Warbands -Post Wrap

(The bulk of my Warbands unit for Adepticon, the rest being some Handgunners and Huntsmen using old models at this point, but hope to get two new units done for my Pirate Militia Warband, my Captain being the Saratosa Pirate Captain..not sure which wizard I'm using yet...this works one thou with any generic lore)

The Warbands tourney was a big success from my perspective we 16- 500 point games over 4 hours. I assume its going to work similarly at Adepticon this year. recaps of my games were as follows.

Game 1 vs Wood Elves..
Chris had alot of shooting, including a hero with the "Hail of Doom" arrow which is like a potential Vindicator Cannon at this points level, Lost almost half my block of 25 on it, unfortunately for Chris that was his biggest strike against me...huntsmen thinned small units as much as they could fleeing every chance they had trying to draw dryads into range of the Handgunners. My Wizard did most of the work with strong 3 die fireballs (thanks to the wizards staff a great 10 point item that lets you throw one more die than normal at a spell, so my level 1 can cast as if he's a level 2) Chris charged my black on multiple sides but thank to number of attacks I had back and good hero at this level he broke and fled...some off the board, some to be caught. eventually my block was wiped by some strong late shooting from 5 - glade guard left, but my captain ran one group down, leaving chris with only 2 glade guard on the table versus, my Captain, 5 huntsmen and all my handgunners.- WIN


(We went terrain heavy on the setups, lots of terrain on the 4x4's here are 3 of the 5 tables we used)

Game 2 Vs Warriors of Chaos
Choosing to make a Marauder Champion his Warband Commander, rich took 10 Chaos Warriors instead of a Hero character..it was good choice, Rich ending winning the event with a formidable force. I was luckly and rolled a "4" on my spell, "fire blast" the 2d6, Str 4 hit Fireball, I got a couple of them off doing serious damage, taking one unit of Fast Cav...in one shot, and the second to low enough where some shooting finished them off. My wizard then miscast, losing his level so being level one wasnt a wizard anymore. knowing I was out classed in combat...I shot Rich up best I could before engaging, winning a combat against some of the warriors and killing them off. I ended up killing all the warriors, but lost my captain, my huntsman failed a big rally..I was still in pretty good shape at the end but rich had 3 table quarters...in the end which made the game just barely a draw, close but not close enough. - DRAW



Game 3 vs Vampire Counts-
Bill had 2 units of Ghouls, a corpse cart and block of skellys with a Vampire Hero with and extra magic level, Thankfully Bill got stuck with summon the horde which isnt useful at this points level, simply invocation everything I killed. My shooting was very good this game, but my magic which I needed badly, decided to take the game off, which was a drag as I took the lore of Light and hoped to put those ghould down with Str 6 Burning Gazes. I got nothing and again Miscast, just losing the turn. I thought I did everything tactically right this game but it all went wrong, I end up charged by the Vampire and his Skeleton, with a raised and invocated unit of Zombies on my Flank...thankfully I got lucky because even putting all my attacks into the Vampire paid off I managed to get one wound, and after calculating the # of attacks to front and side, Bill points out I have one guy left who can go to the front...he basing the vamp hero so I put the attacks into him get lucky and get that second wound!, Bill fails the armor save..and the Vampire Dies..now I still lose and the whole block gets run down...but Bill Starts crumbling, this was the bottom of turn 4, I still had my shooters...my Huntsmen grab the building in the center of the table, while my handgunners just start shooting at crumbling units...by turn 6, all Bill has left is his Corpse Cart, I've got 2 full units..I win +105 points.. +76 being the win.- WIN



Game 4- VS Orcs and Goblins-
my pal Anthony is probably the best Orc and Goblin player out there, at normal point levels, although he did drop one game in this event, he rarely ever loses..and I have never beaten him People who say the O&G arent competitive haven't played Anthony but since he works for GW you won't see him on the competitive scene. Anyway Anth brought a comp friendly list with no magic, with Black Orc Boss on a Pig being the toughest thing. Things just went terrible for me, I roll two Irresistables on fireballs hitting key units and fail to score even a single wound both times, my shooting just totally wiffed. I did kill a small unit of wolf riders, but other than than he just marched across the table and wiped me out in turn 4, it was pretty comical. Anthony remarked.."I'm not one to usual put much into bad luck, but that was some bad luck dude". regardless of the spanking- these where all great games...so at 2-1-1- I was fine with my Army's performance- LOSS

Overall this was a great time and recomend the Warbands rules and 500 point games to Veterans and new players alike, give it a try sometime!.

