Blood Angels, now there’s a chapter to be feared!

Another Sunday has passed, the last AGS of the year, a low turnout but fun was had. First to arrive was Mickey, soon followed by Dan. Mike had bought along the blood raven space marines and Dan had his Blood Angels, an unpleasant taste is in my mouth as I write the name of the last chapter. It is the taste of defeat. Dan suggested a 1000 point battle, a simple annihilation, simple my foot. We rolled for deployment, although Dan won the roll he insisted that I deploy first. An unusual tactic, but I soon discovered why, Dan was fielding and entire force comprised of assault squads. Turn 1: since there were no BA’s on the table all I could do was take up a defensive position and hunker down in the hope that one of my five squads would sight movement on the battle field. Turn 2: As my Terminator squad teleported onto the battlefield, the wail of jump packs filled the air as a squad of Blood Angels descended from above heading for my devastator squad. As they fell from the sky their jump packs stuttered and died. The marines plummeted to the ground, smashing through the floor of a building, their bodies crushed from the impact; all that could be done was to mutter a prayer to the Emperor to guard their souls. The rest of the force must have become apprehensive about performing an orbital drop as no other Marines arrived to collect their fallen brethren. Turn three: Blood Angels rained from the sky, this time none of the jump packs failed and they took position in some of the ruins of a once great city. The battle brothers of the ninth legion expected them to advance, instead they withdrew, making full use of available cover. A few shots were hurled at the warriors of the Chapter Aurelius, none of which did any real damage. The Terminator Squad and the Dreadnought moved in on one of the Blood Angel squads, the Dreadnought launched a krak missile into the unit, bringing down one of them. It then unleashed a ball of plasma fire, despatching two marines. The Terminator squad opened fire with an assault cannon and four storm Bolters, bringing down four more men. The Devastator squad also opened fire, further reducing the enemy squads number by three. Unfortunately the Plasma cannon overheated, the Marine carrying the weapon managed to avoid serious injury.

From the top of another ruin a squad of snipers fired at the same squad, although the shots found their marks they failed to bring down any of the Blood Angels. Once again the BA’s did not act as anticipated. I expected the squad that had taken losses to move against either the Terminators or the Dreadnought, instead they retreated further into the ruin. It appeared they were apprehensive about firing upon their own, whatever their plan was it was soon to be played out. Turn 4, the air was once again filled with the all too familiar scream of jump packs, Dante and a squad appeared behind the devastator squad. Dante fired his Infernus pistol into the squad, although the shot hit, the targeted marines armour protected him and no damage was taken, the rest of the squad fired bolters into the squad, bring one of them down, removing the hazard of the las-cannon. Suddenly the blood Angels poured out of the protection of the ruin and opened fire with flamers, choosing the Devastator squad as their target but doing no harm. Dante then led his squad into combat with the Devastator squad, eradicating them before they had a chance to strike back. The unit of blood Angels that had been reduced to just two men charged toward the Terminators, no doubt hoping to bring them down with chain swords and pistol fire. Although they managed to slay two of the Terminator squad the retaliation was merciless and the last two members of the blood angel squad were cut down, their blood staining the ground. The Terminators found no solace in this victory; they were fighting not only for their lives but for the honour of the chapter Aurelius. The blood Angels are devoutly loyal in the service of the Emperor and have sworn to eradicate any that do not swear allegiance to the god emperor. The Terminators and the Dreadnought turned their attention to squad Dante. Storm bolter and assault cannon fire tore through the air, felling two of the squad, Dante remained untouched. Meanwhile the sniper squad, eager to join the fray, reposition so that they stood a better chance of targeting Dante. By the time they had braced their weapons the Terminators had already charged into combat. Squad Dante were too quick and unrelenting in their assault, cutting the mighty Terminators down before they could act. Turn five saw the final squad of blood angels make landfall close to the tactical squad that had so far missed any of the action, The Angels fired into the squad killing two men. Squad Dante broke and their commanding officer tore into the Dreadnoughts armour, damaging the servos that operate the legs; the continued assault resulted in the Dreadnoughts plasma cannon being ripped from its mounting, all the machine could do was pivot on the spot in the hope of acquiring a target lock with the missile pod. The remainder of squad Dante slaughtered the sniper squad. The Ninth legions captain broke cover, firing a melta shot at Commander Dante, although the shot scored a hit, the emperor was watching over his favoured son and he survived the shot. The tactical squad fired on the assault squad that had attacked them moments before, although the entire squad was slain, the battle forces victory was short lived as the remaining members of squad Dante eviscerated the Ninths captain but not before he could cleave in two one of them. Dante stood victorious over the fallen captain, there was nothing more the remaining space marines of the chapter Aurelius could other than retreat, carrying with them the hope that one day their honour will be restored and they would once again be embraced by the Emperor they lived to serve. Until then they will continue to fight all enemies, whether they be a part of the Xenos threat to the future of mankind, or the brethren they longed to fight beside under a single cause. On receiving the news that his men had failed to find a world where the disgraced ninth legion could find respite, Chapter Master Marcus Aurelius destroyed a console on his battle barges bridge, vowing that for the next encounter his warriors would show no mercy, no relent, they would eradicate the next enemy from the galaxy and send them begging for the Emperors grace.

