Quake City Rumble 2015: Tournament and Game Overview (Part 2)

Welcome back! And without much ado, I present Part 2 of my Quake City Rumble tournament overview. I hope you enjoy this post as much as the last one.
Round #3: Jack Kelly - Wood Elves
For the last game of Day 1, I played Jack Kelly and his higher comping Wood Elf list. Jack's list scored a nine for a very solid and traditional Wood Elf list. His list included:

• Spellweaver (Level 4, Lore of Shadow, Channelling Staff, Obsidian Lodestone, Moonstone of the Hidden Ways, riding an Elven Steed)
• Glade Captain (Battle Standard Bearer, Starfire Shafts, Dragonhelm, Pidgeon Plucker Pendant, Hail of Doom Arrow, riding an Elven Steed)
• Spellsinger (Level 2, Lore of Metal, Dispel Scroll, Dragonbane Gem, riding an Elven Steed)
• Glade Guard (10 models, musician and standard bearer, Starfire Shafts)
• Glade Guard (10 models, musician and standard bearer, Trueflight Arrows) x3
• Sisters of the Thorn (8 models, full command, Standard of Discipline)
• Wild Riders (7 models, musician and standard bearer, Gleaming Pennant)
• Wild Riders (7 models, musician and standard bearer)
• Waywatchers (9 models) x2
• Great Eagle x 2

This list was extremely threatening to me. Even though it comped better than my list, his list is just designed to take my list apart. With three units of Trueflight arrows, Jack would be able to wipe whole units of mine off the board in each shooting phase. Sizing this list up, I knew that I was going to have to do my best to maximize my shooting on a single unit of his while preventing Jack from getting more than a single unit of shots at any one of my units in a single shooting phase. I wasn't worried at Jack's choice of magic lores and there wasn't much he could do to my units, so I was looking at decent magic superiority if I could get close enough after I had a few wound counters. Though I had the feeling that magic wouldn't play that much importance in determining the outcome of the game. 

Round 3 was the LAND OF GIANTS scenario. In this scenario, each player received a free giant to play with during the game. The giant is worth no victory points, but is worth all four bonus points if the giant survives (1 point), makes it into the opponent's deployment zone at any point in the game (2 points), and destroys a model during the game (1 point). Deployment was standard battle line. 

Jack set up his entire army in a heavy cornered position with the Wild Riders in the back preventing my Glade Riders from coming on his board edge. The sisters were placed in the center of those two units with all of the character models. Finally, the archers were placed guarding all of the other units so that archers could try and pick up my units. Jack's giant was deployed completely away from his army hoping to make it down to my deployment zone. I deployed my two units directly across from Jack's giant. My scouts and Waywatchers were deployed outside of 35" from Jack's archers in case he got the first turn. Luckily, (or unfortunately as the case turned out to be) I won the roll to go first.

I started by moving all of my scouting units into range of a single unit of Jack's archers and was able to wipe out the entire unit of Starfire shafts in a single turn. My giant raced forward and with magic I was able to push through two wounds on Jack's giant. In Jack's turn, he moved his archers forward to get within range of two of my units while his giant raced forward. The rest of his army moved so that if I moved any closer I would be targeted by massive shooting and possible long range charges of the Wild Riders. 

Turn 2 and 3, I worked on managed to take out a eagle that was blocking a unit of Trueflight and a unit of Trueflight archers while taking some loses in my units and losing a unit of scouts. My giant was closer to making it into Jack's deployment zone while his was down to just two wounds left (after some bad poisoned rolling). Turns 4 and 5 I played well making it so that Jack couldn't do to much damage to my units but he was able to drop my 5 man unit of Glade Riders to three models and another unit of scouts to just two models. However, I was still up over 100 points on Jack.

