Tournament Report: Feast of Blades Qualifiers (with pictures!)

Hey there folks, how's it hangin?  Xaereth here again, from Delusions of Grandeur!  Today I have a tournament report for you.  I brought a Space Wolf list, (I know, I know, this is supposed to be a Blood Angels blog) but I figured since Jawa was kind enough to paint a banner for this event out of the goodness of his heart (click here to take a look at it), this was a good opportunity to post up a few battle reports!

The Feast of Blades looks to be an up-and-coming annual tournament in Colorado.  The basic premise is this:  each gaming store in the state has a qualifying tournament.  The two best overall players from each store are then invited to the Feast of Blades 'finals', where the best players from all over the state compete for big prizes, including the honor of hanging the Jawa Banner in your LGS for a year, until the next year comes along and someone else has the opportunity to win it.

I should say straight off that my LGS is home to one of the most competitive group of players in the state.  We recently (as in, 2 or 3 weeks ago) had our first GT in Colorado with over 70 players.  The end result had from my LGS alone:  Best Overall, Second Overall/Best General (me), 4th Overall, Sixth Overall, and a few other guys in the top 15.  If you want my tournament report for that tournament, click here.

At any rate, suffice it to say that at this specific tournament, we had at least six guys who could very likely qualify for the tournament in any other game store, had they wanted to.  Instead, everyone showed up for one of the toughest 3-game tournaments I've ever taken part in.

So, enough back story.  Let's jump into the games!

First, here's my list, Space Wolves at 2000 points:

Wolf Lord w/ Thunderwolf Mount, Saga of the Bear, Runic Armor, Thunder Hammer, Storm Shield, Wolf Tail Talisman, Wolf Tooth Necklace

Wolf Lord w/ Thunderwolf Mount, Saga of Majesty, Runic Armor, Wolf Claw, Storm Shield, Wolf Tooth Necklace

Rune Priest w/ Jaws of the World Wolf, Murderous Hurricane

3x Wolf Guard w/ 3x Power Fists, 3x Combi-meltas

9x Grey Hunters w/ Wolf Standard, Rhino (Wolf Guard goes here)
9x Grey Hunters w/ Wolf Standard, Rhino (Wolf Guard goes here)
8x Grey Hunters w/ Wolf Standard, Rhino (Wolf Guard + Rune Priest go here)

4x Thunderwolf Cavalry w/ 2x Storm Shields, Thunder Hammer, Melta Bombs (one has both SS and TH)

6x Long Fangs w/ 5x Missile Launchers
6x Long Fangs w/ 5x Missile Launchers
6x Long Fangs w/ 5x Missile Launchers

This is almost the exact list I got 6th with at Wargamescon last year, with a few tweaks to the Wolfstar itself.  It's a pretty tough list, and I've had good success at tournaments with it thus far.  But enough reminiscing, let's talk about my games!

Game 1:  Wolfstar (me) vs. Eric's Blob Guard!

So, me and Eric have a history of playing each other quite a bit of late.  Of note, we played the 2nd round at the GT a few weeks ago, though he had Tau then.  In fact, I almost typed 'Eric's Tau' up top, instead of Guard.  He's one of the guys who played his way into the top 15.

Here's his list:

Straken's CCS w/ 3x Meltaguns, Medic, Bodyguard, Astropath, Chimera w/ HB

Platoon Command Squad w/ 4x Flamers, Chimera w/ HF

Infantry Squad w/ Autocannon, Meltagun, Power Weapon, Commissar w/ Power Weapon
Infantry Squad w/ Autocannon, Meltagun, Power Weapon
Infantry Squad w/ Autocannon, Meltagun, Power Weapon

Platoon Command Squad w/ 4x Meltas, Chimera w/ HF

Infantry Squad w/ Autocannon, Meltagun, Power Weapon, Commissar w/ Power Weapon
Infantry Squad w/ Autocannon, Meltagun, Power Weapon
Infantry Squad w/ Autocannon, Meltagun, Power Weapon

