Week 3 Army Lists

Wow. This blog is late in coming. My game vs. Dave was like over 2 weeks ago. Better late than never…

This game, I decided to go with a much faster force and I also wanted to break out my Autarch since I had just finished a conversion of one. So here’s my list.

Autarch w/ Jump Generator, Fusion Gun, Power Weapon, Mandiblasters
Farseer w/ Jetbike, Fortune, Doom, Spirit Stones
8 Harlequins incl. Shadowseer (w/ H-kiss), 4x H-kiss, 2x Fusion Pistols, 1x Shu-Pistol/CCW
10 Fire Dragons incl. Exarch w/ Firepike
2 squads of 10 Dire Avengers incl. Exarch w/ Shu-Pistol and Diresword and Bladestorm
10 Warp Spiders incl. Exarch w/ Powerblades, 2x Death Spinners, and Withdraw
5 Shining Spears incl. Exarch w/ Starlance, Skilled Rider, and Withdraw

I did not get a chance to write-down Dave’s SM list, so have to go by a bit of memory and a few notes. Before I get to the list, I have to say, Dave’s SM army is incredible. It LOOKS awesome. It is well painted, features several nice conversions, and many older minis – combined these elements made for an excellent army. But wait, there’s more. Dave told me the backstory about the Chapter (I won’t go into it, I would not do the story justice) and how that guided the Traits he chose. Also, to fit with his fluff, Dave chooses to field ONLY low-level HQs. In essence, his Chapter is a Siege chapter. So he uses the “Devastators can = Elites” trait and the “heavy weapons can be exchanged for assault weapons” trait. The drawbacks were no scouts and no infiltrators (I think). Anyway, Kudos to Dave for his excellent army. Onto the vague list…

Low level Commander
Low level Chaplain
6 (or so) Assault Marines without the jetpacks
2 or 3 Tactical squads w/ 8 (or so) marines, melta and flamer
2 or 3 Devestator squads (6-man, I think) w/ Missiles and Heavy Bolters
Predator Destructor
2 (Yes, TWO) Vindicators


I’ll *TRY* to get a bat-rep up tomorrow night, but I’m striving to have a Deathwing “Belial” and Deathwing Terminator Interrogator-Chaplain painted for an event this weekend (Belial is half done, I-C is about 1/3 done). Until then, keep the mandiblasters charged-up and the teeth of your scorpion chainsword razor sharp!

Week 2 Army Lists

Well now, I just typed up 2 army lists. Due to crappy key stroke (damned wireless keyboard), voila, erased in an instant. So here they are AGAIN. ;-(

Here’s my Eldar list. I tested the “Farseer-Avatar-Wraithlord” combo (see last blog). I’ll follow my list with Ray’s =][=/DH list.

ELDAR

*HQ*
Farseer w/ Doom, Fortune, Spirit Stone, Runes of Warding, Singing Spear upgrade
Avatar

*ELITES*
6 Fire Dragons incl. Exarch w/ Dragon’s Breath flamer
10 Howling Banshees incl. Exarch w/ Executioner
9 Harlequins incl. Shadow Seer (w/ Harlies Kiss) and Troupe Master w/ Power Weapon; troopers armed w/ 4x HKs and 2x Fusion Pistols

*TROOPS*
10 Dire Avengers incl. Exarch w/ Diresword & Shu-Pistol
10 Dire Avengers incl. Exarch w/ Diresword & Shu-Pistol

*HEAVY SUPPORT*
Wraithlord w/ Brightlance and double-flamers
Falcon w/ Scatter Laser, Shu-Cannon upgrade, Spirit Stones, Holo-Field, Vectored Engines

Points: 1494


RAY’S DAEMONHUNTER LIST

*HQ*
GK Brother Capt.

*ELITE*
Inquisitor w/ Psycannon
Eversor Assassin

*TROOPS*
8 IST w/ 2 plasma guns
> Chimaira w/ Multi-laser & Hvy Bolter
9 IST w/ 2 plasma guns
> Rhino

*FAST ATTACK*
10 Grey Knights incl. Justicar
10 Grey Knights incl. Justicar
5 Grey Knights incl. Justicar and 2x Psycannons

*HEAVY SUPPORT*
Grey Knight Dread w/ Assault Cannon, DCCW, Incinerator, X-armor
Lance Strike

Points: 1496

Life sure has gotten in the way of blogging my league experience. I hope to get the full battle report up by the end of tomorrow (thank goodness for the long weekend). Until then, make sure your power weapons are charged and ready for blood!

Missing Out this week...

Real life has gotten in the way of gaming this week. Bummer.

