Hi all
This is Game 6 of 6, vs Grey Knights
Because im a spastic at posting photos please have a look at the photos on the bottom then read the report, I think it will be more digestable that way.
Tournament Game 1 –
SM victory over Space Wolves
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/431321.page
Tournament Game 2 –
SM loss to Dark Angels
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/431582.page
Tournament game 3 –
SM loss to Daemons
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/431611.page
Tournament game 4 –
SM victory over Iron Hands (vanilla) Space Marines
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/431617.page
Tournament game 5 –
SM victory over
CSM
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/432490.page#3960955
Setting
Clash of the Titans is a yearly tournament in Sydney Australia. There is no score component for how competitive your list is, so its regarded as the place to max out your codex in a competitive environment. This year points available were 1850 with six games variously table quarters, objective and kill points.
My List
I chose a list that was themed around organic elements to a Space Marine rifle company, in my case second company Aurora chapter. I wanted no ‘chapter’ assets, whether librarian, first company veterans or armoured elements that would come from the chapter pool, such as speeders, vindicators or raiders. As such this list was certainly not optimised and one many would regard with near contempt. Given the nature of this tournament, if this list held its own, then I figured I had a right to say the humble Tactical Marine, even though he constantly forgets his chainsword, is certainly solid and reliable. We will see.
Captain with Relic Blade, Plasma Pistol
10 Tactical Marines with Combiplasma, Powerfist, Plasmagun, Lascannon
10 Tactical Marines with Combimelta, Powerfist, Meltagun, Lascannon in rhino with dozer blade and Hunter Killer missile
10 Tactical Marines with Combimelta, Powerfist, Meltagun, Lascannon in rhino with dozer blade and Hunter Killer missile
10 Tactical Marines with Power Axe and Plasma Pistol, Meltagun, Lascannon in Razorback with Twinlinked Heavy Bolters
10 Tactical Marines with Combiflamer, Powerfist, Flamer, Lascannon in rhino with dozer blade and Hunter Killer missile
8 Devastators with 4 Plasma Cannons
7 Devastators with 4 Missile Launchers
His List – the covers pages and pages, so although its frustrating im going to type out what I think he bought so you can tell whats here
Grey Knight Grand Master in terminator armour with psyk-out blind, psychotroke and rad grenades, nemesis force sword and storm bolter, psyker level 1 with the Aegis, Hammerhand and psychic communion
Librarian in terminator armour with brain mines, nemesis force sword and storm bolter, psyker level 2, the Aegis, Hammerhand, Might of Titan, Quicksilver, Sanctuary and The Shrouding
5 Paladins in terminator armour withbrotherhood of psykers, Aegis, Hammerhand and holocaust, 2 psycannons, 3 halberds, a sword and one daemon hammer
10 Grey Knight Strike Squad with 2 psycannons, psyk-out grenades, the aegis,
HH and Warp Quake
5 Grey Knight Terminators with the Aegis and
HH with an incinerator, 4 force swords and a halberd
Stormraven gunship with ceramite plating, 4 mindstrike missiles,
TL multimelta,
TL Lascannon, psychic pilot, shadow skies, the Aegis and Fortitude
Dreadnought with psybolt ammo, two
TLAC with psychic pilot, reinforced aegis, the aegis and fortitude
Dreadnought with psybolt ammo, two
TLAC with psychic pilot, reinforced aegis, the aegis and fortitude
Nemesis Dreadknight with dreadknight armour, personal teleporter, doomfist, heavy incinerator, daemonhammer, psyker 1 the aegis, dark excommunication and hammerhand
Mission – Objectives (primary), Table Quarters (secondary) and Kill Points (tertiary)
Primary parameter was worth the most total battle points and determined the winner.
Deployment – Spearhead
I win the rolloff and deploy a very defensive position where he needs to come through a very open area
He rolls and one of his dreads and his paladins become scoring (so now he had 4 scoring units)
His paladins and the grand master are going to deepstrike as at the
GK strike squad, the terminators and libby deploy in the stormraven right at the edge of the board
The two dreads are at extreme range in cover
The dreadknight is hiding behind that massive piece of cover in the centre of the table that I cannot see through.
His attempt to seize fails
Turn 1 A
All his units are very far away so I fire all three
HK missiles at that SR. Oh how I would love to bring it down! Two hit but both bounce off.
