Death Comes to Agronnax XII

Introduction

Agronnax XII, a quiet Death World near the Eastern Fringes of the galaxy. The very edge of the Imperium. Centuries ago, there had been a colony of the Imperium of Man here, but something unexplained had happened, and the dangerous indigenous lifeforms had overrun the planet wiping out its human population. Too far away and of little consequence to the Administratum, no-one had ever bothered to investigate.

Fast forward 300 years, Hive Fleet Medusa is rising through the galactic plane and scout forces of the 13th Black Crusade are investigating Agronnax XII in case the cause of its destruction can be used to sow chaos and confusion across the periphery of the Segmentum Tempestus.

Terrain

The board was half ruins and half death world. Most terrain was area terrain with a bit of a killing zone in the centre.

Deployment

Deployment - Chaos Space Marines



The CSM were fairly straightforward in their deployment. On their far right flank was a Forgefiend daemon engine. From their centre to their left flank were Marines in Rhino, Daemon Prince, Cultists behind a Defense Line with a Quad Gun Emplacement and more Marines in a Rhino. In Reserve were a squad of Terminators and a Heldrake.

Deployment - Tyranids

Fairly conventional from the Tyranids as well. A Screamer Killer carnifex out on the flank to soak up the Forgefiend, Tervigon with a small brood of Genestealers in front. A brood of two Biovores behind the building in the centre of the Tyranid deployment zone. Finally the key to the attack, Hormagaunts, Warriors and a Hive Tyrant, all ready to rush up the right flank and roll up the Chaos positions. All the Tyranids had in reserve was a couple of Lictors and a brood of Raveners.

Turn 1 - CSM

Everything on the table (apart from the cultists who believed they were safe inside their defense line) pushed forward. Some desultory bolter fire and Havoc missiles from the Rhinos inflicted minor casualties on the Genestealer and Hormagaunt broods. The Forgefiend's plasma cannon missed the Carnifex and its autocannons bounced harmlessly from it's tough hide and chitinous armour plating.
End of CSM turn 1.

Turn 1 - Tyranids

Go, go, go... everything moved straight towards the nearest Chaos object it could see, except the Biovores who sat building up enough spew to disgorge a spore mine cluster across the table. The Carnifex hugged cover a bit and moved through the terrain (forgetting it was a monstrous creature and could move through cover for the extra dice). Mama Tervigon gave forth of her tyranidous bounty and expelled fourteen (6, 5, 3) newborn termagants from her birth sacs.
The Tyranid shooting phase was almost non-existent. Everything that wasn't spitting spore mines in a ballistic trajectory ran towards the enemy. The spore mines hit inside the defence line, though not exactly where intended but still managed to kill 2 or 3 cultists.
End of Tyranid turn 1.

Turn 2 - CSM

Reserve rolls went 50/50. Terminators - No. Heldrake - Yes. Taking advantage of sneaky flying rules the Heldrake came zooming onto the table, while the Daemon Prince (whose mighty pinions had propelled him  into the air last turn) swooped over the Genestealers and Termagants towards the Tervigon, vector striking a couple of Genestealers as he passed. The Rhino borne marines noticed how close the Tyranid broods were and reversed back to their deployment positions (at no point in either turn had any marines got out of their transports).
In the shooting phase the Heldrake did tremendous work squirting Soul Blaze, Chaos napalm substitute all over the Hormagaunts, instantly frying 6 or 7. The gun emplacement and Rhinos again fired on broods, with casulaties amongst the Genestealers (1) and the Warriors (1 warrior, but 3 wounds). The Forgefiend again scattered his plasma blast and rolled even worse for his autocannons and again the Carnifex stood unscathed.
With no assaults, this ended CSM turn 2.

Turn 2 - Tyranids

Here we go, here we go, here we go...
Tyranid reserves were a bit beardie as I'd bought the Hive Commander upgrade. So two Lictors and a Ravener brood appeared behind the Chaos lines.

You know that feeling you get when you think someone's looking over your shoulder...

