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 jy2 wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
'Counts As' doesn't fix the underlying absurdity.

Why is it other armies can reap the benefits of Comms but daemons can't? Just call it a Warp Beacon or something like that.

Obviously because it's just absurd...

We all know, anyone can use any except Nids.
Apparently they don't have opposable thumbs so cannot shoot guns ...

As for anyone and everyone else all is good

Watching the top gaming table from the Narrative side, after round 2 only deamon armies fought for the top spot. All had the flamer/screamer/plaguebearer list with the comms relay. The only variety was if some brought in a MC.

 jy2 wrote:

 whigwam wrote:
I'm the fellow who won the invitational. My list was as follows:

Herald of Tz.

3x9 Flamers

9 Horrors (Changeling)
8 Horrors (w/ Herald)
2x7 Plaguebearers
5 Plaguebearers

3x9 Screamers

ADL w/ Comms

I think I was the only Daemon player without 1-2 FMC's. Otherwise it's a rather cookie cutter list.

The runner up had:

Fateweaver
Masque

3x9 Flamers

4x7 Plaguebearers

3x6 Screamers

ADL w/ Comms

Also in the top 8 were Nids, Tau/Eldar, GK/Tau, and several more Daemons. Thanks to Duke for putting on a great event. I'm already looking forward to next year.

First of all, congrats to Whigwham for a job well done. That is a very extreme list that probably 95% of the people out there would have problems against.


However, as good as it is, it is still a hammer list. A big hammer, but nonetheless, it can be overcome by a paper list and some tactical play. And no, cronair isn't a solution. This list IMO has the resiliency to survive a full-on necron airforce list. Worse yet, it has the potential to table Cronair on Turn 1 if the necron player does not deploy enough units on the ground. What you need to beat it is a large amount of firepower and an equally resilient army on the board. The Green Tide orks backed by lootas and/or dakkajets, grey knight Coteaz-striker-spam, hybrid wraithing-tesla necrons, shooty-MSU builds and even psychic-heavy tyranids are some of the armies that can give daemons a problem.

But for now, people are going to have to figure out how to deal with both Tzeentch daemons and necron flyer/hybrid-flyer lists in the tournaments to come.

I would have to disagree with you Jy2. I would LOVE to play against green tide orks with my daemons, and the other lists really aren't as much of a threat as you suggest.
Coteaz striker spam doesn't have the fire power to stop it, even with the extra 12" warp quake gives you.

Daemons should be extremely nasty, and they were devastating in 5th despite what a lot of the Internet psycho babble would have you believe. What I don't like are all the bandwagon players jumping on the army because it has had
some success. It really turns me off from the recent tournaments, and I myself am a very competitive player.

As an attendee I would like to start out by saying thank you to Chandler and the entire crew. Then tournament was run smooth and mostly on schedule (mostly due to Chandler pulling the fire alarm at 6am to get everyone up), and aside from a few raised eyebrows the judges calls were fair to all players. All in all it was a great tournament and an exhausting weekend playing 10 games in 48 hour period three being from the Friday night qual.

I do want to point out for those that did not attend why there were so many Daemon players in the top bracket. The Invitational tournament was split by battle points day one to determine your bracket and win loss day two. Meaning in order to make it to top seed bracket you essentially had to table your opponent as there was a major difference in points between a minor win and a crushing victory. This obviously plays to Daemons strategy of crush and destroy quite well. High endurance infantry armies, which I was playing myself had a huge presence at this tournament and seemed to really excel at win lose. However, couldn't seem to match the amount of battle points produced out of sheer killy armies. Long story short if your going to play in a battle point style tournament and your all about winning over having fun then bring a army to table your opponent. Personally I had a blast playing what I did and am fine with winning a bracket ace over the entire thing and really can't wait for next years feast this event gets bigger and better each year.

On a side note I want to give a shout out to Frankie and all the guys over at Frontline Gaming. They saved me many sleepless nights by painting half my army in under two weeks before the tournament. They did a great job on matching colors and I would highly recommend them should you need work done fast.

Wall of text incoming...

Ghostcat wrote:Gratz on the win!

