I called the army I took The Magic Trio of Faith, Hope and Love, because it was lead by three level 2 sorceresses. I wanted to try using a magic-heavy army, and not an overly strong one, as the majority of the players attending the tournament are rather casual, and don’t take overpowered lists (except the local daemon player, and, as I later found out, the Polish druchii guest who won the tourney). The army list:
Sylvia (faith): level 2 on pegasus with Focus familiar and a scroll
Linda (hope): level 2 on steed with an additional spell and Crystal of Midnight (one use; can nominate an enemy wizard at turn start; the wizard must pass an Ld test on 3d6, or forget one spell)
Revy (love): level 2 on foot with an extra power die and a scroll
Reaper: assassin with 4+d3 attacks with KB and re-roll 1’s to wound
Joker: assassin with 4 attacks, rending stars, manbane and bound Steed of Shadows at PL3
2 x 5 harpies
5 dark riders with musician and crossbows
2 x 20 warriors with FC and shields
2 x 10 crossbows with shields
Hydra
Game 1
During the first game I faced the only daemon attending the tournament, because we agreed to have a grudge game already before the tournament.
His army was:
Nurgle herald BSB in a unit of 12 plaguebearers (pretty unkillable for me, and making all units within 12” stubborn)
Two Tzeench heralds with master of sorcery
10 horrors
17 horrors with +1 to cast banner
10 horrors with +1 to cast banner
2 x 5 furies
2 x 5 flesh hounds
3 flamers
The scenario was such that for each unit you kill, you get a kill point if it is core, and 2 kill points for special, rare and characters; in the end, each kill point gave 50 victory points.
We set up: blocks against each other, hydra on the flank, a hound unit on each flank, and all my shooting and magic on my right flank.
I went for dark magic with the whole trio, hoping to destroy flamers with it. Basically, I failed to do this, because my rolls were a bit below average, and the opponent had 8 dispel dice (I had 8 power dice and the bound). I managed to reduce the flamers to half-strength.
On the right flank, where the shades with the Joker assassin were, I made the big mistake of fleeing from the combined charge of furies and hounds (Revy was also in shades, that’s why I fled). Of course, I should have stood and shot at the hounds, and then the assassin would have a chance to kill some of them in CC, as well. But I fled, then rallied, and was charged by the same units next turn any way.
On the left flank, I also made a mistake. I should have rushed the hydra directly forward instead of going around and doing nothing the whole game. She was the only model in my army that could hope to destroy the BSB, and I should have tried to do this.
I supported the shade combat with the remains of my two crossbow units (which had been almost completely decimated by magic at this point). I lost all the units in this combat after a few turns.
On the left flank, my hydra was soon killed by magic, and the block units by combined actions of the nurgle unit and the flesh hounds, whom my warriors couldn’t hope to avoid.
In the end, I had one model standing on the table – Sylvia on her pegasus. The opponent scored 20 kill points, getting an additional 1000 victory points. I only managed to kill furies, and reduce flamers and one unit of hounds to half-strength. This was a bloody massacre, with around 2600 victory point difference.
Game 2
My second game was against a Bretonnian opponent. The army consisted of:
3 x 6 KoTR
7 knights Errant
2 x 5 mounted yeomen
6 pegasus knights
Trebuchet
10 skirmishing archers with flaming arrows
Damsel with the item that gives an additional die unless you roll a 1
Damsel with two scrolls
Paladin with a virtue that gives him better stats but units near him are at -1 Ld
BSB (I assume, the +3CR variant)
The scenario was such where one player got three resource markers that he has to protect. These are assigned to three of his scoring units (any ranked infantry with US 5+, and for Bretonnians also KoTR with 5+ models). If the unit carrying the marker flees or seizes to be scoring, then the marker is lost, and given over to the other player. In the end of the game, each marker gave 200 points.
Sven (my opponent) won the roll for choosing who is the defender, and decided to be the defender himself. He assigned the markers to the three KoTR units.
I deployed my ranked blocks and the hydra in the open field, and had a unit of crossbowmen on either flank. I decided to concentrate my mages on the left flank, except for Revy, who was in the middle in a unit of warriors. Reaper was in the same unit, for Revy’s protection.
I placed Joker into the other unit of warriors (more to the right), hoping to fly him out and into the trebuchet.
I took lore of Metal on the whole Trio, but didn’t manage to roll Spirit of the Forge.
In turn 1, I moved closer in the center, and with magic managed to score a wound on the BSB. The other two sorceresses killed the champion of pegasus knights. Also, I think I lured out a scroll or even two – but one was definitely burned for the bound steed of shadows, which came as a surprise to Sven.
