Disciples of Belakor finish 10th at Southampton Super Major

I'm not sure Arks of Omens will go down as a great meta, but Demons and Disciples of Belakor in particular have been a joy to play in this gunline heavy meta as the most aggressive army that's resilient for shooting to try and deal with all the bonkers firepower in the game at the moment.

The Dark Master prepares to take on the finest War machines the Imperium can offer.

Whilst I was very happy with the list, I took to Beachhead I did want to change things up - when I 'finish' a list I tend to have less fun playing it and there is a bit of change for sake of change going on. I did want a second Fiends unit so that came in - I was finding when the first unit was taken out, I could be a bit slow in on the second wave, a second unit would helpfully keep the pressure up. What came out was a bit tougher - the easy swap was for Exalted Flamer and Chariot, but this created a big problem with my already very scant options for Banners stretched beyond breaking point (and with character protection the Exalted has some great Despoilers of Reality play.) The initial solution was to change flamers from 5/5 to 4/3/3 for extra action play, but this had the minor side effect of having the list illegal with 7 elite units. Solution was to very reluctantly drop a Nurgling squad and a single flamer - it really reduced my up-field screening and obsec which wasn't ideal. In a different meta this is probably a big mistake, and I was very worried about it in general but in AoO hopefully the extra killing power would make up for it. I was also able to purchase a staff of change for my Changecaster and hoped the retail therapy would lead to an improved performance after it underwhelmed at Beachhead. So this is what I ended up with:

Game 1 - Secure Missing Artefacts v Blair Hall's Imperial Knights

(As list hard to read 3 Big knights, 4 Small is super quick summary)

My Secondaries: Bring it Down, Reality Rebels, Banners

Opponents Secondaries: Assassinate, Grind them Down, Yield no Ground.

Pregame thoughts: Imperial Knights can be a real problem for Daemons, but this list looks much better with 3 big knights compared to lots of little ones. There isn't much in the Knights arsenal that can deal with Belakor - especially when he can ignore a scary melta/chainsword to the face each phase with Blessing of Belakor making it damage 0. Secondaries felt strongly in my favour, and going second Knights were going to have to extend first. If I could keep them away from my top left objective and murder everything in the middle, it was going to be hard for Knights to keep up on an attrition basis unless they could high-roll Belakor.

Knights deployment with the Armigers huddled around the big knights.

Chaos deployment - hugging the walls were possible except for Belakor who's ready to counter attack a Knight advance.

Nurglings a little over 12 away from my deployment zone - Knights have potential for huge advance and charge T1, but even if they blow the Nurglings away in shooting they can't reach my lines

Knights win first turn and the 'shooty' flank of Knights moves up but can't get to the objective with regular movement (they end up advancing onto it instead.)

Up top the 'combat' flank ends up pinned in by the Nurglings, who don't last long but ensure Knights aren't in position to threaten anything valuable.

My turn 1 and Flamers move up close - with Buffs from Belakor and Changecaster for re-roll hits and +1 to wound they bring an Armiger to a sole wound remaining and block the path.

Big Knights are ignored given how limited there movement options are at this stage.

Fiends move up, charging the Armiger and reducing it a wound (after some softening up with Skull Cannons), before tagging the other.

Armiger spends CP to fall back and shoot but for the second turn in a row Knights shooting is mostly ineffective into Daemon Saves.

Knights turn 2 - still penned in as they readjust, unable to push forward up top still.

Knights mistake - they push forward the injured Armiger after softening up Flamers with some shooting but its killed on Overwatch. Healthy Armiger behind can't make the charge and Flamers can buy me another turn of movement blocking.

With Knights unable to take the attack to my top Flank I can commit Belakor and Friends to the South side.

Beasts get bored of waiting to heroic onto any Knight that pushes onto my objective and start to advance upfield.

Belakor charges in and prepares to decapitate the proud war machine.

With a surprise turn of extra life for the Flamers they keep Knights locked up at the top of the board.

Belakor charges in, flying over the Knight and hoping to kill it then consolidate into the Armiger.

Belakor does 20+ wounds to the Knight who does survive and interupts the Fiends after they charge in. Knights damage is minimal however and Fiends kill steal Belakor's prey.

Sadly ording means Belakor isn't able to tag the Armiger, but flank is in real trouble for the Knights.

Errant moves in to threaten Belakor.

Fiends had fell back to middle last turn to stay on objective/get some Reality Rebels points as mass of Medium demons await the Knights to break through up top.

Overview of battlefield - Knights are very far behind on attrition and scoring.

Armiger charges in as Flamers are finally dealt with.

Errants melta cannon bounces off Belakor thanks to his myriad of defensive rules and Blessing of Dark master.

