Right, so we wake up, go through the morning rituals. I'd actually gotten to bed at about 1:00 so I was positively refreshed! Anyway, Scott and I went back to our game while Manny watched Jocelyn.
Remember how I said there'd been another chainsaw on the field? Well we did it wrong. I forgot to add the crowd frenzy for the first chainsaw...which made the result a pitch invasion.
And this was where the wheels came off the bus for Scott: first, his chainsaw guy got beat up by the crowd. Scratch 1 chainsaw and the Dwarrf holding it is KO'd. Then 5 of his models were stunned. I also had 5 stunned models, but 4 of them were Snotlings.
Interest story: there's this one snotling doing a "na-na nanaa!" face. He spent the whole game getting stomped all over the place...but was never KO'd. His new name is Petey Bootprint!
From there, it was just a beating. I think I won 1-0 or maybe 2-0. But the game was fairly unimpressive as the Dwarves simply could never get enough assists when it came to dodging. I'd knocked out Scott's Troll Slayers early, to prevent just that sort of thing.
After the game, we had an hour before I had to take Manny to the airport. He and Scott decided to try and squeeze in a quick 1500 pt game of Cardhammer: Dwarves vs Undead.
This time Manny learned to leave the bony guys home and took Zombies. Basically he took a ton of Zombies, 2 Zombie trolls, and an abomination. The game got called just as it got interesting, with Scott busting through the zombies at various places, but the final rush into a pinch ended up exposing the flanks of his units to the second wave. The Longbeards had taken a rear charge from the zombie trolls in the center while some crossbowmen were desperately trying to hold off the zombie trolls on the left flank.
So we packed Manny up and took him to the airport. It was sad to see him go, but I can't say the weekend went too fast. We'd crammed just about as much gaming as we could with an average of 20 hours of awake time each day. Still, I was sad to see my friend go.
Getting home, Jocelyn went down and I suggested Scott try and beat the Ogre Kingdoms BGFW list. Scott also wanted to see how taking crossbowmen as Core would be. So we configured a Kingdoms tree, giving him enough gold to get to the keep. We made Hawkshold our mercenary faction, but neither of us took them.
My list was the usual: 4 Ogres, a Hydra, and a Healer Mage. His list was 4 units of crossbowmen, 2 ballistas (to kill that pesky Hydra), and a unit of Longbeards. The mission was Total Warfare with the terrain set so there was a small hill in the center flanked by a fence on either side.
He deployed with his crossbowmen on the left and center, his ballistae on the center-right, and his longbeards holding the right flank. I deployed basically centered with the table: Hydra in the middle flanked on either side by two units of ogres. The healer mage went behind on the left side of the hydra.
It went poorly for Scott. His crossbowmen moved into short range, but my Ogres were on him by turn 3. Sadly, on turn two, they'd ended up abutted to the fence. So while I didn't get slowed down by it (being Large), I did benefit from it. Meanwhile, the hill and the Ogres to the right of the Hydra shielded it from the Ballistae. Meaning the Hydra only took a wound or two, which it healed.
The Ogres on the right of the Hydra, though, took the brunt of the Ballistae firing. Essentially both units were weakened to the point that when the Longbeards got their, they sent the one surviving Ogre packing.
On the left flank, though, things were different. The Ogres and Hydras simply ate through the four squads of Crossbowmen. Combined pinches, failed fear/terror checks, the Healer Mages, and Scotts inability to draw red cards when he needed them meant the Dwarves were done for.
Eventually the Hydra turned, and ate the first Ballista. It got charged by the Longbeards, but the sheer number of attacks the Hydra had meant that even attacking to its flank, it simply ate the wounded Longbeards. Then is was a charge into the flank of the last Ballista with something like 12 attacks.
So my desire to build a fun, silly Ogre Kingdoms-esque list has resulting in a pretty tough army. They all move 5" and the Healer Mages can really make the difference with key heals at the right time.
But with that game, the Kubla weekend came to a close. Jocelyn woke up, and I went about trying to clean up the house from the whirlwind. Evenetually Mer came home (we forgot to take the car seat out of her car, so I couldn't take Scott home), we had dinner, then I took Scott home.
All in all, a great con. Much better than last year (which was the least fun I'd had at Kubla, so a poor comparison). Probably as much fun as 2007, which I ranked as the best Kubla I'd been too.
I'll post some pictures of my finished Tau later. The tanks has been absconded while the Tau have been pre-sold. Meanwhile, I got crazy and bought a new Blood Bowl team (what is wrong with me?). Because, you know, with the new IG army, the Ork Flash Gitz I have to build, and the IG guys I need to convert and paint, I don't have enough stuff to do.
Final Game Count: 16.
Friday, May 29, 2009
Kublacon Report: Day Four
More gaming, you ask? Isn't Kublacon over on Monday?
Well, yes. But I don't stop gaming until the Fat Man gets on the plane (and this year, not even then).
Waking up Monday was rough. Rougher than the post-Capt'n Morgan wakeup. Three nights in a row with 4 hours of sleep made the two nights with 6 hours seem like I slept in. Mer and I were literally dozing off while Jocelyn ran around the hotel room. But I got up and went down to get the coffee for the room, this time taking Manny & Jocelyn with me.
We did breakfast with everybody, including the minis coordinator and his friends. There we tried explaining Blood Bowl to my step-mom. Luckily, one of her daughters had moved to England so she understood the wackiness of "rugby with the forward pass."
From there we chatted about what to do next year, which was frankly new. Usually we're so done by Monday that next year isn't even on the radar. But we had all agreed to build new Guard armies and play them at Kublacon. So we decided to run a tournament, and as you can see, we don't believe in running things "Straight Up."
Breakfast done, we said our goodbyes to Trent, Darby, & their entourage. We packed up, checked out, and headed home. Manny & I stopped off at Game Kastle to unload the terrain while Mer & Scott took Jocelyn home and put her down. Both Mer and Jocelyn crashed for a good four hours while Manny, Scott, & I chatted.
After the women-folk woke, we did dinner at Armadillo Willy's. When we got home, we decided to play some Bloodbowl, since Scott had missed the event he'd been looking forward to. His Dwarves played Manny's Halfling on the Tzeentch Bowl pitch.
This about sums up the game:
On turn 4 of the second half, Manny was chanting "Pit-ty T-D, Pit-ty T-D"
By turn 6 of the second half, Manny was chanting "Make. It. Stop. Make. It. Stop."
As Manny said, one of the worst beatdowns he'd had in awhile. It was literally like Tzeentch had it in for him. For example:
On one drive, the roll on the Kick-Off table was Tzeentch letting people re-roll a reroll. People could use multiple team RRs. Manny had like 5 team RRs, so this would help him, right? Yeah, except when a Halfling went to dodge out (or pick up the ball, can't remember). He rolls a 1. Re-roll. Rolls a 1. Re-roll. Rolls a 1...
Yeah, Manny burned through 5 team Rerolls at once. I swear I thought he was gonna have a stroke.
Next kick-off result: magma burst. Every model on the table makes an unmodified Agi or be hit by magma (opponent rolls to break armor). Scott playing Dwarves had like 7 guys get hit. Manny only had 4 Halflings hit. Even the Treant managed to dodge.
Then came the armor: none of Scott's Dwarves got hurt, but 2 of Manny's Halflings were casualties and 2 were Stunned. It was hilarious...for me anyway.
So it's turn 8. Scott has scored (I think it's like 2-0 or 3-0 by this point), leaving Manny with one chance to throw the (halfling holding the) ball. Except Tzeentch changes the rules again: on a 4+ each team is allowed 3 GFIs. On a 3 or less, they're allowed only 1. Scott rolls a 3.
And of course Manny has a near perfect series of rolls: a 6 to pick up the ball, a 6 for the throw, a 6 for the Halfling landing, and a 6 for his first GFI. All of which brings him one square away from the endzone.
"Make. It. Stop."
"Make. It. Stop."
Right, so game #2. It's like 9:00pm at this time, so we know we're only going to get in half a game. It's Scott's Dwarves vs my Ogres on Thunder Bowl. No ref, special weapons are not ejected. But fouling and special weapons piss off the crowd who storm the field and stun a number of guys equal to your Crowd Frenzy rating. Plus you add the crowd frenzy to the kickoff, making storm the field more and more likely.
The first half is pretty uneventful (it's Dwarves vs Ogres, folks) save for a few things: on one kick off roll after my snotling scores the crowd throws in a chainsaw. Yup, a Dwarf with a chainsaw. Scott started protecting that guy more than he did the ball carrier. And I can see why: the chainsaw dwarf put my Ogre in the casualty box.
But the Dwarves failed to score and the half expired. We figured we'd set up, and roll on the kick off table then call it a night. I rolled up another chainsaw. This one too ended up on Scott's side of the field.
Greaaat...
Game Count: 14.5
Well, yes. But I don't stop gaming until the Fat Man gets on the plane (and this year, not even then).
Waking up Monday was rough. Rougher than the post-Capt'n Morgan wakeup. Three nights in a row with 4 hours of sleep made the two nights with 6 hours seem like I slept in. Mer and I were literally dozing off while Jocelyn ran around the hotel room. But I got up and went down to get the coffee for the room, this time taking Manny & Jocelyn with me.
We did breakfast with everybody, including the minis coordinator and his friends. There we tried explaining Blood Bowl to my step-mom. Luckily, one of her daughters had moved to England so she understood the wackiness of "rugby with the forward pass."
From there we chatted about what to do next year, which was frankly new. Usually we're so done by Monday that next year isn't even on the radar. But we had all agreed to build new Guard armies and play them at Kublacon. So we decided to run a tournament, and as you can see, we don't believe in running things "Straight Up."
Breakfast done, we said our goodbyes to Trent, Darby, & their entourage. We packed up, checked out, and headed home. Manny & I stopped off at Game Kastle to unload the terrain while Mer & Scott took Jocelyn home and put her down. Both Mer and Jocelyn crashed for a good four hours while Manny, Scott, & I chatted.
After the women-folk woke, we did dinner at Armadillo Willy's. When we got home, we decided to play some Bloodbowl, since Scott had missed the event he'd been looking forward to. His Dwarves played Manny's Halfling on the Tzeentch Bowl pitch.
This about sums up the game:
On turn 4 of the second half, Manny was chanting "Pit-ty T-D, Pit-ty T-D"
By turn 6 of the second half, Manny was chanting "Make. It. Stop. Make. It. Stop."
As Manny said, one of the worst beatdowns he'd had in awhile. It was literally like Tzeentch had it in for him. For example:
On one drive, the roll on the Kick-Off table was Tzeentch letting people re-roll a reroll. People could use multiple team RRs. Manny had like 5 team RRs, so this would help him, right? Yeah, except when a Halfling went to dodge out (or pick up the ball, can't remember). He rolls a 1. Re-roll. Rolls a 1. Re-roll. Rolls a 1...
Yeah, Manny burned through 5 team Rerolls at once. I swear I thought he was gonna have a stroke.
Next kick-off result: magma burst. Every model on the table makes an unmodified Agi or be hit by magma (opponent rolls to break armor). Scott playing Dwarves had like 7 guys get hit. Manny only had 4 Halflings hit. Even the Treant managed to dodge.
Then came the armor: none of Scott's Dwarves got hurt, but 2 of Manny's Halflings were casualties and 2 were Stunned. It was hilarious...for me anyway.
So it's turn 8. Scott has scored (I think it's like 2-0 or 3-0 by this point), leaving Manny with one chance to throw the (halfling holding the) ball. Except Tzeentch changes the rules again: on a 4+ each team is allowed 3 GFIs. On a 3 or less, they're allowed only 1. Scott rolls a 3.
And of course Manny has a near perfect series of rolls: a 6 to pick up the ball, a 6 for the throw, a 6 for the Halfling landing, and a 6 for his first GFI. All of which brings him one square away from the endzone.
"Make. It. Stop."
