As of this posting, this list is now 7-3-4. Still working the kinks out of it, and getting used to 2k points, but I think its pretty much set. Just have to practice more to get to the level I was at with my 1850 Orks (with which I won the last two Best General tournaments).
Hoping I have this thing on lock-down come Adepticon time, which is when I should have it 100% painted as well (I got nearly dead-last in painting at TSHFT due to most of my army being basically just 3 color minimum).
Anyway, enough about my army, time for bat reps.
Game 1
Brandon and his Nids
Brandon had an interesting Nid force that I would characterize as being fluff-first and not really even remotely competitive. I didn’t keep a copy of his list (didn’t keep any for the week…) so this is off of memory.
Tyranid Prime with regeneration
3 units of four warriors with Rending Claws and Devourers and one venom cannon.
2 units of 4 Raveners with devourers
2 Trygon Primes with Regeneration and Adrenal Glands
3 Lictors
Deathleaper
Basically a lot of T4, 3 wound models all looking to get rokkited or klawed.
Mission was a Zen creation: Recon. Essentially you place 3 objectives in your opponent’s deployment zone 12″ apart from each other and those are the only objectives you can control, though you could contest any objective. Deployment was Spearhead. Secondary objective was you get a bonus Battle Point for every unit an elite unit of yours kills (or finishes off or makes run that doesn’t rally). Tertiary…I don’t recall.
Terrain was mostly LoS blocking hills with some sparse area terrain towards the center.
Can’t remember who won the roll, but I had second turn.
Brandon set up his whole army other than the lictors and deathleaper and one unit of raveners (regular reserve). He had his Trygons centered and two warrior squads on either’s flank, with the other ravener unit behind one of the Trygons and the last unit of warriors with the prime on a hill in the center of his quarter.
I deployed with my standard deployment of BW centered with Big Mek and Gretchin inside with Kans in front and boyz mobs to either flank of the BW. The lobbas I put roughly in the middle of my long table edge on the edge to get good cover of the field. My lootas deployed on a barren hill, but I put my boyz in a ring around them for cover saves (why not!?). My buggies I actually deployed with the idea of interdicting the left Trygon.
All images courtesy of Zen and Bloghammer
This game was pretty straightforward. Brandon moved up and plinked a few Orks dead with shooting, I responded by killing a trygon, two raveners, and a warrior. He then shot up some more boyz, assaulted one of my mobs with his raveners and shot at my stormboyz. The raveners lost combat, but were still alive. I followed up by wiping out the left side warriors, finishing off the raveners, and wounding the remaining trygon severely. He charged his Trygon at my Kans, and shot with his warriors. I lost one kan and another had a weapon destroyed. I failed to charge his right side warriors with my trukk boyz who showed up, but I charged the Trygon with my stormboyz and killed it before it finished off the kans. I finished off the other warrior squad with lootas. His lictors showed up and failed to hurt my battlewagon. I kill the lictors and shoot the remaining warrior squad down to one model. Deathleaper shows up and fails to kill a buggy. Snikrot and company burn/shoot Deathleaper to death and I assault and kill the last warrior.
Result: Win! 19 of 20 Battle Points.
Next game pitted me against two-time Best Overall winner, Jayson Besacon; who recently was 2nd Overall at SpoCon and Best General there. Jayson won the first TSHFT with his Necrons, and the last one with his Space Wolves; now he was determined to win with his ‘Nilla Space Marines. Quick note: Jayson is like 0-17 against my Orks with regular Space Marines.
This is roughly his list:
Librarian in Terminator armor with Null Zone and the teleporting one.
Librarian in power armor with…dunno, he died too quickly.
6 or 7 assault terminators with TH/SS in a Land Raider Crusader with the Termy Librarian.
5 regular terminators on foot with other libby (Cyclone?)
3 units of 5 tactical marines in HB razorbacks; power fists on the sarges.
3 Typhoon Speeders
1 LS storm with 5 scouts with power fist.
Mission for this game is Shoot the Big One! Essentially Kill Points, but you get bonus KP for killing vehicle squadrons, Land Raiers, and every Monstrous Creature after the first. Deployment for the mission is a Zen special where the deployment zones are 24″ from the short table edges. If you win the roll to go first you get to choose which short edge and long edge. Secondary for this mission was for every two troop choices left alive at the end of the game you got 3 Battle Points. Tertiary…can’t recall.
