White Scars vs Necrons 4/15/22

This round of the Octarius Crusade saw my White Scars of the Invaders faction facing off against the Necrons of the Attackers faction. There's a third faction, the Defenders, as well. We played at 50 PL, the Incursion mission The Relic from the 9th Edition core rule book.

White Scars:

Librarian in Terminator Armour

Tactical Squad of 5 Marines x2

Terminator Squad of 5 x2

Land Speeder Tornado

Devastator Squad of 5

Drop Pod

Necrons of an Ancient Dynasty:

Overlord

Chronomancer

Necron Warriors unit of 20

Immortals unit of 5 x2

Skorpekh Destroyers unit of 6

Lokhust Destroyers unit of 2 with a Heavy

Tomb Blades unit of 3

The Necrons' special rules allowed for a pre-game 6" movement and for them to add 1 to every charge roll. I know my opponent, Shane, was using Command Protocols each round, or at least he let me know what they were in the first two or three rounds. I don't recall which he used when or them ever being crucial to what was going on. Conversely, the new Armour of Contempt rule from the new Balance Dataslate was a very nice assist to my marines this time out. 

After meeting up to play, it was apparent I'd be playing on the board with the Sector Mechanicus terrain for the third time in a row. This particular mission has a rule that prevents any terrain from being within 6" of the center of the board, so the lack of light cover (dense cover was to be had if you wanted it) was somewhat to be expected. I managed to put a ruin on my half of the board, but it never was relevant, as things turned out.

The mission was determined, as was who was attacker or defender in the battle. The Attackers were the attackers, as luck would have it, and the Invaders were defending. So, when we got to the deployment stage, I went first, announcing that my Drop Pod was high in the skies, carrying a Tactical Squad and my Devastator Squad. I believe his first unit were the Lokhust Destroyers. I followed up by placing a Terminator Squad in the middle of my deployment zone, behind dense cover. To which, he responded I believe by placing his Tomb Blades. I put down my second Terminator Squad so that there was terrain between them and his Lokhust, but such that his Tomb Blades had a clear shot. Bait. I think this is when he then deployed his 20 Warriors. I put down a Tactical Squad behind the second Terminator Squad, so that the heavy bolter would have line of sight to the Warriors. He then put down something else, maybe his Skorpekhs. I put my Land Speeder into Outflank using the Encirclement stratagem. He put down something else. I put down my Terminator Librarian HQ with one of the Terminator Squads, but so that he was shielded by them (Look Out, Sir). With that, I was done, and he was free to play his remaining units. Below are pictures of each army deployment.

Shane won the roll off for first turn, and the first thing he did was his beginning-of-game free 6" Normal Move for his entire army. Basically everything moved up, since the name of the game in this mission is to reach the single objective (the relic), peform an action to take it into possession, and hold onto it for the entire game. 

The free movement along with going first meant that his 20 strong unit of Warriors got right up to it and was able to do the action in the first turn, so he immediately was off to a good start. With the rest of his first turn, he used the Chronomancer's relic to teleport him and the nearby unit of Skorpekhs up the board to a point 9" away from my Terminators on the right flank, and to move up his Tomb Blades to screen, and to shoot with both them and the Lokhust. Right away the new Armour of Contempt rule saved me a few wounds, and I had only lost two off a single Terminator by the end of his turn.

In my first movement phase, my Terminators all move up their 5 inches, and my Drop Pod comes down on my left flank, whereupon my Devastators and Tactical Squad all hop out, precisely 9" away from the Tomb Blades.

I have put Adaptive Strategy on one Terminator unit, to make it attack as though all three doctrines were active for that battle round, knowing that would be a cinch to move up 5" and then charge 4" into the Skorpekh that turn. 

In my Psychic phase, I use the Stormseer Librarian to Smite the Skorpekh, and he turns out a roll of 11 for a super smite, which results in 5 mortal wounds! Nearly kills 2 of them, right off. I probably should have followed that up with the other damage power, but instead I put Ride the Winds on my other Terminator Squad, so that I could add 2 to their charge roll, reasoning that a higher likelihood of getting them into combat would probably result in more wounds, all told.

In shooting, I go around each squad putting all the S4 bolter shots into the big unit of Warriors, and pretty much everything else into the Skorpekhs. Everything else being Grav Cannons and Multi-meltas. The Devastators disappoint me a little here. I think they finished off a second Skorpekh, if even that. About 5 Warriors are killed. His Warriors have a 6+ Feel No Pain, which is from Grizzled, a Crusade buff. This is in addition to their 5+ invulnerable from the Chronomancer, and the Reanimation Protocols as well, so most of the game to kill a single warrior he has to fail a 5+, then a 6+, then another 5+ but that re-rolls 1s, of course. So, they are incredibly resilient. 

