I'm posting a series of reports and battle summaries covering my learning experiences with 6th edition.
I've been writing up my games since it came out, and I thought that with the box set coming out now, more people will be getting in and learning as well. Each report I will be including as many general observations as I can about changes to the rules, important details and new elements, changes to balance and what units are good, etc.
It's my hope this will be helpful to experienced players just changing over, to older players just getting back in with 6th, and to new folks as well. Any questions or comments are very welcome.
My first three games were on July 4th. I had a half day off work, and a bunch of local guys were at the store early, starting around noon. I got three games in that first day, at 1500. These are some quick summaries + observations. Some of my later reports will be much more detailed.
I brought my
CSM instead of Blood Angels, for three reasons:
1. It's more finished/prettier.
2. I wanted to try allying "real" daemons.
3. I can do more of a "1 of everything" style build with a good variety of units, to try out different rules.
I brought:
Winged Lash Prince - 155
4 Terminators (combi-melta & power maul, 2x combi-melta & power sword, 1x heavy flamer & chainfist) - 155
8 Berserkers w/personal icon, power fist - 213
in Rhino w/Combi-melta- 45
10
CSM w/2 melta, Icon of Glory, Champ w/Fist - 220
in Rhino w/Combi-melta - 45
2 Oblits - 150
5 Havocs, 4x missile, Icon of Glory - 165
Khorne Herald with Fury, Blessing
attaching to
8 Bloodletters - 120
8 Daemonettes - 120
I had to guess on the points for the herald as my Daemons codex hasn't arrived yet. I allowed 110 for him, which I think is more than he costs, as the Fury/Blessing/Unholy Might on a Bloodcrusher herald only runs 135.
Here are a few pics of some of my stuff (the marines have had a good bit more work done to them since, but this gives you the basic idea:
Game 1 was against a guy running a new-built Deathwing army.
Roughly:
Belial with sword of secrets, stormbolter
in squad of 5 with mostly Lightning Claws, 1
TH &
SS, and an apothecary.
Term Librarian who took two Divination powers, hoping for the three dice for Reserves power, got Foreboding, which could be nasty.
4 squads of
DW with assault cannons, mix of
SB/
PF &
LC, usually with 1
TH&
SS per squad.
We played Purge the Alien, diagonal deployment. He deep struck everything. Turn 1 his
DW assault shot my herald to death out of my 'letter squad, earning him two points, including first blood. Thankfully that left his squad (including attached librarian) exposed for me to kill them, but it definitely put me on the back foot. Overall I outmaneuvered him a bit, but he gave up
KPs less easily than I, and we wound up with a draw, 5/5. I had one more
KP, we both had Linebreaker, he had First Blood, neither killed the Warlord. I wouldn't have even eked out the Draw, most likely, except his 2+ saves were pretty darn poor, qnd he had some bad Reserve rolls.
Game 2 was diagonal deployment again, The Scouring. My opponent had:
Term Librarian with 1 biomancy (got Iron Arm), 1 telepathy (took shriek,
IIRC), leading...
5
TH/
SS assault terms in
LR Crusader with
MM
10 Tacs w/
ML, Flamer, with Rhino
10 Tacs w/
ML, Melta, combi-melta, in
HB Razor
5 Sniper scouts w/Camo
2 Attack Bikes w/
MM
LS w/
MM, H Flamer
Predator w/
AC,
HB sponsons
He wound up with two three point objectives in his backfield, I had two twos. The 1pt and 4pt were pretty central, with the 4 more toward me. I had no real good answer to the terminators, but their threat range is smaller now, so that's good. i encircled on both flanks, summoning daemons to assist. I focused on his combat squads, some of whom were hiding up in ruins, but Lash helped with that. We had a super close, bloody game. I wound up with my
DP left on 1W, having just killed his last two terminators (my shooting had killed one and my oblits took two with them when they died to a terminator charge), and my berserkers deep in his backfield on a 3pt objective. He had his libby (who had miraculously failed a pin test against Lash at the end, as I did NOT feel confident fighting Mr. S7/T7 Iron Arm with my wounded prince), his
LR which had been hiding one
tac marine inside (who jumped on the 4pt objective at the very end, but my Prince was in contest range Blake could not quite finish him off) and another from a different combat squad behind it, and an Immobilized
LS which was not on an objective. The final score was 4/2, as I had that 3pt objective and Linebreaker, and he had First Blood and Linebreaker.
Game 3 was against my friend Jamie, a good tournament player, with a sort-of fluffy Grey Knights army.
