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I headed to Borderlands in Greenville, SC on Saturday with my newly acquired FW Thunderhawk Gunship "Wings of Fury" and 2000 additional points of Black Templars.

Borderlands is a great store with plenty of gaming tables and a full selection of GW and other miniatures games--plus people to play against. Check it out if you're in the area!

The game was organized by the store owner. There were three other players ready to go at start time, with 3000 points per player. One player had brought Black Templars & Witch Hunters, so we were placed on a team vs an unholy alliance of Tau and Codex Space Marines (with He'stan).

A shiver went down my spine as I saw what the Tau player had available: a Tiger Shark AX-10 and a Barracuda! The Tiger Shark is a super-heavy with a twin-linked heavy railgun: a Destroyer weapon! And the Barracuda had an anti-aircraft twin linked ion cannon. The Thunderhawk would have to be careful!

We bid 4 minutes and they bid 3, somewhat unfortunately they would get first turn (the owner ixnayed Sieze the Initiative).

The goal was to control six objectives at various positions on the board. Modified 4th edition rules were used for scoring: all units were scoring, at above 50% strength or equivalent.

Numerous buildings crowded both sides of much of no man's land. My teammate's forces occupied the buildings facing off against numerous Devilfish and Battlesuits. I placed my Land Raider Crusader towards the middle and a Dreadnought in a bit of cover. A five-man squad with Plasma Cannon occupied an objective in the southwest (I face north).

The Thunderhawk would carry Helbrecht and a Command Squad, a Venerable Dreadnought and an Assault Squad led by a Chaplain. My plan, formed earlier in the week, was to enter with a combined Drop Run (Assault Squad) and Bombing Run, then hover and let loose Helbrecht and Dread. The Blind Barrage asset would protect the Hawk while hovering. Keep reading to see what happened.

While we were deploying a fifth player came in, shortly followed by another. One joined us with Black Templars (yep that's right), the other had Space Marines. All their forces were put into Strategic Reserve, and they did not receive assets (punctuality counts ).

The Tiger Shark roars in on the first turn thanks to the Careful Planning asset. The Tau advance some, then unleash a predictably deadly barrage. The Tiger Shark nukes my Land Raider, and Grimaldus and squad inside are reduced to roughly half strength. My Dreadnought is also wrecked.

On our turn, my partner advances on the far west. My EC with Grimaldus blows up a Devilfish, which causes a Fire Warrior squad to fall back. Generally speaking we don't accomplish a whole lot.

On their 2nd turn they bring in the Barracuda, Hammerheads and Devilfish to the east, and a fair number of Marines including bikes, all across the battle line. Their shooting dominates the middle "city" section, except the far west where Teammate 1 has quite a force advancing on an objective.

I make to bring in the Thunderhawk on our turn, but as I suspected they have taken the Long Range Ack-Ack asset--I must disengage or take hits. The thought of the hawk getting blown up early (with stuff inside) is too much, so I hold off. Teammate 2 brings a heapload of Rhinos with Templars (far from the line though) and Drop Pod Dreads. He also brings in a Land Speeder with multi-melta which blows up the Barracuda--huzzah! Now if we could do something about the Tiger Shark!

They bring the rest of everything on--heaps of Marines mostly. I am furiously looking for a bombing corridor but there just isn't enough room to land on their side of the table. Generally speaking they are dominating the kill ratio, but we still are doing fine with objectives.

The Thunderhawk arrives! Teammate 2 recommends bringing the Hawk in Hover Mode. We think we can neutralize the Tiger Shark with both his Land Raider and my Hawk--its AVs are all 10. (You may say that the Hawk can only move 6" in Hover Mode, not enough to bring it onto the board--let's just say we weren't playing the tightest game.) The Hawk lands in the central south, unleashing Helbrecht and the Dreadnought directly in front of two traitorous Terminator Squads! The Blind Barrage is released in front of the Hawk, blocking all significant ground shooting.

Teammate 2's LRC manages a Gun Crew Shaken result against the Tiger Shark's railgun--but the sophisticated Primary Weapon Systems avoid damage on a 4+. (My opponent didn't know this rule--can I get a karma point for honesty?) My Hawk's lascannon scores a penetrating hit--but again he makes his 4+ obscured save (for flyers). (My Turbo-Laser is a blast weapon and can't target a flyer.)

