Post by abbysdad on Dec 3, 2009 15:39:30 GMT -5
SS Occult detachment (Chris) vs. SD Experimental detachment (Chuck)
Scenario: Random, to play with new toys! We set up with a 12 inch deployment zone along each of our table edges and picked primary and secondary objectives. Chris picked Breakthrough and Defense. Chuck picked Capture and Defense.
Board Set-up: Sooner or later Chuck and I will remember to stop BSing and take some pictures! A rough description: rocky Ardennes-like terrain, with clumps of evergreen trees over the entire table and several changes in elevation. There was a trench work embankment directly in front of Chuck’s deployment zone and a similar series of trenchwork to the left of my deployment zone.
SD List: Experimental Detachment – SD Field Unit
Elite: Assassin Sniper
Veteran: German Officer
Regular: Sturmaffe
Regular: Rohlingsoldat
Regular: Feuersoldat
Green: Emaciated troopers
Green: Volksturm
SS List: Occult Detachment - Hunting Party
Elite: SS Commando (Mounted Hero, Totenkopfring, Rune Dagger, Rod of Command)
Veteran: Hellhounds
Regular: Hellhounds
Regular: Hellhounds
Regular: Vril Engineer (Vril Armor, Rune of Othala/AP)
Regular: Vril Engineer (Vril Armor, Rune of Othala/AP)
Chuck’s deployment: The SD
I deployed my SD around a trench formation. The german officer and the volksturm were in cover there, while the Sturmaffe was to the right of the trench in the board center. (CDC: The monkey looked at the Hell Hounds and licked his lips. Several of the hunting dogs wet themselves.) The feuersoldat, Rohlingsoldat and sniper went to the left with the sniper hiding behind a small copse of trees out of sight. The ogre was in the trees and looked very menacing. The emaciated troopers were put into the breach between the trench and trees as a speedbump for puppies. (CDC: Chuck did an awesome job of using terrain in his set-up and controlling the center of the board. If I hadn’t had a fast moving small detachment, I would have been in a really tough situation.)
Chris’ Deployment: The SS
Chuck placed his big bad monkey in an aggressive posture. Right in the middle of the table in front of his entire detachment. Then he put his Volksturm behind the trench works. With little to no fire power in the SS detachment, I put the entirety of my force on the left hand side of my deployment zone. This way I could use trees and the other trench works to cover my advance. Plus, the Hell Hounds were surefooted and had scent, so I would be able to break out of the trees and charge Chuck’s units when the time was right. Technically, this was a denied flank sort of set-up, because Chuck’s own men were preventing him from having line of sight to shoot my units. I say technically because such a plan usually references some serious fore thought, which I had not done until I saw Chuck’s detachment across the board.
Turn 1: Chris won the roll and went first moving his puppies forward. (I ran like a coward into the trees and began moving my line along the board edge to Chuck’s side of the board.) We alternated back and forth with the only real action being miniatures moving and my sniper taking a shot at one of his Vril Engineers with no real affect thanks to invulnerable. This set up a routine for the majority of the game: Chuck would hit one of the SS despite being at long range and forcing the bullet to make several 90 degree changes, but then roll a miserable score for damage. Chris would then miss his Armor roll and make the Impervious roll. Chuck begins to cry “My kingdom for a mortar.”
Turn 2: Chris won the roll again and started charging his dogs into close combat. I managed to win wit a trooper, but couldn’t wound due to invulnerable. I shot at another Vril Engineer and caused a wound. The other shot was ineffective due to invulnerable. I start hating that ability. The sturmaffe gets stopped in his tracks by the dog howls. I activate my officer and remove the effect with command.
The veteran Hell Hounds bound out of the trees to howl and then walk close to the grouping of SD. The vril engineers each move up give 1 AP to a hound. The closest Hound manages to be just in range to the Ape to paralyze it with a gaze. The other Hell Hounds bound from the forest to charge the SD.
Turn 3: Chuck won the roll for activation order. More dogs charge my emaciated troopers. The volksturm uses command to help the monkey break suppression. My sturmaffe wades in. The troopers are more effective than the ape killing the 2 veteran dogs. He hits, but decides to only pet the doggies instead of pummel. Chris’s mounted SS commando charges my sniper and wipes him out in CC (CDC: lethal + charge bonus + mounted bonus + sword = dead sniper). The feuersoldat lose a trooper to dogs.
CDC: Things looked good until I realized that I had two big problems, (1) the Rohlingsoldat now had a straight shot with a MG34 at my commando. (2) The large monster bases prevented my other dogs from joining the fight or from moving around it directly! In frustration, the locked out dogs paralyze the monkey again.
