Campaign game report - Adeptus Minneapolis

Doc Railgun makes an appearance! Always happy to have your stuff Doc. :) Jawaballs

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Recently, I played a game in my game club's monthly campaign - 1850 points, Orks vs Blood Angels.

Orks -
2 squads of biker boyz, a squad of nobz on bikes, Wazzdakka, Lootas in a Battlewagon with a KIllkannon.

Blood Angels -
A jump Librarian
4 x 5 Assault Marines with a melta and power fist and a Sanguinary Priest, each squad in a Razorback with TL Lascannons
a Librarian Dreadnought w/ a heavy flamer
a Vindicator with a Siege Shield and a storm bolter and extra armor
2 Baal Predators with heavy bolter sponsons
an autocannon Predator with lascannon sponsons
(I had an extra 50 points due to the campaign situation)

It was a Dawn of War deployment with 1 objective each.

The Orks won initiative, but chose to defer.
Turn 1 -
The Angels all stayed in reserve.
The Orks put down a biker squad, the biker boyz, and Wazzdakka. They all turbo-boosted as they moved, even though the BAs would not come in that turn. The second boyz squad came in, and the Battlewagon.

Turn 2 -
3 of the 4 Assault squads came in, 1 Baal, the jump Librarian, the Vindicator, and the Librarian Dreadnought.
The Baal outflanked on the Ork's right, 2 of the Razorbacks moved on 12" also on their right. The Vindicator moved on 12" directly into cover, the Dreadnought followed it on along with the last Razorback. The jump Librarian came in via Deepstrike just behind the Battlewagon.
All the Razorback lascannons fired on the Battlewagon hoping to keep the Deffrolla from running over all the Marines' vehicles, but all missed or did no damage. The Vindicator fired its cannon and killed several biker boyz. The Baal opened up on the same set of boyz and also killed several.

The Lootas inside the 'wagon blew the assault cannon turret from the Baal, one squad of bikers moved to fire on and assault it after but not otherwise hurting it. A second squad turned to cut down the Librarian in a hail of dakka and the nob bikerz revved toward the Vindicator and Dreadnought.

Turn 3 -
The rest of the BA reserves came in - the second Baal on the Orks left, the autocannon Predator and the last Razorback came in on the BA right near the objective in their deployment zone. The first Baal and a Razorback moved forward to tank shock the nearest biker squad, chasing it off the board. The Vindicator and Dreadnought stayed put, trying to draw the Nobz towards them away from the objective. A Razorback lascannon managed a lucky shot and destroyed the Battlewagon while the Vindicator ignored the Nobz while finishing off the Lootas hunkered down in the Battlewagon wreckage. The remaining Razorback lascannons and the Predator's weapons fired at the second boyz squad, killing a few.

The bikers and nobz zoomed forward again, hoping to get to grips with the BA vehicles where they would be vulnerable, but the biker nobz were loathe to assault into cover with the Dreadnought so close and able to countercharge. Instead, Wazzdakka shot and killed the Vindicator, making a crater of it. The bikers did manage to immobilize a Razorback.

Turn 4 -
A squad of Marines disembarked on their own far right near their objective, their transport rolling forward to make it more difficult for the nob bikers to get to their objective, as did the Predator. The two Razorbacks in the middle moved forward as well and the vehicles on the BA left rolled towards the remaining biker boyz along with a now-disembarked Assault squad. Rather than assault the nobs, the Dreadnought moved toward the boyz as well. Most of the firepower on the BA left and center whittled down the bikers and the Dreadnought assaulted them with the Assault squad. Though several of the Marines died, the Dreadnought was able to run down the biker squad after their failed their morale check. It was able to consolidate towards the wreckage of the Vindicator nearby to prepare for the coming Nob assault. All the remaining Blood Angel firepower rained down on the nobz, but their cybork parts or cover saves protected them all.

The nobz swerved to their right, hoping to preserve a draw by holding their own objective, while Wazzdakka split off to shoot at the Baal moving to try to shoot them in the rear, managing to kill it with his kustom weapon. The nobz shot at and assaulted the few disembarked Marines, but only one died.

Turn 5 -
An Assault squad disembarked from a Razorback in the center, hoping to assault Wazzdakka, the other Razorback moving all out to get between the nobz and their objective. The Dreadnought charged the Nobz after the Marines were finished shooting at the orks. Several nobz fell, along with Wazzdakka. 3 Marines died in the Assault (leaving only the power fist-wielding sergeant alive), but the Marines also killed 3 Nobz, leaving only 4.

The assault continued on the Ork turn, they managed to kill the last Marine but the dreadnought killed 2 of them. The Orks gamely fought on.

Turn 5 -
The disembarked Blood Angels assaulted the last few Nobz, between them and the dreadnought finishing them off in the ensuing melee.

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What did I learn?
Reserving everything allowed me to keep the fast bikers guessing where to go. The high speed Angel tanks were able to tank shock to good effect as well as threatening both objectives while keeping to an advantageous position to fire from. The Vindicator drew the interest I hoped it would and even got off a couple of useful shots. I didn't think this army would do well against all those bikers, but my firepower knocked down their numbers to set up the tank shock to chase the lower LD orks from the board.

It was (as usual) a fun game against a great opponent.

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