4-Orbital Relay - Battle Report

The mission card was a Strategic card called Orbital Relay. It was a standard Kill points game with an bonus objective worth 5 Points which was in the Defenders (Ultramarines) deployment zone.

Edd wanted to play 1500 points.

The orks were not allowed to use Warbosses as per the reward for Edd winning the last game.

The Deployment was done Diagonally. Edd won the initial roll and let me deploy first.

Deployment Orks
I deployed a Wagon, then a mob of Boyz, then a Deff Dread, then another wagon in the middle, followed by another Dread, Mob and a final Wagon the other flank.

Ork Deployment

More ork deployment!

Deployment Ultramarines

Edd only deployed 2 rhinos and a devastator squad and held everything else in reserve. He hid completely out of sight.

Turn 1 Ork
The Orks just charged forwards

Turn 1 Ultramarines
The Devastators did a single hull point on a wagon! A rhino and its tactical squad moved to a ruin.

The Ultramarines bunker into a ruin near the Relay

Turn 2 Ork
The Orks just charged forwards. No targets were in range.

The orks had nothing to do so they tied this ultramarine to the back of the wagon!

Turn 2 Ultramarines
The Land Raider, Vindicator and stormtalon arrived from reserve. Calgar and his tactical squad guard were inside the Land Raider.

The Landraiders multi-melta killed a dread and the land raider and the tactical squad with Calgar reduced the mob of 30 boys down to size. Else where, the other unit of Boys took some wounds.

The Tact squad in the rhino got out and got shelter in a ruin.

Turn 3 Orks
The Killkannons went to work. 2 of the 3 shots hit bang on. Calgars Tactical squad were reduced to a single model and Calgar.

After a direct hit from the killkannon, Calgar and one marine are left.

Another tactical squad was reduced to 3 models and due to some epic Snap shoting by these 3 (5 kills from 6 shots!) made the Orks fail a charge against them.

Before the killkannon...

...and after!

Turn 3 Ultramarines

The Storm talon moved and opened fire on the larger unit of boys along with plenty of tactical marines and Vindicator. This second mob only had about 12 models left.

The Land Raider and Calgar finished off the original unit of Boyz with shooting.

The unit of 3 Marines left standing, quickly ran into a Rhino and headed back to secure the objective.

Turn 4 Orks

The Orks at this point had all 3 Wagons alive, 1 Dread and a unit of 12 Boyz. The Boys got into a Wagon ready to rush for the objective. The killkannons had pretty much ran out of targets which their AP3 templates would hurt and were left to shoot the Vindicator and Tanks, but failed to do any damage.

Turn 4 Ultramarines

The Ultramarines has Calgar and a single tactical marine in the Land Raider, a Stormtalon, 2 rhinos, a full squad of tactical marines, a unit of 3 marines in a Rhino, a Vincidator and a Devstator squad. They had not lost a single kill point yet!

The Ultramarines clearly had revenge and wanted to empathically prove their dominance. The Landraider damaged a Wagon with Melta Fire. The Storm Talon and devastators killed the last Dread.

The Devastators scout out the battlefield

Turn 5 Orks

It was pretty grim at this point. The orks in a last ditch effort to try and save the game charged the objective. A Wagon rammed a Rhino moving 13” (due to red paint job!) however the ram inpact failed to destroy the rhino. The killkannons open fired but due to the Marines using ruins very effectively they didn’t cause as much chaos as they perhaps should have.

RAM THE RHINO!!!

Turn 5 Ultramarines
Calgar got out of his Land Raider alone. He clearly wanted to show the greenskins a feat of strength to raise his profile even higher. He assaulted a Wagon and with his ‘Titanic Might’  and blew it up. Annoyingly the Big Mek inside, my warlord for this fight got hurt by the exploding Wagon!

Calgar uses his 'Titanic Might'

Elsewhere a Wagon was Killed by the vindicator.

Turn 6 Orks

It was hopeless, but in true Orky style I came up with an amazingly awesome plan. It involved charging a wagon really fast getting a few orks out and then hoping I could kill 3 tactical marines holding the relay.

This didn’t work. No Marines died and the Orks were hopelessly left out of cover!

