Really brief batrep: Deathwing vs Marines & Guard, 1750pts

Just had a game against Wong today. Man, Deathwing is really weird to get my head round. I didn't record most of the battle, but here's a brief summary.

My list:

Belial

Level 2 Librarian in Terminator armour

DW Command Squad with 2 Hammers & Shields, Cyclone Launcher, Deathwing Champion and Banner of Fortitude

7 Deathwing Knights with a Perfidious Relic of the Unforgiven

5 DW Terminators with Cyclone Launcher, Chainfist and Hammer & Shield for the Sergeant

5 DW Terminators with Assault Cannon, Chainfist and Hammer & Shield for the Sergeant

5 DW Terminators with Plasma Cannon, Chainfist and Hammer & Shield for the Sergeant

Same list I took against Ian, with less proxying, hurrah! I'd been holding back on assembling 2 more Deathwing Knights, as I wasn't sure I wanted 7. So, I figured I'd put this list on the board one more time and see how it works.

Wong's Marine & Guard list:
Company Command Squad with Regimental Standard and Astropath
Company Command Squad with 4 meltaguns
Sly Marbo
Veteran squad with shotguns and 3 meltaguns
Platoon Command Squad with 4 Sniper rifles
4 x Infantry Squads with meltagun and autocannon in 2 squads of 20
Hellhound with hull multimelta
2 x Vendettas with heavy bolter sponsons

Lysander
10 Sternguard with 4 combiplasmas, 4 combimeltas and 2 meltaguns with a Drop Pod
5 Sniper Scouts and a missile launcher

Look at this list. Just LOOK at it! My poor Deathwing is staring down the barrels of EIGHTEEN melta weapons! Not to mention a pair of Vendettas, which are bad news for anything on the board. And holy hell, look at the guns the Sternguard are toting!

Anyway, the mission was the Scouring, I let Wong go first, and he prudently deployed the Sternguard... at the vanguard of his forces, actually, hehe... I Deathwing Assaulted the whole army in. The squad with the Assault Cannon had a mishap on the way in and went into Ongoing Reserves. This time however, I did something that I'd never consider doing in any other army. I needed something to distract Wong's guns and put a vicious threat where it would mess up any plans Wong had for gunning down my army in one turn. So I plonked the Deathwing Knights right behind his lines:

EVERY gun in that photo turned right round to pour an insane amount of gunishment into the Deathwing Knights. Amazingly enough, only 4 Knights went down! This was in no small part due to a bad salvo from the Sternguard, but hey, such is the price one pays for 8 combiweapons, eh? Oh, and Fortress of Shields, which meant the Guardsmen with their flashlights needed 6's to wound, which took a lot of the sting out of 70-something shots.

Meanwhile, Sly Marbo chucked a demo charge right into the Command Squad, killing the standard bearer, who failed his first save of the game with a roll of 1. What on earth did I pay 5 pts to give the bugger a Storm Shield for, eh? More shooty death from the Vendettas reduced the squad to just the Librarian and the Deathwing Champion.

Things did turn around, though. The remaining Deathwing Knights charged and wiped out one mass of Guardsmen. The Deathwing Champion smashed Marbo. The Librarian joined the Plasma Cannon squad to wipe out the Sternguard and lock Lysander in a vicious melee. The Assault Cannon squad came in next to Belial and would later wipe out the Company Command Squad with the regimental standard.

By around Turn 5, I had 8 models left on the board, Wong had the 2 Vendettas, the Hellhound, the Platoon Command Squad, a Scout Sergeant holed up in a building and the other 20 man combined squad of Guardsmen, who were locked in combat with Belial and 2 Terminators.

Victory point wise, I had:
First blood
Slay the Warlord + 1 VP from the Hunt
Linebreaker
About 5 VP worth of objectives within easy reach

Wong had:
3 VP within reach of his PCS,

At this point, Wong figured Belial and friends would smash the remaining Guardsmen and grab the objective, so he conceded.

Afterthoughts:
29 Terminators go in, 8 walk out. Man, that was vicious, but against that kind of firepower, I was pretty pleased with how it turned out. One thing that particularly surprised me was how well the Deathwing Knights took a turn of 45 Guardsmen, a Vendetta, a Hellhound and 10 Sternguard worth of shooty death.

Another component of the army that really shone was the Librarian. Prescience is GOLD. With an army this small, reliability in any form is worth so, so much. As for everything else, well, I daresay nary a model was wasted. Except the Banner, who got awfully unlucky, what with catching a demo charge full in the face, but them's the breaks, eh?

Well, I'm pleased with this list. It's a nail-biting roller-coaster ride compared to my other armies, but man, it is really, really satisfying to win with Deathwing! We'll see if we can't get a more detailed Deathwing batrep sometime in the future. Truth be told, the main reasons I don't record my battles with Deathwing quite as meticulously as usual are:

1. They're barely painted. Very bad form on my part.
2. Every time I put Deathwing on the board, I kind of expect to get wiped out in pretty short order. I can't tell you how chuffed I am that this isn't the case... 

And that's it from me. Til next time, happy wargaming...