Nico
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Game 5 vs Paul Buckler
Apologies to Paul for not doing our game justice. He’s an awesome chap all round! He likes to take unusual lists (something we have in common). He took the Lightning Echelon (Fulminators and Tempestors) which I previously took to Honour and Glory (it didn’t go very well). I do think Tempestors are stealth filth with the auto -1 to hit debuff at range.
I do wonder if Fulminators are a bit redundant now that Staunch Defender makes any Dracoth Knight immune to Arrer Boyz and resistant to almost all shooting other than KO. Also nothing is less reliable than 3+, 3+, -1 when doing 3 Damage on the charge - the Dracoths end up doing more damage in melee.
Paul is very experienced and knew it was a bad match up for him. Scorched Earth suits DoT very well as Pinks can be lobbed in suicidally only for the Blues to burn the objective.
That was the plan here - I stopped myself from YOLOing the chicken (which would have been fatal due to the mortal wound pew pew Dracoths). I slowed down the Dracoths and scored early with Horrors and the Chicken zapped away. From memory it wasn’t spectacular and dice continued to disappoint. Paul’s counter attack was pretty spectacular - using the double charge mechanic to penetrate deep into my central objective. However my early lead proved decisive.
Really good game and I look forward to seeing Paul again.
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Day One - Game One
After a practice game vs the delightful George’s Beastclaw Army on the Friday we rocked up early for Game One against Joe Carr’s Hammerstrike Force. Significantly the FAQ for the event made this a true setup rule so they could setup directly into combat (I believe this is correct as no rule should be both a move and a setup). This made my Aetherwings pretty redundant as they could not block this. I did wonder whether they could fly over on the enemy’s charge phase and touch the back of the Retributors to hinder their pile ins (as each model must pile in towards the nearest model).
Deployment
I bunkered with the 30 Vulkites and tunnelled the Magmadroth instead (as he can pop up and then use his “Once per game” ability as it’s not limited to my hero phase. I was near Mystical but didn’t have much of an effect in the game - it’s pretty useless for Fyreslayers as they have ample reroll wounds anyway.
Joe deployed opposite me in a bubble. Throughout the game his zoning off of territory was great - I was never able to get good spots to drop in my 30 blocks.
Joe picked the 4 Quarters Battleplan (the easiest one), while I went for killing 3 Battleline).
Battleround One
Joe chose to go first from memory. He went for it. Smashing in 15 Paladins.
I saved the shot from the Venator (or maybe he just did the Regular shots). The Paladins rolled badly and bounced - only killing a handful of Vulkites (and I had my Battleshock immunity aura) even before I could trigger Reroll Saves from the Battlesmith.
Unfortunately for Joe I remembered a Triumph roll and got Saves, which I could immediately use. In the combat phase.
I would say that Joe was too defensive with his general. He needed Staunch Defender on his Paladins, even if this would require tailing back. He could have dropped him in behind with Liberators as a Shield behind (but I guess this would require a 3+ Roll and would cost him Battleshock immunity).
I started the grind, killing a few Paladins in response.
In my turn, I picked the extra 8” throwing axe range and may even have rolled a 6 for the extra buff.
I got the Reroll Saves Up . The Runemaster tried his Volcano ability on the Heraldor (fighting fire with fire - the two scenery attack heroes). Spoiler - the Runemaster is garbage except for having 6 Wounds.
I tunnelled up 30 Vulkites and the Magmadroth but left the Aurics off the table.
I popped the reroll wounds bubble just catching both units of Vulkites.
The axes weren’t very effective against Liberators (with Staunch and Lantern).
In the charge phase I managed to roll a (1, 2) charge so the reroll couldn’t help. This was the start of a pattern for 9” charges. The Paladins were melting away while the Vulkites stood firm. The Raptors did solid damage against the Retributors.
Battleround 2
The comet came down on the far right. I won the initiative and tightened the net. I hit the rend Rune, so the Vulkites would have -2 rend. The Magmadroth went off right to grab it, but fell short.
The Vulkites in Joe’s deployment area made their charge and swamped the Castellant and the Lord Celestant on Dracoth. I dumped 30 shields into him, dropping 4 wounds. Unfortunately the LCoD survived with a wound left.
I rolled badly for the home Vulkites (4+, 4+ rerollable is still pretty swingy), so the Paladins clung on. My champions sucked all weekend. Damned terrain would be mental on Vulkites.
In response, Joe brought down 10 Liberators to my left (where I couldn’t get the Aurics to them easily) and 5 Liberators on the right objective. He used Lightning Chariot on his Relictor to lob itself to the right corner of the table on my side to score the 4 quarters secondary mission. While I was feeling confident on the primary mission (Starstrike) with 30 Aurics in the back pocket, I really didn’t need to be dragged down to a minor win by not getting my secondary too.
The Paladins were down to just the Maces and the Vulkites just kept coming. The LCoD died as did the Castellant.
Battle Round 3
The comets landed in the far right (vaguely near The Magmadroth) and right next to the Relictor - thankfully not near the 10 Liberators. I won the initiative and moved 3 Heroes onto the middle nearby objective (outnumbering the Relictor). The Magmadroth grabbed the far right objective and vommed Magma over the 5 Liberators - killing 3.
The focus quickly switched to the secondary objective as Joe sensibly conceded the Primary. I still could t get the Aurics into place, but the remaining Vulkites managed to kill off the Liberators by the end of Battleround 5.
Final result: 20-0
I got 1920 kill points to boot, which was a good haul but would keep me off the top table. A lot of the chat before the event was about avoiding/defeating Jack Armstrong with his Kroaknado list.
It was a bad match up for Joe - he killed plenty of Vulkites, but got zero kill points somehow. He went on to win some of his games and said he really enjoyed the event so all good.
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My feedback on #AngelCore can he found here:
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Game 4 - Ian Spink's Bonesplitterz
Game 4 was pivotal - win here and I had a shot at the top 10.
Ian's army had Bonesplitter allegiance – I was worried about the mask (indefinite mortal wounds) as my dice had been poor all weekend. The 30 Arrers were worrying but surely I could smash them with spells turn one as I'd done to the Bloodletters in game 1.
Ian also had a lot of Maniak Boarboyz, which are pretty tasty with a double pile in – I keep looking at them as part of a Gordrakk list. I knew that Big Stabbaz were also a threat and resolved to chaff them up with Horrors.
