Spring 2011 Tournament Report

I alone am best! Details to follow...

My final list. I made a few last minute tweaks. I dropped one of the attack bike squadrons for land speeders to add a little range and some more flexibility. I picked up two land speeder typhoons on Thursday, and was up late painting them on Friday. More on how that was important later...
1500 Point Space Marines

HQ
Librarian w. Null Zone, Avenger 100

Elites
Dreadnought 105
Dreadnought 105
Dreadnought 105

Troops
10 Tacticals w. Multi-Melta, Meltagun, Sgt. w. Combi-Melta 185
Rhino w. Hunter-Killer Missile 45
10 Tacticals w. Multi-Melta, Meltagun, Sgt. w. Combi-Melta 185
Rhino w. Hunter-Killer Missile 45
5 Tacticals w. Sgt w. Power Fist, Combi-Melta, Melta-Bombs 130
Rhino w. Hunter-Killer Missile 45

Fast Attack
2 Attack Bikes w. Multi-Meltas 100
2 Land Speeders w. Typhoon Missile Launchers 180

Heavy Support
Predator Destructor w. Heavy Bolter Sponsons 85
Predator Destructor w. Heavy Bolter Sponsons 85

Total: 1500 Points

HK's on the rhino's. I likey.

I like this list more than the old.

Congrats!!

There were four players at the tournament. My vanilla marines, a very similar marine army from Beau (Roland), a blood angel list from Mark and a tyranid list from Scott Maxwell. With 4 players we did round robin with randomly generated scenarios. If both players wished, the scenario could be rerolled. All tables had standard 1/4 terrain coverage.

Round One Versus Tyranids

Scott is an old friend of mine from my Reader's Book Shop days. I hadn't seen him for years so it was nice to do some catching up. Scott had been playing his Nids on Vassal and obviously knew what he was doing. He had 3 tervigons (1 HQ, 2 troops), 6 hive guard in 3 units of 2, 2 units of stealers one with a broodlord, 2 small units of termagaunts, a unit of harpies and a unit of raveners. His army was mostly painted in a purple and black scheme. We rolled capture and control and pitched battle. I won the roll and deployed, happy to be going first. I basically castled up in the middle to keep away from outflankers and all my troops were deployed on foot. Scott decided to infiltrate his stealers 18" away. He tried to seize but failed. I had a good first shooting phase, I put 4 wounds on one tervigon and 2 on another. All 3 of my hunter-killer missiles hit and wounded! I whittled down both stealer squads with bolter fire, although Scott made a lot of cover saves. Scott's turn one was better still. His hive guard were on their game, destroying 2 rhinos and a dreadnought. After the first turn my shooting cooled off. My land speeders hit with 2 out of their next 8 krak missiles and I was unable to kill either tervigon. Scott destroyed marine units on both flanks, but I had dreadnoughts and attack bikes which counterassaulted. At this point time was called and we were on turn 3! I realized that I had been a chatty Cathy all game, catching up with Scott, talking to Trevor, Alex and another old friend from Reader's, Quentin. I have noone to blame but myself for running out of time. Obviously neither of us was close to an objective so it came down to kill points. Mine were easy to add up, I had zero. Scott had more than zero (maybe 5?). That being said, I didn't mind how this game was shaping up. His gaunts were still a turn away from charging (because of some subpar terrain rolls), and my dreadnoughts had the flanks stabilized. His one stealer unit was down to 2, and his broodlord one was down to 3 and pinned. He had a tervigon with a single wound left and one with only 2 wounds left. My mobile elements (attack bikes and speeders) were still intact. It would have been an interesting game to finish. Oh well.

