Points: 3000 points
Lists Used:
Chaos Squats Development Thread
The Bloody Hand Development Thread


Armies taken:

The Bloody Hand
425 Master Thaumaturge 3 coven,
450 Infantry Warband 3 coven, Snipers, Fire Support
500 Heavy Tank Warband Flak
200 Artillery Detachment
200 Warpstrike Detachment
200 Outrider Detachment
150 Sabre Detachment
75 Greater daemon
200 Lesser daemons x16
150 Orbital Support
450 Harbinger


Chaos Squats - 3000 points
300 Chaos Squat + Zharr + Doombane
325 Chaos Squat + 3xAnnihalators+ Doombane
225 Chaos Squat + Annihalator
300 Ludus Golyam + Mutants
300 Ludus Golyam + Mutants
225 Malorcs + Trukks
200 Malorcs
300 Engines of Hashvaht (2) x4
300 Engines of Hashvaht (2) x4
300 Engines of Hashvaht (1) x4
225 Rezhak


Army deployments:

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Turn 1 - Chaos Squats win Initiative

- Engines of H(1) double forward and fire on Warpstrike missiles. Hitting 2 and both save
- Rezhak attempts to Retain and fails initiative. Zharr gives further order yet Rezhak stays where is.
- Coven summons 6 lesser daemons and moves into forest, and fires on Chaos Squats killing 2x INF
- Harbinger retains and GA Chaos Squats that have been shot at and kills 1 Doombane.
- Chaos Squats attempt to Marshall and fail. Decides to Regroup
- Orbital Bombard hits LHS Gladiators for no kills. Pin Point misses Ziganook
- H2 Engines fail to activate and instead fire on Coven killing 6x INF
- U90 Indirect vs Chaos Squats already under fire killing 3x INF + 1 AV breaking the formation
- Malorcs fail to activate and shoot at Coven killing 2 daemons
- Outriders Advance to shoot on Malorcs. Malorcs enact Overwatch killing 3 and breaking the formation.
- LHS Gladiators assault Coven in forest. Gladiators win by 1 without taking casualties
- Thaum Coven summon 4 lesser Daemons and March into Building complex at end of the road
- Chaos Squats Double to in front of Thaum Coven and Annihalator shoots for no hits.
- Warpstrike Launchers March to gain some strategic advantage to the enemy.
- Gladiators Assault Thaum Coven with Chaos Squat Supporting fire. Win combat by 1 while losing Ziganook, 2x Big Mutants and a Gladiator, and thefore becoming broken themselves.
- Heavy Tank Warband Advance and fire H1 Engine formation killing 2 and breaking them.
- H2 engines Double and shoot on Thaum Coven for no hits yet killing 2 via BM
- Sabres go on Overwatch
- Chaos Squats Zharr Double behind broken H2 Engines

Rally
- Outriders fail to rally
- All other formations rally


===========================================

You will have to excuse the fact that I forgot to take a picture at the end of turn 1. I was pretty miffed that out of 10 activations, I failed 5 of them (one with an SC reroll). *shakes head*

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Turn 2 - Bloody Hand win Initiative

- Harbinger Comes on after a Supreme Commander roll and GA LHS H2 Engines for no kills
- RHS H2 Engines sustain on Thaum Coven for 1 kill
- Malorcs w/Trukks retain with SC and Double to Thaum Coven and shoot for no kills
- Thaum Covern summons 4 Furies and then fail Activation so Rally removing 6 BM
- Rezahk Advances on Heavy Tank Warband Killing 2
- Coven Marshall, move and remove
- Malorcs Advance and shoot at Heavy Tank Warband for no kills
- Warpstrike fail to activate and regroup
- LHS H2 Engines Fail initiative and remove 2BM
- Usurpers Indirect on Chaos Squats BTS killing 2x INF and 1xAV breaking the formation.
- Chaos Squats Double and fire on Thaum Coven killing a Cultist.
- Sabre Platforms Advance on Chaos Squats killing 1 Chaos Squat
- Gladiatoirs at centre table assault Thaum Coven with 2 other formations of Support. Thaum Coven countercharge involving bothe supporting formations. Chaos squats win by 7 and breaks formation
- Heavy Tank Warband Marshall and fire on Malorcs killing 1.
- H1 Engines fail to activate and Break
- Chaos Squat w/SC Double and shoot on Outriders killing 1 through BM
- Gladiators jump in Zigganook


