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Scorecard 2 : June-August 07, 40K GT Preparations

and some BFG....

 

As soon as the Fantasy GT was over, I was warned that all gaming in Hong Kong would be 40K, as players grabbed their lasguns and started to train up for September's 40K GT.

I've been playing 40K since the first edition, but I think I must have an average of less than two games a year since.  Most of them  since the Eye of Terror when I finally painted up my Crinan IVth (bought in an enthusiastic response to the Armageddon Campaign, and then left in boxes).    But all my guardsmen were still packed up in Ireland, to be shipped over to Hong Kong, and I had an Iyanden army I'd been buying for years, and which needed painting.  When I was back in Eire on a visit to the in-laws,  I grabbed enough eldar to keep me going for a month or so, until the shipment arrived. If only I'd known the saga our shipping would turn into...!

Switching from expendable and cheap IG to expensive and elite wraithguard has proved a challenge for me, but with shipping difficulties by the wheel-barrow full,  I soon realised that my wave serpents and falcons were not going to arrive in time for me to play with them.  So I started to play with the figures I did have, which were an odd collection of wraithguard and half a wraithlord, and some farseers and warlocks.  Hmm. 

Not surprisingly my army has suffered rather badly.  My army lacks scoring units.  My 2 troop choices, of 10 wraithguard and a spiritseer take up over half my points: and they die very easily when swamped in combat by marines with power fists.  Defeat after defeat followed, and I started to feel happy with my day's performance if I managed to get to round six before being wiped out. 

It was clear that I was in no way in the running for a top spot in the tournament, and the only trophy open to me would be a Best Painted Award.   I had always intended for my Iyanden army to be a display, as so few troops seemed like a good opportunity to make a good looking army.  You can follow my blog on the army painting  here and here

 

Iyanden Army List

The army list has fluctuated from pure Iyanden (20 Wraithguard, Wraithlord, farseers and harlequins) to vaguely Iyanden (10 Wraithguard, 10 dire avengers, 5 path finders).  The list is still being tweaked, but ultimately I'll probably end up choosing models that look good, and having strayed away from the purest, I'm veering back to the ultimate Iyanden List, which marches forward behind a phalanx of 20 Wraithguard with Conceal and Fortune.  It looks good, although it's sadly ineffective.

Lost battles: 10

Won: 4


Game 1

I posted on the Fun Atelier forums and met up with Laurence Ho for a game of BFG.  My first in years, and only my fourth overall.  I was very excited to have a chance to light the heavens with lances and batteries and great flaming hulks.

 

 

A disaster for the Imperials!  I had never faced a chaos fleet before, and was dumbfounded how much better their gunnery was over mine.  Lawrence was rolling more dice than I could imagine, and doing so at 60cm when my range was pretty limited to 30cm.  Obviously losing two dauntless cruisers in the first round was a disastrous blow, and the game was over by then.  What has happened to imperial gunnery since the Horus Heresy?! 

My plan had been to push forward with the Avenger to pound the chaos fleet with broadsides, supported by the dauntlesses, whilst the swords sniped from the side, and the cobras shot down the chaos line with torps.  The problem obviously was that the Avenger didn't have forward arc of fire, my entire fleet had a max armour of  5, which meant I was playing with none of the benefits and none of the advantages of the Imperial Fleet.

I emailed the BFG yahoo group, and found out, to my surprise that the Imperial fleet seems to be generally considered to be a weak list.  I've never read that before, but I decided to get another game in and try and put some of the things I learnt into the next battle.

Game 2

This time I was paired up with Herbert, against Lawrence and Simon's Chaos fleets.  I took a pair of Lunar Cruisers, as these had a good reputation on BFG tacticas, and a couple of Dauntlesses, because I like their manoeuvrability and wanted to improve on their performance in the last battle. 

Herbert took a pair of Dominators, I think, and a squadron of Swords. 

I went all ahead full, in an attempt to get into range and slog it out with the enemy. 

 

 

 

Herbert and I took it in turns rolling the dice.  We took our opponent's dice, and borrowed dice from other tables, but whatever we did we failed every ld 9 test we made, meaning our fleet was without special orders, except Brace for Impact, the entire game.

Again, the range of the Chaos fleet shocked me, and out-gunned and out-ranged, and attacking in piecemeal, we were easily destroyed.

I had a better idea of how to play the next game. Hang back and pound the enemy, whilst launching bomber waves against them.


Game 3

I went back to my baby, the Vengeance class cruiser, and to help him out I put together a Mars class cruiser to offer some nova canon support and also to provide a fighter protection/bomber attack.  This time I was playing with Lawrence against a alien alliance of eldar and orcs.  Lawrence and I decided to take out the orc fleet first, which helped me a lot, as the orc fleet was effectively against both of ours.

Round 1

I intended the Vengeance to go into the midst of the enemy and draw fire onto the three shields, and with the ten hits, hopefully suck up the enemy's fire and so protect the rest of the fleet.

The rest of my fleet - four swords, three cobras and two dauntless and an enforcer, sped up the right flank on all ahead full, with the plan of getting behind the enemy whilst the Vengeance took them in the front.

Round 2

I hadn't expected the orc ram ships, the small blue and green ships in front of the Hulk, to be so fast and there didn't seem much chance of outrunning them, so i decided to turn and take them out.

The Vengeance and the Mars went either side of the asteroid field, a mistake really, although it did allow me to help Lawrence out with my nova canon.  The Mars launched a flight of fighters to stem the flood of orc fighter bombers that the Hulk was spewing out.

Round 3

I had a great round of shooting this turn, crippling  the orc cruiser and taking out the ram ships.  I locked on with the Vengeance, which was a great benefit, and at last she did some damage: pummelling the orc fleet.  The light cruiser squadron was finally around the asteroids and I was hoping to spring my trap taking the orcs at front and rear.

Round 4

My cobras (just off screen) savaged the crippled orc cruiser, while the ram ships were dead.  It was now I started to attack the orc Hulk.  It's a beast with 40 hits, and I was told that it was impossible to destroy.  'Believe me, I've tried!' I was told.  Well, There was little else for me to shoot at, and as I got closer, the amount of firepower it pumps out at a short range was frightening, destroying a dauntless cruiser as they swooped in with their torps and the bombers from the enforcer. 

Round 5

The Vengeance continued locking on, and did terrible damage to the Hulk, which was now struggling along with a massive 22 hits out of 40.

My Mars had cleared the orc defences that were floating in the middle of the battlefield, and was starting to target the eldar fleet. 

It was at this point that we had to call it a day, which was a shame, but this game was an absolute blast with a wide range of fleets and styles and bombers and fighters and torpedoes all streaming around the table.  I was confident that a couple more rounds of shooting and I would have knocked the Hulk out, which ended the game with 26 hits on it, I think.