Over the weekend I played at Guardcon in Auckland. The event attracted 36 players from across the North Island. I must admit I approached the event with some trepidation. The City Guard forums had been the scene of a fair amount of whinging leading into the event and I felt for the TO, Nick Irvine.
I took the Skaven list that I posted last week. It meet all the Composition guidelines set before the event so I wasn't surprised it was okayed without any drama. The list competes in all phases and I felt it was suited to the event where each of the rulebook scenarios sans "Battle for the Pass" would be used. So was I right? Well read on.
Over the course of the weekend I had six enjoyable games against six sporting opponents. My results ranged from 20-0 for to 13-7 against. My record was 3 wins and 3 losses. So what did I learn?
My first game versus Nicholas Ng was very one-sided. We were playing Meeting Engagement and Nic had an Empire army. I felt Nic deployed too far forward and this was magnified when I snatched the first turn. From here I was able to engineer the matchups I wanted and roll up Nic's army for very little cost.
In my second game I played Simon Kwok's Lizards in "Battleline". This game really reflected the vagaries of 8th. I felt I played extremely well and had Simon's army very much on the backfoot. Most units were at or below half strength after judicious use of magic, shooting and positioning of my combat units. As I moved in for the kill Simon's Slaan got off an IF Dwellers Below which killed my Grey Seer.From memory it was only on 3-4 dice so double grrrr. I resisted the urge to log onto Wargamerau and vent my anger in a thread about how bad 8th Ed was or to immediately rush over to the Warmachine Demo table and sign on with my local pressganger. Instead I smiled and remembered there were (probably) games that I had won through luck rather than skill. Simon brightened up immensely as prior to this he'd been rather shellshocked. I got the feeling he still thought he was down but I knew he was now at least a couple of hundred points up. He charged an Ancient Steg into the front of my Furnace and rolled 6 for both Impact and Thunderstomp. With my Seer gone he could raise back any wounds I did to the big lizard and with another 6 for Thunderstomp was able to eventually kill my Monks by the end of the game. This gave him a 13-7.
I didn't think I did much wrong in this game but sometimes luck just bites you in the arse. As the French say "That is Life".
My next game against Nikola's Warriors started in similar fashion with me cutting swathes through his army with some nice magic and shots. However in this case it wasn't Fate that came back to haunt me....rather it was poor play on my part. Well partly anyway. I took the option to use my Abomination to finish off the 50 man Marauder block rather than contact the Hellcannon. My Grey Seer back from last game's vacation decided to move his unit forward. As soon as I did it I saw my mistake. I had left my unit 14" from his Hellannon. Hoping Nikola hadn't seen it I thought I might still geet back from this. Unfortunately Nikola eagle-eyed the brave little rat flipping him the bird and of course rolled 8 on his two dice. No worries I thought, the Seerlord is a tough little bugger. He survived the first round left on a single wound and then I Skalmed them back. In my turn the HellPit turned to set up a charge versus the rear of the Chosen. My chance to get out of jail came in the Magic Phase but I was too cute. Rather than 6 dice Skitterleap, I tried to draw out Nikola's dice by talking up Plague, Skorch etc. He didn't fall for it and my Seer didn't survive a second round. Note to Self: Don't piss around in future! This was compounded in the next turn by Nikola "Gatewaying" my Abomination. His Chosen and lord made short work of the Furnace. A truly bloody battle 11-9 to the Warriors.
So end of Day One I'm on 36 points and with a 1-2 record.....need big Day Two...
The rest tomorrow
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