Review: Sanguis Irae

eBook edition. 

 Sanguis Irae by Gav Thorpe is a short story that is often packaged with another short story, Sin of Damnation, both of which are stories adapted from the background of the last (as of this writing) edition of the Space Hulk tabletop game. 

It starts off with Calistarius, the Blood Angel Librarian Terminator from the Space Hulk game* being launched into a space hulk via a boarding torpedo. He was summoned by Terminator Sergeant Dioneas whose squad found the body of another Blood Angel Terminator. Only this one has been dead for quite some time, preserved in a sealed ammunition magazine. The Sergeant had requested Calistarius' presence so that he could probe the mind of the corpse in order to figure out how he had died and who the assailants were...

+++++++++SPOILERS AHEAD!+++++++++++

Vespesario was the dead guy's name, but that wasn't the only thing that Calistarius was able to probe from the body's mind. Vespesario was going through the Black Rage at the time of his death so every time Calistarius probes Vespesario's mind he sees a vision of the Blood Angel Primarch Sanguinius leading his charge against the battle-barge of the traitor Horus as well as seeing a vision of what was really going on with Vespesario and his team in their final moments. He was seeing two events everytime he probed Vespesario's mind: The final actions of their dead Primarch during the Horus Heresy and the final fate of Vespesario. 

eBook edition twinned with Sin Of Damnation.

Ultimately it is revealed that the xenos filth that killed Vespesario and his team were Genestealers (c'mon, were you surprised?) and that not long after their Terminator team had launched their assault on this Space Hulk that it had jumped into the warp, trapping them on board and cutting them off from their support. Not wanting to repeat this scenario Sgt Dioneas wants to push on and purge the Genestealers immediately but Calistarius insists on probing the dead mind of Vespesario more. It is revealed that the Genestealer Patriarch has a unique quality (I'm not going to totally spoil this story!) that allows it to control when the space hulk goes in and out of the warp. In fact it's intentionally trying to a trap Space Marines for it's grim designs. Luckily the insight gleaned from the mind of Vespesario allows the the Blood Angels to prevail. 

• 
  Did I like it? Yes, very much so. It's definitely the better of the two stories in this book. 
• Was it hard to put down? It was quite a gripping tale actually and just the right length. I do think Gav Thorpe's short stories are his better ones.
• Could I care about the characters? The thing about short stories is that it's hard to get to know the characters, but it seems that Gav pulled it off since we really only have about four characters to care about here. Calistarius has essentially a race against time to get the info he needs from the body of Vespesario before Sergant Dioneas calls the mind probe off so that they can get on with Genestealer hunting or before the Space Hulk slips back into the warp. There is also the added risk that seeing and reliving (albeit vicariously) Vespesario's Black Rage visions could trigger his own slip into the Black Rage. Calistarius has a lot going on. Sgt Dioneas is there to create tension, so it's tough to advocate for him really. Vespesario himself however, despite already being dead, one cannot help but remorse for his fate, yet his ultimate victory is so rewarding. And then there is Sanguinius, whose story has been written to death (unintentional pun?) so it's no surprise Horus kills him. And although it was kind of neat to see what someone's Black Rage vision would be, by showing this it sort of diminishes (to me any way) the mystique behind the whole curse. The story would go faster also if you just skip the Sanguinius bits as they do not service the story hardly at all.

  

  Librarian Calistarius.
  

• Did the writer truly grasp how the 'world' of the 41st millennium works in the sense that it doesn't betray or retcon previously established (as I know it) lore? Gav has more than earned his lore cred at this point. Oddly, this story works so much better than Sin Of Damnation in the way that it fits into the 40k universe that it's unfortunate that it takes a backseat to that story as it is so much better; it's almost as if Gav wrote this as a sort of penance for the war-porn that was Sin Of Damnation...

  

  A Terminator Compilation. 

• Was I being talked down too? This was a good, tight, and focused short story and it didn't trip itself up like some Black Library stories do by getting lost in the minutiae of the setting or devolving into war-porn. 
• How predictable is this story? The thing about Black Library short stories is that they have a tendency to be fairly unpredictable. Or just predictable enough but with a hard twist at the end. And this story was just weird enough to be just that, which was fairly refreshing. 
• Do I recommend this book? This is a good short story, and I enjoyed this one. So yeah, if you come across this short story, give it a shot. It has an interesting twist regarding the main antagonist which I really thought was pretty cool, and I have done what I could to not spoil it here. So check it out! 

