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This RTT I had the opportunity to win my 50th victory with the new BA for 4th and 5th edition combined play in local tournaments. I know... Who keeps count? Anyways I would need to win all three rounds. There were 24 players present. The guy who runs the RTTs at this shop is moving to Ohio soon so there was a larger than normal turnout to see him off. Hod was there and so was Shane Brayla. I decided to go all out and see how many massacres I could post up and aimed my sights on the best general award as this is the one award I haven't won with my Blood Angels. There was a lot of different armies... Lots of Space Marines, some Chaos, Nids, Orks, two Tau armies, a couple of guard armies and some eldar. Grey Knights were there buy I don't remember seeing any Battle Sisters this time.

Coliseum of Comics is a great store with plenty of tables and some excellent terrain. I really like the TO as he is very fair and knows the rules very well. You could always expect to have a good time when he runs a tournament. He will be missed for sure.

Here is my 2k BA list:

Dante
Corbulo
8x DC - rhino
10x VAS/2x meltagun, 3x power fist
2x 10x tactical Marine/lascannon, meltagun, power fist - rhino
10x assault Marine/2x plasma pistol, power fist - rhino
2x Baal predator/HB sponsons
Attack bike/MM
Attack bike/MM

I think 2k is just right for Space Marines in general and they work out great at this point level. I had pretty much everything I needed in this list.


1st round
My first game to be honest was a great draw for me versus a low model count pure Grey Knight list. Here are our army lists:

- BA -
Dante
Corbulo

10x VAS/3x power fist, 2x meltagun
8x DC - rhino

10x tactical Marine/power fist, lascannon, meltagun - rhino
10x tactical Marine/same as above
10x assault Marine/power fist, 2x plasma pistol - rhino

Attack bike - multi melta
Attack bike - multi melta

Baal/HB sponsons
Baal/HB sponsons


- Grey Knights -
Brother Captain Stern
Terminator squad with brother captain, psycannon & thunder hammer storm shield

Grey Knights/psycannon
Grey Knights/psycannon
Grey Knights/psycannon

Grey Knight deep striking unit/incinerator

Landraider
Landraider

The mission was five objectives, three equally spaced across a diagonal across the table and one each in both DZs. I placed my objective as close as possible to the central objective and chose to go second. My opponent deployed two GK squads in landraiders and started the other on foot. His landraiders hung back fearful of all my red hot meltas. I was able to immediately deploy on top of two objectives and made a rhino wall with the two Baals off one one flank. My attack bikes, Dante and the VAS hunkered down behind my armored wall.

First turn the landraiders sit still and pepper my Baals but cannot do squat. My turn some of my rhinos move up to grab two more objectives and I shot down the walking GK with combined firepower.

Second turn in come the GK terminators deep striking safely off my other flank. The landraiders still hang back and pop one rhino and shake one Baal. One my tactical pillboxes manages to immobilize one of the landraiders with a glancing shot from the lascannon... I knew I took those cannons for a good reason. The rest of my shooting goes into the GK terminators and I pop two.

Next turn in comes the deep striking Grey Knights landind safely on the flank by my two Baals. They shoot at the exposed VAS but do no damage. The landraider pulls up to an objective and the GKs inside disembark. The other squad sits inside. The landraiders target my Baals again and tear off an assault cannon. The GK terminators get a tad valley and charge my DC rhino wrecking it but all the DC fall out safe. My turn the VAS shred all of the GK termies before they can even hit back and again combined firepower finishes off the GK squad that had disembarked. My one Baal still with an assault cannon destroys the mobile landraider and my opponent then concedes the game. I get full battle points with all the bonuses.


2nd round
The second round was versus the evil that Shrike is... Shrike leading a full assault squad with a power fist, 30 terminators, a small Devastator squad with three missile launchers & lascannon, a Vindicator plus a couple of small tactical squads. Not much terrain on the table and I again chose to go second. There are five objectives on the table, one in the center of the table and the other four in the center of each table quarter. Each objective was scattered 2d6. My opponent opted to select a table quarter with high ground which was an excellent place to deploy his heavy weapons team. On the flip side there were two objectives in my table quarter that I could deploy on top of during my placement. Each player also was allowed to select five units from the opponent's list that counted as kill points. You got one point for each objective you held and each kill point unit you destroyed. I used a couple of buildings in my DZ to shield units my opponent had selected as kill points then made a rhino wall from the buildings to cut off all LOS. My opponent's Dev squad would always be shooting through cover so my treads were effectively always obscured. The big problem would be dealing with 30 terminators that could fleet plus the demolisher cannon. The new SM demolisher cannon is listed as ordnance/barrage and it is fired as barrage you use the center of the big blast template to determine if the unit fired upon counts as being in cover. I didn't know that and after looking at the new IG codex this morning I see that none of their ordnance can also be fired as a barrage.

