both this and the prior book, I can safely say that they die pretty easily.

Why don't you tell us how you really feel...?

One Cannon ganks them both in one shot and they have no wards and no LOS, outside of ludicrously large warhawk rider units.  They can't fight their way out of a wet paper bag and have no static resolution.  Seriously, sack up and decline the challenge and let the rank and file models send them packing, if they even see combat.  If they don't, then the bird version is a 300 point two S3 shot model.  Hardly game breaking.

And to add to Henning's list, any Greater Daemon packing the Eternal Blade will send them packing, the Ramhorn Shenanigans Minotaur Lord will eat them alive, focused shooting brings them down pretty fast, even randomizing between the two parts, and any two magic missiles have a pretty solid shot at skunking them.  As someone who played the Sisters in both this and the prior book, I can safely say that they die pretty easily.

Hard to argue with that

Honestly, the real problem was that my list was not equipped to handle them.  They operate similar to a demon prince: you need to have the right tools to kill them.  My list was set up to handle a usual wood elf list: some decent shooting for whittling down units, and as much durability as I could manage to ensure I survive to get into combat.  A cannon would have wiped them out easily, and a group of ironguts would probably manage the same.  It was just the fact that I had to deal all the wounds in one go that made it ridiculous.  The standard tactic of whittling a few wounds off each round you don't outright kill something went out the window.

I've played against it and I think he is seeing the rule wrong.
It only really gets the twin rule when on a dragon as when mounted on a eagle, like is said, it's monstrous cav. So the model counts as 1. 
Like our mournfang.

So you only take the highest wounds and toughness. So we see it as 3 wounds t4.
Then use that big shinny canon we all love so much lol.
Hope this helps.

Seems fairly simple to me, hit them with a cannon ball, they both take the hit as it's Monstrous Cav. roll 3+ and BAM! 

Even if you play it like a multiple component MCav model (how I do) a single cannon ball still hits both parts and likely splats them both.  Things I have lost this model to in the last two years of playtesting (using 2 T4 3W interpretation) include:  Cannons, boosted magic missiles, standard bowfire, Foot of Gork, Dual Doom Divers, and Saurus Warriors in close combat.  That's just the things that have outright one rounded them.  I also got them run down in close combat numerous times.

A single cannonball isn't that likely to kill them.

If they are 3W each, what we have is ((5/6)*(1/2))^2 = 25/144 = 0.17 or roughly 1 in 6 chance.

Now two cannon hits will likely splat them both or some BS shooting to finish them off. But one cannon is unlikely to.

found a link that will help I think...

http://warhammer.org.uk/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=123173

Its a forum post on this matter

found a link that will help I think...

http://warhammer.org.uk/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=123173

Its a forum post on this matter

I love how the general consensus with that post is "We have no idea.  The rules blue screen, and the only way to play it is through house agreement."

A single cannonball isn't that likely to kill them.

If they are 3W each, what we have is ((5/6)*(1/2))^2 = 25/144 = 0.17 or roughly 1 in 6 chance.

Now two cannon hits will likely splat them both or some BS shooting to finish them off. But one cannon is unlikely to.

This is true, but outside of Daemons, I have never seen an army with a cannon that wasn't also packing lighter shooting to back it up.  One cannon hit tends to put you into "OMG goblin archers are about to kill me" territory.