Platoon Command Squad w/ Al'Rahem, 4x Melta Guns

Infantry Squad w/ Flamer, Power Weapon, Commissar w/ Power Weapon
Infantry Squad w/ Flamer, Power Weapon 
Infantry Squad w/ Flamer, Power Weapon

Leman Russ w/ Heavy Bolter
Leman Russ Demolisher w/ Heavy Bolter
Gryphon Squadron w/ 2x Gryphons

So, a pretty straightforward list, with lots of tough to deal with threats.  The mission was modified kill points, with HQ's worth 3 points, Troops/Dedicated Transports worth 1, and everything else worth 2.  Special characters were worth an additional point (i.e. Al'Rahem's squad would be worth 2 points, and Straken's CCS would be worth 4).

Secondary mission was table quarters where only troops could score/contest, and tertiary was keeping your highest point unit alive for the entire game.

Dawn of war deployment meant that my army was going to have a rough game of it.  I'll explain a little more later.  Eric won the roll to go first, and took it.

FOR BIGGER PICTURES, CLICK ON THEM!

Here is our starting deployments.  He put down a couple of his blobs, and kept his two platoon command squads (PCS) in regular reserve.  Al'Rahem was of course outflanking.  I put my Bear Lord on the table, 8" from the edge, giving me an extra 4" or so with the Dawn of War deployment, when the rest of the Wolfstar could walk onto it.  Otherwise, a Grey Hunter rhino hid behind some terrain.
 Guard Turn 1:

His stuff walked on.  They took a few potshots at my rhino, but failed to do any damage.

Straken was in the middle in a chimera, just waiting to hand out counter-charge.
Wolfstar Turn 1:

I walked my army on.  You'll see in a little bit where everything is, but you'll see I kept one of my Longfang squads in reserve.  Why, you ask?  There was a +1 bonus point for keeping something in reserve, and I didn't want to spare one of my Hunter squads.  Longfangs would be of limited use against his high AV tanks, I thought.

I drove up my rhino who had started far up the board, and popped smoke.

No picture this turn, apparently.

Kill point count:
Wolves: 0
Guard: 0

Guard Turn 2:

He rolled for reserves, and only got Al'Rahem in.  He walked them on right next to the Wolfstar.  Otherwise, not much movement went on.


See... right next to them.
 The blob fired at the Wolfstar, needing 4's to hit, and 6's to wound.  He caused 5 wounds, and I rolled my first saves of the game:

Nice!  Happy to start the game off rolling well :)
His other shooting didn't do much.  He did manage to pin one of the Long Fang squads with his Grypons, after killing a couple of them off.

See, I kept my Grey Hunters rhinos centralized, to go where they needed to go in later turns.
 Wolfstar Turn 2:

I needed to kill Al'Rahem's blob as quick as I could, and lay down some suppressing fire on those Gryphons!  So, I moved both rhinos over, disembarked their contents next to the platoon, and prepared to rapid-fire.  My other (previously advanced) Grey Hunters got out of their ride, and prepared to assault his blob on the left- I mostly needed to keep them busy for a few turns and divert his auto-cannons.

In shooting, my Rune Priest started things off right by sniping his commissar out of the squad.  Rapid-firing helped to kill droves of guardsmen.  My Star fleeted closer to the squad.  My single longfang squad was somehow able to get a pen and a glance on his Gryphon squadron, and immobilized/destroyed both of them! 

In assault, I tried to assault his blob on the left:

I rolled a 2, and couldn't get to them.  /sigh  Guess last turn he immobilized that rhino too.  Forgot about that!

Other assault occurred with my Wolfstar vs. his blob, and the Wolfstar wiped them out to a man, consolidating toward his blob.

Notice Al'Rahem is still fully intact in his chimera.  I just couldn't get to it this turn.  Actually, this is at the end of his turn 3.  See how little Guard move? :)
Kill point count:
Wolves: 3
Guard: 0
(remember, it's modified kill points)

Guard Turn 3:

His other two PCS came on, but couldn't do a whole lot.  He didn't really move much.

