Caracalla Campaign Part 3

After two successful engagements the Sons of the Sword were closing in on the Orc's, and their mountain home base. They had spread out their units to track down the Orcs and in doing so quickly came across a small force. Well that is my narrative for rolling low and having a battle with 4 units each side. It could easily been 3 units per side if the rolls for reserves had not been successful.

The Space Marines had the high ground and placed their dreadnaught on the hill to take advantage of increasing its shooting range. While the scouts, using the scout ability, took up position on the Orc left flank in a ruined building.

The Orc war bands all advanced while the Killa Kans quickly eliminated the scout unit with some excellent shooting.

The Razorback came under attack after inflicting a few casualties and was destroyed. At this point the momentum was very much with the Orcs.

Meanwhile in the centre the command squad lead an assault on the 'eavy boyz and after a couple of rounds.

The dreadnaught started to pick off the Killa Kans as they advanced. Finally it started to roll some hits.

After their triumph over the razorback the Orcs charged into a combined Space Marine command squad and squad of planetary defence force. Both sides sustaining losses while the veterans of the command squad won through in the melee.

The Orcs had successfully rolled, prior to the death of their warlord, for a waaagh (the "call to arms" ability in my rules) which allows an additional unit to enter an adjacent zone. The unit charged in with revenge on the minds after seeing their warlord slain. The dreadnaught having destroyed all the Killa Kans arrived to provide additional support, only to take a critical hit straight away, putting pay to any Space Marine comeback.

An Orc win! Prior to the game I had made a couple of rule changes and clarifications. The main change was to the vehicle damage chart so vehicles and monstrous creatures are shaken on a 4 or 5 and not just a 5.

2nd Battle of the Caracalla campaign

The second battle in the Caracalla campaign was fought in the rocky landscape east of the mining complex Alpha 825, as the Sons of the Swords capitalised on their opening victory.

There were four ammunition stashes in the game with the aim to control these objective zones. In the event of a tie, the side with the most remaining intervention tokens would win. Decisions would have to be made as to whether to conserve interventions or use them to achieve objectives. Control of the centre was to prove important for both sides with two objective at stake.

While on the marines left flank both sides traded shots with casualties being very even and neither side gained an advantage.

Meanwhile in the centre the timely arrival of scouts saw off the remaining orcs troops.

The dreadnaught slogged out a hard won victory seeing off the last real threat, and any orc come from behind victory. Especially with some very poor dice rolls meant the orc reserves did not arrive.

A final last gasp counter attack was repulsed by the command squad and remnants of the tactical squad.

The assault squad finally arrived after victory was assured. Only to lose half the squad to the deff kopters flyers (house rules) which had successfully harassed the marines throughout the game.

The Sons of the Sword now prepare to move one step closer to the Orc home base in this campaign.

Start of the Caracalla campaign

To begin the campaign I wrote a mission brief, an idea I grabbed from reading about 40K campaigns in the Going on Campaign blog (http://goingoncampaign.blogspot.com.au).

+++ Imperial Assignment +++

+++ Date: 675.887.M41 +++

+++ Issued by: Sons of the Sword Command Council +++

+++ Location: DMZ.465 / Caracalla / Severan System +++

+++ Mission Update +++

+++ Your strike force is to retake the mining complex Alpha 825 from the Orc invasion. Then drive on to their home base in the Alludar Mountain Range. The space port has been made available as your supply deport and as home base. +++

+++ The Emperor protects +++

For each side, Space Marines and Orcs, 10 units were selected for the campaign on the planet Caracalla.

Sons of the Sword Chapter space marines above and Orcs below.

The first battle to be fought was at the mining complex Alpha 825. The table set up randomly using dice throws. It consisted of 1 hill, 4 buildings, 4 broken terrain and 4 alien looking tree. Because the table is divided into a grid of 24 zones (4 rows of 6 zones) for each row I roll a dice for each terrain piece inch row. So a row had one type of each terrain, building, broken and trees. The exception was the hill which had to go into a corner of the table, and again was randomly generated.

Each side had 7 units randomly selected from their 10 units plus one extra unit of defence. The Orcs got some defences and the Space Marines were supported by one Imperial Guard unit. See my previous post on how units get selected for a battle.

The forces tool up position, Orcs on the left and Space Marines on the right. A devastator squad takes up position in a building.

While command and tactical squads advanced on the left towards the Orc position.

The Orcs were looking for a fight and quickly attacked the advancing command squad. 

Only for the timely intervention of the Stormraven to land and a terminator squad to attach from the rear. Saving the day! Or the command squad in this instance.

The Orcs responded with Deff Kopters as their reserves started to appear. In my rule set these are treated as flyers.

The Stormraven having delivered the terminators quickly took off and dealt with a nearby Deff Kan.

It was at this point things were looking pretty bleak for the Orcs, and I was thinking the game was up for the green lads. Then using an intervention to get fog of war their war-bikes launched an attack on the other flank.

The devastator squad supported by hover bikes moved to engage and counter the treat from the war-bikes.

Gunning their war-bikes at full throttle the 2 orc war-bike units launched themselves into battle with minimal losses, and doing lots of damage by wiping out the hover bikes.

With the war-bikes tearing up the flank the remaining Orc unit moved to engage the devastator squad. Meanwhile. the remnants of the command and tactical squads, combined to provide support to the centre.

The Orcs had reversed the momentum of the battle, it was definitely in the balance, as they wiped out the devastator squad. The imperial guard were not to going to hold out much longer.

The combined squads arrived taking the Orcs by surprise and quickly put pay to any thoughts of an Orc victory. Seeing off the war-band with bolter and chain-sword.

In the end, a minor victory to the Sons of the Sword, who now move forward one step on their quest towards the Orc home base.

