40k Combat Patrol: Wrapup

Well the Combat Patrol has come and gone, i wrestled my way to a 3rd place spot overall and managed to come away with Best appearance trophy which was a nice surprise given that while i'm not a terrible painter i would call myself a "looks for any loophole" painter.....that is to say i don't go the extra mile unless it's 100% worth it, and black wash is myfreind =)

Overall i had a great time at the tournie for sure, everyone was chill as usual with only a few exceptions that weren't that big a deal.  My list is below and i'll go ahead and give some post tournie thoughts on their performance, followed by a quick and dirty of the 6 games.

List:
5 Man Grey Hunters w/Flamer 
5 Man Grey Hunters w/Flamer

These guys did what they were supposed to do, better then average space marines in close combat and at medium to close range.  Given that most of my army was much more threatening they didn't get shot at much overall.



Lone Wolf W/Fenrisian wolf

Wolf and son were a good combo, in the first two games i'm fairly certain the wolf did more damage then the lone wolf....but thats a dice anomaly.  Overall worth their points but still rather ineffective because of the huge amount of armor i ended up facing.  Had i played against someone with infantry they would have done better im sure.

Lone Wolf W/powerfist

This guy was upgraded in response to Nob biker lists and Bloodcrusher lists i had faced pre-tournie, the Nobs weren't there though due to time constraints and i never faced the crushers.  But he did good overall, a huge amount of vehicles in the games meant the enemy was putting fire on this guy to keep their stuff safe, and any time fire is put on a lone wolf instead of elsewhere it's a good thing.

Land Speeder Typhoon W/Heavy Flamer

So i brought the heavy flamer for infantry, but i faced next to none of it....so it ended up firing maybe 2-3 times to little effect against other light vehicles or like a power armored marine or two.  I still think it was the right choice, as it would have been hell for an Ork mob army or IG blob army.  Otherwise the Typhoon did pretty good, it was certainly a valuable asset in every game.  It's only problem of course was as soon as the enemy sneezed on it it died, every penetrating hit it took killed it, and only a couple of glances came its way.  Overall worth its points, but i do wish it could have survived a little better.

ThunderWolf Caverly W/Wolf claw

This guy did well in a couple games, earning back his points for sure.  He proved badass but very killable if the enemy got a chance to shoot at him.  Backing him up with another squad mate would have been a great help to both spread wounds (thus keeping both models around longer) and ensuring they won combat and stayed in combat through multi charges.  The wolf claw was a good choice, i missed the extra str a few times while fighint the tons of vehicles, but it wasn't that big a deal compared to the reliability of the claw's rerolls.

5 Long Fangs w/4 Missile Launchers

Devastators are just great, the long fang fire splitting is ok at this point level, but often it's more important to send them all at one target to ensure it dies, worth every point and then some.  more importantly at NO POINT during the tournament did they run off the board......thank god


So on to the games, gonna keep it brief.  Head over to Rob's blog for pictures of each army, just reference the name i use: http://www.warhammer39999.com/2010/10/500-point-tournament-recap/

Game 1 Vs. Kurt's Space Wolves......

Wolf and wolf action to start!  Kurt was all about the infantry, he brought 3 six man squads of grey hunters each led by a wolf guard with some sort of power weapon/fist, along with a long fangs unit.  We played on a table that is...lets say...notorious with local gamers.  It includes hedges, hedges that completely block line of site for a marine sized model.  These hedges created a multi part maze of sorts in the middle of the table, the end result of which was that both our long fangs were pointless.  Pretty much only my land speeder could see over the hedges.  So in the end our troops clashed through the hedges in the middle, i got my long fangs all the way to his deployment zone and was mopping up his long fangs and 2nd of the the three grey hunter squads when time was called during our 4th turn.  Because of that both of his units lived so my grey hunters couldn't make the 1 inch they needed to be "wholly within his deployment zone", so we tied the primary objective, he won the secondary objective because again his units were still there, 1 lone wolf was still alive(and in combat with 4 grey hunters alone) and so he won 3Kp's to 1.

Game 2 Vs. Jeff's Tau

City terrain is my favorite, we setup 3 objectives down the middle of a road and went at it. Jeff brought 2 suits with missiles, 2 with plasma ect., a pirhana, an apc with pathfinders and some troops. My long fangs did a number on his units from afar and the thunderwolf did a good job against the suits, it was a bad matchup for Jeff and i won hands down.

