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Had today small 3 tournament tournament that was intended for bit less cut-throat army lists. Everyone were asked to bring 500 pts(min 3 units, no other restrictions whatsoever so no need to bring HQ etc), 1500 pts and 2000 pts. No LOW period so this time no primarch invasion! I took obviously my sons of horus. This was traitor vs loyal campaign so at the start of round overall generals paired forces each other. Technically 500 pts COULD end up playing 2000 pts but of course if somebody sends 2000 pts against 500 pts that means reverse will also invariably happen. Each list used only once. Some other stuff I wasn't too sure. I just played So first up I got 1500 pts list sent against Solar Auxilia. Yey! This was fun. Non-marines is always experience! It was ambush deployment, first blood and both sides nominate 2 units from both sides that is kill target. Oh and last unit destroyed period scores one more(so opposite of first blood). He had 2 HQ guys, 2 big blops of lasrifles, flamer squad in that demolisher cannon thing, 4 ogryns, 10 volkite guys, icarus lascannon and lightning fighter.

I had librarian(enfeeble, life leech plus primaris power), basic centurion, 2 squads of tacticals(one with bp plus extra ccw), dreadnought with assault cannon and fist, 7 autocannon marines and 3 multi-melta jetbikes.

This was game of trying to scythe through tons of infantry. On left ogryns came toward my bolter squad after losing one to my autocannons(I had failed charge myself) but eventually were dealt with with reasonable casualties. Problem was took time. Then I had to sort through blop of lasrifle guys that KEPT ON FIGHTING! Damn it took ages to clear. Meanwhile on right my second tac squad mulched through flamer squad that tried to get rid of jetbikes. I kept losing guys to lasrifles and volkites though apotecharion and power armour kept things reasonable. Disaster then struct as I failed charge against volkite and lasrifle squad(which had both HQ's, one which was objective designated by him and squad itself objective designed by me. Ogryns were other and plane was other). This could have resulted in disaster as I was bunched up for demolisher cannon but luckily it scattered off to bikes. I still suffered casualties including centurion on front. I tried charge there again but dices weren't quite with me, was outnumbered heavily and the rending sabres took my sergeant with twin lighting claws and one more. I needed 3 to hold, rolled 4. This meant that my other squad with bolters and librarian faced 10" charge as they were able to consolidiate 5" and 6". DAMN!

I screwed up and went for play for what I felt was more realistic(concerve casualties rather than try hail mary) and didn't try but went. Odds were I would have been wiped out but only win/loss mattered. So I lost big time.

Second game. Here bit of campaign shuffling happened. 2k death guard loyalists with toooooons of tanks were sent. I noted I'm seriously in trouble vs tanks so 1500 pts thousand sons were sent instead. I got instead 1500 pts Imperial fists with my 2000 pts sons of horus(feel bit quilty getting to play vs 1500 but that's the breaks. But I would have been pretty toothless vs that deathguard with 2 fliers, 2-3 vindicators, sicaran and land raiders...) and plasma squad in rhino.

Anyway he had smallish tac squad, big tac blob, 2 shatter shell quad mortars, 6 missile launcher squad, 6 heavy bolter squad, sicaran with heavy bolter sponsons and vindicator laser destroyer with machine spirit.

I had 3 squads of blob tacticals(bolter&ccw had 1 short of max), chaplain with cataphractii armour, sicaran, 6 lascannon marines, contemptator with twin fist and jetbikes with heavy bolters and volkite. Apo in big squad(warlord got outflank so off they went. Probably was bad idea) as well as one big squad of bolters.

So this was game of my tacticals moving ahead, boltering bit of this and that. Lascannons shuffled several missile launchers away but eventually died to scatter barrage and something else I think. Lost 2 bikes early on leaving just volkite. Vindicator stunned rhino. Plasma came out and did pretty much nothing but lose guy. Vindicator torched eventually all of them. Dreadnought charged ahead eventually reaching quad launcher taking it out. Alas I failed turn too early charge.

Big thing however was on his left flank where my cataphractii chaplain led his outflanking(lol) tacticals. They came and peppered a bit but not much. On his turn HE got from reserves his blop that promptly walked between my squad and his sicaran(lol) in formation that would have made roman phalanx proud. This meant there was like 50 marines and tank in small maybe 15x15" square Less good news was I had TONS of BS5 bolters face. Even worse indirect barrage got perfect scatter right in top of apotecharion. 11 wounds, 1 failed save(reminds me...Wasn't apotecharion character so 4+ look out sir?) and failed FNP. DAMN! So now I ate 40+ bolter shots that scythed through several marines and hurt chaplain. I was seriously dented so I decided rather than charge big squad with his warlord(maybe mistake) I would multi charge his sicaran(my chaplain with fist ought to take care of that which had btw immobilized itself on difficult terrain) and small squad of tacticals figuring maybe they don't run and I get out of getting shot.

