40k League: Lessons from the Frontline in My Second 2k Battle
The Vilniaus 39th engages the diseased Death Guard for the first time
Onto game two of the 40k league I’m part of. Another really fun game, and my second ever at 2k points. I didn’t win this game either, and I had a very gracious opponent who for sure gave me some ideas on tactical options I might consider, but it still ended up being pretty close right up until the final turn.
For this game, we had Burden of Trust as the primary mission - which includes a guard mechanic to get extra CP if you have a unit that survives on the objective - alongside the Hidden Supplies mission rule, which added another objective to the middle.
Here’s the scorecard below:
Now that I know a lot more about the Death Guard - this was my first game against them - I’m not surprised they did as well as they did on primary objectives. They are slow and pretty tough, so going all-in on primaries from the get-go is going to be a common strategy.
My opponent then wisely picked fixed secondaries that matched both their army and my large number of vehicles. Cleanse is something he could score just sitting on objectives, and Bring It Down gave him VP every time he took out a vehicle.
I’m not doing a battle narrative for this game either, but here are some pictures…
By the end of the battle, I’d lost most of my vehicles - including both Rogal Dorns! - but it was great fun and I’d also obliterated most of the enemy.
See below for some key takeaways…
Having a plan really, really, helps.
As this was my second ever tournament game, I decided I needed to plan it out a bit. I read the Primary Mission, Mission rule, and also looked online for some approaches to forming some kind of plan.
Of course, in reality, plans never survive first contact with the enemy… however, I did stumble across some videos online, including this great video by Joushi 40k on a ‘default game plan’ that can be used by Astra Militarum players. Yes, it’s generic, but it certainly helped me think about how I might approach a game, including planning what objectives to focus on taking, and how I might deny my enemy different objectives.
Death Guard aura on dense boards is tough!
Death Guard have some pretty powerful auras that can make your units worse. In this game, it made me worse at shooting at a certain distance that got longer further into the game. This was pretty bad for me, with most of my shooting being BS 4+, and got worse when I was tied up in engagement range. The lesson? Stay a little further back. Certainly challenging on the terrain-heavy board I was on, but I definitely could have held back a bit more.
Terrain heavy boards don’t mix well with lots of tanks…
I brought eight vehicles on my list, including two rather large Rogal Dorns. As you can see below, this certainly introduced some constraints on my freedom to manoeuvre!
Mortarian is tough, but he ain’t invincible.
I was surprised that I managed to take the big dude out. I mean, it only took the full focus of a Rogal Dorn and a Demolisher Tank Commander… but being serious this highlighted to me that the Imperial Guard is crazy strong in shooting when everything lines up and the dice gods look down favourably.
Do more denying secondaries
While of course I needed to do my best to push the enemy off primary objectives, I did this at the expense of making my tanks vulnerable, which played right into the hands of my opponent. I should have balanced this more.
Gaunt’s Ghosts are amazing.
This was my second time with these guys, and I used them a lot better. Yes, they died, but I was able to score some key secondaries with them, along with kill a few enemy units to prevent my opponent from holding primaries. So useful. I’m not surprised this unit is considered an auto-take.
Small squads of Bullgryn aren’t amazing.
I see how Bullgryn are big in the meta, but at least in this matchup a squad of 3 just… wasn’t. They achieve nothing, and when the Munitorum Field Manual comes out I’m definitely adjusting my list to bench these guys, and maybe sub in some grav-chuting Aquilons instead…
Lord Solar isn’t too squishy
Something my opponent pointed out towards the end - when both sides were pretty beaten up and there was no more risk of deep strike - that I defaulted to keeping Lord Solar and his ‘command blob’ in the backfield, in cover, out of harms way. Of course, that’s all well and good early on, when losing him early would be really detrimental - later on I might need all the help I can get.
Basilisks are really fun against slow enemies
Some of the Death Guard units - in fact many of them - were really slow. The terminators had a 4 inch move! After a successful hit by a Basilisk, I take 2 off that. This was great in reducing the mobility of certain key enemy units, along with helping finish off enemy units like the last enemy Rhino to get ‘Bring It Down!’ on Battle Round 5. Alas, I didn’t have another Basilisk for this specific match up.
And that’s it for this blog article. Lots of takeaways. I learned a ton. My next match up is against Blood Angels - another first for the Vilniaus 39th - so I’ll catch you next time! Thanks for reading.
As a Death Guard player, remembering to roll Morty's disgustingly resilient saves against damage is half the battle. He often feels fragile but he does fight well.
That contagion rule that worsens BS is also only worthwhile if you remember to call it out. Gets tedious all the buffs and de-buffs.
I'm learning about having a plan too. Did you have any avenues that were closed off to your tanks? It seems most Pariah Nexus layouts leave room for at least 4" but not sure if that's enough for the Dorns, which would be a bummer!