type here...
Patrons: click here to disable ads.
GamingCompetitive PlayMeta AnalysisTacticsCore Games
Updated:

Competitive Innovations in 9th: Eternal Grind pt.2

By James "One_Wing" Grover

Four more events to look at today as we start to draw a curtain on the year. Today, we’ll be looking at:

  • Da Winter Waaagh
  • GT Mallorca
  • The FIGHT before XMAS
  • Grinning Demon Series GT

If you’re looking for any of the following events, go look at part 1 from Wednesday:

  • Winter Assault at the Everwinter Convention (Major)
  • Grimdark 10
  • Krumpmus Klaws Brawl at Mythicos Studios
  • Münsterland Encounter

We’ve also got two of this week’s Showdowns today:

  • Ymyr Votann vs Farsight Enclaves at Da Winter Waaagh
  • Blood Angels vs Blood Angels at the Grinning Demon Series GT

Da Winter Waaagh

45-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Horwich, England, GB on December 10 2022. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

The Showdown

Matchup & Mission – “Some 5 objective mission, it didn’t matter”

My normal strategy for finding out which mission was played when someone who I can just DM gets into a showdown has fallen down here, as this was such an out and out shooting match that Matt can’t even remember which mission it was. I could probably find out, but I decided it was funnier not to. Apparently the rules for Player Placed terrain that were in use made it pretty easy to create good firing lanes, and both these armies love that very much!

Matt Robertson – Leagues of Votann: Three bolt Land Fortresses 2×6 bikes and not much else. Despicable.
Army List - Click to Expand

vs.

Adam Lane – T’au Empire:
Army List - Click to Expand

Thoughts

I mean look – the preamble here gives away what’s going to matter in this game, which is who can shoot who into oblivion first (though given the final scoreline, it must have been a pretty even race). From the Tau’s side of the table, they have the distinct advantage compared to almost anyone else going into this game that they actually have the guns to contend the Votann list here, which is pretty unusual. The Votann being relatively short on melee pressure compared to the metagame average is great for them as well, as on a five objective mission that’s going to let them play Primary very effectively. On relatively light Terrain, the Crisis suits are also likely to be the most “hideable” shooting asset either side can bring to bear. What’s a bit less good for them is that quite a few things they’ve invested in are mostly or partially dead – Exemplar of the Mont’ka and Precision of the Hunter bounce off Void Armour something fierce.

That sort of leads into the Votann’s advantage here, which is that when they shoot, they much more reliably make something turbo-dead. Shooting at Land Fortresses with no wound re-rolls is just never a sure thing, whereas whatever Tau toy finds itself shootable is pretty much guaranteed to have a tremendously bad time. That also means that going second they 100% have to pull their planes into Strategic Reserves, leaving them down some assets for a prolonged period of time. My guess is that if they go first then adding the bombs on top of everything, and being able to partially or fully protect their toys with post-shooting moves, means they become heavily favoured, while if they go second things look pretty even. From the scoreline, I would guess that the Votann went first, but having a few more cheap sacrificial units and easier to protect threats allowed the Tau to still narrowly win.

Result

T’au Empire Victory – 77 – 76

Adam Lane – T’au Empire – 1st Place

XV104 Riptide Battlesuit. Credit: Rockfish
XV104 Riptide Battlesuit. Credit: Rockfish

The List

See showdown

Archetype

Farsight Alpha Strike

Thoughts

It is, once again, Farsight Enclaves doing what they do best – going fast and shooting things. This army does truly horrific amounts of damage out the gate against anything less durable than Land Fortresses, and as demonstrated in the Showdown, can take those out too. Generally the highest performing Tau option at the moment, and extremely scary in the hands of a skilled player, so well done to Adam.

The Best of the Rest

There were 7 more players on 4-1 records. They were:

  • 2nd – Matt Robertson – Leagues of Votann: Triple Ymyr Land Fortresses with two big Bike Squads alongside them and (unsurprisingly) not very much else.
  • 3rd – Michael Duff – Thousand Sons & Daemons: Duplicity & Flamers with a couple units of Enlightened for screening.
  • 4th – Matt Charles – Blood Angels: Blood Angels with an extra-large Death Company unit and some nasty Characters with big heroic ranges sewn among the various melee units, including a return of the Selfless Valour Judiciar.
  • 5th – Dale Watts – Chaos Daemons: The big Daemon trio with lots of Flamers.
  • 6th – Markus Hinson – Imperial Knights: Extra-shooty Imperial Knights with two Crusaders as House Raven (helping them get good firing lines).
  • 7th – Dan Fearis – Space Wolves: Lots of fancy Space Wolf specials on show, with Njal leading the charge, a big brick of Wolf Guard, and a scattering of various kinds of Dreadnought.

