Victory Clash - Rivals Tournament

Introduction

On Sunday the 23rd of February, I set off for the Victory Clash in Havant, a small town near Portsmouth in the South of England. This was to be a small local Rivals tournament that my friend Harry (aka Slippy) had told me about.

Preparation

Up until now, in second edition, I have been playing the Emberwatch combined with Blazing Assault and Reckless Fury, but I have been wanting to try something new. For this tournament, I decided to use Cyreni's Razors with Countdown to Cataclysm (C2C), both a deck and warband I had not really considered before. In the first edition, I played primarily with Lady Harrow's Mournflight, a quick, hard hitting but fragile warband. I like this style of play and have been looking for a warband that works in a similar way.

My Razors

In the week before the tournament, I went to my local club, in Redhill, to try-out/practise with the Razors. I played two games. 

The first was against the Gorechosen of Dromm with Reckless Fury. I ultimately lost this game 13 to 13 as the Gorehulk was standing on Treasure token 5 and I was on Treasure token 2. I did, however, learn a lot about the warband and specifically the C2C card Nowhere to Run. I discovered that to score Nowhere to Run ALL fighters need to have move or charge tokens and that you need to draw it early in the game, so that you have enough fighters to occupy the three territories. Secondly, I learnt that you need to hold the Cataclysm counter to 1 until Wreckers is scored, unless you can distribute damage around multiple enemy fighters. Finally, I found that I liked to have Cephanyr inspired in the first round.

The second game was against the Farstriders paired with Blazing Assault. I won this game 17 v 9. This was a fairly straightforward game. The main item I learnt from this game was that I found it really difficult to score Uneven Conquest. To score Uneven Conquest, all odd numbered Treasure tokens need to be held. With four fighters, trying to hold three Treasure tokens this is really difficult to score, especially if one or more are in enemy territory. I have decided to discard this card, in an End Phase, if there is little chance of scoring it.

Tournament day

On Sunday the 23rd of February, I set of to drive to Havant. I arrived at the venue to find a small gathering. In total, there was a small group of eight players, including me and Harry. This was the first Underworlds competition that Callum (the tournament organiser) had organised (for at least this edition). The tournament would be three best of three rounds.

The First Tournament Round

In the first tournament round I was drawn against Simon. He was playing Da' Kunnin' Krew paired with Blazing Assault.

My Kunnin' Krew

Game 1 saw Simon win the roll off for boards. He chose the side with blocked hexes. My plan in this game was to divide my fighters into two groups. The idea being to limit his ability to group all his fighters around mine. This would allow me to: 

• reduce his chance of inspiring, 
• reduce his accuracy 
• increase my chances of picking off his fighters. 

In this game, I managed to use two separate groups of fighters. Alathyrr (inspired) and Cyreni went after Mannok, Gikkit and Torka. Whereas Reinglaith and Cyreni took apart Krookgrin and Shank. The game went well, with my fighters dealing out plenty of damage killing Torka, Krookgrin and Shank, along with scoring all of my deck except Uneven Conquests for a total of 18 v 8.

Game 2 saw my dice hate me! I lost the roll off for the board again and all the Treasure tokens ended up being placed in similar positions to the first game. I again went for setting up in two groups, but this time I inspired Cephanyr. 

In round 1, I managed to cause no damage at all. Every attack failed and Alathyrr and Cephanyr were both injured with two damage apiece from Mannok, Gikkit and Shank. The only positive was that Alathyrr and Cephanyr had pulled these three Krule Boyz over to right hand side of the board (from my perspective).  Reinglaith and Cyreni were far over to the left. In the meantime, I had managed to score Set Explosives and Shocking Assault in Round 1, so I was leading on glory.

In round 2, I drew into Wreckers and Hounds of War. I now needed to get some damage down onto Simon's fighters. Reinglaith, now inspired, charged Torka and caused two damage scoring me Overwhelming Force. I had finally caused some damage only to see it removed with a Healing potion (Simon managed to roll a Shield with Underdog). The rest of the round went badly, with me losing both Alathyrr and Cephanyr, but Mannok was still out of position and would be unable to get back over to the left-hand side of the board to threaten Cyreni and Reinglaith in round 3. Unfortunately, in addition to losing my two fighters, Reinglaith was injured by Krookgrin. To make matters worse, I could not score my Objectives in the End phase, I was now behind. This had been a bad round!

