Luck be a Lady Tonight...

Captain Sendini and Librarian Epistolary Angelus of the Blood Angels 5th Company "Daemonbanes" were disappointed and their ire was beginning to show.  Things were not going well, and it was difficult to pinpoint the source.  5th Company had found through some trick of fate, that every encounter and every battle was not going in any form of positive way.  Captain Sendini could see the feeling creeping into every element of the Company.  They were...unlucky...

OK, I think I've lost the last 4 games in a row.  Critical review of the games would show that there are a combination of factors at play here - it is ski season (still) and I'm not getting any time into the table top; I'm still experimenting with the Blood Angels and trying things out to see how far I can push the game play; I make mistakes often based on bad information or information held back; everyone else's armies are also changing seemingly weekly; and my dice have gone bad, or so it seems.

In reality, the Blood Angels are a tough army to play.  They don't have things like Centurion Stars, or Biker Swarms, or FMCs.  They are pretty straightforward - defeat the enemy face to face with bolter, chainsword, and melta.  And they can only do this if you make no mistakes.  Seriously.  No mistakes. But, I'd still say that I'm carrying around an aura of bad luck.  And my opponents can feel it too, and see it right before their eyes.

Last night, the owner of the FLGS actually came by as he does every week around the shop. This time he paused..."Hey...is that a new army?  Where is the...blue one...?"  It was almost as if he had not seen the Blood Angels I've been playing since the beginning of the year...or the purchases of red paint, cards, and codex.  For a minute or two, the reality of it flooded my mind. Are people that tagged to the Army they play?  Do you remember when the internet was showing pictures comparing dogs to their owners?  Is it that way with game armies too? Am I supposed to be....blue?  Is there something functionally wrong with my attempt to be red that is causing a fundamental change in the universe?  Is this the butterfly effect?

Well, the heck with that all.  I should just stay oblivious to the impact of me switching to Blood Angels and just keep moving forward.  I can be blue some other day.

1850 Points - Maelstrom Mission #1
Opfor: TAU

OK, this was another one of those games where I show up with three lists, and my opponent wants a different point value.  I'll tell you now, I added 100 points to an existing 1750 list, then on the fly tweaked it to create a functional change.  What I did actually, in retrospect, was break the FOC, not that it really mattered.

Librarian Epistolary Angelus would be the warlord.  He rolled up on the BA traits and got the 12-inch fearless bubble.  For spells, rolling from the BA Sanguinary Discipline, he had Force, the Primary, Fear the Darkness, and XXX.  Overall, not bad, but not the greatest.

Keeping with my last few battle reports, I'll let the pictures tell the story while i make comments on what was going on.  There are gaps in the story line, as I was at times too busy clenching my jaw over the dice rolls I was experiencing.

Here is my force for the game.  See the error?  It was a last second add-in just to get in another 100 points.

Here is the Opfor.  The skimmer includes the character to make it BS5, and everything is upgraded to make them as tough as possible and AP-3 or better to the max.

Just after deployment.  I got to choose the corner.  My opponent won the roll to deploy and go first.  I rolled a 1 on the seize attempt. There is a unit of stealth suits hidden from view who will soon pop onto the top of the building on my lower right.

Getting ready to rock and roll.

After Tau turn 1.  I lost a rhino, and a razorback was shaken.  Score is 0-1.  

Here it is in the middle of turn 2.  The Tau tank had been on the other side of my assault melta unit.  They had actually arrived turn 1, and the Tau vehicle either jinked away the meltagun shots or I rolled 1s.  The other unit in the middle was from the Rhino.  I think it was a mistake here (they had to disembark when the Rhino was wrecked. On my turn they had moved 6 inches and then made a long 10-inch charge, able to just reach the suits that had stayed forward in order to shoot up my lines.  I thought I was luck for a moment, until my opponent announced that the suit leader (later disclosed as his warlord) had an AP3 weapon and was WS4, T4...and he challenged my axe-wielding sergeant and popped him.    In the photo, my opponent is measuring how his Xenos mercenaries would jump forward with their AP3 rifles to take down my suicide melta squad...

And then his reserve units arrived.  A character and suits.  I thought the named character was the warlord...side story - around turn 3 or 4, my DC dread actually charged the named character (when he had a choice between that and the "real" warlord) and killed this guy - It was a combined assault with the surviving DC (who never got to swing) - because I wanted the warlord points...I'd eventually correct the problem on turn 5 when the last surviving DC (power fist) killed the actual warlord after it had collected 2 points off objective 3.

Meanwhile, this was going on at the far right...another side story - on my following turn from this picture, the demi-Tac squad got out of the Razorback (which was shaken) and they prepared to fire on the walker.  In that psychic phase, I cast fear of the darkness on the walker and it broke and ran 3D6 back to within a half inch of the table edge.  That put it out of charge range of the RAS/librarian by an inch.  That walker was a PIMA until it miraculously died in the bottom of turn 7 by the last shot from my razorback.  Until then, for every shot, he'd make nearly every re-roll of his shield save.

Here we are at the middle of turn 2.  I lost a razorback, some assault troops, and was hoping at this point I could turn this mess around.   I'd lined up my two Baal preds to shoot at the suits, supported by the other dismounted demi-tac squad, plus the other drop pod melta squad which had deviated off Objective s, back 11 inches towards my own lines.  Out of all of that firepower (2 TLAC, 4 HBs, 1 flamer, 6 bolters, 2 melta guns, and two pistols) he'd lost just two suits, making nearly all of his saves.  After all of the carnage, the game was still tied or within +/-1 or 2 points.  

