STILL More Space Hulk

Friday afternoon, Finnegan and I got in another game of Space Hulk (Fourth Edition). Having both tried Scenario #2: Suicide mission, we moved on to Scenario #3: Exterminate. Once again I was playing the Marines for our first go around and Finnegan played the Genestealers.

Wow... I took a LOT of pictures for this one...


SCENARIO

This scenario is played in up to fifteen rounds. To win the Genestealers have to kill all the Marines before the end of round fifteen. For the Marines to win, they have to either kill all Genestealers by the end of round fifteen or clear the board and be in position to block genestealers from coming onto the board (if a marine is positioned within 6 spaces of a Genestealer entry point, no Genestealers may be brought on at that point.


FORCES

The Genestealers started with two blips on the table and got two per turn until they run out (10 turns - as there are 22 blip tokens).

The Marines get one squad of five terminators including
Sergeant Gideon (Thunder Hammer and Storm Shield)
Brother Leon (Assault Cannon and Power Fist)
Brother Noctis (Stormbolter and Power Fist)
Brother Scipio (Stormbolter and Power Fist)
Brother Omnio (Stormbolter and Power Fist)


THE GAME



The Battleground. There are Genestealer entry points at either end of the area of operations. The area to the left I arbitrarily decided was towards the fore of the Hulk and the area to the right, the aft - as the game quickly turned into two separate skirmishes and I needed some way of differentiating one from the other in the notes I took.

To start Finnegan and I took turns to place the marines - one in each of the rooms.



Sergeant Gideon and Brother Scipio occupied rooms in the aft section.



Brother Leon and Brother Omnio were located in the fore section. Brother Noctis was in a room about midships - or at least the middle of the area of operations...

My plan was to aggressively push forward with Sergeant Gideon and try to plug the aft Genestealer entry points - as the Thunder Hammer had crushed all that came before it last time I had Sergeant Gideon under my control. Brother Scipio would back him up, setting up overwatch to cover his back. The rest were to head forward setting up overwatch stations at the end of the long corridors and just blast genestealers as they came at them. If the opportunity arose, they could move forward and try to block the fore entry points...


TURN ONE



Bother Omnio moved forward and opened the door of the room he was in and took up an overwatch position - giving him a good view of a nice long corridor.



Brother Leon, with the Assault Cannon, turned out of the corner Finnegan had set him up in and started moving towards Brother Omnio to help fight their way forward.



Brother Noctis moved forward as well, getting as far as the door to the room he was set up in.



Sergeant Gideon and Brother Scipio moved out of the rooms they were deployed in and moved forward as fast as they could. There was no point in putting them on Overwatch or on Guard, as the blips were so far away, they couldn't get close enough to cause concern and would likely not even move into range of overwatch.

On the Genestealer end of the round, Finnegan moved the two blips he started with and brought two more on the board!


TURN TWO



Sergeant Gideon and Brother SCipio moved forward again, but this time a bit more cautiously - Brother scipio went on overwatch - to prevent any genestealers from coming down the corridor in front of him and getting around behind Sergeant Gideon. Sergeant Gideon want on Guard as they closest blip was just close enough that, if he wanted to, Finnegan could get a Genestealer in contact.



Bother Omnio moved backwards into the room and set up on overwatch again - to give himself a bit more distance between himself and the corner where genestealers might come around. Also this was to make space for Brother Leon to come through and lead the advance with his assault cannon. Brother Leon and Brother Noctis continued their slow trudge forward to meet with Brother Omnio.

 

On the Genestealer turn, Finnegan just moved some blips up, sensibly moving down the side passage, out of view of Brother Omnio.

 

Towards the aft, he revealed a blip to be three Genestealers, and moved forward with them.



though they got TO Sergeant Gideon, they didn't have enough action points to actually ATTACK him, so the On Guard status was for naught...


TURN THREE



Brother Omnio moved further back into the room, remaining on overwatch. Brothers Leon and Noctis continued their advance.

 

Brother Scipio decided to stay where he was. He COULD have moved forward, but decided to keep as far down the hallway from where Genestealers could enter his field of view - to give him as many overwatch shots as possible before they got to him - and even e far enough away that they couldn't even get to him in one turn - in case his bolster jammed...



Sergeant Gideon hammered his way through the two Genestealers directly in front of him and charged down the hall to attack a third Genestealer. This was a bit of a gamble as there were more blips down the side corridor he passed that could conceivably get behind him. He wasn't able to kill this third Genstealer on his turn!

 

On the Genestealer's turn the Genestealer attack and Sergeant Gideon pummelled it into a pulpy puddle of caustic goo. The other blips advanced... but didn't get close enough to ambush Sergeant Gideon.



At the other end Finnegan revealed one of his blips and sent a trio of Genestealers running down the hallway. Only one of them got into range of Brother Omnio - who missed with his first shot.


TURN FOUR

 Sergeant Gideon backed up, turned to face the blip in the side corridor, revealing three more Genestealers, and went On Guard (the On Guard status allows a marine to re-roll his combat die when a Genestealer attacks on the Genestealer turn). I figured it was a wiser use of action/command points than simply attacking the first Genestealer.

 Brother Omnio fired down the corridor killing two genestealers before returning to overwatch.

 

 On the Genestealer's turn Finnegan revealed the blip in the side corridor to be a single gene stealer which he ran out around the corner and hurtled towards Brother Omnio. Brother Omnio fired three times on overwatch and missed all three! Then the Genestealer stopped. He hadn't used his full action points, but Finnegan figures since he'd survived that long, he probably wouldn't survive another burst and decided to leave him where he was for the time being to cover the advance of the Genestealers behind him.

 

 Movement triggers overwatch fire, but anything in a corridor blocks line-of-sight to anything behind it, so Finnegan was able to bring up a few more Genestealers into what WOULD have been in range of Brother Omnio's overwatch fire, without worry of them being shot at. Clever little monkey...

 

 Towards the aft, the Genestealers attacked Sergeant Gideon.

I rolled a one... now the Thunder Hammer gives me a +2 to my roll... but that doesn't help a one  when the Genestealers rolled fours.... Luckily I was On Guard so I could re-roll!

 

Another one... and that was the end of Sergeant Gideon... and the beginning of the end of the game... or so I felt at the time!

 

"Brothers, this is Brother Scipio! Sergeant Gideon is down, I say again, Sergeant Gideon is DOWN! Requesting immediate back-up!"

 

 Genestealers tearing down the corridors, seemingly impervious to his overwatch fire...


TURN FIVE



Finally Brother Leon was able to turn in the room and get eyes on the Genestealers - and it as none too soon - with one flying into the room he and Brother Omnio occupied. The assault cannon began to spin and with a loud roar sent lead hot death flying down the corridor. Four shots took down three Genestealers!



Back towards the aft, Brother Scipio spent all of his action points firing down the corridor at the Genestealers. Four shots killed three of them.

 

He used the remiaingin command points to go back on overwatch.



And overwatch fire killed the remaining Genestealers in the corridor. The remaining blips, however, decided they need not head straight out into Brother Scipios hail of doom, when other passages were now free and could be used to sneak around behind him. Things were looking dire from Brother Scipio. It would take many turns to turn one of the other Marines around and get him back to where he could help Brother Scipio....


TURN SIX



Brothers Leon and Omnio both used all their action points to move forward. They didn't even bother with overwatch, as all the blips were far enough away, they would give them no trouble this turn (this picture was taken AFTER the genestealers move for Turn Six.

Bother scipio started to back down the corridor, hoping to back into the room where he had initially been deployed so the Genestealers wouldn't be able to get around behind him and to create a bottleneck through which genestealers would have to go to get at him...

Brother Noctis turned around and hauled ass towards the aft - ALL command points for the next few turns were used to move him along - luckily I had a few turns in a row where I drew fits and sixes - which was especially lucky as the Sergeant was gone and I could no longer redraw my command point chip.


TURN SEVEN



Brothers Leon and Omnio moved forward, a little more cautiously, going on overwatch after two moves.



Again all Command Points were used to move Brother Noctis aft. He just about got to where he could help Brother Scipio - just had to open the door. (I kept forgetting about shooting doors - I could have combined a shoot with my moves and tried to just blast the door away... but I forgot...).



"Brother Scipio, I am just about on your position, hold tight!"



Yikes they were getting close! Apparently the terminators cannot look to their sides, and thus this blip did not need to be revealed...?



back in the forward position, Genestealers were charging Brothers Leon and Omnio. Brother Leon had not bothered with overwatch to get a little further forward, the corridor was long enough he knew the Genestealers would not get to him that turn. Two others rushed around the corner into Brother Omnio's view and were blown to bits with overwatch fire.


TURN EIGHT

 

Brother Scipio stepped back into the room from whence he'd originally come, giving brother Noctis a clear view of the blip further down the passage when he opened the door. All Genestealers revealed were blown away! (I realized afterwards that I probably should have had Brother Scipio move FORWARDS! He could have gotten far enough forwards that the Genestealers in the room off to the side there would not have had enough action points to run up behind him AND attack... ah, well...).



Back towards the fore, Brother Leon turned all the Genestealers in front of him into a fine mist of greenish-red. Brother Omnio advanced into the side passage.


