Objectives- 4 objective markers grant victory points at end of the game, 2 do not.

Opponent: Dark angels
Deployment: Square corners, 9" from center.

Opponent units:
-Azrael
-2 or 3 razorbacks w/twin heavy bolters and storm bolters
-2 deathwing terminator squads
-librarian
-full lascannon devastator squad
-2 or 3 squads of tactical marines
-1 squad of scout marines w/sniper rifles
-Imperial knight crusader

Top of Turn 1
He goes first. His scout marines are deployed in cover on an objective near one of the corners, a good distance from most of my units on my right. His razorbacks, librarian, and Azrael push into the center of the board to hold the center objective marker. He kills my warlord with some -very- lucky rolling from the 5 snipers and some bad saves by me. I lose a hellhound and a tank commander to lascannon fire and anti-tank dakka from his knight that marches up from my right. He forgets to deepstrike all his termies.

Bottom of Turn 1 - On my turn I forget to outflank my shadowsword and I've gotten a bad start, but I'm determined, and manage to destroy his entire lascannon devastator squad with the 2 tank commanders. The Trojan support vehicle has pushed up the left side and pops smoke, sensing danger. My remaining hellhound, bane wolf and 2 sentinels push toward the scouts to might right, largely ignoring the imperial knight coming from that direction. The Guardsmen sit tight and await their support.

Top of Turn 2
My opponent recognizes the threat the trojan support vehicle poses by giving my shadowsword rerolls on all misses in the shooting phase. He focuses his knight's gatling cannon, the ironspear rocket launcher, a squad's worth of storm bolter shots from termies, all of the twin heavy bolters from his razorbacks, and still only manages to knock off a few wounds from the Trojan, partly thanks to popping smoke, making it harder to hit. The Trojan is then charged by a squad of terminators and survives all the powerfists with a couple wounds remaining thanks to bad rolls by him and good saves by me. His other terminator squad deep strikes next to azrael in the center. His snipers manage to miraculously do 4 wounds to a tank commander before his imperial knight finishes it with the thermal cannon, and assaults both my hellhound and banewolf at once. He uses his titanic feet, but fails to knock either vehicle below half wounds. Some small arms fire kills a few guardsmen, but otherwise has little effect.

Bottom of Turn 2 - My Trojan remains largely still with some minor re positioning after falling back from the melee with the terminators. The hellhoound and banewolf part ways as they fall back from the melee with the imperial knight. The banewolf heads toward a razorback, while the hellhound continues toward the scouts in cover. The scout sentinel, wounded by small arms fire from various sources, shoots and charges the scouts, making it to melee and tying them up in it, with no wounds dealt to either side of that fight. The last tank commander pours his firepower into the terminators that were in melee with the trojan, killing a few. The 2 nearby infantry squads fire their overcharged plasma into them with orders from their commander, killing one. Finally, the big toy mighty shadowsword arrives, unleashing devastating firepower. It focuses all 4 lascannons and volcano cannon on the unsuspecting knight. Some bad rolls by me and good invul saves by him leave the knight alive with 2 wounds, completely crippled. The 30 heavy bolter shots lay into the remainder of the terminator squad that had assaulted the trojan, burying them in dice until they were gone. The hunter killer missile from the shadowsword fires into a razorback, knocking off a few wounds. Overall, despite not killing the knight outright, a horrifying amount of damage done to his army by the shadowsword, and with half his terminators dead, he was almost out of anti-tank weapons. The other 2 squads of infantry in cover manage to kill a terminator with overcharged plasma, one of the plasmagunners dying to overheating.

Top of Turn 3
My opponant’s knight fires his gatling cannon and missiles ineffectually at the Trojan again, knocking it down to a single wound while the thermal cannon only manages to knock off a couple wounds from my last tank commander due to a good save by me. His knight charges the remaining banewolf, destroying it with attacks from his titanic feet. Seeing the game quickly turning around on him, he falls his libarian back to the objective in his corner to claim it while Azrael, the remaining terminator squad, and squad of tac marines sit in cover on the center objective marker, doling out a few wounds to nearby IG infantry squads, but otherwise proving largely ineffective at doing damage.

Bottom of Turn 3
The remaining tank commander splits his fire, pouring his battlecannon and lascannon into one of the razorbacks, while his heavy bolters lay into the terminators, killing 1 terminator and damaging the razorback. 1 squad of guardsman fires plasma into the terminators, killing 1. The other two remaining squads move and advance to claim the other objective to the right (not the one the scouts were on), seeing their opening. The scout sentinel pulls back from the melee, making some room for the hellhound that moves into range, pouring gouts of flame and heavy bolter shots into the scouts, killing 3 of them. Finally, the shadowsword fires 2 lascannons into the crippled knight, finishing the job. The volcano cannon fires into a poor razorback, vaporizing the entire tank, while the other razorback is destroyed by the 2 other lascannons from the shadowsword. The thirty heavy bolter shots pour into the tac squad in the center, burying them in dice and removing them from as well. The remaining scout flees due to failed morale, the hellhound and scout sentinel fully claiming their objective

Top of Turn 4
My opponent sees victory slipping away as his presence on the board dwindles. His remaining terminators and last tac squad kill a few IG infantry, but are otherwise ineffective and holding position with Azrael in the center. The librarian remains on his objective as well, holding firm. The last tac squad has been sitting on an objective in the back, doing relatively little.