Round 3 began and Torka charged in and killed Reinglaith, but not before I Counter-Charged with Cyreni, onto an edge hex, adjacent to Torka. The only fighter that could now harm Cyreni was Krookgrin, all Simon's other fighters were too far away. I began my plan. I first used Hammertide to damage and Stagger Torka. Simon charged in with Krookgrin and missed Cyreni. I then used Hammertide on Krookgrin. Two fighters were now injured, Wreckers was now effectively scored. For my third turn, I again used Hammertide to reduce Torka to two remaining points of health. Then Simon focused to see if he could draw some better Objectives. I now had one chance to score Perfect Cut and Hounds of War. Cyreni charged Torka and attacked with 3 Hammers and a reroll. I landed the hit and Torka failed to roll any saves, scoring me 2 Bounty for his death and 1 for Perfect Cut. I then scored Wreckers and Hounds of War to finish the game with a win 14 to 8.

C = Cyreni, T = Torka, K = Krookgrin, M = Mannok

I finished the first tournament round 2-0, with a glory score of 32 to 16.

The Second Tournament Round

In the second tournament round I was drawn against James. He was playing Zikkit's Tunnelpack paired with Emberstone Sentinel.

Game 1 saw James win the roll off for boards and he chose the side without blocked hexes. We set up the Treasure tokens, so that there were two in enemy and friendly territory and one in neutral territory. I place my fighters relatively far forwards with the exception of Cyreni who was placed towards the back of my board adjacent to both a Treasure token and a Stagger hex, I would later push her onto the Treasure token using Violent Blasts. I also began the game with an inspired Cephanyr standing next to another Treasure token. James took the initiative and went first. He immediately ran Tik-Tik in and detonated him injuring both Cyrnei and Reinglaith in the process. In addition, he could now inspire Rittak (the Doomwheel). The game proceeded to be an aggressive match up with us both fighting over the Treasure tokens in James' territory and Rittak causing damage across my fighters. Both of us found it difficult to score our Objectives with me discarding Uneven Conquest (2), Collateral Damage (1), Overwhelming Force (1), Hounds of War (1) and The Perfect Cut (1) throughout the game. Regardless, the game ended 11 to 6 in my favour.

Game 2 saw me lose board set up again but once all the Treasure tokens were placed, I found the odd tokens were in neutral or friendly territory. The game proceeded in a similar way to the first. Tik-Tik ran in an blew himself up doing 2 damage to my inspired Alathyrr. Alathyrr then moved away from the enemy onto Treasure token 1. I then used Total Collapse to injure Krittatok. With Tik-Tik dead and Krittatok injured I was now able to score both Wreckers and Hounds of War without causing any more damage. My Focus could now be on Holding all the odd-numbered Treasure tokens. In the process of holding the Treasure token in neutral territory, Cephanyr was injured by Rittak. At the end of Round 1, I scored Wreckers, Hounds of War and Uneven Conquest for a total of 5 glory, with James being on 1.

Round 2 saw my fighters go on the offensive. Both Alathyrr and Cephanyr were injured so I inspired Reinglaith and Cyreni. Cephanyr activated first and began by charging in to kill Nitch, who was skulking towards the back of enemy territory. Cephanyr was then slain in response, which scored me Collateral Damage. James' dice then turned against him and Rittak, could not hit anything. By the end of Round 2, all of the Tunnelpack, except Krittatok, had been slain.

In round 3, I just had to kill Krittatok, which I achieved in the first turn. I then moved onto the Treasure tokens to score Set Explosives. By the end of the game, I had scored my whole Objective deck and gained the 7 Bounty from my opponent's fighters for a 23 to 3 win, a perfect score.

I finished the second round with another 2-0 win and a glory score of 34 to 9.

The Third Tournament Round

In the third tournament round I was drawn against Jamie. He was playing Thircecursed Discord paired with Blazing Assault.

My Thricecursed Discord

Game 1 and I finally won a roll off for the board. I was quite wary of Jamie and his Thricecursed Discord. He played thoughtfully and deliberately throughout the day and was clearly a very capable opponent. It was clear that he understood his warband and was also considering how to counterplay me rather than just score his own Objectives.

