I’ve never been much for Sydney. Sure they have the Harbour Bridge, the beaches and the occasional race riot but the beer is ordinary, the traffic is terrible, the streets are narrow and the place always seems kind of dirty. As for the people? There is something about the place that makes its inhabitants trend to towards being obnoxious, shallow, grasping douchebags. This seems to happen to whoever lives there irrespective of race, wealth, age, gender or religion, so a Trappist Monk living under a vow of silence who moved to Sydney would inevitably become a flashy, venal loudmouth compared to his Melbourne counterpart. Which isn’t to say there aren’t lots of fine people in Sydney, but the gravity of the place seems to draw people into resembling drug dealers who are moving into property development and you soon get used to seeing Uber drivers wearing enough gold jewelry to get them killed and looted if they were NPC’s in Baldurs Gate 3.¹

Still, Sydney GT is the biggest Australian AOS event outside of Cancon. I hadn’t been in five years but visiting places you’d sooner avoid to play AOS is a fact of life for competitive players in the New World. Plus a bunch of Craichouse Patreons would be in attendance and it would be a good chance to go through the painful process of putting real world faces to internet names. There was nothing else for it but to dust off my matching tracksuit, unzip it to the breast bone, polish my gold jewelry and ….

Holy shitballs! Every attendee is getting a free box of Skaventide!!!

We got the news a couple of weeks out and all of a sudden I felt a bit better about making the trip. Sydnet GT is the brainchild of Anthony Magro aka The Aos Coach and somehow or another he got Games Workshop to hand out a free starter box to everyone who bought a ticket. Talk about flexing some clout, and in your face rest of the world. Naturally the local community celebrated the good news with an outpouring of conspiracy theory and gift horse dentistry, but whatever. A Skaventide box is some awesome swag. Shout out to the folks complaining about getting it through airline baggage, I promise I’ll worry about the collapse of the second hand market for box splits later.

For Deadwood fans, the Skaventide box was “Free, Gratis”

Sydney GT is one of the older AOS tournaments around dating back to 2017 and, with the usual Covid interruptions, it has gone from strength to strength under the hyper energetic guidance of the Coach and his helpers.

The Coach himself is one of the real characters of AOS. He has made himself a very big deal in the international AOS world of the back of relentless effort, not just in content creation but with his discord, networking and unwavering positivity he has become one of the recognizable brands of AOS. The Coach represents the best Sydney traditions: Brash, entrepreneurial and unafraid to dream big.²

International success has left the Coach occupying some interesting Real Estate in the hearts and minds of local AOS players. Australians are afflicted with Tall Poppy Syndrome.³ We like people to be successful, but in a modest and relatable kind of way. Ideally someone who does better than you should do so without ever suggesting that they are smarter or harder working than you are. This goes double for internationally successful Australians, who also stand accused of being too good for their own country. If you’ve ever wondered why a Hemsworth or a Margot Robbie seems so down to earth and relatable in interviews, they’ve been conditioned from birth not to act like they’re better than the rest of us.

You won’t find Joaquin Phoenix doing shit like this anytime soon

So while Australian AOS players respect the Coach’s hard work and success, we have a powerful moral obligation to direct a bit of muttering side-eye in his direction from time to time, just in case he starts acting like a big shot or forgets where he came from. Add in a bit of jealousy and interstate rivalry and the Australian AOS scene can get a bit bitchy from time to time.

“Oh look the Coach is at LVO again…. Good for him ….. He works hard.”

None of this seems to bother Magro, who just keeps working hard and getting shit done. I’m more than happy to use his clout to pick up my free box of Skaventide and brag on my acquaintance to foreigners in discord chats.⁴ He’s a good guy and one of life’s natural hype men. Also one of the few Sydneysiders to ever make it to my hometown of Bendigo for an event, so good luck to him.

