Fhanados at the Cando Incident

[Fhanados]

Hi all!

On Saturday I participated in the first 2 games of an escalation campaign in Sydney called the Cando Incident. I stayed up until nearly 2am assembling models that I later realised I wouldn't use until next week, then had to get up at 6 to get there on time, but it was worth it! A brief recount of my games are below (sorry for the wall of text!).



Game 1: 750pts Chaos vs Imperial Guard
Setup: Vanguard, 4 Objectives

Chaos Marines (me)

• Sorcerer: lvl2, Spell Familiar, Biomancy (Haemo, Leech Life), Force Mace/Stave
• Hellbrute: Multimelta, Power Fist
• Chaos Marines x10: 2 Meltaguns, Power Axe Champ
• Chaos Marines x10: 2 Meltaguns, Power Sword Champ
• Havocs x5: 4 Autocannons
• Aegis Defense Line: Quadgun

GK and Imperial Guard Allies

This is a rough list from memory, so I could be wrong.

• Coteaz
• Deathcult Assassins x6
• Deathcult Assassins x6
• Nemesis Dreadknight: Incinerator
• Company Command Squad: 4x Grenade Launcher
• Infantry Platoon:
• Platoon Command Squad: 4x Grenade Launcher
• Infantry Squad: Grenade Launcher, Missile Launcher
• Infantry Squad: Grenade Launcher, Missile Launcher
• Special Weapon Squad: Grenade Launchers

So the first game is against Chris, a friend of mine I consistently lose to. This is the first time I've played his Coteaz/Grenade Launcher list since usually he spams vets with melta. I got first turn and knowing that my scoring units would be running towards midfield I put my objectives towards the centre of the board. He deployed mostly in cover, but thankfully due to the terrain setup I had better LOS to him with my Havocs than he had to anything. Strangely he put one of his objectives in the corner of the board away from everything.

Turn 1
First saw the near annihilation of one of his squads from AC fire. I think it was the CCS... My troops moved forwards and took a few pot-shots with bolters, felling a couple of assassins and guardsmen. Hellbrute shot melta at assassins and failed horribly. In the assault phase the Hellbrute attempted to charge an assassin unit in midfield taking cover in some debris beside a building. Rolled snake eyes for my charge range and died a little on the inside.

In his turn PCS moved behind the building and the assassins moved forwards through it. One of the Infantry Platoons moved out of LOS of the Autocannon rain of death and the CCS took cover behind a random defense line barricade. Shooting phase saw both infantry squads and the remaining grenade launcher in the PCS fail to hurt the Hellbrute. The PCS opened fire on the Chaos Marine unit containing my Sorcerer. 4 direct hits from a Grenade Launcher racked up an amazing 18 or so hits on the unit. This led to about 8 wounds. I then jokingly say "watch me fail all these saves". 1, 1, 2, 1, 1, 2, 2, 2.... Shit.... Once the dust settles I lose everything except 1 bolter, 1 melta and the Champ. My warlord is a fine red mist hovering above a crater along with the gibblets of the rest of the squad. We laugh for a good 5 minutes before I realise next turn his assassins will be in easy charge range.

Turn 2
I blast some assassins with Quadguns, but enough save their pesky cover saves to avoid being annihilated. I polish off the CCS with bolter fire and the Hellbrute moves forwards, failing at shooting again. My axe champ and friends fire at the PCS, killing 2 grenadiers. Assault phase sees my Hellbrute charge the assassins and fail to wound.

Dreadknight comes down and starts incinerating my good squad. Intercept shots shave one wound off it, so that's good I suppose. His PCS runs towards the out-of-the-way corner objective but is just out of range. Coteaz and Assassins move towards my depleted squad and the Dreadknight moves towards the larger unit. Shooting is rather uneventful, with only 2-3 CSM dying to the Incinerator. Assault phase sees the Coteaz assassin unit charging in to my CSM unit and obliterating them. My Hellbrute misses and fails to do anything productive yet again.

Turn 3
This turn is very short. Autocannon shots kill a few assassins, but not enough to wipe out the unit. Bolters and Meltas all bounce off the Dreadknight and again the Hellbrute fails to wound a T3 model in assault.

PCS runs up the hill to claim the objective... which explodes and kills them all. That gave me a happy feeling on the inside. One of the infantry squads also run towards the hotly-contested objective in the building, securing it in the name of the imperium. Shooting takes my remaining CSM down to about 5 and the assault phase sees Coteaz and friends join combat against the Hellbrute and the Dreadknight fail it's charge. Before we can resolve the combat the game ends due to time contstraints and it's a solid 8-1 win for the lapdogs of the False Emperor.

An unlucky round of incredibly accurate grenade launcher shooting turned the tide in his favour early on, giving him Slay the Warlord and First Blood in one blow. The deepstriking Dreadknight gave him Linebreaker at the end. I think if I had scrapped the Hellbrute and put in a unit of Cultists or something then I'd do a bit better.



