Falkirk Free For All 2014 Warhammer Tournament (Pictures!)

Game 1 vs Stuart Murray

So what a weekend! I had a great time at the Falkirk Free For All a 6 game Warhammer tournament at the weekend! It was my 2 dayer and boy was it tiring! Ill be up front here and say I’m a wimp and had to leave after the 5^th game but real life is a bitch!

Overall the weekend was great, I had 5 brilliant games against brilliant opponents! Really couldn’t have asked for better games! If you would like to know the final standings they can be found here . I took my OnG (Army list below) and after playing 40+ games with the list I was very prepared but utterly bored with the play style! Suffice to say they shall be shelved for the next few months and I will be back to my first loves Ogres and Lizards!

Wizzbang Da Shaman (Savage Orc Great Shaman): Lucky Shrunken Head; Fencers Blades; Level 4 Wizard.

Radabutt Da Scrolla (Savage Orc Shaman): Dispel Scroll.
Borgut Facebeata (Savage Orc Big Boss): Obsidian Lodestone; great weapon; Battle Standard.
Urgut Ripeye (General) (Black Orc Big Boss): Talisman Of Preservation; Enchanted Shield.

Urgut's Big Yins (36 Savage Orc Big 'Uns): Savage Orc Boss; Musician; Standard Bearer; additional hand weapons.
Da Red Devils (5 Goblin Wolf Riders): Musician; Standard Bearer; spears; short bows; shields.
Da Red Devils (5 Goblin Wolf Riders): Musician; Standard Bearer; spears; short bows; shields.

Green Lightnin' (Orc Boar Chariot)
Blood N Thunda (Orc Boar Chariot)
Da Speed Freakz (3 Goblin Wolf Chariots)
Da Wild Wagonz (3 Goblin Wolf Chariots)
Da Big Stinkaz (8 Trolls)

Auld Bessie (Doom Diver Catapult)
Da Big Chukka (Goblin Rock Lobber)
Monz Meg (Doom Diver Catapult)
Da Mad Cap Nuttaz (Mangler Squigs)
Da Mad Cap Nuttaz (Mangler Squigs)

So game 1 was vs Stuart Murray from waaaaay up north (I suspect he does naughty things to sheep like all other folk from up there) using his excellently painted and converted OnG. His list is quite similar to mine with the exclusion of trolls in favour of pump wagons and Warboss on a Wyvern! The game was complex game of cat and mouse where the cats were random movers and chariots while the mice were everything else! We had an interesting (daft) drinking game going on (10am in the morning) where whenever some one did something orky (failed animosity etc) we took a hearty shot of Drambuie! Thankfully this only occurred for me once while Stuart had to imbibe 3!

I got first turn and deleted his manglers with my wolf boyz (standard practise really) whereas I held mine back so he couldn’t mirror my shenangins! Unfortunately I miscast in my first magic phase 5 dicing foot of gork (which did nothing) and I was reduced to a lvl 2 L. Stuart moved up in his turn and gave me a few charges with the chariots (which I took) and a mangler was able to abuse a wolf hero. Stuart did a few wounds to a chariot and killed a mangler! In my turn I barrelled forward with my chariots and killed his and a pump wagon. The overrun was not very nice however and all I managed to net was 1 warmachine while Stuart in turn killed the chariots with a pump wagon. I think it would be fair to say he had some bad luck at the start while mine was good and then the rolls reversed later in the game! The game ended in 12-8 win to stuart after I lost everything except the savages + characters but he still had a couple warmachines and his savages! I think stuart out played me in this game so Im looking forward to chance to redeem myself! Stuart was a great laugh to play and I had a great time!

Game 2 I played Trev Moffat who is always an incredible gent and very tactical to play against! Trev was also drinking like a pro (joining me for a cider while he poured the whiskey!). Trev was using his beautifully painted lizards (despite an epic comp rage quit lol) which I was glad of! Really wanted to see how he used them as he is known as bit of an expert of newts! Trev had a cool list with a wandering delibs slann (mucho approve) and couple of scar vets, two skink chiefs on terradons, a skink priest, some skink skirmishers, a block’o’saurus, a skink cohort, 2 ancient stegs and some chameleons!

I think it is very safe to say Trev out played me this game and had a plan from the start (which I fell for). Trev had deployed with a slight refused flank with a building directly infront of him which his slann made a beline for. I fell for the bait and tried to assault the building with trolls which were then flanked by double stegs. The failing in this plan however was dice. The stegs bounced and didn’t kill many trolls ( I think 1!!) and Trev double 1’d casting his first spell of 3 separate magic phases which, because I had killed his skink priest early, meant his magic phases end prematurely. The trolls did eventually break but escaped and took 3 turns to wipe out. We both wiped up each others chaff and a few units with Trev on track for a 12-8 win until Gork had a different plan. Last turn, last spell, I get off a 5 dice boosted foot of gork despite trev rolling 6 dice to stop it…. This foot went on a little bit of a rampage. When the dust settled I had got off 8 stomps, 6 of which were direct hits and one only scattered 1".....This spelled (see what I did there?!) the splattered end of 2 ancient stegs, a scar vet and 15 saurus warriors. Checked the odds and its something daft like 1 in 10000 to get that number of stomps and hits!!!! Not very fair and a bit gutting after we had had such a fun game (we were playing an interesting trust game of movement while the other went to the toilet, nae bnother!). Barring the end incident this was one of my favourite games of the weekend, playing Trev is always a joy! The game ended in a 10-10 draw!

