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Over the weekend I attended the Toys for Tots tournament.

Venue: We were set up in a gym in LIFE university, plenty of room, though I wish the tables had been higher. Refreshments were available, and they ordered lunch for us. I've got no complaints.

Tables/Terrain: They used mostly the same stuff as the Exterminatus, so we had excellent terrain. A lot of effort was put into building that stuff, and it shows. I think they went a little overboard with the terrain on the fantasy side, but I guess that goes towards making up from all those tourneys where you end up fighting on planet bowling ball.

Field: The predominant theme among the tourney players this time was "Orks!". About a third of the players were using orks, in both fantasy and 40k. I'd also be remiss if I didn't note that the 40k side had a large percentage of skilled players and good lists. Ordinarily, at a tourney, you can look around and pick the 2-3 guys who might win. This time there was like a dozen, out of like 26 players.

Switch: I initially was going to play Fantasy, but I switched over to the 40k side upon seeing the strong field. It looks like a fun tourney.

List:

Herald of Khorne w/unholy strength, chariot
Herald of Khorne w/unholy strength, chariot
Herald of Khorne w/unholy strength, chariot
Herald of Khorne w/unholy strength, chariot
4 Bloodcrushers w/Fury of Khorne
4 Bloodcrushers w/Fury of Khorne
4 Bloodcrushers w/Fury of Khorne
Soulgrinder w/Tongue
Soulgrinder w/Tongue
Soulgrinder w/Tongue
5 Bloodletters
5 Bloodletters
5 Bloodletters
5 Pink Horrors w/Bolt, changling
5 Pink Horrors w/Bolt
5 Pink Horrors w/Bolt

This is my usual flavor of list, though looking back at it I'm like 80 points short. Teach me to switch at the last second. Forgetting to put in the Icons really hurt me in the last game.

Scoring:

Each mission had a Primary, Secondary and Tertiary mission. If you got the objective, and your opponent didn't, you got the points and they got zilch. If you both, or neither of you, got an objective, you split the points, rounded down. Primarys were worth 13, secondaries were worth 7 and tertiaries were worth 3, so potentially 23 in any given match, with 10 for a tie straight down the line, and 0 for getting slaughtered.

Mission 1:

The Mission:

Primary: Table Quarters (you can claim with troops, contest with anything, not an easy objective to claim w/out slaughtering your foe)
Secondary: Get an HQ model in their deployment zone (Easy for me, hard for most)
Tertiary: Kill an enemy HQ character you pick(I give him this one for free, as I've got no characters, and the only other alternative is that he doesn't have any chance to get it, which doesn't seem fair.)
D-zone's: Essentially pitched battle, though you lose out on a foot of your D-zone near one of the narrow table edges
Special Rule: Up to four units (and at least one), must outflank.

My opponent: Blood Angels

Lemartes,
10 Death Company
10 Tac marines w/missile launcher, flamer in razorback w/twinlinked heavy bolter
10 Tac marines w/missile launcher, flamer in razorback w/twinlinked heavy bolter
10 Tac marines w/missile launcher, flamer in razorback w/twinlinked heavy bolter
Predator w/heavy bolters, autocannon
Predator w/heavy bolters, autocannon
Predator w/heavy bolters, autocannon
2 Assault bikes w/multi-meltas
2 Assault bikes w/multi-meltas
2 Assault bikes w/multi-meltas
Inquisitor w/psycannon
5 Grey Knights w/2 psycannons

My assessment:

In general, I think his list has too many KP's, but against me on this particular mission it'll be quite effective. He can castle up and fire all those shots, use his multi-meltas on my Grinders and charging the Death Co in vs. my Crushers. He also seems to be a skilled player, so this'll be a tough game. One big weakness he's got is that if I've got any grinders left he has to be real careful of his counter-attack unit, as a Grinder can just dive into the Death Co and execute Lemartes, then hold them up the whole game. Still, getting a good player with a moderately fierce list is uncommon in the first round. I'm going to need to be careful here.

Funny Note:

The guy's list title is "People who play Kairos Fateweaver should go to Heck and Hug the Devil", only less sanitized. I guess that's what all the psycannons are about. I fully agree with his sentiment.

