Rocky Mountain Open 2023

 

Over this past weekend I attended the Rocky Mountain Open. It was a 2 day event with a top 8 and redemption bracket split on Sunday. There was also 40K and AOS represented, but only Legion sold out. Woot! For this one, I doubted I would be considered for painting and I haven't been able to get any games in lately. Basically my goal was to play six games. To which I was fairly successful. Winning? Well, you will have to read on...

Day 1: 

My list:

I wanted to run Mandos, all of the Mandos. Well, technically all the units, I didn't have any heavies. If I'm running Mandos, I might as well run Gar Saxon. And I want Black Sun Enforcers(BSE) for core, cause they do work for me. For them I do like Mag Dets, but I used the points for a commander Vigo with Improv and a Scanner to give out dodges to Outmaneuvered Mandos. I still have issue with armor in general with Shadow Collective, so I opted for impact grenades. Which turns out are also good against the new boogey man, Dark Troopers. Spoilers, I didn't use the grenades all weekend. Still glad I had them.

Unfortunately, I got one game of play test with this list. I thought it up, played a game with a friend, and wasn't super sure about it. I begged for games, but to no avail. In the end I went with it, unsure of how it would perform, because I had to submit a list. I did get a couple more games the week leading up, but it didn't help. The Vigo just seemed to always get pulled too late to be useful.

But, it didn't matter, I was off to the races. I was so confident in my list and how painting would go down, that my goal was to play 6 games. Yep.

Round 1:

For round 1 I pulled a snow table. The terrain on this thing was knee height. I was talking about it later and on of the guys who set up terrain the night before said it was terrible. They had done what they could, but it was still bad.

When I greeted my opponent, I mentioned that I hoped he didn't have a gunline or this was going to go bad for me. He said he had a Pyke gunline, actually. *sigh*

My opponent's name was Will. He was wearing a STABCast shirt. I asked him if he was in fact STABCast Will. He was! SQUEEEE! Maybe not, but still cool. He gave me a Standing Orders card with Maul in a kayak. Pretty awesome.

Will's list:

Looking at the list, I kind of knew what to expect. Black Suns go in the bus, Maul follows, Pykes shoot from the back.

Mission: Hostage Exchange, Hemmed In, Rapid Reinforcements

I think the mission caused him to change things up a bit. I was surprised that he gave the hostage to the Black Suns over a unit of Pykes. This put Maul in the bus. Not completely unexpected. He also Rapid Reinforced a unit of Pykes.

For my part, I gave the Hostage to one Black Suns and Rapid the other two.

This game went pretty much as expected, though his rally dice were on fire. Maul killed 2 units of BSE and took my hostage. He was chased down by my Mandos, which killed him and started flying the hostage back to my zone. His BSE took his hostage back to his zone, suffering casualties, but not enough. There was also a stupid bus healing people.

I dropped one unit of BSE on the left to threaten his bus, but Maul made quick work of them. On the right, near his board edge, I dropped the other unit. The made saves like a boss, but built up a good amount of suppression(8 at one point). In the end they shook enough off to retreat to cover when the obvious was happening. They go to kill points. I will talk more about that at the end.

Loss - 2 - 2 

Kill points: 279 - 328

Round 2:

Round 2 was versus Sarah. I have never played her before, but I knew her from Tacticon, specifically doubles. She was playing Rebels. I haven't played a lot of Rebels, so I was likely to learn something. And I did, just not about Rebels.

Sarah's list:

Great, Din. Him I have faced. But she wasn't running the rifle. Also, Mando saves ARE annoying. Though I didn't put much into him.

Mission: Recover the Supplies, Danger Close, Rapid Reinforcements

She put both Wookies into reinforcements, which meant the didn't have to wait for other special forces to drop. I was worried that it would mean she would get them early, but she didn't. I chose two BSE again. With Danger Close, I mentioned the obvious option, which is our own boxes inside our U, so that is what happened. My Vigo and my last BSE unit went for mine, she sent her emplacements after hers, which surprised me. Not a bad choice, just one I would have not thought to use.

This game went pretty one sided early. I dropped a BSE along my table edge, but on the right, which is her DZ. This took some of her firepower off my main force and distracted attention. As I do. My second drop went down board center to grab that box. She jump Din right into them, locking them up. I recently have found that BSE tend to do okay in combat, so I wasn't super worried, but I put in a unit of Mandos just to make her choose. I spread shots a little, with Gar spending his time trying to remove Han. Ineffectively. I could negate 2 cover or I could negate 2 dodge, pretty much every shot, but not both. I opted cover, using standby/rocket tricks, but never finished the job.