Belakor is able to Heroic into the Armiger, take it out for an easy kill and leave the Errant vulnerable to mass charge.

Forgiving mission primary anyway, but Demons wrack up and early 12 as both Beasts units prepare to go into the Armiger.

Hellflayers moves up into something goes horribly wrong but Demons are in full control

With Armiger taken out don't have to worry about under-commiting to a target so both Fiends and Belakor can commit into the Knight.

Belakor again does around 20 damage to the Knight in combat.

Fiends again kill steal Belakor's kill - the Knights are doing considerably more damage with there explosions than guns/swords at this stage.

Beasts take out the Armiger to leave Knights with a singular model. One Beasts ensure to consildate up to plug the gap again/ensure both squads can't be multi charged.

Even if the Knight can break the deadlock Demons are well entrenched on my side.

It moves back but a comically bad series of rolls means the Fiends escape with essentially no damage

Only one Knight left going into Demons turn as Belakor prepares to finish the job.

Daemon hordes swarms in to their last target.

Fiend squad in combat falls back to make space before Belakor and other Fiends squads charge in. After a softening up from the Skull Cannons Belakor is finally able to claim a big Knights kill himself to end a resounding win for Demons.

Final Result - 100 - 46 Win for Demons.

Postgame thoughts: A rare and welcome 100! This was a tough match up for Knights, not helped by probably over-committing in the top of their deployment meaning I could stop 3 Knights moving up with a single unit each turn - having more in the south side of their deployment meant more could break out easier. Belakor was MVP - normally his value is more in fear-factor than damage and technically he only killed a single knight - but that ignores the fact he did around 60 damage to 3 of them. Comfortable win first up - was able to do a solid job into a favourable match up.

Round 2 - Data Scry-salvage v Matt Strong's Tau

My Secondaries: Reality Rebels, Banners, Warp Ritual

Pregame thoughts: Decisive Action (Kauyon), No Prisoners, Banners

Pregame thoughts: Tau always fill me with dread to an extent, but some noticeable advantages on my side here. Similar to problem from Knights, the Hammerheads fall victim to me being able to ignore the damage from their shots (although not the mortals) so unless both go through Belakor 4+techncially-not-an-invul-save which they can't ignore, and I've burnt my CP I can thank them happily all day long. The Crisis suit is a much bigger threat - but 'thankfully' it's so hard to interact with it I don't really have to worry about it and can just ignore it. The Coldstar's teleport is a scary proposition, as is the prospect of low rolling some saves against the Riptides Ion Accelerators, but I have a lot of threats they potentially have to deal with. Similar when facing most gun lines plan is simple - rush them, overwhelm with options and use what survives to smash into their lines.

Tau deployment with heavy artillery near the line and Crisis suits hiding back behind the building.

Demon deployment - Fiends in the middle/right to try and put as much pressure as possible along with Belakor with Beasts on each flank to try and protect objectives from Kroot Hounds and the like

Overview of battlefield before first turn starts.

Tau win first turn as some Stealth suits (suitabily hidden against the ruin with objective 6) plant a banner.

Crisis suits moved up, fired some Plasma into Belakor and retreated behind the wall - Tau big guns chip away at some Fiends and a Hammerhead forces a Blessing of Dark Master use but its mostly an uneventful turn for Tau.

Demons turn 1 - Tzeentch stuff in pictures all puts down banners with the Exalted Flamer protected by the Beasts from Tau shooting.

Other Flamer unit clears the Hounds and contests objective from Riptide and even consider charging in to tie it up, before electing to just chill.

Tormentbringer gets off 5+ FNP on Fiends, Beasts make a reasonable charge into the Stealth Suits and kill them, allowing Fiends to attempt a charge into some more Hounds near the Riptide and potentially pile in, but they fail the charge.

Flamers in position to toast any of the Kroot that come out.

Tau turn 2 - Hammerhead on the right is almost killed by Skull Cannons and have to spent CP to act on top profile.

Kroot move in to block Demon advance as they prepare to introduce maximum firepower into the Fiends.

Riptide has choice of targets but Tau can't clear the Flamers

Tau commanders and Crisis bravely hiding at the back. Devilfish with Breachers disappears into reserves.

Tau manage to take out the fiends and inflict some mortals on Belakor, but it takes the combined firepower of most of there army to do so.

Riptide charges in - Flamers are able to pile in a second model onto the objective and ensure an early 12.

Kroot Hounds do take a banner down but don't elect to charge the Exalted Flamer

Chaos turn 2 - Flamers retake the point and introduce Hounds to swift firey pain, and Exalted is able to put the Banner back down.

Second Fiend squad moves up and hides preparing to strike next turn - with early lead on primary and Banners don't feel the need to go all out with them.

