You are correct, we don't care...Just kidding. Of course we want to see it!
Well, since you asked:
My lists for reference:
conflictchamber.com/#c4501b_-0U0F1e1e1v1v1h1h1h0te2kw1h2of02Bkj32___-0B0W191h1h1hi22k2ki4i4hZh_hZh_hZh_bBPre-WTC: The FluYep, I managed to be sick the day before the WTC. Luckily my will was strong and my girlfriend is amazing so after a more or less decent night of sleep, I managed to be in a somewhat presentable condition on Saturday morning, for our first challenger:
Round 1: Italy LuigiDavide Insinnia: Madrak 1 (/Kolgrimma 1) on Mirageconflictchamber.com/#c7501b_-0a4N9DiRjq4i0k0miTbKcCiT0b0c6l___-0Gj19DiRiXjq6Gj20li-iZiZezeziTbK My opponent had the choice between his Kolgrimma Storm of the North and Madrak 1 in Band of Heroes. Terminus has no game in the latter and Skarre mulches both quite handily, so my choice was easy. My opponent decides to go with Madrak 1.
He takes first turn, a wise choice, and runs up, with his Fenblades in the lead. I run up as well, but I don't go very far as I don't want to give up my alpha. After this my opponent makes the critical mistake of not pressing his advantage; rather than jamming his Fenblades in, he still skirts around my threat ranges, leaving his own flag contested and the middle flag only contested by a handful of Fenblades, with his Mauler being just outside of 4" and behind a building.
I consider for a few minutes if I should feat this turn, because my alpha on his army will still be quite bad, but I figure it's worth going for the scenario lead. So I feat on Skarre, Aiakos, all Stalkers and all heavies. I use a Stalker to tag the Mauler behind the house with Grievous Wounds and also take out a Fenblade or 2. A Stalker on the flank takes out a few more Fenblades that are blocking the way to the objective, one of the Slayers takes out another and then Kharybdis charges the objective, hitting it at dice +1 and taking it out in 2 swings , then buying two more on the Mauler, but fails to take out any aspects. I run the other Slayer to contest his flag, where Saxon is, the Siren scores the middle flag and Aiakos scores my back flag. Score 4-0 with one ARM 22 Slayer contesting his flag, 2 Stalkers, Kharbydis and the other Slayer in his zone.
My opponent quite handily kills the Stalkers, but the Champions on the left fail to take out the Slayer and the other Slayer and Kharybdis take superficial damage, with Kharybdis still having a function cortex and 1 arm and the Slayer being fully functional. He contests my flag and zone with a Fenblade each. My turn comes around and I kill both Fenblades, have the Overlords kill Saxon for sport and have Kharybdis, with Deathbringers up take some swings at an empty Madrak, but he doesn't even come close to killing him, so I just pass the turn to score 6-0.
Unfortunately only one other team member manages to win his game this round and we lose 2-3, but we're still quite happy with our result against a strong opponent.
Italy Luigi ends up going 4-2.
Round 2: England RosesMatt Townsend: Asphyxious 1 (/Deneghra 2) on Invasionconflictchamber.com/#c4501b_-0U0B1w1f1f1v1v1ve2kwj62k2B2Bkj32___-0Y0C1k1f1f1fkpkrkqks1R1Tkxkx1Nke1Nke Asphyxious had all the Satyxis and Deneghra was in Black Industries. The former actually scares me quite a bit as Satyxis can kill quite some infantry and the Feedback threat is real against Skarre 1. Also, while I know the matchup in theory, I had never played it. My opponent has no hope against either list with Denny, so the match turns out to be, quite predictably, Terminus vs Asphyxious.
I take first turn so he can take up less board space and my opponent actually feats bottom of 1 to try and take out 2 Bane Warrior Officers with Hellfires. Lucky for me, ARM 17 with 5 boxes leaves 1 alive (on one box). The rest of the game is just a massive grind, Bloodwitches ambush from the sides and keep basically 2 units of Banes busy for a while, Tartarus is invaluable the whole game to actually allow me to hit and Gunslingers struggle to take out ARM 17 Banes. My Tough rolls are not bad this game and after a decent Terminus feat where he's basically untouchable and me getting a couple of choice Annihilations off after that (hitting 4 models both times), Terminus is always on plenty of focus to murder stuff.
