Monday, March 22, 2010

‘Ard Boyz Style Tournament 03-20-2010


I played in an 'Ard Boyz style tournament this weekend and took 3rd place. The lists were 2500 points and I took a full on World Eaters list.
My list:
HQ:
Kharn
Demon Prince w/MoK


Elite:
5 Chosen w/ Autocannon, Melta Gun, Flamer, IoCG

5 Chosen w/ Autocannon, Melta Gun x2, IoCG


Troop:
4x8 Khorne Berzerkers w/Skull Champ & Pfist, Rhino
2x10 Chaos Space Marines w/ Aspiring Champ &Pfist, 2x Melta, IoCG, Rhino


Heavy Support
3x Vindicator w/ Demonic Possession


Strategy:
Beat everything into submission. The Demon Prince was my anti-walker/anti-tank/Bullet Sponge.


Game 1: World Eaters vs Space Wolves

The mission was 5 objectives, one in the center and one in the center of each table quarter.
I played a goof fellow named Brad and in his list he had Logan Grimnar, two Rune Priests, 2 sets of terminators w/ assault cannons, 2 sets of long fangs, 3 set of grey hunters, and a group of scouts that outflanked. Everything but the scouts, who outflanked, were in drop pods. I barely glanced at his army list or even at his army after I deployed and moved on my first turn, then I noticed he had drop pods. All of my rear armor was exposed.
Strangely enough, he didn't get behind my vindicators and his shooting on his first turn was uneventful. His squad of grey hunters put a good hurt on my Chosen on one edge of the board.
On my turn (top of 2) the demon prince and a squad of Berzerkers got into position to assault some grey hunters. One of the terminator drop pods had scattered right in front of the vindicator wall and all but one lived after he made 3 invulnerable saves. The demon prince and berzerkers made quick work on the grey hunters squad, but a powerfist took out some berzerkers before the last one died on his turn.
On Brads turn he brought in some other stuff another long fangs and Logan Grimnar moved in to get close to the demon prince. His shooting killed the demon prince off leaving Grimnar open for the 6 berzerkers who took shelter.
Turn 3, the berzerkers moved in on Logan, shot bolt pistols at him, and the assault took him down, only removing one berserker. I positioned some vindicators, melted the lone terminator, shot at the other grey hunters.
Brad brought in another drop pod of terminators and a grey hunter squad, and again his shooting was ineffectual. Some berzerkers and a vindicator took out the grey hunters and the terminators that came from their drop pod were also vindicated. The CSMs I had shot and assaulted the last grey hunters squad and the two sets of berzerkers assaulted the other long fangs squad and rune priest wiping them out.
Time was short so brad got to finish his turn where pretty much all he had left was a long fangs squad. I think I finished the combats on his turn for all of his other troops and what not.
In the end I controlled 3 objectives and contested the rest, a massacre. Kharn and a squad of berzerkers never left their rhino. With bonuses I was at 22 points.


Game 2: World Eaters VS Slaanesh/Nurgle

Luck could not have been more in my favor. Of all the other games everyone else won a massacre and most of the bonus points putting them at 23. Because I had 22 I was at the back of the pack of the "winners". All of the losers had 0 points, except for one person who had 1 bonus point. Because of this I was to face the player with 1 bonus point. So that meant all of the others were playing seasoned veterans high on their glorious victories and I was playing an already demoralized opponent.
This mission had two moving objectives that scattered 4d6" every turn if a scoring unit was not within 3" at the start of every player turn. As luck would have it on turn 5 the objectives scattered within 6" of each other on turn 5 and I was able to spread and hold both objectives with a single troops choice.
The gentleman I played is named Ashton and he had a Terminator lord, 2 sets of terminators that were deep striking, 2 vindicators a Las/bolter predator, a nurgle demon prince with warptime, 3 squads of chaos space marines, and 1 squad of noise marines with a blastmaster, and 1 squad of plague marines. The only armor he had were the vindicators.
The first couple of turns was just moving. One of my vindicators put a hurt on some plague marine killing a couple. His vindicators did nothing as he shot at my vindicators as mine were possessed.
I don't recall all of the turn sequence and what happened in what order but here are the highlights. His plagues were wiped out by squad of berzerkers after being thinned out by a vindicator. I sacrifieced a CSM squad to be able to get my berzerkers into position and they brutally slaughtered the CSM when it was time.
One group of his terminators deep struck in and shot at a couple of things but did nothing. I moved a rhino in to be able to assault. On his turn he blew up the rhino and assaulted into the crater, going at initiative 1. The berzerkers still did a good job and tied them up until they were wiped out.
His other squad of terminators and chaos lord were a complete waste of points. They deep struck in and stunned a rhino. One vindicator swung around, fired with a direct hit, and wiped out all but one puny terminator, which was promptly melted. Oh what a world, what a world!
My vindicators blew up one of his and immobilized the other. I forgot to move the demon prince in to assault but on my next turn the demon prince was able to smash his last vindicator to bits then swooped over and did the same to his predator, and finally assisted in wiping out the blastmaster noise marine squad.
His demon prince was whittled down to one wound with the help of autocannons and Kharn's plasma pistol and was killed quite easily by a squad of berzerkers.
Of the 3 CSM squads he had two were killed by berzerkers and Kharn put all 7 of his attacks onto them wiping them out.
His last man survived while Kharn overheated and saved his plasma shot and a squad of 5 berzekers failed to cause any wounds, but then promptly pounded him into the dirt.
I completed wiped the board of Ashton's models and lost only 750 or so in victory points. I also obtained all of the bonus points to score 24 points and placing me in first place!


