Elias T and I played a 2000 point escalating engagement Saturday night.
He played Orks and I played Space Marines. It was the closest to a
fully painted army that I've used yet--only the Warlord was unpainted.
I'm sure there were many details I've confused or forgotten. Any
that are blatant enough, I'm sure Elias will correct. :-)
My army was: (1935 points)
1 Warlord Titan
2x Space Marine Armor:
5 Land Speeders
2x Space Marine Armor:
4 Land Raiders
2 Predators
Space Marine Infantry:
6 Assault marine squads (12 units)
Space Marine Air:
2 Thunderhawks
Space Marine Infantry:
3 Devastator squads (6 units) with Rhinos
1 Captain + Land Raider
2 Whirlwinds
Elias took: (1996 points)
1 Megagargant
3 big detachments of battlewagons, nobz, boyz, gretchin, weirdboys (1
each),
buggies, big guns, pulsas (I don't remember which was grouped with
which).
Main lesson learned: big detachments are no problem at all when facing
a few smaller detachments at a time.
I set up the battlefield with a lot of Geohex terrain. I got some
pieces for Christmas that allowed me to have a bit more flexibility,
so I was able to do a more interesting layout than I've done before.
We played on a ping-pong table, on a geohex mat about 190 x 120 or so.
The main terrain was a broad ridge that ran from one corner to the
other,
roughly. There were cliff spots, and one place where a river ran at
the bottom of a valley, with a bridge over it.
+---------------------------------------+ objectives (randomly chosen)
| |
| imperial E | SM:
| ruins | 1: bunker
| 8 3 ork | 2: bunker
| 7woods G town | 3: cleanse
| 1 | 4: take and hold
| D 5 |
| |
| I 4 2 | Ork:
| | 5: cleanse
| R bridge 6 | 6: take and hold
| | 7: rescue
| | 8: capture
+---------------------------------------+
The escalating engagement involves a single detachment entering,
with lowest point value, not containing flyers, supreme commander,
or war engines (or something like that). Mine was 5 Land Speeders,
Elias had a big pile of boyz. (Notice I had twice as many detachments
as he did, even with one a Warlord. Them's a lot of Orks. :-)
I began in the upper left corner, Elias in the lower right.
I won movement initiative, but wasn't thinking about it making any
difference in order, so just moved first, a normal move putting me
near my side of the bridge. After that, Elias marched and came close
to his take and hold objective, #6. OK, a march goes a long way.
I may have had someone in range of my Land Speeders, but I don't
remember.
2nd turn, he brought in another great big detachment (and the
Megagargant?). The detachment marched. My thunderhawks and
assault marines came in. I think I could done well by putting
my Land Speeders on assault and coordinating with two thunderhawks
full of marines. (I could shoot with the thunderhawks during
movement, and let off 12 assault marine stands.) I need to get a
feel for how to make detachments work together, and for how to plan
when I don't win the initiative. I think, even losing the initiative,
I could have really hurt his detachment with a better planned assault.
But I didn't plan it well, and he went on overwatch. I lost most of
my assault marines in shooting phase, but still drove the buggies
on his take and hold objective off.
3rd turn he brought in his last detachment, and I brought in my other
Land Speeders, one detachment of Land Raiders and Predators, and
my devastaror detachment. (Is that right, Elias?) The Land Speeders
started up to where my first detachment was (there were only 3 of the
first left, or that happened soon.
Hmm, I'm getting my turns mixed up. Let me just describe it.
My assault marines kept him off his take and hold for several turns,
even with two stands left. My first detachment of Land Speeders (3
of them left) marched to his rear (after all his detachments had
already come in and marched towards my side the previous turn)
to attack one of the bunkers. He brought a detachment on assault
orders back, and managed to shoot them up before they got a chance.
My Thunderhawks softened up various units every other turn. (they
were great for that). He had one unit march up close to my second
Land Speeder detachment. I could have shot them on overwatch. I
would have gotten a high percentage of my shots, but it would have
only been 1 blast marker and maybe 7 or 8 kills. So they repeated
the action of the first detachment, and marched back to attack the
bunker. Elias brought some Orks back to deal with them, but I
put my Land Speeders on assault and moved out of range of those
pursuing Orks. I was able to get one hit in the firing phase and
two hits in the close assault and destroy that bunker (5 points).
Meanwhile, on the side near the ruins, he brought up a bunch of
Orks in the open right in front of overwatching devastators and
two Space Marine Land Raider and predator detachments. Maybe I
should have marched or assaulted them forward the first time,
because I wasn't able to put either Land Raider detachment on
overwatch. (I was worried I wouldn't be in range--I think I
was right.) Yeah, I definitely should have brought them in
on assault the first turns they entered the game. When they
were finally close enough, I rolled 1s for blast marker removal
on both land raider detachments, and weren't able to overwatch
in later turns. I was still able to take that detachment down
to half strength. His gargant came up and added a lot of fire
and whizzy weapons, taking out a bunch of my tanks. My Warlord
finally came out around turn 4 (or was it five?). It basically just
added a blast marker to the gargant on one turn with a death ray,
but then at the end kept a detachment of Orks from assaulting over
the bridge on the last turn. (Yeah!)
But my small detachments were going to half strength left and right,
and he finally got rid of my 2 assault marine stands and took the
take and hold objective. We ended up the battle at 23 to 14, in
favor of the Orks. We looked over the field at the end, and I think
it would have continued to be pretty bloody, but I think the Orks
would have done more damage if we had continued past 6 turns.
Stuff to learn, and things that made a difference:
* there were some die rolls that made a difference, but on both sides
* I really wonder if a well-placed assault using my assault marines
and Land Speeder detachment could have really reduced the first
Ork detachment near the bridge. Elias, I was just thinking that I
could have hidden behind the woods better, and just realized I
could have gone _in_ the woods. Yep, stuff to learn.
* Bringing out my Land Raiders on assault the first turn each
came out may have let them go onto overwatch the next turn.
* Elias didn't have any flak or air force, and my thunderhawks
did a decent job of softening up things.
Good job, Elias.
andy
--
Andy Skinner
askinner_at_...
Received on Mon Jan 19 1998 - 13:51:45 UTC