I had the fortune to play against a very sporting person at Games@Pi, who had to use a makeshift Death Guard army because I just dropped in out of nowhere after finding no opponents in Battle Bunker. Phew. Unfortunately, his list wasn't optimal for taking on 2 Imperial Knights, and those were practically the only guys I brought (I brought 3 Imperial Knights, typical of me). Apparently Games@Pi were under Chaos control last week during the Astaramis campaign, and Chaos won there (though the Imperium eventually secured an overall victory, phew), so I brought my big guns, thinking there would be a formidable Chaos army waiting for me.
Instead, I faced a Death Guard army of 2 Lords of Contagion, 2 Maligant Plaguecasters, 2 Noxious Blightbringers, 4 squads of 10 Poxwalkers, 2 squads of 7 Plague Marines (why 7? because those were the only models available to him), and 2 Foetid Bloat-drones. That army had a power rating of 88 points, apparently. To exploit the Command Points, he divided his army into 2 Battalion Detachments so that he can have up to 9 Command Points. Woohoo. Fun times. He spent every last one of them.
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| The deathly Death Guard guards the forge world, Konor. |
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| Taking them by utter surprise are two Imperial Knights. |
Anyway, we deployed, and as usual I got to go first. My opponent attempted to seize the initiative, only to roll a 5, and...whoops. No go. So I started first. We did this 1/4 deployment where we deployed in one-quarter of the table 9" away from the center. If that makes sense. We were following an actual Konor Campaign mission where I played the attacker and my opponent played the defender. The mission is Seek and Destroy. It was mostly kill points, so we get 1 point for each unit we killed, Slay the Warlord, and if I'm not mistaken, we get an extra point if we wipe out an entire unit with our own units that have a 2+ or 3+ armor save. Meaning, if my Kastelan Robot with a 3+ armor save kills the last model in a Plague Marine squad, I get an extra point for that. I think. It's the victory condition entitled Heavy Duty Onslaught.
Turn 1
Well, this was quite the devastating turn for me. First off, I made a roll to change the protocols for my Kastelan Robots from Aegis to Protector, which would only take effect during my next turn. My Skitarii Vanguard fired their 3 radium carbines and 2 plasma calivers, and so did my Tech-priest Dominus with his Volkite blaster, but they probably only took out 6 Poxwalkers or something? Then my Knight Warden fired at a second squad of Poxwalkers, but despite the heavy flamer and Avenger gatling cannon, he only erased 9 of them and failed to kill the last one. The guy tanked the heavy stubber shots. My Knight Warden then fired his twin Icarus autocannon at one Foetid Bloat-drone, but failed to do any damage.
My Knight Paladin also fired his heavy stubbers at that last remaining Poxwalker, but that guy was disgustingly resilient, tanking every single shot and surviving despite all odds. It also helped that I fluffed my rolls for my heavy stubbers. He then turned his attention to another squad of Poxwalkers and killed about 6 of them with his Stormspear rockets and rapid-fire battle cannon. In the end, the real VIP was my Kastelan Robots, who erased an entire squad of Poxwalkers by himself. No First Blood for this Konor Campaign specific mission, though. Oh well.
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| Kastelan Robots are awesome! |
My opponent tried to advance the 4 Poxwalkers that survived my Knight Paladin's rage, moving them within range of my Skitarii Vanguard (unfortunately). He also moved his Noxious Blightbringer and his warlord Lord of Contagion up to support them while buzzing the first Foetid Bloat-drone away. He also moved his Plague Marines out into view to get them closer to my Knight Warden, and had his Maligant Plaguecasters cast Smite on my poor Imperial Knight, dealing 6 mortal wounds to my Knight Warden. Ouch, that was painful. The second Foetid Bloat-drone buzzed somewhere behind my Knight Warden, but I don't think it was within range. The single Poxwalker stayed where he was, and that was about it.
The Plague Marines opened up on my Knight Warden, but failed to wound him. Any wounds they dealt, I think I managed to save. Phew! Oh, and the 2nd Noxious Blightbringer fired his overcharged plasma pistol on my Knight Warden, but failed to wound him. The first also fired on my Knight Paladin, and also didn't wound him. Knights are tough!
Hilariously enough, one of the Plague Marines fired his plasma gun into my Knight Warden but rolled a 1 when he supercharged, killing himself. All he showed for his efforts was a fluffed roll that failed to wound my Knight. Poor guy.
I think the Lord of Contagion charged in first and ate all the overwatch shots, only to not suffer any wounds. The Plague Marines and the Blightbringer also charged in, and I think the Lord of Contatgion swung his axe and dealt a bunch of wounds to my Knight, bringing him down to 12. Ouch. On the other hand, I killed a couple of Plague Marines by stomping them to death with his Titanic Feet.
