'Ard Boyz semi-finals scenarios up

They finally put up the 40k 'Ard Boyz semi-finals scenarios here. Seems a little better written than the prelims. They appear to be pushing armies with lots of scoring units but I suppose that's good for them as people will want to buy more models. One of the three scenarios require you to have a lot of scoring units and another may require you to have a lot of scoring units. For most armies though they can only muster 6 without some special rules like combat squads or imperial guard infantry platoons so they will have a hard time I think getting massacres.

Here are my thoughts on the scenarios with my army

Scenario 1
At least it's dawn of war so your messenger doesn't have to be too far from the opponent's deployment zone. Makes me wonder if the messenger has to be alive to earn the 500 VPs (scenario just says you have to get him into your opponent's deployment zone, not actually keep him alive until the end of the game, I'd expect the messenger has to be alive as it makes sense, but someone will probably point out that he doesn't have to be).

As for earning VPs, that will be a little tougher as the Deathwing tend to break even in that department. Mind you other elite armies will suffer the same and this scenario will probably favour MSU armies that pack a lot of firepower (razorspam me thinks). At least if you face a razorspam list, the messenger has to be on the table turn 1 so you might be able to nuke it early.

I really wish I could take land raiders as dedicated transports as I could then have a crap load of firepower deployed in Dawn of War missions. As it stands it looks like my usual plan of two cyclone squads on the table with everything coming in on turn 1 will have to hold up (the third cyclone squad would deep strike and Belial's squad rides the land raider crusader). If I come up against a lot of melta or power weapons (space marines or grey knights mostly) I am so screwed, but if I face anything else I think I can manage.

Scenario 2
Scoring terminators who are fearless will be hard to shift off the objective without wiping them all out. As it stands I don't think my list will be able to massacre this scenario (only have 5 scoring units and one of them is an attack bike). Land raider parking lot might actually be decent in this scenario if you run into an opponent that can't dent AV14 (mostly orks and grey knights who don't have storm ravens). Alternatively just focus on downing opposing scoring units and hope one of your terminators survives at the very end. You don't have to actually hold the objective with a scoring unit, just be within 6" of it. Though to earn a massacre you'd need 5 scoring units within 6" and that will be hard for most armies aside from, again, razorspam lists or imperial guard platoons.

Hopefully I face an opponent who brings 6 full tac squads and combat squads them. The added cost of the extra marines would dilute their overall firepower quite a bit and tac marines are pretty useless against terminators. Chances are though I face an uber elite paladin death star which can cut through my terminators. Need more thunder hammers in my list I think but alas I don't have the models.

Scenario 3
Again looks like it will be hard to massacre this mission unless it's kill points. Deathwing are great at wracking up multiple KPs, especially if there are a lot of soft targets like transports around. If it's the terrain features one, that will be harder unless you can keep your scoring units alive and kill of your opponents. The table quarters isn't too difficult I think, you just need to wipe out your opponent's scoring units and make sure a terminator survives in 3 of the 4 table quarters. Razorspam lists might actually be at a disadvantage here if KPs gets rolled, otherwise they appear to have the advantage again (lots of scoring units, albeit easy to kill).

I am thinking of retooling my list so Sammy is in it. Would give me more scoring units but I'd have to sacrifice the dreadnoughts or some land raiders to really make it worth while I think. Sammy, at least does a great job of blowing up light vehicles with his assault cannon so could replace one of the land raiders. I do like being able to protect most of my terminators though from small arms, plasma and power weapons.