2.4k tournament report. HE MSU

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de kaasboer
Posts: 195
Joined: Wed Feb 09, 2011 10:17 am

2.4k tournament report. HE MSU

#1 Post by de kaasboer »

Hey guys i played a tournament with my just painted army 2 weeks ago and did quite ok. it was a 'club tournament' where you participated with a team of 5 players and before each round had to decide which players would count their scoring double. Its a nice system and we have been participating every year over the past 5 years or so. we actually finished 1st, but it seemed something went wrong with the calculations and we ended up taking 3rd place instead (still nice, but next year 1st will be ours:P)

my list for the tournament was as follows:

prince, steed, ha, gw, temakadors gauntlets, luckstone and ironcurse icon (sort of a budget version, as with my other version i was 8 points over and didnt want to drop a (just painted) model from my helms)
Archmage, lvl 4, shadow, vortex shard
noble, BSB, steed, da, gw, helm of fortune, amulet of light

core:
34 spears, standard, musician and gleaming pendant
12 archers with musician
12 archers with musician


specials:
9 silverhelms, shieldsm standard, musician
5 dragonprinces, standard, banner of sorcery
5 dragon princes


6 swordmasters
6 swordmasters
tiranoc chariot
tiranoc chariot


rare:
great eagle
great eagle


ok some short linouts of how the battles went. i didnt make any notes and its 2 weeks ago so hope my memory serves me right XD

first round:
mirror match vs darkelves (i decided not to count double, as DE light shooting is really bad for my small units, and it was a player from the team that won the previous 3 or so years, so i expected a hard matchup)

when i arrived at the table, it turned out his list was somewhat of a DE version of mine, his army roughly consisting of:

lvl4 with sacrifcial dagger
lord on coldone (pendant and stubborn)
cauldron bsb

40 or something spearelves
2x 12 repeaters crossbows (see a pattern?)
2 x 5 harpies (idem eagles:P)
5 darkriders

9 coldone knights with asf banner
5 shades (didnt have shadow warrios:<)
18 black guard (the main difference, but comparable to the 2 units of SM i have)

hydra (hard hitter, like chariots)



I never played this player before but he was very nice, and the battle was much like a game of chess, with both of us trying to achieve a dominant position and waiting for the other to make a mistake. however, due to the round starting late and both of us only half awake and not in a hurry ( it had been a short night) we only played for 3 rounds :< too bad because this was developing into one of the most interesting battles i had in a long time...

I havent used the battlechronicles yet so will one give a short overview of some main events:
I was trying to overtake the left flank with my sorcery DPs + eagle + some infantry, with only some shooters from his army on that side. but a combination of t2 and bad saves meant i lost the banner of sorcery DPs on one round of shooting to 12 repeaters and 5 shades... so that plan went out of the window.

I was kindoff stalling the middle, with my eagle, some threatening chariots and the spears vs his coldones, cauldron and blackguard (he played those very defensively, which was good for me)

I cast an irresistable pit of shades on his cauldron in the 2nd turn, giving me a big advantage. the miscast only caused some archers to die.

on the right flank the real battle of movement was fought with him trying to avoid a multi charge on his spears and/or hydra and vice versa. finally i tried to lure him into charging my helms with his spears (+lvl4) so i could counter with others. he counted on getting mindrazor or a hex through and made the charge, and the bad thing was his hydra also made it (needed 11 or something)

In his magic phase i declared the vortex shard, so no mindrazor for him. the look on his face alone was worth bringing the shard :P
The combat was ok, me slaughtering some elves, and most importantly, his lvl4 (had no save). the hydra didnt do too much damage reulting in a drawn combat.

unfortunately the battle was over at this point, while next turn i could have taken out his whole right flank, and the rest was still undecided. he also had no magic left so i was at a clear advantage...

only VP for me were his BSB and lvl, for him only the dragon princes with sorcery banner. The difference was 400 for me but i needed 500 for a minor :< oh well, better wake up before, and not during the battle next time:P

game 2
this was a objective battle, with 3 placed objectives, and the diference in objectives claimed determining the winner. a 900 vp difference could shift the result by one step or something. Only core units could claim, all units could contest.

