Warhammer 40,000
Warhammer 40,000 or simply Warhammer 40K is a miniature-based tabletop game. It involves building and painting your own miniature army and pit them against others' on a dioramic 6x4 or 4x4 feet table using a standardized set of game rules. Miniature armies come in various factions, from Imperial commandos to space-faring orks, each with its own background stories (what 40K players call "fluff") and combat units.

My army, a sub-faction of the Adeptus Astartes or the Space Marines, is of the so-called Dark Angels Chapter - one of thousands of regiments of bio-enhanced supersoldiers created by the Emperor of Man to impose his will throughout the grim universe of the 41st millennium.


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Dark Angels of the Adeptus Astartes
The Dark Angels Chapter is first among legions of Space Marines bred by the Emperor from his own genetic imprints. Enhanced physiologically for combat operations, they are literally Angels of Death in the battlefield, sowing fear to anyone who dared oppose their mandate. Their homeworld, Caliban - now reduced to a barren asteroid after an epic battle against their traitorous Brothers - holds the Chapter's mobile fortress-monastery called the Tower of Angels. Here, deep within the labyrinthine pathways to the underground caverns, lies the key to their monastic nature. The Dark Angels hides a millenia-long secret that compromised their honor. It is with this reason that they and their Successor Chapters are called the Unforgiven.


The Workshop:

 

 

 
The Interrogator-Chaplain's Wargaming Sanctum

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Finally... A Game for 2012

Finally was able to get a game in for this year at Jeff's office warehouse.

My first match was against Jeff's Grey Knight army where my supposedly shooty Space Marines list failed miserably to put the elite forces of the Inquisition ablaze. Talk about rust and cobwebs.

The list I used:

Dark Watch (Space Marines Codex)
1500 Points, Standard Force Org

HQ:
Interrogator Asiong (represents Chaplain Cassius)
   - Infernus, Feel No Pain

Elite:
Squad Komax
   - 5 Assault Terminators in Thunder Hammer and Storm Shield

Troops:
* Squad Alamid
   - 10-man Tactical Squad (1 missile launcher, 1 flamer, Sergeant Alamid in power fist)
   - Razorback (heavy bolter)

* Squad Amihan

   - 10-man Tactical Squad (1 missile launcher, 1 flamer, Sergeant Amihan in power fist)
   - Razorback (heavy bolter)

* Squad Habagat
   - 6 Scouts in Sniper Rifles and Camo Cloak

Fast Attack:
Attack Bike Squadron "Ondoy"
   - 3 Attack Bikes in Heavy Bolters

Heavy Support:
* Predator Destructor with lascannon sponsons

* Thunderfire Cannon with Techmarine Panday in servo-harness

* Land Raider Crusader with multi-melta


Photos are taken off Gelo's website:
http://badbeefspawningground.blogspot.com/2012/03/general-gaming-at-jeffs-place.html

Game 1 Summary:
The Grey Knight army is composed of Draigo, a bunch of Paladins in a Storm Raven, Inquisitor Karamazov, and a Dread Knight. He deployed the whole bunch right smack in the middle of his deployment zone while I split my army into two. My left flank holds most of my army with the counter-assaulting Terminators while the open corridor of my right flank has the tank buster units. The mission is Annihilation so we just need to bash each others' heads and be done with it.

deployment before game starts

Basically, the first few turns of the game is me missing my shots like a Boss and his Storm Raven, gnawing slowly at my right flank. My Predator exploded with flying colors and the Paladins, disembarking from the flyer, made a short route out of my heavy weapons combat squads.

the Predator can't get a bid on the flyer... the Paladins disembark to exact revenge

Draigo and the Dread Knight crossed no-man's land amidst heavy fire from my left flank. Karamazov opted to stay behind as long-range support. I was able to destroy the Dread Knight but not without much casualty from my side. In the end, the isolated Paladins (less their Storm Raven transpo, which I was able to crash down in the final turns) was short on reinforcing Draigo and his lone Paladin backup. So I was able to focus my resources on finishing them off.

However, short of decimating all of his remaining units (Karamazov and a squad of Paladins), I have no way of winning the game, as my option to breakdown the Tac Squads into combat squads gave him enough Kill Points to make sure of the victory.

in the end, it's my Chaplain and his Hammernator posse versus Karamazov and his Paladins

My next game was against Gelo and his Ork hoard. I used the same Space Marine list while he used the more gimmicky options for his ladz: a Mekboy, two big lumps of ork boyz, a loota squad, some meganobz in a trukk, a squad of burna boyz, two squadrons of killa kanz, Snikrot and his Kommandoz, a biker Bozz, and a lone defkopta. My deployment is maximized to ward off Snikrot to show up and do krazy things on my firing line so you can see my Razorbacks, Predator, and the Land Raider Crusader acting like armoured walls along the potential juicy "Snikrot deployment zones".

Game 2 Summary:
The mission is objective based (we rolled four objectives) and the deployment is by Quarters. His deployment is basically to bunch up both big mobz behind the killa kanz squadrons and whatever cover they can muster from as close to the "push-back" zone as possible. Snikrot will deploy with the Biker Bozz (the basterd!) and placed on Reserve as expected, together with the deffkopta, the burna boyz, and the meganobz. The lootaz set up a firing lane on top of a ruin in the middle of the table.

The first few turns is a game of try-to-get-as-many-cover-saves-as-you-can for Gelo the Ork. My firing lane to his units are strewn with cover saves to his benefit as I let lose with my more effective firepower than the previous game. Probably they'd managed to finally hack off the cobwebs.

I was able to render the lootaz useless by sheer amount of firepower. At the same token, I was able to slowly chip away units from the killa kan squadrons. His return fire is... well, orky. Not really doing anything significant on my army.

That was until the deffkopta finally arrived and buzzsawed his way to my Predator's arse, making a short work out of it. Retribution is a pain, as it joined his Greenskin Gods the next turn. I'm not sure if I should be happy or not with Snikrot not showing up until the later part of the games. I'm always watchful of my back for the first four turns and it's taking a toll on my taktiks!

My Thunderfire artillery finally got struck by massive fire from grotzookas and the Techmarine, now running solo, became a harassing unit against the approaching killa kanz. My Scouts showed its worth by consistently saving its +2 cover saves (camo cloak plus Techmarine bolstered ruin) against concentrated ork firing. This unit will eventually capture an objective for me.

When Snikrot finally showed up, it chewed a couple of Space Marines along with it. I personally think it did not have much impact. The Hammernators decimated the Kommandoz and their Big Bozz on the succeeding Assault Phase. And with nothing to worry about now, I zipped a Razorback on one of the nearby objectives to contest it against a mob of Orkz.

At this point, we are at a draw with 1 objective each with another objective in contest. However, with the number of ork boyz still at large in the middle of the table, Gelo was able to capture two objectives with that single mob. We're not sure if it's legal but for now I take it as a loss for me. Good game!

You can watch Gelo's batrep here:
http://youtu.be/H6wm339ysFc

*****

It's all good to be back on the gaming table. Very distressful games and I enjoyed a lot. Hope I can get myself all fired up to go back to modelling and playing again through such sorties.

Inscribed by Interrogator-Chaplain Randel on 2:25 PM              

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Never forgive! Never forget!