Training Exercise

"We would like a training exercise with you," Urielt Nosferato, the Chapter Master of the Encarmine Angels, said. He placed a hand across the aquila etched across his chest armor in a salute, bowing his head slightly in respect. "We just got whipped by the Thousand Sons, so we need to...uh, reassess our tactics and see what works."

"Certainly!" Ogami replied enthusiatically. "Let's get started!"

He clambered into Okami and started the Knight Preceptor immediately. While the Encarmine Angels went into position, with a tactical squad and a Relic Contemptor Dreadnought scrambling into the Stormraven, along with Nosferato and a librarian who was totally not named Mephiston. The other two tactical squads scrambled elsewhere, searching for archeotech and aiming to fulfil their agendas. Meanwhile, the Terminator squads deployed, the Assault Terminator squad staying in Telepotarium and the Relic Tartaros Terminators marching inexorably across the battlefield.

That turned out to be a mistake.

Whoops, best not to get too ahead of ourselves, shall we? Tanaka cleared his throat and opened his vox.

"Um, lords of the Encarmine Angels Chapter, please go first. We'll allow you to take the first turn."

"Sure. Thank you very much. That's very much appreciated, Sir Tanaka." Nosferato didn't hesitate. He had the Stormraven zoom forward and open fire on Kanda's Armiger Moirax, and despite the latter's best attempts to rotate his ion shields, the Knight armor took severe damage from plasma, melta and hurricane bolter shots. The plasma washed over the ion shields and the missiles detonated harmlessly against the shimmering barrier, but the melta burned a hole through the Armiger Moirax and sent it reeling. Kanda swore when the bolts from the hurricane bolters detonated within damaged circuits, further knocking the Armiger Moirax over.

But he survived somehow.

"Time to counterattack," Tanaka muttered, noting the multiple targeting reticules that danced all over the visual auspex in his Throne Mechanicum. Squeezing the trigger, he blasted the Stormraven apart with his siegebreaker cannons and volcano lance, turning the bird into molten slag. The tactical squad, Nosferato and Not Mesphiston grav-chuted out, but two of the tactical marines were vaporized by the explosion, unable to escape in time. Fortunately, the Relic Contemptor Dreadnought bailed out without difficulty, allowing his grav-chute to slow his descent.

Tanaka left them be and instead targeted the slow moving Tartaros Terminators with his souped up plasma decimator. Nicknamed Cawl's Wrath, the enhanced plasma decimator wiped out the entire Tartaros Terminator squad in a single volley.

"...that was unexpected," he muttered, his eyes wide.

Chiba fired with the grav pulsars mounted upon his Armiger Moirax and finished off the tactical squad. Meanwhile, Suzuki maneuvered his Armiger Warglaive, Hebi, toward the idol and sanctified it, just like the Encarmine Angels tactical squad opposite the battlefield.

As long as they continued doing that, they should be able to score some points for the exercise.

"Charge!" Ogami shouted as he charged his Knight Preceptor toward the Contemptor Dreadnought. The las-impulsor fired, glancing through the atomantic shielding of the venerable, but the war machine endured stoically. Unfortunately, Okami didn't make the charge and stopped just short of the Contemptor Dreadnought, who then counterattacked ferociously with his fists.

Tanaka tried to move forward to help, but he found his position under threat when five Asssault Terminators teleported almost on top of him and charged Kazan. Their thunder hammers smashed apart joints and pistons, causing his mount to sway.

"Ugh!"

While fighting Okami, the Contemptor Dreadnought was able to fire at Kanda's Armiger Moirax, further damaging it. Urielt Nosferato joined in, smashing his relic thunder hammer against Okami and sent the Knight Preceptor reeling.

Despite being on his last legs, Ogami swung back with his reaper chainsword defiantly, cleaving the Contemptor Dreadnought in two.

"Yes!" He cheered. He then turned and blasted Nosferato apart with his las-impulsor, wiping the Chapter Master from existence. Well, given that this was a training exercise, Nosferato survived, but he was still severely injured. Given time, he would recover, so the Daimyo was not too worried about that.

Rather, Tanaka was more worried about his Knight. He triggered the twin meltaguns and fired at the Assault Terminators, but wasn't able to kill them. They survived the onslaught, weathering even the wrath of plasma decimator because of their storm shields. By the time he finished firing, only one Assault Terminator was left, and he was very, very angry.

