“I have long understood that losing always comes with the territory when you wander into the gambling business, just as getting crippled for life is an acceptable risk in the linebacker business. They both are extremely violent sports, and pain is part of the bargain. Buy the ticket, take the ride.”
-Hunter S. Thompson
It’s been a rough pandemic for the Kings of War community. Sure we had a little more time hopefully to work on projects, and plenty of Universal Battle to play and watch, but for those of us who rely on the social aspects of the game to really keep our fires burning, it has been a depressing time. There are signs that the world is healing though, and with in-person events springing up like green shoots of life after a long and painful winter, things are starting to feel some kind of regular once again, and that brings hope. Part of that return to normalcy is the U.S. Masters GT happening in July, with 64 of the best players in the country (well, and me) fighting it out for tabletop supremacy, regional bragging rights and a damn good time.
Now much like last Masters, I’ll remind folks I don’t like making predictions, especially in such a public forum where it can be seen and laughed at by all when I’m way off target. Predicting winners out of a field of 64, in a game that is so matchup and dice dependent is still a suckers game and is basically gambling where you win nothing, but the demands of our editor are the demands of our editor so here I am. I’ve looked through the lists and pulled out a handful to highlight, that with the right pilots, I think can go far, and most importantly give folks out there something to read (and disagree with) before the big weekend.
Jeff O’Neal – Goblins
This is what you get when you move Masters to the Summer, you get Jeff showing up with an absolute filth factory of Goblins. Now from all reports, Jeff is such a nice guy that he regularly gets best game votes from opponents even while curb stomping them with this giant pile of nastiness, which takes a special kind of gentleman. This list (or a variation) has been running things in the South East region for a while now and gets another shot at Masters after a strong showing in Chicago 3 years ago. It unlocks all of its toys with a no nonsense core of 6 Rabble hordes and then brings all the varied and annoying stuff that allows. Winggits, Banggits, Rocks Throwers oh my! There is nothing valuable to attack in this list, as your’e really just fighting a big pile of trash for the most part, and every trade you’re doing is probably a trade down while you’re getting peppered with every kind of shooting from every kind of angle. If the Winggits survive to later rounds, they’re scoring units ready to jump on any exposed or lightly defended objective for added annoyance.
Jeff is an extremely solid player with tons of top table experience, playing a list archetype he’s mastered over the years and is strong within the current meta. With the right matchups and a little luck this very much could be his year. Or, Travis Timm, a very talented player from the Mountain region, playing a very similar (but not exactly) list could find the luck and take it all as well. We’ll see.
Dustin Howard – Northern Alliance
It’s the Ice Elemental build, and dear lord does it look annoying to play against. Dustin gets bonus points for it being a spectacular looking army, and going for a “theme” (although this theme could just be spam one of the best Northern Alliance units), but make no mistake, this list is rough. This isn’t the pure white, powdery, freshly fallen snow, but instead that black ice on a unseen bridge ready to ruin your whole damn day. 72 shots with piercing (and additional 28 without), Heal 10, Surge 24 and just enough chaff to get things where you need its an absolute (super)beast of a list to deal with.
Dustin has a ton of experience with the list this year, added to years of experience playing monster heavy lists with surge and playing in his home state gives added advantage. He’s generally had a good run in previous masters but his bid for the title has been cutoff by extremely close games against very tough opponents. With the right matchups, this could very well be his year.
His Dojo teammate (and former Master) Brad McKay also is bringing a Ice Elemental heavy filthy Northern Alliance list, but I just edge it out with Dustin’s experience with the list and the archetype. We’ll see how wrong I am though.
Garret Mercier – Trident Realm
I’m always interested to see the different directions folks can go with Trident Realm, especially as they’ve gained popularity (thanks to Mantic official models and countless sales on Wrath of Kings leftovers). While really early focus was on the Placoderms and Naiad units, a Depth Horror centered build started to be the more dominant trend thanks to Jeff Swann’s tireless influence, and innate strength of the unit. This created a sort of Akido build that absorbed the aggression of an opponent, locked them up, and flipped the game on its head until suddenly the opponent had lost to an army that didn’t really have hammers, anvils or sometimes even a center. Garret’s army is less Akido and more Greco Roman wrestling. It’s a crushing weight, and unstoppable force that hides subtle trickery and flexibility. Sure its just going to get in your face and bully you, but its got tricksey stuff to do too with Knuckers and friends. 18 unit strength might be a bit low, but honestly a lot of that unit strength is pretty hard to remove so could cause some problems.
Garret is known for bringing interesting builds to events, and with proper prep and not spending all day/night at the venue desperately painting his army at the last possible moment (like last year), he could make a run deep into this tourney. No pressure Garret.
