Top Tournament Tips ... got Any?

[Stemplar]

Brothers, I have signed up for a tournament. As a new player all I want is to not make a complete dick of myself by being slayed and flayed all over the place.

 

I'm getting in as many practice games as I can.

 

It's 1500 points, one list for the whole weekend and 5 games to play. We're doing a combo of Maelstrom and Eternal War games.

 

My list (basically) will probably be something like:

Stormraven

Helbrecht

Assault Centurions

Venerable Dread.

 

Land Raider Crusader

3 x 5 man Crusader Squads

Emperor's Champion.

 

Not a lot of long range shooting and I may yet tinker a bit. I'm desperate to take the two BT characters I've included, and I may try and squeeze a Vindicare Assassin in because of all the psykers that will likely be there.

 

Any hints or tips to help the Crusade? Any help much appreciated.

Edited September 14, 2017 by Stemplar

[Marshal van Trapp]

My best advice for tourney play is be prepared for ANYTHING. Be able to respond to whatever may be thrown at you, if you keep your list open to respond to any threats you mau fave you will do much better. Additionally, dont just go ham trying to kill your opponents whole army, play to the scenario, VPs are better than dead units!

[SydonianDragoon404]

Mortal Wound (smite) spam is the current meta. Mortal wounds do not care about how tough you are, how cool your gear is, or fast you are. The only thing that matters against such armies are how many wounds you have, which means cheap and effective infantry and vehicles are mainly the things that can survive against it. This is why conscript spam works. 

 

Smite doesn't care that you have a storm shield or toughness 5, expensive elite units are food for those armies. That's all I've seen thus far of the tournament scene besides Rowboat Girlyman. And smite spam beat that :cuss into the ground. 

[TheOneTrueZon]

If you had to, what would you use to replace the Centurions?

[Stemplar]

If you had to, what would you use to replace the Centurions?

I guess I'd go with more boots on the ground. Vanguard maybe?? The Centurions have been so good, though, in lead up games. Drop them close to the action and they go nuts.

[Ciler]

My best advice is for you to look at the lists that won recent tournaments and figure out how you would deal with those.

 

How would you deal with 4 stormravens ? How would you deal with 300 conscripts ? How would you deal with 50 horrors ? How would you deal with whatever the russian dude with the howling banshees list did...

[The Spanish Inquisitor]

Not sure it the stormraven spam is still a thing though. They won't be able to capture objectives. Gw will nerf them. 

 

In 8th, you have to bring a lot of dakka and saves malus. 

Mortal wounds are good against small armies like space marines or eldars. But the imperial guard with his hundreds of conscripts will laugh at it. 

 

Land Raiders crusaders with Helbrecht's aura are very powerful and resilient: a lot of dakka and few shots of multimelta and assault guns, reroll everything. You take two with Big H to kill the enemy infantry. The rest of your army holds objectives and deal with enemy vehicles. 

[Ciler]

Oh yes stormraven armies aren't a thing any more, but nevertheless it's a good exercise to consider how your force would fare against one.

[Kontakt]

Flyer spam is dead as far as competitive tournament lists. For now there are 3 major archetypes I have seen.

1. Massed numbers of cheap stuff - Conscripts, gaunts, ork boyz, whatever it is, if you can get a bunch with very few morale penalties, it can withstand a battle of attrition.

2. Smite spam - Not good vs numbers, but it will eat through powerful models or units.

3. Imperial soup - conscripts to eat enemy gunfire and charges, imperial knights/guilliman/celestine for nasty beatsticks, and some support troops like marines or scions.

 

Because weaker weapons can hurt the toughest models, cheap spam is more effective than last edition.

Smite ignores saves. Smite is especially powerful with the varied formations that can be brought, and the open ended Indexes that help propagate massed cheap psykers in combination with other cheap models.

Combining a large number of really powerful models like celestine, guilliman, and imperial knights can be problematic for many to deal with. Especially when there is no smite counter available.

 

These 3 army types have been very popular since the air nerf, with massed guard infantry being the most competitive currently in the big tournaments. The meta, however, has been fluidly shifting. I have no doubt the new death guard and mechanicus will have a serious impact on the way people approach army composition. Large numbers of redundant troops still seems to be a good choice, though.