Mighty Empires VI- Round 5- Warbands

Player	Army	Wins	Losses	Draw	Battle	Comp	Sports	Total	EP
Rich	Warriors	3	0	1	55	20	12	87	6
John	Empire	2	1	1	45	18	14	77	5
Anthony	O&G	3	1		50	17	9	76	4
Bill	Vampires	1	2	1	35	20	16	71	5
Billy	Dwarfs	2	1	1	45	16	0	61	5
Nate	Lizardmen	1	2	1	35	20	3	58	3
Aaron	Warriors		3	1	25	20	8	53	3
Chris	Wood Elves	1	3		30	16	4	50	3

Scores after Round 5

10- Orcs and Goblins- Anthony
8- Warriors of Chaos- Rich
7- Empire- John
7- Vampire Counts- Bill
6- Lizardmen- Nate
5- Wood Elves- Chris
5- Warriors of Chaos- Aaron
3-Dwarfs- Billy


Warbands was good time, we had no problems with time limits and everyone took to the spirit of the event. In the end it shook the map up a little, nice change of pace to get in four games instead of one, in an evening. In fact the suggestion was made we try a whole campaign with lower point games in order to get a couple games in an evening...not a bad idea. Anyway great primer for those of us playing in Warbands at Adepticon, we did my own awards for Sportsman, based of Favorite Game votes (congrats Bills) and Favorite Theme /Comp'd list (congrats Aaron) but otherwise its identical to upcoming event. Ill post a brief write up on my own list and 4 games, with some in game photos next.

Mighty Empires meets Warbands

Alot of us in my local area are excited about the Adepticon's dual AM/PM Warbands event for Warhammer Fantasy on the opening day. It's great alternative to the "Biggest Hammer" event for those that can't meet the hobby requirements (3K painted), or are just looking for something else Warhammer to do that day. As a primer I've decided to take the Adepticon Warbands rules and incorporate them into our Week 5, Mighty Campaign. This Tuesday we start the second half of our 8 week campaign, and no better way to break things up than throw the regular rules aside and play a 4 game tourney that evening with 500 Warbands, These warbands represent small scouting parties for each Empire who are out to make small land grabs where they can on a map that is currently almost completely contested. We have software doing the pairings for us and will also be posting open lists on our forums. Games are on a hard 55 min time limit..so we should have no problem getting the 4 games in. The reward of course will be Empire Points (1 for each victory) and I threw a few soft score caveats so everyone can feel like the won something.
there is an extra point awarded foer being fully painted. and points award for Best theme/Comp and Sportsmanship ( considering we are all pals these are simple favorite list and favorite game votes) The board turn I am allowing up to 6 Empire points won that round to be used against any one player you defeated in the tourney..this could potentially really shake the board up, and give lagging players a chance to get back in...we'll fall back to our normal Mighty Empires rules week 6, but this a fun alternative and great primer for Adepticon. Expect a full write up the day after the event.

Playtesting- Adepticon Fantasy Championships.

That's certainly one way to deal with a Steam Tank!

So Steve and I got down to some playtesting for Adepticon last Saturday, trying out some different armies and lists. Both of us having difficultly deciding who and what to run.
As previously posted my choices are my Empire and my Daemons of Chaos, while Empire are the old standby at this point, 2000 points and the WPS comp score being directly added to your overall as the comp score has thrown a different strategic element into the mix. I have a couple different Empire Lists, both in the 14-15 WPS range, While my DoC list is a 10 (9.65)
Steve brought a low WPS Daemon list in the 6 range, and a Lizardmen list that was a whopping WPS 21 (25 being max). We decided to play Empire vs Daemons and Lizards vs Daemons..but after the fact I realized that a DoC vs DoC then an Empire vs Lizardmen match up is what we should have done because they are more realistic 1st round match ups given the comp scores.

