I've seen a lot of people say that you don't see any good tactics posted on the Internet. Supposedly list building trumps tactics and strategy. Well I have always tended to stick to the following tactics:
•Shooting
-Target selection/ If I am up against an army that is better in assault then I will typically target their faster units first in attempt to take them out before they reach my line. Next I will shoot the slower units that can unleash hell once they get stuck... If they are in a transport then you've got to at least take out their ride and make them foot slog. Also I always favor high odds that have the best chance of paying off as opposed to high risks that require a lot of luck.
I believe in the concept of Focused Fire. Once you have selected a target keep shooting it until it's dead. Too many times I've seen people spread their shooting around. This let's remnant units win games. How many times have I seen a couple of genestealers pop five terminators? Believe when I say it happens. Or when a single Marine runs on top of an objective. I remember once watching a gladiator match at Adepticon. My friend was running L&tD... He charged a Blood Angels Sanguinary High Priest joined with a squad of assault Marines. The Blood Angels assault squad was destroyed and the priest broke but did not fall back far enough to be able to regroup. My friend decided the next turn to ignore the priest and assaulted another unit getting stuck in. The Sanguinary High Priest then regrouped and lead three small las/plas squads into a counter charge... Preferred Enemy + furious charge... They destroyed a large block of mutants which won the game for the BA player. Now if my friend had charged the priest again it would have gone the other way for sure. So you have to remained focused at all times, especially when you are winning a close game.
I see shooting as broken up into three phases: long range, mid range and short range. Against assault armies you are waiting for them to move inside your midrange arc... The short ranged units move up and suddenly you can blast them with everything. It's good to have a balance between the three ranges. You don't want too much of any one type.
• Assaults
Assaults win games and this is most especially where you want to focus on high odds. If I have an IC joined to a unit I'll put all of his attacks on the enemy unit and ignore the enemy IC... generally your IC will hit first, hit on 3+, ignore armor and has a lot of attacks. Kill the enemy squad and their IC will break and possibly you can overrun it too. If you focus on the enemy IC it's harder to hit and typically has a better save so you are wasting attacks that could have killed more. You also want to charge multiple units so you can tie them up. Coordinating your charges is very important.
• Mission Objectives
How often do I see people say one army can beat another solely based upon the two lists? It just does not work that way. If you focus on objectives rather than trying to table your opponents you'll be in a much better position to win late in the game. By playing smart you can neutralize your opponent's best units and force them to not use them as best intended. Killpoints are all about tabling but when it comes to controlling objectives that is a completely different ball of wax.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Friday, November 06, 2009
Battle of the Stores • Ard Boyz Florida style with a twist...
Tomorrow the Skul N Bonz club will be hosting a major tournament for central Florida at their same named store in New Port Richey. I only live about 30 minutes by car and qualified but I had already been invited to play in a big team tournament event up in Tennessee. Three champions from each of the stores participating in the event will play three rounds (1850 points). It's all based upon battle points so whichever store racks up the most battle points after three rounds is the winner. I think it's a great idea. I do wish that some of the better players could have made it out though, but still there will be plenty of competition there tomorrow. Here are the eight stores participating:
Anthem Games (Tampa)
Armada Games (Tampa)
Coliseum of Comics (Kissimmee)
Darkside Comics (Sarasota)
Pop's Comics (Sarasota)
Rhurbarb Games (Orlando)
Sci Fi City (Orlando)
Skul N Bonz (Orlando)
Like I said some of the better players from the central Florida area aren't going so from what I have heard there will be some younger players there representing their stores, which I think is kind of cool. I am pulling for Coliseum of Comics as I consider that my home store even though it's a bit off down I-4. I like Clark and Lance of Skul N Bonz so I hope they do well too. Hopefully there won't be any drama. I've always had a good time whenever I at Skul N Bonz.
G
Anthem Games (Tampa)
Armada Games (Tampa)
Coliseum of Comics (Kissimmee)
Darkside Comics (Sarasota)
Pop's Comics (Sarasota)
Rhurbarb Games (Orlando)
Sci Fi City (Orlando)
Skul N Bonz (Orlando)
Like I said some of the better players from the central Florida area aren't going so from what I have heard there will be some younger players there representing their stores, which I think is kind of cool. I am pulling for Coliseum of Comics as I consider that my home store even though it's a bit off down I-4. I like Clark and Lance of Skul N Bonz so I hope they do well too. Hopefully there won't be any drama. I've always had a good time whenever I at Skul N Bonz.
G
Tuesday, November 03, 2009
Monday, November 02, 2009
MY FIVE CRITERIA FOR BUILDING A NEW ARMY
Here are my guidelines for building an army:
1) THEME!!!
Theme is always most important to me. I want every army I design to reflect the background for that race. I consider myself somewhat of a fluff Nazi; for example, I don't like the new CSM codex because it's very hard if not almost impossible to build a pure cult army. If you like Black Legion then count yourself as one of the lucky ones out there. That's just me though and I don't necessarily begrudge others for building armies that don't reflect their background material well. I know what you are thinking... Dante and Corbulo, everyone who plays BA are running that combination. While that is true I can say that as far as I know I was one of the first BA players to run them together. I'm not patting myself on the back, it wasn't my original idea but it was not commonly seen when I first started to use them together.
2) Effectiveness!
I want an army that is balanced and can win it's share of my games. I always put theme first BUT I always want to build an army that is good. You won't see me running a squad of scouts in my BA army... you won't see me running a pack of Flesh Hounds in my KDA. I want every unit I select to be a good choice period. I believe in synergy and that is where running a combination like Dante and Corbulo comes into my thought process. If a unit is almost too good not to take that in itself is not a good reason in my mind not to take it. I think some people intentionally handicap themselves - they don't want to be seen taking an army that could be perceived as WAAC. If you have a great theme how can anybody say your army is WAAC? I don't like a lot of spam as to me that hurts your theme. Theme and composition are two totally different concepts and some people don't understand the difference. Take my BA as an example. I have had some tell me they love the list as it is no longer frequently seen nor is it considered top tier anymore. I have also had people tell me that running two special characters is totally WAAC.
