BATTLE REPORT: Adepticon Practice vs Hammernators

Another video battle report featuring my latest round of Adepticon practice. Enjoy!

Adepticon Practice: vs Necrons

Game three of the tournament will have to wait for tomorrow, as I seem to have forgotten to upload the pretty pictures which really make it worth your while. So, for today I'll show a different report from a week ago where I first tried out my tourney list against Necrons. Be prepared for a knock-down, drag out fight featuring the Little Pariah That Could.

BATTLE REPORT: 1850 Tourney Prep vs Space Wolves

Another video battle report for you all. This was another battle down at the Last Square in Madison against a fellow looking for some tourney prep with his Space Wolves. Be sure to watch the after battle report for my critique on the mission.



And apologies to you text battle report lovers- no time for it this week. Have a good holiday weekend!

BATTLE REPORT: 1850 Nid Annihilation

So, since I skipped posting on Thursday all of you lucky, beautiful Internet people get a special Saturday post of Humanity Defending goodness! Today I have a battle report for you all available in both video and text forms (after the jump) detailing one of the first games that I had at my new club here in Madison, WI. Hope you enjoy!

p.s. don't forget to vote on my Ogre Champion poll on the right!

BATTLE REPORT: 1500 vs Nurgle Daemons

Another battle report for you fine folks from our Escalation League. This time we're finally hitting the big leagues- 1500 pts. It's good to be home.




Text version here

Mission: Take and Hold (two objectives)
Deployment: Spearhead

My list:
Company Command Squad with 2 plasma, 1 melta, medic, plasma pistol, astropath, meltabombs, and chimera with ML/HF
Al'Rahem's platoon command with 4 melta and a chimera with ML/HF
3 Infantry Squads with power weapons, flamers. Attached Commissar with power weapon. Two of the sergeants have meltabombs.
2 Special Weapon Squads, one with 3 flamers, one with 2 demo charges and a flamer
Veteran squad led by Harker with 3 grenade launchers and an autocannon
2 Vendettas (each operating independently)
Hellhound with Multimelta
Leman Russ Battle Tank with heavy bolter

His list, as far as I can remember it:
Ku'Gath the Plaguefather
Epidemius, Tallyman of Nurgle
2 squads of 10 plague bearers with Icons
1 squad of 10 nurglings
Daemon Prince of Nurgle, Wings, Armor, Breath of Chaos
Deamon Prince of Nurgle, Armor, Breath of Chaos
Soulgrinder with all three mouth cannons

He won the roll and let me go first. Objectives were placed at opposite ends of the battlefield. I reserved everything (SWS go in the two Vendettas) except for Harker, who I infiltrated onto his objective.

Turn 1a: Nothing happens.
Turn 1b: My opponent forgot to pray to Nurgle and the wrong wave (containing 1 plaguebearer squad, the Princes, the Grinder and Ku'Gath) comes in. The Grinder, the walking Prince and the plaguebearers come in near my objective while the other two come in next to Harker. Shooting from them makes Harker's squad break.

Turn 2a: All of my reserves come in, and all of my outflanking rolls let me bring them in on the side with my objective. One Vendetta immobilizes the Grinder and destroys its mouth gun, rendering it useless. The rest of my shooting grinds the plaguebearer squad down to 3 models and takes a wound off of the Daemon Prince. Harker's squad falls back slowly and takes a wound off of Papa Nurgle.
Turn 2b: All of the rest of his reserves come in, and strangely all come in next to my objective. Papa Nurgle and the winged prince move towards my objective. Papa then takes out two more members of Harker's squad, dooming them to continue falling back.

Turn 3a: My shooting grinds Epidemius' squad down to himself and 3 plaguebearers, and I reduce the Nurgling mob to a single model with a single wound thanks to FRFSRF and massed flamers on my combined infantry squad. The wingless Prince is reduced to 1 wound. Harker and his squad continue to dawdle and take another wound off of Papa Nurgle.
Turn 3b: The lone Nurgling, Epidemius and the two plaguebearer squads charge my combined infantry squad. The sergeants and commissar all gang up on Epidemius and manage to take 2 wounds off of him. Elsewhere the wingless Prince and Papa Nurgle move towards my objective, while the winged prince tries to take out my Leman Russ but doesn't quite make it there.

Turn 4a: The wingless Prince is eliminated. One of my Vendettas turboboosts towards the enemy objective. My shooting takes 2 wounds off of the winged Prince. In assault, I kill the nurgling but fail to do anything else.
Turn 4b: Epidemius farts and kills a few guardsmen. Papa Nurgle starts rushing back to the home objective. The winged prince blows up the Leman Russ. In assault, I still fail to do any wounds and lose more guardsmen. The tally now lets him wound me on 2s rerollable. Ouch.

