CTA '11

With the weekend been and gone team 'Primarch' as we called ourselves did very very well in the 40k at Call to Arms '11 in Wellington.

I played my Eldar list which I have not really changed since Masters last year so it was dual Night Spinner harassment and super clowns all the way as usual. I played Ryan Lister first, in hindsight we should have redrawn but we always have fun. So after I had given him a good beating on Friday afternoon in a practice game he retaliated with psychotrope grenades doing a number on my Avatar and Harlequins(both times getting reduced to 1 attack and hit automatically!!!) and pretty soundly winning.

Next I played Jared Odom(ithink) with a mobile Kosarro Khan bike list. He had just been defeated by Cody's Dark Eldar in round 1 and to get me next was a bit rough as he had only played the list for the first time that day! The Eldar pretty much wiped him off the board with a combined charge of Harlequins and an Avatar causing a record 29 wounds on his bike command squad - 19 of which were invulnerable saves only.

The third game of the day was against Peter Rundlett and his Dark Angels with Belial at the helm. We had a very entertaining game exchanging fire throughout the early turns as the meteor objective came down not far from the centre. I forced Belial and his scoring terminator companion off the crater in the last turns with a combined dual wave serpent tank shock and mass focused fire giving me a big win at the end of the day.

Sunday morning had me play PJ Smith and his motley Ork horde. I can never beat the green tide at tournaments try as I might. After removing an awful lot of Ork models off the board I could not manage to kill 3 seemingly invulnerable Orks contesting the centre of the board in a burning building. These Orks were the remnants of a mob who had spent 11 rounds of assault phases with the Avatar and had not bloody run away even after the Avatar kill their warboss in 1 go! The Avatar rolling like a n00b didn't help and after grabbing/contesting what quarters I could PJ snuck a 1 point lead winning the game.

Last game of the event had me across from Carson and his Mephiston Blood Angel list. After some initial rule discussions and clarifications we got under way (you cannot put Mephiston in a command squad he is not an IC). Carson almost completely null deployed against me in a 3 objective game and I swiftly suppressed what elements arrived each turn. The Harlequins camped the Alpha objective and 1 shotted the BA Assault squad which jumped onto the board. The Avatar had no close combat, content to patrol between 2 objectives throwing his Wailing Doom at things. The 2 units of Assualt terminators gave me pause but some Doom aided focus fire had them worn down. Mephiston fell prey to Runes of Warding losing 3 wounds to perils while mass fire got the last 2. I ended with my farseer solo charing his remaining incomplete tactical squad to pull them off their objective. This with plenty of Eldar left on the table gave me a big win to end the competition on.

Wil used a Blood Angel build he came up with last weekend! As the Sisters are still a work in progress. He used two Assault squads in discounted Landraiders, a stormraven carrying a Reclusiarch lead Death Company and Death Company dread, 10 sniper and ML scouts and a ML devastator squad. Bit of a straight forward smash you in the face build and it worked a charm for him. I believ he only lost 1 game! The competitive beast which was nerfed by the Tyranid codex returned for his last tourney in NZ before he heads to Canada.

Cody and his Dark Eldar were on a roll with 4 wins and a draw! Lords in Sydney was obviously a good experience for him and he learnt some lessons which showed. The army itself also looked great on the tables, if I do say myself ;D Cody had some tough opponents but he focused on the missions and kicked some arse!

Ryan after giving me a slap in round 1 went on to also only have 1 'donut'(no point) defeat and his foot slogging Grey Knights went on to multiple victories. I will have to get a rundown on his games and had little tim e to before I headed home.

With this fine performance from the team where did this leave us? Well, Ryan took the best Sportsman medal and came 5th overall! Will got the bronze medal with 3rd, I scored both best painted and 2nd overall medals and Cody rocked it with gold for 1st place! We won 'em all!! I also was presented with an award for best presented for the whole event, thats out of all the game systems in play at Call to Arms this year.

I must say results aside I thoroughly enjoyed myself, Hagen did a wonderful job as TO even if every game he came and told my opponents to destroy my Nightspinners for bonus TO points! It was awesome talking to Wes Barclay as usual, still not facing up against him, I'll grudge match next time. We came up with some very cool ideas for some future projects and conversions including a campaign weekend which was met with some enthusiasm by those included... watch this space... What a great send off for Wil with the group he plays with taking all the top spots, he'll have to berate us and keep us mean from afar.