Cherokee Open 2024 After Action Report
This was my second time going to the Cherokee Open and I had a fantastic time. Huge shoutout to my friends Ryan Sliwoski, for organizing the event with Frontline Gaming, Will Werner, for being the best judge we could've asked for, and my wonderful fiancée Ashley for being their helper (and heckler supreme) throughout the weekend.
Congratulations to Tyler Pridgen of the Crit2Block crew for winning the whole thing with his, now notorious, Experimental Droids list!
I'm going to cover all 6 of the games that I played and all of my opponents.
My List
I'll be honest here, I am a huge waffler when it comes to Legion tourneys. I usually do not decide what I will use until the day list submissions are due. In this case, it was no different. Prior to the weekend, I had only played three games with variations of this list, so I was not super optimistic when it came to my chances of doing well.
Anyone who reads this blog or interacts with me in any way on Discord or otherwise will already know that Din Djarin is my favorite unit in Legion. I find it very difficult to go into a competitive environment without him to fall back on. The same can now be said for Lando. Contingencies and Lando's command cards are very hard for me to pass up when I see a good opportunity to fit them into a list.
The Mandalorian Resistance with Tristan is slowly becoming a unit that I adore. They can be a little bit tilting sometimes when they blank 2-3 defense dice on a big roll, but overall they performed much above what I was anticipating. When the rocket goes off, throwing 3 Red 2 Black with Blast, Impact 3, Lethal, and Suppresive can put real hurt on just about anything.
The rest of the list is pretty standard, though this is the first time I have used 3/3 Vets/Mk2s. Ryan convinced me to try it out and boy had I been missing out. Critical 12 coming from just my corps means that I can pretty reliably get through cover with pot shots and big rolls alike. Rebel Officer is there mostly just to let Lando Covert, but Inspire and Take Cover got me out of a few sticky situations. Slingers are there for a very cheap, very durable second SF token.
If I were to change anything, I would drop Hunter off of the Mandos in favor of a higher bid.
Round 1: Michael Koren - Crit2Block (3-3, 20th Overall)
My round-one opponent, Michael, set the tone for my entire weekend very early on. He, and the rest of the Raleigh crew, are notorious here in Knoxville for being extremely tough opponents to play. They are all excellent Legion players and Michael is no exception.
Our game started with me down in the right bottom and Michael in the top left. It was a pretty standard game of intercept where we both postured to score the middle. I was aiming for the early scores and he was holding his clones back for a late-game push. I was really worried about getting enough damage to stick on his clone ball so that I could maintain middle control on turn 6. Din and my Mandos flanked up the top side of the table to try and use that top middle house as a decent jumping point for some big swings. That went according to plan until Din swung a little too hard and left himself out in the open to be shot numerous times. He missed the Bounty on Cody and got shot to pieces around round 4.
By then I had scored the middle twice but Michael was way ahead on kill points. All I had sitting in the middle point was an Officer, a Single Vet unit leader, and a MK2. Michael put 4-5 shots into the Vet unit leader and somehow I blocked everything. He tried to pull off a really good move that I did not see coming by displacing my unit leaders with one of his ISPs, but it just didn't push them enough. The middle remained tied at the end and I pulled through with 6 to his 4 VPs. This was not an easy game and it was down to the wire. One unlucky roll on my part and he wins, which is too close for comfort for me.
Overall, a really fun game and opponent. I can't wait to see more of him at other tourneys.
Round 2: Raul Rosado - Curio Crew (4-2, 9th Overall)
This was without a doubt the roughest game I had all weekend. Raul and I have played against each other once before and he is such a fun and hilarious dude. He couldn't have made me feel better about the whooping he gave me this time around.
There's not a lot to say here. I misplayed Turn 0 and gave him Recover the Supplies. My thought was that my Mandos or Din might be able to grab the box and run before his wookiees could. It came down to a priority roll at the top of Turn 1 which he won. He grabbed the middle box with his wookiees and there was practically nothing I could do. It was a complete mistake on my part and he was smart to take advantage of it for the win. I conceded by the middle of Turn 3 because he had killed all but my Ewoks by then.
This game was a reality check for my list. I was not prepared for Wookiee Defenders and I got demolished. We finished so quickly that Raul was able to sneak in a little nap between rounds at our table. I was glad to be of such service to him.
Round 3: Travis Clark - Surge2Block (3-2, 22nd Overall)
Going into this weekend there were two lists I did not want to see. Wookiees and SC Pykes. Of course, I saw both and they were back to back. Continuing my trend for the tournament, Travis was a fantastic opponent and also from Raleigh. He and I were chatting and laughing the whole game and it was a great time.
We got Recover the Supplies and I knew my only real chance was to play it really aggro. I was able to build up a nasty Standby castle covering the middle on turn one, send both Din and Tristan in to touch the middle box, and claim and run away on turn two. The rest of the game came down to Travis pushing his army towards mine and trying to either kill my Ewoks, who had two boxes claimed, or my mandos, who had one. He got my mandos early in round three, but Din was able to grab the box and run. He spent the next few turns shooting at Din and killing my Vets with Maul.
The end game was a difficult puzzle for both of us to figure out. There were so many moving parts on both sides that my brain was getting mixed up. Travis went early with a Pyke unit on round six to try and kill Din, but it was all blocked. Din then engaged those Pykes and was safe in melee sealing the game. 3-2 in my favor.
Once again, this game was down to the wire. Really tough opponents three games in a row. I was happy to end the day with a 2-1 record, but I was fearing for what Sunday had in store for me.
