So the next game at the club was against a 12 year old who didn't know the rules very well so I was generous with what I let him get away with. In fact he turned up to a 1000pt game and I thought it looked like he had a lot of marines for those points. After totaling them up he had just under 2000pts worth! I helped him write a 1500pt list and played my Eldar for the first time.

The game was Spearhead with two objectives. His tactical squads and scouts hung around in his deployment zone not doing much all game while he attacked on his right with a Landraider and a 5man tac squad, while on his left he deepstruck 5 termies led by a Chaplain and a Dread in a drop pod which blew up one of my waveserpents in turn 1.

I made a serious error as i jumped Eldrad and 10 dire avengers and a 10 strong harlequin squad out to waste them. Shootig killed two terms even with doom and bladestorm, and then I realised I couldn't assault them in the same turn as hopping out of a moving vehicle (used to playing Deathwing). He proceeded to butcher the dire avengers and Eldrad turned and fled the board. oops. I managed to finish them off with the harlequins on their own, who then got pounded by a whirlwind shot and also fled the board.

Cutting a long story short, I contested his objective with a 5th turn flat out waveserpent, whille I held my own with a guardian squad coming in from reserve turn5. He got distracted shooting things with his Landraider so he didn't reach my objective (5 fire dragons jumped out of a falcon and at point blank range caused 3 hits, followed by all 3 failing to penetrate or even glance it. They then died horribly, incinerated by his flamestorm cannons.

Was fun playing with the Eldar, even tho the victory wasn't something to shout about against an inexperienced player. Not sure Eldrad is best with the dire avengers due to vulnerability in an assault, and I might try a normal farseer in future since I think Eldrad requires a bit of finesse I don't have yet. The wraithlord didn't do muchh but then he was protecting my objective, while the harlies were good but very vulnerable to firepower - these eldar are a bit more flimsy than the Deathwing...

Next week I am playing my Deathwing against a double autarch eldar army with 6 war walkers and 2-3 squads of fire dragons with lots of waveserpents, led by a guy who came midtable at the Caledonian uprising last weekend.

My Landraider isn't finished yet, in fact I have started on my second one as well so am doing two simultaneously, trying to get them tabletop ready. Your campaign sounds good, how's it going?

Ok on to the rules of the campaign.

The Faaris Campaign - Rules

This is a map basted campaign designed for three players who will fight over a planet containing 19 different regions.

Each region has a specific mission, points guide and occupation bonus associated with it, these will not change during the campaign.

Each region begins the game under the control of one of the non-player races (NPR's) see attached table.

The Castrum Praetorio region starts the campaign under the control of a random NPR.
Each campaign turn all players will pick a region that they wishes to attack, if two or more players choose the same target then they must roll off with the winner attacking the choosen region and the loser(s) choosing another region that has not already been picked.

If at any point two players both declare the Castrum Praetorio region as their target they then play against each other for control of the region. If all three players declare the Castrum Praetorio region as their target then a three player game is played with the winner gaining control of the region. In either case any NPR that may control the Castrum Praetorio region is considered to lose control of it just before such a battle.

When a player is choosing a region to attack he may only choose a region that boarders a region he already controls, the two moons are considered to boarder the three regions closest to them and each other.

The attacking player gets to choose the points limit for the game from those listed for that region and a game is played using the mission specified against the race that currently occupies the region. If the occupier is another player obviously the battle is played against them, if it is a NPR them it is played against someone using that race as his army.

Due to the nature of the campaign there can be no drawn games so any games undecided due to the victory conditions of the mission is decided on victory points as in the 40K rulebook. If these are still drawn the defender wins.

At the start of the game the players control no regions so must make planetfall and attempt to gain a foothold. They may pick any region controlled by a NPR to attack in this first campaign turn and in each turn until they gain control of a region.

During these battles, where players do not control any regions, they get a special bonus as they surprise the enemy and their orbital assets are able to aid them in gaining a foothold.

This special bonus allows them to decide who wins any dice roll made before the game starts to choose sides, deployment area's, roles, who goes first etr.. Also at the start of the game after both sides have deployed the attacking player gets to make a single firestorm attack. This attack is resolved as a S:8, AP:3, Large blast, Pinning, indirect barrage attack that can target any point on the battlefield. The attacking player may choose to place a crater where the attack hits if able.

Each region has a special occupation bonus that is available to the player or NPR that controls it. These bonuses are always in effect and can be used in every battle that the controling race takes part in. Any unit effecting bonuses must be assigned on the army list during list building.

All things being well the players will be able to stay even with the number of games they have played and stay on the same campaign turn, but things crop up and someone may find themselves getting a little behind. If this happens a player may choose to let fate decide the outcome of a battle as he doesn't have the opportunity to play, so as not to hold up the other players.

If he decides to do this he declares the region he is attacking as normal but instead of playing the game he just rolls a dice, on an even number he is considered to have won the battle, on an odd number he is considered to have lost.

Obviously this is only to be used if a player gets very far behind and only as a last ditch resort to stop the campaign falling apart, not to be used to randomly take a hard to defeat region.

To keep the game interesting the NPR's have a chance of taking control of regions controlled by other NPR's and even gaining control of a region after they have lost control of all their others.
To achieve this 2D6 is rolled for each of the NPR's (in alphabetical order) at the start of every campaign turn.