Just a close up...sort of.  After taking losses in turns 1 and 2, the RAS, SP, and Libby would jump on top of the building to wipe out the stealth suit team.

Here we are around the middle of turn 4. I'd stopped taking pictures.  I was depressed.  The Tau walker kept powering up his Nova reactor for a 3++ rerollable save with some sort of upgrade, and I could not kill it.  Between that and the flyer, he was making hash out of my marines.  My flyer had gone to hover mode in order to allow the DC to drop out and charge the "false warlord" and had moved to keep shooting at the walker.    

There it is, hanging out back at his lines hoping to survive.  Effin' walker.

End of turn 7.  I think on turn 7 I'd drawn the card that said I'd need to control every objective.

Yep. A Pyrrhic Victory.  Effin' walker.

Score at the end.  I'd lost by one single point.  At this time I had just the razorback and two drop pods.  My opponent only had his skimmer tank and flyer.  It all really ended badly for me in Turn 6 when (1) my DC sergeant was charging (with rage and +1 attacks) at the skimmer tank (a 2-inch charge range in the open), and the flechette launcher got one hit and I rolled a 1, 2 for saves; and then the librarian was hit twice by the flyer and I rolled 1, 1 for saves.  All within 30 seconds.  The librarian had not been wounded to that point, but the Sanguinary was gone from the Walker shooting at them (I blew all of the FNP saves). Effin Walker.  

So yeah, its been like 4 losses so far in a row.  Just a bad month of gaming I suppose.

OK - end of the riddle - in the beginning I said there was an error.  The error was creating a separate RAS squad with rhino - for 100 points (they had a power axe).  That would have made them the 4th Fast Attack unit...originally I'd just added the 5 guys to Pod #1, but then, not thinking,  created the fourth unit...so yeah, stuff happens when you are not prepared for a last minute change.

All for now, Happy War Gaming - may may Luck be a Lady for Your Night!






    

Eye Candy

Had a great game last night (finally...damn you cold!!!) against Thor from Creative Twilight.  Overall, it was fun to get a game in for the first time in a few weeks.  On the positive side, maybe the cold / sinus infection is coming to an end.  On the negative side, as my health gets better, my dice get colder!

I did not collect enough info mentally for a battle report, but  did get some pictures!  Here they are so I can get them off my i-phone!

Here is a shot of the force I used last night.  1750 points.  Maelstrom mission #5.  I only had to proxy a flamestorm cannon turret as a twin linked assault cannon turret, and a flamer and a meltagun.  If you look really close you can see the death company are getting painted....

Here is a shot during turn 1.  I had a maelstrom card for Objective 2, and really wanted to pop a rhino for a point.  I popped the rhino (it was a bad trade...the warlord was pissed that I'd wrecked his ride...), but the drop pod whiffed in killing one cultist...so I held onto the card for later...

Here is my deployment area around the beginning of turn 2. I was collectiing points for having 3 objectives...and these Bloodletters all dropped in to distract me while his other units were to try and move closer.     

Here we are late in the game.  Thor's warlord is trying to convince two surviving death company to "join him".  They said OK, then he killed them with his claw. 

Score at the end of turn 5 when the game ended.  I lost by two points in a game that really could have gone either way.  It was a lot of fun, even if the dice were rolling badly.  It gave me three learning experiences - (1) if it has lasher tendrils, the assault will go badly. (2) if it has defensive grenades, the assault will go badly.  (3) Sometimes its better to just shoot the predator than the Rhino.  

More eye candy to Share!  here are three shots of a very nicely painted Knight.  And the theme is really cool.  AIRBORNE!

All for now.  Spring is coming!  Anyone have any Mephiston Red GW paint?  Local store ran out....

You Brought a Knight? Oh, This is Going to be a Tough Night

First off - before I get to the Battle Report - two things were brought up on my favorite podcasts for you to ponder:

1.  Paint Scores.  As a best practice, if you are going to score players at an event on painting, have a scoring checklist and stick to it.  I loved hearing about how some guys have had the same army scored using the same rubric over several events by the same judges and got different scores each time.  If you are an event organizer, this is a very important thing to address.

2.  Maelstrom tactical objective cards.  I heard an interesting suggestion - instead of discarding cards "that cannot be scored" (like destroy a building or fortification), score the minimum points on that card instead.  There are various interesting reasons why you should consider doing that. One thing being it slows down the player cycling through their deck.  It also "levels the field" if players are not taking certain types of units to keep an opponent from scoring on them.  Note that this only likely impacts 3 or so cards in the deck.  I may try that in my next game. Also, BTW, at the local gaming level, we also were reminded that if your codex has special tactical cards, the wording is "must replace" rather than a choice...

The following is a battle report I played in the League last week.  Of course I was looking to play at a different point range, but I was able to modify a list quickly to get to this level.  Doing this though is always kind of unfair.  At this point level I'd have likely played something totally different, rather than just "added to".

