Greetings,
Our original plan had been to get together between Christmas and New Year’s and have a nice dustup of two Ork players vs.
CSM and Space Wolves. Unfortunately (well, fortunately if you like fluff, I suppose) the 2nd Ork player dropped out due to other obligations so it ended up that what we were looking at was a nice brawl between Space Wolves and Black Templar vs. Death Guard
CSM and Orks.
So, 8,000 points per side, each side having 2 Super Heavies, and well over 160 Ork infantry models about to be placed we geared up for the game.
The lay of the land.
I discovered that 4,000 points of Orks goes a *long* way. I hadn’t even intended to bring two super heavies until I realized even my fairly expansive Ork rmy couldn’t absorb 4,000 points easily.
Deployment
The Imperium turned in a bid of 5 minutes. The Orks and Death Guard countered with their bid of 30 minutes (and we would need almost every minute of it! I had a *lot* of Orks to put down)
The Imperium revealed their first strategic asset – Obstacles. In moments they had laid out an impressive pile of tank traps that would prove quite difficult for the Ork and
CSM vehicles to move through, leaving only a small gap into their deployment zone. Other lines of razorwire and tank traps were placed to guard their flanks as well as really block up the main approach to their lines. Also out came a Disruption Beacon – this asset would prevent easy deep strikes or flank marches from bringing in attacks from the rear (and, yeah, the Orks had taken Flank March – the better to krump ‘umies with)
When Warboss Squatstompa was asked what he thought of the Imperium’s attempts to provide themselves a defensive gunline position he simply laughed and pointed out how many boyz he’d brought – you can’t beat that many boyz…there’s a lot of them, y’see?
A Hellhammer pattern Baneblade anchors the Imperium’s right flank along with Long Fangs, Razorbacks, and Dreads. The green barrels are an objective marker, and the top story of the bastion behind them also holds an objective.
The Black Templars occupy the Imperial center, positioned around their Warhound Titan. Yet more armored vehicles and Dreads fill the street along with Land Speeders and Predator tanks.
Blessed Hull Landraiders packing Terminators await on the left flank – this is the one part of their battle lines that had an opening for vehicles to slip past the tank traps.
The Orks and
CSM now begin to deploy.
The Green Tide battle formation has been taken, and I start the unenviable task of placing 100 Ork models on the table. Mostly in a vast diagonal line that literally stretches from one side of the board to the other and is over three orks deep. (and well spaced out due to template fear!) Rokkit Buggies and Deffkoptas are also placed in position on the left flank to try to rush the Razorbacks there.
Ork Tankbustas and
CSM Obliterators occupy a central building with an eye for sniping at tanks and maybe dismantling the disruption beacon so as to allow the Ork flankers and
CSM deep strikers an easier time come turn 2-3.
A preponderance of the Nobz in the Green Tide are placed opposite the Landraiders and the open gap in the barricade wall. Also visible is a Loota Wrecking Krew formation, waiting in their Trukks and ready to cause mayhem.
The Green Tide surveys the entrenched Imperial armor. They decide their battle plan is to krump them.
Game on!
All three Landraiders surge forward and disgorge Terminators, Marshalls, and an Emperor’s Champion right into the face of the Green Tide.
The Imperium forces actually decided they didn’t like all that talk of ours about knocking out their Disruption Beacon, and so drop some impressive firepower on the Obliterators and even a few at the Tankbustas. Bad luck (and maybe smart spacing) seeks to hamper their efforts, as even with the Hellhammer firing on the building they only manage to kill 2 Obliterators and 1 Tankbusta.
The four Daemon Princes lurking amongst the Green Tide also get a lot of attention, multiple lascannon blasts, assault cannons, and missile launchers are slammed into them. The Tzeentch Prince doesn’t make it and the other three all end up with a few wounds. As the
CSM player noted – ‘I’m playing against form, I’m absorbing shooting to spare some Orks’
The Warhound’s weapons bark out, blasting apart a Rhino and two Loota Trukks in a blinding flash of firepower. The Loota Krew formation is already almost gone and haven’t even had a turn yet.
