And now, after a short delay, for Day 2.
If you can remember, I was sitting on 16 points at the end of day 1. However, points were not how I was going to judge success for this weekend as I was using a very silly list including a Vampire Lord on a Dragon. There were 3 aims for me - I wanted to win a game (which fortunately I had done!), I wanted to get to 20 TPs total, and I wanted the Dragon to be on the table for a total of 20 turns over the course of the weekend. Up to this point I had managed to keep the Dragon alive for 14 turns, meaning I needed 6 turns over the course of the last 2 games. If I could avoid a major shooting army, I could probably get there...
Game 4 - Martyn Furnival, Dwarfs
Balls.
This game was over very quickly, and doesn't need much explaining. Martyn had brought as much of a gun line as was allowed by the comp, including 2 Cannons, a Grudge Thrower, several shooting units, some Slayer speedbumps, a decent sized unit of Hammerers to put his characters in, and an Anvil.
The only lifeline I had was the scenario. We were playing Meeting Engagement, and that meant we had to roll for all of our units before they were deployed. If we rolled a 1, they would start off the table. Martyn proceeded to roll 1's for a cannon, his Anvil, his Hammerers, a unit of Thunderers and 2 units of Slayers.
Now, those people that know Martyn can probably guess his reaction at this point. He sulked. :-) He was all but ready to concede the game then and there, before actually checking what would happen to these units in turn 1 - which was that they would walk onto the board from his edge. As he had gotten to choose depolyment zone, this also meant he would go first unless I could roll a 6, which I didn't. All of this combined to mean that all he missed was half a shooting phase turn 1, and this was not enough for even my army to close the gap. I was not helped by the massive river that was crossing the board, limiting me to a normal move for half my units.
All that happened in the game, when we got started, was I moved everything up and then took all my toys off. Including the Dragon, who was hit by all the artillery and eventually copped it. Altogether it survived 1 of my turns.
Arse.
I did manage to kill a unit of Slayers though!
Final Score: 0-20
Dragon Turns Total: 15
In the several hours between my game finishing and the next game starting, I developed a massive headache and started to feel really ill. For those of you pointing and laughing, this was not down to a hangover! (I had driven home the previous evening rather than stay for the traditional after event drinking) I took some medicine which took the edge off the pain, but I have to apologize to my final opponent, as I doubt the game was that good for him.
Game 5 - Gareth Parfitt, High Elves
In the last game, I needed 4 TPs and for the Dragon to survive 5 turns. It was a long shot, but I was determined to give it a go.
Gareth was running what is becoming one of the two main High Elf lists you see at the moment - the Cavalry Bus. The Bus was made up of Dragon Princes, and contained the BSB, a Level 4 and Level 2 on High Magic and a Prince who was the General. In the rest of the army were some Reavers and some Bolt Throwers, a unit of Archers and a Frostheart Phoenix. I've not played against the Phoenix before, but I knew the capability of the Bus from my games against Simon. I knew that I didn't really have the tools to take on the Bus directly, unless I could isolate it for several turns and hit it with everything at once.
My plan was to try and pull the Bus onto the Ghouls and hopefully hold it up for long enough to kill a large proportion of the rest of the army. However, in my befuddled state I put the Terrorgheist in the wrong place turn 1 to scream at some Reavers and the Bus managed to charge it instead. This did pull him out of position, but cost me the most effective tool I had against the Bus. The Wolves and Varghulfs were running and charging at the Reavers and Bolt Throwers, and the Ghouls (freed up by the Bus's overrun) charged the Phoenix, trusting to poison to see them through.
Over the next few turns I killed 2 Bolt Throwers and a couple of Reaver units, and the Ghouls continued to hold up the Phoenix. The BSB was quickly despatched by a single bolt from the remaining Bolt Thrower as I put her in the wrong position, and on Turn 4 I threw everything I had into the Phoenix to finish it off. This included the Dragon, with the Lord drinking the Potion of Strength on the charge, a Varghulf and the other Vampire. Despite the Lord being Strength 9 on the charge and going before the big bird, she rolled four 1's to wound and it got to attack. Its attacks put a couple of wounds on the Dragon, but it was finally finished off by the remaining 3 Ghouls.
In Gareth's turn 4 he turned his full attention to the Lord and Dragon. If only I could survive this turn I could fly her off and keep her alive, pretty much assuring me of my objectives. But it wasn't to be. Between the brutal efficiency of the Magic Phase and the relentless shooting of the Bolt Throwers, the Lord eventually went down. In the resulting crumble, as is always the case, the Dragon rolled just enough to lose its remaining wounds and those objectives slipped away.
In the last few turns I tried to snipe out the characters from the Bus, but as he had cast a load of High Magic spells they had a 2+ Ward from Magic Resistance - interestingly he didn't have the Banner, preferring to stack the Ward through the Lore Attribute. The last remaining Bolt Thrower then skewered the Vampire in the last turn, as again I forgot to put her out of sight. The Vargulfs failed to shift the Archers from their building and the game was done.
Final Score: 0-20
Dragon Turn Total: 19
Summary
So close! :-)
Overall, I finished 61st out of 62 players - a new low in my tournament performance. I have to say though that this was expected. My list is not optimized for tournament play (it had a Dragon in it for Pete's sake!) but it was a lot of fun to use. As I hadn't attended a tournament for some time, I feel that this is more important than getting a good finish. I also think that I had 4 great games (the Dwarf one doesn't count as a game...) and choosing my Most Sporting Opponent was tough. In the end I went for John from Game 1, with Gareth from Game 5 as my second place. Both of these guys put a lot of effort in to making the game enjoyable for us both.
The event as a whole had some teething problems that have been documented on The Warhammer Forum, mainly to do with the round draws being redone due to drop outs and issues with the food on the Saturday. Some of these issues were unavoidable, and some give them things to improve on for next time, but I don't feel the need to go into the negatives in a lot of detail. The real positive for me was the tables and the terrain. Having decided to provide all of this themselves, the tables looked really good and were quite different from what you normally see at an event. Some of the terrain pieces were a little small, but overall I felt this was a good selling point for the event.
So that's it!
My next tournament is something I'm taking a little more seriously - a Team Event using the Swedish Comp system in Stockport. I will try to take notes of how things go in that event, and hopefully I will be able to write a recap of that as well.
If you have enjoyed these last two posts, please let me know! I appreciate any feedback from those that are reading this blog, either as a comment here or on Twitter - you can find me @sandals_ajw
Til next time!
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