On the other side, Kanda fired and slew Not Mephiston with his grav pulsars. Chiba followed his example and took out about four or so tactical marines with his grav pulsars, but the sergeant ducked into cover, even as he continued to sanctify the idol to score more points. Suzuki mirrored his tactic, choosing to sanctify the idol instead of shooting with his thermal spear.

The angry Assault Terminator hammered Kazan, almost sending the titanic machine to its knees. Tanaka gritted his teeth and tried to stomp back, but he wasn't able to kick the Assault Terminator away. Fortunately, he was able to finish the guy off with his twin meltaguns.

The surviving tactical squads decided to hide out of sight and away from the big guns of the Knights.

"You know what?" Tanaka sighed. "Let's call it a day. There's no need to wipe you out."

"Thanks," the sergeant of the Encarmine Angels said in relief. "We owe you."

"No problem." Tanaka was just pleased that the training exercise ended without any bad blood. On the other side, Ogami was celebrating even as his Knight Preceptor advanced toward one of the objectives.

"I survived! This is the first time I actually survived a battle! WOOHOO! Good job, Okami!"

"Yeah, that's a good reason to celebrate," Suzuki agreed with a sigh of relief. "Hebi survived this time too."

"Well, it's a nice little training exercise," Tanaka replied. "Let's hope we have more of this in the future."

Freeblades and Dreadblades

Have a single big Knight that you always wanted to bring with your army, but you don't because you're afraid he'll break the mono-faction bonus (like Combat Doctrines or Cabalistic Rituals or Martial Ka'tah)? Well, fear no more! Warhammer Community has confirmed that Freeblades and Dreadblades now count as Agents of the Imperium/Agents of Chaos, so you can take them without breaking your mono-faction bonus!

Why did they mention Adeptus Mechanicus's Canticles of the Omnissiah as an example when we already have Knight of the Cog? Uh, I suppose it's to alllow Adeptus Mechanicus to take an Imperialis Knight without breaking Canticles or Imperative Doctrina instead of being forced to a Mechanicus Knight? I honestly don't know. But why would you do that when you lose the Mechanicus keyword and therefore the refund of 2 Command Points when taking a super-heavy auxiliary detachment as opposed to spending just 1 Command Point on a single Mechanicus Knight? Hmm?

Oh, another interesting bit. Apparently Armigers are Objective Secured in an all-Knights Detachment. What the f does that even mean? Aren't...all detachments locked to a single faction? It's not like you can take Knights and other faction's units (Lords of War) in the same detachment - firstly, they need to share a keyword that's not Imperium or Chaos, secondly, I don't think there's many Lords of War you can take unless you're somehow souping Knights and Baneblades in the same detachment.

On the other hand, if you decide to take a Freeblade/Dreadblade unit of 3 Armigers/War Dogs, you can! Not only will you have essentially 3 small Knights running around with your armies without breaking mono-faction bonuses, they get Objective Secured too. So you don't need a pure Knight army to get Objective Secured Armigers anymore. Yay.

The Grey Knights come to Purge

"Um, anyone recognize those Space Marines in silver armor?" Tanaka asked nervously as he monitored their advance. The Grey Knights from the Brotherhood of Rapier were marching in lockstep, pointing their weapons at the Knight Lance of House Yato.

"No," Suzuki admitted, staring at his auspexes while ensconced in the Helm Mechanicum of Hebi. "Sir Ogami, you know them?"

"They must be enemies!" Ogami shouted as he urged Okami forward in large strides. "KILL THEM ALL!"

"Uh, shouldn't we at least confirm their identities first...?" Tanaka began, but it was too late. Okami was already under fire from the Grand Master in Dreadknight armor. A Venerable Dreadnought lumbered forward and took a potshot with his BS 2+ twin lascannons rerolling and one of the ruby beams lanced past Okami's ion shield, causing him to stagger. Under the sheer weight of fire from the Purgation squad hiding in a building like the cowardly heretic Space Marines they were (or so Ogami believed), Okami stumbled, its chassis smoking from the ensorcelled shots.

"Looks like we should shoot first and ask questions later," Kanda said, moving his Armiger Moirax into position. Chiba came up along his flank, covering his charge, but the two retainers/bondsmen were unable to get to Ogami in time.

The Grand Master in Dreadknight armor charged and cleaved the fumbling Okami, toppling the venerable machine over before Ogami could even fire a single shot.

"Ugh! Not again!" Ogami swore and slammed his fists against the console of his Throne Mechanicum. "Why do I always get blown up in the first round?!"