The Game:

He makes a mistake, I think, by putting one of his biker units in reserve and not one of his troop units. He's also put his fortress in a corner, rather than in the back-center. He wagon-trains up with his razorbacks protecting his preds, and hides the heavy weapon half of his combat squads in the top of a three story building. He's going to just hunker down and shoot at me, then try and move out to contest quarters at game's end.

Ok, basically, it doesn't matter what the outcome of storming his fort is. I'll drop my hard stuff and rush him, basically just to give him stuff to shoot at. Then I'll drop troops in the other quarters and a chariot in his d-zone, and take the game. I can't stop the tertiary, but I think I can basically guarantee a primary-secondary win. Lemartes might survive, if he leaves the Death Co, or just hides, but he certainly won't make my D-zone w/out deep striking.

So the game starts. I go first, follow my plan. One of my chariots scatters into a mishap, and gets placed in the opposite corner. I decide to change my plan for secondary from dropping another chariot into his d-zone to just running that guy there. I also vary the order of my strikes, putting the crushers in front and the grinders in back, out of respect for his bikes. If I can get the Grinders into melee he's powerless against them, so I try and keep them around the ~18" line, though they end up scattering back a bit. In light of the scatters I simply advance with them, shooting razorbacks with railguns. The razorbacks are public enemy #1: as they can contest my quarters, also they are giving cover to his preds.

As I siege him, he reacts by sending 2 combat squads out of 2 razorbacks to rapid fire and form a wall vs. the crushers, while his army fires. He destroys most of a crusher unit, and only sends forward one bike squad to fire at a grinder, where it fails. On my turn I charge his sacrifice squads, his grey knights, a tac combat squad that was in the open for no good reason, and the bikes, killing them all.

His turn, he shootas at me and shuffles his wagons around, still nothing really going on. He gets down the crusher unit and starts on the second one, and I think he beats up a chariot. He also starts counter-charging with his Death Co, ablating away at my force and massacre-ing back. I do more charging.

Ultimately, the battle goes pretty much as planned, until he suddenly puts a missile launcher through a crucial grinder-and one of his razorbacks full of tac-marines gets out of the cordon, and zips into my side. He's been slow-playing his shots, so he is able to contest all 4 quarters and declare game-end with his razorback, tac squad and the outflanking bikes (who were late). Grumble Grumble... I did get Lemartes though (grinder squished him, and locked up the Death Co.)

So we drew on Primary, I won on Secondary, and we drew on tertiary, for a total of 14 to 7. A tough match.

Mission #2:

Primary: Secure and Control (as usual, Daemons favorite mission. This'll be a good chance to catch up with the leaders, who might draw this one)
Secondary: VPs (Guh, VP's? That's so 5 months ago.)
Tertiary: Kill an enemy HQ, any enemy HQ unit.
Depoyment zones: Pitched Battle

My Opponent: Space Marines

The List;
Kor'sarro Kahn
Tac squad w/heavy bolter, flamer, rhino, pfist
Tac squad w/heavy bolter, flamer, rhino, pfist
Tac squad w/heavy bolter, flamer, pfist
Scout squad w/heavy bolter, sniper rifles, Telion (only 6 total guys)
Terminator squad w/Land Raider transport
Dreadnaught w/plasma cannon, claw hand
Devastator squad w/4 missile launchers (only 5 strong)
6 man bike squad w/attack bike w/multi-melta

My assessment: It's the sort of list I'd expect in a first round. No real anti-tank to speak of, and no real capacity to counter-charge if the enemy runs up on them. The player has also had less than ten games of fifth edition, so he's rusty on the rules. He's a fun guy though, and I resolve to try and give him a fun game.

The game starts and I get the wrong half of my army, which is a great start towards making it a good game. I drop the horrors up close to shoot, and the letters back around my objective. The chariots go near one board edge, tempting him in there (he's outflanked the 2 mech squads and the land raider, and his boss unit and his dread...in fact, everything but the scouts, devs and one tac squad).

On his turn he takes the bait, bringing in his dread to fight one of my chariots and his terminators/land raider to wipe out the other. He also drives 2 of his tac squads into buildings and lets them out...for no particular reason.