*The version that came out around 2010

Review: Sin of Damnation

Paperback cover. 

Sin of Damnation by Gav Thorpe. Basically this is a narrative breakdown of the plot for the Space Hulk board game that was released about a decade ago. There have apparently been a few different editions of this story printed, my copy is the "Start Here With Black Library" ediiton which has the story Sin of Damnation twinned with a shorter story called Sanguis Irae which I will give it it's own review. Today we are focusing on just the story Sin Of Damnation. 

We follow the boarding actions of two Terminator Squads of the Blood Angels chapter as they run missions against the Genestealer infestation aboard a massive space hulk. These missions are the exact ones from the Space Hulk game as are the characters. One squad is lead by Sgt Lorenzo and the other is lead by Sgt Gideon. They are reporting to, and being directed by, Capt. Raphael who remains onboard their vessel. 

The story is broken down into time increments starting out at 00.04.36 all the way up to and ending with 00.57.77. This is an interesting nod to the game this is based off of as it is a rigidly timed game with some editions even including a small sand-filled hourglass. One would think that keeping up with the time would matter more to the overall story, but it does not. Much of the story is mostly colorful description of the debris and chaotic mess that is the space hulk itself and of bolters, flamers and assault cannons ripping apart and slaughtering genestealers. A plot sort of manifests about 3/4 of the way into the story. 

++++SPOILERS++++

About 3/4 of way into this story, things start to get a bit more engaging for the reader. Fans and players of the last edition of Space Hulk will know that the every Terminator miniature in the game has a name. And these named characters start dying off in spectacular and heroic fashion. Usually with a vicious claw (or dozen) rending them apart. Auletto's death, is a bit exceptional as he is slain by his fellow Blood Angels after a genestealer implant attack infects him. They "reduce his remains to a charred heap within seconds" via a heavy flamer*. Omnio falls down a shaft only to be (apparently) dispatched by 'stealers. And there are other even more dramatic demises to befall these Terminators.

When they find The Wrath Of Baal, a long lost Blood Angels vessel fused into the Space Hulk they redirect their mission to retrieve an object (the chalice from the game) from it. I personally found this to be quite interesting and had hoped for more discoveries and Blood Angel history or backstory to be revealed but, not really, it was all about getting the cup. 

Sergeant Lorenzo.

The most interesting characters are Sgt Lorenzo, Sgt Gideon and the Librarian Calistarius**. I like Gideon mainly because he wasn't Lorenzo. I say this because Lorenzo has a personal hang up about a prior encounter like this on a Space Hulk where a lot of Blood Angels died, but he has survivor's guilt and wants to use this mission to redeem that guilt. This almost gets the guy killed but he comes through in time to defeat the main Broodlord in the end. The story's ending was exciting, and well written and paced, but beware reader, there is a lot of war-porn to grind through to get there!

• Did I like it? It started off quite well enough, it was well written and engaging, but after a while the repetition wore me down. I guess in the end, if you're literally going to write the events of a game, regardless of how clever the mission scenarios are or not, you're going to just end up with war porn. And this is basically that.  I did begin to like it once the characters were revealed to not have "plot armor" and some of them started to die, and die spectacularly.  Ultimately, yes, I enjoyed it, but it was a grind to get me there. 
• Was it hard to put down? At first no, but again, repetition leads to boredom. Leading to this deceptively thin book being very difficult to pick back up. The problem here is that you got to sort of keep a score card (in your head or actually written down) in order to keep up with who the cast of characters are and what they are armed with. In truth, sometimes their "character" is essentially their weapon...
• Could I care about the characters? Honestly? No. They were as expendable as they would be to you if you were playing an actual game of Space Hulk. In fact, I began to root for the the Genestealers to win just so the story would end faster. I found myself actually sympathizing and rooting for the Broodlord, which honestly is what got me through to the end of the story. 
• Did the writer truly grasp how the 'world' of the 41st millennium? Or is this the work of a hack chasing a paycheck vs. establishing his mark on the ever-expanding 40k universe? Typically this question is answered one way or the other. But this is an exception. Gav clearly knows what he's writing about here, and I honestly think he loves Space Hulk, but I am fairly sure this was a gig he took for a paycheck. He tried to apply some subtext and additional background but it's pretty clear he couldn't stray too far from the brief he was provided. 

