Misty Mountain Games RTT -- October 2010
This will be my first tournament in a good long while, so I've taken quite a bit of time and energy to make sure I properly prepare for the event. There were quite a few things that were a deciding factor in my decision to attend, but it primarily came down to the store separating soft-scores from the tournament results. In other words, you can win without having a professionally painted army or playing the circle-jerk game. While sportsmanship is important, it should be required in tournaments, but not scored. I'm a bit curious as to the format, as it seems to be battle points based off of a three game Swiss pairing. Nor am I sure about what scenarios will be used, but I hope something similar to the Nova Open missions will be played. If not, I'll be sure to put my suggestions in at the end to use them, as I find the Nova Missions extremely balanced. The event is on October 9th, 2010.
Tournament Preparation
As I mentioned, I've spent quite a bit of time preparing for this tournament. I have been wanting to go to one for a good while now, as to start putting some weight behind my reputation (hopefully). Obviously, I want to win. But I also know quite a few of the players in this area are extremely competitive, use excellent tactics, and build great army lists. Not to mention, as a Black Templars player, I'm already fighting an uphill battle against the newer codices.
With that being said, there are a couple of army list options (@ 2000 points) that would put me on par with anything that I'll face. One of them is my gunline army. It is extremely balanced and provides massive firepower. Most opponents will not be able to take the onslaught, and those that can, will be severely diminished when they reach my lines. The other list is the defensive drop pod army list. Almost all enemies have difficulty dealing with a proper drop pod army, and fortunately, the only list that can still do it well is the Black Templars.
But alas, I did not want to garner a bad reputation for myself. Since I'm told quite a few players only show up to the tournaments, there could be a few people that I'm not familiar with. For my first tournament here, I don't want to crush everyone's hopes and dreams. So I'll be playing a list that uses a hybrid mix of "fluffy" but useful units, and more traditional competitive elements. I don't want to be labeled a WAAC player or a power gamer by people whom do not know me. So I'm toning it down a little for their sake. We'll find out if it was needed. :P
Originally, I had intended to use this list:
HQ:
* Emperor's Champion w/ Black Sword, Bolt Pistol, Armor of Faith, Frag Grenades, and the Vow: "Accept Any Challenge, No Matter the Odds" [140]
Elites:
* 5 Assault Terminators w/ 3 pairs Lightning Claws, 2 Thunder Hammers and Storm Shields & Furious Charge. Mounted in Land Raider Crusader w/ Multi-Melta, Smoke Launchers, & Extra Armor. [483]
Troops:
* Crusader Squad: 7 Initiates w/ 5 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons (Frag Grenades for all). Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [224]
* Crusader Squad: 8 Initiates w/ 6 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons (Frag Grenades for all). Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [241]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons and Search Lights. [192]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons and Search Lights. [192]
Fast Attack:
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
Heavy Support:
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Search Lights. [126]
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Search Lights. [126]
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Search Lights. [126]
Total Points: [2000]
The list did extremely well during the play-testing phase of tweaking the list (going 7-0). However, I'm hoping to see some solid tournament lists at this event. Therefore, I'm considering the option of dropping the Terminators and Land Raider Crusader from the list. I love them to death, but I cannot risk the unit being marginalized during a tournament game. Because of my experience, I often could get them where I needed to and annihilate whatever I charged. However, they often turned out to be an one-shot wonder, as they would weather lots of fire and charges from CC-units the next turn. That might be a blessing in disguise though. I'm still not entirely sure that I'll switch to my new list (which I'll provide in a few moments), but if I don't, at least I know that I'll be able to provide a hard hitting unit that can kill anything on the board. The problem is, it'll be targeted as such, so I'll have to be extremely careful in deployment to make sure it gets use in my games.
