Another Epic game. The Thousand Sons
Army Champion requested that I do a game using Daemons and Chosen formations, so that sounded like a challenge worth accepting!
Here's the list I used:
Incompertus, 4000 POINTS
Thousand Sons (6.1.1) (Actually now 6.2).
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RUBRIC FELLOWSHIP [370]
Sorcerer, 6 Thousand Sons Marines units., 2 Rhino, Land Raider
RUBRIC FELLOWSHIP [275]
Sorcerer, 6 Thousand Sons Marines units.
RUBRIC FELLOWSHIP [375]
Sorcerer, 6 Thousand Sons Marines units., Daemonic Pact, Icon Bearer, Champion of Tzeentch
SCARAB OCCULT [550]
5 Thousand Sons Adeptus, Daemon Prince of Tzeentch, Daemonic Pact, Champion of Tzeentch, Icon Bearer
AHRIMAN'S CHOSEN [450]
Sorcerer, 9 Thousand Sons Marines units. All have the Teleport ability
SILVER TOWER COMPANY [325]
4 Silver Tower
THOUSAND SONS ARMOR [200]
4 Predator
SEKHMET DISC RIDERS [350]
Sorcerer, 9 Disc Riders, Daemonic Pact
SEKHMET DISC RIDERS [325]
Sorcerer, 9 Disc Riders
SEKHMET DISC RIDERS [325]
Sorcerer, 9 Disc Riders
DOOMWING FIGHTERS [150]
3 Doomwing Fighters
DOOMWING FIGHTERS [150]
3 Doomwing Fighters
THOUSAND SONS DAEMON POOL [155]
Greater daemon (Lord of Change), 7 Lesser Daemons (Horror, Screamer, Flamer and Daemonic Beast units)
Andrew use his "
Ogre" army counting as Imperial Fists.
Pan-European Infantry Battalion (GEV-PC)
First Company (Battalion Command)
HQ Platoon, 4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos, Supreme Commander [250]
2nd Platoon, 4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos [150]
3rd Platoon, 4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos [150]
Second Company
HQ Platoon, 4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos, Captain [200]
2nd Platoon, 4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos [150]
3rd Platoon, 4 Scouts, 2 Bunkers, 50 cm Trenches [150]
Third Company
HQ Platoon, 4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos, Captain [200]
2nd Platoon, 4 Scouts, 2 Rhinos [150]
3rd Platoon, 4 Scouts, 2 Bunkers, 50 cm Trenches [150]
Support Group
Missile Tank Battery, 6 Whirlwinds [425]
Fire Base Alpha, Bastion, Techmarine, 4 Thudd Guns [325]
Fire Base Beta, Bastion, Techmarine, 4 Thudd Guns [325]
Fire Base Gamma, Bastion, Techmarine, 4 Rapiers [325]
Attached Ogre, Mark V
Reaver Titan [650]
Air Support
2 Storm Talons [200]
2 Storm Talons [200]
The Battle
Here's the battlefield setup. Both Strategy Rating 5 and Andrew won setup roll and chose corner deployment, favouring the top left in photo below. Imperial fortifications extend in depth in this area. Imperial Take and Hold objectives are in centre of table, and Chaos Take and Hold objectives are both in bottom left.
My deployment.
Imperial deployment.
I had used the old Epic40K Battlebook to generate terrain, and one of items was this electromagnetic storm which moved 2d6x5cm in a random direction each turn. Any formation passed over takes D3-1 blastmarkers. As it turned out it had no effect on the battle however!
Turn 1 and I teleport in my Chosen and Occult, but then I lose the strategy roll. I wanted to do an early assault to break the Titan, but with both of us being Strategy 5 this is a somewhat risky proposition. The Reaver is geared for an anti-tank rather than anti-infantry role though, so that at least was in my favour.
The Ogre (Reaver Titan) sustain fires into the Occult formation killing two of them. Two Scout formations then do a combined engage action on the Chosen with support of the Reaver and break them, though only killing one of them for loss of two Scouts.
My activation and the Occult summons all the Flamers, engaging and breaking the Reaver Titan, and do a point of damage to it, and also killing 3 Scouts in the combined engage action. 4 Flamers are lost.
Next I move one of my garrisoned Retinues to cover and close to the forward most bastion.
The rest of my forces advance, with air attacks doing some damage. We lose a plane each from each of our air formations this turn.
My Lord of Change is summoned by my third Retinue, and assaults and breaks a Scout formation in two rounds of combat.
Having advanced in the second round of combat, they consolidate forward into the ruins.
My Disk Riders sweep in annihilating Scout formations (this is now turn 2).
I decide to try and take the first bastion.
It is destroyed by my first Retinue with support from the third Retinue and the Lord of Change.
Overview, Daemon Prince has retreated to bottom left but has rallied. Scout formations continue to take heavy damage, my third Retinue is broken by Bastion and Artillery fire, and the Lord of Change is killed.
My Disk Riders take out Scouts but start to come under counter fire.
Looking from my left flank.
My Chosen still in the open but reinforced armour and fearless is serving them well and they have rallied.
Centre of the line.
The right, with only a single scout holding out here now.
Overview, end of turn 3.
Start of Turn 4. Only a few decimated scout formations are left, I've suffered quite a few casualties among the Disk Riders, but my Chosen and 1st Retinue are still in good shape, as are my Towers, and two Predators are still active. I have 4 Doomwings, and 2 Stormtalons are still alive. Two bastions and the Imperial artillery are still active.
I win Strategy roll finally. Chosen double over and 1st Retinue engages the Reaver with their support. The Reaver is broken again.
It drives down the road. More fire is exchanged.
End of turn 4, and still victory conditions are 0-0! We roll and go for a 5th turn.
I try and wipe out whatever I can get to, and stay out of artillery range. The Silver Towers drop the Reaver to half strength. Imperials also have 2 Bastions, their artillery, and 1 scout and 1 rhino left. I am somewhat better off. Thousand Sons win on victory points, 2325 to 1342.5!
Conclusion
A very hard fought game, with both sides wearing each other down, but the Scout heavy Imperial's unable to survive this battle of attrition as well as the Thousand Sons marines with their reinforced armour and fearless abilities. Post-game analysis Andrew guessed his deployment of Take and Holds might not have been the best, as they were easily reachable by me, and he was forced to effectively sacrifice Scout units to prevent me winning on Victory Conditions. I kept my less well armoured formations back and let the Retinues and Chosen take the bulk of fire, and ignored most of the Bastions and Artillery.
My first teleport assault was pretty risky, but didn't work out too badly in the end. Andrew might have done well to break my Occult formation perhaps, which ended up summoning 7 Flamers when it was just one blast marker off breaking. But tough choices as then the Chosen would have attacked and perhaps also smashed something.
Daemons, I'm not sure on. They definitely have some advantages, but sacrificing points and activations to use them in an army with already high costed formations isn't something I can see happening a lot of the time! Of course they worked well enough here, but an alternative might have done just as well. Doomwings flame cannons also turned out to be pretty useful with their Ignore Cover ability against the Scouts! Lack of effective ground AA is still a problem for Thousand Sons though.
