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View Full Version : Tourney Report: The Kalm Before the Waaagh



Kuhlbert
04-18-2010, 04:30 PM
So this isn't a Battle Report - more like a Tourney Report. On Saturday Apr 17th, a small group of players gathered at Mason's Pub in downtown Huntville Alabama for the Kalm Before the Waaagh (www.thekalm.com). This "adults only" tournament is a friendly set of games with some interesting (and sometimes silly) missions, good drinks, and some excellent BBQ.

This is my second time at the Kalm, and I had a blast. Not only did I have my personal-best performance, but it was just plain fun.

So briefly, here's a little about the three games that I played. They're not detailed blow-by-blows, mainly because things were rushed and I didn't take great notes :)

First off - my army:
CCS with OotF, Astro, Melta, Plasma, and Autocannon
Primaris Psyker
Psyker Squad (9) with Chimera
Psyker Squad (9) with Chimera
Veteran Squad with 3xMelta and Chimera
Veteran Squad with 3xPlasma and Chimera
Infantry Platoon:
PCS with 4xFlamer
Infantry Squad with GL and Autocannon
Infantry Squad with GL and Autocannon
Mortar Heavy Weapon Team
Scout Sentinel with Autocannon
Scout Sentinel with Autocannon
Scout Sentinel with Autocannon
Leman Russ Executioner with Plasma Sponsons
Leman Russ Executioner with Plasma Sponsons
Ordnance Battery with 2x Medusas equiped with enclosed hulls and bastion-breaker shells.

Game 1 - Chaos Space Marines (Tzeench)

The first mission had three parts to it: Grab objectives, kill their HQ, and get your own most expensive unit killed.

Yup, that's right. 6 out of 20 mission points were for getting one of your own units killed - because they were "mercenaries" and you didn't want to pay them :).

So this was a problem for me. My most expensive unit is the Ordnance battery. How do I get them killed? My opponent just ignored them. Which hurt him, to be sure - but it meant I lost six points.

However, the rest of the game went just fine. His force was a huge 18 man Thousand Sun marine unit with a sorcerer in it. He also had a sorcerer lord and Ahriman along for the ride. Add two normal CSM squads in rhinos, thwo dreadnaughts with CCWs, and two two-man obliterator squads.

He decided to keep the Obits and Dreads in reserve - I personally think this hurt him bad, as the OotF worked wonderfully.

Even though it would give him six points, I lit up the TS troops, because I knew their inferno bolts would chew me up. They walked across the board, hoping cover and invulnerable saves would save them. It didn't. The sheer volume of fire destroyed them all in three turns. The medusas destroyed one CSM squad with the help of the mortar team, and the Primaris Psyker and one of the sentinels made short work of the other. The CCS and the Primaris also bested Ahriman - the Primaris making his save against the evil sorcerer but Ahriman failing his (after taking a ton of plasma shots as well). The melta team was too close to the table edge, and one of the dreadnaughts charged their chimera, wrecking it. But the team wasn't pinned, so they immobilized and removed an arm the next turn. The other dreadnaught charged the melta team, and managed to wipe them out - but it was destroyed by the medusas the next turn. The Obliterators dropped in late in the game, but were largely ineffectual, falling to volume plasma fire and the might of the Primaris Psyker (11 shots!).

In the end, I won the game 14 to 6 points, with the Primaris Psyker being the MVP.

Game 2 - Space Wolves

This was scary at first. Four grey hunter squads and a wolf priest. Riding in four land raider redeemers. That's it. I wasn't expecting that much AV14 - and all I had was the Medusas, the Melta vets, and the melta gun in the CCS. My decision to _not_ take a vendetta was looking to be poor....

The mission involved a "super gun" that each side had (the actual rule said to put your beverage on a terrain piece - that was your gun). The gun's stats were identical to the IG Deathstrike missile, except that it could be used twice: once in turn 5, the other in turn 6. The goals were to destroy your opponent's gun (and it was only vulnerable to HtH), to get one of your units off the board in your opponent's deployment zone, Kill Points (the one with the most, got 5 points), and you had to try to have one of your HQs kill 150% of its points - to prove that they were 'tuff e'nuff.

The wall of AV14 scared me. Right away, he came barreling towards me, popping smoke turn one just to get closer. The smoke saved one from a medusa shot. Turn two saw a Sentinel come in - and in a moment that people might go "awwww, lame", I had it come in on a back corner, turn, and immediately walk off the board. Four points for me! Sadly, the only four points for me this game...

The rest of the game was attrition - me slamming the LRs with medusas and doing a run with melta vets, then lighting up the marines with plasma when they got out. All the while, he's roasting units left and right and running into hand-to-hand whenever possible. The CCS and Primaris were roasted by a Redeemer, so no points there for me...

I thought I had the prime objective when a sentinel came on the board and assaulted the "big gun". AV10... Str 5.... rolled a 4. Arrgh. And I forgot, that I _charged_ the gun, so I should have gotten two attacks. Maybe the second would have failed too...but maybe... In any case, he turns a LR around and uses the assault cannon on it, stunning it. Next turn, the multimelta finishes the job. Sadly, the third sentinel came out on the wrong side (even with the re-roll).

The best part of this game was when the Wolf Priest decided to charge a infantry squad... and rolled _horribly_. Two men died, but they inflicted several wounds - one of which was unsaved. The squad made their morale check. Next turn, the nearby platoon commander (running solo, the flamers had died from a redeemer flamestorm - how ironic) and 5 psykers charged in to help. Result: dead Wolf Priest.

In the end - he was tabled. He had nothing left - but I was brutalized as well. And when we added it up - he had 1 more kill point. Even though I still had some guys, the fact that dedicated transports gave up KPs killed me.

But neither of our commanders did didly, and neither destroyed the "big gun" (so close!!). So I lost, 4 points to 5.

Game 3 - Space Wolves.

Again! Different list - more "traditional". Four GH squads in rhinos, a 3 man Thunderwolf Calv with Lord on Wolf, 2 vindicators, and a LRC with GH and a Wolf Guard.

This mission caused a lot of weeping in the room. The premise was simple: one of your units is a traitor. So - on your first turn, you got to select one unit (a unit being defined as all elements in a FOC slight) on the other side: and make it yours :) For the whole game. Any unit. You didn't get to use any army-affecting powers (like Combat Tactics) from the unit you stole, but everything else... have at it. And note - you chose it on turn one: AFTER deployment.

Wow. He went first, and really thought long and hard about taking the Medusas - but I had put them out and around some ruins, to make them not as attractive. I was really worried about him taking the Infantry platoon - that would have been the loss of a lot of guys. But in the end, he chose one of my Lemans - and promptly destroyed the flamer team in a blast of plasma. I'm not sure why he chose that unit - maybe he was a little drunk by the end of the day :) Because _I_ would have shot the chimera with the melta vets, which promptly drove up and killed the traitor leman russ, netting me the primary mission's 6 points.

For my choice, I selected a humble GH squad with two melta guns and a mark-of-the-wulfen fella. Worked well for me - he never managed to kill them, and they destroyed a rhino (slowing down another GH squad) and then tied up two GH squads in HtH. By turn 6, they had not died.

The best move was when the Psyker Battle squad lit up a GH squad that had just piled out of a wrecked rhino - and rolled 3 for their AP. No 1s on the wound roll...so 10 marines snuffed out in a blast of psyker fury.

The rest of the game was a brutal war of attrition, my men dying in front of the vindicators as I maneuvered the melta team into place. The LRC fell to the medusas, as did one of the vindicators. In the end, I came out on top - 20 to 0.

So - overall, the day was a lot of fun. Good times, good drinks, crazy missions, and some crazy friends. Saw a _lot_ of Space Wolves (played 3 - two in the tourney and once friday night in a practice game), and a good amount of Marines and Guard. If you're looking for a fun, casual, friendly-competitive tourney, next year look to attend the Kalm Before the Waaagh... I know I will be.