But, that hasn't made me stop thinking of the league and theorizing about some neat list themes I'd like to try out. Here's what I've narrowed it down to. I'd like to try lists that fit these five themes. Probably run each theme once early in the league, then follow up with tweeked versions later in the league--in other words, try them at least once each, and then re-try the ones that were particularly good and/or fun.

Themes to test:

1. Close Combat Oriented Infantry Horde (tried this last week, won)
2. Stand and Fire Heavy Infantry Horde
3. Farseer-Avatar-Wraithlord-Aspect Warrior combo (add in Transportation to differentiate from the above Hordes)
4. Fast list (not to be confused with the Mounted list below, this list features Warp Spiders, Shining Spears, Jetbike HQs, etc.)
5. Mounted list (not to be confused with the Fast list above, this list features a Falcon and two Wave Serpents filled to the gills with Aspect Warrior goodness)

So that's the idea I (more-or-less) came up with over the last week. In terms of who I play against, I'll think about that more as the league progresses. But I definately want to run up against the Khorne army (Eric). I may even try to fight fire with fire on that one - try to see if I can out-close-combat the Berzerkers (load-up on Howling Banshees and Harlequins). I'd like to go against Jack's Tau again, late in the league after he's had a bit more practice with them. I'd like to play everyone once if possible, but we'll see...

Until next time, keep your Shuriken Catapult pointed forward, preferrably at the enemy...

Game 1, Firesweep, vs. Tau (Jack)

Well, it was my first league game last night. As hoped, I was able to play against Jack's new Tau army. The Tau are one of those armies that I have rarely played against in the past, and certainly have not played them much since their new codex, so was looking forward to seeing them in action. As one might predict, the first few turns saw Eldar dying by the droves while the last few turns saw Tau dying in droves. Here's the details...

Jack’s basic list:
Crisis HQ
2 Crisis Suits (Elite unit, HQ joined)
2 Firewarrior squads w/ Devilfish
1 Firewarrior squad w/ marker drones
5-man stealth suit squad
pathfinder unit w/ Devilfish
2 units of 2 gun drones
1 unit of 6 gun drones
2 piranha

Firesweep Mission*, Gamma
* A note about “house amendment” to Firesweep mission. League is calling for VPs to be used, but all but 1 mission use objectives, not VPs. So for this one, we just used the “loot counters” rule for the 5 buildings, thus each gave a 300 VP bonus at end of game.
Jack chose deployment zone and I had to deploy 1st
Jack = Demolition & Prelim. Bombardment** Stratagems
Me = Infiltrators (Pathfinders & Scorpions) & Sewer Rats (2 Dire Squads and Fire Dragons) Stratagems
** Dire 1, Autarch, & Harlies missed w/ Prelim Bomb; Striking Scorps, Guardians, & Pathfinders all hit – Scorps miss 2 saves and are pinned turn 1
I won dice roll to determine who went first - go figure, it was me

(the following is not a full bat-rep; I was so busy dusting the 40k/CoD rule cobwebs off my brain that I only took notes about what I did)

Turn 1
Dire 1 move across building they're in, but are out of range (barely).
Scorpions pinned from Prelim. Bomb.
Harlies & Autarch move & fleet to right, towards Tau flank.
Guardian Brightlance fired at Pathfinder Devilfish, hit, but no penetration/glance.
Rangers are “The Men!” w/ 5 AP1 shots (6th shot also hit); 4 wounds at AP1 plus failed wound from 6th shot removed both crisis suits and wounded the HQ.
**Result, Eldar = 2 buildings; Tau = 0

In Jack’s Turn 1, concentrated markerlights and numerous units firing at the Eldar Pathfinders resulted in the complete loss of that unit.

Turn 2
Both Sewer Rat Dire Avengers come on table; Fire Dragons do not (2 of 4 sewers blocked, so all 3 couldn’t come out anyway)
Dire 1 and 2 shoot up Stealth Suits, killing 1 (opted not to do any bladestorm, not all of the dires could reach suits, so it was more like a squad or so worth of shooting at them)
Dire 3 shoots/bladestorms Firewarrior squad just disembarked from Devilfish, killing 3
Harlies & Autarch run forward; Harlies have a CRITICAL MELTDOWN by rolling 1 for Fleet – ANYTHING else would have resulted in a charge on Firewarriors in a building, as it stood, they were over 6” (and less than 7”) from the unit (and got shot to pieces – more on this later).
Guardian Brightlance shuffles right in their building & shot at Pathfinder Devilfish again, missing completely.
**Result, Eldar = 3 buildings; Tau = 1

