First 6th edition battle report will be up tomorrow!

That's right! I'll be getting in a game at 2,000 points with a friend tomorrow for some 6th edition action. He'll use either his Necrons or his Tyranids. Probably Necrons, since he's been playing them a lot lately. I'll be using the Dark Eldar, of course. Here's the list I'll probably be taking:

Haemonculus with Liquefier
Haemonculus
4 blasterborn in venom
3 blasterborn in venom
2x 8 Wyches with all the good stuff in a raider
2x 5 warriors with blaster in venom
2x Voidraven with Flickerfield
Ravager

Allied Dark Eldar:

Haemonculus
3 blasterborn in venom
8 Wyches with the works in a raider
Ravager

So as you can see, I've brought back the voidraven. I think that at least 2 of these will be necessary for DE to win against other Flyer-spam armies that will be popping up. I'll probably keep them in reserve versus armies that have fliers, so they can come on turn 2-3 to pop vendettas and such. Wyches are absolute beasts with the new rules, what with the 6" disembark and the reroll 1 assault die. Also being able to hit Walkers on WS vs WS instead of 6s is a huge help vs. Grey Knights. And glancing hits are deadlier than ever, which is why haywire is great again. Part of me wants to take some Eldar allies for a Farseer with Runes of Warding, but we'll see how playtesting goes.

Quick Update and 6th edition thoughts

Hey all! Just a quick RTT update, Dark Eldar went 2-0-1 and got 2nd place at an RTT that was unique because it was pretty much only the top players from the local area. I beat Necrons in a tight game, nearly tabled a slightly unconventional mechanized Guard force that ended up getting 3rd, and then drew a more conventional mechanized Guard force that ended up winning. Three of the toughest games I've ever played, and I personally felt that I faced just about the 3 best players there.

So, as we all know, 6th edition is around the corner, and I have been pondering what I'm going to do with it. I'm thinking right now that the Razorwing may find a place in my list once again, and I'm also starting to think that a Wych Cult type army could be in store for the Dark Eldar, not totally sure. I'm getting my copy of 6th pre-ordered today, so we shall see.

But what really excites me for 6th are that my poor Chaos could get a fresh lease on life. Basically, I'm thinking Thousand Sons with some Daemon support. And by Daemon support I mean Fateweaver, of course! Think about it: Rerolling Terminator 2+ saves, rereolling mass 5++ and 4++ saves, and best of all, rerolling smoke saves on vehicles! Since Psychic powers seem to be the rage, taking several small units of Thousand Sons along with Arhiman or 2 Tzeentchian Sorcerers could be a good combination with Fateweaver. Add in some obliterators, maybe a couple bastions with AA guns, and round it out with 2 tiny units of Plaguebearers for last turn objective grabbing, and you've got a pretty effective list that can comfortably take on most of the power lists that I personally see popping up.

Unfortunately, I see no end in sight for Imperial Guard/Grey Knight domination. Both will have access to most psychic disciplines, and Hydras will be cheesier than ever. Psydreads may take a bit of a nerf, which is always acceptable, but if Force Weapons are AP 2, coupled with mass psykers...Yeah, the dudes in grey are still going strong.

Anyway, that's this week's update. I'm sure I'll be posting more about my changes for 6th edition, and hopefully my blogging comrades will too (hint hint...)

EDIT: I also just noticed we're getting a ton of pageviews, but very few followers/commenters. Don't be afraid to hit that follow button or leave a comment, feedback is appreciated!

Tournament Report!

Totally unrelated picture, but Thrones is the shizzle.

Hello, all, and yet another tournament report from Jaybie and his gallant Dark Eldar! Another 1850 point tournament, about 16 players, with a good spread. Only...I want to say 5 Marine armies? And 3 of those were all-terminator. The army I took was:

3x Haemonculus

3x 3 Blasterborn in Venoms with 2x Splinter Cannons

3x 8 Wyches with haywires and Hekatrix in Raider with flickerfield

3x 5 Warriors with Blasters in Venoms with 2x Splinter Cannons

3x Ravagers with Flickerfields

A solid list, basically what I usually take. Anyway, first round was:

Round 1: Vs. Michael B's Dark Eldar!

His list:

Duke Sliscious

9 Trueborn with 5 Carbines, 4 Blasters, Raider with Splinter racks, Flickerfield, Night Shield, Torment Grenade Launchers, Grisly Trophies

6x 5 Warriors with Blaster in Venom with 2 Splinter cannons, Night Shields

2 Beastmasters with 2 Clawed Fiends

4 Reavers with Heatlance

3 Ravagers, 2 with 3 Lances, 1 with 2 Disintigrators

So, a slightly odd list. Michael is a very good player though.

Mission: Table Quarters.

Deployment: Spearhead.

So I win the roll-off, and take 2nd turn for Quarter-controlling last turns of goodness. He deploys with most of his army behind a large building on the edge of his quarter close to me. 3 Venoms he holds in reserve. I put my army way back in my quarter, but leave a single ravager out as bait. I hold the Wyches in reserve.

The Game:

So first turn he takes the bait, and exposes 2 of his ravagers to try to take mine out. He manages to destroy a weapon and stun it. My turn I kill his 2 ravagers that he exposed. He then deepstruck a single venom with warriors near me and disembarked, turned out they were just outside of 18" to blaster my ravager, they died shortly after. 

Rest of the game was just him lurking behind the building, and me ganking anything that showed its face. The beasts almost made a game of it by assaulting a bunch of venoms I had immobilized on terrain, but it was too little too late. I won 3 quarters to 1, and got a healthy number of VPs. 

Round 2: Vs. Ben's Tyranids!

His list:

Tervigon

Tervigon

3 Hive Guard

Doom of Malan'tai in pod thing

7 Ymgarls

Tervigon

Tervigon

10 gaunts

10 gaunts

9 Genestealers with Broodlord

9 Genestealers with Broodlord

Tyrannofex with Rupture Cannon

So, a beatable list, someone I've beaten every time I've faced him, and a mission he can't win. Should be easy, right?

Mission: Get more VPs into enemy deployment zone

Deployment: Pitched Battle

So he wins the roll off, takes first turn, and deploys the Tyrannofex and a tervigon to my right, a Tervigon and a bunch of gaunts centrally, and then 2 tervigons and the Hive Guard to my left. I deploy to the right. He holds all his stuff that can outflank/deepstrike in reserve. 

The Game: 

Let's just say this game was horrific as far as dice go. I was shooting at the damned Tyrannofex, with no cover, with 9+ lances per turn, and it took me 3 TURNS to kill the stupid thing. Add to the fact that he hit with every shot it fired, and blew up 2 of my ravs, and immobilized 1, and it was not a fun day. It also took all 6 Venoms to take down 2 Tervigons in 3 rounds of shooting. Also, his reserves all came on where he needed them to. His stealers suddenly magically had Adrenal glands, which it said nowhere on his list, and tore my vehicles to bits.

So he has me on the ropes, I'm failing every save, and then he...Hunkers all of his reserve stuff in my deployment zone and doesn't move? Okay... I'll just run into your deployment zone with the rest of my army and win, since your Gaunts can't move thanks to Lurk and no synapse.

