8th Ed. Tournament Summary, 2500 points, fought O&G, TK, and Empire

List was posted a few days ago.

http://www.lustria-online.com/threads/2500-death-slann-tournament-list.8713/

Okay I played a tournament and ended up with points to put in a solid 4th place out of 7 contenders. Middle of the pack exactly. I only one of my three games but unlike the others who only one won game, I was reasonably close when I lost.

First game vs. O&G
First game I played O&G and won by a 1400 points. The scenario was a battle line that gave us bonus tourney points for keeping our Core alive, wiping out enemy Core, and crossing the center line with Core unit. I managed to get a fair number of bonus tourney points on this one.

His army had some Big Un orcs with a warboss, a unit of wolf riders, a unit of spider riders, an arachnarok, three River trolls, a unit of savage orcs, two spear chukkas a unit of goblins, and a doom diver. He went overboard with characters in my opinion. In addition to Orc Warboss, he took four Wizards: a L4 goblin shaman, a L2 orc shaman, a L2 savage orc shaman, and a goblin warboss with the Wizarding Hat (and Lore of Fire). Only the Savage Orc shaman and orc war boss were put in an actual unit surprisingly.

One spear chukka and the doom diver were pretty secure in one corner of the board with the Araknarok, trolls, and big uns nearby. The opposite flank of his army was very open by comparison. So I put both my chamo skinks and one of Salamander teams there. The first game went four turns due to time constraints.

LM Turn One: I go first, I advance all three of my infantry parallel to each other. Then I advanced with my chamo skinks into his open flank kill his goblin shaman. My other chamo skinks and take three crewman down off his exposed spear chukka (he had an orc overseer so it was still standing). On the same flank my Salamander team burned his goblin block and , which panicked. On the opposite flank my Salamander burned the Wolf riders and they panicked. Both teams ate one handler a piece but with two panics they earned their meal. I cast the augmented version with Soulblight, got IF and failed my Cupped Hands roll doing a modest amount of damage to his Temple Guard and one wound to himself.

O&G Turn One: The goblins that panicked earlier fled off the board, and the wolf riders rallied. The Savage orcs are frenzied and make a failed charge. The rest march forward. He gets Brainbusta off and takes my Slann to his last wound. His wolf riders rally and due to being fast cavalry were able to shoot at me. Between the doom diver, spear chukkas, arrer boys and wolf riders, he wounded a Sally and took of a few skinks off my block and a single Temple Guard.

LM Turn Two: My Temple Guard and Skroxigor declared charges against the Savage Orcs, only the Skroxigor made it. My Saurus tried and failed to charge the river trolls. The Salamander team on my right side burned a couple Savage orcs and the Salamander team on my left charged the wolf riders (who fled). One chamo skink group killed the orc overseer of the depleted spear chukka while the other turned the goblin with the wizard hat into a pincushion. The spells I cast didn’t really matter much.

OG Turn Two: His Big Un block failed an animosity check, so they had to stay back and squabble while his trolls and arachnarok hit my big Saurus block in the front and left flank respectively. His Savage Orcs charged my Skroxigor’s front and the spider riders hit their flank. The wolf riders rallied and took some pot shots at my Salamander team. The doom diver took out a few Temple Guard, the remaining spear chukka missed and the surviving arrer boys failed to hit anything. My Skroxigor won combat barely but the orcs and goblins held. The Saurus fighting the Arachnarok and Trolls inflicted a single wound on the giant spider and lost several members themselves. They were steadfast so they held.

LM Turn Three: My Temple Guard charged the flank of the spider riders who were flanking the Kroxigor. My Salamander team on the right side of my board hit the flank of the Savage Orcs fighting the Skroxigor. My other Salamander charged the Wolf Riders who fled again. My chamo skinks were out of viable targets in range except for the arrer boys killing one or two. The Temple Guard wiped out the spider riders and the Skroxigor and Salamander team took a heavy toll on the Savage orcs killing the wizard in close combat before breaking the unit and running them down with the Salamander. My magic phase saw me spamming his L4 shaman with Death spells to eventually kill it.

O&G Turn Three: He didn’t declare any new charges and did some minor damage with shooting. Due to amazing rolls on my part, my Saurus killed a river troll and took no casualties themselves (though the troll and araknarok didn’t break). The trolls were in the way his Big Uns from joining the fight, so he pointed them towards my Skroxigor and Temple Guard.

LM Turn Four: I charged the wolf riders with my Salamanders. They had no room left to flee so attempted a stand and shoot. My Salamander wiped them out. I tried to kill his arrer boys with shooting, but only managed to take them down to their command crew. Magic was insignificant. My Saurus engaging the arachnarok and trolls lost combat but held.

O&G Turn Four: The Big Uns were still too far away to participate. He had no living wizards to cast any spells. His shooting damage was insignificant. His Araknarok and trolls one against my Saurus against but they held.

I won by a comfortable margin and lost no units though if we had time for six turns. I probably would have lost the Saurus.

