Chaplain Admetus' Battle Report Thread - Game 32 added

[Chaplain Admetus]

Back after a week long hiatus (been away), here's game 7!

Game 7

Mission: The Scouring

Deployment: Hammer and Anvil

Very unusually, I've managed to get a game against Tyranids. I know they've been getting some bad press, but I have next to no games under my belt against them and I always worry a little against unfamiliar stuff. His list:

Tervigon

3 Raveners

3 Warriors

Tyranid Prime

Swarmlord with a hive guard

6 shrikes

One unit of each type of gants (can never remember which is which)

6 spore mines

Anything that could had rending claws and scything talons as kind of an army theme. He took rulebook powers, netting Endurance and Smite on the swarmlord, and smite on the tervigon.

I used the same list as before, only swapping the rhino for a pod, and put 3 meltabombs on the vanguard. My librarian rolled up prescience and perfect timing, and I won the roll for first turn.

Deployment. Apparently I picked the wrong side, netting the end of the table with the 1 objective and one of the 2s, with him getting a 3 and a 2 in his deployment zone, with the 4 close by. Night fighting on turn 1, and no initiative was seized. Tactical squad succumbed to the red thirst.

Turn 1 - AS: The sternguard pod in near the warriors, scattering 11" but just managing to stay on the table. The sternguard pop out and manage to take down all the warriors for first blood, but the prime is untouched. The assault squads move around and kill a spore mine each before they become a problem.

Turn 1 - Nids: A unit of gants sits on one objective, the tervigon spitting out a unit of 11 to go for the big one. Unfortunately, he rolls 3, 4, 4 - no more of that for the rest of the game (this is why I decide to leave the Tervigon alone for most of the battle). One spore mine hits an assault squad but does nothing, and the sternguard get charged and obliterated by the hormagaunts.

End of turn 1. Lots of nids, but I have 15 more marines waiting in the wings

Turn 2 - AS: I roll for reserves and nothing turns up (even with a re-roll for the vanguard). Now I remember why I dislike heavy reserve armies. With not much to do I retreat with both assault squads, the librarian casting prescience and hoping to bait what would be a 10" charge from the shrikes.

Turn 2 - Nids: His raveners have the decency to also not turn up. The tervigon tries to go back round the rocks for an objective, as the Swarmlord comes out to play. The hormagaunts advance down the right, whilst the shrikes don't take the bait and fly off for the objective on the far left. The prime goes for the drop pod, but can't scratch it. To quote my opponent: "The sweeties inside were nice, but the prime doesn't think the wrapper's very tasty".

End of turn 2

Turn 3 - AS: This time everything turns up. Baal on the right flank, drop pod near the leftmost objective, and the vanguard attempt to land near the squad in the back right but scatter back, landing near the Prime instead. The assault squad moves up to take on the hormagaunts, librarian casting prescience but wounding himself with Perils in the process. Shooting, and combined fire from the tactical squad and the Baal all but wipe out the shrikes, leaving one alive on one wound, and that's promptly taken away by a storm bolter on one of the drop pods. Another VP for killing a fast unit. The assault squad shoots all but one of the hormagaunts dead, and the vanguard assault the prime, losing one but taking it down to one wound. Not a bad turn.

Turn 3 - Nids: The termagants come off the "3" objective and head for the Baal, whilst the tervigon comes in the same direction. Swarmlord assaults the drop pod but somehow fails to break it. The gaunts charge the Baal, but only take off two hull points (phew). The vanguard lose another model, but take down the prime, as well as the last hormagaunt who decided to charge them for want of anything better to do.

End of turn 3. Feeling a lot more confident now.

Turn 4 - AS: I take a gamble and cast both powers with the librarian, getting both without dying. I re-arrange the tactical squad and take some pot shots through at the tyrant, managing to kill the hive guard. The librarians unit moves up to take care of the gaunts on the objective, whilst the others move for the "2" in my deployment zone. Shooting from the Baal wipes out most of the termagants in the corner, whilst the vanguard finish them in assault. The librarian's squad kills all but one on the 4 objective. A lot of onlookers were questioning my choice in ignoring the Tervigon... I decided it wasn't the most threatening thing and wanted to get rid of the small stuff, but I'm not sure this was right.

Turn 4 - Nids: the raveners turn up in my deployment zone and kill two assault marines. The tervigon moves round, kills an assault marine, but fails its charge. The Swarmlord comes round the pod and makes his charge into the tactical squad (taking a wound on the way in), and I promptly feed it my sergeant. Fearless means I can now tarpit it for the rest of the game.

End of turn 4

Turn 5 - AS: The vanguard for for the "3" objective, the Baal moves and then turbo boosts to get to the "2" in his deployment zone (pre-measured - it was 27" away. If I'd been too far, I'd have put shots into the tervy). The assault squads advanced on foot to get rid of the raveners and set up a multi-charge on the gaunt and tervy respectively. Shooting - I take down some raveners and the gaunt (drop pod did that), and take a wound or two off the tervigon. In combat, hammer of wrath wipes out the raveners, and I consolidate far back enough to be able to reach the objective. The tervigon gets taken down by sheer weight of attacks, and that's pretty much game over. It ends at the end of turn 5, and the swarmlord is busy munching tactical marines.

End of the game. Angels Sanguine victory, with 15 victory points.

Not as scared of nids as I was before... I have a bit of an issue with armies that are better in combat than me because it tends to be an uphill struggle. Fortunately, an army that falls over to bolters is a little easier to cope with. The monstrous creatures are fairly hard though, and I suspect that the game would have been a lot harder had the tervigon not blown a sphincter on turn 1. I like the shock-troop style of having half the army come in from reserve, and any unit can be reserved depending on how I feel for specific games.

