Rask - Bastard of the Bog

Overview

Rask is the fourth caster available to the Blindwater Congregation, and unlike the other three, is not a Gatorman. Instead he is a Bog Trog, and an honourless bastard.

What a douche.

Stats

Largely unremarkable stats, besides his good RAT. Same SPD as the average Gatorman and Bog Trog is a little surprising, but I guess he struts more than walks. Defensively, both his DEF and ARM are squarely in the middle of the pack when it comes to warlocks. His most surprising stat is his CMD, which is as dismal as you would expect from such an untrustworthy slimy fishman.

Spells

His spell list has been described by one of my regular opponents as "Khador's dream spell list" - with the notable absence of Iron Flesh, of course.

• Admonition - one of the best defensive spells in the game, an allows target battlegroup model to advance 3" in response to an enemy model ending its movement within 6" of it.
• Boundless Charge - seen on several Khador casters, makes things charge further, for free, and through rough terrain.
• Fury - another Khador staple, makes things hit hard. Really hard. The downside is -1 DEF, which is not really a problem for Gators.
• Inhospitable Ground - usually assigned to tactical warmasters like Xerxis or Irusk, Rask likes to turn large areas into swampy bog.

Note the lack of magic nuke, which is made up for by his potent magical spear gun.

Abilities

• Call to Sacrifice [Bog Trog] - it's like the Errant Seneschal's ability, except in a much smaller area. And on a warlock.
• Ammo Types:
  This is practically like having an entire spell list of really good magical nukes at your disposal, except they are free:
  - Paralysis: aka Krea/Argus gun, lowers a living targets DEF to 7, and stops them running/charging.
  - Energy Siphon: aka. Kaelyssa gun, steals a fury/focus from the target on hit.
  - Arcane Interference: aka. eEyriss gun, strips upkeeps, removes all focus and disrupts jacks.

Feat - Dark Waters

While in Rask's control, friendly faction models cannot be targeted by anything from further than 5" away. No shooting, no spells, no charges... a very potent defensive feat that fits in well with the Gator's "no shooting" shtick.

Thoughts

Damage

His personal damage is almost negligible. P+S 11 non-reach melee weapon with a low MAT is downright crap. Its good enough to kill a trooper or two, but beyond that you want to keep him out of melee and in a clear support role. His harpoon gun is hits as hard as a hand cannon, so not too bad there.

Fury, on the other hand, turns almost anything in Blindwater into a killing machine. P+S 19/16 Totem Hunter? P+S 16 Posse? P+S 20/17 Wrastler? Yes please. This is the caster you want to take when facing heavy armor, as Fury combined with his harpoon gun (see 'utility') gives you the tools you need to take those heavies down.

Coincidentally, 'poison' looks very similar to the French word for 'fish'.
The more you know.

Survivability

He is a support caster, but a support caster that needs to be quite far up because of his short spell ranges (6" for most), and the dependence on his sweet gun (10" range). Fortunately, he has respectable (though not fantastic) defensive stats in a faction that does well at stacking defensive buffs. I usually take a unit of Swamp Gobbers with him to provide concealment or block LoS to him, and Spiny Growth is always useful. I prefer the Swamp Gobber cloud to a Boneswarm's animus here since:

1. Rask usually isn't too scared of melee attacks on account of Admonition and his feat (which is usually followed by a wall of jamming Gatormans).
2. Bog Trogs also benefit greatly from the cloud on account of Camouflage. 
3. Boneswarms are bad. I'd rather have a Snapper/TH/Croctor + Gobbers 99% of the time.

The thing that really pushes him over the edge in this department is his Call to Sacrifice - [Bog Trogs] ability. It more or less means that he is extremely difficult to assassinate if your opponent does not kill everything else in the army first, and bring enough guns to snipe out the pathetic Trogs near him.