That was a ridiculous game, and I got next to no VPs for it, since I killed next to nothing. So, there are only 4 undefeated players left: Imperial Guard, Necrons, Chaos Marines, and Me. So, making up for the terribleness of last game, I draw:

Round 3: Vs. Tick's Chaos Space Marines!

His list

Lord with Termy armor, Mark of Slaanesh, Blissgiver, Combi-Melta

Lash Prince

10 Terminators with a ton of stuff

5 Chosen with 4 flamers, rhino w/ combi-melta

5 Chosen with 4 Meltas, rhino

3x 6 Chaos Marines with plasma gun, rhino

2 Oblits

2 Oblits

1 Oblit

Tick is good player, but this was his mainly fluff list. Still, I've never lost to DE with my CSMs, so we'll see.

Mission: Table Quarters

Deployment: Dawn of war without the Dawn part (no nightfight)

I win the rolloff, and pass him 1st turn. He holds everything in reserve, all my stuff walks on 1st turn.

The Game:

Frankly it wasn't much of a game. His stuff came in from reserve, shot, did little, and then got blown off the table in my turn. My dice made up for last game, and his dice were not kind. He did kill like half of my wyches, and 2 Ravagers. Other than that, though, pretty bad. I wiped him off the table. 

So, I'm 3-0, and I'm watching Guard vs. Necrons. I need them to draw, since game 2 really screwed me in the VP department. If a single Cryptek can draw a unit of meltavets in combat, then they draw. But the guardsmen killed him, so the Guard guy took 1st, I took 2nd, and my round 2 opponent took 3rd, despite some controversy. 

So, another good showing by the Dark Eldar. I'm really hitting my stride with them, I think. Still can't beat Kasrkar regularly, though. Oh well, we can't have everything, can we?

Quick Update and back from the dead!

Hello, all! I know it's been silent lately, but it's been busy with finals and all that. But now that's all over, finally. First, a quick recap of how I've been doing at RTTs, I've been going to almost 1 a week for a while now. All of these are using the mighty mighty Dark Eldar:

2000 points, 3-0, 2nd place
1850 points, 1-2 (If I would have read the first mission correctly, things would have been different...), 8th place
1750 points, 2-1, 2nd place
1250 points, 2-2, 5th place, top of "2-2 bracket".

So, some decent placings. That 1850 point tournament though, that was pitiful. First round I read a mission deployment wrong, turned out it was dawn of war WITHOUT the nightfight...I took first turn vs. shooty Grey Knights...lots of dead paper airplanes. Then the second game lost to necrons when Stormlord's nightfight killed 10 of my vehicles in the first 2 turns...damn Chronometrons. Then I tabled Orks :). Also in the 2k tournament, managed to take down Kasrkar first round 14-6 when I couldn't fail a flickerfield save.

So after many, many games with the Dark Eldar, what are my thoughts?

The Good:

They are such a fun army to play, I must say. Wickedly fast, lots of dice, and a bunch of dirty tricks. A very good counterpoint to my Chaos, I must say.

The Bad:

Firstly, a word on Darklight weapons. Yes, you can take ridiculous amounts of them, and yes they are cheap. However, it will statistically take 12 of them to kill a single AV 12 vehicle. Haywire grenades are nice, but eh. Dark Eldar really lack any reliable anti-tank. I've been thinking about trying some Heatlance Scourges, but I don't know...

Also, it seems sometimes game results will come down to how many flickerfield 5++s I pass. It's such an arbitrary thing for a game to balance on, it gets irritating.

Now that might sound really negative, but I've had a great run with them. I've saved up store credit and actual cash to spend on them once 6th edition drops, and I've got a few GTs lined up for the fall that I hope to take them to. A local event called Duelcon, and a little event you might have heard of called Feast of Blades. Qualifiers for the Invitational are on August 4th, I hope to qualify. Even if I don't, I'll still probably play in the FoB Open.

Anyway, that's the update, I hope that I and my fellow bloggers can get some more articles up soon!

Battle Report! Black Templar vs Dark Eldar! 1000pts!

Hey guys, Grandpa Rhino here, with another battle report. Sorry, this is another 1000pt with me using the same list. I need to buy some more stuff to get it up to 1500. Or maybe change up the list. Maybe I'll make a post about that later.

So, I went down to the usual place again, awesome as ever, they had both a 40k tourney and a 24 hour painting event happening. I sat and watched the tourney games for a while, afterwards one of them agreed to play a game with me. He was Dark Eldar, and the lists were these:

Black Templars:
HQ:
Emporer's Champion, Accept Any Challenge No Matter The Odds. -140

Elite:
6 Assault Terminators, 3 with shields, one with a crusader seal -260

Troops:
5 Initiates, 4 Neophytes, Power Fist, Melta Gun, Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers -198
5 Initiates, 4 Neophytes, Power Fist, Melta Gun, Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers -198

Fast Attack:
Land Speeder Typhoon -70

Heavy Support:
Vindicator, w/ Smoke Launchers and Dozer Blade. -133

1000pts Exactly!

Dark Eldar:
HQ:
Archon w/ Agonizer, Combat drugs, Shadowfield - 120 points
Haemonculi w/ Liquifier - 60 points
Haemonculi w/ Liquifier - 60 points

Elite:
Five Incubi w/ Klaivex w/ onslaught - 140 points

Troop:
9 Witches w/ Shardnet Impaler, Hekatrix w/ Agonizer, and Phantasm Grenade Launcher - 158 points
9 Witches w/ Shardnet Impaler, Hekatrix w/ Agonizer, and Phantasm Grenade Launcher - 158 points

Dedicated Transports:
Raider w/ Flickerfield - 70 points
Raider w/ Flickerfield - 70 points
Raider w/ Flickerfield - 70 points

Heavy Support:
Ravager w/ Flickerfield, and Nightshield - 125 points

Deployment:
The game is Capture and Control, Pitched battle.
He wins the roll-off and goes first.
His deployment:

This picture was taken after my turn, as most in this battle report are, unfortunately. But as you can see, he deployed in the far corner of the table. This was actually a very clever move on his part. Because now I had to choose between getting close to him but having no cover to defend my objective, or vice versa.

I place my objective in the middle of all those little barricades, and my force just to the right of it. I send out the mightiest of my warriors to fend off the Dark Eldar attack. The fearsome Land Speeder! I choose to not try and seize, cause I want the second turn so I can have the final say on objectives.

Turn One:

He moves his paper convoy behind that big tower, and has longer range than I expected on his Dark Lances, and my Land Speeder narrowly escapes harm. It looks like he's gonna keep his guys in that group and steadily advance trying to take down my shooters before I take down his, then zoom a troop choice back to his objective.

Well I'm getting the hell out of there! I thought those Dark Lances were only 24" for some reason. Oh well. I back up my army into more cover, and cover saves him from the typhoon, this guy made cover and shadowfield saves like crazy in the last game I saw him play. I'll have to fight this up close and bloody.

Turn Two:

He spreads out! It looks like he now has his main assault going to the right flank, spearheaded by the Archon/Incubi Raider with Witches behind and one Witch Raider sticking kinda back in case he needs to get back to his objective right away. And his Ravager flanking to the left. Now the game is starting! In shooting his ravager blows the missiles off my Typhoon.

