Grubnards at the Millennium Invitational

The Millennium Invitational was held this past weekend at Millennium Games in Rochester NY. Every year the store holds a monthly 40k tournament on the 2nd Saturday of each month and in December, those who placed in either 1st or 2nd place in one of the previous months, gets invited to to play in the December Invitational. However, due to bad weather and some people's work schedules, not all of the invitees were able to attend. In all, 14 people showed, including 5 of the blog authors Crimanth, Calypso2ts, Crispy, DaCock, and myself (Hyv3 had to bow out due to his work schedule.) So let's get onto the reports of my games.

The list that I brought for the event was as follows:

HQ
Daemon Prince of Khorne - Axe of Blind Fury, Power Armor, Wings
Dark Apostle - Power Maul, Sigils of Corruption, Mark of Tzeentch

Troops
8 Marines - 1 plasma gun, VoLW, rhino
8 Marines - 1 melta gun, VoLW, rhino
20 cultists

Fast Attack
Heldrake with Baleflamer

Heavy Support
3 Obliterators - Mark of Nurgle, VoLW
3 Obliterators - Mark of Nurgle, VoLW

Allies
Herald of Tzeentch - ML3, Exalter Reward
10 Pink Horrors
Soul Grinder - Daemon of Nurgle, Plhegm Bombardment

Game 1

Primary Mission: Kill Points
Secondary Mission: 3 Objectives. 1 in each deployment zone and 1 in the middle. The objective in your opponents end was worth 3 points, the 1 in the middle was worth 2 points, and the 1 in your end was worth 1 point.
Bonus Points: First Blood, Slay the Warlord, Line Breaker

Deployment: Hammer and Anvil

My opponent in Round 1 was Horst. He brought the following list:

HQ
Librarian in Terminator Armor - Force Stave, Storm Shield, ML1

Elites
5 Terminators - Thunderhammers & Storm Shields. Sergeant with Lightning Claws.
5 Sanguinary Guard - Angelus Boltgun, Glaive Encarmine

Troops
10 Assault Marines - 2x Melta Guns. Sergeant w/ Fist
10 Assault Marines - 2x Melta Guns. Sergeant w/ Fist
5 Assault Marines - Melta Gun, Sergeant
Razor back - TL Heavy Bolter
5 Assault Marines - Melta Gun, Sergeant
Razor Back - TL Assault Cannon

Heavy Support
Stormraven Gunship - TL Assault Cannon, 4xBloodstrike Missiles, TL Multimelta
Vindicator
Vindicator

For Psychic powers I rolled on Divination for my herald and got:
Prescience, Perfect Timing, Forewarning.
My Pink Horrors take Flickering Fire of Tzeentch.
For the Exalted Reward I take the Grimoire.

Horst deploys first and I failed to seize the initiative.

Horst's Deployment

My deployment

Turn 1 - Horst
Movement: Horst moves all units forward. One of the vindicators heads towards my left flank.
Shooting: The Razorback with assault cannons kills two of my pink horrors. The Vindicator tries to hit my obliterators but deviates off. The vindicator on my left flank kills one of my obliterators.

Turn 1 - Grubnards
Psychic Phase: I cast prescience on my 3 man obliterator squad and I cast forewarning on my 2 man obliterator squad.
Movement: I move my obliterators up, along with the pink horrors and cultists. I keep my Daemon Prince in Jump mode behind the ruins. I buff the center obliterators with the grimoire.
Shooting: The Soul Grinder drops a blast on the assault marines near the vindicator and I kill 2. All of the obliterators target the center vinidcator with Lascannons and I wreck it for first blood.

My movement for turn 1

Turn 2 - Horst
Reserves: The Stormraven and Sanguinary Guard fail to come in this turn.
Movement: The assualt marines move forward towards my obliterators.
Shooting: The vindicator on the left kills another obliterator and then the Assault Cannon Razorback finishes off the last obliterator in the unit.
Assault: The assault squad declares a charge against the othher obliterator squad and makes it into combat. They kill 1 obliterator but I kill 5 in return thanks to hatred.

Horst's shooting takes out my center obliterator unit.