The board we were on (table one) was chock full of chaosgerbil’s awesome Ork terrain which was very good at blocking LoS (you could easily hide a landraider behind each building), which meant that Jayson could easily move up and do damage to me when and where he wanted, especially with those nasty Typhoons.
I won the roll and elected to go first. Choosing the only side with good firing lanes for my lootas. I did my standard formation, but also left a ring of boyz around behind my lobbas and lootas to protect them in the event that the scouts came up behind me. I also hugged my long edge as much as I could since I was concerned about Jayson leaving stuff in reserve and coming in on the long flank. Incidentally, I left my trukk boyz, buggies, kommandos, and stormboyz in reserve.
Snikrot came in from reserve as well as my buggies. Snikrot set up to assault the squad stuck in with my trukk boyz and the buggies lined up for a rear shot on a razorback. My boyz surged forth with Waagh to assault the terminators (I knew I had to take them out or at least the libby so he couldn’t just teleport away). My lootas immobilized a razorback. The buggies failed to pen the Razorback. In the assaults, Snikrot freed the Trukk Boyz who were down to just 3 models. My two mobs did what they usually do to TH/SS terminators; wipe them out. It was now 5KP to 1.
Jayson started to salvage things by getting one squad back in the razorback and getting his storm in. He decided to have it come in and help out against the Kommandos, deploying to assault them after flaming them. The Land Raider multi-meltaed the last kan, and his razorbacks destoryed my trukk. He also moved his Typhoon flat out back towards his lines and out of LoS of my Lootas to keep it alive. The heavy flamer only got two kommandos who absorbed the assault from the scouts and wiped them out before the sarge could swing. The trukk boyz went down hard to the other tac squad, leaving only the sarge. 6 KP to 4(since the kans were worth 2).
My turn saw my trukk boyz show up and set up for an assault on the razorback with guys in it. Kommandos moved up to assault the remaining sarge, my mobs tried to shoot and assault the Land Raider. Also, I forgot, but my gretchin came in from reserve and I had them over in my far corner. My lootas knocked out the Storm and my buggy shot at the Typhoon and got a lucky immobilized result through and downed it. I just scratched the paint of the Land Raider and finished off the tactical sarge and the razorback. 11KP to 4.
Jayson had little hope at this point and put his mind towards doing as much damage as possible to me. He shot up my kommandos and they ran away and he tank shocked and tried to melta my Battlewagon, which passed the KFF save. 11KP to 5.
I went after his razorbacks and destroyed the immobilized one and failed to hurt the Land Raider.
The Land Raider tank shocked my gretchin who ran off the board.
The game ended. 11 KP to 6. I had three troops left, so only got 3 extra battle points. Plus I got 1 point from some tertiary that I don’t remember.
Result: Win! 19 of 20 KP
Next game was against Dan Root and his Bad Moon-themed Orks.
The whole of the tournament, Dan and I constantly made jokes about being “un-competitive” and the fact that we were both on table one for round 3 tickled us both immensely. I’d played Dan in a previous TSHFT with his Wraithguard/Wraithlord heavy Eldar list and had had a good game. Dan’s army was awesomely converted and well-painted (who has the time to highlight ORKS!??!?!!), it was, also, very potent.
He had, roughly.
Warboss in Mega Armor with attack squig
Big Mek with KFF
12 shoota boyz with ‘eavy armor with a nob with power klaw in a trukk with a boarding plank (VERY IMPORTANT) and red paint.
6 Meganobz (2 with skorchas) in a Battlewagon with boarding planks and red paint
3 Meganobz (2 with skorchas) in a trukk with boarding planks
3 units of 10 gretchin
2 units of 10 lootas
2 units of 3 killa kans with grotzookas
1 unit of 3 killa kans with rokkits
3 units of 1 deffkoptas with rokkit launchas and buzz saws
The mission for this round was essentially sieze ground except one objective had to be in the middle. Dan and I just ended up putting the other ones essentially in the centers of the 4 quarters of the board, keeping them all seperated out. The setup was pitched battle. Secondary objective was you got bonus VPs for having your heavy support choices in your opponent’s deployment zone at the end of the game (1 BP for one, 3 BP for 2, and 6 BP for 3). Tertiary was controlling the central objective and holding all objectives.