I barely resist the temptation to try to ram something with my Typhoon, as I think its out of range. So I use it as cover instead, and start to move everything slightly over to engage his main assault. I don't have any shooting to do this turn so that's that.

Turn Three:

He tightens up and really starts to move in. In shooting he wrecks the fearsome Typhoon! I warm him, that in  the killing of the Typhoon, he has awoken the thunderous zeal of the Black Templars!

Oh boy. He killed my Typhoon. Now its on. I move out to engage. I leave my Champion-less Rhino behind to stay on the objective, and my other Rhino spearheads my force, popping smoke, mainly to give everything else cover. My Vindy scattered off in shooting. Now for the bloody crash of two assault armies.

Turn Four:

He disembarks the Witches in the back to go get his home objective, disembarks the Incubi/Archon hoping his vehicles will pop the smoked Rhino and he can assault the guys inside. His central Raider goes up on top of the big landing pad in the center, ready to go wherever it is needed. In shooting he fires a total of six darklances at my smoked Rhino, but is only able to blow off the gun! His Incubi and Archon assault but do nothing. Sucks for him!

I did quite a bit in my turn so I have two pictures and three paragraphs of explaining. I moved my assaulted Rhino over to my right, pushing the Archon unit into a cluster, and prepared to fire my vindicator at them. Also my Termies tried to surround them while staying spread out to minimize the possibility of a terrible scatter.

Over on this side things get a little crazy. I disembark my objective guards, and go to move out my Rhino to do something awesome. Sir Waldus is restless! However, my rhino immobilizes itself going over the first barricade. Awesome. Waldus is not deterred! He opens fire on the Raider on the platform, two hits... and a six! He glances! Waldus is truely a gunner like no other, but the damn flickerfield saves it. What a buzzkill. My Champion's Melta gunner popped out the hatch to try and finish the job, but only stunned it. Good enough.

My Vindicator misses, but I kill one Incubi with a potshot from the objective unit. My Terminators assault and kill all but the shadow fielded Archon, who flees, and I consolidate my Termies so that they are both in cover behind the Rhino should they need it, and six inches from the Archon so he can't rally next turn. Things are turning to my favor now.

Turn Five:

His army mostly stays put, his Archon flees seven inches, and I believe he tried to shoot at my Termies but did nothing. His old transport moved to be a wall between my termies and him. And he missed all the Dark Lance shots took this turn. Hehehe. He made a joke about how they should be called Dark "Glances" it was funny.

My Rhino moves to engage the Ravager and center Raider, but it Immobilizes itself! Second time this game! Crazy. On the bright side it did lead to this awesome shot of the melta guy coming out the firing hatch to shoot at the Ravager, and he killed it!

My Vindicator was out of range of the Raider it was shooting at, but my Termies assaulted and killed the Raider in the way, staying six inches from the Archon. Now, it may look like I'm wiping the floor with him at this point, but if the game ends this turn it will be a draw...

It goes on! (I know, that was pretty intense.)

Turn Six:

His Archon flees off the board, apparently a very common death for his Archon. He zooms his central Raider riiight over to my objective. I admit, he got me unsuspecting. I was way ahead in kills at this point, but he could still win if his Witches pulled this off.

I moved up with the terminators and disembarked the champion in the immobilized Rhino to run like hell for the objective. As the first picture shows, in shooting, I melted his Raider, and pinned the squad! This is bottom of six, so they are out of the game, hostages for the Templars. My Vindicator was out of range, but my Termies assaulted and killed another Raider, they need a 4+ consolidate roll to be in sure assault range next turn. A four! If it goes on, I think I can win...

It goes on.

Turn Seven:

He detaches his Himmunculai to try and slow me down, and tries to keep his guys just barely within three inches. He fires his Ap-d6 liquifier at the Termies, a six! Oh well. He doesn't shoot Witch pistols, remembering that if he did kill any Termies, they might just come closer.

I move forward, and it becomes clear that I will be in range. I killed the Haemonculi with shooting from the Champion's unit, and shot the Witches with my Vindicator, it scattered slightly, but I killed a few. The Witches fell back, but this wasn't enough. The Terminators charged in and, without casualty, killed all but one.

The last Witch flees the battlefield.  

Well, this was an insanely fun, bloody, bloody game. The guy I played against was really great, even when things turned bad for him he kept laughing and smiling. So, if you're reading this, follow the example, and don't be a competitive ass. Games are meant for fun. Once again I had a great day at the Bowie Bunker, and will keep coming back. If you are thinking of coming, I plan to go most Saturdays. May the dice be ever in your favor, and Goodbye, from Grandpa Rhino.

Oh! Also, check out this awesome Vendetta I saw!

If you paint stuff that cool, you get an honorary high five. Goodbye again.

Dark eldar are victorious!

Hey hey hey, what's going on? So, today was a pretty cool day. It was the day where Kasrkar and I played in a 1k tournament, exactly a year since our first tournament ever, so kinda special. Anyway, the tournament requirements were 2 Heavies, 2 Fast attack, and 2 troops. Since you didn't have to have HQ, the list I took was:

3 Trueborn with 3 Blasters, venom with 2 scannons
4 trueborn with 4 blasters, venom with 2 scannons
5 Warriors with blaster, venom with 2 scannons
5 Warriors with blaster, venom with 2 scannons
2 Beastmasters with 3 Khaemerae, 2 Razorwing flocks
2 Beastmasters with 3 Khaemerae, 2 Razorwing flocks
Ravager with Flickerfield, night shields
Ravager with Flickerfield, night shields

It's exactly 999 points, which is pretty cool if you ask me. Anyways, so I show up at the tourney, hoping to see a lot of good matchups for myself, and first thing I notice is that there are 4 Guard and 3 tau. Seriously? Anyway, lots of good players, and good armies. So, sure enough, round 1 is:

Round 1: Vs. Darren's Imperial Guard

Vets with Grenade launcher, missile
Vets with 2 meltas
Vets with 2 meltas, Chimaera with Heavy flamer
Vendetta
Banewolf with multi-melta
Vanquisher with heavy bolter sponsons, lascannon
Demolisher with Heavy bolter sponsons, lascannon

Mission: Capture and control
Deployment: Pitched battle

So, I will the roll to go first, and take it of course. Never take turn 2 vs. guard unless you are going full reserves. I deployed centrally behind a building, holding one unit of warriors in reserve, but deploying their ride. He deploys spread out in cover, with a squad meltavets in the vendetta, and the missile vets in a ruin.

The Game:

He scouted up his vendetta pretty far, so far that I was able to hit it with blasters turn 1 and blow it up, killing 7 of the guys inside and pinning them. I also got side armor on the chimaera with a Ravager and blew it up, killing 4 of the guys inside and pinning them as well. I also killed a handful of the vets on foot, and stun/weapon destroy the Vanquisher. His first turn, despite losing a bunch of stuff, is very good as well. He kills one ravager, stuns the other, and kills a bunch of trueborn when he explodes their venom.

The rest of the game is me stunlocking his vehicles until the beasts can get in and mess them up. I wind up tabling him turn 4, so a round 1 victory for the Dark Eldar.

