Marbo...? polo!
Played a couple of away games this weekend, on a visit to my friend Ken. Took a list that was designed mainly to play with some newly painted sentinals. It had 9 scout sentinals, and a catachan flavoured list led by Straken. 4 squads vets in chimeras (2 squads melta, 2 plasma) a couple squads penal legion, and two 2 tank batteries of hydras. And of course, Marbo.
My opponent had a Farsight build Tau army. Lot's of suits, 3 squads of fire warriors, a broadside battery 2 devilfish and a hammerhead.
The first game was one objective each, spearhead deployment. This game went very well. Marbo devastated the broadsides with a well placed demolition charge. He then ducked to avoid the survivors instant killing fire. He was then assaulted by the broadside, knocking down the protecting dinner plates and chasing the broadside down. He made a thorough nuisance of himself! Meanwhile one penal legion squad held my objective, despite a late attempt to wrest control from me. By the end of turn 7, there were 2 weaponless immobilised devilfish, and one fire warrior squad hiding in a building. A solid win.
The second game had three objectives, dawn of war deployment. Having seen how much of my force could outflank my opponent castled up in the centre of his lines. He had the first turn and swiftly withdrew his forces back to his own area. I attacked along a refused flank, though with a bulk of chimeras and hydras in the middle as a firebase. This game the Tau had far more success in taking out my forces, my flanking attempts doing minimal damage before being swiftly dealt with. My opponent did do a fatal error though. He pulled his forces off the objective in his deployment zone (fearing the heavy flamer armed sentinal would get too close. He loaded them in a devilfish for more mobility, but a couple of rounds of shooting from a hydra kept stunning the tank, preventing it from moving. With a veteran squad holding my home objective I was in the lead, with several squads bearing down on the centre objective. The game ended on turn 5 with a 1-0 win for me, though I think on turn 6 I could have got rid of the immobilised and stripped hammerhead that was contesting the central objective. I think Ken would have needed a turn 7 to try to force the draw, despite finishing the game with far more intact forces.
All in all a couple of good wins, and good to be back with the guard after Waaaghing for so long!
My opponent had a Farsight build Tau army. Lot's of suits, 3 squads of fire warriors, a broadside battery 2 devilfish and a hammerhead.
The first game was one objective each, spearhead deployment. This game went very well. Marbo devastated the broadsides with a well placed demolition charge. He then ducked to avoid the survivors instant killing fire. He was then assaulted by the broadside, knocking down the protecting dinner plates and chasing the broadside down. He made a thorough nuisance of himself! Meanwhile one penal legion squad held my objective, despite a late attempt to wrest control from me. By the end of turn 7, there were 2 weaponless immobilised devilfish, and one fire warrior squad hiding in a building. A solid win.
The second game had three objectives, dawn of war deployment. Having seen how much of my force could outflank my opponent castled up in the centre of his lines. He had the first turn and swiftly withdrew his forces back to his own area. I attacked along a refused flank, though with a bulk of chimeras and hydras in the middle as a firebase. This game the Tau had far more success in taking out my forces, my flanking attempts doing minimal damage before being swiftly dealt with. My opponent did do a fatal error though. He pulled his forces off the objective in his deployment zone (fearing the heavy flamer armed sentinal would get too close. He loaded them in a devilfish for more mobility, but a couple of rounds of shooting from a hydra kept stunning the tank, preventing it from moving. With a veteran squad holding my home objective I was in the lead, with several squads bearing down on the centre objective. The game ended on turn 5 with a 1-0 win for me, though I think on turn 6 I could have got rid of the immobilised and stripped hammerhead that was contesting the central objective. I think Ken would have needed a turn 7 to try to force the draw, despite finishing the game with far more intact forces.
All in all a couple of good wins, and good to be back with the guard after Waaaghing for so long!
Interesting battle report. I wish the Imperial Assassins worked as well as Marbo seems to do for you.
ReplyDeleteI've had some good times with the Callidus in the past, especially in an apoc game where I had several in combination with psyker battle squads - so you're now LD1 and I have a weapon that fires Str 8 against your LD? Juicy!
ReplyDeleteMarbo and the Imperial Assassins are generally the same idea. Kill something, prove to be a distraction, but ultimately die. The benefit of Marbo is that he's half the price of the other assassins, so it's easier to make his points back. Plus having a demo charge makes it much easier for him to get his points back swiftly. His effectiveness, combined with the fact I started on Catachans, means I take him pretty much every game. I may use Imperial Assassins from time to time, but Marbo is just such an obvious choice and fills a similar role.
Totally agree. It's not that the Assassin's are useful in certain situations. It's more than Marbo is "anything you can do I can do better", at a discounted price. Which in Warhammer 40k is the name of the competitive game.
ReplyDeleteIn the competitive game, yes that is so. In a less competitive environment, assassins can add a fun, different dimension to your game. Admittedly, the last few times I've used them is apocalypse, which is usually just large scale shenanigans!
ReplyDelete