Interesting rules point that came up: Spore Mines are apparently "ignored for the purposes of all mission objectives" - ergo they cannot capture, contest, or give first blood as those are all classed as mission objectives. However, in The Scouring it simply says that fast attack choices that are destroyed give an extra Victory Point - this doesn't come under the category of "objectives". So technically, would Spore Mines therefore give away Victory Points if destroyed, or are they ignored because of their rule? In the interests of common sense we played it as they don't give up additional VPs, but this might be one for the FAQs.

[Remtek]

Really enjoying these batreps :lol: Keep em coming!

 

Have you considered a barebone unit of DC with bolters in a pod? It seems to fit in with this type of list. I am running a similar list, but not finshed painting my DC yet.

[Chaplain Admetus]

Thanks :unsure:. I had considered it, but as you can see, I have several unpainted assault marines and some fleshtearers standing in as my vanguard, so more DC are pretty low down the priority queue. For my 10 game challenge I tried regular DC (pistol and sword) in a pod and was unimpressed, they got always hit by the "OMG death company! Kill it! Kill it now with fire and burning and pain" attitude from my opponents, and I didn't like the overcosted distraction unit

[Brother Lorenzo]

Oh yesh yesh yesh yesh yesh yesh I've been waiting for this foh evah! :huh:

 

So glad to have these batreps running!

 

Do you ever plan on bringing Corbulo into your army? I'm curious to see how he looks under the microscope of turn-by-turn analysis.

[Chaplain Admetus]

Check a few games back :D. I used him once in a pod with Tycho and Sternguard, but wasn't all that useful, and I didn't like having so many points tied up in one unit. There's nowhere to put him in my current list other than with sternguard, and I feel he'd be a bit wasted there.

[Morticon]

Check a few games back :D. I used him once in a pod with Tycho and Sternguard, but wasn't all that useful, and I didn't like having so many points tied up in one unit. There's nowhere to put him in my current list other than with sternguard, and I feel he'd be a bit wasted there.

 

Interesting thought! Ive been having some decent success with him there

[Chaplain Admetus]

Should have guessed that saying bad things about Corbulo would flush Mort out of the woodwork :P. Its an additional 280 points thrown in on top of what was already the most expensive single unit in my army. The reason I stopped using Dante/SG was because I didn't like having one unit of <10 models containing over 500 points of my force. Anyway... new Batrep!

Game 8

Mission: Crusade

Deployment: Dawn of War

Same list as game 7. Wanted to give a reclusiarch a try in the HQ slot, but it turns out that's a lot easier to do if you remember to pack him in your case. I'm facing an Eldar/Tau alliance:

Eldrad

Avatar

Wraithlord

10 Wraithguard with a warlock (so they're troops...yay...)

5 pathfinders

5 fire dragons

3 jetbikes

shas'o with shield generator and twin-linked plasma rifles

2 bodyguards with twin-linked plasma rifles (not sure what their third hard point was)

Hammerhead with railgun

10 fire warriors in a devilfish

Eldrad's warlord trait let him outflank, but he chose not to since there weren't any objectives near a board edge; mine let me re-roll reserves. For powers, Eldrad kept his, and I got prescience and psychic shriek. No night-fighting on turn 1, and my tactical squad and hammer assault squad fell to the red thirst. He won the roll and elected to take first turn.

Deployment. Objective 5 is off to the right on top of the ruin you can just see. The fire dragons are under the building with the objective at the top, the pathfinders are on the objective, and the fire warriors, crisis suits and jetbikes are in reserve. I keep my Baal, Sternguard pod and Vanguard in reserve, and elect to deploy the tactical squad on board to secure an objective.

Turn 1 - Eldar: The wraithguard and wraithlord (its broken, its on the ground behind them) move onto the objective, and the avatar moves then runs. The hammerhead and pathfinders blast away, but a bad scatter and poor sniper rolls means that only one assault marine dies.

Turn 1 - AS: I advance the assault squads off to my right, being sure to keep a Feel no Pain bubble on all my squads. I toy with the idea of having the empty pod come in to give me some flexibility with my reserves potentially all arriving together, but decide against it and land the sternguard near his two units. An ambitious krak missile bounces off the hammerhead. The sternguard decide to shoot and wipe out the fire dragons for first blood, as I figure I'm less likely to die in retaliation than if I shot the pathfinders and was staring down meltaguns.

End of turn 1. That wraithguard deathstar with Eldrad spamming fortune could be an issue. Fortunately its a) slow, :rolleyes: short ranged and c) expensive, so I'm just going to ignore it unless I have no choice.

Turn 2 - Eldar: Everything bar the jetbikes turns up from reserve. The crisis suits land just to the left of the statue, and the fire warriors pop out of the devilfish ready to rapid fire some sternguard. The avatar continues his advance. Various bullets deplete my sternguard down to 4 models, and the plasma rifles take my assault squad down to 6.

Turn 2 - AS: Everything but the vanguard turn up. The Baal appears on the right flank, and the empty pod lands to block fire lanes to my tacticals. The librarian/priest squad goes for the objective halfway down the right hand side of the table, and the other one goes to get the crisis suits. In the shooting phase, the Baal makes short work of 8 fire warriors, causing the remaining 2 to fall back off the table, whilst the sternguard open fire and kill the pathfinders. The assault squad charges and wipes out the crisis suits despite losing two models to overwatch fire.

End of turn 2. Game plan is to try and hold two objectives and ignore the wraithguard on their one.

Turn 3 - Eldar: The jetbikes turn up, and get onto the objective at the back right. The devilfish tank-shocks my sternguard, who fail, and their fall-back move takes them out of range of the wraithguard guns. The avatar continues his long walk. Shooting doesn't accomplish very much.

