Flight of the Dark Phoenix
Hello dear readers, it’s fabulous to be able to reach out to you again with some fun Gunum action. With the pandemic restricting all of our travels and in turn, stifling a lot of our competitive opportunities, my ability to put out Hear Me Out’s has been hampered, to say the least. Adding in a sudden drive to dive into college, I’ve been one busy boy. And though I’ve been doing everything I can to keep my teeth as sharp as I can via bouncing ideas off of my Warhog team, as well as the lads here at Goonhammer, my hobby time has been cut down quite a bit. Still, subjecting these captive audiences to my lists has been a source of nearly unending joy. For me, specifically. Now freshly vaccinated and with renewed gusto and passion, I’m ready to take one of my old 8th edition Hear Me Out lists, dust it off and update it for 9th, and come out swinging to claim an RTT in the name of the Outer Circle.
With the changing of the seasons comes a changing of fortune and growth, and that applies to me just as much as anyone. Those of you who have followed my exploits on the internet of late have seen my Outer Circle grow from its initial bonus of 5+ FNP against mortals to adapting the Master Artisans trait. My lists are all designed around the idea that Bolter Fusillades / Master Artisans are the king way to play Dark Angels, and all those inner circle nerds can go kick rocks. With that said, I decided to back up my bold claims by making some runs at some RTTs being held in Minot, North Dakota that our local T.O Sean Lengenfelder throws on a monthly basis. I traveled to this most recent event with a soon-to-be-initiated hog and star of the Outer Circle HMO, Mr. Sneed. Joining us was another freshly vaccinated hog, Mr. Boe and together we struck out to rejoin the competitive scene at what would end up being a 12-man RTT.
Before I go into the event, I always like to point out the event space itself. The tournament was held in a wonderful little game shop called Chaos Games in Minot, ND. The gaming space is in this massive basement with space for seven 40k tables with 5-6 feet of spacing. Sean’s events all have mask requirements and I felt that; as my first returned event, he covered all my COVID-conscious needs which I was very thankful for. Just because I am vaccinated doesn’t mean everyone around me is, and making sure that our physical gaming spaces are safe for everyone is incredibly important to me. With that important detail out of the way, let’s get into the list I brought and the event results.
The Return of the Outer Circle
The List
Gunums Outer Circle - Click to expand
How I ended up coming back to the Dark Talon is a simple story of there being just too much -1 damage in the game for me right now. I had been playing against Death Guard and the terror of other Dark Angels. As always, I had once again found myself in love with different units that had fallen by the wayside in the Dark Angel codex. Units like the Dark Talon and the Nephilim Jetfighter losing CORE has cost them the ability to get re-rolls to hit, making them often overlooked. But once we start using the benefits of successor chapters, we start to see real dividends from taking them.
With the little introduction to my Outer Circle lads, let’s get into the games!
Round 1 – Sean Lengenfelder’s Iron Hands
Seans Heavy Iron - Click to expand
Round 1 – Mission: Priority Targets – Take & Hold Primary
I Go First
Round 1 had me square off against my fellow Warhog Sean who had brought along a very shooty marine list. When I was looking at it while we were setting up I had noticed right away that he had made his Leviathan Dreadnought his Warlord, as one tends to do in Iron Hands lists. This means that he had invested quite a bit into that guy via extra Warlord traits and even a master-crafted storm cannon! (That’s actually pretty neat.) Doing this did open him up to my ultimate secret weapon though: Secret Agenda, the ability to hide a secondary objective from your opponent. As I’ve been playing this list I have been being a bit tricky via hiding my secondaries using this rule and I have found that Cut Off the Head (i.e. Slay the Warlord) to be a B+ tier secondary instead of an F when you can catch someone off-guard. When your opponent doesn’t know you are gunning for their warlord, they tend to deploy them completely differently than they would otherwise. See the picture below — you’ll see Sean had placed his Warlord Leviathan on the far right side at the edge of his deployment zone. Looks pretty accessible to some Dark Talons, if I do say so myself.
