Remembrance Day Challenge 2001

The event is held at one of the conference halls up at UNBC [University of Northern British Columbia]. It is a great venue and we must all thank the UNBC Gaming Club for securing the space for us.

I must say that it was a great weekend all in all. I went in expecting to do poorly in battle points and was resigned to that fate. I had the attitude that my Tau would look good dying and that was about it. The reason for this attitude is that 40K is won in the HtH phase and the Tau can't fight at all. However, the Tau are more of a 'thinking man's army' and if you move correctly, place terrain well, deploy well, prioritize targets and have a bit 'o luck you can win without being able to engage in HtH. I actually avoided HtH in 3 of my 6 games and was able to work through the HtH in 2 of the others. My last game was brutal, not only was I playing the guy with the most Battle Points [I was 3rd at that point] but I had poor luck and didn't play all that well. Needless to say the result for that mission were humbling, I was wiped out to a Tau, ouch!

Of the six games we played only ONE was a standard mission. The rest were totally crazy and while they favoured the HtH army [IMHO] they were very fun and challenging. The event is strictly timed with 2 hours to play and 15 minutes to set up. This strict time frame and my game focused mind are why I have so few actual game play pics. I will try to be more diligent next year. [note: for some reason my camera dislikes non-macro work and so many of the pics are slightly blurry]

The event is done Swiss style with the people with the most battle points playing the people with the most battle points and so on. You never play the same guy twice and this ensures you have challenging games throughout the tournament. The event organizer has a laptop in the back room where he compiles all the scores and generates matched pairings.

Without further ado I will get into the actual games. The first game was a Cleanse. The victory point bonus' were different, one was +1 for controlling a hill. We didn't ever read that and it was just lucky that I had a squad on a hill from the beginning. I played an Ork army that was modeled very well and painted in true Ork fashion. He had a boy break dancing, mooning, a truck boy drinkin' a bottle of beer...I actually forgot I had my camera until late in the game so no real pics of his army. I had first placement so I pinned him back in his quarter and then had the good luck to go first. I have 10 markerlights in my army so my shooting results were usually not too bad. In the first turn I destroyed a looted Land Raider and 2 trucks with my broadsides and command squad and then the stealth suits started their continual destruction of boyz by killing 9. By turn 4 his boss was alive along with a battery of lobbas and a small number of boyz. My stealth suits actually held off about 30 on their flank, eventually killing them to a boy.

The warboss eventually died under heavy fire from the command squad and eventual anilation by a shot from a broadside.

Game 2 was against an all Sister's of Battle army. No militia at all, but lots of preachers and such. This mission was straight victory points with a mission twist. The mission was called, 'The Eye of Terror' and the twist reflected the instability of the Eye. At the beginning of any of your turns you could deep strike any unit on the board to another point on the board. Well, this is all good but neither of us wanted to risk loosing victory points by utilizing this ability. He killed my pathfinders and I killed a battle squad of sisters and a rhino and that was it.

This is a picture of my turn 3, after my pathfinders had been ripped apart by a squad of heavy bolters.

The terrain wasn't all that good for me and Dave made good use of cover to protect himself from my long range guns.

Very short game where we were actually playing for a tie or slight win rather than an outright win. Lucky for me I was facing a shooting army or it would have gotten nasty.

Game 3 was against one of 3 Space Wolf armies I would fight. The mission was called 'Planet Fall' and I can think of no scarier mission for the Tau. Each one of your units is placed using deep strike, alternating with your opponent. With this kind of set up there is no way to optimize fire lanes and have good fire support from the special units. So, I placed my units all over the board in an ordered fashion but with no cohesion. I did this so that I wouldn't get overwhelmed by having my army in one place and his army all around me and becasue it was a quarter claiming mission. After deployment I knew I had to go first, because in the first turn there was ONLY shooting allowed. So, if I went first I would have 2 turns of shooting before he could get onto HtH. I rolled a '3' and he rolled a '1'. He opted to re-roll as a Space Wolf with a venerable dread and rolled a '2'. The odds are pretty low that this would happen so I had been blessed with a 'chance'. I eventually won 4 quarters to 2. I know the outcome would have been different if he had had first turn.

