Astra Militarum vs Orks, 2021.10.06

Introduction

I initially intended for the nuns to be a small force, perhaps 500 points or so in a Crusade or the start of an escalation league. By the time I painted them, life happened, and the local escalation is already at 1500. No matter - let's try to put them on the table, using Cadian rules and plenty of allies to make up points.

Deployment and first round

I picked sides and opted for the raised areas, even with no cover, as the Orks sported little shooting. The Orks seized the initiative though and ran forward on their turn. I had only rough ideas on what the army did, as it included a bunch of new Beast Snagga models.

Thankfully guard stuff is rather easy to play.

I deployed all my heavy weapons on the raised containers, and gave them all reroll orders with the Company Commander - Colour Sergeant Kell combo. They had little line of sight, but managed to inflict some damage here and there.

My second firebase in the ruins was a Vindicare hiding next to the one-use characters, an Officer of the Fleet and a Master of Ordnance. They did some damage, but barely worth their points. Thankfully, a n infantry nun squad and some Bullgryns also hid out there for protection.

My third threat was a Punisher Tank Commander with two Astropaths for support. The psykers did nothing, but at least the tank melted a squad and half of Boyz.

My fourth threat was a Chimaera with infantry and Eisenhorn. It fired everything into the Ork racecar, doing exactly 1 damage (the rest was self inflicted).

Battle round 2

Ork reserves arrived from the edge of the table. Deffkoptaz unloaded into the heavy weapons team, while two Kannons eliminated the Tank Commander. She couldn't roll a 6 to save, but did so for the explosion, damaging everything around. Great.

The Deff Dread worked itself up to Ramming Speed, charging and destroying the Chimaera. Everything else thankfully failed.

Eisenhorn was out with his squad, thankfully only one sister died on the way out.

On my turn, I was in trouble, with pressure on both flanks. However, I had counter strikes of my own. 

First, all 3 remaining assassins of the Execution Force came out of hidings, scoring Linebreaker and crashing into the Ork backline. The wounded Warboss died without ever declaring his Waagh!, and a squad of Gretchin melted along with their banner.

Scions landed in the forest to reinforce my right flank. Their overcharged plasma shots, along with the remaining heavy weapons teams, destroyed the Deffkoptas and the wounded Kannon.

Eisenhorn summoned Cherubael, then directed the Bullgryns to destroy the Deff Dread.

Battle round 3

The Orks cleared their backlines by unloading the Boyz and the Warboss from the Trukk. Both the Eversor and the Callidus survived the first strike, and I let the Eversor melt the Boyz squad before succumbing to the Warboss.

The Beast Snaggaz emerged from behind their ruin, crashing into the scions, but failing to kill them.

An abrupt end...

At this point the shop was closing and we had to leave without playing out my turn 3. It could have gone either way, I had enough firepower to clear the Orks' forward positions. Not much for scoring, but lots of denial. In the end, we only considered scoring up to the end of round 2, in which case I won 18-16.

Aftermath?

Boy, that was new. First time playing a gunline army! Although I did have mobile and deep striking elements, even if I had to deploy most of them in my own backlines.

My list was far from optimized, but here's some takes:

• Heavy Weapons Teams are crap without rerolls. Even so, I need to practice a better placement and line of sight issues. If they have good targets, they can do well, but also melt in return.
• I expected the Tank Commander to do well, which it did; I did not expect it to die that easily. Then again, both psychic powers failed, and I opted for rerolls instead of launching smokes. Bring two next time?
• The assassins did well, except the Culexus which did nothing. Perhaps it would do more if the enemy had a psyker. The Vindicare did solid work, while the other two appeared, charged in, then died. I extended the Callidus' ability to leech command points, but the Orks mostly used pre-game stratagems and I only managed to squeeze 1 extra  CP out of them.
• The scions are awesome, I probably need more.
• The inquisitorial Chimaera should move out, as hitting on 4+ seems to do nothing, even with a reroll. 
• I felt a distinct lack of bodies to screen with.