Nurgle, Nurgle, Nurgle...
So the other day I decided to write up a gunline army. Most of my armies are centred around Straken and an uber combat unit (I love the look on peoples face when they realise that guard can occassionally fight!) but had noticed that now my regular opponents were expecting precisely this of me. Time to shake things up again.
So I started with the heavy support. I squadroned two basilisks together to give me some good ordnance fire. I then squadroned two Vanquishers with Lascannons. I figured that combined fire should be a potent anti-tank force. And then cos they're new models (but not wanting to mix Executioners damaging AP with Punishers plentiful shots, otherwise wound allocation would screw me...) I went for an executioner squadron of two tanks, with all the plasma cannon trimmings.
In support of this I went for two mechanised infantry platoons, the command squad with meltas as roving anti tank, and the two squads with autocannon and plasmagun, for poking out of the top hatch and supplimenting the chimeras firepower. Both platoons the same, so that's 6 mechanised scoring units. And rounded out with a command squad in chimera, again set up to sit back and fire with an autocannon and two plasmaguns.
I arrived at the club to find I'd be playing Rich, using Chris' Nurgle. Exellent, plenty of plasma goodness, I couldn't have asked for a better opponent. We rolled Sieze Ground, Spearhead. I got first turn and set out my gunline. Rich kept EVERYTHING in reserve. So my first two turns were spent manouvering into position on the objectives with hopefully some decent fields of fire on the likely avenues of approach. When his reserves did arrive, (summoned lesser daemons first, so who knows where those things arrived, 10 miles behind the lines perhaps) and his outflanking chosen. This couldn't have gone better for him as it gave him the chance to get a squad behind me and tackle my basilisks. Everything else was facing forward (I knew only the chosen and the terms could get behind me, so had to be prepared for the majority.) so he managed to cause a fair amount of disruption back there. The majority of the rest of his army then arrived. He made some good headway. My shooting was appalling. My uber anti tank vanquisher squadron shot at a defiler. Missed with all four shots. Shot again the next turn. Missed witht he vanquishers, but hit with the lascannons. Needing 3s... snake eyes. And the executioners took a chance against the other defiler. 10 plasma cannon and 2 lascannon shots later... stunned. Which it ignores anyway. Gah!However, with me happily ensconced on all four objectives it was up to Rich to shift me. And he was doing well, causing merry hell with his defilers. He contested three objectives by the end of turn 5... of course, the downside of Rich forfeiting our first two turns was that the game was at a later stage than he might have realised. So given the chance to run his marines in to contest my fourth objective or take a shot at me he took the shot. Then when I pointed out that we had to roll to see if we had another turn, a look of horror befell his face. The dice favoured me, and despite getting rather badly arse kicked I won 1-0 in objectives.
With this game only effectively being 3 turns long, we had time for another game, and Nige stepped up. Same army. This time Take and Hold. Spearhead once again. I again go first, so deploy my gunline. Nige follows Richs' advice and holds his army off the board. Course this time I had less manouvering to do, I just sent a couple of chimeras scurrying towards Niges home objective. nige replicated Richs daemon summoning (back at base camp!) and then unlike Rich his army turned up somewhat piecemeal. So I took it apart as such. It helped that I think I used up ALL my bad luck against Rich. Those oh so ineffective Executioners last time, this time opened fire on a squad once. Just once, as the puddle that remained ensured that nothing entered their field of fire after that. 35 plasma shots and 2 lascannon shots ensured a swift death for the sorcerer and his bodyguard. I was doing stirling work at killing anything that arrived. Unfortunately for me, Niges final troops squad didn't arrive till turn 5. Earlier, and I think he'd have thrown them at me, leaving one squad to hold his own objective. But having that holding sqaud taken several casualties, and having decided my objective was just too big a task, he winged them towards his own to support the fight there. Behind a building, with my own troops trying to contest, there weren't many things that could fire in amongst them. In the end, despite having an immobilised cannonless defiler, and just about enough marines to make up one squad, Nige had seen off my guardsmen (or at least kept them boxed up in a stunned chimera out of the way) and the objective was his... It ended 1-1. Though, just for the sake of interest, that squad of guardsmen he saw off was the first thing of mine he'd killed... Everyhting went right in this one, yet drew. Everything went wrong in the last one, yet won. Strange.