The Terminators slam into the Orks, and the entire Green Tide starts shambling towards the far board edge since that’s where the fightin’ is. Templar Termies with Lightning Claws inflict a grievous amount of damage with their re-rolling of to hits and damage, and saw down boyz by the handful, and the Hammers do much the same…not to mention the fearless saves.
There are not as many Boyz as there once were…don’t ask me why all the casualties were pulled from the other side of the battlefield, ask
GW 
The Termies pass most of their saves and walk away with minor losses, the only blow being that Warboss Squatstompa snipped the Emperor’s Champion in half for daring to attack him, and then made rude gestures about it to the other Templars.
As the turn is (finally) handed over to the forces of Orks and
CSM the Ork fast attack elements charge forward. Ready to unleash rokkits into the annoying Razorbacks.
The Tankbustas start slogging forward as well, their rokkits will do nothing versus the armor facing them. In other parts of the map a few Chaos Rhinos chug forward, popping smoke to keep them “safe” from the massive gunline they’re facing.
The
CSM desire to show the Imperium the mistake they made in shooting up their princes and manage to roll low enough to summon their orbital bombardment. There is some intense debate with placement, but we eventually settle on the above configuration. The fury of the Chaos Strike Cruiser in orbit strips the Hellhammer of two structure points, damages a Dreadnaught and, most importantly of all, takes out the disrupter beacon (Njall’s Rhino escapes totally unscathed). Possibly this one moment was one of the most pivotal attacks of the game due to what would come later. The Oblits try to finish off the Hellhammer, but in typical die luck for John, fail to do much of anything.
Ork accuracy does okay as the buggies and deffkoptas manage to shake/stun the Razorbacks on the Imperial right flank. Still have that Long Fang problem though…
Blood for the Blood God! A Demon Prince of Khorne and Nurgle smash into the Templar Crusaders fighting the Green Tide. Last round the Terms had amazing saves and walked away with almost no injuries – this round is much bloodier. One squad of five is totally wiped out, and both of the other two take some casualties. The thin grey line might not be able to hold back the green mob for much longer without support…
It is the Imperium’s turn again, and they seek vengeance – to start with a number of Rhinos and Razorbacks packed with Space Wolves pour in to claim an objective and shoot the hell out of the Ork fast attack elements hurting their armor line.
As the Templar Landraiders reposition even more Terminators appear – a squad of Wolf Guard led by the Great Wolf Logan Grimnar himself appear, also present is the fearsome hammer of Arjac Rockfist. The Wolves howl in glee as the rush into the weakening Ork line (now down to…I dunno, maybe around fifty Orks, but all the Nobs and the Warboss are still there) as well as the two daemon princes.
Some firepower is sent the way of the Tankbustas, but they remain safely ensconced in their hideout. However a landraider is moved close to them to obligate them to deal with it as opposed to shooting at Rhinos or Razorbacks.
Meltaguns and plasmaguns arc out, blasting apart some deffkoptas and dismantling the unit of warbuggies. The Ork’s anti-mech shooting threat is practically removed in one turn. (Dat’s okay, notes Squatstompa, shooting is potentially un-Orky anyway – Waaaagh!)
The Warhound moves up into the gunline in an attempt to stay away from the board edges. Its fearsome firepower will shortly be brought to bear on the Oblits.
Both Super Heavies fire on two Oblits with almost all weapons – the end result is one dead Oblit and one Oblit standing proud and firm. I dub him Superman. Not shown – the Khorne Prince is blasted to pieces by Long Fangs packing missile launchers.
Total carnage. Something along the line of forty Orks are slain in one round of combat as the Templars and the Wolves just go to town on them. The return swings are equally telling, as power klaws and the swings of daemon princes tear through Terminator armor and lay out champions of the chapters.
