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Made in us
Storm Trooper with Maglight





Denver

I went 3-0 at a local ITC tournament this weekend using the below list, came in 2nd on points versus the other 3-0 player. It is a little different (Space Viking characters, Rough Riders) if not excessively so.

If you have any questions just let me know. Walls of text broken into sections with spoilers for easier reading.

List
Spoiler:

2,000 pts. Imperial Guard: 12 CPs* [113 PL]

Detachment I: Supreme Command <SPACE WOLVES>


Headquarters

Wolf Lord On Thunderwolf: Thunder Hammer, Storm Shield 144 pts. <SPACE WOLVES> [8 PL]

Wolf Lord On Thunderwolf: Thunder Hammer, Storm Shield 144 pts. <SPACE WOLVES> [8 PL]

Wolf Guard Battle Leader On Thunderwolf: Thunder Hammer, Storm Shield 130 pts. <SPACE WOLVES> [6 PL]


Detachment II: Super-Heavy Auxiliary <TALLARN>


Shadowsword: Volcano Cannon, Twin Heavy Bolter, Storm Bolter 406 pts. <TALLARN> [26 PL]


Detachment III: Brigade <CADIAN>


Headquarters

Company Commander: Laspistol and Chainsword 30 pts. <CADIAN> Warlord Trait: Grand Strategist

Relic: Kirov’s Aquila [2 PL]

Primaris Psyker: 46 pts. (Nightshroud, Psychic Maelstrom) [2 PL]

Primaris Psyker: 46 pts. (Psychic Barrier, Psychic Maelstrom) [2 PL]


Fast Attack

Rough Riders - x9 with Hunting Lances 90 pts. <CADIAN> [5 PL]

Rough Riders - x9 with Hunting Lances 90 pts. <CADIAN> [5 PL]

Rough Riders - x9 with Hunting Lances 90 pts. <CADIAN> [5 PL]


Elites

Astropath: Laspistol 30 pts. (Mental Fortitude) [1 PL]

Astropath: Laspistol 30 pts. (Psychic Maelstrom) [1 PL]

Platoon Commander: Laspistol and Chainsword 20 pts. <CADIAN> Relic: Relic Of Lost Cadia [2 PL]


Troops

Conscripts - x30 120 pts. <CADIAN> [4 PL]

Infantry Squad: Mortar, Plasma Gun 52 pts. <CADIAN> [3 PL]

Infantry Squad: Mortar, Plasma Gun 52 pts. <CADIAN> [3 PL]

Infantry Squad: Mortar, Plasma Gun 52 pts. <CADIAN> [3 PL]

Infantry Squad: Mortar, Plasma Gun 52 pts. <CADIAN> [3 PL]

Infantry Squad: Mortar, Plasma Gun 52 pts. <CADIAN> [3 PL]


Heavy Support

Basilisk: Heavy Bolter 108 pts. <CADIAN> [7 PL]

Basilisk: Heavy Bolter 108 pts. <CADIAN> [7 PL]

Basilisk: Heavy Bolter 108 pts. <CADIAN> [7 PL]



*Includes -1 CP for first additional relic.



General thoughts on the list
Spoiler:

The Shadowsword exists to guarantee* that something will die for the minimum one kill/turn ITC point. It is Tallarn to allow it to remain off-table with the Ambush stratagem until an advantageous spot opens up or the opponent drops their reserves and I can guarantee its safety.

The Space Wolf characters are not as killy as they might appear but three thunder hammers with rerolls to hit and wound rolls of 1 (when grouped up) does provide an effective deterrent against monsters and other large units assaulting. The 3++ makes them very tanky until their luck runs out.

The conscript line exists to take up space, potentially bait someone into taking The Reaper as a secondary and otherwise be a relatively hard to kill area denial unit. If I do get first turn they push enemy deep strike back quite a bit.

The infantry are for taking up space, sitting on objectives and killing chaff that gets close.