He also appears to be aging like Benjamin Button for some reason

The List

Listbuilding for Sydney was a complicated process. I was looking for a strong result but I wasn’t really feeling my strongest armies. The Mawtribes had been shelved after an insipid 3-2 at a recent event. Glutton spam was strong but running index Ogors is a tedious chore compared to the whacky Destro fun of earlier editions. I had fallen back in love with Khorne after running a goofy novelty list at Border Wars but sentiment doesn’t win a whole lot of tournaments. I hadn’t touched my SBGL or Nurgle this edition. The Vamps looked good but no particular build had leapt out at me. Nurgle seemed just awful from a design and power level perspective.⁵ I’d run a Stormcast list at a teams event in the dying embers of AOS3 and found them so awful I would have been happy to leave my army at the venue. They may be a lot better in 4th Ed but fuck em, they can have a time out to think about what they did. So Khorne it was: even if they weren’t the strongest army around, you are always going to be happier running an army you love.

“Even if it’s not a good idea.”

So I went though the index, played a few practice games and tried to get a sense of where Khorne was at and what would be the best approach in AOS4. After exhaustive study I arrived at the conclusion that the best approach to running the Boys in Red was to spam the hell out of the most busted unit available. Skullreapers. You can see my other brilliant insights in my Khorne index review. After a few tweaks I came up with my final list:

Generic Gore Pilgrims 33: What Men in Stained Raincoats Pay For

Blades of Khorne | Bloodbound Warhorde
Drops: 2
Prayer Lore – Blood Blesssings of Khorne
Manifestation Lore – Judgements of Khorne

General’s Regiment
Bloodstoker (110)
• General
• Collar of Contempt
• Favoured of Khorne
Skullreapers (440)
• Reinforced
Wrathmongers (150)
Wrathmongers (150)
Wrathmongers (150)

Regiment 1
Realmgore Ritualist (120)
Skullreapers (440)
• Reinforced
Skullreapers (220)
Skullreapers (220)

Skullreapers, Wrathmongers to buff Skullreapers and minimal heroes to get Skullreapers into combat. Pretty basic stuff but it’s a departure from traditional thinking and it sums up my take on the Index: none of the old shit works and Khorne has become a Destro army with a few movement gimmicks. Destro armies⁶ are strong in melee but have a tipping point where they take enough damage and lose the ability to achieve anything. Khorne used to be able to pull the fat out of the fire with summons, but outside of spending points on a Bloodthirster and saving the Bloodtithe to bring him back it’s not happening anymore.

So the list is geared up for maximum aggression and more noteworthy for what it leaves out. No Slaughterpriest, no “Make Me A Priest” Command Trait. Prayers are OK but unreliable and you don’t need a Slaughterpriest to run up Bloodtithe. You are better off taking Favored of Khorne, which gives you a Bloodtithe to start, to ensure you don’t get caught with your pants down. No faction terrain: garrisoning it is a waste of time and putting it on the table just gives people something to charge in your backfield. No Bloodthirster for the resummon. They’re OK but not having one frees you up to not give a damn about saving up Bloodtithe. No Bloodsecrator, they’re good but not worth a unit of Wrathmongers. I didn’t even expect to use any Manifestations other than the Bleeding Icon. They just aren’t very good.

Sydney would be a good chance to test my theories and see if I still had anything to contribute to AOS. My last solid event was Cancon and I hadn’t actually won my first game at an event in a year or so. I was out of the conversation for top Australian players. I had gotten used to being the oldest guy in the room chronologically, but I was finding it harder to shake the feeling that my best years in the game were well and truly behind me. The Young Bucks were treating me like the childless uncle you have around at Christmas for a few laughs and stories about the good old days, and maybe they were right to do so. Maybe it was time to stop pretending I still belonged on the top tables? Maybe it was time for Old Yeller’s last trip out behind the barn?