Utility

This is what Rask does best. He has the tools to get the job done. His spell list, as mentioned, is rock solid:
Need extra hitting power to crack hard targets? Fury on a heavy beast or a charging Posse will do it.
Need to protect yourself from melee alpha strikes? Admonition.
Fighting an opponent without much pathfinder? Inhospitable Ground to jam them up.
Need to charge over that Janyssa wall, get a few extra inches of threat or save some fury on your beasts? Boundless Charge!

It's like a wish list of Domination-era Blindwater. And then he has three different types of ammo on his gun (which is practically a second spell list of awesome spells) so as to make him at least very useful in any situation.

Playstyle + Tactica

Despite his annoying tricks, Rask seems less predisposed to play the attrition game than our other warlocks. Fortunately, he makes up the difference by being pretty decent at assassination. He can make stuff hit hard, make stuff charge further, and remove buffs/focus/fury. The Totem Hunter is almost an auto-include for a Rask list, as the threat of a MAT 10, P+S 19/16 getting to your caster or valuable pieces is very viable. It's a bit like having Fury-ed Eliminators in a Khador list, except he won't die to blast damage. There's also the Flying Gator trick, which just gets better with more damage, more range and more pathfinder.

His gun is also possibly the single most powerful weapon in the game (besides Lola, I would think). It's almost an entire spell list on its own, each of which provides assassination and control potential:

• Paralysis can help get an assassination on high DEF casters like Shae, Ashlynn, Morghoul or Amon. With a RAT of 7, Rask shouldn't have too much trouble hitting them, reduce their DEF to pathetic, and win. It's also useful to lower the DEF on warbeasts so your gators don't have to use their re-roll on living prayers (where you'd rather use Pathfinder or Dirge).
  Paralysis is also a way to shut down slow living melee beasts like Bronzebacks for a turn (just be sure not to boost the damage roll and trigger Hyper Aggressive!).
• Arcane Interference is also pretty damn sweet. Its most potent use is to remove focus from enemy warcasters. This is a huge deal for Gators, as a lot of warcasters could just camp a handful of focus and be nigh immune to anything we could throw out.
  This ammo type will also disrupt warjacks (very useful control) and remove upkeeps from both enemy and friendly models - great for dealing with pesky Crippling Grasps, Arcane Shields and Polarity Shields!
• Energy Siphon is the least powerful of the three effects, which isn't really saying much. In terms of assassination, stealing a fury from an enemy warlock and using that same fury to boost a POW 12 against them is pretty douchy (aka. characterful). You can also use it to steal fury from non-living beasts and make their warlocks cut themselves to make up for it. It's better than nothing, and you have an extra fury at the end. Finally, I don't remember how many out-of-turn focus-powered effects remain in the game (eSevvy's jack bond?), but you could steal focus from jacks to stop those effects happening. Or steal focus off the Avatar for lolz.

The feat Dark Waters is usually used first or second turn - basically the turn where you would get charged, or shot up. It will allow you to get the alpha-strike a lot of the time, which for an attrition faction like Gators is very significant. Note however that there are a few ways around it for your opponent - they can trample in with a heavy and buy additional attacks, they can run a few models in a unit into your guys and charge their own guys to kill them then use non-charge attacks on your models (which usually isn't a problem for ARM 18 Posse or beasts).

One interesting aspect of the feat is that it also pretty kills arcing spells, because while the source of the attack is the arc node, the model making the attack is usually further than 5" from his target, making the attack illegal.

I find the feat to combo very well with Inhospitable Ground - you cannot be charged, and if the enemy doesn't have pathfinder, they usually won't even be able to walk into melee with you. This also shuts down mass pathfinder spells like Killing Ground. You will usually have plenty of fury to cast I.G. on the feat turn as well, since you won't be doing all that much else before lines engage. In general, I.G. is a very potent but very matchup dependent spell - if you're playing Circle for example, you will rarely cast it. If you're playing Protectorate, it's likely to be up all the time.

