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Next meeting:
Saturday October 9th 2004, at St. Johns Church Hall, Norrie St., Drury, starting at 9a.m.
Games arranged:
Morning session:
Afternoon session:
Copy for the news letter needs to be to me by week before we meet .- Kevin
| End of Year Tournament |
| I know I usually run an end-of-year tournament, but this year I've decided not to, and instead will leave it up to anyone else wanting to do so to run a club tournament, give someone else a turn =) |
| So if anyone wants to organise an event for the December or January meeting, now would be the time to step up. |
| Fields of Blood |
| I'm not sure if the other guys have given their overview of Fields of Blood, but here's what I felt about the event. |
| Personally, I believe Fields of Blood is going from strength to strength, and have seen this year a vast and marked improvement over last years already great event, to become an absolute top-notch tournament. I urge you all, who play such games (Fantasy, 40K, LotR) to attend next year as the event is just awesome. |
| All the gamers appeared to be brilliant sportsmen and great people to waste the day with, the quality of painting was very nice indeed (except for my army... maybe next time), and the games were all interesting and challenging. |
| The only weak point of the tournament is that no-one's turned it into a week-long national holiday extravaganza yet (I'll vote anyone who seeks to do so into parliament) |
| I didn't fare too badly, but the results were far from stunning. That was down to me leaving things once more to the last minute, and I don't intend on repeating that mistake. During the course of this year guys, feel free to hassle me about my army and ask how it's coming along. I need every reminder to keep on track. |
| Insofar as Games go... |
| I did fairly well, but there were a couple of key mistakes. |
| First game was against our resident dirty rat, which was great... except for charging my Teuts into a unit with Skaven hero thingame, which managed to break me, handing over 416 victory points, allowing Pete to win by about 100 points or so... bugger. |
| Second game I came up against the Dwarfs of Lincoln Whatchamacallit... |
| That scenario is fair and balanced only so far as you remember the rules (disrupts movement on a D6 roll of '1', war machines cannot fire on a 1 or 2, etc.). Unfortunately we started remembering these rules when I was in range of handgunners, and when things could go catastrophically wrong for me (Miners show up right next to cannon, go to fire Grapeshot and roll a 2... bugger. Charge unit, roll a 1, roll a 1, roll a 1...) |
| THE most frustrating scenario ever played. What was particularly annoying was me being accepting and then getting no slack when I forgot things. |
| That and the battle-points/victory conditions. I would've
done much better if I'd checked that up and not listened to an oath-breaking Dwarf |
| Third game went fairly well for me, the only real problem I ended up with was not capitalising on the pressure I was putting up on my left flank, and failing to kill that goddamned S7 Killing Blow Armour of the Gods/Guardian Pheonix bloody Elf Prince. That guy was a monster! |
| It was a fairly decisive victory for me, thanks in no small part to getting two of my three messengers off the table (would've got the lot off if it weren't for that damned prince!) |
| Game four was against the Sylvanian undead. This was a tough one, because what I really needed was a lot of dispel dice. That's the thing about sylvanians. They're fine against an army with a scroll caddy, but struggle against one with lots of dispel dice, because they're loaded with Bound Spells but low on conventional wizards. |
| My army was half-decent against mid-high range magic armies, but crap against armies with lots of spells, by virtue of my 3 dispel dice. |
| So I had to concede magical supremacy to my opponent. The game drew to a close with the biggest collection of feck-all victory points you are ever likely to see. |
| The deployment set up and terrain made for what became a very interesting battle-line, and the game had a decent amount of flow to it, but was largely inconclusive due to the poor performance of his Vampires themselves, and the great performance of his summoning rolls, vs. the very average performance of my own force. |
| One thing I learned from it, though, is ALWAYS target
characters. Sometimes they're easier to kill than the rank-and-file troops (stupid zombies
with 4+ saves!
) |
| Game five... |
| It was a nightmare. Simply because the game was not OBVIOUSLY going bad, but I made the WORST rolls where it counted. |
| Skaven army, Grey Seer and 2-3 Engineers. |
| I got dominated in the magic phase. He was able to neuter about 4 units with one spell (vermintide is nasty when your opponent rolls 18 hits at least three times with that damned spell) |
| My army just got sizzled and fried by warp-lightning, vermintide, you name it. |
| Just as an indication of how badly it went... my opponent started to feel really, really bad about his magic phases. You know it's going wrong when your opponent starts to appolagise for his good luck. |
| My Teutogen Guard were reduced from 18 models, to 2, by two spells. |
| My army folded. Panic tests were failed, rally tests were failed, break tests failed, to hit rolls bombed, cannon shots rolled 1 to wound Warp Lightning Cannons |
| Half his army never saw combat and I still got decimated by poor shows on leadership, failing rally tests on 9 or 10 (rolling 10 or 11 respectively) |
| This may sound like an excuse or something like, and I'll be the first to admit that it is a poor general who blames his luck for his losses, but what I'm saying here is my opponent managed to get a LOT of good luck, I got a LOT of bad luck, he was able to capitalise perfectly on his, and I was constantly confounded by mine. |
| It was only because of the scenario rules (you have to fully destroy units, not just break them and have them running towards a table edge at the end of the game) that I was able to salvage as much of a score as I got. |
| Last game... I would've done a lot better were it not for
a failed panic test on Ld 8 where my opponent needed to pass on Ld7
|
| Play Empire and you too can hate psychology with a passion normally reserved for hatred of G.W. price increases! |
| The whole weekend was a helluva lotta fun, the scenarios and battle points system kept the games fresh and interesting, the atmosphere was great and a great time was had by all. |
| Definately look into attending next year if you can! |
| Club Tournament Efforts |
| Okay, so some of the guys have expressed interest in making a collective club effort, a united front, in our preparations for tournaments such as NIcon/NATcon, and the illustrious Fields of Blood. |
| Barry in particular has come up with a few interesting ideas, as have a few others. |
| I'd really like to know who has an interest in joining a 'hard core' of club Tournamenteers and is willing to contribute a little to club efforts in such things (in time/motivation/ideas/encouragement/perhaps minor finances) |
| We'll undoubtedly talk about it at Games Club this saturday, and that would be the perfect place to indicate interest and take part. |
| Have your say and join the fun =) |
| 40K |
| Yay! 4th ed. has been released! |
| It's still not quite what I want, but at least it's playable... now all I need is opponents. |
| Anyone willing to wipe the floor (or rather, battlefield) with my Orks is entirely welcome to give me a game. |
| This is liable to be my major interest for a while, having played Fantasy rather solidly for the past 4 or 5 months. |
| Just a little heads-up... |
| Grass! |
| No, I haven't gone into the horticultural business, it's a game. |
| More than that, it's THE game. A card game based around drug dealing, this game allows you to live out your dreams of pretending to be some jive-talkin' gangster, the cockney-rhyming dwarf from Lock, Stock & 2 Smoking Barrels, our your classic quintessential California stoner while you deal and double-cross your way to profit! |
| Aside from all that it's incredibly fun (especially for me, I win =P ), and I'm going to keep track of how it goes throughout the year, recording the 'revenue' gathered so far. |
| As it stands, only Ant, Damien, and myself have played, and the results are as follows: |
| ME: $963,000 |
| Damien: $520,000 |
| Ant, finally clawing his way out of debt: $151,000 |
| If you wanna try out a hand or two, feel free to jump in this saturday |
| Points Ladder |
| Well, to say the whole thing's folded would be a gross understatement. |
| I want to know, is it a worthwhile idea to salvage for next year? |
| Any improvements you want in it? |
| Well, that's about all, except for the things I'm forgetting. |
| Cheers all! |
| -Pete C. =) |
This newsletter is edited by Kevin Carberry so anything you would like included in the newsletter should be sent to me at kevin@profax.co.nz
Peter "Evil Gnome" Colson is the Club President so any queries, problems, issues or suggestions about the club should go to him at colson@xtra.co.nz or deathloveswar2@hotmail.com (for e-mails with attachments only), monday-thursday, and all day friday and saturday (09) 298-7293