Your first game with the new codex.

[Warsmith Aznable]

I played my first game tonight. The fact that I won the game had a lot more to do with an inexperienced opponent than anything else, but I have some first impressions on list building and on-table performance.

 

What we had

 

1500 point limit

1 Lord - MoT, Murder Sword, Sigil of Corruption, Disc of Tzeentch

4 CSM squads - MoT, Icon of Flame, Plasmagun, H. Bolter, PW & Combi-bolter on champ

3 Bikers - Plasmagun x2, MoT, Meltabombs on champ

9 Havocs - Flakk ML x4

1 Heldrake with Hades

1 Forgefiend - Ectoplasma x3

 

Big Guns, long table, 3 mysterious objectives, moderate urban landscape

vs GK (Draigo, Coteaz, Paladins, Interceptors, PAGK, Henchmen, Storm Raven, AssCan Dread)

 

What Went Down

 

I played with 4 foot-slogging squads, which is something I've never done with just basic CSM before. The Heavy Bolters worked pretty good with the long table set-up, even killing some PAGK. The Paladins came close to my fourth squad, so having the plasmagun there actually took one out. I used one of them as a multi-purpose backfield unit, and it ended up claiming the objective after the Forgefiend exploded. Setting the enemy on fire was kind of funny, but I kept forgetting to use the Soul Fire rule in the beginning of the game, so I can't say if it would have been more of a benefit than the 0 dudes it killed.

 

The Forgefiend. Turn 2 the Storm Raven flew onto the table and turned it into a 200 point 5+ cover save for the backfield CSM. Disappointing, to say the least. AV 12 kind of sucks.

 

The Heldrake came in Turn 2 and initiated an attack run. It hosed the PAGK, lost the Hades to a lucky shot from the Dread, took a "why not" Vector Strike on Draigo that did nothing, then flew off the board with the some Inquisitorial Henchmen in its claws, clearing off the GK backfield objective. Not bad, but I think I'd rather have a second weapon than the Vector Strike rule. Although, since the Vector Strike doesn't rely on wargear, it can never be disarmed, which is nice.

 

The Bikers escorted my Chaos Lord for the first part of the game. I attempted to sneak the group around a building to hit the Henchmen camping on the GK backfield objective, but the Paladins saw me and moved to intercept. The Lord broke off before they got close, then the Bikers performed a road-block to let the Lord escape, taking some plasmagun shots at them before being kicked over by an assault.

 

The Havocs were my MVPs. They had an awesome building that gave all four ML dominating coverage of the table. They took out Coteaz, who foolishly ventured out without his retinue, in Turn 1. They exploded the Dread, then took out some Interceptors just for the fun of it. They failed to take down the Storm Raven, but they did make it reluctant to approach my backfield.

 

The Chaos Lord whispered Draigo's name to his Murder Sword. Draigo was by himself in the enemy backfield, prime for a drive-by jet bike Murder Swording, but after I detached my Lord from his own retinue I was nervous about him crossing the center of the table by himself with the Storm Raven loitering nearby. I rammed him into the remnant of the Interceptor squad that was trying to hold the midfield objective, and he smeared it across the ground. With no scoring units left on the table my opponent conceded the game, but had the game continued I would have pointed him at Draigo and called him out to see what was what. That didn't get to happen, so I don't have an exciting story to tell about it.

 

What I though about it

 

I do like the idea of the jetbike Lord with the Murder Stick and Biker retinue, so I'm sure I'll try that again.

 

I like the extra CSM squad, and don't think I'll be relying on transports nearly as much as I did before. Heavy Bolter/plasmagun mix worked well for a general purpose load-out. Undecided on the MoT and Icon of Flame, probably will drop the Icon and keep the MoT, or even switch to MoN.

 

The Forgefiend made me sad. I was excited about 3 plasma templates, but the 24" range and effective enemy anti-armor made it useless in this particular game. I'm going to try a Hades armed variant next time to see how that works, and maybe add an Icarus to try and intercept incoming Flyers to keep it safe.

 

The Havocs were boss. Iron within, iron without. An extra havoc squad would probably be better than a Forgefiend.

 

The Heldrake survived the game, which I did not expect to happen. I definitely think I got lucky, and plan to proxy a second to see how a pair of them works, as well as having a go at supporting it with FW flyers.

 

What I feel about it

 

I am happy with the new codex. :tu:

[Aothaine]

Good to see another Havoc fan!

 

Thanks for the report!

 

If you have the bases you should try and proxy out one of the CSM squads for some cultists with a attached dark apostle. 180pts for a 30 man unit of cultists with auto guns. Not sure what your CSM squads were running but having two large blobs of cultists are always something for an opponent to be wary about.