Turn 6 Ultramarines

Calgar charged the Big mek. The rest of his army killed the last Wagon and a all the boys bar a Single Ork Nob!

Calgar crushed the big mek in combat .

The game still continued to turn 7!

Ork Turn 7

Another Mork (maybe Gork) plan came into the orks mind. If my single Nob made it into combat with the tactical squad, survived the attacks, and then killed them all and could hid in cover, I could be cheeky and claim the objective and linebreaker!

The nob made it into combat but was killed before he could Klaw any beakies…

With that death the orks were tabled.

Scores

Urm… Total Ultramarine Victory!


2-2 now in terms of victories, however the Ultramarines have the advantage as they have 2 strategical wins compared to the Orks 1 Logistical win.

Should Edd win a 3^rd Strategical battle, he can choose to end the phase of the campaign and force a major confrontation.

There is hope however for the Orks. We have agreed that I can use some experimental rules I have devised for my warboss, Ferotous.

The Armies

Orks
2 Big Meks – Kustom Force Fields

2 units of 30 Boys

2 Dreads

3 Wagons – (killkannons, kannons, rokkits and big shootas)

Ultramarines
Calgar

3 Tactical Squads (2 with Rhinos)

Stormtalon

Vindicator

Devastators (4 Missiles)

Land Raider

4-Orbital Relay

With Ferotous currently regaining control of his Waaagh!  Komminsar Un'Trogg and Admiral Grabba, the Blood Axe Bosses, were left in charge.

Whilst they were brilliant Tacticians and Loyal, two very un-orky characteristics, they were not equals to Ferotous. Whilst the Ork stronghold and fortifications where being controlled and held, they could not stop a Big Mek gathering a force.

He had started to gather en-mass and were not prepared to wait for instructions by the Warboss. He promised any orks who followed him plenty of looting and fighting.

There was an Orbital Relay, completely filled with tesla coil and other high technology 'gubbins' and 'whatnots' which had the Big Mek obsessed. To this end he decided to lead a highly mechanical force to battle. The Orks gathered a force of high armoured deff dreads and Gun Wagons. 

The Relay had a garrison to defend it. The Ultramarines clearly wanted to hold onto the Relay as whilst it was operational, it allowed the nearby forces to communicate clearly and efficiently. It meant the smaller numbers of Marines, could quickly call reinforcements and use their resources to maximum effect.

The Ork big Meks wanted the relay to build something orky, whilst the Relay was a key defensive tool for the Ultramarines.

The appeal was too much for the orks and the Blood Axe bosses could not restrain the attack.

The Ultramarine scouts observed the force and managed to report this back to the Relay. In turn they managed to get the message to the Ultramarine HQ.

Calgar, who appeared to be everywhere, answered the call for aid personally.

Campaign Overview - Battles 1 -3

After the initial successful planetfall by the Orks, they quickly overran the northern half of the planet. The only resistance left in the 3 planets of the system was due to an heroic effort of Imperial Guard forces lead by the local garrison of Ultramarine 8th reserve Company.

Calgar promptly sent a relief force which he personally lead and brought the entire 4th Company with him. Calgar initially gave command to a respective Librarian.

Calgars initial plans to launch a counter attack utterly failed with the Orks destroying the counter attacking force, forcing the Ultramarines to play by Ferotous cunnin' plan.

Ferotous took the battle to the front lines and whilst he won a tactical victory, he was seriously wounded in a challenge between the two leaders in single combat. Calgar in his attempt to salvage the defenses, left Ferotous, who was rescued by his lucky mascot and banna waver Thesaurus MA.

To prepare for his next encounter with Calgar, Theasaurus has done extensive cyborknetic work on Ferotous. A few centimeters under his skin Ferotous now has enfused with his flesh scrap metal that makes his skin as tough as Mega Armour and had to replace a large chunk of his jaw with a metal one. Ferotous has been made considerably tougher by this surgery.

Calgar then took the battle to Ferotous. Knowing this was a Ork leader he had bested before, he vowed to finish the job and leave the Orks leaderless. He lead a ambush attack on Ferotous who escaped with his life - however the Orks paid a heavy cost in terms of deaths.
The Waaagh! was in trouble. Ferotous had been shown wanting twice at the hands of Calgar, and the other orks had noticed. Ferotous had to leave the front line and restore order in his Waaagh! This meant Ferotous was not able to lead his armies personally and had to allow the attack to be led by Komminzar UnTrogg and Admiral Grabba, Bosses of the Blood Axes.

