Advice vs. Sonia, Viktorias

[Exaar]

Hi guys!

I am going for my second game as Rasputina this weekend. Going to be playing my two friends (one at a time). They will be playing as Sonia Criid and her crew, and the Viktorias.

I have the Tina starter set + a Cerberus, but we are allowing proxies so I do have the option of adding in some other units. However, I think we're just going to be playing 25ss, mostly starter box battles (as those are the models we have).

Can any of you guys give me some advice on tactics vs. these guys in particular? I don't have a lot of experience playing the game yet, so I'm wondering if any of you more experienced Tina players might give me some idea of what to look out for, in general or vs. those masters in particular.

As I said, gonna be 25ss games. I have the Tina box and the Cerberus, which I'd like to use if able but I'm not against a proxy or two if it will make a big difference.

Any advice would be welcome! Thanks!

[Ropetus]

Sonnia is a tough matchup due to all their magic resistance and Sonnia's Advanced Counterspell which can shut down Tina's offensive spells against their key models. Sonnia can almost match Tina's magic attack and ignores LoS against her, making it almost impossible to hide. The Cerberus is propably your best bet against her: it can engage her quickly and can make a huge amount of attacks against her weak Df4. This assault should at least drain away some of her resources, leaving less stones to use on offensive magic.

The Witchlings are not pushovers either. They resist your magic as well and explode if killed in melee. They will disrupt your spellcasting if they get up close so you need to get rid of them before its too late. They will fall to two castings of December's curses with Severe damage (cheat and use Soulstones to ensure a neutral damage flip). You can also use the Gamin's ranged attacks against them. The rest of your resources should be used on December's Touch to protect important models (Cerberus!) and Ice Pillars to slow down your opponent. Don't bother with White out (the crew ignores cover) and never let Samael get a Rapid Fire off, that will kill anything you have, especially if he has cast Flaming Bullets.

The Viktorias are a melee crew and can do enormous amounts of damage with their katanas. The same goes for the rest of the crew. However, they are very fragile and have few wounds, so sending a barrage of December's Curses their way should drop their numbers quickly. Ice Pillars are a great way to screw over melee crews so abuse them as much as you can. December's Touched Golem should hold their crew for a couple of turns, giving you more time to cast spells. Compared to Sonnia, this is a much easier matchup for Tina.

-Ropetus

[Poko]

Against sonia, I'd try using the acolyte and harpoon away any valuable models she could have in 3" to blast them away with Raspy spells. Either use all possible means to kill Sonia early on, or ignore her (or keep occupied with something, maybe moleman?) and kill the rest as fast as possible.

[Omadon]

Against Sonnia, I'd play a different master. To be perfectly honest. She's designed to kill you. However - Steamborg Executioners are a pretty solid way to deal with her, keep hold of a couple low masks, use it's melee expert to knock aside some of your own models to line up a charge on her, then flurry her with it - paired CB7 claws with decapitate making four attacks will either flat drain that many soulstones, or just kill her. I've had similar problems playing as sonnia against arcanists before - underestimated just how much damage that thing puts out, and sonnia without stones becomes alot less scary - as she doesn't have the tome she needs for most of her spells. Melee sonnia is far easier to deal with

Soyeah - in short, either play somebody else, or take the executioner. It's Knock Aside trigger is an amazing movement trick - use it to get surprize charges on stuff, and if you arent using it for that, then don't forget to steam cloud, as her explosive burst got errataed into being ranged.

[Ropetus]

I'm not really sure if the two are really THAT unmatched. While Sonnia's Crew is innately resistant to spells, Rasputina deals more damage with her spells (Essence of Power, Bite of Winter) and can match their Magic Resistance 2 with December's Touch and natural armor on her crew. Tina can use Ice Mirror and Ice Pillars to stay out of trouble (outranging Sonnia's Flame Burst and limiting LoS). Counterspell is a pain but at least that drains her hand almost empty if she stops every spell.

If you can avoid Sonnia, it leaves mainly the Witchlings and their Disrupt Magic to deal with which should be manageable. Samael should get majorly annoyed by Ice Pillars like any model with Rapid Fire.

Seriously, I would much rather face Sonnia with Tina than say, Lilith. The latter Crew just plain ignores all your spells by hanging behind terrain and in cover to avoid her offensive spells and Diving Charging over said terrain and any Ice Pillars you have. Melee is almost impossible to avoid there after a few transpositions and then Tina is done for.

-Ropetus

[Exaar]

Hey guys, thanks for the advice.

I have an Essence of Power and two Hoarcat Prides on order at the FLGS, but when I get paid again I am definitely going to pick up the Ramos box. That Steamborg Executioner sounds too good to be without, and I want Ramos as my secondary Master anyway (won't help me much against Sonnia, though!)

I will try out your suggestions when we play on Sunday... try to beat down Sonnia herself as quickly as possible. I will let you all know how it turns out.

[Exaar]

Well, I only got to play the Sonnia player this weekend, as we ran out of time, but as predicted, he beat the heck out of me. ;_;

Really it wasn't even Sonnia herself who gave me the trouble, it was Samael Hopkins. I had Treasure Hunt, and I ran my Cerberus up to grab the token, and he killed it in one activation with Samael and his stupid flaming bullets/rapid fire combo. I actually held out pretty well after that with the rest of my guys, but in the end he just closed in around me with four Witchlings and had Samael and Sonnia shoot from afar.

Next time I will try some different approaches.

[Ropetus]

Well, parking that Cerberus in front of Samael to get Rapid Fired on his next activation was propably not the best thing to do there ;P.

Samael is a nasty model for Rasputina but you have counters for him. Next time try using Ice Pillars to limit his LoS at important places (wasting his Rapid Fire). Treasure Hunt is a tough Strategy for Raspy because of her lack of mobility but at least she has nice means to limit her enemies' movement as well with Freeze Over. If the Treasure token is in terrain, freezing it on your first activation and December's Touching the Cerberus should allow you to claim the token without too much hassle if you have enough Pillars out.

-Ropetus

[Exaar]

Yeah, I realize that it wasn't the smartest move, but by that point int he game I was already hurting and I was trying to score some points by grabbing the treasure token and getting out of there. I knew it was a gamble, but if I had won init and not him that turn I would have grabbed it and gotten out of there successfully... but luck was not on my side and he got to go first.

Also, I'm a bit of a new player, so I was not totally aware of how deadly Samael was. I knew he'd get a shot off: I didn't expect him to kill the Cerberus in one activation. >_<

However, I did lock that terrain piece down with Freeze Over for a large portion of the game. Next time, more aware of my opponent's abilities, I will tread more carefully.