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The hot sun beat down on the desert plains of Kei VI as it has done unchanged for countless millennia. Across its bleached and dusty surface races jet black shadows disturbing the still earth and kicking up choking clouds as they go.
Captain Alaric's voice crackled over the intercom, fighting for supremacy with the deafening noise of the engines. "Brothers, do not be fooled by their appearance, These traitors harbour our target. One who shall not be named. The Heretic has spread the foul word of the darks lords amongst our Emperor's deciples here on this world... Now they must all be cleansed...Out"
Distant irregular shapes began to appear on the horizon. The remains of an attempt at imperial settlement.... this is where the traitors had made their camp. The Heretic previously known as brother Renu was once a talented tank commander in the Dark Angels before giving his will to the ruinous powers. Recon had confirmed his presence here on this unassuming dusty rock, along with a detachment of space marines from the aurora chapter. Somehow these loyal space marines from the aurora 5th company had been inducted into the service of the vile trator Renu. Whether by trickery, treachery or the influnce of the chaos gods themselves, they were now serving an enemy of the Dark Angels and as such, none may leave here alive.

-----Ravenwing battle 1 Vs Aurora chapter (Liam) 2000 points-----
My Army List is here.
Liam had (roughly):
Captain, (thunder hammer, combimelta, aux grenades)
command squad: melta, powerfist, standard
3 tac squads 1 las/flamer, 1 missile/plas, 1hvyplas/melta
drop pod, 2 rhino, lraider (hb/2 x las)
Assault squad 3 ppistol & pfist
Predator las/las & chronos (the traitor!)

Rolled annihalation/pitched and i got first turn.
First time using a bike army so i was excited. I didnt really have a battleplan, i just wanted to see what these units could do. Safe in the knowledge that i had first turn & alot of movement potential, i basically set up in neat lines. My army takes up the entire deployment zone without even spreading out, so i wasn't going to be hiding!
Liam, who is used to seeing my eldar play, took up defensive poitions around the buildings in his deployment zone and decided not to embark tac squads in their transports save one that deployed via drop pod. He was expecting to receive my army on his doorstep in turn 1.....
He rolled a 6 to seize the initiative......
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The Ravenwing's attatched Whirlwind adjusted its targeting co-ordinates to zero in on the main compound. Just as the preliminary bombardment was about to begin, large bolts of blinding light sunk into the fragile rhino chassis of the whirlwind, tearing it apart. The green tanks of the enemy emerged from their hiding places and opened fire at the exposed bikers as they sped towards the town. Dispite their careful deployment and infiltration, the open desert is an exposed landscape, and their presence on Kei VI had on not gone un-noticed. A tactical squad crashed down from orbit amongst the ranks of the bikers, indicating a level of organisation the small detachment of ravenwing had not anticipated. The bikers surged forward, looking to meet this threat head-on....
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I was expecting the loss of first turn would hurt me. I lost the whirlwind, took heavy damage on a speeder squad (1 dead, stunned, shaken and typhoon launchers destroyed) and a wound off an attack bike. First blood to liam, but the whirlwind is cheap and expendable, so i wasn't too worried. I advanced. My melta bikes moved towards his empty rhinos, which were blocking my route to his lines. I think he was hoping for them to survive a turn. They didnt slow my advance and a hail of melta punched through smoke, armour and everything exploding them both, clearing the way and giving away 2 killpoints. 1 of my 2 functioning typhoon squads moved up and got a salvo of missiles away at the predator side armour destroying that, but traitor chronos jumped out and hid behind a hill!. i closed my 2 squads of flamer bikes around the drop pod squad and reduced it to about half strength. everything else moved max distance into empty space.
Liam, not really having any remaining width or mobility, moved his assault squad up and disembarked his command squad on the front line to meet the advancing bike squads. most things had no where to move, so opted to stay put, chronos went to ground behind a hill like the slimy trecherous scum that he is. second turn shooting saw a few bikers lost and the damaged speeder squad shaken this time. Cruicially none of my units were reduced in effectivness, losing only regular bikers and attack bike wounds. i must admit to making quite a few of my saves here, particularly the cover save on my speeder squad that moved fast. No assault so on to my turn. Melta bikes made hard work of the landraider, having to rely on the seargent's emergency combi-melta to finally get the job done. The typhoons on the right flank, encouraged by their cover-save heroics, and the biker plasma squad tore the command squad apart leaving only a wounded captain behind. The drop pod tac squad was reduced to 2 and then charged by 1 unit of bikes. the working typhoons and bike melta squad on the left moved up on the heavy plasma tac squad but a poor selection of dice rolls saw it only reduced to half strength.
At the top of turn 3, it was hard to see liam turning this one around. Having lost most of his hard hitting units i now outgunned, outnumbered and outmaneuvered him. Still, the assault marines were determined to make a difference moving up and opening fire, forcing a leadership test on the melta bikes on the right. I chose to fail, rolling a pathetic 5" on 3d6, but it was all i needed to get out of assault range and rally next turn.The heavy plasma tac squad fired pistol and melta and charged the remains on the left melta bikes and finished them off, consolidating towards the ruins in the centre of the board.
Turn 3 was a chance to press the advantage. My last melta bikes rallied and took out a couple of assault marines which the typhoons couldn't quite finish off and the plasma bikes took care of the captain. On the left flank, my captain's flamer squad swung round behind the central ruins killing the surviving members of the tac squad. The typhoons found time to pop the annoying deaathwind drop pod due to a lack of targets, and the single survivor from within was still locked in combat with an entire bike squad.
Liam had little left, but he battled bravely on. sustained fire on the damaged speeder squad saw another crash into the ground, but still one of the squadron remained.Chronos had been completely forgotten about by now, and was still cowering behind a hill! The assault marines on the right killed the last melta bikers with bursts from their plasma pistols, but that was to be it from the traitor marines as my final turn saw the crushing firepower of the typhoons and plasma bikes finish the remaining heretics and the combat was resolved at the bottom of the board (finally) leaving liam to accept defeat, forgetting about the traitor chronos who presumably escaped to plot his revenge.

This battle was a bit of a massacre really. I won by something like 10-3 killpoints at the end of turn 4. Sure, games like this happen. They are normally less than enjoyable and couldn't help feeling like my army was somehow too powerful. On the one hand i was really encouraged by how it performed. everything apart from the whirlwind caused heavy casualties, and the typhoons were just devestating. I felt sorry for Liam though, I don't like to win like that, i didn't really have to use any tactics, and my dice rolls were only slightly better than average, i think alot of it was down to the list. I could put out a much greater volume of firepower where and when i wanted each turn. Therefore guaranteeing that my primary targets were hit and destryoed when i needed them to be.
All i would consider changing in this list is swapping the whirlwind for more bikers!

All 2000 Points of ravenwing are built, based and sprayed. I tried out the vallejo black primer i recieved a few days ago, and its really good.
So the construction phase has taken just under 2 weeks, which i have to admit being proud of. Still, i have no intention of rushing the painting.
On that note, here is my first painted ravenwing biker:

Hey, just a quick update to show more detail of my Kor'sarro Khan conversion. I made this when i was debating whether to build my bike army as white scars. I decided not to, so now he's for sale.

I used some space wolf and warhammer fantasy parts to give him a more feral/mongol look and to emphasise his 'master of the hunt' status. I really like how he looks and my white scars were going to have a similar blend of parts to acheive the right look.
Unfortunately for the white scars, the look and personality of the ravenwing appealed to me more, so this Khan is now surplus to requirements.




Auction is here.