Round #1:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/218050.page
Round #2:
As detailed above, I was able to win my local store's 'Ardboyz championship, and move on to the second round. That was held this Saturday, so I thought I'd continue my report.
My List:
This time I was able to take the list I wanted to take to the first round.
I brought:
Kairos fateweaver
7 Bloodcrushers w/Fury of Khorne
7 Bloodcrushers w/Fury of Khorne
1 Soulgrinder w/Tongue
1 Soulgrinder w/Tongue
1 Soulgrinder w/Tongue
12 Bloodletters
12 Bloodletters
12 Bloodletters
10 Pink Horrors w/bolt
10 Pink Horrors w/bolt
9 Pink Horrors w/bolt, changeling
The Store:
I went to Borderlands, in South Carolina, which turned out to be a large and really well set up store. They'd had an 'Ardboyz round 1 here, and found that few folks finished their game in 2.5 hours, so they'd sought and secured permission from
GW to make the games 3 hours long. I was thrilled at this, as not finishing a game bites.
In order to pair up the initial round they had a box of dice, of which there were 34, 17 distinct pairs. You picked from the box and then played against the other fellow who picked the same manner of dice as you had. If you both came from the same store and played all the time you could throw the dice back in and repick. Also there was one extra dice that had no partner, as there was an odd number of participants. The drawer of that would fight a bye, skipping round one and getting swissed into the middle in round 2. His final score would be the average of his round 2 and 3 games. We all realized that this was an edge in the tourney, as you'd only have one hard game, but at the same time, how much would it suck to sit out 1/3 of a tourney you drove hours to?
Post-first the rounds would be matched up swiss style, as is usual at these things.
The Field:
I didn't do my usual survey, but there seemed to be an abundance of Space marine and Chaos Space Marine lists. There were no Tyranids, and it seemed like only one or two Eldar, and there was just one Daemon player beside my self. There was an abundance of Land Raiders, and I marked that grimly, as my list has trouble with such things. There were less Orks than one might think, seemed like 3 or 4 at max.
Game #1:
The Mission:
Objective: Annihilation ('Ardboyz style
KP, so
HQ =3, etc.)
Massacre at 8 more
KP, Major at 6, minor at 4, tie if neither player has a >4 point
KP advantage
Bonus points (+1 for destroying all Troops, all
HQ, all
FA, all
HS)
Deployment: Spearhead, + all troops start in reserve
My thoughts: I liked this mission a lot, table quarters with troops starting in reserve and such an onerous
KP requirement for victory will cause many conventional lists to shoot ineffectivly at one another, ending the game in a draw. My list, on the other hand, isn't terribly affected by this mission so long as I refrain from getting jumped by troops coming on from reserve. If I can score a massacre here I might be matched up against a list with incredible long-range firepower, who had gunned down their foe while they tried to cross the field, and I'd obliterate such a list.
My Opponent:
Space Marines:
Master, on bike with thunder hammer and artificer armor. He also had terminator honors and the weapon was master crafted
Epistolary, on bike with master crafted force weapon, artificer honors and terminator honors, a plasma pistol and melta bombs. He had Fear the Darkness, and Might of the Ancients
10 man
tac squad w/flamers, Rhino with Smoke and Searchlights and an extra storm bolter
10 man
tac squad w/flamers, Rhino with Smoke and Searchlights and an extra storm bolter
10 man
tac squad w/flamers, Rhino with Smoke and Searchlights and an extra storm bolter
10 man
tac squad w/flamers, Rhino with Smoke and Searchlights and an extra storm bolter
5 man Bike squad + Attack bike, with 2 flamers and a heavy bolter and melta bombs. Vet had a power weapon
5 man Bike squad + Attack bike, with 2 flamers and a heavy bolter and melta bombs. Vet had a power weapon
5 man Bike squad + Attack bike, with 2 melta gunsand a heavy bolter and melta bombs. Vet had a power fist
Predator Annihilator w/hunter killer missile, smoke
Vindicator w/POTM, xtra armor, smoke
Vindicator w/POTM, xtra armor, smoke
My assessment:
I like my chances against this list. The stuff I have a hard time with (rhinos full of marines) will be in reserve, and will likely disgorge their contents to try (and fail) to rescue the other stuff. In particular those bike squads with melee characters are delicious, as they'll likely shoot/charge one of my units, and then get counter-charged and slaughtered by something khornate. Once he's lost his
HQ/
FA squads he'll have to get daring to try and make it up, and I'll have the game in my hands if I just back up and play the waiting game. I think I can kill his
FA/
HQ with counter-charges, and his
HS tanks with my Grinders, but I don't think I can take out his troops unless he loses his head and comes for me. If he's careful, I don't really have an effective way to chase down and kill rhinos full of marines, and there's no objective to make him come to me.