Turn 2 - Grubnards
Reserves: Heldrake comes in and moves straight up the field.
Psychic Phase: I cast Prescience on the Obliterators again and forewarning on my pink horrors.
Movement: The Daemon Prince goes into flight mode and heads towards the ruins near the vindicator. The pink horrors head towards the center ruins with the objective and my rhino starts to move up the left flank.
Shooting: The heldrake kills 6 marines hiding behind the ruins while the Soul Grinder/Pink Horrors wreck the rhino with the Assault cannons.
Assault: The obliterators finish off the last of the assault marines.

Turn 3 - Horst
Reserves: The Sanguinary Guard come in and Horst decides to chance it and has them deep strike in my back corner near the rhino but he scatters onto my rhino and the mishap result sends his squad back into reserves. The stormraven fails to come in.
Movement: All units in center stay still but the vinidcator is leery of the Daemon prince and starts to pull back.
Shooting: All shooting is pretty much ineffective due to the grimoired obliterators and Pink Horrors with forewarning.

Turn 3 - Grubnards
Psychic Phase: I cast Prescience and forewarning on the obliterators.
Movement: I buff the heldrake with the Grimoire because the Stromraven will be coming in next turn.
I move all of my units up. The rhino in the back moves near my objective and the pink horrors start to make their way into the ruins. The rhino on my left hugs the edge and flat out moves towards the objective in his deployment zone. The Daemon Prince jumps up the center to either threaten the vindicator or take out the marines behind the ruins. My Heldrake vector strikes his remaining rhino and I am able to strip a HP off of it.
Shooting: The pink horrors and obliterators are able to remove the final hull points of the rhino and then the Heldrake toasts 4 out of the 5 marines that hop out of the ruined vehicle.

Turn 4 - Horst
Reserves: The Stormraven comes on and the Sanguinary Guard attempt to deep strike into the same corner but he is successful this time.
Movement: The lone marine heads towards the daemon prince while the vindicator lines up on the 2 obliterators.
Shooting: The Vindicator kills one of the obliterators. The Stormraven tries to kill the last one but I make all of my saves. The Sanguinary Guard blows up my rhino and the explosion kills three of my marines and one of his guards.
Assaults: The lone marine charges my daemon prince and is swiftly cut down.

The Sanguinary Guard drop in behind my rhino.

Turn 4 - Grubnards
Psychic Phase: Nothing as the herald is now in the ruins and cannot see anyone.
Movement Phase: I try to cast Grimoire on the daemon prince but roll a 1, giving him a 6+ invul save. The Soul Grinder turns to face the Sanguinary Guard and the pink horrors consolidate on the objective. My marines jump out of the rhino to capture the objective in his deployment zone.
Shooting: The Soul Grinder and remaining marines in my back corner wipe out the remaining Sanguinary guard.
Assault: The Daemon Prince assaults the vindicator and wrecks it.

The Daemon Prince finishes off the vindicator.

Turn 5 - Horst
Movement: The stormraven moves up and drops the terminators and librarian out near my cultists and Apostle. The last marines in the back edge towards my marines on his objective.
Shooting: The marines in the back shoot at mine but I make my saves.
Assaults: The Terminators charge in and kill 11 cultists and lose none in return. I challenge with my cultist champ and his sergeant accepts and quickly crushes him in his powerfist. Horst also challeneges with is Librarian. I was going to decline but seeig as how I had the game pretty secured I accepted. They both make all of their saves and the combat is a draw.

Turn 5 - Grubnards
Movement: I pivot the soul grinder and start moving back up. The daemon prince moves towards cover to stay away from the stormraven.
Shooting: My marines finish off the last of his marines. My soul grinder fails to wound the stormraven.
Assault: The terminators kill 7 more cultists and I manage to take 1 down in the process. The Dark Apostle and Librarian continue to hack away at each other with no effect.

The only thing left on his side is the stormraven and terminators.

We roll to see if there is a turn 6 and there is.

Turn 6 - Horst
The Stormraven manages to take out the last obliterator. The terminators kill off the last of the cultists and the Librarian puts a wound on my apostle.

Turn 6 - Grubnards
Shooting: My Soul Grinder again fails to hit the stormraven.
Assault: The fight goes on with no one doing any damage and the game ends.

Results:
Primary Mission: Kill Points -  I killed 9 of his units while he killed 4 of mine, giving me a solid Primary win.
Secondary Mission: Objectives - I hold all three objectives for a secondary win.
Bonus Points: I had first blood and line breaker. Neither of us achieved Slay the Warlord so I gained 2 bonus points.

