Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Top 32 at NOVA!

Top 32 at NOVA!

NOVA was a fantastic event. I encourage everyone who considers it to go at least once. There were dozens of vendors and events there and I met some great people. Almost all of my opponents were great people to play with who I'd gladly play with again anytime. But you guys are probably more interested in how the Ravenwing did on the tabletop.

I went 3-1 in the preliminary rounds, with 2 max wins, a 23 point win, and a 4 point loss. That was enough for me to sneak into bracket 2, the top 32 players. I lost my first game there but I was happy to put up such a good result at my first GT. Overall I went 3-3 after playing one additional bracket game after the loss, which was an incredibly close game that I lost. My last post before this one includes my list if you're interested.

As for the matchups:

Preliminary 1: Tripartite Knight Lance+Conclave (Loss)
The internet thought this was gonna be the tournament sweeping ridiculousness at NOVA this year. It definitely wasn’t (This guy barely made it into the top 50 and another guy running it made it to top 32 then lost like me). What it is is horribly uninteractive, definitely the game where I’ve had the least say in what happened in a long time. He got phase form and worldscape, and I didn’t roll a single invisibility on my 5 librarians. Rather than whine, I’d like to briefly talk about how I could have won that so people don’t believe the list is unbeatable. I went first, so had I had a single invisibility I would have made one unit invisible, tied up the knights with it by screening the rest of my guys, then hit and run out and kill Tiggy and friends, then spend the rest of the game jinking and running from the knights. This is more or less what my buddy running daemons did against this same player and he absolutely crushed him.

Preliminary 2: Tau CAD+Optimized Stealth Cadre (Win)
Stormsurge+single Riptide+unit of 3 Ghostkeels. I’m not really sure what this list was supposed to do but I just null-deployed by putting my attack bikes in the back corners then outflanked all of the black knights. It was hammer and anvil so I caught his guys in between my units and tabled him around turn 4.

Preliminary 3: Ork CAD+Bullyboyz (Win)
I was really impressed with both this list and this player. He ran 3 squads of tankbustas in trukks, along with 2 boyz squads, trukks for the meganobz, and a warbiker unit with 2 warbosses attached. I got 2 invisibilities and still lost a unit of black knights in melee to the meganobz. Fearless orks is definitely not to be underestimated. The tankbustas also forced me to jink every turn because of the risk of an errant rokkit killing a 40 point biker. This guy went on to go 2-2 in the preliminaries and swing into bracket 4 or 5 (out of 9), which is a pretty good result for an army people claim can’t win casual games.

Preliminary 4: Tau Dawnblade Detachment (Win)
This is where seeing a tau player almost every tournament finally paid off. He deployed the wing and missilesides in a back corner (vanguard deployment) and I put everything on telepathy. I scouted and moved up, terrified 2 riptides, ran one off the board with that and shrieked another one to death, then shot the missilesides. The game was pretty much over at that point but we played it out a bit longer until he was almost tabled and he conceded. I think playing riptide wings is practically muscle memory for me at this point and I can’t emphasize enough how important all that practice has been for me.

Bracket 1: Fist of Medusa Detachment+Sisters of Battle Allied+Inquisitorial Detachment (Loss)
This is another death star people thought would sweep the tournament. I played against it on The Relic, Hammer and Anvil. That is the absolute worst place to fight a death star. Once again this game kinda came down to the psychic powers. He managed to get both invisibility and veil and I only got null zone. In hindsight I should have tried for invisibility first so I could just tie up his star rather than try to kill it, but this was an uphill battle either way thanks to the mission/deployment and the fact he has hit and run. I was forced to ignore his star and kill his backfield tactical marines and sisters, but that wasn’t enough while he had the relic and I lost.

Bracket 2: Eldar CADx2 (Loss)
They do allow you to keep playing after getting knocked out of the brackets, and this was a final game more or less for fun or to swing your standing up a few places. My opponent was a great guy and we were both very tired. The game was exhausting, as pretty much all bike vs. bike games are all about maneuvering around each other within a half inch or so of their threat range. Luckily for me the mission was crusade so while his wraithknight held the center of the table I got to play a giant game of cat and mouse with his scatterbikes. The game came down to whether or not I could run his farseer and some jetbikes off an objective in melee with black knights and a librarian, which I couldn’t and lost by a couple points. Still an incredibly close game against a good opponent and I was happy to withdraw after this and go root for my friends and teammates on day 4.

I have copies of the Ork, Iron Hands, and Eldar lists I played against if you guys would like to see those. Also I could talk about my trios tournament experience day 1 with my Iron Hands if you’re interested. Otherwise let me know what you guys would like to see next week.

3 comments:

  1. Glad you have fun man, hope to see ya again next year!

    I was a judge there this year and yeah the Triparite is definitely not an auto win by any stretch. It's good obviously but it really struggled vs ObSec MSU lists for the most part, I think the next highest was 17 in Kelsey if I'm not mistaken.

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  2. I agree with you about our game (IH deathstar). I thought your decision-making was spot on, but mission and powers gave me the upper hand. I agree with you that rolling defensive powers may have helped. I also think that while your dice were pretty hot at the beginning with those plasma shots, they also betrayed you toward the midgame, which is when things started to swing heavily.
    Overall I was impressed with what you were able to do with your list, and all your practice has certainly paid off. I look forward to seeing you again at future GTs!

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    1. Thanks, that means a lot to me, we had a great game and you were a great opponent. Hope to see you around!

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