Round Two Versus Blood Angels

Mark had a mostly-painted blood angels list with a dev squad in razorback, assault squad with sanguinary priest, 2 ten man tactical squads, one in a rhino and one in a stormraven, and a furioso dread also in the stormraven. His HQ was a libby in the stormraven also. We rolled kill points and dawn of war and he won the rolloff. I decided to deploy nothing. Turn 1 he moved up a bit. I moved on, hoping to make at least one sight check so I could use a searchlight. Nothing. Turn 2 he deployed his devastators (2Xlascannons, missile launcher and multi-melta) and moved up his stormraven. He fired the assault cannon on his stormraven at my speeders and rolled the lights out, destroying both His rhino and his razorback both had pintle-mounted storm bolters and these began hammering my attack bikes. I lost a bike to bolter fire. My turn 2 I shot what I could at the stormraven but only managed to shake it. My lone attack bike went after his rhino and stunned it. I was doing a lot of hitting and a lot of no damage. His turn 3 he moved up the stormraven and disembarked the furioso. It melted one of my dreadnoughts, but I had 2 others nearby. His devs meanwhile were plinking shots harmlessly off of one of my predators. His assault squad was approaching under cover on the opposite flank the stormraven was on. My turn 3 was the TSN turning point. I managed to blow up the stormraven, and deposited his tactical squad and librarian right in front of one of my dreadnoughts. I happily charged in, and over the next 4 turns (7 or 8 assault phases) my dreadnought squished his librarian and every last tactical guy, despite getting penetrated twice by melta bombs and glanced 2 or 3 times by krak grenades. Mark couldn't roll damage results either when it counted! Brother Pullo is truly a hero of the Imperium!

The other interesting combat happened on the other flank. His assault squad destroyed my librarian's rhino which also had a 5 man squad with a powerfist. That forced my hand and I had to assault his combat unit with my tacticals. I rolled a little above average, and despite him making every single FNP roll he could I wiped the squad earning 2 kill points. Who says tactical marines can't fight? My 5 man squad was reduced to just the sergeant, and after the combat he shook hands with the librarian and they ran away out of LOS in seperate directions. It does bear mentioning that I did not kill his rhino despite penetrating it 8-10 times, several times with melta weapons. At the end of the game it was immobilized, and both storm bolters were destroyed. It faithfully protected the tactical squad still inside and stubbornly refused to yield its kill point. After 7 turns the tally was 6-6 so it came down to victory points. I had 750 points on the board, Mark had killed exactly half my army. I had done a little better, Mark had the aformentioned tactical squad in the damaged rhino, an unscathed dev squad, and an immobilized furioso. It was a win by the narrowest of margins! It was a fun scrap and Mark was a gracious opponent. His army was a little all over the place. The multi-melta didn't seem to fit in the dev squad, and the extra storm bolters on the transports seemed a bit superfluous, but then again they saved his rhino from being wrecked, so what do I know? I think with a little more focus (maybe a bit more assaulty stuff?) this list could hum.

Round Three Mirror Match!

Round 3 I played Beau (Roland from the forums) and his army was much like mine. We each had 2 dakka predators, we each had 2 speeder typhoons. The difference was in long-range shooting. He had 2 dreads with autocannons, a 4 missile-launcher dev squad and 2 tac squads with missile launchers. He also had a unit of sternguard in a razorback with a captain. We rolled kill points and dawn of war (again) but since we had both already done dawn of war we agreed to reroll and got spearhead. Beau won the roll and chose the quarter with an imposing ruin to set up his dev and tactical squad in. I knew I couldn't win a shooting war with him so I decided to reserve my whole force. Maybe I could kill a vehicle or two with alpha strikes and get an early lead. Beau took two consecutive turns of movement for his whole army (he reserved his 2 speeders) and kinda rumbled towards my deployment zone. He spread out his stuff quite a bit, and notably moved his two dreads towards a big LOS blocking ruin on my half of the table. My reserves came on steadily over the next few turns, and I kept my whole army in the farthest corner of my deployment zone. I was just out of 48" range of his dev and 2 tac squads. My plan was working! My whole army was concentrated against 2/3 of his. Over the next few turns Beau realized his mistake and tried to extricate his forward elements, but it was too late. I was able to use the ruin to shoot the two dreadnoughts and not be subject to much counterfire. My AP1 weaponry was efficiently killing his vehicles, and it should be noted that I rolled some pretty decent armour saves when I had to. Beau had one good shooting phase (his speeder blasted one of my dreadnoughts) and then after that his dice went cold. One of his dakka predators opened up on my speeder squadron and got zero damage results. That's some pretty bad rolling. It ended up being a bit of a rout, but Beau was a great sport and never despaired (not outwardly, anyhow) even though his dice had failed him miserably.

Over on the other table Mark defeated Scott in their final game so Scott and I both ended up 2-1. Sportsmanship was a wash (really, everyone was a pleasure to play against and there were no disputes that I saw), so I ended up winning by one point because my army was fully painted. Yay soft scores! Staying up late to finish those speeders was worth it! Darren very generously matched our entry fees so there were great prizes and I ended up taking home another land speeder. Another squadron of 2 typhoons is on the way! Scott was pleased to put his second-place prize towards a killa-kan box set. Thanks to Canadin for running it also!

