GK vs. Spacies Batrep

[Aidoneus]

Played another game today, against my friend Agrad and his Spacies. This was his first time using the new codex, which he bought about an hour before we played. It was a 1750pt Capture and Control mission, with a Dawn of War set up.

 

This was his list:

 

Tigerus:

 

5 Termies: Assault

5 Termies: Assault

Dreadnought: Assault

 

:)

10 Marines: Las, Plas, Power Fist, Tele Homer

---Rhino:

10 Marines: Las, Plas, Power Fist, Tele Homer

---Rhino:

 

3 Attack Bikes:

Land Speeder: Assault

Land Speeder: Assault

 

Thunderfire:

 

 

My army was the same I used last week against TJ. Here it is:

 

Brother Captain: Psychic Hood, Storm Shield

 

8 Grey Knights: 2 Psycannons

-Justicar (frags)

8 Grey Knights: 2 Psycannons

-Justicar (frags)

8 Grey Knights: Incinerator

-Justicar (frags, Targeter)

7 Storm Troopers:

-2 Grenade

 

Land Raider:

-Extra Armour, Dozer Blades

Land Raider:

-Extra Armour, Dozer Blades

Land Raider Crusader:

-Dozer Blades

 

Total: 1750pts, 35 models, 50.000 pts/model, 4 Scoring, 8 KPs

 

 

Pre-Game:

 

I only needed to contest one objective and capture the other. However, since I have 4 scoring units and 3 AV14 tanks that are very good at contesting, I actually had the resources to split up and send scoring units to both objectives. That meant that, wherever he applied the most pressure (2 deep-striking units of termies can be painful), I would still be able to capture the other objective.

 

I won the pre-game roll, and opted to go second. As I've said, in Dawn of War, I always prefer to go second. Agrab chose his zone (away from the camera), and we set up our objectives. His is in the top-left corner, behind the building in the very corner of the pictures. My objective is right under the wooden tower in the bottom-left of the screen. My thought was that I wanted to split up the objectives as much as possible, so he wouldn't be able to swarm in one area and focus-fire my Troops.

 

Agrab combat-squaded his tac squads, and deployed the plasma/vet halves in Rhinos at the forefront of his deployment zone, right in front of my objective. Tigerus was right next to the rhinos. Basically, he was setting up a thrust towards my objective, and he was going to bring in his lascannon teams onto his own objective 1st turn.

 

I didn't deploy, as usual for me in DoW, so we moved on to first turn.

 

Deployment

 

Turn 1:

 

Agrab's termies were in reserves to deep-strike, but everything else moved onto the board. His speeders moved up behind his advancing Rhinos, as did the attack bikes. The techmarine and thunderfire cannon moved up into the building in the center of his zone, where it could support either flank. Lastly, the lascannon teams and dreadnought moved on into the building where his objective was. Tigerus gave himself a 5+ invulnerable save. The Rhinos and Tigerus moved forward, and the squads disembarked. A couple squads ran forward, to get into better positions, but obviously he had nothing to shoot.

 

End His Turn 1

 

Everything of mine entered play at once, a welcome change from last week's game. My ISTs and Crusader came on right by my objective. The ISTs walked up right behind the objective, and the crusader plowed 12" forward, and disgorged its PAGK+BC occupants directly in front of the clump of marines. On the other side of the board, knowing it was Night Fight, my 2 Raiders simply moved 12" forward and sat there, unable to see far enough to laser the dreadnought. On my right, the incinerator let loose against both squads of marines. It didn't kill anyone from the squad not targeted by the rest of my grey knights, but together with the storm bolters took down the lascannon, all three regular marines, and wounded Tigerus. Between the crusader and ISTs, I also killed everyone but the plasma in the other squad there. I charged, getting my BC into base contact with Tigerus, and everyone else in base with his marines. This is about when we realized how much Tigerus sucks at CC, and at staying alive (2W and I4 on a 230pt model? seriously?). He and my BC each caused each other 1 wound, ending up in mutual annihilation. My PAGKs killed both the marines, without suffering any wounds in return. This made me very happy, because now he could only possibly contest my objective.

 

End My Turn 1

 

Turn 2:

 

One of Agrab's two termy squads entered play, deep-striking next to my disembarked PAGKs. He moved his Rhinos forward a bit, and brought his attack bikes and land speeders up into attack position. His thunderfire cannon ascended the building for a better vantage point, and his dreadnought walked forward towards the advancing Raiders. He let rip with one of his speeders at my PAGKs, kills one with rending, and I manage to fail 3 of my 4 saves. Two attacks bikes fired around the hill, taking down the incinerator. Finally, the other speeder killed the last three PAGKs, as I make more spectacularly bad rolls. On the right flank, the dreadnought couldn't rend through the Raiders' armour.