Reecius wrote:Oh, and a big congratz to the winner! Well played!

jy2 wrote:congrats to Whigwham for a job well done

Thank you all very much! Reecius and jy2, it's funny you both should comment as I owe you both a debt of gratitude. I've had extremely limited time to play 6th Edition, probably less than 25 games including my games at FoB, and your battle reports were both extremely helpful while I was preparing for the event. I don't think I would've been prepared for half of what I saw otherwise. So, a very sincere thanks to you both.

Ghostcat wrote:Whigwam, I'm curious did you play vs a cron air force? Did it give you, or other daemon players any trouble?

Reecius wrote:My question though, is how did these armies do against an Air Force list? I think that would be a very difficult match.

From what I observed, Cron Air didn't really show up to FoB. There were Flyers to be sure, but it seemed like most people were taking between 1-3, or none. Night Scythes, Heldrakes, Dakkajets, Vendettas, and Stormravens all had a presence. But full-on Flyer-spam was pretty much absent. In the Invitational, I saw only one player with massed Night Scythes, but I don't believe he was ranked very highly (guessing 6th or 7th bracket from the table he was playing at). Part of that can be attributed to the scenarios, as several missions used table quarters (controlled by most VPs, excluding Flyers--even if they were hovering), but I think it's also the case that Flyers have been over-hyped. At the beginning of 6th, so many people were -scared of 9 Scythes whizzing around the table, but I think it's proven to be a rather clumsy build. I play Necrons myself, and I've even played Flyer-heavy lists myself (that is..against myself, in preparation for this event) and from that perspective, I consider Daemons one of our most problematic matchups. Like jy2 said, Cron Air's limited ground presence is a liability, especially with Daemons alpha strike potential. I wouldn't expect to turn 1 table many players that way, especially more balanced Flyer builds with a stronger ground presence (say less Scythes, more Wraiths). But even if they survive the first turn, those Wraiths, Warriors, Barges, etc. will be hit hard before the Flyers arrive. And then I'm on their side of the table, crowding their Flyers potential landing spots, engaging their units, and making it extremely difficult effectively concentrate fire on any particular unit of mine. When I have scoring/denial units coming out my ears, and Necrons already meek damage output is gimped by a strong alpha strike, it doesn't matter a jot that I can't touch their Flyers. I can avoid them and counter whatever moves they pull, because Flyers are clumsy and Daemons are nimble (and when they're unable to be nimble, they're resilient). Cron Air was the matchup I probably prepared for the most, so it's funny that I didn't wind up facing it at all. I would've liked to though. My list was written to directly counter Necrons and I wish I'd had an opportunity to put that to the test (you know, besides beating up on myself).

That said, I think some Daemon builds will have issues with Necrons. FMC's are probably the biggest liability in that matchup, as Scythes can make quick work of even Fateweaver. Take more than two FMC's, and I think that matchup becomes extremely unfavorable for Daemons. Many people think the opposite, since FMC's are Daemons only serious chance at destroying Flyers, but I think that that's just playing the game Flyers want you to play. And they are better at it than we are. 333 points of Fateweaver is going to get schooled by 300 points of Night Scythes nearly every time. LoC's, Bloodthirsters, DP's are all outmatched as well. From my experience with Necrons, I've always regarded Monstrous Creatures with 3+ saves as Tesla bait. So my perspective is, if you want to beat Flyers, why give them something easy to kill? My army had 146 wounds total, all hard targets, and all the Tesla Destructors in the world can't wipe that away in 5 turns. Their ground presence might help, but it probably won't since I'll either be hiding from or ignoring the Flyers while working to wipe out everything else.

Ghostcat wrote:Actually, what list did you play against that caused you the most problems?

Tyranids, Daemons, and a Jetseer/DE army. Tyranids really caught me flatfooted with their newfound psychic abilities. I had a unit of Screamers Paroxysm'd, Enfeebled, Terrified, then assaulted by a unit of Gargoyles hitting on 3's, wounding on rerollable 4's. Absolutely brutal. At least the Changling scared my opponent out of shooting with them first. Tervigons were able to spawn plenty of Flamer-bait, throwing Gants into the Wall of Death to clear the way for Trygons or Flyrants. Screamers helped a lot to keep me in this matchup (one squad killing a Tervigon and Trygon one turn after another), but ultimately I was saved by the bell. We were engaged in combat from turn 2 onward (those Gargoyles I mentioned), and with hundreds of models on the table the game dragged on and on. We only completed 4 turns, and I was looking at 2 unscathed Flyrants, 2 Trygons, and a 10-wound Doom of Malantai when the game ended. It could've still gone either way, but I think my opponent had the advantage going into the next turn. I only won because the mission weighted kill points heaviest, and I'd racked up plenty killing Gants and other easy KPs.

