So, day 1 was a wrap and I sat at 2-1 with around 54 battle points or so. For me to have a chance to contend to get a top 10 spot I'd need to have big wins in my last two games, but more than that I just wanted to have some awesome matches to wrap up the event. Fortunately I couldn't have had two better opponents to close out WZA 2018.
Game 4 vs Adeptus Custodes, Astra Militarum, Assassins
So, the pairings go up for Round 4 and initially I thought I might be facing off against the triple Castellan list (which was a matchup I was salivating for) but instead I found myself pitted up against none other than Joe "Papa Bear" Behrend. For those who don't know, Joe won NOVA 2018 Best Overall and would go on to win a much deserved Best Painted award at Warzone: Atlanta this year. His army is legitimately one of the best armies I have ever laid eyes on.
Joe is known mostly for his hobby skills, but he was also a pretty incredible player as well. His army was unique in that it wasn't the typical Custodes jetbike spam army (one I'm guilty of running). Instead his army featured mostly Custodes infantry with 3 Custodian Guard squads, some Terminators, and a couple of characters. He did have one Shield Captain on bike. He also had a loyal 32 Guard Battalion for his backfield and to get CP, but what had me most worried in this game were the 3 Culexus Assassins he had. As noted from my day 1 recap, those damn Assassins really can put a hurt on my army. It would take some tactical acumen to overcome this.
The mission was Manifest Destiny II which included a kill point Primary which gave each player a victory point for every 100 points of units destroyed at the end of the match rounded to the nearest hundredth. The secondary was table quarters in which obsec style units counted as double their wound value. This was going to be a tough battle because the Assassins would really limit the amount of damage I could put out with my Psychic phase but I felt confident I could pull this one out.
I will say Joe was an absolute class act opponent and this was probably my most well executed game tactically of the tournament. The deployment was the Hammer and Anvil type with the tip. He deployed most of his Guard units in the backfield and leaned his Custodes heavy to one flank. He made one error in deployment which was putting a Mortar team right up near his deployment tip with an Assassin in front of them.
I got turn one and spent it positioning mostly. His mortars scared me a bit because if left unchecked they could do some damage to the cultists, which was a unit he really didn't have a good answer for. I shifted to the left hard and out of the Culexus range and warptimed a Prince up after casting Weaver of Fates on him to kill the mortar team getting me First Blood. On his turn one, Joe moved the bike shield captain up to charge the demon prince and just shifted the assassins into the neutral zone. He sent a ton of shots into my prince but was unable to bring him down thanks to Weaver of Fates. He ended up charging the prince with his bike captain and still could not kill him. I breathed a sigh of relief as it meant we would not split the First Blood tertiary.
On my turn 2 I dropped the Bloodletters down onto the left flank where he only had one squad of Custodian Guard who were sitting close to a squad of Guardsmen. I did manage to get Death Hex off on his Bike Captain, thinking I would then kill him in combat with my prince. But I realized that would mean he would get the chance to interrupt me as my Bloodletters, being chargers, would have to swing first. I took the chance on it as I needed the Bloodletters in there in his backfield. Sure enough the Bloodletters killed the Custodian Guard and piled in and consolidated into the nearby squad of Guardsmen, wrapping them up so he would not be able to fall back. I also charged a squad of Pinks into the Assassins he had mid-field to wrap them up in order to control their 18" bubble of -2 to cast ability.
As the game went on, I was able to keep the Culexus wrapped up allowing me to maneuver to get powers off as needed to buff, such as Death Hex on his terminators when they dropped into my backfield. I countered with Obliterator firepower and the Khorne Prince killing them and one of the support characters. Meanwhile my Bloodletters completely cleared his backfield earning me Slay the Warlord.
At the end of the game we tallied it up and Joe had killed 835 points of my army while I had killed 899 of his. I squeezed out a narrow in on the primary. We ended up splitting the table quarters secondary. And I had taken First Blood and Slay the Warlord and we split Linebreaker. In the end I pulled out the narrow win. Joe was amazing to play against and we had a fantastic game.
Win: 19-10
Game 5 vs Chaos Daemons and Thousand Sons
After game 4 I meet with my buddy Mark Wise, who is one of my best friends and also traveled with our crew up for his first Warzone. We are getting ready for lunch at the hotel, which provided amazing catered food by the way. He tells me, guess what; we're playing each other in Round 5. Although we were both a bit disappointed because it was essentially a mirror match, we at least knew we'd have a great match.
The mission was Give no Ground which featured 4 objectives that were scored at the end of the game. One in each deployment zone and then one in each player's table half outside the deployment zone. We drew Vanguard Strike for the map and got our objectives down. The way the mission works essentially is that the further away the objective is from your deployment zone, the more points it is worth at the end of the game. The secondary in this was based on Warzone Kill Points. You get a Battle Point for each Warzone Kill Point you earn up to 6 and then at the end of the game, whoever has the most Warzone Kill Points gets 3 more.
His list featured 2 Chaos Daemon Battalions with Skulltaker, a Khorne DP with Skullreaver, and 3 smaller squads of Bloodletters. He also had a Tzeentch battalion with two fluxmasters, and a 30 man horror blob with 2 brimstone squads. Filling it out was a Thousand Sons supreme command with 3 Daemon Princes and Magnus. It is a tough hard hitting list.
He gets turn one and mostly just positions models. He rushes Magnus up with Warptime towards my Cultist blob who I have protected by a screen of brimstones. He rolls poorly on his Smite with Magnus and doesn't kill enough of them forcing him to charge them instead of the cultists. He doesn't kill them and I pass my morale.
On my turn 1 I move up my Pink Horror blob and blast a squad of Brimstones away earning me First Blood. I shoot my Cultists into Magnus but only plink away 5 wounds.
On Mark's turn 2 he drops all his Bloodletters in as well as the Khorne prince and Skulltaker. I have forced him into hitting my horrors head on rather than hitting me on a flank. He hits my unit but I rolled an epic amount of 4++ saves on them only taking minimal damage. Magnus finally charges into the Cultists and kills a few but Abaddon is there to keep them in the fight.
On my turn 2 I'm finally able to drop Magnus thanks to Obliterator firepower and my Khorne Prince charging in and dropping him. I counter assault into the bloodletters wiping them out as well.
This would go on back and forth but at the end, I had managed to kill a good chunk of his army while my losses had been mostly minimal. He made a mistake and pulled a unit off his own neutral zone objective meanwhile I had secured 2 of the 4. This gave me a win on the Primary. I also got the full 9 on the secondary and I ended up with only 2 points on the Tertiary as I never killed his warlord or got linebreaker. It was enough to give me the victory however.
Win: 21-10
Event Wrap Up
I finished the event with a 4-1 record and 94 Battle Points. I managed to max my paint score this year, which I was very proud of, and had 2 First favorite opponent votes and 2 Second favorite opponent votes. This was enough to secure me 18th Overall out of 119 which isn't too shabby. I ranked 38th in Battle Points.
On day 2, everyone is split into 16 groups based on your Battle Points from day 1. I was in Group 7 and ended up winning my Group on day 2 netting me a cool trophy and a box of Blightlord Terminators.
I was happy with where I ended up this year. I didn't think I would make top 10 but was hoping for the shot. I felt I'd probably go 3-2 but I went 4-1 which exceeded my expectation for the event. I had a wonderful time. Warzone: Atlanta truly is a unique experience and is easily my favorite tournament of the year. Can't wait for 2019!
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