When fearless saves are resolved the Nurgle Prince falls, as do some Nobs and basically all the boyz, but a solid knot of Nobz and the Warboss yet stand – the Green Tide will not break yet!
After most of the fight is over – Logan Grimnar and Arjac are looking ready to end the beleaguered Orks – what force could possibly stem the tide of such a fury of Terminator assault?
Then it is the 2nd turn for the
CSM and Orks – and their first chance for reserves…ere we go!
The Orks spring their first surprise – a Dread Mob formation composed of 2 Deff Dreads…and 2 Goff Klawstompas! They’re too big to die! Flank marching in without the fear of the disruptor beacon, each Klawstompa is a walking engine of death, one of them holds the two Deff Dreads in its belly, and the other carries a mob of Nob Bikers! The walkers wait inside their Klawstompa, but the Nob warbikers drop the exit ramp and go roaring out, laughing merrily as they sweep down to encircle Njall Stormcaller’s Rhino.
In the corner where the Wolves had wiped out the Ork fast attack and claimed an objective multiple Chaos dreadnaughts stomp out through the mist, screeching in fury as they make to destroy their foes, coming with them comes the lurking forms of Chaos Terminators. Can the wolves hold versus this fearsome host?
The skies darken and the Chaos host goes quiet except for one whispered word – Kharn!
The Betrayer leaps into the fray, heading straight for Logan Grimnar, and promising naught but death.
Fwoosh! A flamebelcha sprays flame across a Long Fang squad, incinerating almost all of them as well as immobilizing a Landspeeder. The other flamebelcha fills one of the floors of the Imperial Bastion holding an objective, and fries another squad of Long Fangs to a fine powdery crisp.
The Klawstompas also go to town with their Grot Missiles launching all of them in a fearsome wave that destroys a Dread, a Rhino, a Predator, and…most importantly, blasts the final structure point off the hellhammer. The Orks in the Klawstompas hoot in glee as the great gun of the Imperial Guard super heavy goes silent.
The forces of Chaos explode some of the Wolf vehicles and precede to blast apart the occupants.
By the time they’re done the Wolf assault on the objective is vastly dulled and Chaos has a firm grip on the location, will the Wolves be able to do anything to prevent a rout on this flank?
The most important assault roll of the game – the Klawstompa is 11 inches away from the Warhound and has to go through difficult terrain…the dice roll…one of them is a six! In a cacophony of clanking joints and smoke belching engines the Klawstompa roils forward like some maniacal god (possibly Mork, maybe Gork…we’re not sure) and locks its klaws onto the Warhound who quickly replies ‘do not want!’
In the assault phase the Klawstompa easily dispatches the Warhound (1 attack amd
WS 2 versus 8 attacks on the charge and
WS 4 with
Str D close combat attacks – ouch!) Though, for the second time that game I fail to generate even an explosion (much less an apocalyptic one) by wrecking a superheavy. Ah well – next time.
Meanwhile, the war of Orks and Terminators (and Kharn) continues.
Here is a sad example of a Terminator thundershield save roll versus klaws.
Kharn dispatches Logan Grimnar (and an Ork boy…)
The Nob Bikers shred open the Rhino and bellow in happy glee as they sit circled around the wolves inside.
The Tankbustas happily took up the Landraider on its challenge (after all, with those weedy Lootas acting like they’re good at wrecking vehicles the tankbustas have to show them how to do it propa!) One Tankbusta bomb manages the 6 to hit and…bang! Explodes the Landraider. A Tankbusta dies in the resulting explosion but all of the others happily agree it was well worth it.
Things look grim for the Imperium, but they have one more wave of reserves – and there are yet more Wolves yet to appear.
This wave of Landspeeders and a Rhino truck in to eyeball the rear armor of one of the smoke belching Klawstompas, intent on taking the hulking warmachine apart with focused melta fire.
You can also see a Dread storming towards the same Klawstompa, as well as some more Space Wolves showing up to deal with the Nob Bikers.
