Erm...yeah. I lost models here and there...lost half my burna boyz. Ghazghkull took 3 wounds despite his 2+ invulnerable save, a few other models here and there. As for my opponent, he was on a 25 game streak; he's the local "guy to beat."
I'm a freak of nature, but the dice rolling didn't hurt.
Dawn of War, capture and control, he won the roll off. He put his objective in his rear corner, and I put mine 24" away at the halfway point on the board. He chose to deploy and go first; he put a demon prince and a squad of plague marines on my objective marker for his deployment. For my deployment, I chose to deploy nothing.
I stole the initiative with a 6. Turn 1, my stuff all came on the table (except reserves). Everything that could fire attempted to (night-fight); I caused one wound on his demon prince with a big shoota on a trukk, and my tank-bustas had no vehicle to fire at, so they pumped a bunch of STR8 AP3 rokkits into him and finished him off. His turn 1 his land raider and obliterators missed nightfight, his dreadnought had a flamer, so couldn't shoot me, and his plague marines sitting at the halfway mark on the board didn't do any damage.
Turn 2a: I continue up the board; my burna boyz unload 15 templates into his forward plague marine squad (who are unsupported) and cause 96 wounds out of an ungodly amount of hits. I kill all but two members of the squad, but my remaining army that can fire does, and fires into his plague marines, killing the other two. At this point I've killed a demon prince and a squad of 15-20 plague marines without losing anything.
Turn2b: His defiler drops a large template on one of my vehicles, but it scatters off into nowhere. His land raider tries punching a hole through a battlewagon and fails. His two squads of 3 obliterators fire at same battlewagon (Ghazghkull is inside) and roll miserably, getting a single weapon destroyed result. He's got a bunch of Khorne berzerkers in a rhino on his objectives, another squad of...some sort of marines. His dreadnought rolls a 1 (its helping guard his objective) and turns around and unloads his flamer twice on his own scoring unit on his objective killing a few.
Turn3a: I get into assault range. I do some ineffectual shooting that does nothing. My tank bustas unload on his dreadnought and fail miserably. Ghazghkull disembarks 2" away from his nob escort and declares a Waaaugh! At this point, several things happen:
A.) Ghazghkull assaults the land raider (stationary) along with a squad of trukk boyz (adding a second
PK just in case). Ghazghkull pops the land raider and terminators tumble out.
B.) 15 burna boys assault two obliterator squads. They all have I1 powerfists. Burnaboys have I3 powerweapons. Slaughter of obliterators ensues.
C.) Most of my boyz are trying to get around the corner of a big blasted bunker to get to his objective; they've got a rhino full of khorne berzerkers, a foot-slogging squad of something else in the way, along with a berzerk dreadnought that just flamed his own guys.
Turn3b: His defiler counter-assaults into the burna boyz, who are still locked in combat with two surviving obliterators (one from each squad). His terminators assault the trukk boyz who helped Ghazghkull pop the land raider, and his Khorne berzerkers jump out of the rhino and assault Ghazghkull. Despite his 2+ invulnerable save, he takes 2 wounds, although he dishes out 4 deaths in return. The terminators beat down the trukk boyz, causing me to lose them all. His dreadnought isn't in range for anything, although he got a greater demon to pop out of his aspiring champion there, and there's a solid wall of death for me to punch through to get to his objective.
Turn 4a: My second wave (everything else) gets into the action: Two boyz squads (and their nob powerklaws) barrel into the Defiler that is ripping apart my burnas. Said defiler gets powerklawed to death. My nobs countercharge into his Khorne berzerkers and dual-assault his terminators, while another squad of boyz jumps in to assist on the terminators. Ghazghkull takes another wound, nob wound allocation magic does its thing, but no nobs die. Khorne berzerkers die, terminators die. Tank bustas are getting *REALLY* annoyed because they haven't killed a vehicle yet, so they unleash another 13 rokkits (I have two tank hammers) on the dreadnought, this time killing it. The rest of my boyz that were following assault into the final squad of his guys sitting on his objective and deliver death and powerklaws.
Turn4b: He has an empty rhino left on the table and concedes defeat.
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1. It sucked for him that I stole the initiative. It made a huge difference.
2. I intentionally placed our objectives as close together as possible so that I would have to control as little territory as possible.
3. He fed his army to me in two pieces. A demon prince and a squad of plague marines to hold my objective, and the rest of his army guarding his. That means that I got to dedicate my entire army to killing one
HQ and one (troop?) choice of plague marines without having to worry about the rest of his army just yet.
4. Burna boyz assaulting obliterators = awesome sauce. I'd never used them before, they were quite awesome. They killed an entire squad (almost) of plague marines in addition to 6 obliterators. They definitely got their points back.
5. He rolled pretty poorly during his shooting.
6. Anytime that my entire army (regardless of points) gets to attack and mix it up with someone else in parts, I'm going to win. I don't care what army you play, if your army is spread around, and I can throw 2500 points of mine against 1000 points of yours I'm going to win. If I lose 300 points killing your 1000 points, then I'm left with 2200 points that your remaining 1500 points has to kill.
7. Other tactical insights that I'm not going to share because you should already know them as basic principles of warfare, fire and maneuver, massed firepower, flank and maneuver, etc.