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Played in a 1500 point tournament on Saturday at the Dueling Grounds store in Toronto (Canada). Great fun: every table was themed, with *lots* of terrain. Each table had a set mission, with one or two special rules. Points were split 17-3 or 13-7 for major or minor victories, 8 for a draw; as well it was possible for any player to earn a +1 or +2 battle point bonus for achieving secondary goals.

The army split was interesting: half the players brought Chaos Space Marines; there were 2 Sisters of Battle armies and 2 Tau armies; the rest were loyalist (one each of Black Templars, Blood Angels, Deathwing and a couple of vanilla marines I think). No IG, no Eldar (dark or other), no Orks, no Tyranids.

I managed to get two losses and a tie, resulting in the lowest Battle Points of those who finished the tourney (2 people cut out after the 2nd round) but came out with Best Sporstman, so there you go! Apparently I was a pleasure to beat.

My list:

Typhus
Greater Daemon
Chaos Dread with Plasma Cannon
7 Plague Marines (Flamer, Champ with Pfist)
7 Plague Marines (2 Meltas, Champ with Pfist)
7 Plague Marines (2 Plasmaguns, Champ with Pfist)
6 Lesser Daemons
6 Lesser Daemons
Land Raider with Daemonic Possession

Not particularly optimized, and my Lesser Daemons in particular were the subject of many surprised comments. They did some yeoman work though, causing even more surprise. I like them (and the Greater Daemon) because they give me a chance to react to my opponent midgame.

Individual game reports to follow.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Game 1: vs Chaos Space Marines (what are the odds...)
His list:

Daemon Prince with Wings, Mark of Khorne
5 Terminators with Icon of Khorne, Champ with Twin Lightning Claws, Icon bearer with Chainfist
3 squads of 10 Khorne Berserkers including Champ with Pfist, in Rhinos (with extra armor)
Land Raider

Table: Magnetic Mountains. There were three fixed LOS-blocking terrain pieces in a triangle near the board center, and about 10 low hills on the rest of the board. Special rule: at the end of each round, each low hill would scatter d3 inches. Any unit hit would make a pinning test, any vehicle hit would be treated as if it had moved for firing purposes. We were both all-fearless, so the mountains had a minimal effect.
Deployment: Long Table edges; Mission: Kill Points

My opponent deployed all mounted: from my left to my right: Rhino, Land Raider with Termies, Daemon Prince, Rhino, Rhino. My deployment from my left to my right: Chaos Dread, Land Raider (with Flamer squad), Melta squad, Plasma squad. First turn he zoomed across the board and blew smoke. I stayed back except for the Melta squad. The Dreadnought hit a Rhino but it was saved by smoke; my Land Raider hit his Land Raider but didn't even glance.

Turn 2 he drove up and deployed his Termies from the Land Raider, and his rightmost two squads of Berserkers. My melta squad got charged by both and destroyed. The higher WS, Strength (negating my T5), attacks and especially Initiative really hurt. Luckily the rightmost squad of Berserkers had a bad fleet roll and were unable to charge my Plasma squad.

My turn 2 I got my Greater Daemon, who appeared out of the Land Raider. The Chaos Dread landed a sweet Plasma Cannon shot, taking out a Terminator and 3 Berserkers. The Land Raider deployed the Flamer Squad and hosed down the Termies for another kill. The Dreadnought, Greater Daemon and Flamer squad charged the remaining 3 termies, but the Greater Daemon took them all out before they could react! My Plasma Marines backed away from the rightmost Berserkers, but only shook their Rhino with a Plas shot.

Turn 3 he used the center Rhino (empty) to drive across the board and tank shock my Plasma Marines. Of course I tried a Death or Glory, but rolled a 3 (10 vs AV11) and my brave but stupid Plague Marine got run down. He drove his Rhino across in front of the Greater Daemon and disembarked another 10 Berserkers: Their rain of bolt pistols as well as his Land Raider, managed to kill the GD (4+ isn't that great against a lot of hits). His Daemon Prince flew over and charged my Dreadnought, taking it out before it could swing.

