US Masters/ Best of the Rest 2022

Been a long time since I updated this. I though my first trip to the Kings of War US Masters was a good enough reason. To be clear, I didn't qualify for the masters team for the PNW, but with it only 3 1/2 hours away in Seattle, I was going whether I played or not. However, since there was a Best of the Rest tournament, I was happy to bring an army to play. The bonus of only playing five games instead of six was nice. 

First, I don't know if I'll ever get to go to another one, but I certainly hope so. It was a great time and a great atmosphere. BotR was more laid back than the Masters, but even the Masters seemed pretty laid back. 

Second, I was hoping for more presence from out of region. I don't recall anyone entering other than PNW or West Coast players. Due to players getting tapped as subs in the other tournament and other issues, we only managed to have 15 players, with a ringer player. Of those 15, seven of us were from the PDX area. 

Right at the end of 2nd ed. I started building an imperial dwarf army and never got a chance to enter an event with it before Covid. Post Covid, it's the only army I've been playing. 

My List:

x2 Ironguard Regiments with throwing mastiffs

x1 Shieldbreakers Regiment with throwing mastiffs

x1 Rangers Regiment

x2 Mastiff Hunting Pack Regiments with throwing mastiffs

x1 Berserker Brock Rigers with Potion of the Caterpillar

x1 Earth Elemental Horde

x1 Greater Earth Elemental

x3 Lord on a Large Beast

x2 Stone Priests with Bane Chant and Surge

Game 1 was against Kingdoms of Men played by Chris, one of those local to me. By the end of turn seven, I held four table sections to his one, plus his center, giving me the win and five scenario points. I expected attrition to be closer, but he only had a regiment and general on winged beast, and I had a regiment and three lords on large beast. If I remember right, final tally was 24/8, putting me in 3rd place.

Game 2 was against Undead played by Paul. This was my coming back to Earth game. Paul out played me in every turn. He got all but one objective and missed tabling me by the stone priests and a lord on large beast. Final tally was 24/6, dropping me back into the middle of the pack.

Game 3 was against Salamanders played by Blake. He gambled on some turn two flank charges that didn't pay off, trying to pop my Rangers, Brock Riders, and an Ironguard Regiment. All three held, and the flanking units got flanked/rear charged and wiped out. Late in the game he managed to get a regiment of Salamander primes into the rear and another into the front of the other IG regiment and only managed 12 wounds, then rolled a 4 to waiver them. This forced him to take another turn to kill them, allowing me time to get units over there to kill both units of primes with flanks and rear charges and take the loot token they'd taken from my IG. Final tally ended up 24/7. The best way I could describe this game was that he made an early mistake and his dice and mine made him pay for it. When my late mistake let him have the front/rear charge on my IG, the dice were more forgiving. This boosted me up to 4th place. 

At the end of the day, I was sitting at 2-1 and was happy with how the army was working. 

Game 4 found me against the ringer, which was one of the TOs Trident Realms army, piloted by Rob Phaneuf in between recording for Counter Charge.  The list he'd been handed didn't have a good answer for D6 dwarves, with almost no CR or TC and low defense. There was a horde with the Hammer of Measured force, and that unit was the only unit to kill any of mine, other than the archers that shot one of my mastiff packs off the board. Getting the hordes tied up in the center, fouled by my other mastiff pack, now being wounded on 4s rather than 3s due to HoMF, the center turned into a slog letting me get flanks on the hordes, the giant, and the hero on the critter. Also, Rob was generous with advice. I took the last of his units off the board in turn seven, taking the last look tokens. Final tally 25/6, putting me into 3rd place. 

Going into turn I had no chance at first, because even if I got a max win, because only if they both lost could I catch them both. As it was I'd need a strong win and a big loss by number two to even have a shot at second. I was matched up against Vern's Varangur. I managed to use my rangers to keep Vern's flanking cavalry out of my backfield long enough to push my D6 units to the center line. At the end of turn six, he'd gotten 6 units with 14 unit-strength across the board, and I was sitting at5 units and 11 US on his side. He rolled us a turn seven and failed to kill the Lord on large beast I hadn't gotten across the board, needing a five on the dice and getting snake eyes. I managed to kill that unit, reducing Vern's score to 5/11, but needed a 4 on the over-run to get that LotLB across the line, and rolled a 2, leaving me also at 5/11. Attrition was less than 200 points different (his favor, leaving us with a 17/17 draw. Had I managed the win, I'd have pulled off second place by one point, but I am happy to have kept a hold of 3rd place. 

All in all, it was a great weekend. I've never finished a five-game tournament ranked that high. I went 3-1-1and got 96 out of a possible 125 tournament points, for my best battle finish in a two-day event ever. I'll take it. 

A New DIrection

So I'm getting tired of Orcs. I'm getting to the point where they just seem unplayable. I'm not getting rid of them. In fact, I'm painting up a horde of Ax for Clash of Storms in August. After that, I think I'll quit painting Orcs for a while. They'll still be my go-to army while I work on the new one. I'm hoping to have the new army ready for Lone Wolf in the spring. (Assuming I can even go.)

Cascade Clash

My return to the table was not exactly triumphant, however, I cot to throw dice, move models around, and meet new people. I didn't play particularly well, but I managed to finish 11th out of 19. Numerically, it's the highest I've ever finished in a two day tournament.

I officially went 2-3 on the weekend, but one of those wins was against a bye. I wasn't happy about drawing the bye, but the TO decided that he didn't want anyone who traveled to sit out a game, so the locals took the hit. I can see his point and agree.

