Space Husky Battle Report

Hi all....

This week I am blessed with the house guest that is Haydn Korach. Other than having my nosey neighbours peering out their window trying to work out why a police car is parked on my lawn all night, this came with the added benefit of getting a game in with the new Wolves against one of New Zealands top ranked players, using an army he is very familiar with.




I fielded the Wolf list posted HERE

Haydn fielded:

Eldrad
5 Fire Dragons - Wave Serpent with TL Scatter Lasers
5 Fire Dragons - Wave Serpent with TL Scatter Lasers
5 Harlequins - 5 Kisses, 2 Fusion Pistols
6 Dire Avengers - Wave Serpent with TL Scatter Lasers
6 Dire Avengers - Wave Serpent with TL Scatter Lasers
5 Dire Avengers - Wave Serpent with TL Scatter Lasers
Vyper - Scatter Laser
Falcon - Holofields, Spirit Stones, Scatter Laser
3 War Walkers - 6 Scatter Lasers

So, all up Haydns list seemed to be a high rate of fire high strength game plan, with some specialised anti tank in the form of fire dragons and harlies. When you factor in Eldrads guide, effectively it's something like 52 twin linked s6 shots a turn, or if you prefer to think in average rolling terms, the equivalent of 78 non twin linked s6 shots.

Eldrad fortuned with the harlequins can provide a specialised combat punch, so the only thing it really lacks is being quite light on ranged anti tank.

We rolled up the mission and deployment, rolling Draw Bore aka Roll a Dice and Tie, with one objective each in our deployment zone. I won the roll to go first, and placed my objective centrally in my deployment zone, so that where ever Haydn placed his, the game would play in a line between those two points. I have a decent midfield presence, so hoped I could win this war of attrition, and surge forward at the end to contest his and claim my own.

Deployment

I set up the longfangs, two squads on my back board edge centrally to be able to reach most of the table, and one in the ruins across from his objective, to have good elevation and a clear path to the objective at all times, where I thought the bulk of Haydns army would be. The rhinos set up fairly centrally, ready to drive out and cover each other on their way to the objective, with the doggies behind them for cover, lapping around at each end to extend their reach. The wolf scouts finished up the plan by going into reserve, to come on behind enemy lines.


Haydn, instead of deploying on his objective and defending, deployed far in the opposite corner. His game plan was to protect the war walkers, surge forward on that flank and try roll up the longfangs squad by squad. His army has the firepower to kill ~10 meq's a turn at 36 inchs, so it wasn't a terrible plan, and would then rely on his mobility to pull back to his objective and contest mine, hopefully pulling the bulk of my army away from the objectives in the process. As a safety net, one wave serpent stayed back in reserve to come in later in the piece.


Turn 1

Haydn promptly siezed the initiative, and stumbled forward. The warwalkers had not scouted forward for extra range though, and only got a 2 for their movement. This left them about an inch out of range, and unable to shoot, despite being guided. The Vyper turbo boosted up behind the LOS blocking tower, and the rest of the army shot at long fangs, but only killed a missile launcher from the squad on my right, and the pack leader from the squad in the middle.


In my turn 1, the rhinos drove up through a crater to get into position and cover each other. I then immobilised one, despite the dozer blades, and went to shooting, which was about as retarded as Haydns shooting phase. Out of 11, 9 missile launchers missed. The 2 that hit, blew up one warwalker, and shook a wave serpent, but that was it.



Turn 2

The dire avengers in reserve stayed off the table. The warwalkers shuffled forward, and the wave serpents + falcon shuffled around a little. One wave serpent strafed out close to my lines to have a crack at a rhino, while the vyper poked its nose out to shoot longfangs.
In the shooting phase, my rhino with the runepriest and 8man squad + wolfguard was blown up, killing 3 marines in the blast. The other rhino out front was immobilised and shaken, which left me with a single mobile rhino. Another missile launcher, and the pack leader were killed from the long fang squad on my right.