"Make. It. Stop."
Right, so game #2. It's like 9:00pm at this time, so we know we're only going to get in half a game. It's Scott's Dwarves vs my Ogres on Thunder Bowl. No ref, special weapons are not ejected. But fouling and special weapons piss off the crowd who storm the field and stun a number of guys equal to your Crowd Frenzy rating. Plus you add the crowd frenzy to the kickoff, making storm the field more and more likely.
The first half is pretty uneventful (it's Dwarves vs Ogres, folks) save for a few things: on one kick off roll after my snotling scores the crowd throws in a chainsaw. Yup, a Dwarf with a chainsaw. Scott started protecting that guy more than he did the ball carrier. And I can see why: the chainsaw dwarf put my Ogre in the casualty box.
But the Dwarves failed to score and the half expired. We figured we'd set up, and roll on the kick off table then call it a night. I rolled up another chainsaw. This one too ended up on Scott's side of the field.
Greaaat...
Game Count: 14.5
Kublacon Report: Day 3 (pt 2)
So after the BGFW tournament, I ended up missing the painting awards. We'd set up the tournament so that we could wakl into the hallway and see the awards, but I needed to deliver some food to my step-mom who was babysitting. Then we sat and chatted while Jocelyn fought going to sleep. By that time, the awards were over.
So I went down and picked up my entries. I didn't rank (Kubla is using the open system, where each entry is judged on its own merits and not on a First, Second, Third system), which didn't surprise me. I had just entered some of my nicer 'table top quality' stuff. I was a little disheartened, maybe I'll advise Wayne to include a "gamer" ranking next year.
Anyway, so I met up with Manny to do some playtesting on a game. I can't really talk about it much, except to say a couple things: One, the system needs a lot of work. Two, Sunday night at Kublacon is not the time to do playtesting. The best you can do is identify problems. Forget brainstorming solutions.
So after we finished up, Manny and I decided to play a game of Cardhammer. It was midnight and I'd gone to be at 3:00am every night up till now, why wuss out on night three? So Manny pulled out his Undead and I pulled out the Ogre Kingdoms list (4 Ogres, Healer Mages, Hydra).
Manny decided to try an all skeleton force. As you can see, he doesn't play Cardhammer much... ;-) It was something like 8 units of skeletons (spears & horde) plus 2 units of trolls. That's not enough points, so maybe there were some archers in there or maybe he drew a bunch of cards. It was late...
We played Border Defense with a giant forest in the middle of the field. We had a special scenario with assassin's war. This proved to be pretty powerful as there were a lot of units that were on their last wound when it came time to assign assassin wounds.
The forest pretty well divided the match: I had two ogres on the right facing a bunch of skeletons while on the left I had 2 ogres, the hydra, and healer mages facing both skeleton troll units and then a bunch of skeletons.
The right flank went about as you would expect: my ogres crashed into his line, killing skeletons by the handfull but their sheer numbers meant pinches all around for him. The end there was that he had something left as opposed to my nothing. By the end of the game, he had two units of beat up skeletons and I had a unit of ogres that fled, rallied, and then got the last wound taken off as they killed their attackers.
The left flank was where the fun happened, for me anyway. ;-) The first unit of trolls got pinched between the hydra and a unit of ogres. Unfortunately, this exposed the Ogre's flank to a unit of skeleton spearmen. This fight was to be my bane. My ogres, attacking their flank, could not kill the frakking skeletons! Between my healer mages and his Reanimate, those two would still be there slugging it out.
Meanwhile, my Hydra was slowed by the forest, meaning the Skeleton trolls got the charge. The fight was a slugfest, but my Hydra eventually won the day. Meanwhile, on the other side of the ogre-skeleton slap fight my other unit of ogres punched through the Skeleton line. In the end, the Hydra and Ogre unit carried the load and had to come back and help the flanked ogre unit.
Yeah, a unit of skeletons flanked and rear charged by a Hydra and ogres? Was ugly. But the insult? The unit of ogres that had been flanked was down to its last wound. So next turn Manny assigned the assassin hit to it.
At this point we called the game. I was going to get my healer mages and ogres off the table. However, the Hydra would be forced to run around the forest and run down the unit of skeletons over there. It had 1.5" on the skeletons, so the best Manny could do was delay.
We had a discussion as what the Hydra would do after he killed the skeletons. He was on Close and couldn't be direct controlled. So we saw no way I saw to steer him off the table. So we concluded that the Hydra just sat there, gnawing on the carcasses. Which mean I got 600 pts off the table, which was a draw.
A fun game, but oy some bad rolling on my part. So it was 2:30, and we packed up to head upstairs. The con was basically over at this point, but I'd reached my goal of games. From herein, it was all bonus.
Game Count: 14.
So I went down and picked up my entries. I didn't rank (Kubla is using the open system, where each entry is judged on its own merits and not on a First, Second, Third system), which didn't surprise me. I had just entered some of my nicer 'table top quality' stuff. I was a little disheartened, maybe I'll advise Wayne to include a "gamer" ranking next year.
Anyway, so I met up with Manny to do some playtesting on a game. I can't really talk about it much, except to say a couple things: One, the system needs a lot of work. Two, Sunday night at Kublacon is not the time to do playtesting. The best you can do is identify problems. Forget brainstorming solutions.
So after we finished up, Manny and I decided to play a game of Cardhammer. It was midnight and I'd gone to be at 3:00am every night up till now, why wuss out on night three? So Manny pulled out his Undead and I pulled out the Ogre Kingdoms list (4 Ogres, Healer Mages, Hydra).
Manny decided to try an all skeleton force. As you can see, he doesn't play Cardhammer much... ;-) It was something like 8 units of skeletons (spears & horde) plus 2 units of trolls. That's not enough points, so maybe there were some archers in there or maybe he drew a bunch of cards. It was late...
We played Border Defense with a giant forest in the middle of the field. We had a special scenario with assassin's war. This proved to be pretty powerful as there were a lot of units that were on their last wound when it came time to assign assassin wounds.
The forest pretty well divided the match: I had two ogres on the right facing a bunch of skeletons while on the left I had 2 ogres, the hydra, and healer mages facing both skeleton troll units and then a bunch of skeletons.
The right flank went about as you would expect: my ogres crashed into his line, killing skeletons by the handfull but their sheer numbers meant pinches all around for him. The end there was that he had something left as opposed to my nothing. By the end of the game, he had two units of beat up skeletons and I had a unit of ogres that fled, rallied, and then got the last wound taken off as they killed their attackers.
The left flank was where the fun happened, for me anyway. ;-) The first unit of trolls got pinched between the hydra and a unit of ogres. Unfortunately, this exposed the Ogre's flank to a unit of skeleton spearmen. This fight was to be my bane. My ogres, attacking their flank, could not kill the frakking skeletons! Between my healer mages and his Reanimate, those two would still be there slugging it out.
Meanwhile, my Hydra was slowed by the forest, meaning the Skeleton trolls got the charge. The fight was a slugfest, but my Hydra eventually won the day. Meanwhile, on the other side of the ogre-skeleton slap fight my other unit of ogres punched through the Skeleton line. In the end, the Hydra and Ogre unit carried the load and had to come back and help the flanked ogre unit.
Yeah, a unit of skeletons flanked and rear charged by a Hydra and ogres? Was ugly. But the insult? The unit of ogres that had been flanked was down to its last wound. So next turn Manny assigned the assassin hit to it.
At this point we called the game. I was going to get my healer mages and ogres off the table. However, the Hydra would be forced to run around the forest and run down the unit of skeletons over there. It had 1.5" on the skeletons, so the best Manny could do was delay.
We had a discussion as what the Hydra would do after he killed the skeletons. He was on Close and couldn't be direct controlled. So we saw no way I saw to steer him off the table. So we concluded that the Hydra just sat there, gnawing on the carcasses. Which mean I got 600 pts off the table, which was a draw.
A fun game, but oy some bad rolling on my part. So it was 2:30, and we packed up to head upstairs. The con was basically over at this point, but I'd reached my goal of games. From herein, it was all bonus.
Game Count: 14.
Kublacon Report: Day 3 (pt 1)
This 7:00am wakeup was simultaneously better and worse than the previous day. It was better because I was simply used to it, but worse because apparantly Captain Morgan had hit me in the head with a club while I slept. But I shrugged it off, got some coffee for my wife and stepmom, then headed down for the BGFW tournament.
We ended up having 5 people, but that became a bit of a blessing. This mean most people would get a bye one round, and I could tell most people needed it. We had a good spread of armies: Hawkshold, Umenzi, Orcs & Goblins, Dwarves, and High Elves. Ajax from the forum came to show us all how BFGW was played.
I took the bye round one, being adjudicator and food gopher. Meanwhile Ajax thumped Scott and Trent layeth the beat down on Manny. With my gold I picked up the Mine and Logging Camp with my gold and readied my High Elves.
Round 2: vs Ajax.
The scenario was Ambush or Trap. I chose the mission and to be defender so that I'd have an extra Command Action, something High Elves could use. My army was: Celestial Guard, 2 Batte Squads, a unit of Elven Swordsmen, Bowriders, Battle Mages, and Archers.
I set up in a line with a lake on my right flank and a small patch of forest on the center left. The battlemages and archers went in the forest. The swordsmen and bowriders went on the eft side of the forest. The Celestial Guard went on the right, flanked by the two Battle Squads. The trio of units were protected by the river and the forest.
Ajax had something like 5-6 Javelineers, a unit of worthy, a unit or two of Atlatlmen, and 4 Shamans. He deployed all on one long table edge, ready to swarm my line.
The game began with my army holding while his advanced to short range to throw javelins. Two units advanced to charge into my Archers and Battlemages. It was pretty reckless putting them on the front line, but if I had put them behind my melee troops, Ajax couldn't just come on from the other side. I figured a line was the least bad situation.
As it was, my archers & battle mages whittled down one unit before they got charged. From there, I directed my units to attack, figuring Ajax'd just whittle them down with javelins otherwise. I made selective use of Sprint, sending my swordsmen on the left after a unit of javelineers and sending my bowriders to charge the unit beating on my archers. Meanwhile the Battle Squads and Celestial Guards got stuck in.
The battle got heated with some sacrificial units being sent into the fray. Ajax flanked my bowriders with his Shamans while I rallied my Battle Mages whose whole job was to eat a flank charge from the Atlatlmen and buy my Battle Squad an additional turn.
It came down to a turn where we both inflicted enough damage to force Courage Checks in key places. On the far left, my Swordsmen forced a courage check on his javelineers (who did the same on my swordsmen). Meanwhile, on the center right, my Battle Squad had to take a check while his Javelineers facing my Celestial Guard had to check. There was one or two other (the Bowriders and/or Shamans I think).
What's important is that both sides passed all check. Which pretty much spelled the end for the High Elves. If Ajax had failed any of his checks, I would've had flank charges into pinches. However, we both stood firm and it just became a grindfest. Unfortunately we had to call the game for time, and extrapolate the results based on what we saw. We called it a decisive win for Ajax, 4 pts for him and 2 pts for me.
Anyway, I took my gold and was able to buy the Tavern and the Barracks, which'd prove fun for the next round. For me anyway. ;-)
Round 3: vs Trent.
With my whopping 5 campaign points I got to choose the mission. I picked Last Stand as the attacker. For the Tavern, I got the Recruiter so I was even more points up on Trent (Last Stand gives me like a 300 pt edge). I decided to get a little tricky and traded around units to get the following: Celestial Guard, Healer Mages, archers, 2 units of Swordsmen, 1 Battle Squad, & Bowriders.
Trent had: 2 units of Goblin archers, 2 units of Orc spearmen (or maybe swordsmen), a unit of Trolls, a unit of Goblin spearmen, and a bomb chucka.
The terrain had a river bissecting the table with some shallows in the center. On the left, Trent set up Orc spearmen, gobling spearmen, and goblin archers. I set up opposite them a unit of swordsmen, the battle squad, and the bowriders.
