With the release of the Warmaster Heavy Battle Titan last week or so, I'm sure many of you want to see him in action. Well, I certainly did, and I got my wish! Somehow I managed to get a game with my friend at Dreamers Vault (Hiawatha) - I was lucky. He was asking if anyone wanted an Adeptus Titanicus game last week and I immediately jumped at the chance. You all know me by now, I love Adeptus Titanicus. Yay.
Anyway, we had a great game yesterday (I wanted to write the battle report yesterday, but I was too exhausted after returning home in the evening, so I wasn't able to write anything last night). The exhausto was totally worth it, though! I enjoyed the game! It was a blast!
My friend used the Open Engine War cards - somehow I missed this and I didn't get a copy. Bloody hell! I'll need to get Open Engine War cards of my own in future. In any case, we had to draw cards. We drew some weird vanguard deployment where we each had two triangles as our deployment zone, stretching from 14" on the side to the center. The setting is a Hive World, which means dense urban terrain - perfect for me. I like fighting on hive worlds because they are the bread and butter of Warhammer 40,000. The primary Objective was Death and Destruction, which gives you 10 Victory Points if you destroy 25% worth of points of your opponent's army, 20 VP if you destroy 50%, and 30 VP if you destroy 75%. I think. I can't remember the details. I also recall something about Structurally Compromised Titans and Knight Banners with over half their models destroyed also counting as having 50% of their points under the destroyed units, or something. Battlefield effects were Vox Ghost, which had something to do with a failed command check during the Strategy Phase allowing the enemy to pass an order without rolling a command check.
My opponent's secondary objective was gaining 3 victory points for destroying my Lord Scion with targeted attacks, up to a maximum of 10. Mine was Cut off the Head, which gives me 5 Victory Points for destroying my opponent's Princeps Seniores, and an additional 5 VP if I pulled it off during the first or second turn.
So my opponent brought his Warmaster Titan, who was equipped with Vulcan mega-bolters and plasma destructors (obviously). He supplemented the Warmaster with 3 Reaver Titans from a Corsair maniple. I think 2 of them had Apocalypse missile launchers for carapace weapons and one had a Vulcan mega-bolter. All of them had gatling blasters, supplemented by 1 melta cannon, 1 volcano cannon (the Princeps Seniores) and 1...was it laser blaster? I think so. The Princeps Seniores had the Favored by Fortune trait, and they were all Legio Tempestus. Traitor, obviously.
Opposing the towering Titans was my Knight Household Army. I had 2 Lances - 1 Lance consisting of a Cerastus Knight banner of 4 Lancers, 2 Questoris Knight banners, one having 3 Knights Errant and the other having 3 Knights Crusader. The second Lance composed of a Cerastus Knight banner of 2 Knights Atrapos, and 2 Questoris Knight banners of 2 Knights Styrix each. Supplementing them were 2 Auxiliary Acastus Knight banners (1 for each Lance) of 2 Knights Porphyrion each. I made them Imperial aligned, so they have the Valorous Charge Ability. Woohoo! And I rolled on the Master of War Knightly Quality, which made the Valorous Charge Ability give me 4" additional movement instead of 2". HA HA HA HA HA! Why am I laughing? You'll see why later. I spent 50 points to upgrade him into a High King for an additional Stratagem point. Yay!
And so the battle begins. I seized the initiative for the first turn and passed all of my orders, giving the Acastus Knights Split Fire and First Fire, while the Mechanicum (I'll be calling them that for ease of use) Lance had Full Stride and my normal Lance had Coordinated Strike (stupid, I should have given them Full Stride as well). Unfortunately, my opponent dropped an Orbital Bombardment on my Mechanicum Lance and destroyed one of my Knights Atrapos while damaging the other as well as another Knight Styrix. Ouch. I took down all but a couple of void shields from his Princeps Seniores Reaver Titan, knowing I couldn't hurt the Warmaster, and then during the combat phase I blew out his shields and did quite a bit of damage to his head while missing most of my shots. The Warmaster utterly destroyed one of my Acastus Knights Porphyrion with his maximal fire plasma destructors, scoring a critical hit. Ouch. His melta cannon Reaver wiped out my entire banner of Knights Errant, and that particular lance couldn't do anything during the combat phase because they were out of range. Should have given them the Full Stride order. Stupid of me.
All in all, not a very good turn for me, as I lost a bunch of Knights while not doing anything more than grazing the head of the Princeps Seniores Reaver Titan.
In the second turn, however, something hilarious happened. I managed to passs the Charge orders for my Mechanicum Lance and First Fire orders for my Acastus Knights, while I popped Smokescreen off on my banner of Cerastus Knights Lancer. However, my opponent used Blind Barrage on my Acastus Knight banner that hadn't been hit yet, so they were going to miss almost all of their shots. So much for First Fire. I did manage to take out the shields, but somehow he still had a shield or so remaining, I think, thanks to pulling his Emergency Repairs order earlier and restoring quite a few of them. Despite having Smoke Screen, the melta cannon and laser blaster from the Reaver Titans took out 2 of my Knights Lancer. My opponent had the initiative for this round, and he wasted no time giving the other 2 Reavers First Fire. Ouch. Then my Mechanicum Lance charged straight into the Warmaster. I had activated Valorous Charge for them, and with the Seneschal taking the Master of War Knightly Quality, they moved up to 14" (the Knight Atrapos could move 16", but obviously he moved in a straight line and covered only 14"). Unfortunately, one of my Knight Styrix banners couldn't make the charge, but the other did, with both Knights Styrix getting within melee range along with my Knight Atrapos. Now you know why I was laughing earlier?
