Guerrilla Warfare - Lelithar

Planet: Lelithar.
Cadian Sector.
999.M41

Dark Angels vs Death Guard.
2000 points.
Mission: Cloak and Shadows.

The war for Lelithar was not going well. Every attempt to push forward was being met by stiff resistance from the Dark Angels marines. It was becoming clear that despite superior numbers the Death Guard could not strike their targets en mass without suffering serious defeat. Typhus instead divides his legion into multiple smaller war bands and dispatches them to numerous potential targets with the idea that the space marines cannot protect each and every target. The war may be fought piecemeal but slowly the Death Guard would achieve victory.


I haven't played my nephew for a while so I challenged him to a 2000 point 40k game. I knew he would accept and dust off his Dark Angels. I decided to play for fun and try out the new Black Crusade detachment from Traitor's Hate to see if it would work ok for an event I was playing in a weeks time. Knowing that I had to have a Chaos Knight for that event I took one for this game as practice but it's cost meant that I would be forced to forego any vehicles in my list. I can tell you right now that it hurt me big time.

Deployment was the old classic across from one another and the mission rolled was Cloak & Shadows, which I had played recently against Raven Guard. Objectives were well spread around and my deployment let me start with two of them. My nephew started with three in hand.

His list was something I haven't played against before. He normally takes the big land speeder with the shadow/cover effect but this time he didn't and instead played a Librarian Conclave block with Azrael which was frankly scary. Otherwise he did his usual of spamming grav weapons in both tactical squads and a devastator squad. Those things are the bane of my games sometimes.

He got first turn and I chose not to try and steal. He inserted two drop pods, one with a devestator squad with grav cannons and the other with the conclave. His grav weapons knocked down the Knight before it got chance to do anything. Impressive but I felt that I had wasted vital points. Must learn not to get attached to super heavy walkers.

From there the game just got worse for me. He scored all three of his starting objectives and on my turn I scored none but did kill a handful of his marines. My next turn saw me draw an objective that he held so I raced my bike squad up the side, smashing through the tactical squad holding it only to find that his razorback a few inches away had the Objective Secured special rule  and I had nothing now to take it out.

Ultimately he was able to outflank my forces and cut me down in a withering hail of fire from three directions. Terminators and Plague Marines alike just cut down by small arms fire and grav weapons. Even Typhus dropped due to those. He may need to be benched in future games at this rate!

Turn five and it was almost half past midnight so I called it there. He had a very nice army and there was nothing I could do to pull it back. The objectives I drew were just dire and now where near me. The Chaos Warband formation is nice but too restrictive for how I play but the whole Black Crusade detachment was sort of nice. Because of the special rules I ended up with a biker aspiring champion with T7, 2+ armour save, fleet and feel no pain. He was a bit of a monster but he took a lascannon to the chest and died turn 4.

My real problem other than his grav weapons was the lack of speed. I needed rhinos and a land raider to get my units safely around the table. Just means that for the weekend event I'll not be playing the new formations or detachment like I wanted.

Good game but I hope not to play against that many grav weapons again for a while.

Cloak and Shadows - Perdus Rift

Planet: Tyros.
Region: Perdus Rift.
990.M41

Death Guard vs Raven Guard.
2000 points.

Cloak and Shadows.

Confident by their success against the Death Guard, the Raven Guard continue to hound the chaos marines into the countryside of Tyros. Typhus calls upon his psychic connection to the Warp seeking a way to secure a victory over the space marines. What he learns leads him and his forces to stage an ambush. Shryke sees through the false scouting and locates Typhus and his main force. Using the element of surprise they drop from the skies and reverse the ambush.

Played a revenge match against against Richard's Raven Guard last night. Know what he took last time I made a less competitive change to my list to help handle the lightning claw assault marine. I ditched most of what I had before in order to take a 15 man and a 20 man plague marines squad hoping it would be harder for him to cut through them. His list was different again. No lightning claws, just regular bolt pistol and chainsword assault marines. He also took two stormtalon fighters which proved once again that flyers are my bane. CSM really do need a better flyer than the Heldrake.

Six objectives were placed and we rolled for deployment which gave us the short ends of the table. He set up first with a scout squad on the table in a ruin and little else. Everything I had was deployed and just to be on the safe side I kept my Chaos Knight on the back edge to prevent him drop podding down behind it.

