Battle Report Battle Report Lake Morey Resort
Fairlee, VT
So Orkfest Returns, 2007 edition ended up being kind of weak – only Mad Grot Docsnik made it, and he and I were forced to defend ourselves against 5 imperial players, one of whom was fielding two army lists!
On our side was a chaos player, and later, a Sisters of Battle army that joined us late, and apparently due to broken vox communications (more on this later). Before anyone begins to mutter rude comments on the sides of this battle, note that you weren’t there to provide the ork troops we needed. ‘Nuff said.
The game was mis-scheduled, and we started really early – supposedly at 8:00 AM. Due to this, I started the game a bit differently – each of us (at this time just we orkz and the spikie beakie player) took one unit and put them in a terrain feature on a table in hidden concealment. The Imperials all chose one unit (scouts if they had them) and they had to “find” us. The original idea was who ever had the most objectives would get first turn, and I thought this might be a fun game for an hour or so, which would allow other players to show up. The defenders could “split” their unit to put a small decoy team in another feature, and the attackers all had an auspice unit that would “clear” or indicate a building was occupied (but not how many bodies) in lue of shooting.
This turned out to be fun; on the table I was on, my Gray Gob commandos shook up some Ultramarine scouts as decoys before they got wiped, and shredded a wolf scout unit. I ended up losing the objective in the end though, as the Ultramarines and Blood angel assault Beakies pinchered them in two. I won’t speak for Mad Grot, but he was the only one to hold his objective as his tankbustaz gave the imperials (including the same Space Wolf player I had faced, I let him re-enter) a pretty hard time.
I didn't set a turn limit, but instead just played it out for about an hour.
End result? Tank bustaz in one objective, Black Templars in one (chaos), and Ultramarine scouts and Blood Angel Assault Beakies in mine.
Gray Gob decoy unit targets the approaching Ultramarines
Having identified one objective, the Blood Angel assault Beakies move in.
Coming from both sides, the remainder of the Gray Gobz hunker down in cover
Illuminated only by the flames of burning buildings in the early morning, Blood Angel troops make an approach on the Gray Gobz.
So we didn’t have any new players show up, and the decision was made (by me) to begin the game for real.
I decided that any units that were in the objectives would stay there, and all units for both armies would come on the table in a modified “rolling” escalation rule. What the hell is that you ask? Players had no more than 3 dice to roll per turn for escalation, coming in on standard rolls. Fast Attack, Troops, and than player’s choice was the order, and this kind of worked to allow the battle to “ramp” up – except I had miscalculated. There were five Imperials, and three of us – meaning they had potentially 15 units per turn, and we 9. To adjust this after the first turn, they only came in on a 3 or better, and we started rolling 4 dice per turn.
Starting the game this way actually was fun, and eliminated one of the bigger problems with mega battles – initial deployment, and the time it takes to get set up. All of the players involved liked it as well, so I may have to use it again.
The battle was very one sided, we were well under points. Not only were there 5 to 3 players, with 4 titan class super-heavies (3 warhound titans, and a kustom VDR skimmer jobby), but one of the players was using two lists – for a total of 4500 points. Mad Grot was facing him, plus a Space Wolf player with a warhound; the chaos player had a black templar and most of the blood angels and warhound, and on my end was a Ultramarine, with another warhound and the vdr skimmer.
I was stuck with bad reserve rolls, but I managed to re-take the objective on my end, loose it again, and than finally contest it in the end. The Gargant died (first time in a mega-battle), krushing some orks and a fully loaded sisters of battle unit at the same time.
The mekboy gargant I actually used a homemade apocalypse datafax for, as I wanted to try out the supa lifta droppa. Good times, that. My last gargant was on Mad Grots’s table, and it too fell, sadly after failing to shoot one turn.
I also screwed up my units – I didn’t realize until well into the game that I had failed to bring in my kommandos, shoota boyz, tanksbustaz, and gretchin, but that was probably a wash, as I added a basalisk and a squad of 2 big shoota buggies to bolster Mad Grot, and my looted lemen russ ended up on the Chaos table to support him. So against 2500 pts of Ultramarines, were 2 mobs of sluggaboyz, two buggies, and two mobs of trukkaz, and the two gargants.
Even Warboss Bob and the Scarboyz, in the mighty Kroozada didn’t make it to my table, Bob diverted to assist his fellow warboss, but fell short when the Scarboy burnaz actually caused the weedy wolves to break out of assault range, leaving the boyz painfully exposed. Ouch was the word.
In the end we held (contested) the two ork objectives, but the middle one was lost when the Sisters of Battle, who were on our side, turned in the last turn as their vox communicators came back on line, and snuck right in the back, occupying the empty chaos objective.
Lessons learned?
Now for the pics.
Two Konvikt buggies roll up to blast the snot out of an Ultramarine razorback
Mid battle, the gargantz, killa kanz, and a few troops face off against ultramarines and a titan.
Konvikt gargantz on the move.
Lil'Krooza'z rippa fist neatly seperates the two sides of a vindicator
Bob and the Scars experience that painful "Doh!" moment.
In the center, black templar and blood angels move in against Chaos
blood angel forces swarm across the Kanyon
Gargant down!
As the daylight fades, ultramarine troops flow forward to grab the objective...
'ere is dem nasty legal bits:
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