First Tournament Experiance- Daemon Hunters

The new gaming store in the area Grim Foe Games held a free WH 40k tournament as a grand opening celebration of the store. There would be three different rounds with some awards going to Best Overall (highest number of pts), Best Sportsmanship, Best Painted, and a raffle that everyone with a painted army could enter to win. There were 14 players in the tournament with 7 games being played.

Break down of the Points system:
Each game had a total of 20 battle points a person could gain. A total victory or a massacre would net the winning player the full 20 pts (with the other person getting 0!). A major victory would award 17 points to the victor and 3 to the opponent, and a minor victory would award the winning player 13 points, and the opponent 7. A score of 3 pts was tagged on at the end for painting, and each game could get the individual a score of 5 sportsmanship points. Thus over the three games it was possible to gain a total of 60 victory points, 15 sportsmanship points, and 3 points for painting.
Each Game was to last 2 hours each maximum.

Forward: To say I was a bit nervous before going into this game is a bit of an understatement. This was to be my first tournament experience, only the fourth time playing at 1850pts and the second time using my list. Talk about diving in headfirst. I adopted the mindset that I was going to lose, badly- so badly in fact future generations of my family would remember May 1st, 2010 as a very bad indeed. So bad that no one in my family could look at dice without shedding a single tear. With this mindset, I was there to roll some dice, play some games, and most importantly to have a great time.

My 1850pt Daemon Hunters Army - “The Holy Rollers”
Head Quarters-
Grey Knight Grand Master with a Holy Relic, Psychic Hood, and Hammerhand
Retinue of 4x Grey Knight Terminators, Holocaust, Incinerator
Troops-
Grey Knight Squad One
Justicar with 6x Grey Knights (one with an incinerator)
Grey Knight Squad Two
Justicar with 6x Grey Knights (one with an incinerator)
Inquisitorial Storm Troopers Squad One
5x IST, two with Melta-guns- Mounted in a Rhino with extra armor and smoke launchers
Inquisitorial Storm Troopers Squad Two
5x IST, two with Melta-guns- Mounted in a Rhino with extra armor and smoke launchers
Heavy Support-
2x Grey Knight Land Raiders- Each with extra armor & smoke launchers (one with a storm bolter)
1x Grey Knight Land Raider Crusader- with smoke launchers


Strategy- Going into this thing I only really had two basic strategies. To use the two Rhinos to build a wall somewhere to prevent bad things from getting to my Grey Knights, and to try to assault any troops I could with at least two squads of Grey Knights to ensure a quick combat (not to get bogged down anywhere).

Game One-
Opponent was playing a Mechanized Eldar list- something that I had never faced before. Now mind you I’ve killed my share of the fancy space elf folk before, but never one hunkered down in tanks (which move rather fast…).

His List:
Head Quarters-
Farseer with Doom & Guide. Has a Ghost Helm, Rune Armor, Runes of Warding, Runes of Witnessing, Spirit Stones, Shuriken Pistol, and a Witchblade.
Farseer with Guide & Mind War. Has a Ghost Helm, Run Armor, Runes of Warding, Runes of Witnessing, Spirit Stones, Shuriken Pistol, and a Witchblade.
(Each of these Farseers were attached to a squad of Dire Avengers.)
Elites-
6x Fire Dragons with melta bombs (Mounted in the Falcon)
11x Striking Scorpions with an Exarch (with scorpion claw and plasma grenades), Plasma Grenades on the whole squad.
Mounted in a Wave Serpent with Energy field, spirit stones, vectored engines, TL Shuriken catapults, and TL Bight Lances.
Troops-
Dire Avenger Squad One
10x Dire Avengers (Avenger S-Catapult) with an Exarch with Blade Storm, Defend, Power Weapon, and Shimmersheild.
Mounted in a Wave Serpent with Energy field, spirit stones, vectored engines, TL Shuriken catapults, and TL Bight Lances.
Dire Avenger Squad Two
10x Dire Avengers (Avenger S-Catapult) with an Exarch with Blade Storm, Defend, Power Weapon, and Shimmersheild.
Mounted in a Wave Serpent with Energy field, spirit stones, vectored engines, TL Shuriken catapults, and TL Bight Lances.
Path Finder Squad One
5x Pathfinders (Rangers) with Shuriken Pistols and Ranger Long Rifle
Path Finder Squad Two
5x Pathfinders (Rangers) with Shuriken Pistols and Ranger Long Rifle
Heavy Support-
Falcon with Holofield, Spirit Stones, StarCannon, TL Shuriken Catapults, and a Pulse Laser.

