1500pts battle report - Dark Angels & White Scars v Death Guard & Tau - game 3

I was partnered with Rob Nathan for the final game. His turquoise 'White' Scars were immediately familiar as he attended the Birthday Bash in February so it was nice to be paired together as we hadn't spoken back then. His army was just bikes and attack bikes, with a healthy dose of Grav and a Librarian. We were up against David Irving's Death Guard and Mark Hinson's Tau. Obviously we know Tau are annoying - their ignores cover was going to make use suffer and the Death Guard, with Typhus in a Kharybdis Assault Claw and a Fire Raptor Gunship - things did not look good for us.

OK a week on so my recall is going to be even more shaky. Here's the board, looks likt Kharybdis has arrived.

Tau in the middle.

 My bikes opposite the Riptide, Rob was backing me up with a unit of bikes and Attack bike on the left out of shot.

Land Speeders were going to have to face the Assault Claw.

But Rob had scattered his forces thanks to my Infiltrate 3 units Warlord Trait, but had coincidentally also forgotten to pin 3 enemy units, exactly what Ben had done. By the end of turn 1 Dan and Mark had scored 2 VPs and we'd got nothing thanks to no numbered onjectives - just killing units which we were struggling to do.

The Fire Raptor arrived.

And looks like it took out some of the bikers

The Assault Claw disgorged it's occupants - Typhus and his guard who were going to chew through my Land Speeders with ease.

My Techmarine was in amongst the filth and corruption.

He stood steadfast, but one of the Land Speeders was wrecked.

But was overwhelmed by numbers taking first one wound then forced to take another two saves on his 2+ armour.

Not good.

He fell to the foul diseaeased marines, while Typhus assaulted the last Speeder.

Which he destroyed with ease. D&M were on 4 VPs by the end of their turn 2.

We assaulted with the Attack Bikes.

My Dark Talon zoomed on.

We socred a VP in our turn.

The Attack Bikes turned on the Death Guard but doesn't look like they did any damage and were now in a precarious position.

The Assault Claw moved off and by the end of their turn three they'd scored another 5 VPs.

Chaos Cultists over-ran my drop pod to contest the objective..

The Death Guard killed the last of the Attack Bikes.

The Fire Raptor continued to wreak havoc, I think taking out the Dark Talon

and then the last of my Ravenwing. Another 2 VPs to D&M but we pulled two back in our turn, although by this stage all of Rob's White Scars were gone and it was just my remaining Dark Angels left scoring points.

The Riptide started to traverse the battlefield.

By the end of turn four it was 11-4  to D&M.

Turn 5 and we got right royally mullered! My Scouts had gone to ground to stay alive but to no avail. D&M scored a maximum 9 VPs for holding three objectives for two consecutive turns*

They kept my drop pod alive to keep racking up the VPs, I scored none, we rolled for turn 6 and they scored a further 5 VPs that turn. Turn 7 came along and they were able to score another 7 VP. Final score was 32-4, we'd been properly brutalised and only scored 337 Blood Points too.

Despite the scoreline I had a really great game, very tactical and these guys were a lot of fun. I think I ended up in 12th place which was a little disappointing given how well I'd started off but ultimately the most important thing for me was just playing games in the company of great people and in that I was definitely a winner! Bring on Double Trouble 3!

David, Rob, Mark and myself.

* Now, Alex did question such a high score, I had been keeping track and dutifully jotted down the scores Dave and Mark had achieved but in review I've definitely noticed one anomally in the scores I was given. Turn 5 was a maximum 9 VPs for holding three objectives for two consecutive turns. If the 9 VPs are correct that means turn 4 should have scored 0 VPs.

The objectives were always a gamble, you either scored 1VP or gambled on holding it two turns for 3 VPs. Even if they'd thought they get both and held the three for one turn and also claimed the 9 VPs for two it should have been 3 VPs turn four then 9 VPs turn five so I don't know what was scored. However, if the turn four score is correct, that's either two objectives or 1 objective worth 2, which means they achieved either one or two cards and as you only hold three cards at a time there is no way you can then have held 3 objectives for two consecutive turns for the turn five 9 VPs. Without recording actual objectives scored it's impossible to tell what went on.

Bottom line it would have made no difference either way to our result, we were totally outclassed and not for one minute do I think there was anything intentional going on. We were playing really fast so I'm convinced it was an honest error but it does make me think how these things should be more streamlined to prevent this and keep track of what's scored. I usually take notes, I did in game 1 but this fell by the wayside game 2, in future I must be more dilligent.

