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Last night, John and I took a stab at the Mud Marine Challenge. The purpose of our game was to learn and/or refine tactics to better help a foot bound force deal with opponents. So who won wasn?t as important as learning something that would be used to produce wins later on.
For John?s part, this exercise allowed him to continue the refinement of what will be a tournament list, able to take on all comers. We?ve gone through this exercise before where we try different things just to see if new synergies can be discovered.
John?s 2700 pt Imperial Guard List:
1 x Regimental HQ, 1 x Hydra
1 x Mechanized Infantry Co, 1 x Hydra
1 x Leman Russ Co, 1 x Hydra
1 x Baneblade Co, 1 x Hydra
1 x Foot Infantry Co, 1 x Hydra
1 x Vultures
John rolled for Commissars and got enough to give one to each formation.
Honda?s 2700 pt Mud Marine List
1 x Tactical, 1 x Hunter, 1 x Supreme Commander
1 x Tactical, 1 x Hunter, 1 x Captain
1 x Tactical, 1 x Hunter
1 x Tactical
1 x Whirlwind, 1 x Hunter
1 x Whirlwind, 1 x Hunter
1 x Whirlwind, 1 x Hunter
The table had a very healthy mix of hills and woods.
Turn 1
This turn was characterized by general advances on both sides. I used my WW formations to place blast markers on the most urgent threats, which in this turn at least, were the LRCo and the Baneblades.
I positioned the SC-Tactical and a second Tac formation with a Hunter nearby the Baneblades with double moves near the center of the board and one of my objectives, shooting at the formation primarily to place blast markers, though casualties were warmly welcomed, none appeared.
John used the Vultures to wipe out a WW formation in the latter stages (leaving the Hunter), while I took the other pair of Tacs and moved them in the general direction of my other objective. John countered by moving the mechanized infantry company into woods to counter my push on the right.
Turn 2
I really needed to go first and was able to secure that opportunity.
Taking a deep breath, I fired indirectly on the Baneblade formation, placing a blast marker. Next I combined assaulted with the SC-Tac formation and the other Tac into the Baneblades. I got one crit on a Baneblade, which blew up, killed the Hydra and another Baneblade, breaking the formation.
The LRCo failed its activation and elected to continue pressing into my side of the board, controlling one of his objectives. On my next go, I moved one Tac formation over to the entrenched mech infantry and shot, placing a blast marker. Next I assaulted with the other Tac formation, using the supporting fire of the nearby Tac formation to reduce it to 2 x Chimeras and around 6 x infantry stands. The formation broke and I consolidated in the general area around the woods.
John was now faced with a difficult set of decisions. I was deep into his backfield with two very solid infantry formations, his Blitz was within one turns move on my part and I had just blasted one of his maneuver forces.
I used a WW formation to break his Vultures so that they couldn?t provide a cross fire opportunity on my formations.
Turn 3
So there it was, the 800 lb gorilla. That?s right, I?m talking about the LRCo. Realistically, there wasn?t a whole lot I could do about it, so keeping in mind that it is only one formation, I started rotating my remaining WW formations away from it, but it was still able to advance and wipe out another WW formation, but only contest my Blitz.
I advanced with my two Tac formations deeper into John?s backfield, wiping out the remaining Baneblade. I used a surviving Hunter to control one of John?s objectives on my left, hammered the broken mech infantry company with a WW formations and wiped it out.
This really left John with limited set of options. So he moved the foot infantry company back to his Blitz to protect it. The RHQ stayed to contest the objective on the right, while using auto-cannons to hammer my Tac formations on the right.
The store was closing so we quickly looked at where everything stood. By objectives, we were tied 0-0, though I was ahead on point.
Looking to what might occur in a fourth turn if we could of played it, all things being equal, it looked like the Mud Marines would pull out a 2-1, possibly 3-1 victory. We based this on the fact that John only had the LRCo as a viable healthy unit, his RHQ was beat up pretty well and had around 4-5 BM on it, the smaller foot infantry co would have had to deal with to SM tactical formations and the Vulture squadron that was broken only had two vehicles left.
So very interesting results.
Analysis:
The SM were very effective when utilizing a combined arms approach using the Whirlwind formations to prep the attack. Also combined assaults on the IG formations or positioning a supporting formation to lend fire for a follow assault worked quite well.
Looking closely at the MM list, there really weren?t many gimmicks in the SM arsenal, the most effective being the three WW formations. I took a bunch of Hunters to discourage anything that might fly on the table with extreme prejudice, but also to have some sort of solution for the Vultures that I knew were going to be there. I didn?t want John parking the Vultures in spitting distance of my tactical formations with me being unable to respond in some manner.
You?ll also notice that I didn?t take any tanks. Especially in this game against the IG line up, they would have come up second in any attack and for true value for points expended, the basic tactical formation is pretty hard to beat. As many as you can get your hands on is a good deal. Interestingly, this type of army behavior, though using vastly different mechanics, is also manifest in 40K.
I used terrain to mask as much shooting at my formations on the way into their attacks as much as possible and was very thankful that John hadn?t taken an artillery company. Also, lest anyone think I had this all figured out on my own, John was a very willing participant in the exercise and especially in the end-game was extremely helpful in figuring out best case moves. I?ve noticed in my playing style that I tend to play stronger in the early stages of a game, do Ok in the mid-game, and need to tighten up some of my decision making in the end game.
John is an excellent end-game player and several times has pulled out victories through superior moves, especially when he has a mobility advantage. He is already looking forward to our next engagement with his Saim Hann-Sotec 1.8 list. I on the other hand am extremely anxious about that match up.
Other factors that helped:
I started the game pretty much tied in number of activations and was able to turn that into an activation advantage through the end of the game. I passed all of my activation rolls and only had the use the SC re-roll once. The MM superior command and control were quite telling, even with some blast markers on some of my units.
I did use the ?Greatly Outnumbered? proposal and Leaders remove 2 BM, but because of how I lined up my attacks and the successes I experienced, I rarely needed them. I?m sure that if I had been fighting Orks, the greatly outnumbered rule would have been very helpful.
So this was a good learning experience for me, reinforced some of the tactical precepts that have been discussed recently and showed me that timing, focus, and maneuver are critical to not only successfully attacking an opponent, but preserving the SM forces through the latter turns.
Great game John!
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Honda
"Remember Taros? We do"
- 23rd Elysian Drop Regiment
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