Shooting went down, and his demolisher insta-deathed two of my wolves!  Other random shooting put a few more wounds on my Wolfstar, and he killed a couple of my Grey Hunters on the left with lots of lasguns/a battlecannon shot that scattered a little.

Again, no assault, and it was my turn.  Look at the picture from last turn to see what happened, lol.

Wolfstar Turn 3:

I got my Longfang squad in from reserves, and marched them on directly facing where his chimeras had come in at (on the far right side).  My Grey Hunters on the left marched up and got ready to shoot meltas at his 'normal' Russ, and then charge if need be.  Wolfstar advanced toward one of his blobs.  My Rune Priest's squad got back into their rhino and advanced a little bit.  The other squad moved toward Al'Rahem's chimera, ready to open it and assault the contents.

Shooting ended up opening Straken's ride, since I had side shots on it (he failed a lot of cover saves this game).  I failed to hurt the Russ or the Chimera though.

In assault, my Wolfstar charged his Blob, and killed a ton, but took a couple in return.  His commissar was still alive though, and so kept them stubborn on a 9, which they passed.  The Hunters on the left assaulted his Russ, and hit twice with the fist!  Then they rolled double-1's and sat there, waiting to be vaporized.  The fist on Rahem's chimera ended up wrecking it, though the squad passed their pinning check.

On the top left, you can just see the sad squad of Grey Hunters who failed to hurt the Russ.  Poor dudes :(
Kill point count:
Wolves: 5
Guard: 0

Guard Turn 4:

Well, he couldn't do a whole lot more than just shoot at me.  Raheem's squad moved up to try and melta a rhino.

Shooting vaporized my Grey Hunters on the left, and Rahem's squad killed a rhino of their own.  Yikes!

In assault, his Blob lost a lot of good men, but made up for it by dropping my Majesty Lord, who succumbed to a grand total of 4 power wounds over the course of 2 turns (despite his Storm Shield).  Way to be resilient buddy! 

Good come-back turn by the Guard.


Wolfstar Turn 4:

Well, it was getting down to the wire.  I needed to kill more stuff!  I moved my Rune Priest's rhino up, and disembarked the guys inside, ready to snipe Straken with Jaws!

So, they got out, and the Priest rolled for his check:

Failed power!  Sad face :(  Incidentally, this is the last picture for the game, since we started running short on time.
Other shooting went a little better.  The Long Fangs were able to kill his Demolisher on side armor, through a couple more failed cover saves.  I also shot some missiles at Straken's squad, and whittled them down to only Straken.  I also wiped out Rahem's squad completely.

In combat, I was able to wipe his Blob out, finally.

Kill point count:
Wolves: 10
Guard: 5

Guard Turn 5:

He needed to make something happen.  So, he shot everything into my 3 remaining Wolfstar models.  I lost a single model, and the other two (the two hammers, including the Bear Lord) had a single wound remaining on each.  His autocannons shot at my Long Fangs and killed 2 in one squad.  They rolled a 10 for leadership and ran off the board!

His blob on the left assaulted my immobilized rhino, and failed to hurt it with their S4 Frag Grenades.

Wolfstar Turn 5:

I moved the Star up to assault his Chimeras.   Mostly everything else stayed still.

Shooting failed to kill Straken.  One awesome thing though:  I shot 5 frag missiles at his PCS squad with flamers.  I hit 4 times, but the 5th scattered huge, hit one of my Wolfstar members, and killed my Hammer/Shield model!  /sigh  He then went to ground and saved all but one of his guys after like 15 wounds)  Other shooting killed another of his Chimeras.

(as a side note, Eric wouldn't stop talking about how amazing my dice rolls were.  Some were pretty good, but you can't really overlook a couple random terrible rolls of mine netting him a total of 4 kill points to help him stay in the game, especially if you count my 3 failed 3++ saves vs. 4 wounds caused, which was worth yet another 3)

In assault, my Bear Lord decided to take on a nice easy Chimera, which he did.  Every kill point counts, at this point!  His blob whiffed against my rhino on the left.

