Marines versus the Greenskins - Escalation

[Kierdale]

I had my third battle against a friend's orks today. He told me he wanted to increase our game size from 750pts to 1,000pts. I knew all the models he has and so had a good idea what I would face...

it turned out he's been busy since our last game: he army now includes two deff dreads and a big mek with shokk attak gun!

Space Marines: Great Crusade Thousand Sons [C:SM]

Librarian Har-Khebu - bolt pistol, force staff. Gate of Infinity, Null Zone. Warlord Trait: Conqueror Of Cities (not bad as we had a fair few ruins on the board).

Tactical squad Nehebkau - combi-plasma, plasma gun, missile launcher.

Scout squad Maahes - sergeant Telion Maahes, heavy bolter, 3 scouts with bolt guns, 2 with pistols and blades (a lack of bolter-wielding scouts :lol: ).

Scout squad Wepwawet: combi-flamer, 4 scouts with bolt guns riding in...

Land speeder storm Uraeus: heavy bolter.

Devastator squad Resheph: 4 missile launchers, a 6th marine with a bolt gun.

Thunderfire cannon and techmarine Septu.

Sternguard veteran squad Menthu: 4x combi-melta.

1002 points IIRC.

OpFor: Space Orks

Badmoon-version-of-Ghazghkull. Warlord Trait: Dust of a Thousand Worlds.

4x meganob - 2x combi-scorcha, 2x combi-rokkit.

Those five riding in a trukk (grot riggers, red paint).

Big mek - shokk attak gun.

12 ork boys - shootas.

7 lootas - deff guns, and 2 meks - rokkit launchas.

2 deff dreads - 4x close combat weapon.

I didn't have chance to check his points but it should be 1,000pts

Terrain and Deployment

For a change we decided that one of us would set up the terrain and the other could then choose which side they wanted. I set up the board with the buildings concentrated in the middle like a small outpost, with a couple of barricades blocking two roads and a row of fuel cans at one end. An ammo dump was situated in one of the buildings to the west. There were hills in the rear-left of both sides, with a third hill midway across one side. Other than that there were about three scattered forests.

The six objectives (4pts, 3pts x 2, 2pts x 2 and 1pt) we put on the board before deployment and turned them over to find out their values after deployment.

A 2pt objective was put in the forest mid-way up what became my left flank. This one was specially depicted by a Death Skull teef-feef I recently made for our games.

A 3pt objective in the first floor of a ruin at the far end of the outpost.

A 4pt objective was atop a hill opposite my right flank.

A 1pt objective was in a central building.

A 3pt objective was atop the mid-right hill,

and the final 2pt objective was in a small copse between the upper-right hill and the mid-right hill.

The following deployment photos should show the terrain and objective-locations better...

I won the roll off and decided to go second, hence my opponent deployed first:

His lootas and their two meks atop the hill on his left flank (turned out to be sitting on the most valuable objective in the game! Not that they couldn't be scraped off it...).

His big mek and that shokk attak gun at the back, behind a wood, joined a mob of 12 boys who were strung out along the middle.

Ghaz' and the four meganobs rode in the trukk, deployed along with the two dreads as far forward as he could get them.

My deployment:

Devastators on the leftmost hill. Figured they'd be needed to stop the trukk (how I then dealt with Ghaz' was a bridge I'd burn when I came to it) and the dreads.

The sternguard in the forest to the right. I desperately need a droppod for these boys but recently my wallet is focused on my IG. Anyway, the plan was to let the dreads come closer, then hit them with the combi-meltas. That was the plan, anyway...

My tactical squad I combat-squadded: kept the missile half back to hit the ork armour. The plasma-half joined the librarian on the left flank, ready to Gate up the board as necessary.

The thunderfire could reach the whole board and so it kept back.

My two scout squads (one in LSS) outflanked.

LAVA?!

With this game as part of the national campaign GW Japan has going on at the moment, we chose a battlefield with a lava stream. I quickly made some 3"x6" sections of lava. Each turn we took turns to place a piece, starting with it flowing on from one edge (though we agreed not to start from someone's deployment zone) and we could either start a new flow, extend or branch off from an existing one. Rules-wise it was as-per Volcanic Eruption on page 367 of the main rulebook.

Ork Turn One

The trukk sped up the outpost mainstreet, fire from it's big shoota failing to hit the devastators.

The two dreads also moved as fast as they could through the buildings.

