Nothing gets me in that Chistmas Mood…
...like having someone break into my house earlier today.
I was having a great day up until the Sheriff calls me to let me know. All-in-all, my wife and I are fine (which is great), but my laptop and game console are AWOL. If it wasn't for my horrible job with wires behind the TV, that would probably be gone with other assorted AV crap that was too tangled up to get out (they tried though).
The thing that just bugs me though... I had just traded my IG for CSM; and while nearly everything is still there, they took 2 CSM models form my work area; Ignore the big metal ones and the box box of them, just take the 2 that I had just assembled. It just adds insult to injury.
Still, it could have been worse. Neither my wife nor I were home, and all 3 cats stayed inside and just hid. I lost stuff, but nothing irreplaceable.
So, I probably won't be updating much for a little while (not that I'm a frequent updater anyways)... However, I did work up a quick change to my CSM list for the upcoming FLGS leage. More fluffy this time, but I think I have an uphill battle in terms of competitiveness:
HQ: Abaddon the Despoiler (275 pts)
Elite: Terminators (190 pts): 4 Terminators (Combi-melta x2; Combi-plasma x2) & 1 Terminator Champion
Elite: Chosen (165 pts): 5 Chosen (Chaos Glory, Meltagun x2) & Rhino (Combi-melta)
Troops: Chaos Space Marines (245 pts): 9 Chaos Space Marines(Chaos Glory, Meltagun x2), 1 Aspiring Champion, & Rhino (Havoc Launcher)
Troops: Thousand Sons (259 pts): 8 Thousand Sons (Icon) & 1 Aspiring Sorcerer (Doombolt)
Troops: Khorne Berzerkers (263 pts): 7 Khorne Berzerkers (Icon) , 1 Skull Champion (Power Weapon), & Rhino (Combi-melta)
Troops: Plague Marines (296 pts): 6 Plague Marines (Icon, Plasmagun x2), 1 Plague Champion (Combi-plasma), & Rhino (Havoc Launcher)
Troops: Noise Marines (155 pts): 6 Noise Marines (Icon, Sonic Blaster x6)
Heavy Support: Obliterators (150 pts): 2 Obliterators
Skipping the obvious: I know Abaddon is a big points since and Daemon Princes are most cost-efficient, but I want to runt he big guy for the fun of it. The Terminators will be painted each one as a different Chaos God markings (the Champion will be undivided representing Abaddons personal guard). I also have lots of Icons in their to help with Deep striking.
Should be fun to play, and that's what I want out of the league.
I Now Have Chaos Space Marines!!
Thanks to John from Santa Cruz Warhammer, I now have no more Imperial Guard left, but I do have a heafty army of Chaos Marines.
This came at a great time too as my FLGS is about to start a campaign/league called Mittennacht. If I wasn't able to trade away my IG in time, I was going to run my Daemonhunters (which are always good for a sure loss). Fortunately, I will be running my new CSM.
I've worked up a quick list to try out. I'm a bit short on time (and the holiday season isn't giving me more time), so I need to get some list-testing done ASAP to weed out any problems and get used to the new army quickly. Here's my initial list (trying to be somewhat fluffy too):
HQ: Daemon Prince with MoK & Wings (140 pts)
HQ: Daemon Prince with MoN & Wings (150 pts)
Elite: Dreadnaught w/ Plasma Cannon (105 pts)
Elite: 4x Terminators w/ 2 Combi-Meltas & 1 Reaper Autocannon (155 pts)
Troops: 7x Plague Marines w/ 2 Plasmaguns, Champion w/ Power Fist, & a Rhino w/ Havoc Launcher (281 pts)
Troops: 8x Khorne Berzerkers w/ Skull Champion w/ Power Fist & Rhino w/ Combi-Melta (268 pts)
Troops: 10x CSMs w/ Aspiring Champion, Icon of Chaos Glory, & Rhino w/ Havoc Launcher (225 pts)
Troops: 10x CSMs w/ Aspiring Champion, Icon of Chaos Glory, & Rhino w/ Havoc Launcher (225 pts)
Troops: 10x CSMs w/ Aspiring Champion, Icon of Chaos Glory, & Rhino w/ Havoc Launcher (225 pts)
Heavy Support: 2x Obliterators
Heavy Support: 1x Obliterator
Total: 1999 Points
That gives me 60 models with at least a 3+ save that should be a task for any army to whittle down. I wanted to keep everything Khorne & Nurgle (and in their sacred numbers no less) and originally I was toying with 2 of each Cult Troops instead of just 1 each (too few models for my taste though). I'm going to go back through in a bit to try to see if I can find a bit of room to make to give the DP with the MoN a Psychic Power (possibly Nurgle's Rot since I want him up close and personal, but Warptime is awesome too).