My last game of both days were Daemons. Both builds similar to mine, one with a LoC and Fiends instead of Flamers, and Gareth's list which I posted above. These matchups were just surreal for the most part. A lot hung on who deployed first, preferred waves, and the luck of the scatter. In my first day matchup against Daemons (against Rich Johnson, at that point ranked 1st by a wide margin) we traded Screamers for Screamers, Flamers for Flamers, then had Screamers assaulting Flamers, Flamers assaulting Screamers, and tons of messy multi-assaults all over the board. For most of the game he had the upper hand, but we ended in a draw, both clinging onto some objectives while contesting others. My opponent made a huge mistake in forgetting to deploy a unit of Fiends. Fiends are devastating in the mirror match, so that alone likely saved my ass. We both wound up with 30/100 pts, which dragged my point total enough that I ended up seeding 8th. Very close call, and I have to say it leaves a sour taste in my mouth that an opponent's mistake contributed so much to keeping me in contention.

Eldar/DE was also tough for all of the reasons Reece already explained. Both excel in massed anti-infantry, and Doom/Guide combined with all the nasty Psychic powers 6th has introduced give Eldar all they need to manage Daemons. The Fortune/Shadowfield trick isn't too hard of a nut for Daemons to crack (with their ability to target a unit precisely where they want to), but the Jetseer council (with a Fortuned Baron Sathonyx) complicated things. Harlie-star is a lot more manageable for me, simply because it's slow and relatively avoidable. But the reach of the Jetseers was not as avoidable. I killed one of the unit's two Farseers (I thought it was the Fortuneseer...until my opponent informed me, no, that was the other one) and 4-5 Warlocks on my first turn, but after they started engaging my units, Hit and Running, bouncing from unit to unit, soaking wounds on Baron, I couldn't lay a finger on them. Luckily the same was true for them as the Jetseer unit's damage output is pretty mild. But they sure won't die. Probably the best denial unit in the game if you're willing to pay for it.

Firstborn wrote:These tournament results are dissapointing. It shows a trend in 40K that I think is really negative. I would speculate that most of the Daemon
players at Feast are "band wagon" players. Meaning they purchased a daemon army not because they love the models, but because it is
really good in the game. A Ben Franklin says 90% of them will sell their daemon armies after they are updated and the unit power structure changes.

I don't think this was the case at all. I had occasion to get a pretty close look at nearly every Daemon army at the invitational, and every one I saw was beautifully painted. I saw numerous classic models, brilliant conversions, and inventive counts-as. The Daemon player I faced on the first day had an army made entirely of lead--if you want a dedicated Daemon player, there he is. Another good example would be Kenny Boucher's Daemons. Take a look at the 4th and 5th photos here---I wish I could find more shots of his army because it's easily one of the best looking I've ever seen. I very much doubt you'll find them in your local used mini's bin when Daemons are inevitably brought back down to earth.

I started playing 5th with Daemons, just because I happened upon a picture of a Bloodcrusher and thought it was the coolest thing I'd ever seen. I own nearly 4000 points of Daemons now, mostly because I still think they're the coolest thing ever. And I think there are a lot of Daemons players like that, more than people realize. I played in many tournaments in 5th Edition, when Daemons were arguably very weak, and I was always surprised at the amount of Daemons players I encountered. They invariably had lovingly converted and painted armies and didn't care if they weren't the most competitive list on the block. They just liked Daemons. Now that Daemons are actually powerful, I don't think anyone can blame those same players for embracing it. Of course there will be some bandwagoners, but I think you're being overly suspicious--I didn't see any at FoB.

Firstborn wrote:
I would have to disagree with you Jy2. I would LOVE to play against green tide orks with my daemons, and the other lists really aren't as much of a threat as you suggest.
Coteaz striker spam doesn't have the fire power to stop it, even with the extra 12" warp quake gives you.