Beasts leave the objective to put some damage into the Riptide and hopefully tie in in combat if they don't kill it.

Belakor kills the Hammerhead, with the other taken out by Skullcannonsand the Tormentbringer takes out the Hounds, staying within 3 of the Fiends to make it harder to be shot at.

Chaos ensure left flank is beyond Tau reach for now.

Chaos backfield as Cannons snipe, Changecaster and Nurglings sit around playing cards and doing actions.

Tau turn 3 - the Riptide is able to fall back otherwise Tau's shooting options would be very limited. Crisis have to commit properly to ensure Tau can get some decisive action points.

Farsight comes forward, the Beasts and Flamers are taken out but it takes every available Tau gun to do so.

Turn 3 and next wave of Chaos comes in, Skull Cannon assess's if it wants to tank overwatch or charge Ripetide to deny primary.

Chaos backline units start to move upfield to keep pressure up

Belakor moves in to take out a Riptide and Tormentbringer takes out Farsight as the Fiends move in to Crisis unit.

I elect to charge the Cannon into Crisis suits to eat up overwatch, Matt elects not to and makes my charge longer instead so allow them to overwatch the Fiends but Cannon makes the charge.

Riptide has taken a few salvo's of Skull cannon Shots but holds the objective, allowing Tau their first primary points (excluding 3 from mission action) going into turn 3

Fiends and Cannon both end up bouncing off the Crisis unit, the Stim injectors putting in a herculean amount of working to ensure only one Crisis model and some drones were taken out.

Crisis units fall back and rest of Tau forces commit to try and stop the Slaanesh onslaught

Tormentbringer is leave on a wound at end of shooting and the Fiends were there FNP prove a tough nut to crack and 2 survive the turn.

Tau make 2 charges! Cold with Breacher support takes out the Tormentbringer in combat.

Demons strongly ahead on primary and can focus on finishing off Tau threats. Changecaster comes up to help complete Warp Ritual.

After softening up from the Skull Cannons barrage and Flamers eeer Flames the remains of the Crisis suits are taken out in combat and Fiends are able to consolidate onto the Riptides objective to contest it.

Belakor takes out the Coldstar, having completely forgotten there was a Kroot Shaper in the battle.

Tau are heavily tied up, so one squad of Beasts can secure my top objectives without concern.

Tau move up for one last effort and manage to remove the Fiends.

Breachers move up and charge into Flamers to take objective/avoid Belakor Heroicing into them before Tau are destroyed next turn.

Chaos Demons win 96-47

Postgame thoughts: Comfortable win in the end, when the Fiends bounced off the Crisis suits I got briefly worried a comeback might be on the cards as I was starting to get stretched but in reality was a long way ahead even if Tau had managed to turn on the damage to such an extent that they could clear there lines. Data scry can be a funny mission for the match up - its open enough that gunlines can really thrive, but it worked in my favour here well enough that Tau had to commit multiple units over several objectives to slow my scoring and ran out of chaff quickly as a result. Was an interesting moment when my Beasts unit tagged the Riptide were if they could have kept it in combat would have probably ended the game there and then, in the end it didn't matter but it's one of the reasons I'm so in love with the Beasts for their ability to change games in a way other Demon units can't. Wonder if a moment like that will come up again?

Round 3 v Conversion v David Irving's Iron Hands

My Secondaries: Reality Rebels, Banners, Warp Ritual

Opponents Objectives: Behind Enemy Lines, Codex Warfare.

Pregame thoughts: Ever since playing Nassim's Relic Contemptor Dread I've had an unhealthy fear of the undiluted mass firepower that monstrosity can put out. And here it's not even the scariest gun by a comfortable distance. Finding out what the Astraeus could do (Void shields, 18+2d6 damage 3 shots, some small arms firepower, hitting on 2+ re-rolling 1's with 1+ armour save -1 damage on top of Iron Hands FNP when buffs were applied) was unsurprisingly a daunting experience especially when combined with a healthy contribution of Scouts/Phobos for scoring and yet more guns. Secondaries meant Iron Hands couldn't really play a passive game in theory, but in reality would near on max (to quote David - if I table you I get max points right?) and whilst my secondary game wasn't bad I was going to have to disrupt primary a few times - this wasn't a mission I was happy with banners but didn't fancy any of the other options. Plan was to ignore Astraeus unless it got close to Belakor and focus on everything else.

Iron Hands deployment - Astaeus touching the wall so it can see anything that tries to charge it.

Chaos Deployment - didn't want Belakor to tank a Astaeus if IH went first so hides at the back (possibly a mistake on my part.)

Demons win first turn. My plan escated from - maybe I can move block the Astraeus with the Fiends to - lets throw everything forward and hope.