So looking around at the other tables, Karskar drew some Blood Angels, and there was only 1 other person who tabled their opponent. So, that sets me up on table 1 for round 2.

Round 2: vs. Mabus's Dark Eldar!

Mabus is his Warseer name, and he got 2nd place at our local tournament this year, only a little behind Blackmoor, and got best general, so he is definitely no slouch.

His list:

5 Warriors with blaster, venom with 2 splinter cannons, night shields
5 Warriors with blaster, venom with 2 splinter cannons, night shields
5 Warriors with blaster, venom with 2 splinter cannons, night shields
2 Beastmasters with 2 clawed fiends
2 Beastmasters with 2 clawed fiends
Ravager with Flickerfield, Night Shields
Ravager with Flickerfield, Night Shields
Ravager with Flickerfield, Night Shields, 2 disintegrators, 1 darklance

Mission: Seize Ground (3 objectives)
Deployment: Spearhead

So, our lists are very similar. We talk a lot during tournaments, but rarely ever play each other. So he wins the roll for fist turn and takes it. He sets up ready to go after me turn 1, I set up behind a big piece of terrain, and hold one squad of Beasts in reserve.

The Game:
So, on his first turn he rushed up with his stuff, he managed to kill most of my beast squad, who ran off the table when I forgot that beasts are LD 5 instead of 3, oh well. My turn I hurt both beast squads, but just piss them off more. His beasts assault my ravagers, and do nothing, he takes out one of my warrior squads and their ride. I kill all of his beasts, and one of his Ravagers, and he makes like 7 Flickerfield saves in a row, at this point I am pretty sure he will win, he is too.  His next turn, he kills all the trueborn, but I make more than my share of flickerfield saves.

So turn 5, he is holding 2 objectives, I have none. I contest both, and then I remember that there is a warrior squad in an immobilized venom sitting next to an objective, so they get out and claim it. We roll to see if the game ends, it is a 1. A narrow victory to (my) dark eldar! So on the table next to us, a Tau player basically crushed a guard army, so I find myself on table 1 in round 3 vs.:

Round 3: Vs. John's Tau!

So John got 3rd at our local GT, AND is the only person who can regularly beat Kasrkar. Will the tough matchups never end?

His list:

Etherial with 10 firewarriors
2 Crisis suits with TL missiles, flamers, a bunch of crazy stuff
6 Firewarriors
6 Firewarriors
7 Pathfinders with Devilfish with all the works
4 Gun drones
2x 2 Broadsides with Blacksun filters, 2 shield drones, the slow and purposeful thing, target lock

Mission: Annihilation
Deployment: Dawn of War

So, this is going to be tough, with all those Blacksun filters. So I'm happy when he wins the rolloff and takes 1st turn. He deepstrikes his Drones. So, to heighten the tension, I'm going to go turn by turn:

Tau 1: John moves on his army, pretty spread out. Pathfinders hiding in a building, little firewarrior squads thrown up really far.

Dark Eldar 1: I move on, beasts roll an awesome 1 and 2 for fleets. I kill one little squad of firewarriors.

Tau 2: He stays mostly still, ready to shoot the crap out of me. In his one real mistake of the game, the drones deepstrike very close to some beasts. His broadsides kill one of my Ravagers, another wrecks a venom, his other shooting puts a few wounds on some beasts, nothing too impressive.

Dark Eldar 2: My beasts move toward the Drones, ready to draw blood (Coolant fluid?). My other vehicles shuffle around to get good lines of fire. I kill a few pathfinders, a few drones from the broadsides, and stun his Devilfish. Not that impressive. The beasts assault the drones and tear them a new one.

Tau 3: So, we knew that this would be the last turn. I think he gets a little over-exuberant in his attempts to get kill points, as he makes a few mistakes. For one, he seemingly suicidally moves out a unit of firewarriors to kill some trueborn. He kills them, and the rest of his shooting doesn't do much. Some battlesuits assault some beasts, they slap each other a little and stay locked in.

Dark Eldar 3: So, he was ahead by 1 Killpoint at this point. I needed to kill 2 units of his. With that in mind, I killed the Pathfinders down to 2 guys, and prepared to assault his firewarriors with some beasts. The pathfinders run. The beasts kill the firewarrors easily. So now it's down to the battlesuit/beast combat. The beasts manage to wipe them out, securing a 3rd victory for the Dark eldar.

So, final tournament results I am the only undefeated, so I take 1st. A tau guy went win win draw, so took 2nd. And my round 2 opponent took 3rd. With the prize support, I got a new ravager, to complete the spammy trifecta.

So, a successful tournament. Any comments?

Battle Report! 1000pts Black Templar vs Necrons!

Hey guys, Grandpa Rhino here, making the first battle report in quite a while. Sorry for that. Anyway, to the report!

I went down to my local place this weekend looking for a game because I promised Kasrkar I'd make a report. I got there a little late but managed to squeeze in most of a game, and this is that game. By the way, I gotta say I'm really loving this new place. The Games Workshop in Bowie. The vibe there is really great, really friendly, and everybody knows their stuff. If you're in the area, you should head over!

The Black Templars

HQ:

Emperor's Champion w/ Accept Any Challenge No Matter The Odds (What a mouthful...) -140

Elite:

6 Sword Brethren Assault Terminators, 3 w/ TH/SS, Furious Charge Veteran Skill, one with Crusader Seals -260

Troop:

5 Initiates, 4 Neophytes, w/ Powerfist and Melta, in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers and Searchlight -199

5 Initiates, 4 Neophytes, w/ Powerfist and Melta, in a Rhino w/ Smoke Launchers and Searchlight -199

Fast Attack:

Land Speeder Typhoon -70

Heavy Support:

Vindicator w/ Smoke Launchers and Searchlight -129

998pts

The Necrons

(Little fuzzy, and I don't know the codex. But I will try my hardest. If someone knows the codex and could correct name and point costs, I would be very grateful.)

HQ:

Imotekh the Stormlord

Troop:

10x Immortals

5 Warriors w/ Ark?

Fast Attack:

5 Wraiths, one w/ coil, the rest with pistols

Heavy Support:

Barge

Barge

995 points

Deployment

The game was Dawn of War Annihilation 

He wins the roll-off and goes first

His deployment:

He's got the immortals with Imotekh on his right flank, the Ark with warriors on his left, and the Five wraiths backed up by the two barges in the middle.

My deployment:

Now, let me explain. I don't know the Necron codex. So. I assumed everything he had could destroy anything I had, and I felt like the only safe way to go would be to castle, and this was really the only terrain on my table half. We added another piece on after I deployed to even it, and my Land Speeder was in reserve. I try to seize and fail.

Turn 1

He moves up with everything, except zooms one barge to his right, probably to try and flank me, but I don't believe that thing is quite fast enough to get there in time to help him. For shooting it is of course night fight due to Dawn of War, but he is very afraid of my Vindy, and shoots at it with his barge in the middle, he does nothing, but I realise that thing only has S7 and S5. And if he stays afraid of the Vindy I have nothing to worry about. 