Kill point count:
Wolves: 12
Guard: 9

Guard Turn 6:

Well, if he could kill my Bear Lord, and then kill my Rhino on the left, he could win the game if it went unanswered.

He shot at my Bear Lord, and caused 3 melta wounds to him.  I rolled and saved them all.  Whew!

In combat, he finally killed my rhino.

Wolfstar Turn 6:

Heh, I was happy enough to just let the game end.  There was really no way I could get 9 more kill points than him, no matter how well I rolled, which was the 'massacre' result.  I got the win, but drew on the secondary and tertiary.  Not the strongest win ever.

We rolled just to see if I would have killed Straken, and I would have.  So, me passing those 3 saves with my Bear Lord wasn't as pivotal as we had originally thought.

Results:  Win, 25/45 possible points

Like I said, not the strongest of wins.  I felt I played it right, but with the losses of a few crucial squads and the epic fail-ery that was my leftmost Grey Hunter squad I barely squeaked out a win going into the next round.

After a nice lunch with my friends from Laramie (WY) at Noodles and Company, we got our Round 2 pairings:

Game 2:  Wolfstar vs. Mick's Fatecrusher Demons

His list:

Wave 1:

Fateweaver
Blood Thirster

5x Bloodcrushers w/ complex gear
5x Screamers of Tz
Soul Grinder w/ S10 shot
Soul Grinder w/ S10 shot


Wave 2:

6x Fiends
5x Flamers of Tz
5x Plaguebearers
5x Plaguebearers
5x Plaguebearers
7x Plaguebearers
 
Well, this was another guy I didn't want to draw.  His list is solid and extremely difficult to deal with.  I know the internets like to hate on Fatecrusher lately (or do they?  I know Brent does, lol), but if he makes his saves, this list is all but impossible to actually beat.  He's also a great player, and though he didn't go to Genghis, I think he would have also placed high.  No slouches at Gryphons, nosiree.

The mission was 5 objectives, with 'standard' deployment.  I normally really like this sort of mission, but against a demon army with all those plaguebearers able to drop down wherever they want, it was the sort of uphill battle I didn't feel particularly up to.  I mean seriously... who wants to play against Fateweaver? :-p

Guess I could ask the same about the Wolfstar :-p

I won the roll for first turn, and gave it to him.  He didn't have enough shooting to really really scare me, and I needed that last say in who held the objectives.

Here's my deployment.  I tried to spread my Fangs out so as to avoid the Flamers killing more than a single squad once they landed.  I also wanted some shots to reach behind that big wall piece of terrain you can see there in the middle.  Notice I was giving my Rhinos a cover save, since I was more concerned with his Grinders killing Rhinos when they dropped than shooting their single S10 shot into them.
Demons Turn 1:

His selected wave roll (i.e. literally the biggest roll of the game) came up and... he rolled a 6.  So he got his selected wave.  Man, I really wanted that roll to go awry.  Ah well...

He landed Fateweaver behind 'the wall', and his Thirster next to him.  The Crushers scattered backward a little, which made me happy.  You can see that his Grinders landed to either flank of mine.

Shooting caused a single wound on my Bear Lord with his S10 AP1 guns.  Otherwise, he ran a little bit, and that was the end.

Lots and lots of stuff I need to kill this turn.  We'll see how that works out for me.
Wolfstar Turn 1:

I didn't really advance much.  My Rune Priest's rhino moved up 6" to get ready to try and Jaws his Fateweaver.  Another Grey Hunter rhino moved forward 12", so as to get into a solid location to react from.

I used Jaws first, and failed to kill either of his 'big' guys (big surprise, but it was worth a try).  It also hit two bloodcrushers, who both failed their checks and were removed from the table.  Nice :)  My missiles went into Fateweaver then, and though he failed a ton of 'original' saves, he failed a grand total of ZERO saves total.  Ut-oh.

Fateweaver wounds caused: 0

Well, I just have to hope he doesn't get his fiends in this turn.
Fatecrusher Turn 2:

For reserves, he got his Flamers of Tz, who tried to strike next to a Fang squad, but scattered 8" away.