Edited September 14, 2017 by Kontakt

[Schlitzaf]

Liutanent over Champion. And the in terms of your backrow a nice IG contingents is relatively cheap. 2 Lascannons Teams are 144 which are about to equal to a Devi Squad with 4 Lascannons at 165. Also you are putting a lot of eggs into the raider basket. And I love our Crusaders (see my endless posts describing their greatness) they make an incredibly lack luster hammer. You either spam 5 Man MSU Backrow or 8-11 Man FireFight support or 2 13-15 Tide squads with apporiate support. 3 Man Crusaders in Raider even with 2 PoW each will just not hard or fast enough.

 

Or be durable enough once combat is joined. We aren't Orks or Conscript but we can put a fair number of moral immune bodies onto the table. Between Rites of War and Cenobytes. You just have to squeeze ever point you can out of your Neo/Initaites. I like using 2 13-14 Man squads for that purpose back up by 2 Intercessors.*

 

*Tourney lists are good guidelines as others have said It's just important to remember, a BT Army when building for Comp cannot use the best aspects of our army effectively or your essentially surrendering the best part of our tactics (Crusader Squads versatility, Cenos and the Helm).

 

And effectively are playing an SM army that just reroll charges, hits and is strength 5 (mechanically speaking).

[Honda]

1. Don't bathe or brush your teeth ten days before the tourney.

 

2. Eat plenty of beans, broccoli, and brussel sprouts two days before the tourney.

 

3. Continually pick your nose and offer to help your opponent move his models during his turn.

 

4. Sneeze a lot and don't cover your mouth.

 

5. Keep asking, "What edition are we playing again?"

 

6. When you don't get a roll to go your way, pick up a dice and throw it as hard as you can at the table.

 

7. Even though you are playing Black Templars, keep yelling "WAAAAAGH!" throughout the game.

 

8 . Frequently stick your hand down your pants and scratch yourself.

 

9. Keep complaining about how good the Templars used to be in 4th edition.

 

10. Wear too many clothes so you constantly sweat. You get extra points if you occasionally drip on the table.

[Timur]

My competitive games are won and lost by smart (or really dumb) target prioritization.  That includes movement.   Figure out what needs to die and kill it quick w/o distractions.

Realize when you can just leave opposing units alone and tackle a more important one.

 

Let bubble armies corner themselves and take the rest of the board over.  

 

Oh and look out for wave serpent spam. 

 

(if super serious, bring a pad of paper {use a phone app, whatever} and write down opposing lists and some notes of the games.  That should help you the next tourney.)

 

GL

[JAG Templar]

1. Don't bathe or brush your teeth ten days before the tourney.

 

2. Eat plenty of beans, broccoli, and brussel sprouts two days before the tourney.

 

3. Continually pick your nose and offer to help your opponent move his models during his turn.

 

4. Sneeze a lot and don't cover your mouth.

 

5. Keep asking, "What edition are we playing again?"

 

6. When you don't get a roll to go your way, pick up a dice and throw it as hard as you can at the table.

 

7. Even though you are playing Black Templars, keep yelling "WAAAAAGH!" throughout the game.

 

8 . Frequently stick your hand down your pants and scratch yourself.

 

9. Keep complaining about how good the Templars used to be in 4th edition.

 

10. Wear too many clothes so you constantly sweat. You get extra points if you occasionally drip on the table.

11. Ensure every single dice roll hits at least one of your opponents models. Extra points for chipped paint.

[Stemplar]

Schlitzaf, I love all of that bit only understood half of it! Edited September 15, 2017 by Stemplar

[Stemplar]

 

1. Don't bathe or brush your teeth ten days before the tourney.

 

2. Eat plenty of beans, broccoli, and brussel sprouts two days before the tourney.

 

3. Continually pick your nose and offer to help your opponent move his models during his turn.

 

4. Sneeze a lot and don't cover your mouth.

 

5. Keep asking, "What edition are we playing again?"

 

6. When you don't get a roll to go your way, pick up a dice and throw it as hard as you can at the table.

 

7. Even though you are playing Black Templars, keep yelling "WAAAAAGH!" throughout the game.

 

8 . Frequently stick your hand down your pants and scratch yourself.

 

9. Keep complaining about how good the Templars used to be in 4th edition.

 

10. Wear too many clothes so you constantly sweat. You get extra points if you occasionally drip on the table.

11. Ensure every single dice roll hits at least one of your opponents models. Extra points for chipped paint.

Ha!!! Awesome. Will print this out and follow it to the letter.