Shooting made a unit of yeomen on the left flank panic, and in the middle I think I killed an errant knight.
In his turn, Sven slightly advanced with his units, but not very much. This gave me time to reposition a bit, facing the right warriors towards his advancing KoTR lance in the right flank, and also moving the warriors and hydra together, hoping that the warriors are charged and not the hydra.
Also, in the next magic phase I managed to kill the BSB, but all my efforts against pegasus knights were fruitless.
Another thing that happened is the yeomen taking position on the hill, and then getting destroyed by a harpy charge.
Seeing all this, Sven moved his pegasus knights much more aggressively to the area where my two mobile sorceresses were:
On the right flank, he also charged my right unit of warriors with the KoTR lance, and moved errant knights much closer:
The warriors won the combat (assassin killed the champion in challenge, other knights killed two warriors, and I had better static CR).
In my turn, I charged the errants with both the warriors with Reaper and the hydra into the errants (Revy had already left that unit). Errants fled, but not far enough to get away from the hydra. His second KoTR unit was now in a position to countercharge my warriors, but I wasn’t really afraid of this.
On the left flank, I made some sneaky manoeuvres to protect Linda. I separated her from the DR unit, and screened her with both DR and the harpies who had just killed the yeomen, so that she couldn’t be charged by pegasus knights. I also moved Sylvia behind the wood, to a safe place.
In his turn, Sven decided not to charge my dark riders and harpies with pegasus knights, and instead destroyed my crossbowmen (and pursued off the board while doing so). He also charged dark riders by KoTR (DR fled but stayed on the table).
On the right flank, things were bad for Sven. His KoTR unit in the middle failed terror and fled (hence giving me one resource marker). His KoTR in combat with my warriors finally broke from combat, hence giving me another resource marker, and a banner, on top of being destroyed. The only little sweetener for Sven was that trebuchet managed to kill half of the other unit of warriors (where the Reaper was hiding).
In my turn, the hydra charged the trebuchet, which fled from terror, and then destroyed the machine. Sorceresses and shooting targeted the third remaining KoTR unit with the sniping spell, trying to reduce it to below five models, and managed to do so by the end of the turn (hence giving me the third marker). The warriors with Reaper charged the fleeing KoTR, and the other warriors totally forgot to charge the archers. Also, harpies charged the two yeomen who had been panicked in the beginning of the game.
In his turn, Sven moves his pegasus knights again to a position where they can charge any direction. He also splits his character from the unit of KoTR on the left flank, and turns him to face Linda, who is currently alone on her own.
The one remaining mounted yeoman wins the combat against harpies, breaks them, and gets them caught.
On the right flank, he rallies his KoTR that fled from terror. He also fires the bows at the hydra (which he was doing already long), but unsuccessfully.
In my turn, I move the hydra towards the remaining unit of KoTR, and I try to lead Linda away from a possible charge. Then I use magic to actually destroy the character who was going to hunt Linda.
Of course, the archers are charged from two sides by warriors and harpies, and are gone.
Pegasus knights then charge dark riders, who manage to avoid breaking. KoTR who had fled from terror move to some weird position, where I charge them with my hydra and Sylvia. They flee, and are caught by Sylvia, who lands in a place where she can be charged by pegasus knights…
Magic destroys the last remaining KoTR, but then Sylvia is killed by pegasus knights.
This was, if I remember correctly, almost 2000 points difference in VP in my favor (600 of them for the markers).
Game 3
This time I played against the Vampire Counts. The opponent’s list was:
Level 1 vampire as general (on steed, with 2+ armour)
Level 1 vampire as BSB (with drakenhoff banner, on steed)
Level 2 vampire on foot, who could increase ghouls over starting size
2 x 10 ghouls
15 or so Grave Guard
8 black knights
Corpse cart with lodestone
5 dire wolves
3 bats
5 wraiths + banshee
The scenario in this case stated that each quarter was worth 250 VP, but could only be claimed and contested by scoring units (non-skirmishing infantry).
Basically, I won this game very easily, due to some very serious luck with dice.
I decided that I will be taking metal lore on sorceresses one by one, until I roll Spirit of the forge, and after that take Dark lore with other sorceresses. Well, I rolled the spells for Linda (with three spells), and she immediately got spell 6 – so I took dark lore with the rest.
