Friday 14 November 2014

Blog Wars 8 1850pt battle report game 2 - nids vs Grey Knights/White Scars

Sam Georgiou was up next, Josh's gaming buddy. He had Grey Knights, with White Scar Allies. I haven't really played against Grey Knights since PeteB got rid of his. If you recall PeteB often ran two Dreadknights so I should have been a little more prepared but I've probably forgotten much of my tactics.

Psychic Powers
Winged Tyrant Tervigon Plain TrTervigon Miasma
Warp BlastThe HorrorOnslaught
CatalystDominionDominion
Dominion



The low down:
  • Game 2 - The Emperor's Relic with Vanguard deployment
  • I won deployment and went first
  • Warlord Trait - Deathleaper has Mindeater - +2VP for every IC slain in a challenge
  • Night fighting turn 1.
Unfortunately I forgot to take pictures until after turn 1 so you'll have to make do with the following description of the action. I was lucky in that our board had plenty of ruins so I had plenty of options to deploy the Genestealers successfully.  However Sam set up a unit of bikes in the right hand ruins, denying me access to the far right one but seemed to miss the fact the one further into his DZ had a first floor, so I deployed a unit there. 2 Broods were in the centre ruin and Deathleaper was to Deep Strike. In my turn 1 the Flyrant swooped towards the bikes that are shown driving off to the left. Brainleech worms did some significant wounds and Sam tanked them on the Space Marine captain who promptly failed his saves, died and gifted me First Blood!

My objective was in the Cathedral, surrounded by a brood of Stealers. I moved the Tervigons forwards hoping to push towards Sam's objective and reinforce the middle one I already owned. I foolishly forgot to spawn more gaunts. in fact thanks to trying to cast Warp Blast I forgot a number of things as because it's a Witchfire you automatically think you're in the Shooting Phase and carry on shooting and miss elements from a previous phase. I spread out my gaunts hoping to cut off the bikers that were trying to flank me and sneak for my objective.


I also deployed a brood in the cathedral in the centre of the board, with the centre objective [I only put one Stealer down as it was difficult to get my hand in].


Sam's objective was behind this hill.


Sam then decamped from the ruins and headed for his own objectives, moving the Dreadknight backwards to deal with the Stealers in his DZ...


which he promptly did by roasting them alive.


Bye, bye Linebreaker.


The Carnifex managed to do some damage to the dreadknight.


But was clearly punished for it's temerity, even with Catalyst and it's Feel No Pain. Honestly, all the hops you have to jump through to get the power and then it doesn't flippin' work!


Deathleaper arrives turn 2 and smashes open the Cathedral doors.


Shooting at Draigo and his Grey Knights but doing little. He then closes the doors and waits.


I charge the Genestealers into the Dreadknight, but can't bring myself to throw in the Tervigon too as I'm convinced it'll just get pummelled taking the Termagants with it. As a troop I need to keep him safe but this may have been a tactical error as the Stealer fail to capitalise on their weight of attacks on the charge.


With the Tervigon and some spawned gaunts holding the centre objective the Stealer brood  sally forth and assault the Terminators, one Grey Knight falls to the ultimate assault creature


3 Genestealers fall to the chopping Halberds and Hammers [sounds like an RPG]!


The second unit of Knights drop in behind my line, Sam went bold and only deviated a couple of inches, sadly no mishap and Interceptor on my Quad Gun does nothing


Unfortunately they can't really see anything to shoot so I get a healthy cover save meaning my Stealer remain intact while the second blob of gaunts head behind the Bastion to reinforce my objective and bubble wrap against the Paladins.


The other gaunts spread wide but that dreadknight can jump so they won't stop it, then again I probably should have charged and locked it in combat but I was trying to make a wide screen offering options to all three objectives.


Bikers and Assault Bikes multi-assault my termagants locking them in combat.

I do a couple of wounds but suffer a few dead and remain locked.


Dreadknight and stealer continue to play patty-cake, then the brood of three Hit & Run towards the locked Terminators leaving space for the Tervigon to move in next turn.


Deathleaper eventually joins this assault, challenges, Draigo accepts takes all six S6 rending attacks on his armour and then smears Deathleaper across the Cathedral walls [ultimate assassin creature my a$$]


The last Stealer is chopped to pieces too and the unit consolidates.


