50 Point Tournament at Good Games Hurstville

Tournament up at Hurstville - http://www.wargamerau.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=151699&st=0&#entry2304519

Hey Everyone,
Good Games Hurstville will be hosting a 50 Point Steamroller on the 11th of May, a week before the Super Series qualifier. Start time is at 10am and we'll be using the Specialist Variant rules.
Given the timing, this can be seen as some practice before the Single Most Important Event Ever. But, by all means, everyone is welcome to attend and make a day out of it. 
So come along, have a good time, get some games in, learn a thing or two and share stories about how you got killed by a Pyg wearing a Bowler Hat.

Where: Good Games Hurstville, Unit 213, 7-11 The Avenue, Hurstville, NSW 2220
Organiser: Not-at-all-Loud Chris (so, me)
When: Saturday the 11th of May, with a 9:30am pre-reg and a 10am start. Btw, that's a week before the Super Series Qualifier.
Size and Composition of forces: 50 point Steamroller with the Specialist variant. 1 to 2 lists. Both the 2nd list and the inclusion of Specialists are optional at a player's digression. Full details can be found in the SR2013 document. 
Entry Fee: $15
Other Details: 
Again, we're using Specialists for this tournament. Anyone looking to make use of them should re-check the rules to make sure they have valid choices.
No Quarter Theme Forces are valid provided you have a copy of the tier list with you. Mostly for fact checking and so I don't have to guess what the bonuses are (-2 point cost on Lesser Warbeasts? Sounds legit).
This will be a three game tournament in all likelyhood and winner might be decided on SoS.

Specialists means you have an extra 10 points on your lists that you can swap out for models in your lists. Your swaps have to be whole cards so you can't take a unit from MAX down to MIN in order to bring in a solo you have to completely remove the unit. You can remove a UA for another model because they have their own card. If you have three winterguard rocketeers you can exchange all your winterguard rocketeers (for example) for Eiryss but you can't exchange just two rocketeers and keep one.

I'll add that this is the week before the super series and less serious than that tournament so I'm going to take my super series lists whatever they will end up being for some practice.

Tournament Talk

I want to skim over a lot of things in this post.

First - There are quite a few people excited about the club challenge I want to run. It looks like we may even have a team from Melbourne coming up. If we get a team from Melbourne and do not get a team from the Guild I WILL MURDER ALL OF YOU.

Results - Due to the odd number of players and results kind of working the tournament should have finished a round early however we played the last round anyway. This left me on at that stage 3 wins 1 loss playing Jeff Traish on 4 wins and no losses. I won that game leaving 3 players on 4 wins and 1 loss. Me, Jeff and Creagh. The first tie breaker was strength of schedule (how well your opponents had done), since we had all played each other it came down the other guys. I picked up 3rd, Creagh 1st. Didn't play Haley2, first time I'm sad that didn't happen. I wanted to live the dream and kill her on her feat turn. 

About the meta - Not nearly as many colossals as I expected. No stormwalls. None. There was a Mountain King, Two Krakkens, Hyperion and a Conquest. No Galleons but no Merc players which is generally the way (no minions either, it's usually either one or none for those factions). More warmachine than hordes, infantry machine is alive and well, the doomshaper1 theme force and the Vayl2 theme forces are good. They took second and third. Menoth are a strong faction. Guns are still a thing, expect to see guns. The scenarios are very winnable and if your opponent can't jam you, you almost always want to go second. No one was jamming, I did have a ret player jam me with quickened halberdiers but that was after they had killed three Legionnairres so copped almost a full vengeance. That also allowed me to spawn and then refill the pot. The spawning vessel is ridiculous for 3 points. 

About my tournament pairing - By this I mean my competitive super series invitational (essentially the Australian Warmachine Weekend or national championship) lists because I'm still going to screw around with stupid lists and caster combinations for everything else. Last year it was Saeryn and Lylyth2. After seeing how good Vayl2 is I think I want to include her. I don't know who I'd pair her with. Lylyth2 eats Haley double stormwall and Bart Galleon as well as the protectorate gunline and Saeryn does pretty well against Asphixious2 and Cryx in general, as well as Trolls and Skorne. Vayl2 has game against everyone which is great but makes it more difficult to think of a good pair for her. I could always go Mercs and take Bart Galleon and pair with Damiano, Ashlynn or Shae. EDIT: Just spent some time going over all my lists and I am feeling Vayl1/Vayl2. Super series is in May btw so some time next month expect to be saying a lot of Vayl. 