The Game:
He wins the rolloff and decides to go first, picking his corner. I'm not sure what to think of this. I think, on the balance, that he'd have been better served going second, but there's something to be said for trying to get in your reserves as fast as possible.
On his first turn he attaches his
HQ's to his bike squads and turbo-boosts them in all directions. I guess this saves him from tongue/bolt of tzeentch shots, but he does it a little too wildly, with the result that they aren't in range to mutually reinforce one another. His tanks sit there, no smoking, which is an error.
On my first turn I elect to get in my crushers, grinders and Kairos, but I roll a one and get the troops, ah well. He's in the NW corner, and his turbo boosted squads have gone south, south-east and east. I drop around the South squad (which has the meltas/fist), though the changling's unit scatters sort of into the center. I shoot all my pink horrors at his bikes, to no effect, and whine about Daemon shooting.
On his turn he gets in a rhino, which drives in and smokes, and shoots his gunline and 2 eastern biker squads at the changling's unit, wiping it out. His southern biker squad blasts a bloodletter unit, killing 5, and then charges in, killing 4 or 5 more and losing 2 or 3 to return attacks. This is a rather colossal blunder, as they are in counter-charge range of another bloodletter squad, and he's using a fast attack and an
HQ to defeat one troop choice.
On my turn I get in a Soul grinder. I also get in Kairos and a Bloodcrusher squad, who fall next to one another in the middle My grinder shoots at one of his vindy's, misses, and my bloodletters counter-charge the bikers and wipe them out, though they don't kill the librarian yet.
On his turn he gets in another troop squad, which zips south and fires at some pink horrors, killing a few, and he sends his biker squad charging into Kairos, and his other squad charging into the Kairos-protected bloodcrushers. This is effectively a game ending mistake, as the inevitable results.
On my next turn my other two grinders drop in and blast two of his tanks out of existence. His librarian dies this round, while the master stubbornly survives despite being surrounded by bloodcrushers.
Over the course of the next few rounds he sends in his troop squads to rapid fire kairos-enchanced bloodcrushers, and they are run over. Only at the end does he change tactics and send one fleeing in a rhino. I have a chance to wipe it out beforehand, by charging it with a soul grinder, but decide I'd rather not have a 24, as I've got better odds at getting an easy foe if I keep to a 23. I send the grinder charging into a rhino instead, and he takes the hint and runs them away for the rest of the game.
At game's end he's killed 2 troop squads, while I've killed 2
HQ, 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support and 3 troops, I take a massacre with all the bonus points except the one for the troops, for a 23.
Game #2:
The Mission:
Objective: Seize Ground w/5 objectives
Massacre for 3 more objectives, Major for 2 more, Minor for 1 more, Tie for same
Bonus point for objective furthest from deployment zone, for destroying all elites, for all
HQ surviving, for at any time controlling all 5
Deployment: Pitch battle
My thoughts: Pretty standard game. I'm going to be using the basic Daemon victory pattern, drop mean stuff, soak up fire, then drop troops while your mean stuff destroys the enemy's capacity to shoot/assault your troops off the objective(s). This could be a really difficult mission against a mobile mech army. Eldar in particular, as I've got no great way to keep tanks off my objectives and/or destroy them at range.