1500pts battle report - Dark Angels & Blood Angels v Deathwatch & Eldar - game 2

Game 2 and I'm paired with Matty Longmore and his Blood Angels and we're facing the Deathwatch and Eldar pair of Danny Evison and James Maynard. Unfortunately I've little detail about what everyone took. Danny had a Warp Hunter, two Hornets and a load of Jetbikes and Jame's Deathwatch were in a lot of pods. They conferred quite a lot at the beginning of the game which I was reasonably pleased about because I thought we were on a road to a hiding anyway so the longer it was delayed the better. They eventually decided we should set up first, at least that's what I thought, and that given how we'd been handed to go first I was damned if I'd let them dictate the play like that and so I suggested to Matty we deploy first with a view to go second as the rules dictate. Actually it turned out they had deployed first and elected to go second already - they just had nothing to deploy as the drop-pods were in orbit and arrived in their turn 1!

Regardless, with nothing on the board Matty and I could only play the objectives we picked [sadly I didn't record what we achieved but I know the VPs per turn]. Facing an empty board I think we must have captured and objective and held another one [my Tactical Squad and Matty's Veterans/Honour Guard (?) on objective 6]- using our drop pods for board control. We scored 2 VPs this turn.

James drop pod arrived, and his Frag Cannons tore through my Ravenwing despite the bolstered ruins they occupied. Not much else happened and they scored no points.

Swift vengeance came in the form of Matty's Dreadnought and my Dark Talon, removing the Deathwatch from existence. We managed to score another 4 VPs this turn, I recall one objective was to get one unit each into our opponents DZ. We'd both failed our run moves in the previous turn to reach their zone with our drop pod occupants but this turn we made it for 2 VPs and careful conga lining meant they were still in range of their objectives to score another 2 for 4 this turn.

D&J's turn 2 and two lone Assault Deathwatch arrived, the other is behind the hill in the second shot. Half the Hornets and Jetbikes showed up with the Warp Hunter but didn't do a huge amount of damage as far as I can tell. They tried to kill off my Tactical Squad but 2 survived.

Bizarrely, despite being completely LoS blocked by the hill James did move him into cover and failed his dangerous terrain test and then armour save. Danny couldn't believe he'd done it as there was no need and I said to forget about it as it was a moment of madness and put him back on the board - Double trouble is that kind of event in my book. Anyway they scored 2VPs that turn I think from capturing the objective from my Tac Squad.

Our turn three and fate handed us a perfect selection of cards to score 5 VPs if we managed to get all our ducks in a row. There was hold objective a couple of hold objectives and score 2 VPs if the other force holds 1 so Matty's Blood Angels needed to be on objective 6 to double up on the two named number objectives I was holding, probably my Land Speeders being one of them.

My Flyer zoomed in to target the bikes, I got greedy and the Rift Cannon was placed on the Deathwatch, killing one but meaning the remainder would get a cover save from the rock against his Hurricane Bolters.

Perhaps I should have taken out the Jetbikes, although they all seemed to have survived anyway. The Dreadnought smashed through the Warp Hunter. We come to tot up the scores and notice that Matty's veterans have moved off objective 6 into cover meaning we don't double up but thankfully spot his razorback holding Obj 1 and we end the turn with the 5 VPs.

Part of our mission was to score Obj 4 which I thought required me to kill the Deathwatch but my Scouts were ObSec so captured that regardless. Unfortunately they were then exposed to the two Assault marines.

Who had to end their control of the objective.

And cut through them with ease to recapture and score the 2 VPs

One of the Hornets managed to flank my Speeders but his shooting was well off.

I dunno what was happening here.

I dunno what was happening here this pic may be out of sync.

The last of the Tactical squad headed for the drop pod, I think he was eventually gunned down

I had Obj 5 which was behind this hill so I zoomed the Talon over in an attempt to capture it from the lone marine.

My Speeders put an end to the Hornet. We finished turn 4 with another 2 VPs.

D&J score another 2 VPs

The second Hornet tries to achieve what the first failed to do but again his shooting is comical and ultimately pays the same price as the Land Speeders take their second scalp! I thought Danny was going to evict his dice from the building at this point ;)

My Dark Talon gets into position and we score 4 VPs. Somehow I don't have any more pictures but D&J score 4 also to make it 17- 10 at turn 5.

We rolled for turn 6 and it continues, we score another 3 VPs, I think from individual objectives and D&J score none. Turn 7 happens and we rack up another 2 VPs and D&J finish strongly with 8 VPs in one turn! The final score was 22-18 and we did 1055 Blood Points.

Matty, myself, Danny and James

Another great game, highly tactical and quite a surprise to come out on top. As much as I see the wisdom in leaving a lot of you force off the board it did give Matty and I the opportunity to control the battlefield and get up a healthy lead. I've played a fair few Maelstrom games were despite this advantage loss of troops later on has lost me the game but I think it's always better to get a head start than chase from behind. Their 8pt turn 7 shows how that's possible but that was just lucky they got the 7th turn and even then a win was impossible. So, 2 wins, a lot of VPs and some considerable kill points - how well could I actually do in DT2?! Lets find out in game 3.