Daemons should be extremely nasty, and they were devastating in 5th despite what a lot of the Internet psycho babble would have you believe. What I don't like are all the bandwagon players jumping on the army because it has had
some success. It really turns me off from the recent tournaments, and I myself am a very competitive player.

Oh, I guarantee you that 180 shoota boyz backed with 45 lootas will definitely give daemons a good fight.

And 60 strikers all with psycannons and S5 stormbolters, when combined with Warp Quake, Coteaz's I've Been Expecting You and army-wide Prefered Enemy (not to mention 2-3 dreadknights w/heavy incinerators at 2K), is definitely a paper to the daemon's rock. This may arguably be the toughest build for daemons to play against.

And then there's the hybrid wraithwing/tesla crons that I run - 2 D-lords, 18 wraiths, 4x5 warriors in night scythes and 3 annihilation barges. Wraiths really don't care about screamers, teslas will be focused on flamers and then if I have to, split off the D-lord from the wraiths just before charging the flamers. D-lord eats the Overwatch because he will get back up on a 4+ thanks to his ResOrb so that wraiths can safely charge in. While I haven't played against a 27+27 flamer/screamer list, I have gone up against 2200pts of daemons (with 44 flamers, Fateweaver and a daemon flying circus) with my 2K of necrons.

The updated daemons are without a doubt a very strong, tier-1 tournament army now. However, 6E is all about matchups. Whether it be flamer/screamer daemons, Cronair, wraithwing crons, grey knight striker-spam, green tide orks, deathstar armies, MSU or whatever, every army IMO has a weakness that can be exploited by another. The trick is to be able to anticipate what will be predominant in the local meta. Already we are seeing a shift from flyer-heavy armies now to infantry-heavy armies as a form of anti-flyer-meta. And as another poster brought up before, this shift is a boon to the new daemons, who traditionally does well against infantry-heavy armies. Take advantage of that now, for in a few months, you will see another shift in the competitive meta.

Had a lot of good games and had a lot of fun.

I played one demon player and beat him (I played GK/Eldar) so I had the tools to do it. Demons are really new and just like all of the new power builds it takes a little while to learn how to deal with them. BrianPHX has a lot of practice playing against demons and practically tabled the guy who came in #2.

Acherin wrote:


I do want to point out for those that did not attend why there were so many Daemon players in the top bracket. The Invitational tournament was split by battle points day one to determine your bracket and win loss day two. Meaning in order to make it to top seed bracket you essentially had to table your opponent as there was a major difference in points between a minor win and a crushing victory. This obviously plays to Daemons strategy of crush and destroy quite well. High endurance infantry armies, which I was playing myself had a huge presence at this tournament and seemed to really excel at win lose. However, couldn't seem to match the amount of battle points produced out of sheer killy armies. Long story short if your going to play in a battle point style tournament and your all about winning over having fun then bring a army to table your opponent. Personally I had a blast playing what I did and am fine with winning a bracket ace over the entire thing and really can't wait for next years feast this event gets bigger and better each year.

This is 100% right. As seen above the guy that BrianPHX nearly tabled came in 2nd. The reason why was that the scoring system highly favored tabling. I knew guys who lost their first game jump ahead of me (with 2 wins) in battle points because they tabled their opponent in round #2.

Demons can table so they scored a ton of points while Necron flyers are not a tabling army so the demons never had to really deal with them.

I hereby decree this tournament be known by "Feast of Tzeentch"

Whigwam, thank you for answering my questions about your list and tournament win!

I'm going to have to learn how to get that army with Coteaz, some well placed stikers, and shedloads of fire power. I think it's a possiblie all comers list that may handle daemons.

I think the real question about the list is if the WD update Daemons retain eternal warrior. I think RAW is muddy but I don't think anyone is wrong for allowing it. RAI will be clear with a faq or the new dex. While everything this army does is nasty, it's really the 2 wounds, 5++, and EW that make this thing crazy durable. That durability makes it nearly impossible to wipe a squad of screamers/flamers off the table and what's left can usually still do crazy damage to a vehiclesor infantry.