Belakor despite a decent advance can't get to the centre so Tormentbringer has to do Ritual meaning the Fiends don't have FNP. On the left Beasts charater protect the Exalted who places a banner and Flamers teleport to get some shows into Eradicators, despite full hit re rolls on them they only manage to kill 1 thanks to some good saves.

Hold breathe and hope as I cover the objectives.

Iron Hands Speeders move up to contest middle and a scouts move up for BEL

Early battle for left flank as Nurgling take a charge from Scouts and narrowly hold the objective whilst the Scouts/Speeder tag my Flamers

Gladiator moves up and Iron Hands prepare there first salvo

Drop Pod deep strikes in backfield with Devastator cargo

Both fiends and Tormentbringer were wiped in a brutal shooting phase. Nurglings take damage, but manage to hold the point.

Beasts are charged by Land Speeder storm to limit were they can go in HI, manage to kill it and prepare to go back to the middle.

Belakor moves in to take a punt at the Astraeus.

Cannons move up to repulse scouts and try and make BEL harder and they take them out without difficulty.

Belakor tanks a brutal overwatch from the Astraeus and takes a chunk out of it, but thanks to IH chapter tactics the war machine is essentially unaffected.

Beasts in the middle retake objective - real issue on the left. My beasts there failed there charge into the Speeder and I saved my re-roll for Belakor's charge. Should have done this in other order. Thankfully the Nurgling dodge and weave the scouts Thunder hammer well enough to just hold the objective.

Overview going into IH turn 2. IH have lost only chaff and I'm well behind on attrition.

Things get worse when Eradictors move up and take out 2 Beasts with there meltas.

Speeders keep pushing for BEL points. Changecaster had spiked on Mortals for a change - sadly it was on perils.

Belakor tanks the shots very well - using Swarming Flies for a total of -2 to hit to counter the various +1 to hit bonus's and keep IH to hitting on 4's made a huge difference in robbing them of effiecnecy. Wary of HI potential 2 Devastator squads move to tie up Belakor as one is killed.

Things get very hairy on the flank, but Nurgling survive another round of combat to leave me with point to give me a 12.

Beasts in middle have survived pretty well losing only 1 but I can't take another round of IH shooting. I have to keep Belakor in combat for another turn and stop the Devastators falling back.

Flamers can't shoot this turn but Skull Cannon moves in to help assist the flank.

Desperate times - Beasts charge the Astraeus, tank the brutal overwatch (IH hitting on 4's) heal up do some irrelevant damage to the tank and tag the Devestators. Belakor makes less efficent sweep attacks and gloriously low rolls into the IH. They almost manage to flee and escape but 1 remains in engagement range of Beasts.

Left flank is secured and IH primary is limited to 8.

Gamble pays off - Beasts keep the Devestators in combat and I breathe a sigh of relief - game is on!

IH armour moves up in search of targets. At this point my main concern was knocking the table, the Astraeus falling and breaking an expensive FW model.

IH do some blasting and send in Techmarine and Librarian to keep Belakor tied up. Beasts manage to take out the Devesators and Belakor, limping a bit but is just able to take both marine HQ's out to free himself up.

Heartbreaking moment - I can send Belakor off to kill the Contemptor but I need to get some Warp Ritual points (IH ahead on secondary, me ahead on primary) I can teleport the Herald to do it, but its the unit that can get to the below-right objective out of shot which was taken and still counts as held by the Infiltrator squad (although they popped into reserve.) I very sadly sent Belakor into the middle to sit there, unable to charge the Astraues or move under it due to size of his wings/base.

Herald teleports over to 4, having done that I have to spend another CP to avoid him killing itself via perils. Stupid thing.

Beasts move up to deny IH primary as they take out Eliminators on home objective.

Cannon's combined barrage/one charge almost takes out the Reaper and leaves it on a wound. In return it blasts the Skull cannon back to a wound. Contemptor at top is pinning in place by Beast/Flamers to stop its advance and takes out the last Beast on that side.

IH are stretched to limit Daemons primary now and Astraeus has to split targets. It low rolls into Beasts who heal up and Belakor just survives the turn.

Beasts hold IH home objective!

Cannon and Reaper battle out a draw and score is tight going into T5 but Demons cling on to get a 12.

Daemons last turn - I get some Warpstorm assisted healing. Flamer/Exalated end up almost swapping positions so the Contemptor can't move onto the objective.

Beleakor completes the last ritual and IH fail a 4+ to deny it in first of a few big moments. I send Belakor into the Gladiator - at this stage him/Skull cannon dyeing to an explosion potentially hurts IH ability to get some Codex Warfare points

Big moment without a picture so this will have to do. Infiltrators came out from DS behind my home objective and made 9 inch charged into Flamers taking the objective in IH turn 4. Singluar skull cannon just manages to kill them all getting abit lucky to ensure IH can't get a bunch of points via obsec.