Turn 4: Chuck won the roll for activation order. More CC with dogs. The emaciated troopers have only taken 1 wound total currently. This round they manage to spread the wounds around to the dogs. The volksturm move in to support the officer who was charges by a unit of dogs. Chuck activates the rohlingsoldat and opens up the commando. Dark forces prevent the ogre from hitting or wounding the mounted hero despite spraying at the SS commando twice. Chris’s commando runs through a feurersoldat on his way to a board edge with help from a Vril engineer.
Turn 5: Chris won the roll for activation order. The mounted commando flees the table edge. This means that Chris achieved his primary objective (breakthrough) and Chuck failed his (Capture the commando). The dogs howl again and my emaciated and volksturm will rout at the end of the turn. More CC with the dogs on all fronts. The Vril engineers move about. My rohlingsoldat has been shooting, but not hitting anything at this point. A dog wanders over to bite him, and he clubs it with his MG34. Twice. It dies. I keep him on the terrain piece to complete the secondary objective. Chris’ vril engineers run back to the trench works near their deployment zone to make the defense objective.
Turn 6: Chuck won the final activation order roll. Chuck activated his officer to keep troops from routing, just because. I manage to kill another unit of dogs with the troopers and ape. The officer holds his own with a wound. The ape moves and hits a dog and invulnerable save sit from a severe pounding. Final tally, Chuck has killed three hounds. Chris has killed both feurersoldat and a volksturm. Chris got two objectives (primary and secondary) while Chuck got his second objective. We call it for Chris, but since so few models were removed from the game both sides did pretty well.
Lessons Learned:
Chuck: A couple of lessons to be learned. Place the ape last. He was placed far from the combat and spent two turns moving instead of one fighting. A rohlingsoldat is impressive, but cannot shoot very well.
Chris: Chuck is a great guy to play against because he sets up his troops well and definitely controls where things happen on the board. It’s not his fault that the dice failed him in this game. Normally, that’s my job. Chuck managed to choke off my hounds and keep his officer out of the battle for the most part. I would have liked to take him out early so that paralyze and the howls would have shredded their morale earlier. I got lucky with this game. If Chuck had opened up and hit with the MG, things would have gone much differently. Next time I will be more careful with setting up charge lanes. But the small detachment with hounds did pretty well using the terrain. In a more open board I would never have made it. I think using the hunting party in a double detachment game would work great. One detachment for firepower and support and the other for recon and taking objectives. Relying on the lone occult detachment without anyone who has command is dicey. The veteran hellhounds are nice because they can howl and then do something afterwards!
Scenario: Random, to play with new toys! We set up with a 12 inch deployment zone along each of our table edges and picked primary and secondary objectives. Chris picked Breakthrough and Defense. Chuck picked Capture and Defense.
Board Set-up: Sooner or later Chuck and I will remember to stop BSing and take some pictures! A rough description: rocky Ardennes-like terrain, with clumps of evergreen trees over the entire table and several changes in elevation. There was a trench work embankment directly in front of Chuck’s deployment zone and a similar series of trenchwork to the left of my deployment zone.
SD List: Experimental Detachment – SD Field Unit
Elite: Assassin Sniper
Veteran: German Officer
Regular: Sturmaffe
Regular: Rohlingsoldat
Regular: Feuersoldat
Green: Emaciated troopers
Green: Volksturm
SS List: Occult Detachment - Hunting Party
Elite: SS Commando (Mounted Hero, Totenkopfring, Rune Dagger, Rod of Command)
Veteran: Hellhounds
Regular: Hellhounds
Regular: Hellhounds
Regular: Vril Engineer (Vril Armor, Rune of Othala/AP)
Regular: Vril Engineer (Vril Armor, Rune of Othala/AP)
Chuck’s deployment: The SD
I deployed my SD around a trench formation. The german officer and the volksturm were in cover there, while the Sturmaffe was to the right of the trench in the board center. (CDC: The monkey looked at the Hell Hounds and licked his lips. Several of the hunting dogs wet themselves.) The feuersoldat, Rohlingsoldat and sniper went to the left with the sniper hiding behind a small copse of trees out of sight. The ogre was in the trees and looked very menacing. The emaciated troopers were put into the breach between the trench and trees as a speedbump for puppies. (CDC: Chuck did an awesome job of using terrain in his set-up and controlling the center of the board. If I hadn’t had a fast moving small detachment, I would have been in a really tough situation.)
Chris’ Deployment: The SS
Chuck placed his big bad monkey in an aggressive posture. Right in the middle of the table in front of his entire detachment. Then he put his Volksturm behind the trench works. With little to no fire power in the SS detachment, I put the entirety of my force on the left hand side of my deployment zone. This way I could use trees and the other trench works to cover my advance. Plus, the Hell Hounds were surefooted and had scent, so I would be able to break out of the trees and charge Chuck’s units when the time was right. Technically, this was a denied flank sort of set-up, because Chuck’s own men were preventing him from having line of sight to shoot my units. I say technically because such a plan usually references some serious fore thought, which I had not done until I saw Chuck’s detachment across the board.