I managed to extricate my center BSE with just a Vigo and a box, but he went down. I forgot I could grab 2 boxes with one unit, and used Improvised Orders to go with a Vigo instead. waiting to shoot some Wookies. However, the blunder didn't cost me and my BSE were able to grab the second box on their activation. And this is where I learned something new. On the following turn I activated my BSE, but they were panicked. I managed to roll 1 suppression off, putting them below panic. I then used Dauntless to move them, putting them back into panic. No longer counting for points, but after they would have dropped the box. Then, for their only action, I Recovered removing all that suppression, leaving them scoring again. I was then able to evacuate Gar, denying Din his bounty, and the game ended.

Win: 3 - 2

Kill points: 0 - 514(yep, I killed nothing)

Having spent a good portion of the game blasting my army into mist, my win kind of tilted Sarah. She wasn't terribly happy about it. I was a bit out of it. The stress from straining my brain to find a win, pulling a Hail Mary, and having it work left me a bit spent. I went into the next round a bit on the shaky side.

Round 3:

As you can see, no models. I totally forgot to take any pictures. I made some sloppy mistakes in this one, but I don't think that is what cost me the game.

Landon's list:

Yay, Dark Troopers.....

Actually, I was kind of interested in facing them. I had put Impact Grenades on my BSE to try and get passed my struggle with armor. Let's see if they work. Or not.

Mission: Hostage Exchange, Major Offensive, Limited Visibility-> not really

He put his hostage on a mortar, which I found interesting. It puts my stuff inside that minimum range and doesn't have a lot of wounds to hang on with. I suspect it mostly is just to break the deployment rules for mortar teams, but whatever.

He started by handing out suppression with his mortar. I started by blasting a mortar he deployed on the roof with rockets. I had no intention of killing it, I wanted to lure out the Dark Troopers that were behind a building. It worked. Mando rockets do work on a Dark Trooper squad. Though it was a BSE squad who shot on the way in, before making grenade range that actually killed the most. Aims and good rolling does good things. Who knew. I left the DkT squad at just the leader, which may have been a mistake. I also killed Gideon and Boba. He was able to lock up my Mando with his DkT. However, Gar snagged his hostage and made a run for it. Though he died in the end, it wasn't to IG for bounty and it was far enough that he couldn't get his hostage.

I did screw up, though. I left my BSE squad with the hostage out to get them to drop it so the commander Vigo could grab it. I should have just hid them and waited. He "managed" to pull his core squad and snag the hostage before I could. I must have suppressed them, because Uplink shows the score 0-0. 

There were a couple sketch movements during this game, but my opponent always had his hand in his bag before I looked up from doing my stuff and pulled what he wanted an awful lot. Whether he did, or was just lucky, it didn't look good from my perspective.

Loss: 0 - 0

Kill points: 160 - 654

Day 2: Attack of the Clones

After staying up WAY too late finishing my display board and a time change, I was ready for the Redemption bracket. Oops, probably should have mentioned: I didn't make top eight.

I decided that, while I think the Gar list might be better, it was boring compared to Maul. Well, usually.

My new list:

I had played this list once before. I like having Maul over Saxon, he just does more and feels like a character versus Saxon who just feels like another unit. I also wanted a chance to play with Cad. I had only played him once before, and I have cool translucent markers. So yeah, playing Cad.

Round 4:(technically a new round 1, but I'm keeping the continuity)

Round one had me facing Michael. Michael was running Republic. He was running 501st, which can have 3 one pips, which got me later.

Michael's list:

This list has a lot of what I had already seen from clones. I don't really know what it all does, but I do have some idea. 

Mission: Recover the Supplies, Hemmed In, War Weary

He was playing a lot of scout. I didn't realize this at first. I placed my Cad Bane tokens rather far forward. The bomb and the blank were in fine positions, Cad was too close. He placed his strike team on a building to activate the blank and there was a supply crate up there. He moved Echo and the Phase 2s without the mortar up on the left, by the generator to reveal Cad. The third was on the opposite side of the generator, but his Barcs were over there and ate a mine turn 1.

A unit of Mandos opened by taking the Strike Team off. A Barc ate a mine, I would take them off early, too, maybe the top of two. I choked Echo and Fives, forgetting they just come back as a different model. I should have taken models off. Wouldn't end up mattering, though.

I think I played this one well. He took off my stuff, but not before I moved the supplies out of reach. He did make the wrong choice at one point, and went with Fives's squad instead of the Phase 2's, but unlucky dice saw my Mandos ghosted so he didn't have to worry about it. A save would have seen him with 0 boxes.

He moved his commander onto a roof with a long 1 move(I think, removed his template before I could see), which meant my Mandos had to jump up and melee him and take the box. I had two boxes to his one, my list did what it was supposed to. He hit my Mandos with 3 shots, including 2 mortars. They didn't die, but his list did what it did, and they had 5 suppression. They no longer counted for scoring.