1750 Points, Maelstrom Mission #2.

5th Company Blood Angels
Librarian, Level 2, Force Axe, PP, JP, Warlord, force, Quickening, Unleash rage, Wings of Sanguinius
Sanguinary Priest, Power Axe, JP

Death Company, 5, 1 PF, 2 PAxe, 3 CS
Death Company Dreadnought, MM, SB, BTs, MagnaGrapple

Assault squad, 10, 2 MG, 1 IP, PF, JPs
Assault squad, 10, 2 MG, 1 PAxe, Deathstorm Drop Pod

Tactical Squad, 5, Flamer, Las-Plas Razorback
Tactical Squad, 5, Flamer, Las-Plas Razorback

Baal Predator, Flamestorm, HB sponsons

Predator, TLAutocannon, Lascannon Sponsons

Stormraven, TLMM, TLLC, BSMs

This list is still experimental, modified from my last game.  Frankly, it would have been better to have a 1750 list prepared that was optimized for taking down the big stuff.  The "on the fly" modification was adding 5 more assault marines with a power axe to the drop pod element, it might have been better to have 5 more assault marines with jump packs and meltaguns as a separate unit, or whatever I could get for the points needed (about 100).  The painting and appearance is slowly improving. I think I'm going to mod those lasplas razorbacks though - they look goofy having the TLPGs on the hatches, leaving a gap on the turret.  I need to check our bitz boxes for some sort of targeting stuff or gear to either plug the hole on the turret, or just move the TLPGs to the turret.

OPFOR - White Scars w/ Knight

Chapter Master, Bike, PF, Warlord
Librarian, Terminator armor, level 2, Force Staff, Force, Flame Breath, Sunburst, Fiery Form

Knight, rapid fire battle cannon, regular CC weapon, heavy stubber, the usual variant.

Bike Squad, 8 plus 1 MM AB, PF, misc upgrades
Bike Squad, 8 plus 1 MM AB, PF, misc upgrades

Bike Squad, 8 plus 1 MM AB, PF, misc upgrades

Tactical Squad, 5, bolters
Scout Squad, 5, snipers

The Battle
I'll go quick on the battle and just refer to the key photos as I go.

I "won" the roll to go first and deploy first.  Terrain was pretty light, so I decided since my plan was to not remain in my deployment zone anyway, was to choose the lighter terrain area, that had the best turn 1 LOS blockers.  The deployment was intended to be the "drag and drop", so I went heavy on the center, looking to split the table.  The OPFOR deployed seemingly stronger to my left with the Knight, scouts, and 2 biker squads.

Here in the middle of turn 1 you can see the start...I jumped forward with my assault element and used the razorbacks to "wall off" the advance and give cover.  I'd hoped to jump further forward, but I rolled a 1 for warp charges, and i think I was only able to get quickening off.  I did not want to move "too far" forward on the right to keep from being assaulted (and losing some of the BAs' advantages).  Instead of getting everything off on this side, I'd decided to try and drop the pod squad on my far left at an objective, and the pod veered further away.  The goal was to try and use that squad as "knight bait" and draw my opponent's other half left as well, which it did.

Overall, shooting yielded me a few bikers and a tac marine, but no major damage to the OPFOR.

(I hate how I can't rotate photos directly in Blogger)...This is actually during the bottom of turn 3...my stormraven was late coming on.  The DC dread dropped off, and the stormraven (with DC) flew on.  On the right, the Assault element is "stuck in" with the surviving bike element, and where I'd hoped for a quick resolution, the presence of the Chapter master on bike was really causing me trouble!  In the far laft, the assault squad shot up and charged in on the bike squad there, and also got stuck in.  The OPFOR was making 3+ saves like a mad man and not breaking.  In the center, he'd advanced the other bike squad, and the Baal predator caught them napping, and I flamed out 4 bikers before on his turn he assaulted the predator (ongoing in the photo - the predator was wrecked).  Placement of my other predator in the corner became a problem - it had few targets to shoot at.  The razorbacks were a failure, they accomplished nothing other than to become wrecks.  I was falling behind in points too.

In this shot, you'd think I had it made...librarian and sergeant and sanguinary priest with a bunch of assault marines vs a chapter master and another biker.  Things went all to crap with some bad dice rolls and bad psychic phase play.

Here we are around the beginning of the 4th turn...

Middle of the 4th turn...in the far far left, my two surviving assault marines are heading toward where his scouts are hiding on a hill.  The knight took a bunch of hits from the DC dread before it wrecked him and then began stomping toward my right flank.  That central bike squad, having finished the Baal, then moved and charged my tac squad on one of the objectives.  On my right, the assault element is gone, but the DC and stormraven saved the moment - the DC popped out and assaulted the CM at I5, taking him out before his PF could swing.  The Stormraven popped his librarian the old-fashioned way - lascannons and multimeltas to double him out.

I did not have a better picture to capture the moment, but here we are in Turn 5...the DC actually went on to attack the damaged Knight in CC, and actually got lucky!  But then the knight catastrophically exploded, killing all but one of the surviving DC.  They then headed towards the scouts.  On the right, the last of his 4 bikers headed towards my predator, and I worked to try and shoot them, but he made every single save.

  
 Here we are basically at the end of the game, turn 7.  My opponent had just the 4 bikes remaining.  I'd worked hard to kill them or break them, and instead they'd turned away from the predator, and charged a tac squad, killing all but one (who did not break), keeping me from eliminating them during my turn.  I still had 1 DC, 2 assault marines, drop pod, the predator, and stormraven...if that marine had broken on turn 6, I'd have had another chance in turn 7 to eliminate the 4 bikers for a tabling...if only...if only...

And here is the final Maelstrom score - turn 7, White Scars won 13 to 9.

Overall, it was a very enjoyable game and a tone of fun to play the Blood Angels again.

