This weekend I had the pleasure of playing in a 3 game 1850 tournament at Toywiz in Nanuet, NY. Last time, there were about 30 guys playing and I got a narrow victory because the other guy played with an unpainted army. The prize support was outstanding and the games were great! This weekend I went back hoping to find more of the same.
My 1850 list:
Ever striving to be ahead of the trends, I took another step away from AV11. I only fielded two razor backs! I wanted to increase my down and dirty assault punch and try to eliminate gun fights by getting up close and personal... something Blood Angels excel at.
Mephiston
Reclusiarch
8 man assault squad with PW and Melta gun with God Hammer Land Raider, Multi Melta, EA
Attached to that squad was an Elite Chaplain with Melta Pistol and a Priest with PW
5 man assault squad with Melta in a las/plas razor
5 man assault squad in a TL Las razor
5 termies in a crusader. My standard version with 4 claws and 1 hammer, also a priest in power armor. The Rec was attached to these.
Game One:
I was against the standard variant of the Guard list with 3 vendettas, vets in chimeras and heavy tank of choice. This deployment was a "L" shaped zone in opposite corners. Sort of a pitched battle from the corners thing. I deployed first and set up ready to move. I did not want to waste any time getting into the thick of it. In the first picture I had completed my first movement. Then you can see his reaction in my second pic. Shooting would not go great for either of us. I shook a couple Vendettas and got ready to get into it on turn two. He fired back and failed to do any damage other than to shake a land raider.
Turn Two:
I was still a bit far away to assault him yet, so I moved up another 12" with my Crusader and nestled Mephiston in behind it. More shooting would swat down a Vendetta and shake another. He moved up melta vets but they failed to pop the crusader.
Turn Three:
Here the game more or less was over. I moved up the crusader and assaulted a chimera, squad and vendetta with my termies, killing them all. Mephiston jumped up and killed a heavy tank. I wanted to keep him away from all the chimeras full of plasma, so I sent him to my opponent's left flank where he had all of his tanks instead of troops.
Turn Four:
My shooting would take out one or two more chimeras and eliminate his chances of contesting the objectives I was holding. Mephiston jumped again and slaughtered a squad of psykers. My terminators assaulted and killed more vets and chimeras, but they were taking losses. My Crusader was finally exploded by melta fire, but that was too little too late for him. He immobilized my god hammer, but it was in the center of the table by then and sitting on an objective, and in range of all of his stuff with all of it's guns.
Turn Five:
We called the game after my turn. The best he could possibly do was contest one of the three objectives I was holding and he had no way to kill the murderers amongst his ranks because mephiston jumped over and killed the last tank that could hurt me from range.
Game Two:
I was up against my nemesis from Templecon, Jeff from Battle for Salvation and his Blood Angels. Jeff was playing 3 god hammer land raiders with naked squads inside, mephiston and a Storm raven carrying 8 or so death Company with power weapons, a chaplain and a DC Furioso.
It was DoW deployment with 4 objectives that we set up in a rough box and I went first, holding every thing off the table. He did the same. On my turn I came on and took up defensive fireing positions. He would have to come at me because I took the side with most of the objectives. He moved his raven up 24" on my right flank which was my weaker flank. I had my crusader and mephiston in the middle of the table, and my god hammer holding the right. As an added bonus, we had to randomly determine if the terrain was on fire or just smoking. Smoking gave a +1 cover save while on fire made it dangerous terrain, this would come up huge later in the game.
Turn Two:
I opened up on his Raven and knocked it down with my god hammer. Aptly named. I penetrated it three times and he failed all three saves. It exploded! In the middle of the table we had a chess match. He had Mephiston hidden in the very center behind some terrain. I was content to keep him at bay with my crusader while I worked on his troops. I shot up some infantry he started outside of it's raider and nearly killed them. They would be sure to die next turn! But on his turn, he exploded my crusader with a las from his own god hammer. He moved up his dread and death company a bit and popped smoke.
My 1850 list:
Ever striving to be ahead of the trends, I took another step away from AV11. I only fielded two razor backs! I wanted to increase my down and dirty assault punch and try to eliminate gun fights by getting up close and personal... something Blood Angels excel at.
Mephiston
Reclusiarch
8 man assault squad with PW and Melta gun with God Hammer Land Raider, Multi Melta, EA
Attached to that squad was an Elite Chaplain with Melta Pistol and a Priest with PW
5 man assault squad with Melta in a las/plas razor
5 man assault squad in a TL Las razor
5 termies in a crusader. My standard version with 4 claws and 1 hammer, also a priest in power armor. The Rec was attached to these.