Dan won the roll and elected to go first, most likely hoping to do some damage with his deff koptas and gaining tempo. He put his gretchin in reserve (wisely), and put his lootas on either corner of his deployment zone (though, with the terrain as it was, neither had much to shoot at) one in area terrain, the other behind terrain. The center had his BW and trukks and kans spread about on either side, the deffkoptas were spread about 24″ apart down his starting line so I had no where to deploy that they couldn’t come after me potentially.
My deployment, I went essentially refused flank to my right with my standard deployment and my lootas in a ruin looking at his lootas and having SOME LoS to the central objective. I put my stormboyz on the board to the middle behind a building with the buggies next to them out of LoS from either loota unit. Finally, on my far left in some area terrain was my lobbas. I was hoping that they would be ignored and could mess up his gretchin to put pressure on him. Dan zoomed his koptas up, one going after the lobbas and the other two going after my buggies/stormboyz.
In his turn, he moved up with his units and ran kans to get up at me ASAP. His two koptas proceeded to blow up both buggies (I has a sad!) and kill 4 stormboyz with the explosion. HOWEVER! The other kopta took a wound from dangerous terrain and then was KILLED by gretchin in combat before even attacking! (6 attacks, 3 hits, 2 wounds, one failed save!) YAY GRETCHIN!
In my turn, I shot at the side of the battlewagon with my lootas and failed to do anything, my stormboyz jumped up to assault the battlewagon and only shook it. I killed the other two koptas with my boyz and kanz. I also blasted the leftside lootas with my lobbas to the tune of 7 dead, who got pinned but passed morale.
Dan moved up further (his gretchin didn’t come in), and shot at my lootas with his lootas, killing one. His one unit of kans killed some boyz with grotzookas and the other assaulted my stormboyz, but failed to break them. The battlewagon was poised to assault my big unit of boyz next turn. He also sent his small unit of MegaNobz in a trukk at my lobbas.
I shot up the battlewagon with lootas and rokkits again, but it didn’t suffer, I moved my right side Boyz up the field at his lootas to try and snag the objective as Snikrot came in and threatened his right side lootas. One trukk boyz squad got in as well and went after the Meganobz’s trukk. The Kommandos were successful at wiping out the lootas, and my lobbas finished off the other lootas. My trukk boyz successfully assaulted and wrecked his truck, but there was no space for the MegaNobz to deploy, so they were lost as well. His kanz finished off my stormboyz.
Dan had two gretchin units come in and moved them to go after the left side and central objective (that his shoota trukk was sitting on). He moved up the battlewagon to go mulch my boyz and brought up his right side kanz to shoot into them as well. His left side kanz and his warboss moved to go after the trukk boyz squad on my left. Due to terrain, I had bunched up my mob and his combi-skorchas and grotzookas made me pay in droves. His assault on my Mob ended up wiping it out, but I took two down with me and I got two wounds on them. Dan also made a big mistake and shot at the doomed mob with his kans on my left instead of assaulting my trukk boyz over there.
In my turn, my other trukk boyz showed up and moved to take on the remaining 4 meganobz. The other trukk boyz remounted up and ran away from the kans towards the left side objective. The kommandos moved towards his center area to threaten the gretchin. I continued to move up my right side mob in order to threaten his objective and draw his kans to me. In my shooting phase I shot up the battlewagon again with lootas, but failed to do anything…again. My rokkits on my right from kanz and boyz failed to do anything to his kanz. Strangely, my sluggas from my trukk boyz got two wounds through his 2+ save and the meganobz broke and ran away…wait a minute…they shouldn’t’ve been able to rally later… hmmm… well…anyway… Or maybe I’m remembering wrong. In any event, now my trukk boyz were out in the open. UGH. My lobbas continued their reign (rain!) of terror and took out a gretchin unit.
Dan had his last unit of gretchin come in and positioned them on my right to shoot at the kommandos, as well as moving his right side kanz to help out there. The meganobz rallied (were there three left? It didn’t matter really, as you’ll see…). The battlewagon tank shocked my trukk boyz who broke and ran. The left-side kans moved to threaten my lobbas. The Warboss moved to go contest the objective I was moving my trukk boyz at. His other kanz moved up to shoot at the trukk boyz as well. Dan was able to wipe out the Kommandos with his shooting as well.
