The Craftworld Open At UCON: The Missions

As promised I have the missions for the upcoming “Craftworld Open” which will be taking place on October 28^th at Ucon. Registration is still open and can be done at the conventions website www.Ucon-gaming.org. I am keeping it simple. I have decided to go with missions from the man rule book. They are decent and are multi tiered in terms of ways to score victory points. So here we go.

Mission 1

Deployment: Dawn of War ( 12 inch deployment zone along the long table edge)

Mission: Purge The alien

1 VP is scored for each unit destroyed. Units in retreat or not on the board are counted as destroyed at the end of the game.

Slay the warlord, First Blood and Line breaker are in effect. Night fighting and reserves are also used.

Mission 2

Deployment: Classic table Quarters( table divided into quarters with a 12 inch diameter no mans land in the center)

Mission: The Relic

3 VP's are scored for possession of the Relic at the end of the game. Slay the Warlord, First Blood are in effect. Night fighting and reserves are also in effect.

Mission 3

Deployment: Hammer and Anvil

Mission: Big Guns Never tire

set up d3+2 objectives. Each held objective is worth 3 VP's at the end of the game. 1 VP is earned for each heavy support choice destroyed.

Heavy support units count as scoring units.

Night fight and reserves rules are in effect.

So there you have it. I will of course have a complete mission pack for the tournament. I like posting missions as this allows you to prepare your lists accordingly. If there are any rules questions feel free to contact me via the blog email Seerkarandras@gmail.com.

Next time I will be going over the changes I made to the footdar list. I got in a game with CVinton and his 13^th company space wolves. He ran a rather familiar list just to try it out. Grey Hunters, Blob Squads and Long Fangs oh my! The results of the game were surprising and gave me a big boost of hope for the Eldar in the months leading up to a new codex.

Until next time.................

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

The Craftworld Open At Ucon

Well I have been asked to run an event at UCON this year. For those of you not familiar with UCON, it is a Game convention that is based in the Ypsilanti Ann Arbor area of Michigan. The convention has been going on for quite a few years. It covers the width and breadth of games. Role playing, board games, card games and of course war games.

I will be running a Tournament at UCON this year on Sunday October 28^th. The “Craftworld Open” as I am calling it, will be an 1850 tournament using the standard force organization. Allies and Fortifications will be allowed. I am encouraging players to bring painted armies, but it is not a necessity. Models must be fully built though and WYSIWYG. If the tournament does well I may require painted armies in the future.

The cost to participate is $15.00. A day pass to the Convention is $10 dollars and $5 dollars to register for the tournament once you have your convention pass. Registration information can be found at www.Ucon-gaming.org. The convention is being held at the Marriott Ann Arbor/ Ypsilanti at Eaglecrest. It starts Friday, so if you are a gamer in general I would check out the events they are having over the weekend. There is a special deal on rooms for $79 a night with the promo code UCOUCOA. I will be down for the weekend hanging out with my Ypsi Seer Council.

I will be posting Missions next week and giving more details on prizes as well as pimping our sponsors. This should be a fun time. I have heard many say they wish there was a nice Game convention in Michigan. Its the gamers like you that make those events possible. So come out and support a local convention and play some games. I hope to see you there.

Well next time I will be discussing the continuing evolution of my Footdar.  I would like to get my win record up a bit.  I have added some more long range fire power to the list to make it more effective.  I fealt the long range punch was lacking versus foot units.   Also the time of Chaos is nigh. I have a feeling, judging from the pictures, that we are all going to have our hands full as the first official 6^th edition codex drops. The legions are stirring and the Eye Of Terror is opening to spill its foulness into the galaxy. OST is getting 2 codexs in a row........its not fair.

Until next time....................

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

If Ya Can't Beat Them...........Start An Army

Well I have partaken of the Kool Aide. I started a Necron army. I am still of course playing my Eldar and Dark Eldar, but after one game using a rather hodge podge list I decided to start up an army. Being on the receiving end of successive beatings by the forces of the Tomb Worlds got me thinking. What better way to beat my foe than to join them. Play the army and come to understand its weaknesses and strengths, then exploit the weakness with my other armies.

So I have picked up a command Barge aka “The Douche Canoe” a squad of 10 Immortals, 5 Death Marks and Nemesor Zahndrekh with his trusty bodyguard Vargard Obyron. I have them assembled and I plan on actually making an effort to get them painted before I buy more. Although if I can find legs and chest pieces from the many bits merchants on Ebay and such I will be building more Immortals and Death Marks from the bits leftover from my current built units.

BigMek SkrapKlaw and I got a game in with my “Codex Tour” army list so I could try out some of the units and get a feel for the army. As it stands it is a very powerful codex and actually has lots of leeway when it comes to tactical errors and the loss of units effect on the whole army. There are also many dirty little tricks that are fully supported by the FAQ.

So why Nemesor Zahndrekh? Well The character appeals to me. Also I didn’t want to step on The Stormlords toes and take his namesake. I figured it would be ok just being a General in the undying armies of the Necrotyr. I am also planning on playing with Trazyn The Infinite as I find this character highly entertaining. Of course I will also run just dual overlords as having just one command barge kind of leaves it open to lots and lots of fire.

