Ultramarines (Blade of Ultramar) vs. Orks (War Horde) – Warhammer 40,000 Written Battle Report

I’ve fallen into the Marines rabbit hole, and am expanding my Aurora Marines out to cover a lot more chapters! I recently placed 4th at a GT with Ravenguard, but the new Victrix Guard models are gorgeous and my team wants me to play the most busted fair and balanced sons of Ultramar for a team event in February, so it’s time to start painting even MORE marines.

All that to say, this is a battle report featuring unpainted minis, but I promise I’m painting them and here’s the first guy nearly done.

In this particular game, I had a chance to play against Daryn, an accomplished Orks/Daemons/Owns too many armies for me to count player from the Pacific Northwest. He had a sweet War Horde brew to play into me.

For those of you wondering, yes I did actually just take the first iteration Art of War list and play it. I had been noodling around with something about 200 points off of this and decided I liked this better.

Daryn rolled up Mission K, which is Scorched Earth on Search and Destroy. He also randomly selected terrain layout 2.

I won the attacker/defender roll off and opted to defend as I have more drops than he does and I want the middle nice and clear for if I go first.

I put the Stormspeeder into deep strike (I think this was a mistake) and a Redemptor into the Stormraven which was Hover mode.

A unit of Beast Snagga boyz went in each Kill Rig, Ghaz, his retinue of Mega Nobz, and 5 fancy weapon orks went into the Battle Wagon, and the Rocket Launcher fellas went into the Trukkkkkkkk (is that enough “k”s? I can’t tell with Orks.)

My deployment is top left a Combi-Lieutenant, then a Redemptor toeing the top edge of my deployment zone, the Stormraven behind my “L”, Intercessors Stickying my home objective, “I, Cato Sicarius” and his six Victrix Guard deployed behind the “U” terrain but had already scouted into it when I took this picture, Scouts in the middle, and then a Redemptor, Calgar with the fancy Victrix unit, and Scouts on the bottom.

Daryn’s deployment, starting top left, is a unit of 5 Commandos, Mazrog, a Kill Rig, the Trukkkkkkk, and then in the center is the Ghaz-bearing Battle Wagon, the other Kill Rig, some Grots on his home objective, and the sneaky Boss Snickrot hiding on the bottom right objective.

I won the roll off for attacker/defender and went first.

Round 1

Ultramarines:

I chose to put Oaths of Moment on the Battle Wagon, as I had deployed in such a way that I could get the Stormraven, two Dreadnoughts, and a unit of Scouts and the Victrix Guard shooting at it. As such, my plan was to advance and charge the Sicarius unit and I opted to be in Assault Doctrine.

I drew No Prisoners and Establish Locus for secondaries.

The Scouts walked forward, staying within 6″ of the center so that I could Locus if needed.

The Stormraven whirred up the board and dropped a Dreadnought on the table, while the other waddled up behind it.

I wished at this point that I’d just deployed the Stormspeeder, and to be honest on Layout 2 it might always be correct to do so. I’ll need to play around with it.

Sicarius and his unit advanced up the board. I think I slightly misplayed this move here, as I gave myself a short charge into the Battle Wagon, but a lot bigger of a charge into the top Kill Rig. If I’d had the foresight to deploy the Stormspeeder, I think I can reasonably kill the Battle Wagon with shooting, charge the Kill Rig and probably mop it up as well. As it was, I was about 8 inches away from the Kill Rig instead of the approximately 6 I could have been with better placement.

My Calgar brick stood ready on the bottom edge, and the Redemptor and Scouts down on that side of the board hustled to block any long advance and charges from the Ghaz unit.

My two Redemptors and the Stormraven left the Battle Wagon on 1, and the Victrix Guard didn’t finish it off so the Scouts opted to use a Grenade Stratagem and then Establish a Locus.

Ghaz’s unit hopped out on the far edge, so getting to them was impossible with the Victrix Guard, and I chose to charge the forward unit of disembarked Commandos, and then use pile ins to get into contact with the Kill Rig. Again, if I’d been playing this smarter I would have gotten into contact with more than 2 Victrix + Sicarius.

As it was, with Lance and +1 AP, they did knock 7 wounds off the big thing, and it mostly killed one Victrix in return. The Commandos all evaporated.

I scored 4 on No Prisoners and 2 on Locus and passed the turn back.

Orks

Daryn chose not to declare the Waagh here, which I was surprised by. He said that he felt like his advance + charge targets were extremely minimal, and he wanted the threat of it for the next turn, which is completely fair.

He generated an extra CP with his Grots and drew Behind Enemy Lines and No Prisoners.

He moved his Trukkkkkk up with its rocket launcher cargo and dropped them out. Mazrog moved up to try and make a 10 inch charge on the Redemptor on the objective.

