So Waaagh!Paca 2015 is on the horizon and I have my eyes set on finishing up a good portion of my Wood Elves army for the event (though I may lean Eternity King if I like how it plays). To that end, I have been painting (when time allows) and trying to finish up at least a few key units. Right now I am working on finishing three core units of Glade Guard and a Sisters of the Thorn bunker.
A blog of wargaming, board games, video games, and all other geek things. For gamers, by a gamer.
Tuesday, December 23, 2014
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Waaagh!Paca 2015: Tournament Rules Overview
The next Warhammer tournament that I will be attending is Waaagh!Paca 2015. This event just gets bigger and better every year and I am really looking forward to three solid days of Warhammer and random shenanigans. This year, Waaagh!Paca will be the host of several different events including: a five-round tournament using 2,000 point armies; the annual mustache contest; hand crafted prizes; the “officially unofficial Friday night tournament;” annual raffle; and freezing cold temperatures.
Wednesday, December 10, 2014
West Coast Qualifier: Tournament Overview
The West Coast qualifier was a three round 2500 point tournament using the 2015 U.S. Master’s rule pack. In the first round, each player was paired against another player with a similar composition score. As my list was a 14, I knew I would be playing one of the other four players with a 14. Ultimately, I was paired against Southern California’s Zack Lopez.
Round #1: Zack Lopez - Warriors of Chaos
Zack’s list was a hard-hitting (for a 14) Nurgle-based warriors list. His list included a Chaos Lord mounted on Chaos Dragon, two exalted heroes on daemonic mount, a level 2 chaos sorcerer with Lore of Nurgle, a few warhound units, marauder horsemen with flails, two chariots of Nurgle, a twelve man strong unit of warriors marked Nurgle, and a flying, breath-weapon spewing Chimera.
Zack deployed in a solid battle line with his focus on the center of the board. His plan was obviously to rush forward and hit my archer blocks which were spread out at the bottom of my deployment zone. I won the roll to go first, which allowed me to rush my Wild Rider units onto Zack’s flanks and start peppering his units with bowfire. In the first turn, between combined magic and shooting I was able to kill four of the knights to take them out of the game (the last knight would run around for the remainder of the game making unbelievable saves until the game ended), and drop two units of dogs.
Zack retaliated by swinging the Chimera to the flank to take on the Wild Riders with his breath weapon, but only managed to kill a single Wild Rider, leaving the five remaining Wild Riders to cause problems in his back field. Even though Zack would eventually get the Wild Riders, the unit pulled the Chimera out of position for the rest of the game.
Despite early progress, Zack and I only managed to finish four turns in the 2 ½ time limit. Luckily, the Wood Elf shooting with Harmonic Convergence did serious work. I eventually killed off the Chaos Lord and Dragon, the level 2, and most of the unit of warriors. At the end of the game I had lost a unit of Wild Riders and an eagle, but had managed to kill everything but the two exalted heroes, the nurgle warrior unit, the Chimera, one knight, and a chariot with a single wound. Another two turns and I think I would have gotten everything.
The game ended with over 1000 victory point difference in my favor, and I was on my way with a solid 17 point win!
Round #2: Jeremy “Effing” Campbell - Ogre Kingdoms
For Round 2 I played Jeremy Campbell and his Ogre Kingdom army. Jeremy’s army also came into the tournament with a 14 with a solid list. His army included a Slaughtermaster, a BSB, a Firebelly, a Butcher, three small units of Mournfang cavalry, a large unit of Maneaters with scout and poison, a few small units of basic Ogres, and an Irongut unit.
This game came down to two of Jeremy’s Ogre units single-handedly holding up the entire left-flank of my battleline including several of my key units like Way Watchers, two Trueflight glade guard units, and a unit of Wild Riders. Do to a tremendously short overrun of 3 inches against a single Ogre, a unit of Wild Riders was caught in the flank by the other unit and killed, which put Jeremy’s Ogre unit in position after reforming to charge the flank of the Way Watchers holding them up for the rest of the game. On the opposite flank, I couldn’t bring my bow power against the Maneaters as poor rolling for the first four turns of the game allowed the Ironguts to get into my line.