Here I make a couple of mistakes. One ends up being very costly, the other maybe not so much. First, I forget to shoot with my Tactical Squad in back with the heavy bolter. I purposefully left them still so they'd not have a penalty and also have bolter discipline at the Warrior blob, but completely spaced them. Then, when all my charges are going off right and left (I even made the 9" for the one Tac Squad, unassisted), I leave my Librarian out in the open... and then he fails his Charge that would have gotten him into combat, at least.

In the Fight phase, I go first with my Terminator Squad that is in all three doctrines. I think they mostly whiff (he used the -1 to wound stratagem repeatedly on these guys), because when he interrupts with Counter Offensive, he's still got 4 Skorpekhs fighting, which he puts into my Terminator Squad that is yet to fight, and that kills three of them. They then do fight, killing one Skorpekh in return. My Tactical Squad that charged the Tomb Blades also fights, and does a wound or two. 

That's my first turn, and in his second, he takes his ball (the relic) and runs home with his big Warrior blob, which is still at about 15 models, and then, to make matters worse, he puts a bunch of speed bumps in my way to slow my chasing.

Next up, it's time to punish my reckless charging and leaving my HQ alone.

It takes basically all of his shooting from the Tomb Blades, Warriors, and Lokhust. I had a clutch 5+ save after a CP reroll against his Heavy Lokhust's gun, which would have been 3D3 damage had I failed. However, I am justly chastised when in the end my Stormseer is disintegrated by a hail of gauss blasts.



For the Fight phase, it's his turn, meaning I get to go first! I fight with my still buffed triple doctrine squad, and kill another Skorpekh. When he fights back, I lose a couple of that squad.

Then, I fight with my other squad, and kill another of his, so that he's then down to just one Skorpekh.

On my second turn, I fall back from combat with both Terminator Squads. One moves up the board in the direction of his Lokhust, while the other just moves sideways a little to open up the remaining Skorpekh to be shot. My heavy bolter Tac Squad moves up. So does the other Tac Squad, also toward the Lokhust. Devastators stay put. The Land Speeder comes on from Outflank over on my right side, practically in my deployment zone. He's screened out the backfield pretty well. There was technically room to come in behind him, but I judged it as probably suicidal to do so. This way, I could free my Terminators up from killing Skorpekh, and let the Speeder potentially finish them off.

The next pic I have is from way later, after charging and combat, so it's hard to say exactly what happened in what order, I know the Skorpekh died. It was the Terminator Squad, with the chainfist, by the Sector Mechanicus terrain. At this point the Chronomancer has also taken a few wounds, likely from the speeder and nearby Tac Squad in shooting (he wasn't protected by the single Skorpekh).

The pic below was taken immediately after the one above. I think this turn was when my Devastators opened up on the Tomb Blades and killed two of them, as well. 

Here he has moved a squad of Immortals up.

In this pic below, you can see I have hit on a new signature White Scars technique--the advancing but full firing Devastator Squad, made possible by Hunter's Fusillade, one of my favorite stratagems. You can treat the unit's Heavy and Rapid Fire weapons as Assault for a turn. It's not great for the Rapid Fire ones, but it's aces for the Heavy ones! 

I have also flown the Speeder up onto the terrain, giving me a shot at the big Warrior blob, which still in round 3 has the relic. His Lokhust have fallen back and my Tac Squad they had tied up has advanced over by the pipeline, ready to charge through it into the Warrior blob. You can see he's put his last Tomb Blade and both squads of Immortals out for me to roll over on my way to kill his Warriors.

The Chronomancer gets executed, and one squad of Immortals gets devastated while my Terminators smash up the Tomb Blade and a couple more Immortals. 

Meanwhile my Tactical Squad has gotten around, killed another Warrior or two, but then been mauled by his Overlord.

By now it's the final round, and he's managed to hold the relic the entire game with his undying Warriors, while I have rolled up all the rest of his army but the Overlord. Said Overlord killed by one Tactical Squad, the only other unit to be destroyed besides my Librarian. They died valiantly.

So, in the end the cowardly and treacherous Necrons make off with the relic and the win. The prey has eluded the hunter in this instance, but it's badly wounded.

While it wasn't a win, it's a game I can (mostly) feel pretty good about. I think I could maybe have pulled out a win if I hadn't messed around and gotten my mortal wounds engine killed so early on... in this mission possession of the relic at the end of the game is worth more than having held it in every other round combined, so it could have happened. 

In the aftermath, both of my Terminator Squads gained the first level, and I just flat chose (didn't roll for) the Bladesman's Honour bonus, to give them +1 WS, to counterbalance the -1 to hit from their Power and Chain fists. Nowhere that I have seen in the packet made by the league organizer is it stated that anyone is expected to roll for battle honours, so I'm not going to handicap myself (anymore than I do by my list building).