This being my first game in well over a year, we decided to play a straight forward game. Dawn of War with 5 objectives, no TacOps, First Blood, Line Breaker and Slay the Warlord. I told David I would bring Sisters with Imperial Guard allies. He was not sure what he wanted but it would be either Tyranids or Blood Angels. We agreed on 1750 points (or so I thought - more on that in a moment).
I took Saint Celestine as my Warlord and brought a squad of 6 Seraphim to support her. I had 2 Battle Sister Squads with flamer and heavy flamer in Immolators with twin-linked multi-meltas. Fast Attack slots went to a pair of Dominion Squads of 6 with meltas all around and mounted in Repressors. I had 2 Exorcists in the list for their S8 AP1 goodness.
The Imperial Guard allies came in the form of a 35 man platoon blob full of grenade launchers and autocannons, a company command squad with Korav's Aquila (for Preferred Enemy) and a Wyvern. I planed to have the blob behind an Aegis Defense line with a quad-gun.
My opponent brought Blood Angels. Somewhere we miscommunication and he brought 1500 points where I had 1750. The quickest way to solve that little mix up was for me to pull my 2 Exorcists which brought me down to 1500 as well. The Blood Angel force consisted of 2 Storm Ravens with Dreads (one of them Cassor) and Vanguard Vets, a small unit of scouts and a large Death Company squad accompanied by his Warlord Chaplin.
I did not take notes or pictures, which is a good excuse because I am short for time now and want to just hit the highlights.
The Wyvern took First Blood when it landed all 4 shells on the Scouts causing 12 wounds with no cover saves. I think that made the Blood Angels mad because it did not survive the next turn when both Storm Ravens hit it hard.
Cassor is a beast. He hit the Seraphim with Saint Celestine but thank to some under average rolls on his part and fantastic rolls for Seraphim saves, the Seraphim only lost a single sister giving them the opportunity to Hit & Run across the table where they could take on the Chaplin and his Death Company guard. 5 shredding templates caused some heavy damage followed by the Living Saint's charge all but spelled the end of the Death company. It took another turn before the Seraphim could finish the job. By that time Saint Celestine was alone and Cassor had caught up with her.
Both of my Dominion squads took shots at the Storm Ravens with nothing at all to show for their efforts. Each were then attacked by the Veterans riding in the fliers who had to take melta overwatch and assault the tanks to force the Dominions out who then fired on their turn and charged the marines instead of having to take their charge. They died as true martyrs yet I was happy with how the did overall even if I was not happy with myself for not getting them on to their best targets,
On the other side of the board, the unnamed Dreadnought hit the Guardsman who were hunkered behind their wall. With no priest or commissar (I forgot how the guard need them) the entire platoon broke and ran off the board after suffering a few (6) casualties.
David's Storm Ravens were free to roam the skies for the most part. One auto cannon cause a single hull point loss but that was all the damage they took. The Storm Ravens easily took apart the Immolators that were the only other weapons that could threaten them after the Dreadnaught routed the guardsmen and captured their quad-gun.
It was a close game at a tie for points at the end of 5 turns. On turn 6 the Storm Ravens were able to clear one of the Battle Sister squads off of their objective and Cassor stepped off of the one he was holding to again attack Saint Celestine who had already used her Miraculous Intervention. It truly came down to the final roll. If the entombed warrior could not finish the Living Saint, she would move to capture the object Cassor had stepped off of for the win. However 4 S10 AP2 hits were more than she could save (she rolled 3 sixes and a 2 on her 4+ invulnerable save) and the Blood Angels ended the game with a win.
What Worked:
Flamers, Saint Celestine and Seraphim. They all worked together to cause the most casualties for me. The Wyvern performed well for its debut outing as well.What Didn't:
Lack of air support or a reliable way to deal with Storm Ravens. Sometimes it is possible to ignore a flyer and hammer the ground units but when they know you have nothing that can touch them except possibly snap firing melta that can ignore cover, there is little ability to force them to Jink.My Guard platoon were also ineffective. They did cause the only Hull Point damage the fliers took but my own poor list building gave them no ability to handle a charging dread nor any staying power to even tar-pit it.
