Escalation tournament results and experiences

[TheWolfLord]

Sorry this is a long post.

 

I played an escalation tournament yesterday, 4 games at 500, 1000, 1500 and 2000. 1 Lord of War at 1000 & 1500 and 2 at 2000.

 

500 point list - Lvl 1 rune priest on bike, Iron Priest on TW, Iron Priest on TW, 3 TWC with 3 SS, 5 Fenrisian Wolves.

 

Game 1 was against a young lad who was basically bring everything he owned at 2000 points, came for the experience and his list was poor for a tournament.

He had a Champs of Fenris list. Wolf Lord with all CoF relics (apart from Morkai's claws), Ven Dread with Helfrost Cannon and Great Wolf Claw, 5 sniper scouts and 5 Fenrisian Wolves.

He went first but decided to out flank his Lord (warlord trait). He didnt turn up until turn 4 for so I killed the wolves turn 1, dread turn 2 but due to this persons age I didn't want to table him turn 2 so I decided to forget to charge or went to cover objectives instead. His Lord came on and I slammed into him with my TWC and tabled him turn 5.

 

1000 point list - Lvl 2 rune priest on bike, Iron Priest (TW & 2 Cyber Wolves), Iron Priest (TW & 2 Cyber Wolves), 3 TWC (3 SS, 1 TH & 1 WC), 5 Fenrisian Wolves and a Typhon Heavy Seige tank (no sponsons)

 

Game 2 was against a very experienced tournament play with a Thunderwolf Deathstar. Krakenbone Lord, WGBL, 2 Iron Priests and Librarian Conclave (4 librarians) in a unit of TWC. He got Invis and Endurance :(

I deployed first, put my Typhon on right with Fenrisian Wolves and my own lesser Deathstar on left. He placed all of his wolves out of sight behind a building in the far right corner so there was no way for me to shoot him. I decided to let him go first. He moved out and cast invis and endurance but was too far away for a charge.

My turn 1 I moved my Deathstar into a central position 23 inches from his closest Thunderwolf rider, I then moved my Wolves to screen my Typhon to prevent a charge.

Tournament rules made invis BS1 so I shot my Typhon and got 5 hits/4 wounds, because of Storm Shields and Eternal Warrior (endurance) I only caused 1 wound.

Turn 2 and as I hoped he decided to try a long charge on my TWC. Luckily he rolled a '6' for power dice but he only threw 4 dice at invis and got two 1's. I threw all my 8 dice and got the deny.

He failed his charge as I'd hoped, it was risky putting them in charge range but I wanted to protect my Typhon.

My turn 2 and I noticed my opponent had left a Librarian exposed at the top of his unit so moved so he would be the closest target for my charge, my opponent had also strung his wolves out so 3-4 wouldn't get into combat. I caused another wound with my Typhon and then charged into combat Iron Priest on Rune Priest first.

My TWPL was removed by his Krakenbone Lord but because of my placement he only had 1 TWC and his Librarian in base contact. I killed his TWC as I4 step so all my hammers and Axe went on the Librarian. He LoS all the attacks but only a single TWC, an Iron Priest and another Librarian was within the 6" so they all died leaving 2 more wounds to kill him. As Tzeench would say "just as planned"

The next few cc turns was a slug fest between these 2 units, one of the Librarians killed in turn 2 was his Endurance holder so no more EW. I again denied invis in turn 3(I rolled three 6's) but his Krakenbone Lord was the difference, he finished my unit in his assault phase turn 3 but he was left with only the Krakenbone Lord, an Iron Priest and 1 TWC (bolt pistol and SS)

He split them turn 4 to cover the 3 objectives and charged his Iron Priest in my Fenrisian Wolves and killed them and hid behind cover, in my turn I moved my Typhon 12 inches, shot and killed his Iron Priest.

Turn 5 he kept his Lord on the centre objective and hid his TWC on the objective out of sight.

I took a big risk in my turn 5, I could manoeuvre to get a shot on his Lord but with a 3++ I wasn't confident I'd kill him, I'd be off the objective as well so if the game ended he'd win. I decided to flat out putting me passed the cover but within 3 of the objective. My hope was I could Thunderblitz him if the game went on.

