Batrep - 1750 points - Mixed-Wing vs Chaos Marines

[facmanpob]

Morning all,

So on Sunday evening I played the 2nd in a series of games against a mate of mine (Damion38x on these forums). The two of us have been slowly building up small Chaos Marine armies based around the Dark Vengeance box, and are now at a stage where we can field a decently sized horde-style Chaos Army. The first game was a pretty sizeable defeat for me, mainly due to a lack of direction with the list, so I stripped out a few things and rethought my army for this match.

Due to the lack of "cheesy" units in the Chaos Army (no Heldrakes, oblits etc) I toned down my army as well to try to make the game balanced and go down to the wire....so no Standard of Devastation, and no Black Knights (I haven't painted any yet!)......we'll see if that was a mistake on my part!

On to the army lists:

Guardians of the Covenant:

HQ

Sammael on Corvex

Interrogator-Chaplain on bike with Mace of Redemption and Auspex

Techmarine with PFG and Infravisor

Troops

RAS 1: Ravenwing Attack Squadron w/ 6 bikes, Vet Sarge w/Power Sword, 2 plasmaguns, HBAB

RAS 2: Ravenwing Attack Squadron w/ 3 bikes, 2 meltaguns, MMAB

Tactical Squad (10) w/ Combi-plasma, plasmagun, plasma cannon

Elite

Rifleman Dreadnought

Dreadnought with Lascannon, DCCW w/ Storm Bolter

Fast Attack

RSS w/ 3 Typhoon speeders

Heavy Support

Devastators (5) w/ 3 flakk missiles, 1 Lascannon

Whirlwind

Chaos Marines

HQ

Sorceror ML3, w/ Mark of Tzeentch, Sigil of Corruption, Spell Familiar, VotLW

Daemon Prince w/ Khorne, Power Armour, Wings, The Black Mace

Troops

Cultists (20), w/ Mark of Nurgle, flamer, 10 Autoguns

Cultists (20). w/ Mark of Nurgle, flamer, 10 Autoguns

CSM (5), w/ Mark of Nurgle, Power Sword, plasmagun, VotLW

CSM (5), w/ Mark of Nurgle, Power Sword, plasmagun, VotLW

Elite

Helbrute w/ Autocannon

Helbrute w/ Autocannon

Chosen (5) w/ Mark of Nurgle, Power Axe, Power Maul, 2 x LC, extra CCW, VotLW

Heavy Support

Havoks (5) w/ 2 x Autocannon, 2 x missile launcher

Havoks (5) w/ 2 x Autocannon, 2 x missile launcher

Havoks (5) w/ 2 x Autocannon, 2 x missile launcher

Mission rolled was: The Crusade with 4 objectives, Night fighting on 1st turn.

Deployment: Vanguard Strike (although I just realised we accidentally set up the deployment zones the wrong way round! lol! - not that it matters)

Chaos Marines gained 1st turn. Due to time constraints (and work the following day!) we limited the game to 5 turns, and agreed to roll for early finish at the end of Turn 4.

So, thoughts on who'll win?

Deployment and Early game will come next.

[Brother Immolator]

The bad:

 

--Too many points on the HQs and not enough bodies on your part at first glance.

--I would say that having cultists on his part is a liability due to your wirlwind but I doupt a single batterty will outright destroy them.

--If the demon prince gets into CC, with the loadout it has is gonna stomp squads.

--Too many autocannons and missiles.

--Chosen load out is scarry.

--Consider your speeders lost as soon as they are hit, too many missiles and autocannons.

--Why the tac squad?

 

The good:

 

--First turn nightfight

--Mobility is on your side since most of his army must remain static

--If you manage to get into grips with their remains (after a couple of whirlwind shots), cultists for holding objectives.

--Sticking the techmarine between the dreads will practically make them immortal (but he has too many shots...draaaat)

--I cant remember if his squads come stock with aspiring champions, if they dont then your own leaders in CC will be culling.

 

The ugly:

 

Sorry to rain on your parade but I foresee a minor victory on the chaos marines part, by sheer amount of firepower.

