Captain A’s TSHFT Battle Report

The Emerald City hosts many attractions for travelers the world over. Green trees and plants everywhere, mild summers, lots of rain, and for me it held TSHFT – The Seattle Heart of Fire Tournament! I’ve attended a few TSHFT’s in my time and this last year was one of the best. Held at the Red Lion at Bellevue for the second year now, this year’s TSHFT hosted 60 40k players for a weekend of gaming, drinking, dining, and battle.

Last year I did pretty well, going 3-1-1, losing only to Paul McKelvy (MCKELVEY!) who went on to win the ITC that year. I was also delirious with a 100+ degree fever and pretty out of it. I hoped to go hard this year and try to crack the top ten and nab me some much needed ITC points.

Captain A’s Censtar Power Hour

So my list has morphed a bit since LVO. I’ve kept the core of the Centstar, but changed out the peripherals a bit to help shore up some weaknesses I’ve been experiencing against certain army types. Here it is.

Grey Knights – Nemesis Strike Force – Primary

Terminator Librarian – ML3/Daemon Hammer (140) WARLORD

Strike Squad – 5 Man (110)

Nemesis Dreadknight – Personal Teleporter/Heavy Incinerator/Heavy Psycannon/Hammer (220)

Draigo – (245)

Space Marines – Red Scorpions – CAD

Sevrin Loth – (175)

Scouts – 5 Man – Bolters (55)

Scouts – 5 Man – Bolters (55)

3 Centurion Devestators – Grav Cannon w/Grav Amp/Hurricane Bolters/Omniscope (250)

3 Centurion Devestators – Grav Cannon w/Grav Amp/Hurricane Bolters/Omniscope (250)

Blood Angels – Flesh Tearers Strike Force

Sanguinary Priest – Auspex/Bolter (65)

Sanguinary Priest – Auspex/Bolter/Shield of Cretacia (65)

Tactical Squad – 5 Man Heavy Flamer (125)

-Drop Pod – Locator Beacon

Drop Pod – Locator Beacon (45)

Drop Pod – Locator Beacon (45)

This list has a lot of hammer to it and a lot of deployment flexibility. One of my biggest fears is the Cullexis, Drop Pod heavy armies, and Webway Portal D-Scythes. Truth be told, I haven’t faced a lot of that at the last few big tournaments I’ve been to. I know it will pop up eventually, but I feel this list has some null deployment options that will enable me to keep the star off of the table until at least turn two if I have to. I at least have options whereas my list at LVO didn’t have enough.

 

The Venue

Bellevue is a very nice city with a ton of great places to eat and a decent enough bar and restaurant. The food was a bit pricey for what you got in my opinion, but it was nice that I had the option to grab a sandwich there at the event if needed. TSHFT didn’t anticipate the 60 player draw this time around, so the venue space was limited and things were rather tight. Those would be my only big complaints this year. The second round started a bit late as well to a data entry snafu, but it was only a minor glitch As it was though, every table had a F.A.T. Mat, some strong LOS blocking terrain (if too much actually) and the player base was strong with some great people.

 

The Games

Game 1 – Tzeentch Flying Circus

I had played this gentleman last year at TSHFT and we had a good close game, so I was excited to see him again. He was running Belakor, Fateweaver, 2 Tzeentch Daemon Princes, 7 Screamers, and 3 squads of Pink Horrors. A psychic swiss army knife that could summon, throw out lots of psychic shooting, and have a lot of durable models as well.

My basic plan was to ignore the flyers for as much of the game as possible, and focus on the ground forces first. I dropped in my Cents to his backfield and went to work on the Horrors and held back the Centstar so he couldn’t vector strike over them. The Pod Cents held up admirably, making some key Feel No Pains against what was left of the Screamers and some summoned Flesh Hounds. One key feature of my list now is the Locater Beacons. They helped enormously at the end of the game I was able to just put my Censtar on his Emperor’s will objective and clear out his remaining Horrors. It also helped that he wasn’t able to push his Psychic game as much. I think one mistake he did was not throwing enough dice at powers he really needed. Like when my scouts came in on right near his objective and we went after flickering fire, which would have wiped them out. I think he rolled one dice for each horror squad and came up nil, allowing my scouts to tie up and whittle down his Horrors.

Win for me – 9pts

Game 2 – Dark Eldar CAD

I feel there is a bit of a misnomer about ITC mission 2 and how it affects high kill point armies. MSU and High Kill point armies still have the advantage to win this mission overall. Sure, the primary will most likely go to the opponent, but the Maelstrom and 2 of the 3 suit Bonus Point missions all favor MSU builds. I don’t take mission 2 as an auto win at all.

I was playing against Jack, a dedicated Dark Eldar player and one of the Corvallis Crew that I have come to know over the past few years. Jack is a very nice guy and a lot of fun to play against. He was running 5 Venoms with Warriors, 2 Grotesque Squads with Vect (actually Rakarth) in Raiders, 2-3 Ravagers, 2 Razorwings. I think that’s it. I was actually worried about his Grotesque squds, especially when he got T6 on all of them. My Gravs and Hurricane bolters would be hard pressed to take them down.

This game I got Perfect Timing, which was key to how this game played out. My Centstar was able to take down 1-2 vehicles easily every turn, wrecking his Grotesque Raider with Vect in it. He was able to drag down my Dreadknight with poison, but my other Drop Cents went mostly unmolested, probably due to the fact that my Priest is immune to poison with the Shield of Cretacia.