I'm off to the laboratory (army builder) to do some improvements...for the next time...but this game gave me a second loss in my division of the league.  4 more games or so to go in about 2-3 weeks...

Breaking News
Played another game, this time vs an opponent who was packing 6 dreadnoughts (three+ were special forgeworld seige dreads), and a knight, and 6 drop pods...it was a tremendous game at 1750 using the same list as above...I was getting wrecked hard in Maelstrom Mission 3, his dreads were either MM dreads to the siege versions packing S6AP3 flamestorm weapons, seige drills, and S5AP4 heavy flamers.  The knight was his warlord.  The table became a junk yard of pods and vehicles and dead dreads.  Eventually the Knight and my DC dread tangled it up, and the knight - pre-damaged by other shooting - was killed off in a catastrophic blast in my deployment zone.  I eventually (regardless of the knight) won, as my units tangled with and fought the podded dreads all over the table.  It was a crazy game.  Hint...siege dreads at front armor 13 and DANGEROUS...in a fit of mis-communication or bad judgement I'd charged one with a tactical squad (before they got run down with that AP3 flamer BTW), and that turned into a scrum where I added my assault element  and he countered by charging in his knight,which cost me the tac squad and the assault element, librarian, sanguinary priest...but I recovered from that and moved forward.  The game had an early issue where the DC dread deviated onto a necron ruin, and we decided since the ruin had not been declared impassable, we did not know what to do.  Overall, we decided that since the dread (magnagrapples) had move through cover, even with rolling a dangerous terrain test of 1 he was not immobilized, instead rolled on the deep strike mishap table and went back into ongoing reserves and ended up having to walk on, and played a little roll in the battle till around turn 4 when he wrecked a OPFOR pod at an objective, and later tangled with the knight, getting the charge off, and at I5 and rage, wrecked it. Another weird thing is that the DC dread has furious charge...but you cannot get S above 10 anyways?  Anyhow, I still need to figure out some of the issues with a DC dread and the "drop"....In this game, there was no "drag and drop" strategy - just alot of effort to survive the knight while hunting dreads....No photos...

 

Erratica - my 50th Blog Post

Just a rambling post today, I've had a cold, bad enough to keep me from the FLGS, but not bad enough to keep me from work at the office.

1.  Saw that GW published "as January" FAQ updates for the 40K rule book, orks, dark eldar, and spacewolves.  Nothing really there of note, except that - as suspected - immobile skimmers CANNOT JINK.  I ran into this in a few games in the past in 7th edition...most recently vs Tau.  Another good one to remember is that infiltrate cannot be conferred on independent characters during deployment/scout moves by joining a squad/unit that has it.  The only other thing was that hammer of wrath hits on vehicles/walkers are vs the facing unless immobilized.  I did make a shortcut to the FAQ page on my i-phone, just for reference during games.

2.  I'm a rulebreaker of sorts.  I have to confess.  I was pondering list changes last night, and realized on re-reading Stormraven rules that I'd been putting two marines more into it than capacity.  Jump pack death company.  Capacity is 12 marines...or 6 jump pack marines...Not that it has been a game changer, but I'd always appreciate it if you think I'm doing something wrong to tell me.  So now I either need to drop two death company marines, or drop all the jump packs and add more DC...I think I can re-balance the DC to be 10 in number, by dropping some PWs and the jump packs.  But I like the jump packs because in some games I might not want to deploy in the Stormraven...the jump packs give them more mobility, and hammer of wrath.  So...regardless, something has to change. (Update - yep, created a revised list with 6 DC, should work pretty well, but who knows...the extra points allow other upgrades too.)

3.  With the cold has been a sort of malaise.  I should be painting more.  Right now I'm running low on the older GW-named paints, and I'll need to re-stock.  We are also running low on ArmyPainter red primer...regardless, I have two rhinos and the Baal Predators in progress.  As soon as these are done, I'll finish painting the DC unit.  After that, the order may be tactical meltagun/multimelta marines, Stormraven details, command squad, sanguinary guard...lots of stuff.

4.  As part of the issue, I have not yet had a real, ready game in the 40K league.  I have until mid-march to get a game in, and right now I'm 0-1 (based on the "loss" posted two weeks ago).  I've got to start getting games scheduled and just get to them. I'll need to get 1 or 2 games in each week to get them all in at this point.  Right now (or as of last night) hardly any games in my Division had been reported...So right now, my Eldar opponent may be leading the division (1-0), I'm in second (0-1), and everyone else is plain 0-0.  Some of the other divisions are posting more games, with the other "Crossroads" division having each player with about two games played at this point.  I'm sort of glad I'm not in that Division, it has some awesome players!

5.  Tactica - I always laugh a bit when some guys post "tactica" which ultimately just boils down to a review of the codex, and rants about what they think are the better units.  Unit reviews and wargear reviews are not actually tactics.

