SandWyrm and the IG

So last night at the GP North, we had 5 show to play, which is a poor turnout for us. I think the Mall closing at 8pm in Feb. has something to do with it. But we did have about 10 people show up to watch! which was kinda cool. We're starting to get people regularly showing up to spectate, and cheer a bit.

so at first it was DONKEY, SandWyrm, Ross, and I were there. Ross had his Ork horde with Battlewagon and lootas, DONKEY running the 2 warboss 2 nob biker list, SandWyrm had his Tallarn IG with a Demolisher and rough riders, and I had DH, WH, or Light Infantry IG.

Because DONKEY played Sandwyrm the previous two weeks, once with the Biker list, SandWyrm didn't really want to face the biker bendover again. I can't really blame him. DONKEY refused to play against my Sisters, and wanted to play Ross and his ork mobs instead. I was kinda wanting to beat the cheese list with my all comers Sisters and Callidus list.

SandWyrm was happy to play me, and I rolled a die to see which force I'd play. it came up DH. I like to play the DH, they play differently than IG, and aren't adverse to some CC like the Sisters.


It was pitched battle, annihilation. I won the roll for choosing sides and going first, SandWyrm didn't seize the initiative.

I had the 5man GK squad with 2psycannons on some ruins in the bottom left side of my deployment, and 2 rhinos with 6IST's toting 2 meltas in each squad in front, up to the 12" Deployment line. The LRC with the 10-man GK squad and GM started in the center-right, and the Inquisitor Lord on a grassy knoll w/retinue. Shelia the Callidus was in reserves.
SandWyrm had a hill on my right, with 2 Lascannon support teams on it, one with Light Inf, one without, close to the 12" line, two missile/plasma line squads to the left of the hill, towards the center. an Autocannon fire support squad hidden behind a fence behind the two line squads, and the General, standard, medic, and Commissar behind them, and the honorifica JO plasma command squad to the left of the General's squad. The Demolisher Hbolter sponson russ to the left of the line squads, with 2 missile/plasma squads, and a JSO missile launcher to the left of the Demolisher.
6 RoughRiders, and a Hflamer sentinel were held in reserve, and 7 stormtroopers w/flamer and melta would DS.

I used the 'Word in your Ear' power from Sheila to move the Infiltrateable Lascannon squad 6" forward, hoping to be able to get a 1st turn charge out of the LRC.

1st turn:
I jetted the rhinos forward 12" avoiding terrain, and smoked them. the LRC was supposed to jet forward 12", but immobilized itself on the bridge in the center of the board. crap. so the GM and GK's got out, and hunkered down a bit behind the hill for the bridge, to get a cover vs. the Demolisher, and shot at a lascannon heavy weapon squad, as does the LRC. The Inq. Lord shot up one of the line squads in the center, as he really only could see the center line squads and Autocannon squad, as there was now a LRC, blocking one side, and a piece of terrain blocking view to the lascannon hill. The GK psycannons shot at a line squad in the center, to not much effect.
SandWyrm gets to shoot, and Destroys the far rhino, and blows up the closer rhino with his 2 lascannon teams. The IST's in the far left rhino get pinned, and hunker down, the IST's in the other rhino take a couple of hits from their rhino blowing up, and a Demolisher shell landing on them, but they ditched in cover, and make their morale checks. the GK's take some shots from the line squads, with the GM taking a lasgun shot to the face. (yup, he's got Termie armor)

Turn 2:
Shelia insists that She's got TV to catch up on, and doesn't come in from reserves. The far left rhino IST's are still hunkered down from pinning, and the other IST squad moves a whole 1" in their terrain. the large GK squad moves a few inches forward, leaving half of them behind cover, closer to the lascannons. The GK's, GM, and LRC shoot at the non-infiltrator lascannons, and the Inq. Lord fires at the other line squad in the center, and the GK psycannons shoot up a center line squad.
None of SandWyrm's reserves show up to the fight this turn. Gore moves one of the left side line squads up, and into cover to get rapid fire on the IST's. SandWyrm had a demolisher fire at the GK's and hit 3, with a few cover saves, the GK's draw a LOT of fire, and a few more drop, from concentrated shooting. A couple of the mobile IST's die to shooting, and the last man runs away.

Turn 3:
Shelia decides it's time to appear, and hops out next to the jso squad behind the line squads, next to the autocannons. The GM and GK's move up, in position to charge the lascannons, and the left side IST's move around to get behind a hill, and make their approach to the Demolisher.
Sheila opens a can of mind-melt on the Honorifica squad, killing off 3 of the 5. The Psycannon squad throws fire at the line squad that moved up, into cover on the left side, and the Inq. Lord throws fire at one of the line squads that's still standing in the middle, killing it down to 1lasgun, who makes his LD. the LRC throws fire at some of the line squads as well.
the GM and GK's charge the lascannons, and the GM himself eats them for lunch. I forget how much of a beast he can be in combat, with WS5, and a Str6 Force Weapon. They consolidate onto the hill, GM, Justicar, and 4 GK's. Shelia charges, and because of placement and straight line charge, can engage the JSO squad, and the autocannons. she kills off 2, and takes a wound herself. The autocannons fail LD, and run, the JSO is fine.

