Last weekend was the Salt Lake City Gladiators Games. This is the first
GT sized event for us in the state, which we were pretty excited about, using the ITC format. There were 32ish contestants and it was fun to play against new people. I decided to show up with my Chaos daemons/Tetrad list. This is a six game, two day event. It was a lot of fun with great prize support from the community. Along with
40k, there was Warmahordes, Infinity, and Malifaux playing. This is my first report, so formatting will improve as I do it more. There was a great variety of armies with one stand out feature. There was not a single codex Space Marine army present. One guy had a conclave but that's it. Crazy. I don't have a list of every army present so I may have forgotten an army or two, but the breakdown of armies present was:
*Primary Detachment
Eldar: 6
Chaos Daemons: 3
Chaos Renegades: 2 (one with
KDK allies and one with
CSM)
Chaos Marines: 1
Dark Angels: 1
Space Wolves : 1
AM: 1
Necron: 3
Tau: 3
Imperial Knights: 1
Grey Knights: 1
Cult Mech: 1
Harlies: 1
Tyranids: 1
Orks: 1
This will be a short form report and overall review of the games. My list is as follows:
Infernal Tetrad Daemon Prince of Khorne (2 Greater Rewards, 1 Lesser Rewards, Armor of Scorne, Flight) - 280
Daemon Prince of Nurgle (2 Greater Rewards, Armor,
Lvl 3, Flight) - 335
Daemon Prince of Slaanesh (2 Greater Rewards, Armor,
Lvl 3, Flight, SoulStealer) - 350
Daemon Prince of Tzeentch (2 Greater Rewards, 1 Lesser Reward, Impossible Robe, Flight,
Lvl 3) - 360
Warlord CAD Lord of Change (2 Greater Rewards,
Lvl 3, Paradox) - 320
11 Pink horrors - 99
11 Pink horrors (Iridescent Horror) - 104
Game 1 Game 1 was against Caitlyn and her Chaos Marine army. She was a newer player and the list was not the strongest, but a great person to play against and hope to see her again. She ran:
Daemon Prince of Tzeentch (
Lvl 3, Spell Familiar, Wings, Armor)
Cultist Squad x3
Thousand Sons w/ rhino
Thousand Sons w/ rhino
Thousand Sons w/ rhino
3 man Oblit Squad
Forgefiend w/ Plasma mouth thing
Predator w/ lascannon sponsons
Deepstriking Hellbrute formation
I rolled initiative and decided to deploy first. My gifts and psychic powers and deployment were as follows.
Warlord Trait - +1 Mastery Level
TZ Prince - Staff of Change, Hellfire Gaze, 3+ Armor(huzzah) // Summoning, Infernal Gaze, Warp Speed, Psychic Shriek
N Prince - 4+
FNP, Reroll Failed Invul // Psychic Shriek, Iron Arm, Smite, Life Leech
S Prince - +1W
IWND, Reroll Failed Invul // Life Leech, Smite, Endurance, Invisibility
K Prince - Axe of Khorne, 4+
FNP, Hellfire Gaze // Flickering Fire, Tzeentch Firestorm
LoC - 3+ Armor, Reroll Failed Invul // Summoning, Tzeentch Warpflare, Flickering Fire
Pink horrors will take summoning every game
I was feeling very confident. I rolled good rewards for the most part and got most of the powers I wanted plus the first turn. She had only a few things that could damage me at range and I was much stronger than her in melee. She then proceeded to steal the initiative and we were off!
I won't do a play by play. Just a highlight of the game. I was feeling very worried at the bottom of turn 1 and wondered why every Chaos marine player wasn't using a forgefiend. Turn 1 it shoots my Khorne prince. With armor of scorne and 4+
FNP I was like, bring it baby. My prince dies. That's right, she hits and wounds 6 times with the
str 8 autocannon shots. I fail 4/6 saves after
FNP.
Then the oblits shoot my Tzeentch prince with assault cannons and push two wounds onto it. It doesn't disappear but it will perils on my turn and will remain at 1 wound for the rest of the game. Too afraid to cast with it and too afraid to bring it to the ground, it would chase her prince around the table using hellfire gaze, eventually killing her prince in the final turn of the game.
This is the bottom of turn 4.
Her hellbrute formation did not show up until turn 4. I tied one up with plaguebearers and the nurgle prince wrecked the second. She kept rolling the stand there and shoot twice which forced her daemon prince to the ground to get line breaker in turn 5. This is where I killed it netting me Big Game Hunter. Her forgefiend tapered off later in the game, but it killed it's fair share, but it was not enough. I finish 11-0. A good start which will pit me against increasingly more difficult opponents (which is the idea right?).
Game 2 My next opponent was a necron list with a renegade knight.
CAD Vargard Obyron
Cryptec (Chronometron, Phase Shifter, Solar Staff)
Praetorians x5
Lychguard w/scythes
Warriors w/Ghost ark
Warriors on foot
Heavy Destroyer
Heavy Destroyer
Conclave of the Burning One Shard of Nightbringer
Cryptec w/veil and phase shifter
Cryptec w/God Shackle, phase shifter
Renegade Knight w/Gatling Cannon, Meltagun, Icarus Array
His knight was converted to appear like a Necron titan. I didn't know that renegade knights are allies of convenience to Necrons. No Decurion however which was different. My Warlord trait this game was Soul Blaze, so useless. He won the roll and gave me first turn. He had a very non-standard list and he was talking up this nightbringer unit which I've never faced before.
Gifts and Powers
TZ prince - Staff, Armourbane/Fleshbane, 3+ armor // Summoning, Cursed Earth, Invisibility
N prince - Balesword, Reroll Invul // Warpspeed, Endurance, Life Leech, Smite
S prince - 4+
FNP, Lash // Warpspeed, Smite, Haem
K prince - Axe, Armourbane/Fleshbane, +1 W
IWND LOC - Fleshbane/Armourbane, 3+ armor // Cursed Earth, Incursion, Darkflame
Other than iron arm I got pretty much everything I want. Knights can be really hard to take if you do not roll the right psychic powers and gifts. From experience, a single prince with armourbane cannot take a knight full to dead in a single round and risks the D and stomps. Luckily I rolled 3 armourbanes and will have to tag team to kill it successfully. He attempts to steal and fails.
Turn 1
I fly up with the slaanesh prince hoping to get a few glances with lash early.I tried really hard to get iron arm with this prince but no luck. The
LOC also flies, the other princes hang back a bit, waiting to pounce on the approaching knight and necrons. I summon plaguebearers on the relic which will promptly get their butt kicked by the praetorians giving him first strike, woops. Off scrren are some summoned screamers.
He fires a lot at my slaanesh prince, causing a wound but failing to ground. He also veils his conclave into my deployment zone scattering 7 inches from his original spot near my nurgle prince. He shoots a psychic shriek type shooting attack from the nightbringer at the nurgle prince but I roll under the leadership. He would then fail his charge. The Knight is also within 12 inches of the TZ prince but fails its charge.
Turn 2
I take no chances. Invis on TZ, warpspeed on Nurgle and endurance on Khorne. Now you see it now you don't.
Elsewhere and less interesting, the
LOC lands in preparation to start kicking ass and taking names. The screamers blow up the ghost ark.
On his turn, the knight moves up attempting to get as close as possible to the princes. Shooting the K prince and taking a couple wounds. The rest of his army shoots at the
LOC, but the warp storm had rolled the magical 10 and with cursed earth, my army was sitting pretty. You could call it.... the perfect storm. He would fail a charge with the knight again.
Turn 3
My Tz Prince and K prince go after the knight. They both have armourbane so I should drop it. Nurgle goes after praetorians with the relic. The
LOC goes after a warrior squad and the S prince lands to assist in the slaughter. All would make their charges.
The
str 9 Tz prince goes first and only does 5 hull points to the knight. Good thing I brought the K prince. He finishes it, but it falls on top of him killing him in the process. The N prince wipes the praetorians and the
LOC wins combat and fails to sweep the warriors. From here on out it is clean up, however. The N prince will move into Obyron's unit taking it himself while the
LoC and S prince tag team the rest of his units. I win primary and secondary, Table Quarters and Warlord. He gets first strike. 10-1. He was a great opponent. And even though the game was going south quickly for him, he was very good about it. Maintained a positive attitude through the whole thing.