"Unlucky, I guess," Kanda suggested, only for his Armiger Moirax to find itself in trouble when the Grand Master in Dreadknight armor eagerly consolidated into him. He smacked the Dreadknight with his grav pulsars half-heartedly, not expecting to do anything...but for some reason the Grand Master stumbled and there was a loud shriek as the adamantium armor tore under the weight. Kanda's eyes bulged. "Whoa, I did not expect that to happen."

He then fell back, hurrying over to one of the Mechanicus idols that they were supposed to be protecting. A Strike squad was approaching there, so he had best do something...or so he hoped. Meanwhile, Suzuki urged Hebi forward to take out an Interceptor squad, his meltagun and thermal spear glowing before unleashing molten beams of fury that disintegrated several of the unfortunate Grey Knights.

"Tanaka!" Chiba yelled, even as he squeezed the trigger and pulverized five Strike squad Grey Knights with his graviton pulsars. "I'm leaving this weird walker thing to you!"

"I think it's called a Dreadknight, even though I'm not supposed to know what it's called because Grey Knights are supposed to be some top secret Chapter."

"Who the frak cares!? Just shoot the damned thing!"

"Sure...but you're an Armiger pilot...you shouldn't be ordering me around. Plus I have seniority." Tanaka rolled his eyes, but he complied, firing the volcano lance, siegebreaker cannons and shieldbreaker missile into the Grand Master in Dreadknight armor, who was triumphantly pursuing Kanda's Armiger Moirax. Having gained confidence after slaying a Questoris Knight, he was determined to add another engine kill to his tally...plus, he couldn't leave the Paladins exposed. They were trying to reach the Mechanicus idol in the center, but if he teleported away, he knew that all of Kazan's big and scary guns would go into them instead.

So he decided to tank the shots.

That was the worst mistake he made. The Dreadknight armor first crumpled under the explosion from the shieldbreaker missile, and then the volcano lance vaporized him. On the other side of the battlefield, the plasma decimator - nicknamed Cawl's Wrath because the Archmagos Belisarius Cawl was that sort of proud tech-priest - disintegrated the remaining Interceptors.

The Paladins continued their slow but inexorable advance, covering the Strike squad behind them. The Grey Knights proceeded to burn the Mechanicus idol while the Paladins attempted to hammer Kazan with mind sorcery. Tanaka gritted his teeth and prayed to the Emperor, and His Benediction allowed Kazan to ride out the mortal wounds that would otherwise damage his steed.

On the other side, the remaining Dreadknight continued to advance forward, bludgeoning Kanda's Armiger Moirax with psi-rounds. A Strike squad teleported into the fray, fresh from the teleportarium or whatever Strike Cruiser they came down from, and charged while simultaneously firing their storm bolters. Kanda's Armiger Moirax shuddered from the impacts, but his ion shield and armor held for the most part. The Venerable Dreadnought fired once more, the lascannons hammering into Chiba's Armiger Moirax and almost sending him toppling. Meanwhile the Purgation squad pummeled Hebi with their heavy psy weapons, causing Suzuki to reel.

"Stop that!" Suzuki whined.

"Well, they can't, otherwise we'll kill them," Tanaka pointed out. His volcano lance erupted and the Venerable Dreadnought vanished in a fireball.

"Yikes!" Kanda shouted as the Strike squad rammed into his Armiger Moirax. He fired instinctively and one of them fell, his armor crumpling and crushing the Grey Knight within, but the rest hammered him with their falchions. Fortunately, for some reason, they didn't do as much damage as he thought they would. "Huh, I expected them to destroy my Armiger."

"Thank the Emperor they didn't, I guess," Chiba said as he fired at the Strike squad Kanda retreated from. Three of them were crushed by the immense gravity waves from the Armiger Moirax's pair of grav pulsars, but otherwise he was unable to finish him off.

"Yeah," Tanaka agreed, breaking the Dreadknight with his siegebreaker cannons. The Dreadknight survived the bombardment, listing from the devastating damage, but the Techmarine rushed forward to repair him. Not only that, when he turned around and smote Kanda's mortally wounded Armiger, his divine psychic powers were able to restore more components for the Dreadknight. Tanaka decided to leave the dude for now and focus on the Paladins who were running right up to his face.

First, he unleashed his meltaguns on them, but they tanked the shots surprisingly well, their armor of contempt and armor of resilience combining to make them incredibly infuriating to kill. Worse, they somehow had Transhuman Physiology popped off, making them even harder to kill. Fortunately, his plasma decimator tore through them, along with a shieldbreaker missile that did 3 damage (which he had to spend a Command Point to reroll when he rolled a 2). Fortunately, the Paladins used up their luck with the 2 twin meltaguns and 3 of them were vaporized by Cawl's Wrath. Phew.