On the right he set up the Bomb Chucka, trolls, Orc spearmen, gobling archers. I set up my Celestial Guard, a unit of swordsmen, the healers, and the archers.
The game wasn't even close. Not from any tactical genius on my part, but from Trent never having seen Celestial Guard before. He figured the Trolls could take care of them. They charged up, outrunning his Orcs which he lashed to keep them up. The Trolls and the Clestial Guard got stuck in while the Swordsmen and the Orcs duked it out.
Unfortunately, all his ranged stuff was far behind while my archers were right behind the line. Oh and the Healer Mages...yeah that's a brutal combo with Celestial Guard. His Chucka would roll like 1-2 hits a turn despite needing 1s, which would promptly come off the next turn. Meanwhile the Troll discovered that Defense 4 is a tough nut to crack.
On the left, it was simple math: 3 units (one being cavalry) vs 2. I used Manuever Mastery to skirt the bowriders around the flank forcing him to give me his flank if he went forward into my line or turned to face the cavalry. So the Battle Squad fought the Gobin spearmen while the Orcs took the pinch from my Swordsmen and Bowriders.
The irony is that Trent did better on the left than the right. The Troll went down hard which allowed the Celestial Guard to the flank the Orcs. Once they were done, the line simply advanced on the poor the Goblin Bowmen and Bomb Chucka, wiping them out in the last turn of the game.
On the left, Trent managed to rout the unit of Swordsmen with his orcs. The Goblins died a hard death, and the weakened Orcs finally broke against the Bowriders. Amazingly, they lived to run away. Sadly, they never got to get back into the fight as the Bowriders ran them down. The Battle Squad then moved up and dispatched the Goblin Archers.
So a amazingly resounding victory wherein I whiped the Orcs and Goblins off the table. My only casualty was a squad of swordmen in the red, which I had the Command Actions to rally in the last turn as the Bomb Chucka was being carved into kindling by the Celestial Guard.
Round 4: vs Manny.
The mission was Ticking Clock with three terrain pieces (2 small forest and 1 small hill) in a diagonal pattern across the field. We were at 2500 pts this round, and I decided to be mean. Manny called me worse than the guy at the 40K event, but egh, it's Manny. It's not like he's people. ;-)
The source of my evilness? Take the above list from the last game. Drop a unit of swordsmen to upgrade a battlesquad to Elder Blade swordsmen Then add a unit of Celestial Guard. Yeah, I'm a bad man.
Manny had Hawkshold and he took: 2 Longbowmen, 3 Militia, 3 swordsmen, 2 heavy infantry or greatswordsmen, and a unit of Knights. This is from memory so the points may not work out.
Manny put his militia in the center with his swordsmen and great infantry/heavy infantry on the flanks. The knights went on the left flank. I had a bunch of watchtowers at this point, so he had to set up a good chunk of his army. I put the two Celestial Guard in the center, with a swordsmen unit on the right. The healer mages and archers went behind the Celestial Guard. The Bowriders and unit of swordsmen went on the left flank. (I've lost a unit of swordsmen somewhere in there, but I honestly don't remember what they did).
The real action all took place on the left flank, because the terrain in the center slowed down that engagement. His Knights made a beeline for my Bowriders, who I direct controlled to keep them in place while my swordsmen advanced. I knew that if I made my bowriders do some wonky manuever, he wouldn't expose his flank to me so I just kept them in place and shot (doing no damage).
Next turn, the swordsmen flank charged the Knights while my bowriders moved around the other flank. No need to give the Knights a charge bonus & impact hit just for the pinch bonus. So on the turn after, the Bowriders flanked & pinched the Knights. The only problem was that Manny had a unit of swordsmen and Greatswords moving up to flank my swordsmen and Bowriders.
This is where the center came in to turn the game. Manny's Longbowmen had tried to whittle down my Celestial Guard, but the combination of the range, their defense, and my Healer mages meant that wasn't going to work. At about the time the Knights were getting their first flank charge, the Militia met the Celestial Guard.
Yeah, that's a bad matchup.
The Celestial Guard on the left blew right through them and the next turn charged the Hawkshold swordsmen about to flank my swordsmen attacking the Knights. The Celestial Guard would eventually win, while the Great Swordsmen were just shy of charging my Swordsmen against the Knights (stupid 2.5" move). This allowed me to finish off the knights, then wheel and charge reserve units on the left flank.
It basically was all over after that. My right flank took a beating, with my Battle Squad forced to rout. (I think I had the second swordsmen squad there, it's a bit hazy). The eight turn saw me direct controlling to back away, ceding them the forest but avoiding a pinch. I held the central hill and the forest on my left flank. Meanwhile, my Celestial Guard advanced to final rush a unit of Longbowmen, forcing them to rout while my Bowriders turned the flank, giving me two units in his deployment zone.
So it was another crushing victory for me. When we tallied the points, I had 15 campaign points. Ajax had beat Trent, giving Ajax 16 campaign points. I heartily congratulated him as the winner. while shaking my fist in curses. Had Ajax failed any of his courage checks in that one turn of our game and I might've pulled out a draw. That net 2 pt swing would've put me over. Curses!!! 8-)
No seriously, it was good fun. My score was more indicative of the fact that I have a few games under my belt while Trent & Manny didn't get to play much. I have a feeling they're gonna thump me next year.
All in all it was good fun times. The campaign system worked perfectly, and we're planning on running an event again.
Game Count: 12.
We ended up having 5 people, but that became a bit of a blessing. This mean most people would get a bye one round, and I could tell most people needed it. We had a good spread of armies: Hawkshold, Umenzi, Orcs & Goblins, Dwarves, and High Elves. Ajax from the forum came to show us all how BFGW was played.
I took the bye round one, being adjudicator and food gopher. Meanwhile Ajax thumped Scott and Trent layeth the beat down on Manny. With my gold I picked up the Mine and Logging Camp with my gold and readied my High Elves.
Round 2: vs Ajax.
The scenario was Ambush or Trap. I chose the mission and to be defender so that I'd have an extra Command Action, something High Elves could use. My army was: Celestial Guard, 2 Batte Squads, a unit of Elven Swordsmen, Bowriders, Battle Mages, and Archers.
I set up in a line with a lake on my right flank and a small patch of forest on the center left. The battlemages and archers went in the forest. The swordsmen and bowriders went on the eft side of the forest. The Celestial Guard went on the right, flanked by the two Battle Squads. The trio of units were protected by the river and the forest.
Ajax had something like 5-6 Javelineers, a unit of worthy, a unit or two of Atlatlmen, and 4 Shamans. He deployed all on one long table edge, ready to swarm my line.
The game began with my army holding while his advanced to short range to throw javelins. Two units advanced to charge into my Archers and Battlemages. It was pretty reckless putting them on the front line, but if I had put them behind my melee troops, Ajax couldn't just come on from the other side. I figured a line was the least bad situation.
As it was, my archers & battle mages whittled down one unit before they got charged. From there, I directed my units to attack, figuring Ajax'd just whittle them down with javelins otherwise. I made selective use of Sprint, sending my swordsmen on the left after a unit of javelineers and sending my bowriders to charge the unit beating on my archers. Meanwhile the Battle Squads and Celestial Guards got stuck in.
The battle got heated with some sacrificial units being sent into the fray. Ajax flanked my bowriders with his Shamans while I rallied my Battle Mages whose whole job was to eat a flank charge from the Atlatlmen and buy my Battle Squad an additional turn.
It came down to a turn where we both inflicted enough damage to force Courage Checks in key places. On the far left, my Swordsmen forced a courage check on his javelineers (who did the same on my swordsmen). Meanwhile, on the center right, my Battle Squad had to take a check while his Javelineers facing my Celestial Guard had to check. There was one or two other (the Bowriders and/or Shamans I think).
What's important is that both sides passed all check. Which pretty much spelled the end for the High Elves. If Ajax had failed any of his checks, I would've had flank charges into pinches. However, we both stood firm and it just became a grindfest. Unfortunately we had to call the game for time, and extrapolate the results based on what we saw. We called it a decisive win for Ajax, 4 pts for him and 2 pts for me.
Anyway, I took my gold and was able to buy the Tavern and the Barracks, which'd prove fun for the next round. For me anyway. ;-)
Round 3: vs Trent.
With my whopping 5 campaign points I got to choose the mission. I picked Last Stand as the attacker. For the Tavern, I got the Recruiter so I was even more points up on Trent (Last Stand gives me like a 300 pt edge). I decided to get a little tricky and traded around units to get the following: Celestial Guard, Healer Mages, archers, 2 units of Swordsmen, 1 Battle Squad, & Bowriders.
Trent had: 2 units of Goblin archers, 2 units of Orc spearmen (or maybe swordsmen), a unit of Trolls, a unit of Goblin spearmen, and a bomb chucka.
The terrain had a river bissecting the table with some shallows in the center. On the left, Trent set up Orc spearmen, gobling spearmen, and goblin archers. I set up opposite them a unit of swordsmen, the battle squad, and the bowriders.
On the right he set up the Bomb Chucka, trolls, Orc spearmen, gobling archers. I set up my Celestial Guard, a unit of swordsmen, the healers, and the archers.
The game wasn't even close. Not from any tactical genius on my part, but from Trent never having seen Celestial Guard before. He figured the Trolls could take care of them. They charged up, outrunning his Orcs which he lashed to keep them up. The Trolls and the Clestial Guard got stuck in while the Swordsmen and the Orcs duked it out.
Unfortunately, all his ranged stuff was far behind while my archers were right behind the line. Oh and the Healer Mages...yeah that's a brutal combo with Celestial Guard. His Chucka would roll like 1-2 hits a turn despite needing 1s, which would promptly come off the next turn. Meanwhile the Troll discovered that Defense 4 is a tough nut to crack.
On the left, it was simple math: 3 units (one being cavalry) vs 2. I used Manuever Mastery to skirt the bowriders around the flank forcing him to give me his flank if he went forward into my line or turned to face the cavalry. So the Battle Squad fought the Gobin spearmen while the Orcs took the pinch from my Swordsmen and Bowriders.
The irony is that Trent did better on the left than the right. The Troll went down hard which allowed the Celestial Guard to the flank the Orcs. Once they were done, the line simply advanced on the poor the Goblin Bowmen and Bomb Chucka, wiping them out in the last turn of the game.
On the left, Trent managed to rout the unit of Swordsmen with his orcs. The Goblins died a hard death, and the weakened Orcs finally broke against the Bowriders. Amazingly, they lived to run away. Sadly, they never got to get back into the fight as the Bowriders ran them down. The Battle Squad then moved up and dispatched the Goblin Archers.
So a amazingly resounding victory wherein I whiped the Orcs and Goblins off the table. My only casualty was a squad of swordmen in the red, which I had the Command Actions to rally in the last turn as the Bomb Chucka was being carved into kindling by the Celestial Guard.
Round 4: vs Manny.
The mission was Ticking Clock with three terrain pieces (2 small forest and 1 small hill) in a diagonal pattern across the field. We were at 2500 pts this round, and I decided to be mean. Manny called me worse than the guy at the 40K event, but egh, it's Manny. It's not like he's people. ;-)
The source of my evilness? Take the above list from the last game. Drop a unit of swordsmen to upgrade a battlesquad to Elder Blade swordsmen Then add a unit of Celestial Guard. Yeah, I'm a bad man.
Manny had Hawkshold and he took: 2 Longbowmen, 3 Militia, 3 swordsmen, 2 heavy infantry or greatswordsmen, and a unit of Knights. This is from memory so the points may not work out.
Manny put his militia in the center with his swordsmen and great infantry/heavy infantry on the flanks. The knights went on the left flank. I had a bunch of watchtowers at this point, so he had to set up a good chunk of his army. I put the two Celestial Guard in the center, with a swordsmen unit on the right. The healer mages and archers went behind the Celestial Guard. The Bowriders and unit of swordsmen went on the left flank. (I've lost a unit of swordsmen somewhere in there, but I honestly don't remember what they did).