Game 3 Vs. Eric1's Eldar

I have so little experience with Eldar, his force was basically 4 warwalkers with tons of shooting, some jetbikers, striking scorpions with exarch, and some dire avengers.  He declared his scorps were in reserve and deployed the rest, i deployed way out in the middle for first turn and then he stole the initiative.  I did really well wiping out his units on the board slowly but surely, waiting for those scorps to come in and counter attack.  When they did though he rolled for outflank and they came in an inch away from my long fangs in the back which was the primary objective of the game.  I was a bit annoyed because he had said reserved not outflank, and i had played the game waiting for them to walk on his board edge, had i realized they were in fact outflanking i would certainly have not left the unit he needed to kill to win at the boards edge all game.  He apologized for the miss communications and showed me that he had purchased wargear for them that allowed them to outflank so it was his intention.. at this point my inner power gamer decided to take a break.  I know Eric and i dont believe he was trying to deceive me, despite the fact that he had nothing else on the table and that his scorps plus exarch would simply win the game right then i decided not to turn it into an argument and basically conceded the game through that decision.  Perhaps if i knew more of the Eldar rules i would have double checked with him that he meant outflank not normal reserve, but oh well.  Total loss as nearly everything bonus point and otherwise revolved around my long fangs living and his scorps dieing.

Game 4 Vs. Tony's Blood Angels

Tony brought 3 attack bikes with multi meltas, a devastator squad, and an assault squad in an assault cannon Rhino with a Sanguinary priest.  We had a good game, i held down a forest out in the middle while we exchanged ranged fire, eventually his rhino made it's way to my force and my thunderwolf ran out and said hello, after that my lone wolves had to clean up the rest and all of his units except the remnants of the long fangs were wiped out.  A good victory for me, though tense after he blew my long fangs off their hill reducing my ranged options to natta, fortunately he only had 2 rockets at range so if he wanted to win he would have to come play with the wolves he wouldn't be able to shoot me down all the way.

Game 5 Vs. Tony2's Eldar

Another Warwalker list, but this one was completely devoted to it. 5 War walkers this time, 2 Vypers with double cannons, and 2 jetbiker squads with 1 cannon each.  It meant he had 15 cannons with 3 str 6 shots a piece on mobile platforms.  We played on a map with some grey blocks that could sorta block line of site to a  marine but the objective was get to the middle and stay there for 2 turns...  The end result is he opened up with a torrent of fire on whatever he pleased each turn.  On turn 1 he blew away the thunderwolf with no problem, a couple long fangs went down, and a wound was given to the power fist lone wolf... a very bad way to start for me. My long fangs returned the fire with all three hitting with krak missile, then all three rolled 1's to penetrate (they need a 2 to glance and at least stop them from shooting....). My speeder managed to destroy a weapon on one vyper with it's double Krak, and everyone else advanced, at this point im pretty much done....if i roll great armor saves it might be ok i tell myself....  His turn see's the long fangs down to a single model, speeder gone, couple random marines dead.  The long wolf with power fist was the only one rollin good and he survived a decent amount of fire.  In my turn i did 3 glances to his vyper in melee with like 8 grey hunters and the normal lone wolf, all of which just shook it despite it being open topped...the Power fist lone wolf assaulted a 2 war walker squad and died to their attacks before he could strike..... a couple turns later i was wiped out.  If i had some terrain that blocked line of site this would have really helped, sure my army got cover saves thanks to all the random terrain on the board but who cares because i got armor saves that are better, instead he had unrestrained access to shoot at any target he wanted each turn, which with his army make up was just killer. I did manage to keep him from winning the primary objective though, so it wasn't a total loss.

Game 6 Vs. Jared's Space Marines

Jared brought a sniper scout squad with rocket, 2 tactical squads one with a rhino the other with a razorback.  We had a humerous objective which was to cross 48 inches of terrain to get a scoring unit into the other player deployment zone which was a tiny triangle of the corner.  My Grey hunters spent the first 4 turns running straight at them, while my ranged elements dealt with his army slowly but surely, the thunderwolf and speeder held off the razorback with combat squad, and scout squad on my left flank alone.  Overall it was kinda fun to run headlong at them, in the end i won.