IH last turn - Astraues needs to clear Belakor and Beasts to help swing a 12 for IH, one Beast dies but Belakor clings to life again.

Contemptor also splits shot, destroying my Skull Cannon, Exalted flamer and Changecaster to max out Codex Warfare and clear out an objective. It then charges my flamer on objective but fails to kill it in combat. Combination of the 3 models surviving (Belakor, Beast, Flamer) denies IH 12 at the death.

Final Result: 93-68 win to Demons

Postgame: Absolutely buzzing after this, without question one of my favourite wins in 40k ever - was reliving it blow by blow with a silly grin on my face entire journey home at end of the day. After turn 1 I was worried this was going to be a brutally short game and margin of victory in the end was hugely flattering - David ended up splitting firepower ambitiously in the last turn to potentially get within 3-5 points and ended up low rolling a little to leave my few battered models alive. Beasts keeping the Devastator squad in combat with Belakor and rolling badly enough to just keep them in was huge, really happy I spotted the opportunity to do it (unquestionably would have lost without it) but a large slice of luck as well. Very, very happy with this and would be almost as happy to never fight the Astraeus again.

Walking around Southampton between rounds saw this road. Yes, as a grown adult I still found this funny.

Round 4 - Tide of Conviction v Nicholas Willingale's GSC

My Secondaries: Reality Rebels, Nourished by Terror, Despoilers of Reality

Opponents Secondaries: Ambush, Broodswarm, RBD

Pregame thoughts: So, my basic plan for GSC over 9th has been very simple - don't overthink things and be aggressive, which is easier said than done and my last game v GSC has resulted in me conceding going into GSC T3 with Belakor and 3 skull cannons v most of GSC army. GSC feel like a very bad match up for me with lots of obsec bodies - mass volume of easily buffed firepower that isn't that worried about Daemon Saves, ability to get first blow in reliably via DS and ignoring all my lovely hit modifies combined with an incredible secondary game meant I was very concerned going into the game. This played into my choice of secondaries - Reality Rebels was a lock in, Nourished by Terror (points for fleeing models) felt like I was going to need morale work here and even more importantly, was more stylish than No Prisoners (also I felt that if I was chipping away at squads and they were regrowing models I could score a few points rather than having to kill at 20 in a single go.) Despoilers felt easier than Banners as well - I wasn't confident I could keep them up and being able to hopefully bank a safe 8 if going first felt like a better bet.

I very deliberately didn't play too much around first turn charges - I'd give up so much board control to do so and after some deliberation decided I'd rather have my Nurglings provide obsec on my objective than kind of-screen-out some bikes (different gameplan if I had 2 units still) instead choosing to rely on natural demon toughness to hopefully do some work rather than box myself into a corner - I wanted to have the chance to break out in the open if I went first.

GSC deployment - lots of blip behind the walls

Chaos Demons deployment - Flamers huddled in the back so they can't be tagged, Fiends and Beasts up front to take a head on charge if I go second, or put pressure on if I go first.

GSC find first turn and sneaky gribles come crawling out

GSC forward elements with pre-game move rocket upfield

Another bike squad moves up and prepare to take on the Beasts

Neophytes arrive as well to bring the dakka. In most games Warpstorm is used exclusively for -1 to hit when more than 12, here it was only used to make GSC -1 leadership.

GSC charge in after softening the Fiends up. I blow 2 cp to keep a third Fiend alive on a single wound, then another 2 to interrupt after the Genestealer attacks but some good FNP rolls mean then only take out a single quad.

2 Beasts are killed as GSC do an excellent job of pinning me in.

All the action on the right flank with almost nothing happening on left. The various flamer and Skull Cannons reach a terrible vengeance into the GSC first waved, helped by morale difficulties on GSC side.

Despite being penned in, I feel I need to play aggressively here and send Fiends upfield - if I'm just defending my lines GSC secondary scoring will run away with the game.

End of daemons turn - Neophtes are untouched but outside of a single Bike the lines are cleared. GSC morale penalties are such that I get 7 points on Nourished by terror in the turn and I regrow a Beast.

All GSC models at top of photo in there deployment are dead (the large pile) or about to come in. Fiends manage to limit GSC primary turn 1 but don't inflict a great deal of damage with the 4 wound/6+ FNP Quads there D2 blows repeatedly.

Belakor and Beasts midfield, potential to pounce over to left GSC objective keeps them hiding behind ruin for now.

No way to screen out my side against DS - as above I felt it was more important to put pressure back on GSC than hold them out so another Neophyte squad jumps in the back.