The FIGHT before XMAS

All the lists for this event can be found in Down Under Pairings.

Sean Sullivan – Leagues of Votann – 1st Place

Ûthar the Destined. Credit: Rockfish
Ûthar the Destined. Credit: Rockfish

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Greater Thurian League Goodstuff

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Not particularly complicated here – it’s basically one of everything as Greater Thurian League, with a bulked up squad of Hearthguard, and that gives you a potent all-rounder list, with Uthar’s looming auto-six providing some extra swings. Need to guarantee a 6 to wound with the Land Fortress’s railgun (after auto-hitting using the stratagem, naturally)? You can! Want to guarantee that the Exactor dunks some poor bastard for d3+3 Mortals? You can! Want to bounce a second big hit off your Fortress? Also very available! You do lose a bit from not being Ymyr, notably that your Hearthguard have to be a bit more careful around opponents with very high AP weaponry, and your Beserks are a bit more guaranteed to be one-and-done, but a bit of extra reliability is always very welcome, and it’s nice that it isn’t only Ymyr getting to the top. Well done to Sean!

The Rest of the Best

There were 6 more players on 4-1 or better records. They were:

  • 2nd (undefeated with a draw) – Chris Parkin – Creations of Bile & Daemons: Lots of Terminators, lots of Possessed and some Flamers of Tzeentch in support (but no Abaddon).
  • 3rd (undefeated with a draw) – Liam Herbert – Imperial Knights: Taranis with a Forgemaster Errant to send out waves of buffed Warglaives. Single big Knight lists with Forgemaster feel like their stock is on the rise right now, as it gives you more of a fighting chance against Guard or Votann.
  • 4th – Hamish Reeve – Votann: Double Land Fortress Ymyr with a Hearthguard unit and lots of bikes supporting them (but no Beserks).
  • 5th – Charlie Kang – Tau: Farsight Enclaves Triptide, with a hefty Crisis team as a fourth big threat.
  • 6th – Vincent Dion – Chaos Knights: Herpetrax with the Desecrator/Abominant setup.
  • 7th -Michael Taylor – Adeptus Custodes: Emperor’s Chosen robot skew, combining lots of Dreadnoughts with some Hunters of Beasts Helverins.

Grinning Demon Series GT

36-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Greater Sudbury, ON, CA on December 10 2022. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

The Showdown

Matchup & Mission – Secure Missing Artefacts

Sam Procopio – Blood Angels: Go-wide Blood Angels with Dante replaced by an own-brand Chapter Master, taking the Visage of Death/Rites of War combo to create a guaranteed ObSec machine.
Army List - Click to Expand

vs.

Jake Brunette – Blood Angels: Slightly more heavy-duty Blood Angels, upgrading one of the melee threats to a Terminator Assault Squad, bringing an ultra-tanky Bike Chaplain to mess around with Angel’s Sacrifice, and some grav-cannon Devs for ranged firepower.
Army List - Click to Expand

Thoughts

So the Patrons chose this one before I’d read the lists, so I’ve been really hoping that they weren’t just identical, and mercifully there’s some quite major differences. Sam’s list is a fairly standard go-wide Blood Angel build, with one major divergence in the meta-tuned Chapter Master instead of Dante. The combination of traits and relics stacked on him provides a bit of Mortal Wound defence (the bane of Blood Angels) and provides an iron clad guarantee that you can flip an objective when you really need to, even against things like Scarab Occults, Armigers and Jormungandr monsters. I like this, it’s a neat choice, though I do think (both) of these lists probably should be packing a Whirlwind in the current metagame.

Jake’s build goes even further in breaking for the norm, introducing some Bladeguard to hold down a position, a Terminator Assault Squad as a wrecking ball, and some grave devs to give the list a way to poke at elite infantry without having to commit a big threat entirely, very helpful for opening up the Creations of Bile matchup in particular. In the abstract they’re pretty interesting tweaks, and having something so you’re not just fully owned against Bile is certainly nice, but in this matchup I think the tuning for each build fairly clearly ends up favouring Sam. The grav cannons are fine if they can get shots off without getting owned, but without a pod they’re a prime target for Forlorn Fury, so are going to have start waaaay back. Meanwhile, the theoretical upsides of the Terminators and Bladeguard are mostly blanked here, as some of Sam’s assets still just make them entirely dead in one swing – being a bit more durable isn’t cutting it in this game. Finally, Rites of War vs. not having it just makes it far easier for Sam to take a Primary lead without burning all his toys.