Suzuki didn't have much luck, unfortunately. Despite firing his meltagun and thermal spear at them, they tanked the molten beams like bosses. Frustrated, Suzuki charged Hebi into them and slashed with his reaper-chain cleaver. Once again, Armor of Contempt combined with Armor of Resilience allowed the last Paladin to survive the blows, and he tore a hole in Hebi.

"Ow!" Suzuki complained, righting Hebi and trying to pull back.

To everyone's surprise, the last remaining Paladin decided to bail. Either his nerve failed him or his sense of preservation overrode his sense of duty, but the Paladin turned and fled the battlefield, much to Suzuki and Tanaka's astonishment.

"...what was that about?" Tanaka asked, bewildered.

"Beats me." Suzuki shrugged.

On the other end, the Dreadknight rushed Kanda's Armiger Moirax and wrecked him in combat. Kanda cursed and ejected, but even as his Throne Mechanicum surged free, his Armiger exploded and engulfed the Dreadknight and sole surviving member of the strike squad. So ferocious was the explosion that the Dreadknight fell back, slightly charred and the Grey Knight infantry was boiled alive in his armor, his corpse falling over before he could complete the burning of the Mechanicus idol that he had started.

"Aha!" Kanda whooped even as he parachuted down from the heavens. He punched the air. "Take that, you traitorous scum!"

Obviously the Grey Knights were not traitors, but they were assigned to purge the Knights of House Yato because...uh, they saw things that they weren't supposed to see. The Daemons from the warp that were summoned by the Thousand Sons in that last ritual, to be specific. Apparently, the Inquisition had thought it too dangerous for the survivors to remain after having been exposed to such dangerous energies and corruptive entities.

But none of the Knights of House Yato knew that. So...yeah.

"Argh!" Suzuki shrieked when the Purgation squad smote his Hebi with psychic powers. Despite a valiant effort to remain alive, the Armiger Warglaive toppled over. Suzuki smashed his fist into a console, cursing angrily. "Not again!"

"At least you survived longer than Sir Ogami," Tanaka remarked.

"That's not much of a comfort, considering Hebi is wrecked again! How come you get the Dominus Knight!?"

"Because I'm the main character. I hope Kazan survives this time too."

Unfortunately, Tanaka found himself under fire by the Purgation squad and last remaining Strike squad. The psi-rounds smashed into him. The Strike squad then charged and hammered him with their Nemesis weapons, scything through the adamantium armor of Kazan and almost taking the massive Knight down.

"Yikes!"

Tanaka tried to stomp them...and failed. With Kazan heavily damaged, he was unable to hit any of the agilely ducking Strike squad Knights. Uh oh.

He then backed off and fired into them again. This time, he managed to take out 3 of the Strike squads with meltaguns, while his plasma decimator annihilated four Purgation squad members. The siegebreaker cannons boomed and the Dreadknight on the other side of the battlefield vanished in a brilliant conflagration. Chiba aimed his grav pulsars at the Techmarine, but missed.

"Whoops...I tried."

"Try harder!" Tanaka snapped, charging the surviving Grey Knights. Fortunately, thanks to Machine Spirit Resurgent, he was able to land a few stomps this time...and the two Strike Squad dudes were pasted into bloody pancakes. The sole survivor of the Purgation squad took one look at the battlefield and decided to nope out of there, realizing that he was going to get killed if he continued to stick around.

That left the hero Techmarine, who bravely advanced and bathed the damaged Armiger Moirax with a flamer.

"Oh no!" Chiba cried as his Armiger Moirax went down, its armor buckling under the psychic prowess from the Techmarine. The Techmarine stood atop the smaller Knight, raising his axe in triumph.

Then he vanished when Kazan's volcano lance erupted and erased him from existence.

"Well...at least Kazan survived and we successfully protected the Mechanicus shrine," Tanaka remarked, looking around in dismay. "Huh, seems like I'm the sole survivor...again."

New Knight Rules

Warhammer Community has just released a new article on Imperial Knights, just hours after I posted that Knight Leaks video from Chapter Master Valrak (just scroll below or something). Damn.

Well, if you've read my previous post, then you probably already know about the Command Phase buffs. You know, the one where Questoris Knights can choose a single Armiger model and buff him during the Command Phase? Now we have an official name for it. It's called Bondsman Abilities.