The Rough Riders are more for fun than anything else but they do open up Recon as an easy secondary (or at least force the opponent to counter-deploy around Recon which can be advantageous). Since people do not see them often they introduce more unease/concern than they would if they were more widely played.

Basilisks + Cadian + Cadian stratagem + Relic for one turn can often be quite nasty on their own as well.

*For certain values of guarantee of course.


General thoughts on competitive play
Spoiler:

Kind of unfortunate that it comes to this but being aware of your opponent, their army and rules and tracking what they are doing is key. This gets pretty taxing over the course of a full day but you will win or lose games based on it. This is not just 40k though, but unfortunately some choices GW has made do not help. As an example, in a recent AoS event I ran into a Nurgle player attempting to use the Harbinger of Decay's Feel No Pain rule (Morbid Vigour) on Nurgle Daemons (it only works on Mortals). At least in AoS the warscrolls are all online and I have at least read most of the common units, particularly if lists are available in advance, or you can reference them after the game to see if mistakes were made. Not having an equivalent in 40k makes it far more likely for mistakes to slip through and continue.

As an example of 40k mistakes from the event, one opponent's recollection of the base range of Warptime included the Thousand Sons Brotherhood of Psykers range bonus already added in. If I did not play Chaos myself I would never have questioned a 15" range on the power for Thousand Sons. Narrowing it to 9" resulted in a play mistake that may have handed me the game (stranding a squad of deep striking Rubrics with Warpflamers out of range, potentially costing him several points that round).

Sometimes an opponent would forget that I had successfully denied a power (with four psykers of my own successful denials can happen). Personally I put the cards for successful buff/debuff casts next to the appropriate target unit to show that they are in play, which helps prevent misunderstandings like that. I would recommend asking your opponent to do the same or at least put down some marker.

If you are going to bring a horde to a timed event, even if it results in some inefficiencies (i.e. less area denial), you have to bring movement trays for as many models as possible and pre-measure dice blocks. As someone who plays a horde army the difference in my movement phase and other parts of the game is very observable when playing against opponents who do not take similar time-saving measures. Just being able to grab a brick of dice and add/remove a few extra is also a huge time saver versus counting them out individually over the course of a game.


Round 1 vs. Dark Angels
Spoiler:

The good news was getting a game in against a good opponent and knowing that it would be very close, challenging and enjoyable. The bad news was having to play a friend who I match up against regularly at the FLGS R1. Such are pairings and the whims of BCP...

His list was Guilliman (proxy Lion you might say), Belial, a big 10 man terminator squad, a 9 man Hellblaster squad, a squad of 6 plasma Inceptors, 3 5 man squads of intercessors and some other accessory characters (foot slogging Lt., jump pack Lt.)

The scenario was Seize Ground with Dawn Of War deployment. I had my infantry spread evenly out to go after the middle line of objectives with Basilisks in one corner (there was an LoS site blocker for one to hide behind). He had Hellblasters and characters in the middle with intercessors spread throughout his deployment zone.

I had Recon, Old School and Headhunter. He had Headhunter, Old School and Titan Slayers on the Shadowsword.

I got first turn. My conscripts advanced in a line and later successfully got the Order to advance again, giving me huge board control. They were also buffed with Mental Fortitude and Psychic Barrier (Nightshroud failed). I deployed one squad of Rough Riders on the table quarters for his deployment zone, but outside of 12" to stop the Auspex Scan stratagem. In combination this gave my a pretty large area of denial against deep strike.

I killed one squad of Intercessors with Basilisks to get the point and killed some Hellblasters.

In his turn he brought the Deathwing down towards the middle of the board, but almost touching his deployment zone because of how far back the conscripts were pushing the 9" bubble. Using Deathwing Assault he cleared out a large number of conscripts thanks to all of the re-roll auras, adding some more damage in the shooting phase. Not being able to use Take Cover against Deathwing Assault was pretty painful (as the extra attacks are not in the Shooting Phase). Some Inceptors shot at and assaulted one flank of Rough Riders, leaving two models (I auto passed morale for them). The other was shot up but only lost one model. The Hellblasters took out a squad of Guardsmen to get the unit destroyed point.