Fury is self-explanatory - apply to thing, then get thing to charge and kill enemy thing. I like to put it up on a Posse on the feat turn, so I can hotswap it to another target after that Posse has charged. Rask will usually be activating amongst the first few models most turns anyway, since he sucks in melee, will rarely need to move forward much, and almost everything he does focuses on support or denial.

Admonition is a trickier spell to use. Often it best serves being put on a heavy melee beast early on to serve as bait and cause headaches to your opponent. Later on in the game, you can switch it to Rask to make any potential assassination attempts even more difficult. Either way, make sure you use a visible token so you don't douche your opponent out of a good plan!

List Composition

One of the interesting things I found about Rask is that he does not demand a Bull Snapper like the other Blindwater warlocks do. He is so aggressive that you will usually end up getting the alpha charge with your heavies (which will die to the counterattack, Spiny Growth or not), and Fury allows the Posse to do such ridiculous amounts of damage on the counter attack that you'd be foolish not to use them. Most of my lists run with only a Wrastler and a Swamp Horror (who does amazing things with Fury, and brings reach on a stick) and I've been doing fine with that, never lacking for fury or transfer targets. Most people don't even consider assassinating Rask if he has a fury or two, and a few Trogs/Shamblers hanging around. Saying that, a Bull Snapper is still probably the best beast available to us, so why not take one?

Otherwise, he works quite well with everything in Blindwater. Just be sure to have a unit of Trogs around him to bring him from 'average survivability' to 'damn hard to assassinate'. Shamblers are especially good at this since they are cheap bodies and benefit nicely from Rask's toolset.

Weaknesses

Rask's main weakness (besides being in a young faction) is that he himself is a wuss, and he doesn't make his stuff harder to kill. You have to make sure to hit hard and fast, while trying to protect your army using his control tricks. If you can get controlled and grinded down, then you're in trouble since Rask's wussiness means you lack endgame credit.
Secondly, he is also somewhat prone to assassination if you can deny him transfers and healing (ala Grievous Wounds, Entropic Aura, etc.). He needs to be a bit further up to have a meaninful impact on the game due to his short spell ranges, RNG 10 gun and Inhospitable Ground, so he can be sniped off quickly if your opponent has the pieces to deny him his defenses, or push him away from his Trog friends.
Third, unlike Barnabas with Warpath and Maelok with Revive, he does not provide unpredictable threat angles out of turn (except perhaps Admonition).
Fourth, he is vulnerable to FU auras of anti-spell. I discovered this recently when I played against Kromac and his Bestial spell. Having to be a bit further up the table and unable to cast spells really sucks bad for the little fishman. Other similar effects include Mage Blight, Lamentation, Circle Druids or the Book of Menoth.

His other big weakness is that he kind of forces you to bring Bog Trogs, who are good if and only if they ambush into the enemy's backfield. If they don't, then they are just overpriced crappy infantry. Furthermore, his CMD of 5 in no way helps the Trogs crappy CMD of 8.

Conclusion

Power Level:
Assault Kommandos|---------------------------------[9k]----[Rask]---| Rask's Gun

The best thing about Rask is that he more or less invalidates any reason to play Pigs at present, other than perhaps against a weapon master swarm matchup. No need to play Carver lists for tournaments just to deal with armor lists anymore. Gators are the complete Minions package until PP decides changes their approach to Farrow.

I hate to say it, but Rask pretty much replaces Calaban in every way (except maybe Carnivore), and then some. He is arguably the best caster available to Blindwater, giving Barnabas a serious run for his money and an excellent partner in a 2-list Steamroller format. He also works pretty well alongside Maelok, switching the grind for the punch. His gun is absolutely insane, and his spell list is all A-list spells, and he has something meaningful to do every single turn.

I think if I ever attended a Hardcore event with Gatormans, he would be my go-to caster without a doubt. While Barnabas has more good matchups, Rask does not initially appear to have any bad matchups not shared by other Gator casters.