Warhammer 40k Blood Angels Battle Report: Blood Angels vs Salamanders

On December 22, 2008 Lord Dante caught word of Vulkan who was excavating some Xenos world for alien technology to improve his twin-linked flamers. Dante needed to challenge this afrontery personally since he was in the area, and Vulkan decided he would have this alien power at any cost. Well this day that cost was measured.

Blood Angels vs Salamanders
1750 points
Kill Points
Dawn of War

I used my new standard force, with assault squads and DC in rhinos with Corbs and Dante, supported by a Speeder, Vindi, Baal, Attack Bike and 2 Furiso Dreads. My buddy Ed used his new Drop Pod Salamander army. Vulkan, 4 Ironclad Dreads, a squad of Vets joined to Vulkan, two Tacticals and a Techmarine with Thunder hammer.

Ed is a great player, and always has a strong list. He is also a great modeler and painter. Always a pleasure to play him. Unfortunately for him, he doesnt have a lot of experience with 5th edition, and I apologized to him before the game started because he was about to see the new tactics.

We roll off and of course I fail to win first turn choice. He grants me to first go. I select my side, which had a nice terrain piece which blocks line of sight in the back corner, then I RESERVE EVERYTHING. The defense against all drop pod armies is to reserve every unit. With Drop Pod Assault, half of his pods come down turn 1 with nothing to shoot at. This will leave dreadnoughts stranded, and troops exposed as they will have little cover usually. This worked perfectly with Ed.

Turn 1:
I go first and reserve every thing.
Ed is forced to deploy 4 drop pods. He chooses to drop his 4 Iron Clads into the middle of the board, evenly spaced and behind cover from my deployment edge.

Turn 2:
I go and my Speeder, Attack Bike, Vindicator, Tactical and an assault squad come on. I run my tactial into cover to get a good position to fire the Lascannon. The Vindi moves up behind a small wall to fire on dreads and pods, and the attack bike and speeder move in for opportune shots at pods with their Multis. The Vindicator lands a straight shot on a Dread, but I roll a 2 to wound and fail to pen its 13 armor. The fast attack both fire on a pod and destroy it earning me my first kill point.

On Ed's turn, only one more pod comes in for him. He drops it right in the middle of my terrain piece and deploys. His troops fire on my speeder, knocking off its melta and stunning it. There are no assaults yet. The score is 1 KP for me to 0 for Ed.

Turn 3:
Every thing else is in for me except for my Baal. The Speeder moves 24 to get out of trouble. The bike also moves 24 to try to flank the other Iron Clads and keep them where I want them. I move up my rhinos and here is where the game gets fun for me. Being Fast Vehicles they can move 18", and his tactical squad that came out of the drop pod was in range, so I TANK SHOCKED him twice! The first TS he makes his leadership and decided to Death or Glory with his Techmarine. Bad choice. It was actually not a bad choice because he had a Thunder Hammer, but he failed to wound beyond stun, and that became shaken with my extra armor. VS Death or Glory the defender must Stun, Imobo or destroy the tank to stop it. He failed, so he lost the Techmarine. His marines moved back to get out of the way. With my second TS I hit them again. This time he chose DoG with his Meltagun. Again it was an auto hit against my front armor 11. Sadly he rolled a 3 on the glance chart. That became a 1 due to glance, which became a 2 due to the +1 melta shot, which was reduced to a 1 again with my extra armor. The melta guy died, and they were forced to move again. This killed his threats in this squad, pushed them back from my armor forcing him to assault my transports with guys inside if he chose, and put a hurting on his overall morale! And I hadnt fired a shot this turn... In the shooting I move my Dreads up behind the rhinos that TS. All of my troops that were in rhinos stayed embarked. The Lascannon fired on a pod and knocked the gun off and the Vindicator knocked the gun off another. Curse my supernatural ability to roll 1's and 2's. My turn ended since I had nothing to assault with yet.