Tactics are the applied small unit approaches that you can detail out in order to achieve a particular mission or function.  For example, saying that a blood angels tactical squad armed with a flamer, combiflamer, and heavy flamer is great, is not tactics.  However, detailing out that to eliminate a key light infantry unit (such as tau pathfinders) from ruins, by attacking it turn 1 with a drop pod containing the same blood angels tactical squad, including positioning the tactical squad so as to get cover from the pod from later enemy reaction fire, is a tactical approach.  Frankly, I'd always love to see descriptions like that.  So, please, don't confuse codex reviews with tactica...as further penance - here is a larger tactical discourse - for lack of a better source, I'll call it the "Drag and Drop" tactic:

• Mission or function:  Attacking a OPFOR who has deployed on a broad front, with a goal of isolating a section of front, and setting up the assault for the following game turn.  
• Types of units required: Mobile or deployed screening elements to create the isolation, and follow-on / assault elements to push forward with the attack.  
• Strengths / Timing: Establishing the isolation turns 1-2, creating the assault opportunity turn 3 and on.  You can select which flank to focus on.  
• Opportunities / Benefits: You are providing LOS blocking elements to increase unit survive-ability to preserve them for the assault.  You are effectively splitting the OPFOR's forces, and potentially controlling the table center.  
• Weaknesses:  You can be countered by the OPFOR's mobility, and can be susceptible to massed blast / artillery fire.    

The Drag elements are the ground elements (fast vehicles) and such that can get out and create the immediate isolation / LOS blocking needed.  Like a drag race they zoom out into position on Turn 1, with the fast rhinos capable of going as far as 18 (or more) inches to get in position when including movement in the shooting phase (flat out).

The Drop elements are jump pack or other fast assault units, either deployed on the table and advancing swiftly up behind the screen, or coming in from reserves to do the same thing.  The goal for them is to counter assault, not be assaulted.  For blood angels, getting the assault move is the most important aspect of their lethality.  You need the isolation (visual and physical screening) as a means to preserve the assault elements from enemy fire. You need to keep the assault elements within 18 or so inches of your screening units too, so they can in fact counter assault if your screening units become assaulted.  

Here are rough two sketches to illustrate the concept (below).  I've been developing with this idea for over time, first with Ultramarines and now Blood Angels.

The example here is not that simple.  The OPFOR has about 5 mechanized infantry units and a supporting artillery unit in the sketches.  I'm using about the same amount of units, but some are as combat squads.  The biggest thing is using a wall of "cheap" vehicles (rhinos and pods) to create a wall, screening my infantry from reaction fires (creating cover saves or blocking LOS completely).

In my sketches, the OPFOR actually is counterattacking into my units, rather than staying put as a gunline.  The OPFOR is advancing towards the objectives and firing as reactions, but by the end of turn 1 I already am able to control three or so objectives and am already assaulting forward with the "Drop" units.  If the OPFOR had similarly fast units to the Blood Angels (like Eldar bikers or Wraithknights, or had Imperial knights, etc), the concept gets a lot more complicated and dangerous, as the Darg and Drop Units themselves could become tied up and eliminated.  

The overall concept, if successful, then allows me to clear the right and pivot left as we get toward the end game.  Overall, you may consider that this is just a variant of a flanking attack, but I think the Drop units give it more speed when coupled with the Drag units as a screen.










    

But I was not ready yet....

Librarian Epistolary Angelus reached up and scratched his head with his gauntleted fingers.  Sometimes her just had a feeling that something was about to happen, and when his head itched this much, it was always going to be bad.  He could sense the presence of a strong Eldar force ahead, and it reeked of warp powers.  Regardless, the Blood Angels were going on the attack....  

OK, like I arrived at my FLGS to play a game, still very busy and not really prepared for anything except continued learning and growth playing Blood Angels.  I did not have time to even reflect on the list changes from the prior week.

The conversation went..."Hey, want to play a 1650 point game? Sure, I'll need to change my list to get it up to that, no problem.  I'm still working out Blood Angels.  Are you in my division for the Maine 40K League?  Sure! We'll play this game, but I'm not ready to do an official game yet.  OK, sure...yes, I'm just trying to figure some stuff out..."

Blood Angels vs Eldar, 1650 Points
Maelstrom Mission - Lost Contact
Terrain - light woods and ruined village

Blood Angels (Baal Strike Force)

• Epistolary Angelus (Warlord), PA, jump pack, level 2, force, quickening, blood lance, blood boil ; WL trait - adamantium will 
• Sanguinary Priest, PA, pistol, jump pack
• Tactical Squad #3, 10, flamer, ML, infernous pistol, combat squaded, Rhino
• Tactical Squad #4, 10, flamer, ML, combat squaded, Rhino
• Death Company Dreadnought Titus, blood talons, magna-grapple, MM, SB
• Death Company, 8, 5 PS, 2 PA, 1 PF, jump packs
• Assault Squad #7, 10, 2 MG, 1 PF, jump packs
• Stormraven, TLMM, TLLC, 4xBSML
• Baal Predator, Inferno cannon, HB Sponsons

OpFor - Eldar

• Wraithknight (Warlord)
• 5 Jetbikers with 2 psychers (level 3? each)
• 5 jetbikes plus 1 larger  with two psychers (level 3/4), witchblades
• 5 Eldar Guardians, Waveserpent
• 5 Eldar Guardians, Waveserpent
• 6 Fire Dragons, Waveserpent

Assessment
The last time I'd played this guy, he was packing a Eldar-Tau list, and my Ultramarines lost to him.  Now he was all-Eldar, and the list is pretty high on the psychic scale.  I think that for every warp charge roll, I'd start with 2 dice and he'd have 12 or more dice to deny things with.  So, right off the bat, lets just say I was outclasses on the psychic phase.  Might as well have not had a Librarian!

Changes to my list included a pistol for the Priest (1 point, duh!  It goes well with 8 DC having 3 point jump packs!  I also brought in a Baal predator, because I wanted to try it as an upgrade over the predator from the last game.