First turn his drop pods came down and all they did was kill four plague marines and nothing else. Even the melta weapons failed to touch the Knight. It looked well for me and I was hopeful that his poor dice rolls would help me in the long run. Come my turn the objectives I drew were rather terrible with only one that I could take. On his turn he had secured two with random victory points netting him 5 VP. My turn I achieved none. Thankfully though the squads he dropped in my deployment zone died to mass bolter fire and the actions of the Chaos Knight.

The second turn saw my dice go as bad his my opponent's/ We had a helbrute vs deadnought battle. My helbrute fired point blank with a multi-melta and missed. In combat it knocked one hull point off and his dreadnought hit me for five hull points and boom! When his planes came on they wrecked all kinds of trouble. Immediately my Knight lost 4 hull points and my predator turned into a burning wreck.

The objective cards then gave me objective 5 and two objective 4. Number 5 I had but 4 was contested until my Knight took out the drop pod stopping me. The following turn I got objective 4 again. Richard however kept pulling all the high point cards though and it was clear that without divine intervention I was losing this just on VP.

Typhus once again fell to his dreadnought. That seems to be a recurring element in our games. I got my revenge though when my Chaos Knight charged the Dreadnought crushed beneath the teeth of it's chainsword. Unfortunately my Knight exploded not long afterwards.

My plan to hold him back with large numbers of plague marines failed. Even just equipped with basic close combat weapons and just two thunder hammers, he smashed through both squads with ease although I did manage to drop a good number of them before my last plague marine fell.

Turn six and he tabled me. We didn't even bother looking at the victory points for comparison, he had easily doubled if not tripled whatever I had. It was a good game though and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I am going to have to really consider what I can do about his hard hitting list for future games.

Surprise Attack - Perdus Rift

Planet: Tyros.
Region: Perdus Rift.
990.M41

The war against the Tau is going well. The planet D'Then is slowly falling to the forces of Nurgle. Typhus has returned to his base of operations on the planet of Tyros in the neighbouring system to oversee the war effort throughout the Perdus Rift.
Unknown to him the Death Guard presence has been detected by a Raven Guard battle barge headed towards their own war against the alien empire. Shrike decides that this may be the chance to strike against Typhus. For several days Raven Guard scouts monitor Typhus' base reporting back to the battle barge hiding behind Tyros' moon. When the time was right, Shrike lead an attack against the Death Guard.

Last night played a game against my friend Richard and his new Raven Guard army. We played a mission from the Battle Missions book called Surprise Attack. It represents a Space Marine surprise attack on an enemy headquarters so somewhat thematic.

My list was pretty much what I had played lately but as Richard wanted a 2000 point game I added in a Hel Cult (plague bearers proxying for some missing cultists), a few extra plague marines and two vengeance weapon platforms.

I was quite worried by what he could bring and I was not disappointed as nearly everything came with lightning claws. This was an army built to bring down my poor plague marines. He played 5 man squads though to break up his deployment and give me more problems to deal with.

Deployment for this mission is awkward as I can set up anywhere more than 12′’ from the table edge but the units must be 6′’ from each other. How a horde army might do this I have no idea as I struggled and we had to agree to shrink that where necessary. Richard’s forces can deploy in the 12′’ table edge and come in from any side.

To start with I was doing awesome. I was racking up victory points but turn three was the beginning of the end. Although his dice rolls were fairly pants all game he had slowly whittled hull points off of my Chaos Knight and when his Storm Raven came in it took the walker down with an impressive explosion. I had nothing that could touch the flyer and that was a huge problem. My only multimelta, on the helbrute, never got close enough to do anything.

His lighting claws were just horrible. No armour saves and FNP did me no good. I’m now dreading that my local space marine players will start outfitting with lightning claws when facing me. Typhus himself fell to a dreadnought after it ripped through his terminator bodyguards. Although thought dead, his body isn't recovered after the battle. Typhus will survive to fight again.

Come turn 5 and the game ended. Counting up the VP’s Richard’s space marines beat me by one point. 10vp to 9vp. Good close game.

Contact Lost - D'Then

Planet: D'Then.
Region: Perdus Rift.
990.M41

Death Guard vs Tau Empire.
1500 points.
Contact Lost.

