Astral Cup 2009 Results... Finally

So... it has been a while since the end of the tournament and I am finally getting around to posting the final results.

1st Place - The Stronghold
2nd Place - Oatmeal Stout
3rd Place - Z's Transmog'd Furries

In addition to the tournament winnings there was a raffle drawn on the final night. The raffle winnings are as follows. All tournament winnings are in store credit at Astral Games in Medford, OR. The store has had a list of the raffle winners since the final night of the tournament, so much of this information is old news.

$40.00 > Oatmeal Stout - Jeff H.
$35.00 > The Stronghold - Matt S.
$30.00 > Creative Carnage - Sean D.
$25.00 > Z's Transmog'd Furries - Justin I.
$25.00 > Maggot Bread - Ryan K.
$20.00 > Eco Shadows - Chris H.
$20.00 > Chossen Ones - Ryan P.
$15.00 > Killer Kaos Kows - Sean P.
$15.00 > Ospreys - Todd N.
$10.00 > Keg Bearers - Erik P.
$10.00 > Scavenblight Scramblers - Walter
$10.00 > Tree Huggers - Tiffany

Astral Cup 2009 Schedule - Finals

Here is the Schedule for the Astral Cup 2009 Finals.

Playing for the Astral Cup
The Stronghold (B1) vs. Oatmeal Stout (B2)

Playing for 3rd place
Z's Transmog'd Furries (A1) vs. Creative Carnage (B3)

Any team that is not participating in the playoffs is encouraged to show up and play against other non-playoff teams. Commissioner will help arrange games.

Also, there will be pizza provided for the tournament participants. There will be raffle drawings for the tournament participants at the conclusion of the final games, and an award for the best painted team (11 player minimum)

I look forward to seeing everyone there... this has been a great tournament.

Astral Cup 2009 Rosters - Updated - Quarterfinals

Astral Cup Rosters
Updated for Semifinal Results

GROUP A
Eco Shadows - Wood Elf
Hochland Harriers - Human
Keg Bearers - Dwarf
Killer Kaos Kows - Chaos Dwarf
Maggot Bread - Orc
Tree Huggers - Wood Elf
Z's Transmog'd Furries - Elf

GROUP B
Creative Carnage - Orc
Dark Chargers - Dark Elf
Chossen Ones - Lizardman
Oatmeal Stout - Chaos Dwarf
Ospreys - Human
The Stronghold - Dwarf
Skavenblight Scramblers - Skaven

NEW TEAMS - Not in Current Tournament
Tarteron Slashers - Chaos
New Lizards - Lizardman
Crimson Kings - Vampire
Risen Raiders - Necromantic

Astral Cup 2009 Schedule - Semifinals

Here is the Semifinals Schedule.
The Letter/Number combination after each team indicates which grouping they are in, and their current rank within that grouping.

Any team that is not participating in the playoffs is encouraged to show up and play against other non-playoff teams. Commissioner will help arrange games.

Z's Transmog'd Furries (A1) vs. Oatmeal Stout (B2)
The Stronghold (B1) vs. Creative Carnage (B3)

Astral Cup 2009 Schedule - Quarterfinals

Here is the Quarterfinals Schedule.
The Letter/Number combination after each team indicates which grouping they are in, and their current rank within that grouping.

Any team that is not participating in the playoffs is encouraged to show up and play against other non-playoff teams. Commissioner will help arrange games.

Z's Transmog'd Furries (A1) vs. Scavenblight Scramblers (B4)
Oatmeal Stout (B2) vs. Killer Kaos Kows (A3)
The Stronghold (B1) vs. Eco Shadows (A4)
Maggot Bread (A2) vs. Creative Carnage (B3)

Astral Cup 2009 Standings - Updated - Week 7 (End of Regular Season)

Current Standings for the 2009 Astral Cup Blood Bowl Tournament.

