The First 6th Edition Tournament In Lansing: Aftermath

Well This weekend marked the first 6^th edition 40k tournament of the Lansing area. 16 Warriors descended on Evolution Games and fought on the field of battle. Congratulations goes out to AFK games native and fellow Seer Paul Steiner and his Eldar war-host. He beat out CVintons Necrons for top honors. He also put my Dark kin in their place in round one of the tournament. Dark Future Games own CVinton took 2^nd while Lord Solar Steve took 3^rd and local regular and outright lucky Git Austin Proux took 4^th.

I was middle of the pack being edged out by one battle point by The Judge. I have to say I am still feeling out 6^th edition. The new meta seems to be leaning towards shooting. As such I constructed a list to take objectives and dish out lots of Daka. So I went the Kabalite Warrior route.

HQ: Duke Sliscus

Troops: 9x Kabalite Warriors with Sybarite and blaster. Raider with Night Shields and Splinter Racks

Troops: 10x Kabalite Warriors with Sybarite Blaster and Dark Lance. Raider with Night Shields and Splinter Racks.

Troops: 10x Kabalite Warriors with Sybarite Blaster and Dark Lance. Raider with Night Shields and Splinter Racks.

Troops: 10x Kabalite Warriors with Sybarite Blaster and Dark Lance. Raider with Night Shields and Splinter Racks.

Troops: 5x Kabalite Warriors with blaster mounted on Venom with Night Shields and Splinter cannon

Troops: 5x Kabalite Warriors with blaster mounted on Venom with Night Shields and Splinter cannon

Heavy: Void Raven Bomber with 2 Monoscythe missiles and 2 shatterfield missiles

Heavy: Ravager with Night Shields and 3 Dizzys

Heavy: Ravager with Night Shields and 3 Dizzys

The list worked reasonably well although I am still learning the nuances of the Dark Kin in 6^th. There is basically zero room for tactical mistakes. Splinter Racks are one of the keys of the list. Since you can shoot from the back of the Raider making all the warriors shooting, at least splinter weapons, twin linked is pretty nice. It helps with snap shots a ton and if you only move 6 inches with the Raider you can use full ballistic skill. The other key is distance from the enemy, which can be very hard to maintain. The speed of just about every army has increased and the Dark Eldar, although they have a slight edge, did not get a whole ton faster than the other armies. This is where the Night Shields come in. With the exception of the Tau the night shields allow you to keep units just in your range and your Raiders out of range. Heavy weapons aside that is. As long as you move 6 inches you can fire at full ballistic skill and you have a 5+ jink save with a Raider and a Venom.

This worked rather well in game one, with the exception of the Harlequin unit that I could not get range to. When his Nightwing, Forgeworld 40K approved units were allowed, came in after my Voidraven did I knew its fate was sealed. I have another trick to share, which borders on the transition gray area. It involves an Exarch and a Aegis defense line quad gun. Regardless I lost momentum and the Craftworlders wore me down in a war of attrition.

Round two was a heart breaker. Local Chaos Marine player Austin is known for basically one thing. Having hot dice when its a clutch moment. Truth be told I should take this kid to the casino and have him throw some dice on the tables. I had his army basically wiped off the table. A allied ratling was turtled up in a set of ruins while little over half my army was trying to kill a plague marine who was holding the relic, aka primary objective for the round. I tried but alas after 7 turns the 2 models were still alive and victory was stolen from me. If I had won or at least denied the primary to him I would have placed. Oh well.

Round three was a massacre. I wiped a blood angels with codex allies army from the face of existence in 3 turns.

So I am going to continue to tweak this list. I have talked over some tactical issues on my part with opponents and list related development stuff with Wolfson, he is running a similar list, and I am going to make a couple changes as I got 3 very good games in.

So more on that later. Later this week I am going to talk about fortifications and terrain. I have some mixed feelings on the new options.

Until Next time........

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!!!!!!!