So, after months of not wanting to run a Daemon Prince list because they seem so prevalent amongst Chaos Marine lists, once I had one I figured that I might as well put together a list that included it. Most of the list – such as the Obliterators, the Noise Marines, and the other Chaos Marine squads – I was happy with, so I really only needed to change up the daemonic portions of the list. Here’s what I managed to put together:

HQ: Chaos Sorcerer (1#, 130 pts)
1 Chaos Sorcerer (Mark of Slaanesh; Lash of Submission; Personal Icon)

HQ: Daemon Prince (1#, 135 pts)
1 Daemon Prince (Mark of Slaanesh; Sorcerer; Lash of Submission)

Troops: Noise Marines (7#, 285 pts)
5 Noise Marines (Sonic Blaster x4; Blastmaster; Personal Icon)
1 Noise Champion (Doom Siren; Power Weapon)
1 Rhino (Daemonic Possession)

Troops: Chaos Space Marines (11#, 285 pts)
9 Chaos Space Marines (Icon of Slaanesh; Plasmagun x2)
1 Aspiring Champion (Power Weapon, Plasma Pistol)
1 Rhino

Troops: Chaos Space Marines (11#, 285 pts)
9 Chaos Space Marines (Icon of Slaanesh; Meltagun x2)
1 Aspiring Champion (Power Fist)
1 Rhino (Daemonic Possession)

Heavy Support: Obliterators (2#, 150 pts)
2 Obliterators

Heavy Support: Obliterators (2#, 150 pts)
2 Obliterators

Summoned Lesser Daemons (6#, 78 pts)
6 Summoned Lesser Daemons

Total: 1498 points

There’s a lot of icons in the list, and that’s to make sure that the Lesser Daemons (and if I choose to deep strike them, the Obliterators) always have a spot to come down safely. And yes, it is a dual Lash list, albeit one with only one Daemon Prince. The two Lash users, though, have different purposes. The Sorcerer rides along with the Noise Marines and uses his Lash to pull enemy infantry into the range of the Champion’s doom siren. The Daemon Prince, on the other hand, mostly uses it to pull units into assault range (to make up for the lack of wings) or out of it (when facing off against horde armies). Otherwise, the list performs identically to my other Slaanesh CSM list.

I even had a opportunity to run a short test of this list against WDR, one of my friends at the Undergopher podcast, and his vanilla Marine army. We only had time for a partial game, maybe three turns, so we rolled up a mission from the main rulebook. Luckily, we got Pitched Battle/Annihilation, the most basic mission type available. WDR won the roll-off to see who would deploy first and decided to take the first turn. He brought the following:

1 Razorback w/ Twin-linked Lascannons, with 5 Sternguard Veterans and a Captain inside
2 Rhinos w/10-man Tactical Squads inside
2 Scout Squads
1 Dreadnought w/Multi-melta and Storm Bolter
1 Whirlwind
1 Vindicator
1 Predator w/ Twin-linked Lascannons and 2 Lascannon sponsons

That was a lot of tanks to face off against, and those tanks were packing serious firepower. In response, I deployed everything I could, knowing I would need my Obliterators on turn 1 to counter his armor. Then, tempting fate, I attempted to seize the initiative… and succeeded! This turned the tables a bit, and gave me the first turn to get the jump on his army.

Chaos Turn 1: I run my Rhinos up and pop smoke, keeping my Daemon prince shielded from WDR’s scout snipers. The Obliterators take some shots with Lascannons, but don’t manage any noticeable damage.

Marine Turn 1: He keeps his army stationary, choosing to take shots and make me come to him. He’s able to land a couple of wounds on the Daemon Prince with the Razorback and the Dreadnought, but otherwise either he misses, fails to do damage, or my smoke cover keeps me safe.

Chaos Turn 2: The Lesser Daemons come in, and I bring them in 6 inches from the melta squad’s Rhino, which puts them within 6 inches of his one deployed scout squad. Everything else moves up closer towards his tank line, and a pair of meltagunners fire from their Rhino and destroy the Razorback, killing two veterans and slightly wounding the captain in the process. The Daemon Prince then lashes the survivors closer, so that it can assault them. The Obliterators also have a decent turn, wrecking one Rhino and taking the turret off the Predator, as does the plasma squad, which wrecks a second Rhino. When time for assault comes, it’s a mixed bag. The Daemon Prince slaughters the remaining veterans, leaving only the Captain. On the other hand, the Lesser Daemons only roll a 4 on their Difficult Terrain check, leaving them unable to cross the lip of the crater holding the scouts.

Marine Turn 2: Again, WDR keeps his army mostly stationary. He manages a solid shot with one of the Predator’s sponsons on the Noise Marines’ Rhino, destroying it and killing one of them in the resulting explosion. Elsewhere, he cuts down half of the Lesser Daemons with sniper gunfire. Near the center of the table, the Captain and Daemon Prince remain locked in combat, with the marine taking a second wound.

Chaos Turn 3: My army continues pressing on. The melta and plasma squad Rhinos pull up and drop off their passengers, who proceed to whittle down one of the two exposed Tactical Squads down to 3 men remaining. Meanwhile, the Sorcerer splits off from the Noise Marines so that he can “fire” separately, lashing the other TacSquad into a  teardrop-shaped formation. The Noise Marines then open fire, leaving one marine remaining. The Obliterators have another productive turn, destroying the cannon on WDR’s Vindicator. In assault, the Noise Marines finish off their lone opponent, the Lesser Daemons lose two more members after finally getting into assault, and the Captain and Prince remain locked in combat, each unable to kill the other.

Marine Turn 3: At this point, WDR is ready to concede the game – we’re running out of time, and I’m definitely in a superior position. However, in true marine fashion, he doesn’t want to go out without a fight. His Whirlwind wants to land a shot on the Obliterators, but he doesn’t have line of sight to them, meaning he’ll scatter without any Ballistics Skill reduction. Instead, he tries to drop the shot on a Rhino he can see… and the scatter takes the shot right on top of the Obliterators anyway! That’s some Kentucky windage for you. (Unfortunately, the shot does no damage.) The remaining TacSquad unloads some shots on the melta squad before charging into assault and manages to take a few Chaos marines with them, and the scouts sweep the remaining Lesser Daemon. Finally, the HQ assault is finally resolved – the Daemon Prince is unable to injure the Captain, but he manages a wound on it. The Prince loses the assault, and then loses its life as it fails to save its Fearless-inflicted wound at the end of assault. The Captain is victorious! Unfortunately, he’s also surrounded by two angry squads of Chaos Marines and has only one wound remaning. With that, we call the game in Chaos’s favor.

