Friday Night WM/H

+Maurus Markwalder and +Andre Suwanda impresing the locals with their WM/H tactics.

Last night we were playing at the Tactica FLGS that we don't get that often to because it's a primarily 40K bunker. However, +Andreas Balmer was int he mood for a game and four more joined, so we basically steamrollered the place. While playing I overheard this dialogue:

40K veteran 1 - "oh, is it WM night?"
40K veteran 2 - "guess so..."

At the end of the evening some guy even purchased a Convergence battle box, let's see we can play him soon. :-D

My game against +Andreas Balmer went pretty bad - he basically had nothing other than the Thunderhead to really kill any of my warbeasts in Runes of War, but he simply outmaneuvered me. (the objective markers on the images count as flags in Incursion.)

At the end of his turn 1 everything had moved forward; I was glad he had the Stormblades not on the side where I had my heavies. I wanted to have the center flag

On my turn, everything ran forward. The Axer was already in a prime position next to the Runeshapers.

On +Andreas Balmer's turn, the Black 13 decided to go up these funky WHFB stairs.

At the end of his turn 2, I had basically lost the game. His infantry sat on the flag in the center, the flag to the right was held by a Stormcaller solo, the flag on the left where all my heavies were sitting had disappeared.

Here, both the scenario and the board were a problem for me because I had no mini with a base small enough to go through that stone arc in the center. I figured I would do well enough passing the arc on its left side with my heavies, but especially once the left flag had disappeared I had 30pts of my army doing nothing for most of the game.

On my turn 2 I hit back and I hit hard. pDoomshaper cast onto the Axer his own animus, the Storm Troll's animus, and Fortune. The Axer moved forward, performed a Thresher Attack, and emptied the ranks of Gun Mages and Boomhowler & Co. The Runeshapers on the right moved to the flag on the right assisted by the Storm Troll, but as I was to find out the Storm Troll is good for nothing in melee.

On his turn 3, the Thunderhead connected with the Axer in the center, but couldn't take him down because of Whelp Shedding.

On my turn 3, Mulg killed a Firefly without a problem plus a Stormcaller. The EBDT killed two Black 13 (which was illegal as it turned out 24h later). The Mauler attacked the Thunderhead, but couldn't one-round him. The right flank was lost, the Storm Troll and the last Runeshaper were just in for cosmetics. pDoomshaper feated with pretty much the entire Cygnar army in his CTRL.

At this point I did another really bad mistake: all my warbeasts were full on fury with eEiryss sneaking up into pDoomshaper's back - if anybody had hit him, he couldn't have transferred damage. I really need to remember that for the future.

Andreas finished the game quickly in his turn - eNemo ran to the flag on the right, dominated it, boom - 5 CP. Congrats. :-D

Testing shooty Trolls

+Botond Gati calculating threat ranges - you can't say that guy is not prepared!

So +Gergely Gati has this three games challenge going on where he tries to make me and +Botond Gati play more games by giving treats to the victor. Of course we'd also do it just for the fun of it, but I guess we won't tell him. :-D

The whole point behind this challenge is that pDoomshaper Runes of War T4 is my rock solid primary list:

Hoarluk Doomshaper, Shaman of the Gnarls - WB: 7
- Earthborn Dire Troll - PC: 10
- Mulg the Ancient - PC: 12
- Mountain King - PC: 20
Janissa Stonetide - PC: 3
Troll Whelps - PC: 2
Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes - Leader & 3 Grunts: 3
- Stone Scribe Elder - Elder 1
Trollkin Runeshapers - Leader & 2 Grunts: 3
Trollkin Runeshapers - Leader & 2 Grunts: 3

However, I have been struggling a long time with what to pick as my secondary list; pMadrak, pGrim, eGrim, pGrissel, and eGrim again have all been in the loop. I obviously see the the benefits of eGrim, but I got quite disillusioned with him as he is not the über-assassination warlock that I hoped him to be. The problem I see with eGrim is ranges and LOS: he needs LOS to key pieces of the opponent's army to cast Mortality plus he needs to have them in range. Also all other units have to be well orchestrated to be in the proper positions on feat turn etc.

Disclaimer: whenever you see a Mauler in the pictures, he is proxying as a Bomber until the new Bomber arrives. ;-) I want to run two Bombers in the future because, you know, more Dakka. Botond resulted in calling them the "Bomber-Bomber" and the "Mauler-Bomber" for convenience which made perfect sense. :-D

We kept playing Incursion throughout all games.

