An Introduction

As a new author here at Rites of Battle I suppose a quick introduction is in order. My name is dramatt and along with Ishamael, Heretic, and Loki I'll be bringing articles about 40k both in the form of my opinions and battle reviews.

Look for my articles about once a week or so under the title "Liturgies of Blood" (guess which army I play).

Coming soon will be the first of my three part review of the new(ish) Blood Angel Codex (that army). I realize its kinda late to do a review, but I need to establish my Blood Angel street cred.

Battle Missions and Beyond

So I have played many games over the past week, which has been a great change as I usually struggle to get in one or two. Many of them have been very close and extremely enjoyable. I really like playing at the house with friends invited over for a few reasons; one being the tables Ishamael and I made are much more textured than those at our F.L.G.S. and the other being the atmosphere.

But anyways to the point. As I said, I had a chance to play a lot more games than usual this past week or two, and most of them have deviated from the usual 3 set ups and 3 game types from the Big Rule Book. Not that those aren't fun, but after a few hundred times playing them, they begin to get a little stale. So, it shouldn't be much of a shock to know I purchased the Battle Missions book. And I will say without a doubt, I highly recommend this purchase for your gamer group. Find someone who has it, or even purchase a copy with friends to be used by the whole group. It adds a nice bit of variety to the game, and makes for many enjoyable new twists.

But I want to urge people to go beyond just that. It is not impossible to create a unique game type or set up. Earlier in the week I played against ZerkeX with a modified version of "Save the Fallen Commander", a mission from White Dwarf when the new Tyranids were fist introduced.

This mission shows me that if people come up with a fun and fair way to alter the usual rules in a balanced a fair way, it can really add a lot to this game. We shouldn't look at 40k as being a set in stone game that must be played as it has been in the past. It is a game, and one that we can really have fun with by making our own rules, scenarios, etc. The sky is the limit, and I really hope we get some new and unique ideas for missions. (Just had a neat idea... tangent)

We could get a group together to brainstorm and create mission and or set ups for the armies played by those people. I think that would be a great way to get players to look at their army and picture them as more than just plastic minis.

Anyways, I hope people look at this, and consider the use of alternative styles and missions, rather than just looking at the same three and only play to win. Have fun everyone, and try new ways to make the game more about enjoyment in the game rather than just winning.

Cheers!

Battle Report III: Loki v. ZerkeX

VS


This Battle Report will follow a similar Picture based Style to the previous as they were done on the same day. We will most likley be returning to a video style in the coming reports, but as of right now this is our best and only real option to get reports out to the world.

Black Templars
Marshal Irons (Helbrecht) with command squad in LRC
3 Rhino Crusader Squads
Venerable dreadnought


Space Wolves
Logan Grim
2 Wolf Guard Terminators in Drop Pods
Long Fangs
Grey Knights in LRC

Game: Capture and Control
Set Up: Dawn of War
First Turn: Loki (Templar)

Set Up

Nothing on the table but the Emperor's Champion with a 9 man squad in a lonely Rhino. The wolves hold their units in reserves hoping to hit the field in a glorious shock and awe tactic.

Turn 1

The Forward Rhino with the Champion deems best to hold position and wait for the bulk of the crusaders to arrive at their side before advancing.




The Wolves move Long fangs into a ruined manufactorum on their extreme left. While a crusader filled with the Knights of the Daemonhunters move cautiously up the center, a Wolf Lord lands on the Templar's right flank to hit a lone rhino advancing up alone.

Turn 2

The Templar Move up the center to counter the Daemonhunters before they can make use of their superior skill and wargear to bare.


While the lone rhino falls back in an attempt to force the Woven Terminators to follow them away from the main force of the Crusaders. The Wolfs take the bait, but now the squad is forced into solitude against the Fenrisian Guard, who quickly destroy the holy Rhino with the strength of Russ.

Turn 3


After firing all weapons and receiving aid from the Venerable dread once more, the crusaders fell two the the Fenrisian Gaurd. With their numbers lowered, the Templar assaulted with righteous Zeal against a Wolf Lord and his Guard in a bloody fight leaving the two sides locked in close combat for a turn.


Across the field, Heavy Fire from the Wolves brought down yet another Holy Rhino of Marshal Iron's Crusade, this one belonging to Godfrey, the Emperor's Champion.

Along with the loss of the Rhino's Protection, the Marshal now faced implacable Terminators arriving from orbit via Drop Pod. And with Grey Knights awaiting orders to attack in the hull of a mighty Land Raider... the battle looks ill for the Crusaders, and songs of Glory would soon sound in the great halls of the Wolves.