The Battleplan was Starstrike
Battleround 1
I went first, lobbed out the LoC, and the Herald and formed a bunker 3" away from them. No YOLOChicken this time. The Chicken knew Treason and did minimal damage to the 30 Arrers with it. I summoned the Balewind and lobbed in Infernal Flames, but the dice just sucked. At the end of the turn after Pink shooting and Battleshock there were only 10Arrers dead – a pathetic result. Ian would still have the oh so ridiculous 3 shots per model. I buffed up the Chicken to a 3+ rerolling 1s and 2s. Gateway went into the Stabbasbut didn't even kill one model.
The Curseling went forward too as did the Marauders who made a solid run roll to form a shield in front of the Pink shield.
Ian began his turn. All his spells went off except for the +1 to hit spell and Mystic Shield, which I unbound and then cast onto the Chicken (Rule of One only applies per turn, so you can stack it in this most unusual circumstance). This was probably the only value I got out of the Curseling all game – he is terrible for his cost – far too many opponents where he does nothing.
Lacking the Rukk, the shooting wasn't too bad. I think it chipped 2 wounds off the Chicken. Ian proceeded to make some truly bonkers charges with the Pigs. One was an 11 with a +2, which threaded his huge unit through a tiny gap in my Marauder line (where one had been shot off) and into my Sorceror Lord – who was I thought comfortably safe.
See how far those Pigs moved!
The Stabbaz also got a solid charge and one of them threatened the Herald of Tzeentch.
The Pigs rolled like crazy and killed the Sorceror, the Maras and took several wounds off the Curseling on one side. On the other side the Chicken went in and double one'd his one sword attack that hit. The Maras didn't get their +1 to hit buff and generally stank. The Pinks died. The second wave of Pile Ins shredded even more of my bunker and killed the Curseling, the Herald and the Sorceror Lord, who I had thought were comfortable. Split bogged down Ian's Stabbaz.
Battleround 2
The middle comet came down right.
Ian proceeded to win the initiative and continued the pain. The right pigs strung out right to shield the right objective from my Chariots. The Pigs ate through the Marauders and got onto the Chicken in a big way. In perhaps the most absurd turn of events I've seen for a while, they rolled a 5+, which gives them 6s on wound roll causes a mortal wound and then proceeded to roll 10-12 such sixes (with a double pile in), exactly killing the 2+ save rerolling ones and twos Chicken. Utterly absurd. Even with one wound left he would still have been a colossal threat and on a 4+ the Scrubs would have learned Gateway for use later. I was raging at my dice.
Ian scored 2 points.
In response I failed the Bubble spell, then failed Daemonic Power and Treacherous Bond on the Ogroid. The Chariots hit the back end of the Pig Line on the right and the Spawn hit the left end. There was a glimmer of hope as the Chariots rolled 6 attacks with the flail each and chainsawedthe pigs down to 2 models for minimal losses. The Chaos Warriors and Ogroid killed most of the other unit of Pigs. Still – things were looking exceedingly bleak.
Score 0:2
Battleround 3
The comets came down – mine was left and Ian's diagonally right. I did manage to win the initiative, however I failed to free up the Ogroid to attack the remaining ArrerBoyz on the left side. The Gaunt Summoner needs to learn to shoot. However, I did have a small brain wave as I realised I could summon another Herald (instead of the Toads) onto the far right objective 36" away from the Gaunt Summoner. The Herald started zapping the Pigs on the middle right objective too.
One Chariot went right with the Spawn, while the other one went left. The Scrubs zipped across to score left.
The Ogroid and Warriors were left stranded in no man's land.
In response Ian basically shredded the Ogroid and the middle Chariot and ran a hero towards the far right objective. He cast Hand of Broken which helped him lob 10 bodies a very long way towards the left objective.
Ian scored 6 points.
Score
6:8
Battleround 4
Ian rolled a 2 for initiative and I felt I had a shot – only to roll a 1 – now I was absolutely livid with my dice.
Ian now flooded the left objective with 10 Boyz and the remnants of the Arrer Boyz. Remarkably the handful of Big Stabbaz managed to miss the Blues chaffing them up. The Scrubs wielded their quills to little purpose. This time Ian scored a punishing 8 points. His handful of Pigs clung onto the mid objective.
My Herald managed to cast Bolt of Tzeentch and took off the Maniak Weirdnob running at him in one shot.
The Chariot and Spawn cleared the middle objective too. My remaining Warriors went into the Arrerboyz around the Scrubs, but it was too little too late and more Arrers were flooding in.
I only scored 4 points back as I couldn't quite finish off the pigs in the middle.
Battleround 5
That was game over as I couldn't get the left objective out of the hands of the Arrer Boyz, so Ian would be exactly 1 point ahead. What a game!!!!
Final Score
20:21
My dice were the worst I've ever had in a tournament game. Mostly this was the Chicken dying to absurd mortal wound rolls, but I was also growing increasingly sick of opponents constantly rolling every single casting roll they need, while I struggled to get Daemonic Power off on a 5+ even with rerolls to cast. Every Hand of Broken cast succeeded in particular. #CraigRolls
The initiative roll for Round 4 proved decisive. Had I won I would have cleared the Pigs off a round sooner, scored 8 points; and that would have been that. The dismal rolling for my first turn attempts to nuke the Arrers was also critical.
Thankfully Ian was a delight to play against. If you want drama , if you want dynamism and excitement, then AoS is your game. An underdog army can beat an army armed with the very tools to combat it (Infernal Flames, Treason and very strong rerollable saves).
We both had hats, although my fez is mainly a dice cup. The Bonesplitterz are a force to be reckoned with thanks to the strength of the double pile in Pigs and the Big Stabbaz – they aren't confined to arrer spam. Ian finished well as I recall and was up near the top.
Mid-table mediocrity beckoned for me, however.
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Saturday night was Bugman's and the quiz! I can recommend the chicken burger.
A team of just Ben Savva and I came 2nd, which was a great result - no doubt assisted by Ben's artwork for next AoS release - the mighty Squig Zeppelin Pirates!
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Game 3 – Craig Namvar and the Vanguard Wing
My reward for losing game 2 to DoT was surely softer opposition in game 3 – not so as I faced off against Jack Armstrong's list, which had recently won Facehammer – the Stardrake, 30 teleporting Libs and some more pewpew.
