Tom M and I got in two good games of 40k last night at Redcap’s. We played 1000 pts on a 4×4 table, Kingbreakers versus Tom’s Custodes (Grey Knights). Having not played since February it was important for me to refresh before the upcoming tournament on Saturday, Tom got in a few more games learning Grey Knights, and we both got to test our armies a little before the small-armies May tournament.

There are more photos than those here in the Flickr gallery.

Army

Kingbreakers brought a just slightly funny list:

• Capt Angholan—Vulkan
• Ghosts (Sternguard) x5 w/ 3x Combi-Meltas and Poweraxe in Drop Pod
• Tacticals x6 w/ Vet Sgt, Powerfist+Boltgun, Flamer, Drop Pod
• Tacticals x10 w/ Vet Sgt, Chainsword+Bolt Pistol, Meltagun, Missile Launcher, Razorback
• Scouts x5 w/ Camo Cloaks, Sniper Rifles
• Predator w/ Autocannon, Heavy Bolter sponsons
• Imperial Bunker

To some extent this was dictated by what I’ve got painted that makes any sense in 1000 points. Only the scouts aren’t finished, and I might be able to get them done by the tournament if they stay in the list (questionable). The big thoughts before this weekend are the related questions of keeping the scouts, working in a quadgun, and/or switching that Razorback for a Drop Pod.

The Custodes fielded something like:

• A Grand Master w/ Thunderhammer
• Dreadnoughts x2 w/ 2x Autocannons
• Terminators x5 w/ Halberds
• Purifiers x5 w/ Halberds w/ Rhino
• Purgation Squad x5 w/ Psycannons

That’s not a lot of dudes!

Game 1

First battle we played 12″ deployment, 4 objectives, Tom went first. He placed his two objectives fairly wide apart along his back edge. I clustered mine up into one corner near my bunker. Scouts infiltrated up into a center position overlooking the whole table but were quickly swept off the board by psycannon fusillade. Kingbreakers Ghosts crashed through the roof of an administratum building and onto a Custodes objective, blasting away a Dreadnought with combi-melta fire to claim First Blood. Terminators ganged up on Captain Angholan and managed to bring him down with their lightning quick halberds. The Kingbreakers immediately avenged his death, a lucky long range krak missile from the Kingbreakers’ base obliterating the Grand Master amid a hail of heavy weapons fire from the tanks charging his position on the other Custodes objective. Sgt Scolirus crumpled the hull of the remaining dreadnought with his powerfist but was himself caught out by the remaining Terminators. Both Kingbreakers’ and one Custodes’ objective safely locked down, the endgame became a delicate dance of tank shocks and troop movements as the Kingbreakers attempted to physically push the Custodes off their remaining objective with a Predator and Razorback, to no avail.

Outcome

Tied on objectives, tied on Slay, Kingbreakers eek out a victory with First Blood.

Game 2

Next round we used the same table setup, corners deployment, 1 objective each, Kingbreakers attack first. Each of us put our objectives right back into the corner positions we had both used last game. Taking a strategic change following the first game, Tom prepped his Terminators to deep strike and placed the Purifiers and their transport into reserve. This was fairly threatening as my home objective had a nice little landing area around it, and the Scouts and Tactical Combat Squad originally deployed to hold my objective would not be able to do much about incoming GK Terminators. However, trying to fill the space and make landing there more risky as well as to have more shooting on hand would mean dedicating even more resources to doing nothing in the early part of the game until those Terminators hit.

In the end I decided to go for it and leave the home base to fend for itself. I figured even if they failed, hopefully Tom and I would just swap objectives and still tie out. All of the Kingbreakers’ mobile forces went hard after the Custodes’ home objective—Drop Pods, Predator, Razorback, everybody made haste and wedged themselves into that one little corner. Ghosts again claimed First Blood, crashing through a building to wipe out a Dreadnought. Vulkan and Tactical 1 flamed the opposing power armor off the board, and Sgt Scolirus crushed the other Dreadnought in his crackling powerfist.

The opposing objective secured, the Kingbreakers’ vehicles about-faced and began rushing headlong to support their own home base. The Heavy Custodes had deep struck directly onto the KB objective and immediately eliminated the Scouts in withering stormbolter fire. Taking discretion as the better part of valor, the defensive Tactical Squad retreated into their bunker and laughed grimly as the Custodes outside beat on its AV14 shell to negligible effect. Meanwhile, the Kingbreakers tanks wound up in perfect position to intercept the incoming Custodes transport on the fly. Squad Titus leapt from their Razorback on the run, meltagunning the rear armour of the hovertank. With precision timing, the supporting Predator immediately swept the side rank of the troops spilling out of the Custodes’ flaming wreckage while the Tactical Squad in the bunker ahead also peppered them with fire. The Purifiers devastated, the Razorback hung back on mop-up duty while Sgt Titus lead his men to shore up the Kingbreakers’ home objective while the Predator began trimming away the Terminators. Reinforcements in sight, Titus’ defensive Combat Squad charged from their bunker and directly engaged the Terminators, tieing them up.

Outcome

Custodes withdraw in the face of an unavoidable loss.

General Thoughts

Hiding out in the bunker for much of the second game felt kind of cheesy, but worked out exactly as I hoped it might when selecting the fortification in my list. The theory is that at this point level there just isn’t going to be that much around which can really go after an AV14 building, which is actually more robust than a similarly armored vehicle. Tom was reduced to trying to crack it with a single thunderhammer and a melta grenade. He did manage to reduce the armor value but by that point it was too late and the guys inside were at full strength to run out and grab or at least contest the home objective at the end.

Making up my army I’d been hedging back and forth about switching the Razorback to a Drop Pod, both to shave points and to have two landing on Turn 1. I was definitely glad I didn’t though as mobility took the day in the second game. Those guys literally went from my deployment zone, to the far corner in case Tactical 1 got ripped up in claiming that objective, and then all the way back to the opposite corner to cover my own objective. One of the things I had to get used to when I started playing 40k in 4th edition was that it wasn’t like a video game. Squads just couldn’t go running all around the table tackling different tasks; at best they might make it ~24 inches. Then in 5th they got a lot more mobile with running and more efficient transports. In 6th there’s even more mobility with the basic transports moving flat out, let alone the flyers. It sounds like units will get even more mobile in 7th with difficult terrain being reduced to -2 inches. I have mixed feelings about that particular change, but the general increase in mobility is much to the improvement of the game.

Finally, I had great fun crashing Drop Pods and tanks through all manner of buildings in these games. All those buildings though really hampered my Scouts. The buildings were designed for Infinity and have fewer windows and ruined sections than typical 40k terrain. This cut down the shooting lanes pretty hard and gave few places for the Scouts to hang out in cover—they were either completely visible or had no sightlines. As such their cloaks were useless and both games they and their 4+ armour were quickly swept off the board. There’s potentially a general consideration there in playing at Redcap’s in the future. The store’s built up a substantial collection of Infinity terrain, and it gets used quite a bit so it’s usually out on the tables. I’m sure the guys are cognizant of the differences between the two types of terrain so I don’t expect it to have a ton of impact in tournaments. I do expect though to have a few more tables now and then with very limited sightlines but no cover within those sightlines. For pickup games this is definitely something to be prepared for unless you take the effort to ensure you wind up on a 40k table.

Again, there are more photos in the Flickr gallery.