The real action all took place on the left flank, because the terrain in the center slowed down that engagement. His Knights made a beeline for my Bowriders, who I direct controlled to keep them in place while my swordsmen advanced. I knew that if I made my bowriders do some wonky manuever, he wouldn't expose his flank to me so I just kept them in place and shot (doing no damage).
Next turn, the swordsmen flank charged the Knights while my bowriders moved around the other flank. No need to give the Knights a charge bonus & impact hit just for the pinch bonus. So on the turn after, the Bowriders flanked & pinched the Knights. The only problem was that Manny had a unit of swordsmen and Greatswords moving up to flank my swordsmen and Bowriders.
This is where the center came in to turn the game. Manny's Longbowmen had tried to whittle down my Celestial Guard, but the combination of the range, their defense, and my Healer mages meant that wasn't going to work. At about the time the Knights were getting their first flank charge, the Militia met the Celestial Guard.
Yeah, that's a bad matchup.
The Celestial Guard on the left blew right through them and the next turn charged the Hawkshold swordsmen about to flank my swordsmen attacking the Knights. The Celestial Guard would eventually win, while the Great Swordsmen were just shy of charging my Swordsmen against the Knights (stupid 2.5" move). This allowed me to finish off the knights, then wheel and charge reserve units on the left flank.
It basically was all over after that. My right flank took a beating, with my Battle Squad forced to rout. (I think I had the second swordsmen squad there, it's a bit hazy). The eight turn saw me direct controlling to back away, ceding them the forest but avoiding a pinch. I held the central hill and the forest on my left flank. Meanwhile, my Celestial Guard advanced to final rush a unit of Longbowmen, forcing them to rout while my Bowriders turned the flank, giving me two units in his deployment zone.
So it was another crushing victory for me. When we tallied the points, I had 15 campaign points. Ajax had beat Trent, giving Ajax 16 campaign points. I heartily congratulated him as the winner. while shaking my fist in curses. Had Ajax failed any of his courage checks in that one turn of our game and I might've pulled out a draw. That net 2 pt swing would've put me over. Curses!!! 8-)
No seriously, it was good fun. My score was more indicative of the fact that I have a few games under my belt while Trent & Manny didn't get to play much. I have a feeling they're gonna thump me next year.
All in all it was good fun times. The campaign system worked perfectly, and we're planning on running an event again.
Game Count: 12.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Kublacon Report: Day 2 (pt 2)
After Rezolution, it was pack the stuff up, drop it off upstairs, then grab some dinner, then back down to the miniatures hall for our 40K for Pink Slips event.
This event has a storied history. Essentially Trent tried running it in 2007, but without many takers. So we decided for shits & giggles to do it at Kublacon. I'd always wanted to play with a Demolisher and some Tau Crisis suits, hence my painting for the last month or so.
The event ended up being much more popular than we'd anticipated, with 8 people clustered around my sole 8x4 green table cloth. Oopse.
Anyway, round 1 was my Demolisher vs Trent's drop podding Black Company Furioso Dreadnought. Yeah...bad matchup. Round one, Trent dropped in, moved up, missed with the meltagun, and then charged the tank. Pop goes the tank. Done on turn one.
But wait. You can't assault out of deep strike. So we put the two vehicles back where we found them. I turned and fired with my lascannon and plasma cannons, missing horribly. (I was using the old IG Codex because otherwise I'd come out to more than 200 pts). Furioso moved up and shot, killed my tank with the melta. Game one done. Twice.
Now Trent could pick from either my Tau crisis suits or my tank to take to the next round. He choose the crisis suits. Which actually suited me fine, because I got to play with his Movie Marine.
Round 2: Demolisher & Movie Marine vs Nurgle Demon Prince & IG Veterans in a chimera.
If you don't remember, the Movie Marine list is in White Dwarf 300. I've played the whole list, and it's really fun. This time I got to play a Space Marine Dude and his 5 extras (essentially 5 extra wounds).
The mission was to grab a piece of terrain in the center of the field. I advanced to get some shots then withdrew to put the objective forest between me and the chimera, to essentially deny shots. My movie marine layed on some Assault 3, Rending love to his demon prince, putting it on its last wound before charging in. Sadly the dice went poorly and my movie marine died. The demolisher made up for it by killing the demon prince.
Unfortunately, because I'd backed off, the random game length meant Manny held the objective. So despite staring down a demolisher from 24" away, he won.
Now you may ask why I made such a bonehead move. Well, there's two answers. First, I really am capable of that level of stupidity. Second, we made brought down about 15 or so Captain Morgan & Cokes. And I make them like so: pour the Mooooooooooooooooooooorgan, pour the coke. Three of those and I was having myself a good time.
Also, there was one other reason I was happy to concede to Manny. I knew who would pay the winner of our match. This guy played like this event was a Grand Tournament. He was looking for the most brutal combos he could. In fact, at one point, he looked at me and Trent and said:
"You know, I didn't really think about the combinations you could have until after I got to the con. I mean, I just took some stuff out of my Ork army from the Golden Gargant [the afternoon's 40K tournament]. But you know, there's some real powerful combos you could pull off. I mean, you'd be unbeaten if you brought a Vendetta full of Khorne Berzerkers!"
I remember this moment, despite the booze. Trent and I were playing Cardhammer (more on that in a second). We heard him speak, I saw Trent do the 'blink, blink' and then look at me. He wanted to say it, but Trent's just too much of a nice guy.
I, however, am not. I looked at the guy and said "You're completely missing the point of this event."
Anyway, so while the people who had our armies played, Trent and I decided to play a game of Battleground. We figured we'd brush Trent up on his skills. I honestly don't remember what Trent took in his army (again, the booze) but it was Orcs and Goblins. Mine was my "Ogre Kingdoms" army of: 4 Ogres, a Hydra, and a unit of Healer Mages.
We played until after the 40K event ended. My Ogres got all up in his coolaid with a quickness. Charging wolf riders into Ogres...bad idea. Beyond that, it went bad for him. Trent might be able to chime in with more because it was a bit hazy for me.
We ended the BGFW game early because the Mini Coordinator for Kublacon wanted to try out the Pink Slip. He borrowed Trent's Movie Marines and I used my Crisis Suits. I realized after I deep struck them that dropping them in 6" away was a phenominally poor idea. I had the guy down to 1 wound and I think all his extras (maybe he had one left) before he broke me in melee combat and ran me off the board.
Then from there, I think Trent played him. Like I said...things were a bit hazy in the evening. But still it was fun. In retrospect, it was probably the least fun event I did. Not because any individual game wasn't fun, but because I had so much fun with everything else that, well, something has to be near the bottom.
Anyway, so it was 2:30am and I was feeling no pain, but I knew that was a tab that was gonna come due with interest at about 7:00am. By now, that feeling that this was a pattern was replaced with grim certainty. Only I had a "okay, this is what I'm gonna do. Bring it." attitude. Went up to the room, had a couple glasses of water, watched about 20 minutes of MSNBC's obsession with prison documentaries and crawled into bed.
Oh, and by chance, if that guy I called out at the 40K tournament ever reads this: buddy, my name is Corey Somavia and I live in Santa Clara, Ca. You got a problem with what I'm saying, you can come find me. Just know that I'm a big fan of all ten amendments in the Bill of Rights.
Game Count: 9 (or 11)
(I count the 3 games of the 40K event as 1 game, because they were all really short, but if you wanted to count each seperate I'm at 11.)
This event has a storied history. Essentially Trent tried running it in 2007, but without many takers. So we decided for shits & giggles to do it at Kublacon. I'd always wanted to play with a Demolisher and some Tau Crisis suits, hence my painting for the last month or so.
The event ended up being much more popular than we'd anticipated, with 8 people clustered around my sole 8x4 green table cloth. Oopse.
Anyway, round 1 was my Demolisher vs Trent's drop podding Black Company Furioso Dreadnought. Yeah...bad matchup. Round one, Trent dropped in, moved up, missed with the meltagun, and then charged the tank. Pop goes the tank. Done on turn one.
But wait. You can't assault out of deep strike. So we put the two vehicles back where we found them. I turned and fired with my lascannon and plasma cannons, missing horribly. (I was using the old IG Codex because otherwise I'd come out to more than 200 pts). Furioso moved up and shot, killed my tank with the melta. Game one done. Twice.
Now Trent could pick from either my Tau crisis suits or my tank to take to the next round. He choose the crisis suits. Which actually suited me fine, because I got to play with his Movie Marine.
Round 2: Demolisher & Movie Marine vs Nurgle Demon Prince & IG Veterans in a chimera.
If you don't remember, the Movie Marine list is in White Dwarf 300. I've played the whole list, and it's really fun. This time I got to play a Space Marine Dude and his 5 extras (essentially 5 extra wounds).
The mission was to grab a piece of terrain in the center of the field. I advanced to get some shots then withdrew to put the objective forest between me and the chimera, to essentially deny shots. My movie marine layed on some Assault 3, Rending love to his demon prince, putting it on its last wound before charging in. Sadly the dice went poorly and my movie marine died. The demolisher made up for it by killing the demon prince.
Unfortunately, because I'd backed off, the random game length meant Manny held the objective. So despite staring down a demolisher from 24" away, he won.
Now you may ask why I made such a bonehead move. Well, there's two answers. First, I really am capable of that level of stupidity. Second, we made brought down about 15 or so Captain Morgan & Cokes. And I make them like so: pour the Mooooooooooooooooooooorgan, pour the coke. Three of those and I was having myself a good time.
Also, there was one other reason I was happy to concede to Manny. I knew who would pay the winner of our match. This guy played like this event was a Grand Tournament. He was looking for the most brutal combos he could. In fact, at one point, he looked at me and Trent and said:
"You know, I didn't really think about the combinations you could have until after I got to the con. I mean, I just took some stuff out of my Ork army from the Golden Gargant [the afternoon's 40K tournament]. But you know, there's some real powerful combos you could pull off. I mean, you'd be unbeaten if you brought a Vendetta full of Khorne Berzerkers!"
I remember this moment, despite the booze. Trent and I were playing Cardhammer (more on that in a second). We heard him speak, I saw Trent do the 'blink, blink' and then look at me. He wanted to say it, but Trent's just too much of a nice guy.
I, however, am not. I looked at the guy and said "You're completely missing the point of this event."
Anyway, so while the people who had our armies played, Trent and I decided to play a game of Battleground. We figured we'd brush Trent up on his skills. I honestly don't remember what Trent took in his army (again, the booze) but it was Orcs and Goblins. Mine was my "Ogre Kingdoms" army of: 4 Ogres, a Hydra, and a unit of Healer Mages.
We played until after the 40K event ended. My Ogres got all up in his coolaid with a quickness. Charging wolf riders into Ogres...bad idea. Beyond that, it went bad for him. Trent might be able to chime in with more because it was a bit hazy for me.
We ended the BGFW game early because the Mini Coordinator for Kublacon wanted to try out the Pink Slip. He borrowed Trent's Movie Marines and I used my Crisis Suits. I realized after I deep struck them that dropping them in 6" away was a phenominally poor idea. I had the guy down to 1 wound and I think all his extras (maybe he had one left) before he broke me in melee combat and ran me off the board.
Then from there, I think Trent played him. Like I said...things were a bit hazy in the evening. But still it was fun. In retrospect, it was probably the least fun event I did. Not because any individual game wasn't fun, but because I had so much fun with everything else that, well, something has to be near the bottom.
Anyway, so it was 2:30am and I was feeling no pain, but I knew that was a tab that was gonna come due with interest at about 7:00am. By now, that feeling that this was a pattern was replaced with grim certainty. Only I had a "okay, this is what I'm gonna do. Bring it." attitude. Went up to the room, had a couple glasses of water, watched about 20 minutes of MSNBC's obsession with prison documentaries and crawled into bed.