Slowly, step by step, the Death Guard have advanced across D'Then. Outposts have fallen and thousands of Tau citizens now lie dead from numerous plagues. When contact is lost with mining station XII  on the Tau side of the front lines a scout force was dispatched to investigate.

What they found was Typhus the Traveller and his personal retinue of plague marines. While cultists and other marines looted the mining station's reserves, Typhus engaged the Tau expeditionary force.

This was my second game against my friend Adam and his Tau army. He had recently bought some new models, including a Barracuda, from one of our occasional fellow players who is selling his army and wanted to give it a go. We had planned on playing one of the Tau scenarios from the Battle Missions book but due to work getting in the way we decided to rearrange that and just play a friendly game from the rule book.

The six objectives were set up three to a side so we started mirrored. Unfortunately for Adam my first two objectives cards were two that I started with. Turn four saw me claim the third. His objective cards were not helpful to him at all.

Adam's list was led by Darkstrider and contained two units of fire warriors, one of pathfinders, one of stealth suits, two ghostkeel's, a hammerhead and a barracuda. Not bad for a nice friendly game but I felt he lacked some hard hitting units. I never managed to destroy either ghostkeel. One was kept locked in combat with plague marines, the other lost combat and ran away after facing Typhus with terminators. Even the barracuda, which I was concerned about, didn't really cause any problems ultimately. It didn't help his cause that my armour saves and FNP rolls were perfect throughout the game.

I had started the game with the intent of, or rather the hope of, getting the objectives that I started with. Lucky for me that was the case. I think Adam had the same hope but it was not to be. He was forced to come forward from his side which gave me a better chance of gunning him down. His hammerhead did nothing and my predator which I was using to to bring it down failed to hit all game. Eventually my Knight took out Darkstrider and his squad with a well placed thermal cannon blast but otherwise was almost useless. Likewise his barracuda which managed to take a HP from the Knight but did nothin else all game.

We eventually collided mid table between Typhus and his terminators, and some stealth suits and a ghostkeel. Typhus didn't do too well as Manreaper snatched a wound of him in the first round. The terminators slowly fell but they did bring down the stealth suits and knocked a wound from the ghostkeel which fell back. On my left flank Adam's second ghostkeel assaulted one squad of plague marines hoping to take them down and steal an objective. My plague marines slowly fell but held it back denying him some VP.

Towards the end of the game Adam had a chance to draw but his bad luck continued and when the game ended turn five by mutual agreement I was 5 victory points to 2.

My list was:

Typhus.
5 Chaos Terminators (reaper autocannon and lightning claws).
10 Plague Marines (plasma pistol/power weapon champion, 2x meltaguns, icon of despair)
10 Plague Marines (plasma pistol/power weapon champion, 2x meltaguns, icon of despair)
2x Rhinos.
Chaos Predator with lascannon and heavy bolters.
Chaos Knight Errant (daemonic possession).

Mobile Defence - Cadia

Planet: Cadia.
Region: Cadian Sector.
999.M41

Death Guard vs Craftworld Alaitoc
2000pts.
Mission: Mobile Defence.

Having been driven from the main battle by massed artillery fire, the Death Guard had been forced to find alternative routes back to Abaddon's lines. Typhus cast his eyes across the ruined cityscape before him. This part of Cadia's second city had been destroyed weeks earlier and now a small force of alien Eldar held the main route through. His suit's lenses detected the presence of two vengeance weapon platforms between them and the aliens. The batteries in inactive but the Traveller knew that if his marines got close enough then the signature of their power armour might reactivate them. He directed his marines to hold the nearest ruin and hold it as a make shift command post. Two squads of Plague Marines and his own Terminator bodyguards were directed to capture vital locations on the path to the main thoroughfare. True to his wishes as his forces got close to the Eldar lines both weapon platforms opened up targetting the alien filth before them and opening a path forward.


Thursday night last week was a game against my friend Chris B and his Eldar forces. I played a battle missions scenario called Mobile Defence. Chris wanted to play 2000 points which gave me a few more options. Between work and other commitments I still haven’t had time to build or paint much more.

