NOVA Open Games 5-8

SO we are a month out now and at this rate I’m never getting through these things so here we go.

Game 5: Vs Nids

Mission was Table quarters I think.

My opponents list was a bit of a mishmash of tyranid stuff.

Swarm Lord

Hive Tyrant (Heavy Venom cannon, LW/BS, Hive Commander, Armored Shell)

Troops

10 Termagaunts

Tervigon (With Catalyst and maybe some other stuff)

2 squads of Stealers

Elites

2 x 2 Hive Guard

Heavy

Trygon Prime

So lots of points in HQ.  I think he won first turn, Deployed The Tyrant, Swarm Lord and Hive Guard, and Reserved everything else (he was going to outflank the Tervigon. Right away I thought that this was a mistake given his list and mine.  I seized, blew away the swarm lord and 1 of 2 hive guard units turn 1.  Turn 2 his trygon and stealers came in (the stealers hid)  The Trygon then died on my turn.  Then turn 3 his tervigon came in and hid.  I killed the Tyrant, and hive guard, and the game was pretty much all over.  Major win for me I think I won all 3 objectives.  I felt my opponent should have started with everything on the board to overload my target priority, if I have few targets they tend to die.

Gave 6 Vs Space Marines

Mission was Kill points I think

My opponent was running

A thunder fire cannon,

Vindicator

Libby (null zone)

Land Raider with TH/SS termies

2 Iron Clad Dreads

Some tactical squads.

This was a close game that came down to objectives (which was the 3^rd tie breaker) I held 3-2.  It was very back and forth with me killing some of his stuff, then he would hit me hard and kill my stuff.

Game 7 VS Mech IG

Mission was Objectives I believe

This was a very close game my I won the roll off to go first and go seized.  This got a bunch of my stuff get hurt by his 2 Mantacores. We tied all 3 objectives and I lost by 15 VPs.  Great game, though thinking back on it I think he may have gotten one extra turn (we went 7) because I have the feeling that he went last, and I know I got seized.  But the game was so good it did not even matter.

Game 8 Vs Wolves

Mission was Quarters.

 His list was pretty standard SW fare with a Wolf Lord and 2 Cav.  I won first turn and my opponents dice were terrible.  Turn 1 I killed 5of 6 long fangs in 1 unit (they fail morale), entirely killed another unit of Long Fangs and killed 2 Rhinos.  On his turn he kills nothing, I then I kill the one of his speeders, his other long fangs, his cav down to the lord.  This pattern pretty much continues as he cannot make a 3+ save.

SO overall I end up 4-4, not too bad given that all my losses were close.

NOVA open Game 4:

Now standing at 1-2 I was really feeling the pressure to finish out day 1 as 2-2 (as my goal going in was to try to finish with more wins than losses).  I lined up across the table from a Codex Space Marine Player, and looking at his list I felt pretty good about my chances.  His list consisted of Vulkan, 3 Tactical squads, a Thunderfire Cannon, A typhoon speeder, a Land Raider, A Libby with Null Zone and Gate, 2 MM attack bikes, and some TH/SS termies.

Mission was Objectives, Quarters, and KPs, my opponent won the roll off and gave me first turn.  I deployed in one quarter and he deployed opposite me.  He reserved 2 of his tactical squads.

At this point I honestly don’t remember much of what happened turn by turn.  This game was my one contentious game of the tourney, and unfortunately I think both me and my opponent handled it badly.  He was very concerned that I was moving things too far early on so I took it back and moved them again.  Then it seemed to me that he did not know many of the rules for his particular army (or base rules as well.) So the game took a while as I let him take back a few moves because he did not realize that they would cause things like dangerous terrain.  The game came down to turn 5 being the last turn due to time, and my opponent was able to control 2 objectives and contest 2 of mine.  One with his terminators killing a purifier squad, and the other with a librarian Gating himself to the objective from inside the land raider.  This was a contentious point which ate up some time, as I was not sure that gate would work from inside of a vehicle, but the judges ruling said it could so he was allowed to do so.  Honestly though I had forgotten that he had the power, so that was my fault as I could have deployed to block him out of 3” from the objective, and cast warp quake to attempt to prevent the move had I thought about it.  We rolled to see if the game would go on and it did.  However, since we were up against time the judges had ruled that the game would only continue if both players wanted to go on (which is not a very good ruling, either allow it, or call a hard cap, leaving it to the players can lead to bad blood as in a close game the winning player will never want to go on), my opponent said since he was winning he did not wish to continue.  This attitude upset me (not because he was in the wrong simply because I am just not that competitive as to want to win by a time out), and the game ended on somewhat bad terms.  Reflecting on it later I realized that what I should have offered was to give him the tournament win, score the points as they stood, and finish out the game just to see what would have happened (as that is what I wanted to see).  I think this was made worse because we were both tired.

