It has taken me far too long to get to this battle report, but better late than never. I really wanted to make sure that I got this in because I felt like the list I was running really has some potential. I have already made changes to it based on how this went and I am really excited to try it out. I haven't been this excited about what I have been running since Blood Angels Mech at the end of 5th edition. That was a list I really felt like I had figured out and could face any other list with...I'm starting to feel that with the new Dark Angels/Guard.
Here's the list that I was running. It has two key elements Shooting (tank, devs, lascannons), resilient troops (Guard blob and the deathwing).
List:
Azrael
Librarian power field generator
Company Command Squad with Officer of the Fleet and Lascannon
Deathwing Squad (5) plasma cannon and 2 thunder hammers
Tactical Squad (5) plasma cannon
Tactical Squad (5) flakk missile launcher
Platoon Command Lascannon
Platoon Squad x3 power axe x3
Heavy Weapons Team lascannon x3
Devastator Squad Lascannon x3
Devastator Squad Flakk Missile Launcher x3
Devastator Squad Flakk Missile Launcher x3
Lemun Russ Eradicator
I was a little concerned going into this event because of the start time 1230 on a Sunday. Typically the tourneys at this venue run long and I was worried about being out late on a Sunday night, what with work the next day and getting home with enough time to get myself and help my wife get the girls ready for the week. Turns out this was not a problem at all. The event was well organized, started on time, round times were respected and everything went smoothly. I was home by 8, 45 minute drive and all!
Small field for the event, I think there were 8 of us total. I am not used to this at all. My local store hasn't had a tournament with less than 30 people since they started running them. I have to say this was a very pleasant change. I got to talk with everyone that was playing, look at their lists and even glance at most of the games as they were going on.
All of the games were a combination of scenarios from the big book. Each one gave you victory points. The difference in victory points between the two players was then referenced against a sliding chart to determine that number of battle points earned for that match. Fully painted armies received an additional 5 battle points for the event.
Round 1: Rob and Orcs
This was objectives and objectives. We each had an objective in our deployment (which was Vanguard by the way) and there were 3 more going diagonally across the no mans land. The TO made a point of letting me know that Rob was new to the game and to play accordingly. He knew I would beat him, but wanted to make sure that both players had fun in the process, which is right up my alley anyway.
Rob won the role to deploy and go first. He set up with 2 trukks to my left, 2 wagons center and a horde of stormboyz (never seen these in a tourney before) to my right. I deployed as far back to my table edge as I could with my entire army except the blob, which I left forward a bit.
Rob took the bate and pushed everything towards the blob except the stormboyz which he brought further to my right and towards me a little. Rob got terrible rolls for his lootas the entire game, so there is little worth mentioning about his shooting. Once he brought everything forward, I collapsed the guard back and did first rank second rank to give them all 2 shots. This also left everything of his with nice lines of visiton for all my ranged guns. I dropped the terminators between him and his objective, making it impossible for him to get back to it as well. I pretty much secured a total victory in the first game turn.
The next few turns I made sure we had some fun. My blob was far enough back to not be in assault turn 2 either, so I got in another great round of shooting. The rest of the game was assaults and I think Rob had a much better time once we got to this. He kicked the teeth in on my devs, but once the blob was finished with him it was over. Max points for me.
Round 2: Terra and Daemons w/ Chaos Marines
It says Chaos Marines, but there were 0 marines on the table: daemons, cultists and a Helldrake instead. This was the test I was waiting for. Chaos flying circus and me with 7 Flakk Missile Launchers! long story short, the missiles did nothing, I deployed poorly (too far forward and too spread across my zone). I got stomped. The only thing that went well was the blob shooting a daemon prince out of the air, a nice crash and then the lascannons finishing him off. Also, Terminator Sergeant challenging the Badass Khorne HQ and making his 3++ shield saves was pretty epic. When things went bad after round two I went for better lucky than good and tried to make things happen. Instead I should have strived for a minor or medium loss to get just get a few points. In such a small field it would have made a huge difference. 0 points out of round 2 and I had the opportunity to mitigate this to a minor or medium loss instead of major.
Round 3: Ted and Vanilla marines
Ted was running Lascannon marines. 2 Preds with las sponsons, 2 tactical squads with las and plas, 2 Sternguard squads with 2 las each. Kantor, Aegis w/Quadgun, scouts, and a thunderfire to round out the list. Solid gunline. The scenario was an objective in the middle of each quarter and the relic in the center. Ted deployed his scouts almost on the objective with infiltrate. I put everything except the blob in ruins or cover to hide from the las.
Turn one the scouts grab the objective. He starts shooting and doesn't do much. The thing with relying on lascannons is that when they miss, it is a lot of wasted points and with so many, you are missing a third of the time, which adds up quite a bit. Ted seemed disappointed with their performance, but numbers wise I didn't think it was that far off of expected probability. I should have been shooting at the thunderfire from round one....instead I tried picking off the squads. This was a mistake. There were plenty of tactical and sternguard guys to take the wounds before any of the lascannons could actually get hurt. I should have also focused on the predators, taking these out and the thunderfire would have been a much better approach.
First turn I drop my terminators down right between his scouts and the rest of Ted's army. I advance the blob as far forward as I can towards the relic, running them as well. I know that the terminators won't last long against the las, but hope they buy enough time for the blob to get to the relic. The Lemun Russ clears most of the scouts, and the Terminators guns finish them off. Round 2 I get the relic easily with the blob.
The rest of the game is simple attrition. I continue to shoot marines instead of tanks and artillery and he keeps trying to whittle away ay my blob. I had the objectives and the relic nicely tied up on turns 3-5. Turn 6 the blob is nearly gone, just Azrael (minus 2 wounds, note he made 2 FnP) and one guardsmen left, hiding out of LOS. On turn 7 Ted has had enough rounds to shoot me off of one of my objectives. I win the relic and we tie on the objectives. I get a minor victory, but needed a medium vitory to pass Ted for third place in the standings. I could have easily gotten those points in round 2 if I had not been fighting for glory instead of fighting for points.
4th place overall, which was just fine by me, considering I got crushed round 2. I had a wonderful time. Didn't lose to a noob, got beaten by a good player and beat a good player. Considering the relaxed attitude I had going into this, it was as much as I could have asked for.
Things about the list that need to change...The flakk missiles are expensive and do very little. I have enough ability to twin link my heavy guns that I should be using those. I removed one dev squad with the flakk. I'll keep the other and the single flakk launcher in the tactical squad. I needed to add a couple more terminators to the squad. 5 did not cut it. By the time they are able to assault there is only 1 or 2 left. I found this to be even more so the case against Gundam John last week. The Tau and their intercept left me with 1 terminator left on the charge, who promptly died to overwatch. The terminators have been amazing for taking all of my opponents firepower for an entire turn, freeing up the blob to run rampant. The combination is great and actually having a couple terminators left when I charge would be a nice bonus. I don't think they have ever lasted 3 full turns.
Lemun Russ Eradicator continues to be so choice. Round 1 vs. Orcs it decimated boyz and nobz. Round 2 against the plague bearers super cover saves, it was great, round 3 against the scouts one turn 1 it secured me the relic. I really have no idea why I have never seen anyone else running this...maybe people are stuck on it being useless against MEQ still?
At 1850 I have adjusted it so that there are 8 terminators, only 2 dev squads and the Platoon Command has flamers and hangs out in a chimera. I had toyed with adding more to the blob, flamers, autocannons etc. but they don't shoot all that much, rarely get charged and it seemed a waste of points, so spent them elsewhere. I want to get in a few more games to see if anyone can actually take out that many anyway.
Hoping to get in a game this Thursday, but not sure yet. If so it will be against multiple Helldrakes again, something I know I need to figure out with more consistency if I am going to do well at tournaments.
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Monday, April 15, 2013
Dark Angels Vs. Tau
Gundam John and I got in a game yesterday and I got my first taste of the new "Greater Good." John brough some Grey Knight Allies and I had my guard as well of course.
We played a simple game with standard deployment, 5 objectives and kill points. I won the roll and elected to go second. My range is much more limited than his, so I wanted to make sure that I was not wasting time repositioning and moving while he got 2-3 extra rounds of shooting at me before I would be able to respond.
He put his Aegis line in the middle and deployed evenly across the board, broadsides, 2 suit teams and the ethereal center followed by Fire Warrios squads, pathfinders and Hammerheads on both sides, in that order. I decided to counter by putting all of my ranged shooting on my left, the blob with Azrael in the center and one squad of tacticals on the right. For reserves I had Marbo, 5 Deathwing, Platoon Command w/ Flamers in a Chimera, and the Lemun Russ Eradicator. I usually don't like to start games with so much in reserve, but with the range and firepower the Tau bring, it is better for these to arrive late than to get shot off the board before I see a turn.
Ultimately, I won the game because of this deployment. It left me with just enough advantage throughout the game to take advantage of John's static gun-line.
