The Map

   The adventurers have journeyed around the frontiers of the Outlands.  While the Human Lands are just to the east and north, their quests have carried them through lands that most people only hear of in stories.

  Of course, context in necessary, so the rest of the world: 

The Word versus the Xenos

   The alien swarm descended from their hovering hive-ships, code-named Leviathan by the Ordos Xenos, to carpet the planet below.  They only thought of devouring and chewed their way through everything they found, from long-lost ruins to verdant, untamed forests.  The scant population that tried to put up a resistance was now little more than a forgotten meal for these creatures.  First had come the streaks in the sky and later reports of towering shadows slaughtering people with vicious claws.  Then came the silent rain of pussey balls that unleashed millions of canine-sized beats to swarm over everything.  Finally, massive pods of pulsating flesh and tentacles fell from the sky and heralded the arrival of the massive aliens- taller than tanks and able to rip through even the strongest of walls.  The terror and gore was swift and now the surface of the planet simply suffered its scouring.

  The call for aid was answered by the Blood Angels chapter of Astartes- Captain Raldeo leading his strike force to stem the alien tide.  The arrival of the Space Marines meant certain victory for the residents of the world, but it was too late.  Now the Blood Angels hunt for the apparent mastermind for the xenos- the Terror of Vardenghast.  Coincidentally, another force came to this backwater world seeking revenge for a recent defeat.  Zarkan and his possessed band followed the loyalists and planned for a brutal punishment, but instead encountered their prey- the Terror.  

  The alien swarm saw only the red colour of the enemy.  They had already been defeated and another generation created because of Raldeo's efforts.  But this was a different red- darker, colder, and covered in spikes. It mattered not to the creatures, even if a brief flicker of vengeance crossed the Terror's mind.  The same opponent again is the same as another opponent first- they're all tasty!

Mission and Deployment

  In this battle, each player gains 5 victory points for each objective marker they control, or 10 points for each objective marker they 'raze'.  Razing the objective means it can no longer generate victory points, so decisions on timing will have to be made.  

  The forces involved are the Chaos Space Marines and Tyranids, led by Zarkan and the Terror of Vardenghast respectively.  We've used these forces before, so nothing revolutionary for this battle.  After all, you can't change the army lists in Combat Patrol.

Master of Possession (Zarkan), 5 Possessed, 10 Marines, 10 Cultists

Winged Prime (the Terror), 3 Leapers, 5 Barbguants, 20 Termagants, Psychophage

  Zarkan deployed his forces across the battlefield, with the Cultists hiding in the woods to the right and the Legionnaires screening the Possessed in the middle.  Those sneaky xenos like to ambush things...

  The Tyranids split the mob of Termagants into two and carpeted the left side of the field, following the infiltrating Leapers.  The monstrous Psychophage took up the center and the Barbgaunts took up a firing position from the left flank, enjoying the cover of a crater.  

starting positions

Round 1

  The Tyranids rolled to took first turn.  Instinctually, the horde moved foward, with the gants and Barbgaunts moving up to claim objective points and unleash their living ammunition against the marines.  The fire was so accurate that it dropped two and suppressed them just in time for the Leapers to advance from the shadows and charge.  The Chaos Marines tried to overwatch, but they failed to wound any and their prayer to beseech the dark gods failed and killed one of themselves.  When the Leapers finished their slaughter, they had killed three more marines and only lost one of their own.  It was a level of brutality that took the heretics by surprise.

  Still in shock, the Chaos Marine squad fired their pistols and killed another Leaper, but the plasma pistol exploded in the champion's hands and took him out of action as well.  Apparently, the dark gods weren't on the side of these marines!  They prayed again as they tried to fight their way out, but failed to cause any damage as all but one of their number were destroyed.  

  Hoping for any turn of luck, Zarkan and his Possessed moved up to engage the Terror, using his witchfire to immolate the monster before his bodyguard hacked it to pieces, earning 12 victory points for slaying the warlord so quickly.  The Master of Possession consolidated into the skittering gants, then turned and ordered the Cultists to advance at the Psychophage, where they hesitantly stepped up into a screen and stared.  The order made no sense, but the Cultists wouldn't dare defy their leader.  

End Round 1- Tyranids 0, Chaos Marines 12

Round 2

  It was a great start for the Vardenghast Swarm.  While they lost the Terror very quickly, the 'scoring' unit for the enemy was nearly dead and the 'hammer' unit was now engaged in an unbalanced trade.  Better, the aliens held two of the objective points, gaining them 10 victory points right away.  The Leaper finished off the last Chaos Marine in the backfield, exposing their home objective point.  During that melee, one of the units of gants disengaged from the Cultists and moved to switch places with the Psychophage.  To support the maneuvre, the Barbgaunts unleashed their firepower to suppress the slow-moving Cultists and instead completely wiped them out, leaving the entire flank of the battlefield empty for them!  The Psychophage moved to charge the Possessed and support the other small unit of gants, combining to take one of the daemonkin down as five small creatures died and suffering two wounds.  

  The Word Bearers Chaos Space Marines had nothing left- only four of the Possessed and Zarkan.  But they were filled with rage and were focused on doing as much damage as they could.  The Master tried his psychic powers against the moster but failed.  Unperturbed, the Possessed lashed out and killed two more gants and wounding the Psychophage five more times.  But the surviving force couldn't score any points...

End Rd 2- Tyranids 10, Chaos Marines 12

Round 3

  Now came time for the final push for both sides.  The Leaper failed his Battleshock test, now unable to claim the Chaos home objective, but the Barbgaunts continued to rack them up and scored 5.  The unengaged Termagants moved to claim an objective and the Psychophage tried to take down a Possessed, failing to do enough damage and going down to the damonic onslaught.   

  Sensing an opportunity, Zarkan blasted the last gant and claimed that objective, earning the Chaos Marines 5 points, and then led his Possessed to attack the shocked Leaper.  Another Possessed fell, but the monster was cleared from that objective and the threat of losing by points was avoided.  

End Round 3- Tyranids 15, Chaos Marines 17

Rounds 4 and 5

  There wasn't much left for either side and the Chaos 'deathstar' of Possessed were now running rampant through the xenos.  It was time for the Tyranids to think strategically.  The gants Razed the objective they held, removing it from the battlefield, and the Barbgaunts continued their camping to earn a total of 15 victory points.  

  The Chaos Marines only held their home objective and gained 5 points, falling behind the xenos.  Desperate to gain as many points as possible, he and his bodyguard advanced toward the last unit of Termagants, blasting them with witchfire and charging to kill 7.  That leaves three to hold their objective and lock up the Word Bearers.  

End Round 4- Tyranids 25, Chaos Marines 22

  The xenos still held that objective- the gants have OC 2 each and 'outnumbered' the heretics, and the Barbgaunts still held theirs, earning the 'nids 10 more victory points.  The surviving gants retreated from the massive Possessed and allowed the Barbgaunts to open fire, killing one.  

  The heretics took the opportunity to Raze their newly claimed objective, earning ten more points, then charged the retreating gants and wiped them out.  The battle was left with only eight models on the field!  

End game- Tyranids 35, Chaos Marines 32

Conclusion

  That was brutal!  Zarkan's Deamonkin was not blessed at all the dice certainly showed it.  The Vardenghast Swarm was highly effective right from the beginning and made sure to keep the heretics on their toes, eliminating almost all their scoring ability despite the vicious Possessed-bomb.  But there was quite a bit of strategy involved for such a small battle and it was fun trying to overcome the bad luck.  

  My brother, my son, and I have all played our Combat Patrols twice.  After that quick 'Round-Robin', the Sanguinary Host is 2-0, the Vardenghast Swarm is 1-1, and my unloved Zarkan's Daemonkin are 0-2.  Have I mentioned how much I hate Chaos?  

As always- Happy Gaming!

Colours of the Word

   It's that time of the week again and I had to get some painting done.  My brother brought his Blood Angels to start the assembly-line for his Assault Intercessors, and I couldn't let that noob be more productive than me.  Plus, this is going to be my first completed Combat Patrol.  If I ever paint it, that is...

Step 1- um, build the models and stuff.  You'll notice the odd colour of the plastic- don't worry about that.  It's still the modelling material that takes primer and paint.  Speaking of primer- sand was added to the base and the models were spray-primed black.   

Step 2- overbrush silver.  I used Iron Warrior to keep the colours dark and then slapped it all over the models to base the metallic ares.  

Step 3- basecoat the red.  Again, I chose the dark version of the colour (Khorne Red) and then basecoated that onto the armour panels.  At first, I was going to paint the shoulder pads black, but I finally had to consider the decals for later and I needed to go back to repaint them red.  

going back a step before going forward to the next one...  Stoopid shoulder pads!

Step 4- basecoat black.  This was supposed to be the shoulder pads, underarmour, weapon casings, and belts and pouches.  The shoulder pads are now red, but everything else needed its colour.  Now the models are 'framed'.

Step 5- the brass!  I basecoated the golden bits with Screaming Bell.  This was really only the ammo belts and a couple of icon details or backpack vents.  Much like the Master of Possession, I chose to limit the colour palette and had to avoid the gold- silver is the secondary colour for these guys!

Step 6- a little fun- the bones and parchments needed their colour, so I basecoated all those items with Zhandri Dust.  This step is really supposed to be about re-basing the silvers, but I knew that would take some time and I wanted to have some fun.  Between the gold and bone, these models suddenly had some colour and started to please the eyes.  

That's it for now!  It's time to go back to the silver and then the washes (shading) begins.  But that's tedious, so that will be the next hobby post.

Happy Hobbying!