Kaboooooooom!

I mentioned in yesterdays post that my favourite part of the hobby is painting, I’ve been painting for around twenty years now and even in my quietest point I managed to paint one model every few months. I have my favourites and there are some that I’ve disliked.

It’s all down to personal preference, but I prefer to paint the plastic models, I think it's the way that the quality of the moulding process has improved. When GW produced the very first set of plastic Space Marines (RT01) I remember them well, mainly for the lack of detail and that they went together quite badly. A box of current plastic marines can be used to build a squad with individual models in dramatic poses with a variety of ranged and close assault weapons. i also own original copies of the first edition of Space Hulk, the Genestealers haven’t changed much, but the terminators have undergone a major design change. I bought a boxed set of termies about fifteen years ago, maybe longer, I thought they were fantastic pieces, highly detailed and quite simple to put together. the same models, now in plastic are incredible. there is so much room for conversion and a wide selection of options. don’t get me wrong, there are some very fine metal models available, the Ork Shok attack gun being just one example. the model is so well detailed and the sculptor has put so much effort into telling a story with the model. from the expression on the big meks face to the little snotling clawing at the ground desperately trying to escape the horrible fate that awaits him. with time, skill and effort, this model looks amazing and makes a fine addition to any Ork force, plus it’s quite scary when your adversary announces that he’s going to fire the damn thing. when you consider that it can, with a good dice roll, unleash a strength 12 AP2 large blast. I, for one, wince in fear when the strength dice are rolled and I find myself praying that a double one is rolled. I honestly don’t know which is the nastier weapon, that or the Stompas supa-gatler. all i know is that I’ve had squads on the receiving end of both and fare badly against them. What Ork weapons lack in reliability, they make up for in the ability to decimate a force. So I wonder what my readers like about the game, maybe they would be gracious enough to leave a comment telling us about their favourite aspect of the GW multiverse.

On the subject of readers, I’ve noticed that the majority of them appear to be from the States, it would be interesting to get their perspective on the game.

For the Emperor!

It’s all in the game.

After reading an article in this month’s WD, I got to thinking what the hobby means to me, I make no secret of the fact that I prefer painting and only wish that I could paint to GW standards. I really enjoy seeing other people’s models and the quality of some goes beyond the pros who work for GW. Seeing a model go from plastic kit to a beautiful finished piece is a real thrill. When one of the lads shows me some of their work I make a point of noticing the good effort they have given to painting rather than looking at a model and telling them it’s a bad job, these guys are young and as an older player I feel that I just make every effort to encourage them to stick with the hobby. In truth I’ve seen many styles of painting from the lads, some have improved greatly where as others have continued to slap paint on with a 2 inch brush. Some listen to the advice I give others completely disregard it. Of course it’s their choice and it’s not my place to tell them that their work is bad, but I think that if I can help them improve the way they paint then I will continue to do so.

Although I’ve said that I would rather paint, I do enjoy a game, I’m happy to play against the lads and older players/ I’m also happy to be corrected if I get a rule wrong, especially if it’s one of the youngsters that corrects me, it shows that they’re taking the time to learn the rules.

I wouldn’t consider myself a competitive player, I like to win, that’s the point of playing any game. But I can also lose gracefully. I will congratulate an opponent when they take down a powerful unit and share in their victory. At times I’ll remind my opponent that they’ve forgotten to deep strike or take advantage of a situation, and every now and then I’ll use their forgetfulness to my advantage, something I’m sure we’ve all done at one point.

When I supervise games for the lads, I will point out a flaw in their opponents’ tactics, this usually results in cries of despair from the other player, but then I do the same for them and they soon realise that I am helping them improve their game, they soon learn to avoid making the same mistakes.

If I had to choose a favourite opponent for me, it would have to be Smiffy. Our games are good fun and we both enjoy playing. When he and I play we tend to expose weak areas in each other’s army. Of course this also means that we both get to the shop to buy something to fill that gap and look forward to trying out a new vehicle or squad. That was the reason I bought a sniper squad and a very good purchase it was. I suspect Smiffy has rectified a few flaws in his army, most likely to combat the dreadnought plasma cannon. No doubt this will mean that I need to add something that will deal with his new addition, namely an assault squad, at the moment I don’t have anything that’s really hack and slash so something that is primarily close combat might be a good idea. I would really like to get a Necron Tomb Stalker, I’m sure it make like work of Smiffy chaos Space marines and it would look very cool on the table.

Looking to the future I plan to have the Tau table ready within the first half of 2011, a whole new army to field will make for some interesting games, and I’m sure Smiffy looks forward to putting his CSM’s against them.

Have fun, and roll well

Toodles

K