The first round of shooting took out my Lascannon Heavy Weapons Team, and the Company Command Squad, with the exception of the commander himself. My turn I blasted 2 of the three broadsides off the board with lascannons. Terminators came down on my right.
Turn 2 I lose the terminators to rapid fire and plasma/fusion suits. I also lost a few marines, but the only one with a special weapon I lost was the Plasma Cannon to gets hot! Chimera comes on, but no Marbo or Lemun. I have another solid round of shooting where I clear off the 3 suits that had just killed the terminators...not a fair trade, but I'll take it.
Turn 3 the the chimera gets popped and the blob of guard is wittled down to 3 guys and Azrael. Lemun and Marbo show up. Marbo wastes most of a Fire Warrior Squad and the Lemun takes out another. Things are picking up for me at this point big time.
we only have turn for another round so we agree to call it after 4. I lose the blob and Azrael in this turn, Marbo gets shot up good from overwatch, but the Lemun takes out another squad and I pick off enough from another with the devastators to make some run. I end up winning objectives 2 to 1 and kill points 7 to 6. It was interesting because a turn earlier and we would have tied objectives and I would have lost kill points by a good deal. I made some really choice moves with target selection late in the game and did a really good jobs of not giving up 3 squads that were decimated by hiding them out of los.
I expected a bit more out of the new Tau book. I think part of this was that John was running pretty much the same thing he has been but with a couple suit teams and hammerheads instead of broadsides. I think there are a lot more toys and upgrades, that he has up until now previously ignored because they were bad in the old book, that will make a bigger difference. I think I'll be more afraid as the adjustments start being made.
We played a simple game with standard deployment, 5 objectives and kill points. I won the roll and elected to go second. My range is much more limited than his, so I wanted to make sure that I was not wasting time repositioning and moving while he got 2-3 extra rounds of shooting at me before I would be able to respond.
He put his Aegis line in the middle and deployed evenly across the board, broadsides, 2 suit teams and the ethereal center followed by Fire Warrios squads, pathfinders and Hammerheads on both sides, in that order. I decided to counter by putting all of my ranged shooting on my left, the blob with Azrael in the center and one squad of tacticals on the right. For reserves I had Marbo, 5 Deathwing, Platoon Command w/ Flamers in a Chimera, and the Lemun Russ Eradicator. I usually don't like to start games with so much in reserve, but with the range and firepower the Tau bring, it is better for these to arrive late than to get shot off the board before I see a turn.
Ultimately, I won the game because of this deployment. It left me with just enough advantage throughout the game to take advantage of John's static gun-line.
The first round of shooting took out my Lascannon Heavy Weapons Team, and the Company Command Squad, with the exception of the commander himself. My turn I blasted 2 of the three broadsides off the board with lascannons. Terminators came down on my right.
Turn 2 I lose the terminators to rapid fire and plasma/fusion suits. I also lost a few marines, but the only one with a special weapon I lost was the Plasma Cannon to gets hot! Chimera comes on, but no Marbo or Lemun. I have another solid round of shooting where I clear off the 3 suits that had just killed the terminators...not a fair trade, but I'll take it.
Turn 3 the the chimera gets popped and the blob of guard is wittled down to 3 guys and Azrael. Lemun and Marbo show up. Marbo wastes most of a Fire Warrior Squad and the Lemun takes out another. Things are picking up for me at this point big time.
we only have turn for another round so we agree to call it after 4. I lose the blob and Azrael in this turn, Marbo gets shot up good from overwatch, but the Lemun takes out another squad and I pick off enough from another with the devastators to make some run. I end up winning objectives 2 to 1 and kill points 7 to 6. It was interesting because a turn earlier and we would have tied objectives and I would have lost kill points by a good deal. I made some really choice moves with target selection late in the game and did a really good jobs of not giving up 3 squads that were decimated by hiding them out of los.
I expected a bit more out of the new Tau book. I think part of this was that John was running pretty much the same thing he has been but with a couple suit teams and hammerheads instead of broadsides. I think there are a lot more toys and upgrades, that he has up until now previously ignored because they were bad in the old book, that will make a bigger difference. I think I'll be more afraid as the adjustments start being made.
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Tournament Results and why the new Dark Angels book sucks!
First tournament with my favorite faction (I did not say codex) under my belt. The new book is a nightmare in this edition for anyone that wants to actually play with the units in the Dark Angels codex, that sets the chapter apart from regular marines.