I failed 4" charge...

Enter fury of legion. _80_ bolter shot. It was barely but last 8-10 or so tacticals died and chaplain lost his final wound exactly(albeit there were more bolters).

DAMN!

So he had slay warlord, first blood and 1 objective. I had 2 objectives(just 2 scoring unit left). I needed to get line breaker but dread had died. If game goes to turn 5 I could get tac squad there(and control objective), sicaran, vindicator he has no chance of taking out anymore without quad mortars and jetbike. He blew sicaran(which btw 2 turns earlier had eaten 4 penetrate and 2 glance and cover saved ALL!). Game ended...Damn. Lost. With 500 pts advantage and him rolling like crap for hit and saves. Embarrassing...

I also screwed up with jetbike not moving out earlier. Had no danger there on right flank that didn't see him anyway(2 krak missiles) so just go there for line breaker. Should have got draw at least but basically threw it out.

Game 3. My 500 pts with basic concul with power sword and plasma pistol, 11 tacticals with bolter&ccw's and dreadnought. Got paired with iron warriors with rhino tac squad, seeker squad and dreadnought. Was up against 2 terminator concul's and 5 terminators from imperial fists, vindicator, sicaran and xyphon or whatever flier from death guard...Oh gak.

Well game wasn't actually as one sided as I thought. Didn't help they got their reinforcements on stat though. We seized and moved ahead. It was bit of cat and mouse initially. Objective was dead center and who's in b2b wins which would then launch barrages to main games. Terminators came there. My dreadnought lost one combat arm and charged into terminators(I had expected iron warrior dread to join in support but HE was worried I would not make it so after I had moved and was facing 9" charge with fleet reroll he actually went AWAY. Whaaaat? Anyway I charged, storm shields kept the HQ guy safe and I got vaporized. He then charged in and killed 2 and got vaporized. Terminators came into objective where my tac squad that had been hurt a bit were waiting. Iron warrior tac squad had finally came so on our last turn we fired bolters like hell leaving wounded concul, intact chainfist concul and 2 basic guys I think. Alas plasma pistol failed to wound. I tried to charge as we NEEDED to get them out(hey we lose game if I dont' charge!). I killed one more but from 9 wounds or so that was it. Another 1 and wounded HQ would have bit it. My refractor field failed completely so was splatted and ran and that was it.

Fun tournament anyway. And then I lost to temptation and bought reinforcements...There was box of sniper scouts so I asked staff that's it? No more? Well actually seems there WERE so I suddenly was facing 3 boxes of sniper scouts and 2 bp&ccw...Whoops. My idea of 2 squads of snipers to spice troop choices enlargened into possibility of actually running recon company which isn't even barebones! Urgh. So that's what I bought.

Sniper rifles are easy. 3x5, sniper rifles. Don't think there's point doing much more updating. CC ones are bit more of question. I probably sculpt them cloaks for stealth on basis they have 4+ save so want at least good cover save. Snipers are good in 5 squads but cc ones probably should be in one blop? Should I go for 9 + convert HQ variant or just 10? That's the first question. Maybe get later artificer armoured sergeant(funny that scout sergeant can have artificer armour and power fist and still be stealthy but HQ one can't ).

For HQ I was thinking thus maybe rending blade or power axe to give some AP2 ability. And for sergeant maybe fist for same reason. Not intended for heavy combat but some flexibility in case there's dreadnought or something I need to deal with(HQ obviously has melta bomb).

There's tournament coming in 3 weeks so I was planning to get these there. Above 4 squads would be there plus cheap concul to get rites of war. Then I remembered veterans can be pretty scouty sneaky guys and I have 10 of those so lol those in. And then for extra lol thought about taking also the sons of horus reavers. This is also less competive tournament with restrictions like knights are 0-1 ally(so no all kngith list), no armoured ceramite for LOW, spartan can take flare OR armoured ceramite and phopsex quads 0-1.

Anyway initial plan was something along(points aren't 100% verified yet. I need to check what equipment I had on some models plus scouts are still on sprues):

Concul that opens up ROW, plasma pistol, power sword, melta, refractor, artificer. Not sure what this guy does actually! Just to unlock ROW but WYSIWYG so needs at least some gear.