I peak my vindy out from behind the corner, with the rhino moving to cover its side armor, and the termies moving up to the wall to get ready to counter assault, also they cover the rear amor of my tanks in case a mystical angry Sasquatch appears behind my lines. I want to shoot at his barge and try to spot it with the rhino's searchlight, but begin a game of lower-than-my-usual-rolling. In hindsight I should have pivoted the vindy and shot the wraiths. But oh well. He also fails to see the barge. 

Turn 2

My apologies, I forgot to take a picture of his movement. But this pic taken at the end of my turn shows he moved his wraith's up. Also his immortals moved into a building and the second barge came into sight although far away. His shooting was again unsuccessful. On my turn I moved the Termys through the building to assault his wraiths, I rolled a five and was in. I move my rhinos to give my vindy cover, remembering that evil Sasquatches are only in my daydreams. I again roll low and cannot see a thing. In the assault, things go bad. For one I roll pretty shamefully considering I'm usually a great roller in the assault, and I didn't expect wraiths to freaking have two wounds each and a 3+ invuln. We both end up with two guys dead. As this pic shows:

Turn 3

Neither of us really moved, but he continues to have wonderful nightfight rolls, and blows off my vindy's gun with the flanking barge, and immobilized the painted rhino with the center one. The assault continues with neither side taking any casualties. Pfft.

I figure screw it. Firefights are for guardsmen, Charge! This seems to please my dice a little, and things start to turn around. I move up my Vindy and functioning Rhino to be mobile cover should I win the assault, or the troops in my rhino to be reinforcement if things go bad. I keep the guys in my other rhino back to wait for that arc to get closer. This new Berserk tactic seems to please my dice, and I kill two wraiths, losing one lightning claw guy. (Thats four wounds to one remember, against a 3+ invul. Better than it sounds.)

Turn 4 

The place was starting to close up so this was our last turn. He didn't move in favor of more shooting, and immobilized both my cover vehicles, and wrecked the painted rhino killing more guys than I expected. But I wiped out his Wraiths in the assault phase. Sorry I didn't take a picture for his turn because he didn't move.

On my turn, I moved out and assaulted all his vehicles, on a rush for kill points, I will show the results.

                                                  There was a Barge where that squad is.

                  There was an arc where that squad is, he didn't bother getting his warriors out though.

                                             And there was a Barge where those Termies are.

A 4-1 victory for the Templars! I felt bad accepting this victory, as the game ended right at the worst time for him. He may have still lost, but it wouldn't have been by as much. It was an okay game. I need to learn to  not always just try to castle. It suits my army against other assault armies, but I need to take my combat advantage against shooters. My opponent was a good guy, although sadly I don't remember his name, maybe next time! I'll try to make another battle report over this coming weekend, but I'm still working on getting my list comfortable at 1500, hopefully soon! Until next time, goodbye from Grandpa Rhino.

A (somewhat unexpected) Dark Eldar tournament report!

Hello all, and time for yet another tournament report as I attempt to perfect my Dark Eldar list and tactics! This tournament was 1500 points, and the funny thing is, I knew Kasrkar was going to be there with his dreaded Guard, but I didn't think I'd be going. I had a prior engagement beforehand, and I figured I'd go and watch Kasrkar dominate his way to the top, and then get in a game with the man in question afterwards. However, when I showed up, the guy running the tournament said they had an odd number of guys, and that he'd let me jump in with 10 points as if I'd gotten a draw, since I missed the first round. So, I wrote up a list in 5 minutes that looked like:

Haemonculus with Shattershard, venom blade

5 Incubi with Klaivex, venom with 2 Splinter cannons

3 Trueborn with 2 Splinter Cannons, raider with Flickerfield

9 Wyches with haywires, hydra gauntlets, Hekatrix with agonizer, raider with Flickerfield

5 Wyches with Haywire Grenades, venom with 2 Splinter cannons

5 Warriors with Blaster, venom with 2 splinter cannons

5 Warriors with Blaster, venom with 2 splinter cannons

5 Warriors with Blaster, venom with 2 splinter cannons

Ravager with Flickerfield

Ravager with Flickerfield

Razorwing with Flickerfield

Like 1,499 points or something. Just under 1,500 for sure. Not one of my usual lists, trying MSU for the first time really. We'll see how it goes.

So, round 1 which I missed, Kasrkar faced a Grey Knights guy with a Land Raider of each type, a Stormraven, A dreadnaught with a Lascannon, Coteaz, a Libby, and a bunch of random henchmen. Anyway, Dawn of War, seize ground, turn 1 nothing much happened, turn 2 Kasrkar killed all the Raiders and the Stormraven. He tabled his opponent, but was prevented from achieving the secondary and tertiary. So he wound up with 15/20 points, and everyone got set for round 2...

Round 2 vs. Thomas' Crimson Fists!

His list:

Pedro

Chapter Master with Plasma Pistol, powerfist

9 Sterngard with Powerfist, plasma pistol, 2 lascannons, 2 combi-meltas

10 Tacs with Lascannon, Plasma Gun, sergeant with Plasma Pistol, Powerfist

10 Tacs with Lascannon, Plasma Gun, sergeant with Plasma Pistol, Powerfist

10 Tacs with plasma cannon, Plasma Gun, sergeant with Plasma Pistol, Powerfist

10 Tacs with plasma cannon, Plasma Gun, sergeant with Plasma Pistol, Powerfist

So, quite the large army.

Mission:

Primary: Capture and Control

Secondary: Kill the Traitor, each player gives the other a model to be the traitor, you must kill your traitor.

Tertiary: Table quarters, have the most VPs in a table quarter.

Deployment: Spearhead

So he wins the roll off, and deploys his Sterngard with the Chapter Master, and separately my traitor, in a building in his quarter, and one Lascannon tac squad next to the building, everything else in and around a crater that had his C&C marker in it. My deployment was all of my ships deployed around a building in my quarter that held my C&C marker, using my ravagers to give cover to the rest of my army, since they won't be much use this game (or so I thought).

The Game:

I try to seize, and fail! He goes right to shooting, and calls down 2 bombardments turn 1, and added in with all the lascannons, he wrecks my Razorwing, took all the weapons off a warrior venom, and immobilized the Raider with my wyches in it. My turn, I zerg up the middle, and kill half the Sterngard, and half of a squad of tacticals, who run off the table. The rest of the game is essentially me pushing forward and shooting, and him immobilizing my vehicles. He calls it turn 4, as I am about to launch a game-ending assault.

Result: Win for the Dark Eldar, 20/20 possible points!

A terrible matchup for Thomas, but he took it in stride. Kasrkar played on the table next to me this game, and his game only lasted 2 turns. It was against a wych-heavy Dark Eldar player, and he killed basically everything turn 1, and they called the game at the exact same time as we called ours. So Kasrkar was on table 1 for round 3 against some Khorne CSMs, and I was on table 2 vs:

Round 3 vs. John's Grey Knights!

His list:

Draigo (sigh)

Librarian with Vortex of doom, might of titan, sanctuary, shrouding, 2 servo-skulls

Vindicare Assassin

5 Paladins with 2 MC psycannons, 4 Halberds, 1 MC hammer

10 Strikes with MC hammer, Warding stave

Stormraven

Psybolt dread

So, not too many models. I wasn't too scared going into this game, although that opinion changed midway through the game.

