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Hi guys,
So this weekend I'll face my Chaos opponent, probably playing his DG army this time. However, I don't know which list I want to bring:
The first one or the second one with the ironclad ?
I'll let you decide !





Both are quite close to be honest, but I don't own a stalker yet, I'll have to proxy it. I think I'll be quite happy to play the ironclad, but the first list may be better.

So the game happened !
I played the ironclad list and it was... not a good list haha. But managed to get a draw ! I'll post the battle report tomorrow but I can already tell you that classic marines vehicles are really lacking in resilience.

So, my list was the following (already written in the opening post):


The idea was to try several under played units that hadn't seen a game for a long time, and seemed less useless now, like a LS (ignoring malus to hot after having moved etc). I tried to increase the ironclad number of attack with twi relics giving +1A while keep a solid core I knew would perform: scouts chapter master and sternguards.


My opponent list was the following:

In short, a powerful anti tank army quite adaptated to the City of Death kind of table we were using. Too bad for me trying to test old marines vehicles !


We went with a Maelstrom of War game, playing the cleanse and control scenario IIRC, we needed 3 tactical objective in our hand at the beggining of each turns.


He deployed first, and he went first. The cultists and the Objective6 are on the roof of the tallest building in his deployement zone, that we can barely see on the pictures. A 5 man squad of PM is in the building too.

I used the redeployement Ultramarine stratagem to redeploy my tanks I had deployed very aggressively in case of me stealing the initiative, and the game started.



T1
He advanced his rhino right to the objective 5 and popped smokes. two units of plague marines walked and Advanced toward my deployement zone, slowly getting in position, getting into cover (damned 2+ armor saves !). One of the plagueburster moved too, followed by his lord. The drones moved, aiming at my poor vindicator. The dread, deamon prince, cultist (securing Objective6) and the last plague marines unit (just under the cultists) didn't move,

The psy phase wasn't significant and he went to the shooting phase, the terrible shooting phase.

He destroyed my vindicator using his drones then both of my rhino and put 5 wounds on my predator with his dreads and crawlers.
Wow, that's my whole armored ressources taken out in the first combat phase of the game. Nice. Out of Loss shooting is quite powerful ! Two sternguards died due to small arm fire coming from the closest plague marine unit, too, and two marines died in the explosion of their transport.
I deployed the units of the left rhino in the closest building and the 9 surviving tactical marines behind the containers, but they took 2 more casualities.




Then I began my first turn. I draw my obective cards: to get and to defend objective 2 (my scouts were just under it), to have three units in my deployement zone ("you can't achieve this objective T1"), and to secure objective 1 (in the central tower). So that's two objectives I couldn't achieve T1, on 3 objectives....
I made my tactical marines and characters move to confront the plague marines, the ironclad stepped outside of the building too, with a wonderful 6 on his Advance roll, trying to hide behind the tower, and popped his smokes. the land speeder move right next to the thunderfire, being useless against 10 plague marines, in order to capture obective 3 (just right of the tower) later. The chapelain went on the tower to capture Objective 1.
The scouts didn't move, holding two objectives (4 and 5) except the right flank scouts getting on objective 2. The scout bikers moved toward the plague marines too, getting about half of the at 12" for the shotguns.



My psyker casted Might of Heroes on the ironclad, taking 3 MW in the process, and the other one failed to do anything.

I shooted the thunderfire on the cultists holding objective6, killing 4 of them. Disappointing. Then I made it shoot again, and he wipped the full squad: -1ap + shooting twice is quite fearsome ! Denying them all save and counterbalancing badluck. So I got first strike too.
Using way too much firepower (including the wounded predator) I killed 4 of the 5 plague marines in cover.

T2
The closest plague drone went on the tower, ready to take the kill of the lonely chapelain. Two squads of plague marines stepped outside his rhino on objective 5 on my left flank, a third squad replaced the dead cultists on objective 6, another squad kept closing to my army , followed by his lord and the last surviving member of the last squad didn't move.
He casted miasm (-1 to be hit) on the central squad of plague marines.
Shooting phase and he wounded my chapelain, 3 wounds, but didn't kill him. He finished the predator with his dreads, killed a bunch of tactical marines (the two sergeant survived), failed to destroy the scout squad holding Objective 2 (again, the sergeant survived) but annihilated the scouts on objective 5, killed two scout bikers and the buffed ironclad and failed to wound the veterans with one of his mortars.
He charged my chapelain but didn't wound him and took a wound. The Emperor Protects !



T2
My big characters unit moved into the tower. the tactical marines holded positions, ready to open fire with plasma weaponry against the abominations. The scout bikers moved in order to be closer to his lord than to his second plague marines squad, the land speeder moved to get LoS on the lone survivor and the chapter master went with the chapelain, trying to save him.
Using he remants of the tac squads, the land speeder, the thunderfire and the scout bikers, I killed the last survivor, the lord and two other plague marines from the central squad. He managed to save all of his plague marines wounded by the veterans with his FNP, which is quite frustrating (my veterans are able to shoot at his plague marine squad holding objective6 without retaliation using their 30" AP-3 bolguns to deny them save and wounding them on 4+ despire their T5).
Assault phase and the drone is wounded 6 more times despite him being disgustingly resilient, but it still lives !






T3
He disengaged his drone, made his two plague marines squad on objective 5 come closer to my objective 4 holding scouts and didn't really move anything else.
He missed the chaplain, but finally got ride of the last tactical marines, the land speeder (he actually neede two dreads for that) and the scout bikers, using a smite too.

My characters finally got out of the building right in front of his deployement zone, but things weren't really looking good: my chapter champion couldn't get any character: his foul blightspawn and deamon prince were behind his crawler and drone, and none of my heroes had a jump pack.
Using smites and shooting I finished the second squad of plague marines and buffed my chapter champion.
My chapter master assaulted the drone, taking 3 wound in the process, then the chapelain charged it too. He finally survived with 1 wound... The "big" assault of the librarians, ancient and champion against the second drone in his deployement zone was...disappointing. Those things are really resilient !

End of my turn 3, we are 7-7 on scoring, both of us having first strike and a bunch of objective (is "killing a character" backdated / retroactive ? Or only slay the warlord ?) and we have to stop there.

DRAW !

So, the Thunder Knights fought to the bitter end and against all odds, stole a draw ! The sheer amount of anti tank weaponry the Death Guard brought to the battlefield was impressive and just confirm what I thought:
I'll probably be doing all infantry lists in the futur, making this kind of firepower useless. My classic marines tanks aren't resilient enough anymore to survive the lethal 8th

I liked his MSU style list, quite different from last time I faced him. It was a valuable game for me, as I could try lots of things I wanted to in order to get my futur lists and games better. I am as happy as ever with all the scouts, holding 3 objectives just by themselve and getting me "supremacy / domination" for example. The bikers really benefits from the new codex, as does the thunderfire !

I am however a bit sad I forgot to use some Ultramarines stratagem like the -1ap on a 6 (could have been useful to get those pesky cover out !). Oh and next time, I won't bring more than 2 or 3 relics
The Chapter Champion really needs a drop pod: no more foot slogging characters except the lieutenant.