My Warband: Tiefling Captain, Eye of Gruumsh, Red Samurai, 2 Orc Champion, Orc Spearfighter, 4 Orc Warriors (10 activations)

I decided I was not as switched on as I thought I needed to be to run the warband I was planning on.


Match One Win
Vs. D. Matzen: Greenfang Druid, 2 Dire Bears, 4 Graycloak Rangers w/ 4 Timberwolfs. He is 10 years old and did well for his age. I have demoed the game many times to young kids and he did far better than they.

Round 1. He moved out with his Dire Bears in series (lead blocking following one) and the Graycloak Rangers (GCR) and Timber Wolves (TWs) in a cluster. Because of a double corner, the Dire Bear could not move and attack my two Orc Champions (OC) and Eye of Gruumsh (EoG), all three in range of his bear. My Red Samurai (RS) moved so he could move and breathe on the GCR/TW cluster.

Round 2. He moved first, but did not prevent my RS from breathing and killing all the TW and routing one GCR (all 4 burnt.) My OC moved and hit the lead Dire Bear, blocking the other from moving up without AOO. The rest of the round he shot my RS and I hit, routed, and killed the lead Dire Bear. I blocked the following bear from reaching my three heavy hitters with an Orc Warrior.

Round 3. I blocked his bear again with an Orc Warrior and after he killed it, my heavy hitters moved and smacked the bear for three hits for 85 (30+30+25.) My RS and Orc Warriors finished off the GCRs.

Round 4. I finally won initiative and killed the bear, cleaved onto the GFD. GFD hit the OC and routed him, the others killed the GFD and match over after about 15 minutes total.


Match Two Win
Vs. Guy Fullerton: Rakshasa, Gauth, Deathknight, Snig, Blue, Mongrelfolk/Goblins (13 activations.) I have played against Guy running this band before and he was not excited about an early matchup against 4 CE heavy hitters. He sets up terrain so that he cannot get tile points, but does restrict somewhat my options on getting to him. Guy is confident I will not turtle, and he is right this time.

Round 1. He deploys Goblin screen, I move up, but keep all my creatures out of sight.

Round 2. I kill to goblins (cleave) and I loose a couple Orc Warriors pulling his goblins up. The Rakshasa, Gauth, Deathknight, and Snig stay on his rubble assembly. My Orc Champs, Eye, and RS all move to within range or charge range of his main force.

Round 3. I win initiative (first and only time this match). RS breathes on 2 goblins and the Gauth (who takes 20) and the RS moves between Snig and Rakshasa. OC kills blocking Blue. Snig, Rakshasa, and Deathknight hit RS for 35 damage. My other OC moves adjacent to Rakshasa and Gauth and misses Gauth, after Deathknight moved from that spot. My Eye charges and kills a goblin (to get in charge position for next turn.) At this point I am sad I blew my cleave opportunity off the Gauth since I missed and did not hit/rout the Rakshasa. Oh well another turn, one that could get ugly.

Round 4. Guy gets initiative, Snig hits and routs my RS (conveniently out of LOS of my Tiefling), paralyzes the adjacent OC (ouch!), and Gauth moves away. At this point Guy does NOT move and hit my paralyzed OC for 40! So my OC unparalyzes and then the Deathknight moves and hits my OC. The other OC double moves to base the redeployed Gauth and Rakshasa. My Eye charges and misses the Deathknight (only +17 vs. AC 23.) Red Samurai does not rally and routs more. My Tiefling moves to see the RS, but makes sure to stay out of sight of the OC (I need it to rout, not die in place.)

Round 5. Last round with 5 minutes left. Guy gets initiative and paralyzes the basing OC (twice in a row now, ouch.) Deathnight kills first OC. Other OC unparalyzes and later gets routed. Eye of Gruumsh takes all the AOOs and kills the Gauth. Red Samurai actually rallys. Total points for Guy 48 (OC + 3 OW) for me, over 100 (Gauth + about 7-8 goblin/mongrels.) Very close not couting tile points, and could have been closer if both my RS stayed (although he would have killed something too.)