Turn 3 - AS: Still no Vanguard. The 4 remaining assault marines on the left take up position behind cover, hoping to go for the hammerhead next turn. The sternguard rally and move up, taking down the jetbikes (sternguard have been EPIC this game) with the help of the Baal, and the krak missile in the tactical squad wrecks the devilfish.

Turn 4 - Eldar: The avatar continues coming at my tactical squad. The wraithguard advance to the low fence, to shoot some sternguard, killing two. The wraithlord doesn't do much (keep forgetting its there!) and nor does the hammerhead.

Turn 4 - AS: The vanguard drop in, hoping to be cheeky and splat Eldrad. The surviving sternguard take cover behind the pod, whilst the assault marines conga-line to take the objective and have linebreaker in case it comes down to it. The other assault marines hop out and wreck the Hammerhead, nicking an objective into the bargain, and the vanguard get stuck in to the wraithguard as a tarpit. Tacticals have moved away from the avatar. I keep forgetting that they're on a grav-generator objective so anything that assaults them will be 3d6, pick the two lowest, then cut it in half...

End of turn 4. There's the wraithlord!

Turn 5 - Eldar: Night falls. The avatar continues plodding on, and the wraithlord goes and kills my assault sergeant in a challenge. I fail my morale test and flee.

Turn 5 - AS: I send the assault squad over to contest the objective that the wraithguard are holding. Ambitious shooting takes two wounds off the avatar. The wraithguard finish off my vanguard. We roll for and get turn 6

Turn 6 - He wipes out my assault squad and moves the avatar in to contest my tactical squad's objective. I respond by moving the librarian back and attempting a cheeky psychic shriek but he makes his deny the witch save; I then cast prescience but roll 6,5,1 taking a wound, and the Baal wipes out the avatar as the game ends.

End of the game. Angels Sanguine victory, 8 Victory Points to 3.

Interesting game... Tau and Eldar could make a good alliance, but I can't really see how the two halves of this list gel together. Eldrad and wraithguard are a nasty combination, but expensive and slow. They're great for holding objectives, but not for much else, and they can only take 1. Psychic powers this game were just weird... Eldrad attempted to mind war my priest, I denied the witch on a 5 thanks to the librarian. He did it to a meltagunner 3 times, and one time I denied the witch on a 6, and won the roll off both other times (despite needing a 6 on the second one). He also rolled a double 1 twice, but was saved by the ghosthelm. I think I'm beginning to annoy Eldar players thanks to having a knack for sneaking powers through runes of warding. Avatars are still powerful, but slow and will die to massed fire. If it makes it into combat with all its wounds left, its troublesome, but otherwise fine. I think Eldar suffer this edition from not having very many good troop choices....pathfinders are godly in cover but most armies have ways of dealing with that, guardians are 'meh' at best, and dire avengers need a transport. Jetbikes are good though, for reserving and late-game objective snatching. Just throwing out a bit of Eldar-analysis in case people were considering them for allies... the big draw is runes of warding, but IMO you'd get more out of allying with Space Wolves and taking a rune priest with some grey hunters.

[Remtek]

Im curious to see how a battle vs a flyer list will go.

[Chaplain Admetus]

I've not really faced many fliers... no list I've played against has had more than one, and I don't think anyone up here plays flier-spam lists. There's a GK player who's been running two Storm Ravens, but maybe not at 1500 points. I think I'd lose quite badly, as I don't have much ranged weaponry and can't assault fliers.

Game 9

Mission: Big Guns Never Tire

Deployment: Dawn of War

I was beginning to worry that I might be using my Librarian as a crutch, especially with Prescience, so I decided to try a list without him, and one that wasn't quite as jump-pack happy as the last one. Also meant I was able to get my namesake model back on the table for the first time in ages. Also brought George out of retirement for comedy value...

Reclusiarch with Jump Pack

7 Sternguard, Fist, melta, 3x combi-melta, pod

Revered Brother 'Furious' George - Furioso, Heavy Flamer, Pod (should give him blood talons...wished I'd had them in this game)

Sanguinary Priest, Jump Pack, Power Weapon

10 Tactical Marines, fist, melta, ML, Rhino

10 Assault Marines, Hammer

10 Assault Marines, Fist

5 Devastators, 2 ML, 2 Plasma Cannon

Orks:

Ghaz

Big Mek with Shokk Attack Gun

18 boyz

3 units of 10 boyz in Trukks

Battlewagon (Ghaz and 18 in here)

10 Stormboyz

15 Lootas (Big Mek here)

Looted Wagon with Boomgun

Deffkopta

I won the roll and elected to take the first turn. I got an irrelevant warlord trait, the Orks got to use Ghaz's leadership within 12" (came up once or twice). Sternguard and Devastators fell to the red thirst.

Deployment. Deffkopta and both my pods are in reserve. The objective the Lootas are on is re-roll 1s to hit, which I've now realised they technically can't use because they're not a scoring choice, therefore can't control the objective. The one behind the rocks is a half-charge-distance one, the one in the temple thingie did nothing, and the one by my devastators was sabotaged, blowing up precisely once and during about the only turn of the game where there was nothing nearby.

Turn 1 - AS: Whilst the smart thing to do would be to get rid of that boomgun (no AP3 template, a first blood point, and a heavy support kill), I couldn't resist the 3-trukk parking lot on the right hand side of the board, so dropped George in over there. Unfortunately, a bad scatter from the pod meant that I couldn't get close enough to heavy flamer all 3. The rhino scooted down the left of the table, whilst both assault squads went to the right, out of range of the Boomgun. George managed to melta the nearest trukk with an uncharacteristic hit (predictably the flamer doesn't do much to the other one, but worth a try), for first blood, and the devastators plinked off a couple of lootas.