Game 3 I am at 21/22 total points and end up on table 2 against my friend Ryan and his amazing converted nurgle themed renegade army. His spawn are big daddy's from Bioshock!
We are always happy to play one another. He was just less excited since game three ITC is a kill points game and I start with 7 on the table. An uphill game for him right off the bat. He won the roll to go first and took it. Luckily there was a large
los blocking building in the center of the table I took advantage of. He rolled well for powers getting invisibility and endurance which could stall my princes if they go off. Plus he rivals me in power dice. The sorcerers on bikes are the modified plague drones. He has a converted skaven thing as his jump pack sorcerer. The maulerfiend is the rat abomination. The other sorcerers on foot are with the zombies. His list.
Chaos Marine CAD Sorcerer (Force axe, spell familiar)
Cultist x2
2 units of 5 Nurgle Spawn
Maulerfiend
2 man obliterators w/
votlw,
MoN Cabal 2 sorcerers w/
Lvl 3(I think) aura of dark glory, bike, melta bombs, spell familiar, axe,
votlw 1 sorcerer w/
lvl 3, aura of dark glory, blight grenades spell familiar, jump pack,
votlw, melta bomb
Renegades of Vraks Command Squad w/ autocannon
Arch Demagogue w/
Lvl 2 carapace armour, covenant of nurgle, power ague, refractor field
warlord Plague Zombie x40
Mutant Rabble with lasguns
Quad launcher with 3 artillery platforms
Rapier Laser Destroyer w/ 3 platforms
I rolled +1 invul for my warlord trait. Unlike him however, my powers were lack luster this game and the gifts were not very good. At least my Tz prince will have a constant 2++ rerollable. My nurgle prince and khorne prince were the only way I was going to deal with those spawns in a timely manner. And that's only if I can stop his endurance. I don't have much shooting so his cabal's main trick is useless.
Tz prince - staff, +1W
IWND, 3+ armor // Psychic Shriek, Cursed Earth, Summoning
N prince - balesword, Armour/fleshbane // Smite, enfeeble, hemorrhage, Life Leech
S prince - Lash, Armour/fleshbane // Enfeeble, invis, smite
K prince - Axe of khorne, Armour/fleshbane +1W
IWND LOC - Hellfire gaze, 3+ armour // Summoning, darkflame, infernal gaze
I deploy as such. Notice pink horrors trying their hardest to be forgotten and avoid getting blasted to death.
Turn 1 He moves his spawn forward. One moving up to cover the middle objective and the other coming around the south side of the building. Units on foot shuffle about. He casts endurance, invisibility on the closest spawn unit, and gets force off on all the sorcerers in the spawn units. He targets the daemon prince of slaanesh with the mortars but no wounds are caused. The building blocks sight from the rapiers.
On my turn, I fly my
LOC and S prince up the board to target his softer elements in the back. This is my favorite use for these two. I debate on how to approach the spawn unit. I can easily make it with 1 prince, but not guaranteed with the others. After deliberation I decide to put my faith in the chaos gods and will bank on the next psychic phase being more successful for me. If he gets his powers off, it's gonna need all of the princes to power through those spawn in a timely manner. So I keep them together.
The Tz prince is in range with shriek on the mortars. I cast it and he fails to stop it. He rolls for their random leadership and gets a 6 total. With the look of smug satisfaction, I roll the 3 dice to slaughter the unit, but only roll 7 total. I also kill an oblit with hellfire gaze and lash of despair.
Turn 2 He does the only thing he can do and charges with both spawns and the maulerfiend into the nurgle and tzeentch prince. However, his psychic phase is a complete flop. He 5 dices endurance and invisibility and fails to cast, even with the reroll. He has to challenge which I accept with my Tz prince. The sorcerer lives after the invul saves are finished, but I hack through several spawn with the N prince and his balesword. He takes 2 wounds from the maulerfiend I believe. In other news, my pink horrors get bombed and one unit is down to a couple models.
