With the impending homecoming of my daughter, I bravely took to the tournament and hoped she would hold out until I was done rolling dice. 😛

This was an awesome event! Because there were only 3 people signed up, the TO arranged to change the format of the event so it was one large game on Saturday instead of a the 5-6 game tournament format that is common around here. They dropped the price by half and we got one more person to sign up and played a 4 person 2500 point game on a 6×8 table. 10,000 points, 95 dice in the bag. It took us about 8 hours to play, thanks to some exceedingly efficient dice pulling — the puller would draw 2, and then decide whether the first dice would affect the second dice, and if it didn’t, would give the second dice to be played as well. We often had 2-3 people going at once, which really helped speed the game up so we didn’t take all night, and also keep it fast paced and exciting!

Here’s a break, because there are about 40 photos in this post.

The table was 6×8, which was 2 F.A.T. mats against each other. We scattered a variety of different types of terrain around to keep lines of sight low. The buildings we used the official building rules, but also called each building a teleporter so you could use an Advance or Run action to transport between buildings as though they were attached. This meant you could hold a building by keeping a unit in it, but you could be dislodged by being assaulted.

My army consisted of everything in my case. Which is:

5 man drop command with medi drone

5 man drop squad with lance and spotter

NuHu with all the fixings

4 Standard Strike Squads

X-Howitzer with all ammo

C3T7 with 2 shields and 1 batter

3 C3D1 drones with batter

2 C3D2 drones with 1 shield, 1 batter and 1 spotter

2 X-Launchers with spotter

1 Plasma Support Team with spotter

3 Interceptors

If I were to do it over again, I would not take the NuHu. Every time she goes on the table, she gets blown up without doing much. I really want a C3M4 or C3M407 for some really resilient shooting!

96 dice in the Christmas gift box. One of them was a Distort dice, as Clark played his Rebel Ghar.

The Rebel Ghar deployed. Clark had a hard time with the 3M in and 2M up deployment zones (that he set!) so he ended up putting a lot of his army into reserves to take a command check to come on later. I think this bit him a bit, as he didn’t have the forces initially to pressure both of his neighbours, and he picked the neighbour that wasn’t me. 😀 He also had a distort cannon that didn’t come on until turn 6!

My deployment.

Clayton’s deployment. I’m jealous of his numerous drone tanks and skimmers.

Clayton does excellent painting.

Greg’s deployment. He’s the main reason I want a C3M4, what with his Compression Cannon (which was a Plasma Cannon for this game) and it’s crazy SV.

You’ve got this far into the post, and we haven’t even started the game yet. This is just before the first dice is pulled. We’re all wide-eyed and bushy tailed and have had zero beers. The bar didn’t open until noon and it’s 10:30am when we start pulling.

We’re playing an Antares adaptation of the 40k Maelstrom Missions that Clark and I wrote. After the game, we all agree that it could use some tweaking to adjust for the differences in systems, but that it’s an excellent scenario as is. We all used scrap paper to write tables of what missions we had each turn, to keep it all organized. You’ll see this paper again at the end, all filled in.

Clayton’s NuHu, I think they are in one of his transports.

I love the shit out of this photo. Click on it to make it bigger, it’s just so cool with the blues and the crisp greens.

Turn 2 all I’ve really done is moved 10″ forward (in some cases, 5″) and deployed batter shields. I really liked having 4 batters this game, and think I’ll try to do that again. Batter drones are safety and security. We started turn 2 at 11:30am, 1 hour after we started.

A pair of Ghar suits amble up a roadway. These guys were Clark’s command squad, and the ended up giving me 4VPs in turn 5 for a solid lead on the victory.

Greg’s tanks advance while his artillery hides behind a barricade.

I haven’t posted a photo of my finished X-Howitzer. I think it’s my favourite model in my army right now, not only because it’s really cool looking but also because I’m really happy with how the airbrushing worked out with the blue, in combination with my regular Concord workflow of whites and washes.

Some bikes vs a skimmer. Greg’s bikes got to far forward to quickly in turns 1 and 2, and he lost both squads really quickly for his aggressive decisions. I ended up not being able to score a mission in turn 4 because there was no Fast/Rapid Sprint unit on the table. The rules we wrote say you can immediately discard a mission if it was impossible at the beginning of the game, but that you have to wait until the end of the turn to discard if it had been possible, but was no longer. Such is life.

A more expansive view of the convention room. It was unfortunately smaller than usual, so I hope Dan made money on it ok. I blame the weather — it’s finally got really nice in Vancouver after a super rainy and cold spring.

I spent a lot of brain power setting up this Strike Squad. I laid down an Arc shot which reduced incoming fire by a 6+ on a D10, as well as a batter from certain angles. They sat on an objective marker for 2 turns. The first turn they scored 1 for holding it. The next turn, they held it to gain me 2 points for holding at least 2 objectives, and twice as many as my opponents.

A lot of Ghar, fighting some Freeborn.

This is turn 3 now, and my T7 is only holding my NuHu. He was the other piece of the 2 point objective holding from above, so thankfully he was in the right place at the right time for that. We started turn 3 at 1:45, meaning turn 2 took about 2 hours and 15 minutes. Because 1 turn was just a lot of “moving forward”, it was very quick.

