Red and her husband took a step back from being tournament organizer types this month and both ran lists in the 1850 point Warhammer 40k 8th Edition Tournament hosted by their FLGS.

Since the store had not really run any tournaments since the drop of 8th Edition, the organizer decided to go with no restrictions and allowed players to make pretty much whatever they wanted. After doing some research online and comparing the datasheets of various units, I came up with a triple detachment to make use of the new Command Points.

Battalion Detachment

• Warlock + Singing Spear
• Warlock
• Guardians x10 + Bright Lance Heavy Weapon Platform
• Guardians x10 + AML Heavy Weapon Platform
• Rangers x5

Outrider Detachment

• Farseer Skyrunner + Singing Spear
• Windriders + Shuriken Cannons x4
• Windriders + Shuriken Cannons x4
• Windriders + Shuriken Cannons x3

Vanguard Detachment

• Spiritseer
• Fire Dragons x4 + Exarch
• Fire Dragons x5 + Exarch with Dragon’s Breath Flamer
• Wraithblades + Axe and Shield x5
• Wave Serpent + Twin Bright Lances + Crystal Targeting Matrix + Spirit Stones
• Wave Serpent + Twin Bright Lances + Crystal Targeting Matrix

The Spiritseer went in the less upgraded Wave Serpent with the Wraithblades; while, both sets of Fire Dragons were accompanied by the Singing Spear Warlock in the other. The Farseer generally stuck close to the Windriders and the second Warlock was typically with the Guardians and Rangers.

Round 1

Death Guard – Chaos Acastus Knight Porphyrion, with Typhus, a Sorcerer, a Bloat Drone, three squads of Havocs, and four squads of Poxwalkers

The organizer decided to run the games out of the new Open War Cards, having each group draw one objective and one twist. Whichever player had a lower total Power Level got to draw one ruse card. For this round, we ended up with The Comet for the objective, which would drop one objective at the start of turn three, and Orbital Debris for the twist, which had each player roll three dice at the start of each of their turns and inflict D3 mortal wounds to a unit of their choice on the roll of any 6’s.

We ended up deploying on the long edges of the table, and I rolled to place first. Since each transport reduced the number of effective units that I had to place, I ended up finishing first, which allowed my opponent to save his Knight until the very end.

Thankfully, the ruse that I had drawn was Ambush, which allowed me to move three of my units after deployment was complete. I used it to move my two Wave Serpents and one squad of Windriders up, so they were just along the edge of the board and 12″ away from the Knight. Without that ability, I would have really been hosed, especially since the roll off ended with me going second, even with the +1 for finishing my deployment first.

My opponent turned everything he had to fire against the forward deployed units, destroying one Wave Serpent and most of the Windriders. Thankfully, my opponent targetted the transport farther away from the edge of the board, so only my Wraithblades ended up foot-slogging. Without much else to do, the Poxwalkers moved forward in hopes of securing a charge but did not roll well enough to make it in. On the other side of the board, the Bloat Drone moved toward the rest of my army but did relatively negligable damage.

In response, the Fire Dragons and their accompanying Warlock disembarked from their transport and got as close to the knight as they could; while the Wraithblades moved forward but were out of range of charging the Knight. I chalk that one up to not being familiar with the 8th Edition rules; instead of disembarking like they should have, I simply placed the Wraithblades in the center of where the destroyed Wave Serpent had been. My psychic powers ended up doing all of nothing before all of the Fire Dragons unloaded on the Knight and did… well, rather poorly. Rerolling 1’s to Wound is nice, but it really is not very helpful when the roll I need is 5+. The majority of the damage instead came from the Wave Serpent’s Bright Lances and the Guardians’ Missile Launcher.

Meanwhile, the Windriders and the other Guardians’ Bright Lance stripped some wounds off the Bloat Drone before the forward deployed models charged. The Warlock with the Fire Dragons declared first and was subsequently vaporized, letting me Soulburst shoot one of the Dragon squads. After that, the Dragons and Wave Serpent charged into the Knight, and the Wraithblades charged the nearest group of Poxwalkers. While the Wraithblades did alright, the sheer volume of return attacks from the Poxwalkers stripped quite a number of wounds off them. The Fire Dragons did basically nothing since their Melta Bombs are apparently something they can only throw now. (What kind of sense does that make?) Still, the Knight was down a lot of wounds, reducing its movement so much that it could not escape the models penning it in and saving the rest of my army from its devastating shooting.

