Dark Angels are Here! and well eh..... (also another battle report)

All right the Dark Angel Codex has finally come out and I have had it for 3 days already.  I have been charged by my ATC team mates with coming up with an army to bring to the tournament in August.  However I can not at the moment find any inspiration.  Now the codex is not bad by any stretch of the imagination I just can't find my muse.  For one thing a lot of the new stuff is either over priced or not super effective.  I really wanted to use the new flyers but they were like well that is either underpowered or over priced.  I also wanted to use a vengeance but once again I was not impressed.  I also wanted to build an all ravenwing force but then I would play a heldrake and watch him just own me..(God forbid two heldrakes!)
So it looks like I am heading towards the Deathwing again.  Or maybe actually gasp... a force with actual green marines in it.  Well I will have to sit down and post ideas after I brainstorm for a bit.  Anyone else looking at the DAs any thoughts would be greatly welcomed and/or stolen....


Well here is another quick battle report from the Christmas break gaming marathon.   This was written up by my opponent and I am too lazy to rewrite it.

His List

HQ - Sorcerer, level 3, spell familiar (both took all telepathy powers)
HQ - Sorcerer, level 3, spell familiar
a Warpsmith has been making an appearance in place of one of the Sorcerers from time to time

El - Helbrute,multimelta
El - Helbrute, plasma cannon

Tr - 10 CSM, 2 plasmaguns, CCW, vets
Tr - 10 CSM, Lascannon, plasmagun, CCW, vets
Tr - 10 CSM, 2 meltaguns, combi-melta,meltabomb, CCW, vets, rhino, havoc

Fa - Heldrake, bale flamer

Hv - Maulerfiend, tendrils
Hv - Forgefiend, ectoplasma head
Hv - Defiler, power scourge Hereto referred to as Django because the scourge looks like he just broke his chains and he's got 6 million weapons and attacks

My List
Coteaz
Grand Master w/Rad and Psychotroke
5 Paladins two hammers and two psycannons
10 Strikes Ammo, Hammer 2 Psycannons
7 Assassins
5 Warriors in Psyback w/searchlight
10 Interceptors Ammo, Hammer 2 Psycannons
Land Raider w/Ammo and searchlight
Dreadknight w/teleporter and incinerator


We rolled up Big Guns Never Tire which meant I had 6 scoring units and Hammer n Anvil deployment. First turn was nightfight and I was going first.

Top of 1

All I had in front of me was a Land Raider full of assassins, 5 walking Paladins with Coteaz hiding behind the LR and 3 cowering henchmen in a psyback. I should have charged forward with 2 dreads, the Maulerfiend, the meltagun rhino squad and Django, but I didn't. I was to worried about the outflanking Interceptors, Dreadknight and Strike squad so I hunkered down on a hill behind a large sphinx and hoped my one Lascannon could take out the Land Riaider. It didn't and my turn stunk.

Bottom of 1

Nothing moves. The Land Raider fires two lascannons and blows the multimelta Helbrute sky high.

Top of 2.

WTF! It was dark out! How did he see my Helbrute. Damn Imperial searchlights. I realize my mistake from turn one and decide to charge a turn late and without a Helbrute and the rhino which is behind my army behind the hill. Basically the Maulerfiend gets invisibility cast on it and moves up to a ruin near the Land Raider and Paladins. The last Helbrute follows along.

Bottom of 2

10 Interceptors, 10 Strikes and a teleporting Dreadknight come in behind my army where I have a rhino with 10 guys who need to meltagun the Land Raider. The Strikes blow up the rhino. The Land Raider shoots the Helbrute, doesn't kill it and just makes it madder. The Paladins shoot at the Invisible Maulerfiend and get one penetrating hit. I fail my 2+ cover save and Greg rolls a 6 to detonate the Maulerfiend.

Rest of game - Highlights

I am hopelessly out maneuvered, outgunned and losing models fast. I am already crying that I lost this game on deployment. On turn 3 I get the Heldrake in and it proceeds to kill 10 Strikes and 10 Interceptors over 3 turns. Nothing can stop it and there is no escape from the Heldrakes wrath. I then realize what all the excitement on the Internet is about. This thing is great, right now, against an elite 3+ save army, which put 20 guys in my backfield who can't hurt It. Just to keep things in perspective.

