Carnage Asada '24

 

Yes, this is about a month late. Sorry. Life happens. We had our (mostly) annual Carnage Asada Battle & BBQ this past Memorial Day. We always like to try big and/or new things on this day, and this time we went small and new.

Mrs. Blackheart is a professional theatrical carpenter, so she likes building things. She has recently discovered a love for everyone's favorite plastic crack from Denmark. Thus, the idea was formed to host a Star Wars skirmish game using Lego for the minis and scenery. Now to pick some rules.

For a bit now, I've trying out different Skirmish Rules. I love the new version of GW's Kill Team, but it is a very closed system, without any real ability to create new units of your own. One Page Rules' Grimdark Firefight is fun, but I'll get into it in an upcoming post.

I chose Space Weirdos by Garske Games. I had picked it up a while ago, and finally got around to giving it a go. Simple, fast, and a lot of fun. Most importantly for our game, you have to create your own units!  It seemed a natural fit for the event.

I spent a few evenings hunting up the names and generating stats for all the mini figs we chose for the game. We wound up with seven teams to choose from, six Outlaw/Bounty Hunter teams plus a Squad of Stormtroopers.

The battle was a lot of fun. So much fun that I didn't even take any good pictures while it was going on. 

The Handsome Outlaws (Han, Lando, and Chewie) were victorious. The forces of Law and Order (Stormtroopers) were wiped out, and both Jabba's Enforcers and The Operators, were badly mauled in the battle of Mos Eisley's Happy Hour. 

The rules work very well for such a setting, and I shall try for others. I do have a lot of painted Imperial Assault minis that are just sitting in the garage...

Go Roll Some Dice

With Carne Asada and LEGOs

High Noon...with a Warhound

 

When the Stompa and four Deff Dread Gang rolls into you town, you have to make a stand!

I just had the urge to see what a Warhound (1100 points) can do in 10th edition.  Who should Lupus Magnus do battle with? A Stompa and 4 Deff Dreads (1320 points) proved to be a interesting battle.

Orks went first, the Stompa did 18 wounds, very nearly half of the Warhounds HP, with its opening salvo. Mostly from the Deffkannon. The lighter weapons had real trouble damaging the Warhounds Toughness of 14. The 2+/5+ save helped as well. 

Lupus Magnus return fire gutted the Stompa, 27 damage done from the Turbo Laser Destructors. The Dreads turned out to be very hard to damage with the Vulcan Mega-bolter: 18 hits, 6 wounds, 4 points of damage to Big Hugga, the close combat Dread.

Ill-fortune befell the Deffkannon's gun crew on the second turn, six shots, two hits, three points of damage! The Rokkits from Dread Tuska managed to score three hits, but not a single wound got through.

The Stompa was removed from the table by the Warhound's Turbo Laser return fire. Another four points of damage from the Vulcan Mega Bolter was just enough to kill the damaged Dread.

  In the end, only one Dread made it into close combat. It did not go well for it.

A quick and enjoyable battle that was something different. The Orks had really cold dice, and that made a huge difference. The Vulcan Mega Bolter seems extremely underpowered for a Titan Weapon. Next time I will use the stats for Plasma Blastgun instead. 

I am working on a variation of this mission, where the Warhound has to stop a mass of Orks from moving off the table edge it is guarding.

Go Roll Some Dice

Try Something Different

New Avatar, who's this?

 

The freshly painted, New & Improved Avatar of Kaela Mensha Khaine took to the field for the first time against the Orks in a 100PR slugfest. Both sides brought one Lord of War to the party, the Orks went big on mega-armored bosses and nobz, while Mrs. Blackheart's Space Elves had a mix of Aspect Warriors, Vypers, and Guardian Defenders. 

The Pointy Ear Devils went first, and the swift Eldar made it to 3 out of 4 objectives.

Her Wraithknight smoked the Battlewagon that all the Mega-armored folk were riding in. That's a long walk to the enemy for Orks with a 4" movement. The rest of the Aeldari shot up a fair amount of Boyz.