 

End His Turn 2

 

With all of that anti-infantry firepower on my right flank, I knew the ISTs were doomed if they spent another turn in the open. With all due haste, they embarked into the now-empty crusader, which moved slightly to shoot the termies. On my left, I wanted to move forward quickly, so the unpainted raider moved 12" up behind a hill, while the painted raider only moved 6", so it could keep firing at full effect. First off, the painted raider shot one lascannon at the dreadnought, causing it to explode! My crusader unleashed hurricane and assault cannons at the termies, killing 2 regular termies and the sergeant (thanks to some bad saving on his part). Not quite done yet, the crusader then machine-spirited its multi-melta at the termies, killing the last regular termy. And finally, one of the Raiders swiveled its sponson around, and pulverized the assault cannon termy from across the board. There's one threat neutralized!

 

End My Turn 2

 

Turn 3:

 

At this point, Agrab was in bad shape. He hadn't been expecting so much heavy armour, and I'd been systematically concentrating my fire on what anti-tank he had. Also, he spent a lot of points on Tigerus, only to find out that he's really not very good. Anyway, Agrab needed to destroy my raiders, and he knew it. His second termy squad came on in the path of my advancing raiders on the left, but scattered back almost to the board edge. The speeders moved up onto the hill, to shoot the crusader, and the attack bikes and rhinos moved to where they could shoot ISTs if the speeders managed to rend through the raider (not uncommon for Agrab, actually). Unfortunately for him, nothing so much as glanced any of my tanks. The only thing he did was to "tremor" one of my Raiders, so it counted as being in dangerous terrain. Good thing I took dozer blades.

 

End His Turn 3

 

I was feeling pretty solid by this point, but I knew the game wasn't over yet. I still needed to get to his objective, and to move about contesting units off my objective (attack bikes, 2 rhinos, 2 speeders), just in case I couldn't completely control his objective by the time the game ended. My two raiders moved forward, the tremored one onto the hill (had to make a dangerous terrain check anyway). It passed its check with a 3. On the right, my crusader moved to face the bikers. Between its hurricane bolters and assault cannons it killed off 2 bikers. The last biker fell back. It tried to shoot a speeder with its multi-melta, but missed. A lascannon from across the board shook a speeder. The two raiders also each killed one termy with lascannons.

 

End My Turn 3

 

Turn 4:

 

Agrab's shaken speeder high-tailed it backwards, to stay alive for a turn, and so it could help with the crucial left flank next turn. His Rhinos and biker moved to contest my objective, while his termies moved forward to threaten my advancing raiders. One of his lascannons penned a raider, and to my horror rolled a 6! Thankfully, I then remembered that I got a cover save from his being more than 2" in cover, and my raider lived to see another day. Again, that his shooting had no other effect, except that his thunderfire cannon tremored my painted raider this time (since the other was on a hill anyway).

 

End His Turn 4

 

I decided that I was doing well enough, it was time to take a little risk and be really aggressive. In other words, it was time to disembark all my grey knights! Unfortunately, dangerous terrain had other ideas, as I rolled two 1s in a row, immobilizing my raider on the hill. The tremored raider also rolled a 1, but thankfully its dozer blades saved it. The PAGKs all got out, with the orange squad in the building, within 3" of his marines. The red squad shot the termies, pulling down 2 of them (they failed 3 of their 6 saves, with two of those on the same model). The immobilized raider killed the last termy, just to be sure. The orange squad only killed 1 marine due to some good rolling, but that was fine since they wanted to assault anyway. On my right flank, the crusader killed a rhino with its multi-melta, and its hurricane bolters and assault cannons shook and blew the assault cannon off the speeder there. To end my turn, the orage squad charged into his marines, killing two, and forcing the other two to fall back off the board edge (by about .25")! The consolidated onto two levels of the building, and within range of the objective. At this point, I held his objective and contested mine, with at least one more game turn to go.

 

End My Turn 4

 

Turn 5:

 

Agrab wanted to forfeit at this point, since he had hardly any chance to win, but I convinced him to play one more turn, just to see if he could pull out a draw. He moved his red speeder up to where it could shoot my PAGKs, and moved everything on the right flank to within contesting distance of my objective. By his objective, the squad of marines killed 3 of my grey knights (1 psycannon, 2 regular). The thunderfire cannon tried to shoot that squad as well, but thankfully shrouding did its job and kept off the long-range fire (it tends to work about once per game for me). Unfortunately, that was all Agrab could do, so he ended his turn.

