And tonights outcome

If there's one thing you can say about the Grey Knight codex, it probably has better shooting than any other book.  Maybe not better guns in some cases, but still.


Anyway I had an infantry platoon with 3 squads with autocannons, 3 lascannons, platooon command with flamers.  Creed with medi pack, astropath, Officer of the fleet and snipers.  5 stormtroopers.  Marbo, Veteran squad with plasma.  Veterans with melta.  Valkyrie, Leman russ with heavy bolters, Leman Russ Demolisher with Multi Meltas.  leman Russ executioner with Plasma sponsons.  And an aegis line with quad gun,

Against a bunch of henchmen with MONKEYS!!  Some highlights of the monkey madness, one of the unit had 48" range heavy bolters, and Coteaz had a psychic power that meant i got no cover save from them :(  oh and we both had aegis line

We were playing The Emperors Will with hammer and anvil deployment.  My objective was sabotaged which I completely forgot about after turn one.  Richards was +1 cover saves, which on a bolstered ruin, meant that anyone holding it had a 2+ cover save.

Turn one I did seize the initiative, but Coteaz stopped that forcing me to reroll.  The inquisition Land Raider moved up 12" and the flat out a further 6" right in front of my lines.  A variety of shooting bounced of the aegis line.  for my part, I took a hull point from the land raider and not a lot else.  Again the Aegis line absorbing a lot of fire.  The two

Turn two no reserves arrived for the inquisition.  The deathcult assassins disembarked from the land raider and tore into the squad manning the quad gun.  I had my Kasrkins, Marbo arrive and my platoon command was outflanking thanks to Creed also showed up.  Kasrkins teleported next to the Land Raider and reduced it to mere debris,  too late to save my lines though.  Marbo showed up in the ruin that had been bolstered by a techmarine.  The command squad showed up next to Coteaz's unit, intending to flame them to death.  Unfortunately I did not realise that Coteaz's unit would get a free shot against these units.   Marbo lost a wound, and the chimera was blown up. (FIRST BLOOD!)  The command squad within pinned.  Marbos demo charge did nothing to the squad in the ruin thanks a 2+ cover.

Turn three saw the calidus show up and reduce half my infantry platoon's brains into goo with the neural shredder.  Lost my executioner to the deathcult, and the demolisher was destroyed by the stormraven. Also lost a lascannon team.  Marbo was denied his cover save by psychic trickery and died.  3 of the command squad died the survivors fleeing, never making it of the board, but they would be taking no further part in the battle. I also lost the battlecannon from my Leman Russ.  On my turn however I was able to kill the deathcult assassins with whats was left of my infantry platoon, and Creeds command squad finished of the calidus.  Finally a Lascannon from my Leman Russ finished of a techmarine hovering in my lines. My Valkyrie showed up, the veterans inside and the transport unable to affect the stormraven.

Turn Four the occupants of the StormRaven disembarked.  The Arco Flaggelents going for my melta Vets, and the dreadnought making a move for my kasrkin loitering in the midfield.  The valkyrie was shot out the sky by the stormraven, the machine spirt bringing it's bolters to bear on my command squad felling Creed (WARLORD!)  And the Arco Flaggelents made short work of the veterans, they did manage to kill a couple though.  Bastonne survived combat, but broke and ran, and was cut down.  A henchmen unit of psykers tried to fry the sole survivor of the command squad, the astropath.  However they rolled double 1, the entire unit wiped out by the predations of the warp.  to add insult the astropath made his deny the witch.   I also lost my final leman russ to the crack shooting of the vindicare.

Turn Five  The flaggalents did not make into combat.  I lost some more guardsman to inquistorial heavy bolters.  The dreadnought failed to charge the kasrkin, it did fell 2 of them with assault cannon fire however.   The vindicare with a lack of targets gunned down one of the fleeing flamer guys. The meagre remaons of my army consolidated towards the objective.  The remaining kasrkins failed to penetrate the dreadnought, and a heroic charge resulted in a dead kasrkin, and me failing to scratch it's armoured sarcophagus with a krak grenade.  The survivor turned to flee and was slaughtered by the mighty machine.