My turn I disembarked my trukk boyz to try and hold the objective (hoping that the slow warboss wouldn’t make it in time), sending the trukk to interdict the kanz. My boyz on the right moved up to within contesting distance. They shot up the gretchin, who held. The lootas shot at the kans who only lost a klaw. My kans moved up the building to go contest the central objective held by the Meganobz and the ‘ard boyz in the trukk (with the boarding plank). My lobbas again did a number on gretchin, but they held this time.
Dan’s turn, his kans on my left took out the trukk, his warboss moved up to charge my trukk boyz while the kanz tried to go contest the objective my battlewagon was on, while his right-side kanz set up to assault my boyz. His warboss ended up making the charge (thanks to Waagh) but rolled horribly and took a wound while doing NONE. His leftside kans destroyed the trukk and his left side ones hit my boyz and tore into them, and I didn’t do much in return. His gretchin on the right moved to take the objective over there, while his other gretchin took the left side one.
My turn, I disembarked the gretchin from the battlewagon to use it to block the advance of the kanz towards my objective. My kanz moved up to contest the objective in the center. My lootas killed the gretchin on the right who fled, but my lobbas failed to kill the gretchin on the left. I was able to put another wound on the Warboss at this time, but he did enough wounds that I lost, but held.
In Dan’s turn he moved his right side Kanz up to help out his Warboss while the central ones headed towards my objective (I think I had this mixed up and my gretchin came out next turn…). IN melee his warboss and kans killed me and he lived. His right side Kanz lost one, but still grinded out more Orks, keeping me from taking the objective.
I moved my Kans up again towards the central objective, now obviously contesting it from the upper level; however they ended up being 2″ from the trukk (Dan kindly pointed out I was in Boarding Plank range, but I didn’t really understand what that meant), which was about to become crucial. I guess this is where I disembarked my gretchin and moved to block with my battlewagon to block. In combat, I failed to kill off the kans on the right though there was only one left. It was at this point that I discovered that boarding planks work in MY turn as well, and the Nob counts as charging. Dan proceeded to wreck both kans. At this point, I had one objective to his two and would’ve lost (since we rolled to end the game and it ended), but Dan magnanimously let me take back the kan move to be in contesting distance but out of range of the trukk’s 2″ death bubble; allowing me to draw the fight. Class act dude all around (he said, “I’d rather get a draw than win on a rules misunderstanding”), and Karma played out for him as he went on to win Best Overall!
Result: Draw! 9 of 20 Battle Points
That was the end of the first day and the two Ork players were in 1st and 2nd place in the Battle Points. UNCOMPETITIVE!!!!!!!!!
Day 2!
For my 4th game, I was paired up against Matt and his Mechdar. Mechdar is an army that I usually have few issues with as it rarely does enough damage to me to have much of an effect on the game.
Matt’s list was essentially:
Eldrad
Yriel
two units of 10 Dire Avengers with exarch with bladestorm. One had defend and shimmershield/power weapon, the other had dual avenenger cats. Both in wave serpents with Scatter Laser turret, Shuricannon chin mount and spirit stones I think.
One unit of 5 dire avengers (they went in the falcon)
two units of 5 fire dragons in wave serpents as above
one Falcon with bright lance and goodies
two Fire Prisms with goodies
The mission this game was like Sieze ground, except all the objectives were in the center of the quarters and all would scatter at the beginning of the game once. The deployment was dawn of war. Secondary was you got a bonus BP for each type of FOC you took out (if your opponent had none of that type, you got one point automatically) and you got a total of 6 points if you took out one of each type (or one of each type that they had). Tertiary was you got bonuses for winning the roll to go first but going full reserve, and…something else…
I won the roll to go first and cackled madly! I did my standard DoW deployment of putting my two big mobz at the 24″ line with a trailing edge back to snag KFF cover saves when the BW showed up. Other than Snikrot, I had everything else set to come in on turn 1.
Matt deployed just the wave serpent with the dire avengers with defend and Eldrad in it; trusting to night fight to keep him safe.
In my turn, everything rolled in, mostly on the left flank, but my lootas showed up on the right. I moved up my mobz and took a shot at the wave serpent, but failed to hit.
