Wednesday, June 1, 2011

JotWW Can Suck It! Local RTT Batrep Round 1!

So this weekend I played in a little 3-round RTT at a local store. Now I've been told by the store owner (the 2008? GW GT Circuit Champion) who's a great dude that his store doesn't have the most hardcore competitive group but that it's a decent group to game with. Well with that being said I decided on Friday night that it might be a good idea to give my no big gribbly army a shot. It's an 1,850 tournament so it's not the full list but this is what I chose to run.

My Army:

Parasite
Prime w/Dual Bone Swords
2 Lictors
3 Hive Guard
3 Hive Guard
15 Genestealers
14 Genestealers
10 Genestealers
19 Hormagants
5 Raveners w/Rending Claws
5 Raveners w/Rending Claws
20 Gargoyles w/Adrenal Glands & Toxin Sacs

I brought the lictors because, by god, I wanna try them out. Plus it's another back field threat if I don't roll horribly. On to game #1.

The format is that there are 3 objectives. The 3 objectives are the same every game. They are all the rulebook mission. So you're playing for KP's, 3 Regular Objectives, and 2 "Base" Objective. If you win an objective then it's worth 10pts. If you tie it then it's worth 5. Tabling is worth a bonus 5pts but you can only score a maximum of 30 per game.

Deployment: Pitch Battle

Opponents Army List (Tau): Approximately

And to be fair to my opponent about what you're going to read I don't think he'd played his Tau in more than a little while.

Commander (3 Wound) w/2 Shield Drones, Plasma Rifle, Missile Pod
2 Bodyguards w/Burst Cannon, Missile Pod, 1 w/2 Gun Drones
2 Crisis Suites w/Plasma Rifle, Missile Pod, 2 Shield Drones, 2 Gun Drones
2xCrisis Suit w/TL-Fusion Blaster, Targetting Array
3x6 Fire Warriors
2x20 Kroot Warrior
3x6 Pathfinder w/Devilfish
Hammerhead w/Railgun, 2xBurstcannons
2 Broadside w/2 Shield Drones

I won the roll to go first and deployed centrally. He deploys as seen below. This is after his scout moves.


The above shows my first move. I move up fast, trying to close. He had moved up his devilfish to start blocking assaults. I manage to down one on the left you can't see and charge all the drones he put down to "distract" me. I manage to shake another Devilfish.

On his turn he moves up where I failed to fall my genestealers on the right back into cover from the consolidation and manages to kill 14/15 Genestealers with a single unit. That was the majority of the damage he did on his turn. On my next  (2) I move up and assault his HQ unit w/the Parasite who is going one on one w/his Suit Commander. My middle Genestealers hit his Broadsides while my far left genestealers his a troop choice. My Raveners move up and assault another troop choice. I wipe out both troop units. Now in combat the Parasite instant poofs his commander but fails to make some babies. I actually lose combat because even though I was pretty sure it was majority WS2 but didn't push it. I lost an extra few gargoyles but lock in. Table looks like this at the bottom of 2.
On his turn one kroot squad comes in on the left and a Monat drops on that building you see on the left. He wipes out the Hormagants on his turn and the Genestealers on the left. My Genestealers are locked in combat with his Broadsides because he's rolling to hit on 4's instead of 5's after I again asked him what the WS on his Broadsides is and he says 3....But it's all good.

On my turn (3) I go on a killing spree and the end result is this:
I consolidate my genestealers assuming as turn 4. We don't get it and so we tie on 2 of the objectives for 10 points and only win the KP one...

So we got in 3 turns which kept me from tabling my opponent. My lictors were pounding on his suits (again his suits hitting on 4's...) on the left but he only had his 2 kroot units, 2 monats, and his last pathfinder squad. I've got both units of Raveners fully decked, both units of hive guard ready to rock and my genestealers. But it was a pretty good game and he was a nice guy so it's all good.

I really enjoyed how fast this army was and how well it reacts. It feels light on the troops now that I've gotten used to 6 Troop choices that are all bigger units or tougher than what I had here but it did work out for this game. I'm also realizing how much softer Genestealers are without FnP :)

Oh, and Raveners are frickin ridiculous! The speed and hitting power are insane. Especially if you can catch a unit out of terrain. But they do have the resilience to take the hit and then pound back which was nice to remember since I haven't played with them in months.

The lictors, while slowly munching his suits, didn't really do much else. I wasn't very impressed with them. This would continue to be a theme for the tournament but I did have to try them out.

So not a bad start. Who thinks they know how this tournament turns out?