I played against lizards. not a great matchup, but with me being at a lower table (due to the draw) and having shadow magic we decided i would count double.

he had roughly:
slann, light, all the goodies
skink lvl 2, flying, scroll
scarvet on coldone in foot unit (sword of might and some other stuff. i expected stubborn crown but

he didnt seem to have it)

2x 12 skink skirmishers
2x 25 ish saurus. one unit with spears.
5 chameleons
20-25 templeguard
8 ! kroxigors

2 salamanders


so kind of the standard bubble-me-up lizzies seen quite a lot, but with the kroxigor unit instead of stegadons/more saurus/ more skinks. ....interesting

The table was scattered with very large (high) hills which the note on the side of the table said counted as "scree slopes" so dangerous terrain all over the place.... and blockin line of sight as well (a dragon could easily have hidden behind them, and how my cav would ever climb those edges... no clue :P)

We actually had to roll to place the objectives, no closer than 12" to a table edge, and no closer than 12" to each other. i wonn the roll off, place the first on the edge of (what later turned out to be) my deplyement zone, between 2 hills in the middle ( a bit on the left side actually), then he did

the same on the other side of the board, but a bit more on the right. i got to place the last one and

decided to put it near the middle line of the board, somewhat more to the right than his placement.

this would give me a decent position to work from no matter which side i got.

deployement something like this :

---- kroxxi--TG--saurus--saurus---skinks-------
----salamanders--skinks--(0)HILLLLLLLLLLL------
---HILLLL----------rock-----HILLLLLLLLLLL------
---HILL-------------rock---------HILLLLLL------
----------Chameleons-----------(0)-----------
----------------(0)-HHILLL--------------------
DP-TC-SM-Archers-TC-archers-spears-helms-DP
---Eagle--HILLLL-SM--HILLLLLLL-eagle----------

the (0) marks the objectives. both archers were on those hills btw. my lord was with the left DP (to fake more preasure on that
side) and bsb with helms. mage was with right archers.

my plan was to take out his supporting stuff, stall his left side (or get them into a vice between swordmasters +chariots and spears if he advaced straght forward) and break the right side. by doing this i hoped my spears could claim the objective in his deployment zone and the archers get the 2 others. if that wasnt possible i would try to claim the 2 on my side and disrupt the other.

I got the 1st turn, charging his chameleons with the swordmasters (needed 8, but hoped he'd flee, which he didnt. he killed 1 in SaS) i moved up on both sides, making sure the adancing units on my left turned a bit to the middle, to discourage him from advancing. also advanced my middle chariot to threaten/draw a long charge. I decided to take the dangerous terrain for granted (manouvering around the hills would take too much time and get me in a funnel which is the last thing you want with an army like mine) and lost a silverhelm or something

took some shots at the chameleons and killed 2 or 3
magic didnt do too much (i had -str, -T, pit and mindrazor. he dispelled pit ofcourse)

in his turn he advanced just a bit with only the skinks on the right and the salamnders advancing.(he was afraid to march due to the hills...) and then managed to bubble up his army with 1000 buffs... hmm not a nice prospect. could stop maybe 1 or 2 spells per turn of the 5 or 6 he cast o.0

with his shooting he killed a swordmaster with the chameleons, which were on the objective now

HE turn 2
in my 2nd turn i charged the salamanders with my lord (out of the DP) and a chariot, charged the other chariot into his middle skins (which fled but i caught them, rolling. the chariot was now in between the kroxis and the TG, but out of their angles, gogo rocket power)

On the right i could have charged my helms in the front of his right saurus, but decided to just move around their flank and then turn (wheel) to the middle. lost another helm to the terrain, but atleast they were off the hill now. princes went on the hill, spears moved to taunt his left saurus, swordmasters moved a bit to the middle area (clear of the skiks now) and i turned both archers to finish of the chameleons.

I wanted to go for pit of shades on his left saurus (slann was out of range) but then realised they were I10 due to buffs. so i decided to give them -2 str instead (in case they charged the spears) and -1T on the salamander. he dispelled mindrazor on the spears.

my archers finished the chameleons
in combat i killed the salamanders and the handlers fled, i restrained (putting some more presure on his kroxis with my lord and chariot.)

I moved the left Dp to threaten his kroxis in the flank if he decided to charge the eagle parked in front (like i would ever do that... but he was afraid so that helped:P)

Liz T2
he didnt charge. at all.
he reformed the kroxis a bit, shuffled his TG a bit to that side as well. ok, my stalling-the-left side-plan was working great:P and moved the left saurs a bit forward (would be a long charge for him to the spears, and he was -1S this turn) and turned his right saurus to face the helms.

in the magic phase he rolled 6-6 but i revealed my vortex shard, as i could combo charge his saurus with my DP(flank) +helms, and his other saurus with spears + SM(flank), and did NOT want any buffs on them.

shooting killed a DP on the right side. the skinks were advancing around the hill btw.

HE turn 3

I took the opporunity for both charges with the SM and spears making it, the helms making it, but the DP needed 6 and rolled 4 >.<

ok at least the spear combat could be good, especially with some debuffing.