I did have a though about the Command barge though. The main strength of the Command Barge is that it is a very effective harassment unit. Its effective against vehicles, very effective, and it can thin units out a bit all using its sweep attack. Zahndrekh is a nice HQ because of his ability to strip units of their universal special rules and to let units deep strike on your opponents turn. Granted your units must be able to deep strike to begin with to take advantage of this rule.

So I have been mulling it around a bit and the way I am reading it, the rule states you can Deep strike any number of your units that can deep strike. So it sounds like I can deep strike all of my units if just one enemy unit deep strikes. It also sounds as if I don’t need to make a reserve roll. Unless this is implied, and should be actually stated, that for a unit to deep strike it must make a reserve roll. So I can drop all my deep striking units on my opponents turn. This really would mess with an opponent. All of a sudden their plan of attack has to alter, maybe radically, to deal with your entire army on the board after they only have one unit come in. I am exploring this ability and seeing what I can do and what use it is. I like the idea of dropping a monolith on the opposing force, especially when I can use it to deploy reserve troops in the enemy deployment zone enmasse on my actual turn.

It also occurs to me that Night Scythes and Doom Scythes also can deep strike. Flayed ones can as well. I definitely must explore this ability more it seems untapped and left behind in the wake of Tesla spam and Colombian Death Squads.

I am also taking hard looks at Immortals and Warriors as my Troop Choices. Immortals are better. They have better weapon options and have a bit more survivability. The more I read the more I lean towards the Immortals. Now Warriors did take a hit on armor, but the rapid fire rules changing did make the Gauss Flayer better. As long as you use squads of warriors in conjunction with Ghost Arcs you get an increase in survivability. The Ghost Arcs are also very robust, despite being open topped. You can add warriors every turn and really gives the Necron army that undying feeling.

Well I have a lot of studying to do before I buy any more models. This army must be planned as there are lots of different options and possibilities. There are great units that all fit into an army because of good distribution in the force organization chart.

Lots of research, studying and playing indeed. It will be a good filler until the Eldar Codex comes out. Then the real fun can begin.

I will be making an announcement this weekend as well. I have been asked to run a 40K tournament this year at Ucon. I will have details Saturday both here and on Dark Future Games. This is a game convention in the Ann Arbor area that has been running for years. I am glad to be part of a local convention. Look for details Saturday.

Until next time.........................

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

Footdar: The New Black

Well I have a couple games in with the new Footdar list. I am in at one win and a very close Tie. As in my opponent had to really work to get a tie. With all the changes in 6^th I have to say that I think The Footdar are the way to go now when running Craftworld Eldar on the table, at least in my opinion.

Space Marines got tougher. Well I should say that things with a 2+ armor save got tougher. There is a lack of sufficient AP 2 in many armies to deal with the hordes of Terminators people seem to be keen on fielding now. Granted the real key to winning games in 6^th edition is going troop heavy and I mean trying your damnedest to max out your troop slots and trying to gain more scoring units in another slot.

As it stands the Footdar list is clocking in at 5 troop units. I have two standard guardian squads, a Storm Guardian squad, a Guardian Jet Bike squad and a Squad of Dire Avengers. Although the Guardians are not as resilient as other troop choices they make up for the fact in numbers. As always you bolster them with a Farseer and the close proximity of an Avatar of Khaine.

The only real issue I have been having is close combat. If a dedicated close combat unit of size hits the guardian unit it gets shredded very fast. The Avatar is the only thing keeping the unit in combat if there are any survivors. This issue is really made worse by terminators and things with a 2+ save.

Of course my solution to this issue is to run the Fire Prisms. I have 2 in the list thus far. They have proven to be very valuable so far. In the past I have been weary for some reason about using them. They have been targeted and eliminated quickly in the past.

Massed fire has also been pretty good in dealing with those hard targets. I have an 8 man Warp Spider unit jumping around the battlefield supporting the Guardians. These guys have been pretty effective so far. Deep Striking behind my opponents army seems to be stalling forward progress. The only real issue is that stalling the opposing force limits what I can do to them at range.

This my friends is the only real big issue I am having with my Footdar list. Range. This was really evident with the short table edge deployment. Night fight aside all I had to handle the parking lot of Razorbacks was 2 Fire Prisms and a Night Spinner. Although the Prisms are adept at killing armor its hard slowing down a mechanized force with only 2 of them.

The Warp Spiders helped mitigate the range issue a bit and kept the army occupied but I couldn't bring enough fire to bear and wipe out units before they reached my lines. So I am looking at options. The Night Spinner may be removed and swapped out for something with a good amount of ranged fire. I am considering War Walkers or possibly a unit of Dark Reapers. This of course means reallocating points and shifting some points around.

So progress with the Eldar is slow but I am relearning the army in this new edition. I know once I get in the groove the new codex will drop and the process will start all over again. I do have a side project started though, besides the Dark Eldar that is. I will have more on that later though. One Elder race at a time.

Until next time...........

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