What sucks a bit is that I really like Lucius the Eternal and alot of the Slaanesh stuff, but I also really like the Berzerkers. Mixing the 2 would kinda kill the fluff thing I want to keep, but it's be fun. For this, I want to keep a bit of fluff going, but in a future fluff-be-damned list, I may play with them together a bit more.
Another list I'm playing witht hat I think would be a really fun list to play is a Black Legion army fielding 1 of each Cult Troop in their respective sacred number (Tzeentch,= 7, Khorne = 8, Nurgle = 7, Slaanesh = 6). Fill that out with other units divisible by 4 (to model evenly amongs the Chaos gods) to get more support and a bit more variety. I've toyed around with it a bit, but so far, no list I rally love yet.
Upcoming Apocalypse Game
Recently, I was in a small leage att my FLGS. That league is over, and while I didn't place high enough for the championship playoff game (I was 3rd and only the top 2 go), I did get the Fellowship Award to play as a "chaplain" in the playoff game. The playoff is an Apocalyse game with the two leaders fielding 4000 pts. and the chaplains fielding 1500 pts. plus a 500 pt. Super Heavy (either a Baneblade or Ork Stompa). The other chaplain gets 1st pick, so I'm not sure which I'll be getting. As I was running Daemonhunters, the Baneblade makes the most sense. But, the other chaplain ran a Space Marine army, so the Stompa makes no sense for either of us. Oh yeah, my team leader is Tyranids, so the whole alliance thing is out the window... he battle is consisting of 2 Space Marine armies, 1 Tyranid army, and my Daemonhunters... It wasn't destined to be fluffy.
1500 pts. for an Apoc. game isn't much, so I'm a bit torn on what to do about it. At 70 pts. each, I'm having a hard time not squeezing in a few of the Lance Orbital Strikes. That may be too cheezy though. Regardless, I'm almost certain I'm going to bring at least one.
Aside from that, I'm not sure what to field. For most of the league I used almost exclusively Grey Knights, but with only 1500 pts. to work with, I'm leaning towards using more Inquisitional forces and maybe an Inducted Imperial Guard Platoon. With all the Space Marines that will be on the board, I don't want my high points cost to hurt my army, and with all fluff gone out the window, maybe this would be a fun time to be as cheesy as I want.
My concern is that my playing is going to impact the winner here, so if I try to build a reasonable 'bring-back-the-fluff' army, then we might et wiped out costing him a prize. If I go Uber-Cheese, then we might win, but would we really have earned it? I'm not sure if having an Apoc. game for the playoff makes sense when all the prior games were normal rulebook missions. I play very differently in a league than in a for-fun game... and I've never played an Apocalypse game that wasn't for-fun.
What to do?
Snatching Defeat from the Jaws of Victory
Over the course of my blog-reading, I came across this little gem on NockerGeek.net about keeping your eyes on the prize and playing the game at hand instead of just trying to slaughter your opponent. I know I've definitely fallen to the 'Pride' problem described, but for a reason not covered by the original post. I'm not overly confident about my units abilities... Rather, I'm usually on the pessimistic side about what I can and can't do. However, nothing makes me happier in the game than unleashing a reign of fire upon my foe and forcing him to remove models from the table.
It's not that I want revenge against a particular unit or that I think the target might be a threat to the objective. It's that I just like to run aggressive armies. Imperial Guard is usually one of the less aggressive armies in 40k (although the new codex and 5th edition has changed that a bit), and how do I kit out my troops? I gear them for assault or to be in the opponents face, knee-deep in the action. Admittedly, this doesn't typically work out to well, but it is a blast to play (and when it does work out, it is AMAZING!).
