Sons of Medusa vs Tyranids | 750 pts

[Rogue]

Sons of Medusa vs Tyranids  |  750  |  Crusade

 

The tyranids had carved their way across the world, destroying everything in their path, leaving nothing in their wake. Adapting. Strengthening. Learning. One tendril of the swarm had struck out for a small isolated complex. Did they know about the weapons laboratories concealed beneath? The chance couldn’t be taken. Despite the significant damage inflicted on the complex by the little artillery that could be spared, a small force of marines had been sent to scour the area clean before the tyranids arrived…      

 

This is a 750 point ‘Crusade’ engagement with four objectives, played across the table. My marines (Sons of Medusa, using Imperial Fist chapter tactics) against Tyranids.

 

The battlefield was on the outskirts of an Imperial weapons complex. In the southeast corner stood the remains of a garrison building, with a line of shell craters running away towards the northwest corner interrupted only by the gutted bulk of a manufactorum in the rough centre of the field. There was a small wood in the southwest corner, and a fallen aquila in the centre of the southern edge. A second small wood covered the northeast corner.  The objectives were located in the southwestern wood, on the aquila, and in the two most central craters.

 

Sons of Medusa

Codicer Amos:                                   force staff and bolt pistol, flame breath

Tactical squad Judah:                       5 marines, flamer

Tactical squad Naphtali:                    5 marines, flamer

Devastator squad Issachar:              5 marines, 4 heavy bolters

Devastator squad Zebulun:              5 marines, 4 lascannon

Dreadnought Cain:                           2 pairs of twin-linked autocannon

2 Razorbacks:                                   twin-linked assault cannon

 

The marines deployed first, along the southern edge. To protect the razorbacks (and their cargo of tactical squads) from the anti-tank fire of the zoanthropes and the hive guard, they were placed in reserve. The heavy bolter squad took cover in the woods on the left flank, and the lascannon squad formed a line behind the aquila, with the dreadnought in the open ground between them. This gave the heavy weapons a good field of fire, broken only by the manufactorum, but the different firing lines left very few places to hide behind it. (The devastator squads were in position to contest the objectives in the wood and on the aquila – the latter proved to be nothing significant, but the woods housed a grav-shield generator that would make it difficult to charge any nearby unit)

 

Tyranids

Tyrant:                                                  big guns, 12 twin-linked shots at S6

2 zoanthropes:                                 

2 hive guard:                     

biovore:                                              

14 gaunts:                                           guns roll three dice each

12 gaunts:                                           guns roll three dice each

12 gaunts:                                           guns roll three dice each

 

The tyranids deployed second, in a line facing the marine positions. From the marine viewpoint, there were two broods of gaunts and a zoanthrope amongst the craters to the left; the tyrant, hive guards and biovore in the centre (somewhat shielded by the manufactorum); the second zoanthrope and the last brood of gaunts on the right, facing the lascannon squad. They left nothing in reserve.

 

[With the battlefield as it was, the tyranids were always going to find some cover. Hopefully I’d have enough time to knock out the three synapse creatures before they got too close...]

 

TURN 1

With plenty of targets in range, both devastator squads stood their ground and readied their weapons. The dreadnought moved to its left to gain line-of-sight to the large creatures sheltering behind the manufactorum, and opened fire on the hive guard, causing a wound. Issachar’s heavy bolters reduced one zoanthrope to pulp (scoring first blood), but Zebulun’s lascannon could only land a single wound on the other, and this was deflected by its invulnerable save.

SONS OF MEDUSA LEAD 1-0

 

The tyranids advanced en masse. The western flank, having suffered the loss of the zoanthrope (but still within synapse range of the tyrant), flowed across the broken ground surrounding the craters. The tyrant moved up behind them (discovering that the nearby objective had already been sabotaged), whilst the hive guard tried to shelter from the dreadnought’s auto-cannon. On the other side of the manufactorum, the zoanthrope and its accompanying gaunt brood moved towards the lascannon that had attacked it a moment ago. With almost all of the tyranid guns out of range, it was left to the biovore to lob its spores towards the heavy bolter squad. A near miss left the spore mines in range to attempt an assault, but they were blown apart by the squad’s point blank overwatch fire.

