Warhammer Players Society Tournament army (2000 points) - (2/1/2)
Brief: I went to the big WPS tournament with 100 odd other people. This really showed who was who, and i think i did quite well considering the "soft" Ravening Hordes HE list. I got 67th out of 114 entrants with Vampire Counts sweeping the top places. All weekend the small boards made it quite hard going in most of my games to actually move about the flanks much, add the general increase in the number of units due to RH's cheapening of troops and many armies could cover almost from end to end of thier table edge. Not fun for elves who's supposed advantage is speed. The recommended accomadation was real low-quality, though it was fun doing this with Wozza and Sadam. Overall a real eye-opener compared to the small SLW tournaments.
I think this army was something like my 2001 South London Warlord army which is here.
Round 1: loss vs VC (5 - 18)
I cant remember which VC army this was, i think it had loads of wolves and a Vampire Lord with wolf-form, graveguard, skellies. This board had a load of terrain which limited movement, and line of sight. He crushed my left flank, as his troops were stronger than i thought, and the wolf-form caught me out slightly, bad bad rolls didnt help at all. After that there wasnt much hope of saving anything although i tried...
Round 2: win vs Orc and Goblins (18 - 6)
Slapped down to the bottom of the table gave me an easy fight, this was more like it. Two huge NG units (like 40+) boar boys, wolf riders and wolf chariots. A load of mages. My opponent was a nice guy, but really didnt seem to grasp the probablities for this fight. We placed out terrain, i was hoping to break up his huge units and limit thier movement, and after the diverting had finished he had 3 woods half blocking his deployment zone and really limited his placement. I dumped an eagle by two night goblin units, and predictibly out popped 6 fanatics further limiting his chances of getting to me - best bit was they didnt even get the eagle! I shot his boar-boyz to bits, and then charged into the left flank getting some nice flank charges, though the two chariots and silverhelms that went over the top of his generals unit seemed to surprise him :-> he had left most of his mages out of units, and once the overruns started i managed to catch a few, and even the eagles got some charges in. Then it was cleanup...
Round 3: draw vs Chaos Warriors (12 - 12)
Super nasty Chaos army, really min/maxed with 3 units of wolves and 2 units of Chaos Knights, maybe a warrior block? I knew from setup and terrain i wasnt winning HtH so did a load of marchblocking, shooting and general weasling to get a draw. Not a very satisfying fight, on part my fault for not commiting, but against that optimised hard army i didnt think i was going to get much better.
Round 4: win vs Orc and Goblins (18 - 6)
Another O&G army, this one was more orcs, i dont remember much at all, i might have lured some savage orcs about one flank while attacking up the other? Another big win, and some respect back. I was actually doing better than Adam at this stage.
Round 5: loss vs VC (6 - 18)
I think i made table 14 or something, definitely within spitting distance of the big boys, i could see Rob Lane's High Elf cavalry army just over there beating up some demons for an eventual 2nd place, while i did best out of all the other HE players who all had more general infantry + support armies.
This VC army was also nasty for me. 2 units of Black Knights, one was 12 big and had general and wight. the guy was obviously good to have got here, but he also had a rubber ruler and some dodgy rule interpretations, overall giving another unsatisfying game. Something about the type of player who min/maxes? as i enjoyed the other VC game which crushed me. Any way, again i was reduced to some weasling and shooting to try to whittle him down before combat, i saw a chance and charged his big skillie unit with a mage, but i crapped the rolls, 2nd Sign gave 3 impacts hits combined for the two chariots, and my general killed nothing. I had been hoping to blow him away in one turn, but instead i got countercharged by a BK unit and my general got Killing Blow'ed by a wight <mutter, mutter> after that i could still have got a draw but for some great magic from his side which got my mage hiding in the woods and lost table quarters from Van Hals just into my reavers and an eagle being blasted. Real dissapointed especaially since the guy got more annoying at the end.
Overall i had fun, but it was depressing to see how much luch with the opponent draw and terrain had to do with it. i think i did pretty well considering, but dont see High Elves being a serious contender until GW changes their perspective of elves, paying points for WS, I and LD (with the Intrigue rule not helping) just doesnt make them cost effective. Check out the 2002 SLW tournament for the biggest crushing i've given someone in a while! :-D