Th Stealer Brood from my objective charge the Paladins, losing 2 Stealers to 1 Paladin :(


Hive Guard join the 2 remaining stealers who are splatted, but the added bulk of the Hive Guard prevails


And the Dreadknight finally falls while the other brood attacks Draigo's unit who are more than happy to take them on thanks to their psychic powers and Apothecary.


I'd debated long and hard where to send this Tervigon, with time running out we didn't have enough turns from to reach Sam's objective with spawning gaunts so I sent the tervigon to shore up my own objective and spawn more gaunts round it and landed the Flyrant to capture Sam's but although he survived some Multimelta fire, lost full control of the objective by the contesting bikes. Draigo [as a uber-scoring unit in BW8] contested the centre objective so my objective was where the final showdown would take place. The Dreadknight wisely disregarded the Tervigon and managed to roast all but two Termagants holding my objective. The Dreadknight charges and out of it's 5 monstrous attacks manages to kill just one of the valiant defenders. Unbelievably I've won 7:2 ... except I haven't yet, we forgot Hammer of Wrath so Sam rolls and unsurprisingly wounds. If I make my Armour Save I've won... that would a 6 I need then... doh!


So the final score was 17:2, 15 + Slay the Warlord and Linebreaker for Sam and First Blood and Linebreaker for me. This was a great game, Sam was very Tactical throughout, which given the limited units he had to secure/contest/defend three objectives he did amazingly. I was utterly let down by the psychic phase and Deathleaper in particular. Seriosusly, Deathleaper only had to take one wound off Draigo with six attempts and couldn't do it, pathetic! Once again the Stealers were the most pivotal units. even if they did very little it was them holding units at bay or being the first turn targets in Sam's DZ which meant he wasn't advancing and picking on my bigger more valuable scoring



9 comments:

  1. A suitably epic battle that literally came down to the last dice roll! I was never likely to push you off the centre objective, but this really could have gone either way for the other two. Your Flyrant managed to kill the troop bikers lurking to steal my objective back off him in the last turn as well, but then it was only a couple of inches away from being vulnerable to your spawned termagants as well.

    Brilliant game overall and you were a fantastic opponent to play against.

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    1. Indeed it was a great game and I can't feel too bad because it was so close. One or two dice rolls in it, not to mention the game was just fun and tactically interesting too so if there's any way to lose then that's the way. Of course you won so you get to enjoy it even more ;)

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  2. Epic battle! Nice report, nids looking great as always. I wouldn't feel bad about draigo...he is a freaking super beast. I've never seen him not do nasty things in games. In the fluff daemons are scared of him....

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    1. It was just the inability of Deathleaper to take that last wound. I think I'll look at an alternative Special Character for the next one. He's had two chances at Blog Wars and failed probably 5 out of 6 games. So it'll either be the Swarmlord in a Tyrrannocyte or Old One Eye...

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  3. Sheesh that was a close one :). Great battle. I faced Sam next and was surprised how tough a small model count army like his was to face against, and it was super manouverable. Shame about deathleaper. Looks like he didnt leap high enough :D

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    1. He'll definitely be resigned to the digestion pits until the foreseeable future, or at least until I get the actual model.

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  4. Interesting to see you using stealers Dave, with the return of pods I was thinking that stealers might be worth a look at as you don't need snyp with them .

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    1. personally I see the return of pods making this formation a little bipolar. On the one hand you're able to drop synapse in nearby to make them Fearless. You're essentially parking the stealers for first turn, they can't assault and can only weather the storm. If a pod with Warriors, Tyrant or Zoies arrives turn 2 that makes them even tougher and they can assault the units that would otherwise hammer the deep strikers and then hopefully survive for them all to pile in.

      However, with the pods you don't really need the stealers because you can get in your opponents face with something else, that may be cheaper, more effective and possibly more durable. One of the Lictor Formations may be an alternative because they deploy in a similar fashion but also mean your pods come down exactly on target. There are so many options now it's a little bewildering if I'm honest. i was only just getting to play with the Leviathan stuff now it's crazy. Definitely worth a try though as Stealers are really cheap to get hold of and most everybody has loads anyway so well worth running. i just wish I could find those missing 11!

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    2. I'm wondering if the arrival of this new gigantic sized broodlord means the stealers are getting a new formation to buff them up. I could see them getting a ork kommando style formation. Ambush + shrouded + rerollable cover saves the turn they come on. That would make them a ridiculous threat.

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