catalyst2 | Battle #38 (Reply)

Tonight's game was originally 1000 points against Liam's Orks. As I was writing my list, I was concerned about my lack of firepower so imagine my joy when I arrived at PAGS and Liam suggested that we make 1500 points. I took my usual 3 tactical squads (but with no rhinos because I was happy to sit and wait for the Orks), Predator Destructor, Whirlwind, Thunderfire, 3 HB/assault cannon speeders and Ironclad Dread in Drop Pod with deathwind ML. He took Battlewagon (with Big Mek and KFF) with four truks (all of them filled with Boyz, no Nobz), a war buggy squadron with 3 vehicles and a squad of bikers with Nob and Warboss. His reserve was kommandos and a squadron of two Deffkoptas. Oh crap!

It was Annihilation mission with Spearhead deployment - just about the worst combination I could get against a mobile force like that. I won the roll but elected to give him first turn, my reasoning being that I could at least see what he was aiming at me before I deployed. His deployment was exactly as expected, bikers swinging wide to my right backed by two truks and the centre with a screen of war buggies in front of the two truks and battlewagon. My deployment was equally conventional - screen of tactical squads in front of a gunline - left to right, Whirlwind, Thunderfire, Predator) - with the speeders ready to swing on my left wing and Ironclad coming in via DP. The terrain might also help me - a lot of craters and buildings to restrict his mobility including critically, an enormous crater in front of almost the whole width of my line and a series of smaller carters across the centre.

Turn 1 - he rushed forward, shot, missed everything and he was done. The bikers made an especially wide swing to get cover. I stood still fired and missed almost everything. The only exception was the speeder squadron. He could have got stuck in a potential bottleneck between a crater and a building if I could have immobilised or wrecked any of his buggies. Instead, I blew two up (which I really shouldn't complain about) and the third escaped unharmed. The Ironclad landed and unloaded on the rear of the battle wagon, getting a single weapon destroyed result.

Turn 2 - he turned one truk around in the centre, coming back to assault the Ironclad (he had a Nob with claw on the squad) but everything else hurtled forward. He shot, missed almost everything and he was done again. Next turn, almost his entire line would be in combat with me so I really had to stop him this turn. The Ironclad fought off the assault with the Nob failing to get a single hit. The dread in return killed two taking the squad down to 13. The rest of the line shot and shot and did next to nothing, with the exception of the speeders again, who managed to take a weapon off a truk.

Turn 3 - I think he had put a great deal of reliance in the Nob/Warboss on bikes because he held off with most of his army, relying on on them to do a lot of damage so that the rest of the line was softened up for the Boyz. Sure enough, the bikers arrived and ate a tactical squad, no problem. the Ironclad over on the far left did some funny things - the Nob again failed all his attacks but the ironclad killed 2, taking them down to 11. The Kommandos had come on and assaulted the DP for an easy kill point. They duly blew it up but resulting blast killed three kommandos (out of 8), killed 6 Boyz so the Boyz ran. I kept the Ironclad close enough that they would run off the board next turn. In my turn, The Ironclad pivoted and then used Heavy flamer and meltagun to kill 4 of the remaining 5 Kommandos so the Kommados ran too. The Speeders turned their attention to a squad of grots in some ruins. The grots failed every cover save and ran, having lost half their squad. Unfortunately for them, they were running straight towards the Ironclad. On the right, it looked a lot grimmer - the bikers kept on coming and took out the Predator. The battelwagon and both truks disgorged their contents who tried to charge - all three squads rolled low on their difficult terrain tests (remember that crater?) so only my right hand tactical squad got charged. Here's were it got funny - my shooting had been crap for most of the night but now the ork's combat turned to crap. The mob of Boyz killed one marine but I killed 4 of them, not enough to force a test yet but getting close. The Orks now paid the price for those poor rolls - the Thunderfire shot a perfect round and killed off all the bikers, including the Warboss and Nob, the Whirlwind was getting short of targets because of the close range but the center Boyz were had two models that were thirteen inches away so it fired on them, got a perfect scatter back and half that squad died, along with one marine. The two tactical squads fired and caused no casualties. I elected not to charge!

Turn 4 - the Ironclad over the far left continued to cause utter mayhem - both the last of the Boyz and sole remaining Kommando ran off the board whilst the grots kept on running straight at the Ironclad. In the center it got funnier - despite all three Boyz squad now being in combat with the two tactical squads, they caused absotuely no casualties whilst I killed two from each of the mobs. The centre mob passed its check, being under 10, but the other two were still OK. In my turn the speeders swung around and shot the last immobilised and weaponless war buggy for another kill point. On the left, the Ironclad killed all the grots but one got with its Heavy flamer/meltagun combo and then (because I was feeling mean by now!) I assaulted the sole survivor. It died! In the centre, it just got funnier - I killed two more from the centre mob which duly ran and more from the right hand mob but it still didn't run. The left hand mob had some success, killing three marines but it lost three as well so a drawn combat.

Turn 5 - His assault was murderous - for him! - because every Boyz mob lost combat, went under 10 and ran! I caught one and killed it whilst the other two kept going. The Ironclad over the far side tooled up on the last truk and destroyed, earning it's fourth kill point of the game. In the centre, the Thunderfire died to big shooters on the battlewagon and truk. Because the mobs had run, one came back in range for the Whirlwind which duly killed the last four in the center one. Game ended here.

Result - win for me by 7-3 (I think). WOOHOO! Thanks for a great game Liam - and a very funny evening!

What I learned tonight:
1) Sometimes the dice gods are against all of us - my marines couldn't shoot and his Orks couldn't assault tonight.
2) Somewhat like Tyranids, the look of an Ork army can be quite intimidating but holding my nerve and sticking to the plan does work. Of course, it didn't work quite the way I expected (see #1 above!)

My W-L-D record:
40K: 26-8-0
Apocalypse: 2-0-1
Planetstrike: 0-1-0