No problem! I agree that Coteaz/Strikers will be a good counter for Daemons. Stormbolters (Psybolt or not), Psycannons, and Divination powers (especially Forewarning and Prescience) can put a hurting on Daemons. Then of course there's Warpquake, the cherry on top. DK's aren't all that they used to be against Daemons (as Dark Excommunication does almost nothing against Flamers/Screamers) but their Incinerators will still hurt a lot. Especially since they ignore Screamers' Jink save.

Army-wide Eternal Warrior is something that I think every Daemon player knows won't last. Fearless is also doubtful. My suspicion is that the new Daemon codex will include Flamers/Screamers with the same points/statlines they have now, except without EW, without Fearless, and maybe a LD reduction to boot. For now, the WD Daemons are benefit from the best of both worlds and are criminally undercosted as a result. We pay for it in part with overcosted troops, but the point efficiency of the WD units more than makes up for that.

Of course, powerful, undercosted units are all over the place in this game. Grey Hunters, Long Fangs, Vendettas, Psybolt Strikes, Coteaz/Henchmen, Night Scythes, Guard Blobs, etc., have been the backbone of many competitive lists for the same reason Flamers/Screamers have. They do too much for too little. People can cry OP, broken, undercosted all they like, but competitive 40k revolves around the OP, broken, and undercosted. As many have said, Daemons will probably only benefit from this for the next couple months, then we'll get a new Codex, new builds, and all of this will be a blip on the radar.

 Ghostcat wrote:
Whigwam, thank you for answering my questions about your list and tournament win!

I'm going to have to learn how to get that army with Coteaz, some well placed stikers, and shedloads of fire power. I think it's a possiblie all comers list that may handle daemons.

I think the real question about the list is if the WD update Daemons retain eternal warrior. I think RAW is muddy but I don't think anyone is wrong for allowing it. RAI will be clear with a faq or the new dex. While everything this army does is nasty, it's really the 2 wounds, 5++, and EW that make this thing crazy durable. That durability makes it nearly impossible to wipe a squad of screamers/flamers off the table and what's left can usually still do crazy damage to a vehiclesor infantry.

The best way to kill them is through torrent of fire.

Let's say you fire a unit of 10 strikers with 2 psycannons and psybolt ammo.

8 psycannon shots x 2/3 hit x 5/6 wound x 2/3 fail save + 16 stormbolters x 2/3 hit x 2/3 wound x 2/3 fail saves = ~8 wounds against flamers and screamers

But it will actually be more like 9-10W when you take into effect Prefered Enemy. Now imagine firing with 6 squads of those knights, 1 of which is re-rolling to hit thanks to Prescience from Coteaz.

If the knights go 1st, cast all psychic powers and wait. Flamers will drop a few knights with their shooting, but they also run the risk of scattering within Warp Quake/I've Been Expecting You range if they try to land within shooting range of the knights.

If knights are going 2nd, setup 1 unit (and perhaps the dreadknights) as a screening unit. You're just going to have to make that sacrifice but at least you've got I've Been Expecting You for some limited protection. Every flamer unit that wants to deepstrike aggressively will be taking a risk of getting shot as well.


The Coteaz-striker list goes something like this (at 2K) and is a legitimate Take-All-Comer's (TAC) list:

Coteaz
6x10 Strikers - 2x Psycannons, Psybolt Ammo (and if you have extra points, get a few hammers though not on the Justicar).
2x Dreadknight - Heavy Incinerator
1860

You have 140pts for whatever.


Of course, this is not taking into consideration skill. A skilled daemon player can still beat a grey knights striker list, though if both players are relatively equal in skill, IMO the knights would have the advantage in such a matchup.

Big props to the organizers and staff, I had a blast.

 whigwam wrote:
Wall of text incoming...


My last game of both days were Daemons. Both builds similar to mine, one with a LoC and Fiends instead of Flamers, and Gareth's list which I posted above. These matchups were just surreal for the most part. A lot hung on who deployed first, preferred waves, and the luck of the scatter. In my first day matchup against Daemons (against Rich Johnson, at that point ranked 1st by a wide margin) we traded Screamers for Screamers, Flamers for Flamers, then had Screamers assaulting Flamers, Flamers assaulting Screamers, and tons of messy multi-assaults all over the board. For most of the game he had the upper hand, but we ended in a draw, both clinging onto some objectives while contesting others. My opponent made a huge mistake in forgetting to deploy a unit of Fiends. Fiends are devastating in the mirror match, so that alone likely saved my ass. We both wound up with 30/100 pts, which dragged my point total enough that I ended up seeding 8th. Very close call, and I have to say it leaves a sour taste in my mouth that an opponent's mistake contributed so much to keeping me in contention.