Game 2: 1000pts Chaos vs Chaos
Setup: Vanguard, Big Guns Never Tire, 3 Objectives

Chaos Marines (me)

• Sorcerer: lvl2, Biomancy (Endurance, Warp Speed), Force Mace/Stave
• Terminators x3: Combimelta/axe on termies, Combiflamer/Chainfist Champ
• Hellbrute: Multimelta, Power Fist
• Chaos Marines x10: 2 Meltaguns, Power Axe Champ
• Chaos Marines x10: 2 Meltaguns, Power Sword Champ
• Havocs x5: 4 Autocannons
• Obliterators x2
• Aegis Defense Line: Quadgun

Chaos Marines

• Chaos Lord: Murder Sword, Plasma Pistol, some kind of inv save
• Terminators x5: 3 Combibolter/Powerfist, 1 Reaper/Powerfist, Combibolter/Powersword champ
• Hellbrute: Multimelta, power fist
• Chaos Marines x9: Plasma gun, Rhino, Plasma Pistol champ
• Cultists x10: 8 Autoguns, 1 Heavy Stubber, Shotgun champ
• Cultists x10: 1 Flamer
• Helldrake: Baleflamer
• Raptors x5: Meltagun, 2 Plasma Pistols, Plasma Pistol champ

Originally I got drawn against Chris again. The organiser saw me glaring at him and decided to redraw. This time I got paired up with a relatively new player also using Chaos (no surprise really since half the players were using Chaos). He was a nice kid and I had a really fun game. There were a few things I let slide for the sake of sportsmanship (what's with that Raptor squad?) and ultimately I pulled of a pretty solid win, but it was close for a while.

I don't remember this too well so I'm honestly not sure of the turn order, merely the events that transpired.

He deployed his Autogun cultists in a building with one objective, I holed up my AC havocs behind the defense line with another. His close combat cultists sat in a crater next to his Rhino full of CSM and the Lord. Raptors, termies and Drake in reserves. I deployed the rest of my army pretty much opposite and the third objective was placed in the forest/wreckage/lava terrain in the middle.

My first turn exploded his rhino and some of the embarked troops, and some cultists in the crater dropped to bolter fire. I ran in and claimed the middle objective and he shot at me with everything he had on the field, but not much died. Our Hellbrutes charged one another and proceeded to have a hugging match for most of the game.

My Oblits and Termies came down on turn 2. Oblits pasted the CSM squad with plasma fire and termies started picking off cultists in the building while moving in for the kill. There was an epic clash between his crater dwelling cultists and my Sorcerer's unit, with the Sorcerer killing his champion easily in a duel and rolling something useless on the boon chart. Helldrake and Raptors came in, killing my Sorcerer and most of his unit and his Lord moved towards the middle.

The Hellbrutes finish their hugfest with his stripping the last hullpoint off mine before I even scratch the paint.

I took some pot shots at the raptors but their return fire sent my squad fleeing. Havocs downed the drake and some more cultists died to terminator fire. Oblits explode the Hellbrute in a spectacular manner.

His Lord moved in to combat with my midfielders and challenged my Champ. Absolute overkill. My squad fled an got cut down by the Lord's sweeping advance. His Terminators dropped in near the Havocs and killed the Champion manning the Quadgun, who also happened to be holding the objective.

In my last turn (which I think was the last turn of the game) one of the havocs moved to man the quadgun and claim the objective, and the return fire killed all the terminators in one round of shooting. My termies and oblits finish off the cultists and move in to claim the building objective.

The game ends, and I hold 2 objectives to his 1 (I let him claim it with his Lord. One of the things I let slide) and my First Blood and Linebreaker to his Slay the Warlord and Linebreaker. A very fun and bloodthirsty game.

Sadly I couldn't stay for round 3, but from what Chris tells me it was a great battle for him. I'm looking forwards to the final 2 games this weekend. It's gonna be awesome!

[Arguleon-veq]

Nice reports, escalation is always fun. Looking forward to the next games. Hard luck on losing a whole squad to fire like that in game 1, thats the problem with smaller points values, a handful of bad dice can lose you a whole game.

[Fhanados]

So this weekend gone I spent Australia Day as any good patriot does

[BigToof]

Hi Fhandros,
Sorry I've been away, really liking how this is setting up and really want to see the conclusion.
I think I can answer some of the questions.
Ravenwing and Deathwing do get preferred enemy (CSM), so they get to re-roll 1's.  I was pretty sure it's 1's to wound though.
Deathwing only have splitfire.
Belial has to be in the main detachment to get DW troops, but he doesn't have to be the warlord.
I'm not sure about the re-rolling of traits.  That's kind of new.
Yes, they actually can take 2 heavies.

Best,
-BT

[Fhanados]

Hi Toof! Thanks for replying. I knew there was something fishy with the DA guy! I chalk it up to being a new codex. I doubt he really wanted to cheat, he just didn't seem like that kind of guy.

This was the grand finale and by far the most exciting game I

[Arguleon-veq]

Thanks for the reports. Shame on the results but it is all a learning process, the more you play the better you will get. I agree that termies for chaos are a bit of a points sink that dont really achieve all that much. Jugger Lords are great and spawn really arent a bad place to put them. Spawn are pretty great now actually.