The Kill Rig stayed put so that Sicarius’ unit could not use reactive move, and the Ghaz unit moved up to charge them.

The remaining Commandos came out to bother the center board Scouts, and the other Kill Rig, with only one real pathway forward, came out to meet the Calgar unit. The Snikrot used its once per game teleport to go way into my backfield for Behind Enemy Lines.

Shooting killed a Victrix Guard and put a couple dings into the Redemptors and Stormraven.

Then, Daryn proceeded to not fail a single charge and I was in the hot seat. Mazrog not making that charge completely changes this game.

Ghaz’s unit obliterated the Victrix Guard, the Commandos killed a Scout and lost a member in return later, and the Beast Snagga Boyz and Mazrog left the Redemptor on 4 wounds. In return it did something like 2 damage to Mazrog.

Daryn scored 4 on No Prisoners and 3 on Behind Enemy Lines and shipped the turn back to me.

Round 2

Ultramarines

I spent a CP on the really hurt Redemptor to keep it from battle shocking, moved into Tactical Doctrine, and put Oaths of Moment on the Ghaz unit.

I scored 5 on Primary and drew Area Denial and Assassination.

I dropped the Stormspeeder on my home objective, and it stripped cover from the Mega Nobz so that the Stormraven and Redemptors could kill them off. Incidental shooting left the Warboss alive in the top left side of the board without his Boyz.

At some point in here, Daryn overwatched 5 damage into the bottom Dreadnought with his flamer lascannon on the Kill-Rig.

Both of the Stormraven multi-meltas failed to connect with Mazrog, and all of the incidental shooting I had failed to kill more than 1 Commando in the center.

My charge phase went well, with Marneus and his boys connecting to the Kill Rig, each Redemptor at the top getting into their target, and both units in the center getting to the Commandos.

I also, hilariously, charged the Rocket boys with the Stormraven (and it killed one of them!)

The fight phase started off promisingly – I chose to put lance and +1 AP on Calgars unit, but I also popped +1 attack and strength which felt really silly when Calgar killed the thing on his own. Oops.

I opted not to consolidate into the Beast Snagga Boyz, which I regret in hindsight, but I did consolidate some models that were out of range of the objective back onto it to steal it from Daryn.

The rest of the fight phase was an unmitigated disaster. Neither of the top Dreadnoughts did any damage to their targets, and zero Ork Commandos died.

In return, one of the two Dreadnoughts went down (though Mazrog was held in place by the Combi-Lieutenant fighting him as well) and the other Dread dropped to 6 wounds.

This meant that I scored nothing on Area Denial and nothing on Assassinate either. I opted to keep Assassinate, as there was a good chance I could get it on Daryn’s turn or on mine, and I passed over to him.

Orks, Chosen of the Waaaaaaagh

(The previous title card felt too short)

Daryn scored himself a nice 10 on Primary, passed all of his Battleshock tests, and drew Recover Assets and Cleanse.

He also declared a Waaagh. Calmly. Like one does.

The remaining Kill Rig came to the middle of the table, and the Trukk had the Rocket Boys fall back into it and then move away from the plane. Ghaz did a little song and dance number with the two vehicles as he moved over to threaten the Stormraven, and the only other things that moved were the incoming Storm Boyz.

In the shooting phase, not much happened aside from a couple damage onto a Dreadnought here or there, and the Storm Boyz, Snikrot, and Grots did a big Recover Assets.

The Kill Rig charged in, Ghaz charged in, and the ongoing combats continued. Ghaz wiped the plane out, and the Kill Rig murdered my Scouts.

The Intercessors Power Fist Sergeant missed all three attacks again, so zero Commandos died, but one Intercessor did.

We did a complicated little “who’s fighting where” game here, where we both wanted to fight with a specific model last, namely Mazrog and the top Redemptor, because neither wanted to consolidate into melee with a thing that hadn’t fought yet. Mazrog finished off my Combi-Lieutenant, the Redemptor finally killed the Beast Boss (scoring me Assassinate), and things flipped over to me with Daryn scoring 5 on Recover Assets and pitching Cleanse for a CP.

Round 3

Ultramarines

I chose to put Oaths of Moment on the big Beast Snagga Boyz unit and did not pick a Doctrine for the turn. I drew Display of Might and Behind Enemy Lines, scoring 10 on Primary thanks to the bottom objective being mine.

I ran the Redemptor top left back as far as he could freely move, and put more things in the middle. I also put one Scout from the remaining unit on the bottom right objective behind the terrain feature and started burning it.

I didn’t quite finish off the Kill Rig in shooting (though I did kill all the Commandos finally), so I had to charge in with a Redemptor who barely made it (but did kill it), and Calgar and co. made very short work of the Beast Snagga unit.