On Ed's turn another pod, with Vets and Vulkan came down. He dropped them right in front of my Vindicator. They disembarked and killed all but the Lascannon marine from my Tactical with their first volley of shots and flame. Dante was angered. Most of those men were friends. Lads Dante had known since their induction into the ranks of the Blood Angels from Baal Prime. He would suffer not this scorn. Ed's squad that suffered the TS moved back and fired bolters at my speeder but only 4 were in range and only 1 glanced, I made my cover save. Nothing could assault so turn 3 ended.

BA 1, Sal 0

Turn 4:
This turn would see some bloodshed. Dante, nearly engulfed by the Black Rage at the sight of all his dead battle brothers ordered the Vindicator to move and fire point black into Vulkan's squad. He moved to assault immediately, while the Baal came up behind to lend support fire. None shall survive. Assault marines deployed from their rhinos to assault the first tactical squad and the Furioso dreads moved up to counter charge his Iron Clads who had moved into assault range this turn. The speeder moved to safety again while the attack bike took a shot at a pod and missed. The Lascannon marine ran and embarked into the Veteran squads rhino that they left empty for them. He would spend the rest of the battle lamenting the loss of his entire squad. He earned a purity seal for surviving. Coordinating the ordinance blast from the Vindicators demolisher cannon, Dante ordered the commander to fire. The shot landed true, the blast seared the dust from Dante's artificer armor. I rolled 11 wounds, one for each member of the squad including Vulkan. 10 died instantly in the blast, and Vulkan, looking to Dante for forgiveness as he saw the error of his ways, turned to ash when his Iron Halo failed to save him. Sorry Vulkan, there is no forgiveness, there is only the Emperor. You have been vindicated. With the infantry dead, Dante and the Baal fired on their pod but failed to destroy it. In the assault my troops assaulted and killed all but one of his other tactical squad, losing 3 battle brothers in the process. He failed leadership and escaped me, but I consolidated close to him.

On Ed's turn, his last pod wold come in right in the middle of my back ranks. He opened up on my speeder, again, with his squad, and this time killed it. His Clads moved up and opened fire. One on my assault squad chasing his last man, and one on a rhino. They killed 2 marines and knocked the gun off the rhino. In the assault, only the one that shot the Rhino could get in because I pulled off the marines in reach of the other. It assaulted and exploded my rhino, earning Ed's second kill point.

Blood Angels 3kp, Salamanders 2kp.

Turn 5:
I went for the killing blow on this turn, expecting to roll a 1 at the end and finish the game. I disembarked the DC to assault his last infantry squad that just killed the speeder. Corbs stayed inside the Rhino, which moved to support the assaults with his Furious Charge. Dante also moved to support the assaults with his preferred enemy and death mask. My bike would move and fire on another pod, failing to hurt it. The Vindicator fired on a pod, destroying it and the Baal would fire on the last infantry squad, killing a couple. In the assault, each of my Furioso would pick an IronClad and face off. They each rolled +3 attacks, for a total of 7 on the charge. Sadly for Ed they got Preferred Enemy AND Furious Charge. That let them go first and reroll misses. One IC exploded and the other had its Hammer ripped off and was stunned. My tactical squad assaulted the last of the marines and lost combat, but did not break. The DC assaulted his other squad, killing a couple but not overwhelming them. I suffered no losses.

Ed would have little luck on his turn. He shot little and killed nothing. In the assault, his other IC would die, and his infantry would fall back from the attack of the Death Company. I let them go, knowing I would wipe them out next turn with Furioso, Dante, corbs and DC if I had to.

End of turn 5:
Blood Angels 6kp, Salamanders 2
Time to roll the die... result? A 2. Of course. :) Game ends, victory for the Blood Angels.

MVP of the game for the BA? Vindicator. Its point blank shot right on Vulkan and his Vets, killing them all, was a devastating blow.
MVP for Salamders? Drop Pod assault. His last 3 pods coming in right in the middle of my ranks really changed my strategy. Sadly their passengers would almost all die immediately, but they could have seriously changed the game.

I felt bad for mowing down Ed's guys like that, especially when I assaulted and destroyed his Dreads with them unable to get in a shot. But thats what happens when you enter the maw of the beast! The new marine codex has allowed marines to field a mere shadow of the might that is the Furioso Dreadnought. But they arent quite there. That extra d3 attacks makes a BIG difference!

I will have to keep them in the list... for now.