The game itself was a 1500 point Maelstrom mission, XXX, between a combined force of Nurgle demons and marines and the Eagle Knights. The Nurgle force consisted of a Great Unclean One (henceforth GUO), with two 20 man unit of plague bearers and a unit of 10, a demon prince, three 7 man marine squads, a sorcerer, some other character which I think was linked to the plague bearers.
In response to this nurgle infestation, the Knights deployed 3 tactical squads, two 5 man and a 10 man squad, a 10 man assault squad, 5 man vanguard vets squad, a devastator squad with 4 heavy bolters, a captain, two lieutenants, a chaplain, librarian and a 15 man death company squad.
My opponent deployed first and complete his deployment before me and gained the +1 to the roll, as we tend to use the chapter approved deployment system for all missions. The deployment map we ended up with was XXX and my opponent deployed all but his plague bearers, which would be summoned in later. I chose to deploy everything but the assault marines and vanguard vets. My deployment was cautious, as I haven't had much luck with my Marie's so far. I kept the marines back, dropping a small unit on the objective in the centre and another on the right to secure that flank, the 10 man unit dropped with the devastators and the captain\lieutenant combo on the left. The breath company on the other hand pushed up as far as they could along with the second lieutenant, while the librarian held back in the centre. I pushed up the death company in case I got first turn and could use forlorn fury and get a first turn charge on the GUO and try and do as much damage as I could before it got a chance to get into the fight. The assault marines and vanguard vets were hopefully going to go after the marines that my opponent had placed in his back field on objectives.
My deployment
Turn 1
My opponent easily won the role off and I failed to seize, which worried me as I had my Death Company pushed forward and even in cover, very exposed.
This was my opponent during his movement phase, the closest I got to capturing his deployment.
The overall board, just before his summoning occured.
Lots of plague bearers.
Fortunately for me, not a lot happened, only one Death Company fell to smite but that's not the bit that is important, as I think an error was made with the summoning. Now, before i go in to this i want to just say that i think that this was an honest mistake and in no way an attempt at cheating, i for one am sure that i got a rule wrong later in the game that also could have changed the game quite a bit. The issue is that the summoning rule states that you summon instead of moving and you can summon one new unit, however, my opponent moved his GUO and then summoned 2 units of plague bearers. This seems to be incorrect according to the rules but at the time i didn't really see anything wrong with it and so let in slide. If i had picked up on the error, it might have made a difference to the game, then again it might not. He would have been able to place one unit of plague bearers on the objective to gain the supremacy objective card anyway, so its only whether the movement of the GUO or second plague bearers would have affected the game at all, and to be honest, i don't know that it would have.
Anyway, My opponent mostly moved forward in his turn, but managed to rack up quite a few points with the supremacy card and two objective cards for 4 points in his first turn.
My response was quite slow. I drew objective 5 which was held by some plague marines, the centre objective that the 20 newly emerged plague bearers were sitting on and another card which i wasn't going to achieve (yes, i really should have kept better track of the cards!) I though that i could at least get objective 5, so dropped in the vets and assault marines to take out the 7 plague marines. My Death Company moved up towards the right flank and multi-charged the demon prince and the Plague bearers on the centre objective.
The start of what would be a very, very long slap fest.
So, it all started quite well, as all of my charges managed to go off and the death company, vets and assault marines made it in. I started with the death company as i didnt want him interrupting with his demon prince. The DC marines had unleash rage on them, thanks to the librarian, so with 4 attacks each, the hammers managed to smash the demon prince back in to the warp, while the rest of the marines made a good dent in the plague bearers. The assault marines and vets however didnt follow suit, managing to just take out 2 plague marine! So i failed in all my objectives, however, i did manage to get first blood.
The central fight, this would also continue for the majority of the game, but with far more casualties.
The board at the end of turn 1
At the end of turn 1, i was looking at a 3 point deficit and an up hill struggle. I was 4 point to 1, failing to clear either objective and looking at a GUO coming charging in.
Turn 2
While ther was little in the way of movement and shooting, the GUO moved in to the centre and the unit of plague bearers moved up and that was it. The psychic phase was a lot more devastating, taking out a few DC marines but it was the charge and fight phase that was most potent. The DC marines were reduced in number quite significantly, but did manage to do some damage back to the plague bearers.
The centre fight
The fight for objective 5 continued with the vets and assault marines doing some more damage, taking out 2 more plague marines, although the unit of 10 plague bearers joined the battle, further denying me the objective!
The slap fest continued
The Board at the end of my opponents turn 2
My fight phase proved more successful, destroying the plague bearers in the centre and claiming the objective, the GUO however remained completely untouched.
~Destroying the central plague bearers.
The left hand assault
On the left hand side the marines decided to venture forward and take on the plague bearers, however, it didn't quite go to plan and only a couple of models were removed.
At the end of turn 2, things were still looking grim. The score was 5 to 2 and the GUO and objective 5 were still in play.
Turn 3
By this point i was thinking that this was going to be a looking at another loss but i was determined to do as much damage as possible, mostly taking out the GUO.