All of Matt’s stuff showed up, Yriel joined Eldrad in the WS and he proceeded to shoot the crap out of my right side mob, killing 16 boyz. He was heavy to my right, but hadn’t moved very far in order to shoot more. Hopefully Sniky could show up and knock out some tanks.
Unfortunately, he didn’t come in; but I surged at the Eldar and started shooting. I didn’t get many results, but on the three glances I got, I got TWO immobilized results, one on the WS that Eldrad and Co were in, and another on a FD WS. I attempted to assault a WS on the far right with my shot up mob, but didn’t hit with the Nob.
Matt disembarked Eldrad’s group and shuffled around and shot up my Mob, killing all but the Nob and two rokkit launchas, which fell back. The WS that I had assaulted zipped up and disembarked the other DA squad which bladestormed my lootas; however, due to the angle, I had a cover save for being on the hill and he rolled poorly anyway, killing only one loota.
The kommandos came in from reserve and moved to assault the DAs that had shot at the lootas. My stormboyz jumped to assault the immobilized WS and I disembarked my gretchin to hold an objective (since I wanted to move up with the BW and give my vehicles cover. I shook a prism with the buggies, the unit of Kans immobilized the wave serpent that had moved up at me which Sniky was going to assault. I lobbaed the other DA squad with Eldrad, but they took it like champs, only losing two guys. My lootas shot up and exploded the other FD WS. In assaults, I blew up the other WS with the stormboyz; wiped out the DA on the right; and destroyed the remaining weapons on the immobilized WS that had moved up the DA.
Matt decided it was time to take care of bidniz with Yriel heading towards the Stormboyz, but he left him too close to the DA so he was stuck with them. Matt tried taking pot shots at my lootas/lobbas, but only killed a grot. He used his scatter lasers on his remaining WS to destroy a trukk and knocked off a rokkit launcha from a kan with the Falcon. His fire dragons attempted to shoot up my buggies, but missed.
In my turn, my stormboyz headed over to go deal with the other immobilized WS, the Kommandos moved up to assault Fire Prism. I shot up the DA with lobbas and lootas and he was down to ~6 + characters. In assaults I knocked out the WS and shook the Prism.
Matt tried to ram my buggies with his prism, getting a pen result, but rolled a 1, leaving it in the open near my kans. Matt shot at the kommandos, but didn’t do much. As well, he killed a buggy and…I can’t remember. It was at this point though that Yriel made his run at my big mob on my left. He was able to assault and unleashed his crazy attack. In the end I lost 24 Orks to No retreat and initial damage, but put two wounds on Yriel (who saved 2 power klaw wounds!).
In my turn, I moved the kans to assault the prism and moved up the stranded boyz to try and attack the DAs or Fire Dragons. The Kommandos moved towards the DA as well and the stormboyz jumped at the Falcon. I shot the falcon up a ton and got 9 pen or glance results, but all I did was shake it! Yriel finished off my boyz (passing another Power Klaw save!). The Kans wrecked the Prism and were set to assault the DA with my Kommandos.
Matt zipped his Falcon over to the objective on my far left. His other prism stunned my truck. Yriel moved back to help Eldrard and the Fire Dragons downed a kan and buggies. He also shot up my trukk boyz squad which broke and ran away…
In my turn, I moved the battlewagon to go and try and contest the objective the falcon was on as well as disembark/run my trukk boyz at the other objective (I succeeded, therefore holding 2 objectives). I then assaulted the DAs and Eldrad with my kans and Kommandos. My lootas shot up the one unit of fire dragons (in order to get the secondary, though, now that I think about it, I should’ve shot the DA…). In the assault I killed the Exarch with Snikrot and several other Dire avengers, but lost a Kan to Eldrad. However, he was now well off the objective and needed a good run for Yriel to come and help him.
Bottom of 5, Matt shot what he could at my trukk boyz in the open but failed to kill them. Then Yriel got a good run and assaulted me, killing a few boyz, but the kicker was Eldrad blowing up the last killa kan and killing 4 kommandos. Snikrot killed Yriel, and all that was left was ONE dire avenger. I had two attacks with a power weapon on him, got one hit, just needed a 4+ to kill him and seal the win: rolled a 2. I lost combat and broke, Matt then got enough of a massacre move to get that one stupid Dire avenger on to the objective. Roll to continue game: 1.
AAAAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!! Frustrating to have a win stolen from you, but it was a great game regardless. Also, since I got max points for the secondary, I got 15 battle points anyway, so I wasn’t too bummed.
Result: Draw! 15 of 20 Battle Points
At this point, at 2-0-2 I wasn’t really in the run for anything (especially since Dan ROFL-stomped Sisters army that went against him), though, my battlepoints were still #2 overall due to having gotten so many points from my draw. If I could muster a win I’d be in the running for Best General for Group A (we’d had LOTS of draws in the 3rd and 4th rounds).
For round 5 I was paired off against Zach and his ‘Nids. Ever since Fire and Sword closed shop earlier this year, I’ve been heading over to Zach’s store: Fantastic Games in Edmonds to game. I’ve found Zach to be a good general and fun person to talk to in general. If you want a good place to get a game and buy crap: check out Fantastic Games.
Zach had won Best General for Group B at the last TSHFT and was now in Group A, he was also in the running for Best General; he just needed to beat my face in. Fortunately for him, he had a list that was geared to do just that to me!
His ‘Nids were, more or less:
Prime with Devourer, BS/LW, regen(?), poison(?)
7 Warriors with BS/LW Devourers and poison
2 units of 16 devo-gaunts
2 units of 10 genestealers
1 Tervigon
2 units of 3 Hive Guard
3 Zoanthropes
3 Biovores
The mission was basic kill points and the deployment was Echelon (which is the deployment where its like diaganol and 18″ up on either side, also, it’s night fight starting on turn 5). Secondary was to have more Fast Attack choices than your opponent alive at the end of the game gaining 1, 3, and 6 respectively. Tertiary was bonus points for reserving nothing and something else.
Zach won the roll to go first and took the side with the best cover. He deployed his force with the Warriors in the middle with Hive guard and devogaunts flanking on either side. The Zoeys were near the warriors as well in the center. In his backfield was the tervigon and the biovores. He infiltrated his ‘stealers in order to get the tertiary point. They both ended up on my far left flank.
I responded by doing my standard deployment, but also put my stormboyz on behind my battlewagon. In retrospect, I should’ve put everything on the table to get early threat, but the thought of the buggies and trukks getting blasted by Hive Guard was too painful for me, so I left them in reserve. I also infiltrated the Kommandos this time because Zach wasn’t going to be near any table edges as I could tell. The kommandos ended up in some terrain on my far right. My lobbas were on my left side table edge on the very edge, strung out in a line 2″ apart. The lootas did the same on my long table edge. All of this was to avoid Biovore annihilation. Oh, and I also deployed my gretchin as a screen in front of the lootas.
I tried to sieze, and failed.
All photos courtesy of Zen and Bloghammer
Zach started out by moving towards me and then shooting me. He took out two kans with Hive Guard and Zoeys and did enough wounds on the gretchin with the biovore that they ran. He also did a few wounds on my right side Ork Mob. 0KP to 1
I moved up my left-side boyz onto a bridge in order to force the stealers to charge into cover and also to shoot at them. My Stormboyz moved over to the right more, hoping to get a combo charge on the warriors with the boyz on turn 2. The kommandos moved up through cover to threaten the right side Devogaunts. My shooting was OK, I killed a biovore with lootas and killed 6ish devogaunts on the left as well as 4 ‘Stealers with the lobbas. My shoota boyz only killed 3 stealers from the other group. All my rokkits failed to wound the warriors. 0KP to 1
Zach shuffled his lines a bit and moved his ‘stealers at my boyz mob. He put almost every bit of shooting into my right side mob and whittled it down to 8 models (who passed their test at -1). His stealers didn’t get a good charge move and only the small unit of 6 assaulted. I was elated as I figured I’d smoke them in combat, then shoot and assault the other unit in my turn. However, of the 7 wounds I did, Zach saved 6… My Nob whiffed and I lost combat and was now stuck in. 0KP to 1