Game Type: Seize Ground with Five Objectives
Deployment: Pitched Battle


Summary of the game:
I won the dice roll and opted to deploy and go first. My first turn saw me blowing apart the Eldar Falcon (off to a good start), but unfortunately that was the best round of anti-tank shooting I was to have for a little while. I moved the two rhinos towards the rightmost objective to claim it, and with the approaching Eldar grav tank the over eager Storm troopers jumped out and missed spectacularly with their four melta-gun shots. At which point the Striking Scorpions wandered out of the tank to inspect the damage and promptly commit unspeakable acts to the bunched up and rather bewildered Storm Troopers. Note to self- do not bunch up the ISTs so both squads can be assaulted by one rather mean close combat unit. At this point the Eldar player outflanked his pathfinders on my board edge, sneaking them towards the objectives. I turned around the two rhinos, tank shocked the unit, and shot them up rather nicely- forcing them under half strength so they began their long fleeing run off the board. On the left flank things were going alright for me, I shot up, assaulted and ripped the path finders up with a squad of PAGK- whom were in turn assaulted by a squad of Dire Avengers and the Farseer. The Crusader was milling about waiting for the Eldar to pop out of their transports- and the other raider was moving towards the center of the board. The Eldar player targeted the center raider, blowing it sky high it with one of his infernal grav tanks, and then cutting down the surviving PAGKs with massed fire from his Dire Avengers. (Darnit)
My Crusader was similarly blown to bits by his other grav tank which was in turn blown up by my Grand Master and his terminators- whom were rather upset at the destruction of their ride. The two Rhinos on the now firmly Eldar controlled side of the table were tank shocking the Dire Avengers whom were attempting to spread out their numbers so they could hold the two objectives on that table side. I actually got them to fail their moral and flee- but the darn Eldar rallied the next turn and held firm on the two objectives. On the left side of the board, or the Grey Knight held side- the Terminators charged into the Dire Avengers and Farseer, killing off the fancy space folk rather quickly. The remaining PAGK jumped into the Land Raider, and floored the gas to the nearest objective, Whilst blowing apart one of the remaining two Eldar tanks (huzzah!)- with the Terminators milling about in front to be sure to keep any fast moving tanks from contesting the objective. In the Eldar player’s last turn he firmly held the two objectives on the right flank, and moved to contest my objective- which was just shy of the 3’ inches needed (I thought it was within range but the Eldar player gave me the objective- this gave me some points rather than no points).



A great person to play for my first tournament game- really friendly and he practically let me have that objective on my side. We finished well before the two hours needed, and discussed tactics about the game. I learned a bit from this game, information I would need to quickly apply to my next game. This was a pretty fun game, as we had nearly wiped each other out on the board.
I never played an Mechanized Eldar before- and now I know why there hard to beat- two land raiders destroyed in a single turn?! JEEZ that’s some serious fire power.
Lesson Learned- Don’t bunch up the IST’s when they bail out like that again… ever…I practically handed him that objective and those two troops, messy and a tad bit bloody- but still handed him that objective. Also combined assaults are the way to go with my Grey Knights.

Loss: Two Objectives to my holding one (major loss).
Score: thus far: 3 Battle Points & 5 Sportsmanship Points

Game Two:
My second game was against the venerable JamesI from the Bolter & Chainsword forum and his Blood Angels (oh noes!). I had yet to face a Blood Angels army- and from what I’ve heard from the internets….such an army is apparently nigh unstoppable.