In terms of the game, the scores are 2-1 to the Orks in overall victories. We both have one campaign card. The Orks get to pick the next mission.

Assassination - Edd's Thoughts

Firstly, we were playing on Simon’s turf for the first time. This seemingly small change erupted into near disaster as I forgot that:
a) It was my turn to play a mission card 
b) Thanks to the success of the Orks in the previous mission I could not use any heavy slots.

I had to re-do my list with the models that I had with me. Thankfully Simon let me play the Land Raider in an Elite slot, so with a re-giggled list I was only 30 points or so down.

Mission wise, I remembered that I had the Assassination card, and by luck I had my Librarian in the small carry box – allowing me to field the mandatory 2 HQ choices. Calgar was going to show the Librarian how it should be done as we chased down the Warboss.

Diagonal deployment meant the marines organised themselves on one side of a road facing into the ruins of a city. Tellion and his scouts had a small ruin to bunker down in with their camo cloaks, and everything else prepared for the Ork onslaught. 

In previous battles, the orks had come at us fast and in numbers, so we were looking to gun them down with full size tactical squads as they approached, and then use some organized movement shenanigans to try to prevent heavy losses in close combat.

With the Land Raider using an Elite slot, Calgar and his bodyguard could not deploy inside it. Instead they readied themselves next to it, anticipating an embarkation. 

Only, the orks didn’t come.

Instead they skulked through the ruins on the opposite side of the road. So we shot at them, and we called down an orbital bombardment. 

We shot at their shadowsfor two turns, neutering a few threats and suffering nothing in return.

By turn three things started to heat up. Rexus, the Landraider was destroyed – it had been a primary target for the Orks, and we started to see Orks in larger numbers emerging from the ruins. Thankfully they failed an important charge range roll (through terrain), and with the tactical doctrine blaring in the ears of the marines, our overwatch fire was looking good.

The stormtalon’s late arrival was a blessing. It came in just as the Land Raider was destroyed, and provided a replacement distraction target for the Orks.

Calgar meanwhile proceeded to show the Librarian how to engage the enemy properly. In tandem with a Land Speed Storm providing Cerberus launcher cover (blinding the Orks), he charged and destroyed a load of them. The group then moved into the ruins, and the following turn Calgar separated to tear apart an immobilized Wagon (Incidentally, the resulting explosion killed Calgar’s standard bearer – meh). 

So, in a swathe of bolter fire and blue, Calgar was sweeping enemies aside. We’d had to change our planned approach due to a number of things, but by turn 5 we were up by three kill points. This was largely, I feel, down the Orks piecemeal commitment to the fight; they seemed to keep a large part of their army out of the way, allowing us to attack the smaller biker units. 

When Blooditooth finally did make a proper appearance, his prowess was evident. He took out an entire tactical squad on his own!

But it was too little, too late for the Orks – by then we were able to concentrate fire on the poor warboss. Tellion cought him well and took two of his three wounds.

Calgar, confident enough to stride around on his own now, tried a nine-inch charge. Oh how he and I would have loved to have made that charge! It wasn’t to be though. Game ended well for the marines. We learned some lessons though, and on another day the Orks could easily have torn us a new asshole, and taught us how to breathe through it.

The war thunders on...

Assassination - Battle Report

Edd managed to forget it was his Campaign turn; he had to alter his list a bit. He did remember his mission which was Assassination. A Mission based on kill points with a bonus 5 points should he kill my warboss. No other ways to score.

Due to my bonus from winning the 2nd mission – Sabotage, the Ultramarines could not take Heavy slots.

Ultramarines

HQ - Calgar and a Level 2 Librarian

Elite Choice – Land Raider

Troops – 3 units of 10 Tactical Squad. One in a Rhino, One with Calgar and one on foot. There was a s 5 man tac with a Razorback and a unit of 5 tac squad. Finally a scout unit with snipers and Telion.

Fast – Land Speeder Storm and stormtalon.