The boyz mob did nothing while the big mek shot at the Devastators with his shokk attack gun. That is not a weapon to be underestimated! Four of my marines were hit and of those only one survived, the whole squad going to ground in order to save his skin.

Loota and mek fire likewise killed off four of the Sternguard. The sheer volume of fire was too much and only the sternguard sergeant was left standing.

Oh, and the first wave of lava swept onto the board from my left.

Here's how the board looked at the end of Ork turn one:

Marine Turn One

With the Devs gone to ground that took two missile launchers out of my dread/trukk stopping effort.

The Sternguard sergeant moved out of the forest to my right and just got in range of the trukk...and shook it.

The Tactical missile launcher in the middle failed to hit the trukk, nor did his bolter-wielding brethren.

The plasma-half of the tactical squad moved up and shot their plasma at the side of the trukk, stripping off another Hull Point and reducing it to 1HP.

Shots from the thunderfire flew way across the board and dropped one loota and both meks from that squad.

The river of lava extended (I was hoping to persuade the leftmost dread to head over to the right...but the lava just wasn't long enough!).

Ork Turn Two

Shaken trukk does nothing (he forgot to even try to take snap shots with the mounted big shoota or the orks riding it).

The dreads again move forward as far as they can. I must say having a pair of four-armed, huge cans clunking their way toward your lines, grot riggers hanging off them, is very amusing...and irritating. One clambers through a ruin (stomping on the ammo crates!) in order to avoid the river of lava, while the Death Skull teeth-pilferer looked on from the nearby woods.

The shokk attak gun fired at the plasma-combat squad and librarian on my left but thankfully this time it scattered way off, the snotlings decanting from the warp only to fall to their doom in the river of molten rock!

Fire again cut across the board from the lootas, this time taking down two of the marines from the missile-combat squad.

Marine Turn Two

A lot happened this turn...

The lava river continued to flow (the dreads would be able to get away from it so I had it advance toward the middle of the board, trying to cut it).

In a hail of fire from the devastators and missile-combat squad the trukk went up in a ball of fire! Ghaz' and his meganobs made an emergency disembarkation to the rear...only to be shot at by the thunderfire, trying to slow them down with ground-quaking shots so that they might fall victim to the advancing river of lava ;)

Sergeant Telion Maahes lead his six scouts onto the board via my left flank while sergeant Wepwawet's swept onto the board via the right flank aboard the landspeeder storm. It felt really good to have them coming on via different flanks, like a planned pincer movement! :D

Maahes' marines fired at the big mek but only manage to score one wound, which was intercepted by a dumb boy nagging the mek at just the wrong (right?) moment to "'ave a look at me shoota an' add moa bling" (Look Out, Sir!).

Wepwawet's scouts, on the other hand, did far better. The sergeant himself hopped down from the speeder, took up a textbook stance and triggered his combi-flamer: engulfing all seven lootas! Burn fungus-boys! Burn! :D

Along with a tossed frag grenade and bolter fire from the other scouts they dropped the entire mob. First blood to the XV legion!

Brave Sternguard sergeant Menthu charged the rightmost Dread (there was little else he could do) and failed to do any damage with a krak grenade...he was then violently dismembered by four dreadnought close combat weapons.

On the left flank I had little that could stop the other dread before it hit my remaining Devastators so the librarian split off and headed up-board (I could have tried to Gate him and the combat-squad across the lava river but at the time it was very iffy: a bad scatter and my opponent would've dumped a S10 AP1 lava template on the whole squad!) while the five tactical marines charged the leftmost dreadnought (through fire and grenades it was by this point down to one HP)...with only the plasma-gunner surviving to flee up the hill toward the Devastators who were just picking themselves up out of the mud from Going To Ground...

End of Marine Turn Two:

[Kierdale]

Ork Turn Three

The leftmost dread charged both the plasma gunner who had survived last turn's carnage and the remaining three Devastators...tearing the Devs limb from limb and sending the plasma gunner fleeing making a tactical withdrawl once again. Hehe.

The other dread advanced toward the middle missile-combat squad (and the thunderfire).

Across on the other side of the board the big mek left the boyz mob and took a shokk attak gun shot at the landspeeder storm...failing to damage it but killing off one of the scouts beneath it.

Ghaz' and his meganobs bashed through the walls of one of the outpost buildings, desperately fleeing the advancing river of fire, and popped off a few shots at the remaining four scouts around the 'Storm, sadly killing off sergeant Wepwawet. The remaining scouts held.