My turn 3 I got Typhus and one squad of Lesser Daemons. Typhus teleported in off of the Flamer Squad's icon. He managed to Wind of Chaos a few Berserkers, but I forgot that he couldn't charge the turn he deep strikes: big oops. The lesser daemons and the Flamer squad were able to charge the big Berserker squad, but my Feel No Pain wasn't working very well and I lost a lot of Plague Marines before they could swing. My single Plasma gun in my retreating right-hand squad still wasn't able to do more than shake a Rhino.

His turn 4 his Land Raider lascannoned my Land Raider into slag. The Daemon Prince charged Typhus, but only did 3 wounds. Typhus got a wound on him, but blew his Force Weapon roll with an 11 (phttbbbbt!). His Berserker squad finished off my Flamer marines as well as the Lesser Daemons.

My turn 4 my second squad of Lesser Daemons still didn't come in! My Plasma marines backed away again, but still didn't manage to do anything to a Rhino. The Greater Daemon failed to wound Typhus, but Typhus responded by eating his own Daemon Weapon to lose his last wound (boo!).

His turn 5 he finished off my last squad (the plasma guys) with his Land Raider, multiple bolt pistol squads and a charge from the Berserkers.

When the dust cleared I had scored one (1) KP for his Termies, whereas he got all 9 of mine. My second squad of Lesser Daemons never even came in from the Warp. Le sigh. He also got an extra point for having a scoring unit in my DZ. 18 points to 3 (ouch).


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Game 2 vs Black Templars:

Grimaldus the super-chaplain with 3 servitors
Emperor's Champion
another Chaplain with 3 servitors
3 squads of 10 Black Templars with a meltagun in each
4 Bikes, one with meltagun, champ with powersword
vow: Purge the Unclean (+1 S, -1 I)

Terrain: a string of 4-inch forest templates across the middle of the board; a few sandbagged areas to one side of one edge where the forests were most distant.
Deployment: Dawn of War, Mission: Kill Points (again!)

Now we screwed up the Dawn of War - for some reason I had been playing it as "get one HQ and two troops, everything else goes into Reserves" and my opponent had never played Dawn of War so he went along with it. Oops.

He got first turn and took the more forested side, deploying one squad in a forest center-right, and a second squad with Grimaldus center-left (from my POV). I put plasma squad into the far right sandbags about 24" from his first squad, and put Typhus with my flamer squad behind a forest about 18" from Grimaldus.

Rather than a turn by turn summary, I'll give a summary this time: Grimaldus and squad met Typhus and squad after taking some flamer and Wind of Chaos casualties. Grimaldus put two wounds on Typhus but died to the Manreaper; however he got back up and proceeded to kill Typhus! I needed to bring in a squad of Lesser Daemons to help finish off that squad, along with my dreadnought. Thankfully Grimaldus fell over permanently after hitting a few Lesser Daemons.

His second originally-deployed squad legged it across towards my bunkered plasma marines, but got wasted when my Land Raider drove on and combined fire with the Dreadnought. They were reduced to 3 men who hid in the middle bunkered area. The bikes drove up to shoot at the Plasma marines, but were assaulted by 6 Lesser Daemons (killed two bikes on the charge, then tied them up for the rest of the game).

His Emperor's Champion joined up with his Chaplain + servitors, but I managed to mount up my Melta squad in the Land Raider the turn after they came in, to drive up and assault-ramp into his HQ-blob (accompanied by the Dreadnought and the remnants of the first Lesser Daemon squad. My Greater Daemon had popped out just after mounting up, so he was left behind and joined the Plasma marines in trying to get to the bunkered 3 Templars left from the first squad. Sadly the game ended before I could finish off either the 3 Templars or resolve the Chaplain/EC melee. His 3rd Templar squad barely made it onto the board on the last turn and didn't get to do anything.

