Chaos Daemons vs Imperial Fists, 26.05.2015

Time for payback!

Mission: Tactical Escalation
Map: Vanguard Strike
Lists:
Chaos Daemons:

• 3 Nurglings
• 10 Pink Horrors, champion, icon, instrument
• 2x 5-man Furies
• 5 Seekers of Slaanesh
• Kairos Fateweaver, warlord
• Daemon Prince of Nurgle, exalted reward, lvl 3 Psyker, power armor, wings
• Daemon Prince of Tzeentch, exalted reward, lvl 3 Psyker, power armor, wings

Imperial Fists:

• 5 man Tactical Squad with flamer and combi melta
• 10 man Tactical Squad with flamer, heavy bolter and combi melta
• 10 man Tactical Squad with meltagun, multimelta and veteran sergeant in a Rhino
• Librarian in terminator armor, force sword, lvl 2
• Venerable Dreadnought with heavy flamer in drop pod
• 5-man Devastator Squad with 4 lascannons
• Centurion Devastators with grav cannons and grav amp
• Thunderfire Cannon

Deployment:

I deployed first.

The Horrors are nice and cosy in the ruins. The half-painted model behind them is the Daemon Prince of Tzeentch, the primed model behind it stands in for Kairos. Behind them are Furies, and on the far left there's the Daemon Prince of Nurgle. One unit of Furies and the Seekers are deep striking. Nurglings are infiltrating.

You can see my custom ability cards in action. I've got them for psychic powers and daemonic gifts. I'd have no chance at all of remembering what all my psykers do otherwise!
The Nurgle Prince rolled all on Biomancy (Iron Arm, Smite, Endurance). He also got Doubly Blessed, taking an Etherblade to complement the Grimoire of True Names. The Tzeentch Prince rolled on Change to get shooty, and on Biomancy for Smite. He also placed the Portalglyph on the first turn. Kairos had his 10 powers, but mostly used the shooty Change ones.

The Fists consolidated around the ruins.

Devastators on the floor above. Reinforced by the Tech Marine, this gives them 3+ cover. The warlord trait gives the entire army Stealth (Ruins) and Move through cover (Ruins), so they ended up with an impressive 2+ cover save. The Librarian joined a 10-man unit of Tacticals.
I infiltrated the Nurglings behind the far bastion, then got ready to fly up in the Marines' face... but my opponent stole the initiative.

Imperial Fists, turn 1.

The Dreadnought, prepared to face my Soul Grinder (which I luckily did not bring) went ahead and landed next to the Nurglings. Heavy Flamer and Multimelta destroyed one base and wounded another.

Lucky shooting also took off a wound from the Nurgle Prince, bypassing my 2+ Jink.
Tactical objective: Psychological Warfare, discarded.

Chaos Daemons, turn 1.

My movement here was two-fold.
In the back field, the Portalglyph spawned 6 Horrors (proxied by Daemonettes) for an extra warp charge, taking me up to 12. The Furies jumped towards the objective in the left, just in case.
The monstrous Daemons swooped forward, eager to get close. They unleashed an array of psychic shooting attacks, but didn't do much damage. The Dreadnought in particular was targeted 3 or 4 times, but I didn't manage even a glance. I was disappointed at what 12+d6 warp charges can do.
Tactical objective: Kingslayer. I kept that.

Imperial Fists, turn 2.

The Rhino moved forwards, carrying its load of Marines to the front.
The Dreadnought moved in for the kill and annihilated the Nurglings. First blood! All other shooting targeted the Nurgle Prince (strategically placed in the front), but his 2+ Jink saved all wounds.

Chaos Daemons, turn 2.

I've got the Seekers in, deep striking within 6" of the banner. They prepared to move forwards towards other objectives.

The Tzeentchian Daemons used a combination of Vector Strikes and psychic shooting attacks. At 12+5 warp charges, I didn't get anything off. The Nurgle Prince dropped to glide mode, ready to charge.

Imperial Fists, turn 3.

That's an immobilized Rhino!

Time to disembark the lads.
Horrible amounts of shooting took the Nurgle Prince down to 1 wound, then he was charged by the Librarian's squad. Luckily, he survived, killing the sergeant in a challenge, and swiping another Marine.

Chaos Daemons, turn 3.
An uneventful turn, really.

The Nurgle Prince kept up his struggle, killing more Marines.
The Tzeentchians kept up their shooting, failing utterly. I didn't get 1 power off, with 12+5 charges.
Still, I was leading in points, scoring the two objectives in the back several times. The Marines were being whittled down little by little. The Devastators were killed by a combination of cover-ignoring Vector Strikes and warp storm effects. The Centurions were also ravaged, with only one lone survivor.

Imperial Fists, turn 4.

Two charges took place. The Dreadnought moved to annihilate the Seekers, but got stuck in combat. The 10-man Tactical Squad charged in to save the other squad from the Nurgle Prince. They failed to kill him, failed the morale check and ran away. The Librarian also finally died.

Chaos Daemons, turn 4.

A really devastating turn! Finally, the psychic powers paid off. Tacticals on the bottom, gone; Centurions, gone; the lone Devastator, ready to be charged by the Nurgle Prince.

All of these awarded D3 points:

With only a few units left, no mobility to capture objectives and behind in points, my opponent surrendered.
Just as planned!