Tyranids surged forward to try to get within assault range. The Daemon prince in the midst of my line disconcerted me a bit, so when Mama Tervigon disgorged another fourteen termagants (6, 6, 2 so no more spawning) we concentrated on shooting down the Chaos beastie.
Twenty eight termagants in two broods shot the Prince. The first brood did two (!) wounds but failed to ground him, the second brood did another wound and this time did ground the beast (which was lucky as the spine cluster thing on the Tervigon did nothing). When we checked, the Heavy Venom Cannon the Hive Tyrant was carrying was a blast weapon and so couldn't have shot at a swooping Daemon Prince, but a grounded Daemon Prince was a different matter. There were a lot of Tyranids in the potential blast area but in the end the thing scattered wildly missing everything! Spore mines splattered on the red rhino and caught the edge of the defence line, doing a point of damage and killing one more cultist.
In the assault phase the Hormagaunts poured past the Rhino (realising that there was little damage they could do), the Genestealers piled onto the Black Legion Rhino, The Carnifex barrelled towards the Forgefiend and the Hive Tyrant did the honours against the critically wounded Daemon Prince.
The Hormagaunts made it to the defence line and slaughtered all except one of the cultists for very little damage (if any) in return. The cultist held his nerve though and the Hormagaunts consolidated inside the perimeter.
The remaining four Genestealers rending claws ripped through the rhino, destroying it utterly forcing the marines inside to make an emergency exit.
To add insult to injury the Hammer of Wrath charge from the Hive Tyrant killed the Daemon Prince before an assault could be fought (most people around the table were waiting for a termagant to kill it in hand to hand). First blood to the Tyranids!
The final assault of the turn saw the Carnifex win the fight but fail to destroy the Forgefiend.

Turn 3 - CSM

Things were looking bad for the followers of Khorne, but not to worry, the Terminators would be appearing through the Warp any second. Whoops, another 1, so no Terminators this turn either.
Chaos movement was pretty much limited to Marines getting out of Rhinos and the Heldrake descending on the cluster of Termagants near the middle of the board.
In the shooting phase the marines had some success, wiping out the Genstealers and killing three Warriors with fire from everyone who could see them (Quad gun, Khorne berzerkers, Rhinos...). The Heldrake again spewed out its hellish napalm killing 7 or 8 Termagants from one of the spawned broods.
The assault phase was reduced to only those squads already in melee as the Rhino that the Berzerkers were in wasn't an assault vehicle (whatever one of those is... Tyranids just walk). The remaining Cultist died a lonely and horrific death, while the Forgefiend faired rather badly against the Carnifex. Two penetrating hits ripped of an autocannon arm then blew the thing to smithereens, with the resulting explosion bouncing harmlessly off the Carnifex.

This is what happens when you bring an autocannon to a knife fight





Turn 3 - Tyranids

Time was up for the Chaos interlopers. Movement was all about positioning for the assault. Lictors and Raveners congregated around the Black Legion, while the Hormagaunts and Warriors lined up on the Berzerkers. Having despatched the Daemon Prince back to the Warp, the Hive Tyrant turned back towards the fight hoping to lend some weight to the subsequent shooting.
The Lictors and Raveners fired flesh hooks and borer grubs into the Black Legion marines, but with little effect, killing only two of the defenders. The Warriors let rip with their Deathspitters killing two Berzerkers (one of whom was the Aspiring Champion) and the Hive Tyrants Venom Cannon killed only one more Berzerker, but did damage the Rhino.
In the assault phase, the Black Legion Marines were doomed as both Lictors and the whole brood of Raveners got in with no overwatch injuries. The slaughter was almost complete with only two marines running off toward the Tyranid lines because all other routes of escape were blocked.

Usually its the insidious forces of Chaos doing the surrounding...

The Berzerkers fared slightly better. Hormagaunts did little damage and because of the distance only two Warriors could assault and neither of them could reach Kharn. Kharn and his squad accounted for 4 Hormagaunts, but the Warrior's boneswords did the job killing 3 or 4 Berzerkers in return. The Betrayer and his remaining squad held though, even in the face of massively superior odds.

Turn 4 - CSM

It was all over. If the Terminators did make it in it would be into carnage and certain death and so the Chaos Space Marines called it a day.