Game 3/3 - Hunters Grim vs. eVayl

I went first, end of my first turn. The Burrowers got the Burrow order, the marker is in front of the Kriel Stone.

Botond started to shoot, but so far no significant losses.

On the left flank, the Fennblades start a piece trading game of vengeance and counter-vengeance. In the center, the Burrowers and the double Bombers take down the Angelius on eGrim's feat turn.

Botond kills the Burrowers and some Fenns, but other than that I am still ok. Then Botond puts his second Angelius right in front of eGrim's nose and tauntingly asks if I have a plan to deal with it. I honestly tell him I don't because the Angelius has reach, therefore is in melee, and therefore all my ranged attacks are useless. Now I know why +Robert Lundgren says that the Dire Troll Blitzer and his animus are worth something. ;-) 

In desperation, my best plan was this: ignore the Angelius and kill eVayl instead before the Angelius kills me next turn. Fennblades use Vengeance to get in melee with eVayl. Muggs got to do a useless attack against the Angelius while eGrim moved away and set the stage for the assassination. The two Bombers move and throw four Bombs onto the Fennblades, always boosting the blast damage against eVayl. eVayl dies thanks to some lucky dice rolling.

This was actually the first time ever that I defeated Botond. Yet the winning move was not the result of clever tactics that dominated the game, but grew out of desperation. On the other hand one can argue that if you can score a homerun in a desperate situation, that IS clever tactics. Either way, this game showed me how important the two Bombers are. If you want to defeat shooty Trolls, kill the Bombers first.

Game 1/3 - Calandra vs. pVayl

My Calandra list:

Calandra Truthsayer, Oracle of the Glimmerwood - WB: +5
- Trollkin Runebearer
- Dire Troll Bomber - PC: 10
- Dire Troll Bomber - PC: 10
- Troll Impaler - PC: 5
- Pyre Troll - PC: 5
Gatorman Witch Doctor - PC: 3
Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes - Leader & 3 Grunts: 3
- Stone Scribe Elder - Elder 1
Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters - Cylena & 9 Grunts: 10
Pyg Burrowers - Leader & 9 Grunts: 6

Credits here belong to Daniel Pawelka aka. Snot as my Calandra list is heavily influenced from his WTC list.
The idea is here to do the same thing as with eGrim, yet with less complexity. Calandra basically buffs primarily her own units, key spells and the feat have RNG CTRL, and she has a comfortable 7 FURY, so she takes less thinking power which I hope will pay out while learning her list first and under stress at tournaments later.

Calandra is the one with the purple skirt so far. ;-)

This is how we set up.

This is how it ended. Botond used his Blighted Nyss Striders to quickly kill off my Nyss Hunters. After that his Warbeasts focused on killing my Bombers. After that he easily won on scenario with pVayl dominating one flag.

Lessons learned: Nyss Hunters are really hard to be kept alive because Calandra's Star Crossed spells doesn't protect them against ranged fire.

Game 2/3 - Calandra vs. pVayl

This is how we set up...

... and I decided to do the most stupid thing ever: protecting my Nyss Hunters with my Burrowers.

After Botond's turn 1, 3 out of 10 Burrowers were left. Blighted Nyss Striders again.

This is how it ended. Botond won on scenario again by dominating the flag. With my Pyg Burrowers all but gone and Botond's entire army out of charge range, my second big mistake was in this game to run my Nyss Hunters into B2B contact with the Blighted Nyss Striders to stop their shooting - but I forgot to zombify them with my Gatorman Witch Doctor, so that didn't help a lot. :-/

Lessons learned: ah **** it. Calandra isn't as easy to play as I envisioned. Any shooty army is a tough challenge to her weak defenses. I think I should challenge +Andre Suwanda and his retribution next.

Game 3/3 - Calandra vs. pVayl

This is how we started. Botond went first and was able to kill three Burrowers already in their AD zone, but right after that they successfully burrowed to safety.

My last turn which was a key moment. As usual the Nyss Hunters died quickly, though I left one back to zombify the unit. Then I spotted pVayl standing next to the Typhon, so Calandra cast Star Crossed, popped her feat and cast the Impaler's animus on each Bomber leaving her without any Fury. The Bombers dropped four bombs onto the Typhon and brought pVayl down to two health points.

