With the recent Battlescroll entering the picture there’s been a major hit to Squig Gitz lists, as well as changes to Rally and Arcane Tome really altering the landscape of the competitive metagame as lists like Vulkite Spam take a step back. That said, this week represents the last of the old battlescroll, and we have one tournament to cover.

Cake or Death 2023

32-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in New Westminster, BC Canada on April 08 2023. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings. Please note that this event used the scaling 20-0 system for tie breakers.

The Showdown

Matchup & Mission – Jaws of Gallet

Matt Beasley – Disciples of Tzeentch: Horrors board control
Army List - Click to Expand

vs.

Ricky Fischer – Gloomspite Gitz: Troggs Troggs Troggs
Army List - Click to Expand

Thoughts

Jaws of Gallet is one of those missions that really rewards the player with priority, and it’s likely to have been the deciding factor in this matchup for Matt as he would be able to control the removal of objectives and really blob up on the central and his chosen second objective to really dig in and defend. That’s not to say the Gitz list is hopeless here, but one of the issues for Troggs lists is objective control, and while Ricky has supplemented his list with 40 Stabbas, they were likely not long for this world when there are 6 Tzeentch Enlightened available to run them down, with mortal wound spells at range to force leadership issues on multiple units – a thorn in the side for every Gitz army.

Result

Disciples of Tzeentch Victory – 11 – 9

Matt Beasley – Disciples of Tzeentch – 1st Place

The List

See Showdown

Archetype

Board Control

Thoughts

Guild of Summoners lists have been performing well over the past month or so, but this list has gone in a different direction and taken a more balanced approach. Horrors are great in the current metagame outside of the most skewed hammer units which are capable of lifting them in one go, and the ability to squat on an objective and out score your opponent on primary points is going to be an issue for scalpel style armies that don’t really want to get involved in long drawn out combats.

Tzeentch have gone under the radar somewhat but have really benefitted from the current battlepack – no Bounty Hunters and better protection for their squishy support casters means its a lot harder to shut off their summoning engine than previously, and they excel at playing the long game if they can keep even on primary scoring. This list brings 6 Disc Enlightened to have *something* to bully the opponent off objectives early on however, likely a nod to the fact that he needs at least one real hammer to allow him to get his horrors onto objectives in the first place.

The Best of the Rest

There were 5 more players on 4-1 records. They were:

• Position – Player Name – Faction:
• 2nd – Ryan Ihl – Gloomspite Gitz: An all in Trogg list with a total of 21 lil Troggs and 2 Big Troggs – it’s not a subtle list, but with the typical buff package it’s a tanky list that can trade punches with the metagames nastiest heavy hitters
• 3rd – Joseph Tsai – Kharadron Overlords: A Barak Nar list that seeks balance – 9 Endrinriggers and Brokk make up a nasty melee package, with 2 Frigates and 10 Thunderers giving the army some real ranged punch
• 4th – Ricky Fischer – Gloomspite Gitz: See showdown
• 5th – Tanner M – Fyreslayers: A Lofnir list that ignores the current trend of Vulkites for 3 Magmadroths, 15 Hearthguard Berzerkers and allied Runelord/Knight Zephyros for some Galletian Champion versatility
• 6th – Darren Macinnis – Maggotkin of Nurgle: A Nurgle list that takes a different approach with very few mortals and instead a whole bunch of chonk. 6 Plague Drones make up cheap and still effective mobile anvils. A Great Unclean One anchors the list, with a package of a Stench LoA/Gutrot/5 Blightkings still a mainstay for objective play and harassment

Wrap Up

I expect we will see a lot more Kharadron going forward, with Khorne and Slaanesh I think being late bloomers that are nevertheless more than capable of showing up in future showdowns as they both have powerful and deep toolboxes. I expect we will see a little less Hopperz list and a lot more Squig herd, as that variant didn’t get hit *as* hard and suffers less from the nerf to rally.

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