Crushed!

The unbeaten streak is over. It was fun while it lasted, but Marty made sure it ended with a bang.

We met at the Bunker with 2000 pts each. I was stretching it since I haven't painted anything in a while, so a couple extra Dark Reapers and warlock along with some questionable upgrades to my dependable 1700 pt list and I was ready to go. Marty took what I consider to be one of the best 2000 pt Marine lists around:

Commander in terminator armour with bodyguard with 2 assault cannons
Librabrian with terminator armour
2 land speeders with assault cannon and heavy bolter each
Venerable dreadnought, fire support pattern
3 Tactical squads, 10 men, las-plas combo
1 Assault squad
2 Dev squads with 4 missile launcher

Some mobility, tons of firepower. He deployed in an excellent defensive position with lanes of fire covering all approaches and sat back and shot anything he could see.

I on the other hand made lots of little mistakes that doomed me not only to defeat, but utter destruction:
- suggested 2000 pt game that I don't have the models for
- forgot to deploy pathfinders so they had to walk on the table from reserves
- decided to attack wrong flank with vehicles
- split my forces
- deployed dark reapers such that they were in range of assault cannons turn 1

By the end of turn 2 things were grim and by the turn 3-4 it was obvious it was a lost cause, so I made it my mission to try and kill the space marine commander, but the fates were against me and I failed to do that even.

By the end of the game, I had killed 6 infantry and 2 land speeders. In exchange my entire army was dead except the two warp spiders and one pathfinder that ran off the board.

Ouch.

Side note: Fury of the Ancients causes pinning on any squad it hits even if it fails to kill a model?! WTF? Not even indirect fire from a Basilisk or Defiler has that ability, but if some stupid D3 shot psychic power fries a plant beside my squad they must do a pinning check? Give me a f***ing break. No I'm not bitter, not at all.

Analysis:
What more is there to say that I didn't say above? In hindsight flanking around the other side such that one of his fire positions (dev, tac squad, and dreadnought) was in the way blocking line of sight of the other (dev, tac squad, assault marines) might have given me a chance to actually get units into combat where I might have been able to swing the battle more to my favour.

Also, I should have vetoed Cleanse. Its one mission that allows the enemy to really get in great position for shooting and unlike Cityfight, there was not enough terrain to advance behind to negate the firing lanes effectively. Take and Hold, which we rolled first but Marty vetoed, would have been more to my favour. Smart move on his part.

Ah well, I knew the streak was going to end someday. Better to lose to an awesome general than in some close game where the dice betray me.