Game 2

Primary Mission: Big Guns Never Tire
Secondary Mission: Victory Points (who kills the most total points of unit cost)
Bonus Points: Slay the Warlord, First Blood, Line Breaker
Deployment: Vanguard

My opponent for this match was Brian. Brian brought a Daemons of Tzeentch list but I forgot to grab a copy of his list. It was something like the following:

HQ:
Fate Weaver
4 Herald of Tzeentch

Troops:
11 Pink Horrors
11 Pink Horrors

Fast Attack
9 Screamers of Tzeentch
3 Flamers of Tzeentch
4 Flamers of Tzeentch

Heavy Support
Soul Grinder of Tzeentch
Soul Grinder of Tzeentch
The Burning Chariot of Tzeentch

I win the roll off for deployment but due to the primary mission being objective based I decided to give it to him as I knew I probably would not be able to kill anything for first blood plus I wanted a chance to grab any late objectives.

We roll for 5 objectives and we each put 2 in our zones and Brian puts the last in the center of the board to make things interesting.

My Psychic powers for this game would be: Prescience, Perfect Timing, and Forewarning.
I selected the Grimoire as my Exalted Reward.
My Pink Horrors get Flickering Fire.

Brian deploys the 2 units of pink horrors near the center of his line and the screamers start way in the back corner behind the hill. Fateweaver goes on the side of the hill way in the back as well. The chariot starts in the back as well. He declares that he will deepstrike the 2 Soul Grinders and 2 units of flamers.

Close up of my deployment.

I declare that I will Deepstrike one squad of Obliterators.

Turn 1 - Brian
Psychic Phase: He casts Prescience pretty much on all of his units and Grimoires the screamers.
Warp Storm generates 8 new Pink horrors which he places near my unit of horrors.
Movement: The Screamers move up to screen his pink horrors. The Pink Horrors move up as well. Fateweaver flies behind the pink horrors and the chariot comes out from behind the hill.
Shooting: Both Pink Horror units cast flickering fire on my Obliterators and I lose 1 wound. The newly arrived Pink horrors shoot at my pink horrors and I lose 1.


Turn 1 - Grubnards
Movement: I pretty much leave everything where it is this turn. I wanted to see where he was going with the screamers before I committed myself.
Shooting: The Soul Grinder drops a phlegm bomb on the screamers and I manage to kill 1. The squad in one of my rhinos manages to kill three pink horrors from the newly created unit. I attempt to cast flickering fire on the Pink horrors but he denies the attempt.

Board after turn 1.

Turn 2 - Brian
Reserves: Brian gets all 4 units in on this turn and drops the two soul grinders near my lines. One in the center and one along my right flank. The 3 man unit of flamers lands near my cultists and the 4 man unit goes near his pink horrors.
Psychic Phase: All units again are prescienced and the screamers once again are grimoired.
Movement: The screamers zip towards my oblits and soul grinder. The pink horrors continue to move forward.
Shooting: The flamers and soul grinder near my cultists kill 15 of the cultists.

Turn 2 - Grubnards
Reserves: Nothing Comes in
Psychic Phase: I cast prescience on the Soul Grinder and Grimoire the Daemon Prince.
Movement: I move my obliterators towards the pink horrors and I fly my Daemon Prince up over the hill.
Shooting: The soul grinder kills 7 pink horrors to my front. Over on my right all shooting flamers and pink horrors proves ineffective.

End of Turn 2

Turn 3 - Brian
Psychic Phase: All units again are prescienced and the screamers once again are grimoired.
Movement: The Flamers hop over near my remaining cultists and the screamers fly towards my remaining pink horrors. The pink horror squads over on his end continue to move up. Fateweaver makes his way towards some area terrain.
Shooting: The Pink horrors are wiped out (first blood) and the herald takes a wound. His other pink horrors and flamers manage to kill the obliterator with 1 wound.