So many stock images for ‘Old Man Regret’, it’s downright depressing

Day One

I was travelling alone for this one and had booked a roadside motel about 15 minutes from the venue. It had a lot of bad reviews on google but mostly from the sort of people who freak out about cracked bathroom tiles. It wasn’t anywhere near what this connoisseur of flophouses would consider a shithole and I spent most of the non-tournament part of the weekend getting uber eats and catching up on some much-needed sleep.

This year SGT had moved to a basketball facility in Sutherland Shire to accommodate increased numbers. The place was pretty underwhelming from the outside, but the gaming space was huge. The Coach got sixty-odd tables with room to spare. The NSW AOS community is large with a lot of fresh blood and I was in the unaccustomed position of not knowing most of the people or gaming clubs at an event. It felt odd. I’m not sure what it says about the health of the game, but outside of Cancon I just don’t go to events where you see a lot of strangers.

I did the grip and grin, Hail Fellow well met! routine with the people I did know and commenced the awkward process of meeting Craichouse Patreons for the first time. “Oh right, you’re such and such on discord. Umm what’s your actual name? Have you met any of the others?” Eventually we got down to round one. As always I forgot to take photos of every game and I’m supplementing them with pics lifted from the socials, with thanks to those who took ’em.⁷

Round 1

Loss Vs Alexander Krohn (Kharadon Overlords): 34-20, Shifting Objectives

Talk about a shitty first round draw, the KO in the hands of their one true master, AOS Veteran and current Team Australia member Alexander Krohn. I’ve had a heap of games against him and it seems we are fated to play each other at every event we both attend and I’m not sure what either of us ever did to deserve it. Krohn is South Australian so there is a pretty good chance he is some sort of serial killer, and I mean as a great man once said, “What the fuck did I do?’

Krohn was running 30 Grundstoks in the big boat with the Fyreslayers ROR. It’s not a super strong build assuming you have the tools to come to grips with KO, but it is particularly bad for Khorne. Against most shooting armies you can Murderlust into their shooting units to shut them down, but the KO just redeploy into their stupid boat, set down 12 inches away and blast you with Covering Fire. To make matters worse we were using the pre-patch Honour Guard rules, so I had one unit of Grundstoks shooting into half my army at +1 to hit and wound.

My only chance was to get stuck into the Grundstoks and I needed a bit of luck somewhere along the line to make it happen: Winning a priority, a 4inch redeploy, an 8 inch charge, an 8+ for the Bleeding Icon to switch off a Redeploy. It didn’t happen and by turn 3 I was effectively shot off the table with only a bunch of dead Fyreslayers to show for it. Krohn was a delightful opponent as always and I can’t think of a nicer guy to grind you into oblivion with a shitty NPE army. Also hats off to the design team for consistently managing to implement very different KO playstyles while maintaining a consistent level of ball-sucking to play against. For all that they kicked my ass, the sky dwarves really aren’t strong against anyone with the tools to reach out and touch them. I’m not surprised they are doing so badly. Krohn finished the event on an eminently respectable 3-2 and is back to playing his other army – Tzeentch.

It started out so nice

Round 2

Win vs Ryan Curcio (Cities of Sigmar): 50 – 12, Jaws of Gallet

We had pizza for lunch on Day 1 and I stood around complaining about my miserable luck to the few people who could be bothered to listen. I’d come a long way with high hopes and here I was already, hoping to submarine why way to a respectable finish. Still, I’m a professional and after a bit of dignified weeping and a few calls to my support team I was ready for the next round. Ryan was a new player running a narrative Cities Steam Tank list. SGT was his first ever tournament and his first round opponent was none other than one of Australia’s top players, Joel Graham. Talk about lucky.

Things didn’t improve much from there. I gave him first turn in the game, he took Seize the Center and I more or less massacred him with a flood of Skullreapers. I noticed what would become a recurring problem for the event: you can explain to new people how Murderlust works, but if they’ve never played against it they don’t really understand it until they see it. Of course, you demonstrate it by walking 10 Skullreapers 14″ inches into combat with a prized unit and chopping it to bits, so it is inevitably a bit of feels bad.⁸ Luckily young Ryan was a lot more grown up than me and we had a pretty good game.