I have to say that I like this variant of the list just as much as the other one, although there are still things I might change. I’d like to pump up the number of Lesser Daemons I’m running (which means finding more previous-edition Daemonettes), and to make the points for it, I might consider dropping the Chaos Sorcerer. It’s not that he’s not useful, but the points have to come from somewhere, and he’s semi-redundant with the DP there. Alternately, I could bump the list to 1750 points and have the best of both worlds, although none of my friends have 1750-point lists together yet.

So, where does my Slaanesh list go from here? Come back tomorrow, where I’ll take a look at the future of my Chaos Marine army.

Artwork by SelenaH. Used without permission.

I finally had a chance to use my Slaanesh CSM list on Saturday in two separate games. Actually, I used two different versions of the list; now that I have a daemon prince together, I went ahead and created a variant that included one. First, though, I wanted to play the original list I’d built. I’d promised my friend Jon that he would get first crack at the list, so he brought his Space Wolves to the table. Here’s what I brought to the table:

HQ: Chaos Sorcerer (1#, 125 pts)
1 Chaos Sorcerer (Mark of Slaanesh; Lash of Submission)

Elite: Possessed (7#, 241 pts)
5 Possessed (Icon of Slaanesh)
1 Possessed Champion
1 Rhino (Daemonic Possession)

Troops: Noise Marines (7#, 280 pts)
5 Noise Marines (Sonic Blaster x4; Blastmaster)
1 Noise Champion (Doom Siren; Power Weapon)
1 Rhino (Daemonic Possession)

Troops: Chaos Space Marines (11#, 285 pts)
9 Chaos Space Marines (Icon of Slaanesh; Plasmagun x2)
1 Aspiring Champion (Power Weapon, Plasma Pistol)
1 Rhino

Troops: Chaos Space Marines (11#, 265 pts)
9 Chaos Space Marines (Icon of Slaanesh; Meltagun x2)
1 Aspiring Champion (Power Fist)
1 Rhino

Heavy Support: Obliterators (2#, 150 pts)
2 Obliterators

Heavy Support: Obliterators (2#, 150 pts)
2 Obliterators

Total: 1496 points

We rolled up a mission from the Battle Missions book and ended up playing Pillage, a Chaos Marine mission. It’s basically a Spearhead deployment objective mission, but with two differences. First, your board edge is not the long board edge touching your table quarter; instead, you only get the edges of your quarter itself. It’s a bit restrictive, but as you can only start with an HQ and 2 troops, and everything else goes into reserves, it’s not as crowded as a standard Spearhead deployment. Secondly, you don’t score objectives held at the end of the game. Instead, you accumulate points by having an uncontested, un-assaulted unit touching the objective at the end of your opponent’s turns. It’s an interesting concept, but in practice it felt very wonky. I was able to claim two of the three objectives on the first turn, and I just out-accumulated Jon to the point where the winner was clear on turn 3. I’d rather use the deployment with a standard Seize Ground mission instead.

With the scoring being a bit odd, I won’t go into the play-by-play, but I will cover some of the highlights of how my army performed.

Initiative wins battles. I’ve played enough games against Eldar, with both my Tau and Khorne CSM armies, to know how important going first in assault is. Having the Mark of Slaanesh on everything in the army (save the vehicles and Obliterators) made a huge difference. Rather than trading blows with the Space Wolves in assault, I could get the drop on my opponent and throw a flurry of blows at them. With enough hits, I could cut down the competition (even something as hardy as a Storm Shield Terminator) and reduce their ability to counterattack. Unlike Khorne Berzerkers’ Furious Charge, the effect wasn’t limited to the first round of combat; every time, I was swinging and hitting first.

Lash of Submission is effective. I know that quite a bit has been written about Lash princes and Lash sorcerers, but there’s a reason; it’s that good. Even with mechanized armies being so prevalent, it’s not hard to force troops out of their transports, and once they’re out you can pull them right to where you want them. One particularly effective strategy was to Lash a unit of marines towards my Noise Marines into a vaguely teardrop-shaped formation, and then have the Noise Champion hit them with his doom siren. Whatever survived the AP3 template weapon (which generally wasn’t much) would be mopped up by the rest of the unit’s sonic blasters, and any particularly lucky enemies that survived would get assaulted.

Obliterators are more fragile than I thought. Obliterators are basically Terminators on steroids: same armor save, same invulnerable save, and twice as many wounds. However, melta guns ruin their day. Not only do they ignore the Oblits’ armor, but they’re strong enough to double them out and kill them instantly. With every unit of Jon’s Grey Hunters packing a marine with a melta gun, there were multiple threats on the table, and Jon used them effectively to whittle down my heavy support.

Possessed Marines aren’t bad. There’s not much chance of me running them as a hammer unit; they’re not predictable enough or nasty enough to serve that job. However, they’re still a decent assault, and the randomness is a fun aspect (which I think can be just as important as being powerful). I’d compare them to summoned daemons, but with a number of advantages even though they cost more. First, they’re not solely dependent on having a 5+ invulnerable save; they still have marine armor under all the claws and teeth. Second, they can take icons, which mean they can take chaos marks; see “Initiative wins battles” above. Third, they really only have one bad random power: Scout. Everything else they can get is a solid option. Finally, they can take a Rhino, which gives you another piece of moving cover to use.

All told, I had a lot of fun playing this army. Unlike my Tau, which can really only shoot, and my Khorne CSM, which can really only assault, this felt like a much more versatile list. Like most marine variants, it’s solid both in shooting and in assault, and it has a few edges particular to it that really allow it to shine. In fact, I enjoyed playing this army so much that I’m strongly considering selling off my Khorne army to focus more resources on growing this one. Anyone interested in 1750-2000 points of assault-y Chaos Marines?

Tomorrow, I’ll talk about the other variant of my Slaanesh list, which got to face off against W.D.R. from the Undergopher podcast and his vanilla Marine army!

Artwork by Remton. Used without permission.

Last Monday, I managed to get in a couple of games to celebrate the holiday weekend, and to start off I decided to use my Khorne Chaos Space Marine list to mix things up a bit. On the other side of the table was Dennis and his Eldar army. Lately, he’s been working on switching things up a bit and trying out a few variant lists. He also picked up one of the new Fire Prism kits, which looks as good up close as it does online. He also assembled a second Wave Serpent and third Vyper and went fully mechanized. His list looks something like this:

• 6 Howling Banshees w/Exarch and Jain Zar in a Wave Serpent
• 9 Dire Avengers w/Exarch in a Wave Serpent
• 8 Jetbikes, w/2 Shuriken Cannons and a Warlock w/Witchblade
• 2 Fire Prisms
• 1 Vyper w/ Missile Launcher
• 1 Vyper w/ Brightlance
• 1 Vyper w/ Starcannon

We determined mission and deployment randomly (including the Battle Missions book) and still managed to come up with Seize Ground/Dawn of War. I went first, and started my Berzerkers as close to mid-table as I could, and held the rest back for Turn 1. In response, Dennis deployed nothing. Two objectives were placed just left of center of the table on my table half, just over a foot apart. His objective was on the right of the table closer to his table edge.