My Centstar was able to catch and kill his Grotesque and HQ unit in close combat, as well as taking out a large portion of the Venoms and Ravagers that would threaten my Dreadknight and Pod Cents. It was still a close game though, even with me killing most of his stuff.

Win for me – 7pts.

Game 3 – Daemonkin

This game I drew a local guy from my area, BigTal with his Daemonkin list comprised of a Brass Scorpion, 6 Soul Grinders, and 2 Heldrakes. I have faced the Brass Scorpion before and know what that thing can do so it was first priority, especially when his Grinders and Scoprion getting more attacks the more I kill!

My first turn was pretty lucky. I committed both Cent units to go after the Scorpion. I also had Perfect Timing and my Warlord had the command trait that gives me and friendly units rerolls of 1 in shooting within 12”. Its my new favorite trait as it is pretty much a poor man’s Prescience. One unit did one hull point to the Scorpion, but the other unit did 9 hull points from shooting! He saved four leaving it with only 3 hull points left. I was feeling pretty good at this point.

The next round he did some shooting, but then went all out and charged my Centstar, needing 13” on 3D6. He rolled a 15”! Oh man oh man I was sweating. This could be it as he getsD3+2 Stomps and only needs one 6 to cripple my star. Three stomps! No sixes! My Centsar survived pretty much unscathed and I went hard into Gate to get out of there and killed the Scorpion that next turn. It wasn’t over though as we were playing the Relic and h was moving all his Grinders and summoned Flesh Hounds onto it. I was able to take down many of the Grinders but on turn five, had it ended, Joel would have been able to win! Game went on and I was able to seal it, immobilizing a Heldrake and take out the rest of the Grinders that counted. Close game and had me sweating buckets through most of it. Ton of fun.

Win for me 11 pts.

So day one I was 3-0! My first goal is always jus tto get a winning record so I was already there, now just to crack the top ten!

 

Day 2

Game 4 – Tyrandis – Firs the Father, Then The Son

So round four had me paired against the son of my opponent from round 1. He was running 3 Flying Hive Tyrants, 2 Tervigons, 2 Toxicrenes, 2 Rippers, 3 Spore Bomb Thingys, 1 Venomthrope, and 1 Zoanthrope squad. With the Scouring being the primary his list was no joke and I knew I had to go after his ground forces hard. I made him go first and he sat mostly in his deployment zone. I also had Perfect Timing this game and went hard at his Toxicrenes, taking out one and getting the other to 1 wound left. His Zoanthropes were also easily whittled down when he couldn’t roll a 3++ to save his life. After that, one of his Hive tyrants perilsed twice and went to two wounds, so I took a turn to take one down with both Cents who ended up getting stuck by spawned Gaunts. Things went bad though, when my Centstar and Dreadknight took out both Tervigons and wrapped it up at the end with Perfect Timed shots at his then grounded Hive Tyrants who were trying to score objectives.

Win for me 11 pts.

Game 4 – Orks!

So I am 4-0 and at table 2! I was very pleased overall. My last round opponent was Mason, formerly of BTP whom I knew from their videos, and is now in his own painting studio – Hobbyhawk Studios – check em out as Mason is a very talented converter and painter.

Mason was running a great Ork list that actually was a good counter to my Centstar. The Void Shield Generator! He was also running a Snarf Snarf….er Zardsnark deathstar, 5 minimum Lootah squads, a Lobba squad, 2 squads of Boyz in Trukks, a squad of Tankbustas in a Wagon, 5 single Deathkopta units, and 2 Grot squads. That’s all…I think!

Mason was a ton of fun to play against and savvy with his list. He kept his star  under the Void shiled until all my stuff was on and then rushed out to lay down the hammer. This kept me guarded a bit as I was mostly trying to score Maelstrom points which ended up to be hard to do, especially when I kept needing to secure objectives in his deployment zone. One edge I had though was in his large amount of heavy units. I knew if I could get up on those I would be able to win the primary pretty easily. I went for it with my deadly scouts! They outflanked and both came in on his back table edge, ending up killing 3 Lootah squads in the process. It cost my my obsec, but I felt it was worth it.

The game came down to the last round or two. Mason threw his bikestar out, gunning for my pod cents and I answered with my Centstar and pod cents shooting into his deathstar. I didn’t have Pefect timing, but my poor man’s PF with the Auspex’s ensured that I wasn’t facing a 2+ jink. I only killed a few bikes on my initial shot and he ran over the Pod cents. My Centstar then pounded his deathstor with only a 4+ jink and 5+ FNP and he mad a ton of great saves. We clashed in the middle and I had bottom of turn. I should have looked more closely at the maelstrom missions as I think by that time I was only down by one and could have actually had a chance to shoot a boyz squad off of their objective, but I was staring down a timer with only minutes remaining and was rushed. I went for 2 bonus and nabbed one with my Dreadknight that killed his Big Mek. I then went for Warlord and Linebreaker and rolled for Prescience….and perilsed! Then rolled on the chart and killed my warlord in the process. That gave him Slay the Warlord and when I was unable to get force off and not kill his squad it was game over.

Loss for me at 5 pts.

 

Conclusion

I ended up 4^th, nabbing a gob of ITC points and won Best Grey Kngihts! It was a great weekend and I ate way too much good food, but had a great weekend. Thanks to Mr. More Tanks and Dan for TO’ing and Mr. Y for the Chump Change! With their new terrain and Cruishammer tickets on the line. I’d highly recommend TSHFT in Seattle as one of your tournaments for the year. January looks to be the next date so keep it on your radar.