Hello! So, I've been busy turning by Renegade Guard army into a Warp Cult force over here - - so that I could attend the Scorched Earth tournament this past weekend at Firestorm Games in Cardiff. This was a five-game, 2250pt Horus Heresy tournament run by The Imperial Truth podcast.
After much frantic last-minute painting, here's the list I took:
Primary Detachment - Imperialis Militia & Cults
HQ: Force Commander - Warlord, Cult Demagogue, Hand Flamer, Provenances: Cult Horde, Tainted Flesh - 130
HQ: Rogue Psyker - Alpha Psyker - 60
HQ: Rogue Psyker - 35
TROOPS: Inducted Levy Squad - +20 models, Auxilia Pistols - 80
TROOPS: Inducted Levy Squad - +20 models, Auxilia Pistols - 80
TROOPS: Inducted Levy Squad - +20 models, Auxilia Rifles - 80
HEAVY: Auxilia Malcador - Turret Twin-linked Lascannon, Hull Demolisher, Sponson Lascannons, Siege Armour - 295
HEAVY: Auxilia Malcador - Turret Twin-linked Lascannon, Hull Demolisher, Sponson Lascannons, Siege Armour - 295
HEAVY: Mutant Spawn - +6 models - 235
FORTIFICATION: Aegis Defense Line - Icarus Lascannon - 85
Allied Detachment - Word Bearers
HQ: Zardu Layak - 175
ELITES: Legion Terminator Squad - Cataphractii Armour, 1 Plasma Blaster, 1 Lightning Claw, 1 Power Axe, 2 Thunder Hammers, 1 Dual Lightning Claws - 230
TROOPS: Legion Tactical Squad - 150
FAST: Anvlllus-pattern Dreadclaw Drop Pod - 100
HEAVY: Deredeo Dreadnought - Anvillus Autocannons, Aiolos Missile Launcher - 220
TOTAL POINTS - 2250
The aim was to go for maximum summoning, so I had a batch of Daemons with me. All in all, this was 150 models before summoning, which frightened everybody suitably. I only managed to get in one practise game, which was also my first ever game of Heresy, and although we learned a few things from it and could make some obvious list changes, I'd already submitted the list! On we go.
The event was at Firestorm Games in Cardiff, Wales, which was one of the biggest hobby centres I've ever been in. Ridiculously well-stocked with a ton of tables (with sideboards!) and lovely terrain. There was space for our 30-man tournament and we hardly took up a fifth of the space!
Game 1 - Word Bearers / Warp Cult So, it seems I was deliberately paired against another player for the first game who had bought a similar list to me. Chris Gent had primary Word Bearers with Lorgar Transfigured, a Fire Raptor and Drop Pods, with an allied force of 80 Warp Cult crazies. It was a very competitive list, and went on to win the Traitor side of the tournament!
We started lined up, and I got the Infiltrate Warlord trait, but then stupidly misused it, and ended up giving him the charge on everything. This wasn't neccesarily the worst bit though, as I also managed to Possess Zardu Layak into a Daemon Prince on turn 1, inadvertantly giving him First Blood!! I also had a hard time dealing with Lorgar (with a 2+ re-rollable save due to selecting Precognition) who, in a Drop Pod with a Chaplain, Flamer squad and Cult Commander, wiped out another squad of Cultists.
Unfortunately, because of all our models and it being first game of the day, we only managed to get to the end of turn two, and he was at that point ahead by one objective. If I could win a central Cultist vs Cultist massive combat I could force a draw, but despite throwing in all the Spawn and a Keeper of Secrets, a couple of his Cultists survived and nobody could hold the objective. First loss to me!
Game 2 - Space Wolves The second game was lots of fun - against Jason Mullins (of The Overlords) and his Space Wolves. He had a Wolf Lord in a Spartan, a Sicaran AND a Scarab Venator, a Contemptor and a couple of big, 20-man squads on foot. We played a Relic mission with Hammer & Anvil deployment.
This started out much, much better. My whole line moved forward, crippling a good few of his tanks and the dreadnought, and swarming onto the objectives. Spawn zoomed up and tarpitted some of the units, but again we were hampered by the amount of models, and only got to turn four, which meant that a lot of things (like summoned Daemons) couldn't get forwards enough to do anything. In the end, with a very successful Turn Four, Jason's big squad managed to kill all the spawn and steamroll onto an objective, while I failed lots of charges to rescue the Relic from his Wolf Lord. Another loss, but a very fun game, with the tide of battle swinging massively from one player to the other.
