PBKW Oct. 10th Warhammer Fantasy Tournament – Overview and Round One Battle Report

So Lon, Blair, Dallas, Ian and I returned from the Parker, Banner, Wayne and Kent WFB Tournament in one piece. Spent a Saturday just the way I like it, which is getting in three great games of Fantasy and learning some new tricks. The Charlotte folks were great, and meeting a lot of new people was a blast. I think Dallas got to talk to a lot of folks about his Master’s Series next year, and there looked to be some genuine interest in it.

The Composition scoring system was the same one from The Cage. I’ll save a discussion of that for another post.

So, results…I’m going to possibly get some wrong and maybe mess up names, but here goes:

Best Sportsmanship: TJ - Vampires

Best Painted: Lon Sims - Lizardmen (Way to go, Lon!)

Runner Up: Chad - Bretonnians

Best General: Dan Rothrock – Wood Elves

Best Overall: Me – Dark Elves

Battle Reports! I forgot my camera, and we left Durham at about seven in the morning and got back close to midnight, so forgive the fact that I’ve forgotten all but the goriest details. I’ll try and get one up per day for the next few days.

My list was this, as I posted a few days ago:

Dreadlord with Executioner's Axe 220
Death Hag with Cauldron of Blood, Rune of Khaine 225
Sorceress with two Dispel Scrolls 150
Assassin with Additional Hand Weapon, Rune of Khaine, Manbane 146
Ten Repeater Crossbowmen 100
Five Dark Riders with Repeater Crossbows 110
Five Dark Riders with Repeater Crossbows 110
Five Dark Riders with Repeater Crossbows 110
Twenty Black Guard with Full Command, Banner of Hag Graef, Ring of Hotek 355
Ten Witch Elves with Hag, Standard Bearer, Rune of Khaine 145
Cold One Chariot 100
Cold One Chariot 100
Hydra 175
Reaper Bolt Thrower 100
Reaper Bolt Thrower 100
Total: 2246

Round One

The first scenario gave bonus and objective points for capturing the center terrain feature (a small tower on my board), holding more terrain features than your opponent, and killing their largest units.

I was randomly paired against Tim Carmichael, who plays a mono-Tzeentch Demon list. It had, I believe 18 power dice. Now, a lot of people are going to say that this is a cheesy army, but I strongly disagree. I like that it’s themed to one god, and I don’t think it’s as nasty as it is on paper. It’s also a strong army that breaks against my army. But I promised I’d save my composition discussion for another day. Here was his list (not exact, from my memory)

Lord of Change

Three Heralds of Tzeentch, one was a BSB with the Stubborn Banner.

Three Units of 25+ Horrors

Three Flamers

Here was the setup (again, from memory):

Turn One:

I go first. Dark Riders go marching up the board and take shots at the Lord of Change, doing nothing. Chariots, Hydra, and Black Guard march forward to the left of the centerpiece, Witch Elves march to the right of it. The Bolt Throwers punch a couple wounds into the Lord of Change.

In his turn, he starts chucking magic at my army. He had all the nasty fun Tzeentch stuff. I had piled everything within twelve inches of the Ring of Hotek, and it paid off in droves this game. He miscast a few times with exceptionally bad luck, but only lost two or three horrors. He didn’t do much moving.

Turn Two:

I continue to march up my army aggressively. I am now in a position to force combat next turn. Tim charges his Lord of Change at my Chariot, which flees unsuccessfully. His LoC is now sitting just behind my Black Guard and in front of my Cauldron of Blood. His Flamers, having shot a couple wounds off the Hydra, charge it. He moves his left (from our overhead perspective) unit of Horrors up to eventually flank the Hydra. His magic phase continues to fizzle due to bad

luck, my two scrolls, and the Ring. He does make one of the Dark Riders on the right flee.

The Board looked roughly like this:

Turn Three:

In my turn, the Dark Riders on the left charge the group of Horrors nearby. Black Guard charge the middle Horrors. Witch Elves charge the right Horrors, and the Dark Rider unit hits it in the flank. Combat is not exceptional due to the Stubborn Banner.

In his turn, his Lord of Change charges my Cauldron of Blood. The Hydra kills off his Flamers. The Horrors on the left break and chase the Dark Riders. The center combat continues with a few Horrors killed. On the right, he has a magic banner tha

t wipes out the Witch Elves. His Horrors then break the Dark Riders and chase them down. Unfortunately, he pursues twelve inches and ends up with his BSB Horror unit deep in the far right woods, away from the rest of the army, which no longer will benefit from being stubborn. His BSB’s unit will spend the rest of the game trying to get out of the woods. To add insult to injury, my Death Hag beats the Lord of Change to Death.

Turn Four:

My Cauldron moves up to claim the center objective and sit there doing Cauldron things. My Black Guard kills the Horrors off now that they’re not stubborn. His Horrors move to threaten my Crossbowmen. A single Herald, earlier detached from his central Horrors, moves around the center objective. The Board (roughly represents the endgame as well):

Turn Five and Six: I move my Crossbowmen back to deny the Horrors a charge down in the south. He lone central mage kills my chariot off, but later miscasts and, giving me a free cast, is taken down to one wound by my Sorceress’ fireball.

End Game: My Cauldron controls the center, his biggest unit (Lord of Change) is dead, and I control more terrain features. His other Horror units are below half from various fighting and getting shot in their Horror faces. I get a 24/25, he gets (I believe) a 5/25. I give him full sportsmanship points and a 15/25 composition. The Daemon Stubborn Banner is brutal! If I had not managed to get a bit lucky pulling his army in different directions, I would have had real trouble chewing through them. That was really the turning point of the game, as was the Death Hag going Terminator on the Lord of Change with her poison attacks.

Tim is a great guy to play against, and I had a lot of fun. We were both a bit sloppy, from rust or being tired, but I had fun and would definitely play him again.

Ben