Sanguinary Guard vs Death Company II

Its like Deadpool 2 but without a movie...actors...fans...

Since I need to keep practicing, and evaluating, in these experiments, I ran a game scenario at 501 points DC vs 489 Points SG - plus or minus a few points.

Death Company:
Lemartes, Stock
10 Death company (as before w/ 9 Bolters and Chainswords; 1 thunderhammer)
1 Death Company Dreadnought, 2xBlood Talons, 1 MG, 1 SB     
Everything here has black rage, red thirst, benefiting from the DC rules and buffs from Lemartes
Not enough (yet) for command points.

Sanguinary Guard:
Captain Slamguinius (JP, Thunder Hammer, SS)
5 Sanguinary Guard (as before, 3 angelus bolt guns, 2 inferno pistols, 3 encarmine blades, 2 power fists)
Furioso Dreadnought (frag cannon, heavy flamer, blood fist)

The Blow by Blow
Similar to before, each faction was deployed about 6 inches in from their own table edge, creating about 36 inches of space between them.  The aircraft wreckage area was going to be treated the same as craters - would give cover to shooting, and would be -2 to charge distance. 

The SG went first, DC failed to sieze.

Turn 1
The SG all advanced, with the Sg getting just a total of 13 inches, the captain got 15, and the Furioso 15 inches of movement. I kept the Captain within the distance of the SG. No shooting was available.

The DC in response moved forward 6 inches, and stopped.  The DC dreadnought advanced on the right and Lemartes advanced on the right.  In 9 bolter shots, 1 converted to a wound on a SG. 

Turn 2
The SG and Captain jumped forward 12 inches, and the Furioso 9.   In shooting, the frag cannon was barely in range to the DC and fired first, causing 2 casualties.  The Angelus boltguns accounted for 2 more. Tehn in the assaults, the SG charged Lemartes, but the Captain and Furioso failed their charges! In the fight phase, neither side wounded the other!

In response, the Death Company moved forward. Lemartes fired his pistol into the SG but failed to wound.  The DC marines fired on the Captain and failed to wound him.  The DC Dread set itself to charge directly into the Furioso to determine who was better! Its Meltagun caused several unsaved wounds on the Furioso, who caused a few back in overwatch!

The DC Dread punched first, however, with 5 attacks on the charge hitting on 3's rerolling and wounding on 2's (rerolling) - the Furioso was dispatched and the DC Dread consolidated into the Captain! Between the DC marines and Lemartes, three SG were taken down.  Then the Captain swung his hammer into the DC dread (Hitting on 3's, rerolling 1's, then wounding on 2's) and dropped it!  Both dreads were gone! Lemartes was wounded.

Turn 3
The Captain jumped forward into the only remaining close combat.

The Captain took down 2 DC marines with his hammer, but was wounded in return.  The SG took down Lemartes in exchange for another SG.

In the DC turn, the end came swiftly.  The remaining DC marines failed to wound the Captain or the one remaining SG. In response, they were dispatched by blade and hammer and the experiment ended. 

End thoughts
I'll soon do this again, but add in the JP death company (5 more marines) and then a 5-marine (gold painted) veterans squad similarly armed.  The points should go up to about 675, and each side will be similar.  I'll run these as Vanguard detachments so each side will have 4 command points, and will include a single relic for each (probably the relic hammers so they can be ever more useful). 

It was interesting that the SG faction won again, but it was close.  It might have been interesting to have the DC Dread plow into the SG in turn 2 rather than go after the Furioso.  I thought about not advancing on the Captain but figured the Captain would then just charge the Furioso anyways. The end would have been the same just in a different turn.

I need to get that Stormshield painted and mounted on the Captain...its from an older lead original terminator model, but its a good size to pin to his elbow.  His gold needs brightening too. Maybe a new base. Some 5th Company markings...

All for now!

MING

Sanguinary Guard vs Death Company

I spent some time down in my "beats lab" last night to dabble around on testing some thoughts on Blood Angel list building and who in reality is better. 

Being a scientist, I decided the best thing to do was run some experiments. 

187 or so points of Sanguinary Guard vs the +/- same in Death Company!

Any bets here?

Experiment #1 (all as modeled)
5 Sanguinary Guard, 2 Power fists, 3 Swords, 2 infernous pistols, 3 angelus bolt guns:

7 Death Company with jump packs, 1 power fist, 2 power axes, 3 power swords, 1 chainsword, 5 bolt pistols, 2 plasma pistols:

Going along with my earlier post, the Sanguinary Guard have a total of 10 wounds with a base 2+ save, while the Death Company has 7 wounds, and a base 3+ save and 6+ FNP.  The Sanguinary Guard have 8 shooting dice and the Death Company have 7 (as modeled).