Turn 1 - Orks: The Stormboyz go after my rhino, the battlewagon advances, the boomgun comes to get a clearer shot at the devvies, and the orks go to molest the dreadnought. The two Trukks don't move. The boomgun mercifully misses, but the lootas manage to take down a missile launcher and a plasma cannon. In combat, the stormboyz break the rhino, and the boyz charge the furioso. Interesting note, because of the way the rules are worded now apparently power klaws are S10 on the charge. Even with that, he only managed to take off two hull points and no lasting damage, and I killed a boy (just getting warmed up!).

Turn 2 - Orks: My opponent decides that letting a chaplain-led unit of 10 furious charge assault marines hit him is tantamount to suicide, so tries to pre-empt it with the two trukks full of orks, both move up and disembark. The boomgun shifts back to have a go at the tac squad, and ghaz's boys and the stormboy come across to have a go at the sternguard. I lose two assault marines to shooting, the boomgun misses again, and the lootas kill the devastators. In combat, the stormboy and ghaz's mob hit the sternguard - I take down a fair few boyz, but not enough, and am left with just one marine standing. George continues his one man crusade, slowly whittling the numbers down. One unit of orks charges the chaplains unit, but the other one fails (A 4" or so charge, he rolls a 2 and a 1)...10 feel no pain marines, with 3 power sword attacks, 4 power maul attacks, and 2 thunder hammer attacks, vs the same number of orks? No contest...the chaplain pimp-slaps the Nob in a challenge, and the squad deals with the rest.

http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/uploads/1345641863/gallery_27692_7547_139297.jpg' alt='gallery_27692_7547_139297.jpg'>

End of turn 2 - Blur-tastic.

Turn 3 - AS: The tactical squad moves around the rock, again leaving the ML in place, as the boomgun is 18" away from my meltagunner - 2 S8 shots should be enough I hope. Its not - all I do is glance it again. Still 1 hull point remaining. The assault squads both converge - one ready to kill the other ork mob, the other wrecks a trukk with a grenade. In combat, the other boy squad dies easily, and the last sternguard finishes off the stormboy before being cut down.

Turn 3 - Orks: Deffkopta turns up and shoots the drop pod, taking off a hull point. Lootas don't do much, and the boomgun picks a really opportune moment to score a hit, killing the front 6 tactical marines. The remaining 4 can't do much when Ghaz and his boys charge, and are cut down. Praise be to the emperor, after the 5th round of combat George finally finishes the orks, and stumps off after the lootas.

Turn 4 - AS: The no-character squad starts to head back towards my objective, whilst the other one attempts a conga line to take the temple objective, and score linebreaker. George flamers away most of the Lootas, but gets cruelly cut down by overwatch fire on the way in :) .

Turn 4 - Orks: Ghaz has split from the mob (Can't remember when or why) and is wandering around solo. The other orks go for the objective behind the rocks, and the boomgun comes across to take the one near the lootas next turn. Shooting doesn't do much, the only productive thing is the deffkopta taking another hull point from the pod.

http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/uploads/1345641863/gallery_27692_7547_326701.jpg' alt='gallery_27692_7547_326701.jpg'>

End of turn 4. That objective's looking mighty far away...

Turn 5 - AS: No night time yet. The assault squads go about their business, with run rolls being the order of the day. The assault squad coming back my way rolls a 6, but its not good enough, I'm going to need a 6th turn.

Turn 5 - Orks: The boomgun moves to hold the objective, but doesn't immobilise itself on the ruins (annoying...it couldn't take it if it had...) but its shot scatters wide, the shokk attack gun gets its first double, but its a double 4 - good for me, bad for the greenskins. The Deffkopta stops waging its private war on a metal box, and comes to get linebreaker/maybe contest that objective. We roll for turn 6, and get it.

End of turn 5. Well, sort of... that looks like a massively cheaty assault marine move, but I started my movement phase before I realised I forgot to snap a picture, so they've already moved.

Turn 6 - AS: Night falls. The conga line is in place, the assault squad is on the ruins, but I decide a bit of redundancy is in order. The priest leaves and flies out to try and contest the objective the looted wagon holds. The chaplains unit shifts around so as not to present a good target. I manage to assault and bring down the deffkopta, and consolidate back onto the objective.

Turn 6 - Orks: Ghaz can't assault the priest because there are boyz in the way. The shokk attack gun therefore moves to give him space. The boomgun fires, and lands hitting the priest and the big mek.. rolls a one to wound the priest, and then a one for the mek. Sterling job. The lootas bring him down with gunfire though, and the game ends.

Final state of the board. Notice the old metal furioso faceplanting the crater in resigned acceptance of the fact that he's normally just a little bit rubbish...

I checked the assault squad at the back (should have pre-measured), turns out one guy was in linebreaker position but was actually out of coherency with the next guy in line...I could have shifted a different one, but in the interests of fairness moved him back out to where he was in coherency, and not in linebreaker range. We both hold two objectives, we've both dropped a heavy support choice...another game won by First Blood *cue sarcastic enthusiastic flag waving*. Angels Sanguine victory 7 Victory Points to 6.

In retrospect, that game would have gone a lot smoother if I'd been more careful with placing objectives, and with how I'd used my drop pod units. The two assault squads should have been more than capable of dealing with 3 boy mobs, especially with a priest and chaplain in the mix...the dread would have been much better off on the other side of the table. My very first move of the game and it almost cost me it. Mind you, if I'd remembered that the lootas couldn't have used that re-roll 1s objective, I might not have lost my devastators as early as I did, and might not have lost George at all. Ah well - just got to remember these things.

[TheRedeemed]

Great report, Chaplain Admetus. Always makes for interesting reading.

 

What are your first thoughts on how the chaplain performed? Did you miss the librarian?

 

If I didn't already know you are in Scotland (from trolling your 10 game thread!) I would have figured it out from the Irn-Bru! Gotta love it!

 

- TR

[CitadelArmyGuy]

Interesting note, because of the way the rules are worded now apparently power klaws are S10 on the charge.

