428 - 'After the Storm' Batrep Part I - (Drax's Side, incl. Mission)

Sitrep:
Beg leave to report, Colonel, that the God-Emperor in his wisdom has led us to within half-a-click of the sought artefact, and scanners indicate that it lies directly on our axis...as do the foe. First Platoon will advance to contact. Will advise. The Emperor Protects. Out.

Last night, Col. Gravis and I got to play our game...and it was quite a feast for the eyes - at least for me, as I got to gaze upon Gravis's gorgeous minis! There's not much chance that Gravis and I will be able to coordinate our posts, so I'll just present you - by incremements - with what I can remember, punctuated by the poorly-lit photos I snatched. I suspect Gravis's pics will be better. And don't worry - it'll motly be pics, not prose!

My Beautiful Foemen.

 Most importantly though, what follows is the actual mission we fought. No, I didn't take it awfully seriously when I penned it [better to open in a different tab]:

Rather inexplicably, I failed to take a picture of the table, but believe me when I say it was 12'x4' and seemed absolutely bloody huge!

Right then. the Lists were published in the previous posts, but here are the forces, whose high, upreared and abutting fronts a perilous narrow 24" gap parts asunder:

B Coy, 2/24th Cadian Light Infantry; plus.

Hello Sunray? This is Pawn Sacrifice. Sitrep, over?

My Vets, above and below. My 'G/Sgt Harker' is on the left.

Veteran heavy weapons team. Such a weird configuration for me to run with, but more of that later...

The Cadian main infantry force.
NB: The HQ and three rifle sections from 1 (Red) Platoon, on the left, acted as my scouting element. 

My cavalry reserve. They looked pitifully few on so huge a table.

The Praetorians

Two rough rider sqauds and two special weapon squads

Gravis brought along some of his beeee-eautiful tanks. Check out Mr Malcador there!

A dreadful pic, but this was the central of three [admittedly rather ad hoc] objectives

For deployment we each had 250pts' worth of inf to deploy, 12" in to the central 48" of our sides. I won the roll-off and opted for second turn, mostly because I'm slow and indecisive enough when wargaming without having to anticipate what my opponent will do - I like to take the coward's way out and react. Plus, I totally forgot that fully half of Gravis's main force would bimble onto the table at the start of Turn 1. Doh!

A wird angle, but this is just left of my central line - my near-left flank. The PBI were deployed in reasonable cover from Gravis's deployed weapons, but I clean forgot half hs army would arrive Turn 1. stupid.

This 3-level ruin, just right of my central line, was my castle and Coy HQ for the duration. Here, the [horrbly shiny] 1Pl command section edge forward to see what they can see...



...and this is what greets them: the Praetorians had rolled out a platoon HQ with two sections and a heavy bolter section (annoying and top-left)

Drax takes a punt: Harker gives his squad 'Infiltrate' so thy did. They sat on a ruin hard on the Praetorians' right flank [my left flank]. You can see how close they are to Gravis's table edge: a real enfillading position...if they coud have hit anything.

That's all for now, folks. Tune in soon for Part II, and keep an eye on Gravis's blog too, won't you?

- Drax.