He decided to go for it with his Thirster.  Jumping up, he prepared to assault the Wolfstar under the cover of Fateweaver's awesome ability to reroll stuff.  His other stuff also advanced.  One huge break is that Fateweaver landed on terrain, and rolled a 1, followed by a 2 for his save, followed by another 2, and he took a wound. 15 missiles can't hurt him, but some 'dangerous' terrain can.  What a joke.  He passed his leadership though.

His shooting didn't really do a whole lot.

In assault, he attacked my two rhinos, one with the Grinder, one with the Screamers.  He failed to hurt either one very much, though he did immobilize the one the screamers were in contact with.  The Thirster assaulted the Star, and caused a couple wounds.  I was able to cause 3 back, and we stuck there in combat.  Man, a 4++ rerollable save is nothing to balk at!

So you can see the scrum there in the middle.  Things are getting tense quick!
Wolfstar Turn 2:

I needed to neutralize his Soul Grinder on the right this turn, at all costs.  So, I disembarked both rhino squads, and moved one into assault range of the Blood Crushers.  The plan was to melta with one squad, and if they failed to do much, to melta with the other.  If the first squad succeeded, I could assault his Crushers, taking away their charging advantage.  The other rhino from my left moved up and disembarked, scooping up the Rune Priest from another rhino, and preparing to rapid-fire Fateweaver.

Shooting happened, and I was able to put another wound onto Fateweaver.  I was also (barely) able to immobilize the soul grinder on my right, though it took both squads' meltas to do it.  A squad of Long Fangs were able to frag missile his Flamers out of existence.

In combat, I killed his Thirster, though only after he killed two of my wolves (they already had wounds on them).  His screamers exploded the immobilized rhino.

Fateweaver Wounds Caused: 2 (one of which was super lucky)

Lots of stuff I gotta kill here.  Way too much stuff.  And it's his turn.  Scary, scary army.
Fatecrusher Turn 3:

His fiends came in, as did most of his plaguebearers, who struck close to various scattered objectives.

His Crushers moved to get out of terrain, but failed to get out of it entirely.  His grinder on the left moved up, ready to assault my Long Fangs.  And perhaps my biggest surprise:  his screamers moved up to assault my Wolfstar.

Shooting again didn't do much.

He failed the charge on the left with the Grinder, but his screamers dove in against my Star.  Crazy as it was, I only caused 2 wounds, and we stuck into combat.  Excellent move by Mick, since that makes my Bear Lord unable to go try to swat the Grinder on the left next turn.  Fateweaver can make units like Screamers multi-faceted.  Madness :)

The crushers charged in against a single Grey Hunter squad, and I failed to cause any wounds at I4, and at I1, I was left with just a few guys.  I was, however, able to cause a couple back with my fist.  I barely passed leadership, and stuck in.

The fiends are all behind 'the wall' in the middle.
Wolfstar Turn 3:

I needed to kill Fateweaver this turn.  It was now or never.  If I couldn't, then I would lose, simple as that.

Movement was somewhat limited.  I moved my rightmost grey hunters into charge range of the crushers, and the other squad into charge range of the screamers (though if I needed to I would rapid-fire fateweaver as a last resort).

Shooting went as well as it could.  I first targeted Fateweaver, and killed him off fairly quickly. Whew!  Then I shot at the leftmost Grinder, and immobilized it.

In assault, the Grey Hunters charged in, and killed off the injured Crushers, and also wiped out the suddenly beleaguered screamers.

The Grey Hunters wanted to get into cover, to prepare for the last great threat:  the fiends.
Fatecrusher Turn 4:

He moved his fiends, and decided against assaulting any of my Grey Hunters, instead opting to charge a rhino I had moved forward to eventually contest an objective on the right.  They failed to do much to it.

The bird things on the top right are the fiends.
Wolfstar Turn 4:

I moved the Grey Hunters forward to rapidfire the fiends.  The wolfstar moved toward the top right objective, and the plaguebearers there.

Shooting wiped out the Fiends.

I charged the shite out of his plaguebearers.