(I ended up running the K prince back to the objective I forgot about. Why he seems further away.)
In my turn, K prince joins the brawl. Slaughter continues. I also land the S prince who rolls well on lash and causes a morale and the unit flees off the table.
Turn 3 On his turn three. There isn't much for him to do. He gambled on the fight in the center with the spawn and his dice left him on the most crucial turn. The zombies make a long charge into the S prince and the sorcerer who has to challenge survives the combat (you suck princes). Between the mass of attacks they drop the S prince to 1 wound. In the big fight, N prince has armourbane and turns the maulerfiend inside out. The sorcerer challenges and the Tz prince takes him and a spawn out. The K prince rolls 3 6's to wound with his axe and all the spawn die.
On my turn, the N prince goes to assist the S prince in getting out of the zombie tarpit, which I learn is really good against my princes. It would take all game for one to get through it. The S prince kills 4 models and goes back to full wounds thanks to Soulstealer. The
LoC lands and the other princes move to objectives. The game is essentially over at this point. It's just a matter of hacking his warlord out of the zombie unit. He generously accepts a challenge when I declare it to end the game so we can have a drink and chat with other players. 10-0
Game 4 A start to a fresh day and my next opponent is one of the few marine players. Dark Angels and bikes. Lots of bikes, Null zone and conclave. Plus the initiative gets stolen again.
My opponent is a local of the game store I go to. One of those die hard Dark Angel fans. A psychic heavy list with the powerful space marine psychic powers.
Ravenwing Strike Force 3 squads of Ravenwing bikes w/ 2 grav guns
3 squads of Ravenwing bikes w/ 2 melta guns
Ravenwing Darkshroud w/ assault cannon
Librarian w/
lvl 2, bike, conversion field
Command squad - apothecary, champion
Libararius Conclave (White Scars) Librarian -
Lvl 2, bike, Hunter's Eye
Librarian -
Lvl 2, bike, force axe
Librarian -
Lvl 2, bike, force axe
Allied Detachment(Ultramarine) Captain - Cataphracti, relic blade
Scout Squad - combi melta
Devastators - drop pod, 2 grav cannons, lascannon, multimelta
I rolled and took the first turn. He had a lot of small units, but they were going to be vulnerable to shriek. Plus his army is short ranged. He rolled powers I haven\t fought against. Veil of Time, Power Scourge(?), Null Zone, and ignores cover spell. Forget the name. I roll +1 Invul save however so that's nice. I deploy aggressively and he deplosy pretty much all along the 24 inch line ready to bring the fight to me.
My gifts/powers
Tz prince - Staff, +1W
IWND, Hellfire gaze // Cursed Earth, Psychic Shriek, Smite
N prince - 4+
FNP, Balesword // Enfeeble, Psychic Shriek, Endurance
S prince - +1W
IWND, Lash // Psychic Shriek, Endurance, Life Leech
K prince - Axe of khorne, Blade of blood, armorbane and flesh bane
LoC - Fleshbane, hellfire gaze // incursion, sacrifice, cursed earth
Feeling confident, he then steals the initiative and I start getting a little concerned.
Turn 1 He drops his pod behind me with the captain and the devastator squad. All the bikes move up ready to bring grav and plasma talons in range.
I was very worried I was going to lose a prince or two turn 1 to this attack. I for some reason completely forgot how deny the witch worked. He opens with null zone on my Tz prince which would reduce it's save to a 4++. He had like 4-5 successes. Not sure why, but I thought I would need 6's to deny. So I throw all my dice to stop this. But I am a higher mastery level so I would have needed 4's. I deny the gak out of that power. He now has free reign to cast everything since I just blew all my dice. The follow up took the air out of him though. His entire command squad is in range of the nurgle prince and they ignore cover. It does not suffer any wounds from the plasma shots. Same with a grav bike unit. The devastators shoot it and it jinks and saves all. Slaanesh takes a wound. That's it. His entire turn 1 did a single wound. There was this awkward silence.