I scored Display of Might here and pitched behind Enemy Lines. I took the following picture right after Daryn had moved his Storm Boyz the next turn, but everything else was in the right places.

Orks, Chief Architects of the Will of Gork and Mork, Beloved by All

This was a pretty fast turn. Daryn scored 5 on Primary, drew Assassinate and Secure No Man’s Land, and began moving pieces around. His Storm Boyz came up and claimed the top objective with Ghaz providing the ultimate back up.

His Trukkkkk ran away and the Rocket Boys got out to shoot up the Dreadnought.

The Snikrot ran up to a place where it could maybe get onto my home objective the next turn to burn it. The Grots ran as far as they could away from Marneus and co.

Shooting did not do enough to take out the Dreadnought thanks to Armour of Contempt, but it did leave it on three, which was a dangerous number given that so far I’d failed five hazardous tests on the Dreadnoughts.

Daryn scored a small Secure No Man’s Land and passed it back to me.

Round 4

Ultramarines

I put Oaths on the Rocket Boyz and went into Devastator Doctrine because I really needed to kill the Snikrot. I drew Cleanse and Storm Hostile Objective and scored 10 on Primary.

Calgar’s unit rolled a 2 on the advance and re-rolled into a 5 to go after the Grots.

It took every gun I had in the center to finish off the Rocket Boyz, but the Intercessors did manage it. Unfortunately, that meant no Cleanse for me.

Oh also I failed my sixth Hazardous check and the Dreadnought died, exploded, and did some minor damage to everything around it.

The Redemptor on the bottom edge had advanced into range of Snikrot and put two AP-4 plasma beams into his head and killed him.

Calgar and friends made the charge into the Grots and Daryn didn’t even let me pick up dice before he had taken them off the board.

Taking that objective meant that I got a Storm Hostile Objective, but I pitched Cleanse.

Orks, the Untamed Primal Fury of the Waaaaagh

Daryn scored 5 on Primary and drew Sabotage and Display of Might.

Ghaz started working on a Sabotage while the Storm Boyz advanced up to try and kill my Intercessors so he could score display of might.

Unfortunately, the Intercessors lived and the Sergeant punched back and actually killed something, leaving three models alive.

Daryn kept Display of Might.

Round 5:

Ultramarines

I scored 10, picked the Storm Boyz as the Oaths Target, and drew Extend Battle Lines and Engage on All Fronts.

My Intercessor Sergeant failed his battle shock and died to the desperate escape. The Redemptor killed all the Storm Boyz, and I forgot to make attacks with my Landspeeder but I did start burning Daryn’s home objective.

Orks, Bringers of Armaggeddon, Glorious Rampagers of the Fiery Night

Daryn drew Marked for Death to accompany Display of Might.

I had a 5 health Storm Speeder and 5 Scouts in No Man’s Land.

Daryn had a Trukkkkkkkkkkkkkkk and Ghazkull Mak Thrakka, Da Prophet of Da Waaaagh.

Unfortunately, I’d kept the Stormspeeder 17.1 inches away from Ghaz, so he couldn’t charge it which meant it was up to the Trukkk.

Ghaz started burning the objective, and the Trukkkk shot the Stormspeeder for no damage.

Unfortunately, Daryn failed his charge for the first time this game and had to reroll it to make it in, taking Tank Shock off the table. It also failed to either connect or wound with any of its attacks so we tied on Display of Might, and we tied on holding that objective, so Daryn scored 5 on Primary and finished burning the top objective at the same time I burned his home objective with Calgar and buddies.

Clearly, my rainbow-esque marines were luckier, faster, and sneakier than the orks this time round – that’s how Ork Kolor Theoriez work I’ve been told.

I was impressed by the output of the Ork list, as I always am whenever I get to play into the greenskins.

Now – talking about Victrix Guard – this unit is dramatically undercosted for what it can do with the characters it has access to. Six plus Sicarius doesn’t crack 300 points, and that is absurd. I’ve had about a half dozen games with variations on this core of two units with Calgar and Sicarius with various amounts of guns backing them up, and they’ve been utterly dominant in every matchup I’ve put them into to this point. They are absolutely a 280 point or higher unit, and GW will be justified in cranking their points up a bunch.

This actually ties into something that I think is slowly clarifying amongst the community – +1 to wound on oaths of moment is probably not a thing that the game needs anymore. With each chapter getting access to their own, bespoke detachments that play to their strengths more often than not, I think this needs to change.

That said, they are a blast to play on the table so I’m going to keep doing that, and occasionally I’ll be writing up my games with them.

Thanks for reading, we’ll see you in the next one.