Mission:

Primary: VPs, need to win by at least 200

Secondary: Eliminate highest point enemy HQ

Tertiary: Table your opponent

Deployment: Pitched battle

So he wins the roll-off, and, bizarrely it seemed, decided to go second. Perplexed, I set up in the center of my deployment zone, set up for the alpha-strike. Then in his deployment, he said he was deepstriking everything. I probably should have seen that coming, but oh well. He set up his servo-skulls down the center line of the table. He then infiltrated his Vindicare in a ruin in the middle of the table.

The Game:

He tries to seize, and fails. First turn I move up and lance the Vindicare to death, and in my second turn I turbo far away from his servo skulls. Well, turn 2 he rolls for reserves, and gets nothing. Turn 3, I turbo again. His turn 3, everything comes on, and all hell breaks loose. Everything lands on target, Draigo with the Pallies, and the Dread and strikes with the Libby hopping out of the raven. Shooting, he kills one ravager, and the Raider with my wyches in it. My turn, it is time for retribution! I set both squads of wyches up to assault the strikes, and everything else moves away from the Paladins. Shooting, I fire a lot of stuff into the paladins, and kill 1 paladin outright, wound the rest, and put 2 wounds on Draigo. Shattershard takes care of the Libby and 2 strikes, and splinter fire accounts for 1 more strike. Raven is immobilized by blasterfire from the warriors.

The rest of the game is the wyches assaulting the strikes and them doing jack to each other, the raven and dread killing my vehicles, and the paladins eating 200+ splinter shots and 15 lances, and there were still 2 wounded paladins and draigo on 1 wound left. As it turned out, I won primary by like 300 VPs, and we tied secondary and tertiary. Had it gone into extra turns, I would have tabled him for sure. John was a good guy, and very good player, and no matter how many guys I killed, he was a great sport.

Result: Win for the Dark Eldar, 15/20 points!

That last game turned out to be pretty tight down the stretch. Oh yeah, and Kasrkar killed the CSMs. Just blew apart defilers and dreads without a second thought. Pretty crazy.

Tournament results:

I was hoping Karkar would draw, and I would massacre, meaning I would leapfrog him, and get the top spot, but that didn't happen. So I had to contend with second, whilst Kasrkar took the top spot. Kasrkar's round 1 opponent took 3rd. In addition to other prizes, Kasrkar got the 25th anniversary special model. I got anther box of warriors, destined to become Trueborn, so that I can kill tanks for once.

So, anther tournament over. Any comments? Criticisms? Witticisms? Any kind of -cisms?

Chaos Daemons Progress Report

Greetings, everyone!

While I may have only mentioned my daemons army a couple of times, the time has come to actually make a post dedicated to them.

Since I started the army, I have placed high in a few tourneys, gotten a few conversion ideas, and made a couple of trades. As such, the daemons have been growing remarkably fast for an army that I am not spending any money on.

My army is roughly 1500-1600 points now, assuming that I don't give everything a ton of dumb upgrades. Here is a list of daemon things I have, as well as how I obtained them without spending any cash:

2 Tzeentch heralds on chariots (converted from stuff bought w/ store cred from tourneys)

28 pink horrors (store cred from tourneys)

10 bloodletters (store cred from tourneys)

10 fiends of slaanesh (converted w/ stuff from store cred from trading)

2 daemons princes (1 converted from stuff bought w/ store cred from tourneys, 1 scratch converted)

The daemons have really become more of a modelling project than I'd have liked, but I've been jumping whenever I see something I can convert. I will be honest though, I'm pretty proud of my conversions. It makes the army feel much more personalized. I will attempt to get some pictures soon.

Anyway, I have been basing my lists (and units I get) off of a technique I developed very recently. Below is my 1500 point list with infomation on the technique/tactics I use with each unit.

HQ:

-Herald of Tzeentch, Master of Sorcery, We Are Legion, Bolt of Tzeentch, Chariot of Tzeentch

-Herald of Tzeentch, Master of Sorcery, We Are Legion, Bolt of Tzeentch, Chariot of Tzeentch

Being jetbikes, these guys can hover outside of assault range and bring down tansports with bolt. Their job is also to flank medium tanks like predators or vindicators and get side armor shots. They can do all this while splitting their fire and bringing down marines with their 24" S5 AP3 assault 3 gaze.

Elites:

-5 Fiends of Slaanesh, 1 has Unholy Might

-5 Fiends of Slaanesh, 1 has Unholy Might

Unless I roll badly, fiends can pretty much beat or match about anything in combat. 6 rending attacks per dude on the charge at S5-6 is pretty brutal. Especially when you strike before marines. Oh yeah...and they are beasts. I primarily use fiends to bust me out of tough situations, break an enemy line, or hang back and give me a devastating counter-charge. They are the type of unit that has a lot of utility, and they are a bargain for their point costs.

Troops:

-6 Pink Horrors, Bolt of Tzeentch, Changeling

-6 Pink Horrors, Bolt of Tzeentch

-6 Pink Horrors, Bolt of Tzeentch

-6 Pink Horrors, Bolt of Tzeentch

Probably one of the least point efficient units in the game, but the only troops choice I can take that has the ability to shoot and pop tanks. Luckily, 4+ invulns keep these guys alive, even in smaller squads. Since most people castle up against daemons, I've seen success in surrounding your enemy with horrors. The horrors can shoot stuff up, and when the enemy tries to charge them, it's good to have something scary hiding behind them for a counter-charge.

-7 Bloodletters

Super cheap unit that will pretty much wipe out any space marine unit before it gets to attack. Bloodletters get misused a lot, though, since people always just deepstrike them right in front of the enemy. While my experience with bloodletters is limited, I use them as a counter-charge unit and hide them behind terrain near the horrors.

Heavy Support:

-Daemon Prince, Mark of Tzeentch, Bolt of Tzeentch

Not very cost efficient, but he is BS5, and he helps fill the gap in the daemons codex where mass, ranged, anti-tank should be. This guy really doesn't matter a lot in some games, so from time to time it is fun to just deep strike him behind the enemy and try to get him into the assault.

-Daemon Prince, Mark of Nurgle, Wings, Iron Hide, Noxious Touch, Cloud of Flies, Daemonic Gaze

A lot of points go into this daemon prince, but he is tough (T6, 3+, 5++, W4), killy (Avg. of 6 dead marines before they can attack when he charges), and fast (jump infantry). A very good counter-charge unit. He is also able to jump on badly positioned units pretty well.

So, my list comes to 1500 on the dot, and as you can see, my technique revolves heavily on trapping my enemy and getting off a lot of good counter-charges while using the horrors as bait. It has worked well so far, but I have a lot to learn.

Anyway, this is the stage that the daemons are at. I will make it a goal to get a picture battle report to you guys by the end of the week with my daemons.

Oh, and one more thing. Mostly due to my recent tourney victory that Jaybie posted about, I have about $70 store credit that I will spend on the daemons. What do you think I should get? I am thinking Fateweaver perhaps...or 8 more fiends to give me 3 units of 6.

Hope you all are having a nice Spring Break!

-Kasrkar

Oops

Today, I received a text from Jaybie today. It was him yelling at me for not posting on the blog. This text message made me remember one very important fact, and that fact is that I am a writer on a 40k blog. For the last 5 months I have been kept very busy by school, my job as a media technician, and my second job as a Skyrim player. While I cannot say that this will change, I can say that I am going to say for the millionth time that I will try to post more.

So, while it feels like every time I post I have to update what's been going on for the last several months, I will just say that not much has happened. I have been to several tournaments in the last 5 months, some I have no doubt placed in, and the last couple I have gotten 4th with W/W/L and W/D/D.

It is noteworthy that at the tournament before last, I went against the one and only Blackmoor and his Draigowing. I can say from personal experience that he is an amazing player, and I just barely managed to beat him by a mere 2 kill points with my guard.

Anyway, I will jump into the actual post now.

I have not been playing a lot lately, but I've come to a very evident conclusion about my guard. They simply are not the most mentally challenging to play. They can be mentally challenging to succeed with, as Jaybie found out when he tried to use them against my daemons, but they have gotten a little bit old.

The point is, I have not ranked 4th in the last couple of tournaments due to large errors. At no point in the games was I in a situation where I could have made a critical mistake. Most losses/draws with them have been due to bad dice or single critical die rolls. This made me realize that my playstyle is a bit dry.

I think that as a 40k player, I should be able to make critical errors, and not be rewarded by sitting in a corner and shooting the bad guys. This is why I want to start playing my daemons and eldar more. I have also been very inspired by Blackmoor claiming 1st place with his daemons and then footdar in his last 2 tournaments.

So, long story short, I have changed my footdar list around a little bit so that I can use it in larger scale games and not just 1000pts. I plan on getting some practice games in soon, and I will post those if I remember. (I won't lie, you've seen my posting history. I probably will forget).

Here's the first draft of the updated Footdar. It is heavily influenced by Blackmoor, so go check his list/blog out to compare if you'd like.

Footdar V.2! 1,750 pts

HQ:

-Eldrad Ulthran

What did you expect? A normal farseer?

-Avatar

I've heard the idea of swapping him out for a fortune/doom farseer, and I'm not sure which I should roll with. The avatar serves as an amazing counter-assault unit, but another farseer would give me 3 fortunes per turn. And I could give the farseer eldritch storm, which has actually become one of my favorite abilities. (It would allow more rear/side armor shots on bigger vehicles.)

Elites:

-10 harliquins, 10 kisses, shadowseer, death jester

I need a solid counter assault unit, and Blackmoor uses clowns. The simple fact that the shadowseer can prevent them from being shot up while they wait is invaluable. Plus they are pretty freaking fast, and hit hard.

Troops:

-10 guardians, scatter laser

-10 guardians, scatter laser

-10 guardians, scatter laser

I love my little 10 man SL guardian squads. They may suck at shooting, but with as many shots as they can pump out, they will hit something. Plus they can kill rhinos/razorbacks.

-10 dire avengers, exarch w/ 2 catapults, bladestorm

-10 dire avengers, exarch w/ 2 catapults, bladestorm

Every time I mention Footdar, my fellow eldar players start raving about dire avengers, so I've decided to try and play them a bit more.

Heavy Support:

-Wraithlord, bright lance, EML, 2 flamers

-Wraithlord, bright lance, EML, 2 flamers

I really like wraithlords, and I have never used this build with them actually. I feel that it is a necessary build in today's metagame, though.

-3 war walkers, 6 Scatter lasers

What can I say? 24 S6 shots makes me salivate, especially when those shots are guided.

So, my total comes to 1,724. I'm thinking about dropping the upgrades on the dire avengers for 64 points and getting a 5 man squad of fire dragons. Or I could drop the dire avenger upgrades and a single harlie, which would allow me to get a 5 man warp spider squad. Anyway, since I made this list almost entirely based on units I want to get better with and comments from my peers, I would really appreciate your own comments. I'm going to make a post on my daemons and their progress soon, maybe tonight.

Thanks for reading, and happy Valentine's Day in advance.

-Kasrkar

Dark Eldar Tournament report!

Hello all! It's Jaybie coming at you with a tournament report with the Dark eldar! I played this tournament at a different store than I usually do, which just opened near me. It was very well run, and they did some things differently than what I'm used to. Notably, that the missions were all battle point based.

Each mission had a Primary objective worth 10 points, secondary worth 6 points, and tertiary worth 4 points. So, a massacre would get you 20 points.

I took the list that I detailed in my last post. It's not built to be super competitive, but it can win, and is really fun to play with. On to the games!

Game 1 vs. Daniel's Grey Knights!

His list:

Draigo

Librarian with Sanctuary, Shrouding, 2 other powers that were never used

10 Paladins with BroBanner, 4 psycannons, everyone else wound allocated out

10 Strike Squad with Master-crafted hammer, 2 psycannons

3 Psydreads

Ouch! Lots of hurt in that army. Only 25 models too, lol.

The mission:

Primary: Seize ground, 3 objectives

Secondary: Win more rounds of assault

Tertiary: Kill the most expensive enemy HQ (Draigo for him, Vect for me)

Deployment for all 3 games was pitched battle.

The Game:

I won the roll off, and took second turn. He deployed his paladins and HQs in a blob in a big piece of terrain to the right flank, all the Dreads behind them, the Strikes in reserve. Grand strategy made the 3 dreads troops. I deployed my ships behind a building opposite him. I then seized with Vect!

He began a slow advance, shooting at my vehicles. He did little damage, killing a few vehicles in the early game, and my venoms torrented his Paladins, causing a wound on ever single one. I immobilized and knocked all the weapons off of one of his dreads. However, once his Pallies got in range, my ships started popping left and right. I still had a chance to draw, or even win, but then I showed my inexperience against the GKs and charged the Pallies with my Wyches and Vect, and surrendered all three objectives in one fell swoop. The rest of the game was mostly just cleanup for him.

Result: Loss, 0/20 points.

Well, I underestimated those Paladins something fierce! Those Dreads are hard to kill, too. Daniel was a great opponent. He knew what he was doing, and made me pay for every mistake I made. He also kept a great demeanor through it all, even when he failed to penetrate my Ravager with all of his dreadnoughts!

Game 2 vs. Mark's Orks!

His list:

Ghaz

Big Mek with Kustom Force Field, heavy armor, cybork body

10 Nobz with various weapons, every damned save in the book, trukk with every upgrade

10 Ard boyz with shootas, trukk with everything

10 Boyz with Nob with power klaw, trukk with everything

Deff Dred with 4 CCWs, extra armor, grot riggers

4 bikes with power klaw

4 bikes with power klaw

3 bikes with power klaw

Mission:

Primary: Capture and Control

Secondary: Table Quarters (Control goes to whoever has most VPs in the quarter, HQs and vehicles don't count)

Tertiary: Kill your "Traitor" (Each person gives one of their models to the other person, they are ICs. I gave a warrior, he gave and Ork boy)

So, this guy is good, as he had nearly beaten some Mech BAs in the last round, and with only 2 models left! I figured I would have to use my experience against Orks to the full!