The Havocs and Bloat Drone then turned their attention to my Windriders, wiping all of them off the board although they gave me one round of Soulburst shooting against the drone in the process. A second unit of Poxwalkers charged the Wave Serpent but did little to it, and a third unit charged what remained of the Windriders that had been hiding behind my forward deployed tanks.

The beginning of the next turn, the Knight died to some falling orbital debris and exploded gloriously. It did the most mortal wounds to the two closest sets of poxwalkers and took out a few of my Fire Dragons, which then dropped the remaining few poxwalkers after my Wave Serpent fell back. On the other side of the board, the Guardians came out of their hiding place and finished off the Bloat Drone.

After this, time was called. Having gotten to the beginning of the third turn, we decided to see where the Comet dropped, and it landed somewhere that gave no one any hope of securing it. Thus, the organizer declared that we would win based on Kill Points, although he picked number of units instead of Power Level considering that the downed Knight would have ensured my clear victory. Amusingly, we ended up having both killed exactly four units each, leaving the result down to a die roll.

I won the roll and was given the points for the primary objective while a group of Fire Dragons secured Linebreaker. My opponent had gotten first blood via the Wave Serpent.

Ynnari 11 | Death Guard 1

Round 2

Tyranids – Hierodrule with 7 or so Broodlords, 7 squads of Spore Mines, and 1 Lictor

This game ended up drawing the Supply Cache objective and the Dead of Night twist. The maximum range for all ranged shooting and psychic powers was reduced to 12″ (which would increase at the start of every turn if a 4+ was rolled although that did not happen through the entire game), and six objectives were placed, a die being rolled for each one under a player’s control at the start of their turn. The roll of a six would make whatever objective it was rolled on the only one that mattered, the others being removed for the rest of the game.

Once again, I had the lower power level and drew the Ambush ruse, although in this round it really did not do much to help me.

I deployed behind a cluster of buildings, having one set of Windriders off to the side to secure an objective while my opponent deployed his broodlords all in a cluster across from the center of my army and his Hierodrule a bit off to the side. The spore mines utilized a special deployment type to come in 12″ away from my army, and my opponent set them up in a big screen.

Having finished deploying first, the +1 gave the roll for who went first to me, and I disembarked the Fire Dragons and Wraithblades from their transports and proceeded to unzipper the entire line of spore mines. My opponent was a bit confounded since the few Eldar players in his area (he traveled for the tournament) did not run Ynnari, leaving him never having seen Soulburst before. He theorized that if he had instead set his spore mines up in a cluster that I would have been able to kill fewer of them, which I generally agreed with.

In response, his Hierodrule and Broodlords were left with advancing across the field, although bad rolls only allowed two of the seven broodlords to make a charge into my ranks, where they ate one of my Fire Dragon squads. Thanks to the wierd rules exempting the spore mines from scoring purposes, my opponent scored first blood off my Fire Dragons.

Once the second turn rolled around, my Windriders in the fortress found the primary objective as the rest of my army coverged upon the remaining Tyranids. The two broodlords that had made their charge withered under the Eldar firepower, and one squad of guardians stripped a number of wounds off the Hierodrule. The other moved off toward the fortress to back up the windriders; while what else of my army had not fired reduced the number of remaining broodlords to two.

In response, the remaining Tyranids charged into the Wraithblades, and the Lictor appeared in the fortress to charge the windriders. The melee cut down the windriders to two models and the wraithblades to one, although after they had fallen back, my firepower leveled all that remained; while, a single squad of windriders broke off to advance into the backfield.

