Being asked, by EPIC UK, if I wanted to play
in its first ever battle report wasn’t a hard
decision … YES! Even better I was playing the
part of the Space Marines. EPIC UK have been
working hard on getting this new book ready
and I was going to be playing it in it’s first
ever battle report … so no pressure then!
Hopefully I’ll have an easy opponent with an
easy army.
Great … Kevin with his Black Legion, so
neither an easy opponent nor an easy army;
Kevin is a good friend of mine and we’ve been
going to EPIC tournaments for a little while so
I new it would be a good close game. But never mind that onto the tactics and
chosen army for this titanic battle.
Tactics
Well my tactics were pretty simple (they have to be, or else my ‘pea-brain’ can’t
cope):
Chaos is a problem for Space Marines because of the amount of war engines they can field. Unlike Imperial Guard, Space Marines lack the ability to kill big war engines, therefore my plan in facing Chaos war engines is the same as when I face any other race; Warhounds or smaller kill them with terminators in close combat; anything bigger than that ignore and feed them small cheap formations.
The Army
My First choice was a tactical formation with a Supreme Commander in
(Kruger). This formation would not move all game and protect my blitz. Within
the new EPIC errata, formations that garrison are allowed to start on overwatch;
therefore this formation would start on overwatch on my blitz; this meant that
they were only allowed one unit with a movement of 30cms or more … umm a
Hunter was then chosen. I didn't expect any aircraft within the chaos army;
however with the Hunters 60cm range it meant that I could lay a blast marker, on
enemy units quite far away (and laying a blast marker, especially before an
engagement, is very handy indeed).
1st Tactical Formation - Supreme Commander Kruger,
Hunter – 475points
My Second choice was another tactical formation. I didn't want my Supreme
Commander unit being my most expensive formation as this would give the
enemy too many prizes if it died (Blitz and most expensive objectives plus my
Supreme Commander re-roll). Therefore within this formation I added two
vindicators (now they are reduced to 50 points each), a Razorback with lascannon
and a Hunter. This formation then came to a whopping 500 points, 25 points
more than my other tactical formation.
2nd Tactical Formation - 3 Rhinos, 2 Vindicators, 1 Razorback
with lascannon, Hunter – 500points (BTS)
With a good amount of marines bought, I next bought some fun stuff. As discussed in my tactics I needed some terminators to teleport and kill enemy war engines; so I added a formation.
1st Terminator Formation – 350points
Then I added a devastator formation with
two Land Raiders. Not seen much before the Land Raider has now been reduced
to 75 points each therefore making it 150pts to transport my Devastator
formation. With reinforced armour saves I hoped this would save some of my
valuable Devastators until battle is joined.
1st Devastator Formation - 2 land Raiders - 400points
I was running out of points fast; so now it was time to add some smaller formations to get my activation count up. A formation of bikes, with an attack bike and Chaplain, were added and these would be deployed in a Thunderhawk (as Attack Bikes can now go in a Thunderhawk). These would hopefully engage the Chaos forces with a Tactical formation providing supporting fire (hopefully my ‘most expensive’ with its two Vindicators).
1st Bike Formation - 1 Attack Bike, Chaplain - 250points
Thunderhwawk 1 - 200points
Next was a formation of Scouts with two Razorbacks with Lascannons. A cheap
activation at 200pts is quite welcome at the moment.
1st Scout Formation - 1 Rhino, 2 Razorbacks with lascannons
– 200points
My final land formation had to be a Warhound. At 25 points more (275 points) these are still very useful formations; I could only add one though as I was running out of points and still didn’t have enough activations.
1st Warhound Titan - 275points
Thunderhawk 2 - 200points
1st Tunderbolt - 150points