I was very concerned with the very light terrain.  Apparently wave serpents can shoo their serpent shield through terrain, and you don't get a cover save from them.  Not to mention the amount of firepower he could put out.  Meh, its just for practice right?

My opponent won the roll for deployment, and selected to go first.  I cannot recall what he had for a warlord trait.  His spells were a combination of Eldar spells, telepathy, and divination.

The Game
Here are pictures with turn summaries so you can follow along the progression.

Here we are right after deployment.  White disks are the Maelstrom objectives all numbered.  As you can see the table was pretty sparse.  I thought I'd try to go up my left flank quickly and turn to the right, as 4 of the objectives were within that arc of advance.

Here we are at the end of Turn 1.  Nobody had first blood (yet).  I'm pushing up the left, and the Eldar are spreading to my right.  The yellow dice on the rhinos show they have lost some hull points.  3rd Squad has dismounted.  I had hoped to take down one or both Waveserpents in my path, but they made all of their jink saves.  Squad 4 and the dismounted squad 3 used flamers on the jet bikes and got two.

Here we are about the end of turn 2. Both rhinos are gone, I'm trying to push forward and keep on mission, but my maelstrom cards are not yielding any points.  The 4th squad ML-team (combat squad) in the woods are now under assault by the eldar jetbike team, and the ML marine is the only survivor, keeping the eldar engaged for another player turn.  At this point, a lucky shot damages the flamestorm cannon on the Baal predator.  DC Dread Titus has jumped off the back of the Stormraven, but deviates into terrain.  

Here in Turn 3, the stormraven was exploded on a lucky 6, 6, 6, 1 roll set.  All but one of the DC perished when the immobilized flyer crashed.  The second wave of Eldar, freed from their assault on squad 4, are now in my center.  I just finished off the assault that wiped out the fire dragons.  My world is going upside down.

At the end of turn 3, I'm bleeding off models like popcorn.   The Librarian and Sanguinary priest jumped in to try to kill off the jetbikes, but they kept making all their 3++ saves.  Not even the DC Dread Titus or the DC marine could get through their lucky dice rolls.  I did pop a Waveserpent in assault though.  At this point the game is like 6-2.

Here we are at the end of turn 4. I've got a handfull of marines and the damaged Baal in play, struggling to get some points.  Witchblades take down Titus, as does bad saves by my Librarian and Sanguinary Priest.  I'm moving in a direction to try to get some points on what cards I have.  

Here we are at the end of Eldar Turn 5.  There is no Marine Turn 5.  The Eldar are down to the knight, 4 or so jet bikes, and two waveserpents.  The one closest to me still has 5 guardians in transport.

Another view of the wreckage.

So, not only did I lose, but I was tabled in 5 turns.  Eeek! Maelstrom points were 10-2.

Post Game Stuff
OK, just to jump to the point, as I stated up front, I'm just learning to play blood angels and learn about them, and I told my opponent I was playing for fun, not for the 40K league.  So, I guess I should not have been surprised that when i showed up in the office on Thursday that the League game reporting system was asking me to confirm the results of the match, giving my opponent a win in the league (and me an official loss)?  WTF.  So I decided, FINE, since he wanted to do that, I could go ahead and accept that result and move on.  If he really NEEDED the win, I guess I could live with that.  It might have been just the spark I needed to get ramped up and get my education phase over with.

So, things I learned in this game:

1. The risk of the DC in the Stormraven is huge. Losing 7 DC marines in a single shot (plus the Stormraven itself) is a 500 point loss in favor of my opponent.  I think next time I'll just start them on the table, or deep strike them separately.  RippedDragon said it is the biggest hazard in a list like this, it was the source of all of his 5th Edition BA losses.  I had considered dropping them out "on the zoom" but the table midfield was getting crowded so I risked keeping them on-board for one more turn (to be able to assault).  I need to re-read the flyer rules too (as punishment for the loss).  Another tactic would have been to move the tactical squad rhinos forward more to the right just to create a larger landing zone. Such a barrier would help protect the DC so they would be available for assault on the following turn.    
2. Dreadnought Titus also showed what can happen when he "drops off" a zooming Stormraven.  He ended up in a bit of terrain, and I made a decision to throw him the next turn into the jet-bike / marine mosh pit, thinking he'd kill a bunch of jet bikers.  Good move, offset by my opponent making every invulnerable save possible, due to direct rolls and prescience. Overall, it might have been better for me to just send Titus and the Stormraven off on a Eldar flank, rather than charge directly into the fray. I'd have likely still lost on maelstrom points though.    
3. Jury is still out on the Baal Predator.  It was (again) unlucky that he lost the Flamestorm Cannon almost immediately.  I think overall, I might be better off with the TLAC variant instead.  
4. Waveserpents are armor 12/12/10, and if the enemy is turtled up in them it is very difficult to wreck them. I have some ideas on how to change the list to take care of that.    
5. I still have a weakness for the Wraithknight or any large gribbly.  For the most part I tried to ignore it, and it only ended the game minus a few wounds but otherwise not impaired.  Again, for fun, it might have been nice to try and assault it with Dreadnought Titus, but the chance did not arrive.  

With all the snow arriving in the Northeast, i missed a chance to get a game in this week, but I've been working on painting, and just bought the i-book short story Redeemer which seems to be about a BA 5th Company, first squad sergeant Rafel (sp), who encounters the dark side of the Blood Angels command structure, on returning to Baal with a Chapter relic...Rafel will make a great addition to my 5th Company Characters.  