  

Blood Angels on pest control

Mission and Deployement

  This mission gives us points for controlling objective markers in no-mans-land and the enemy deployment zone.  Our deployments were the short edges across from each other.  The Blood Angels left a unit of Sanguinary Guard in reserves and placed the other one in a flanking position on the right, while their Captain and Intercessor squad mobbed up in the middle to react in either direction.  The Tyranids placed their big gun bugs to their right and further back to take advantage of the range and cover the advance of the Psychophage.  The Termagants and Winged Prime stuffed themselves into the rest of the deployment zone, and the Von Ryan's Leapers infiltrated behind the ruins to get the jump on the golden-armoured boys.  

The pieces are set

Blood Angels' zone

Tyranids zone

Round 1

  The Tyranids won the roll-off for first turn and immediately leapt foward.  The Psychophage trundled up to threaten the middle of the field while the skittering hordes around it moved up and opened fire.  The Barbguants fired long-range and killed one of the Intercessors, being the only effective shooting against the power armour.  The Winged Prime, also known as the Terror of Vardenghast, flew up to claim one of the objectives and ordered the Leapers to assault the marines.  Following their hive-mind imperative, they dashed up and started slicing the golden Sanguinary Guard, killing one and leaving a second one with only a wound left.  The survivors struck back and killed one of the infiltrating beasts in return.  

  The Blood Angels responded in their turn by choosing the Leapers as their Oath of the Moment and ordered their own assault.  The Intercessors strode forward and shot at the big monster in the middle, causing a couple wounds with the overcharged plasma pistol.  They then charged into the Leapers to support their Sanguinary Guard brothers, only for the xenos to fight first and kill off the rest of them.  But the red-armoured marines killed off the Leapers and re-established control of their side of the battlefield.  

Round 2

  The Tyranids received five points for the Terror holding an objective in no-man's land, to start the turn.  The monstrous Psychophage led the Barbguants forward to press the Imperial deployment zone and claim the other objective in the neutral area, and then unleashed their ammo into the Intercessors, bringing down a few.  The Terror charged in, leaving his objective for the Termagants to hold, and only brought down one more marine.  But this was enough to add more victory points.  Everyone attacked back and hacked down the xenos leader.

  The Blood Angels, sensing the momentum of the Tyranids beginning to wane, moved up to engage the horde of Termagaunts and killed 16 between bullets and chainswords.  While they were busy, the other unit of Sanguinary Guard dropped from the sky in the backfield, stealing the home objective from the aliens.  They had only scored four points, falling behind in the score so far.

Round 3

  Unfortunately, the Termagants failed their battleshock test after the brutal assault and couldn't score more points for the their objective.  Worse, the Terror of Vardenghast was gone, and so the xenos army couldn't score secondary objectives either.  They still racked up five more points for the Barbgaunts' efforts, and those gun-bugs turned their attention to the freshly-arrived Sanguinary Guard but only caused a couple of wounds.  The Intercessors and original unit of golden boys easily dispatched the Termagants but watched as the Psychophage advanced to take their home objective!

  The Blood Angels were now earning points like crazy- 15 points for holding an objective in no-man's land and another in the Tyranid deployment zone!  The Sanguinary Guard that just arrived stood their ground and took shots at the Barbguants, but failed to cause any real damage.  It didn't matter, they were scoring victory points (4 more for the secondary)!  Raldeo ordered the charge of his forces into the Psychophage, which chose to overwatch his acidic breath into the rushing horde, felling another of the golden-armoured attackers.  The Captain claimed his 'finest hour' rule, but failed to cause enough damage to the monster.  Now bleeding, the beast returned the favour and chomped down one of the Intercessors.  It would have been more without the Refuse to Bend strategem.  

Round 4

  The Tyranids were able to score 15 victory points for holding the objective in no-man's land and the Blood Angels home objective.  While this gave them the lead, their hunger was not yet sated.  The Barbgaunts used their Voracious Assault to unleash their living firepower on the rear Sanguinary Guard, causing 14 wounds!  After all the armour save, one golden boy fell.  On the other side of the battlefield, the beastly Psychophage continued to fight with the mob of marines, suffering a few more wounds as it took down two more Intercessors.  

  The Blood Angels were now in a perfect position, scoring 15 more points and retaking the lead by a wide margin.  The rear Sanguinary Guard continued to hold the Tyranid home objective and duel with the Barbguants.  The fight with the Psychophage resulted in the loss of more of the Intercessors and a little damage back.  But the outcome was becoming obvious.  

Round 5

  The Tyranids only gained 5 more victory points, now being outnumbered on the Blood Angel's home objective and losing control.  The Barbguants continued their barrage on the rear Sanguinary Guard, killing another and leaving only one remaining.  But it wasn't enough, as Captain Raldeo and a single Guard finished the massive beast on their own objective.  

Conclusion

  The Blood Angels only had Captain Raldeo and two Sanguinary Guard models left on the table, while the Tyranids still had an entire unit of Barbgaunts remaining!  But the final score was Tyranids 34, Blood Angels 61- Imperial Victory!

Happy Gaming!