Group A
Z's Transmog'd Furries
Maggot Bread
Killer Kaos Kows
Eco Shadows
Keg Bearers
Tree Huggers
Hochland Harriers

Group B
The Stronghold
Oatmeal Stout
Creative Carnage
Scavenblight Scramblers
Ospreys
Dark Chargers
Chossen Ones

Astral Cup 2009 Schedule - Week 7

Here is the Week 7 Schedule.
The Letter/Number combination after each team indicates which grouping they are in, and their current rank within that grouping.

Hochland Harriers (A5) vs. Eco Shadows (A4)
Tree Huggers (A7) vs. Killer Kaos Kows (A3)
Maggot Bread (A2) vs. Keg Bearers (A6)
Z's Transmog'd Furries (A1) vs. Dark Chargers (B6)
Chossen Ones (B7) vs. Ospreys (B5)
Oatmeal Stout (B2) vs. Scavenblight Scramblers (B4)
The Stronghold (B1) vs. Creative Carnage (B3)

Astral Cup 2009 Standings - Updated - Week 6

Current Standings for the 2009 Astral Cup Blood Bowl Tournament.

Group A
Z's Transmog'd Furries
Maggot Bread
Killer Kaos Kows
Eco Shadows
Hochland Harriers
Keg Bearers
Tree Huggers

Group B
The Stronghold
Oatmeal Stout
Creative Carnage
Scavenblight Scramblers
Ospreys
Dark Chargers
Chossen Ones

Astral Cup 2009 Schedule - Week 6

Here is the Week 6 Schedule.
The Letter/Number combination after each team indicates which grouping they are in, and their current rank within that grouping.

Hochland Harriers (A4) vs. Z's Transmog'd Furries (A1)
Tree Huggers (A7) vs. Keg Bearers (A6)
Eco Shadows (A5) vs. Killer Kaos Kows (A3)
Maggot Bread (A2) vs. Chossen Ones (B7)
Oatmeal Stout (B1) vs. The Stronghold (B2)
Creative Carnage (B3) vs. Ospreys (B5)
Dark Chargers (B6) vs. Scavenblight Scramblers (B4)

Astral Cup 2009 Standings - Updated - Week 5

Current Standings for the 2009 Astral Cup Blood Bowl Tournament.

Group A
Z's Transmog'd Furries
Maggot Bread
Killer Kaos Kows
Hochland Harriers
Eco Shadows
Keg Bearers
Tree Huggers

Group B
Oatmeal Stout
The Stronghold
Creative Carnage
Scavenblight Scramblers
Ospreys
Dark Chargers
Chossen Ones

Astral Cup 2009 Schedule - Week 5

Here is the Week 5 Schedule.
The Letter/Number combination after each team indicates which grouping they are in, and their current rank within that grouping.

Hochland Harriers (A4) vs. Keg Bearers (A5)
Z's Transmog'd Furries (A1) vs. Maggot Bread (A2)
Tree Huggers (A7) vs. Eco Shadows (A6)
Killer Kaos Kows (A3) vs. The Stronghold (B1)
Chossen Ones (B7) vs. Creative Carnage (B3)
Oatmeal Stout (B2) vs. Dark Chargers (B6)
Scavenblight Scramblers (B4) vs. Ospreys (B5)

Astral Cup 2009 Standings - Updated - Week 4

Current Standings for the 2009 Astral Cup Blood Bowl Tournament.

Group A
Z's Transmog'd Furries
Maggot Bread
Killer Kaos Kows
Hochland Harriers
Keg Bearers
Eco Shadows
Tree Huggers

Group B
The Stronghold
Oatmeal Stout
Creative Carnage
Scavenblight Scramblers
Ospreys
Dark Chargers
Chossen Ones

Astral Cup 2009 Schedule - Week 4

Here is the Week 4 Schedule.
The Letter/Number combination after each team indicates which grouping they are in, and their current rank within that grouping.

Z's Transmog'd Furries (A1) vs. Tree Huggers (A6)
Maggot Bread (A2) vs. Killer Kaos Kows (A3)
Eco Shadows (A5) vs. Keg Bearers (A7)
Hochland Harriers (A4) vs. Creative Carnage (B4)
Chossen Ones (B6) vs. Oatmeal Stout (B2)
The Stronghold (B1) vs. Scavenblight Scramblers (B3)
Dark Chargers (B7) vs. Ospreys (B5)

Astral Cup 2009 Standings - Updated - Week 3

Current Standings for the 2009 Astral Cup Blood Bowl Tournament.

