Post-Tournament thoughts

The tournament ended about 3 weeks ago now and I have only just got around to getting back into 40k. I don't know if I just overloaded myself on the game in such a short amount of time that I momentarily had to stop, or if I just generally need a break. Either way I have had one, and now I think it’s time to look over how I did and see what I can get from it.

First of all I walked away from the tournament with two wins and a single loss earning me 8th place. I was very pleased with this but I can't help but think if I had played the second game better and not got tabled I would have been able to creep up in points giving me a shot at anything up to 4th place, it’s unlikely but I can dream. So what let me down? The army wasn't bad but could have been better, my tactics had much to be desired, and finally my experience was lacking.

Experience

I can't say much other than I haven't got much tournament experience and that meant I made large mistakes in the second game and a few in my third game. In my first game it was like playing one of my buddies so I know what to do and what to deal with first etc. So all I have to do to get better at this is to just go to more tournaments i guess.

Tactics

Having used eldar a lot in the past I assumed that not practising with the list would be fine. I was wrong. I know what each unit did on the battlefield but I didn't understand how to use it properly. Three games in and I can't say I am a master of my list but I have learnt a few tricks my list can do. I am sure it could do more as well, however I have not used it enough to know.

In the tournament I foolishly rushed forwards when I didn't need to and risked my tanks on several occasions. I did learn to stay back in the end though. More importantly I need to learn when its best to take first turn and when going second and taking the pain is best. That could easily cost a game.

Army list

It can't deal with high numbers of flyers, they easily over whelm the serpents and lascannons ability to stop them. While I do have a high volume of shots they just can't shoot them down reliably.

Close combat, my list has 0 assault ability and if a fast unit such as spawn, flying monstrous creatures or jump units like wraiths gets to me I'm in trouble. Maybe adding one to counter attack might just help.

Before going any further I think it would help me share the 3 lists that were undefeated in the tournament.

1st place: chaos marines with necron allies

Daemon prince

Daemon of tzneetch, wings, black mace

Sorcerer (Warlord) w/ spawn

Level 3 (hallucination, invisibility, dominate), bike

10 Cultists

11 Cultists

Heldarke

Baleflamer

Heldarke

Baleflamer

4 Spawn

Mark of nurgle

Defence Line

Comms relay

Allied Necrons

Destroyer lord

Mindshackle scarabs, Sempiternal weave

5 warriors

Night scythe

5 Warriors

Night Scythe

5 Wraiths

Annihilation Barge

2nd place: tyranids

Hive tyrant - wings, 2x twin linked devourer

Hive tyrant - wings, 2x twin linked devourer

Tervigon
Tervigon
Termagants
Termagants
Termagants

8 ravagers
8 ravagers
7 ravagers

Defence line

This list was at first glance rather odd to me. I had never seen a nid list with a defence line and 3 units of ravagers.

3rd place: tau

I can't quite remember but it had 3 riptides in. Not very useful I know.

Anyway looking over these lists my army is struggling against them, granted with some luck and good tactics I might be able to do something to them, but I need to add something more to my list. Against the nids I might have been able to take out the ravagers with the wave serpents but I can’t be sure, they will be going to ground and having a massive cover save behind the defence line, forcing me to rely on the serpent shields, not great. The dark reapers and other heavy units would focus on taking out tervigons to prevent any more spawning early on, but that then leaves the 2 hive tyrants free to fly around and molest whatever they want, it’s not a good situation.

Not the tau list that came 3rd, this one came 6th maybe?

Vs Tau I would have issues as I don’t think I have enough fire power to take out 3 rip tides! 1, maybe 2, but the 3^rd one will just cream me. Maybe hawks can deal with a few pathfinders with their grenade pack, but it’s not a definite. I need more practice against Tau.

It’s hard reviewing my own list right now as I can’t think of a single unit that was bad in the games; it was mainly due to me not knowing what to do. Granted I should have more anti-air but that would mean losing something else. Maybe the fire prism could be swapped out form something as it wasn’t the best unit all day but it still had its moments (i.e. sniping a chaos lord). So if I did drop that I get in a crimson hunter if I drop another 20 points from somewhere? The sprit stones where something else which maybe could be dropped? Giving me 15 points elsewhere, but if I rolled some more useful powers then I would be regretting dropping the stones.

It’s a hard choice right now so I have decided what I will do, forget all about the tournament list for a little while and experiment with different way of playing, I had had stupid idea of a list recently based on the tyranids list I would love to try, also a semi-bike list. But most of all I want to get the dark eldar back into the list, I really miss having a unit or 2 of pain loving eldar who can ignore night fight if it rears its ugly head.