This week he gave us info on one of Cyriss's casters. It's nothing terribly ground-breaking, but this guy does make me smile. While I enjoy tricky casters like Mohsar or Old Witch, I can't deny that I truly love a caster who gets in your face and smashes it to pieces.
That's what we get with Axis, the Convergence's living warcaster/cyborg, but with a twist. With warjacks taking on the MAT/RAT of their warcaster, this guy is going to field an army that wants to scream up the board (well, at SPD 5 anyway) and smash in to anything standing in their way.
With 3 or 4 jacks at MAT 7, and the ability to bounce focus between them, Axis and his battlegroup are going to tear apart the enemy with a devastating alpha strike. This tactic is emphasized by his feat Circumpotence:
"Enemy models currently in Axis’ control area suffer minus 2 SPD and STR. and Friendly faction models currently in axis’ control area gain plus 2 SPD and STR. Circumpotence lasts for one round."
That's just wicked, and carries a bit of utility with it. If you're too far away and are at risk of eating an alpha strike, pop the feat and charge 10". The downside to that is that it only affects models in his 12" control area when the feat is popped, so it's likely that your targets are the only things that will be affected. Fortunately they're retaliating at -2 STR.
A use I'm excited about is what you can do if you're within 8" with Axis leading the charge. Picture this:
- Charge an enemy heavy with Axis. Before making your melee attacks, pop his feat (you can pop feats and cast spells before your charge attack as long as it was successful).
- When you hit with your initials, you're doing 3d6+16 and 2d6+16. Odds are that you left yourself with 3 focus. For every additional attack you buy, Doublestrike grants you an attack with both weapons.
- The rest of the battlegroup follows his lead, charging up and wrecking the frontline. Remember that these warjacks can give 1 spent focus to another nearby warjack, allowing all jacks to charge on 1 focus if you so choose.
And now, the ramifications of this turn. Axis popped his feat so close that most of the opponent's army is affected by the -2 SPD, meaning no charging in retaliation. The opponent is now left to shoot or run, lest they grant you too much of an advantage on the scenario. Cue Axis's trump card: Countercharge. Countercharge is an ability that Axis grants to his battlegroup, allowing each of them to charge at a model that ends its movement withing 6" of them. Normally this is used as a deterrent since only 1 model usually has the ability, thus allowing the opponent to skirt around it. But when an entire line across the board is threatened (assuming they killed their targets), things can get messy quickly.
Obviously the above scenario is going to be a rare occurrence, but the -2 SPD/STR, and the ability to kill an opponent's heavies on turn 2, thus removing most of their armor cracking, is huge. The spells Onslaught (charging pathfinder) and Unstoppable Force (bulldoze) further increase the threat of his battlegroup, although like other melee casters' spells they hold the usual lack of excitement.
Although Axis seems cool, he does further confirm my primary concern with the Convergence - despite the focus on the battlegroup, units are going to need to do a lot to shore up the holes created by a caster's melee or range specialty. The shield/flail unit we've seen so far looks like it could act as a great tarpit for ranged casters, a tactic we've seen in Cygnar. But casters like Axis are going to need a ranged unit to soften up the enemy and clear out any cannon-fodder, or they'll need some great support units like we've seen in Menoth and Trollbloods to further boost a few select models.
I was hoping this week would push me closer to "all in," but I think I'm right where I was last week. Axis isn't a bad model by any means, but I'm crossing my fingers that he's very vanilla compared to the rest of his fellow casters.
See you tomorrow!
Obviously the above scenario is going to be a rare occurrence, but the -2 SPD/STR, and the ability to kill an opponent's heavies on turn 2, thus removing most of their armor cracking, is huge. The spells Onslaught (charging pathfinder) and Unstoppable Force (bulldoze) further increase the threat of his battlegroup, although like other melee casters' spells they hold the usual lack of excitement.
Although Axis seems cool, he does further confirm my primary concern with the Convergence - despite the focus on the battlegroup, units are going to need to do a lot to shore up the holes created by a caster's melee or range specialty. The shield/flail unit we've seen so far looks like it could act as a great tarpit for ranged casters, a tactic we've seen in Cygnar. But casters like Axis are going to need a ranged unit to soften up the enemy and clear out any cannon-fodder, or they'll need some great support units like we've seen in Menoth and Trollbloods to further boost a few select models.
I was hoping this week would push me closer to "all in," but I think I'm right where I was last week. Axis isn't a bad model by any means, but I'm crossing my fingers that he's very vanilla compared to the rest of his fellow casters.
See you tomorrow!
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