OPEN WAR – Carcharodons/House Raven vs. Grey Knights/Blood Angels

Warhammer 40,000– I really like the Open War Deck. It’s a quick way to set up a game that tends to be different every time you play. Unlike Maelstrom of War the objectives tend to be simple and fixed so there is more “skill” and less “luck of the draw.” Although some of the mission combinations you can get with the Open War deck are pretty ridiculous at least both players have to deal with the bad flips.

This week I decided to move away from my Blood Angel/Guard CP Farm list. While I enjoy playing it I feel the winds of change will be blowing soon and I’ll have to change up the list. So this week I decided to do something completely different.

Carchardons (White Scars) Vanguard Detachment

HQ - Tyberos the Red Wake 
ELITE - Terminator Assault Squad (5-Man with Thunderhammer/Storm Shield)
ELITE - Terminator Squad ( 5-man with Cyclone Missile Launcher)
ELITE - Terminator Squad ( 5-man with Cyclone Missile Launcher)
FAST - Caestus Assault Ram

House Raven Superheavy Detachment

Knight Gallant (Warlord) - Meltagun
Armiger Warglaive - Thermal Spear, Heavy Stubber
Armiger Warglaive - Thermal Spear, Heavy Stubber

With this list I went from being overloaded with CP to being starved for it. Using the Open War deck we flipped: Drawn and Quartered for the objective, Table Quarters for Deployment and had to draw two twists being one boosts the Psychic Phase and the other was the sun coming up (12” shooting range + 6” each turn on a 4+).

Both sides deployed fairly aggressively on the lines of our respective deployment zones. I placed my teleport homers as close to the objectives near my deployment zone as I could. I figured with such a small force I might need to make a hasty retreat and attempt to claim some points if my play to slaughter them didn’t work out.

With the +1 to the roll I got to go first and advanced with everything. A poor roll on my Gallant left me at a charge range that was unlikely and not worth spending my limited CP to attempt a charge. The Caestus was able to put a hurt on a squad of Death Company nearly wiping them out, luckily the marines Knew No Fear and passed the Morale test after a re-roll.

Smites and Melta gun shots proceeded to put a hurt on my Assault Ram and Knight Gallant, but they both survived through the first turn. Dumping off it’s payload of pain the Ceastus tore across the board to blast at the Razorback. My other Terminators arrived and proceeded to blast away at the enemy on the far flank. One of the Armigers melta-lanced the Grey Knight Dreadnought into oblivion while the other crept up on the Scouts defending the far objective. Not having the bodies to score objectives I was focusing on killing off their forces and wasn’t putting out enough damage to get through their saves.

The game went to Turn 4 with my opponents scoring 8 points to my 1. Not having any extra units to just camp on objectives means this type of mission is almost always an auto-lose for a elite force whose only path to victory is tabling the opponent. Overall I was happy with how the list functioned but I really need command points to make it shine.