The mission called for my opponent to set up everything that wasn’t a skimmer basically in his half of the table and then I deployed. Everything else of his comes in on reserve starting turn 1.

I took two vengeance weapon platforms hoping that they might do me good against his frail Eldar. His forces got the first turn and took out one platform. My heavy options did a fair job of taking things down but against Eldar they were popped pretty much every turn.

As it was an objective holding mission (3 on the table) my plague marines and CSM squad were basically tied into holding objectives. I used a terminator squad to capture the one in my opponent’s side of the table. Even with my usual FNP rolls Chris’s Eldar just whittled my plague marines down. Even Typhus only mnaged to destroy one squad of guardians by himself before succumbing to mass fire from three wave serpents! I am getting fed up of playing him as he just doesn’t seem worth it any more.

The game ended turn 6 with my terminators holding one objective and my opponent claiming the other two. Another fun game but Eldar are a force that I just don’t know how my Plague Marines are going to handle in future.

The Relic - Lelithar

Planet: Lelithar.
Cadian Sector.
999.M41

Adeptas Sororitas / Dark Angels vs Death Guard.
2000 points.
Mission: The Relic.

During the war for Lelithar, Typhus ordered a raid upon the shrine of Saint Lelithar. He directed the troops under his command to storm the cathedral and take the dead saint's treasured remains. The theft and destruction of the body would cause a severe fall in moral for the defenders. Leading the attack himself, Typhus charged into the ranks of gathered Adepta Sororitas. Only once battle was joined was the trap sprung. Dark Angels marines dropped from the sky and crashed through the ruins on bikes. Determined not to lose, Typhus ordered his men to seize the relics and fall back.

For some time now I have wanted to challenge my nephew's Sisters of Battle army. He doesn't like playing them as they are in desperate need of an update, something we both agree on. However, after some friendly persuasion he agreed to field them in the Relic mission. When he turned up with Dark Angels allies I was a little surprised as I had expected him to field his own Imperial Knight.

Instead he had turned up with a whole shedload of grav weapons which were quite frankly, the bane of my existence this game. Grav cannons and even the basic guns ripped my Chaos Knight to pieces over three rounds! I didn't even get to do anything with it other than incinerate a handful of bikes. My defiler (which I played purely because I had just bought it off a friend and wanted to play it) died turn 1 to a lascannon and a couple missile launchers. There was nothing I could do it seems.

Even my Plague Marines were screwed. They made plenty of FNP saves but every time I got to base contact with the relic, my nephew would gun down enough of them that I could never move away from the relic. By turn 3 I had resolved myself that this was going to be a loss for me. So I had Typhus charge and challenge Saint Celestine. Let's go out in a blaze of glory! Except for two rounds neither of them managed to hit each other and when I did get her down to her last wound she slew Typhus (Who was quickly snatched off into the Warp by the Dark Powers) and I conceded.

A good game but frustrating. I have not been on the receiving end of grav weapons before and definitely not that many!

Big Guns - Cadia

Planet: Cadia.
Region: Cadian Sector.
999.M41

Death Guard vs Death Korps of Krieg
1500pts.
Mission: Big Guns Never Tire.

On the front lines of Cadia the forces of Chaos are being pummeled by a barrage of ordnance from the Astra Militarum. Abaddon directed the Death Guard to remove that threat. Supported by a allied Nurgle Knight, the forces of pestilence marched through the shattered battlefield to engage those forces, freeing up the no man's land for Abaddon's advance..


I had been looking forward to this match for a while. I had seen Mick's Death Korp army once before and it looked lethal but I wanted the challenge so I said let's bring it on this mission. In the end he didn't overdo the expected Basilisk line that I thought he might bring. Instead it was a nicely balanced list. I'm not 100% on the Forge World models so I can't name what the units were off the top of my head.

We deployed across table from one another. He had a nice line of basilisks, some smaller artillery pieces and a great big artillery tank. With this arrayed against me I tried to ensure that my plague marines and predator tank were safely in cover, and I deployed my chaos knight to the side closer to his basilisks as they were my biggest threat I thought.

The high points of the game for me was his big artillery tank which decimated his own horse cavalry and took out one of his centaur's including the unit within. The other was my completely ignored knight smashing into the artillery and then the basilisks.

