Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Alamo GT 2013: Round #2 & Round #3

I have already made mention that I wouldn't be doing full battle reports for these two rounds. One reason, is that the pictures from Round 2 and the notes/everything from Round 3 are fuzzy and didn't provide enough for me to do full re-caps. Second, the games themselves were very boring from a playing/generalship sense which means that the games don't lend themselves to full write-ups. Thus, I feel these shorter re-caps do a little bit better job of setting out the games and what happened.

Round #2: Warriors of Chaos
This round I was playing a heavily tooled Warriors of Chaos army. This army was nasty, nasty, nasty. The list included a Demon Prince (Level 4, Lore of Tzeentch, Mark of Tzeentch, 1+ armor save, ASF, and 2++ against flaming as well as a breath weapon); unkillable Battle Standard Bearer (exalted hero on disc with Mark of Tzeentch); a Level 1 Metal Sorcerer; 10 Nurgle warriors with flaming banner; 2 chariots with Mark of Nurgle; four units of warhounds; 2 Chimera with breath weapons and regeneration; and 4 skullcrushers with banner of swiftness. This is an extremely hard hitting list.

This game came down to the fact that it ended on Turn 3. On Turn 2, my Level 4 miscast and sucked herself into the warp. On Turn 3, my Level 2 and his unit of xbows fled a charge and rolled 11" to fall off the table (they were 10.5" away, of course). That was two huge point losses that occurred so early, that when the game ended, I was unable to make back their points.

When the game ended I had killed both Chimeras (550 pts), all four units of dogs (140 pts), and one of the chariots (125 pts). The remaining chariot had 2 wounds left, and the BSB was in combat with my lord and only had 1 wound left. Plus, I had killed all but one of the skullcrushers. The Demon Prince was still alive (with unfettered magic dominion), but the Nurgle warriors and Level 1 Metal were staring down a flank charge by a full-wounds hydra. On my side, I still had an unwounded lord, an unwounded hydra, a RBT, a few crossbowmen, a unit of dark riders, and the cauldron.

I think that had the game continued a full six turns, and based on the position of our units at the time, I would have gotten the BSB, skullcrushers, Level 1 with nurgle warriors, and the remaining chariot. I probably would have lost a bunch more units, but instead of losing the game by more than 500 points, it would have been a much closer game - probably a draw. Especially if I could have tied up the Demon Prince with my lord on turns 5 and 6. I didn't expect to get the bonus points this round, and I would not have been able to anyways as the judge's ruled that the skullcrushers had to frenzy overrun into the pinata each turn (so that 1 skullcrusher was protected from the RBTs for two turns) and that 1 skullcrusher managed to put over a dozen wounds on the pinata in three turns.

Round #3: Demons of Chaos
This was another absolutely tooled up list that had no theme going for it. This list included Papa Nurgle (Level 4 with Lore of Death, and all the weapon upgrades), a large Nurgle block with herald, 2 units of horrors (10 strong), a Tzeentch herald, a large unit of beasts (6 models), 2 lone beasts, 2 small units of Nurgle flies (3 models each), and 2 Khorne cannons.

There were a lot of problems with this game that stem from both my opponent not telling me all of his rules - and following them - and me forgetting the most basic rules of the game. For example, my Level 4 died to a purple sun while she was in a unit (because I forgot her "Look Out Sir" roll). My bad! That is totally my fault.

However, as I write this and look over my notes, I remember that my opponent never rolled for his own units from the winds of magic. His bad. Especially with so many different unit types of different gods. This is another reason to make sure your opponent gives you all the special rules you need to play (or you bring your own copy of the book) and you look through them before the game. Further, this is a reminder to me that when playing against armies with incredibly complicated rule sets, to really focus on the game (which I was not doing - it may have had something to do with bidding the maximum number of beers for the bonuses).

This was also that game where my opponent asked for another turn after turn 3 with 25 minutes left (when it looked like a draw). So we played the ENTIRE turn 4 in ten minutes! Then, with 15 minutes left, he said that there was no way we could fit a turn 5 into the game when it was likely that I would have cleaned up a few more units. I have already discussed how upset I was after this, so I won't go into it any further.

For the game breakdown, at the end of Turn 3, I had managed to kill both Khorne cannons, a lone beast, and drop one unit of flyers to 1 model (in combat with my Lord) and the large unit of beasts to three models. In turn, I lost my harpies, a hydra, shades, and my Level 4 (my own fault).

At the end of Turn 4, I had managed to kill an additional lone beast, one unit of flyers, papa nurgle, and had dropped one unit of horrors to 4 models and the other to 3 models (including the herald) for the loss of both dark rider units, the other hydra, the cauldron, and the assassin. This is where the game ended. I lost, but by less than 500 points.

Had we played the other two turns, I would have been able to get both horror units (I still had my xbow units) and the remaining three nurgle beasts (as my lord was still running around and I had both bolt throwers left). I would not have been able to touch the large nurgle unit or the other unit of nurgle flyers, but a single turn (or two) would have given me enough points for a draw at the very least.

Overall, this game was disappointing. Much of it was my own fault - loosing my Level 4, forgetting that the cauldron was a warmachine so only 3 of the beasts (and not all six to start) could attack it - and some of it was bad luck - hydras charging the nurgle unit and large beast units and failing to hit or wound with the attacks (I lost both combats on the turn I charged and used the breath weapon!). But some of it was attributable to my opponent taking advantage of me, and finally, refusing to finish the game - which caused my tantrum.

Next week, back to full write-ups and fabulous pictures.

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