The Running Gagg 2014

I've been busy these past couple of weeks helping to put together an event that will be held this weekend at the Running Gagg. What is the Running Gagg you ask? The Running Gagg is a gaming club in SUNY Geneseo and every year they hold a gaming convention at the college. In the past years the host of the 40k tournament has run a 1850 point, three round tournament. While this format was fun for getting out and playing, it is pretty much typical of any event/tournament held at any game store across the country. So Paul (aka Golden Eagle) and myself decided to approach the TO and asked if he would be willing to allow us to run a different type of format and he graciously agreed to give it a try.

hyv3mynd vs the New Tyranid Codex

So here we are, a week after the newest tyranid codex release.  If you read this blog, chances are you read many blogs and discussion forums all dedicated to wh40k.  If this is the case, you've been exposed to hundreds of opinions, analysts, winging, praising, and soapboxing about the new book.  I've been silent about the topic on this blog and I don't want certain emotions and arguments to dominate the atmosphere, so this will be my one and only post on this topic.

Starting Off on the Right Foot

January has turned out to be pretty solid for me on the gaming front so far this month. In past years, with the unpredictable weather typical of upstate NY, I'd spend the cold and dreary days of winter huddled over my painting table trying to stay warm. Even the monthly tournaments in past January's were a hit or miss with me. Already this year mother nature has hit us with a polar vortex (sounds like a #6 spell from fantasy) and on/off lake effect snow from Lake Erie but after 2 weeks into the new year I've managed to get a string of pick and tournament games from across a variety of gaming systems, which hopefully is a trend that I'll continue throughout this year. While I am still getting in some games of 40k, what really has got me excited was the chance to play some games of Warhammer Fantasy and X-Wing.

Custom Skimmer and Jet Bike Bases

Back towards the end of 3rd edition, when I bought my first  Tau Devil fish, I wasn't that far along into the hobby and did not know about conversions or making custom bases and such. Like most people, I assembled my model, painted it and then added sand and flock to the clear skimmer base and then I was ready to play with my new model. After a few games of playing with the devil fish, the tip of the clear plastic rod that inserts into the bottom of the skimmer snapped off inside of my devil fish. I  was forced to drill out the bottom of the skimmer base so that I could insert a new plastic rod but then that soon broke off as well. That's when I knew that I would have to come up with a better solution.

Building a Portalglyph

The Warhammer 40k Daemons of Chaos book has a unique item that you can take from the Exalted Rewards section called a portalglyph. Basically, once dropped on the board it allows the daemon player the potential to "summon" in new daemonic troop choices (i.e., bloodletters, daemonettes, plague bearers, or pink horrors) to the battle field. I liked the idea of using this piece of war gear but GW never made a model or issued a template for users to represent the portalglyph. Instead the codex/army book simply states to use a small blast template or something similarly sized. Well, I for one saw this as a challenge to make my own portalglyph instead of tossing a blast template on the table. So let's take a look at how I built my portalglyph.

DaCock at Millennium Invitational

Millennium Games

This is a follow up to my last post discussing the Eldar list I planned to bring to the Millennium Invitational.  If you are unfamiliar with the event, both Calypso2ts and Grubnards have posted a description along with some games.  Since that has been taken care of, I am going to jump straight into my games.

In case you forgot, or do not want to look it up, here is my list:

Farseer on Bike with the Shard of Anaris

Farseer on Bike

9 Eldar Jetbikes with 3 Shuriken Cannons

3 Eldar Jetbikes

3 Eldar Jetbikes

5 Dire Avengers in a Wave Serpent with Holo-Field.

7 Warp Spiders.

Hemlock Wraithfighter

Wraithknight

Dark Reapers with Starswarm and Starshot Missiles in a Wave Serpent with Holo-Field

Night Spinner with Holo-field

I had issues throughout the day remembering my psychic powers. Since my powers were from the following disciplines; Divination, Telepathy, Runes of Fate, and Runes of Battle it was hard to keep track of which ones I had gotten.  On top of that, they had very different times when they could be used.  Some I had to cast them in beginning of the turn, the beginning of movement and shooting or during shooting. It was confusing and while I am used to casting blessings (beginning of the turn), the others were difficult to remember. I need to get more games in all the psychic powers and reread the psychic rules again. I not sure if it would of impacted the outcome of my games, but it would definitely make me more confident of my actions.