The table, turn 3
The marines that had moved out from the back left objective to attack the assault marines, had to move back to the objective to secure it this turn, giving my marines some extra breathing space. in the fight phase the killing continued. In the centre, the GUO took down another few marines, reducing down the squad to only a couple of marines, namely the two with hammers and 2 with power mauls. While a few wounds had been done to the GUO, they had all been healed back up with psychic powers.
The centre fight going badly for the marines
In the other fights, the fight around objective 5 continued but the marines were down to 2 left and the plague bearers were down to 8. The combat on the left flank continued with a few more plage bearers being destroyed.
Yes, this really is the top of turn 3 and yes that means 3 fight phases have passed!
In my turn i drew a couple of cards that i could actually achieve, including defending an objective on the right of the board that was within reach of the librarian, who thanks to the demise of the plague bearers was now out of combat. He there for advanced across and claimed the objective. In addition a marine squad moved up to throw their weight in to the fight in the centre.
The board on my turn 3
During the fight phase things took a turn for the better. I finally managed to take down the plague marines! In addition the assault marines piled in to the plague bearers and manage to remove them all, before consolidating forward. In the centre of the board there was some more good news, as the last two DC marines, armed with hammers stuck true and managed to inflict 9 wounds on the GUO! In addition, the Chaplain had charged in and managed to do some more wounds, taking the GUO down to about 6 wounds remaining. There was hope for removing the unit after all!
However, this is where i might have made my rules mistake. Throughout the game we kept on forgetting the -1 to hit on the GUO, combined with the hammers own -1 this should have been a -2 to hit for the hammers. Now, when i rolled for the hammers, including re-rolls from the chaplain, i know that i took account of a negative hit modifier but i don't know whether it was just the -1 or the -2? if i didn't then i think at least 2 of the 5 hits might have missed, meaning that i probably would have only done 3 damage instead of 9, as i failed to wound with one dice and he saved another. One the flip side, i know that i quite often forgot the +1 to wound for units that charged, which may have made a difference over the course of the game. Hopefully all of these errors levelled themselves out over the course of the game.
At the end of turn 3 the score was looking a little better. Having started defending an objective that i was not going to be contested on and clearing objective 5, i had jumped up to 5 points, putting the score at this point at 6 to 5 in favour of the Nurgle force.
Turn 4
With the start of turn 4, we were running out of time and were unsure if we would get a turn 5 in but we went for it to see if we could. My opponent moved out a squad of plague marines that had been sitting on an objective since turn 1 that i had completely forgotten about. However, by this point they were well out of the fight. The sorcerer moved to attack the vanguard vets, smiting them but only killing off one marine, before charging in and doing no damage but taking a wound in return.
At the end of turn 3, finally, the marines are down.
In the centre, the GUO wiped out the last of the DC marines, taking out my hammers and my most potent weapon against it. However, i got lucky that the psychic powers failed to manifest so the GUO did not heal any wounds this turn.
My turn 4 started off well, with the librarian, who had successfully defended his objective, moved back and smite'd the GUO, removing some more wounds, before both he and the tactical marines when charging in. At the point the GUO was down to 4 wounds and with Unleash rage on the marines, they had a grand total of 11 attacks! The librarian struck first, taking a couple of wounds with his force sword, however it was the tactical squad that were the real heroes, striking at the GUO and somehow taking the last 2 wounds, killing the GUO! this claimed me a warlord kill and a point.
The GUO's last stand
The demon is banished back to the warp
The other fight at the left hand flank also was finally concluded, with the help of the captain and lieutenant, the last demons were banished.
The table at the end of turn 4.
The enemy deployment zone, Plague Marines hiding on the objective at the bottom, with the third squad moving across to attack the assault marines.
At the end of turn 4 my opponent had failed to score any objectives and i had scored 2 points, as i has both assassinate in my hand and slayed the warlord. This put the score to 7 point to 6 in my favour! Not something i had expected at the beginning of the game. At this point we decided to draw all our cards for the next turn to see if it was worth trying for another turn as we were going to be very pushed for time. As it was my opponent pulled out a card, having discarded one last turn, and ended up with 3 cards that he would struggle with, being able to get one point and maybe a second. I pulled out two cards, having discarded one card and achieved one card last turn. The first card i turned over was king slayer, giving me at least 1 point, which when added to the point i was going to get for line breaker, would have put me on a definite 9 points to a possible 8. It was at this point we decided to call the match. So the final score was 8 point to 6 in the Eagle Knights favour! Finally a win!
I think i was quite lucky with this game, as i was out scored on objective points, 6 point to 5, but claimed first blood, slay the warlord and line breaker for 3 points. However, i was very happy with how my tactics had gone this time and think that keeping the death company on the field is a better idea and will try it again in future. Plus with the changes to the command points, i may well get to try out a couple of extra stratagems, including Forlorn Fury!
There is another batrep to come but it was a lot less competitive as it was with a new player, who was re-entering the game after a 13 year absence, so it was more of a slow time walk through but up first i think is the army review after the Big FAQ.
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