This guy is supposed to be great and while I can see lots of great pieces when I look at him I can't see how they all come together to make a great list. I'm going to jot down my process here in figuring him out.
1. Have a look at his rules. His gun can give a warbeast +2 SPD on a charge or knockdown whatever it wants to kill if it is close enough not to need the speed boost (Melee beast). His feat drops SPD and DEF which will stop my opponent from being able to charge me if I hang back a little which suggests I want some ranged threat. He can give a model/unit pathfinder and hunter (good for everything that doesn't have those abilities), has a spell that drops DEF, gets rid of stealth and allows targeting regardless of LOS but is dangerously short ranged which suggests more ranged stuff. Lastly he has return fire which will let a model shoot back if it gets shot at (ranged beast).
Trollbloods are the most infantry heavy faction in hordes but they still have great beasts so generally you are looking for a mix of beasts and infantry in your list. If you take a troll melee beast though you will need a damage buff (which means Mauler, Pyre Troll or Slag Troll). So from looking at his abilities I'm thinking:
Good Stuff
Bomber - Trolls best ranged beast
Impaler - really needed for the bomber and will help Grim out as well
Mauler, Mulg, Earthborn - A melee threat
Pyre Troll - Might need a damage buff and it shoots as well.
Champions - Grims feat will stop them from being charged so they will be very very hard to kill.
Long riders - Love cross country and will love the feat.
Runshapers - shooting
Scattergunners - A unit with sprays, ignores all your own models and Grim fixes the problem of their lowish RAT (5). They look great with Grim.
Burrowers - fixes their low MAT problem and they are otherwise awesome.
War Wagon - it will have no problem hitting directly under the feat, it has great ranged firepower and it can fight too.
When building a list you generally want to avoid the models that are overcosted and do not benefit significantly more than more appropriately costed models from your warcasters abilities. In this case that's Sluggers, Skinners and Bushwackers. I'd probably also avoid Blitzers, Bouncers and the thumper crew.
2. What is the prevailing wisdom? Whenever I'm putting together a list for a new caster I'll have a look at what other people are doing to see if there are any tricks other people have thought of that I have not. Here I ran into a road-block. You can often find good advice if you have a look at lists that have done well at tournaments. At least you can find a starting point or some synergies you have not thought of. There's nothing on Grim though, which is a bit weird as he is generally considered one of the top troll warcasters. There is a summary of Troll tactica on the forum and the one for Grim is old and bad (from before the release of the troll army book). Even Chain Attack played Grim in their first episode and didn't have any special ideas I had not picked up on.
3. What do I want the list to do? Good lists should do something, they shouldn't just be a collection of random models there should be an idea behind it, a plan of sorts. For example my Constance list is all about jamming with infantry, my doomshaper2 list is a high ARM beast brick. It should also be balanced, it's not just about taking the best synergies. A lot of my everblight lists have legionnaires in them just to die but to die in preference to my more important beasts. You may need a cheap unit of infantry just to get in your opponents way, you may need a model with a ranged attack just to get rid of those annoying blocking models your opponent has put on the table.
So what I want the list to do is to feat and slow my opponent down while my beasts shoot stuff to pieces. I'm going to need a heavy hitter to take down high ARM stuff and I'm going to need a fast unit to get in the way of stuff (always important when you have shooting). So I want:
Melee beast that can kill a heavy
Bomber/Impaler
Fast unit that does not require warcaster support.
Trollbloods
Standard Army
PCs: 50 / 50
32 models
[00] Grim Angus (0 / 6 WB)
[02] >> Trollkin Runebearer
[10] >> Earthborn Dire Troll
[10] >> Dire Troll Bomber
[09] >> Dire Troll Mauler
[05] >> Troll Impaler
[03] Janissa Stonetide
[03] Fell Caller Hero
[02] Troll Whelps
[04] Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes (5 grunts)
[01] >> Stone Scribe Elder
[06] Pyg Burrowers (9 grunts)
[01] Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew
The Burrowers can rush the zone while I advance up my beast brick.
Next Step: First game. Ok so Grim's feat was devastating and I tabled my opponent on his feat turn (he had left a unit of bloodweavers way out on the flank, wolf lord Morraig badly wounded and his caster and that was it, he had killed a single whelp). I already see a problem though. The beast brick is slow. I can run it first turn to get it into the zone but I feel like I want more speed. I don't think an Axer will solve the problem either as I want to run Grim first turn to get him up to catch my opponent in his feat.
Maybe I'm just to used to playing Legion. For now the list remains unchanged.
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