Capt’n Dees’ Game 4 Tournament Report from Feast of Blades

So the start of day 2 and as expected I’m paired up with Ken’s hilarious and excellent Grey Knight army!

I’ve lost a few sheets this being a week after the even and I’m sure more than a few details are going to be lost to me now!

Draigo

Coteaz

10 Paladins, 4 Psycanons, Psybolt Ammo, Apoth, CC upgrades!

1 Paladin

6 Henchmen (Warriors?)

6 Henchmen

3 Henchmen

3 Henchmen

Dreadknight, Personal Terminator, Heavy Incinerator, Nemesis Greatsword

Dreadknight, Personal Terminator, Heavy Incinerator

Dreadknight, Personal Terminator, Heavy Incinerator

I’m probably missing more than a few upgrades but you get the gist.  It is a strong Draigo list but really the highlight of this army was how crazy awesome the conversions and painting was on this army!

I mean look at this thing!  There are crazy awesome conversions.  Draigo on a Unicorn, He-man, Skeletor, a Paladin in a wheelchair!  Comedy gold!

So we’re looking at ‘hey let’s not tie’ mission and vangaurd strike and I rolled to go first.  In thinking about the game I was hoping he would shunt all the DKs forward and I could give them the Gravgun welcome 🙂 and then a I could play the 17.5″ game with the Paladins.  The henchman I figured were basically Thunderfire targets most of the game and I’d clean them up with whatever bikes I’d have around at the end.  All in all while the list is REALLY dangerous there is no denying this game on papers looks in my favor with all that sexy 2+ armor.

So I set my scouts and Thunderfires back on my objective and all my bikes up on the line.  I left my bikes with flamers on the far right flank.  He sets up the Draigostar on my left in front of all the bikes, puts all the DKs to grab some 4+ cover from the ruins and reserves the rest.

I make a scout move to pull most of the bikes to the left still conservatively so I’m mostly out of range of Draigo in case of the seize.  I send the flamer bikes farther around the right.  I figure they will either stay off on the side or be a target for the DKs if he doesn’t play super aggressive.  Either way he doesn’t get the steal and we’re off!

I start turn one with Prescience, and shoot off my orbital bombardment trying to target the Paladin Apothecary because getting rid of him would be swell.  It scatters forward and only clips a few so I go for the reroll.  Sadly it scatters backward and just falls off the board.  I drop the Thunderfires on Coteaz figure a couple of lucky saves I could snag first blood.  Alas it is no good but maybe I land a wound somewhere.  I have the bikes at 17.5″ away and unload every grav gun I can.  It turns out to be just enough to kill Draigo for a nice first blood and warlord and a big hit for Ken.  My bikes on the right scoot up a bit.

On his turn one he advances the Paladins and unloads on a bike squad in range and they are smashed up pretty good.  He conservatively keeps the DKs and hops one over to deal with the flamer bike squad.  The incinerator manages to kill two and they break out of assault range but stay on the board, which is pretty good fortune for me!

My turn 2 and I think both Storm Talons manage to come in and I prescience the command squad.  I lay into the Paladins with about everything I have and do a good clip of damage killing I think all the Psycannons and more.  I think I had advanced enough thinking I would charge in to avoid getting shot but with killing the 6 or so Paladins I’m too far out and no charges are made.

I think his turn 2 and he gets two of his henchmen squads in and they go hide on the objective in the ruins.  One DK wipes out my flamer bike squad.  I can’t remember what the Paladins do here, shoot a squad but also fail a charge.

My turn 3 and now I’m just going into grind down mode.  Thunderfires work on henchmen which they pretty much shoot the rest of the game.  I think some bikes start swinging over to a DK and put on some wounds.  The command squad just goes into the last of the Paladins and I think I killed Coteaz in a challenge and we are duking it out there.

His turn 3 and I think his solodin and two henchman squad also come in this turn.  He puts the solodin back by his objective to fortify that position with what he can.  The DKs are in a bit of a pickle as they can go after bikes in midfield or start think about the next moves so I think he plays a bit conservatively and wants those shunts for later.  We stick around in combat with the command squad and paladins.

Basically the next turn 4 and top of 5 are a bit of blur.  In short I did clear off his paladins, including the solo pladin, I killed his acolytes off, and one of his Dreadknights.  He’s managed to work down more troops and one of the DKs had moved up to flame my scouts off my objective before it had died.  If I recall he charged my Thunderfire and he saved a wound from the plasma but took his last wound from a flamer!

Now the end of my 5 looks something like this:  I’ve got one squad of about 3 bikes on his objective with some of my command squad over there to try to give some buffer.  My other objective has I think two bikes and my thunderfires sitting by my objective.  He’s got his two DKs with shunts left and I think they are a bit dinged up but not in terrible shape.

So his bottom of 5 and he shunts each over toward an objective.  I’ve blocked his objective off pretty well so while he has torrent range he can’t contest.  The other guy doesn’t have the range to contest but his incinerator has torrent range on the bikes on my objective.  He torrents them but they make both saves.  He torrents my three bikes on his objective and he manages a wound but they make the LD a sit on it.

We roll for another turn but the game ends.

So while I had really put the hurt on him early this game was actually quite close.  If the dice gods had smiled on Ken that last turn both squads could have broke off objectives and ended.  But I did have warlord, first blood, and linebreaker, so that still would have been a victory for me.  Had the game gone on I think my command squad could have finished up one DK, but the other DK might have taken over the objective in my zone.

But as the game played out this was another 30-0 victory for the bikes.  Ken played really well against a matchup that was tough from the start, and it was bit of a bummer to get 0 points after in his first loss of the tournament.

There was a 3rd undefeated player in this round and he was playing a local buddy that only had a draw at this point.  So we go take a look at this game and it comes down to a dice roll for turn 5 to end.  If it ends the undefeated players easily loses, but if it ends he’s manage to contest one objective and hold his own… and it ends!  My buddy takes his first loss and my next opponent, Ed, remains undefeated going into round 5!