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Ok, so I didn't get tabled before my first turn, I still had three models left. Two from one squad who had failed their moral check and were 3 inches from the table edge; and in heavy weapons team that had one wound and had passed its moral check. Either way, we decided to call the game there.

So, how it happened. My local gaming store is doing a league that involves an entrenched position being attacked, I had opted out of the league because I am not sure how long I'm going to be available to play and so I can work on finishing painting some long over due stuff. I like to paint at the local gaming store while everyone else is playing (I also usually try to by something, even if it's only a coke). So today, one of the players bails for the third time in the row and now this one guy is three games behind in the league. I get asked by several people to fill in just to advance the game. Reluctantly, I agree and quickly draw up a list.
Now, I've never done entrenched positions or building before, I've played with ruins all the time, but never building. I don't really want to take any buildings and don't know how they work from a roles perspective (yes they are in the core book, but I've never used them), but my opponent insist so I grab a couple. So I set up, and before he does he gets to take a number of str9 artillery shots (with how many he gets dependent on how many buildings I have). With those shots he knocks out all three of my wyverns, my manticore, and about half my infantry. Now, he sets up his troops and moves into his shooting face. He one shots both of Leman Russ Exectutioners. Blows up my chrimea and then kills all the troops in it, and wipes out my remaining infantry with the three exceptions I put up top. I still have no clue what the point of buildings are, one of my squads got a 4+ invul for where they were standing, but he scored 20+ wounds on them so that was useless.
I don't like to be a sore loser, but it's hard to enjoy a game when you loose before your first turn. It took me longer to set up than it did to play the game. The only dice I rolled were for armor saves and leadership check, all but 2 of which I failed. I am use to losing, I play guards it happens all the time, but I usually get to kill something before all my guys die.
We shook hands, and I left. I don't think I will be playing again for a while.

edited for grammar*

Your wall of text just tabled me before turn one.

Sorry

By Khaine's left nipple. I am sorry.

Well, tell you what, you did a solid for a guy falling behind in the league, and he's a lot better off for getting a big win out of it.

Otherwise, sucks that you got walloped first turn but I guess I have limited sympathy, It sounds like you pretty much passed on informing yourself how the special rules for a regular part of the campaign worked, and you got thumped pretty hard for it.

 Bookwrack wrote:
Well, tell you what, you did a solid for a guy falling behind in the league, and he's a lot better off for getting a big win out of it.

Otherwise, sucks that you got walloped first turn but I guess I have limited sympathy, It sounds like you pretty much passed on informing yourself how the special rules for a regular part of the campaign worked, and you got thumped pretty hard for it.

Speaking of special rules, it's kinda weird that attackers got the first turn after a bombardment, usually the planetstrike sorts tend to have attackers have to come off the board or through deepstrike, and the defenders get first turn after the bombardments.

"I don't really want to take any buildings and don't know how they work from a roles perspective (yes they are in the core book, but I've never used them), but my opponent insist so I grab a couple. So I set up, and before he does he gets to take a number of str9 artillery shots (with how many he gets dependent on how many buildings I have)."

Well, that's probably the problem right there. All in all, you lost the time it took to set-up your army, so not the end of the world.

You suffered the wrath of his campaign advantage whatnots and didn't have your own to respond. Seems like a pretty dumb rule without a restriction that the shots have to be directed against the buildings.

sounds like the game type you played was bs.

OP, please don't take your unfortunate game as normal. I'd expect that any game outside of the league would be much different, with more opportunities for you to actually do stuff.

Yet, I have to ask - when you opted out of the league, did you read the league special rules beforehand? Did you talk with other players about the league?

It sounds like you had several opportunities to learn the special rules of the league games, and thus would've known what was possible going into this game.

Of course, it sounds like those artillery shots would've scattered the full distance, so them doing that much damage was just your opponent getting quite lucky [unless you clumped your units together, or were forced into using an undersized field].

