Army Building
Painting
Couple of weeks holidays in Victoria with plans to relax for a week, spend a week chasing up family and also paint 3 minotaurs, 6 centigors and Beastlord for Dogcon army. Did the relax and family bit but only drybrushed fur on 6 centigors in two weeks - yah me :)
Tuesday of the first week saw me have a crack with my Dogcon army vs two of the Vagabonds boys in Mark Povah's garage, scored two wins, including one vs Mark's 300+ model Skaven army, got home at 4am - shagged I was, absolutely shagged, but giddy with excitement in beating Mark ;)
Following weekend was a mini tournament in Cam Tingay's shed in my old home town, held in my honour the weekend before Dogcon. I dutifully came dead last - again yah me :)
Locked myself away in my hobby room for the next four days - made 37 hills for terrain for the event (rounding out my quota to 45 tables worth to supply Dogcon) and finished the painting of the Minotaurs/Centigors and Beastlord with a night to spare.
Packed everything up and hit the road early on the Thursday morning with my wife Nicole, Alan Carey and Dave Lancaster with our mission to get to Sydney by 7pm that night to setup terrain at the venue. We made it with half an hour to spare - yah us :) BTW Nicole spent the weekend with her sister (a Sydney local) shopping (I think that cost more than everything else on the weekend :( )
I had 14 Teams lined up for the inaugural Australasian Teams event to be held on the Friday prior to Dogcon for those interested in squeezing more games in. The event ran well with me putting the onus back onto the players to total up scores and so forth, leaving me to relax and just generate the next round for them using Overlord (jeez I love that program). Kudo's to team Cunning Stunts (Charles Black, Lachlan Macwhirter & Andrew Bishop) for taking out the event.
I had the following army, all undivided, no marks.
Dave had been trying to line me up for a grudge match for first round of the event for a couple of weeks prior and I'd been skilfully avoiding him due to lack of online time to accep. ;) We'd never played each other at a tournament avoiding each other for a number of years, usually because I float around the bottom tables. :) But on the crunch day I bit the bullet and lined up against him. Turns out Dave had a very similar Beasts army to myself, with just a few minor tweaks.
I decided not to ambush with my army (usually doing 2 small herds and one dog unit) as it would be a severe disadvantage due to the flexibility of Dave's army being able to charge me after I'd ambush. We had a messy centigor on centigor battle on my left flank until one of my herds joined the fray and I routed his boys. This allowed me to come around his left and put pressure on his mages hiding in woods. I managed to get a herd to encircle on of his mages and put the crush on him. His Beastlord stayed out of action, which was a pity as it had some cool combat magic items which would have been more useful to his overall game if it had got into the fray. My right flank of a dog unit, small herd, minotaurs and a chariot played footsie with his minotaurs and bigger herd. I scored an IF Doom and Darkness spell which allowed me to go the whole hog and dive in knowing that his reduced leadership would be a hamper to him vs my giant in the centre, and it was. Dave picked up a few tidbits of info from our game that apparently helped him later in the event which was great to hear. And we both need to re read our centigors rules and I've learnt about regen. :) Dave finished 65th overall. At the end of the game it was a 20-0 win to me.
John Zammit made the trip from Darwin with his exquisite Empire army, you can check out some figs here and here:
He'd gone without the Stank this time, but gone with two big units of troops (swords & spears which had griffon banner) with detachments, 2 of pistoliers, one of knights, helblaster, two cannons, EC on foot, Mage with speculum, another Mage and BSB on horse.
