TheChirurgeon’s Road Through 2025, Part 7: Taking Down a Stompa

Welcome back, Dear Reader, to my ongoing blog of competitive and hobby progress for 2025. Last Time Around I went up against Chad’s Orks in the Ettin League and dropped a game after some truly rancid dice, then worked with my son to assemble his Canis Rex. Then I got sick, spending the better part of the week battling the flu. I managed to work my way out of that for a game on Sunday, only to then develop bronchitis on Monday, prompting me to spend another few days rolling around, coughing my lungs out. Whatever this was, it was worse than any time I’ve had COVID.

As a quick refresher, here’s my Creations of Bile list for this week’s game:

My list - Click to Expand

The Game: Taking on Andrew’s Orks

Shortly before the annual Super Bowl party we throw at our house, I had a few friends over early for some Warhammer. One of these was my regular sparring partner, Andrew “Hero of Team Imperium” Corban. You may remember him from his Astra Militarum army, but he’s recently been dabbling with Orks and considering a Dread Mob list for an upcoming teams event. I wasn’t expecting to play Orks again so soon, but wasn’t upset about the prospect, either. Andrew’s list is heavy on vehicles and light on bodies, and that makes it an interesting threat.

Andrew's List - Click to Expand

Like I said, low on units but big on tough threats. If I get into melee with a bunch of Deff Dreads, I’m going to bounce off and then eat shit unless they’re low on wounds before I go in. The general combination of T9+ and a 2+ save are generally a bad deal for me. Likewise, the Stompa is an issue – I don’t really have many solutions for a T14 threat, save potentially using Lethal Hits on more of my units. And using Lethal Hits on Lascannons feels pretty bad. My real plan is to try and whittle it down a bit, then go to town on it with the 4-damage Chaos Lord.

The Mission: Purge the Foe | Tipping Point | Smoke and Mirrors

I roll +2″ Movement and +1 Strength for my Bile effects. The movement is always great and +1 Strength is genuinely helpful here since it’ll get me wounding bigger threats on a 5+ and more easily punching regular T5 orks.

Another game on Purge, and I end up “winning” the roll-off to go first. That’s not at all what I want, as it means Andrew can play more reactively to my moves. I need to keep the Predator and Vindicator out of line of sight of the Stompa early as it can capably one shot either (but probably not both), so I keep them hidden. I throw my Nurglings ahead where they’ll stop Andrew’s battlewagons and a Deff Dread from leaving his Deployment zone and I draw Recover Assets and Assassination, scoring 3 on the former and discarding the latter.

On Andrew’s turn I’m vindicated – he draws Sabotage and Containment, and ends up being unable to score more than 3 on Containment thanks to being blocked out on the bottom of the table. He ambles forward with a few units and starts Sabotage with a unit of grots at mid-table. His Stompa moves forward to where I can see it, and completely destroys my Rhino, forcing the Chaos Lord and his Legionaries and a unit of Plague Marines to get out and walk.

I draw Overwhelming Force and Extend Battle Lines and decide it’s “go” time. That Stompa’s arm is hovering over Andrew’s home objective so now’s my time. I have 3 CP so I take my Chaos Lord and advance with his unit, rolling a 1. I CP re-roll that into a 3, so they go 11″ forward to the middle of the table. I’ll need an 8 on the charge to reach the Stompa at this point. Around the bottom I wheel my Rhino forward and get out with Plague Marines and Chosen. They shoot a few wounds off the Deff Dread. I wheel my Predator and Vindicator up and start shooting the Stompa, but only connect with two Vindicator shots which do a whopping 4 damage. I have more luck with the small guns, and end up taking off another 3 wounds with those. My Obliterators both pop their once-per-game indirect to try and kill the grots before they can finish sabotage but my rolls aren’t good enough and a couple of models survive.

Then it comes time for the big play. I spend 1 CP to charge with the Lord’s unit… and then promptly roll a 6. I CP re-roll that, and roll a 3. My Lord and his unit are stuck in the middle of the table. I’ve spent a full 3 CP to do all of fucking nothing and lose the unit. Just great. Andrew calls his Waaagh!

Predictably, on Andrew’s turn he pulls out his tankbustas and promptly just eviscerates the unit. He also cleans out a unit of plague marines who failed to finish off one of his Deff Dreads (did 0 damage on the charge needing only 2), and then charges at the bottom of the table, where he’s much less successful, only killing Bile’s helper goober with his Deff Dread and one plague marine with this boyz, leading to the two units just wiping his boyz off the table in retaliation. Andrew’s Stompa blows up my Vindicator despite it popping smoke and then charges into mid-table.

I’ll admit, at this point I thought I had lost pretty badly. I wasn’t sure if the Obliterators could handle the Stompa and it was going to get pretty rough. Fortunately for me it took some wounds to Hazardous, helping chip it down a bit more. On my turn the Chosen fall back and finish off the Deff Dread while the Plague Marines swing around and handle the trukks. Then the Master of Executions and his Nemesis Claw got out and went  after the Stompa. A bit more softening from Obliterators and I manage to drop the Stompa below half wounds. That means that my unit will get +1 to hit and wound against it, plus re-rolls to hit and wound as well. I charge in with the claw and tag the tankbustas and the Stompa, and come in with the Plague Marines as well. The group pact for Sustained Hits and end up getting enough damage in with fists and the Master of Executions to finish the thing off (the MoE dropped 8 wounds on it by himself!).

It was then that I realized that Andrew just didn’t have very many units in his army and was already running short. Far from being in a bad place, I was getting close to tabling him and his ability to handle my units was running short. I scored Secure No Man’s Land and Storm Hostile, plus 16 on the Primary for round 3.

On Andrew’s turn he made an attempt to come back to the middle with one of his remaining Deff Dreads, the Boyz, and the Breaka Boyz, but isn’t able to get much done with them. I light them up with Obliterators and Plague Marines and wipe most of them out. Andrew blanks on secondaries with Behind Enemy Lines and Engage on All Fronts.

And that’s pretty much all she wrote. I pull another 16 on Primary, wipe most of Andrew’s army off the table, score 3 for Sabotage and 4 for Engage, and then pass it back to Andrew, who has to blank on Area Denial and Establish Locus. We end up calling it at this point so more games can be played (though that one was between Andrew and Erik).

Final Result: 93-60, Win

A fun game against Andrew, who was definitely not running the strongest possible list. Still, it was a good test for my list, as lots of hulls are a problem I’m not always prepared to handle. Despite some early blows, Andrew just didn’t have the juice to keep going, and I think that if he’d dropped a dread and the breaka boyz/tankbustas for more bodies and Stormboyz I’d have been in more trouble. Andrew’s always a blast to play either way.

Hobby Progress

Not so much this week as I battle the plague, but I managed to get some paint on my Emperor’s Children Rhino.

The big challenge here is just figuring out how much black I want on the final piece and which pieces will be black vs. pink. My general scheme take is that black trim meets pink armor, while gold or pink trim meets black armor; I seldom do gold on pink. I want to keep that here and I think the above shot has the correct setup, though that visor for the front windows will probably end up pink. How that I have the base layer of Pink Horror down I’ll start doing blends up to Emperor’s Children before edge highlighting with Fulgrim Pink.

That’s it for this week but I’m going to try to get in more practice and hobby time next week for my upcoming Clutch event. Provided I can finally shake this goddamn sickness. Wish me luck.

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