Aventine, Oh My Aventine!

Here we are, Game 7 of WarGames Con - the last and final game.

As I'm moving my stuff, TastyTaste comes over to my table and tells me I'm in the running for the second day RTT.  I didn't believe him.

We also worked out the bit about cheating; check out this video.  What's most funny is the bit that went right over everyone's heads... watch the video then Google 'Double-Knuckle Shuffle.'  There was a reason I said Aventine would go right over the table at me!

Good times, good times.
Okay, this is me stealing Aventine's work... this is his report on the game, copied from his blog:

• Primary- Capture and Control. Control both for 20, one for 10.
• Secondary- Scaled Victory Points, 13 points max.
• Tertiary-Kill more enemy units than they kill of yours, 9 points.
• Bonus
• +1 if you ever control the enemy objective
• +1 if the enemy never contests your objective
• +1 if your opponent has no surviving Elites
• +1 if your opponent has no surviving Fast Attack
• +1 if your opponent has no surviving Heavy Support
• Dawn of War deployment

The final game of this marathon of a tournament was against Brent (of Strictly Average) and his versatile Daemons. First game of the tournament I got first turn, and I opted to go second. He had four Tzeentch Heralds on Chariots, max Fiends, minimum pairs of Plague Bearers and Horrors, and three shooty, walking Daemon Princes of Tzeentch. I again deployed my commander and the Death Company. The SanguinorThe Sanguinor, who was eventually killed by it. Once more, it came down to my Storm Shield Terminators and their inability to fail saves. Also, the fragility of the majority of his units meant I was able to scrape back in (the Heralds in particular seemed like glass cannons). We ended up drawing the Primary, while I got 10 for the Secondary, and won the Tertiary. 31/47.

That's a fairly concise summary.  We tied the Primary, I won the Secondary, and he won the Tertiary.  Ultimately it was enough to get me best general... the Best of the Worst, as I like to point out.  Of course, Kenny from the Wrecking Crew actually won the Sunday RTT with the Best Overall spot.  I probably don't point that out enough.

Moving on, check out the first picture, above.  It was a Dawn of War deployment and Aventine had the Sanguinor and the Death Co. in Rhino pushing 24" at the center.  As an aside, notice I took the side with the building.  I can never, ever, EVER afford to give that advantage to my opponent.  Fiends can't climb stairs!

I pulled out the gate hard.  Most of my stuff was on the table by Turn 2.  I dropped the Death Company's ride early and put shots into the Sanguinor.  Both of those jumped out of the wreckage and attacked my Daemon Prince, which I was fine with.  He's pretty fantastic in close combat and I knew he'd hold a turn.  My Fiends dropped in the backfield and swept the board...

Running right into a pretty incredible Terminator squad.  The Sanguinor upgrades a Sgt. - and behold!  He picks the Terminator Sgt. - that was a rock I broke my head on.  Unreal tough.

My Fiends on the left are fighting the Terminators I just mentioned while the Fiends on the right are helping out the DP against the Death Company.  The DP has already put paid to the Sanguinor.  What a *SELF-EDIT* (kitty-cat).

The Drop Pod was a pain, mostly because I had to ignore it for awhile, there being more pressing things to do.  Then I forgot to charge him... then he returned the favor and forgot to charge me!  Those little mistakes are costly.

I'm moving toward the right flank.  The slow movement of the Daemon Princes hurt this game.  I usually centralize them for this reason.  It's another reason I use the Heralds on Chariots a lot - they have the mobility the DP's lack. 

See the Horrors on the far right?  Basically, Aventine - who's a smart cookie - started targeting my mobile Troops, so I had to consider what I'd capture his objective with.  I ran them all the way around that building, basically reserving them for use later.  The game goes on and the quality of the Space Marines starts shining through.  My stuff suffers when I start losing models, but a Marine is a Marine - down to the last model.

The Land Raider is a huge pain.  I basically ignored it all game.  He broke an axle trying to get through the terrain to attack my Horrors.  If Aventine made a mistake, that was it.  That Raider could have parked on his objective and he could have used the rest of his army to contest mine. 

The Land Raider Redeemer is the tank I fear the most.  My usual strategy is to ignore the Raiders - of whatever stripe - but the Redeemer is hard to ignore.  I hate it!  It's actually making me consider other anti-tank options, like DP's with Wings and Unholy Might.

I owned my objective.  Aventine realized if he tried to take both he'd lose both, so he staked his game on a draw.  That was by far the best move, and my chances were slim of destroying the Rhino and the models inside in the last turn, and Aventine knew it.

I think I surprised him by wanting to play out the last assault of the last turn, since I'd need 6's to hit, then I'd need to destroy the tank, then he'd have to die in the explosion... that's 3 Marines, if I recall correctly.  Obviously those odds are astronomical, and I wasn't worried about it - I was happy with the game, regardless - but I just didn't want to end it early.

It was such a barn-burner I wanted to see what would happen!  It would have been a shame to stop early, even if it was three rolls of the dice early.

Anyway, that's it!  Thoughts?  Questions?  Concerns?  Gropings?