Librarian with Shrouding, Sanctuary
with 5 terminators, Psycannon, Hammer, 1 halberd & swords
Crowe
5 Purifiers w/2 psycannnons, hammer, 2 halberds, psybolt Razor
5 Purifiers w/2 psycannnons, hammer, 2 halberds, psybolt Razor
10 Strikes w/2 Psycannons, Hammer, in Rhino
2x Psyflemen.
This one we played the short-edges deployment, The Emperor's Will. Okay, so this could be just two objectives way deep, plus bonus points to break the tie. We both chose to put our objectives more forward, his about 12" from the center line, mine about 18" from the center line, both behind ruins. He had first turn, and I chose to reserve my
CSM squad's Rhino and my Berserkers in their Rhino, in addition to my deep striking elements, to make it hard or impossible for him to get the First Blood point (naturally my Prince was also positioned so that only one Psyfleman could see him). This paid off, as he stayed static and shot my
CSM squad down to 4-5 guys with various units, but didn't get a dead unit. On my turn between my havocs and oblits I managed to pop one of the dreads, so I was in the lead. I pushed forward suicidally with my Bloodletters, to encourage him to sit and shoot for a turn or two , which worked; he hammered them (and sadly my daemon prince too, with a crazy round of shooting, evening the score), but I had some good cover saves and by turn 3 I knew my plan was working and he would be pressed to get into my DZ, as he had stayed too static with his scoring and denial units, and after popping the one dread I was focusing on his transports. I dropped my daemonettes and terminators in his backfield, to take the linebreaker point and/or encourage him to move backward (and the terminators to blow up his other dread). Sadly both units got shredded in a round's shooting, the terms dead, and the damemonettes down to one model, which spent three turns hiding in terrain before finally getting capped by the Rhino's stormbolter (which only had
LOS as he had managed to Repair it the turn before on a 6). On turn 5 I had the game won, 5/4, but alas it went on. His Terminators didn't make it to my objective, but he got three survivors from a purifier squad onto it, and his Rhino tied the score by killing my last daemonette. At the bottom of 6 my berserkers cleared the purifiers (despite losing my champion to Cleansing Flame), and the game ended with a draw, 4/4. Both held our own objectives, he had Warlord and I had First Blood. If it had gone 7 his terminators would probably have contested my objective/forced me to throw my last few berserkers into them in (probably) a suicide charge.
Some general thoughts-
Wound allocation felt finicky, slow, and (at least kind of) dumb. it's felt dumb in assault, as at first we thought we had to randomize hits among the guys in base contact. I can see how allocating to a guy with different armor one save at a time feels cinematic and suspenseful, but it just eats time like candy.
Snap Firing is fun, and I like how it makes stuff in a way more mobile.
Having to take saves one at a time is just stupid. I was looking for places where saves were the same, so we could just agree on which models were closest and we could roll multiple dice at once and take the casualties for failed saves in order of closest to furthest, but sometimes there's just no getting around it.
Warlord traits are fun. They're only occasionally going to matter, but sometimes they can be big. In game 1 my opponent got the one where he could choose to re-roll successful or failed Reserves, which should have been huge for his DSing army, though he kept failing re-rolls. Game 3 my Prince was scoring, though his traits the other two games were basically useless.
I loved trying out the beefier daemons, but they are like wheat before a scythe when
GK are on the table. Oh my head, re-rolling 1s to hit and wound in shooting was regularly resulting in 10+ wounds on my packs from a single unit's shooting.
Fearless is stupid and broken again, like in 4th. Dumb change to get rid of No Retreat. It's also made worse by the possibility to lock people in challenges for an extra turn or more if you've got a durable character in your squad.
ATSKNF is incredible now, particularly in combination with Combat Tactics. Honestly I think it makes Vulkan much less attractive, because he steals your absurdly awesome Combat Tactics. Being able to auto-rally within 6" of the enemy makes
SM squads frighteningly slippery and hard to finish off. Even without it, though, not having to worry about No Retreat makes it great.
Rhinos for assault units are almost more a liability than a help. The threat distance is much decreased, and you're forced to expose your guys to at least one turn of shooting before they get to assault. I might seriously consider using NO Rhinos in
CSM; maybe just a
LR and possibly a Defiler or two.
OTOH if I'm up against more of a gunline army, as long as I'm not playing the
KP mission, going Flat Out 18" on turn 1 will be very helpful to close ground on them. I'm thinking it'll be more like 4th ed- use the Rhino for one move, then if it survives, one more move and immediately disembark, using it to shield you from at least some enemy shooting. More play against a variety of armies will be needed, of course.
I will definitely be building and painting both Tactical Terminators and more Jump Infantry, the latter particularly for my
BA; assault troops with better speed/mobility than transports can manage will be nice, as will assault-capable squads which are durable on foot and can shoot effectively as they advance and maneuver.
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