Turn 6 is where I screwed the game up. I got my giant into Jack's deployment zone and killed his off, finally. Seeing that I was up points, I pushed my small scout unit back as far as possible, but I was still within maximum range of a Trueflight unit after it moved. I was thinking that decent rolls would see the unit die, but that would only take the game to a draw. So I didn't move my other shooting units forward (which I didn't want to risk a bad round of shooting and getting panicked off the board) to target that Trueflight unit. This was going to be my downfall. Jack, first moved the archer unit up to take a whack at the two remaining scouts. Then, Jack used his moonstone to swing the sister-star right next to the three remaining Glade Riders. This move was amazing (especially as I had completely forgotten about that item). Jack then had an amazing round of shooting killing off the scouts with 10 Trueflight archers (which I should have shot at) and then managing to do three wounds with his eight sisters against my Glade Riders. To which I promptly failed all three armor saves. The game had gone from a well-played hundred point victory, to a draw with the loss of my scouts, and then to a minor loss when the Glade Riders died. 

It was a sad day and completely based on my own bad generalship on Turn 6 that Jack exploited brilliantly. Had I managed to just move forward and shoot the Trueflight unit I could have probably killed it (thus securing my victory) or at least dropped the unit small enough that it couldn't have killed my remaining scouts. This was the game pressed home the lesson to not let off the gas when winning a game until the game was actually over. I turned what should have been a 15 point win (as my giant didn't kill anything) into a 10 point loss bringing me up to 50 points for the day. A decent amount of battle points, but not the 55 that I was gunning for. 

Jack would go on to place 49th in the tournament as he played some nasty lists on Day 2.

Round #4: Aaron Chaum - High Elves

Starting off Day 2, I played Aaron Chaum after a morning re-draw in response to a few player drops and point entry errors. I have never played of seen Aaron at a tournament before, but he was playing a very solid High Elf list that comped far higher than I would have comped it, mainly because it had two flying monsters. His list comped a surprisingly high 10 and included:

• Anointed of Asuryan (Giant Blade, Enchanted Shield, Golden Crown of Atrazar, riding a Frostheart Phoenix) (So this was a 2+ armor save, 4+ ward save, magic resistance 2, flying character with three strength 7 attacks on a mount that caused all opposing models to strike last. Obviously nothing too powerful here.)
• Archmage (Level 4, Lore of High Magic, Obsidian Amulet, Ironcurse Icon, Dispel Scroll, riding an Elven Steed)
• Noble (Battle Standard Bearer, Ogre Blade, Dragonhelm, riding an Elven Steed)
• Noble (Sword of Anti-Heroes, Charmed Shield, riding an Elven Steed)
• Ellyrian Reavers (5 models, musician)
• Ellyrian Reavers (5 models, musician and standard bearer) x2
• Silver Helms (12 models, full command)
• Phoenix Guard (20 models, musician and standard bearer, Razor Standard)
• Frostheart Phoenix
• Eagle Claw Bolt Thrower x2

This list was a particular pain to mine as I knew that I wouldn't be able to drop the Annointed with a Level 4 of High Magic backing him up. Plus, I had to worry about another flying monster, a nearly impregnable unit of Phoenix Guard with their 4++ ward save, and a large character bus that had magic resistance 3 and ward saves from the mage. I knew this was going to be a tough game, but I thought that if I could focus on all the chaff quickly, I would be able to take down one of the other units for a 100 point victory. 

Round 4 was the GREED IS GOOD scenario. In this scenario, deployment was as per Blood and Glory, meaning that Aaron was going to be an additional 3" closer to me with his flyers than he normally would be giving him the opportunity to put significant pressure on my army a turn earlier. The scenario was based around fortitude (which I had more of) and breaking your opponent. Bonus points were awarded for controlling a table quarter (1 point), breaking your opponent's fortitude (1 point), breaking your opponent's fortitude first (1 point), and controlling more table quarters than your opponent (1 point). 

Aaron deployed strong in the center with his Phoenix Guard, flying monsters, and Silver Helms. I deployed to maximize shooting on his chaff units while preventing his bolt throwers from having any targets without significant minuses. Aaron then won the roll to go first and threw his entire army into my face in an attempt to lock some of my units down. In the magic phase I lost a few scouts to magic. In my early turns I worked on killing off all of the Reavers while trying, unsuccessfully, to put wounds on the normal Frostheart Phoenix. Magic was generally ineffective except to put a few wound tokens on the unit. 