Yeah, I'm calling BS on that campaign too. X amount of S9 artillery shots and gets to go first?

Did they expect it to last longer than 3 turns Max? Sounds like they didn't play test these rules first to see how it would turn out (I.e. total rape of the defending army.)

Sounds like a planet strike mission, but you should have received the buildings for free... Weird.

 Lance845 wrote:
sounds like the game type you played was bs.

This. Too much alpha-strike in 40k already - so they add more in the form of S9 artillery from nowhere.

Sounds like one hell of a narrative (TM) got forged!

> Temporarily quits 40k to focus on studying
> Pops in on Dakka to see if 40k has improved at all in the last few months
> Literally the first thing I see is "It's as depressingly bad as when you left, Selym"

 Selym wrote:
> Temporarily quits 40k to focus on studying
> Pops in on Dakka to see if 40k has improved at all in the last few months
> Literally the first thing I see is "It's as depressingly bad as when you left, Selym"

Why? This was a custom league scenario that the original poster didn't properly prepare themselves for. This NOT regular 40k.

If anything, I feel regular 40k has actually gotten better in the last few months.

KayTwo wrote:

It took me longer to set up than it did to play the game.

Haha, damn I feel you. I usually run above 100guardsmen with 7ish tanks depending on points and it has happened to me too. Nothing quite like having all your lovingly assembled and painted models wrecked in less time then it took to deploy. Never got tabled pre turn 1 though, so achievement unlocked I guess. Turn 2 charges wrecked me back in the day a few times.

It'll get better. gak happens. May I ask what the point value was?

Sounds exactly likelike Planetstrike. This was a GW approved game mode, back in 5th. Not a homebrew thing (barring the defender needing to pay for some buildings, and some stuff about first turn moving), but otherwise, nothing too different. Yes, you weren't familiar with the system, and wasn't interested in playing, and I can completely sympathise with the loss. However, at the same time, by failing to make yourself aware of the rules and plan accordingly, it could have been avoided. If you don't care enough to find out the rules, you can't be blameless when you are on the back foot.

Can't call the game BS if you sign up to do it.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Sounds exactly likelike Planetstrike. This was a GW approved game mode, back in 5th. Not a homebrew thing (barring the defender needing to pay for some buildings, and some stuff about first turn moving), but otherwise, nothing too different. Yes, you weren't familiar with the system, and wasn't interested in playing, and I can completely sympathise with the loss. However, at the same time, by failing to make yourself aware of the rules and plan accordingly, it could have been avoided. If you don't care enough to find out the rules, you can't be blameless when you are on the back foot.

Can't call the game BS if you sign up to do it.

To be fair, 5th edition didn't have an auto-lose condition if no units were on the table at the end of the turn. As a result this sort of thing wasn't nearly as ridiculous as it is now.

Now? A Turn 1 blitz is an auto-lose for you whereas before you still had your reserves to come in.

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
Sounds like a planet strike mission, but you should have received the buildings for free... Weird.

I did receive the buildings for free, but as I pointed out they didn't do much. There were two other league games going on at the point that I got asked to fill in, so my building selections were limited. I ended up with two buildings that gave me chance to re-roll failed leadership test and my opponent got 5 of those str9 reduced scatter shots. He also took his turn before I did, so; I set up, the shots came down, he set up, and moved straight into his shooting phase.

I want to be angry and refute some of the above comments about being over my head, but; they are right. While I never intended to play a league game I still agreed to do so, and even though I was being rushed I should have sat down and read the rules I have no one to blame but myself. I wish I wasn't still sore about it, but I am. Haven't even unboxed my stuff to paint. I'll calm down and play again. But it looks like its going to take some time.

It'll get better. gak happens. May I ask what the point value was?