Fiends pressure does force GSC to put an squad in the back to deal with them.

And the last squad pops in on the back left flank to put pressure on my home objectives here.

GSC blast off the skull cannon and whilst it takes some effort remove the Fiends

GSC not daring to stick out on far left objective means primary is going to be limited for them.

Nurglings huddle around the Changecaster whose moment of redemption is night. Faced with lots of juicy 1 wound targets for bolt of change he manages a single mortal from smite and fails to do anything else.

My turn 2 - Belakor decided not to play wake-a-mole in the backfield and makes a charge into Jackals, clearing the objective and limiting GSC to 0 on primary again.

Flamers move in back to clear lines - my Tormentbringer lined them up with a charge but took 7 mortal wounds from the Webbers on overwatch and died. Thankfully another chunk of them fled after so whilst the threat isn't gone, the damage coming back is much more limited.

Blurry pic of the right, but a big moment - I successfully gamble on the Jackals fail a 50/50 morale and get the rightmost Beast back. In addition to the body it means the Neophtes can't regrow bodies back onto the objective thanks to the space it takes (which is also why the fiend/Exalted are angled as they are.)

Neophotes here don't suffer badly from morale thanks to the Clamavus, but again much of there threat is neutered.

Big pile of bodies in the top right? All dead.

GSC regrow bodies around the edge, they hang back out of Beast HI range and just kill the Exalated Flamer in combat despite a desperate 6+ reroll CP from me to pile into my objective to limit me to 0 on primary. Exluding mission bonus its 4-0 to me on primary by end of turn 3.

Neophytes continue to be a pain but GSC are running out of punch.

Neophytes on left fall back whilst Clamavus remains trapped in combat.

GSC come out on the left, peeking out the Nexos and a Acoylte

I've got 0 on Desploiers so far and only have 2 Flamers and a Changecast capable of performing it, when they survive the turn though they start racking up points.

GSC denying me primary, but the Beasts are essentially invulnerable to damage at this point and start the clean up job.

Same here, Beasts wrap up and GSC almost tabled.

Look, we are still here! At this stage however I could ignore them as primary jumped my way heavily in last 2 turns.

Belakor (off his base) takes a surprinsgly large amount of damage from the last Neophyte squad to tie him up, whilst they do this they are GSC's last real asset of note

Dead bodies pile up even further as game ends in Demons routing GSC.

Final result - 91 -55 to Demons

Postgame: Funny game, brutal for 3 turns were both of us were trading blow for blow with only a single 4 point primary between us (excluding mission bonus) over first 3 turns - thankfully whilst RND/Broodswarm were racking up points I was keeping track with Reality and Nourished by Terror which rather impressively had been maxed by turn 2 and combined with a surprisingly low scoring ambush meant I was keeping up with secondaries, even if I had to delay Despoilers right to end before scoring points on it (and was relying on scant infantry models to do so, very concerned I wouldn't be able to at one stage.) GSC just ran out of bodies before I ran out of Demons and whilst not as extreme as last game, I was very worried on several occasions. As usual in a tight game - the Beasts were excellent and using Draught of Terror to regenerate them several times was back breaking for GSC as they ran out of damage - they would have been MVP's but I think the morale phase probably takes it - with all the combined debuffs from Demons and fragility of their models to the Demons in combat, if GSC didn't roll a 1 for morale around a third of the squad at least was running on a regular basis.

Round 5 v Tear down Their Icons v David Gaylard's Imperial Guard

Secondaries: Reality Rebels, Banners, Warp Ritual

Opponents Secondaries: Inflexible Command, Boots on the Ground, Banners

Pregame thoughts: So, plenty of pros and cons to this match. Biggest issue by far the Kasrkin and there 'it's totally the intent to do 18 mortal wounds combo' still intact, with the Finial banner a pretty close behind given how hard it shuts down Belakor. Heavier on Sentinels provides another issue that it's hard for anything really to reliably take them out outside of Belakor as units like Fiends/Beasts struggle with the combination of high toughness and volume of wounds. On the better side, my list didn't have any great targets for the Mortars and -1 to hit from Warp Storm could dent much of the output from the Russ's, even if Finial likely kept most of the rest of the army pumping out damage faster than I'd like.

Secondaries should be reasonably even - even if I was likely going to have to sacrifice more to achieve mine but real issue came with the mission - Planting Bombs in this mission is horrible for Demons and much easier for Guard, especially when outflanking. Going second, I could potentially play safer and try and run Guard out of units to score Boots with and take a late lead on secondaries with last turn scoring, as it was, I was going first which meant I went to much more aggressive rush them down plan - wasn't necessarily a bad thing but did dictate how I played.

Side on view - Guard tanks/sentinals at the front with mortars/Leman Russ's at back.

