++HQ++
Khan

Magister Sevrin Loth

Commander Dante

++Elite++
Sanguinary Priest
Jump Pack

++Troops++
Bike Squad
+1 member
x2 plasma
MM attack bike

Bike Squad
+1 member
x2 plasma
MM attack bike

Bike Squad
+1 member
x2 plasma
MM attack bike

Sanguinary Guard
Chapter Banner

++Fast Attack++

++Heavy Support++
Vindicator

Vindicator

Thunderfire Cannon

Vindicator (Blood Angels)

++HQ++
Company Command Squad
Officer of the Fleet
Astropath
Plasmagun x3
Chimera

++Troops+
Infantry Platoon
Platoon Command Squad
Heavy Weapons Team - Autocannon
Chimera

Infantry Squad
Heavy Weapons Team - Autocannon
Chimera

Infantry Squad
Heavy Weapons Team - Autocannon
Chimera

Infantry Squad
Heavy Weapons Team - Autocannon
Chimera

Veteran Squad
Veteran Weapons Team - Autocannon
Meltagun x3
Chimera

Veteran Squad
Veteran Weapons Team - Autocannon
Meltagun x3
Chimera

++Elites++
Quad Launcher

Quad Launcher

++Fast Attack++
Vendetta Gunship
Heavy Bolter Sponsons

Vendetta Gunship
Heavy Bolter Sponsons

Vendetta Gunship
Heavy Bolter Sponsons

++Heavy Support++
Leman Russ Battle Tank
Lascannon

Leman Russ Battle Tank
Lascannon

Leman Russ Vanquisher
Lascannon

A better mission and deployment for me, but I feel his list is stronger this time than last. Terrain still isn't ideal and I have nothing to hide my Vindicators behind effectively. On Loth, I sub out C:SM powers for Biomancy powers in hopes of having another assault threat. Obviously I have to adjust my strategy from the last game, but at the end of the day I'm going to have to take the fight to him - even fighting 12-24" inches away, he still beats me and there's not enough terrain on the board to cut off large numbers of his units at once. The Officer is still going to make my reserves less effective, and now the mission type means I have to kill his Leman Russes instead of just his infantry in Chimeras. He has a lot of scoring units and that really concerns me - SM Bikes isn't really a tabling list, especially against IG, and I have to kill about 1500 points of units to stop him from being able to score at all. I immediately regret not having dozer blades on my Vindicators anymore.

Apparently the IG forget to have their engines started, so only a Leman Russ and a Chimera bother to move. The Leman Russes combine their fire on my Vindicators, but his streak of luck in hitting all 3 is matched by my luck in making cover saves. The BA Vindicator is stunned, unfortunately. A Quad Launcher manages to squish a biker, but overall a very low damage turn for the IG.

The Vindicators all push forward, but one of them gets stuck in the woods. The second black Vindicator pushes into the lake safely, discovering it to be Daemon Bile. The BA Vindicator moves flat out into the other forest, immobilizing itself as well. Ouch. The forest was nothing special. My bike squad turbo-boosts to the middle of the board, using the bunker for cover. Loth mumbles some gibberish and makes his saving throw invulnerable and gives the BA Vindicator It Will Not Die.

I only have one Vindicator in range, and it plops a template down on the Vanquisher and Chimera in the ruins. It manages a stun off of the Vanquisher and nothing else, but at least I caused some damage. The Thunderfire Cannon shoots at the Quad Launcher and due to the T7 of the Launcher and 3+ save, it survives several hits and absorbs all the damage for the squad, leaving it with 2 wounds remaining (is this really how artillery is supposed to work?).

No first blood yet, and I expect my opponent will get it since I could not.

Well, this turn went not so well for the Emperor's Finest. Two Vendettas came on to the board, including one from Outflanking. The same Leman Russ and Chimera move, and everyone else prepares for the shooting phase.