Game 3 - Night Lords Jason Gayland's Night Lords were another scary Primarch-based army, with Kurze, a Praetor and a big Raptor squad, supported by three Terror Squads in Drop Pods and some Terminators in a Dreadclaw. It was a beautifully painted army, really fun to play against. We played a Table-Quarters mission.
I started by castling up in my quarter beind the Aegis line, which meant that (after the first turn) I could pick off the odd Contemptor and wait for Terror squads to start dropping. Zardu narrowly survived being assassinated by a Terror squad who were taking advantage of the loophole in the Legion Drop Pod rules to stay inside and not bother disembarking! Needless to say, the Cultists came over the line and took them to bits, and then Kurze finally committed and started wading through them. With some reserve Cultists coming in and taking out another squad, and my Terminators getting behind his lines to hold his (now empty) quarter, I won by a big margin, but it was a fun game, and Kurze certainly shredded a ton of my useless goons. It was also the first game where we actually got to the end!
Game 4 - Solar Auxilia Oh dear. This was bad. Joe McGough had brought a fantastic tank-heavy Solar Auxilia army, including a big Techpriest squad with Haywire grenade launchers, three Russes with Volkite turrets, two Dracosans, Thudd Guns and the Malcador Infernos, which meant we had five Malcador Hulls on the table! It was a pretty reasonably list against a Marine list, focussing on getting tons of tons of low-
AP shots and forcing the Marines to take loads of saves. Unfortunately, against my goons, every shot was instant death!
We started out badly, with infiltrating grenades taking out a Malcador in his turn 1, and the Infernus template taking out my Tacticals, a load of Cultists and Zardu Layak at the same time. It wasn't until a turn later we realised that we'd been using the Template rules wrong and Zardu and the Marines should have survived! By then was too late. We were playing Kill Points, and though my Terminators and Cultists wiped out a fair few units (even with reduced numbers) I couldn't compete with his volume of fire. Of particular note was 40 Cultists running in from reserves, only for the three Leman Russes to wipe out 35 of them in a single turn of shooting! Another loss!
Game 5 - World Eaters Game 5 was a fun one against Alex Orford's World Eaters - Kharn and mates in a Spartan, Red Butchers in a Land Raider, and a few Tactical squads including a Scorpuis and some Basilisks in the backfield to scare my Cultists! We were playing an Objective game with all the objectives relatively central and points scored at the end of each TURN for holding them.
I started with the Infiltrate Warlord trait, which gave me a bit of an advantage as I was able to move onto objectives really early in the game. Kharn got bogged down in combat against the spawn for almost the entire game, with summoned Daemons being thrown in to make sure the combat never ended, and Terminators and Daemons running around the backfield to make sure the Tacticals at the back couldn't do much. This left the Cultists free to hold the central objectives for most of the game, and even a charge by the Red Butchers couldn't help - six Red Butchers charged into a full Cultist squad and immediately suffered ten Rending wounds, removing most of the squad without a chance to attack!
So, another fun game, but definitely skewed by way from the start, and another win.
Conclusions
So, that was fun, but I don't think I'll be bringing another horde of that size to a tournament any time soon - almost every game went to time and two we didn't really get half way with! Zardu was fun, but summoning was erratic and not really as scary as it could have been. The issue was often getting him far enough forward to actually allow the summoned units to get into combat - not helped by the short games. I also need to paint up some Icons so that I can worry less about scatters, which are a real issue with that many bodies on the board.
I found playing these five games of Heresy much LESS tiring than regular
40k tournaments I've been to. Possibly this was because of the sort of lists - there were lots of really tough lists, but nothing of the Wraithknight-spam sort of thing that can really annoy you in
40k tournaments. Even with the games where I was at a disadvantage, I felt that I knew roughly what everything did and had at least a chance of winning against it, and most of my losses were because of stupid mistakes I made or games ending too soon rather than because the lists skewed the game too much.
Organisation was good, with lots of prizes, but there were a few annoying loopholes in the rules, not helped by the weird missions, and I got the impression that the
TO was putting dodgy matches together for a laugh. I know that it was their first go, though, and they're planning to do more, so all that will probably improve. My army got a good response, with many people very impressed by some of the conversions (or just the scale) - though I felt there were a few people who were a bit purist about the number of conversion parts and lack of 'original'
FW stuff - par for the course at these sort of events I suppose.
Anyway, a fun time was had by all, and I'd definitely try a Heresy tournament again - just with a smaller army!