More to Come...

PS...Army Builder updated their files for the Blood Angels a week ago (right after this battle), and so now I can experiment more quickly with army lists.  

It was like being at Bike Week - 5th Company Blood Angels vs White Scars

Librarian Epistolary Angelus of the Blood Angels 5th Company "Daemonbanes" was injured.  Badly.  The Apothecarion on the Strike Cruiser Blood of Vengeance had his health well in hand, however, and he'd live to fight again!  Angelus was going to spend some time in his golden Sarcophagus as his wounds, from a short range flamer, would need some time to heal properly.  At least he would sleep with the knowledge that his forces had met Victory.

1500 Points - Blood Angels vs White Scars
Maelstrom Mission #3 (increasing maelstrom cards each turn)
Terrain - Ruined Village

Baal Strike Force
HQs

• Epistolary Angelus, level 2, sanguinary spells, force axe, plasma pistol
• Sanguinary Priest Sachiel, blood chalice, power axe

Elites

• Death Company, 8, jump packs, 1 power fist, 2 power axes, 5 power swords
• Death Company Dreadnought Titus, MG, SB, twin blood talons

Troops

• Tactical Squad #3, 10, flamer, ML, Rhino
• Tactical Squad #4, 5, flamer, Rhino

Fast Attack

• Assault Squad, 10, jump packs, 2 MG, sergeant with PF/SB
• Stormraven, TLLC, TLMM, Blood Strike missiles

Heavy

• Predator, AC, HB sponsons

OPFOR - White Scars - CAD
HQ

• Khsoro Khan (per the book) on bike

Elites

• Terminators, 5, AC

Troops

• Tactical squad, 10, Flamer, MM, Drop Pod, Deathwind
• Tactical Squad, 10, LC, Flamer, Sergeant with PP and PS
• Scouts, 5, SRs

Fast Attack

• Bike squad, 7
• Stormtalon Gunship, TLAC, TLLC

Heavy

• Centurions, 3, GC, 2 TLLC, 3 MLs

Assessment
Well, it was not the list I wanted to play, but I'd left some models at home (note to self...models likely still inside bunker terrain piece), so on the fly I marked up the list from last week, bringing in a cheap predator to cover for the missing combat squad and ML.  Only other change was dropping an infernus pistol and replacing it with a stormbolter on the assault squad sergeant.

I still used the Blood Angel specific Maelstrom cards, and the Sanguinary discipline spells.  For spells, I got quickening, force, blood lance, and blood boil.  Angelus' warlord trait was the #6, which creates a 12-inch fearless bubble.

The deployment is the long-ways across the table.  We had placed the objectives largely in the zone between our deployment area (look for the white chips in the photos.  As a "best practice" we distributed the numbered objectives randomly, with the numbers hidden.  We placed the objectives, and only disclosed their numbering when the game started.

My opponent and I still considered this game a training mission.  I'm still trying to get ready for the Maine Warhammer 40K League (see them on Facebook).  BTW, the League is a great model created by THOR at Creative Twilight, and it is an awesome way to reinvigorate your game play.  I have several weeks in which to play several games within my "Division", after which the top players in each Division go to a selected location for a playoff tournament event to identify the State Champion.  I came in second last season with my 3rd Company Ultramarines!

In this game, my opponent won the roll to deploy first.  He chose the far left deployment, in part because there was a hill there in the center of his deployment zone that provided a huge LOS area and kill zone for his Centurions.  He deployed a tactical squad to support them on their left, and Khan and the bikers on the right.  The scouts were placed after my deployment in midfield left, at a location to give them a cover save, and at a location to support where his podded tactical squad would eventually arrive.  As a reminder, his troop choices would be OBSEC, while mine were not.

He left the terminators, drop pod squad, and Stormtalon in reserves, so i was concerned where the terminators would eventually arrive.

I deployed my two tactical squad sergeants with combat flamer squads in the Fast Rhinos as a wall to help give me cover and give me options towards keeping objectives.  The 3rd Squad ML would remain behind at a location that allowed them to be near an objective and also provide some overwatching fire on my left.  The predator was also deployed on the left,  as I wanted to be able to shoot at the bikers as they advanced up to collect objectives.  Angelus, Sachiel, and the assault squad stayed on my right getting LOS/cover from the down range White Scars.  My intent was for them to go up the right flank of the table.  I was hoping to be able to cast some successful spells this game, and also learn a bit more about how to use the Blood Angels to their best intent.

 Game Play
Turn 1
The White Scars draw a card.  It is for an objective out of his reach.  His drop pod slams down (well, placed gently) on my right flank, and the 10 marines pile out to go after my assault squad!  His bikers move forward on the left, to a location where they can claim a cover save from a short hill.  In shooting, after all of the firepower from his scout squad, drop pod, centurions, etc., I only lost a hull point on Squad 4's Rhino.  Regular armor saves and lucky FNP rolls worked well for me.

On my turn, I needed to turn my attention to his pod squad on the left, and biker squad with Khan on the right.  My two rhinos moved forward to what I hoped to be future unit locations.  In the Psychic phase, I was able to get Quickening and Blood Boil, but blood boil periled, and then was dispelled!!  Angelus lost a wound! Regardless, I went into assault and killed off 7 marines, who held.  I also took down a biker on the right.  My Maelstrom card was for something I could not score.

