Okay, so after the break we are waiting on pairings and reklawsj and I know we both have the same amount of points and are hoping to get paired up so we can make the trek home early since we were already out of contention for a top spot. Well not to be, I was paired up against one of the 2 daemon players that were there. I was just happy to play against an army with less models than Horde Orks so it didn’t take so long. I have never played daemons and know very little about what they can do besides deepstrike everything. His list consisted of the following:
Bloodthirster
Lord of Change
3 Flamers of Tzeentch
4 Bloodcrushers
2 units of 8 Bloodletters
2 units of 9 Pink Horrors
Soulgrinder
2 Daemon Princes
His army was fully painted to a good standard and had lots of nice conversions which was a nice change of pace from the Horde O’ Gray Orks from the last game. I should have taken some pics of more of his army in hindsight. His first wave was going to consist of Lord of Change, Bloodcrushers, both units of Pink Horrors and the Soul Grinder.
The mission for this round was Killpoints with Dawn of War deployment, minus the night fight part. An add-on for this was having more of an L-shaped deployment for reserves, though you didn’t know which side until after deployment. I took this to mean actual reserves, like the ones you roll for, not the units you move onto the board first turn. In the ruling it said “reserves” and in Dawn of War it states that any units not kept in reserve move onto the table in your first turn. This seems clear, right? It didn’t matter in my game due to playing daemons, but many other games guys were rolling on their nasties from the board edge in the first turn. Also, there were 2 objectives for addition battle points. Again, my opponent rolled and got first turn and deferred it to me. These 3 games for me should have been an Imperial Guard player’s dream tournament, but I couldn’t capitalize. The pic above was taken after he dropped his first wave in turn 1.
Turn 1
I roll on most of my army keeping a Platoon Command with Chimera, Vet Squad in Chimera, and the Sentinel Squadron in reserve. This turn I move some things around, but have nothing to shoot at. I should have castled my army up in the middle, I guess, so I could concentrate more firepower as he deepstriked. This I thought of later in the game after I noticed he only had 11 KP to give up and I had 28 KP to give up. This meant I needed to table to have a chance. So, with my army spread out I was already screwed.
His turn, he drops in his initial wave and his Lord of change shoots at a couple units and takes down some infantry. His Pink Horrors also shoot down a couple men and the Soulgrinder scatters off target. Not much happened, but his shooting kinda surprised me by how much he had. I thought they were a more assault-oriented army.
Turn 2
Only some Veterans come in from reserve and I roll them on mostly near the Bloodcrushers and center board to start protecting my objective. Some combined shooting from Pask and some Vets take down 3 Bloodcrushers. I also shoot a lot of heavies at the Soulgrinder and cause no damage.
This turn only his Bloodthirster drops from reserve due to very poor rolling. He lands within Mystic range and the Hydras cause 1 wound. His Horrors finish off two of my infantry squads and his Soulgrinder finally hits and takes out my Company Command Squad leaving only the Regimental Standard, who promptly passes Leadership. His remaining Bloodcrusher charges my Medusa and rips off my main weapon. His Lord of Change breathed on some of my infantry and then charges them. He whiffs and they hold with some insane Ld rolling.
Turn 3
Only my Sentinels remain in reserve and the rest roll on this turn, reinforcing the center of my army. A unit of vets finishes off the last Bloodcrusher and the Hydra Battery finishes the job on his Bloodthirster before he gets a chance to move. I finally have a chance to fire into the Horrors and kill a few. I am pretty much letting the Lord of Change run amok the entire game and never shoot at him.
This turn he does a little better with reserves, but still not good for him, getting only 1 unit of Bloodletters and one prince in. This time the Mystic guided Hydras put 2 wounds on the Daemon Prince. He wisely dropped the Bloodletters behind some terrain. This time the Soulgrinder smacks a direct hit on my lascannon team killing them and finishing off my CCS. The Lord of Change takes down some Ratlings and they turn and run off the board. He then rips the Vanquisher cannon off Pask’s ride.
Turn 4
My Sentinels walk on this turn and do little. I finish off the Daemon Prince this turn with the Hydras before he gets to act. They now have two big kills in this game. A lone special weapons squad member with demo charge suicide runs toward his Horrors killing five, before assaulting them and tieing them up with no kills for either of us. I finally use some heavies to take the battlecannon off the Soulgrinder, stopping it from slaughtering more of my guys. I was happy I finally damaged it.
His remaining reserves drop this turn including another daemon prince, 3 flamers and another unit of Bloodletters. This time he stays out of Mystic range with everyone. His shooting starts hot with the second Horror unit taking out my Missile Launcher teams. The Lord of Change then puts the Bolt of Change into Pask’s ride wrecking it. The Soulgrinder finally got close and charges my Hydra Battery exploding one. The Lord of Change then charges my Sentinel Squadron and destroys all of them. The LoC is becoming a menace and is wrecking everything he comes in contact with. He has taken down my whole left flank and I haven’t even wounded him yet.
Turn 5
Turn 5 already and I need some killpoints. I haven’t bothered to count at this point. My melta vets whiff their shots at the Soulgrinder, but glory was mine when one remaining lascannon explodes it finally in a shower of daemonic shrapnel. I use multilaser fire from a couple Chimeras to put a couple wounds on his remaining Daemon Prince. I then jump a Platoon Command out and cleanse the big Horror unit with flamers. The other Horror unit kills my demo charge guy in assault.
Those 3 Horrors then shoot up my Platoon Command killing four and sending the last one off the board. His flamers finish off the Lascannon that took out his Soulgrinder. His Bloodletter units are finally making it to my side and tear apart the Psyker Battle Squad’s Chimera with the ensuing explosion killing 6 of them. They pass Ld and hold in the crater.
Turn 6
I move around to clean up as many units as I can to try to get killpoints even though I know I can’t kill all his Bloodletters because they are mostly full strength since they took the long way around to get to my army. I run 2 Vet units up and finish off his only daemon prince with melta fire. I use a couple Chimeras to finish off the only remaining Horrors and use the Hydra Battery and Soulstorm from PBS to destroy the Flamer unit.
His turn the Lord of Change makes it to the middle of my deployment after reaping 5 killpoints from my left flank and charges my veterans. He kills a few but they hold their ground. His Bloodletters then charge my remaining Psykers and finish them off. Game Ends.
At this point I have my objective firmly controlled so at least 1 point to me. He has left his behind to harvest some souls, I like his style. We start counting killpoints and I only get 8. He gets 17 from me getting a massacre. After also totaling VPs, in case he ties with someone, I have almost 1,900 and he has around 1,800. Those are the perils of playing guard. Have a close game and kill almost the entire opposing army and hold 1 objective, while still being massacred and getting zero points.
Overall, this was a fun game with a great opponent that had a nice looking army who helped me with his rules along the way because I knew nothing about daemons. I wish I had castled up more forcing his units into a mass of gunfire with help from Mystics. Instead I spread out and he spread out also taking my army apart while receiving minimal fire in any direction. Also, this table had a huge LOS blocking terrain piece in the middle protecting his Bloodletters on my right flank until he had worn down my units over there. I feel like I took down the large monsters pretty easily, only letting the Lord of Change and Soulgrinder get to me. I was really surprised at how much shooting the daemons bring to the table, it was impressive at times.
Finally, semi-finals are over and we went home before awards. I think I placed high in the lower half. I’m happy with that as the 6 games at ‘Ardboyz this year are the only ones I have played with the new IG codex. I didn’t use the orders rules at all during semis, but probably should have. Oh well, time to devise an army with less dudes so I can play faster next year.
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