For the second turn my conscripts ran away from the approaching Deathwing (I actually had four survive the game and sit on an objective). My Space Wolf character blob danced around some LoS blocking terrain near them in order to assault the Deathwing if they came around the edge. The squad of Rough Riders already in combat walked away to keep Recon going. The other squad moved into assault range on the other flank.

The Basilisks and other indirect fire wiped out the Hellblaster squad while the Rough Riders killed most of the Intercessors they were engaged with.

In his turn he continued to wipe out infantry and conscripts, with the Rough Riders on the right that had fallen back dying. As an example of how even an honest friend can make a mistake he was continuing to double fire with the Deathwing Assault stratagem even though as I later read that only works the turn they came in. Having Recon continued to give me a growing points lead.

For Turn 3 I finally brought in the Shadowsword. On the left flank I had carved out a huge bubble where the plasma Interceptors could not land within 24" so I plopped it down there. Unfortunately that left it unable to fire at anything through LoS blocking terrain in the mid, other than the handful of Intercessors the Rough Riders on that flank fell back from. I put the last unit of Rough Riders down on the other flank to get Recon again.

For his turn he brought in the Interceptors. They Combat Squad-ed (another stratagem that it seems may have been misplayed as there are only 6 of them at max size), with one wiping out a Basilisk using Weapons Of The Dark Age and the other taking out some Guardsmen to get close to an objective. The still double-firing Terminators killed one squad of Rough Riders and more Guardsmen.

On the last turn the Shadowsword and remaining Basilisks got both Inceptor squads. At this point pretty much the only thing remaining was the character blob and Deathwing, maybe some Intercessors in the right corner. He was able to kill some characters and Guilliman was able to get around some terrain and kill my warlord-two of my Space Wolf characters heroic interventioned and almost brought him down but not quite.

I won the game 18-17, so quite close.


Round 2 vs. Death Guard
Spoiler:

This was a Pox list (30 cultists, 18 walkers) also featuring Typhus, 3 bloat drones with dual plaguespitters, the Nurgle bell character as Arch-contaminator warlord, a winged prince, 5 Blightspawn and 8 terminators. Mission was Cut To The Heart with deployment in table quarters 9" from the middle. I took The Reaper, Headhunter and Recon. He had something similar (Recon, Headhunter, Big Game Hunter if memory serves).

My conscripts provided a bubble for the edge of my deployment. I kept one infantry squad towards each table quarter on the edges with the rest pushing towards the middle. Basilisks were in the back, characters spread out other than Space Wolves going towards the middle. My opponent took first turn.

This game went very quickly so just to keep it simple:

His first turn was two drones and cultists killing conscripts and maybe some infantry. Pretty much everything advanced towards the middle objective. I needed to call out 2" coherency with the cultists a few times as they were trying to spread around his backfield to stop my Rough Riders from deploying in his table quarter. One drone moved back into that corner as well.

In my turn I killed lots of Cultists and some Poxwalkers, including some extra Cultists after I reminded my opponent that they are 6+ save, not Guardsmen equivalent 5+. Even though Cultists were respawning as walkers I was not sure how many rounds I would get due to the time it was taking so I focused on killing the Cultists for Reaper points. Plus with them being spread out for area denial not all were within 7" to spawn (I did have to issue a reminder about the errata requiring the new models to be set up in coherency with models that existed at the start of the phase to stop chaining placement). With Lost Relic the Basilisks went to town on the drones. One unit of Rough Riders came in on each side near his deployment zone. I believe one made and one missed their charge against the flanking Cultists.