This time, they hit their marks much better. Two Vindicators explode on only two penetrating hits, and my last Vindicator is stunned due to each Leman Russ landing their shots. My black Bike Squad gets mauled, losing two members from Chimera and Vendetta fire and a wound is put on my Attack Bike. I pass morale, but I've given up First Blood and 2 other VP this turn, and am essentially down about 450 points this turn.

I get lucky (or unlucky, depending on how you look at it) and both Dante with his Sanguinary Guard and the teal Bike Squad show up. The Teal squad gets stuck on the left table edge, so I position it behind the green IS Chimera. I decide to gamble big and have Dante & crew drop on the south objective and hope they can take it solo. My plan at this point is for Dante to take that objective and to contest the top objective, while keeping my TFC on the other objective. However, I've now given two Leman Russes and 3 Chimeras of squads much, much better targets than they would have had otherwise. The arrival of 2/3 of my reserves forces me to play very aggressive to attack together, so the black Bike Squad breaks cover. I struggle a lot with that choice, wondering if it would be better to turbo-boost them away safely and objective camp, but decide their firepower is more valuable. Loth pushes through the forest.

And it pays off. The black Bike Squad melts the Chimera, exploding it and killing a few guys inside. The TFC cleans up the survivors quite nicely. The teal Bike Squad fails utterly to cause any damage to the side armor of the Leman Russ, depriving me of a victory point I was hoping for that turn. Dante manages to stun the Leman Russ nearest him - not quite the damage I was hoping for, but at least it was something.

The last Vendetta comes in, and besides their swooping around, a few vehicles shuffle around to line up shots.

His shooting phases manages to vary wildly in effectiveness. He shoots a bunch at my Vindicator, but manages to do nothing. The teal and black Bike Squads take a lot of fire and manage to survive it with minimal casualties. However, the TFC gets shot by 3 lascannons and takes 2 wounds from the deal (despite having 3+ cover). My Sanguinary Guard get mauled by a single Quad Launcher and two squads in their Chimeras, losing 3 from much less than expected firepower. To top it off, Loth takes two wounds and promptly dies to a Multi-Laser.

I get lucky here and my last squad comes in, putting all my forces on the board. They show up on the right table edge, however, meaning the I end up overloading the bottom. This means I need to make sure I position myself to wipe out everything down there and take the objective, as my left flank isn't going to hold. Dante and Khan both split off from their squads to attack as many different targets as possible. The black and teal Bike squads move forward and gamble, hoping to get into assault and save themselves from being mauled by Vendettas.

Dante fails to wreck the Leman Russ, despite now taking two melta shots to the rear armor. Khan fails to damage the other Leman Russ at all. My Black Bike squad similarly does no damage, and the wounds from my TFC are all saved. Teal Bike Squad takes another wound off of the Quad Launcher, failing to kill it due to it having 4 wounds. The Sanguinary Guard try a side shot on a Chimera and do nothing. My green Bike squad fairs a bit better and explodes the purple Infantry Squad's Chimera.

I assault with everything that can. My gamble pays off, and for as awful as my shooting phase was, my assault phase went as splendidly. Dante finally wrecks the Leman Russ, while the Sanguinary Guard explode the Chimera. Consolidation means that neither are too clumped up for Barrage fire next turn. The black Bike Squad wrecks the other Leman Russ, and while teal squad loses a biker, they win combat and the artillery crew holds, meaning they are safe from return fire. This is a big turn for me, as I've now picked up 2 points and denied my opponent 6. More importantly, it's the first turn I can look at the board and feel I have the resources to complete the objectives.

One Vendetta flies off the board, while the other two line up shots. Some of the vehicles move to face their suddenly vulnerable rear as the IG left flank is in danger of complete collapse.