The Battleplan was Battle for the Pass – longwise.
Deployment
The extra space behind meant that Craig could hide his Castellant with impunity and he did the same with the Liberators themselves, so no Infernal Flames for me.
Happily, I had a sweet building to bunker in and could pop the Chaos Spawn in the doorway to block it.
I knew I would be going down the usual LoC, Horrors, Split, Plague Toads route for this game. The question was whether to go first or second. If I went first, then I could deploy the Horrors as an additional shield around my bunker. However, Craig might get a double turn and be able to redeploy his stuff to smash through the hole he made in my bunker in his first turn (as he can set up out of combat without it counting as a retreat).
Craig's final drop was putting his Stardrake on the borderline, but right by his side of the table, next to the Judicators. This was probably to make it easier for him to fly vaguely near the bunker for Staunch Defendering. However, it left the Stardrake within 36" of my batch of Wizards. This tipped the balance for me and I opted to go first.
Battleround 1
My DD were poor – only one six from memory. However, that didn't stop me from having a brutal hero phase. I summoned on the Chicken and fired off Gateway into the Stardrake, then Inferno. Inferno did really well – netting 7 mortal wounds for a change. The Herald pumped out the final mortal wounds to kill it.
Meanwhile the Ogroid summoned 10 Pinks partly in front of my bunker and partly to threaten the 5 Judicators on the middle line. This meant he didn't have Treacherous Bond.
I used a 6 and a 4 to make a 10" charge into the Judicators near the Starcorpse with the LoC. He was toting 3 sword attacks and Daemonic Power but proceeded to fluff his rolls completely – doing zero melee damage. I scored 5 points.
In response the Liberators went in. They wrapped around most of my bunker and the Pinks. The Grandhammers concentrated on the Chariot which formed part of the ring. Shooting was painful, especially rerolling 1s to hit with Judicators. The Herald died. However, the Prosecutors lacked line of sight of the Gaunt Summoner and the scoundrel clung on with 1 wound left.
The Combat Phase deleted 10 Maras and a Chariot, together with just some of the Pinks. The Chaos Warriors did well in response, but Craig saved like a god. Split gave me a tonne of models on the nearby side objective. I used a 1 for Battleshock and got 2 Pinks back.
Craig didn't outnumber me on my home objective, so only scored 3 points.
Score 5:3
Battleround 2
I won the initiative.
The Chicken cast Gateway and struck down the Castellant with one zap – the only model guarding Craig's home objective. He failed his other spell, which was painful. I also forgot to cast anything with the Pink Horrors, who should have had Treason to help grind down the Liberators. After the game I realised that I should have summoned another Herald knowing Treason instead of trying pointlessly to get 3 Plague Toads on – I ended the game with 140 left in the summoning pool.
Infernal Flames rolled pretty well and I got Treacherous Bond off from the Ogroid to the Spawn. Various other spells went off. Meanwhile the Chicken ran onto Craig's objective.
My shooting bounced off the Judicators embarrassingly. Combat was meh, with the Ogroid doing poorly/Craig rolling all his saves on 3 damage hits. Battleshock was a 4 or so and the Liberator line was looking much thinned.
I scored a healthy 7 points.
In response, Craig shot off the Gaunt Summoner and my Sorceror Lord on a Horse. He started to grind down the Horrors, but not quickly enough to score. The Liberators were rolling very hot and cleared off the Chaos Warriors, but my Curseling came in and did some damage in return. Craig had removed casualties to suck the Ogroid out of combat. This time Craig had more models on my home objective. Prosecutors moved onto his own home objective and shot plenty of wounds off my Chicken. The Liberators were pretty much down to the Hammer now.
Craig scored 7 too.
Score 12:10.
I won the initiative.
Battleround 3
The Chicken took out the Prosecutors and again seized Craig's home objective. Meanwhile the Ogroid sensed an opportunity – a sweet Fireblast could potentially take out 3 Liberators and also bring on 5-6 Brimstone Horrors directly onto the objective, who could then move as normal.
However, it was not to be, I rolled a 1 for the damage. Nemo, the Ogroid continued to derp, when he could readily have wiped the unit. Craig killed him with his final two Liberators (which was obscene – how did they do 8 damage vs Paradoxical Shield)? Battleshock finally claimed the Liberators or maybe it was the Spawn.
The Pinks were dead and the Blues couldn't hit a barn door, but they kept on scoring.
I scored 6.
Craig cleared up my home objective and continued to work on the Blues. He retreat-ran his Prosecutors and rolled a 5! to get his home objective back. Craig scored 7.
Score 18:17
Battleround 4
We were running short on time. I believe Craig won the initiative. He shot and charged the Chicken and got it down to 2 wounds before melee. I had to make a 4+ save for the game, which I did. The Chicken killed them, so Craig didn't score his home.
Craig scored 6.
In response, I scored a final 6; and won the game.
Final Score 24:23
I think the final score at the time was 25-22 for the record.
A very, very close one. Craig was a cool guy to play against too.
This really underscored the strength of the Vanguard Wing – even with over 500 points shredded turn one, it very nearly beat my bunker.
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Game 2
Interestingly the draw was based only on tournament points, not kill points (so much for the upper mid-level submarine). I ended up in a Tzeentch off for Game 2. As a result of the excessive magical forces surrounding the game, almost all records have been lost in a time slip. Only the Major Defeat for me escaped the vortex.
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Game 1 – Eilir's Khorne
It was a leisurely start time for the Finals which was much appreciated given my lack of sleep due to my 7-month old son. Khorne wasn't a great match up for DoT, but thankfully my opponent (who was a lovely chap) didn't have the Brazen Rune. His army looked sweet too!
The Battleplan was Duality of Death vs Skarbrandanother Billy, 30 Letters and the usual Bloodboundstuff including 10 Wrathbros.
Battleround 1
I chose the correct strategy in terms of summoning. I summoned the LoC, who knew Treason of Tzeentch – he got fully buffed up. I began the magical onslaught, by nuking the letters with Treason and then Infernal Flames. Gateway and spells from the Herald slammed into Skarbrand, but only made him angrier.
The Chicken saw the Bloodsecrator in front of him and charged in – killing him exactly with the sword (which was a bit lucky on my part). The Blood Warriors did little in return due to Shield of Fate and Mystic Shield. Meanwhile the Horrors failed their charge and held a line in front of the rest of the army.