On his turn he did not bring the terminators down. His Daemon Prince jumped over my lines and killed one unit of Guardsmen in assault. I had lined up my Space Wolf characters in such a way that he could target them with the Blightspawn grouping (near Arch Contaminator warlord). With average shots and always wounding on 3s or 2s with rerolls, he managed to kill . . . nothing. Truly the Storm Shields did work and made the Space Wolves the MVP of this game, just soaking that turn of fire.

On my turn I brought in the Shadowsword to kill the drone in the back corner. I placed it in an empty corner so that even if the terminators landed there they would be way out of position to threaten anything else. My artillery and other weapons fire wiped out most of the cultists, poxwalkers and daemon prince. My remaining conscripts and the Space Wolf characters assaulted the poxwalkers. Fortunately for me I had opened up enough holes in the formation that I could use pile in/consolidation to engage the Blightspawn.

At the end of the turn he was down to his characters minus the Daemon Prince, the terminators that were not yet on the board and 5 or fewer poxwalkers. At this point he conceded. We worked it out with the concession rules and came to a score of 35-5.


Round 3 vs. Thousand Sons
Spoiler:

Mission was Nexus Control with Front Line Assault. He had disc Ahriman, a winged Daemon Prince, a Shaman, a Fluxmaster, the Changeling, Magnus, 6 Enlightened with great bows, 9 Rubrics with warpflamers, 10 Rubrics with bolt guns and a Soulreaper, 19 Tzaangors with blades, 10 pink horrors and 2 units of 10 brimstones. I went with Recon, The Reaper and Kingslayer (Magnus). He took Old School, Headhunter and Big Game Hunter.

I had my artillery towards the middle (to provide the largest barrier against charges) with the conscript line on the outside.

My opponent did get first turn. He had the brimstones spread out in the back of his deployment zone to make outflanking more difficult. My right was just the big Rubric squad of 10 with bolters. His characters were clustered in the middle behind some pink horrors. The great bows were on his left. Most of this army moved forward in the first turn. The Tzaangors stayed in reserve but the Rubrics with Warpflamers dropped in front of the Enlightened, who held the left middle objective. He was well outside of denial range so I believe was able to cast everything successfully. Lots of buffs and a few minor bits of psychic damage, the most notable being a few mortal wounds to the Space Wolf Battle Leader.

This psychic phase was the one I referenced in the intro. The Daemon Prince manifested Warptime. He indicated that he was casting it on the Enlightened squad (to get them into range to shoot my Basilisks). I pointed out that they were visibly farther than 9" away from the Daemon Prince (3" + Brotherhood of Psykers 6"). This took a little while as he verified that I was correct on the range and then went through determining what his valid targets were before selecting to move Magnus up in front of my conscripts.

The Enlightened did 9 wounds to one Guard squad, leaving the plasma gun alive. Elsewhere he killed a few conscripts and plinked other Guardsmen with the bolter Rubrics. Magnus declared a charge against the conscripts. He needed a 4 and rolled a 2 and 1. He re-rolled the 1 into another 1, failing the charge.

The most important part here was that after positioning poorly for Warptime he was unable to destroy a unit. I used stratagems to stop anything from running away, with the conscripts losing several more to morale but not dying. That cost him the point for killing a unit, the point for First Strike in Old School and basically conceded me the round point for most unit kills.

In my turn I brought in Rough Riders on each flank to go after the brimstones, leaving one in reserve. I brought in the Shadowsword in a far corner away from most of his army-he could charge it with Tzaangors if he brought them in but I figured that was not a bad sacrifice. Two Space Wolves went towards Magnus, one hid in some ruins. I was attempting to get out of Line of Sight to charge the Warpflames if I needed to, as it turned out it would have been better just leaving them together.