Who says what now?

 

Um I really don't think so. If that's true, then Death Company powerfists are Strength 10 on the charge. Plus any other PF in range of a SangPriest for that matter. What shenanigan of a rules interpretation did your opponent give you to convince you normal Nob Power Claws were strength 10 on charge?

[Chaplain Admetus]

@ The Redeemed; yep, Scotland :D. Nice to be somewhere where other people drink Irn Bru...when I was in Wales I went shopping in April and they still had their xmas-themed bru on the shelves because nobody was buying it...

The librarian, I do miss a little. But then, there are times when the Chaplain will always be better. I lose out on force-weaponing nasties, but the Chaplain is cheaper (because I've taken an Epistolary), liturgies of blood is fantastic, especially if you can guarantee you get the charge, and I'm not sold on fearless being a positive or a negative. Its impossible to shoot me off an objective, but I can't go to ground or hope to fail a leadership test to bail out of a bad combat. He's also more survivable than the librarian... 3 wounds, 3+/4++ is a lot better than 2 wounds, 3+. Equally, sometimes the librarian rolls rubbish powers (its why I almost never roll on Telekinesis, because if I get a bad power the signature power is terrible, at least Prescience, Smite and Psychic Shriek are all useful), or you won't want to be casting powers because nothings in range/there's shadow in the warp/there's a farseer hiding somewhere. There have been games where my librarian's cast so few powers that I'd have been better off with a chaplain.

 

Whilst I'm thinking about it, playing against a farseer is a great way of figuring out how your army and psychic powers work. Runes of warding makes you constantly consider whether your power is worth the risk of your librarian's brains leaking out of his ears, even more important if he's also your warlord. Even when I'm not facing them, I'm now automatically thinking "Do I really need that power?" instead of casting it just because I can. Is it that important that your BS4 devastators can re-roll hits that its worth the chance that your librarian on his last wound kills himself, and turns victory into a defeat?

 

@CitadelArmyGuy; I just thought it was something to do with the way it was worded in the Ork codex, but Power Klaws are in the main rulebook now. I'll point out the "multiple modifiers" section next time I see him, and see where he was getting S10 from. Its not something I'm unduly bothered about, since S9 and S10 are pretty much the same in the vast majority of cases; any extra penetrating hits that should have been glancing didn't do any proper damage (just shaken), and it came up precisely once in the entire game.

[Chaplain Admetus]

Been a while since I've posted a decent report...only managed to get a few games in, and none were really worth sticking up here. This'll be my last Tuesday update for a while since GW is now closed on Tuesdays, and our Veteran's night will be moved to Thursdays as of next week.

Game 10

Mission: Big Guns Never Tire

Deployment: Dawn of War

1750 points against a combined force of Eldar allied to Dark Eldar (this seems to be becoming quite a popular choice up here). New list for me from the ground up, trying to test out some shiny new toys:

Reclusiarch with Jump Pack

Reclusiarch

Sanguinary Priest with Jump Pack

7 Sternguard, Pod, 3 combi-meltas, meltagun, power fist

Furioso with heavy flamer, pod

2 x 10 man assault squads, 1 with hammer 1 with fist

7 Death Company, 2 power swords, power fist, land raider

Whirlwind

Twin reclusiarch cos I ran out of elites slots and wanted to add more punch to the death company, landy because I recently got it and wanted to use it, and the whirlwind because its been so long since I fielded one.

Eldar List:

Farseer

2x 5 Pathfinders

2x Fire prisms with holofields

X warp spiders including exarch (genuinely can't remember how many)

3 Dark Reapers (including exarch)

10 Scourges with 4 haywire guns

warrior squad in venom

trueborn squad with archon in venom

This is going to be interesting...we're both trying out some new stuff, my army is heavily geared towards combat with some incidental shooting, and his is almost a pure shooty list. I won the roll off and elected to take the first turn.

Deployment. He has the pathfinders, spiders and scourges in reserve. Two venoms are on the far flank, farseer with reapers next to them. My whirlwind is hiding, twin assault squads are doing their best to act like they're one squad of 20. Both pods are in reserve, and the DC are in their box where they can't hurt anyone. He attempts to seize the initiative, but rolls a 4.

Turn 1 - AS:

I move both assault squads up 12", and the land raider 12 as well (trying to get my head around the best way to use POTMS, as I've never used it before). The sternguard arrive and attempt to get the reapers, but a bad scatter leaves them more than 12" away after deploying (so no rapid firing AP3 bullets...). Shooting, and I use the land raider to split fire with POTMS, taking down one prism (5 and a 6 on the holofield dice) and shaking the other one (snake eyes), but that's fine by me as only snap fire means that it can't use the prism cannon as you can't snap fire a blast weapon. Whirlwind has shifted and fires on the dark reapers, managing to squash the Exarch. I rapid fire the Kraken bolts from the sternguard (30" range, I'm within 15" so I decide to go for twice as many shots rather than AP3) to kill another, and get incredibly fortunate with the drop pod's storm bolter snap-firing, and pick off the last one.

Turn 1 - Eldar:

The Farseer dooms the Sternguard and Guides the venom... I'm fairly sure that they're not being allowed another turn on the tabletop. The fire prism shifts itself sideways, but can't do much else. The combined shooting from the venom squads rips the Sternguard to pieces - they won't be taking any further part in the battle.

End of turn 1. I've knocked a sizeable hole in the Eldar army already...just hope I can keep it up.

