This is the first in a series of articles breaking down the Chapter Approved 2025-26 Tournament Companion Missions (which can be found here.)
Competitive missions, terrain, and scoring can feel overwhelming when you’re first stepping into tournaments. If you want a clear starting point, I’ve put together a full guide on getting started in competitive Warhammer 40K that explains which resources actually matter and how to use them.
In this article I will be looking at Mission A: Take and Hold on Tipping Point deployment. I’m going to go over the approved GW terrain layouts and how to approach this mission for each. The goal with this article is to give you the fundamental understanding of how to breakdown the mission, how to approach it tactically and how to prepare a gameplan for success. Let’s get into it!
Mission A: Take and Hold Primary, Tipping Point Deployment
Take and Hold is one of the more common missions in competitive 40K events as it is considered one of the most basic and fundamental of all the primary missions. Let’s first examine how this mission scores:
“Second Battle Round Onwards. When: End of the Command Phase (or the end of your turn if it is the fifth battle round and you are going second). The player whose turn it is scores 5 VP for each objective marker they control (to a maximum of 15 VP)”
Key takeaways:
- There are 5 Objective Markers on the battlefield
- Your Home Objective counts towards Primary Scoring
- The player going second has a big advantage to score maximum Primary at the end of the game (potentially swinging a score by as many as 25 points or more in the end of the game depending on Secondary draws)
Mission A: General Strategy
Take and Hold has 5 Objectives and your ability to control them, and the manner in which you will be able to do this, is largely influenced by the layout you will play on. In some layouts the expansion objectives (no-man’s land) are comfortably protected by terrain while in others, they are largely open within big firing lanes. Your home objective does count as one of the objectives you can control to gain Primary points, so you will need some manner to ensure you can hold this for the entirety of the game.
This particular mission gives the player going second a big advantage in the game as they will score at the bottom of the final turn and there is very little you may be able to do to respond or retaliate if you are on top of turn. This can often swing a game particularly in combination with good Secondary draws in the final turn by as many as 25 points or even more. Whether you go first or second will largely influence how you may have to approach this mission.
Going first may require you to be the aggressor especially to deny Primary scoring in the mid-game to make up for the big potential swing your opponent may have in the end-game. Holding your opponent to 5 points on Primary while maintaining scoring 10 points yourself consistently each round can help close the scoring gap. Consider if your opponent scores only 5 points on Primary in turns 2-4 and then the expected 15 points in the final turn, while you were able to score 10 per turn, the Primary score would then be 40-30 in your favor. And assuming in some of your turns you may not be able to prevent them from scoring 10+ on Primary, you can see how that end result can swing much closer on the final Primary scoring.
Going second gives you the advantage of being more reactive and responding to your opponent without overextending resources. Saving important scoring pieces to shift a big Primary score to 15 in the final battle round. While you should aim to score at least 10 per turn on Primary, you can afford a couple of 5 point Primary turns if it allows you to swing 15 in the end. You don’t have to go overly aggressive in response to your opponent early as you’re setting up resources to maximize your Primary scoring in the later turns and the end-game.
Mission A: Layout 1
Layout 1 is often considered the “melee map” because of it’s L-shape ruin configuration in the center which allows for pockets of fast melee units to stage. While that is certainly true, on Tipping Point that can be a bit more difficult because of the deployment configuration.
As far as objective placement, the middle of the board is exposed to a long firing lane from each player while being mostly protected from flanking fire because of those center ruins. Still yet, trying to stand in the center is often a futile prospect as it is essentially a death trap for shooting.
The objectives on either flank (north and south in no-man’s land) are largely exposed with only a small edge to really hide behind making them vulnerable positions to shooting from the opponent’s side of the table.
There are a few different ways to approach this mission on Layout 1. You can make a push towards the opponent’s natural expansion early to try to establish board control, while contesting the mid-board or you can shift to maneuvering most of your forces to defend your own natural expansion using the center ruins to protect them from shooting attacks as you stage. This is a good tactic especially if you have a lone op unit you can plant on your natural expansion in the mid-game after you’ve pushed out and cleared that side of the board from threats.