My only defense for forgetting the fiends was that I was on game #7 in less than 24 hours. Combine that with having to sit in that tiny room with nobody else but a judge and my opponent for something like 8 hours and having to do the pre-game, post-game stuff it was a long day.

That's definitely understandable. I have no excuse for forgetting my Hammer of Wrath attacks in nearly every game of the day. Thanks for beating it into my head before my last game...I actually remembered to use them for all but 1 or 2 charges!

It was really nice meeting you, Rich. Definitely one of my most enjoyable opponents, even if playing the mirror match is as awkward as kissing cousins. I hope we cross paths again some day, but I could probably do without a rematch.

Ugh don't remind me, remembering HoW is like a perpetual curse. Mostly it's my opponent who goes "don't you get HoW?"

 jy2 wrote:


The Coteaz-striker list goes something like this (at 2K) and is a legitimate Take-All-Comer's (TAC) list:

Coteaz
6x10 Strikers - 2x Psycannons, Psybolt Ammo (and if you have extra points, get a few hammers though not on the Justicar).
2x Dreadknight - Heavy Incinerator
1860

You have 140pts for whatever.

Again, boots on the ground. Warpquake only puts off flamers for a turn, screamers will hurt your strikes without transports. Once you do not kill all of the flamers, your PAGK are expensive toast.

Don't forget interceptors too, if you want to go this route.

Warpquake is essential to GK beating this list, but it's about combat squadding smaller numbers of strikes/ceptors, positioning them well, and using coteaz's troops unlock for more cheap scoring bodies. Henchmen and GK die the exact same to flamers and screamers, but one is a hell of a lot cheaper to field.

I understand the idea, but warpquake spam will not beat that daemon list outside of a horrible string of luck with deep strike mishaps and i've been expecting you. I woudln't hold my breath for that in a tournament though.

Also, this should be about the event, so I'm going to pull out of this thread and stop disscussing anti-Tzeentch daemon list tactics.

It's just very telling between NOVA and this that the daemons are the new beatstick.

I heard that there was a Necron Airforce with 10 flyers. How did he manage that? Don't you have to have half your stuff on the board?

Sounds like a fun event. Sorry I didn't make but another flight this year would make my wife want to strangle me.

@Ghostcat

I disagree. A solid strike list with sufficient psychic support and DK's would make this army cry. It would probably be a fight if the daemon player went first and got his preferred wave but outside of that it's an uphill battle. I say this as someone who plays both all foot Strike GK and Daemons.

Though in an environment where all units weren't scoring I'd be unlikely to run into a deamon at the top tables outside of someone like Yermom from Nova who's a dirty genius with his daemons and has been for years.

Even without going first, GK can still move and still shoot the heck out of demons. With divination powers they can concentrate fire and still keep out of range of some of the demon units, even though the killy units are super fast. All you have to do is move so you are 18" away from some of the demons while shooting the other units that are closer. 18" is the safe zone because flamers are a lot less of a threat at that range, or be in terrain for screamers and they will have trouble assaulting you.

 Blackmoor wrote:
Even without going first, GK can still move and still shoot the heck out of demons. With divination powers they can concentrat fire and still keep out of range of some of the demon units, even though the killy units are super fast. All you have to do is just stay 18" away from flamers for example for them to be less of a threat.,

Basically all you're saying is they're both good armies and what it basically comes down to is generalship.

 Ghostcat wrote:

 jy2 wrote:


The Coteaz-striker list goes something like this (at 2K) and is a legitimate Take-All-Comer's (TAC) list:

Coteaz
6x10 Strikers - 2x Psycannons, Psybolt Ammo (and if you have extra points, get a few hammers though not on the Justicar).
2x Dreadknight - Heavy Incinerator
1860

You have 140pts for whatever.

Again, boots on the ground. Warpquake only puts off flamers for a turn, screamers will hurt your strikes without transports. Once you do not kill all of the flamers, your PAGK are expensive toast.