Rally
- Outriders fail to rally
- H1 Engines fail to rally


End of Turn 2

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Turn 3 - Chaos Squats win Init
- cENTRE h2 engines advance and shoot on Thaum Coven killing 1 Death Brigade breaking the formation and placing 2BM on the Sabres
- Rezhak retains and fails. Shoots on Heavy Tank Warband killing 1.
- Warpstrike Platforms Advance and shoot at Rezahk with 3 missiles killing it.
- Malorcs w/ Trukks Advance in building and fire on Sabres killing 2 and breaking the formation.
- Coven summons Greater daemon and 2 Lesser daemons and assaults Ziganook destroyting it.
- H2 Engines Double to own Bliitz to contest and Fiire on Coven killing 2
- Harbinger GA H2 Engines for no kills.
- Malorcs Sustain on Heavy Tank Warband for no kills.
- Usurpers Sustain on Squat BTS for no kills.
- Chaos Squats w/SC Engage Heavy Tank Warband and lose by 2 and consolidate back to objective.
- Heavy Tank Warband Engage Broken Chaos Squats wiping the formation out.
- Squat BTS Double to obtain opponent's Objective
- Gladiatoirs Double towards Coven
- Chaos Squats fail activation and remove BM

Rally
- H1 fail
- BH SC fails
- Sabres fail
- Outriders fail


End Turn 3

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Turn 4 - Chaos Squats win Initiative

- H2 Engines near Blitz Advance and fire on Cultist Coven killing 1 INF
- Cultist Coven Marshall (move) and remove 5 BM
- Squat BTS Marshal (move) and remove BM
- Usurpers Indirect Squat BTS Killing 1 Vedaj and breaking the formation.
- Gladiators March to contest own Blitz
- Harbinger GA Gladiators breaking them and the H2 Engines
- Chaos Squats March to contest own Blitz
- Warpstrike March to contest one of their objectives
- Heavy Tank Warband attempt to Retain and fail even with SC. Decide to shoot at H2 Engines killing 1 and and breaking the formation
- Malorcs double and fire on Warpstrike platforms for no kills
- Malorcs Double and fire on Heavy Tank Warband killing 1.


Rally
- H2 Engines attempt to rally
- BH Thaum Coven fails to rally
- H2 Engines attempt to rally
- Outriders fail
- Heavy Tank Warband fail to rally


End Turn 4




===================================

Score
Chaos Squats: 0
Bloody Hand: 0

Countback:
Chaos Squats : 625 points
Bloody Hand : 1737.5 points

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Post battle comments to come a little later.

Bothe sides made some mistakes with myself making a game winning mistake in turn three. Due to that, I deserved to lose the game.

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You haven't used a picture of a chaos squat in your intro banner thingy.

.

That is a picture of a Chaos Squat posted up by eypyeash

I will support any community involvement I can get.

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Post game thoughts

This battle really highlighted the old saying "know thy enemy".
Without studying the Bloody Hand, I made certain tactical decisions from set up and right up to turn 3 without understanding certain limitations to the force. For one thing I thought the Warpstrikes had Indirect, which forced me to start my Gladiators outsiode of the Ziganooks, and hide the Rezahk. Upon finding out that they did not, I realised what opportunities I missed from the get-go, as well as the silly movements I made to tackle what I saw as threats.

