On Monday the LATCS Podcast guys hosted a tournament (sort of) at Battlegrounds, our local store. I say sort of, because the prizes were not dependent on your placing in the tournament. There was an entry fee of $5 which put you in a drawing for several prizes. I hadn't played a game of 40k in over two months due to all my Fantasy preparations, and the events of the 'Ard Boyz semifinals left me soured on over-competitiveness so I decided to just take a "whatever" Tyranid list. That meant I took whatever I had painted or mostly painted, or even just converted.
Here's what I took. The tournament was 1500 points.
Parasite of Mortrex
2x Hive Guard
Doom of Malan'tai (I used my Malanthrope)
Mycetic Spore
11 Termagants
Tervigon
10 Genestealers + Broodlord
Harpy
30 Gargoyles (I borrowed these)
Tyrannofex (I used my Barbed Hierodule)
The missions were a bit unusual. Each game had 5 objectives and what are called "Destruction Points." For every 200 pts killed, you get one destruction point. It doesn't work like victory points in that you have to kill the whole unit; if you kill one model from a squad its points add into the Destruction Point total. It's an unusual system and I have mixed feelings on it.
The third facet of the missions was the secret objective. With this one, you drew a secret objective out of a hat and tried to accomplish this during the game. I really liked this idea, it was a lot of fun.
My first game put me up against the frakkin' toasters, the Necrons. The Tyrannofex took out his Monolith on the second turn and pretty much sealed the game. The Doom didn't show up until turn 4 and then proceeded to mop up with his blast. I won although it was not a large victory.
My second game was against Deathwing. I have been playing against Deathwing for a very long time so I knew exactly what to expect. He was running an all-foot Deathwing list. We all know how much Tyranids love foot lists. I tabled him, the first time I've tabled someone in a very long time and got all possible battle points.
My previous victory gave me enough points to contend for first. I was tied in battle points with the other Tyranid player. His list was a Mycetic Spore list with everything capable of arriving via Deep Strike. The final scenario screwed with Deep Strike in that you always scatter even if you rolled a hit. Mycetic Spores mitigate most of that problem, but it kept some of his units away from mine a bit longer than they would have otherwise.
The battle was a hard-fought bloody combat. I had more shooting than him, and we both had the Doom of Malan'tai. His killed a few gargoyles and mine killed two of his pods instantly so he was up to 10 wounds immediately. My gargs and the Parasite charged him and finished him off in one round. My Doom chased down some scattered Warriors and took a few turns to finish them off. He had a Trygon Prime in my flank that was chewing up my units. I fed it Termagants for two turns but then he got my Tyrannofex. I charged a mass of Termagants into it boosted by the Tervigon's Adrenal Glands and Toxin Sacs and nearly killed it.
In the end I held more objectives and my opponent got more Destruction Points, while neither of us got our secret objectives. So we tied for first place.
I like the scoring system that they used though I think that they could have used a bit more mission variety concerning the 5 objectives that were used every round. As it was I think it was a great success for the LATCS Podcast's first event. It wasn't the most competitive of tournaments, but it wasn't supposed to be. I had fun and learned a lot about Tyranids. I also got some Black Library books as a door prize.
Showing posts with label Tournament. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tournament. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Kill-Team Tournament After-Action Report
Yesterday we had the long discussed KT tournament. All in all we had some tough games and some tough lists. The format was swiss pairings, double elimination. We had ten players. Here's what I brought:
2x Hive Guard
3x Warriors+Barbed Strangler
One Hive Guard had Scout, the other FNP. The warrior with the BS had Stealth. The army had 5 models and 14 wounds.
My first match was against a Space Marines player. He had 5 Terminators with Storm Bolters and one with a power weapon. No matter how many shots I poured into him he just kept advancing. Finally I started to force some 1s and dropped enough just as they approached my lines, taking out a Warrior in the process. They failed their Leadership test and I won.
Round two saw me against IG. The player had brought thirty something guys with three mortars. He deployed out of LoS and started shooting the mortars at me right away. I had the Barbed Strangler Warrior up high and managed to get a few that way, but the Hive Guard really shined in this mission. I was able to take out his Mortar squads efficiently thus removing my biggest threats. All that remained were the flashlights. Even then I just couldn't take them out fast enough with their cover saves (they piled into area terrain). I thought the Barbed Strangler would be king but with cover it hardly mattered. The timer ran out and I won due to having killed more points.
