Part 3: Baltimore GT
I've only been playing Warhammer for 8 months now, but it's been pretty intensive--2 games a week, every week. However, I
learned more in 5 games at the GT than I had learned in dozens of games against my friends. It's amazing what a little
environment will do for your concentration! I went into the GT with three dream goals--top 3 in painting, top 3 in Player's
Choice, or an overall score of over 150. If you don't set the bar high, you'll never reach it!
Let me also apologize in advance to my opponents if I get some of the small details wrong--I didn't write anything down. I'll know better next year.
Some of the other Warmongers and myself arrived at the convention center as it opened at 3:00 so that we could start setting up our Cults of Chaos project. All of our armies were troop/core heavy and avoided knights, shaggoths and some of the other super-scary chaos critters. My list included:
| Lord & Heroes |
| Doombull Mark of Nurgle, heavy armor, great weapon |
| Bray Shaman (Level 2) Mark of Chaos Undivided, Braystaff, two Dispel Scrolls |
| Bray Shaman (Level 2) Mark of Chaos Undivided, Braystaff, Power Familiar |
| Core Units |
| 7 Minotaurs with Great Weapons Mark of Nurgle, Light Armor and Standard 3 Minotaurs with Great Weapons Mark of Nurgle, light armor 7 Minotaurs with Great Weapons Mark of Nurgle, light armor and additional hand weapon 21 Pestigors with full command Mark of Nurgle, War Banner 10 Beastmen Musician, 5 Gors and 5 Ungors 1 Tuskgor Chariot |
| Special Units |
| 5 Chaos Furies |
| Rare Units |
| 2 Nurgle Spawn |
A pretty balanced beast list. 7 casting dice, 5 dispel.
Once our displays were out I started to wander around to take a look at some other armies. I was stunned at how well the majority were painted. I quickly recognized Brad's army (Biggrin) and he introduced me to Randy Atchley (Atchman). I enjoyed a casual pick-up game against his very cool and different Middelheim list. I made some very poor deployment choices--it was my first time using such a large amount of difficult terrain! I would go on to play 3 more games on the Chaos table, so it was a great warmup for the GT. Not to mention that Randy's a hell of a guy. Honestly, I don't remember much about the game, save that he whupped me pretty good.
Soon after that game I heard Matthew Birdoff calling out to me. "Hey, Ryan. Guess who you're playing in game one?" I walked over. It was General of Chaos! Oh no...my heart sank. For weeks, since George posted his list, we had been talking about the fact that my army, due to its limited maneuverability, had no shot of beating GoC's dragon. But George turned out to be a really nice guy, so I smiled and spent the rest of the night prodding my Warmonger buddies on strategies to take him on. We designed a very creative deployment method, and I went to sleep hoping for the best.
Day 1: Game 1--George O'Connell (Tzeentch Chaos)
George had arrived nice and early. We were paired on the Chaos table--difficult blood pools and rock outcroppings--not
great for my big, wide minotaur units. I ended up losing 2 of 3 games on that table.
I set up my units so that each one was at a slightly different angle, in three ranks. The goal was to trap the Chaos Dragon and draw it into a unit that had a chance of knocking it out. As I had suspected, George sent the dragon straight down my flank, and basically moved the entire rest of his army as far away from me as possible. I had assumed that would be his strategy. But it was my first ever GT game, and I was nervous, and I allowed my beastmen, with both shaman, to be overrun and chased off the table in turn 2. Damn! Now he had a dragon and tons of Tzeentch magic. I knew I was screwed, so I smiled while he danced around and took out my units, one by one. The pestigors were decimated by the "everybody hit themselves" spell (green fire? I tend to get them confused), and his Chaos knights charged in and took out one small minotaur unit. The only thing I managed to get into combat with the dragon was a spawn--of course, it got clobbered. To his credit, George remained a gentleman the entire game. He rolled quite well, and I rolled quite poorly, but it didn't matter. He would have clobbered me, anyway. It ended with a mighty victory for George. He gave me top soft scores, which was nice of him, and a good time had by all.
After a game against such a notorious army, I figured things could only go up. I found out that fellow Warmonger Andy Small had drawn George for game 2, so we reconnoitered and discussed some of George's strategies. Andy went on to avenge my loss.
Day 1: Game 2--John Kosinski (Dark Elves)
Game 2 I was paired against another fantastically nice guy, a Dark Elf player named John Kosinski. John fielded two
scary units--8 Cold One Knights with a Hydra Banner, and a big unit of executioners led by his general. Then two RBT's and
some fast cav, and a scattering of smaller units (archers and skirmishing archers, among others). The game was played on
the desert table, which is pretty wide open. We ended up splitting into two fronts--one with his Cold One knights on one
side, my minotaurs and the chariot on the other, and the other front with the rest of our troops. This was the spy mission,
so our spies started across the table.
John made one big tactical error in this game, which we discussed openly afterwards--he kept his executioners at the back of the table, and never moved them into combat. Since I didn't have to worry about them at all, I just concentrated on the COK. I threw a chariot at it and held it for a turn. Then I threw two units of 3 minotaurs into it. By the time that combat was over, it was down to 3 or 4 models, and I hit it with my Doombull's unit. COK go bye bye. John's spies had been walking in a straight line in front of and next to my Doombull’s unit, so after pursuit I wheeled and charged after the pursuit. One spy fled, I caught it and redirected into another one, and eventually they were taken care of. By then John had started to move in his Executioners, but I just backed up my Pestigors and they never met. Beastmen and Spawn dealt with the archers, fast cav and skirmishers. My furies not only took out both war machines, but also his mage. It ended up as a major victory for me. John was a pleasure to play and a great sport--I look forward to seeing him at Philly or Baltimore next year.