Both get red thirst (+1 to wound rolls on turns charging or charged), Death Company also have black rage (+1 attack when charging). Both can jump 12 inches.

I randomly started the test with a few spectators nearby.  Is that Captain Slamguinius?

The units were randomly started +/- 36 inches apart.  Sanguinary Guard (SG) won the roll to go first. The SG advanced 15 inches.  In response the Death Company (DC) jumped forward and shot, putting one wound on a SG.

   

The DC then charged, but lost one model to overwatch. 

In the first round, the DC went first, with the dice not so hot.  They assaulted with 18 dice, needing 3s and 4s to hit and 3's and 2's to wound.  They caused 5 wounds, of which three failed.  The SG were now down to 3 models (all swords).

In response, the SG swung back, 6 attacks, 3's to hit, 3's to wound. They caused 3 wounds, two failed. The DC were now down to 4 models to 3 SG models. 

On turn 2, the SG first use the 1 remaining infernous pistol, removing another DC marine.  The DC are now down to 3.  In the continued assault, the SG swordsmen removing the remaining three DC models. 

Experiment #2 (Same as Above)
I reran the experiment.  It pretty much ended exactly the same way.  The SG again won the roll to go first, charged in, lost a few models (I kept removing the power fist guys as casualties for the SG, whereas the preference for the DC was to remove the lower AP weapon armed models first).

After two turns it ended the same way.  The SG still had 3 models on the table, and the DC had none.

Experiment #3 (Who needs Jump packs or Pistols?)
In this case I swapped out the jump pack, pistol packing DC for:

10 Death Company, 9 bolters, 9 chainswords, and 1 Thunderhammer.
(10 wounds, 9-18 shooting dice)

I have to paint up and add chainswords to these models...probably will "mag-loc" them to their power packs if possible.

Since they were fighting around some wreckage, I did include a +1 cover save to units within the wreckage from shooting).

In this case, the DC won the roll to go first.  After checking ranges, determined to advance a total of 11 inches.  Their bolters were still out of range.  The SG jumped forward to meet them.  The SG opened up with shooting, taking one DC marine down. The SG then failed their charge.

Sorry for the next few shots being upside down!

On turn 2, the DC started with shooting - 16 dice, needing 3s to hit and 4s to wound.  The DC then charged.  The SG overwatch caused no wounds.  The DC assault was a large block of dice - 8 DC chainsword marines with black rage =  32 dice, plus 3 thunderhammer dice.  Needing 3's or 4's to hit and 3's or 2's to wound.  35 dice resolved to 18 (all chainsword) wounds, resolved to 1 unsaved (2+) wound. In response, 4 DC were removed.  We are down to 4 SG vs 5 DC.

In turn 3, the assaults continued.  The DC, going first, removed another SG marine and put a wound on another. 

In response, the three remaining SG (shooting one DC with an infernous pistol) completed the assault by wiping out the remaining DC (again). 

So...what do we get out of this? Note I did not bother with morale checks for either side.  That was intentional, as I wanted them to fight it out.  Overall, I think it was a good measure of what the Sanguinary Guard could do.  Where possible I supercharged the plasma pistols on the jump pack DC, to try to overcome the SG better.  It failed.  One thing I do need to practice better having grown a bit rusty in the past few months is to use the pistols every turn possible.  Every little bit helps!

Overall, I'm thinking that the decision to use SG vs DC will be local meta-driven.  Certainly I'm thinking the SG are better - their Angelus boltguns are assault and -1 AP, and they all pack power weapons. If anything the infernous pistols they are modeled with are a point of inefficiency, compared to cheaper plasma. For now they stay... 

I may try some lists with just more SG in them.  Especially where I suspect I'll be encountering other marine equivalents.  Overall, I should look at lists that separate the SG from the DC, in order to more effectively benefit from their differences. 

DC may get relegated to games where I am to encounter xenos or astra militarum. Maybe create some Lemartes' led lists and really focus those lists on the DC strengths.  I am still looking to replace DC pistols with bolters now.  It is something I just need to get completed.  Sorry for the hand swaps little model dudes! I did not create the rules as currently written!

Another piece of work to look at is evaluating who is better -  a Sanguinary Ancient - or Chapter Ancient! 

What are your thoughts?

MING

Analytical thinking or Am I Thinking Too Much

I'm working on getting my MoJo back on 40K. 

