Another enjoyable game vs. Sam's Orc horde which includes a number of really good scratch built vehicles. 2000pts means a lot of Orcs and I do mean A LOT.... 140 Boys all up. The game gave me my first opportunity to use my new Blightlord Terminators and they turned out to be very good.
Death Guard @ 2000pts
Battalion Detachment
Typhus
Plaguecaster
5 x Marines - 2 Blight Launchers, Plasma Gun
5 x Marines - 2 Blight Launchers, Plasma Gun
8 x Marines - 2 Blight Launchers, Plasma Gun
20 x Poxwalkers
20 x Poxwalkers
Rhino
Rhino
Outrider Detachment
Plaguecaster
Foetid Blightdrone - 2 x Plaguespitters
Foetid Blightdrone - 2 x Plaguespitters
Foetid Blightdrone - 2 x Plaguespitters
1st Turn I made a mistake and moved forward forgetting that Sam's orcs can advance and charge. But still the Poxwalkers ability to ignore morale means they have the ability to at least stick any early chargers in combat. Shooting limited to one unit of Marines which took a few wounds off an Orc Truck - all 3 of these are custom built.
Turn 1 the Orc Horde promptly charged - 30+ Boys doing 5 attacks each puts out a ton of damage but somehow I still had 5 Poxwalkers left out of the unit they charged. That proved crucial as their ability to ignore morale locked Sam's big unit into combat. His Rocket boys also failed to score hits and wounds on my Blight Drones despite their re-rolls meaning in Turn 2 they'd be able to really munch his Boys.
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| Damn Orc Psychic powers see a unit of boys pop up behind me |
Turn 1 threw up another surprise as well when a unit of Boys were warped in behind my line. These guys would hold out until Turn 4 proving to be a real pain and very difficult to remove.
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| Turn 2 the central melee gets interesting |
The Poxwalkers holding up the large block of Orc Boyz allowed the rest of my army to move in to deal with them. First Typhus and the Terminators arrived in behind them and promptly blew up one of the Orc Trucks before charging into the Orc Mob. The 2nd unit of Pox Walkers also went in. Over the rest of the battlefield the Blight Drones were doing their thing and vaporising Orcs everywhere while proving incredibly resilient to Orc shooting.
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| Terminators get into combat - the Plague Flail is gold |
Combat nearly went pear shaped when I didn't attack with my Terminators first. Sam interrupted the combat order using his CP and promptly chucked 40+ attacks at them from his Orcs. I got incredibly lucky and only took a single wound. Typhus unfortunately failed his charge - but despite being out on his own wasn't targeted by any Orc shooting.
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| Blight Drones move up to target the other Orc mobs |
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| Poxwalkers nearly all dead but then so are the Orcs |
Turn 3 and the Plaguecasters begin to do their thing punching out Smites and gaining the extra Mortal Wound by rolling 7+'s on their Pyschic power manifestations. Typhus also adds his buff to the Terminators meaning I'm throwing extra Mortal Wounds out left right and center and the Orcs are getting whittled down.
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| 4 x D6 auto-hits @ S6 make for a lot of dead Orcs |
Another key moment a unit of 15 Orcs come in from reserve shoot at a Blightdrone fail to wound it and then charge in only to have 10 of them die from overwatch. The result the Orcs get wiped out and the Drone is allowed to carry on - despite being severely weakened. Believe it or not this was also the games 'First Blood'....
The Orc Heroes get into the action and Sam continues to try and kill the Blight Drones but he's losing Orcs fast and not making a lot of progress. However, more reserves come on as the last of his 140+ Orc Boys arrive behind my lines and start blasting away.
In the backfield those pesky Orcs who warped in during Turn 1 are still alive - end up withdrawing from combat and pouring a load of Smite powers and shooting into them to kill them off.
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| An alive Blight Drone is a dangerous Blight Drone |
Despite his best efforts Sam's Orcs can't kill the drones and they continue to wipe out his Boys. Of the 140+ he started with there are probably only 30 or so left on the table.
Sneaky sneaky - the heavily wounded Blight Drone charges an Orc Truck to keep itself alive. Meanwhile the central Orc mob is all dead allowing Typhus, the Terminators and a unit of Marines to move and begin shooting the remaining Orcs.
Final phases of the game - 2 Blight Drones finally go down but shooting and Pyschic powers have killed nearly every Orc on the table with the exception of a few characters and a single Truck. In the end we ran out of time and only got to the end of Turn 4. In terms of points Sam was up by 1 - but it looked like I would table him if we had continued another 2 turns.
Thoughts on Death Guard
Love them... list works well as is. What I took is basically my 1500pt list with 2 Rhinos, the unit of 8 marines and the extra Pox Walkers added in. Blightdrones are gold and the slow movement of Deathguard doesn't hurt them at all. Still might get Mortarion but honestly I don't see the need right now.
