Draconis:
Well, as some of you may know, I went to a Tournament at a GW store with 3000 points of Chaos Dwarfs this weekend. We had good attendance and the challengers were definitely good players as well as good sportsmen.
I’m honestly kinda surprised not a single individual responded to my thread in the army lists forum asking for suggestions for help. There were plenty of views, but not one bothered to say a thing. Disheartening to see from fellow Dawi Zharr to say the least of matters.
Regardless, I settled on a list 1 hour before I was due to show up, packed up my Minis, and headed to the store.
I took the following:
Heroes:
1 Chaos Dwarf Sorcerer Lord, Level 4
1 Chaos Dwarf Bull Centaur Lord
Armor of Gazrakh
Black Hammer of Hashut
Gauntlets of Bazrakh the Cruel
3 Level 2 Chaos Dwarf Sorcerers
Core:
2 Units of 20 Hobgoblins with bows
2 Units of 20 Hobgoblins, Light Armor, Shields, Handweapons, Full Command
2 Units of 21 Chaos Dwarf Warriors, Full Armor, Full Command
2 Units of 20 Chaos Dwarf Blunderbusses, Full Command
Special:
1 Death Rocket
2 Hobgoblin Bolt Throwers
Rare:
2 Earthshaker Cannons
1 Unit of 20 Chaos Dwarf Bull Centaurs, Full Armor, Great Weapons, Full command, War Banner, 7 wide frontage for a total of 18 Attacks!!! 5 at Strength 8 from the Lord and 13 at Strength 6!!!
1st Game: Chaos Dwarfs Vs High Elves (Prior new book release)
This game I screwed up in Deployment in retrospect, or maybe I didn’t. Not sure entirely. Due to hesitance of throwing my bull centaurs into combat with his mounted Knights and not placing them towards the other end of the table near his scouts, archers, and war machines. Though in retrospect I had a choice of either letting his cavalry roll my line up and try to do the same to him, while risking getting shot up by bolt throwers…or have my solid block of 20 bull centaurs with the lord in there try and take on his cavalry and keep my shield wall solid. I opted for the latter. Mainly due to the vunerability of Bull Centaurs with Repeater Bolt Thrower fire due to poor armor saves.
I deployed in a typical shield wall line save for a few differences. This time I spread myself, placing the Hobgoblin units with armor in front of my warriors, and the mages in the line of hobgoblin archers so I could have LOS for my spells. I placed the Blunderbusses to my left alongside the bullcentaurs to provide them support. Overall, the battleplan worked pretty well. Though due to my hesitance the Bull Centaurs did not do as well as I would have liked. The game came to a draw, with me seeing his Archers destroyed, his scouts destroyed, 1 unit completely obliterated by fireballs down to 2 minis, and the other whittled to half as well as his knights reduced to 2 miniatures out of 10 and fleeing at the end of the game. I lost 1 unit of Hobgoblin Archers and that was pretty much it. Everything else was at good strength save a unit of Blunderbusses that had been outright devastated.
However, the game came to a draw vp wise. So not too bad.
2nd Game: Chaos Dwarfs Vs The Empire
Deployment: This time I deployed in my typical Shield Wall line. This battle was fought for table quarters only. I deployed my Chaos Dwarf warriors in the back, the Blunderbusses next to them at an angle, and them proceeded to place the Hobgoblin Foot Soldiers in front of the warriors, and my line of Hobgoblin Archers in front of that. On a Hill I placed all of my Artillery, and placed my other unit of archers in front of those as a meat shield line. To the right of my line, I placed the HUGE, and I mean LARGE unit of Bull Centaurs.
He had a large unit of knights, which he aimed straight at my artillery, 2 great cannons, a helblaster, a giant, (Don’t ask me how, DOW I think, but it was legal), a unit of fanatics, some swordsmen and some pistoliers. He concentrated all of his artillery on the hill.
Highlights of the game:
Bull Centaurs rock. This single Unit destroyed almost his entire army. I rolled up his entire line in the center and just mowed through everything in my way. His Handgunners had been slammed by my earthshaker cannon fire and couldn’t stand and shoot as a charge reaction, thusly, when my bull centaurs hit, they hit hard, and then proceeded to mow through 2 units of hand gunners, 1 unit of swordsmen(Had unbreakable when I mowed through, but I dispelled it so I could break them), and 2 great Cannon Crew. They came back onto the table to claim a table Quarter with their unit strength after they chased down everything.