Ynnari 12 | Tyranids 1

Round 3

Space Wolves – Wolf Scouts, a large squad of Thunderwolf Cavalry with Wolf Lord on Thunderwolf, and a Landraider and Stormwolf each with a squad of Wolfen and a Wolf Priest embarked

(The number of times I just typed wolf is quite funny.) So, for this round, I ended up not being the person with the lower power level, but my opponent never ended up using his ruse. Otherwise, we drew the Supply Cache objective again and a twist that made us set up in the old 7th edition style. I won the roll-off for who deployed first and clustered all of my units in the right hand corner, prompting my opponent to stage everything but his Stormwolf directly across from me.

Thankfully, my opponent did not Sieze the Initiative and I went first, pouring most of my firepower into the Landraider and Thunderwolf Cavalry after moving my Windriders and Wave Serpents up, although with my predominantly short range, the tide of wolves did not hesitate.  The Wolfen in the Landraider disembarked, advancing across the field with the Thunderwolf Cavalry as the Landraider brought up the rear. The Stormwolf crossed most of the table, ending just to the side of my Wave Serpent that sat next to the forward-most objective and stripping some wounds off of it. The scouts likewise stripped some wounds off my Farseer; while, the one squad of Wulfen on the table then charged my Windriders, killing an entire squad for First Blood before consolidating into the one behind.

Thankfully, the bikes simply fell back before most of my army turned on the Wulfen. The Wraithblade and Spiritseer having disembarked from their transport, the Wulfen were on the recieving end of three smites, which wiped them off the table when coupled with the massive amounts of firepower from my guardians. Meanwhile, my rangers arrived in the forested hill with the guardians and warlock and engaged the scouts in a sniper duel, killing two of them. My heavy weapons then finished off most of the thunder cavalry, allowing my Wraithblades to charge the solo Wolf lord and kill him with ease.

At this point, the objective on the very top of the giant peice of terrain (the walkway around the tower was about 12″ off the board and the top of the tower where the objective sat was mayber 15″ directly up) rolled a six and became the only one that mattered. My opponent focussed fire on the models I had that could fly, disembarking the second squad of Wulfen to charge and destroy one Wave serpent and shooting my other Wave Serpent off the board with his Landraider. The scouts on the top of the tower, meanwhile, dropped to the walkway on the backside to avoid any further fire while the Stormwolf moved to perch atop the tower as well.

In response, my infantry focused down the Wulfen, Stormwolf, and Landraider; while, my Farseer and one remaining squad of Windriders advanced toward the tower. The other Wolf Priest, which had disembarked the Stormwolf with the Wulfen, darted off behind the nearby building. The organizer called approximately thirty minutes remaining.

At this point, my opponent called over the organizer for a ruling on if his scouts were indeed holding the objective, even though I had not questioned it. I had to prompt him to finish moving the one Wolf Priest sitting at the base of the tower before I could start my turn, although he thankfully did so. The organizer ended up calling other people over to look at the scouts and objective, starting a discussion that I had to loudly announce my actions over. It made me feel a little rude, but if I had not done so, time would have run out and gifted my opponent the win. As it turned out, I had plenty of firepower to finish off the two Wolf Priests, and my Farseer and Windriders easily flew up onto the tower to make short work of the scouts.

Ynnari 12 | Space Wolves 1

Results

Having won three of my games, even though one was a bit of a technical win, I ended up in second via points, my husband taking third since his loss to the first place winner netted him almost no points. My round 3 opponent took fourth.

I was pleasantly surprised with this list, although I still need to figure out how to best use my Windriders. They end up dying pretty quickly, which leads me to think that I am placing them poorly. I was quite impressed with the Wraithblades, even though they did not do very well against the Poxwalkers. They did well against most other cases, and one of my overall takeaways from the tournament is that cheap, numerous units are a lot stronger than previously. The Wraithblades were a bad matchup against them; I have a feeling the guardians would have done a lot better since the eighteen dice they rolled when shooting really did a number on almost anything.

It really makes me happy to see guardians as a functional unit again. They have sat on my shelf for quite some time now, and I might even end up purchasing a few new sets. It will be a little strange to play the guardians + psykers Ulthwe style, but it will get me painting those models finally.