Back with another batrep for my infantry heavy guard army. I challenged an old rival to a game at 1750. He took his black templars. Here's the lists.
IG blood and guts brigade
HSO mortar flag iron disc
2x lascannon teams light infantry
2x autocannon teams
gaunt
40x conscripts
JO mortar iron disc
3x infantry plasma gun heavy bolter
2x infantry grenade launcher heavy bolter
basilisk
JO mortar iron disc
3x lascannon teams light infantry
BT
termie marshall
termie command squad flamers x2
chaplain 3 x cenobytes
EC
termies
AC x2
ven dread pod
big crusade
2x 8 man choppy crusade pfist pod
tornado
tornado
Roll mission... cleanse, ok I can live with that just don't roll alpha, roll type.... wait for it....
alpha. Ugh, the old alpha mobility missions with my guard. Time to put my ice skates on and skate up that hill.
Ok, his crusade is packed up kinda tight behind a forest 6" away from the center and about 99% out of
LOS, his speeders are just chillin in the back corner. He won first turn. He hustled his guys into the woods, dispersed them a little, but still kinda packed up. Moved his speeders to get
SMF, but hung one out a little too far. (there would be compaints about my terrain to follow, he is a close friend of mine so I told him to file an official complaint)
My turn one I fired my bassy and mortars at the crusade. The bassy hit. (in fact in 4 turns I got 3 hits, the turn I didn't get a hit I didn't even shoot) I think I got 7 with the bassy and 1 or 2 with the mortar. he rolled a 3 for movement, rerolled and got a 3 again. I had moved my conscripts over to my left flank to give them something to charge on turn 2. That was a mistake. I could have wiped them out in shooting if they had given me one more shooting phase to work on them. It didn't seem like a mistake until I saw how much damage they dish out with STR5 vow. Also, popped that speeder that had its butt hanging out.
Turn 2 He charges my conscripts with the much smaller crusade, one termie unit shows up pretty much right in the middle of the field, and one crusade drop pod, right where I wanted it to, on my extreme right flank. Shot at a heavy bolter squad that had moved out to that side with the pod crusade, shot at the conscripts with everyone else, killed a lot of them.
My turn 2. Put all 15 lascannons into the termies, and killed 2!!!! If I didn't roll a '1' to wound, he rolled a '5' to save. One of the 2 guys that died went down to a heavy bolter. I was still not worried, but those termies will be hiding in close combat next turn if I don't play smart here. I spent some time moving heavy bolter squads either into other table quarters or into charges with marines. I conga-line charged the pod marines, hoping to lose, pass morale, get consolidated into, lose, fail morale and shoot them to death. basically trying to lure them out from behind their pod. shot the other pod. Second speeder popped out to shoot at the conscripts with the termies. He mentioned regretting that.
His turn 3. he had crap reserves rolls. I reminded him that its an alpha cleanse and that those guys coming down on probably the last turn of the game might even be better. One pod does come down, and manages to perfectly cut off my infantry squad. Their ploy to lure out the small crusade has failed. And now they are dead. Close combats get rolled. His ven dread came out and he couldn't decide between coming out and shooting or coming out and being a falcon for a turn (smoke) he chose to shoot, and would pay for it. He took out a lascannon squad with the shooting though.
My turn 3. Finished off the termie squad, it was JUST out of charge range on his turn (he rolled a 2 for righteous zeal on turn 2, by the look of it, even a 3 would have given him the charge), that was almost a disaster. I think at this point I had to add a 10 man unit into the conscripts
CC. I couldn't keep gaunt wrapped in bodies anymore, and the emperors champion teleported over to him and cut his head off. I had brought over a leadership bubble, and passed the trademark item test, and passed the test when I lost combat. Whew! Unfortunately his pod crusade wildly broke the math on their close combat. I brought a leadership bubble with iron disc over to cover that
CC. I had 6 guys left, I just wanted to hold him up for my
CC so he didn't run riot on the table edge. Sure enough, he kills 6 guys with like 10 attacks!! Note to self... choppy black templars with the strength vow RULE guardsmen.
His turn 4. Looking at my watch, I could see that this was gonna be the last turn. He was playing for it too. He rolls for his last drop pod and his termie command squad. Double 1's!!! Game, blouses...
Neither of us were satisfied with that result, so we decided to bunch the time limit and keep going. That is no way to win a game, rules or no rules.
My turn 4. Basically me getting chopped up by the two remaining templar squads while I spread out as much as possible for objective claiming.
his turn 5. Marshall and company drop scatter free next to the homering chaplain. Kill a 10 man guardsmen unit in shooting with ease. (it was frightening really) and the last pod dropped right in the middle of all my support squads, now that all of my
HB screen squads had moved and left them a nice big space. they shot at a lascannon squad in cover, killed maybe a couple.
My turn 5. lost a priority test to shoot some lascannons into his termies and blew a pod up with a pen 6. Bodies flew everywhere, and my entire collection of support weapons now had a clear shot at his fresh pod crusade. So I waxed them, instead of his termies.
His turn 6. Termies charge into the conscripts/infantry squads. other crusade charges another support unit. Support unit dies. His termies and chaplain/
EC have to kill 17 guardsmen to be able to consolidate into the table quarter that I am contesting. It didn't happen, I passed both iron disc LD9 tests and stuck em there.
My turn 6. Same as his basically. Turns out his termies were on the line anyway, and his other crusade sweeped backwards into the other quarter I was contesting.
This is why alpha cleanse is stupid. He had 2 scoring units left (I had 10) and was able to tie me? He put 1 scoring unit in each of my adjacent quarters, he had none in his own (which I couldn't get to) and I had claimed my own (which is worth nothing)
I don't know why I am complaining. It was a great hard fight, and my army that you guys helped me write up has been doing VERY well. Up to 3-1-1 "officially" Against some very respectable lists and opponents.
things i learned.
BT with strength 5 and all choppy are just unbeatable. I just kept throwing bodies into those
CCs, and they would not fall down, and I had to pay the butchers bill way too often against them. The smaller pod squads were just as bad. Once they got in tight with my support squads, they were invincible. You just have to fall back on the superior leadership special rules, and walk away with any
VPs you scored in the first part of the game.
I'm starting to also think about making one of my heavy bolter squads a veteran squad. Something like 10 veterans 2x plasma gun heavy bolter pfist. Not any more expensive than a lascannon support squad with light infantry and you get the floating power fist. I would have KILLED for a pfist that game. I could have potentially brought that termie marshall unit down to below half, winning the game (the second time
).
Another thing... I couldn't really make close order drill work for me. Even as a free doctrine I think I'd rather look into possibly picking up independent commissars. Gaunt has been working out very well for me, the idea of having 3 fearless units (albeit not quite as effective as gaunt) is intriguing. Plus Im guessing there will be tourneys that don't allow special chars, and comp is iffy with a vostroyan army that enlisted the help of tanith's main man.
I hope this batrep isn't too "stream of conciousness" and is a semi interesting read. My friend is working on a graphic based batrep system for me to use. I find those are the easiest to follow. Thanks for reading...