The Opponent:
Tau
Crisis Suit Commander w/2 bodyguards, plasma rifle + missile pod, shield drones, other upgrades
3 Crisis Suits w/plasma rifle, missile pods
3 Crisis Suits w/plasma rifle, missile pods
6 Pathfinders w/Devilfish
6 Pathfinders w/Devilfish
10 Fire Warriors w/Devilfish
10 Fire Warriors w/Devilfish
12 Fire Warriors
12 Fire Warriors
12 Fire Warriors
2 Broadsides w/shield drones
2 Broadsides w/shield drones
1 Hammerhead w/railgun
All vehicles were properly tarted up, flechettes, cover save, move as fast vehicle, all that jazz
My thoughts:
This guy did me a huge favor by obliterating a Land Raider list in a previous game, but nonetheless this was a hard matchup for me. My army makes a small, invulnerable chunk and charges/countercharges really well. Against a mobile shooting enemy it would be hard to inflict damage. Further, he could tank shock me off objectives at game's end, as this army will certainly have killed my Grinders by then. I'm not loving my odds, but at least he's no Orks or twin-lash.
The game:
First off, the board we are on was a cityfight board, with difficult terrain covering perhaps 80% of its surface. I was a bit dismayed by this, but figured run would mostly cancel out the lost inches.
He won the roll to set up the objectives, and set one up right about in the middle. I responded by setting up one about 12" away on a diagonal, and then to my surprise he set up the third one on another diagonal from the first. I wasn't about to miss this opportunity and so I set the next one up in the last point of the square. He finished up by putting one going away, still 12" out, so we had a diamond with a line sticking out, like a kite.
This helps my list tremendously. We have to bunch up, while the tau are a mobile/shooting list who can spread out. If he'd spread the objectives out as widely as possible (2 pairs and a final one), I could only have had Kairos in one place at once, and the odds would have been much better for him.
I win the roll to go first, and his deployment takes roughly forever. He's got a laser pointer and he's squatting down to verify each model's field of fire. I'm irked, but figure we've got 3 hours, so I don't whine too much. He redeploys stuff a couple of times, remembers that he can't start his fire warriors in his pathfinder's devilfish, etc. He ends up with his whole army deployed spread out along his line, with no particular concentration of firepower, save that his crisis suits are more on the tail area and less on the kite area.
I ask for crushers, grinders and Kairos, and get it. Kairos and his Crusher buddies drop on the northern end of the Kite (with him being north), and the Grinders drop spread out along the line, firing tongue attacks at devilfish. They don't do anything.
On his turn his shoot phase (which is also nigh-endless), destroys 2 of the Grinders and immobilizes the last one (railgungs + markerlights). He doesn't really get anything done to the Crushers though, and doesn't even shoot at Kairos. He tries to send a devilfish around the opposite flank as the rest of the army.
On my turn 3 troops fall and the Crushers kill off his flanking devilfish (lucky to get that done in one round), from here the game is basically over. My army stands on the kite, his army clusters around the tail area. He shoots at the Kairos-protected daemons, I run towards him. At the end of the game he sends his fish shooting out to claim objectives, he's able to contest half the kite objectives and keep the tail, so I win 2 objectives to one.
He nearly shoots Kairos + 3 Bloodletters off one of his objectives and forces the tie, but some inspired saves keep the game in the narrow win column. I get the minor victory, still have all my
HQ, and control the objective furthest from my zone. So I get 15 points. He's got all his
HQ alive, so he takes 8.
It's an unsatisfying game, and an earlier bit (the judge miscalled the 2 hours left mark as one hour left, and I thought he'd slowplayed 2 turns into 2 hours) left a bad taste in my mouth, but what can you do? It's revealing that in
VPs he'd killed like 1.5 thousand points of my army, and I'd killed 4 hundred of his. Some "victory". We also didn't have time for more than 5 rounds, which deprived me of my chance to finally assault the tanks which had just flown up and grabbed my objectives.