Second Game vs. Tomb Kings
The second game actually ran six turns. We went so fast my memory is too hazy on the fine details to go turn by turn. The second game was a variation on the breaking point scenario. Points were still used to determine the winner of the game, but if we reach the breaking point we’d lose the reroll ability of the BSB and the inspiring presence of the general. We moved very quickly, this was the only game we had time for six turns. The speed of the game probably led to me having some errors in memory.
Left to right I had a Salamander team, my Skroxigor, my Temple Guard, then Saurus block then the other Salamander team. Left to right from my view was a block of archers with his hierophant in front of a casket of souls with a nearby heirotitan. Then had had two warsphinxes (one with a tomb king riding it), then two groups of six chariots. Then way off on the side were some Necropolis knights. My chamo skinks couldn’t get remotely close to the casket so my first group deployed near the knights. Then he put some scouting horse archers the corner of my side of the board and I place chamo skinks near them to prevent the horsemen from flanking me. I won first turn.

LM Turn One: I advanced. I couldn’t get a bead on his hierophant so I threw some death spells at the Tomb King, but failed to wound him. My chamo skinks in the upper corner managed to wound the knights once. My other chamo skinks took down a horse archer or two. Neither Salamander team inflicted any damage that wasn’t healed the TK first magic phase and both ate some handlers.

TK Turn One: He advanced his line a tiny bit. His horse archers took down a few chameleon skinks while his knights surprised me. Rather than move towards my center like I expected, they made an about face to corner the unit of chamo skinks behind them. His archers and the casket took some shots at some of my units and took out a few models from my infantry blocks. He put a ward save on everything he had on my left side of the board.

LM Turn Turn Two: I advanced my line a bit. I threw all my magic at his hierophant and killed it. After crumble, the casket souls took a wound, a couple archers died, and two horse archers died. My Salamander team on the left killed an archer or two. My Salamander team on the right was in a fungus forest and failed their stupidity test, and thus couldn’t fire.

TK Turn Two: One block of chariots thundered into my Temple Guard and the other one hit my Saurus block. I lost combat by a modest margin, but both the Saurus and Temple Guard held easily due to steadfast at Ld 10. Both of the Warsphinx charged my Skroxigor in a statistically unlikely charge. One closed the distance and with the help of a good thunderstomp roll and his breath weapon won by a significant margin. The Skroxigor were steadfast and held. The Necropolis Knights charged my cornered chamo skinks and killed them but the Chamo skinks inflicted one more wound on the knights before they died. The archers and casket fired on my Salamander on the left and forced to panic and flee off the table edge.

LM Turn Three: My Salamander team recovered from their stupidty and charged the flank of the nearest chariot group. My Slann fired several hero killer spells at the tomb king and either got dispelled or failed to wound. I did get Soulblight off on the chariots fighting me. I won both close combats with the chariots but failed to wipe out either unit. The Skroxigor were broken and run down by the Necrosphinx

TK Turn Three: The TK lost another few archers to crumble but nothing else. He moved his sphinxes towards my Saurus and TG blocks. The horse archers fired on the chamo skinks continue the long low stakes shooting match. Now the horse archers and chamo skinks were down to two units. The Necropolis Knights, victorious after slaying the chamo skink units, were now very far from the fighting and ambled towards the center. In close combat I killed both chariot units and turned my two Saurus blocks towards the Warsphinxes.

LM Turn Four: I tried to charge a warsphinx with the Temple Guard and failed. Then I tried to Death spell the Tomb King to again. The spells I got past his dispel attempts only inflicted a single wound. My surviving Salamander team having just helped kill the chariots last round was towards the edge of their effective range but I still took out two or three archers. My surviving chamo skinks finally took down the horse archers they were exchanging fire with all game.

TK Turn Four: The Casket of souls blew up due to a crumble but didn’t hit my Salamander, the skeleton archers, or the heirotitan, all which had about a 50/50 chance of being blasted off the map. One Warsphinx charged my Temple Guard and won by a wide margin, but the TG held. The Necropolis knights tried to charge my remaining Salamanders and failed. The Warsphinx that couldn’t get into a good charge arc this turn hadn’t fired his breath weapon yet so toasted some Saurus. Not content to leave my Salamanders unharmed, he fired all his remaining archers and the Hierotitan’s spell to wound a Sally and kill a crewman.

LM Turn Five: There weren’t a lot of archers left, so I charged my remaining Salamander team into the archers and killed it (though I took a few wounds in the process). My last two Chamo skinks ran up behind the Necropolis Knights and finally finished off the one with two wounds. My Saurus failed to get into close combat to reinforce the Temple Guard. The Temple Guard were beaten in combat and the Slann BSB broke then auto-died.

TK Turn Five: The Warsphinxes charged my Saurus block and took it down to handful of members. The Heirotitan killed my Salamander team with shooting. The Necropolis knights tried to charge the chameleon skinks who fled.

LM Turn Six: My chameleon skinks rallied. Then my Saurus were wiped out in close combat.

