As for the event itself it seems there is always some amount of 'uh what?' that happens every year. This year was a new (I think first time) TO and he ran into a few problems. The biggest being that he was only given 25 tables I think this year when usually 40k runs high (60-70s). So at the start of the day he stated we had too many players, so those that hadn't emailed or registered might not make it. So after getting everyone signed in he ended up cutting some folks which was too bad.
Then I got paired in Game 1 and half way through I notice there are empty tables. So it looks like he kept spots for people that emailed or registered but hadn't actually shown up yet and turned away warm bodies that were there to play. There was even an odd amount that meant someone had to take a bye. That was a real shame, and certainly by game 3 it looked like only 15 or so tables were running since of course more people dropped after the first round or two.
That said he did bring two other TOs and the event ran smoothly once it got off the ground. The tables were maybe a little light on LOS blocking terrain but I've pretty much gotten used to the whole gamut of terrain at tournament to not be too fussed about it.
The 1ksons were ready to roll and looked great, and I was sure they would just be crucified all day long on the table. Certainly no game went horribly great for them, but with a bit of luck they actually did pretty well in the final results!
Game 1 was against Joshua's Necrons, and the list looked something like this:
Necron Overlord
Royal Court (Cryptek and one or two Lords)
15 Warriors
5 Warriors w/ Ghost Ark
5 Warriors w/ Ghost Ark
5 Warriors w/ Night Scythe
10 Immortals w/ Night Scythe
Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge
I don't know Necron's really well so I didn't take note of all the upgrades and certainly a few things might be off with this. His army looks pretty nice, as far as Necrons go, with a very clean job painting. Nothing crazy but the clean look suits the army well. His Ghost Arks aren't done but with everything else complete it is easy to overlook and the army looks nice.
The game was Dawn of War with Big Guns and Crusade if I believe.
This picture is right after I start my turn one. First roll of the dice is to cast the Boon of Mutation on my sorcerer and I Daemon Prince. We were both laughing at the crazy odds of that happening and we started talking out if it was any good to actually keep or reroll since I had the warlord trait. I decided to keep it and it made the game pretty fun. After the game we found out I should have HAD to reroll that result so we screwed up so that kinda stinks. It didn't really make the game drastically different, though small bits would have ended differently.
It was a fun game and I had some good shooting and some good saves, he had some great rolls balanced by some horrible rolls (overlord failed LD twice!). In the end he just had too many troops for me to wipe out in shooting, and his flyers let his troops get where they needed to go. When we totaled up the points it was a 9-0 victory for him, and we were both a little surprised just because the game felt a lot tighter. We called it after the top of 5 with about 10 minutes to go, so in theory I could have possibly made that tighter if we rushed through the bottom of 5 and even got through another turn, but it was not horribly likely.
After this we set up for paint and players choice. I was on the farthest corner and it was dark where we were in the tent (yes it is a banquet tent that 40k is always at for Kubla). So I didn't think my army showed quite so well since it was hard to see the blending and the details. There were a few other nice looking armies, but it was also a smaller group of people and it lacked some of the REALLY AMAZING armies that we've seen at this event in the past. I thought my army probably deserved being in the top 5 for sure but you never know what people/judges like.
For Game 2 I got the lucky BYE draw which I was a little bummed about at first, again given that we had turned people away. However the TO said I could either take a Win with 4 points (out of 10) or I could play the ringer (one of the TOs). I said 'oh hell I'm earning my losses today!'
So I played one of the judges and a Tyranid army. I have really always struggled with bugs with most armies, but my chaos worst of all. His list looks pretty familiar with a few twists (again this is from memory).
Swarmlord
Winged Hive Tyrant
3 Hive Gaurd
Doom in Pod
1 Zoanthrope
10 Gants
10 Gants
Tervigon
Tervigon
15 or so Gargoyles
The game was hammer and anvil deployment and Killpoints and Single Objective. I was happy about the kill points and less so about the single objective. I figured I'd deepstrike one squad of oblits as my only real chance of getting anything in the backfield and possibly making him leave some tougher stuff not advancing on me.
He gave me first turn, then he stole it from me! Laughter ensued.
This was another great game. He advanced up with everything led foremost by the Hive Tyrant. I brought the Tyrant down to one wound on the first round but failed to kill him all game. Doom came down and just wrecked my backfield. Out of I think 7 LD checks over the next 4 turns I rolled 3 14s, 1 15, and passed two. EEF. He killed off my cultists and HQ and took over half a squad of sons and one oblit before I was able to Oblit him dead.
