Picking Tournament Lists

Been working out what I want to take on Sunday so I can try to get it slightly more painted. In the end it came down to Trolls or Mercs and I've decided to take the trolls but since I like to crap on about warmachine here is what I'm not taking and why I think it's good.

Mercenaries
Highborn Covenant
PCs: 35 / 35
31 models

[00] Ashlynn D'elyse (0 / 6 WJ remaining)
[02]  >> Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker
[08]  >> Mangler
[06] Arcane Tempest Gun Mages
[02]  >> Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer
[08]  >> Mule
[05] Alexia Ciannor & the Risen (9)
[10] Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters (9 grunts)

Mercenaries
Highborn Covenant
PCs: 35 / 35
38 models

[00] Constance Blaize, Knight of the Prophet (0 / 6 WJ remaining)
[02]  >> Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker
[09]  >> Gallant
[02] Rhupert Carvolo, Piper of Ord
[01] Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator
[03] Ogrun Bokur
[06] Steelhead Halberdiers (9 grunts)
[08] Horgenhold Forge Guard (9 grunts)
[08] Precursor Knights (9 grunts)
[02]  >> Precursor Knight Officer & Standard

First off these are two very different lists, one high DEF and one high-ish ARM. That enables me to pick the thing my opponent will struggle with. Neither has many jacks, that's because mercenaries lack a good jack running caster.

Ashlynn: great offensive and defensive feat, everyone rolls two extra dice when rolling to hit and then discards two dice of your choice. Your opponent discards the high dice and you discard the low dice. To get the most out of it you want high DEF troops, that's the Nyss and the gun mages. Lots of shooting allows you to be flexible, if your opponent tries to force you to use your feat defensively to avoid being killed on the charge you can still shred them with feat assisted shooting and then be protected when they charge (though best results still come from feating and charging). Gun mages also allow you to push around the things you don't want to face or to open objectives when you can't kill the thing holding them. Risen give you anti-magic and generally get in the way of your opponent, with the large amount of troops you have you'll be able to raise more. The risen also give you dominate undead, great against Cryx and Cryx will already struggle as Ashlynn's feat negates their high DEF. It's important to run up first turn and get in your opponents face early with this army and it has a problem going against more than 1-2 heavies.

Constance: Most important thing for a second army is that it is strong against the weaknesses of the first army and though this army actually contains less jacks it has more jack killing power. On the charge forge guard and precursors will kill 2 jacks each on average and the Gallant can wreck two if your opponent made the mistake of leaving upkeeps on them. The Halberdiers are in the list to die, they serve no other purpose, they stand out in front of everything else blocking charge lanes on the feat and die giving up souls for Constance (her feat gives her a soul for every warrior that dies, each soul makes everything else +1 ARM and gives Constance an extra focus next turn). If your opponent has things with cull soul then they can shut this down so this list is weak against Cryx, a weakness covered by the first list. The other thing this list is good at is dealing with upkeeps, the Gallant gets additional hit and damage dice against anything with an upkeep, Constance has banishing ward so you can get rid of enemy upkeeps on your troops and she and the precursors have blessed so they ignore increases to DEF and ARM from spells.

In the end I decided to go with trolls because more of them are painted. I might even be able to finish painting them before Sunday.