World Beater: Chaos Space Marines vs World Eaters

Time for my first tenth ed game as a training dummy!

Sting in the Tail

A second outing with Chaos for me today. I'm still in love with being able to kill off my own guys for extra bullets, so I'm sticking to my oath of always declaring Dark Pacts. This time I'm taking a few different marks of Chaos though, to experiment with what they can do. 

2000 points today. Kas is hosting, so I'm drawing on his collection of terrifying stuff, whilst he is trying out a list for a future battle. 

Great Brass Scorpion! That'll do for a mark of Khorne. Then two Obliterator units, one each for Nurgle and Tzeentch, and a Nurgle Helbrute to throw out extra Dark Pact powers whilst hiding itself if targeted. 

Two big units of Legionaries, led by a Master of Possession and Chaos Lord respectively, then a big pack of shooty Cultists, all of whom are Chaos Undivided. The Lord is taking the Liber Hereticus, so his unit gets double Pacts all the time. Finally, a Heldrake to swoop about being annoying, and a Warpsmith to fix broken machines. He'll be Mark of Slaanesh for the sake of completeness. 

Chaos Space Marines Slaves to Darkness Detachment

• Chaos Lord - Warlord with Liber Hereticus, Power Fist and Plasma Pistol, leading one of the Legionaries squads
• Master of Possession - standard issue, leading the other Legionaries
• Warpsmith - Mark of Slaanesh
• 10 Legionaries - Heavy Combat Weapon and bolter for the Champ, an Icon, a Havoc Autocannon, a Meltagun and bolters for everyone else
• 10 Legionaires - as above
• 20 Cultists - Two heavy stubbers, autoguns all round
• 2 Obliterators - Mark of Nurgle
• 2 Obliterators - Mark of Tzeentch
• Helbrute - Heavy Bolter and Fist, Mark of Nurgle
• Helldrake - Baleflamer 
• Great Brass Scorpion - Mark of Khorne

Eat the World, Make it a Better Place

Kas himself is running World Eaters, with a list featuring exactly the kind of horrors you'd expect. Honestly, I was feeling a bit bad about taking the Great Brass Scorpion until I saw this! 

I had been having fun with WE; but this was was the first day of trying this list. 

It's a fast and angry list, but with some fairly beefy guns backing it up. Maybe a bit thin on numbers, but does that matter when Angron can come back from death?

Two big toys. Prior to this, my WE attempts had neither, but was keen to see if could make work.

Aside from the Blessings of Khorne (lots of excellent but slightly unreliable boosts that can be triggered at the start of a round), their detachment ability gives them extra strength and attacks on the charge. As though they'd need that! They're being led by a Master of Executions, who's brought a giant axe that does extra strength and damage on the charge. Again, as though he'd need it. 

The plan was to use Angron with abandon; then, with the rerolls from the bezerker icons (if on objective) and the +1 from the lord of skulls (if killed something) standing a good chance to get the trip6 to bring Angron back. I was tempted by the enhancement to give the extra full reroll for blessing, but could not fit in as was would have taken me to 2005 and couldn't quite find the build to fit in. 

No pictures tonight, sadly - in the heat of the action, the Instagram phase got forgotten. But you lot know what these things look like, you can make the pictures in your head (whilst making pew-pew noises). Are you sure it's still pew-pew when it's a lot of roaring chain blades?

World Eaters Berserker Warband Detachment

• Angron (Warlord)
• A Lord of Skulls
• 3 Exalted Eightbound
• 3 Eightbound
• 3 Eightbound
• 5 Khorne Berserkers
• 5 Khorne Berserkers
• 1 Rhino
• 1 Forgefiend with triple Exoplasma Cannons
• 1 Master of Executions with the Berserker Glaive

Mission and Terrain

It's a Leviathan game, we're in the shattered wreckage of a once-bustling city. Nobody's taking fixed objectives, that's clearly the choice for squares! (and you can't ditch objectives to get extra command points)

Although... the twist today is that we get three objective card draws, not two. So you could be square and still get command points! Neither of us succumb to that siren call, though. We're playing from diagonal long edges, (no we weren't diagonal from mid point on long to opposite short corner... although there was confusion as I sent wrong photo when first deployment made, but we worked out before finishing deployment or first turn) the primary is to get characters on to mid-field objectives to enthuse them? Enliven? Engorge? Some sort of En-word, anyway, so three points per objective but six if it's got an important chap on it and it's in no-man's land. In other words, the exact opposite of how World War One was fought. 

Deployment

My first time against World Eaters, and I'm immediately surprised by Eightbound making scout moves! Although I suppose it's more like their handlers really can't keep them back. Kas leaves the Exalted ones in the teleporter, but everything else is sat behind ruins, out of sight and ready to romp in later. Angron and the Lord of Skulls take one flank, a Rhino full of Berserkers the other, and the Forgefield sits at the back on an objective. 

I more or less mirror this, but with no deep strikes or Rhinos, and just the one hulking abomination dedicated to the Blood God. And Cultists instead of a Forgefiend. And a good deal less rage. Perhaps that's why I calmly take the first turn. 

Turn 1

I don't do much, because my objective draw is a cruel joke. Behind Enemy Lines, Tempting Target and Capture Enemy Stronghold? If the haunting laughter of dark gods really is the only sound over my blower to command, they could at least be subtle about it. 

Knowing something of the speed of World Eaters, I nudge the Brass Scorpion towards the middle so it can shoot the Lord of Skulls, something it does singularly poorly at. A handful of wounds in, then I fail my Dark Pact test and lose three myself, so I'm glad the Warpsmith is right behind it - he'll be able to patch it up later. Otherwise I do nothing this turn, merely move units out of the back corner a bit. 

This immediately bites me in the ass, because World Eaters are even faster than I expected. Kas has blessed them with advance and charge as well as an FNP save in round one, and my midlines immediately have Eightbound and Berserkers screaming around in them. 

That's not where the bad news stops, though - the Lord of Skulls and Forgefiend give the GBS a lick of return fire and completely wipe it off the board, even with a bit of Dark Obscuration from my side. 

Then all those angry angry infantry pile into the gap left in my forward line. I immediately lose the Helbrute to Eightbound, but the Obliterators prove a bit much for the Berserkers. I lose one but the other punches two of Khorne's busboys out. 

Kas is now on objectives, has scored all three of his draws (I forget quite what, but take an objective and kill stuff was probably about right) (actually two: discarded behind enemy lines for a cp, but scored secure no man's land and a well timed bring it down) and is generally looking pretty keen right now. 

Turn 2

But I'm not going down without a fight! Firstly, Skinshift on the wounded Obliterators. They're conveniently Tzeentchian, so the wounded one is back to full health and the other reappears, budding off his buddy's shoulder. I don't often surprise Kas with strats, but this gets a raised eyebrow along with the raised dead. Yep, not looked much at CSM yet, and that caught me out. Nice!

Then I use the Slaaneshi strat to pull out of combat but still be allowed to shoot and charge, which raises his other eyebrow. (not sure I spotted at the time; how were they Tzeentchian for the revive AND Slaaneshi for the fall back and stuff? The Slaaneshi strat still works on other units, but has extra juice if you're also Slaaneshi, letting you advance and charge instead)

I've been told to clear the centre, so the Heldrake zooms in to do that. Alas, it cops some Lord of Skull overwatch, which costs it half its wounds (Angron is telling it to reroll misses be thankful that aura kicks in after first round of shooting as starts at charge phase), but it then burns down an Eightbound and announces open season on red blokes. 

