2022 was the first time I travelled for pleasure without my family in over 20 years. The purpose of this trip was to trap myself in a Marriot or Hilton and play Age of Sigmar with strangers. The Chicago Open is my last traveling event of 2022.

Chicago Open

“The bar will be brought in shortly but you will need to get tickets where they are playing 40K” was the announcement from the James, our TO, and is a great description of how it feels to play an Age of Sigmar event at an official Games Workshop event. We are present, but we don’t get to share space with 40k. To get to the AOS game room you had to walk through a construction area and a bank of elevators that feel straight out of The Overlook Hotel.

One of the things I do like most about Age of Sigmar is that it’s solidly a second choice for the IP owners and miniature players in general. We get all the benefits of well-capitalized production and professional management and get to be safely ignored to play our game. Many of the best parts of our game, like points, the list building app, and the community standards are really driven by members of the community.

(Unfortunately my phone ate pictures from the event so we will fill in the gaps with some gorgeous pictures from our library)

The List

Ironjawz - Click to Expand

My list was very similar to the one that was brought to Nova.  The main change was putting the Arcane Tome with Master of Magic on my Mawcrusher to be able to dispel endless spells. Relying on a heroic willpower in this meta isn’t good enough. I also decided to pick up Bounty Hunters to deal with any Vet units in play. Since I’ve started playing Ironjaws I’ve been accused by multiple opponents of wanting to charge forward on the first turn and I think I’ve only done it once prior to this event. Unless your opponent misplays deployment they are very likely going to screen you out in the first turn.

Game 1 – Vs. Jason Lambert (Nighthaunt) on Close to the Chest

Jason's List - Click to Expand

My opponent was an extremely nice Nighthaunt player attending his first two-day event.  His list had Lady O, a bunch of chainrasps, a Kruleghast, and some Bladegiests.  He was running Emerald Host so instead of mortals on the charge I received mortal wounds every battle round on 3 units.

I have a huge advantage in movement that is typically countered by Nighthaunt ignoring rend on my elite units.  Unfortunately for my opponent I’ve play a lot of Nighthaunt locally and make every effort to 1) avoid a double turn and 2) keep units 16 inches away or more so that any combats and engagments were on my terms. Mighty Destroyers allows me to basically double move and the 3D6 charge from Kragnos gives a huge advantage in closing the distance. Since I outdropped him I was able to dictate first turn priority and gave away the first turn. He mostly kept his castle intact but didn’t drop down any of his reserve units. I had hoped to shake out one or two of them so that I could eliminate them and not have to worry about my back objectives in later turns.

The first turn was mostly positioning as he anticipated that I was going to charge forward with all of my units and kept his castle intact. I did put a group of 3 Gore-Gruntas on the upper right objective to hold the point and made a charge hoping to clear out a unit of Chainrasps.  While the unit lived but I was able to “take more” points putting me ahead on points.

I won priority going into turn 2 and gave away the turn as I wasn’t well positioned to take advantage of a double turn and hoped to finish off the unit of Chainrasps during his combat phase. I was too far away with the majority of my units for him to charge and he moved to take back the point I had taken during my turn. During the cleanup phase he mentioned that he wasn’t close enough to complete his battle tactic but I told him to move the unit and take it.  As there was nothing I could have done to prevent him from completing the tactic I didn’t see a point in not allowing him to move the unit an extra two inches to complete the battle tactic. In the context of:

• Me, drinking Malort since 9 AM
• Him, participating in his first GT event and a totally pleasant person to be around

I’ve had teammates of mine deny me this grace during an event and don’t think either response is wrong. If we are going to grow our hobby, welcome people in, and have fun it is important to show a little understanding during an event.

During my turn I was able to engage him on all fronts with my mawcrusher, pigs, and Kragnos but didn’t do AS MUCH damage as I thought I would.  Kragnos, in a running theme on day one, didn’t do very much at all in combat.  Fortunately, I won priority into 3 and elected to double turn and removed most of his units. During his turn he was put into the position of having to decide to fight my main threats or not engage and grab more points. He killed my mawcrusher and most of my pigs but I was able to continue to hold more points in turn 4. We talked it out turn 5 and I won 24-20 due to holding more primary points and completing an extra battle tactic.  Big love to my local nighthaunt players for giving me so much experience in this matchup.

Game 2 – In the Prescence of Idols – Vs. Carlos Munoz (Seraphon)

Carlos's List - Click to Expand

I am sure that I made mistakes in this game, where I was tabled, that I should look at and analyze. My goal of being a better player is not helped by imagining a scenario where the dice had not been so unkind to me. My opponent had a good time removing my units from the table by turn 3 and I had as enjoyable time as one can. I’ll likely spend 10-15 minutes of my next therapy session talking about the single sarus knight that, by living on a single wound, prevented a lot of good things from happening in my life during this game.

