40K Little League Week 1
WHY HELLO chaps, and welcome to our first instalment of our little league coverage! Its like Match of the Day but with more swearing and more awesomeness. And not on the telly, on this lame blog. And 40k, not football.
On that hallowed day, Thursday 12th July 2012, the first raging battles were fought. Tears were shed, lives were lost, and lots and lots of frigging dice were rolled, and subsequently lost, as keen as they are to dive under things and never return, the little bastards. It was awesome. Many thanks to Leo for allowing us to come down to his gaming club to play, very much appreciated, and it would never have happened without his benevolence. To the greater good!
The battles were as follows -
Neil (Grey Knights) vs. Leo (Tau)
Noel (Chaos Space Marines) vs. Newt (Chaos Space Marines)
Phil (Orkz) vs Newt (Chaos Space Marines)
Neil (Grey Knights) vs Leo (Tau)
Now, for Neil and I this was our first go at 6th Ed rules so we were thrust into the unknown, as it were. How exciting! Leo had had a go previously so he knew a bit more than us. I had a bit of time to kill before Noel arrived so I helped them set up the battle. A dice was rolled for the mission type - a 4, "The Scouring". To me this seems like a fancy objectives mission, made a bit kinkier by having set points values for the objectives (a 4, two 3s, two 2s and a 1) which are hidden and randomly placed before deployment. After deployment, hey presto, they're flipped and its to bloodshed to get them. Seems a good idea really, mixing up the arl objectives mission by GW.
Night fighting in every mission is also a bit "meh" as far as I'm concerned. Doesn't really add much apart from annoying you a bit. I suppose in games terms it adds a bit more "realism" (if they can do such a thing) and protects your lids at the start, but from what I can gather most of us forgot the rules were in play once the dice started rolling and the swearing had commenced. I'll live with it, like, but, you know, whatever.
I didn't get to see a lot of this battle, but I did manage to catch this wonderful picture of a particularly dramatic moment -
I assume that's the result of one of those Tau Rail Gun motherfuckers.
The honours eventually went to Neil and the 666th Chapter - I don't know the exact score but it looked pretty close by the reactions of both chaps. Looked like a boss game.
Noel (CSM) vs Newt (CSM)
So for mine and Noels battle, we had a bit of a smaller one, 1000 points. I took my mixed bag of vanilla marines, Plague Marines, bezerkers, Oblits and (of course) the lash prince - its funny to think at how much of a fluff player I was a couple of months ago (STRICTLY SLAANESH) to the brutal reality of needing different types of dudes on the battlefield. Anyways, Noel had a pretty similar set up, spiced up with an incredibly imaginatively modelled Chaos Lord with a Khorne Daemon Weapon (he had the bottom half of a scorpion, fucking METAL), a lash sorcerer (the old Noise Marine model brilliantly painted! ENVY), plagues, bezerkers and havocs. To my eternal shame I didn't take any photos of the battle - I was too wrapped in the game. What a tit. My apologies Noel, will get a few snaps of your boss models next time.
We rolled a 2 for the mission type - "Purge the Alien", which is the old Annihilation in every single respect apart from its name. Is right, we both thought, no better mission for the blood guzzling Chaos hordes, fuck all of that objective bullshit.
It was a pretty close game if I remember - I managed to get the "First Blood" secondary mission objective (these secondary missions are boss and add a lot to the game, I reckon), and we both got slay the Warlord (those new Warlord traits are bit redundant, from what I can make out). In the end, though, I managed a couple of lucky shooting and combat phases and ended up finishing off Noel's warband. A good game though, and the first time I've had to endure the annoyance of getting lashed - a taste of my own debauched medicine. Kept my plaguers out the battle.
Phil (Orkz) vs Newt (CSM)
So after my victory, I was ready to charge headlong into the next one, covered in blood and all that business. Phil's Orks would be a completely different proposition, however. For a start, it was a bigger game, 1750. I tarted up my list with that absolute sex beast, the Greater Daemon of Slaanesh (or a Keeper of Secrets to old arses like me), another unit of vanilla CSMs, more oblits, and that strange beast, the Defiler. More on that spidery nonce later. Phil's list was genuinely terrifying to me, someone who hasn't fought orks for...
hmmm...
17 years. I could have had a child. For a start, there's always a billion of them, and he had 3 killa kans and a deff dredd, incredible models and absolute fucking raging monsters in battle. Also, he had about 20 Nobz in a massive unit with his Warboss, who would obviously roll 2,400 dice on the charge.
We rolled a 1 for the battle, Crusade, which is the old Objectives mission, you know, d3+2 primary objectives, you always roll a 3, that one. "Oh shit", I thought. My frail pink and pustulent line holding on to bits of scenery against the whole baddie cast of Lord of the Rings. I hoped my Slaaneshi pack had ingested an awful lot of drugs.
"Hey! There are only 15 Chaos Space Marines to my 30,000 orks!"
Well, as it went, my first round of shooting went OK, destroying a Trukk. Of course, that big gangly tit the Defiler ran out, spunked his Battle Cannon somewhere idiotic like a tree, and then promptly got cut apart by the screaming green horde. i don't understand the people who swear to me I must have one in my force when they literally get killed in Turn 1 in every battle.
Then this BIG FUCKING GREEN TIDE TSUNAMI'D OVER THE BOARD. I got lucky - my keeper of Secrets showed up and butchered the Nobz and Warboss after the unit had been weakened by the old lash/obliterator combo. I was gobsmacked. The Keeper is ferociously brilliant.
Of course, he didn't hang around in the physical plain for long. Phil sought retribution and whipped his kinky pink ass to the warp with his Deff Dredd, but only after Keepy had immobilised him. This was genuinely one of those "cinematic moments" they bang on about in the new rule book, and it was boss.
Would you like to dance?
Once the Orks showed up to my objectives, I had genuinely thought it was game over. They are amazing in combat, sheer weight of dice. They butchered these idiots who were huddled up next to a wall.
They were probably having a communal piss, the perverts.
However, I accidentally exploited the greatest weakness of the ork codex, and subsequently the biggest handicap for ork players...they have no bastard armour. 6+ saves in a game like 40k were most ranged weapons are at least AP5 just seems broken to me. These are orks, for Christ sake. Not Tau.
So, the game finished with me rapid firing a lot, and my berzerkers heroically having off a late charge from the Killa kans to hold an objective to eventually see me run out an 8-6 winner. A brilliant game, and I still can't quite believe I came out with a win. If Phil had been luckier with getting his deathstar unit of the nobz and warboss down my throat, he would have won. End of.
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SO, there you have it. Andy Crabtree and Kev Walsh, yous two have a game and let me know the outcome!
Here is the table...
| Name | Played | Won | Drawn | Lost | Points |
| Newt | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 6 |
| Neil | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| Noel | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Leo | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Phil | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Kev | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Andy | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Death to your false Emperor! Glory to Chaos!
