Spring-Step RTT/GT

So I went and participated in a tournament at the Forge in Chaska. Many thanks to my friend who gave me a ride, otherwise I never would have been able to go to the Forge. I kind of feel bad - it was a long drive, so maybe I shouldn't take advantage of him. Oh, well. Anyway, the tournament itself was a great experience. As usual, I brought Imperial Knights because...well, I'm a Knight player. What else did you think I was going to bring? Black Templars? Nah. I'm all about Imperial Knights!

Anyway, my list looked something like this:

Imperial Knights Super-heavy Detachment (Glorified History, Hounds of War, Mechanicus aligned)

Dominus Knight Castellan with Cold Eradication and Cawl's Wrath

Questoris Knight Prceptor with Ion Bulwark and Stormspear rocket pod

3 Armiger Warglaives with meltaguns

3 Armiger Knights Moirax, 2 with 2 graviton pulsars and 1 with 2 lightning locks

So yeah. That pretty much sums up my list. Hey, it's Imperial Knights, I don't have that many units. Still pretty fun to play with them because...well, Knights!

Game 1

I had the fortune of playing against an awesome Nurgle Daemon list in my first game. The mission was Recover the Relics or something like that. There was no Great Unclean One, but there was Be'lakor, who basically ran up the table, killed my Knight Preceptor in combat, then my opponent used a Stratagem for Be'lakor to fight twice and kill a Knight Moirax. Ouch. My shooting in the first couple of times was...bad. Still, I managed to kill Be'lakor with my Knight Castellan, and Be'lakor himself ate 3 mortal wounds when he perilled twice with Warp Ritual. I think he rolled 2 6s the first time, and then rolled 2 1s on a Command Reroll. What are the odds!?

My Knights had to slowly fight their way through a bunch of Plaguebearers riding on wasps, the Armiger Warglaives slowly hacking away at them over five turns, but eventually I succeeded in clearing them off the table and managed to get more primary objectives than him. I thought I had lost the game, but I managed to somehow turn it around in the last few turns, and I think the score was 89 to 82 in my favor. My opponent made the mistake of not taking Bring it Down, or he would have scored 9 points instead of 3 for Warp Ritual, having killed my Knight Preceptor and 3 Armiger Knights. Hmm, even if he did take Bring it Down, the score would still have been 89 to 88. Well, it was a close and very fun game, so I have no complaints! I really enjoyed it!

Game 2

This time, I ended up playing against Deathwing. There were literally 47 Deathwing Terminators on the table, along with Champion in Terminator Armor and an Interrogator Chaplain in Terminator armor. The mission was Data Scry Salvage, and I used the Armigers' Objective Secured to my advantage to claim the objectives in the No Man's Land and score more on primary while keeping my distance from the slow-moving Deathwing Terminators. Despite their durable Transhuman (can only be wounded on unmodified rolls of 4+), I was able to table him by turn 5...somehow. That said, I only had 3 Knights left on the table because he wrecked my Knight Preceptor in the first or second turn, and I used Noble Sacrifice to blow up his Terminators...and accidentally destroyed one of my own Armigers with 6 mortal wounds. Ouch. Well, I also did quite some damage to his Terminators, so worth it, I guess?

In any event, I managed to win 92 to 44 despite losing 4 Armigers and my Knight Preceptor to a bunch of thunder hammers. It was a fun game, and it was a lot closer than the score made it seem, mostly because the Deathwing suffered from only being able to score points only if they hold 2 or more, or hold 3 or more, or hold more than me. I was always holding more than him and grabbing the objectives all over the table. I think I was able to max out Yield no Ground, which was the new Imperial Knight secondary I took for all my games. Honestly, I was surprised. I thought I would lose and be unable to kill his Deathwing, but I think my raw firepower took out his Terminators, who might benefit from an Apocethary's Feel No Pain, considering my graviton pulsars and Cawl's Wrath plasma decimator were doing like 3 damage apiece.

Game 3

The mission was Conversion, and my opponent brought Orks. A SpeedWaaagh using the SpeedFreakz Army of Renown. I went first, to my chagrin, and the first couple of turns were...pretty bad. But when he raced his bikers across the table, I took them out fairly easily with the graviton pulsars. The raw number of lightning locks shots also helped take out the deffkoptas despite the Ramshackle stuff. Eventually, I was able to power through and kill all his buggies and deffkoptas with melta and the Knight Castellan's firepower, along with the Armigers...though I ended up losing like 4 Armigers and once again my Knight Preceptor died. I pulled Noble Sacrifice and blew him up, dealing 6 mortal wounds to 2 different deffkopta squadrons and 3 mortal wounds to a third squadron. The explosions were really on point!

I have to say the Knight Preceptor was pretty...useless, though. The only thing he can do is blow up on death and deal mortal wounds, but his shooting and melee were pretty abyssmal. Can't complain, given I almost tabled my opponent, leaving just 2 buggies hiding in a ruin, but otherwise I killed everything else, including the Warboss in a buggy. Whoa. I so did not expect that. After the last time I played against Orks where I got tabled, I expected to die horribly, but I actually won for a third time in a row. The score was 91 to 53 in my favor, I think. Again, the game was a lot closer than the score made it out to be, with my opponent wrecking over half of my Knights. Dakka is awesome.

Game 4

The next mission was the Scouring, and I knew my luck would run out eventually. But I didn't think it would be this bad. In any event, my opponent was Adeptus Custodes, so...you probably know how it went down. Needless to say, I got tabled by turn 3...hell, I didn't have a turn 3, my Knights were totally annihilated during my opponent's turn 3. Yikes. His jetbikes, Galatus Dreadnoughts and Sagittarium pushed down the table, with the Vexilia providing a -1 to hit. Damn it.

My shooting was, as usual, horrible. And I paid the price for it. I was rolling 1s and 2s, and missing entirely, and when my shots did land, I rolled 1s for the damage - talking the D6 damage for Stormspear rocket pod and las-impulsor. Not to mention my 4 meltaguns on my Knight Castellan failed to do a single wound. Can't complain after the first three games, and like I said, my luck was going to run out eventually. But even so, it was a completely one-sided affair where I only killed one squad of jet-bikes and the 2 Galatus Dreadnoughts...and that was it. In exchange for all 8 of my Knights.

The score was 22 to 95, which was a heavy loss. Yeah...that was painful.

Edit: Apparently there is no round 5. There was only player who was undefeated yesterday, so he's the winner! Congratulations to David, I think, for finishing first with Space Wolves!

I ended up finishing 10th. Well...that's not so bad...I think.

Relax, Sis

"Uh...why are the Sisters from the Order of Sacred Ashes shooting at us?"

Tanaka asked, astonished, as a barrage of bolter rounds pinged off the armor of his Armiger Warglaive. He didn't even bother to activate the ion shield for Kazan, which cost him dear when a few of the bolts detonated against vital joints and sent his machine limping. Tanaka barely noticed the damage, focusing on the fact that their erstwhile allies had turned on them.

"Bad news," Suzuki reported, his features barely visible on the fizzling holo-pict in Tanaka's Helm Mechanicum. "The Adepta Sororitas have deemed our faith lacking and decided to arbitrarily purge us."

"...say what?"

"Does it matter?" Kanda said grimly, pivoting his Armiger Knight Moirax to fire gravitic pulses at a shrieking squad of Sisters Repentia, squashing them into bloody pulps in a single volley. "If we don't fight back soon, we'll be killed. Let's just get out of this situation first."