Game 3: World Eaters VS Orks
The game was Dawn of War, Annihilation.
I really wasn't looking forward to this game as I had never played orcs before. I played Topher who had two 30 man boyz squad with a nob leading them who had a power claw, two battle wagons and 3 or 4 trukks, 2x2 deffcoptas, and a squad of commandos. One of his HQs was a generic one and the other I don't remember. One of the boyz squads, lead by his other HQ, had feel no pain. Oh, there also two nobz squads, the ones with 2 wounds and they were all different, his other HQ was leading this squad.
I made too many errors this game. The vindicators lived only long enough to fire one shot. The berzerkers killed tons but couldn't survive the overwhelming number of powerclaws hitting back. The demon prince was smacked down with all of the ungodly amount of powerclaws, too. All I did this game was hang back and try and place my rhinos to be able to get the assault off and that didn't work out to well as I forgot/didn't pay enough attention to the battle wagons and trucks and they were able to move up, disembark, and cause some real damage. The Waagah didn't help either.


Results

I lost only to a major (or minor, I forget) victory. If either one of us had won this game with a massacre we would have gone on to win the tournament. That was not the case as I took 3rd, Topher took 2nd, and another fellow took first. I won $20 for my efforts, which is nothing to complain about!


Other Thoughts
I was very fortunate to be able to play the opponents in the beginning that I did. I feel that if I had more experience playing orcs I could have done better and would have used a different strategy. However, even with a great deal of more experience, a massacre and a win for the tournament would have been hard to pull off.
This was the first time I had used a Khorne Demon prince and he did pretty well for what I intended him for: acting as a bullet sponge and letting my other units get into place.
I spent a lot of time painting my Kharn model and several people gave me praise for my efforts.
I bought a drop pod with the money I won. I am going to use it for apocalypse games.

Friday, March 12, 2010

A List of Acceptable World Eaters Units from the Chaos Space Marine Codex


World Eaters have specific and strict guidelines as to what should be in the army list. Those are:

  • Units should be Khorne marked or have the ability to be Khorne marked wherever possible.
  • No magical spells or abilities can be used.
  • All World Eaters are "Berzerkers."
Given the above guidelines it is easy to see that there are a lot of units that cannot be used from the Chaos Space Marine codex to strictly play a World Eaters army. What also comes a long with that is a deficiency in adaptability. For example, in an army where all models were "Berzerkers" then almost no melta guns would be available.

A quick note on "All World Eaters are Berzerkers". This is some fluff from long ago and some may construe it that only Khorne Berzerkers can be used. To me this is not the case, but it means that all World Eaters have had the psycho-surgery to enhance aggressiveness that the codex mentions.

The following list are units in the Chaos Space Marine codex that, in my opinion, are acceptable to use in a strict World Eaters Army.

