Tuesday 2 October 2018

Fields of Blood - Day 2


The clocks went forward overnight in NZ on Sunday and I woke up late.  ++Game 4++  Serendipity

I was halfway down Brooklyn Hill before I remembered that I had forgotten my display board for the Beauty Pageant finals.  I had to go back and retrieve it and ended up 10 minutes late for my first game of the day.  I had no time to get a coffee which was a huge blow to both morale and mental faculties.  I also badly needed the toilet.  I couldn't possibly get any more flustered so I just relaxed and went with it (not enough to let go of my bowels, but you know what I mean).  Upon arrival at the hall, the TO informed me that I had drawn a bye and didn't have to play.  Blessed be the RNG Gods!  I quickly grabbed caffeine, relieved myself and spent the next 2 hours wandering around, chatting and taking pictures.  With no opponent to play, I scored a default win. Bliss.  Since I have no pictures of my own game I've included a selection of other people's:

Aidan Corlett vs. Hagen Kerr


Craig Latta vs. Paul Knieriem

Shane Rongonui vs. Simon Smith

Erm... ahh shit I've forgotten

Liam Miskelly vs. Dave Hodgetts

"Shhh! Be vewy qwiet. We're hunting wabbits.." (Craig Stewart vs. Sam Whitt)

Adam Thornton vs. ....?

Spot the grumpy T.O.

Rory Taylor vs. Jordan Green

Bob Pearce vs. Ryan Moran


Dave Lewy vs. Sean Sullivan
Marked for death.  John Murrie vs. Cody Parlato



++Game 5++ Cameron Robertson - Blood Angels


This was a kill point mission essentially with extra points for killing vehicles and characters.  Cameron had brought Mephiston, Astorath the Grim, Slamguinius and Slamguinius-lite.  I didn't rate my chances with a single Jump Pack captain of my own so I castled up in the corner of the board and milled about in confusion.


He had named his army the 'Bloody Nose' which was either displaying bravado or a wry sense of humour, I'm not sure which.  I got first turn and blew up a Redemptor.  Good start!  My opponent then launched the most inept assault I have ever seen.  The primarch of the Ninth would have been appalled.  Oh, there was nothing wrong with his tactics.  He had Stratagems and psyker powers which practically guaranteed a devastating charge.


Mephiston and the two Jump Pack captains were set up to come down on me from the heavens with vampiric fury and shut down my shooting.  Astorath and the Death Company would then sweep through my back lines.  The problem was that Cameron's dice had gone on a short holiday to hell and he failed practically every roll in his initial psychic, assault and charge phase.  Captain Precarius took full advantage of the situation to bash Mephiston's head in (God that felt good.  I love Dante but Mephiston gives me the fucking willies).


Then my (completely un-teabagged) heavy artillery opened up like rolling thunder.  The result was slightly underwhelming; they only just managed to take Slamguinius down. But I was ahead on points.  Cameron's second wave of assaulters was successful but I had done enough damage to stay ahead.  If the game had gone a full 6 rounds it might have been a different story but I was saved by the bell and the T.O. called time.



++Game 6++ James Milner - Black Templars and Sisters


I got Celestined!  I've never faced St. Celestine before and the trash talk is true.  She's utterly frustrating to deal with on a heavy terrain board where all first level ruins block line of sight.  This was another progressively scored objective mission, but with only 4 Objective Markers.  I took out the Land Raider and killed Celestine but she just came back to life, popping up in the soft underbelly, stealing my home objective right out from under my nose.


Cpt. Precarius decided to rectify this affront to the Chapter's honour and declared a charge after I opened fire with everything in range and only managed to kill the Geminis.  She butchered him out of hand. Thinking about it now, I must have forgotten that he had the Shield Eternal but those termies in the background would have finished the job next turn anyway.


James's Thunderhammer/Stormshield Terminators were a real thorn in my side, which probably shows how weak my list (and my generalship) is.  I tried a few shenanigans and shot all his scouts off one of the objectives with the Madcat but I was playing it counts-as Stormtalon Gunship. The 'Boots on the Ground' rule prevented me from capturing the objective myself.


I even killed his Landraider but it didn't matter because Celestine was playing merry hell with my back lines, dancing in and out of LOS blocking cover.  The flyer nabbed Linebreaker again (is that illegal now too?) so I salvaged one point from my final game.


In total, I had scored 1 win, 1 bye and 4 losses with a smattering of bonus points.  Not my worst result by any means but this tournament was not just about generalship.  In fact, battle points only counted for 40% of your total score.  I had maxed out both my Painting and Sportsmanship scores.  We were also marked on army composition which accounted for 10% of the total. I bagged 7/10 so effectively won an extra game over someone who scored 0.  All of which meant I came in 19th out of 59.  Not bad at all, considering.  And I got best painted too which, as you can probably guess, I was trying very, very hard to win.


Rogue's gallery.  Click to enlarge:

Alistair Morgan


Craig Latta (Interesting hand positioning!)


Dave Lewy


Hagen Kerr



John Murrie

Jordan Green


Josh Hill



Liam Miskelly



Ryan Pike


Sam Whitt



Glen Burfield/Cody Parlato/Jake Easton won best terrain



Scott Avery
Ryan Moran




14 comments:

  1. Some lovely photos and armies, thanks mate.

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    1. no worries, I know you like pictures. Me too.

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  2. A well deserved win on the Best Painted - and 19th overall is great as well! And some really beautiful pictures of the battles again - only no. 12 seems to be a two for one?

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    1. I couldn't find an angle on that picture which didn't put one or the other force completely out of focus. So I just took 2. Thanks Xar.

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  3. Great pics and report, fields has some awesome armies. Congrats on best painted, well earnt.

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    1. Thanks Courtney. I think you won Bloodthirster didn't you? Sorry, I never get near the top tables and the awards were a sleep deprived, nail biting blur for me.

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  4. Excellent stuff! I wish I lived close enough to attend at some point. Everything I've heard about FoB sounds great, and everything I've seen looks better!

    Also, your placement there is exactly what I like about events with Best Overall. I'm not the best player, painter, or sport*, but I'm often better at any given two of those than whoever is best at the third, and occasionally by enough that I can actually snag Best Overall.

    *OK, I have actually won each of those at least once, but I don't pick up any of them consistently.

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    1. Yeah, Sam Whitt won Best Overall with very high scores in Paint and Comp (theres a few pics of his Daemon army above). He was about 20th in terms of gameplay but came equal top in Sportsmanship. So it was just enough to raise him above the shark pool. The tagline of the tournament was, "Bringing the Hobby Back" so he was a great advocate for the cause.

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  5. Your army was brilliant deserved win. Thanks for the photos and see you next year

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    1. Yeah, you may have inspired me to something a bit bigger next time. I didn't really like the Castellan Knights from photos but they look pretty damn good in person. And your knights are exquisite. Cheers.

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  6. Thanks for some awesome reports from the tournament, and congrats on the best army win! Judging by your pictures, there was some very strong competition, but that is a testament to your awesome army. So clean and crisp, it really suits the Primaris well.

    You need to do a whole army pic with all your Primaris units.

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    1. Cheers Michael. I did a full army shot on day 1 but the scouts slot in nicely next to the normal Primaris so might do a shot of them all together. There were some absolutely beautiful armies at the tournament and I think I sneaked the presentation win on conversions (which you scored extra points for)

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