I hadn’t played Cities this edition and I was a little shocked at how weak the Steam Tanks had become – at least they used to get two shots. Freeguild Cavaliers wounding on 4’s was a little rough as well, one of those cases were GW may have taken the racial stats a bit too far. I’d expect to see freaky Dwarf/Elf builds dominating Cities for the foreseeable future, because the humans were pretty ordinary. Ryan and I had a bit of a chat about tournament life and he was nice enough to listen to a few gaming tips. He went on to take the wooden spoon for the event so there is a fair chance he may have made the mistake of listening to me. He was a good guy and I hope to see him at events down the track.

Round Three

Loss vs Shaun Baldwin (Kruleboyz): 42-40, Scorched Earth

My third round opponent was not⁹ a member of the fearsome Western Warriors gaming group who come from some part of Sydney I can’t really remember. Shaun is also a Craichouse Patreon and active in the Discord so there was a ceratin amount of “Right, you’re that guy” to start the game. Like far too many of our Patreons Shaun is a flaming Destro-sexual and was running an awesome nearly-all-monster Kruleboyz list with Kragnos and a Mega for shits and giggles.

I blew this game of the back of simple rookie errors. Not that Shaun did anything wrong, in fact he played an immaculate game but I fucked this one by making the same stupid mistake twice. During the pregame phase I assured Shaun I knew all about Kruleboyz Dirty Tricks. Then I charged 10 Skullreapers into Kragnos and a Troll, and was somehow astonished when the Troll made me fight last and Kragnos wiped the unit. I’d learned my lesson so later in the game I put my other 10 Skullreapers into Kragnos, and was again shocked to discover he could make me fight last because he now has the keyword of whatever faction he was in.¹⁰ Shaun was kind enough to allow me to reset my charge but the damage was done. The particularly galling part was I could have springboarded my boys in off an Endless Spells on both occasions, just pure stupidity on my part.

My poor Skullreapers about to charge Kragnos and a Troll, sorry boys

It was still a really good game. My Reapers pink misted everything but Kragnos and a Shaman in fairly short order. The Shaman zipped around my backfield picking up objectives in a battleplan that may as well be renamed “Teleporting Army Wins”.

The real honors of the day belong to Kragnos who managed to do everything but pack up the terrain when the game was over. The big guy won the game by retreating out of combat with 2 wounds remaining, then hitting a 15 inch charge to get around my troops and kill two weak units, preventing me from having enough bodies to win in my final turn. And this was before he dropped 100 points. Expect to see more of the one remaining unsquatted BOC unit in the future. Shaun was a great opponent and quite indulging of my childish pissing and moaning. He finished on 3-2 in 39th place. A truly great result for a novelty list.

I headed back to the hotel room in a subdued mood; 1-2 was not the result I was hoping for and I couldn’t even blame it on my army being shit. This one was all me.

Day Two

I slept poorly. When you travel with your boys there is always something to keep you busy, but on my own there was nothing to keep the doubt and self-recrimination at bay. I briefly considered going on an epic solo hotel room drug- and booze-fueled bender like Martin Sheen in Apocalypse Now.¹¹ But I was getting too old for hangovers and who knew how illegal drugs would react with my prescription meds? Besides which, drug-fueled benders are only dramatic and cool when thin people do them. Skinny folks get Trainspotting and Requiem for a Dream. Fat Guys get The Whale.