On my turn almost everybody Advanced, and had some decent rolls, but I didn't gain control of any objectives. My shooting phase had one highlight: The Morkanaut did significant damage to the hated Wraithknight.  At the end of the turn I was down 0-3. 

The Wraithknight's revenge was not long in coming. With the help of the Farseer, it dealt a stunning 34 points of damage to the Morkanaut. Nothing like some good overkill. Fancy(flaming no)pants Avatar killed off a Deff Dread, and charged and super-overkilled a second one. 

Vypers and Striking Scorpions wiped out the rest of my Left Flank. Yeah, not going to plan.

Realizing this battle was lost, I declared the Waaaaagh! My mob of Mega-Armored fools ran a whopping 10" to get within charge range of the Wraithknight.

Tuska, my last Deff Dread unleashed his two rocket launchers at the Wraithknight, and guided by the Hand of Gork did 12 points of damage, destroying it! 

Which then promptly exploded and killed two meganobz, the Big mech, and badly injured the Boss. Such is the fickle nature of the gods.

The next turn was just the cheesy Eldar jerks mopping up what was left of my army. Final Score 1-9.

A fun if bloody and short battle! The new Aeldari are quite the force to be dealt with. Stay the hell out of close combat with the Avatar. Kill the Farseer. If only I had an army that valued shooting over everything else...

Go Roll Some Dice

Damned Smug Space Elves

Tyranids Vs. Tau

 

So new Tau paint jobs, new Codex, same old beat down from the Tyranids.

100 PL, I was so ready to make some bugs dead!

And then the battle started. The Tyranids went first.

The Exocrine and Tyannofex have been improved. A lot. I lost both of my Hammerheads on turn one.

It didn't get any better after that. I was in so much shock, I only took three pics. 

The rum helped.

The Tau got steamrolled in three turns. I'm sure I forget a few of the (too many) special rules and abilities that might have made a big difference. This is an ongoing issue I'm having with 40K, and one I shall talk about soon.

As bad as the Tau got smoked, I'm very happy to see the Tyranids are scary once again.

Go Roll Some Dice

Try to Remember All your Rules

Neu Aeldari Vs. Necrons

 

It was time for Mrs. Blackheart's Eldar-i to give the new Codex a try. 100PL vs. my Necrons. 

Wow, those Space Elves can shoot! And use cheezy psychic powers, and high morale, and don't get me started on the Avatar... 

The battle started off poorly for me and then went downhill from there. 

A standard cross the board and seize the three objectives type of mission. I even got to go first. Didn't do me a lot of good though.

All of the Aeldari units that got improvements, really kick butt. The Dire Avengers went to an Elite slot from troops, but their Avenger Catapults now have 3 shots. With the shuriken rule. Bad times indeed.

Fire Dragons are fast and extra-melty, Striking Scorpions are more stabby! Guardians with a 4+ save? What is the galaxy coming to?

Seeing the writing on the field, I decided to see if the Avatar was in fact, all that. I charged with a full 10-robot-thing squad of Praetorians, one of my favorite units. They did some good damage on the very molten god of anger issues. Just not enough.

New Avatar is still in the paint shop.

The retaliation was suitably impressive. Eight very dead Praetorians, with the last two being wiped out by the lurking Wraithlord. 

Fine. My Overlord decided to go all Leroy Jenkins and charge in. Of course, he didn't make it.

The Wraithlord shot him, charged him and thanks to some amazing saves, the Overlord survived, down to a single wound. Some days it's just handy to have a S9 melee weapon, and the Wraithlord was taken off the field. Next came the battle of Commanders!

The Overlord continued to have some super hot saves, and did not die! Sadly neither did the Avatar.

The next and last turn, my plucky Overlord finally fell and the game ended in a rout for the Necrons.

The 9th edition Codexs continue to increase the power of armies. I don't think it is too much, but rather making some units are strong as we feel they should be. The Aeldari will be a worthy opponent!