About Colossals/Gargantuans - I played 4 games against colossals, two in the tournament proper and two in my practice games in the week leading up. I destroyed only one and that was in a practice game, both colossals I faced in the tournament I did not even damage. I won all 4 games. You can't contest all the scoring areas in 2013 with a colossal, if you can't kill a colossal you still have a game. My colossal advice should probably have an addendum - don't get fixated on the colossal. If you get tunnel vision you can throw away opportunities to win. In this list I had no way to minimise the colossals, I just ignored them and killed their caster and/or went for the other scoring area. The colossal needs to predeploy and can't run if it wants to shoot. I would have went after the colossals had I needed to, my list is capable of killing them but as always in this game you prioritise targets based on what will put you ahead on scenario or attrition or to set up an assassination. Always focus on winning not on killing the big scary thing. 

Battle of Dave's Crack

These are what will be the final version of the rules unless anyone has any objections or suggestions.

This will be a team league. Experienced players will be teamed with less experienced players.

Each club day you play games against someone not on your team. These can be team games with your team-mate or single player games or three player free for all games. Games will be played according to the current steamroller packet or if they are 3 player games the following 3 player scenarios (more may be added).

Supply Line 

Kill Box 

Points will be awarded, 2 for a single player game, 3 for a 3 player game and 4 for a team game if the winning team does not lose a warcaster, 3 points for the winning team and 1 for the losing team should the losing team manage to kill one of the opposing casters.

Every week league models from one of the privateer press leagues will be available. I will pick a league at random and post the basic model profile plus points cost on this site (to enable players to build lists in advance should they want to). You can use league models from your own faction or your team mates faction.

4 club days after which there will be a final for the two leading teams, the team with the most points picks the match ups. If tied match ups are either to be agreed on by both teams or randomised.

Upgrades will be available at 6-12-18 points. The list of available upgrades is here.

As an optional rule - Roll 2 dice before deployment but after army list selection. On a 2 or 3 swap armies and play your opponents list.

Tournament at HoH

http://www.thehallofheroes.com.au/event_details.php?event_code=162

Points Values:
25 points
Rounds:
3 Rounds
Army Lists:
Tier Lists are allowed as normal. If the Tier List is from a NQ Magazine, please have a copy of the NQ with you for checking
Players are only allowed one army list.
Please email all army lists to eric.iwasenko@nmhg.com
Match Timing:
Each round will have a set length and at the end of this time to TO will call “dice down” as per the 2012 Steamroller pack.
Each player will have a set time to complete each turn and one extension as per the 2012 Steamroller pack. The specific values are stated below.
Day 1 - 25 point Steamroller (Modified 2012 Format)
All scenarios will be determined by the TO before the event from the Steamroller 2012 pack.
Each player will have 9 minute turns with one 5 minute extension per game.
Prizes:
Each person that attends will receive a ticket to enter a draw for prizes. An additional ticket will be awarded for each game a player wins. At the end of the Tournament, a raffle will be drawn to determine prize winners.  Players placing 1st to 3rd will be awarded a trophy.  The player with the best painted army will also be awarded a trophy.

Super Series Wrap

my lists:

Legion of Everblight

Standard Army

PCs: 50 / 50

Reinforcements: 10 / 10

18 models

[00] Saeryn, Omen of Everblight (0 / 5 WB)

[09]  >> Scythean

[09]  >> Scythean

[09]  >> Angelius

[09]  >> Angelius

[08]  >> Seraph

[02]  >> Shredder

[02]  >> Shredder

[02] The Forsaken

[02] The Forsaken

[01] Blighted Nyss Shepherd

[01] Blighted Nyss Shepherd

[01] Spell Martyr (1 Martyr)

[10] (R) Blighted Nyss Raptors (4 grunts)

Legion of Everblight

Standard Army

PCs: 50 / 50

Reinforcements: 10 / 10

27 models

[00] Lylyth, Shadow of Everblight (0 / 5 WB)