In the end my opponent has nothing left and I win on scenario, while also scoring 112 army points.
We manage to win this round 3-2 for our first victory of the weekend!
England Roses eventually goes 3-3.
Round 3: Portugal PrimePaulo Morais: Kolgrimma 1 (/Doomshaper 2) on Recon IIconflictchamber.com/#c7501b_-0bj1c6jp0h04jq7d6R0ki-6n6n___-0b539Dc6jp0h0jjq7dfF6R0k0m Both lists were in Power of Dhunia and the threat ranges of the Doomshaper list bothered me enough to leave Skarre out. Besides, Banes should quite handily deal with even a Mountain King. My opponent drops Kolgrimma.
It must be said that I have met Paulo a few times at WTC's over the years and Portugal has never been considered a very strong country. To my shame I must say that I underestimated him (and to my greater shame, it wasn't the first time) and for some reason my brain thought it was a good idea to get to just within 11" of Mulg, next to a house and with 6 Bane Knights in front, thinking that it would be difficult for him to remove the Knights and if he needed Rush that he would never be able to kill me. What a fool I was…
My opponent thinks for a long time about going for the kill and eventually does so, Kolgrimma feats and pushes the Knights so they are no longer B2B (they were 2 by 2, so push the first one, bump into the next then push the next away) Terminus bumps into Tartarus. She then charges a Bane Knight and sprays over all 6 of them + Terminus, she misses 1 and deals 1 damage to Terminus (no crit), the other Knights all die without passing a Tough roll. She then proceeds to tag Terminus with a Hunter's Mark (right, that's the one I forgot…), Vanishes out of the way and gives Rage to Mulg (crap). A couple of Runeshapers move up to eliminate the last Knight and Mulg charges Terminus. Everything moved rather fast here and I questioned my opponent's ability to reach him as he was only just within 11 before the feat and he was pushed away. My opponent claims to have measured it and when I remeasured to the flag, where Mulg was B2B with, it was indeed exactly within 11, by about 0.001 mm. Since the model had already moved, I couldn't really contest it anymore, so I resigned and let it happen. The charge attack then hits the boosted 7 it needs and at dice -1 (focus) he deals 14 damage (yeah), he buys and boost another attack which crits (there goes my hope of Tough) and slams me into the objective for enough damage to kill me through focus.
Through a combination of some luck and my own stupidity (no reason why I shouldn't have been a few millimetres further back) I lost this game that I was supposed to win.
Lucky for me,
bennep 's karma saves him on the other table (ask him about it, really) and we do manage to win the round 3-2. I would've never forgiven myself if we had lost this one because of me.
Portugal Prime ends up at 4-2, which proves that we/I should really stop underestimating them…
Round 4: Australia WobbegongBrian Woods: Vladimir 2 (/Butcher 1) on The Pit IIconflictchamber.com/#c3501b_-0T6ZkTeQl5l4l4l3l38M8I7Ml0l7l1jJ___-0T77f8l5l5l4l3l3l2l7l17QgdjJ Both these lists are in Armored Corps with a Viktor, which scares me as I had never played against the new version. My opponent picks a table with lots of clouds, telegraphing his pick, which was rather good for me as, unlike the Butcher list, his Vlad list had no Aiyana & Holt. Feated Man-O-Wars can outthreat Stalkers and match Kharybdis, so I decide not to throw Skarre into the grinder and drop Terminus. My opponent has his Viktor on one flank and his Assault Chariot on the other.
I run forward, spacing out against the fire AoE. The Viktor doesn't accomplish much, but the chariot kills a couple of Warriors and manages to drift onto a Stalker, taking out the arms. It must be said that my Tough rolls were quite hot this turn, but it mattered little as there were plenty of shots to go around anyway.