The Ogroid got onto the left objective, while the Curseling took the right.
My opponent moved up and wrecked the Pinks. Skarbrand was in whipping range and made a long charge into the LoC. The LoC got obliterated – at least 16 wounds from Carnage.
The Pinks also died, but this meant the Blues got into the way of Skarbrand and co. The Blood Tithe was overflowing at this point – 5 points already. The Bloodthirster on my right tried to clobber the Curseling, but without success.
Battleround 2
I won the initiative, but my opponent used Blood Tithe to decimate the Blues with Skarbrand. 1 Blue defiantly survived. The Brims replaced them. I had a chariot exactly 3" away from Skarbrand. I zapped at Skarbrand until he had 1 wound left. Would the little Blue Horror that could deal the fatal blow?
The other chariot failed a 3" charge leaving my Ogroid unprotected other than by his Treacherous Bond to 10 Marauders. Painful.
The Blue failed to do the business, but thankfully the Chariot completed the job.
My opponent surged in and really started wrecking my chaff. The Ogroid saved a lot and bounced wounds onto the Maras. The Billy killed the Curseling in the hero phase and started scoring. He then shredded the Chaos Warriors too.
Battleround 3
I think I won the initiative again. I kept sniping at the right Billy with the Gaunt Summoner and the Scrubs, but did little. It was very much delay and rack up the points now.
As part of that delay the Chariot tried to charge again and failed a 3" charge again….
Meanwhile the forces of Khorne shredded my middle and eventually the Ogroid failed Treacherous Bond. He clung on with a few wounds.
Battleround 4
I was fortunate to win the initiative again. The Ogroid managed to retreat out of combat while staying within 3" of the objective (which I believe is legal), you cannot retreat onto the objective to grab control, but seemingly can move as you like afterwards provided you end within 3".
I then got the Chariot into the Slaughterpriest and Mr Whippy. As this meant they couldn't score next turn, this made my lead insurmountable.
An exciting and close game though!
In retrospect, I should have used spells to nuke the Bloodsecrator, rather than melee and hidden the LoC and the Herald inside a Horror Bunker to guarantee two full turns of zappy zap, followed by fly and goodbye onto the objective. I underestimated how farSkarbrand would reach. Nevertheless, it was a Major win and 1,100 kill points to 1,300. A decent start. I was pumped because I was a few metres away from Table 1 and heard the howl of anguish from Ben Savva's opponent - he had thrown it away to Skryre's benefit!
One of the Warhammer TV team said some very kind things about my army painting and invited me to be on the Livestream. However, it didn't pan out in the end. Thanks a great deal for the kind comments on the painting.
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Right - here we go - had a great time and event amazing overall and well organised!
Practice games
For my practice games I was fortunate to bump into Dan Mitchell of the Ashes of the Imperium podcast with his Pestilens army. After realising that my Nurgle Exalted Greater Daemon was essentially immune to Dan's catapults, my brain slowly realised that for a meaningful contest I should probably summon the Chicken Bucket (EGD of Tzeentch) instead, which I hadn't used on the table before.
The EGD has 3 valuable features – a 3+ save and 20 wounds, a bigger command ability bubble and Turbo Gateway – on a 2+, which could readily do 8 mortal wounds rather than 6. The second feature didn't apply to me. He is however, a lot of points 580 – if I take him, then I can only summon on the Balewind for 100 and 3 Plague Toads for the final 100 (780).
Summoning the Plague Toads is a real pain as it's an 11 cast and the 2+ cast anything ability of the Scrubs doesn't help (since it would just cast the summon the single Toad version); and you cannot try to reroll the failed cast either – as if you roll a 5, then you've cast the summon a single Toad version. The goal of the Toads is to suck up wounds from the Treacherous Bonds spell with their 4++ ward save.
Against Dan I lobbed in the Chicken and stuck a bunch of buffs on him – Mystic Shield (possibly I failed the cast), Daemonic Power and Shield of Fate. The Chicken Bucket zapped 5 wounds off a Plague Furnace, but it was hardly the pyrotechnics I was used to with DoT.
He went into the Furnace and 40 Monks.
Meanwhile the Gaunt Summoner annihilated the other unit of Monks.
After that Dan basically ground me down. The chicken melted surprisingly fast to mortal wounds and sheer volume of attacks. I never got the Toads on. Dan romped through my other units and claimed a major. A sobering experience. Having played with an army that lobbed blocks of buffed Clanrats and Stormvermin at people, I was experienced in how nothing beats the killing power of a fully buffed block (30 Stormvermin fully buffed was obscene at -2 rend – possibly only Bloodletters and old school Necropolis Knights could compete with this).
However, I knew that the Chicken Bucket was a marginal option – probably only if I needed a tougher lynchpin to boss the magic phase, for example in a DoT-off or against Sylvaneth – oh look I've learned regrowth on my 20 wound model….
The second game was more ominous. It was against a well-commanded DoT list. He had a Chicken, 20Tzaangor, 6 Skyfires and the usual supporting cast – but no Scrubs and no battalion. For whatever reason he put the Skyfires on the 12" line (maybe he thought I would give him turn one) with the Chicken and Tzaangornearby. I somehow failed to have the DD to cast summon LoC, which was pretty fatal – I probably should have cast it using the Gaunt Summoner, who was +3 to cast with best 2 out of 3 dice, but I wanted to get Arcane Transformation off too.
However, the effective part of the plan was summoning on the 10 Pinks and getting them into combat with theSkyfires, who wrecked them. Due to a discussion about when split occurs, I was unable to pin the Chicken and the Tzaangor too. I lobbed Infernal Flames at the Tzaangor and dented the unit nicely. The game threw up an interesting issue about the split FAQ, what the meaning of the words "If a rule" wipes out the unit all at once. I thought that this was talking about weird rules like going through a Realmgate and things going wrong, but my opponent thought "a rule" could include dying to regular melee attacks. It does make a fair difference as to when the Horrors arrive. I'm minded to play it my way – end of the phase - for the time being, but it could be cleared up.
Nevertheless, the Skyfires were locked down for a turn, just like in my game vs Joe. However, while I had deliberately lobbed the Curseling forward in order to unbind Gateway and fire it back in my opponent's face, for some reason I had also been really aggressive with Chariots and other wizards who should have stayed back.