Bottom of Turn 4
The remaining tank commander orders his crew to take aim and fires everything into the dwindled terminator squad, finishing them off under the weight of his battlecannon. The infantry squads dig in, standing on objectives. The shadowsword, moving full speed toward Azrael, with all of its firepower bears down on him, with Azrael making an amazing amount of 4+ invul saves and shrugging off enough firepower to survive with 1 wound. The driver of the shadowsword has had enough. What we cannot blast with our cannons, we will crush under the treads of the Imperial Guard! I use the “Crush Them” stratagem and the shadowsword surges forward, the adamantine treads grinding Azrael into paste beneath them and claiming the center objective.

The game ended at the end of Turn 4 as time ran out. I received points for slay the warlord, winning primary and winning secondary objectives, while he only received points for slay the wardlord and first blood. Some highlights are:
-Azrael’s 4+ invul save bubble is a BIG deal and well worth it. A lot of damage was saved by it.
-Using the Ambush Strategem with a kitted out shadowsword worked just as intended, ensuring it got to fire and destroyed more than its points worth in enemy units in a single shooting phase.
-The Trojan worked exactly as intended, as the rerolls provided the shadowsword with effectively 25% more firepower, well worth the 98 points, especially considering how much of the opponent’s firepower it drew as well.
-Snipers are nastier than I thought. The 5 scout snipers punched above their weight by killing my warlord on the first turn and doing 4 wounds to a tank commander. I’ll be considering my own snipers in the future for the mortal wound output.

Opponent: Imperial Guard
Objectives: 1 objective is inferior, 1 is superior, all others are worth 2 pts.

Opponent Units:
-vanquisher tank commander
-Primaris Psyker
-Lord Commissar
-2 squads of 30 conscripts
-valkyrie w/lascannon and hellstrike missiles
-2 Leman russ Annihilators w/hull lascannons
-3 basilisks
-manticore
-Sergeant Harker
-3 thudd guns with crews
-1 squad of scions with 4 melta guns and plasma pistol
-1 heavy weapons squad w/3 mortars

Top of Turn 1
It looked as if he was going to go first, but I managed to seize the initiative. I deployed spread out along my lines, with the squadron of hellhounds moving up on the right with the Trojan to go after his artillery. The Shadowsword, using the Ambush Strategem again, came in on the right side. The sentinels pushed up the middle of the board to cover ground. I saw major threats to my already thin infantry, so I started to whittle those threats down first. 1st tank commander pounded the Valkyrie, knocking it down to its last bracket. 2nd tank commander fired into the thudd guns and conscripts, killing a few conscripts and 1 thudd gun. 3rd tank commander fired into the mortar heavy weapons teams, killing all 3. The Shadowsword fired and destroyed the manticore, as well as crippled 2 basilisks and damaged another.

Bottom of Turn 1
It was no surprise my opponent knew exactly what he needed to target with his big guns, the Shadowsword. His first turn saw him taking my shadowsword down below half wounds After he rolled 6 shots on every basilisk, and hit well over the averages. The AP-3 and d3 wounds per shot did the rest of the work. I can only imagine how much more damage would have been done had I not poured all the shadowsword’s firepower into that artillery. His Scions melta squad deepstriked behind my lines, hitting one of my tank commanders and knocking off 4-5 wounds, but largely being ineffective. The Leman Russ Annihilators did the rest of the work on the wounded tank commander, finishing it off with focused lascannon fire. The 2 remaining Thudd guns poured lots of shots onto one of my infantry squads in cover, killing all but the plasma gunner and Sergeant after morale checks were made. His conscripts charged straight into my hellhound and bane wolf, taking casualties but otherwise being no worse for the wear as they locked them up.

Top of Turn 2
My battered shadowsword largely held still, destroying a Thudd gun, another basilisk, and completely crippling the last basilisk. The 30 heavy bolter shots sprayed into the conscripts to thin them out. The hellhound and banewolf stuck in combat fell back, with the banewolf bolting past the enemy conscripts line to sit on top of the objective in the corner. My 2 remaining tank commanders finished off the Valkyrie and focused their battlecannons and bolters on the second conscript squad and thud guns, thinning their ranks further killing off another thudd gun. Seizing the opportunity, my warlord and his remaining squads of Guardsmen all bolted toward the edge of my deployment zone into some ruins, going for a secondary objective.

