Death From Above: Belgian Grand Open 2013

In the weekend of the 9th and 10th November it was Belgian Grand Open for Warhammer 40K and Fantasy! This means big business is going down! It’s the only two day event in Belgium and I love it! 2 days of wargaming and meeting new people. This year they posted the first round pairing up front.

First Day:

This showed that I would play against Tau and Eldar. I faced Cedric, the player behind the army, on F.A.C.T.S. tourney and had a blast game. This time the psychic powers weren’t with me and he placed all his kroot up front. This meant if I assaulted him he would over watch with almost his entire army on my guys. Thanks to the support fire rule of his Tau. He brought 3 riptides with him this time. And they were a pain… I managed to kill one squad of kroot and bring two squads below half. That was it! If the terrain would had been different, IF I had other psyhic powers. Maybe then it would be difficult for Cedric but he later on went and won the Belgian Grand Open. Which he deserved of course!

Cedric ready to shoot me from the board

Second battle was also against Tau and Eldar. This time it was a more fluffly Tau / Eldar list. My biggest mistake there was that I didn’t assaulted him the second turn. Cause he could shoot at his full Balistic skill with over watch. And a lot of units surrounding my target, with the support fire rule. Result of that mistake => no units left to assault him… I should have let my spawns assault him first. Then my second unit spawns and then my 2 sorcerers in the combat… Stupid mistake learned and noted. I did got in assault with my destroyer lord and killed his Tau Commander! Felt good!

3^rd battle was the most enjoyable of the whole weekend. Against Grey Knights, cotaez and his henchmen dudes. It started with my rolling 2 sixes a row. Making Jacky go nuts… Then I terrified his dreadknight of the board and got first blood like that. Really I felt bad already. Later on he went and locking my wraiths in combat for 3 turns. Which I could have killed, if I didn’t challenge with my destroyer lord. And the fact that he killed my Warlord. Fun rounds later it was a Draw and he called it. I enjoyed it some irritating moments on both sides but it was fun.

Day two:

I was going to face a Salamander list. This meant a lot of AP 2 shoot weapons, flamers, 2 vindicators (which could hurt me a lot if I didn’t watch out) 5 thunderhammer salamanders. I went first turn place my aegis defence line in the half of the table. Runned up to it and tried to puppetmaster his land raider to pop a whirlwind. Sadly for me he rolled a six in denying it. I just run with the rest of the unit and then he wanted to assault me with Vulkan and the thunderhammer squad. This would have hurt me a lot if he didn’t fail it. So I charged him the next turn + shoot something first at him. And thanks my invisibility he had to hit on 5’s. This meant that we had a long combat going on. In the end it was all very tight he couldn’t shoot me from the objective, so we contested it both and I got the primary objective at home safe and sound. This meant a win for me. Had great game! Even with the 27 saving rolls he had to make for 2 guys who got a 2+ save. I only managed to get Vulkan on 1 wound. Glorious moment!

The last battle was against Darek a german player coming all the way from Germany to play with toy soldiers. He brought a list which I would have a hard time against. A Leman Russ Punished… shooting out 29 shoots a turn. Against spawns with no save… bye bye unit of spawns in round two. I did got in assault with my destroyer Lord again! (He deserved a little rest after this weekend) And my warlord also made it and killed some imperial guard troops. With master of the fleet not all my flyer arrived in time and with that he could just intercept them one by one. I ended up being tabled. After the game he told me that he encountered a similar list already so he knew what to do against mine. Ooh well lesson learned against Imperial Guard. Certinally hope the air force arrive on time next time.!

One thing is for certain the organization did a great job hosting this. The awesome swords that were given to the winners. I also liked the location; this was in the Belfort of Bruges.