Don't forget interceptors too, if you want to go this route.

Warpquake is essential to GK beating this list, but it's about combat squadding smaller numbers of strikes/ceptors, positioning them well, and using coteaz's troops unlock for more cheap scoring bodies. Henchmen and GK die the exact same to flamers and screamers, but one is a hell of a lot cheaper to field.

I understand the idea, but warpquake spam will not beat that daemon list outside of a horrible string of luck with deep strike mishaps and i've been expecting you. I woudln't hold my breath for that in a tournament though.

Also, this should be about the event, so I'm going to pull out of this thread and stop disscussing anti-Tzeentch daemon list tactics.

It's just very telling between NOVA and this that the daemons are the new beatstick.

And 1 turn is all you need to deliver a crippling turn of shooting by the GK's. Daemons can still play through it, especially if there is a lot of LOS-blocking terrain, however it will still be an uphill battle for them if they have to eat even 1 turn of shooting from the GK's.

I used to run a 30-interceptor GK list but that is a 1-trick pony list. It is severely lacking in scoring bodies and just does not have the resiliency to last against many of the other armies out there. Now if you are bringing it specifically to battle daemons, then it is nasty against them (especially if you can get 1st turn). However, it just isn't as good a TAC (Take-All-Comer's) list as a Coteaz-striker list and you will have more problems against the other good non-daemon tournament builds.

Screamers can be mitigated somewhat by taking a Aegis Defense Line, which is actually a good investment in an all-foot TAC GK list. Make them charge through cover and you at least having a fighting chance against them should they get the charge off. No matter what though, you need to set up a sacrificial screening unit (or 2) just to eat those charges and/or take the flamer shooting. The more turns you can delay their offense, the more turns you have to shoot them down, the better your chances are (as a GK player).

And as we see more daemons in tournament play, I think we will also see more anti-daemon builds in the future. I do see a shift by some GK players into a more striker-based GK build. Not only is this build effective against daemons, but IMO they can hold their own against the crons and is a great TAC army to boot.

Hulksmash wrote:Though in an environment where all units weren't scoring I'd be unlikely to run into a deamon at the top tables outside of someone like Yermom from Nova who's a dirty genius with his daemons and has been for years.

Much has been made of Flamers/Screamers being scoring (when, actually, they weren't). Their VP's only counted toward controlling table quarters (and Troops counted a lot more toward controlling quarters as they were always treated as being full strength). I think the list the format favored most would be something like Tony Kopach's troop-heavy SW/IG from Nova, or something like the 5x10 GKSS + 3 DK list you've played. Not an army with troops as weak as Daemons. In the end, I don't think scenarios had a whole lot to do with Daemons' success. For my part, I can't think of any matchups I won on table quarters. I won most on KPs and objectives (which only Troops could control), and if table quarters were a condition they were usually just gravy on top. The Screamers/Flamers shined as beatsticks and denial units, not in taking table quarters, and that's just as true in BRB scenarios as it is for the Feast scenarios.

If SW had won, I suspect we'd be hearing a lot about scoring Long Fangs, Rune Priests, and Razorbacks. If Nids had won, it would be scoring Flyrants, Trygons, and Gargoyles. But that's all obfuscating the matter. What table quarters did was arbitrarily nerf Flyers, and I would argue that benefits Daemons less than most armies. As plenty of people have observed, gunlines are Daemons strongest counter, and the format definitely favored gunlines.

@Whigwam

Thanks very much for the lengthy reply, that was very informative.

And I am very glad you got some good info from our bat reps! That is why we do them, so I am glad they help.

We play against Daemons a lot here, so we are more comfortable with them than most people are, but those Flamers and Screamers are pretty bananas for the points.

I think you guys made excellent points though, about Battle Points being a big part of it. That is why we tend to lean away from BP missions as it so heavily favors certain types of lists. In straight W/L or W/L/D, you can make an army that wins by small margins and still win the entire event, which to me is more enjoyable, but that is just me. There is a good argument for both styles of tournament.

Man, I wish we could have come. Frankie has his ticket and his flight paid for, but he had some last minute family stuff come up and had to bail. I just flat out couldn't afford to go this year, but we will certainly make the trip next year.

