VISIT:
Astral Games, Main Street
Klamath Falls, OR
541-882-3030
Here’s a brief Bat Rep of the Apocalypse Game from November 12. The sides were unevenly matched, about 15,000pts vs 18,000pts.
THE SIDES:
Side 1 (ours): about 18,000
Ben – Dark Eldar, Chaos and
IG
Jason – Blood Angels
Grover – Orks and Salamanders (
SM)
Side 2: about 15,600
JD – Iron Hands (
CM), Crimson Fists (
SM), Salamanders (
SM) and Wolf Hound
Dylan – Tau
Rob – Grey Knights
Jeff – A 600pt Valkyrie Squadron
THE BATTLEFIELD:
Three 4x8 tables. The North (NT) and South (
ST) tables oriented as the base and top of a capital “I,” with Middle (
MT)… in the uh… middle. The
ST was largely forested with scattered buildings and hills, and an objective in the SE corner. The
MT was densely urban with a main street bisecting it longitudinally with little in the way of side streets. An objective was in the dead center of that table. The NT was mostly open ground with an objective in its NW corner.
DEPLOYMENT:
A line was drawn from the NW corner to the SE. No deployment within 9” either side. Table edges were defined as East and West. Side 1 takes East Side
SOUTH SUMMARY:
On the
ST, about 1000 points of an Ork Kan Wall squared off against a resplendent array of mechanized infantry of Chaos Marines, Space Marines, Grey Knights and a few pieces of Tau artillery thrown in to boot. As you might imagine, the Orks did not fair so well in the South. With a divided force, the Orks were able to walk/run about 18” in a very disorderly and Orkish fashion to within spitting distance of the South Objective. Not a single boy got within scoring distance before the combination of fire from Side 2s armor, bombing runs by Valkyries and Tau Tiger Sharks turned the foolishly deployed Kan wall to fungus dust.
NORTH SUMMARY:
On the NT, the entire Blood Angel horde deployed. I think there was about 8000pts of massed troops, partially mechanized and spread over 2/3rds of the NT. The Blood Angel armor rushed the objective while Grey Knights deep struck drop pods, dread knights and fliers into our back field to the embrace of Ben’s two
IG super heavy tanks and some dark eldar. The NT was a hard fought battle with Grey Knights ultimately succumbing to Side one’s superior numbers… until the end. When a flotilla of Tau super heavy fliers, Tiger Sharks (not “paper tigers” mind you, but pizza-box cardboard Tiger Sharks) loitered over the North Objective, denying scoring units to Side 1 with major fire power.
MIDDLE SUMMARY:
The
MT was again a divided ork force supported by well positioned lootas and a shok attack gun overlooking the center objective in 4+ cover. They were largely ignored. For good reason as they seem to be targeting womp rats in the distance and their shooting was ineffectual. Dark Eldar fast movers swooped in from behind the lines to deliver some anti-tank punch, but were ultimately vaporized by apocalyptic barrages. My Salamanders were largely ineffectual as well having their two
tac squads combat squaded and sweeping around the Left Flank of the enemy, getting into melee with Chaos Marines and Grey Knights and losing terribly. Tau and Orks exchanged fire, you can guess who won there… wrong. Ork dakkaguns did work on some Pathfinders. Then in melee, a flechette discharger caused the only melee wound. It was a sad sad day for the Orks. Dark Eldar in a typical selfish
DE fashion brought down Orbital bombardments turn after turn on the center objective denying access to all scoring units friend and foe until the last turn. The Wolfhound Titan immobilized the Salamander Crusader and Assault Termies round 1, They spent the next two rounds trying to figure out how to unlock the assault ramp and turn on the guns, but figured out the keys were in Vulkan’s pocket the whole time. Side 1’s Chaos Defilers and
IG Super Heavies did work on deep striking Grey Knights and Chaos Obliterators on our right flank, and virtually cut off ground access to the NT. When the
DE orbital bombardment finally ceased, Side 2 had well positioned scoring units to swoop into the uncontested center objective. Deep striking Blood Angels appeared too little too late and too far from the objectives to rescue the befuddled and war ravaged Orks and
DE - center.
CONCLUSION:
As this was my first true Apocalypse game I had fun. Good lord they take forever. I very much appreciated the mechanics of the game. I especially like the timed turns and timed phases. I also appreciated the way the game ends. Instead of playing to a set number of turns, the game ends at a set time. There were 4 turns total, I think. There were several things that our side could have done better in my opinion:
Primarily, my army, Orks and Salamanders were poorly deployed. I divided my force and placed an expensive portion of them deep within the enemies territory. Without good armor saves, the boyz evaporated before even approaching objectives. In the future, I think consolidating the boyz around a home objective would have been a better plan and leave the Titan fighting up to the mechanized forces that can get into the backfield.
Second, Although the scheduled orbital bombardment is awesome, placing it directly over an objective marker denies the objective to friendly units as well. Therefore, if employing that in the future, I will push it into their lines of deployment and hope for a hit rather than risking friendly fire on top of the objective.
Finally, our lack of fast moving fliers compared with the Super Heavy Tau Tigersharks was regrettable. More anti-aircraft dakka is required if you are going mostly with ground units. However, this was the Tau’s major footprint with really only 2 scoring units. So, although air dominance was certainly the Tau’s contribution to the greater good, it is unlikely to win a game of Seize Ground without boots on the ground.
Hope you enjoyed the game… I did.
