NEAT was my first tournament (and truth be told, my first 'proper' games of E:A). Everyone I faced was great about excusing the more obvious of my slip-ups and remining me of assault modifiers, blast markers and being patient as we regularly called for adults. my Imperial forces ground inexorably (albeit slowly) forward. As it's been my first I haven't written one of these up before, but here goes:
For reference, my army.Game 1:
Erik's Fir Iolarion Eldar.Loss, 0-3. Summary - Phantom Titans are Vicious Xenos Jerks.
Erik was especially helpful and patient that 'my' first matchup was actually played by my hubby, who hadn't played a wargame before, of any sort. I don't remember a great deal about this battle, being more focused on suddenly realising I couldn't remember a single thing about how to play. First game, this was a pretty heavy loss for the Guard, with some really crushing defeats of infantry regiments in assaults from two titans at a time. My artillery and thunderbolts excelled themselves, very nearly bringing death to both Revenants, but the PBI just couldn't last long enough against firepower of that magnitude to make it count and nothing could dent the warlock and phantom in return. Lost on T&H, Blitz and BTS (I think). Crushing loss, but still great fun to play out!
Game 2:
Anthony's Steel Legion Guard.Draw - 1-1. Summary - BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD G... Oh.
This fight was definitely cinematic, with some massive engagements and buckets of firepower being hurled about. The first turn started out pretty brutally for Anthony, with the dice luck going my way in extremes. First with a mechanised company catching a Warhound out and taking it from full to very dead with autocannon and multilasers and then with a squadron of sentinels surrounding and picking off the second with three sixes. Also in the first turn my thunderbolts took advantage of a tiny break in aircover to wipe out any artillery support from the rebellious guardsmen opposing them. After that, the maneuver and firepower advantage was hard for Anthony to overcome.
He did great tying up my army and it was unfortunate that we had to finish at a draw without time for a third turn because we were both wanting to continue. We both agreed that I would have driven him off to a 2-0 win (BTS and DTF) had it gone to turn 3, but nearly only counts in horse shoes and hand grenades, right? Of particular note should be the 40-something dice engagement between two griffon-reinforced mechanised infantry companies and their respective hydra. After some nice prep, Anthony rushed forward with them and they broke the company, with my being (again!) very lucky to avoid being cut to pieces in the withdraw. It was a brave assault that we ended up having to fight twice due to the first round being a draw, too! The game was incredibly bloody and incredibly close. I've never laughed and had so much fun as I did in this game.
Game 3: Cameron (oh dear, I think I forgot the name >_<) and the Dark Eldar. Loss 0-2. Summary - Wiping Out The Army Doesn't Mean You Win.
This game was a perfect example of why Epic is so fun, at least to me. Two very different armies, both playing fairly well and each having a slice of good and bad luck and everything came down to one move (or, more accurately, one not moving a formation) on my part. Once again the thunderbolts and artillery played a pivotal role in maintaining firepower and air superiority to largely knock out the enemy air power and strike where they wanted. Between them they more or less kept two or three enemy formations broken every single turn. Particular note for me was winning initiative in turn two and having one basilisk battery virtually wipe out deep stroking scourges before they could activate. Unfortunately I couldn't get to grips with the Tormentor Titan and didn't use my SHTs terribly well to push that advantage. That, plus being too defensive with my infantry, ultimately cost me.
Some clever hit and run attacks left one regiment stranded and undermanned in the center of the table and I directed them to hold in cover rather than advance into the enemy half of the table, freeing the titan to rush down and contest one objective, denying me DTF and giving him a win on DTF and TSNP at the end of turn three. With the superiority of numbers and firepower I had at that point, the post-game discussion suggested that I could have gone on to at least a draw, or possibly (with some luck and aggression) pushed a win out. The simple answer though, was that I lost track of the objectives towards the end of the turn and lost because of well-thought, well timed attacks on the part of my opponent. Again though, a very sporting opponent, very fun to talk to and a lot of laughs (and cursing our bad dice) were had.
To anyone having read all that, I'm hoping the continuing theme through it was that everyone was great fun to play against and the event was something that everyone in the area should try to get to in future. Every game had it's moments, luck was shared around and stories made. Hopefully I wasn't too much of a drag to all my opponents by still learning precisely how to completely ignore my objectives and go solely for beating up the enemy in a bloody brawl.
EDIT: Because I'm lazy, have an imgur of the four most passable pics from the few I remembered to take.
http://imgur.com/a/9piuI"Come to NEAT, because it's... uh... Neat." (put that on your posters next year, Dave!)
