A few comments from the other side of the gunsights

First, a few pics
over here. Note that we had plenty of LOS-blocking terrain in the middle of the table.
Oberst Lynild wrote:
I faced my dreaded enemy, Speaker to Machines' Titan Legion

I really feel I should get a moustache that I can twirl while I cackle like a maniac...
Morgan Vening wrote:
Oberst Lynild wrote:
StM's Titans:
2 Warlords - one standard, one w 2 quake cannons, spotter platform and death strike (the mvp)
3 Warhounds
1 Sentinels
2x Thunderbolts
1x Marauders
Yeesh! Yeah, the macro-artillery Titan tends to cause consternation amongst our group too. When I was helping to playtest for a tourney, I took a Reaver version of those as part of my AMTL force. Needless to say, it didn't go over well. Lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Yep, the best part of life. The lamentation of your enemies' women after you crush them, all that. Also, the lamentation of your enemies
before you crush them, if they are little girls
The AMTL list does have exploitable weaknesses (in activations and movement), which the macro artillery mitigates but doesn't negate. But yes, it is a tough list to face unprepared.
Oberst Lynild wrote:
Turn 1 Atml won initiative and the mvp warlord almost levelled my colussus, leaving it 5 dc down and damaging one of the overlords as well. Both squat WE broke, but I found out later this was perhaps wrong, having forgot all about the Resolute rule.
There's a downside to having list-unique special rules; I had no idea what I was facing (I was still marveling that the pesky fortress didn't have particle shields and thus was nicely vulnerable to Deathstrikes) so I couldn't help either. I'm sure we'll both remember it once we've had a few more games with it.
It seems like a reasonable rule, though, very fitting of dwarfish stubbornness.
Morgan Vening wrote:
Oberst Lynild wrote:
Turn 2 and things turned around. Atml won initiative and didn't hold back the cerimonial barrage from their deployment zone (1050 pts is a lot to tie down on ones baseline, if you ask me). Having moved into range of my enemy, my stouty fellas proved quite lethal, killing one warhound, routing the two other (the both luckily saved enough hits) and damaging the advanding warlord (the smaller one).
As you say, with 1/3 of the Army on the Blitz, and only 5 other ground Activations, yeah, keeping objectives seems difficult.
The 1050 point big cheese is a lot of points, yes, but it does rather effectively deny both BTS and Blitz. I haven't seen an opponent yet that could realistically threaten it.
As for taking objectives, yes, it is usually there the AMTL falters. The Warhounds really need to survive to do that in later turns, and I was a bit careless with mine (leaving them where the Cyclops could draw a bead on them was not a wise move).
The warhounds would have been even more dead if we had played the Cyclops Hellfury right; I seem to recall one that it took a hit on its one remaining shield, without us rolling D6. That thing is made for killing Titans, and should probably have topped my target priority list (as it was, I focused on the other fortress for the BTS goal).
Oberst Lynild wrote:
The overlords proved worth every gold nucket my boys ever pulled out their mountains, threatening on long range and AA. DC 3 might be a bit much for 225 pts but given they only have 2 weapons, it doesn't seem overpowered. They played great. My opponent found them quite irritating. I deployed them on each flank with the mortar batt garrisoned in the centre, so I had an AA firebase covering most of the table.
It was
very annoying indeed, since I play the Titans with lots of air support, to chase down stragglers after the big guns break them; the Overlords make an excellent AA umbrella.
Range 60cm AA seems a little odd for a mobile platform (for the ground thunderfire I think it's fine), but I suppose the list needs
some AA, having no aircraft of its own. I found the 4+RA a bit odd too; It's a balloon, after all, those are supposed to be more fragile than Land Raiders.
In my humble opinion, they should be 5+RA, with 45cm AA fire, and cost only 175/300 points. It would also allow a few more of the cute little blimps hanging over the dwarf line, WWI-style. They do look very good, after all.
Morgan Vening wrote:
Oberst Lynild wrote:
The Cyclops broke the one warhound. We discussed the piercing shot rule, agreeing it would play better as MW2+, TKd6 as other TK weapons also has MW. AT2+ piercing just doesn't make good sense on a weapon of that size.
Ahh, you misinterpreted. I probably should have put in a specific note (will do for the next version). By being TK, the weapon is automatically considered MacroWeapon (Last sentence of 2.2.9). The Piercing Shot is only there for the +Critical effect, and the AT2+ is there so that the weapon can't be fired at Infantry. It's too big to be able to target anything even the size of Terminators.
Hum. It's still weird, I think... It's the only AT/TK weapon I can think of, so I suspect others will misinterpret it too. I can see what the gun is trying to be (and my Titans really really hate it!), but it does need a bit more explanation, I think.
On the 10cm movement - it didn't come up much, since the only infantry formation was happy enough to just sit and remove shields from my Titans. There were no engagements at all in the battle, it was a straight up gunfight.
Next time I should perhaps try my Biel-Tan Eldar; It would be interesting to see what a hyper-mobile army can do to the bearded ones