Even better - what was not mentioned in Valrak's leaks video was the -1 Damage Reduction. So your Armigers not only get buffed, they get -1 Damage! Holy Terra, that's amazing! Well...it's okay, I guess, but still a lot better than before. I did say that we need better durability, and this is it! YES!

Also, like I posted in my previous post, Knight Crusader buffs an Armiger's BS by 1.

Also, if you promote your Knights to Exalted Court status (I'm guessing this is gonna cost points), they gain the ability to use their Bondsman ability twice.

High Monarch looks cool.

Gatekeeper also looks cool. Did I say we need more durability? Yes? Now imagine your Objective Secured Armigers being Toughness 9 on an objective. Hell, yeah! Now we're talking!

This is looking promising. Can't wait to see what else the Knight codex has in store for us, but Toughness 8 Armigers with -1 damage reduction? That's pretty sweet! WOOHOO!

Valrak might be making a new video soon...I hope.

Valrak's Imperial Knight "Leaks"

Chapter Master Valrak released a video on Imperial Knight "leaks" today. Some of them make no sense, but I think it's worth a shot because...well, I play Imperial Knights, and I'm going to talk about whatever rumors or leaks I can find, unless I know for real they are fake (like those supposedly leaked datasheets).

Anyway, here's a brief rundown on what we can expect to get.

Out for preorder in first half of May (Valrak claims they go on preorder on May 1st and are released on May 7th, but that makes no sense because Necromunda Ash Wastes was already announced, so I suspect it's more of a preorder announcement on May 1st, up for preorder on May 7th and release on May 14th).

Ion Shields are still 5++ against range only.

Mechanicus Knights regain 1 wound per turn.

Imperialis Knights get +1" to Pile In and Consolidate.

Heavy Stubbers - Mechanicus Knights still AP0, but Imperialis get AP -1 (Ironhail).

Armiger Helverins: Now D3 shots per cannon (really? Nerfed from 2D3 each?), AP -2

Armiger Warglaives: thermal spears now Heavy 2, Strength 9, D6 + 2 damage when half its maximum range or less.

Dominus Knights now have 2+ armor save, but same number of wounds (28).

Knight Castellan: Volcano Lance Heavy D3 Strength 16, AP -5, D6 + 8 damage. Blast.

Knight Valiant: 18" flamer and Thundercoil Harpoon, flamer still does Strength 7 AP -2 Damage 2, Thundercoil Harpoon gets +1 to hit against Monsters and Vehicles, Strength 16, AP -6, Damage 10 plus 3 mortal wounds.

Questoris Knights can now buff a single Armiger within 12" during the Command Phase.

- Knight Gallant: +1 WS

- Knight Crusader: +1 BS

- Knight Warden: Count as 10 models for objectives

- Knight Errant: +1 to advance and charge

- Knight Paladin: Reroll a hit roll or wound roll of 1 until next command phase.

Honestly, while I like the buffed thermal spears and Command Phase stuff, I'm a little disappointed by the volcano lance being nerfed to D3 shots. I guess it is what it is. I personally think the weapons are fine, and what Knights need are more durability. Oh, well. I'll wait to see what else the new codex brings. Till then!

Renegade Spring Up GT

The second day of the Renegade Spring up GT was just as fun as the first. As I said yesterday, the fourth mission was Tear Down their Idols, and so...yeah. My opponent this time was Dark Angels. He had 3 Relic Contemptor Dreadnoughts with volkite culverins, a Talonmaster, Azrael, 5 Bladeguard Veterans, an Apocethary, 6 Eradicators divided into 2 squad, several squads of Infiltrators, a squad of Assault Intercessors, and more. I can't remember what else he had.

Um, it was quite the brutal game. I think he managed to drop my Knight Preceptor to 8 wounds in a single round of shooting just from the Volkite Contemptor Dreadnoughts alone. Despite doing my best, I was only able to destroy one Contemptor Dreadnought and reduce the other 2 to 4 wounds each. Yikes. My Knight Preceptor, despite his best efforts, only killed 1 or 2 Infiltrators.