My opponent proceeded to zap and then batter my forces. The Skyfires stayed occupied for a time, but eventually came out to wreck me. I wasn't able to get either the Toads or the LoC onto the table for far too long and it was a crushing defeat in the end.
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So two fun practice games today vs Dan Mitchell and Shaun.
Got me warmed up - still rather tired.
I lost both games. I tried out the Exalted Greater Daemon of Tzeentch vs Skaven - he sucked. Then I went up against my nemesis - the Skyfires. I played far too aggressively and got zapped off. My Pink Horrors did well.
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Massive Kudos to GW for the changes to the Firestorm abilities - this is good news for Death and Destruction in particular. They adopted the solution that @Thomas Lyons and I reached.
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The problem is that the pool was crafted for particular combos.
I don't doubt that 40 rending Maras are strong!
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I do not rate Glimpse. I suppose it helps with Shield of Fate, but underwhelmed.
Firestorm (Inferno) seems palpably worse than Bolt of Tzeentch.
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Give Archaon Treacherous Bond and it might work out ok ?
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I think I simply didn't have room. It's not a spell I particularly rate either. It would be a great spell if it was Lore of Change, so that that third unit of Pink Horrors could cast it while looking derpy in your line.
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Right - here we go:
Sunday – Game 5 – Joe and the Skyfires (DoT-off)
Skyfires were one of the units I was hoping to avoid. Joe had 21 and the Battleplan was Starstrike. The repointing is insufficient – they are still better than Kurnoth Hunters (they do more effective pew pew than bows and as much melee damage as Scythes), Dracoth Knights and Plague Drones. I think the biggest fix would be reducing the maximum unit size to 6. Wiping out 36 wounds is incredibly difficult – especially as they will be getting a 1 on that Battleshock roll.
One brightspot was that I would be able to pick who would be going first.
Deployment
I won the roll and got the side with the Damned Terrain on it (so preventing the autowin for Joe). I deployed in a fairly tight multi-layered bunker slightly to the right. Joe deployed his Skyfires close together in a cluster behind a thin line of chaff. I'm pretty sure that he expected I would give him turn one – as on reflection his deployment actually handed me the chance to win the game on a platter. In particular Joe's Shaman wasn't tucked away in the corner, so I would be able to summon units within 9" of it.
Battleround 1
I needed Joe to commit his forces, bounce off my Treacherous Bonded Kairos and the IllusionistMantisorc and chaff and then for me to focus fire one unit of Skyfires with my whole army. This meant that I needed to take turn one. Had I not done so, he could likely have taken Kairos off turn one.
I realised that the same ploy I had used against Matt could also work here. By lobbing in Pink Horrors, I would end up with 10 Blue Horrors at the end of my turn. Joe wouldn't be able to zap them off in his hero phase and so they would hold up some or all of his units.
I had a solid set of DD this turn and Joe's were dreadful, which gave me some hope.
I reasoned that with the Pinks' pew pew and Magic, if I managed to make the charge into the 9 Skyfires on the right with 20 Summoned Bloodletters, I could kill enough of them to put Battleshock in jeopardy. If Joe used a 1 for Battleshock, then the Hornblower would force him to reroll this, or Kairos could change it to a 6. I reasoned that the -1 rend of the Bloodletters would chop through their 5+ save nicely.
The spells all went off. Sadly Bolt of Tzeentch only claimed 3 wounds or so. Kairos bonded himself to a chariot. The Pinks shooting contributed another 2 wounds. I used DD to make the Pinks' charge. Sadly the Bloodletters failed their charge and so Kairos had to rig the roll.
In combat, I activated the Bloodletters first – they were extremely underwhelming. When all was said and done only 2 Skyfires died and another lost 3 wounds – absolutely dismal. Two Skyfires in the other unit killed about 7 Pinks by themselves. To compound my misery –without the rerolls, the Skyfires killed 18 Bloodletters after Joe rolled a 3 on a D3 for their attacks. The unit was dead. On a brighter note at the end of the Combat Phase I was able to slot all of the Blues into place behind Joe's line (wholly within 6" of the Pinks) – tagging all 3 units of Skyfires and the Shaman. Joe wouldn't be able to zap them off before the Movement Phase and so his whole effective army would be stuck for a turn. I used a 1 for the Pinks' Battleshock and got the unit back up to 6 models. I was livid about the Bloodletters derping so badly. However, on reflection, this was just a terrible plan – they just don't do the damage I was counting on in my imagination (probably 7 mortal wounds and another 4 regular ones).
On reflection, all I had to do was not summon the Bloodletters. Instead either cast Bolt of Tzeentch with the Pinks at the Shaman and use Kairos to turn this to a 6 to one-shot him or summon on a Herald as well and use Pink Fire, Bolt of Tzeentch and then Arcane Bolt if needed to finish the job. This was all possible as Joe's Shaman wasn't more than 9" behind his front line and Joe's DD weren't good enough to block my spells. With Kairos Treacherous bonded to 3 Toads and theMantisorc immune to mortal wound pew pew from the Skyfires – I think this would have been game over.
Joe's turn was uneventful – he failed his spells, although the Changeling revealed himself and proceeded to zap off my Gaunt Summoner (he rolled a great cast roll). I didn't really see the point of this – I suppose his spell was ok against 9 models.
I won the initiative and gave Joe the initiative – he seemed surprised by this. The point was that after wasting my summoning points – I had literally nothing in threat range against the Skyfires. Had he won, he should have given me the turn.
Battleround 2
Joe zoomed forwards and was able to cast Mystic Shield unopposed. This is where the 27" unbind trait would have been huge. He shot the Curseling dead. He zapped off the Marauders and charged into the Acolytes with one unit of 9 (the one with Mystic Shield) – he just made the 7" charge, but at least he didn't connect with theOgroid. He shot the Bonded Chariot.
I was dented but still in the game. I revved up everything and poured everything into the big unit of 9 Skyfires. I may have failed Bubble at this point, which was frustrating. Kairos either failed Wind of Chaos or did very poorly with it – somehow there were still 9 Skyfiresalive when I charged in. I bonded Kairos to 10 Marauders who stayed back. Everything else lined up charges into the Skyfires. I made all the charges (in some cases narrowly) and had them surrounded. The impact hits from the Ogroid were poor. The melee from the Ogroid was really poor (despite Infusion Arcanum). Joe rolled fairly poorly for the number of disk attacks, which gave me some hope. The Ogroid got to attack again and I believe he may have rolled a double one for his 3 damage attacks. The derping theme continued. 3Skyfires died in the end – seriously dismal.