• 

  eBook variant cover.. 

  Was I being talked down too? Not really, but a chart or a Dramatis Personae listing at the start of this story could have helped with keeping up with who's who of the squad as it does sort of get muddled after a bit. To give Gav credit, the way the story is broken down into time increments is a tool to assist with keeping the pacing quick and exciting. It does help the story from being utterly boring. Some of Gav's writing anomalies do pop up and disrupt the pace of the read, which caused me to stop and re-read what I had just read. This happens too much in this story, and being that this is intended to be a fast paced story it's really irritating. For example this line: "Lorenzo approached the Librarian and took the tissue sample from his belt." Seems straightforward enough, but up to this point in the story the reader knows that it is Lorenzo that is carrying the tissue sample, when did the Librarian get it? Why is he taking it back?  The next sentence in the story sort of straightens it out, but, again if it was written correctly ("Lorenzo took the tissue sample from his belt and approached the Librarian.") the confusion would never have happened and I could have followed the story better without any disruption.
• How predictable is this story? About as predictable as closing a car door. Like a horror movie, sometimes the order and methodology of the characters individual demise can become interesting in and of itself, but these guys don't give you  many reasons for you to care whether they live or not. 
• Do I recommend this book? Only if you have the deepest passion for Space Hulk's background elements or if you are completely new to the hobby. Otherwise you're likely to be bored by this. 

*A weapon that has always been way more effective in the Space Hulk game than it ever was in the main Warhammer 40,000 game. Another ironic observation is that Terminator armor is way less effective in the Space Hulk game than it is in Warhammer 40,000. 

**They're also the most popular Space Hulk miniatures on eBay as well!

Death by Flashbang

Straight to Hell. 

Hello, and welcome to another Kill Team battle report. This one is very much different from the other Kill Team reports as it involves 5 players controlling 4 different factions. This would be my first multiplayer Kill Team game, and my second fielding the Celestial Lions. The Bob chose to use his Death Watch, Screech would field his Imperial Guard Vets, and Jim & Chyanne would each play a small Blood Angels Death Company squad.

With 4 preset boards to chose from we decided to once again give the fractured ground with the molten lava fissures another go. Oddly enough it was still set-up from the last game, (supply-drop) that The Bob and I played together, and we decided to leave it just like that. Since we are only playing on just a 4'X4' section of the board, it was decided that Screech's Imperial Guard models should be placed in one of the "off board" fire pits as casualties accrue mostly so that we could all keep up with who he had in reserve and who was dead. We were all carrying on and having a lot of fun, and since Screech's IG are notorious bastards, someone stated that when they die "They skip St. Peter and go straight to Hell!". We were all in agreement with this notion.

Alone in the Dark was the mission we selected, but with the 4-way rules in effect. Three objectives were placed in a line in the center of the table to hopefully encourage more cross-fighting between the four factions. (Yeah, we'll see how well that idea will worked out.) Anyway, this mission has the Nightfighting rule in effect for the whole game. In addition to that we had to roll off to see who in our respective Kill Teams would end up in Reserves.

Celestial Lions Deployment. 

Only six of my Lions would start on the table. I divided them into 2 groups, hoping for solid strike at my foes and still be able to make a mad dash at the objectives.

BA Death Co. Deployment. 

The entire Death Watch deployment. 

The field of battle, everyone deployed. 

This game had a lot of chaotic, hilarious, and crazy events taking place. Therefore the following will mostly be highlights with a few comments. The turn order was Imperial Guard, Celestial Lions, Blood Angel Death Company and Death Watch.

Turn 1, not a lot happened really, mostly missed opportunities, missed shots and movement strategies. Accept for Bob's Death Watch who picked off one of my Lions (the gravgun guy) and earned a Secondary VP for First Blood.

 Turn 2, Screech brought in the majority of his reserves and placed them in a line in my zone and behind my KT Leader and another marine. My guys lived through the flashlight hits however.

Flashlight ambush! 

He also took shots at the ravening Death Co. marines storming down the trenchline at him.

"They are coming right at us, and they look pissed!!!"