Maybe the sneaky scout concul

2x5 marksmen veterans with missile launchers. One has sergeant w/fist and combi melta, one has sergeant w/power sword and combi melta. One squad has also power sword&combi melta guy. Alternatively simply one squad of 10

3x5 sniper rifle scouts
9-10 cc scouts(depending on HQ or not)

5xreavers(3-4xchain axe, 1-2 fist(don't recall how many I had), 4xvolkite, plasma gun, artificer armour). Yeah expensive as hell. Went overboard with equipment building models :(

sicaran w/lascannon sponsons
3xjetbikes with multi-meltas
2xvindicator w/laser destroyer

knight gallant(bit odd for recon company but figured some big threat would be good and I just got these painted liking it rather lot so would like to field...Gallant because I'm pretty sure I can't fit bigger one. Think melta would be good to tank bust).

Options I can do is drop one vindicator and maybe upgrade knight to something with ranged weapons. Jetbikes could be FA version as well thus avoiding having to start from reserves.

Sooo...How would you build the CC scouts? And any suggestions how to get that HQ scout model bit more....well heroic!

Tough second game, failing charges suck and even worse - that result; at least the opponent must have enjoyed it...

My instinct is to put artificer armour on the sarge and three melta bombs among the squad instead of chameleoline.
I'd be tempted to put a hand flamer on the sarge too just for the 'old skool' feel.

Alternative to the PF - take a power axe so you get the same I1 AP2 hits against their opposite number and take a melta-bomb somewhere in the unit with the spare 5pts

 SirDonlad wrote:
Tough second game, failing charges suck and even worse - that result; at least the opponent must have enjoyed it...

Certainly rare you get to fury of legion point blank with full blop of tacticals! Took quite a while with all the look out sirs and what not.

Pity opponent decided to use fury of legion. He had been poundering does he use or does he not. I was silently praying nope. Good for him he did seeing even with it it was barely kill with zero overkill.

I really shouldn't have went there in the first place and just go for the objective on my side. Got too amused by idea of outflanking terminator HQ! Had I deployed them normally his big blop would have had to come forward against at least 2 squads waiting. Or just sulk back and take objectives but then I had more troop choices so would have had jolly good time taking objectives. Concentrate fire on smaller tac squad to remove it too. And he wouldn't have got slay the warlord. Easy win.

My instinct is to put artificer armour on the sarge and three melta bombs among the squad instead of chameleoline.
I'd be tempted to put a hand flamer on the sarge too just for the 'old skool' feel.

Alternative to the PF - take a power axe so you get the same I1 AP2 hits against their opposite number and take a melta-bomb somewhere in the unit with the spare 5pts

Artificer isn't good if he's not at front and if he is then while it's marginally better than say with tacticals(where tanking with sergeant is just plain bad unless you know it's AP3 fire you'll be tanking. But this turns into bad idea the second AP4 or worse or AP2 fire is aimed at them instead) due to 4+ for rest it still puts special weapon, that melta bomb and leadership at risk. I don't like LD8. I keep failing them.

Also no model. Don't have spare power armour guys and no money or time to get another calth box before tournament in 3 weeks.

Fair enough, my meta always have arty sarge up front and 'look out sir' for the AP2 or better.

I presume there isn't the spare points for rhino's?

 SirDonlad wrote:
Fair enough, my meta always have arty sarge up front and 'look out sir' for the AP2 or better.

I presume there isn't the spare points for rhino's?

Thing is for tac squad you pay 10 pts for artificer. 10 pts for extra tactical marine. Against AP4 or worse you save in average one extra marine. So basically artificer armour saves it's cost BUT you lose any special weapon and extra point of LD and in CC if opponent has AP3 weapon(like power sword) you lose ability to challenge and soak THAT. If you plan to tank AP4 or worse you would be better of keeping LD safe and buy extra marine! If you take ANY upgrade for sergeant besides AA you are losing points when he dies.

Unless your meta has tons of AP3 but very little AP4 or worse coming your way that's just bad idea for tacticals. Bit more justifiable for say heavy weapon squad though again that costs you point of LD. Something which bit the imperial fist in the arse when he tanked, lost sarge and another guy and then promptly rolled 9 for LD. Now my REAVER squad meanwhile is good candinate for using AA sarge to tank as basic guys are so expensive there and sarge isn't even best guy out there damage output wise. Hmm. Wonder if I can attach apo into there as well?

Rhino's I figured I put on veteran marines. Scouts for one are either shooting sniper rifles(=want to stay still. Not good combo with rhino's) or are h2h squad. Now that might benefit but infiltrate works to get them close, move through cover helps and can't assault out of rhino anyway so not really sure how much of help that is.

Might be nice to have 3rd rhino for reavers but apart from points I also lack model.