Point value was 1650, I had to draw up a list from scratch, but; what I ended up with was pretty close to my standard list. CC with MoO, 1 pcs with chrimea and flamers, 3 squads of 10 with autocannons, 1 squad of 3 wyverns, 1 manticore, 2 lemanruss executioners, 2 valks, 2 squads of vets with melta. Reserves never came in, to be honest by the time my turn did role around I wasn't to keen on playing anymore. With three guards men still on the table he agreed to call it.

After I had set up, I was informed that the landing pad in the middle of the field had to be held by the defender and gave a 4+invul. I tried to set my army up on it, but I couldn't make it work, so I just took one of my vet squads and threw them up there. Yeah, that 4+, I made 4 of them out of 20. I am not sure what my opponents list was, the only time I asked him about it I was still drawing mine up and he refused to share. He played Tau, had three mechs and most of his army had split fire and hit and wounded on 2+s

edited for grammar*

Your opponent insisted you take buildings, which directly resulted in him having STR9 large blasts? That seems to be a step past "you didn't read the rules" into "your opponent actively took advantage of you" territory. Kind of not cool from where I'm standing.

It sounds like tthe mission was balanced around the defender getting free bunkers/bastions to give you resistance to said bombardments, not just making the whole situation be a huge turkey shoot.

Still it was really nice of you to step in and play a game with him even though you weren't interested. Shame it turned out so poorly.


[edit]: What do you mean by Mechs? The riptides? The big walkers with a 2+ save and a mini gun/AP2 large blast? Because if he was busting three of those out that's an incredible amount of cheddar. Or was it a unit of three ghostkeels? Big stealth suits run in a group of 3 in a formation are BS 5, ignore cover, shoot vehicles in their rear armor? Because that is less "cheesy" but is utterly made to slaughter imperial guard.

Tau is my race of choice. It sounds like you're not very familiar with playing against them? They can be frustrating to play against in the best of situtations ontop of which it's a rough matchup for imperial guard even if you're familiar playing against them. Ontop of which you didn't have first turn and were placed in a scenario heavily biased against you. It's not surprising your army got shot to pieces in such an unenjoyable fashion, which is a shame. I consider any games of my own that end in such a way to be a loss not a victory.

Basically every gun Tau has is STR 5, so every gun in the army will wound all your infintry on 2+. Tau basic BS is 3 across the board, so its odd he hit you on 2+ much unless he was rocking a ton of markerlights or formations. I'd be happy to discuss the tau army strengths/weakness ez more in depth with you if you're interested (and you can remember more of what he had), so you can be slightly more prepared in the future.

If your opponent isn't going to share their list with you, always assume they're cheating.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
However, at the same time, by failing to make yourself aware of the rules and plan accordingly, it could have been avoided. If you don't care enough to find out the rules, you can't be blameless when you are on the back foot.

Can't call the game BS if you sign up to do it.

i think that's a bit rough mate. he didn't sign up for it, he was only filling in so the fellow could get a game in for the campaign.

 Rippy wrote:
Your wall of text just tabled me before turn one.

The wall of text wasn't the problem for me, it's the continual usage of the word "loose" instead of "lose". OP, that statement isn't directed expressly at you, either, but to everyone on the internet who I've seen use those two words wrong. I hate to be a grammar nazi, but this has gotten ridiculous. You "lose" a game, you "loose" a captive or prisoner when you release them. If English isn't your first language, then you get a pass. Native English speakers have no excuses.

On topic, wtf kind of game is that where one player gets X free artillery shots? Most of the rest of the bad stuff was just down to sheer rotten luck (like the LRs getting one-shotted), but the artillery thing just seems dumb to me, especially giving the player who gets them the first regular turn also.

In the updated planet strike rules the opponent will get d3+ the number of buildings you have.

You should have put your tanks on the pad, and surrounded it with infantry for counter assault.

If he had 9 blasts and you only had three buildings, then their campaign would always favor the attacker. If you could have gotten void shields for free, you should have been told so.