[Deadman Wade]

I had 2000 pts game against Space Wolves with IG allies, Emperor's gift ission.

- Lord, TDA, Sigil of Corruption, Bradn of Skalathrax, Mark of Nurgle, Lightning claw, grenades

- 5 terminators with RAC, 3 power fists and 3 combi-meltas

- 2 CSM squads with bp, ccw, bolter, mark of khorne, rhino

- 8 khorne berzerkers

- tri-las predator

And some ork allies - warboss, 2x20 boyz, 6 nobz, trukk.

 

My opponent had 2 squads of Long Fangs with MLs, thunderwolf cavalry with wolf lord, 2 squads of grey hunters in rhinos and one footslogging, predator, rune priest, wolf guards, vendetta, veterans and primaris psyker.

Long Fangs killed some ork boyz, blew wartrukk and glanced rhino, vendetta destroyed my predator, but on turn 3 my terminators teleported near long fangs and grey hunters. Brand of skalathrax burned 3 Long fangs and wounded rune priest, terminators finished remaining 3 fangs. Bererkers charged thunderwolf cavalry and wiped them out, with only lord alive (he got smashed by nobz and warboss), on turn 4 lord and terminators killed GH squad. But real stars were my regular CSM squad - while one was attacking opponent's objective, second squad recieved GH charge, defeated them (champion killed Wolf Guard in a challenge), suffered rapid fire from second GH squad and plasmavets with Primaris, charged vets, wiped them out, recieved second charge from GH squad and won again, finally, they destroyed a rhino and defended my objective till the end.

By turn 6 wolves had only 1 haf-dead squad of grey hunters, rhino and a vendetta.

[King Willy]

Since chaos always had trouble in low points tried a 1000 pt game

 

Chaos Lord 160

Two Lightning Claws, Sigil of Corruption, Gift of Mutation, Vetern of the long war, Dimensional Key, Mark Of Tzeentch

Icho Blood

 

Ten Chaos Space Marines 240

Bolt pistols, Close combat weapons, Mark of Khorne, Icon of Wrath, Two Flamers, Veterens of the long war, Power Maul.

Rhino

 

Ten Chaos Space Marines 255

Bolters, Bolt Pistol, Mark of Slaanesh, Icon of Excess, Two Melta Guns, Veterens of the long war, Combi-melta.

Rhino

 

Helldrake 170

Hades Autocannon

 

Helldrake 170

Baleflamer

 

VS

 

Bloods

Reclusiarch

3 Priests

Death company

Assault Squad

Death Company Dread

Tactical Squad

 

Didn't realise different marked lords couldn't join different marked squads, but forced me to hold back my Lord so didn't lose slay the warlord, which won me the game.

 

Turn 1

I went second he rushed, hard all on foot, only tacs stayed back on objective, was the game with D3+2 had 3 all up.

 

I sat back and sent some fire down field, largely ineffective.

 

Turn 2

Assault squad deep struck and tried to melta my lord, THANK THE GODS FOR A 3+ INVULN.

No packs or transports so he was stuck running through terrain which slowed him heaps.

 

Both Drakes came on, both Vectored the Death Company for 3 dead, then baleflamer slammed the Tacs, crisping 4 while hades removed an arm form dread, disembarked ready for charges, Lord Charged Assault squad declared challenge hoping he'd deny and remove the lightning claw sergeant, accepted, won easy and tied them up.

 

Turn 3

 

He failed to his Death company charge of 8 with reroll, Assault Squad down to one and Dread lost other arm to melta Overwatch.

 

Killed assault squad shot at then assault DC with Khorne Marines, Hades Drake vectored the tacs before flying off and Baledrake hovered then destroyed last 3 Tacs.

Death Company actually took a lot of casualties from bad rolls but Power Weapons one out and I lost combat 5 to 6, failed LD test but got away. Dread did no damage with kicks and then popped by Kraks, Lord won then ran away from DC.

 

Turn 4, Last turn.

He tried to table me with the DC, but messed up and charged the Khorne who rallied but lost combat and were cut down.

 

HadesDrake comes on and parks over them, BaleDrake turns and is just in range, FIRE EVERYTHING, wipe out DC, Reclusiarch left, do the boss thing and manage a nice 9 inch charge with Lord in to Reclusiarch, Kill him without taking a wound.

 

DRAKES WERE AWESOME, AP3 Flamer or S8 four shots, no matter how you look is sick and does the damage.

 

New Icons actually nice would have liked to roll better but no matter.

 

Warlord trait was Deception would have been useful if half my army wasn't flyers.