I outdropped my opponent, who had a lot of big dinosaurs and a few little ones that all reduced damage by 1. I picked a unit of pigs, my mawcrusher, and Kragnos as my Idol units.  My opponent picked a three really big dinosaurs as idol units.

I elected to give my opponent first turn after deploying some of my units pretty far back to avoid turn 1 shooting and position away from any terrain pieces. Had I taken the first turn I likely would have had to run everyone forward and would have been very susceptible to a double turn. During his turn he shot off a unit of pigs and started moving a Purple Sun in my general direction.  Most critically, he was able to summon an additional screening unit of saurus guard into the middle of the board. He moved his heroic MVP Saurus knights to cover the middle objective and had multiple screen units covering it. I felt pretty lucky to avoid the majority of his shooting and didn’t mind giving up a single unit of pigs to a Seraphon as the price to avoid a double turn.

Due to the sequencing of start of turn actions I was able to attempt to unbind the purple sun clearing out space to move on the center objective.  With it’s big base out of the way I decided to fully commit to getting a double turn. My plan was to pick up all his screens and take my two idols into his idols to rack up points. If I didn’t win the double turn I’d be OK sacrificing one of my core units.

I was successful in getting a unit of my three remaining pigs into combat, the mawcrusher, and Kragnos. However, all three of my units had well below average combats that resulted in his Saurus Knights remaining alive on a single wound. Running the numbers after the event, even with the Thunder Lizard damage reduction, this outcome should happen less than 10% of the time. While I was able to score all of my primary points and battle tactic I was in pretty bad shape no matter what happened in combat.

After winning the priority roll I took a second to see if I could give away the turn.  Against a lot of armies, I would be confident that Kragnos or the Mawcrusher would both survive.  However, I anticipated that my three remaining units of pigs would be lifted by a combination of spells and shooting leaving me without the ability to compete on the primary objectives. I took the turn and made a desperation move heave to arcane bolt and use the 4 shooting attacks in my army to do that last wound to his MVP. I failed.  In combat I was able to do that final wound to my opponent’s heroic knight and piled Kragnos into more combat where he failed me a second time.  However, I was unable to do any damage with either Kragnos or the Mawcrusher.

My opponent, who was very nice to me, took his turn and I used Finest Hour on my Mawcrusher at the start of the hero phase. Critically, my opponent cast purple sun enveloping Kragnos and my Mawcrusher in its glory. I failed to roll a 9 to spell ignore with Kragnos and was left with a very rendable god model. An additional curse prayer sealed Kragnos’ fate and by the end of the combat phase my troubles were over. With my Mawcrusher and Kragnos both gone I was left with three units and I lost priority into the third round. We called the game and talked out our final three turns ending with a score of 31-10.

When looking at matches it’s cheap, easy, and unproductive to bemoan dice rolls. In my experience I’m typically pretty even on my reactions to extreme dice rolls. Unlike Nova, where I identified a boneheaded play in every single one of my games, I didn’t have a great insight on this lose at the time, on the flight home, or even while drafting this recap. I’m sure a top Age of Sigmar player could check the tape and let me know where I went wrong. What I’ve diagnosed is that in this matchup is that list construction is likely the most important culprit.  By trading Kragnos in for 9 more pigs, a second Warchanter, and an allied Fungoid Shaman I’d likely be able to engage in the time-honored tradition of pinning my seraphon opponent into his or her deployment zone. Having 1200 points in two units means they need to do work on every turn.

Game 3 – Won’t Back Down Vs. Mike Drafke (Legion of the First Prince)

Mike's List - Click to Expand

There can be no trust between hammer and rock. Eventually one or the other must surely break. My opponent had a Lord of Change, Khorne Demon Prince, a Bloodthirster, and several nurgle demons with a Sloppity Bilepiper. In addition, he also brought shackles and Ravenak’s Gnashing Jaws. If in the prior game I had wished to swap out Kragnos for extra pigs this matchup was one that I welcomed having him in the mix. The Khorne Demon Prince has the ability to halve runs and charges making getting into combat extremely difficult.  Combined with the Bilepiper preventing a pile-in move in combat this presented a real problem for many non-shooting lists.

However, my list had some tricks of its own to counter this.  First, might destroyers allows pile-in moves in the hero phase if you’re in combat.  Kragnos allowing for a 3D6 charge should help me get into combat after moving my pigs 18 inches. My opponent outdropped me and elected to go first to set up the Khorne Demon Prince ability and was able to summon a group of Plaguebearers as an additional chaff unit. During my turn I decided to move my Mawcrusher into his chaff units so I could hold 4 primary points while being stuck in combat.  Kragnos moved on the upper middle point and I placed my mawcrusher in combat with two units of chaff to prevent his units from getting on the lower middle point.

