Anyway, on to the analysis:
My List (1500 points)
MAIN DETACHMENT - Iron Hands
Chapter Master w/bike, artificer armour, shield eternal, power fist, digital weapons
Tactical Squad (10) w/Rhino, combi-melta, meltagun
Tactical Squad (5) w/Rhino, combi-melta, meltagun
Storm Talon w/Skyhammer Missile Launcher
Thunderfire Cannon
ALLIED DETACHMENT - White Scars
Khan w/bike
Bikes (5) w/grav-gun x2, combi-grav x1, veteran sergeant w/power fist
Bikes (4) w/grav-gun x2, combi-grav x1, melta bombs, attack bike with multi-melta
Bikes (4) w/grav-gun x2, combi-grav x1, melta bombs, attack bike with multi-melta
His list (1500 points)
Company command w/Chimera, four veterans with plasma guns
Commisar x2
2x Heavy Weapons team with autocannon
3x 10 man guardsman squad
10 veterans with 4x meltagun and Chimera
10 veterans with 4x flamer and Chimera
10 veterans with 4x meltagun and Chimera
Leman Russ bolter-boat x2
Lemand Russ Demolisher with heavy flamer
Aegis Defence Line with Quad Gun
We played mission one, which has diagonal deployment. I placed my objectives out in the open in line with my thoughts in previous articles, but it didn't end up mattering because we drew very few 'secure objective x'. The final score after five turns was only 5-1. We were playing on a desert terrain board with a fair bit of small line of sight blocking terrain, which made for a bunch of cover saves for tanks but not much for bikes and infantry. They ended up hiding behind the bountiful, often wrecked, chassis of tanks instead.
He deployed first and went first, so I outflanked all of my bikes. There was no way I could hide them in my deployment zone as his choice of zone meant I was in the sparsest part of the board. I managed to get cover saves for my thunderfire and Rhinos, everything else started off.
He spent his early shooting trying to pop my Rhinos, which survived somewhat miraculously. His Russ's couldn't get a good bead on them and so fired at my thunderfire instead, but the techmarine tanked the wounds on his artificer armour. One of my Rhinos was reduced to a hull point and immobilised, the other just lost a hull point. On my turn the healthier Rhino drove forward towards his Russes in order to disgorge melta in the following turn and managed to get behind some solid cover while doing so. The other Rhino rolled a 6(!) to repair its immobilised result and then a 5(!) for it will not die - such luck, wow!
Next turn the repairing Rhino got blown but survived long enough that the guys who got out didn't have to weather much shooting, certainly not a demolisher template. They headed towards a large piece of cover where some guardsman were securing an objective (that I needed). My other Rhino survived shooting with one hull point intact! He set up a guardsman squad and some Chimera's down his left flank in a long line to prevent me from scouting in from the majority of that area.
My turn my pseudo-command squad came on, as did the storm talon. His Quad gun was ineffectual as I got a cover save behind a high piece of rock. My combat squad spilt out of its Rhino and lit up a chimera with meltas and crack grenades while sheltering from the Russ's behind the Rhino. His Veterans had to get out behind a rock wall that separated our squads, so I didn't have to fear return melta fire. Huzzah!
My other tactical squad split in two. One combat squad went after the closest Russ with melta and krak grenades, the other pistol-ed and assaulted the guardsman squad holding the objective. I took two hull points off and stunned the Russ so it couldn't cannon me next turn. My combat squad won combat but didn't get to sweep, which didn't matter too much because I managed to kill enough of his squad to claim the objective. Score 1 point.
My command squad managed to immobilise and blow the cannon of the demolisher. It still had one hull point but it was effectively useless.
On his turn he killed pretty much the entire pseudo-command squad with flamers, first-rank/second-rank las-fire, meltaguns and scatter lasers. Khan and the Chapter Master survived and tanked wounds from various directions but everyone else was dead. His tanks retreated and boltered my marines, joined by his autocannons and quad gun, taking some casualties. One of his russes went round behind my wrecked Rhino and cannoned the combat squad there to mush. My marines swept in Assault and consolidated towards his command Chimera which had been imobilised previously.
My turn my remaining bike squads came in and lit up his demolisher and a Chimera. The Chapter Master assaulted his command squad and Khan assaulted a guardsman squad. The CM won outright, Khan swept. The Talon continued to cut down infantry men. The combat squad that swept the assault charged his Chimera and krak-grenade wrecked it. My other surviving tactical marines krak-grenade wrecked one of his Russes. Never underestimate massed krak grenades. They get shit done. My thunderfire cannon managed to finish the other Russ off inadvertently while trying to hit the veterans standing behind it.
His turn he shot at my talon and I jinked. I took a hull point but survived, denying him a victory point for 'scour the skies'. Some of his veterans managed to get shots off against my combat squad, leaving 1 survivor (come at me!). He killed Khan with meltaguns (I forgot he is toughness 5 and doesn't die instantly, but I think he would have taken enough wounds anyway) and put some wounds on my bikes with flamers and scatter laser fire.
