THE SAGA CONTINUES!
Mission: Crusade (4 Objectives)
Deployment: Dawn of War
Night Fight: Not in play.
___________________
Nikolii's Renegades
Huron, 160
Great Unclean One, Cloud, 165
7 Possessed, Nurgle, Rhino, 245
6
CSM,
BP/
CC, Nurgle, Melta & Combi, Rhino, 161
10
CSM,
BP/
CC, 2 Melta,
PW, Rhino, 210
7 Plaguebearers, 105
7 Plaguebearers, 105
Heldrake, Baleflamer, 170
Heldrake, Baleflamer, 170
1491
How do you build a better list? Take more of the stuff that worked, and less of the stuff that didn't. I'm also more focused on the plan. Using Daemonic Assault and Infiltrate, I can put my entire army on his doorstep, or where ever else it needs to be. Then, when he's boxed in, the Drakes bring the rain.
___________________
Razor's Kiss, SMurf Biker List:
Captain, Bike, Lightning Claw, Power Fist
8 Bikers, 2 Plasma, Multi-Melta Attack Bike.
8 Bikers, 2 Plasma, Multi-Melta Attack Bike.
8 Bikers, 2 Meltas, Heavy Bolter Attack Bike.
3 Multi-Melta Attack Bikes.
Stormtalon, Typhoon Missile Launcher.
Stormtalon, Typhoon Missile Launcher.
Pregame thoughts:
Ouch, 2 Heldrakes… one with poor luck was scary to deal with already. Coupled with not knowing flyer rules well, it's gonna be messy. I'll have the same approach to the summoned Daemons and focus on killing what I can in the 24" buffer zone and focus on the melee options coming at me. You will see, that all the plans I had and simple decisions I could make, I would sabotage and not do.
___________________
Sanctjud loses the roll off for table side and DarkHound takes top.
Sanctjud wins the roll for first and takes it.
Sanctjud: I won't lie, I am not happy with the terrain. But, you can't always get favorable terrain, so you work with what you are handed. I was about to say how useless the Warlord Traits were, until I rolled Move though Cover and Stealth in Ruins in the Strategic column.
I set up the plasma bikers on the flanks of the meltas bikers in the middle. The Captain and MMABs support the middle. I was some what spacing out the right bikers in anticipation of daemons coming in should I lose first turn. It is important to note I had Warmachine terrain rules in mind, so that hill will be annoying later on. Honestly, I will have a lot of rules hickups.
DarkHound: Come Hell or high water, I'm actually going to stick to the plan this time. I focused on clumping the objectives up as much as possible, so now all I need to do is drop in the ruins and settle in. Unfortunately, Infiltrate doesn't do me much good in this deployment.
___________________
Top of turn 1
Easy Peasy turn. Right bikers shuffle but stay put to deter close range daemon drops on the right objective. Middle bikers and MMABs only manage to strip the bolter from Huron's rhino. Left bikers shuffle back a bit and snipes the possessed rhino exploding it and killing 2 possessed for First Blood.
___________________
Bottom of turn 1
More and more I feel like Rhinos aren't worth their weight. Anyway, Huron rolled Endurance, so I passed that to the Possessed. Now, the Possessed were actually in charge range this turn, but I read Infiltrate's clause as 'you can't charge on the first game turn.' Sanctjud thinks it reads player turn, and I hope he's right. I did not get my chosen wave of daemons, so only 1 Plaguebearer squad arrives. I place them near the objective, but in retrospect I could have used their bodies up front drawing fire from his bikers. Besides that, I disembarked in preparation for assault (damn you transport rules!).
___________________
Top of turn 2
Reserves: 1 Stormalon comes in at a low angle. Right bikers slide a bit to center. Left bikers move back and take pot shots at possessed. Captain and the middle bikers move full forward to get ready to charge Huron's unit. All other shooting is resolved against either Huron's unit or his rhino. The rhino loses a hull point and Huron's unit loses 4 members. I then learn the Move Through Cover does not work for assault, nor does it do what I think it does, and charging into cover are the lower set of dice for charge range. It was most disappointing...sufficed to say, they failed their charge and are left in the open....honestly, the glorious charge was a bad idea already, this is just salt in the wound. (DarkHound's note: we later discovered that bikers aren't affected by terrain when assaulting. However, due to the nature of challenges, we agreed that getting the charge would not have altered the game much.)
