Update

Just an update on an event with an editorial at the end, not the normal quality, apologies for that.

So I don't have that much time, sorry for not posting the past two days I've simply forgotten since I haven't been in the habit of posting so later tonight I should have time to copy and paste while also looking for a picture but at the moment I have a very short window of free time since I really need to get packing.

I know that this is really just a lore blog, but I just wanted to throw in a brief report of a recent event that I went to.  At its most basic level it was a team tournament with one player having 1000 points the other 1500, using all the new rules aside from terrain placement (fortifications were allowed), warlords you roll once and pick with that result from any one of the three tables, allies could consist of up to but no more than 1/4 of your points.

I took my Tau and also I grabbed a farseer and 5 pathfinders, also an Aegis defense line, suffice it to say I had 4 troops (though that never ended up mattering), a 3 normal suits, a shas'o (with x2 shield drones and himself a 2+ Sv) and x2 bodyguard, x2 broadsides, and some pathfinders.  I don't know why I keep taking pathfinders since I seem to be the only Tau player who can't seem to make them work, I always end up not doing anything substantial with them and just use them to hold off an enemy assault for some time (as you've seen in a previous Battle Report).  My partner took 1000 points of Dark Eldar.  Archon with 2+ inv (you all know it and despise it), x10 wyches in raider, x5 kabalites in venom, x4 incubi (including klaivex) in venom, x2 ravagers, x2 3 man reaver squad with caltrops.

First game we got a bye.  It sucked.  Gave my partner a chance to learn the new rules since he hasn't laid his eyes on the rulebook yet and doesn't pay attention to rumors or blogs, but all the same it was extremely boring and I felt like it seriously decreased the value of the money I had spent to come for now only 2 games ($10 total plus gas, about 3 gallons round trip).  In any case after spending 3 hours 15 minutes waiting to actually play since the lunch break was after the first game we finally got to game two.

Facing off against necrons with 1 doom scythe (a surprise considering the lists going around at the moment) and he had 4 wraiths.  Nothing else ever mattered in his list.  Partner was death wing (who found out at the start of our game that he could only death wing assault a quarter of his army since he had misinterpreted the special rule; I always hate pointing things out like that to people because I feel it really makes the game less fun when they can't play like they had planned to, but this event I felt like was more a chance to learn the rules than an actual event.  Its okay though since they took second and each got $15 store credit anyways).  Belial and 5 squads of terminators with one DDM (for those of you who don't remember Dice like thunder when they used it or IVC when they occasionally mentioned it that is a drop-pod dreadnaught with a multi-melta and heavy flamer).  Of course there were 5 objectives with one being in the very center of the board.

What happened:  To keep it brief I took literally 3 casualties because I loled and outflanked my commander directly behind their lines (it was the sideways deployment, a pain in the rear to do since their DZ was against the wall and there was a convenient book shelf unit that occupied an additional 6" out from the wall next to it on one side.  Great placement, no one has any idea why that is the freaking spot for that book case) where they lost 2 drones and one battlesuit before the game ended.  I rolled like a boss, 8 3+ Sv's?  I can do that.  Only thing that got me were the 2 AP 3 shots that I thought were going to get to my commander anyways but ended up killing that guy.  Too bad I entirely forgot about Look out sir, since that entire unit aside from the drones were characters since the bodyguard are shas'vre.  In any case what is important is what I learned from this.  Pathfinders are crazy awesome with their precision shots that are AP 1 on 5+ to hit, especially against terminators.  Having a farseer allow them to reroll because of prescience was dope, so almost always hit with 5 shots and then about 2 AP1 shots were given to the terminators (I forgot until game 3 that I could allocate on 6's so I wasn't taking out Belial unfortunately.  That would have been nice to kill his warlord).  Aegis only got to shoot twice (game ended after turn 3, ran out of time because my partner took WAY too long with his turn.  I tried as best I could to speed things up by doing simultaneous shooting and we both moved at the same time, but he was very indecisive and kept referring back to me for tactical advice and it just took too much time).  And only took off 1 hull point off of the doom scythe because I rolled poorly and missed with 3 shots despite TL.  But allies are awesome, aegis was great because that forced the enemy to prioritize their targets differently since there wasn't much point shooting at the things behind it (Pathfinders have 2+ cover, which is very very nice.  Didn't shoot at them once lol).  1 Flier isn't so bad, take multiples based on this one game.  Eldar jetbikes are crazy, we would've totally won this game if it had gone to turn 4 because they can move 12" and then 36" turbo-boost, perfect for contesting.  Also that 3+ cover because reavers are skilled rider was just as good as last edition.  Vehicles are just as vulnerable as we suspected, annihilated the command barge on turn 1 and then the dreadnought turn 2.  Ignored the drop pod because it wasn't doing anything significant.  Just be careful about the objectives, one of our objectives (of course) was the booby trapped one, of course that means very little to most armies anyways, and even less when it explodes only on 1's.  2+ Sv's are just as great as expected, 4 wraiths charged my commander and his surviving bodyguard and they took 1 wound.  Suck it wraiths, who's your daddy?  Also the archon was terrific with 2+ invulnerable, because enemy lord challenged him, archon was only worried about 1 necron fighting him and hurting him instead of the entire squad, so was able to contest that objective and was going to keep doing so until the end of time.

Game 3 was against Orks and chaos, nothing much to be learned from here other than the fact that not deploying half your army is not a good idea against an army of Tau and a bunch of Dark Eldar that have Ravagers and who knows what.  We focussed fire upon the chaos player and almost wiped him off the table turn 1 (after we seized the initiative due to my partners good rolling) and mostly ignoring the Orks.  That fire that we couldn't put on the chaos because we couldn't see him because we'd killed what was visible was expended killing things like a trukk and some deffkoptas or lootas.  Nothing particularly 6th edition happened though, we didn't have much interaction with the rules that changed aside from psychic powers (only mine ever went off since the 3d6 check meant the Orks never got to manifest heehee).  My dice were hot this event because I kept rolling 6's on the damage chart even though I didn't need it because of AP 1 railguns.  Perhaps the thing to remember is that its okay to go second because then you can deploy (and this was a tactic that was used in 5th as well obviously) all in one area while your opponent is spread out.

I'll provide one final note.  While I was watching the various tables during game 1 while my partner read the rules that I pointed out to him to read up on, I found a table that had a team of douche bags.  This is actually my first time seeing anyone actually be jerks in how they play in all of my experience at this game store and it really shocked me.  Literally everyone else is fun to play with or against, these two are the only ones that no one likes to play, and you can tell because no one likes to talk to them.  An instance of their evil was when the tyranid player on the opposing team forgot the shooting phase and had started to declare an assault.  He hadn't even rolled any dice, just declared it.  They then looked up something in the rules because something was unclear an then the guard player found out they had entered the assault phase.  Consequently the other two then shrugged their shoulders and said sorry you didn't get to shoot, it’s the assault phase.  Before any dice had been rolled for the assault phase either.

There are two points to be had here, what those two players did and then how the guard player reacted.  First there is nothing that anyone can say that can convince me what they did was right.  That is playing in a manner that is unsportsmanlike, un-fun, and certainly not in the spirit of the game.  I don't care that the rules say that the assault phase is after the shooting phase is over, nothing had even changed on the board, no movement, no overwatch shots, no models removed, nothing.  If you are going to play like that, do it at home in your troll cave with other trolls who are like you and have no real friends who will even make conversation with you when you are browsing through the store (there was about a 10 foot radius of empty space around them at all times that people weren't playing against them.  Would've thought they could take a hint).  But enough about that I only mention it because it honest boggles my mind and frustrates me when people are like that.

What also was uncalled for was the guard player's reaction.  Sure I can understand being upset that your partner forgot about the shooting phase.  But he wasn't reasonable about it at all.  First of all he should have understood that the tyranid player forgot about the shooting because he doesn't do much of it anyways and so what little he has is sometimes forgotten.  Second everyone makes mistakes and this isn't unusual at all.  Third he shouldn't have kept on about it for 10 minutes, railing on the guy.  Not cool.  It’s a game, treat it as such, move on and have fun.  By complaining all you ever do is spoil everyone else's time.  Its like that everywhere, if you talk negatively then your life and the people around you will begin to feel negative to you and to others.  This is why a lot of people stopped listening to the Eternal warriors, they almost never said anything positive for a long time, and only now are starting to sound better (on those rare occasions they release an episode).  Blogs are like that as well and why I try and be positive and stick with my chosen topic.  This is why I don't read blogs like Yes the truth hurts, not only because he frequently says things that are ridiculously stupid and often without much evidence and sheerly is theory hammer without play testing, but he can never say anything good.  So not only do I not gain anything from his articles, but also I end up hating the company that owns the game I play or just the game itself!  Whenever I find myself disliking the hobby for some reason or another though, I'll go to places that people actually laugh and talk with positive attitudes.  The Independent characters is one of the best ones, Turn 8 and the Overlords are also other ones.  Blogs that are also positive are often ones such as Warllama's blog or the Aleph sector campaign.

So I'm sorry to have used your time making you all read an article that isn't thought out like the others along a decent topic, but I just felt that this one time I should say this type of thing since it was on my mind.  I'll do my best to stay on topic and stay positive so that this blog stays relative to your interests.  Until next time, this is Charging Carnifex.