[10]  >> Ravagore

[10]  >> Ravagore

[06]  >> Nephilim Bolt Thrower

[02]  >> Shredder

[02]  >> Shredder

[04] Annyssa Ryvaal, Talon of Everblight

[02] Strider Deathstalker

[02] The Forsaken

[02] The Forsaken

[01] Blighted Nyss Shepherd

[05] Blackfrost Shard

[06] Blighted Nyss Striders

[03]  >> Blighted Nyss Strider Officer & Musician

[10] (R) Blighted Nyss Raptors (4 grunts)

Game 1 - v Skorne (epic Hexeres)

Flanking scenario with reinforcements. Took Saeryn (Skorne has a lot of trouble with her). Scenario was bunkers and I put my two Angelius towards the circle I had to control. Always going to be an issue as I can double repulse and move anything you put in the zone 6" as it's an 8" circle that's almost always going to be outside of the zone. In the end though I didn't have to, I managed to respawn an Angel into melee with his shooting unit and then he couldn't hit it with any more shooting or magic on feat turn. Meant I had more than enough alive to clear the zone and win on scenario. 

Game 2 v Cryx (epic Deneghra)

Destruction. I took epic Lylyth as she wins destruction pretty easily. My opponent (the eventual winner of the super series) (spoiler alert) actually gave me line of sight to his caster. A very narrow line of sight but I could get two ravagores into it on feat turn. 4 shots and setting her on fire... I went for it. I failed (frowny face). She lived, the fire went out and because I went for the assassination I didn't have the shooting to crack the objective (and I was much further forward than I wanted to be). From there I was never going to win. I tried to score at least one scenario point but failed. My opponent had deliberately left the line of sight open to distract me from the objective but hadn't realised I'd be able to get two ravagores into it. Still it was 50-50. 

Game 3 v Cygnar (epic Haley)

So the scenario was incoming and it's a shit scenario. It's way too easy to score scenario points. It ended 3-2 to my opponent when his sneaky bid to run something into my zone had him 1/4 of an inch in and my attempt to do the same left me 1/4 of an inch out. What I do want to talk about though is that he had two lists, epic Haley with infantry and shooting and a jack heavy epic Nemo list. Lylyth cannot deal with armour very well and Nemo isn't just armour he's fast armour. Saeryn though struggles against shooting and Haley has a lot of shooting, in fact Lylyth is designed specifically to deal with Haley2. I ended up picking Saeryn because she was the least bad match up. She would not autolose to Haley2 like Lylyth2 would to Nemo2. I think it's important to have that variation in your lists. It can really put your opponent on the back foot and give you a good match up as it did in this case. 

Game 4 v Retribution (Ravyn)

So as soon as I saw retribution I knew my caster would be Lylyth2. She auto wins against retribution. They are a shooting army that has nothing that ignores stealth. Lylyth out shoots them and out ranges them without stealth, when you take into account that everything in her list has stealth requiring the Ret shooting units to advance through a hail of fire to within 5" before they can shoot me (while I move back) and it's a really really bad match up for ret. I lost a shredder and picked up 48 army points off my opponent before killing his caster. 

I'm expecting something to come out in the Colossals book that either has the ability to ignore stealth or allows you to give it to something in the army. They really need it. It'll still be an uphill battle for ret against lylyth2 but a less nutso one. All in all I think I did pretty good considering I spent most of last night throwing my guts up, 2-2 is what I was aiming for.

Highlander

There is a Highlander tournament up at Hall of Heroes (where I play on Thursdays) and I'm trying to put together a list. The general rules for Highlander (the one at Matt's is a bit different):
1 unit (ua allowed)
1 solo
Beasts/Jacks all become FA C, faction models only, no character beasts/jacks and sometimes no character units as well.

The purpose of highlander tournaments are to make people think a bit more about their lists and get different things played. I like it as a way to mix things up. Usually the points are low, 15-25 points is pretty common.

The one up at Matt's is:

up to 1 unit
up to 1 solo
up to 1 light jack/beast
up to 1 heavy jack/beast

20 points. It's much, much more restrictive. Gators for example can't actually get to 20 points and will have to play at least a point short (18 points if they want to be competitive, 17 points or less will not be tournament legal). Nor can pirates and in Seaforge you must take 10 highshields with UA and Gorten is still maxing out at 19 (still tournament legal, can't take the driller with him though, has to be Avalancher or Rockram to be legal).