 

End His Turn 5

 

At this point, I had pretty much won the game. But I still really wanted to clear him off my objective, and to more convincingly take his. My red squad of PAGK all moved towards his objective. On the right, I decided that I wanted some more firepower, so I got the ISTs out of the crusader (making sure to keep them in scoring range), and moved to shoot whatever I could. The crusader killed the second Rhino with its multi-melta, and finished off the last attack bike with its other guns. The ISTs shot the speeder, which was now his only contesting unit in the area, but only managed to shake it. The immobilized land raider tried to help out from afar, but it only weapon destroyed the speeder (leaving it with no weapons, but still alive). The PAGKs all shot at the last marine squad, kill 2 marines each. I opted not to charge him, because that would have pulled me out of scoring range.

 

End My Turn 5

 

We rolled to end the game, and got a 5, which meant at least one more turn. However, since things were pretty decidedly in my favor, we just called it a game. In the end, I controlled his objective, and contested my own (although in that next game turn I would have easily killed his speeder, so barring some crazy thunderfire barrage killing all 7 of my ISTs, I would have held that too).

 

I think I had an easy time of things since he was so new to his codex. For starters, we both agree that Tigerus is just not good, and Agrab is not going to take him again. Second, while combat-squading does give you lots of scoring units, they're not very resilient units, so Agrab's going to have to take more tac/scout squads in the future. He likes his scouts, so I expect to see more of them, although neither of us were sure how good they are now, with their BS3 and the changes to sniper rifles. Also, while the thunderfire cannon was interesting, it seems to only be good against infantry, which Agrab's lists are never really weak on. So while he likes techmarines and all, he'll probably go back to a predator or two in heavy support. As far as tactics go, he's decided to wait until my Raiders show up to disembark, or really advance all that far, since he saw how painful my assaults can be.

 

So there you go. I hope you enjoyed the read. I'm certainly loving the list, and hope to keep playing it, preferably against some different armies, although TJ and Agrab are the guys I usually play, since my hobby club doesn't have gaming over winter break. Anyway, as always, I welcome any comments.

 

Thanks for reading,

-Aidoneus

[boreas]

Great read! 2 questions, though: How did Tigurius (with less Ini IIRC) and the BC kill each other off? Wouldn't the BC take the last wound off Tigurius allowing no attack back? Also, did you LR have 50% of it's side covered? The 2" inside cover rule doesn't apply to vehicles!

 

Maybe suggest to your opponents investing in Lascannon devastators or MM speeders? Given your penchant for tri-raider lists , that could boost their chances a lot!

 

Kudos on another win!

 

Phil

[WarriorFish]

His list seemed quite odd, but since it was his first game with the new dex (after owning it a mere hour, no less) it'll take some time for him to adjust. Having 3x as many Elites and Fast Attack as Troops probably didn't help - those termies are expensive! I mean, 2 Troops at 1750? :P I'm sure next time you do battle he'll have a list with Mr Vulkan and meltas everywhere... ;)

 

It was a good read, though the outcome wasn't much of a surprise!

[number6]

Another excellent batrep, though it doesn't sound like you were seriously challenged. It's interesting that you noted that he's relatively new to the game; his army list looks like one concocted by yet another new 40K player seduced by the Space Marines. It's top-heavy, full of shiny bits, doesn't have a balance of units capable of handling either opposing balanced or opposing extreme list builds (and triple land raider lists -- DH/GK or not -- would have to be classified as an "extreme" list) but has little in the way of tactical flexibility. However, we Inquisition players are very familiar with playing unusual, low model count, elite lists. I would be interested if you and Agrab could switch lists and see if you might have a closer game out of it. Still, it appears to me that 3 raiders are going to be more than his army can reasonably handle. It may be worth dropping one of them in the interests of playing a more competitive game, assuming that your friend has a relatively limited selection of models to choose from. The two issues I think he needs to address is his lack of anti-armour weaponry and his shortage of scoring units. It's almost unheard of for any army to have fewer scoring units than a DH/GK list ... especially one employing three land raiders! That's just not right.

 

One rules quibble I have with the game:

Thankfully, I then remembered that I got a cover save from his being more than 2" in cover, and my raider lived to see another day.

Cover saves for being in cover only apply to infantry. Vehicles benefit from cover only when at least 50% of their hull is obscured. Distance into/through intervening cover doesn't matter, only the amount of hull visually obscured from the vantage point of the firer matters. See p. 62 of the BRB.

