Today my friend Rich and I wanted to get a good solid day of wargaming in. We played 2 games my grey knights against his tau. (yes tau, they are actually the only army with a winning record against me. when played properly they are absurd). The first was a game where he went first, but I still managed to win. The second was a game where I went first and managed to lose, oddly enough. Either way we had time to play another game but neither of us really wanted to play another grey knights vs tau match and I didn't bring my other armied with me. In the end he asked me to proxy up some dark eldar and play as them to give his tau a real test.
What I learned from dabbling into the darkness was all of the weaknesses and thought processes of the dark eldar player. Since I'm always on the receiving end of the army, I always see them from my perspective, which is this scary 12+ tank meeace with 25+ lances and 108 poison shots. Now that I've played as them I understand how hard it is to deal with an army that can shoot back, much like my grey knights can. How a couple bad rolls for damage, or some good rolls for cover could spell the end of the game. Despite its spammy nature, it's actually a much more luck dependent army that I originally thought.
The point is I know demons, tyranids, and now grey knights like the back of my hand. Against an opponent playing one of those armies I have a sever advantage due to my experience. So what I'm saying is maybe instead of play testing how your army works against certain armies, try plaaying those armies and see what they have to worry about and thought processes you have as your opponent.
I for one can tell you, against willing opponents I will be proxying some of the natiest lists I can think of to try and further my skills as a general
I think the army trades are a fantastic idea, and I'll propose this to the group that meets weekly at my LGS. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteAgreed about Tau. When played properly, they are just brutal opponents. People laugh at me when I say this, and then I point them to someone who knows how to play Tau. And those critics stop laughing when railguns come sailing at them, lots and lots of railguns. And missile pods. There's nothing they can't handle. Oddly though, my Daemons have decimated Tau regularly. They shouldn't, but I figure it's revenge for all my Chaos Marines that got the crap beat out of them by those damn desert fish people.
I've made it a habit for the last 4 years of proxying both with, and
ReplyDeleteagainst most of the top lists I expect to struggle with.
The other thing I do is before an event, make sure that I've played
against the lists I know the other top players will be fielding.
It's great to playtest other armies against your own army too, so that
you can see what other people struggle with - and how your list
applies pressure from the other perspective :)
Agree with your comments regarding Tau, the only thing that makes them
a no go to play with for me is that while they can be a beast, they
have to play the same way every time, without much variety in options
you can realistically take, making them get very dull, very quickly.