Berserkers? Or hapless away team soldiers? Dark Pacts, baby! I want to tell you how good these are as shooting magnifiers - the Berserkers get shot apart by Cultists! Pretty awesome! The Eightbound are caught in a withering crossfire that kills all of them, then Warpsmith and Obliterators head to finish the Berserkers in melee. Alas, the Warpsmith doesn't come out of this, he's punched his own card with a failed Pact, but I wouldn't swap it for the world. Brilliant

A lone Berserker somehow lives through all this, guarding his Master of Executions buddy. This costs me the Obliterators too, somehow - the pair of ragers hack my newly reborn Oblits apart, then watch as the other Eightbound squad take a charge from my Lord of Chaos and his squaddies. I lose one through Dark Pactism again, but the big blokes are wiped. This gets me all my objectives too (Clean the centre, steal an objective, take no prisoners), and I'm pretty happy with how it all worked out. 

Cue Kas's Turn two, and the utter reversal of all my fortune. The Master of Executions is a superb character killer, and I don't want him getting near my Lord, so when Kas moves him in that direction I throw some Baleflame from the Helldrake. Stupid move on my part to turn a 5" charge to unfailable at the risk of being flamed. Someone's been eating their armour biscuits though - the lone Berserker takes all the hits and just barely dies, leaving Mr Axey to run towards my legionaries. 

Hah! I think. I've got a full squad, I'll be fine! 

Nope, the Forgefiend disagrees and pulverises all of the lesser guys, so that the Executioner can run in with his relic axe and deliver a 5-wound devastating hit that insta-gibs my warlord. Defer, mammajammas. 

Elsewhere, the Helldrake lasts for all of no seconds against Angron's axe, but Big Red pulls it down on his own head. Deadly Demise, costing him and the Rhino a pair of wounds each. (I realise now I forgot to heal the rhino each round which is a thing they have now apparently). And the Exalted Eightbound appear but fail their charge, which at least gives me a nice target for next turn, but I'm looking a bit thin here! Plus Kas is racking up objectives and secondaries at a fair lick. I need a quick turnaround here. 

Turn 3-4

I don't get one. High command, still snickering up their sleeves, decide the time is right to Assassinate Angron, Bring Him Down and also Deploy Teleport Homers, possibly on his corpse. Given he's pretty unscathed so far, I'm not confident. (he was slightly scathed)

And no surprises - even with the Darkest of Pacts being called, I barely scathe him. The Exalted take a pretty good beating in combat, though, although it costs me (more Dark Pacterism, mostly, but one survives and eats half my squad). The ray of sunshine in all this gory drizzle is the death of the Master of Executions, shot apart by the massive Cultist firing squad. Go Cultists! Wow! That cultists do things now beyond just holding objectives and hoping to be ignored!

Kas promply revenges this by turning the Forgefiend and Lord of Skulls on them, and all the Cultists promptly die happy. Angron sweeps through my other Obliterators, and in the next turn (which is a short one) the rest of my chaps get tidied away pretty handily. The last moments see the Master of Possession go toe to toe with Angron, and that goes just as well as you'd expect. 

Result - Victory to the World Eaters, 80-37!

Locker Room

Yeah, I reckoned my goose was cooked when the Scorpion folded early. That points cavity left me with no real answer to either of the big equivalents on the other side - but I still made them work for it, and took a surprising amount with me. I wonder if first turn hurt you here.

Cultists are actually reasonably effective with a Dark Pact on them. That's partly due to the massive improvement their heavy stubbers have (Rapid Fire 3 is beefy on top of 4 shots native), but also because nobody expects it from them. Sure, they still die in droves to minimal attention, but if you have to waste firepower on those T-shirted nobodies, somebody else is probably thankful for it!

Khorne's lot are a fearsome foe, and no mistake. I was very impressed by the Lord of Skulls too, that's a great pressure vehicle. Expensive to lose, of course, but it's going to be that or Angron (or neither, here), and either of them is going to leave some big marks. 

Kas's force passed his test - they will be going on to greater things. Just remember where you saw them first! Thanks for letting me try it out.