Oh, and by chance, if that guy I called out at the 40K tournament ever reads this: buddy, my name is Corey Somavia and I live in Santa Clara, Ca. You got a problem with what I'm saying, you can come find me. Just know that I'm a big fan of all ten amendments in the Bill of Rights.
Game Count: 9 (or 11)
(I count the 3 games of the 40K event as 1 game, because they were all really short, but if you wanted to count each seperate I'm at 11.)
Kublacon Report: Day Two (pt 1)
Promptly at 7:00, my daughter stood up in her crib and, seeing her parents, decided we should wake up as well. Meredith got and gave her a bottle while I wondered how the little gnomes managed to put sandpaper under my eyelids without me noticing.
But it was Kubla. I didn't come here to sleep. So I got up, went downstairs, and got some coffee for me, Mer, and my step-mom (babysitter for lil'un). The one nice thing about having a 7am wakeup is that I could slowly wakeup, have a costco muffin, and chat before I had to get going.
So shower and it was time for Rezolution. Luckily we had Dan crashing in the other hotel room and could use his cart to get all our terrain. The three Crews I brought all came down in 1 army transport. The three tables worth of terrain took up substantially more space.
The Rezolution campaign-a-ment used the system from the Outbreak book, slighty modified. We were playing the linked scenarios as our Crew tried to escape being trapped on the Serenity moon colony. Players got bonus campaign points for having a fully painted Crew and for choosing "non-standard" leaders. For example, Trent had a Bride of Lilith as his leader and got 2 campaign points.
I took my cursed Ronin Crew. I think in the two or so years since I assembled them, they've won like 2 games. Mainly because I take a lot of the not-normal choices. The crew is:
Maven
Fiddler
2 Ghosts
4 Fists
2 Bricks w/miniguns
Esper
Since my fiddler was my second (a non-standard choice) and my force was painted, I got 5 campaign points to start. I gave my Bricks +1 RCA, my Esper +1 craft, and Fiddler got +1 Nrv and Medic.
Round One: vs Dravani.
The scneraio was Resupply, essentially fighting over buildings to loot. Trent's Crew was: Bride, 4-5 Baggers, 2 Volkoda, 2 Wraiths, 2 Souless, and 4-5 Shamblers.
Nominally the game had deactivated gun turrets that our hackers could control, but that was just a roll for Trent to fail every turn. My hackers stayed away from the HPT because there was the Bride and Vokodas cruising up that flank. I put a serious amoutn of firepower into them and they went down, but the baggers and shamblers ran right up the middle.
My fiddler basically took the Souless out of the game with a suicide flamer run that ended up with him living. That was because the Baggers and Shamblers went into the middle where he had been, and beat up on the Fists, the Maven, and the Ghosts.
In an act of desperation, I moved the Esper up and rolled for Volcano know it'd catch my Bricks and my surviving Fist as well. I managed to pull it off and set everyone but the Fiddler, the Bride, and two Shamblers on fire. Five Baggers standing there screaming "Make it stop, it burns!".
I then followed up with the Fiddler who flamed the Bride and the last two Shamblers. It what would be the crucial roll of the game, I did just one wound shy of putting the Bride into Critical Damage. The next control phase, she put the fire out and charged the Fiddler. The baggers also put out the majority of their flames.
From there it was all downhill. All I had left was one Brick (the other was on fire) and my Esper. I tried in vain to shoot the Bride with the minigun, but she was just too dodgy.
So win for the Dravani. Trent rolled to see what type of buildings he found. Essentially he could take equipment out of the back of the Outbreak book, either ghost decks & software, cybernetics, or guns & equipment, depending on what he rolled. He got the Ghost Parlor and upgraded his Wraiths to some better decks. I picked up some campaign points, but honestly can't remember on what I spent them.
Round Two: vs CSO.
The scenario was the Beacon, which was getting inside a locked door to send out a homing beacon to bring the shuttle. Oh yeah, it was guarded by toxic zombies, with more zombies coming on during later turns. It was actually designed to be a short game to prevent people from just killing the enemy and winning by default.
Scott's CSO was on loan from me, so I knew the Crew well and it was tough. Marshal, 4 Peacekeepers + a major, 5 CSO troopers plus a Sergeant and Flamer trooper, a Technician, and a Field Engineer.
The field was set up so that the entrance to the objective building was down a wide street. There were some sandbags, but let me tell you, that's not enough against a CSO gunline.
So the early turns was us manuevering and killing zombies (rather quickly, actually). My Fists ran up (in teams of 2), killed the Marshal, then got gunned down. Not to worry, I thought, and sent in the second Fist squad. One got beat down by CSO in melee and the other failed to kill a single guy.
Crap.
The upside was that I managed to hack open the door and then put the second Ghost (with his wonderful Sneak ability) right by the front entrance. I won initiative next turn and resisted the urge to try and lay down a beating. Instead I walked inside and activated the Beacon.
So I picked up a quick win with a low casualty count. Still can't remember the advancements I gave to people other than I gave the Esper the +4" bonus to her Craft powers, thinking how much fun it'd be with Jaunt.
Round 3: vs APAC
The mission was Escape. The premise was simple: get on the shuttle by turn 6 and it'd takes off. Hackers inside the shuttle could speed up the countdown while hackers outside could slow it down. Oh and did I mention the zombies? The start coming on from the sides, with extra ones coming on behind the Crews who lost last round ("they're right behind us!")
That was Manny's plight. He was playing my APAC crew, but the build was exactly the same as his that had gotten lost at home. It was: Arashi, 2 Panthers, 2 Senshis, Yureii, 4 Enforcers w/Lt. and Heavy, 4 Enforcers with Shotguns. Manny had won Round 1 and gotten some extra guns & equipment. So his shotgun enforcers had smoke grenades and his Yureii had a shotgun.
This was an annoying game with a funny ending. The annoying part was Manny and I each had terrible luck for half the game, just not the same halfs. My first half was so frustrating I was banging my head onto the table. His was the second half.
Remember that extended Craft range for my Esper? Well that's not all that impressive when you fail 5 of 7 Craft rolls, needing a 6+ on two dice. Meanwhile, Manny claimed the shuttle early parking his shotgun enforces inside while the rest of the Crew caught up. He moved his other Enforcer squad onto the elevated platform I'd bought at the flea market the night before.
This would prove to be a mistake as zombies came on behind him. While they couldn't operate stairs and a ramp, the zombies did trap the Enforcers on the platform. Meanwhile, the zombies gang tackled a Panther and eventually dragged the robot down by sheer weight of numbers. The Enforcers on the ramp would whittle down the zombies but it'd be too little too late.
Meanwhile inside the shuttle, my fiddler and Fists engaged in a battle of attrition. There was charging and flaming, followed by shotgun blasts and Arashi psychic powers. My Fists let me down again. One got stabbed in the back by an acrobatic Senshii. On my left flank, the zombies charged my Maven, eventually bringing him down and zombifying him.
Then Manny's luck turned. My Esper managed to jaunt her Bricks to short range. Despite cover and with Storm Shield, a short range minigun is nothing to be ignored. Five dice, all coming up 5 or 6. Dead Arashi.
The zombies charged my Bricks, killing an zombifying one but my Esper jaunted right into the shuttle. Inside, a badly wounded Fist and a Ghost fought a Senshi while my other Ghost fought and killed the last shotgun Enforcer. The Fists lost the combat with the Senshi, but thanks to Manny's ability to only roll 1 wound (which became a theme), no harm. Then my Ghost wins combat and kills the teenage super soldier.
At the end of the turn, the shuttle lifts off, but not before a zombie manages to come aboard, killing my Ghost. I'd won with 3 models in the shuttle but decided to roll it off to see if the people survive or if the shuttle would spread the zombie plague.
My Brick minigunned one of the zombie but the other was unhurt. It charged the wounded Fist, killing and zombifying him. Then it was a lather, rinse, and repeat: I'd Jaunt out of combat with a zombie and shoot, but not kill all of them, then the surviving zombie would charge in. I'd jaunt out of combat and shoot...
This went on for 2-3 tense turns before the last zombie was killed, leaving my Ghost, Brick, and Esper. We joked about how that was right out of a horror movie, minigun blazing away in a pressurized shuttle and all... It was an entertaining end, and a fun game, but frustrating for us both at points.
Honorable mention to the table over where Trent and Scott faced off. Here's some advice: if zombies are coming on behind you, don't form a gunline 8" from the board edge. The Dravani got off the table with all but his Volkoda and one other model. Meanwhile, the entire CSO force was zombified. They literally ran out of zombie models.
So the Dravani carried the day, escaping from Serenity Station almost entirely intact. By the end, two big wins going into rd 3, the Dravani were scary. Both the Baggers and the Shamblers had Scout to go with the Volkoda, so their motto was "all up in yer grill, byotch!".
I was extremely pleased with how the tournament worked out. Most the games were close, and everyone had fun. I just wish we'd had more people. Anyway, second half of Saturday report will come later.
Game Count: 7.
But it was Kubla. I didn't come here to sleep. So I got up, went downstairs, and got some coffee for me, Mer, and my step-mom (babysitter for lil'un). The one nice thing about having a 7am wakeup is that I could slowly wakeup, have a costco muffin, and chat before I had to get going.
So shower and it was time for Rezolution. Luckily we had Dan crashing in the other hotel room and could use his cart to get all our terrain. The three Crews I brought all came down in 1 army transport. The three tables worth of terrain took up substantially more space.
The Rezolution campaign-a-ment used the system from the Outbreak book, slighty modified. We were playing the linked scenarios as our Crew tried to escape being trapped on the Serenity moon colony. Players got bonus campaign points for having a fully painted Crew and for choosing "non-standard" leaders. For example, Trent had a Bride of Lilith as his leader and got 2 campaign points.
I took my cursed Ronin Crew. I think in the two or so years since I assembled them, they've won like 2 games. Mainly because I take a lot of the not-normal choices. The crew is:
Maven
Fiddler
2 Ghosts
4 Fists
2 Bricks w/miniguns
Esper
Since my fiddler was my second (a non-standard choice) and my force was painted, I got 5 campaign points to start. I gave my Bricks +1 RCA, my Esper +1 craft, and Fiddler got +1 Nrv and Medic.
Round One: vs Dravani.
The scneraio was Resupply, essentially fighting over buildings to loot. Trent's Crew was: Bride, 4-5 Baggers, 2 Volkoda, 2 Wraiths, 2 Souless, and 4-5 Shamblers.
Nominally the game had deactivated gun turrets that our hackers could control, but that was just a roll for Trent to fail every turn. My hackers stayed away from the HPT because there was the Bride and Vokodas cruising up that flank. I put a serious amoutn of firepower into them and they went down, but the baggers and shamblers ran right up the middle.
My fiddler basically took the Souless out of the game with a suicide flamer run that ended up with him living. That was because the Baggers and Shamblers went into the middle where he had been, and beat up on the Fists, the Maven, and the Ghosts.
In an act of desperation, I moved the Esper up and rolled for Volcano know it'd catch my Bricks and my surviving Fist as well. I managed to pull it off and set everyone but the Fiddler, the Bride, and two Shamblers on fire. Five Baggers standing there screaming "Make it stop, it burns!".
I then followed up with the Fiddler who flamed the Bride and the last two Shamblers. It what would be the crucial roll of the game, I did just one wound shy of putting the Bride into Critical Damage. The next control phase, she put the fire out and charged the Fiddler. The baggers also put out the majority of their flames.
From there it was all downhill. All I had left was one Brick (the other was on fire) and my Esper. I tried in vain to shoot the Bride with the minigun, but she was just too dodgy.
So win for the Dravani. Trent rolled to see what type of buildings he found. Essentially he could take equipment out of the back of the Outbreak book, either ghost decks & software, cybernetics, or guns & equipment, depending on what he rolled. He got the Ghost Parlor and upgraded his Wraiths to some better decks. I picked up some campaign points, but honestly can't remember on what I spent them.
