Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So as much as it pains me to type this! lol

We rolled Crusade (4 objectives), Vanguard Strike.

2 Objectives bottom left, 1 objective top right and 1 dead centre.

Nightfight turn1!

My list which you can see bottom of page1 but for the lazy:

Commander with all the toys
Farsight
7 Bodyguards, all target locks, 4 double plasma, 2 double fusion, 1 double missile pod
10 Kroot
10 Kroot
10 Kroot
Skyray blacksun and sms
Skyray blacksun and sms
Tigurius
5 Scouts CCWs
Storm Raven

My opponents list:

Chapter Master - Bike, Shield Eternal, Artificer Armour, Power Fist
Tigurius
5 Bikes, 2 Grav Guns
5 Bikes, 2 Grav Guns
4 Devastator Centurions - 2 Grav Guns, 2 Lascannons, 4 Missile Launchers, Omniscope
Commander - Command and Control Node, Stim Injector, Shield Gen, Pen Chip and Multi Spec Suit, 2 Gun Drones
10 Kroot
10 Kroot
Riptide - Ion Acel, Early Warning, SMS
3 Broadsides - High Yield, 6 Missile Drones

My Tig - Crush, Gate and Prescience
Opponents Tig: Precognition, Prescience and Missfortune

My opponent makes me go first, which is worst case scenario.. as he's chosen the side that has a mount Everest size hill about 26" away, he can hide is entire army behind... I deploy in a line along my deployment zone, ready to gate to either flank of the hill he doesn't deploy hjs deathstar, to play the you cannot see me all game, game, the Skyrays deploy at the back behind my LOS blocking terrain (ruined bastion), 1 kroot unit outflank, scouts in raven and 2xkroot walk on.

My opponent deploys behind/biased towards the left flank of the hill with the death star, Riptide right in the corner, broadsides biased towards the right, kroot outflank and Bikes go in reserve.

Turn1
My opponent then seizes... and I realise I've been careless with deployment... the Deathstar (Dev Centurions, Commander, Tig and Chapter Master) walk round the hill, the Riptide moves to a side and gets LoS to the Skyrays and the Broadsides fail to get onto the hill but 2 Drones do.

Shooting and the Chapter Master brings down a Orb Bombard which lands on 3 Battlesuits.. then scatters into the perfect location to catch 5! and kills the lot... the rest of the shooting kills off 5 Drones, the missile drones from the Broadsides take out another couple of Drones, the Riptide does nothing to the Skyrays (again scatter is kind and catch's both tanks which are 3" apart... so when the dust had settled I have 2 double plasma suits, Farsight, Commander, 4 Shield Drones, Tig and 3 Gun Drones.... LOL

My turn1
I Gate after the Bomb and am looking to kill either Tig or the Chapter Master on bike, who are the 2 closest.

The Skyrays shuffle, the remnants of the bomb unload into the Deathstar and do a decent number of wounds, putting the Chapter Master down to 1 wound and Tig down to 1 wound....

Turn2
My opponent gets 1 unit of kroot who outflank onto the right flank, no where near any objectives? a squad of Bikes also arrives centrally, the Deathstar trundle forwards after the bomb after Missfortuning them, the Broadsides move onto the hill, the Riptide moves back a little, keeping LOS to the Skyrays. Shooting does little this time?? Commander does pass about 5 or 6 FnP hits! Leaving just Farsight, Commander, Tig and both Battlesuits, the Riptide does nothing again, the Broadsides help chip away at the Bomb killing a couple of drones as does the Bikes, leaving the above.

The Deathstar charges my bomb and kills a Battlesuit, takes 2 wounds off Tig.. I take out both Drones and put a wound on a Centurion, I fail moral and my bomb falls back, but auto rallies.

My turn2, 1 squad of Kroot walking on from reserve, the Bomb gates behind the hill and goes for the Broadsides, killing just 2, the Skyrays then unload with all 12 Missiles and kill the Bike squad centrally.

Turn3
My opponent gets both the Kroot and remaining Bikes, Kroot come on bottom left near an objective bikes go top right again near an objective. Deathstar moves towards my lines, the Lascannons and Missile rip into both Skyrays (split fire) and 1 is glances and penned (stunned) the other the same with help from Riptide support), the Bomb is then taken out by the Broadside (plus drones) and Bikes combined fire.... giving away Warlord.

My turn3
Storm Raven come on right flank, as does a Kroot squad, 1 more Kroot squad stays in reserve, the Broadside intercepts the Storm Raven getting 4 hits (out of 4 shots lol) and then 2 Pens and Glance... I fail to jink save any so it crashes and burns killing 4 scouts... the Kroot shoot up the Bikes and cause about 6 wounds, 1 Bike dies.

Turn4
The Chapter Master moves and turbo boosts towards an objective bottom left, the Kroot move towards another objective bottom left, the Riptide goes after the Kroot as do the Bikes, shooting and the Dev Centurion Deathstar remove both Skyrays, into combat and the Kroot hold there own... killing a Bike and the 4 guys that survive pass moral.

My turn4 and the remaining Kroot arrive bottom left, the Kroot that arrived along with the other squad bottom left shoot dead my opponents Kroot squad in the area, in combat and the Kroot survive with just 2 blokes dying (2 left), they pass moral lol, holding the Bikes and Riptide for another turn.

Turn5
The Dev Deathstar moves to get LOS to the Kroot that arrived, with frag missiles cause about 14 hits and get 10 wounds... so remove that squad, the Chapter Master moves round the ruined bastion, charges the Kroot, kills about 4 and they cause about 4 wounds back, but no failed saves and they fail moral and get swept, leaving just 2 kroot which are killed by the 3 Bikers...

