Final battle report in Singapore

Well, this will be my final battle report in Singapore...for this year, anyway. I'll be returning to the United States on Monday (August 6th) so I won't be playing any more games here. :(

Anyway, I had another game against the Blood Angels player that I played on Monday and Tuesday. This time, he brought a Primaris Apocathery, a Captain with thunder hammer, 3 Intercessor squads, a Librarian Dreadnought, a Predator Annihilator (4 lascannons), Saguinary Guard, Sanguinary Ancient and a Redemptor Dreadnought. I brought the same list as Tuesday, so basically 2 Battalions of Imperial Guard. You know, 2 Company Commanders, 3 infantry squads with plasma guns, a Leman Russ Annihilator, 2 Leman Russ Executioners, a Vendetta gunship, 2 Tempestors Prime, 2 Tempestus squads with 2 plasma guns each, 2 Tempestus squads with 2 hot-shot volley guns each and a Tempestus command squad with 4 meltaguns.

I got rekted.

Never mind, let's talk about the mission first. We had Secure and Control, which meant 2 objective markers - one in each deployment zone. My opponent went first, and his guys moved and advanced, and he scored First Blood when his Intercessors, combined with the Redemptor Dreadnought, erased an infantry squad and killed another infantry guy. Meanwhile, his Predator Annihilator fired and dealt 5 wounds to my Leman Russ Annihilator.

My turn came and I fluffed all my shots despite the number of lascannons I was sporting. I only managed to deal about 9 wounds to the Predator Annihilator, leaving it with 2, and maybe 7 wounds to the Dreadnought Redemptor despite supercharging all the plasma on my Leman Russ Executioner tanks. My infantry squad fired on the Intercessors, and despite having First Rank, Fire! Second Rank, Fire! they failed to even wound one guy. Lasguns are not exactly good against Space Marines.

My opponent capitalized on the advantage and took out one Leman Russ Executioner with his Captain and Thunder Hammer plus Librarian Dreadnought. The Sanguinary Guard wounded my other Leman Russ tank, but failed to kill it, and my Leman Russ Annihilator was brought down to 4 wounds. Meanwhile, the Intercessors and wounded Redemptor Dreadnought killed my 2nd infantry squad without batting an eyelid. Ugh. I think he lost one Sanguinary Guard to a supercharged plasma pistol shot when he re-rolled his misses and rolled a 1. Heh. I also used Defensive Gunners and killed another one or two of them if I remember correctly.

I had my Leman Russ Executioner fall back, and Deep Struck my Tempestus Scions into my objective marker, with only the melta command squad in my opponent's deployment zone. I split my fire, having 2 fire at the Predator Annihilator and the other 2 fire at the Redemptor Dreadnought, but only killed the Predator Annihilator. The Leman Russ Annihilator, despite hitting on 5s, managed to finish off the Redemptor Dreadnought, while the Vendetta gunship killed about 2 or 3 Sanguinary Guard. Meanwhile, all 4 Tempestus squads fired and killed just 1 Intercessor squad. Wow. That sucked.

On the third turn, my opponent closed in, trying to finish off all my tanks. He killed my Leman Russ Annihilator, left my final Leman Russ tank on just 2 wounds, and then killed 1 Tempestus squad and left another with just 3 guys. I retaliated and killed about a couple of Sanguinary Guard on overwatch or so I think, but I can't remember. Anyway, I left both Intercessor squads with just 1 guy each even with my melta command squad running and advancing to get within range of them, which sucked. Oh, and the Vendetta gunship flew away to take the objective marker on my opponent's side of the map. I think he tried to charge my Vendetta gunship, and I killed 2 guys in overwatch while he failed his charge for the Sanguinary Guards.

On the fourth turn, the Sanguinary Guard and everyone turned toward my Tempestus Scions while the Captain killed my wounded Leman Russ Executioner. I think I lost all my Storm Troopers except one squad, and my Tempestors Prime mostly survived (one had 2 wounds left). In any case, I had my Vendetta shoot the 2 Intercessors and finished off both squads for good, and the melta command squad dealt only 2 wounds to the Sanguinary Ancient, but that's all I could do. The fifth turn basically ended with the Sanguinary Guard and everyone charging into my Tempestors Prime, 2nd Company Commander and last Tempestus squad and killing them. My Company Commander survived the duel with the Librarian Dreadnought, thanks to his refractor shield, but only had 1 wound left. Ouch. I could only bring my surviving Tempestor Prime to capture the objective while my Company Commander fell back. Meanwhile, my 2 surviving melta command squad ran to take the objective that my Vendetta gunship was hovering over, but didn't actually disembark my Warlord and the infantry squad within. I think I killed another couple of Sanguinary Guard with the lascannons on the Vendetta.

My opponent rolled and the game continued to turn 6.

Nothing to say except that he moved his 3 surviving Sanguinary Guard, Captain and Ancient to capture the objective while killing my Tempestor Prime. Poor guy. The Librarian Dreadnought finished off my wounded Company Commander without so much as a thought. Ouch. With nothing to lose, I had the melta command squad hold the objective in my opponent's deployment zone while zooming my Vendetta back to my deployment zone and grav chuting my guys 9" away from the Blood Angels holding my objective marker. I rolled 4 ones and lost 4 guys to the drop (what the feth?!) but I had my Warlord order them to Move, Move, Move! and rolled a 5 for them to move 11" during the shooting phase. They piled onto the objective and captured it right from under the Sanguinary Guard, Ancient, Primaris Apocathery and Captain's nose because they are Troops and have Objective Secured. And they passed their morale, thankfully. Ugh. My opponent then rolled and the game ended there and then.

Final verdict: I scored 6 points, 7 if I include Linebreaker. My opponent scored 2 points from First Blood and Linebreaker. Phew. I actually won. Wow. I don't freaking believe it. That was so close, just by the skin of my teeth. I had nothing but 2 melta guys from the Tempestus Command squad left, half an infantry squad left (how the hell did I lose 4 guys to grav chute...), a Company Commander and a Vendetta gunship. My opponent still had a Librarian Dreadnought, a Captain, a Sanguinary Ancient, a Primaris Apocathery and 3 Sanguinary Guards, enough to wreck whatever forces I had left on the table. It was such a tough fight, and I almost lost. Ouch. I almost got tabled. Thankfully I managed to win through Objectives alone, or I would have gotten rekted, like, completely. Phew.

I wonder what I should have done to improve my play.