Chaos Turn 1: With no sense of where he was going to be other than his objective, I ran my Berzerkers up towards where his army would be coming in. The rest of my army started following behind, with the Defiler on my left, the Land Raider coming up near the middle, and the Raptors moving up the right. Most of the army would be out of range due to night fighting rules, but the Rhinos popped smoke just to be safe.

Eldar Turn 1: Dennis had his army come in mostly on my left flank, refusing the right save for his three Vypers. This kept his Jetbikes out of immediate reach of my berzerkers. One of his Fire Prisms ended up on the far right edge of the table, and the other sat on a hilltop near the center of his table edge, with Wave Serpents flanking the hill. He took a number of shots at the Rhinos, but between the smoke and the night fighting round, he was unable to land a single damaging hit.

Chaos Turn 2: The Rhinos did not move this turn so that the Berzerkers inside could disembark and move. One squad moved up and assaulted the Starcannon Vyper, destroying it. The other squad assaulted the Wave Serpent to the left of the hill, with the Skull Champion wrecking it with his power fist. However, I discovered that I had chosen my target poorly, as a angry squad of Howling Banshees, complete with Exarch and Phoenix Lord, poured out the back. My Defiler lobbed a shot at the Jetbikes but only managed to drop one. The Land Raider advanced a bit more slowly so that it could fire a shot with one Lascannon, which destroyed the other Wave Serpent, forcing out the Dire Avengers. Finally, the Raptors harassed the far Fire Prism, managing to stun the crew.

Eldar Turn 2: The Jetbikes started moving along the right edge of the table, trying to avoid the mess that was gathering around the hill. The Brightlance Vyper made for some ruins to put distance between it and the Berzerkers harassing its peers. The Dire Avengers stood their ground near their objective. On the other hand, the Howling Banshees came around from the back of their destroyed transport and proceeded to utterly wipe out the responsible squad of Berzerkers. The Fire Prism on the hill took a shot at the Land Raider, but could not penetrate its armor. Finally, the Jetbikes took some potshots at the Raptors, but only managed to kill two.

Chaos Turn 3: If left unattended, Jain Zar and her Banshees would do terrible things to my army, so I had to put a stop to her. I moved in the Land Raider and both Rhinos, boxing the squad in. The Land Raider released its cargo of Terminators, ready for the kill. The Rhinos fired their combi-flamers, and the Heavy Flamer terminator joined in. By the time the shooting was over, only Jain Zar remained. The Terminators finished the job, only losing two in the process. The Terminator Lord, however was of no help, as he was busy smacking himself in the face with his Bloodfeeder. Elsewhere on the table, plans were shifting a bit. My remaining unit of Berzerkers pulled back towards the closest objective, and the Raptors charged the Fire Prism on the hill. Again, thought, they could only stun it. The Defiler hung back near the objectives, keeping them contested as it continued lobbing ineffective shots at the Eldar troops.

Eldar Turn 3: The Dire Avengers did not like having the Raptors that close, and proceeded to Bladestorm them, but to little effect. They then swung around their wrecked transport and assaulted them. They managed to whittle away a couple of Raptors, but both sides remained locked in combat. The unstunned Fire Prism took a shot at the Land Raider, but once again could not penetrate its AV14 shell. On the other side of the field, the Brightlance Vyper took a shot at the Defiler, but failed to damage it. The Missile Launcher Vyper, on the other hand, set its sights on the withdrawing unit of Berzerkers and managed to kill a couple. The Jetbikes turbo-boosted towards my table edge in order to gain a 3+ cover save against Defiler artillery.

Chaos Turn 4: One Rhino pulled back to attempt to shield the Berzerkers from the Vypers, while the other attempted to ram the Missile Launcher Vyper. However, the fast skimmer darted out of the way. The Terminators moved up the hill, joining the Raptors in combat and evening the odds a bit. Together, though, they’re still unable to wipe out the Dire Avengers, and both sides remain locked. Again, the Terminator Lord was too busy keeping his Bloodfeeder under control to be of any assistance. The Land Raider wheeled around to fire its lascannons at one of the Fire Prisms. Once again, though, only a stun could be managed.

Eldar Turn 4: The melee on the hill finally concluded, as the Terminator Lord finally got his weapon to behave and butchered the Dire Avengers to a man. Elsewhere, though, the Eldar were more successful. The Brightlance Vyper landed a solid shot on the Defiler’s back armor and wrecked it, and the Missile Launcher Vyper finished off the other Berzerkers. Finally, the Fire Prism on the hill, unstunned again, destroyed the Rhino nearest to the objectives on my side of the board. Oh, and the Jetbikes? They just waited, out of range from any threats.

Chaos Turn 5: At this point, it became clear that I’d been outplayed. I moved one of my Rhinos back towards my objectives, but I can only manage to get in contesting range of one. The Land Raider will fare no better, so I take the opportunity to unload with both sets of lascannons on the far Fire Prism, finally immobilizing it. The  Terminators hang tight, as they have nothing they can contribute from their location, and the remaining two Raptors ineffectively assault the Fire Prism on the hill.

Eldar Turn 5: Coming in for the victory lap, the Jetbikes turbo-boosted to my objectives, claiming one of them.

Final Results: Eldar win, 1 objective to none.

I’m still getting used to an assault-y army, and in this case I got straight-up outplayed. I wasn’t as aggressive with my Defiler as I probably could have been; had I been going after Vypers with it, I might have kept my second unit of Berzerkers alive. That might have been enough to keep the Jetbikes from coming in relatively unmolested at the end. I also need to stop trying to assault Banshees with my Berzerkers; it never ends well for my side. I didn’t completely lose track of the mission, but in true Khornite fashion I got more interested in kills, and it cost me.

On the other hand, the Raptors did a fair job of keeping Dennis’s Fire Prisms tied up early on, which kept my units a bit safer, so I felt that they were well-utilized. I am contemplating swapping them for a third unit of Berzerkers in a Rhino, though. The price is roughly the same, and I could mount a Combi-Melta on the Rhino so as not to lose all the anti-armor capabilities. With more troops and some better play, I could have tied the game, if not won it outright.

I will say that there’s some luck involved, though. There’s some absolutely lousy rolling on both sides, but particularly on the Chaos side. Had the dice been more favorable to Krox’s opponent, he would have been in a much better position to overrun Krox’s positions. It’s a very hard-fought battle, though, for both sides, and I’m definitely leaning towards agreeing with Krox in the Null Deployment v. Alpha Strike debate.

