UM Test Game

[Prot]

Hey guys,

 

Just to let you know I did get in a test game last night against my friend's Astra. 

 

I will tell you flat out I think that a properly made Astra list is going to be a beast. My friend's list adapted better to 9th this time had all the elements you need: walkers with flamers, walkers with lascannons, Basilisks, Wyyvern, fair amount of bodies, flame tank/chimera's. Lascannon team. He also has a flyer with Stormtroopers aboard. He had a command tank with a plasma eradiactor main turret (?) side plasma sponsons too. And of course 5-6 Bullgryn.

 

So a very respectable foot print.

 

I took my current 'base' that I've been using with White Scars even though I'm using Ultra since it's been a good, solid base. 2 Impulsors, 1 Incursor squad, 2 Intercessor squads. (I just take more of the assault intercessors with White Scars.)

 

I took 3  Eradicators, 3 Outriders, a squad of 3 Bolt Aggressors, 1 Apothecary (He's new because of how brutal I've found 9th in high end casualties and Character killing is very real.) I had my Thunder Fire for my only idirect.

 

 

I tried something else I haven't in a very long time: 5 Devs in Pod with Cherub, and 4 Grav Cannons. And 5 Plasma Inceptors. Finally, my HQ's are Cassius, Calgar (Supreme Cmd assumption here),  Tigurius, and an LT.

 

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

We play Scorched earth. Astra goes first.

 

I'm going to say flat out I've seen some people state that Indirect fire is not going to be as valuable, and I think that's dead wrong. I took a HORRENDOUS beating from Indirect last game with White Scars, and it happened again. 

 

I deployed defensively enough but 2 x Basi's and a Wyvern are no joke. I take wounds on Aggressors, and (I put -1 to hit on Eradicators). And I flat out lose one of my 3 Impulsors.

 

The Astra have far better board control now, right off the hop.

 

I try to push back, but two things hit me about Ultramarines: 1. The need for the shooty aura. 2. By using a 'wedge' formation I cannot with any real conviction, move on to the objectives and push him back.

 

I do try though: the Outriders tried to bully some units, but a lot of his infantry is in metal boxes, and his flanked (scout move) sentinels are giving me issues... The Outriders are fun, but I think they are overrated. Even in assault, I feel the lack of a special weapon truly makes this unit less useful than traditional bikes with a Multimelta, and Hammer Sarge (this is my build with White Scars.)

 

 

 

The center of the table is where I make most of my moves, even putting my  Impulsor out there, and exposing some of my army, but trying to keep away from his command tank.

 

+++++++++++++++++++

 

The first turn set the pace, I knew I couldn't win because objectives were scored in his command and he started with 15, and would score 10, 15, 10. 

 

This is what I mean by primaries winning a lot of games. My opening was very different for primaries: 0, 0, 5, 10.

 

My biggest secondary would be Bring it Down which I would max out. To be honest he took off with such a massive lead, he stopped counting points on secondaries.

 

We also could not find anything that said a Flyer cannont score 'quarters' from the battlefield Supremacy secondary. So he probably filled that out. The rest was tougher for him, but again he hammered the primaries.

 

This is where my white scars are far superior in board control. They do not have the firefight ability, but are engaged on all fronts, relying less on aura's to be competent, and using other means to slow vehicles.

 

I will say the Ultra's starting hitting hard even though I had little on the table:

 

- Plasma Ceptors took down a tank (assisted), 5-6 Bullgryn, and a squad of Sentinels. Every turn I overcharged, and every turn I killed one of my own.

- The Eradicators have been in every list. Although they died in the end, I resurrected 2, and they took out 2-3 transports/tanks.

- The Grav Devs were a big splash really.... almost entirely killed the command tank, then killed 2 basilisks.

 

But by the end game you would look at the table and think.... this must be really close, both sides are eliminated, but as I keep saying scoring that primary early on has been a huge factor in every game I've played, no matter the armies.

 

Oh and again on the character note: I lost Tigurius T3. In every game I've played, keeping all characters alive past turn 3 is VERY hard for marine players. If you put too many point in protection, there goes your ability to take the board control.

 

Astra have a very good selection of units for 9th, although some of it is 'flimsy' it's enough to score those early points, and run away with the lead hitting you with inaccessible tanks until mid game.  

 

As a side note something I have noticed with my Ultra's and White Scars. It is extremely hard to get any sort of real deep strike or 'encirclement' working. The board is so small, and if you play a typical 'board control' army with lots of figs, it's almost worth less to deep strike. 

 

It feels really strange to say that, but I don't think elite armies are going to work that weill...like Knights as an extreme example.... no board control. And killing doesn't get you a ton of points.... or you have to kill at such an alarming rate, you cannot afford to go second.

 

Lastly, I'll say learning to go second is really massive now. Terrain is more important than ever... play with Obscurring Ruins to keep things fair. (We had 2 larger obscurring ruins and many structures.)

 

Anyway, that's how it went. I felt I would have to rethink this list in order to go second. It kicks into 'high gear' a little too late, and since it has a 'smallish' foot print, it needed to be more aggressive.

[Paulinus]

I agree that Guard is going to be in a really good place in this edition.

 

My grav pod devs did some good work for me too.

 

So yeah, primaries are absolutely vital and someone can take an early almost insurmountable lead.

 

I think what we need to be able to do is hit back and remove their objective takers if they get first turn. Drop pod grave devs are really good for that. It gives us a good reactionary unit and with a cherub allow us to even pink away at redundant units that are their to back up whatever is holding the objective. (ie troops inside transports)

 

On the flip side we need to be able to take and survive that that first turn to score ours. This is where I think Impulsors can help. They are fast enough to get on an objective and have the redundant soft stuff on the inside that hopefully can survive their transport getting popped.