On my turn I drop down a couple of 'ard units, but only a few, I think I get a crusher unit and a chariot. I remember it was notable how little I got, anyway. He's blasted down the nearby letter unit and the changling's unit, and also killed a chariot. I drop 2 bloodcrusher units (I guess I got 2 in), near his 2 fortified buildings. My pink horrors keep shooting, and have by now almost finished off the devestator squad.

On his turn, more shooting, to no real resolution. He whittles down and then charges a bloodcrusher unit with one of his ten man squads, which ultimatey doesn't work out well for him, and he charges I think a chariot with his terminators, who get waxed by the Khornate HQ.

On my turn the grinders come in, which pretty much signals the end. One of them vomits on Telion & co, taking them out. Another idles near the other board edge, in case his HQ shows up over there. The last lands near one of his forts and gets read to take a run at him.

He shoots at some stuff with his tanks, then the grinders kill pretty much everyone. He sends Khan and the bikers over to shoot at the grinder, but its 13 " out, so it ignores the multi-melta blast and then moves, fleets and charges, killing khan and routing them.

I end up with primary and secondary, and we draw tertiary, for 21. It was a fun game, primarily because he was a great guy, and my list malfunctioned and kept things competitive for the first few rounds. Hilariously, the dreadnaught-herald battle from the first round was still going on at game's end (turn 6), with the Dread having lost both arms, while the Herald had taken a wound.

Mission 3:

Primary Objective: Capture the Flag

Ok, this one requires some explanation. 3 of your units have "flags". You pick one, and the other 2 are randomly selected.

If a unit if run down or killed in CC, the destroyer unit takes their flag.
If a unit routes off the board they take the flag out of the game with them.
If a unit is shot down the flag falls on the board, and any other unit may pick it up by moving over it.

At the end of the game you want to have more flags than the enemy. ( I like it, its novel, and doesn't seem particularly biased).
Secondary: Table Quarters (as usual, not going to be easy)
Tertiary: Kill an enemy HQ (dang it, again! Shoulda brung non-sacrificial HQs)

The enemy: Dark Eldar (wtf?)

The List:

HQ w/lots of CC wargear, including dark shield, with warriors in raider
2 Haemonculi w/scissorhands and the ap d6 flamer
Wych unit in Raider
Wych unit in Raider
3 ten man warrior units in raiders w/the 12" assault dark lance equivalent
2 nine man warrior units in raiders w/the 12" assault dark lance equivalent
3 Ravagers w/3 disintegrators
Some guys on bladed skate boards

So, to be clear, we are talking about 8 raiders, 3 ravagers and some Back to the Future rejects. The wych and Lord ravagers have nightshields. All the raiders have dark lances, and all the warrior squads have the 12" assault dark lances, so they can hop out of the raiders and fire, I guess.

My assessment: I've honestly got no idea. I mean, it's the Dark Eldar air force, clearly, we've all seen this before, but I just don't know how it'll do vs. Daemons, particularly in this mission. Seems like he we can both be in all the quarters, and we can both kill an HQ, but grabbing the counters might be tough, if they don't end up on something fragile. In particular, I hope they don't end up on warrior squads that he can whisk away in random raiders.

Anyway, the player is a good one, with a grudge against me after I shot him down with my Necrons at table 1 at the end of a tournament a few months back. The batreps up somewhere on dakka.

The Game:

My flags end up on a Herald (yay!), a Crusher unit (YAY!) and a Grinder (hiss!), while his end up on 3 Raider units (hmm...).

I go first, (I chose to do this to prevent him from going first and zooming all over the dang board, creating a nightmare deep strike environment and giving his raiders saves vs. my railguns), and drop the good half of my army (crushers, grinders, Heralds). pretty close to him. The grinders shoot down a pair of skimmers with their railguns, one of them has a flag, and its pinned.

He shoots back, destroying half of 2 crusher units and a Soul Grinder. He also charges the two Heralds with a wych unit and the skaters. Neither gets much done, skaters hit and run.

I move up and open fire/charge. I'm not able to get to the pinned flag unit, but I pop another one out of its transports and pin it with a Grinder (flaggy, in fact).

