Like Rocky but with less punching.

For the next 2 months this blog will be a personal ramble on finding tournament skills. After becoming the Event planner at my local Wargaming club I've been busy setting up events and getting people to run them, well now it's set and on September 25th we will be holding our first national sized tournament. And since I'm not running it (I just pulled the strings to get it done), I get to play in it! If you're in the UK, it would be awesome to see other IABN guys there, so keep the Saturday free and when the tickets go on sale (only £10 including lunch) grab yourself one and come throw some yellow dice with me.

So I decided I need to tighten up and start to play a couple of games of WM a week, maybe even go as far as one a day. After my break from WM I returned and found I had lost what skills I had got (I took about a year break in total, so obviously I lost a lot), which means I now need to get back into estimating stealth ranges and such..

I also filled out my Retribution army (at the cost of selling my never used Legion stuff), so I now own every Warcaster and every released unit except the houseguard. I'm a few solos off but I have enough left over from the legion stuff to grab them and a unit or two.

So I sat down and made 2 lists I wanted to use at a tournament level of play.

List 1,

Rahn
Phoenix
Chimera
Full sentinals + UA + Soulless Escort
A pack of Mittens
2 MHA
E Eiryss
Arcanist

List 2,
Kaelyssa
Hydra
Full Sentinels + UA
Full MHSF+UA
A pack of Mittens
2 MHA
Narn

So I'm already some what used to Kaelyssa (although no where near enough, I will dedicate at least 2 weeks to playing her into the ground. But I've been playing Rahn a lot lately and I'm getting a good feel for him.

Here is what I've learnt over those games.

-Stealth rapes Retribution, we just have no answer to stealthed Heavies except Sents, who are priority one.
-I need to learn to guess Stealth range much better.
-I need to use a 'caster not just 1 of their abilities.
-Rahn's feat is rarely powerful, but it's useful for a double force hammer turn or wiping infantry off the board with 12" of AOEs
-Mittens are great for my style of play, they increase ranges
-I need to protect my solos better, I offer them up too easy and always call people's bluff on the MHAs, which they either run from or take out turn 1. I need to try holding them back or at least 1 of them.
-Forcehammer is very good but risky and expensive, the D6 slam can be a bad thing more than it's good.
-Don't get frustrated when the game looks over and you're going to lose. I did this in a game I had tonight and pointed out to my opponent how he could kill me, I should of shut up and let him miss it, he didn't take it any way and I later got a 11.7" line on Lylyth including 2 free strikes on Rahn, took it and if the dice hadn't failed me I would of beaten her down. As long as you have a high focus model on the table you can do something.
-I need to protect my Sentinel officer better.
-I don't value my models enough, I always play high risk high reward and it makes me give up points I shouldn't be. I need to stop throwing away stuff and making bad trades, I have to look at this more like Magic where you only trade if you get a perk from it or you have no choice but to.

That's it for my ranting now. If any one wants to give me any suggestions and feedback or set up a game of Vassal below I'd be up for that. I need to play games and I've met some great guys on IABN I'd like to play with.