In the shooting phase the Shadowsword failed to do much to Magnus, even with Vengeance for Cadia going and 6 or 7 shots. -1 to hit and the 3++ are pretty good as it turns out. I was able to kill all of the Warpflame Rubrics and kill some random models in different units. One Rough Rider squad made its charge and killed a number of Brimstones. The Space Wolves got a couple of thunder hammer hits through on Magnus but not quite enough to knock him down a profile.

Because he had failed to get a first round kill I ended the turn ahead on scoring.

In the second turn the Thousand Sons did not do too much of note. Magnus fell back from the Space Wolves, after which both characters died to psychic and shooting (he later attempted to assault something and needed to give a reminder that Fly only allows shooting, not assault, after falling back). We did need to have a conversation about Infernal Gateway that turn as well. Magnus manifested it and my opponent thought that the range was based on all models in the unit, not a single model, and was attempting to snipe several characters with it. I was able to deny Prescience, although I did need to restate that later in the turn. Magnus rolled a 2 on d3 for his heal with Temporal Manipulation which was rerolled into a 1. Rubrics and Horrors wiped out the conscripts. The Tzaangors came in and charged the Wolf Lord in the ruins-with the fight again stratagem they got him down to 1 wound. He would die on my turn.

On my turn I finished wiping out one unit of Brimstones and the pink horrors, getting 2 Reaper points. The Shadowsword and other shooting dropped Magnus down to his last few wounds, getting me max points for Kingslayer. The Basilisk trio wiped out the Enlightened. Fortunately this cleared the objective, giving me a 2-1 edge on the round and the bonus point.

Unfortunately with lots of rules discussion and some other difficulties we did not really have time to get past T2 (or at least there was not enough time left to start a turn and be fair to both players). I finished with a 12-8 win which was nice but unfortunately the points total put me behind the other 3-0 player at the 20 person event. Such is the Emperor's will.

A closing small note about this game that may be of amusement-my opponent was much better at making his rolls Helm of the Third Eye than I was with Grand Strategist/Aquila. He finished the game with more CP than he started, I was down to 3 (and that was even with rolling 3 5+s on Ambush during deployment).


Changes?
Spoiler:

I am considering dropping one Wolf Lord and adding a Primaris Psyker in the Supreme Command. Three Thunderwolf characters might be a bit of overkill but the deterrent is very nice to have. However with the extra points I think I can squeeze in a Hydra. While it is not objectively "good" the +1 to hit on flying, when almost every army uses Fly one way or another (certainly it would have had a target in each match I played) is attractive for triggering Overlapping Fields Of Fire on harder to hit targets with Fly.

As I get or convert the necessary models I will also likely be dropping one Rough Rider in each squad to add a pair of plasma guns. The extra fire power would certainly be nice to have around. It would be fun to actually deploy them on the table sometime to take advantage of the Lost Relic in assault but I do not think that would be prudent in ITC. Maybe against a horde all assault army or something, but certainly nothing too common.

I really like the concept of the Master Of Ordnance boosting Turn 1 Alpha potential (BS 3+ with relic and regiment re-rolls is a great way to trigger Overlapping) but I cannot seem to escape rolling a 1 for the D6 shots so I am avoiding him in anything remotely competitive. Guard is all about creating efficiency and reliability with weight of dice and he cuts against that hard, even if he does only cost 30 pts.

I also need to get a marker of some kind for the Grand Strategist re-roll. I went through another event without remembering to ever use it.


Other Thoughts
Spoiler:

I know that some of the above, like chronicling opponents' mistakes, is not very uplifting. On the whole I did have an enjoyable time at the event and will be playing in a GT at the venue in a few weeks. This is the third event I have played in run by this particular organizer and I will continue to participate in their events. I wanted to include this not to shame or denigrate any players but just to reinforce for those interested in or considering competitive play that you need to be up on your rules to protect yourself and as a courtesy to other players.

Interested in gaming related original artwork?* You can view my collection of 40k, BattleTech, L5R and other miscellaneous pieces at https://www.comicartfans.com/GalleryDetail.asp?GCat=158415

*This means published works by professional artists, not me of course. 
   