[Doomaflatchi]

Thankfully, I then remembered that I got a cover save from his being more than 2" in cover, and my raider lived to see another day.

Cover saves for being in cover only apply to infantry. Vehicles benefit from cover only when at least 50% of their hull is obscured. Distance into/through intervening cover doesn't matter, only the amount of hull visually obscured from the vantage point of the firer matters. See p. 62 of the BRB.

If I'm not mistaken, I believe that he's saying that the Raider got a cover save because the enemy troopers shooting at it were shooting through more than 2 inches of the cover they were hiding in, meaning that they weren't close enough to the edge of the terrain they were taking cover in to accurately shoot through it. If this is the case, then wouldn't the Raider still get its cover save, since standing inside cover means that anything you look at will be obscured by that cover?

[number6]

If I'm not mistaken, I believe that he's saying that the Raider got a cover save because the enemy troopers shooting at it were shooting through more than 2 inches of the cover they were hiding in, meaning that they weren't close enough to the edge of the terrain they were taking cover in to accurately shoot through it. If this is the case, then wouldn't the Raider still get its cover save, since standing inside cover means that anything you look at will be obscured by that cover?

Ah! That would indeed allow for a cover save. That's not how I read it, but is probably what Aidoneus meant.

 

My bad. Nothing to see here. Please move along.

[Aidoneus]

Hey guys. Thanks for the comments. Glad you liked the report.

 

Tigerus and the BC are the same initiative. They were in single combat, they each dealt the other two wounds, and they each failed one of their invulnerable saves. Tigerus has two wounds, but had already lost one from shooting, while my BC only had the one wound to start with, so they killed each other simultaneously. Given that my BC was 91pts and Tigerus is 230pts, I was more than happy with the exchange. :down:

 

I did indeed mean his marines were more than 2" in cover. The raider, as you can see from the picture, was nowhere near area terrain. I'm pretty sure that if the firing troops are more than 2" in cover, they give a cover save to their target, whether that target is a tank or not. Even so, the walls and floor of the building must have obstructed quite a bit of the raider anyway, so in this case it comes out the same. I would however like to know if anyone can find evidence that my rules interpretation is wrong, for future reference.

 

The list was not particularly good, I'll admit. I think Agrab would admit to that too. I know specifically that he wanted to try out Tigerus and the Thunderfire, just to see what they were like. He also has played few games in 5th edition, and still isn't used to how many troops he needs to take. I expect another tac squad, or maybe a couple scout squads, will appear in his next list. Certainly, with the point he'll save from dropping Tigerus for a more reasonable HQ, that's the cost of a small squad right there. And while I certainly don't expect him to drop the speeders (he loves those things, and to be honest they do quite well for him), I can easily see him trading out one of the termy squads or the dreadnought.

 

The problem with my friends taking list heavy on anti-tank is that, just as often, I play mostly-infantry. I like to keep them guessing, not to mention the variety makes things interesting for me. That being said, I do think Agrab would have done well with MM attack bikes instead of HB ones, or a lascannon dreadnought instead of the assault cannon (although lascannons aren't as good as they used to be, with cover being what it is).

 

I have to say, I'm absolutely loving this list! The versatility, the protection, the potential for powerful offensive bursts... it's really a blast! Having said that, I think next time I play (probably later this week), I'm going to use an infantry-based list. As you've said, the tri-raider thing is extreme, and since my friends and I only have the opportunity to play each other (our gaming club isn't meeting over winter break), I'd like to give them a more balanced list to face. Not necessarily a less-powerful one, just more balanced. -_-

 

Anyway, thanks again for the comments guys.

-Aidoneus

[Mal]

There is one thing I have to ask.... in turn 4 you shot a rhino with your multimelta from the crusader, then shot at a speeder, are you aware the the GK PotMs, unlike the C:SM one, doesn't allow you to target seperate units?

[Silent Requiem]

Actually, if I remember correctly, the DH FAQ allows the machine spirit to fire at a different target. And if it doesn't, Chapter Approved 2004 does.

 

-Silent Requiem

[Aidoneus]

Yeah, the DH FAQ gave us a terrific version of PotMS, with better BS, multi-unit targeting, and no combat-speed restriction. And since our hurricane bolters can fire no matter what, the crusader is pretty sweet. Drive 12", fire the hurricanes at one target and machine-spirit one of the other two guns at a second; or drive up to 6" and fire the hurricanes and one other gun at one target, and machine spirit the third gun at a different target. It's awesome!