I moved my dp on the left onto the hill (threanening both TG and kroxi), placed the eagle in front of the kroxis again, moved my lord back to the DP and my one chariot (which comabtted the salamnders) to the middle, threatening the flank of his saurus, kroxi(if he charged the eagle and didnt catch it), and the front of the TG. the other cleared the remaining handlers off the board, catching them and running of the board itself. (didnt do much after that)

left archers moved onto the objective, right archers turned a moved a bit toward the right objective while taking some shots at the skinks there.

in the magic phase i managed to cast -1 T on his unit fighting the spear+ SM (jay) but he dispelled the -1s on the unit and scrolled mindrazor.

combat then:

i killed a good portion of his unit (i think there were 23 at the start, and 9+ character after) and had more ranks so was confident i was going to break him if he wasnt stubborn. he reavealed som magic sword (+2 strenght i think) on his scaret, so could NOT be stubborn!

then he hit back, killing some spearelves, but more importantly, his 4! attacks to the flank (these were the last dice he rolled in the combat) killed all 4 of my swordmasters...... switching an insane courage test to a ld 4 test, which he made... (with bsb and coldblooded ofcourse)

hmm stuck in combat with a unit that was about to get all its buffs back:S

the helms then, could they win without the DP support?
they did, but not by enough to take away his steadfast (i killed 9 or something, DP would certainly have made the difference)

so stuck twice... but it was all about the objectives so i hoped i'd stalled him long enough.'

from now on the turns went quite fast so i dont remember exactly (time was an issue)

LIZ T3
in his turn he shuffeled a bit, moved skinks towards my archers (+lvl4), killed the eagle with his kroxi (fine) and got off a bunch of spells. i stopped birona's and net of amyntok on my lvl 4's units, but he got off pha's protection and speed of light i think (one of these was irresitable, and the last spell he cast, leaving me with dices left...). he forgot to dispel the -1 t but he was hard
to hit so didnt matter much for him.

In combat my helms won again but lost a few more (leaving only bsb+ 3 others)
my spears lost (needing 6s to hit without rerolls, i did nothing...) but were steadfast and past their test on the reroll (thanks to gleaming pendant)


HE T4:
I charged my chariot in the flank of the spears combat, and my DP in the helms combat (losing 2 to difficult terrain >.<). my archers + lvl4 charged the skinks in front of them (i would not win a shootout but in combat i should win, even though i had only 8 archers left), which were just within 5 (no Stand and shoot) so opted to flee. I rolled high, he rolled low and i caught them. moving near the objective. good:D

i knew i was going to win the right combat, so i focussed on debuffing the middle saurus, to keep my spears steadfast. i irresistabled the -d3T on them after also giving them s1, my wizard took a wound and lost the rest of the PD

in combat i killed all but the front rank of the right saurus, who managed to kill 2 more of the remaining helms. he failed his test and i caught them.

the middle combat wasnt as good, with my chariot doing only 1 impact hit, not wounding >.< and the spears doing nothing again. but he was only s1 now only killed a few more spears. i think it was a draw.

In his turn (it was the last turn due to time) he couldnt charge anything, he moved his flying skink priest, which was hiding behind the hill somewhere right next to my archer unit, contesting that objective :shock:

Then he focused all his magic on trying to panic both my archer units off the objectives.
he cast the basic missle (killing 6 archers:S) , and boltfrom lore of heavens on the other archers,

meaning both my archers had to take a panic test. not good:s

then with his last dice he cast banishment on the left archers, but i managed to dispell it.

2 panic tests then... :?

both made
phew

so the battle conlcluded to; me having one objective, him contesting the other, and the fight between

the spears and the saurus right on the other.

but... he didnt cast any buffs this turn,
and my debuffs were RiP

I managed to slay all the t2 saurus (except the scarvet) and he fled off the objective:D

giving met 2 vs 0, meaning a 16-4 result

i also had 830 VP more than him, but needed 900 to make it 18-2 :<

oh well, cant complain:P

last battle was VS orcs with double wyverns, report will come tomorrow if you're interested ;)

I will try to do some proper battle reports (with chronicler) when i play more battles, but hope this was somewhat readable. after the last report i will also try to give a tactical breakdown of how my units/army performed and what i will add/change in the future, but you guys can already comment ofcourse:)

oh and while i didnt take any pictures during the battles, i did make some pictures of my speedpainted army during the break with my phone:

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

and one of my first-round opponent's cauldron:
Image

thanks for reading:)

gr, J
SchlieffenB
Posts: 12
Joined: Thu Oct 28, 2010 7:00 pm

Re: 2.4k tournament report. HE MSU

#2 Post by SchlieffenB »

I love the blue swords! They look awesome. How did you paint them?

Eagerly awaiting the next battle report and maybe some more pictures :)

S
User avatar
de kaasboer
Posts: 195
Joined: Wed Feb 09, 2011 10:17 am

Re: 2.4k tournament report. HE MSU

#3 Post by de kaasboer »

thank you, although its not really the right forum section for that:P

but the swords, and the gems on all the models as well, were black undercoat, then a layer of scaly green, then highlights in 50/50 scaly green and skull white, with some more highlight in pure skull white. quite easy actually :)
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