Adeptus Custodes Battalion
Shield-Captain on Jetbike (re-roll charges, 5+++ Feel No Pain Warlord Trait)
Shield-Captain on Jetbike
3 Dawn Eagle Jetbikes (I think that's their name? They are Jetbikes)
7 Custodians
2 squads of 3 Custodians
Adeptus Mechanicus Battalion (Servitor Maniple from Vigilus Defiant, Ryza forge world dogma)
Tech-priest Dominus (Field Commander, Bio-splicing)
Tech-priest Enginseer
5 Skitarii Rangers
5 Skitarii Rangers
5 Servitors
12 Kataphron Destroyers with plasma culverins and cognis flamers
Inquisition Vanguard
Inquisitor Greyfax
3 Acolytes
Holy Terra, that's a lot of firepower! As you can see, the majority of his army was made out of Toughness 5 models with 3 wounds apiece. Those Custodes and Kataphron Destroyers will be hard to take down. Furthermore, he gave the Kataphron Destroyers a 5++ invulnerable save with the Mindlock Stratagem, and Ryza gives him +1 to wound, and +1 damage to plasma. No prizes for guessing who the Ryza Plasma Specialists Stratagem will be used on.
Against this terrifying list, I had 3 Knights as usual, and my Leman Russ tanks. The only saving grace is that I have a tremendous amount of firepower, armor and Toughness 8 models of my own, and he didn't have any anti-tank, surprisingly enough. Then again, the Kataphron Destroyers were all the anti-tank he needs.
Imperial Knights Super-heavy Detachment (House Taranis Household Tradition)
Cerastus Knight Lancer
2 Knight Crusaders with Ironstorm missile pods
Imperial Guard Battalion (Cadian Regimental Doctrine)
2 Tank Commanders in Leman Russ Executioner tanks
Company Commander with plasma pistol (Grand Strategist, Kurov's Aquila, because I couldn't think of any other relic to take)
Platoon Commander with bolt pistol
3 infantry squads with a plasma gun each
As you can see, I went for my standard plasma Imperial Guard regiment. Yay. I opted to go for House Taranis's Household Tradition because I brought 2 Knight Crusaders, and I felt that the House Griffith's Household Tradition wouldn't really benefit this iteration of Knights. Honestly, neither of my Knights want to be in melee (ironically enough, they ended up being in melee, but that's something we'll talk about later). The Omnissiah's Grace really helped me out, though!
My opponent chose Kingslayer, with the Knight Lancer being the Character (totally forgot about that, since I didn't make him my Warlord for this game), Big Game Hunter and Engineers for his ITC secondary objectives. The Skitarii Rangers on his backfield objective was an Engineer, and so was one squad of the 3 Custodes. As for me, I chose Gang Bustas, Ground Control and Old School. I'm a big fan of Old School, since I usually play Maelstrom and Eternal War, so those were the objectives I'm more familiar with. We decided on Dawn of War deployment for simplicity's sake, so we were arrayed opposite each other.
Turn 1
We rolled off, and I got first turn. My opponent failed to seize the initiative, and we started the ball going! I had 2 infantry squads camp on 2 objectives, and a third one running - I actually rolled a 6 for their advance, and they grabbed a third objective. Nice! The Platoon Commander also followed suit, and I rolled a 4 for his advance. My Knight Crusader also moved up a little to support my infantry squad (I'll call this Knight Takeda Takeshi). My other Knight Crusader also moved up the board, but was unable to grab a 4th objective (this one will be my Knight, Tanaka Tomoyuki, heh). Kenji in his Knight Lancer advanced, and being a Cerastus Knight with Flank Speed, I rolled 2 D6 and I rolled 2 6s. That was crazy. Kenji and his Knight Lancer basically moved 26" forward and ended up almost on top of the Kataphron Destroyers.
My infantry squad who moved up received the "Forwards, for the Emperor!" or whatever order it is that allows them to shoot after advancing, and they killed about 2 or 3 Skitarii (I think 3). My Knight Crusader fired upon the Kataphron Destroyers, and I actually killed 2 or 3. I think. The Ironstorm missile rocket pod killed maybe 1 Skitarii Ranger? Whoops.
On the other side, my Leman Russ Executioner tanks and Knight Crusader (Tanaka Tomoyuki) fired and I managed to wipe out a single squad of 3 Custodians, while killing 1 Custodian from the second squad that had 3. Needless to say, I got almost all the Gang Bustas points this turn, and I also received First Strike from Old School. Phew! Tomoyuki's Ironstorm missile pod killed another Skitarii Ranger on the objective, but there were still 3 left.