In the middle of the game, Aaron was finally able to lock some of my units in combat. Both Phoenix's charged into separate units while the Phoenix Guard charged a unit of poisoned scouts in a Venom Thicket (these woods would go on to be my saving grace). The Phoenixes were unable to go through the units in a single turn and the Phoenix Guard lost a few models to dangerous terrain tests and then a few more to poisoned attacks finishing off a full rank (and putting the unit at a size than could be dealt with over the course of several turns). The scouts would also survive for another turn of combat. Eventually, the Phoenixes would take care of the units they were fighting but not before the rest of the army was able to move away and save themselves. The unit in the forest would eventually die and be rundown, but the Phoenix Guard would be completely wiped out do to massed Glade Rider shooting after the ambushers came on the board and killed the bolt throwers a turn earlier. 

The Waywatchers and Waystalkers would work on killing off the Silver Helms and characters, but were having a hard time wounding the toughness three elves or hitting with sniping shots. Eventually, the Waystalkers would kill the Level 4 giving me magic supremacy, but magic would only help me kill a few more Silver Helms. I would eventually lose a unit of Waywatchers and a Waystalker and would spend two full rounds of shooting trying to snipe a BSB with only one wound left. However, the eight sniper shots taken at the model would either completely fail to hit or wound and the BSB would like with a single wound. Further, all the combined remaining shooting that I had could only kill off all the Silver Helms except for the standard bearer. At the end of the game, Aaron was only left with the BSB, the Frostheart Pheonix, the Annointed, and the standard bearer of the Silver Helms, but that was a solid 1300 points. Meanwhile, I had lost enough of my units that we were within a 100 points of one another. Thus, the game ended in a draw. 

After the great game against Jack where I made the mistakes that cost me the game, I was definitely disappointed in the outcome of this game due solely to two turns of horrible dice rolling (but that's why it is a dice game!) Even with poor statistical rolling I should have killed off both the standard bearer or the BSB, but the last two turns of shooting was completely horrible. Poisoned attacks missed, sniper shots rolled "2s" instead of "3s" and those few shots that did hit completely failed to wound. In fact, on the last turn I only did 1 single wound to the Silver Helm standard bearer who easily rolled his 3+ save. Had I killed either of these two models by causing just a single wound that would have been 300 points in my favor giving me a minor victory and cementing the 2 bonus points for breaking my opponent (as he was at just at four fortitude at this point). Had I gotten both (which was the statistical outcome of 8 no-armor shots needing "3s" to hit and "4s" to wound), I would have gotten over 600 points giving me the full 20 points. Instead, I ended the game with only 12 points giving me a measly 62 going into the final round. 

Aaron would go on to place 23rd with 75 battle points. 

Round #5: Sam Valdez - Orcs and Goblins

For the last round of the tournament I played Sam Valdez from Club Capri (the SoCal club that is home to West Coast Hammertime and also both Bill Curry and Jeremy Campbell). Sam was playing a very traditional Orcs and Goblins army that was going to have a very hard time of taking out my scouts and characters (or getting any points off me in fact) unless he managed to go first and have some fantastic rounds of shooting. His list included:

• Black Orc Warboss (Talisman of Preservation, Crown of Command)
• Savage Orc Great Shaman (Lucky Shrunken Head, Obsidian Lodestone, Level 4, Spells of da Big Waaagh!)
• Savage Orc Big Boss (Battle Standard Bearer, Armor of Silvered Steel)
• Goblin Big Boss (Enchanted Shield, riding a Giant Wolf)
• Savage Orc Shaman (Level 1, Spells of da Big Waaagh!, Dispel Scroll)
• Night Goblins (20 models, standard bearer, Fanatics x2)
• Savage Orcs (35 models, full command, Big 'Uns)
• Goblin Wolf Riders (5 models) x2
• Trolls (8 models) x2
• Doom Diver Catapult x2
• Goblin Rock Lobber x2
• Mangler Squig x2

Round 5 was the DO YOU FEEL LUCKY PUNK? scenario. Deployment was as per battle line and the objective was simply to kill your opponent with the only special rules being that each general hates the opposing general (which wouldn't matter in this game as my Level 4 was never going to get close to the Savages block). Bonus points were awarded for killing your opponent's general (1 point), ending the game with more "character fortitude" than your opponent (1 point), destroying your opponent's most expensive unit (1 point), and having a non-fleeing unit in the enemy's deployment zone (1 point). 