Turn 5a: Vendetta continues to turboboost towards the enemy objective. The other 'detta and the rest of my forces destroy 2 Nurglings that were spawned by Papa. In assault, I lose yet more guardsmen. The tally now lets all Nurgle daemons get FNP on a 3+.
Turn 5b: Hellhound gets blown up by the winged prince. Papa tries to take out the Vendetta with a Breath of Chaos but fails. In assault, Epidemius finally goes down to the weight of power weapon attacks on his corpulent frame.

Turn 6a: My company command squad eliminates the Daemon Prince and my opponent concedes. I win 1.5 objectives to 0 (I had my Vendetta on his home objective at this point, but it probably would not have been scoring thanks to Papa.)

After action report: Biggest piece of luck was having all of the monsters come in first. If they had come in later I would have eaten a fair few Breaths and other templates, not to mention them crashing into my lines. The Harker distraction paid off, splitting his forces and allowing me to deal with them piecemeal. Overall, I'm pleased with how the game turned out and how my list is running.

And don't listen to people who say that power weapons are useless against Daemons. They are AWESOME against Nurgle.

BATTLE REPORT: Invasion!

A video battle report for you all. We chose a scenario from out of the Battle Missions expansion called Invasion. Daemons pour forth from a portal, and my boys and girls are the only thing in their way. Who will win? Text version below the video.

Text version here

Mission: INVASION!

Setup: There is a large portal in the center of the map and 4 objectives that are halfway between it and the four table edges. I have the option to deploy anywhere (except within 12" of the portal) or can reserve and have them come on from any table edge. Chaos Daemons take first turn and can walk on from the portal if they choose.

My list:
Company Command with Plasma Pistol, 3 Meltaguns, Astropath, Vet with pistol
Chimera with ML and HF
Vet Squad with Harker, Missile Launcher and 3 grenade launchers
Platoon Command with Al'Rahem, 4 meltaguns, chimera with ML and HF
3 Infantry Squads, power weapons, flamers. 1 commissar with power weapon.
Special Weapon Squad, 3 flamers.
Hellhound with HF and extra armor.
Vendetta
Leman Russ with HB

His list:
Great Unclean One (Papa Nurgle)
Daemon Prince of Khorne
2 Bloodcrushers
10 Bloodletters with Skulltaker
2 squads of 10 plaguebearers
2 squads of 5 Pink Horrors, both with Bolt of Change and one with the Changeling

I choose to reserve everything, he chooses to have Papa Nurgle, a squad of plaguebearers and both Pink Horror squads enter first. Nurgle agrees with him.

Turn 1a: Papa and one of the Horror squads walk out from the portal, the others deep strike near the objectives.

Turn 2a: Bloodletters (with Skulltaker)and the Bloodcrushers come in.
Turn 2b: My Vendetta (with SWS inside), Company Command, Leman Russ and Harker's squad all come in from one of the small table edges. Shooting kills most of one of the Horror Squads and picks off a few Bloodletters.

Turn 3a: His Daemon Prince and final squad of plaguebearers make their entrance near my forces. Things mill about.
Turn 3b: The rest of my reserves come in. Al'Rahem and her platoon come in on the opposite small board edge, threatening one of the plaguebearer squads. My Hellhound arrives to support my Vendetta, but gets Glamoured into shooting the Vendetta (thankfully doing no damage) instead of roasting the Bloodletters. My Command Squad disembarks and two BIDs take out the Prince. A few plaguebearers bite it and a Bloodcrusher is picked off.

Turn 4a: The remaining Crusher assaults my command squad but they hold. The Plaguebearers try to do the same to Harker's squad, but don't quite make it. The Bloodletters assault my Hellhound and manage to immmobilize it.
Turn 4b: The Platoon flames then assaults the plaguebearers, getting stuck in but off the objective. Vendetta kills a few bloodletters, the Hellhound and Leman Russ whittle the Pink Horrors on one of the objectives to two models (got the Changeling!). Harker's squad gets the plagebearers down to 2 models and I assault, losing Harker in the process. The Hellhound is wrecked, and the Crusher wipes my Command Squad.

Turn 5a: Papa Nurgle wades in to assault the platoon, but they hold. The Letters and the remaining Horror from the first squad I shot at move toward the objective, but the Horror is the only one to make it there. The Plaguebearers and the Crusher eliminate my remaining vets.
Turn 5b: Al'Rahem's chimera moves onto an objective, the Vendetta does likewise (the latter is contested by the 1 horror). Shooting fails to take out the Horror.