Celestial Lions Turn 2, again a folly of dice rolling ment either they didn't hit or brought clips full of dud bullets. It made sense to charge the nearest Guardsmen only to botch that as well, and the Sgt found himself locked in combat with the steadfast and determined trooper.

It was a better plan in his head.

The Celestial Lions reserves came in on the Death Watch side, attempting an ambush, and that plan flopped also. I think at that point I switched out dice. I was very frustrated with my dice at that point.

"I thought you said these guys were undefended?!"

The Death Company performed more maneuvers, seemly obsessed with getting closer to the Imperial Guard. The Death Watch retaliated against the Celestial Lions, sending two of them after my leader. It seemed as if my deployment zone was becoming a battle royal pit. They killed a lot of Guardsmen, which actually pleased me.

"Oh, this looks fun!"

The Deathwatch, being Inquisition agents afterall, purged my two Celestial Lions in his zone.

The Lions have been eliminated.

Turn 3, and IG kill a few Death Company marines despite their Feel No Pain attempts.

The shooting gallery.

Some of these following turns get a bit fuzzy, so I will go into Highlight Mode (TM):

For example, someone killed the DW shotgun guy (I think I shot him in the back but I don't recall if I killed him? Or if that was the guy Screech Flashbanged?)

(Not sure what happened in this pic)

The Celestial Lions Missile Launcher with Sharpshooter arrived,  and with an amzing snapshot killed one of the Death Watch guys, and it was apparently their KT Leader! This earned the Lions the first Kill The Leader Secondary Objective of the game.

Snapshot of doom. 

Eventually the Celestial Lions Leader killed his Guardsmen foe.

"These grunts are tough!"

The Blood Angel Death Company tangled more with the guard. More of the Death Watch Reserves arrived, killing a guardsmen in their zone.

"Get off my bunker!" *WHOOSH!*

On Turn 4 the Death Watch returned the favor and snuffed out my KT Leader.

"Eye for and eye!"

The Death Company continued their assault on the bastion controlled by the Death Company. They used their jump packs to assault the troops on the roof. Tbey killed one of the guardsmen up there but one guy refused to be killed and hold out for a few Close Combat phases.

Attacking the roof.

The Celestial Lions continued the assault on the IG held trenchline. One of the Lions was overhelmed by them and eliminated. The heavy flamer guy at the end of the trenchline was proving to be very resilient, and survived a lot of bolter rounds that were sprayed his way. Same goes for the three marines in the pic below who were also dodging las blasts. I wanted to kill the Sgt that was in this trenchline as I really wanted my revenge against his from the last time I encountered him. He, and his small cluster of men, are holding and objective in the trenchline and I was focused on getting it. The Celestial Lion on the crater is holding an objective also.

Trench warfare.

Meanwhile the Death Company continued their assault on the rooftop guardsman, only to continue to be held back by the bayonet weilding fiend.

"How is he surviving this?!"

Also out of no where, a Death Company marine in the control of Chyanne, charged the Celestial Lion holding the objective and a fierce hand melee would begin with neither warrior defeating his foe.

"The objective is mine!" "No, mine!"

Typical of the treachery that Screech is renowned for, and not having any of his troops in the fight, his Guardsman weilding the Heavy Flamer immolated the Death Company and Lion marine who were locked in combat with each other. But they cared not, and continued to clash amongst the flames!

A literal fire fight.

It was looking like it would be the last round of the game so I decided to have the Missile Launcher Marine make a dash for the objective on that side of the table. He reached it and held it while dodging bullets from the Death Watch and Death Company marines.

Taking the objective! 

In the trenchline I was happy to kill that Sgt only to discover that he was not the IG KT Leader afterall. That guy was snuffed by the Death Watch in a previous round and somehow I had not realized it! Still killing traiter guard is always fun no matter their individual relevance. Sadly one of my Celestial Lions would fall. Bring my Kill Team to it's break point and earning the IG a Secondary Objective. But at least I now had a marine on all three objectives!

Trench warfare continues.

Ultimately the guardsmen on the bastion top would be overwhelmed and slaughtered by the blood lusting Khorne worshippers in denial.  One of Chyanne's Death Company would start an assault on one of the guardman at the bastion's base that had been attacking her for most of the game. I do not recall the outcome of this clash however...

Seizing the bastion.

