Welcome to GarageHammer, our first blog post.
GarageHammer is a bunch of guys from Western Sydney who just like to hang out and play wargames. We are also known as the Western Warriors, our club until our local independent shut down. We still have the flag in honor of 'Mikes'.
The idea of this blog is for us as a club/group to post updates on our hobby adventures, be it games, campaigns or modeling and events.
To start off with post one I thought I would discuss our weekend just gone and the great Warhammer fantasy event that was the Sydney Slaughter.
We had six of us go along to the tournament. Slaughter was a six game warhammer fantasy singles tournament using 2800 point armies with hidden panel comp scores between 0-8. The event also used all six scenarios from the warhammer book.
I took along a soft Warriors of Chaos list with none of the new legion toys.
My army consisted of:
Khorne Lord on Juggernought, sword of might, 4++ ward
Nurgle Sorcerer Lord, level 4, lore of nurgle, dispell scroll, Barded Warhorse
Exalted Hero of Nurgle, BSB, Filth Mace, Dragon Bane Gem
19 Warriors of NUrgle with Halbers, Shields, Full Command
10 Warriors of Khorne with additional Hand Weapons, full command
5 Warhounds with Vanguard
5 Warhounds with Vanguard
20 Marauders of Khorne with Flails and full command
9 Knights of Nurgle, Enscrolled weapons, full command and banner of swiftness
Gorebeast Chariot of Khorne
Spawn of Nurgle
3 Skull Crushers with enscrolled weapons, full command and banner of rage.
Pretty tame for 2800 of Warriors.
I ended up with a comp of 6 our of 8. This was exactly what I aimed for, and what I liked about this event is they kept your comp scores secret until the end.
The first game was a Dawn Attack, very fitting to open the weekend up with.
My opponent was Mikkel Kragh with one of the most beautiful High Elf armies ive ever seen.
His army was not the typical avoidance, minimum units elf list, he had some good solid blocks of fighters and bowmen. A general on a phoenix and a second phoenix to cause problems.
A few in game shots.
The bridge was quite fun to fight over. We decided not to worry about ranks width within reason. Halfway over the bridge I got flanked by his greatswords. We agreed that it would count as a wall/barrier for a defended obstacle, but the river ended up being a light river and gave him WS10 I10. It was a fun fight to see us grind each other down.
My deplyment let me keep fairly central as did Mikkels. The game was fun, and he was a great opponent to play against. I ended up with a 17-3 win. We both had the same comp score so this wasn't adjusted at all.
Game two was against Chris A-J and his Goblin army.
This game was great, playing a battle for the pass I was up against spiders. There were two goblin wizards riding Araknaroks, two more Araknaroks, a HUGE ambushing mob of giant spiders, about 30 I think, two more blocks of giant spiders and a bunch of spider riding characters.
This game was much closer than my first one with me getting a 12-8 win. Again we both had comp 6 as it turns out so our scores stayed the same.
Game three saw our first scenario with an objective being blood and Glory.
In this unlike most warhammer tournaments Victory Points didn't mater. If you broke your opponent you got a 15-5 win, that was it. Played just like it should be from the rulebook.
I played Marcell Fisher, a late entrant to the event and his Beastmen/Warriors of Chaos army.
Firstly ill start with the game, or lack there of. He had a very low fortitude, having only a general, bsb and two banners. Turn two I charged the BSB on its daemonic mount with my Gorebeast chariot, did 7 impact hits, his 1 up armour became 3 up and he failed 4, he went for his 4 up ward (rerolling any ones and got a 5, 3, 2, 2. SO three wounds and he couldn't even reroll any. BSB dead.
His warrior block got charged by my hounds and Knights the same turn, were split open and that was the end of the game in my turn two.
I won 15-5 without Marcell getting a second turn.
Marcell had a comp of 2 against my 6 which means a bonus to me of 800 points, im not sure how that worked into the 15-5 win but it was massive.
Now I have a bit of a gripe about Marcell's army. He was Chaos Legion's, Beastmen and Warriors of chaos. Every single model in his army was a Beastman model, with them counting as warriors of chaos. Usually I wouldn't have a problem with this, keeping things into a theme is cool. However I felt Marcell took things to far. of hsi 2800 point army the only unit that were actually beastmen were one unit of Bestigors. His minotaur was a daemon prince, his beasts chariots were warriors chariots, etc etc. I felt that just the one single beastman unit was pushing the counts as thing way to far. It should have been the other way around with most of the beastmen models being beastmen and one being a warriors unit. It was confusing.
That ended day one and we decided as our team to hit the Chinese restaurant downstairs.
I highly recommend the restaurant at 99 on York, it was delicious.
Most of the tournament goers it seems headed into town and got on the cans.
Into day two Game four was a Meting Engagement against Matt Wilson (who ended up winning the tournament) and his Skaven.
Firstly I thought the Panel comp judges did an amazing job with good fair scores. Out of 60, from what I looked at aroudn the room I felt they were a bit kind on only two lists. Matt's was one. Everyone knows Skaven are filth and he ended up with a 5.