And with that the game ended.
We each had our own objectives.  However Richard had First blood, Slay the Warlord and a unit in my deployment zone.  Final Score 6-3

Man of the match.  Aegis Defence Lines :D

And the aftermath

Was a fairly solid victory for the guard.  12vp to 4vp.
Was playing The Scouring which is the 6 objectives of varying values.  By chance I had 8 of the 15 vp's in or near my deployment zone.

Marines went first, doing little due to range.  My first turn I took a couple of hull points of a rhino.  I did have a pinned infantry unit from sniper fire though.

Second turn again very innefectual shooting by themarines.  And the plane did not show up.  My second turn marbo showed up, his demo charge scattered, took two marines out and their rhino was wrecked.  Kasrkins deepstruck behind the predator and reduced it to slag, losing a melta gun in the explosion.  An incredible round of shooting from the lascannon team took three hull points from the land raider.  And I wrecked the other rhino

Turn three Marbo suffered the full wrath of the 8 marine survivors who blazed away in venegance for their fallen comrades.  He did not survive.  Lost another Kasrkin to the scouts. And the stormtalon arrived.  The Quad gun blazed away to no effect.  The stormtalon open fired on the squad manning the quad gun, felling the autocannon team and another trooper.  The Lascannon team was incinerated by the land raider redeemer cannons.  For my part I killed the scouts and generally panicked at the land raider near my lines.  To which I could do little.  Also it turns out you can throw grenades at flyers, so my brave trooper made a mighty throw and actually hit the Stormtalon, but did nothing to it.

Turn four the stormtalon flew off the board.  Land raider toasted a few guys, but the terminators did not disembark.  Very little else left to do anything.  My turn was also quiet..  One of my infantry squads made to claim another objective.  I killed the plasma gun and the heavy bolter guy from the marines in the backfield. My command quad hid, ready to ambush the tactical marines advancing on them.

Turn five saw the return of the stormtalon, which was blasted out the sky by 2 glancing, and 2 penetratings from the quad gun.  Finally wrecked the land raider with a leman russ lascannon.  The terminators were out and I had little left to shoot at them :(

Turn 6 the terminators made mincemeat of an infantry squad.  I managed to kill three of them with shooting, consolidated towards the mid field objective, and killed the final tactical squad in my deployment zone.

Turn 7 the terminators made towards my deployment zone.

Final score -
Imperial Guard =  Objectives - 4,1,3,2 First blood and Linebreaker = 12
Space Marines = Objectives- 3 and  Linebreaker = 4

Observations,  Aegis lines are ridiculous good value.  Since vehicles only need 25% cover, pretty much anything can get a cover save behind it, 4+ cover as well.  And the skyfire gun can (and did) wipe out a flyer in a single salvo.
Placing objectives after choosing deployment zones is silly.  Sure I was lucky with what objectives I had, but my gunline didn't even have to move from behind the Aegis line.  A perfect set up.


I don't like to critisize, but I fell Colin could of been a bit more aggresive with the Land Raider.  A drive right towards my lines (I had no melta there and had horrendous difficulty getting rid of it as it was)  would of probably wiped me out, but there ya go.

Colin also has a pretty amazing setup at his gaff.  It's a pleasure to play there , and he's a fine opponent I wish I had remembered my camera.

Because Guard don't do subtle

Heres what I'm taking tonight.  No valkyrie melta vets for a change.  Colin may or may not get the advantage by seeing this beforehand.  But like the title says.

Test

Photos show how crap my ten minute work is, but still the colour works I think.

I have an Aegis defence line

Hurray.

Went to GW Cambridge today.  Wasn't much Dark Vengeance there, just the ability to pre order it.  But it's always fun to go to gw and gawp at the scenery and mini's on display.

Picked up some paint to resume some old projects, and also have an Aegis line and quad gun.  Ever useful.

Matt's Imperial Guard house rules.

From now on I shall be doing the following for the sake of sensibility, and my sanity.

My command HQ shall be taking Kasrkin bodyguards.  Because it makes sense, even if not supported by rules for these elite to be guarding the commander.  And gives a reason to use the models, which are awesome.  Stormtroopers however are not.