In my first turn, I moved Linda and her dark rider unit a bit closer to the black knights, into within 24”. I took four dice to cast Spirit of the Forge, and got 18 as the result. The vampire had no dispel scrolls, so he rolled all his five dispel dice for dispelling. Nevertheless, he didn’t roll high enough, and so the spell went off. Guess how many hits I rolled? 11!!! That’s 2+ to wound, no armor save, flaming (i.e. no regeneration). In one spell (the first spell in the first turn of the game), the whole black knight death star was gone. Here is my opponent, shocked by my magic phase:
Well, after that I flew Joker with his rending stars and manbane closer, and shot at the two characters, scoring a wound on each. Of course, the assassin was killed by a banshee scream in the next turn, but I blocked all the attempts to heal the vampires, and in the next turn killed the general with the Rule of Burning Iron. After that, I just sat back and shot and magicked the army to death.
In the end, the assassin was my only casualty, while the vampires had only Grave Guard, one unit of ghouls and the level 2 vampire remaining alive.
Game 4
This game was against Warriors of Chaos, with the following list:
Tzeench level 2 on barded steed with puppet, talisman of protection and homunculus (spells 1, 6)
Nurgle level 2 on barded steed with 2d6 S3 bound (spells 1, regeneration)
Nurgle level 2 on barded steed with two scrolls (spells 1, quagmire)
6 nurgle knights with banner of rage
6 nurgle knights with bound d6 S4 missile banner
4 dragon ogres
5 mounted marauders, slaanesh
5 dogs
10 marauders on foot, naked, slaanesh
Hellcannon
Of course, I took lore of Metal with all my sorceresses. All of them got spells 1 (sniping) and 4 (2d6 missile), plus Linda also had spell 6 (Spirit of the Forge, baby!)
The scenario was called ambush; after deployment, each player rolled 1d3, and pushed the respective amount of opponent’s units back to the edge of the table, and these units can’t march first turn (but scoring units and scouts couldn’t be pushed this way). Both me and Kamil (my opponent’s name) rolled 3.
You can see the deployment below:
I pushed back both his knights and dragon ogres (the banner of rage knights are the ones between his hands in the picture). He wanted to push back my crossbowmen, but they are scoring units, so he pushed Linda’s dark riders, hydra, and Silvia on her pegasus.
A comment regarding my deployment: I had the Reaper assassin in the middle warriors, and the Joker in shades. I decided that I’ll try to weaken the right flank with magic, while the two blocks plus reaper will try to deal with the only knights on the left flank (I chose to ignore hellcannon, because Joker would be needed for shooting at dragon ogres).
Kamil won the roll for first turn, but let me go first. I advanced a bit with everyone. Crossbowmen with Revy got into the building. Linda, of course, was out of range for casting.
Now, already in the first turn, the dice decided that this game is going to be funny. The only effect I had from my first turn is a miscast by Sylvia, as a result of which she lost a wound, and so did her Pegasus.
Kamil, in his turn, moved all his cavalry forward, but still kept dragon ogres behind the hill (this unit was very important, because we both agreed that it may assault buildings). In this turn, his magic phase was manageable, as casters were partly out of range of things, and nevertheless I used one scroll already.
On the left flank, Kamil also moved both the marauders and the dogs towards my harpies, who were at this point of time behind the hedge. Naturally, in my turn I moved them away to march-block the frenzied knights, and then unleashed shooting on these units from the hill.
On the right flank, I repositioned a bit, getting all casters in range, and revealing the assassin. In my magic phase I managed to score one wound on the Nurgle mage with the Rod (in marauders), but no other spells went off (I was a bit unlucky with rolls, and he was rather lucky).
Now, in Kamil’s second turn, the things started to become more serious. He killed my shades with magic, and I had to use a scroll to save Linda from death. This turned out to be a good decision, as in her next turn, when trying the Spirit of the Forge on the knights with two casters (tzeench and nurgle with rod), she rolled double sixes, and then rolled 10 for number of hits, hence destroying the whole unit except mages. Kamil of course hid his casters in marauders, and then with a miscast rolled 11 (modified to 12), and killed my hydra with an infernal gateway. Also, he killed my dark riders and Linda with magic, which I find to be very sad, and Revy with her crossbowmen found scary, and fled away from the building. By the way, his mages soon left the marauders, and instead shifted to the hellcannon crew, as marauders got reduced to just one guy =)
During the same time, an interesting thing was happening with my Joker assassin. He saw that the dragon ogres are close to the building, and so stood in front of them to prevent a charge on the building (I was being stupid, I know). His rending stars plus manbane shooting and my magic had some effect on the ogres, and only three managed to get to combat with him. They scored 0 wounds on him, as nobody managed to hit. He still lost due to outnumber, and needed snake eyes to prevent an overrun into the building. At this point I had a conversation with my leadership dice, explaining that I really need double ones. Guess what? They agreed, and rolled snake eyes! And after that, in my own turn, when the opponent had spent all dice to stop RoBI on his nurgle mage, the assassin just flew out of the combat behind ogres’ back to shoot at them once again =). The ogres of course had no choice but to face towards the crossbowmen who had just rallied.