 

I also noticed the character vulnerabilities.

 

9th is really going to be a different beast.

[Captain Idaho]

Interesting report, Prot. Thanks.

 

Good to see we can still work in the killing side of things at the very least.

 

Scoring the Primaries looks to be the way forward then. More troops perhaps, but that might cause a drop in our killing power.

 

Certainly mechanised will help, but then that's a smaller army.

 

Rhinos have gone up in points and Impulsors are already quite expensive, but both will grant access to board control.

[Prot]

Thanks for reading it... no pics because half the army was white, and half was blue. :)

 

I find with that game I was scratching my head about how to play UM. It's funny because my opponent said my White Scars and UM were so different to play against.

 

His perspective was that my White Scars played much more dynamic, but the UM had a real higher threat level from the stronger shooting. 

 

My difficultly from playing all my marine armies on a rotation, is coming to grips with 1) Characters. 2) using a mobile 'fire base' and 3) having board presence -without- giving up 1 or 2 is extremely challenging.

 

It's kind of hard to explain but that's the feeling I've been getting from Marines, and UM in particular. 

 

To expand a bit on that.... You're paying a premium for HQ's, and you really have only 3 choices. They have to be so good now. They have to do a lot of heavy lifting if you are putting the points into them. And in return they are essential to keep alive. 

 

With expensive UM characters, I still think the army relies on a very potent shooting phase, even if it's at close range. I think going too far into close combat is going to be a problem against those high end foes I spoke of in other threads. 

 

It's a real conundrum. The secondaries... I always take "quarters" from Battlefield Presence. GW did it better than ITC did. GW's version: You can't be within 6" of the middle of the table and must be wholly within that quarter.

 

BUT also I found keeping that outer board presence usually means you're scoring Primaries. 

 

This really forces you to be dedicated to the perimeters, and that's an 'aura' killer.

[Paulinus]

We may find ourselves relying way more on those “aura” type strats and relics to counter the issue you bring up Prot.

 

Seal of Oath

Avenge the Fallen

Sons of Guilliman

Etc etc.

 

Luckily we have a good number to choose from.

 

Aura characters may well be limited to localized, precision and priority points.

Edited July 19, 2020 by Paulinus

[Lemondish]

We may find ourselves relying way more on those “aura” type strats and relics to counter the issue you bring up Prot.

 

Seal of Oath

Avenge the Fallen

Sons of Guilliman

Etc etc.

 

Luckily we have a good number to choose from.

 

Aura characters may well be limited to localized, precision and priority points.

That's a good take, and kinda exciting from a tactical perspective. It sounds like you have to make some tough choices, which is better for everyone.

[Paulinus]

 

We may find ourselves relying way more on those “aura” type strats and relics to counter the issue you bring up Prot.

Seal of Oath

Avenge the Fallen

Sons of Guilliman

Etc etc.

Luckily we have a good number to choose from.

Aura characters may well be limited to localized, precision and priority points.

That's a good take, and kinda exciting from a tactical perspective. It sounds like you have to make some tough choices, which is better for everyone.

Yeah, and it makes a victory or well fought game so much better.

[Prot]

We may find ourselves relying way more on those “aura” type strats and relics to counter the issue you bring up Prot.

 

Seal of Oath

Avenge the Fallen

Sons of Guilliman

Etc etc.

 

Luckily we have a good number to choose from.

 

Aura characters may well be limited to localized, precision and priority points.

 

Seal of Oath was really big in my game. Since we have to pick all those relics/traits/psych etc before the game starts, I think SoA is auto take. It's hard not to get something meaningful out of it.

 

In this game it was a massive factor in taking down his command tank tank with a 2+ save on it. 

 

Going forward... I really think a few of my other Astartes armies take much better advantage of the Outriders, and even to a degree the Eradicators! So that's back to advancing , shooting twice, Bolt Aggressors. Perhaps a bit boring, but they are a UM staple pretty much.

 

Over my last 4-5 games of 9th, I think flyers are a touch better in some secondaries, and flushing out squads that I think UM are going to have problems with (or at least I do). Again one thing I think people will find as they start to get into 9th is deep striking/infiltrating etc is super difficult... nearly impossible except against the most unaware of opponents. (Having the D3 redeploy was used for me in this game.)

[Ishagu]

Interesting report, Prot. Thanks.

 

Good to see we can still work in the killing side of things at the very least.

 

Scoring the Primaries looks to be the way forward then. More troops perhaps, but that might cause a drop in our killing power.

 

Certainly mechanised will help, but then that's a smaller army.

 

Rhinos have gone up in points and Impulsors are already quite expensive, but both will grant access to board control.

Like I said in the other topics. It's about board control, having multiple units, staying in auras is very difficult so the value of expensive characters is diminished, and they are harder to protect on top.

 

The obscuring rule, if you're playing on a table with good terrain, is a game changer. Some units are hard to reach and indirect fire is very valuable.

[Bloody Legionnaire]

Great report and break down Prot! It's given me somethings to think about as I build up an UM Army for this edititon.

Funnily enough, you put some interesting ideas in my head and confirmed some others on how my SWs Army will look this edition and I think it'll turn out to be somewhat of a blend between what you've been looking at doing with your White Scars as far as Impulsors moving forward and then Drop Pod devs or in the SWs case Long Fangs. 

 

As far as shooting goes, how do you think things would have been had you ran Repulsors (Executioners) for the Ultramarines instead of the Impulsors? 

Edited July 21, 2020 by Bloody Legionnaire

[Prot]

Ah well the truth is with point hikes, I don’t like the idea of running and Repulsor chassis. sire killing power is nice but taking the board is bigger for my playstyle. You get a much bigger baking out of old school Grav Devs for example. 

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Repulsors are too easy to kill for their points. One is close in points to three Impulsors.