TK Turn Six: Everything he had left was pointed towards my two chameleon skinks but only the Necropolis knights were nearby. They charged and the Chameleon Skinks fled again.

He killed everything I had but two chameleon skinks. I wiped out a unit of archers, a unit of horse archers, 12 chariots, the casket of souls, and his hierophant. I lost by about 1000 points. There was very little left on the board. This one of the most satisfying losses I ever had. I was impressed he managed to beat me despite losing his hierophant the second turn.

Third game vs. Empire
I had some real bad luck early on that cost me the game.
Right to left, my foe had two cannons on a hill with his general hiding behind them, two big blocks of knights with no command models at all. A large block of swordsmen with a halberdier and handgunner detachment. Joining his swords men was a cleric, L4 Life wizard, and BSB. There was an impassable terrain feature guarding the flank of his ueber unit.

LM Turn One: My first spell, Doom and Darkness on the big unit got off with IF (only three dice!). My miscast went to the L4 human wizard but only killed three swordsmen. My second spell attempting to kill the L4 wizard also got IF with three dice, inflicted only a single wound on said wizard. My second miscast was Dimensional Cascade, killed 22 Temple Guard and pulled the Slann into the Realm of Chaos. I thought about conceding, but I thought “My last opponent won despite losing his hierophant turn two, maybe I can draw with a Slann turn one?”

My chamo skinks marched up to his cannons but got very poor to hit and damage rolls and failed to kill more than two crew members. Due to the annoying impassable terrain feature, my Salamander teams had two choices, not shoot at anything or shoot at the big unit and expose one of the teams to a charge. I chose the latter and killed quite a few swordsmen and some of the halberdier attachment. The halberdiers didn’t panic and the big block was immune to psychology.

Empire Turn Two: The swordsmen charged the nearest Salamander team, the Salamanders broke and ran through the impassable feature. The swordsmen pursued them and ran them down, taking one casualty to a difficult terrain test in the process. The jump through the impassable terrain took them out of charge range of my last six Temple Guard which I think was his plan. His wizard got Throne of Vines up and healed the one wound I inflicted on it. Then cast regrowth to get his dead swordsmen back. The Hellblaster Volley Gun blew up due to a misfire. The cannons both rolled 10 for grapeshot and killed all my chamo skinks. At this point I decided a draw was probably out of the question. The Handgunner fired on the Temple Guard and did no damage.

LM Turn Two: My Saurus and Skroxigor each successfully charged the two knight blocks. The Saurus actually touched both units so it was one big combat. Both knight groups broke and ran exactly 12 inches. Both my blocks chased them exactly 8 inches. My remaining Salamander team burned some more halberdiers.

Empire Turn Three: One knight group rallied and the other ran off the board. The big block of swordsmen pivoted towards my Salamanders and the surviving temple guard. He tried to shoot the Temple Guard with the handgunners and a cannon and only killed one. The other cannon killed a Kroxigor and a skink. He spent most of his dice on dwellers to try to take out my Temple Guard and did no damage.

LM Turn Three: My Skroxigor and Saurus charged the knights and broke them. The knights were practically on the boards edge so I let them ran and reformed the Skroxigor to face the swordsmen and the Saurus to face the cannons. My Salamander team charged the halberdier detachment, broke them and ran them down. The Temple Guard charged the handgunner detachment, broke them and ran them down. I dispelled Throne of Vines in my magic phase (forgot to do it last turn).

Empire Turn Four: The Swordsmen charged my Salamanders, broke them, and ran them down. The Wizard cast Regrowth on his swordsmen and nothing else successfully. He fired on my Skroxigor and Temple Guard some but failed to kill either unit.

LM Turn Four: I charged the cannon crew with my Saurus, wiped it out and overran into the other. I think we had time for turn five but he insisted we didn’t. It wouldn’t have taken long and I’m sure I would have killed the other cannon but that wouldn’t have changed the outcome of the game. Also we eventually ended up ruling that detachments are part of the parent unit and don’t yield victory points unless the parent unit is destroyed. That seemed unfair but the points value of the detachments were so small as not to have a material effect on the tournament rankings.

 

Re: Tournament Summary, 2500 points, fought O&G, TK, and Emp

Sounds like it was fun! Good writing as well.

Did you miss your skink skirmishers at all? Looks like you fared pretty well without them.

 

Re: Tournament Summary, 2500 points, fought O&G, TK, Empire

At no point did I think "I wish I had a unit of skink skirmishers." Though I did think I might have been slightly better off with 20-something skirmishers instead of 14 chamo skinks. I wanted to show off my first painted chamo skink (a regular skink painted in mixed browns and greens). It was well received so I plan to make 19 more. I actually got a small amount of store credit as a fourth place prize and I bought MORE skinks.

 

Re: Tournament Summary, 2500 points, fought O&G, TK, and Emp

Kroxigors (and mixed units) cannot be thunderstomped or stomped. You would think that the rule would work like terror does when faced with a fear causing unit (i.e. monstrous models can be stomped by bigger monsters). But, that is not the case.