That was a long weekend.. I didn't take pictures for battle reports, and didn't think to write down anyones name/army lists for a write up. But I'll do a brief re-cap.
I ended up using the new Space Wolf codex, and didn't finalize my list untill the night before. I should have gone with my original instinct on the list, but ended up switching it at the last minute (something I do often, and this time it somewhat screwed me).
My list was:
Logan Grimnar
x4 Wolf Guard terminators
wolf claws
drop pod
x4 wolf guard terminators
power fists, assault cannon
drop pod
x1 wolf guard
power fist (attaches to the "fighty" grey hunter pack)
x9 Grey hunters
melta gun, mark of the wolfen, power weapon, wolf standard
drop pod
x10 Grey Hunters
x2 melta guns
drop pod
x10 grey hunters
x2 melta guns
drop pod
Lone wolf
terminator armor, thunder hammer, storm shield
x6 long fangs
5 missile launchers
x6 long fangs
5 missile launchers
GAME ONE:
I went against a guy named Zack (Zach?) from california. He had a Chaos nurgle army he made the week before for the event. 2 Princes, but no lash which was a nice change. The mission was kill points, where everything was worth 2 but dedicated transports were worth one.
My initial drops went well, I screwed up deployment of my long fangs and wasn't able to see much after I blew up his rhinos. The first few turns saw me crippling his mobility and getting punched in the face. I whittle most of his squads down and target anything thats an "easy kill". Logan arrives turn 5 and mops up reduced sized units.
Victory to me. I believe it was 16kp to 10.
GAME TWO:
Crashed piolet. A central objective you had to carry off the board.
My opponent was playing space wolves as well. Name was Charlie I think? He was a nice guy, but probably one of the slowest players I've encountered in a tournament. He had to proxy several things (which I can understand since the codex recently changed). Often forgetting to do little things, I would allow him to do so anyway..
I manage to chop his army in half with drop pods and use of a large building in the middle of the table, I opt to deploy my terminators in order to carry the objective and have my grey hunters drop. Back and forth killing for the first 3 or 4 turns, as I near the table edge he throws everything he can into stopping me or slowing me down. Noteworthy charge of 25 blood claws against logan's squads, I use his howl and have preferred enemy. I lose logan to the blood claws, but my wolf guard wipe out the smaller squad and make the larger one break, nearly walking them off the table.
This scenario was difficult to pull a win from, nearly everyone at the tournament tied this round. All my opponent had left on the table was a heavily damaged crusader.
I tied however. But wracked up a ton of victory points.
So now I'm one win, one tie.
GAME THREE:
The scenario was old school, table quarters worth victory points and night fight for 3 turns.
Went against nid-zilla. In all honesty, he was a nice guy.. I was a bit impatient after my shitty game the previous round, so the bad is on me for that one. After being slow played and the guy doing nothing more than trying to get a draw in game two, I was irritated and acted like a bit of a prick. I was also very tired by this point in my defence.. Anyway
nid-zilla with a more balanced twist than usual. Only one tyrant and 3 carnifex, but he did have a broodlord and a good amount of genestealers.
I dropped defensive with the terminators and fighty grey hunter pack. I begin grinding through his line for the first few turns, but miss a key charge with logan due to the horror and 3 bugs with psychic scream. Had I known about it, I'd have made logan fearless to auto-pass the leadership check in order to charge. This cost me nearly two squads over the next two turns.
a close, close game. I had a hand-full of models left by the end, and he had one stealer squad that just finished putting the boots to my long fangs in my own table quarter. I win, but barely.
2 wins, 1 tie. and with that, we break for the night to return for the "secret scenario".
GAME FOUR:
Shoot out. Now, I know sometimes its cute to throw out a weird scenario as a tournament organizer to hear people groan.. But this one was a bit much, I feel had it not been "secret" people would have raised hell over it. Personally, when I first saw it I was kind of pissed and felt a bit cheated that I paid $80 to come play a scenario like this. The scenario was victory points, 16" deployment zones and NO TERRAIN. None, nothing. Not a thing.
Not only this, but I was playing Ryan Shepard's vastroyans which had been punching faces for the first 3 rounds.
To give an idea of what I was up against:
2 company commands in chimeras
4 meltas each
battle psykers in chimera
3 veteran squads in chimeras, 3 plasma each
3 hydras
2 manticores
2 bane wolves
Oh fuck me. Twice. I get to wake up and play against this in the round with zero big, hidey, "I'm a fkn coward" pieces of terrain to cower behind? Lucky for me he didn't include a Inquisitor and Mystics in his list, or I'd have been entirely 100% bent over.
