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So I went to my third ever 40k tournament and had a blast. There were about 20 or so players and some really lovely tables with great terrain.

The format was 1750pts, 2 detachments, no maelstrom missions. I decided to bring 2 chapter masters and 2 imperial knights for beefy cheese with some supporting units. I figured that without maelstrom, I didn't need too many small units to score objectives every turn and thought it would be better to bring some heavy hitters. My list was:

Space marines (Iron hands)

Chapter master (260pts)
Bike, thunder hammer, shield eternal, digital weapons

Chapter master (230pts)
Bike, power fist, storm shield, combi-grav, digital weapons

Bike squad (150pts)
5 bikes including 2 grav guns, sarge with combi-grav and meltabombs

Bike squad (140pts)
5 bikes including 2 meltaguns, sarge with combi-melta and meltabombs

Stormtalon gunship (125pts)
Skyhammer missiles

Thunderfire cannon (100pts)

Imperial knight detachment

Knight errant (370pts)

Knight paladin (375pts)


Here is a picture of my army:



Round one

My opponent for the first round was an eldar player with a fairly traditional serpents + wraithknights list. Here's a photo of his army:



His list was roughly:

3 serpents with shuriken cannons and dire avengers, 1 serpent with fire dragons and farseer, 2 wraithknights with double cannons, 1 wraithknight with suncannon scattershield scatter laster

The first mission was the relic with the emperor's will. I sort of knew how to play against this list, although it would still be a tough match. I was hoping to take out a wraithknight turn one with all my grav shots and then go serpent hunting. I deploy my knights behind a 3+ ruin thanks to the techmarine and the bike squads on the flanks, with one chapter master eyeing the relic. He wins the roll to go first and moves everything but one serpent up close. His fire dragons get out onto his home objective with his farseer (I think this was a mistake) and all the serpents open up onto the bike squads. Once the smoke clears, both chapter masters have taken 2 wounds but no bikes are dead, 2+ saves rule! He then fires the wraithcannons at a knight but I make all the 3++ saves.
In my turn, I move the grav squad up towards a wraithknight and the other chapter master's squad pick up the relic. My knights swing out sideways to get shots off on serpents and his farseer's squad. I shoot off the battle cannon into the farseer and the firedragons who just have a 5++ cover save and cream the farseer who fails a look-out sir roll for first blood and warlord! Off to a great start. I then put a hull point and blow a scatter laser off a serpent. The central chapter master brings down an orbital bombardment onto a serpent and stuns it as well as wounding a wraithknight. The other chapter master blows his combi-grav, as does the sergeant and the other two grav guns fire. That's 12 grav shots firing at a wraithknight - 9 hit but only 1 wounds! Terrible... I fully expected to cream that knight. I'm too far away to charge. However, at the end of my turn, both chapter masters regain a wound with IWND!
His turn two, he essentially manoeuvres what he can and then opens up into the bike squads again and amongst look-out sir rolls etc. both squads are stripped of all their bikes except for the chapter masters, who remain there with 2 wounds each. In my turn, I then manage to charge serpents with both chapter masters and cream them. I also charge one wounded wraithknight with one of my knights and luckily only lose one hull point but cream him with a D weapon 6. The stormtalon comes in and kills some dire avengers. By this point I'm pretty confident. On his turn he starts to fall back and manages to kill a chapter master. I then take over and kill the remaining serpents and D weapon another wraithknight (taking 4 hull points in the process). At the end of the game, it's closer than it looks as he only has a single dire avenger left on his backfield objective but I score my home objective and all 3 secondaries.

Round 2

My opponent for the second round was a necron player. I was new to facing newcrons so I took my time asking about what each unit did. Here is a picture of his army:



He had 20 warriors, a few wraiths, a destroyer lord with lychguard, some praetorians, some jetbike things, 2 annihilation barges, some scarabs, a night scythe with lord and immortals and a doom scythe.

I was pretty confident against this list due to its lack of armour and I felt like my list could deliver a big punch. The mission was big guns and I had first turn. I basically moved everything forward and open up with the thunderfire into the scarabs. I killed the unit for first blood. I open up with the knights into his warriors which were sitting in buildings and the tournament had ruled that blasts hit all levels of buildings so I took out handfuls just in the first turn... a good start. I also brought down the 2 orbital bombardments onto his barges which were close to the jetbikes. One barge blew up and the other lost its bottom weapon. A great first turn. He responded by moving everything forward and opening up into one of the chapter master's squads. I proceed to make 15 2+ saves like a boss! He doesn't do any damage in his turn. In my turn 2 I start to clean up. The thunderfire finishes off one unit of warriors and the paladin finishes the other. The grav guns open up and blast all but one praetorian to hell. I multi-assault with one bike squad into the praetorians and jetbikes and cream them both. The other bike unit fails its charge. The paladin charges and kills all the wraiths but takes 3 hull points in the process! From here it was basically clean-up with the knights and chapter masters running around in his backfield. I also get all the objectives, secondaries and kill 3 heavy supports for a perfect 15-0 finish!

Round 3

In the third round, I get pitted against the VP leader who's playing a similar nasty list - adamantine lance with white scars. Here is a rubbish photo of his army:



His list was 2 paladins, 1 errant, chapter master with burning blade and shield eternal, a bike squad with grav and a multi-melta attack bike. Also a stormtalon for good measure.

The game is a modified version of kill points. This sucks because he only actually has 6 kill points to give up... 3 of which are knights... I could tell how this was going to go - it kinda depended on lucky 6 rolls with the knights and hoping my other units don't get stomped out. I ended up doing alright, we kind of charged at each other and I managed to kill 2 knights (one in a spectacular D-slap from my own knight), his bike squad, stormtalon and put his master down to 1 wound. However, I just couldn't finish off his seneschal and I ended up getting tabled in response as BOTH my chapter masters were stomped to death after my 2 knights died. So I guess the moral of the story is more knights wins!

All-in-all I was very happy going 2-1 with 2 big victories and a close match at the end! A great day and a great learning experience. Some beautiful armies on display too.




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