Game ends- score is 1-1.

I also had a game against Tyranids in First Contact... boy is that a butchery mission! Since most of my force relies on reserves to be useful being stuck out on the table is a nightmare. I lost half of my force on his first turn, then proceeded to be mulched to death by greater swarms of gribblies. Very historically accurate, I suppose, but I would need a much different force to be competitive in that mission.

Escalation League, Round 2: Battle Report vs Space Wolves

Another 750 pt battle, this time against the Space Wolves. Enjoy!



As always, comments and criticisms are appreciated.

Escalation League, Round 2: Battle Report and Pics

We've got a 750 battle report of my IG Air Cav vs Warrior heavy Nids for you, as well as some pictures of my trio of finished Valkyries that you can see below my report. Enjoy!

 

  

The Inquisitorial J of the Black Jacks

I can differentiate between the Valkyries based on the color of the screens shining on the pilots:

  

Escalation League, Round 1: vs Dark Eldar and Chaos Daemons

So, a real treat for you: two bite-sized battles against armies that you don't normally see on the table top, Dark Eldar and Chaos Daemons. Enjoy!






Next up will be a look at my 750 pt army that will hopefully be completed on Friday, and then a slew of 750 battle reports.

Because I am doing so many reports, I'd like to get some feedback from you all on how I am doing. Either leave a comment here or type one in my newfangled GuestBooker over on the right column and let me know how I can make these reports more useful and/or more enjoyable for you, the viewer.

Thanks, and be sure to comment!

Escalation League, Round 1: vs More Space Wolves and Eldar

Two more Escalation league battles against... well, more Wolves and Eldar. Enjoy!




Click me to read spoilers

So, welcome to another 500 pt battle report, this time against another Space Wolf army.

My list: as before (Vendetta, AS with AC, Psyker Primaris, Vet squad with 3 melta, Vet squad with 3 grenade launchers)

His list:
2*10 Grey Hunters with 1 meltagun, 1 plasma gun, 1 mark of the wulfen, and a wolf banner
Rune priest with JotWW, Living Lightning (with Squad 1)

Mission: Annihilation
Deployment: Dawn of War

He gets first turn.
Turn 1a: His troops move and run forwards.
Turn 1b: My forces enter the board. The Vendetta kills two members of Squad 2 and the Chimera kills two members of Squad 1. The AS hides behind a hill waiting to charge forwards.

Turn 2a: Squad 1 moves and shoots at my Chimera but fails to damage it, Squad 2 runs towards the Vendetta.
Turn 2b: The Vendetta turboboosts away from Squad 2 while the Chimera advances slowly towards them. The Sentinel charges Squad 1, and only krak grenades and the MotW can scratch it. The Wulfen rends, scores a penetrating hit but only manages to shake the vehicle.

Turn 3a: Squad 2 runs away from the Vendetta while Squad 1 shakes the Sentinel yet again thanks to the Wulfen.
Turn 3b: I fire at squad 2 but do nothing to it. In assault, the Wulfen explodes the walker and squad 1 consolidates towards my Chimera.

Turn 4a: Squad 1 shoots at, then assaults my Chimera and explodes it, leaving 2 meltaguns, the sarge and a mook in a crater. One Grey Hunter dies from the explosion. Squad 2 continues to run from my Vendetta.
Turn 4b: The squad in the crater meltas a Grey Hunter in squad 1 while the Vendetta kills two more members of Squad 2.

Turn 5a: My melta vets are wiped out by shooting, and Squad 2 continues to flee.
Turn 5b: My grenade vets and the Psyker unload and fire on Squad 2. In combination with the Vendetta they manage to kill 3 more members of Squad 2.

Turn 6a: Squad 1 hides in a crater, Squad 2 hides behind a rock.
Turn 6b: My shooting picks off 3 members of Squad 1 thanks to some failed 3+ cover saves.

Turn 7a: More hiding.
Turn 7b: I fail to do anything.

Space Wolves win, 3-0.

NEXT BATTLE: vs Eldar

His list: 2*10 squads of Dire Avengers with Exarch (two catapults, bladestorm), Farseer with Doom (attached to squad 2) and 7 fire dragons.

Mission: 3 objectives
Deployment: Table corners

He gets first turn, I fail to seize initiative.

Turn 1a: Squad 1 moves into some ruins and are very tightly packed, Squad 2 and the Dragons hide behind LOS blocking cover.
Turn 1b: Exceedingly lucky shooting on my part kills all of Squad 1 with grenade, lightning and lascannon fire from my disembarked Vets, Primaris and the Vendetta. Everything else moves up.