Yay for cavalry, I guess?
Rest of the Game:

We played out most of the rest of the game, but he wasn't able to do much with a couple immobilized Grinders and a few plaguebearers.  In the end, I had contested or controlled all of the objectives.  Here's the last picture I took:
Whew, that game was much closer than it looks like here.
The secondary objective was kill points, which I got.  I forget what the Tertiary was, but I got it as well.

Results:  Win, 44/45 total points

Mick was a great sport, though he made known to me how much he hates my list (as in, he thought it was difficult to deal with).  I don't blame him, though Fatecrusher isn't exactly the easiest list to deal with either.  :-p

Well, the stage was set.   I was still in the running to win or at the very least qualify.  However, none of my options for opponents was very favorable.  I ended up drawing:

Game 3:  Wolfstar vs. Andy's Battlewagon Orks

Man, this was seriously the matchup I least wanted to draw.  For those of you who hadn't read my Genghis Con GT report, Andy was the only guy who beat me the entire tournament, and who went on to win the whole stinkin' thing.  He's got a nasty list, and is a great player who just waded through the competition to get the GT win.  Going in, I least of all wanted to play Andy.  The other guys all thought it added to the drama, though that wasn't something I cared about- I just wanted to qualify for the 'finals'.

On a positive note, it looked like if I could win this game, I could also eliminate him from going to the finals, so we didn't get a threematch (see what I just did there?)

His list:

Ghaz

KFF Mek

15x Kommandos w/ 2x Burnas, Snikrot

4x Meganoz w/ 2x Kombi-Skorchas, Battlewagon w/ Deff Rolla, Red Paint, Boarding Planks
18x Slugga Boyz w/ PK Nob
18x Slugga Boyz w/ PK Nob
12x Trukk Boyz w/ PK Nob, Trukk w/ Boarding Planks
12x Trukk Boyz w/ PK Nob, Trukk w/ Boarding Planks

2x Deffkoptas w/ 2x Power Klaws

Battle Wagon w/ Deff Rolla, Red Paint, Boarding Planks
Battle Wagon w/ Deff Rolla, Red Paint, Boarding Planks
3x Killa Kanz


So as you can see, he's got lots of S10 floating around, and Ghaz has a potential 27" charge, which beats my wolfstar by a pretty wide margin.  Lots of stuff that negates my advantages.


To make matters worse, it was Capture and Control on Spearhead.  Orks with all those scoring units do better than my three clunky Hunter squads.  Spearhead was also bad for me, because I had to put all my Longfangs on one side, making it somewhat impossible to get side shots on his Battlewagons.

We rolled for first turn, and he won, taking first turn.

I knew he would try to alpha-strike my Longfangs with his Deff Koptas if he could, so I put them all in a neat little cube and then bubble-wrapped them with my Grey Hunters.  So, that's what you're looking at right now.  I kept one Grey Hunter rhino in reserve
My game plan was somewhat more complex than it normally is:  I put my objective (where you can't really see it) on the far right side of my deployment zone, though not in the corner.  You see, I wanted to make it impossible to ignore my Long Fangs.  Either he went for my objective, and my Fangs would get good side-armor/back armor shots on his wagons, or he would wipe out the fangs, and make it easy for me to keep my own objective contested/controlled.  My reserved rhino in the meantime would make it's way up to control his own objective, doing what they could to control/contest it.  The wolfstar would help where needed, though my main plan was to wreck the battlewagons as quickly as possible, sacrificing the Wolfstar if need be.

With all that said, let's start the (somewhat tense) final game.

Orks Turn 1:

He decided to try to alpha-strike with his Koptas, but into my Grey Hunters instead.  Everything else rumbled up toward the Longfangs.

In combat, he charged the Hunters, killed one, and the Koptas died, as they likely should have.


Cool... stage 1 (killing the Koptas) complete.  Note the trukk off to the far right.  It's important.
Wolfstar Turn 1:

Well, I wasn't going to wreck any Wagons this turn, with them having moved this fast.  So, I decided to flank them, and go for the trukk on the side.  I also wanted him to take the bait with Ghaz and charge the Long Fangs, so I took my Grey Hunters and put them in their rhino, ready to counter-charge or wreck a wagon if the opportunity presented itself.