After that, the Kettle had a Stinger emerge who killed Calandra in return.

Lessons from this game:

• If the Impaler had cast his animus onto a Bomber once, Calandra would still have had Fury left.
• If the Runebearer had decreased the cost of her Star Crossed spell, she'd still have had Fury left.
• Calandra is less complex to play than eGrim, but Calandra-Impaler-Runebearer need to be well orchestrated. Oh, and don't forget the Gatorman Witch Doctor.
• Calandra is as devastating with assassination on her feat turn as eGrim is. eGrim gives Snipe for free to anyone and can drop the target's defense up to four points, but Calandra hits like a train as soon as her Bombers are within range.

Conclusion

After these training games I feel very comfortable that Calandra finally IS my new secondary list for 2014, so expect me to play the pDoomshaper-Calandra combo. With my first victory against Botond eGrim has reestablished his honor, though, and I don't think he is that bad anymore. However, to all those guys who are rejoicing how often they win with eGrim: you are either way smarter than I am or you should get tougher opponents.

2013 Zürich Open

That's the view you get on the city center from the terrace of the Zürich Open.

For months we were looking forward to it and now it's history already - the first WM/H tournament in the city of Zürich ever, the 2013 Zürich Open! +Gergely Gati and +Sven Emmert worked tirelessly for weeks to make it happen and they created an event that is on par with other European tournaments! Thank you guys for this big effort!

+Gergely Gati and +Sven Emmert, the guys who made this possible.

Winners got trophies... (1st to 3rd from left to right)

...medals...

...and certificates.

The corresponding palyers also got "best faction general" badges.

The Winners

Josch got a special newbie prize as the first game at the tournament was his 8th game ever. :-) Welcome to the community, Josch. :-)

ePhilipp got best Trollbloods general. pPhilipp, that would be me. I feel a grudge coming up. :-D

+Dante Suwanda and +Botond Gati both happily shared 4th rank. In six years their names will be known all over Europe - in some parts they already are. ;-)

Our German guests came for winning this thing and so they did. Riccardo Rubbiani with Skorne won 3rd place.

+Dominic Beyeler defended our Swiss honor by placing 2nd.

1st place went to a German again, namely Magnus Matz.

My games

I am trying a new system for writing my game reports in hopes to improve their readability. In case you care, drop me a feedback if you think it's better now or not.

Game 1 - eGrim vs Dante Suwanda's eSeverius

Early game

Dante Suwanda had never played against eGrim, so I had some sort of advantage there. My Fennblades aggressively charged, my Scattergunners were moving into position behind them. Alas, the two Warjack's in his center proved to be too strong to inflict any significant damage really.

Midgame

The game went back and forth without any significant advantages, just the infantry on both sides died.

Endgame

In the end, Dante's Warjack tanked through the center and killed eGrim with their reach weapons. My big big big mistake here was that the Impaler was the only Troll not at his Fury limit, so I couldn't transfer neither to the Bomber nor the Pyre Troll although they still had full health. :-/

Game 2 - pDoomshaper (Runes of War T4) - vs. Patrick Liebi's eSorscha

Early game

Patrick spread out his forces, so I decided to have the Runeshapers run on my left flank. They were perfect for that job since they are very autonomous plus I somehow had to deal with the two zones that need to be controlled/contested.

Midgame

Patrick popped his feat early and had his Conquest charge my warbeasts; Mulg and the Mauler melted like butter in the sun. On the left flank the Runeshapers were hacking a blood path through the Winterguard.

Endgame

My situation grew so desperate I even had the Krielstone unit charge the Conquest just to keep it busy - and with their Tough rolls they even managed to do so. Yet in the end, the sheer Khador power was overwhelming and pDoomshaper got killed when even he himself had no other option left than to charge into close combat. (running down the clock was no option as Patrick still had plenty of time left)

Game 3 - eGrim vs. Robi Deola's eBaldur

Early game

I went for my eGrim list because I am still sort of hoping that shooty Trollbloods are my best hope against teleporting Circle. However, with eBaldur I was soon to find out that his armor buffs make my damage rolls go puff.

Midgame

During Midgame, eBaldur got dangerously close to my eGrim. However, his Druids' solo had some sort of spell that wouldn't let me cast spells on him, so Mortality was out of the question. Also it was his feat turn, so I gave him bombs, Scatterguns and the full load by eGrim's group, but to no avail. After that, eBaldur moved away to happily camp behind a wall.