This weekend, I went to the Huzzah!! Gaming Con, to visit friends and see the vendors.  In particular, one vendor I follow - from new Hampshire (Adler Hobby's Board Game Cafe) - had stated they were bringing gaming mats from Frontline Gaming - and I wanted to get one! So I got the pretty cool Scrapyard mat. It was interesting - they had come with maybe 30 mats, and by the time I got there noon on Saturday they were down to 3. Everybody wants one! 

I also bought from them the Bolt Action 2nd Edition rule book. I have the models - I just needed the rules! BTW, Bolt Action is a fun, easy game - my FLGS, Crossroad Games - will hopefully have a Bolt Action day monthly.  Its kinda funny.  Bolt Action uses points.  Bolt Action was designed by a guy who has roots to 40K. Bolt Action also has strong links to osprey publishing.

I digress.

Back to 40K:

Last night was all about looking at a means for my brain to analytically compare units. 

I took out a pencil (a valuable skill at that), and started a simple table.

The goal was to more clearly see the point efficiencies in terms of getting the maximum number of wounds on the table and the maximum number of dice in the shooting phase. 

Unit name, points, weapon points, total points, wounds, firepower (number of dice it fires), and then calculated some factors: wound value (total points divided by #wounds), and fire value (total points divided by #firepower). I did it this way so most numbers would be greater than 1, vs the reciprocals where they would be smaller than 1.

Then I ran the numbers for some typical units in the Blood Angels codex just to see where they would be.  I also allowed be time to really examine the details. 

It really started to show some interesting things that you may already know. 

Twin-assault cannon razorbacks are better than twin assault cannon predators and they are better than twin assault cannon Baal Predators.

Intercessors with bolt rifles are better than scouts with bolters who are better than tactical marines with bolters.

Some of these things you may already know. 

Overall, it is for me like one of those questions in College-level economics class on a decision to buy or not. 

I have more details to evaluate, but it starts to lead one down the path of looking to improve the model collection as a means to get more competitive. 

I'll see if I can get you some interesting tidbits tomorrow.

As a weird teaser, did you know of the vehicles, the Blood Angels vehicle with the best Wound Value is the WHIRLWIND? And it is right up there for Fire Value too with the Castellan launcher. 

Overall, the premise is that Space Marine Players need to be more points efficient. 

I may look to add a quality factor of some kind to balance out stuff. 

Interestingly, if you create a Quality Factor = wound value divided by the fire value, a Tactical Squad has a Quality Factor = 1.  Hmmmmm.......

MING  





   

  

Incoming!

Yep.  Lost another game. 

Blood Angels vs Astra Militarum.

Overall though, I just wanted to see what the Astra Militarum list would be like to experience. 

My opponent is a long time 40K player who relocated from the west coast to the east coast.  He just loves the AM (IG). That said, some of his stuff was proxied in order to just test the list idea. 

I only got one picture...then thankfully my camera batteries died...

 This is a shot in towards the middle of Turn 1.  My Death company had started as 10 models...they started on the table and moved forward using their stratagem.  I used everything I could to rough up the center AM squads, then charged in. At the end of turn 1 the Death Company were all gone to massed AM firepower.  

Not to belabor my own list.  I just used the same one as last time, having been to busy to change it.

My opponent started with about 19 command points (using the FAQ) to my nine.  Overall, he had something in two battalions like: 3+/- commissars; 3+/ officers; a few Ogryn bodyguards; about 8 full infantry squads, each with a plasma gun and 6 had mortars, 2 had lascannons; a full squad of plasma-maxed scions in reserve; a full squad of plasma-maxed rough riders to outflank; a squad of all heavy bolters; and a squad of autocannons; and two manticores.  Vostroyans (his manticores could reroll dice for more hits). The officers gave him enough orders such that he was rerolling 1's to hit and or 1's to wound from units. Commisars to keep units from failing morale. I was outnumbered 3-1.   

For the first four turns, the two manticores and lascannons would pick off a vehicle or so per turn.  The mortars would pick off a dismounted squad or two per turn.  Everything else would take out a nearby assault unit per turn.  

We were fighting over 4 objectives.  Through turn 4 I was winning by a point (7-6).  By the end of turn 7 I was tabled, with Dante being the last blood angels standing. Final score was about 10-1. 

I ran out of command points in Turn 3. 

He had command points for the duration. Probably had 1 left at the end of the game.  

In reality, he could have played more aggressively, but that comes with practice. IIRR this was his third or so 8th edition game. 