Finally, the morning after, played Chris with his nurgle before he had to go to uni. Take and Hold Spearhead once again. This time the board was more open so I kept a few chimeras off to head on for his objective from reserve. Chris boldly went for deploying his army. First things first, take out those damn defilers! Credit goes to the basilisks for one of the kills I believe, the first of many accolades and one Chris and I at first overlooked when tallying up the game. Chris sent everything towards me. He dropped his terms in a very bold place, and took out my executioners. From the placement of the terminators, those executioners HAD to die as far as Chris was concerned...
I believe it was at this point that Chris got a squad out of an immobilised Rhino. Reasoning that I was more likely to scatter off target completely if the squad took up less room, he bunched them up together. The downside of this being, when I promptly rolled two hits, it was only the Sorcerers inv save that kept him in the fight, once more standing in a green puddle that used to be a squad of troops (though given last time he hadn't been standing in a puddle of troops, merely oozing wih them, it was a definite improvement...) I was holding my own on top of the hill where I'd chosen to place my objective. With hindsight, perhaps I should have placed it further back, but that would have meant deploying my scoring units further back too, and would have opened up the temptation of an outflank for Chris chosen.
As my reserves turned up I sent a single chimera to go for Chris as yet untouched objective, while the other two went in support of my command chimera. They whittled down a squad quite well, but couldn't take out the meltaguns or power fist sergeant. When his chosen and his terms came to join the fray, it looked bleak. His chosen did a spectacular job of blowing up a chimera... killing 1 chosen and 3 terms in the process. I beleive they may have killed two guardsmen too, but was in too mcuh hysterics to recall accurately. Of course htis left his chosen nicely bunched up. My basilisks once again got the targetting perfect. Bye bye chosen.
Chris dropped his summoned lesser daemons near his objective, to claim it for himself. meanwhile his power fist sergeant and a couple of buddies were doing an effective job on my left flank. My plasmaguns having mostly fried themselves by now, I was back to the old thing of throwing everything I had and hoping one of them fell. Its a slow and laborious process. One that was sped up by the basilisks. i ordered them to fire on the squad. One obeyed my order, leaving just hte power fist sergeant standing. The other seemed to be a very wayward shot... but the crew clearly knew what they were doing, as the sorcerers luck finally ran out!
Having repaired several rhinos, chris was now charging them headlong through the wreckage of several vehicles to try to contest my objective. I meanwhile was doing much the same at his end with a chimera. I couldn't panic his daemons, but I could herd them away from the objective... This ring o roses ended in stalemate on Chris objective, and a brave rhino rush meant mine was contested also. The game ended 0-0. We played on an extra turn for shits and giggles, and while I got rid of the offending rhino, his power fist sergeant did the oh so usual thing of charging a guard squad, killing a couple, then laughing as they flee, leaving him alone to claim the objective. So if we'd had a turn 7 Chris would have won the day I think. Byt he end of the game, I had 2 chimeras and 2 basilisks. Chris had a couple of rhinos, a couple of terms, and about 4 plaguemarines, plus a few lesser daemons. I had 360 points left, Chris about 500. We'd kicked the living shit out of each other!
While in the second game the executioners proved their worth with 37 killing on 2s hits... this set them up for a fall in the game against Chris. He wanted them dead, and quick. On the bright side, this left the basis unmolested to do Stirling work. We believe they killed a defiler on turn one, troops squad 1 on turn 2, rattled a couple of Rhinos on turn 3 (they'd bunched up, couldn't resist the shot) the chosen on turn 4, a few plague marines and a chaos sorcerer on turn 5, and possibly a Rhino on turn 7. I can't remember what they did on turn 6, but if the above list is anything to go by the crew were busy painting kill markings on the side of the damn tanks! We reckoned they'd done about 700 points worth of damage (without the defiler, which we forgot) for a 250 point squadron. Man of the match or what?!?
