Battle Report: Fiona vs. Terminus - hardcore practice

So I'm trying to get used to 7 1/2 min turns for the softcore tournament at Kingdom Con in 2.5 weeks. I really just can't play fast enough with my Coven theme list, so I've been considering a few options. Since I've been playing the Coven a fair amount recently, I could run a jack heavy force with them, taking the DJ & Nightmare & a Stalker as the main assassination threats aside from my 2 nodes. My other thought is to run a Terminus list. Reason being, it may be a lot of models, but it's got a relatively straightforward plan that doesn't take much extra thought beyond order of operations for the turn. Additionally, since Hardcore is always using Killbox scenarios, it helps Termy out as well by preventing how far the enemy can run, while weakening the Coven since it forces them to be closer than I would generally like. Finally, it will give my opponent fits since tough rolls interrupt them a bit and can often force a change of plans in midgame. Basically, it gives them hell when they only get 7 1/2 minutes to work with. With all that in mind, I wanted to test whether or not I could run a Termy list in 7 1/2 minutes. On to the battle report!

The Lists!

His list was something like this:

Points: 50
Fiona the Black (*6pts)
* Mangler (8pts)
Alexia Ciannor & the Risen (Alexia and 9 Risen Grunts) (5pts)
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer (2pts)
* * Mule (8pts)
Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters (Cylena and 5 Grunts) (7pts)
Lady Aiyana & Master Holt (4pts)
Sea Dog Crew (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
* Mr. Walls Sea Dog Crew Quartermaster (2pts)
Doc Killingsworth (2pts)
Eiryss, Mage Hunter of Ios (3pts)
Lord Rockbottom (2pts)
Master Gunner Dougal MacNaile (2pts)

My list was this:

Points: 50

Lich Lord Terminus (*4pts)
* Reaper (7pts)
* Skarlock Thrall (2pts)
Bile Thralls (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
Mechanithralls (Leader and 9 Grunts) (5pts)
* 2 Brute Thrall (2pts)
Mechanithralls (Leader and 9 Grunts) (5pts)
* 2 Brute Thrall (2pts)
Necrosurgeon & 3 Stitch Thralls (2pts)
Necrosurgeon & 3 Stitch Thralls (2pts)
Soulhunters (Leader and 4 Grunts) (9pts)
The Withershadow Combine (5pts)
Darragh Wrathe (4pts)
Madelyn Corbeau, Ordic Courtesan (2pts)
Saxon Orrik (2pts)

So I lost the roll, and he wanted to go second. So there wasn't a whole lot of rough terrain on the board, just 2 walls in the middle on my side & 2 trenches on his side in the middle. The rough terrain was off center on each side, so I was just going to be barreling down the center of the board. Cause I'm boredish, I drew pics of the basic army setups.

1st Turn: I run everything forward, Termy casts Malediction on himself, "charges" at Mariner.

Darragh deathrides for another 1" of threat. Forget to give the Reaper a focus to run, so it's forced to walk and lag behind the army. Combine upkeep Malediction for Termy all game.

2nd Turn: Mule shoots at the closest Brute to him, miss & deviates backwards away from my army. Mariner shoots at Brute closest to him & kills.. ATGM kills a Mcthrall, not much else happens this turn.

3rd Turn: Front McThrall group runs to engage Alexia & Risen. Everybody else follows suit. Saxon tries to engage Eiryss, but is ~1" away. Reaper walks up since I forgot a focus for him again.

4th Turn: Mule blows up several biles and mcthralls. ATGM kill off some biles & mcthralls with arcane inferno. Mariner shoots & kills a soulhunter, Nyss kill a second SH. Risen kill some McThralls while Alexia puts some damage onto Darragh.. Eiryss & A&H kill Saxon. Fiona pops her feat (-1 dice to enemies on attack & dmg). Somewhere in there, the front necrosurgeon was killed.

