League Battle Report: Merkan 76th IG vs. Chaos Marines

Hold the line!

Sunday I played what may be my last game of our recent 40K league, against Will's Chaos Marines.  The top four scorers will go on to a playoff.  I have no idea of my score or relative standing, but with something like a 50/50 record if I do make it to the playoffs it will likely be as the fourth out of four.

This game was at 1750pts.  Since it was going to be the big points value, I wanted to bring in my big commander so General Starken (aka Iron Hand Straken) made an appearance as well as the things I'd recently painted, an autocannon squad and the Hydra.  We rolled up Purge the Alien (Kill Points) with a Hammer and Anvil (short edges) deployment.

I set up first (see above pic) with Russ and Hydra backing up the infantry in the aegis line on my left, lascannons and Starken in central ruins, barrage weapons, missile launchers and autocannons in ruins on the right, with a speed bump squad in front.  Moe Berg (Marbo), Storm Troopers, and veteran squad with Chimera in Reserve.

View of IG lines from other flank

Chaos deployment.  Flying Tzeentch Daemon Prince, two squads of plague marines, thousand sons in Rhino, two helbrutes with reaper autocannons, vindicator, two oblits in big tower.  Typhus teleporting in, Heldrake flying in.

Chaos seizes the initiative and starts rolling forward.  Prince flies into ruins near aegis line, Rhino zooms up but gets popped by torrential IG fire.  Manticore rocket lands on vindicator and far helbrute, stunning the tank and immobilizing the walker.  Mortar fire on the disembarked thousand sons snipes out the sorcerer.

Prince flies lower and charges into the front rank of guardsmen while vindicator moves up to try to get into range.

Prince takes one wound from overwatch fire, and another from a krak grenade to the face but slaughters the squad, consolidating towards the center of the line.

Coordinated fire including the timely arrival of the veteran squad bring down the daemon prince while chaos troopers move forward.

Vindicator is finished off and approaching infantry gets whittled down.  Moe Berg appeared behind the Chaos lines and tossed a demo charge into a plague marine unit, killing two before the survivors boltered him down, but distracting them from their advance for a turn.

Storm Troopers outflank to try to get a Linebreaker point but are quickly dispatched by the Heldrake's vector strike and obliterator plasma cannons.  I need to remember to set up some good terrain on the edges of the enemy zone for them to hide in or try deep striking them more instead of outflanking.  The Heldrake's victory is short lived, as the Icarus lascannon tracks its arrival and delivers a killshot through the ruin windows.

Typhus had arrived earlier and spent time approaching the Imperial lines.  He made it into the defenses and slaughtered one platoon command squad before being surrounded and gunned down.  The veterans had finished off the Daemon Prince, and now they finished off Typhus.  Get those boys more plasma guns!  And some new recruits to replace the guys that blew up.

Fire continues to pound the approaching Chaos Marines.  Closer plague marines are wiped out, and thousand sons whittled down, soon to fall.  Closer helbrute immobilized as well and then destroyed, other plague marines whittled down.  Hydra is blown up by the obliterators.

The game ended on turn six, and we added things up.  I had lost an infantry squad, a platoon command squad, the Hydra, Storm Troopers, Marbo.  He had three plague marines and the obliterators left, giving me a VP edge even before First Blood (the rhino) and Slay the Warlord (Typhus) are factored in.  Good way (for me) to end the league.

Will had a lot of scary stuff, but I was able to deal with it piecemeal.  His Prince flew up into my face, and half my army was able to concentrate on him.  Then Typhus comes up and does the same.  Meanwhile the other half of my army was able to pound on his advancing infantry units.  Part of it is down to luck, but if he were able to coordinate his attack better, like doing it a little later but hitting home with the DP, Typhus and something else (like teleporting the oblits) all at once in one area could have overwhelmed me.  I enjoyed the game and seeing the other folks, so a good day before I had to head off for a Super Bowl party.

I assume that we'll get another league going at some point, but not sure what I'll take.  Will certainly shelve the Merkans for a bit and am leaning towards the Chaos Marines since they're what I've painted most recently, but Orks are a strong contender.  We shall see!