Endgame

In the end Robi won on control points because he managed to clear the zone to the right by killing my Pyre Troll.

Speed up!

And we were both dangerously close to deathclocking each other.

Game 4 - eGrim vs. Rodrigo Recinos pLylyth

Early game

I didn't like this table at all - the two houses near my deployment zone meant I'd have to split my army in two and have them join again once they passed them. :-/

Midgame

The Incursion flag to my left disappeared and I continued to dislike this game as it put Rodrigo into a stronger position with his refused flank. However, eGrim saw that flag in the center of the table and started to move toward it.

Endgame

eGrim dominated that flag as if it were the last thing to do ever. Fennblades died and to a lesser degree the Scattergunners, but eGrim couldn't be moved og his flag. On the right, Rodrigo's unit controlled the flag on and off because I kept sending infantry over, so I accumulated my CP's quicker than he did. It also helped big time that he forgot to use pLylylth's feat. I'm sure he won't be so nice again, but I did clearly win on CPs. :-)

General observations

I finally ranked 15 out of 17 players. At the last three tournaments I have been able to win my last (in the "cellar duel" as we call them in German), so I see trend there of becoming the best among the worst. :-) If I can work out the big mistakes described above, I should be able to slowly move into the midfield on the scoring charts. :-)

Monster Brawl Basel (MBB) 2013

Getting ready for the MBB 2013 - the Tau didn't make the trip back. ;-)

The MBB is a tournament usually taking place at the Gymnasium Liestal near Basel, Switzerland. The tournament is located in the school's cafeteria and its patio which offer tons of space and first class catering. Honestly, at the venue I had my best meal and the best price at a Swiss tournament ever:

Ice Tea, country potatoes with sour cream, ratatouille, and roasted chicken.

Before we could have lunch, some major gaming had to be done with my Trollbloods, of course.

Game 1 - pGrim vs. The Old Witch

I decided to pick my Grim list since I figured I would need some shooting in this match-up against high DEF infantry. This game I played against Nicolas "Lt_Gaga" Bajic from Konstanz who picked his Old Witch list.

This is how we set up.

Nicolas went first and surprised me how quickly his troops advanced.

In my first I tried to establish a firebase on my left flank with my Trolls and pGrim, after that the Fennblades cautiously charged.

On his turn, Nicolas' cavalry charged in and anything but totally annihilated the Nyss Hunters on the right. The Fennblades were melting like butter in the sun, too.

Desperate to get the ball rolling, pGrim tried to cast "Marked for Death" onto the Old Witch, but just fell a couple millimeters short (yes, I measured the control range prior to that). The Bomber got the Impaler's animus and started to shoot the warjack letting the Old Witch suffer the blast damage. Unfortunately, this wasn't enough to kill her.

Naturally, all of Nicoles units closed in on pGrim now.

On my turn nothing really happened, I was just trying to attack as many of his units as possible.

On his turn, Nicolas won the game with six CP as his Old Witch was camping alone in the zone for three turns.

Once the game was over, +Botond Gati pointed out Nicolas couldn't have won because he didn't destroy his mission objective, so the Old Witch couldn't dominate the zone. With the tournament organizers we agreed that Nicolas got 3 CP for controlling the zone and a caster kill instead - pGrim was holding the line like a boss with his high DEF, but obviously it would have been only matter of time to finish him off.

Lunch!

Möru entertaining everyone else. :-)

Game 2 - pGrim vs. eKreoss T4

Well, so finally I had to eat the sour apple and play against +Dante Suwanda evil list - he only had this list for the entire tournament, BTW, so you can guess how good it is. Basically it's just a sea of Menoth infantry you can't get rid of. Once again I picked my pGrim list because I figured throwing templates is my best chance.

This is how we set up.

My Trollbloods carefully moved forward to stay out of charge range and shoot them next turn.

The Protectorate moved to the flags and took a couple shots, but nothing that really mattered.

The Fennblades on the left charged carefully with everyone except three staying back for a countercharge after Dante's countercharge next turn. The Bomber started to throw templates, but only could throw one as he got knocked down because of some foul eKreoss magic. The Nyss on the right did a couple CRAs. Grim also popped his feat.

Here, Dante's infantry simply walked in and started to thin out my lines. It turned out pGrim was way too far in the back, so most unity could still charge.

