Sunday, March 27, 2016

Tournament Report - AusComp 1850

I recently went to an 1850pt tournament with my Harlequins army, and brought the following list.

Masque Detachment
3 x Lvl 2 Shadowseers
3 x Harlequins troupes with one Dedicated Starweaver
2 x FA starweavers
1 x Voidweaver

Faolchu's Blade Formation
2 x 4 Skyweavers with glaives
1 x Voidweaver 

Heroes Path
Solitaire with Rose
Level 2 Shadowseer with Mask of Secrets
Death Jester

The Masque of The Third Act

As it was a Comped tournament, I went with the spirit of the game and tried to bring a list with as low a comp score as possible. The list ended up with 2 comp points.

My first game was against a reputed Khorne Daemonkin player in the local scene. He deployed by screening off his bloodthirsters with his 30 flesh hounds, and I had to kill off his assault monsters before his Heldrakes came in to standstand a chance in this game.

As the mission was also scored on Kill Points, I had to choose between killing his units and giving him blood tithe or giving up the Kill Points. I made a big mistake here as I elected to stop his blood tithe instead of gaining the Kill Points. His Heldrakes predictably slaughtered everything that was in their line of fire, but I gave as good as I got. When the final total was tallied, my opponent ended up winning 24-20, showing how I probably should have gone for the Kill Points. Killing off the last few units of hounds would have been really helpful.

Look at that pile of dead units.
The next match saw me face off against a battle company, all in drop pods. Spam AV12 with Obsec is a rock to the Harlequins scissors, unless you tailor for it by bring loads of haywire in place of shuriken cannons. The mission rules meant that we could only draw cards for the number of objectives we held at the start of our turn, definitely skewing this in favour of my opponent.

I deployed by hiding my troupes in transports to protect them from dropped bolters, but made a HUGE mistake by leaving my shadowseers in the open instead of putting them in reserve. This mean I lost a lot of psychic firepower early to his drop marines, which hurt because I had a lot of leadership based witchfires to kill off marines in cover.

The AV12 came to hurt me in the long run, as one heroic drop pod tanked 6 rounds of haywire grenades from the Solitaire in shooting and assault, helped by my forgetting that immobilised vehicles are auto hit. Major mistake. I would have been able to claim more objectives and possibly even up the score. Assault and superior firepower helped me narrow the gap towards the end of the game, but I ended up losing 22-16.

And that's only those that came in Turn 1...

My last game was against arguably the top race at the moment, Tau, against a general who was smarting from being hit with a Macro-cannon salvo.

Same as the second game, we drew a number of maelstrom objectives equal to that which we already controlled. My opponent's warlord trait let him auto regroup and shoot at full BS after going to ground, and it helped him immensely as he weathered a round of my shooting by going to ground for a 2+ cover save.

I charged everything forward to try and get into close combat, but perhaps that was too aggressive. It did mean that I could also grab midfield objectives while he couldn't. Despite managing to kill a riptide, some suits, and a bunch of marker drones, some poor rolling meant I couldn't get into combat with his stormsurge. The sad clowns were predictably tabled thereafter.

Under tournament rules, a tabling was worth an additional 10 VP, but he didn't score any of his objectives! The end result was that I lost 12-7. If I had played to the mission, either trying to grab the relic, or holding my backfield objectives with veil of tears up, I might have just sneaked in a draw with a bit of luck.

Lots of firepower arrayed against the clowns

Anyway, 0-3 for the tournament. Not what I was hoping for, but I was hopeful that my low comp would work in my favour. As it turned out, I finished 7/13, which wasn't too bad, considering I went 0-3.
The only Harlies player in the field.
The reason I didn't finish higher was because the TO adjusted how much comp was worth in terms of overall score. If he had applied the 50% approach, I'd have finished 4/13 on battle points and 5/13 on overall score, which is a LOT better. Still, I had known this just before the tournament. The big drop in my points came against what could have been a fair chance at winning Game 2, and maybe Game 1, if I didn't make the mistakes I did.

Winning game 2 would have helped me a fair bit here...
Learning Lessons

1) REMEMBER YOUR RULES. Forgetting that immobilised vehicles are auto hit was unforgiveable.

