Howl at the Moon: a Chaos vs Space Wolves Battle Report

The Space Wolves and a detachment of Imperial Guard held a relatively worthless piece of rock; worthless but for the altar to the Ruinous Powers that laid abandoned there.  The forces of the Emperor intended to deprive the denizens of Chaos from having it.  The Chaos Marines and their Daemon allies hadn't come to recapture the altar, however; their goal was simply to reactivate it, by spilling as much blood as possible.

J and I played a 1850 pt game that rolled out to be a kill point game with diagonal deployment.

My army (dubbed "Love in the Time of Typhus") was roughly thus:
 CSM
   - Typhus (warlord)
   - plague marines, plague zombies, rhino
   - noise marines, thousand sons    
   - raptors, spawn
   - obliterators
 Daemons
   - Keeper of Secrets
   - daemonettes
   - flesh hounds
   - soul grinder

J's forces, as best I can remember:
 Space Wolves
   - Bran Redmaw (warlord)
   - 2 squads of grey hunters, rhino
   - lone wolf, wolf scouts
   - thunderwolf cavalry, fenrisian wolves
 Imperial Guard
   - command squad
   - 2 platoons (each with junior officer squad and combined 20-man squad with heavy weapons)
   - Guardsman Marbo
   - leman russ tank

I'll give communicae like "tweets" - brief bursts that give episodes of the battle:

* Chaos fires first.  The soul grinder, obliterators, and noise marines all target the enemy rhino and those grey hunters that stumble from the exploding wreckage of it.
* IG platoons lay continuous suppressing fire with autocannons and lascannons, aided by the leman russ tank, but with limited effectiveness.
* T-Wolf Cavalry suffer sonic attacks and are assaulted by 5 ogre-spawn. One spawn dies but they kill the wolf riders.
* The lone wolf fiercely charges the Keeper of Secrets, lightning claws out, howling with rage, but the greater daemon and his concubine are too quick. The daemon bride keeps his head to practice her kissing technique.
* The pack of flesh hounds creep through woods and leap through a ruined wall, assaulting 20 guardsmen.  A handful of guardsmen die but they kill the hounds in two rounds of combat.
* The soul grinder's phlegm bombardment launches large blasts of deadly, suffocating goo into the massed soldiers.

* A squad of Grey Hunters outflank by Redmaw's command behind the ruins housing the noise marines and obliterators. They trade shots with the chaos units, then charge the noise marines.  After two rounds of combat the hunters prove victorious, only to be assaulted by plague zombies in the final turns of the game.  The last two hunters takes some zombies with them, then feed the rest with their atrophied brains.  (hehe, space wolves are dumb...)
* Guardsman Marbo appears behind the soul grinder and flings his explosive charge over a smoke stack on its ass.  The soul grinder takes several hits to the rear but miraculously survives the entire battle, continuing to push forward and fire his heavy weapons.  The daemonic machine loses two hull points and its harvester cannon, but never returns to the warp.
* Marbo fires his poisonous ripper pistol at new targets and was so damn stealthy that he survived twin-linked plasmagun shots from the obliterators high above (rolled two 6s to make open-ground stealth saves!)
* Wolf scouts outflank behind the soul grinder and attack it too, doing little to no damage.  They are then torn apart by obliterator assault cannons.
* The raptors leap over a building, flame one of the already battle-weary guardsmen squads, and attack.  They win the combat and perform a sweeping advance, killing around 15 men without taking any losses.
* On the IG's turn, the remaining squad lights up the raptor squad with a mass of lasers and autocannon shells, killing them three times over.

* Bran Redmaw and his pack of 15 fenrisian wolves arrive by outflanking near the guard platoons.  He immediately releases a howl and transforms.
* Typhus twice curses Redmaw with diseases, once with -1 to S and T, once with a cloud of flies that reduces the whole unit's Attacks by1 but gives them an improved cover save.
* The Redmaw and his pack assault the daemonettes and slaughter them.
* The Thousand Sons position and fire into Redmaw's back, inflicting one wound.
* The rhino (which also some how manages to survive the whole battle) pulls up and drops its stinking load: Typhus and his plague marines.  The rhino is shaken when its riders get out so they cannot fire weapons.  They and the ogre-spawn charge the werewolf and his pack.  The plague marine champ challenges to allow Typhus to work his disease magic and kill wolves.  The wolves are wiped out (eaten) by the ogre-spawn but the plague champ never gets to swing his power sword -- the werewolf tears him in half too quickly.  Typhus also has no targets by Initiative 1 and so does nothing.
* Typhus and Redmaw go into challenge with the plague marines and spawn watching on.  Redmaw gambles on a Smash attack, making half as many attacks at twice his strength, thus inflicting instant death.  Typhus is slammed about by the monstrous wolf-beast and killed before he can counter attack with his daemonic scythe.  Redmaw wins again!
* In the final clash of titans, the Keeper of Secrets joins the combat, challenged by Redmaw (who prefers not to have the plague marines and spawn also attacking him).  The Keeper and his concubine accept.  The combat lasts two rounds, both down to a single wound in the second round.  The Daemon's speed proves the deciding factor and the werewolf is skinned as a fur coat for Cassandra.  The battle is over and this world becomes a portal to the Warp that will flood this sector for centuries to come.

Recalculating the final tally:  The Imperial forces had 5 kill points, plus Slay the Warlord and Linebreaker (marbo) for 7 Victory Points.  The powers of Chaos had 9 kill points plus Slay the Warlord and First Blood (rhino) for 11 Victory Points.  Chaos wins this battle, but the war goes on...