Go Fight Some Battles

Just Roll Better Than I did

 

Freeblades vs. Dread Mob

 

A favorite matchup returns! Not that I have been able to beat a Knight list with my Orks...yet.

A 100 PR battle, for a change of pace I brought in a The SquiqHog (a Smasha jet proxy), mostly because I like the cut of its jib.

And it did deliver some much needed anti-tank hurt on the Knights.

Due to my camera still deciding not to focus most of the time, I do not have enough pics to give this battle justice.

The new and improved Orks have a crazy amount of rockets these days. The Brave and Noble Killa Kans did a lot of damage, right before they were swept from the field. 

The two battlelines clashed and many Dread and Knight were laid waste.

<PICT-CAP MISSING>

<PICT-CAP MISSING>

On my right flank the Mega Dread felled the Knight Valiant, but was destroyed in the following reactor explosion.

The SquigHog has received very little damage up to this point, but was at the end of the table and had to depart the field.

Over on the left flank, only my Gorkanought and a Knight Errant were left

 

<PICT-CAP MISSING>

I had a terrible turn of shooting followed by a pretty-good-but-not-enough round of melee. The Errant had three wounds left! Then its chainblade cleft the Gorkanought in twain. No explosion, I even used a re-roll. 

With the SquidHog off the table for the turn, there were no Orks left, and Victory goes to the Freeblades. By three hit points. Sigh.

It was a fun, fast paced battle. I'll get them next time!

Orkses is Never Defeated in Battle...

There Will Be Annuver Go

Raven Guard & Eldar Vs. Necrons

 

Another good battle, another dead Monolith. Raven Guard have allied with the Eldar to combat the newly risen Necrons. 

The Eldar and Necrons swarm to seize the objectives, while the Marines hid in the ruins and shot the heck out of the zombie robots. 

The Raven Guard are very good at shooting, and very hard to get out of cover. My Deathmarks arrived from hyperspace and were promptly out-snipered and wiped out.

The Monolith deep struck, (as one does, but shouldn't) did a fair amount of damage to the Wraithknight. Just not enough. The following turn my Monolith was removed by force. Again.

I committed my reservers for a last-ditch grab for the center objectives. A Wave Serpent full of Striking Scorpions quashed that plan. 

Then the Raven Guard broke cover to claim the final objectives and sealed the non-robot victory.

A fast and brutal game. One of those matches were it felt like I deployed every unit exactly wrong. 

The firepower of the Eldar and Marines is quite daunting, and I could not match it. A more cautious use of the Monolith would have helped at a lot, but where is the fun in that?

Execute Shift-Alt-Kill

Need to Update First

 

Necrons Vs Cult

 

Time to unleash the Necrons! Overpowered Robot Skeletons against the poor Genestealer Cultists? Seems unfair.

(Morgan Freeman voice) It was indeed a slaughter.

We played a Incursion Battle (50PL per side) and used the Open War deck to generate the mission. Nice and straightforward: Kill. Side witht he most PL in kills wins. I like it!

The map was lengthwise, with Army "B" setting up in the middle and Army "A" on either side, we rolled to see who was Army "B", it was me. I didn't like it. 

After Deployment

It's awful lonely on the tabletop when the other side only deploys Ambush markers...

At the start of my first turn.

Mrs. Blackheart got to go first, and wow. Two mining lasers took out my Hexmark Destroyer before it got to blink one of its many eyes. I took some serious losses during the shooting phase, but worse was to come in the assault phase. Genestealers may have some shortcomings, but speed is not one of them. In a flurry of Rending Claws half my Destroyers and a full squad of Warriors went down hard. 

Two squads of jerks with power tools popped out of the sewers and made their charge rolls. Today was just not going my way.

Still all was not lost. On my turn I put the hurt of a couple of squads of cultists, and got the Destroyer Lord into hand to hand. The speed and firepower of the Tomb Blades is quite useful. Pity they got blasted by Smite and Krak Grenades the next turn. 

One turn three it was over, and the last Necron had phased out to that deluxe Monolith in the sky.