Group A
Z's Transmog'd Furries
Maggot Bread
Killer Kaos Kows
Hochland Harriers
Eco Shadows
Tree Huggers
Keg Bearers

Group B
The Stronghold
Oatmeal Stout
Scavenblight Scramblers
Creative Carnage
Ospreys
Chossen Ones
Dark Chargers

Astral Cup 2009 Schedule - Week 3

Here is the Week 3 Schedule.
The Letter/Number combination after each team indicates which grouping they are in, and their current rank within that grouping.

Hochland Harriers (A3) vs. Killer Kaos Kows (A4)
Z's Transmog'd Furries (A1) vs. Keg Bearers (A7)
Tree Huggers (A6) vs. Maggot Bread (A2)
Eco Shadows (A5) vs. Scavenblight Scramblers (B3)
Chossen Ones (B6) vs. The Stronghold (B1)
Oatmeal Stout (B2) vs. Ospreys (B4)
Creative Carnage (B5) vs. Dark Chargers (B7)

Blood Bowl References

I just wanted to share some files that I have created or modified for use with BloodBowl (Living Rule Book v5) and share some links to other important BloodBowl documents.

The official BloodBowl Rulebook (LRB 5).

A very useful Guide to Blocking.

My customized Team Roster. (recommended for anyone playing in the Astral Cup)

A 4-Page Quick Reference guide... updated for LRB5.

I will continue to add documents to this list and re-post as needed.

Announcement - Blood BowlAstral Cup 2009

The RVBBL (Rogue Valley Blood Bowl League) and Astral Games present:

The 2009 Astral Cup

The Astral Cup Blood Bowl Tournament will have room for up to 24 teams.
The Tournament will operate under the LRB5 rules. (Available here as free download from GW)
Starting Team Value will be 1,000,000GP
Games will be schedule based (schedule to be determined by a random draw), plus playoffs.

Entry fee is $10 product buy-in at Astral Games in Medford, OR.
Each $10 spent will provide 1 raffle ticket. A Maximum of 5 tickets earned from buy-in.
Additional tickets can be earned during the tournament based team performance, painting, and sportsmanship.
Prizes will be awarded for top 3 teams, plus raffle. (All prizes in store credit)

Tournament length will depend on the number of participating teams, estimate 7-10 weeks.
Tournament games will take place on Wednesday nights at 6:00 PM beginning on 9/9/09.
Astral Games is hosting 3 pre-season events (Sunday 8/23/09 @ 2PM, Sunday 8/30/09 @ 2PM, and Wednesday 9/2/09 @ 6PM)
The last day for Tournament Sign-up will be 9/2/09 (by the end of the pre-season event)

RVBBL Co-Commissioner - Creative Carnage

Eldar - 1750 Point Tournament List

Here is the Eldar List I ran for the 1750 point tournament

1 Eldrad Ulthran @ 210 Pts

Seer Council on Jetbikes @ 516 Pts
1 Farseer w/ Jebike, Doom, Fortune, Runes of Warding, Spirit Stones, Singing Spear
5 Warlocks w/ Jetbikes, Destructor
1 Warlock w/ Jetbike, Enhance, Singing Spear

6 Rangers @ 114 Pts

Dire Avengers @ 150 Pts
8 Dire Avengers
1 Dire Avenger Exarch w/ Defend, Power Weapon, Shimmershield

Harlequin Troupe @ 214 Pts
4 Harlequins w/ Harlequins Kiss
2 Harlequins w/ CCW
1 Harlequin Shadow Seer w/ Harlequins Kiss
1 Harlequin Troupe Master w/ Power Weapon

Howling Banshees @ 155 Pts
7 Howling Banshees
1 Howling Banshee Exarch w/ Acrobatic, Executioner

Fire Dragons @ 163 Pts
7 Fire Dragons
1 Fire Dragon Exarch w/ Tank Hunters, Firepike

Dark Reapers @ 227 Pts
4 Dark Reapers
1 Dark Reaper Exarch w/Crack Shot, Fast Shot, Eldar Missile Launcher

1750 point Tournament.

