Badabing!

Today I took myself and my Astral Claws down to Warhammer World to participate in the Tale of 4 Gamers Badab War campaign run by Arbitor Ian's YouTube channel.

This is actually the second event of the campaign (confusingly it's Phase III of the war); as there was a Kill Team event held in November that I was unable to attend.

As this is a Combat Patrol event, my force is using the rules for the OOP Dark Zealots (a Chaos Space Marine Combat Patrol). Given what fate waits for the Astral Claws after the war, this seems more than appropriate.

One of the nice things about Combat Patrol is that you don't need to worry about choosing your army, as it's selected for you. Therefore, my force consists of:

• 1 Corpsetaker Apothecary (Dark Apostle) with 2 Servitors (Disciples)
• 10 Tactical Marines (Chaos Legionaries)
• 5 Devastator Marines (Havocs)
• 1 Dreadnought (Hellbrute)

In preparing for the event, I did have a little painting that I needed to do.

Firstly I needed to paint up my final monopose Marine as I needed a Meltagun in my Tactical Squad. The gun itself was cobbled together from various bits, but looks the part.

As we were playing in Warhammer World, my Servitors weren't appropriate as they aren't Games Workshop miniatures. Therefore I painted up a second Goliath Juve so they could be used as stand-ins.

Finally, I wanted to distinguish my two Heavy Bolters, as one of them would be proxied as a Reaper Chaincannon. Without any alternate barrels knocking around I opted to go for putting a chain bayonet on one simply to make the difference clear.

With that all done, I made my way to Nottingham this morning to take part in the twenty-ish person event.

Game 1 - Bull by the Horns

My first opponent was Andrew with his Minotaurs force. He had opted to use the current Dark Angels Combat Patrol which consists of:

1 Captain in Gravis Armour

3 Bladeguard Veterans 

5 Helblasters

10 Intercessors

The game would see the newly reinforced Loyalists conducting Sweeping Raids into Secessionist space following the stalemate in the Phase II Kill Team event.

I got the first turn but failed to make a telling impact as Andrew used the terrain to negate my ranger advantage.

On his turn he pushed his Helblasters forward and obliterated my Devastators, leaving me no option but to try to get stuck in.

I pushed my close combat troops forwards to try to capture the mid-table objectives, but they were met by a Captain and some Bladeguard who were packing the most effective invulnerable saves I ever seen and despite the Bladeguard being cut down, they took the Dreadnought and most of my unit with them.

Meanwhile, my combat squad armed with bolters tried to take out the advancing Intercessors, but had to content themselves with simply holding my home objective.

Ultimately the battle came down to my Corpsetaker Apothecary against Andrew's Captain, a fight that was won by the Minotaur, but left him with a single wound.

With the game pretty much over, we called the result on turn 4 as nothing was going to change.

Minotaurs 70 - Astral Claws 43

Game 2: Raptorous Applause

Despite my loss, the Secessionists had won the first round and so now we were aiming to push back the Loyalists with a Display of Might.

I matched up against Jack's Raptors, which it turned out were also based on the Dark Angels Combat Patrol, and so also consisted of:

1 Captain in Gravis Armour

3 Bladeguard Veterans 

5 Helblasters

10 Intercessors

The fates unkindly conspired against Jack in this game as not only had I already learned that the real threat was the Helblasters, but he also proceeded to have absolutely horrendous luck when rolling saves throughout the game.

After I'd driven back his Helblasters with my concentrated fire, my Dreadnought could advance with impunity and I had a significant advantage in firepower.

Unfortunately for Jack, the scenario required us to advance, and so he made a valiant push with his Bladeguard, but a failed charge saw them out up from all angles.

Ultimately, the Dreadnought strode unchallenged down my right flank; concentrated Bolter fire not enough to deter it, whilst the Gravis Captain was met and defeated by the Corpsetaker and his entourage, his gene-seed added to the Astral Claws' stockpiles.

Astral Claws 58 - Raptors 25

Game 3 - Howl You Doin'?

With the Secessionists winning the second round as well, we were now pushing out to capture the Loyalist Forward Outposts.

In this game I was matched against Will's Howling Griffons. Like many players at the event, he is using the standard Space Marine Combat Patrol which consists of:

1 Captain in Terminator Armour

1 Librarian in Terminator Armour 

5 Terminators

5 Infernus Marines

I really liked how this game fits so well into the narrative as my Astral Claws pushed into a built up area to find it apparently defended by only a small squad of Howling Griffons.

It looked and felt like a trap.

A trap which was sprung when a whole load of Terminators deep struck into my back line, capturing my home objective and almost obliterating the Corpsetaker's unit and leaving him alone.

Realising that I stood no chance against the Terminators with my units so spread out, I opted to push towards the enemy deployment zone, capturing objectives on the way, in an attempt to match the Howling Griffons build up of victory points.

The Corpsetaker charged into the remaining Infernus Marines whilst the Havoks and remaining Tactical Marines positioned themselves on the mid-table objectives knowing that the Terminators were coming.

The Dreadnought moved to help the Tactical Marines, who found themselves overmatched by the Terminator Captain, and helped them hold onto the objective for an extra turn, until the main squad of Terminators arrived and cut them all to pieces.

Meanwhile, the Corpsetaker ran hell for leather into to enemy deployment zone to grab their valuable objective, putting pressure on the Howling Griffons.

On their final turn, the scores were close, but the Astral Claws would win if they still held two objectives at the end of the game.

However, the Terminators made a long charge (after judicious use of a Command Point) to reach the hiding Devastators and destroy them in hand to hand combat.

Astral Claws 56 - Howling Griffons 52

I ended the day with a loss, a win and a draw. However I don't yet know how the round went for the Secessionists.

The day has been really fun. I've met some excellent people and enjoyed playing games against opponents who have the same limited exposure to 10th edition as me, and so we've been learning together.

So far, I like the Combat Patrol format as it's going ven us time to get our heads around the rules.

The best bit?

I get to go back again tomorrow.

Acquired: -26
Painted: 31
Lead Mountain: 600