Game 1 Daemons of Chaos vs The Empire
Empire-
Arch Lector on a Barded WarHorse
2 Level 2 Wizards
44 Swordsmen broken into 26 and 2-9 man detachements
2 x 10 handgunners with HLR's
2 10 man units of Freecompany
20 Flagellants
5 Pistoliers with Champ
2 Cannons
Steam Tank

Daemons of Chaos-
2 Khorne Heralds on Juggernauts (Aoc/FB kit)
one is the General one is BSB with Unholy victory
Herald of Slannesh

2 x 15 Bloodletters
15 Daemonettes
2 x 5 Flesh hounds
unit of 3 Fiends

I went the MSU route with an actual Magic Phase for change, much different than my last couple years of tournament Empire. Not taking a BSB is hard change for me..but I am getting used to it. My setup had one unit of handgunners and a Freecompany unit in the backfield looking to protect each cannon on different ends of the table, I had my Stank, Flaggies and my Swordsman up the middle. The Swordsman block had my Arch Lector and one Wizard in it, the Other wizard was in the back field and couple move around freely between handgunner and freecompany units. I had the Lore of Light and Lore of Fire and lucky rolled and "6" and "1" for both wizards..meaning both Cleansing Flare and Wall of Fire.

Things where definitely in my favor most of the game..with only 2 dispel dice for the Daemons I got alot of spells off even with the Magic Resistance, Steve charged both Heralds out into the Stank..I saved off all but one wound 1st turn and but despite 7, strength 6 attacks a the heralds I only managed 1 wound on the BSB, subsequent turns then destroyed the Stank, but I ended up putting 1 wound on the general and killing the BSB with a cannon. On my right side I shot up steve's hounds and killed Herald of Slannesh on a Stand and Shoot..I thinned out the Daemonettes a bit, but even flanking them my free company's dice were shit and I could get them. I put a serious hurt on both units of Bloodletters..tying one up with a Wall a Fire really saved me from getting charged on numerous fronts, and shooting the blazes out of the other with both my pistoliers. I put myself in the best position I could charging 7 Bloodletter with 45 Swordsmen and two characters..my static res alone was +6, I totally wiffed on the dice only killed a couple steve was popping on a 7 on the break rolls a 5, loses 3 more and sticks with two models..which allows his General and fiends to Flank charge me next turn. If I had killed those two bloodletters I would have overrun and escaped the flank charge and most likely have won the game..but it didn't happen. Trying to salvage things I had a turn 6 screw up trying to kill the Daemonettes with my Free Company, figuring If can get them below half (only 1 model) and stick I pick up some points..I wiff again, lose the unit and the table quarter..stupid move I could have held and kept 150 points. In the end I lose with Solid Victory to Steve..I could have very easily won this game but didn't because of two things.

Analysis-

The list is pretty good, my magic phase was great, shooting was great, my pistoliers combined with the other shooting were so much more useful..then they usually are with alot less shooting. My problem was combat, and Arch Lector while great for leadership and prayers..just sucks in combat.needing support and survirability items over weapons he's got 2, Strength 4 attacks when other character in the unit is a wizard and you have a S3, T3 Army..you're screwed if you not fighting Skinks or Rats..I've reconfigured this list dropping the Arch Lector for a Empire General and Warrior priest..both on foot you still get leadership 9, a prayer..with you might actuall get off with two level '2's on the board. and giving me 5 Str 6 attacks in close combat..way more useful, plus I still get hatred from the Warrior priest. trade off is I have to cut 100 points somewhere else. switching up the Handgunners to Crossbows...saves me 50 points, I lose the HLR's but gain 6 inches of range. I also drop one unit of Free company and changing my detachments from Swordsmen back to free company (the extra attacks are worth it). This allows me to keep one unit of free company in the back field plus give it a Standard...I'll be trying this list out next time to compare. The other issue is- I need to learn not give points away last turn on gambles..I always do this and I get burned 4 out of 5 times. leave the points on the table, dummy. In a tourney...if your losing to a Solid...keeping it to minor isnt a big deal but a Draw is..even after losing my main block..I could have kept this to draw if I managed my last 2 turns better. (of course the problem unless you know your opponents army very well, your unlikely to know what you're losing by).
Steve's list is solid hard hitting DoC list..he's really going only going to run into problems against heavy magic and shooting lists...and he can still manage it well with a little luck.


