'Ard Boyz Prelims Tournament Report

Hey all.  I played in the prelims Saturday using a rather familiar list if you've been a reader here for a few weeks.  I went for a nice 45 mile bike ride in the morning before the tournament.  I figured either it would wear me out and I would be exhausted by round 3 and making tons of mistakes, or it would wake me up and get me sharper.  I'm not sure what happen, actually.

In any event, I played at DaVinci's Dreamworks in Vero Beach, FL.  We had a good turnout, but the only bummer was an odd number of players, which mean there would be a bye every round.

Round 1: vs...

A bye.  Ofcourse I get the bye.  So a minor victory with no bonus for me, +13 points.  I get to relax and watch some of the other games, and I went home and took a long lunch.

Total Points: 13

Round 2 vs. Colby with Dark Eldar

Colby was running a list roughly as follows...

Vect in Raider with Incubi

2 Raiders with Wyches

3 Raiders with Warriors

1 large foot Warriors unit

6 jet bikes with 2x heat lance

2 Venoms with True Born with blasters

3 Ravagers

I won the roll off, and deployed first, but I set up in a manner where I wouldn't be too hurt if/when Vect seized the initiative on me.  I kept my Typhoons and Dreadnaught completely out of line of sight.  This plan worked, as Vect seized and he got first turn.  His shooting was rather ineffectual the first turn, and mine wasn't too bad.

Turn 2 was where things went well.  By the end of turn two, all his forces were de-meched and the only intact vehicles he had was an empty Raider and a Venom.  And my Typhoons were all intact as most of his firepower went to shooting Rhinos and Predators.

In the end, it was the Typhoons who were the MVP.  The double frag missile + heavy bolter mowed down his de-meched infantry.  By the end of the game, I controlled 3 objectives including the middle, and he controlled only the one in his deployment zone.  Massacre with +2 bonus points.

Total Points: 35.  Things are looking good, if I do well in the last round I should place, which is always the goal at 'Ard Boyz.

Round 3 vs. J.D.'s Hybrid Blood Angels

I was matched up with J.D. who was leading having Massacred his first opponent and Majoring his second round match.  His list was pretty unique, and was as follows...

Terminator Reclusiarch

Corbulo

2x Priests (one in terminator armor)

5x Assault terminators in LRC

3x Riflemen dreads

1x Furioso with Blood Talons and meltagun in drop pod

2x 10x Assault Squad with triple melta in drop pods

2x 5x Assault Squad with double melta in Las/plas razorbacks

It was Dawn of War and I was going second.  I elected to walk on everything in order to bone his drop pods.  It worked as planned and he dropped in defensively and far from my deployment zone in order to avoid getting nuked as I rolled on.  The rest of his stuff walked on with the LRC in reserve.

My stuff rolled on and thanks to search lights I got a decent amount of shots off that did a little bit.  His LRC deep struck in using the Drop Pod's locator beacon to avoid scatter.  Thankfully for me, his non-aggressive drop pod placement kept the LRC out of range to do anything.  On my turn I kept the pressure going with my shooting at his army with my massive amount of 48" range firepower.

In a key tactical move I sacrificed a Rhino to block his LRC.  On his turn he popped the Rhino, but the double melta inside lived to threaten the LRC.  He tried to assault them with his 10x assault squad, but thanks to the crater of the Rhino they didn't roll enough to get to them.  On my turn, that multi-melta exploded his LRC.  With his terminator rock out in the open I unloaded a ton of firepower on them, killing about half.  The rest of my army mowed down his dreads, razorbacks, and assault squads from afar.

On his turn, his terminators failed to charge one of my melta units who were hiding in cover by rolling a 1 and a 2 for distance.  Had he rolled a 3 he would have gotten them.  This left me another turn of full power shooting at them to wipe them out.

By the end of my turn 5, all he had left was half an assault squad, a full assault squad and an immobilized razorback.  All I lost was 2 Rhinos, 3 Typhoons, 2 Rhinos, and a 5 man melta squad.  I won 2,043 victory points to 632 for a massacre.  I got 2 bonus points for him not bringing a fast attack choice, and for my EC living through the game.  My MVP was luck.  All my units preformed average and none stood out as being particularly better than the others, which you expect from MSU really.  But him failing two very short charge distance rolls  dramatically changed the game.  I probably still would have won, but it would have been much closer. 

+22 points

Total Points: 57

Good enough for first place!  I've placed in 'Ard Boyz the last 3 years, but I had never won.  It was nice to take home first place for once, in rather convincing fashion.  Super happy with how the list preformed, and I somewhat regret not bringing the 2k version to NOVA and trying to be more competitive, but it's neither based nor fully painted to a high tabletop standard so that won't be happening.

What loot did I get for first prize?  Two things, one of them practical, and one for fun.  The fun item I would have never bought, but if it's free...

All in all, a pretty fun day.  The tournament was smooth, no dickhead behavior that I was aware of and no one was a sore loser/bad winner.

Good night all!