3) UNIQUE!!!
I always want to play unique armies that are not frequently seen. If the army happens to become popular later that is no fault of my own. I ran a completely unique 13th Company that was also a great army. I had a lot of people tell me to my face it was crap but I proved them wrong. My original BA army was unique - full Honorguard, two dreadnaughts in drop pods, terminators and scouts... Both the 13th Company and original BA armies can no longer be played now under 5th edition and are defunct. The beauty of running a unique army in tournaments is that your opponents will have problems figuring out how to react to it and that's a big advantage. It's great to build an army that no one ever expects to see; I think Marc is the best in this category.
4) Appearance
I want to field beautiful armies period. This includes both painting and more importantly to me unique conversions.
5) The Fun Factor
If an army is not fun for me to play then I have no desire to build it. I can figure out by reading the codex if I would enjoy playing the army. I don't want to play any army unless it makes me feel inspired. I don't want to play a weak list to challenge myself. You are tying one arm behind your back if you take such an army to a competitive event such as Adepticon. I know it's all in the mind, what one person perceives as weak another might see as very strong. Many people have told me I need to stop playing MEQ. To me that statement in and of itself is not a good reason to not play MEQ. Two or three years ago I bought everything I needed to build a Feral Ork army. As soon as I heard rumors the list would be removed from GTs I immediately stopped working on the army and I'm very glad of that decision. I'm playing KDA now but if you stop to think about it the Bloodthirster and Blood Crushers both have 3+ armor saves plus my two Soul Grinders have front and side AV13 so for all practical purposes it has greater armor saves overall inherently built into it's design of mine. Sure the Bloodletters don't have that great a save but often a 5+ invulnerable save is better than a 3+ armor save plus if they go to ground in cover then it's just as good as Marines with the exception of most flamer template weapons. Probably my next army will not be MEQ and that is because I don't like the new SM codex and I finally looking forward to playing something else after all these years. Heh!
So those are my five criteria I use to select an army that I will actually build and play.
G
1) THEME!!!
Theme is always most important to me. I want every army I design to reflect the background for that race. I consider myself somewhat of a fluff Nazi; for example, I don't like the new CSM codex because it's very hard if not almost impossible to build a pure cult army. If you like Black Legion then count yourself as one of the lucky ones out there. That's just me though and I don't necessarily begrudge others for building armies that don't reflect their background material well. I know what you are thinking... Dante and Corbulo, everyone who plays BA are running that combination. While that is true I can say that as far as I know I was one of the first BA players to run them together. I'm not patting myself on the back, it wasn't my original idea but it was not commonly seen when I first started to use them together.
2) Effectiveness!
I want an army that is balanced and can win it's share of my games. I always put theme first BUT I always want to build an army that is good. You won't see me running a squad of scouts in my BA army... you won't see me running a pack of Flesh Hounds in my KDA. I want every unit I select to be a good choice period. I believe in synergy and that is where running a combination like Dante and Corbulo comes into my thought process. If a unit is almost too good not to take that in itself is not a good reason in my mind not to take it. I think some people intentionally handicap themselves - they don't want to be seen taking an army that could be perceived as WAAC. If you have a great theme how can anybody say your army is WAAC? I don't like a lot of spam as to me that hurts your theme. Theme and composition are two totally different concepts and some people don't understand the difference. Take my BA as an example. I have had some tell me they love the list as it is no longer frequently seen nor is it considered top tier anymore. I have also had people tell me that running two special characters is totally WAAC.
3) UNIQUE!!!
I always want to play unique armies that are not frequently seen. If the army happens to become popular later that is no fault of my own. I ran a completely unique 13th Company that was also a great army. I had a lot of people tell me to my face it was crap but I proved them wrong. My original BA army was unique - full Honorguard, two dreadnaughts in drop pods, terminators and scouts... Both the 13th Company and original BA armies can no longer be played now under 5th edition and are defunct. The beauty of running a unique army in tournaments is that your opponents will have problems figuring out how to react to it and that's a big advantage. It's great to build an army that no one ever expects to see; I think Marc is the best in this category.
4) Appearance
I want to field beautiful armies period. This includes both painting and more importantly to me unique conversions.
5) The Fun Factor
If an army is not fun for me to play then I have no desire to build it. I can figure out by reading the codex if I would enjoy playing the army. I don't want to play any army unless it makes me feel inspired. I don't want to play a weak list to challenge myself. You are tying one arm behind your back if you take such an army to a competitive event such as Adepticon. I know it's all in the mind, what one person perceives as weak another might see as very strong. Many people have told me I need to stop playing MEQ. To me that statement in and of itself is not a good reason to not play MEQ. Two or three years ago I bought everything I needed to build a Feral Ork army. As soon as I heard rumors the list would be removed from GTs I immediately stopped working on the army and I'm very glad of that decision. I'm playing KDA now but if you stop to think about it the Bloodthirster and Blood Crushers both have 3+ armor saves plus my two Soul Grinders have front and side AV13 so for all practical purposes it has greater armor saves overall inherently built into it's design of mine. Sure the Bloodletters don't have that great a save but often a 5+ invulnerable save is better than a 3+ armor save plus if they go to ground in cover then it's just as good as Marines with the exception of most flamer template weapons. Probably my next army will not be MEQ and that is because I don't like the new SM codex and I finally looking forward to playing something else after all these years. Heh!
So those are my five criteria I use to select an army that I will actually build and play.
G
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