Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Battle Report: 500pt BA vs Space Wolves - League Round 1

As I mentioned, there is a League game going on at the local store starting at 500pt and ending at 2000pt with an extra Apocalypse game at the end to round it out. The first round match up was random match ups, but after that it will be more structured. So far about 8 people are in it as far as I can remember. I remember 2 Chaos Marines, one Imp Guard, Space Wolves, Orks, Eldar, and Tyranid, with me as BA. The organizer had Space Marines, but would only play if there were an odd number of people, so he didn't have to pull them out. I drew up against the Space Wolves player, the first time I've seen them in person. He said it was his third army he's painted and they were amazingly done. He had two Rhinos with some Grey Hunters in them and a 5-man unit of Long Fangs with Missile Launchers. He had a Mark of the Wulfen and a Priest that could cast some good magic including JotWW (not sure exactly what the model is called). I used my 3x ASM JP army kitted to take out some sneak Guard player or min-max marine with a Dreadnaught, so they weren't really that well kitted out to fight power armor. Mission was Spearhead deployment with the goal to hold table quarters. Equal hold was a draw, +1 a minor victory, +2 a major, and +3 a massacre. Bonus points for holding zones other than the one you deployed from. I drew first player and held all in reserves. He fans out to hold his zone. I deep strike into his lines to try and pop the Rhinos and hold them in that zone, then jump away and claim the other zones for a win. The pictures below are of mid-turn 2 and 3 and the end of the game, showing how it all turned out.
(Click for details)
 
In the first pic the x'd out Rhino was on the table when I took the pic but it was where the crater and GH stand and then after that he switched out the models so the painted one was still on the board. Counter-attack is a pain in the butt, that's for sure. I was able to get my squads together and used each other for cover or FNP and piled on the shots to take out two squads of Grey Hunters down to 3 guys. Unfortunately he took out one of my units, so I only had two to jump around to take table quarters. His Long Fangs piled on the ML templates but most missed or didn't cause wounds. In the end, I could either pull back to the closest quarter or jump to one on his side of the board, but either way, that Rhino would either contest or even tank shock my men. The most we could do was draw, and we both held our own deployment zones, so no bonus points to either. It was fun to fight something new and balanced and he gave me a run for my money. We both got 10 points towards the League for the draw. 

As part of the League you can challenge others for a win of +5 points or if you challenge and they decline you get +3 points. A guy challenged me to play his Plague Marines and I should have declined, but I just wanted to play some more. No pics, but obviously, I didn't do so well. We had 2 objective markers and by the end of turn 5, he had both and my marines were wiped out by his Chaos Lord wielding some Plague weapon that was 3 base attacks +d6, power weapon, poisoned. :-\ Next time it will be 1000pts so I am working on retooling my list and playing smarter. I need to stop dropping my DS'ers into melta range of units that can charge into CC for one. And I need to make power-weapons mandatory, even if it messes up other things, because fighting power armored dudes with none is not fun.

5 comments:

Chumbalaya said...

You can't prepare for everything at 500 points.

Going up to 1k I would totally recommend power weapons for your SPs and powerfists for your ASM Sergeants. Bigger squad sizes would be a must as well. If you're feeling frisky, a unit if Vanguard would be a fun addition to bring some seriousy combat ability in charging from DS.

SynnerG said...

Most def on those Fists for Sgts. The VV are pretty cool with the added DoA rules, but I still feel like I'll be lacking ranged punch. Or maybe I don't need any and just need to move quick? Not sure yet...

Chumbalaya said...

If you go all DoA you'll want to go all in with the jumpers. Mostly because having some units deployed and some in reserve doesn't really mesh too well. DoA lets you get up close safely with the melta, and the jump packs keep you mobile, so ranged power is traded away in return for greater mobility and accurate deep strike.

Kinsman said...

Nice report man! I like how you use the pics to actually 'write' up the report. Might need to borrow that idea^^

SynnerG said...

@Chumby - Hm, so you're saying maybe just stay in-their-face instead of keeping people in the back, laying down fire? The only thing is fighting enemies my CCs can't handle, like better CCers (high I with power weapons) or MCs. Plus the ability to take on tanks like Fire Prisms or a Leman. My thoughts keep coming back to Stern with their 2+ poison weapons and some missile launchers.

@Brisbane - Ah yeah, the pics are part of my less-is-more approach. I give a brief intro and outtro and let the pics speak for themselves. I don't want to bore people with 2 pages of details. My only wish was that the text box was big enough to show off the X-Large image so you didn't have to click on them for the detail.

Post a Comment