The Bomber and the Pyre Troll continued to throw one template each, the Impaler annoyed the Menoth Jack with a critical hit on his spear.

Slowly but surely the Fennblades and the Nyss disappeared.

Back in my turn again I shifted everyone to the left except for the Nyss. pGrim, the Impaler, and the Bomber took shots on eKreoss, but on the hill behind the rock he was well enough protected.

In Dante's turn, he essentially charged pGrim and ended this game with an assassination victory.

Game 3 - pGrim vs. eKrueger

Game 3 was against Thomas Fuchs' Circle army. I came here to play my pDoomshaper T4 list as much as possible, but I knew I needed some shooting to get rid of those pesky Shifting Stones no matter what warlock he picks, so pGrim was in for the ride again.

This is how we set up.

This is how my army advanced in turn 1.

This is how much of my army was left after Thomas' turn 1 with all that electricity flying around. At the same time it was also eKruger's feat turn.

In my turn 2, the Bomber charged with the Pyre Troll's animus and heavily crippled the wolf, but didn't kill him. In other words, nothing was really gained here.

Thomas focused on killing my Fennblades and started to throw things around with double handed throws. Okay...

In my turn, pGrim moved, put "Marked for Death" on eKrueger, and shot his gun. The Bomber dropped two bombs on eKrueger and got him down to four health points left. Once again, almost killing someone isn't the same as fully killing someone, so nothing was gained here either.

In return, pGrim got killed...

...with only 51s left on Thomas' clock.

I guess I could have won this by either doing better at assassination or running down the clock - which I didn't notice until the very end of the game, unfortunately. Either way, Circle continues to be a problem for me.

Game 4 - pDoomshaper vs. Kraye

Game 4 was against Werner Schosser's Cygnar Kraye list. Here it helped that I previously was a Cygnar player while Werner wasn't that familiar with Trollbloods. Since I was locked in in my choices I had to play the pDoomshaper list - but I would have done so against his army anyway.

This is how we set up. Evidently, my Rune Shapers on both flanks had to take care of the Ranger's (on both flanks, too), while my Trolls were forming a solid core in the center together with Janissa. I decided to ignore the zone, but try to position pDoomshaper at the flag.

My Trolls moved, the Rune Shapers attempted to throw templates, but were still out of range.

Werner's warjacks essentially moved into cover behind the wall he got from his T4 list while the Hunters were trying to take shots, but other than that nothing really happened.

Now it was time for the Rune Shapers why they are not to be laughed at although they are only three men units. From all the options I had in the center I decided to cautiously move the wall forward to see what Werner would do. I didn't see any benefit in running to his wall and get one round of beatings in return - especially since the Mauler and the EBDT didn't have reach to attack accross his wall.

This was the key turn. Werner wanted to charge accross his wall, but I told him he can't do that unless he has Pathfinder. Very unhappy he decided to stay behind the wall, just to find out after the game that Kraye would have had a fitting spell. :-( The Ranger's moved in trying to kill Janissa, but fortunately they could only run her down to one health point. At this point, Tough rolls were the most cursed thing in Werner's universe. On the right, the Rune Shapers started to have fun with the Minuteman for the rest of the game.

In my turn, I tried to be more risky as things seemed to go in my favor. In the center, the EBDT charged Ryan and ended up in front of Kraye's wall as I figured he's the best model to stay there with his animus. The Mauler moved up and charged Lynch, too. Mulg was just moving, ready to move in wherever he is needed. pDoomshaper popped his feat and started to camp at the flag with three fury.

The moment of truth: both Hunters shot at pDoomshaper, but failed their To Hit rolls. The EBDT ate some damage from the Stormclad's sword, but didn't really care at ARM 20. The Minuteman once again was frustrated of the Rune Shaper's Tough rolls.

The EBDT walked around the wall and one rounded the Stormclad. Mulg charged and one rounded the Centurion. The Mauler ran into Kraye's melee range.

I forgot to take a picture of Werner's turn, so here we are back in my turn again where the EBDT essentially chased Kraye and one rounded him for an assassination.

This game basically taught me that no tournament is over until the last game has been played. Werner was too defensive, didn't have exactly a list that could cope with my three heavies, and of course he suffered bad luck on top of that, too. However, I am sure the next time I play him it will be much harder.

The telling sign I spent my weekend at at tournament. :-)