Sixth Battle - VS 1750 Sisters of Battle

My IG opponent from the other day decided to use Sisters of Battle this time against my GKs. We brainstormed and came up with the following background story (we had to borrow a little from Ben Counter's novel: Grey Knight):

An Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor Lord requisitioned the services of a large force of SoB to secure pieces of an ancient artifact. He said that the Enemy has sent a potent force of traitor marines to do likewise. Unbeknownst to the Sisters, the IL went rogue and is already serving the ruinous powers (actually fitting coz my buddy is putting together his new chaos army LOL). GM Rivan is leading his GKs to secure the ancient pieces to bring back to Malleus sages. He told his men that it is unfortunate that the rogue IL has tricked the noble Sisters into doing his evil work but such is the way of the enemy. There will be no quarter given, the mission for the emperor supercedes everything else!

1750 Sisters of Battle
HQ - IL w/ PW and inferno pistol; 3 veteran guardsmen
HQ - Canoness w/ cloak of St Aspira, blessed weapon, bolt pistol, mantle of Ophelia, jump pack, melta bombs
ELITES - Eversor assassin
ELITES - 3 death cult assassins
ELITES - 3 death cult assassins
TROOPS - Sister superior w/ 9 SoB (1 flamer)
TROOPS - Sister superior w/ 9 SoB (1 flamer)
TROOPS - Sister superior w/ 9 SoB (1 flamer)
FA - Sister superior w/ eviscerator, melta bombs + 9 seraphim (2 twin hand flamers)
FA - Sister superior w/ PW, melta bombs + 9 seraphim (2 twin hand flamers)
HS - Immolator w/ TWL multi-melta
HS - Sister superior + 4 Retributors (4 HBs)

My standard 1750 GK List
HQ - GM Rivan w/ m-c nfw, p/c, psychic hood, SI & hammerhand + 3 GKTs (1 p/c)
ELITES - BC Olorin w/ p/c + 3 GKTs (1 p/c)
TR - 6 PAGKs (targeter) --Squad Armael
TR - 6 PAGKs (targeter, incinerator, melta bombs) -- Squad Raguiel
TR - 6 PAGKs (incinerator, melta bombs) -- Squad Uriel
HS - LR Sanctus Fidelis w/ EA, DB & SL
HS - LR Draco Tempestus w/ EA, DB & SL

Mission: Seize ground Deployment: DoW
My opponent elected first turn. The terrain was set up as pictured...

After we both deployed our forces, the board looked like so...the green markers represent the 3 objectives. The canoness is the silver model on the rocks near the trees.

Turn 1
His canoness jumped to the trees and both SoB squads moved forward through difficult terrain. His retributor squad moved in from his board edge right behind the center terrain. Another SoB squad, as well as the eversor and all the DC's moved in near his left corner. His IL and retinue moved in right into the stone-henge like rocks in his right corner. None of his units had range due to moving so there was no shooting. I can already foretell my opponent is going to try to overwhelm my right flank but I can't predict yet where the seraphim will deploy.
D.T. moved in from my left corner. S.F. moved in from the center. Squad Olorin moved in from my right corner. Both Rivan and Squad Armael moved a little forward. I passed all my night fighting rolls and commenced shooting. Squad Olorin fired on the SoB in front of them and killed 3. Squad Armael and S.F. fired on the middle SoB squad and killed 3 as well. The board looked like so after my movement phase:

...unfortunately, at this point, my camera went dead (I forgot to charge it )
Turn 2
One of his seraphim squads came in and he said they were deepstriking. I said what?!? I asked since when can they deepstrike? He said since 5th ed. and showed me page 52 of the small rulebook. Wow, I totally didn't know that...so this was a real curve ball for me...oh well...
The seraphim wanted to deepstrike right in front of Squad Armael but scattered onto the terrain b/w Squad Armael and Squad Olorin and ended up losing 1 model. The canoness jumped to the middle SoB squad and joined them. The 2nd SoB squad continued to advance towards Squad Olorin. The rest of his forces (the IL, all the assassins and the 3rd SoB squad) moved and ran forward. The seraphim used divine guidance and unloaded everything they had on Squad Olorin. Thankfully, he didn't roll any 6's but I still had to roll a lot of armor saves and luckily made them all. The middle squad fired on Squad Armael but didn't do anything.
On my turn, Squad Armael and Squad Olorin both moved towards the seraphim. Both D.T. and S.F. pivoted and selected their targets. Squad Armael and Olorin concentrated fire on the seraphim, killing 3 while D.T. and Rivan fired on the middle SoB squad w/ the canoness, killing 4. S.F. shot everything at the eversor and vaporized it. Armael and Olorin assaulted the seraphim squad who invoked spirit of the martyr (giving them 3+ invulnerables). I only managed to kill 3 while Squad Armael lost 1 GK. They passed their leadership and used hit and run to jump right beside S.F. Armael consolidated a few inches towards S.F. while Olorin stayed in terrain.
Turn 3
His other seraphim squad came in and wanted to deepstrike in front of Squad Armael again but scattered on top of his other seraphim squad. A roll on the mishap table resulted in "misplaced" and I put them on the hill towards my opponent's right corner (where most of his units moved in from). The resulting dangerous terrain rolls killed 3 seraphim The canoness detached from the SoB squad moved 12" towards Rivan while the SoB squad stayed put. The SoB squad in front of Olorin advanced while the DC's and 3rd SoB squad continued to move and run. The canoness fired her bolt pistol before charging into Rivan while the 3 remaining SoB's in the middle fired on Squad Armael. The other SoB squad rapid fired on Squad Olorin and again they make all their saves. In the assault phase, the canoness makes all her 2+ invulnerable saves (due to spirit of the martyr) except for one. Normally, she'd be insta-killed but she has the mantle of ophelia w/c lets her ignore one instant kill result once during the game and she takes 1 wound instead. She in turn, kills 2 GKTs. The seraphim superior automatically hits S.F. w/ a melta bomb, penetrates and rolls a 1! My opponent is beside himself since he really, really wants to destroy at least 1 LR LOL.
I moved D.T. onto terrain and disembarked Squad Uriel. Squad Raguiel disembarked from S.F. before S.F. backed up 6". D.T. and squad Uriel fire on the 3 remaining SoB in the middle and killed them all. Squad Raguiel assaults the 3 remaining seraphim (who invokes spirit of the martyr again) and kills 2 while losing 2 GKs. The seraphim superior use hit and run again to detach and moved right behind S.F. again. Squad Olorin assaults the SoB in front of them and wipes them out and consolidates back into terrain. Squad Armael had fired on one of the DC's and (epic fail!) caused only 1 wound. Rivan and his last bodyguard dispatches the canoness with an instant kill hit (she missed one 2+ save).
Turn 4
His immolator finally comes in and moves cruising speed right by the retributors, who move 6" towards the tank and embarks. The IL moves on top of the hill terrain beside the trees. The assassins, SoB squad, seraphim squad all move forward and run. The lone seraphim superior, needing a 4+ to hit S.F. w/ a melta-bomb, succeeds but rolls two 1's and doesn't penetrate, again LOL.
D.T. moves 12" and faces the immolator, shoots it and manages to stun. Rivan shoots the immolator and actually destroys it. Squad Uriel kills off the lone seraphim superior. Squad Raguiel moves towards S.F. and Squad Armael moves towards the closest objective (lower right hand corner). S.F. moves 12" and picks up Squad Raguiel, fires a LC shot at 1 DC but she makes her save.
Turn 5
The seraphim and SoB's make it close enough to pour all their shots into Squad Olorin who finally loses 1 GKT. 5 of the death cults make into assault and Squad Olorin kills 2 while making 4 invulnerable saves!
Squad Uriel claims 1 objective and they and Rivan both shoot at the IL and kill all his henchmen. The IL decides to fail Ld and falls back (my opponent said the IL is being true to fluff and is leaving the SoB's to their faith...) S.F. moves 12" right over the objective, pops smoke and disembark Squad Raguiel who shoots the seraphim and assaults them, killing all but one (and losing 2 GKs). Squad Armael claims the 2nd objective and shoots and kills the unengaged DC. In the assault phase, the DC's take down the BC and another GKT. The remaining GKT kills one DC and makes his armor save for losing combat.

My opponent rolls a 2 and the game ends. GK - 2 SoB - 0 Victory for the GKs!

My opponent had opted for the strategy of pouring all his forces into mine to overwhelm my position, thus he didn't even claim the objective in his own deployment zone. When my left flank was secure (after the canoness was killed and the immolator was destroyed), I knew I had the game. What really worked for me was having 2 very tough units on each flank. Rivan and retinue dealt with the canoness while Olorin and his GKTs held the other flank against a tide of foes. What was funny was my opponent really had a miserable time with his dice rolls. We joked that it was because he was already working on a chaos army and he lost his mojo for his Sisters LOL. He said and I quote: "I can't believe how your GKTs can survive that many shots! I've never encountered such a durable army. One of these days though, I will get at least one of your LRs!"

I love your battle reports, keep them coming brother!

Well done again Brother Rivan! I am very pleasantly surprised that you can get in so many awesome games, and provide such interesting and detailed batreps! Love the fluff; just like Ben Counters novel Except the Grey Knights simply had to exterminate them this time, a much bloodier battle.

Hmm, so Rivan's Force Weapon didn't "out right" kill her Cannones? I thought that it even wiped out those with eternal warrior. Or were you just being nice?

On the other hand, your Grey Knight Terminators really held strong throughout the battle! Splitting your two main forces and supplementing them was a great move; shame that the tainted Inquisitor lord managed to escape, but we can't get'em all right away

No Landraiders will feed taint today Keep up the awesome battles!!!

Geez, Rivan. Your'e gonna cleanse the entire system all by yourself. Nicely done. It's good to see a pure GK force can be more than just competitive. Once again, another great batrep.

Nausaden: the Cannoness had a wargear item that downgrades the first insta-kill wound she takes in a game to a normal wound only. Without it she definitely would have been toast.

And...Sisters of Battle are all immune to force weapons!

A few more lessons learned for me that I want to share with everyone...(just in case anybody else didn't know it)

-all units w/ jump packs can deep strike (as long as their codex doesn't say otherwise; eg. the Witchhunters codex actually says the seraphim follow the rules for jump packs as stated in the rulebook...)
-when you have enemy models positioned right at your vehicles, you can still pivot your vehicle. The models will have to be physically moved out of the way first and then put back in their original position (small rulebook p. 63). I once saw a player try to prevent his opponent's vehicle from pivoting by surrounding it with infantry models...this may have been the case in 4th ed but obviously not now in 5th ed.

Ah, thank you Brother Nemesis for clarifying that for me! I wasn't entirely sure how that worked.

Sisters? Immune to the allmighty Force weapons? *GASP*

Very cool notes Brother Rivan; I am going to memorize that pivot trick