If you haven’t had a chance to listen, my first podcast appearance is available for download now.  About 38 minutes in, Tim (“ThatDamnPunk”, or just “Punk”) talks briefly about his basic strategy with his Blood Angels: pin his enemy into a corner. Late Saturday night, we tried just that scenario out, as I ran my Tau against him. Our mission/deployment? Annihilation/Spearhead. We only managed to get two and a half turns in before we had to call the game on time, but the first two turns were the key to the game, and what happened is making me re-evaluate how I deploy my army, especially in Spearhead.

First, let me just say that Spearhead is my least favorite of the three standard deployment types. The deployment area is the smallest, and my opponent is closer than in any other deployment style. With 5th Edition’s strong support of assault armies, this is that much more dangerous for me. Invariably, my army ends up being plastered along the very back corner to try to maximize my distance from my opponent’s army. Hopefully, this can buy me a turn or two of firing and maneuvering out of the corner, splitting my army to attempt to pincer the enemy between two firing lanes. I can relieve the clutter in deployment by putting some things in reserve, such as my Fire Warriors. However, while this does allow me to deploy them later outside of the box, it takes away their firepower, weakening my first-turn “alpha strike” capability. This hurt me in my tournament earlier this year, when I faced Dark Eldar. Had I left the Fire Warriors on the field in deployment, their fire would have likely brought down a number of Raiders, but by putting them in reserves, I just left them to come on piecemeal and get taken apart by the oncoming horde.

Against Tim’s Blood Angels, though, even this Alpha Strike plan didn’t work. He went first (with me failing to seize the initiative), and proceeded to, well, pin me in the corner. Between his Baal Predators rushing me with 30″ of movement (a 18″ flat out Scout move, plus 12″ of normal movement), and dropping two of his three drop pods right in my deployment area (each of which contained a Furioso Dreadnought and a Locator Beacon), he boxed me in and opened fire. Before I could even take a turn, I was down a Piranha and a Hammerhead, and my avenues for movement were highly restricted. I was able to get a bit of revenge on my turn, though. A combination of markerlight and railgun fire brought down one of the Predators, and I was able to remove the melta from one of the Furiosos. My Crisis Suits were able to start moving out a bit, but quarters were still a bit tight.

Turn two saw two of his Assault Squads deep-striking in, but because of the scattered units in and around the drop pod locations, denying him the use of his Locator Beacons. Still, he was able to drop one squad just behind my Crisis Suits, winning the gamble that he wouldn’t scatter. He proceeded to disarm my remaining Piranha, kill one of my Deathrains, and slaughter my Pathfinders in assault with a Furioso. Thankfully, the crater left from the Hammerhead I’d lost slowed down his other Furioso, keeping it out of assault with my Fireknives. In response, I had two squads of Fire Warriors come in around the middle of my board edge, and I opened fire on his forces with what I had left. A railgun round destroyed a Dreadnought, my remaining Deathrain disarmed his remaining Predator, and my Fireknives and Commander whittled away half of one of his Assault Squads.

However, even with the injuries I’d dealt him, it just wasn’t proving enough to stop him. His third turn (the last turn we played) saw his Librarian and Honor Guard dropping in near my Fire Warriors, my last Deathrain eliminated by an untouched Assault Squad, and my Fireknives caught in a pincer assault between his remaining Dreadnought and the remnants of his other Assault Squad. I was quickly running out of firepower, and once again, massed pulse rifle fire from my Fire Warriors had not made any scratches in a unit with Sanguinary Priests. At that point, we called the game, extrapolating out that while I might be able to bloody him some more, he definitely had the upper hand.

Clearly, this game was lost for me in the first turn. Even with what casualties I was able to inflict in return, I could not overcome the momentum of that initial tank/pod rush. The Alpha Strike strategy doesn’t work if you don’t get the first turn, and even if I had, what would I have had to shoot at? Two Baal Predators, and that’s all. My best bet would have been to leave the corner entirely and avoid getting boxed in. As more and more armies get solid fast/deep-striking options, I’m beginning to really question whether or not I should deploy at all. To paraphrase Monty Python, the first lesson of not being seen is not to stand up. If I don’t want to be targetted, I shouldn’t present one in the first place.

This brings me to the Null Deployment idea. Should I, instead, deploy as little as possible on the table? One strategy that got some traction in Tau circles shortly after 5th Edition was released was the Ninja Tau plan. This involved using a Shas’O Commander with a Positional Relay, usually with a Shield Generator and Shield Drones for maximum survivability. He would avoid fire as long as possible, bringing in one unit a turn to keep the rest of the army off the table until turn 4 or 5, when everything else would sweep in and catch the enemy off-guard in a “Delta Strike” of sorts. There’s something very attractive about this plan. It denies my opponent anything beyond the HQ (and possibly 2 troops in Dawn of War) to target, and neutralizes much of their battle plan. It also negates the “piecemeal army” effect of putting things into reserve, while allowing you to pull out units that can be useful on their own, such as Hammerheads and Broadsides and the like. On the other hand, it’s entirely dependent on the survival of that Shas’O; if he dies, the entire plan falls apart and you’re left with an army that comes out in small, uncontrolled clumps. With all the melta that’s popular in armies today, there are a lot of weapons out there that can easily double-out the Commander with one hit.

The Alpha Strike is too dependent on getting the first turn. The Null Deployment is too dependent on keeping one unit alive for four turns. Is there a middle ground? Perhaps it’s a matter of running a Positional Relay commander with a firebase of some sort, and then bringing in the heavy artillery as needed. It’s more of a Kauyon-style plan, but it might work. I don’t know if I would use Fire Warriors as the firebase, though, especially in any sort of objective-based mission. You need them to be able to grab/contest objectives late in the game. Perhaps it’s a Crisis Suit-based firebase, with Deathrains and Broadsides taking aim at the oncoming enemy while Piranhas, Hammerheads, and Fire Warriors in Devilfish sweep in late in the game. It’s going to take some doing, and more playing and testing, to figure out just the right strategy.

Last night, I got in my first game against the new Blood Angels… and it wasn’t pretty.

