A new week and a couple of new event results to pick through. We’re starting to see Idoneth and Fyreslayers lists taking advantage of the new book, but as of yet neither has pushed through into a top finish, excluding Adepticon… Oh yeah, about Adepticon.

A Note on Adepticon

Unfortunately, as the AoS tournament was run largely through pen and paper, what little information we have about one of the largest tournaments of the year is reliant entirely on tidbits showing up on social media. What hasn’t helped matters is that the winner of the event has changed from the awards ceremony as an administration error was made when tallying up points for each player. As a result, we unfortunately don’t have any analysis to offer on the event. A pity, and we hope to see them modernise things for next year as it’s a very large data set that’s effectively a black box.

Anyway, moving on.

GT ŁÓDŹ

A two-day, five-round event which took place in Poland. You can find lists for this event at Tabletop.to. 

Mateusz Eljasz – Hedonites of Slaanesh – First Place

Mateusz' List - Click to expand

Notable Features

• This is a mistake right? Huh…
• *checks notes* you sure this is right? This doesn’t make any sense!
• What do you mean! There’s a Chimera! This i-uh huh okay

Why it’s Interesting

Despite being a punchline to many jokes amongst the AoS community, we have a 5-0 performance from one of the game’s weakest factions. How is it done? Well, it helps to bring in Be’lakor for a control element to shut down your opponent’s best unit for a turn. From there, there’s speed elements to control the board and some Blissbarbs to help farm depravity points to get the summoning engine going early.

I’ll be honest with you dear reader, this list has served somewhat of a riddle to mine eyes, and I would love to pick the brain of Mateusz to better understand what’s going on here. As far as I can tell, the Chimera is here in order to ensure the army remains a one drop, as he has points leftover and no other battlefield slots to use up in the battle regiment. Having priority is very important to this army after all, as it can help leverage the power of the Lurid Haze host, which lets him put D3 units into reserves AFTER deployment has finished but before the battle begins, so he can set up unfavourable first turns for his opponent and then give them first turn.

Jakub Golec – Stormcast Eternals – Second Place

Jakub's List - Click to expand

Notable Features

• Is there something going on in Poland that I’m missing here?
• 5 Stormstrike Chariots and the Farstriders!

Why it’s Interesting

Now that enough time has passed since release, I think it’s safe to say the Stormcast Eternals book is deeper than many first claimed when it first came out. Now obviously the Stormdrake Guard and Longstrikes stood out, as did Fulminators, but hidden behind the obvious has been a series of highly efficient gems that have shown that they are rock solid if unspectacular, units like Vindictors, the Paladin units and the Knight Judicator have all demonstrated they are up to the task when called upon, and now we have #Chariotmeta.

For 165 points, you get 12 wounds with a 3+ save (and a 6+ ward thanks to Hammers of Sigmar), on a fast moving large base that’s capable of blocking off parts of the board that does Ogor Mawtribes style mortals on the charge – oh and they’re not shabby in combat either! So we have five of these bad boys to control the board, what else do we use? Well, high volume attacks from Boltstorm Judicators is an efficient unit that can do it’s job safely behind the large bases, and Knight-Toot-Toots to make your opponent have to avoid terrain or avoid getting blown to pieces by the power of the humble trumpet.

The Rest of the Best

4 more players finished on 4-1:

• 3rd – Ziemek – Seraphon: Standard Thunder Lizards list with an EOTG, a Skink Chief Stegadon and a Slann being the notable standouts.
• 4th – Pablo – Seraphon: Another Thunder Lizard list much like Ziemek’s, but allies in two Stormstrike Chariots (do we need to establish a Polandwatch article series?)
• 5th – Piotr Kurkowski – Daughters of Khaine: Morathi and the bow snakes list, that takes only 15 total snakes and invests the rest in a Cauldron and Witch Aelves.
• 6th – Kuba Kostrubiec – Lumineth Realmlords: 30 Sentinels and 3 Foxes, with Twinstones to really make your opponent wish they didn’t show up!

Shropshire Slaughter GT 2022

A two-day, five-round event held at Glasshamer Gaming in Telford, England. You can find lists for this event at Tabletop.to. 

James Field – Sons of Behemat – First Place

James' List - Click to expand

Notable Features

• Kragnos and his bros – two Gatebreakers.
• An absurd amount of high quality damage output, with most of the wounds also sporting a 6+ ward.

Why it’s Interesting

It’s pretty simple really – can you survive the initial onslaught of Kragnos and two of the most dangerous Mega-Gargants? Well you might have a game – might. The success of Kragnos since his new warscroll is well documented, and his inclusion here simply allows the Mega-Gargants to get into killing position quickly and deliver an early haymaker.

Alternatively, when the situation requires it, you can simply hang back and play defensive and trust your opponent may not have the kind of damage output required to shift them off central objectives. It’s a versatile list that also is quick to pilot, meaning less brain fatigue over the course of the weekend and importantly, plenty of opportunity to chat with your opponent and have a nice time.

Shanee Nishree – Stormcast Eternals – Second Place

Shanee's List - Click to expand

Notable Features

• 5 Dragons lead the charge
• Bastian, the Lord-Arcanum and the Lord-Relictor provide toolbox elements
• Technically illegal, as it’s running two hunters of the heartlands Core Battalions (we assume this was caught during the weekend and one of the battalions was removed, though do not have confirmation as of time of writing)

Why it’s Interesting

In a metagame that’s shifting as people adapt to the post Battlescroll world, Shanee has chosen to leave the longstrikes at home in favour of more Vindictors and several support elements that crucially don’t give up any priority target points.

The support elements in question? An Everblaze comet for long ranged punch, a Lord-Arcanum to zoom around the board and provide healing to the dragons and threaten to steal unguarded objectives, and a Lord-Relictor to mitigate the Stormkeep’s one weakness (no deep strike) by shunting the Vindictors up the board to where they’re needed, locking down objectives midgame as each unit of 5 counts as 15 by round three.

The Rest of the Best

5 more players finished on 4-1 or 4-0-1, which we’ll cover below:

• 3rd – JackQuig – Seraphon: Thunder Lizard list with Kroak, an Ark of Sotek Bastiladon and an allied Celestant Prime.
• 4th – Dan Arnold – Idoneth Deepkin: A total of 8 sharks headline this Fuethan list, 6 of which are in Shivers for added punch. Dan uses Teachings of the Turscoll to flip the tides chart and get aggressive – a list made for a crushing turn two.
• 5th – Dan Kiernan – Legion of the First Prince: Fairly standard list here, notably with a boomthirster but without any horrors, likely a concession to the battlescroll update.
• 6th – Andy Bryan – Stormcast Eternals: 6 Longstrikes, 5 Dragons, 15 Liberators and a slightly bored Ellarr. Brutal and effective.
• 7th – Aaron Walters – Maggotkin of Nurgle: A modified summoning list in Befouling host, brings two Maggoth Lords and two Lord of Afflictions to provide some solid herohammer action, supported by a bunch of Beasts of Nurgle.

Next Time: The Dust Settles

I’ve got a tournament this weekend I’ll be writing the winners for in this column, and there’s a total of five Idoneth lists and three Fyreslayers list so it should be a good barometer for the power level of those books depending on how they do. Off in the horizon, new ghosts and murder aelves ready themselves to make a splash on the competitive scene, but there’s a lot of tournaments to cover between then and now – Cya next time!

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