My Knight Lancer tried to charge the Kataphron Destroyers, and he ate a few shots in overwatch. My opponent saw one Kataphron Destroyer slain with a double roll of ones, despite his Tech-priest Dominus providing re-rolls. He used a Stratagem from Custodes that forced me to deduct 2 or 3 from my charge rolls (I can't remember) and even with a re-roll Stratagem, I failed my charge against the Kataphron Destroyers. Whoops. At the end, I gained 3 victory points for holding 3 objectives, and 1 for killing a single squad of 3 Custodes.
My opponent moved his 7 Custodes up to capture one objective, advancing to do so, so that he could get 3 objectives (same as me), and his Jetbikes and Shield-Captains on Jetbikes captured another Objective in the center. The Kataphron Destroyers moved away from Takeshi's Knight Crusader while the 4 remaining Servitors attempted to screen them - this was after my opponent used Bio-splicing and sacrificed one of the Servutors to revive a single Kataphron Destroyer. So he still had about 8 or 9, I believe. The 2 Skitarii Rangers moved up to challenge my infantry squad, but fired on my Knight for some reason, and I made my save. As for the Engineers Skitarii on the objective in his backfield, they failed morale and 1 ran away, leaving 2. Hmm, I think that was about it for movement. Oh, right! Greyfax and her Acolytes advanced, along with the 2 remaining Custodes!
The Jetbikes then proceeded to erase my infantry squad in one of the objectives, so I only held 2 objectives to his 3. Ouch. One Tank Commander received potshots from the Shield-Captains, and took a total of 2 damage, which wasn't bad. Could be worse. Tomoyuki's Knight Crusader went away unscathed. Meanwhile Kenji's Knight Lancer got hit hard by an onslaught of plasma, but thanks to me doing well with my Omnissiah's Grace rolls, I think I only took a total of 16 damage. Phew. Still in his second bracket somehow!
My opponent got 3 objectives and 1 kill (the poor infantry squad), and Kingslayer as he definitely did 16 damage to my Knight Lancer. Ouch. So he was ahead in points for now, probably 4+1+4 = 9, to my 3+1+3+1 = 8. Oh well.
Turn 2
I moved my Knight Lancer right to the back, walking over the Servitors (because I can - Kenji's Knight Lancer is a Superheavy Walker). Takeshi's Knight also moved up, as did Tomoyuki's Knight Crusader, toward the Shield-Captains. In a crazy round of shooting, my infantry squad at the middle objective finished off the 2 Skitarii Rangers who had run upward, Takeshi's Knight Crusader killed all four Servitors with his heavy stubbers, and demolished about...2 or 3 Kataphron Destroyers with his shooting. His heavy flamer did nothing to the Custodes, but whatever. His Ironstorm missiles also failed to kill the Skitarii Rangers on the backfield objective. Kenji's Knight Lancer ended up killing another couple of Kataphron Destroyers with his shock blast - I didn't expect that! I think my opponent had about 4 or 5 Kataphron Destroyers left at this point.
Tomoyuki's Knight Crusader killed the Skitarii Rangers engineers with his Ironstorm missiles (yay!), and proceeded to split his heavy stubbers between 2 Acolytes. He failed to kill one, but took out the other. Phew. He then did a lot of damage to the jetbikes with his primary weapons, killing maybe 1 and injuring the other. My Tank Commander who was wounded fired and took a mortal wound from supercharging, bringing him down to 9 wounds, but wiped out the Jetbikes. Holy Terra! That was an awesome round of shooting! I was rolling really hot (sorry for the pun) for my plasma shots, and the jetbikes couldn't withstand that amount of plasma. The other Tank Commander then fired on the 2 remaining Custodes who were the 2nd Engineers, and they also died to the storm of superheated plasma. I was rolling really good!
My Knight Lancer then charged in and stomped maybe one Kataphron Destroyer to death (or just wounded - I know I whiffed all my Titanic Feet rolls, funnily enough), while my opponent lost another to overwatch (supercharged plasma, rolling 2 ones in a row despite re-rolls), which meant he was left with three. I think. Meanwhile, Tomoyuki's Knight Crusader charged in and dealt 6 wounds to the Shield-Captain on jetbike with his Titanic Feet, and he took maybe like 6 or 7 wounds from both Shield-Captains, thanks to me making my Omnissiah's Grace rolls. But since they are bikers, I didn't get the Objective they were on. Whoops. Oh, right, the Tech-priest Dominus did a Heroic Intervention, but failed to wound Kenji's Knight Lancer with his Omnissian axe.
I only held 2 Objectives, but I slaughtered like 6 units (2 Skitarii Ranger squads, an Acolyte, the 3 Jetbikes, the 2 surviving Custodes, and Servitors), and got the last point for Gang Bustas, which brought me up from 8 to 17. Phew!