His list:
Head Quarters-
Reclusiarch with Crozius Arcanum, Bolt pistol, Jump Pack, Frag & Krak grenades, and a Rosarius
Librarian with Force Weapon, Bolt pistol, Pyschic Hood, Jump Pack, Frag & Krak grenades, shield of Sanguinius, and Unleash Rage
Elite-
Sanguinary Priest with Chainsword, Bolt Pistol, Jump Pack, and Frag & Krak grenades
Sanguinary Priest with Chainsword, Bolt Pistol, and Frag & Krak grenades
Troops-
Assault Squad One
10x Marines- with 2 Meltaguns, Chainswords (for all!), Jump Packs, and Frag & Krak grenades. Squad has a sergeant with a power first, jump pack, and Frag & Krak grenades as well.
Assault Squad Two
10x Marines- with 2 Meltaguns, Chainswords (for all!), Jump Packs, and Frag & Krak grenades. Squad has a sergeant with a power first, jump pack, and Frag & Krak grenades as well.
Assault Squad Three
5x Marines- with a flamer, Chainswords (for all!) and Frag & Krak grenades. Squad has a sergeant with a power weapon, hand flamer, and Frag & Krak grenades as well.- Mounted in a Razorback with twin linked heavy bolters, and smoke launchers.
Death Company (7x) with a Power Fist, Power Weapon, and all with chainswords and bolt pistols, and with Frag & Krak grenades. -Mounted in a Rhino with storm bolters, and smoke launchers
Fast Attack-
(7x) Vanguard Squad with one Power Fist, Power Weapon, and the rest with bolt pistols and chainswords. Sergeant has a pair of lightening claws and the whole group has Frag & Krak grenades
Heavy Support-
Predator with Autocannon, and two las-cannons with smoke launchers
Vindicator with storm bolter, dozar blade, and smoke launchers

Game Type: Capture & Control (2 Objectives)
Deployment: Spearhead



Summary of the game:
I unfortunately did not manage to get the first turn, and deployed in a bit of a box formation with the raiders facing his main army. The two objectives were each placed within our deployment zones. There was an awful large amount of red Space Marines running at my lines at a rather rapid pace…so I figured I would need to steal the initiative, and playing a capture and control game- I needed to go after his troops. He moved his vindicator, and death company up along the short board edge towards my raiders, with his jump pack marines moving along the center of the board. His Razorback dropped off his objective grabbing marines, and moved along the long board edge to aid in the assault against my objective.
Deciding to play a bit more offensively than I had in the previous game I moved both of the PAGK raiders’ towards his death company and vindicator, putting the two raiders right in these two units’ face. One raider shot at the Death Company Rhino- which had popped smoke, and was able to destroy the tank. The other raider managed to similarly wreck the Vindicator. First turn- and one of the ranged threats against my raiders was gone. He began to foot slog with the Death Company, and the remainder of his jump pack marines moved forward again- getting closer to my objective. One of his assault marine troops ventured outside of the range for the feel no pain rolls- and were promptly assaulted and rudely wiped off the table by my Terminators. In this turn as well I moved both raiders next to the Death company- figuring that a unit aptly named the “Death Company“ had to be some sort of hard hitting unit- I had a combined firing and assault against the unit with two PAGK squads, which wiped them out- with the loss of a single PAGK. In his turn he managed to explode one of my raiders- and wiped out the Terminators whom had stopped after the brutal assault against the Jump Pack Marines to pose for pictures- wiping out the confused Terminators.

The PAGK surround the remaining Death Company:


I put a PAGK squad back into the remaining raider and charged it towards his objective being held by 6x marines- wrecking the Predator along the way. The other PAGK squad- a bit upset about losing their raider charged the second Assault squad seeking revenge- but unfortunately were just shy of the charge range- and were in turn wiped off the table by the laughing blood Angels squad. The PAGK squad in the remaining raider managed to close with the Blood Angels holding the objective-and cut them down to the sergeant- but were in turn also cut down to only the Justicar after rolling four ones….The next turn saw these two models slapping each other to death with power weapons as the raider (that at this point had traveled the entire table) took a potshot at the assault squad sitting on my objective. I ended up contesting my own objective with my Land Raider Crusader and IST squad, with no one controlling his objective. We had to go to kill points to determine whom was the winner- and I lost by a single kill point.



