Grand Tournament: Ironweld Spring Assault 2024
For my list, I modified the list I detailed in my previous post entitled One List, 27 Bikes. The version of the list I used is on BCP, which you can view here. To spare you having to click on the link, here's the quick-and-dirty version.
DA Ravenwing Concept List v2.31 (I should come up with catchier names for my lists)
Azrael
Ravenwing Command Squad: Fire Discipline
Ravenwing Command Squad
Tactical Squad: 10 old boys
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Outrider Squad: 3 chonky bikers
Outrider Squad: 3 chonky bikers
Outrider Squad: 3 chonky bikers
Ravenwing Black Knights: 6 awesome bikers
Ravenwing Black Knights: 6 awesome bikers
Gladiator Valiant
Gladiator Valiant
Ravenwing Darkshroud
Storm Speeder Thunderstrike
Storm Speeder Thunderstrike
The big changes were the inclusion of the second Thunderstrike and a second Gladiators, with the tanks becoming Valiants instead of Lancers. My thinking had been to have something to throw at units with halving-damage effects to overwhelm them with 6d6 damage. It didn't work as well as I'd hoped when I did try to apply it, but I'll get to that later.
Unfortunately, I didn't cover myself in glory over the weekend, going 2-3. On the other hand I didn't embarrass myself either. I won my first 2 games, and scored decently in all of them. Game 1, I went 100-91 against a Flesh Tearers Sons of Sanguinius list. Game 2 I squeaked out a 90-89 win against Grey Knights. Game 3 I lost 96-63 against Adeptus Sororitas. Game 4 I lost 89-75 against Leagues of Votann. Game 5 I lost 74-59 against Necron Hypercrypt Legion.
I think it's probably fair to say that the games I won were against armies I was more familiar playing into. Space Marine stuff is Space Marine stuff, so the Flesh Tearers list was not that different from the army I'm intimately familiar with. I've played against Grey Knights often enough to know what to do and what not to do against them. Also, to be fair, my opponent missed what should have been a fairly easy charge with one of his big bricks of Terminators (getting the same result when he rerolled), so luck was certainly a factor.
An amusing little interaction from my game against Grey Knights was my opponent using his 3" Deep Strike strat to drop a Techmarine in the extreme corner of my Deployment Zone to score Behind Enemy Lines and Deploy Teleport Homers 1rst turn, but it set me up to score Assassinate when I drew it my 1rst turn.
As for the games I've lost, I've probably played against Sisters as often an I've played against Grey Knights, but I have yet to win a game against Sisters. Arco-flagellants are just dirty. My ego is somewhat soothed by the fact that the Sisters player went undefeated and took second overall, and he said I didn't make any mistakes. This weekend was only the second time I've played against Leagues of Votann, though I think I did better than last time, and as a funny little highlight I was actually able to deny my opponent Defend Enemy Outpost for a turn. Finally, against the Necrons, my opponent kind of turtled up in one corner with a Monolith, 2 Doomsday Arks, and a squad of Immortals and I struggled to come to terms with his army. Meanwhile, he kept using his 3" Deep Strike strat to drop stuff in my deployment zone, obliging me to keep stuff back to deal with it. In retrospect I might have been better off if I'd not tried to contest his castle so hard, but it was overlooking one of the midfield objectives, and in this mission there were only two of them (Vital Ground). I did, at least, put up decent scores, so I can take a certain amount of satisfaction in that. I may not have helped our overall win rate, but at least I didn't hurt it.
To start the critique, the Ravenwing Knight bricks were good. They can move around the table fast, bring a lot of firepower to bear, and are a credible assault threat. I had to spend a turn staging them before I could bring them to bear, but I knew that going in and designed my list around it. Even when there were only a couple of them left, they could still pose a threat to similarly depleted units, or to weedy utility units - that was how I denied my Votann opponent Defend Stronghold for that one turn.
I was also happy with the Thunderstrikes. They did a good job helping the RWKs punch up against tougher targets, and they do some work on their own with their bigger guns while their Icarus pods trigger their Thunderstrike ability. It's also handy to be able to Deep Strike them, which relieves congestion in my deployment zone and makes it easier to get units into staging areas first turn. More on that later.
Having two Scout Squads was invaluable for scoring secondaries. Being able to pick them up at the end of my opponent's turn and then redeploy them off of any table edge (subject to what turn it is) scored me a lot of points. When I didn't need them to do that, I'd even occasionally have them try and help out with damage dealing, assuming I could do so without putting them at undo risk. If I recall correctly, one of them did manage to do 6 damage to something with a missile launcher one game. It's not what they're in the list for, and I don't expect them to help much in that way, but I'll take it when I can get it.
