Tournament results - a hard luck story.

Well the tournament I attended yesterday went well overall, although the ending may haunt me for weeks to come...

Got to the store to find one of the regular players had locked his keys (and army) in his vehicle. Made a quick call to my insurance company and got a truck to come out and slim jim the lock. All was well and I felt a surge of good karma come my way. Had a cup of coffee and I was ready to take on the Warhammer world!

I left my camera at home. Crap. Without my camera I didn't bother to keep track of everything that went on in my games but here is a "short" recap of the important moments as I remember them.

Game 1 - Eric's Lizardmen

• Eric (nice fellow who I had never played before) brought a fairly tame Lizardmen list. Lord on Carnosaur (always bad news for Ogres) but not with Blade of Realities (can't recall what his kit was), Scar-vet on Cold One, level 2 Skink Priest, and a Skink Chief on Ancient Stegadon with the Stegadon Spear. The rest of the list contained one unit of Skinks with blowpipes, one with Javelins, one unit of Cold One Cavalry, and two blocks of Saurus Warriors - one with spears.
  
• My entire focus during deployment was to avoid the Carnosaur with my mini-star and go for the Cold One Cav and Saurus.
  
• He had less to deploy and I was able to avoid his Carnosaur by placing my Maneaters with characters last.
  
• Deployment looked (mostly) like this:

• Everything moved up on Turn 1 (with the exception of the Scraplauncher and Hunter).
  
• On Turn 2 my Trappers in the woods on the left passed their Terror test against the Carnosaur (awesome).
• Leadies moved up on the left and blasted away some Skinks that were screening the Carnosaur.
  
• Scraplauncher scores a direct hit on the unit of Saurus with Spears but only kills 1 Saurus.
• The Maneater unit charges the Cold One cav who flee 4" and are caught and killed.
  
• Slavegiant redirects its charge into the Saurus w/ spears, Yells and Bawls and keeps the Saurus tied up for a round.
• Ancient Steg w/ Skink Chief attempts to charge the Slavegiant's flank but can't fit in between the two Saurus units sideways and moves backwards instead.
• Meanwhile on the far right flank the unit of Bulls charges the Skinks, loses one to stand and shoot before winning combat and chasing the remaining Skinks down.
• The Hunter and Trappers keep the Carnosaur busy while the Skinks move towards the Maneater's rear.
• Skink Priest drops a Comet on a unit of fleeing Leadbelchers, the Sraplauncher, and Hunter. The Hunter survives while the other two units are destroyed.
  
• Trappers move up and kill the Skink Priest with sharp stuff in revenge for their fallen Gnoblar brothers.
  
• Maneaters charge the Saurus unit to help back up the Slavegiant (who is down to 2 wounds remaining), kill two ranks on the charge and proceed to chase down the fleeing Saurus and kill them.
  
• Skinks get their revenge by shooting the Slavegiant to death who then falls on the Skinks and kills the remainder of the unit.
• The Ironguts flank charge the remaining baited Saurus unit (with Scar-vet), win CC, and laugh as the fleeing Saurus are chopped down as they run into the Trappers who have spent the game bickering in the nearby forest.
  
• Trappers realize they are awesome, leave the forest and hurl sharp stuff at the Skink Chief on the Ancient Steg but fail to kill him.
  
• Game ends as a Victory for the Beer Gut Tribe with only the Ancient Steg and Lord on Carnosaur remaining.
  

Game 2 - Ralph's Vampire Counts

• Just the other night Ralph and I were discussing the list he planned on bringing to the "Hobby" tournament (it seems that as an Ogre player I am the unofficial opinion maker for what is "fair" and what isn't) and in a strange play of luck we were matched up against one another.
  
• Ralph's one nasty character was a level 3 Vampire Lord w/ Infinite Hatred, Red Fury, the Cursed Book, Dread Knight, Bloody Hauberk, and the Balefire Spike. The rest of his list was made up of a Scouting Vamp, two Wight Kings, one on foot with the Black Axe, one as BSB with the Nightshroud and Sword of kings, a big unit of Black Knights (where the characters went), two units of Skeleton Warriors with full command and magic banners, a Varghulf, a unit of Fell Bats, one unit of Dire Wolves, and a block of 12 Ghouls.
• My goal was to not get charged by the Black Knight unit while avoiding the Varghulf.
• Deployment looked (something) like this:

• Ralph got Turn 1 and used it to get his trap into position by moving the Wolves and Scout Vamp up in front of the Ironguts while the Bats moved to screen the Varghulf near the Trappers.
  
• Trappers pass yet another Terror test and pop out to sharp stuff the Fell Bats but fail to do any wounds.
  
• Leadbelchers move up and blast away at the Bats, dealing 4 wounds and leaving one base.
  
• Meanwhile the Ironguts have charged the Terror causing Scout Vamp and Dire Wolves, managing to survive a challenge and killing all of the Wolves before chasing down the Vampire as he fled.
  
• The Scraplauncher fired ineffectually at the Black Knight unit, killing one Knight.
  
• Hunter shot at the Varghulf and hit before the nasty creature made its Regen save.
  