Round Two: vs CSO.
The scenario was the Beacon, which was getting inside a locked door to send out a homing beacon to bring the shuttle. Oh yeah, it was guarded by toxic zombies, with more zombies coming on during later turns. It was actually designed to be a short game to prevent people from just killing the enemy and winning by default.
Scott's CSO was on loan from me, so I knew the Crew well and it was tough. Marshal, 4 Peacekeepers + a major, 5 CSO troopers plus a Sergeant and Flamer trooper, a Technician, and a Field Engineer.
The field was set up so that the entrance to the objective building was down a wide street. There were some sandbags, but let me tell you, that's not enough against a CSO gunline.
So the early turns was us manuevering and killing zombies (rather quickly, actually). My Fists ran up (in teams of 2), killed the Marshal, then got gunned down. Not to worry, I thought, and sent in the second Fist squad. One got beat down by CSO in melee and the other failed to kill a single guy.
Crap.
The upside was that I managed to hack open the door and then put the second Ghost (with his wonderful Sneak ability) right by the front entrance. I won initiative next turn and resisted the urge to try and lay down a beating. Instead I walked inside and activated the Beacon.
So I picked up a quick win with a low casualty count. Still can't remember the advancements I gave to people other than I gave the Esper the +4" bonus to her Craft powers, thinking how much fun it'd be with Jaunt.
Round 3: vs APAC
The mission was Escape. The premise was simple: get on the shuttle by turn 6 and it'd takes off. Hackers inside the shuttle could speed up the countdown while hackers outside could slow it down. Oh and did I mention the zombies? The start coming on from the sides, with extra ones coming on behind the Crews who lost last round ("they're right behind us!")
That was Manny's plight. He was playing my APAC crew, but the build was exactly the same as his that had gotten lost at home. It was: Arashi, 2 Panthers, 2 Senshis, Yureii, 4 Enforcers w/Lt. and Heavy, 4 Enforcers with Shotguns. Manny had won Round 1 and gotten some extra guns & equipment. So his shotgun enforcers had smoke grenades and his Yureii had a shotgun.
This was an annoying game with a funny ending. The annoying part was Manny and I each had terrible luck for half the game, just not the same halfs. My first half was so frustrating I was banging my head onto the table. His was the second half.
Remember that extended Craft range for my Esper? Well that's not all that impressive when you fail 5 of 7 Craft rolls, needing a 6+ on two dice. Meanwhile, Manny claimed the shuttle early parking his shotgun enforces inside while the rest of the Crew caught up. He moved his other Enforcer squad onto the elevated platform I'd bought at the flea market the night before.
This would prove to be a mistake as zombies came on behind him. While they couldn't operate stairs and a ramp, the zombies did trap the Enforcers on the platform. Meanwhile, the zombies gang tackled a Panther and eventually dragged the robot down by sheer weight of numbers. The Enforcers on the ramp would whittle down the zombies but it'd be too little too late.
Meanwhile inside the shuttle, my fiddler and Fists engaged in a battle of attrition. There was charging and flaming, followed by shotgun blasts and Arashi psychic powers. My Fists let me down again. One got stabbed in the back by an acrobatic Senshii. On my left flank, the zombies charged my Maven, eventually bringing him down and zombifying him.
Then Manny's luck turned. My Esper managed to jaunt her Bricks to short range. Despite cover and with Storm Shield, a short range minigun is nothing to be ignored. Five dice, all coming up 5 or 6. Dead Arashi.
The zombies charged my Bricks, killing an zombifying one but my Esper jaunted right into the shuttle. Inside, a badly wounded Fist and a Ghost fought a Senshi while my other Ghost fought and killed the last shotgun Enforcer. The Fists lost the combat with the Senshi, but thanks to Manny's ability to only roll 1 wound (which became a theme), no harm. Then my Ghost wins combat and kills the teenage super soldier.
At the end of the turn, the shuttle lifts off, but not before a zombie manages to come aboard, killing my Ghost. I'd won with 3 models in the shuttle but decided to roll it off to see if the people survive or if the shuttle would spread the zombie plague.
My Brick minigunned one of the zombie but the other was unhurt. It charged the wounded Fist, killing and zombifying him. Then it was a lather, rinse, and repeat: I'd Jaunt out of combat with a zombie and shoot, but not kill all of them, then the surviving zombie would charge in. I'd jaunt out of combat and shoot...
This went on for 2-3 tense turns before the last zombie was killed, leaving my Ghost, Brick, and Esper. We joked about how that was right out of a horror movie, minigun blazing away in a pressurized shuttle and all... It was an entertaining end, and a fun game, but frustrating for us both at points.
Honorable mention to the table over where Trent and Scott faced off. Here's some advice: if zombies are coming on behind you, don't form a gunline 8" from the board edge. The Dravani got off the table with all but his Volkoda and one other model. Meanwhile, the entire CSO force was zombified. They literally ran out of zombie models.
So the Dravani carried the day, escaping from Serenity Station almost entirely intact. By the end, two big wins going into rd 3, the Dravani were scary. Both the Baggers and the Shamblers had Scout to go with the Volkoda, so their motto was "all up in yer grill, byotch!".
I was extremely pleased with how the tournament worked out. Most the games were close, and everyone had fun. I just wish we'd had more people. Anyway, second half of Saturday report will come later.
Game Count: 7.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Kublacon Report: Day One
Promptly at 6:30 am, my daughter alerted me that it was time to get up and start packing for Kublacon. She thinks she wanted to be picked up and fed, but she was wrong. Six hours two days in a row meant two cups of coffee, but I'd done worse.
Right, so long story short: we hoped to get out the door at 2:00pm (after Jocelyn's nap) and we got out at quarter of three. Not Jocelyn's fault either, she was awake at 2:00. Mer and I hadn't showered and we hadn't finished packing away all our stuff.
Also, if I had a motto for this Kublacon it would be: "Aw crap, we forgot that." Minor stuff from utensils for sandwiches and yogurt, to fairly important stuff like the cart we use to lug around our terrain. If Dan hadn't spent a night in one of our rooms, we wouldn't have had a cart come Saturday when we had like 8 boxes of urban terrain.
Anyway, we get there, get checked in, and the porter arrives with our stuff in like 10 minutes instead of the 90 it took last year. Before we knew it, it was 6:00pm, and time for some Bloodbowl.
The BBCS (Blood Bowl Championship Series) is essentially a 3 round league with 12 wacky pitches, each with their own set of rules. This ranges from relatively minor (playing desert, so always hot and bonus armor because of the sand dunes), to somewhat weird (playing in Mordheim where people can bounce-pass off the walls and drink wyrdstone potions), to outright hilarity (playing on a mostly secure forcefield over a lava pit and having Tzeentch change the rules every drive to allow such things as: no rerolls, rerolling a reroll, two blitzes a turn, 3 GFIs a turn, 1 GFIs a turn, etc.).
Teams are 1.3 million GPs and start with 30 SPPs, but other than that it's a 3 round league. We had five people, would've been six but Scott had "issues" with registering (at one point we thought he'd been banned from the con and escorted off the property). We ended up picking up a person who basically played a demo game.
So we have 5 or 6, depending on how you counted it. This was half of the 12 we had last year. But then again, while we had 12 start the tournament we only had 4 play round 3. Most of them said it was because of the flea market, but there was a lot of grousing that the rules for the pitches were wacky and they thought they'd be playing straight up Bloodbowl. Read the F'ing event description, people.
This year, everyone who started finished and had a great time. Hopefully we'll have more next year. Right, so my team and my games:
The Ten-Sea Titans
6 Ogres
9 Snotlings
FF: 0
Rerolls: 3
Apothecary
1 Asst Coach
1 Cheerleader
Before the game, I spent my 30 SPPs to give 5 ogres an upgrade. I got 4 skill upgrades and a double. Three ogres got Guard, one got Break Tackle, and one got Block.
Round 1: Ogres vs Halflings
The pitch was the Norsca Bowl with snow drifts (+1 to armor but GFI fails on 1-2), rowdy crowd (+1 injury roll if pushed into the crowd), and a revised weather table with more cold effects.
So a word to the wise: play a game of something less than 3 months before you're gonna play in a tournament. Will make the learning curve a bit better. I was just getting used to the Bloodbowl rules and Manny scored. Stupid Halflings. But it was okay, I thought, because I'm Ogres. Ogres are all about ball control (stop snickering, it's a valid football term). I held the ball for like 6 turns, slowly plodding down the field while laying a beatdown. Sure I could throw just like the halflings but I figured I'd play for the second half.
Silly, silly me. Manny got the ball back and scored on his turn 7 or 8 of the first half. Then came the second half and he kicked to me. I didn't get the ball as quickly as I should and the halflings scooted into my half and grabbed it. Three to one.
From there I decided to play for the draw. I never thought it an especially sporting tactic to sit one or two squares from the touchdown and just thump the other guy, but I was told by multiple people that it's a valid tactic for running teams. Especially when facing quick scoring teams. So with an ogre holding the football and flanked by two ogres, I kept the ball two squares from a touchdown for like 5 turns, playing for the draw.
Yeah...anyone who's reading this and saying "hey wait, the score is 3-1 for the Halflings" can count better than me. Imagine my joy when Manny informed me of this fact. Oh well. Right, a loss, no advanacements, and only 10K gp (not even enough for a snotling) I shamefacedly moved onto my next opponent.
Round 2: Goblins vs Ogres
The pitch was the Sylvania Bowl with zombie crowds (can fight/dodge free if pushed into the crowd), a necromancer for each team (dead players can be resurrected as zombies), and a zombie themed kick off table (including being pelted with body parts and zombiefying the ref).
I don't remember this game too well, except for the fact that it went bad for Trent. In fact, it went so bad for him that the parts I remember are basically a highlight reel of his humiliation. It started with him flanking his chainsaw Looney by two trolls with Guard. No problem, I put my ogre with block flanked by two ogres with guard. Pop-squish, hurt Looney.
This'd be a theme. Despite putting half his team in the injury box, nobody was killed. It was usually just a badly hurt or a KO. Still, it went badly for him. 2 of the 4 snots that left the field did so for being caught fouling. His pogoer never got to do anything before being removed. His bombadier ate fried chicken before playing and had greasy fingers, dropping the bomb at his own feet twice I think. His ball & chain fanatic carved a path through my line...and then I surrounded him so I could roll 2 block dice. Off goes the fanatic.
The real coup d'hilarity was the clutch fails. At the end of the first half, a gobbo with the ball has to dodge free of my guys (or maybe GFI), and promptly trips. Half over.
Fast forward to the end of the second half. He's got a gobbo with the ball covered by a snotling. and has to make a blitz roll on a snotling with gobbo. Double skull. Game over.
(like I said I don't remember too clearly the events, so I may be mixing them up. Beer was involved.)
So I get +1 FF (yay) and 70K in gold. I almost bought a 10th snotling, but figured "really, is it going to come down to that last guy?" Instead, I opted for +4 coaches and +4 cheerleaders.
So we had a quick 'check out the friday flea market' pause wherein I bought some urban terrain including a platform. It'd be useful for the Rezolution event the next day. Then it was back to the tournament.
Round 3: Ogres vs Pro Elves
I apologize because I don't remember my opponent's name (Sean?). Anyway, we played the Karak Bowl. It has a low ceiling (-1 to pass), stone floors (-1 to armor), and Dwarves Refs with a 'let them play' attitude (players ejected for fouling and secret weapons only half the time). Also the kickoff had skulldugery such as a rogue deathrolla, disgruntled goblins bombing the pitch, and Bugman's Special Brew.
Anyway, this game was the most fun I had despite being an utter blowout. I think I lost 4-1. But due to inducements, I could hire Bomber Dribblesnot. I had so much fun with him and he attracted a lot of attention until he ran into the one honest Dwarf ref on the payroll.
