Again, no pictures, sorry. Details are also a little spotty. For the TLDR crowd: Kris won.

Game 2: Dan (Chaos Troopzilla) vs. Kris (Vulkan bikers)

Kris and I came to the tournament together and with only 3 players in the tournament it was inevitable that we’d play each other. So, we sucked it up and made the most of it.

Kris’s list is dead-hard and I knew I was fighting an uphill battle from the get-go because his list could only potentially yield 26 kill points, whereas mine yields 36. More importantly, each of his Troop units are fast and pack a ridiculous amount of anti-tank, and we both knew he could afford to send units on suicide missions if it meant taking out my heavy and elite choices.

His list was as follows:

Vulkan
Captain – Bike, combi-flamer, relic blade

5 Assault Terminators – Thunder hammer and storm shield, Land Raider Redeemer w/ multi-melta
5 Assault Terminators – Thunder hammer and storm shield (in LRR)

5 Space Marine Bikers (Troops) – Meltagun x2, combi-melta, Attack Bike with multi-melta
5 Space Marine Bikers (Troops) – Meltagun x2, combi-melta, Attack Bike with multi-melta
5 Space Marine Bikers (Troops) – Meltagun x2, combi-melta, Attack Bike with multi-melta
5 Space Marine Bikers (Troops) – Meltagun x2, Attack Bike with multi-melta
5 Space Marine Bikers (Troops) – Meltagun x2, Attack Bike with multi-melta

2 Land Speeders – Multi-melta, heavy flamer
2 Land Speeders – Multi-melta, heavy flamer

Land Raider Redeemer – Multi-melta

I lost the roll-off and was made to take second turn. I deployed a single Rhino containing Plague Marines and a Sorcerer towards the right side of the board as my 2 Troops + HQ. There was very large piece of impassible terrain in the center, so I had hoped to make it look like I was going to castle in the corner and bait Kris into bringing his army in on the far right after which I would then bring my army on the opposite side in order to take advantage of my battlecannon range.

Unfortunately, he didn’t fall for it and came on at the center, advancing behind the building and his Land Raiders. I brought my army in slightly to the left, but primarily behind the building opposite my enemies, hoping to create a bottleneck and mitigate my own losses. I managed to blow up a Land Speeder and stun another by shooting through a building, but other than that the shooting phase was uneventful thanks to Night Fight and short-range weaponry.

Turn 2 opened up with Kris bringing a bike squad forward and turning my Defiler into a smoldering crater. The other speeder squadron popped out to kill another Defiler, but only managed to damage it.

The rest of the game consisted of trading units back and forth across a giant clusterfuck in the middle of the board, which did not feature a favorable exchange rate for yours truly:

Meltaguns popped a raider, Terminators pile out, get lashed forward and killed by Berserkers.

Remaining Berserkers get charged by more Terminators and die, then the Terminators get charged by more Berserkers and also die. Vulkan then finishes off the last of the zerkers on the bottom of turn 6.

Bike units suicide into my deployment zone and kill a Dreadnought, then get killed by meltagun fire.

Defiler charges the immobilized Land Raider and kills it, then gets killed by bikers.

And so on.

The game ended with Kris ahead by 5 points, enough to get a minor victory but just short of the 6 required for a major. Kudos to Kris for a game well-played, and for giving me my 2nd loss over the course of 9 tournaments since May 2008. (The other was to Matt back at the infamous Brothers Grim tournament of February, 2009.)

Game 3: Zach (Battlewagon Orks) vs. Kris (Vulkan bikers)

I did document this game through pictures, but the silliness of the rolling really eclipses the strategy and tactics employed by both sides, so I’ve decided that it isn’t really worth writing up. When Kris can’t kill any Battlewagons with 10 meltaguns, 5 combi-meltas, and 11 multi-meltas then it’s just not in the cards.

The game ended with both players controlling an objective, however Kris beat Zach handily in kill points, earning a minor victory for himself.

And, by popular demand, pictures: