Afraid of Change?

Tenth edition you say?

I'm still wrapping my head around second.

There's only one kind of change I'm currently embracing: the Great Deceiver; the Architect of Fate; Tzeentch, the Changer of the Ways. 

The emanations of the warp under my command were from the Daemon World army list from the 2nd Edition Chaos Codex, and the list was really quick to put together as the Daemons don't come with any options other than...more.

Characters

• M'Kachan - Daemon Prince of Tzeentch

Daemons

• 3 Flamers of Tzeentch
• 3 Flamers of Tzeentch
• 7 Pink Horrors of Tzeentch
• 5 Pink Horrors of Tzeentch
• 5 Pink Horrors of Tzeentch

Unfortunately, Screamers, Burning Chariots, Heralds  and Exalted Flamers didn't exist back in second edition, and adding a Lord of Change would have taken the mount of points I had in character models over the allotted limit, therefore, my force was somewhat two dimensional.

Fortunately, my mission was Engage and Destroy, and so I could focus on running forwards, spewing magic and hoping M'Kachan would shop stuff up.

My opponents would once again be Matt's Squats, which also have a somewhat limited range of options.

Characters

• Warlord in Exo-Armour
• Living Ancestor in Exo-Armour (Level 4)

Squads

• Thunderer Squad (2 Heavy Bolters, Plasma Gun, 2 Lasguns)
• Thunderer Squad (2 Lascannons, Missile Launcher, 2 Lasguns)
• Thunderer Squad (Missile Launcher, 2 Plasma Guns, Plasma Pistol, Lasgun)

Support

• Weapon Team (Mole Mortar)
• Bike Squad (5 Bikes)

With Matt drawing the Witch Hunt card the game immediately became all about my warlord, M'Kachan. Would he make it to the Squat lines and proceed to dismember them? Or would he be blasted back to the warp by a wall of heavy firepower?

SQUAT TURN 1

With no massive incentive for Matt to advance the Squats, the only movement in his line was the Bike Squad rolling forwards to get some shots in on the Daemon horde.

Predictably, the heavy weapons opened up and began dropping Pink Horrors, only for them to be replaced by their Blue brethren. I should point out that we discovered later that I was cheating massively by mistakenly giving all of my Horrors a 4+ invulnerable save. Bear that in mind as events progress.

Beyond that, the only other significant events were Lascannons putting a marker down and almost vaporising M'Kachan. Thankfully his Daemon save protected him (he is entitled to one), but it was clear that he'd have to weather a storm before he made contact.

Also, the Living Ancestor erected a Force Dome in the centre of the battlefield, forcing the middle of the Daemon line to have to divert around it.

DAEMONS TURN 1

As the Squats hadn't advanced, it was up to my Daemons to go to them. Pink Horrors and FLamers surged forwards across the board, trying to use cover as much as possible.

Meanwhile, as expected, the centre of the Daemon line was forced to go around the Force Dome, and slow their advance. I was probably too cautious with M'Kachan and, should probably have rammed him down Matt's throat straight away.

SQUAT TURN 2

With Matt neglecting the movement phase and me neglecting the shooting phase, the turns were moving past quickly. Again, Matt's only movement was the Bikers repositioning to bring their guns to bear on the lurking Flamers.

Elsewhere, the Squat line opened fire, aiming to kill everything they could, concentrating fire on M'Kachan and his accompanying Horrors.

In a quite awesome display of firepower, and even with me outrageously cheating, Pink Horrors were obliterated in droves. Yes, they would be replaced by Blue Horrors (of which I don't have enough, hence the imminent appearance of Brimstone Horrors on the photos), but my limited ranged threat was being significantly diminished as the magic level of the Horror units dropped as they took casualties.

The two Lascannons once again took aim at M'Kachan and this time one of them got through. This was enough to utterly destroy the Daemon Prince and almost certainly win the battle for Matt...

...or so it seemed...

...M'Kachan has the ability to select an additional strategy card at the beginning of the battle (as long as the opponents can't guess which one has been selected) and so I unveiled the Saved strategy card, and the Daemon Prince strode unharmed through the blast.

He them proceeded to add injury to insult by obliterating half of the Biker unit with a Tzeentch's Flamestorm.

DAEMON TURN 2

Realising that the safest place was actually in combat, the Daemon horde surged forwards seeking to make contact with their tormentors.

M'Kachan ripped into the remaining Bikers, killing one and consolidating into another to provide some protection for the inevitable salvo in the following turn.

Meanwhile, Flamers charged into the Warlord's squad on the right of the battlefield and effectively bounced. It was clear that this particular gamble had failed as they were now locked in combat in reach of the Warlord himself

However, the last Flamer in the second unit made it into combat with the Mole Mortar, killed one crewman and the other one fled.

SQUAT TURN 3

With the Daemon Prince getting ever closer, the Lascannons opened up on M'Kachan. One missed and the other hit the Biker in combat with the Daemon Warlord, killing him. Things looked bleak for the Squats.

However, on the other flank that I didn't photograph for some reason, the Squat Warlord began to make mincemeat of the Flamers.

DAEMON TURN 3

The Pink Horrors finally made it to the fight and ran in to engage the very last Biker, finishing him off but leaving them surrounded by out of control bikes.

Meanwhile, M'Kachan made straight for the Lascannons that had been tormenting him and made short work of the Squats. I'm not sure even the Warlord would have been able to stand up to his wrath.

SQUAT TURN 4

With very few units left on the board, the Pink Horrors on the left were pummelled by out of control Bikes exploding around them and the last unengaged squad of Thunderers unloading a volley of plasma upon them.

Meanwhile, the Living Ancestor ran forwards to engage the Horrors on the right, whilst simultaneously Dominating a Flamer into firing at them as well, leaving only Blue Horrors left.

DAEMON TURN 4

Having ripped apart his previous victims, M'Kachan turned, looking for new toys to play with. He swooped down upon the remaining Thunderer Squad, and with the aid of the last Flamer, tore them limb from limb.

The Blue Horrors closed in on the Living Ancestor, but were outmatched, despite outnumbering him, and he cut through the rest of the unit with ease.

FINAL RESULT: DAEMON VICTORY

Even though most of the Horrors and Flamers had been destroyed, remnants of units were still left, denying Matt points. Conversely, M'Kachan's rampage had left pretty much every Squat apart from the characters dead. Given that my mission gave me extra points for destroying units, the final result was a somewhat convincing victory for the Daemons.

The shine was somewhat taken off it by discovering that I had been cheating. This was accidental as I'd actually been reading up about Horrors in 10th edition (in which they do get an invulnerable save) that afternoon. However, the Horrors had a limited impact on the game, which was really all about whether Matt could kill M'Kachan, and the Saved card made that doubly hard.

The Daemon army was fun to play with, if a bit of a one-trick-pony. I may consider getting some Cultists, Beastmen or Trolls to vary things a little bit.