My friend Tim was a Dark Angels player in 4th Edition, but the newest edition (and especially the vanilla Marine codex) have not been kind to that army, so he’d been taking a bit of a break from the game until the Blood Angels were announced. Now that the actual codex is available for reading and list-building, he’s been contemplating several different builds, and last night he settled on one to try out against my MechTau+Pathfinders army. With 1500 points, he built something like this:

• Captain Tycho, Brother Corbulo, and 6 Sternguard Veterans in a drop pod
• Furioso Librarian Dreadnought in a drop pod
• Baal Predator w/ TL assault cannons and extra armor
• 2 11-man Assault Squads, each with 2 meltaguns, a sergeant w/an infernus pistol, and a sanguinary priest w/ an infernus pistol

Lately, our group has been enjoying playing missions out of the new Battle Missions book, so we rolled up a themed mission and ended up with Surprise Attack. This was probably the best mission we could have rolled up for Tim’s army. I was on the defense, having to deploy my army at least 12″ from all table edges, and with no unit being less than 6″ away from any other. This left my army a bit scattered and disorganized. Meanwhile, his entire army entered on turn 1 from any and all table edges – and anything that could deep strike could do so on the first turn. This ended up putting his assault squads and dreadnought scattered amongst my armor, his veterans within rapid-fire range of my Fireknife suits, and his Baal Predator coming off the side of the board near my Piranhas. By the time his first turn was over, I’d lost one Piranha, the fusion blaster off the other one, and both Hammerheads; not a good situation for me to start with.

The rest of the game became became a game of cat-and-mouse, as I tried to pull away from his forces and focus fire on them. Sadly, most of my guns proved ineffective thanks to the Sanguinary Priests in each unit. Combining a 3+ armor save with Feel No Pain made it nearly impossible for pulse fire to stick. My Fireknives, on the other hand, were much more effective. In one round, they decimated Tycho’s unit of veterans, reducing it to Tycho (with two wounds), Corbulo (with one wound), and one remaining Sternguard, partially thanks to some very lucky fire with the Cyclic Ion Blaster – I managed to roll three 6s on my wounding rolls, meaning they ignored FNP. I also had some luck with the remaining Piranha’s gun drones, which managed to disarm the Predator with a shot to the rear armor. I then finished it off with more rear armor hits from a unit of Fire Warriors. Unfortunately, they and their Devilfish got picked off by the Furioso, thanks to a combination of Blood Lance and assaulting. My Deathrains had a chance to pick it off on my first turn, but both hits failed to penetrate its armor – my cursed dice rolling left me with two rolls of 2.

We called the game at the end of turn 4, as the only thing I had surviving was my Piranha; I had given up a ton of kill points – 20, due to the rules for Surprise Attack – and had only managed to get 2 for the Baal Predator. Partially, this is due to the scenario; it strongly favored the Deep Strike-heavy assault army that Tim was playing, and left me scattered across the board with my units unable to easily support one another. Also, there’s the MVPs of his army – Sanguinary Priests and Infernus Pistols. The combination of melta-heavy assault forces and ICs that give them Feel No Pain and Furious Charge was just killer; I was losing one or two vehicles each turn, and I just couldn’t deal enough damage in return to finish anything off. I did heavy damage to him – of his original 11-man assault squads, he had only 7 marines left between them, and his HQ/veteran squad was nearly wiped out. Unfortunately, I couldn’t seal the deal and finish off any of them. As an assault-heavy army, they were more than a match for my Tau, even with their reduced numbers.

Despite my poor showing, I don’t think it’s hopeless against the Blood Angels. It is an uphill battle, but other scenarios won’t necessarily favor them so strongly. Like other Marine armies, they’ve got a low model count, so it doesn’t take a lot of casualties to weaken them. It’s a matter of keeping them at arm’s length for as long as possible and focusing fire. It’ll be tough, thanks to the fact that, at least in this case, they’re a deep-striking army that only scatters half as far as other deep strikers. Tim was able to drop his army pretty much where he needed them, and they served him very well. Fortunately, in most scenarios he won’t get to drop all of them in on the first turn.

Images © Games Workshop.

My three friends (Dan, Dennis, and Richard) and I wanted to do something a bit different, so we got the materials together to set up a second table last week, all ready for two simultaneous games. On table 1, I faced off against Dan. Table 2 had Dennis and Richard. Each of us brought a 1500-point army of our choice:

• Me: my 1500-point Khorne list
• Dan: his Salamander list: Vulkan He’stan, a Master of the Forge, two dreads w/multi-meltas, an Ironclad dread, 2 5-man Terminator squads, and 2 10-man Tactical Squads
• Dennis: his “Sampler Platter” Eldar list: basically, a Court of the Young King (Avatar plus one of squad of each of the following w/exarch: Dire Avengers, Dark Reapers, Fire Dragons, Howling Banshees, and Shining Spears), a unit of Pathfinders, a unit of Jetbike Guardians, a unit of Harlequins, and a Fire Prism
• Richard: his new Tyranid list: Swarmlord with two Tyrant Guards, a unit of Gargoyles, a small squad of Hormagaunts, a unit of Genestealers w/ a Broodlord, a Warrior Alpha with three extra Warriors, and 6 Raveners in reserve

To keep things relatively simple (which will become important in a moment), we went with Pitched Battle/Annihilation for our mission. Lists in hand and armies deployed, we each took our first turns. For Dan and I, it mostly involved a bit of movement, along with some fire from my Defiler that immobilized one of his dreads. On Dennis and Richard’s table, the Eldar unleashed a fusillade of fire that wiped out the Gargoyles and the Tyrant Guards, and put three wounds on the Broodlord.

With everyone’s first turn wrapped up, we then each shifted one place to the left. Our armies stayed where they were, but the players changed. I moved to the Eldar position, Dennis was now facing off against his own Eldar as the Tyranids, Richard went across the room to play as the Salamanders, and Dan took control of my Khorne Marines. Keeping things simple with the mission made it easy to pick up a new army, since the only goal was to kill your opponent’s force. On our table, the second turn saw a lot of killing. The Raveners came out of reserves, but suffered a mishap and ended up burrowing from the ground at their own board edge. The Genestealers made quick work of the Shining Spears, the Hormagaunts tore into the Fire Dragons, and the Swarmlord leeched life from the Howling Banshees right before he charged into them and finished them off. In return, I sent the Avatar forward to get into a Monstrous-Creature-on-Monstrous-Creature fight with the Swarmlord, but my dice betrayed me. Two bonesaber hits later, the Avatar fell. Meanwhile, the Harlequins managed to go toe-to-toe with the Warriors and survive, at least for a little while.

On the next turn, we switched again, and now I was in the ‘Nid’s spot, facing off against Dan again. The Swarmlord once again tried to leech life, this time from the Jetbiker Guardian squad, but couldn’t manage to land a hit. Instead, the Raveners made good use of their beastly speed to assault the jetbikers, devouring them in one turn. The Warriors managed to finish off the Harlequins, but were down to half their former numbers, and the Genestealers, stranded across the length of the table, began the steady slog to get into assault range of anything. The last Fire Dragon fell against the Hormagaunts as well. However, the Eldar began to strike back in seriousness. Bladestorming Dire Avengers cut down the Hormagaunts, and the Swarmlord fell to Pathfinder fire, including 3(!) AP1 sniper hits. The Fire Prism took fire as it could, picking off some of the Genestealers.