Turn 2 - AS:

The second pod turns up, and I manage to land it where he can flamer both venoms. Tempting a target as the farseer is, I get the feeling that the venoms will cause more problems. The assault squads both blast forward, and I continue with my plan of getting the land raider as far away from me as possible. (Its second hand. I tried to strip it with dettol. End result: a slightly lighter red land raider that smells of anti-mould dettol. The thing stinks). George's shooting is predictably rubbish, as his meltagun misses and the heavy flamer does nothing. The land raider tries to be cheeky and bring down a venom and the remaining fire prism, but misses the first and fails to scratch the paintwork of the other. The whirlwind lands its template on both venoms, but can't do anything thanks to flickerfields.

Turn 2 - Eldar:

All his reserves bar one pathfinder squad turn up. The scourges attempt to deep strike near the whirlwind, because he's scared of it - unfortunately they mishap, and I place them in the back right corner, where the pathfinders have come in. The spiders turn up on his board edge and shred the Dreadnought with its rear armour exposed. The venoms move down the left and try and take cover behind a building, but the front of one is exposed. The fire prism can drop a death template, but in doing so will almost certainly die itself to a fist or hammer next turn, so decides to move and turbo-boost to the far right of the board where it can shoot with relative impunity.

End of turn 2. Didn't do a lot of damage this turn, but didn't take too much either.

Turn 3 - AS:

I split the assault squads to go for an objective each, with my whirlwind still holding a third. The landy moves some more and pulls its split-fire trick again, taking down the archon's venom, and immobilising the fire prism. Clearly its decided to be good rather than suffer from new model syndrome. Its staying in the middle of the table as it can react best to threats there, and its the only thing capable of coming back to help out should those venoms get behind me. The whirlwind fires at the warp spiders, but scatters waaaay off.

Turn 3 - Eldar:

The pathfinders turn up and begin a slow trudge to the objective in the sandbags. The warp spiders move to shoot and then assault my assault squad, as its better than the alternative (the assault squad hitting them), and have been guided and fortuned by the farseer. The scourges move forwards, and the remaining venom moves round behind the whirlwind. Combined shooting from the venom and the blasters takes it down. The warp spiders shoot down some assault marines, and then win combat (fortuned 3+ saves are annoying). The Fire Prism kills some from the chaplain's squad, and the scourges manage a penetrating haywire hit which stuns the land raider.

End of turn 3. Assault squad tarpitted, venom behind my lines, scourges closing in. The first few turns were definitely mine but I can feel the pendulum swinging in favour of the space elves... the big question is did I do enough damage early on.

Turn 4 - AS:

My plan of moving the land raider and death-companying the venom is scuppered by the LR not being able to move. I decide to take the best course of action and pile the assault squad over towards the one locked in combat, as I figure they might need some help. The land raider can still snap fire though, and I get more luck than I have any right to expect by scoring two lascannon hits on the fire prism (one hits naturally, the other off the re-roll), and taking off its last hull point. The chaplain's squad charges in and is needed, as it takes all my attacks to bring down the fortuned spiders, the last three falling to the hammer and fist.

Turn 4 - Eldar:

Scourges close in, and the venom scoots round to have a go at the Land Raider. Pathfinders continue to trudge towards an objective, and the farseer does all he can and runs off to try and escape the assault marines. The blaster in the venom misses, and the scourges get horrifically unlucky with their haywire shots. 4 hits, but two 1's, a 4 and a 5 leave the raider clinging to its last hull point, and free to act as normal next turn.

Turn 4. Looks promising, but there's still a scoring squad in the venom, and those finders will reach the objective, so he's more than capable of grabbing two. Not sure if its enough, but I'm going to play it safe.

Turn 5 - AS:

The land raider swivels, moves back into my deployment zone, and spits out the death company. The chaplain splits from one squad to the other, who are going to go kill a farseer. The land raider has other ideas though, and picks him off first with a cross-board lascannon shot, whilst its other weapons wreck the venom, and the DC kill the contents. At this point, my opponent decides to call the game.

End of the game.

Interesting game, and I quite enjoyed playing at 1750, I'll have to do it more often. This was another one of those games where all the luck just went one way, and I have to give credit to my opponent for sticking it out with such appalling dice rolls. We both learned stuff from the game, so it was worthwhile. His big take-aways were reserves - he thinks he should probably have reserved the fire prisms, and unit placement, with the venoms (should have hidden from the raider, should not have been right next to each other when the whirlwind was lacking for targets). I think my opponent might have been a bit too scared of the whirlwind, as its comparatively light armour and it can only get one squad a turn. Man of the match was definitely the land raider - accounting for 4 Victory Points single-handed (both prisms, first blood, and the warlord). Also gains bonus points for the time I spent tooling around with facings trying to avoid revealing a weak spot because I decided not to remember that its AV14 all round...

An enjoyable game though, and I hope to get a re-match sometime within the next few weeks where the luck isn't so one-sided.

[Morticon]

Do you house rule that Eldar powers can work on Dark Eldar? The codex specifically mentions "Eldar units" for fortune and guide.

[Chaplain Admetus]

Huh - didn't know that. They're still Eldar after a fashion, so whilst it may not be an 'official' house rule (I play in a GW, so it tends to be RAW and FAQs) its something I'm generally happy to let slide. I've just checked the FAQ and there's nothing in there. What I did find, however, is that Farseers are only mastery level 1, but I'm assuming that that doesn't matter for the Eldar psychic powers/there's some way to boost it, otherwise Farseers can only technically chuck one power out a turn (unless they're Eldrad).

[Knaru]

Eldar Farseers have an upgrade (Spirit Stones) that costs as much as a naked DC member and gives them the ability to use 2 powers in a turn.

[Chaplain Admetus]

Eldar Farseers have an upgrade (Spirit Stones) that costs as much as a naked DC member and gives them the ability to use 2 powers in a turn.

That's the one! Thank you, I knew there was something but I couldn't remember what it was...

[Chaplain Admetus]

Been far too long since I got a game in, but here's game 11!

