Tournament pair: Haley2 and Caine2

I have had a 20 or so Mk3 games now and feel that I am slowly starting to get back into the groove. It's time to start working on a tournament pair! I haven't done this in a long time, but my first proper tournament is coming up in December and it's time to focus. It is time to put my Haley2 / Jakes1 / Thunderhead fun list back into the drawer and build the best lists I can!

The casters I have picked are Haley2 and Caine2. Haley2 is considered the strongest Cygnar scenario caster overall, and her strong alpha and control can really put the hurt on high armor lists and melee focused lists. Caine2 is great for dealing with mass infantry, and should be better against all the cloud walls I expect to see in our Cygnar-filled meta.

Here are my first two candidate lists:

Major Victoria Haley

Major Victoria Haley (+25)
* Squire (5)
* Thorn (13)
* Ironclad (12)
* Dynamo (18)
Journeyman Warcaster (4)
* Firefly (8)
Arlan Strangewayes (4)
Ragman (4)
5 Storm Lances
6 Trencher Infantry
* Trencher Infantry Rifle Grenadier

List Explanation

This list is all about punching first and hard and using Haley's control to do it twice. Squire and Thorn are auto-includes with Haley, Squire for the extra feat range, and Thorn for landing offensive spells, disrupting jacks, and all the crazy movement shenanigans and angles.

Ironclad is a good and cheap initializer.

Dynamo hits crazy hard with Acceleration, and  Storm Lances, Ragman and Firefly together can do some serious armor cracking and electro leaps.

The Trenchers are mainly for protecting Haley and allowing me to play her more aggressively on scenario, and also some light infantry removal.

The list is jack heavy, and Arlan is very handy for spot repairs, especially on that very fragile arcnode, but usually just handing out extra focus.

Captain Allister Caine

Captain Allister Caine (+27)
* Reinholdt
* Stormwall
Journeyman Warcaster
* Firefly
Gun Mage Captain Adept
Ragman
Rhupert Carvolo
6 Rangers
5 Storm Lances
Lynus Wesselbaum & Edrea Lloryrr

List Explanation

Caine, Reinholdt, Rangers, and GMCA are the most important tools for Caine2 assassination, by increasing his damage, accuracy, and granting vision through models. Even though I intend the list to play mostly for attrition, I think it's important to play to Caine's strengths by having the package.

Rhupert is mainly there to keep the Rangers alive and annoying. He can also help with getting Storm Lance DEF high, and getting Caine DEF insane.

Storm Lances are there for being the best and most self sufficient Cygnar unit.

Stormwall is a huge distraction and important scenario piece. Firefly is cheap and increases the electro leap punch from Stormwall and Lances.

Ragman is, well, Ragman, and quite simply too good to pass up in any Cygnar list that expects to get into melee.

Lynus and Edrea give me the opportunity to cripple jacks and beasts with Caine without having to use the feat to do so. Arcnodes, Cortex and Spirit are the primary targets. I am not quite sure about my choice, but they have done good work in other games, so we'll see. If they don't work out, we have plenty of other good solos to pick from.

Testing

Next step: Testing the lists to see if they have game against the strongest opponents. Jarle advised me to play against some of the usual bogeymen: Rask, Haley2 mirror, Haley3, Karchev, Issyria, Wurmwood and Rhulic.