[DCM]
Tilter at Windmills
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This weekend I played in a 24 person 1750pt 40k tournament at Templecon in Providence, RI.
It was three rounds using 2004 GT missions, and with painting and sportsmanship counted by the old RT standards, but no comp! Special characters welcome. It was run by Manny Almeida, a great guy and a GT veteran, going back to before I started attending. He was my first pickup game Friday night at my first GT back in 2001. With Manny in charge, I knew things would run smoothly and it would be a good time, and had no qualms about driving two hours down from New Hampshire to attend*. Also attending the tournament were two of my buddies in the Cold Steel Mercenaries tournament team, Alex Fennell and Chris Flores, bringing Necrons and Space Wolves.
Templecon this year was held at the lovely historic Biltmore hotel, downtown. Specifically on the 17th and 18th floors! Which meant we had amazing views through the floor to ceiling windows. Very nice. Parking was a bit of a challenge, but we were within walking distance of basically everything downtown.
Due to a miscommunication of some kind, when Manny arrived that morning the con folks had only five tables set up instead of ten. He had to push a bunch of regular tables together to make more tables (several of which didn't have any covering/gaming surfaces over them), and we had to scrounge up terrain, some from con organizers who apparently had more, and some from the Warmachine guys. There wound up being 12 tables, with sizes varying from 4x6 to 4x8 to 6x5 (and maybe one or two other sizes) depending on what size tables were pushed together. This was the only downside of the event, because it led to some less than attractive tables. The sizes were actually not a problem, because they gave an added tactical dimension. Thankfully enough terrain was located to make the games fun to play. If I can ask anything of the Templecon guys for next year it’s just to make sure there are enough tabletops and designated terrain to have everything set up in the morning and as attractive as the stuff the WM players had.
There was a good group of enthusiastic players, with lots of folks showing up to sign up that day, so we had more than the expected 20. Manny did a great job improvising and was able to squeeze in two more tables, allowing 24 to play. There were some very nice armies, including a really nice Dark Angels force, a great Guard army led by an Inquisitorial contingent, and Alex’s crazy pink Strawberry Shortcake themed Necrons. Until you’ve fought a pink Nightbringer, you haven’t lived. Most of the armies did seem like pretty strong builds, but not necessarily the full-on nastiness you’d see at the UKGT or Adepticon.
I fielded my Dark/Fallen Angels, as Fallen this time. My list was:
Prince w/wings, warp time
5 Chosen with las/plas
5 Chosen with las/plas
10 CSM w/Icon of Glory, Las, Flamer, Champ w/Fist, in Rhino
10 CSM w/Icon of Glory, ML, Melta, Champ w/Fist, in Rhino
5 Lesser Daemons
5 Lesser Daemons
8 Raptors with 2 Meltas, Champ w/Fist
8 Havocs w/Icon of Glory, 4 ML
Pred w/Twin Las and Las Sponsons
1 Oblit
1750 even.
Round 1:
My first game was against Ray, a veteran Night Lords player with a fairly similar list to mine, except no vehicles and little long-ranged punch. He had a flying Tzeentch Prince w/Warp Time, a flying sorcerer with Lash, 8 Chosen w/Icon of Slaanesh, 2 Plasmaguns & Champ w/Fist, 8 Chosen w/Icon of Khorne, 2 Meltaguns & Champ w/Lightning Claws, 10 CSM w/Icon of Glory, 2 Plasmaguns & Champ w/Fist, 10 CSM w/Icon of Glory, 2 Plasmaguns & Champ w/Fist, 8 Raptors with 2 Meltas, Icon of Khorne & Champ w/Fist, and three single Obliterators, which he Deep Striked (sp).
