Wednesday, June 19, 2019

It did not go well

If anything, my June 2019 ITC experience affirms I'll need to modernize my 40K forces.  You can be highly trained and play pretty well, but if you are just outgunned, you still can get slaughtered.  Every game was pretty close to start, and each had their own moments and takeaways.

I think I'm on a totally losing streak now of 6 games. 

2000 Points - ITC - 10 person event.

Game 1: Nurgle

The biggest takeaway in this game is how disgustingly resilient is a game changer.  5++ FNPs vs all wounds is wayyyyy better than the 6++ that some other armies can get.  In this game I misunderstood who the warlord was, and I might have done better with better secondaries. 

Early game, Turn 1.  Nurgle heads for the center while I'd gone off to try to punch a hole in the screen that was keeping me out of their deployment zone. 

Turn 3 - Nurgle terminators in my back corner.  My reinforcements are off in the distance, distracting the opponent from fully committing to attacking my small fire base.  

Turn 5 - If it had gone another turn....

22 to 17 loss after 5.  

Game 2: vs Ravenguard
The biggest issue in this game was the -1 to hit Ravenguard more than 12 inches away.  Being closer with half your army does not help much.  Old 1W marines vs new 2W marines does not help either.  I also wanted to go back and check his maths...if it checks out, there are some cool things I can do to imprive my Ultramarines before the next event based on these ideas...

Not bad, pretty cool, modern list here.  

You know your game is going bad when your Chaplain is all alone and had no other marines to lead...

Telion can hide like a boss from large piles of shooting dice...

The score belies the fact that his 5 man infiltrator squad in ruins was nearly impossible to kill, and I could not do it on Turn 1...and barely on Turn 2...fun game.  Todd's Ravenguard are really coming in to their own!


Game 3: Orks! 
Giant piles of orks.  Not enough pictures for another great game!  Favorite opponent with a really detailed really cool ork warband! Overall, I probably should have put the fliers in Hover Mode for this one...

The horde in its glory. 

Turn 2...Kill retreat kill advance.  Its a huge mess. 

Holding the left flank.  Sternguard about to be charged (again)....

Telion ordering the scouts to stand firm...shoot the driver!  Which one?  

8 points from Victory...

After all that, on the next day was Fathers Day!  My two home-grown 40K players dropped in with a bottle of Tin Cup Whiskey and a game of 40K!  It was a great time...for one it was his first game in 5 editions...for the other it was his second game as 8th edition.  They ganged up on me (but it was to be expected) - they used my Ultramarines, and I used that practice blood angels list.  We did not keep score, but the Blood Angels were wiped off the table in Turn 5....





Thursday, June 13, 2019

Back to 40K - Local ITC Prep

Just a heads up.  Of course, regular reader, I'm still pretty busy.  Its been a month since my last 40K game, but I have an ITC event coming up this weekend.  So, I've been down in my "beats lab" doing some solo practice to re-acquaint myself to my standby Ultramarines list, through use of a cobbled/junk drawer Blood Angels list.  ITC Mission 3. 

It does not go well for the Ultramarines. 

The Blood Angels went first. 

Both sides had reserved their assault elements. 

The Blood Angels list is surprisingly devastating.

The game remained a near tie through turn 4. 

Not unexpected, after all, I'm playing...me.

I'll reset tonight and do it again, then pack up and reset tomorrow for the Saturday event.

FYE - here is the Blood Angels list - it has stuff I'm just trying...3 detachments, 2000 points.

Blood Angels Captain, TH/SS - upgrade stratagem to DC.
Tellion
Scout squad, 4 SRs, HB, cloaks
Tac squad, 5, flamer, 4 bolters, 1 CS
Ditto
Furiouso dreadnought - frag cannon and HF, DCCW

Lieutenant w/ twin claws
Lemartes
Sanguinary Guard, 4, 3/w swords, 1 PF, angelus boltguns
Sanguinary Guard. 4, 3w/ swords, 1 PF, 2 PPs, 2 angelus boltguns
Sanguinary Ancient, PF, relic banner, angelus boltgun

Sanguinary Priest
Mephiston
Stormraven Gunship, loaded
Assault squad, 5, pistols and chainswords, flamer
Assault squad, 5, pistols and chainswords, flamer
Inceptor Squad, 3, plasma exterminators

It is pretty interesting....