Helbrecht single-handedly kills three Terminators, wiping one squad, and the Ven. Dread. wipes out the other. I also have a five-man Termie Squad teleport and shoot at Battlesuits to no effect--not good.

And now comes the pivotal turn for the Thunderhawk--will it survive the Tiger Shark? The Tiger Shark rolls to hit (twin-linked BS4) ... a 3 and a 1. Now the damage roll (automatic pen)... a 6!... then another 6! red alert! ... then a 4 which costs the Thunderhawk its last Structure Point and cause it to explode apocalyptically! Helbrecht's squad is nearly wiped out and the Dread loses its Assault Cannon. The Assault Squad inside just takes S4 hits for being in a transport... beardy I know but there you have it.

So thus ends the Thunderhawk's debut. My Terminator Squad is shot up by Battlesuits, reducing it to 1 model who is slain by a Dreadnought.

I'll summarize the rest of the game (six total turns). My surviving Assault Marines held an objective until the Tiger Shark submunitioned all but two models. Teammate 2 had a squad in a Rhino retake that objective. But my 5-man squad with PC held one objective with three men at the end of the game. Our opponents' forces broke through our line but couldn't get to our back objectives. Teammate 1 entered a war of attrition in combat with traitorous Marines and contested their far west objective. Teammate 2 had a Dreadnought that survived all kinds of Marine fire in the far east (China?) and so contested that objective.

VICTORY: BLACK TEMPLARS WITH ALLIED ORDO HERETICUS (2+ to 0)

In retrospect it was perhaps too risky to use Hover Mode with that Tiger Shark weapon, although his rolling so well was unlikely (< 3%?). I think I'll only use Assault Marines in the future for Drop Runs and not mess with Hover Mode.

Here are a bunch of pictures. P.S. I know my teammate's names but I like to keep things private.

Damn. Wish I'd a gone.

Sounds like it was alot of fun. I'm Sorry I missed it.

Ah. The Deus Ex Machina-Pattern Tiger Shark, the one the Tau pulled out of their asses during the Taros campaign despite never having successfully faced Titans before or since, yet somehow they had a unique aircraft that was perfect for felling Warhounds. Sorry... there are parts of Imperial Armour III's story that are more than normal GW stupid.


Honestly though, I'm digging the old-school terrain. A Bastion, and even the plastic Fort from Heroquest or whatever the mass-release Warhammer game was called. Even Mordheim stuff.

One question though - why is there half a planet on the table?

BYE

I saw that planet...interesting touch.

looks like a fun game, you told it better with words than the pictures. though it was cool to see the battlefield.

glad you guys still won. long may the hawk fly!!

I just love where you have all those painted models on the table, and then BOOM there's this primer-black Tigershark.

Shame, shame I tell you. If you're going to spend $500 on a forgeworld piece, have the decency to paint it before bringing it into a battle.

Normally, I'm not that hardcore about the painted model thing. If my opponents are fielding a new unit and it's not painted yet, hey, whatever, we're going to have fun.

But, there's something about playing with an unpainted forgeworld super heavy that just screams "I put my wallet on the gaming table", and leaves me with a bad feeling.

One question though - why is there half a planet on the table?

Isn't it obviously a warp rift that affects psyker powers? Hmm, not too many psykers among Tau and BT, and the SMs didn't bring any Librarians. But it was also an objective. It's probably for BFG.

I just love where you have all those painted models on the table, and then BOOM there's this primer-black Tigershark.

Nah, go easy on him. He had everything else painted, including IG and Baneblade that he didn't use in this game. You'll notice that my Teammate 2 brought LEGO Rhinos, oldschool Rhinos with broken turrets--pretty much nothing worthy of putting on the table. That did irritate me some.

I noticed I didn't use Blind Barrage quite right. You put it on at the beginning of a Game Turn. If I had done it right I could have fired my Destroyer weapon at something--not the Tiger-Shark though, as it's a Blast. So it just goes to show that you have to study all the various rules carefully.

I kind of petered out in my post since it takes me a while to write up things. At the end of the game I only had about ~7 models left so there wasn't much to report for my actions.

Thanks for the comments!

Looks like a great game! Nice write up and good pics. I bet it was fun as can be!

I didn't see that Rhino made of lego. Wow, just wow.

Dang, wish I'd been in town. That would have been a blast to have 3 Templar players on the same side.

CK