The Forgefiend activates the daemonforge and strips the remaining hull points off the Land Raider.

The Dreadknights jumps from unit to unit and avoids Django in combat by hiding in challenges I have to accept, but eventually the DK runs out of challenges and an invisible Django cuts down the Dreadknight.

We have very little left on the board at the end. We tie on objectives, but Greg has First Blood and Warlord to get the victory.

The game went very fast I out manuvered Fred but the stupid heldrake came on and I had no answer for it.  Luckily my remaining warriors were so far back and the drake ran out of time to get them.  Another highlight was my Warlord going down to three hits from an exploding vehicle rolling three ones...

More Skulls for the Skull God

I played in a local tournament yesterday - it was 2000 points with double FOC. I'm just going to write one batrep and this is for the second game versus Space Wolves... Sorry but no pictures.


 OBJECTIVES

The mission had two primary objectives:

(1) Three Objective Markers - one placed in the middle of the table and the other two were both placed on the center line 18" apart from the center marker on either side. Note that heavy support units could hold objectives and were also worth one point each towards this objective if destroyed (Big Guns Never Tire).

(2) You gained one point towards this objective for each unit you moved into the enemy deployment zone and they must be there at the end of the game (not destroyed or fleeing).

Each primary objective was independent of the other for adding battle points... For example if in the case of the first primary if you and your opponent both held an equal number of objective markers then whoever destroyed the most enemy heavy support units would win this one. Each primary was worth 10 battle points for a win, 5 battle points for a draw and 0 for a loss. First Blood and Slay the Warlord were each worth one bonus battle point apiece.


DEPLOYMENT ZONES

Dawn of War (12" from the long table edges). Note that total battle points scored over the course of three games were used to determine the overall winner, not your win-loss record.

Three Intriguing Chaos Units

So - beginning to look at the new Chaos codex with a thought towards tournament army list - both Adepticon and ATC.   There are three units that are jumping out at me to look at how they perform on the table top.

#1 - The Defiler:

Found this picture of mine online from a ages past great game against Monty Kerr (Mkerr) of BOLS fame at the Chicago GT.  In the new 6th edition dex, I'm seeing lots of pluse for these guys.   4 hull points, 5+ Invul save, regeneration, and a crap ton of weapons options.  If I read the Walker rules correctly - a walker can fire ALL of it's weapons - including ordance - so this bad boy can fire Battle Cannon, Reaper cannon, 2 Havok Launchers, Combi-Bolter, and 1 combi-weapon of your choice - EACH TURN.....





#2 - The HelDrake.....
The new Chaos flyer seems a little bland - but then you look at it closer and see the Vector strike rule - along with some decent fire power, and you have a good anti-Flyer and anti-Ground combo vehicle.  All the possession, demon, regen, etc all make this a pretty appealing unit.



#3 - The ForgeFiend....

This one is intriguing.....but the jury is still out on it for me.  I think the three Ecto-cannon's give the termy armies a lot to worry about if that variant is used.   It's got all the good demon/regen stuff + fleet.   I'm not sure it's better than the Defiler - which just seems rudely over the top now......











Right now I'm looking at a Nurgle themed list with two Defilers, two Drake's, and a ForgeFiend - along with a lot of Plague Marines and Termies.  Lots of firepower combined with the toughness and staying power of Papa Nurgles finest.....

Hoping to play test soon!

New Year Musings and quick battle report

Let me start out wishing everyone a Happy New Year.  This year I hope to get back to gaming more and maybe even some of my own painting and assembly (who knows probably not).  Anyway I have been in a funk lately in regards to 40K.  I have just not been able to get into the new edition.  However lately I have been able to shake off the doldrums.  I have played a bunch of games lately and am actually looking forward to building a new army.  I am already signed up for the Adepticon championships and plan on playing with BNB at the ATC again.  I am going to sell off my Grey Knights army and begin a new army either Chaos or Dark Angels as those are the most of the figures I have laying around.  I look forward to the DA codex as they were my first real army.  I am also going to try and post at least once a week in here but will see how that goes. (I started this on the 2nd...)

Anyway here is one of the battle reports from one of the last games I played.  I was playing against Fred Fortman one of the better players in the Chicago land area.  I pulled out Mordrak for one of the last times.

My list was:
Mordrak and 4 Ghost knights w/halberds
Librarian w/teleport homer and just about every power
10 Terminators w/ammo, standard, 2 hammers, 2 psycannons and all the rest with halberds
10 Strikes w/ammo, 2 psycannons and hammer
10 Interceptors w/ammo, 2 psycannons and hammer
Dreadknight w/incinerator and teleporter

His list was:

HQ - Librarian, terminator armor, storm shield, force axe, Nullzone, gate of infinity
El - Dreadnought
El - Dreadnought
Tr - 5 Scouts, Telion, camo cloaks
Tr - 10 Tacticals, Lascannon, flamer, meltabomb, Lazerback
Tr - 10 Tacticals, Plasmacannon, flamer
Tr - 10 Tacticals, Multimelta, meltagun, combimelta, powerfist, rhino, GK missile
Fa - 3 Attack Bikes
Fa - 3 Attack Bikes w/ multimeltas
Hv - Vindicator, siege shield
Hv - Whirlwind
Hv - Thunderfire cannon
Aegis Defense Line, Icarus Lascannon


We decided to play with the West Coast BAO rules. These take two book missions and play them at the same time.

Primary - Emperors Will. The winner of this objective will gain 4 victory points
Secondary - Relic. The winner of this objective will gain 3 victory points
Tertiary - First blood, line breaker, slay the warlord. Each of these is worth 1 victory point each.

Vanguard deployment + nightfight.  Fred gets the warlord becomes scoring I get the night fight trait.

Fred deploys the ADL diagonally over a hill in my deployment zone. He has his Emperors will objective just to the right of the ADL next to the Icarus. I deploys 10 Terminators deep in his corner backfield and out of the fight. The Dreadknight is deployed centrally behind a building (my objective in there) and 10 Interceptors are next to it on his back end line. Fred goes first.


Top of 1

Fred sends 3 Attack bikes around the ADL to the left. The dreads climb over the line and go for the Relic. The Rhino moves up to the relic and the Vindicator follows driving over a ruin. The Lazerback stays behind the ADL, fires at the Intercepters and turns the light on them. The rest of the Vanillas open up in the Intercepters. Telion snipes a psycannon with the Icarus and eventually  he kill 8 of them. The last two guys break and run off the board.

Mordrak, GK Librarian and 5 Ghost Knights deep strikes in next to the Vindicator and uses it to block Los from most of my army. The Dreadknight shunts up next to Mordrak. Combined fire immobilizes the Vindicator and kills two multimelta attack bikes.

Top of 2

Most of the my army is out of range or LOS. Fred sends 5 melta shots into the Dreadknight, but shrouding protects him and he loses one wound. Telion snipes the Terminator Banner, but rolls a 1 to wound. He lives for now.

A Strike squad drops in next to the Vindicator using a teleport homer. The Librarian brings the 10 Terminators in through the Summoning power and everything is next to the Vindicator, next to the  ADL and next to my Emperors Will objective. Shooting drops a few scouts and a few Tacticals.

Top of 3

Rhino squad is sitting in their rhino next to the relic. The 3 Heavy Bolter attack bikes are by them along with both Dreads. Everything else is behind the ADL and next to the GK army. The Whirlwind drops onto the Terminators and kills the Banner. A plasmacannon kills a few more. The Thunderfire cannons does 17 wounds to the Strike Squad and kills 6. I peck away at them and kill 3 more leaving one guy left.

The Dreadknight jumps over the Vindicator and Flames Telion to hell. The Terminators advance around the Vindicator towards my soft innards.

Top of 4

The rhino squad drives over and jumps onto my objective.  He takes one more wound off the Dreadknight and charges him with both dreads. The dreads whiff bad and put one wound on him. The Dreadknight kills a dread. Everything else opens up on the Terminators and kill 1-2, but they fail their pinning check from the Whirlwind. The rhino squad takes his Emperors will objective and the Librarian (who was a scoring unit this turn) takes the relic and joins the attack bike squad.

Bottom of 4

The Dreadknight and dreadnought kill each other. The Terminators sit and the Ghost knights charge a tactical squad. They fail their charge when I Overwatch and kill the closest Ghost knight.

We call it there because Fred has the Relic and the Emperors will objective is tied.

Fred has a ten man tactical squad and the remnants of another one along with the attack bikes and the librarian, I have mordrak most of the termies and the librarian.

I had a little bit of brain cramps.  I should have went first and then after allowing him to go first I should have out the interceptors out of sight of everything else.  I forgot about every imperial vehicle having night fight which really ruined it for the interceptors.  Also if the dread knight manages to make one more save I probably end up with the relic and the game.

Happy New Year!

(and some musings on gaming in 2013)

A hearty Happy New Year to all!  

 

Wishing you all Blessings in this New Year of 2013!

Well, 2012 has come ane gone.  Somewhat of a "BLAH" year for me personally on the gaming front - all though the rest of things made for a pretty good year.   Gaming wise, I made it to my standard tourneys - Stones River, Adepticon, ATC, and Battle for Supremecy - playing my Wolves and Grey Knights for the most part this year from a competitive standpoint.   With the exception of the Adepticon Team Tournament - I managed a fair to middling showing in all.  The Team Tournament is almost always a good showing for us - and this year was no exception - with the Blade and Bolter Boyz coming in a respectable 10th (I think) overall and being the second best Imperial team overall.  Again we were bridesmaids - and not the bride!  Oh well - still a blast.   The rest of Adepticon was fun - but almost a little to intense in the competitive arena.  Stones River is always a good time - best local tournament around.  ATC - well it is somewhat my brainchild as I came up with the idea, format, mission and talked Shane and Chris into starting it up - so it will always have a special place for me tournament wise.  So glad to see it taking off and that it is moving to a larger venue this year and closer to Nashville and a major airport.  Supremacy isn't the tournament it was back when Laughing Corpses ran it - but was still a lot of fun - and hats off to Jason Dowding for keeping it going.



So - what does 2013 hold for me on the Gaming front.   I'd be foolish to think that Family and Work will not slow down my gaming - and rightly so for Family is first and work is a must for survival.  That aside, I hope to be more active in gaming this year.   The new 6th Edition is still being understood by the tournament gamers - and still a lot to be learned there for me.    Several of my favorite armies have or will have, new Codex's being released and are singing their calls to me.  How does this shake out?

 

Well - the new Chaos 'dex has been out for several months.  My beloved Death Guard have been languishing in their Battlefoam for years - along with my Berserkers and yet to be finished Night Lords.  Yeah - I kinda like Chaos and have way over 10,000 total points of them and haven't even let them hit the battle field yet with the new Codex.   So - Step 1 - need to fix that - maybe as soon as this Thursday!    A few of the new units look interesting - and a few old favorites sound good as well.

Dark Angels are also slated for a new release this year if rumors are true.  My first tournament army for the 1998 Chicago GT - and holds a special place in my heart.   I was blessed to win best Sportsman at Baltimore GT with them in 1999 and have been a tournament junky ever since.   Excited for their new release and the new models - which initial pictures look pretty cool!   For the LION and the EMPEROR!!!!

 I still have a love for Space Wolves that is not matched by my tournament success with them.   I think that there is a strong list in there that fits my playing style - that I just need to work with some more.  I've had brushes with greatness with them - but haven't cracked the code yet.  Maybe this is the year!

 

Black Library continues to chunk out a great amount of fan fiction for 40K - I'm woefully behind in my reading - and have probaly 20 stories I need to read eventually.  I'm going to focus on the three Horus Heresy novels I'm behind on first - then work on the others.....hopefully!

 

 

I have greatly missed hanging with my battle brothers in the Blade and Bolter club as much as would have liked this year.   They are my friends and buddies - who I hope to revitialize and renew our club and relationships this year.   My good friend Sabote has now returned from his 3 year stint in Europe - and hope to get more time hanging with him now.   It was great to see my buddy Gimli at Supremecy and look forward to seeing him and Swanson in Chicago.  Swanson become a good friend as well being one of our anchor players in my ATC team.

 

This brings me to the end of a long post and sleep calls.  Back to work tomorrow.   Hope everyone has a great year!

 

Al