Tuesday 4 August 2015

Fondest memories in gaming

I was putting the finishing touches to my latest battle report (due to be posted on Thursday) and was thinking about how much I enjoyed the game, which got me thinking about all the unforgettable moments that I have had in gaming over the years. I started to reminisce about some stand out memories over my gaming years and thought I would share a few today.
 
1. Invulnerable Terminators
Many, many moons ago, my gaming was carried out at GW Braehead. I would venture there most Thursdays to do battle on their amazing boards with my Dark Angels (my only army at the time). This battle took place immediately after Terminators had just received a 5+ invulnerable save (thanks to Chapter Approved from White Dwarf) and I took my only unit of Deathwing to the table that week to try it out. We were playing on a city board, featuring a river in the middle of the table and a narrow bridge over it.
On one of my opponent's turns, my Deathwing were on the bridge, leading the charge against the enemy. My opponent's Chaos Space Marines fired every weapon in the army at the Terminators; bolters, Lascannons, Missile launchers and more. Yet my Deathwing emerged from the barrage completely unschathed. I made every armour save and invulnerable save that I had to make and the Terminators were able to turn the tide of the battle.
 
Another stand out moment for my Terminators was in a recent battle report against Ross' Orks, where my Deathwing took the brunt of a 60-strong Ork mob charge without a single terminator falling. Eighteen wounds and not a single failed save! This was one of the turning points in the game. I didn't go on to win, but it softened my loss significantly.

2. The Fall of Nagash
My first foray into wargaming was with Warhammer Fantasy 5th Edition. A friend from school and I decided to have our first big warhammer game with special characters. As we had both just started, there was a lot of proxy-ing and substitutions in both our armies.
I decided to take the most powerful special character I had available in my army book, the dreaded Nagash. My friend, playing Bretonnians, decided to take Morgiana le fay, the Fay Enchantress. One Saturday, we started in the early a.m., setting up our armies, deploying and counter deploying, trying to size one another up and outwit one another's ploys. My friend got the first turn, cautiously moving his Knights forward to engage the Undead ranks. Then the first magic phase, we draw our cards and wait for the epic clash to begin.
 
Turn 1, Total Power, Morgiana turns Nagash into a toad.
 
With that, 80% of my army disappears on the first turn. I actually tried to argue that since the spell didn't actually state that he was dead, my Undead army could continue with a now invulnerable Nagash at the helm. Surprisingly, that did not work.
 
3. Clash of the Titans
This is a more recent moment from our club's apocalypse game. In the final turn, the Eldar Phantom Titan finally squared up against the Imperial Knight. Hoping to soften up his opponent, the Phantom fired his two D weapons at the Knight. One struck on target, getting a 6 on the D table and obliterating the Knight. The other shot scattered back onto the Phantom, also rolling a 6 on the D table and killing the Phantom in the process. Two superheavies in one shot!
 
4. Warboss' Revenge
In my first apocalypse game, I took a Green Tide formation; one Warboss leading 100 boyz into battle.  I set up opposite the enemy army, the giant Baneblade forming the centre of the lines. For four turns the armoured Behemoth pounded the Ork lines (aided by the multitude of other tanks in the army) as my Boyz slowly ran forward.
My Tau and Necron allies were able to decimate most of the enemy tanks and strip quite a few hull points from the Baneblade while the Orks had to look on impotent as they slogged across the battlefield. As the battle was coming to a conclusion, my Warboss threatened my allies that is anyone slew the Baneblade, the entire might of the remaining Ork army would be vented on them. This threat seemed to work as my Warboss was finally able to charge the Baneblade and rip it apart with his bare hands (aided by his Power Claw of course), to the cheers and applause of the 8 or so boyz who survived the trip.
 
So that was just a few of my memories from wargaming over the years. Any other fond memories of gaming from the rest of you out there?

10 comments:

  1. I fondly remember a game back in the Rogue Trader days with my mate Chris. I got first turn and had a unit of Bombots - small tracked robots that are armed with a grenade. I had mine telephone in with Rad grenades which were super powerful at the time and left 2, 3 or 4" irradiated zones that caused wounds when you walk through the it. Chris stood there stunned but impressed stating it was a really cool tactic, despite the many loses he suffered as a result. I was so chuffed with this praise right up until his turn when it transpired the praise was only due because he'd come up with exactly the same tactic, which given the huge variety in Rogue Trader was a huge coincidence!

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    1. I never got a chance to play Rogue Trader, sounds fun. I guess the closest we have now is Vortex, though I've never had a chance to use this yet.

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  2. I fondly remember a game back in the Rogue Trader days with my mate Chris. I got first turn and had a unit of Bombots - small tracked robots that are armed with a grenade. I had mine telephone in with Rad grenades which were super powerful at the time and left 2, 3 or 4" irradiated zones that caused wounds when you walk through the it. Chris stood there stunned but impressed stating it was a really cool tactic, despite the many loses he suffered as a result. I was so chuffed with this praise right up until his turn when it transpired the praise was only due because he'd come up with exactly the same tactic, which given the huge variety in Rogue Trader was a huge coincidence!

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  3. I think that my stand out moments in my in my games were the slaying of a wraith knight by a 20 man squad of guardsmen! Granted having misfortune (rending) cast did help but it was still quite funny watching my opponent removing his knight wondering how some lowly guardsmen had just annihilated it.

    Second moment would be when a squad of TH/SS termies charged a guard squad. 7" charge, 10 termies vs 10 guardsmen, no problem. Er, apart from the fact that one died to over watch, 2 hits, 1 wound, one dead termie! Oh, and a failed charge resulting in 8 more dead termies the next turn when everything else shot at them, including 3 Leman Russ's, 2 Griffins and a plasma command squad.

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    1. It's always great to see Guardsmen or Gretchin take something down that they should have no chance against.

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  4. I actually had a nearly identical experience with my Chaos Terminators right after they got their 5++. Playing against Eldar, Termi Squad Deep Strikes right in the middle of the board. 2 Falcons roll up, drop off a dozen Fire Dragons, who fail to do even a single Wound to the Termies. It was awesome :D

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    1. It's because of iconic moments like these that it is a shame terminators are not taken more often in games.

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  5. I have too many :-) If I had to pick one though, I would say my favourite 40K gaming memory was challenging Kharne the Betrayer to a one-on-one battle with Commander Dante during a 2nd Ed. game. My opponent didn't have to accept, but had a pretty big ego and did anyway. Dante was outclassed but dealt some lucky wounds, broke combat and survived the free hits, then stripped Kharne of his last wounds with the Inferno Pistol. Eternal glory right there.

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    1. Always great when a character beats the odds in combat. My latest one was Sammael taking out Abbaddon in a challenge (it took three rounds, but he did it in the end).

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  6. Back in 4th edition 40k I played Orks, and they were not the strongest army. I'd just joined a new club and the reigning champ was a guy who played mechanized Tau. One night I was up against him and my whole army had been wiped off the board by turn three. My warboss stood alone, facing the entire Tau gunline which was unharmed). The whole Tau army fired at him, and he weathered it without taking a single wound, including a direct hit with a railgun. Then he charged and wiped out three squads of fire warriors. This was back in the days when you consolidated into close combat. He was only killed when he ran out of fire warriors and it was Tau turn four, and the tanks finished him off.

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