By the end of the game, I was able to take out two of the Mournfang units, all the Ironguts, the Slaughtermaster, and one unit of Ogres, but was not able to take down the BSB or the Maneaters which was where a large number of Jeremy’s points were. Luckily, I was able to keep most of my units alive including the Sister bus and the Spellweaver, but I did have to sacrifice a few units during the game. In the end, I took a small 8 point loss to go into game three with 25 out of 40 points.
Round #3: Josh Fricke - Daemons of Chaos
For Round 3 I played Josh Fricke’s Daemon army. Josh’s list included a Keeper of Secrets, a herald of Slaanesh, a fifty-two man unit of daemonettes, a unit of seekers, a unit of fiends, two units of furies, and two soul grinders. His list comped a 9.1 which meant that I got to start the game 490 victory points up. This gave me a huge advantage and pushed Josh to go on the offensive very early, pulling key units out of position.
Knowing how dangerous the spell Cacophonic Choir can be, I set up all my units so that the Keeper would not be able to cast it on anything important on the first turn so all Josh could do was move up fast to get ready for Turn 2. On my first turn, I placed every shot available into the Keeper taking off two early wounds. From then on, Josh’s Keeper was on the back foot and couldn’t throw too many dice at each spell attempt for fear of taking additional wounds from my Feedback Scroll.
Eventually, I was able to take out the Keeper with more combined shooting including the Hail of Doom arrow. I threw the dryads and a Branchwraith into the face of the daemonettes to keep them from the rest of my battleline while I slowly killed off everything else with combined shooting, magic, and Wild Rider charges. At the end, I was up over 1500 points to take the solid 20 giving me 45 battle points out of 60 to end the day. A solid score for second place for the tournament and a place at the U.S. Masters.
Overall List Thoughts:
After playing three games with this list I am happy with its overall performance, but the one game where I did not get Harmonic Convergence I definitely noticed my overall shooting effectiveness decreased significantly.
The Wild Riders performed as expected. They were great in most games, but every once in awhile they did something that cost me the unit before it made its points back. I did miss having shields on the units in one game, but most things that I went into combat against had high strength attacks so that shields wouldn’t have made a difference. I think that shields may be worth it in games against other elves, but I don’t know if it is worth the additional 4 comp points simply for a +1 armor save.
The Branchwraith’s performed as expected. I ended up with The Dwellers Below in all three games, but due to the nature of my opponent’s armies I never had a reason to cast the spell. But, I was able to use the Branchwraiths as sacrifices and speed bumps to protect my archer units. For only 75 points they performed well, but I am not sure that they are also worth the 15 comp points for all three of them. Though, I do think that they will be more effective against other armies, particularly where Dwellers would be more useful.
There is still a lot of list tweaking to do before Masters, but I am confident in both the Spellweaver with Lore of Heavens and the four units of shooting core. Another unit of Starfire Arrows may be the way to go over the unit of Arcane Bodkins, but only more play testing will tell.
Round #1: Zack Lopez - Warriors of Chaos
Zack’s list was a hard-hitting (for a 14) Nurgle-based warriors list. His list included a Chaos Lord mounted on Chaos Dragon, two exalted heroes on daemonic mount, a level 2 chaos sorcerer with Lore of Nurgle, a few warhound units, marauder horsemen with flails, two chariots of Nurgle, a twelve man strong unit of warriors marked Nurgle, and a flying, breath-weapon spewing Chimera.
Zack deployed in a solid battle line with his focus on the center of the board. His plan was obviously to rush forward and hit my archer blocks which were spread out at the bottom of my deployment zone. I won the roll to go first, which allowed me to rush my Wild Rider units onto Zack’s flanks and start peppering his units with bowfire. In the first turn, between combined magic and shooting I was able to kill four of the knights to take them out of the game (the last knight would run around for the remainder of the game making unbelievable saves until the game ended), and drop two units of dogs.
Zack retaliated by swinging the Chimera to the flank to take on the Wild Riders with his breath weapon, but only managed to kill a single Wild Rider, leaving the five remaining Wild Riders to cause problems in his back field. Even though Zack would eventually get the Wild Riders, the unit pulled the Chimera out of position for the rest of the game.
Despite early progress, Zack and I only managed to finish four turns in the 2 ½ time limit. Luckily, the Wood Elf shooting with Harmonic Convergence did serious work. I eventually killed off the Chaos Lord and Dragon, the level 2, and most of the unit of warriors. At the end of the game I had lost a unit of Wild Riders and an eagle, but had managed to kill everything but the two exalted heroes, the nurgle warrior unit, the Chimera, one knight, and a chariot with a single wound. Another two turns and I think I would have gotten everything.
The game ended with over 1000 victory point difference in my favor, and I was on my way with a solid 17 point win!
Round #2: Jeremy “Effing” Campbell - Ogre Kingdoms
For Round 2 I played Jeremy Campbell and his Ogre Kingdom army. Jeremy’s army also came into the tournament with a 14 with a solid list. His army included a Slaughtermaster, a BSB, a Firebelly, a Butcher, three small units of Mournfang cavalry, a large unit of Maneaters with scout and poison, a few small units of basic Ogres, and an Irongut unit.
This game came down to two of Jeremy’s Ogre units single-handedly holding up the entire left-flank of my battleline including several of my key units like Way Watchers, two Trueflight glade guard units, and a unit of Wild Riders. Do to a tremendously short overrun of 3 inches against a single Ogre, a unit of Wild Riders was caught in the flank by the other unit and killed, which put Jeremy’s Ogre unit in position after reforming to charge the flank of the Way Watchers holding them up for the rest of the game. On the opposite flank, I couldn’t bring my bow power against the Maneaters as poor rolling for the first four turns of the game allowed the Ironguts to get into my line.
By the end of the game, I was able to take out two of the Mournfang units, all the Ironguts, the Slaughtermaster, and one unit of Ogres, but was not able to take down the BSB or the Maneaters which was where a large number of Jeremy’s points were. Luckily, I was able to keep most of my units alive including the Sister bus and the Spellweaver, but I did have to sacrifice a few units during the game. In the end, I took a small 8 point loss to go into game three with 25 out of 40 points.
Round #3: Josh Fricke - Daemons of Chaos
For Round 3 I played Josh Fricke’s Daemon army. Josh’s list included a Keeper of Secrets, a herald of Slaanesh, a fifty-two man unit of daemonettes, a unit of seekers, a unit of fiends, two units of furies, and two soul grinders. His list comped a 9.1 which meant that I got to start the game 490 victory points up. This gave me a huge advantage and pushed Josh to go on the offensive very early, pulling key units out of position.
Knowing how dangerous the spell Cacophonic Choir can be, I set up all my units so that the Keeper would not be able to cast it on anything important on the first turn so all Josh could do was move up fast to get ready for Turn 2. On my first turn, I placed every shot available into the Keeper taking off two early wounds. From then on, Josh’s Keeper was on the back foot and couldn’t throw too many dice at each spell attempt for fear of taking additional wounds from my Feedback Scroll.
Eventually, I was able to take out the Keeper with more combined shooting including the Hail of Doom arrow. I threw the dryads and a Branchwraith into the face of the daemonettes to keep them from the rest of my battleline while I slowly killed off everything else with combined shooting, magic, and Wild Rider charges. At the end, I was up over 1500 points to take the solid 20 giving me 45 battle points out of 60 to end the day. A solid score for second place for the tournament and a place at the U.S. Masters.
Overall List Thoughts:
After playing three games with this list I am happy with its overall performance, but the one game where I did not get Harmonic Convergence I definitely noticed my overall shooting effectiveness decreased significantly.
The Wild Riders performed as expected. They were great in most games, but every once in awhile they did something that cost me the unit before it made its points back. I did miss having shields on the units in one game, but most things that I went into combat against had high strength attacks so that shields wouldn’t have made a difference. I think that shields may be worth it in games against other elves, but I don’t know if it is worth the additional 4 comp points simply for a +1 armor save.
The Branchwraith’s performed as expected. I ended up with The Dwellers Below in all three games, but due to the nature of my opponent’s armies I never had a reason to cast the spell. But, I was able to use the Branchwraiths as sacrifices and speed bumps to protect my archer units. For only 75 points they performed well, but I am not sure that they are also worth the 15 comp points for all three of them. Though, I do think that they will be more effective against other armies, particularly where Dwellers would be more useful.
There is still a lot of list tweaking to do before Masters, but I am confident in both the Spellweaver with Lore of Heavens and the four units of shooting core. Another unit of Starfire Arrows may be the way to go over the unit of Arcane Bodkins, but only more play testing will tell.
Friday, December 5, 2014
West Coast Qualifier: Army List
For the West Coast qualifier, I was playing my Wood Elves. Wood Elves are one of my favorite armies, but for years they had problems competing in tournament environments. With the addition of the latest book, however, Wood Elves have gained some serious muscle.
Here is the list I went with, including cost for each unit in Swedish Comp:
Total Swedish Comp: 14
Wanting to take advantage of all the power the Wood Elf book packs, I went about trying to design a list that maximized my shooting potential while still providing some serious close combat hitting potential backed up by a solid magic base. As Swedish Comp penalizes the Lore of Death and the Lore of Shadow heavily for mounted elf mages, I decided to go with the Lore of Heavens on a Level 4 Spellweaver. My hope here was to get Harmonic Convergence to re-roll “1s” with my archer core, control my opponent’s board movement with Comet of Cassandora, and destroy my opponent’s chaff with Chain Lightning.
I went with a Level 2 of Metal so that I would have something besides the small Way Watcher unit to take on 1+ armor saves. Searing Doom is a great spell to take on Chimeras and other high toughness, multi-wound, decent armor save monsters that comp well in Swedish Comp (like ridden Dragons in particular).
I chose two units of Trueflight Arrows over Hagbane so that I could deal with other shooting units like Skinks, Way Watchers, and Shades, as well as the large number of low toughness skirmishing units that are floating around the game. Anything more than 25 models of Trueflight or Hagbane arrows is a serious composition hit, so to fill out the rest of my archers I took a unit of both Arcane Bodkins and Starfire Shafts to help drop 1+ armor saves and negate regeneration saves on Chimeras and trolls.
The Branchwraiths were a key component to making sure that I had access to The Dwellers Below in games against other elves, and choosing three of them made sure that I would be getting that spell in most of my games. I also liked the aspect of having additional cheap chaff units I could throw in front of the battle line to protect my archers. At only 75 points, these guys are awesome. They can take on most other similarly pointed chaff (especially on the charge) and can force nasty frenzied units into bad overrun positions saving my archer units for another shooting phase.
The rest of the army is fairly self-explanatory. Next time, I’ll go over my three games and show how the army performed.
Here is the list I went with, including cost for each unit in Swedish Comp:
- Spellweaver (General, Level 4, Lore of Heavens, Elven Steed, Feedback Scroll, Talisman of Preservation, Warrior Bane (-31 Swedish Comp))
- Glade Captain (Battle Standard Bearer, Elven Steed, Hail of Doom Arrow, Dragon Helm, Luckstone, Great Weapon, Starfire Shafts, Shield (-17 Swedish Comp))
- Spellsinger (Level 2, Lore of Metal, Channeling Staff, Ruby Ring of Ruin (-8 Swedish Comp))
- Branchwraith (-5 Swedish Comp)
- Branchwraith (-5 Swedish Comp)
- Branchwraith (-5 Swedish Comp)
- Glade Guard (10 models, Trueflight Arrows, Musician) (-7 Swedish Comp)
- Glade Guard (10 models, Trueflight Arrows, Musician) (-7 Swedish Comp)
- Glade Guard (10 models, Starfire Shafts, Musician) (-5 Swedish Comp)
- Glade Guard (10 models, Arcane Bodkins, Musician) (-5 Swedish Comp)
- Dryads (12 models) (-2 Swedish Comp)
- Sisters of the Thorn (8 models, Full Command, Lichbone Pennant) (-25 Swedish Comp)
- Wild Riders (6 models) (-7 Swedish Comp)
- Wild Riders (6 models) (-10 Swedish Comp)
- Great Eagle (-5 Swedish Comp)
- Great Eagle (-5 Swedish Comp)
- Way Watchers (7 models) (-11 Swedish Comp)
Total Swedish Comp: 14
Wanting to take advantage of all the power the Wood Elf book packs, I went about trying to design a list that maximized my shooting potential while still providing some serious close combat hitting potential backed up by a solid magic base. As Swedish Comp penalizes the Lore of Death and the Lore of Shadow heavily for mounted elf mages, I decided to go with the Lore of Heavens on a Level 4 Spellweaver. My hope here was to get Harmonic Convergence to re-roll “1s” with my archer core, control my opponent’s board movement with Comet of Cassandora, and destroy my opponent’s chaff with Chain Lightning.