In round 1, I began by using Hammertide in my first two turns to primarily Stagger and then injure Lascivyr, putting the daemon into one-shot range of all my fighters. Jamie's first turn saw a ranged attack from Vashtiss miss my fighters but inspire Vexmor. After the second Hammertide, Jamie attacked Alathyrr with Lascivyr for two damage, before using Sidestep to retreat. My third turn saw me charge Lascivyr with Alathyrr and with the aid of stagger, I killed the daemon. Vexmor then used Commanding Stride to push within range of my fighters. Using his Indolent ability, he injured Cephanyr for a mighty 3 damage. Sensing the threat posed by Vexmor, I charged in with Cephanyr to cause 2 damage and using his Grapple ability I placed him between three of my fighters so that he was surrounded. This would hopefully help to make Vexmor easier to hit next round and improve my chances of saving.

V = Vexmor, S = Cephanyr, R = Reinglaith, C = Cyreni

In round 2, I went first. I began by hitting Vexmor with a Hammertide. I knew I could not kill him in one go, but by injuring and staggering him, I hoped in my next activation, I could finish him off. Vexmor then attacked again causing 3 damage on Cyreni. I now had two vulnerable fighters and one with 2 damage. Three fighters could now be killed easily by Vashtiss from range. Reinglaith now inspired, and with Vexmor staggered and surrounded, attacked. Vexmor failed his save and was slain, not only did I take 3 Bounty, I scored Overwhelming Force and removed a very dangerous fighter from the board. It was now time to catch Vashtiss.

In round 3, I lost Cephanyr and tried to chase down the remaining daemon with a tooled up Reinglaith. Unfortunately, I did not catch him/it/her (who knows), but I did score Loaded for Bear. This difficult game ended 16 to 14 and another win for me.

Game 2. I was now confident but scared of these daemons. The game played out in a similar manner to the first. To begin with, I focused on scoring my Objectives, notably Set Explosives and Wreckers. However, Vexmor had other ideas and used Commanding Stride to yet again reign down pain on my fighters. 

In the second round, I managed to bring Vexmor down, but by then I had lost both Reinglaith and Alathyrr. Cyreni was also badly injured. In Jamie's fourth turn of the round, he killed Cyreni. The only silver lining here was that his killer, Lascivyr was now basically on my back board edge and Cephanyr was deep in enemy territory. For my fourth turn, I moved Cephanyr to the back board edge of Jamie's territory. My plan was simple, stay alive and prevent him from scoring Annihilation.

Round 3 saw me take the initiative. I placed Cephanyr on Guard and equipped him with Utter Conviction. He now had a Save of 3 Dodge (due to my Cataclysm Value of 3). Vashtiss used her range 4 attack, but I saved and used Phantasmal Ink, my warscroll ability, to creep along the back board edge. My second turn, I moved putting me out of range of both daemons. Jamie then charged with Vashtiss, and again I saved the attack. For my third turn, I focused discarding Nowhere to Run and Uneven Conquest and drew new Objectives, including Spread Havoc, to add to Shocking Assault, which was already in hand. I then played Growing Concerns. Lascivyr would now be at -3 move in the next turn and would effectively be unable to do anything in his third turn. As a result, Jamie also Focused. For my final turn, I moved Cephanyr onto the Treasure token in neutral territory. Uninjured and on Guard, I sat to wait out the attack from Lascivyr. I had reasoned he could not kill Cephanyr as he had already used Twist the Knife and Great Strength (Great Strength had been swapped with my Great Fortitude to kill Reinglaith with the Thricecursed ability, Vile Temptations). Realising, he could do nothing more Jamie ended the game, and I scored Shocking Assault after his activation. Into the End Phase, Jamie scored only Fields of Blood, and I scored Spread Havoc. The game ended 17 v 11 and a final win for me.

I finished the third round with another 2-0 win and a glory score of 33 to 25.

Tournament result

I had won the day! I had played 6 games and won all 6. I had scored 99 and conceded 50 glory. A pleasing glory difference. Almost 2 to 1.

The results were called, and I won first place with Harry coming in second with Zarbag's Gitz paired with Emberstone Sentinel.

Conclusions.

I had had a great day, and after a week of playing the Razors had found they played in a very similar to my first edition favourites, Lady Harrow's Mournflight. I had also found that the C2C deck to work well and the Objectives to score well, although there are some that could easily be replaced. Many of the upgrades and ploys are not that good, if not entirely useless.  

Over the next few weeks, I would like to play the Razors more often. In addition, I would like to give the Thricecursed Discord a go.

Thank you for reading, my first and probably last tournament win.

Checkout my Warhammer Underworlds for more articles.

See you soon.