That was the last in-game pic I took. I am sure there was stuff I missed (or got wrong) but without a pic it's difficult to recall exactly what those events were. With a cast of the die, the game was ended at that point. The Celestial Lions held one Objective and contested the other two.

Victory Points tallied out as follows:
Blood Angel Death Company =0.
Celestial Lions- 1 Objective, Slay the Leader (DW), Break The Enemy (IG).
Death Watch- First Blood, Slay the Leader (CL), Breaking IG = 3 VPs.
Imperial Guard- Break The Enemy (DW & CL) = 2 VPs.


One of the highlights, at least for Screech, was that he got to kill a marine with a defensive grenade!

Screech: "I mean, that guy is the real MVP for the IG.  "What's worse for a Death Watch Marine than being killed by a Guardsman?  Being killed by a Guardsman with a Flashbang."

The highlight for Jim and Chyanne was the slaughtering of Screech's Imperial Guard, which they had declared early on was the only objective they cared about (it's a vendetta thing).

Jim: "Such a small and weak heretic (that looked like a guardsman) should have his name immortalized as a deceptively fearsome opponent -before ripping his head off and diembowling him!" (In regards to the guardsman that locked two Death Company marines in close combat for a few turns).

As you can see, having Screech place his dead directly in Hell was rewarding for all of us:

So many souls to stoke the fires of Hell.

Bink's Birthday Bash!

"I know I dropped it around here somewhere...".

 

Last night we gathered for a massive 40k game, and since it was the eve before Bink's birthday we decided to have two Ork armies (Waaagh Bink and Waaagh RorRuk) square off against Screech's Chaos army (yes, the nefarious Thousand Sons (of Bitches) deploying from their battle barge The Velvetta Scourge) along with Jim's Blood Angels (of Khorne, apparently). Since we all had 1500pt armies made up, we just went with those.

Setting up the BAs...

Knowing that time was limited for such a large scale game we agreed to try to limit our movement phases to 15 minutes tops. We choose to e deploy on the long table edges, and chose Purge the Alien as out mission.

Orks set up on the right side of their DZ

Orks set up on the left side.

Thousand Sons set up

Blood Angels set up and the start for 1st turn moves...

 

Surge in a pop smoke!



And here are the highlights

Turn One Blood Angels/1K Sons

 

• A Blood Angel Drop Pod lands in the middle of our Deployment zone cutting off a key path between one of the high rises and a bunker. It deploys a dreadnought with twin-linked heavy flamer! (ulp!)
• The BA dread blows up the trukk that was transporting Mad Doc Grotsnik!
• BA Bikers shoot up my Kommandos who break and run!
• One of my Deff Dredds takes HP damaged from the 1K Sons Landraider.

The BA dread blows up a Mad Doc's Trukk!

 



Turn One: Orks

• None of my shooting was effective at all! I rolled a lot ones considering that I needed 5+ to hit, yeah I expected to miss, but jeeesh! I killed a single Devastator marine.
• Mad Doc's retinue is a mob of 'Ard Boys who charge with frothing fury at the fire throwing dread, but it is no match against all of that rage and is wrecked.

 

And a dreadnought dies

Turn two BA/1K sons

Thousand Sons and Dread Co. Dread tearing up the Ork lines

• The Death Company Dread is deployed via Drop Pod into the left portion of the Ork's deployment zone. It blows up my Battle Wagon with a lucky shot!
• A squad of Thousand Sons marines lead by his Warlord, a Chaos Sorcerer, arrive via Dread Claw. They shoot up, and charge Bink's Bikers, killing his Warlord in a Challenge, defeating them and running them down. It was a humbling affair but at least one of the Thousands Sons died via overwatch.
• On the other flank, the Chosen charge my slugga mob, and champion challenges my squad's Nob. They kill each other! The two units remain locked in combat...

Turn Two: Orks

• We focus most of our fire on the left flank on that Death Co. Dread. It simply must go! And after taking HPs to a Weird Boy Zzzap! it's my Lootas T7 guns that finished it off.
• On the right, Bink's Deff Coptas and my Dredd shoot the heck out of a 1K son's Rhino and fail to do anything to it! My dredd charges it and wipes it out with a power klaw!

Look, more things to kill!

• Desperate, and statistically challenged, the Burna Boys charge the Thousand Sons. They are crushed by the Thousand Sons who slowly and purposely stride across their fuel soaked corpses.