As usual I made more than my fair share of FNP rolls which helped me when I realised that the barrage of incoming fire was going to be far worse than I expected. It did seem that there was no way for me to keep my units alive let alone have them move forward into battle. In the end I just had to hold what I could and hope for the best.

Once more the game ended at just the right time for me to achieve victory. One more turn and I think Mike may have just stolen victory from me. Another win scored for the Death Guard. Will it remain? I hope so.

The Scouring - Miridian

Planet: Miridian.
Region: Cadian Sector.
999.M41

Death Guard vs Dark Eldar.
1500 points.
Mission: The Scouring.

Through the ruins of Miridian's cities the Death Guard and Dark Eldar fight a series of running battles. The favoured of Nurgle called upon the mightiest in their arsenal to destroy the raiders..

This was a revenge match against Gary D's army from the last battle report. He didn't even change his list. But I played a list which I expected to be fun but easily defeated. How wrong I was!




My list was:

Sorcerer of Nurgle, level 1.
Two 20 man Plague Marine squads, with two meltaguns and a icon of despair. Both champions had plasma pistols and power swords. One squad a Rhino.
Predator with TL lascannons and heavy bolter sponsons.
Chaos Knight with thermal blaster and chainsword.

Deployment was short table ends and I set up with the idea of moving forward and taking the two nearest objectives, and then using the Knight to advance to the most important one. Gary purposefully moved his army to the opposite edge to where the Knight was and en mass moved all his fast skimmers up and began to smash through my plague marines from one side of my table across to the other. I managed to take down a few and the Knight just moved up, capturing the highest scoring objective and blasting the Dark Eldar. My opponent managed to knock a couple hull points on it but the big machine healed them with It Will Not Die.

When the game ended, I still managed to secure victory by just 1 victory point and it was because all because of the Knight. Hopefully the beginning of a nice winning streak.

Into Darkness - Miridian

Planet: Miridian.
Region: Cadian Sector.
999.M41

Death Guard vs Dark Eldar.
1500 points.
Mission: Purge the Alien.

The Death Guard had successfully captured the world of Miridian from the Imperium. Typhus began to turn the planet into his own place of power from which to launch attacks upon Cadia.
A few weeks after the Death Guard won the planet, they cam under attack from a raiding force of Dark Eldar eager for slaves and to sow confusion.




This was a replacement match for the last game. I played Gary D's Dark Eldar in the Purge the Alien mission. I wanted to play against a Xenos army as it was thematic to the mission. Gary D is, like myself, a very casual gamer and this approach made for a very fun game. At the time of writing this I cannot remember a lot of the game but I do remember I got to field my two heavy 20 vengeance defence cannon turrets. Unfortunately I do remember that he avoided them staying on his side of the table and using long range dark lance fire to slowly strip my army down. He didn't even need to do anything to achieve victory. It was still a very good game but I think I put too much faith in the defence turrets when I thought they would do a lot better. I don't even think the game went to full term before I lost.

The Purging - Lelithar

Planet: Lelithar.
Cadian Sector.
999.M41

Dark Angels vs Death Guard.
1500 points.
Mission: Purge the Alien.

The Death Guard have found the Dark Angel threat on Lelithar hard to defeat. Unable to defeat a fast moving and mobile force the plague marines are forced to lure the space marines into tight battlefields where their mobility will not be as useful. If the Dark Angels can suffer just one defeat on Lelithar it may give the Death Guard the push they need.



This game was played about three months back and was planned against my friend Joel. I had asked to play against his Tyranid army as my Death Guard had not been tested against them (and still haven't). Unfortunately on that day I had had some bad news and turned up not in such a good mood, and I found Joel had not brought his Tyranid army but a new Dark Angels army his girlfriend had bought him for his birthday. Unfortunately I was a bit of a dick and not very nice for which I am sorry.

His list was a nice one with some fast moving bikes, land speeders and heavy support tanks. With the limited force available to me it was difficult to actually do anything to counteract it. I did have some bikes but they didn't last long. My plague marines were not able to get across the table either. Joel's force was heavily armed with plasma weaponry and I force once I didn't get a lot of FNP rolls.

Joel was by far the better opponent in this game but I also feel that I was not in the right frame of mind to play a game of 40K. I still think he would have won but I might have done better.