Over the weekend of 24th and 25th of January a group of us, Team Shocker, and Squirrel Chin will be going to arguably the best tournament we have been to.

Its a wonderful event in Munich with around 120 players. The venue is the old olympic village where the first recognised terrorist incident occured, the murder of the Israeli athletes. Needless to say the activities surrounding the tournament are what help make it a winner and as its earlier in the year we are hoping for the snow that we have been promised for the last 3 years to show its face. If it doesn’t we will have to drown our sorrows in one of the many fantastic bars selling 1 litre pitchers of larger. No doubt a Brazilian techno club will find its way into the story somehow….

My list for the event is:

Duke [steed, lance, armour of agilulf, virtue of heroism, grail vow, morning star] 233
BSB [steed, grail vow, sword of might, gromril great helm] 145
Damsel [steed, 2 scrolls] 130
Damsel [steed, scroll] 105

6 Errant [full command] 141
6 Errant [full command, banner of chalons] 151
6 Realm [full command] 168
16 Bowmen [skirmish, standard] 122

7 Questers [full command, warbanner] 248
7 Questers [full command] 223
3 Pegs 165
5 Mounted Yeomen 75

Treb 90

Total: 1996

It has the potenital to be in 1 of 3 bands, A B or C. Band A has all the naughty boys with their filthy lists, Band B are your regular run of the mill tournament lists and Band C are the fluff bunnies. I’m in Band B with my list which is a happy place to be.

I managed a last practice game against fellow Team Shocker member Timmy and his soft VC army. With only 5 power dice it was much more of a combat VC army than a stand at the back raising VC army which is probably why it got into Band B as well.

With some heroics worthy of legend Ballume the Brave saw off the Vampire threat and returned from battle in time for tea and his favourite maiden.

Lets hope he can carry on the trend!

Friday:

A practice game against a Band A badboy. Ian was taking his Dark Elves and we had a practice game the day before the tournament at a local gaming store.

The game went well(ish) after a lucky irresistable beast cowers on a unit of cold ones stopped Ians right flank and let me pull a minor defeat from the jaws of big defeat. The banding turned it into a minor win for me. A good result. Just.

Saturday:

After many many beers we arrived in the morning for the weekends gaming.

Game 1 was againt Mathias Berger and his Dwarfs. He was in Band 2.

Dwarfs tend to be tricky for Brets to handle as they can get very tough blocks of infantry which the Brets can struggle to break. The game proceeded in the usual fashon with the Brets moving forward, taking some incoming fire and moving into position to charge.

Some highlights of the game:

Me being charged by Dwarfs, twice! Ok he had an anvil but still….

The peg knights taking 3 rounds of combat to go through the flank of 10 crossbow dwarfs.

The Iron Breakers charging the BSB combat res lance but fluffing for enough turns to allow me to hold them up for the game. Mathias failing at least a save a turn helped!

The end result was a 14-6 win for the brets. A good start to the tournament against a really nice guy.

Game 2 was against Felix Dahlke and his Wood Elves. Felix was in band 2.

I think if i knew before the game what i know now i would probably have lost this game. Wood Elves can be another tricky match up for the Brets, being a little tricky to pin down.

Some highlights of the game:

A lucky scatter on the first turn meant the trebuchet put 5 wounds on the treeman before he moved.

The peg knights failing their fear test against a unit of wild riders and then fighting a running battle against dryads and said wild riders.

The second unit of wild riders playing tag with a unit of Errants.

The end result was a 12-8 win to the Brets. I was told afterwards that Felix is very highly rated in Germany and he certainly seemed to know what he was doing. He was part of the winning ETC team and rarely loses with his Woodies (I think i was the only person he lost to over the weekend) so i’m very happy with a win! Really nice guy too.

Game 3 was against Fabian Nedwed and his Band 1 Dark Elves.

Dark Elves can be, again, a tricky match up for Brets but the armour can really help them out so, with a 4 point head start i was confident i could get something from the game.

Some highlights ffom the game:

Fabian marching his level 4 straight into the centre of a wood on turn 1. Obviously he had the focus familiar so never came out!

The Trebuchet almost killing the level 4 after a friendly scatter.

Fabian casting spirit of the forge with irresistable force and and then rolling snake eyes for the number of hits.

I made a couple of major mistakes in this game, the first being the depleted black guard rather than accepting half points for them and the second was being led around by the nose by the hydra. Nevertheless i was able to come out with a 12-8 win, after banding had been factored in, which considering my mistakes later in the game i was happy with. If i hadnt charged the black guard it could have been a 14-6 win but alas i was tired and mistakes creep in when your tired. Good game though against a good opponent.

So at the end of day 1 i was on 3 wins out of 3 and 38 tournament points from a possible 60. I beat 3 armies considered hard (impossible if you listen to some people!) to beat with brets.

The first game on Sunday is traditionally an army swap and i ended up with a Band 1 Vampire army to use against my Brets. I find Vampires a very tough match up personally so i was hopeful i would get something from the army swap.

Sunday:

Game 4 was against Marc Oeser. I was using his Vampires and he was using my Brets.

Some highlights from the game:

The trebuchet was unusually accurate. I suspect Marc has bribed the crew with bonus payments for accuracy and each shot hit its target with the black knights and a skeleton block feeling its wrath.

A slightly dubious tactical wheel on a blocking unit of fell bats allowing both big lances to get into the black knights and then the vampire lord failing to kill a single knight with 8 attacks.

In the end with the Vampire crumbling i lost 20-0. I’m still not convinced the wheel on the fell bats was enough to get both lances into the black knights but its my own fault for not calling the judge. Too English i guess. Perhaps the most telling is that Marc only got 2 ‘good games’ over the course of the tournament. Never mind, i wasn’t expecting to win the event anyway!

Game 5 was against Erich Rankl and his Southlands army.

I hadn’t ever played Southlands before but Erich was in Band 3 so how hard could they be?

Having said that i was determined that i wouldn’t treat them casually and duly focussed my mind.ish.

Some highlights of the game:

A skink chieftan charging the trebuchet crew and drawing combat.

4 Terradons charging 3 pegs and not doing anything.

A fully ranked unit of skink cohorts and 2 terradons charging the bsb’s lance in the flank and losing combat by 3!

In the end the endless Skinks were overcome and the game was a 19-1 win for the Brets. Erich was a really nice guy and a good player. Its just Southlands couldn’t really cut it against the Brets, i’m sure with a more powerful army Erich would have given me a very tough game.

I finished the tournament with 57 battle points. I was also nominated for best painted (all 4 of us were). In the end i placed 22 out of around 100 players which is pretty good. I had a great time and some great games against really nice guys.

At the awards we were presented with a 4 litre bottle of 8% beer which was a lovely gesture. We shall drink it at Liverpool, a slightly less glamorous location than Munich!

As usual it was a fantastic weekend and i would like to thank my opponents, the organisors and everyone who made us feel welcome.