Back from the Bayou

So my return to the Houston gaming scene was not a rousing victory, but I had a great time. The hotel was pricy, but more than welcoming to the group.

I ended up 63rd out of 78 or so, which was worse than I hoped but about what I expected.

Game 1 - Jeff G.'s Daemons of Chaos
Skulltaker on a Juggernaught
Herald of Nurgle on a Palanquin
39 Pink Horrors
48 Plaguebearers
Herald of Tzeench
5 Flamers
5 Furies (x3)
5 Blood crushers.

Not a good day to be an orc.

I deployed poorly, my doom diva blew itself up on the first shot, and Jeff outplayed me. It's been over a week, so I don't remember how, but between Skultaker and the blood crushers, I didn't hae much to stand up to them. He methodically killed my units by defeating them in HTH, making them run, and running them down.

Game 2 - Chuck W.'s Warriors of Chaos

Chaos Lord on a Juggernaught
Exalted Hero on a chaos steed
Sorcerer on a Palanquin
36 Chaos Marauders
21 Chaos Warrios
16 Chaos Knights
Warshrine (X2)

This game looked to be going well, but I foolishly took the bait when one of his units ran around behind me and turned to face it rather than charging the unit fighting my trolls. That cost me the game. His knights, combined with the hero and CL decimated the trolls while the marauders and the Savages face off for a long time. He killed almost everything, leaving the general and the giant. I killed the warriors and that's about it. Up until turn four, it was looking good for me, but I lost two combats, rolled bad, and the chain reactions started. (I think Chuck wins no matter if I make those rolls, but it might have been closer.)

Game 3 - Devin van Damme's Dwarves
Dwarf Lord
Runesmith
Thane
30 Dwarf Warriors
12 Thunderers (x2)
28 Hammerers
20 Slayers
Flame Cannon
Grudge thrower
Organ Gun
Gyro Copter

Trade out the slayers for another cannon and this is very much like the list I learned to play against. It wasn't a fun day for the dwarves.  Like me, Devin is newish to fantasy and mare tactical mistakes.  I got turn one and move my trolls directly at the slayers lined up across them and killed a few thunderers with  the doom diva.

Devin forgot to shoot the flaming cannon at the trolls until the end of shooting, leaving them lots of regen before that point. He killed a troll and a orc boy in his shooting phase.

I got the trolls into the slayers in turn two, in turn three they killed the last slayer and overran into some thunderers, and then into the organ gun in the next combat. Then, wonder of wonders, they made back to back leadership tests to not overrun and get back into the main fight.

On the other side, my black orc stood up face to face with his hammerers and the unit champ survived along with my general and BSB. What killed the hammerers was getting the block of boys, the trolls and the savages, who'd just killed the warriors.

We called the game after turn four, because we agreed I would never catch his gyrocopter or the 8 remaining thunderers who'd hightailed it for my side, and I had several units positioned to charge his remaining artillery with two full turns to do it.

I lost a few trolls, a most of my black orcs, my giant, and my nightgoblin shaman who'd miscast and sucked himself into the warp.

I finished day one 1-2.


Game 4 was against Ryan G's Imperial
Archlector on a war alter
Lvl 4 battle wizard - light
Lvl 1 battle wizard -light (x2)
CaptainBSB
Master Engineer (x2)
50 Halbereers FC
5 Detachemt FC (x2)
30 Crossbowmen
5 Detachemt FC (x2)
Great Cannon (x2)
Hell Blaster (x2)
8 Reiksguard knights

Points didn't count for this one, only saving the three women at the centerline of the board. I foolishly chose to ignore one and go for two. I kept the one on the left side, didn't challenge for the one on the rights, and the main battle was fought for the one in the center. My plan was sound until I finally lost a combat after sizing her. I needed a 10 or less on leadership, and rolled an 11, then 12 on the reroll. We called the game then, because he was going to to take her out of my range on his turn and the remaining turn wouldn't be enough for me to get her back since my closest units were either facing the wrong way or failing stupidity checks.

Straight up fight? I think I could take this one, but I failed every single leadership test for the last two full turns.

I did make the Reiksguard Knights a non-factor by keeping my trolls between them and the fight.


Game 5 Mike S.'s Skaven
Can't say what he had in his army since he didn't give me a copy of his list, but it involved a pile of plaguemonks, several slave hordes, a couple of warrior hordes, and an elite horde of some kind, plus big cannon thing, a big horror looking thing, and a doom wheel.

My giant tripped stepping over a wall and got mashed by the doom wheel, which in turn got run off my the savages. The trolls and the other units mauled all of his units except the plague monks, a warrior unit, and the horror thing. Hs characters were in the units not mauled, except his general which was with the elite unit running away. We had to stop at turn four because of time. I'd killed the doomwheel, the cannon, the rats, all of the slaves, and a warrior unit. He killed the black orks, the giant, my doom diva, and my BSB. He won, 1000 to 600. Seems I killed all the cheap shit. The units running, all within five inches of the table edges were worth another 500 points and change. Had we played out the game (or even another turn), I win. Had I known the relative value of skaven units, I win. Oops. Chalk it up to experience.

I did respectable in all categories except battle points. I managed 42 (out of 100 possible) battle points,  16 for painting, 12 for comp, 53 for sportsmanship, and the 10 on time points.

I did win a box of ghouls in the raffle, though. Defintily planning on going to more GTs, especially Alamo, since it's local, and BB13 next year.