SandWyrm's Rough Riders and Stormtroopers arrive. the RR's come in, and size up the GK's on the hill for a charge. SandWyrm's Stormtroopers DS right next to the Psycannon GK's. The ST's flame and melta the GK's, killing the two vanilla GK's. Gore fires some line squads on the IST's on the left, and kills a couple, they make their LD, the Demolisher shoots at the LRC, and fails to penetrate. the remnants of the right side, with the exception of the General and the squad locked in CC fire at the GK's, one more goes down, and the GM takes another lasgun shot to the face, for his 2nd wound wound.
The Rough Riders charge, but the GM goes at the same init, chopping down 2, with the Justicar chopping down 3 more, and a Vanilla GK killing the last RR. The RR's put one more Power weapon wound on the GM, and he fails his invul. They also manage to kill off 1 more vanilla GK. the Justicar and 2 GK's consolidate towards the line squads and General, who has charged Shelia (who failed her Jump back roll) She cuts down a few more people, but ultimately dies to the flurry of power weapons. The general consolidates towards the GK's. showdown!

Turn 4:
The Psycannon GK's get out of their cover, and prepare to eat some ST's. the IST's move forward, and shoot the last man from one of the line squads, and get ready to eat lasguns from 2 of Gore's line squads.
The psycannons chew up the ST's, cutting down 4 of the 7 the last 3 brace for impact. The Inq. Lord fires into the general's squad, killing a few, and the LRC killing a few more, and the MultiMelta firing at the Demolisher, not doing much. the GK's fire into the general's squad, for effect. at the end of all the shooting, It was the general and commissar. The general actually failed the leadership check, and was laid low by the female commisar.
The Justicar and 2GK's charged the comissar, and also hit the last 2 guys of a line squad on their charge, with the JSO remnant probably out of reach. The Justicar puts quick work to the Commissar, and the GK's don't quite finish off the line squad. The psycannons charge the last 3 ST's, and the Justcar kills them with his power weapon, to consolidate back onto the ruins.

SandWyrm's sentinel shows, and charges the GK's still in CC. The demolisher fires at the LRC, but scatters wide. The 2 left side line squads kill off the IST's, with the othe line squad moving up to hunker behind the hill, with only the missile launcher poking its head out.
The Justicar hits the Sentinel, immobilizing it. The Sentinel kicks furiously in return.


Turn 5:
the Inq. Lord squad shuffles to the right a bit, wanting to get away from the LRC, and the Demolisher scatter.
The LRC fires it's MM at the Demolisher, with not much to really show for it. I think it got stunned, and couldn't shoot. the hurricane bolters fire into the line squad in the ruins. the Psycannon GK's fire into the line squad in the forward ruins, and knock down a few more guys. they make their LD.
The Justicar and GK's whiff a lot, and don't do anything to the Sentinel, and the sentinel doesn't do much in return.

SandWyrm's line squads fire into the Psycannnon squad, to no effect.
The sentinel and GK's go one more round of not much happening.

we roll the 4+, and have one last turn of satisafction.

Turn 6:
The Inquisitor alone can fire into the line squad in ruins on the left, and the psycannon GK's do as well. I think this finished them off, with help from the LRC. The multimelta didn't do anyhting to the Demolisher.
The Justicar and his 2 GK's explode the sentinel, and move closer to the Demolisher and JSO hiding behind the fence where the Autocannons were.

In Gore's final turn, he shoots his last line squad into the Justicar and his buddies, and fires the JSO at them, to no effect. the Demolisher again scatters wide to hit the LRC.

that's game.

Post:
It was a very good game, pretty close I felt. We should have defined terrain a bit better, like clarifying that the crashed shuttle from the macraegge box is 4+ cover diff terrain, and that the hills, while 5+ cover were NOT difficult terrain. (we 4+ rolled it) There was a lot of low-er lying terrain, that obstructed a normal trooper, but not tanks, which made it a bit complicated, and we gave everything a 4+ for ease. I did forget that the old DH smoke downgrades everything to glances, which might have helped some.

I've also got to check on the Sage re-roll. I had someone else challenge the sage's re-roll ability for 'Gets Hot'. They said the 'gets hot' is not part of the to-hit, and shouldn't be able to re-roll. I can see having to roll all of the to-hit together, which is something I hadn't thought about, even if you re-roll the scatter. So rolling the 2d6 and scatter with a 'gets hot' die might be appropriate. I need to dig through my BRB for more info.

I think having the Sentinel outflank might have been a better choice for SandWyrm. I had units on both flanks near the end of the game. It was a hard call to make at the begining of the battle.

I'm glad immobilizing the LRC didn't hurt me too badly. The game would have been much faster had the GK's gotten over there 1st turn, and started trying to engage multiple units at once on 2nd turn. The Rhinos might not have been destroyed by lascannon if the GK's had gotten there.


SandWyrm and I will have a rematch of sorts this weekend. I might let him choose which force to fight, or roll again. We're going to move my gaming table into his basement, until the wifey and I sell our house back in Champaign-Urbana area, and buy a real house near Indy.