Game Reports 24-26: Very Nice, Great Success

This weekend was the first fully 6th edition tournament at Gamer's Haven, and boy howdy was it fun. There was a pretty decent turnout considering the low numbers that we've been seeing as a result of people still learning 6th. There was a field of 22 players, and surprisingly enough, not a single person brought Grey Knights. Anyway the dice were on my side and I managed to do quite good (taking best general). Here's the story of how it all went down for me...

Game 24

Opponent: Tony, a player from the old school of 40k thinking, he fought me on so many rules it wasn't funny. This is one of those games where you have to force yourself to be nice to your opponent and not take pleasure in crushing them. 

My list: Double Wraithstar

His list: Dark Angels: Librarian in power armor and belial leading a fist + bolter deathwing squad w/ cml. Deathwing assault squad w/ all the cc gubbins, double plasma tac squad, lasplas tac squad in a rhino, double melta tac squad in a pod, ravenwing attack squadron w/ multi-melta attack bike. Whirlwind, Vindicator. 

Mission: Endless Crusade: 5 mysterious objectives, basic book secondaries. Vanguard deployment

Highlights: It was obvious just from looking at my opponents list that he is from the old school 40k community and that his list was built for a more fluffy game and less than optimized for tournament play. This led to some problems later on in the game, as we were both approaching the game from different mindsets. I took first turn and sent one wraithwing after belial's squad on my right flank and the other towards my left in a pincer formation. I also moved the Annihilation barges up midfield (making sure to stay out of range of the vindi) while shelling up in a corner with the majority of my troops waiting for his reserves. The annihilation squad chewed up belial's unit fairly well and I moved in the wraithwing to finish them off on turn 2. My warriors were hiding very close to the corner and blocked in by the ghost arks so I thought for sure that they were relatively safe... but on turn one he deepstruck his Deathwing assault squad in right behind them in the ballsiest deep strike I've ever seen. If he had scattered at all he probably would have mishapped. That deepstrike pretty much forced me to split my forces between dealing with the terminator squad (killing all but one dual lightning clawed termy) and the rest of his army. On his second turn his drop pod also came in to put pressure on my backfield but by then his terminator threat was manageable and I was able to commit my arks to clearing out the drop pod. In the end it came down to him not committing enough to taking out my back field and my forward assault forces pincering in his units and working their way in towards his mid board taking out a unit a turn through the one-two punch of softening units up with Annihilation barges and assaulting them with wraiths afterward. The game ended with him only having that single assault terminator on the board and me controlling 2 of the objectives. 

MVP Moment: That deepstrike into my back field was the ballsiest move I've seen in a while, it would have paid off too if he had planned a little bit more ahead and put some pressure on my backfield so my warriors couldn't just light up the terminators... Here's a quick snapshot I took of the deepstrike just so I could show it here:

This man has balls if nothing else. 

Result: Decisive victory, WLD record: 14-8-2. Tournament WLD: 1-0-0

Game 25

Opponent: Dane Lindh, he is an up and coming player in the area who I have a lot of respect for. I see great things in his future as far as 40k is concerned. 

My list: Double Wraithstar

His list: Ork Rush: 10 Nobs w/ 7 big choppas, 2 Klaws, bosspole, banner, eavy armor, cybork bodies, pain boy. Led by Zogwart and a klaw warboss, all stuffed into a rolla wagon. Two units of 30 slugga boyz each w/ klaw nob, 5 deffkoptas w/ tl rokkit launcha, 15 man loota squad. And a looted wagon w/ boom gun just for good measure. 

Mission: Seek and Destroy: Kill points with three objectives, each worth 1kp. Hammer and Anvil deployment. 

Highlights: I came really close to losing this one. I moved my wraithwings up together in a way that was too aggressive and I positioned them in a way where I would for sure get the turn 2 charge... as long as he didn't get the long charge off... which he did... And it hurt. He dispatched both wraithwings easily by the end of turn two and left me backpedaling all game. I used a denied flank strategy which effectively kept his second 30 boy squad out of the game while I whittled them down with the Tesla immortals all game. He was winning up until the last turn of the game when I somehow managed to get all of his units out of combat and have them be completely exposed to being fired down. I went from being down 4 kill points to being up 2 all in that last turn. 

MVP Moment: My positioning with my wraiths was a huge play mistake, I should have never banked on him failing the long charge without any way of punishing him for failing it. It nearly cost me the game and I had to work my ass off for the entire game to rectify it.

Result: VERY close win, WLD record: 15-8-2.Tournament WLD: 2-0-0

Game 26

Opponent: Alex, the guy who's Dreadknight absolutely obliterated me in game 21

My list: Double Wraithstar

His list: Space wolves w/ Space Marine allies: I wasn't able to get a copy of his list so I'm doing this from memory but what I remember of it is: Thunderwolf cav unit w/ all the fixings. Led by a rune priest w/ jaws and hurricane, wolf lord, and Space Marine Captain on bike. Two squads of double melta grey hunters in pods, two units of long fangs, one manning a quad gun Aegis defense line, one w/ a pod (which drops empty on turn two so both units of grey hunters come in turn one), a space marine bike squad, and an asslas stormtalon.

Mission: Transmission received: This is a cool hybrid mission where you play both The Relic and Emperors will, resulting in 3 objectives each worth three vps, the two in the players deployment zones are regular mysterious, while the middle one is a relic. The secondaries are slightly different too, they were linebreaker, slay the warlord, and 'transmit data' which was to control the relic and have it within 3" of either player's objective at the end of the game. 

Highlights: Alex is quickly becoming one of my favorite people to play. He is an excellent painter, and a very strong player if not a little inexperienced. The game went fairly quickly, I used one wraithwing to intercept his thundercav squad while I sent the other around to his backfield to take out the longfangs and move him off his objective. He dropped the grey hunters off on my left flank near my interceptor wraiths in an attempt to bolter them down before they could catch his thundercav, but they failed their mission and the interception went off as planned. The wraithwing took out all but the wolf lord and captain who were each reduced to one wound before the wraiths were wiped out. The destroyer lord managed to get up and take out one of the grey hunters squads solo while my warriors finished the other. The true surprise of the game came when he went to charge my warrior squad with the remaining characters of the thundercav. By some miracle of the dice my 8 man warrior squad managed to score two wounds with overwatch... which he failed, killing both special characters (each of which had a 2+ save). The game ended with his bike squad grabbing the relic and making a break for it as my hunter-killer wraith squad managed to finish the longfangs, leaving them wide open to be taken out, meanwhile my immortals flew in and claimed his objective, while my warriors held mine. 

MVP Moment: After rolling my overwatch with my warrior squad against his two thundercav special characters I joked with Alex that he was gonna roll snake eyes for his saves... Which he then immediately did. I felt like the biggest douche in the world when it happened and that moment allowed my warrior squad to become a serious thorn in his side for the rest of his game.
Result: Decisive victory, WLD record: 16-8-2. Tournament WLD: 3-0-0

At the end of the day it came down to just me and Kriston Broxson as the only undefeated players (both of us playing Necrons) The tiebreaker was sportsmanship which I somehow edged out the lead on, allowing me to take best general for the tournament. Overall it was a great day and I am most certainly looking forward to the GT Gamer's Haven is hosting in October. Here's hoping for a repeat performance!