Round three was the final round, me against the other undefeated player. He brought Orks. His list had three Lootas, one Deffkopta and the rest Shoota Boyz. This was the toughest match of them all. My dice were with me in the beginning when I dropped two of the Lootas and a mess of Boyz, but once again I just couldn't kill them fast enough. For me the game came down to a set of rolls. He had two Boyz in the open and I hit both with my Hive Guard but rolled double 1s for wounds. Then I defeated his Kopta in CC with my Warrior, and to catch it just had to roll anything but a 1. Of course, you can guess what I rolled. Time ran out and he took the win. I ended second.
Now that I think about it, it's unfair to say that the game came down to a few rolls on my part. I made one little mistake not getting my Hive Guard behind some terrain (trusting to T6) when I should have just moved. My opponent also rolled poorly on his to wound rolls, had he done better it wouldn't have been very close at all. He played very well and had a good combo of numbers, toughness and volume of fire.
I had a lot of fun and in a bit of confession, it was my first tournament after 13 years in this hobby. I hope it's not the last as I had a lot of fun trying to stay on top of my game.
2x Hive Guard
3x Warriors+Barbed Strangler
One Hive Guard had Scout, the other FNP. The warrior with the BS had Stealth. The army had 5 models and 14 wounds.
My first match was against a Space Marines player. He had 5 Terminators with Storm Bolters and one with a power weapon. No matter how many shots I poured into him he just kept advancing. Finally I started to force some 1s and dropped enough just as they approached my lines, taking out a Warrior in the process. They failed their Leadership test and I won.
Round two saw me against IG. The player had brought thirty something guys with three mortars. He deployed out of LoS and started shooting the mortars at me right away. I had the Barbed Strangler Warrior up high and managed to get a few that way, but the Hive Guard really shined in this mission. I was able to take out his Mortar squads efficiently thus removing my biggest threats. All that remained were the flashlights. Even then I just couldn't take them out fast enough with their cover saves (they piled into area terrain). I thought the Barbed Strangler would be king but with cover it hardly mattered. The timer ran out and I won due to having killed more points.
Round three was the final round, me against the other undefeated player. He brought Orks. His list had three Lootas, one Deffkopta and the rest Shoota Boyz. This was the toughest match of them all. My dice were with me in the beginning when I dropped two of the Lootas and a mess of Boyz, but once again I just couldn't kill them fast enough. For me the game came down to a set of rolls. He had two Boyz in the open and I hit both with my Hive Guard but rolled double 1s for wounds. Then I defeated his Kopta in CC with my Warrior, and to catch it just had to roll anything but a 1. Of course, you can guess what I rolled. Time ran out and he took the win. I ended second.
Now that I think about it, it's unfair to say that the game came down to a few rolls on my part. I made one little mistake not getting my Hive Guard behind some terrain (trusting to T6) when I should have just moved. My opponent also rolled poorly on his to wound rolls, had he done better it wouldn't have been very close at all. He played very well and had a good combo of numbers, toughness and volume of fire.
I had a lot of fun and in a bit of confession, it was my first tournament after 13 years in this hobby. I hope it's not the last as I had a lot of fun trying to stay on top of my game.
Monday, August 16, 2010
Upcoming Kill-Team Tournament
So my LGS is hosting a Kill-Team tournament next week. The owner wanted to to KT because we have a lot of new players and he wants everyone to be able to participate. After careful playtesting we came up with some other restrictions for the tournament. Here is our FAQ/Format restrictions. It's pretty much set in stone at this point but I would still appreciate feedback for future events.
General:
Nothing with an armor value may be chosen.
Nothing with greater than three wounds may be chosen.
No unique units may be chosen (such as Marbo or Deathleaper)
Universal Special Rules must be chosen during army building (they must be on your roster).
You may not assign the following Universal Special Rules to your models (if they already come with it, that's fine): Swarms and Turbo-Boosters.
In the interest of time, models that are all going the same general direction may share the same "Run" roll, though the controlling player does not have to do so. If you do this, you must declare which models are going to share the roll before rolling.
All "specialists" (the three models with the bonus Universal Special Rule) must be clearly distinct. This can be something simple like a piece of colored tape on the base.
When splitting fire, you must declare all targets simultaneously. For example, if I have a Heavy Bolter, I can't fire the first shot and see if it kills its target before I declare the next target with the second shot. I have to state how many shots are going at each target at the same time.
Q: Do squads have to deploy together and then move off separately, or do they deploy individually just like they were their own units?
Since each model is its own unit, they don't have to start off in coherency.
Q: How do things like Orders and Exarch powers work, and other "benefits the squad" type rules?
Powers affect only models that stay within 2" of the character granting the upgrade power.
Q: Reserves aren't used in the KT scenario. What about a unit that must start in reserve such as a drop pod?
If a unit must enter via reserves, it deploys normally at the start of the game.