The Dark Angels then proceeded to kill 3 Knights in the second turn with the 6 Eradicators. With most of them hiding out of view, I couldn't do much, despite shooting whatever I could. I eventually killed 1 squad of Infiltrators, but was unable to finish off the Eradicators because they had a 4++ invulnerable save from Azrael. The Eradicators took out more of my Knights, including my Knight Castellan, who failed all of his invulnerable saves and took tons of damage from both the volkite Contemptor Dreadnoughts and Eradicators. Eventually, I was left with 2 Armiger Knights, and despite finishing off the Eradicators and holding the center objective for most of the game, I lost. The score was 86-77 in my opponent's favor, with me scoring only a single point for Bring It Down. If only we had better secondary objectives for Knights. Oh, well. Still, the only reason why I scored so many points (77!) was because I attained a lot of primary objective points. I think I almost maxed it out, with 44. Unfortunately, I was unable to capitalize on it, and scoring only 1 point for Bring It Down was one of the major reasons why I lost. Assassinate would have been worse - I didn't kill any Characters, so I would have gotten 0 for that. Maybe I should have taken Grind Them Down. Would have scored 3 from killing the Contemptor Dreadnought in the first turn alone. Oh, well. It is what it is. In contrast, my opponent maxed out on To The Last, with the Talonmaster, Azreal and the Bladeguard Veterans surviving. Yikes.

The second game was Data Scry-Salgave. This time my opponent was T'au! Unlike most T'au players, he chose the T'au sept that gives a re-roll for shooting or wounding (just one), and Kauyon instead of Montka. Cool! He also had a Stormsurge, which made me really excited. I always wanted to play Knights versus Stormsurge, so yeah! Um, his list had Commander Shadowsun, a Coldstar Commander, Darkstrider, an Ethereal, 3 squads of 10 Breachers, 10 Pathfinders, 2 Devilfishes, 9 Crisis Suits (3 squads of 3), 6 Stealth Suits (2 squads of 3) and the Stormsurge. Nice.

For the first time ever in this tournament, I got first turn. Not that it did much for me because my opponent simply hid his Stormsurge in reserves and hid all of his infantry behind cover. Yikes. So I literally only killed a single Devilfish and 10 Pathfinders in the first turn, and that was it. The Crisis Suits ran up and nuked my Knight Preceptor into oblivion. Ouch. At least he didn't blow up next to my Armigers. Fortunately, I was able to lead on Primary objectives once again, with my Armigers just grabbing whatever objectives they could. My opponent attempted to deny me my objectives by piling his Breachers into the objectives, but I simply killed them with my Armiger Warglaives and my Armiger Knight Moirax. With nothing to shoot at, my Knight Castellan did Data Intercept (yeah, it was hilarious).

The Stormsurge arrived and...didn't do much, I think he did like 6 or so damage to my Knight Castellan despite firing everything at him? Honestly, it was also because I used Rotate Ion Shields and made awesome invulnerable saves. One of my three Armiger Moiraxes wasn't as lucky and died to Crisis Suit fire. Ouch. I wasn't able to kill the Stormsurge, though, and despite my Knight Castellan using Order of Companions to re-roll all ones, I only reduced him to 3 wounds. I did kill 2 Stealth Suits, the Devilfish, and maybe 1 or 2 Crisis Suits (more like killed one and wounded the other, only for him to die from a mortal wound when he supercharged his cyclin ion blaster and rolled a 1 twice). I wasn't able to do much...well, I did have my Armiger Warglaive advance, fire, and used Full Tilt to charge the Breachers and steal the objective right from them. On the other side, I lost my remaining Armiger Moiraxes to Crisis Suit fire, and the Stormsurge finally reduced my Knight Castellan to 2 wounds. On the other side, my Armiger Warglaive survived fire and charges from 3 Crisis Battlesuits and Stealth Suits, and he cut down one or two Stealth Suits. I think. Phew.

Finally I killed the Stormsurge with my Knight Castellan, as well as the Stealth suit (by charging him), while my Armiger Warglaive continued to hack away and kill another Stealth Suit in combat. Another Armiger Warglaive came up the board, charged and killed the remaining Breachers (though melta helped a lot too). Unfortunately, my Knight Castellan - despite suffering a lot of fire from 4 Crisis Suits, survived...only to finally die to Shadowsun's fire. He didn't blow up, sadly enough. Would be great if he did, but oh well. The Crisis Suits killed 1 Armiger Warglaive. The other one charged and killed the last remaining Stealth Suit while my last Armiger Warglaive went in and charged the 3 Crisis Suits. I wasn't able to do anything, unfortunately, and my opponent proceeded to kill the Armiger Warglaive in his deployment zone, but my last Armiger Warglaive survived, taking like 6 or so wounds from plasma rifles. Yes! I didn't get tabled!