We both had good times, I just rolled more normally than I do when we are not in tournaments. (Guy easily wins 75%+ of our non-tournament matches and is usually shocked at my relentlessness due to getting no love from lady luck.)


Match Three Win
Vs. Zack Drake (zdrake): Tiefling Captain, Eye of Gruumsh, Red Samurai, Ogre Ravager, ZWD (11 activations.) I played Zack before and knew he is very sensitive to tile points. I won terrain initiative and placed Hall of Heroes straddling the centerline and allowing only a move 8 creature to score and only on his Corridor tile, if he chose that option, which he did. The mistake was since I can charge from rough terrain, he set up the one spot he could move in the charge path of my OC. He could have avoided that by placing the Corridor slightly closer to the center (but I still would have surrounded the unsupported creature.)

Round 1: He moves RS to the tile scoring spot on the Corridor. He moves his Ogre Ravager and Zombie White Dragon (ZWD) in front of his mass of Orc Warriors. I double move with Orc Champion to place it behind RS (just in case I crit on charge.) Move up EoG to support the charge and charge and hit with other OC (30 damage to RS.) A OW moves to cover my heavy hitters and the Red Samurai moves up near his Ravager and ZWD. He bases my RS with his Eye.

Round 2: Woot! I win initiative. I swing on the RS and it routs! Because the OW there hits and kills him (also within range of Eye), my RS is not even bothered with having too kill the RS. I finish by moving that OC to a spot down the corridor. Now my entire warband, except the RS and an OW are out of range of his warband, except for his Eye. I have a hard choice now. I can base the Ravager and breathe on his entire warband, except the Eye. Or I can breathe from where I am at, hitting entire band except one Orc Warrior, the Eye, and the Tiefling. I really want the Tielfing. If the Tielfing misses the save and morale check, he is off the board and that seems very nice. I weigh the odds and decide to breathe and run. I get the Spearfighter, 4 OW, the Ravager for 10 net, and the ZWD for 10, all nice damage.

He moves his Eye to attack my Orc Champion and hits. He also brings up the ZWD and bases the same OC. I counter by attacking Eye once with OC and moving away. ZWD rolls a 1 and misses, his Eye gets no AOO due to cover. He moves his Ravager to base the OC that killed his RS (the other OC moved to be near here.) He also moves his last OW up to cover his Eye and Tiefling and moves his Tiefling up too far, but reconsiders and backs Tiefling up out of kill range. I move my Eye up on his Eye and hit, and his Eye does not miss morale check.

Round 3: Zack gets intiative and smites the based OC, hits and does not rout, second attack misses. His Eye swings twice on mine, hits both (and my Eye makes morale.) I retaliate with three OC swings, and two hit. My Eye hits his Eye once and kills it. His ZWD and OW kill my Eye.

Round 4: I get initiative and make 4 OC attacks, 2 hit and kill the Ravager, but keeping the OCs in place. My RS hits Tielfing who saves. His ZWD engages my two OCs.

Round 5: 5 minutes left. I win initiative and have the OCs kill the ZWD with 4 attacks. RS later kills Tiefling. All dead.


Match Four Loss
Vs. Ray Snyder: Beholder, Gauth, Uthok, Snig, Goblins (15 creatures, 16 activations.) Ray knows how to play well and this warband has opportunities against my warband. My main goal in settting up the terrain is to get staging positions so that I can get a move away from the expected positions of his Beholder and Gauth. I was very concerned about the ability of my Orc Warrior screen to keep up and also to provide any counter to his screen. My overall goal was to absolutely minimize my exposure time vs. the Gauth and Beholder for my heavy hitters. I figured I would attack the Gauth first, since almost always it is the key target, but I wanted to stay open minded and not forget that even with 3 heavy hitters left, the Beholder could solo them all. The first piece I would expose, as usual, would be the Red Samurai.

Round 1: I moved and OC and Eye to base the hidden Mongrelfolk. I moved the rest of the band out of sight center south. He moves out his goblin screen and moves the Behold Gauth combo toward the middle.

Round 2: Mongrelfolks attack my Eye and my OC cleaves both and moves to a corner north-center. (My Eye ends up moving up only a little, but in cover.) My OWs move up into cover positions and RS and other OC moved to hidden positions within striking range. His goblin screen disperses more and takes a couple OW with javelins.