But if I do take the LRC unit out of the list (as well as the search lights and frags), I can use a different list that goes something like this:
HQ:
* Emperor's Champion w/ Black Sword, Bolt Pistol, Armor of Faith, Frag Grenades, and the Vow: "Accept Any Challenge, No Matter the Odds" [140]
Troops:
* Crusader Squad: 7 Initiates w/ 5 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons. Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [215]
* Crusader Squad: 8 Initiates w/ 6 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons. Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [231]
* Crusader Squad: 8 Initiates w/ 6 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons. Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [231]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons. [191]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons. [191]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons. [191]
Fast Attack:
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
Heavy Support:
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Smoke Launchers. [128]
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Smoke Launchers. [128]
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Smoke Launchers. [128]
Total Points: [1999]
This list uses more units to try and overload your opponent's fire support. It doesn't have a hard hitting unit, but it does have 3 units that do reasonably well there. In addition, it has 3 more units that can sit back on objectives to fire away all game long while your opponent is dealing with your close combat units. There is a nice sustained 6/3/3 force that must be dealt with or your enemy will lose. The list contains 6 melta weapons, 9 lascannons, 3 twin-linked lascannons, 3 autocannons, and 6 flame weapons. Everything has mobility, tank busting ability, and a way to deal with infantry. Your opponent will have to make a decision early on: Kill the CC units? Or kill the fire support? I'm inclined to go with list #2, but I don't like not having a hard hitting unit. Although, having a MSU-style army does have its advantages more times than not. This will probably be a game time decision, as I have some vehicle assembly yet to accomplish to field the second list. Opinions?
With that being said, there are a couple of army list options (@ 2000 points) that would put me on par with anything that I'll face. One of them is my gunline army. It is extremely balanced and provides massive firepower. Most opponents will not be able to take the onslaught, and those that can, will be severely diminished when they reach my lines. The other list is the defensive drop pod army list. Almost all enemies have difficulty dealing with a proper drop pod army, and fortunately, the only list that can still do it well is the Black Templars.
But alas, I did not want to garner a bad reputation for myself. Since I'm told quite a few players only show up to the tournaments, there could be a few people that I'm not familiar with. For my first tournament here, I don't want to crush everyone's hopes and dreams. So I'll be playing a list that uses a hybrid mix of "fluffy" but useful units, and more traditional competitive elements. I don't want to be labeled a WAAC player or a power gamer by people whom do not know me. So I'm toning it down a little for their sake. We'll find out if it was needed. :P
Originally, I had intended to use this list:
HQ:
* Emperor's Champion w/ Black Sword, Bolt Pistol, Armor of Faith, Frag Grenades, and the Vow: "Accept Any Challenge, No Matter the Odds" [140]
Elites:
* 5 Assault Terminators w/ 3 pairs Lightning Claws, 2 Thunder Hammers and Storm Shields & Furious Charge. Mounted in Land Raider Crusader w/ Multi-Melta, Smoke Launchers, & Extra Armor. [483]
Troops:
* Crusader Squad: 7 Initiates w/ 5 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons (Frag Grenades for all). Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [224]
* Crusader Squad: 8 Initiates w/ 6 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons (Frag Grenades for all). Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [241]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons and Search Lights. [192]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons and Search Lights. [192]
Fast Attack:
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
Heavy Support:
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Search Lights. [126]
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Search Lights. [126]
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Search Lights. [126]
Total Points: [2000]
The list did extremely well during the play-testing phase of tweaking the list (going 7-0). However, I'm hoping to see some solid tournament lists at this event. Therefore, I'm considering the option of dropping the Terminators and Land Raider Crusader from the list. I love them to death, but I cannot risk the unit being marginalized during a tournament game. Because of my experience, I often could get them where I needed to and annihilate whatever I charged. However, they often turned out to be an one-shot wonder, as they would weather lots of fire and charges from CC-units the next turn. That might be a blessing in disguise though. I'm still not entirely sure that I'll switch to my new list (which I'll provide in a few moments), but if I don't, at least I know that I'll be able to provide a hard hitting unit that can kill anything on the board. The problem is, it'll be targeted as such, so I'll have to be extremely careful in deployment to make sure it gets use in my games.