Game 11

Mission: Purge the Alien

Deployment: Hammer and Anvil

1750 points vs Necrons. We originally rolled the scouring, but decided to re-roll as this was the exact same mission/deployment we'd had last time we played each other. My opponent had recently dug his old Necrons out of retirement, and wanted to test them with the new rules. I intended to use the 1750 list from my last game but left it at home, so came up with a new one:

Dante

Reclusiarch, Jump Pack, Meltabombs

7 Sternguard, Melta, Fist, 3x Combi-Meltas, pod

Sanguinary Priest, Jump Pack, Power weapon

Corbulo

5 Sanguinary Guard, fist, infernus pistol

10 assault marines, hammer

10 tactical marines, fist, melta, ML, rhino

5 devastators with 4 ML

Whirlwind

(Note: this game was played yesterday so BEFORE the FAQs were updated - we were playing Dante and the SG as S4 AP3, whereas now Dante and 2 of my SG are S6 AP2 - curse those awesome looking axes)

Crons:

Trazyn

5 Lychguard, lord

20x Warriors, lord

20x warriors

3 wraiths, whipcoils

4 destroyers, destroyer lord

Monolith

All the lords have res orbs, one has a warscythe.

We both got useless warlord traits, I forgot to oogy-boogy Trazyn with Dante. I won the roll and elected to go first.

Deployment. Corbs is with the Sternguard in their pod, Dante and sanguinary guard are in reserve. The Necrons have a unit of warriors and the monolith in reserve. No night-fighting, no initiative seizure.

Turn 1 - AS:

Pod turns up behind the big block of warriors. The assault squad advances, and the whirlwind backs up to where it can shoot without fear of retaliation. The rhino moves to the rocks in the middle of the table. I land a pie plate from the whirlwind right on the middle of the warrior squad and put down 8, and the devastators knock over another 4 with krak missiles. The Sternguard manage to get just enough wounds through to knock all but one wound off of the wraiths, and I get a lucky snap-firing storm bolter from the pod (or a lucky bolt pistol from Corbulo, can't remember which) to put the last one out of commission. The rhino sneaks forward with its turbo-boost and is now invisible to the destroyers. Gotta love the low profile old-school vehicles :P . The Necrons pass their morale test, and 8 of the ones I put down stand back up. And so it begins...

Turn 1 - Necrons:

Lychguard move round and are going to attempt to assault the rhino. the warriors turn and go after the sternguard, and the destroyers shift around a little. The destroyers attempt to blast the sternguard, but I've cunningly put Corbulo on the side nearest to them and he sponges most of their AP3 shots, taking a wound in the process. The warriors open fire as well, and the net result is 2 dead sternguard. I see why people like Corbs now; shame it won't be as effective a tactic any more. The lychguard roll badly and fail to make it into the rhino.

End of turn 1

Turn 2 - AS:

Dante and the Sanguinary Guard turn up and land near the destroyers, since they can sponge hits. Corbulo splits off from the sternguard, and the assault squad gets into position to charge the warriors. The tactical squad leaps out and gets ready to attempt to gun down some lychguard. Shooting puts down some warriors, but most get back up. The MLs fail to break the destroyers, I only kill one and it gets straight back up again. I do manage to knock over a couple of lychguard though. Most importantly, I put the lord down, nerfing their reanimation protocols. Dante misses, but the infernus pistol takes a wound off the lord. I assault the warriors and break them, running them down (can't remember in which combat phase, but they're gone by the end of turn 2. I think its this turn though).

Turn 2 - Necrons: Monolith and the warriors both arrive, monolith deep strikes into my backfield, and the warriors are forced to trudge on from the board edge. Trazyn and his friends come to have a go at the tactical squad. The monolith starts doing rude things, blowing up my whirlwind with its guns. Particle whip spanks the devastators, but he rolls 4 1s to wound...ouch. The destroyers bring down a few sanguinary guard by weight of numbers. Trazyn and friends charge in...I get lucky with snap-firing my 2 S8 guns (melta and ML) and roll boxcars, trazyn being closest. He goes down to a failed look out sir, but pops back up. He goes down again to a power fist in a challenge, but pops back up. I lose combat by 1, but hold.

End of turn 2. Combat is hidden by the monolith

Turn 3 - AS:

Both my jump pack units go after the warrior squad. The sternguard come back in an attempt to deal with the monolith sooner or later with combi-meltas. Shooting is uneventful as my missile launchers can't hit anything. I charge the warriors with the Sanguinary guard first, and the Necron player decides not to overwatch, figuring they probably won't make it. He's right... I figured it was worth a try though. The assault squad do make it in but get overwatched in the process, losing 2 marines. I win that combat by enough to make the 'crons need a double 1 which they don't get, and they're either fleeing off the board or getting sweeping advanced. In the lychguard vs tactical squad combat, its a draw. I put trazyn down for the THIRD time, but he pops back up in one of the few remaining lychguard. Sigh.

Turn 3 - Necrons:

Monolith floats round and attempts to portal my devastators, but nobody dies. Its particle whip scatters way off, and the flux arcs take another hull point off my rhino. The destroyers pick off another sanguinary guard. Combat's a complete bust for us both.

Not many Necrons to put down, but that monolith is practically indestructible with what I have to hand.

Turn 4 - AS:

The assault squad comes back to help finish the lychguard for good. Dante and the Sanguinary Guard are fed up of the destroyers and go after them, as the sternguard come down to get to grips with the monolith. Shooting is again uneventful (apart from taking another wound away from the destroyer lord), and its combat time. Dante and friends beat up the destroyers win combat but they hold, regular attacks from the tacticals and assault squad finish off the lychguard, leaving trazyn staring down the barrel of a fist and a hammer, with nowhere to jump to. After putting him down for the FOURTH time, I consolidate and deny him space to get back up.