If you ever really want an anti-drug movie, stack at least 30kg on everyone in this cast

Round 4

Win vs Shane Sherovo (Khardron Overlords): 28-12, Battle for the Pass

You would need a lot more mental resilience than I possess to not be aggrieved at drawing KO twice in the same tournament. Mind you, at my last SGT I played Tomb Kings twice so there is a pretty good chance the City of Sydney hates me. Shane was running the Ironclad/Grundstok build but less optimized. He had Brokk and a few combat options. He was a little spooked by the output of my Skullreapers and deployed very defensively, allowing me to take the side objectives and rack up an early and eventually game-winning lead. I was able to save my boys some punishment by Murderlusting out of short gun range¹² and most of my boys made it into the KO on a good charge turn, killing everything but Brokk and the Grudndstok/Haulers.

From then on it was The KO Show as my army was blown to pieces by redeploying Sky Dwarves that I was completely unable to land a blow on. The game finished on a fairly ridiculous note when I hid the remains of my last 3 units in a Wyldwood and ran out the clock with an unbeatable lead. Silly stuff and a timely reminder not to take myself or this stupid game so seriously. A good trick to remember when you are being blasted by shooting armies.

My surviving troops, moments before an “Exit stage right” into the Wyldwood/Ruin

Shane was an awesome opponent leaving me to ponder why so many otherwise good dudes are drawn towards playing an army designed for gaping assholes. There’s probably a Psychology PHD thesis in that somewhere. He finished 79th with a 2-3 which is a decent result given the state of the faction.

Lunch of Day 4 was a selection of grilled Kranskys which were delicious. A great alternative to pizza if anyone is planning on catering an event. I pulled my head out of my ass long enough to soak up a little sunshine and hang out with my pals. We even managed to assemble the Craichouse Patreons for a group photo.

It’s class all the way around here

Round 5

Win vs Joel Menzies (Ogor Mawtribes): 36-4, Feral Foray

By a happy coincidence my final opponent was a guy of about my own vintage that I’d been chatting to throughout the event. Joel was a fairly casual gamer running a Gutbuster/Mawtribes list including actual Maneaters. A unit beloved of Ogor players and seemingly despised by rules writers. On a side note, someone pointed out to me that the goofy Maneater ability gives you a chance of being immune to Covering Fire, so that’s one good thing they’ve got going for them.

I’m sworn off Mawtribes but the idea of three of these dopes just Noping their way out of 70 Ratling Gun shots is very tempting.

Our game was something of a massacre. Joel took first turn and ran his 8 Ironguts down field to kick in my flank. I Redeploy/Murderlusted a unit of Wrathmongers to break up their charge and counter punched with my Reapers next turn. The highpoint of the game was splitting a bunch of attacks from my Skullreapers, and Joel’s Ironguts survivng on 2 wounds. From there it was one of those magical games where all my stuff worked as it should and the Ogors went into the Woodchipper.

The GIF that keeps on giving

Unfortunately for Joel he expressed a vague interest in playing Khorne himself and was subjected to an overly enthusiastic lecture/tutorial from me which in hindsight, may have been a bit aggravating.

“So this, as you see here, is the other common use of Murderlust. I spend a command point to run and just walk my unit 14 inches into combat, like so. You can’t Redeploy and I chop you to bits with absurd output before you can activate. Isn’t that super cool!”

He was a great opponent and finished 66th with a 2-3. His two wins were absolute full points scoring massacres as well, so well done Joel. I hope I didn’t put you off playing Khorne.

Wrapping Up

So that was it for Sydney GT for another year. The event was won by Gary Chen, an up-and-coming Sydneysider, with his Nighthaunt. Joel Graham and Papps finished 2nd and 3rd but the standout among the 5-0’s had to be Jasper Rowley with his Nagash-led OBR. Terry Voller had an amazing run with a skewed Kruleboyz list made up of Kragnos and Boltboyz, but unfortunately crashed out in the 5th round, breaking the hearts of Destro-Sexuals everywhere. Again.

My personal man of the match was none other than the Craichouse’s own Russell Crowe.¹³ He took a Sons of Behemat list, had five competitive games with it, won three of them and managed to finish at the top of the 3-2 bracket. He also won coolest army with it which is an amazing effort.