My only hope is a good drop. First turn see's ryan hammering my long fangs. I get very lucky and one unit doesn't run off the board. His banewolfs turbo boost over, ready to spray flaming poop all over my marines, or whatever the hell those tanks actually shoot. The majority of his firing is at my long fang units, I get lucky and survive a lot of it.
My first turn drop is extremely lucky. My pods land exactly where I want them. All 3 grey hunter squads. I drop aggressively on top of him, not giving his firing line much room to wiggle away. My strategy is if I can survive the initial drop, I'll overwhelm him with power armor, krak grenades and foul language. I take pot-shots at a few transports with melta guns and blow most of what I shoot at. I stun one banewolf and prepare to bend over for the other.
Turn two, ryan shifts around a little.. Mostly just to start putting in the boots to my poor marines. Since when does Logan Grimnar, Lord of the Space wolves, High king of Fenris, victor of the first Armageddon war, grizzled old bad ass, think its wise to attack a mechanized guard army out in the complete open? His command should be up for review by the other wolf lords, he is obviously senile and losing his damn mind. Ryan sprays poo all over one long fang squad, reducing them to a single model.
His manticores nearly make one squad of grey hunters their new bitch with something like 20+ wounds inflicted. I get lucky and save most of them. His battle psykers end up doing a perils of the warp on themselves for the second time. Pot shots see my lone-wolf die. My turn two logan and the other terminator squad both arrive. That never happens for me.
So in Ryans defence, I got lucky this turn. It was pivotal.. Sooooo lucky. Lucky like I have never been. Now, when dice hose me (as they often do) it pisses me off. I hate it when a clear win get ruined by dice. He takes this turn right on the chin, smiling. If I were him, I'd be kicking children and throwing minis by this point. A true good sport, and had there been a vote for "best sport" Ryan would have got mine without a doubt.
So turn two, I blast some more tanks. My long fangs kill both banewolfs. Noteworthy shot is that one pack was only one long fang. My grey hunters swarm through the pods in a attempt to overwhelm his line. I try to do mix charges where possible in order to hit a squad as well as tanks to keep me locked in combat with both. But I throw a little too much into his infantry and wipe them where I hit them. My terminators manage to pop the battle psykers chimera.
Turn three onward I manage to pull out the win steadily grinding through his tanks and infantry a few at a time.
Win to the wolves when they shouldnt have got it. I'd gladly play Ryan again any time. He is a solid player and very cool person. The first time in a long time I have genuinely enjoyed a tournament game, win or lose and it was all due to his character.
So now I'm 3 wins, one tie and in the fighting for a spot in top 3.
ROUND FIVE:
5 objectives. Central objective is worth 2.
I go up against a nurgle based force (again) but with 2 lash princes this time (ugh).
So in game 4 the dice did piles of awesome and I stole a win, right? Well in this game, my dice decided it was time to fuck me again. In all the time I'd been using drop pods, this was probably the worst drop I'd ever seen. Every pod managed to scatter almost a full foot away from the other pods, leaving all my squads isolated and waiting to be picked off by the two lash prince tranny tag-team.
However, even with horrible dice I manage to give nearly as good as I get. My opponent's name was Doug and another very cool player. He came from california as well. The game ends on turn 7 with doug holding two objectives and with me holding one. I just couldnt quite get the rolls I needed to squeeze out a tie. Well played to him, but I think the game would have been very different had my initial drop gone well. I usually just castle up a bit at first and reinforce it with later reserves. With all my shit scattering as far away from itself as it could, I was hosed from the start.
So I finish with 3 wins, 1 tie, 1 loss. Doug and I were fighting for second.. It looked like he made off with a good mountain of stuff.
My friend Cody took third with my old Salamander army. So congrats to him.
All in all, a good tournament, I'm considering throwing my dice in the trash... I think the wonky scenarios were okay. Round 4 was a crock of shit though, and downed piolet really sucked.
I think to make round 3 work better would just be:
A: if a player gets it off the board edge, auto-win. game over
B: if a player ends the game holding the objective, its a win.
As it was, it didnt matter if you held the objective.. Or tabled the other guy. It was a tie.
Thanks to everyone for coming out from all over the country. Thanks to Romeo and Battlefoam for sponsoring the event, and thanks to Empire games and Kyle Kinghorn for hosting it, judging and never getting to have any fun punching faces themselves.
I look forward to the next one.
