MI cup recaps

I played 5 games in the MI cup warmachine tournament last Saturday. I did pretty well too. I did make some mistakes, but overall it was a good day.

Round 1 I played a flint local using Khador in the scenario Close Quarters. He was newer so I decided to get my Stryker drop out of the way. He played strahkov.

Stryker1
Stormwall
Lancer
Squire
Black 13th
Rangers
Sword Knights max
Rune wood
Jr
Eiryss2
Reinholdt
Alexia2

I really like Alexia2. She's printed a lot of money for me of late. She might show up in some other lists. In this one I abuse blur on her ridiculous defensive stat line.

I went first, but he had deployed his conquest on a flank and I thought I could "hide" my stormwall behind the flag on my side and an obstruction.

His list was
Strahkov
Conquest
Dog
IFP normal max w UA
Shock Troopers max
IF kovnik
Widowmaker marksman
Manhunter
Max battle mechanics
Press gangers
Hawk

We both moved up a lot turn one. I shot a few press gangers with sniped rangers. Then they ran into my rangers. Next turn I killed most of the rest of them, feated, and knocked down the shock troopers. I had covering fire and Mage storms blocking charge lanes, and alexia and Dixon Lynch high fived and killed the man hunter in a forest.

He took the bait and feated, but conquest was about 2.5 inches from stormwall when it hit the flag and skirted past the obstruction. So strahkov's feat was a bit wasted. Stormwall killed 5 models with electro leaps while pounding conquest. His mechanics were mostly out of position because of running through a forest that conquest had shambled through without issues.

Conquest counter-slapped stormwall. It hurt a lot. I earthquaked his shock troopers to drop shield wall and killed 3 but those dudes are tough. We wound up going to dice down and I won on army points. Quick round.

I should have saved my feat a turn.

Round 2 I played my haley2 list against my first of 4 opponents from Gamers Gauntlet. He was playing menoth and dropped severius1. I won the roll and ran up. I should have given him a chance to kill my dudes, but instead I stayed out of threat. He ran into the zone with defenders ward and tough on errants. Ugh.

The scenario was balance of power.

Haley2
Thorn (bond)
Squire
Forge guard max
Storm blades with UA and 3 gunners
Alexia1
Tempest Blazers max
Gorman
Anastasia
Piper
Jr
Stormblade captain

V

Severius1
Repenter
Repenter
Avatar
Vessel of judgment
Choir min
2 vassals
Errants max with ua and senechal solo
Zealots max with ua
Piper

This game was good. After we postured on turn one I feated over much of his stuff. He had boxed sevvy in, so I made sure he was barely in my feat so that he couldn't walk up and counter feat on Haley. What good is a time walk if my opponent does it right back?

This game hinged on the avatar moving toward my stormblades after a hammerdorf did some damage and triggered enliven. Thorn and the stormblades managed to wreck a repenter, bring the vessel to 4 hp, and do a bunch of damage to the avatar.

The Stormblade captain then charged the avatar and managed to finish it with a baller damage roll (18 on four dice?). He then used quick work and killed a vassal. Nice.

My opponent was on the back foot at this point. He'd been concentrating a lot of fire on alexia, but she was def 17 against his shooting from non-errants and the errants were hip deep in dwarves.

His zealots managed to roll a LOT of 9s to kill dorfs, but he was back pedaling. The next turn I cleared a path for thorn and TK/reaction drove him to sevvy's behind. Thorn failed to kill the old man tho.

My opponent made a last ditch effort at scenario but thorn got it done the second time.

Round 3 was fire support against retribution. I decided to play Stryker because of the Mage hunters.

Issyria
Hyperion
Chimera
Halberdiers max with ua and thane
Sentinels max with ua
Strike force with commander

I won the roll and went first. He was a bit choked by his side of the table but he did alright unpacking his list.

Turn two I feated to time walk him but I didn't get enough work done because the black 13th were blinded. My rangers got jammed by halberdiers. His turn two he blinded the stormwall and just tried to take up real estate. I had knocked down the sentinels to turn off vengeance.

Turn 3 my blind stormwall jacked the Hyperion all up with fists and killed 4 mooks with electro leap as well. I knocked down the sentinels again but I wasn't killing his infantry fast enough. He blinded stormwall again and dropped it to 3 boxes. It did a bit more memory but was pretty much done.

I have up alexia 2 too easily. I couldn't figure out a way to close the game and went for a weird play that cost me Stryker.

Turns out stormwall can't be targeted by blinding light. I should have asked during the game.

Round 4 & 5 I played against the warmans podcast crew.

Round 4 was process of elimination against paint vagrant playing Krueger2.

Krueger2
Gorax
Pureblood
Stalker
Ghetorix
Double wold scrimps
Stones and keeper
Blood weavers

He won the roll (drat) and decided to go first (drat). So my plan was to score first if possible. I was expecting him to feat on top 2 but he held it. So I feated bottom 2 to score and deflect reprisal. He feated top 3 and I couldn't do much debuffed and under stormwall. I did manage to kill the second objective on bottom 3 with storm gunners and my girl alexia.

Then the game ended. Dice down came pretty early. I feel like Brian was about to eat half my doodz with sprinting wolves. I had been rushed my last turn and my dwarves hadn't gotten tough (piper didn't activate before I ran out of clock).

So I won on control points but it was a weird way to win a game. 8 army points to 0 (I'd killed all the blood weavers and a valu bucket of popcorn scrimps, he'd killed a couple dwarves). 2 control points ftw I guess.

Game 5 was rallying point against bill of warmans playing rahn fires on high tier 4. It seems like a rad list. He won the roll (drat) and opted to go first (drat) against my Haley 2. We postured a bit turn one. Deceleration did a lot of work against his archer guys. My ponies were def 20 with piper deceleration on a hill. Even aiming they needed boxes.

I managed to disrupt his Phoenix and get a couple gunners into it as I feated. Gorman also blinded it. It had immolated 3 ponies tho.

Hyperion swallowed a bunch of dwarves and zombies. I pushed up the middle with stormblades and alexia. Hyperion ate a bunch of stormblades later too. In the late game bill went for a dominate point as he knew dice down was coming. I managed to get alexia on rahn and she went through 5 zombies before he was dead.

Alexia was a boss all day. She's going to be in a Lot of lists going forward.

-Merlin out.

Bored Games are Rad

I've been playing, uh, lots of warmachine to prep for the MI cup.

I did play one game with Charlie, but I got my teeth kicked in by Harbinger.

Then we had a board game night and we played King of Tokyo for a while, then 3 5-player games of Small World, which I'd never played. It's awesome. I won the first on accident. Then Brice, and last William.






I bought the app later the next day on iPad. It's also rad.

Last night Robb came over and we played some games again. We played a game of Death Angel and lost in the final location (real close).

Then we played a game of Letters from Whitechapel with my wife and I managed to get away with it (I played Jack). It was a sweet game.

So yeah. I'm ready for the cup?

-Merlin out