Game 2 Daemons of Chaos vs Lizardmen

Daemons of Chaos
Great Unclean One, Trappings, Nurgle Infestation, Level 3 Wiz
Nurgle of Herald, BSB (Sundering) Palaquin, Slime Trail

15 Plagebearers FC
15 Bloodletters FC x 2
5 Flesh hound
3 nurgling bases
2 beasts of Nurgle


Lizardmen-
2- Saurus Hero one on Foot, One a Cold One
Skink Chief
Lv 2 Skink Priest
15 Saurus Warriors w/ Spears x 2
3 Krogigors
5 Cold One Cav
4 Terradons
Salamander Pack
Razordon Pack
Chameleon Skinks
3-4 other units of Skinks..mixed rank and skirmish.

Ok, WPS 21 Lizardmen, No Slaan, No Engines, No Stegadons versus a 10-ish WPS DoC list with a Greater Deamon, should be a blow out right?, Nope...One thing I am sure of is I don't know what the hell I am doing with Daemons and I am running a list solely based on wanting to use my FW GUO- but the the reality is in the numbers. Steve's list is 130 models versus my 57, and that 73 model difference is all shooting!. My GUO rolls some nasty spells, Rancid Visitation, the Pox, plus I have Miasma if I every get into CC. Steve blows my Dogs off the table 1st turn throwing about 100 shots into them along with the rock drop. My Beasts (one on each flank) are a huge pain for Steve plus my Nurgling unit is growing by one base a turn..Steve charges the Flank of my Herald and his Plaguebearers and bounces off- getting run down..he then goes into point denial mode kills off all the easier stuff he can, (my Bloodletters). I do have alot of his army running at various time, but cold blooded absolutely can save your but against any psychology army, and only one unit runs off the board. I did make a couple tactical errors..I should have charged my GUO a few times into some smaller units for easy points instead I held choosing to cast spells. trying to take down heroes for bigger points..Steve killed his magic phase putting dice in Diadem for the dispeling my spells, and even though I got alot of Rancid Visitations and Pox's off he kept making alot of the 50/50 toughness checks..so i came up short...after he took my beast down from constant shooting..my nurglings died on a wiffed combat and bad break test (an 11 or 12) and popped against Skinks!.
Shooting got my Herald and his unit down 1/2 with Everything else dead, even my 635 point GUO untouched..I couldn't kill enough to get any leverage..easily controling 3 table quarters for a bonus 300..gave Steve a solid victory over a marginal on kill points alone., I was baffled it wasnt closer but there were just too many units.

Analysis-

This list is tough, but is going to have problems against any tough magic phase or or heavy shooting MSU, even against Empire multiple cannons into the GUO even with my extra save could be disasterous. I tweaked list a bit to try to get more out of it, but came to conclusion to really be effective it needs to be an all nurgle list bumping the WPS to 13, ideally 15 so your get a good first round match up. With more magic and two heralds, and lots of stuff rengenerating it some legs..since I dont have the models or the inclanation to do this I think, my GUO is going to be staying on the Shelf this year..I'll give it couple more games before I seal the deal.

Conclusions-

Contrary to popular opinion on some forums I frequent, The popular theory of taking as low a WPS score as possible and trying to outgun/outmuscle your opponent, while still viable has a definite flipside. High WPS, MSU armies with some pychology protection and either strong shooting /magic or a balance are going to do very well, Steve's list is great example, he got the win with a 11 point WPS lead on me..looking at that game as a potential round 2 match up, Steve could easily be in the top tables round 3. Contrary to popular opinion I think high WPS Scoring MSU armies are going to be something to watch out for I see Lizards, Dark Elves and Skaven all doing very well with various configurations outside the normal "big monster/s" plus army concept. More playtesting is required but I think I am going this route with the Empire. Steve and I still need to throw down Lizards vs Empire for a general round 1 match list analysis..more soon, we're going to keep playtesting

Winged Nazgul!