Score:  0 - 0

Turn 2
His terminator reserves fail to come in.  The White Scars got a card for the objective near the scouts, and an objective near his bikers.  He decides the bikers are too exposed to the predator, so he moves them back, while keeping them in range to score the objective.  In shooting, he kills Squad 4"s Rhino (wreck), so the combat squad dismounts and passes their pin check.  In assault, I lose a marine, but finish off his pod squad.  I decide that since his pod is not at an objective, I'd just work to ignore it and keep advancing towards his lines and the objectives.  He scores his objectives.

I draw a card, but it is for a mission I won't achieve this turn.  I get my single reserve roll for the Stormraven.  As it moves in 36 inches, the Dreadnought Titus jumps off, deviates, but fails to take damage.  The Death company stay embarked at great risk.  I move up on the right flank towards his scouts and an objective.  I run the assault element around the scouts to get them more towards cover, but I'm also torn.  If I move too far forward, my supporting rear units might get jumped by the Terminators.  In shooting, Squad #4 is able to take down a few scouts, BUT I fail the short charge range through cover!  His scouts pass morale. Other shooting is inconsequential.

Score: 3 - 0

Turn 3
The White Scars draw three cards, good for scoring on three objectives in range of his bikes, scouts, and terminators.  His reserves come in. His terminators deep strike into my deployment zone, at a location near the predator and Objective 3.  His Stormtalon zooms in directly in front of my Stormraven.  The scouts have no choice but to stay in place and score by OBSEC.  The bikers also move forward to head toward Squad #3's advancing Rhino.  In shooting, he tries to damage the Dreadnought Titus and wrecks it! He also tries to shoot the jinking Stormraven, causing one hull point of damage with a glance.  Other shooting is somewhat inconsequential.  He scores two points.

 Alas poor Titus!  I was hoping to have him charge into the terminators!  I draw three cards, and some look good for getting some points finally!  As the Stormraven goes into hover mode, the Death Company dismounts in order to take down the bikers.  The Stormraven peels off and heads towards the terminators.  On the right, the assault element jumps past the scouts, looking to get closer to the White Scars remaining tactical squad.  Squad #3 dismounts from their rhino, and the rhino zooms forward towards a central objective.  In the psychic phase, Angelus manifests quickening on the Squad #4 sergeant.  he also gets Blood Lance, but then misses the "to hit" roll.  On other shooting, I take down a terminator, shoot up the bikers, and the scouts are down to just two!  In assault, overwatch from the two remaining scouts shoot down the "quickened" Squad #4 sergeant! Ouch!  I make the assault with the other 4 marines, kill off the scout survivor, and consolidate back to cover.  The death company then kills off the remaining bikers and Khan!

Score: 5 - 1

Turn 4
The White Scars are looking like they are on the ropes, but they get some good maelstrom cards.  The terminators move towards my Squad #3, Stormtalon moves in hover mode to a location to wreck the predator at an objective, and the other units don't move.  In shooting, he fails to damage the predator, but he does immobilize the Stormraven! He softens up the Squad #3 combat squad, and then successfully assaults them to take them out.  I also may have lost an assault marine or so.

I get some good, complex maelstrom cards.  On my turn, I move the assault element up and around the building to go after the tactical squad.  The death company now sets its sights on the terminators.  In the psychic phase, I get Quickening off (on the librarian), but fail on Blood lance.  In shooting, I (maybe) take down a terminator, explode the stormtalon, and maybe pistol a tac marine.  Then, I lose an assault marine to overwatch, and then fail the charge range!  On the left, the death company overwhelm the terminators before the terminators can swing!

Score: 5 - 6

Turn 5
The White Scars are looking grim, but get some possible scoring cards.  In shooting, he takes down all of my assault element except the Librarian!

In my turn, I get some complex cards, but some are scoreable and give bonuses.  I basically move everyone towards any objective possible, except the librarian, who moves up to assault the tact squad by himself!  He casts quickening and blood lance, which takes down a tactical marine.  Then I declare the charge.  The first overwatching unit is his flamer marine, who rolls to get 3 wounds on the Librarian, and I fail my last save!  Warlord for the White Scars (plus he still gets linebreaker for the drop pod)...we roll another dice and the game ends.

Final Score: 7 to 10.  Blood Angels Victory!

Postlude
Well, for a second game, everything worked pretty well, and the last-minute list change seemed to be beneficial.  Overall, I still had made a few mistakes, that required looking up in the rulebook.  At one point, for example, I rolled like a 1, 1, 6, 6, 4 to cast a spell...my opponent was excitied as I'd periled on double 1's...actually I'd periled on double sixes, and the Librarian took a wound from it.  Another aspect, still boiled down to how many attacks and at what initiative, does a marine with a power axe and pistol actually have.  Overall, nothing big, but always good to affirm.

Still was not enamored over the actions of the librarian in battle.  I'd hoped to end the game with him in assault with the last tactical squad, but he "flamed out" LOL.  I may go back and check the relics section and see if there is something better for him to use (not the staff though) rather than be a level 2 psycher.  Every little bit helps!  Also, the assault sergeant with the power fist has not been optimal in the past 2 games.  He may be better off with a power axe and infernous pistol that the power fist/storm bolter variant we tested.

The predator was more of a distraction for my opponent than anything else.  It did its job.

Overall, the unmodified death company proved their worth again, but they remain to be a huge point sink!  I still need to see about trimming them back a tad, and use the points elsewhere!

All for now, hope you enjoyed the photos.  It is difficult to get a good angle of the table, but in this game you can really see the progression to accompany the text.