The boyz mob fired their shootas and dropped three of Maahes' scouts.

The lava river turned as it ran against one of the buildings, and began to melt the wrecked trukk.

Marine Turn Three

The lone plasma gunner recovered his senses and, with the Ork dreadnought hot on his heels he quickly turned, moving behind it and triggering a pair of plasma blasts, which finally took down the lumbering hulk! Vengeance for his fallen squadmates!

Maahes and his scouts fired on the big mek, finally downing him and ending the threat of the shokk attak gun, while librarian Har-Khebu used Gate of Infinity to teleport safely across the lava river...which branched and began to turn toward the Ork deployment zone (at the time I wanted to keep a line of it between Ghaz' and my librarian).

The remaining scouts in the upper-right squad boarded the landspeeder storm once more and it rocketed off toward my deployment zone. Here I made a mistake: I planned to have it move away from Ghaz' and his deployment zone, hopefully drawing him toward the speeder, then in turn five zip back up to grab the 4-point objective...however I did not remember that Fast Skimmers can move All Out 18"...and I moved too short.

The thunderfire dropped a few of the ork boyz from the mob while the missile-combat squad failed to hard the righthand dread which was rapidly bearing down on them...

End of turn three:

Ork Turn Four

The remaining dread charged the missile-combat squad. Their krak grenades failed to get 6s to damage it but fortunately only one was killed. The other two did not flee. Well, as least it held the dread up a bit...

The remaining ork boys attacked sergeant Maahes and his scouts in my top left corner. It was bloody and the orks were victorious...moving on from the killing to advance through the woods: toward the two-storey building and the 3-point objective within! Curses!

At this point my opponent bellowed Waaagh!, Ghaz' and his four meganobs charged the landspeeder storm, hit it with 20 power klaw attacks (if only I'd remembered that longer All Out!) and it blew up! Thankfully the three scouts survived, for the moment.

I guess you can't get a Jink save against close combat attacks? :lol:

End of Ork turn four:

Marine Turn Four

The lone plasma gunner advances back up the battlefield and to the left, running to capture the 2-point objective Death Skull teef feef.

The three scouts, clambering from the wreckage of the downed speeder, shot at the meganobs (what else could I do?) along with shots from the thunderfire cannon, resulting in only one wound overall.

The two marines still in combat with the remaining Ork dread were butchered and the ork warmachine turned its gore-smeared gaze upon techmarine Septu (who always dies to power klaws, without fail, in every game he is fielded in).

Librarian Har-Khebu, realising that the remaining forces from the XV legion cannot secure enough objectives to win the field, turns his gaze upon the enemy leader and Gates across the board towards Ghaz'. May as well go down in flames!

Ork Turn Five

The Ork dread charged techmarine Septu, whose plasma pistol fired to no avail. A grenade too failed to find a chink in the Ork machine's armour and he was struck down. The dread then turned to head back toward the outpost buildings (thinking about it now he should've stayed put and got Linebreaker, but that's my opponent's choice).

Two of the meganobs unleashed torrents of flame from kombi-skorchas along with a hail of fire from Ghaz' and the other two meganobs, cutting down the remaining three scouts.

The remaining boyz made it to the cover of the two-storey building, capturing the objective therein.

End of Ork turn five, taken from my left side, for some reason:

Marine Turn Five

We didn't have a whole lot of time left and anyway I found myself with two models left on the board: the lone plasma gunner and librarian Har-Khebu.

The plasma gunner advanced a little through the trees, just enough to be able to keep his objective and let loose two plasma shots at the ork boys in the building. One of the To Hit dice comes up a 1! I really though I might have just suicided my one scoring unit, but thankfully he passed his save and the other shot took out an Ork. Not enough to force a Ld test (that would've been beautiful!) but a bit of vengeance.

Librarian Har-Khebu muttered the verses of the lower enumerations, grasped his force-staff tightly and charged through a hail of meganob overwatch fire, calling out a challenge to the huge Ork warlord - surely not such a hulking beast had been seen since Ulanor? - the challenge was duly accepted. Har-Khebu swung his heqa staff, managed to land a wound...yet it failed to penetrate the thick armour the beast wore. There was naught time for a curse before the Ork warlord's power klaw descended, conquering...

...I rolled to see if we would continue and the game ended at that rather dramatic point.