I won the must-win initiative roll and took the double turn.
Battleround 3
I continued the zapping and the chopping. The Skyfiresslowly died but it wasn't enough – Joe did some damage back. In the end I think there were still 3 alive – obscene.
Joe blasted the Marauders and then started chopping wounds off Kairos. I had a final chance to wipe the unit, but blew it.
Joe won the initiative and I conceded soon afterwards. I don't think I've ever thrown away a game as badly as this one. I am still kicking myself over this one.
Joe was lovely throughout (his dice were also lovely to him, which didn't help). We're 1 win each now (1:1).
Aftermath
This knocked me down to 3 Major Wins and 2 Major Losses. I came 32nd from memory – not bad – but I should have beaten Joe and snuck into the top 10. I still detest Skyfires as the worst designed unit in the game and they are still a significant imbalance in the game (because they are amongst the best melee damage per point in the game on a unit that can make turn one charges and which is deceptively resilient). As predicted, Tzeentch have eaten a load of unjustified nerfs (in addition to the justified ones) because Skyfires are so hated. They've even nerfed the Eternal Conflagration – the never used Battalion with like 6 Exalted Flamers – garbage; and nerfed the Windthief into the ground so it's unusable – it should be a move in your hero phase – it's limited to Arcanite Heroes so it doesn't even enable an alpha strike charge of any substance.
All in all, a fantastic weekend at a great venue - really enjoyable. The entire SLL crew had a great time and our leader Rob Bradley would have been 3rd had he prevailed over Mark Wildman.
@Chris Tomlin very kindly gave me some painting tips after the event, which was cool.
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Thanks Steve!
The best is still to come - taking on Joe's 21 Skyfires.
Yes - here are some photos from another post on the blog:
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On a slightly bigger scale, here's the Chicken Bucket!
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Here's a close up of the newly painted Mounted Sorceror Lord on Horse to illustrate the basing.
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I was trusted with finding a restaurant – Giovanni's Italian was excellent – with great portion sized to boot! We were accompanied by Mediocre Joe who was pretending to be on a stag do….
Game 4 – Matt Lyons – Cthulhu Nurgle
Matt was an awesome dude and it was great to put a face to the voice from past Black Sun episodes and his new Pro-Painted podcast (I'm half way through Episode 2 while painting for the GT Finals). His army looked sweet – fantastic conversions and painting.
To smooth things along Chris had told us the Battleplan and the opponent the night before – accordingly I'd spent far too much time mentally rehearsing the game. The Battleplan was Scorched Earth which I liked in principle and is particularly suited to alow drop Tzeentch army. Matt's army was full of Blightkings using the Blight Guard? Battalion (-1 to hit debuff), whose slowness would not help on a 6 objective map.
Deployment
As predicted – Matt was forced to cover his objectives with units of 5 Blightkings as well as a 30 Block of Plaguebearers on my right. The Glottkin was his general.
I deployed fairly centrally with the Gaunt Summoner in the middle. There was a natural funnel between the scenery in front of my centre.
Battleround 1
My first hero phase was Tzeentch firing on all cylinders – although I have a feeling that the Scrubs failed their cast roll for the bubble. In any event, I first Balewinded the Gaunt Summoner, who nuked about 8 Plaguebearerswith Infernal Flames. He also 'nudged the Beetle'shunting the Curseling forward 5 or so inches towards The Glottkin. The Curseling proceeded to Glean Magic (24" range) The Glottkin's own spell (it's not clear whether his roll to learn the spell is a casting roll or not – he has to match the casting value on 2 dice – purposively it probably is). I then cast this spell on the Acolytes to give them 2 wounds each, which was fun. Meanwhile I summoned on 10 Pinks 9" away from the left objective and the 10 Blightkings there, along with a Herald of Tzeentch. They proceeded to zap the middle unit ofBlightkings (as the leftmost unit were out of position once the objective was burned).
I used Destiny Dice to make the 9" charge and lobbed in the Pinks. They died as expected in the Combat Phase and then spawned a bunch of Blues on the objective, who necessarily outnumbered Matt's Blightkings. I burned the objective and rolled 2 points.
Score 5-0
Matt responded by casting Mystic Shield with a good cast roll (interestingly if the Curseling unbinds and casts it, then you can have two Mystic Shields in effect as the Rule of One only applies in your turn). The Glottkin fired off their bubble buff and wandered forward. Rather foolishly I'd left the Curseling where The Glottkin could charge him as well as the Herald. In the event, The Glottkin killed the Curseling, but didn't kill the Herald.
At some stage I mentioned to Matt that The Glottkin'scharge impact hits rule occurs when The Glottkin charges rather than the other way around ("they" is the 3 Brothers Glott plural). It could be clearer. Also his -1 to hit rule could be better!
Score 5-2
Battleround 2
Matt won the initiative and The Glottkin proceeded to eat the Acolytes even with 2 wounds thanks to their junk bravery. His Blightkings failed a Mystical test on the right.
In my turn, I Treacherous Bonded Kairos to some Marauders on the right and then lobbed Wind of Chaos at The Glottkin. The Ogroid took Infusion Arcanum and an extra attack from Arcane Transformation. I went into The Glottkin with the Ogroid and Kairos and eventually deleted him. My Chariot on the right attacked theBlightkings but didn't achieve much – minus 1 to hit being brutal.
Battleround 3
Matt won the initiative and the wave of Blightkingslanded. In the middle they deleted the Ogroid and Kairos slowly ground them down. The ones on the left weren't able to get more bodies onto the objective.
On the right, Matt lobbed his Lord on Daemonic Mount into my Chaos Spawn, but derped his attacks.
That was pretty much game over. In the middle Kairos cleaned up and started advancing on the Rot Sorceror. I ultimately burned that objective, while Matt burnt my right one. The Gaunt Summoner kept melting Plaguebearers and eventually Kairos would have taken that objective too. Matt kindly conceded.
It was an enjoyable game and Matt was great to chat to. It did make me fear for the viability of Nurgle lists – they haven't fared terribly well under the GHB (with @thomas Lyons as the striking exception. Their speed is a huge problem.