5th Turn: Reaper gets 1 focus. Termy pops feat, charges toward a SeaDog, and lands closer to ATGM than Alexia is (so I can get soul tokens). Additionally, the only big threat to hurt him is the Mariner & Mule. The Mule can't get focus, so it's relatively safer to sit over on this side. The SeaDog toughs it, and I don't buy extra attacks, so no souls there. Biles activate, 3 left, 2 are KD. 1 walks to ATGM and purges, killing all, including UA. 1 stands and purges all over McThralls + Risen and Termy. 1 walks forward, stupidly in front of the other. He toughs, but dies to corrosion later. All Risen but 2 die this turn, but Alexia is too far away for anything to kill her with just one dice. Remaining McThralls just engage everything and give Termy sac pawn targets. 1 soulhunter (of 3 remaining) engages Nyss, can't hit their DEF 15 on 1 dice. Darragh gives -2 ARM to living enemy models in his cmd. Reaper charges and kills Eiryss. Terminus sits on 31 ARM.

6th Turn: Mule walks up and bounces off Termy's ARM 30. Mariner shoots and damages Darragh, but no Dismount. Alexia dismounts Darragh at the cost of her last 2 risen. Fiona hides a few inches behind Mariner. A&H run from the Reaper, Nyss (with MAT6) rolls 8's 2x to hit, and roll ridiculous damage to kill off the engaging Soulhunter.

7th Turn: Reaper gets 3 focus, leaving Termy with 10 or so. The Reaper charges and wrecks the Mule with some good rolls (really just wanting to remove the melee weapon to minimize the damage when Termy leaves. Darragh charges Alexia and kills her, hellfire's Doc in the back, but he toughs it. McThralls kills some Seadogs. Necrosurgeon returns 3 McThralls. Termy is .5" outside of charging Fiona, so he charges the Mariner. With 3 focus, he leaves it on 2 boxes (2 cortex). Rather than kill it and lower my ARM by 1, I just let it live since it can't hurt Termy and it's in his way for Fiona. Skarlock casts Ravager onto remaining Soulhunter, who charges Nyss and kills off 3 of them. Between the Berserk and 3 base attacks. Combine kill something with Darkfire attacks.

8th Turn: Mariner takes free strike and dies. Fiona charges Termy, rolls boxcars on damage to hit Termy for 4. Spends the rest of her focus and keeps bouncing off my ARM. At this point, we call it.

So, my thoughts on this game/my list. Overall, if I hadn't rolled Tough rolls on the bile thralls twice, I would have been stuck trying to clear out Alexia forever. I need to have more biles and protect them better. Second of all, I need to not let my McThralls get wasted without returning any via the necrosurgeon. Also, if I can remember to cast Ravager on Terminus any time he charges toward infantry, I'd be able to nab a lot more souls. Also, if he had his 4+ tough infantry out front feeding corpse tokens to Alexia, I would have been in a lot more trouble. If I had used Darragh to give Termy an extra 1" threat, I would have been able to get to Fiona a turn earlier with 10 focus and end the game sooner. So I'm thinking that I'll tweak my list in order to have more biles, and so that the front McThralls dieing will feed the 2nd McThrall unit. I also need to remember to give my Reaper a focus on the first turn so that he can not be so far behind. It was nice as a late game threat though, so I'll need to be careful to keep him alive as well.

With those thoughts in mind, I'll be testing this next time I play. Hopefully on Tuesday since I can't play at all next weekend.

Points: 50
Lich Lord Terminus (*4pts)
* Reaper (7pts)
* Skarlock Thrall (2pts)
Bile Thralls (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
Mechanithralls (Leader and 9 Grunts) (5pts)
Mechanithralls (Leader and 5 Grunts) (3pts)
* 3 Brute Thrall (3pts)
Necrosurgeon & 3 Stitch Thralls (2pts)
Necrosurgeon & 3 Stitch Thralls (2pts)
Soulhunters (Leader and 4 Grunts) (9pts)
The Withershadow Combine (5pts)
Darragh Wrathe (4pts)
Madelyn Corbeau, Ordic Courtesan (2pts)
Saxon Orrik (2pts)

The above is probably what I'll have my basic setup be, although things may have to change depending on what my opponent has. The reason I put the Brutes and min unit in back is to try and preserve them and feed them to be bigger from the front max unit of McThralls. That way I can hopefully make the best recycling possible. Soulhunters make a great reserve force, and although they steal souls from termy, they also can help finish off a caster if Termy can't seal the deal. They also make pretty good anti-infantry if all my biles do bite the bullet too soon.