"You Blood Angels just hang back an' watch this..."

•  My slugga mob wipe out all but one of the Chosen, and he's the guy with fearless banner! So, this one guy has my Warlord and big mob locked in combat with him.

"HA! I will take you ALL on!!!"

• My Kommados, who rallied on our Turn one and have been making their way over to the BA Bikers that have been shooting at them, attempted and failed a charge against them.

it struck us that it was now nearing 2 am, and most of us were feeling it hard! The funny thing is, when you're having this much fun it only feels like 2 hours have past, but in fact MANY hours passed and passed quickly! We agreed to call it there and tally our VPs, declaring the BA/1K Son alliance the victors! All of us were itching to continue, but we just HAD to stop. Still, it was good fun and all units got to participate (regardless of their effectiveness, heheh).

Looking down the Ork lines, another round or two and it was going to get SERIOUSLY bloody

As we packed up we tried to figure out what happened: how can we do this on a Friday night and actually finish the game? Shy of playing with a greatly reduced point agreement, we probably can't. We would need to agree to play an all day game starting at noon or so get through this kind of Epic awesomeness. Still, finishing wasn't the point: it was the fun of getting our war-cries out and hanging out together, and enjoying the time well spent, and that is what this is all about! It was a good start to Bink's Birthday weekend: we'll see if we can top it next time!

Where (Blood) Angels Dare

Good weekend! Although my painting/modeling output has been slow over the past fortnight, I have made some progress that will soon materialize into some posts. Speaking of materializing...

Materializing onto the field of battle, ready to engage the foe!

Last night I did get in a game with Jim's Blood Angels. Fresh from his recent victory he spotted me upon walking into Hobbytown, slapped me with his blood encrusted gauntlet and challenged the Company of Sven Axegrinder on the field of battle! To make things more appealing, a relic of importance to the Space Wolves Chapter was at risk of being confiscated by the Blood Angels. Sven, being of both a stubborn and noble character (and, it must be stated, a naïve sort of fellow), was quick to launch the Thunderhawks.


The army assembled.

The Relic is a yellow base with a Space Wolf icon on it. A rather basic objective marker that I made for the a previous edition that occasionally still finds a use. The field of battle was 2/3 wilderness with a 1/3 of ruined city. I imagine that this fight is taking place at the edge of an old habitation zone, long torn asunder by the state of constant war that besets the Imperium of Man.

 

Space Wolves deployed 1st. On my left flank, my venerable Landspeeder Tornado (the Chairlift of Death) lurks behind a rock column. In the distance behind a rocky outcrop (that's what those turd-looking things are supposed to be),

I place the Long Fangs on the high ruins on my side, while the Vindicator is placed behind a tree line to get a bit of cover.

In the ruined streets to the right of the Long Fangs is a rhino with more Grey Hunters riding in it and the Lone Wolf, sitting in the shadows mourning the loss of his comrades and humming the catchier melodies of Piotyr and the Wolf to himself as he works himself up in preparation of a heroic death.

Nice dilapidated bastion huh?

The Blood Angels deploy and the bulk of their battle-line is shifted to where my forces are lightest. He has the best chance to grab the objective 1st as his Death Company are all jump infantry and the objective is directly in front of him

 Failing to seize the initiative the Blood Angels watch as the screaming roar of the Space Wolf drop pod tears down from the heavens. The screaming is actually Wolf Lord Sven, raging at the horribly miscalculated scatter that sent the drop pod 12" off target and in between the woods! More infuriating is the drop pod blocks most of the Long Fang's LOS to the relic and the bulk of Jim's Blood Angels.

 Two dreadnoughts ambling over in the BA deployment zone seem pretty threatening to me, so a concentrated krak missile volley eliminates the Death Company Dreadnought. As you see in these pics, and as I mentioned in a previous post, Jim loves to make cool effect for this game. Seen here is on of the explosion plumes he made. He has his dreads made so that the torso can separate from the legs, and when we wrecked the dreadnought we separated the two halves and placed a plume in between them. It makes in interesting pic for a battle report and makes for a more interesting battle to play in.

First Blood goes to the Space Wolves as the Death Co. Dread is reduced to scrap.

