RIW - Thursday Night 40K

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BATTLE REPORT: Warhammer 40,000 – I recently made a trek down over to Flatlands Games in Wixom,MI for a team game. We decided to play 1500 points a player with a standard malestrom mission.

I put together a simple CAD to bring since this was the first time I played with one of the guys and only my third game against the other. I didn't want to do anything to crazy. I opted for White Scars (However looking back on it the Iron Hands would be way better for the Feel No Pain roll.)

HQ - Tech Marine on Bike with Conversion Beamer

TROOP - Three man Bike Squad with (2) Gravgun

TROOP - Three man Bike Squad with (2) Gravgun

TROOP - Three man Bike Squad with (2) Gravgun and Power Lance

TROOP - Tactical Squad (Combimelta, Melta, Imperial Marine) Razorback with Assault Cannon

TROOP - Tactical Squad Rhino

HEAVY - Relic Sicarian

HEAVY - Grav Centurions in Landraider Crusader

FAST - Landspeeder Mulitmelta/Assault Cannon 

FAST - Landspeeder Mulitmelta/Assault Cannon 

It's a pretty straightforward list that should have been pretty good. My opponent played Guard with a bunch of tanks and basilisks as well as an infantry blob squad lead by Yarick. 

We faced off against Ultramarines using the Scout Company formation and Orbital Stike Force Formation with a Flyer Wing teamed up with a Wulfen and Thunderwolves. This was my first time seeing the Wulfen in action and I was curious to see what they could do.

We set up first and were ready to lay down some hurt on the first turn, however they siezed the initative and we got to be on the receiving end of the hurt. The Wulfen some chart they roll on that grants special abilities to other Space Wolf models. What that meant for my squishy guard ally was a face full of hammer and fur as the Thunderwolves moved twice and assaulted his lines. The Orbital Strike force and Space Wolf Drop Pods crashed down in front of the guard player essentially cutting off his LOS to most of the table. After the smoke disapated a bit I had lost the Siccarian, and the majority of the blob squad was cleared as well as the sentinals on the far edge of the board.

On our turn all my grav didn't have many hard targets just a bunch of jinking speeders. So I felt a bit ineffective, my partner on the other hand could do no better. I had an ominous feeling at this point things were not going to go well for us. The Malestrom card didn't help either as our objectives seemed to always be on the other side of the table.

The second turn continued the meat grinder as the Thunderwolves continued to eat the guard side of our lines. Manuvering around the mess of drop pods and speeders proved difficult and once again it was a pretty ineffective turn for us.

Over all this was quite the tromping with the guard player being tabled  by the time we had to call the game due to the store closing. It was still fun and great to see assualt isn't dead in 40K.

June Flatlands Team Event

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BATTLE REPORT: Warhammer 40,000 – I'm not sure how I feel about random team events. On one hand they're fun and it's a great way to meet new players. On the other hand it can be grueling trying to play a team game with someone you don't know with lists that may or may not work well together. To offset this most events of this type that I've played in are raffle events that don't give a real prize to the overall winner but rather tickets for participation and other random events over the course of the day. Some do it better than others but overall the goal is to keep it casual and focus more on having fun than being the top dog. 

The day of the event I got packed up and headed out early figuring I'd have plenty of time to get there and relax before the event started. Unfortunately it's construction season in Michigan and most of the major highways I'd take to get to the event were closed ... good thing I left early. When I got to the event they had already wrapped up the sign ups apparently the organizer posted two different times in two different places. So far this is looking to be a great day. Oh and every mission is Malestrom, yet I left my cards at home...

Round one I faced the ringer for the event in an 800 point match up. He was playing Dark Angels Raven Wing with the big skimmer that gives everything a 2+ re-rollable jink save. I spent the whole game inflicting a tons of wounds that were ignored because of the re-rolls. It was a little frustrating having never faced the force I realized after the fact that I should have just charged and hoped for the best rather than wasting the waste the game hoping he'd roll two ones in a row. My opponent was pretty nice guy which helped make the trouncing tolerable.