Meanwhile, the pro Elves danced around me, scoring pretty much at whim. I realized after the 2nd turn of the first half (when I was down 3-0) that I didn't stand a chance. I decided to roll out Plan B. The "B" is for Beatdown.
It's amazing. I had better results when I didn't try to win. All this silly nonsense about putting the spiked ball across some line way over there. Naw, I'd rather just hit stuff.
My personal crowning moment was rolling a twelve. On the Injury Roll. Against Prince Morianon.
Oh that was nice.
At one point, the Elf team was down to 5 players. I had 1 casualty, a snotling. It was my first of the whole tournament. Then the two guys of his in the KO box woke up and brought the Elves back up to 7 guys, allowing him to score a fourth touchdown. I decided at that point I'd do something wacky and try to score. I tossed a snotling with a ball and he managed to land and then make both GFIs. Woohoo walk off TD!!!
(don't bother me with facts like "I lost" okay? It was a walk-off TD...the fact that 'walk-off' usually implies victory is just that: an implication. I scored a TD, and then we walked off the field.)
So we cleaned up, chatted for a bit (shocking!!), and then made our way upstairs by about 2:30 am. As I lay in bed, so amped up and overtired that it took me until 3:00am to fall asleep, I had this feeling that the next day was gonna suck and that this was going to be a pattern.
Game Count: 4.
Right, so long story short: we hoped to get out the door at 2:00pm (after Jocelyn's nap) and we got out at quarter of three. Not Jocelyn's fault either, she was awake at 2:00. Mer and I hadn't showered and we hadn't finished packing away all our stuff.
Also, if I had a motto for this Kublacon it would be: "Aw crap, we forgot that." Minor stuff from utensils for sandwiches and yogurt, to fairly important stuff like the cart we use to lug around our terrain. If Dan hadn't spent a night in one of our rooms, we wouldn't have had a cart come Saturday when we had like 8 boxes of urban terrain.
Anyway, we get there, get checked in, and the porter arrives with our stuff in like 10 minutes instead of the 90 it took last year. Before we knew it, it was 6:00pm, and time for some Bloodbowl.
The BBCS (Blood Bowl Championship Series) is essentially a 3 round league with 12 wacky pitches, each with their own set of rules. This ranges from relatively minor (playing desert, so always hot and bonus armor because of the sand dunes), to somewhat weird (playing in Mordheim where people can bounce-pass off the walls and drink wyrdstone potions), to outright hilarity (playing on a mostly secure forcefield over a lava pit and having Tzeentch change the rules every drive to allow such things as: no rerolls, rerolling a reroll, two blitzes a turn, 3 GFIs a turn, 1 GFIs a turn, etc.).
Teams are 1.3 million GPs and start with 30 SPPs, but other than that it's a 3 round league. We had five people, would've been six but Scott had "issues" with registering (at one point we thought he'd been banned from the con and escorted off the property). We ended up picking up a person who basically played a demo game.
So we have 5 or 6, depending on how you counted it. This was half of the 12 we had last year. But then again, while we had 12 start the tournament we only had 4 play round 3. Most of them said it was because of the flea market, but there was a lot of grousing that the rules for the pitches were wacky and they thought they'd be playing straight up Bloodbowl. Read the F'ing event description, people.
This year, everyone who started finished and had a great time. Hopefully we'll have more next year. Right, so my team and my games:
The Ten-Sea Titans
6 Ogres
9 Snotlings
FF: 0
Rerolls: 3
Apothecary
1 Asst Coach
1 Cheerleader
Before the game, I spent my 30 SPPs to give 5 ogres an upgrade. I got 4 skill upgrades and a double. Three ogres got Guard, one got Break Tackle, and one got Block.
Round 1: Ogres vs Halflings
The pitch was the Norsca Bowl with snow drifts (+1 to armor but GFI fails on 1-2), rowdy crowd (+1 injury roll if pushed into the crowd), and a revised weather table with more cold effects.
So a word to the wise: play a game of something less than 3 months before you're gonna play in a tournament. Will make the learning curve a bit better. I was just getting used to the Bloodbowl rules and Manny scored. Stupid Halflings. But it was okay, I thought, because I'm Ogres. Ogres are all about ball control (stop snickering, it's a valid football term). I held the ball for like 6 turns, slowly plodding down the field while laying a beatdown. Sure I could throw just like the halflings but I figured I'd play for the second half.
Silly, silly me. Manny got the ball back and scored on his turn 7 or 8 of the first half. Then came the second half and he kicked to me. I didn't get the ball as quickly as I should and the halflings scooted into my half and grabbed it. Three to one.
From there I decided to play for the draw. I never thought it an especially sporting tactic to sit one or two squares from the touchdown and just thump the other guy, but I was told by multiple people that it's a valid tactic for running teams. Especially when facing quick scoring teams. So with an ogre holding the football and flanked by two ogres, I kept the ball two squares from a touchdown for like 5 turns, playing for the draw.
Yeah...anyone who's reading this and saying "hey wait, the score is 3-1 for the Halflings" can count better than me. Imagine my joy when Manny informed me of this fact. Oh well. Right, a loss, no advanacements, and only 10K gp (not even enough for a snotling) I shamefacedly moved onto my next opponent.
Round 2: Goblins vs Ogres
The pitch was the Sylvania Bowl with zombie crowds (can fight/dodge free if pushed into the crowd), a necromancer for each team (dead players can be resurrected as zombies), and a zombie themed kick off table (including being pelted with body parts and zombiefying the ref).
I don't remember this game too well, except for the fact that it went bad for Trent. In fact, it went so bad for him that the parts I remember are basically a highlight reel of his humiliation. It started with him flanking his chainsaw Looney by two trolls with Guard. No problem, I put my ogre with block flanked by two ogres with guard. Pop-squish, hurt Looney.
This'd be a theme. Despite putting half his team in the injury box, nobody was killed. It was usually just a badly hurt or a KO. Still, it went badly for him. 2 of the 4 snots that left the field did so for being caught fouling. His pogoer never got to do anything before being removed. His bombadier ate fried chicken before playing and had greasy fingers, dropping the bomb at his own feet twice I think. His ball & chain fanatic carved a path through my line...and then I surrounded him so I could roll 2 block dice. Off goes the fanatic.
The real coup d'hilarity was the clutch fails. At the end of the first half, a gobbo with the ball has to dodge free of my guys (or maybe GFI), and promptly trips. Half over.
Fast forward to the end of the second half. He's got a gobbo with the ball covered by a snotling. and has to make a blitz roll on a snotling with gobbo. Double skull. Game over.
(like I said I don't remember too clearly the events, so I may be mixing them up. Beer was involved.)
So I get +1 FF (yay) and 70K in gold. I almost bought a 10th snotling, but figured "really, is it going to come down to that last guy?" Instead, I opted for +4 coaches and +4 cheerleaders.
So we had a quick 'check out the friday flea market' pause wherein I bought some urban terrain including a platform. It'd be useful for the Rezolution event the next day. Then it was back to the tournament.
Round 3: Ogres vs Pro Elves
I apologize because I don't remember my opponent's name (Sean?). Anyway, we played the Karak Bowl. It has a low ceiling (-1 to pass), stone floors (-1 to armor), and Dwarves Refs with a 'let them play' attitude (players ejected for fouling and secret weapons only half the time). Also the kickoff had skulldugery such as a rogue deathrolla, disgruntled goblins bombing the pitch, and Bugman's Special Brew.
Anyway, this game was the most fun I had despite being an utter blowout. I think I lost 4-1. But due to inducements, I could hire Bomber Dribblesnot. I had so much fun with him and he attracted a lot of attention until he ran into the one honest Dwarf ref on the payroll.
Meanwhile, the pro Elves danced around me, scoring pretty much at whim. I realized after the 2nd turn of the first half (when I was down 3-0) that I didn't stand a chance. I decided to roll out Plan B. The "B" is for Beatdown.
It's amazing. I had better results when I didn't try to win. All this silly nonsense about putting the spiked ball across some line way over there. Naw, I'd rather just hit stuff.
My personal crowning moment was rolling a twelve. On the Injury Roll. Against Prince Morianon.
Oh that was nice.
At one point, the Elf team was down to 5 players. I had 1 casualty, a snotling. It was my first of the whole tournament. Then the two guys of his in the KO box woke up and brought the Elves back up to 7 guys, allowing him to score a fourth touchdown. I decided at that point I'd do something wacky and try to score. I tossed a snotling with a ball and he managed to land and then make both GFIs. Woohoo walk off TD!!!
(don't bother me with facts like "I lost" okay? It was a walk-off TD...the fact that 'walk-off' usually implies victory is just that: an implication. I scored a TD, and then we walked off the field.)
So we cleaned up, chatted for a bit (shocking!!), and then made our way upstairs by about 2:30 am. As I lay in bed, so amped up and overtired that it took me until 3:00am to fall asleep, I had this feeling that the next day was gonna suck and that this was going to be a pattern.
Game Count: 4.
Kublacon Report: Day Zero
So Kublacon has come and past, and I'm frakking exhausted. Something about three days with a 3:00am bedtime and a very chipper little girl saying "Hiii!" at 7:00am. But I get ahead of myself...
The goal for the Kublacon weekend is 14 games from the time Manny touches down on Thursday until I drop him off on Tuesday. I don't try to best myself every year, because that just sets me up for failure. Just a healthy 14 games every year. This year I'm happy to say I blew right through it late Sunday night/early sunday morning, leaving Monday and Tuesday for running up the score.
Right, so Thursday. Day Zero. I'd picked up Scott the day before and so had stayed up a bit late chatting (me? chat too much? NO!!!). Still, got a decent 6 hours of sleep. Normally that was an extra half-cup of coffee but I was flying on Kubla-excitement.
11:00 am: the Portu-geek lands. The gay jokes commence at around 11:02. We get him some food (some whining about a bagel in the past 8 hours or some such), go to Game Kastle to pick up some terrain for the Rezolution event, then hit the grocery store for some last minute foodstuffs so we don't drop $300 on food at the con.
Between feeding Manny and Game Kastle, Jocelyn wakes from her nap (Scott was watching her, I wasn't leaving her alone people. Although leaving him in charge could be seen by some as more negligent...). She gives "Papa" Manny the hairy eyeball for the first twenty minutes and then decides she likes him. After that, Papa got hugs whenever he wanted.
Come home, BBQ some Tri-tip for Manny. By "barbeque" I mean "ruin." The bald fatman likes his meat well done. And well done tri-tip is a Geneva Convention violation ranking just shy of waterboarding and Episode II of Star Wars. I should've just taken off my shoe and thrown that on the grill. Anyway, my cut of meat was suitably rare: it had just stopped begging me to stop cooking it.
After recovering from the meat coma, we packed the game stuff in the car and got down to business: some gaming. Our tradition is to keep Manny up for 24 hours by gaming, and we went to our old standby: Battleground Fantasy Warfare (affectionally known as "Cardhammer").
Manny played Men of Hawkshold vs my Umenzi, using the Kingdoms campaign pack to generate a scenario. I honestly can't remember the scenario, it might've been Total Warfare. The point was, we just slugged it out with the winner being the guy with anything left as opposed to nothing. That might have even been the mission. ;-)
My Umenzi rolled Manny up pretty good, but his two units of Longbowmen on my right flank were unscathed. They were effectionally dubbed the machinegun pit, and while the majority of my army rolled him up pretty good (including my Possessed standing against the charging Knights so the Worthy could get a rear charge), they held the right.
In the end, my army controlled the left and center but was battered and out of position. I figured he'd probably have just eough shooting to take care of me while he figured I had just enough target saturation that one unit would get there and roll him up. But either way, it was going to be a rather grinding affair and so we called it a draw. It was 12:30 am (3:30 ET), so Manny had been up the requisite 24 hours and so we called it a night.
Game count: 1.