Aftermath

A good game, which was loads of fun. My first 6th Edition game as well.
I got distracted by the Prince and so pulled my Hive Tyrant and some Termagants out of the line. In retrospect, the Chaos side was a bit wary of close combat and if he was going to let him Swoop all game, occasionally vector striking a monstrous creature or a couple of broods I should have just let him get on with it. No Skyfire, and a preponderance of blast weapons at long range left me with no real defence against the Heldrake. I might need to check the FAQ/Errata to see if there is anything I can do about that.
The Chaos player made the fatal mistake of leaving the boys in the back of the van in turn 1, reversing like a coward in turn 2 (and still not getting out of the van), then finally getting out of the van when the Tyranids caught up. A turn or two of shooting would have broken up my broods and the Tyranid Warriors took a punishing when fire was finally concentrated on them, but basically it was all over when  the Tyranids were within assault range having lost only 7 Hormagaunts, 4 Genestealers and 2 Tyranid Warriors.
Tyranid Man of the Match - Screamer Killer! Not a single wound! Plasma blasts missed, autocannons pitter-pattered off the tough exterior and close combat was amazing.
Chaos Man of the Match - Heldrake. Little I could do against it and its Balefire flamethrower thingy did most of the damage the Tyranids took in that game.
The interested can check out the photobucket story of the game here (http://s249.beta.photobucket.com/user/romizzi/story/13749).

Dystopian Wars - Prussians vs British

Second ever game of Dystopian Wars. 1000 points a side. Naval Core.
I played Prussians. Dave played Kingdom of Britannia (KoB).

Prussian Fleet

• Emperor Battleship - Tesla Generator
• 1 Squadron of 3 Reiver Cruisers
• 3 Squadrons of 3 Arminius Frigates
• 1 Squadron of 3 Stolz Destroyers
• 1 Squadron of 2 Metzgers
• 1 Squadron of 2 Geier bombers
• 2 Tiny Flyer Fighter Wings of 5 tokens each.

Britannian Fleet

• 2 Ruler Battleships with 3 Bastion Escorts each
• 1 Squadron of 3 Agincourt Class Gunships
• 1 Squadron of 2 Hawk War Rotors
• 1 Squadron of 2 Vanguard Submarines
• 1 Tiny Flyer Fighter Wing of 5 tokens
• 1 Tiny Flyer Torpedo Bomber Wing of 5 tokens

The terrain rolls were rubbish. A couple of small area, medium height islands around the centre in the KoB half of the board and a large area, massive height mountainous island on the left flank of the KoB half of the board.

Highlights of the game:

Turn 1: Jockeying and manoeuvring. The Vanguards went down the KoB left flank between the table edge and the big island and I diverted a Metzger, a frigate squadron and the destroyers to intercept. The Britannians stayed broadside on moving from right flank to left flank across their deployment area, while the Agincourts manoeuvred between the small islands. Prussian came head on across the table activating Tesla Schnellen Boosten and Sturginium powered engines where they could (neither of the Metzgers succeeded in activating their Boosts at all).
What firing there was turned out to be insignificant with a couple of points of damage on the nearest Rotor and a dead frigate.
Turn 2: Achtung Minen! The rotors had dropped mines but forgot to move them and when the Reivers moved up and opened fire on the nearest Rotor immediate action was taken. Dropping a mine and moving off as quickly as possible the most damaged Rotor blew up another frigate. The least damaged rotor dropped it's mine right in the middle of a frigate squadron taking out two when it dropped bombs and shot at RB1. In retaliation the Prussians returned fire inflicting significant damage to both Rotors.
On the flank one of the Vanguards went off the table when it didn't have enough room to manoeuvre. The other Vanguard got jumped by frigates and destroyers and blew up on an Magazine Explosion critical taking two of the frigates with it.
In the middle, one of the Agincourts started taking damage from combined battleship, bomber and Metzger damage leaving it at half movement.
Turn 3: The Rotors had to be finished off, so we jumped them with a fighter wing, then the remnants of two frigate squadrons and then the cruisers. Both crashed and burned with surprisingly little damage in return, although the handful of mine markers they left behind would in fact prove critical later on.
The trailing Britannian battleship turned head on towards the Prussian Battleship and bombers and inflicted some minor damage. Ignoring the threat for the moment the bombers and battleship concentrated on the Agincourt squadron inflicting a Fusion leak critical and leaving the centre ship massively damaged.
Some dogfighting in the middle and the judicious use of offensive Ack Ack crippled both of the Brittanian tiny flyer wings and one of the Prussians.
Turn 4: Things get critical! We both played Flash Fire cards on each other. The Britannians played there's on the Prussian battleship when it activated the Tesla Schnellen Boosten. The Prussians played their card when we poured fire on the Britannian battleship and it used it's Guardian generator. We still managed a prodigious critical and put another Raging fire on board.
The Agincourts didn't fare well. The centre vessel was quickly dispatched, and some fire started to knock superstructure of the trailing gunship.
The small ships and the cruisers started to turn in towards the gap in the islands to concentrate fire on the lead Britannian battleship and the lead Agincourt. Torpedoes crippled and sank a damaged cruiser, while various fire tried to deal with the two loose frigates but failed.
Turn 5: Achtung Minen again! With no way to avoid it one of the remaining cruisers hit a mine, and suffered a Magazine explosion critical. The last cruiser plowed through the mines avoiding triggering any to deliver some fire on the Britannian lead battleship. Various small ships (including loose frigates and the Stolz squadron) attempted to engage the battleship or it's escorts with minor results sinking an escort and delivering some hull damage to the battleship.
On the other flank, the Prussian battleship closed with the blazing Britannian battleship and delivered 28 points of damage to a ship already suffering a Fusion leak! The Guardian generator saw off enough damage to reduce it to 3 criticals but a magazine explosion ensured the job was done. The Prussian battleship then unleashed it's starboard broadsides and Tesla coils against the trailing Agincourt and after activating the Tesla Generator, again caused a magazine explosion.
With only a battleship, a gunship and two escorts on the table against two frigates, three destroyers, two Metzgers, two bombers, a cruiser and a battleship; the Britannians conceded defeat...

Good game. Mixture of dice, but I got the right dice at the right moment generating 28 hits from 13 dice against the battleship and 18 hits from 7 or 8 dice against one of the gunships. Dave's dice were average at best.
Post battle I would say that I might have done better with maxed out frigate squadrons and using spare points for some escorts or corvettes. The Metzgers were slow, but did have some long range AD, but with no small targets on the Britannian side they didn't really count for much. For the second game running, God bless the Stolz!! They did a splendid job in hunting down the last submerged Vanguard, and had we gone to Turn 6 might have scored some telling damage on the remaining battleship. On the Britannian side, more Hawk rotors and small squadrons rather than escorts I would say.

Short Reintroduction Post

Just over 7 years to the day. Why didn't Google just delete the blog?
Anyway, I'm back. Everybodies doing blog things. I'm gonna do wargames projects and AAr's and stuff from now on.

Honest.

Told you so...

I knew I would never keep this up. A whole year. Another convention came and went and I still haven't done "Dude! Where's my alien?" Did play a big World War One game though, with a German attack on some Russian trenches. Became a bit of a walkover for the Germans towards the end as my artillery pounded nine shades of crap out of the Russian staging areas.
A couple of games of Memoir 44 were played late in the day and some terrain was purchased. A good day I thought.
I am going to try to keep this more up to date than in the past, but I can make no promises.

Working on a participation game

OK, was supposed to be at the gaming club, and was hoping to get to the clubs annual gaming convention but s**t happens and I can't. I'm still going to run my game though given that I've painted all the aliens. I'll need to dig out the flying saucer piece and dust it off.
"Dude, where's my alien?" will be coming to a gaming club near me very, very soon (though not quite as soon as expected).

And so it begins...

I used to update a website with all sorts of stuff, but then I stopped (about four years ago). Most of the stuff there is still pretty relevant but is a pain to update on FTP and dial-up, so...
I'm going to blog, just like everybody else does. Hopefully this will have more regular musings and insights than the website and hopefully people will pay more attention to this than the website (fat chance).
The topics of conversation are likely to be the same

• Gaming (with toy soldiers)
• Films (quite often with soldiers of some description)
• Miltary History (chock full of soldiers)
• Rugby and Golf (the only sports I watch or play)

Check back if you want. You never know I may actually keep this thing going!