Game One:
I was against the standard variant of the Guard list with 3 vendettas, vets in chimeras and heavy tank of choice. This deployment was a "L" shaped zone in opposite corners. Sort of a pitched battle from the corners thing. I deployed first and set up ready to move. I did not want to waste any time getting into the thick of it. In the first picture I had completed my first movement. Then you can see his reaction in my second pic. Shooting would not go great for either of us. I shook a couple Vendettas and got ready to get into it on turn two. He fired back and failed to do any damage other than to shake a land raider.
Turn Two:
I was still a bit far away to assault him yet, so I moved up another 12" with my Crusader and nestled Mephiston in behind it. More shooting would swat down a Vendetta and shake another. He moved up melta vets but they failed to pop the crusader.
Turn Three:
Here the game more or less was over. I moved up the crusader and assaulted a chimera, squad and vendetta with my termies, killing them all. Mephiston jumped up and killed a heavy tank. I wanted to keep him away from all the chimeras full of plasma, so I sent him to my opponent's left flank where he had all of his tanks instead of troops.
Turn Four:
My shooting would take out one or two more chimeras and eliminate his chances of contesting the objectives I was holding. Mephiston jumped again and slaughtered a squad of psykers. My terminators assaulted and killed more vets and chimeras, but they were taking losses. My Crusader was finally exploded by melta fire, but that was too little too late for him. He immobilized my god hammer, but it was in the center of the table by then and sitting on an objective, and in range of all of his stuff with all of it's guns.
Turn Five:
We called the game after my turn. The best he could possibly do was contest one of the three objectives I was holding and he had no way to kill the murderers amongst his ranks because mephiston jumped over and killed the last tank that could hurt me from range.
Game Two:
I was up against my nemesis from Templecon, Jeff from Battle for Salvation and his Blood Angels. Jeff was playing 3 god hammer land raiders with naked squads inside, mephiston and a Storm raven carrying 8 or so death Company with power weapons, a chaplain and a DC Furioso.
It was DoW deployment with 4 objectives that we set up in a rough box and I went first, holding every thing off the table. He did the same. On my turn I came on and took up defensive fireing positions. He would have to come at me because I took the side with most of the objectives. He moved his raven up 24" on my right flank which was my weaker flank. I had my crusader and mephiston in the middle of the table, and my god hammer holding the right. As an added bonus, we had to randomly determine if the terrain was on fire or just smoking. Smoking gave a +1 cover save while on fire made it dangerous terrain, this would come up huge later in the game.
Turn Two:
I opened up on his Raven and knocked it down with my god hammer. Aptly named. I penetrated it three times and he failed all three saves. It exploded! In the middle of the table we had a chess match. He had Mephiston hidden in the very center behind some terrain. I was content to keep him at bay with my crusader while I worked on his troops. I shot up some infantry he started outside of it's raider and nearly killed them. They would be sure to die next turn! But on his turn, he exploded my crusader with a las from his own god hammer. He moved up his dread and death company a bit and popped smoke.
He fast moves his Raven up my right flank.
And I knock it down with 3 penetrating hits, two from TL Las and one from the Multi Melta!
Jeff deploys his death company from their exploded raven.
Turn Three:
I opened up on his dread, but the combination of smoke and armor would stop me from destroying it. I moved up my termies and meph towards his meph, causing him to pull his back. But little more happened. He returned fire and failed to do much of his own. He failed to take out my god hammer with his dreads melta and then assaulted it. Here an interesting rules question came up. He wanted to use his assault on my land raider to get his dread into a safe position. I said that he had to move straight into base contact with my tank by the shortest route possible. He contested that he could take an arching angular route and come in on the very front. (He wanted to get him away from las fire) He ended up going straight in after a quick discussion.
What do you guys think?
Turn Four:
I immobilized his dread in shooting, and moved out my terminators towards the center of the table hoping to draw out his Mephiston. I assaulted his death company with my assault squad from inside the god hammer, and wiped them out on the charge. This pretty much solidified my right flank. On his turn, he blasted and destroyed both of my razorbacks as well as my god hammer. The razor on my left was a huge loss. They were holding my obective but had to bail out into dangerous terrain. I rolled two dangerous tests, and failed them both. This caused a leadership test, which I failed, and the squad ran off the table. Drat. He moved out with his other raiders. One tried to tank shock my assault squad on the right that just wiped out his death co. But I used my chaplain to death or glory with his melta pistol! Here, Jeff tried to use smoke launchers to get a cover save from Death or Glory. After some discussion, and a look at a rule book, it was realized that smoke is used at the end of movement. I destroyed the raider on the DoG attack!