I won the roll off to go first, and let him go first. He deployed very aggressively, only leaving the boyz and their trukk with my traitor back at his objective. I deployed along my board edge. I do not attempt to seize.

The Game (You just lost it!):

He rushed everything at me, shot a little, and didn't do anything. I shuffled around, and shot down a unit of bikes, and immobilized his two trukks that were rushing up. turn 2 he Waaghed, and assaulted my vehicles. He killed my Voidraven, and a venom.

In retaliation, I assaulted both of his bike squads, one with Incubi, the other with Malys's unit, and his big Nobstar+Ghaz with Malys (Multi assaults, ftw) and Vect's unit. All targets were destroyed, with Vect himself killing Ghaz in a (not so) dramatic duel. That was basically game, but we played on. I killed the rest of his stuff, but one awesome boy squad killed my raider AND Malys in turn 6. They were then avenged by the Incubi.

Result: Win, 20/20 points.

Mark was a very crafty player, who went on to beat his own son's Tyranids in the final game. He was stunned by the amount of damage my army was able to do, but took it all in stride, like a true sportsman.

Game 3, vs. Corey's Eldar!

His list:

Avatar

Farseer with Guide, doom, Eldrich storm, spirit stones, Runes of Warding, Runes of Witnessing

10 Scorpions with exarch with the crazy weapon that makes your strength get bigger

5 Wraithguard with Warlock with some psychic power, Serpent with Missile Launcher

3 units of 10 Pathfinders (!)

5 Warp spiders with the deepstrike thing.

Fire Prism with Holo-field

Mission:

Primary: VPs (Win by 250)

Secondary: Table your opponent

Tertiary: Table your opponent by turn 5

So, a perfect mission for a grudge match between the Eldar and the Dark Eldar.

I won the roll, and chose to go second, reasoning that even if I didn't seize, his army didn't have enough firepower to scare me overmuch. He deployed his Prism on the far right, and his Avatar, Farseer, and serpent with Wraithguard to the left. I deployed centrally, in a fleet. Corey then infiltrated his scorpions and two units of pathfinders about 18" from my dudes, and his other pathfinders in a building on the right. His Spiders are in reserve, to deepstrike.

The game:

I seize (Thank you Vect!). My dudes decide to just go for it. Vect and his girls run up and fleet so as to be in assault range of his Scorpions and a unit of Pathfinders, and the Incubi disembark 1" away from some Pathfinders. The rest of my ships zerged up, ready to shoot at his stuff! In shooting, I shook both of his vehicles, and put 2 wounds on the Farseer. In Assault, the Incubi wiped the Pathfinders without a problem, and Vect alone killed 6 of the scorpions! I killed everything that I assaulted. In his turn, the Pathfinders in the building killed 4 of the Incubi, and the Klaivex passed LD.

The rest of the game was pretty much cleanup for me. He conceded turn 3, with only the Spiders in reserve left.

Result: Win, 20/20 points.

That was a terrible matchup for Corey. I got lucky on my fleet rolls to be able to get off that massive turn 1 assault. Vect was the star of the show, killing 6 Scorpions, 5 Wraithguard, and soloing the Avatar.

So, at the end of the Tournament, I have 40/60 points. Not great, but not bad either. Daniel, my round one opponent, took a tough loss to some FootDar on table one, putting him at 40 points like me. It turns out we tied for 3rd! Admittedly, I got a couple of good matchups to get me there, but doesn't everyone? At least it wasn't my usual Blood angels, then Guard, then Guard again!

So, post tournament thoughts on the Dark Eldar:

This list is fun, but if I want to win consistently, I'm going to have to make some major changes. Vect is fun, but he has to go. He's just too many points! I need more Troops, probably 6. I need more anti-tank, which means more Wyches in Raiders, maybe a 3rd squad. Malys I think I will keep for 1750, just because she is useful. Full post coming later!

So, that's it for today. Comments?

Dark Eldar for a tournament this weekend!

Hi, all!

So, a new game store opened near my place. I've been taking my chaos to RTTs lately, so I thought I'd change it up a little. Here are my dark eldar at 1750 points

Asdrubael Vect

Lady Malys

5 Incubi with Klaivex, venom with 2 scannons

3 Trueborn with 2 scannons, venom with 2 scannons

9 Wyches with hydra gauntlets, haywire grenades, Hekatrix with Agonizer, Raider with FF, Grisly trophies

8 Wyches with hydra gauntlets, haywire grenades, Hekatrix with Agonizer, Raider with FF, Grisly trophies

5 Warriors with blaster, venom with 2 scannons

5 warriors with blaster, venom with 2 scannons

Ravager with 3 Dark lances, flickerfield

Ravager with 3 Dark lances, flickerfield

Voidraven with flickerfield

Total: 1,750 points

Now, there are some choices in there that a lot of people don't usually take. I will explain the uses of these units:

Malys:

I really like what she adds to the army. She's a little bit of a shocker to a lot of people, with her redeployment. Often during dawn of war i will deploy Vect and some wyches in a raider as far up as possible, and hoping to kill him early, the enemy will deploy a couple of razorbacks or something, then I can pull him back to come on turn 1, and then kill the razors with ravagers, all while cackling maniacally, of course. Also, 8 power weapon attacks are not to be sniffed at.

Vect:

He is my sledgehammer, honestly. He is possibly the best pure assault character in the game, even topping Mephiston I think. He will rip through MEQs and HQs like nothing. But be careful he doesn't get gang-tackled, because once that shadowfield goes down, Vect will soon follow.

Incubi w/ out grenade support:

A lot of people will use these guys as a spearhead unit, to just bash face, with an archon with a PGL, of course. However, I use them differently, and very effectively. See, I usually keep my venoms in a fleet, very tightly packed, all shooting at the same 1-2 targets. The downside to this is that a lot of the time, people will multiple assault and beat up my poor paper airplanes. The Incubi are there to dissuade such units from attempting such moves. Also, if there's a tactical squad out of cover, they are the perfect unit to handle them.

Voidraven:

The Strength 9 lances are really useful to pop dreadnoughts. I also like to point out that it is the most durable vehicle in the Dark Eldar army!

Now as to the whole army, there is one thing you probably noticed: A lack of anti-tank. That is true, however, I've found that if you just kill or suppress a few key vehicles per turn, you're okay. Also, people will often use their ravagers to shoot a tactical squad. What i do is if there are no vehicles or monsters in line of sight, i will just turbo boost for the 4+ cover, or behind terrain, etc.

I have only played 1 games with this list, against Deathwing, in killpoints dawn of war. I got a 1st turn assault on some termies with a squad of wyches and Vect, who were then countercharged by a squad of terminators, who were then charged by Malys and her girls. At the end of this huge assault, the only survivors were Malys, and 15 wyches. The rest of my army was able to shoot the rest of his army to bits, except for one dreadnought who rampaged through my dudes.

My bad habit with this list is to shove the wyches+HQs up the center on a turn 1-2 assault, kill some stuff, then they get shot to death, and that's a lot of my army gone. What I will try to do is to play a little less aggressively.

We'll see how it goes. Expect an after-action report. Farewell until then!

P.S. I'll try to get Kasrkar and GR to post more.