Dog Slog
Last round of the Mindtaker tournament. I’m playing Cody, who I last faced with my Yu Jing:
I got put back on the same two tables I played at the beginning of the day. I can’t complain, because Pete (Exile) has already got enough trouble getting me two adjacent tables.
Overview
- Mission: ITS14 Superiority
- Forces: Tartary Army Korps versus Jurisdictional Command of Bakunin (300)
- Deploy First: Bakunin
- First Turn: Bakunin
I’m playing the Strelok spam list from the last game…
Template City
GROUP 1
7
1
1
GROUP 2
COLONEL VORONIN (Lieutenant [+1 Command Token], Strategos L1) Rifle / Assault Pistol, AP CC Weapon. (0 | 25)
PAVEL McMANNUS Ohotnik, Chain-colt, Shock Mines, D-Charges / Pistol, T2 CC Weapon. (0 | 32)
SCOUT (Forward Observer) Ohotnik, D-Charges, Flash Pulse, Shock Mines / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0 | 30)
TRAKTOR MUL (Deactivator) ( ) / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 5)
TANKHUNTER Missile Launcher, AP Mines / Pistol, CC Weapon. (1.5 | 33)
IRMANDINHO Chain Rifle, D-Charges, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, AP CC Weapon. (0 | 8)
SPETSNAZ (Mimetism [-3], Parachutist]) AP Rifle, Grenades, D-Charges / Pistol, AP CC Weapon. (0 | 30)
STRELOK (Minelayer) Boarding Shotgun, Shock Mines / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0.5 | 21)
DOG-WARRIOR Chain Rifle(+1B), Grenades, Smoke Grenades / AP CC Weapon. (0 | 24)
3.5 SWC | 300 Points | Open in Army | Copy Code
versus Cody’s Bakunin list. He’s proxying a lot of non-Bakunin things for this game, so it’s a bit confusing to parse.
Cody (Globemaster)
GROUP 1
PENITENT AP Spitfire / Pistol, CC Weapon. (1.5 | 40)
CENOBITE Chain Rifle(+1B), Flash Pulse / Heavy Pistol(+1B), DA CC Weapon. (0 | 21)
ORPHAN (Engineer, Repeater) Submachine Gun, E/M Mines, D-Charges ( | GizmoKit) / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0 | 23)
MODERATOR (Hacker, Hacking Device) Combi Rifle ( ) / Pistol, PARA CC Weapon(-6). (0.5 | 14)
RIOT GRRL Missile Launcher / Pistol, CC Weapon. (1.5 | 32)
GROUP 2
ZERO (Forward Observer) Combi Rifle, Shock Mines, Flash Pulse / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0 | 20)
INITIATED (Surprise Attack [-3], Camouflage [1 Use], Infiltration, Minelayer) Submachine Gun ( | Deployable Repeater) / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0 | 21)
STEMPLER ZOND Combi Rifle, Flash Pulse / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 16)
METEOR ZOND Boarding Shotgun, Flash Pulse / PARA CC Weapon(-6). (0 | 22)
REAKTION ZOND Heavy Machine Gun / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (1 | 25)
LUNOKHOD Heavy Shotgun, Heavy Flamethrower, D-Charges, Crazykoala / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 27)
4.5 SWC | 300 Points | Open in Army | Copy Code
Deployment
In any case, I took deployment so Cody took first turn. He set up his Moderators on the left and the Penitent Haris in the center, with the rest of his stuff on the right. He had a great deployment for the Reaktion Zond–it was a real nuisance for much of the game. What’s funny is both the Zhayedan and the Riot ML ended up in exactly the same spot.
I Salt-Bae’d some camo tokens across the center of the table, ensuring that I boxed a Zero in with mines on the right. Voronin went in the safe spot he had been in on my last game on this table:
The Scout was easy to deploy, and then I set up the Dog Warriors on either flank with the Muls in safe spots.
I don’t recall what Cody’s reserve was, but mine was the Tankhunter watching his Penitent and Pavel on the left.
Turn 1
Top of 1 – Bakunin
I took two orders from Cody’s second group. His first action was to use the Stempler to sensor one of the Streloks out of camo, no big deal. They’re there to drain orders.
He then snuck one of the Moderators around the corner into the tail section of the plan and flipped one of the consoles.