My turn looks like this. My Nurgle prince goes into his command squad with 2 librarians, the slaanesh prince shrieks a nearby bike unit and charges a unit with a librarian, the
LoC is flying and will continue into the corner with the scouts. Khorne at the far right grav unit. Tzeentch will challenge the drop pod squad killing it on his next turn. He would also fail his hit and run on his librarians in the combat with the nurgle prince and slaanesh prince. Bad dice on his side. I have never had a game decided so quickly. Half his army was gone. The command squad disappeared to the balesword and he loses most of his psychic powers. We play it out but it's me just chasing his bikes down. 11-0.
Game 5 There is a lot of Tau and Eldar players here and it is finally time that I have to face off against it. I have to face off against 18 scat bikes and 30 warp spiders with skathach knight.
I was watching my buddy Russ and this guy duke it out on the table next to mine in the previous round. Two eldar heavy-weight armies. Russ ended up losing so I was paired against Adrian. This is for ITC scenario 5. His army was fairly simple.
CAD Autarch Skyrunner w/ laser lance
6 squads of 3 scat bikes
Eldar Warp Hunter
Skathach Wraithknight w/ two inferno lances
Void Shield Generator w/ 3 shields
2 Aspect hosts, all with 5 man warp spider squads.
I have read a lot of posts about the terror of warp spider spam. It didn't occur to me until we started playing how good this matchup was for me. Warpspiders wound on initiative and all my big baddies are
init 6 for the
LoC and 8 for the princes. Effectively immune to their damage. The scat bikes are a threat, but their weakness is low model count and leadership. That just leaves his wraithknight, who does not have an invul save. If I plan it right, I should be able to take it too. There was a slight debate as I wasn't sure how psychic shriek worked on a shield. Does it go through it or bounce off the shield? The
TO looks through the
FAQ but after a few minutes, I just take the conservative approach and say it does not go through. I also rolled harness warp charges on a 3+ for all my princes.
Gifts and Powers
TZ Prince - Staff, FleshbaneArmorbane, reroll invul // Cursed earth, psychic shriek, something else that never mattered
N Prince - 4+
FNP, Balesword // Life Leech, Psychic Shriek, smite
S Prince - 4+
FNP, Lash of Despair // Iron Arm, psychic shriek, Enfeeble
K Prince - Axe of Khorne, Reroll invul, blade of blood
LoC - +1W
IWND, Hellfire gaze // Summoning, Infernal gaze, Dark flame
I rolled incredibly well on my powers. He doesn't have psykers to oppose me and I harness on 3's. The only way it could be better is if I got iron arm on the N prince. But lots of witchfires to target his small squads.
I get first turn and it isn't stolen. He deploys like the above picture. Reserving all his warp spiders and a bike squad and warp hunter.
Turn 1 First turn. I fly the slaanesh prince and
LoC. Both just get in range of their shooting attacks on the closest bike squad. The nurgle prince hops on the ground. The plan is to use the two flyers to deal with the bike threat and the N Prince hit the wraithknight when the opportunity presents itself. Tz prince goes down to the objective. Khorne hangs back in preparation for the warp spider arrival. In psychic I summon with some pink horrors who peril, roll a 1 and fail leader ship and half the squad blows up. Good. The daemonettes are seen by the K prince. I cast all blessings as we ruled I can't shoot through the shield. In shooting, my
str 10 S prince rolls 8 shots with the lash and blows through the shield, but the bikes make all their saves.
He rolls his objective in the building in his deployment zone. One squad of bikes boosts to the objective I am holding to contest so I cannot score. Brave souls. He shoots his whole army at the
LoC. I take 3 wounds, fail grounding and I go down to two wounds. I must say, that wraithknight has a damn cool weapon. shoots like 8 melta shots a turn.
Turn 2 I continue to fly the
LoC and S Prince. Nurgle hops forward again. I am nervous with his placement because the wraithknight is able to jump and attack it if he wanted. TZ flies to the bottom right corner of the table to deal with a bike squad. Khorne jumps and assaults the squad on my objective wiping it. Psychic phase is good. I shriek 2 squads of bikes off the table. The
Str 10 S prince shoots at the shield generator and fails to kill it.
