Wood Elves & The Learning Curve

Yesterday I had my second game using Wood Elves and it went a lot smoother than the first. My first game was against Beastmen and I got pretty much crushed. This time I rolled out against an experimental all-cavalry Warriors Of Chaos army that Matt really wanted to try. The result? Well, I lost again but this time we actually had to total up the victory points to work it out.

Still, the fact I went from being crushed by a slightly outdated lower-tier army to only narrowly losing to a higher-tier one feels great. Especially as I used the same army list in both games so what improved was how I used my units and not what units I chose.

I'm finally getting used to the idea that moving and shooting isn't a terrible idea. My Deepwood Scouts have trueflight arrows so they shoot without penalty and the Waywatchers have such a high ballistic skill that it hardly matters. Both are skirmishing units who can float round outside of the enemy's charge arc shooting off volleys of arrows. Let me tell you, Matt loved them, in the sense that he dedicated the whole of his final magic phase to exacting revenge on the Deepwoods. Positioning is the key: keeping them in range and out of charge arc.

Shooting really is the key to the army. In the first turn Matt used his Vanguard moves to bring up two units of Marauder Horse and one of Hellstriders to unnerve me, distract me and make me call hasty charges.

Between the Glade Guard, Glade Riders, Deepwood Scouts, Waywatchers and the Treeman's strangleroots, all three units were vapourised by the end of my first turn. Which, okay left me with two units of Chaos Knights that I never really managed to shift for the rest of the game but it meant far fewer distractions bouncing around the table. If I'd had fewer shooty units I might have ended up target blind.

Combat is my weakness. My Dryads spent most of the games out of position and fighting Chaos Hounds whilst my Eternal Guard got eaten by Skullcrushers, an enemy well above their weight. Like shooting, its just a case of picking my targets better and I'm confident I'll get there.