"I have dibs on the tank!" Suzuki said eagerly when he spotted the Castigator tank pulling up from behind a hab-block. He sounded a tad too enthusiastic for Tanaka's liking, but before the latter could stop him, Suzuki was already goading Hebi into a loping stride toward the armored vehicle.

However, the Castiagor opened up, its barrels roaring as it unleashed a storm of santificed shells upon Hebi. Suzuki deftly angled his ion shields to deflect the exploding rounds, but even so, his Armiger Warglaive rocked from the impact. Hebi reeled and nearly staggered, only for the surviving Sister Superior that was leading the Repentia from earlier to leap and assault him.

Suzuki skillfully chopped her in half, her body disintegrating in a bloody mist, even as her neural whips left a single scratch across the thigh plating of Hebi. He righted his Armiger Warglaive and fired a volley from its thermal spear, the molten lance melting the front ceramite armor of the reversing vehicle.

Tanaka wanted to help him, but he had troubles of his own. Two Battle Sister squads were converging on Kazan, their bolter shells pinging ineffectively against his machine. This time, he activated his ion shields, minimizing the damage from the small-arms fire, but the Sisters were far from discouraged. Even though he vaporized three Sisters in one squad with a single shot from his thermal spear, the carapace meltagun missing, they were simply galvanized further by the loss of their comrades. Led by a Canoness, who was raising her women to ever-increasing zeal with fiery rhetoric, the completely unscathed squad charged him. The Sister Superior swung her chainsword, matching her rhythm with the Canoness's gleaming power sword.

"Ugh!"

Kazan stumbled from the blows, and though he swept out with a sweeping blow of its Reaper chain-cleaver, the Sisters dodged with what seemed like miraculous agility. A few of them were knocked over by the whirring teeth and power field that enveloped the weapon, and despite the gouges in their power armor, they simply stood back up and shrugged off what would otherwise be grievous wounds.

It appeared to Tanaka that they were compelled by near-supernatural faith, driven to acts of higher zeal. Shouting hymns and utterly convicted in the righteousness of their decision to purge their imperial allies for what they deemed was a lack of faith, they continued to assail the sparking armor of Kazan.

"Hang in there!" Kanda shouted, but his Knight Moirax was currently besieged by a squad of Seraphym who had swooped from the heavens to open up on him with bolt fire. He snapped off a couple of shots from his graviton pulsars, but only killed three of them. The other two continued to boost toward him, the superior brandishing her glowing power sword with vengeance in her eyes.

"Just die already!" Suzuki howled, enraged, even as Hebi was rocked back by another devastating salvo from the Castigator. Fortunately, his ion shield deflected the worst of the blow and he was able to close in on the rapidly retreating tank. Unleashing his wrath upon the stricken vehicle, which was partially immobilized by a second shot from his thermal spear, he finished it off with a penetrating hit from his carapace meltagun without even having to close in and engage it in close combat. Suzuki crowed. "Hah!"

His triumph was short-lived, however. The Sisters' boltguns roared and the barrage of rounds detonated against the already weakened armor of the Armiger Warglaive. For one second, Hebi teetered. Then it fell over, wrecking itself against the ground.

"Oh, for the love of the God-Emperor...!" Suzuki raged impotently, slamming his fists against the console of his Helm Mechanicum. "Not again! I hope I don't get a Battle Scar!"

"Don't you miss the days before the Great Rift, when we were using AV and Hull Points instead of Toughness and Wounds?" Tanaka sighed heavily and shook his head. "Back then, our AV12 Armigers were immune to bolters. Now all it takes is a 5+ to wound our Toughness 7 Armigers."

"What in the nine hells are you talking about now!?"

"Nothing." Tanaka managed to slay the Canoness with a lucky shot, impaling her with the Reaper Chain-cleaver after she survived a point-blank meltagun fire. Her faith had held strong at first, but the eventual weight of attacks had finally worn through her strong defenses. With a slash, he finished off the rest of the Sisters, finally hacking a path through them.

As if on cue, Kanda annihilated the surviving Seraphym, his Knight Moirax falling back to blast them with gravitic pulses. Their armor crumpled in upon themselves, squishing the soft human flesh within like a crushed ration can commonly distributed among the Guardsmen of the Astra Militarum. Kanda sighed in relief.

The last Battle Sister squad retreated swiftly, with only three of them having survived the battle. Tanaka watched them go, but didn't pursue.

"Hey!" Suzuki whined. "What are you doing? Go after them! Wipe them out!"

"No," Tanaka replied, shaking his head firmly. "I'm sure this whole thing is a misunderstanding. Let's get back to HQ and contact High Command. We're already getting our asses kicked by heretics and xenos here. We can't afford to destroy each other with all this frivolous infighting."

Looking up at the skies, which was a ghastly red from the baleful glow of the Great Rift, he felt ill. At this rate, even before the Great Enemy could launch a proper invasion, the Imperium might end up tearing itself apart from within.

Painted a bunch of models

I painted a bunch of models today! I finally got around to painting my Cerastus Knights for Adeptus Titanicus. I was painting my Armiger Knight Moirax anyway, so I decided to paint the Adeptus Titanicus Cerastus Knights along with him. So all 5 Knights are now painted! My Knight army, both 40K scale and Adeptus Titanicus scale, is fully painted!

I also painted my Terminators. Assault Terminators for my Black Templars, I mean. I had gotten another 5 Cataphractii Terminators, along with the Imperial Fists shields from Forge World, and so I assembled them a couple of weeks ago. Now I've painted them! So my Black Templars army is fully painted as well!

As of now, except the Forgefiend and Warpsmith, as well as the Civitas Imperialis terrain, all of my models are painted! I managed to clear my backlog. The Warpsmith and Forgefiend...well, I'll paint them another day. I might get a bunch of MKIII Space Marines and field them as Fallen. So Fallen (Traitor Dark Angels) with lots of plasma, and a couple of ectoplasma Forgefiends. That will be cool. I'll field them against my Black Templars and see what happens. It'll probably be hilarious. But that project will be a long way off, so yeah. Until then!

A Warpsmith and a Forgefiend

I managed to get my hands on a Warpsmith and a Forgefiend from the Eldritch Omens box, and...yeah. I assembled today. Yay, I guess?

What am I supposed to do with them? Forgefiend will be joining my army of Daemon Engines already following my Thousand Sons around, but like my Dark Apostle, the Warpsmith can't be included in a Thousand Sons army. Which is kind of...dumb, but it is what it is. Well, we'll see what we can do. Maybe I will build a small army of Fallen or something, but I don't know. Again, we'll see. At least I have a bunch of Daemon Engines now! Too many, in fact, but...I like Daemon Engines. So yeah.

Krieg

Krieg by Steve Lyons is awesome. I'm reading it right now, and this little scene made me laugh. I really enjoyed this little extract, and it ties into the whole Death Korps of Krieg memes, so I thought it would be a good idea to share it. So the Orks were attacking the trenches manned by Krieg Korpsmen and Cadians, and the stalwart Guardsmen of the Imperium successfully repelled them. In the aftermath, an Inquisitor was speaking to his Interrogator about what happened.

2. [10:30 PM]

   'The Ork attack had been repulsed," said Inquisitor Ven Bruin. "The Krieg decided to press their advantage. Two thousand went "over the top".' 'They swept across no-man's-land," he continued, 'killing any xenos stragglers they found, gaining roughly one point seven miles of ground.' 'And then?' 'And then they dug more trenches.'