Game 1

Primary Mission: Kill PointsSecondary Mission: 3 Objectives. 1 in each deployment zone and 1 in the middle. The objective in your opponents end was worth 3 points, the 1 in the middle was worth 2 points, and the 1 in your end was worth 1 point.
Bonus Points: First Blood, Slay the Warlord, Line Breaker.

 

Round one is up and I playing David K. He is from nearby city of Buffalo. (it is about 1 ½ drive). He is part of the gaming group called Beef and Wing. I have never met or played David before, but I have heard good things about him. First I heard he was a good painter (very true) and  a good player. I always love playing a good player. I always seem to learn something from them. David sure did live up to his reputation.  I did wish this was game 2 so I could get at least one game under my belt with a new list before I played him. This was my only loss of the day. I would have at least tied David on the primary had I did not fail a leadership test (from the terrify psychic power) with my big jetbike squad on the last turn. In that unit I had the warlock, 5 bikes, and 2 farseers. They all ran on my turn and that was a deal breaker. I lost too many kill points on that one roll to recover from. It was a fun game. The one funny part of the game was David thinking long and hard why did I brought the hemlock wraith fighter. I think he thought I had some secret dirty plan with it. I just brought it because it looks cool. It did live up to its reputation though...It really sucks. It showed that throughout all my games.

Picture of Game 1

 

Another Picture of Game 1

 

Game 2

Primary Mission: Big Guns Never Tire
Secondary Mission: Victory Points (who kills the most total points of unit cost)
Bonus Points: Slay the Warlord, First Blood, Line Breaker
Deployment: Vanguard

Round two had me playing Chris. We were both playing Eldar armies. He was playing all Wave Serpents and Fire Prisms. Most of his points were tied up in 3 wave serpents with each 5 man squad of Wraith Guard. Our lists were very similar, but I had more long range anti-tank fire power. The dark reapers guided should be able to take a wave serpent down a turn. I also got the physic power fortune for my Farseer so it going to hard to take out my Jetbikes.  Since the primary mission was objectives I chose to go second. . So the first 2 turns we shot each other up and with nothing really happening. Our shooting was so bad that Chris did not get first blood until his second turn.  Things started to go better fro me in turn two after Warp Spiders, Jetbikes and Wraith Knight got close enough to do some damage and I was able to pull out a win this game

Picture of Game 2

Picture of Game 2

Game Three:

Primary Mission: The Scouring
Secondary Mission: The Relic
Bonus Points: First Blood, Slay the Warlord, Line Breaker
Deployment: Dawn of War.

The last game was against old school player Mike Nogle from Beef and Wing. He is old school because I played Mike back in the day when there when Games Workshops had Grand Tournaments. It was either late 90’s or early 2000’s. Either way it was early into third edition. He won that game, so every time I play him I work to avenge that loss.

                                   

Picture of Game 3

Mike was also playing Eldar with 2 Wraithknights and 2 Crimson Hunter. I told him I was playing Hemlock Wraithfighter and he laughed and asked “why in hell are you playing that piece of crap”. After that I knew we were going to have a great game. So Mike got Forewarning (4+ invaluable) and fortune (reroll saves) from his one Farser. That is going to make the Wraithknights harder to take down because of the extra protection.. I did not get fortune this game, but I did get Invisibility. I also won the rule roll to go first, but chose to go second since it was objective based mission. Sure enough it took all my shooting turns 1 and 2 (and assaulting it with my own Wraithnight) to take one down. The key factor in this game was using Invisibility on jetbikes. It was amazing. It was the only unit I had at the end of the game, but it was good enough to pull out a  win. 

Picture of Game 3

Well I went 2-1. It was a fun event. There was not much I would have done differently other then change of my army lists. Hemlock Wraithfighter did not make any unit run all day.  I also think if would got some practice games in before the event I would played better.

hyv3mynd @ DaBoyz GT ~ Game #2

After a strong victory in game #1, I looked up my next pairing on Torrent of Fire and headed off to game #2.  Dan P. (15th overall) was my second opponent with Taudar.  Dan introduced himself as a blog follower of many years from back when it was synaps3 and just me and my bugs.  I felt disadvantaged going into this game as my opponent has read my blog and should be familiar with my army, and I had never faced the new Tau in a 1 on 1 game a this point.