2k8/10/20: Evening 40k
Rules
One thousand points, standard force organization. Everything except the base terrain board counted as difficult terrain. Overhangs counted as dangerous terrain. The objective was simple: Annihilation.
Yeti rolled for first turn, deploying all of his forces and taking the first move.
Board had large amounts of ice plateaus, but good sized vehicle lanes around them, and a fair but not overwhelming amount of ice walls and columns. Overall it was a very solid mix of wide, long fire lanes and just enough terrain to hide behind if you put some effort into it. The large amounts of difficult terrain also made assaulting a bit more risky.
Battle!
Turn One
Tactical 1, Angholan, Terminators began moving into position toward the north, boots clicking on the hard ice as they ran. Tactical 2 and Tactical 3 meanwhile moved out from the trees on the southern edge, gambling for an open firing lane onto the enemy transports next round. Devastator 1 dug in for the long haul, eyes wide open for any opportunity shots that might arise.
(Rhinos move out)
Turn Two
Turn Three
Turn Four
Turn Five
Turn Six
Chaos marines leveraging what opportunities they could to land potshots on Tactical 1 as it advanced through tree cover. Ignoring the hits as no more than small bug bites, Tactical 1 marched across the ice and unloaded.
...
Chortling in his deep, mucous and gravel filled voice, Kar'eth raised his sword toward the mute, watchful Angholan. Eyes narrowing, the Kingbreakers captain scowled just slightly more than usual as the Chaos troops faded back into the screaming ether of the Warp, untouchable...
Results
Another resounding draw! Yeti had three units killed (Great Unclean One, Plaguebearers, Rhino) and some under half strength (Plague Marines), for a total of 455 points down. Joe had two units killed (Tactical 2, Tactical 3) and some under half strength (Terminator 1), for a total of 488 points down.
Lessons
Joe: Doubling up units seemed to be fairly effective. Key here was shooting with one unit, then assaulting with another. If anything, in the future I would strongly consider condensing forces even farther so they can really concentrate fire and support in assaults. Having Angholan and Bolingen assaulting with each other was also interesting, and a powerful combo. I had mixed feelings about not deep striking the Terminators, but it was useful to have them with Angholan and supporting Tactical 1 from the start.
Devastator 1 did an excellent job of suppressing much of the board from a fixed, well defended location, and getting off a good number of potshots. Deploying it in a good site with nice fire lanes was a good move.
At some points I definitely wished I had a few Rhinos to load up troops and move across the board, but in the end it was good that the fighting came to them. Good use was made of difficult terrain to take shots at advancing troops before assaulting.
Tactical 3 seemed to be almost a waste, it was gone so fast. It was nice to have that extra unit to command but making it bigger under the point cap would be hard, and it's just so easy to have five guys killed that the squad really needs to be bigger.
Both sides made good use of terrain to cover from enemy fire, as well as Run moves to get into battle faster.
Notes
We need to remember that moving in difficult terrain and then assaulting or assaulting in difficult terrain has a variety of effects.