Turn four saw me in the Salamanders position, fighting against my own Khorne army (now in Dennis’s hands). The Ironclad and the formerly-immobilized Dreadnought (repaired by the Master of the Forge) had closed into assault with the Defiler, and all three had ended immobilized, locked in combat until one side or the other was destroyed. Fortunately, on the Chaos turn, the Ironclad slammed into the Dreadnought with a Seismic Hammer, causing it to explode and clearing line-of-sight. Across the table, Vulkan was swarmed by Chaos Terminators (his own Terminators having died the turn before), but before they could close in he and the Chaos Lord slew one another. The other Dreadnought was in the combat as well and picked off one of the remaining Chaos Terminators. With the Ironclad out of assault, it took the chance on the Loyalists’s turn to open fire with its hurricane bolters at one of the Berzerker squads that had just disembarked on its way to cut down the remnants of the last Tactical Squad. By the time the smoked cleared (with extra fire from the Master of the Forge and the other MM Dread), only one Berzerker remained in that squad. Back on Vulkan’s side of the table, the other Berzerkers had disembarked, ready to run at the Dreadnought.

On the fifth turn, everyone was back at their original positions, and I had to make the best of what I had left. From my original force, I still had:

• Two Rhinos
• One Land Raider
• Two Terminators
• One squad of one Berzerker
• One untouched squad of Berzerkers

I ran the whole Berzerker squad up to assault the Dreadnought attacking their Terminator brothers, and the Skull Champion’s power fist made short work of the metal foe (although one Berzerker did die in the resulting explosion). The lone Berzerker on the other side of the table ran up to assault the three remaining Tactical marines, killing one with bolt pistol fire. In assault, though, all were equally matched and no wounds were struck by either side. The Land Raider pulled forward and fired on one of the remaining Dreadnoughts, but failed to damage it.

Both games ended up ending on Turn 5, and the final tallies were:

• Khorne Marines v. Salamanders: Khorne wins, 5 kill points to 3
• Eldar v. Tyranids: Tyranids win, 8 kill points to 4 (the Eldar had only the Dark Reapers and the Fire Prism remaining, while the Tyranids still had their Warriors, Raveners, and Genestealers standing)

It was a really interesting and fun night. Having to suddenly jump into a new army gives you a new perspective into how that army plays and what its strengths and weaknesses are. I also really enjoyed getting a chance to see the new ‘Nids in action, both as the player and as the opponent. I’m glad I’m not facing them with my Tau; they have to be one of the fastest assault armies I’ve ever seen, and I don’t think I could do enough damage to them before they closed in and made short work of me. In the end, a good time was had by all, and I have a feeling this won’t be the last time we do this. If you get a chance to try out this sort of player shuffling, I highly recommend it; it’s really fun!

Round 1
Deployment: Spearhead
Mission: Seize Ground (5 Objectives), with Kill Points as a secondary objective
Opponent: Dark Eldar

This was the first time I’ve ever faced a Dark Eldar army, and while I knew roughly what to expect, I didn’t know all the details. This, combined with a bit of first-round nerves, led me to make a few critical tactical mistakes. Spearhead is my least favorite deployment format anyway, and against a fast assault army it leaves me at a distinct disadvantage. I left my Fire Warriors in reserve, which was a mistake in retrospect. Had I deployed them along the back edges of my corner, I would have had a gunline that could have been putting out 30″ shots. My opponent went first, and on turn 1 managed to get one of his two Archons in assault with my HQ unit. Amazingly enough, I managed to lock that Archon in melee for two turns, and actually came out on top. I lost my bodyguards and shield drones (which kept me alive) and took two wounds on my commander in the process, though, which left him weakened against the Wyches which followed. Meanwhile, I was able to thin out two of his Warrior squads with Hammerhead submunitions, but that left two more – one in a Raider, one in ruins near an objective, that I could not destroy. The sheer number of lance weapons I had to face kept my vehicles stunned, and my Fire Warriors coming on piecemeal were wiped out one by one. I managed to wipe out one unit of Warriors, destroy one Ravager, and disarm and disable a Raider, but in the end my army’s setup worked against me. I lost two objectives to none, and fifteen kill points to three.

Round 2
Deployment: Dawn of War
Mission: Cut Off the Head (see below), with Capture and Control as a secondary objective
Opponent: Space Marines (Imperial Fists)

The mission was an Annihilation variation – kill points counted, but only after you had killed one of your opponent’s HQ choices. Anything before that did not count towards the objective (but did provide bonus points for the overall standings). My opponent chose to deploy and go second, and deployed nothing before the game. I mostly concentrated my forces in one corner (near my objective), but kept my Piranhas, one Hammerhead, and one Devilfish in the other corner. His army itself consisted of two Land Raiders containing terminators – one with Lysander and Storm Shield/Thunderhammers, and one with a Chaplain – and two Razorbacks containing five-man tactical squads.  He moved them up the middle on his first turn. I responded on turn two by destroying one Razorback and immobilizing the Chaplain’s Land raider with railgun and missile fire. In return, he started moving up Lysander’s Land Raider and destroyed the Devilfish. I eventually lost the Piranhas to lascannon and assault cannon fire, and didn’t manage to do much beyond shaking the mobile Land Raider. I did manage to immobilize the other Razorback about 5 inches from his objective. Unfortunately, without the lighter vehicles as targets, most of my army was left with nothing to target. Lysander and his escort did get out twice; once to kill my Deathrains, and once to kill an immobilized Hammerhead, but beyond that I had few opportunities to kill his HQ. I kept mine on the edge of the board and out of LOS. In the end, no one was claiming either objective uncontested, and no HQs had been destroyed, so no kill points were awarded. With that, the game ended in a draw.

Round 3
Deployment: Pitched Battle
Mission: Once More Into the Breach (see below)
Opponent: Eldar

This was an interesting mission. It was a variation on kill points, but instead of points being awarded for killing units, they were awarded for forcing a morale check by causing 25% casualties during the Shooting phase (even if the check couldn’t fail). Every such check awarded to shooter one point. There was also a secondary objective that awarded points for destroying enemy units in assault. My opponent was running a hybrid Eldar list – one maximum-size Jetbike squad with a Warlock, a Jetbike Farseer with Fortune and Doom that ran with them, two Wave Serpents filled withFire Dragons, two units of Pathfinders, and a Falcon for heavy support. Being mechanized was to my advantage in this game, since my vehicles couldn’t give up points, with one exception: the gun drones. Early on, one of my Piranhas was destroyed by an immobilizing Pulse Laser shot, which caused the squadron’s drones to all disembark together. One was then killed by shuriken cannon fire from the jetbikes, forcing a morale check. The other Piranha ended up getting revenge against the Falcon, however. His Jetbikes spent half the game turbo-boosted, and along with the Farseer’s Fortune, that made landing any wounds on them difficult. The other challenge was not landing too many wounds. On two occasions, both against his Pathfinders, I managed to do so many wounds that the unit was wiped out before a morale check could be taken. Eventually, though, his Jetbikes had to slow down to take shots, and that opened them up to my attacks. I managed to force two morale checks against them in turns 5 and 6. I also forced two checks on his Fire Dragons, but not before he forced checks against my Deathrains and Fireknives. At the end of turn six, we were tied on shooting morale checks with four each. The secondary objective never came into play; we had one assault at the end of the game, with three of his Fire Dragons against my one remaning Fireknife, but neither group could hurt the other. Again, the game ended in a draw.