Game 3 I played Michael “First Round Loss” Ross who had lived up to his moniker being smashed in his first game. Michael was on an alcohol embargo despite my siren (more like a banshee) like temptations to lead him down the garden path. Michael and I were very much on the same page with our approach to Warhammer, using the rules to the point that it was still fun. The sentence “Meh, It looks like a 12” charge so if you double six it you’ve got it!” was uttered and set the tone! We both had a great laugh!

Michael was using his lovely Vampire counts with loads of ethereals and dogs (not what an OnG army with 3 magical attacks wants to face!). I cheekily deployed my manglers at the back planning to move them off to the sides to waste the time of Michaels ethereals. This went roughly to plan and the game went very well indeed for me despite me expecting to lose heavily! I main events were the combat between his black knights with vampire and my savages in which my lvl 4 and lvl1 lost their heads but in return the savages deleted the black knights in one go, crumbling the vampire! The trolls were run down by the hex wraiths despite an 8 with a reroll break test in the first round lol! The game then went pretty well I killed everything except his terror ghiest and necromancer lvl4 bunker while I lost everything except the savages and a few chariots! The game ended with a 10-10 score which was pretty good I had thought!

Game 4 was another excellent games Darren Allwright's dwarfs! Ill start off by saying how great an opponent Darren was and how much we laughed in the game! It was crazy to say the least!

So I got turn 1 and failed my stupidity test on my trolls but otherwise surged forwards at his army! Darren shut down my magic and I killed a few dwarfs with shooting! Darren's turn 1 is where it all went wrong for him... His cannon misfired and blew up despite his obligatory dwarven reroll after which the organ decided it would like to do the same! The rest of his shooting only netted a single dead troll and fail to wound my boar chariot! My turn two I surged up again and miscast casting foot of gork, it duly scattered off target and then my lvl 4 went down a hole taking 12 savages with him lol! After this I killed his stone thrower with mine and my trolls killed his crossbow men in two combats! We had a big old battle over his bolt thrower with his dragon slayer joining in, I lost two units of wolf riders for my trouble and never got the damn skewer hurler! The wolf chariots pounded the slayers but ultimately died for their efforts! In the end all that mattered was the big combat: savages & flanking trolls vs his long beard bunker with all the characters! My experience of playing mike a lot(ignore characters kill the unit!!!) hot dice and Darren's misfortune meant that when the dust settled 30 longboards lay in a beardy, bloody tangle and his unit broke to be ignominiously run down! The game ended in a 16-4 win to me but I felt really bad for Darren he didn't deserve the dicing I handed out!

Game 5 I (finally!!) got to play Mr John Harper who had for months in advance been leaking his list, spreading propaganda and generally big up his frankly mental Brettonian list. John, like a small child, had basically taken one of everything and even stooped so low as to take a hippogriff, arguably the worst monster in a world of troglodons and slaughterbrutes! What john doesn't let on though is that he know Bretonnians inside out and has used the poncy French for a long long time and is thus a very consummate general! He had been flying high all weekend much to the puzzlement of any and all onlookers! The other factor effecting his success was his use of esoteric (but incredibly good in the right situation) tricksy magic items! I was caught out in a massive way!

All this said it was a pleasure to play John and we had some hilarious banter through out! So it was all going very well for me, I had killed most his stuff and then combat began! The trolls charged his battle pilgrims with grail reliquary and had killed swathes of them, john then informs me that this unit is stubborn (sad face) and the reliquary cannot be killed until the unit is... Woops lol! Then things went really bad! His general and his depleted grail knight unit (2 men) and bsb charge headlong into my savages.... Normally this would because for celebration but first round I win after killing the hippogriff but John holds firm! Now the trolls which had hoped and assumed to be free to rear charge the dirty French were tied up with the silly stubborn reliquary so were of no use to me! This turn john wins by 2 (hard to kill these tin cans!) and informs me his bsb is carrying the banner of the lady... For those of you who do not know (I hope almost all of you lol!) this rag of a flag disrupts units and they cannot gain any combat Rez from ranks.... Therefore I am not steadfast and I am testing on a 5 with a reroll... I fail, escape (huzzah!) but I am charged off the board in the following turn (boo!). So last turn of the game my trolls heroically pass their stupidity test (leadership 4 no reroll!) and rear charge the bsb and remaining grail knight! John elects to flee (its a long charge) but rolls an 11 on his flee distance and pops off the board!!! This epic swing turns what was shaping up a to a 20-0 to me, then a 5-15 loss then back to a 10-10 draw!!!

So overall I had a great time, I wish I had been able to play all my games as I was shaping up for a decent finish (would have played the supremely excellent Grieg Summer's WoC last game which was looking in my favour!) but hey ho! If I had a best sports vote I would give it to Darren for dealing with his awful luck in great way and having a laugh despite it all! Full Results can be found here :) http://warhammer.org.uk/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=120101

Below are a tonne of pictures of the best armies at the event displayed for players choices (other great armies were not displayed unfortunately :( ), the standard of painting in the Scottish Scene really has taken off in a big way with very few unpainted armies and several always in contention for best painted! Tim Gronnenberg's OnG won the award more than deservedly, the paint job is awesome, conversions great and the effort on the basing is second to none! The army has really inspired me to go that extra mile with my OrcOgres and I will be putting in a lot more effort on the details (tattoos, basing and huge centre pieces!). I am aiming to have the army done for Cry Havok in June so fingers cross I can achieve this!

Anyway onwards and upwards to the Ogres for my next army! Cant wait to use them!!!

Rich!