Overall I'm very pleased with how the day went, we got to the store(the Game Vault for those of you who were wondering), and found out that they were filled to capacity! Fortunately for me and the friend who rode up with me, 2 people failed to show and we were able to squeeze in. First lesson of the day: ALWAYS CALL AHEAD! After things got settled and coffee was served(really good coffee too), we got our first round matchups. Sadly due to time constraints I was unable to get pictures of the rounds, but did take one each of some really nicely painted armies that were there.
Round 1 I was matched against Eric, aka 'Blue', who was a great guy to play against, very friendly both on and off the table. He was running Blood Angels with 50 ASM and three Autocannon/Lascannon Sponson Predators with Dante leading an Honor Guard squad. I won the roll to go first and deployed in a block formation in the middle, with the Gargoyles up front, one Tervigon on each flank, the Swarmlord, Tyrant Guard and Venomthropes in the middle, my messenger(still sad I couldn't make a Tervigon the messenger) and his squad on the left, and my Harpy on the right. The Trygons started on table, one on each side, and the Genestealers outflanked. He deployed in a similar wedge, though his was more to my left. He combat squadded all the regular ASM, and left Dante's alone. Once the game started things went downhill for me pretty much immediately. It started off well enough, with my Harpy positioning itself to take out the autocannon on the one predator that could see it, but once the ASM got in close, combined with my getting caught up in one charge and forgetting to charge the Gargoyles into the ASM squads right in front of them, doomed me to a slaughter. The game ended with me getting Massacred with a wide difference in VP.
Round 2 saw me matched against the person collectively known as 'The Bye Guy', 'That Guy Whose Name Isn't Dave Despite People Calling Him That' or 'Dave'. He usually preferred the last one since that was in fact his name. He was also playing Blood Angels, though his list had a Storm Raven, A Baal Pred with Flamestorm Cannon and 2 Heavy Flamers, 2 squads of Devastators each with Lascannon, Plasma Cannon, Multi-Melta, and Heavy Bolter, a Furioso Dreadnought, a Land Raider Redeemer with 5 Terminators and a Sang Priest in it, and Dante leading a pistolier squad with more pistol variety than you could shake a stick at. This time I went second, but did much better, despite making the exact same mistake of forgetting to move all my chargers, THEN roll dice(I even wrote down on my Notes sheet to remember that!). Anyway, He set up with the Storm Raven on my left, the Land Raider in the middle and one squad of Devs on my right, the second squad took the tower in his deployment zone. I deployed in a wedge again, the Hive Guard setting up on my left to deal with the Storm Raven, the Harpy on the right to try and hit the Baal, and the Zoans in the middle-right to hit the Land Raider once it got closer. I managed to stop the Storm Raven early enough, though the Dreadnought survived and charged into my Gargoyles, eventually killing them all. Meanwhile, the one squad of Stealers I got came in on my right, moved up 6, rolled a 6 to fleet, and then I forgot to charge the Devs! And what's worse, I didnt charge the Baal with the Trygon or the squad of ASM with Priest with the other! However, I did much better against Dante, smacking the unit around with the Swarmlord and sending them packing, keeping Gaunts up near the objective close enough that they were falling back when we ran out of time. I scored a minor victory with 1 BP for killing Dante.
Round 3 same me matched against the Tau(I am honestly ashamed to say I cannot remember the guy's name now). I was really leery of his 2 Hammerheads and 3 Broadsides, but the Harpy ended up dying to outflanking Kroot who managed to slip through the Gaunt screen. We rolled for the random objective and got terrain features, which we defined as all the hills, the giant rock in my quarter, and the giant building straddling the opposite quarters. I got both stealer squads that time, one came in on each flank, and between helping the Trygon kill the Devilfish directly across from my quarter(and by help I mean stand there and cheer the Trygon on), and the other side wiping out his HQ squad of Crisis Suits and another one after it, the game ended with me controlling 5 terrain features to his 3 for a Major Victory with 3 BP. Of special note from this game was the Piranha which, despite his forgetting to move it second turn and it's subsequent destruction at the hands of the Hive Guard, managed to keep the Gun Drones alive and necessitated a second round of shooting from the Hive Guard, and they almost survived that! He was a really excellent player as well, very friendly and patient with my turns taking twice as long as his. On a related note, his army was also a really well painted army, with the Kroot not far behind. Here's the one pic I got:
I also got this pic at the start of things of one of the other Tyranid players, who's army looked fantastic.
