Had a great time this year with six very enjoyable and tough games against great opponents. Also thanks to Dave for running everything brilliantly.

Very quick reports.

Game 1. vs Tim (Saim-Hann)
Really tough, tactical and fun game to start the weekend although it is a bit hazy now. I had a good first turn shooting down a Vampire Hunter and Breaking some of Tim's smaller ground formations including his AA. If I had won the initiative turn two I felt in a very strong position but it was not to be and some perfectly executed rolling Eldar assaults and a triple retain turned the game back in Tim's favour. Luckily for me he failed to rally anything going into the third which meant from then on it was only really me in a position to squeak a win. But Tim defended well and the game finished a complete draw.

Game 2. vs Gavin (Biel-Tan)
Gavin had two pairs of Revenants so I knew this would be a tough struggle. He also castled very effectively in the early turns and gave very little opportunity for my air power to be decisive. Was fairly even until the later in turn three when the Revenants felt safe enough to break out and start decimating formations. Had enough resilient little Marine formations running around to never really be in any chance of a loss but without a good way to effectively deal with the revenants it was an easy winning draw to Gavin.

Game 3. vs Richard (Krieg)
Game started ok with two Terminator assaults destroying two Warhounds. But a mistake with probably an unnecessary and disastrous air assault with some bikes where I tried to be a little too tricksy immediately reversed any early gains. In reality didn’t feel like I had anything in my army that could deal with the Gorgons, Shadowswords and Tanks and had it not been for my Whirlwinds doing some crazy work would probably have been crushed. Although I might have been able to drag the game into a fourth turn, I was happy enough to just take a 2-0 loss in the third.

Game 4. vs Chris (Ghazgkhull)
Chris’s army was dominated by an imposing Great Gargant which I promptly ignored and spent the rest of the game destroying all the support formations. The first turn of this game was odd in that every air assault tried by both sides (one Ork and two Marine) proved disastrous for the air assaulters every time. But despite this enough Marines survived to win with blitz and take and hold. But not enough to prevent the Gargant parking in the centre of the table on two objectives to give the Orks take and hold in return. 2-1 win to me.

Game 5. vs Simon (Dark Angels)
Simon was fielding the Dark Angel first company with some drop podding Devs in support. The game was a series of brutal teleport and air assaults but in the end the larger number of activations and flexibility of my more standard Marine army told and in the third turn I out activated Simon to win with blitz and take and hold against him holding my blitz. 2-1 win to me.

Game 6. Vs Mark (Necrons)
A very interesting and enjoyable last game despite the fact we were both probably a little frazzled after the marathon that is Britcon. I set up a very defensive Marine castle while trying to hunt Pylons and Monoliths with Warhounds, Terminators and my Whirlwinds. I destroyed one Pylon which gave my air a small corridor it could operate in and contribute to the game. Also I destroyed a Barge fairly early. In return Mark pulled off a series of tricksy assaults where formations would bounce from one side of the field to another and took out some Terminators and a Warhound. The game was very even going into the third turn. But I got a little lucky with my shooting (and his failed armour saves) to take out Marks BTS. It probably gave me an advantage going into a fourth turn but out of tiredness we both decided a draw was the most likely result and called it there.

As usual Britcon was great the games were all brilliant and played in a very good spirit. I was very happy to get second place with my first outing with Marines in a long time. Richard was a deserved winner (and overall Champion of Champion) with his brilliant use of the devastating Krieg combined with some daemonic dice powers.

Yeah maybe the cunning thing to do would be to let somebody gets some points from time to time

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Builds is probably just taking Titan Killer or Macro weapons so the Guard fear their Gorgons being destroyed so have to spend more time outside and so become vulnerable.

Assault vulnerability (apart I guess to things with TK close combat or fire fight weapons) is possibly refering to the fact if you can base a Gorgon with six units** the Guard onboard can't disembark.

Just a guess as to what you mean, if there are others maybe you should share them, might make it less of a nerf when it comes .

**During our game there were a couple of times I felt I could do it to one Gorgon but didn't think it would matter because you would still be +1 up in the combat resolution (Probably no casualties), Krieg get +2 double outnumber, +1 inspiring and Marines get +2 (less and no blast). Which just seemed too risky to be worth it.

the TK and Macro are of course a bit threat, but it's when combined with barrages that it becomes a real problem for them (like your whirlwinds hammering a unit and breaking it without too much trouble). It's why of all the armies of the weekend, Gavin's was the one that worried me most on paper. Granted Tim probably had more Macro overall, but he didn't have 3 units of night spinners backing that up, meaning that if i felt the gorgons were threatened i had the option of them jumping out (especially if there was terrain around), which i just couldn't risk against Gavin until i'd dealt with them.