Yeah, I'm loving the book so far. There's some sardonic humor in it, which makes it even better. I hope I can finish the novel as soon as possible!

Newest member

Welcoming the newest member to my Knight Household!

Ugh, I remember how much I hate dealing with resin. Now my fingers are covered in super glue, and it took me a lot of time just to glue the damned thing together. And that's after I washed the damned anti-glue stuff off the resin. Also a lot of frustration when things refused to stick or took a super long time to stick together. I prefer working with plastic. Not to mention the toxicity...

Well, at least I now have a Knight Moirax with lighting locks! I magnetized the arms, as usual, so I can swap the lightning locks out for volkite veuglaires if I have to. I'll eventually get a third pair of graviton pulsars, so yeah. We'll see!

Now I have six Armiger class Knights. And they all have Objective Secured and count as 5 models! This should help me in whatever matches or tournaments I participate in! Or so I hope...anyway, until then!

The Twisted Helix is...twisted

"Find them! And hunt them down!"

"Yes, my lord."

Bondswoman Susanne said little else, for she had no intention of incurring any further wrath from her lord. Sir Justin Hemmington's furious expression was displayed upon a pict-screen in her Helm Mechanicum, and honestly, she didn't blame him. When House Donovar discovered the presence of a Genestealer Cult within their serfdom, they mobilized entire lances to hunt down the xenos-tainted heretics and burn them out.

Susanne's lance was but one of them. Commanding a trio of Armiger-class Knights, she led them to the depths of the Hive City of Dronar, intent on carrying out her lord's orders. Sir Hemmington's Knight Preceptor had lumbered away, taking a lance of his own to seek out the Patriarch and destroy it before it could further subvert more of their loyal subjects.

"What do we know about these heretics?" Justine asked. Another bondswoman, she was Sir Hemmington's daughter. Susanne didn't like her much, for Justine's hot-headedness and impulsiveness often cost the lance dear. However, Sir Hemmington's orders had been clear. She was to take charge of the younger bondswoman and teach her the chivalrous ways of House Donovar. Normally a pilot of a Knight Preceptor would have been given the role, but the forces of House Donovar had been stretched.

And now they learned there was a Genestealer Cultist infection runnng rampant within their own home world.

"They seem to be from the Cult of the Twisted Helix," Susanne said eventually, consulting the data-screeds that flashed over the holo-feeds that linked to the noosphere of the Mechanicus. "They were discovered conducting heretical gene-therapy to enhance their physiques, mixing xenos DNA with sacred human genomes."

"That is unforgivable," Jerome growled. The last third of their Armiger lance, he had his Armiger Warglaive stride forward. "We shall cleanse their taint from our world!"

"Be careful," Susanne warned, noting that her two lance mates were pulling too far ahead. "We cannot afford to underestimate the enemy."

"Yes, my lady."

While Jerome agreed, Justine ignored her superior and surged ahead. Susanne felt a stab of irration and was about to call her back, but Justine's voice fizzled excitedly over the vox.

"Enemy vehicle spotted! Moving in to eliminate it!"

"Wait..." Susanne began, but Justine paid her no attention. Her Armiger Warglaive was already loping forward, its carapace meltagun swiveling about. Incandescent beams lanced out from both the meltagun and thermal spear, punching molten holes through the swerving vehicle several dozen meters forward. Susanne caught sight of an Achilles Ridgerunner, a rugged four wheel drive that was used by the poorer citizens of Hive Dronar. Her lip curled when she realized that the xenos-loving Cultists must have appropriated one of them.

"I see more," Jerome reported, switching the aim of his steed. Melta beams glowed red-hot as they bathed a mob of cultists carrying autoguns and what looked like mining equipment. A few of them disintegrated almost immediately, and the bondsman barked out in laughter. "These mere dregs of humanity think they can challenge our noble house?"

"Be careful," Susanne repeated. "We don't know if they have laid any traps..."

"Just look at them, ma'am." Justine snorted. "They aren't fit to lick the boots of even the PDF."

"Don't worry, I'll keep an eye out for anything that might be out of order." Despite Jerome's assurance, there was no mistaking the bloodlust in his voice. His Armiger Warglaive was already charging into the beleaguered crowd of bald mutants, laying into them with his reaper chain-cleaver. Several cultists ceased to exist as the power field enveloped them.

Susanne took aim and crushed a few stragglers with the pair of graviton pulsars that her Armiger was equipped with, trying not to sigh. Even as she did so, she kept an eye on her auspex.

Despite her caution, she never saw the trap sprung.

The first warning she received that something was amiss was when Justine screamed. Spinning her steed about, she caught sight of the younger girl's Armiger Warglaive falling. A swarm of abhorrent mutants had her surrounded, smashing the limbs with pick axes, drills and other power equipment. Much larger than the bald cultists, the newcomers were hulking abominations whose skin had darkened to a sickly purple. Susanne felt revulsion soak through her at the sight of the foul creatures. She took aim and tried to fire at them, but hesitated when she realized that Justine's machine was in the way.

The poor girl's screams ceased when one of the huge mutants smashed its way into her cockpit, its drill penetrating the adamantium and gouging something out. There was a spray of blood, and Susanne turned away with her eyes closed. She did not have to note the cessation of Justine's bio-signs in her Helm Mechanicum to confirm her death.

"You monsters!" Jerome yelled furiously, his Armiger Warglaive attempting to move back, but he found himself surrounded by more Cultists, all of them swarming out of ruins and buildings. There were more of them than House Donovar had expected. Jerome's engine flailed about, crushing the frenzied mob and just barely extricating himself out of the situation.

"Retreat!" Susanne shouted into the vox. "Fall back!"

"I'm trying to!" Jerome growled, his Armiger Warglaive limping out of the pulped remains of the cultists. He wasn't able to get far, however. Before the Warglaive could duck behind a building for cover, several of the Aberrants reached him, their hammers, pickaxes and drills crackling with power fields. Beside them, a Biophagus cackled, its syringe dripping with some sort of vile serum.

Whatever it had injected its charges with, it had made them stronger. The berserk mutants tore into Jerome's Armiger, smashing it down and clambering on top of it. Jerome yelled something, anger turning into fear...and then silence.

Susanne was backpedaling her Armiger Knight right now, suddenly all alone. A cold chill gripped her spine. With both of her lance mates down, there wasn't much she could do but retreat.

As she turned her Knight Moirax around, however, she found herself staring right at a second group of Aberrants.

"When did you...?"

Their response was to smash their power picks and hammers into her Knight Moirax. There was a shudder and her machine crashed backward in a shower of sparks. Susanne's head hit the back of her seat, causing her to almost black out.

Mercilessly, she recovered her consciousness just in time to see the Aberrants tear their way into her cockpit.

She screamed.

*

"Did House Donovar fall?" Tanaka asked nervously, skirting along the edge of the bastion in his Armiger Warglaive, Kazan, and watching the buildings anxiously. He was expecting the enemy to pop out any moment now. They all were. They had heard the screams and the gunfire...and then silence.

"Apparently," Suzuki replied heavily, swiveling his Armiger Warglaive, Hebi, about as he continued the patrol. "Sir Yato and Lance Ryuu are rescuing the survivors before they get overrun."

Tanaka nodded and glanced at the bastion. It was their job to guard this stronghold until House Donovar could evacuate what remained of their beleaguered lances. Apparently their strike against the Cult of the Twisted Helix had ended in failure and most of their machines were wrecked by insidious ambushes. Answering their call for aid, House Yato had landed Knight Lances of their own to help their fellow nobles extricate themselves from the situation.