On the left flank, there was some action too. The mounted marauders hid behind the wood, while the dogs died from arrows. I placed my warriors without the assassin so as to lure his frenzied knights forward, but then saw that the other warriors would still be in the front of the knights. After that, I used my harpies to bait the knights once again, and this time they were very well showing a flank to my warriors.
So, this is how the battlefield looked by the end of Kamil’s turn 3:
In my turn 4, Revy went out of the crossbow unit, and the unit moved closer to the ogres, to make it impossible to wheel and get Revy. Shooting and magic reduced the ogres to two models.
On the left flank, I wanted to charge the flank of the knights, but failed the fear test. This was very unpleasant… Well, there was another unit of harpies (the first ones failed to rally, btw) – and I used that one to set up another bait for the knights, so that my warriors would have another attempt next turn:
In Kamil’s turn 4, the ogres of course charged the crossbowmen. From six attacks, only one manages to kill a crossbowman. Of course, no wounds were caused back, but crossbowmen still won by one due to a rank and outnumber. The combat lasted for two more rounds, and crossbowmen won each single round. In Kamil’s turn five, dragon ogres broke from combat and ran away (crossbowmen didn’t manage to catch them).
In the middle, the hellcannon finally made something useful. It shot my warriors with reaper assassin, who were ready to charge the flank of the knights (which had just charged the harpies, who fled), and killed one warrior. After that, I failed my panic test, and ran. Again, no charge on the knights’ flank! Well, in my turn 5 they rallied, and the other warriors (who had rallied earlier) came into the charge range of the knights. The knights, to my relief, chose to charge them, and not the warriors who had the assassin inside. I guess, this was because the fleeing path of the warriors without the assassin would cause them to flee off the table on a 5+ roll to flee. So, my warriors with the assassin inside now had the flank of the same knight unit in front of them for the third time.
As for the mages, he tried to run away from my RoBI with his casters (leaving the hellcannon), but I decided to take some risk, and moved my own casters closer, and killed the nurgle mage, and almost managed to put a wound also on the tzeench general with the rending stars of the Joker, who had just flied closer (the wound was saved by his 5+ ward). After that, the general decided to get back to the cannon.
So, this is the snapshot of the table after turn 5:
In my last turn, I charged the fleeing dragon ogres with my crossbowmen (who are behind the building on the picture above), and they fled through the impassable special object in the middle of the table. So, basically, the crossbowmen destroyed the dragon ogres…
I also charged (finally!) the flank of the knights. The Reaper joyously revealed himself, and killed two knights with KB. I think we even forgot to resolve the attacks of my usual warriors =)). Anyway, the knights broke and fled, but to my big disappointment weren’t caught
As a final touch, his general managed to kill mine with an Irresistible Force on his spell 1.
The result was approximately half points destroyed on each side. Counting everything, Kamil won by around 200 points. This was the most enjoyable game of the tournament; it had a lot of sneaky manoeuvring, and some very crazy rolls, which were all the time shifting the balance back and forth.
Game 5
This was also an interesting game, and an enjoyable one, because the opponent is a very good guy, with a very good attitude to the game sportsmanship-wise. He plays dwarfs.
When the pairings were announced, and I saw the table I were going to play on, I was really terrified. I mean, an open field with a piece of difficult terrain in the middle and only two small pieces of it blocking LOS, and a big hill in each deployment zone (in one, just a wide one-level hill, and in the over a smaller hill in the corner, with two layers). A perfect table for the dwarfs!
The opponent’s army:
Thane general with oathstone
Thane BSB oathstone
Runesmith
16 hammerers with FC (of course, immune to fear and terror due to the banner) – general went here
21 longbeards with FC (BSB goes here)
20 warriors with FC
10 thunderers
10 quarrellers
Cannon
2 bolt throwers
Gyrocopter
For me, the biggest problem with this sort of army is that I have nothing that is able to kill dwarfs except hydra and assassin, and the assassin can be killed by his heroes (who are often immune to KB), while the hydra will be the target of all warmachines that have the rune of burning. I thought that the only way to help things for me would be to kill his characters by using lore of metal spell #1 (because they usually all have 1+ armour save).
The scenario also said that the player who controlled the special object in the center at end-game would get +400 VP.
Here is how we deployed:
Explanation: on the hill are cannon on the left and flaming BT on the right; blocks in front are (from left to right) hammerers with general, longbeards with BSB and warriors with runesmith.
My assassins are hidden in the warriors in the middle (Reaper) and shades (Joker).
The picture above, though, is the picture after turn 1 movement – you can see that his Gyro moved and nothing else did. By the end of turn one, after a round of shooting by his warmachines, the hydra was dead (2 wounds scored by the flaming cannon, and another 3 wounds by the ballista on the hill, which was also flaming).
So, I move my warriors forward at full speed, and the crossbows at a speed that allows shooting. The left harpies attack the gyrocopter, and the right harpies screen the gap between the big stone in the middle and the special object (they both block LOS, so I placed Sylvia behind that stone, and wanted to screen her from the BT in the wood).
My shades and rxb shoot at the thunderers, and mages snipe the runesmith, and shut the cannon. By the end of my turn 1, dwarfs use up one scroll, and Joker manages to Steed-charge his flaming bolt thrower (I am sure that if the hydra were still alive, he would have used the second scroll for my bound Steed, because the flaming cannon had already been shut down by spell #2).
In combat, my harpies fight against gyro for three phases, and in my turn 2 finally break and are caught. Assassin kills the champion in first phase of combat, then fails to kill all crew in next phase, but thanks god, in my turn two, he still doesn’t kill the one remaining crew member (and so isn’t there alone in the field by the start of dwarf turn 3).
From the harpies, one unit is destroyed, and another one panicked. End of my turn 2:
In dwarf turn 3, the gyro march-blocks my infantry, and the warriors wheel to refuse Linda LOS to the runesmith. Dwarf shooting reduces my warriors and crossbowmen a bit. Assassin finishes off the last remaining crew member.
I decide to charge his warriors in the flank with my DR, front with shades and rear with assassin. Later, my opponent remembers that he wanted to use the rune of challenge of his general on the assassin, and I allow him to still use it, if he rolls 4+ (which he did). So, in combat, I have only the DR and shades. In retrospect, I should have asked to cancel these charges (I allowed him to use MR of Challenge, so he'd allow to cancel the charges, I'm sure) – just I was already a bit in hurry at that point, and didn’t think enough about this.
My harpies and hydra handlers charge the gyrocopter, which flees, but rolls low enough to get caught by harpies.
In combat with warriors, I win by 2, but he holds. Oh, by the way, during the magic phase one interesting thing happens. My opponent looks into his roster, and goes like “oh, hell, I totally forgot that all my characters are immune to flaming attacks, and that RoBI is a flaming attack”. Basically, the wound that I had already scored on the runesmith with RoBI in reality couldn’t have been scored. Still, we agreed that it stays there, because if I had found out during the first time when RoBI were cast that his characters are immune to its effects, I’d have used magic differently – Revy would be casting the #2 to stop his warmachines from acting, Sylvia would be casting Law of Gold to neutralize his magic items, and Linda would be casting the 2d6 magic missile on his thunderers, and then quarrelers. But anyway, this was the turn when I found out that the decision to take Metal lore on my sorceresses was a bad one – dark lore would have served me so much better.
Ah, and also the assassin was killed in combat with the hammerers.
In dwarf turn 4, shooting panics my warriors with Revy (but without Reaper). Now shades and DR lose the combat against dwarf warriors, and both break. Dwarfs pursue shades, but don’t catch them. Hammerers and longbeards reposition themselves in such a way that the warriors can only charge hammerers.
In my turn, I make a very big mistake – I commit to CC with my whole warrior block instead of just the assassin (who might have killed the general, for example). Anyway, I charge the warriors into hammerers, and they of course don’t break (a note here: I moved a unit of crossbowmen away from the special object, in order to make my warriors unit control the special object, which on this table made the unit controlling it cause fear; I won the combat and I was outnumbering, but I failed to pull off Law of Gold on the unit in the magic phase, and so the unit remained immune to fear and terror).
Well, after that, he charges the shades with warriors (shades accept the charge and kill the runesmith, but then break). This charge also freed the path for his longbeards to flank-charge my warriors, and they of course broke from combat.
He of course didn’t manage to destroy anything else, but in my last turn, Sylvia has a miscast result 4, and he gets half points also for her. Additionally, his warriors control the objective, and hence get 400 more points. Altogether, he won by 1100+ points.
Result
The tournament had 18 participants (it’s Estonia, and my guess is that we only have around 50 players in the whole country), and I ended eighth by battle points, and fifth when counting also points for painting and knowledge test. And I also think that I learned something about using a magic heavy army (this is the first tourney to which I went magic heavy).