Iron Warriors. Armored Breakthrough. Battle Report.

Yesterday I had my first run with my armored breakthrough list against a walker heavy iron hands force.

The 3000p of walking death featured:

3 leviathans. 2 Contemptors. 3 Contemptor cortus. 1 predator. 20 immortals and 2 squads of marines in rhinos. Just a small disclaimer, my friend mixed up some of his game ceases and was missing half of his force. To fill up his list he borrowed some of my contemptors and a predator. That’s why you will see some mixed color scheme in the iron hands force. He got a really nice looking army so it was a little sad he couldn’t display all of the force this time.

As for the iron warriors, this is what would resist the iron hands road forward:

Deployment was clash of the line. Not ideal for either one of us. And mission

Blood feud. The mission statement says that each army picks a unit type in secrecy and in the end of the game earns victory points for each unit of that type destroyed. With him being dreadnought heavy and me tank heavy there where no secrets about who picked what.

The iron hands won the initiative so after deployment all I had to do was to weather the storm as the lumbering machines crushed forward in cover of night.

First turn went relatively painless. We traded some shots. Pinged of some hull points. The best result was done by my contemptor mortis that unleashes a hellstorm of gunfire into one of the leviathans and manage to immobilize it.

Second turn and the iron hands was still coming, releasing more and more gunfire as they came closer. I had up to this point played it cool with my land raiders and terminators. I figured I needed to get as many turns of shooting done before the the armored lines meet. But I was split between two choices. Either head up with the land raiders, intercepting the walkers and trying to destroy or tie them up. Holding them off of my back lines. Or stay in place, let the land raiders get assaulted and counters punch them back with the terminators. The reason I went with staying in place was to allow my own leviathan to get in range earlier. This was a gamble but I needed as much firepower in range as possible as quick as I could. The outflanking tactical squads also arrived and started to threaten my back lines. Lucky for me everything survived with only some hull points lost.

One of the iron hands leviathans coming around the corner of the ruins managed to unleash his phosphex discharger and the Melta lance into my tyrants. Resulting in 5 being lost. A significant loss I needed to make up for. Unfortunately I didn’t manage to get much done. Some hull points here and there. A rhino destroyed but nothing that was stopping the oncoming assault.

Turn three. One of the iron hands leviathans and two contemptors smashed into the land raiders with full force. Crushing them with ease. The terminators inside, despite their transports exploding walks out of the wreckage unharmed, wading through fire and molten metal.

On top of this the tank commander got the main gun of his sicaran blown off at the same time as the outflanking marines opened fire on one predator and the Medusa. The weight of fire was to much for the two tanks rear armor to withstand and just like that the iron warriors lost two more tanks.

I need to make this turn count. If I flunked this turn that would be the game. Opening up with everything I got left on the front ranks and charging head first against the hulking machines pulled me back into the game. The two contemptors got gunned down and the leviathan got wreaked by my own leviathan.

Turn four. The enemy predator have slowly been beating on my lines turn after turn. Finally he makes the killing blow on my tank commander. The last of the predators fall and the terminators is gone. There is not much left of my army at this point. But I still have some good firepower left. The mortis, spartan and leviathan is undamages. But the left flank is about to get hit by the iron hands. Two contemptors and a leviathan is now to close to avoid.

The surviving tyrants and my delegatus takes cross fire from the two contemptors and then assaulted by the closest. One tyrant dies but the rest pinns the contemptor in place. In response I sends in my leviathan. The claw ripping through the contemptor like nothing. The spartan turns and end the last contemptor standing. My tyrant and warlord slips into cover behind the wreckage of the sicaran.

Turn five. My leviathan gets assaulted by the second leviathan. Not only does he survive but also manage to reduce the attacker to one hull point. The spartan is desperately trying to end the immobilized leviathan in the ruins but with no luck as the immortals starts to flood its hull. Ripping off all but one hul point. My warlord hiding behind the burning sicaran with the lone surviving tyrant traded shots with one of the tactical squads. He is winning that fight for now.

The final turn. This is still anyone’s game but it is going to be close. Like some divine intervention my leviathan finish the enemy leviathan without getting destroyed himself. The spartan weather the assaults and manage to explode the final immobilized leviathan. A massive explosion rips through the ruins and collapses the broken building. When the dust settles the fight is over. The warlord manage to overwhelm the tactical squads with shots, forcing it to flee and with that the game ends.

Like almost every game of Horus Heresy, this was a brutal game. So much death and destruction. When the final victory points was accounted for the iron hands had lost by one point. 7-8 to the iron warriors. Super fun game!

I really enjoyed my list and it will definitely be something I will run more frequently.

Just the mix of tanks and heavy infantry is just up my alley. I will run this list once more before I make any changes. It is hard to make any conclusion after only one game, but so far it preformed as it was intended.

A big thank you to Björn for putting up a great fight. Luck was on my side this time but I am sure it evens out in the end.