Ashlynn struggles a bit too, if you want gun mages you have to take an 8 point heavy and the Vanguard and you can't marshal the heavy (no mule or mariner marshalled to the mages). The Nyss are out as are Aiyana and Holt (character unit and not enough points).

I'll add as this is going to be a more easy going tournament than others and Matt's tables are gorgeous. This is probably a good one to come up for, the super series next month is going to be a little more hardcore. The highlander format also stops you from pulling some of the more difficult combinations to deal with. (still expect iron-fleshed winterguard and Kovnic Joe, actually now that I think about it I have nothing to deal with that, back to the drawing board).

Tournament Wrap Up

Another tournament, another second place finish.


Trollbloods
Standard Army
PCs: 35 / 35
13 models

[00] Hoarluk Doomshaper, Rage of Dhunia (0 / 6 WB)
[02]  >> Trollkin Runebearer
[12]  >> Mulg the Ancient
[10]  >> Earthborn Dire Troll
[09]  >> Dire Troll Mauler
[03] Janissa Stonetide
[04] Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes (5 grunts)
[01]  >> Stone Scribe Elder

The cannon: The trolls have ridonkulous threat ranges under doomshapers feat wild aggression + goad will chew through any infantry unit like it was never there and Mulg is an unstoppable wrecking ball. Spamming Rage each dire troll can kill a heavy and a half and Mulg can kill two.

Trollbloods
Standard Army
PCs: 35 / 35
15 models

[00] Madrak Ironhide, Thornwood Chieftain (0 / 6 WB)
[12]  >> Mulg the Ancient
[09]  >> Dire Troll Mauler
[03] Fell Caller Hero
[03] Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes (3 grunts)
[01]  >> Stone Scribe Elder
[10] Trollkin Champions (4 grunts)
[03]  >> Skaldi Bonehammer

The Brick: Slow, but everything on the front line is ARM 20 or higher and with Rage, champions and Mulg it hits unbelievably hard when it finally does hit. With Carnage + fell caller and feat the champions can chew through an entire army themselves. This army is designed to watch your opponents charge bounce off and then clean up.

Game 1
vs Scott (rematch of last tournaments final)
He brought

Protectorate of Menoth
Standard Army
PCs: 35 / 35
36 models

[00] Grand Scrutator Severius (0 / 6 WJ remaining)
[06]  >> Crusader
[06]  >> Crusader
[06]  >> Redeemer
[02] Choir of Menoth (3 grunts)
[08] Deliverers (9 grunts)
[05] Daughters of the Flame
[06] Temple Flameguard (9 grunts)
[02]  >> Temple Flameguard Officer & Standard

Not a lot that can take high ARM multi wound models and not particularly fast. A perfect match for the brick.

Turn 1:

Trolls. Everything moves up in formation. Madrak palms off his focus to the krielstone without casting anything. 

Menoth. Move up a little but not even the full basic movement. Daughters run up a flank. Attempt to shoot but mostly out of range.

Trolls 2: Move up again. Sure foot on Mulg catches two Champs and the Mauler. 

Menoth 2: Daughters charge and do four damage to the mauler. Deliverers shoot and take a Champion down to 1 wound. Jacks move up a bit. Mauler and Mulg engaged by daughters. Flamegaurd Charge the champs, put 2 wounds on one 3 on another miss the wounded one with two combined attacks. 

Trolls 3: Madrak moves up and feats casts carnage, upkeeps surefoot. Mauler kills 4 daughters and they fail their command check, casts Rage on Mulg. Mulg charges and wrecks a Crusader. Champions carve up the flameguard like they aren't there. 

Menoth 3: 3 focus onto a Crusader and it charges Mulg and scratches him a little. Deliverers and Redeemer shoot Mulg and hit the Crusader, do more damage to the crusader than it managed to do to Mulg. Daughters rally. Severius has to move into charge range of the champions to avoid staying outside of the killbox.

Scott called it at this point. The champions were about to charge his caster with carnage and war cry (from the fell caller so equivalent MAT 11 P+S 11 and 4 dice damage vs DEF 14 ARM 14). Also in range of Madraks axe if he fancied a shot. More importantly I had not lost a single model and Scott had very little left. 

