40K League: Day One

We got our newest league started today, got a few games in and met some more prospective players.  All in all a productive gaming day!  Above Leonard's orks battle Joshua's Tyranids.

 

 

 Scott and I set up to play our first game of the league, his Space Wolves against the Scythiak Usurpation.  1000pts a side.  The Scythiak set up ready to move forward in the teeth of enemy fire.

 

40K army checklist

We had a question for our upcoming 40K league that I thought wouldn't be well-answered by a Facebook reply, so I brought it over here:

It appears that this 40K league will have several new or returning players including myself. One of the things I did was a small checklist for army building when involved with the Fantasy league. This question goes out to the more experienced players:  When creating an army list what items or capabilities do you make sure that it has?

There have been some good replies already, and some of this will overlap.  Keep in mind this is for a pretty casual league.  I don't think we'll see super-tough top meta builds or anything like that; the advice is more geared to being sure you have options and aren't blindsided.

So, what should I keep in mind while building a 40K army?  The more you can answer with a yes the better, but you don't necessarily need all of them.  There are multiple ways to do most things, and a single unit can do multiple things, but be careful of relying too much on any one unit.  A lot of things also come down to how you use something, not just the army build itself.  Caveats aside:

• Can I secure objectives on my side of the table? (Can I have units be there at the end of the game? Can they survive?)
• Can I secure objectives on the other side of the table/get Linebreaker?
• Can I get First Blood and protect myself against it?
• Can I get Slay the Warlord and protect myself against it? (Do you have ways to protect your own Warlord?  Do you have ways to pick out the enemy Warlord?)
• Can I handle hordes?
• Can I handle elite infantry (2+ saves)? (either weapons that can bypass the saves or ability to kick out enough wounds they are bound to fail saves)
• Can I handle high AV vehicles and high Toughness targets? (some things work against both, some only vs one - poison is great against T8 but lousy against AV for example)
• Do I have a way to ignore cover?
• Do I have a way to get at somebody hiding? (Fast units, indirect fire)
• Can I handle flyers? (Skyfire, buckets of dice or ability to weather them?)
• Is my army fun to play against? (Great point by one of our players, Will!)
• Is my army fun to play?

A word on flexibility - be sure to take a second look at things that inherently offer extra flexibility.  Things like missile launchers, with different fire modes or psykers that can look at the mission and the opposition before deciding what disciplines to go for.

Other things?  Things you think are more important than others?

And They Shall Know No Rules - aftermath

A smaller turnout than hoped for, but we still ended up with four new or returning players in the end.  First off we had an old grudge match, Dark Angels vs. Space Wolves (Ben and Scott, respectively), and I broke out the Orks to battle Josh M's Tyranids. Swarmlord is a beast!  He would have been even nastier if Josh's dice had given him more respect.

7th Ed 40K quick table of contents

Just a quick post, if you find it useful great, if not no worries.  For your convenience a reference sheet showing where in the book different things are found in case you don't want to use the index or table of contents.  I put it together for some new and returning players I will be having another "And They Shall Know No Rules" event for.  Enjoy!

Warhammer 40K 7^th edition reference sheet

Movement Phase p18

               Difficult/dangerous terrain p108

               Movement table p199

Psychic Phase p22

               Powers – see codex or p192

Shooting Phase p30 (Ranged Weapons p176)

               To hit – p32 (p200)

               Snap shots – p32

               To-wound table p34 (p200)

               Move & shoot? (p201)

               Saves/AP pp36-7

               Run/Turboboost/Flat Out p38, p63, p75 (p199)

(Weapons p40)

Assault Phase p44 (Melee Weapons p178)

               Overwatch p45

               To hit p49 (p202)

Morale p56

               Regrouping p59

Unit Types p62

Vehicles p72 (plus pp201-2)

               Shooting at vehicles p75

               Vehicles in assault p78

               Transports p80

               Flyers p84

               Chariots p86

               Open Topped/Heavy/Fast Vehicles p88

               Skimmers p89

               Walkers p90

               Tanks (and Tank Shock/Ramming) p92

               Super-Heavy Vehicles p94

               Vehicle Upgrades p98 and codex

              

Characters p100

               Challenges p101

              

Terrain p108

Choosing your Army p116 and codex

Warlord/Warlord Traits p124 and codex

Allies p126 (Allied detachment p122)

Missions p128

Special Rules p156 (including Blast, Independent Character, Template)

Ranged Weapons p176 and codex

Melee Weapons p178 and codex

Grenades p180 and codex

Psychic Powers p192 and codex

Reference tables p199