Mission: The Heart of Battle
Deployment: Dawn of War

Mechanicum are a bit of a bogey faction for me, mostly as I tend to lean into the melee-ness of the Sons of Horus and thanks to plentiful Return Fire/Overwatch, the incredible firepower Mech have access to tends to leave my fighty units worse for wear before they even reach their targets. Jason’s force consisted of some terrifying units too, such as Darkfire Castellax, Plasma Myrmidons (ouch!), 2 Thanatars and a talon of Moirax to provide some melee punch. All big scary stuff!

However, despite all of those horrible scary things, it was the humble Tactical Marine squad that won the day! Leaping into the single centre objective turn one, they grabbed an early 3 points, staring down the oncoming Moirax who promptly charged them turn 1. What followed was 3 incredible turns by the boys in green, managing to draw combat turn one thanks to some clutch krak grenades, the Moirax struggling with their low attack value and WS4, and thanks to the nearby Master of Signal, routinely succeeding their Morale checks. They did of course finally break after managing to kill a Moirax with grenades, with their Leviathan buddy coming in swiftly after to easily dispatch the final Moriax.

Elsewhere, the Conversion Beamer Contemptor managed to pip a squad of Thallax with a couple of direct hits turn one, followed by a bit of a vehicle battle in the centre with the Spartan and Triaros, exchanging shots before the latter rammed the former into submission. Abby and his retinue made a daring Deep Strike along the board edge, dispatching another squad of Thallax and Arlatax despite being blinded (Brutal 2!).

In the centre, the Chaplain and his Tartaros charged and demolished the Archmagos’s Castellax bodyguard, although with the Magos’s rising combat proficiencies struggled to take him down. However, having dispatched the Moirax, the Leviathan soon followed suit and put in enough Brutal 3 hits to grab Slay the Warlord, although Abaddon fell too on the far side of the board to Thanatar fire.

Great game and a bit of catharsis of the Sons of Horus having struggled against Mech before!

Mission: The Crucible of War
Deployment: Hammer and Anvil

First Primarch sighting of the weekend! Ferrus Manus himself took to the field along with his Morlock buddies in what was another incredibly tight game that came down to the wire. Ross is another player I’ve had the pleasure to go up against before, so this was the second time I’d faced Ferrus and had taken a very similar army composition against it. This time, however, Ross took additional armour in the form of 2 Land Raiders (one Spartan, one Proteus), a dual Lascannon Contemptor, a Volkite Deredeo and a Sicaran Arcus, along with the previously seen Cataphractii and Tacticals.

With three objectives on the map, the game boiled down to who could take the centre, while defending a “home” objective. This led to a massive ball of marines in the middle of the field vying for a 2nd objective to grab those precious points. Turn 1 also saw some mutual destruction, with the Arcus attempting to finish off my wounded Contemptor who’d just finished taking 7 Lascannons shots to the face, but a cheeky return fire saw the Arcus pay for its greed thanks to the AP1 Conversion Beam Cannons.

The following turns boiled down to, my Veterans taking a holding the nearest point, the Justaerin deep striking and killing off the Librarian and his Cataphractii retinue then trying to bully the IH Tacticals off their point, made much harder by the terrain but managing to hold it for a turn and denying it the rest of the game (granting me an extra point and denying the Hands theirs).

The centre scrap once against saw the return of the Hero Tactical marines, despite taking an obscene amount of bolter fire, the Apothecary kept them going for 3 turns, holding the centre for turn 1 and denying the point for the rest of the game. Some movement shenanigans also blocked Ferrus and his boys from exiting the Spartan, keeping the main death ball out of the game until turn 3 where they were slowed down by some Inductii and thus didn’t make it to the point until turn 4. Then a mass of Tartaros once again stormed the objective, denying it further thanks to just being too numerous and Stubborn to kill.

Even with Break their Ranks and Last Man Standing, the Hands couldn’t make up the points, meaning the Sons of Horus ended the weekend 3-0-2! Not bad for my first 30k event.

Shattered Stars 2024 Conclusion

I wouldn’t call myself a big tournament-goer, but this was definitely amongst my favourites and has certainly cemented Heresy as my go to game. It’s not as mechanically tight as 40k or focused like Blood Bowl, but it’s full of big moments and that feeling of playing 5th edition when I was 15 can’t be denied. Nostalgia is a powerful thing!

As usual, Tabletop Republic put on a great event and if you’re interested in who won and the other lists you can check out the full event on BCP. I think playing the Cthonia/Beta Garmon missions was the right call, 4 turns when you’ve got to fit in 3 games a day is perfect and it means every game is a mad, fun, chaotic scramble for points.

I do think that I need to add more shooting to this army, it’s very Elite and when you get it they do some serious work, but being unable to trade in the shooting phase certainly hurt me in the first few games. The Conversion Beam Contemptor did very little in the first two games and with that being my only long range weaponry outside of the Spartans lascannons, when it did whiff I really felt it. I’ve got some Predators on the go which I think are a fun way of getting that kind of ranged firepower on the board, without resorting to things like Heavy Support Squads which I don’t really want.

All 5 of my opponents were top notch as well, Ross (game 5) and Llyod I’d faced before and I knew I’d have fun games with them, but it’s always a good feeling when you face someone for the first time and they’re a great opponent. Ross (Game 2) in particular really made a show of it and took home a thoroughly deserved Players’s Player award.