These are picture of Rene's army.

Game 4 was a serious test of the fire power of a Tau army. I went head to head with an Armoured Fist Co in a mission to get out of your deployment and into your opponents. Terrain set-up was huge, we have always said that you can place pieces on top of pieces and so I put a hill ontop of the hill he had placed in the middle of the board. I pinned him with a braodside on the hill and then placed a second one there as well. It looked like a fire base from a Vietnam movie. Pathfinders and Shas'ui markerlights were the component that allowed me to win. I seemed to be hitting on 2+ with every big shot and was able to destroy all his transport vehicles. By doing this, and completely ignoring the battle tanks I was able to cripple his ability to enter my deployment zone. By the 3rd turn of 6 he had to start moving his tanks out so he could get to my deployment zone. This freed up my army to move for his zone. Pulse rifles are deadly against guard, wound on 2 with no save is gross.

Turn 5 with little fear from my army of his tanks because he would have to move 12" in his next two turns to get into my deployment.

More pics of Chris' great looking Armoured Fist Co.

Chris works for the tournament organizer and as you can see from his display base terrain, he was invaluable as the terrain creator for the store. Each table had 2 sets of trees, 2 hills, 2 ruined buildings and a misc. piece. The top 4 tables had 8-9 pieces.

Game 5 was against my second Space Wolf opponent. He has a very themed army with little wargear and no transport vehicles. He was also number 2 for battle points proving that Space Wolf armies are viable even without heaps of power weapons and rhinos. The mission was a victory point game with an extra 200 pts for each messenger you got off a certain spot in the opponents deployment zone. We each had 3 messengers with altered stat lines, gun and a 4+ inv. save. I went first and this game was actually won in this turn. I mean, we still had to put the nails in the coffin but my shooting was so amazing that I got the upper hand quick. I markerlighted both his predators and railed them into the ground. Then I jumped my command squad up on a hill and killed 4 of his 5 terminators, doing a wound on the leader. I then jumped back and he had nothing to shoot at. His scouts caused me massive damage and disruption eventually weakening my right side enough that his Rune Priest and Grey hunters got in close and personal with my stealth suits and Ethereal. When my ethereal died [squished by a thunder hammer] I rolled bad and much of my army broke. I was lucky that in my turn I rallied all but one unit that ran off the board. In the end it was a dead tie but I had managed to get 2 messengers off so I was able to win.

This is a picture of Darcy's army. It has two different colours of grey because it has been painted over a period of 10 years and his taste in colour changed.

Ok, now onto the worst defeat of my playing career. I have often dished out this kind of punishment with my nids and Blood Angels and it really does leave you stunned. Not a Tau left alive, every life sacrificed to the greater good. The mission was Cleanse with night fight first turn. Notice this is NOT Dawn Assault as that has a 24" deployment distance between opponents. We set up 18" from each other and after the game I feel that contributed to my eventual demise. My opponent is an amazingly competent general and we have had many games, even attending the 2000 Seattle GT together. I knew from the get go it was going to be tough and so made my first mistake. I should have been playing for a tie but instead I put my head out too far to try for an eventual win and my neck was cut. All in all a good game, proper placement and movement were violently hammered home and I doubt I will make those mistakes again. Sorry, no pictures of Matt's army as it is only partly painted as wolves, Dark Angels and bare metal.

Other well painter armies that I didn't play but photographed during paint judging.

Jordy's Bel-Tan Sword Wind army.

Butch's Dark Angel army. Tied for Best Overall.

Matt's Sister of Battle army. Notice the crazy exorcist launchers.

Conan's Necron army. He had 10 Destroyers on the hills to ether side of this picture.

Best Painted: Desmond did a great job bringing this army to life. Vibrant highlights, great conversions, details like lightning throughout the army, squad markings, flame and exhaust. Great job and an excellent army on the table. I adjusted the light metering of my camera for his command squad pics and none of them turned out. It was very cool and maybe I will try to get a couple of shots down at the store.