WFN Round 2

In round 2 I found myself all the way up on table one, facing off against Jesse's space marines. He had what I would consider to be one of the scariest space marine builts which is one that is mostly shooty based, and contains one or 2 of each type of unit. The reason I find this to be the scariest is simply because if someone has the balls to play such a "battleforce" like army they not only have the tools to deal with almost aanything but also they are probably going one hell of a good player.

My list

Coteaz 100
Inquisitor- rad and psykotrok grenades level 1 psyker hammer hand 3 servo skulls  94

Elites
5 Purifiers- 2 psy cannons hammer halberd rhino with dozers and searchlights 193
5 Purifiers- 2 psy cannons hammer rhino with dozers and searchlights 191

Troops
5 Strikes- psy cannon master crafted hammer razorback with psybolts searchlights and dozers 181
5 Strikes- psy cannon master crafted hammer razorback with psybolts searchlights and dozers 181
5 Strikes- psy cannon master crafted hammer razorback with psybolts searchlights and dozers 181
5 Strikes- psy cannon master crafted hammer razorback with psybolts searchlights and dozers 181
10 Death Cult Assasins 150

Heavy
Dread- 2 twin linked auto cannons psy bolts searchlights 136
Dread- 2 twin linked auto cannons psy bolts searchlights 136
Land Raider Redeemer- Multi melta, psybolts searchlights extra armor 276
My opponent's list from memory.

Librarian- null zone and avenger
2 dread with 2 twin linked auto cannons
5 sternguard- 3 combi meltas 2 combi flamers
2 10 man space marine squads- melta las cannon combi melta, in rhinos
2 5 man space marine squads- las plas razors
1 unit of 2 attack bikes- multi meltas
1 typhoon (maybe he had 2?)
2 dakka preds- auto cannon 2 heavy bolters
5 devestters- 4 missiles in ass cannon razorback

The mission was dawn of war objective, There were 2 objective placed on the center line I believe and the 2 placed in our deployment zone. I put mine in the center behind a small los blocking building. He put his in area terrain in the far back of his deployment zone. The twist of the mission was night fight didn't happen turn 1 but instead happened turns 5-7.

He won the roll for first and took it. He deployed 2 halves of his 10 man tacticals on the board with las cannons near the objectives. He rolled on fairly spread out accross his deployment zone with eveything.

On my turn 1 I rolled on and rolled for night fight, despiete their being no night fight, damn habits! Because of this I couldn't see anything. Here is where I made my fatal mistake in my opinion. I came on fairly centered with my deployment, allowing his whole army to shoot at mine, (barring the devesaters who he admitted to deplloying poorly and had no los). I should have come on in the far right flank where there was almost no terrain, so my vehicles had more breathing room and a lot of his units would be out of position. Well live and learn I suppose.

On his turn he shot and immobilized my front most rhino which bottle necked me very badly, then blew up 2 more rhinos/razors and killed most of the occupants. He started to advance his 3 double melta units up my right flank to get to my land raider.

On the left flank my return fire shook a razorback and killed a attack bike... I could see that I would be losing this fre fight. And on the right I felt that it would be a mistake to commit the land riader in such a dangerous field. My plan was to use it's shooting and a psy back and strike squad to open up his rhinos, getting his marines on foot and then deathcult that flank. For the next 3 turns or so we would be trading blows on the right flank however he eventually won out as he blew up my rhino and decimated my strike squad.

As the game progressed up to turn 5 He shot my left flank up more and more leaving me with not much. He never targetted the immobilized rhino again since he didn't want to wreck it or explode it, giving me the option of going through it. Over the next 3 turns, he immobilized and weapon destroyed a dreadaught, killed a purifier squad, and a strike squad, as well as left the other 2 strike squads at 1 man, and 3 man respectively. By turn 3 I believe all my razors were wrecked or exploded in my deployment zone.

At some point through the game I got the idea of killing all of his troops and ignoring all the other stuff, forcing a draw or minor win for me, however I remember this became unattainable as I realized about half way through the game that he had 10 more marines then I thought in his 2 razorbacks (I thought they were empty until turn 3 or so)

Although things were looking grim I felt that I could still draw and if things went my way, maybe even pull a minor win.

On his turn 5 he flew a speeder 24" to contest my objective The score was 3-0 at the end of his top of 5, and I knew I had to pull some stuff out of my ass to do anything. I remember I moved something up to contest one of the objectives in the center that was held by his 2 razorbacks, I just don't remember what lol. I drove my land raider 12" forward and got my death cults out which multi charged 2 of his vehicles wrecking both, since hammerhand managed to go off twice. The deathcults were placed so that they were cotesting the objective. My 2 strike squads shot his speeder ad charged it, but could only shake it. If the game ended on 5 it would be a minor loss for me, however it went on.

Jesse forgot about turn 5-7 night fight which started to really hurt him as he could no longer sit there and shoot me off the table. He managed to kill whatever it was that I mvoed up to contest his objective and immobilize the dreadnaught I was planning on using to move up and contest it again. Damn. He also shot 3 or 4 squads at my deathcults, killing the inquisitor and 8 out of 10 deathcults.

There has been talk of me claiming tthat the deathcults had 4+ armor saves, I would just like to say here that I claimed no such thing. My opponent ad I have talked about it and we've come to agree that it was probably a misunderstanding of some sort. I would just like to say that I did not intentionally say the death cults had 4+ armor.

He also tank shocked a rhino through the building in my deployment zone to which I death or gloried with a hammer, who had cast hammerhand in the previous player turn. I told Jesse it was S 10, which in fact it was not since hammerhand expired (at the time I honestly thought it was S 10). While I would not have immobilized his rhino, and my justicar would  have died, it would have had no impact on the outcome of the game since I still contested the objective with 3 strikes. Regardess, I cheated, unintentionally however.

So now it was my turn 6. My purifiers from teh immobilized rhino got out and contested the objective (this was my plan if it went to turn 7.) My land riader moved up 6" and flamed 2 marine squads leaving the sternguard o just 1 guy and the librarian and the troop choice at 2 models. My 2 deathcults and coteaz were hoping to come in and kill the remaining marines and take the objective from him, giving us a draw, however I rolled a 3 for my difficult terrain test and failed the charge. The game ended with a minor win for Jesse, and a well earned win at that.

He played exceptionally well, with no major mistakes, and simply played better than me. Which is why he won. I would gladly play him in a rematch!