So, one loss and two draws. Not as good a performance as I’d hoped, but I did hold my own, more or less. Once again, a fast assault army was my undoing; this just shows that I need to practice against such armies more, especially in Spearhead deployment games. Still, I had a great time, and I hope I can attend another event sometime this year (although the schedules rarely work with mine). On a side note, my friend Dennis, who played the other Eldar army at the tournament, came in just shy of getting third place, so congratulations are in order to him!!

• Farseer on a Jetbike w/Fortune and Mind War, along with a Jetbike Seer Council
• Harlequin Troupe w/ Death Jester
• Howling Banshees w/ Jain Zar and an Exarch w/ Mirrorswords, all packed in a Wave Serpent w/ TL Bright Lances
• 2 squads of Jetbike Guardians w/ Warlocks and Shuriken Cannons

Our mission was Seize Ground, with 3 objectives, with a Spearhead deployment. Unfortunately, I don’t have a fully-detailed battle report to give – it’s been a week or so, and some of the specifics are fuzzy, but I can give you the highlights.

Eldar went first, and I was unable to seize initiative.

First turn, the Wave Serpent managed to immobilize my Land Raider, which slowed down my Terminators significantly. Fortunately, this still left my LR with clear lanes of fire for one TL Lascannon and the TL Heavy Bolters, so it wasn’t a total loss. On my first turn, that came into play, as the heavy bolters tore into the Harlequins, who had deployed just a bit far forward for their own good. The combi-flamer on one of my Rhinos did a bit more cleanup, and the Berserkers themselves finished them off on Turn 2.

By the end of Turn 2, I had Berzerkers on two objectives. This didn’t last; Turn 3 saw the Banshees near the objective, so I tried my luck at charging them with one squad of  Berzerkers. This was not a bright move, but I learned something very important – Banshees will beat Berzerkers every time thanks to acting at Initiative 10, and it’s doubly bad when Jain Zar is involved. The other squad of Berzerkers left its objective to charge at objective #3, held by a group of Jetbike Guardians. By turn 5, the objective was firmly in the hands of Chaos.

Turn 3 also saw my Raptors enter play from reserve, and I deep struck them right next to one squad of Guardians. They managed to get off a couple of melta shots, but they ended up getting caught between Shuriken Cannon fire and Destructor templates from the Seer Council. In the end, they only managed to be a fire magnet for one turn before being destroyed. However, they kept fire off of the Terminators, which gave them an extra turn to close in with the Eldar.

The Terminators held their own, a tribute to their survivability. The Chaos Lord lost a Mind War with the Farseer, but only took two wounds, leaving him injured but still able to fight. They managed to close ranks with the Seer Council, which tied up both squads for at least two turns. In the end, though, I brought my Berzerkers hooking around a wall and into the Council’s rear, and the pincer attack finished off the Council. I was able to consolidate back onto the objective at the end of turn 5, and the game was mine. The other unit of Guardians had been finished off by Defiler cannon fire.

Unfortunately for me, the game went 7 turns. On turn 6, the Banshees crashed into my 4 remaining Terminators, and they were locked in combat. However, on my half of the turn, my Chaos Lord was betrayed by his Blood Feeder (thanks to rolling a 1), which left him unable to drop any attacks on Jain Zar. Had he been able to swing, he probably would have finished her off. As is, she killed him, and the rest of her unit took care of the remaining Termies. On turn 7, they assaulted the Berzerkers, and I got a repeat of turn 3. At the end of 7, neither of us had any troops to hold objectives, so we fell back to kill points, and the Eldar came out slightly ahead.

I can’t say that I was unhappy with my army’s performance. Had the game only gone 5 or 6 turns, I would have won 1-0. Against anything but Banshees, my assault troops did very well, and my crippled Land Raider was still able to provide fire support. The Defiler wasn’t quite as great as I’d hoped, although the battle cannon was great against Jetbike Guardians – a unit with a large footprint like that means that even with some scatter, I was still landing direct hits, and the STR8 AP3 hits were deadly. Getting the Defiler into assault, though, proved trickier against a highly mobile army (and I got some terrible Run rolls as well, which kept its Fleetness from being a benefit). The Banshees were the bane of my army, though. When I’ve run my Tau against Dennis’s Eldar, I can deal with them at range. With Khorne CSMs, that’s not as much of an option. I’d hoped that I could kill the Wave Serpent early on (which I never managed to do), but once its passengers had disembarked, they just cut a swath of power weapon death across the board.

Would I change anything? Not yet. One battle against one opponent does not provide enough info one way or another. I need to run it against the other armies in our playgroup – Orks, Dark Angels, Salamanders, and even my own Tau (if someone doesn’t mind giving them a spin). I think I have a good start, though; I just need more data, and then I can start tweaking. In the meantime, I’m going to start working on CSM army #2, a Black Legion force with Abaddon at the lead.

HQ: Forgefather Vulkan He’stan (1#, 190 pts)
1 Forgefather Vulkan He’stan

HQ: Space Marine Chapter Master (1#, 190 pts)
1 Space Marine Chapter Master (Artificer Armour; Bolter x1; Power Sword x1; Auxiliary Grenade Launcher; Digital Weapons; Hellfire Rounds)

Troops: Tactical Squad (10#, 175 pts)
9 Tactical Squad (Bolter x7; Flamer; Missile Launcher)
1 Sergeant (Melta Bombs; Bolt Pistol; Chainsword)

Troops: Tactical Squad (10#, 175 pts)
9 Tactical Squad (Bolter x7; Flamer; Missile Launcher)
1 Sergeant (Melta Bombs; Bolt Pistol; Chainsword)

Elite: Dreadnought (1#, 120 pts)
Dreadnought (Extra Armor; Dreadnought CCW; Storm Bolter; Twin Linked Heavy Flamer)

Elite: Dreadnought (1#, 120 pts)
Dreadnought (Extra Armor; Dreadnought CCW; Storm Bolter; Twin Linked Heavy Flamer)

Elite: Ironclad Dreadnought (1#, 175 pts)
Ironclad Dreadnought (Hunter-Killer Missile(s) x2; Ironclad Assault Launchers; Seismic Hammer; Heavy Flamer; Hurricane Bolter)

Fast Attack: Assault Squad (10#, 255 pts)
9 Assault Squad (Bolt Pistol x7; Flamer x2)
1 Sergeant (Thunder Hammer; Storm Shield)

Heavy Support: Thunderfire Cannon (1#, 100 pts)
1 Thunderfire Cannon
1 Techmarine Gunner

Total Roster Cost: 1500

Note that there are no transports, or really any mechanized capability. That’s mostly because Dan doesn’t own any yet, but something that we may rectify before the end of the year. For now, it’s all foot slogging.

