So Starraptor and I spent the day playing in a (fairly) local 2K tournament and I have to say it was a blast! It was at Play the Game, Read the Story in Syracuse. The TO, Paul, did a great job of organizing it and I have to say I love their new location. One of the reasons I hadn't been down there for a while was because their old location had very, very little room and tables for games and tournaments had to be held in the mall's common area. However, their new location has a HUGE gaming area and I love it! I tried to take pictures but something went wrong with my camera and so I didn't actually get any to turn out. Also, I was trying to knock the rust off, so I didn't have a lot of time to take notes between turns, so I will stick to fairly short summaries.
I took my normal Marine List.
Game 1
Kill Points and Dawn of War
Chaos Space Marines (from memory)
HQ
Lash Prince
Lash Prince
Troops
Bezerker with PF x8 and Rhino
Bezerker with PF x8 and Rhino
Bezerker with PF x8 and Rhino
CSM Squad with LC and Rhino
Elites
Termicide Squad x4
Termicide Squad x4
Heavy
Possessed Vindicator
Possessed VIndicator
Defiler
This was a very hard fought game. He won the roll and had me go first. My first turn I just shuffled around with nothing to shoot. He rolled on and had pretty good night fight rolls, lashing a Tactical Squad into the open. I couldn't get them back into cover and he lashed them again next turn, and blew a lot of them up with Democannons. However, Combat Tactics actually saved the unit. I jumped out to a pretty good lead, popping a Rhino and putting a hurt on a zerker squad and blasting both Princes with shooting. However, my "knockout blow" of charging a Termicide Squad with TH/SS and Null Zone failed miserably. I rolled terribly, only causing 2 wounds, of which he saved all of them. He killed 3 and broke the squad. Ouch... so I went from removing the only threat on my left flank to scrambling to get away. Also, his 2nd Termicide Squad didn't come in until Turn 4, so by then my LR was outside bubble wrap and had burnt it smoke, so it got smoked, exposing the Libby and remnants of Tactical Squad to a charge a turn later (rolled like crap for my move through cover and run). Because of that and my misguessing some Zerker charge distances against my vehicles, he was able to tie it up at the bottom of our last turn. Considering how rusty I felt, I was pretty happy with the result. Dan was a lot of fun to play against and a great player and would love to have a rematch!
Best moment for me: Tie between the Typhoon Squadron pasting a Prince in one shooting phase and getting off Combat Tactics twice
Worst moment for me: Fluffing the TH/SS assault
Second Game
Capture and Control and Spearhead (VPs as a tiebreaker)
Space Marines (from memory)
HQ
Sicarius
Command Squad with a RB
MotF
Troops
Scout Squad x10 with Snipers, ML, and Telion
Scout Squad x5 with PF
Fast
Scout Biker Squad with MG/PF
Landspeeder Storm
Landspeeder with Assault Cannon
Elite/Heavy
Venerable Dread with Assault Cannon/HF
Ironclad with MG/HF and Drop Pod
Ironclad with MG/HF and Drop Pod
Dread with MM/HF and Drop Pod
Dread with MM/HF and Drop Pod
Uh oh... I haven't had the pleasure of facing a Marine list like this before, so I'm not sure what to do. I win the roll to go first and castle in the corner with as much bubble wrap as I can muster with our objectives as far apart as possible. I hold the Attack Bikes and MM/HF Speeders in reserve. He deploys the Venerable Dread, the Speeder, the Command Squad, and Telions Scout Squad (Combat Squadded). He infilitrates the Scout Bikers and outflanks the LSS. The bikers do a scout move turbo-boost but I think he underestimates the charge distance of the Termies in the LR. He fails to sieze even with Sicarius's reroll. My shooting immobilize the Vend Dread which will buy me some breathing room. The LR and Termies move 12" to go smash the Scout Bikers. No 3+ cover save against Thunder Hammers. I make a fairly big mistake as I leave a hole in my castle just barely big enough for a pod and Dreadnought.
He brings in a IC and a MM/HF Dread and lucky for me the pod scatters of the table, allowing me to place it in a corner out of the way. However, good run rolls will bring it into the fight around my objective way too soon for my liking. The MM/HF Dread tries the same spot and sticks the landing and kills a Razorback. I fail to kill him with all of my shooting, so I tarpit him with a Combat Squad. The Termies load back up, the LR moves 12" and the Libby clears out the non-Telion Scout Combat Squad with Avenger and a charge. By now a fairly large hole has opened around my objective, so he drops the other ICD in there and his LSS comes in on the wrong side and gets shot down by my Rifleman before they can get to my objective. His shooting and a dropping Dread stall my Rhinos and associated Combat Squads in his table quarter. The TH/SS Termies and the Libby scare Sicarius and the Command Squad off the table. My Attack Bikes eventually come in and kill two Dreads near my objective, but a combination of Drop Pod shooting and a Dreadnought exploding actually breaks (I failed way too many pinning/morale tests) two of my Combat Squads who fall of the table. The other two objective campers get killed by Dreads, so I was beginning to sweat about pulling off the win. Luckily on Turn 5 my LR picks up a stranded Combat Squad and gets on his objective after my MM/HF cleared it off. My first win of the day! Once again a great opponent who I would love to play again.
