Battle Report - Orks vs Chaos Daemons

Hello!

Back for game two of 9th edition, and this time I brought the Orks! WAAAGH! I was playing against fellow DZTV patron Sharpy aka Jonathon (j.sharpe0608 on instagram) with his Khorne Daemons, at 2000 points of matched play Four Pillars goodness. With limited shooting and lots of punching on both sides, it was going to be a bloodbath. We did technically play on a 6x4 board, but a significant chunk of the board was some awesome industrial dock scenery, so in avoiding going into the sea we were almost at the new minimum board size anyway.

I took a classic battalion, using the Feral Ork specialist mob from Saga of the Beast for the first time. This meant a chunk of my force had no benefit, but all my boyz, non-mega nobz and some characters could advance 3d6 pick the highest, and had a 6 inch pile in move. I also used a pregame stratagem from the book to make my warboss 'Da Biggest Boss' for +1 attack, wound and a 4+ invulnerable save. Rounding out my pregame spending, I upgraded my weirdboy to a Warphead. For my secondary objectives I took Thin Their Ranks (since there were quite a lot of daemons about), Assassinate (he had 5 characters that I imagined would be getting stuck in) and the mission specific one, Siphon Power.

HQ: Warboss (kombi-skorcha, attack squig, Da Killa Klaw, Might is Right, Da Biggest Boss), Mekboy with Kustom Force Field, Weirdboy (Warphead, Da Jump, Warpath)

Troops: 30 Boyz (slugga/choppas, Nob with powerklaw), 30 Boyz (slugga/choppas, Nob with powerklaw), 20 Boyz (shootas, 2 big shootas, Nob with powerklaw)

Elites: Nob with WAAAGH! Banner, 10 Nobs (9 big choppas, 1 pair of killsaws), 5 Meganobs (2 kombi-skorchas/powerklaws, 3 kustom shootas/powerklaws)

Fast Attack: 3 Deffkoptas (kopta rokkits)

Heavy Support: Battlewagon (killkannon), Battlewagon (deffrolla, 4 big shootas)

Transport: Trukk

Sharpy took a battalion and an outrider detachment, and splurged pregame CP on two banners of blood, sticking a blob of Bloodletters in the warp and making his Bloodthirster Exalted - rolling for it like a boss, and getting a 2+ armour save and an additional +1 to attacks and strength on the charge/when being charged. I forget his warlord trait, but his relic was a mega axe on one of his princes. His secondaries were Thin Their Ranks, Siphon Power and Engage On All Fronts.

HQ: Bloodthirster (Exalted), Karanak, Skullmaster (the herald on Juggernaut), Daemon Prince (wings, sword), Daemon Prince (wings, relic axe)

Troops: 20 Bloodletters, 10 Bloodletters, 10 Bloodletters

Fast Attack: 4 Bloodcrushers, 5 Flesh hounds, 5 Flesh hounds, 5 Flesh hounds

Heavy Support: Skull Cannon, Soul Grinder 

We rolled for deployment, and I was the defender - I picked the most open of the two available quarters and we alternated filling the tip of our corners. I had the Nobz in the Trukk, Meganobz in the kannon wagon and the 20 shoota boyz in the rolla wagon, and I elected to start the koptas on the board. There was a decent chunk of line of sight blocking terrain and plenty of craters, but not much in the way of ruins leaving the centre of the battle pretty open for a big scrap. We left a 5th objective marker in the centre of the board for ease of Engage on All Fronts-ing. Then, admin done, we rolled for first turn, and it fell to the Daemons!

Turn one, and Jon's Daemons raced forwards, hounds on the flanks heading to the objective to my left, and controlling/siphoning the one to my right, while a Bloodletter unit started to siphon off his home objective. No Psychic Phase and minimal damage on shooting, straight into the first charge of the game as the Bloodcrushers barrelled into both my Battlewagons and two units of boyz. The Deffrolla wagon was damaged, but revved up and crushed a couple of the juggernauts, while the boyz were able to pile some in and reduce the unit to a single model at the end of the turn. Not much damage done but it did crucially block me in a bit.

