1st Confrontation Alliances - The Pride of the Gods

Greetings Sinners!
A bunch of the Cold Steel Mercs made the long journey south to the sunny climes of Havant for a doubles tournament held by Confrontation Events. Neil, Iain and myself travelled down together, stopping for a quick coffee at Michael's and continuing on to Havant.
Everything was going swimmingly, we arrived at our destination without any problems and piled out of the car, straight into the pub opposite the hotel. After several pints, we phoned my fallen brother, Steve to see how far away he was from joining us. We were delighted to hear he was 10 minutes away. After another couple of beers, we phoned him again asking where he was, only to be told he was outside the hotel looking for us. We told him to look across the car park and he would see us sat outside the pub......"Err.....lads, we're at the wrong hotel!......Oops, can you come and pick us up Steve because we've had too much to drink now?"
So not the best of starts then.......





.......Fortunately for us, Steve managed to fit all of us in his car and didn't go on about it too much ;-)
After a few more drinks and a bite to eat we retired for the night at the right hotel.
Next morning soon arrived and after a hearty breakfast we were raring to go. The day before, Confrontation Events posted up on Facebook that they were allowing grudges for the first round, so my fallen brother and I naturally grudged each other!

Game 1 - Steve and Matt (Tau and Ynnari)
Steve had Wraithknight with D Cannons, 5 WraithGuard with D Weapons with a character with a Webway Portal, 2x 5 Warpspiders, 2x 5 Dark Eldar warriors.
Matt was using 3 Riptides, a Ghostkeel, 2 x 5 Stealth Suits.
Yikes! Maybe the grudge wasn't such a good idea after all ;-)


Primary - Crusade, 4 Objective (3VP's each)
Secondary - Contact Lost
Tertiary - Kill points, Line Breaker, Slay the Warlord, First Blood.
Deployment - Hammer and Anvil

We won the roll to deploy first and set up as far forward as we could.

Naturally, the Ynnari and Tau didn't deploy quite as far forward as we did!

Everything we had moved forward as fast as possible, this would be a regularly occurring theme!

With no Psychic phase we moved on to the shooting phase.....which consisted of a roll on the Warpstorm table. The gods smiled on us and a couple of Stealth Suits and 4 Dark Eldar Warriors fell to gods wrath. Flushed with success, everything flat-outed or ran forward eager to get to grips with the enemy!
The end of our first turn had the TauDar perilously close to the Chaos forces .......

......unfortunately, it was Khorne and Slaanesh who were in peril. Matt, destroyed my Chariots with contemptuous ease, while Steve showed us just why people don't like Ynnari! The Wraithknight D weaponed the Bloodthirster before charging into the Flesh Hounds and stamping them into the ground.

The Khornate Bikers shot at the lone Dark Eldar Warrior on the hill, claiming a precious kill for the tally of the gods. Iain's Daemon Prince charged into the Wraith Knight in a bid to help out the Flesh Hounds but the Eldar Warmachine shrugged off his attacks and put the dogs down. The Chariots had more luck scything down a unit of Warp Spiders and claiming a kill point for Slaanesh........

........Unfortunately all that did was allow the Eldar to wipe them out with retaliatory fire! The Wraithknight Stomped the Daemon Prince into the ground leaving the combined Tau and Eldar free to pick off the Soul Grinders at will......


.......Ouch! at least it was quickly ;-)
Loss: 1-19
The Tally of the Gods: Slaanesh 1 - Khorne 1
We got this game totally wrong. I should have been going for the Eldar and Iain should have been going for the Tau. I don't think it would have altered the result too much, but it would have given Steve and Matt more of a game.


Game 2 - Mark and Sam (Orks and more Orks)
Primary - The Relic (6VP's)
Secondary - Spoils of War
Tertiary - Kill points, Line Breaker, Slay the Warlord, First Blood.
Deployment - Dawn of War

Mark and Sam were using double Orks.....
10 Ork Bikers with Pain Boy and Warlord, 4 Units of Trukk Boys, 14 Lootas in a Battlewagon x2, Looted Wagon, squadron of 3 Warbuggies and a Gorkanaut containing the other Warlord. This was such a cool looking army....

I'm not sure if it's called a Gorkanaut, Morkanaut or Gorkamork, but it's bleedin' cool nonetheless!

Mark and Sam won the roll to deploy first......

The First and the Last deployed right across the table.......

......with our Warlords loading the left flank.


With our Warlords hidden from the Orks considerable fire power we didn't even try to steal the initiative.
The Ork Warboss and his Bikers shot forward on the left, supported by two units of Trukk Boys. The Looted Wagon rolled 'Don't Press That Button!' and shot forward on the right flank. The Orks opened fire and lead filled the air, Fortunately for us, most of it stayed there and only one squadron of Chariots was destroyed to give the Orks First Blood.

The First and the Last shot forward, just as eager for a scrap as the Orks were!

The Daemon Prince, Sladic and the Bloodthirster jumped over towards the Trukk Boys.....

....while two units of Chariots and both Biker squads moved up on the right flank.

A unit of Chariots slammed into the Ork Bikers, supported by the Flesh Hounds. 6 Ork Bikers fell to the onslaught for the loss of 1 Chariot!

The Bloodthirster and Sladic earned two precious kill points for the tally of the gods by wrecking both Trukks......

.....while on the right a unit of Chariots wrecked the Looted Wagon to earn a kill point for Slaanesh.

The Orks hit back like a wounded bear, The Lootas targeted Sladic and the Bloodthirster, dropping both Monstrous Creatures down to a couple of wounds with the help of the Trukk Boys that had bailed out of their destroyed rides. The Gorkanaut blasted a unit of Chariots apart on the left flank with the Help of some Trukk Boys. The central Trukk moved over towards the Relic and the Boys jumped out to claim it.
The Ork Bikers and Warlord continued to battle against the Chariot and Flesh Hounds killing a chariot and a couple of dogs for the loss of a Biker. The Trukk Boys charged into the Bloodthirster and Sladic, but the Khorne Daemons laughed off their attempts to hit them and hacked them down in short order.
The First and the Last continued their slaughter. A unit of Chariots moved around a rock formation to line up a charge on the Boys holding the Relic supported by a unit of Khorne Bikers.
The Slaanesh Herald moved up to support the Flesh Hounds who were still locked with the Warboss and his Painboy.
The dark gods cannot stay their meddling hand and the shooting phase began with my customary roll on the Warp Storm table.......The Dark Prince Thirsts!.......any Daemons of Khorne takes d6 strength 6 hits with rending on a roll of a 6! Bwahahahaha!
Sladic, puppet of Khorne was about to be made Slaanesh's bitch! 5 hits hammered into Khorne's champion, blasting him from the battlefield with two rending hits and earning Slaanesh another kill point for Our Lady's tally......so after a good two minutes of laughing, we got back to the game. I'm not sure if it did any damage to the Orks, but who cares? It worked a treat on Sladic!
The Khorne Bikers in the centre destroyed the last Trukk to finish our most successful shooting phase all weekend.
The Slaanesh Herald charged into the combat with the Ork Bikers and between them and the Hounds wiped out the unit. The Chariots in the centre charged into the Ork Boys holding the Relic and wiped them out. The Bloodthirster charged into the Loots' Battlewagon (after a single chariot had taken the overwatch shots) smashing it apart with his Axe and killing 7 Lootas in the explosion!

The Warbuggies arrived from reserve.......

....And the Gorkanaut stomped towards the Relic. Shooting saw the Bloodthirster go down to the 7 Lootas stood in front of him. The Warbuggies killed a Seeker and the last of the Trukk Boys killed the Khorne Bikers on the right.

The Khorne Bikers moved onto the Relic to claim it as a Soul Grinder moved up to protect them from the perilously close Gorkanaut


The Flesh Hounds lined up for an assault on the Lootas......


......the Seekers and Soul Grinder charged into the Warbuggies wrecking them over two turns, but not before one of them killed the Slaanesh Herald!
The Flesh Hounds Charged into the Lootas wiping them out with ease. The Soul Grinder charged into the Gorkanaut and Stripped a couple of Hull points from it while losing one in turn. The Game had been incredibly close all the way through, swinging one way and then the other, and although the Gorkanaut killed the Soul Grinder in the last turn, it had done enough to keep Iain's Khorne Bikers alive with the Relic......Phew!
Win: 12-8
Tally of the Gods: Slaanesh 8 -Khorne 9

What a game! The armies looked great, the battlefield was truly a sight to behold and our opponents Sam and Mark were brilliant. Sometimes you go to a tournament and line up your forces and think to yourself "Why am I still playing 7th edition?" But then you get games like this. Games that remind you just how much fun this glorious game can be.
A massive thank you to Mark and Sam, your army was gorgeous and you were truly a pleasure to play against.





Game 3 - Martin and Tristan (Tau and more Tau)
Primary - The Scouring
Secondary - Deadlock
Tertiary - Kill points, Line Breaker, Slay the Warlord, First Blood.
Deployment - Vanguard Strike

Martin and Tristan had a Riptide wing, a lot of Drone units, another Riptide, a Broadside and several deepstriking Crisis Suits.
The Tau won the Deployment roll.

The Tau opened fire with everything they had, but with half of their army deep-striking they didn't have enough fire power to kill a unit out right.
Our customary opening move consisted of one order.....Charge!!

