On The Eve Of Impending Battle

Well, my moving is done and now I return in semi-grand style! Tomorrow (Sunday), I have a battle:

2K points of Marines


VS


1K Guard & 1K Eldar

Yes, folks, the Ancient and Glorious Astramalleus against the vile and most foreign Eldar and obviously Traitor Guard! Now, I'm not usually a defeatist, but I actually think I'm not going to win this battle. The Eldar make up for the Guard's biggest flaws (assault power and immobility) while the Guard are an excellent fit for the Eldar (numbers and big guns). I have to gear against two different styles of fighting while my opponents only have to face one well known and analyzed enemy. So I don't think I'm going to win. Because of that I've decided to take a somewhat crazy and hopefully brutal list in hopes of giving back what I think I'm going to get:

Captain w/ lightning claw, combi-plasma & Hellfire rounds
10-man Tac Squad w/ power weapon/bolt pistol, missile launcher & flamer in Rhino
10-man Tac Squad w/ power weapon/bolt pistol, missile launcher & flamer in Rhino
10-man Tac Squad w/ power weapon/bolt pistol, missile launcher & flamer
10-man Sternguard w/lightning claw/bolter, missile launcher & flamer in Rhino
10-man Devastator Squad w/missile launcher x4 in a Razorback
Speeder Squadron ([heavy bolter & heavy bolter] x3)
Dreadnought (assault cannon & heavy flamer)
Dreadnought (multi-melta & heavy flamer) in a Drop Pod
Whirlwind x2

The plan is something like this: If it's Seize Ground, I'll hold my own objective, assault another and contest a third. If it's Capture & Control, I'll do the same but there'll only be two objectives to worry about. If it's Annihilation, I'll stay squadded up and assault in force. The Sternguard will use Dragonfire ammo to deny cover saves and (if I combat squad them) possibly Hellfire ammo with the Captain to kill an Avatar. The Dred with the multi-melta will drop pod in behind the Leman Russ and Basilisk I expect to find against me. The other Dred will be kept behind for the Swooping Hawks I expect to Deep Strike near me and the Striking Scorpions I know will be assaulting me. Whirlwinds and Devastators should provide effective anti-infantry and the speeders will pick off squads at range until late game when I can rush them to contest an objective.

That's what I'm intending to do. Will it work? We shall see tomorrow.

500 PT Battle Report

So, my friend and I played a 500 pt battle today. He's started repainting his old IG (including the two really awesome squads I painted for him. Grrrrr!) and is trying to learn the way 40K plays now. So we had a small battle and here's how it went.

On one side, the good guys, the Ancient and Glorious Astramalleus, the Scions of Besradine, the Sons of Guilliman, the Scourge of the Stars and the Hammers of the Emperor!

On the other side, the most foul and foreign Imperial Guard!

Why were we fighting? Well, I maintained that the Planetary Governor had gone renegade and was using the Planetary Defense Forces to try to shield him from his just and righteous justice. My friend claimed that his world knew a secret about the my Chapter and we were attempting to eradicate any trace of it by wiping out the inhabitants of this world. I'm sure that's what their renegade Planetary Governor told them!

He lost the roll so I had him go first. It was Command and Control with long side setup. He placed and I placed and chose not to seize the initiative. First turn, he advanced and I advanced. I fired off a few heavy bolter shots with my speeder and killed a Guardsman. It was a pretty quick Turn 1.

Top of turn two, he advanced toward my speeder and fired two meltaguns at it. One missed. One hit and turned it into so much explosive shrapnel. Nobody was in range of the explosion but I was sad that I never got to use the heavy flamer.

Bottom of turn two, my Captain along with a Tac Squad moved forward and assaulted his Guard. Unfortunately, I was a little strung out so I could only get into hand to hand with one unit. I killed 5 of his guys but they didn't run away, which was good for me because I wouldn't get shot up during his next turn And believe me, he would have liked to. If he had his way, he'd fire Basilisks onto his own men to get the enemy if he could. On the other flank, however, I moved out of the way of a heavy weapons team that popped two of my men with Krak and heavy bolters.

Top of turn three, he started coming around the hill after me while moving his other squads away from the assault. We continued the assault and the might of my Captain and the squad managed to kill them all...but one. How this lonely little Guardsman lived, I have no earthly idea but he did which was bad for me because I would have to spend my next assault finishing him off meaning he could shoot at me when his next shooting came up. To their credit, this squad did more to mess me up than anything else in the game. What a waste that capable Imperial troops would have to be used up this way...

Bottom of turn three, Of course, the assault was finished and I was aware that I was being anticipated on two sides. On the other flank, however, I decided to take the fight to the enemy. I went up the hill and decided, instead of pulling out pistols and risking not being able to assault through the difficult terrain, I prepared to lay out the glory of the bolter on these rebel scum. I point at a squad and put a squad of rapid firing fury into them. And killed three... Some glory. I think this squad is going back to target practice when they get back to Besradine. But the IG squad failed its LD check so they fell back anyway! But that was little comfort because now my boys were standing in the wind on a hill being looked at by a lot of flashlights.

Top of turn four, he fired his heavy weapons team at my Captain and his squad. Cover didn't save me from a Krak missile but armor save me from everything else. Otherwise, he didn't want to get close at all. On the other flank, he decided to take the hand-to-hand to me. He brought up the Company Commander(and his power sword) with his Command squad and charged up the hill. They charged and killed...nobody! I counter attacked and fared just as well. Drawn combat and he didn't shoot me up. That was a good result for me.

Bottom of turn four, the Captain ans his squad needed to get to his objective. So I made a beeline for it and then ran four more inches to get closer. That left them right outside the ruin it was in and they were prepared to lose a couple guys from Krak and maybe some Melta. In the assault, there was a different result. I attacked and killed four of the five Veterans. He swung the power sword and killed nobody again.

At that point he decided to call it because ehe thought he was getting his ass handed to him. I actually thought something similar but I definitely had the advantage. As long as he didn't totally wipe the Captain and his squad, I would have his objective and if I fell back with the other squad, I'd have my own and without a good helping of luck I didn't think he could pull it off easily. If it ended on turn 5, I would have won. Turn 6? He may have been able to pull out a draw, but I think I would have won. Turn 7? I'm not so sure. I think he could have definitely made a draw but there was a decent chance he could have pulled out a win. Either way, he learned some thing and I was refreshed on some things and that's what really matters.

Next time we're going to play at 750. I totally expect a Leman Russ in that one. We also played on a smaller board this time (3'x4'). Definitely a bigger board next time.