Been Around the Block
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Throne Of Skulls UK - January 2013 - 1500pts of Daemons (long)
I attended the Throne of Skulls over the weekend at Warhammer World, my first ever proper tournament. For those unfamiliar with the format, it's five games over two days. All games are randomly chosen - no "top tables". Three points for a win, one for a draw and nothing for a loss. After the five games are over, everyone votes for their favourite game. 0-1 favourite game votes gets you one additional point, two votes gets you three additional points and 3+ votes gets you five additional points. Finally the average score for your codex (primary detachment) is subtracted from your score to give you your overall score. There were awards for best overall score and best score for each codex.
I'm afraid I didn't take any photos or make notes, so this is all from memory.
I brought my Tzeentch Daemons and here's my army list:
Fateweaver
7 Flamers
7 Flamers
9 Pink Horrors with Changeling
5 Pink Horrors with Bolt of Tzeentch
5 Pink Horrors with Bolt of Tzeentch
5 Pink Horrors with Bolt of Tzeentch
8 Screamers
8 Screamers
Not all-out Flamer & Screamer spam, but there are certainly enough of them in there to be competitive. I've been playing mostly Tzeentch Daemons for ages and except for eight screamers, all are metal models, so not just another band-wagon list.
I got there fairly early on Friday evening so was able to get in a practice game in against a Salamanders list with lots a melta and flamers. Vulcan, five Terminators, a Land Raider, two Rhinos, two AC/HB Predators and plenty of marines. Deployment was Dawn of War and mission was The Relic. I got the first turn and my favoured half with Fateweaver, both Screamer units and the three smaller Pink Horror units. A bolt of Tzeentch took out a Rhino giving me first blood and my list worked like a well oiled machine after that. I ended up tabling my opponent on turn four when I turned Vulkan, his last surviving model into a Chaos Spawn. A good confidence booster for the weekend.
Game 1: Imperial Guard
My first opponent on Saturday morning didn't turn up (really bad weather over the whole weekend), so I was matched up with Oliver, a really friendly Imperial Guard player who also didn't have an opponent.
His army had two Vendettas, a Demolisher, an Executioner, a Command Squad with an Astropath and the rest of the points spent on three foot platoons (105 guardsmen). Deployment was Hammer and Anvil and the mission was The Emperor's Will.
I went first, but got the wrong half, getting two Flamer units and the three small Pink Horror units. I put one Horror unit on my objective, and the other two mid-field, just within Warpfire range of his troops. I put both Flamer units behind his lines. One deviated away out of template range, the other deviated a little, but still close enough to just get his Command Squad. Flame templates and Warpfire took out everyone except his Commander who failed his morale check and ran off the table, giving me First Blood and Slay the Warlord! Warpfire from the Horrors and other Flamer unit killed ~10 random guardsmen from various units. The return fire on his first turn took out both Flamer units. I was up two victory points, but had lost 322 points of Flamers for ~130 points of guardsmen.
Everything else arrived during turns 2-3 and slashing attacks from my Screamers and Warpfire from my Pink Horrors started taking out guardsmen. During his turn 2 both Vendettas arrived, one of them picking up a unit of guardsmen. My Screamers started munching on his tanks taking out the Demolisher on turn three and the Executioner of turn four with Fateweaver’s bubble of protection keeping their attrition rate to reasonable levels. At the end of turn four the Vendetta holding the guardsmen dropped them off ~5 inches from my objective and combined shooting from both Vendettas and these guardsmen killed the Horrors holding it. However by this time there were just a handful of guardsmen left on his table side and I had four Horrors on his objective.
In my turn five, I turbo-boosted my Screamers and put them between my objective and his troops. During turn six I charged in the Screamers and killed them. The game ended after turn six. I had one objective, First Blood and Slay the Warlord, we both had Linebreaker, so 6-1 to me. I had ~10 Horrors, 6-7 Screamers and Fateweaver left. He had one lone guardsman and both Vendettas left.
Great game and very tense during the first three turns. Fateweaver meant he couldn't do to my Screamers what he did to my Flamers in turn one, which probably won me the game. However, apart from his Command Squad nearly all the kills came from my Pink Horrors and Screamers, with Fateweaver being fairly ineffectual as far as actual shooting was concerned.
Game 2: Dark Eldar
Next up was Martin with his Dark Eldar army.
Now Dark Eldar is an army I hardly ever get to play against, so this one was a bit of a struggle for me. He had Duke Sliscus and some troops in a Raider, some Wyches in another Raider, some Reavers, a Beastmaster and some Razorwings, a Venom, a Ravager, a Voidraven (with four missiles), an Aegis with a Quad-gun and some more troops to man it. Deployment was Dawn of War and mission was Purge the Alien. I had a slight advantage since he had 12 kill points against my 9. But then he got the warlord trait that gave me -1 to my reserves.