Sorry you got pummelled :/

Terminal wrote:

 Selym wrote:
> Temporarily quits 40k to focus on studying
> Pops in on Dakka to see if 40k has improved at all in the last few months
> Literally the first thing I see is "It's as depressingly bad as when you left, Selym"

Why? This was a custom league scenario that the original poster didn't properly prepare themselves for. This NOT regular 40k.

If anything, I feel regular 40k has actually gotten better in the last few months.

ey, don't interrupt the person's studies.

captain bloody fists wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
However, at the same time, by failing to make yourself aware of the rules and plan accordingly, it could have been avoided. If you don't care enough to find out the rules, you can't be blameless when you are on the back foot.

Can't call the game BS if you sign up to do it.

i think that's a bit rough mate. he didn't sign up for it, he was only filling in so the fellow could get a game in for the campaign.

Hypothetical unpopular argument: So, if it didn't mean anything to OP, why is there an issue? They had no investment in the game, so much so that they didn't read the rules for the campaign. They didn't have to play, but chose to, and didn't read up on the rules. If one fails to prepare, they prepare to fail. /hypothetical argument

ZergSmasher wrote:

 Rippy wrote:
Your wall of text just tabled me before turn one.

The wall of text wasn't the problem for me, it's the continual usage of the word "loose" instead of "lose". OP, that statement isn't directed expressly at you, either, but to everyone on the internet who I've seen use those two words wrong. I hate to be a grammar nazi, but this has gotten ridiculous. You "lose" a game, you "loose" a captive or prisoner when you release them. If English isn't your first language, then you get a pass. Native English speakers have no excuses.

On topic, wtf kind of game is that where one player gets X free artillery shots? Most of the rest of the bad stuff was just down to sheer rotten luck (like the LRs getting one-shotted), but the artillery thing just seems dumb to me, especially giving the player who gets them the first regular turn also.

That would be Planetstrike, which was a GW approved game mode.

Reading the OP again, he says entrenched position. I'm guessing attacker has to take and hold these positions, kind of like the end of the film Brotherhood, where the South Korean forces assault a trenchline of the North Korean forces, using much more force.

But, giving the attacker lots of S9 artillery shots it's way to easy to RNG a win if your dice are lucky. Adding in that the OP was merely filling in for his opponent (who should be kicked out. Seriously, 3 no shows? feth that guy.) And was told to take some buildings seems to stink of metagaming scrub who knew his opponent wasn't totally prepared and simply curb stomped him.

Adding in that in tournaments, many, many players will use total cheese lists, it seems that the OP wasn't expecting total annhialation, but to at least get 1 turn.

This was always a problem with the planetstrike ruleset as the free pie plates are WAY better then some free buildings so was lopsided in the attacks favor

 Selym wrote:
> Temporarily quits 40k to focus on studying
> Pops in on Dakka to see if 40k has improved at all in the last few months
> Literally the first thing I see is "It's as depressingly bad as when you left, Selym"

Lol. "This game group somewhere not in the country where I play came up with house rules that ruined the game for somebody, 40k is clearly a broken rule system so I shouldn't play."

If you let me make up my own rules, I can make freakin' chess an unplayably unbalanced ruleset. Like, it wouldn't even be hard.

I wouldn't let it get to you. I went and played at a local tourney created by some of the top itc players as LVO prep. Now I signed up for it but knew it could be rough. My first opponent, who I know through another local store, just man handled my list. I knew mid turn two it was over. We played through four turns, even though turns three and four I had almost nothing on the table. But we were talking about what I could/should have done or things I could do better. Or possibly better unit choices. My other two games were fortunately much closer. Both were within gone point. I know you didn't fully sign up for it like t did but when I'm outmatched I'm always talking to my opponent about what I cold have done better. Some are very surprised that I'm asking for the criticism but it makes me a better player and I know people that have been playing many years have a lot of advantages over me. So I try to use that as much as I can. All my opponents in the two tournaments I have played have been very good at giving me some constructive feedback.