This bad boy showed up in my email today...check out the kits details. This thing has possibilities for all kinds of Fantasy uses..not to mention Lord of the Rings, I already have an older version I'll be picking this up..maybe for the Witch King..maybe for Karl Franz's Dragon! we'll see.

Mighty Empires VI -Round 4

Round 4 @ Plastic Legions HQ 1/12/10




Players and Scores after Round 4

9- Orcs and Goblins- Anthony
6- Warriors of Chaos- Rich
6- Wood Elves- Chris
5- Vampire Counts- Bill
5- Empire- John
5- Lizardmen- Nate
4- Warriors of Chaos- Aaron
2-Dwarfs- Billy

Events

Orcs and Goblins- Diplomacy @ Chaos (black) Wood Elves- Survey the Battlefield Warriors of Chaos- Scouts Dwarfs- All or Nothing Vampire Counts- No Guts, No Glory Lizardmen- Raid @ Orcs + 150 Warriors of Chaos- War Tax Empire- Disaster @ Anthony

Challenges

Dwarfs VS Orcs and Goblins -
Draw 2 Ep each

Warriors of Chaos (Black) VS Lizardmen
Lizardmen- Solid Victory 4EP

Wood Elves VS Empire
Draw 2 Ep each,

Warriors of Chaos (brown) VS Vampire Counts
Draw 2 Ep each


Notes:
Continues to be the Campaign of "Drawn Battles" my round 3 rematch of a Draw was even a closer draw with only a 30 pts difference!!

The Orcs and Goblins were raided and cursed with Disaster, as a result the lost an Empire Point!

Big win for the Lizardmen, allowing them to climb to the middle of the pack

For Round 5 we have planned something totally different- round 5 will be mini 500 point Warbands tourney where everyone will send a 500 point scouting party out onto the map, each player will play 4 games and the rewards are of course Empire points! - more soon!


The current map with many custom markers from the guys


Somewhere well into the evenings games..

Road to Adepticon 2010

Here we go! first post of the year and it's January in Chicago, it's bitter cold and the basements warm, that means one thing for me and lots of the readers here: Adepticon. Big and Bolder in 2010, Adepticon has even more events and grown from a Games Workshop hobby event to a full blown minatures wargaming event. Lot of different systems going on, and while I am interested is Flames of War, I am sticking with the GW events this year.

I know from personal stories from some of you, that like me. 2009 was a financial disaster for alot us, many friends had lost jobs, homes or just had financial woes, that seriously hit our time and motivation to play with toy soldiers. Personally my business almost shut its doors twice last year, and the unknowing of what this Spring could bring forced me to back out of running a Legend of the High Seas Campaign at Adepticon this year, (Fear not fellow Pirates as I will do one again sometime this year at my house). Part of being broke, while also having to be way more hands on at work also forced the canceling of plans to attend Gathering in the Desert as well. Despite these set backs, Adepticon takes place a mere 10 miles away from my home, so I am going to be there even if I have to sell a bunch a junk to pay for it. I signed up for three events this year and will be around all day friday, and saturday..staying until way late in evening to celebrate/commiserate our games over Beers, If you read here and we haven't met
please stop by and say hi!

My three events and progress report on each as of today is.

Friday AM- Lord of the Rings Championships 350pts-

My Grey Company Army of Gandalf, 3 Rangers of the North and and 12 Rangers
is small even for 350 pts..but surprisingly flexible against most armies., The Army seems to do worse against other good armies..but I know they try to set you up against the opposite faction when they can. My Army is done, the display base is done, just need a 40mm objective..I know what its going to be..I just need to paint it and paint it well, I feel like if I can win any "best appearance" award at the Adepticon this is going to be it.