But if I do take the LRC unit out of the list (as well as the search lights and frags), I can use a different list that goes something like this:
HQ:
* Emperor's Champion w/ Black Sword, Bolt Pistol, Armor of Faith, Frag Grenades, and the Vow: "Accept Any Challenge, No Matter the Odds" [140]
Troops:
* Crusader Squad: 7 Initiates w/ 5 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons. Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [215]
* Crusader Squad: 8 Initiates w/ 6 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons. Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [231]
* Crusader Squad: 8 Initiates w/ 6 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Meltagun & 1 Bolt Pistol and Power Fist; 2 Neophytes w/ 2 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons. Mounted in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers & Extra Armor. [231]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons. [191]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons. [191]
* Crusader Squad: 5 Initiates w/ 3 Bolt Pistols and Close Combat Weapons, 1 Flamer & 1 Lascannon. Mounted in a Razorback w/ Twin-Linked Lascannons. [191]
Fast Attack:
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
* Land Speeder: Multi-melta and Heavy Flamer. [75]
Heavy Support:
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Smoke Launchers. [128]
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Smoke Launchers. [128]
* Predator Destructor w/ Autocannon, Lascannon Side Sponsons, and Smoke Launchers. [128]
Total Points: [1999]
This list uses more units to try and overload your opponent's fire support. It doesn't have a hard hitting unit, but it does have 3 units that do reasonably well there. In addition, it has 3 more units that can sit back on objectives to fire away all game long while your opponent is dealing with your close combat units. There is a nice sustained 6/3/3 force that must be dealt with or your enemy will lose. The list contains 6 melta weapons, 9 lascannons, 3 twin-linked lascannons, 3 autocannons, and 6 flame weapons. Everything has mobility, tank busting ability, and a way to deal with infantry. Your opponent will have to make a decision early on: Kill the CC units? Or kill the fire support? I'm inclined to go with list #2, but I don't like not having a hard hitting unit. Although, having a MSU-style army does have its advantages more times than not. This will probably be a game time decision, as I have some vehicle assembly yet to accomplish to field the second list. Opinions?
Crunch Time! -- Friday, October 8th @ 0145 hrs CST
A little update, since that is what this is for correct? I've neglected my website updates for the sake of getting ready for this tourney. There will be no painting, though I would love that. I will, however, ensure that everything is at least primed. Still, I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to finish building all of my stuff in time to use the second list. I'm going to try, but I'm exhausted this evening. The plastic cement and super glue might be having an effect (not to mention the magnets and green stuff)! My bed looks mighty fine right about now. I did get everything built so that I can use the first list.
You guys might be thinking: "Hey. Wait a second. How did you play your games before?" Well, if you noticed on one of my pages, I had a huge stack of unopened vehicles waiting to be built. The reason for this is to update my forces. Most of my models that I've been using were proxied, albeit with the correct model. For example, when I had wanted to use an AC/Las Predator in a game, I proxied them with my AC/HB or Tri-Las Predators since I was an idiot and didn't magnetize my models. My land speeders were also the old version, so are quite frail and broken-like from several moves. And I didn't own any razorbacks prior to 5th Edition. So I always proxied with spare rhinos. This needed to be corrected for tournament play, obviously. Yeah, its expensive to replace this stuff, but such is the nature of my on and off again OCD. ;)
Hopefully, I'll wake up semi-early tomorrow so I can prime my stuff and maybe have enough time after work to finish assembling the final razorback, land speeder, two flamer initiates, and two lascannon initiates. We'll see. I doubt it, as one of the biggest things people do wrong before a tournament is stress about it. I'll probably peruse the rulebook to make sure that every little rule has been cast into memory (I have memorized the book, but its always nice to refresh every once in a while).
You guys might be thinking: "Hey. Wait a second. How did you play your games before?" Well, if you noticed on one of my pages, I had a huge stack of unopened vehicles waiting to be built. The reason for this is to update my forces. Most of my models that I've been using were proxied, albeit with the correct model. For example, when I had wanted to use an AC/Las Predator in a game, I proxied them with my AC/HB or Tri-Las Predators since I was an idiot and didn't magnetize my models. My land speeders were also the old version, so are quite frail and broken-like from several moves. And I didn't own any razorbacks prior to 5th Edition. So I always proxied with spare rhinos. This needed to be corrected for tournament play, obviously. Yeah, its expensive to replace this stuff, but such is the nature of my on and off again OCD. ;)
Hopefully, I'll wake up semi-early tomorrow so I can prime my stuff and maybe have enough time after work to finish assembling the final razorback, land speeder, two flamer initiates, and two lascannon initiates. We'll see. I doubt it, as one of the biggest things people do wrong before a tournament is stress about it. I'll probably peruse the rulebook to make sure that every little rule has been cast into memory (I have memorized the book, but its always nice to refresh every once in a while).
