Friday, April 11, 2014

Fantasy Friday - My Adepticon Big Brawl Experience


Last week was the biggest minis gaming convention in the country - AdeptiCon! My schedule was packed with Fantasy, Warmachine, 40k, and hobby classes. I started off with a bang, doing the Big Brawl (3,000 points) on Thursday for Fantasy - 8 games over ~ 10 hours.

I used this event as a huge impetus to get all of my Beastmen painted. I've had these dudes for a few years and I just really wanted all of it painted. This included 40 gors, 40 ungors, and 40 bestigors - tons of horde dudes that I decided to dip in order to actually get them finished.





My general tactic with Beastmen so far has been to use the herdstone to enable my magic superiority. I use this magic to buff my troops (Wyssan's Wildform) and debuff enemies (Miasma). Then I might throw some large spells like Occam's Mindrazor to make my dudes win a combat.

I like my horde of gors (40 dudes, 10 across) with Wyssan's at T5 and S5 (Beast Banner helps here). They have no armor but you don't need it - you just chop dudes up. The bestigor help with hard targets. The ungor are a bunker and can hold up stuff with steadfast. I usually put my L4 wizard in there.




The difference for this con was that I decided to go a little more competitive and bring more 'drops' (chaff) that allows me to dictate where I fight and when. I brought two chariots, three razorgors, and one unit of ungor raiders. They run out in front, take charges, then I can dictate who is going to countercharge.

I also took a large unit of minotaurs to take up shots and kill as many dudes as possible. I've had mixed results with these guys in the past but they're super fun so I take them anyway. They're a huge point sink but if they don't die then I've denied the enemy 515 points. The other option would be something like a giant and a ghorgon, but I figured there would be tons of cannons and stuff to kill those dudes.




Here's my list:
3000pt Beastmen Roster (Standard)

Lords (523pts)

  • Beastlord (233pts) Armour of Destiny, Crown of Command, Shield
  • Great Bray-Shaman (290pts) Dispel Scroll, Lore of Death, Talisman of Endurance, Wizard Level 4

Heroes (521pts)

  • Bray-Shaman (125pts) Lore of Shadow, Shard of the Herdstone, Wizard Level 1
  • Bray-Shaman (115pts) Chalice of Dark Rain, Lore of Shadow, Wizard Level 1
  • Bray-Shaman (75pts) Lore of Beasts, Wizard Level 1
  • Wargor (206pts) Battle Standard Bearer, Gnarled Hide, Heavy armour, Shield, The Beast Banner

Core (750pts)

  • Gor Herd (345pts) Foe-render, Musician, Standard Bearer
    • 40x Gor, 40x Additional hand weapon
  • Tuskgor Chariot (80pts)
  • Tuskgor Chariot (80pts)
  • Ungor Herd (215pts) Halfhorn, Musician, Standard bearer, 40x Ungor
  • Ungor Raiders (30pts) 5x Ungor Raiders

Special (1205pts)

  • Bestigor Herd (525pts) 40x Bestigor, Gouge-horn, Musician, Standard bearer, Standard of Discipline
  • Minotaurs (515pts) 9x Minotaurs, Standard bearer
  • Razorgor Herd (55pts)
  • Razorgor Herd (55pts)
  • Razorgor Herd (55pts)


  • Tons of dwarfs with two handed weapons
  • An unkillable general who does a ton of work
  • Two stone throwers
  • Two cannons
  • Two organ guns
  • One bolt thrower
  • Some rifle dudes
My dudes basically wear t-shirts and the one unit I have with heavy armor he can pretty much deny with black powder. I did have a large advantage in that we started six inches from the center - so I could get into combat a lot quicker and take less shooting.

Each one of us had to reserve a core unit. I thought about my 40 gors as they could chop dudes up, but I really didn't want them to run away from taking some shooting as soon as they came on the board. Instead I chose my ungors as they could likely kill some war machines using combat res. They would come on in the opponent's deployment area. Jeff chose his gun dudes (10 or so) and they came on behind me and were largely ineffectual.

I did take the Chalice of Dark Rain. I was worried about large quantities of massed shooting so I brought it. It makes it so war machines need a 4+ roll on a D6 to actually shoot for one turn, and all BS shooting is -1 to hit. It was pretty amazing and really helped me out in this game - he was able to shoot only two of his war machines, I believe.


I really liked how Adepticon wrote their scenario for Fantasy. You had your main victory points mission, but after that you had other objectives: hold a piece of terrain, table quarters, end up in the opponents' deployment zone, etc. For this scenario I wanted to hold terrain pieces and keep my 'outflank' unit in their deployment zone as that would secure me extra points. 

Since I deployed first (everything) I would go first unless Jeff rolled a six. He managed to roll that six and went first. I was a little disheartened but I managed to weather his fire and move up. He didn't really move stuff until I got very close.


At the bottom of turn two I basically pushed up my entire army. On my left you can see the razorgor setting up for the bolt thrower charge. On my right you can see two razorgors and two chariots spreading out, likely to take terrain. The herdstone in the back was surrounded by three shamans ready to unleash hell.

I used the Chalice of Dark Rain to really save my dudes. By providing target saturation it made it hard for him to whittle me down - he focus fired on the minotaurs for sure, but got a little unlucky in taking them down to one minotaur with one wound left (515 points!). 



4 comments:

  1. Yeah I mulled that first turn charge for a while! I figured with you pushing up so fast due to first turn and Blood and Glory deployment, I needed to commit. When you IF'd the Wysan's I wasn't sure I'd win combat, and when you scrolled my Death Frenzy I was really worried!

    Your army looked great. Glad you got it finished for the event.

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    1. Thanks man! That Death Frenzy would have been abominable. You don't care about D6 rats a turn :P

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  2. i was lucky to be able to hang around your games and see some action. everyone was cheery, and that gaming space was great. the conference room had huge windows and lots of natural light.

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    1. I loved the huge windows. It made the day seem a lot less like a marathon. Contrast that with the dark as shit Necromunda room... that was bad.

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