This will bump the HQ base price from 50 to 80 (a slight premium considering they don't get deep strike or special ops).  For this they get Krak Grenades, Carapace armour, Hotshot lasgun and Hotshot laspistol.   Any veteran may replace his lasgun or laspistol with a power weapon for 10 points. They may not take a heavy weapon though.   But retain all other options.
The commander does not get the hotshot guns however.

Troops in valkyries/vendettas may disembark even if it is zooming, but they must do so by deep strike as per the grav chute instertion.  I'd say the same for stormravens aswell.

Leman Russ tanks that were stationary or moved at combat speed may always fire their turret weapon, which won't affect what other weapons it may normally fire, even if ordnance.  Note that you still can't snap shot blasts, so shaken/stunned is going to shut down the big guns.  But can only cruise at d6+6"

Atillery also doesn't generally make sense, but they are still potent.  I don't use them, so can't think of a way to fix them.

I won!!

I did make an adjustment to my list.  Took a demolisher instead of an executioner, and dropped the sniper rifles, taking 2 plama guns instead.

And turned out I got a choice of Grey Knights or Space Wolves.  I went for the grey knights.  And we were playing the relic.  From memory I was facing  Draigo, 6 paladins.  I think they had 1+ psycannon,  a terminator squad with thawn.  5 Interceptors with incinerator.  Purgation squad with psycannons and dreadknight with gatling gun and psycannon.

Some things that went well.


Good fortune 1....seized the initative!!  Always nice to get a round of shooting before people start eating you.
Good fortune 2...draigo died volley one.  Leman Russ demolisher put 14 ap2 hits on Draigos Paladin squad.  Draigo took 7 demolisher rounds on his storm shield, but was felled (First Blood+Slay the Warlord)
Good fortune 3..  Only 4 terminators from the 2 squads survived.

After that it generally was a case of whoever could do so marched toward the relic sitting on top of a skyshield landing pad.

2 more volleys of demolisher fire saw the end of the paladins, and only  terminator and Justicar Thawn were still alive from the terminator squad.  I had a infantry squad up there, and turn three saw my valkyrie arrive, and my melta veterans dropped of turn 4.  At this point justicar Thawn had the relic.  But he had a demo charge and melta guns thrown at him, killing the terminator and thawn.  Unfortuantly I could not get the objective to pick it up.  (difficult terrain and bad run rolls)
Marbo showed up and killed an interceptor squad. also worth noting the calidus showed up and made a mess of bastonnes squad (just him and a shotgun left)  They fled but rallied next turn, the result being they were back exactly where they were.
Justicar thawn stood back up and picked up the objective.

And then died

And then got back up and picked up the relic.

And then died.

Thankfully turn 6 he did not stand up, and I finally had a free turn to claim the objective.  Bastonnes veteran squad picked it up, and next turn ate psycannon fire.
 At this point was very little to shoot, so just made a bee line with all my units towards the otherside of the board for linebreaker.  And I was able to kill of the nuisance purgation squad.

Turn 7 again I picked up the objective with my Platoon command squad.  Thawn stood back up, killed the guy with the relic, and then punched the rst of the squad in the face.  He then got a power fist reply. 
 
No one had the objective, but I had all three secondaries for a win.

Star unit?  Leman Russ Demolisher.  It made well over it's points back, killing a great many paladins and terminators.
Most usless unit?  Possibly hellhound.  Had I known I would be against marines wouldn't of took it.  But also the chimeras killed a grand total of nothing.  But they are pretty rapid in 6th, being able to go 18" a turn. helps a great deal for linebreaker.
I was also against a very elite army that did not have anywhere near the numbers to deal with the number of threats I had, plus the opening volley was devastating to them.  Losing almost half the terminators.

For this weeks ritual slaughter of humanity

We have Counts as Creed, and 4 sniper rifles.  Who happen to be ratling models.  Go go ratling bodyguards.  They have a Chimera.

Guardsman Marbo.

Infantry platoon
Command squad has 4 flamers, power fist and a chimera with hull heavy flamer.