TURN NINE



Brother Scipio moved forward out of the room and took up an overwatch position at the end of the corridor he's spent most of the operation in. Brother Noctis advanced up the corridor behind him and set up in an overwatch position to guard his rear.



Brother Leon and Brother Omnio continued their push forwards. Perhaps THEY would be able to move forward enough to block this entry...?



Finnegan started revealing Genestealers and sending them down the hall at Brother Leon. Five of them were blown apart by the roaring assault cannon!! Brother Leon was starting to run low on ammo, though. Down to only five more bursts!



Back aft, Finnegan bided his time, moving blips into locations they could assault from...

"Auspex reads movement, ahead and to the flank. There are a lot of them, Brother, remain vigilant!" 


TURN TEN

This is where things really started to go south... I'd had such good luck for several rounds, it was bound to turn...



Brother Scipio moved forward slightly, keeping on overwatch.

On the Genestealers turn, they attacked!



Brother Noctis' overwatch fire took down a few genestealers attacking from the flank, but he was eventually taken down....



Then Brother Scipio's stormbolter jammed allowing a pile of Genestealers to stack up in front of him, ready to attack in the following turn... or rather to keep him busy in the following turn, so the one behind could sneak up and attack Brother Scipio from behind!



Brothers Leon and Omnio had continued their cautious advance, remaining on overwatch. Brother Omnio killed one Genestealer with overwatch fire, but then his gun jammed and the trailing Genestealer was upon him! In one last bit of extreme good luck, Brother Omnio managed to kill the assaulting Genestealer in close combat with a roll of four!? (The Genestealer had rolled 3, 2, and 2...).



Finnegan started revealing more Genestealers but was unable to send them down eh hall this turn.



Things were looking dire all around...


TURN ELEVEN



Brother Scipio cleared his jam and spent the rest of his action points blasting away at the Genestealers to his front, there was no point in saving any for overwatch, as the Genestealer behind him would attack first... He managed to take two of them down...



Brother Omnio cleared his jam, loosed off a few wild shots at the Genestealers down the passage and then went back on overwatch. Brother Leon moved forward and went on overwatch (I realized later, if I'd spent one command point, I would have been close enough to the entry points, that I would have prevented any more blips from coming out of that location. It was clear I was not going to kill all the Genestealers or block bother entry areas at this point, but I might have brought it to a draw...?)



Or not... The first Genestealer to attack managed to dodge two burts of overwatch fire from Brother Leon's assault cannon and then killed him in close assault...



Brother Omnio took out one Genestealer with overwatch fire... but rolled double sixes, jamming his weapon at the same time.



The next Genestealer in line charged down the hall and fell upon Brother Omnio as he desperately tried to clear his jam!



As expected Brother Scipio was attacked from behind and killed as well...

And that was the end of this squad of Blood Angel terminators, and with them, the game...

Wow! Another INTENSE battle - from the get-go I thought it was going to be a tough slog, that I would probably lose to attrition. After Sergeant Gideon died, I thought all hope went with him. but my spirits were briefly bouyed when Brother Noctis was able to get back so quickly to help out Brother Scipio, and Brothers Leon and Omnio got SO CLOSE to blocking the entry in the fore area!!! GAH!? So close, yet so far...

Finnegan had wanted to play again, but it was getting late in the afternoon and we had other things that needed doing, so well have to try another day this coming week. I'm curious to see how well he does. What he managed to learn from how I did things...


Coming Soon to Tim's Minature Wargaming Blog:

I was hoping to get in a game of Kill Team this weekend, but it's looking like it's not going to happen... Too many other things going on... I do hope we can get in a game some afternoon or evening this coming week! So there may be a game report of that.

Still plugging away at all the terrain I picked up with Kill Team, perhaps I'll post some pictures of those bits as some are getting close to being done.

I could also post some pics of other Kill Teams I'm putting together - with figures I already have! I put together a Tau Kill Team already. I could easily put together a few Astra Militarum Kill Teams (from four different regiments!?)  as well as Eldar and Harlequins...

I've assembled and primed some Adeptus Mechanicus Skitarii Rangers and Vanguard (the ones that came with the Kill Team Box) and some Sicarian Infiltrators and Ruststalkers. I also have some Drukhari sitting on deck ready to assemble.... These will probably be the first NEW Kill Teams I paint up. I probably won't be posting any pics of those for a few weeks, though.

Finnegan's put together an Ork Kill Team and has planned out a Genestealer Cult team (that he needs to assemble and paint!) and The Girl could field teams of Eldar and/or Harlequins. Perhaps I'll post some pics of those as they sort them out. The Girl recently finished up her first Rangers and they look pretty rad. I think they will be the core of her Asuriyani Kill Team - so I'll definitely post pics of those when she figures out how she wants to put the team together...