In Jack’s turn, Dire 2 that just emerged from left sewer between Dire 1 and Scorpions was shot to pieces, leaving Exarch and 1 trooper. I can’t say enough how bummed I am about that horrific fleet roll for the Harlies – they were all killed for that mistake (it did take a lot of shooting from Jack’s vehicles). Eh… ;-(

Turn 3
Fire Dragon sewer rats come on, emerging from right flank sewer near Dire 3 and Autarch.
Dire 3 moves and fleets towards building w/ Firewarriors (had bladestormed last turn); they assault and the combat results in a 0-0 draw w/ Dire Avengers piling in (thus “piling into the building”).
Dire 2 moves and fleets towards HQ Crisis Suit; making it into assault, causing 1 wound, and then Dire Swording him into oblivion! HA! That 10 point upgrade DID come in handy! Consolidation move takes him into stealth suits.
Fire Dragons positioned to shoot at Devilfish, destroying a weapon (missile pods) and stunning it several times (3 to be exact).
Autarch – Hmmm, can’t remember what he did – probably shot fusion gun at something to little effect (or aided Dragons in shooting at the Devilfish).
Guardian Brightlance shoots at Piranha and fails to glance/pen.
**Result: Same Score… Eldar = 3; Tau = 1

In Jack’s Turn 3, Dire 3 in close combat w/ Firewarriors kills 4 for no losses in return and then routes the Firewarriors with a vicious over-running. Conversely, Dire 2 Exarch is killed by Stealth Suits w/o killing any in return.

Turn 4
Things are looking desperate at this point. Dire 1 is down to a last man standing (Exarch), Dire 2 is wiped out, Guardians are down to a last man standing (Warlock), Harlies are wiped out w/o ever doing anything, Scorpions down to half-size due to prelim bomb (2 dead) and 2 dead in dangerous terrain (central building destroyed in start of turn 3, scorpions moved into it afterwards to claim) and 1 from general shooting by gun drones; Fire Dragons down to 6-man.

But things turn around in this first half of Turn 4, and the rest of the game is all for the Eldar (Jack’s dice went cold, mine turned hot, and I finally hit the Tau lines so they crumpled in close combat)…

Dire 1 exarch and Warlock pass Last Man Standing rolls. In the shooting phase, Autarch killed one of the two piranha, fire dragons downed the firewarrior devilfish damaged earlier, and Warlock singing spears the Pathfinder devilfish and downs it. Dire 3 shoots at 6-drone gun drone unit, killing all 6. Assault phase: Dire 1 Exarch runs, fleets, and charges stealth suits, killing 1 or 2, and then overrunning the rest after they failed LD test. Scorpions charge 2-drone gun unit, killing both and consolidating into the other 2-drone gun unit (which was killed in Jack’s subsequent part of Turn 4).
Result: Eldar = 4; Tau = 1 (Dire 3 finally in building uncontested, so claimed it from Tau; but Stealth Suits had been in the other building long enough to claim it – Eldar added an objective; Tau just traded one for another).

Turn 5
Shooting phase sees Autarch & Fire Dragons gun down a bunch of Firewarriors and then cleaning them up in close combat. Warlock clambers onto downed devilfish to spear the one behind it, but it is out of range. Scorpions charge into Pathfinders and kill them off.

Jack is left with 1 unit of Firewarriors, a Devilfish, and a Piranha. Since the Devilfish & Piranha couldn’t claim objectives, Jack conceded the game at the mid-point of 5. Doing some rough calculations (my VP bonus alone was 1200 while Jack’s was 300), it ended up being a Massacre/Victorious Slaughter for the Eldar, providing 20 points to me and 0 points to Jack.

So, what did I want to “test” in this game? First of all, I wanted to start w/ the Horde list. In lower point games, such as 1500, I always start list building by “going back to basics”. For this one, that meant really kicking the tires on many of the Troops units. Originally, I had 6x Troops including 2 Guardian squads; but some bad math resulted in the list actually being over 1500 points, so I re-organized the guardians into one larger squad, after bumping up Scorpions and Fire Dragons to full-size. Second, I wanted to test the Harlequins. On paper, they look poised to be the best damn Cityfight unit in the game, with their ignoring terrain rule (works for both movement and assault) plus fleet of foot move (plus Furious Charge and Hit & Run skills).

What did I learn regarding these “tests”? Troops are really the meat and potatoes of list building. The Dire Avengers got pretty trounced by Firewarrior guns, but in the end, even they were able to wipe out entire squads of Tau in close combat (I would NOT suggest Dires as close combat troops vs. ANY other army). Oddly, their overall shooting was not impressive – a bladestormed Firewarrior squad still only lost 3 guys to 27 shots. The large guardian squad did little. It DID claim one building (the one it deployed into), but then proceeded to bounce Brightlance shots off everything it shot at. I guess it did enough by claiming an objective (300 bonus VPs). The Pathfinders were great in Turn 1. Maybe too great. They died to the man after attracting way too much fire and markerlights (Jack used 4 of the markers to reduce the 2+ cover save to 6+, which is how they died miserably).

