Maelstrom of War 1500
As the IG player, I will try to recount some of this from memory, here it goes
Blood angels went first and deploy two marine squads and a scout squad across their table edge. The guard deploys four tanks, two chimera, a wyvern and two veteran squads hiding in the ruins annoyed there wasn't enough points to put them in a nice warm tank.
Turn 1:
Blood angels go first and advance up the field with their warlord in a marine unit using a psychic power to jump upfield to grab an objective. Shooting wise, the scout backfield squad hits a veteran squad for a couple dead infantry.The Imperial Guard opens up on the warlord lead unit of marines in cover. Even with cover, marines fall and the warlord is left to tank for the squad and he finally succumbs to the firepower.
Turn 2:
Blood Angels arrive from orbit, two squads deepstrike aggressively into the IG lines. One lands really close to a terrified mechanized squad of veterans lead by the warlord as seen on the right. The other lands in front of the IG lines in the picture above. A stormraven arrives on the battlefield and plinks away a hullpoint on the tank. The scout squad again kills several gaurdsmen, but the unit holds. The deepstrike squads are close combat built and have little effect shooting.
The Imperial Guard open up on pretty much everything. Every unit joins in firing wildly at the closest superhuman killing machine breathing down their necks. Marines begin falling but only the aggressive deep striking squad in front in removed. An heroic effort by the Hydra is made to knock off the stormraven HP.
Turn 3:
The Blood Angles deep strike squad slams into combat with the veteran team lead by the warlord in Terminator armor. Veterans get slaughtered and the warlord takes one wound from the onslaught, only to take out 2 marines with the Deamonhammer. The scout squad kills more Veterans from the squad leaving just three marines left, who decide to stick around.The Imperial Guard again open up with everything, dropping more marines across the board. The second chimera has been moving slowly over to the backfield scout squad and makes it into some ruins to take an objective. In close combat, the Imperial Guard's warlord terminator armor finally fails him as Blood Angels swarm in a pack.
Turn 4:
The stormraven drops its cargo off in hover and pushes a command squad off the board by using a lot of bullets. The squads that drop open fire on a chimera but only glance it. The assault squad, fresh after killing the warlord, destroy a command squad in close combat but leave themselves sitting out in the open. The scout squad drops two more veterans, leaving one very nervous sniper left in the squad. To his credit though, he stays around.The tanks of the imperial guard all turn along with a wyvern and veteran squad and remove the assault squad with extreme prejudice. The Chimera that has made it upfield drops it's payload off in front of the scout squad. Through some expert flying, the stormraven stays alive in hover.
Turn 5:
Things are certainly looking bleak for the Blood Angels, a scout squad in the backfield, the stormraven and a few marines are left on the battlefield. The stormraven kicks in the afterburners and goes into zoom, while the scout squad opens fire at the veterans bearing down on them, dropping several.The Imperial Guard tanks move near the stormraven and finally bring it down with snapshots, along with wiping out the marines left. This leaves just the scout squad in the ruins which comes under heavy fire and is down to 3 scouts about to be assaulted by what looks to be a very angry terminator equipped Ethereal. The game was called at this point.
Wrap up:
Tanks are helpful. The Blood Angels just didn't have enough to shoot the Leman Russes off the board and never had the chance to remove them in close combat. This was also the first game the Blood Angels had played against Guard, so I am sure it was a learning experience. For my side as Imperial Guard, I liked the way the list played, although I needed luck to counter that stormraven. Strong flyers at 1500 can be hard to deal with. I am looking forward to seeing the Blood Angel list against other lists. I at least had some AA, against other lists, that stormraven will clean up.
Battle Result: Major Victory for the Brimlock Dragoons