Observations:

- I'm glad I went with avenger over machine curse. I actually cast it 3 times and killed a blood angel assault marine, a sternguard, and did a wound to a space marine captain. Not bad!

- 85 point predators are amazing.

- Attack bikes are really situational. When they're good they're great, but they have some tough matchups. The land speeder typhoons are always good.

- My playtesting really helped. I kept my dreadnoughts in groups instead of spreading them out and the redundancy was great. Brother Pullo almost singlehandedly won me the game versus Mark's blood angels.

A very well done and explicit battle report.

Even with a low attendance this time, The event ran very well. And the Round-Robin format allowed every to play everyone that was there. And even If I didn't play, I had a lot of fun watching the games.

All of the matches ended very closely, which is the best sort of result imho.

And Daren matched the entrance fee's for prize support, so everyone got something back (40$ 1st/ 20$ 2nd, / 10$ 3rd/4th).

The next Tournament I run will be sometime in August, details on that to come.

My list

Capt w/ Relic Blade and bolter; Hellfire rounds
5 Sternguard; 1 Power fist
Razorback (HB)
2 Dreads (T/L AutoC; Powerfist, SB)
2 Tact. Squads (Meltagun. Missile Launcher, Rhino)
2 Landspeeder (not squadroned, Typhoon, HB)
2 Predators (Autocannon, HB Sponsons)
5 Devastators (4 Missile Launchers)

Round One/Marc/Blood Angels
Seize Ground (5 Obj)/Spearhead
Highlights: His 5 Assault Marine and Sang. Priest massacring my Captain and Deathwatch bodyguard. Me rolling a 6 on a Penatrating hit with his stormraven, with the explosion taking out 3 marines inside and immobilizing his DC Dread.

I ended up making a successful dash for 2 other obj. (the large ruined building and the hill) with my tactical squads while using my 2 dreads to contest the tank traps obj. A very close, tight match. Lots of fun.

Round Two/Scott/Tyranids
Kill Points/Dawn of War
I'll admit it, I immediately was playing for the draw, which will just about guarantee a loss. I went first and deployed a single tact. squad in rhino, up the middle on my table edge, which was a huge mistake as I pretty much gave him the entire table. The first few turn we traded KP with me taking out his genestealers and broodlord at the cost of my sternguard. His hive guard and tervigons owned me, with the hive guard laying down a steady steam of fire that kept several of my big guns stunned/shaken and managed to pop one of my dreads and the razorback. His gargoyles and second genestealer took out a LS, and his raveners and one of the tervigons pinned down one of my tacticals and their rhino. Highlight of the match was his lead tervigon and 2 generated guant swarms assaulting a stunned Pred, blowing it up and taking out half his guants in the process. Next turn I used a tactical squad and the Captain to take out the rest.

Scott won on kill points, a lot to a little. I want to say he had 5-6, and I think I had 1-2. I kept shooting the closest thing to try and keep him out of assault, but a combo of FNP and canny use of cover, meant a lot of my shooting was ineffective. He get +10 for agreeing the E is dropping the ball w/ Christian, +5 for calling my tactical marines "jabronis" and asking if they could smell what he was cooking but loses points for not like Punk. I had a LOT of fun getting my ass kicked here:)

Round Three/Tim/Codex Marine
See above. I tried to move into range w/ my autocannon but stay out of melta range. Honestly I did. To be frank, his putting everything in reserve took me by surprise and I was reacting to it the rest of the game. He frankly did a awesome job of taking my tactical and devastator out of the match for pretty much the entire games. While neither unit was even shot at, they account for 2 of my three kill points by popping his rhinos when they tried to come around that damn building that Tim was using to block LOS for the static elements in my army. Big mistakes were not realizing the attack bike would come on with a 36" threat range (they immobilized one dread and stunned the other, which lead to his standing around to take in the face next turn and be destroyed), and trying to shot the bikes up with my sternguard and capt, leaving 3 KP sitting in the open and unsupported. They did not survive the round. Up to then it had been a one point game, but it swung decidedly in Tim's favor by then.

Good tournament, would've like to have had more ppl, but as it was we got to play on a different table each game, and it was a true round robin. I think 1500 is the sweet spot for these tournaments, as most games were finishing on time (Scott's Nid seemed to be the exception) and playing on a 4x6 area left some space for reserves/destroyed units/books etc. at the ends.