The Tournament
First of all, you can find the tournament battle reports on this page. This section is to explain what happened during the tournament. I ended up using list #1, as I didn't have sufficient time to build the remaining Razorback. In the end, it helped me out a little bit. But not much. Either way, I would have gotten destroyed. I ended up with zero wins, two losses, and one draw. And you'll find out why in the battle reports. The turnout was lower than normal, when I have come in to watch tournaments. It numbered 14 players, with a pretty broad spectrum of armies. Only about 40% of the total armies were Space Marine chapters. Unfortunately, another 25% were Imperial Guard armies.
I need to say that this was one of the worst tournament experiences I've had in a very long time. It wasn't due to my opponents, as they were some cool people. There were a few glaring problems, however. First, the scenarios. They were crap. I was led to believe prior to the tournament that we would be using the Nova-style missions, to which, I was extremely pleased with. When I've played with the guys at the store during open gaming, we use these missions extensively. However, it wasn't to be. Instead, we were subjected to missions that purposely unbalanced the game, changed the rules of 40k, and prevented entire army builds from having any success at all. The army I brought had zero chance of winning the tournament given the scenarios we played with. Had I known this before hand, I would have strongly reconsidered losing sleep to ensure my hybrid army was built. Or I'd have brought Black Tide and won every game. Yes, I know; a completely uncompetitive archetype. But the Black Tide would have dominated. The point is, there was no way to predict that my army would be irrelevant. You can find out more about the scenarios on the battle report page.
The second thing that made me super emo was when my first round opponent (we'll call him Bill) called the judge over because he didn't think I should be able to use the rules in my codex. In other words, he felt that because the Black Templars codex was so old, it should be auto-updated to use the 5th Edition Space Marine wargear. I tried explaining that Games Workshop says to use the printed codex over the rules in the rulebook (and showed the rule), and even offered up the FAQ to support this conclusion. However, somehow the judge agreed with him, so I was forced to use completely different wargear than my army uses and is literally built AROUND. Ironically (and hypocritically), the judge didn't let me get around my 4th Edition special rules such as 'Kill Them All' and 'Righteous Zeal'. So I was forced to continue using the crap special rules, while being forced into using updated wargear.
I'm not even angry that my opponent called the judge over, it is the fact that judge blatantly went against everything Games Workshop has said in regards to older codices. What am I supposed to do? How is it my fault that GW hasn't updated the codex? Changing the current printed word of the codex to suit another army is bad. It screwed me throughout the rest of the tournament, as 4th Edition smoke launchers are critically important to ensure the transport's survival. There are few things going for the BT, and when the judge takes one of them away, there is a problem. I later asked if he would have ruled the same had I been playing my Drop Pod army, and he said that he would have updated my Drop Pod Assault rules to the new ones as well. I would have been extremely annoyed at that. Beyond belief.
In addition to those two things, I drew the worst possible opponents imaginable for my army. First round was IG blob with 150+ infantry that scenario completely favored. Because of the large amount of setup time, movement/shooting time for the IG, and the judge thing...time was not on my side. We were only allowed 2 hours per game, so this match up only allowed me to get in three turns my first game. Barely. Very few players finished a complete game the whole tournament.
The second game also favored my opponent completely. It was like the TO was doing it on purpose. A large part of the scenario centered around killing your opponent's HQs; however, because I was playing a Space Wolves player with 4 HQs, this was an impossible task to accomplish as he just hid them behind LOS blocking terrain all game (the other mission rules prevented me from getting to them). My last opponent was a Necron player using a Destroyer-wing army. Because of the scenario, his army was perfectly suited for the task at hand but I managed to pull out a draw.