We played Cleanse II on a 6x5 table with decent terrain. Manny ruled that per the mission any mobile vehicle could hold a quadrant. I deployed well back and spread out to maximize my range advantage and the risk to his sorcerer if he wanted to use the Lash, and to force him to make hard choices about where to put his footslogging units. It was corner deployments, and to my left the table was more open, and to the right it was heavier, with a couple of good-sized pieces of area terrain. Ray elected to pretty much refuse the left, only leaving one 10 man squad over there, while his prince and chosen units both pushed the side behind the area terrain. I countered with my pred, raptors, and prince, who did some decent damage before dying, as well as one squad of lesser daemons, who stalled an assault and helped finish off the Khornate chosen. My stuff on that flank died, but (in combination with some supporting fire from my havocs and shooty squads) crippled his advance. I won the game by sneaking a Rhino around the left flank into his home quadrant. Only a 16pt win because my general died and Ray blew the combi-bolter off the Rhino in his DZ. We had some fun dice, with it taking about four-five turns for me to kill all three oblits, and him repeatedly rolling ones when said oblits tried to paste one of my big 10 man squads with plasmacannons. Overall a very good game, with him making a tactical error to weight too much to one flank in a quadrant misson. He still could have tied it in the last turn if he managed to kill that Rhino. He still had both his ten man squads over half, and the Slaaneshi chosen over half. I had pretty much just lost the stuff I mentioned on the right flank.
After round one I went out for lunch with friends. The hotel had a nice restaurant, and there was a lot of other stuff nearby, but we went for the quickest and closest option. Right across the street from the hotel entrance was a skating rink in a park, and it had a subway and a hot dog/pizza shop serving it. I was able to point it out to friends from the windows where we were playing, which made it very convenient.
Round 2:
My second game was against Alex, using Necrons. Nightbringer, 10 Warriors, 10 Warriors, 5 Destroyers, 5 Destroyers, 8 Scarabs, 2 Heavy Destroyers, 2 Heavy Destroyers, 2 Heavy Destroyers. Mission was The Hunted- designate a non-HQ enemy unit before deployment to be worth double VPs. I picked a unit of Destroyers, he picked my Raptors. The table was a pretty standard 4x6, which had one big (like 12" x 12") section of area terrain ruins in the middle a bit to the left, and otherwise was pretty open, with one med-small (maybe 4" x 8") area terrain building just outside my DZ to the right. And some small bunkers and trenches scattered here and there.
Alex castled up behind the big area terrain, and I mostly castled behind the smaller building, with my havocs more central in a bunker, and some stuff spread out to the right table edge. I looked at it and figured we could play defensive and just snipe around the terrain, which would come down to luck and a likely draw (with probably a slightly better chance for him to eke out a win due to his superior mobility and We'll Be Back), and would be boring to play. Or I could get aggressive. So I started moving stuff up, breaking cover with the Raptors in particular in the hopes that with one good turn of armor saves, they could get across the open area and into HtH, then break/run down a unit or two before being munched by Nightbringer. If that worked, it would likely tie up that side of his formation at the same time, allowing me to move my shootier units to shoot lengthwise down the table where his Destroyers would have to come out into the open to shoot me back, and I might even sneak another unit or two into HtH. Alas the Raptors got chewed by shooting, but Alex was a good sport and made some aggressive moves of his own instead of just sitting back and preserving his lead. This led to a very bloody game, in which some of the highlights were: A unit of Scarabs assaulting my havocs, eventually being beaten down by them and by a unit of lesser daemons, which then moved on and both assaulted a unit of Necron warriors, who had advanced to the point that they were very nearly in my DZ! Another unit of lesser daemons assaulting his last three heavy destroyers, and tying them up until the end of the game. Alex's Hunted unit of Destroyers taking two wounds while within 3" of the table edge, breaking and running off the table. Nightbringer, my Prince, and a CSM squad w/Fist battling it out for the last two-three turns, ending with each unit in that trio on its last wound or two. Overall it was a very fun game, and a well-fought draw. We both got the base 9pts.