Turn 4 - Necrons:

The monolith again tries to portal the devastators, but fails. Particle whip again scatters into the middle of nowhere, but it at least manages to finish off the rhino. Dante and the SG kill the destroyers.

End of turn 4. Monolith vs The Rest

Turn 5 - AS:

I retreat Dante and the Sanguinary Guard across the border for linebreaker, and denial of 3 VP, as if the monolith gets lucky it could shred everything I have on that flank, between the portal, particle whip, and many many shots. I put some spiteful krak missiles into it and knock off a hull point, and everything closes in to try and get meltaguns in melta range.

Turn 5 - Necrons:

The monolith can't escape so it stays put, and manages to bring down 2 of the devastators with its weapons. We roll for a 6th turn, but don't get it.

Final score is a comfortable victory to the Angels, as I've only conceded two victory points and have all 3 secondary objectives to the Necrons' 0, winning by however many Necron units I managed to kill.

Much like my last game against Necrons, they're quite a fun army to play against if the player behind them doesn't cheese it up immensely (9 flier list, I'm looking at you). Warriors are very beatable in combat, but frustrating because they won't stay down. Destroyers are officially a priority 1 target - S5 AP3 guns are lethal to BA, and I'm glad I had a 2+ save unit to go after them with otherwise there'd have been a lot more dead BA. Not sure if targetting the wraiths was the right thing to do on turn 1, but I wanted them down as they're the only things there that really worried me in combat - I could outmanoeuvre the lychguard.

[WarpWhisper]

Hey Chaplain, loving the battle reports (and the previous thread too) - thank you very much for posting them up. I'm halfway through Game 6 in this thread, but when I came across this:

 

The (now automated) quad gun takes a few pot shots and kills one.

 

I thought I should mention that I understood the rules to be that (unlike in planetstrike) gun emplacements in 'standard' 6th Edition are not automated; in fact I've played a game where I took control of an emplacement from an enemy and used it on him ;) Am I missing something there?

 

Right; back to reading the rest of the game and the other reports ;)

 

Edit: I've just re-read the rules on pg96, and although I can see where the automated fire rule has come from, I am still confused about if an ageis defense line would count in this case, as it's still not a building per se. Although there were no units with that stretch of the defense line at the time, so it should still count as unoccupied either way...

(Sorry if this is derailing your thread btw :) ; just typing 'out loud'! )

 

2nd Edit: Got to the end :D Thank you again for writing these reports; they make excellent reading, and the pictures go well with them too. Looking forward to more B)

[CitadelArmyGuy]

Looks like that Reclusiarch should have been a Prescience Librarian-- those ongoing melees would have gone better with constant re-rolls rather than only on the charge.

 

Of course, Jump-Pack Blood Angels are generally the achilles heel to Foot-Necrons, so he didn't have much of a chance whichever HQ you took.

[Chaplain Admetus]

@CAG - yeah, I've been having a lot of trouble figuring out whether to use the reclusiarch or the librarian. I've been enjoying both. The librarian is a better force multiplier, but the chaplain's invulnerable save and bonus wound are excellent for combat. Equally, the chaplain's bonus is always on, whereas there's a chance that the librarian's won't be (which skyrockets as soon as there's a farseer on the other side of the table).

 

@WarpWhisper - thanks :). Good to know that people are getting something out of them. Re: quad gun, we were under the impression that it worked the same as the one on buildings, but could be wrong. It'll be interesting to see what happens to defence line players with the new FAQ, since they now have to be an unbroken line.

[Xenith]

I put the lord down, nerfing their reanimation protocols.

 

Trazyn and friends charge in...I get lucky with snap-firing my 2 S8 guns (melta and ML) and roll boxcars, trazyn being closest. He goes down to a failed look out sir, but pops back up. He goes down again to a power fist in a challenge, but pops back up. I lose combat by 1, but hold.

Few things: Even if the lord goes down ,the res orb is still in the unit so they get a 4+ RP. This was true even before the FAQ defined it. Also, RP is made at the end of the turn, Trazyn could not have done what he did there. It should have gone like this:

 

Trazyn unit declares charge.

You overwatch, kill Trazyn. Place everliving counter.

Lychguard unit move into combat.

Work out combat results.

End of assault phase, roll for everliving with Trazyn, if he passes, he stands up within 3" of where he fell, if he fails, roll to see if he takes over a lychguard/lord.

[Chaplain Admetus]

Should have clarified, I meant that the lord -stayed- down, nerfing future RP rolls. As far as Trazyn goes, I don't think it made much difference in the overall scheme of things. Only my 3rd game against the current Necron book, and my opponents first game using them, so there were bound to be mistakes. Its all a learning curve :huh: . Will hopefully have another game or two to add to the list come Thursday

[Remtek]

How do you rate sanguinary guard in general? They seem so bad on paper, but i have never tried them. If i field Dante, it is usually with a RAS squad.

[Chaplain Admetus]

How do you rate sanguinary guard in general? They seem so bad on paper, but i have never tried them. If i field Dante, it is usually with a RAS squad.

 

Solid performers, but very expensive. I never field them and Dante without the other (so I'm looking at a vast chunk of points) because that way I get them to replace a troops choice - I like having 3 troops units minimum in my games. Add in a jump-priest to make up for the lack of invulnerable (5+ FNP is almost equivalent to 5+ invuln, making them more like flying terminators) and its suddenly -really- costly. Also, they eat up a valuable elites slot otherwise, and I often use mine before I get to them. Good performers, but experience has taught me that using them at 1500 or below is risky - to be safe I wouldn't start taking them until 1750 unless you're trying the Goldwing army. Caveat: I saw a kids lash/oblit spam army (the same 1 from game 1 of my other thread) table a goldwing army in about 30 minutes right after we played, so the lack of invuln is a bit dodgy. I enjoy using them and they're fantastic models, but they're not making the cut for my ToS list.