My opponent then moved his Acolyte to grab the objective his Custodes were holding while his Custodes advanced toward Takeshi's Knight Crusader. The Shield-Captains remained locked in combat, while both Kataphron Destroyers and the Tech-priest Dominus fell back from Kenji's heavily wounded Knight Lancer. Greyfax also moved up, along with another Acolyte. She then cast Dominate on my Tank Commander, who ended up getting a mortal wound despite re-rolls, and did 4 wounds to Kenji's Knight Lancer. Ouch. He was left with 7 wounds, still just barely on his second bracket. Just one more wound! Actually, he did 6 damage (because supercharged plasma), but I rolled 2 6s for Omnissiah's Grace, and he only took 4. Phew! Otherwise he would be swinging on his third bracket! The Custodes fired on Takeshi's Knight Crusader, and charged him, but with both combat and shooting, they did a total of 10 damage, I think? The Kataphron Destroyers couldn't shoot because they just fell back from combat, and he actually lost 1 to morale, even though he could re-roll morale (he rolled 2 5s in succession) because of Canticles. Ouch. I paid 2 Command Points to use the Counteroffensive Stratagem to have Tomoyuki's Knight Crusader literally stomp the wounded Shield-Captain to death, but my opponent then spent the last of his Command Points to allow the Shield-Captain to fight before he died, and passed the Warlord Trait to the other Shield-Captain. Between the two of them, they did another 6-8 wounds, but by the end of the turn, Tomoyuki's Knight Crusader had taken 14 wounds total, leaving him with 10 wounds. Ouch.
My opponent still held 3 objectives, but he didn't kill any unit this turn, surprisingly enough. All my Knights were still alive - they really are tough to kill, and House Taranis's Omnisssiah's Grace helped me a lot! I'm so glad I took that as my Household Tradition! That gave him 3+1, but he didn't get Tank Hunter, and I literally killed all his Engineers in the 2nd turn, so he didn't get anything for that either. I denied him 4 points, phew. It brought him up to 13 points, which was still pretty close to my 17, so he could win on just Objectives alone.
Turn 3
This was a really short turn, with Kenji's Knight Lancer killing both remaining Kataphron Destroyers with his shock blast. That was unexpected. I used Machine Spirit Resurgent on Tomoyuki's Knight Crusader and have him move out of combat to grab the objective (plus be within charge range of Grayfex). Meanwhile, Takeshi's Knight Crusader ran away from the Custodes, and between the Guardsmen (who did only 1 or 2 wounds with their First Rank, Fire! Second Rank, Fire! lasguns) and him, they killed 6 Custodes, leaving just one. Phew! Takeshi's Knight Crusader filled to kill any of the Acolytes with his heavy stubbers, though. Tomoyuki's Knight Crusader and the first tank commander killed the last Shield-Captain on jetbike, though the tank commander ate another wound from supercharged plasma. Worth it, though. And that earned me Slay the Warlord! The heavy stubbers killed one Acolyte but the Ironstorm missiles whiffed their shots, so one Acolyte remained alive, though there was no longer anyone on the objective in the middle.
At this point, we called it. My opponent conceded the game, as there was nothing he could do to catch up. I had wiped out the majority of his army at this point, and to be honest, I still had a single Leman Russ Executioner tank who hadn't fired a single shot. Yet. And I would have just charged Grayfax with Tomoyuki's Knight Crusader and stomped her to death while claiming a third objective for myself. I was way ahead in points, having gotten just 3 from killing the Shield-Captain, Acolyte and Kataphron Destroyers, my Knights were poised to charge and kill even more units, and I had another point for Slay the Warlord. Plus he had no way of killing my Knights now that he had but a single Custodian left, and all his Kataphron Destroyers were dead. Recognizing the uphill task he faced, my opponent conceded the game and surrendered.
So it turned out to be quite an overwhelming victory for my Knights and Guardsmen! The Leman Russ Executioner tank commanders were rolling really hot that day, and my Knights actually destroyed a lot of stuff with both shooting and combat! I hope this means that Imperial Knights are viable? Okay, it was not a pure Knight list, so never mind. That said, I was a little surprised that they did so well. I was kicking myself for not having brought my Armiger Helverins, as their Strength 7 AP -1, 3 Damage Helverin cannons would be more effective against the Custodes and Kataphron Destroyers, but in the end it didn't matter. My list had too much firepower and plasma to shoot everything off the board.
I really like this list, and I feel a bit bad. I think my opponent will bring more anti-tank next time! I was actually surprised that he didn't - I told him I would be bringing Knights, but he didn't bring his melta missiles and stuff. I think he was relying on his Kataphron Destroyers to do some serious work with the Ryza Plasma Specialists Stratagem. It would also have changed if he had gone first, maybe? Yeah, he probably would have done more damage and mitigated my attacks if he had gone first.
Well, let's see what happens tomorrow!
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