Hobgoblin Archers were the heros of the game. I don’t care what anyone says. These little guys rock. Against all odds, even though they were getting massacred, they managed to take an entire unit of Mounted Knights that was eviscerating them after my earthshaker cannon had destroyed a good portion of the unit in tandem with archer fire. Towards the end it wasn’t looking for them, but then Lucky Bob and Lucky Phil (I was being goofy because I thought they had no chance in hell of hitting and wounding) managed to hit, and successfully wound the two remaining knights! Including his seargent! He rolls for his armor save…and boom! Snake Eyes! Hobgoblin Mob for the Win!!!
Earthshaker Cannon Fire: Taking out a Helblaster with one direct hit, first guess I took to aim at it. The Player could not believe it, and I just simply shrugged and informed him that this is why people dislike me with my Artillery. My guesses are 95% of the time, spot on to the target, and 95% of the time I always roll a direct hit. I rolled a direct hit, successfully wounded, and did 3 wounds, enough to destroy it outright. The player could not believe it. I myself was ecstatic because It meant my Bull Centaurs would survive being shot at.
In the end of this game, I held 3 out of four Table Quarters, and took Balthasar Gelt down to 1 wound out of his total, and knocked his mount down 2 wounds as well. That act alone successfully garnered me that table quarter.
Game 3: Chaos Dwarfs Vs Chaos
This game admittedly had me concerned. The player had not only brought tooled up heroes who could fly. Very bad news for my War Machines, but he had also brought a HellCannon!!! I have seen this single warmachine cause an entire army to flee off of the table on Turn 1. So I was very concerned. Luckily, I won the roll to go first.
Highlights of the game:
On the First turn, I rolled to cast conflag of doom and got double 1s. Upon rolling the results, my Sorcerer Lord was immeadiately sucked into the warp and everything surrounding him took a strength 10 hit. Wonderful way to start the game.
Once again, my hobgoblin archers proved invaluable. I don’t care what anyone says. These guys are dirt cheap and prove absolutely vital to me EVERY. SINGLE. GAME. This time, one unit rained down arrow formed death on his hellcannon in turn 1. I managed to take down 2 of the crew members. Sigh of Relief from me. On another turn, the Archers on the other side of the table managed to completely obliterate a large unit of furies which were flying fast and heavy towards my war machines. I took out over half on the first round of shooting, and when he charged me, I chose to stand and shoot and completely annihilated the remainder of his furies. Gods I love my hobgoblin slaves. Soft Squishy Meat shield and 'ard troops all the same.
My Hobgoblin foot soldiers also proved invaluable, as I managed to manuever them and sandwhich in a beefy unit of minotaurs that could have wreaked absolute havoc. I got two flank charges with the hobgoblins and a frontal charge with my Warriors. Bye bye Minotaurs. The Hobgoblins managed to score an impressive 5 wounds!
My Bull Centaurs once again proved king. They managed to roll up his entire line, destroying 1 big block of Chaos Chosen Knights, Centigors, Marauders, and one other unit which currently escapes my mind. They wreaked absolute devastation.
Final Highlight: This individual had the Dark Emissary as a spellcaster in his list. (Yeesh, the joys of a GW store tournament). During the game he cast coils of the dark master or something. Been forever since I played the Albion campaign and I don’t remember the exact name of the spell. The problem is, the spell goes through and affects all of my units, and then it affected his. Well, it managed to take out a fair share of my army. The kicker however was, when his spell backfired on him and managed to take out the last remaining member of the Hell Cannons crew. With no one left to crew it, the Hellcannon went berserk and proceeded to tear through the right flanks of his army, destroying everything it came across. His entire side of that army fled for their lives, two units fleeing off of the board entirely.
At the end of that game. He managed to secure 737 Vps, included amongst that 1 table quarter.
My total: 3 Table quarters, alot of captured standards, dead wizards and leaders, and several units gone bye bye. My VPs, 2,173.
Tournament Results!!!
Out of the entire tournament it came down to a very close matter. The three top players drew their first game, and won their other 2 completely. In the end, they had to tally victory by Victory Points alone.
And the Winner of the Tournament is…
CHAOS DWARFS!!! Praise be to Hashut!!!
In the end, they had to tally everything by Vps as I stated. Out of all the players, competition was very fierce, but I managed to pull ahead by 90 Victory Points!!!
I now hold in my possession the Limited Edition no longer in print ( I believe ) Goblin Fanatic from the 2006 release of the new army book. Suffice it to say, I am ecstatic. I usually win alot of my games but in tournaments the competition is always fierce. This is the first tournament I have ever fully won. The last one I participated in with my Chaos Dwarfs, I was ONE POINT away from winning that one.
So I am happy. Very Happy. Praise be to the Dark Father Hashut!!! May the Chaos Dwarf Empire Enslave all who dares come before them!