I would have used the points of the chaplain to buy something to add to my force in there to increase damage output or bodies.

OFC those are observation on list, in game its also luck and generalship (yeah thats a word starting about...now!).

So good luck and have fun on your gane and tell us how it went, make the DA proud :D

[Damion38x]

Thanks Brother Immolator,

Can i ask how much terrain you use in your games? (thank you)

I'm not going to spoil the suspense and hi-jack Brother Facman's post so i will not comment just yet on the battle rep. I'm waiting to see all the feedback on the lists - as the various opinions of our members would be interesting.

@ Brother Facman - ermm... wheres the first Battle's report?

[Brom MKIV]

Ok for fun my prediction is the maces own this game on both sides, along with the havocs wrecking everything if the chappy doesn't get to them in time. We will probably see something like a Bolter drop the Daemon and the typhoon kills it straight away meanwhile the game will be going against DAs until attack bikes make a last second dash for objectives to steal the game.

 

Advantage of mobility and first strike goes to DAs, resilience and firepower to chaos. looks like both lists were intentionally made similar to each other with the main departures being troops but maybe its just the way I look at things idk.

[John_f]

Yeah, unless that chaos player is a complete tool, he will pretty much wreck your imperial face with that list..

[facmanpob]

Advantage of mobility and first strike goes to DAs, resilience and firepower to chaos. looks like both lists were intentionally made similar to each other with the main departures being troops but maybe its just the way I look at things idk.

Interesting analysis Brom.....in one sense you are correct that my DA list was tailored to be of similar strength to the Chaos list, but only because the Chaos list was essentially fixed by what minis are available to us so it would be dull and uninteresting for me to min/max my list ....

Yeah, unless that chaos player is a complete tool, he will pretty much wreck your imperial face with that list..

Err, yeah, bit strong there!

@Immolator - Some good observations there mate, and I do agree with you about the HQ slots being expensive on my part....but I really wanted to see if I could do something with the Chaplain. The tac squad is in there simply because I wanted to run a proper mixed wing with tacticals holding a backfield objective. If I was going more competitive it would be one of the first units I'd drop

@Damion38x..... ahem, yes, shall we just say that your Daemon Prince of Tzeentch destroyed my backfield while my bikes outflanked on to the wrong side of the board to get to your objective in time (trying to wade through that many cultists is tough!

Oh yes, I managed to leave the deployment photo on my camera at home, so I'll post that up with the Chaos psychic powers etc when I get home from work. :)

[Damion38x]

Chaos Psychic powers was:

Doom Bolt (tzeench)

Boon of Mutation (Tzeentch)

Iron Arm (Biomancy)

 

I was trying for breath of chaos but failed - in hind sight - it was better that way otherwise i may have been TOO aggressive with my sorcerer (who was my warlord)

 

@ facman - Lol! no worries but your depriving all our Brothers of the fact that my Demon prince 'Forgot' his spell familiar and promptly peril'ed on the first turn!

 

I will quickly drop the reasoning behind my list.

 

As mentioned by facman list was constrained by miniatures at hand - Hence two large cultist squads & the chosen.

The havocks where setup this way as i knew i had to deal with bikes, and light Armour - anybody that has played me can attest to the fact that i need weight of fire - as usually i cant hit the broadside of a barn or wound after that. I2 small squads of CSM - They sit on objectives with a nice wrapping of cultists Forcing facman to deal with teh cultists or risk giving me a nice cover save.

And two Hell brutes with auto cannons - can never have too much dice to throw at your opponent.

At this point to make up points i started allocating Mark of Nurgle - Makes cultist more survivable against Str 4 shooting, ditto for the marines.

 

My Idea was to stick the Sorceror in the chosen hidden in the middle of my lines - I was NOT going to give away warlord. I then wrap the havocks and tactical squads in Cultists to protect them - also (in my mind) force my oponent what to shoot - Scoring units or those Havoc's

 

Brutes where slightly behind my cultist wall on each flan providing another target to shoot at and water down the enemy shooting.

