I had planned to have my whole marine force painted for the
battle, but alas real life intervened and I was not able to get them as far as I
liked. Nevertheless, as this is not a competition, and my opponent’s army is in
a similar state, no harm no foul.
We both selected our crusade armies up to the 50PL limit, and spent a few of the requisition points on relics and warlord traits. I can only give commentary on my list.
Ultramarines 2nd Company.
I wanted to Include at least some of the new units from
Indomitus in my army. Indomitus is quite character heavy, and selecting a force
for a crusade mission requires you abide by the restrictions of the force
organisation chart, in this case a battalion. You can only pick units from your
crusade roster, but there is quite a lot of freedom as you can fire and hire
units whenever you want. They will of course start with 0 experience, and
levelling up units is one of the main aspects of the narrative rules. The force
is led by a captain, assisted by a Lieutenant, 3 troops choices made up of
intercessors. And support in the form of Bladeguard, eradicators and the always
effective aggressors. An outrider squad fills and chapter ancient fill out the
force.
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| Ultramarines 2nd Company Task force |
50 PL
Primaris Captain (Indomitus): The Imperium's Sword, Warlord
Primaris Lieutenant (Indomitus)
Primaris Ancient: Standard of Macragge Inviolate, Chapter
Ancient
Aggressor Squad: 3 Aggressors
Bladeguard Veteran Squad: 3 Bladeguard
Assault Intercessor Squad
Intercessor Squad: 5 Intercessors
Intercessor Squad: 5 Intercessors
Outrider Squad: 3 Outriders
Eradicator Squad: 3 Eradicators
Agendas: Cull the hordes: Secure the area
Genestealer Cult: Rusted Claw
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| The Cult of the four armed Emperor surges forth |
Total 50 PL
Jackal Alphus: The Gift from Beyond
Patriarch: Amulet of the Voidwyrm, Power:
Mass Hypnosis, Power: Might From Beyond, Warlord, Born Survivor
Acolyte Hybrids: Cult Icon, Hand Flamers 2x Rocksaw
Acolyte Hybrids: Cult Icon, Hand Flamers 2x Rocksaw
Neophyte Hybrids: 2x Mining Laser, 2x Grenade Launcher, 1x
web pistol
Achilles Ridgerunner Heavy Mining Laser, Survey Augur
Achilles Ridgerunner Heavy Mining Laser, Survey Augur
Atalan Jackals Demo Charges, 5x shotgun, 2x Grenade Launcher
Wolfquad with Incinerator
Goliath Truck Cache of Demolition Charges, Heavy Stubber,
Twin Autocannon
Agendas: Breakthrough, Deploy Vox relay
Mission and Deployment
We rolled for the mission, and the result was behind enemy lines. The problem with this is that you can only deploy reserves in your own deployment zone, so after a brief discussion, we re-rolled and settled on Recon Patrol (1-0 to the Ultramarines).
After setting up the battlefield using the always awesome looking forward base from Antenocitis Workshop (I had to sell several internal organs to get it) we got down to business. Deployment was quite easy with half of each force being in strategic reserve.
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| Looks too pretty to be imperial tech. probably the work of heretics! |
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| Definitely the work of heretics! |
The marines deployed clustered around the objective in their deployment zone, with most of the army hidden behind the central building. Deploying on the board are the assault intercessors, one squad of intercessors, the bladeguard. captain and eradicators.
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| Ultramarines Deploy The Genestealer cult kept the majority of their troops in reserve, the only things making an appearance was a pair of ridgerunners, the patriarch and Jackal alphus  |
Turn 1
The Genestealer cult took the first turn, and quite
surprisingly, none of the reserves showed up and the shooting was quite
unspectacular. I had given a few easy shots through poor deployment, and several
intercessors were gunned down. The patriarch deployed a Vox relay on the
objective in the GSC deployment zone.
In response, the ultramarine Eradicators sprinted towards the nearest Ridgerunner, while the rest of the ultramarines moved up to support them and secure the home objective. my deployment zone was reconnoitered.
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| Ultramarines move up |
The Eradicators were able to draw line of sight to one of the Ridgerunners, having advanced to get into range. They were able to shoot and several shots punched through the vehicle and destroyed it.
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| Priority Target Sighted |
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| Priority Target Neutralized |
Turn 2
The Genestealer cult maneuvered to get a few shots at the Ultramarines, and again, none of the reinforcements decided to show up. This was
a bit of a blow, but it did allow them to save up another CP for their
inevitable appearance on turn 3. A couple more marines would fall to their
fire, but nothing of any significance.
In response, the Eradicators moved up again. They were in position to both shoot the remaining Ridgerunner and act as bait for the patriarch in the next turn.
