Victory over the T'au Empire!

The first game of 10th results in victory for the Vilniaus 39th

My first game of 10th Edition! A fun experience, and overall I think the ‘simplified, not simple’ slogan attached to this new edition by Games Workshop is justified.

In this battle, we used the ‘Only War’ mission from the Core Rules - this involved us looking to take and control four objectives spread across the map. Nice and simple to get started, as we anticipated we’d be checking rules a fair bit. Check out the battle report below, and after some thoughts on my initial experience with 10th Edition.

Urban street fighting against the T’au Empire

See below for the after-action report submitted by Lieutenant Spade:

**After Action Report – Astra Militarum – Vilniaus 39th Regiment**

**Engagement: Urban Warfare Against T'au Empire Forces**

**Author: Lieutenant Spade, Vilniaus 39th**

As the commanding officer of the Cadian Shock Platoon and leader of the Vilniaus 39th contingent deployed in the recent engagement against T'au Empire forces, I submit the following after-action report.

At dawn, our forces made tactical deployment, with the infantry platoon poised to control the city center and objective buildings. The 117th Mordian Iron Guard occupied the Chimera, reserved to fortify our right flank. On the left, our Leman Russ Battle Tank squadron took defensive positions among the ruins, with one unit, equipped with a Punisher gatling cannon, advancing up the left flank.

Our forces move to take a commanding position overlooking the centre.

Upon sensor detection of the enemy force, our Punisher tank and other Leman Russ unit initiated a robust assault, inflicting substantial casualties on the enemy's Breacher team.

The Punisher screeches to a halt as it’s commander detects an enemy Breacher team in the distance.

Concurrently, our infantry platoon and Chimera advanced into the centre. Upon detecting movement in a nearby building. Despite an unidentified smart-missile system assailing our infantry platoon and causing light casaulties, I ordered the platoon to 'First Rank Fire, Second Rank Fire'.

This weight of fire, combined with the Chimera’s turret heavy flamer, annihilated the Kroot enemy infantry controlling a key building. While this occured, the Chimera commander sighted enemy Crisis Suits, and the Mordian Iron Guard dismounted to engage.

The platoon in the centre makes ready to wipe out the Kroot, as the Chimera and dismounted infantry engage the Crisis Battle Suits.

Despite taking losses, the enemy counterattacked fiercely. The Hammerhead gunship targeted and severely damaged one of our Leman Russ tanks. Enemy Crisis Suits, supported by their Commander, delivered heavy fire to the Mordian Iron Guard - they bravely fought until the end.

Undeterred by losses, we maintained the offensive. Our Punisher tank pressed forward, eliminating more Breachers, insteading at least once directly beneath it’s armoured tracks. The Chimera followed suit, flaming the enemy Strike Team and running one of them over.

The Cadian Shock Platoon, under my orders, delivered a devastating volley of fire into the central building, this time at the Crisis Suit squad that had moved into the location, wiping them out and leaving the enemy commander isolated.

At this point, I’d like to break the fourth wall quickly to show an astounding roll for the Crisis Suits - note they needed a 3+ to save for wounds from my shooting, and this is what they rolled instead.

The result? Wiped out and their Commander was left all alone.

The report continues…

The Hammerhead's retaliation was swift and devastating, disabling our Punisher with a well-placed railgun shot. The enemy Commander, employing a fusion weapon, caused the Chimera to explode, simultaneously eradicating the remaining Strike Team and causing severe damage to the Commander's battlesuit.

However, we turned the tide of battle. Our Cadian Shock Platoon advanced into the central building with bayonets fixed, forcing the enemy Commander to fall back. Despite a last effort from the T'au forces disabling our remaining Leman Russ Battle Tank, their retreat signaled the victorious end of the engagement for the Vilniaus 39th.

A blurry capture of the moment the platoon makes ready to advance into the centre and engage the enemy commander.

This report is by no means exhaustive and is pending the review and integration of other field reports. Nonetheless, it provides an initial understanding of the scope of the battle and the effectiveness of our strategies against T'au Empire forces.

In service to the Emperor,

Lieutenant Spade,

Vilniaus 39th, Astra Militarum Regiment

As the dust settled, we tallied up the scores:

• Astra Militarum - 7 Victory Points

• T’au Empire - 6 Victory Points

A victory! Huzzah! It was incredibly close. There were multiple points where I genuinely thought I had no hope at all of winning, but that’s how it turned out.

Initial thoughts on 10th Edition

Here’s my initial thoughts on how this relates to 10th Edition - though note:

• This was of course only a single game (of only 750 points).

• I am a relative rookie. WIth only ~5 games of 9th Edition under my belt.

My thoughts:

• It was easier to prepare for. 10th Edition has really streamlined getting ready for a game. Learning about enemy capabilities now is just reviewing their army special rule, detachment ability, six stratagems, and the specific datacards. That’s a fraction of what 9th included, where it felt like research sometimes to even understand if I was referring to the right books. As a relative rookie, this is a hugely welcome change.

• There were less ‘gotchas’. Not having to try and keep 40-ish strategems in mind during the game was a blessing. This meant I could spend more of my time thinking about positioning, planning ahead for objective control, instead of checking if there’s some kind of gotcha I might suffer. Plus, another bonus of datacards is I could very quickly check them as and when required. The re-introduction of ‘universal special rules’ also helped me know if I understand the impact of some rule impacting an enemy unit (eg it’s shooting).

• It seemed a bit less lethal. We both got the feeling that lethality was definitely lower. This can also be due to other factors like dice rolling, lots of terrain for two shooting armies, and not being hugely competitive, but by turn three we both had lots of our army left. Less armour-piercing on lots of weapons definitely helped - I even passed some armour saves! Also, it’s worth noting that tanks and vehicles feel really tough now - you absolutely need dedicated anti-tank for vehicles. The days of plasmagun spam are long gone.

• Command points are gold-dust. Gone are the days of lots of command points, and this really made me plan ahead on when I might really need one. Gone are the days of impulse Command Re-rolls when I feel like it. Well, hopefully.

• Platoons are back! Having a whopping big blob of infantry - 26 figures in all - was fun, and countered the new rules where Orders cannot impact multiple units. It really felt that this was how the Astra Militarum would really work. Risky, of course. I am fortunate at the enemies lack of blast weapons. Also, movement trays made moving this platoon around easy.

• I’m not sure about the free wargear. In my mind, the jury is still out about the introduction of free wargear. I did min-max a bit with it in this game, proxying lascannons and plasma cannons my russes, along with hunter-killer missiles on all vehicles - but it didn’t seem to swing things too much. And, of course, the enemy could do the same. I am concerned this makes running ‘vanilla’ units to squeeze more into a list, or ‘cheaper’ options like flamers, just less optimised, but let’s see. The game felt balanced, at least.

• It was still really fun. In addition to all of the above, it was quite simply a joy to play. This is probably the most important criteria, and I just wanted to point out it was fun.

Thanks for reading, tune in next time where hopefully we find out that Future Freddie has been super productive at finishing the remaining units on the backlog. See you next time!