Round 3: This is the key turn. I have to decide who I will attack first, Gauth or Beholder and I need to clear some of the goblin skirmishers or I will have no choice but try the paralyzing Gauth first. Ray wins initiative and bases the RS with another goblin. Awesome, I get a chance to catch Snig!, goblin, Gauth, and Beholder in a breath. But first I need to decide how to handle the two goblins on the RS. The easy solution is ignore them for now and go breathe. Instead I make a mistake and use the OC to hit/cleave the two goblins. This is a mistake because even if Snig and Uthok can get within range of where these two will attack next round. I should have held the OC in reserve to see what options I had (and to protect the RS from goblins if he gets paralyzed by the Gauth.

RS moves and breathes, Gauth takes 20 (awesome), Beholder takes 10, and Snig makes save and takes only 10 (sigh.) If Snig missed save and morale check, he would be off the board. Ray's choice of Uthok's +5 commander rating pays off. Now Ray activates the Beholder and disenegrates the RS (who saves, but takes 30 damage, ouch!) Gauth burns RS and RS makes both stun and paralyze saves. Uthok moves down toward Gauth and Snig and goblin move to attack RS (both hit) and another goblin hits to kill the RS. Three total goblins attacked the RS, two without Uthok, but all three hit (ouch.)

Now my unengaged Eye and OC have to decide who to engage. They can both base the Gauth or Beholder. To keep the Beholder from moving and sliding the Gauth anyway, I need to base the Beholder (since another target is nearest now.) Since I still have 3 heavy hitters and one more turn of exposure, I try for the Beholder instead of the Gauth. I should have split one each on Gauth and Beholder, since ability to negate the threat of the one-hit killable Gauth is slightly better than affecting the Beholder. Just because it does not end up mattering next turn does not erase the mistake.

To end the turn, an OW clears off his goblin getting tile points, so I now have 30 to his 20.

Round 4: Last turn of the game. I loose initiative again (lost every round.) After last round's disinegrate, I am hoping for a little love. He trys the beholder on the basing OC, but gets a slide that the OC saves from. Ray correctly activates the Gauth next, instead of the too random Beholder. The Gauth stuns the Eye and paralyzes the OC (ouch.)

My turn I have the OC in line of sight of the Tiefling and move the OC. If I can kill the Gauth or Snig and a goblin, I will win on points even still, if I can pin down the goblins to keep the paralyzed OC from getting killed. My OC moves, takes AOO from a goblin and gets adjacent to Snig and two goblins (ie. where the RS was killed.) If I miss Snig, I loose anyway, so I swing on him first. I miss (+13 vs. AC 18.) I carefully look at other options to narrow the points range and have my Spearfighter and Tiefling attack to garner just a few more points. They both miss anyway (+6/+8 vs. AC 14.) I get tile points again to Ray getting none, 40 to 20 total.

He has killed the RS (40) and 3 OW for 49+20 tile = 69.

I killed 8 goblins (24) and 40 tile points = 64.

Final Thoughts

In the final match, I needed Snig or both of the goblins based by my OC to have won, I got none. If Ray had not kept spending goblins to keep tile points, he would have lost, and it was a good move essential to his win.

If I could do it over and have some Gauth/Beholder defense, would I have? The answer is no. I limited my exposure to two Gauth and 4 Beholder activations (if we played another round it would have been more.) With 4 heavy hitters and VERY careful movement, they can usually overwhelm the Beholder/Gauth combo. If I had not made the mistake/choice to have my OC clear the damage off the RS, I could have used it as a reaction force (the orginal idea.) Not saving that OC for more important work was the key reason I lost the match. Both Ray and I made suboptimal choices, but mine cost me the game, his did not.

Remember, look for ways to improve you game and reweigh the odds, don't use excuses about what ifs or bad luck to limit your ability to learn from a match ways you can improve your game.

Overall, I had a great time at a greatly anticipated match. A few of our regulars could not make it, but we still had reasonable turnout. A Monday event at a $30 one-day pass convention turned out 14 players, pretty impressive.

Group Photo with wizards forum handles