“Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.”
–Nils Bohr, Nobel laureate in Physics
Look, predictions are a suckers game, but here I am making some thanks to the tireless efforts of our editor and his drive for “Masters Content.” I usually much prefer to wait till after events are over, restate the obvious with a few charts and claim I knew these trends all along. It is way easier to fool people into sounding a little smart connecting observations from the past. Having to predict things ahead of time is a whole other game, with a much greater chance of ending up with me looking like a fool (I give it roughly 95% chance). Masters is 64 of the best players in the country, with all the variability that matchups, terrain, scenario and dice luck bring to the event, predicting winners is damn hard for anyone, and that was before we even did an edition change. All that being said, I really did want to take a moment to highlight some interesting lists, that with the right pilots, I think can go far, and give folks something to chew on before the big weekend.
Erich Trowbridge – Orcs – Midwest
The army I wish I had enough painted Orcs to field and the army that will deny me best Orc general. I love this list. Naked in its aggression and plan, it is a straightforward beatdown with surprising subtlety. The lack of Elf and Goblin bow shooting in the meta has opened up space in the game for these Def 4 Orc combat behemoths hidden behind a plethora of Orcling shaped speedbumps. Straight forward it can chew up lists with high quality (Me 3+ and CS 1 & 2) attacks that do work on both trash spam lists or elite hammer lists. It doesn’t care about phalanx or stealthy and just attempts to overwhelm an opponent with almost wall to wall threats. 3 mounted Krushers to hunt whatever needs hunting and 3 foot Krudgers to keep the lines in order and play last minute defense give a huge amount of versatility to a otherwise blunt force object. No God Speakers, no heal, no shooting, no Bane Chant, no bullshit.
Erich has missed Masters in the past I believe due to scheduling conflicts but is coming in hard with this list. It took down all comers at a recent GT and if it can avoid what I think are some bad matchups in the field has a real chance at winning it all.
Dustin Howard – Forces of Nature – South
Ooooh child this army looks fun to pilot! Monster Mash 2.0 as evolution from his Kingdom of Dustin list with Greater Earth Elementals replacing Bone Giants and a Tree Herder standing in for Shobik. This is another no bullshit army that has trimmed the fat and is sporting just what it needs to get the job done and nothing else. Just that little bit of surge to do tricky stuff. Just that little bit of heal to keep the monsters in the game. Just that little bit of flying to do what it needs.This might leave it short of tools in certain matchups or scenarios but the core of what it does is so good it might not matter. A compact, extremely hard to kill, pretty hard hitting army this could probably be deployed entirely in a 12″ box (and might just be). Dustin is playing a style that he is used to, but updated to V3 and the painting on it looks great.
Previous masters from Dustin have seen very close games against very abusive lists (Jeff O’neal Goblins and Brad Mckay Twilight filth) knock him out of contention but this could be his year and this could be the list. Rumor has it he rolled a dice to pick the list, this makes me want it to win even more.
Aaron Chapman – Abyssal Dwarfs – South
I think some people might have forgotten how scary this army can be, now with added long range threat. This archetype almost won in 2018 but ran into some Un-nerfed Steel Behemoths and very unfriendly terrain as well as a very on fire Alex Chaves. Aaron has a ton of experience playing it, has tripled up on some of the more annoying units currently in the game (Heavy Mortars and Hexcasters) while losing a little of the flexibility (no combat characters floating around) and decimator punch (no piercing item) the old list had. This army brings a lot of the long range threat a war engine based build should have but then clogs the field with Slave Orcs and creates killing zones with Decimators to lock down and blast away anything trying to actually come out and play. Three sources of weakness to make every opposing hard hitting unit much worse at chewing through Slave Orcs is all kinds of nasty as well.
There is potential for struggle against lists without varying heights (making Mortar targets and Decimator shots harder to come by) but this list will also just walk over some armies in the field. This has been a great list for a couple years now and the primary reason I think we don’t see copycats is that people realize they probably won’t pilot it better than Aaron (and you have to paint 6 hordes of freaking Slave Orcs). He narrowly missed out in the past with this list, lets see if it now is the time.
Alex Chavez – Free Dwarfs – Mid Atlantic
Former Master, playing the type of army that won it all for him in 2018, could be a triumphant return to glory on the Masters stage (and another rough night if he drinks half as much as last time). With five units sporting Def 6 and a number of harder hitting threats this army is compact but dangerous (much like the Dwarves themselves). With all the talk of broken War Engines in the run up to Masters, Def 6, and how hard it is for some armies to deal with it, is one of those lower key narratives right below the surface. Alex is taking full advantage of this armies access to hard to remove units, but has also included some speed in the list to better compete in scenarios and force the issue against some gunline style builds.
Honorable mention to Jeff Shiltgen and his list as well. I agonized over which was actually the better Dwarf list but barely prefer Alex. Jeff shows up with seven units sporting Def 6 and it really is a rock hard list I could see going deep into the tourney as well.
Chris Fisher – Kingdoms of Men – Mid Atlantic
Gone forever is Kingdoms of Men’s underpowered status. Gone is the reputation of fluffy historical armies just making do with average ranks of men folk fighting other armies monsters and demons. Gone might be Chris Fisher’s carefully cultivated nice guy reputation. This is a rock hard army expertly leveraging the current power of War Engines in the meta and then aggressively countering the fast moving cavalry based answers. It’s a wall of dudes backed up by 5 artillery pieces (including the feared AD Heavy Mortar), mobile scoring characters and a solid block of close range shooting. The Kingdoms of Men versions of the War Engine list feel superior to the Goblin versions to me as there troops can do slightly more than the ranks and ranks of rabble, and I slightly feel like Chris’s version is a better all comers list (especially with some hard shooting counters in the field) than Keith Randall’s tough as nails build.
Chris is a brilliant tactician with a strong test environment for his lists and lots of other good players to lean on for advice. Because of this, we have a chance of seeing Kingdoms of Men, the most generic of armies in the game, rise above its lowly station and claim the top spot in Pannithor, which would be a sight to see. I might need a shower after saying that though as this list is also all kinds of filthy.
Shannon Shoemaker – Nightstalkers – Midwest
Honorable mention to Shannon Shoemaker who I think has made an incredibly effective Nightstalker build that contains fast stealthy elements but isn’t all in on the anti-war engine build. This creates a very well balanced all comers list that could be the sweet spot against the field. So far no one has made Master after losing their first round however, and since Shannon is obviously losing to me in the opening game, this knocks him out of serious contention even with his cool list. Sorry Shannon.
So there you have it. Five (ish) strong lists paired with experienced and skilled pilots I think have a good shot at taking down the thing. We’ll know a lot more coming out of Masters weekend than we knew going in, so I’m going to enjoy revisiting these predictions and seeing how everything turned out. What I find really compelling is that these aren’t the only powerful versions of lists from each of these armies possible. V3 is still young, and while these lists look damn hard, there are other list building routes in each of the factions that can create rivals. This gives me a lot of hope for the future as there is plenty of army design room in V3 still being explored. Also, if I didn’t mention you and you feel offended, be secure in the knowledge I probably just jinxed these folks and gave you a better chance at winning so I’m secretly helping you.
