Well I'm sorry to say the monkeys were pretty underwhelming overall leaving me with a 1-2 record, with the win being a very narrow victory. I still had a fantastic time, and although I lost the second game horrendously and only narrowly took the first I think they were two of the most fun games of 40k i've ever played. Also the tournament was very useful due to the fact i learnt about a few rules I'd either overlooked or misinterpreted i.e Chimeras have 5 fire points not 6, Psycannons are Rending even when fired as Assault Weapons and a unit of Jokaeros only rolls once on the customisation table, not once for each Jokaero.
As is usually the case I was far too wrapped up in playing the games to properly remember how each of them played out but i'll try and give a rough account of how things happened
"The Apes of Wrath"
Game 1 Luke aka Lighningslayer from Buckaroo Mathhammer
Star Wars Imperial Guard + Yarrick
Pitched Battle - Kill Points
So the first game was a pretty cool draw - two themed armies facing off against each other - monkeys vs the Rebel Alliance. Luke's army was really cool with each model in his units having different themed names from Battlestar Galactica, Transformers, Star Trek etc - my favourite unit being a squad of Penal Legion named "Wesley Crusher and the Crushettes" lol the X-wings were fantastic conversions and I loved his themed special Character Commisar Yarrick as Luke Skywalker (they've both lost a hand!)
The Guard were all employed in reserve, ready to outflank and attack after a couple of turns so I had the table to myself at the start. I shot everything at the one Chimera starting on the table and managed to wreck it first turn, and spread my forces out ready to intercept the guard when they arrived. When the Guard did turn up pretty much everything arrived in the same turn and shot my army to pieces - i lost both Chimeras and a squad of monkeys to outflanking guard and the X-Wing Vendettas tore me to pieces. After the hammer blow of the surprise attack I used my Dreds and Purifiers to start taking the fight back to the guard and began devastating several units - unfortunately I was really struggling to finish squads off, leaving 2 or three guardsmen each time, who then proceeded to rally thanks to the "Get back in the fight" orders. The game was very tight and in the balance, with a lot of my army left on the right flank and the Guard camped on the left we pretty much destroyed what was around us and then tried to claim any easy Kill points left. Coteaz did manage to put a Hammer through Yarrick's skull, only for the blighter to get back up again and cut the intrepid inquisitor in half!! by the end of turn 5 the score was definitely in favour of the Guard, but as the game managed to go on for a couple of extra turns I had enough time to finish of the remains of a few units and claim enough kill points for the win. The final score was 11 - 9 in my favour with 1057vp to me and 991vp to my opponent - very close but a win nevertheless!
Check out the X-Wings
Han Solo Frozen in Carbonite
Game 2
Matt - friend of Fromthefang
Grey Knights + Coteaz
Spear Head - Table Quarters
The second game saw me playing Matt and his Greyknights - Matt came 3rd at Blog Wars 2 so I knew this was going to be a very tough game. His list consisted of 2 Dreadknights, 3 Dreds, 2 Purifier Squads in Rhinos and 4 acolyte squads in Razorbacks Matt won the role to go first and as the set up was Spear Head, chose to push his forces to the centre of the table ready to maximise his shooting and assault range the first turn. I set up castled in the corner, knowing as soon as he got close to me I was toast - and with the deployment I was pretty much doomed to fail from the start. First turn, Matt shunted his DK's up close and personal and he pretty much incinerated my command squad - meaning most of my lascannons taken out of the game already!! He also popped a razorback and a Dread and pushed towards my lines. I responded by shaking and stunning a couple of his dreads (nicely ignored the next turn thanks to fortitude!!) and failed to do much else - the monkeys BS of 3 and the fact my penetrating damage rolls were never more than 2/3 was really starting to hurt. I did take out one of his DK's with combined shooting from my purifiers and engaged the other in combat. in Matt's 2nd turn he popped another of my Dreds, my other Razorback and lost his other DK in combat to my Purifier squad. Again I responded (with what little I had left) popping a Dred and Immobilizing one of the Rhinos. Turn 3 Matt engaged Coteaz and the last remaining purifier in combat with his squad of 9 Purifiers, and shot what was left of my army off the table - leaving me with one lonely looking monkey squad hiding in the corner. I thought Coteaz was doomed, but thanks to a combination of Sanctuary, Cleansing flame and some VERY impressive dice rolling I managed to kill 5 Purifiers and win the combat!!!! needless to say by turn 4 normal order was resumed, Coteaz was destroyed and the table was empty of monkeys - totally wiped out by the start of my turn 4 - an absolute annihilation!! despite the result Matt was a fantastic opponent and very helpful, discussing potential tactics and ways to help improve my game. The final result was 0-4, with 942vp to me and 1750 to Matt
Game 3
Jamie aka Jimbo from Index Astartes
Iron Hands + Chaplain Cassius
Dawn of War - Objectives
In my final game I played Jamie and his beautifully painted Iron Hand Space Marines - so good in fact he was the winner of the best painted army award (he got my vote!) his army was pretty well put together too, with a couple of tactical marine squads a bike squadron landraider, Whirlwind and Predator. Initially I felt I'd have a fairly competitive game, I got the first turn and so I had the first chance to fire after the Dawn of War cleared. Also against this Mech list it was really my monkeys time to shine! However things didn't go very well right from the start - my dice rolling was atrocious and despite pretty much consistently penetrating the Landraider/Predator I never managed to do any damage until I finally wrecked the Raider at the end of the 4th turn. One of My dreds got stuck in combat with a Biker for 3 turns and the rest of my army failed to do much - the only good thing that came my way was Jamie's complete lack of ability in rolling to hit with his scatter dice - i think he landed 1 of 10/12 attempts all game! Overall this game was a bit of a grind but my opponent was a lovely bloke so it wasn't half as bad as it could have been. I ended up losing the game I think 4-1 which I think fairly represented how bad my game went.
Conclusion
I really enjoyed the tournament, and once again Alex did a fantastic job of organising a fun and competitive event. Despite coming a lowly 22/26 (worse than last year!!) I was happy as I'd never intended to take a competitive list. I really enjoyed building/paining and converting my monkeys an I think gaming, in this case, was just a nice added bonus. I was slightly disappointed about not winning the best themed army prize - as I put a lot of effort into Chimpeaz and his companions - in fact I think my force was probably better than any other in tying the Special Character to the army in a very fluffy way. That being said however, the winner - Ian aka Ginge from Need More Tanks did have a phenomenal Star Wars themed army with some amazing conversions and details added - it was great fun looking through the ranks of his guard spotting characters from the films, including severl Ewoks, Admiral Akbar and the special Character Bobba Fett! Also the scratch built AT-AT and Han Solo frozen in carbonate as objective markers really made the army a worthy winner - well done!
The Imperial Force
C3PO and R2D2
I'm really excited about Blog Wars 4, and have already written my army list (6th edition dependent) I'm planning to take another themed force but more on that to come later!
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