The two bright points for me included: (1) Dante arrived turn 2 (per FAQ) among my castled up vehicles and game them all rerolls to hit.  (2) the Sanguinary Guard, Ancient, Chaplain, and Sanguinary priest dropped in Turn 2 on the right flank - they withered away to plasma guns and assaults through turn 4.  The commissars over there kept the AM in line. The Sanguinary priest actually did his job further, bringing back a sanguinary guard from the dead pile on turn 3 and giving wounds back to the Ancient in turn 4...but still, there is only so much for plasma you can eat! 

My third best moment was seeing the Manticores run out of rockets. 

One big issue was that at the beginning of each enemy turn, the AM would retreat, and then in some cases get back in the fight.  Regardless, it meant that I'd get shot all to pieces each time.  

Considering all of the non-deviating indirect fire I was taking, I think it was pretty good to last as long as I did.  

Kinda makes me wish I had a bank of three Whirlwinds in my own back corner. 

Two thumbs up to predator autocannons, although they played no real role in the game that could not have been met by just having more twin assault cannons. 

Until the next disaster, 

MING 

      

   

Bolt Action! US vs Germans, Cherbourg Peninsula 1944

WOW! I went to the FLGS - Crossroad Games - for a special - hopefully monthly - event.  A regional historical gaming group has created a defacto "Bolt Action League", and plans to have events here and there each month for gamers to attend.  Overall, it was really cool, as guys I have not gamed with in a decade were there leading the tables, and there were in total about 20 attendees from Maine and New Hampshire.  I'd originally had hoped to attend their March event, but I had other things to do. 

For this one - the attendees were invited to bring their own figures if possible - I dug out my dusty American Infantry from my earlier experience with the old BGWW2 game system.

On arrival, it was truly fun to see old friends and meet some new ones! I was hoping to buy a new Bolt Action 2nd Edition rulebook...or maybe the starter set...but the store was out of product! Boo!

For gaming, I was assigned to the newbie / training table.  I was teamed with Tina, and we were to be a combined force of American paratroopers (82nd Airborne and 4th Infantry Division), and out fictional mission was to cut across the highway N13 - the main road that cuts from Carentan to Cherbourg.  We'd be fighting against a mixed german infantry force in the heavily hedged "Boucage".

The terrain was a great mix of farm fields and roads - a small village setting with intact and bombed out or burned houses.  If you think of the table as long N-S, the terrain was split by the roadway running N-S.  Several smaller farm roads also cut the table E-W.  Tiina would attack through the center, and I'd be her right flank.

Our opponents were Ryan (an experienced player) and another new player (like me). Tina was familiar with the game but had played just once before.  Heck, I knew of the game, but had only just watched a Beast of War game on you-Tube that morning on how to play!

The "American" attacking force consisted of two platoons that were fairly identical - My platoon was led by a 1st LT, and had attached to it a 60mm mortar team with spotter, 2 30-cal MMG teams, a sniper team, and a 10-man infantry squad with BAR, and a 10-man paratrooper squad with all rifles.  The other platoon run by Tina was similar with two regular infantry squads and no paratroopers. 

Our opponents each were similar for this training game - 2 LTs for HQs, two regular infantry squads, each with a LMG, two falschirmjaeger squads with LMGs and submachine guns, 2 mortar teams, 2 MMG teams, and a crewed light artillery gun (somehow emplaced in the second floor of a building). 

To save time we all deployed simultaneously, but the battle diverged essentially into two conflicts which saved time!  The game would essentially be played on kill points (destroyed units). 

Here are some pictures and comments from the event:

Deployment - Paratroopers are hugging a hedgerow - The officer and runner are up at the building.  In the distance is our target.

The other squad and support.  Bob is the BAR gunner.  Lost his helmet someplace I guess. Probably days before on the beach.

Tina's troops are looking more professional. No milling around. 

Paratroopers are advancing (running) turn 1 to get to the next hedge, adjacent to the N13 roadway.  German defenders are scurrying around in the distance. 

Gunners re-positioning to place fire on the distant building - Only the gunner is peaking...there is a cannon out there that just missed the mortar team!

Paratrooper spotter is looking for the enemy.  He ultimately starts placing mortar rounds across the road to help the paratroopers advance.  It is good shots either hit or miss!

Tina's regular infantry squad from the 4th ID are getting tangled up with some German infantry! It does not end well for the Americans...

Priming up to dash across the road.  

Made it!  But look! German office just up the hedge line!

The source of a lot of trouble...how on earth did it get there? Blown up to the second floor when the building was destroyed? Or disassembled, moved up, and reassembled? No matter! These guys are bad shots!