Here are the 5 KPs I selected:

10x terminators (8x lightning claws, 2x thunder hammer storm shield)
10x terminators (2x assault cannon, power sword & storm bolter, 7x power fist & storm bolter)
10x terminators (same as above)
Shrike
Assault squad

Here are the kill points my opponent selected:

DC rhino
DC
Attack bike
Attack bike
Assault squad

My opponent opted not to infiltrate and setup all his termies plus Shrike and the assault squad as close as he could towards my DZ. He got to go first and moved all his assault units right up on top of rhino wall. The Vindi moved up into a piece of terrain and passed its DT. His Devs fired on a rhino but were unable to do any damage. One unit of termies made it into base contact with a rhino and wrecked it. The tactical squad bailed out on my side of the rhino wall. I should mention that my opponent held back one squad of terminators for a counter assault unit.

My turn I disembarked all my squads except for Corbulo and the Death Company. My mobile rhinos then wheeled about so I could shoot and then charge. I focus fired both Baals and the attack bikes into my opponent's assault squad with Shrike since they were the easiest unit to kill with massed shooting. The VAS with Dante moved in to target one terminator squad, both tactical squads moved in to target the remainder of the assault squad and my assault squad moved in to target the other assault squad. Both tactical squads combined killed Shrike and the assault squad... only Shrike could hit back before he was insta killed. Dante and his VAS killed their terminator squad they had targetted and my assault squad killed five terminators and lost some Marines when the remaining terminators swung back with their power fists. It was a solid first round, dropping Shrike, the assault squad and 15 terminators with few losses on my side. The two tactical squads were safe behind cover and out of range from the Vindicator. Dante and the VAS used their consolidation move to hunker down behind a rhino.

Second turn the last squad of terminators move in but a poor fleet roll means they can only hit my assault squad already engaged. The Vindicator fires its demolisher cannon as barrage killing all of the VAS and Dante. There was nothing I could do about even if I had known it could fire as barrage. The Devs fire on another rhino and destroy it... it's empty so no big deal. The last full squad of terminators charge my engaged assault squad and destroy them but I manage to kill two more terminators from the original squad. 13 terminators left to kill without my heavy hitters Dante and his VAS. The game is pretty much even again.

My turn Corbulo and the DC dismount from their rhino. I was really glad I had decided to hold them back from the first engagement. The tactical squads, both Baals and both attack bikes all focus fire on the full squad of terminators and manage to kill half their number... Now only eight terminators left to destroy. Corbulo and the DC charge the squad of five terminators and destroy them with a large number of rending attacks and luckily one failed armor save. I get a good consolidation roll and move the DC into the crater left by the destroyed rhino for the 4+ cover save versus the demolisher cannon.

The next turn my opponent focus fires everything into Corbulo and the DC but my cover saves are red hot and I only lose three DC Marines. The last three terminators charge Corbulo and the DC and I kill all of them before they can strike back with another great round of rending attacks.

My turn both tactical squads mount up into rhinos and move forward to fire their meltaguns into the Vindicator. Both penetrate but my opponent makes both of his cover saves. Both Baals fire into the Vindicator with their assault cannons for two more penetrating hits but again my opponent makes both of his cover saves... frustrating.

We have time for one more turn. His tactical squads move onto two objectives but the Vindicator scatters and his Devs cannot finish off my DC. My turn my two rhinos drop back onto two objectives and my Baals cannot hurt his Vindicator.

I manage to squeak out a minor win and learn I will be playing on the second table against IG (old codex) in the final round. One more win and I can finally retire the army from RTT play.

3rd round
So my last game was against a guy who basically said he Hates tournaments and 5th edition but he came out since the TO will be moving away and this was his big farewell event. He complained every turn about the rules and kept wanting to play 3rd edition. Basically he said special characters are crap and should not be allowed in tournaments. I asked him if he thought Corbulo is over the top and he said yes. I had perfect soft scores going into the final round but I knew I was playing TFG.