Turn 4


As Godfrey lead his squad to the charge to fulfill his sacred duty, Marshal Irons stepped forth from the doors of the great crusader, the two squads opened fire on the terminators lead by the great wolf himself, then charged with the zeal and hatred of all who stand before them. After a great battle, only a wounded Logan and Arjak stood in defiance of the crusaders.


While the great battle raged on, the Venerable Dreadnought used his expertise in Tank Hunting to bring down the mighty Daemonhunter Land Raider, leaving the knights of the Inquisition to the mercy of the Crusaders.

Though the battle turned in the favor of the Templars mid field, the crusader squad laid down their last lives to the Wolf Lord and Guard. Though victorious, the squad was badly wounded, and far from any help to their wolven brothers. The Crusader's sacrifice was no in vain.


The end of turn 4 brought the final judgment of not only The Great Wolf Gimnar and Arjak... but the horse they rode in on was felled when the Drop Pod was destroyed by the might of the Sergeant's Power Fist.

Turn 5


With the Grey Knights exposed, the might of the crusaders open fired on the holy warriors, removing all trace of their once majestic presence with ominous silence.


While the crusader squads moved up, the crusader rained vengeful fire upon the wolf lord and his Guard for the fallen crusaders.


After seeing the Grey Knights fall, the Long fangs opened fire upon the Mighty Venerable Dreadnought, but were unable to crack the skilled opponent's mighty hull.


Turn 6
The battle continues with a roll of a 5


Having taken refuge in the final remaining Rhino, the crusader squad mounted up and ran for the Wolfen Objective, killing a few Long Fangs with the mighty fire of the zealous Dreadnought and the command squad.


Though having lost the battle, the wolves did manage a small victory, by escaping the fate of all Heretics. The Wolf Lord and his Guard made it free from the fire of the Crusader before it could bring it's vengeance to bare.

Game ends on a 1.

Final Score:





Templars - 1
Space Wolves - 0

Battle Report II: Heretic v. Ishmael

+++++TRANSMISSION INTERCEPTED+++++

Aun'ki'Fi'rios, it is with my deepest apologies that I must inform you of the continuing fighting on Ke'Shan. The gue'ui made planetfall in an uninhabited region of the planet, but quickly made their way into the ruins of a gue'la city, perhaps searching for some relic. Upon entering the city, I discovered five statues that had escaped prior detection. They resembled the gue'ui of Ishmael, but emitted an energy signature of who's nature my technicians were unable to discern. Regardless the gue'ui brute Ishmael seemed intent on having them so I believed a confrontation to prevent him from attaining to be in order. The account of the battle follows.The warlord aligned his forces in a tight pack, with his, vindicator I believe is their term for it, and battlesuits in front of his transports. A wise move as I sought to disable his transports. He placed a massive and hideous warmachine, defiler is their name I believe, behind an orbital cannon.As per your wise council Aun'Ki, I deployed my forces with my shas'la furthest from the gue'ui, with my piranha skimmers closer and I led by broadside brothers from the safety of a crater. The cadre's hammerhead was deployed opposite myself and looked to decimate the flanks of Ishmael's assault.

Here is a flyover image of the battle as it commenced, for your consideration.

As the battle began, Ishmael's forces advanced toward myself and my broadsides, with the vindicator deploying smoke and one of their battlesuits committing fratricide with his large fusion weapon. If this is the quality of our opponent, I am sure the Greater Good will triumph in the end.
Having fought gue'ui many times in the past, I knew it would be futile to attempt to destroy the vindicator while it was obscured by a cloud of smoke so I sent the piranhas to slow the armored column's advance while the broadsides and I attempted to dismantle their transports. While the gue'ui armored column advanced on my right my hammerhead and shas'la advanced to my left, creating a circular fight and hoping to lure only one group of gue'ui toward themselves at a time.


As the battle progressed, the warlord advanced his forces under the cover of more smoke, as my broadside pilots showed their lack of recent practice by failing to destroy a single vehicle. Showing their resolve in the face of the loss of their sisters, the crew of the piranha Swift Strike swept behind the column and destroyed the demolisher cannon of the vindicator. Assaulted by foul beasts, the Swift Strike deemed it wiser to withdraw than continue attacking the column.


As one team attempted to secure the far statue on the left flank from a deformed pair of obliterators, the other three showed a group of gue'ui the power of a united force, reducing their vaunted power armor to smoking piles of slag. However on the opposite flank, another team of gue'ui assaulted and disabled the broadside team I had recently disengaged from.