SONS OF MEDUSA LEAD 1-0

 

TURN 2

Both razorbacks arrived from reserve, but the tactical squads elected to remain embarked. One razorback appeared on the marines’ left, coming around the western edge of the wood – it was only able to bring one gaunt into range, but promptly reduced it to a fine purple mist. On the other flank, the second razorback moved behind the lascannon squad to reinforce their firepower. Unfortunately, the combined lascannon and assault cannon volley still failed to land a single wound on the last zoanthrope. Elsewhere, the marines faired a little better. Issachar’s heavy bolters chewed up 9 gaunts, leaving just 5 in the nearest brood, and the dreadnought dropped one hive guard, and wounded the other.

[Grr. Two full turns of lascannon fire, and a round of assault cannon shells, and the zoanthrope wasn’t even scratched. Suddenly, that second razorback was looking very vulnerable. In fact, I’d have preferred the razors to arrive a turn later, when more tyranids would be in range of both the assault cannons and the embarked marines. In retrospect, it might have been better to bring both razors on from my left, away from the zoanthrope, but I wanted to try and protect the lascannon squad a little, and really thought the zoanthrope would die in this turn. Yay for hindsight.]

SONS OF MEDUSA LEAD 1-0

 

The tyranids continued their steady advance across the board, bringing themselves within range of the devastator squads. The hive guards’ seeker shells swooped around the ruined manufactorum, but failed to find their target, before the zoanthrope focused its psychic energies into a single, powerful lance, which speared into the razorback’s engine, blowing the tank apart. The suddenly disembarked tactical squad Naphtali avoided any further injury (and took control of the objective).

On the same flank, the gaunts fired into the lascannon squad, killing three, before the tyrant fired across the face of the ruins to obliterate the other two. Zebulun’s squad had disappeared in moments. To the west, the remaining gaunts fired into the woods, killing Issachar and two of his heavy bolters. In a single turn, the tyranids had exploded a tank and killed 8 devastators, leaving only two heavy bolters, the razorback’s assault cannon and the dreadnought with heavy weaponry.

[Ouch. I really don’t like those gaunts. At three shots each, each brood is putting out 36-42 shots a turn, causing 9-10 wounds (on average). Even 3+ can’t shrug that much off, as the casualty rates show.]

SONS OF MEDUSA LEAD 4-0

 

TURN 3

The surviving razorback moved forward and fired at the tyrant, but failed to cause any wounds. The nearby heavy bolters, clearly rattled by the death of their brother marines, took down two more gaunts before the dreadnought finished off the last hive guard. To the east, the tactical squad tried to better the lascannon by shooting at the zoanthrope – if they could kill it, then there was a chance of the tyranid flank collapsing – but also failed to cause any wounds.

[i really wanted to deploy the other tactical squad and the librarian at this point, but was out of template range, and didn’t want to face the volley of fire that the almost undamaged gaunt brood would be able to unleash in return.]

SONS OF MEDUSA LEAD 4-0

 

Again, the tyranids moved forward – the gaunts nearest to the wood reaching the marines’ deployment zone. In the east, the gaunts neared the crater holding the last objective, whilst to the west, they moved closer to the survivors of Issachar’s devastator squad. The tyrant fired first, shaking the razorback. Sadly, not only did this reduce the tank to snap-firing, but also its occupants, meaning that the flamer would be unable to fire in the following turn.

Elsewhere, the gaunt broods finished off the last two devastators in the wood, and killed three of the tactical squad sheltering behind the aquila.

SONS OF MEDUSA LEAD 4-1

 

TURN 4

By now, the marines were looking pretty battered, reduced to just 7 marines, the librarian, a shaken razorback and the dreadnought. Still, there were tyranids to kill, so the survivors of squad Naphtali moved out from behind the aquila towards the gaunts, bringing them into flamer range and successfully immolating six of them. Squad Judah, still shaken from the battering inflicted on their razorback, fired through the trees at the nearest gaunts but failed to hit anything. Finally, the dreadnought turned its guns on the tyrant, inflicting one wound.  

SONS OF MEDUSA LEAD 4-1

 

Stung by the flamer, the eastern-most gaunts scuttled into the crater on their left, taking control of the objective (a shield generator). Although reduced to half strength, they were able to finish off the last two tactical marines on that side of the board.

To the west, the other gaunt broods, supported by the biovore, poured fire into squad Judah, killing all five marines, and leaving only the librarian standing. The tyrant continued to fire at the razorback, causing three penetrating hits and destroying it. With the tyranids now in control of one objective, and contesting another, they moved into the lead for the first time.