Loss: 0 - 1

Kill points: 233 - 701

Round 5:

Sweet, I move one table and get to play on the cool board! Against Clones, again. My opponent was Jason. I had played Jason at a tournament at TEG. It didn't go well for me.

Jason's list:

Regular clones, not 501st. But not a lot different.

Mission: Breakthrough, Disarray, Rapid Reinforcements

Breakthrough is in my list because I need a fourth mission. Paired with Disarray versus a gunline. It is incredibly boring. I played Standing Orders on 3 turns by choice. This game was sit there and wait. I dropped my BSEs in his zone. Between Force Push and poor bag pulls, they ended up going to late and getting wiped before I could do anything with them. I spent much of this game waiting for him to come to Maul and launching pot shots. I couldn't do enough damage.

I do believe I made mistakes. He deployed all in one corner, except his Barc. I should have pincered his force, but I was too worried about having stuff at the end of the game. I made some questionable moves with Maul that could have gone either way.

In the end, it was just boring. I pushed a Mando squad too far, so they couldn't make it back, but he would have still pipped me.

Loss: 2 - 4

Kill points: 110 - 322

Round 6:

My last game of the event was against Kevin. He was running Clones. All day, clones.

Kevin's list:

Mission: Bombing Run, Danger Close, War Weary

I placed Bane tokens, keeping Cad back, but revealing him on turn 1. I placed 1 Mando, 2 BSE, and the Swoops on his side of my U. I placed everything on everything else on my side U. He placed Anakin, Wookies, and Padme on my side, the rest his. He gave the Wookies, Anakin, and a Phase 1 a bomb each. My bombs went to the Swoops(duh), a Mando squad on my side, and Maul.

I blasted Padme out of the gate. She tried to move off, but Cad finished her, netting my first Bounty all day. But he soon died, so didn't matter. I activated my Swoops late and the got me the bomb turn one.

Turn two, Maul finishes the Wookies, steals their bomb and drops it back in his zone. Anakin dropped his bomb, but didn't detonate. Maybe worried about damage to Anakin(psh, weak) or the suppression for his flaw.

Turn three, Maul drops his second bomb, jumps, picks up Anakin's. This whole time, Anakin is killins BSE and Mandos, but sacrifices must be made. On the opposite side my forces are keeping his clones distracted. Bombs are going back and forth, but I don't care, I own 4 on this side.

Turn four, I play Ploy, but he also one pips. Not for the first time have I wanted a Maul 1 pip, just for cunning. Ploy is more versatile, but I only seem to play it for Maul to NEED to go first. But I win the roll off, Maul jumps over and plants the last bomb. He chokes the last Mando in one squad and pushes the other last Mando. He then jumps into Maul, but only gets 2 actions(pathetic) and the bomb goes off.

Turn five, my opponent decides the only way to win is to table me. I'm not worried. He takes my stuff off on the far side and moves Echos team up. My Mando, being the target, still has 2 shields, and is completely blocked from LoS. He might get 1 shot on 6, but I'm not going to let that happen. He knocks Maul to 4 wounds, but Witch Magick. Which I use.

Turn six, he fails to kill Maul and never makes line to the Mando.

Win: 4 - 2

Kill points: 185 - 507

Conclusions:

I learned to use Dauntless this weekend. I disagree with everyone, it is great, BECAUSE of the new suppression rules. Before, I didn't want the tokens. Now, I can use it to move AND recover, since it matters more.

Originally, I was unhappy with my performance. I lost most of my games. But having written this up, they all came down to the wire. My day 1 losses were both draws, sent to kill points, which I always am aware is a loss for me, just due to play style. All or nothing. Game 4 was suppression. The new rules swung that one. I was still in it.

On kill points, I averaged 504 points lost per game. On day 1 I killed 437 points, ALL DAY, day 2 526. Yeah, kill points aren't my strong suit.

The only game I think I played really wrong was game 5. Even though it is in my deck, I don't play Breakthrough. I tend to lose a lot of models, but I have been able to hold my opponents back enough that hey can't make it. I should have done more pushing in that game. It is a mission that I need more practice in.

The only change I am looking to make is to take my day 1 list, drop Gar and the Vigo and put in Maul. With Burst of Speed. I missed Burst of Speed. I think it will be more fun and scarier for my opponents. Leaning hard into that glass cannon.

How fine a knife edge can I walk?

Painting. Well, I was close with my bike for vehicle, but I don't think my army is even being considered. Until I bring something new, I will continue to not make painting. And it is unlikely I will bring anything new. I like playing Shadow Collective. Going forward, at 5280 events, I'm not even putting my army out. 

Truly enjoyable event. I highly recommend 5280 events. I met some great people, got to see even more great people, and had some good games.

Frontline Gaming? Do they actually do anything but take my money?