If the bastion fell to the hands of the xenos-infected cultists, then they would gain access to the orbital guns. They couldn't allow that to happen, or the fleet above would come under fire from the orbital guns spread across the planet's surface. House Donovar had prepared for an invasion from the void, but they had never expected to be betrayed from within.

"They are coming," Kanda reported dispassionately, reflexively taking cover behind the bastion. A mining laser blasted toward them, catching Tanaka's Armiger Warglaive and causing it to shudder despite his best efforts to deflect it with his ion shield.

Taking a deep breath, Tanaka depressed the trigger in his haptic gloves and blew almost half of the advancing Achilles Ridgerunner apart. The smoldering vehicle skidded forward and contunued peppering him with stubber rounds, though. Cursing himself for not having fired off a clean shot, Tanaka charged the half-wrecked vehicle and finished it off by plowing his reaper chain-cleaver into it.

Not far from him, Suzuki's Hebi disintegrated a couple of Aberrants with the high-powered melta weapons mounted on his Armiger Warglaive. Three of them flaked away into ashes, completely vaporized by the sheer heat of the thermal beams. Kanda added to the fire with his paired graviton pulsars, his Knight Moirax striding from cover to cover. The small, nimble Armiger Knights were able to hide behind the ruined buildings, making use of their size and agility to avoid the mining lasers that came their way from the hordes of mutant cultists emerging from the ceramite shells of once pristine hab blocks.

"Ugh!" Suzuki cried out in frustration when one of the mining lasers snapped off the leg of his Armiger, causing it to topple over. "Of all the Throne frakking things to hit...!"

"Be careful!" Tanaka warned. He was somehow able to finish off the Primus and the cultists that it was leading with a swing of his reaper chain-cleaver, even as Hebi eradicated the last of the Aberrants before the twitching Knight went still. However, a second wave of cultists surrounded him, egged on by a Biophagus who had seemed to inject them with stimulants. Clicking his tongue, he tried to have Kazan fall back, but...

Crack!

"Huh?"

Tanaka gaped in utter astonishment when the cultists did a couple of mortal wounds to his damaged Armiger, causing it to topple over. He blinked, unable to believe what had just happened.

"What on Holy Terra...?"

"Don't worry, I got you!" Kanda assured him, sweeping his graviton pulsars over the remaining cultists and crushing them with waves of gravity. The Biophagus growled and hopped away, sneaking into the bastion.

"Oh, that's not good..." Tanaka moaned. They weren't supposed to let the stronghold fall into the hands of the enemy. And for some reason, the rules prevented them from disembarking from their Knights and pursuing a single character into the bastion. Well, at least they could still hold the objective because of their Armiger-class Knights, and it appeared that the Biophagus couldn't do anything to them...

...until Tanaka spotted the falling beam from above.

"What's that?!"

"Orbital bombardment," Kanda replied calmly, also staring at the heavens. Apparently the Cult of Twisted Helix had seized one of the cruisers and was launching a firestorm at them, not realizing that one of their own had captured the bastion. The three Bondsmen watched in amazement from their damaged Knights as the blinding lances struck the bastion and obliterated it, turning it into chunks of ceramite and debris.

The Biophagus staggered out of the rubble, spluttering in shock and dismay at the apparent betrayal. Kanda blinked and then fired, crushing the foul monstrosity with waves of gravity and turning him into a bloody smear across the ruins of the bastion.

"Uh oh..." Suzuki gulped as he watched the ruins of the bastion, his Knight still lying on the ground, immobilized. "The nine bloody hells! Does that mean we failed our mission?"

"Well...at least nobody would be getting control of the orbital guns now," Tanaka said with a shrug, trying to look on the bright side as usual.

Eldritch Omens Story

Thanks to a friend, I was able to read the Eldritch Omens story. I'm a fan of the lore, as you all know, so whatever I can read, I will. Sort of. Heh. Anyway, here's the summary of the story in Eldritch Omens. Needless to say, there are minor spoilers (I'm sure most of you can already guess what's going on anyway or you probably don't care about the lore as much as I do), so...yeah. Anyway...

We'll skip over the introduction - if you don't know what's happening regarding the Nachmund Gauntlet, then you probably have been living under a rock or something. Needless to say, planets and systems get swallowed into the Empyrean surrounding the Nachmund Gauntlet, and these are called tidal worlds or something. Daethe - an Exodite Aeldari maiden world - is located in the Zykathura System, which itself lies upon the liminal boundary where the realspace of the gauntlet overlapped with the warp storms beyond. A warpsmith named D'vok, who was a former Iron Warrior who took his Forgeborn and deserted the IV Legion after killing his former superior, Jagoth, joined the Black Legion. Because...the Black Legion are the Chaos posterboys and are on par with the Ultramarines as the strongest and most numerous Chaos Legion. In any event, he wanted to win Abaddon's favor, so he went to Daethe to grab all the Aeldari spirit energies and world spirit in the psychocrystalline matrix in there to create more powerful daemon engines.

To do so, he constructed an octagonal fortress near Daethe's world spirit and began the long and arduous process of dismantling the stuff to absorb the spirits for his daemon engines. The fortress has psy-baffles, Geller shields and solid-flux power shields (no void shields?) to protect it, so yay, I guess? As expected of a former Iron Warrior. Anyway, D'vok also built a ring of Noctlith Crowns to create a warp energy siphon that he called the Lens Empyric.

The Exodites are all dead by this point, but they managed to preserve the world spirit with sacred runes and stuff. So poor D'vok is stumped because he's unable to break through the last circle that is protecting the world spirit. Unfortunately, while he was stripping away the world spirit's defenses, it was able to call for help.

The Craftworld of Saim-hann received the distress call, and though they were like, "hey, is this a trap or something? Maybe we shouldn't answer it." Autarch Medevyal Ghaelyn stepped forward and said that she had sworn a blood oath to the Exodites and would see it fulfilled. She took half of her Zephyrborne Hunt to execute a rescue mission. Farseer Kearth remained behind to guide the Vaethyr Kurthanil and help them elect a new cheftain if Ghaelyn failed to return. Very grimdark and ominous.

Long story short, they flew through the warp-torn region and faced lots of dangers on the way there, blah blah, suffered assaults from warpborn void-predators and pirates, blah, but finally reached Daethe. Unfortunately, by now Daethe was well on its way to becoming a daemon world. Ouch. Worse, there was an approaching warp storm that might trap the Zephyrborne Hunt on the planet and prevent them from leaving or receiving reinforcements. This put them on a timer, and Ghaelyn was like, screw it, we don't have time, let's strike! Because she knew her dudes would follow her command and seek vengeane on the morons who tainted the once pristine maiden world.

Ghaelyn and her Zephyrborne Hunt attacked the cultists and warbands on Daethe, killing lots of them and disrupting the activities there. Far from being annoyed, D'vok was delighted. As I said earlier, he got stuck at the last protective circle and despite sacrificing lots of human pyskers and mortals, he was unable to break through that final defense protecting the world spirit. However, he thought that securing himself an Eldar Farseer might finally break the last defensive circle - a skeleton key to the spiritual lock, if I'm not mistaken about the wording.

So what does the scheming Chaos Warpsmith do? Set a trap, of course! So basically D'vok sent all of his men away and only had him and a small band of Forgebond Chosen work on maintaining a chained Daemon Engine, giving the impression that he was alone. Oh, and he basically pretended that all his shields were down because of the approaching warp storm.