He won priority into the second round and put finest hour on his bloodthirster to throw him into combat with my Mawcrusher.  I thought it was possible that he would go into my mawcrusher so in the prior turn I tried to keep most of my Pigs and Kragnos away from the 8″ mortal wound blast radius. Again, he was able to summon another demon unit (2/2) and put shackles up near his daemon prince. My opponent charged my Mawcrusher with a set of furies and it was now surrounded by the bloodthirster and 3 chaff units. I’ve heard stories from Khorne players of how the 5 attacks from a bloodthirster completely whiff.  As a Gitz player I’m familiar with the cruel nature of a D6 damage roll. While I avoided taking any mortal wounds I was really surprised to take 16 wounds on my mawcrusher in the exchange. My focus shifted to targeting chaff to gain an extra wound from strength through victory.  I was able to kill 5 furies, a large number of plaguebearers, and survived attacks from both units of Plaguebearers. However, his single fury cowered and took the lower left objective. Kragnos continued to be tied up in combat but we were even on primary objective points.

Going into my turn I had one goal, to cripple or kill his bloodthirster.  I was able to get off all of my required buffs, flaming weapon on my 9-attack gore hacka, finest hour, a Waagh! for an additional point of rend. To support Kragnos I put a unit of bounty hunter pigs into the horrors in anticipation lifting them. The only thing I wasn’t able to do was recover my back objective. I’ve looked at the math and should have been able to do an average of 16 wounds to the bloodthirster. I split no attacks and left nothing back. However, between wards and saves I only did three wounds. This is far below average output. A pitiful showing that cost my Mawcrusher its life and put me in a bad position. My opponent was rightfully gleeful, and I wanted to remember trying to move past the combination of rolls. If you’ve ever played a game where luck is involved you know that feeling of “That can’t be right” or the desire to look a second or third time. I immediately wanted to drink three shots of Malort.

During his turn he started to consolidate on the lower center position and used his superior numbers, bolstered by a third successful summon, to continue to hold more points than me. I was able to free Kragnos from combat during his turn and was well positioned to charge his bloodthirster and finish the job. In addition, I was able to finally kill and capture my back objective giving me a “holds more” primary score. I lined up my charge with Kragnos and was able to successfully get in range for a big pink daddy charge. As an experienced craps player my opponent was much quicker to notice that my mortal wound monster charge was a three and a four, totaling seven. Seven meant no mortals and I again wiffed on my attacks leaving it alive.

Turns four and five were pathetic showings where Kragnos was eliminated and my opponent continued to successfully summon new demon units on the field.  We finished the game with a score of 27-19 in his favor.

Game 4 – Realmstone Cache vs. Patrick Fisher (Sylvaneth)

Patricks' List - Click to Expand

My opponent was an extremely nice person who was playing a light-bodied Sylvaneth list with 6 kurnoth hunters with bows, a Treelord Ancient, Durthu, two units of Tree Revenants and a warsong revenant.  He was a 4 drop as well and elected to be the attacker and dictate turn priority.  During deployment I set up to attempt to cover his overgrown territories but knew no matter what happened he was going to have his Treelord Ancient poop out a tree if he went first.

I put Kragnos right on the line in hopes of drawing fire from his bows and keeping my pigs alive. My fear was that he would snipe out my pigs and I wouldn’t be able to engage the units I want due to strike and fade.  During his turn he throw out a purple sun that avoided Kragnos’ spell ignore. In addition, it ate a pig (not great) and did 11 mortal wounds to Kragnos. At this point he apologized and I told him not to worry because it’s a dice game. I’d already had a shot of Malort and wasn’t really expecting good things to happen.

During his turn he moved his treelord up on the point to capture it and achieve his battle tactic. I looked at the deployment, his lack of screening units, and the mission and decided during my turn that I was going to zug zug. I picked gaining momentum on the treelord and positioned my mawcrusher, a unit of pigs, and Kragnos outside of 9 of the Treelord. I called a Waagh! in the first turn (one of the first times I’ve ever done it) and got every roll you could possibly imagine. I got a huge charge with my mawcrusher that allowed me to get into combat with all his Kurnoths. I got Kragnos in combat and did 18 mortal wounds to the treelord, killing it. I absorbed an entire unleash hell without taking a single point of damage. My mawcrusher eliminated 30 wounds of tree people with bows and Kragnos didn’t take a swing. None of it was due to skill, just the kindness of dice.

