Played a game of 6th ed 40k today, I had 2000pts of Imperial Guard and I had a friend playing 2000pts of Space Wolves as my ally. We went up against 2000pts each of Chaos Space Marines and Dark Eldar.
I had my Plasma Company Command Squad and Primaris Pysker, 1st and 2nd Platoons (2 squads each with a single flamer) with Autocannon Heavy weapons squads attached, 20 Rough Riders, 2 Hellhounds, 2 Leman Russ MBT's, a Leman Russ Punisher (Gatling GOOD!) and 3 Basiliks. Lee's Space Wolves were 3 Long Fangs, a Grey Hunters squad, a wolf scout squad, a Rhino, a Land Raider and a Wolf Command Squad with a special character (I can't remember, but he was in power armour not termi armour).
The Chaos force was pretty average, Lord and a couple of larger squads, a Termi squad with lightning claws on my flank, 2 Rhino's, a Land Raider and he took a Fortress of Redemption with guns everywhere. The Dark Eldar player had a couple of lots of wytches, some incubi, a bunch of Hellions and some chick called Lillith with another bunch of close combat guys to accompany her. Lillith and co stayed in reserve and never made it onto the board, sadly.
Mission rolled was Purge the Alien, basically shoot 'em all dead and tally the points, whilst deployment was Vanguard, teh diagonal one. I took the left flank, and Lee with his Space Wolves took the right. We won 1st turn, and proceeded to open a can of whoopass on the traitors and xenos. Night fighting came into effect, and thus my Basiliks were useless turn one. Not really worrying about that I drove my tanks forwards on the left, beginning the opening pincer as my Rough Riders followed up in support. 1st and 2nd platoons led teh way through the center, aiming for a loose rubble line to hold, backed up by the 3 Autocannon Squads in cover with the Basilisks and the CCS. A single squad of wytches and a single squad of Chaos SM were able to be shot at, and enough wounds were inflicted by accurate lasgun fire to break the wytches, forcing them to fall back and soften up the Chaos SM squad for Lee to pull off a charge with his Command Squad out of their Land Raider. The CCS provided covering fire, a veteran managing to melt his face off (our first casualty, and he was only just promoted too!) along with the Primaris Pysker who joined them. The Hellhounds were in range to flame a large Chaos SM squad in cover on my flank, and another few traitors fell. I didn't assault anything, but Lee finished off the forward Chaos squad, consolidating into cover alongside 1st platoon.
We were at 2 Victory Points already, having claimed first blood and a squad wiped out.
Their turn one was less than stellar. Matt (Chaos player) moved his Iron Warriors forward, focusing on Lee's flank. That suited me fine, Dark Eldar are considerably more squishy than Marines. The Dark Eldar moved up as well, hopping forwards into the next line of cover. They were falling into my pincer trap, heading diagonally across from the tanks and into the semi-open rear of my infantry. The DEldar hellions moved up to support the Chaos marine push, hiding behind the big scary Land Raider. Not many shots came my way, and were all cover saved anyways, and the Wolves fared well, loosing none of their men to decent fire. They were out of assault range, and turn two looked to be the decisive turn, even this early in the game. There was only 16 odd inches between the armies to begin with...
Our turn 2 came along and night fighting lifted. "The dawn sun rises to bath the battlefield in its glory, revealing dead and dying Traitors and Xenos. Today is a blood day, a good day to fight and win gloriously!" I announced, to laughter all around. My tanks rumbled forwards once more, and the rough riders moved through them, ready to charge the Terminators and crush the flank. 2nd platoon repositioned to form a solid defensive line with 1st, a half moon clearly forming and the trap set and executed. With a roar, the Basilisk's opened fire, dropping their ordnance dead on target on the Fortress of Redemption, turning the main bastion into rubble and taking out the Icarus Lascannon. The Leman Russ MBT's fired upon the Terminators, killing 3 out of 6, not bad at all. The Punisher let fly, BRRRRRRRRRRRT'ing at a squad of 8 wytches, who proceeded to die horribly. Another victory point to us! The Hellhounds fired two large bursts of flame at the Incubi, who made most of their saves and only lost two of their number, staying around. At this point, Lee decided to add his firepower into the mix, firing his first lascannon shot into the enemy Land Raider, penetrating it and rolling a 6. BOOOOM goes the big land raider, and roughly half the hellions hiding behind it. Some accurate autocannon fire later (The captain said so!) and the Hellions were wiped out. MOAR VP's! The Chaos SM inside bailed out, and took a fair amount of lasfire from 1st platoon, loosing about half their number but stubbornly staying with a good leadership check. As Lee's Wolves got stuck in on the left flank in assault and stuffs, my Rough Riders saw an opportunity and took it, charging out from the tanks to spear some Terminators. Overwatch fire failed for Matt's Chaos, unfortunately for him. The valiant Riders killed one underhoof on the charge, and another bought it from an explosive tipped hunting lance. The Terminators responded in kind, killing two of the Rough Riders. With combat drawn, both sides grimly commited to the melee.
