NZ Teams Championships - Wellington - 16 Teams of 4

Dropping into Team 'Ham', of Nick M (Cap, Daemons), Paul (Lizards), Rowan (Dwarves) and I. Rowan had stepped up as our resident Chaos Warrior player had discovered that he had booked 'Bruce Springsteen tickets' on the same weekend. We Road tripped it to Wellington and used the 5hr Drive to do all the match up process we hadn't had time to do in the last three months. Who does home work anyways. Here's my Army and take note, I don't have the Banner of the world Dragon on the Whitelions.

 Banner of the World Dragon on White lions?? but they are T3 infantry, I'd consider it if the unit was a 25+ unit.

Saturday morning and it's in Kandallah a small sleepy suburb just on the out skirts of Wellington. Little did the small township know that it was going to be decended on by 64 rabid Miniature playing Wargamers. Hence I guess the lack of open cafes and Doughnut Shops in the morning. The 2 cafes and the local Hell's Pizza were mightily friendly after, as soon as they discovered that Wargaming builds an appetite.

Straight onto my Games. As I was looking for a relaxed weekends gaming I left it to El'Capitaine to guide the team from our matchup matrix. It turns out that the it worked pretty well actually when you predetermine the favourable and try to hold on for a 10-10. Tactics might be a little fine tuned going forward.

1st Match- Wolf pack - Dan (Daemons), Locky (Skaven), Ross (Warriors) and Jeff (Empire).

My Game vs Jeff - Light Council Empire with 1 Steam Tank.

I gathered from all the teams over the weekend that Light councill should get a good win against my Elves. I disagree and was confident that I would offer very few targets and was likely to get a draw and if I managed to exploite any opportunities that presented itself it would turn out to be a solid to a big win to me. 

Hoping to get first turn with all of Jeff's artillery park within 30" of all my archers I managed to lose it and got to go second, oh well. The game had no surprises, with the Empire cannons knocking over all my bolt throwers and a refuse flank with the steam tank. I picked up all the points on the fringes and pushed for a big win last turn by withering the Steamtank to T3 and charging both my Dragon Princes with Lord & the unit of Whitelions. The Whitelions failed their 8" charge and the Tank sits there with 1 wound left tettering at the end. Jeff is a good bloke and even better player. We had a very tight but enjoyable joust of a game.

11-9 Win

The team had a mixed bag and with Rowan getting mauled 20-0 by Dan's Daemons we were hanging around mid tables.

2nd Match- Stones Fall Massive - Joel (Empire), Glen (Daemons), Ryan (Warriors) and Will (Ogres).

My Game vs Joel - Empire light council with 2 Steam Tanks.

Joel's obviously in tune with his army and he deployed double refuse flank and Demi-Chickens to the fore with a mountain of Halberds in the centre. My shooting was a bit sad and both his Steam Tanks were unhampered from my shooting all game. Which meant he could collapse one flank and push for a good win. So I had to push the button on Mind Razor to even the odds on the other flank. Mind Razor for the game and the Dragon Princes munch 3 units. Joel's a awesome chap and a credit to the hobby in Wellington. Good chat about the hobby and discovered that he was the other of the bearded fellows who didn't manage to make it to Canopener all those years ago. Defo keen and looking forward to a rematch soon.
Blam moment was Joel IF with his Archmage Banishment on my Dragon Princes and falling down a hole. They had the Banner of the World Dragon on them (2+ward).

13-7 Win

Our Dwarves had a bad day shooting and with the Skink cloud not working we were another slight loss in this matchup. So sitting at Low mid tables.

3rd Match - Nice Team - Bo (Lizards). James (Warriors), Tane (Dwarves), and David (Skaven)

My Game vs Bo - Monster stomp Lizards with 2 Stegs & 2 Bastilidons.

Not such a great table for me as there was two large hills down each 1/3 of the table that basically blocked line of sight to all his monsters or gave them cover. Bo deployed all his monsters on one side hidden from all my RBT's scattered all around the board and put his Skink cloud down the other side. I countered with a solid centre and most of my bows to take care of the Skinks. This turned out great for me as archery killed all his Camo-Skinks and skirmishers and let me push his Monster flank with the bulk of my troops.
Bo then pushed his 4 Monsters forward and I said thank you as my Dragon Prince bus with Lord should have easily killed his Bastilidon and then overrun to chomp up the rest of his other flank if I did one more wound to his steg with 13 attacks at Strength 5 with rerolls to hit. They all hit and dice fail means game changer. Bo is a great guy and he made a forgettable game for me into a awesome hobby one. Must get you up for a game in Auckland Bo and yes you got my best sport vote.

8-12 Loss

Tane shot off our Dwarf player 20-0 and with our Daemon player losing his Greater Daemon 1st turn with a 3 dice cast down a hole it was a big loss for the team this round. Lower Bottom Tables after day 1.