Best moment for me: Managing to kill the MotF on his objective with a TLLC shot from the LR (had failed to do anything the entire game)
Worst moment for me: Failing WAY too many Morale/Pinning tests...
Game 3:
Sieze Ground (4) objectives and Pitched Battle
Tyranids (from memory)
HQ
Swarmlord and 2 or 3 Guard
Winged Tyrant
Troops
Genestealer Squad with Broodlord
Genestealer Squad with Broodlord
Genestealer Squad with Broodlord
Termaguant Squad
Tervigon
Elite
Lictor
Fast
Harpy
Heavy
Carnifex in a Spore
So I haven't actually played more than a handful of games against the new nids, so I was pretty fretful going into this game. I lucked out in that I won the roll to go first and was able to pick a side with a pretty long piece of impassable terrain to act as a buffer on my right flank. He went full reserve and everything came in but the Harpy and Carnifex. However, two squads of genestealers and the Tervigon came in on the wrong side (left side) of the board. To top it all off, his Tervigon pooped out after 9 gaunts. The more I look back on this match, I realize I pretty much got outplayed, but got lucky when I needed it.
I goofed and just barely had an Attack Bike in charge range on my right flank, even with the impassable terrain. The stealers stick on his turn, meaning I wasn't able to shoot them. However, I was able to build a textbook Rhino Wall to prevent them from getting into the rest of my army while my Speeders get to work on my left flank. My shooting put some wounds on the Tyrant Guard and my TH/SS Termies got the Winged Tyrant in combat away from the Swarmlord. The Termies actually killed the Tyrant with no losses to themselves. Before I couldcelebrate, though, Nid shooting wiped 3 of them and pinned them. I tried to get cute and Combat Tactics out, but ended too close to the Carnifex and Pod that had dropped down and spent the rest of the game running. To top it off, the Swarmlord was just BARELY in range (I misjudged my distances all game) to charge the LR and immoblizes it. Things were starting to look VERY grim.
By this point he had his Tervigon and two gaunt squads on one objective way up and to my left and had a Broodlord and Stealer (survivors from the LS barrage) whittling away at a Combat Squad on my left flank. I had one objective on my far right, but Swarmlord was about to tee off on my immoblized LR on a center objective within striking distance of the gaunts. This is where my dice decide to bail me out and I had a huge turn. My flamer Combat Squads cleared out the Stealer squad on my right flank while my Landspeeders and Dakka Pred wiped the exposed genestealer squad on my left. My Rifleman draws a bead on the Harpy and WTFpwns him in one go. My Librarian knows the Swarmlord is coming for him, so he just heads south on a "No guts, no Glory" run to charge the Carnifex who is about to go on a rampage. Swarmlord whiffs against the LR, not doing anything with his autohits. The Combat Squad in battle with the Genestealers hold out one more turn. However, the biggest swing was when my Libby hits the Carnifex twice and rolls a magical "6" to wound. He activates his force weapon and the Carnifex goes "poof". Absolutely perfect turn of luck.
The nail went in the coffin the next turn when I was able to kill the Tervigon with shooting (gogo Typhoons!) and one Pred contested his objective while I put another Pred, the Libby and Combat Squad in Rhino on the objective the two stealers were trying to hold. I actually screwed up and put myself in a position to tie had the game not went to Turn 6. I could have sent a squad to another objective, but unexplainably sent them towards the one the genestealers were on. Luckily it did go on and he offered to concede as I could simply wipe the two stealers out and claim one objective with two others contested. Overall it was a bloody battle with two Gaunt squads, Spore, Swarmlord, and a Tyrant Guard left against the super-Libby, 2-3 Combat Squads, Preds, and Speeders. Once again, I thiink my opponent played better than me, but he had a hard time dealing with my Speeders and had several strings of bad dice (or good dice for me). I misjudged distances on multiple occassions, allowing charges that shouldn't have happened to go off, putting me on my back foot. It was definately one of the most fun games I've played in long time. My opponent was very laid back and a blast to play and definately worked me over pretty well!
Best moment for me: Super Libby offing the Carnifex... turning point of the game
Worst moment for me: Misjudging all of my distances and getting my Attack Bikes killed
At the end of the day, I ended up tying for 3rd (out of 21) with a record of 2-0-1. The person I tied with was none other than my first round opponent. I put my winnings towards a SR which I can't wait to paint soon. The two people tied for first were an IG player and a Blood Angel player. I never saw the IG army, but the Blood Angels player had a pretty vanilla, balanced army (I'll post his army list tomorrow) that was painted beautifully in a DIY scheme. I really enjoyed all my games and the "rush" of playing in a tournament again. I met a lot of great guys and it was great to talk shop with other players. I will definately have to start making more trips that way in the near future!
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