When the Inquisition is involved does anyone win?

Warhammer 40,000 – This week my Night Lords faced off against Space Marines and Sisters of Battle/Inquisition. Since the Inquisition was involved it's pretty easy to twist the narrative to accommodate a three-way carnage game.

The mission originally came from the 7th Edition Altar of War book in the Tyranid section. Some minor tweaking made it work in our campaign. The idea is since the Night Lords hold the planet they'll start culling the population as slaves or potential recruits. The Space Marines (Bone Fists - Imperial Fist Successor) are attempting to save the population that hasn't been tainted yet. The Inquisitors want to purge the population to be sure the taint is cleansed. 

Set up is pretty simple, three large blast markers are set up equidistance from each other down the center of the table. The "defender" sets up in the center of the table anywhere with 12" of the center line. The other two players roll off to chose one of the long table edges and deploy within 3" of the table edge. Anything that doesn't fit in their deployment zone is held in reserve and walks on the first turn. The "defender" gets first turn unless one of the "attackers" is able to seize the initiative. Player order is determined by a roll off at the start of each Battle Round. Players may shoot into a combat that doesn't involve their model on a 4+, wounds are randomly allocated.

The native population is represented by the blast markers. (I'll probably model something because this was a really fun mission). At the end of each movement phase the player whose turn it is rolls two dice for each template. If the "defender" is closest to the template it moves in a straight line towards the closest short board edge. (ignoring small terrain and moving around large buildings or impassible terrain) If one of the "attackers" is closest to the template it moves directly towards the other "attackers" board edge. Once the center of the template moves off the table edge it is removed and worth 6 VP. Defenders score if the native population makes it off the short board edges and the attackers score 6 VP if it moves off the opposite long board edge.

As neither attacker was able to seize I got first turn and attempted to alpha strike both sides while staying close to the templates. While I did score first blood, I failed to do as much damage as I anticipated and felt my glass hammer shatter under the weight of fire coming from both sides. Knowing I couldn't win a war of attrition I focused on herding the two templates I had closest to the docks off the edge. This left the sisters and marines slugging it out over the other template which was force almost off the edge by my giant spawn. 

We only made it through 3 Battle rounds (technically 9 turns) and the Inquisition managed to squeak out a win by scoring Slay the Warlord and Line-breaker. I feel like I would have been able to force the two templates on the boat off the table one I killed Celestine a second time. 

I'm looking forward to trying this mission out 1v1 as it was really fun.