HQ
Kharn the Betrayer
Demon Prince (Khorne Marked)
Chaos Lord (Khorne Marked)
Chaos Terminator Lord (Khorne Marked)
Summoned Greater Demon

Elite
Terminators
Chosen
Dreadnaught
Possessed

Troops
Khorne Berzerkers
Chaos Space Marines
Summoned Lesser Demons

Fast
Bikers
Raptors

Heavy
Defiler
Havocs
Land Raider
Vindicator
Predator



Using the units above can make for a pretty limited list, so in some cases some allied units could be acceptable in a non-strict world eaters army. These are:

HQ
Abaddon the Despoiler
Fabius Bile
Typhus

Troops
Plague Marines

Heavy
Obliterators



Lots of fun can be had with a World Eaters army when restricted to the above units, but thanks to the limited dimensions of the codex writers not much thought was put into lots of aspects of the units. For example, a Khorne marked Demon Prince pretty much sucks compared to the abilities of the other marked Demon Princes; the same can be said for the Chaos Lord. Oooh, cool, +1 attack! Pffft! I think being Khorne Marked should at least impart +1 WS, +1 Attack, and Furious Charge. Some options to buy might be blessing of the blood god or something a little better than just +1 attach while others get to use powers that are exceptional force multipliers (lash of submission).

That said, I think for those of use who love World Eaters and want to be competitive at the same time that it should be acceptable to use stretched fluff to incorporate some of the better and stronger aspects of the codex into a World Eaters army.

Demon Prince Marks & Psychic Powers
The Demon prince is probably the best generic HQ in the whole game thanks to the marks and Chaos's psychic powers. Plus one attack just doesn't cut it for the mark of Khorne, and unmakred prince using warptime is probably better.

Mark of Nurgle imparts +1 toughness making the prince hard to kill when receiving small arms fire. However, given that he is a large target and monsterous creatures are best killed by heavy weapons fire, if adequate cover is not constantly provided the extra toughness can be a waste.

Mark of Tzeetnch imparts a 4+ invulnerable save. This means that the demon prince is "in cover" no matter where he goes and is better able to thwart incoming heavy weapons fire.

Mark of Slaanesh imparts +1 initiative. To me this rarely comes in handy but this mark is required for the use of the lash of submission psychic power.

Lash of submission is one of the best, overused, and anticipated psychic powers int he game allowing the player to move the enemy's models anywhere within 2d6". Grouping models together and using templates on them is a devastating combo. However, thanks to its over use and other armies recently gaining outstanding psychic abilities, other armies have enhanced their psychic defenses making perils of the warp and the power being unreliable is a real possibility. Lash of submission or any other psychic power should never be relied upon to win the game.

Given those facts, and combined with the Demon Prince's size, I think a Chaos Sorcerer has some potential. A sorcerer comes with a force weapon and can be given marks, wings, terminator armor, plasma pistol, and, with a familiar, the use of two psychic powers. However, the cost could get pretty high with all of those options.

New units in the game have high toughness or exceptional special abilities (New Blood Angels & Tyranids) but are lacking eternal warrior. The use of force weapons and the Bliss Giver demon weapon are going to be seeing more use. A Chaos Sorcerer with warptime and the force weapon's abilities is going to be a devastating combo to a lot of these new units.

One consideration is to use a Sorcerer with familiar, warptime, and lash of submission. The warptime and force weapon can be used in close combat to eliminate troublesome characters and the added +1 initiative can really help in this situation. Lash of Submission is just a bonus.

Another consideration is the gift of chaos. No matter the toughness or if a character has eternal warrior they could be turned into a blob of flesh or a spawn on a good roll of the die. And with a familiar the power can be cast twice. The downside is the power must be cast at the beginning of the turn and higher toughness models can only be 'spawned' on a roll of 6.

Incorporating Psychic powers into a World Eaters Army

If a Sorcerer of non Khorne marked demon prince is used then the World Eaters army isn't really a strict World Eaters army. The conundrum of using psychic powers in a World Eaters army by stretching the fluff.

Warptime can be considered as the demon prince harnessing the rage of Khorne to his advantage. Lash of Submission can be considered as a Blood Thirster using the whip me holds in his hand. A poster on DakkaDakka suggested using a tech marine as a sorcerer and lash of submission is a old technology gravity gun modified to suck enemies closer to ensure a devastating assault.

Whatever fluff is made up there must be a differentiation between strict World Eaters, World Eaters allied with other units, and Competitive World Eaters.


Switched Blogs!

I am a World Eaters player before I am a Chaos Space Marine player, so I switched the blog over to a more World Eaters-esqe name.

The Devourer of Stars is the space hulk that Angron attacked the Armageddon world with. Snippets of this epic battle can be seen online, but the best and most details of the tale are told in the recently published Space Wolves codex. Borrow or buy one and read about it!