Desolation - Part 2

Day One

As I said in the last post, I joined a team of four to enter the Canberra teams Warhammer event ‘Desolation’.

Our team consisted of Myself playing Ogre Kingdoms, John playing the Dark Elves, Eric with the Empire and Scott fielding Warriors of Chaos.

My initial plan was to take notes of each game and lots of photo’s as I went. However that plan didn’t work out as I got caught up having way to much fun and just forgot to write my notes or take as many photo’s as I wished.

The match up system was both teams put forward one of their lists simultaneously. Of their remaining three lists, they choose two to face the list the opponent team presented. That opponent’s captain then picked one of the two lists put forward to face their list.

The team with the lower competition points then got to pick the match ups of the remaining lists in the pool.

Before the event our captain had us go through all the army lists and rate how we thought we would go against them. I have to admit, I guessed at a lot of this. My regular opponents are Dark Elves, Orcs n Goblins, Lizardmen and Dwarfs. Outside of this I wasn’t so comfortable in my process.

Game One. To start the weekend we took on an unnamed team from WaggaWagga, NSW.

In round one I was matched up against fellow Kiwi Abraham M and his High Elves.

His list consisted of Lvl 4 mage lord with Shadow, a BSB noble, level 2 hero with high lore, big block of spearmen, a unit of archers, block of phoenix guard, 2 lion chariots, only 5 dragon princes, 2 bolt throwers and a flame phoenix.

Of the high elves there over the weekend Abe’s was what I considered a nice balanced list without trying to be nasty. I had this down as a close game, mostly as I was unsure about a lot of High Elf tricks. I set up in a slightly spread out deployment, but with more strength given to my right flank. On that edge I had my four mournfang who pushed up slightly as I intended to hang back in the early stages. Abe had a different idea and early on declared a double long distance charge on my mournfang with both his knights and a lion chariot. Not too worried as I didn’t think both would get there I let the charge run, and shook my head as both units somehow got stupidly huge rolls and got stuck in.

My frown was turned upside down though as the dice gods smiled upon the Tribe and both High Elf units failed to cause any wounds. Taking wounds in return the chariot and the knights fled, the chariot was caught and cut down.

The rest of the game was give and take back and forwards, with me concentrating on avoiding the phoenix guard and trying to kill the flame phoenix. I mostly achieved one, and completely failed at the other. That big damn fire bird would not die. I did learn to pay closer attention though, make sure you check what augment spells are on enemy units. Charging spearmen who are under the influence of a Mindrazor is not a good idea. Ever.

In the end the game finished as a 10-10 draw. I had a great time playing Abe, the guy knew the game was just about having fun. Our team won this round 63-17.

At the end of round one we had a nice lunch break. We didn’t have to go looking for food though as the TO had arranged a spread at the venue. Hot chips, BBQ chickens, salads, fresh rolls, you can’t go wrong.

Game Two. Second up we came against team Super Hyper Alpha Force Team (S.H.A.F.T) from the ACT and I was paired up against Tom and his Tomb Kings.

Tom was running a High Priest with the Tomb Kings lore, a high priest with death (Ogres hate death, 2 units of chariots, 2 big units of archers, Snake Knights guys, some ambushing from under the sane snakes, a Casket and three huge monsters, Warsphinx, Necrosphinx and the Hierotitan.

This was a match up I was even more uneasy about. I wasn’t sure how to deal with all that toughness 8 monsters. This especially concerned me when my Iron blaster lost it’s cannon in turn one.

I pushed forward quickly trying to draw the undead towards my line which mostly worked. On my left flank the Mournfang crashed into some chariots and wove their round away terrain to put pressure right down the undead line. The Casket managed to survive a charge from a sabretusk. It was healed of the wound sit had taken but then couldn’t survive the second charge coming from an ambushing Gorger.

A potential disaster was shaping up as my Ironguts with my Lord and BSB were right in the sights of the combined charge of the three huge monsters and the snake knights. It would have been all kinds of bad, but I avoided it by moving into a building and minimising the charge to only one of the four units. Next turn stepping out the other side of the building in a classic ‘yoink’ manoeuvre, none of the four could get to me and the archers with the undead lord was now between a rock and a hard place, also known as a gutstar in one flank and mournfang in the other.

My fears of the giant toughness 8 monsters was allayed as gnoblars with thrown weapons chasing behind them demonstrated that 6’s come to those who deserve them.

Once the High Priest was crushed under foot and hoof, the game was pretty much over. With a big 20-0 win my team was happy. Our team won this round 68-12

Game Three had us playing team Slayers from NSW and I was matched up against Jack and High Elves again.

Jack’s list wasn’t nearly as friendly as Abe’s was and showed me that no comp system is perfect. Even this one can be broken.

Jack was running the infamous light council with a lvl 4 light mage, two lvl 1 light mages hiding under his skirt, a noble BSB, 2 units of archers, 2 units of reavers, 2 sky cutters, a big block of phoenix guard and swordmaster and 2 bolt throwers.

Comp score wise the list didn’t score badly at all, on the table it was a nightmare. All credit to these guys, they made no attempts to hide the fact they were there to win.

I was never really in this game and it was quite a bad match up for me. I didn’t mind though, it meant the rest of my team got match ups they felt they could do better in and minimise the damage. I lost the game 6-14, and our team lost the round but only by a close 36-44.

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In the evening the TO had arranged a group dinner at a restaurant called PJ's next to the event.

Just wanting to chill in our hotel room though we decided to get pizzas and go watch the four nations final.

We went to a family joint called Arnolds Ribs and Pizza. Lets just say I wont be going back.