The one where I met Battlefield Birmingham... Part 4!

The cold sun rose upon the River Severn, glistening to the music of the rain which broke the stillness of the water. It was morning. Sunday morning. As I made my way home on Saturday night I thought about my mates and how they've got on during the tourney.

Pete (@Petehumpage) was on 1 win and 2 losses, Nigel (@NigelSBartlett) was on 3 losses along with Graham (@Wilsongrahams) and Little Liam (no twitter handle) was on 2 losses and 1 draw. I know that Nige hadn't enjoyed a few games due to the lists played and maybe down to the helpfulness or friendliness of an opponent. I think that I had been extremely lucky (again) at who I drew. I know that Graham had a slightly better experience but there were times when he seemed to not be enjoying it. A sentiment which he reflected in his post day summary. Liam came close to winning but got it snatched away from him and had to settle for a draw and Pete...well... lets say I got a text at about 10.30 saying how much he enjoyed the day and wanted to go to more! After the first day I thought it was just me who was enjoying it! As it ended up, they did all enjoy it to some degree! But more on that later!

Sunday morning came with a detour on the M5! This is what happens when you keep talking to people and not really pay attention! With Nige following me we went round the houses to Droitwich and back! Nige decided he had enough of following me on the M5 so overtook only to get lost... slow and steady wins the race!

10am on Sunday. Did I mention it's a Sunday morning? I caught up with Grahame from my previous game and he wasn't in a good place having been out on it last night!

The positions are up from the previous day and for me, it wasn't a complete disaster! I'm not last!!!

So the draw was up and I'm up against Ashley Rowe. Now so far I've had a real mixture of lists and in the room there are a load of different lists to play which could test my ability. What do I get? No, not GKs... Space Wolf Drop Pod army! When I saw it my heart sank a little but actually I thought I could try out my tactics that I failed so miserably on in the previous game. So actually it would be a very good experience. This list was slightly different to my previous opponent...

Yes, that's right... GK allies! Hmm... a really nice twist to the list and something which I'd be interested to see how it plays!

Game: Purge the Alien
Deployment: Vanguard

Powers: Forewarning, Scriers' Gaze, Perfect Timing

Warlord Trait:

Well, a kill point game suited me just fine and I thought I might run this close with the DKs and Wraith taking the majority of the flack but outputting a great deal of damage! What I wanted to do was try and stay close. The problem was, vanguard deployment spread me out so I could get into cover. I was under the impression that I could get into his dreadknight in the second/first turn and take him. What I didn't bank on was the fact that the bullshit Rune Priest can nullify powers on a 4+ (I know I've moaned about it already) stopped my force sword working! So in the first turn one DK bit the dust with a force sword failing a save and the other... Jaws of the World Wolf sucking it down! Unheard of!

 I was actually on the table next to Franco (those of you who don't know - Scottish ETC player and on the 40k podcast I listen to!) He was using his 9 broadside list against... DAEMONS!!! The second picture better reflects how the daemon player wanted the game to go...Can I point out that he brought the bastion... More on that later!

 The other side of me... Gaz Donnelly (Pete's first round opponent and can be seen on the right) and his GK trip-stormraven list against another Scottish ETC player playing... daemons! You can see how this is going to go can't you...

Anyway, back to the real stuff!
Pods are dropping everywhere, Rune Priests are popping out and coupled with the mass of shooting, my 5 man units were falling like flies! It might be worth in future tourneys taking a 10 man and a 5 man squad because if I wanted to at the beginning of the game I could combat squad them giving me a bit of flexibility! In a kill points game against an alpha strike army which could virtually deploy anywhere on a table 5 men squads are not durable enough and Ash showed me that when he got the drop!

The simple fact is, he got in a better position and had a better knowledge of what to do in those situations, whereas I didn't!

My Stormraven became a highlight taking out the Dreadknight and a Runepriest with Mindstrike Missiles over the course of the following turns! Huzzah! It was the job of the remaining wolves to munch through what little was left in my army, shooting the jetbikes down and the Farseer with the Mantle!

I manged to get Cotez down to a wound and as you can see from my last picture my Wraithknight was gunning for him. Unfortunately, he was needed elsewhere on the battlefield so I couldn't touch him! My stormraven proved worthy of a mention (not to note that he was one of the two remaining figures I had left on the board) as he took down Ash's raven!

We took the game strenuously to 6 turns with the Wraithknight and the Stormraven the only two remaining figures left on the board. The model count was immense! It's clear that facing a drop pod list isn't my forte, but I need to play a few more times against them to see what to do and how to combat them! This game was in opposition to the last, I actually scored and had a few points on the board in terms of game points. Reflecting on this Ash played a really strong game and got his tactics spot on with being able to drop pods either side of me confining me to a central channel in the middle of the board which took my completely out of the game! So in game terms, I lost 12-6 and in tournament terms... I lost 20-1! 

Not the result I wanted but still another good game against a great opponent.

Oh... Remember that game with Daemons and GKs on the table next to me... This is what the Scottish ETC player did...

 Not a lot of defense against it!

As for the other side with Tau vs. Daemons...

I don't have another pic to show you, but remember that first one?

This one where he's setting up behind LoS blocking terrain? Well... his Daemons all manged to get behind and in the bastion... ALL 1850 points to avoid the onslaught that was coming! Think of sheep in a pen, that's how the daemons ended up!
Oh... saying that, I have found one:

This is how it ended...


SO! We've reached lunch time and I'm 1-3 and 23 points! I'm really quite sick of drop pods and don't want to see any more... unless they're playing Pete...

Hmm... You may guess how that turned out! I can tell you that the Centurions in Pete's list tried to get at his Warlord but all the shots put on him he tossed them aside with his invun!

Back to lunch! I'm proud to say that I've played against 2 and know 2 of the 6 painting contenders! Graham and Nigel were up against Grahame (Space Wolves) and Graeme (Tau - @gremer987).

Here are snipits of the 6 entrants! 2 Ork, 1 Corsair, 1 Tau, 1 Space Wolf and 1 Daemon!

I will come on to the winner when I write part 5!

I will leave you with some other photos from around the tournament:

One final thing for this post, Harry (Tournament Organizer) was selling charity dice for a very worthwhile cause! At the end of the tournament people would roll the dice to see who would win a prize!

My first roll of the dice I purchased...

Even charity hates!

Thanks for reading! I'll see you soon!