My local FLGS, Astral Games, hosted a 1750pt 40K Tournament on August 1st. Once again the tournament was very well run and had some interesting scenarios.

Winners:
1st Place - Mitch (Orks)
2nd Place - Luke (Chaos Space Marines)
3rd Place - Me... (Eldar) will post list later.

I believe that this was the fourth consecutive tournament win for Mitch's Orks mob... including the 'ard Boyz qualifying event.

I took more pictures than this, however without the flash they got pretty blurry... so here are a couple of the pictures from the event that mostly came out ok.

Battle Deck - Eldar

I really like the Battle Deck idea originally created by Peter over at The Aspect Portal. With Peter's permission, I reformatted the Eldar Battle Deck to print four units to a page so they could be printed on card stock and used as note cards during a game.

Here is my version of the Eldar Battle Deck

If you are interested, here is Peter's original post.

If you find any errors, please let me know so that I can make corrections to the document.

Enjoy... now that I have created my template I will continue to create these decks for other armies when I get the time.

Brightlance/Wraithsword Conversion

I have found myself running the Brightlance and Wraithsword combination with my Wraithguard far too often lately and I really don't care for the way the stock assembly looks for that weapon combination. So I decided to combine the Wraithsword with the Brightlance as a sort of bayonet.

I started out by cutting the Wraithsword away from the hand on both sides... I will use the lower part of the sword grip as a stock for the Brightlance.


Next, I cut the power cell away from the blade section of the Wraithsword... This is necessary in order for it to fit under the barrel of the Brightlance.


Next, I attached the sword grip to the back of the Brightlance to create a stock. I then attached the Wraithsword blade to the underside of the Brightlance and connected it to the trigger guard using a small piece of plastic tubing.


Now the the Brightlance/Wraithsword is done, I attached it to one of my Wraithlords. I am really happy with the way this simple conversion turned out and I will definitely be making another Wraithlord like this one. I am not 100% happy with the way the BL/Sword looks on the current model, but now that I know how the Brightlance/Wraithsword looks I will pose the next Wraithlord differently.

Pig Iron via Santa Cruz Warhammer

Well I finally got my photo box put together... so here are the pics of the miniatures from Pig Iron that I won from the Santa Cruz Warhammer blog

After checking out more of their products, I think the Pig Iron models could be a cool alternative for an IG or cultist army.

I Won (OK so the contest was random...)

I recently won a contest over at SantaCruz Warhammer for some models from Pig Iron Productions. I will post some pictures as soon as they arrive. I will be looking for some ideas on how to include this models in an army (any army...) as either a conversion or as is. I either play or know someone who plays every 40K army and if the idea is cool, I am not opposed to giving the models to a friend to include in their army.

Big Mek Sprokkit's Boyz - 1250 points

Here is the list I ran at the 1250pt speed tournament:

Big Mek Sprokkit w/ Kustom Force Field (85)
Mad Dok Grotsnik (160)
30 Shoota Boyz w/ 2x Rokkit, 1x Big Shoota, Nob w/ PK, BP, Hvy. Armor (250)
30 Shoota Boyz w/ 2x Rokkit, 1x Big Shoota, Nob w/ PK, BP, Hvy. Armor (250)
30 Slugga Boyz w/ Nob w/ PK, Hvy. Armor (220)
8 Lootas (120)
5 Warbikers w/ Nob w/PK, BP (165)

1250 Points, 7 Kill Points, 3 Scoring Units

I ran the Big Mek with the Shoota Boyz, and Grotsnik with the Slugga Boyz. I really like the tournaments because it allows me to try new things with my army against a variety of opponents.