The middle of the battlefield is going to be a trading ground so you’re going to want to send cheap disposable units there early to block and screen while positioning shooting threats from the area around your home objective to pop out and shoot down that middle firing lane.
Going first on this map may require you to be more aggressive in pushing towards your opponent’s natural expansion while playing the flip-flop denial game on the middle and securing your own natural expansion. Don’t overextend but stage aggressively and force your opponent into bad positions where their units are in the open to either get onto the objective or charge you. Your goal here should ideally be keeping the middle flipped, pressing the opponent’s natural expansion and defending your own natural expansion by hiding in the edges when you can.
Going second, you can be more patient and respond to the opponent. You don’t have to force units onto expansion objectives or the middle early as you can play a reactive game. Scoring only 5 Primary points here on turns 2 and 3 is not going to hurt if you can gameplan around holding 2 expansion objectives and your home by the end of the game.
Mission A: Layout 2
Layout 2 has some pretty wide open shooting lanes especially across the mid-board coming from the diagonal position north-south. This makes holding onto expansion objectives to be very challenging as there aren’t a lot of places to hide on any no-man’s land objectives. There is a small corner of the north/south objectives that are tucked behind a ruin wall, but they are opposite of what would normally be a player’s “natural expansion” (the expansion closest to their own deployment zone.)
That said, the positioning of the north and south no-man’s land ruins creates an avenue where your units can maneuver behind cover to position onto those objectives so in this layout, those objectives shift to become your first “natural expansion” rather than the wider open ones closer to your deployment zone. Enabling a plan that prioritizes holding and defending those objectives while screening the mid-board seems to be the move. Defending that objective becomes challenging however as it is closer to the opponent’s deployment zone with a very narrow charging lane for fast assault units.
Considering the middle of the battlefield is almost entirely wide open for the enemy to draw firing lanes from multiple positions, you’re probably only pushing into that area with cheap units to score positional secondaries like Area Denial, Secure No Man’s Land or Establish Locus and, aside from screening behind the nearby wall, should avoid entering the mid-board except with the most durable of units or to counter assault units trying to gain positioning for your own home objective or your natural expansion.
Mission A: Layout 4
Much like layout 2, layout 4 also has a fairly open mid-board for drawing lines of fire. The difference here is that the natural expansion objectives closest to each deployment zone are defended with a wall to limit drawing line of sight. Meaning you can stage smaller units behind the ruin walls and hold objectives and be mostly safe from enemy firepower. The exception to this being those units that will flank or come around the edges. During deployment it’s best to position units tucked into the corner where the ruins meet to pop out and shoot away enemies that will attempt to move up the edge of the table to attack from behind the wall.
Again, like layout 2, the mid-field objective is wide open with no real room to press without being exposed. Baiting charges with cheap skirmish units then countering with shooting can be an effective means to set-up bad trades for the opponent in the mid-field. Similar to layout 2 you want to avoid this area unless you need to score those positional secondaries and even then, you want to engage them with the most expendable of units. That doesn’t mean the mid-field should be ignored. But you should be prepared to play a cat and mouse game in this layout with that mid-field objective as neither side will likely want to commit to that area until later in the game.
Mission A: Layout 6
Layout 6 has a similar design to layout 4, however the smaller ruin footprints are in the mid-field which creates a lot more spaces to maneuver and hide in no-man’s land. Similar to layout 2, we have the expansion objectives hidden mostly behind walls making the strategy similar to that layout in which you want to push up to protect your natural expansion objective with scoring units hiding behind the ruin wall. Again, like layout 2, the edges are a bit exposed here so the counter-play strategy is much the same.
The mid-field objective is again wide open so putting units out there becomes very dangerous, but the smaller ruins on either side of it make staging counter-charge threats and even shooting threats to draw angles possible. Diagonal to the mid-field objective are two larger ruin pieces with walls perfect to stage behind to push into the mid-board area and this is likely where you’ll be pushing some of your harder hitting melee pieces to move to attack the mid-field objective and your opponent’s natural expansion.