He got first turn and spread his units out. I got the wong half again, so ended up with both Flamers units, a small Horror unit and the big Horror unit. One unit of Flamers took out the Quad-gun and the unit manning it, Warpfire from the other Flamers and the big Horror unit took out the Razorwings (but not the Beastmaster) and about half the Reavers. I played fairly defensively after that and didn't get Fateweaver in until turn four, but managed to kill slightly more than he did each turn. The game finished on turn six and I had managed to score 8 kill points against his 5, I had First Blood and Slay the Warlord and we both had Linebreaker, so I won 11-6.
A very tough game and every kill point was hard-fought over. Playing defensively with Daemons isn't something I normally do, but I had very little choice here, but I guess it paid off in the end. The game could probably have gone either way until turn five.
Game 3: Space Marines
The final game of the day was against Toby with his Halo themed Space Marine army. This was mostly Dark Vengeance models but with ots of green stuff, making them virtually unrecognisable as marines. Very cool, but probably more so if I had actually played Halo just a PS3 for me, no XBox). He had a Captain, a Chaplain, a Venerable Dreadnought with a Plasma Cannon in a Drop Pod, two Attack Bikes, two Thunderfire Cannons, two or three Tactical Squads, some Devastators, a Stormtalon and an Aegis with Quad-Canon. I can't really remember the upgrades. Deployment was Vanguard Strike and the mission was Crusade with five objectives. I got the warlord trait that allowed me to re-roll my reserves. He castled up in a corner behind and around his Aegis line.
I went first and again got the wrong half. This time I ended up with one Flamer unit, one Screamer unit and the three small Horror units. The Flamers landed and took out the Quad-Cannon and the squad (think it was some Devastators) manning it. The Screamer's slashing attacks and Warpfire from the Horrors killed one Attack Bike and 1-2 marines. On his turn one, shooting took out all but two of the Flamers and a couple of Pink Horrors. He charged one of the Pink Horror squads with the Attack Bike and the other with five Tactical Marines with very little damage either way. Then he charged a full Tactical Squad with his Captain and Chaplain into my Screamers, doing very little to the Screamers, but loosing most of his Marines.
My turn two and I got everything else (didn't even need the re-rolls), but lost the second Flamer unit to a deep strike mishap. After that my units just moved around eating Space Marines. The Surviving Flamers killed one Thunderfire Cannon on turn two and the other on turn three. My Screamers finished off the Captain & Chaplain on turn two and then just bounced around the board eating Space Marines and the Dreadnought with relative impunity. By his turn three, all he left was the Stormtalon and since he hadn't killed a single unit by then, put it into Hover mode to kill off the last of my Flamers. One my turn four, my Screamers blew it up, winning me the game.
This was probably the only game where I felt bad for bringing Tzeentch Daemons. My opponent kept going on about how broken Flamers & Screamers were (very true), but if I'd brought Fiends and Bloodcrushers instead, the result would have been the same, he would probably have just lasted a turn longer. Even fairly average Daemon lists without Flamers & Screamers can beat Space Marines in 90% of the their games if played properly. His deployment also didn't really help. Castling up against Daemons is not the way to go. And it's almost always better to rapid-fire Screamers rather than trying to charge them. Even though he was a decent chap, it was fairly obvious he didn't enjoy our game, which was a shame.
Game 4: Necrons
Sunday morning started with Mark's Necron army. I find Necrons, even without Flyer spam to be a tough matchup. Thankfully Mark hadn't brought Flyer spam. Lots of nasty stuff on both sides, but thankfully everything fairly evenly balanced. Before the game started I predicted that one of us would get tabled, but in the process, the other player would loose nearly their entire army. I had no idea which way the game would go, but carnage was pretty much guaranteed.
His army had a unit of Immortals, two large units of Warriors, one with a Cryptek (think it just had the Abyssal Staff), three Wraiths, three Scarab bases, a Doom Scythe, a Triarch Stalker, two Annihilation Barges and an Overlord with Warscythe and Mindshackle Scarabs (initially deployed with his Immortals). Deployment was Hammer and Anvil and the mission was The Scouring. This time I got the -1 to his reserve rolls, though the only thing he had in reserve was his Doom Scythe.
I went first and for the fourth time in four games, got the wrong half in, getting both Flamer units and the three small Horror units. One flamer landed next to his Immortals and killed most of them. Warpfire from the other Flamer unit killed the rest, giving me First Blood, but did nothing to the Overlord attached to them. One unit of Horrors deployed well back in my deployment zone, capturing an objective and doing nothing else for the rest of the game. The other two landed just within their 18" range and killed four warriors. Return shooting from the Necrons killed one whole Flamer unit and killed 3-4 Flamers from the other. The Wraiths tried to charge the surviving Flamers but lost a model to overwatch and failed to reach combat. The Scarabs charged and killed a Pink Horror unit, killing two of them and loosing a couple of wounds in return. His Overlord joined the Warrior unit containing the Cryptek.
