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Back in 2014 I got together with my primary WH40K group (my 3 older sons, who were at the time 13, 11, and 9) and we decided that henceforth all of our WH40K battles would take place in a campaign setting. The Shoals of Llirea, a small subsector of the galaxy that has been cut off by warpstorms for the last 300 years and only a small passage has recently opened (believe it or not, that was our storyline even before Vigilus). So all of the factions had a reason to head there, Imperials to take it back, Chaos to keep control, T'au to figure out warpstorms, Orks to break things, Necrons just awakening, you know the drill.

The first year of battles took place in the star system of Avalon. The Imperium eventually recaptured it. And then we lost interest for several years.

Now with the Crusade system on us, we are back at it, working to dominate the second star system, Emmett's Star. And so my two middle sons (the oldest one joined the Air Force and is stationed far away now) and I have been playing Crusade since Monday of this week. I drew a map with four continents, divided them up into regions, we claimed regions and then started rotating through choosing battles. Whoever is choosing the target region is the Attacker, and if they win, they capture the region. If the region has changed hands before, then it's an Incursion (50PL) battle. The first battle for any region is just a 25 PL battle.

We have just begun the third round of battles, so we have had six already (plus at least two practice battles).

Orks at 25 PL are horribly dangerous, and the relics and Battle Traits they can gain just make them worse after a few battles. Early battles for the T'au and Imperium are literally just about gaining as much experience as you can. If you survive, then great job. 50 PL battles are played on the same sized map, though, so they're a lot easier. I can bring so much more firepower at 50PL!

The first round saw the Orks take a region from the Space Marines, the T'au take a sector from the Space Marines, and the Space Marines take a (different) sector from the Orks. Round 2 saw the Orks take a sector from the T'au and no other changes. In turn 3, so far the Space Marines have held off the Orks from re-taking the previously conquered sector. Using the Crusade booklet and the Battle Diary, I've written down more details about battles this week than I had in the previous year.

I'll try to start posting quick summaries of every battle. Todays was Goff Orks vs Imperial Fists, and the scenario was Behind Enemy Lines. Victory points were scored by preventing the enemy from leaving the battlefield via your deployment zone, or escaping your units through the enemy's deployment zone.

Turn 1 the Space Marines led off and poured a lot of firepower into a 20-man unit of 'Ard Boyz, killing about 15 of them. An Orbital Bombardment in the middle of the Ork line managed to pick off 5 gretchin, and a Dreadnought managed to put some damage on an ork Trukk. The Space Marines managed to kill off a unit of Ork Nobz completely, which was a huge plus. Orks in their turn regenerated the entire 20-man ork boyz mob and charged the Razorback right in front of them, put some wounds on the dreadnought with shooting, then charged the dread with deffcoptas and a trukk. Interrupting the fight phase, the Dread managed to crush one deffcopta and withstood all the attacks from both vehicles.

Turn 2 the Space Marines shot the 20-man ork boyz squad to annihilation, leaving the Warboss exposed, and then managed to put some wounds on him. They mostly killed off a gretchin squad and the dread shot the deffcoptas in the shooting phase, wrecking another one. In the fight phase, the survivors from the Razorback attacked away from the warboss and put a feel-good hurtin' on some gretchin but didn't manage to kill the whole squad. Then the dread smashed the trukk good, which blew up and wrecked most everything. When the orks took over, the remaining deffcopta fled, as did the boyz from the trukk. Some Meganobz attacked the space marines who were bullying the gretchin and there was some back-and-forth. The warboss charged an entire gunline and got shot to pieces.

Turn 3 the Space Marines broke contact with the Meganobz and got ready to shoot them all to death when the orks decided to flee ignominiously. Battle over - Space Marines won.

10 August, 2020

Orks vs T'au. Crusade Mission: Supply drop.

T'au are the attackers, end up going first. Jump on objectives early and have more VP by the end of turn 3, but are wiped by the bottom of 4 and the ork player comes back for the win.

Since the T'au were attacking, no territory changed hands and we're still at something like 4 sectors that are 50PL battles.