Lastly (and my mistake IMO) was i deployed my Demon Prince near my Sorcerer - I wanted to boon him to the teeth! in the back field behind LOS blocking terrain - I wanted to use him as a mobile Blocker - either to intercept a unit breaking into my lines Or those pesky outflankers.

[facmanpob]

Ok, so on to the battlefield........

A bit of a narrative here in that one end of the battlefield was essentially the edge of a town and contained a large ruined Administratum style building, whilst the other end of the table was a blasted ruin of a battlefield, with ruins, fortifications and craters everywhere. This would give lots of cover for units on the ground, but plenty of fields of fire for long ranged weaponry.....

Chaos won the toss and elected to go first, choosing, unsurprisingly to deploy at the end containing the building.....

[facmanpob]

Deployment went something like this......

and I was faced with a certain amount of the following from across the table

as I had already committed my first error of the day.....namely not deploying Sammael with the Chaplain and big bike squad.....a mistake I won't make again. Why did I do this? Well, I thought that the Chaplain would have the Skilled Rider rule, but alas it would appear not, so that +1 to the jink save was nowhere to be found when it was needed! Doh!

My second mistake was deploying the bikes at all......again I made the mistake of forgetting where my table edge was. Had I reserved all of the bikes they could have come on the table up somewhere near the top left and rained death and destruction on the CSM squad and cultists up there, before letting the Chaplain beat up the Daemon Prince (maybe! )

[Brother Immolator]

 Damion38x  much to my amusement, the store i go to play does use only scarce terrain pieces(usually large buildings a couple of hills, some trees that sort of thing) to encurage us to use (read buy) fortifications.

My bikers ofc don't need such things and my infantry is rarely more than 30 models so they can hide with no problems :D

 

Facmanpob roll the dice of the interrogator against the prince as they are now in single combat, trust me you wont like the result.

[facmanpob]

Turn 1

Nightfighting in effect:

Chaos Marines:

Most units out of shooting range, repositioning at the top end of the map, as the Chaos forces start to spread out along the short table edge to try to deny my outflanking units anywhere to deploy. Southeastern havoks knock an autocannon off the Rifleman Dread and do a single HP of damage.

GotC:

Bikes reposition up the left flank to make a dash for the top of the board. HBAB moves into position on the right to shoot at the cultists. The Techmarine repairs the autocannon and the Rifleman illuminates the havoks. Some ineffective shooting sees 4 cultists and a single havok killed (the Sergeant).

Initial thoughts: Nurgle cultists get wounded at the same rate as Marines, but cost half as much.....stick them in cover with a 4+ cover save and they are extremely resilient!

[Damion38x]

As a small note i'd like to point out (Brother Facman will back me up on this) I have NEVER rolled so well for armour saves, To Hit / Wound rolls or leadership tests in my gaming history as i have had these past two games!

This fact allone created severe frustration ( ) for Facman

[facmanpob]

Hehe! I'm coming on to that!

Turn 2:

Chaos - Cultists and marines continue to spread out across the top of the board, but can't quite cover the whole length of the table edge, and leave just enough gap to get my bikes through, after which they start the slow process of blobbing back together! A couple of bikes are shot down on the left flank.

GotC - Bikes, Chaplain and Sammael charge up the left flank, and both outflanking units hit the board at the top of the map....phew! Another turn and they wouldn't have been able to come on that edge! Coordinated shooting downs the Helbrute on the right of the table, and more cultists and havoks are killed, but they pass their morale checks.

Turn 3:

Chaos - The Daemon Prince jumps over to the MMAB and makes short work of it, while the 2 havok squads in the building kill 4 bikes and knock the Chaplain down to 1 wound! That's 6 unsaved wounds caused by 8 autocannon shots and 4 missiles! Using my dice!

GotC - The melta bike squad tries and fails to kill the Helbrute, first by shooting and then in CC. The Techmarine blob of doom turns its attention to the havoks in the building, but some good cover saving throws limits the damage.

[facmanpob]

Turn 4

At the end of this turn we would be rolling for early finish, as it was Sunday evening and time was running out!