Final photo...The runner is dead. The LT is all alone.  How did that happen? Well...the artillery piece somehow shot downward into the paratroopers, causing some pins...in unpinning, they rolled boxcars on the dice.  That meant the rolled on the FUBAR table...and the result was a friendly fire incident.  Don't tell the investigators...it was not a paratrooper - infantry dust up...

Overall - VICTORY for the American Side!  I think the score was about 8-4 at the end in terms of killed units.  I think I only earned 2 of the 8 points...Tina got the rest! If I recall right, I lost a MMG team...and a few casualties from the squads. I'd taken down a german FJ squad and officer, but pretty much collapsed the german flank.  If we'd gone another turn, I'd have hopefully taken out the artillery piece in assault!    

Once I get the rule book I'll need to go through and see if there was anything else to learn.  At the end I was dropping mortar rounds on a building, which was complicated.  Also shooting at units in buildings was a little iffy.  I think we were also a little lax on line of sight issues. That said, the rules are really easy and everything is all about the modifiers and having great models!    

So now, I'll wait for the next available game for bolt action - probably June.  I did win a door prize for the event - which I used to procure the Bolt Action Book on American Units.  It is nice to have - with points and such for list building.  But I still need the rule book!  Our table host - Larry - had some really nice summary sheets that had all of the key rule elements.  More importantly, he pointed out a website from which anyone can do list building.  I might need to pre-construct a 750 point and a 1000 point list of my own for next time! Not to mention American unit players seem to be rarer! Maybe I'll do some paint repair and basing improvements before next time...dust off that Sherman... 

All for now, 

MING

Simple tip for the red guys

I was sitting around the other day, and thought of the following simple tip for Blood Angels.  Some of you may already know this.

Don't be sentimental for your named characters. Dante should not be the warlord. 

OK, it is really like 2 tips, and it can be applied to the blue guys, green guys, slimy guys. 

But it is the sort of critical feedback my gaming buddies won't give me. 

Imagine, you have a list with Dante and a Chaplain. And maybe some Sanguinary guard.  Stuff like that.

In my comfortable little world, Dante leads.  He is the Chapter Master and warlord.

In the alternative competitive world, he is a bubble maker among other bubble makers. But you should never put all your bubbles in one basket. Bubbles can be popped! Spread the bubbles around!

Imagine of the Chaplain was the warlord instead.

Imagine, as in my last game, The Chaplain and the Sanguinary Guard went off on their own mission.  The Chaplain, as warlord, chooses a trait.  There is a table full of them. He goes off to go lead an assault on the enemy line. Sanguinary guard tags along. Um...

Dante gives all units within 6 inches rerolls to hit as an ability for being a chapter master.  His warlord trait is different from that...his trait is to create a fearless bubble.

The Sanguinary guard love the warlord.  Sanguinary guard get rerolls to hit automatically if within range of the warlord, who does not need to be Dante.  It could be the Chaplain.  The chaplain could take something like soul warden.  Or maybe +1 damage.  Stuff like that. 

So, by spreading the warlord responsibility around you can make a better list? Yes.  Look for the synergies that you can create by spreading it around. 

Imagine a list with Lemartes and a thunderhammer SS Captain with Jump pack.  If lemartes is the warlord, he adds soul warden as the auto choose.  Imagine making the Captain warlord instead and that Thunderhammer now gets +1 damage as a trait for being artisinal?  Sneaky and cool!  

Are these improvements?

Duh. 

Next time...

As always, feel free to leave me a tip.  What is the biggest learning moment you have had building lists in 8th?



            

Ideas Needed

OK, I need to create a Blood Angels captain model for 5th Company, jump pack, thunder hammer, and storm shield.  Of course, there are no specific kits for it, so, what do you recommend for me to use for bits?

I could simply take a model I already have - a bog-standard marine fronting as vanguard, and give it extra parts and seals and such to make it stand out...

I also have the debris of a 10-year old disaster of a marine that was to be using a Sanguinary Guard jump pack, dreadnought leg cover as a shield, and a force halberd instead of a hammer...meh.

Interestingly, the guides and fluff don't really show any Blood Angels captains...but I have to assume their armor will be more gold than red...at least gold helmets...

I was thinking about trying to grab one of the old metal captain models carrying a thunder hammer (Ultramarines range) but don't know if I'd then have to remove UM symbols from pauldrons and such.

I could try to build one using a Sanguinary Guard model, just add a regular jump pack with no wings...hammer...still need to find a shield...

What are your thoughts?  LOL, if anything, based on what we've seen at the LVO recently...maybe I need to build a whole collection of just them...

MING