The Eldar Warhost blundered into the trap. At first it seemed like they were winning because they were massacring the cultists, who weren't warned of the thing and were caught entirely by surprise (y'know, because Chaos is evil and ruthless). D'vok realized that he had underestimated the Aeldari and panicked for a moment, but then the trap was sprung. The Lens Empyric unleashed warp energies and took the Eldar by surprise. Aspect Warriors basically died from headaches, and others convulsed and mutated (into Chaos Spawn, heh). Grav-tanks ground to a halt and wobbled, the Wild Rider jetbikes spiraled around and exploded, crashing into each other and against the ground.

Basically, lots of Eldar died. They were pretty much screwed by this point.

As some sort of a last-ditch effort, Autarch Ghaelyn charged forward with the ragged survivors of her remaining Warhost, attempting to assassinate D'vok. Apparently she believed that if they took out the leader, they could stop the whole damned thing (somehow I doubt that - that's awfully naive. Wouldn't D'vok's successor just take over and continue whatever he was doing?). She and her Dire Avengers and Striking Scorpions - still not yet in plastic - slew lots of Black Legionnaires (or ex-Iron Warriors?) and wrecked a lot of daemon engines on their way to D'vok. She dodged D'vok's thunder hammer, but got tentacled by his writhing mechadendrites/mechatendrils (I'll leave it to your imagination) and knocked unconscious by a blow to her face.

The story ends there. On a bloody cliffhanger. Well, I guess there's very little room for what transpires after that. Clearly Ghaelyn lost, the Zephyrborne Hunt got massacred, and D'vok got what he wanted. He probably would use her spirit to pry the final defenses open and obtain the world spirit, powering his warp infused creations and constructing more powerful nightmarish daemon engines than ever. Or maybe the survivors of the Zephyrborne Hunt would attempt a rescue later. Who knows? I doubt these stories would be explored in greater detail. They weren't for Hexfire, Shadowthrone and the other box sets, so yeah. Never knew what happened to Castellan Crowe or the Genestealer Patriarch. Kind of sad. Speaking of which, I did write a post for the Hexfire lore, right?

It's a great time to be a Chaos player! Chaos is on the ascent! Ah, screw the meta and the tournament rules, who cares about all that?! I'm more interested in the story and lore. And that's what we got here.

The irony is that if Ghaelyn didn't answer the call, D'vok wouldn't have gotten the key he needed to break through the world spirit's defenses. Or he might have eventually, but she still literally delivered herself to him on a plate. That...sucks. Oh, well.

My friend speculates that the story might actually continue in the Corsairs Kill Team boxset, which is rumored to pit Corsairs against Cultists (new sculpts! Yay!). That would be really cool! The Corsairs attempting to rescue Ghaelyn and save Daethe! So there might still be hope, after all!

Anyway, if I get hold of more information, I'll update you guys on it. Not that anyone will be reading this blog, and I know that most people aren't interested in the lore and story, but...yeah. Oh, well...until next time.

Daemon Engine

The binding of a daemon into a machine was a dangerous process.

"Are you ready, Sorcerer?"

I looked at the Dark Apostle opposite me. Chronos, formerly a Chaplain of the now renegade Sapphire Drakes, stood with his hands clasped. His skull helm had been discarded, the Space Marine now in favor of exposing his "true" face. In one hand, he held a tome. Behind him, two Chapter serfs lingered, dressed in black robes and murmuring prayers under their breath. The thick scent of incense flooded the chamber, several wisps emanating from the blazing braziers affixed to the back power plant of Chronos' armor.

Taking a deep breath, I nodded and affixed Chronos with an intense stare of my own. "Yes. Are you?"

"Whenever you are ready, you may begin."

The runes engraved into the surface of Chronos' sapphire blue armor glowed faintly, almost in anticipation of the ritual we were about to carry out. A low growl drew both of our glances to the side. Within the shadows, Noveno emerged, his mechadendrites writhing impatiently.

"Then let us hasten," he said, his voice distorted through the vox-grille in his helm. He thumped the blunt end of his thunder hammer against the ground, power tools and drills igniting to life as he ran one last check on the machine he had constructed for this purpose. "We do not have much time."

Trying not to sigh, I raised my force staff and tapped it against the formation that I had drawn over the floor. Fresh blood glistened, recently taken from sacrificed menials only too eager to offer the meager lives to the voracious entities that dwelled within the Great Ocean. Whispering the words of a language that was never meant for the tongue of man, I weaved an intricate spell. The air between us shimmered as I weakened the barrier between reality and the immaterium.

Already I could sense the primordial predators swimming in the endless depths of the Great Ocean. Like a shark who had caught a whiff of blood, a shoal of daemons streaked toward the weakening barrier. Among them was a single monstrosity, snapping its shapeless jaws and attempting to devour its rivals. The other lesser entities scattered, their fins torn, but they wisely kept their distance from the immense brute.

I say immense, but it was not size that I speak of. Such concepts were meaningless to the denizens of the Warp, for their forms were never fixed. The creature closest to us at times resembled a bodiless shark, a jaw filled with rows upon rows of sword-like teeth. Other times, a serpentine lamprey with a globular mouth. And the next instant, it appeared to have morphed into a draconic aspect with wings and claws, lashing out at the other daemons that continued to stalk them.

And stalk it they did, for they were bitter, vengeful things. The gods that ruled over the Great Ocean were fickle beings, after all. One moment they might abandon a favored patron and grant dark blessings to another. The hierarchy was far from being set in stone. The scheming creatures of the Warp would snatch at every opportunity to rise above their rivals, gleefully trampling upon the latter if they so much as displayed even a hint of weakness.

For now, though, the shifting monster was brimming with strength. Its anger, its hatred...its hunger was a volatile thing, bestowing upon its essence a primal power.

"Ah." Chronos smiled, his eyes glinting in triumph. "That one."

His fngers tightened upon the arcane tome he held. The grimoire was one that contained the names of Daemons, gathered from several hundred worlds sacrificed to the warp. Those damned planets now swirled aimlessly about in the Eye of Terror, domains of indomitable entities who warred incessantly against each other. It wasn't difficult to coax the true names of daemons out from their treacherous rivals. It was infinitely more difficult to leave safely after harboring such knowledge.

That was precisely how the Imperium ought to keep its citizens safe. Through the fragile shield of ignorance.

Whispering another incantation, I completed the spell and opened a portal between reality and the Great Ocean. The primordial predator closed in, gnashing its fangs ravenously. It had latched onto our scent and considered us prey. An illusion I had allowed it to see. To the Daemons, we psykers and witches were particularly appetizing meals, our minds ripe for them to gorge on. Perhaps it might attempt to inhabit my body and use me as a host after feasting upon my soul. Or maybe it would just devour my existence entire, both physical and spiritual.

Not that it mattered. It would fail to do either.

As the Daemon reached the portal, Chronos moved. He chanted an esoteric chain of words that sounded nonsensical. Yet each word contained power, saturating the air with a tense, almost electric tang. Hoarfrost began expanding over the usually hellish furnace, freezing over the dull fires that Noveno kept alight in his smithing chamber.

The words that Chronos uttered were part of the Daemon's true name, identified by the grimoire. It was also an entreaty to the Ruinous Powers, a pact that was sealed by the incantation.

