Strategy for Dirz
Strategy for Dirz |
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Although Dirz does not especially need a user
manual to win, there are many points for which some tips
can be useful to play them … elegantly.
Because the key to Dirz is also their main weakness: it's vital to
know how to take the advantage in the right place, at the risk of losing all the hand-to-hand
fights.
The competence of army of Dirz is plainly brilliant: with your die of boost per chunk of 100 PA, you can add points:
In Courage to rally runaway figurines, or to charge Wolfen,
Undead or Mid-Nor.
Example: activating 3 Warriors of Dawn to charge a Minotaur,
with one muta die in Courage for one of them, gives on average 3 +2 (two
other warriors give 1 each) +3 (mutagène) or a 2+
to charge.
In defence for non-magical characters or Warrior Mages,
to improve counter-attacks.
Example: a Biopsiste of Dirz takes a die of mutagène in
Defence against a Griffon Templar. The die comes up
4. The Biopsiste thus has 7 for Defence. The Templar must therefore
roll 4+ to hit (to reach the difficulty of 7). But the Biopsiste
can then counter-attack on 2+. It is therefore useful to put one die in
attack and one in defence for the Biopsiste, because the Templar,
on average, is going to hit with one attack and miss with the other. So the
Biopsiste responds with one attack and will get a second attack
on 2+.
In Initiative to strike first in a hand-to-hand fight where
you outnumber the enemy.
Example: a Skorize takes a die of
mutagène in Initiative,
and gets a 3. He thus has 7 in Initiative, and with the help of a Halberdier of
Dirz, Dirz now has 8 for Initiative in mêlée to
control the fight.
In Movement for Scout figurines or Kératis with
their Fear.
Example: a Skorize is placed 23 cms away from a
Paladin, in hiding.
He takes a die of mutagène and gets 3. He can now charge
26 cms and cannot be engaged, out of reach of the Paladin.
In Fear to bring about the crushing defeat of a group of attackers,
or to avoid being charged.
Example: a Kératis warrior with mutagène / 1, is activated
first. He makes a 5 for the mutagène test, and so has 6 points
of boost. By placing them in Fear, he thus reaches 11 in Fear before
his charge of 25 cms. No doubt that the group of Khor warriors placed
approximately 20 cms from him is going to flee in a flash. Conversely, with 11
in Fear, he will be engaged only with great difficulty by figurines
with a Courage characteristic, and this will prevent him from being outnumbered.
In Attack to hurl unparriable attacks, by optimizing the die
thresholds of the opponent.
Example: a Skorize warrior with his competence (the pincers
of the scorpion) charges a Paladin of
Alahan.
He places his 3 mutagène in Attack
(+1) and Force (+2). There are therfore 3 dice, with a 5 in Attack,
which have difficulties of 7 for the Paladin, who no longer has more
than 1 in Defence. The Force 5+2 hits of the Skorize will doubtless be
very painful for the Lion player, who parries on a 6...
In Discipline to manage the turn on your terms.
Example: Vargas in a War-staff gets a discipline of 7, without
mutagène. With mutagène / 1, we can roughly claim
to have 7+1+3, that is 11, in Discipline.
In Attack and Defence for characters to
get "free" supplementary dice.
Example: Lukhan Cypher takes a die of
mutagène, and obtains
a measly 2. With his mutagène / 2, he has all the same 4 points
to be distributed. He places 2 points in Attack and 2 in Defence.
He thus reaches 8 in Attack and 6 in Defence. Depending on the
Initiative Test, he's going to be able to adapt himself:
== > losing, he'll keep his dangerous 6 in Defence for
counter-attacks, and will land one practically unstoppable attack with an 8 in Attack.
It's enough to pray for a wound test with Force 13.
== > winning, he can take a supplementary die no problem
and use still his initial characteristics but now with 3 dice.
Once again, the Force 13 hits will be very effective …
In Aim for your Crossbows, even if it's much less powerful in Confrontation 2.
Example: a Crossbowman of Dirz
ran the first turn to
take a position 25 cms from Azoth the Deceitful. In the
second, he tries a mutagène in Aim. He makes a 4.
So he has 4-2=2
to distribute, in Aim. He now has a 5 for the Aim characteristic. He
aims at Azoth with prolonged aim (+1 to Aim) having
moved 10 cms while Azoth also moved, and so
has to make a throw of difficulty 7 (medium range) with his
5 in Aim -1 (he moved) +1 (drop in Initiative) -1 (small size
of Azoth) which is a 3+. Without the
mutagène, he would have hit only on
a 5+. So a small bit of mutagène gave you 2 chances
in 3 to hit instead of 1 in 3 … that's significant!
But then who to play first and foremost?