One of my lascannons is in range of his dreads and penetrates it but it makes cover.
He moves his dreadknight 6, still behind that building in t he centre.
His dreads climb into the building they hiding in.
The storm raven moves 24` on the far edge of the board.
Hi first dread glances one of my rhinos, which I save.
His second dread destroys one of my rhinos.
His storm raven uses
POMS to fire but misses.
Turn 2
I hit his storm raven with a lascannon and penetrate it, but his libby uses one of his powers to give it a 3++ cover save, which it makes. The libby rolled snakes eyes on the psych test and takes a wound.
Two lascannons miss the dreadknight
My plasmacannons drops two wounds on the dreadknight, saving a gets hot result along the way.
I put 4 krak missiles into the storm raven, 2 penetrate, one is saved by cover but one gets through. Oh PLEASE KILL
IT! I roll 2... which it ignores if it passes a
LD test (which is does). Sigh.
His paladins and the grand master scatter about 1´ away from my defensive position. Oh no.
The strike squad is still getting their hair done and is not ready to join the fun.
His dreadknight shunts behind my forward line into the middle of my defensive position.
The storm raven shrugs off my pathetic penetrating hit, moves 24 towards me, is now mid board.
His knight flamers my plasma cannons and the razorback, the razor takes cannot shoot, a plasma cannon and bolter marine die.
His paladins holocaust causing 7 wounds and 5 dead marines in one of my squads.
One of his dreads stuns a vehicle.
The othe dread kills a marine.
His storm raven immobilised a rhino with its
TLLC.
Turn 3
OK I have a bunch of
GK paladins in terminator armour, with a grand master in terminator armour, on the doorstep of a tactical marine company with no working vehicles..
I put 2 melta wounds on the paladins, he rolls two 6s and smiles.
I fire my combiplama/plasma squad at the paladins. Like last game, my powerfist SGT kills himself with a combimelta gets hot! He is not coming to battle again.
The squad puts 4 wounds on the paladins, two wounds are saved, one paladin and the grand master each take a wound (grand master now 2 wounds).
My captain takes the last wound off the dreadknight and kills it.
My plasmacannons open up on the paladins. First shot incinerates two Aurora tactical marines, the rest put 5 wounds on the paladins, 4 of which save with their 5++ invul! 4 paladins left.
In hope I put 4 krak missiles into the Storm Raven (carrying the wounded libby and some terminators) and I get a pen and a glance. He rolls and fails both cover saves! I roll for damage... 1 for the glance, and 1 for the pen.
I shrivel a little bit on the inside because I now know im about to take a terminator assault at two points next turn.
Turn 4
Hi
GKs strikers come in.
The storm raven shrugs off yet another stun, moves 12, drops its ramp next to my flamer squad and out step terminators.
His libby uses a power to make the initiative 10, rolls yet another perils of the warp, and dies! But they are initiative 10 power weapons..
His storm raven multimeltas and
TLLC my razorback, resulting in a stun.
A dakka dread kills a rhino.
His paladins does a joint assault on my plasma squad (whose SGT Gets Hotted himself in the last two games) and my combimelta/melta squad- they use special grenades, consult a chart (he rolls 6) and my marines have to roll their initiative or hit their own squad (only one hits his mate) while the other squad gifts the paladins a reroll to hit and become T3. He also gets off hammerhand so is S5.
I take catastrophic casualties before we get to initiative 1 weapons. My SGT wipes out a paladin (three left) before the remainder of both of my squads are wiped out.
His paladins consolidate closer to me, in cover.
His other terminators (ex Libby) assault with hammer hand and initative 10. Somehow they fluff it and only kill 1 marine.
I hit back and inflict 4 wounds, all saved, my fist then smashes another but he saves on a 4++. I pass
LD.
Yes that turn of his cost me around 500 points of damage.
I move nothing, not that I have much mobility left.
My plasma cannons fire on the paladins in cover, cause 4 wounds, two are saved with cover saves, 2 wounds bring a paladin down (two left).
My bolters cause another 2 wounds! (one more paladin)
My captain and the combat squad (SGT has a power weapon and plasma pistol) shoot at the terminators. The SGT gets a Gets Hot roll and dies. Yep loving that plasma. The captain and melta each cause a wound, while the bolters cause a further 7 wounds. The last paladin dies.