Too late the Daemon halted, suddenly aware of the trap. Unfortunately, it had crossed the event horizon, the point of no escape. Chronos continued speaking, growing in confidence with each second, each syllable spoken. Silvery chains froze along the Daemon's shifting, churning form. No matter how it transformed, it was unable to slip out of the arcane restraints that coiled over it. Chronos' voice grew in volume, and the Daemon was dragged through the portal.

I caught a glimpse of thousands of eyes and teeth, melded and splitting from an ever-mutating mass of flesh, before Chronos directed the metaphysical shape into the mechanical shell that Noveno had fashioned. Hoarfrost expanded all over the metallic construct, and there was a thunderous wail that shattered workbenches and tools across the warpsmith's chamber. Without fliching, Chronos spat out the last words that bound the Daemon to a physical body in the material universe, fusing the immaterial essence with metal and ceramite. Plasma reactors blazed with daemonic fury, brought to life by the pulsating energy that was the Daemon's essence.

Amidst the shrapnel of warp-tainted metal and broken ceramite, Noveno worked fast. His mechadendrites moved in a blur, almost like the tentacles that the Daemon occasionally conjured. Setting the warding-chains over the spiky shape of his masterpiece, he ensured that the binding was permanent. Not only that, he prevented the newly forged Daemon Engine from lashing out at us. Already the Daemon was thrashing, pulling against glowing chains, each link inscribed with esoteric runes of a primordial language long dead. The metal glowed red-hot, steaming, and the Daemon within the metallic shell howled in agony.

For a while, it fell back on its haunches. It glared at us through a reptilian facade...three of them, in fact, for this was a Cerberus type Forgefiend. The three ectoplasma cannons that served as its heads glowed, superheated steam billowing from the vents. I could sense its resentment even as I closed the portal. On the other side, the other Daemons chittered and swam away in delight, amused at how one of their mighty brethren had fallen so low.

However, the newly forged Deamon Engine was unable to aim any of its ectoplasma cannons at us. Whenever the Forgefiend attempted to swivel the fanged barrels in our direction, the warding chains ignited, sending shocks throughout the creature's tormented body. With a wail, the Daemonic construct flinched and shrank back, its rage shimmering.

"You will be Infernal Rage," Noveno said, his distorted voice filled with reverence. I felt a pang of disgust over how the warpsmith seemed to worship the Daemon within his creation, but suppressed it. How was I any better when I participated in such a foul ritual?

Certainly, it was done out of necessity, but...that was simply an excuse. It was meaningless to justify my actions. It changed nothing...the fact that I had spilled the blood of innocents in order to create a monster. That I intended to set this monstrosity upon my enemies, knowing full well the massacre it would result in.

I was already damned. There was no turning back. The only way was forward.

"Call me again when you have the next host ready," I instructed Noveno. The warpsmith did a half-bow, though I wasn't sure if he was mocking me.

"I will call upon your services once again, Ignatius."

My lip curled, though it remained unseen under my helm. Noveno was mistaken if he thought me as his lackey, one he could summon at will. However, I had no wish to engage in a conflict with him, not at so critical a juncture. Sighing heavily, I mustered up the last of my magicks to seal the breach in reality that I had created. Once I was satisfied that no Daemon would be tearing its way through the fabric of space and clawing into the material universe, I finally allowed myself to relax. Turning away, I departed the chamber, leaving him to croon to his latest masterpiece.

Chronos lingered on for a few moments. There was a time, I recalled, when he absolutely loathed such things. But now...I could sense an admiration in him as he watched the newly forged Forgefiend. With each Daemon he bound to a construct, the less hatred he held for them. Indeed, he was becoming increasingly fascinated with esoteric lore, seeking out more daemonic grimoires and forbidden knowledge.

It wouldn't be long before he indulged in daemonic pacts of his own.

There might have been a time when I felt regret over watching a once honorable Space Marine sinking into the depths of such depravity, but now I felt nothing. A hollowness filled me, much like the empty shells of my brothers who were now forever condemned by the Rubric to exist as soulless automata.

War was inevitable, and the only thing I could do now was prepare for it.

Horus Heresy Day with Legio Cybernetica!

I had a long Horus Heresy day yesterday, which was just great. It's been a while since I played Horus Heresy, almost a year if I remember correctly. The Janus Campaign last year, actually...so I was delighted when my friends organized another Horus Heresy day. So I joined in and we had quite a field day.

This time, there wasn't a narrative. We just showed up with our 30K armies and had games, which was fine by me. Still pretty fun. This was the first time I was playing my new Legio Cybernetica army...I say new, but it isn't actually brand new. Most of the Cybernetica models were stuff I have slowly collected over the years, as you probably already know. I mean, you recognize my Thanatar, my couple of Castellax, and my Vultarax, along with the Magos and Tech-priests that I already use in regular 40K, right? Only 2 of the Castellax battle-automata were new, but otherwise evrything else had been collected over the years. Oh, and I added Mechanicum Knights - which is why I have 2 Knights Moirax with graviton pulsars and a Cerastus Knight Atrapos. I also added a Knight Errant because...yeah. I needed a regular Knight anyway, so might as well. In any event, my Legio Cybernetica list looked something like this:

Taghmata Mechanicum, Legio Cybernetica

Archmagos Dominus with graviton gun and power sword

Tech-priest Auxilia with cortex controller and 4 servo-automata armed with servo-arms

2 Castellax battle-automata with mauler-bolt cannon

2 Castellax battle-automata with Darkfire cannon

2 Vultarax strato-automata

Thanatar siege-automata

Thanatar siege-automata

Mechanicum Knight Moirax Talon of 2 Armiger Knights with 2 graviton pulsars

Questoris Knight Errant

That's for the 2,500 point list. The 3,000 point list allows me to add a Stormspear rocket pod to my Knight Errant and moves the Knights to an allied Questoris Knight Crusade army...meaning I have a Cerastus Knight Atrapos as my Knight Seneschal (HQ), a Knight Errant as a Scion Marshal and the Knight Moirax Talon as Scion Amuntar, both of which are considered Troops and thus scoring units. Yay.

My boys (bots?) did me proud yesterday. Seriously, praise the Omnissiah! I love my Legio Cybernetica army! They did not let me down at all!

Match 1

The first game I played was against Salamanders, and it was a 2,500 point game. I can't remember what he had...it looked something like this:

Some Character Dreadnought as HQ, the Dragon guy with AV14...

2 Tactical squads (can't remember if they had 20 marines each)

2 squads of Fire Drakes (Salamanders special Terminators)

2 Land Raiders

1 Saber Tank with volkite slaker

1 Skorpius Whirlwind or something with that insane Strength 8 Barrage missile launcher (Sorry, I can't remember the name)

The mission was War of Lies, if I'm not mistaken. I went second, unable to seize the initiative, and he moved his dudes forward, especially the Land Raiders. I think one of my Thanatar ate quite a bit of lascannons, as did my Knight, who went down to 2 wounds or so after taking a few hits. The Vultarax also lost a wound or 2 from the volkite attacks from the Saber tank. I struck back and destroyed his Character Dreadnought with my Vultarax Strato-automata. That was hilarious. Haywire is so broken in this editionn. Not to mention, my Armiger Moirax crippled and immobilized a Land Raider, and the Fire Drakes had to get out and footslog toward my deployment zone. My Castellax and Thanatar slowly wiped out the tactical marines throughout the entire game with plasma stuff and Darkfire cannons, which was insane. Don't you just love plasma wave?