This game was pretty straightforward – nothing too exciting to go about, to be quite honest. My Bladeguard Veterans, BG Ancient, and Ravenwing Apocthecary all hid very gingerly behind the center L blocker. Sean hid his hammer terminators on the other side of his L blocker, causing a bit of a deadlock as we dared each other to go for the center objective. After getting the first turn, I lined all of my Dark Talons up to delete his warlord, which they promptly did. Sean did do what he could to keep it alive, but I rolled 3 shots, 2 shots, and 3 shots for each my aircraft, respectively. He had popped Smoke Screen to keep it as protected as he could, but thanks to the Master Artisans re-roll, I was able to hit with seven of those eight shots, and wounded with all of them. This ended up being 20 mortal wounds when it was all said and done, and the Iron Hands’ ability to shirk off the mortals just not doing enough to keep it alive. The Dark Talons’ hurricane bolters ripped into his marines and that was essentially my first turn. The following turns saw his remaining Levithan shooting down a plane and my Dark Talons picking up Dreds every turn. The game wasn’t exactly one-sided, but a great example of that first-turn advantage we talk about. If I had gone second I could have lost two Dark Talons quite easily, instead, I was able to use them to rip down Sean’s normally very durable units and score Cut Off the Head. The Rift Cannons again proving how they are better than my Nephilim Jetfighters’ primary guns, being able to wound just about anything I want without an issue, and having a workaround to the -1 damage problem quite a few armies are able to present right now. Fabulous game, a great opponent who did everything he could to score after being put on the back foot early on.
-Result –
Round 2 – Mission: Battle Lines – Take & Hold Primary
I Go Second
Logans Magic Lads - Click to expand
As I was setting up for round two, I was introduced to a new face in the area, Mr. Logan here. I found out quickly that Logan here was quite the fan of the 30k variety of Thousand Sons and had grabbed a list crafted by T.J Lanigan to pilot into the world of 40k. He had scored a whopping 100 in his first round, so right away I knew that he had at least a small idea of how to play these guys. Sometimes when a person picks up a netlist, they don’t quite know how to rock out the secondaries for the lists or know what little combo interactions exist. These challenges can be overcome by just getting in games and practicing with these lists, which these kinds of RTT’s are absolutely amazing for. So as we set up on this Hammer and Anvil deployment type, I was making sure to watch everything here as he was placing things, as I hadn’t played against a list like this yet and I sure as hell had no idea what the Rubric marines would be up to. I have played against Magnus and his Big Bird buddy a couple of times, so I knew those were going to be critical targets for me to focus down. Not only that, since Magnus had to be a Warlord, as it is no surprise to anyone, I hid Cut Off the Head and planned on dumping every mortal wound gun I had into that man. If I couldn’t stop Magnus, my plans would all die, and I would for sure lose this game.
This game was every bit the slobber knocker I had expected it to be. When my opponent had gotten the first turn I wasn’t too worried to be quite honest. I had deployed to protect my juicier bits from his longer-range smites, and I knew with my once-per-game auto deny provided to me by Watched I would be able to stop an early game warptime that would threaten my planes. All I could do was hope my 3-wound Bladeguard vets would be able to eat the majority of the mortal wounds from Magnus while being backed up by the feel-no-pain provided by the Apothecary. A 6+++ doesn’t go far, but sometimes it’ll be just enough.
Logan moved up his Tzaangor block towards the mid-west objective and moved Ahriman in with them, if not slightly to the side. He then pushed up his brick of Pink Horrors to the other objectives on the opposite side, planning on charging my infiltrators that were sitting there. Seems like a great target for Engulfing Fear. As he lined up for his magic phase, the only thing that was in range to threaten anything was Magnus staring down some very exposed Bladeguard Veterans. This magic phase ended with using my Watched warlord trait on his Warptime, just as planned, and having one BGV left over after all of his magic mortal wounds.
I’ll kind of fast forward through some of this gameplay; this game only had four objectives, and as one would be forever held by his Tzaangor block behind his L blocker, and the other would be held down by my infiltrators hanging out with Engulfing Feared Pink Horrors, this became a game of Dark Talons verses Big Bird and Magnus. He didn’t have anything to charge at the end of his turn with Maggy, so began my turn. The counter-attack of the Dark Talons!