Terminators: the Deathwing are not much different than they were in 5th edition. Stats are the same and the cost is a little higher. Twinlinked shots on the deepstrike and the split fire are fun, but not good. Between the point cost going up and the prevalence of plasma guns throughout every opposing army these guys are shelved. The one area I would have liked these guys would be against helldrakes.
Bikes: I ran a Ravenwing/IG list at the tournament. I assumed with the hit that the terms took that the bikes would get the boost...not so much. Again the issue here is point cost. I don't think bikes themselves are overcosted in the book, seems fine. The issue is that DA is about the wings and people want to build wing armies. Ravenwing can't pull this off by themselves and I was not able to make it work even with the cheap guard backing them up. The bikes come off the table all too easily. They just are not survivable enough in the tournament scene in my area where there were at least 15 drakes on tables at any given time. While their survivability with the Darkshroud is decent, one bad hanful of dice just makes too much of an impact on how many models I kept having to sweep off the table.
So the two wings are over-costed, ineffective and nothing to write home about. The flyers are a disaster. One of my favorite models and despite the $ was interested in getting a pair of them...am I ever so happy I waited to see the point cost and the stats before I through that money down the drain!
I still think I can make many of the other parts of the book work, just not either of the two wings that are what makes this book different than Vanilla. The regular units (tacs, devs, etc.) have an improved point cost and a little more versatility (not having to buy a Vet serg or taking heavy weapons in the 5 man squad). I'll throw in some bikes or terms as compliment to the list, but I can't see either wing bringing anything to a competitive scene.
I won't do a battle report on any of the games, but will summarize.
Game 1: Helldrakes are stupid good. I don't like to call them broken, because I know what they do and I didn't take enough time to figure out how I would counter them effectively.
Game 2: Game was fun though I felt like I lost to a really bad list. Very interesting in that I was getting almost maz points on turn 5, about a tie on turn 6 and a solid loss on turn 7. It means the game was close throughout, but I think there was a couple of stupid things I did spacing out my troops that could have kept me in this for 7 rounds...I honeslty didn't expect it to go that far and should have assumed it was possible and started to maneuver troops to hold objectives sooner.
Game 3: I played and beat some one under 10 years old...go me?
Well, the day was harldy a complete loss as I did win the best painted army with the newly painted bikes. I was definitely thrilled with this!
Terminators: the Deathwing are not much different than they were in 5th edition. Stats are the same and the cost is a little higher. Twinlinked shots on the deepstrike and the split fire are fun, but not good. Between the point cost going up and the prevalence of plasma guns throughout every opposing army these guys are shelved. The one area I would have liked these guys would be against helldrakes.
Bikes: I ran a Ravenwing/IG list at the tournament. I assumed with the hit that the terms took that the bikes would get the boost...not so much. Again the issue here is point cost. I don't think bikes themselves are overcosted in the book, seems fine. The issue is that DA is about the wings and people want to build wing armies. Ravenwing can't pull this off by themselves and I was not able to make it work even with the cheap guard backing them up. The bikes come off the table all too easily. They just are not survivable enough in the tournament scene in my area where there were at least 15 drakes on tables at any given time. While their survivability with the Darkshroud is decent, one bad hanful of dice just makes too much of an impact on how many models I kept having to sweep off the table.
So the two wings are over-costed, ineffective and nothing to write home about. The flyers are a disaster. One of my favorite models and despite the $ was interested in getting a pair of them...am I ever so happy I waited to see the point cost and the stats before I through that money down the drain!
I still think I can make many of the other parts of the book work, just not either of the two wings that are what makes this book different than Vanilla. The regular units (tacs, devs, etc.) have an improved point cost and a little more versatility (not having to buy a Vet serg or taking heavy weapons in the 5 man squad). I'll throw in some bikes or terms as compliment to the list, but I can't see either wing bringing anything to a competitive scene.
I won't do a battle report on any of the games, but will summarize.
Game 1: Helldrakes are stupid good. I don't like to call them broken, because I know what they do and I didn't take enough time to figure out how I would counter them effectively.
Game 2: Game was fun though I felt like I lost to a really bad list. Very interesting in that I was getting almost maz points on turn 5, about a tie on turn 6 and a solid loss on turn 7. It means the game was close throughout, but I think there was a couple of stupid things I did spacing out my troops that could have kept me in this for 7 rounds...I honeslty didn't expect it to go that far and should have assumed it was possible and started to maneuver troops to hold objectives sooner.
Game 3: I played and beat some one under 10 years old...go me?
Well, the day was harldy a complete loss as I did win the best painted army with the newly painted bikes. I was definitely thrilled with this!
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