Turn 2a: The remaining Eldar hide more behind LOS blocking cover.
Turn 2b: Vets and Psyker re-embark in the Vendetta, but shooting fails to do anything.

Turn 3a: The eldar move up, DAs providing cover to the Dragons while the Farseer attempted to Singing Spear my Sentinel. It hit, but failed to pen.
Turn 3b: My shooting takes out 4 dire avengers.

Turn 4a: Eldar continue to advance, but the Singing Spear still fails to do anything.
Turn 4b: I wipe out the Dire Avenger squad while the Vendetta moves towards the top right-most objective.

Turn 5a: Fire dragons blow up my Chimera, killing 7 of the passengers and causing them to flee.
Turn 5b: Vendetta moves onto the objective, Sentinel charges the Dragons.

Turn 6a: Fire dragons meltabomb the sentinel and move towards the objective.
Turn 6b: Vet squad disembarks, combined fire from my forces wipe out the Dragons.

Click me to read spoilers

So, After Action Report. In the Space Wolf battle I really didn't use my range and firepower to my advantage. Tons of firepower was left sitting in my Vendetta where it could have been hammering away at the Wolves with huge numbers of shots every turn. The Meltaguns in my Chimera also never got a chance to shoot because I was too conservative with the tank's movement.

I also relied way too much on the Sentinel to hold the close combat.I should have either moved my troops as quickly as possible away from that area or I should ahve engaged the squad later with the Sentinel to increase its chance of holding. Really, I think it was just the Rending from the MotW that got me. In cases where there is a power fist or just no rending I can count on either losing or winning the combat, but with Rending there is always the question of "Am I going to lose this time or am I going to keep on being safe?" It's such a small chance of happening, but it happens more often than you would think and often at inopportune times.

If I had sent my forces more quickly after the other Grey Hunter squad I might have fared better for me.

In the Eldar case, I got extremely lucky on the first turn. Also the Eldar player wasn't playing my fear of meltaguns well enough against me. Squads of DAs on the objectives are really tough for me to move if they are backed up by Dragons. My Vendetta can't tank shock and my Chimera would be annihilated if it got close. He also packed his DAs a bit too tight, causing my grenade launchers to be supremely effective. If I hadn't been able to get them all I would have been open to a bladestorm the next turn, which from even 4-5 DAs could have wiped out my squad.

Overall I still have a lot to learn about running Valkyries/Vendettas as I am far too used to keeping my troops safe in their little metal boxes. Now that they can't shoot out I need to know when to unload them to make the most of their firepower. Hopefully I'll learn this before too long as at 750 I am hoping to run a fully airborne list. We'll see how I run that, as it should be fairly interesting.

There might be another two 500 pt battles before next round, but other than that that's all for now. See you next time.

Escalation League, Round 1: vs Space Wolves and Eldar

So, some video battle reports for you. In case you don't like videos, there will be hidden text versions of the games as well. Hope you enjoy!



Click me to read spoilers

My list:
Vendetta w/ 3 twin linked lascannons
Psyker Primaris
Vet squad with 3 grenade launchers
Vet squad with 3 meltaguns and shotguns
Chimera with Hvy Flamer and Multilaser
Armored Sentinel with Autocannon

His list:
Rune priest with Terminator armor, Living Lightning and Jaws of the World Wolf
8 Grey Hunters, 1 meltagun, Mark of the Wulfen, Power Sword (Squad 1)
8 Grey Hunters, 1 flamer, Mark of the Wulfen, Power Fist (Squad 2)
3 Long Fangs, 2 Missile Launchers

Mission: 3 objectives
Deployment: Quasi-table quarters (12" from half of short and half of long board edges each)

He wins turn 1 and deploys his forces. Squad 1 sets up inside a ruin with the Rune Priest attached and on an objective, Squad 2 sets up near a bunker (also very close to the ruins). The Long Fangs are in the second floor of the ruin with a good view of the battlefield.

I hold everything in reserve :)

Turn 1a: Squad 2 moves into the bunker, and that's it.
Turn 1b: Nothing happens

Turn 2a: He sits still.
Turn 2b: None of my reserves come in.

Turn 3a: Squad 2 moves towards one of the objectives but doesn't quite get there.
Turn 3b: My chimera comes on and moves 12". It manages to hide itself from the Rune Priest behind a ruin, as well as getting plenty of cover from the Long Fangs.

