Force Z 2014 #1… before the slaughter.

Tucked away in a quiet area of Queensland, Australia is a tournament called Force Z. The coming weekend will see me attended the first of five Force Z events over the year. This critically acclaimed event, based in Cleveland, is the brain child of Adam Nordberg of Alpha Hobbies. Force Z is a 750pt, no-comp, one day tournament, broken up into five 1hr 15min rounds. The action is fast passed and furious! With armies pitted against each other in a death match where only one will emerge victorious! Well that’s the idea any way. To this event, fully expecting to have my face handed to me, I will bring a gun line guard list of dubious nature (You can see my list here).

The Strategy:

This was a simple one: Shoot! Shoot anything that moves. Shoot anything that stands still. Shoot everything! The only problem was clamming objectives and I knew this was going to be my Achilles heel (what am I saying the whole dam army is my Achilles heel). So I decided to focus on stopping them from getting objectives.

The Missions:

#1 UPDATED ORDERS

Mission: Various mission objectives-

Five objectives, must be one objective in the Centre of the table.

At the start of Game Turn 3, each player rolls a D6 to reveal their mission objectives.

Primary and Secondary Objectives:
1-2 Primary: Purge the Alien – Score one point for each enemy unit you destroy

Secondary: Objectives - Score 3 points for every objective you hold

3-4 Primary: Objectives – Score four points for holding the centre objective and two points for every other objective you hold
Secondary: Purge the Alien – Score one point for each enemy unit you destroy

5-6 Primary: Objectives – Score three points for every objective you hold
Secondary: Purge the Alien – Score one point for each enemy unit you destroy

Deployment: Dawn of War

#2 THE HURT LOCKER

Mission: Big Guns Never Tire (3 objectives)

The centre objective is objective is worth 5 Victory Points. However, each time a unit moves within three inches of the objective, roll a D6. On a roll of 1-3, the objective (Plasma Core) releases a toxic jet of burning plasma. Place the teardrop template so as to cover as many models in the unit as possible. The strike has the following profile:

Burning Plasma – S7 AP2 - If a wound roll is failed, the unit must take a pinning test on 3D6.

Primary Mission:

Each objective (except the plasma core) is worth 3 points.

Destroyed and fleeing heavy support units are worth 1 victory point.

Secondary Mission: Purge the Alien – Score one point for each enemy unit you destroy

Deployment: Spearhead – Table quarters

#3 SABOTAGE

Mission: Sabotage.

Before deployment both players need to place 2 objectives each. Because their Attackers cannot be certain of destroying them properly at distance, these objectives count as having a 4+ invulnerable save against any shooting attack or blast damage they suffer.

Primary Mission: Sabotage.

Score 3 victory points for every enemy objective you destroy and 2 victory points for each objective you hold.

Secondary Mission: Purge the Alien – Score one point for each enemy unit you destroy

Deployment: Vanguard

#4 FIRE SWEEP

Mission: Plant the flag

Both forces are seeking to clear the enemy from this sector. This is achieved through occupying key strategic points. Only scoring units can “plant flags” and they do this whenever one or more models from the scoring unit ends its movement phase on the terrain piece (or its base) with no scoring or denial enemy models on it.

Primary Mission: Each flag planted is worth 3 points.

Destroyed and fleeing fast attack units are worth 1 victory point.

Secondary Mission: Purge the Alien – Score one point for each enemy unit you destroy

Deployment: Dawn of War

#5 WARLORD HAMMER

Mission:

Primary Mission:

Warlord Hammer- Modified “Purge the Alien”. Score victory points as normal. However, killing the opponents Warlord is worth 2 kill points. Killing your opponents Warlord with your Warlord is worth 5 kill points. The Warlord is only ever 1 model, even if in a retinue. The actual Warlord must be killed to score these bonus points.

Secondary Mission: Cleanse – Score one point for every table quarter you hold

Deployment: Vanguard

Thank you to Adam at Alpha Hobbies for putting this tournament packet together. This is only a condensed version of the Force Z #1 Tournament Packet for the whole thing hit up the face book page (here) 

Stay tuned for "Force Z #1… after the slaughter." for a roundup of my experience at the tournament and how I fared after the dust and blood settled.