The lay of the land at the top of Turn 3.
In the foreground you can see the Klawstompa incursion into the delicate gunline.
To the bottom left you can see the Land Raiders near the big Ork/Termie/Kharn brawl (note that you don’t see 100+ Orks on the field anymore
)
In the center you can see the building where the Tankbustas charged out of to deal with a Landraider – on top of this building yet sits SuperObliterator.
The upper right corner is the site of the strategic location the Space Wolves are battling with Chaos Dreads and Terms for.
A closer look at that side battle (it really was almost its own little isolated fight from the main battle lines) you can see some reserve Wolf Guard Termies have Flank Marched in to deal with the Chaos forces along with the ragged remains of the Wolf assault force (they’re also aided by some Long Fangs and a Dread in a nearby ruin visible in the foreground.
A true tidal wave of melta, lascannon, and assault cannon firepower is brought to bear on the Klawstompas as the Imperial lines focus all their attention on the foreboding avatars of Orky might. However, due to the Dredd Mob Formation the Orks have (kunningly) installed a Kustom Force Field on the lead Klawstompa, and the two super walkers suffer only minimal damage.
For the Emperor!
Some Templars rush forward to engage the Klawstompa along with a pair of Dreadnaughts. They manage to inflict some more damage upon it and strip off two structure points as well as silencing all of its guns (noooo! My flamebelcha!).
In exchange the Klawstompa rips off the
CCW from one Dread and…well…whiffs all of its swings on the other.
The once impregnable gunline is looking less secure with the two Klawstompas still active within their defensive line.
Mostly forgotten (I even forgot to shoot them once or twice) the last Loota Trukk continues to race forward, along with some plague zombies (summoned daemons) who lay claim to the objectives near the map center – the Imperial defensive line making it hard for them to get out to contest those points.
Arjac stands as the last survivor versus Kharn, a Warboss, and half a dozen Nobz. Needless to say, he is slain by Kharn before the others can even swing (and Kharn also kills a few Orks…we asked him about it and he replied that if we thought he was underperforming he could always kill more Orks.)
The bottom of Turn 3 and the final round for the game.
As currently stands the Imperium holds 3 Objectives.
The Orks and
CSM hold 2.
1 Objective is contested.
Even more Chaos Terminators stalk out into the private Wolf/
CSM brawl as Chaos vows to wipe the Wolves out and secure the objective.
The small side engagement for a point has expanded into what would otherwise be called a full game of
40k, as basically full armies of
CSM and Wolves vie for supremecy.
Waaaagh! An Ork battlewagon appears from reserve, smashing into the rear of a Razorback and wrecking it as the Orks and Big Mek inside spring forth to start tromping towards the Wolf Iron Priest and his Servitors and Rhino.
Another Battlewagon arrives, smashing into the Imperial Bastion as Ghazkhull Thraka and his mob of Orks storm up towards the objective secreted on the third level. Ghaz also declares his Waaagh, to ensure that all the last minute Ork assaults will have all the speed they need. WAAAAGH!!!!
Not pictured – a third Battlewagon rolled in and lit up a Space Wolf squad, basically killing it down to just two men.
The Flamebelcha does damage to the entire Landspeeder line and the Rhino as well as incinerating the Wolves who had gotten out of their precious metal box.
Kharn, the Ork Warboss, and a Chaos Dread engage a Wolf Dread – Kharn smashes not only the Wolf Dread, but also the Chaos Dread as well as he lays about him causing absolute devestation. Warboss Squatstompa is heard to note that Kharn might be more stompy than a big mob of boyz.
The Big Mek’s mob tear apart the Iron Priest and his accompaniment.
The Klawstompas go on a merry rampage through the gunline, wrecking 2 Dreadnaughts and a Predator and lobbing the flaming wrecks around the battlefield in evil glee at the carnage they were causing.
But now the game was being called, and it became a question of who had won?
Ghaz and his boyz storm the top level of the bastion, shredding apart the Wolves there and claiming the precious strategic point.