NOVA tournament Report and Game 1

So I’m back from the NOVA, and I must say that it is the best tournament I have attended to date.  The atmosphere was great and I played 7 good games (one was a little contentious).  I ended up going 4-4 (1-3 the first day and 3-1 the second day) all my losses were extremely close and mostly due to mistakes on my part, and well timed plays by my opponent.

My list

2k Grey Knights

HQ

Crowe

OM Inquisitor in terminator armor w/ Psycannon and 1 servo skull.

Elites

5 Paladins (3 Halberds, Hammer, Sword, 1 Psycannon,, 1 MC Psycannon)

Troops

2 x 10 Purifiers (5 Halberds, Hammer, 4 Psycannons) in Rhino (one squad had psybolts)

2 x 5 Strikes (Psycannon, Hammer) in Razorback with Psybolts and search lights.

Heavy

3 x Dread with 2 TL auto-cannons and psybolts.

The list functioned well all tournament and the shooting power was quite devastating at times.  Most games I worked around trying to take center table and pushing my opponent back.  I also made use of the terrain to keep my opponent from being able to shoot with large portions of their army.

Game 1: Vs Space Wolves (Hulksmash)

Mission was Objectives, Quarters, Killpoints.  Deployment was Pitched Battle.

My opponents list was foot Logan wing and was sporting 24 missiles per turn.

He won the roll to go first and deployed his army across his table edge with a large Squad of 10 Wolf Guard (8 termies) and Logan in the Center of the table.  I deployed in the left corner of the board using the terrain to hide my army from view.  At this point I joked that now that I went through all the trouble to hide my army that I would probably seize….and then I did.

Turn 1:  I moved up which exposed my army to some shooting, and shot one Wolf guard squad down to 1 PA wolf guard, and did a wound or 2 to another.  On his turn he weapon destroyed and immobilized my 2 Razorbacks, which rendered them useless.

Turns 2 -4 We Traded shots but really not much damage was done (I killed a second wolf guard squad and a few of logans squad) His scouts came in and killed a couple of Paladins. 

ON Turn 5 I was moving up the left side with my Purifiers trying to kill a couple more of his units and getting set up to take objectives on turn 6 (and here was my first mistake of the tournament, I though all games were at least 6 turns, because that was the case in the NOVA primers).  His turn 5 he contests one of my 2 objectives and Moves on to a second objective and then we roll and the game ends in my loss. Really not much had been killed I think I was up maybe 2 Killpoints, and we had each killed about 600 points of the others army.  But not realizing it was the last turn cost me the chance to win.  I say chance, because there was no Guarantee that I would have been able to win with another turn, but I certainly had none when I did not grab for objectives on turn 5 ( I could have tried to contest the center objective turn 5 and I certainly would have moved more quickly toward the center if I had know I had fewer turns.

Headed For the NOVA Open.

Over this past weekend I finally figured out the logistics of heading down to VA and participating in the NOVA Open (and purchased my ticket).  This will be my second NOVA style event (I attended the Battle for Salvation GT last October) and by far the largest tourney I have participated in.  All that is left for me to do is determine which of my armies to bring.  I have my Deathwing, who are in the process of being repainted (as my first army the paint job left a little to be desired even for me.), and rearmed post FAQ.  I also have a work in progress Tyranid army, I have been playing around with ideas for.  Finally I have the army that has been my most recent tournament army, which is a Codex Marine biker army.  So on the run up to the NOVA, I’ll try posting up my lists, what my thoughts were behind making them, and what my findings are in play testing.  As we get closer to the tourney, I see what people out there think I should take and probably bring that with me as the list I will run.  So feel free to give any feed back or ask any questions you like about the lists, as I post them.