His turn. He uses the autarchs ability to keep most of his stuff off the board. Two spider units show up regardless. He rolls his objective in the building again. So he moves his wraithknight on it. He has lost a bit of fire power, but tries to finish the
LoC. He gets him down to a single wound. The spiders fail to do anything to the N prince and the spiders in my zone kill a handful of daemonettes.
Turn 3 I land my S prince so he can start helping with assaults. The
LoC remains aloft to hopefully keep it alive. Paradox saves me in this psychic phase as I perils, but I just swap the dice to avoid it. It's such a good item. I pit the N prince against the knight just as planned, getting enfeeble off on the knight and...
I hit with all attacks and wounded with 4. He goes to make
FNP and I let him know they are instant death so no
FNP. Then he moves the wound counter to mark 4 wounds and I let him know instant death does d3 wounds per wound afflicted to gargantuans. So I roll and do 10 wounds to the knight.
The Khorne prince would jump up and make a long assault to the warp spiders in the center of the table. TZ prince heads for his deployment zone as well.
His final gambit is his warp hunter. The spiders are not effective and he is really far behind in maelstrom now. It's 6 to 1, thanks to the knight dying (I went for three kills on turn 2). It shows up and he decides the flame template hitting both the N and S prince is better than the barrage variant. He shoots, rolls a 1 for Slaanesh, wounds N prince but only a 1 on the d3.
At this point he has the 2 squads of bikes, one has the autarch, and several squads of spiders and the warp hunter. The game will continue to turn 7 with me nearly tabling him. Just one warp spider unit hiding for line breaker. He will kill the
LoC finally, and a spider unit will kill a horror unit down to one model who will kill himself periling while summoning plaguebearers. This was a bad match up for Adrian. He spent a third of his army on units that couldn't hurt mine. I get full points 11-1.
Game 6 My final game is another Eldar opponent, Ben Cromwell. A similar looking army to the previous one, but switches the wraithknight for a seer council. I am feeling confident. Boy was I wrong.
I apologize ahead of time. My battery was running low this game and the game was really tense. I forgot to take pictures for most of the game. Ben's list.
Autarch Skyrunner - shard of anaris
Farseer Skyrunner
4 squads of scat bikes
3 squads 5 man warp spiders (no exarch or aspect host)
D-scythe wraithguard w/ serpent and scatter laser
D-Cannon artillery
D-Cannot Artillery
D-cannon Artillery
Warlock Conclave thingy (both farseers might have been from this as they were casting on 3's)
Farseer Skyrunner
5 Warlocks
Allied Dark Eldar
Archon w/ web way portal
5 warriors
Lot's of D on his side which kind of scares me, but it's weak to psychic scream. He has a lot of psychic dice, but I still beat him. Haven't fought a seer council with the Tetrad, but I plan to take them like normal. Just throw a couple daemon princes into it and it should go away.
My Gifts and Powers
TZ Prince - Staff, Reroll Failed Invul, 4+
FNP // Incursion, Psychic Shriek, Dominate
N Prince - Balesword, Hellfire Gaze // Life Leech, Invisibility, Psychic Shriek
S Prince - Lash of Despair, +1W
IWND // Smite, Hemorrhage, Psychich Shriek
K Prince - Axe of Khorne, Hellfire Gaze, Blade of Blood
LoC - +1W
IWND, Armourbane, Fleshbane // Sacrifice, Incursion, Summoning
My rewards were mediocre, but my powers were decent. Missed Iron Arm which is too bad, but I got lots of shrieks and an invis. I also rolled Ignore the First perils of the warp tests for all my daemon princes. I got first turn and deployed thusly.
Deployed centrally so I could go to any corner of the table if I needed.
This is where my pictures end. His first move to throw me on my back foot was to reserve his entire army except the seer council with farseers and autarch. These he deployed in the very corner of his deployment, well beyond my reach. He chose not to seize.
