List submissions are in (for the most part) and although we still have to wait for more people to send in their lists while getting yellow carded for submitting late, we have some interesting numbers to look at so far. So as a heads up, this list is still not complete as more than half the players have yet to submit.
As of right now, here are the army faction representations when it comes to the Las Vegas Open. As a side note, we’re only looking at armies with 10 or more submissions for lists just because there’s so many with just 2-3 offs that would just bog down the graphic. I will say, there are even some Renegade Nights coming to the event as well as a single Night Lords list that we know of so far. Blood Angels are appearing as well along with Harlequins.
The Top 3 factions going into LVO with the most representation is looking like Tyranids, Custodes and Drukhari followed up by Orks and Grey Knights with Death Guard trailing slightly behind. Very interesting to see the Custodes coming in after their book just dropped and telling of how the Custodes book is a lot easier to pick up comparatively to the Genestealer Cults.
Genestealer Cults (although it could just be because not a lot of people play them) got a new book, but it’s incredibly front loaded and very in depth in terms of what you need to do with the army, meanwhile with Custodes it’s more Ooga Booga. Not to mention, Custodes is one of the best armies you can possibly bring to a Major just because of how little models you bring so it’s less straining on a physical level.
No surprise that Tyranids have a huge surge in players coming in with their new Crusher Stampede and Leviathan rules. Whether you’re going for Forces of the Hive Mind, Crusher Stampede or working with a pure Tyranids list – the bugs are here and they’re a pain to get rid of. Keep in mind, if people are bringing Forces of the Mind they’re working with the new GSC codex so they’ll have access to new 9th edition rules. Things like Purestrain Genestealers are well within reason with 3d6 charges out of an 8″ deepstrike, a scout move and so much more.
Drukhari, what else can we say about these guys expect that Thicc City is a tough nut to crack. With Custodes flying about though, Thicc City might have met it’s match going against Crusher Stampede or Custodes at this point. It’s just the sheer survivability that Custodes have is insane and if you’re already hard to kill and you have Obsec you’re basically winning on primaries most of the time.
Moving forward, let’s take a look at the highest ranking players in the ITC according to Factions to see what their previous games were like and how they match up for this event.
HIGHEST RANK IN ITC BY FACTIONS
Adeptus Astartes
Patrick McAneeny
Faction Ranking: #2, 834.22pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #27, 1213.87pts.
Bringing to LVO: Sisters of Battle
Switching off of his White Scars where he’s placed decently at on Team Battle Brothers he made a switch over to Sisters where he recently placed 2nd at an RTT.
Adepta Sororitas
John Lennon
Faction Ranking: #1 – 872.02pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #1 – 1431.19pts.
Bringing to LVO: N/A
Art of War is bringing the heat with Lennon joining the event. Although we don’t know what army he’s bringing just yet, it’s up in the air on whether he’s swapping over to Custodes for LVO, going back to Forces of the Hive Mind or picking up GSC with their new dex. Amazing showings at the events he joins and surprisingly not a lot of Sisters of Battles games even though he’s ranked #1.
Adeptus Custodes
Steve Trimble
Faction Ranking: #1 – 816.56pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #36 – 1178.56pts.
Bringing to LVO: Adeptus Custodes
Steve is in his happy place with the new Custodes book and is sticking with his faction where he’s #1 on the leaderboard. Being #36 overall in the ITC shows how well the guy plays and with a new codex out he’s definitely someone to watch out for at LVO.
Adeptus Mechanicus
Malik Amin Rubio
Faction Ranking: #1 – 937.65pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #6 – 1330.11pts.
Bringing to LVO: N/A
Team Dice Down brings in Malik Rubio, a die hard Admech player that has been placing really well throughout the year. #6 in the overall standings, it’ll be interesting to see how he approaches this major with the new Admech changes.
Aeldari
Sean Nayden
Faction Ranking: #1 – 921.67pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #3 – 1402.51pts.
Bringing to LVO: Drukhari
Sean Nayden the lover of all things Eldar is back with Team Battle Brothers to try and claim his stack at this major. Running Drukhari it’ll be interesting to see how he feels about not only Orks now, but also Custodes when piloting Drukhari.
Astra Militarum
Brett “The Catachan” Urbanowski
Faction Ranking: #1 – 734.5pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #119 – 1047.07pts.
Bringing to LVO: Astra Militarum
The Catachan returns with Team Texas to bring the pain with Astra Militarum. Understandably he hasn’t been placing well with the army, but still ranked #119 overall and #1 in faction goes to show that if you love an army you can make it work. Maybe. Sometimes.
Blood Angels
Junior Aflleje
Faction Ranking: #1 – 775.76pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #29 – 1210.71pts.
Bringing to LVO: Drukhari
Junior has been Team Zero Comp’s Blood Angels player, but has been messing around with Drukhari having a great showing over at SoCal not too long ago. Strong player to contend for the top 8.
Chaos
TJ Lannigan
Faction Ranking: #1 – 773.49pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #49 – 1134.9pts.
Bringing to LVO: Genestealer Cults
This one surprised me, TJ has been a die hard Chaos fan for the longest time and for this event he’s decided to switch completely over to Genestealer Cults. Already with a GT win under his belt with the army from this past weekend running the new book, we’ll have to see what he can bring out during this event.
Chaos Daemons
Mark Aescht
Faction Ranking: #1 – 742.65pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #44 – 1149.08pts.
Bringing to LVO: Chaos Daemons
Mark sticks with Chaos Daemons for the U.S. Army Esports team. Daemons have it rough right now, and with the upcoming T’au changes they’re basically dead in the water after that. However there is no new T’au book at this event so ha! Eat your heart out Mark and make the daemons proud.