Chaos/Orks – 1
Imperium – 0
The Black Templar still hold the objective at the center of the Imperium gunline.
Chaos/Orks – 1
Imperium – 1
The huge side battle ends in a stalemate – as one lone Wolf Guard manages to hold his ground and contest the objective in the name of the Emperor.
Chaos/Orks – 1
Imperium – 1
Contested - 1
Chaos holds the center point in No Man’s land.
The remains of the Green Tide (yes, that’s it) holds the objective that had once been held by the Landraiders.
Chaos holds the home Ork/Chaos point, and it was a Vital Objective and worth two.
The Loota Wrecking Krew had floored their Trukk and hustled across the waste to the site of the Hellhammer tank, claiming it in the name of lootin’, the wrecked super heavy became an objective and the Orks held it. The Mek announces that he can picture it now, it will be very big, and mostly blue, and stompy and shooty, very very shooty.
Chaos/Orks – 7
Imperium – 1
Contested - 1
A massive rout – and the winners are Chaos and the Orks!
MVP for the Imperium
The Imperium army was very
MSU-y so it is a little tough to really do a central callout. I suppose I would want to peg it as ‘the gunline situation’ as when they first set up with their beacon and tank traps and just a bloody wall of armor and long range guns facing us it felt like there was never a chance for Team Evil. A more specific call out might need to go to the odd 16 Black Templar Termies who assaulted 90 Boyz, 10 Nobz, and a Warboss and basically slew around 60 or so Orks all by themselves and held the line even as Daemon Princes slogged into the combat – that was a lot of killing and they basically plugged the only access to the gunline for 2 rounds – just the image of 16 Terminators versus a wave of Orks was visually and mentally appealing and thus gets the nod from me.
MVP for Chaos/Orks
SuperObliterator endures…
The Obliterators did a gem for us – they actually never really killed much of anything, but somehow were amped up in Team Imperial’s minds enough that they spent an inordinate amount of firepower on them and *still* failed to remove the little blighters. By Turn 2 I sort of felt some of the shots at them were just from annoyance that they weren’t dead yet.
A strong secondary shout out goes to the Klawstompas. Prior to their arrival there was (at least in this Ork commander) a serious question of how things were going to go for us. However, after their arrival it almost felt like there was no question that we would kill everything if given but another turn or two. They racked up a kill tally of 3 Dreads, 2 Predators, a Rhino, 2 Landspeeders, and an odd 15 or so Marines of various types.
I’ll also note that the Flamebelcha is one of the, hands down, best weapons for Orks ever. No ‘to hit roll’ and it’s a
Str 6(!) and AP3, which means it’s basically assured death for any Marines caught outside of transports…and it’s even pretty good versus light vehicles and just has a shockingly huge threat range and that Hellstorm template is *awesome*.
WTF for the Imperium
Their Super Heavies. Just…just the super heavies. Neither of them ended up fulfilling the expected promise of their points, and I’m betting by Turn 2 both of the Imperial Generals would have happily traded those suckers in for some Hammer packing Terms and a few more Preds. They just suffered some ‘meh’ shooting and a few lackluster scatters and never managed to inflict much damage.
WTF for Chaos/Orks
I’ll admit I expected more from both the Loota Krew and the Green Tide…though to be honest neither did ‘bad’ per se, I just wanted them to do better (though in the Krew’s defense, they were sort of hit by D Weapons before they even got a move phase…)
For Chaos I’ll call out a DSing Oblit squad. Now, the two squads in the building did *great* But a third squad DSed in to put a hurt on a Dread. They had one of them die thanks to Njall’s storm power, then missed with their melta shot, and then died as some random squad just fired once at them and took a potshot at them. Just…what were they doing exactly? Not much, that’s what.
Regards,
Thor.
(Fantasy I miss you)
Yeah, we *still* haven't had an apocalyptic boom yet, but I'm sure it's just a matter of time...