Victory Pointless

This is Game 4 of my Ork crusade army – a 500 point Boarding Actions game against an all-Genestealer Tyranid army.  We were playing the mission ‘The Pipeline”.

“I swear ta Gork, Professa, if dis is annuva false alarm…”

Krakdakka examined the looted auspex device in his hand carefully.  “I am tellink you, Kaptin, ve are detektin uvva life signs on ze ship.  Und I haf checked for sneezes on ze scanner screen zis time.”

Uzblitz growled.  The lower reaches of the ship were a twisting maze of maintenance corridors and machine rooms that had only grown more convoluted since the Ork rebuild.  It was entirely possible that any manner of things might be lurking down here.

The auspex started to ping.  “I am gettink zumthink!”

The radio cracked.  “Boss, itz da forward patrol.  We saw sumfing.”

“Wot iz it?”

“Looks like dem humies we krumped wiv too many arms, boss, only just the too many arms bit an’ not the humie bit.”

Uzblitz considered this.  The extra arms had been the worst bit.

From the radio the sound of fighting suddenly erupted.  “Dey’s on uz, boss!  Dere coming outta da walls!  Dere coming outta da Gork-zogged walls!”

The signal abruptly cut off.  The peeping of Krakdakka’s auspex grew more frantic.  “Zey are near ze main power konduits – if zey damage zem ve vill lose power to half ze ship!”

“Professa – you take your gitz round dat way.  Shouta, ladz, youze wiv me.  Nargrub you ‘ed up da middle.  We’ll get dem inbetween, like a Power Klaw wiv three bitz.”

In the tight confines the pounding of hobnail boots was deafening as the Orks rushed forwards.  The volume increased still further as, from a few chambers away, it was joined by the sound of snazzgun fire and subsequent cheering.  The Flash Gitz had avenged the forward patrol.

Ahead, a mob of Boyz hollered and charged as they came across a brood of lurking four-armed horrors.  Uzblitz made to follow but through an open hatchway spotted an even larger creature and peeled away.

“Dat one’s mine!”

He launched himself towards the beast, which snarled through a tentacle-ringed mouth and dived aside as Uzblitz’s Rokkit Choppa slammed into the deck where it had been standing.  It also evaded the next swing that caught on the low ceiling, but Uzblitz adapted quickly, kicking the Broodlord into the wall and following up to bury the choppa in the monster’s carapace.  His grin of triumph was short-lived, however.  With fluid grace the genestealer bunched and sprang from the bulkhead, razor-talons outstretched and cutting deep into green flesh.

They tumbled together, brawling with tooth and claw and boot and tusk.  Evenly matched in size and ferocity they spun apart, each bleeding from a dozen minor wounds but with no clear victor.

The monster circled.  Uzblitz hefted his axe.  Something in the creature’s manner was unsettling.  The inorky face was unreadable, yet somehow it gave the impression of smiling, perhaps even laughing.

Uzblitz realised that he was alone.  There was no noise from the adjacent chamber, which did not bode well for the Boyz.  His Nob bodyguard had fallen behind somewhere in the twisting maze of corridors.  Even Nasha the squig seemed to be missing.

The other genestealers struck silently from behind, claws flashing red in the emergency lighting.  Uzblitz roared and tried to turn but was dragged down by weight of numbers.  The choppa fell from his hand.  His body would not respond.

“Wuh-”

The Broodlord loomed above him, another tentacle – longer, tipped with a hollow needle – snaked out of its jaws.  Somehow Uzblitz knew, at the end of that needle was something worse than death.

“GET AWAY FROM ‘IM, YOU GIT!”

A power klaw struck the creature on the side of the head.  The chamber was suddenly filled with stamping boots and the sounds of fighting.  The Nobz had finally caught up.

“Wah-” Uzblitz choked on his own blood.  His normally booming voice came out as a croak.  “Waa-”

“WOT IZ IT, BOSS?  WATTA YOUZ TRYIN TA SAY?” Shouta was at his side.

“Waaagh, you zoggin idiot.” Uzblitz spat, then fell unconscious.

***

Sergeant Nargrub raised his fist, signalling a halt to his crack squad of kommandos.  All obeyed instantly except for Basha, who walked into his back.