 That was First Blood, my Land Speeder zipped up and tried to slag the BA Predator with a multimelta shot but missed. My Vindicator would announce itself by sending 4 Deathcompany marines to their graves. Not a bad 1st turn for the Space Wolves.

The Blood Angels return the favor, with the Predator noting the Landspeeder's immediate threat and swatting it from the sky with a single blast from a Las Cannon sponson. We noted the event as "second blood", More calamity would occur with the Green Dreadnought shooting it's twin-linked lascannon at the Rhino on my right flank, turning it into a smoldering crater and killing one of the Grey Hunters inside of it.

"Weren't we in a tank a second ago?"

 On Turn Two, my force would concentrate it's fire on eliminating the Death Company with the Vindicator landing another direct hit that would finish off all but the Chaplain, and even he was left standing with a wound. On the BA turn 2, the Terminator's would beam in along with the BA Commander, and the two Terminator squads, each with the respective army commander joined to it, staring each other down behind a hail of Storm Bolter shots. I lost a Wolf Guard to this attack. Note that the Chaplain joined the Terminator Unit.

Beaming in. Note that we had a flashlight above them for the added glow effect.

 The BA Tac squad moved into the dilapidated bastion and fired a krak missile at the last SW Rhino, but it missed.

Jim's firing missile marker.

 Turn 3, and it was time kill stuff. The problem with teleporting in is that you don't get to spread out, which makes the Vindicator's Demolisher Cannon giggle with glee as shoots another directed hit on of the BA commander's head. The entire Terminator squad is wiped out, including the BA commander (Slay the Warlord point) leaving, once again, the Chaplain alive. This left us to wonder it maybe the Chaplin is a curse the units he joins? As he stands their contemplating this, he is felled by a snapshot from the Vindicator's Storm Bolter. Shooting through cover, the Long Fangs manage to blow up the Predator with some surgically precise krak missile shots, leaving another flaming crater in the BA deployment zone.

BA turn 3 saw the Green Dreadnought getting some revenge for his fallen Commander. A well placed shot at the Wolf Guard, and a failed Look Out Sir roll, would see Sven instant-deathed by a twin-linked lascannon shot.

Turn 4, the wolf guard press on taking the fight to the Blood Angels who had just made a mad dash out of the Bastion in a desperate gambit to find some way to get the relic, while my Rhino zips up, deploys a unit of Grey Hunters and they manage to take the relic in triumph!

Lined up for a perfect shot the Vindicator was set to shoot the green dread. Having spent the whole game charging up the field, the Long Wolf was poised to charge the green dread (his Beastslayer oath ment that he was born to engage this foe!), when suddenly, surprisingly, the rhino fired it's hunterkiller missile and it actually hits, and actually penetrates, wreaking the dreadnought! We all looked around in shock, having rarely seen one of these actually work so well!

"...! AH! You bastards! That was going to be MY kill!!!"

Reduced to one unit, the BAs at the bastion fought back, but to little effect.

Turn 5 saw the rhino make it's escape with the relic, while the wolf guard moved in for the kill. The vindicator sent more Blood Angels to their grave, but they held on, refusing to be pinned.

 

Finally, it all ended, as the Wolf Guard charged in and finished off the Tactical Squad in the assault phase in the game.

 

 

For the 1st time in a long time, the Space Wolves tabled their foe! And with few casualties.
Still, the Blood Angels got a few well placed licks in as well.

We had a fun game, and despite the game turning grim for him quickly, Jim remained a good sport all the way through. In fairness to Jim, his dice just didn't want to be there and were just begging to be shot off into the lake with a sling-shot.

He earned 2 VPs (One for his Slay the Warlord kill on Sven, and another quite humorously from my Lone Wolf surviving the game!)

I claimed 6 vps, all 3 secondary objectives as well as the Relic which was worth 3vps.

Afterwards we went to work on improving his army list. He has some models that he has yet to build which I think could make his force far more competitive than it currently is. Including an assembled Rhino and an assembled Razorback. Also he has a Baal Predator model somewhere I think could bring some hurt if he were to use it. So, like all of us in our circle, we take these kind of games and we weigh our strengths and weaknesses vs. our playing styles and make adaptations for the next list. Jim is fairly new to 6th edition and hasn't played consistently since 2nd, so he's learning a lot still, and regardless of his dice, he's having a good time escaping with us to a place where there is only war...