Emperor's Children versus Iron Warriors: 1000 points BatRep

Yesterday evening at TSA I took on Nemesis in a battle of 1000 points, putting my trusty Legion in the field against the second one he is building next to his Death Guard, the Iron Warriors.

It was also the first time we played with the Tactical Objectives cards, in the scenario Spoils of War.

I fielded the same list as I did a few weeks ago versus the Orks, in the form of an Exalted Champion and a Sorcerer for HQ choices.  The 3 required Troops slots in the chart where made up of a fully equipped Marines squad, a small 5 man Marines squad, and a blob of 20 Cultists with flamer and stubber.  A Helbrute was the only Elite choice, while my 3 Heavy Support choices where filled out with the Rapier Quad Bolter, a Twin lascannon Predator and a small Havoc squad of a lascannon and 3 plasma guns.

The Iron Warriors faced me with the Heavy Support chart, bringing along a Lord in Terminator armour and a Sorcerer as HQ's.  The lone troop choice was a 20 strong, double Heavy Stubber cultist squad, while the three Heavy Support choices consisted of 2 fully equipped Havoc squads and a Forgefiend.

The table was set up, and deployment resulted in opposing quarters of the table.

Now, my Tactical Objectives turned out to be a bit of all eggs in one basket, as I got 2 cards that granted me extra points for killing his Warlord, and the Chaos one you get for manifesting a Psychic Power.  Nemesis managed to pull out cards that gave him points for capturing objectives mostly... and then to put insult to injury, those in his deployment zone...

As such, he immediately parked his Cultists on the first objective, scoring him his first point as he got first turn.  His shooting however was pretty abysmal, as only 3 cultists didn`t live to tell the tale.

My first turn was a bit more effective on that front, hitting his Cultists and shooting some Havocs off the tower.  The manifestation of Delightfull Agonies grabbed me my first victory point of the game as well.  It is to say, that was actually the only power I managed to cast, Prescience, which had served me so well against the Orks, never came through, nor did the one attempt at Smite later in the game.

In his second turn, he grabbed another objective for a card he just drew.  While he dwindled down the Cultists some more, he managed to shoot down the Predator this turn.  This resulted in him grabbing the points for both First Blood in the scenario, as well as for killing something as well, and putting him in a solid lead.

My turn on the other hand saw the Marines arrive to slug it out with the Cultists, supported by my own religious fanatics and the Exalted Champion following to the slaughter.

In his third turn, he withdrew his Cultists with the Stratagem, and have them reappear at the table edge.  While this caused his objective to now be claimed by me and give me a single victory point for the Claim card, that meant I had to face a gunline as his Warlord "tactically redeployed" away from my Marines and next to the Cultists.

Turn four and the forces are being spread thin.  While I did hurt his fiend badly in the previous shooting phase, it healed back from 1 to 2 wound remaining, and while his Havoc squad had suffered losses, it was still in the game with it`s Lascannon.
I needed to advance to his lord, and while I first fired some bolter rounds into his Cultists, I managed to get the few surviving Marines in contact, while my single surviving Cultist ducked for cover.
However, with the addition of some good objectives, I managed to pull into the lead for the first time in this game.

The perhaps final turn saw two very depleted forces face off, as he shot down my Exalted Champion who had previously slaughtered the Cultists.  I had killed off his Forgefiend, but his returning Havoc fire made short work of the Helbrute, and took down two of my Havocs.  But the Exalted yielded him a victory point for dying...

By my fifth turn, I had his lord facing off against my sole Power Fist wielding champion, so I had to charge in the Sorcerer as well.  That still 2 wounds left lord needed to die if I wanted to secure the win, as he would grant me between 3 to 5 points.  I eliminated his Havoc squad on the tower in the shooting phase, but then battle began... and thank Slaanesh for the Emperor's Children legion trait.  The Sorcerer did nothing at all, but the champion managed to get a power fist swing through, and inflict the final 2 wounds.  The roll gave me +1 VP, combined with the scenario rule and the other card nailing me 3 points total for him.

In the after phase he got one more point for controlling more hold cards then me, while I grabbed an extra point for having models in his deployment zone.  The total result was as such 9 to 7 in favour of the sons of Fulgrim!

Not many went home that day though.  He had his Sorcerer left unscathed, with a Havoc squad that took 1 casualty so far.  I was facing him off with my Sorcerer, a lone Power fist Marine, a single cultist with a flamer, 3 Havocs consisting of a lascannon and 2 plasma guns, and the small marine squad... but he had rolled not enough for another turn, which I doubt I would have held out against if the battle endured.  But I guess my "unit of the match" must have been that Tactical Squad, who together with the Agonies power just didn`t die fast enough for him to have free reign on that section of the table.

But decadence prevailed over logical thinking this evening!