Turn 1 I set up to alpha strike and he denied it to me. I fly all my princes to get them closer to his side of the table. I stay at about the 18 inch line from his board edge with all the flyers. I have to get in his deployment zone for maelstrom. All my psychic powers are either offensive or summoning. I start summoning like a fiend for lack of better things to do. A unit of screamers, daemonettes, seekers, and plague bearers hit the table.
His turn also catches me off guard. He has invisibility on one farseer, fortune on the other. Nasty combo. His turn consists of casting both and turbo boosting this squad into my deployment zone right between both pink horror squads who are now too close for comfort.
Turn 2 All my baddies are in the air, so I can't answer the aggressive play made by Ben. What's worse, I can't land or I will eat some D and scatter laser shots when his reserves show up. I run my pink horror squads away from each other to avoid a multi charge. Summoning sees another unit of screamers hit the table. I attempt to cast invis on the seekers but he denies it. I was planning on assaulting with the seekers and hoping they stall for a turn. With that I run them into nearby terrain. At least warlocks do not have grenades.
His turn. Wraithguard show up, 2 warp spiders, 2 bike squads, and a dcannon. He keeps a lot off. He rolls kill a unit twice and opts to go for 3. Which he promptly does. The wraithguard drop in his deployment thanks to the archon. I have a unit of plague bearers on an objective in the building and screamers right nearby. He elimates the screamers. One unit of spiders scatters poorly and lands right next to my
LOC who is flying. The other hits and targets my daemonettes. He forces 2 wounds on the
LOC thanks to the spiders and bikes. I fail grounding and take another. Daemonnettes lose some models and he multicharges the seekers and pink horrors getting him all 3 points.
Turn 3 Most of his army is in. I hum and haw about what to do. Finally I decide, screw it and land everything but the slaanesh prince who is flying in order to get to a better part of the battle field. I cast invis on the N prince, who landed right next to the seer council. I kill a bike squad with shriek, and a warp spider with various psychic shooting. I summon another unit of screamers. The spiders near the
LOC get assaulted by the
LOC and the daemonettes and die. And the other bike squad gets assaulted by the other squad of screamers I summoned in T2. They chomp on two bikes but stay locked.
His other spiders and bikes come in. Both D cannons arrive. He rolls kill a unit twice and opts to go for 3. He shoots the new screamers down to 1 model with the new spiders. The wraith guard kill the plague bearers. One bike squad shoots at my K prince who takes a wound. The other squad boosts into my deployment, behind my other pink horror squad. He doesn't take my bait and multi assaults the daemonnetes and
LOC with the council killing both. On the bright sight, my screamers kill his bike.
Turn 4 I am now way down on maelstrom. It's like 6-3. I roll 2 kill a units and opt to go for three. A gamble but if I get it, the game is back on. This council being invisible and fortuned seems impossible to deal with. And all the fleshbane kills my big guys easily. I am really not sure what to do with it. But I can't let it run free. Nurgle can make it to them, but he didn't roll well enough on powers to tank them. That leaves Tzeentch, who is right next to them. I am reluctant to throw my warlord away, but I need to stall them while I clean up his army. I cast invis on the Tz prince successfully. Also roll 12 on the warpstorm getting me a full unit of pink horrors. Slaanesh flies towards his corner with the wraithgaurd to eventually contest the objective. Tz goes into the council, N into a warp spider squad, K into a D cannon, the bike slaying screamers into the next bike squad, and the lone screamer into the D cannon. Khorne slaughters the cannon, good. Nurgle only kills one warp spider and they hit and run, ugh you suck. The bikes kill a screamer and I fail to kill any but hold. Tzeentch challenges and he accepts with a farseer. I hit with 3 attacks despite them being invisible. He rolls three saves and fails two, rerolls and still fails one. YES, the farseer literally explodes thanks to the staff but no collateral damage. He pushes a wound onto the prince in return. I killed two units so far, its up to my loan screamer to beat to crew members on the Dcannon. I do normal attacks and kill one. They fail leader ship and are 4 inches from the table edge. He runs and I fail to catch. He runs 3 inches and stays on the table
His move, his remaining bike squad shoot my pink horrors. The wraith guard move to get closer to the action. Spiders move and shoot at the free pink horrors on one of the crusade objectives. Combat is a stand still. The screamers and bikes fluff their attacks, and TZ and council can't wound each other. It is important to note, that the farseer with fortune died. They are still invisible.