Lastly, I was told prior to the tournament that every army needed to be compiled using Army Builder and that we needed 5 copies of the army printout (3 for opponents, 1 for the TO, and 1 for yourself). None of the players except the Necron player and I used AB to create our lists. Of us two, only I brought an extra copy for the other player. Going around the tournament, I noticed that only half of the players brought copies for their opponent and they were all woefully lacking (i.e. points values not on the sheets, complete wargear not listed, transports changed around mid-tournament, etc). Without using AB, how am I to know if my opponent is using a legal list? I don't. It was ridiculous.
I need to say that this was one of the worst tournament experiences I've had in a very long time. It wasn't due to my opponents, as they were some cool people. There were a few glaring problems, however. First, the scenarios. They were crap. I was led to believe prior to the tournament that we would be using the Nova-style missions, to which, I was extremely pleased with. When I've played with the guys at the store during open gaming, we use these missions extensively. However, it wasn't to be. Instead, we were subjected to missions that purposely unbalanced the game, changed the rules of 40k, and prevented entire army builds from having any success at all. The army I brought had zero chance of winning the tournament given the scenarios we played with. Had I known this before hand, I would have strongly reconsidered losing sleep to ensure my hybrid army was built. Or I'd have brought Black Tide and won every game. Yes, I know; a completely uncompetitive archetype. But the Black Tide would have dominated. The point is, there was no way to predict that my army would be irrelevant. You can find out more about the scenarios on the battle report page.
The second thing that made me super emo was when my first round opponent (we'll call him Bill) called the judge over because he didn't think I should be able to use the rules in my codex. In other words, he felt that because the Black Templars codex was so old, it should be auto-updated to use the 5th Edition Space Marine wargear. I tried explaining that Games Workshop says to use the printed codex over the rules in the rulebook (and showed the rule), and even offered up the FAQ to support this conclusion. However, somehow the judge agreed with him, so I was forced to use completely different wargear than my army uses and is literally built AROUND. Ironically (and hypocritically), the judge didn't let me get around my 4th Edition special rules such as 'Kill Them All' and 'Righteous Zeal'. So I was forced to continue using the crap special rules, while being forced into using updated wargear.
I'm not even angry that my opponent called the judge over, it is the fact that judge blatantly went against everything Games Workshop has said in regards to older codices. What am I supposed to do? How is it my fault that GW hasn't updated the codex? Changing the current printed word of the codex to suit another army is bad. It screwed me throughout the rest of the tournament, as 4th Edition smoke launchers are critically important to ensure the transport's survival. There are few things going for the BT, and when the judge takes one of them away, there is a problem. I later asked if he would have ruled the same had I been playing my Drop Pod army, and he said that he would have updated my Drop Pod Assault rules to the new ones as well. I would have been extremely annoyed at that. Beyond belief.
In addition to those two things, I drew the worst possible opponents imaginable for my army. First round was IG blob with 150+ infantry that scenario completely favored. Because of the large amount of setup time, movement/shooting time for the IG, and the judge thing...time was not on my side. We were only allowed 2 hours per game, so this match up only allowed me to get in three turns my first game. Barely. Very few players finished a complete game the whole tournament.
The second game also favored my opponent completely. It was like the TO was doing it on purpose. A large part of the scenario centered around killing your opponent's HQs; however, because I was playing a Space Wolves player with 4 HQs, this was an impossible task to accomplish as he just hid them behind LOS blocking terrain all game (the other mission rules prevented me from getting to them). My last opponent was a Necron player using a Destroyer-wing army. Because of the scenario, his army was perfectly suited for the task at hand but I managed to pull out a draw.
Lastly, I was told prior to the tournament that every army needed to be compiled using Army Builder and that we needed 5 copies of the army printout (3 for opponents, 1 for the TO, and 1 for yourself). None of the players except the Necron player and I used AB to create our lists. Of us two, only I brought an extra copy for the other player. Going around the tournament, I noticed that only half of the players brought copies for their opponent and they were all woefully lacking (i.e. points values not on the sheets, complete wargear not listed, transports changed around mid-tournament, etc). Without using AB, how am I to know if my opponent is using a legal list? I don't. It was ridiculous.