As the battle progressed, the gue'ui battle suits moved to assault the shas'ui teams after disabling their devilfish. Ishmael bypassed myself in search of the shas'la on the near left flank. The Swift Strike moved to contest the central point, pursued by the warp creatures summoned by Ishmael. It is my sad duty to inform you that two crisis pilots were lost to a mishap, but the other team landed near and killed three gue'ui.

While I was preparing to destroy the statue closest to myself to prevent it falling into the hands of the gue'ui I was called away to another battle as the warlord had sent one of his lieutenants to attack another sector and I was forced to prepare defenses there. The statues have fallen into Ishmael's hands, but my technicians have attempted to sabotage some of them so they will detonate when any attempt to investigate them is made. They were only able to sabotage two but they gathered valuable data on the energy source that will aid us later in this campaign. I await your judgement. Shas'El'Mel'ek out.

+++++TRANSMISSION ENDS+++++

Battle Report Incoming

+++++TRANSMISSION INTERCEPTED+++++

To Aun'ki'Fi'rios

Hail most wise and honored one, I regret that I must bear grim news. A warp storm has opened above our new colonies on Ke'Shan and I fear our colonists will come under attack. The Earth Caste technicians you have assigned to my coalition have intercepted transmissions coming from the storm. They believe a band of gue'ui renegades under the deranged warlord Ishmael are mounting an attack near the end of the current earth week. My shas'vre and I are deep in meditation on what would be the course of action to defend Ke'Shan, but I felt it necessary to inform you of the situation. I am confident in victory, but Ishmael has been know to lead many gue'ui devoted to their "god" Khorne. I am still at a loss to this concept of a "god," oh wise one, but this one seems to drive the gue'ui to a bloody frenzy. I will send word on our first engagement with these barbarians hopefully within the coming earth week. I would ask that you consider preparing a relief force should our defenses be overrun.

+++++INTERCEPT ENDS+++++

Inquisitor, I propose we prepare to take advantage of this clash between Xenos and Heretics. All information will be passed to you by your faithful agent Loki.

Hail the God-Emperor

Keeping Your Eyes Open

This weekend I got a lesson in humility from Loki and I thought I'd tell you about it. As you may recall, I play Tau, with little luck. Loki told me about a player who ran a very different style of Tau with great success. This player had decided to play on the weakness Tau and turn it on its head by instead of minimizing the number of fire warriors on the board because of their mediocre stats, this player decided to field five full squads, sixty fire warriors. Instead of my standard tactic of hugging the table edge and scooting away from enemies as they came to me, this player would drive toward the enemy, attacking a flank and deep striking in suits to support while railguns targeted light armor first, then heavy armor, ignoring hammer units until the endgame. This was such an alien concept to me I wondered what this mystery player was smoking.

The next day Loki had convinced me that, crazy as it was, the list had some merit after we had built a rough replica of this mystery army. Loki and I hadn't been able to play a game in quite a while due to conflicting schedules, so he suggested we test this list out. We rolled into the Keep and set up a game between ourselves and Loki told me a secret: he was the mystery Tau player, he had thought up the army the night before. Having been thoroughly conned, I had to shake his hand as we lined up to duke it out.

The game forced me out of my comfort zone and to think, as I had slipped into such a rut I was playing in my sleep. It was one of the closest games Loki and I have ever played and that's saying a lot since he was the person to get me into the hobby. With his assistance my school of devilfish kept swimming and advanced up one of his flanks, intimidating and eliminating his sternguard, while one crisis team dropped in, killed two devastators and forced them to run off the board. Loki's terminators ripped a path through my broadsides, commander and two fire warrior teams. The game was decided on turn six when Pedro and a tactical squad bowed to the massed shots of two teams of fire warriors, two devilfish and a crisis team. The game ended on a two with a tally of eight kill points for Loki and nine for myself. Surviving for Loki were five terminators and six tactical marines facing down thirty-six fire warriors, two devilfish, three suits and a hammerhead.

Through taking a leap of faith, or indifference, and a convincing lie by Loki, I was able to get out of a rut. Generally, I have too high an opinion of myself when it comes to this hobby, but I will admit this was a learning experience for me. Loki was able to figure out an army he's played all of one time, both in list building and tactics, and take it to a close victory over his own tournament winning army. Will I keep running this new list? Probably. Will I try harder to keep my eyes and ears open to advice in the future? Definitely.