On turn five I moved the guys above over to the left, but chose to take the kill and slaughtered his squad. I should have shot my melta at his raider. I did not want to take the chance of being short on the assault after and not being able to slaughter the enemy infantry. So I went for the sure thing and wiped them out. My meph assaulted one of his raiders but failed to kill due to a hood blocked STR 10.
On his turn he would commit Mephiston to the fight and assault my termies. I made some huge saves and put a hurt on him, but we drew combat. His two raiders moved onto objectives. Uhoh... I held one and he held two. Crap. Game ends on a die roll. Win Jeff.
If the game went on I would certainly have won if not tabled him. But that is why random game length exists! I did manage to score all the bonus points though. So it was more like a draw for me instead of a loss. This game had any number of vital turning points, from me destroying his raven, to him killing my crusader with a lucky las and running my squad off the table due to failed dangerous terrain tests.
Oh well. He would go on to play for the win vs Dark Eldar and I would play Tau. :)
Game Three:
Deployment was pitched battle and kill points was the mission.
He went first and deployed in the corner, I deployed two razor backs like you see in this first pic, and hid meph behind them. I deep striked my raiders.
My plan was to jump mephiston into that ruin piece between my razors and his boys. Then jump out the next turn and assault. I had to make sure he survived that nasty Tau range turn one so I set up the razors to but hopefully just wreck and not explode.
That part worked. He wrecked the razor on the left and immobilized the one on the right! Meph jumped up into the terrain piece that would block LoS and give him an attack point, but took a wound in the process. Damn me and my incredible ability to roll 1s.
Turn Two:
On his turn he knew what was about to happen, so he moved his kroot around to speed bump me. But he left a hole! His shooting did little but knock weapons off my razorback.
On my turn my god hammer came into the fight, and I deep striked it right into the center of the table. I knew it would not survive, but it did not have to. Deep striking it meant that it would at least be killed with the troops in assault range. That was the best I could hope for. Meph jumped out of the terrain, taking yet another wound in the process. Man I suck. I had to take down some suits to lessen the plasma fire that would be shot at my troops once their raider was killed. He left me a chance! There was a hole big enough for Meph to get through the kroot and assault the suits behind. They would die by my blade and meph would hunker down for return fire.
Turn Three:
As I suspected, my god hammer was killed. But much to my chagrin, it was killed with the very first shot. Luckily I managed to disembark the troops on the right side and shield them from most of the fire. That was because all of the rest of his shots went at Mephiston! But by a miracle of cover save love, he survived the round with a single wound left. This spelled the end of the game.
On my turn my other raider came down into terrain. You can see it in the pic above. And of course, it immobilized itself with a 1 upon landing. But at this point it was over and the Tau did not even know it. My troops assaulted both of his kroot squads, killing them all. Mephiston moved into the ruin and killed his Broadside squad. My crusader shot his hammer head and immobilized it.
Turn Four:
He with his fire power greatly reduced he would try to salvage the game. His immobile hammer failed to kill my immobile raider. He did wipe out the chaplain and the entire squad that killed his kroot though! Only the priest survived and he would scurry for cover. On my turn my termies assaulted every thing in range from their crippled transport. The Fire warriors and hammer would die. The crusader shot up his pathfinders and they failed leadership and ran off the table. At this point I had such a large lead in kill points that my priest and meph simply hid in the terrain having found a wall that blocks line of sight.
Turn Five:
He would go for my immobile razor in the back trying to scratch up a kill point, but failed to kill it. My boys hunkered down in the terrain. See the pic below. That would end it! Maximum Victory for me.
New Jawa-Dice!
Their base became their coffin, and my salvation. It's a conga line of one wound kill points!
So that ended the day. Two big wins and a loss for me. I ended up in second by a couple of points. And to the victors go the spoils! Saving up for a home has my pockets strapped. Thanks to every one who bought some of my stuff by the way. Almost all of it has gone into the mail. I am sending out the last two packages today, the Eldar Fire Dragon and the plastic GW case. I have very little money to spend on new projects nowadays.
But store credit from winning the previous one and taking second here allowed me to leave with quite the haul of Grey Knights to pump up my army!
I left there with a Dreadknight, lemarte blister, stern blister and sanguinary priest blister, three terminator squads and 2 infantry squads! I also restocked some paints.
Thanks goes out Toywiz and Matt Wallach for running a fun tournament and giving awesome prize support.
Next week? Battle for Salvation RTT. There is still some time to get yourself a ticket! VISIT THE SITE for details and to buy your ticket. I know it will be a rock solid tournament with wicked prize support. See you there!
EDIT: I thought you would be interested to know that I made no less than 7 dangerous terrain tests during the day, and failed EVERY G-DAMNED one of them. Thats right, I rolled a 1 every time I tried a dangerous terrain test. 7 times at least. I'm cursed.
Jawaballs
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