Harlequins. What a poor performance. God, I can’t go on enough about how disappointed I was in their showing last night. But I can’t judge their overall performance on the total crap-out of a single Fleet roll. Really, had that dice been anything but a 1, they’d have likely waltzed through the FW squad that turn and then have pleanty of options for who to work on next (more FWs, vehicles w/ Fusion pistols and/or H-Kisses, even the Tau back line defense w/ the right Fleet move).

I should also point out that this was Jack’s VERY 1st game with the Tau. He certainly made some learning curve mistakes (forgetting some seeker missiles, not realizing skimmers can’t claim objectives in CoD). I’d very much like to go up against Jack again in the last round of the league, see how he fares after getting 6-9 games of practice in w/ the army.

Truly one of those games where I thought I was had by the 2nd turn, REALLY had by 3rd turn, and then (still) amazed that turns 4 and 5 were so decisive in favor of the Eldar. Kudos to Jack – EXCELLENT game!!!


Ciao for now. May be a while before I blog again - I won't be able to make next week's league night, so look to hear from me again in a couple of weeks...

Week 1 List

For tonight's inaugural night of the league, I have decided to try out a Horde type of list. 80 models at a mere 1500 points is an amazing feet (unless you're IG or Nids). Its a Firesweep mission, meaning the objective is to plant flags in unoccupied buildings. The player with the most flags at the end of the game is the winner. My list features 8 scoring units led by a (relatively) cheap HQ Autarch. Some elements of the list will infiltrate (stratagem) and others will come in via mini-webway portals (sewer rats stratagem). I'm itching to try out the Master Sniper stratagem, but that will have to wait for another day... ;-)

Anyway, here's my list:

MJ Eldar Cityfight League Week 1

++HQ++
1 Autarch @ 100 Pts
Fleet
Independent Character
Master Strategist
Forceshield
Mandiblaster
Power Weapon
Shuriken Pistol
Fusion Gun
Haywire Grenades
Plasma Grenades

**TROOPS**
10 Dire Avengers (incl. Exarch) @ 157 Pts
Fleet
Avenger Shuriken Catapult
Exarch Upgrade
o Dire Sword
o Shuriken Pistol
o Bladestorm

10 Dire Avengers (incl. Exarch) @ 157 Pts
Fleet
Avenger Shuriken Catapult
Exarch Upgrade
o Dire Sword
o Shuriken Pistol
o Bladestorm

10 Dire Avengers (incl. Exarch) @ 157 Pts
Fleet
Avenger Shuriken Catapult
Exarch Upgrade
o Dire Sword
o Shuriken Pistol
o Bladestorm

6 Pathfinders @ 144 Pts
Fleet
Infiltrate
Pathfinder Upgrade
o Ignore Difficult Terrain
o Pathfinder Stealth (+2 Cover Save)
o Scouts
o Shuriken Pistol
o Ranger Long Rifle (to hit roll 5+=AP1)

14 Guardian Defenders & 1 Warlock @ 175 Pts
Fleet
Shuriken Catapult
Bright Lance Weapon Platform
Warlock
o Fleet
o Embolden
o Rune Armor
o Shuriken Pistol
o Singing Spear

^^ELITE^^
7 Harlequin Troupers & 1 Shadow Seer @ 214 Pts
Dance of Death (Furious Charge and Hit & Run USRs)
Fleet
Flip Belt
Holo-Suit
Close Combat Weapon (x3)
Harlequins Kiss (x4)
Fusion Pistol (x2)
Shuriken Pistol (x5)
Hallucinogen Grenades
Shadow Seer
o Dance of Death, Fleet, Flip Belt, Holo-Suit
o Harlequin’s Kiss
o Shuriken Pistol
o Veil of Tears
o Hallucinogen Greandes

10 Striking Scorpions (incl. Exarch) @ 212 Pts
Mandiblaster
Scorpion Chainsword
Shuriken Pistol
Plasma Grenades
Exarch Upgrade
o Mandiblaster
o Scorpion Chainsword
o Scorpion Claw
o Shadowstrike
o Stalker

10 Fire Dragons (incl. Exarch) @ 180 Pts
Fleet
Fusion Gun
Melta Bombs
Exarch Upgrade
o Fleet
o Firepike
o Melta Bombs



Total Roster Cost: 1496

...Wish me Luck!!!