Shooting went alright, killing the leftmost trukk, and scattering them far away (because of the ramshackle rule), toward his objective in the corner.  The explosion killed 6 of them as well, though they didn't fail their leadership.

In combat, the Wolfstar charged the Trukk, and killed it, though it also ramshackled away.  So there I was, ready for him to deal with me.  If he didn't, I stood a good chance of winning the game.

No picture though, for some reason.

Orks Turn 2:

His Kommandos didn't come in, which was fortunate for me.  Ghaz + Meganobz moved up and disembarked, ready to assault the shite out of the Long Fangs.  The other two wagons peeled off, ready to assault my Wolfstar with both 18-boy squads + the Trukk squad they had forcibly disembarked.  48 Boyz were on their way to give the Star a bad day.

No real shooting, though he did declare his Waaaaaaggghhh!!  and move 6".

Assaults came at me.  These were the deciding assaults of the game.

See, he couldn't get all of his boyz into combat.  He maintains that he missed out on about 50 attacks, though I think that might be including boyz I normally would have killed before they could have struck.

Ghaz and his Nobz could get into combat with only two Longfang squads, which was fortunate for me.
The battle raged, and I ended up killing a ton of Boyz in the Wolfstar battle.  I wasn't without losses though- my Majesty Lord took 10 wounds, and on his 2+ Runic Armor save, he failed like 5 of them.  Lol, resilient my ass.  I lost a couple other wolves in the combat as well.

When the smoke cleared, I had won combat by 10, and as such, one squad of his went POOF! due to his being fearless this turn, and the others were decimated, but stayed locked into combat.

There's all the boyz I killed.  I also put a wound on each nob.

As expected, the Long Fangs all died a grizzly death, though they did manage to put a wound on Ghaz.
Wolfstar Turn 2:

My reserved Grey Hunters rhino didn't come in.

The Grey Hunters on the left got out of their ride, and prepared to try and melta the side of his KFF-less battlewagon.  The Rune Priest rhino moved up 6" to use Jaws on his Nobz.

Shooting went well for me.  I used Jaws, and killed two Nobz.  I then also used missiles to kill another Nob.  The Hunters also did me a favor, and exploded his Battle wagon.  So, on that front, there were only Ghaz + a single Nob left.  Not bad :)

In combat, the wolfstar wasn't positioned to be able to kill all of his boyz off, and so only killed most of them, for another casualty in return.  Next turn I'd break loose though.

I feel bad for the Longfangs there.
Orks Turn 3:

His Kommandos came in, and decided to reinforce Ghaz' squad.

His two remaining wagons moved backward toward his objective, and away from the Wolfstar.  Ghaz and the Nob moved toward the Grey Hunters to try and charge them.

In assault, the Wolfstar finally wiped out the last of the Orks, and consolidated toward his Wagons.  Ghaz failed his charge, and the Kommandos killed all but one of the Longfangs, who killed a couple in return, and passed his leadership.

Those lucky, lucky Grey Hunters.
Wolfstar Turn 3:

My reserves came in, and headed straight toward his objective.

I moved the remaining models of the Wolfstar up toward his Wagons.  The Grey Hunters in the middle decided they wanted a piece of the Kommandos, and got ready for that.

Shooting didn't really exist.

In combat, I killed one Battle Wagon, immobilized the other.  The Kommandos all died, but not before finishing off my poor final Long Fang.

You can't see it, but the Killa Kanz are easily in range to counter-charge my Wolfstar.
Orks Turn 4:

He didn't have a whole lot to do- charge in, and hope it's enough.

Ghaz and his minion charged into the Grey Hunters, and largely whiffed.  The Hunters put some wounds on them in return, and stuck in combat.  The Wolfstar combat was a little weird, with the Kanz charging in, and me killing one.  The Bear Lord was somehow unable to get into that combat, and stayed there next to the immobilized Wagon, which he exploded.  The Kanz killed my remaining Wolfstar, except for the Bear Lord, who still somehow had 2 wounds left on him.

