hyv3mynd's Eldar + Dark Eldar @ September 1850pt RTT: Game #1

I'm a little behind my co-authors in reporting on last Saturday's tournament, but that's OK.  Now you're familiar with the missions and terrain.  Here's the list I ended up taking.  It's close to my list for DaBoyz GT, with a few extra vehicle upgrades to make up for a couple models I haven't assembled yet.



1850pts Eldar + Dark Eldar
Farseer + spirit stone of anath'lan (game #1 - scoring warlord. fortune, doom, prescience)
Spirit Seer + shard of anaris (game #1 - conceal, puppet master)
Baron Sathonyx
Wraithguard x5
Wave Serpent + scatter lasers, holofields, ghostwalk matrix
Dire Avengers x5
Wave Serpent + scatter lasers, holofields, ghostwalk matrix
Windrider Jetbikes x3 + cannon
Windrider Jetbikes x3 + cannon
Kabalite Warriors x5
Venom + extra cannon, grisly trophies
Beastmasters x4 + khymerae x12, razorwings x2
Wraithknight
Vaul's Wrath Support Battery x3 shadow weavers
War Walkers x3 + scatter lasers

Game #1 was against Neil and his Orks, whom I've never played before.  Grubnards played him in round #2 if you read his report.

Neil's list:
Big mek + kff (warlord)
Old zogwort
Lootas x15
Lootas x15
Lootas x15
Boyz x19 + nob, klaw
Boyz x19 + nob, klaw
Grotz x15 + runtherd, grabba
Deffkoptas x3 + bog bombz x3
Battlewagon + deff rolla, big shoota
Battlewagon + deff rolla, big shoota
Battlewagon + deff rolla, big shoota
ADL + quad gun

The first mission was Crusade with 5 objectives and hammer/anvil deployment.  We agreed to put the odd objective in the middle so one person didn't start with 3.  We had night fight and Neil took the first turn.

 Neil places his 2 objectives near his back edge with his fortification and grotz nearby.  3 wagons are in front of the ADL with zogwort + lootas in the closest one, kff mek + boyz in the middle, and 15 lootas in the furthest.  The remaining lootas went into the far area terrain, koptaz in front of them, and the remaining 19 boyz reserved.

I pre-measure everything to be safe from turn 1 night fighting except the wraithknight.  Beasts are in the near corner with baron, spiritseer, and farseer attached.  Wraithguard are in the central serpent, dire avengers on the far side with artillery behind the wall.  I reserved both jetbike squads and the venom.  War walkers are outflanking.  I don't try to seize.

Turn 1:

Deff koptaz scout and move up but end up backing away from the wraithknight.  His first volley with lootas does 4 wounds to my wraithknight as I failed way more saves than expected.

Wraithknight gets fortune, beasts get conceal.  Serpents move up 12" favoring the right flank with the knight.  Beasts advance, but cautiously at first.  Only the koptaz are in range due to night fight and I tag them with serpents for first blood.  Wraithknight's shots on a wagon get saved.

Turn 2:

19 boyz arrive in the far corner and run up.  2 squads of lootas fire at my knight and take it down despite fortune.  The last squad removes a hull point from the central serpent.

My bikes and venom arrive from reserve, but not my walkers.  Beasts get conceal and fortune.  Artillery get prescience.  Serpents move up to put the lootas in terrain exactly 36" from their lasers.  Beasts advance and I keep bikes and the venom back and safe.  Combined serpents and artillery knock the lootas in terrain down to 5 models who pass morale.

Turn 3:

Not much movement.  Lootas successfully take out both serpents and I lose an avenger and wraithguard in each explosion.

My walkers arrive but on the left/close edge when I really wanted them on the right, further from the battle wagons.  Beasts get conceal, prescience, and fortune.  Everything advances except avengers who hug the wall and pull back towards by rear objective.  Bikes try to block themselves from loota sight and bide time for a last turn grab.  Walkers battle focus towards the ADL and focus fire the grotz not in cover as their weapon mounts are high enough to see well over the wall.  Four models remain and they pass morale.  My artillery kills another loota or two.

Turn 4:

Zogwort's wagon moves up 6" and he jumps out to try and squig my warlord.  Luckily, I pass the roll-off.  The wagon with boyz rams my walkers, but I only take 1 hull point.  The third wagon pulls back behind the ADL.  All lootas combine fire and take down 2 walkers.  The rest of his shooting bounces off fortuned beasts.

Battle wagon gets doomed.  Beasts get prescience and conceal.  My warlord drops from the beast squad to join wraithguard who take the middle objective.  Beasts move up to surround the wagon.  My last walker moves to get side shots on the boyz' wagon but immobilizes itself on a wrecked walker.  Wraithguard insta-gib zogwort.  Beasts assault the wagon and surround it, but the baron explodes it.  The aftermath of the explosion is 8 dead khymerae, and 12 dead lootas with the last 3 fleeing.

Turn 5:

The boyz wagon pulls away from the walkers.  The 3 fleeing lootas rally with insane courage.  He focuses everything on the beasts out of cover and I lose several more despite fortune.  He also explodes my last walker.

Beasts move up next to the rallied lootas.  Wraithguard are joined by the spiritseer with conceal.  Bikes claim my rear objective and the others go mid to turbo boost onto one of the ork objectives.

We've got enough time for another turn, but after talking over a few contingencies, my opponent concedes to me.  I'm holding objectives 3-1 (or 3-0 after boosting my bikes).  My beasts are going to assault the last 3 lootas and bounce onto the closest objective.  I also scored first blood and linebreaker between beasts and bikes.  My opponent could shoot and assault my bikes and beasts (if the game continued) and possibly secure his two objectives, but he doesn't have enough units left to take his objectives and remove one of mine.  We call it 11-0 based on objectives, linebreaker, and first blood at the end of turn 5.  This tournament is win/loss so it's 15 battle points for the win.

This was a really intense but fun game.  Neil's list definitely had the tools to take me out.  If it were me, I'd have deployed all lootas on foot on the back edge with boyz in front of them and empty wagons in front of them to zoom around and deffroll stuff.  It would have created target overload as I'd have to deal with the wagons in my face, 38 scoring boyz, and 45 lootas all separately.  I never actually had to engage his boyz and the wagons did very little so it was more like my army against 45 lootas.  He took out the wraithknight on turn 2 and both serpents on turn 3, but never moved forward to engage me so those loses meant very little in the scheme of the mission.

I probably could have played the beasts more aggressively, but going second I didn't want to lose the whole unit before I could get conceal and fortune up.  Lootas in battle wagons are even more scary because they can move 6" and still snap shot 48" up to 45 shots.  The wraithknight didn't kill anything, but drawing every loota shot for 2 turns allowed the rest of my army to get in place.  That's where a lot of the internet analysis of knights falls down in my opinion.  Yes, they are not very killy, but they're the toughest unit in the game (barring psychic daemons) in an army of relatively fragile units.  By drawing all the fire, they allow the glass hammer units to do more hammering which usually flips the war of attrition in favor of the Eldar.

Next up is big guns never tire against double heldrake CSM with screamers and a disc herald.