Unconquerable aimed, and may be the hardest event in 40k history (debatable claim for sure)- an invite only event where tickets were only eligible to those who had managed to go 5-0 at a UKTC event in the past year. I had managed to get an invite due to my performance at the 2021 LGT, ending up 5-0 at with my Iron Warrior/Death Guard list and also managed a second qualifying event for my Birmingham performance with Tyranids (write up for both on site for those interested.) Given the quality of players on display there was a certain recalibration of expectation - even with some great personal results in the last year I was going into the event with a desire to go 3-2.
Those savvy among you may realise that's the name of this site, and was my personal tournament desire when originally starting playing competitive 40k, but 4-1 is very much the aim at a 'normal' event these days. With calibrations suitably set I decided to go again with a Creations of Bile list.
My list:
First a disclaimer - for those eagle eyed amongst you a powerfist cannot be taken on the Chosen Champion (without battlescribe updated to correct me I misunderstood the difference between "A Chosen model" and "A model in a Chosen unit") thankfully this was cleared up with the TO prior to the event starting and my opponents were informed before each game - Thanks to Michael Costello who informed me on the evening before and saved a potentially awkward moment during the event. Otherwise the list has a couple of new additions since last time - some Warp Talons and Terminators are out, a second squad of Chosen are in (to be a target for Illusory Supplicant if the first squad die) a Havoc Squad is in so I can have a shooting phase (and also needed to allow 3 cultists squads) a Biker squad with Black Mace comes in for some extra reach and a Venomcrawler is in - more so because of remaining points rather than a desire for them to be in the list.
Game 1:
Opponents list (Thomas Lowman):
Mission: Abandoned Sanctuaries
My secondaries: The Long War, Specimens of the Spider, Warp Ritual
Thomas's Secondaries: No Prisoners, Scry Future, Behind Enemy Lines.
Pregame thoughts:
Good and bad here. The good size - decent mission with 3 midfield objectives helps try and force Ynnari into a conflict in the middle where my durability helps and mitigate their speed to a degree and I can hopefully use fight on death to make trading really difficult for them. The bad is the sheer volume of mortals they can put out, especially targeted ones. The ugly could be summed up WTF do I do about the Ycarne and decided to try and ignore it at the start and wait for it to expose itself at a time I could deal with rather than get my head around it teleporting around could negatively affect me in the early turns.
Result - 85-72 win.
Postgame thoughts: Real tough game, and a delight to win. Ynnari always fights first v Bile's fight on Death is a really interesting contrast in how to win the fight phase. Two really critical moments in the game - a Possessed squad managing to keep a single model alive after a Banshee charge to take the left flank and hold it, and the Slaanesh Chosen managing to pile into a Shadowseer on the right and threaten a Consolidate if it fell back - and when it didn't they were able to pile into a Troupe unit to remove obsec from the objective to steal it back for a big swing on primary. The game plan worked well although not exactly to plan - I envisaged the two Chosen blobs holding on for longer, but the constant damage kept chipping away and it ended up being a couple of very small things that kept me in the game.
Game 2 David Gaylard
Opponents List:
Mission: Data Scry-salvage
Secondaries: The Long War, Specimens of the Spider, Banners,
David's Secondaries: No Prisoners, Banners, Mental Interrogation.
Pregame thoughts: Game 2 of the event, and the number 2 rated player in the UK as my opponent, things weren't getting any easier. I'd played him once before (Crusher v Thousand Suns, also written up on this site) and the game was over as a contest at the end of his first turn - so the only way was up? This was my worst mission as well, and against a list with more speed, shooting, mortal wound output obsec and resilience this wasn't going to be good, and I was pretty prepared for a loss. The plan was to try and get the chosen into the warrior as fast as possible and really try and let their mass damage one attack grind through them and hope from there.