Crazy battles... it's winding down now.  He can't get to my objective in time.  Can I get to his?
Wolfstar Turn 4:

My reserved rhino kept truckin' on up toward his objective.

No shooting.

In assault, I was able to kill both of his Kanz, and received a single wound on the Bear Lord in return.  The Grey Hunters were further whittled down, but put another wound on Ghaz.  One more to go on the big boy!

That's the Bear Lord hanging out with the scraps of metal that were the Kanz.


Poor sad Grey Hunters.  They're heroes though.
Orks Turn 5:

We skipped straight to combat, where I killed Ghaz, but failed against his final Meganob, who killed the remaining Grey Hunters.  Man, those guys were heroes- they killed 1) Deff Koptas 2) Battlewagon 3) Kommandos 4) Ghaz
So, we played a little more, and I ended up killing his KFF Mek, and likely would have tabled him if we had played the full game.

Results:  Win, 45/45 points

So, I had won all 3 games, and probably won the tournament.  I was also glad to have won the rematch between me and Andy, though if I never have to play that Ork list again, I'll be happy.

In the end, I'm not sure exactly what happened.  It was a somewhat confusing situation regarding what painting scores should count for, and I think in the end we just used straight battle points.  In this, someone edged me out by 3 points, though had we gone with painting I think I would have 'had' him.

It was no harm no foul however, since the purpose of this tournament was simply to qualify.  A few extra prize support dollars would have been nice, but in the end, I qualified, which was what mattered.

All of my opponents were great, both in sportsmanship and in gaming ability.  I was fortunate to have done as well as I did, with the missions and opponents as they were, and I'm honored to be able to represent my club at the first annual Feast of Blades Finals, which is on Saturday, March 19.

In the end, it was a fun time, and I can't wait for the finale in a couple weeks!  Then, it's off to Adepticon, and the Glory that might (but probably doesn't) await me there!  :-p


 Thoughts?  Questions?  If you want more battle reports like this, I do lots and lots of them.  My own blog has a link on the right hand side labeled 'battle report log', or you can simply click this link.  I try to do a 'weekly' battle report, though lately I've only been doing tournament reports.

6 comments:

Jawaballs said...

Great batreps man!

Thomas aka Goatboy said...

Good Batrep - Always liked the WolfStar obviously :). I got some new testing things that are interesting - don't know if I will play it but it makes the army a lot more resilient versus PBS and making your run away without needing a Rune Priest.

Lox said...

Nice report! I enjoyed it. :)

Jawaballs said...

woops didnt see I already had one scheduled for today when I posted this one Xaereth. Sorry mine came up so close after!

Commander_Vimes said...

I'm the Guard player from game 1.

Adam's rolls started amazingly well, though he had some hilariously bad ones towards the end, especially killing his own Thunderwolf.

The most significant dice effect was his amazing missile launcher rolls, hitting with like 18 of the first 20 shots, combined with me going 1 for 11 on vehicle cover saves. The combined effect was every single vehicle the Long Fangs shot, died. 3 missiles at the side of a demolisher in cover? No problem!

That said, I made some mistakes, particularly in the placement of Al'Rahem's squad. My hope was that the massed lasgun fire could take some wounds off the squad, and then they could bog down the Wolves for a turn. But 6 flamer hits and 66 lasgun shots gave me 5 wounds, and Al'Rahem's squad inflicted about 3 more AP 1s, and only 1 went through.

I didn't see the both Grey Hunter squads coming over to rapid fire me coming, and that, plus leaving the Commissar where he could be sniped, destroyed that blob a lot faster than I'd hoped.

I haven't fought a serious deathstar with my Guard before, so it was a good learning experience.

It was a good game, and a good tournament; I ended up with 3rd place, just shy of qualifying.

Xaereth said...

Goatboy: how's that? My best idea so far besides layered psychic protection is to not let two of my wolves die in a turn, which can be pretty difficult if you roll even a little below average.

Jawa: My anger knows no bounds.

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