His list consisted of a Vermin Lord Warpseer, BSB and Rat General, two Engineers, big block of Slaves, two big blocks of Stormvermin, a Hellpit, a doom wheel AND three Stormfiends. Rat Ogres and scouts.
A five just felt a bit generous. Matt handed me my first loss of the tournament 11-9. I think my bonus 200 points may have pulled this back to a draw.
Game five was the second objective scenario of Watchtower.
As per the book who ever held the watchtower, won the game. Victory Points didn't matter.
Up against Mitch Edwards and his all Slaneesh Warriors of Chaos army this was going to be fun.
Mitch had a Daemon Prince, Sigvald as his general, a lvl 4 fire wizard riding on a Chaos Warshrine.
A block of Slaneesh Warriors with Halberdsm a Manticore, A slaneesh giant, and some hounds.
I won the deployment roll and threw my khorne warriors into the tower. First turn they were charged by Sigvald and his Warriors. Sigvald strolled into the fight slaying a lot of my guys, my Khorne Champ was in a challenge with the Slaneesh champ, which I won. The few remaining Khorne Warriors slayed some of their Slaneesh kin before the remaining warriors struck back killing the rest of the unit. My Unit champ from the challenge was still alive however and steadfast held the watchtower all on his own.
His warrior block bounced out and were visable with one warrior each side of the tower. I charged in on the left with my skull crushers and on the right with my knights.I only had one guy from each unit fighting corner to corner. My Khorne Lord ended up in a challenge with Sigvald, while one night slowly whittled down the Slaneesh warriors a turn at a time.
This fight was soon joined by a Slaneesh Chariot, a Manticore, a Daemon Prince a Warshrine and my Gorebeast chariot.
Big epic smackdowns later most of his units were gone as were mine. In the challenge however on his final wound my Khorne Lord severed the head of Sigvald in one mighty blow.
Khorne was watching closely and the eye of the gods came up double 6.
Rejuvenated to full wounds and now sporting true Daemonhood, this was the real turning point.
Mitch's Chimera ran down the last of my Marauders, and while this was going on i sneakily moved my big Nurgle block and BSB into the watch tower.
I ended the game holding the tower so took a 15-5 win. Mitch had a comp of 4 which surprises me. So my 15-5 would have been pushed up into an even bigger win.
Then we rolled into game six. At this point I was in second place. Our scenario was a plain old pitched battle scenario and I had drawn Simon Turner and his Ogres.
I had been prewarned that Simon can be sometimes a punish to play against as a player but I found him to be quite decent. We had a few rules/situation issues but he just blew them off and said 'what ever, move on'.
What wasn't fun though was his army. This guy, unlike me was obviously a serious tournament player and his army matched that. It was strong and very effective, but from a garage hammer point of view it was not fun to play against.
Now when it comes to warhammer I believe this to be a social and multi person hobby. Its my opinion that both people need to have fun and want to play the game or there's no point playing. Of course im a garagehammer, shits and giggle kinda player. I don't begrudge Simon for his list, it was a tournament, and he took a good list to win. Kudos to him. It was unfortuantly for me the only non fun game of the weekend.
Simon's list consisted of
Lvl 4 wizard lore of Heavens (general), lvl 1 wizard lore of Maw, BSB guy
2 Thunder Tusks
4 (or 5?) minimum 3 man iron guts units with full command
3 big units of leadbelchers (16 in total)
3 individual dogs,
1 cannon chariot
Right from the start I didn't know what to do. I needed to get my stuff into combat as one round of shooting would kill an entire unit no problem. However Simon plays his Ogres as though they are elves. The Ironguts bait and flee, screening the guns. Nothing can get into a fight. His dogs block and divert, its a nightmare. He plays the army very very well.
I had a huge building in front of my right flank and thought id just have to go defensive and try hide. This was working well until the end turns when my wizard and knights failed a panic, failed the BSB reroll and fled. With everything else he had managed to shoot to pieces, that pushed it easily to a 20-0.
His comp was 4, which I felt was about 2 higher than it should be. Chatting to people in the know this army list seems to fly under the radar, its not the 'usual' power build comp judges see so it seems as though they didn't see the potential. Kudos to Simon though, he really knows his army.
Since our game and having had time to think ive come up with another play. I don't know how it'd work but I would be interested to try it out.
In the end I slid down to fourth place. I was happy with that result in only my second tournament and my first individual tournament, especially since i said months ago I don't want to go and try place, I just want to play casual fun gamers in the low/middle levels.
That plan didn't really eventuate, but with the high comp pack players and armies were really great (mostly).
A big thank you to Nick from the WatchTower podcast for hosting the first Sydney Slaughter, and I plan on making an appearance again next year if it's the same format.
With a successful charge by Queeks Storm-vermin and Gnawtooths Giant-rats i was feeling rather solidly about a victory.