It looked like I'd done a lot more damage: killed Grimaldus, a whole squad of Templars, half the bikes and over half of his first Templar squad. He had killed Typhus, my Flamer squad, half of my Melta squad and half of a unit of Lesser Daemons. That left us tied at 2 kill points, so as per the scenario rules we compared VPs: we each scored within 35 VPs of one another, making it a true draw. 8 Battle Points, but we each got +2 for killing the other's highest point HQ.

Hard to say who would have been better served if we'd played the scenario properly and brought all of our forces in on turn 1... probably would have balanced out. His vow was kind of annoying in that S5 canceled my T5, but I was glad to be striking at the same initiative as he was.

Game 3: vs Chaos
His list:
Sorceror MoS, Lash
10 Thousand Sons (Sorc with Power Sword)
10 Noise Marines (2 Sonic Blasters, Blastmaster, Champ with Power Sword)
10 Plague Marines (Champ with Pfist) in a Rhino
Land Raider
2x2 Oblits

Table: Desert table: many sand drifts, dunes, lots of tiny forests
Mission: Seize Ground (5 objectives), long table edge deployment
Special rules: at the beginning of each player turn, roll for each of your units: on a 1 it is compromised (roll again on a table that ranged from can't move, can't move or shot, can't shoot, or move only 1/2 speed) due to "heat exhaustion"

He clustered more of the objectives to one side of the board: there were 4 in a rough square on the left 2/3 of the board, with one more stranded way on the right side.

Deployment: I won first turn and chose the side with 3 objectives closer of course. I put my Plasma marines with Typhus attached on the left, near one objective; then my flamer marines went in the Land Raider left-center practically on top of a second objective, then the Melta squad center, about 12" from the third objective, and the Dreadnought far to the right and not far from a 4th objective.

He deployed his Noise Marines on my left, behind an area of difficult ground that contained the 5th objective. His Land Raider was next, opposite my own, with the Plague Marines in their Rhino sheltering behind (along with the unembarked Sorceror); then the Thousand Sons near the center, who looked ready to contest the 3rd objective. He completely ignored the right side of the board where my Dreadnought was.

I realized that the Dread couldn't claim the 5th objective, but it seemed reasonable to sit him out there to contest it and take a cross-board pot shot with his 36" range weapon. I didn't want to dilute my forces in the center by having a whole Plague Marine squad sit on the 5th objective all game.

First turn I moved the Melta squad up behind a ridge, out of LOS but close to the 3rd objective. The Land Raider rolled forward and took a shot at his Land Raider, but got nothing. My Plasma squad edged up to claim the 1st objective, and the Dreadnought ran up to get within 3" of the 5th objective.

His first turn he moved his Sorceror up to attach to the T-sons, and lashed my Melta Marines around the ridge to be shot at by the T-sons. Most were still in cover, so I only lost one marine. His Noise Marines shot at Typhus and the Plasma Marines, and I lost a couple to the Blastmaster. His Rhino overheated due to the scenario, and could only move 1/2 speed. His Land Raider rolled up and took a shot at mine, which didn't accomplish anything.

Second turn: My Land Raider rev'd up and unloaded the Flamer squad, which was able to Flame and charge the T-sons to begin a very drawn-out combat

His second turn, his Rhino moved up and disgorged the Plague Marines almost on top of the first objective. Their rapidfire, combined with the Noise Marines sonic weaponry, left me with only the Champ and icon of the plasma squad (and Typhus).

My third turn I got one unit of Lesser Demons in, bringing them in off the lefthand plasma squad icon. Wind of Chaos from Typhus followed by a charge from Typhus, the Plasma squad Champ and the Lesser Daemons killed a good halfo of his Plague Marines. Typhus got hit by a powerfist but made his Invunlerable save. My Melta squad moved onto the 3rd objective and was able to get one meltagun within 6" of his Land Raider and explode it (killing a T-son for good measure). The Dreadnought moved over a bit to take a cross-table shot at the Noise Marines, killing one. The melee in the center started to swing when the Sorceror went down.