[Kisada]

Schlitzaf, I love all of that bit only understood half of it! what is IG? And MSU?

 

Obviously I'm trying to load up as many Command Points as I can. I'm trying to squeeze a Battalion and Vanguard detachment in and make use of stratagems.

 

IG = Imperial Guard, or now known as Astra Militarum

 

MSU = Minimum Size Units.  

[Stemplar]

 

 

Schlitzaf, I love all of that bit only understood half of it! what is IG? And MSU?

 

Obviously I'm trying to load up as many Command Points as I can. I'm trying to squeeze a Battalion and Vanguard detachment in and make use of stratagems.

IG = Imperial Guard, or now known as Astra Militarum

 

MSU = Minimum Size Units.

Thanks! Newbie, so learning all the time.

[Marshal Wolfhart]

Seems Honda is riding the Deathguard hypetrain now... :P

I thought MSU meant multiple small units... you never stop learning :D

Also be prepared for character spam with assassins at the front. you can't pick your targets fro shooting against an army of characters (you can only pick em if closest) and callidus assassins get hit on 6+ only. your raven might be key here to deploy a squad where you need it.

[Kisada]

Seems Honda is riding the Deathguard hypetrain now... :P

I thought MSU meant multiple small units... you never stop learning :D

Also be prepared for character spam with assassins at the front. you can't pick your targets fro shooting against an army of characters (you can only pick em if closest) and callidus assassins get hit on 6+ only. your raven might be key here to deploy a squad where you need it.

Which is exactly why I have no interest in competitive tournament play

[Honda]

Seems Honda is riding the Deathguard hypetrain now...

 

 

Hah! There's a really big difference between "have used" and "experienced". I am of the latter variety.  ;)

 

Which is exactly why I have no interest in competitive tournament play

 

 

I'm right there with you. I used to go to tourneys because I wanted to see new armies, see how they were used and meet people. I can get enjoyment out of that.

 

However, "wanderers" generally have to pay now and with the proliferation of people posting pictures and youtube, I can get my jollies vicariously though other means.

 

Also, it seems like the well themed, well painted, "hobby" armies haven't been as prevalent at tournaments  as they used to be in 4th-early 6th editions. There's still some of that, judging from pics, but it seems like it used to be like a third of the armies. Guys/gals who just showed up to hug the bottom tier tables because they were more interested in having some fun.

 

Maybe that's just my general impression. I pretty much stopped going to any conventions/tourneys about four or so years ago.

[Medjugorje]

you need screening unit that other deepstrike armys cont charge or hit you.

 

Take Scouts to infliltrate and use the  18" + 9" ( 9 Inches away from your main units + 9 inches away from your scout and 9 inches away form the scouts from the other side) to disable bad first strike armies like Obliteraters Spam. Take Helbrecht and a Castellan.

[Kisada]

you need screening unit that other deepstrike armys cont charge or hit you.

 

Take Scouts to infliltrate and use the  18" + 9" ( 9 Inches away from your main units + 9 inches away from your scout and 9 inches away form the scouts from the other side) to disable bad first strike armies like Obliteraters Spam. Take Helbrecht and a Castellan.

 

What's a scout?

[Othniel's Blade]

Legion Recon Squads, in light armor, for surprise zealous stabbing.

[Stemplar]

Seems Honda is riding the Deathguard hypetrain now... :P

I thought MSU meant multiple small units... you never stop learning :D

Also be prepared for character spam with assassins at the front. you can't pick your targets fro shooting against an army of characters (you can only pick em if closest) and callidus assassins get hit on 6+ only. your raven might be key here to deploy a squad where you need it.

Yeah - I'm 100% convinced about the Raven. Also thinking I might try and squeeze in an assassin or two. As always, tho, what I want to fit in ours me JUST over the points limit.

[Stemplar]

My best advice is for you to look at the lists that won recent tournaments and figure out how you would deal with those.

 

How would you deal with 4 stormravens ? How would you deal with 300 conscripts ? How would you deal with 50 horrors ? How would you deal with whatever the russian dude with the howling banshees list did...

All of the advice has been awesome, but this is the one I keep coming back to. How would I deal with ... etc. Thanks, mate. Appreciate it.

 

As far as the winning lists: where would I even look for those?

 

Edit: found some. Bloody fantastic. Pretty close to what I hope will be a good list now, so all O need to bring is ZEAL!!

Edited September 20, 2017 by Stemplar