I finished assembling the last 99.99% of the Deathwing Terminators I need for this weekend’s ‘Ard Boyz.  All I need at this point, really, is a hooded head from the Veterans sprue for a sergeant and I can call it done.  (And, for the purposes of ‘Ard Boyz, that’s not a biggie.)

That’s it.  All 47 models I’ll be using at ‘Ard Boyz.

I stopped by Game Parlor Woodbridge yesterday to drop off the Sternguard Veterans and, while I was in town, get in a couple of games with folks with whom I don’t normally get to game.  Since it’s on my mind (and sever other folks’ minds), I brought the Deathwing.

Unfortunately, instead of getting in the two, maybe three, games, it was just the one.  I like chit-chatting, and taking it easy… but I really should start working on getting games to move along at a better clip: I think it’d improve my performance at tournaments and (more importantly) help ensure I get to play more games outside of tournaments.

I played against Steve Schweitzer’s Salamanders.  His list (from memory) was something very much like this:

HQ
Vulkan
Librarian – Terminator Armor, Storm Shield, Avenger, Null Zone

Elites
Assault Terminators x9 – Thunder Hammer / Storm Shield x9
– Land Raider Crusader – Multi-melta, Storm Bolter
Sternguard Veterans x10 – Heavy Flamer, Combi-Flamer x4, Meltagun, Combi-Melta x4
– Drop Pod
Sternguard Veterans x10 – Heavy Flamer, Combi-Flamer x4, Meltagun, Combi-Melta x4
– Drop Pod

Troops
Scout Squad x10 – Telion, Sniper Rifle x8, Heavy Bolter
Tactical Squad x10 – Flamer, Multi-melta, Powerfist
– Drop Pod
Tactical Squad x10 – Meltagun, Multi-melta, Powerfist
– Drop Pod

Heavy Support
Devastator Squad x5 – Plasma Cannon x2, Lascannon x1
Thunderfire Cannon

I’m pretty confident that that list is off, since it prices out to 2580.  Not sure what I’m remembering that wasn’t there, though.  My confidence in the loadouts of the Tactical squads is particularly low.

I was running the list I talked about here.

Since it was ‘Ard Boyz practice, we randomly rolled for a mission from the list of scenarios, and ended up with #3: “Kill Da Fast Ones.”  Basically, Annihilation with Pitched Battle deployment, save that models that can move > 6″ in a round are worth 3KP and HQs are worth 2KP.

The game was incredibly brutal.

His Assault Terminators ate two and a half squads of Deathwing Terminators: taking hardly any casualties until the Deathwing Command Squad started puking up Lighting Claw wounds that allowed probability to start catching up and getting through the Storm Shields.

I made a huge mistake and put Belial (and five Terminators) up against Vulkan (and five Sternguard).  Poor rolling didn’t help, but they didn’t really stand a chance against Vulkan, who took damn near everything threw at him.  Only finally, in the next-to-last round of the game, was the Grandmaster able to get a single wound through Vulkan’s Kesare’s Mantle.  It was a Force Weapon, though, so thankfully that’s all I needed.  That’s good, because he died at the same time.

I made another mistake at the end and assaulted a tactical squad with two terminators in the last round of the game.  I didn’t have to.  They couldn’t have killed the whole squad.  Instead, they were wiped out and gave up another KP.

I had two mishaps: one was a lost in the Warp, the other allowed him to place the squad.  (The remnants of whom I just mentioned crashing against a Tactical Squad.)  When your entire army is Deep Striking, you must make peace with mishaps… but it’s a lot easier to swallow when the squad mishapping only costs ~160 points and not ~250.  Could have been worse, though.

The Grandmaster was a champ.  He killed Vulkan, and shut down half of the Librarian’s psychic powers.  A Strength 6 Force Weapon with (4 base + 1 charging + 1 Deathwing Company Standard) 6 attacks ain’t no joke, son, either.  I need to decide if I think I can get away with just using my Librarian model, or if someone’s going to give me grief that he’s not a Grey Knight on Sunday.

At the end of the game, I had 2 models left on the table.  Two models, one in each squad.  I gave up 11KP and took 13KP.  It was a brutal, bloody fight: excellent.

In terms of results, I copped a Minor Victory, with probably +2 Battle Points (I’m 99% sure I killed 1,000 points worth of his guys and I had a scoring unit in his deployment zone).  He got +3 Battle Points (he killed 2,000 points of my guys and he had some scoring units in my deployment zone).

A really, really good game.