I went with a Level 2 of Metal so that I would have something besides the small Way Watcher unit to take on 1+ armor saves. Searing Doom is a great spell to take on Chimeras and other high toughness, multi-wound, decent armor save monsters that comp well in Swedish Comp (like ridden Dragons in particular).
I chose two units of Trueflight Arrows over Hagbane so that I could deal with other shooting units like Skinks, Way Watchers, and Shades, as well as the large number of low toughness skirmishing units that are floating around the game. Anything more than 25 models of Trueflight or Hagbane arrows is a serious composition hit, so to fill out the rest of my archers I took a unit of both Arcane Bodkins and Starfire Shafts to help drop 1+ armor saves and negate regeneration saves on Chimeras and trolls.
The Branchwraiths were a key component to making sure that I had access to The Dwellers Below in games against other elves, and choosing three of them made sure that I would be getting that spell in most of my games. I also liked the aspect of having additional cheap chaff units I could throw in front of the battle line to protect my archers. At only 75 points, these guys are awesome. They can take on most other similarly pointed chaff (especially on the charge) and can force nasty frenzied units into bad overrun positions saving my archer units for another shooting phase.
The rest of the army is fairly self-explanatory. Next time, I’ll go over my three games and show how the army performed.
Wednesday, December 3, 2014
West Coast Qualifier: Tournament Overview
The West Coast Qualifier is over and victors have been announced (see previous post). But, with this post I thought I would take the opportunity to better explain the qualifier. Next time I will describe the list that I brought to the three-game tournament and then I will provide a breakdown of my three games, along with my opponent’s army lists.
The qualifier was held on November 15, 2014 and Endgame in Oakland, CA. The rules were fairly straightforward and simple: 2500 points following the U.S. Master’s rules pack. The U.S. Master’s rule pack used Swedish Comp for army list design (we were using the October 2014 version) with a required comp band of eight (8) to fourteen (14). Any comp score above a fourteen would be reduced to a fourteen and any list with a score of less than eight was banned from the tournament. All games were standard Battleline deployment.
Swedish Comp is an interesting comp formula. If you haven’t heard of it, or played with it yet, I suggest you try. It is not an “end all, be all” composition system, and it allows for armies to still have some very nasty combinations. But the purpose is to provide a recognized level of power across all armies and allow players to design and play armies at similar strength levels. Although the system can be complicated at first, but this is the easiest way I can explain it. Every person begins list design with a score of 300 points before taking a single unit. Then you begin building your list, deducting a number of points from your starting total of 300 equal to what the unit costs. For example, a Level 4 mage might cost 28 points while a unit of core troops or a particular magic item costs 10 points. After your list is built, you then divide your total composition score by 10 (thus, if you finished score was 140 you would be a 14, but if your final score was 10 your list would comp a 1). In this manner you try and build a list that falls between an 8 (or 80) and a 14 (or 140).
The benefit of playing within a composition band, is that if players want to take particularly nasty combinations or play slightly harder lists, the “softer” lists are given a leg up in the game. For example, in the U.S. Master’s rules pack, the difference in composition scores relates to a pre-game victory points difference in favor of the softer list equal to 100 victory points per full point of composition difference. Thus, a 14 playing a 14 would not be entitled to any bonus points, but a 14 playing an 8 would start the game 600 points up before the game even begins. This type of victory point advantage can heavily influence the play style of the opponents for that particular game making one player play more conservatively or more aggressively than they would normally to overcome the points difference.