Demon deployment - worried about Finial so keep Belakor at back.

Fiends placed up front to jump out early, Beasts on left to guard home objective.

Demons win first turn. Belakor can't get to middle so with risk of Finial stopping FNP I used Tormentbringer to cast Ritual instead.

Nasty of line up of guns await, Skull Cannons combine to take out 7 wounds from a Chimera but a low roll on Warpstorm means I can't -1 hit Guard shooting.

Nurglings plant a bomb as Fiends do there best to hide/character screen the Chariot

Guard chuck multiple bodies on the objective and Russ's move around to get Line of Sight. Yes that is my writing and it is that bad.

Side shot of battle as Sentinals up top move upfield

Kasrkin use Baricant's key to teleport ontop of ruin and unleash a hellish barrage of mortals into the Fiends and Beasts 'only' doing 12 mortals.

End of guard shooting phase, 2 Beasts are dead, both fiends and Beasts up top have lost 2. Exalted Flamer ended up needing a re-roll to survive a sniper shot as well.

David struck up a pose. He apologised for what he was going to do before the shooting phase even began.

Dead pile after turn 1 - Beasts need to have another stormer to keep this going.

Beasts on bottom flank move up - preparing to charge Chimera and tag as much stuff as possible.

Flamers move up looking to take out Kasrkin as Belakor goes Sentinal hunting. Warp Storm is an improvment on last turn techincally getting 2 points, but I can't get -1 to hit up again.

Beasts manage to finish off the Chimera and Pile into Kasrkin, Sentinals and a Shock Troop squad.

Kasrkin survive the Flamers shooting attack with some great save rolls, Belakor takes a measure of revenge by destroying the Sentinal squad.

Sentinels manage to take out a Beast in combat and enough Kasrkin flee (after being shot up by Skull Cannon) that they can free themself from combat.

Not a critical moment but annoying one - both the Kasrkin and Shock troop squad are auto-running outside a roll of a 1 so I pop Draught of Terror to try and regenerate a Beast. The Cadians manage to roll a 1, so David can auto-pass with the other and deny me a Beast

Beasts pop Slime Trail to try and keep Guard in combat - the Shock troopers fall back but its only to make room for the Command squad to enter the fray.

Guard outflankers appear and start laying down firepower. I hold onto the objective with the Exalted but the rest of the Flamers around it are destroyed/flee

Sentinals with full re-roll and Command squad manage to take out a Beast and take no damage of note back.

Bright spark in the middle as a lone flamer survives Leontus's charge - I auto pass the morale and it allowing me to hold the middle for a 12.

Going into my turn 3 - technically up on primary, but David has an extra bomb down to virtually even out score and I have no easy way to disarm them.

Lone Beast now feels like its locked in combat with Guard rather than other way around.

Belakor tries to stem the bleeding taking out 2 mortar squads to limit Guard primary for now

Skull Cannon does its best to hide and Character protect the Exalted Flamer from behind the wall. They can't clear the infantry squad which means I'm going to lose the objective and banner.

Changecaster hides very well in the building as last Flamer comes back to offer morale support.

Tormentbringer manages to complete Warp Ritual before Guard come hurtling up the field having cleared out the Beast on the objective in my turn. My last beast is hiding in the top left ruin so it can threaten Guards home objective next turn.

A wall of flesh and steel descends upon the middle, Tormentbringer is overkilled easily enough and Guard can start laying firepower into my Skull Cannon, then Exalted flamer at the back.

Last picture of the game in my turn 4 (Tormentbringer in shot is dead.) From here Guard run away with scoring and ignore Belakor as they wrack up points. Belakor does clear the sentinels before planting a bomb, which is a rather hilarious mental image.

Final Result - Guard win 98 - 73

Postgame: Fun fact, did some maths after game and realised that 27% of my tournament defeats in 9th edition are now at hands of David (Played 78, won 66, lost 11 and a draw combined total with 86% win/draw rate for those interested) and the score sadly sits 0-3 in his favour. First time the Demons have lost to guard, so interesting looking bad thinking what went wrong compared to others. Things which didn't help include rolling only 1 then 2 for Warp Storm points in first two turns which meant I couldn't get the -1 to hit up and the Russ's really did take advantage which didn't help but it wasn't decisive by itself. three main points stood out after the game:

1 - Overprotective of Belakor which I could have addressed

2 - As result of having to use Herald Chariot to Warp Ritual rather than cast FNP on Fiends up top, meaning they died cheaply.

3 - David using more units to secure home objectives I could contest.

3 Obviously I can't do much about, how dare people play well! Keeping level with the guard wasn't going to win me the game, so I was happy with the overall 'rush them' game plan. What's annoying is that fear/overly respecting Finial led to Belakor being delayed and not contributing to Ritual casting. Having lost Belakor cheaply to Finial-related firepower before and I was overly careful him when I needed him just to soak damage for Fiends instead. Even doing that I could have teleported him 9 inches in front of guard/within 6 of centre and force them to deal with him turn 1 and get ritual off. Hard to say what happens from there - possibly a world where I feel sad that Belakor died too cheaply but I think I need to force a situation like that on this mission to win and Fiends causing Havoc in backlines easier than Belakor sounds great. David went on to win the event

So ended up 10th overall with 4-1 record, reasonably happy with it - would have loved to finally get the win over David as felt the match up was reasonable but given the armies overall hard to argue with 4-1 feeling reflective with the win over GSC being very tight and the Iron Hands win feeling incredible as certain highlights. Was great catching up with rest of Fire and Dice team some old foes and chatting demons with a few of the other players there.

List felt good overall, in the current meta I'm happy with how it ended up - over the 3 events I've run it/variants of the list its only lost to Mani Cheema/David Gaylard who've both gone on to win the event. Belakor still feels a bit of a tax IMO (really feels his sweep should be damage 2) but does provide a lot of utility and without him the Knights game would have been very different. Also, without him the army is illegal, which has to be a point in his favour, and he does drastically change the maths on the Beasts.

The Beasts still the MVP of the list, every time the game has gotten close, they have won the game. It was interesting that in the first 2 games where I was on top throughout, they did little but when it was needed, they stepped up and even in the loss v Guard put in a shift. I wouldn't want a third unit given their speed and if the meta called for the extra Nurgling unit I'd probably drop 1 to have a 3/2 split and still have most of the effect, but I love them to bits - erratic damage output and all (if they whiff on mortals they tend to kill 1/2 of anything tops.) They were so crucial after Fiends went in to stopping people retake ground and I could gush on about them for paragraphs. Would be even better if I remembered they could explode on enemy's when they die more than once a tournament as well.

Fiends/Flamers and Skull Cannons all were great, hard to separate them out. Skull Cannons didn't have as good a tournament as Beachhead, but they add such a unique role to the list and their ability to add another dimension is invaluable to the otherwise exceptionally close-range demons and I think if I took them out the chance for opponents to rack up some primary points very softly would noticeably go up. Flamers are great, nice option for banners, hard to shift at range and murder light infantry so well - 9 feels like a real bare minimum for them. Fiends equally great, MVP v Tau and excellent at rescuing tempo v GSC. I probably should consider using one in reserve more and utilising Belakor's Warp Locus to reduce my footprint on the board, but then I get worried about Belakor dyeing and play more defensively which feels wrong.

Nurglings sure were there, hurrah? One feels like it's too few to screen effectively but they did their job well and did contribute heavily on primary v Iron Hands putting in a low-key masterclass of primary.

Exalted Flamer was a bit of a let-down, but provided useful action monkey options and against GSC did have a few really key moments to help push back the onslaught. The real disappointment was the other HQ's. Tormentbringer on Hellflayer did kill Leontus and provide 5+ FNP/Warp Ritual points but downgrading to one on foot and saving some points does feel a real option - you get a lot for the points you spend on the Flayer (13 extra attacks of various quality, wounds/toughness/save improvements) but in 15+ games it still hasn't really had a defining game. One to consider if I tweak the list. Getting the 'needs improvement' award again is the Changecaster. Sadly, the new staff/different model used didn't improve its fortunes, it managed a single Bolt of Change cast over the tournament doing a single mortal and I think only managed one mortal from a smite as well with its largest contribution shooting 2 Neophytes with its staff in terms of kills. To be fair, its ability to teleport around and place banners has contribution at score, and something does need to stay at back and put a banner down - I just miss having a cheap 50-point cultist-esq unit to do it.

On a sadder note this might be the last blog post I do on this site - storage limits getting reached means cost jumps to an eye watering amount per month if I want to continue here so if anyone has any recommendation for a free site to host something like this please let me know. Otherwise will think how to do these in a different format or you'll see a suspiciously similar named site pop here up soon.

Hope you enjoyed reading this - going to be diving into World Eaters soon and seeing if my fear that they are a great Nephilim army trapped in a AoO meta prediction is true or if they are better than I gave credit for as they look like a lot of fun to play and I have a A4 Really Useful Box full of old Berserkers itching to KILL! MAIM! and probably not BURN given there's almost no flamer options in the book. If you enjoyed this recently started a podcast chatting about the competitive scene and our local league, were we talk various match ups with a couple of friends, you can find at https://open.spotify.com/show/6g3TJdkmgG7sC2XNHLUFWm or on iTunes if you search for Warhound League.