Glad everyone had so much fun!

@Acherin

Glad you had fun! Getting all 70+ infantry painted in essentially 8 days was crazy! But we got it done and we're really glad that you had a good time with them!

Honestly, I'm surprised that nobody has been talking about the terrain in regards to the proliferation of daemons at Feast of Blades. EVERY table had 3-4 pieces of huge LOS blocking terrain enabling entire squads of daemons to remain completely hidden. In several of my games I lost the roll for table halves and was stuck with zero workable firing lanes. I ended up doing fairly well, finishing somewhere in the twenties, so I'm not here to complain and make excuses.. just making some observations.

Daemons are extremely efficient killers, don't get me wrong. And I'm not trying to take anything away from Whig, who has been a close friend for some 18 years. When your entire army counts for table quarters, kill point missions are ridiculously over-represented [daemons have a tiny 12 kill points, all of which are tough to take out], tabling being a necessity due to battlepoints, and the ability to hide entire squads of close-quarters-oriented units due to poor firing lanes.. it was simply a perfect storm for Daemon armies at FoB.

Michigan, represent!

Big thanks to the staff of FoB for an amazingly well run and fun event. Hopefully everyone made it home safely. See ya there next year!

 hippesthippo wrote:
Honestly, I'm surprised that nobody has been talking about the terrain in regards to the proliferation of daemons at Feast of Blades. EVERY table had 3-4 pieces of huge LOS blocking terrain enabling entire squads of daemons to remain completely hidden. In several of my games I lost the roll for table halves and was stuck with zero workable firing lanes. I ended up doing fairly well, finishing somewhere in the twenties, so I'm not here to complain and make excuses.. just making some observations.

Daemons are extremely efficient killers, don't get me wrong. And I'm not trying to take anything away from Whig, who has been a close friend for some 18 years. When your entire army counts for table quarters, kill point missions are ridiculously over-represented [daemons have a tiny 12 kill points, all of which are tough to take out], tabling being a necessity due to battlepoints, and the ability to hide entire squads of close-quarters-oriented units due to poor firing lanes.. it was simply a perfect storm for Daemon armies at FoB.

Michigan, represent!

Big thanks to the staff of FoB for an amazingly well run and fun event. Hopefully everyone made it home safely. See ya there next year!

Granted I played on the same table most of the tournament but I didn't see this. About the only thing I could consistently hide would be some small 5 man plaguebearer squads. The landing pad-esq thing was more central and off to the side and could be shot from across the table but not directly in front, although since it had pylons on the bottom it wasn't too hard to draw line of site through it. The bunker thing was also in the middle but off to the other side and those two main pieces were offset. The 2 high hills were towards the deployment zones. I didn't feel like I could just hide my stuff from my opponents.

I kept trying to hide behind those pylons, but my opponents kept moving a couple inches to the side and spotting me anyway. I did wind up using the bunker terrain piece to hide some Flamers in my game against Tau/Eldar (lest they get eaten alive by Firewarriors at 30"), but otherwise I wasn't able to hide a whole lot. "Hiding" mostly meant simply staying out of range. I personally think LoS-blocking terrain should be standard, and I've been consistently disappointed by tournaments where the terrain's so sparse I feel like I'm playing on a bare kitchen table. That's half of the reason I brought an ADL.

I played several games where the solid bunker was in the center, depending on deployment type, with multiple large two-tiered hills just off-center.

The problem with the terrain was that it was not difficult terrain other than the landing pad, so demons were never at a disavantage of striking last.

Blackmoor wrote:The problem with the terrain was that it was not difficult terrain other than the landing pad, so demons were never at a disavantage of striking last.

Funny you should mention that. I wound up playing the hills/bunker as difficult in every game on the first day. It was only when my Tyranid opponent corrected me day 2 that I realized we were doing it wrong. That would've helped though!

And there was a DT test required to get on top of the bunker (which was the only way, really, to set up on it). As for the hills, per the BRB, hills are "normally treated as open terrain," so I don't see playing them as open terrain as a problem.

Yeah, I never understood why so many people play hills as area terrain. They weren't difficult in 5th, either. They have always been open terrain. And besides, from a logical point of view, hahaha, standing on top of a hill certainly doesn't make you harder to shoot!