Area 51 RTT 11/13

So on Saturday I went with a bunch of the Austin guys for a RTT at Area 51 Games in Grapevine, TX. We had to hit the road at about five am and I carpooled with Bigred, Bushido, and CRP. Got to the store and it was pretty nice, they had tons of tables packed in there. I really liked the terrain and the guys running the event did a good job. They were using a kind of hybridized P/S/T Nova format where the four Nova Objectives were rearranged on a P/S/T system each round. Primary was worth 4 points, secondary 3 points, and tertiary 2 points. A different kind of setup I hadn't seen before for sure. I later found out that any ties were worth 0 points to both players. I played this list. Let's go through it.

Game I v. Nick V.'s Tyranids

So Round 1 I was paired up against Nick from Chapter House Studios and his Tyranid army. Above you can see ole' Sangy' fighting one of Nick's Tervigons, which is made using a conversion kit Chapter House sells. His army had two HQ Tervigons, Deathleaper, three Zoans, two Hive Guard, a troop Tervigon (w/ min Gaunts), a small squad of Genestealers, two four-man Ravener broods, and two Trygons. Our board had lots of low line of sight blocking terrain, and no high vantage points. We had primary VPs, secondary objectives, and tertiary table quarters. I stole his initiative. Both my Baals got excited and busted a little early (haha), zooming into his ranks with no real plan unfortunately. But once Angels started hitting in it got a little better. Sanguinor charged in killing a Tervigon then later his Hive Guard while the Sanguinary Guards first charge killed about twenty spawned Gaunts and his Zoanthrope unit. My Devs managed to kill a Trygon with their missles before Death Leaper popped out next to them. Good for them they got him with a krak missle to the face right away. Our armies really brutalized each other in this close game, so we tied the primary (for zero points we find out at this point), he got objectives 2-1, and we tied quarters. So 0/0 for me.

Game II v. Brian B.'s Space Marines

So next game I played against Brian and his want-to-be-grown-up Dark Angels. Primary was KPs, secondary quarters, and tertiary objectives. My opponent had a Terminator Librarian, a Thunder Hammer unit in a Crusader, a Tactical Terminator squad, three Tactical squads w/ Razorback, and two Predators. He combat squadded all the Tacticals, went first, and advanced with all his transports. I responded by killing two of his Razorbacks with my Devastators, and destroying his Land Raider with a Meltagun out of the top of a fast Rhino. His Terminators charged the Rhino to no effect and were then killed by a charging Sanguinor and Sanguinary Guard. My Baals outflanked and took destroyed some objective holders. My Sanguinary Guard kill another combat squad, a Predator, and cleared off another objective. I got full points.

Game III v. Matt R.'s Eldar

So I finally ended up playing one of the Austin crew, and this was an especially funny match-up because we had play-tested these armies just a few days before. In the test game Matt had managed to use his Guardian screen to prevent me from getting a charge off on his Wraithguard with my Sanguinary Guard. I learned my lesson and made sure to get a few more shots in to thin the Guardian horde this time. We had Dawn of War this game. The Sanguinor was able to see off a Banshee squad, but took two wounds due to power weapons and being doomed. But then he synced up with the Sanguinary Guard for the charge on the Wraithguard and some Guardians. Managed to kill Eldrad with fourteen fearless wounds. Once he was gone I was really able to manage everything better.

Game IV v. Mike W.'s Death Korps

Game four had primary KPs, secondary table quarters, and tertiary VPs. I played against a pretty mech-ed up IG army with spearhead deployment. He had three Russes of various kinds, two Vendettas, four Vet squads (two in Chimeras, two in Vendettas), a hellhound, and a Command HQ in a Chimera. I only deployed my Devastators and used his Officer of the Fleet to make my kill points harder to get. The Devs started off by downed a Vendetta, but they got shot at by his whole army and folding in two turns. The Guard and Sanguinor deep struck into his backfield and started to wreak havoc. We ended up tieing VPs, but I won the other two.

All in all a really fun tournament, I ended up fourth overall. A lot of the Austin crew won awards. Kings took Best General, Bushido won Players Choice, with Caldera getting 2nd Overall and CBJ 2nd Best General...