Turn 5 I failed the gamble, there is no way to catch him in maelstrom, so focus on primary. He got first blood. Nurgle chases the warp spiders and gets 7 inches away from them. I dare not shoot them or they hop away (not broken). Khorne goes to assist the screamers in combat. The lone screamer charges the Dcannon and finishes it this time. Slaanesh continues to fly to his table edge right behind the wraith guard and remaining d cannon. He psychic shrieks the cannon away. The pink horrors fail to manifest flickering fire on the bikes. I then fail to charge the spiders with the N prince. He also cannot see the Tz prince to cast invis. Khorne charges and makes it. Had I been more successful, this would have cleared the board of his units. All he would have is the wraithguard, council, and a serpent. ( We both forgot his dark elder warriors in reserve). As it stands now, he can contest 3 of the objects and holds the one with his wraithguard. The Tz council fight is right on top of an objective. I challenge and he accepts with the other farseer. The magic happens and I kill it and a warlock. The farseer explodes and also kills 3 more warlocks. He fails to wound the prince. I didn't realize how tough re-reollable 3++ followed by 4+
fnp is.
His move is short. He contests the objectives, shooting the units holding them. I go to ground with the pink horrors in a ruin to keep them alive longer. He assaults the pink horrors with the 3 bikes. Tz kills the last warlock, but the autarch lives. He kills some pink horrors, and after instability, there are 5 left. If the game ends, he contests three and owns 1 giving him primary, secondary, first blood and line breaker. I just have line breaker. Thank fully, it goes on.
Turn 6 Nurgle makes his charge this time killing the spiders. Slaanesh lands on his objective with the wraithguard. I still have the free pink horror squad on the third objective. Psychic shriek kills one wraith guard, and lash of despair fails to kill any. Damn. I was hoping to drop the squad with those. Tz prince kills the autarch getting me warlord. The bike/pink horror slapfest continues.
His turn. He scoots the serpent to contest the objective that my Tz prince now owns. Wraithguard kill the Slaanesh prince. Now, he owns one objective, I own one, and he contests two. He would get secondary and first blood and line breaker, I get line breaker and warlord. The game continues. It just doesn't want Ben to win. He is getting agitated as the game just doesn't want him to win. Understandably so.
Turn 7 I see the win and my turn is brief. I actually should have paid attention to any possibilities instead of rush it. Nurgle flies to the bike combat cleaning it up, and Tz wrecks the serpent. The Archon pops out. I remembered he was there, and wasn't too surprised. With this, I have two objectives and he has one giving me primary.
But he has yet another surprise. He moves the archon away from the Tzeentch prince towards the objective with the pink horror squad, He can get into contesting range if he moves 6 and runs 6. This happens. The other move is to line his wraithguard from the objective they currently hold to the one my Tz holds. He can contest mine while holding his. The realization dawns on me as he needs to run three inches with the wraithguard to do this. He rolls a 2. I win primary by the skin of my teeth. In hindsight, I should have just summoned screamers from Tzeentch and contested his objective too, but I was too confident in my position. Had he succeeded, we would have drawn on primary and he has secondary. I win 6-5.
Overall a fun tournament with a variety of players. I take first place overall with 6-0 record. Second place goes to an imperial knight player, then 4 Eldar take 3-6 places. I will definitely go next year. If the pattern continues, we will probably be seeing a 50+ player event next summer. Great time and great opponents. I would also not take the Tetrad in a friendly match in a local
flgs unless you are both preparing for a tournament or are masochists. I am rather new to the army, but it is built to negate a large portion of enemy attacks. The army is frighteningly easy to play. A good player with a strong list will give you trouble. While it can have bad matchups, the list of things it counters is great. A person who just enjoys the hobby and shows up on a Friday night with his infantry tau army would not have a good time. In the spirit of the game, this type of army can ruin it for most players. Just my 2 cents. Thanks for reading!