The Knight Atrapos hit like a damned truck. He pulled off a move worthy of legends. His Atrapos lascutter, which had the Fusion Trait, allowed me to roll D10s for his armor penetration rolls - and keep in mind, I had 6 attacks from Charge (adding 4 because I moved 14", so 1 extra attack for every 3"). Good lord, he utterly ravaged the poor Warmaster with his Atrapos lascutter, with me rolling 2 10s and 2 8s, causing a couple of critical hits and devastating hits. Boom. The poor Warmaster fell right into the damned red thanks to my Knight Atrapos's massive Atrapos lascutters. Holy Terra.
The Knights Styrix, having 8 attacks (4 additional attacks from Charge for 1 of them) finished the Warmaster off with their Hektaon siege claws (keep in mind, I got the +3 bonus or so for armor penetration rolls after dealing so much damage to the Warmaster's body from the Knight Atrapos's Atrapos lascutter). Needless to say, the heroic Mechanicum Knights of that particular Lance brought the mighty Warmaster down in a single charge phase. The Knight Atrapos was brought down when the Warmaster retaliated with his Wildfire catastrophic damage table, but he was a hero. The hero I needed, and the one we Knight players all deserved.
Yeah, that was brutal. Heh.
The remaining Reaver Titans destroyed my single Acastus Knight (the one who lost his buddy), and wiped out the entire Knight Lancer banner. OUCH. I also lost a Knight Styrix, but I did manage to strip the Princeps Seniores's shields with their volkite chieorovilles and damage his head further with a few shots from my Acastus Knights, but the highlight of the turn was still my Mechanicum Knights' slaying of the Warmaster Titan. Heh. That, my friends, is the stuff of legends. I need to write a story about that one day.
The third turn came and I seized back the Initiative this time. I think my opponent tried to move his middle Reaver away, only for him to suffer a few hits to his legs thanks to my plasma mines Stratagem, while his Princeps Seniores backed away. The third Reaver destroyed 2 of my Knights Crusader, with only a single Knight Crusader left. He passed his Charge order...only for me to stupidly realize that he had no melee weapon when he ran to smash the melta cannon Reaver...to no avail. Yikes. Should have given him Coordinated Strike instead. In any event, I managed to strip the shields off the middle Reaver Titan, and I think I lost the poor Knight Styrix who already watched his buddy fall the previous turn. The other two Knights Styrix managed to charge into the Princeps Seniores and ripped his already damaged head off with their Hekaton siege claws. Thus I achieved Cut off the Head, but a turn too late. Well, better late than never, right?
The surviving Acastus Knight banner fired upon the middle Reaver Titan, his shields having been stripped off by the surviving Knights Styrix's volkite chieoroviles, and to my astonishment, their magna lascannons scored 5 out of 8 hits despite them only hitting on 5s (counting for Obscured). That was 10 direct hits...and I rolled so many Devastating hits on the body that the Reaver Titan was obliterated. Wow. Just wow.
With that, my opponent only had a single Reaver Titan left, locked in combat with my Knight Crusader. Yikes. My Knight Crusader fired his Stormspear rocket pod, rapid-fire battle cannon and Avenger gatling cannon at pointblank range, but didn't do much. I think I took out his melta cannon, though, by a lucky shot from the Stormspear rocket pod, but didn't bother rolling the Avenger gatling because it wasn't going to do anything with Strength 3.
In the fourth turn, I gave my Knight Crusader Coordinated Strike and moved him to the side so that I can get the bonus to side armor. I managed to continue pinging away at his side, dealing some minor damage, but that was about it. The Reaver Titan was out of range of my Acastus Knights, and he couldn't reach my Knights Styrix either. I was trying to keep them out of his weapon arcs, especially since he succeeded in repairing his melta cannon during the damage control phase, but perhaps it would be better if I stayed away.
And then the game ended there and then. Tallying the points, I got the full 30 Victory Points for destroying over 75% worth of points of his army, with his Warmaster accounting for over 50%. Nice. In contrast, my opponent scored 20 because I had an Acastus Knight banner, a Questoris Knight banner with its full 2 Knights Styrix and the lone Knight Crusader, whose banner only counted as 50% destroyed in terms of points. Phew. My friend had 3 points for his secondary objective, having destroyed a Lord Scion with a targeted attack (I believe it was my poor Acastus Knight) while I had 5 for Cut off the Head. Not to mention, I had spent most of my Stratagem pointss on tertiary objectives such as Decapitating Strike, Fight for every step and Vengeance, which gave me more VPs. Worth noting I got 0 for Fight for every step because the surviving Reaver Titan wasn't Structurally Compromised. Still worth it, though.
That was a brutal game, with me losing 15 of my 20 Knights, but it was totally worth trading them for a Warmaster and 2 Reavers...in terms of strategic value, anyway. That was awesome! Brought a big smile to my face to see my Knights still being able to compete. The Warmaster might be scary, but as long as I can get into close combat with him - especially with someone like the Knight Atrapos - I might be able to bring him down. Phew! I'll admit, I got lucky there. Scoring 2 Critical Hits and 2 Devastating Hits isn't something you see everyday. I literally rolled 2 10s. TWO 10s. For a fusion trait melee weapon. I still can't believe it.
And thus my Knights of House Yato have emerged victorious, but not unscarred. The Martian Legio Tempestus lies dead, trampled beneath the ashes of a devastated hive world. Okay, never mind. That sounded dumb, sorry. In any event, I should spend some time thinking of how to write a story about a heroic noble pilot of a Mechanicum Cerastus Knight Atrapos selling his life dearly to inflict critical damage on a near-invincible Warmaster Titan and laying him low with the help of his subordinate pilots of accompanying Questoris Knights Styrix. That will be a legend worth telling over and over again.
For the Emperor! Deus Mechanicus!
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