Course, that army is vicious. But I've played three games in a row with it now. Admittedly agains the same army, though threee different opponents. Most armies I creat don't see two games in a row! So I'm probably gonna change things around for my next game... but success is nice, so might give it a few more runouts ;o)
So I started with the heavy support. I squadroned two basilisks together to give me some good ordnance fire. I then squadroned two Vanquishers with Lascannons. I figured that combined fire should be a potent anti-tank force. And then cos they're new models (but not wanting to mix Executioners damaging AP with Punishers plentiful shots, otherwise wound allocation would screw me...) I went for an executioner squadron of two tanks, with all the plasma cannon trimmings.
In support of this I went for two mechanised infantry platoons, the command squad with meltas as roving anti tank, and the two squads with autocannon and plasmagun, for poking out of the top hatch and supplimenting the chimeras firepower. Both platoons the same, so that's 6 mechanised scoring units. And rounded out with a command squad in chimera, again set up to sit back and fire with an autocannon and two plasmaguns.
I arrived at the club to find I'd be playing Rich, using Chris' Nurgle. Exellent, plenty of plasma goodness, I couldn't have asked for a better opponent. We rolled Sieze Ground, Spearhead. I got first turn and set out my gunline. Rich kept EVERYTHING in reserve. So my first two turns were spent manouvering into position on the objectives with hopefully some decent fields of fire on the likely avenues of approach. When his reserves did arrive, (summoned lesser daemons first, so who knows where those things arrived, 10 miles behind the lines perhaps) and his outflanking chosen. This couldn't have gone better for him as it gave him the chance to get a squad behind me and tackle my basilisks. Everything else was facing forward (I knew only the chosen and the terms could get behind me, so had to be prepared for the majority.) so he managed to cause a fair amount of disruption back there. The majority of the rest of his army then arrived. He made some good headway. My shooting was appalling. My uber anti tank vanquisher squadron shot at a defiler. Missed with all four shots. Shot again the next turn. Missed witht he vanquishers, but hit with the lascannons. Needing 3s... snake eyes. And the executioners took a chance against the other defiler. 10 plasma cannon and 2 lascannon shots later... stunned. Which it ignores anyway. Gah!However, with me happily ensconced on all four objectives it was up to Rich to shift me. And he was doing well, causing merry hell with his defilers. He contested three objectives by the end of turn 5... of course, the downside of Rich forfeiting our first two turns was that the game was at a later stage than he might have realised. So given the chance to run his marines in to contest my fourth objective or take a shot at me he took the shot. Then when I pointed out that we had to roll to see if we had another turn, a look of horror befell his face. The dice favoured me, and despite getting rather badly arse kicked I won 1-0 in objectives.
With this game only effectively being 3 turns long, we had time for another game, and Nige stepped up. Same army. This time Take and Hold. Spearhead once again. I again go first, so deploy my gunline. Nige follows Richs' advice and holds his army off the board. Course this time I had less manouvering to do, I just sent a couple of chimeras scurrying towards Niges home objective. nige replicated Richs daemon summoning (back at base camp!) and then unlike Rich his army turned up somewhat piecemeal. So I took it apart as such. It helped that I think I used up ALL my bad luck against Rich. Those oh so ineffective Executioners last time, this time opened fire on a squad once. Just once, as the puddle that remained ensured that nothing entered their field of fire after that. 35 plasma shots and 2 lascannon shots ensured a swift death for the sorcerer and his bodyguard. I was doing stirling work at killing anything that arrived. Unfortunately for me, Niges final troops squad didn't arrive till turn 5. Earlier, and I think he'd have thrown them at me, leaving one squad to hold his own objective. But having that holding sqaud taken several casualties, and having decided my objective was just too big a task, he winged them towards his own to support the fight there. Behind a building, with my own troops trying to contest, there weren't many things that could fire in amongst them. In the end, despite having an immobilised cannonless defiler, and just about enough marines to make up one squad, Nige had seen off my guardsmen (or at least kept them boxed up in a stunned chimera out of the way) and the objective was his... It ended 1-1. Though, just for the sake of interest, that squad of guardsmen he saw off was the first thing of mine he'd killed... Everyhting went right in this one, yet drew. Everything went wrong in the last one, yet won. Strange.