Bottom of Turn 2
My opponent continued his onslaught against the shadowsword, and despite needing 6’s to hit, managed to roll 6 shots again, and hit with 3, doing more wounds to the shadowsword and pushing it into its last wound bracket. His russes and Tank Command bore down on my tank commanders in cover, doing minimal damage thanks to some good saves and bad rolls on his part. His infantry largely remained still aside from Straken and Harker charging the hellhound, leaving it crippled but still alive.
Top of Turn 3
The hellhounds proved their usefulness yet again as an underrated threat as the one sitting on the corner objective fired its multi-melta, finishing off the last of the basilisks and removing the last threat in LoS and range to hit the shadowsword. The remaining two tank commanders fired their lascannons into a predator annihilater, barely scratching it as their battlecannons focused on the thudd guns, finishing them off with the help of the Shadowsword’s volcano cannon. All the heavy bolters from all sources went into the conscripts, thinning them further and forcing morale checks.

Bottom of Turn 3
This turn saw little progress for my opponent as his conscripts charged into the hellhound again to keep it locked in melee, the Leman Russ Annihilators failing to kill my tank commanders due to some bad wound rolls. With his artillery completely destroyed, his control of the board was massively reduced as his only anti-tank left was the Annihilators and tank commander that were engaged on the other side of the board.

The game ended at the end of Turn 3 as time ran out. I received points for First Blood and Linebreaker, losing primary and winning secondary objectives, while he received no bonus point, winning me the game. Some highlights are:
-Catachan Basilisks backed up with Harker giving them rerolls of 1 to hit are incredible damage dealers
-Thudd guns are as effective as expected at murdering unsuspecting infantry, glad I whittled them early
-Conscripts didn’t feel all that scary, although this was hardly conscript spam, but I can see how they did their job.
- I need to stop forgetting to charge with the shadowsword whenever possible, using the “crush them” stratagem makes it an absolute beast in melee, rivalling knights for melee damage output.

Opponent: Siam-Han Eldar
Objectives: I don’t even remember what the objective was... because it didn’t matter, you’ll read why.

Opponent Units:
(This list is approximate, don’t remember exact numbers)
-Autarch on Jetbike
-Farseer on jetbike
-3 full squads of shining spears
-3 squads of windriders
-3 vypers with Bright lances

Top of Turn 1
I failed to sieze, yielding first turn to him, and completely destroying any hope I had. His entire army moved forward with the shining spears forming the front line, backed up by windriders behind them. By the end of the shooting phase, they had zipped across the board, destroyed 25 infantry, destroyed the hellhound and a banewolf, and damaged both sentinels and both leman russes. His Assault phase saw another 2 Guardsmen dead, a Tank Commander dead, and the last banewolf dead. Before I even got a turn, about 700 points of my army was destroyed, with almost no casualties from overwatch due to his 4+ invulnerable saves on the shining spears.

Bottom of Turn 1
My Trojan scooted up the side of the board to get into position while the shadowsword “Ambushed” in. My movement phase was almost nill as most of my mobile units were gone already, so I opened up with everything I had. The Shadowsword put an end to 2 of the Vypers in short order, vaporizing one with the volcano cannon and lascannoning the other to death. It was a futile effort though as the 30 heavy bolter shots failed to kill enough Shining spears thanks to their 2 wounds a piece. Both remaining tank commanders poured all their firepower into the same squad of shining spears as well, only to watch the squad survive with a few left. Keep in mind… everything else in his army was largely untouched.

Top of Turn 2
His 2nd turn saw him cleaning up leftover forces of mine, leaving the shadowsword alone for the moment. By the end of his 2nd turn, I had 1 sentinel, the Trojan, and 1 tank commander left. All else was dead.
At the end of his 2nd turn I conceded the battle, as his jetbikes were well within range for him to move and shoot the shadowsword to death in 1 turn and my board presence was completely gone. I will be honest and say this battle completely and utterly bored me, not because I hate losing, but because there is absolutely nothing interesting about watching a horde of jetbikes using absolutely no tactics and just charging forward into my lines and alpha striking my army into oblivion before I even get a turn. The player was very mature about it and didn’t brag much, but it still stands that he brought what looked to me like a spammy netlist to a small FLGS tourney that was focused on fluff more than WAAC, so I’ll reserve any judgements of him for now until I get to know him better. Some key takeaways from this:
- It seems to me that Shining spears are very undercosted at the least. Their stats are pretty close to a space marine biker (aside from toughness), except that they are ludicrously fast, have far superior firepower and melee capability, and a 4+ invul save against shooting. Even Ravenwing only get 5+ saves, and they’re supposed to be the best bikers the SM’s have.
- If you play a jetbike spam list like this against a non-tourney player… prepare to be hated, seriously. It’s not that it’s OP, it’s just that it’s not fun.
- Had I seized and gotten first turn, it’s definitely possible this could have turned out very different, as I would have had all 3 hellhounds in range on the first turn, and been able to fire all of the tank commanders into his shining spears as well as the shadowsword before they could do any damage. Even 4+ invul saves probably wouldn’t have saved them there.