A good character against armies without Fear (Arkéon, Sasia,
Kayl Katarn and soon Salias Yesod).
A character with command and a War-staff against Fear (Arkéon
'crowned' or Vargas following the cases).
Classic troops
- the Warriors of Dawn for their derisory cost and their versatility.
(one blister pack minimum).
- the Skorize warriors for their high characteristics and their
competence Scout (one blister).
- the Kératis warriors for their boostable Fear
which gives the possibility
of either causing Fear or resisting the Fear of Wolfen or Mid-Nor (one blister).
- Biopsistes for their ability to counter magic, and Scout.
(1 or 2 Biopsistes).
From there, finish off with Halberdiers to bulk up the numbers,
Crossbows (1 or 2) to have a little bit of shooting and to
hinder the enemy's advance, and possibly 1 or 2 Tigers
of Dirz.
The Tigers are specialised, because they allow you to make either a very powerful Scout army
(the version with Scout) or an army with a Scout tendency which discovers
scouts (the version with Consciousness). The version with Jump is useful in
complex terrain or to try to gut the enemy War-staff by killing, for example,
the musician or the enemy champion
by pouncing on him in a kamikaze attack; all this before the charge of the
Kératis / Lukhan …
Give yourself a treat!! Play Arkeon!
Hey, I've written a special section for this guy because he
is without question fun.
The idea is as following: to play Arkeon with 2 Biopsistes, one with
Bloodthirsty Bitterness and the other with Abyssal Strength.
Quickly cast Bloodthirsty Bitterness on Arkeon, make a
mutagène test on Arkeon and reveal him.
If the result is good enough, you can do the following combo:
Make him charge in tandem with a Biopsiste with
mutagéné in Defence.
The 2nd Biopsiste has to be in the contact with
Arkeon to
cast Abyssal Strength on him this turn. Cast it on 4+ in a prolonged
incantation with an extra gem, which gives you a
final difficulty for the spell of 8 (successful on a 4+ with 2 dice: that should go).
The idea is to kill the enemy character in one blow with practically
no chance of survival for your opponent. With your super mutagène
+3, you have roughly a 7 point bonus to put in Attack, for a total of 13. With
the boosted-Defence Biopsiste and
Arkeon (that's a 6 for Init), try
to win the initiative.
- if you lose it, defend like mad with the Biopsiste (big
Defence threshold and counter-attack) and take 3 supplementary dice
for Arkeon to have 5 dice and an attack of 7 (13-2x3).
- if you win it, swing a Masterstroke on 2+ with an
unparryable difficulty of 15 and get a hit of Force 15+7+8, that is, 30. Look at the Wound Table
and come down a line (Bloodthirsty Bitterness). If
it's marked Critical, he died … (Sword-Axe)
Roughly, if you obtain 1 and 2 on the die throw and if your opponent
has a resistance of 11, for example, (it's all the same whatever),
and hey, you've got 33-11 that's 22 on the legs and it's already
Critical and therefore Killed Outright. On Kael
the Quick-tempered on a Razorback, that's
still 33-12, for 21+ to the legs … Gniark
gniark. It could be said that you could do it
simpler by using only Bloodthirsty Bitterness,
that works the same, but hey, after all it's a funny combo.
The only problem is on an Exceptional Wound: a double 5 or double 6 it's still nice
but double 1 or 2 and you're cursed ^ _ ^
Arkeon Sanath + Crown
Oriflamme of Shamir
Musician of Dirz
2 Skorizes
2 Kératis
2 Biopsistes + Bloodthirsty Bitterness
2 Crossbows
2 Halberdiers de Dirz
Arkeon Sanath + Crown
Oriflamme of Shamir
Musician of Dirz
4 Warriors of Dawn
2 Kératis
2 Biopsistes + Bloodthirsty Bitterness
3 Crossbows
Arkeon Sanath
4 Warriors of Dawn
2 Skorizes
1 Biopsiste + Bow of Mana
3 Crossbows
Lukhan Cypher +
Némésis treatment
4 Kératis
Vargas Métatron
Oriflamme of Shamir
Musician of Dirz
4 Halberdiers
Kayl Kartan + Skull of Souls +
Word of Pain
(Or another spell, from the
technomancie book of magic spells for example)
2 Skorizes
2 Biopsistes + Bloodthirsty Bitterness / Bow of
Mana
2 Tigers (Scout / Consciousness)
2 Warriors of Dawn
3 Halberdiers of Dirz
For the Magicians, prefer 1 or 2 spells maximum. Beyond that, you risk not being able to cast them all and you've paid for them for nothing... Some combinations of spells are nice on the Halberdiers such as Experimental Substance, Chitinous Eruption and Libation Sanguinaire (with mutagène on the Halberdier obviously).
Miles Teg