It was brutal, and I was almost tabled, with only a single Armiger Warglaive remianing at the end of the game, while my opponent still had all of his Characters and 7 Crisis Suits. And the Shield Drones, because I realized it would be impossible for my Knights to kill the damned Crisis Suits, so I gave up on shooting them or the Coldstar Commander. Sigh.

Fortunately, thanks to me holding objectives and playing to the mission, I scored 39 for primary while denying him (I think he had 17 for primary). The final score was 74 to 60, with me somehow pulling a win out of the bag despite losing almost my entire army (a single Armiger Warglaive being the only survivor) and almost getting tabled. Whoa. That was unexpected. I had expected the Tau to win because of how many models he had left on the table and how he almost tabled me, but...wow. Good going, Knights.

Somehow, my Knights - in this tournament, at least - end up being unable to kill anything, but score big on primary objectives. The Objective Secured Armigers and their count as 5 models (10 for Titanic) are really important. Without those, I would have lost all my games. Thank you, Games Workshop, for giving us back Objective Secured and count as 5/10 models in the Balance Dataslate before the new codex came out. Otherwise I would have been screwed. Ugh.

In any event, I finished the tournament with 2 losses, 2 wins and a tie. Not bad, if you ask me. That gave me 20th place out of 39 with 382 battle points. Phew! I enjoyed myself tremendously, and many thanks to the Renegade people for organizing this! It was fun as hell, and there were a few unexpected results, but all in all, it was an amazing experience. Looking forward to another tournament in the near future, though I doubt I'll be participating in the summer GT. I'll be returning to Singapore for the summer to visit my folks, so yeah. No summer tournaments for me, no Waaaghfest. That's fine. I really need to visit my parents and brother after 3 years stuck in the US because of covid. It's time to return!

Hopefully the Renegade GT in November will be just as fun! I can't wait! Oh, and Horus Heresy too!

Renegade Spring Up GT

I'm exhausted, so I'm going to keep the battle report brief today. Basically I participated in the Renegade Wargaming Spring Up Grand Tournament for Warhammer 40,000 today. I'll be going to bed early because I need to go for the last 2 rounds tomorrow, so yeah, best to keep this short. Not like I can remember much anyway.

As you all know, I play Imperial Knights. There was a scare when Games Workshop released the balance dataslate 2 weeks ago, which removed the Objective Secured for Armigers and the "count as 5 models, 10 for Titanic" rules. Apparently, we're getting them in the codex, so Games Workshop or whoever thought they could just take out those rules, never mind that it'll screw Knights over during the 1 or 2 months before their codex arrived, even though we have tournaments like the Renegade Open Spring Up GT and stuff. I changed my list and added Thousand Sons (so Rubric Marines and Scarab Occult Terminators) to "Chaos" Knights because I needed infantry with Objective Secured to grab objectives. Thankfully, Games Workshop had a change of heart and gave Knights back their "count as 5/10 if Titanic models" and Armigers' objective Secured back last Wednesday, and the Tournament organizer, Ben Cherwien, was kind enough to allow me to change my list back to pure Knights even though the cutoff submission date for lists was Monday. Thank you, Ben.

After getting advice from the Imperial Knight discord group (which I left after having some disagreement regarding the Tyranid codex - basically everyone was whining about how overpowered the Tyranid codex was, and they attacked me and talked down to me in a very condescending manner when I suggested that we wait for the meta to settle and players to actually play games first before coming to a conclusion), I went with House Raven. I used the same old Imperial Knight list that you guys are probably familiar with by now. You know, my Knight Castellan with Cawl's Wrath and Cold Eradication, Knight Preceptor with stormspear rocket pod and Ion Bulwark, 3 Armiger Knights Moirax - 2 with grav pulsars and 1 with lightning locks, and 3 Armiger Warglaives with meltaguns.

The first mission was Conversion and my opponent played Harlequins. He had 6 Voidweavers, went first, and...yeah. Needless to say, I was utterly destroyed. Funnily enough, my Knight Preceptor tanked 6 Voidweavers' fire like a boss, surviving the first turn with just a single wound remaining. Unfortunately, I failed to capitalize on that. The Harlequins' -1 to hit, no re-rolls allowed and army-wide 4++ invulnerable saves were just atrocious to play against - unable to pop off Order of Companions (which was the whole reason why I used House Raven in the first place), I was unable to do much except watch my Knights get deleted by a mixture of fusion pistols, sheer weight from shuriken cannons and the prismatic cannons. I was only able to destroy 4 Voidweavers and a couple more Starweavers, and a bunch of Troupes (eventually). At least I killed the Warlord and Characters, but I took Bring it Down, which on hindsight was not a good idea. In any event, my Knight Castellan survived, and I denied him To The Last once, so he scored 95 points to my 53. Well, considering that I didn't get tabled and my Knight Castellan survived, I'd call that a win in my book. Heh.