Infantry squad with grenade launcher and autocannon.
Infantry squad with grenade launcher and autocannon.
Infantry squad with grenade launcher and autocannon.
Heavy weapons squad with lascannons.

Veteran squad with 3 plasma guns and a chimera

Veteran squad with 3 melta guns, demolitions, and sergeant bastonne.
In a valkyrie, with rocket pods and sponsons.

Hellhound

Leman russ with heavy bolters

Leman russ executioner with plasma sponsons and lascannon.

I expect Dark Eldar, so the plasma is prob wasted, but could be useful. Just point and shoot is the plan, as ever.

woe is me

I much prefer fantasy to the current iteration of 40k.

In terms of the background for them, i'd say It's even.  I like them both.   The grimdark of 40k is interesting, but the fantasy realm just works by itself.  Although they do seem to be trying to turn that into grimdark as well, which I would rather they wouldn't.  the galaxy is a big place, and it's fine that everythings going to shit.  But the warhammer world is much smaller.  Can't have the entire world be deadly, how can anyone ever survive.


but back to the point of this post, I wish i could play morwe fantasy games, but only really have ~1200 viable points, and I would much rather play bigger games.  hence I'm mostly playing 40k.  Although hopefully when everyones got to grips with 6th, can convince people to play 5th, or even 4th.  4th being better than 5th imo.


BUT NOWHERE NEAR AS GOOD AS 2ND!!

But yeah, would rather being playing fantasy :(  Need monies!!

new 40k starter

There are some pics of the minis from the new starter box, and omg the miniatures are awesome.

http://natfka.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/leaked-starter-set-pics.html

Malifaux

The more I read about this, the more ovely excited I get about.

message ends.


Ok so more.  the miniatures are great, Weird west is great, steampunk is great.  This is great.  Allegedly has great fluff, and the chracters rules are designed for their fluff, so they can all do the crazy stuff they do in stories.  From what i have read the fluff does appeal to me.

And has weird combat system, where you use a deck of cards (a standard card deck, + jokers) to dertermine your combat results, but you also have a hand which you can use to cheat fate and replace your drawn card.  Sounds somewhat interesting.

the force organisation chart

Is designed to be a limiting factor obviously.  And to stop you bringing overly stupid amounts of powerful elite units.  Which it does an ok job of.  And you can get realtively large armies without filling everyslot.  I don't think any army is overly limited at 2000 points.  Theres always a slot empty, and it's doing it's job, forcing to you to balance your list somewhat.  Unlike at say <1500 3="3" and="and" codex="codex" elites="elites" every="every" heavy="heavy" is="is" just="just" mim.="mim." of="of" one="one" or="or" p="p" stakes="stakes" strongest="strongest" the="the" troop="troop" two="two" when="when" wherever="wherever">
It's always been suggested in the 3 rulebooks prior to have second detatchment at above 2500, as yes it can be difficult to get that high in some cases.

And then GW go and ruin it by letting you take a second chart at 2000 points.  They may as well just delete the chart altogether.

How to not play blood and glory

1. put your battle standard and general in one unit.
2. Cast a spell with irresistable force, killing the general and half the unit.
3. Unit runs of table, leaving me with 0 standards and a lost game.

Yup, although I did take a bunch of crazed lunatics with the dreaded thirteenth, which was the spell I miscast on.  And actually killed the entire unit with it unit, netting me 17 clanrats.

Roleplay

Nothing to do with miniatures, but it is gaming.
So, Colin Brett is recruiting for his 40k roleplay. Dark heresy or rogue trader. And he seems to want me.

No idea why.  Whilst I have a great interest in the setting, I am failure as rpg player.  I can barely communicate for myself, let alone any imaginary character.  Tried 3-4 times before.  one was just terrible when I was at school, one was at college when I was throroughly miserable anyway and can barely remember it.  Tried a session of rogue trader before, was throroughly useless, and a warhammer fantasy roleplay, which I was again probably useless and was extremely uncomforable with.

So I now have no interest in roleplay at all.  I can imagine events, and settings, but can I imagine what a person would do in any situation?  Nah.