Spot on assault wise though, Marines aren't quite as adept at taking advantage of that compared to some armies - when you look at things like Eldar for instance, a guardian unit in waveserpents has just enough bodies to lock in both gorgons, and the bloody waveserpents can then still pop up and firefight! Granted with decent dice you're still not going to be winning a combat by much (if anything), but that's no worse than trying to assault Nid formations...

Just a sanity check bit here but the first wave serpent that based to based a gorgon would have 2 models on it so the guardians would be similarly looked inside? Just asking.. only time I've tried it was with Dominatrix and Hieridules

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Don't they dare!

Just because one of the best players wins a couple tournaments with DKoK doesn't make it OP.
Let other people repeat it first, then you'd have an actual indication of things being unbalanced.
Till then it's crying about loosing to a better player.

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While I've played it both ways, I was under the assumption that war engines only count as single models for the purposes of preventing infantry from disembarking?

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Yeah, that's right... I even asked this to make sure I could, if I had been mad enough, engage a great gargant with my Dom and three hieriodules!!

So yes mech eldar would be good... mech guard not bad either in truth, but the risk of staying mounted over a turn a big risk for them.

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The other thing most people seem to forget is that Gorgons don't have thick rear armour, so can be crossfired. Mark did it to good effect in our game at the weekend, although no-one else managed it!

I knew they didn't have TRA, getting something into position to crossfire was an entirely different thing!

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Oh, i'm not saying i'm going to make it easy for anyone - just that it's possible!

Yeah for sure there are ways, but they are all very situational. I certainly do look to trap the infantry in, it just hadn't been possible yet. I have been in positions where I could lock in one gorgon, but not both - this is with eldar, which you say is ideal but there are actually only 2 formations you will commonly see in an eldar army that can do it (mounted guardians and mounted aspects), and so only in a ground pounder build (not webway or vampire). And as you say, for marines it is pretty much impossible. I just find that the theory is all well and good, but it's totally binary (it either will work or it won't) the chance of the situation arising where it's possible AND with good odds (eg there is no support near the gorgons) AND you can do the damage required (mounted guardians will average 3 damage and don't have inspiring) is fairly rare. The problem with these situational counters (and it's not specific to krieg of course) is that you can't rely on them, and you quickly run out of formations capable of doing it if you need to do it more than once (ie three of those inf coys).

To be honest most of the strategies I have thought up for dealing with krieg have been around playing the player if you like (trying to get them to do things which are contrary to the best usage of their army). Which of course tends not to work against the best opponents, who know how they're going to use their formations and aren't so easily distracted

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Don't go easy it'll only be better when we win

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And to bring us back to the thread, my tournament summary (long note warning) . . .

After a very late night (4 hours sleep) and an unusually gruelling 5.5 hour car journey to Manchester, I got out my slightly experimental Eldar "Double Revenant" list with 14 activations including three formations each of Rangers, Night Spinners, Falcons and Warhosts.

Game 1: Richard (DKoK)
Oh dear! My usual Friday night 'practice game' was drawn against one of the top UK players with an army I have not played before. I chose 'sides' and set up fairly conventionally. Richard put two infantry formations mounted in Gorgons dead centre, and the last on his left flank. After some stalling activations, two warhounds doubled forwards and broke two Falcon formations, leaving me at an activation disadvantage and forcing me to activate stuff that he feared. In an attempt to fend off the advancing armoured horde I spread my remaining formations which only compounded the problems, and got trounced 4-0.

Game 2: Joe (Codex Marines)
Another top player, with a strong air-assault army, and Terminators just aching to chew up my weaker stuff !! This forced me to adopt my version of a 'tortoise', starting with the Eldar entirely surrounded by Rangers and then using a moving triangle of AA to form an umbrella under which the whole army slowly pushes forwards. The Marines tried to nibble at the flanks, but Eldar hit-n-run shooting and assaults repulsed or destroyed these. In the 3rd turn the Revenants tried to ambush the Marine BTS guarding their Blitz but failed to entirely destroy it, and I was not quite able to gain a decisive 2 point victory due to very canny Marine tactics by Joe.
Winning Draw to me.