The mission does give Jake a little bit of an angle, as it makes being a bit more on the defensive slightly more viable. His best bet is probably to put the Terminators with the Chaplain babysitting on his priority objective, and hope that when something comes to fight them they just about bounce, and the counterattack lets him make enough inroads on Sam’s army to win. I think it’s a rough game to try and play though, and it looks like Sam took it on the day.

Result

Blood Angels Victory – 94 – 76

Sam Procopio – Blood Angels – 1st Place

Blood Angels Captain with Thunder Hammer
Blood Angels Captain with Thunder Hammer. Credit: Jack Hunter

The List

See showdown

Archetype

Go-wide Blood Angels

Thoughts

Pretty much all covered in the Showdown – it’s a very archetypal go-wide Blood Angels list with one very unique and very well-targeted piece of metagame tech. No complaints there – making one smart tweak to an army and winning an event is the exact energy we like to see here at Competitive Innovations.

Ridvan “Skari” Martinez – Drukhari – 2nd Place (Undefeated)

Credit: Wings

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Drukhari Goodstuff

Thoughts

The Archon himself rises above the rut that the Drukhari faction has been in for a while, and takes an undefeated finish with a very classic looking Drukhari Goodstuff build. In particularly excellent news for any Comorrogh fans wondering how it all cames together, Skari sent me his thoughts on what made the list so potent:

“The list had a lot of tools to deal with most of the armies that we are seeing in the meta recently. The high volume of potential Mortal Wounds (9xD3) makes even some of the toughest opponents at range, like Tzeentch Flamers or Terminators, take some significant damage before the Incubi, Drahzar and Characters close in for the kill. The army boasts 9 ObSec units that are excellent for denying / taking Primaries, and doing secondary actions as well. The key to the early game is to keep your Venoms alive, and only send one out per turn close to the target you want to focus on with the Phantasms. And don’t forget, life is cheap in the dark city; it’s not uncommon for me to finish the game with very few models left , but the key is to get more points than your opponent before that to win.”

Very useful advice there, and definitely makes sense – having 9 relatively expendable ObSec units is pretty unusual in the current meta, and can wrong-foot opponents who’ve skimped on them, while I can attest from personal experience that ramming Drazhar into Scarab Occults is one of the best feelings in 40k. Thanks Skari, and big congratulations on the undefeated run!

The Best of the Rest

There were 4 more players on 4-1 records. They were:

  • 3rd – Jake Brunette – Blood Angels: See showdown.
  • 4th – Nicholas Blackburn – Thousand Sons & Flamers: Duplicity & Daemons with the full six Rubricae units.
  • 5th – Tim Deetlefs – Harlequins: Light Saedath mostly all-in on boats/Troupes/Characters outside a couple of small shooty bike units.
  • 6th – Luc Bourdages – Votann: Ymyr without fortresses, instead packing in a pair of double-sized Bike units and a full Hearthguard squad.

GT Mallorca

35-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Palma, Illes Balears, ES on December 10 2022. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

This event used 20-0 scoring.

Xisco Ubeda – Chaos Daemons – 1st Place

Be'lakor
Be’lakor – Credit: RichyP

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Daemon Monster Mash

Final Round Matchup

10 – 10 Victory against Marc Costa – Thousand Sons.

Thoughts

Xisco helps make it a really good week for Daemons here, taking the trophy here with his ultra monstrous build – with only seven Flamers to boot! I do like that this frees up points fo Pinks, who are a good unit to have for Despoilers of Reality, but beyond that we know how this works at this point – the big Daemons are really scary and really sticky, and that gives you the tools to win tournaments if you use them well. Congratulations to Xisco on doing just that!

The Best of the Rest

There were 3 more players on 4-1 or better records – all of whom finished on three wins and two draws. They were:

  • 2nd – Joaquin Jurado – Emperor’s Children: Lots of Noise Marines, a big Terminator brick and Abaddon.
  • 3rd – Marc Costa – Thousand Sons: Pure Duplicity here, going for two big Scarab blocks and a Orrery-buffed VolCon.
  • 4th – Toni de Sóller – Black Legion: Black Legion with a big Terminator squad and a trio of Obliterators, plus smaller Daemonkin to harrass the enemy.

Wrap Up

My holiday starts today, so I am hoping you excessively keen try-hards mostly give me a week off next week, but I know with sinking certaintly that somewhere some High Kahls are making a (long) list and checking it twice, so I’m sure we’ll have something for you next Wednesday. See you then!

Previous articleStart Competing: Black Legion Updated!
Next articleChucat’s Age of Sigmar Battle Report: Leicester GT
© Goonhammer LLC