I Get Back Up Again

 It's the Plumbawumba decider battle - Alpha Legion back against Mantis Warriors to determine an eventual winner!

Underminers

General P was given full range of my Alpha Legion this time, and a 1000 points to blow through. Which he did in short order, coming up with a pretty fierce list. It went mostly on his observations of how vicious Obliterators are, and I was duly appalled to see the WAAC side rear its head in my pupil. He was supposed to bring balance to this force, not three Obliterators and the Termite!

Alpha Legion Battalion Detachment, 1000 points, 6 CPs

• HQ - Terminator Lord, Warlord with Combi-bolter, the Shadeblade relic Power Sword and Master of Diversion trait
• HQ - Winged Daemon Prince with twin Malefic Talons, Warp Bolter, Warptime power
• Troops - 10 Cultists with Autoguns and a Flamer
• Troops - Same again
• Troops - 5 Chaos Space Marines with Bolters and Pistols, Champion has Combi-Plasma, someone else has a Melta
• Heavy Support - 3 Obliterators with the Mark of Slaanesh
• Dedicated Transport - Terrax Pattern Termite

Mants in your Pants

Mantis Warriors for me again. I'd pre-picked mine before showing Plumba his options, and went for the idea of a Land Raider Crusader full of Terminators. Pricey, but reliably hard hitting as well. A variety of small troops to hold ground, a Biker Hammer Captain for the punch and some scouts to dick about and get in everyone's way. Somewhere along the way I forgot to bring a Relic, but it's only dirty traitors I'm fighting so I probably don't need one. 

Mantis Warrior Patrol Detachment, 1000 points, 6 CPs

• HQ - Biker Captain with Storm Shield and Thunder Hammer, Warlord with Master Rider trait
• HQ - Librarian with Force Axe, Ride the Winds and Storm Wreathed, Storm Bolter
• Troops - 5 Assault Intercessors, Sarge has Plasma Pistol and Power Sword
• Troops - 5 Tactical Marines, Sarge has a Chainsword and Bolter, someone brought a Missile Launcher
• Elites - 5 Relic Terminators featuring three Power Fists, two Storm Bolters, a Grenade Harness, A Reaper Autocannon, a pair of Lightning Claws and a Chainfist and Volkite Charger for Sarge
• Elites - 5 Scouts with Sniper Rifles and Camo Cloaks
• Heavy Support - Land Raider Crusader with Storm Bolter, twin Hurricane Bolters and twin Assault Cannon

Mission and Terrain

We are once again playing a simple 'Hold the Points' game, with 5 objectives evenly spaced across our 6x3' jungle base. 1 VP for each point you hold at the end of each of your turns. The trees are generally Dense and Difficult, buildings with rails or bannisters to hide behind give cover, and the river counts as difficult to Infantry, but other stuff is big enough to wade through unrestricted. 

We are also introducing Combat Doctrines for the Marines, and Plumbawumba has been thoroughly briefed on all the Strategems available to him. 

Deployment

I get to be defender, and pick the long edges for our drop zones. My Terminators and Librarian are in the Land Raider, and I use a CP on Encirclement so it can come in at the end of a movement phase. Even the first one... 

My other units spread out, with the Tac Marines holding the left, the Captain on the right and the Assaultacessors hidden in the jungle, ready to push the centre. Snipers in the tower, like good snipers should be.

Plumbawumba laughs in the face of this place. His shifty Alphas have the Obliterators in deep strike and ten Cultists in the Termite, somewhere below us. And after he's baited my Captain out, his Warlord trait lets him shuffle everything round so the Daemon Prince is facing the Biker, with cultists opposite the centre and the Terminator Lord and Marines lurking opposite my Tacs. Then the DP uses Forward Operatives to get even closer to me.

This is clearly ballsy play, a gamble for the Daemon Prince to strike first, and it doesn't pay off - Mantis Warriors go first!

FIGHT!

There's a big enough hole for my flanking Land Raider to immediately spring up behind the Daemon Prince. The Scouts waddle round to get a bead on him, the Biker Captain decides to hang back on the objective for now. All the firepower on that side (Biker, tank and snipers) focuses on the big bat. Plenty of hits and plenty of scraping, but the Alpha Legion trait proves very helpful here, and I only take off half of his eight wounds. 

The Tac Marines help by shunting a flak missile into him, but he's not quite out (I realise later that this was the old Flak Missile Strat and was thus wrong, I haven't read up on Marine strats as much as I should). I do, however grab the centre by using Wind Swift on the Assault Intercessors and score 3 in my turn. 

The counterpunch is painful - the DP flits across the field with Warptime and slams the Biker Captain flat in a single turn. Only in Death does his Duty End, however, and he returns the favour - both Warlords down!