Sam's best chance to take down my list was with decent rolls on the Doom Divers, clever use of the Mangler Squigs (or some really high rolls), Foot of Gork, and going one wide with his Savages block and swinging down a line catching me in a corner of the board. Unfortunately for Sam, even with 5 different spells, he failed to roll-up Foot of Gork or get doubles so I wasn't going to have to worry about getting pounded to death by that killer spell. Then, even worse for Sam, I won the dice roll to go first. 

Sam had sent up in a standard Orc center with his rock lobbers on the flanks surrounded by the wolf riders (within 6" of the rock lobbers) and a mangler squig on each side. The Savages were in the center with the night goblins behind and doom divers to each side and trolls on the flanks. I swung forward with poisoned shooting to destroy one Doom Diver right away. The flaming unit took a shot at some trolls killing a model which was then followed by the Hail of Doom Arrow and a unit of Waywatchers (at the double tap) which killed another three leaving only 4 trolls in one unit. The waystalkers began trying to kill the Level 1, putting through 1 wound. The other poisoned unit killed a unit of wolf riders which caused the rock lobber that was within 6" to panic (meaning it would not be able to fire next turn). The other Waywatcher unit put one wound on the other rock lobber as they began to move forward but staying 19" away from one of the Mangler Squigs. 

In Sam's first turn, already being down two warmachines, he decided to race everything forward and hope to close with my scouts. In his shooting phase, the one rock lobber able to shoot deviated off my Level 4 while the one remaining Doom Diver misfired and was not going to be able to shoot until the next turn. 

On my second turn, all three Glade Rider units came on the board and the small unit was used to pop the Fanatics out of the Night Goblins (though Sam only killed four of the five). The other two units moved to take on the remaining two warmachines. In magic, I was able to break the magic resistance on the Level 4, allowing me to start casting spells onto the Savage block, though my first attempt at the flaming spell drew out the Dispel Scroll. With shooting, I killed off the rock lobber that had failed its panic test as well as the mangler squig on that side. On the other side, I took off the other mangler squig and the remaining Doom Diver with poisoned shooting. The rest of my shooting took out the remaining four trolls thereby cutting Sam's army in half in only two turns.

Sam responded by charging the remaining wolf riders into a Waywatcher unit but the entire unit was wiped out to a stand and shoot. The same thing happened on the other flank when the lone goblin hero charged the other Waywatcher unit. Personally, given the options available to Sam, I would have charged the poisoned scout units instead. Sam's sole warmachine (the last rock lobber) misfired this turn and would not be able to shoot this turn or next turn (if it lived that long, which it wouldn't).

The rest of the game was spent whittling away at Sam's units while he tried to chase me down. The rock lobber and remaining trolls were wiped out as was the Level 1 from sniper shots. I was also able to break the Lucky Shrunken Head dropping the Savages' ward save to a 6++ which had lost a full rank of models in a single turn. Over the next three turns I was able to wipe out every single model Sam had (including his BSB and General on the last turn with Waywatchers). In turn, Sam did not manage to even get a single victory point from me. It was a bad match-up for him that just got worse when he rolled for his spells and warmachines. It felt like redemption for my dice in Game 4. I ended up getting all 20 points as Sam had no models left and ended the tournament with 82 points and a 12th place finish while Sam still managed to be the one of the highest scores of his club with a 36th place finish (higher than the other two members that I also took down). 

Overall, I had a great time and performed decently well (despite my error Game 3) as I hadn't played too many games of 8th Edition since my son was born. I know that the tournament will be happening again next year and I will be looking forward to attending with whatever format they come up with.