I can readily think of several games that I won on turn 4 or 5 and then subsequently lost because I abandoned an objective to go kill an enemy that didn't matter. Even in kill-point style games, I've done this. In a recent Warhammer Fantasy game, I charged a full unit of Dark Elves (I forget the type) in the 6th tun and lost my 600+ point model to a single failed Instability test. If I hadn't charged, I would have had a solid victory. Even if I had won, it would have still been a solid victory. But, since I lost, the game ended up as a draw.
I think subconsciously I know that I'm doing something stupid. The problem is that my inner child that wants to Crush-Kill-Destroy drowns out the voice of reason telling me to win the war, not the battle.
This is definitely something I'm working on, and I think I'm slowly getting better in part because I'm doing a few more league games over friendly games. Since losing has penalties unlike a friendly game, I'm remembering more often to go for the win instead of go for the slaughter.
Edit: Over the course of writing this post, I have also learned that I have been mis-spelling "Aggressive" all my life (I'd been spelling "Agressive")... Where the hell did that second "g" come from?
New League and New Event @ Fat Ogre
My FLGS (Fat Orge) is having 2 40k events coming up:
Dark City Scenario Event - Based on the movie of the same name, everyone fields up to 250 points of a Fast Attack choice and deal with your opponents as the buildings around you move and the city reforms (makes much more sense if you've seen the movie). Instead of my normal Daemonhunters or Imperial Guard, I'm thinking of getting out my Fantasy Daemons army for this. With 13 Flesh Hounds + Karanak (Furious Charge, anyone?) or 14 Seekers of Slaanesh (can you say: 70 rending attacks @ Initiative 6?), I can see this being rather wicked.
40k Mittennacht Campaign League - A 2000 point fixed-list (with exceptions) campaign based loosely on Mighty Empires (not sure why since Planetary Empires is out now). I've been thinking about using my Imperial Guard for this, but I'm still on the fence about whether or not to join in this one. On the one hand, leagues mean gaming certainty (and usually reasonably serious games too); but on the other hand, there's a few clientele that grate my nerves and I'm unsure if they are going to be in the league as well.
Flames of War League Over
I was recently in a Flames of War (Early War) league @ Adeptus-Ineptus using my American Tank Company/Rifle Company from Afrika. The end result put me in a 3-way tie for 10th place out of 18 places (there were 34 players... there were alot of ties). By count, this puts the 3 of us that were tied for 10th almost squarely in the 50% mark... Better than half and worse than half.
All-in-all, I'm happy with the results. These were many of my first games with Flames of War ever (I had a while 3 games prior to the league), and I learned a great deal. The playoffs are going to be held shortly, and while I'm not involved, I'd like to be a spectator for a game or two and see what I can pick up.
The biggest learning I'm walking away with is that superior firepower can be as much of a weakness as a strength. My M4A1 Shermans were the biggest and baddest tanks for most games. However, this also meant I had one of the smallest armies in terms of platoons and models. In my most stunning lost, I was forced into a Company Morale Check at the top of turn two and had one of the shortest games ever. We played on for funs, but in terms of league play, the game was over and we both only had 1 turn). So, while I had the firepower advantage in most games, I had to learn real quick to be careful about exposing myself since none of my platoons were ever expendable.
The next big lesson was movement tactics. I'm more versed in Warhammer 40k where armour saves are better than most cover (up until 5th edition changed that), so I didn't place a premium on being in cover and forcing the enemy to either move to a better position or take an unlikely shot. Flames of War was much more brutal than I was expecting and it took a few games for me to find my way about the battlefield without walking into my own death. With my Imperial Guard in 40k, this is definitely somethingI'm going to carry with me.
Next time, I think I'll be in a much better shape to do things based on my experience now. Also, I'm thinking of converting my Rifle Company into either Paratroopers for the enhanced training/motivation or Armoured Rifle Company for the quick movement and increased platoon counts. While I work on my Imperial Guard though, I don't anticipate much happening with my Americans, but I'd like to play a few pick-up games at the FLGS at some point.
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