Joe vs Hawk or David vs Goliath??

My cyclones hoping to get some sneaky shots on Sean's type 1'

So now life has calmed down a bit, I've managed to get to some words into a bat report for you all.

Who ever said planning to get married, going to Cardiff and the UK Games Expo, then on my stag do in 4 weekends in a row couldn't be done?!!!!!

First off, Firestorm Games in Cardiff. Easily the best hobby store I have visited.
Beer on tap... he he, and a small kitchen that could cater for any gamer's needs. chilli, chips and cheese, need I say more.

It has all the toys in the shop from board games to airbrush stencils. The actual gaming space is huge and could probably hold 200+ people with ease. They have all the scenery and even hand out trays to carry your army around on for tourneys. I'm telling you its gaming heaven!!!!

Rubble also supplied by firestorm games

Getting to the actually fighting!!!!!!

The Hawk guys had made sure that me and Ed played someone from their team for game 1 and then let the normal system decide who plays who after.

Game 1 was targets of opportunity against Hawk Simon and his Resistance, 10-10. Ed played Hawk James, both our natural rivals.

I wasn't really looking forward to this game one. going up against Simon's Leviathan was always going to be a grim challenge for me. His list had a load more anti-tank and those pesky Zhukovs were no help at all.

With targets you always want to get in the buildings first, we had quite similar infantry so was going to be who wins activation. The only thing I could do to gain the upper hand, was to hope my pathfinders showed up.

One did turn one and the other followed turn 2. I won the activation turn 2 and launched them at the Lifthawk leaving it on 1 pesky wound, should have just done my infantry. There was a good chance of taking it out though.

Simon's list

Simon then activated that Lifthawk and went into objective buildings . My Thunderstorm rocked up and dropped ceilings on the infantry's faces rolling perfect dice 16 damaged to the building, killing 8 Resistance Fighters. errr fucking harsh!!! Krakens and dropships soon took the remaining 2 off!!. My vets had given up searching for my home objective already and decided to have ago after Simon's Alexander. Had I known he would have done a revenge attack with his deadly Leviathan and 24 gun Technicals, I wouldn't have sent the battle buses to their death. He had so many shots he went for my home objective too. Yes turn 2 he was in range of it!!!!!

Simon wins the activation with the help of Central HQ Directive. The Gun Technicals finish off my home objective and the remaining vets in the open. I also manged to pull another perfect shot with the stormy leaving a building on 6 damage points. I had a Brave Gamble and a Central HQ Directive (CHQD) that I was going to use to drop that building next turn

With the help of the CHQD card. I blow up that central building containing troops. Hawk Simon then starts to mop up what units I had left. I'm now down to 4 battle groups, he had killed the single gun wagon squad and both pathfinders. By this time Si had his home objective and I had 1 search in the far right middle building only, BOOM first search was a 6 they then escaped straight out of the drill which had basically mounted the same building. Si goes into the only remaining objective building, the same one that I did all that damage to the Resistance Fighters.

He wins the next activation, but I held onto the Brave Gamble and finished off the last building.
We both call bullshit, Thunderstorm man of the match. one objective found each, straight draw.
probably moral victory to Simon, he had me over on kill points.
Still didn't beat me though. mwahahahaha.

Game 2 was ground control against one of Hawks newest members. Hawk Sean and his PHR. 13-7 win

Sean's list

Going into this game I think Sean was a little worried to be facing a player from OB. He need not worry, I had seemed to have left my tournament game at home and was interested in having fun. Maybe it was Sean's devilish charm or it was his pure Jedi mind tricks.
Saying that though we both didn't make any tactical mistakes, yet we just couldn't do anything.

Here you can see my deployment tactics

I was trying to send the vets up through the middle to back up the Thunderstorm. Freeriders got sent forward to annoy and caress Sean and draw his fire and units out (didn't happen).
Sean spend most of his shots shooting at the Freeriders killing barely one all game. The Freeriders also fluffed all there rolls! Resistance fighter squads got sent to left flank to hide for a turn 6 deploy into a quarter.

This board was made for my army

Apart from the top left unit, Sean's army basically stayed defensive.

I think if Sean had played a bit more aggressive or had a Medusa to soak more shots he would have had a very good chance of winning the game. or just redeploying some of his units. I did try my best to take out some Neptunes,

The only time we managed to wound something we both had bloody field repairs the next turn. I think the kill points were 200 ish each. and I'm sure that was self inflicted or men just dying in the field of old age.  

Gun wagons shooting a Neptune

Game 3 was take and extract against Hawk James (yeah another Hawk member and ex team OB) 9-11 loss. Should have been 11-9 win, due to tiredness.

We were having a pretty even game apart from James' Warspear owning the airspace above our battle!!!!

I managed to get into the central building first which was a plus, I also sent one squad of vets through a turn 2 monorail after failing to find the objective. The drill deployed turn 3 and scattered about 7" directly toward the back building.

My Gun wagons, held there nerve as the Firedrake and Caimans were trying to shake them out of the Krakens. The Wagons pulled some luck and managed to take it out after 3 activation's of shooting at it. they kind of hit perfect on the last one causing enough to kill it in 1 volley........ Joe dice!!!!!

This is about turn 3 as I fail to find the objective

My Freeriders gunning for the last Kukri top right 

I managed to find my home objective turn 4 and passed it to the Battlebus and Kraken squad. I also found the central objective going through the monorail into the home objective ready to get into the drill turn 5. James used every long range gun he had to try and kill said Kraken and he almost succeeded. 

Turn 5 came and this is where my mighty flaw was, well what we thought at the time. i wanted to disembark my unit carrying the objective from the central building out through the drill. Get out of the building within the 2" be enough distance to go straight throw the drill. Mr James convinced me I couldn't do that, and then I convinced myself. I was sooooo tired I just couldn't think straight.

Sod knows now, my brain was off. James had spend the last part of turn 4 and the following turns surrounding the Kraken with landed dropships and infantry.  Spirit moving 30" turn 4 then deploying turn 5. I was working every way possible to get these objectives off but I just couldn't. Annoying thing was I though I had control of the batlle field and my incompetence is what lost me the game. This same move with the drill is what drew me the game with Simon what was I thinking.
Face Palm

Game 4 and look me vs Hawk again playing recon against Louis and his PHR. At least I got to play all four of the Hawk chap on that weekend.

The game was a brutal one if you have ever seen Louis dice. They are the most horrible thing I know. Even Dan's pre-coffee morning face.

Louis' List

This chap though had the perfect army for this mission. 5 troops 2 of which were Sirens, and a dedicated demo squad. I was not looking forward to this!!.

We started by both waiting out each others infantry and demo groups. I wanted to co ordinate my troops efficiently. Lou had one unit in a Juno which I knew would be a bit slower. I didn't fancy having a tumble with the sirens.

Louis first turn at shooting a 20 point building did 16 damage to it causing 14 falling masonry, decimating the 10 resistance fighters in the squad.

Okay well that was mean. Turn 2 he got activation and dropped a 20 point building killing a whole squad of vets, you can imagine the shock on my face. I just went down 2 search's in about 2 mins.
Bullshit called. Louis fixated on destroying building left a Triton full of sirens precariously placed and about 1" too far into my Gun wagons treat range. They followed the same fat as my vets.
Louis did then stick some troops in the central buildings, and the Thunderstorm took some immortals down to half strength. "we put the names to the test".

After some clever Kraken play killing the slow moving Juno halting Louis troops progression. also being able to kill one squad of sirens and the one squad of immortals no dead to other failing masonry. I was somehow controlling the search's again in the focal points. I had units in the building slowly dying not running away but also not letting Louis get the search he needs to find any more point of Intel.

I managed to walk away from the game 12-8 win.

Game 5 was Andrew Page and his Shaltari. The mission was military complex and was an 18-2 loss

Mr page managed to win all but one activation in this game, the first 2 were vital. My pathfinders failed to wound any spirits early on to slow his troops down

He found his home objective turn 2 and redeployed into the only 2 central building I could have gone in. I had my own home objective on 19 wounds and couldn't afford to loose the 2 squads of vets and a squad of resistance fighters. I went for the more search's and keeping my elite infantry in the game. I was going to need them to defeat the braves and firstborns now in the central buildings. Andrew then started firing at the vets in bus's exploding them out with 2 out of 4 bases left.i was about 2 turns from footslogging to a building.

Andrew's list

I had a few cards that give the Resistance fighters a squad of legionnaires and some hit modifiers lined up for the upcoming battles. So I was looking to have a fair fight, even against the firstborns who I outnumbered. I had lots of wounds for them to go through i would just need some average dice.

Well after rolling 60+ attacks over the whole game I did 0 points of damage to the firstborns. the first few CQB's went terrible for me so under average. I had not reduced any of Andrew's dice for the next round of combat. He also had all of the perfect command cards for the situation. escape gate droned out of combat into another to truly screw my dice pools over.

I gave up and just tried to kill stuff and that failed too, I think I was so demoralised by knowing that in turn 2 I had basically lost. The only point I got was my home objective. Hats off to Andrew for probably having the game of his life.... Payback will be had brother!!!  


Coming back into the game from not playing since invasion I think I was a bit rusty. I wanted to use sappers and I did not realized I had some until I opened my army bad in Cardiff.

My list was a little boring and plainish, and didn't really have much flavor. One must try better.

Hey but hawk you didn't win. Team Ob did, better luck next time chaps. I'm also claiming that my loss against James doesn't count anymore as I got fulled by his mind games of suppression.