Epic 4K: Thousand Sons vs Iyanden - 2 battles

Two battles a couple of weeks ago, only just got around to getting these pictures up now though. By random chance of army selection it ended up being two battles with lots of 'ghost' warriors on both sides. I.e. troops who are effectively spirits in robotic constructs/armour. Thousand Sons vs Iyanden. Lots of armour and Fearless ability.

Here's the Thousand Sons list I used for both battles:

Incompertus, 3975 POINTS
Thousand Sons (6.0.2)
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RUBRIC FELLOWSHIP [370]
Sorcerer, 6 Thousand Sons Marines units., 2 Rhino, Land Raider

RUBRIC FELLOWSHIP [370]
Sorcerer, 6 Thousand Sons Marines units., 2 Rhino, Land Raider

WARP PALACE OF TZEENTCH [550]

SILVER TOWER COMPANY [360]
4 Silver Tower

SCARAB OCCULT [450]
5 Thousand Sons Adeptus, Daemon Prince of Tzeentch

AHRIMAN'S CHOSEN [450]
Sorcerer, 9 Thousand Sons Marines units. All have the Teleport ability

DOOMWING FIGHTERS [150]
3 Doomwing Fighters

DOOMWING FIGHTERS [150]
3 Doomwing Fighters

DOOMWING FIGHTERS [150]
3 Doomwing Fighters

SEKHMET DISC RIDERS [325]
Sorcerer, 9 Disc Riders

SEKHMET DISC RIDERS [325]
Sorcerer, 9 Disc Riders

SEKHMET DISC RIDERS [325]
Sorcerer, 9 Disc Riders

First game was against Tim using an Iyaden army list which looked as follows, with two big units of mounted Wraithguard, Revenants, Wraithlords, and supporting formations...

Unfortunately I forgot to take photos of the game!! But it was closely fought and an eventual 4th turn tiebreaker on victory points, which went to the Thousand Sons with 2220 points to the Eldar 1845 points.

The next game was against Andrew, also using an Iyanden list, as follows:

		Avatar
375		Ghost Warriors, 4 Wraithguard + Wraithseer
575		Ghost Warriors, 5 Wraithguard + Spiritseer, 5 Wave Serpents
475		Ghost Warriors, 4 Wraithguard + Spiritseer, 4 Wave Serpents
475		Ghost Warriors, 4 Wraithguard + Spiritseer, 4 Wave Serpents
475		Ghost Warriors, 4 Wraithguard + Spiritseer, 4 Wave Serpents
300		4 Falcons, 2 Fire Storms
250		3 Falcons, 2 Fire Storms
250		3 Falcons, 2 Fire Storms
175		3 Night Spinners
175		3 Night Spinners
175		3 Night Spinners
100		4 Rangers
100		4 Rangers
100		4 Rangers

Turn 1

Here was set up of the second game.

Both sides moved to contest the centre of the table. Here my Warp Palace blasts a grav tank formation.

Wraithguard and Chaos Marines contest the central terrain features.

Doomwings manage to destroy a couple of Wave Serpents.

A Thousand Sons formation is broken and falls back. Formations aim to setup for winning assaults in the following turn. Silver Towers fail to activate.

The other flank.

After rallies. Aircraft disengages are catastrophic for the Chaos with 5 of 9 Doomwings being destroyed by 2 Firestorms despite their jinking, invulnerable saves, and the -1 to shooting on disengage moves. Damn.

Turn 2

I teleport the Scarab Occult and Chosen near the Iyanden Blitz objective, win Strategy Roll and engage. Disaster. Four chosen are blasted down by overwatch fire from the Wraithguard formation, breaking the formation. Follow up assault from the Occult also loses. 900 points of Chaos effectively neutralised, and now the rest of the Iyanden army is free to do as it pleases.  I usually fight on, but after such a disastrous 'all the eggs in one basket' event like this I decide to concede this one.

Conclusion

One win, one loss from these games, though in both games my teleport assaults were not fabulously executed. And naturally I forgot to photograph the hard fought turn 4 game rather than the turn 2 lemon game.

The plan in the second game was to knock out the Iyanden backfield of Supreme Commander and 2-3 of the weaker grav tank formations in the first activations second turn. Then take a couple of punches, isolate the Wraithguard and destroy their transports. However the Wraithguard overwatch shooting was accurate, and my saves (admittedly crossfired) were terrible, and then when I did assault I only killed a single Wraithguard stand.  My fault for initiating an over-optimistic assault. Thousands Sons armour is something I've got so used to that I forgot what a crossfire from macro-weapons can do if they manage to hit! And how tough Wraithguard are. Ah well, lessons learned for next time.

Minigeddon 1K Orks vs Guard

Minigeddon is a way to learn the basic rules of epic, with a small 1000 point force on a 80cm by 120cm table, and a range of smaller formation sizes. More details about Minigeddon here.

I played Paul of Painting Little Soldiers blog a couple of weekends ago, to provide a an introduction to the rules. We played Imperial Guard vs Orks, swapping sides after the first game. Imperial Guard won both times.

Epic 4K: Fir Iolarian Titan Clan vs Imperial Fist Successor

Another very quick game with me using Titan clan against Marines again. Tiny activation count on my part, but all very solid, how would that work?

Fir Iolarion Titan Clan 4.2.1 (3975 points)
Phantom Titan with Pulsar and Starcannon, Autarch (850)
Phantom Titan with Pulsar and Starcannon (775)
2x Revenant Titans with Pulsars (750)
2x Revenant Titans with Pulsars (750)
Wraithlord Troop with Spiritseer (350)
Spaceship (150)
Avatar (Free)

Imperial Fist Successor List

150	4 Scouts, 2 Bunkers, 50 cm Trenches
150	4 Scouts, 2 Bunkers, 50 cm Trenches
150	4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos
150	4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos
150	4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos
400	6 Tacticals + Supreme Commander, Rapier, 4 Rhinos
275	6 Tacticals, 3 Rhinos
325	4 Predator Annihilator, Hunter
425	6 Whirlwinds
325	Bastion + Techmarine, 4 Thudd Guns
325	Bastion + Techmarine, 4 Thudd Guns
325	Bastion + Techmarine, 4 Rapiers
200	2 Storm Talons
650	Reaver Titan

Battlefield and Deployment

Here's the setup. Marines have fortifications spread across the table once more.

My very limited looking Eldar forces...

First activations. Revenants take some fire but break a Scout formation on the left flank.

A phantom kills another couple of scouts on the right flank.

Eldar set up to assault the right flank Take and Hold Objectives. Wraithlords break under fire but being fearless hold where they are.

Weight of Marine numbers is breaking Eldar formations purely with Blast Markers...

Turn 2

Avatar is summoned to lead assault on the Marine position, and knocks away the first formation in his way.

Phantom comes over to support, but takes fire and loses its holofields.

Things don't go well - all Eldar formations are broken at end of turn 2, and many are badly damaged!
Too many Marine formations mean everything is just getting suppressed!

All formations except the Phantom rally.

But... marines win Strategy Roll and after first couple of activations we both agree that the Eldar don't have a chance with so many suppressed and damaged formations. I concede.

Conclusion

Well that was the most one-sided game in a while. Expensive Eldar formations, that are extra expensive with present changes to the Titan Clan list. It is difficult to play a titan heavy list against a "popcorn' army with many cheap formations. My list would be better with some cheaper activations. However I think the Titans themselves (the Revenants especially) are too costly at the moment.

(EDIT: And as was pointed out to me on Tac-com, I was short 375 points in this game! Oops! That's what happens when I try to use my brain to add numbers rather than Army Forge!)

Vanguard Tramplers

More Skinnerz, these are Tramplers from Vanguard. Big orky death machines, I'll use them as Stompaz for my Epic Orks.

Some Skinnerz armies deploy medium sized Mechs known as Tramplers, fearsome at range, in close combat they are terrifying. Their pilots are protected by personal force shields that deflect incoming weapons fire so long as their engines provide enough power.

Vanguard Skinnerz

Epic Armageddon is a 6mm Scifi game (originally by Games Workshop) now grown by an international community of players, with a central resource site at www.net-armageddon.org.

In recent years several 6mm Sci-fi companies have produced figures that make great units for the game, and mean that new players can get started easily. The following are 'Defeat in Detail Skinnerz', that I am using as Orks for Epic Armageddon. They are available from Vanguard Miniatures who recently purchased the line.

These Trucks are probably my favourite of the Skinnerz models so far. They come in packs of 4 with 4 different tops and 4 different wheel bases, so mixing them up you get 16 different ramshackle trucks.

For all these models I went with simple painting scheme. Undercoat black. Drybrush gunmetal, and then drybrush some silver. Paint some red bits, paint some white bits. Paint the crew and then wash the whole thing with Dark Tone ink from Army Painter. Pretty quick, which is what I want when I'm painting a lot of them!

I might add some brown wash later to rust up bits of them, as I notice the metal looks pretty pristine in these photos!

Next are Flame Vectors.

Huge fuel tank and flamethrower on tracks, what could go wrong?

And then super-heavies. Beasts (Battlefortresses) in the back row and Gunwagons in the front. I took the turrets off the Gunwagons and stuck them on the Beasts, and the top hatch from the Beasts and stuck them on the Gunwagons. Because I want to use the Gunwagons as Battlewagons (transports).

Here's all the Skinnerz (Orks) painted so far.

 And lastly some Novan Light Walkers, that I will use as Sentinels with my Imperial Guard.

Note: This is a duplicate post of that in the Analogue Painting Challenge.