The Outriders did the job I put them in the list for. I included them to have something I could run out onto midfield objectives so I could take a turn to stage my Ravenwing Knights. It's not a glamorous job and most of the time I lost them, but that didn't shake me because that's what I was expecting.
Going into the event, I was oddly psyched to be using a Tactical Squad. Having played 5 games with it, I'd say it was adequate but otherwise unremarkable. Five of them just acted as ablative wounds around Azrael, and the other five gave me a unit I could pitch somewhere when I needed it. They did do a little work in at least one game, and them being OC 2 was occasionally relevant. I suppose they were worth what I paid for them, no more, no less.
The only units I was disappointed by were the Gladiator Valiants. They didn't really meet the expectations I had for them - particularly Game 5, when I was able to bring one to bear against the Void Dragon. Even with a Thunderstrike giving it a buff to its to wound rolls, it whiffed out against that thing. It's a good thing I got lucky with the Grenades strat against that thing. Maybe my expectations for the things were too high, or maybe they just never really got a chance to shine, but they just didn't do it for me this weekend.
One thing I found challenging over the weekend was maneuvering all my units in the space between terrain. The Ravenwing Knight bricks have a big footprint, as do the Gladiators. Deploying them where they would be both safe and be able to come out and do damage was also hard to do. All of my units needed to go through the same lanes of movement, which crowded them.
Along a similar vein, it was also challenging to have to always have to go around terrain rather than being able to go through it. That was leveraged against me, particularly in game 3 against Sisters. My opponent, Tony, staged his Arco-flagellants in buildings around the center objectives, and I knew whoever was obliged to commit to the center first was going to lose, but Tony's Castigators and Nundam squad were able to pick off the disposable units I put on the center objectives, and I finally had to commit a Knight Brick to the center, with the results I expected. Having something that could go through walls would have helped a lot.
As you can imagine, I've been thinking about how to improve the list ever since I finished the last game of the weekend. My first thought was to replace one of the Ravenwing Knight bricks with a squad of Hellblasters, have Azrael join the Hellblasters, and then invest in a Lieutenant and some slightly sexier utility units. Hellblasters do have numerous advantages over Ravenwing Knights. They're cheaper, they're Infantry, and their plasma incinerators have the Assault and Heavy keywords, so I can advance and shoot with them without needing to be in a particular doctrine, and I may occasionally get to stand still and shoot with them for +1 to hit. They have a longer range than RWK's plasma talons too, so I could stage the Hellblasters behind the RWKs if there's something on the table I really want to turn to vapor. Plus, I already have Azrael in the list - I can attach him to the Hellblasters and have both plasma units get Sustained Hits.
I was also contemplating replacing the Gladiators with 3 squads of Eradicators. Eradicators are also infantry, and get full rerolls of everything against the targets I wanted the Gladiators to deal with. There are upsides and downsides to that plan. Eradicators are slower, and they're not as tough as Gladiators. However, they're Infantry, their output is more reliable, and they have a smaller footprint.
Ultimately though, I think I've decided to go with this:
Plasmatastic
Gladius Strike Force
Azrael
Apothecary
Ravenwing Command Squad: Fire Discipline
Ravenwing Command Squad
Assault Intercessor Squad: 5 choppy boys
Hellblaster Squad: 10 plasma boys
Infiltrator Squad: 5 sneaky boys
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Scout Squad: 5 sneaky lads
Outrider Squad: 3 chonky bikers
Outrider Squad: 3 chonky bikers
Ravenwing Knight Squad: 6 awesome bikers
Ravenwing Knight Squad: 6 awesome bikers
Ravenwing Darkshroud
Storm Speeder Thunderstrike
Storm Speeder Thunderstrike
Basically I decided to embrace the skew, putting 3 big squads of plasma death on the table, all with invulnerable saves and Apothecaries. The Hellblasters being infantry should help some with movement lane congestion and give me a unit that can pop through walls and bring the pain. My backfield presence will be the Infiltrators and one of the Scout squads, at least until my opponent has expended their reserves, with the other two Scout Squads functioning as they did over the weekend. The Thunderstrikes will help my plasma squads punch up against what they need to punch up against, and the Darkshroud adds a layer of protection to the plasma squads. I replaced one of the Outrider Squads with the Assault Intercessors only because the list was 5 points over with 3 Outrider Squads. We'll see how it works, but I am kind of keen to try it. Wish me luck, brothers!
Comments
Post a Comment