I managed to hide a lot of my army from him in the first turn behind some convenient hills on the right flank which kept my general alive for ambushing, I went with the centigors on the left flank backed up by a herd. Stupid detachment of militia was John's unit of the game dealing with my centigor units without a drama. My ambushing herds dealt with the warmachines. My Giant took on some cav winning and causing a cav unit with the BSB in it to flee. In the next turn my combat shaman got of steed of shadows leaving John in a bit of a pickle, he decided not to dispel which let the mage chase the cav/BSB unit off the table, the look on John's face was a ripper, he'd completely forgotten about them. The pistoliers dealt with some chariots and overun, failed a terror check from the giant and again the steed of shadows cleaned them up. The giant went after his handgunners while the rest of my army mopped up the support units. In my turn 6 a combo charge on the Spears with general and mages in it saw the speculum used on my foe render in the generals unit. The combined flank and rear attacks from herds and chariots saw the unit broken leaving me the extra scenario points. I'm not sure how John went for the rest of the event as he dived off to catch his plane on the Sunday evening, but I know he picked up some players choice votes and ended up 46th. It was a 19-1 win to me
Byron is my Dogcon nemesis from 2003 when he spanked me 20-0, he was sure he wanted to do it. ;) Byron rocked up with a cookie cutter tournament Vampire Counts army this year, 4 characters, Book, periapt, spirit hosts, fell bats, bat swarms, skellies, lots of zombies.
I made him a few little promises before the game that I was going to behave myself and not come out with my stupid questions that populate our tournament conversations. :) Byron struggled to work out what to do with his spirit bases, which crumpled under my Beastlords magical weapon attacks, throwing him and the herd he was with into an overrun into the flank of the VC generals unit of skellies, a protracted combat ensued with me taking two wounds off his general and dying a turn later with my own. There was a three chariot combo charge on a zombie unit, which was a waste as the chariots then fled off the table when threatened by another zombie unit. One spawn took on the bat swarms and survived. The giant took on a zombie unit and walked away from it. His generals unit crumpled down over time due to magic missle shots from my mages, a suicide charge from something of mine (can't recall what) in the front saw him overran into the charge range of a herd which hit it in the flank and popped him on the second last turn, crumple tests cost him a lot of points in the last turn. That left me with the win at the end of the game, 14-6. Byron finished up 18th overall and copped a ribbing from the Newie Boys about his loss.
I in turn copped a flogging from all and sundry about being on 53 Battle points going into day 2, with only one other person above me, Lachlan Macwhirter. A late night of drinking and dice games followed, with a night spent tossing and turning, stressing about going up against a multiple Grand Tournament Winning General, last years Masters Champion and 2nd Overall on the Australasian Rankings for 2005, he's a good player!
Going into this game I knew I was playing for the draw, there was no way my army could beat his, not with me commanding it. ;)
Locky scored a hill in the right of his deployment for his SSC, 20 bowmen and liche priests. His swarms backed them up and a flanking horsemen unit was his right flank. His centre was two massive units of tomb guard, the red one with the warbanner and tomb prince with the curse, the other with the Banner of Everlasting Conquest and tomb king with destoryer of eternities. Two left flanking units of 3 chariots and 2 burrowing scorpions rounded out his army.
I hid the majority of my army behind the trees on my side of the table, squeezing everything in out of sight of the SSC except a herd. I survived the first turn, moved my minotaurs up to plug the gap between woods so only one chariot unit could charge them, threatened the others with the centigors on my right flank, moved the shamans within sight of the horsemen and tried to nail them with magic missiles, I eventually got rid of them. My second turn saw my generals herds move up into sight of his tomb guard, I ambushed and got a unit almost close enough to his SSC but his swarm hit them and tied them up, they did however win that battle and eventually got dealt with by his archers before they could kill the SSC. The centigors dealt with the first unit of chariots, charging them winning combat and holding. By this stage my general had sacrificed himself by slaying the tomb prince who's unit had been magically charged into the herd. The curse killed my general and the archers dealt with my mages. So at the bootm of the third it was looking grim for me having lost three characters. The giant had charged the other tomb guard unit and spent the rest of the game whittling it down to just two models. Three rolls of 6's when doing thump with club were very handy, but I had nothing that could finish the unit off until the last turn when centigors and chariots were in position but failed LD tests. The chariot killing centigors destroyed the first unit and charged into the flank of the other unit. Killed them and set up a charge on the SSC which by that time had dealt with my minotaurs making them flee, later to rally but do nothing for the game. One of my messengers got off the table, I killed one of Locky's with an enveloping herd, he killed one of my others and I ended up in combat with a dog unit and one of his messengers when the game was called by at the bottom of the 5th.
