Last night saw round 2 of the Escalation League at my local store. I showed up on time like usual, but a lot of people couldn't play that day and will have to reschedule. There were an odd number of players so one would have to sit out til someone showed up. The more seasoned Space Wolf player I faced off with in round 1 said he would wait and let me face the other person waiting to play. He said this was his first time playing 40k and he pulled out a Tau army... Well what are the odds? I already felt bad for the kid before deployment. I had to re-do my list since it was built for 1000pts, so this was what I came up with at an even 500pt:

• 1x Libby (JP; Shield, S10 Sword)
• 3x 5-man ASM (1x MG; PW)

His army was approximately: 

• 1x Ethereal
• 1x 12-man FW Squad with Team Leader
• 1x ~20-man Kroot Squad with Shaper
• 1x Hammerhead (Rail; SMS; MT)

You all read my rant in the post below right? Well, I didn't want it to happen, but the dice gods were bowing down to me. I chose to go second and DS everything so he got 2 free turns of movement, as he spread out to take other table quarters. I decided to DS everything right behind his HH to melta it... and it happened. All 3 units and the Libby (all on his own) all made it in from reserves and either hit or scattered 1". This lined up 3 meltas with one taking down his HH in an explosion and the other popping the Ethereal. This lead his FW to take a leadership and they failed. This led them to fall back into me within 6" and they couldn't regroup and ran off the table without firing a shot. The Kroot turned around to charge at me but were outside of assault range so just fired and killed off 2 marines. I shot into the Kroot to weaken 'em and then the Libby and two units charged, with the 3rd waiting in the back to hold that table quarter. By the end of the turn the Kroot were wiped, ending the game on bottom turn 3.
The Organizer gave me the Massacre and points for assuming I could continue the game to hold 3 quarters and ones other than my deployment zone and this would could as my round 2. So, I'll have to make a 1500pt list for two weeks from now. I told the guy I fought that I felt bad for doing it, but really, I didn't think I'd pull off all units in on turn 2 like that and still get in all my shots in. We talked a bit about how he could improve some of his list, but really, not much can be done against my entire force starting withing 12" of his. He could use the Kroot as bubble wrap so I had to deal with them first, but this was his first game, so it's not like he knew that meta-game technique. Some of the other games going on were Plague Marines vs Eldar and Ork vs Space Wolves. Since they were in transports and the models were on the side table, I thought I'd take another pic of the Wolves:

As I mentioned, there is a League game going on at the local store starting at 500pt and ending at 2000pt with an extra Apocalypse game at the end to round it out. The first round match up was random match ups, but after that it will be more structured. So far about 8 people are in it as far as I can remember. I remember 2 Chaos Marines, one Imp Guard, Space Wolves, Orks, Eldar, and Tyranid, with me as BA. The organizer had Space Marines, but would only play if there were an odd number of people, so he didn't have to pull them out. I drew up against the Space Wolves player, the first time I've seen them in person. He said it was his third army he's painted and they were amazingly done. He had two Rhinos with some Grey Hunters in them and a 5-man unit of Long Fangs with Missile Launchers. He had a Mark of the Wulfen and a Priest that could cast some good magic including JotWW (not sure exactly what the model is called). I used my 3x ASM JP army kitted to take out some sneak Guard player or min-max marine with a Dreadnaught, so they weren't really that well kitted out to fight power armor. Mission was Spearhead deployment with the goal to hold table quarters. Equal hold was a draw, +1 a minor victory, +2 a major, and +3 a massacre. Bonus points for holding zones other than the one you deployed from. I drew first player and held all in reserves. He fans out to hold his zone. I deep strike into his lines to try and pop the Rhinos and hold them in that zone, then jump away and claim the other zones for a win. The pictures below are of mid-turn 2 and 3 and the end of the game, showing how it all turned out.

I got word of an Escalation League at the LGS where it starts at 500 then goes to up every two weeks to 1000, 1500, and ends at 2000. I'll detail it out in my next post which will cover the first game I played of the League. I built a list, mostly in fear of a mech enemy. Someone sneaky trying to field minimum troops and fit in a tank or walkers. The list was:

• 1x Libby (Shield, Lace)
• 1x Priest (Meltabombs)
• 3x 5-man ASM (Sgt has MBs; 1x Meltagun)

This comes out to 500 even. Covers vehicles well, but no power weapons or fists and that is the weakness here. The Tau list was:

• 1x Shas'el (Flamer; TL-MP)
• 2x 6-man FireWarriors
• 2x Hammerhead (Ion Cannon; SMS; MT; D-pods; Sensor Spines)

Basically my plan was to drop down first chance I got and melta the tanks and then do mop up. My Priest drops in first just fine but my Libby squad fails, even with DoA and the normal squad makes it in. I place my Priest near his HH on his flag but since I only have the 1 squad now, I take the shot on his HQ suit instead. Melta fails and one pistol wounds him, woo... The other normal squad drops near my flag to keep his units from just piling on it and holding it all game. In retrospect, I might have done better dropping it on the HH as well to try and pop it, or the suit. It boiled down to my two special squads working together on his point, and my loner squad holding the home base and him having two teams of a HH and 6 FW (one at his flag, one at my flag) with his HQ in the center, lending missile pods where needed. I only ever shot down a HH and nothing else, proving to be quite ineffective. However, I was able to weather dozens and dozens of wounds from missions and pulse rifles, winning the game by just surviving.

I'll soon do a write up of the actual League game I participated in and details on how it is structured.