Game 2:

Some guy named Graham or something.

Skorne

Standard Army

PCs: 35 / 35

23 models

[00] Archdomina Makeda (0 / 5 WB)

[03]  >> Aptimus Marketh

[09]  >> Titan Sentry

[04]  >> Basilisk Drake

[11] Cataphract Cetrati (5 grunts)

[07] Praetorian Ferox (2 grunts)

[06] Praetorian Swordsmen (9 grunts)

(I think) Makeda has the ability to make something ludicrously lightning fast. I needed some sped or else I would be horribly outflanked, scenario is overrun so speed is very important in controlling the zone in the middle. Time for the cannon. 

Trolls 1: Run forward. Wild aggression Mulg. Drop some fury into the stones.

Skorne: Advance so that out of trolls massive threat range. Ferox way out on the flank. 

Trolls 2: Mauler runs towards Ferox. Move the two remaining heavies forward and together and drop a wall in front of them (completely covers the earthborn but not Mulg). Doomshaper drops Elemental Communication on both (+2 ARM +4 with the stones). Casts primal shock through the Mauler for no damage and agitation to add two fury to the beasts. 

Skorne 2: Basilisk fails it's threshold check and kills a swordsman. Cetrati charge Mulg and scratch him a little. Ferox charge the krielstone scribes protecting Doomshaper, kill two. Swordsman can't charge as the wall is in the way.

Trolls 3: Doomshaper drops Rage on all three heavies Mulg annihilates the Cetrati with wild aggression and Rage and a goad to move to reach the Cetrati standing further back, snacking heals all the damage done. Mauler turned around and walked up to the Ferox. With assistance from Rage and another goad it kills all three. Earthborn charges the Sentry but fails to kill it. I'm running stupidly high on fury right now but there is very little left of the skorne. Janissa puts a wall to protect Mulg. I score 1 control point.

Skorne 3: Sentry has a swing at the earthborn but it lives, swordsman charge the earthborn and scratch it a little more.

Trolls 4: Mauler frenzies and kills a runebearer. Earthborn frenzies and kills the Sentry, doomshaper upkeeps wild aggression. . Doomshaper drops rage on Mulg and then feats. Mulg charges the basilisk killing it. Janissa drags the swordsman back just to make sure they are out of the zone. 2nd control zone and a win for me. I have thus far lost 3 points worth of models in two games and I killed 2 of those points. 

3rd game other Scott

Legion of Everblight

Standard Army

PCs: 35 / 35

5 models

[00] Thagrosh, Prophet of Everblight (0 / 5 WB)

[11]  >> Carnivean

[11]  >> Carnivean

[09]  >> Scythean

[09]  >> Scythean

Still not convinced I did the right thing this game. Scenario was killbox, I was worried having to face a charge, the scytheans between then can easily shread the champions even at ARM 20 only with doomshaper do I have a chance at getting the jump on the everblight. This game was a bit long and the turns are blending together so I'm not going to break it down turn by turn.

Trolls pushed forward as far as possible, using the terrain and elemental communication. Everblight got very slightly too close to me but I could only get two trolls in. I decided to feat and charge anyway, I spammed rage but I forgot to cycle wild aggression and that combined with some crappy rolls meant that each beast only killed one heavy. Now I was in trouble. I ran up the Mauler to protect Mulg. 

Thagrosh feated (bringing back a dead carnivean), killed the earthborn and almost killed the Mauler. Scythean was engaging both the Mauler and Mulg and has spiny growth on it. Had I attacked with the Mauler it would have died before it could kill it but I needed rage to guarantee a kill with Mulg so the mauler dropped Rage on Mulg and turned towards the other models. Mulg killed the Scythean and goaded into line with the mauler. Janissa dropped a wall in front of them protecting Mulg. 

A carnivean finished off the mauler and something "killed" Janissa but she passed her tough roll. Mulg killed another heavy leaving only one carnivean left. It killed Mulg. Doomshaper and Janissa tried to kill the last carnivean but it survived and killed doomshaper. 