Made in us
Dakka Veteran





Thanks for the report. The lack of time in the last battle must have been a real downer.

On your musing about changes, I find the Master of Ordinance to be absolutely worth it if I take three Basilisks. I fail to see how 30 points would reduce the efficiency of your army in any material way, especially as the Master should add several extra hits from the Basilisks over the course of the game. Is there some aspect of the ITC rules that make him not worth it?

Madness is however an affliction which in war carries with it the advantage of surprise - Winston Churchill 
   
Made in us
Storm Trooper with Maglight





Denver

Since I usually run them as Cadians his buff is wasted meaning that his only value is more easily getting off Overlapping with his 3+ BS. If I ran a different regiment it would certainly increase his attractiveness.

Interested in gaming related original artwork?* You can view my collection of 40k, BattleTech, L5R and other miscellaneous pieces at https://www.comicartfans.com/GalleryDetail.asp?GCat=158415

*This means published works by professional artists, not me of course. 
   
Made in us
Regular Dakkanaut




Great report. Highlighting common mistakes by other armies is useful.

You seem pretty light on lascannons. You didn't really come up against many tanks are the basalisks and shadowsword sufficient to tank hunt?
   
Made in us
Storm Trooper with Maglight





Denver

CaptainO wrote:
You seem pretty light on lascannons. You didn't really come up against many tanks are the basalisks and shadowsword sufficient to tank hunt?


At least locally I am the only one I know of who indulges in heavy tank spam. I sometimes see one Knight/super heavy type armies but the Shadowsword can handle that easily.

I have played against a couple of triple Predator armies and the like, although not with this exact list. In that case, the Shadowsword/artillery will kill at least one to turn off the Killshot stratagem. Depending upon deployment I can either focus on shooting the infantry screen off the table and/or dropping all three Rough Riders early. At least one should make the charge, locking something in combat.

If it were really some kind of giant tank swarm (that is not the Hellhound or Plague Burst Crawler version with auto-hit flamers) I imagine the conscript horde could also do an effective job locking most of it in combat.

Interested in gaming related original artwork?* You can view my collection of 40k, BattleTech, L5R and other miscellaneous pieces at https://www.comicartfans.com/GalleryDetail.asp?GCat=158415

*This means published works by professional artists, not me of course. 
   
Made in gb
Potent Possessed Daemonvessel





Why Aye Ya Canny Dakkanaughts!

Got a pic of your full army?

Ghorros wrote:
The moral of the story: Don't park your Imperial Knight in a field of Gretchin carrying power tools.
 Marmatag wrote:
All the while, my opponent is furious, throwing his codex on the floor, trying to slash his wrists with safety scissors.
 
   
Made in us
Storm Trooper with Maglight





Denver

Lighting for photography is pretty bad in my apartment but this gives you a flavor. I will try and get some better shots tonight at the FLGS.
[Thumb - IMG_2380.JPG]
Infantry

[Thumb - IMG_2381.JPG]
Cavalry And Artillery

[Thumb - IMG_2382.JPG]
Space Wolves

[Thumb - IMG_2379.JPG]
Group Shot

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2018/03/31 19:58:30


Interested in gaming related original artwork?* You can view my collection of 40k, BattleTech, L5R and other miscellaneous pieces at https://www.comicartfans.com/GalleryDetail.asp?GCat=158415

*This means published works by professional artists, not me of course. 
   
Made in gb
Potent Possessed Daemonvessel





Why Aye Ya Canny Dakkanaughts!

This is actually quite an interesting list, I'd love to be able to play it with my new comp list.

Ghorros wrote:
The moral of the story: Don't park your Imperial Knight in a field of Gretchin carrying power tools.
 Marmatag wrote:
All the while, my opponent is furious, throwing his codex on the floor, trying to slash his wrists with safety scissors.
 
   
 
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