Tabling win for my opponent (who isn't on a single objective turn5! :( )

Well being seized on really hurt, but I learnt a lot from that game:

1) not until I type this now that I realised Nightfight effects the Chapter Master who couldn't see the Battlesuits.. who were easily 50" away... so shouldn't of had the ord bombard which sniped out 5/7 Battlesuits! This leaves the bomb at practically full strength bar a few dead Drones... this means the Broadsides are dead turn1 as I don't have to kill the Chapter Master (who did what I wanted to stop...) and it would have been a totally different game... my head probably wouldn't of gone so down...

2) Storm Raven I should have brought it on the other flank and gone after Kroot... but as the Kroot had outflanked right, I wanted to support them, being intercepted killed by 1 snap firing Broadside was shockingly unlucky and it cost me bad, had I got left flank, the Raven would have taken out most of the kroot, freeing the other unit to run the 2" behind a nice hill they could have hid a couple of models, so the blast wouldn't of wiped that unit out.

3) Commander with FnP and 4+ Inv save without missfortune would have tanked every single hit from the Dev Centurion bomb and another Bike squad, but missfortuned he still tanked like a boss for 4 wounds, before failing a 2+ save in combat, so the 4+ Inv and FnP are here to stay, being able to Auto LoS is massive when on 1 wounds.

4) Drones, I liked the Shield Drones, with missfortune, they were a little poor, but better than no save at all and I'm not likely to be in the same situation again, so won't be needing to within missfortune range.

I was disappointed to be tabled... but a few rolls really didn't go my way... like being seized on, failing to deny Missfortine and the Storm Raven being shot down by 1 Highyield Missile Pod, which just shows how powerful my opponents list really is with a bit of luck and how weak the rest of my list is once the bomb goes down! Had I got turn1, I think the game would have gone another way, being able to take out the Broadsides turn1, being out of sight to the Dev Centurion Deathstar, which would have still hit the Farsight bomb, I think I would have lost a good portion of my bomb, but not enough to stop the Riptide from dying.

Next up tomorrow night is a fight against a Beastpack!

My opponent has asked to borrow some figures as I used to run a Beastpack, he wants to try it out for the first time, so has sent me a list of models he wanted already... which basically equates to 1850pts... so going from the model list I think he will run a list like this:

Eldrad
Farseer - Jetbike, Runes of Witnessing, Shard
3 Jetbikes
3 Jetbikes
3 Jetbikes
3 Jetbikes
8 Warp Spiders
7 Warp Spiders
Wraithknight
Wraithknight
Baron
5 Warriors
5 Beastmasters, 25 Khymera

Again random mission etc

If I go first I'm going after the Beastpack, I have too if I don't want to give up board control, if I'm going second I will have to play defensive, I know the Beastpack will try to push the Bomb back, but I can gate to a side away from the Baron chip away at it. But will have to stay at extreme range.

Should be another bruising encounter either way!

Well, 1) his entire victory was predicated on an illegal shot; so there's little value we can draw from this other than "that was not a cagey deployment....."

2) was it impossible to play defensively, i.e., not deploy so aggressively and stay out of his range largely? Was the corner with 2 objectives on his side? Broadsides really struggle in vanguard; and centurions as well. I'm actually encouraged by the game. No illegal shot and you win I think.

 The Shrike wrote:
Well, 1) his entire victory was predicated on an illegal shot; so there's little value we can draw from this other than "that was not a cagey deployment....."

2) was it impossible to play defensively, i.e., not deploy so aggressively and stay out of his range largely? Was the corner with 2 objectives on his side? Broadsides really struggle in vanguard; and centurions as well. I'm actually encouraged by the game. No illegal shot and you win I think.

1) LOL yeah that was not a cagey deployment... I was supper aggressive as I've always been when deploying first with the bomb, but I think with good reason..this time... I should have taken a photo.. basically I had a bastion, hill that could hide a few kroot (maybe 4??) a wall (about 2" high) and.. wrecked flyer terrain about 1" high and 6" square, so no place to hide my bomb, the only bit of terrain to hide behind on the table was the Everest size hill (about 16" long, 12" deep and 5-7 in places" high lol), going first I would have made it, I think that strategy should still be employed being in that situation again.

But on the flip side, going defensive... that Bastion was about 2" back from the edge of my deployment zone and towards the right, so I could have stuck most of the Drones and Battlesuit behind it, bunched, but behind it, the problem is, my opponent could have deployed the Riptide top centrally, Deathstar to the right of "THAT" hill, as the Bastion was quite far into the table, it could be flanked easily, meaning no matter which direction I shift the bomb turn2 he's hitting it... with either, plus the Skyrays are in the open from the off, A tough choice for sure.

2) was almost definitely the case of impossible to play defensive, I had 2 objectives bottom left (I wanted him to take that side.. but didn't take the bait),

I think you could be right, like I said, I just take out everything bar the deathstar which has to come after my bomb, which means it doesn't kill my troops or Skyrays which means I kill more troops and I win the game on objectives turn5/6.. 7 and his death star will till be operational... and I have troops in the open...

If the commander was with the chapter master, or if the centurions had an omniscope then he ignores night fight.

Very true JPR! Damn!

So my opponent pulled out last second last night, we've rescheduled for the weekend.

Gives me more time to for a solid strategy against this list:

Eldrad
Farseer - Jetbike, Runes of Witnessing, Shard
3 Jetbikes
3 Jetbikes
3 Jetbikes
3 Jetbikes
8 Warp Spiders
7 Warp Spiders
Wraithknight
Wraithknight
Baron
5 Warriors
5 Beastmasters, 25 Khymera