My oblits did an admiral job and also did some nice things to his backfield. I somehow had a single HP rhino make it around his solo Zoanthrope to get to his backfield as well. The Helldrake got downed after one round by a lucky solo Hive Gaurd which hurt me deeply! ;)
I think by the end of 5 he had killed both rhinos, my cultists, my HQ, my helldrake, and one squad of sons, plus he had first blood. I had line breaker but had only killed his gargoyles, doom, Hive Gaurd (I think) and one squad of gaunts. I think I was contesting his objective and mine was open though he had a small gant squad closing in on it. Luckily for me the game went until turn 7 and in that time I was able kill his pod, his solo Zoanthrope and two more squad of gaunts (I think he had spawned 3 overall). I had a squad of sons on his objective and his Swarmlord had failed a charge and what was left of his gants was pulled out of contesting range by combat losses. So I managed to get the primary and secondary objective as well as linebreaker. It was pretty amazing to get an 8-0 victory with basically 4 oblits (in 3 squads) and about 4 1ksons when he still had both his HQs and both Tervigons that had just ended up a bit out of position by advancing to midfield a bit too slowly to get either direction fast enough.
Game 3 I played against a CSM/Damon army that I had actually given my Players Choice vote. I like the look of the army and thought the colors were great and painting done well. The army itself was also quite different than what you might typically see.
Sorcerer, Slaneesh, Lvl 3, Sigil, Spell Familiar
3 Mutilators
10 CSM, 2 Plasma, Combi Plas, Lighting Claw
10 CSM, 1 Melta, Lighting Claw
4 Spawn
3 Oblits
Keeper Of Secrets (Rewards?)
15 Daemonettes
15 Daemonettes
The game was Vangaurd deployment, the relic as primary and the modified Scouring (where/who places objectives and how many points they are) as the secondary. I believe I got to choose to go first in this one and we set up and I completely forgot to get a picture sadly.
This game was a lot of laughs also. We knew were playing in the beer bracket so we had a great time and played for fun though we still went for winning of course! This was another game that I had lost by the end of 5, was still losing at the end of 6, and managed to win only because it went to round 7.
I basically did a bit of a fighting retreat and once I had whittled enough stuff I tried to sneak around to have some options. In reality the relic was just never really going to be an option for me and I probably should have just stayed on my objectives. The helldrake was king for me this game as he didn't have much anti air and once I removed that the turkey was free to finish off most of his marines for me. Bolter fire did in most of the deamonettes, while the oblits burned down his mutliators and oblits and spawn. He did manage first blood and line breaker, but in the end all he had left was the Keeper of Secrets at the end of 7.
The craziest part here was that by turn 7 my sorcerer had been casting boon on himself (with reroll warlord trait again) had Crusader, Adamantite Will, Shred, Fleshbane, +1St bolter, and +1 T. I had forgot to do powers in turn 7 because I was stoked the game had gone on again! Too bad too because I really could have used Warpspeed for the extra attacks as well!
Anyway he charges and I have to do the challenge of course and he strikes first. He has decides to smash to go for the instaglib and manages 3 wounds I need to 4++ save. I make two, but I get to reroll one dice per combat due to having my cultists. I make the save!
I strike him and land a lucky two wounds. With fleshbane and shred they both end up wounding as well. If he fails any of his saves I can go for the (fairly likely) forceweapon... but he makes both! It was a silly end to a silly game. In the end I only have the Scouring and warlord, and he has Linebreaker and First blood for a 5-2 victory for me.
So I end up going a surprising 2-1 with the 1ksons.
But even better I won the Players Choice with 11 votes and Best Painted as well!
Granted it wasn't as big of a field this year but I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth and there were some other very nice armies there as well.
So I got a snazzy trophy and two certificates for some LED lights from http://poweredplay.net/ which I think I might try to get and put into my Tau since I'm working on that army next.
I also got 20 kublabucks, but I wanted to race home for dinner with the family and not muck around with that whole 'what the hell can you get with these' that I've heard about in the past. Joshua from my first round ended up going 3-0 and getting 2nd best general and best overall, so I just gave my Kublabucks to him with the hope that maybe he could get something cool.
All in all I had a great time and I now don't feel so bad about putting my 1ksons on the shelf to work on Tau after having spent so much time updating them from the last dex!