Final Thoughts
Ok, so now that you've read the battle reports, you'll be on the same page as I am. Yeah, the scenarios made the games "interesting", but they had absolutely no place in a competitive tournament. The fact that the guy writing these (Note: was NOT the Tournament Organizer) supposedly likes to occasionally "shake up the metagame" to make things more "fun". Really? I'm pretty sure that most of the players there, even the eventual tournament winner, thought the missions were completely and utterly ridiculous. Changing the rules of each codex and the rulebook is a bad thing. It promotes unbalanced game-play, and is not fair to the players. Note only were the scenarios not play-tested, they were poorly written and hard to understand.
Thinking about my list and how it performed in battle, I do have a couple thoughts. First, I determined that I would have been better off taking power weapons over power fists in the CC oriented lists. I had thought about it, but in the end, I chose to stick with the PF for insurance reasons. The PF is always a safe bet, but I like to kill more at initiative 4 whenever possible. I can take the risk of a dreadnought getting into my face.
The second main thing I noticed was that I was correct in my belief that only two units of each type of crusader squad would hurt me. The shooty units ended up getting shot up in each game and usually eliminated, preventing them from claiming their respective objectives. Now, the scenarios were partially to blame for that, as I usually jump them in the Razorbacks if they are taking too much damage. Unfortunately, in mission #1, I couldn't claim if I did that and in mission #2, my razorbacks died early because of the easy vehicle kills. The second list I created would have stood a better chance at winning, but ultimately, would have still had to scale a nearly impossible to climb mountain to be successful. Possible, but very unlikely.
With that being said, the terminators were immensely useful. They got multi-charges off in every single game, killing multiple squads a charge. But it wasn't enough, as my scoring units were forced out of position by the scenario's whims. In Nova-styled battles, I believe I could have beaten every single list at the tournament easily (provided I had been able to use my 4th Edition rules like I was supposed to). But such is life. I wasn't mad I brought a "real" competitive BT list to the tourney, as I couldn't have predicted the shenanigans that were to ensue.
Will I go back there to play? Probably, if only to see if the crap continues. The times that I had gone in to observe the tournaments, the scenarios seemed at least fair to everyone. So I guess I'll give the store another chance, but it'll likely be from behind a Dark Eldar army. But I will check out tournaments at other stores in the area, namely at The Source (makes me sad face, because its a long drive). Otherwise, I plan on attending several national level tournaments this next year, so I'll have real competitive tournaments to look forward if Misty Mountain Games fails us again. Hopefully it won't come to that.
Thinking about my list and how it performed in battle, I do have a couple thoughts. First, I determined that I would have been better off taking power weapons over power fists in the CC oriented lists. I had thought about it, but in the end, I chose to stick with the PF for insurance reasons. The PF is always a safe bet, but I like to kill more at initiative 4 whenever possible. I can take the risk of a dreadnought getting into my face.
The second main thing I noticed was that I was correct in my belief that only two units of each type of crusader squad would hurt me. The shooty units ended up getting shot up in each game and usually eliminated, preventing them from claiming their respective objectives. Now, the scenarios were partially to blame for that, as I usually jump them in the Razorbacks if they are taking too much damage. Unfortunately, in mission #1, I couldn't claim if I did that and in mission #2, my razorbacks died early because of the easy vehicle kills. The second list I created would have stood a better chance at winning, but ultimately, would have still had to scale a nearly impossible to climb mountain to be successful. Possible, but very unlikely.
With that being said, the terminators were immensely useful. They got multi-charges off in every single game, killing multiple squads a charge. But it wasn't enough, as my scoring units were forced out of position by the scenario's whims. In Nova-styled battles, I believe I could have beaten every single list at the tournament easily (provided I had been able to use my 4th Edition rules like I was supposed to). But such is life. I wasn't mad I brought a "real" competitive BT list to the tourney, as I couldn't have predicted the shenanigans that were to ensue.
Will I go back there to play? Probably, if only to see if the crap continues. The times that I had gone in to observe the tournaments, the scenarios seemed at least fair to everyone. So I guess I'll give the store another chance, but it'll likely be from behind a Dark Eldar army. But I will check out tournaments at other stores in the area, namely at The Source (makes me sad face, because its a long drive). Otherwise, I plan on attending several national level tournaments this next year, so I'll have real competitive tournaments to look forward if Misty Mountain Games fails us again. Hopefully it won't come to that.