Turn 2 was the real crunch turn for my army, and pretty much everything happened this turn. The wolf scouts came on from a side edge, and I decided to double melta a fire dragon wave serpent up the butt, so that I could assault the contents if they blew it up, and tag the warwalkers with the powerfist should I get a decent difficult terrain roll. The odds were fairly high this would go down, so I didn't feel like I was betting on a long shot.
My mobile rhino moved up near the Dire Avenger wave serpent that had strafed out, and the squad that had been blown out of their vehicle hopped up close as well. The squad from the immobilised rhino disembarked and moved up to fire some meltas at the fire dragon wave serpent, while the 4th squad chilled out in the rhino I immobilised myself the previous turn, desperately trying to kickstart it back up.
The shooting phase was a biggy. The wolfscouts wrecked the wave serpent at his back, the squad I disembarked wrecked the fire dragon wave serpent, the 4 missile launchers in the building exploded the dire avenger wave serpent that had strafed out - and shook the falcon thanks to split fire, the other 4 missile launcher squad immobilised the other dire avenger wave serpent amongst his lines, and the decimated longfang pack of 2 took revenge on that vyper, exploderating it.
A huge shooting phase for me, removing 5 out of the 7 total skimmers from having an impact on the game.
In the assault phase, the runepriest and pals finished off the avenger squad that had been exploded out of their vehicle, the wolf lord and dogs went and demolished the fire dragons, and the scouts drew with the fire dragons, but punched a warwalker out of existence.

Turn 3

Haydn was now kind of reeling from the damage done. The last wave serpent came on from reserve, coming on near his objective, in a position to get rear shots on my immobilised rhino, but only managed to shoot off its storm bolter.
The dire avengers in an immobilised serpent disembarked and shot at doggies, but only killed 2 of them.
The harlequins disembarked, and charged the scouts, killing all but the wolf guard, who in turn punched out the remaining warwalker, failed his leadership check, was caught, and then died to no retreat.


In my turn 3, the mobile rhino drove up another 6, dumped its meltas into the newly arrived wave serpent, blowing it up, and the missile launchers in the building dumped frags on the squad, scoring 20 hits and wiping them out.


The rhino I immobilised in turn 1 started itself back up, while the squad from the other immobilised rhino moved forward to rapid fire the dire avengers, but didn't manage to kill any.
The other missile launchers ripped off the pulse laser from the falcon, and shook it a million times, while the wolves ate the dire avengers, and blew up the immobilised wave serpent - meaning 9/10 vehicles were now dead in his army. The dogs and wolf lord consolidated back, to be as far as possible from the harlequins, but still in assault range, and were now 3 dogs and the lord strong.



Turn 4

Haydn had little left now, the fire dragons melta gunned a dog to death, and the harlies moved up to assault. I proceeded to fail my moral check and fall back 8 inches, leaving me out of harlequin assault range.

In my turn 4, the dogs auto rally thanks to ATSKNF on the spacemarine (if one marine is alive in a unit containing fenrisian wolves, they are also effected by the rule) - consolidate 3, move forward 6, seperating from the lord. They try to eat the remaining 3 fire dragons, but roll too low on their assault. Missle launchers frag the harlequins to death, and bounce off the falcon. The wolf lord assaults it, and punches the scatter laser off, and shaking it yet again.


Turn 5

Mad at the dogs, Hayden melts one, and the remaining dog runs away, never to return. Eldrad fortunes himself (the runepriest was having a fail when it came to stopping this power all day), hops out and assaults the wolf lord - doing 1 wound to him which is saved, and takes 4 wounds in return, all of which are saved with a 3++ rerollable. The falcon tank shocks a squad of grey hunters, who immediately fail, and fall back 1 inch too short a distance, so they will run again next turn.


In my turn 5, the unit falls back a short distance, tries to melta the falcon but misses. The missile launchers rip the last gun off the falcon, and in the combat eldrad does 1 wound, but I save it, and do 4 in return, which are saved again. The falcon is finally immobilised, and the unit is safe.

Turn 6

Eldrad tries to cast fortune, but it is finally stopped. He misses the wolf lord, who inturn sneaks 3 wounds past the keeper, which make it through his invulnerable save to instant death him.


The squad that ATSKNF rallied moves forward and gets another weapon destroyed result on the falcon, but without any weapons or mobility left, this is upgraded all the way to wrecked.
The last 3 fire dragons are deleted by the wolf lord for a tabling, and both objectives are claimed to win 2-0.


Post Game Analysis

The biggest mistake for Haydn was to make the game so far from his objective, and limit himself so much in range. A missjudgement in range was all the difference between killing 2 longfang squads in the first turn, or killing 2 longfang models. Sure, the long fangs never really do that much, and in the end of the day the thing blowing up vehicles the most was the grey hunters/wolf scouts and their melta guns, even though I didn't get the extra dice thanks to wave serpent shields, but they still got to add pressure and stop vehicles shooting back at me, also fragging 2 squads in the process.
Haydn underestimated the midfield presence of the wolves, and paid big time for it. While I always had him dead by rights in close combat, taking out those longfangs early and keeping at range would have seen him prevail. Instead, he started as far from me as he could, so could only ever get closer to me as the game went on.
A huge turn 2 for me on damage results meant that I had the game sewn up early on, and just got to keep ramping the pressure up.

Casualty pile for the game.