Orks

Ferotous (using rules for Wazdakka)

14 tankbustas, 6 Nob bikers

4 units of 3 bikers and 2 units of 20 boyz

2 Battlewagons.

I won the dice roll, and decided to take first turn.

Ork Deployment

I pretty much deployed everything on the right. Ferotous and the Nob bikers at the back.

Ultramarine Deployment

Edd made a line on the right as well. Lines of tactical squads on the right, Land Raider and Calgar in the centre and the Razorback/scouts and Rhino on the left.

Ork Turn 1

Since the Ultramarines had to be aggressive I decided to mostly hide. Got my tankbustas ready to strike in turn 2 whilst the bikes got into nice safepositions.

Ultramarine Turn 1

Land Raider moved forwards, whilst the rest of the army shot. Due to range and well placed bikes, not much happened. About 6-9 Tankbusters did die however.

Ork Turn 2

Unwilling to charge into the rapid fire spam the army bunkered down. A biker unit charged the land Raider and did a hull point. The wagons moved forwards to get the boyz closer to the action.

Lone ork Biker damages the Land Raider!

Ultramarine Turn 2

Storm talon didn’t arrive. The Ultramarines started to move up. Shooting was low, the Bikes took a few wounds and a wagon was immobilized.

Telion started to try and snipe Ferotous.

The Tac squads don't have many targets!

Ork Turn 3

Another unit of Bikes charged the landraider, this time blowing it up! A unit of bikes tried a charge on a tactical squad but failed. The Ork boys got out ready to fight a tactical squad. Ferotous tried to fix the wagon but failed, whilst the other wagon and bikes shot lots of things, only doing a handful of kills.

Another unit of bikes finishes off the land raider

Ladz pile out into a ruin

Ultramarine Turn 3

The Marines advanced in full and the Storm Talon arrived. The main targets were the 20 Ork boyz fresh out of the wagon, but the shooting wasn’t a huge success. However the Ork bike units now were all down to 1 or 2 boyz per unit.

Ladz prepare to charge the tac squad

Ork Turn 4

The Boyz and a single Biker charged the large tactical squad, which they wiped out. The Nob bikers shot down the Stormtalon with help from a big shoota elsewhere. The Shoota boyz unloaded their ammo into a tactical squad. Amazingly the Land speeder didn’t die to big shoota fire. 

The Scores were 4 to the Marines and 3 to the Orks. Ferotous tried and failed fixing the wagon.

Shooting success but repair failure!

Ultramarines Turn 4

Calgar and his tac squad charged the slugga boyz and killed them and advanced on the already damaged wagon. Telion continued to try and kill Ferotous but failed to target him. The Rhino moved up to try and support Calgar tac squad and shoot the nob bikers.

Ork Turn 5

Ferotous gave up trying to fix the wagon and moved up towards the centre hoping to cause some chaos in the next few turns. His biker team shot a number of Marines. The Shoota boyz continued to weaken units.

Ultramarine Turn 5

Calgar left his tac squad and charged the damaged wagon. His Power fists made short work of it. The tac squads tried to shoot the bikers and the heavy weapons failed to kill the last wagon.

At this point it was 6-3 to the Ultramarines.

The end game dice was rolled but continued.

Ork Turn 6

Ferotous was clearly in spilt minds. He wanted to kill something so badly he charged a entire tactical squad by himself. He bellowed his orders to his Nob bikers to weaken Calgar. Between the shootas and the Nob bikers shots, Calgar was wounded. The Bikers failed their charge and couldn’t bring their klaws down on Calgar who was isolated from his tac squad.

Ferotous charged the tac squad which had 6 left standing. Between crashing his bike, Thesaurus MA stabbing and Ferotous Klaw, No-one was left standing. The piles of shattered Marines lay around him in a pile.

WAAAAAAGGHH! DIE BEAKIES! (Can I hear Telion reloading?)

Ultramarine Turn 6

Calgar, was wounded, but was within sight of Ferotous. He Ignored the Nob bikers challenge and ran with all haste towards Ferotous. Meanwhile the tact squads largely failed to hurt the bikers or the very badly damaged battlewagon.