Chaos Space Marines
Russell Tassin
Faction Ranking: #1 – 745.37pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #66 – 1103.41pts.
Bringing to LVO: Black Legion
Russell is taking his tried and true Black Legion to the table where he’s placed pretty well at RTT’s and even at Major’s with Chaos Space Marines. I don’t expect him to go far with Black Legion at this event, but no matter what you know he’s going to have a good time brining his comfort pick.
Dark Angels
Tom Ogden
Faction Ranking: #1 – 828.52pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #18 – 1243.25
Bringing to LVO: Dark Angels
There’s not much to say about Tom besides the fact that he’s incredibly consistent. Placing top 4 in a majority of his events be it a Major, RTT or GT this guy is a monster that has his Dark Angels dialed to it’s max effectiveness.
Death Guard & Thousand Sons
Jony Velazquez
Death Guard Faction Ranking: #3 – 823.95pts.
Thousand Sons Faction Ranking #2 – 790.04pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #17 – 1245.55pts.
Bringing to LVO: N/A
Jony Velazquez score 2 of the highest ranked players joining the event by faction with Death Guard and Thousand Sons. What he’s bringing to this event? We don’t know for sure right now however I would expect it’s either of the two.
Deathwatch
Jason Sniegowsky
Faction Ranking: #2 – 750.63pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #90 – 1067.68pts.
Bringing to LVO: N/A
Deathwatch is a pretty underplayed faction however they love their dreadnoughts and guess what, dreadnoughts are pretty good. He has played an Orks game as well as an Iron Hands game at events so we’ll see if he sticks with Deathwatch or swaps to a different army.
Drukhari
Brad Chester
Faction Ranking: #1 – 961.66pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #2 – 1403.99pts.
Bringing to LVO: N/A
Brad has been hard at work with Drukhari and being the #1 ranked in faction along with being #2 overall is nuts. We’ve seen him at the top tables multiple times so we’ll see if this event becomes an Art of War finals or not.
Forces of the Hive Mind
Tyler Bortel
Faction Ranking: #2 – 700.85pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #145 – 1018.14pts.
Bringing to LVO: Forces of the Hive Mind
Tyler has been repping Forces of the Hive Mind and with the new changes since SoCal, he’s probably ecstatic about the recent rules that Tyranids have gotten.
Genestealer Cults
Eric Tadt
Faction Ranking: #1 – 564.98pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #847 – 655.3pts.
Bringing to LVO: Genestealer Cults
This mans is happy. Coming from Team Texas running GSC, now is his time to shine with the new book. I’m interested to see how he places with the new codex compared to the old one.
Grey Knights
Matthew Green
Faction Ranking: #5 – 720.78pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #206 – 973.17
Bringing to LVO: Grey Knights
Coming from the Squad Marks team Matthew Green comes in with Grey Knights. I’ve had the pleasure of talking to Matthew multiple times and his gameplay with Grey Knights is so strong it’s scary with just barely missing out on the Top 10 at SoCal.
Harlequins
Colin Mcdade
Faction Ranking: #1 – 762.06pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #8 – 1312.56
Bringing to LVO: N/A
Colin plays a lot of armies, so really I have no idea what he could possibly be bringing to this event. It’s really up in the air right now.
Imperial Knights
Brian Jones
Faction Ranking: #1 – 807.44pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #161 – 1005.14pts.
Bringing to LVO: Imperial Knights
As of right now there are 22 lists submitted for Imperial Knights and Brian is the top dog when it comes to this army. Placing pretty well at multiple events, the changes to balance slate makes for Knights to be a strong contender at this event.
Necrons
Marshall Peterson
Faction Ranking: #3 – 758.4pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #43 – 1149.13pts.
Bringing to LVO: N/A
Although a lover of Necrons, Marshall has some games of Orks under his belt and has been placing incredibly well with them and even his Necrons place well going to Top 3 at Lone Star.
Orks
Jack Tite
Faction Ranking: #1 – 804.25
Overall ITC Ranking: #63 – 1105.94
Bringing to LVO: N/A
Orks? Orks. Orks Orks Orks. Orks! Orks Orks. Waaaagh! Orks. Orks? Oooooorks (roughly translated: he do good)
Space Wolves
Jaime Paris
Faction Ranking: #1 – 795.15
Overall ITC Ranking: #39 – 1160.73
Bringing to LVO: Space Wolves
Jaime comes in with his Space Wolves from ProTabletop with him being one of the sole reasons why Space Wolves have seen such a resurgence in the recent meta. If you go up against Jaime, be prepared.
T’au Empire
William Abilez
Faction Ranking: #2 – 731.15pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #312 – 892.88pts.
Bringing to LVO: N/A
Oh T’au. How I long for the day your new codex drops and brings pain onto everyone. Until then, enjoy your last hoorah before you become the boogeyman that everyone despises.
Tyranids
Shawn Prosser
Faction Ranking: #5 – 652.25pts.
Overall ITC Ranking: #354 – 874.61pts.
Bringing to LVO: Tyranids
Shawn bringing love for the Tyranids with some mediocre showings for the army. However he’s a tried and true Tyranid Player so maybe he’ll make a switch for Crusher Stampede to still be a pure Tyranids army but having that much more punch on his swing.
And that’s it for this round up of what’s happening at the LVO and what to expect! This lineup is insane as usual and it’s going to be one tough uphill battle to climb at the champs event. I for one am looking forward to it and hope there’ll be some spicy upsets throughout the event. Until next time!
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