The goal for the Kublacon weekend is 14 games from the time Manny touches down on Thursday until I drop him off on Tuesday. I don't try to best myself every year, because that just sets me up for failure. Just a healthy 14 games every year. This year I'm happy to say I blew right through it late Sunday night/early sunday morning, leaving Monday and Tuesday for running up the score.
Right, so Thursday. Day Zero. I'd picked up Scott the day before and so had stayed up a bit late chatting (me? chat too much? NO!!!). Still, got a decent 6 hours of sleep. Normally that was an extra half-cup of coffee but I was flying on Kubla-excitement.
11:00 am: the Portu-geek lands. The gay jokes commence at around 11:02. We get him some food (some whining about a bagel in the past 8 hours or some such), go to Game Kastle to pick up some terrain for the Rezolution event, then hit the grocery store for some last minute foodstuffs so we don't drop $300 on food at the con.
Between feeding Manny and Game Kastle, Jocelyn wakes from her nap (Scott was watching her, I wasn't leaving her alone people. Although leaving him in charge could be seen by some as more negligent...). She gives "Papa" Manny the hairy eyeball for the first twenty minutes and then decides she likes him. After that, Papa got hugs whenever he wanted.
Come home, BBQ some Tri-tip for Manny. By "barbeque" I mean "ruin." The bald fatman likes his meat well done. And well done tri-tip is a Geneva Convention violation ranking just shy of waterboarding and Episode II of Star Wars. I should've just taken off my shoe and thrown that on the grill. Anyway, my cut of meat was suitably rare: it had just stopped begging me to stop cooking it.
After recovering from the meat coma, we packed the game stuff in the car and got down to business: some gaming. Our tradition is to keep Manny up for 24 hours by gaming, and we went to our old standby: Battleground Fantasy Warfare (affectionally known as "Cardhammer").
Manny played Men of Hawkshold vs my Umenzi, using the Kingdoms campaign pack to generate a scenario. I honestly can't remember the scenario, it might've been Total Warfare. The point was, we just slugged it out with the winner being the guy with anything left as opposed to nothing. That might have even been the mission. ;-)
My Umenzi rolled Manny up pretty good, but his two units of Longbowmen on my right flank were unscathed. They were effectionally dubbed the machinegun pit, and while the majority of my army rolled him up pretty good (including my Possessed standing against the charging Knights so the Worthy could get a rear charge), they held the right.
In the end, my army controlled the left and center but was battered and out of position. I figured he'd probably have just eough shooting to take care of me while he figured I had just enough target saturation that one unit would get there and roll him up. But either way, it was going to be a rather grinding affair and so we called it a draw. It was 12:30 am (3:30 ET), so Manny had been up the requisite 24 hours and so we called it a night.
Game count: 1.
Monday, May 11, 2009
....Painting...this is supposed to be fun right?
Yeah so I've discovered I'm not having a whole lot of fun painting right now. The Tzeentch tank was more work than I thought. Now I'm painting the Tau crisis suits. I have one 99% done and let me say this: painting white over black...when did that seem like a good idea. It's kinda a pain in my ass and as I rush to get it ready for Kublacon I'm starting to justify not finishing.
"I'm just gonna sell them to Gavin and he's going to strip them probably..."
"Manny and Trent probably won't even have theirs done..."
"If I smash it against the wall...."
Painting season is just about done for me. I do this every year. The month of Kublacon I race to get some models painted for the big show. Then I don't paint, minus a day here or there, until about September.
Then football starts. And I'm on the couch from 10:00am until about 7:00pm, with a few interludes. Plus monday night football. And I can't just watch football. The local teams are the 49ers and the Raiders, so you see why. You can only watch a car crash so many times before it becomes dull. But even if its interesting, I can't just sit and watch. Don't ask me why.
So I paint. I get the lion's share of my painting done during the fall and winter. This year I got done about 110 models. I know what you're thinking: that's not a lot of models for all that time on the couch. To which I would reply thusly:
One: Shut up.
Two: I paint slow. I'm a deliberate painter.
Three: believe it or not there are interesting games or portions of games where I watch.
Four: painting every sunday for the whole time is the myth. The reality is I paint about 75% of the time. The wife and family do have some demands about me 'being present' at crucial parts of their life.
Five: Shut up.
Anyway, come the end of January, playoff season ends. Usually I've still got the painting bug, mainly because I'm not done with whatever project I'm working on at that moment. So I generally pop in DVDs of a favorite TV show, something I've watched like a dozen times, and keep painting. This year I just watched four seasons of Battlestar (up to the last ten episodes) in like 3 months.
In February, I paint almost every weekend and some nights. In March, I paint most weekends plus some nights. In April it's half the weekends plus some nights. And then in May I paint mostly on weeknights trying to finish whatever project for Kublacon, by which time I'm exhausted from painting...
Then the paints go away until September at which point a wind-chimey voice in my head says "And so it begins..."
Yeah, so no pics right now. So if you just read this whole thing for that, neener neener.
"I'm just gonna sell them to Gavin and he's going to strip them probably..."
"Manny and Trent probably won't even have theirs done..."
"If I smash it against the wall...."
Painting season is just about done for me. I do this every year. The month of Kublacon I race to get some models painted for the big show. Then I don't paint, minus a day here or there, until about September.
Then football starts. And I'm on the couch from 10:00am until about 7:00pm, with a few interludes. Plus monday night football. And I can't just watch football. The local teams are the 49ers and the Raiders, so you see why. You can only watch a car crash so many times before it becomes dull. But even if its interesting, I can't just sit and watch. Don't ask me why.
So I paint. I get the lion's share of my painting done during the fall and winter. This year I got done about 110 models. I know what you're thinking: that's not a lot of models for all that time on the couch. To which I would reply thusly:
One: Shut up.
Two: I paint slow. I'm a deliberate painter.
Three: believe it or not there are interesting games or portions of games where I watch.
Four: painting every sunday for the whole time is the myth. The reality is I paint about 75% of the time. The wife and family do have some demands about me 'being present' at crucial parts of their life.
Five: Shut up.
Anyway, come the end of January, playoff season ends. Usually I've still got the painting bug, mainly because I'm not done with whatever project I'm working on at that moment. So I generally pop in DVDs of a favorite TV show, something I've watched like a dozen times, and keep painting. This year I just watched four seasons of Battlestar (up to the last ten episodes) in like 3 months.
In February, I paint almost every weekend and some nights. In March, I paint most weekends plus some nights. In April it's half the weekends plus some nights. And then in May I paint mostly on weeknights trying to finish whatever project for Kublacon, by which time I'm exhausted from painting...
Then the paints go away until September at which point a wind-chimey voice in my head says "And so it begins..."
Yeah, so no pics right now. So if you just read this whole thing for that, neener neener.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Tank done. Next!
So the tank is done. I didn't really enjoy painting it as much as I thought I would've. I'd always harbored dreams of doing a Thousand Sons army (you know, before they won the codex lottery) and so thought the paint scheme would make it interesting. It's one of those things: about half way through I wanted it done. Now that its done...I really like it.
The symbol on the front and the back: I wanted to do this Tzeentchian graffiti, scrawled by some cultist. So I was deliberately going for the 'rough' (aka bad) look. Think I was a little too literal with the Tzeentch symbol and may go in to make it look a little smother, less like a jelly belly left out in the sun.
Right, onto the next Kublacon project: the Tau. Here's a quick shot of them before they were primed. Mainly to show the bases. I'm gonna do white and red with a few back details, essentially the Tau color scheme from the front of the Cities of Death book.
Haven't decided on what to do for the base. I'm currently leaning towards stone grey with gold for the inset lettering/pattern of the Imperial Basilica. Any suggestions on something that'd contrast with red & white?
The symbol on the front and the back: I wanted to do this Tzeentchian graffiti, scrawled by some cultist. So I was deliberately going for the 'rough' (aka bad) look. Think I was a little too literal with the Tzeentch symbol and may go in to make it look a little smother, less like a jelly belly left out in the sun.
Right, onto the next Kublacon project: the Tau. Here's a quick shot of them before they were primed. Mainly to show the bases. I'm gonna do white and red with a few back details, essentially the Tau color scheme from the front of the Cities of Death book.
Haven't decided on what to do for the base. I'm currently leaning towards stone grey with gold for the inset lettering/pattern of the Imperial Basilica. Any suggestions on something that'd contrast with red & white?
Vehicles
Working away on my Tzeentch Demolisher, I realized two things:
1) I haven't painted many vehicles.
2) I don't like painting vehicles.
Once upon a time, I had a blessed arrangement. My wife liked painting, but hated assembling & converting. So she painted two armies for me (and two for herself, which are long gone).
After 4 armies, my wife had had enough and I no longer had a blessed arrangement.
My Mordian tanks very done in a very minimalist style (black with silver rivets & guns, essentially). My Orky vehicles were a little more involved, but still...I didn't do them.
Since then I've painted a lot of models. Easily a couple hundred. But not many vehicles. And, well, I can't say I like painting them. The Tzeentch tank is being kind of a pain in the ass. I'm finding that I'm really not enjoying it, even though I like the look of it. I liked assembling it even less. I remember when I put together my 3 chimeras, basilisk, and russ for my IG that it was a frustrating process.
My Martian SRO has 2 Vendettas and 5 Chimeras.
Crap.
1) I haven't painted many vehicles.
2) I don't like painting vehicles.
Once upon a time, I had a blessed arrangement. My wife liked painting, but hated assembling & converting. So she painted two armies for me (and two for herself, which are long gone).
After 4 armies, my wife had had enough and I no longer had a blessed arrangement.
My Mordian tanks very done in a very minimalist style (black with silver rivets & guns, essentially). My Orky vehicles were a little more involved, but still...I didn't do them.
Since then I've painted a lot of models. Easily a couple hundred. But not many vehicles. And, well, I can't say I like painting them. The Tzeentch tank is being kind of a pain in the ass. I'm finding that I'm really not enjoying it, even though I like the look of it. I liked assembling it even less. I remember when I put together my 3 chimeras, basilisk, and russ for my IG that it was a frustrating process.
My Martian SRO has 2 Vendettas and 5 Chimeras.
Crap.
Friday, May 1, 2009
For someone who doesn't like 40K very much...
...I sure seem to have a lot of 40K projects, and none of them are the Martian SRO. Don't have the minis yet. What I'm working on:
What do Orks and Necrons have in common?
Nothing.
I have an Ork army, Deathskulls. Very heavily converted. And, one model aside, I never really made the transition with them to the new codex.
I'd been using my Orks with sniper rifles as Flash Gitz. But it didn't feel right. Flash Gitz have Nob stats and my guys were regular boys. (I think her hear some lightbulbs popping to life)
Yup, Nobs + Necrons = Deathskull Flash Gits with Cybork bodies.
Oh and the box of boys? Nothing, just needed some more boys to fill in a couple mobs here and there.
And this?
This is my Tzeentch Russ Demolisher. Work in progress. I'm playing in this event at Kublacon this. Go to Kublacon.com and search the events for "40K pink slip".
Essentially, it's a 200 pt game where the winner takes the loser's army for the rest of the tournament. People bring a second 200 pt unit (can be from a different army) that goes in a pool. First round losers make a 400 pt army from the pool.
My other selection are some Tau Crisis Suits. They're just primed with some red on them right now, and so didn't make a good pic. When they get painted, I'll post them.
My final project: Updating the Mordian 442nd to the new IG Codex. Got a couple of sergeants who're going to get their arms hacked off and powerfisted up. (Edit: Um...that sounded a lot less wrong in my head. Which probably says a lot about me).
And just for fun: my ogre blood bowl team for this year's Kublacon: The Ten-See Titans.
If you're interested in the event search "BBCS" or "Blood Bowl Championship Series." It's a great event, with digitally rendered pitches by Trent LeClair.
You've never played until you've played on a forcefield over a pit of lava with Tzeentch changing the rules every kickoff ("for this possession...two blitzes per side!")
And a pic of the team captain
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