Round Two I got paired up with Dark Eldar and would be facing odd against a mostly Killa Kan Ork list. Unfortunately the other partner was nowhere to be found so I got to face the Ringer again. The Dark Eldar player was better equipped to deal with the bike nonsense but it was still an uphill battle. The mission allowed you to steal your opponents capture objective 1-6 cards and score on your turn. We go lucky with the way the cards came up and out-scored our opponents pretty badly.

Round Three I was paired with a Necron player against a Khorne Daemonkin and Dark Angels force. This was a weird mix of The Relic with generic Maelstrom Objectives. The table was set up rather odd with a raised city potion on one side of the table. (I really liked the idea behind it and might build my own terrain piece with a fortress to defend set up similarly) We didn't size the initiative so the Khorne player ran to the middle of the table to seize the relic with his Bloodthirster. Since it was on the ground I poured lascannon a melta fire into it until is vanished back into the warp. From that point on the game was more of an exercise in playing smart and killing off threats as they presented themselves. This is a game where the benefits of the Stormlance Squadron really paid off. Besides staying safe in my transports most of the game I was able to gun down a unit of cultists charging me while I was on an objective. Since the cultists had objective secured they "controlled" the objective when I fired overwatch which allowed me to re-roll my overwatch shots. (pretty strong, ability).

Overall I had a good time at the event, 32 players in total made for a busy event. This was my first time at this game store and the overall impression I got was pretty good. They have a good amount of space to play, decent terrain and really nice tables. I'll defiantly be back and might even swing out to meet up with some of the guys I met at the event. The event itself was a little losey goosy for my tastes, even when you're not playing "to win" it's nice to see standings and to keep the rounds tight so the event doesn't go to long. I'm sure for future events they'll pay a bit more attention to that so they can keep this momentum going.

Your list is only 10 models?

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BATTLE REPORT: Warhammer 40,000 – Some time ago I painted a boatload of assasin models for a client/friend. At the time I though he was crazy and couldn't imagine ever being able to field them outside of the random apocalypse game. The other day I went up to the game store to get in a 1500 point game. I had scheduled a game with an eldar opponent who had to bail due to other commitments. Luckily Glen also had his opponent bail on him as well so I was able to get in a game.

We decided to play the "Sacrificial Lamb" Mission out of Angels of Death, because we got a late start all of the good tables were taken so we played on a bare table with a mishmash of terrain on it. (One of the dangers of playing at game stores is the availability of good tables) Per the mission rules I set up first and had to put a unit in reserve for each unit I deployed. I won't be able to start rolling for reserves until turn 3, but when they come in everything does at once.

My List

CAD

HQ - Tech Marine bike with conversion beamer

TROOP - Tactical Squad in Razorback

TROOP - Tactical Squad in Razorback 

LORD OF WAR - Knight Acheron 

Armoured Taskforce Formation

Techmarine

(3) Thunderfire Cannons

(2) Vindicator

(1) Whirlwind

His List

(2) Caldius Assassins

(8) Vindicare Assassins

Based on the mission I deployed my artillery, barrage and Knight on the board to start. He then deployed his assassins in a way that made me questions why anyone would every take artillery. I fail to seize and my opponent proceeds to go to work. (Note: I completely forgot Feel No Pain and It Will Not Die both of which may have made a serious impact on the game, someday I won't suck at 40K) 

The first turn sees me lose a hull point on the knight, whirlwind, and two thunderfire cannons. The knight walks forward and kills one assassin in shoting and charges the other stomping him into the mud. The second turn sees me lose the other cannon, more hull points on the knight with me taking out another assassin. Turn three is looking really bleak with the Knight my only model left on the board when I make the reserve roll and the calvary arrives. The salvo I unleash takes out a few more assassins and puts me back in the game.

Turn four the knight explodes and scatters away from the action. There's some back and forth between the marines and assassins a few wounds tossed back a forth but nothing major. Turn five sees the game continue to six where it ends.

Once we tally up the points for the mission the assassins win by one point. Only three of the ten survived the battle and I had my tactical squads left.