My Vultarax Strato-automata and Knights Moirax continued to wreck the Land Raiders with their grav weapons, and the Vultarax eventually swooped upon the Skorpius and destroyed it. I think it was my Knights Moirax who wrecked the Saber Tank. But not before the Skorpius killed my poor Tech-priest Auxilia with a barrage blast and damaged my Knight again. On the other side of the table, the Fire Drakes went forward and wrecked my Knight Errant...who simply blew up and did several Strength D blows to them, nuking the entire unit. Ouch. On the other side, the second squad of Fire Drakes rammed into my Thanatar and Knight Moirax and tied them up in combat, and I had my Castellax and surviving servo-automatas crash into them. I lost three of the servo-automata eventually, but with Smash granting my battle-automata and siege-automata AP 2 in close combat, I was finally able to destroy the Fire Drakes. Better yet, the Strength 8 of the Thanatar meant Instant Death. Holy Omnissiah.

By the end of the game, I think my opponent had a few tactical marines or so left, but we held like a similar number of objectives? 2 to 2. Unfortunately, I killed way more units than he did, so even though we rolled a 6 and lost 1 victory point (him) and 2 victory points (me), thanks to me killing a lot more, I won the game like 11 to 4 or something. Or was it 10 to 3? That was just...brutal. I didn't expect my Legio Cybernetica to be so...killy.

Match 2

The second game was Tide of Carnage, and it was another 2,500 point game...this time against Iron Warriors. What did he have again? Uh...

Some Special Iron Warrior Character Warsmith

10 Tyrant Siege Terminators

1 Spartan Assault Tank (their dedicated transport)

1 Mortis Contemptor Dreadnought with 2 twin lascannons

Contemptor Dreadnought talon of 2 Dreadnoughts with Kheres assault cannon and fist

2 Tactical squads of 20 (?) marines each

Typhon tank (is that the name?) the one with the Strength 10 AP 1 cannon

We had Hammer and Anvil for deployment, so the mission meant we needed to have scoring units in each sector to get points - 3 in our respective deployment zones, 5 in the no man's land, and 7 in the opponent's deployment zone. That was...yeah.

Once again, I got second turn and failed to seize the initiative. My opponent basically nuked my lines with the Typhon tank...except that he only collapsed the shield construct on 1 Armiger Knight Moirax and did maybe 1 hull point of damage against my Knight Errant. The Tyrant Siege Terminators let fly with their Cyclone missile launchers and did 13 wounds to my Vultarax strato-automata. That hurt like hell...until I made 9 5++ invulnerable saves and only 1 Vultarax died. Whoa! Lucky break there! Holy Omnissiah, that was a lucky break! Some people claimed that the Vultarax got nerfed when Forge World faq-ed them to remove their flare shielding and replace it with atomantic shield, but I think having the 5++ atomantic shield is a lot better than the flare shielding reducing Strength of attacks by 1 (blast and template weapons by 2). So yay!

I proceeded to nuke his Typhon tank with haywire from my surviving Vultarax strato-automata and Knight Moirax talon, glancing the damned thing to death. Try as I might, I was only able to take out 6 Siege Tyrant Terminators, leaving 4 of them (I think?) despite shooting them with both Thanatars and the Castellax with Darkfire cannons. Ouch. I wasn't able to kill many tactical marines with the Castellax's mauler bolt cannon because of the Sergeant's 2+ armor save artificer armor. Yikes.

My opponent then destroyed my Knight Errant with the Spartan assault tank and the remaining Siege Tyrant Terminators. Ouch. I had to scramble to haywire the Spartan to death while my Knights Moirax and Darkfire cannon Castellax eventually destroyed 2 of the Contemptor Dreadnoughts, including the Mortis Dreadnought. Meanwhile the other Contemptor Dreadnought made it to my lines and got into a slugging match with my Castellax battle-automata with the Darkfire cannons, killing one of them. I had to use Smash attack on the damned thing because Strength 6 can't do much against AV13. Yikes.

Fortunately, I was able to whittle down his tactical marines by a lot, throwing pie plates after pie plates of plasma from my Thanatar. The Vultarax helped by firing his havoc launchers and I annihilated one squad. The other squad was also decimated and only a single Sergeant survived along with the Warsmith, who ran away. Oh, and the Contemptor Dreadnought, who was locked in combat with my Castellax. Yikes. But hey, it is what it is. The sergeant remained in the No Man's Land, securing my opponent 5 points...until I ran my Castellax battle-automata with Mauler cannons to deny him the No Man's Land. Heh. That was hilarious.

With the combat ending in a stalemate, the Contemptor still unable to kill the Castellax, who was also unable to take him out even with Smash, they got stuck there. But I still had a Scoring (?) unit or Troops on my deployment zone, which means I had 3 points. Neither of us had the No Man's Land while the Contemptor Dreadought, Sergeant and the Warsmith were the only ones who survived. I had more units than him, so I scored that secondary objective of the player having more units surviving, and we both scored Price of Failure because we both lost our Lords of War. That meant I had 5 points to his 1. It was a good thing I was able to deny him the No Man's Land with my Castellax battle-automata, otherwise I would be screwed. No, seriously. I might have been well on the way to tabling my opponent, but he actually was winning on objectives. He had more scoring units than I did, and had more units spread across the table while I only had 2 scoring units - the Castellax, which meant there was no feasible way for me to get them across the table. Fortunately, I was able to hold my own deployment zone while denying him the No Man's Land. In addition to scoring Attrition - I had 7 units (2 Knights Moirax, the Vultarax, the 2 units of Castellax, and the 2 Thanatars) to his 3, that gave me a slight advantage. That meant I won the second game. Phew.

Match 3

The third game was against a scary White Scars list with quite a bit of bikes. It was 3,000 points this time, and the mission was Shatterstrike. We had the Dawn of War deployment zone. My opponent's Whiite Scar List looked something like this:

Some Khan on bike (his warlord)

Librarian Consul on a jetbike

2 squads of 5 bikers (I think?)

1 Tactical squad of 10 marines

1 tactical support squad of 5 marines with plasma guns

1 Rhino as their Dedicated Transport

10 Cataphractii Terminators

1 Storm Eagle

1 Xiphon Interceptor

2 squadrons of 5 (?) jetbikes) with a bunch of meltaguns

I can't remember if that's all? Yeah, that seems about right.

Anyway, once again I got second turn and failed to seize the initiative. My opponent had almost everything on reserve, so he only had 1 squad of bikers with the Khan, the Rhino with the tactical marines, a second squad of bikes with the Rhino and...that's it on the table on the first turn. In any event, I had my Knight Moirax and Vultarax destroy the Rhino, and then my Knight Errant tried to kill the tactical marines and 5 bikers...without much success. I think I only killed a few of them and maybe 2 bikers with the Thanatar and the thermal cannon, but the other Thanatar, Knight Atrapos and the Castellax battle-automata killed 4 Bikers, leaving only the Khan and the Sergeant. Wait, what about my opponent's first turn? He had nothing in range, so he didn't do much shooter, with only his bikers killing my Tech-priest Auxilia. Yeah...that was about it. Anyway, on to the second turn.

The outflanking plasma support tactical squad dropped in and fired into the back of my Knight Atrapos, taking one wound off him, but the Storm Eagle got in and dropped him to 1 wound with all the lascannons, multimelta and stuff...and I failed a bunch of my invulnerable saves with he rolled a 6 on the vehicle damage table plus a 3 for D3 wounds. Omnissiah...my luck was just horrible. A single squad of jetbikes got in and took out the construct shield of one of my Knights Moirax, while the tactical squad and surviving bikers tried to get out of the building to charge my Knight Errant. They failed.