If a race that controls any region gets a result of 11 or 12 then that race gains control of a random region boardering one they already control, that is currently controlled by a different NPR. If they have a boarder with the central Castrum Praetorio region and it is controlled by a different NPR they always gain controll of it instead.

If a race that no longer controls any regions rolls a 12 on its 2D6 it gains control of a random region controlled by another NPR.

A player is declared the winner of the campaign if at any point, when all players have taken the same number of campaign turns, he controls the central Castrum Praetorio region and any six other regions.

Below is the fluff for the campaign myself, Pershore and Nasty are about to embark upon.

I should be putting up the rules for the campaign and a load of special missions over the next couple of days (if I remember).

The Story Of Faaris

The peaceful world of Faaris had long ago been part of the Imperium but had been under the control of the Tau for countless years until the present conflict erupted, until the tyranids came.

A tendril of hive fleet Charybdis assaulted the planet and the Tau resisted with all the weapons at their disposal. Seeing an opportunity to retake the world in the Emperors name the Lords of Terra dispatched a large contingent of space marines from various chapters with the backup of a substantial Imperial Guard force.

Marines from the Blood Angels, Black Templars, Space Wolves ,Ultramarine and a few other allied chapters arrived on the planet and immediately began the process of eliminating all alien life.

They may have managed to contain and even beat the Tyranids and the native Tau but other foes were soon to arrive. Seeing a big fight brewing some eager mek sent a large ork rok crashing into Faaris bringing with it thousands of battle hungry boyz.

Another enemy announced their arrival at this time as well, the Dark Eldar saw the turmoil of a battle this grand and chaotic as the perfect place to gather new and interesting slaves for the fighting pits back on Comorragh.

With titanic weapons of war being unleashed all over the planet on such a large scale Faaris was being strained right to its very core and this was where the real threat lay.

Imprisoned tens of thousands of years ago in a powerful Tezzeract Labyrinth fused to the planet as a whole, a volatile and incredibly destructive C’tan Shard was partly released when his prison was weakened by the force of the weapons being brought to bear in the war raging on the planets surface.

His release sent a mental shockwave rushing over the planet, effecting each of the combatanting armies in its own insidious way, calling upon them to throw all their might into the conflict, to hold nothing back, to kill everyone.

The war raged to new heights of destruction, with burning piles of the dead growing each day. For this was what the C'tan wanted, if the planet was ravaged and destroyed there was a chance that his prison would fully break and he would be free once more.

Death on such a scale has other consequences, rifts into the warp appeared where the fighting had been the most intense and Chaos Daemons imerged to join in the slaughter, much to the C'tans glee.

Not all were so pleased at the events happening on Faaris, the Swordwind of Prince Euthrace of Biel-Tan have arrived to contain the threat of the C'tan after Farseer Fiathrandael forsaw its imminent release.

Inquisitor Damgrad of the Ordo Malleus, along with a strike force of Grey Knights, have come to put an end to the Daemonic incrusion and purify all those affected by the C'tan be they friend or foe.

Lord Commander Kelly of the 659/656th Air Corps, redeployed from the conflict in the Iraqistan area and arriving as backup to the spacemarines, has been ordered to take the planet back for the Emperor. He intends to see those orders through even if it means fighting against those warriors of the imperium who seem to be under the influence of some kind of filthy xeno skum.

Found a gaming club! (and quick battle report)

OK so I found a gaming club in Redditch which is ~ 25min from me and went along for the first time last night. Seemed friendly and got a 2000pt game with a tyranid player, the old enemy ;)

He had two hive tyrants with a guard and venom cannon each, 3 groups of 15 genestealers, 2 groups of 30 basic hormagaunts, 30 termagants, 2 zoans in a pod and the doom in a pod. My list was a bit different from the one at the tourny, I took two dreads (one fire support, 1 ven with ass can and hf)and a second landspeeder instead of the chaplain and one ravenwing squad. I also replaced the 5th DW squad with a tac squad with flamer in a rhino. (this is the list I went with, not knowing who I was going to face).

Basically he deployed all in a big line across the table (mission was 5 objectives) and charged. I refused a flank and wasted one of his hive tyrants with missile fire on my turn 1 (he went first). The dreads were good, one was lucky not to die from the zoans and charged 30 hormagaunts while the bikes and the other dread charged the other 30 hormagaunts. So I tie dup almost half his troops with dreads that they couldn't hurt. Think he was a bit frustrated by that...

He called the game on turn 4 after my noble Deathwing defeated two genestealer units in combat and he was left with all his horms tied up and a hive tyrant about to be shot down by both landspeeders and an attack bike, after failing to reach combat or do anything all game. Belial died again though :( he was wounded and on his own after fighting off some genestealers and got shot by 3 termagants with fleshborers!

Liked how the dreads did and he didn't have much anti-tank, not a great list I thought (no Hive Guard or toxin sacs on his horms) and he kept bunching his models up too much for my frags. Anyway, enjoyed the game although not sure he was too pleased about losing... Might get a few more games in than I have been now, hurrah! They also seem to be quite into Warmachine at the club and a game called Cutlass which I'd never heard of. Has anyone ever played these?

Happy new year guys!