Turn 2
As I said earlier, my opponent had made the unfortunate mistake of moving his Poxwalkers within range of my Skitarii Vanguard. Ignoring the Poxwalkers, my Knight Paladin stomped toward the Noxious Blightbringer. My Knight Warden also moved away from combat so that he could shoot them. His shooting proved...ineffective. Well, not really. Surprisingly enough, his and the Knight Paladin's heavy stubbers were able to remove that last Poxwalker and helped me erase 3 units.
My Skitarii Vanguard then fired on the last squad of Poxwalkers and annihilated them with radium rounds and plasma blasts, which meant every single Poxwalker is dead. For the Omnissiah!
Again, my twin Icarus autocannon didn't do much to the Foetid Bloat-drone. Maybe 2 damage at the most, or none at all, I can't remember. That thing is hard to kill. My Kastelan Robots fired and erased the first squad of Plague Marines with their Ignores Cover heavy phosphor blasters, taking out all 7 of them. I then fired a second time - thanks to Protector Protocols - on the remaining Plague Marines that had charged my Knight Warden earlier, and wiped them out.
Wait, what? Did I just destroy 6 of my opponent's units in 2 turns? Holy Omnissiah...
My Knight Warden's and Knight Paladin's shooting, however, were ineffective, and I ended up charging. My Knight Paladin and Knight Warden, despite revving up their Reaper chainswords, couldn't kill the Noxious Blightbringer or Lord of Contagion because of their invulnerable saves. Ouch.
My opponent left his dudes to be stuck in combat with me. I think he casted Smite, took 3 wounds off my Knight Paladin, and another few wounds off my poor Knight Warden. His Foetid Bloat-drone floated away to harrass my Kastelan Robots, and put a single wound on them. The combat continued, but thankfully the Knight Paladin received no damage from the Blightbringer. On the other hand, my Knight Warden was reduced to just 4 wounds after taking a few hits from the Lord of Contagion's axe, and was teetering dangerously close to exploding.
I opted to stomp with their Titanic Feet, and this time, I succeeded in stomping the Lord of Contagion and the Blightbringer to death. Phew.
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| Death to the Death Guard! Death to all Traitors! |
I adjusted the movements again, and somehow I was forced to shoot at the Foetid Bloat-drone with my Skitarii Vanguard and Kastelan Robots and finally brought it down. I couldn't kill the 2nd Noxious Blightbringer with shooting, so I charged my Knight Warden in. My Knight Paladin also couldn't bring down the Warlord Lord of Contagion with shooting, so he also charged in. By stomping with their Titanic Feet, I managed to bring about both Characters' demise, leaving just the 2 Plaguecasters and a single Foetid Bloat-drone left on the table. I failed to change Protocols for my Kastelan Robots, though, so they remained in Protector Protocol.
My opponent used Smite, but he was pretty unlucky this time and took only 2 wounds off my creaking and failing Knight Warden, bringing him down to 4. Despite his Foetid Bloat-drone shooting him in the back, he failed to wound, and thus my Knight Warden continued to stand. Grandpa Nurgle had frowned upon his champions and abandoned them, it seems. The Foetid Bloat-drone, not to be outdone, charged my Knight. It failed to wound. My Knight also did some damage to it, but other than that, not much else could be done and both models survived.
Turn 4
Theere was not much that could be done. My Knight Warden, with only 2 wounds left, retreated. He fired on the Foetid Bloat-drone, did some damage, but that's about it. My Knight Paladin chased down the Maligant Plaguecasters, wounding one of them with his shooting, and then the two of them charged, and killed their respective targets with their Titanic Feet. Phew.
My opponent, left with only one Plaguecaster, ran and advanced him to within 8" of my wounded Knight Warden and Smited him to death, scoring a great moral victory. At that point we called the game. With only one model left, there was little my opponent could do, and I still had 4 Kastelan Robots, 1 Cybernetica Datasmith, a Knight Paladin with 21 wounds left, 5 Skitarii Vanguard and 1 Tech-priest Dominus. Even if we count his killing of my Knight Warden as 3, he would only score 3 points. 6 since his Plaguecaster has an armor save of 3+. In contrast, I had killed 13 of his units so far, was on the way to tabling him, and given how most of my kills were by my Knights or Kastelan Robots, I would easily have 24 or 25 points. Oh, don't forget. My opponent scored Hold Your Ground by running his Plaguecaster all the way to his deployment zone...though, truthfully, if we had continued onto turn 5, I would have stomped on him with my Knight Paladin, but let's not rub salt in his wounds. On the other hand, I have Slay the Warlord, and my very own Warlord is still alive. So it's actually 7 points for my opponent and 25 or 26 for me. Still an overwhelming victory for the Adeptus Mechanicus and Imperial Knights. But not a victory I can be proud of because...well, my opponent was caught off guard by my list and didn't have any anti-tank weaponry.
Oh well...that was one-sided. Thankfully, my opponent was sporting enough and had fun with his moral victory. For now, Konor has been successfully retaken by the Adeptus Mechanicus forces of Draconis IV and the Imperial Knights of House Yato. I have scored a victory for the Imperium and made a difference! YAY!
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| See that 100% Imperium right there? That's all thanks to me! |
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