Win, Lose or Draw...

Played 3 games on thursday Win, Draw and Loss

First game was against Red Corsair Chaos Marines.

Huron and 9 Marines with Power Weapon, Plasma Pistol and a Meltagun in a Rhino
Chaos Lord with MoK, Terminator Armour, Daemon Weapon & Combi Melta, 10 Marines with Meltagun, Flamer, Power Fist and Icon of Glory in Land Raider
10 Chaos Space Marines w Heavy bolter, Power Weapon, plasma pistol and Plasma Gun in a Rhino
Daemonic Vindicator
Tri-Las Predator.

I used:

Librarian, Corbulo, 6 RAS with Thunderhammer and Melta in Rhino
5DC with Fist and PW in Flamerback
6 RAS with Lightning Claw and Meltagun in a TLACorback
6 RAS with Lightning Claw and Meltagun in TLACorback
2 Vindicators
3 individual Meltabikes

The game was Capture and Hold, and the deployment was quarters.

I wanted to test out the fast Vindis so ran them together with an attack bike round the side of a big bunker partially covered so they could nip out 12" then drop a pair of pie plates on top of his Vindicator or Predator. Unfortunately he went first, I failed my cover save, one of my Vindicators evapourated. This caused me to stay back and hide the other vindicator when the bike also died in the first turn. I left the Vindicator and one of my TLACorbacks on my home objective out of sight of the mean Predator and Vindicator.

His other force was split into 2 with the 10 man rhino squad on his objective whilst Huron and the Lord both went to circle round the large bunker in the middle of the board from the opposite side to the pred and vindi pairing. This group I felt much happier taking on. I had 2 attack bikes and the fire power of 2 TLACbacks along with the support of the Librarian and Corbulo Rhino AND the Death Company. I played a range game and made sure that it was he who left himself exposed coming round the corner of the bunker first, and although my Meltabikes BOTH failed to pop the Land Raider in one turn, I got it in the next after his Lord and CSM squad as well as Huron got out to engage the Death Company Razorback with Meltaguns. Thanks to Smoke I got to dual charge both units with the DC and caused 7 wounds, winning the combat and causing Huron and his unit to run off the table! After that the Death Company were cut down by the Lord who was horribly exposed, and indeed died to massed gunfire. The one remaining bike shot his Rhino up and I was able to make a last ditch surge for his base with my Rhino and contest after blowing up the Rhino housing the CSM squad on it. Game ended with me holding one objective and contesting his. God bless fast vehicles! Boo hiss to not using Vindicators properly.


Second game was against a peculiar Codex Marine army and I was quite thrown off by some of the choices....

Korsarro Khan on Bike with 8 Bikers with Fist and Meltagun and Multimelta Attack Bike
10 Sniper Scouts with Telion
2 Thunderfire Cannons (which I can say I have never seen in use in my life)
Kantor and 10 Sternguard in a Drop Pod with 4 combi melta and 4 combi plasma

The game was multiple obectives and table edges deployment

I *should* have torn this list to pieces*

However I am so used to playing with my Daemonhunters and their Mystics I didn't give enough respect to the Sternguard and lost one of my Vindicators in turn 1 because I deployed them together so to give him 2 targets for his combat squads. I should have been dropping 2 pie plates directly onto those Bikers and removing them as a threat, instead I tried to 'vindicate' the loss of one of my tanks due to poor planning. I wasted a Vindicator shell on the Sternguard. This meant his Bikers were able to race forward and surround my DC Razorback and cut them down with ease. The Thunderfire Cannons were pretty ineffective against my transports even with their 4 St6 shots each. I spent my time securing one objective in my right corner of the board, he sneaklily left his one remaining Sternguard model on an objective in a place I couldn't see it. Out of sight out of mind and I forgot to snipe him with an attack bike. The game ended on turn 5 as a draw with 1 objective held each. I was lucky not to lose. It was a comedy of errors and bad judgement on my part, but all part of the learning process.

Last game was against Salamanders

Vulkan & 5 Terminators (4TH/SS 1 LC) in a Redeemer
10 Tacticals with Fist/CombiMelta & Multimelta in a Land Raider
10 Tacticals with Fist/CombiMelta & MultiMelta in a Rhino
2 Attackbikes in a squadron

Table edges and KillPoints

Again, I felt comfortable taking this list on. I should have been able to easily take it down, with my abundance of melta and his lack of units. Pop the Raiders with Bikes and Vindicators then use my fast gun platforms to whittle down the units within to nice chewable morsels for my small but elite assault units to finish off. As it happened he dangled bait in front of me by dismounting Vulkan and the Terminators right in front of my Death Company Razorback. Foolishly I disembarked within charge range and then shot at the Terminators with both Vindicators. One scattered wildly and the other succeeded in kill one. The one who was in charge range.... Uh oh! His turn and blew the guns off both my vindicators with his Land Raider and Thunder Hammers despite them moving 12" in my turn. Throw enough dice and you can kill anything! I should have focused on taking out the Land Raiders, ignored the Terminators until they were more managable. I ended up losing 4-5 on KP. I immobilised his other Raider but couldn't kill it even with a St9 Thunder Hammer and 3 Meltaguns. Woeful.

I am not one to blame bad dice, as I believe they even out. I think my main issues were getting distracted by nice meaty targets and wanting to drop the pie plates on them, rather than sticking to my pre-determined target priority hit-list. We must be flexible, but don't get distracted like a Magpie after shiny things!

It is all a learning process with this new army, and I will continue to get as many game sin as possible. Should be more tomorrow!