Warmonger Club 40K Tournament: Slann vs IG

Opponent: Steve

Army: (1850 pts) -- “Grateful Dead” Imperial Guard. Maxed Command squad, 3x Vets, 1x Platoon (Lt, 2xInf, 2xSpecialists), 2x Psyker Battle, 2x Leman Russ, 2x Rough Riders. Lots of Grenade Launchers, Plasmaguns, and Meltaguns throughout all the infantry squads, but only two infantry heavy weapons (Missile Launchers) total.

Terrain: A ring of ruined buildings surrounding a small (18” wide) open area in the middle of the table. Plenty of cover and LOS for all involved.

Mission: Dawn of War, Secure & Control

Summary: I got the first turn, but between Steve and I both having to move all of our infantry from off the board, we only got three turns into the game. I deep-struck all my Crisis Suits onto his gun-lines, but they deviated badly, and I got exactly zero flamer shots off before most of them were overwhelmed. Although I managed to shred both of his Rough Rider units, immobilize and de-fang his Russes, neutralize nearly all his long-range fire, as well as wipe two of his other infantry squads, the game ended up as a draw, with the tie-breaker coming down to Kill Points. Steve had the edge: 5 of my units wiped, to four of his.

What Should I Have Done?: I essentially threw away my Crisis Suits in this mission; they would have been far better served coming to provide long-range support from behind, rather than simply deep-striking wholly unsupported into the IG lines. They ate a faceful of lasguns for their efforts, and despite my amazingly good armor saves, there’s only so many armor saves you can really roll before going down. My decision to deep-strike them was where I decisively lost the game.

This was also a reminder of how poorly my fourth-edition tactics of “sacrificing units” works in the mission objectives of the new edition of the game. Even had Steve and I continued all five turns, it would have been a comparable result – after losing my Crisis Suits, I had few units that could shred infantry as well or as reliably as they could, and certainly no units that could realistically contest his objective, which was neatly within his “castle” formation on the far side of the table from me. I had demonstrated how effectively I could destroy any units in the open (his Rough-Riders), but there were only so many Markerlights that I could use to “strip” IG cover saves, and only so many IG units I could target with them each turn (=two).