The Vendettas don't disappoint. One of them mauls the TFC while the other wipes out my black Bike Squad. The Quad Launchers continue to show why they're one of the best Elite choices for the IG and wreck the Vindicator on glances. The green Bike Squad shows up the Sanguinary Guard and doesn't lose a single member to similar firepower. Khan utters a challenge to the Leman Russ and decides to take both the Lascannon and Battle Cannon to the face, and promptly fails both Iron Halo saves. Thank you, true T5! A bit of firepower hits Dante, but he's less of a wuss than Khan and doesn't take a wound.

My Attack Bike wipes out the rest of the Quad Gun crew and eyes the next crew greedily.

I commit to clearing out the bottom objective, at the expense of giving away the top objective. Khan and Dante both regain their senses and join their respective units. Green Bike Squad moves to go after the last Leman Russ and take the bottom objective, while the Sanguinary Guard footslog towards the nearest IG squad.

Shooting from the Green Bike squad wrecks the Black Infantry Squad's Chimera, and I skip all other shooting to guarantee an assault.

Dante and crew promptly beat up the Imperial Guard Veteran Squad, while the Attack Bike assaults the last Quad Gun and kills a crew member. Again, they hold. Dante and the Sanguinary Guard consolidate next to the building, prepared to hop over it next turn.

One Vendetta leaves, the other two line up to finish off my Techmarine and hoping for a 4 point swing. One Leman Russ 'races' (as much as a Leman Russ can race) towards my abandoned objective, but falls short. Some guardsmen move around, and one squad deploys to take the top objective in their deployment zone.

Going to ground saves my techmarine, as a 2+/2++ is tough to do anything against. A biker of green squad gets zapped as my only casualty for the turn - much different from just a turn earlier.

My Attack Bike beats up another guardsman.

At this point, I am very much hoping that it is the last turn. I'm technically losing 7-6, but I can get 3 points by taking the bottom objective with no dice rolling involved and win the game. Just in the case the game goes on, however, I consider this turn carefully - I will likely lose the techmarine, and give up another 4 VP when he goes. Further, my opponent will be able to nab 3 more points from my abandoned objective.

My bikes chase after the Leman Russ, hoping for some rear armor luck shots. Dante and the guard jump over the middle building, conveniently having a juicy target. They skip shooting to guarantee the assault (and resulting consolidation, I hope). Green squad doesn't do any damage, but Dante's Angels fly into the Imperial Guardsmen with righteous wrath, wiping them out to a man and consolidating on to the objective to boot, a 6 point swing. My Attack Bike beats up yet another guardsman - surviving and do much more damage than I expected.

We roll, and the game ends.

Space Marines 12 - Imperial Guard 4

Victory to the Space Marines!

This game went relatively well, and without an enormous amount of luck either - the TFC, Sanguinary Guard, my HQs and Vindicators all took less firepower to bring down than they should have, and I got less than half of my meltas to net explode results on penetrating hits. Terrain wasn't ideal either. I did get some luck with my Attack Bike holding up the Quad Launchers and in rolling this mission, as well as my reserves being able to group up with each other and my main force.

Khan's Outflanking meant I took less damage on the approach, and Chapter Tactics would have been worthless anyways. Loth was pretty worthless this game. Dante and his SG are golden (no pun intended). Their precision and mobility fits as allies for bikes perfectly, and they provide the assault unit I've always wanted better than a choppy CCS could hope to be. Counting as troops means that while I only have 29 models, 20 of them are scoring and one of them is rock hard.

The Bike Squads had a much better game, showing that they are at least a bit tougher to kill. I'm really torn on the 2x plasma + MM setup. It's almost always overkill on AV 10 tank hunting, and not worth ~200 points for the shooting at AV 13-14, especially outside of 12". I think against infantry armies or with better luck popping transports I'll appreciate the bolters more.

The Vindicator wall did its job. It got mauled and eventually wiped out, but it took a decent amount of firepower from IG to do so, and even still my opponent had to get lucky to wipe it out. The TFC did okay. Not having Barrage really hurts it, especially with the amount of wrecks a mechanized army can put up to block LoS.