Battle for Salvation: Game 3

Who's got thumbs and Loves Chaos? This Guy!

Game 3 paired me up with my friend Ragnar from the Cold Steel Mercs. Ive known Ragnar for about a year now, and even helped him win the annual CSMercs invitational by drawing with Matt Cassidy. But I had not had the opportunity to play Ragnar until now.

Ragnar's list:

HQ
Lord Uriel Ascendent
Daemon Prince (110), Wings (20), Mark of Slaanesh (5), Lash of Submission (20) = 155
Lord Talmachus the Reaper
Daemon Prince (110), Wings (20), Mark of Slaanesh (5), Lash of Submission (20) = 155
Skane the Soul-Eater
Greater Daemon = 100
Elite
The “Deathwing”
3 Chaos Terminators (90), 3x Combi-Melta (15) = 105
Feared Brother Domius
Chaos Dreadnought with Missile Launcher, CCW = 100
Hunter Squad V
5 Chaos Chosen (90), w/3x Meltagun (30), 1x Flamer (5), Aspiring Champion Flavius (10) = 135
in Rhino I w/Smoke & Searchlight = 35
Troops
Tactical Squad I
5 Chaos Space Marines (75) w/Icon of Chaos Glory (10), 1x Flamer (5) = 90
Tactical Squad II
10 Chaos Space Marines (150) w/Icon of Chaos Glory (10), 2x Meltagun (20), incl. Aspiring Champion Ezekiel (15) w/Power Fist (25) & Bolt Pistol = 220
in Rhino II w/Smoke & Searchlight, Combi-Melta (10) = 45
Tactical Squad III
10 Chaos Space Marines (150) w/Icon of Chaos Glory (10), 2x Meltagun (20), incl. Aspiring Champion Michael (15) w/Power Fist (15) & Bolt Pistol = 220
in Rhino III w/Smoke & Searchlight, Combi-Melta (10) = 45
Our Desire Frustrated
5 Daemonettes (Lesser Daemons) = 65
Our Rage Given Flesh
5 Bloodletters (Lesser Daemons) = 65
Heavy Support
Havoc Squad Omega
5 CSM (75), Icon of Chaos Glory (10), 4 Missile Launchers (80) = 165
Reviled Brothers Brutus and Magnus
2 Obliterators = 150
Reviled Brothers Cassius and Publius
2 Obliterators = 150

Game 3 was pitched battle deployment. Primary objective was seize ground. Secondary was kill points and tertiary was quarters. Ragnar won the roll and gave me first turn.

Here is our deployments. Ive got the harlequins with archon on the far right.

He's deployed the 5 man marines near the building on the right. Havocs up in that building. 10 man marine squad in the Rhino on the right. Chosen and other 10 man squad on the left. Princes in the middle. Terminators, demons, and oblits deepstriking.

I move up on turn 1 and drop the portal. Pitched battle is actually the worst deployment for the one portal list set up.

Ragnar then moves up. Sorry the pic is blurry, you can see his rhinos have shuffled towards the central cover, trying to give a little berth to the portal.
Turn 2 I got 1 Talos, Cronos, 1 wych squad, 1 beast squad, and the Incubi in. Wyches and Incubi got great move through cover rolls though the building. Cronos went left and ran. Talos moved right and lined up a shot on the Rhino there. Beasts came out the back of the portal and wrapped forward. Archon joined the back of the Incubi, while harlequins separated and ran left.

Was just inside half range with the heat lance. hit, pen, explode. Great fleet rolls by both Incubi and Wyches meant 10 dead chaos marines with no casualties back. Archon is great for giving grenades to Incubi. Randomly placed the pain point and lady luck favored the wyches.
Ragnar was reeling from the fast hit, but he is a pro. On turn 2 he got in one lesser demon pack, and both Obliterator units. He dropped one oblit on the top side, with a lesser demon pack, and the other off the bottom left of the board near my deployment edge.

Rhinos pulled back, needing to get safely away from the Incubi death team. Princes lashed wyches in front of the oblits. They got flamed... a lot. But passed an ungodly amount of feel no pain saves. Leaving me with about 9 of the 15 still alive. So Ragnar had to charge into them with the lesser demons. I killed 4 of the 5 sadly getting stuck in combat.
Turn 3 was pretty pivotal. I got my other talos, wych squad, and beast unit in. Seeing Ragnar's oblits close to my board edge on the left(see final pic) got me all excited to charge them with beasts. I sent the Talos in on that edge as well to give support in case his dreadnought came down.

After a few moments of indecision I sent the wyches in from my table edge on the right side.

My other wyches were locked in combat. My other beasts moved toward the building on the top right, followed by the Talos, and after a weak move through cover roll the INcubi... who I really didnt have a plan with and in hindsight should have gone left instead though it may not have mattered.

Also on the left the Cronos and Harelequins moved up and assaulted the Chosen's Rhino wrecking it. The wyches predictably finished off the last lesser demon.

The beasts on the top right assaulted though the building needing a 6 to double to 12 to reach the 5 man troop squad there. Easily tearing through their power armor and sending the last man fleeing for the table edge.

And on the left side failure.

here was my assault set up with beasts on the oblits... I moved poorly and so had to touch the terrain so needed to test. Needed probably just a 3 to get there, rolled double 2's oh well. I think in hindsight there may have been a way to make it creating a screen with the furthest models, but regardless sloppy play and a clock will leave you in bad spots sometimes and you need to take your lumps. So Ragnar's forgetfulness in putting the oblits so close to the edge was saved by my poor movement phase.
Ran out of pics at this point as the game got really tight and the clock was against us.

On Ragnar's turn 3 he got his other demon pack in, and his terminators. Terminators and Chosen killed off my Cronos. Demon princes both lashed the INcubi, into a tight little pile, which he hoped to plasma cannon away... but my wyches kept passing feel no pain saves, so he shot them down instead. Havocs dropped frag on my incubi and 37 wounds later everyone but Drahzar and the Archon were dead.

On my turn 4 I slid my wyches in the bottom half trying to maybe reach out and grab the middle objective in addition to that one in the corner but couldnt reach. My beasts in the bottom left got to charge the oblits there and killed one. In the top right Drahzar assaulted the Havocs and killed them, while the Archon joined the beasts to give them grenades while they assaulted and killed the demon prince.

On the top left all I had was the Harlequins. So I lined them up and assaulted his 10 man marine squad and lesser demons I guess hoping to break them both to win on objectives. I killed some but not enough, losing all but one harlequins.

On Ragnar's turn 4 he did some things including killing the harlequin. But all that really mattered was he moved his demon prince its 12" and was just high enough while sitting on his wrecked rhino to see my wych squad and just in range to lash them off my objective so he could pull off the win.

I won the secondary and tertiary.

Both our lists did a great job of putting pressure on each other. I think in that last turn I lost sight of the fact that I didnt need to win primary to win the game, I was winning everything else already. If my harlequins had assaulted the demon prince instead of the troops I think the game would have easily been mine no matter how many more turns we went. As it was with the demon prince running free he would have won no matter how many turns we went on.

I had 6 harlequins with kisses left at that juncture. Thats 24 attacks, so 12 hits, so 2 rends and 2 saves for the prince. So he loses maybe 2 wounds. He probably kills 3 back or so, probably lock him a turn which is probably all I'd need.

Ah well. It was an awesome game. With us both making some critical mistakes and also wonderful counters back and forth. Cant wait for another shot at it with Ragnar king of Chaos!