Round 4: Chris Lawton - Crit2Block (3-3, 25th Overall)
I did not sleep well. I was tired and sipping on some coffee when the pairing went up. Of course, not only did I get paired with my third Raleigh player, but it was Chris Lawton who beat me hard the year before. Chris is a wonderful opponent and one that I would happily play against any time. He and I seem to enjoy fairly similar list styles with Rebels so I can appreciate a lot of what he is doing. The Raleigh crew also has a YouTube channel that you should check out!
I think Breakthrough was the best bet I had at a win for this game. I set up behind that big building in the bottom left corner. I had the activation advantage so Chris knew he had to come to me to win. He set up most of his army in the top right corner in order for them to score VPs. He sent Din and Boba in their respective Landspeeders after my army hoping to wipe a few acts and force me to go on the offensive. Turn one he was able to wipe two of my MK2s and get 3 wounds on my Din. At that point, I knew my only chance was to kill Boba, Din, and/or his Speeders. I started throwing as many dice into them as I could and I did a fair amount, but I was not able to kill anything during round one.
Round two was a bit of a rough one for both of us. At the end of the game we were talking and Chris and I both agreed that he should've run away with everything he could, but instead, he set up for some nasty kills staying near my army. I was able to take advantage of this move and Kill his Din (scoring my bounty) and Boba by the end of turn three. Turn four I killed a speeder and started running all of my army to score. He tried swinging back with his Vets and remaining speeder to pick up a few of my acts and hopefully kill my Din, but he was unable to. He had to move them away and try scoring.
The game ended 10-6 to me. Chris was an amazing opponent as always. I wish I had taken a picture, but his paint jobs are also incredible. Anyone who has seen his minis knows how amazing they look on the table.
It was at this point that a buddy of mine, Eric, who is from Raleigh but couldn't make it to Cherokee, texted me and asked "Are you trying to become Crit2Block's arch nemesis??"
Spoiler alert: Their Avenger would be my round-six opponent...
Round 5: Timothy Reitz (3-2-1, 16th Overall)
I forgot to take a table pic for this game. This is the only picture I have, oops.
Timothy is not from Raleigh! At least, I don't think he is, but he was an incredible opponent nonetheless.
This game went very similarly to my game with Travis. We got Recover and I figured my only real chance at the win was to grab the middle box as early as possible and run away. I did just that. My mandos got the box and ran on turn two while Din pushed up and played Distraction/Harasser. My gunline sat back and took standbys to keep the clone ball from pushing up on me too hard. Timothy was able to wipe Din by the end of turn three. My gunline did its job of sitting and blocking his advance for as long as it could, but they did not hold for as long as I was hoping. The rest of the game had Timothy chasing my box carriers (Mandos, Vet unit, and Ewoks) to the very far back corner of the map. The game ended almost identically with my Mandos engaging his only ARC unit that could kill me. I figured my Mandos would have a significantly better chance at living in melee than my Vets would when getting shot at. I was right and the game ended.
He killed everything on the table except for my three box carriers. I killed nothing. No kill points at all. It made the end of this game so much more stressful considering if he was able to kill one of my boxes he would've blown me out of the water on kill points.
Round 6: Kentucky Dan - Crit2Block (5-1, 2nd Overall)
Ah, who's surprised? Another Raleigh player and of course it's Dan and of course he has SC Pyke spam.
This was a game I was really hoping I would not have to play. Dan has consistently placed very well at events I have been at and is an absolute mastermind when it comes to playing Pykes (btw Ashley is still mad about round 5 last year, Dan).
We flipped Intercept. Of all the options, I think this was my best bet at pulling out the win. I had the act advantage, but with Pykes on the table, it did not feel that way at all. Turn one, I was able to set up my Mandos and Din in a decent way to start threatening some early kills. Mandos picked up three pyke minis very early on so I was feeling pretty good. His pykes shot back real hard and killed some Vet minis and a MK2. Turn 2 started with Din playing his one pip, jumping into melee with a Pyke unit, and killing all 6 of them in one attack. My mandos killed a few more bodies and my gunline did a lot of suppressing. Lando went 9/9 on a huge defense roll which was pretty tough to watch even though it helped me out. Round two felt quite good for me, but that feeling did not last long.
Round three came around and Din went first. I got him into melee with Bossk and tried getting the bounty kill, but he was just short of doing it. Bossk came back with his 2 pip and double hit Din killing him. Uh-oh. Black Suns then joined the fight from their flank and deleted Lando. Uh-oh. I whiffed some shots from my gunline and in return, Dan killed a MK2 and a Vet unit. UH-OH.
Round four came around and I went from feeling great to feeling desperate. Things just started to snowball for me. I lost a few more units but took two more pyke units with me. Even with 3/5 Pykes dead, I was just not able to catch back up after losing my heroes. The remaining turns just had Dan killing my remaining units and me trying my hardest to keep them alive. The game ended 6-5 in favor of Dan.
His list is so expertly crafted. I had to make the early choice to either go for Pykes or go for his BSE. I chose the pykes and it left his BSE to do as they pleased against my gunline. Doing it differently, I think the outcome would still be very similar. His Pykes would cause some serious issues for me if left unchecked.
Conclusion
Overall, I am very very happy with how I did over the weekend. I was just hoping to at least get 2 wins, so coming out with 4 wins and 2 losses in 8th overall felt amazing.
I cannot wait for next year's Cherokee and any tourneys I will go to in between now and then. Thank you again to everyone who helped out and all of my amazing opponents for making my weekend so great!
P.S. (This is for Ryan so if you're not him, move along) If I have to play another Raleigh game at Rocky Top '24 or Cherokee '25, I will personally come to your house, steal your Taun Taun minis and feed them to my dog, Chewbacca. Thank you.