Game 3: Simon (Dark Angel Marines)
Yet another tough match up. The Marines took one look at all the AA, and decided to start with their entire army off-table with all THawks empty, the Terminators teleporting and the Devestators ‘podding in while choosing corners to make my deployment ‘interesting’. I put my blitz unconventionally near the mid-point of the long table edge, but placed my now traditional castle along the short edge. Fortunately the Marines were fooled by this plan and I was able to avoid the spaceship bombardment, putting the Eldar in position to erase the Devastators when they arrived. Turn 2 saw the marines scared of my AA ‘tortoise’ so they chose not to teleport anything, leaving the Eldar to move across an entirely empty table-top (a very weird experience indeed!) and ended with the game still fairly even. However I made a couple of mistakes in turn three (leaving some formations intermingled and moving a Revenant formation to an isolated position where it was "Assaulted!!") which allowed the Marines to gain a winning draw.

Game 4: Mark (Necrons)
Another army I have heard about but never played. More by luck than judgement, I decided to set up in a corner that was almost entirely surrounded by terrain, which reduced the impact of Pylon fire. As the Necrons advanced the Eldar were able to keep the Pylons suppressed and then destroyed the Warbarque and a formation of Monoliths, so that the Necron phalanxes had to stay on the table. Finally the Eldar were able to erupt out of their corner to break the Necron BTS and claim T&H. As all broken Necrons must leave the table, and the BTS counted as 'destroyed' if off-table (something that I was unaware of), this gave me a 2-0 win.

+++++++++++++++
In the early hours of Sunday morning, various French students decided to hold a spirited debate outside my window for several hours. So I think I got around 4 hours disturbed sleep before the final games. I was not a 'happy bunny' to put it mildly !
+++++++++++++++

Game 5: Chris (Orks)
My games with Chris are always deeply enjoyable and this was no exception. We both set up and played very warily, each concerned with the potential shooting capabilities of the other. To break this circle, the Eldar advanced some Guardians under the AA cover of Falcons behind a large set of ruins. The Orks were able to break the Falcons by some lucky shooting and then break the Guardians with a Landa air assault. In return the Eldar destroyed the Landa and one Ork formation, breaking the other and paving the way for the Eldar to advance on that flank. The Orks attacked the feared Eldar artillery that were still on the Eldar baseline and then advanced the Great Gargant on their left flank. Over two turns the Eldar tried to destroy this Ork titan by shooting from many formations including the Revenants, but were unsuccessfull. With both sides circling clockwise into the opposing half of the table, this left a flat draw at the end of turn three when time was called.

Game 6: Dave (Tyranids)
I have always found the ‘Nids difficult opponents, especially in Dave’s hands so approached this game with some trepidation. With no ‘Nid fliers the Eldar spread out a little more, surrounding the Blitz with Rangers to prevent tunnelling ‘Nids from stealing it, and opposing the 'Nid Dominatrix BTS with the Revenants on the Eldar left flank. The Nids advanced other swarms up this flank despite sniping from the Revenants. In turn 2, the Eldar Aspect BTS warhost mounted a spoiling assault on a small Harridan formation hiding beyond some ruins – and my usual poor dice luck returned with a vengeance; the ‘Nids lost a single gargoyle, whilst the Eldar lost all eight Aspects and the assault. But this proved to be the ‘Nids high-water mark as I was able to kill off several other small ‘Nid formations leaving the Eldar poised for victory.
However I was physically exhausted at this point and just could not see what to do – Dave very sportingly indicated what was needed, thereby giving away the game and putting me into 3rd place.

Echoing the others I would like to thank everyone for the hard fought and most enjoyable games, and especially Dave both for organising the tournament – the Round Robin system published all the games beforehand was a superb idea that helped greatly – and for his patience and encouragement in our game.

Now Dave just needs to post the pictures he took

Well I didn't really give you the game Ginger... but with no activations left in turn 4 and you having 4 or so I couldn't sit back and not point out what I'd do in your shoes and had any of the 4 broken formations in your half (with a re-roll) managed to rally on a 4+ it would have been a points draw in your favour! Good game, which maybe I should have been more aggressive with my BTS... but it did fail to activate turn 2 which kinda sealed it as the ultimate Blitz guard!

I do plan to write up my games on my blog, with the pics I took over the weekend. Though I took less than I should as is usual.

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