Round 3:
In my third game I was up against a thirteen year old named Evan with 36 battle points (two max value 18pt wins) coming into the round. And I had 25. Huh? Oh well. He had a Destroyer Lord with Warscythe, Orb, and 4+ invulnerable, 10 Warriors, 10 Warriors, 13 Warriors, 13 Warriors, and three Monoliths. The army was painted decently for his age, but had no flying bases, which he showed no embarrassment regarding when I brought it up. We were on a big 4x8 with little terrain, except for a bunch of difficult rivers crossing the board. Ugh. Thankfully the open table was good for me to be able to focus fire.
Evan deployed the two minimum squads of warriors in the middle, with his Lord between them, and kept the Monoliths and bigger warrior squads in reserve to Deep Strike in. The mission was Never Ending Carnage, another corner DZ setup, and so I built a very spread out castle on the left, with everything spread out for Ordnance markers and ready to start dropping every Lascannon and ML shot I had on the Monoliths, and maximizing my range advantage to keep the footslogging warriors out of rang for a while. I also had one Chosen squad infiltrating on the far right in a building, and my Prince and Raptors set up spread out in cover centrally, with the intention of heading straight into his deployed troops and hopefully killing them. Overall we had a tight game, with my Prince and Raptors dying but taking a squad and most of another with them. Also killing the Lord four times. I finished him off twice more with the Chosen's Lascannon, and he finally stayed down on the final turn. Only one Monolith came down on turn two, right in front of most of my stuff. It immediately killed my Pred, so I was down some lascannons. In later turns another Monolith landed over there, and the third was more central. I immobilized the first one early, but was never able to finish it off. I exploded the second one. The third lasted the game. I managed to finish off one of the big squads on the left flank and work the other over a bit, but it ended the game over half. So at the end he had one larger squad of warriors, a couple models left in the smaller squad, an undamaged monolith and an immobilized monolith. I had sustained enough damage that we got a draw with me. If the darn lord hadn't stood up FIVE times and eventually killed my Prince, I'm pretty sure I would have phased him out; though Alex pointed out at the pub later that Necrons don't phase out in Sustained Attack missions. Ah well. Evan and I had a very close battle, with lots of interesting moments. I wouldn’t want to play against three Monoliths on a regular basis, but it was a fun challenge this time.
Our game ran long, so afterwards I was scrambling to clean up and didn’t get a peek at the scores. I heard from one of my fellow Cold Steel Mercs that I had taken third, Alex was second, and Chris Flores had won the whole thing. Nice showing! I was surprised I did so well with two ties, but people must have been kind in scoring my sports and painting.
Overall it was very good tournament, and the improvised tables actually added some fun tactical dimensions as we had to adapt our range estimates. I definitely look forward to attending again next year.
Particular good points:
Nice venue
Better attendance than expected.
Good organization, with quick pairing and table assignments.
Suggestions/criticisms:
Need more table tops/terrain.
Prize support a bit strange. I’m not expecting a lot, but there were only two. The first was for overall- it was a simple ceramic tile with a small engraved plate. Modest, but not bad. Perfectly appropriate for a free tournament. But the other prize was a random raffle, of three (3) new Baneblades. Not three Baneblades raffled off to three different people. Not one to the winner, one to the best painted, and one raffled at random. All three raffled to one winner. No matter how hard I try, I can’t quite wrap my head around that one.
*It also didn’t hurt that the wife and I got a hotel room in Providence and went out that night on the town. Providence is a beautiful city and a lot of fun. I recommend it. I also recommend the Irish pub Ri Ra, right downtown, with excellent imports on draft (I had Boddington’s, the Mrs. had Hoegaarden) and very good eats; basically an expanded Irish pub fare menu, as executed by someone who really knew how to handle food. My better half’s shepherd’s pie and my crab cakes were both works of culinary artistry, lovely to look at and delicious in taste. I think my crab cakes were actually better than the one I had when I was in Baltimore for last year’s GT.
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) and is painted its fine. Expect to see lots of Eldrads / 2 or 3 Harlequin squads + falcons / twin lash deamon princes / 6 to 9 obliterators / mephiston and lemartes / 6 tyranid monster / Taudar armies. If you expect this before you arrive you'll be pleasantly surprised when you fight that odd fluffy list.
