Vern and his Wonderous Journeys

My Photo
Name:

check my friendster la. i dun update there for nothing

Thursday, June 26, 2014

Epic 40k Bombard done

I was inspired by my last game and have continued my painting spree.  So here's the next unit completed, the Bombard super artillery.  As usual, here are the pics and official fluff of this unit.


The Bombard is a powerful Imperial mobile artillery piece that mounts a Heavy Siege Mortar on a Leman Russ tank chassis. It is amongst the most powerful and largest artillery pieces in use by the heavy artillery and siege artillery companies of the Imperial Guard
Unlike most other Imperial artillery pieces, the Bombard Heavy Siege Mortar is built upon the larger and more robust Leman Russ battle tank chassis rather than the more commonly employed but less load-bearing Chimera chassis. Even then, the Leman Russ chassis has been heavily modified to accommodate the massive weight of the Siege Mortar. Despite these modifications, a Bombard still moves very slowly compared with other Imperial tracked vehicles. Though the tank's engine and tracks provide the Bombard with limited mobility, its extremely slow speed means that it cannot be considered a true self-propelled artillery piece because it cannot fire while moving.
A Bombard is normally crewed by only a single driver. The rest of the Bombard's gunners follow in standard armoured transport vehicles like Chimeras and Centaurs and work outside the Bombard's cramped interior. Most of a Bombard's gunnery crew are occupied with loading the Siege Mortar's ammunition, whilst the gunner aims the weapon at its target. Loading a Bombard is a very time-consuming process, as each shell is far too heavy for a man to lift on his own. As such, the Bombard actually incorporates a small crane into its mechanisms to move shells into its breach.
As the Bombard lacks mobility and requires such a herculean effort to reload, it is not normally deployed along the Imperial front-lines. Due to these limitations, Bombards are only deployed for the sustained bombardment of completely static targets such as an enemy fortification or enemy-held urban area. Once deployed, a Bombard battery will remain in place and will pound its target without remorse. Launching its huge shells over long distances, the pounding shells of a Bombard battery can quickly reduce enemy walls and fortifications to rubble.
The Bombard includes other features such as a large recoil spade that wedges into the ground and helps to absorb the massive gun's powerful recoil and stop it from rolling backwards with each shot. Since the Bombard is not designed as a front-line unit, it is not equipped with any weapons for self-defence, but might be fitted with a pintle-mounted weapon for crew defence in case Imperial lines were suddenly overrun.
Many other Imperial vehicles are required to support the deployment of a battery of Bombards, such as aChimera or Centaur that serve as the Bombard's crew transports. Trojans will be used to tow large trailers filled with Bombard ammunition, while Sentinel Powerlifters will be used to load supplies for the battery. Salamander Scout vehicles may be on hand to serve the needs of the battery's forward observer teams and an Atlusrecovery vehicle may be present to help move a Bombard if one of the massive guns should become bogged down or has burnt out its engine. An Imperial Guard siege artillery company is essentially a small army in its own right.

Labels:

Saturday, June 14, 2014

1st Epic 40k Game

I had my first epic 40k game today.  Originally I wanted to write a full battle report but I had forgotten to take pictures, and as this is a trial game it is filled with non-optimal tactical decisions that perhaps it is not worth writing about.

Basically I won, with my artillery pinning ande destroying HX's vehicles (aka his tanks which are Monolith and Obelisks) even before he can do his thing, and my big guardsmen unit with hellhound and griffon swamp and eliminate all his necrons warriors/immortals unit in 1 turn.  Hongxi's superheavy and destroyers did a lot of damage to me, especially on my infantry squads.  But through sheer numbers as well as lucky rolling from my blitzen and howitzers I manage to take them out.  My shadowsword did nothing on HX's superheavy at all.

The only thing worthwhile sharing IMO is my pre-battle shot of my Baran Siegemasters army marching to battle.


Some takeaways today.

1) IG numbers allow me to make many shooting on my enemy - especially via blast markers.
2) Artillery allow me to deliver those blast markers at range.
3) Thudd guns are thus very important for the siegemasters.  But they slow the unit down.  I can take griffons but their range is short and also there's no supply for minis except Ebay.
4) DKOK dun have artillery in their core formations, need to rely on hellhounds and leman russes
5) Guardsmen without their supporting equipment are useless.  No armor and heavy stubber only hit on 6's.  The only thing they can do decently is firefight in large numbers...and being meat shield.

Labels: