My First Ever Game of Warhammer 40K
Welcome Brothers and Sisters, I’m James, an average closet Warhammer Nerd who has been drawn back into the Warhammer Universe by a Slaaneshi Fiend (friend) I thought I had left the Grim Dark Future behind me in the late 90’s….but it looks like I am back. Join me on my journey back to social and tournament 40K gaming.
Well, up until now I have chatted a lot of the proverbial!! But now it was all going to come together, all the research, all the live streams watched, all the cogitating, ready to explode into action in my first game. (spoiler alert I forgot everything!!)
WE’RE GOING TO WAR
I packed up my army, for now in a large plastic storage box and with all of my dice and markers ready to go, I marched into the gaming store.
I was feeling uncontrollably excited, I had only received my newly commissioned army in the post a few days earlier and already had a game line up. The miniatures looked amazing! They came very well packaged and unwrapping each one was like a burst of joy. I spent far to long staring at each individual model, it took me an age to unbox them all!!
I went and found the table I had hired and the store (Entoyment in Poole) was buzzing, it was Saturday afternoon and most of the tables were taken with a mix of GW game systems and lots of other card games being played.
I felt a little nervous, I didn’t know what to do, should I get my models out? should I move terrain, should I just wait for my opponent? Luckily they arrived pretty soon after I did and we settled on a terrain layout and started to set up the battlefield. I had made the total rookie mistake of laying my army all over the table, so everything was in the way of terrain lol .
First lesson learnt!!
My oppo was impressed with the painting of my army and I of course confessed they were not my work but the work of Steve from Blasted Miniatures. I was playing against Votann! Yes those tough little Dwarfs. I was excited to be playing one of the newer factions and I would be up against a fun selection of units from Hekaton land fortresses to Steeljacks. We then spent far too long talking about miniatures and armies and the hobby in general. Second lesson learnt!! don’t chat too much if you are on a time limit!!
STARTING THE BATTLE!!
So onto deployment, easy peasy I thought, I looked at the table and we weren’t using much terrain and I completely froze!! all of that studying had vanished, I checked in my brain for some help and all that came back was an image of Homer Simpson shrugging his shoulders
“I DUNNO”
FUCK…… I was on my own! Slowly I gathered some composure and started placing out infiltrators and then the units who would lead my second wave of assault and finally my heavy guns taking some cover from obvious firing lines, though I should not have been quite so cautious as the Votaan in general have very limited range shooting (mostly 18-24 inches).
TURN 1
Hit the roll off and I was going first, BAH!! we were playing Take and Hold on crucible of battle. I felt like I needed to be at least a little bit aggressive and force the game, though in hindsight this is not the case. Votann now need to be aggressive to earn yield points for their army rule, so I could have played things a little more cleverly. However my mind was still melted and I was excited just to be moving my miniatures for the first time in a game. I was aware that I had also dived in at the deep end a little bit playing a 2000 point game straight out of the gate!
The stage was set but did the Imperial Fists general have a clue what he was doing??
I pushed my JPI’s forward to my nearest no mans land objective, scouts onto the centre and scouts onto the farthest no mans land objective. I shuffled a few other units around, pushing my Invictor Warsuit up to support the scouts on the farthest objective. I took some pot shots with my scouts at a biker and scratched off a wound.
I scored 5 points for Cleanse, I had also drawn Assassination, which I should have spent a CP to re draw but I WAS AT MY BRAINS LIMIT!! It wasn’t that I was finding everything difficult, I was just too damn excited, my mind was wizzing thinking of a hundred different things and trying to work the table top battles App and chat, I totally forgot anything most players would think of as basic. I was just having a lovely time pushing my glorious Imperial Fists around the battlefield. I checked in on my brain and now Homer was smashing cymbal’s together and playing the trumpet.
The Votann went full send!! They rushed my units on objectives pushing up the Hekaton’s and sagitars, taking control of all 3 centre objectives, destroying my JPI’ I had sacrificed like a WW1 general, popping out 6 Steeljacks who obliterated them with a hail of fire. The centre scouts were also sent to their final rest, Uthar the destined and his cronies popping out the Sagitar and wiping them out with ease. On the other objective I held a little firmer, the Invictor Warsuit overwatched and killed a Thunderkyn, luckily due to having to split fire, the scouts and The invictor warsuit survived the round.
TURN 2….FOR DORN BROTHERS
Uthar and his boys were about to find out that the Blasted Praetorians can pack a punch!! I was being crushed on primary but if I’m honest that side of the game wasn’t really even registering in my ape brain. I just wanted to smash!!
I had made the mistake of leaving the heavy intercessors behind cover at my home objective, luckily they were able to move just enough and had Uthar in their sights!! My predator drew down a line on the sagitar with Uthar and the Ballistus took a line on a lone biker and Uthar, the Gladiator Lancer stayed put to take a shot at a Hekaton. I should have brought my 2nd Ballistus in from reserves at this point and gone all out to destroy the Hekaton or at least bracket it to make it slightly less dangerous.
The Lancer let rip with a massive boom from its heavy laser destroyer cannon and took 8 wounds off the Hekaton, a good result but not enough! The Warsuit shot and killed another Thunderkyn, grilling him with the Incendium cannon. Due to a sneaky strat, at this point the beserkers were able to leap out of a transport charge my scouts, they fought and wiped out my scouts and chose to pile into the Warsuit….big mistake!!! The left hook strength 14 fist of Dorn smashed 3 beserkers, like Henry’s hammer clobbering Ali and sent them off to Dwarf heaven.
I had big brained the centre objective Oathing Uthars Unit and the incursors firing at the sagitar, meaning other units had +1 to hit it now. The Predator did its thing and shattered the Sagitar into a pile of smouldering high tech ruin, it did not explode….good more meat for the heavy intercessors to deal with. With Oath in effect and the free strat from Captain (unamed as yet) giving them +1 ballistic and +1 AP they hit HARD and Uthars unit were about to learn the HARD WAY!!
Under a hail of devastating heavy bolter fire, the unit were cut to shreds, only Uthar remained on 1 wound. Hmm what to do with Uthar, well fire a Ballistus Dreadnought at him, BAM, he was destined to take a 7 damage Lascannon blast to the face!
My battelfield control was very poor but at least I had hit back and given them something to think about.
The Votann, shrugged off the loss of their Warlord and set about firing back. a Hekaton fired at the heavies but only managed to kill one. The other Hekaton with the steel jacks repositioned and the Hekaton let rip at the Lancer with a savage stratagem giving lethal hits on 4’s sustained 2!!! there was nothing I could do, it landed 3 heavy blasts cauing 12 damage total and the lancer was no more.
Something had to be done about Uthar and his boys in the midfield!!!
TURN 3 TIME TO GET GRIMM
We did not enjoy seeing the Lancer being taken out, so I brought in the second of the Brothers Grimm, both Ballistus now drew down and fired at the Hekaton with the steeljacks, I had oathed the big moon buggy and this may have been overkill as Grimm sent the Hekaton and its pilots to a hell where you’re boiled in oil. This left my 2nd ballistus with only the steeljacks to fire at and some wiffy shooting only killed 1 of the 6 dwarf?….robot??? unit. Meanwhile, Slaughter, the Brutalis dreadnought decided enough was enough and went on a rampage to kill himself a hekaton. (had I oathed the Hekaton this may have worked) Slaughter moved into range and fired his multimelta, not bad 1 went through, damage 1 bah!! I had to re-roll, which was a 3. We both forgot +2 for melta….. but anyway! Slaughter then charged headlong into battle, tilting the full might of his giant bulk into the Hekaton causing 3 mortal wounds with his brutalis tank shock. In theory the Hekaton should now have been on 8 wounds and sweating…but….but, scoring only 1 hit with the talons and failing to crack the armour of the brute Slaughter had come up short and was now very very vulnerable!!
The heavies moved to draw a line on the bikers and were a little underwhelming struggling against the toughness 6 targets and only killing 1 of them.
We then got a little confused, I was going to bring in my Terminators as it was turn 3 and my oppo was convinced that I did not need to. It would have been the right thing to have brought them in this turn and could have slightly changed the result. Another lesson learnt!!
The Votann still had good board control and now Slaughter became the target of massed fire from Thunderkyn and a Hekaton, letting out a mighty roar Slaughter was no more. The bikers shot at the heavies and killed 2 but the unit had stood up well to shooting and certainly proved themselves to be tough and durable.
Fill your hearts with HATE BROTHERS, they have killed Brother Slaughter!!
FINAL SCORES AND THOUGHTS
Well the obvious issue is we only played 3 rounds, we were both slow, both kept checking our datasheets and both chatted and had far to much fun lol
The final score was 38-53 to the Votann. Yes going first sucked a bit but I had been crushed on primary 10 - 25!! I was too cautious, I had killed a lot more of the enemy than they had the Praetorians but that counts for nothing.
If the game continued for 2 more rounds, would or could I have won, yes I think so, as the Votaan were now heavily depleted but I can’t have a style of play where I could have won later.
As far as the experience goes, absolutely grade 1 super fun happy time. I loved every bit of it, meeting a fellow Warhammer nerd, soaking in the store vibes, seeing my army on the table, doing battle, taxing my brain. It may sound like an exaggeration but I was absolutely buzzing, I felt high as a kite!!! I had a strange feeling in my face which I believe is caused by something called a smile! Truly all of the build up and the hype did not fall flat, I’m in love!!! I’ve been away from Warhammer for too long and now I’M BACK!!
I’ve since managed 2 more games in 10 days and am as of now packing for London GT. Going into the largest tournament in the world with 3 games under my belt, what can go wrong………OH my round 1 pairing….Necrons!! with the Silent King, 2 Wraith bricks and 2 DDA’s.. WE MARCH TO WAR, IT IS LIKELY THAT WE GO TO OUR DOOM!!!!!
