13.4.17 1850 Grey Knights vs Imperial Guard - Most fun game with Grey Knights yet!

Damn.  What a terrifically fun game last night.  Imperial Guard armour against Purifiers with Psycannon.  A lot went wrong.  An ass-kicking ensued.  Most enjoyable game I've had so far with my Grey Knights.

JJ typing, Met Shawn at Fantasy Flight.  Wore my light blue shirt from India.  Has a mockery of KFC with a baby chick and mother chicken.  Baby asks momma "Is that the Guy that killed dad?"  Momma chicken replies "Sob, sob."  It was a gift from buddy David.  He felt the t-shirt matched my morbid sense of humour and had to buy it.

Mission: Capture the Flag, err Relic.  Deployment: Hammer and Anvil.

Relic is my favourite mission.  The centre of the table becomes a violent bloody warzone.  Like most actual battles.  Trading lives for a scrap of land.  Hammer and Anvil was ideal for Imperial Guard.  Once I saw the result of the die for deployment I knew it was going to be ugly.  This capture the flag game just turned the bloody up a few notches.

Grey Knights are sorely under equipped against this type of army.  Two leman russes.  One punisher.  One banewolf.  Two Vendettas not in a squad.  Three Basilisks.  That is seven pieces of armour with two flyers against 30 purifers and 3 psyflemen.  Great Match-Up.

Shawn won roll off decided to deploy and go first.  During deployment Shawn says that he thinks this is going to be a fast game.  It was fast but not for the reason that we both expected.

Our shooting gallery.  Well Shawn's shooting gallery.

Imperial Guard deploy.  Apparently Shawn isn't f'ing around.  He has four pieces of armour.  Three with front armour of 14 as close to the flag as possible.

Attempt to seize initiative.  Nope.

Top of first.  While my deployment wasn't ideal.  I believe it was quite handy for the game.  Now the dice, that's a different story.  A lot of shooting from IG and middle rhino is gone.  See that guy in the far left he's awesome.  Shawn scoffed at me for putting my psyflemen behind the far hill.  With some pie plates landing on rhinos in the far back.  Several land on Crowe.  Iron Halo fails him and he's done.  2 VP first blood and slay the warlord to IG.

Bottom of first.  About this time Shawn said that no one is going to get the relic.  I told him I'm not going for the relic.  I have a secret objective.  Thanks, Spyrle, for reminding me of that.  It was the same objective I had for a game of Dark Eldar vs Shawn's Imperial Guard over a year ago.  Move pysflemen around the hill to line themselves up for shots into the middle.  Rhinos clear aegis and Purifiers with hammers come out.  Bad decision.  Shawn is extremely curious about the spacing of the combat squad in the foreground.  Assassin in far corner moves through terrain to get into position next turn.  In retrospect should've kept him where he was so he can shoot for an extra round.  None of the tanks in the middle of the board would've received a cover save.  24 psycannon shots at a leman russ and not one 6 for armour penetration.  Psyflemen take out banewolf.

Top of second.  Both vendettas arrive thanks to Astropath.  One psyflemen is immobilized.  A rhino is removed along with both combat squads that disembarked.  Squad inside also was removed.  I'm reminded of Natfka's line "Dark Eldar can't go toe-to-toe.  Find the weakness and exploit it."  Learning the same applies for Grey Knights.  However I know one of Shawn's weakness with his Imperial Guard and I focus on just that.  Basilisks are great at removing marines.

Bottom of second.  The Grey Knights second renaissance arrives.  Assassin takes out punisher with an amazing armour penetration due to turbo-penetrator.  Then 5 result with Ap 1 Exitus rifle.  Finally one psycannon rolls a 6 and 6 result for damage table.  Only one leman russ is left in the middle field.  Psyflemen glance a vendetta.

Top of third.  IG aren't messing  around anymore.  One vendetta goes into hover to take out assassin.  Successfully does so.  Other stuns a psyflemen.  Last rhino and squad inside are lunched by IG shooting.  Those pie plates are damned nasty.  Need to work on getting closer to IG front line.

Bottom of third.  This is when I figure out I have done something terribly wrong with the 9 purifiers behind the aegis.  I have sacrificed sure footing for a killing stroke (guess that quote).  Instead of spreading my purifiers out to minimize blast markers effectiveness I wanted to focus shooting heavy 4 with pyscannons.  Next turn it happens.  Psyflemen are damned lucky.  Hover vendetta is put down easily.  After using fortitude to ignore stunned.  Shawn is disgusted.  So am I.  Grey Knights are cheesy.  Other psyflemen takes down vendetta that is still zooming.  Psyflemen are now pulling the Grey Knight army.  Completely forgot morale rolls for both veteran squads that were in vendettas.  Grrr.  Hope to remember next time.  Oh, by the way I love twin-linked psyautocannons when shooting at flyers.  Oh, didn't roll a 6.  Re-rolling.

Top of fourth.  Focused shooting from IG remove one pysflemen.

Bottom of fourth.  All veterans are removed from board.  Shawn asked if I was going to assault the veterans with psyflemen.  Told yes if they are still alive.  Definitely going to shoot them first.

Top of fifth.  Psyflemen continue to hold their own.  This is turning out much better than I expected.  Was expecting to get tabled.  It won't happen.

Bottom of fifth.  Some shooting from psyflemen but nothing happens.

Roll the die for turn 6.  1 appears.  Games done.

Wooden chip in the middle is the flag.

One thing I need to do is focus on priorities.  Specifically keeping in mind what each units job is.  Example both times I disembarked combat squad with hammers instead of keeping them in the Rhinos.  It might have come into play to have two hammers wailing on a leman russ.  Next time.  Tactics.  I'm slowly picking them up with this army.  I'm getting there.  Feel something clicking in my head with Grey Knights.  Also made a terrible mistake by keeping my rhinos so close together.  Should've deployed them farther apart.

Loss 2-0 Imperial Guard.  Damn fun game.  Thanks, Shawn!


slainte mhath