I got both units of Screamers in on turn two. Slashing attacks from one unit finished off the Wraiths. The surviving Flamers and slashing attacks from the other Screamer unit killed the Overlord and his whole unit of Warriors except one model. However the Overlord and ~75% of the Warriors came back (but not the Cryptek). My Horrors killed a few more Warriors from the other unit. During his turn two, shooting killed off the remaining Flamers, six Screamers from one unit and arcing damage killed the last three Horrors fighting the Scarabs. The Scarabs then charged the two Screamers, loosing a couple more wounds, but doing no damage to the Screamers.
My turn three, I multi-charged the Warrriors with the Overlord, the Triarch Stalker and one of the Annihilation Barges with the full unit of Screamers. I got rid of the Quantum shielding on the Triarch Stalker, took out the Annihilation Barge and killed a few Warriors, but lost 2-3 Screamers. I also killed 1-2 more Warriors from the other Warrior unit. His turn three, I lost a couple of Horrors to shooting. The unit with two Screamers killed off the Scarabs. The other unit of Screamers finished off the Triarch Stalker and killed a few more Warriors, but lost another 2-3 Screamers in return - just the Overlord and 5-6 Warriors left now.
My turn four, Fateweaver and the large unit of Horrors finally arrived. Shooting from the Horrors killed a few more Warriors and Fateweaver didn't do anything useful. The unit of two Screamers that had just finished off the Scarabs joined the other Screamers, killing some more Warriors (think there was just the Overlord & 2-3 Warriors left at this point), but the original Screamers that started the melee finally died. His turn four and his Doom Scythe finally arrived. I lost 4-5 Horrors from the big unit & a few from the smaller units to shooting, but finally won the Combat with the Overlord, finishing off all the Warriors and causing the Overlord to run.
My turn five, the two surviving Screamers charged and destroyed the other Annihilation barge that had been knocking off my Pink Horrors. Fateweaver took out the Doom Scythe with his Bolt of Tzeentch and shooting killed all but two of the final unit of Warriors. His turn five and his Overlord ran off the table.
Finally on turn six, shooting from Fateweaver killed one Warrior and turned the last one and his last model on the table into a Chaos Spawn, winning me the game. By the end of the game I had ~7 Horrors left spread over three objectives, the two surviving Screamers on a fourth objective, plus Fateweaver still left alive. As predicted, absolute carnage.
Definitely the most challenging and enjoyable game of the weekend. Until the the combat with the Overlord ended at the bottom of turn four, the game could have gone either way.
Game 5: Space Wolves with Imperial Guard Allies
The last game of the event was Tom with his Space Wolves and Imperial Guard.
His army consisted of two Rune Priests, 2-3 Long Fangs and 2-3 Grey Hunter Packs (can't remember the exact split, but there were lots of missiles in there) and several Lone Wolves in Terminator Armour. The Imperial Guard detachment had a Vendetta with Heavy Bolter sponsoons, a Manticore, a Primaris Psyker and a Veteran Squad. Deployment was Dawn of War and the mission was Big Guns Never Tire with three objectives. He went first and deployed with maximum model spacing spread over the whole table width. Deployment took ages as he measured to make sure everything had 2" spacing, but very sensible given my Flamers. His Manticore was sat right on top of an objective, hidden behind a large building. His vet squad was also used to provide a fairly thin layer of bubble wrap around it.
He went first and on his first turn, his Grey Hunters moved forwards, but otherwise not much happened. One my first turn I got the wrong half again! I got both units of Flamers down on one flank roasting a all the models from a Grey Hunter Pack except the Lone Wolf and Rune Priest Warlord. Two of the small Pink Horror units came down near two objectives and ran towards them. The third small unit came down in the middle to lure him forwards and to take some heat off my Flamers. They managed to kill 1-2 Grey Hunters.
One his turn two, he killed 2-3 Horrors and 2-3 Flamers with shooting. Spreading everything out meant I couldn't do too much damage on the drop, but it meant lots of his models were out of range. On my turn two I got both Screamer units, but lost one to a deep strike mishap. The Flamers roasted a couple of Long Fang units, some more Grey Hunters and his Rune Priest Warlord. The Pink Horrors and slashing attacks from the Screamers killed some more Grey Hunters. When the dust has settled, I'd managed to clear about two thirds of his deployment zone, except for one last Long Fang and a Lone Wolf. The other side still had around a third of his Grey Hunters, one Long Fang Pack, the Manticore, Astropath and Veterans in it.