This was a really amazingly fun game- we nearly wiped each other out by turn seven. I made a couple minor mistakes, but those poor PAGK rolls against his rear squad really hurt me in the end. The Blood Angels are certainly a tough army to face off- and I feel that my decision to charge them, and try to split them up a bit really paid off in the end- especially in my assault against the Death Company. Another great player to go up against too, and again gave out another 5/5 for sportsmanship- just a fun game ripping apart each other’s armies- 40k at its finest. Plus, I had not at this point lost by a hideously wide margin yet- so in my book I was doing very well.

Loss- No objective controlled- 6 to 7 Kill Points (Minor Loss)
Score thus far: 10 (+7)Battle Points & 10 (+5)Sportsmanship Points

Game Three-
I was facing Chaos Space Marines in this last battle of the day, a really close up shooting based army, and finally got to play on one of the big tables (constructed with the Drunken’ Dwarfs’ design apparently)- which was rather awesome to play on. Not to mention playing on a citadel game board for the first time.

His List:
Head Quarters-
Chaos Lord with Power First, & Combi-Flamer
Elites-
Chosen (7x) with 5x Meltaguns, IOCG- mounted in a rhino with combi-meltas.
Chosen (7x) with 5x Meltaguns, IOCG- mounted in a rhino with combi-meltas.
Troops-
Chaos Space Marine Squad One
CSM 10x with 2x Meltaguns, IOCG, Champion with a Power Fist and combi-flamer- Mounted in a Rhino with Combi-melta.
Chaos Space Marine Squad Two
CSM 10x with 2x Meltaguns, IOCG, Champion with a Power Fist and combi-flamer- Mounted in a Rhino with Combi-melta.
Chaos Space Marine Squad Three
CSM 10x with 2x Meltaguns, IOCG, Champion with a Power Fist and combi-flamer- Mounted in a Rhino with Combi-melta.
Heavy Support-
Vindicator with Daemonic Possession
Vindicator with Daemonic Possession
Vindicator with Daemonic Possession