Finally, the morning after, played Chris with his nurgle before he had to go to uni. Take and Hold Spearhead once again. This time the board was more open so I kept a few chimeras off to head on for his objective from reserve. Chris boldly went for deploying his army. First things first, take out those damn defilers! Credit goes to the basilisks for one of the kills I believe, the first of many accolades and one Chris and I at first overlooked when tallying up the game. Chris sent everything towards me. He dropped his terms in a very bold place, and took out my executioners. From the placement of the terminators, those executioners HAD to die as far as Chris was concerned...
I believe it was at this point that Chris got a squad out of an immobilised Rhino. Reasoning that I was more likely to scatter off target completely if the squad took up less room, he bunched them up together. The downside of this being, when I promptly rolled two hits, it was only the Sorcerers inv save that kept him in the fight, once more standing in a green puddle that used to be a squad of troops (though given last time he hadn't been standing in a puddle of troops, merely oozing wih them, it was a definite improvement...) I was holding my own on top of the hill where I'd chosen to place my objective. With hindsight, perhaps I should have placed it further back, but that would have meant deploying my scoring units further back too, and would have opened up the temptation of an outflank for Chris chosen.
As my reserves turned up I sent a single chimera to go for Chris as yet untouched objective, while the other two went in support of my command chimera. They whittled down a squad quite well, but couldn't take out the meltaguns or power fist sergeant. When his chosen and his terms came to join the fray, it looked bleak. His chosen did a spectacular job of blowing up a chimera... killing 1 chosen and 3 terms in the process. I beleive they may have killed two guardsmen too, but was in too mcuh hysterics to recall accurately. Of course htis left his chosen nicely bunched up. My basilisks once again got the targetting perfect. Bye bye chosen.
Chris dropped his summoned lesser daemons near his objective, to claim it for himself. meanwhile his power fist sergeant and a couple of buddies were doing an effective job on my left flank. My plasmaguns having mostly fried themselves by now, I was back to the old thing of throwing everything I had and hoping one of them fell. Its a slow and laborious process. One that was sped up by the basilisks. i ordered them to fire on the squad. One obeyed my order, leaving just hte power fist sergeant standing. The other seemed to be a very wayward shot... but the crew clearly knew what they were doing, as the sorcerers luck finally ran out!
Having repaired several rhinos, chris was now charging them headlong through the wreckage of several vehicles to try to contest my objective. I meanwhile was doing much the same at his end with a chimera. I couldn't panic his daemons, but I could herd them away from the objective... This ring o roses ended in stalemate on Chris objective, and a brave rhino rush meant mine was contested also. The game ended 0-0. We played on an extra turn for shits and giggles, and while I got rid of the offending rhino, his power fist sergeant did the oh so usual thing of charging a guard squad, killing a couple, then laughing as they flee, leaving him alone to claim the objective. So if we'd had a turn 7 Chris would have won the day I think. Byt he end of the game, I had 2 chimeras and 2 basilisks. Chris had a couple of rhinos, a couple of terms, and about 4 plaguemarines, plus a few lesser daemons. I had 360 points left, Chris about 500. We'd kicked the living shit out of each other!
While in the second game the executioners proved their worth with 37 killing on 2s hits... this set them up for a fall in the game against Chris. He wanted them dead, and quick. On the bright side, this left the basis unmolested to do Stirling work. We believe they killed a defiler on turn one, troops squad 1 on turn 2, rattled a couple of Rhinos on turn 3 (they'd bunched up, couldn't resist the shot) the chosen on turn 4, a few plague marines and a chaos sorcerer on turn 5, and possibly a Rhino on turn 7. I can't remember what they did on turn 6, but if the above list is anything to go by the crew were busy painting kill markings on the side of the damn tanks! We reckoned they'd done about 700 points worth of damage (without the defiler, which we forgot) for a 250 point squadron. Man of the match or what?!?
Course, that army is vicious. But I've played three games in a row with it now. Admittedly agains the same army, though threee different opponents. Most armies I creat don't see two games in a row! So I'm probably gonna change things around for my next game... but success is nice, so might give it a few more runouts ;o)
We had a very epic game that morning. It's the second game we've played now where neither of us has much standing. I guess your last 2 builds and that army I was using complimented each other well for death and smellyness!