Random Taunar. I so wanted to play against Tau and see how my Knights would fare against the Taunar Supremancy Suit, but...oh, well. It is what it is.

The second mission was Tide of Conviction, and I ended up playing against Salamanders this time. This time, my opponent wasn't able to maximize his use of melta, or I somehow made all my invulnerable saves. It was a brutal back and forth game, with me losing my Knight Preceptor and all of my Knight Armiger Moiraxes. Funnily enough, my Armiger Warglaives all survived this game and helped me secure the objectives. I had the 3 of them run around to grab objectives. Instead, my Knight Castellan bore the brunt of the Captain on bike and Primaris Chaplain on bike, being reduced to 5 or 6 wounds (I can't remember, but fortunately I had Machine Spirit Resurgent). This time, I used Order of Companions 2 or 3 times and wiped out most of the Salamanders, killing 9 Vanguard Veterans (though the Armiger Warglaives helped with that), annihilating the Terminators and quite a few Bladeguard Veterans, the Eradicators (again, the Warglaives helped with that), and a bunch of other infantry that included 4 Aggressors. My Castellan eventually killed both the Chaplain and Captain on bikes after being smashed about, but I succeded in tabling my opponent on turn 5. My poor Knight Castellan was practically on his last legs, but the Armiger Warglaives did a lot of work, killing the last of the Eradicators, an attack bike, company Veterans and Assault Intercessors. Wow. I didn't think that would go that well.

I eventually won the game 94-66. Phew. That was a hard fought battle. Don't let the tabling fool you, the match was closer than the score or the last turn made it seem. A lot of it came down to me denying my opponent objectives while making use of Objective Secured Armigers to secure objectives. If Games Workshop hadn't given us back our Objective Secured Armigers and counts as 10 models Titanic Knights in the updated balance dataslate last Wednesday, I would have lost that game. Badly, I might add. That rule is a lifesaver. It changes everything. Don't underestimate Objective Secured Armigers and Titanic Knights counting as 10 models.

The third and last mission for the day was Secure Missing Artifacts. This time, my opponent was Space Wolves. He used the Whirlwind of Rage and Master Artisans successor Chapter Tactics, and it was quite brutal. In the first turn (in all three games, I went second, which suited me fine - I prefer to be the defender and go second, let my opponent come to me), his Longfangs and 2 Dreadnoughts with their Helfrost cannons killed my Knight Preceptor. Ouch. This time I failed all my invulnerable saves, and he was melted to slag by multimeltas.

From there I knew it was going to be an uphill task, and I did my best to grab objectives, with my Armiger Warglaives killing the Eliminators. I used Order of Companions three times - and I'm telling you, that Stratagem is absolutely amazing. Without it, I would have lost the two games (not including the Harlequin one). The Venerable Dreadnoughts survived volcano lances with their 6+++ Feel No Pain (ugh), and his Wulfen, Chaplain with jetpack and Assault Interecessors proceeded to wipe out my Armiger Warglaives. Oh, and the Longfangs too, though I killed one squad of Longfangs with my Knight Castellan. The game was pretty back and forth, with me losing all my Knights except the Castellan and a single Armiger Moirax by the end of the game. Funnily enough, my Knight Castellan survived a charge from Terminators with lightning claws and proceeded to both stomp and shoot them to death afterward. Despite losing so many models, I was surprised that I was able to all but table my opponent, with his Phobos Librarian being the sole survivor by the end of the game, hiding from my Knight Castellan (and surviving through Transhuman Physiology Stratagem). Eventually, I pulled back on primary objectives and a couple of secondaries (except Assassinate), with No Prisoners and Yield No Ground yielding lots of points. My Armiger Moirax also killed a bunch of Intercessors and the Cyber Wolves by themselves.

Unexpectedly, the game ended in a tie! Both my opponent and I scored 84 points each. That was hilarous and awesome. We both had a good laugh out of it. Honestly, ties are the best because nobody loses. What matters most is having fun!

Tomorrow, we'll be having Tear Down their Icons and Data Scry-Salvage. I don't know how I'll fare tomorrow, but I do know I'm exhausted as f. So I'll just sign off right now and continue writing more after the tournament ends tomorrow. Till then!