4th Match - Legend of Doom - Herman (DE), Luc (Ogres), David (Dwarves), and Rex (Wood Elves).

My Game vs Luc - Double Ogre Bulls with Double Mournfangs.

Always going to be a ask for Ogres if my shooting went off and it did. Luc was left with a Ogre bus of 4 Ogres and 3 of his Characters having to face a rear charge from my Dragon Princes who had devoured two units of Mournfangs. The ensuing combat had me up by 16 combat res and on the way to a big win. Luc is just getting use to his army and with a few games he should quickly turn the tables. Excellent sport and so was the rest of the team from kapiti.

20-0 Win

This was the turn around and the team all had wins or big wins. Recovered to lower mid table.

5th Match - Krak Team - Tim (DE), Hagen (Lizards), Neil (Dwarves), and Ben (VC).

My Game vs Tim - Bro-lock Supreme Sorceress Dreadlord bus, Dble Executioners and Witch elves.

On paper I had this down as a draw and a good win if the terrain was suitable. The terrain on our table turned out to be way too important to the game. There was a massive Elven tower that dominated almost right up to the middle of the board from one side of the table. If I had won table sides, it would have been Tim's army hiding from all my shooting and game decided as it turned out Tim won table sides and managed to snipe points he needed and retreated just out of range of return fire with Dreadlord, Supreme Sorceress all on 1 wound.
My very first game against Tim and it's about time too. Great guy and holding up the WHFB flame in WH40K country in the south of NZ. See you at GuardCon for a rematch mate.

10-10 (High Elves had a slight edge)

Very close results from the team and I think we fought ourselves to a standstill.

6th Match - Bucket Heads - John (Ogres), Adam (Dwarves), Regan (Empire) and Brendan (Beasts).

My Game vs Adam - Anvil, Bugman Rangers, Horde of Warriors with Great Weapons, Hammerer Horde,                                      Miners.

Haven't seen Adam for an age and it was great to get a game against him, our very first. So we went about it to re-enact the war of the beard to see off the last tournament with the old Dwarf book. Adam Deployed his Anvil and 30 Hammerer Horde and waited for my deployment before he scouted the rest of his army. I deployed aggressively with Dragon Princes swooping on the flank to collect the anvil. Since all the hills on our table were 1" hills this blocked none of my shooting and I deployed everything ready to shoot and run into combat.
Adam deployed his Warriors and Rangers 12" from my Archer line and was waiting to rune of challenge my unit with Archmage and armoured archers. I got 1st turn and this probably saved my bacon as sure enough the Archer unit with Archmage was challenged in. I Wyssans the Archer unit and withered the Dwarf horde to Str3. With my centre held the Dwarven army was destroyed to a man turn 2.

20-0 Win.

The Bucket heads were top blokes and unfortunately the dice went all our way this round and we had maximum points last round with John saving a 10-10 against our Daemons. Good stuff Ham's!

So a good weekend of gaming for the Team. We expected to middle table and we were very happy to achieve our goals. Our matrix predictions were very on the button and we may change our tactics with the matchups a little more next time to see how we go. All in all the team was great, good on you fella's! I'd go into battle with you guys any time.

Personally I had a great weekend playing 5 outta 6 new opponents I've never played before. 6 outta 6 players were superb guys. I totalled 82 points for the 6 games and felt that my rushed non-netlist held it's own. Good to know that High Elves are still competitive in this hard as nails tournament environment.

Venue: Sparkling new venue and just big enough to hold 64 gamers which meant it was very cosy some of the time. Overall it's airy and well lit and amongst the top venues I've been to for wargaming in the country.
8/10.

Tables & Terrain: Some excellent terrain and and very well painted large building pieces on most of the tables. There were some tables with extra large hills to represent true line of sight rules that we were playing, which was excellent. Unfortunately there were many tables with very small negligible height hills which meant there was no consistency. The one Table I played on with a massive Elven Tower on the table dominated the result of the game which felt a bit overlooked. These things are easily remedied with a bit of shuffling and with the resources I can see, Wellington looks ready to stay a great tournament town. 7/10

Tournament & T.O: Both Pete's running the tournament are experienced and slick. Very smooth tournament and only a few timing slips but I'm sure that's due to the nature of a teams event. All the match's and the T.O's calls we asked were solved quickly and efficiently. 8/10

Results:

Congrats to 'Team with The Guy'. For Taking out the 2nd NZTC.

Here's the Pic collection.

Venue

 Joel's Empire.

 Paul's Lizards.

 John's Ogre's.

 Pete's infamous Skaven.

 Von Trapps with Cousin Joe.

Road trip down fuelled by Macca's

Welly Waterfront.

Good Watering hole.

 Hobby Overload!!!