13.5.21 1850 Grey Knights vs Chaos Daemons

This is just awesome.  Another game with Connor.  Love the frequency of our games.  Really enjoy hanging out with him and getting to know him more.

I'm reminded of Grey Knights novels people rave about.  Grey Knights besieged by Daemons on all sides.  Fighting til their ammo empties, power armour fails, ever-growing darkness as brother after brother is swallowed by the warp personified, standing stalwart until the last Grey Knight falls.

JJ playing, met Connor at Fantasy Flight.  Wore my I support single mom's stripper silhoutte t-shirt.


Deployment: Dawn of War  Mission: Big Guns Never Tire  Objectives: 3

Connor's Bugeater list.  Guess they play 1750.  He added an extra unit of Plague Bearers to be at our 1850.  Which would put him at 1834.

Our stage of destruction this evening.

Connor won roll off decided to deploy and go first.  He also wanted to use Bugeater rules.  Guess they roll off for deployments before placing objectives and don't use First Blood.  Wanted to familiarize himself with the rules.  I was comfortable with it.

Daemons deploy.

Grey Knights deploy.

Attempt to seize initiative.  Nope.  I believe it was better for me to go second in this battle.

Top of first.  Daemons come in hot.  Hounds scout before first turn.  Heavies are scoring units.  There three squads of three slaanesh chariots to take down.  Was going to ignore them but once they became scoring the plan changed.  With 90 points of Plaguebearers sitting on middle objective I'll ignore them.  Now it's a battle between 1850 of Grey Knights vs 1750 Chaos Daemons.  Love those terms.  Choose your engagements and ignore those that aren't key to your victory.

Bottom of first.  All 30 Purifiers shoot at Plaguebearers on objective in cover.  The scoring unit is removed.  Psyflemen take out several chariots.  Crowe has no idea what to do so he hops into a Psyhino, Rhino with psyammunition.

Close up of H2H, hand-to-hand, top of second.  Herald breaks off from hounds and assaults Assassin.  Both take a wound.

Top of second.  It is about this time I realize I have another win in my belt.  All but a few slaanshi chariots are still on the field.  Those were the hammer of this daemon army.  While I've lost my share of Purifiers.  Frankly my effectiveness hasn't been irrepairabled compromised.  Daemons on the other hand.

Bottom of second.  Now all but one chariot are down.  Daemons still have one Plaguebearer still in reserve.  It will either deep strike onto my objective or onto the objective that was cleared in first turn.

Now we know how Slaanesh Chariots are made.

Top of third.  Plaguebearers deep strike onto original objective.  Bloodthirster Vector strikes a Psyflemen.  Rolls three 6's.  Glances that bad boy to wreckage.  It was an awesome roll!  Hounds pull around building in attempt to cut me off at the pass at the other side of the tower.  As Connor said last turn "It's not looking good for daemons."

Bottom of third.  Continue the move up the right flank.  Four combat squads shoot at Plaguebearers that arrived last turn on objective.  Psyflemen helps out.  One Psyflemen shoots at last herald.  Both those units of daemons go to ground.  After removing some Plagubearers, 3 Purifiers assault and remove them.  Love that Cleansing Flame.  Connor really wanted to lose that close combat.  My dice were dropping 1's left and right.  When it was time for him to roll daemonic instability he was quite happy.  Plaguebearers are gone.

Top of fourth.  Bloodthirster arrives and vector strikes Purifiers.  Two are removed.  Hounds arrive from behind building and take out single Purifier.  Now I have a Bloodthirster and 7 hounds to remove from that objective for a win.  Feel like the Vorta Keevan in Rock and Shoals "You know, Captain, with one more vial of ketracel white.  You'd never have a chance."  With one more full combat squad I would be able to do it definitely.  Just when I thought the daemons were against the ropes they come back to deny the objective.  Warp Storm table is 3.  Bloodthister has to make daemonic instability test on 3d6.  Connor thought it was 2d6.  When I gave him a smile after reading it in the codex suggested he read his.  He's panicking a little bit.  He says "If I lose Bloodthirster to this I'll quit warhammer."  I laughed.  Immediately wrote that down so I can remember to put it in the BatRep.  Bloodthirster made the test.

Bottom of fourth.  Continue moving towards the objective.  Hounds go to ground.  Some are removed.  Not enough.  This is the time when I start re-thinking my tactics and how things might have gone had I followed my original deployment.

Top of fith.  Bloodthirster lands and stands over the Purifiers targeted objective.

Bottom of fifth.  The round that made the game.  11th hour heroes til the end.  After an amazing round of shooting and after rolling several 2's for armour saves, Bloodthirster is removed with just Purifier shooting.  That was 5 Storm Bolters and 3 Psycannons of shooting.  Two Psyflemen unload into hounds.  Doubling them out.  There are only two hounds in cover.  They are removed then others quickly fall.  Was within assault range should the hounds live past shooting.  Only one hound and one squad of Plaguebearers remains on the field.

Win Connor calls it.

During our post mort Connor said he was surprised that I shot at the Plaguebearers on the objective.  That if I would've shot at the chariots and hounds that would've removed them from the field and then walked up to the bearers and assaulted them with Cleansing Flame and Halberd.  Connor mentioned in our last game what he was going to use chariots and told me how to beat the army, focus on chariots.  Was going to fight the army the hard way to show how huge of a failure it would be by not taking out key threats.  Once big guns was rolled, target priority changed.

As Natfka has said on his blog, Rest in Peace, and in emails.  You can lose in deployment.  Felt my deployment in a corner was key to winning this game.  Cutting off key routes of movement to reduce avenues of getting into close combat.  Daemons would have to divide their forces up into multiple fronts which my complete front could take on the front of their choice at their leisure.

My suggestion to Connor was to have his daemons mirror my Purifiers right flank movement.  Like in meteorology.  There would be a clash of high and low pressure systems.  Which would stay in position as bodies fell as a result of those colliding fronts.


slainte math