Battle Report: Jawaballs BA vs Salamanders

I played a game last night...

1850. My three ven dread list with a Vindicator added in.
Mission: Kill Points
Deployment: 12" table edge

He had Vulkan, 5 TH/SS Terms, three 10 man tacticals, a rhino, a vindicator, 2 squads of speeders with 3 Multi meltas and a venerable dread with ass cannon.

I won the roll to go first and passed him the honor. He deployed along the entire edge of the board, placing a tactical in either corner and one next to his Vindicator on the right side. his LR was in the middle. I deployed my entire force in my left corner, effectively eliminating his Vindicator and a tactical squad from the game.

Then I seized the initiative, and rolled a 6! :)

Turn 1:
I go first and move up my Baal Preds from behind cover and open up on the tactical squad in cover on the left. Yet another opponent was shocked to see the effectiveness of a Baal Pred an I had to show him the rules. And he even has a BA army! :) He had the codex printed out. I only killed a few marines though. I shot my las cannons at his Vindicator, but missed. I moved a rhino with a combat squad up the left flank to go assault his squad in the left corner. The captain was in that rhino. My bikes moved up to support my tanks.

On his turn, he moved up his Land Raider 12" and fired a lascannon with Machine spirit at one of my preds, but failed to damage it. He moved up his Vindicator to almost range. He also moved over his rhino to try to get them into the fight. He moved his ven dread into the cover on the left to protect his squad.

Turn 2:
I moved up my preds again, but one stalled. They opened up on his tactical squad and killed some more. They would make their leadership. I moved up my rhino again and hid it from LoS. Next turn I would disembark and assault his squad survivors. One of my pods came in this turn, and I dropped it right in front of his Land Raider. But it scattered 10" back towards my own squad. The dread got out, but was out of double pen range, and did not hurt the Land raider. But that shot did not matter because my vindicator drew a bead on the massive tank, and destroyed it. Now his termies were on the table. My two lascannons fired at his Vindicator, and immobilized it. It was out of range to do anything else the rest of the game.

On his turn, he moved up his termie squad and assaulted my dreadnought, destroying it. Not much i can do against 8 penetrations. None of his speeders came in this turn, his guns were silenced, I was about to assault his squad in the ruins, and his terminators were on foot. It seemd at this point that the game would be easily mine...

Turn 3:
I disembark my rhino and break off my commander. The squad goes in and assaults the remaining 5 marines in cover. The capt goes out to fire his combi melta at the dread, and immobilizes it. In the process though, he got dangerously close to the termies. I would pay for that. But I was prepared to sacrifice him. I wanted them to assault and kill him, so that I could get another round of shooting them with my preds. I know from experience it takes at least two rounds to kill the squad with my two preds. This turn, I opened up on them, but failed to kill a single one! Yuck... so much for my plan. One more of my dreads came down and it got out and shot at his rhino from behind... but missed. My vindicator opened up on the rhino and blew off its gun. My lascannons opened up and one missed and the other caused a Shaken result. The damn thing would not die! That would cost me more then I could know. My combat squad assaulted the squad in cover, and it was a drawn combat. I did set up one of my bikes to protect my vindicator, it would act as a speed bump for the squad coming at me.

On his turn travesty struck. He deep striked his first squad of speeders into a key position. They scattered onto terrain. Not a terrible thing, but he was forced to roll two dangerous terrain tests... snake eyes. Since they were a squad, they were both destroyed. What horrible luck! He almost threw in the towel right there but trooped on like a champ. Then he assaulted my commander with his termies and vulkan and killed him as expected. His squad on the right was able to draw range to my pod with a multi melta, and destroyed it. His tactical squad disembarked, moved shot at and assaulted my bike. But failed to kill it. He moved up his rhino next to them to try to block LoS if they wiped out the bike. Lucky for him, he did not. Very lucky for him. My vindicator was lined up for a perfect shot! The assault in the corner was grinding down... drawn again. But he had the edge now. I would not las long.

Turn 4:
The game at this point looked like a complete victory for me. I honestly thought I was about to wipe him off the table, save for a single tactical squad.

I open up on his squad of termies with every thing I had. I killed all the termies and left Vulkan standing there. My two death company models came on and moved to assault the squad that had my bike locked up. My last dread came down and I dropped it next to the squad in cover on the left, and next to the dread. He got out and shot at the dread, blowing off the CCW arm. My second dread that came down assaulted and destroyed his vindicator.

The assault still going on in the terrain on the left wore on. I was down to my Sgt, he was down to his sgt and a melta gunner. In the middle, he shifted his focus to the death company models that joined the assault. But no one managed to cause a single wound. It was a pillow fight! My vindicator destroyed his rhino.

On his turn, vulkan assaulted and killed a bike. He would be responsible for racking up three kill points with the help of his termies. But that would end next turn I hoped, he was about to dive into my las can squads. He killed my sgt, and I managed to kill his, leaving just a melta gunner in the terrain. He also killed off my two DC models with his power sword, scoring two more kill points. (see where I'm going with this?)

Turn 5:
Quickly looking at the table, we both agreed that I had the game. Neither of us noticed him silently piling up the kill points. My dread assaulted the melta gunner and scored the KP. My tanks mowed down Vulkan. The rest of my guns opened up on his speeders that made it down safely last turn but failed to hurt any thing. I destroyed one. My other combat squad, still in it's rhino, disembarked and assaulted the bogged down mess in the middle, trying to save the bike. But it mattered not, I lost two members of the squad and the bike. That was one kick ass tactical squad! I easily should have killed it twice with all the attacks I gave it. At the end of my turn, it was still 5 men strong, and up against my 3 marines. I should have just left it alone and let it kill my bike, then erupted on them with my fire power.

He moved his speeder over and popped my rhino, picking up another KP, which would be the last one of the game. The turn ended with the assault still locked up in the middle. He had 4 marines left there, 10 in the corner, an immobizlied and weapon destroyed dread, and a single speeder left. I rolled the die, actually wanting the game to go on... but of course rolled a 2 and ended it.

After counting up the kill points, we both looked at board dumbfounded... he won the game... 8kp to 7. I still had a huge amount of stuff on the table. Three combat squads, three tanks, two pods and two dreads... easily enough to wipe him out... but that was it. The game was over.

Splitting out my commander from the CS hurt me. I should have kept him in, and fed Vulkan a bike that he would have gotten any way. Then My captain could have helped wipe out the tactical squad in a hurry and move on. Instead I lost them both.

There was little I could actually learn from the game however. I made a few moves that I would not have made in a tournament, but nothing really game breaking. In the end, it came down to him taking advantage of my biggest weakness... my pods and bikes coughing up kill points. Oh well... next time Jim! Sorry, no pics or vid this time. It was the first time I was playing Jim and did not want to bust that stuff out.

More to come...

Jawaballs