Fantastic game. I really needed Mulg to roll less poorly for damage on the first charge he had to at least severly damage a second beast and normally he can do that. Otherwise I could have backed off again and waited for the everblight to come closer. 

Picking Tournament Lists

Been working out what I want to take on Sunday so I can try to get it slightly more painted. In the end it came down to Trolls or Mercs and I've decided to take the trolls but since I like to crap on about warmachine here is what I'm not taking and why I think it's good.

Mercenaries
Highborn Covenant
PCs: 35 / 35
31 models

[00] Ashlynn D'elyse (0 / 6 WJ remaining)
[02]  >> Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker
[08]  >> Mangler
[06] Arcane Tempest Gun Mages
[02]  >> Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer
[08]  >> Mule
[05] Alexia Ciannor & the Risen (9)
[10] Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters (9 grunts)

Mercenaries
Highborn Covenant
PCs: 35 / 35
38 models

[00] Constance Blaize, Knight of the Prophet (0 / 6 WJ remaining)
[02]  >> Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker
[09]  >> Gallant
[02] Rhupert Carvolo, Piper of Ord
[01] Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator
[03] Ogrun Bokur
[06] Steelhead Halberdiers (9 grunts)
[08] Horgenhold Forge Guard (9 grunts)
[08] Precursor Knights (9 grunts)
[02]  >> Precursor Knight Officer & Standard

First off these are two very different lists, one high DEF and one high-ish ARM. That enables me to pick the thing my opponent will struggle with. Neither has many jacks, that's because mercenaries lack a good jack running caster.

Ashlynn: great offensive and defensive feat, everyone rolls two extra dice when rolling to hit and then discards two dice of your choice. Your opponent discards the high dice and you discard the low dice. To get the most out of it you want high DEF troops, that's the Nyss and the gun mages. Lots of shooting allows you to be flexible, if your opponent tries to force you to use your feat defensively to avoid being killed on the charge you can still shred them with feat assisted shooting and then be protected when they charge (though best results still come from feating and charging). Gun mages also allow you to push around the things you don't want to face or to open objectives when you can't kill the thing holding them. Risen give you anti-magic and generally get in the way of your opponent, with the large amount of troops you have you'll be able to raise more. The risen also give you dominate undead, great against Cryx and Cryx will already struggle as Ashlynn's feat negates their high DEF. It's important to run up first turn and get in your opponents face early with this army and it has a problem going against more than 1-2 heavies.

Constance: Most important thing for a second army is that it is strong against the weaknesses of the first army and though this army actually contains less jacks it has more jack killing power. On the charge forge guard and precursors will kill 2 jacks each on average and the Gallant can wreck two if your opponent made the mistake of leaving upkeeps on them. The Halberdiers are in the list to die, they serve no other purpose, they stand out in front of everything else blocking charge lanes on the feat and die giving up souls for Constance (her feat gives her a soul for every warrior that dies, each soul makes everything else +1 ARM and gives Constance an extra focus next turn). If your opponent has things with cull soul then they can shut this down so this list is weak against Cryx, a weakness covered by the first list. The other thing this list is good at is dealing with upkeeps, the Gallant gets additional hit and damage dice against anything with an upkeep, Constance has banishing ward so you can get rid of enemy upkeeps on your troops and she and the precursors have blessed so they ignore increases to DEF and ARM from spells.

In the end I decided to go with trolls because more of them are painted. I might even be able to finish painting them before Sunday.

Another Tournament in Wollongong!

When?

Sunday 15 January 2012

Start Time?
10am

Where?
Good Games Wollongong.

What?
35pts of either Warmachine or Hordes. No tiers this time around.
No proxy minis. All minis must be released.
Time Turns as Steamroller 2011.
Two list are allowed but BOTH must be used at least once. If two list are used, must use different named caster/ warlock.
Winner determined by knockout style (everyone will still play the full amount of rounds). Tie breakers determined by kill points.
Kill points breakdown:
Caster=10pts
Units. Half points for half of the unit destroyed.
Jacks/beasts must be fully destroyed to score their points.
Number of rounds determined by the number of players.

Cost?
$10

Prizes.
First place overall. More depending on numbers.

Attitude!
This is a fun tourny. No offensive, cheating or unsporting behaviour will be tolerated.