I won priority and took the double where Kragnos did 25 wounds to the Spirit of Durthu. Cool, GG, I won 26 vs. 12 when the battleplan, matchup, and distribution of dice results were all in my favor.

Game 5 – The Silksteel Nests vs. Ironjaws

Vince's List - Click to Expand

This was the first time I played a mirror match vs. Ironjaws and I was pretty excited. I felt that I had a lot riding on this as I wanted to have a winning record at an event for the first time since the Cherokee Open in February.

My opponent joked that we wouldn’t have many models on the table by round two and I felt a surge of excitement that I was going to be on the other side of the Ironjaws attack. My biggest issue, that was pointed out by my opponent, is that he had more units, both pigs and Ardboyz, then I did. I felt like I couldn’t deploy with my pigs as screens as he would just trade and that he could deploy with his Mawcrusher behind a few Ardboyz making a potential alpha strike worthless. I put both my Mawcrusher and Kragnos literally on the back of the board but close enough that I could support the other if the were in combat. I put pigs on all four points pretty far back. With his unit of 6 pigs and mawcrusher safely screened out I gave my opponent first turn and made the critical error of not giving my mawcrusher finest hour.

My opponent was true to everything I’ve heard about ironjaws players and moved up units of pigs, his mawcrusher (using fast-un) and charged his mawcrusher into my mawcrusher after declaring a waagh and activating his destroyer. I was legitimately a little shocked and had hoped that having Kragnos nearby but not engaged would have kept his general out of combat the first turn in exchange for some pigs.

He was able to kill my mawcrusher, eliminate a lot of pigs, and left me down about 30% of my army. My turn was one where I attempted to regain some momentum and was able to do 25 mortals to his mawcrusher with Kragnos and fight back on his two units of pigs. However, I was down in points and lost the ability to call my own WAAAGH when my general died. Going into two I won priority and the double and picked gaining momentum as my battle tactic.  With Kragnos and a group of pigs I was confident I would be able to hold 5 points and start eliminating some of his backfield units. During my hero phase my opponent asked if he could make the back left back objective a proving ground after I failed a charge with mighty destroyers. I hadn’t specifically called out that it was his option and agreed as long as I could switch my battle tactic. He agreed and I gave up hope of holding more for the turn.

He also smartly redeployed his unit of Ardboyz in a way that prevented me from claiming the point they held. I needed to keep Kragnos near a terrain piece for desecrate but was alright holding 3 objectives in the turn. During his turn I used Finest Hour to discourage his unit of 6 pigs from fighting Kragnos and he took them to the left side of the board to eliminate a unit of my pigs and start burning objectives. On the right side I was able to have a favorable combat and hold onto both my points.

Turn three saw his lack of command points really start to hamper his ability to move, reroll charges, and support his units. While we both lost our named general Kragnos counts as a general, so I was always two command points ahead of him. He won priority and destroyed a my last unit of pigs on the left side of the board while burning my center left objective marker. In my turn moved my Warchanter 11 inches away from both units of 9 pigs he had in his territory to prevent them from being able to use mighty destroyers. I then moved my two units of pigs to his far right back objective and used Kragnos to capture his center left objective. While he was ahead on points I had recovered for a disaster of a first turn and had a path to victory.

He won priority going into the 4th turn but failed both charges against my Warchanter after a 6 inch redeploy. I was finally in place to burn a back objective and kept my pigs far away from him so I could accomplish my grand Strategy.  Going into turn 5 whoever won the roll-off would be able to win the game. If I won I would be able to burn an objective and move my somehow still alive Warchanter far enough away that he couldn’t hold more points. If he won he would be able to get both of my backfield points and burn one. He won the priority and ended up beating me 22-21. It was a great game.

Overall Thoughts

The Chicago Open was a great event to attend with very few issues or controversies. While I’ve been personally disappointed with my results but have enjoyed the majority of my games.

January LVO will be my next travel event and I hope to see y’all there. I’ll likely be playing some manner of orc list but beyond that I cannot say anything with any certainty.

Between the balance dataslate and another GHB I have no idea what changes I might make to a potential list between now and my next event. Unlike last year I’m going to take the time to play and practice with intent in TTS and in my local community.

2022 has been an interesting experience and I’ve met a lot of really great people at Age of Sigmar events. If I have one major suggestion for all events, it’s to stop being cowards and run all of the battleplans. I know I’m in the minority and that certain battleplans are dismissed as “unfair”. Relying on the same seven or eight plans is boring and creates a situation where frequent event players expect to play on these plans. I think that this GHB was a real step up from the prior years in large part because of “messed up” missions like Turf War, Battlelines Drawn, and The Lurkers Below. Or I guess we’re just going to play Close to the Chest again.