Combat Patrol is only a 5 hour long event and there are three separate times that it is run, twice on Saturday and once on Sunday Morning. In the grand scheme of things it’s a cheap event that doesn’t use up a lot of time and offers some really nail-biting battles. The rules for Combat Patrol are very specific to Combat Patrol and are all based on the old ‘40k in 40 Minutes’ rules that were published long ago in a White Dwarf. Things like no monstrous creatures, limitations on armor values and characters all help to keep the games balanced and interesting. For the first time 2+ saves were allowed this year and I was very concerned about a bevy of Terminators running the field but it didn’t turn out that way. At smaller points values for the games Terminators were quickly gunned down by the superior firepower of normal infantry. My list for the event was pretty simple:
Wolf Guard with Power Sword, 5 Grey Hunters with Melta Gun in a Razorback with Heavy Bolters
Wolf Guard, 5 Grey Hunters with Melta Gun
Wolf Guard, 4x Long Fangs, 3x Missile Launchers in a Razorback with Heavy Bolters
My plan was to use the Long Fangs for long range fire support while one squad of Grey Hunters controlled objectives on my half of the table and the other squad moved forward to control / contest objectives in my opponents side of the table. It actually worked quite well in all the missions and I was very happy with how it performed. The list was super flexible and managed to function like a Swiss Army knife at every turn with the mutually supporting elements all working together quite well in such a low point environment. The two Razorbacks were really the MVP's of the tourney for me as they were hard to kill and provided much needed covering fire throughout the games.
In the first round I drew an Ultra Marine opponent who used a similar list to my own with the exception of a Land Speeder and only one Razorback. The Razorback fell to Melta fire quite quickly and without any devastators on his side my Wolves ground up his force very quickly ending in a very one sided affair. In the second round I played against a Grey Knight lists with double Razorbacks and lots of storm bolters and psycannons in two squads. I managed to pull out a win in this game despite loosing all my Long Fangs in one round of shooting from one of his dakka squads!
My Third opponent was playing Blood Angels with a Predator, a combat squaded Tactical Squad and some Assault Marines. The Assault Marines were introduced to a withering hail of Heavy Bolter and Krak Missile when they came over the central terrain piece and the Predator fell in the next turn, the rest was clean up operations producing a very lop sided massacre. In my final game I pulled a beautifully done Blood Angel army with a Razorback, Priest, Tactical Squad and an Assault Squad. I managed to immobilize his Razorback behind a building with a lucky missile strike that forced his squad to string out trying to hold two objectives while I slowly picked them off one at a time and my Razorbacks concentrated fire on the Assault Squad. After a very tense final assault on the central objective between my Grey Hunters and his Priest I carried the day with another major victory.
Much to my utter amazement and complete surprise my reward for those hard fought victories was the Overall Champion for the Saturday Morning Session. An Awesome Plaque for down in the 'Man Cave', a Manticore Kit, some Warpath Mini's and various other bit, bobbles and trinkets:
If I can make it back to Adepticon in 2013 I think I will probably enter the two Combat Patrol events on Saturday and not even worry about the Grand Tournament on Friday. In all honesty the Combat Patrol events are much more to my liking. There is no pressure to win (its just Combat Patrol after all) and the games are fast and very cordial. Everyone I talked to at the Combat Patrol events were there to just have fun and most of them would say, while pointing their finger towards the Team Tournament, without all the stress. The atmosphere at the Combat Patrol event was very relaxed and enjoyable with, what I perceived to be, genuine camaraderie between the participants. A very welcome change from the competetive environement of the other events taking place.
still practicing_
Tallarn