Attending?
Pay in store to confirm place
OR
If the distance is too far or unable to get into the store, drop me a line here on WAU or at
sdz364@uowmail.edu.au

See you all then. Cheers.

Thinking about varying it up and running my trolls. I haven't run eMadrak at all but I'm tempted to get him on the table and see if he's as good as I think he should be.

Tournament! (WOOO!)

Awesome day of gaming today. I took two lists:

Legion of Everblight

Standard Army

PCs: 35 / 35

10 models

[00] Saeryn, Omen of Everblight (0 / 5 WB)

[12]  >> Typhon

[09]  >> Scythean

[08]  >> Seraph

[02]  >> Shredder

[02]  >> Shredder

[02]  >> Shredder

[02] The Forsaken

[02] The Forsaken

[01] Blighted Nyss Shepherd

Legion of Everblight

Standard Army

PCs: 35 / 35

13 models

[00] Lylyth, Herald of Everblight (0 / 6 WB)

[12]  >> Typhon

[08]  >> Seraph

[02]  >> Shredder

[04] Annyssa Ryvaal, Talon of Everblight

[02] Strider Deathstalker

[02] The Forsaken

[01] Blighted Nyss Shepherd

[10] Blighted Nyss Raptors (4 grunts)

Saern is the primary caster, she's an absolute beast and even after today I have not lost a game with her. She does however have very bad match ups against shooting armies. Cygnar (in particular Seige) and Retribution are two very bad match ups. I wanted a second caster who would do well against shooting, it was down to Lylyth and Thagrosh, Lylyth is a very assassiny (I'm allowed to make up words) caster, where as Thags is attrition and soaking up damage. I went for the chick with the cleavage. 

Game 1: Killbox

I was playing some guy named Theo, seemed a good sort. Though he had Cygnar (usually a bad match up for Saern) he had very little shooting so I felt confident unleashing Saern.

Turn 1: Everblight

Slipstreamed the Scythean and Typhon and ran. This got my two beasts 14" up the board Shredders ran as well and the shepherd calmed the Seraph. The forsaken also ran. 

Cygnar: Theo advanced slowly, staying at range and dropping Polarity shield across his line of jacks. The Black 13th went up one flank and Taryn de la Rovissi up the other. 

Turn 2: Theo had unfortunately strayed just too close. Slipstream on the scythean brought it into range and it scrapped a Centurion. Typhon sent three sprays onto something (?) and the Seraph sprayed some useless shots. One of the shredders ran up to the back 13th and allowed Saern to blight field through them killing 2 of the 3 gun mages. FEAT!

Theo unable to attack anything in melee backed off and put up a polarity field line again. Unfortunately this scenario was killbox so his caster had to be forward inside the square, this left him with his two jacks right up against his caster on the edge of the box. 

Turn 3: Slipstreamed the Scythean to the right, though he could not charge the Centurion he noe had line of sight to Nemo who had no such charge restriction. To make matters worse Typhon lined up three sprays through the Centurion. Despite having 3 boosted shots at Nemo only one managed to hit but I did roll ridiculously high damage and Nemo was left looking very unhappy. The Scythean then charged and the game was over. 

Game 2: Everblight - Killbox

This game was against Scott 1. He took pThags 2 Carniveans and 2 Scytheans. Saern was pretty much an auto win against this list so I had to take her again even though it would mean that I could not take her in the final. 

Turn 1: I run forward. Slipstream Typhon.

Scott advanced and threw down spiny growth (+2 ARM and d3 damage to any jack or beast that hits the model in melee) on 3 of his beasts. He stayed back enough that he was about 11" away for beasts that charge 9". 

Turn 2: Slipstreamed Typhon and the Scythean. Bringing them both into charge range and feat. Typhon trashed the beast without spiny growth (carni) and engaged the other Carni. Scythean rolled so badly he was almost sacked and failed to kill the scythean he was fighting. Seraph shot and I believe did 3 damage. Two Forsaken sucked up some fury and the shredders ran to engage the unengaged Scythean (one made it). 

Scott: unable to attack he backed off his Scythean engaged by the shredder (which promptly did 8 damage to it) and hid the Scythean and Thags around the side of a conveniently placed house. 