On his turn three, the Vendetta came in an killed a couple of Pink Horrors holding an objective. His lone Long Fang charged the undamaged unit of Flamers, eating overwatch death, but was then followed up by the Lone Wolf. This combat went on until the start of turn five when I finally managed to kill the Lone Wolf off for the loss of 1-2 Flamers. The second unit of Flamers were right on the board edge and had a long journey to get anywhere useful. On my turn three I got the large unit of Horrors and Fateweaver in. Shooting from the large Horror unit opened up a hole in the Veteran Squad that my Screamers could charge through, which they did, multi-assaulting the Mantcore and Veterans. The Manticore exploded and the Veterans all died. Shooting from some other Horrors and Fateweaver killed some more Space Wolves, the other Rune Priest and the Primeris Psyker. The unengaged Flamers moved towards the action.
On his turn four, his Vendetta managed to finish off a unit of Horrors on one of my objectives. Other shooting managed to kill 1-2 Horrors from the recently dropped large unit. On my turn four I decided that the unengaged Flamers weren't going to be able to get anywhere useful before the game ended so charged in to help kill off the Lone Wolf engaged with the other unit of Flamers. Fateweaver, Screamers and Horrors killed everything else apart form a Lone Wolf and 2-3 Grey Hunters.
On his turn five, my Flamers finally managed to kill off their Lone Wolf. The Vendetta failed to take down Fateweaver and his last few Space Wolves failed their assault on some Pink Horrors holding an objective. On my turn five, I killed off the rest of the Space Wolves and then the game ended. I had two objectives, First Blood, Slay the Warlord, Linebreaker and a kill point from his Manticore. He just had the Vendetta left on his side of the table, so 10-0 to me.
Just for laughs and because we had the time, we did play on, but there were no more kills in turns six and seven - I couldn't down the Vendetta and he could kill Fateweaver.
This was a really fun game against a great opponent. We were both fairly tired from two intensive days of gaming, so from turn two onwards it was played mostly for laughs.
Even with his deployment, the result was pretty much a foregone conclusion. Spreading everything out just meant it took longer to kill stuff and saved him from being tabled.
Conclusions
Some really great games. The Necron and Dark Eldar games were very challenging. The first Imperial Guard game was also quite tough for the first three or so turns. The Space Marine & Space Wolves games weren't too challenging - those are the sort of armies I've always done well against, even in Fifth Edition.
Every single game had me getting the wrong half, which meant Fateweaver wasn't much use with his bubble of protection. My strategy was to get Fateweaver and the Screamers down the first turn. Hopefully do some opportunistic slashing attacks and then get everything into Fateweaver's protection. Instead I got my Flamers. They came down, got first blood and were (usually) shot off the table the next turn. Perhaps this was a good thing though - the following uphill struggle made the games more challenging for me and more fun for my opponent.
Also only half-spamming Flamers and Screamers and making up the missing points with more Horrors made the games more challenging and fun. Pink Horrors are expensive for what they are, but they weren't the points sink some people think they are. 24 of them can give out up to 72 shots a turn, which can be pretty nasty, even at BS3. Given my Flamers didn't last too long, the Horrors probably ended up with more kills than the Flamers by the end of the tournament.
Flyers weren't really a problem. Most people had 1-2 of them, which was manageable. I did see a handful of armies with ~4 of them, but luckily I didn't get play against them. Just as well, because as my only source of Skyfire, Fateweaver wasn't a very effective flyer counter. Out of the six flyers I came across, Fateweaver was only able to shoot down one of them (the Doom Scythe). I didn’t play against any Helldrakes, but there were around 20 Chaos Space Marine armies and most had two of them.
The only really bad thing that happened over the weekend, was during the last game when someone stole a Screamer model. It hadn't been dropped on the floor or into my or my opponents bags, we checked, so the only explanation was that someone watching the game lifted it.
So five games, five wins. I also managed to get two best game votes. One was from the final Space Wolf player, not sure about the other, but probably from the Necron player since he seemed the most enthusiastic about how our game had gone. This gave me 18 points. Out of around 100 players there were two others who scored 18 points, so from just the raw scores, I was joint first. However there were five Daemon players in the tournament, with an average score of 13, so my overall score was reduced down to 5 and I was then a long way off getting the best player award. However I did win best Daemon player - one other Daemon player had five wins, but he only had 0-1 best game votes, so only scored 3 points.
Out of interest here are the player counts and average scores for each codex:
A few surprises. I would have predicted that Necrons would have done better, probably getting the number two spot after Daemons. And what are Tau doing up there in fourth place? Also with the net complaints of how "average" the new Chaos Space Marine codex is, they managed to do very well. Though most people playing them did have two Helldrakes and they've been much improved with the latest FAW changes.
Thanks for reading, and again, apologies for the lack of pictures.
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Also, nice battles reports.
World Eater's 3rd Company-1650 pts 
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.....LVO GT 2014 Team Tournament - Best Generals