Turn One Outer Circle Shooting Phase
I put every single gun that I have into that man and… he’s left standing, brushing his shoulders off like a nonplussed villain in subpar action movie. Well, every gun except for some hurricane bolters, which light up Ahriman who is a bit exposed and unprepared for planes, killing him. I low rolled 2 of my Dark Talons, missing a bunch of mortals, giving him a chance to counter strike. In a moment of heroic glory, my remaining Bladeguard Vets charge into Magnus, not killing him but leaving him with 5 wounds remaining. Magnus does 6 wounds back, of which these brave heroes of the imperium save everyone on their 4+s.
Dark Talons left – 3
Magnus left – 1
Cut Off the Head Points – 0
Turn Two Thousand Sons
With Magnus tied up by the Bladeguard remnants, he is forced to put his magic into them, freeing himself but leaving my planes spotless. Logan’s Big bird turns around, instead of pushing the advantage on the objective the Pinks are doing their best to hold, to help the team take down a plane or three. His shooting phase reveals a pretty cool stratagem combo for his Rubrics that gives them essentially 4 shots a model at +1 to wound, tearing a Dark Talon out of the sky. Next, Maggy and Big Bird both charge into my aircraft, Maggy knocking one down and the Bird doing negligible damage.
Dark Talons left – 1
Turn Two Outer Circle
My Dark Talon flies out of combat from the big bird, putting its guns into an exposed sorcerer, knocking him down. Magnus is sadly out of range for my marvelous Time Guns. What’s left of my entire army shoots Magnus, again.
Magnus has 5 wounds remaining. Again.
Dark Talons left – 1
Magnus left – 1
Cut Off the Head Points – 0
Turn Three Thousand Sons
His turn three saw his big bird chasing down my last plane, with Magnus turning around to try and threaten my backline. He does end up getting close but essentially does no damage. His stratagem combo with his Rubrics sees my last Dark Talon go down. The pinks continue to fight endlessly with my Infiltrators, my other infiltrator unit in the back racking up Stubborn Defiance Points.
Dark Talons – 0
Turn Three Outer Circle
Magnus, now exposed, with no buffs to speak of and the second tactical doctrine now in full swing now faces the wrath of my Talonmasters. They tear down this very present and important scoring threat, finally killing Magnus and scoring a HUGE amount of points on cut off the head. My lascannons from my Dreadnought knock off a bunch of wounds off the Big bird, and we finally see some progress against these tanky bois.
Dark Talons left – 0
Magnus left – 0
Cut Off the Head Points – 6. Amazing.
This game saw a lot of back-and-forth pushing. We had both taken the mission secondary, Logan chose While We Stand, We Fight and Assassinate. I had taken the Mission secondary, Stubborn Defiance, and Cut Off the head. Had I been able to knock down Magnus early, I would have had planes flying about, time gunning things without a care in the world. But thanks to the 3++ save, and some very powerful 4+s on my opponent’s part, he was able to keep the Red Primarch cooking for just long enough. By the end of the game, all that was left was a single group of Rubrics and his Tzangors. My shooting base was for the most part intact and more than able to finish off the bird.
For being brand new to the game, Logan showed some real tactical chops with this list and I had a blast playing him. He had made some critical mistakes, and I should have taken Assassinate based on the way he just handed me his leadership. He’s a great addition to our local community and I’m excited to see if he is able to repeat this kind of showing a second time.
-Result –
74-74 Draw
Round 3 – Mission: ….uhh…. – Take & Hold Primary
I Go First
So this round. I played versus my teammate Trevor who was playing non-meta Drukhari. 3 Raiders, 2 Ravagers, 3 Venoms, and infantry to go in everything. Never in my life have I played a game where going first was so important.
I went first.
After discussing how I would write up this game with him, we had decided to sum it up with a meme. Because it was Brutal.
Enjoy.
-Result –
97 – 11 Outer Circle Win
Closing
And that’s all I’ve got for you guys today! Overall a really great showing for my Bois in Black today, pushing into some really tough matchups that could be swingy depending on that first turn drop. Building an entire list that focuses on surviving as my Dark Talons tear around the field feels like a very all-in strategy that has been paying off pretty great. With what we have seen in the Admech book though, I think my list here is probably going to be dead in the cradle by the time I am able to bring it to any serious GTs. Maybe it’s time I start looking at a different plan, or maybe a different army…
Insert odd R2-D2 sounds
Who knows.
Good Game
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