As the frosts of winter begin to recede and the rain gets steadily warmer, it’s time to warm up the shed once for more for some 2nd Ed 40k!
Recent terrain builds have all been of a certain retro theme and that’s been no coincidence, as we’ve been planning the next scenario in our vaguely narrative 2nd Ed 40k campaign featuring the 1991 Blood Angels against the miscellany of Da Black Ork Cav, and in their previous outing my red lads took an absolute kicking and were for the most part unable to hit the side of a barn door before their morale broke. This left Captain Tycho largely unsupported as he attempted to salvage Chapter honours by barrelling into the Warboss and his command section in a last ditch effort to deny them their objective.. and despite dishing out a beating to the various greenskin oiks around him, ultimately fell to a barrage of choppas.
Of course, Space Marines don’t die easy, and we figured it would be much more thematic for a second game if his 2ic, the Lieutenant, led a rescue party on the Black Ork Cav HQ building Jim put together some weeks back. This time, the Marine objective would be to reach the building (presumably Cap. T’s power armour has some sort of emergency distress beacon on it), while the Orks would be attempting to kill, break, or otherwise prevent them – so not quite true to the 2nd Ed Mission Cards, but should be fun.
That table is set – Black Ork Cav HQ garrisoned with Gretchin, the rest of Da Cav ready to counterattackBattlewagon with Warboss BludGuzzla and co ready to counterattackDa Dread stands ready to lead the push backGretchin stand to on the walls of the HQMarines dash forward hugging cover where they can, with missile launcher team providing cover“MOVE OUT”Closing in on the objective…Missile launcher attempts to take down the Dread.. misses.. of course!Gretchin fire patters off Marine armour.. at least they hit something, unlike the Dread!Battlewagon darts forward and drops off the Warboss and entourage.. like all sneaky Blood Axe gitz, they eschew a good honest charge forward and prefer to skulk around in cover… “taktix”, as they call itMarines gun their jump packs and leap into combat with the Warboss and his entourage Assault Marines fight a deadly brawl with Ork Warboss, Nobz, and OddboyzAssault Marines and Ork Nobz take a healthy toll of each other..Meanwhile, the second Assault Marine combat squad clears the hill in front of Black Ork Cav HQ Marines take the hill…Warboss & Bigboss take a toll on the Assault Marines..Da Black Ork Cav Don’t Quit! One lone Ork Boy disputes the hill..Marine Chaplain engages the Warboss in melee while the Bigboss barrels into the Assault Marine squadBEHIND YOU!!!!! Despite jamming it’s heavy bolter Da Dread turns it’s lascannon on the missile launcher Marine, turning him to superheated mist…With nothing but bolters to face down the Dread, support team leg it into coverMeanwhile, the assault group close in on Da Cav HQGretchin gulp down their fire and let fly with their autoguns, to little effect..The Chaplain finally batters the Warboss into submission, but the Bigboss is still well in the fight and presumably having the time of his life…A volley of frag grenades massacre the GretchinSurviving Assault Marines jump pack in onto Cav HQ roof top and go to town on the poor Gretchin!And that’s 20 Gretchin despatched without a scratch… raining Grot copses off that roof! (We figured it was quite a nice cinematic image to imagine these 7 foot behemoths hurling Gretchin off the roof with each swipe of a chainsword)That’d be Objective Secured then.. as the surviving Gretchin break and run for the hills
Right, so that’s Captain T rescued then. and the survivors of Da Cav legging it over the horizon.. a Dread, half the Gretchin, a Battlewagon and most of a Boyz Mob.. along with Da Snipa… so what shall we do for the next scenario? Jim has an idea for a “chase” scenario – stay tuned, and most importantly stay thrifty!
It’s been said before on this blog, but it deserves saying again – the people that make up our little hobby, that create the community and each add their own touch to it.. can be absolute and total legends.
We’ve seen it before with Whittlesey40k – we got in touch to ask if he’d mind if we linked the 1991 Blood Angels pics he had on his blog, and not only was he fine with it but got in touch a few days later to offer us some decal sheets, free of charge!
And so it was that at the very start of 2023 that Roger from Rantings From Under The Wargames Table who we’ve been following for a while got in touch to offer “a few bits and pieces” that he happened to have lying around and wondered what we might be able to do with them…
Sure enough, a couple of weeks later, a package arrived in the post.. with a couple of little ziploc bags…
And a HUGE amount of plastic bitz!
LOOK AT ALL THIS!!!
So, after an evening indulging my OCD I can see we’ve got a little baggy of Epic Imperial Guard infantry with some custom Rhino conversions, some great bitz for vehicle conversions (Da Black Ork Cav will be VERY happy to see those), enough torsos and legs to allow about 6 Marines to be built – which, given another recent eBay score, will give me a good chunk of a 16 strong Crusader platoon for Firefight.. who will also be pulling double duty as a Raptors force for 40k.
And then there are the bitz – HUGE resource for conversion here, particularly for anything with a Chaos-y kind of vibe.. Certainly enough to keep us going for the foreseeable!
So this is something of a short fill in post before a biggie in a couple of weeks’ time, with the intent of saying a huge THANK YOU to Roger, and to thoroughly recommend go check out Ranting From Under The Wargames Table, you won’t regret it!
Skinflint Games 