1st Warhammer Basilisk Dystopian Wars Cup - Group Stage

Gaming is so much more relaxed with all markers nicely stored away. :-D

In Switzerland, the first Warhammer Basilisk Dystopian Wars Cup is taking place - and as far as I can see, the people in Basel are the most active DW players.

The line-up for the group stage:

Group A:
Henshakles (Ottoman Empire)
Wildstyle (Covenant of Antarctica)
0815 (reserve player)

Group  B:
Geddon (Kingdom of Britannia)
Rufus (League of Italian States)
Seph (Russian Coalition)

Group C:
Apolloxer (Covenant of Antarctica)
Madwulf (Kingdom of Britannia)
Parcival (Empire of the Blazing Sun)

Group  D:
Sackratte (Empire of the Blazing Sun)
Sir Mauriac (Russian Coalition)
Stonhead (Republic of France)
At the very moment my participation in the group stage is over and Apolloxer and Madwulf still have to battle out their game. Here's the report for my two group stage games.

My fleet for the DW Cup group stage (from left to right): Tenkei Sky Fortress, Hachiman Dreadnought, 3 Tanuki Gunships, 3x4 Uwatsu Frigates, 3 Fujin Class Corvettes, Tiny Fliers.

All games are played at 1'000pts. My list:

1	Hachiman Otsu-Gata Class Dreadnought
3	Tanuki Class Gunship
4	Uwatsu Class Frigate
4	Uwatsu Class Frigate
4	Uwatsu Class Frigate
3	Fujin Class Corvette
1	Tenkei Class Sky Fortress

Apolloxer (CoA) vs Parcival (EotBS) (3:0, 635:550)

(please excuse some proxy models)

As it turned out in the end, both Apolloxer and I picked the Field Order to eliminate the other's medium sized ships.

Not quite the beginning of the game anymore. I immediately realized when I moved the Sky Fortress that I totally misplaced it. Truth be told, she won't see any action for the rest of the game.

End of Round 1 - so far only minor losses. My Dreadnought started to put damage onto the center ship of his medium sized ones.

End of Round 2 - things start to get bad. The Torpedo Bombers meant to kill off his medium sized ships in the upper center get shot down by his Interceptors. His small ships disrupt my lines. My small ships are not strong enough to block his worm. However, I am able to finish off his medium ship that already had damage from Round 1.

End of Round 3 - things start to get really bad. His small ships lock down my Tanuki Gunships at close range so while they still only have minor damage, their missiles are ineffective. The worm tears into my Dreadnought. :-/

End of Round 4 - I lose because my Tanuki Gunships get killed. Half a turn later, my small Uwatus would have taken down his last medium sized ship, but obviously, that would have been half a turn later.

Lessons learned:

• The Tanuki Gunships generally *want* to stay back.
• The Tenkei Sky Fortress is useless - at least for me.
• The Dreadnought is nearly unsinkable and should not be held back.

Madwulf (KoB) vs Parcival (EotBS) (0:3, 460:600)

As it turned out in the end, Madwulf decided to pick the Field Order where he had to sink my large vessels (i.e. my Dreadnought in this case) whereas I decided to destroy his small ones.

This is how we started.

End of Round 1 - Not much happening here. Madwulf killed an Uwatsu and wounded two plus started to fire away at the Sky Fortress (which I placed right in the center this time ;-)  ).

End of Round 2 - Things start to get serious. Madwulf keeps inflicting damage to my Sky Fortress, but his fire on her draws fire away from other more valuable parts of my fleet. (once again I have no clue what I should really do with her) Probably his biggest mistake here was to move his medium sized whitestriped shipes right between the two islands to block the way and fire salvos at me. My Uwatsus and my Dreadnought had little problems removing them in return. In the top left, my Uwatsus furthermore had no problem the British small ships, only one lowly ship remains. At this moment I felt I could win this game.

End of Round 3 - In the top left, the Uwatsus have no problems finishing off the last British small ship. In my lower left I am confronted with the problem that I have to turn my Tanukis and the Dreadnought so he can't hide on the right edge of the board making me chase him around that island forever. In other words, I needed a two-pronged attack with the Tanukis as the anvil and the Uwatsus as the hammer. And oh, my Sky Fortress is gone.

End of Round 4 - Everything I have is racing to the right for the hammer and anvil two-pronged attack. However, I realize that if his Dreadnought manages to sink my small ships before I can sink his ships hiding behind his Dreadnought, I can still terribly lose this game.

End of Round 5 - everything that can fires at his small and medium ships even if his Dreadnought blocks line of sight and my dice are reduced by half. My Dreadnought is busy turning around and would be turning still if the game hadn't ended there because I had killed all his small ships plus more than 50% of his overall points score.

Lessons learned:

• Once again, the Uwatsus are the work horses - for me a game is being decided on how effectively I can put them to use (or rather not, for the matter).
• I still have no clue what to do with the Sky Fortress.
• My Dreadnought always has to turn into the fray and not away from it even his starboard mounted weapons have a superior firing angle from that maneuver.

Now it depends on the outcome of the game between Apolloxer and Madwulf whether I advance in the cup or not. :-D

Thanks for reading. :-)