Result - 85-53 loss
Postgame thoughts: This was always going to be an uphill battle. After my turn one though I thought there was a chance - I'd gotten in some decent damage, got some field position and a strong follow up could see me put real pressure on the Nids. David however took the hit well enough and essentially stopped me from ever landing that follow up blow - stabilising the early hit before crushing a flank. The secondaries were what killed me - the primary was almost even but my best secondary score was lower than David's lowest score (8-9 both Banners scores) and was perhaps best encapsulated with me getting a solitary point on The Long War - I didn't flip control of an objective all game and only managed to kill a Venomthrope unit on an objective. Was happy enough with how I played - it was a tough match up on a tough mission and I didn't feel there were any clear mistakes in my game (The Chosen willingly tanking a round of Warriors a calculated risk given the gamestate. )
Game 3 - Death and Zeal
Kyle Grundy's list:
My Secondaries: Warp Ritual, The Long War, Specimens of the Spider
Kyle's Secondaries: Decisive Action, Retrieve Nachmund Data, No Prisoners.
Pregame thoughts: So the oddities of the format was that despite a loss, I ended up going up to face Kyle - going from 2nd ranked in UK to top Tau player was pretty tough - especially as I was due to play Drukari before a redraw occured due to someone in our pod playing each other already (I'd explain the format more, but honestly I couldn't say I understood it.) Tau might be Bile's toughest matchup as it removes the best part of actually playing Bile with fight on deaths a non-factor in the game. The mission was helpful however - 5 objectives is always my preference for this style of list - doubly so into Tau where I can hopefully bully the centre. Otherwise ignore the big suits unless a opportunity presents itself and murder any/all chaff possible, ideally on an objective.
Result - 86-87 loss.
Postgame thoughts: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGH so close. We must have recounted the points 5/6 times after (and about a million times by myself on the car journey home)- if I'd failed to revive a single chosen model (so it couldn't have been killed again) it would have ended in a tie due to one less no prisoner point, the game was that close. As it turned out I had won the primary game by 7 points, but lost the secondaries by 8. I really, really can't think of a secondary that would have got me the extra point or an additional chance - Kyle played a great game of keep away and all I could do was try and sit on objectives and survives, I only made one charge into anything that wasn't chaff (killing a Riptide) and I really can't think of a different secondary that would have got me the extra point if the game had played out the same way. There was a huge moment were the Tau Commander got tagged by the Warp Talons, and a failed roll of might have swung the game in my favour, but from a tactical perspective rather than a dice, i'm not sure I could have done much differently (moving Nurgle Chosen into the middle would have been ideal, but I couldn't get anything over to replace them on the north left flank.) The game was a frustrating one to play throughout, not becuase of the result or player (Kyle was a blast to play) but becuase Tau made all the decisions of what to go, and who got charge/shoot whilst my lack of reach in comparison was ruthlessly exploited - perhaps best demonstrated by at the end of the game Tau's clock had expired whilst mine had another 34 minuites remaining showing how much more game they had got to enjoy - not a timing issue, just an example that they were able to roll all the dice whilst I could only sit on an objective and hope the primary pressure forced a mistake.
Game 4 - Tide of Conviction
Dom Maidlows list:
My Secondaries - Specimens of the Spider, No Prisoners, Banners
Dom's Secondaries - Specimens of the Spider, No Prisoners, Banners
Pregame thoughts - The most mirror of mirror matches. Same secondaries, same legion, about 95% the same list. To be honest, I didn't have that much of a plan going into the game as to how I wanted to play other than roll better dice. I had a vague - try and use charges for movement more than damage given both of us fight on on death and I did make an effort to hide cultists at the back to ensure I had access to obsec if the fighting broke out over my objectives late on rather than use them as a screen. Both of us really, really wanted to go second here for the late game upswing on mission points, sadly I 'won' the roll off and had to go first.
Postgame thoughts: This is the game I look back on with the most regrets. In terms of small scale decisions I'm happy but my vague game plan was wrong and the indecision left me with a more defensive game plan that hurt. Going second was in effect the difference between the two sides - going into turn 4 Dom had a 3 point lead (not counting the no prisoners tally which was pretty equal but counted at end of game) which ballooned out with the end game scoring which would have probably been reversed if I'd gone second. However - I knew that was the case going into the game and I didn't play around it, playing defensively and keeping the score level until the end when I needed to be more aggressive - I probably needed the Slaanesh and Nurgle chosen swapped around, and then to be more aggressive with the Slaanesh Chosen in particular but it is a struggle knowing exactly what I could have done to put the pressure on. A very good game with probably the most crazy fight phases i'll ever experience - Unit A charges and kills unit b, who fights on death and kills unit 3, that kills more of B and some of D that then kills unit A and then Unit B actually gets to fight.