In came the Deep-Striking formation, but with so little space for them to Deep-Strike into it was inevitable that a couple of units would mishap. One went back into reserve.......

.......and we placed the other in a rather precarious position!


The Tau shooting saw Slaanesh Chariots stripped of Hull Points and the odd wound taken here and there but nothing too drastic....

The First and the Last were spoilt for choice with targets, The Bloodthirster, Slaanesh Herald, Sladic and a Soul Grinder tore into the Deep- Striking Tau, the Flesh Hounds on our right flank tore apart the mis-placed Crisis Suits and the Tally began to climb!

The Chariots kept the pressure on the  Riptide Wing.


Tristan and Martin did an admirable job of blocking the Daemons from engaging their Riptides with their Drones, but the Warp Storm table spewed out 10 Daemonettes to make their position impossible.

Their Deep-Striking antics may well have worked against a more static opponent, but our speed proved too much for them and they just didn't have the fire power to stop the advance. Slaanesh and Khorne started blocking each other off to try and claim more kill points for respective gods as the slaughter turned into a feeding frenzy

Win: 20-0
Tally of the Gods: Slaanesh 19 - Khorne 16
When we first saw the double Tau we thought we were doomed. When they split their army and half would be Deep-Striking we thought we had a chance, but when the Riptide wing failed to make any major impact on the Chariots (my saves were on fire) we were confident it was all over by the beginning of our second turn. Martin and Tristan took it well though, they were a pleasure to play against and battled on just to see who would claim more kills for our respective gods! Top blokes and just goes to show that not all Tau are the same ;-)

So after hard days fighting we all headed back to the hotel. Tales of do-erring do were heard as vast quantities of ale and food were consumed and Iain and I were pleasantly surprised (and more than a little smug) to discover we were leading our little band of very merry men!
Sunday morning rolled around (all too quickly for me I'm afraid) to discover we would be facing the great enemy Grey Knights.....oh and some Skitarii as well.

Game 4 - Rob and Callum (Grey Knights and Skitarii)
Primary - Emperor's Will (4VP's each)
Secondary - Contact Lost.
Tertiary - Kill points, Line Breaker, Slay the Warlord, First Blood.
Deployment - Dawn of War

Rob and Callum had (roughly) 2 units of 5 Sydonion Dragoons, 1 Sydonion Dragoon, 4 (maybe 5) units of Skitarii Rangers and an Imperial Bunker. The Grey Knights had 2 Dreadknights, 2 units of Grey Knight Terminators and a Libby.

The First and the Last deployed first.......

.......and the customary order was given to charge! Alas, the Bloodthirster and Sladic (henceforth known as Sladic the yellow, because of the streak that runs down his back) refused the order and stayed back.

The Skitarii opened fire on the Chariots and I was horrified at just how effective they were at bringing down armour.....wait, they do what! To make matters worse, A terminator squad immobilised a Soul Grinder, effectively taking out of the game.


I can only apologise for the brevity of this battle as I had a stinking hangover and was really struggling to focus on this game (I made many many trips to the toilet that morning). I remember thinking that we were so far out of position that the game was effectively over by turn 2, but really my memory of it is very iffy. Iain's Flesh Hounds got locked down by the Grey Knight Terminators and the Thirster and Sladic were to far away to help anybody out.
More pain came our way from the Skitarii shooting and the Sydonian Knights arrived on our left flank.


The Dreadknights moved slowly forward destroying Chariots at will.....


The Libby and his Termies made short work of the Flesh Hounds.


Two units of Chariots charged into a Squadron of Sydonian Knight, destroying 3 before being torn apart.


The Bloodthirster finally grew a backbone and charged into the Knights to finish them off......it was all a cunning plan to gain more kill points for his god ;-)


Sladic the yellow charged into a Dreadknight that had lost a wound to a chariot and although he wounded it 6 times, the Dreadknight only failed two 5+ saves and butchered the Khorne Prince where he stood! With all the Chariots and Flesh Hounds dead as well the Imperial forces picked apart the Chaos force at the leisure, wiping us out with ease.


Loss: 0-20
Tally of the Gods: Slaanesh 19 - Khorne 22
Rob and Callum were jolly nice chaps. Their army was really nice and pretty damned fluffy, they simply out played us. We were attacking the wrong units and they were attacking the right units in return. I'd like to apologise to my opponents and Iain for spending more time in the toilets than I did at the table, I really wasn't at my best that Sunday morning.

We were delighted to hear that we had been nominated for the best army awards and as soon as we set our armies out we headed into town to refill my stomach....





















Game 5 - Charles and James (Ynnari and Dark Eldar)
Primary - Big Guns Never Tire, 5 Objectives (3VP's each +1 for each Heavy Support)
Secondary - Tactical Escalation.
Tertiary - Kill points, Line Breaker, Slay the Warlord, First Blood.
Deployment - Hammer and Anvil

Farseer, 5 Wraithguard in a Wave Serpent, 5 Harlequins in a Vyper, Solitaire, 10 Wyches in a Raider, 5 Dark Eldar in a Venom, 10 Dark Eldar Warriors in a Raider, 5 Incubi with Lelith in a Venom, 5 Scourges and a Talos.
The Eldar deployed first......


.....with everything in transports it looked very small.


......Especially, compared to the First and the Last!


The Eldar edged forward to target the Chariots but very little could do any damage to them.
The Flesh Hounds moved up on left flank supported by Sladic.....Out jumped the Solitaire, charging into the Flesh Hounds and killing 5 for the loss of one wound!


.....Everything else moved up en masse.....


.......moving so quickly the pict-servitor couldn't keep up!


A unit of Slaanesh Chariots slammed into the Solitaire, screaming their joy at the Eldar who has the audacity to play the part of the Dark Prince and squealing in delight as they harvested her soul.
The Eldar horrified at the Daemons rapid advance quickly redeployed. The Wraithguard disembarked and wiped out a unit of Chariots.....they then destroyed another Chariot with their tricksy Soul Storm antics! The Eldar on our right moved towards the Bloodthirster and knocked him down to one wound with all of their fire power. On the our left 5 Harlequins charged Sladic but the Khorne champion smashed two to the ground before they could even land a blow!


The First and the Last continued with their advance. The Chariots moved closer to the Wyches as the Flesh Hounds moved in to help out Sladic with the Harlies......


Sladic and his Hounds tore the beleaguered Harlequins apart and the Chariots scythed down 8 of the Wyches. It all proved too much for them and they legged it.


On the left the Thirster, Chariots and Khorne Bikers moved into position to bring ruin upon the Eldar. All the while the Soul Grinders kept shooting away at the Eldar skimmers, forcing them to Jink to stay alive.


In a selfless act the Bikers charged the Wraithguard drawing fire away from the Slaanesh Chariots which butchered them to a man. Not content with that the Chariots rammed into the Warp Spider and wrecked it. With all of their transports destroyed the Eldar had nowhere to run and the First and the Last slaughtered them with abandon!

Win: 20-0

Charles and James were great opponents and an absolute pleasure to play against. Even when we had over-run them and they had nowhere to retreat to, they still had a smile on their faces as the First and the Last tore through their army. They were as interested in the Tally of the Gods as we were and were genuinely good sports (like all of our opponents were).


So we had managed 3 wins and 2 Losses which was much better than we were expecting with an army with no psychic powers or shooting, and had finished on 53 Tournament Points. We were both chuffed to finish ahead of the rest of the Cold Steel Mercs (hey, but we didn't gloat or anything......honest!).
Although we had a long drive back, we decided to hang around and see how we had done in the painting awards.....I'm glad we did!
Iain won some Citadel paints in the raffle......and, fortunately for him, it contained a yellow, so expect to see a yellow streak added to Sladic's back sometime soon ;-).
The awards were announced  and Iain and I were delighted to take second place in the Players Choice for painting (especially as a couple of my Soul Grinders hadn't been finished properly), However, that delight soon turned to ecstasy as we then won the Judges choice for best painted :-)
We both received a very nice Paint Station as our prize.

Our ecstatic delight quickly turned into utter disbelief as the results were read out and we discovered we had finished 3rd!......Yes 3rd! Iain's post on the Cold Steel Mercs facebook page just about sums up how we felt:

To say Gary and I were surprised would be an understatement. Getting a couple of awards for painting is nice but to achieve 3rd place came right out of nowhere. It was all in the rules pack but who reads rules packs? The overall standings calculations hark back to the old GW tourneys when your overall score was a combination of game points, painting scores and sportsmanship nominations. We were happy to finish the weekend with 3 wins but when Rick (the head TO) announced us in overall 3rd place it was a bit of a shock.

So I'd just like to thank Ricky and all the helpful people at Confrontation Events for a truly fantastic weekend. Everybody was incredibly friendly and the atmosphere was brilliant. If you ever have the opportunity to attend one of their events, I cannot recommend them highly enough!
A big thank you to all of my opponents (and Iain of course!) for keeping me entertained all weekend and thanks to Michael, Neil....and Steve for the driving......and if you've read this far, thank you for reading my inane ramblings.....this is my 100th post so I hope you enjoyed it.

Until ne.......Oh yes, I nearly forgot, the Tally of the Gods........Khorne claimed 27 skulls for the Skull Throne and Slaanesh claimed 34 Souls (one of which was Sladic's!) much to the delight of the Dark Prince!
And so the Last God becomes the First and the First God becomes the Last!

Until next time......May Our Lady grant you her number!