The central Cultists have Renascent Infiltration on them, and vanish from sight again, so Plumbawumba is on a single objective for now, and I have an early lead. 

Turn two, and my tank rolls back towards my own lines, first dropping the passengers off on the objective before popping smoke (again, I'm a bit behind on marine strats - this should have been done next round). The other marines don't have anything to shoot at - everything is either too well hidden, or too far off. So I have to settle for squatting on the objectives, but it's another 3 VPs, and my lead is looking solid. 

But here come the Alpha Legion deep strikers - the Termite bursts out from under my dead Warlord and completely whiffs its shooting (hoorah for smoke!). The Obliterators appear next to it, and very much do not whiff either of their rounds of shooting, and the Land Raider is left on a single wound (just the driver clutching the steering column between a pair of smoking tracks, basically). 

As the re-infiltrated Cultists appear back by the Terminator Lord, he immediately sneaks off himself with the same strat. Blasted Alpha Legion! Why can't you just stay put? Two VPs for Plumba, but he's still behind. 

I respond by advancing what's left of the Land Raider back to where it came from, so it can hold the objective there. The Terminators, boosted by both the Librarian's powers, head for the Obliterators, laying a curtain of almost entirely useless fire down as they come. The Scouts fail to help out, so the full pack are still ahead of me, and a good way off. 

On the other side, the Tac Marines pick off half the Cultists, but they pass their morale without bother. And the Assault team stay in the scoring zone. 

The Terminators, aided by Ride the Winds and Fierce Rivalries, make their charge. It's turn three, so we're in Assault Doctrine, and I have high hopes for the boosted AP and damage! Until I roll the dice, at least. A full pack of Terminators manages a meagre five wounds between them, so I fell a lone Obliterator. Their return hits kill two of mine, and keep me from retaking the objective. Ouch! Still, it's another 3 VPs in the bag, and I've got a decent lead here. 

The Alpha Legion waste no time in wasting me - the Obliterators pull Feigned Retreat, and backed by the autoguns of the Cultists pouring out of the Termite, wipe the Terminators out. Yes, I lost the Relic Terminators to autogun fire, and no, I don't want to talk about it. 

Not gonna lie - this is going to hurt

The Termite melts the last bits of the Land Raider, then manages a huge charge roll that puts it on the back objective with enough movement to reverse pack neatly on my Librarian, and it even manages to kill a Scout with spare gunnery. 

And worse, the Chaos Marines and Terminator Lord (newly emergent on my own back line) start converging on the Tac Marines, firing as they come. The other Cultist pack does what Cultists do best, and hides behind some packing crates whilst holding an objective. 

So I'm a bit thin on the ground going into turn four - the Scouts do nothing to the Obliterators again, whilst the Tac Marines bounce bolter shells off the Chaos Marines and fail to pin the Terminator Lord with a Krak Missile. But I'm still scoring, now up on 11 VPs to Plumba's 6. 

It doesn't last. The Terminator Lord ploughs into the Tac Marines as the Chaos Marines suppress them, and the entire squad get torn up in pretty short order. The Obliterators, Cultists and Termite pour fire into my sniper nest, leaving what resembles broken eggs and nothing more. Which means the Alpha Legion have four objectives to my one, now, and he's very much back in the game. 

Sure enough, the writing is on the wall. My Assault Intercessors decide to sell their lives dearly and scamper towards the Chaos Marines, charging in and somehow only killing three, despite the massive volume of Assault Doctrine attacks. My hope had been a charge, kill the Chaos Marines and use Strike for the Heart to jump on the Terminator Lord and nick his objective, but I'm denied. 

Which leaves them to get shot up at close range when the Alpha Marines pull another feigned retreat, and then the survivors get roasted by the Chaos Lord. At least the Sergeant does me proud! Not only does he not die, he also nearly kills the Alpha Warlord, for all the good it does me. Even if I'd sat on that central objective, he would outscore me here, and with my last minute ploy letting me down, I have nothing to do but sit and take my lumps. 

Result - 14-11 to the Alpha Legion!

Locker Room

A convincing drubbing from the Alpha Legion there! What chump went and let them have a Termite?

Great game! My Land Raider was a poor choice in retrospect. Quad Lascannons would have been more helpful, or maybe a big squad of bikers instead to outmanouver those slippery rascals. But good stuff all the same, and my early lead nearly paid off. Next time! 

My coaching has paid off a little too well. General Plumbawumba has already planned his Death Guard army, his homebrew Marine chapter, and has a search history full of eBay deals. Having created this monster, I feel somewhat obliged to head off into Antarctica on a raft. Instead, we part with the promise of a rematch another time, perhaps even against visiting armies.