Seeing as I have basically no way to deal with the durable battle engine with reposition anyway, I sacrifice the Stalker by just going to stand B2B to it, so I can at least restrict its movement. Banes run forward while still spreading out and Terminus repositions more to the flank to stay out of 14" of the unit of Shocktroopers in the middle. My opponent feats on 5 of the Shocktroopers and places them in the middle zone, dealing some damage to my army in the process. He has Bond of Brotherhood up on the Demolition Corps.
My turn I think about feating but ARM 24 with Retaliatory Strike up is going to be too much of a bother. I do send in some Banes on the unit, including the one in the back that is not feated, but I still leave him on 1 box and the other (feated) one on 5 or so. I also feed the Assault Chariot some Banes to keep it busy again. Terminus is seeing the Viktor come dangerously close so I sacrifice my Wraith Engine to charge into the Shocktroopers, accomplishing exactly nothing, but as he is now corporeal, he's a nice road block in the middle of the table for Terminus to hide behind. My opponent also had no presence in his rectangular zone, so I manage to kill his objective and camp a Stalker in it to go to 2-0. My opponent easily dispatches the Wraith Engine and kills more things, among which is my objective so we go to 2-1.
Now it's go time. Terminus feats and takes out 2 Shocktroopers that are tagged with Grievous Wounds from an earlier Stalker, he does some damage on the others, but leaves himself empty while not killing any others. Banes then proceed to kill 2 Tankers, 1 more Shocktrooper, Atanas and a couple of Demolition Corps, putting Terminus at ARM 25, though empty, but Vlad is too far and I feel quite safe.
Brian is getting low on clock so needs to start getting shit done, he kills some things, but his Shocktroopers are unable to touch Terminus even with Hand of Fate and boosts available. He wanted to get the Viktor there, but it didn't work out. Vlad exposed himself trying to clear some lanes, so after the Banes and Stalker deal with the Shocktroopers (don't want a crit freeze to mess everything up), Terminus swoops in for the kill.
It was a great game that both of us started unsure about what was going to happen. I though the Viktor would take out most of my army and my opponent thought I would scythe through his army with all the Banes. Neither of us was completely right and I actually feel that Butcher would've been a better choice for him as the list had more shooting overall.
We again win the round 3-2 and are starting to be quite pleased with ourselves.
Australia Wobbegong ends up at 3-3.
Round 5: Austria DandyDaniel Pawelka: Grim1 (/Kolgrima 1) on Standoffconflictchamber.com/#c7501b_-0G590rc6jqfIj20ki-iZezj4j0___-0Gj104040404jqj6fJj20li-iZiZezeziTbK Both lists are in Storm of the North and I make my second big blunder of the weekend. There were multiple signs that my opponent would go with Grim:
1. He looked (and was) hungover and Kolgrimma would just give him a headache
2. It's Grim 1 on Standoff
I should've really gone with Terminus, even if I assumed he would drop Kolgrimma, because it has the better game into both and Skarre is quite weak into Grim as it eliminates her alpha. I still somehow decide for myself that he would drop Kolgrimma and drop Skarre, he of course drops Grim, crap…
He takes first turn and moves up. I move up and have to manoeuvre well to keep everything out of 20" of the Mountain King, yay. I put an Overlord near the side to bait the ambush from his Lookouts. He indeed ambushes and feats, positioning his Bears in one zone, Fire Eaters in the other and Raiders all around. He also leaves 1 Stalker on 1 box of movement. I'm Firetrucked and continue to mess it up more, I get hung up on killing the Lookouts with Skarre's Blood Rain after the Overlords completely fail to do anything. I then move her away, at the edge of the kill box and still outside 20 of the Mountain King. I then limp the Stalker over next to the Raider contesting my zone and of course fail to kill him. I should've activated the Withershadow Combine first to try and blast him. I run one Ripjaw into the right zone so he at least doesn't score there, but I'm still too conservative. My opponent scores his own zone and I don't, because of the Raider and the score is 1-0 at the end of my turn 2. He easily clears the Stalker on 1 box, kills the Ripjaw and shoots down my objective to score 5-0.