THINGS I LEARNED:
1) I should have stayed with at least 2 groups of Slugga Boyz.
2) The unit that will be attached to Grotsnik should have either the 'Eavy Armor or Cybork Upgrades.
3) I will probably not run Warbikes again in such small numbers unless I have multiple units of them... and preferably Wazdakka to make them scoring units.
4) Lootas have been proving themselves incredibly useless due to the scenarios... Almost every scenario had some sort of night fight type rule for at least one round... this is very debilitating for games played on small tables (4' x 4') with a rule set that already favors close combat troops.

1250pt Speed Tournament

Our local FLGS in Southern Oregon hosted another tournament a couple of weeks ago. 1250 points games stop at 1.5 hr (finish current game turn). It was a 3 round tournament.

I played a modified version of my 1000pt list (I will post the new list soon) and once again had a great deal of fun at the tournament. Gork and Mork cast their favor on another at this event which was won by an Ork player... I finished 15th out of 17 players.

Round 1 vs Eldar - Minor Loss...
Power Klaws could not damage my opponents Wraithlord or Avatar (the only units he had left at the end of the game)

Round 2 vs Tyranids - Minor Victory...
Again with the damned Monstrous creatures... I managed to eek out a victory with my opponent having a Carnifex and Hive Tyrant left on the table... with a total of 4 wounds remaining.

Round 3 vs Blood Angels - Minor Loss...
This game was played against my best friend (known each other for nearly 25 years). This was his first time playing his Blood Angels and he did pretty good (7th out of 17). I helped his cause significantly by making a couple of big mistakes at various points in the game regarding unit movement. His first two assaults were each in range by less than 1 inch... and in both cases I had moved those units just a little closer to him the turn before. It was a very close game that came down to a single kill point at the end.

The tournament was very well run, things were kept moving in a timely fashion and the scenarios were very interesting. I do think that the scenarios were skewed towards assault based armies. (my Orks were a bit on the shooty side as you can see once it is posted)

Big Mek Sprokkit's Boyz - 1000 points

Here is the list I ran at the 1000pt speed tournament:

Big Mek Sprokkit w/ Kustom Force Field (85)
30 Shoota Boyz w/ 3x Rokkit Launcha, Nob w/ PK, BP, Hvy. Armor (255)
30 Slugga Boyz w/ stikkbombs, 3x Big Shoota, Nob w/ PK, BP, Hvy. Armor (270)
30 Slugga Boyz w/ stikkbombs, 3x Big Shoota, Nob w/ PK, BP, Hvy. Armor (270)
8 Lootas (120)

1000 Points, 5 Kill Points, 3 Scoring Units

I ran the Big Mek with the Shoota Boyz, shielded by at least one of the Slugga/Choppa Boyz. In retrospect I would not take the stikkbombs again and would probably use those 60 points to add 4 more Lootas.

1000pt Speed Tournament

Our local FLGS in Southern Oregon hosted a great little tournament yesterday. 1000 points games stop at 1 hr (finish current game turn). It was a 4 round tournament with a maximum of 23-25 points per round. This was the first 40k tournament I have ever entered.

I am happy to say that I made a very respectable showing with my Ork mob. I took 2nd place over all with 69 points... the winner was a Dark Eldar player who I believe scored in the high 70's. In general the tournament was very fun, however I noticed that many of the players were not well versed on 5th edition rules. I will definitely participate in more tournaments in the future, but I will be making some suggestions regarding the way the tournament was managed to the owner of the FLGS who was running the tournament... while trying to run his shop.

My Results:
Round1 vs Orks
Massacre - 23 points, tabled opponent on turn 5
Round2 vs Tyranids
Massacre - 22 points, tabled opponent on turn 4
Round3 vs Gray Knights
Minor Loss - 6 points, game ended after turn 3
Round4 vs Imperial Guard (new codex)
Major Victory - 18 points

Welcome to Northwest Geeks -

We are a group of dedicated gamers from the Pacific Northwest with interests ranging from tabletop RPG's (D&D, Shadowrun, Mage, and 7th Sea), tabletop miniature gaming (Warhammer 40k, Bloodbowl), and video gaming (PC, Xbox 360, Playstation 1&2, Wii).

We will bring you reviews anything new we can get our hands on... updates on local events, modeling and painting... and possibly some literary works from some of our members.