The mission was 12" deployment zones along the long table edges and you had to start with two troops and one HQ deployed, everything else had to start in reserve. I again won the roll for deployment and chose to go second. The mission would be decided by old school victory points. I started with two tactical squads in their rhinos and Dante on the table keeping the Marines embarked and put them in a corner with Dante hidden behind them. My opponent had all drop troops with carapace armor and two Leman Russes and one Demolisher (old codex). If you've played against drop troops you know that they are great at killing MEQ dropping in with cheap units that are armed with as many meltaguns and plasma guns they can stuff into the list. Mech is a great deterrent to drop troops since they have to bust the tanks first then shoot at your Marines. I had my two rhinos right up against the corner hoping that some of his units would scatter off the table for mishaps. It was a cityfight table so there was a lot of DT for his drop troops to scatter into as well for the mishaps. My plan pretty much worked like a charm with one unit of drop troop veterans destroyed the second turn due to a mishap and another squad I got to place in the corner furthest away from my rhino wall. My opponent was already pissed as hell about the two second turn mishaps. Everyhthing I had in reserve came in on the second turn except for the two Baals. I shot up all his drop drops that had landed successfully by disembarking the two tactical squads inside my wall and shooting around the corners. Each attack bike shot and charged one squad to tarpit them.

The third turn was more of the same with a couple more drop troop mishaps but he did manage to pop the two tactical rhinos but did not destroy them. His tanks came on the table but only one LR could fire and it scattered into one of his drop troops and vaporized them. This turn my two Baals came on and helped to decimate the other newly landed drop troops. Corbulo also slipped out of his rhino to assault another squad to prevent them from shooting the next turn. The attack bikes were slowly whittling away their guardsmen in close combat. One of his command squads landed in DT and took enough wounds from the DT to force a morale check and they broke. My opponent was just miserable still complaining all the time.

By the end of the game I had lost three rhinos and the two attack bikes plus 1/2 points for a tactical squad. I had killed all the drop troops except for the one I had placed far away and the last turn of the game Dante came out and crushed the Demolisher with his perdition pistol. In fact late in the game my opponent started landing his drop troops away from my cluster but I just shot them down with the two Baals sitting side by side.

So I won by a massacre but the points weren't reported correctly. I should have won the best general award but it's no big deal really. I was just glad to rack up the 50th win for my all time favorite army. It was quite cool really and a great feeling for sure.

0b :HQ:

Nice report as usual; always nice to see BA played well.
Few pics would have been perfect =)

Sorry no pix this time.

G

Just found out the demolisher cannon was modified in the SM FAQ such that it cannot fire as a barrage... I should have gotten a massacre in the 2nd round.

G

Sounds like good fun. I run a similar BA list but don't do as well... .

I'll just keep telling myself that it's the dice...

Good Job, Green Blow Fly! Its a shame about the last round opponent.

Thanks!

G

Nice solid list (the one thing i do compliment you on is your BA lists )
Well played aswell, but out of curiosity, why not take meph in your lists?
when with the DC he is pretty much unstoppable.

Dante and Corbulo are the bomb. They make a tactical Marine better than a Berserker. Maybe one day you will come up with a good list yourself pup.

G

Green Blow Fly wrote:Dante and Corbulo are the bomb. They make a tactical Marine better than a Berserker. Maybe one day you will come up with a good list yourself pup.

G

Damn straight. I had no Idea until this past weekend when my BW spam orks were tabled in 3 turns at the local RT. That stuff is the Chedda!

I have been saying that for quite some time now. I guess I will just have to win a big event to prove it.

G

Green Blow Fly wrote:I have been saying that for quite some time now. I guess I will just have to win a big event to prove it.

G

Well I don't know if I would go that far. You definitely would hand it to orks, don't know how they would fare in a shoot out with a ranged list.

If it is objective based I think BA have the advantage due to the rhinos with OCE.

G

Your opponents lists didnt seem so competitive.

Shrike and termies are nothing to sneeze at. Same with drop troop IG. Grey Knights are bad but that was a good matchup for me.

G

The termies with shrike werent that scary because they had power fists instead of thunder shields or lightning claws. Drop IG can be effective but not always. I still dont know why your opponent disembarked his gk unit out of the land raider voluntarily.

Green Blow Fly wrote:Grey Knights are bad but that was a good matchup for me.

well... it looks like the good matchup for you were the GK player, more than the list...

-firing in the first turn 4 LR GoodHammer twin linked shots, that can be split into 4 different targets, at the outranged baal's instead of the rhinos is moronic......
-placing a gk squad so you can "shot down" them with "combined firepower" in turn 1 is plain stupid...
-using deep striking gk is not a good 5th edition idea
-the same goes for deep striking gkt instead of using psycanons and the veil to outrange your infantry
-what was the point in debarking the gk from the LR?

your opponent has no idea of the game he was playing and handed himself his arse to you from turn 1 onwards

I'm not complaining. It's always nice to get an easy one in on the the 1st round.

G