I don’t have time for a full rundown, so I’ll post my thoughts and what I’ve learned from my beatings on my two games on Friday (I’m writing these off memory, so they may not be entirely accurate. However, it’s for sure not skewed in my favor 😉 )
Ok first of all: my apologies to everyone, mainly you, Brent, on Friday for the P.P.A. I was tired and already in a sour mood so I wasn’t probably the most fun opponent. You know me well enough that I’m not usually that whiney 😉
It was a pretty good set up for both us, and awesomely enough the oldest vs. the newest codex in Warhammer 40,000. He had/used:
- a unit of missle toting Long Fangs with a Razorback armed with Lascannons
- 2 units of Grey Hunters in Rhinos
- 1 Dreadnought.
- I didn’t see his Lord (I’m not sure if he was attached to the Long Fangs hiding in the crater or attached to one of the Grey Hunter squads).
The game was Annihilation using Dawn of War (which we deployed corners, because we forgot that the 6th edition Dawn of War is table edges) setup. Normally I’d reserve off table, but with Night Fight I thought I’d be confident enough not to need that. Big mistake I forgot all about Enhanced Senses (and I play Wolves too, arrrrrgh!) On his first turn I lost 2 raiders (one of which being my big Wytch/HQ squad) at 30+ inches and a Ravager was shaken (not stirred) on first turn. Thanks to well placed nasty missle fire and very poor cover saves (which if I recall I made three the entire game) I lost about half of my firepower (which on the bottom of turn one was completely ineffective due to me rolling no more than a 6 on two dice for night fight). Turn two was a bit just almost brutal for me as he took down one Ravager completely shook another Raider (which are still nigh impossible to hide even in dense terrain). However I did get to do some shooting at some marines with my Ravager (keyword: “at”!). What it boils down to: I was able to obliterate his dreadnaught (with a 6 on pen and result!) and a squad of Grey Hunters and one or two Long Fangs, while I was backpedaling quickly to not get tabled on turn 5 (which thankfully ended).
I don’t remember the setup (I think it was pitched), but it was objective claiming for the mission. Brent’s army consisted of (please forgive my lack of knowledge of the Daemon army as it’s probably very inaccurate):
- a sizable posse of Slaneesh Fiends (6-7 or so)
- 2 squads of Pink Horrors (I think only 1 had a Changeling)
- a Daemon Price with wings and a fat, Nurgle belly
- a Soul Grinder
- Skulltaker on a Juggernaut of Khorne
Note: Brent will probably have a better battle report as he brought his camera to the slaughter and will have visual ques for what happened when.This was a big learning game for both of us. Unfortunately I was already unhappy with the general performance of my dice the previous game so my attitude gradually spiraled downward as all the wrong rolls happened at all the wrong times. I did happen to win the deployment and chose to deploy last (so that he’d have first turn) the table was completely empty turn 1.
Brent rolled the half of his army he wanted to come in (thanks be to the powers of Chaos–he wasn’t so lucky the game after), but he had not a target to attack and basically just placed his units in key locations that were both relatively safe for cover saves if possible and as ready to attack anywhere possible when I came in on reserves. I just thankfully hid my raiders quietly, although against this particular army and build I might have been better off being on the board–there wasn’t any (or very little) shooting in the half that came in.
Top of Turn two (Daemons): Brent I believe rolled in all but his Soul Crusher (his two squads of Pink Horrors)
Bottom of two (Dark Eldar): I rolled for reserves and everyone but my HQ/Wyches was able to come on–fantastic dice rolling (as you’ll read it was hit and miss all game) so at this point we only had one unit remaining in reserves.. My Ravagers jumped on and attempted to take out the biggest threat: the Fiends although my first Ravager used the template version of the Disintegrator, and was able to put on 3 wounds to the fairly well spread out Fiends, the second one nearly devastated the unit (and would have if I had used the secondary firing mode on the first Ravager) 18 AP3 (not that it mattered with his army) shots between two Ravagers is very brutal. I also happened to put a wound or two on the Prince.
Top of Three (Daemons) The Soul Crusher comes in, however lands on top of one of my raiders and thankfully for Brent was only delayed a turn, not destroyed. Skulltaker runs in and attacks a raider, blowing it to smithereens and the 2 of the 5 warriors perish in the crash. The remaining 2 and a half (a wound on one of them) Fiends attack the Ravagers and both of which are immobilized (which probably wouldn’t have happened if I just moved 12″ and fired secondary mode, but at least they could still shoot next round). I had a raider immobilized to the Daemon Prince, but the horrors were able to take down a Raider from shooting (but not destroy it so I didn’t lose any Warriors). Bottom of Three (Dark Eldar) I believed I rolled a 2 or 1 for my HQ & Wyches to come in, so they were delayed as well. I finished off the Fiends with my immobilized Ravagers and the 3 remaining warriors were lucky enough to put a wound on the Bloodcrusher with their splinter weapons (they die next turn).
Top of Four (Daemons) Soul Crusher comes in–safely and knocks down my remaining Raider squad’s raider. The Prince jumped into charge range of the Ravagers and destroyed it. Bottom of Four (Dark Eldar) I attempted to shoot at some Horrors from my remaining flying Raider squad but the sneaky powers of Tzeench forced me to make a leadership test or fire onto one of my units–I failed miserably with a 9 I lost 5/9 Wyches from my shooting who failed their leadership test with two sixes. My Dracon (who split off from the Wyches to attack the second set of Horrors–big mistake as his leadership would have kept them from running, but he could have just as easily have run off with them if I rolled a 10) attacked horrors and was able to kill 2, which he lost another from Fearless loss of combat. Things went waaaay downhill fast, and was those two leadership tests, in my memory, cost me the game. Sure there were a few other mistakes, but that was the pivotal moment as once my Wyches are in hand to hand they’re fairly resilient.
Brent just cleaned up of the remainder of my now-sparse force my few shots here and there didn’t matter much. My dracon lost his Shadow Field on Turn 5 against a couple of Horror stragglers, so as soon as he got the attention of Brent’s Prince, he was toast before close combat even happened.
I do believe that I finished off his Horrors, so if I had one model survice somewhere technically it would have been a draw as neither one of us had claiming units, but I digress. It was piss poor commanding on my part and a couple unlucky rolls.
What I already knew, but I haven’t actually played correctly: Dark Eldar need to MOVE (and move often and quickly) and choose their targets and focus in masse on individual threats. Its difficult as the Nightshields on a 4×4 foot table aren’t as effective as they would be on a 6×4–at least they weren’t that evening.
Never split the Archon/Dracon from his/her retinue whether it be a joined squad of Wyches or his/her Incubi (which you can’t anyways), the Archon just doesn’t have enough umph as an individual to take out squads (but can be quite resilient).