Telion however finally stepped up to the plate. After the whole battle of Telion targeting Ferotous, he double tapped and scored two hits on Ferotous, hitting him square in the face. This wounded Ferotous greatly. The final action of the turn was Calgars very far charge on Ferotous which failed.

Ferotous was saved.

The dice was rolled and the game ended.

Scores

Ultramarines scored 6 – (4 Biker units, Boys unit and a battlewagon) Did not get the bonus 5 for killing Ferotous (he only had 1 wound left thanks to Telion!)

Orks scored 4 – 2 tac squads, Land Raiderand Stormtalon.

Final Score – 6-4 to the Ultramarines.

Assassination - Target Bluddietoof

Following the Battle for Hulthinsar, the war was in the favour of the Greenskins. They had convincingly killed the Ultramarines on planetfall and after Ferotous had not been killed at Hulthinsar both battles had been victories for the Horde.

Calgar knew that the Ork Warboss needed to be killed and set upon a mission to kill ‘Doktor’ Ferotous Bluddietoof. Telion had recovered from his wounds and had been assigned by Calgar to report and track Bluddietoof.

Telion reported that the ork warboss was on the move in a highly mobile force. Calgar, with no heavy support, utilised his thunderhawk gunship to deploy an infantry heavy force to seperate Ferotous from his horde and use this opportunity to kill the warboss and cut the heart out of the WAAAGH!

Calgar met up with Telion and waited for Ferotous to appear. The mission was simple – Kill Ferotous Bluddietoof – Once and for all!

Calgar and his Ultramarines lay in wait on the cities edge.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Ferotous (on the bike at the front) and his Speed Freak's Bike army leaving the Ork base.

The 'Doktor' was on the move again. He was at head of the army with his Bikerz. He was moving from the ork stronghold through a city that was already destroyed. Ferotous was rather tired having had to fight a number of challenges to his leadership following his loss of the challenge with the Ultramarines Boss. Anyone who even mentioned Calgars name was swiftly dealt with via Power Klaw.

With his new Bionic eye, Ferotous could see some of those blue beakies were lying in wait in the city. The Biker army prepared out to battle. As soon as the battle lines were drawn up, Ferotous could see Calgar himself.

For the first time in his entire life Ferotous had a shiver on the back of his neck. Was this fear? He didn't even feel this when he was ready to square up to Ghazghkull back in Auctorian. 

Ferotous had to make sure Calgar did not finish the job... He had to survive this onslaught...

Sabotage - Thesaurus MA saves his master

The camp was amazed and in shock…

Ferotous had never returned before in such a state. Thesaurus knew some of the bigger Nobz must be considering a challenge to Warboss. Thesaurus managed to get Ferotous back to his own Mek shop without a challenge. Dispite limping so heavily, no-one jumped the boss. Such was the fear and awe the other orks had in Ferotous.

Thesaurus had to work fast. His position as sidekick of the warboss was at risk here as well as his Guardians life.

Thesaurus started work which surpassed the highest quality work of the most skilful painboy. Thesaurus measured and cut along the line he had drawn. This was the most technologically advanced surgery in the history of the Greenskin race.  For 3 hours the only noises you could hear from Ferotous workshop were buzzsaw, drill, rivet gun, blowtorch and the occasional hammering noise. Thesaurus worked tirelessly.

After the operation Ferotous woke from his slumber following the surgery. There was an unholy roar:

“CAAAAALLLLGUAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH”

On the surface Ferotous just looked battered and bruised, but just centimetres’ under his skin his body was infused with scrap metal, whatnots and gizmos.  Thesaurus had not only saved his master, but he had amplified his body like never before.  Ferotous was not really in a suitable position to fight still, however he had to gain control of his horde.

He defeated a number of rivals over the next few hours following the surgery. He was impressed by the work Thesaurus had done and felt that was remarkably more durable thanks to the improvements. Within a few days order had largely been resolved.

Ferotous had figured out that he had completed his objective. The Marines were crippled around the town of Hulthunsar. He was not able to capitalise on the advantage as he had to ensure loyalty within the warband.

The Marines had gained the initiative. Whilst waiting to see the Marine next move, Ferotous and Theasaurus started work on the biggest project to date.

Following defeat at Calgars hand, Ferotous and Thesaurus MA start work on their new secret project!