2000 points Genestealer Cult vs Astra Militarum/Imperium

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**the_scotsman**

2,000 points Imperium vs Genestealer Cult

Cult List:

Spoiler:

Guard List:

Spoiler:

Mission:

Spoiler:

The game:

Spoiler:

The Cult deployed everything either in ambush or in a transport. Seeing the Guard placing the big pack of basilisks in one far corner behind a set of shipping crates, the cult placed one transport truck, the rockgrinder, and both russes on the objective on that side of the board, and just a solo transport+squad on the other objective. The Guard deployed the punisher tank and both command squads in tallarn ambush, one Battlecannon and two infantry squads on the objective opposite the solo transport of cultists, and everything else surrounding the rest of the objectives. Commanders and Psykers were liberally scattered throughout.

Thanks to the beauty of transport and cult ambush drops, the cult finished deploying comfortably before the guard and got +1 on their roll to go first, which they won. Using the new Meticulous Ambush stratagem, 20 acolytes and a Primus rolled a 6 to ambush and launched themselves straight at the basilisks' bubblewrapping squads and one leman russ punisher tank. The patriarch used a command point reroll and got another 6, so he and his genestealer escort went straight for the battlecannon tank and supporting infantry. Both squads of shotgun neophytes also ambushed in, but rolled poorly and were out of the main fight for now.

between shooting and the patriarch's charge, the battlecannon russ, a company commander, and one full infantry squad went down. A Primaris Psyker was left alive and attempted to be surrounded, but the genestealers didnt have quite enough distance on their pile in to fully hem him in. The acolytes lost nearly half their number to the overwatch, but wiped out one infantry squad, engaged another, all three basilisks, and took the leman russ punisher down to 2 wounds. Shooting and morale took down one of the unengaged Tallarn infantry squads as well. The cult scored 3 points from objectives.

Looking to take back momentum, Saint Celestine went straight for the enemy's throat. All the ambushers arrived on the side of the map with the patriarch and plasma fire and saint celestine's burning sword wiped them out. Rather than risk failing the long 9" charge with celestine and giving the patriarch a chance to get away, the guard commander opted to use his ambushing tank to shoot him to death and take the 3 points. The guard scored 7 points in total by killing the patriarch, stealing an objective I had held, and securing an objective. Vitally for the cult, one basilisk trapped in the corner could not fall back far enough to get out of 1" away from the acolytes, so nothing could shoot them at all. both other basilisks, infantry squad and leman russ all fell back and did not shoot. Numerous characters and an infantry squad piled on and murdered one squad of shotgun neophytes in melee.

The cult brought in the last squad in reserves, the aberrants with another primus, with the ambush stratagem also got a 6. they charged the basilisks, taking one down and leaving the other with 2 wounds. Both primuses also put in work, one killing a primaris psyker and the other Sgt Harker.The wounded russ was finished off by shooting and the remaining russ taken down to just over half wounds.The cult scored 2 points from objectives leaving the score 5-7.

Saint Celestine went straight for the aberrants, but unfortunately her murdering them was stopped by the MVP rule of the game, Bestial Vigor, meaning her 2 damage sword only did 1 to them and left 2/5 alive to whack her with their hammers. Between them and the Primus who had intervened in Celestine was left with 2 wounds. The remaining Russ attempted to clear a goliath truck off one of the objectives but it survived with a single wound left and the objective stayed contested. the guard scored 1 point from objectives, putting the score 5-8.

Shooting from the cult russes and mining lasers takes down the last leman russ, and the aberrants and goliath rockgrinder take celestine down for the first time. She revives back on the last friendly objective nearby, which is currently a giant melee scrum between the surviving guard squad+Characters and the second shotgun neophyte squad. Thanks to obsec, the neophytes grab that objective momentarily, scoring 5 points and putting the score at 10-8.

Celestine murderizes the cultists on the objective and scores it for the home team, gaining 3 points from objectives. The last basilisk dies to melee and fails to explode despite trying with a reroll. The score is 10-11, but the cult is all set to score 8 points and table the Guard in the last turn, so we rolled through the acolytes, aberrants and rockgrinder killing celestine the last time and called the game a cult victory.

Summary:

Spoiler:

**Primark G**

I really enjoyed reading the BR - thanks!!!

**Caspian89**

Thanks for that! Not nearly enough Cult battle reports around. Good job.

**Captain Roderick**

Thanks for posting - good batrep and nice added narrative.
Next time you might want to thread photos into the narrative of the game? It looks good that way - but either way I'll still enjoy it :-)

**Aesthete**

Great bat-rep, and good pointers re: terrain.