Monday, May 23, 2011

Lessons Learned #1

All right, for those of you who aren't familiar in the military we like to conduct AAR's after every single event.  Good/Bad/Ugly/Whatever events, they all end up with some form of written AAR that is intended to document how things went and how to do it better.

I am going to attempt to do AARs for most of the games I play and events that I attend. Theory and mathhammer are fine, but I far prefer actual experience to thought exercises.

So after this last little LGS Tourney (see Battle reports below) there are several things to look at and think about.

Things that went well and are worth keeping...
1.  Riflemen Dreads, while these guys weren't spectacular they did their jobs nicely.  With a decent price and good survivability a pair of them is well worth it.
-But is a third worth taking?  Interweb consensus is yes, but I think that third and final heavy slot can be used otherwise.  For later argument/testing I think.

2.Brotherhood Banner - This thing really shines in bigger groups, but even  with just 5 guys in the group an additional attack per model and auto passing force weapon checks is well worth it.

3. Deep Striking 5 man GKSS squads later in the game.  This allows for the small and mildly squishy nature a touch more survivability as well as other benefits.  It allows that magical (for GKs) 24 inch range to be maximised and for a late game score.

Things that need to be examined further-
1.  Librarian powers...really only 3 of these have impressed me as useful all the time.  Sanctuary, is a must every single time. This power is a must, allowing you to control the assault better and possibly grab a free wound or two.  Shrouding, really situational but very much useful in many situations and used in most if not all games I have played so far.  Might of Titan, +1 str that stacks with Hammerhand, yes please, for 5 points...even better.  Warp Rift netted me 1 penetrating hit, one time in three games.  This could be more useful if the libby is running solo, but when attached to a group of Termies it isn't valuable.
2.  Land Raider-  Now only for 2000+pt games.  My track record for these very awesome tanks is about 50/50.  50% of the time they get popped/wrecked in the very first turn, the other half of the time it lives for most of the game and is effectively Conan.  
3.  5 man squad size for GKSS- do you combat squad 10 men squads for 2x the scoring possibilities or just run a couple (2-3) small squads?  Situation/game dependent but in a tourney the list can't change.  Combat squadding happens at deployment but list writing happens long before that.

Things that went poorly and won't see the light of day again.
1- My own lack of judgement.  Sometimes I go for the longshot risk that may have a big pay-off.  Many times it works out great, many times it fails horribly.  Lesson learned here, but it will probably need to be learned a number of more times.  Its a game, make it fun, more risk is more fun.

2- Lack of transports; simply put I need more Rhinos and Preds.  The extra points for the TL Assault Cannon with Psybolts may or may not be worth it.  But is trading 2 fire points and 4 more pax for the mounted gun worth while?  Depends on the use I guess.  We will see. 

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