Anyway, the mission was Seize Ground (4 objectives), with a Spearhead deployment. He put almost everything on the table – a tac squad on each of his two objectives, a fan of HQs and elites between them, and the cannon perched on top of a hill. Meanwhile, the assault squad was held in reserve. I paired up my Devilfish with my Railheads, and kept all my suits in reserve. I went first, and he chose not to attempt seizing the initiative.

Tau Turn 1: I move my ‘fish out towards two objectives – one unclaimed, one currently held. I fire submunitions with my Railheads; one shot scatters off-target, while the other ends up taking out 3 marines from a tac squad.

Space Marine Turn 1: His fan of heavy hitters spreads out a bit. He tries landing shots from his Thunderfire on one of my Railheads. All either scatter off or fail to penetrate armor, a trend that continues for most of the game.

Tau Turn 2: 3 of my 4 Crisis Suit units come in from reserves, leaving only the two Deathrains remaining. I want to focus fire as much as possible, but his forces are still clustered in one quarter of the board. I make a gamble and start deep-striking my suits around the far end of the “fan”, near one of the held objectives. The HQ squad scatters near the heart of the fan, next to his Ironclad. The Fireknives scatter near Vulkan. The fusion suits scatter little. I bring up the oncoming fish and disembark my FWs within rapid fire range. The Fire Warriors unload on the Tac Squad, and leave only one survivor – the marine with the flamer. He breaks and starts running for the nearest long table edge. The fusion team fires on the nearest Dreadnought, which explodes – catching 3 of the FWs in the blast. The shooting falls apart after that. The Fireknives are unable to land but one wound on Vulkan, and the HQ team only manages to clear out 3 more marines from the other objective. Meanwhile the Hammerheads fail to do anything useful.

Space Marine Turn 2: Things start to fall apart for me here. The lone flamer marine rallies, and the fan of elites reverses itself, closing in on the HQ team. The Thunderfire cannon takes out two of the three fusion suits with a 4-shot barrage. My FWs are lined up neatly under the Devilfish – all within flamer range, and the marines claim revenge. Only 2 FWs from that team remain. The heavy flamers and hurricane bolters on the remaining dreadnoughts fail to make much of a dent in the HQ team, but they more than make up for it in assault, along with the Chapter Master, who slaughter that squad. Vulkan cuts down one Fireknife and catches the other two in a sweeping advance. The flamer marine charges the remaining FWs, and they lock each other up in combat.

Tau Turn 3: My gamble has backfired, and now most of my firepower is dead or unavailable. Vulkan shrugs off a railgun round thanks to his mantle, but is not so lucky against the gun drones on the Devilfish – a second wound is inflicted. The remaining fusion suit is unable to land a wound on him, though, and tries to jump away. More submunitions from the other Hammerhead, but still 4 marines stubbornly sit on the other objective. All this time, the other ‘fish is sitting on an uncontested objective across the board.

Space Marine Turn 3: The Assault Team comes in from reserve, deep-striking near the rest of the carnage and within assault range of the empty Devilfish. The dreadnoughts flank around the bastion in the middle of the table and each start moving towards a different Hammerhead. Vulkan ducks behind the bastion, hoping to avoid taking any more fire. The Ironclad launches an HK missile at a Railhead, but misses. The fusion suit is finished off by a krak missile shot from the remaining Tac Squad. Assault, on the other hand, does not go as well – a Fire Warrior falls, but his last remaining squadmate takes out the final marine.

Tau Turn 4: The Deathrain team still refuses to come in from reserves. The lone Fire Warrior re-embarks in his ‘fish and tries to move away from the Assault Team. The Hammerheads reposition and fire, but no damage is dealt.

Space Marine Turn 4: The fan closes in on its targets and goes straight into assault (prefixed by a second ineffectual HK shot). The thunder hammer in the assault squad makes short work of the Devilfish, causing it to explode and kill its passenger. The Ironclad drops its Hammerhead with one solid blow. The Chapter Master tries to get into a good position to drop an Orbital Bombardment on the remaining Devilfish. Vulkan remains near the bastion, biding his time.

Tau Turn 5: The Deathrain team drops in within flamer range of the remaining 4 Tac Squad members in hopes of clearing them out. Another railgun round misses, but the Deathrain flamers do not – two marines die, and the squad breaks and moves off of the objective. The Devilfish swings around behind a building, but still within capture range of the objective, denying the Chapter Master line of sight.

Space Marine Turn 5: The last two marines rally and move back onto the objective. Vulkan charges the Deathrains, finishing them off in assault. Meanwhile, the normal Dreadnought and the Assault Squad catch the remaining Hammerhead in a pincer move. The Dreadnought lands a hit, immobilizing the tank, and the assault squad’s thunder hammer finishes the job.

The game ends after Turn 5, with each of us holding an objective. Falling back to kill points to resolve the tie, he clearly came out ahead. So, what important lessons did I learn?

1. Don’t underestimate Dreadnoughts. I ignored these early on because they were focused on assault, something that I didn’t consider to be a threat to my tanks. In the end, my tanks fell to them in assault. That’s a mistake I won’t be making again.
2. Deep-striking within assault range is a bad idea. I thought I had enough firepower to seal the deal and clear out what was in my deep strike target zone. I didn’t, and it left me with my pants down. I lost almost all my heavy hitters in one turn because of it. I had firepower, sure, but the targets I couldn’t clear survived because they were just that resilient. I needed more turns of firepower, and that meant that I needed to deep strike further away.
3. Better control of reserves is necessary. I’m considering modifying the list to fit in a positional relay for the command suit. Having most of my suits come in on turn 2 wasn’t to my advantage, and neither was having the Deathrains coming in on the last turn. It would require me to keep my HQ suit out of reserve, but I think it might just be worthwhile. Alternately, I may just keep a couple of units in reserve (probably the fusion suits and the Deathrains), and keep the rest out and able to harass from turn one.
4. Vulkan He’stan is a bad-ass. He’s killer in assault, he’s damn near impossible to kill, and his special ability does great things for the army. He is not to be underestimated.

So, I dust myself off, tweak my tactics, and try again… and just remember that next time, Dan might be Drop Podding that army into place.