3/25/2024 - Adepticon and Hobby Bingo update!

 

Hey Everyone!

The Adepticon Grant Tournament has come and passed. I very happily was in attendance this year, having started playing too close to it in 2022 and not having the funds for 2023. Adepticon is a large convention in Chicago in mid March. This year, the tournament was 6 rounds of 750 points, 2:15 rounds, and using veto by pools. In total there were 85 players in the tournament, with people from all over North America, and even from Europe. 

Now, "What did the crazy Dunland player take to this?", you might ask. The answer might shock you, but not Dunland. I took Isengard! Having played my Huscarl style of Dunland at 750 before, I was not too interested in a repeat performance of LVO 2023 where the composition I took with my style did not quite pan out, so I shifted away. Not to say I did not take a nasty amount of Wildmen Hobos though.

I have been a bit dis-illusioned with Uruk performance recently, so I decided to just not pay for them. I knew I wanted magic with Saruman, and the Dunland foot heroes are just insanely cost effective and useful, that all I had to do was pad my numbers. Taking 24 wildmen and 24 orcs, with 2 banners, and a crebain allowed me to hit up to 54 models, with Saruman and with 12 might. Not something you see every day. The combination of pressure from my numbers, might and casting let me control a lot of the board state. 

Lets take a look at my matches:

Game 1 - Domination vs Army of Dunland on Table 9 (Pool 2)

Result - 11-0 Major Win (6 TP)

Opponent - Evan from Michigan
Grima Tax - 1 Might (Thrydan)

Both mine and my opponent's original pairing did not show, so we got matched for a semi- thematic fight as I attempted to subjugate the Dunlendings to my cause. With my positioning and swarm of bodies, and with a lot of luck on tie roll offs, I managed to beat up too many for my opponent to handle, and took all 5 objectives, but could not nab Thrydan (but got his horse). It was unfortunate for my opponent to run into a few of Dunland's biggest counters: Consistent magic, a full spear supported line, and then myself who has played more games than I can count with Dunland and knows most if not all of the tricks.

Game 2 - To the Death vs Goblin Town on Table 4 (Pool 4)

Result - 9-0 Major Win (6TP)

Opponent - David from Maryland

Grima Tax - 2 Might (Goblin King and Merc Captain)

This was a grind match. He started at 98 models, but I managed to sorcerous blast the scribe to take him out only after 1 successful roll of 3 goblins. I had some fun blocking Saruman with a disguised Grima from the Goblin King. Then it was just a lot of 6s and fight 3 to start murdering goblins. I was one model from breaking at end, but my opponent opted to not break me as a tournament strategy. Had he done so, it would've been 7-3 and only a minor win, me having quartered him on the last turn. Gorulf got ripped to pieces on the right flank, but Frida led her forces through all the goblins on her side, then the middle went back and forth with about even losses as I used magic to keep the Goblin King for being able to kill things.

Game 3 - Destroy the Supplies vs Azog's Legion/Hunters on Table 1 (Pool 3)

Result - 2-12 Loss (0TP)

Opponent Richard Lin from British Columbia (Into the West Podcast)

Grima Tax - 0 Might

Pool 3 was one that could go either way for us, since we both had flying models that could nab objectives, and some tricks a piece. We ended up on Destroy the Supplies, likely the most even scenario. I made a mistake moving models a bit too far from one supplies so the Merc Captain in his army grabbed it. Unfortunately the mistake was compounded when I had to pull models over to deal with them, who all whiffed and died, leaving it an easy triple burn for him. I grabbed one with a Saruman command clearing the way for Grima, but ultimately got wiped out from some rough rolls on my side and great rolls on his. This was always going to be a match-up of who sneaks a supplies where, but once the initial tricks went off, I ran out of steam while he did not.

Video credit to Richard, and you get to see me in disguise in my NorCal MESBG shirt.

Check out Into the West on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/@intothewestpodcast

We also had a fun thought experiment come up. Can Grima assign himself to the Goblin Mercenary Captain, and what happens. Does it force the warband to deploy as normal, or does Grima spring out of a hole next to them? Likely never worth it, but was funny to imagine.

Game 4 - Fog of War vs Halls of Thranduil on table 8 (Pool 6)

Result - 7-7 Draw (2TP)

Opponent - Cody from Maryland

Grima Tax - 0 Might

Pool 6 in this was rough, since Legolas forces an Assassination ban. My opponent was heavier into shooting so got rid of Clash by Moonlight over Fog of War. I lost 13 models on the approach, and my force melted in melee, however I was able to almost break him just from the random chance of winning duels (1 away) and nabbed my terrain piece and kept Grima safe, while losing the Oathmaker, and wounding his protect target with sorcerous blast (Legolas) to end on a draw after almost all my models died. Very close draw that could've swung either way with a single additional turn.