His third turn he got all 4 Obliterators, which plunked down dead center with my Land Raider to the south, the T-sons melee to the north, my Melta squad to its east, and the Plague Marine - Typhus battle to the west. The Oblits sprouted twinlinked plasmaguns which completely evaporated my Melta squad. In the T-sons melee, he was down to 2 T-sons and the Aspiring Sorceror, but I had to choose to lose my Champ or icon - I chose to lose the Champ. In the battle with the Plague Marines, Typhus slew all but one - however, the power fist landed and instakilled Typhus. :(

My fourth turn, I got the rest of my Daemons. I brought the lessers in off of the icon in melee with the T-sons, and they managed to multi-charge both Obliterator squads as well as the T-sons. Prior to their charge, my Dread managed to kill one Obliterator by plasma cannon. The daemons put a wound on an Oblit and killed a T-son, but only lost 2 of their own number and kept all units locked. My Landraider shot at the Plague Marines' rhino, but only glanced and shook it. My plasma squad Champ birthed the Greater Daemon, who charged in and finished off the Plague Marines. The T-sons power sword killed my icon-bearer from my Flamer squad (the last of his unit).

His fourth turn he backed the Rhino over a ridge (staying within 3" of the first objective) to get cover. His Noise Marines killed all of my Lesser Daemons on that side, leaving me with only the 6 Lesser Daemons in melee with the Obliterators as my only troops choice left (argh). I ran the Lesser Daemon up to towards the Noise Marines and the 5th objective, shot the Rhino with the Land Raider but hit the dunes (cover saves). The Lesser Daemons finshed off an Obliterator and the second-last T-son, but were then wiped out.

My fifth turn, I tried to plasma cannon the T-sons Aspiring Sorc but missed. The Land Raider tried to pop the Rhino but again only glanced it! My Greater Daemon suffered heat exhaustion and was unable to move at all (booo!).

His fifth turn, he moved the Noise Marines up in front of the 5th objective and shot the Greater Daemon up (with the help of one Oblit) but failed to kill it. His other Oblit multimelta'd and charged my Land Raider, but failed to do anything to it (!). His Aspiring Sorceror ran over to claim the 3rd objective. We rolled for another turn, but no.

At the end his Noise Marines held the 5th, his Rhino held the 1st, and his T-sons Aspiring Sorceror held the 3rd objective while I held none. Clear victory to him. We both managed to wipe out each others' most expensive unit (his Plague Marines, my Typhus) so we each got 1 extra battle point, giving him 18 and myself 4.

It left me with a total of 17 battle points, but hey, I got Best Sportsman...

The tournament was a lot of fun, and everyone I played against was super-nice. I'd play any of them again casually, no problem. I think I need to finish painting up my Chaos Terminators and Obliterators before the next tourney though. I was also surprised at the resilience of the other Chaos players' Rhinos - I shot them with lots of high S weaponry, but they just did not go down. Maybe I should mount up my other two squads in Rhinos of their own...

Thanks for posting this, a real fun read. In that first game, don't worry too much about blowing your force weapon roll, daemon princes have eternal warrior and are immune (I am pretty sure)

Glad you had fun and thanks for the report. Best Sportsman is nothing to sneeze at. Some people don't handle playing fair very well, much less losing at a tournament.

Congratulations!!

Thanks for writing up the report. Looks like you got some bummer rolls but continued playing well. Try to get some pics next time!

- Blackbone

Way to hang in there man, mad props.

Somnicide wrote:Thanks for posting this, a real fun read. In that first game, don't worry too much about blowing your force weapon roll, daemon princes have eternal warrior and are immune (I am pretty sure)

You're right, damn.

Why I paid over 200 pts for Typhus when a ~130 pt Daemon Prince kicked so much more butt, I don't know. I may have to get a new HQ! The nurgle Daemon Prince is actually a pretty fun looking model. I'll have to get some appropriately rotted wings for it I suppose. And run it with Warptime...his Prince managed to miss hitting and wounding Typhus (before saves) one round.

Thanks everyone for reading and for your comisserations!