• The Bulls near the Maneaters move up into a position to flee from the Black Knights, while the far right Leadbelchers do the same.
• Ralph charges the Leadbelchers who flee, leaving a nice tasty flank for the Maneaters to take advantage of.
  
• Ralph manages to IoN back all the Fell Bats before flying them directly in front of the Maneaters and blocking their charge.
• Meanwhile the two units of Trappers are swarming around the Varghulf and throwing sharp stuff, hitting and wounding approx 8 times but the damn thing Regens all of the wounds.
  
• Maneaters charge the Bats while the Bulls charge the Black Knight flank in an attempt at holding them in combat.
  
• Scraplauncher and Slavegiant charge a unit of 5 Zombies which have been raised in front of the Skeleton units preventing a combo charge.
• Ghouls charge and kill the unit of Leadbelchers on the right flank, then overrun into the Bulls before killing them as well in the next combat.
  
• Maneaters crush the Bats and overrun out of the charge arc of the Varghulf behind them.
  
• Bulls hold for the turn they charge, although the do not win close combat against the Black Knights.
• Black Knights turn to face the Bulls and the Vampire Lord moves the fight them, dealing 4 wounds in a challenge against the Bull champion.
  
• Bulls lose combat and break, are run down, and the Black Knight unit hits the front of the Maneaters (with a frontage of 3 and no ranks).
  
• Slavegiant and Scraplauncher beat the 5 Zombies but only the Slavegiant manages to overrun into the nearby Skeletons as the Scrappie only goes 3" (needing something like 4" to make it).
  
• Luckily the Slavegiant rolls a 1 and Yells and Bawls against the Skeletons winning the combat by 2 and allowing the Scraplauncher to charge in and help next turn.
  
• Hunter fails two Terror tests, one which almost puts him off the board, and another when he needs to charge the Varghulf to keep it from charging the rear of the Maneater unit.
  
• A massive clusterfuck of a fight continues in the middle as the Ironguts charge the Black Knights flank, followed by the nearby Skeletons charging the flank of the Ironguts, followed by the Scraplauncher charging the flank of the Skeletons after destroying the other Skeleton unit.
  
• Tyrant manages to hold on in a non-challenge fight against the Vampire Lord, even after a turn of the Cursed Book being used.
  
• Game ends due to time on Turn 4 as a Victory for the Beer Gut Tribe.
  
• A truly brutal (and fun) game, with many things not going well for the Ogres but with them managing to still claw their way to victory.
  

Game 3 - Thomas (Goatboy)'s Warriors of Chaos

• This game was played on table 2 of the tournament and was for third place in the prizes.
  
• Thomas brought a hard but not too terrible list that had a Chaos Lord in a big block of Blasted Standard/Tz marked Chaos Knights (w/ a level 1 Nurgle Sorc in the block as well), another big block of Khorne marked Chaos Knights (w/ Exalted Hero on Juggernaut), three units of Marauder Horsemen, a Warshrine, and a Hellcannon.
• I was excited for this game as I have never had a hard time killing Chaos Knights with a Maneater/character unit and I knew he would be looking for close combat to get the win.
  
• Deployment looked like this (same table as the first game so same terrain for the most part):

• Thomas had Turn 1 and moved his Horsemen up for the screen and flee.
  
• Ironguts charged the Hellcannon while the far left Leadbelchers moved up and shot half the nearest Marauder Horsemen unit off the board.
• Bulls charged the Horsemen in the middle, both of which fled through the Knights but failed to panic anything (shocking).
  
• Far right Leadbelchers moved up to bait the Khorne Knights while the Slavegiant moved to a flanking position.
  
• Ironguts deal three wounds to the Hellcannon before being flank charged by the Chaos Lord's unit of Knights.
  
• Khorne Knights charge the Leadbelchers who flee, leaving a tasty front charge for the Maneater unit and a flank charge from the Slavegiant.
  
• Maneater unit blows through the Chaos Knights and they are chased down as they flee.
• Ironguts are obliterated by the Hellcannon and Chaos Lord, Leadbelchers manage to kill off the remaining Horsemen with another round of shooting before running off the board from the rampaging horde.
• The rest of the game consists of the Chaos Lord unit falling back to not allow the Maneater unit to get a charge, while the Scraplauncher and Hunter fail to do any additional wounds through shooting.
  
• Game ends as a Draw with the Beer Gut Tribe needing 4 more points to take a victory.
  

So there you have it, three games played, two wins and one draw. What is so tragic about that you ask? I was one point away from taking third place (my last opponent Thomas took it from me). It came down to the fact that I had two unpainted units on the table (my Hunter and a unit of Trappers) so I basically double screwed myself out of a top three finish.

From now on, I am not pulling any Ogre punches. I could have taken a "harder" list but I chose to go with something "soft" and lost out on prizes because of it. Lesson learned, better luck next time. Tomorrow I will post my specific thoughts on the list, what worked and what can be improved in the future.

Thanks to all of my opponents for three great games - win or lose I had a lot of fun and that is why we play the game right?