Greg’s Strike Squad holds the chemical plant.

After scoring, at the beginning of turn 4 my NuHu charged into the chemical plant to take out his Strike Squad. They reacted by running away, the cowards! Then he dropped a Scramble shot on the building. Then Clark shot an SV4 shot at my NuHu, which I passed the res test on a 1. The next SV4 shot took him out, ~250 points gone, and all he did was hold one objective and charge a unit. I’m pretty sure I hate the NuHu, they are far to glass cannony for my liking, although I love their concept. I need them to have more than res 4 and 1 failed res test to die. >.> As has been pointed out, Scramble fucks NuHu really hard so he didn’t get the -2 for his Nano drone, or the 2 shield drones I gave him to soak shots, but still. Not good. Turn 4 started around 3:45pm, 3 hours after it started.

Clayton’s Freeborn come around the building to strike at Greg’s C3.

One of my Strike Squads was hanging out in the building in the corner of my table, waiting to be able to teleport to another building. I was shooting another squad in another building, trying to put pins on them so I could charge more safely, when Clark shot 3-4 SV5 shots at my building and destroyed it, and my Strike Squad in the process!

Many beers were drank!

I have been on a difficult and awful diet for medical reasons, and drank water all day. In fact, I haven’t had beer or carbs (including rice, potatoes, beer anything with any amount of sugar in it) for months.

65 dice in the box at the start of turn 5. I didn’t write down what time turn 5 started, but it must have been quick because turn 6 started at 6:50pm, which means turns 4 and 5 together took 3 hours, the same amount of time that turn 3 took!

My forces turn around, back towards Clark, as my objectives change and it becomes more advantageous to hit at him instead of heading forward towards Greg or Clayton.

I have no idea whats happening here, but I liked the two tanks together. 🙂

Freeborn sneaking along a building.

So. Many. Ghar suits.

After easily removing the NuHu, Gregs strike squad explores further into the chem plant.

After the tournament, we all got into the selfie-trophy pose to get a photo taken. I got first place with 14 points, Clark 10 points, Greg and Clayton got 6 or 7 points it’s unclear from conversation which was which, but I do know that Greg got third place and Clayton got the event “selfie” model.

Packing up at the end of the night.

We finished the game before we ran out of dice during turn 6. We decided not to play the optional, random turn 7 and ended the game at 7:30pm, a mere 40 minutes after it started.

Here’s a breakdown of my scoring.

Turn 1, I rolled “1 VP for unit within 12″ of opponents table edge”, which was absolutely not going to happen safely, and control objective 1 and 2, both of which were in the middle of the table.

At the end of turn 1, I kept control 1 and 2 because I felt I could do those with some work. I discarded and re-rolled to gain control objective 5, which was 10″ out of my deployment zone so I was a happy camper. I scored 2 points, making my total 2 – the others scored between 2 and 0, so I was on track.

Turn 2 I scored objective 5 and 1, and kept 2 because it was only about 10″ from 1 so I could hop over and make it happen.

Turn 3 I generated “score 1 for 3 Down units”, “score D3 for 2 holding objectives and twice as many as opponents”. Because I had 5 and 1 locked down already, and was heading to 2, the D3 mission seemed possible, with a lot of planning. I carefully laid down Arc shots and batter shields and moved my troops into position to hold what I needed to hold, and it paid off! I scored 1 point for 1 Down unit, 2 for the D3 and 1 for holding objective 2. I was doing good, but Clark scored a 3 pointer and I think was still ahead of me at this point.

Turn 4 I rolled “1 for a failed break test, D3 for 3+ failed break tests on different units”, “1VP for killing Fast/Rapid Sprint”, “1 VP destroy unit in assault, D3 for destroying 3+ in assault”. I flailed a bit this turn, having no real solid thing to do. I threw a drop squad into assault with some rebel ghar, and barely escaped alive and with the point. That unit died moments later, having done their duty. This is also the turn I turned my army around to focus on Clark instead of pushing forward into the table to have more to do with Clayton and Greg. I discarded the Fast/Rapid Sprint mission. I only scored 1 point this turn, for the assault, failing at causing a break fast.

Turn 5 I rerolled “D3 for destroying a Leader 2, Leader 3 or High Command unit” and “1VP for destroying unit by shooting, D3 for destroying 3+ by shooting”. In a string of lucky dice pulls, I pinned out Clark’s command squad, getting the break test and the leader destroyed mission completed for 4 points total. I held onto the shooting one for next turn.

Turn 6 I rolled objective 5 again, and “1 VP for destroying 3 drones, D3 for destroying 5+ drones”. I destroyed a distortion cannon by shooting, blew up a ton of targeter and spotter drones Greg had lying around, and was still huddled against objective 5, to score 3 points (D3 only gave me 1) in the last turn, securing my victory!

This was exciting, because I’ve only ever won one other game of Antares. And that one is hard to count — it was Xilos mission 4, which I appear to have forgotten to write about. It’s a very strange scenario where you are more playing against the placement of tiles, than you are against your opponent. Dirk and I played two games of it, because he trivially won the first game, then we made some rules changes and played another to try it again.

This was an amazing game, I’m so stoked I managed to make it happen, and I wish I was still playing the game right now!