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| Ultramarines advance again |
Only a few marine reinforcements appeared, the aggressors and Outriders still being off the board. I was quite happy with this as it would allow me to respond to the GSC 3rd turn strike with them, and whatever else was left of my army. The Bladeguard reconnoitered another table quarter, and then the eradicators shot the second Ridgerunner which disappeared in a ball of flame.
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| Priority Target Sighted |
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| Priority Target Neutralized |
Turn 3
This turn hurt a lot, all of the GSC reinforcements appeared. The jackals appeared right by my lines, with some acolyte hybrids behind them and thanks to poor placement of units, there being no screen, Ultramarines were blown to pieces by a barrage of grenades and demo charges leaving a few survivors.
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| Atalan Jackals appear and lob improvised explosives... |
The Jackals then threw their remaining demo charges, blasting a handful more marines to pieces before speeding off to safety.
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| ...And then speed to safety |
The patriarch sprinted towards the Eradicators, some more
acolyte hybrids appearing behind him, and bathing the eradicators in flames, They emerged from it with some scorched armour, but none had fallen. The patriarch then charged into the eradicators,
and was easily able to dispatch them, capturing an objective into the bargain,
but he was now exposed and alone, the acolytes behind him having failed to make
their charge.
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| GSC reinforcements appear |
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| The patriarch slaughters the eradicators |
The Ultramarines had taken a serious beating, but their reserves also appeared. The captain and the bladeguard moved towards the patriarch, intending to both kill it and seize the objective he was holding They and cut it down easily.
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| Priority threat sighted |
 |
| Take the beast down |
The aggressors moved in behind the Jackals (surprise!) and managed to kill most of the Jackals with bolter fire, and then charged in to finish the job, killing them to the last man, and taking an objective into the bargain.
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| Aggressors move in |
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| and kill the Jackals |
and the outriders moved to counter one of the units of hybrids. they failed to make much of an impression, only killing a handful
 |
| unpainted models normally underperform.. |
Turn 4
The full strength squad of acolytes advanced towards the bladeguard and captain, using their hand flamers to try to do some damage, they totally failed (the +1 save from the storm shields makes a huge difference vs AP0 weapons) and then charged in to try to take them down. The captain bellowed a battlecry and charged to meet them, a flurry of blows saw two of the bladeguard killed, and in return, the remaining bladeguard and captain killed 7 of the hybrids, one more turning tail and running, leaving just two.
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| The Genestealers last throw of the dice fails |
On the other flank, the whittled down squad of acolytes finished off the outriders, losing one of their number.
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| But they do manage to kill the outriders |
While the aggressors faced shooting from the
Goliath truck and neophytes. They cultists were obviously still shaken from
seeing their god felled, and the aggressors emerged unscathed.
The Ultramarines judged that the Genestealer attack was more or less spent. the lone Bladeguard, finding himself outside of combat moved into the Genestealer deployment zone, and reconnoitered it as an action, the captain fell out of combat ready to charge back in (fall back and re-engage) to the 2 remaining hybrids, but the lieutenant, moving forward killed both with his Volkite pistol.
The aggressors moved forward, and obliterated the Neophytes
in a hail of fire (spending 1cp on squad doctrines to put them into tactical
doctrine) before charging into the Goliath truck and tearing it to pieces with
their power fists.
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| Aggressors move in |
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| And finish the job |
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| The marines move back to counter the hybrids |
Turn 5
With 4 Hybrids still alive, and the marines well ahead on VP’s,
we decided to call the game. The Genestealers skulking back to their lair. The Ultramarines had gathered enough Intel
to track them back to their hiding place.
 |
| Time to leave! |
Conclusion.
A hard won victory to the ultramarines. Both sides had to
contend with reserves arriving late. But it was the failure of the GSC to capitalise
on the knockout blow of turn 3 that decided it. The Aggressors did a stellar
job of racking up the kills when they did finally arrive, accounting for 3
units in 2 turns. Mistakes on my side were failing to properly screen my force
which meant the Jackals were able to decimate my infantry when they appeared. Some
of my units were also somewhat lacklustre in their performance, while others
were able to emerge from absolutely murderous barrages of flames unscathed. The
late arrival of my reserves was what decided the game though, I was able to
respond to the genestealers turn 3 attack with a knockout blow of my own. I
also concentrated on objectives, reconoitering 3 out of the 4 table quarters,
and scoring more on the primary objectives, so I would have won on VP’s even
had the GSC proven to be more devastating in their attacks. As it was, under a
third of my army survived. I could have mitigated a lot of the punch of the GSC
attack with a unit of infiltrators and the 12” deepstrike denial bubble, but I had
judged given the size of the board that it would have been massively unfair
considering the GSC tactics revolve around deepstrike abuse to get in their
punches. They cannot take the punch back, as evidenced by being cleared up
quite efficiently once they had all appeared.
Thanks again to my opponent for a great game.
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