He opens fire, and is unable to damage the grinders, despite a hail of dark lance fire/short range dark lance fire. He also blasts down some more crushers. On my round the Herald with the Icon lands, in my backfield, and I flame his unit with the flag, kill 8/10s and sending the rest fleeing. My grinders also knock down another raider full of guys, and my crushers kick down another flag unit.

Ultimately, the rest of the game is him blasting my stuff and me stubbornly holding on. He's ultimately able to make my crushers drop their flag, but I've got more stuff around to pick it up, while his flags get carried off the board by his routing troops. He's up on VP's as the game ends, but it doesn't really matter.

I'm actually also able to get the secondary, when one of his raiders crashes in terrain trying to get into my last quarter. Go me! I get the massacre, 21 to 1. (we both got tertiary, again, Haemonculus got dropped and he killed a Herald).

Round #4:

The Mission:

Primary: Kill Points (not good for me, owing to my large # of units)
Secondary: Claim Terrain Features (any unit can, not just troops, good for me, owing to my large # of units)
Tertiary: Have > half your units alive (not gonna happen, unless its a complete walkover one way or the other)

The Opponent:

Orks


Warboss on Bike w/Klaw, trimmings
Big Mek w/KFF
2 Trukkboy squads w/PK Nobs, bosspoles
2 big Shoota squads w/PK Nobs
1 (or 2, not sure) slugga boy squad w/PK Nob
2 units of 3 Killa Kans w/big shootas
2 units of 10 Lootas
Snikrot and a full unit of Kommandos
1 Battlewagon w/deff rolla

My assessment: Everything would need to go perfectly to win this one. I can generally beat Orks in an objective game by making them charge the grinders and counter charging with the crushers/Heralds, but KPS is a whole different kettle of fish, and the lootas are going to be hunting my troop choices pretty relentlessly. I like the look of those trukks for easy KPs, but the KFF will probably defend them well enough. I need to go for a slaughter, just try and blitz him down and keep him from killing much.

The other player is a local, from my club in fact. He's skilled at Orking, and he's played me enough to be that rarest of creatures, an Ork who understands how the game goes vs. Khornate Daemons. We are playing on table #1, winner wins Best General.

The game:

I won't keep you in suspense, I got run over. The wrong half of my army came in, then I got 3/8 in the next round, and in the third round I lost a Crusher unit to scatter and a Grinder got sent to the back.

Initially he fortressed up, and I tried to seize the initiative. He didn't understand why, but not letting the Orks spread out is clutch to a deep striking army. If they surge forward I have a lot of trouble landing all my deep strikers. Fortunately, though, he stayed put on his first turn, which let me strike all around him...or, as it turned out, in the opposite corner, cowering from Loota fire.

Due to his caution I didn't lose too much initially, and when I got just 3 on the second round I up them all on one flank of his force and got a basically fair fight. He pulled some nonsense with his warboss joining a unit post-assault, but I got fortunate in the grinder trashing a unit of his cans which charged it, killing one and pulling the fighting arms off the other two.

Next round when the rest of my army came in the bad scatters and two fights basically ended the game. In one his shootas moved up and one-shotted the grinder that was slapping around his kans, in the other my grinder charged some kans and got blown up without doing anything.

Following this my game collapsed, and he swept the middle, taking the win in primary, secondary and tertiary. I got 0, he got 23.

He got Best General. The same Nid player who won Exterminatus won Best Overall, due to soft scores.

All told it was a good tournament. I got 3 competative games, 2 with strangers and 2 with guys I know but play rarely. It helped me firm up my list for Baltimore too.

Really nice report. Well written and insightful as always, thanks.

Awesome job, great list! Thanks for the report. Gotta love daemons.

Are the tourney organizers going to update the website with results and pics? There were some great armies there that my crappy mobile phone couldn't photograph well.

Great report. Glad to see the Daemons on the field, as always, and I'm genuinely surprised the psycannon guy did so poorly. Too bad the lottery was against you in that last battle, would have liked to see you take it.

I'll get at them to update the site with pictures and such, not sure they have such but it'd be nice just to get the embarassing old news posts off of there.

I think the Blood Angels guy did alright. I think he went 3 wins, 2 losses for the tourney.

good report.

dems orkses are tough.