Game #3:
Objective: Capture and Control and Annihilation ('Ardboyz style
KP)
Massacre for control both objectives and have more
KP, major for control both objectives and have less
KP, minor if nobody has both objectives and you have more
KP, draw if equal
KP and nobody has objectives
Bonus points: Control both objectives at some point, never let enemy control an objective, keep
HQ's alive, kill all enemy troop selections
Deployment: Dawn of War
My thoughts:
Good for my army, as the split between the objectives means that the enemy has to divide in half, which I can observe and react to. Daemons generally love C&C missions, and this one is no different. I'm also a fan of Dawn of War deployment, as it lets the enemy make errors in initial placement, and denies them heavy weapon fire on round 1. This should be good for my army.
The Opponent:
Space marines
Reclusiarch w/terminator armor, storm bolter
Terminator squad w/assault cannon
Assault Terminator squad w/furious charge
Dreadnought w/missile launcher, twin-linked lascannon
10 man tactical squad w/8
ccw/bolt pistol, 1 flamer, 1 power fist in Rhino
10 man tactical squad w/8
ccw/bolt pistol, 1 flamer, 1 power fist in Rhino
10 man tactical squad w/7
ccw/bolt pistol, 1 flamer, 1 lascannon 1 power weapon in Rhino
10 man tactical squad w/7
ccw/bolt pistol, 1 flamer, 1 lascannon 1 power weapon in Rhino
10 man tactical squad w/9
ccw/bolt pistol, 1 flamer, 1 power weapon, 1 TP homer
1 Vindicator
1 Land Raider Crusader
1 Land Raider Crusader
My assessment: Rough, a mech-list with 2 Land Raiders and rhinos to hide all the delicious power-armor. I'm going to have to pry them out of these tin-cans. If he's skilled, he will just drive around and try and retain the ability to take both objectives at the end game with tank shocks. In particular, I'm worried about those land raiders, as one
tac squad doesn't have a Rhino which raises the horrifying possiblity of a Land Raider that scores. This is a tough list, and he's got 2 massacres, so he'll be a tough player. I wish this was more of a
KP mission, but at least it's an auxillary part. Eagerness to take
KPs might get him out of the rhinos.
The game:
To my annoyance I get the wrong wave of my army again, so my troops come down. Fortunately he's pretty well castled up up north so we fall far away from him, but I'd really have liked Kairos and his Bloodcrusher buddies to get the siege on. I immobilize one of his rhinos on my first round of shooting, and he does similarly small amounts of stuff back.
My reserves are really bad, with one grinder coming in on round 2 and just Kairos on 3, but he's cautious and doesn't take advantage of this to come down and do nasty things to my troops.
This game plays really tamely, with the first
KP being taken in round 4, when I he charges a squad out of his land raider at an immobilized Soul Grinder, which beats them in combat and sends them running off the board.
I get a lucky break when a last-man standing from a pink horror unit destroys a Land raider full of terminators on the bottom of 4, and he's suddenly faced with losing an Elite unit and the
HQ it's protecting, which will drop him a fatal distance in
KPs.
He attempts to make the best of it by killing Kairos with the termies, and does so, but the counter-charge by Bloodcrushers puts him below in
KPs (along with the crippled soul grinder thrashing the shooty terminators and sending them running after the tact squad when they charge it...I'm not sure why he wnated that thing dead so badly, it misses half the time with its tongue).
A Death-Or-Glory and the post-Kairos combat keep him off the objectives on the bottom of turn 5, but he's set up to drive in on them on turn 6...and then the game ends.
We are both a bit stunned, as it felt like it never really got going, but that's 5th for you. I had both objectives, and he'd never controlled them, so I had 2 bonus points and the massacre.
Overall I've got 60 Battle Points, and I was on table 2 in the last round, so I'm thinking I might have the win. The guy with the bye (the Nurgle Daemon player) is fighting on table one, and I drift by and see that it's really close. I skidaddle before I can make a nuisance of myself rooting for the non-Bye guy, and ultimately word drifts back that the bye-guy won a minor victory, which is excellent. With that, I win the tourney, as I've got 60
BPs and the next 3 guys seem tied at 56.
I've got crazy plans for the 2500 point prize, but then find out that
GW picks the units for you and you just pick the dex. That's much more sane on their part, and its still an incredible prize, so I just pick
IG (new dex coming up, probably gonna rock) and revel in the win.
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