July Event Game #2: Tyranids vs Imperial Guard 1500pts

Our monthly event for July was a "Welcome to 6th" event.  Players were allowed to bring up to 3 different 1500pt armies to try out as many of the new rules as possible.  Allies, fortifications, and player set terrain were all in use.  Prize support was raffled off randomly at the end to discourage WAAC lists/behavior for the first event under the new rules.

My second opponent was Konrad (Political Officer Krad from Death or Glory), also my first opponent's brother.

His list:

HQ

Company Command Squad(Power Fist, Med-Pack, Standard,Vox, Plasma Gun) + Chimera

Fast

Vendetta Gunship

Troops

Vets 1 ( 3Plasma Guns, Grenadiers, Power Fist) + Chimera

Vets 2 ( 3 Meltas, Demolitions, Power Fist) (In Vendetta)

Infantry Platoon

Command Squad (Vox, Power Sword, Commissar, Power Sword, Standard)

5 Infantry Squads (2 Commissars, 7 Power Swords, 2 Vox, 3 Flamers, 2 Grenade Launchers)

Heavy Weapons Squad (3 Lascannons)

Heavy Weapons Squad (3 Missile Launchers)

Special Weapons Squad (3 Sniper Rifles)

Special Weapons Squad (3 Grenade Launchers)

I actually brought 2 lists and I decided to try the more diverse one for this game.

My list:
Tyranid Prime (warlord) + whip/sword, toxins, regen (bio)
Tyrant + wings, devourers, old adversary, regen
Hive Guard x3
Zoanthropes x3 (all telekenesis this game)
Termagants x30 (warlord here)
Tervigon + claws, toxins, 3 powers (bio), cluster spines
Raveners x6 + rending
Shrikes x3 + whip/sword, toxins

The mission was The Emperor's Will and deployment was Hammer/Anvil.  We set up the terrain and I took the first turn.  I don't recall warlord traits so I think they were inconsequential.  Zoans get crush x2, dome x2, shockwave, and the rest primaris.  Tyrant gets iron arm.  Tervigon gets endurance and enfeeble.

There's the swarm.  My one objective (skyfire nexus from mysterious objectives) is just on the other side of the wall between raveners and zoans.

Konrad's guard closest to furthest: blob in front, PCS in back.  Plasma vets in the chimera.  Big blob in the middle with missile team up top.  Snipers in the black ruin.  In the furthest ruin is another blob, lascannon team, and the CCS in their chimera.  Melta/demo vets are in the vendetta reserved.  Guard fail to seize.

Tyrant gets endurance and  two zoans pop the tk dome.  Tervigon spits out 17 gaunts with doubles who move into the lower right ruin (also within 3" of my objective).  Everything except the spawned gaunts advances.  The tyrant guns down the lascannon team (first blood).

Nothing in the guard army moves.  He issues bring it down and FRFSRF twice.  My tyrant survives the fusillade and passes all grounding tests.  I lose 1 ravener and 1 termagant.

Tyrant gets endurance again.  Zoans save their power for crushes (which totally sucks IMO).  The swarm advances but the tervigon gets poor terrain rolls.  Shrikes advance in the open to help provide target saturation.  Tyrant swoops over the central blob and puts himself closest to their commissar.  

Love that raveners can move 12" now and ignore terrain.  Hive guard wiff against the plasma vet chimera.  Zoanthropes attempt crushes on the missile teams but do nothing.  Tyrant open up into the blob killing six or so including their commissar.

Raveners assault the closest blob, taking 40 (ish?) overwatch shots, striking last, and still mowing down a dozen or so guardsmen.  Their commissar is still in there though so we lock.

The vendetta does not arrive.  The PCS next to the ravener melee moves out but gets poor terrain rolls.  The far side wipes out the shrikes.  Stuff in the middle tries to ground the tyrant again but I pass my tests.  At some point my tervigon takes a perils and one wound from shooting.  Raveners finish the nearest blob in assault.

The tyrant pivots and swoops to get rear shots on the CCS (warlord) chimera.   Raveners move on the PCS.  Tervigon leads the prime's blob across the middle.  Tervigon gets endurance and I forget to use tk dome on the zoans.

In the backfield the spawned blob holds my objective, hive guard are at table center, and the rest of the prime's blob stays back in case my objective is threatened.

Hive guard wreck the plasma vet chimera via hull points and the unit is pinned.  The tyrant also wrecks the CCS chimera via hull points and they pin, but pass with the reroll from the banner.

The tervigon assaults the central blob (lost their commissar).  The raveners assault the PCS and wipe them out.  The tervigon takes a wound and kills a couple guardsmen, but we lock.

The vendetta arrives in my back corner but the unit stays onboard.  The vendetta wipes out the zoanthropes.

The backfield guard try to down the tyrant again but I pass my grounding tests.  The tervigon melee continues.

I send the raveners after the plasma vets now.

The tyrant glides down to shoot and assault the CCS (warlord).

In my backfield, I pull the spawned unit into cover and the prime's blob back into scoring range (objective is behind the wall).  Hive guard hit the flyer once but fail to damage it.  The tyrant wipes out the CCS with shooting.

Ravaners take a couple wounds from overwatch but I put the wounded models in the back of the unit so I don't have to pull one.  However, the plasma vets kick butt in assault with 5 regular wounds and a couple from the str6 fist.  I'm now out of synapse and one surviving model falls back.  Tervigon and blob continue to bang on each other.  The blob fails morale and falls back.

Melta/demo vets jump out and kill 6 or so gaunts.

Plasma vets come up to finish the last ravener.  The central blob rallies and forms up.  He focuses fire on the tervigon and knocks it down to 1 wound.  The far side focuses on the tyrant also knocking it down to 1 wound.

This will be the last turn due to time.  Spawned gaunts shoot and assault the vets.  Hive guard wiff.

 Tervigon and tyrant assault the central blob and wipe them out.

Combined fire kills the tyrant but my tervigon makes every save.

The game ends at the bottom of 5 due to time.  Tyranids 9vp (2 obj, first blood, warlord, linebreaker) Guard 0vp.  Had the game gone extra turns with more time and the 3+, Konrad would have killed the tervigon and claimed his own objective making it Nids 5vp, Guard 3vp.

This was by far the most "cinematic" and fun game I've played in 6th so far mostly due to the lists and terrain.  It was like playing out Starship Troopers.  Game wise, I forgot my regen rolls again and fudged the powers on the zoans, but I've been out of my tyranid game for the end of 5th ed so it's mostly getting back in the groove.  Konrad's dice rolls were a bit depressing at the end with the vendetta rolling at least 7 1's over two turns.  The tyrant and tervigon also should have died a bit earlier.  All in all, still a pretty close game considering I was slowly losing the war of attrition.  I probably should have deployed the shrikes on the same side as raveners and maybe they would have survived to see combat.  Everything else went pretty well I think.

Read about the battle from Konrad's point of view HERE.

Game #3 vs "Courtney" and his Necrons coming later this week.