Even though it was a horrible (and unexpected) slaughter it was a lot of fun. The Cult are fragile to be sure, but they are numerous and tricksy. A rematch is in order!

Join the Cult, Hear the Voice!

Spend a Lot of Time in Sewers 

Wolves Vs Cult

Mrs. Blackheart and I had a nice little Combat Patrol battle, Space Wolves versus Genestealer Cult.

I took just infantry, led by my Wolf Lord for their combat debut. The Cult had a Broodlord, some 'Stealers, a Sentinel, and a whole bunch of Cultists.

As usual, I didn't take enough pics during the game, which is a good indicator I'm having fun. The Wolves had a couple turns of impressive shooting, then we got into close combat on the bottom of Turn Two.

"We can just pick them off from here!"

"By Russ's empty stein! Nobody should move that fast!"

The poor Helblasters got shredded. A 5-man Intercessor squad was also mauled by Neophytes armed with power tools. The next turn saw payback aplenty for the Wolves. All the Genestealers were felled by shooting, then the Wolf Lord made an Impressive charge roll and hacked up the Broodlord (top of page picture). The remaining Intercessor Squads cleaned up the streets. A hard fought victory for the Wolves.

We are going to do a three-mission mini campaign with using Combat Patrol. Should be able to play though in one evening. That's the plan at least...

For Russ and the Allfather!

Our Cult is Better Than Yours.

  

Combat Patrol Dust Up

 

The Combat Patrol missions for 9th Edition have turned out to be quite entertaining. Quick battles let you pick some fun army lists that you may not normally have tried. 

We did a Ork vs Tyranid battle. Mrs Blackheart's force had a Warboss, 5 Nobz, 20 Ladz, 10 Grot, and a Dred. I brought a Warrior Prime, nine Warriors and six Raveners. 

The small map makes for fast engagements! In a surprise to all, the Warriors shot up the Dred on the first turn. Venom cannons are your friend. 

On turn Two my Six Raveners arrived and made the charge into the Nobz. It went quite badly for me. I only killed one Nob, and the Warboss made her Heroic Intervention, and poof! No more Raveners. Damn Power Klaws... 

We had two more turns of carnage, the battle flowed back and forth with the victory points staying close. At the end of turn four it came down to my Warrior Prime, her injured Warboss and the last Nobz in a fight for a objective that would determine the outcome of the game.

I had the charge and killed the Nobz, but left a wound on the Warboss. The Warboss hit well but did terrible on the damage rolls. Next turn, (Top of Five, the last turn) she attacked first and the poor Warboss had no fight left in it, zero hits, even with a command re-roll. The Prime put the Warboss out its misery for the win!

A exciting, very close game. I feel that we will play some 100PL games, a lot of the games will be Combat Patrol.

Next: More World Eaters

The Great Devourer Hungers

They Like to Eat Their Greens

Friday Night Fights

Fun fact: 15 Genestealers can fit if they deploy with a Trygon. Well, it's not that fun if you are the one facing them, and there are two such groups, and nine Raveners.
It went poorly for the Guard.

100PL battle, Tyranids vs Imperial Guard with a Deathwatch Squad. Tyranids went first, and the Guard never found their footing. Not to mention the worst Overwatch rolling I have made in a long time. Even with the Strategy card that lets me hit on a 5+.

It just wasn't the Cadian's day. Mrs. Blackheart made some great chrage rolls and the 'Nids were disregarding Social Distancing in no time.

'Stealers aren't that good against tanks anymore, but if they can arrive in close combat with 10+ models...that's a lot of dice, and usually enough sixes to do some damage.

The Swarmlord didn't take a scratch on her way into my tanks. Deathwatch killed everything they shot at, but were only one squad and a Gunship, and it was not enough.
We were playing with Tactical Objectives, and at the end of turn three it was Tyranids:7 Guard:0.
Even though I lost bad, it was a fast, fun game. Next time I will manage my deployment better...

The Hive Mind Hungers

This Was a Good Snack Though