Adepticon Masters - eHexeris

Three days until we fly out to Chicago! I'm getting seriously excited. Reservations have been double-checked, armies painted, lists made... Nothing to do now but randomly blog about the trip to keep me occupied.

This is the thrid and fianl list discussion for my Open Masters lists. the last article can be found HERE. My final caster is also Skorne's newest kid on the block, eHexeris. pHexeris was one of the casters that got me started with Skorne, and his epic incarnation did not disappoint! Because he is so new, I have less play experience with him than with my other two lists. But his raw power and fun play style made me pick him over casters I might be more comfortable with.




Let's start by discussing eHexeris himself. As the newset caster in Skorne's arsenal, he has recieved overwhelming positive responses from the Skoren community on the main PP forums. some bloggers and pod-casts have been skeptical of him, but I tend to agree with the forums on this one. eHexeris has some great tricks that we haven't had access to before. he is a beefy caster in his own right, and can sling spells like a champ.

Let's start with his feat. you can remove up to 7 focus, fury, or souls from any non-caster model in Hexeris' control range. you can pull from your own guys or enemy models. each of those 7 points becomes fury for Hexeris. This is a huge feat. there are different uses depending on the enemy you're facing, but it is flexible enough that you will always have enough out there to pull a full 7. When the rules were first "leaked" players thought that it would be unlimited in that you could remove up to ALL fury/souls/focus from the enemy and then get 7 as Fury. unfortunately this wasn't true, but it is still a stellar feat.

Guitar Hero Hexeris

Hexeris also comes with a long spell list for a Hordes caster. His first and least-used spell is Arcane Reckoning. it's a friendly upkeep for a model/unit that makes any spell that misses the affected models hit their attacker instead. this is very situational, since there aren't that many offensive spells in an average list. it can be very good against certain enemies, though. Druids will hate this spell. also nice to put on Hexeris if you're worried about a spell assassination.

Hexeris' second friendly upkeep is Ashen Veil. this gives concealment and makes enemy living models worse at hitting things while near your affected models. this one is a nice ability on your jamming infantry. it will keep them alive longer, but can also protect other models near one model with Ashen Veil on them

his big offensive spell is ashes to ashes. this is an expensive spell that does a pow 10, and D6 additional pow 10s to enemies in 5". it's amazing when you roll a 5 or 6, but overpriced on those turns you roll a 1. still, it is great for handling those high def things we can't normally hit.

His other damage spell is Hellfire. very straight-forward high pow shot that causes a cmd check. this is what gets spammed on feat turn, and can often lead to an assassination.

and finally we get to his best spell - Black spot. offensive upkeep spell that causes -2 Def and allows a free attack anytime a friendly kills an affected model. this is a huge boost to your army's hitting power, and should not be underestimated. this should be on the field every turn.

Hexeris also has his fair share of special rules. One beast in his battlegroup can be bonded to him, allowing channeling spells through the beast. it's not true chanelling, as Hexeris has to be in cmd range, not control range. still, channeling is nice.

His other big ability is Vampiric Harvest. any time an enemy living model dies in his control range, a member of the battlegroup can heal a point. this is huge! with black spot and all the infantry clearing we have in our armies, it is easy to get a few points each turn. this means Hexeris and the paingivers will rarely if ever have to heal your beasts.

That's Hexeris in a nutshell. let's look at my list with him:

eHexeris
 * Bronzeback Titan - bonded
 * Titan Gladiator
 * Titan Cannoneer
 * Cyclops Savage
 * Cyclops Shaman
 * Marketh
Agonizer
Soulward
Void Spirit
min paingivers
max swordsmen with UA

Reinforcements - Archidon, max paingivers

This is actually a pretty standard Skorne list, but it happens to work very well with eHexy. I like taking the titan herd with a lot of my casters. the Gladiator and Bronzeback are in almost every list I use, and the cannoneer is very nice IMO.

Group Photo

The infantry is very stock standard. swordsmen, paingivers, soulward, agonizer. I threw in a Void Spirit, even though he may get dropped for something else before this weekend.

The bronzeback is the bonded beast. He is hard to take down, and can clear himself pretty well if he gets tied down. with beat back, he can usually make sure that he ends his activation unengaged so that he can be used to channel. I've also had a few nice assassinations with him with his smash and grab throwing a heavy into a caster who is then in range of hellfire from the bronzeback's location.

A lot of the list is based on making use of Black spot. a cannoneer is pretty good, a cannoneer with 2 shots is amazing. the shaman and soulward also make good use of a second shot. the Savage hasn't been in a lot of lists recently, but he loves eHexeris. beat-back on a reach model swinging at a black spot unit is very nice for his cheap price tag. and then he can give Hexeris Future Sight to help use his fury for the hellfire assassination.

And finally, I added in Marketh. I decided Hexeris could make the most use of him out of my three lists. He helps with my multiple upkeeps, he casts Arcane Reckoning first turn to keep me from wasting fury on it (usually on the void spirit), and he is great for getting black spot on a second unit. because the only thing that kills more infantry than black spot is 2 black spots...

Well, that wraps up my list discussions for the Masters. Later this week I'll be talking about the Team event lists we are taking. Also, I'll be talking about my personal goals for this year's events.

Stay posted after Adepticon, I will be trying to get battle reports (or at least summaries with some pictures) of my games. And lessons learned, because I plan on getting my rear end kicked this year. If you see my Green Skorne at the 'con, come say hello!