They were passing a maintenance crew of gretchin, gibbering nervously to each other as they dragged along a few crates of supplies.  Nargrub tried ineffectively to hush them, but in the end had to resort to another set of hand signals to the effect that they could go zog themselves.

Then, suddenly, the corridor contained five genestealers and the gretchin were dead.  Nargrub had once seen a grot fall into a sqig mincing machine and the effect was not dissimilar.  He plucked a tiny severed green limb from the brim of his cap.

The genestealers wheeled towards them but the kommandos were prepared.  Nargrub gunned his chainaxe and carved through two of the beasts himself.  Basha’s breaching ram burst the head of another.  Shortly the Kommandos were the only thing still moving in the corridor.

It seemed quiet by comparison but the sounds of battle still sounded from adjacent chambers and a cry echoed from afar.  “Da boss iz down!  Da boss iz down!”

A sudden darkness swept over them, though the lights stayed on.  A wave of pressure building inside their heads.  Nargrub looked into the dead eye of a slain genestealer and for a moment it was as though a trillion different eyes were staring back, all very hungry and very, very angry.

The Shadow In The Warp fell over them.

“Hold it togevva, Ladz!” Nargrub ordered.  “Hold it togevva!” He was speaking as much to himself as to his men.

Basha was shaking.  “Dats it, ork” he muttered.  “Game over, ork!  Wot da zog are we gunna do now?”

Nargrub thumped him on the helmet.  He thought he might have to start meting out more extreme violence to maintain his authority but before that could happen a second cry rang out, passing from Ork throat to Ork throat and building in volume as it came.

“WAAAAAAAAAAGH!”

Nargrub joined in and – with a few extra thumps of encouragement – so did the rest of the squad.

“Come on, Ladz, let’s get deze zoggin things off our ship!”

He broke into a run and the kommandos followed.  As they ran they caught brief glimpses through open hatchways and side passages – the Nobz emerging blood-soaked and triumphant, the Professa’s Flash Gitz engaged in vicious hand-to-hand with another group of ‘stealers.

They rounded a bend and came face-to-face with a lurking group of the creatures.  With Waaagh-infused fury overriding their fear they launched into the beasts and lay about themselves with chainaxe, choppa and breaching ram.  The last of the Tyranids screeched defiance as Nargrub carved through it.

The radio crackled into life and Professa Krakdakka’s voice came through.  “Ze scanna iz clear.  Zat woz ze last of zem.”

Final Result: Ork victory, 50VP to 15VP.

Post Mortem

• Playing Boarding Actions vs Genestealers feels very fun and thematic. Like Space Hulk… but better because it also involves Orks.
• When the Boyz got minced and Uzblitz went down in turn 2 I thought the game was lost, but never underestimate the power of a good Waaagh turn – by the end of turn 3 only a single genestealer remained on the table. I picked up almost the entirety of my VP in the last two turns by controlling every objective.
• This was an interesting matchup since Orks and Genestealers are pretty similar in profile – strong in melee but a bit of a glass cannon defensively.  Genestealers do a bit more damage but Orks are cheaper and therefore have the advantage of numbers.  As with the Blood Angels last game and the Genestealer cults before that it’s mostly a case of who-charges-wins at a micro level but as an Ork player I can afford to lose a few units in this way and still win the overall war of attrition, while the more elite melee units need to have everything go their way.
• Despite the victory, I made a few mistakes:
  • I should have called the Waaagh a turn earlier.  Without it the charge of Uzblitz and the Boyz didn’t have enough oomph to get the job done and without an advance the Nobz didn’t get close enough and failed the initial advance.  You get two turns of Waaagh in Boarding Actions so I don’t really know what I was waiting for.
  • I was fortunate the gretchin got charged and not the Kommandos – if it had been the other way around things might have gone differently.  I should’ve positioned the grots to block the passageway more and removed even the risk of the Kommandos getting charged.
  • I forgot to apply the crusade weapon upgrades on Uzblitz and Krakdakka, as well as the Extra Attacks from Uzblitz’s squig.  Oops.
• Post-battle, disaster struck: Uzblitz failed his out-of-action test and ended up with Deep Scars.  I’ll probably just pay the 5RP to get rid of this.