Turn 3 - Grubnards
Reserves: My Heldrake comes in and move up the board.
Psychic Phase: I cast prescience on the soul grinder and Grimoire the Obliterators.
Movement: I move my rhino to box in my herald to prevent him from getting shot at. The daemon prince goes into jump mode and makes his way towards a squad of pink horrors.
Shooting: The rhino squads pump shots into the screamers and I manage 1 wound. The obliterators and soul grinder kill 2 flamers.
Assault: The Daemon Prince of Khorne charges the pink horrors and i reduce the squad to 3 pink horrors left. He loses 1 more to instability.

End of turn 3.

Turn 4: Brian
Movement: He moves the screamers over to my cultists and apostle.
Shooting: The flamers kill the last of the cultists and Apostle (Slay the Warlord) All shooting at my obliterators is ineffecive.

Turn 4 - Grubnards
Reserves: The Obliterators come in and I successfully deepstrike them in on one of his objectives by the chariot.
Psychic Powers: I cast prescience on the 2 obliterators and Grimoire them as well.
Movement: The herald continues to move back towards my soul grinder while my rhinos rush towards the center hill.
Shooting: I am able to wipe out the flamers near my obliterators. The melta gun near the sould grinder on the hill only glances but he makes his daemon save. My Obliterators that deepstruck in manage to multimelta the chariot to death.

Turn 5 - Brian
Movement: Knowing that the game can end next, he pulls the screamers as far away from my units to prevent me from getting more victory points. The flamer unit also jumps back behind cover while his other soul grinder moves up to claim the objective in my back corner. Fateweaver also jumps back to prevent any chance of me shooting at it. The Pink horrors move up to contest the Obliterators on my objective.
Shooting: the pink horrors shoot my obliterators but fail to wound. The soul grinder manages to wreck one of the rhinos with the melta gun.

Turn 5 - Grubnards
Movement: I pull my daemon prince back. The rhino that is still mobile ruins up the hill and my troops come out to contest the objective. The marines from the wrecked rhino circle behind the soul grinder to try and shoot it from behind.
Shooting: The melta gun only glances the soul grinder and the game ends.

Primary Mission: Big Guns: My Obliterators in his back corner hold an objective while his soul grinder in my corner holds an objective. The center objective is being contested by my troops and his other soul grinder and the objective with my Obliterator is being contested by his pink horrors. So we both hold an objective but I manage to pull out the win since I killed one of his heavy units (the chariot) while all of mine were still on the board.
Secondary Mission: Victory Points: Brian managed to kill a little over 400 points of my models while I was only able to kill over 300 points of his so I lost the secondary mission. He was able to grab all three bonus points while I only had 1 for line break. Close game but I eek out a win.

Game Three:

Primary Mission: The Scouring
Secondary Mission: The Relic
Bonus Points: First Blood, Slay the Warlord, Line Breaker
Deployment: Dawn of War.

This game was against a fellow club member and an author of this blog, Crispy. Crispy brought along a new army to the event. His Necrons with Chaos Marine Allies.

I did not get many notes from this game so I'll just provide an abbreviated version. The game started out strong for me when I was able to get first blood due to blowing up his ghost ark on the first turn. I also was able to reduce his Daemon Prince to 1 wound in turn 2 and then when Crispy attempted to cast Iron Arm on the prince in his turn 2 it periled and killed the Daemon Prince. After that, all of Crispy's fliers came in and turned the game around in his favor really fast. He simply had too many fliers for me to deal with. He was also pretty lucky as he had 10 cultists sitting on a 4 point objective and every time that they need to make a morale test they passed. In the end I was pretty much shut out. Crispy grabbed both the Primary and Secondary Missions and two bonus points for Slay the Warlord and Line breaker. I was only able to grab line breaker.

Deployment

End of Turn 1.

Crispy's flying circus appears.

The beginning of the end.

How the table looked at the end.

At the end of the event I ended up with a total of 55 points and placed 5th out of 14 players. I scored 30 battle points, 11 points for Sportmanship and 14 points for painting and I took top place in painting for the event. After a full day of gaming and hanging out we went to a local restaurant for wings, beer, and food. It doesn't get any better than that!

As all of you know, next week is Christmas so most likely I will not have any updates next week due to family gatherings and eating stupid amounts of food. I would like to wish all of you a Merry Christmas and no matter what religion you practice or what your beliefs are, I hope you all take the time to enjoy the company of your family and friends.

I'll be back before the new year with my thoughts on the hobby during the 2013 year and what I am looking forward to in the new year.