In my turn da boyz moved up as best they could. The white mob disengaged and swarmed toward the nearest objective (just under the lip of the landing pad on the picture) while the Deffkoptas flew over to start siphoning it. The Battlewagons remained in combat with the Bloodcrusher, while the pink mob were left unengaged so advanced up the ramp toward the hounds on the objective. On the far left the Trukk full of Nobz zoomed up to swing around later or something. My characters shuffled around in the centre, the big mek starting to siphon the objective (he did this every turn after this) and no one got out of their vehicles.

In the psychic phase the Weirdboy smited the last Bloodcrusher, removing him and freeing the wagons up to shoot, which they did, removing a few daemons here and there. Then the charge phase - only one to do, the pink mob going into the hounds... and they failed. This was quite significant, as it meant Sharpy was holding two objectives at the start of his turn and managed to siphon power from both of them.

Turn two, points on the board for the Daemons, and they looked to get seriously stuck in as the Bloodthirster moved up for a charge, as did the Soul Grinder and the warlord Daemon Prince. The Bloodletter bomb arrived behind me as well (I'd forgotten about them to be honest), which would get all four corners for Engage on All Fronts. Shooting happened, with the 'thirster using his whip and roar, combined with fire from the Soul Grinder to kill 2 of the 3 Deffkoptas, leaving one alive on one wound. Since he was siphoning power, the Bloodthirster would have to deal with him in melee. Then a whole load of charges went off - the aforementioned Bloodthirster into the kopta, the Prince and Soul Grinder into the pink boyz, and the Skullmaster into the damaged Battlewagon. Crucually though, even with the banner of blood, the musician and a CP reroll, the Bloodletter bomb failed to reach my Boyz and exposed Weirdboy.

Into the fight phase, and it got interesting, with a lot of CP being thrown around. Jonno elected to fight first with the Prince since the pink boyz were looking like interrupting. He killed a chunk of them, but left me on more than 20 models still and within range of the WAAAGH! banner. I interrupted anyway and used my 6 inch pile in to get as many models around the Prince as possible, including the klaw wielding Nob - who proceeded to roll a batch of ones and twos to hit anyway. The Boyz stripped some wounds off, before losing more to the Grinder. The Skullmaster/Battlewagon combat was fairly uneventful, and the last Deffkopta got predictably smashed. With both of us eyeing up 'attack again' stratagems, Sharpy activated his warlord Prince once more to smash some more boyz, bringing me below 20 to remove my +1 attack and out of range of the +1 to hit from the banner. I proceeded to fight again anyway, but the klaw whiffed once more, though the Boyz did well to drop him down to a few wounds. The promptly failed morale, but thanks to the new rules a few stuck around - though not for long...

My turn 2 and I picked up a few points for holding and siphoning one objective. This turn was going to be a big scrap - I started carefully considering where I was going to charge before realising Jon had no command points left, so I'd be free to attack first everywhere. With that in mind, the Meganobz got out and wandered over to the Bloodletters, the Nobs hopped onto the landing pad to eye up the Bloodthirster, the white Mob swarmed up to the Flesh Hounds now on the left objective, the yellow mob got out and lined up against the Prince/Soul Grinder along with Warboss Redtoof himself and the Pink boyz ran away, with their suspiciously similar replacements returning on the other side of the board after I used the Unstoppable Green Tide stratagem. Thanks to the new edition morale rules this stratagem seems like it'll be a lot easier to get off!

The Weirdboy tried for a smite but it was denied, then cast Warpath on the Meganobz with a 13, causing 3 mortal wounds to himself as his brain started to dribble out of his ears. In the shooting phase the Meganobz and their Battlewagon poured fire into the Bloodletter bomb, but did not thin the ranks as much as I had hoped. Other shooting was fairly incidental. Then came the charge phase, with successes across the board.

Fighting broke out across the board. The yellow boyz dragged down the Daemon Prince (after the powerklaw failed, naturally), Redtoof obliterated the Soul Grinder with ease, the Meganobz cut a healthy swathe of Bloodletters down (and more fell to morale later), before the Nobz bashed the Bloodthirster - who rolled pretty well for his saves (mostly 3+ thanks to his exalted armour) and got away with 8 wounds remaining. Fighting back he smashed six of the Nobz! I chose to use the stratagem at the end of the turn to automatically pass their morale. Two of the Meganobs were brought down as well by the Bloodletters.