Turn 1: Chris won the roll and went first moving his puppies forward. (I ran like a coward into the trees and began moving my line along the board edge to Chuck’s side of the board.) We alternated back and forth with the only real action being miniatures moving and my sniper taking a shot at one of his Vril Engineers with no real affect thanks to invulnerable. This set up a routine for the majority of the game: Chuck would hit one of the SS despite being at long range and forcing the bullet to make several 90 degree changes, but then roll a miserable score for damage. Chris would then miss his Armor roll and make the Impervious roll. Chuck begins to cry “My kingdom for a mortar.”
Turn 2: Chris won the roll again and started charging his dogs into close combat. I managed to win wit a trooper, but couldn’t wound due to invulnerable. I shot at another Vril Engineer and caused a wound. The other shot was ineffective due to invulnerable. I start hating that ability. The sturmaffe gets stopped in his tracks by the dog howls. I activate my officer and remove the effect with command.
The veteran Hell Hounds bound out of the trees to howl and then walk close to the grouping of SD. The vril engineers each move up give 1 AP to a hound. The closest Hound manages to be just in range to the Ape to paralyze it with a gaze. The other Hell Hounds bound from the forest to charge the SD.
Turn 3: Chuck won the roll for activation order. More dogs charge my emaciated troopers. The volksturm uses command to help the monkey break suppression. My sturmaffe wades in. The troopers are more effective than the ape killing the 2 veteran dogs. He hits, but decides to only pet the doggies instead of pummel. Chris’s mounted SS commando charges my sniper and wipes him out in CC (CDC: lethal + charge bonus + mounted bonus + sword = dead sniper). The feuersoldat lose a trooper to dogs.
CDC: Things looked good until I realized that I had two big problems, (1) the Rohlingsoldat now had a straight shot with a MG34 at my commando. (2) The large monster bases prevented my other dogs from joining the fight or from moving around it directly! In frustration, the locked out dogs paralyze the monkey again.
Turn 4: Chuck won the roll for activation order. More CC with dogs. The emaciated troopers have only taken 1 wound total currently. This round they manage to spread the wounds around to the dogs. The volksturm move in to support the officer who was charges by a unit of dogs. Chuck activates the rohlingsoldat and opens up the commando. Dark forces prevent the ogre from hitting or wounding the mounted hero despite spraying at the SS commando twice. Chris’s commando runs through a feurersoldat on his way to a board edge with help from a Vril engineer.
Turn 5: Chris won the roll for activation order. The mounted commando flees the table edge. This means that Chris achieved his primary objective (breakthrough) and Chuck failed his (Capture the commando). The dogs howl again and my emaciated and volksturm will rout at the end of the turn. More CC with the dogs on all fronts. The Vril engineers move about. My rohlingsoldat has been shooting, but not hitting anything at this point. A dog wanders over to bite him, and he clubs it with his MG34. Twice. It dies. I keep him on the terrain piece to complete the secondary objective. Chris’ vril engineers run back to the trench works near their deployment zone to make the defense objective.
Turn 6: Chuck won the final activation order roll. Chuck activated his officer to keep troops from routing, just because. I manage to kill another unit of dogs with the troopers and ape. The officer holds his own with a wound. The ape moves and hits a dog and invulnerable save sit from a severe pounding. Final tally, Chuck has killed three hounds. Chris has killed both feurersoldat and a volksturm. Chris got two objectives (primary and secondary) while Chuck got his second objective. We call it for Chris, but since so few models were removed from the game both sides did pretty well.
Lessons Learned:
Chuck: A couple of lessons to be learned. Place the ape last. He was placed far from the combat and spent two turns moving instead of one fighting. A rohlingsoldat is impressive, but cannot shoot very well.
Chris: Chuck is a great guy to play against because he sets up his troops well and definitely controls where things happen on the board. It’s not his fault that the dice failed him in this game. Normally, that’s my job. Chuck managed to choke off my hounds and keep his officer out of the battle for the most part. I would have liked to take him out early so that paralyze and the howls would have shredded their morale earlier. I got lucky with this game. If Chuck had opened up and hit with the MG, things would have gone much differently. Next time I will be more careful with setting up charge lanes. But the small detachment with hounds did pretty well using the terrain. In a more open board I would never have made it. I think using the hunting party in a double detachment game would work great. One detachment for firepower and support and the other for recon and taking objectives. Relying on the lone occult detachment without anyone who has command is dicey. The veteran hellhounds are nice because they can howl and then do something afterwards!