Score

Orks: seven points (three-point objective x 2, Warlord).

Marines: three points (two-point objective, First Blood).

On Reflection

i. I need a rhino for my tacticals, a drop pod for my sternguard (heck, a drop pod bought for the devastators then dropped empty to hinder the trukk/dreads would've been nice). Dropping the Sternguard behind (or to once side and take one at a time) the ork armour could've fried at least one of those three targets.

ii. The volcanic eruption didn't have a great effect but it was good fun. Perhaps we should have added 2 or D2 pieces in each turn rather than one.

iii. Should have kept the sternguard in reserve and walked them on when the ork armour, dreads in particular, were closer.

iv. In turn four I should not have shot the thunderfire at Ghaz' and the meganobs. My three scouts over there were dead either way. I should have pounded the remains of his boyz mob and maybe destroyed them.

Anyway, the game was exceedingly good fun to play. Nice to scale things up a bit (though I doubt we can go beyond 1,000 points unless we speed things up: we can only book the room for four hours) and face some new units in his army.

Not sure when we'll get another game, probably next year. Whether it's with my marines or my Imperial Guard (if the latter then the report will be over on the Boot Camp) I don't yet know. Depends what I get built over Christmas...

[Svarte Hanske]

I love those orks! Especially the deffdreads!

 

In the grim future there is only war... on green fields. Looks a bit weird.

[Kierdale]

I love those orks! Especially the deffdreads!

 

In the grim future there is only war... on green fields. Looks a bit weird.

Yup! :o

The buildings? Pounded into ruins.

The turf? Not a blade bent!

 

Honest answer: I'd rather spend my hobby money on miniatures rather than on terrain for occasional games. If my 100yen store gets some brown felt in, then we'll see a change :P

[Polythemus]

Kierdale you always have great batreps and great pics. How did you like using the lava scenario? Been wanting to try that.

[Kierdale]

Thanks, Polythemus!

They're always fun to write up, even if I don't win.

 

The lava was fun though it didn't have a dramatic effect on the game.

Only after deploying did we both realise that we had put units within 6" of table edges and so agreed that we would only allow lava sections to start from the table sides in 'no man's land' (they could then flow into deployment zones though). I suppose it did effect our planning as time went on: I had to get my librarian further forward before using Gate of Infinity, and with my placement of the sections I did get to chase Ghazghkull a bit. So, no dramatic effect but definitely something we had to take into consideration with movement.

I'd recommend giving it a try.

 

If I can get some craters I might try the earthquake battlefield effect.

 

Some other things I've been thinking, tactics-wise:

My opponent's recent purchases split his army neatly into his backfield-holders (big mek with shokk attak and boyz mob for LO,S! And his meks/lootas) and his assault force (CC deffdreads, trukk with Ghaz and nobs).

Now I need to think about how to handle this next time:

I. He has a minimum of squishy troops: only one boyz mob, while his other scoring units are tough (deffdreads and meganobs).

II. My scouts Outflanking did a good job on his backfield holders. Perhaps I can get a third scout squad into my list next time. With him charging his assault force over to my side it might be worth getting more of my scorers coming on over on his side! Even if he takes out my backfield forces, they're generally not scoring units so he wouldn't have enough turns to get back up the board to engage my scouts.

III. With that in mind, placing my objectives as far onto his side of the board as possible will help (since he himself admits he thinks about grabbing objectives secondarily).

IV. As I mentioned before, either getting a drop pod for my Sternguard (unlikely before our next game) or keepin them in reserve until his heavy hitters are close.

 

Lastly, from a terrain POV I really need to make some LOS-blocking terrain.

[Kierdale]

[mispost]

[DAwarrior43]

Hey Kierdale Great BatRep! Regarding the paper field check out the Citadel Battle Mat, its like $33 USD and it's great quality. I bought one for my house and I love it. I am not entirely sure what it would run you in Tokoyo so keep that in mind.

[Centurion645]

Cool batrep, gave me quite a nice read. ;) Really nice Thousand Sons by the way, nice conversions and great paint jobs.

[Kierdale]

Thanks, DA Warrior43, Centurion645.

Yes, I considered the battle mat (4100 yen over here. Not bad) but to be honest my first child will be born in April. I expect to have zero gaming opportunities for a long time after that. I'll be lucky if I can pick up a paint brush for a while :unsure: Still, I'll have an all-new miniature to play with...and perhaps bring up with a love of The Hobby :devil: