We finally finished off the last game of the first tier, Grey Knights vs. Space Marines.
THE GAME
Rosters as before:
Laur’s Sternguard with Rhino taxi, Jump-pack equipped assault squad & scouts were up against my Strike & Purgation squad both in razorback taxis. However, this time my Psilencer-carrying Purgationeers were Relentless!
We rolled off and got Dawn of War...
Here was the result:
1st TIER – BATTLE 01
Grey Knights Vs. Space Marines: I stole the Initiative and went first, result was a Grey Knight victory (2 Killpoints over 1 Killpoints)Deployment: Laur deployed his scouts dead centre of the board in cover, hoping to use his Stealth USR to give himself a 3+ cover save while sniping my men and their taxis, hoping to shred them with Rending. Laur’s Sternguard were hidden away in a Rhino partially obscured to grant him a cover save, with Deepstriking Assault Squad to enter the fray later. Not wanting to get shot to sh!t, I elected to reserve all my guys and was surprised to find myself successfully stealing the Initiative. Why I had not chosen to have my men roll out my 1st turn I still do not know why, but after skipping the first round mutually, my men started to come on the board.
Highlights:
Purgation squad’s taxi zoomed ahead first and deployed the GK’s out of sight. They let rip with their now-Relentless Psilencers and with 9 saves having to be made, I killed 3 of Laur’s scouts, a good round of rolling! He was (un)pleasantly surprised to learn his Stealth USR counted for nothing from Astral Aim, hence an accusation of Codex Cheese! Was lodged and duly noted, but hey what can I do about that?
The Purgation squad’s lazer-taxi got immobilised then blown up in an assault. Surprisingly only 1 of my Purgation squad was killed by the S4 blast (having got back on after the round of shooting), but the S3 blast ended up forcing Laurence to roll 5 saves for his Sternguard, and lost 3!
Jump pack squad arrived by Deep Strike, my Strike Squaddies hadn’t managed to get Warp Quake off as they weren’t on board yet, so an opportunity wasted there. They helped blow up my Lascannon razortaxi, but lost 2 guys from a round of shooting from my newly-arrived Strike Squad, and the remaining Sternguard were wiped out having to make another 9 saves from massed Psilencer-fire.
Laur’s Scouts were shot by my TL heavy psybolters, losing another and resulting in his last scout running away, regrouping, and hiding for the rest of the game.
His remaining Assault Squad members (3 of them) charged into my Purgation squad, but surprise surprise! After 2 rounds of combat, I didn’t lose a single guy and he lost the remains of the squad. I note it didn’t help the first round of combat he forgot to factor in his extra charge attacks. The 2nd round of combat he forgot his Sergeant had an extra attack, but the game had progressed so far on from these events this ‘schoolboy error’ proved irrecoverable. I note Laurence failed to contact with his ‘to-hit’ assault rolls, only occasionally forcing the odd save here and there. On my part, my Purgationeers pistol-whipped the assault squad into submission although my Justicar wiped himself out on a double-1’s Perils of the Warp roll activating Hammerhands, and yes, stranger things have happened (e.g. in a past game a 4-wound power sword Captain charged into a 10-men shotgun vet squad, fluffled all his rolls and was killed in return)
My taxi-fire was pretty underwhelming. A few rounds of shooting with twin-linked psybolters and lascannons only resulted in an immobilised and weapon destroyed result for his single Rhino by the end of the game, but again with enough time I would’ve wiped that out too.
Once Laur lost his Assault Squad, he wished to concede the game and cut his losses. With enough time I would’ve definitely wiped out his last 2 units for the last 2 killpoints, as my Purgation squad would’ve killed off his last scout despite being out of sight, and his Rhino was literally a sitting duck with nothing to fire at me, or even scratch my last Psy-back taxi with a fresh squad of GK Strikers.
Summary: In the first game of this tier, Dougie had pretty bad luck. In the 2nd game of this tier, my shooting and assault rolls were piss-poor, so I had pretty bad luck. In this last game, Laur’s assault rolls and armour saves were really, really bad.
So bad luck does move around in a complete circle!It was a bit weird that my attempts to list-fu the others with a longer reach (lascannon) never came into fruition, but my now Relentless Purgation Squad was now the MVP of the game considering I was going to drop them off my army roster in the next tier for a more points-efficient Psyfleman Dread.
VETERAN ABILITIES
The overall rewards now stand as follows:
Space Marines – Rhino (Ability to ignore Shaken results), Scout Squad (Fearless)
Chaos Space Marines – Chaos Space Marines Squad(Furious Charge & Counter Attack), Chosen Squad (Tank Hunters)
Grey Knights – Purgation Squad (Relentless, Tank Hunters), Strike Squad (Hit & Run)
As Laur’s Scout squad lost over 50% of it’s unit strength, his Night Vision/Acute Senses vet ability was lost as per the BRB’s Veteran Abilities rules. In turn, he re-rolled and gained Fearless! (which again, he wasn’t too thrilled by). It seems likely the Scouts are going to be the first thing to go in the next tier roster.
Having won my game, I rolled for a Strike Squad and gained Hit & Run, which I suppose is more useful in a halberd-heavy melee build, which I will consider for the next tier. After having witnessed the ‘bogging-down’ attritrion style warfare of dice-rolling between MEQ’s, any advantage would be most welcome! I will be able to disengage from combat with a more bulked-up squad, pump fire back into my attackers and re-charge them to gain the extra dice I will need.
My ‘Relentless’ Purgation Squad is now worth taking in the next tier. Combined their new Tank Hunters veteran ability with Psybolt ammunition as an upgrade, and re-equip them with Psycannons I now have a squad capable of pumping out effectively strength 9 shots (S8 + 1 during armour penetration) at other Rhinos, behind cover without needing LOS. W00t!
Needs moar dakka
That’s 16 shots (relentless, not counting Justicar’s stormbolter), hitting 10.66 times, glancing 8.88 times / penetrating 7.1 times (Rhino front/side being AV 11). Them’s very, very good odds and without a doubt a shoe-in for them to be included in my following games next tier!
THAT’S A WRAP
Last year we ended 2010 with a mega-Apoc game in progress. This year we’ve closed 2011 with our first foray into a Campaign game. We hope to build up to the Grand Finale in the early quarter of 2012, so thank you for reading & happy holidays to all!
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