Both trukk boyz squads came in, but due to poor placement of my lootas, I really didn’t have a chance to get stuck in in the middle with them, so I swung them out wide right (a huge mistake as they would effect nothing in the game from then on); I also chose to move my depleted boyz squad into the BW to preserve the killpoint (I think I should’ve moved up to assist in the upcoming assault instead…). I jumped up with my stormboyz and moved up with my kommandos. I used the lobbas to kill 7 of the 10 remaining devogaunts on my left. Here I made another mistake, I shot at the biovores again with the lootas, hoping to finish them off, and only killed one more. Had I thrown those shots at the warriors or the unengaged genestealers on the left, I would’ve been in better shape. I ended up assaulting the warriors and right devogaunt unit with both stormboyz and my kommandos (I called the Waagh, also a mistake). The warriors did what they do and killed all the stormboyz, and I also lost a kommando to the devogaunts, but then I wiped out the gaunts with my kommandos and got 3 wounds through with the surviving Nob from the stormboyz. I ended up winning the fight by 9! However, my kommandos were stuck in the open and the Nob was surrounded by warriors. Had I gone all in with my remaining shoota boyz (and the NOB in that unit) as well as thrown my lootas into the warriors (who were in the open so would’ve only gotten FnP saves), I could’ve broken that combat wide open. Also, had I been more aggressive with my trukks, zooming them up 18″ to get ready for turn 3, I could’ve probably broken open his center right there. Alas, I was too bold with too little and too timid with too much, essentially feeding Zach units for little gain. To top it off, I whiffed against the genestealers and was still stuck in combat and staring at 7 charging stealers next turn as well. UGH. 1KP to 1KP
Zach proceeded to wreck the BW with his zoeys, shoot up the kommandos with spawned termagants (he’d been spawning the whole time FYI) so they fled and couldn’t rally. He also finished off the kan. Then in his assaults finished off the Stormboyz nob and the mob on my left, moving to threaten my lobbas. 1KP to 6
My buggies didn’t come in yet, which was good. I essentially tried to hide the remaining boyz squad behind the wreckage and salvage the left flank. I was able to kill the remaining genestealers with my lobbas and lootas, so the lobbas were safe for now. My trukks moved back and took pot shots at the warriors to no real effect. 3KP to 6
Zach now moved up at my weakend lines and shot up the mob with the Big mek in it, killing all but one rokkit boy who held, but was pinned. He was now moving with impunity and would be tabling me shortly. 3KP to 7
My buggies came in and I moved them to the far left hoping to stay alive. I shot at the warriors with lootas, but did nothing noticeable. I also failed to kill any of the devogaunts that had moved into cover. 3KP to 7
Zach moved up and shot at my buggies with his Hive Guard, but was just out for Night Fight (which was now in effect). He shot at the Lootas, who died, but held. 3KP to 7.
I moved my buggies further away from the Hive Guard as much as I could, but I knew he’d be in range of his shots. I also moved up my trukks for a desperation assault on his lines. 3KP to 7
Zach moved up and finished off the lootas with his warriors as well as tried to kill the buggies with his Hive Guard. He could see them, but didn’t kill them. Since I couldn’t come back, we rolled to see if the game’d end, and it did. SO we skipped my last turn.
Result: Loss. 7 of 20 Battle Points.
I went over some of the tactical errors I made in this game already, but I think I should’ve been more aggressive. Actually, in recapping the game I realized I wasn’t that far off in kill points and had I been more aggressive, I could’ve broken through. Oh well, no shame in losing to Zach.
That was it for TSHFT, I knew that I wasn’t going to be in the running for any of the awards, so that was lamentable due to me trying to live up to my standards of Best General. I was, however, happily surprised when Zen pulled Trehern and I aside to tell us we had both tied for most Favorite Opponent votes. We decided that the winner of the prize would be determined by coin flip. I won the flip! YAY! That meant I got a free ticket to the next TSHFT, which, IMO, is the best prize.
All photos courtesy of Zen and Bloghammer
Props to Dan Root for winning Best Overall with uncompetitive Orks. That marks the 2nd time an Ork player has won Best Overall (which, at TSHFT, is mostly determined by battle points). Add in my two Best General wins with Orks and Orks have won 4 titles at TSHFT that are heavily geared towards Battle Points.
In the end, TSHFT was a blast as always, and I’m hoping that we will get a much larger turnout for our March event and I’m hoping that my further work on painting my Orks will be rewarded with a better paint score!
Also, thanks to TastyTaste and Chaosgerbil for promoting the event as well.
Zen has a bunch of coverage of the event on his blog: