My first OZ tournament.

[Simon]

This weekend I entered one of the Australian well-known warhammer fantasy tournaments held at New Castle, roughly 155 km away from Sydney. This tournament used the good old (but shitty) judge comp panel and heavily modified scenarios. All the lists were marked by 3 unknown judges and were given a comp score between 0 to 6 and a 7 for the softest army. This comp score basically give a small bonus to the softer armies and give a small deduction to the harder armies.

There are absolutely no hard caps on any thing but only a few minor rule modifications. If you are interested in their player pack you can download it from their website on www.castleassa ult.net.

Since this is my first OZ tournament so I decided not to take any cheesy lists but instead I took my fluffy Gobotonnia.

My list is:

Bretonnia lord, crown of command, sword of might, 1+ rerollable armor save
Prophetess level 4, scroll
BSB paladin, 1+ rerollable armor save
Paladin on royal Pegasus with heroic killing blow
Damsel with silver mirror
8 knight errant, with errantry banner
8 knights of the realms with flaming banner
10 skirmisher archers
20 men at arms
5 yeomen
5 yeomen
3 Pegasus knights with banner
grail reilguae
6 grail knights
Trebuchet

I got a comp of 5 out of 6 for this army.


Game 1: Lizardmen

My first game was up against lizardmen, and before I even bother mention the outcome, I think I will post his list up for review:

Slann, focus of Mystery, focused rumination, becalming cogitation, cupped hand
Skink preist, cube of darkness
Scar vet with toys and crown of command
Scar vet with burning blade + toys
Scar vet with more toys

20 temple guards with +1 Leadership banner
25 saurus warriors
25 saurus warriors
10 skinks skirmishers
10 skinks skirmishers
10 skinks skirmishers
6 chameleon skinks
6 chameleon skinks
salamander
salamander

And he got a comp of 2.

I actually manage to stay alive for 6 full turns. 10-5 to him.


Game 2: Tomb king

Well, well, new tomb king army book, where to start… his list consists:
Liche high priest, level 4, 4+ ward, earth rod
Tomb prince, 2+ save
Necrotect with toys
20 skeletion archers
20 skeletion archers
25 skeletions
6 chariots, flaming banner
4 necropolis knights
4 carrions
khemrian warsphinx
hierotitan
screaming skull catapult
casket of soul

he got a comp of 4.5. I couldn’t believe my eye.

Luckily he didn’t play very well, ended up 7.5-7.5 draw.

Game 3: warriors of chaos

I think I was pretty much at the lower half of the table by now, so I was hoping to play against an army of similar strength to my bretonnia.

My third game was up against warriors of chaos, his list was a funny one:

Khorne lord with sword of bloodshred +toys
Bsb with crown of command and mounted
Chaos sorcerer level 2
24 khorne warriors with halberds, flaming banner
24 slaanesh warriors with halberds, +1 leadership banner
20 khorne chosen warriors with haldberds, +1 movement banner, favor of the god
warshrine.

Seriously, I had no idea what he was trying to do, he mindlessly marched everything up, I gladly combo charged his warriors with 2 buses up front and 1 bus to the side. Nothing left by turn 5.

15-0 to me.

Game 4: Dwarf (watch tower)

With a perfect win last game, I was back up to the top half of the table, my fourth game was up against one of the OZ ETC player. He told me he was using one of the hardest dwarf army used at ETC 2011.

For your info, this ultimate ETC dwarf list of doom consists:

Anvil of doom, spelleater rune
BSB with 1+ rerollable armor save
Master engineer, rune of challenge
20 rangers with great weapons and crossbows
20 rangers with great weapons and crossbows
25 miners with stream drill
25 miners
Cannon with forging and burning
Cannon with forging
Grudge thrower with 2-x rune of penetrating, accuracy
grudge thrower with rune of penetrating, burning, accuracy

he got a comp of 2.

if you were curious how it performed, he started with the watch tower, I had 80% of my army behind a small hill, but it didn’t help at all. He killed all my Pegasus knights, my paladin on royal Pegasus, Trebuchet and a hand full of knights on turn one and by the end of turn 2 I only had a few knights left. I was trying very hard not to get tabled.

 14-1 to him.

Game 5: High elves

 Despite my massive lost in my previous game I was up against another OZ ETC player. He had a really well balanced high elves list.

His list consists:
Archmage, can only hurt by magic, +1 spell
Level 2 mage, pick spells
BSB with crown of command on steed
30 spearmen
10 archers
10 archers
10 archers
5 dragon princes
5 dragon princes
T chariots
T chariots
Eagle
Eagle
Eagle
30 white lions with +1 leader ship banner

He got a comp of 4.

The game pretty much ended with my lord and grail stuck with his spearmen and his bsb and dragon prince stuck with one of my bus.

7.5-7.5 draw.


Overall, I came 15 out of 33, and I won the best painted army award.


In conclusion, Nz tournaments are awesome and should stick with hard caps and restrictions. My next OZ tournament, I will take the sickest list I can come up with.

[Antony]

Good stuff Simon. Glad to see that you took at least some of your tin soldiers with you. Keep us up to date with your progress. I'm sure you'll be kicking a$$ soon (even if you need your crutch to do it )

[Fujin]

Cheers for taking the time to write that up Simon - an interesting read. I've only played in one Australian Warhammer tournament (DogCon 2010) and in terms of the comp scoring and relative 'army hardness' I was quite stunned. I think there are profound differences between the two countries and you've learnt a valuable lesson.

Looking forward to the next report - taking Lizardmen next time?

[Chaoswolf]

Interesting report, and like the others I look forward to your next tournament report, using the lessons you have quickly garnered from this one. The strength of the comp handicap was the issue here, not the fact that it was being used I think. If it was 0 - 15 (15 for the softest) you probably would have got more appropriate compensation.

[wouster7]

Excellent stuff Simon, and hope that you write more about your safari across the ditch. Group of us are looking to get in a tournament over in Aussie too and would be glad to get more of a low down about tournaments over there. Do they still require you to have exclusive GW mini's? Sounds like the one you went to was a relative small affair in terms of aussie gaming. Is it still a common thing for comp to be used in tournaments over there? Perhaps they have been sold the phrase 'the games balanced now since we released failcast all the OP models have warping and too many bubbles and have been returned...'.

[Simon]

Good stuff Simon. Glad to see that you took at least some of your tin soldiers with you. Keep us up to date with your progress. I'm sure you'll be kicking a$$ soon (even if you need your crutch to do it  )

kicking ass with crutch better than getting my ass kicked without it. haha  
seriously, last weekend wasn't fun at all compare to the tournament I've been to in NZ, it was a completely different experience.

Cheers for taking the time to write that up Simon - an interesting read. I've only played in one Australian Warhammer tournament (DogCon 2010) and in terms of the comp scoring and relative 'army hardness' I was quite stunned. I think there are profound differences between the two countries and you've learnt a valuable lesson.

from my point of view, I just don't think there are many good fantasy players left in OZ anymore, there just ain't any experienced enough player to be a good comp judge. From what I heard, most of the "good experienced 7th edition fantasy" OZ players just stop playing now and moved to either flame of war or warmachines. quite sad really.

Looking forward to the next report - taking Lizardmen next time?

tempted.  

just need to ask my parent to send my lizardmen army over now. 

xcellent stuff Simon, and hope that you write more about your safari across the ditch. Group of us are looking to get in a tournament over in Aussie too and would be glad to get more of a low down about tournaments over there. Do they still require you to have exclusive GW mini's? Sounds like the one you went to was a relative small affair in terms of aussie gaming.

to be honest, current warhammer fantasy community in Sydney is actually much smaller than what you think. Since 8th edition, many experience fantasy players left the hobby and moved to something else. Many huge Sydney fantasy tournament like Leviathon which had close to 100 players last year ended up with only a few dozens this year.

MOAB 2011 fantasy tournament in early Oct this year (same time as guardcon) has only 9 registered players so far.

I couldn't get a practice game before castle assault tournament because I was struggling to find a fantasy game at one of the biggest gaming club in Sydney. Luckily I met a few ETC players at castle assault and they suggested to me a few places where I can arrange a decent game in the future.

and castle assault at new castle is suppose to be one of the better warhammer fantasy tournament around with some of the best fantasy players would attend, I think this year at least 5 ETC 2011 players went.

Is it still a common thing for comp to be used in tournaments over there? Perhaps they have been sold the phrase 'the games balanced now since we released failcast all the OP models have warping and too many bubbles and have been returned...'.

composition is a very strange thing in OZ, some of the tournaments still prefer judge panel, some prefer hard caps and some prefer a mixture of both. it is really all over the place. To answer your question, yes comp is still common but there are also tournaments with no comp as well.

Interesting report, and like the others I look forward to your next tournament report, using the lessons you have quickly garnered from this one. The strength of the comp handicap was the issue here, not the fact that it was being used I think. If it was 0 - 15 (15 for the softest) you probably would have got more appropriate compensation.

I think the experience level of the comp judges are very important as well, I almost fell off my bloody chair when I saw the tomb king army had 4.5 points for comp.

From my point of view, f**k comp and stick with hard caps and restrictions.