Game 5 - Secure Missing Artefacts
Michael Costello's List:
My secondaries: No Prisoners, Specimens of the Spider, banners
Michael's secondaries: Enage on all Front, No Prisoners, RND
Pregame thoughts: 3rd game in a row against a member of Vanguard tactics! aPretty confident about this one - me and Michael had played a couple of weeks before on a similar mission with similar lists and Creation of Bile's chapter tactic and secondaries are just so much stronger head to head. The secondaries pretty well sounded out our game plans - I wanted a head to head fight over the centre, whilst Michael presumably wanted to avoid this with focus on corners for EoF/RND and to hit with more precision strikes.
Postgame thoughts: So the game plan broadly worked here - I bullied the primary whilst the secondaries were essentially even. As expected Fight on Death provides such an advantage that even with a few low rolls on leadership for a surprisingly high amount of attrition damage it allowed a comfortable win. When the Night Lords Possessed squad high rolled there saves and killed my Prince it allowed them back into the game and if the cultist squad had managed to snipe the Prince after he revived it could have been a different game - as it was it threw some jeopardy into what was looking like a very comfortable win. In the same way I look back on my round 2 game and think the match up mission meant I don't think I'm likely to ever win that, the same in reverse is very much true of this one that I'm very heavily favoured in it.
So I finished up 2-3, below what I'd hoped for but respectable enough given the calibre of opposition and had I managed one more point against Tau a 2-1-2 would have been a very good result.
In terms of the list - the Prince, the Slaanesh Chosen were incredible and a clear mainstay going forwards and were always the MVP's, with Warp Talons and Possessed pretty close behind. The Master of Possession and Chaplain were both really good - but I felt both were overkill, I think dropping one and adding back the Lord Discordant I had previously added back in more speed that I was kind of lacking. Master of Possession is easier to replace the effect of (adding a legionary squad to cast Delightful Agonises) but dropping them makes me less eager to take Warpcraft secondaries with no fall back if the Prince is killed - I think if I drop the MoP then dropping the Prince as well and going down the route of hoping Abhor is a option is probably the way to go, albeit one that I don't like and does leave me vulnerable to C'Tan/phase lock wound equivalents.
In the middle tier - Cultists did their job as ever with a highlight of killing a Harpy (ok taking the last wound off a Harpy) so they can go back saying they had a successful tournament. The Nurgle chosen experiment was fine - the option to Transhuman didn't come up alot, and going back to terminators for some deep strike threat is a decent side grade - not sure one is better than the other but if I did drop the Prince in the above line of thinking then they would probably go as well (The Prince often ended up casting -1 to hit the Chosen.) The Master of Executions goes here as well - he's too cheap to put in bad, but he didn't have a great tournament really. He's really good, but this kind of list just doesn't really need him, a nice points filler but eminently skippable and I'd be tempted to drop the elixir on him to have a CP as it would give me the option to reserve some cultists to maybe open up some secondary options instead.
In the low tier - the Havocs. I didn't have the highest expectation for these and they didn't add enough - virtually no attrition damage from these and I'd rather have another brawler threat than them as I'm not sure there's a shooting option that can do better than them (allied flamers might disagree with this though.) The Bikers were also pretty underwhelming - one of my more expensive units and most of the damage is in 4 powerful but high variance swings. Their threat range is great, they cause opponents headaches to play around and I think I need something to replace them in that role, but I ended up not a fan of them. The Venomcrawler was pretty average as well - decent unit, but needs more support/similar profiles to get the best of - aware of this going into the event and it was hoping that putting it on a flank might draw heavy guns out of position/away from my valuable stuff but didn't really materialise. Needs a few more similar profiles to get the best out of, again a good unit just in the wrong list.
In terms of changes I'm tempted to go a bit more Daemon Engine heavy - adding some Helldrakes for reach and some Venomcrawlers to help add durability/ensure I do have a shooting phase and make no prisoners less appealing. The problem is I also want to have more Warp Talons, and there's only 3 fast attack slots to take. Havocs get dropped, and the Nurgle chosen probably gets downsized to a 5 man terminator blob to ensure points, with maybe a legionnaire squad with Icon taking the place of master of possession to allow a Discolord to come back in, although I keep flip flopping if I like the idea or really hate it. Still with LGT on horizon plenty to experiment with (even without thinking about including any daemon allies.)