Hello everyone the greatest 40k player here to shed some light on Maelstrom missions.
In our league right now down in San Diego we are playing Maelstrom missions. It is a nice change from the ITC missions I usually play but not missions I would prefer at a tournament. A lot of the people I’ve talked to down here about the missions have expressed how much they are loving it. There is no right mission or wrong mission type in a tournament format but I actually prefer something a little less random.
So first lets go over the positives about Maelstrom. The main thing I like about Maelstrom is that every army has a chance at winning the missions. Another really great thing about the Maelstrom is everyone has a chance to win the mission. What I mean by that is if you always play someone and they always beat you on other missions because of some difference in you armies, you won’t see that as much in Maelstrom missions due to their random nature. The Maelstrom missions give that player a better chance as a lot of it is luck of the draw. Lastly the missions are fun and you are constantly trying to figure out how you are going to score your points or how you’re going to get more cards.
Now for the negatives and why I prefer more structure: the Maelstrom really rely on lucky draws. The other day I drew two cards that gave me D3 points on turn one and ended up with 6 points at the end of my turn one. At that point it was almost impossible for my opponent to catch up. The rest of the game he was playing catch up but was not able to pick up any 3 pointers. The luck of the draw takes some of the skill out of the game or at least that is how I feel. Now you can argue that the other way as well since you have to tactically move your models and play for points opposed to killing models but that is just my opinion. Lastly on one of the missions you usually have no idea what cards your opponent has so you cannot deny them the points. You just feel defenseless as you watch them score points.
Now let’s talk about what kind of lists will do well in these missions. Like I said it feels like every list will do well. But, I believe lists that have a lot of units and fast units so that they can score objectives all around the table. Basically MSU armies will dominate. Also lists with resilient troops/ units that have high damage output so that they can last till the end of the game. And of course armies that are threat overload lists because then you can take over most of the table with ease. The main codex’s that will be good at Maelstrom are nothing new: Eldar, Necrons, Space Marines, Daemons, And Dark Eldar actually isn’t to bad since they are fast and you can put a lot of units on the table.
Some tournaments are coming up that are all Maelstrom so I am really interested in what armies will prevail. Especially since every army has a chance with the luck factor. I really hope to see some kooky lists in the finals. And maybe I’ll even make it with Dark Eldar. Let me know what you guys think of Maelstrom and if you prefer it to other mission formats.