2) PLAY TO THE MISSION. Not something I should be forgetting, but in all 3 missions I forgot to make scoring points my overriding priority. Not scoring KPs in Game 1, not keeping units safe in Game 2, and not grabbing objectives to generate new ones in Game 3 all harmed my overall score.

3) Objective placement is key. For example, I placed the objectives far apart in order to try and nullify the drop in my second game. But given my small number of units, I could have clustered the objectives together so as to allow me to kill off his obsec units faster.
4) Don't discount objective secured when looking at detachment bonuses. Battle company lists were a pain, and it was really because non obsec lists just didn't have the firepower to take them down in a comp environment.
5) Comp only works if it takes up a large portion of the score. When players are not as penalised for bringing higher comp lists, then the effectiveness in ensuring people bring more balanced lists is greatly reduced. This isn't me whining about not placing better; my place in the final running wouldn't have changed much. However, some people have complained that battle companies were under-comped, which is true to a certain extent. My response is that they seem even more under comped in this tournament because the TO adjusted how comp was applied without adjusting the comp cost.

Many thanks to Gamersaurus Rex for organising the tournament, and looking forward to the next one, a 2v2 in April!




Thursday, March 10, 2016

Additional Malifaux Goodies

I have been busy beavering away at my Malifaux collection and raising them as quickly as possible. Quite recently I managed to secure some reinforcements for my Ten Thunders and Outcasts which should give me some options with the Schemes and Strategies. 

Got them with Von Schill and Misaki in mind
I have heard really good things about all three models above. They synergize really well with the 2 Masters I am currently learning and should give me a good spread of typecast for the S&S that we randomly determine at the start of each game.

Yamaziko

The crew all assembled
Some of you may notice the Limited Edition Katanaka Sniper that came along in the Shenlong Boxed Set. I swapped one of the Snipers from the box set with Eugene hence we both had 2, but both would have our Limited version too.

I got this guy just because he looked so very Samurai! 

Even got myself the Shadow Effigy

Broke open the Shenlong Starter set

Got out the Samurai as well! 

These archers just looked too cool not to include! 

To compliment my Malifaux collection, I added a little Garden

I was pleasantly surprised by how little mould lines this kit had. Saved me a ton of time

All bases completed with the cobblestone, I put them all into my priming booth and sprayed all at one go! 

Monday, March 7, 2016

Hobby Corner: Opening up the deff dread hatch



Hobby Corner update 7/3/16: open hatch ork deff dread
  

new to the ork faction this month, is the new starter box 'pain mob' formation. I cant wait to test it out!. On paper, it does look like GW's best gift to orks in a long time.

But first I need to get them all assembled...

Flipping through the instruction sheet unlike the newer models like the new Tau Shadow Ghostkeel, the deff dred's all buttoned up. That wont do... cos  ‘sum kommanders have a better view of da battlefield with da hatch open!’

Photo 1:






Cutting the hatch open

Step 1 & 2: Using a pin drill that I got from daiso, size doesn’t really matter, drill a ring of holes on the inside circumference of the hatch that you would like to cut open.
Step 3: Then using a plastic clipper, cut the bit between each hole linking up all the holes, then with a sharp box cutter, carefully trim away the excess material, til you have a nice clean circular hole. Hatch opened!

Photo 2 making the hatch
Top left Photo: I traced out the hole onto a piece of tissue
Top right Photo:Which I then whiteglued onto a piece of polystyrene sheet and then cut out with a sharp scissors
*in hindsight,  perhaps tracing out a true circle (ie a coin) might have made a more symmetrical looking hatch.
Bottom left Photo:Then I decorated the inside of the hatch with some of my ususal watch gear bits to create the hatch locking mechanism and then some plastic bits outside to create something visually interesting,
Bottomr right photo: I then scored a line across and bent the little tab at the bottom of the circular hatch which I then glued onto the hull.

Complete!


M


Thursday, March 3, 2016

Malifaux Ten Thunders Shenlong vs Outcasts and Neverborn

Managed to get 2 games in with Eugene and Pat. I had just finished up Shenlong's crew out of the box and wanted to give him a go so I set up to play with that in mind. 

The first game had me playing Eugene and his Outcasts. He brought the Victorias (and their Secret). 

I chose these Schemes
 In hindsight, Take Prisoner and Assassinate do not gel. You can't take what you kill! DOH!