Game Type: Annihilation
Deployment: Dawn of War

I won the roll and deployed and went first. Turn one was most eventful as neither of us had moved anything on the table. In turn two I brought on the raiders in the center of the table- with the Crusader and the two rhinos off the right flank a bit more, I figured I would hook right with the crusader a bit more using buildings to cover from the vindicator fire. Looking at his list I realized that he had a lot of meltaguns. Actually scratch that- tis’ an understatement. He had a plethora of Meltaguns- yea broke out the dictionary for that one (21 melta guns at a glance). I my first reaction was to sit still and shoot from a range with las- cannons then counter assault, but looking at the chosen and the commander that were coming on the flanks I needed to get away from the board edges. In his first turn his shooting failed to accomplish anything, with all three of the vindicator blast’s veering off the land raiders. In my turn I pushed the crusader up along the flank- immobilizing the vindicator with the multi-melta, and letting out the terminators. The center Land Raider charged up as well- failing to do anything to the vindicators- but blowing up a Rhino that had failed its’ smoke cover. My other raider circled around the Chaos temple, immobilizing another Rhino. In my assault phase I destroyed a vindicator with the Grand Master- whom was all to happy to rip it apart with his hammerhand power- and another Vindicator was wrecked by the PAGK squad. The PAGK squad on the leftmost raider also assaulted the now immobilized rhino- blowing it up as well. On the third turn of the game I was up 4 kill points.
In his turn he moved in the Chosen along my board edge- heading towards my IST’s in Rhinos- but managed to immobilize itself on a ruin. The other outflanking unit managed to get to my PAGK- and the combined fire from the surviving squad of CSM and the commander’s unit managed to wipe out the PAGK. (darnit) His chosen and two squads of CSM emptied their bolters and plethora of melta guns on the PAGK that had just destroyed the vindicator- killing a good deal of them (My opponent was amazing- he saw that I was doing the wound allocated a bit incorrectly- me being a nub- and walked me through how to allocate wounds so I wouldn’t lose as many PAGK’s- amazing sportsmanship there). The CSM then assaulted the PAGK- but the squad managed to hold on despite being further cut down by a power fist. The Terminators on my turn closed in on this combat- coming to the rescue of the PAGK- killing the CSM squad- the terminators consolidated into the ruined vindicators- and the remaining two PAGK fled towards their raider. In his turn the remaining vindicator- having just brushed off a melta gun hit from the Crusader shot its’ cannon at the remaining two PAGK- veering off again- missing the two entirely. His chosen squad began their walk towards my raiders with their melta guns- but were still out of range, and his commander hopped back into his own Rhino- speeding off towards by now empty raider- that had pulled back in the pervious turn. At this point I took my opponents’ advice (again amazing sportsmanship), and castled up- playing kill point denial for the most part. I pincer moved his chosen squad- unloading with the IST squads, the assault cannon on the LRC, and the heavy bolter on a Raider- felling the Chaos Marines. I also took a lascannon shot his remaining rhino- blowing up the tank as well.
In the final turn of the game (turn 6), his chosen squad that was staying in the back field closed in on the Crusader- shooting at the tank with their melta guns- but either managing to miss or failing to do anything productive. In turn the chaos quad whilst screaming in a rather high pitched tone were ripped apart by the combined fire of the LRC and then the power weapons from the Terminator squad- not very civil at all actually. I took some shots at the immobilized rhino and the vindicator put failed do anything to the remaining tanks. In his final turn the vindicator shot at the Raider, but again scattered off target (the center of the hole was between a Rhino and a Raider). Dice rolled for a seventh turn but it wasn’t in the cards- and the game ended.

Unfortunately I nearly forgot to take a shot when the end of the game happened so he removed his command squad, and the remaining CSM squad from the hill before I could snag a shot.


This was a great game, not because I won but because the person that I played pointed out some things that I had not been utilizing in my list- such as not using the wound allocation system properly- which I pretty much re-learned in this game (and will undoubtedly come in handy next time around). Plus all of the sound effects from when he moved his tanks/ removed his dead CSM were all amusing. I feel that I had used the correct strategy for this game- to charge him ASAP- steal the initiative from him from the get go- then try to withdraw my forces as soon as I got a good amount of kill points. My opponent saw it as using the Land Raiders as Aircraft Carriers- something that I never really thought of before. Had I stayed back and fired - waiting for him to come to me, I would have been hit by the vindicators, and the deep striking chosen/ his commander all that the same time- really making it a much different game overall- one where I would have been killed rather quickly.

Win- 8 Kill points to 1 (Massacre)
Score thus far: 30 Battle Points (+20) & 15 (+5) Sportsmanship Points

Total Score:
When the scores were announced I tallied up the following:
Best Painted Army (Huzzah!)

30 Battle Points (Out of 60)
15 Sportsmanship Points (Out of 15)
3 Painting Points (Out of 3)
1 Bonus Point (For having a constructed display board- of if it was for winning best painted I forgot which)

49 Total Points- which put me in 6th Place out of 14. Not half bad for Nub’s first tournament- with a barely used list.

I ended up using the store credit I won to grab an Empire State Troops box set, and bought a squad of Imperial Guardsmen & a Heavy Weapons team. I figured I’m going to be painting up my unpainted models until (hopefully) a Grey Knights codex, or something similar is to be released at some point over the summer (I’m not going to start a new army just to have to stop it short and go back to collecting Grey Knights again lol)

I had an amazing time at GrimFoe Games’ tournament, and I’m now biting at the bit to get more WarHammer stuff painted up- but alas final exams will block this for now unfortunately. It’s a great store to go to- with more than enough room to house seven players (atm they have 5 of the Drunken Dwarf tables- each with a Citadel game board)- and room for I believe up to 30 Warhammer tables- including full terrain for all of them. Not to mention a great staff- running a well organized tournament (plus they ordered a ton of pizza for everyone- awesome tournament indeed) I also found myself incredibly lucky to play three great people, and have three great games of Warhammer 40k.