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Saturday – Game 3 – Murdermost! Dan Ford (Khorne Murderhost)
The Battleplan was Battle For the Pass – which wasn't ideal as Dan could threaten the objectives with 120 Bloodletters across 4 units together with another 3 units of 10. If I had been on Duality of Death this would have been easy – sniping off his heroes – the Murderhost is far from an autowin.
On the plus side, it did give me space to retreat back into. Dan had literally no ranged threat, which meant that anything I stuck on the Balewind would beunkillable. Given that this would be the Gaunt Summoner – I had the tools to win this game, even if Dan would be starting off with an early lead.
Dan was an absolute gentleman as always and exceptionally proficient in playing the game and particularly this army. He was very cognizant of the possible threats – e.g. me summoning a unit behind his horde to threaten his 4 pointer objective. I've learned more from Dan than any other AoS player – he taught me Tomb Kings and the fire a single cannonball into your opponent each turn strategy which I've put into my own arsenal (e.g. the Clanrat Bomb list that came 6th at Heat 3). We were 1 win each prior to this game.
http://www.tga.community/blogs/entry/1008-nico-takes-on-heat-3/
We'd chatted about his list before and I knew he had done well with it all year. He had everything ready – colour coded movement trays for his 150 odd Bloodletters– dice to mark out his 2 D6 rolls. I've got to say it's a real shame that Cunning Deceiver is better than the Khorne Allegiance pack – they should have nuked that ability rather than Lord of War. It didn't matter against me as my army is light on shooting.
I knew I wanted to go first so that I would get some damage in before the Bloodsecrator came down and made the 30s immune to Battleshock. We were both 3 drop armies. I won the roll off so took turn one after Dan did his free move from Murderhost. He rolled pretty well. I moved some of his models for him throughout; and I had a script for my hero phase, so we zoomed through this game and ended with 40+ minutes to spare!
My Destiny Dice were dire for this game – one 6 and four 3s.
Deployment
I deployed Marauders as chaff on both sides. The Gaunt Summoner was up front as was Kairos. I had a second defensive line of the Chariots and Acolytes. Dan had the Red Tide. The Bloodsecrator was diagonally opposite Kairos and co.
Battleround 1
Fortunately I had a building on my side of the table with which I could split Dan's forces in two and funnel his forces on the right into a trap (tanking them with Kairos and then hitting back with the Ogroid). I did this by using the Balewind as a wall adjacent to the building.
The Scrubs did their bubble thing. However, the humble Flesh Hounds were in unbinding range of Kairos and the Gaunt Summoner. They also had a rerollable unbind. I wasn't in range/line of sight of the Herald sadly. With only one 6 in the tank – I managed a decent cast for the Balewind Vortex and Dan failed that unbind. I also buffed up the Ogroid's horns. I pondered using the 6 for the Infernal Flames cast, but ended up rolling it – I rolled a 6+2 for the exact casting value – but this was almost the worst outcome as it gave Dan the best chance to unbind it. He duly rolled a double 6. I thought about using Kairos to change one dice to a 1, but elected not to do so – because he would still have a reroll of both dice and could just get a 9+ (I was hoping to use the Kairos dice to block a charge as had worked well vs the Seraphon). With hindsight this was a costly mistake – I should have spanked the 6 on the DD to give me a minimum cast roll of 9 and then used Oracle if Dan beat it. It would have killed 15 Bloodletters and Battleshock would take a further D6+4 – basically crippling a quarter of the army's strength.
Kairos tried to cast Wind of Chaos and rolled badly – for some reason I elected to zap the puppies, even though getting a unit below 20 models would significantly weaken it.
After that I made a swift retreat with Kairos and established a new defensive line (in preparation for the double turn). The Gaunt Summoner sat on his perch fuming. The Maras ran forward and scored the points for the objectives without pulling in the Bloodletters. I scored 5 points.
Dan spent his first turn chomping through the maras and scored 5 points straight back.
Score 5 – 5
I won the initiative.
Battleround 2
This time I cast Infernal Flames – but rolled quite poorly – it did take one unit below 20 at least – Battleshock immunity hurt. Kairos and co. set up the Plague Toads (I think I had to burn the 6 DD for this) and Kairos bonded himself to them. I also summoned Pink Horrors who formed a line in front of my army. On the far left I lobbed in a chariot to try to take down some Bloodletters, but didn't do much. The Chariot may have actually survived happily. The other chariot formed a makeshift wall in front of the Puppies on the left side of the building.
Score 6 - 5
Dan swept forward on the left flank and deleted my makeshift wall of Chariots. Dan held back on the right – content to hog the objective. Dan scored another 5 points.
Score 6 - 10
This time Dan won the initiative.
Battleround 3
Dan made a big roll for the movement of the leftBloodletter unit and surged around my Acolyte Wall. His puppies went into the Pink Horrors and got plenty of bodies onto my home objective. He killed the Ogroidand most of the Acolytes, which was a hammer blow as I had been relying on him to cripple a unit of Bloodletters as a counterpunch on the left (while Kairos would clean up on the right). On the plus side the Blue Scrubs had learned Infusion Arcanum off him already. The Manticore Sorc started killing the big unit of Bloodletters.
Dan scored a whopping 9 points.
Score 6 - 19
The Gaunt Summoner cast Infernal Flames again and killed another 14 odd Bloodletters. Kairos came out to bat with both Infusion Arcanum and Treacherous Bond on him. The Manticore Sorc cast Wind of Chaos and started taking out the Bloodletters. I activated theManticore Sorc first (as Kairos was sufficiently tanky) and he crippled the big unit of Bloodletters that had broken my lines. However, one model within range of the Bloodsecrator meant they would not pop.
The Bloodletters did one wound to Kairos and a handful to the Toads. Kairos spanked some 3s from my DD pool and killed about 11 Bloodletters – I think Dan was pretty shocked.
However, it was too little too late. I only scored a single point in return.
Score 7 - 19
I think Dan won the initiative again.
Battleround 4
Dan pulled back some of his Bloodletters onto the objectives – all 4 units were heavily depleted now. Dan went into Kairos with the second unit of Bloodletters, but did very little. Kairos killed another 10 or so.
Dan scored a further 5 points. It was all over.
Score 7 – 24
In response, the Mantisorc chased up the Bloodletters. Kairos wiped out one unit of Bloodletters and dented the last one. I may have finally clawed back the right objective. I was gunning for kill points now.