From a rules perspective the overrun rule by vehicles proved important to the Orc war-bikes and the tactical squad when backing up in the centre.

Planning a 40K campaign

To make my battles more interesting I am planning out a campaign using the campaign concept from KISS Rommel rules. Through a series of battles the objective is to push back the enemy back to their starting zone.

Both sides start in the centre at the mining complex. The map uses Planetary Empire snap together hex tiles. With each battle the winning side can progress forward one zone. The Orcs home base is in the mountains and the Space Marines home base is at the space port. Once your home base is overrun the game is lost.

Each side chooses 10 units as their battle force. I try and select a range of units in varying sizes to ensure a level of balance between the sides. This is a rule or thumb approach rather than any points system.

At the start each side gets 4 urgent reinforcement tokens. This allows them at any stage during a battle to call upon one unit to join the battle - marching to the sound of guns. More than one token can be played during a battle, once per turn, until reinforcements arrive on a successful 4+ dice roll.

For each battle 2 dice are rolled to determine the number of units per side. The number of units is equal to the highest value and halve the lower value rounded up. So a roll of 5 and 3 would be 7 (5 plus 1.5 round up to 2).

To decide which units in your force are available for the battle. Shuffle a deck of 10 cards numbered 1 to 10 and place a card against each unit. Select your command unit and all units from 1 to 6 as your battle force, and set aside number 7 for reinforcements if called upon. Do the same for each side.

After the battle all destroyed units return to your force with a 4+ dice roll. If they fail, remove them from your force.

Current Projects

While I continue to do one off solo games, I am getting lots of ideas for a mini-campaign from reading Donald Featherstone's Solo Wargaming book (available as an iBook). I remember reading as a library book last when I was 13 or 14 years old. I'll probably end up "mashing" up the campaign approach from KISS Rommel rules with the chance card ideas from Solo Wargaming.

In terms of current modelling projects, I have two on the go: building up my very small 40K Chaos force; and creating some units for a KISS Rommel game using some old Peter Laing 15mm models with home cast vehicles.

The home case models are originally made from balsa wood, covered liberally in PVA glue and sanded, before creating a latex mould for plaster casting. Its a bit hit and miss with the resulting models all which all need some remediation work, but I'm not looking for perfection and I get to create some hypothetical forces for next to nothing. FINALLY I get use up some old figures I'd packed away and carried halfway around the world.

Another Battle - Another Rule Modification

Another battle and another rule modification or two. This week I was able to set up a quick game between Space Orcs and Space Marines (Sons of the Sword Chapter). A fairly straightforward game, where the Space Marines have to attack and occupy a Orc fortified position.

Orc Bikes harass the Space Marine forces as they appear. Meanwhile an oversized Killa Kan takes up a defensive position on a hilltop.

While the Orcs are focused on the frontal assault an Assault squad deep strikes close to the Orc fortified position and takes cover. The Orcs open fire with everything they have and the Marines take a couple of casualties. Reacting to the fire (as a fast unit) they charge into the fortified position using their jetpacks. In the ensuing melee the Orc squad is put to the chain-sword.

The following move saw the Killa Kan destroyed and the objective taken.

From this battle I ended up making two changes and updated my grid based rules.

Firstly, I have worked out how to differentiate between a flamer (hand held) and a heavy flamer (vehicle mounted). A flamer is of medium impact and can ignore personal armour. Therefore will continue to be effective in assaulting troops, but will require a 6 to cause a vehicle or monstrous creature to take a saving throw. While a heavy vehicle mounted flamer will always be high impact.

The second modification was to vehicle overruns. All vehicles can overrun and roll a D6 minus 1 from the score for casualties. Similar to a blast weapon. In the case of light vehicles the hits are low impact, with medium vehicle causing medium force hits and heavy vehicles high impact hits.

Assault on industrial complex 314

This weekend's battle report is of an assault on industrial complex known by its number 314, which had been overrun by Orcs. A Space Marine assault force from the Son's of the Sword chapter have been called into retake the complex, and in particular an alien artefact, which if decoded could influence the whole campaign on this world.

The Orcs have put up defensive lines around the industrial complex with roaming war bands in the surrounding area. The assault force comprises:

- a scout squad which start the game on the board and are treated as covert.
- two armoured land speeders.
- an assault squad
- a drop pod with tactical squad
- a Jet fighter
- a storm raven with terminators and dreadnought
- a small assault squad in reserves to be used anytime after all unit have arrived.

The landing areas were mapped out in advance along with the turn they arrive.

The game started with the arrival of both armoured land speeders to support the covert scout squad. One was quickly downed with a bombardment of rockets from a Killa Kan on the hill. The scout squad opened fire on a mob of orcs.

Another orc mob and war bikes close in on the scouts squad. While behind them an assault squad arrives and a jet fighter helps provide support to the beleaguered scouts.

The drop pod arrived and delivered a Tactical squad which was quickly wiped out with some high rolling orc shooting. This was a major set back for the Son's of the Sword.

Next turn the Terminators and Dreadnought landed without casualties.

The Orcs with Killa Kans ready for an assault in the industrial complex. Using a couple of interventions they were able to launch a surprise attack.

While a desperate battle was fought out with the Terminators, elsewhere the Assault squad using interventions to make multiple moves launched an attack on the front of the industrial complex. The final reserves a half Assault squad turned the battle for the Son's of the Sword.

After dispatching the Orc mob the Assault squad moved into the complex to engage Orc reserves defending the objective.

Meanwhile the Dreadnaught took on an oversized Killa Kan.

Finally, the objective was seized as the Assault squad continued their rampaging successes dispatching a Killa Kan and Orc mob.

This game highlighted the need to clarify the rules for recovery actions with flyers. Flyers can recover   with a 3+ but still require a 6+ to attack.