___________________
Bottom of turn 2
I get some good reserves, and everything except 1 Heldrake arrive. The Great Unclean One scatters dangerously close to the Possessed, and then the Plaguebearers scatter right into the middle of them. Sanctjud places them in the corner of the table due to the mishap. Huron gives the Possessed Fire Shield, and they begin their long march to engage the orange bikers. However, their journey is cut short, as the Heldrake flies 36" from the board edge (snapping up an attack biker's side car as it passes) then lobs its flamer another 12" into the orange bikers. The bikers lose half their squad, break, and flee the board. It's not the cheesiest thing on the planet, but I wouldn't
quite call it fair.
Now, with the Captain staring down Huron, I can't help but throw everything I've got at him. I charge the wounded Rhino through his squad and a Death or Glory sees it wrecked. The
CSM disembark and fire their Meltaguns and pistols, but the Captain saves it all. I was counting on their help in close combat, but due to the damned disembarkation rules they were unable to. Huron and his Meltagunner try their hand, but the man continues to be invulnerable, even into the ensuing assault. (You'll notice that I did run the daemons. I now know Slow and Purposeful precludes this.)
___________________
Top of turn 3
Reserves: The second Stormtalon enters straight on. The other Stormtalon flies over in front of the Great Unclean One. Both Stormtalons unload on the Iron Warriors and result in 2 casualties. I don't know why I didn't send the Stormtalons after the Heldrake, even though that is why it is there. I guess I felt the higher priority was to kill troops.
MMABs and the plasma bikers shoot at the Heldrake to no result.
___________________
Bottom of turn 3
The bitter slap-fight comes to a close as Huron slays Sanctjud's Captain and is rewarded with Warp Frenzy. The Possessed, Great Unclean One, and
CSM dog pile in. The Possessed put 7 wounds on the bikers with their AP3 claws, the
CSM kill the rest, and the Great Unclean One has nothing to do. Oh, and instead of leaving the board, the Heldrake begins to hover and toasts some more bikers.
___________________
Top of turn 4
Both Stormtalons zoom off the board. This turn is the Morale Victory stating turn.
1. Avenge the Warlord.
2. Dare Darkhound to table me.
All my bikers bunch up to dare Darkhound's two Heldrakes to table me.
The plasma bikers are successful in killing the last member of a
CSM unit and killing Huron. The MMABs kill some random Iron Warriors and they proceed to fail a charge that is 5" away.
___________________
Bottom of turn 4
God damn it, Huron. Pass your 4++'s once in a while, will you? Well, the game is winding down. The Heldrakes vaporize his blue bikers, but the Great Unclean One and Possessed fail to finish off his blasted attack bikes.
___________________
Top of turn 5
Both Morale Victories have Ben met! Both Stormtalons come in and shoot at each Heldrake, killing one.
The MMAB kills a
CSM before he is killed by the
GUO.
I concede at this point.
___________________
Sanctjud's Unit Rundown:
*Captain*--He did the minimum expected of him, but I am disappointed in my reluctance to try using the fist on Huron when I had the chance. But, he did suck up shooting like a champ and was able to stall combat...for better or worse.
*Bikers*--I used them poorly this game past turn 1. At least no one overheated and exploded...generally, the terrain made me feel cramped. Left squad did well enough I guess, nabbing first blood...but running off after a cross table ap3 flamed is just sad. Middle squad was most disappointing, failing a charge I should not have commit to, forgetting to overwatch, and winning combat when they shouldn't. Right squad is the yawn squad. I dunno...as Darkhound suggests after the game, the bale-flamer is a pretty good counter to bikers who rely on keeping away, jink saves, 3+ armor, T5, and low model count.
*MMAB*--They were not the all stars as they normally are, but they were pretty lucky in melee to kill a few
CSMs and holding vs unfavorable odds.
*Stormtalon*--I am still getting used to flyers, but I'm not 'feeling' them. My target priority with them was still poor this game. The assault cannon still refuses to rend. Two seems to be the sweet spot with them, but I don't feel I'm getting my 310 points worth.
I dunno, I had a lot of mess ups and I don't think I can do anything to respond to Heldrakes, they will get a shot off no matter what. Proper spacing can reduce the number of kills to maybe 3, but requires space, space I can't have at will. I still don't feel the love for Assault cannons, I prob just don't have enough. I may need to do something I don't want to: adjust the size of my biker units and maybe introduce a mechanized troop choice with no armor saturation. Personally, I'm still not a fan of
40k after jumping into Warmachine/Hordes.
DarkHound's closing thoughts: A second Drake did indeed even out my odds, and Huron very nearly survived. Progress! I like the way this army plays, and I feel it captures the lore it's based on. I think I'll Infiltrate more often without the Rhinos, leaving them in the deployment zone. This will give my infantry a chance to charge on turn one, and shouldn't effect their survivability much.