Friday PM- Warhammer Fantasy Warbands Nighttime 500 pts-

No offense to my pals James and Steve running the 2999 point, No comp Warhammer event but that just doesn't interest me at all. I'll miss the good ol'Escalation tourney for sure, and wish them luck with their event. Personally I like the warbands rules so much I just had to play in that with my Empire. I'm doing a Pirate Theme'd Milita army with Handgunners and Huntsmen with two Characters for my 500 points, I'm building as much new stuff as I can specifically for theme purposes..most of the free company is done..I need to 5 models including a standard bearer...I have a new Captain in the works..and am probably going to do new Huntsmen and theme'd handgunners to boot. How much of this is new vs what comes of normal stock is up the in the air right now depending on what I do on Saturday..needless to say, I have 500 points of Empire covered.



Saturday- Warhammer Fantasy Championship- 2000 pts-

If you follow these things like I do, you know there is as much pre controversy about the WFB Championships this year as there is the normal post controversy, Lowering the points to 2K, pissed some people off and using WPS as the comp system also pissed some more people off. But in the end the people that got pissed off about this are the ones that will be playing in Friday's 2999 event and are for the most part, people I really dont care if I play anyway..so while I prefer 2250 for my Empire. I am gladly accepting of the changes and know it will make for a better event.

The major dilemma for me is- what to run, I have two options, my Empire or my Daemons of Chaos. 2000 points forces me to look at my Empire much differently then I normally do, I can get a median WPS score of 15 and build a much more difficult Empire list. than I normally run at 2250. Why? because of the hyper competitive environment, WPS penalizes things like fast movers, monsters and lots of magic and while it does penalize shooting and war machines, that's about the only thing in an Empire Army it penalizes, so I can take 2 Cannons and a Steam Tank, and get a better score than I certainly would under any player jugded comp. If I am going to run Empire, I'll have to do this to be competitive..many people will surely run as low a WPS score as they can and then hope to make up the difference in Battle Points by winning games. The Comp score is only 25 pts..and most sane people will be at the median 15 or below..going higher isnt going to win you any games, so you'd lose more that you should for an extra 5 or so points of comp Knowing your comp score going into the event is both good and bad, it's good in that there are no surprises when it comes to what your score is on composition, which cuts down on complaints. It's bad, in that it opens a whole other can of worms in tactical list building that usually isn't necessary, if I do run Empire..everything is pretty much ready to go..the list I am debating has two units of Crossbows..so I may need to build another..and I am toying if using a Mortar..if so I'd need on of those..otherwise I am all set.

Daemons of Chaos on the other hand get hit pretty hard on the WPS scale, That list centers around my Forge World Great Unclean One and comes in at a whopping 9 WPS. Even with my GUO's never ending paint job..he's looking pretty bad ass these days and must go on the table on these days so I see opportunity here. My planned list is not what I normally see being played with DoC these days...its slow, and tarpitty. Coming in at only 62 models I have a GUO, Herald BSB of Nurgle, Plague Bearers, a Beast of Nurgle, 2 Units of Bloodletter Infantry and one unit of the shock troop Fleshounds, some furies and finally Nurglings...I am going to use infestation of Nurgle..to spam these little buggers...starting with 3 I could have up to 9 bases by games end giving me an extra 210 pts on the list for free., they'll all be in one unit..so with the GUO being very hard to kill..and a 9 base nurgling unit..that ideally it will be easy to keep more than 50% of alive..I should have 1000 points easy sticking on the board...not to mention the Herald led Plaguebearers being very hard to kill also being another 438 pts...in short almost 3/4 of my army isn't going away quickly..the Khorne stuff is there to kill as much as it can before it goes poof...its a point denial, spoiler army..not what I am at all used to playing..but it's intriguing me, I might just go for it, if I do I have a good month of solid painting to do to get ready..plus some display work..The jury is out this one..I of course need to see how it plays..so I don't expect to make a final decision until the end of the month.

I'll be updating each with new photos soon, expect me working on either Championship army in some capacity regardless, right up until crunch time.