When I'd been looking at the ToS: Carnage Facebook page I'd seen there was a 4 Knight list going, but this was not it. This was a Baronial court controlled by Sam, including a Cerastus Castigator as the Baron, Cerastus Lancer, Paladin with Icarus Autocannon and Warden. So yeah, I was bit shocked but I've faced three before at Blog Wars and managed to kill one and take two to half their hull points. The main concern was the Icarus
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The low down:
- Into The Maelstrom - Spoils of War
- Warlord Trait - Warlord and three units Infiltrate
- Night fighting first turn, won deployment, elected to go first!
- CARNAGE! effect:
- Rage - 2A on charge
Having learnt from the last game I chose to go first rather than weather the storm of shooting. I was incredibly fortunate with the ruins on the left and my warlord trait got me to position two Carnifex far forward with the Flyrant and Hive Guard [not to mention the Stealers and Broodlord]. The third would arrive in the Tyrannocyte, hopefully getting rear armour shots on the Knights when it deployed.
One point of note is that the Cerastus were not glued to their bases so will feature in later pictures 'in repose', but more on that later.
Broodkin supported my left flank, with the Rippers on the far right.
Carnage cards were drawn
At the end of my turn I'd managed to put three Hull Points on what I felt was my greatest threat - the Icarus toting Paladin. I was quite pleased with this as a start.
I'd advanced everything else, using the one story ruins to screen the Stealers and Carnifex, the second MC not moving quite as quickly so remaining stuck in the ruins. In leaning across the board to move the Flyrant the whole Realm of Battle board shifted and the Cerastus Lancer tipped back off the base, it was only Sam's quick hands that caught but even a couple of other players stopped to commend his catch while I apologised profusely - my clumsiness at these events know no bounds. The Lancer was rested in the corner for safe keeping and the Paladin moved over to that corner also. Sam was unable to achieve any Carnage missions.
My turn 2 and the Genestealers, Purestrains and Carnifex break through the back wall of the ruins and set their sights on the Paladin
The Tyrannocyte lands behind the Castigator and Warden with just enough room for the Flyrant to join them for rear armour shots. Meanwhile the Broodkin and the Carnifex follow the path made by the other Genestealers and Carnifex. I think the Hive Guard were out of Synapse and so fled back but I moved the Zoanthrope up to try and recover synapse, hopefully next turn at the latest.
The unholy brood got to grips with the Paladin
and three penetrating hits managed to end it for First Blood before he could destroy them.
Luckily only a couple of Stealers and the Purestrains suffered in the ensuing explosion. More importantly the Knight was down and I scored 4VPs for 'under a tide of flesh' - outnumber your opponent 3 to 1.
The Castigator managed to kill the Carnifex getting Sam 2VPs for killing something and killing it in a shooting phase.
I think the Warden focused his efforts on the Flyrant as the Carnifex somehow managed to survive this turn.
Turn 3 and the second Carnifex bursts free of the ruins and joins the Broodlord to hunt the Castigator, it looks like it's on two wounds at this stage.
With the Flyrant on one side and Carnifex on the other I think I was able to force the Lancer to commit to shielding one side and exposing the other. It was interesting to not that the shield only changes position in the beginning of the shooting phase so positioning a shot with Warp Blast in the Psychic Phase means you can out-manoeuvre that saving throw.
With some awesome dice rolls I managed to get these three glancing blows.
And 4 Hull points in total
Unfortunately the Carnifex and Broodlord were less effective than I'd hoped this time around. The Carnifex went into the combat with three wounds so when the Baron activated his Tempest blade he was killed and the Broodlord was instakilled. So much for Paroxysm hoping to prevent him hitting!
The Baron consolidates and the Warden manages to take out the last Carnifex.
The Warden also targeted the Tyrannocyte so charges and kills it, scoring 2 VPs for 'go for the throat'.
The Lancer manages to get into combat with the Tervigon
Unsurprisingly the brood mother is no match for the knight gaining another VP
Luckily very few Termagants pop with synapse and as they're still within Synapse range of the Zoanthrope they all huddle beneath the Skyshield out of sight of the Lancer and out of range. Unfortunately the Venomthrope fails his move through cover rolls, getting just a 2" move and is left on top of the pad, however that misfortune would in fact prove extremely lucky! With one of my models still on the pad it remains 'claimed' for the nids and with the Knight on it he was protected on all sides by the force field, but I still had the power to turn the field off.
I threw all my Warp Charge dice at the Zoanthrope, trying to Lance it to death, the zoie Perilled and ultimately died with the shock making it's shooting attack miss completely.
The Hive Guard still managed to put shots on the side and the Lancer was taken to just 1 Hull Point and then tragedy struck. In the middle of talking Sam gestured with his hand and caught the Castigaor knocking it onto the floor shattering it into it's constituent parts [you can see it's remains in the background] it was utterly horrific and I felt so bad for him, even more so when immediately after the Flyrant managed to get the last Glancing shot on his exposed rear armour. Blowing it up and not even touching the Venomthrope. A moment later I realised I'd made that attack without applying his Jink Snap Shots. I re-rolled the dice, managed to get two hits and one glance, the Lancer remained destroyed. This scored me 3 VPs
With the game in it's final turn Sam was able to bring the Flyrant down scoring a VP for killing a unit in the shooting phase, another for destroying a unit, a third for it being a Monstrous Creature and lastly Slay the Warlord.
The game was over and I thought I had it in the bag but my record keeping hadn't taken into count some of the card's VP values and modifiers. I thought I had 8 VPs to Sam's 7 but when it was totted up correctly he had 9 and then I checked my own and realised I'd not included the Broodkin and their Linebreaker leading to a 9 all draw. Given the shattered Castigator I thought that was the best result all round.
More importantly I'd killed two Knights and taken the Baron to just 1 Hull Point. So not only was I not going to lose every game I actually had overcome one of the worst lists imaginable. My tactics were sound, my army was proving itself and aside from the loss of the Flyrant things had gone really well. Carnage points wise I scored 51, but gave up 96. A really great game and it's definitely changed my attitude to Knights.
