LVO Shaltari Report. What worked and what didn't.

Report on LVO

LVO 2017 would be my first Dropzone tournament.  Up until now my dropzone experience was casual play with only a couple different opponents.  I would typically play a different army and a different list each time I play.  Leading up to the tournament I wasn't sure which army to play but I had slightly more experience with Shaltari than any of the others.

Given this was my first tournament with new opponents and that I didn't get a chance to practice my list beforehand I didn't hold out much hope for me winning the tournament.  My goal was essentially to not place last.  My tournament experience can be expressed per below:

Scenarios
Survey and Control
Crucible
Bunker Assault

My biggest concern for the tournament was Crucible.  This was the only scenario I had played before against a PHR army with a Hades.  I tried to run a Jaguar brick with a dreamsnare.  I was able to control the Critical Location for the last half of the game but lost most of the objectives.  The Shaltari bricked worked out ok in this scenario but I found it difficult to build a balanced list with any Shaltari brick taking up so many points.  I ended up running the following.

My List

Gates
Eden x2
Spirit x2
Haven x2

Court of Elders
Gharial CV2
Ocelot

Swordpoint
Tomahawks x6

Warrior Clan
Braves
Braves

Warrior Clan
Kukri x3
Braves
Braves

Warfist
Jaguar
Panther

Arrowhead
Warspear


Lessons learned:
Ocelot + Panther combo


This was my answer for the Critical Location.  My hope was to use their infinite ranged weapons to sit in the back and prevent anything from coming close to the CL.  I knew this was a bit of a long shot since the Ocelot only has one shot and the Panther can no longer reaction fire.  Either way I was pleased with their performance.  The Ocelot was able to snipe some PHR Enyos and Odins as well as some decent building demo.  The panther scored points by hitting transports from a good distance.  Neither of them were amazing by themselves but together they worked well together.  


Tomahawks

This was a group that people praised me for bringing since they have fallen out of popularity.  I was quite pleased with this battlegroup as it provides something that the Shaltari typically lack, multiple shots.  Units like the Jaguar and Ocelot can really be hurt by bad dice with so few shots, but six E10 shots give you a lot of flexibility and consistently.  They were good at as Anti-tank shots, they worked for decent demolition and they had decent survivability being a skimmer.  Their biggest weakness would be from template weapons but luckily I only faced one of those during the tournament.


Gharial Commander

I decided on the Gharial to use his flame weapon on Bunker Assault.  I received mixed results from the Gharial and have decided that he is a harder commander to use.  His greatest use came from his flame weapon against the PHR Medusas.  This was the first time I played against Medusas and they can be annoying to take out for Shaltari.  I didn't have any warstriders with Dragon Cannons to give me a ton of shots and Medusas evasion makes any other weapon difficult to get a hit on.  But flame ignores evasion countermeasures and I was able to effectively neuter one Medusa for the rest of the game.

The Gharial's weakness though is in its short range.  I was, at times, a little too aggressive with the Gharial and I ended up losing the unit.  Losing commanders is a lot of kill points and effectively removes your ability to ever get the initiative.  My general conclusion is that the Gharial needs to be either highly protected, perhaps a flanking unit, or used as a late game piece once some more threatening pieces have been removed.  A Mid-table unit the Gharial is not.


Jaguar

The Jaguar was a bit underwhelming but may have been how I used it.  I attempted to use it for Anti-Tank and for an AA bubble.  The problem is that Shaltari AA is short ranged, compared to my PHR opponents.  The Jaguar's AT lacks sufficient shots to take out heavier units like Odins.  Perhaps the Jaguar needs to be used more as a flanking unit.  The biggest use my Jaguar performed was baiting a medusa to come after it only to be flamed by my Gharial.


Warspear

Another unpopular choice but I find myself sticking with my Fast Movers.  Yes they can be frustrating when don't come on until turn 3.  Yes, I hope that changes.  However, that ability to hit anything on the table I find to be invaluable.  In games when I don't bring a FM I find it difficult and frustrating to snipe light transports and prevent my opponents from extracting objectives.

The Warspear is also one of the best AA weapons that Shaltari have with the exception of the Panther.  With four E7 shots it does well as an AA weapon compared to the typical 18" four E6 shots that are typical Shaltari AA.  The AT weapon can be a little underwhelming.  I was able to pick off APCs but anything stronger than that will brush off the Warspear's AT weapon.



Next time I will look at how these units performed in each scenario and my successes and failures in each scenario.

Let me know what you think.