Day 1: Game 3--Steve McNamara (Lizardmen)
I was a little nervous when I saw that I was paired against a Lizardman player, because I feared meeting a Carnasaur or a
second gen Slann. But Steve had about the most balanced Lizard list I've ever seen--a little bit of magic, about 20 skinks,
10 chameleons, 2 big units of saurus warriors, 3 Salamanders, 4 Kroxigors and 3 Terradons. A little bit of everything. We
were on the Ice table, which was a huge detriment to Steve. It had 2 big ice pools that were impassible--even to Lizardmen.
Two small forests outside of the battle zone. Not good for skirmishers.
Steve placed his warriors, skinks and salamanders front and center, and placed his chameleons in a forest near my deployement zone (or nearby--don't remember). I put my doombull's unit, my pestigors and a chariot in the main charge corridor--flanked by two ice pools.
Steve's chameleons moved up into the forest in my deployment zone, but I managed to chase them off with a spawn and my beastmen. I ran them down in turn three for some VPs. In the meantime, I had sent my furies across the table, along the right flank. He intercepted with his terradons and wiped them out.
At this point, I had expected him to move his Terradons into my deployment zone. But he decided to move them back behind his front lines. I'm not sure of his strategy, but I think it didn't work out the way he expected.
While all this was going on, his Salamanders were plugging away at my pestigors. Damn, those things hit hard! Decimated my pestigors to almost half strength before they were in range. They did eventually take the Salamanders out with a charge. My smaller minotaur unit with GW were charged by his Kroxigors, held, and eventually defeated him. That unit and the other small unit chased off his skinks, and I believe busted through his terradons. My Doombull unit and the rest of the Pestigors dealt with the two saurus units. He failed some leadership checks, and I was in business. Another major victory. Steve was another great guy, and was nice enough to give me a bottle of water out of his cooler, which by then I needed badly.
I was exhausted! But I never would have believed I'd be 2 and 1 after day one of my first GT. North/South was planned for 9 pm, but the entire Warmonger Club decided to go to a local brewpub for dinner. Dinner ran late, and we were burned out. Between 10 and 11 I played a game of Speedhammer against Wilson Badillo. We got in about 3 turns, he had a pretty solid victory. We had some more beer at the hotel, and I went to bed around 1 am.
Day 2: Game 4--Matthew Something (Dark Elves)
I woke up the next morning pretty fried. I don't know how you guys used to do 6 games! Upon arriving at the convention
center I saw that I was again on the Chaos table--in fact on the same table I was on for Game 1! And it was again against
Dark Elves. This time, it scared me a bit. I assumed my opponent also had 2 majors and a loss, and I was worried that meant
a manticore--and a possible replay of game one.
I stupidly forgot to write down my opponent's name, but I'm pretty sure it was Matthew Something. Matthew had a magic heavy dark elf army with two bolt throwers, some cold one chariots, a unit of executioners, a unit of warriors and two units of fast cav. This was a very tactical, up and down game. Dark Elf magic is NASTY. I had no idea. It feels very similar to Slannesh. It was 9 dice, IIRC, so I couldn't stop everything. I hid my mages in a rock outcropping well away from the main combat. He dedicated both fast cav units to going after my mages, but was never able to successfully trap them (I kept dancing in and out of the rocks). We had a little discussion over how the field of view rules work inside of forests (the 2" rule).
The rest of the game was a story of failed tests on both sides. His cold one chariot went stupid two turns in a row. I was soon in range with my main Minotaur unit, which he then charged with both the chariot and his executioners. I felt I could take a charge from the chariot, but not both. As I had guessed, his executioners were out of range, but I hadn't noticed he had the banner that gives him extra movement! I decided to flee, and the Minotaurs made it out of range. To protect his executioners from the pestigors, he moved the warriors in between, blocking them out.
The next turn I managed to rally my Minotaurs, about 10 inches from the table edge. I charged his warriors with my pestigors. This is where Matthew's luck went bad. He failed a fear test! The minotaurs redirected into the executioners. They failed their fear test! Now he had his two best units running across the board. But in the next turn, he managed to get in a spell on my minotaurs that required a panic check, and they panicked. They fled within a half inch of the table edge. This was the second of our small rules discussions. He was under the impression that Minotaurs fled 3d6, not 2d6. Would have made a big difference, of course. But we resolved it quickly. He failed a rally test, the executioners ran off the table, the pestigors ran down the warriors, game over with a Mighty victory. If I had failed my minotaurs rally at the board edge, it would have gone his way. That was a stressful roll!
Matthew was the only person who gave me an 8 in painting. Still, he was a great opponent, and it was a fun game. I would play him again anytime.
Game 5--Adam Steele (Tomb Kings)
Adam has already written up our battle report in his GT story, so I won't bore you here with a recap. Suffice it to say it
was my most tactical, most intellectual game of the tournament. Not surprising that he made it 4-0-1!
I finished the weekend with 70 battle points, 32 sports, 15 comp and 48 painting, to tie for 10th place and make my overall score goal of over 150. I couldn't be more thrilled, and I can’t wait for Philly! I had the greatest weekend I've had in a very long time. It was great meeting everyone from the WPS, and I hope to see you all again soon.
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