BR: 35pts eCaine vs. eIrusk

Not bad for a first game.

I managed to play my first game of Warmachine in two years today on Vassal.  It was a smaller game than most SR lists and we only played caster kill.  We could have played a scenario game, but my opponent actually suggested caster kill after finding out that it was my first game in a long time.

Alright, so we're off and away.  I used my eCaine list with Tempest Blazers vs. eIrusk.

Points: 35/35
Supreme Kommandant Irusk (*5pts)
* Destroyer (9pts)
* War dog (1pts)
Man-o-war Demolition Corps (Leader and 4 Grunts) (9pts)
Man-o-war Shocktroopers (Leader and 4 Grunts) (9pts)
Widowmakers (Leader and 3 Grunts) (4pts)
Winter Guard Mortar Crew (Leader and Grunt) (3pts)
Winter Guard Mortar Crew (Leader and Grunt) (3pts)
Harlan Versh (2pts)

When I looked across the table, I saw lot of multi-wound models in front of me.  The problem with my list is that while I have a good amount of firepower, it struggles against high armor.  I guess I was lucky he wasn't running heavy jacks/beasts with another caster.

Alright, now to the game:

• My opponent went first and ran most of his stuff into better positions.  I did the same, put my Tempest Blazers and Rangers on high elevation and threw my B13 into the woods.  My A&H slowly moved up and Caine lurched forward and threw Blur on the Tempest Blazers.
• The second turn saw a bunch of shots explode from the Khador side and most of it missing.  Nothing hit their targets dead on but one of the mortar blasts found Eiryss and Taryn under the scatter.  Thankfully, my opponent rolled low for damage and Eiryss survived with 1 health (this was huge) while Taryn didn't take any damage.  His Widowmakers ran far up my left flank.
• On my turn, I dropped Blur on my Tempest Blazers and ran one of my brave little Rangers up to paint the backside of his Demos, Shocks and Destroyer who was behind an obstacle.  The Tempest Blazers moved up on the far right, shot at the Destroyer and with the help of Mark Target, managed to do 9 points of total damage using Brutal Shot.  They then used their Light Cav movement to get out of the LoS of the Destroyer.  I charged Ol'Rowdy up but I was just short of Tremoring the first batch of Shocktroopers.  It's OK, I can still do some damage:  Ryan opens up on the first batch of Shocktroopers and puts her Mage Storm on top of 6 dudes.  After damage rolls, I was only able to damage two of them because of Shield Wall.  Next came Lynch and Watts who opened up and shot down one of the Widowmakers on the far left.
• Caine himself moved up 7 and opened fire with Feat and 10 shots.  I only missed one shot and focused everything I had at the Shocktroopers and Demo Corp.  After the smoke cleared, I killed 2 Shocktroopers and 2 Demos.  Not the best results, but what upset me the most was that I shot a Shocktrooper with a POW19 shot and left him with 1 HP.  That's one more ST that's going to swing at Rowdy next turn.  I finished off the turn by running my 1 HP Eiryss up and put her within Arcane Interference range of his Destroyer.
• On his next turn, he retaliates by trying to shoot Caine with the mortars but missed with everything.  His Destroyer aims and takes a shot at Caine as well, but it scatters and hits Ryan in the face.  Since Eiryss was next to his Destroyer, he was unable to allocate any focus to it, so he wasn't able to capitalize on the revenge shot.  He retaliates with his Shocktroopers and a single Demo Corps on Ol'Rowdy and did some serious damage.  Fortunately for me, Rowdy's hammer was still functional.  Two of his Demo Corps break off and charge my Tempest Blazers.  Three of them go down to Backsswings but that's to be expected because he was rolling really hot to hit.  One of the mistakes that my opponent makes this round was moving his warcaster slightly behind his medium based units engaged with Ol'Rowdy thinking he would be safe.
• Next round, I analyzed the situation and activated my units:
• Caine takes a bite from the Squire.
• Reinholdt moves up and reloads Caine.
• The remaining Tempest Blazers move up and Brutal Shot the Demo Corps (killing 1 and leaving the other with 1 HP, tying up Eiryss still). 
• Taryn doesn't move, aims and Black Pennies the remaining Demo Corps to death.
• This frees up Eiryss to take aim and shoot his warcaster, stripping his focus.
• Next is Ol'Rowdy who Tremors all of the Shocktroopers and remaining Demo Corps to the ground.
• I thread the needle with one of my Rangers and paint his Warcaster.
• Caine checks his control range, sees Irusk past the knockdown Shocktroopers, aims with Mark Target and shoots with RAT13 vs. DEF15 with a -3 damage modifier.  It takes 5 shots to put Irusk in the ground.

Overall, I think this game went pretty well for me.  I was able to utilize most of my units and use them to full effect, although the Tempest Blazers were not ideal vs. such heavy armor.  The only unit that didn't see much use was A&H, and I think I played them too defensively because I was afraid of Aiyana dying to random blasts.  Against a list like this, I really need her Kiss to allow me to punch through heavier armor.

The only thing I was really afraid of was messing up my activations.  I played this game pretty religiously back when I was invested and I think that helped a lot.  During this game, a lot of things were coming back to me and I was able to capitalize on mistakes and activate my units in the correct order.  A good first game.