I put 4 krak rounds into the storm raven, even if its delivered its payload, I figure I dont like it. All 4 missiles miss.
In assault his terminators on my left flank (storm raven delivered) kill 3, I cause 2 wounds back and a power fist wound, all saved. My squad fails leadership and leaves the field of battle.
Turn 5
His two normal units move closer to me.
I cop storm bolters from his terminators, take two armour saves and fail both.
His Grand Master charges my
ML devastators with hammer hand. His grenades mean he will be auto hitting on me and my guys are T3. 2 of my guys die, the squad falls back.
On my left, the normal terminators assault my remaining combimelta/melta squad. He kills 2 at initiative 6, another 2 at initiative 4. I cause a wound back (saved) before the powerfist SGT rolls snakes eyes to hit. To add insult to injury they fail their
LD and run off the board.
I line my plasmacannons up on the terminators and fire. One plasmacannon marine dies to gets hot, my third casualty from plasma this game. The others hit 6 times, cause 5 wounds, killing the Justicar and 2 terminators.
My razorback is back in action and puts 2 wounds on the terminators, both saved.
My captain assaults his grand master. The
GM uses grenades which drops my initiative to 1. Our officers each put a wound on the other (im 2 wounds, his
GM is 1), combat drawn.
Turn 6
His grey knights pass leadership.
His storm raven kills both my remaining vehicles.
I kill his grand master
I fire my remaining plasma cannons at the terminators. Another devastator dies from gets hot, my fourth gets hot casualty this game (combiplasma powerfist SGT, powerweapon plasma pistol SGT, and 2 plasma cannons)! The master of the forge will pay.
The remaining 2 plasma cannons cause 2 wounds on the terminators, plus the bolter ablatives put another 2 wounds on the terminators, resulting in the remaining terminators succumbing.
I have successfully killed all his paladins, terminators and both his terminator clad
HQ (well the libby killed himself with psychic powers, but still!)
End of game, victory to grey knights.
Concluding remarks
Victory points were 1387 to him and 1155 to me. I think this tells a good story. Had I bought the storm raven down, even on the last turn, this would have been even. The reality was I gave as good as I got, even though he fought a great battle that resulted in all his units hitting mine as and when he wanted them to. Yes I lost more kill points, and he dominated 2 quarters to my one, but in sheer damage caused the tacticals actually did ok. He told me at the end I was the second opponent to have killed all the paladins and the only opponent who had killed all his terminator wearing models.
Yes I acknowledge its a very valid game plan to ensure I have to castle up and defend against terminators while his scoring models go and claim the board.
Wow those
GK have a mean assault! The sheer scope of their grenades and psychic powers was awesome. My opponent was very polite and really tried to ensure I followed what was going on (which I really appreciated) yets it honestly felt like there was no hope taking those guys in close combat.
His
TLAC dreads were great this game. They were superbly placed right at the edge of 48´ and in cover, so half my lascannons were out of range and some of those in range were totally obscured by the massive building in the centre of the board. Equally his use of the storm raven, keeping it out of range of all but the
HK missiles till I was pretty well engaged elsewhere, was excellent.
Had that librarian not killed himself, im sure he would have caused more problems for me with those terminators.
All in all the
GK left me with a sense that I dont want to tangle with them again.
This was the last game using my tacticals at this tournament and here are my overall thoughts of a
tac heavy army.
1. With no heavy armour my light vehicles were routinely smashed aside by
AT weapons. If I was going to do a similar army with no heavy armour, I will need to rethink my mobility. Librarian, drop pod, foot.
2. No more plasma on critical models. Power weapons and powerfists are not the place to concentrate plasma risk. Its 5.5% chance for a power armour model to turn into a casualty from gets hot, yet as you saw in my last game, 4 critical models did just that. Gamblers Fallacy is real.
3. Even though I had powerfists in the squads, I tried to win using bolters. Massed fire cannot be relied upon, assuming it can be coordinated. The
DA episode proved this. I needed a mobile hammer to hit whatever bait he puts down, flooding bolters on the enemy worked some times, other times it failed with terrible repercussions.
4. 4 plasma cannons are good, but they will not solve heavy armour alone.
5. 4 missile launchers is good, not great.
6. Captains with relic blades are very good.
Thank you for reading my battle reports, I hope there was something useful for you to take away from my mixed experiences here.
Best of luck and happy hobbying.