ReplyDeleteI think it is worth noting as well that although in our game I swapped some things around to take 2 meltaguns in each troop choice, it has been pretty much the same army I've used for a while now. For anyone reading, I've been playtesting for Escalation 2009, in Bracknell.
You only get to make an army in 500pt blocks, which is very hard to do with the old codexes, and when (if you love Nurgle) your troopers are 23pts a pussy piece. Also there are bonus points for making a fluffy army, rather than an uber-powerful build.
So no double lash Princes! That's not something I ever do, as I like playing mono-god and I can't bring myself to be THAT cheesy.
I had a quick re-read of the rules last night, and there was nothing major in the game, but one interesting thing did come up to do with the firing of the basilisks that I'm gonna have to check out.
ReplyDeleteUnder the rules for vehicle squadrons, they all aim at the same target. This is what I did, end then the gods scatter the shot where they may (quite profitably in the case of the chaos sorcerer! :oP) However, there is another rule to do with multiple barrage. It's aimed at squads of mortars really, but it clusters the shots together and means if they miss, they tend to miss together, but if they hit, you get more bang for your buck. Would this apply to squadrons of basilisks?
Now it wouldn't have stopped the sorcerer getting slightly more oozy than he started, as at the time they were firing direct. But it would mean that with, say three in a squadron, your army lining up like it did at the start could prove to be a gift. If the first one was on target, the other two shots, depending on scatter rolls, could potentially be placed so they hit two adjacent targets. Ouch! Note that this would only count when firing indirect, and thus counting as barrage weapons. Methinks I shall have to check this out.
Also discovered something else quite interesting about vehicle squadrons which has convinced me to take this army out for at least another game, to see how much more flexible my discovery makes the army... ;o)
I am most interested to see what this second discovery is!
ReplyDeleteI believe that it does indeed fire like the mortars. I seem to remember something I read from somewhere about it. It would help if I could remember where!
As you say, it had no effect on the game really at the end there :D
That vehicle squadrons only give one kill point?
ReplyDeleteOh please tell me that's true. I don't have my rulebook here to check if you're joking or not :P
ReplyDeleteOh he's right on that one, I knew that. And of course you have to kill all the vehicles in the squadron to get it. No, I'm talking about something else... someone play me Monday and you'll find out :oP
ReplyDeleteI won't be there this Monday unfortunately, so you'll have to tell me afterwards!
ReplyDeleteIncidentally, I hadn't realised that you put an end to my epic winning streak. I've been recording my results for standard games 1500pts and over. I'd had a massive 12 victories in a row! And now, it's a draw :P
2009 results:
Blood Ravens
W6/D-/L-
Tau
W1/D2/L-
Nurgle
W12/D1/L1
Total
W19/D3/L1
Streak: D1
Ha! pwned!
ReplyDeleteI take it our bash in GW counted as a win for that one yes? :oP
Yeah because we were playing it under the "old" KP type when we started. Our new %age system would drastically change the way we play, and I'm really looking forward to trying that system out again!
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I have read your email and scenario, just need to find the time to write a full reply :D
Ok cool.
ReplyDeleteHow'd the tournament go?
Just got back! Was a really fun tournament. I drew the first 2 games, won the third and lost the fourth. The game I lost was against another plaguemarine player :P And he took the units I decided to leave at home lol. The other armies, apart from the one I won, were perfect for playing against my armies at those points levels, and armies I never play against. Eldar, Orks, Dark Angels, Nurlge Marines in that order.
ReplyDeleteI came 13th overall out of 20, and Rich was 15th.
I also won the Fergus Award, for my objective I made :D Well chuffed with that. It's the Soul Grinder Daemon bit coming out of a warp rift (that looks like the Stargate).
The Fergus Award is: "as an expression of admiration for a facet of your army that is beyond the normality and general madness presented by a sane gamer."