I didn't expect to do well as I hadn't played in almost a year and never with the CoK18 rules. Still it was fun and I was thrilled just to play again.

As is normal, I got the painting bug from looking at some of the amazing armies. I've decided to build a new one using as many Mantic models as possible. I've got about 1200 points of the new army so far and have a plan for the rest. I'm not touching it until after I get my Orcs ready for Clash of Storms. My goal is to have it ready for Lone Wolf 2019. I hope to make either LW or Alamo in 2019.

Better Luck the Second Time

So Deadzone was a flop with my ever-patient wife. I'd hoped she would like it as she had been a fab if Mordheim. Some of the most abysmal dice rolling I've seen in a very long time mad the game short and not fun.

Remembering how she liked Mordheim, I thought I'd get her to try Frostgrave, She was enthusiastic, and her dice were far less antagonistic toward her minis this time, We played to a 3-3 draw, but she cleaned up on the treasure rolls and got more XP from casting more spells successfully.

This looks promising.

Demo Game Failure

Moving to Oregon from San Antonio meant leaving our D&D group and everyone I knew who played tabletop war games. I've been itching to get back into Kings of War and Deadzone. I recently found that there are KoW players up here, though not many. I have yet to find any Deadzone players.

However, my wife and I both used to play Mordheim, that out-of-print GW gateway drug into miniature gaming. So I convinced her ti give DZ a try. I made up a couple of 100 point lists, Enforcers for her and Forge Fathers for me. It went poorly. To start with, the tactical dice were generous to me and rude to her. Then the d8s said, "Hold My Beer!" and tried to top them. Every shot I took killed a model. Not a single shot of hers resulted in a wound to mine. I left models wide in the open, with her models elevated, doubling her chances to hit. No luck.

Needless to say, after I killed the third o her five models in two turns, she declared the game over. I don't think I have a convert for this game.

Long Time No Write

The last time I posted, I was still living in San Antonio. Later that week she was offered the job she'd been going for in Beaverton, Oregon. So here I am, 10 months later, living in a suburb of Portland. I managed to get some painting done, at first, but when I finally found a job, it ate my life for the first several months. Add to that the general lack of Kings of War or anything Mantic in the state of Oregon, and I really had no reason to paint. Our role-playing group was gone, I had no one to play KoW or Deadzone with, and there was little reason for me to paint, as I had no purpose for painted minis.

A series of events unfolded recently to rekindle my interest in minis. I then found the PNW KoW Facebook group, found out about Clash of Storms outside of Seattle in August. Then, to my surprise, I found out about Cascade Clash here in Portland next month. So I'm signed up. I'll be bringing the Orcs out again, and I hope to have the Elves re-based and ready for Clash of Storms in August. As of now, I need to paint up my second War Drum and finish he base for my second orcling regiment. I Might need to make a display board as well, as I don't know if my current army will fit on the old one.

Defying Expectations

Aside from gaming and historic swordplay, another long-time hobby of mine had been shooting. While visiting the in-laws in AZ a couple of weeks ago, my brother-in-law and I went shooting for an afternoon, reminding me of how much I miss it. So when I got home, having left my sweet wife there to spend time with her new nephew and other, lesser noteworthy members of the family than a new 5 month-old nephew, I decided to visit the range.

There was a time when I looked more at home on a shooting range that at a gaming table or historical recreation event. Now, not so much. Jeans and boots have given way to cargo shorts and hiking shoes. The local sports team or NRA baseball cap had given way to the breathable, modern materials hat from REI. Rather than a modern black nylon shooting bag with Remington or Smith & Wesson printed on the side or the plastic case a pistol comes in,  my range bag is a green Craftsman tool bag.

Yesterday, as I approached the shooting line, the range officer approached me and began giving me the newcomer speech.

"First time here?"

"No, just first time in a few years."

He seemed to not believe me. "Need me to show you how the target carrier works?"

"No, thanks. If  I remember right, it seemed pretty straightforward."

He still didn't believe me, but was polite enough to not say so. He just kept an eye on me not so subtle-like.

Once I'd set my bag down, hung my target, and send it down range, I'd just gotten it to where I wanted it, which was half-again farther down than the people around me, (not being macho or cocky, just practical, which will be revealed later) he nicely came over and started to tell me how to bring it back in closer.

"If you wanna bring that back in a little, you just lower the riser and that'll roll back in."

"Thanks." I left it where it was."That's good there."

He stepped back as if to say. "Suit yourself," and walked a bit away as I turned and unpacked my shooting bag. When I uncased my pistol, which is a Ruger Competition Target Mark 2, He made a grunt as if to say, "Nevermind," and walked back to his usual position.

He was satisfied at that point that I seemed to know what I was doing, but I think I hurt some penises on either side of me. My first couple of shots were a little wilder than I wanted, but even then, I could have folded  a dollar bill in half and covered the grouping after the first twenty. This is less a testament to my skill than to the quality of my firearm. It's a very accurate target pistol with a heavy barrel and almost no recoil.

The guys on either side of me were shooting much louder and larger things, making MUCH larger groupings than mine. The guy on my right's reaction seemed to be taking more time to aim between shots. The guy on the left's reaction was to move his target past mine and all but quit hitting the paper. He even it mine once. Or at least someone who wasn't me did, as 22's don't make holes that big, at least not with one shot.

I missed shooting. I plan on going back again soon. When my sweet wife comes back, I'll take her with me, because she used to enjoy it too.