During the game a peanut gallery had grown, the noisy ones I'd told to feck off, while others were smarter and kept their mouth shut, kudo's to the smart ones. Locky had the win with 12-8 at the end, he went through to finish 2nd Overall, and I was more than happy to get 8 points off him.
Mark Brown with his Tzeentch Daemonic Legion. I'd never faced off against Mark in all our years at the same events, so it was good to have a crack at a perpetual Best General winner. More than enough gags were flying across the table to keep the interest flowing for the game. He had the budgie, 2 units of 5 flamers, two units of 12 horrors, one of 14 all with full command, 2 flying chariots, 3 screamers and 3 changebringers.
I weathered the magic as best I could in this game. Managed to charge his budgie in my first turn with my left flank centigors, he over ran, charged a unit of dogs next turn, overran off the table, came back on in his third at which stage my generals unit charged him, did some wounds and was slapped down for the priveledge. The giant dealt with a horror unit in the centre with an ambushing herd hitting it in the rear. A flank charging horror unit then tied up the giant for the rest of the game. The screamers were hit by two chatiots which over ran out of the changebringers arc into difficult ground, one popping the other parking and watching the rest of the game. The Steed of Shadows Bears Anger combo went off twice with not much damage happening to the changebringers, eventually they dealt with the pesky mage and the supporting herd, claiming the treasure at the end of the game even though I goaded Mark into over running. Some sloppy work by me on the last turn meant my furies and hound unit missed claiming a table quarter. In the end the budgie had only one wound left and I'd dealt with about half his army. The score was 13-7 to Mark, not too bad considering who and what I was up against. Mark finished 4th Overall and also took out Best General.
Having chatted with Mark Robson and his wife Andrea since Thursday when I'd met them it was nice to face off against him in the last game. Mark was over from the US specifically for the event, he's currently 5th in the North American Warhammer Rankings, and Charles Black rates him as one of the top three players in the world, so I was a bit interested to see how he plays - and yeah he can play. ;) He's also a bit of a thinker, which is a good thing, especially against a sloppy player like myself. We were only separated by one Battle Point Overall, so it was going to be an interesting game. Marks small Slaaneshi Daemonic Legion Army of Exalted on foot, BSB in Chariot, two units of 18 daemonettes with full command, one of 12 no command, 3 Pleasureseekers and 2 x 6 mounted daemonettes was going to be an interesting tussle.
First turn I got of two d6 St4 magic missiles on his Exalted killing it. Mark's face was a picture. He chared a chariot with his pleasureseekers and killed it overrunning through a building, my generals unit charged it in the flank killing it. My minotaurs and a chariot charged into a big daemonette unit holding it, but a flank charging mounted daemonette unit dealt with them. A follow up spawn locked into the corner of that daemonette unit, but the mounted daemonettes pursuits roll hit it in the flank and dealt with it. My centigors got smashed by his right flank mounted daemonettes, both units in fact. His BSB in chariot killed two herds, got into combat with my generals unit which killed him in a challenge, my steed of shadows/Bears Anger mage dealt with the chariot hitting it in the flank. A follow up charge into the other big daemonette unit saw my units broken with the generals unit pursued off the board and my mage rallying to deny a table quarter. I had no big hitting stuff left to deal with Marks daemonette units but managed to knock a mounted unit down under half with magic missile spells by the end of the game. The final score was 11-9 to Mark. He finished 8th Overall.
I myself finished 10th overall, which I am very happy with, considering how I went on the last day and who I was up against.
Had a nice relaxing drive home the following day, mulled over what happened in our games with the other fellas, bored Nicole silly with all our Warhammer talk and lined up what we think would be a cool army idea for Dave to run with for next year.
All in all a great time was had.