The game went to turn 6, his Lord charged hoping to cause some damage charged and caused none. I pivoted and declared a tank shock of 1 inch. I rolled a 5 for Thunderblitz (6 with crushing weight Typhon rule) and caused 7 S10 wounds, he failed 1 and died leaving me tied for objectives but ahead with first blood. A tough tough game.

 

Game 3 was a disaster, only 3 people won both their first games so I was against a very good Taudar player with Double D Wraithknight, 2 Warp hunters, Jetbikes, Farseer (invis) and Tau buff commander, broadsides and crisis suits. To make things worse he got first turn.

He destroyed my Sicaran but whiffed against by Typhon (phew), because of good Look out, sir tactics his combined shooting only killed a single TWC and 3 Cyber Wolves.

My relief was short lived when I rolled 11 for my morale test followed by 15 for my run taking my entire Deathstar straight off the table. Before my turn even started i was left with only a slight damaged Typhon and 3 Fenrisian Wolves.

I took my turn and a scattered shot from the Typhon blew up a Warp hunter and wiped a unit of Jetbikes but turn 2 he was destroyed by the WraithKnight and the other Warp Hunter.

Very bad luck and to be fair to my opponent he felt awful. He went on to win the tournament.

 

Game 4 was against a Chaos list, Chaos Knight, Maulerfiend, Hellbrute, 2 Oblits, Abbadon plus Termies in a Land Raider, couple of cultist Squads, chaos marines and a squad of Thousand sons with sorcerers. There were a few things in his list I need to read up on as the Land Raider, Termies and Thousand Sons all had 4++ saves.

He put Knight, Land Raider with Abbadon and the Thousand Sons on my right, Hellbrute and Mauler Field in the centre and only the Oblits and a squad of cultists of my left.

I put my Typhon in centre next to Fenrisian Wolves, on my left I had 3 TWC with Iron Priest and a Deimos Predator with Plasma Destructor. On my right facing most of his army I had my 5 TWC with my Krakenbone Lord, Iron Priest and Rune Priest (finally rolled Endurance).

This was a very fun, tough and blood thirsty game. My TWC took the left flank easily coming back to kill the Hellbrute. The Maulerfiend wrecked my Typhon as my opponent cleverly tried an easy first blood on my Fenrisian Wolves hoping to make them run, I had no choice but to go to ground to save them so I wasn't able to move to screen my Typhon.

On the right my Thunderwolf unit charged the Knight bringing it down to 1 hull point, it's stomps killed my Rune Priest and a hammer TWC (Terrain made positioning hard and I kept my Iron Priest and Lord at the rear to protect them from stomps). I lost combat by 1 and again ran :( but was well away from the table edge.

Second turn he charged with his Knight and used a sorceror to summon a Blood Thirster. My TWC became the talk of tournament and they ate through the knight, the blood thirster, Abbadon and his Termies and half a squad of thousand sons and cultists. Because they took on so much my other units were able to play the objectives and I won 13 to 7

 

Taudar won with Necrons second, Eldar Wraith army Third and Necrons 4th. I finished 5th with 33 TP and was only 4 off second and 3 off third. There were 3 other good Space Wolves players and they finished 6th, 7th and 8th.

Space Wolves are very solid but I just struggle to compete against Eldar.

 

TWC Death Stars are a risk and a huge points sink but are godly if your roll well.

[Chaplain Otho]

Nice reports and well played brother. Thousand sons do have a 4++ and so do chaos terminators if they have mark of Tzentcth, so annoying to deal with,  

[TheWolfLord]

It was the 4++ on his Land a Raider that puzzled me, I'm not bothered as it was a really fun and hard fought game.

 

Even if my TWC hadn't survived so long (I made loads of good saves against Abbadon) I'd taken out every thing fast in his army so he would have been stuck chasing my faster units with only infantry and he was camped in the right third of the table. From that point of view I'd completely outplayed him and would have beaten him still but the points would have been much closer.