Score 10 – 24
Battleround 5
Dan won the initiative and retreated away – not very Khorne like – that Herald had survived the whole game. In response, Kairos tried for a long bomb charge but didn't make it.
Major Defeat
It was a great game – not quite the classic of our Tomb King-off at this very venue earlier in the year (which I won).
I felt a bit down as I knew I'd made mistakes in this game. As well as not near-guaranteeing Infernal Flames early doors, I should also have thrown in Kairos bonded to the Toads sooner, rather than waiting for the GauntSummoner to deplete the units.
Other than that the strategy of successive chaff walls while chipping away was the right one. Perhaps I should have summoned the Pinks in sooner and used them (with Blues) to lock down the left flank for Battleround 1, and had the Marauders behind them as a second line.
Dan was very helpful in discussing my options throughout the game and I think we both let each other do some ability we'd forgotten. I gave him my sports vote – partly in reflection of the efforts in preparing the army and getting so familiar with it that we finished the game early. My constant jumping from army to army (I briefly held the Changeling Icon on Bad Dice) probably costs me places at events.
If I had won the initiative again for Battleround 3, then I still might have pulled the game back if the GauntSummoner melted the left Bloodletters and stopped Dan from scoring those big 4 points in the centre.
On the plus side – the army certainly has the tools to deal with hordes and I'd be confident playing anyMurderhost wielded by a lesser player. There's no shame in losing to a player as strong as Dan and a very strong list – Dan would ultimately go on to take out the event.
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This is a fairly close shot on the bases. I'm touching up the Pink Horrors which were the first unit I did. Can take another one if you need. The Water is Vallejo Ivory, then Badger Ghost Tint Plasma Fluid, then Vallejo Water over that. I used Vince Venturella's method.
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They give you reroll casts, which is a huge deal - you can try the spell naturally then use Destiny Dice if you fail. They also learn spells.
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Saturday - Game 2 vs Jack McQuiggin (Seraphon)
It was Duality of Death. I was nervous at seeing Seraphon as an opponent. They have some anti-Daemon tricks and my only previous game against them had been a Kroak inferno at my first London's Calling two years ago - a brutal defeat.
Jack was a cool dude and had painted goggly eyes onto his Dread Saurian which earns some serious hobby kudos! He was also using the Firelance Battalion of Saurus Cavalry, which are slow junk!
He didn't have a Slann - instead fitting in the Dread Saurian, the Snake Bastiladon and some Kroxigor and the Shadowstrike Starhost. While I didn't raise the point in this game (partly as it was only a unit of 3 models). The Blot Toads rule is NOT available as the Rippers aren't on the table in your first hero phase (which is the only time that this ability can be used) - they only arrive in the movement phase - too late:
This is good as this is one of the most outrageous alpha strikes in the game (if the Toads rule is in force) and virtually all other alpha strikes have gotten weaker.
Battleround 1
I took first turn after bunkering to shield from the Ripperbomb.
I summoned on the Herald, who got 3 spells off (as far as I can tell his cast of 9 allows one more spell to be cast rule can be chained, which allows you to dump your Destiny Dice for a strong burst of damage - Pink Fire, Tzeentch's Firestorm, then Arcane Bolt) and the Daemon Prince - between them they nuked the Dread Saurian!
Bye bye big guy!
The Daemon Prince used DD to charge in (after Kairos had given his sword an extra attack. Kairos bonded himself to some friendly Toads.
The Daemon Prince power derped and didn't even kill one Kroxigor to my disgust. He then lost 5 wounds despite having a 3+ rerolling 1s and 2s.
My Ogroid grabbed the right objective and awaited the inevitable Ripperfest.
James flooded the other side of the board with his teleporting Knights. My Chariots dug into cover and breaced themselves. Indeed they liked the cover so much they had both failed Mystical tests....
The Rippers came down and a load of shooting took out some Acolytes. The Snakes flooded out of the Bastiladon and did like 4 wounds to my Ogroid - painful! However, with a charge roll of (1, 5). Kairos ensured that the Rippers failed their charge with Oracle.
However, I lost the initiative.
Battleround 2
The Rippers went into the Marauders and shredded them and took two wounds off the toads. Jack kept scoring on the left. More snakes came out. However, the Ogroid cheesed it - handing on with one wound left. The Daemon Prince went down.
In my turn, the big move was Kairos nd the Toads going left and the Manticore going right. The Manticore got a 6 for his run roll which meant that the Ogroid could depart and then the Manticore move onto the objective to take it over. The Ogroid levelled a charge at the Rippers and proceeded to double 1 it! I still killed them with other units.
The Big Boys Split Up
One of the Chariots kept on grinding.
Battleround 3
Jack won the initiative again and fortified his position on the left objective with the Saurus Knights. Despite its ridiculously strong save, Jack's Bastiladon did some crazy damage to the Manticore (mortal wounds being its only weakness) and killed the Ogroid. The Camo Skinks kept shooting away.
In my turn Kairos got serious and zapped his general dead. He then made the charge into the Saurus Cavalry and seized the objective, supported by the Curseling.
On the other Flank, the Manticore Lord failed to dent the Bastiladon and kept losing wounds.
Battleround 4
I lost the initiative again. Jack actually killed the Manticore Lord - but not with the Bastiladon, so he was unable to grab the objective immediately. From memory, the Blue Scrubs ran in to rescue a point. Kairos racked up points. That was pretty much game at this point. Major to me.
It was an interesting game and Jack took the loss of the Dread Saurian very well! My dice were dismal from the moment it died, which was fair enough.
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Nemo and Fatesworn Friends head to the Grand Tournament Finals
in NicoLab
A blog by Nico in General
Posted
Game 6
Somehow my opponent managed to make playing against Kunning Rukk 90 Arrer Boyz with Damned Terrain on Knife to the Heart vaguely enjoyable.
I YOLOed Ted into the Arrers with Damned and all buffs on - I’ve never seen so many 6+ Saves against 3 Damage attacks. This was a daft strategy borne of the fact that I wouldn’t get a Major if I did the usual line of Pinks and Infernal Flames approach. It just wouldn’t get me anywhere near his objective in time. A minor win was not materially better than a loss at this stage.
My Saves were little better and as we know Hand of Broken has an infinite range (true) and never fails to cast (also true). Ted popped - eventually the Gaunt Summoner went down.
Major Loss.