Chaos - The cultists and CSM squad at the top of the map head South and start running for the objective nearest to them - they'll reach it on Turn 5 if the game lasts that long. The cultists in the East (what remains of them) start running for the central objective. the Helbrute remains locked in combat with the 3 man biker squad. The Daemon Prince heads over towards Sammael and the Chaplain, but its all rather pointless as 'unfeasible round of shooting MkII' from the 2 havok squads in the building knock out the last remaining wound on the Chaplain and all 3 of Sammael's wounds! The Sorceror casts Boon of Mutation on one of the Chosen, and turns him into a Daemon Prince! It's going from bad to worse for the Emperor's finest!

GotC - All is not lost though! the last remaining melta biker uses hit & run to break clear of the Helbrute and legs it South! The HBAB turbo-boosts into position on the central objective, and the shooting of my Dreads, Devastators and Typhoons finally comes together and kills the Mutated Daemon Prince and some more cultists. If the game ends now its a victory to me..............

....we roll.........

....and the game continues to turn 5

[facmanpob]

Turn 5

Final Turn!

Chaos - The Chosen and Daemon Prince kill the HBAB, and the cultists and CSM squad take hold of the northern objective. 'Unfeasible round of shooting MkIII' takes place, with 2 havok squads causing 5 HP worth of damage to my Typhoons, killing 2 speeders outright! Chaos are currently leading - I have to get them off the northern objective!

GotC - Once again, my trusty Whirlwind does its thing, and clears the northern objective of cultists and marines........

the game finishes as a hard fought draw..... 4 vs 4

3 VP each for holding 1 Primary objective, and I got an extra 1 for First Blood (Helbrute on Turn 2) and Damion38x got 1 VP for Slay the Warlord.

[John_f]

Very nice batrep! Sorry for sounding harsh. Humour on the interwebz is hard :)

[facmanpob]

Very nice batrep! Sorry for sounding harsh. Humour on the interwebz is hard

Hehe! You're not wrong there! Damion38x wanted me to let you know that he's not offended!

So, final thoughts on the battle.........

1) Neither of the lists are competitive, the chaos list being limited by availability of models (we had some DA devatators standing in for the havoks for instance....damned Fallen! lol), and the GotC being balanced to make the game more closely matched.

2) Mark of Nurgle rules! Nurgle cultists get hit and wounded from shooting at the same rate as normal Marines, being T4, and if you stick them in 4+ cover then they die at broadly similar rates too......but they cost half the points! No brainer!

3) Weapons that are S7 and above are devastating to T5 bikers, as they wound on a 2+. Havoks can take autocannons as a cheap upgrade........hmmmmm, enough said!

4) Never let spawny gits roll stupidly well while borrowing your own dice.....

5) Heavy Bolter Attack bikes are really good! Previously I'd always just upgraded to a multi-melta as a matter of course as the cost was the same. Now that the HBAB is 10 points cheaper than the MMAB its not so clear cut. 2 HBAB puts out more dakka at a longer range than 3 bikes, are harder to wipe out as they require more wounds to kill and are 2 separate units!

6) My Techmarine blob of doom was virtually impenetrable.....so much so that firepower was diverted away from them towards my scoring units.....sometimes putting too much defensive capability in the wrong area is a bad thing. Maybe if I'd not had the Techmarine with the PFG then the Havoks would have focused more on trying to knock out the Dreads and WW, and the bikes would have lasted longer.

7) Deployment is ultra-important with the bikes. I got the deployment correct with the Attack Bikes, and they proved their worth. I got deployment wrong with the bikes and they didn't!

8) The tactical squad was of little use as they were sitting on an objective too far back to use their plasma cannon. A cheaper scoring unit such as 5 snipers with camo cloaks in a bolstered ruin would have been more survivable and saved me over 100 points......which could have been spent beefing up the Ravenwing aspect of the list.....

We're planning a third game along the same lines as soon as we can free up some time...... watch this space!

[fellipe]

Nice bat rep. Love the schematics.

[Izzuan]

Awesome! Very fun to read. Cant wait to see more :)