Game 5 - Reconnoitre vs Assault Upon Helms Deep on table 12 (Pool 5)

Result - 8-1 Major Win (6TP)

Opponent - Matthew from Michigan

Grima Tax - 0 Might (but did delay channeled Fury a turn - did not matter though since we were so far)

Rolling pool 5 made it difficult to choose for this matchup. Most scenarios would result in the same positions as the crossbows mounted the hill to shoot from above. I managed to get in fast enough to not take too many losses, and from there it was a grind match, but my dice and heroes were enough to work through his Uruks without too many of mine dying, with me breaking going into the last turn that he quartered. I got Grima and my Crebain off his edge, and killed his leader to get the win. Saruman spent most of the game sending his channeled fury Shaman on an adventure, while Gorulf and Frida each split off in order to fight his two captains.

Game 6 - Hold Ground vs Last Alliance on table 6 (Pool 1)

Result 8-3 Major Win (6TP)

Opponent Matthew from Texas (The Durin Show Podcast)

Grima Tax - 0 Might - I actually forgot to assign him, would've been with Erestor, but ended up in the same place he would've anyway, and actually helped body block, so I ended up unpunished for it.

All that was left was Maelstrom, which is a really swingy pool for the last round. It was rough going early, with Saruman not arriving, Frida and Oathmaker mighting to a 1 to stay off, and Gorulf deploying alone in middle of the West side. On his end, Cirdan and Elendil came on near each other on the North end, with Erestor staying off. Round 2 things got a bit crazy. Saruman rolled a 5 and mighted to come on behind Elendil looking for a horse snipe, but rolled a 2, needing a 3 on distance to throw. The Oathmaker and Frida came on to support the line. Erestor followed to the western side of north edge to join the fray. From there it was a lot of grinding, and some lucky rolls from me, along with a lot of priority wins when it mattered. Ultimately, I broke him right before I was broken, and the tar pit of hobos kept his forces stuck to the board edge, as a couple elves ran away. Gorulf had casually strolled to the middle, having nothing to do with the game, and grabbed the center with his whole warband, only 1 Wildman dying to shooting from Gorulf's warband (RIP Jim the Wildman, Son of Jim, Cousin of Jim, Brother of Jim - All my Wildmen are named Jim). On the 4th roll, the game ended with both of us broken, me holding middle as a triple, and Saruman dead while Elendil was out of resources and on foot but unscathed. It was one or two turns from the Middle being taken by the remaining forces of Good, the picture above showing them on their march into the Middle.

Check out the Durin Show on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/@TheDurinShow/

In the end, I managed to get 4 major wins, a major loss and a draw, ending in 7th place with 26 Tournament Points, 45 total VPs and a 22 VP Differential, which I think is a respectable position for the list I brought. I had been saying for a while that I think this style of Isengard is the best style to handle tourney play, since the value of Uruks just do not keep up anymore.

My highlights from the Tournament:

1) Getting to meet a lot of the MESBG Discord members (https://discord.gg/MZfUgRtV56) in person along with being able to hang out with other tourney attendees that I hadn't seen in a while due to my minimal attendance in 2023.

2) 6 very enjoyable games, win loss or draw, against some great players. 

3) Showing that Isengard can be competitive without playing a Legion or doing a yellow alliance.

4) Getting to play a game on the top table, and with the acknowledgement that the first round was a random table, playing on tables no lower than 12, playing 4 of them on the main stretch (tables 1-8).

What I need to work on:

1) Not flying in at Midnight the night before, and getting home Midnight of the second day, working on Friday and Monday.

2) While I think I got a lot of value out of Saruman, who was definitely my MVP. There were probably a few cast choices that were not optimal that I need some practice identifying.

3) Grima positioning. He did not get to tax many things, both from my opponents staying outside 6", and me playing a bit passively with him when I could get him really close, at the risk of being trapped for the game.

That wraps up my Adepticon experience!

Now for some Hobby Bingo updates!

I don't have much new to add, but have some partials to report:

I built a Rohan house that I intended to make a display board, but have no painted yet. It is on my list for this month.

I scored this with my Adepticon List, since almost every model was a fresh paint since I had little carry-over from LVO.

I watched the Two Towers on my way back from Adepticon. Two more to go!

Not much updating on the Bingo but making a lot of partial progress. I am only a few games away from hitting the 10 different armies or legions, and can play with an additional legion to get that box. With the few more partials, I should be almost 50% done sometime in April!

Thank you all for reading, and I will see you next time!

-Scott