Next up was advancing the Penitent haris in full view of my Tankhunter ML. I let him move unmolested until I had an opportunity to template all three link team members. Cody surprised me by shooting instead of dodging. The range, low-vis and saturation zones really came out in my favor and I deleted both the Cenobite and the Orphan while doing a single wound to the Penitent.
Cody kept pushing the issue, so the Tankhunter finished off the Penitent and that was that.
Cody then wanted to push on the console on his far left (my near right) and used the Zero to do so, almost getting blown up by my mine in the process.
Cody replaced the mine with one of his covering my Strelok, then recamoed the Zero.
Bottom of 1 – TAK
My plan for this turn is to just open up the table for movement and to punish overextension. First up is the Stempler and the Initiated Observant. I prone crawl the revealed Strelok forward…
then pop out and template both the Initiate and the Stempler. The Stempler fails its dodge but passes both ARM saves and the Initiate dodges. I lose the Strelok to the TR bot, which is decidedly an awful outcome for me.
I do get a Dog Warrior in position to kill the Zero and clear the mine, which is nice.
The Dog Warrior also drops the moderator that flipped the console.
I then advance the Scout to my near right console and flip it before recamoing. Not the amount of damage I wanted to do, but I do set up the Irmandinho on my left to push into the Stempler later.
Turn 2
Top of 2 – Bakunin
Cody wants to stabilize, so he pushes the Lunokhod forward… right into a mine, losing it.
The Stempler then challenges my Irmandinho, but neither of us take any damage.
Cody brings on a Meteor Zond behind my Dog Warrior on the right and shoots it in the back making it bigger and angrier… Unfortunately he also did so after he moved his Moderators forward. They try to extricate themselves from trouble by dodging and manage to do so without all dying.
He then routes one around the tail section of the wing and takes a shot on the Dog Warrior, with neither of us doing any damage.
The Meteor Zond tries next and I drop it with the Chain Rifle while tanking the hit safely, and then it’s back to me.
Bottom of 2 – TAK
I still haven’t achieved freedom of movement, so I need to get rid of the TR bot. The Irmandinho sacrifices itself to down the TR Bot while the Initiate dodges.
I then blow up a bunch of Moderators with the Dog Warrior’s chain rifle, but not all of them.
I shoot the Stempler in the back with my Scout but fail to kill it in a repeat of the same invincible Tachimoto problem against the Rafiq in my last game on this table.
I still need to deal with the Riot Grrl, so I set up a super jump into base contact. The Dog Warrior hops over the trees and ties her up in CC.
This gives me the movement freedom I need and I grab the far right console with the Scout.
Pavel grabs the console in the near left, and I pass turn.
Turn 3
Top of 3 – Bakunin
The Stempler wipes out Pavel…
then the remaining Moderators try to take out the Scout only to have the Dog Warrior dodge out of close combat…
I lay a template across them as they all try to leave and drop them.
The Stempler makes its way to try and grab my near left console, but the Strelok on overwatch puts a stop to that, finally taking out the Stempler.
Bottom of 3 – TAK
We call it here, as I’m already at max points, having controlled more quadrants each round and having 3 consoles. Cody has 2 consoles though, making it a
10-2, 239-72 Tartary Army Korps Victory!
Post Game Analysis
Things really fell apart for Cody in trying to deal with the Dog Warrior on the right. I think he just wasn’t expecting me to dodge the Dog Warrior into standing while his Moderators walked around. He should’ve just brought the Meteor Zond in behind the Dog Warrior and started blasting then moved the Moderators up. By locking them there I basically held his orders hostage under a chain rifle, forcing Cody to expose a lot of resources to remove it. The dice dictated that he would be ultimately unsuccessful, but even if he had succeeded it still would have been a minor victory for me there.
Walking around in front of a missile launcher at long range with a link is also very dangerous. Admittedly I had a truly unreasonable amount of camo tokens on the board, but it still felt really dangerous and unnecessary. I suppose some of that can be chalked up to the general rarity of the Tankhunter missile launcher in Cody’s meta, perhaps, but if I see a reserve drop camo token with elevation in the backfield, I’m going to to assume it’s got a heavy weapon and intended for ARO. In Cody’s defense, the last time he played me I had a pair of mines that held his Avatar at bay for a whole turn, so maybe I mindgamed or faked him out a bit.
In any case, I think losing the Penitent so early was recoverable, but not if the other link also got taken out as well as all the stuff you sent in to rescue it. Thanks for reading!