Added a Sniper to my base box set

Mostly were just primed sorry! I'll get painting! 
Shenlong is a tough Master to use. You really need to synergize his abilities with those of his crew. If he dies, that's pretty much game over for you because the rest of the crew really depend on his abilities.


At game end
Unfortunately, I was not able to kill off the right Victoria, leaving me with a very bruised crew.

Pat then came in and we set up for another round of Malifaux!
Due to time constraints, we set up for 35 Soulstones instead. I focussed on using most of the Shenlong crew but dropped one Peasant as I could spawn another during the game.

Haha, I need to sacrifice my own guy! How Malifaux!

Pat brought Jacob Lynch and his casino crew
This time I played differently and kept Shenlong behind, leaving my Peasants out to bait him.

Upgrades change the game a lot and confused me to no end!

Turn 2, I lost Shenlong to a very nasty Bad Debt. 

Game end

Got those tokens! 
We tallied the score and now I drew with Pat! Close close game! At least I wasn't loosing like a cow any more!

Now that aside, this Master is hard to use. Really really hard. I would not suggest using it until the player is a little more familiar with the game, what the opponent can do, or is using a lot of debuff conditions (Poison, Fire, etc). Monks are gooooood! Always charge them in if you can!

Hopefully you guys are interested to give this game a good try. 

Wednesday, March 2, 2016

Terrain WIP, Malifaux and Space Marines vs Tau (Green Variant)

I've been working on some terrain recently so I can get some games in at home. The kit from GW is amazing. With elevation, it creates a nice battlefield too. 

Detailed detailed!
Almost done now, just need some detailed work and weathering

And then I got in a game with Samuel - a long time player of Malifaux. I really wanted to get more variety and he brought a list I am totally unfamiliar with. The Strategy and Schemes were also very unique as he used the Gaining Grounds 2016 ones. Nonetheless, I just played on!

Love how the mat just tied everything together
I brought a hybrid Misaki list. She would be Outcasts and she can hire up to 4 from 10 Thunders. The Trapper and Librarian from the Hired Guns were really useful

That LOS blocking terrain really hampered both our sides
Eventually we ran out of time and the game had to be called on Turn 3. Sam ran in and Laid the Trap, giving him 3 to my 2! Damn! Like all lists, you need to play and familiarize yourself!

Right after the game with Sam, Alan came in and we set up for our 1850 game. I brought the very same list I have been practicing with (we had only found out that you cannot use FW). This means that I will have to remove the Fire Raptor and replace it with a few other minis. I suspect they will be more Marines!

Rolled on Cloak and Dagger.

Tau would take first turn. 
There is of course the issue of how the Tau share buffs. Aus Comp does not allow the sharing of buffs but the players at Grex do. We chose to follow the Grex ruling although we both agreed that this was a little too extreme an interpretation as this allowed for multiple units to gain ignore cover, twinlinked etc just by attaching one Commander to the group of 3 units that is firing.

In the games leading up to this, Pat has thought me that keeping the Centurions in cover is critical

Even then, I lost one to his Intercept

While his Stealth Cadre entered mid field and killed everything around it while gaining 2+ cover
Tau breaks so many rules that it really made this game very one sided. I lost the game eventually. This was the first time that I was playing Tau with buff sharing in place and I think it is definitely too extreme. However, if that is how the community is interpreting the rules, then you either have to come to the table prepared or just don't play that ruleset. Thankfully there are people in the community to rule otherwise, including AusComp which prevents these shennanigans. Let's hope GW can come up and respond. 

Tuesday, March 1, 2016

Malifaux Batrep - Misaki vs Sonia Cridd 40SS Encounter

I managed to get some time off from work to get a game in with Eugene at his store. I wanted to learn how to use Misaki better. Here's a brief of the game we had with some nice highlights

I chose these two Schemes from the pool

Spread the two Torakage out to attempt the Strategy, Stake the Claim

Gotta love the Plascraft terrain. Fast and cheap! 

Planted this Torakage here to wait for Eugene's minion on the other side.

The Trapper picking off targets where he could

Eventually both Masters faced each other and I was able to pull off a kill, achieving my Scheme

By playing Misaki cautiously, I was able to use the last few turns to send the missile to take off the Master, Sonia Cridd. As this was my Scheme, it meant I led in points! It is also my first win in Malifaux! Thanks for the game Eugene! 

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