Winning at the U.S. Master’s (and thereby the West Coast qualified) is determined solely by victory points and the tournament uses the standard 20-nil system. This system provides battle points to each player based on the difference between the victory points both players earned. Both players start the game with 10 points each. For each 150 victory points a player beats another by, they gain 1 battle point and their opponent loses 1 battle point. So for example, beating someone by 500 victory points corresponds to a three point bonus for the winner for a total score of 13 and a three point loss of the lose for a total score of 7. A full 20 battle points requires a difference in victory points of over 1500.
This year, the following players came to the West Coast qualifier (also included is their army choice and final composition score):
The qualifier was held on November 15, 2014 and Endgame in Oakland, CA. The rules were fairly straightforward and simple: 2500 points following the U.S. Master’s rules pack. The U.S. Master’s rule pack used Swedish Comp for army list design (we were using the October 2014 version) with a required comp band of eight (8) to fourteen (14). Any comp score above a fourteen would be reduced to a fourteen and any list with a score of less than eight was banned from the tournament. All games were standard Battleline deployment.
Swedish Comp is an interesting comp formula. If you haven’t heard of it, or played with it yet, I suggest you try. It is not an “end all, be all” composition system, and it allows for armies to still have some very nasty combinations. But the purpose is to provide a recognized level of power across all armies and allow players to design and play armies at similar strength levels. Although the system can be complicated at first, but this is the easiest way I can explain it. Every person begins list design with a score of 300 points before taking a single unit. Then you begin building your list, deducting a number of points from your starting total of 300 equal to what the unit costs. For example, a Level 4 mage might cost 28 points while a unit of core troops or a particular magic item costs 10 points. After your list is built, you then divide your total composition score by 10 (thus, if you finished score was 140 you would be a 14, but if your final score was 10 your list would comp a 1). In this manner you try and build a list that falls between an 8 (or 80) and a 14 (or 140).
The benefit of playing within a composition band, is that if players want to take particularly nasty combinations or play slightly harder lists, the “softer” lists are given a leg up in the game. For example, in the U.S. Master’s rules pack, the difference in composition scores relates to a pre-game victory points difference in favor of the softer list equal to 100 victory points per full point of composition difference. Thus, a 14 playing a 14 would not be entitled to any bonus points, but a 14 playing an 8 would start the game 600 points up before the game even begins. This type of victory point advantage can heavily influence the play style of the opponents for that particular game making one player play more conservatively or more aggressively than they would normally to overcome the points difference.
Winning at the U.S. Master’s (and thereby the West Coast qualified) is determined solely by victory points and the tournament uses the standard 20-nil system. This system provides battle points to each player based on the difference between the victory points both players earned. Both players start the game with 10 points each. For each 150 victory points a player beats another by, they gain 1 battle point and their opponent loses 1 battle point. So for example, beating someone by 500 victory points corresponds to a three point bonus for the winner for a total score of 13 and a three point loss of the lose for a total score of 7. A full 20 battle points requires a difference in victory points of over 1500.
This year, the following players came to the West Coast qualifier (also included is their army choice and final composition score):
- Austin Morgan - WoC - 13.5
- Dave Inman - Skaven - 10.6
- Ed Phillips - DoC - 11.3
- Fred Whitney - WE - 10.0
- Ivan Jen - O&G - 13.9
- Jacob Berry - WE - 12.6
- Jeremy Campbell - OK - 14.0
- Joseph Urban - Brets - 13.1
- Josh Fricke - DoC - 9.1
- Josh Stuart - DE - 12.2
- Justin Rusk - WE - 14.0
- Mike Hengl - O&G - 12.8
- Mike Sanders - OK - 11.5
- Mike Scaletti - WoC - 14.0
- Que Bohn - DoC - 14.0
- Zach Lopez - WoC - 14.0
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