My Castellax with Darkfire cannons and Thanatar were able to take out the whole squad of jetbikes while I did my best to move my Knights Moirax forward, runnning them toward my opponent's deployment zone. The Storm Eagle was stunned by the arc blasters of the Vultarax strato-automata. Then my Castellax charged and attacked the Khan and biker sergeant, but didn't do much. I did kill like a couple of the tactical squad guys, but my Knight Errant failed to do anything with his thermal cannon, and he even failed his charge against the tactical marines. That was just...horrible. Maybe he killed another biker, leaving just the sergeant in that decimated bike squad, but otherwise he did f all. Sigh. The Knight Atrapos charged the support squad, but before he could fight, he could melta-bombed to death (?). And he failed to do anything with the explosion. I think I rolled a 1. Sigh.

The Storm Eagle hopped out of hover mode and the Terminators jumped out and destroyed my Knight Errant, who rolled a 6 on the catastrophic explosion table...only to scatter away and do f all to the Terminators. Jesus, why was my luck so horrible? The Knight Errant was a liability the whole game. Meanwhile the Khan and biker Sergeant charged and killed a Thanatar in close combat.

The game was falling apart and my army was being annihilated. The Xiphon Interceptor came on and did more damage to my Knight Moirax. For Omnissiah's sake...the only silver lining is that the second squad of jetbikes failed to arrive on reserve.

My Vultarax strato-automata had to fly off the table. I was able to finally kill the Khan and Biker Sergeant with my Castellax battle-automata, while the other Castellax squad killed the plasma squad. Phew. The surviving Thanatar fired and killed a bunch of Terminators, but it wasn't enough. It was far from enough. Ugh. Sigh. To make matters worse, my Knights Moirax tried to shoot the Storm Eagle, but it jinked and didn't get destroyed. For the bloody love of the Omnissiah...

The jetbikes finally arrived and destroyed one Knight Moirax. This was bad. Like, really bad. The Storm Eagle returned to flying, but...at least I didn't lose any more units. The Terminators, surviving tactical marines and a single biker sergeant (the sole survivor of his squad) rushed toward my deployment zone to get points. It was just frustrating...

My Castellax and surviving Thanatar killed all the Terminators with Darkfire cannons, mauler bolt cannons and plasma hellex mortar, then charged in and finished them off. Finally! My Vultarax also flew in and finished off the wounded Storm Eagle. Good riddance. But that changed nothing, for my opponent still had more units on the table. I watched with dread on the 5th turn when the jetbikes took down the construct shields and damaged my last Knight Moirax, and then charged and destroyed him in combat. Ugh. That was just horrible...and so painful to watch. I had lost all my Knights and the only scoring unit that could get across to my opponent's deployment zone. Sigh. It was game over for me, or so it seemed.

With nothing left to play for, I had my Thanatar move and shoot the tactical marines hiding behind the building. Apparently my Castellax couldn't see them because they were behind a wall (I call BS on this, but whatever, not gonna argue with my opponent - besides, I was feeling salty at this point, so it's more my frustration than because I had any valid argument) so I couldn't shoot them. I failed their charge too, to make matters worse. The Vultarax flew back onto the table, and despite shooting the Xiphon Interceptor with 2 hull points with Haywire (they had to drop to hover mode and I was hitting on 6s, apparently), I only took a off...and my opponent jinked and made a save, so I failed to destroy the damned thing. On the other hand, my Thanatar made the charge, and I finally rolled hot, scoring 3 hits and 3 wounds. What? Doesn't he have 2 attacks base? Where did I get 3 attacks from? Well, he gets +1 to his attacks on the charge, right? Isn't that how 30K works? Strength 8 AP 2 (because of Smash) did the job, and I wiped his tactical marines off the face of the table. Unfortunately I could do nothing against the Sergeant biker who was hiding inside a building and surrouded by walls. Apparently he could smash into the ruins with his bike, but I still can't shoot at him because of the wall with no windows blocking line of sight (didn't he smash through the wall to get into the ruins? Where's the logic in that?). In any event, the game was over. Yikes.

So...what was the score? My oppoonent had 2 points because he had a single scoring unit in my deployment zone - the Sergeant biker I failed to kill. As for me, I had a single point from Slay the Warlord because I killed his Khan with my Castellax, and...wait, I scored Attrition. He killed my Knight Atrapos, Knight Errant, 2 Knights Moirax, a Thanatar and my Tech-priest Auxilia. That was it. What the? That really was it - he killed 6 units. On the other hand, I killed his Khan and his biker squad (that counts as 1 unit), a tactical squad, a Rhino, a support tactical squad with plasma guns, 10 Terminators, a single squadron of jetbikes and the Storm Eagle. Yes, I killed 7 units, which meant I scored Attrition. In the end, the match ended as a...draw, 2 points to 2 points. Wait, what about Price of Failure? Well, tough luck...because I brought my Knights as an allied Detachment, they don't count as Lords of War. No, seriously. If you bring a Questoris Knight Crusade army, they count as their own detachment with their own unique Force Organization Chart, not as Lords of War. My Knight Atrapos was a HQ, my Knight Errant was a compulsory Troops choice. My Knights Moirax were non-compulsory Troops. So yeah. No Price of Failure for my opponent. That meant he only had 2 points from the primary objective while I scored both secondary objectives to also get 2 points.

That was...unexpected.

It was certainly an exciting and intense way to wrap up the day, no doubt about that. I couldn't stop laughing at the outcome. Despite how...cheesy the dudes all hiding behind walls was, I somehow scraped out a draw. After losing all of my Knights and a single Thanatar. Holy Omnissiah, despite my bad rolling (especially for my Knight Errant) and horrible luck, I somehow avoided defeat by the skin of my teeth. That really was beyond my expectations. But hey, that was hilarious. Sorry, I just feel so amused by the whole thing...my opponent was so sure he had won the game too! HA HA HA HA HA! The look on his face when he realized that I had somehow forced a draw beyond all else...but that was a great game. The both of us had great fun, and we are good-natured people, so we simply laughed off the result - no hard feelings or whatever. This wasn't a tournament, anyhow, so who cares? What mattered was fun.

And so the day ended, with lots of fun and laughter. I love my Legio Cybernetica army...in fact, I think I like it a lot more than my 40K Skitarii. I would love to see them have 40K rules. They have a lot of flavor, I think...being Monstrous Creatures and all that, plus being so tough and possessing immense firepower. All that AP2 plasma weaponry being chucked around and forcing Terminators to take invulnerable saves...yeah! Oh, and the amount of Haywire I had in my list was just...absurd. I did not expect my Vultarax and Knights Moirax to go around wrecking as many vehicles as they did yesterday. It was insane. Maybe I should tone down on them...then again, if I didn't, I would get wrecked by the Salamanders with their Land Raiders and the Iron Warriors' Typhon and Spartan Assault tank, with all that armored ceramite (actually, the Iron Warriors didn't have the points for armored ceramite, so that wasn't so bad).

I look forward to playing Horus Heresy again in the near future! I don't know if they will have some Heresy 2.0 or if they will ever release that rumored plastic boxset with MK VI power armor and a Spartan Assault tank, but we will continue playing Horus Heresy nonetheless. For the Omnissiah! I can't wait to field my Legio Cybernetica again! YAY!