Friday 15 April 2022

Go Down In A Blaze of Glory

I can only imagine the naming meeting at Games Workshop for Tzeentch Daemons was running late. After all the Fluxmasters, Changecasters and Fateskimmers, they finally got to the Chariot carrying an Exalted Flamer and decided on...Burning Chariot.


I'm not going to go into how I've painted it because it's basically a combination of how I did the Screamers, Exalted Flamer and other Discs, so my earlier posts will tell you everything you need to know (follow the Tzeentch link in the sidebar).

Suffice to say that I'm really pleased with how the Screamers turned our, but I'm less than impressed with my choices regarding the Flamer.

In game, the Burning Chariot is something akin to a light tank. It has manoeuvrability, acceptable anti-tank capability and decent close combat potential.


Ever since Matt produced his surprise Japanese army for Bolt Action, there's been a running theme in our gaming group of ambushing each other with things we'd kept secret.

Therefore, prior to our game of 40k, I'd not mentioned to Pete that I was working on the Burning Chariot and was aiming to produce it with an, "ah-haaa!"

However, my surprise Chariot moment was somewhat undermined when I arrived at Pete's and he greeted me with a surprise entire Imperial Guard army and a much bigger "ah-haaaaa!"


We set up for a matched play incursion game using the Ransack scenario, which involves six objectives, and scoring primary points if you control two, control three and control more than your opponent.


My army consisted of:

HQ
- Daemon Prince
- The Changeling
- Fluxmaster

Troops
- 10 Pink Horrors
- 10 Pink Horrors
- 10 Brimstone Horrors

Elite
- Exalted Flamer
- 3 Flamers

Fast Attack
- 4 Screamers

Heavy Support
- Burning Chariot

For my secondary objectives I chose: Malefic Terror as I thought I'd stand a decent chance of making Imperial Guardsmen run away; Engage On All Fronts as I had decent manoeuvrability; and Psychic Interrogation as I believed that I'd remember to do the psychic action each turn (spoiler...I didn't).


Pete's army consisted of guns. Lots of guns.

HQ
- Company Commander
- Tank Commander

Troops
- Infantry Squad
- Infantry Squad
- Infantry Squad

Elite
- Commander Squad
- Tech-Priest Enginseer
- Commissar

Fast Attack
- Sentinel

Heavy Support
- Wyvern Launcher
- Leman Russ Battle Tank

In terms of secondary objectives, Pete chose three that dovetailed well: For The Emperor meant that he'd score for each unit he destroyed; as five of my units were psykers he would also score for Abhor The Witch for each if them he killed; and whilst he was killing units, Grind Them Down would see him score if he killed more units than I did.


Fortunately, I got the first turn and barrelled forwards and moved forwards inflicting damage across Pete's lines (unfortunately nobody failed morale checks). I knew I had to close the ground as I would lose a shooting battle.

In a worrying sign of things to come, I rolled a double 1 on my first psychic test, forgot to do psychic interrogation and positioned my characters in a way that would leave then exposed if the leas unit of Pink Horrors was destroyed.


I managed to get a charge off with my Screamers, but the Sentinel survived their attack on one wound.

Now it was Pete's turn to shoot back.


Suffice to say that Pete had noticed my poor positioning and proceeded to unleash a storm of lasguns and mortar fire onto them, wiping out the Horrors and allowing the Fluxmaster to be banished back to the warp by sustained multi-melta fire from the Tank Commander.

Then, I'm what can only be described as Tzerntch laughing at me, the other Leman Russ pummelled the Daemon Prince with Battle Cannon and Heavy Bolter shells and I failed an abominable abount of 3+ 'Invulnerable' saves.


By the start of the second turn, I'd lost half of my force and the only u it that had a reasonable chance of dealing with the tanks.

I knew the game was lost, and so it was damage limitation time.

My Exalted Flamer finished off the Sentinel, which blew up, injuring the Commissar. I brought my Flamers in from the warp and they deleted the Mortars. However, the Burning Chariot failed to destroy the Guardsmen holding the objective and they also didn't run (this was to become a theme).


The Screamers went on a suicide run to assassinate the Company Commander as his ability to regenerate command points was annoying me.


In Pete's turn he concentrated on trying to clear my units out of his lines with another volley of devastating firepower. However, when the smoke cleared, even though the Flamers and Burning Chariot had been incinerated, a single Screamer remained on one wound.

This allowed me in my turn 3 to fall back to contest Pete's central objective, and concentrate my fire on the Guardsmen and Commissar on Pete's right flank, destroying them, gaining points for failed leadership tests and denying Pete any primary points for the turn.


There was nothing I could do about the tanks.

Another deadly volley took out the Exalted Flamer and most of the Horrors. Fortunately, Pete had killed so much that his Tank Commander was out of position and had nothing to shoot at.

Ha! Sucks to be him!


The game was up. With the Changeling and Brinstone Horrors scoring me a measly few primary points, I sent the last of the Horrors into the centre of Pete's lines to finish off his Command Squad to try and gain an extra point and reduce his primary score once again.

Having a succeeded in that, they were subsequently shot off the board, as was the Changeling. It turns out the tanks don't stay out of position for long as they can apparently move.

Pete was able to pick up the full 15 primary points on his final turn leaving the score at: 72 - 43

Given that I lost half my army in the first turn, I actually think I played the rest of the game reasonably well, denying Pete points and keeping things relatively close until the last turn.

As is now usual with 40k, here are Captain Hindsight's thoughts on the game:
  1. I really need to pay attention to the positioning of my characters in the early turns.
  2. I need to concentrate my firepower and make sure I remove enemy units.
  3. If I'm going to use a Warpcraft Secondary, I need to give that as a job to a character and focus them on it.
  4. I probably need more Pink Horrors to form a more robust core to my army.
  5. I need to convince Pete to get more line of sight blocking terrain.
The game was enjoyable, but messing up the first turn was a bit frustrating. 40k in all the editions I've played, remains one of the most unforgiving games I've encountered and things go south quickly.


The Burning Chariot only counts as a single model painted, but it does leave me with just a handful of Daemons left to paint in the backlog.

Acquired: 48
Painted: 69 (ooer missus)

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