If any of you live up in the New York State- Capital Region area- or ever are passing through I would highly recommend to swing by their store- just outside of Albany.

Store Site: http://www.grimfoegames.com/
Club Forums: http://www.grimfoegames.com/forums/

The next time I play a game I’ll be sure to try to get to a more detailed battle report with individual pictures of each turn rather than this more broad over view.
Myself and several others in the store managed to snag a few pictures of the different games going down during the tournament- and here they are- a bit of a tournament slide show if you will:


















(these were the extra tables which were used by people coming in for other games including WarMachine)



































As always thank you very much for your time, and I hope that you enjoyed reading this post- and have a great day.

-Cease

Great report and pics. And a nice placing for your first tournie. I know how you felt going in. I had only played a 40K game 3 times going into my 1st tournie and I had never played an opponent 1 on 1. Like you, what made it an enjoyable experience was the fine players I went up against. That CSM player is what it's all about.

Congrats! I'm actually from that area ( a little west of albany though) so it's good to see the hobby doing well up there.

Congrats Brother! Loved the batrep and the pics!

Good job on a 6th place finish at your first 40K tournament! I liked the detailed batrep and the high amount of good pictures.

Thank you very much for your comments, I hope to have a much more detailed battle report accomplished in the future, after I wrapp up with finals (ugh...).

Going over my list after the last game I discovered I had rather royally screwed up. I took Holocaust on my Terminators- and never used it, although it would of only come in hand in the first game against Eldar. I also was I 6 points under- which I could of used to give the Justicar's grenades- which wouldn't of been any use, but still darnit lol.
Concerning the use of the Holy Relic....YES TAKE IT EVERY TIME! Being able to give your Terminators their charge bonus on a turn when your getting assaulted or +1 attack (so that the GK GM now has many attacks on the charge O.o) is a wonderous thing. Not to mention this spreads to nearby GK squads. I was on the fence about this- but no longer lol.

MJ Swasey- There is a 40k gaming group that meets up every Monday evening at the store, I believe there is a Fantasy group that will start to meet there as well- but I'm not 150% sure about them. I know that will be hosting a Fantasy Tournament at 2250pts on the 22nd of May, if you wanna swing by. I personally won't be there as I'll be graduating lol, but you should totally swing by at some pt.

As always thank you for your time,

-Cease

Just remember he can't use the holy relic if he charges (cuz he moved that turn)

I still sometimes forget my shrouding rolls, lol.

I can't make it the 22nd, and i work so mondays are out, but if they have another tournament sometime when i'm visiting up there i may swing by and hop in.

Just a little tip, When i first start out with new armies, I get a few notecards, write out what I want to remember, usually just a word such as Shrouding, Aegis, 'Warptime' etc. Then i place the card next to my dice on the table so i will remember it.

i'm happy you enjoyed your first tournament ...and for your opponents : happily most of tourney players are like that (Aka good guys) the cheaters or the enerving ones are finally very few ... and they finish their carriers playing one against another because they can't find other opponents !
Aubec

So good to see how you did in the tourney Brother Cease!!! You do your Grey Knight Brethren proud! *If we allowed ourselves pride, of course*

Your army, namely the Land Raiders, looked really good on the tables! Your face off against Chaos was certainly my favorite; that wound allocation has let me Grey Knights hold off much longer by slapping all the AP3 shots onto a single guy in the face of overwhelming wounds.

Plus, those other armies looked great! The Nurglery one? That's be fun to battle!

Keep it up Ceasarian, I love these reports!