Q: When half the Kill-Team is gone, what if there is no model remaining on the table with a LD value?
Use the "standard" leadership of the army. Space Marines would be an 8, IG and Orks would be a 7, Eldar would be an 8 and so on. (This point is moot as vehicles are not allowed in this tournament.)
Q: What if your last models are fearless?
They still have to take the leadership test. It's not a morale test.
Q: If one of the models has the Stubborn rule, does that affect the roll to determine if you lose?
No, Stubborn only affects Morale tests, and the final roll is a Leadership test.
Q: Since you can split fire, can you assault a different model than one you shot at?
No. You can only assault models that you shot at.
Army Specific Questions:
Necrons: The Phase Out rule is not used.
Tau: If you buy a squad of pathfinders, you do not need to take their transport.
Eldar: The Skyleap Exarch power is not used.
We originally decided to take Troops only, but it was kind of dull and certain armies had major advantages over others. Then we decided to go with no vehicles after a couple rounds of telling games, one player took a Vendetta and no one could touch him. He simply moved away from everything, because he was so high up he had a clear LoS to everything. The best strategy for taking him out was to kill the troopers he had, so he just put half of them inside the Vendetta and that pretty much ended it.
We then made the armor restrictions to nothing with a total armor value of all three sides 33+. I took three dual cannon Vypers and was untouchable. I was putting out 18 S6 shots per turn. I won all my games, the worst damage I took was I lost a weapon.
Finally we settled on no vehicles but with the standard KT FOC. After our testing this proved to be the best.
I'm taking Eldar but I don't want to reveal my list ideas just yet! I've tried out a lot of combinations and I still want to try a few more.
General:
Nothing with an armor value may be chosen.
Nothing with greater than three wounds may be chosen.
No unique units may be chosen (such as Marbo or Deathleaper)
Universal Special Rules must be chosen during army building (they must be on your roster).
You may not assign the following Universal Special Rules to your models (if they already come with it, that's fine): Swarms and Turbo-Boosters.
In the interest of time, models that are all going the same general direction may share the same "Run" roll, though the controlling player does not have to do so. If you do this, you must declare which models are going to share the roll before rolling.
All "specialists" (the three models with the bonus Universal Special Rule) must be clearly distinct. This can be something simple like a piece of colored tape on the base.
When splitting fire, you must declare all targets simultaneously. For example, if I have a Heavy Bolter, I can't fire the first shot and see if it kills its target before I declare the next target with the second shot. I have to state how many shots are going at each target at the same time.
Q: Do squads have to deploy together and then move off separately, or do they deploy individually just like they were their own units?
Since each model is its own unit, they don't have to start off in coherency.
Q: How do things like Orders and Exarch powers work, and other "benefits the squad" type rules?
Powers affect only models that stay within 2" of the character granting the upgrade power.
Q: Reserves aren't used in the KT scenario. What about a unit that must start in reserve such as a drop pod?
If a unit must enter via reserves, it deploys normally at the start of the game.
Q: When half the Kill-Team is gone, what if there is no model remaining on the table with a LD value?
Use the "standard" leadership of the army. Space Marines would be an 8, IG and Orks would be a 7, Eldar would be an 8 and so on. (This point is moot as vehicles are not allowed in this tournament.)
Q: What if your last models are fearless?
They still have to take the leadership test. It's not a morale test.
Q: If one of the models has the Stubborn rule, does that affect the roll to determine if you lose?
No, Stubborn only affects Morale tests, and the final roll is a Leadership test.
Q: Since you can split fire, can you assault a different model than one you shot at?
No. You can only assault models that you shot at.
Army Specific Questions:
Necrons: The Phase Out rule is not used.
Tau: If you buy a squad of pathfinders, you do not need to take their transport.
Eldar: The Skyleap Exarch power is not used.
We originally decided to take Troops only, but it was kind of dull and certain armies had major advantages over others. Then we decided to go with no vehicles after a couple rounds of telling games, one player took a Vendetta and no one could touch him. He simply moved away from everything, because he was so high up he had a clear LoS to everything. The best strategy for taking him out was to kill the troopers he had, so he just put half of them inside the Vendetta and that pretty much ended it.
We then made the armor restrictions to nothing with a total armor value of all three sides 33+. I took three dual cannon Vypers and was untouchable. I was putting out 18 S6 shots per turn. I won all my games, the worst damage I took was I lost a weapon.
Finally we settled on no vehicles but with the standard KT FOC. After our testing this proved to be the best.
I'm taking Eldar but I don't want to reveal my list ideas just yet! I've tried out a lot of combinations and I still want to try a few more.
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