Turn 4a:Squad 2 moves up more, Long Fangs fail to dent the Chimera.
Turn 4b: Vendetta and Sentinel come on. Chimera pegs off a marine and the Sentinel pegs off a marine. Vendetta turboosts onto the far right objective.

Turn 5a: Long Fangs and the Rune Priest fail to scratch the Vendetta, while Squad 2 moves up to assault the Chimera. They rip off the Heavy Flamer, the Multilaser and immobilize it.
Turn 5b: My meltaguns pile out and Sentinel moves into position. The Vendetta turboboosts onto the marine objective. At the center objective, before shooting:

After shooting:

 

Assault eliminates the powerfist guy.

Turn 6a: Rune Priest JotWW my infantry squad, killing 2. A frag missile kills 1 more. Squad 1 moves to assault and melta the Vendetta, but fail to scratch it.
Turn 6b: Vendetta moves and slags the detached Rune Priest. My troops settle on both remaining objectives. Game ends, 2-0.

After battle: I got lucky with reserve rolls and benefited from his inexperience with Wolves and lack of aggression. When all of my stuff rolled in on turn 3 he had very little time to do any damage, and I simply managed to do more than he could.

Click me to read spoilers

My list:
Vendetta w/ 3 twin linked lascannons
Psyker Primaris
Vet squad with 3 grenade launchers
Vet squad with 3 meltaguns and shotguns
Chimera with Hvy Flamer and Multilaser
Armored Sentinel with Autocannon

His list:
Farseer with Fortune, Doom, Runes of Witnessing
5 Pathfinders
Squad of Guardians, Scatter Laser
Wraithlord, Bright Lance, Wraithsword

Mission: 4 Objectives (two close together mid board-ish, two on my side to the left and the right sides)
Deployment: Board edges

I set up first (!) and deploy everything on the board. The Vendetta takes the right flank while the rest of my forces stay on the left.
He sets up near the two objectives with his forces. Scout moves see the Vendetta move 24" to get a good shot on the Wraithlord, his Pathfinders move towards cover.

Turn 1a: Vendetta gets exceedingly lucky, hitting and wounding 3 times on the Wraithlord and taking it out of action. The rest of my forces move up and fire on the Pathfinders and Guardians, causing 1 casualty in each.
Turn 1b: His forces try to shoot but fail to scratch my vehicles.

Turn 2a: I shoot, kill a guardian.
Turn 2b: He shoots, knocks a twin linked lascannon off of my Vendetta.

Turn 3a: The Chimera heavy flamers the Pathfinders and eliminates them. Vendetta moves to the right and takes potshots at the guardians, killing 2 I think.
Turn 3b: The Farseer charges forward and engages the Sentinel, but only manages to immobilize it.

Turn 4a: Around this time we get confused and think that it is turn 5 instead of turn 4. Chimera backs up, unloads my troops on my objective. The fight continues against the Sentinel.
Turn 4b: Guardians spread out a bit but fail to reach both objectives. Game ends, resulting in a win for me 2-1.

After battle: taking out the Wraithlord first turn was ridiculously lucky. Without it he had no real anti-tank besides glances from the scatter laser and close combat from the Farseer. If I hadn't taken the WL out first turn it could have gotten a lot uglier, as I would have had to rely on Meltaguns and massed firepower to take out the beast without the Vendetta.

I played a couple of other games that I didn't get a chance to cover in the blog. My first four games were Wolves, Daemons, Orks and Necrons. I lost to the Daemons in hard fought game, was almost tabled by the orks and failed to earn a KP against the Necrons for a tie. Eldar were the fifth and I defeated Nids for a sixth game, but only the first four counted for scoring (all additional games earn only a single point).

I definitely misjudged the metagame as everyone except a Dark Eldar player was playing horde instead of mech. Therefore my Vendetta had few real targets for it to shoot at, and same with my melta guns. My 750 will probably include more anti-horde than anti-tank because of this.

Still, I've had fun, and will continue to share more reports with you later. Let me know if you have any suggestions/comments on either my tactics or reporting format.

Second Video Battle Report: Nids vs Guard and Marines

My second video battle report! Enjoy!

Imperium vs The Bugs: A Video Battle Report

Welcome to my first video battle report. My friend Russell has just gotten the new Tyranid codex and has whipped up an 1850 list to go against 1100 points of my Fortunan 24th and 750 heavily proxied points of Space Marines for Caleb.

None of these lists are intended to be competitive- we're just trying out all of the new stuff that Bugs have to offer. Same goes for proxies- since all of the new stuff just came out, we're trying a few builds before purchases are made. Hope you enjoy- I'll be trying to do some more of these!