Nearly-finished Gargants. WIP from expert hobbyists is yet another perk of the Craichouse discord

The event itself was a triumph. The venue was huge with ample parking for people who decided not to daydream about looting their Uber Drivers. The terrain was first class and the organization flowed without a hitch. I’ve never been to a large event with so much space between tables and it was nice to get that big event vibe without Ass to Ass action or having to shout at your opponent to be heard.¹⁴ Everyone I spoke to had a great weekend and even the most miserable soul¹⁵ struggled to find anything to complain about. Whatever else is happening in 4th Ed, the NSW scene is running strong with a whole bunch of new faces around.

The Coach and his helpers at set up. Great venue

The Coach has vowed to make SGT the biggest AOS event in Australia and even his most mean-spirited critic¹⁶ wouldn’t bet against him. If you are the sort of cashed-up dilettante who travels internationally for AOS, Sydney is definitely worth putting on your list. Bring the family and ship them of to the Zoo or some crap while you hang out with the locals.

As for me, Sydney was a very mixed bag. My results were below par but I’d had a great weekend enjoying the hobby I love surrounded by friends and fellow travelers. That should have been enough to send me home happy but I boarded the plane full of doubt and misgivings. Was my time over, and why did it matter so much anyway? Most people can watch sports or play games without going on some ridiculous emotional rollercoaster but here I was, pushing 50 and worried about my spot in the imaginary rankings of my Toy Soldier hobby. Psychologically it was all displacement activity to avoid real issues in my life, but that particular gem of enlightenment has never stopped my from wanting to flip a table when an important dice roll comes up 3 instead of 4. Was I stuck with myself forever?

The melodrama is real, folks

I had a spectacularly awful trip home with a Series of Unfortunate Events that led to me being stranded on the highway at 2am, 20km from home and out of petrol. I contemplated walking off into the bush to commence a new life but we ended up waiting around for somebody with a jerrycan. At some point in the miserable evening, my hobby brain magically switched from existential dread to planning my next list.¹⁷ That’s the beauty of gaming for obsessives. There’s always a new book, update or event to shift your focus back. It would probably be healthier to try and address my underlying issues, but who has the time? BBBB was up the next week, Lost Legion GT was after that and then it was practically time for Cancon. Hope to see you all there.

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1. Opinions on Sydney are the authors own, shared only be everyone who ever visited the place that wasn’t a drug dealer looking to get into property development. ↩︎
2. I can only speculate about involvement with Sydney’s other traditions. ↩︎
3. See season 1, episode 1 of Koala Man for the best explanation of the origins of this condition. ↩︎
4. On a side note it would be really cool if non-Australians stopped assuming that we all know each other. It’s a big country with 27 million people. I’m happy that one Australian kid did a student exchange at your High School or whatever but I’ve never met them. ↩︎
5. I took them to an event a week after SGT and they were even worse than I thought. ↩︎
6. Not Gitz, I mean proper destro armies. ↩︎
7. And their permission, I hope? ↩︎
8. Or having 5 Wrathmogers redeploy and murderlust to shut down your opponents charge turn etc etc. ↩︎
9. Had to edit this. I got Shaun confused with Sean Tufnel, another Craichouse patreon who is in the Western Warriors. I left in the shoutout to the Warriors who are good bunch and planning their own GT next year. Keep an eye out. ↩︎
10. In my defense this had only been mentioned in the Craichouse chat about 1000 times, how was I to know? ↩︎
11. And during the making of Apocalypse Now. Check out Heart of Darkness sometime. ↩︎
12. It really is the best ability going. ↩︎
13. Not his real name of course but he goes by his internet persona in real life like an 80’s pro wrestler refusing to break Kayfabe. ↩︎
14. Sorry Cancon, I know you do your best with what you have. ↩︎
15. Me ↩︎
16. Me again ↩︎
17. I’m thinking Skullcrushers, they’re shit but possibly useful in a shooting meta. ↩︎

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