1st Match: Dark Angels/Iron Warriors vs Iron Hands/Imperial Fists. We only made it to the end of turn two as we were teaching our opponents how to play (Hence quite a bit of proxying). We lost by 1vp in the end as my tactical squad got pushed off the objective at the moment by the enemy despoilers, but it was a good match never-the-less as we learnt a fair bit.

Start of Turn 1. As we quickly discovered, our deployment strategy needed work as we spent both turns tripping over ourselves in the movement phase, which against savvy opponents would have cost us dearly.


After nuking the kratos on a fantastic turn one alpha strike, the sky hunters are brutally pulled apart by a combined effort from the Missile HSS and terminators. For 150 points, they did really well and quickly cemented themselves in my partners list.


End of our turn 2. My tactical squad is all tied up on the objective with the enemy despoilers. I was confident I could see the despoilers off through sheer weight of numbers, but his apothecary pulled his weight and saved every wound, where as I lost about four marines IIRC and subsequently failed my moral check, I won the sweep roll though so didn't get rolled up. The commander of the terminators made a tactical misjudgement here though and shot at my plasma repeater support squad. I fired back and promptly atomised the remaining terminators.


End of opponents turn 2 and the game. On the right is the scene from above. In the middle my partners tactical squad capped an objective and trades fire with a tac squad under the broken bridge. Middle left, a contemptor and leviathan head towards an inevitable confrontation. On the left, an Iron Hands terminators squad Kool Aid Manned their way through the building to assault my tacticals, (not strictly game legal, but too cool not to allow) and after slaughtering 6 of them, the game was over.


Post match review, we decided that if we had gone another turn, we would have regained the right flank as my tacticals would likely have rallied and the remaining despoilers would not have withstood the subsquent shooting from both them and the support squad. Middle objective we had secure, but the left was a bit dicey. What's not shown in the photo is the talon of 3 boxnaughts duking it out with my partners plasma predator. They that would have murdered my tacticals and despoilers given half a chance, so us pushing his tactical squad off the left objective and capping it ourselves was something of a lost cause.

Game 2 was against the same to guys. Again we only made it to turn 2 this time as my partner had to leave early.
We won this time 4-2 as we were playing the mission where you pick a unit type and score VP for killing that unit type.
Only 1 picture from this match as every other one I took was blurry. So this is from the start of Turn 2.

Turn 2 saw my partner take down the kratos again with the jetbikes, the contemptor (behind the big building on the right) got into combat with the levi this time around and won. The top tactical squad and the despoilers combined efforts to deal with the enemy despoiler squad, soundly removing them. The lower tactical squad polished off the two remaining missile launchers before being charged by the terminators who failed their 4inch charge and lost a guy to overwatch. And once again the repeater squad showed how good they are at removing units from existence by jumping up on the landing pad and firing at the tacticals on the building opposite.


Post Match, this game was not in our opponents favour at all. It likely wouldn't have made it past turn 3, even if my partner didn't have to leave. Our initial deployment was much better this time around and that put at in a position to play quite aggressively. We pretty much forwent all shooting in turn 1 (bar a volley from my partners scorpius) to push up to an advantageous position.
It just wasn't looking good for the other team.

Turn 1: I split my force 1 tac squad, a contemptor and some interemptors on one side, a 2nd tac squad and a termie brick in the spartan on the other side. I was a touch apprehensive as I was going up against 2 contemptors and levi with only 1 contemptor of my own, but I had a surprise waiting for him in the spartan.


I will tell the tale of this battle in a few separate stories.

The interempors got killed off by the levi on turn 1 and contributed nothing to the game, and the lascannon contemptor immobilised the spartan as well. This was not to plan as it mean the terminators had to slog it on foot.

The left side tactical squad drew the ire of the praetor and a squad of morlocks who hardily charged across open ground. The spartan, though immobilised, could still speak and indeed spoke loudly, dealing 3 wounds to the morlocks. The morlocks then failed their 3inch charge into the tacticals and took a 4th wound for their troubles although surged forth to ensure they wouldn't fail next time.


Turn 2, the tacticals deal another wound in the shooting phase but hold their ground against the praetors charge. Although they deal no wounds, the combat doesn't go disastrously for the tacticals only losing 4, they are forced to fall back, but don't flee off the board.


Next turn the tacticals regroup and then run south away from the morlocks, who slowly give chase gunning down two of the retreating tacticals.


It was at this point though the enemy commander realised he'd been lured into a trap. The Spartan makes it's presence felt once more and removes the final two morlocks after they appeared past the wreckage of the aircraft. The tactical squad, having done their job, turn and face down the enraged praetor.


In a few swift strokes the praetor enacts his revenge on the defiant tactical marines...


...Only to find himself staring down the barrels of the spartan. Which quickly vapourises him with a well placed burst form it's lascannon array.


While that was happening, the spartan had disgorged it's contents into the face of the lascannon toting contemptor who laid it low. 10 terminator led by a Paladin quickly dispatched the offending contemptor, but not before it killed two on overwatch.
(I didn't get any pictures of this bit. )

Having dealt with the threat of one dreadnought. The veterans turn their sights on an even larger monstrosity.


Weathering a hail of storm cannon fire the terminators charge in only to have the Leviathan stomp on two of them before being torn apart by chain and power fists.


With two dreadnoughts to their name now, the remaining terminators turn their attentions to their opposite number, but not before a hail of krak missiles from a top a building end another of their number.


The tide turns against the terminators when overwatch takes down another of the squad numerical odds in favour of the Iron Hands.


Despite the disadvantage, the terminators even the score laying low 3 of the enemy squad. The Paladin, although quite successful against his earlier foes misjudges the Iron Hands sergeant and is killed in a challenge


The final two terminators would avenge their leader, slaying the last of the enemy warriors in a last brutal round of combat.

With the Tactical squad out foxing the praetor on the other end of the battlefield, and the terminators resolutely marching their way across the centre field, the right flank saw dreadnought meet dreadnought on a collision course with only one outcome.


One punishing round of combat later saw both contemptors explode in monstrous fireballs.


With the dust settled on 6 rounds of intense fighting, little remained of the two armies that clashed here. Although the Dark Angels would walk away the victors 5 VP to 1.


Post Match: A really fun match and quite a different outcome then I expected given the rocky start I had. Only 5 models remained on the board at the end of turn 6. Two Heavy Support Squad missile launchers, The spartan and two of my terminators who by that point had marched across half the table!
I couldn't believe my opponent took the bait of chasing the tactical squad with his praetor. I'm also somewhat surprised the spartan manged to have such an impact despite it's less then ideal location. The dread punch up was great fun with a super cinematic ending. Star of the show goes to the terminator brick though. Ate two dreadnoughts, 5 terminators and shot one of the missile launchers off the top of the building. The Paladin is not to be fethed with. For a 30 point upgrade, you get arguably the best non-character beatstick in the game and it really shows. It was actually him doing most of the work on the dreads rather then the power fists. Terranic Great Swords fearsome!
The tale that didn't get told is that of my other tactical squad. They were in the top right building the whole match and didn't do much except distract the HSS for 5 turns. The templates rained down upon them, but the dice were in my favour and I saved more wound on them then I could even count. They were enough of a pest that they pulled the other terminator squad away from my contemptor which is a confrontation that might have gone differently for me if they'd got into combat with it.