Most of that action here is going to happen on the outer edges along the long-board edges and along the mid-board. Setting up units to sit those natural expansion objectives and shooting/melee threats to counter the enemy’s inevitable attacks there is needed while being able to push those long-board edges yourself.
Mission A: Layout 7
Layout 7 is quite different from all the others in that it provides a lot of ruins along no-man’s land to stage from to launch both charges and position for firing lanes. Because of the way the ruins are laid out, it makes maneuvering Monster and Vehicle units a little cumbersome however as there is limited space to move them making their positioning somewhat predictable in deployment. You’re obviously going to position to hide and move while being able to gain maximum advantage for firing lanes and your opponent is probably going to recognize this. Meaning they can deploy anti-tank options early without revealing too much information for other crucial units.
This layout really favors more infantry builds especially fast ones like World Eaters, Blood Angels and Aeldari who can avoid being shot hiding behind ruin walls along no-man’s land and rush out to get where they need to in order to attack your expansion objectives. Screening these areas of the board is vital.
The mid-board objective is very much exposed here with easy staging from opposing ruin walls on either side of it while leaving plenty of shooting lanes for units on the north/south ends to engage. This plays more into the cat and mouse game of controlling the mid-board with each player attempting to leverage and position to take the better end of trading.
Mission A: Layout 8
Layout 8 is similar to 7 only instead of having big ruin walls in no-man’s land to stage from, we have the smaller 2″ ruin areas along the middle of no-man’s land. These are closer to the mid-board objective but it is not very easily protected. Units can still stage behind the footprints of the 2″ walled ruins entirely however and have plenty of room to react to threats along the mid-field, however attacking the opponent’s natural expansion becomes a bit more difficult.
It’s important to note that the ruins on either player’s natural expansion are pressed right up along the board edge making those easier to defend against flanking attacks. This means units tend to gravitate more towards the middle of the battlefield and again Monsters and Vehicles may have predictable movement patterns on this map.
Deployment for Mission A
Deployment is crucial to a successful game plan. You need to assess your opponent’s army and protect your biggest threats. Do they want to charge you early? Can you use infiltrating units to move block and control no-man’s land? What units are going to hold your home objective? Which expansion objective do you plan to hold from Turn 2 onward?
Your deployment should have all of these factors in mind while being able to adapt as needed as the game progresses. Positioning key units to both hold your objectives and protect them from enemy threats is critical. Remember it isn’t enough for your opponent to keep you off objectives. They also need to sit on them too. So positioning melee units and shooting units to respond is critical in both how you will attack your opponent’s objectives and defend your own.
Pitfalls to Avoid in Mission A
It is not necessary to score 15 victory points every single turn. Ideally you want to position to score 10 every turn meaning holding your home objective and one other in no-man’s land. Even if you’re going first you don’t want to overextend and expose your entire army on the first turn. Use your movements to stage to respond to threats, defend your chosen expansion and protect your home field. You will have to play more aggressively in many cases if you are going first to leverage the expected 15 point Primary scoring swing from the opponent at the end of battle round 5, but you don’t want to play so aggressively that your opponent can just blow you off the board either. Leverage your turns to deny Primary to the opponent as much as possible.
If you’re going second in this mission, you can play far more passively to protect your units. Staging and positioning is important for your late game units to ensure they can get onto the three objectives you’ll need in the end to swing the Primary in the final battle round.
Final Thoughts
While simple in its Primary scoring mechanic, Mission A can be one of the most challenging missions in the Chapter Approved 2025-26 Mission Pack. Leveraging resources and knowing how to play both when having first turn and second turn is critical to success. Your game plan for this mission changes depending on your position in the battle round. Having a plan for deployment, staging and holding your objectives is necessary for a successful strategy for the mission. You need to have a plan to hold your home objective and at least one other every battle round while threatening the opponent’s position on the battlefield.
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