With the holidays over, I can finally find time for a game. The Sisters have been sitting on the shelf for too long. Between the holidays (and, lets get honest here, Star Wars: The Old Republic) I have not had any time for painting, much less a game. So getting right to it, this is the set up.
Points agreed on were 1750. We wanted something different so we pick a mission out of the battle Missions book. Since I were hosting Chaos, we picked a random Chaos mission. Scorched Earth. But I am getting ahead of myself. First, there were the forces involved. I will be going by memory since I did not take any notes and only took a few pictures.
Chaos:
HQ - Daemon Prince Sorcerer with mark of Nurgle and Winds of Chaos
HQ - Abbadon the Dispoler
FAST - 10 Raptors
TROOPS - 2 units of 10 Plague Marines
HEAVY - 2 Land Raiders
HEAVY - Havocs with 4 missile launchers.
Sister of Battle:
HQ - Saint Celestine
HQ - Uriah Jacobus
HQ (no force slot taken) - Battle conclave consisting of 2 Crusaders and 7 Death Cult Assassins
FAST - 2 Dominion Squads consisting of 5 sisters armed with 2 melta guns, Sister Superior with combi-flamer and Immolators equipped with twin-linked multi-meltas.
TROOPS: 2 Battle Sister squads with a melta gun and heavy flamer
HEAVY: Squadron of 3 Penitent Engins
HEAVY: 2 Exorcist Tanks
In this scenario, deployment is by table quarters with objective markers placed as usual. We placed 5 points around the board. Also, Chaos always moves first.
The Chaos forces took one of the quarters with the smoldering structure on it and placed Havocs on the upper ramparts to take advantage of high ground and cover. The plague marines each took an objective and were deployed on the table Each Land Raider took a flank with Abbadon and the Daemon Prince filling in the middle.
The Sisters deployed with the Penitent Engines front and center, getting as close as possible (9 inches away from the center of the table in this scenario) so as to spend as little time in the open where they are susceptible to enemy firing. The Exorcists were deployed in cover. Both Battle Sister Squads were deployed towards the rear in their Rhinos to keep them safe until they were needed near the end of the game. Both Dominions took scut moves even tho they were not going to get the first move. Possibly a dumb move but if they took the opening volleys and let my Penitents move unmolested across the short distance between us I hoped to cause massive destruction with the 6 heavy flamers and all those dreadnought close combat weapon attacks. Big mistake number one happened in the deployment. I forgot to place Celestine. She was on the table where I sat her along with the rest of the forces as I was deploying, but it was on my edge far away from the action. At least she was on the table.
Chaos opened fire where they stood. Only Abbadon and the Prince moved forwards. One Immolator was destroyed along with one of the Penitent Engines. One Exorcist was immobilized (oh darn) and all in all I was in great shape. My Dominions were pinned after performing an emergency disembarkation of the wreaked Immolator but they were otherwise ok and out of line of sight from the enemy.
My other Dominion squad disembarked in front of Abbadon ready to open up with melta weapons. The two surviving Penitent Engines moved across the table and getting a good run move they were able to assault one of the plague marine squads. The Battle Conclave moved along one flank and Saint Celestine tried to get closer to the action. At least she has a 12" movement range so my mistake was not too costly. Shooting failed to even scratch Abbadon even with one of the Exorcists targeting him as well. The other Exorcist rolled well and took out 3 of the 5 havocs in the smoldering structure. On the assault, the Penitents did what I knew they could and hammered into the plague marines, wiping them out even without the extra hits from their rampage. This left them in the open but still in good shape.
I was already in a good position as long as I could survive the Land Raider fire and Abbadon's assaults.
The next few turns were a struggle for position and we both fought our dice more then each other. One of those hard struggles was the battle with the Daemon Prince. At the end of the second turn I disembarked my Battle Conclave well across the flank and ready to move towards the remaining Plague Marines in the rear. Chaos countered by moving his Prince in to intercept and charging the conclave at the start of turn 3. This combat continued until the end of the game. After 6 rounds of combat, they were still locked in combat. The Death Cult Assassins get a ton of attacks and the they are all power weapon hits but they are still only Strength 3 and need 6's to wound the against the high Toughness of the Prince with a mark of Nurgle. It seemed like the only time I rolled 6's were with the few wounds I took against the assassins.
In the center of the board, Abbadon managed to take out the Immolator, both Penitent Engines and later the immobilized Exorcist before finally dropping from combined fire of the second Exorcist and rapid firing bolters from one of the Battle Sister Squads. Raptos arrived via Deep Strike and shot one Dominion squad away on their first turn of firing. Saint Celestine killed all but one in retaliation before her first death. When she resurrected, she moved after the second unit of plague marines but only managed to kill 3 before loosing her last wound against them. Celestine failed to come back on turn 5 so she ended the game as a casualty.
The game ended with a roll of 1 after turn 5. Five plague marines held one objective while one full Battle Sister squad held 2 with one other objective was contested.
Chaos forces at the end of the game consisted of the 5 plague marines, a Daemon Prince with one wound remaining and one Land Raider.
Sisters of Battle forces remaining consisted of one full Battle Sister Squad, one Battle Sister Squad with 8 sisters remaining, Uriah Jacobus, 5 Death Cult Assassins, 1 Dominion squad in a Rhino and one Exorcist. The Sisters had purged the heretics with melts and bolter fire, extracting their revenge over a plundered world. The Sisters of battle owned the table.