Then things got interesting. That Skullmaster managed to finally chip the last wounds off the Battlewagon - which promptly exploded! That's D6 mortal wounds within 6 inches!

When the smoke cleared, the Weirdboy and the Skullmaster were both gone, while my other three characters were wounded and I lost a load of boyz from the two nearest units. Ouch - but points for Assassinate!

As the dust settled at the end of turn 2, the shape of the battle had changed drastically. Blood was flowing everywhere (though not so much from the Flesh Hounds at the top of the battlefield, somehow surviving the charge from the reinforced pink mob!) However the Khorne forces still held two objectives and successfully siphoned both at the start of their turn, putting them into a fairly handy lead on the points.

Turn three and there was decidedly un-khorne activities. The Bloodletters and the Flesh Hounds left combat in order to secure Engage on All Fronts again and avoid the wrath of Orks striking before them. The Bloodthirster stayed in though, even though the Nobz would go first - as it happend this was the right choice as they got murdered. Elsewhere Karanak and the other remaining Flesh Hounds charged the Yellow boyz to think their numbers and keep them away from the objective, and the two other Bloodletter units held and siphoned their objectives. There was a moment of glorious bloodshed however as the remaining Daemon Prince charged out to cut down Redtoof in the centre (don't worry, there are always more Redtoofs.)

In my turn the pink boyz on to left flank were swarming over the objective, dispatched the last of the Flesh Hounds over there while charging and wounding the 'thirster. The white mob moved up to charge the remaining Daemon Prince along with the wagon looking for some bonus movement, failing to bring him down. The Meganobz handily dispatched the last of the Bloodletter bomb, and with the help of the banner Nob, the right flank Flesh Hounds were removed as well.

Turn four saw more objective points scored for the Daemons and more running away. The badly wounded Bloodthirster fled from combat, while the Prince did the same, landing on my home objective to stop me scoring that. Karanak fell back, while the Skull Cannon moved up for a cheeky charge on my remaining wagon. I imagine all those daemons were gnashing their teeth and stomping with rage after Khorne willed them to claim battlefield superiority rather than fighting to the death. 9th missions are certainly making us think!

I started my turn 4 scoring a handful of points, and knowing that I needed to score big in turn 5 and probably max out Assassinate. To that end the pink Boyz held their objective and wandered over to smash the Bloodthirster. The Meganobz stumbled over to hit the Prince and secure my home objective with the Big Mek. The yellow boyz surrounded Karanak and the remaining few Bloodletters on the right objective, between shooting and melee finishing them off. Finally the white mob moved up around the Skull Cannon to get a 8 inch charge on the Bloodletters on Jon's home objective, succeeding and thanks to their 6 inch pile in, stomping them into the ground.

This left only the Cannon left for the Daemons in turn 5, scoring them no points. In my turn 5 I was holding all the objectives! Time to add up the scores...

And with that, plus the 10 points for fully painted, it was a very narrow win for the Orks, 70-65! As it turned out, if I had failed that charge on the last objective, Sharpy would have picked up 5, plus 1 for Siphon Power on turn 5 and could have held on! Great game - win for the Orks, and a first win in 9th edition for me, but those Khorne boyz were not muckin' about (apart from when they ran away). 

I'm having a lot of fun in 9th so far, though that might just be because I'm playing 40k again, but it definitely feels like 8th but better. The matched play missions feel nice and balanced, but definitely a bit more admin heavy and requiring much more forward planning. I think I probably made a mistake with the Siphon Power secondary, as I didn't have that many units to leave on an objective doing nothing. I also felt under pressure to get across the board rather than kill everything and leave it too late, which is definitely a good thing compared to previous editions of gunlines blasting you off the board then grabbing objectives in the last few turns. I do think, as it stands, the rulebook has a bit of a missed niche in terms of open or casual play - there's only one scenario in the book as written that isn't either matched play or Crusade with all the admin that comes with them. As much as I enjoyed the matched play scenarios, I can imagine going back to the old Maelstrom cards or the open war deck for some less brain intensive games sometimes.

Anyway, I had fun, I hope you all enjoyed reading about it, and stay safe out there.