I Firetrucked up this game right from the beginning and then neglected to meaningfully contest, granting my opponent an easy victory. I probably still would've lost if I sacrificed a Slayer to contest his zone, but at least it would've been a game. At least I managed to not get assassinated, so small victory.
We lose the round 3-1 (with 1 double-loss due to dice down), even though one of us pulled a really impressive stunt winning his game that was supposed to be a pretty bad matchup.
Austria Dandy goes 5-1.
Round 6: France GoudurixSébastien Jeoffroy: Harbinger 1 (/Amon 1) on Spread the Netconflictchamber.com/#c2501b_-0d171U1U1U1U1q1ql_l_7jlM1L3C3t3t3z3z3B2____-0Om1l_3Ume3k7jjC3E3C3t3t2Sip3O3F3H3G3H We're at 3 victories and we face a French team, arch nemesis of the Walloon players in our team and very tough opponents in general. Sébastien has Harbinger in Faithful Masses and Amon in Creator's Might, he can't ever drop Amon against the Bane spam and I'm not too sure if Skarre can deal with all that infantry even if she has Grievous Wounds coming out of her ears, so we end up with Terminus facing off against Harbinger.
My opponent starts early by taking out half the boxes of a Stalker by running an Idrian close-by and shooting it with his Deliverers, well played. I then mess up and forget to move this Stalker which means he can take it out next turn. Lucky for me, my opponent then forgets to activate his Monk which is important later, because it ends up having to run to contest my zone, meaning no stance up and I can take it out easily with a Stalker.
It's worth noting that there was some dispute on the table next to us and my opponent was distracted (I actually had to wait for him on my clock for a while), the clock was paused a couple of times and somewhere along the course of my second turn, we notice that the time is on his clock. We come to an agreement that after my turn, I give him 8 minutes on my clock during his, a timer is set to accommodate.
The rest of the game is not all that special, stuff dies on both sides (Harbinger and her Martyrdom can't be everywhere), her feat is annoying but doesn't block me completely, I take out both his heavies and with the Sanctifier gone I can use my Wraith Engine at the end of the game to go contest his flag that the Champion was scoring. In the end my opponent is so low on clock that he just says "forfeit everything" and passes the clock, with 2 seconds left, that's actually without rolling for Corrosion on his book. At this point the score was 6-5 and I score again on my turn to go to 6-6.
There was some dispute here about if it was turn 6 or 7 as my opponent thought it would be over and even didn't see how I got to the tied score. He eventually accepts that it's 6-6 and it doesn't matter if I get another turn (and he effectively doesn't) to go to 6-8 or we stop it there because I would win on army points destroyed. My opponent, understandably, feels a bit salty about the clock thing, because maybe he would've had more time, but we sadly couldn't know that.
We end up very narrowly winning the round 3-2 which propels us to the 14th place at 4 wins, 2 losses, for the best Belgian placing ever
Epilogue My pairing actually managed to work, which is a little surprising, since I only settled on that Skarre list about a month before list deadline. Before that I was fiddling around with Denny 2, but she never managed to do proper work for me.
I did manage to dodge most of the Take Down matchups, or got handed the one where Skarre excells, so Terminus, with the three Bane Warrior mini-feats and Tough all around, really managed to shine. The access to 3 Stalkers also really helps the list as they can take out annoying support or get some pretty much guaranteed (no Tough and accurate) souls for the feat.
I also still love that Skarre list to bits for being outside the norm of Dark Host, which wouldn't pair well with Terminus anywa
y, and for the sheer amount of tools the list has available (couple of Carapace heavies that are almost impossible to dislodge with the feat up, long threat ranges, high accuracy, Grievous Wounds everywhere, magic weapons)
I probably could've gone 6-0 if I hadn't made the mistakes I did, but it didn't matter for the team victories in the end, so that stings a little less.
I'd like to thank all of my wonderful opponents that again helped to make this event a blast to attend and my team for really getting it together. It must be said that in the months up to the WTC we were all a bit insecure about our pairings and team composition, but we all really pulled through as a team and I'm very proud of all of them!