Ultramarines (Jim) vs. Tau (David)

We placed terrain, then rolled off – got Pitched Battle deployment, 3 Seize ground objectives, which ended up one right outside each deployment zone and one in the middle, closer to the Ultramarine side. The Marines went first, and elected for a balanced deployment, weighted toward the right flank. The Tau then deployed in a castle formation to their right, therefore opposing slightly less than half the Marines – the idea was to defeat in detail the Marines as they advanced. However, this was the terrain heavy side of the field, and the Tau placement didn’t leave much line of sight to anything. One unit of Broadsides and the Pathfinders were placed toward the left, behind a hill.

Turn one, the Marines opened fire; the Whirlwind destroyed a full unit of Fire Warriors and damaged another, while the Scouts in their Landspeeder Storm piled out and shot, then assaulted the Pathfinders, wiping them out to a man, then consolidated back toward their transport. Meanwhile, an Ironclad Dreadnought dropped in from the heavens right in front of the ‘castle’, using its heavy flamer and meltagun to inflict many wounds on crisis suits and the Kroot in front of them. The rest of the Marine line advanced up the field.

The Tau, in retaliation for their losses, piled on the fire to the Ironclad and the Scouts; however, neither was destroyed. The Ironclad suffered the loss of its meltagun and was stunned, while 4 of the 5 scouts were killed, leaving only the sergeant. Sadly, this required most of the available firepower of the Tau forces, setting the Marines up nicely for turn 2.

In turn 2, the Ironclad flamered the Kroot, killing many; meanwhile, the Whirlwind killed more Fire Warriors, and the lone Scout sergeant shot a combi-melta at the Devilfish, blowing it up, taking both Kroot and Fire Warriors with it. At this point, both the Kroot and Fire Warriors failed their Morale tests, ran off the board, as, ignominiously, the Shas’El in command of the detachment. This was the last of the Tau troops. The Tau only had the Broadsides, Hammerhead, and some Crisis Suits remaining, while the Marines had only lost one 5 man squad of Scouts and the weapon off the Ironclad. With no way to claim an objective and no real chance of contesting all the objectives given the relative casualties, the Tau conceded.

Conclusion: Ultramarine victory, claiming a Manufactorium for the campaign.