Bottom of turn four my bikes shot and assaulted his veteran squads. The chapter master killed the heavy weapons team (after issuing a challenge to the commissar for a victory point) and was poised to annihilate the quad gun so I could score a victory point for killing a gun emplacement. The nearby combat squad dropped behind cover. My thunderfire made a valient dash to a nearby objective I needed and succeeded at getting just within 3" so I could claim it.
Turn five not much happened. My bikes took a few more wounds from his Chimeras. There wasn't much else left on the table. My turn I finished the combats I was in and destroyed the quad gun. We called it at the end of the turn, 5-1 to me (plus linebreaker, slay the warlord, and first blood).
So I won pretty comprehensively and I don't think I made too many mistakes besides maybe the way I deployed the pseudo-command squad. I feel like I couldn't have limited the amount of fire they took a bit more, but then perhaps the Chapter Master couldn't have covered quite so much ground afterwards. My love affair with krak grenades continues, and I must say that White Scar tactical marines are better because the hit and run lets them bring those grenades to bear more often. The bikes were great. Khan died easy but not before killing maybe 70 points worth of guardsman (half his points), tanking some wounds and allowing my whole army to outflank, which was game winning. Thunderfires are a steal at 100 points - don't leave home without won. Doing 13 wounds to a unit as it disembarks in a tight cluster is delicious.
My opponent was a super nice guy and I had a great time. I read on forums that 40K is full of douchebags but I haven't met one yet (which means I'm probably the douchebag, lol).
Lessons:
- In the regular Maelstrom missions (i.e. not mission 2 - communication lost), don't be in too much of a hurry to score. It's better to get in a good position at the end of turn two and then grab objectives easily as you plow your way across the board in the back turns thanks to your superior board position. If you go all out early you are likely to overextend yourself, which will result in casualties and prevent you from killing units that expose themselves to kill your units.
- This goes double against guard and Tau who will bunker down in a corner. Let them. Make it painful for them to leave that corner and content yourself with scoring objectives in the other 3/4 of the table. You should get over the line easily.
- You can try bunkering down against Orks (chances are they will come to you), but where possible, try instead to play catch me if you can in the middle of the table. Get the orks on foot, take out of the Warlord so he can't Waaagggh and then shoot backwards while running away, just like White Scars did when they assaulted Europe from the Mongolian Steppe, oh wait...
- I'm not big on discarding tactical objective if you can probably score them in the next two or even three turns. For the moment, I'm only discarding things that are either unscorable (kill enemy psycher when he doesn't have one) or where I can't see light at the end of the tunnel (like secure all objectives on the table - it might happen on the last turn, but I can't see how to get from A, where I am not, to B; I'd rather not gamble).
- The objectives that score massive points, like D3+3 for controlling all objectives, typically only come off if you are winning anyway. They can allow you some tactical flexibility to ignore scoring for a few turns though, keep that in mind.
- I think the best way to play marines is to minimise your casualties while moving forward. The middle of the board is where you want to be all the time. There you have optimal range, can limit (with terrain and Rhino hulls) line of site for your enemies' low-AP guns, can get into krak grenade assaults and can mix up rapid-fire and pistol assaults. If you hang back to minimise casualties you will be ineffectual because you don't have that much range, but if you charge forward to score objectives you will lose too many men. Each of your guys has a great load out and can take on just about any unit, but if you suffer a lot of casualties you won't have enough weight of dice anymore. This strikes me as the way marines operate in the fluff (tactical advance), which makes me double happy.
- best piece of space marine advice I got from 1D4-chan's article: learn to love your Rhinos, especially in 7th edition (where even meltaguns can't kill tanks). They are super tough because they have 11 on the side and self-repair, can score, move quickly and give your guys shelter both inside and as brilliant LOS blocking cover. You can also use them to screen units off objective because they are so bulky. All for 35 points. Don't forget that you can get back in Rhinos to deny your opponent kill points.
After the match I flashed my list past the TOs of the upcoming tournament to see whether I needed to tone it down. To my surprise they said only a little. The Chapter master's load out needed to be weakened so that he was kill-able and the bikes needed a greater variety of weapons. So now I'm going with this:
IRON HANDS
Chapter master w/bike, artificer armour, storm shield, power fist
Tactical Squad (10) w/Rhino, meltagun, combi-melta
Tactical Squad (10) w/Rhino, meltagun, combi-melta
Thunderfire Cannon
Storm Talon
WHITE SCARS
Khan w/Bike
Bikes (5) w/grav-gun x2, veteran sergeant with power fist
Bikes (4) w/grav-gun x2, combi-grav, melta bombs, attack bike with multi-melta
Bikes (4) w/meltagun x2, combi-melta, attack bike with multi-melta
So the Chapter master is a little less beefy but still has T5 (hard to insta-kill), 2+/3++/5+IWND, and I gained five tactical marines for more krak-grenade antics. I might try the second tactical squad in a drop pod next game. With ten men it might actually be useful. But I do love my Rhinos...
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