Tuesday 22 December 2015

Trying something new... 40k Battle report Imperial Fists/Imperial Knights vs Salamanders

Apologies for my long hiatus, but since its holidays time, I have plunging into the hobby to make up for lost time. I have for a while now been secretly working on a new 40k/30k army, and this is the first game that I could use one of those units as an ally, just to see how they go.

This is a 1000pt game. I decided I wanted to use my Imperial Knight that I just painted up, though conscious of the points level I made sure it was okay with my friend first, to which he said, go for it, which was very kind of him. We were playing long ways down the table and we used the mission cards, as I like the idea of the shifting objectives.

Here are my forces.
Imperial Fists
Captain Lachdannan
Artificer Armour, Relic Blade, Storm Shield

Tactical Squad I
10 Marines, Veteran Sgt, Power Fist, Missile Launcher, Flamer
Rhino, Extra Armour

Tactical Squad II
10 Marines, Veteran Sgt, Power Sword, Missile Launcher, Flamer
Rhino, Extra Armour

Imperial Knights Ally
Knight Paladin

Salamanders (from memory)
Vulkan Hestan

Dreadnought
Multimelta, Drop Pod

Tactical Squad
Veteran Sgt, Combi-melta, Melta gun, Drop Pod

Tactical Squad
Veteran Sgt, Combi-melta, Melta gun, Drop Pod

Tactical Squad
Veteran Sgt, Combi-melta, Melta gun, Drop Pod

Attack Bike
Multimelta

Devastators
10 Marines, 4 Missile Launchers

Turn 1
I won the roll of for the table sides, and deployed my whole force down. I tried to keep them close together to support each other, as I knew there would my a lot of Drop Pods incoming. My captain is a the foot of the Knight, so he can run out and eliminate the melta squads I know are incoming. Otherwise, my Tactical Marines were in position to take cover and shoot whatever comes. Time to dig in!
My Knight killed 3 of the Devastators (they were put into combat squads), and these failed their morale and fled 2". Then rallied. Otherwise not to eventful this turn.
How its looking before the Drop Pods thunder down.
3 Drop Pods comedown in his turn. They are represented by big cups as he hasn't assembled the vast number of Drop Pods he has. I'm sure its high priority at this time of the year. These guys popped out of their Pod, and let rip with their melta. Although I did have the Ion shield facing them, hey still got a hit through, which did 4 Hull points of Damage (explosion result which gives +D3 Hull points off).
The other two pods came down on the opposite side of my center building. They popped out and destroyed my Rhino with melta shots, though the Storm Bolters on the Drop Pod is what finished the job.

Turn 2
My Rhino burns out of these towards an objective, whereas my Captain sprints from the cover to take out the melta squad. The squad over watch, hit and wound with the melta, though my Strom Shield saves the instant death wound. The Assault phase sees my Captain kill 1 Marine, but the rest stay put.
My Knight faces off against the smaller walker. I manage to do a wound and Stun the machine, but that is all. I also fail my charge move (needed an 11). My 2 Tactical Squads open up on the small squad between them, and wipe them out.
Come get some!
The rest of the Drop Pods thunder down. The empty one lands in the middle of the the field, whereas Vulkan's pod lands bang on behind my Knight. You may notice he has only 1 Hull Point left, so he is very close to going down! They like the others open up with their melta, get through  my Ion Shield, though fail the Armour roll! (double 1). Unbelievable. His Dreadnought fires, misses and charges in. I think he put on the 4th Hull point of damage, In retaliation my Knight Destroys the Dreadnought. Good ol D weapon!

I think in the combat my Captain finally flares up and kills them all, though not before taking aound for his trouble. 

Turn 3
Lots of pods, though not many marines.
Warlords eye each other off. The whole squad that was with Vulkan got killed from all the shooting, though Vulkan refused to fail a single save. I decided to not assault with my Captain, as I thought the Knight would do better (and couldn't be hurt).
Here my Rhino moved up to claim the objective so I could finally cash in on a Mission card (up until that point, they were pointless). I managed to get 2 Victory points.
Vulkan moves up to my Tactical squad.
He flames them all, killing 1, but fails his charge.

Turn 4
Not too much shooting in my turn. I try and knock out some of these Pods. My Knight charges Vulkan and instantly kills him with his D weapon. So that is what a '6' does!
My friends turn just sees long range pot shots, and an attack bike that is screaming across the battle field in a B line right for my nearly dead Knight!
Shooting takes a toll on my tactical Squad II, though they pass their morale. I shoot at the attack bike with everything, though only cause 1 wound. He did jink though, so needs 6's to hit next turn.
Gutsy bike screams forward and shoots at my Knight through the window on the bottom floor. He hits on a 6, I fail my cover save, and he rolls low for armour! What a finish!


The game ended at Turn 5. The table still sees lots of drop pods and Devastator Squad at the back of the field. He also still has his attack bike. A very enjoyable game!
Final scores are:

Imperial Fists/Imperial Knights
Ascendency - 2VP
Slay the Warlord - 1 VP
Total - 3 VP

Salamanders
First Blood - 1VP
Line Breaker - 1VP
Total - 2VP

A very close game indeed! My Knight had a very close but entertaining game. Loosing a lot of Hull Points early made me play very conservatively, though despite that, he still killed Vulkan, a Dreadnought, and a few marines. Not too shabby for a first outing. My friend did a stellar job of trying to take him out, and came close many times. Drop Podding melta, especially mastercrafted melta seems to be something to watch out for. Still, it was good fun to roll some dice again.

Thanks for looking.

Cheers!

No comments:

Post a Comment