Last night I had the opportunity to observe a game of Warhammer 40000 between two of Melbourne’s greats.
Leigh and Sam went one on one; Plague Marines versus Salamanders.
In previous games with my Plague Marines, I am impressed by their resiliance! Base toughness of five and ‘Feel No Pain’ really area game maker.
Vulkan is a NASTY piece of work.
However, let’s look at the Plague Marines, particularly.
Unlike my somewhat uninspiring list, the Plague Marines employed bikes, and a sorcerer mounted on a bike, lesser daemons, a Defiler and a Predator. Like my list, there were a couple of units of Plague Marines in Rhinos.
The Salamanders made short work of the Plague Marines, much to my chagrin. Also, tactical advice (“Stop being crap and start winning”) seemed to have very little impact.
Most interestingly was the use of Chaos Marine bikers. The ability to go screaming across the battlefield and get toughness bonuses and also turbo boosting needs to be supported. This was demonstrated by the bikers and the sorcerer standing out in the open and getting shot/assaulted off the board.
Post game discussions lead to a pretty obvious answer, support your hard hitters. The bikers could have been very ably supported by a squad of Plague Marines in a Rhino. Park the Rhino between the bikers and the things that will hurt you; pop smoke on the Rhino. Now your opponent has to totally destroy the Rhino or it continues to be mobile cover or becomes difficult terrain to get around before you can assault them.
Another option would be give the unit an icon, go screaming up the board and vomit daemons all over your opponent.
What other options are there?
CHEAP WARHAMMER 40000! Total War Gamer!
