For the Emprah!

Citizens rejoice, the minions of chaos have been given a bloody nose as loyal soldiers of the Imperium have go over to the offensive.  A combined arms attachment have defeated a daemon incursion bought about by the foul rites of a traitor marine coven and their damned followers.

James and Rob bought over a bunch of toys and we played 3,000 points a side of 40K. We set up on long table edges with six objectives and played with the maelstrom of war tactical cards, three per side.

James had his Grey Knights, assisted by Exorcists and an Inquisitor. Rob had Guard, Sisters and Marines – so pretty much every loyal faction was represented.

Opposing them were Chaos Space Marines and Slaanesh Daemons.  Having had a narrow win in a bruising encounter against the Grey Knights last time we met I was quietly confident. After all I had a bunch of terminators ready to deep strike and three vindicators. What could possibly go wrong?Quite a bit, it turns out.  Did you know that Grey Knights can deep strike on turn one?

Hey Sisters, I think I’m going to need some help over here

Chosen about to be minced

Daemonettes showing the correct way to deal with GK Terminators

The other wing didn’t quite go as planned either. A rock hard unit of noise marines were kebabbed by a different sort of Sister:

I think there were some sternguard there too

The eviserator wielding priest is close to MVP for mine. He tore up some Noise Marines, a couple of Word Bearers and a Vindicator. Not a bad day’s work for the frothing chap.

And to add insult to injury, my sorcerer got turned into a spawn when winning against a Canoness was deemed unworthy:

The role of spawn was bought to you today by Syd the Arcanasaur

(Spawn was subsequently caught milling about in open and hosed by bolters or lasguns or something else undignified like that.)

Back on the other wing things didn’t get any better. While I was dealing with the Grey Knight terminators a dread knight showed up and, while it took several turns, stomped on the remaining daemonettes.

Hint for novice daemonettes: for rending to work you need to roll 6s

The cultists did well by their drug addled standards. After milling about in some mud-filled craters they successfully charged a unit of Legion of the Damned and went on to seize an objective! Too little too late to change the outcome, however.

A big shout out to the boys in Imperial Tower. Psykers turing 6s into rending shots on targeted units, with some old-fashioned Guard fire discipline can really mess up your day:

Well done boys.

The final margin can be judged by the height of the two piles. A clear victory to the Imperium.

The changing situation bought on by the tactical cards really can bring a game to life. I still like missions with clear objectives but the fluidity required to win with the tactical cards brings a fun level of chaos and some genuine generalship challenges to a game as you seek to exploit the hand you’re dealt.

So on a beautiful, sunny day in the Republic of Northcote it was a pleasure to be inside playing dollies.

Thanks Lads.

How do you stop an Imperial Knight?

The Republic of Northcote faced an incursion from James’ Grey Knights, who just to mix things up a little bit bought along an Imperial Knight.  Not just any IK, but Gerantius!

Brevet Gerontis; but still a very nice lend lease Imperial Knight

We played 1,500 points and used the tactical objective cards. So with 500 points on imperial knight, the Grey Knights took a venerable dreadnought, one of those monster dreadnought things and a couple of tooled up squads (including some paladins).

How to stop an Imperial Knight?  Well, my Word Bearers experimented with a couple of terminator filled land raiders.  I took a couple of squads of cultists (because it is always funny to see cultists dying horribly) and allied a slaneesh herald and some deamonettes.

Sharp eyes will spot two squads of daemons. The second were summoned by the herald

It was not a good day for the Imperium.  They just couldnt’ bring enough fire to bear, a disasterous deep strike saw the Lord and retinue sucked into the warp. Ouch!  This was, of course, the culmination of decades of subtle plotting by my Word Bearers.

How to stop 500 points of Imperial Knight?  Avoid the enemy deep striking into your deployment zone and then unleash 1,000 points of Land Raider-Terminator combo on the big boy.  Not cost effective but very satisfying.

Final score 10 VP to 5 VP; imperial tacticians are already plotting the next likely move of the traitors. This is good, because it will give a chance for chaos spys to steal the plans and so avoid the need to develop any for themselves (leaving more time for partying at the temple).

cheers,
D.

Sisters and Grey Knights to the rescue

Faith & Steel are pleased to report that Dr. Elphinstone Mercator, along with certain mysterious artefacts, have been rescued from heretics and aliens by a combined Sisters of Battle-Grey Knights force.

Dr. Mercator sent out a distress signal from his research station on XT-1984, a world accessible by permit only due to the prevalence of xeno-archaeology, after he became aware of a combined Tau-Chaos threat. How the Tau and Chaos came to be operating together is uncertain.  Indicative of the importance placed on Dr Mercator’s work, a rapid-response Sisters of Battle force was available in orbit, who deployed immediately.  A Grey Knight company also linked with the Sisters – their presence unexpected but welcome. Inquisition spokes-servitors would not comment on “operational matters” beyond noting that the company has been tracking a recurring source of daemonic incursions for some time.

There you have it folks: War was had over the weekend. Two on two, Tau and Chaos versus Sisters and Grey Knights, 3,000 points a side. The Imperium won out this time, rescuing the archaeologist and capturing three mysterious objectives.

With multiple players still learning 7th ed, we kept things simple. Purely by chance we all had bound lists and at least one psyker on each side.  We set up three objectives (scattered randomly) along the centre line. We also decided on a xeno-archaeologist and used the same rules as the relic to represent his capture or rescue.

Pictures follow.

The Tau go hard early and grab the archaeologist

A gutsy deep strike from a Nemesis dreadnought takes out the Tau Ethereal, turning the game

Chaos’ turn to seize Dr Mercator

But the Sisters and GK win out

Chaos Lord goes hard, but not hard enough

Saint Celestine’s finest moment: purging the heretics with fire and sword

Thanks James (Grey Knights), John (Sisters) and Oli (Tau) for a great day of gaming.

Until next time – I’ll be back as soon as Slaneesh lets me have some more daemonettes (I don’t think this is the last we will hear of the mysterious XT-1984)

D.