Turn 3: Typhon trashed the other Carni and my Scythean finished off the Scythean he had been fighting. Stuff moved to get into position to get around the house. 

Scott: Brought a Carni back to life. Charged my Scythean with a Scythean and hurt him. Thags himself charged a forsaken and killed him and a shredder. 

Turn 4: My Scythean killed the last Scythean. Typhon moved up to spray Thagrosh and failed miserably. Shredder engaged Thagrosh and Saern cast blight shroud for a little damage.

Scott: Moved the Carni over to kill the shredder. Thagrosh killed Typhon only to have him respawn 3" away behind the new conveniently placed cloud which stopped Thagrosh from casting spells at him.

Turn 5: Saern moved up now throwing a deathspur at Thags, did no damage but now he could no longer transfer damage. First time I've actually used that. She also cast breath stealer on him so now he was -2 DEF.  Three shots from the Seraph and three sprays from Typhon later and Thagrosh was no more.

The Grand Final - Scott 2 (Menoth) - Overun

Unfortunately for me I still would not face an army with shooting so pLylyth would have to operate outside her comfort zone. 

Turn 1: Everblight ran forward toward the zone in the middle. Cav went wide and ludicrously fast down the flank. (18" run move + 5" light cav move). 

Scott: Dropped +2 DEF +2 ARM on the daughters and ran them to engage me (DEF 17 daughters and my other list had most of my high DEF removal). Arc noded Ashes to Ashes to damage my cav. 

Turn 2: (or the turn where I needed to roll 1 more). Shredder went rabid and engaged a daughter 12 to hit everything boosts from rabid, two attacks two 11s. Typhon engaged against a daughter rolled 3 attacks, 10s to hit, a five and two 9s (even I had to laugh at that stage) Seraph sprayed 3 boosted shots, all missed, two again missed by just 1. Lylyth herself had a shot and hit and killed a daughter. The Strider deathstalker missed and the forsaken had to draw in some fury. The cav trashed the arc node and dropped back 5".

Turns out Scott had two arc nods and dropped Ashes to Ashes through the second node killing all but 1 cav (who promptly started fleeing). Daughters did very little damage killing only the forsaken and charging my caster. 

Turn 3: Feat. Bugger it, the daughters have to die and they did. Typhon went forward to spray but I forgot that the flameguard cleansers had reach. Typhon has gunfighter but if you are between 0.5" to 2" away from a model you can't shoot. (whoops).

Scott: managed to get a shot at my caster with one of his jacks and a charge with reach from the flameguard cleansers and Lylyth went squish.

Final Thoughts

So 2nd place. I'm pretty happy, Lylyth had a bad match up but I should have managed my lists better, possibly taken Lylyth against Theo. I think Kallus might be the best second caster for Saern so I might give him a run next tournament, just need another box of incubi (which my prize money will hopefully cover), though at 50 points eVayl might be the go. When the Naga Nightlurker is released that would probably be a very good addition to this list. It's animus gives blessed which would have enabled me to ignore the DEF buff on the daughters and made a huge difference. 

Tournament in Wollongong

Got an email from Graham last night, he has something to do with this (from wargamerau):

Wollongong's first Warmachine/Hordes tournament.

When?
4 December 2011

Start Time?
At the moment 10am (Subject to change due to the University)

Where?
University of Wollongong Building 1, G05 (that means Building 1, Ground floor, Room 05)
Link for campus map
http://www.uow.edu.au/about/campusmap/index.html

What?
35pts of either Warmachine or Hordes. No tiers this time around.
No proxy minis. All minis must be released.
Time Turns as Steamroller 2011.
Two list are allowed but BOTH must be used at least once. If two list are used must be different named caster/ warlock.
Scoring as per Steamroller 2011
Number of rounds determined by the number of players.

Cost?
$10

Prizes.
First place overall. Depending on numbers may be more.

Attitude!
This is a fun tourny. No offensive, cheating or unsporting behaviour will be tolerated.

Attending?
Drop me a line here on WAU or at
sdz364@uowmail.edu.au

See you all then. Cheers.

I will be there, not sure what faction to take yet. 35 points is an interesting level for a tournament, at 50 points you can take everything your caster needs at 35 you have to make some tough choices. Be interesting to see if any of the Sydney people come down.