In hindsight, I should have concentrated more of my forces to the left side and forced his Covens back to attain the ATSNP objective. I did not follow up on Broken formations for two reasons:

1. They were useless and did not have a good chance of rallying
2. They consisted of Fearless formations - so do not take BM casualties

In Turn 3 I made an Engage move with Squats vs his Tank Formation and stupidly set them up to FF engage. I have no idea what I was thinking at this stage. I should have gone in for the CC attacks. In doing this, I gave up my advantage in numbers and allowed my opponent to equalise the combat and beat me on resolution. The fall of the right side with little to no loss from the enemy meant I could not attain the RHS objective without a lot of luck (which was not there), so I was chasing my tail at that point.

I did make some good assault decisions, and sadly could not bring any x-fire bonuses into play.Now that I know the opposing force, I should be able to give it a right 'run for it's money' in the future.

In regards to the Chaos Squats, the addition of the built in optional Vedaj was a huge improvement on performance. It was nothing game breaking, it just meant that the Chaos Squats could at least compete with getting onto the opposing table half.

The activation count and power level of the force appeared reasonable and not overpowered. I will allow my opponent to give feedback on this as well as you do not always see everything from the player side.

In regards to the Bloody Hand, I have no real pressing concerns from what I saw. The only areas I would think to give feedback on are as follows (I will update these on the relevant development thread):

a. More clarity on the Daemon Pool at the start of the game and what is available
b. Cultists - take these down to FF6+
c. Thaumaturge Coven. These are too cheap at 25 points

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The warpstrike missiles I thought did have indirect? They are just variants on deathstrikes. Should be speed 20cm as well otherwise they can start the game on overwatch!

The cultists and coven and demons are supposed I believe to make up for the lack of leader and inspiring in regular guard armies.

Cultist wise I think the expendable ability is powerful and the other stats are marginal. Making them cheaper seems a bit off. They can always get autoguns

I'll have another proper look at list tomorrow whilst dodging work!

They are the same pretty much as the Mossinian Firestrike Missiles (which do have Indirect!). Mossinian ones come with Gun Emplacements as well. Difference is that The Bloody Hand ones have a AR6+ and are counted as AV instead of LV. I would not wish to see 3 missiles TK(d3) priced any cheaper than what they are...

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on that point we are completely in agreement. there is no way i would allow the warpstrikes to be anything less than the 200 they currently are. so perhaps they should have indirect fire afterall...

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Why not just adopt the Mossinian stats? If is walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck....

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the main reason was that the mossinians have the added protection of a gun emplacement (which gives them a 5+ cover save) which does not fit in with the idea of this force. that being said, i think the unit needs some more twiddling. i'll continue that line of thought in the development thread, as well as addressing your other concerns.

my thoughts on the battle where as follows:

the daemons where less effective in fighting and/or absorbing gunfire than i thought, but they did help. their main value came from being able to create infiltrators and scouts as needed which was quite useful in parts.
the harbinger bomber performed excellently, but i am not sure it's worth the price of 4 helltalons+change. (or infact, it's only 25 points less than an artillery warband with an even higher BP ratio)
without leaders, the infantry units really are vulnerable to blast marker accumulation, and their relative unwillingness to rally was quite a frustration at times. still, for the most part, my army fought much the way it was intended to.

my only real thought on the chaos squats was that their transports where incredibly useful, making them much faster than my own troops, and providing their infantry with added protection. it was not so much that i though they where undercosted (although there was a large number of units on the table that all seemed pretty darn decent) but more that such speed was not something i expected to see from a squat list.
likewise the rezhak seems quite good when compared against warhounds. i know lance isnt as good as macroweapon, but on a barrage (which is apparently a scary thing) and with that kind of range, i'm not sure it's much less survivable than a warhound (4dc vs 3dc 2 shields)

i made numerous little mistakes throughout the game (but not any really big ones that i can recall) but the one that stings the most was how i took on the BTS in turn 4. i should have sent the warpstrikes in first, with 3 heavy stubbers, i might have been able to kill that remaining infantry, leaving the transports broken. then, firing on them with my usurpers (which unlike the warpstrikes, could hit whereever they wanted) would have killed the rest of the formation. alas.
a good game, and a very thorough report. thanks for taking these guys out for a spin.

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