It was now the enemy's turn two. Their remaining Marines close to the fortress fell back into it, standing on the battlements to shoot us and prevent us from assaulting them in the bottom levels or something. I didn't care, I had artillery, heh heh heh. Everything else they had moved in closer, the assault beckoning them. Their shooting saw the turret of one of the Hellhounds blown off and both Platoon Command Squads wiped out. Other wise, the DEldar failed their charge rolls, and the Marine combats continued. Lee reported he was winning the battles though, and the left flank was secure. Sadly for me, the DEldar Incubi piled into the combat between my Rough Riders and the Terminators, shattering the unit and slaughtering them. That was sad, but a benefit for me as it left them all in the open and fair game to shoot.
Our turn 3 rolled around, and things looked grim for the traitors and xenos. "Watch this!" I said to Lee, and proceeded to fire my artillery at the Fortress once more. 3 large blast Ordnance barrage templates all directly hit it, and three penetrating rolls later the whole bloody thing collapsed, taking all the marines on it straight to Hell. We cheered, the enemy stronghold had been eliminated! Not wanting to be outdone by the arty boys, the Punisher crew opened fire upon the remaining terminators. 20 shots fired, 17 shots hit, 10 shots wounded. 3 failed saves later and the Terminators were no more.
SIDE NOTE: Punisher tank is going to get a proper conversion now, complete with shark's mouth painted on.
The battlecannons on the Leman Russ MBT's opened up on the last remaining Chaos SM squad on my side of teh board, and all but 2 of 12 died, with the last two running off the board with a spectacular roll of double sixes on their leadership. Lee reported that for a few Wolf casualties his side of the board was clean, another squad of Chaos and Dark Eldar wiped out, along with their Rhino.
1st and 2nd platoon scanned the battlefield, finding it strangely devoid of enemies. They couldn't believe it. They had won. WE had won. In what was supposed to be a bloody attack on the Chaos fortress and their Xenos allies, Fox Company 14th Rencorus Regiment and a detachement of the Space Wolves Chapter had completely wiped out the enemy in a crushing victory at dawn.
The final tally of victory points was something like 18-3.
Thoughts on the battle:
1) They let me take 2000pts of Guard. I took 8 tanks, 9 autocannons and a full company of men. I had the firepower advantage, and used my superior range to take them apart.
2) Ordnance barrage pretty much ignores cover, taking from the center of the large blast marker. I have a reason to run my Basilisk's again, wee!
3) Buildings suck. Seriously, Matt had over 300pts of Chaos sitting there the whole game, and they weren't even safe from me.
4) Leman Russ Punisher's are not bad tanks. Where the Battlecannons wouldn't have been able to kill the Terminators with their 2+ saves simply because of a single wound per termi under teh template, the sheer Rate of Fire allowed enough wounds to be caused and therefore enough saves to be failed for the big expensive Termis to die. Seriously, anything T4 and under just dies to it. Saves don't matter so much when you just caused something like 10 wounds to a 5-10 model squad. It's like a Warthog-tank.
Lastly: BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRT!!!
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Through your report, it didn't seem that they stood a chance after your first turn of shooting and their first turn of doing almost nothing. Something were broken, someone were lucky/unlucky or were you just the better player?