Cool award definition :o) Congrats
ReplyDeleteShame you didn't get to face off against any loyal imperium troops, only filthy xenos and other traitorous scum. ;o)
Haha yeah. In the last round the set of tables I was on was Chaos Vs Chaos and Dark Angels Vs Chaos. We joked that it was a chaos corner :P
ReplyDeleteIt was really good to be up against armies that were well matched against my build. In the first round (combat patrol) I forgot to pop smokes AGAIN, and we forgot about Night Fighting in turn 1, as it was Dawn of War set-up. We could have had an entirely different outcome, but in the end it was a good match we had. I had 2 squads of plaguemarines in rhinos, and he had 3 singing spears and a warlock, 6 jetbikes with 2 shuriken cannons, and 2 war-walkers with 2 bright-lances a piece (which ripped through my marines). That round ended on one KP apiece, with me getting the most VPs.
Second round was a weird scenario. Short table egdes, DoW set-up, "Hidden Ambush" rules in the scenario book. Also the winner is with the most "scoring units" within 12" of the opponents table edge. Against Orks I was quite screwed, as the 1k round was my weakest build. I had 2 squads in Rhinos and a Sorc on the board, and Chosen in rhino outflanking. He had quite alot :P and the unit that did me over in the end was a unit of Nobz customised for wound allocation, with a big mek and pain boy! The round ended in a draw with 1 troop in each zone. I just didn't have the resources to chase down a unit of Boyz (which could have been anywhere, when you read the rules you can see why). So I had to hope for a draw.
Post continued!
ReplyDeleteThird round I was up against those Dark Angels. Scenario was Capture and Control/Spearhead, 1500pts. Usually a bad scenario for me, and I was going to go hell for leather and do the usual blitzkrieg tactics all over the enemy objective. Unfortunately I had no such option as one of my rhinos exploded and the other was stunned for a couple of turns and then immobilised. In the end it worked out for me, as I kept my Sorc and his squad over my objective with a defiler (left side of the board) and they fought hard for it. My defiler was exploded by a dread in combat which was pretty awesome. My chosen came in on my obj flank and so the troop choice, chosen and defiler between them fought off 2 vehicles, dread, librarian and 2 squads.
I actually fired my battle cannons for quite possible the first time ever in this game. One took a dev squad from 5 men to 1, and the other knocked 3 guys out of a tac squad with a Chaplain. My other defiler got into combat with the chaplain and his squad, and they fought it out for a couple of turns with the defiler winning out. The defiler then charged at the enemy objective wiping the troops off of it. I took both objectives in the end and tabled my opponent. He suffered alot from bad dice rolls but most of the damage was in the match up I think.
Fourth round was pitched battle, 2000pts, seize ground, and we got 5 objectives. I don't even want to talk about it, it went that bad :P haha. I did about 500 vps of damage, and he did 1700, and controlled 3 objectives and we contested another. Two highlights of the match here I think was a battle cannon from his defiler killing ALL TEN of my chosen in one shot, and his Greater Daemon making 4 invulnerable saves! My reserves just didn't want to come in until it was too late either and I was pretty much obliterated, but I did kill a daemon prince...
What marks did you get for the hobby side of things? Apart from the Fergus award. Should we all be scared for TOFG? :oP
ReplyDeleteWe misunderstood the hobby side, as we thought the points were combined with your tournament performance. It was actually something seperate for "Best Army" award. I quite like the idea of that because it doesn't only award points for best paint job, but also army build, conversion etc to give everyone a chance. I'll send you their pdf later that details the tournament rules.
ReplyDeleteWhat should you be scared about? I don't get it lol.
They're running a 40k doubles tournament on February 20th if you're interested. Combat patrol army list rules, 500pts. Maybe Ken could join in coz isn't it near where he lives?
Well our shift pattern is rumoured to be changing a day forward or backward in the new year, or maybe not. So it's pointless me checking for feb yet as I won't there's only about one weekend it can fall on that I'll KNOW for sure I'm available, I could lose the others depending on which way the shift moves if it moves...
ReplyDeleteI didn't think you'd gone as far away as where Ken lives for this tourney. Ken lives up in Bedfordshire. Where did you go?
Bracknell, Berkshire. I don't know where Ken lives, but Rich said that he thinks it's not so far from him? It was only an hours drive from Pompey, and was well worth the trip!
ReplyDeleteLearnt alot of new rules too. Especially in the Ork game, and my opponent (called Adrian) was really patient with me as practically every turn a rule came up that I hadn't seen before!