Tom Annis – Undead
Tom had a terrible Masters last year and almost dragged the South region out of the top spot single handedly and bringing shame to the Dojo. His beloved Basilea list he’d qualified with had been beaten with the nerf hammer and he’d shifted to Brothermark last minute and underperformed. I’ve said this as I’m about to compliment him (against my better judgement) so I had to dredge up some bad memories first so I can’t be accused of going soft.
Tom really embraced playing remotely through UB2 this year knocking out countless one-off games and competing in multiple tournaments. He’s put in the work, while folks like me just sat on the sidelines complaining and that could really help him in a potentially under practiced field. He’s also brought Undead (easy mode), a perennial powerhouse in the meta that even after a couple adjustments this edition are still top tier. Double Soul Reaver infantry are an absolute buzz saw in a tiny package which are easy to hide from nasty shooting at height 2. Double Wight horde and triple Wraith troops backed up by three dedicated Surge casters gives tons of room for shenanigans. A sprinkling of other utility pieces rounds out a really balanced but effective list. It was so good that Mike Grant copied it wholesale point for point and brought it as well. Tom better make sure to finish above Mike or that will be quite embarrassing.
Corey Reynolds – Ratkin
19 unit strength and only 14 total units for a Ratkin force feels super weird to me but I also understand that Corey Reynolds knows way more about winning with Ratkin than I ever will so I took a closer look. What you have here is a solid set of high nerve medium defense units that will take some work to shift, and then some really nasty support pieces built in. Between Clawshots, Weapon Teams, lightning bolts and blight staff there is a chance for concentrated fire doing some real work on opponents as they try and engage, and 3 big gribbly monsters backed up by a Brood Mother to pump out high quality attacks on the counter. This feels like a more compact / less bullshit version of classic Ratkin lists Corey has terrorized GTs with in the past so could go far in this event. He’s also a great dude who puts tireless effort into running events and still dominates on the table so would be a very worthy master after sitting out last year to T.O. the event.
Aaron Chapman – Varangur
This army is all freaking go folks. Sure there is a ton of nuance in how it can be played but this is some serious Alpha Strike that will just roll over certain matchups in a single combat phase. If you’re thinking about your army surviving against Alpha Strike in the current meta, think of this army primed to charge and how you’d deal with it before hitting submit on that list deadline to the GT. Frostfang cavalry (with Sharpness) along with 2 units of Mounted Sons form the core bag of hammers with just enough chaff to get them where they need to go. Fallen hordes and 3 (yes 3) Lord on Frostfangs bring fast, nimble, high quality attacks that is hard to counter. Adding in some Draugr for utility / objective sitting and it is a super strong, very aggressive list. Aaron has a ton of experience playing with this archetype over the years (it wasn’t always just Slave Orcs). It’s a stripped down list with all scoring units, 3 basically under costed dragons and the ability to just blow up half a battle line on a good charge which looks a lot of fun to play. I know it means I picked another Dojo player and believe having 3 of them in my list is making me a bit sick in the mouth but I wanted to talk about this army.
Erich Trowbridge – Orcs
It’s the same damn list as last year people, and I bloody love that. Just run the freaking thing again and see who can beat it this time. I don’t even care if it is the best option to bring, I just like that folks get another crack at the list/player that holds the title. The truth is it requires a lot of luck (and of course immense skill) to win an event like this. It is rare for those lucky matchups, clutch nerve rolls or spiked combat rolls to line up perfectly two years in a row for folks so we’ve yet to see a repeat Master in the KOW era of this event. Erich running this behemoth of a list just might do it, and it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.
For list analysis I’m honestly just going to copy and paste what I wrote for last year as it still applies…
“Naked in its aggression and plan, it is a straightforward beatdown with surprising subtlety. The lack of Elf and Goblin bow shooting in the meta has opened up space in the game for these Def 4 Orc combat behemoths hidden behind a plethora of Orcling shaped speedbumps. Straight forward it can chew up lists with high quality (Me 3+ and CS 1 & 2) attacks that do work on both trash spam lists or elite hammer lists. It doesn’t care about phalanx or stealthy and just attempts to overwhelm an opponent with almost wall to wall threats. 3 mounted Krushers to hunt whatever needs hunting and 3 foot Krudgers to keep the lines in order and play last minute defense give a huge amount of versatility to a otherwise blunt force object. No God Speakers, no heal, no shooting, no Bane Chant, no bullshit.”
So there it is, 7 lists/players I think have the potential to win Best General at 2021 Masters in Texas. Hopefully you take this in the spirit it was intended, the half mad ravings of lunatic overloaded on Thai food and Coke Zero and not anything too serious or insulting. If you’re not on this list, you can laugh at me extra hard as you lift the trophy on Sunday. Good luck to everyone coming out and feel free to let me know exactly how wrong I am in all of my predictions in the comments / thread.
Go Erich! Would love to see Orcs win again!