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Hey gang,

Well, I played my first game ever of Warhammer 40K. It was mostly fun. This is my effort of writing a short battle report.

First off, thank you to the Soldiery in Columbus Ohio for hosting Tuesday night 40K. They have lots of great terrain to choose from. There were also quite a few people there, 12-15 I would say. I also found out that the rules they use for the 500 point night is basically annihilation missions, 500 points from one codex, one troop required. Everything else is open, no limits on wounds, save value, or HQ required. Pretty simple really.

As for my game, here is the 500 point army I had. I was unaware of the exact restrictions, so I built it per normal rules.

496 points
Commander XV8 Crisis Suit, Burst Cannon, Fusion Blaster, Drone Controller
2 Gun Drones
24 Fire Warriors in 2 units. Each has a Shas'ui
8 Pathfinders in one unit. 2 armed with Rail Rifles.

Turns out I was not the only new player that night. So they found a kind soul to take us all under his wing. He ran a 2 vs 2 game. On one side was two newvies with Space Marines and Chaos Space Marines. On my side was his Iron Fists and my Tau. I really don't know for sure what they had, but here is my attempt.

Enemy Space Marines
2 5 man Tactical Squads with some Las Cannons
A dreadnought with las cannon and missiles.
Maybe some other standard marines.
He also had some deep striking Terminators.
I also think he provided the Ageis Wall.

CSM
Hellbrute
Rhino with Khorne guys inside (10)
Some other CSM, or maybe some cultists. I was not sure.

Partner Iron Hands
5 Assault Marines
2 Dreadnaughts (assault cannon and flamer, plasma cannon and flamer.)
Another squad of tac marines I think.

We put out some terrain, and I do not have pictures.
We deployed and moved first.

He put his dreads and marines behind some ruins. His assault marines (or whatever) were in a stream for some reason.
My Fire Warriors were deployed in a two deep Gun line across the board. My commander was on my right as were my pathfinders. The enemy were basically In the center and right of the board hidden behind the ageis wall. I infiltrated my scouts into some area terrain to get better cover.

First turn
Our first turn was basically shooting. He moved up some units, my commander started to try and flank right, and my Gun line leap frog advanced. My teammate shot the Hellbrute and one shotted it. The explosion killed a few others too. My shooting involved two markerlights and then some BS 5 shooting from my first Fire Warrior unit. A few kills, but not too much.

Their turn one.
They did not do too much on turn one. The Rhino moved flank speed toward my pathfinders. Everyone else just re-positioned behind the wall. Their shooting killed about 4 pathfinders, fire warrior or 2 and some of the marines.

Our Turn 2
My partner moved his dreadnought closer and tried to move the marines forward in the river (rolled a 1). I moved my commander (and gun drones) to try and flank the Rhino. I did not make it, but got a clear fire path on it. The space marines did some shooting, killing a few guys. My Tau did REALLY well. My commander and his drones laid some BS 5 fire into the Rhino. The Fusion Blaster hit, pen and rolled a natural 6 on the vehicle damage table. Boom. The guys inside lost one guy escaping. Then my Pathfinders opened up and killed 4 more survivors. They failed a 10 leadership test and were pinned. My Gun line was rolling hot. My 8 year old son rolled the dice. Out of the one unit of 12 fire warriors he got 11 hits, which generated 10 wounds. There were 2 space marines in the target unit. Dead. My other Tau did well two, killing 3 more space marines.

Their turn 2
They got some revenge this turn. They failed on their reserves roll, so the Terminators did not show up. They tried to counter my flanking on the right by taking a building to get some elevation. Gun fire killed the last of my pathfinders. They killed on of the Dreadnoughts, which killed 3 fire warriors in the explosion. Shooting killed another marine and a tau I think.

These two turns took about 1 1/2- 2 hours. It was time to take my son home for bed. So we called the game there. Overall, I think my side was doing somewhat better. A lot of that was the hot rolls we had. I also think that putting Khorne troops behind a wall is a bad idea. They never got to close combat that would have slaughtered my Fire Warriors. It also seems that vehicles are REALLY weak and blow up. We lost the Hellbrute, a Dreadnaught, and the Rhino all to single shots ruling high on the vehicle damage table. Based on this I am leaning more towards a Broadside suit than a Hammerhead now.

Anyhow, that is my attempt at a battle report. Sorry it was not really exciting. Hopefully I will play again soon.

Thanks,
Duncan

Nice report, Looks like you had fun.
If you want to keep doing reports, I'd recommend taking pictures. (pic of deployment Beginning and end of Turn 1,2,3 ect)

Thanks, it was fun. Of course good shooting can make any game fun. I need to try it again before I fully commit. (Not that all my Tau are not a commitment.)
I meant to take pictures, but my phone died. Next time.

Thanks,
Duncan

Really nice. First games are always fun. I think a 2v2 is not a bad idea for beginners because you get to see alot of other armies work and how they use their tactics. Cheers