TYRANIDS LEAD 4-1

 

TURN 5

In an act of desperation, the librarian attempted to charge the tyrant, but was killed by overwatch fire. The dreadnought continued to fire at the tyrant, causing another wound – the tyrant now had two wounds remaining.

TYRANIDS LEAD 7-1

 

With only the dreadnought left on the marine side of the table, the gaunts consolidated onto the objectives in the crater and in the woods, whilst the zoanthrope concealed itself in the manufactorum. The tyrant advanced through the woods, firing at the dreadnought and glancing it once.

TYRANIDS LEAD 7-1

 

TURN 6

The dreadnought fired on the tyrant – killing him now would still remove synapse control from this flank – but despite the short range, could only inflict one wound, leaving the tyrant still alive.

TYRANIDS LEAD 7-1

 

The tyrant emerged from the woods, firing into the dreadnought from point blank range, and glancing the ancient war machine to death in a storm of fire. The marines were wiped out, and the battle was over.

TYRANIDS WIN 7-1

 

For a moment, the battlefield was silent. The marines were dead; the tyranids victorious. And then, with a piercing scream, the shells began to fall again.

 

 

I don’t like tyranids. I used to get them – they were a close combat army, and if you could kill them before they got to you, you’d win. But now, they’re not even trying to get into assault – the gaunts can just stand off at 16” (outside rapid fire range) and blow my infantry away. Ouch. Couple that with some nasty anti-tank (at least, nasty to armour 11, and not healthy to armour 12 either), and I’m not sure where to go next.

 

Ok. Positives. The heavy bolters can really put down a wall of fire, given the chance – they battered the zoanthrope to death by sheer weight of metal, and nailed nine gaunts in a turn. The dreadnought did pretty well, grinding the hive guard down over three turns, and almost getting the tyrant over the next three. In the end, repeated doses of 12 twinned S6 shots to the face put him down, but he was the last man standing by then. Finally, albeit briefly, the one flamer shot on the gaunts (in turn 4) did serious damage; but on the downside, getting that close was pretty much a suicide mission.

 

So, what about target priority? A lascannon has around a 1 in 5 chance of killing a zoanthrope (with instant death), so eight shots over two turns should have taken him out (not to mention four assault cannon rounds and seven bolter shots). Had the zoanthrope gone down earlier, the whole eastern flank changes complexion – synapse threatened, the razorback still alive and able to deliver the tacticals with impunity; it looks a lot better. Still. I’ve seen hive guard chew through better tanks than razorbacks, so I’m glad they went down, and I think that achieving that was a good use of the dreadnought. On the other hand, with the lascannon concentrating on the zoanthrope, and the auto-cannon dealing with the hive guard, nothing was firing at the tyrant. In the end, the dreadnought almost took him out single-handedly – a couple of earlier wounds would have really helped later on. Again, with the tyrant gone earlier, the razorback survives, the template weapons put real hurt on the gaunts, everything looks different.

 

Talking of razorbacks, I should have kept them together on the left. Splitting them up allowed then tyranids to deal with them fairly easily, whereas as, acting in tandem, at least one would have been able to maintain the pressure on the tyrant whilst forcing the zoanthrope to redeploy (potentially damaging the synapse net) if it wanted to deal with them.

 

I think I need to get more templates going on. I’m really tempted by whirlwinds, suddenly, and they have the range to stay away from the hive guards and zoanthropes whilst still hitting the gaunts. I’m also wondering about flamers – mostly, how do I get close enough without getting blown away? Drop-pods? Small assault squads with twin flamers? That, but with a power fist wielding sergeant, able to take on the big guys too? One though was that I could take the gaunts on in close combat, but even on overwatch, 42 shots is a lot to ride out.

And I’m inclined to drop the lascannon for missile launchers – S8 still wounds T6 on 2s, still causes instant death on zoanthropes, and still removes armour saves from everything. And saves me points. As much as playing with a fixed list is nice, they’ve been tabled by these tyranids twice in two games, so there will be changes for next time…

 

 

Clearly, I'm in need of some advice here. How do I get flamers in close? Are whirlwinds the answer? Is there another way forward? Seriously, let me know what you think.

[markham82]

How about getting heavybolters for the tacs and giving the sarge a combiflamer. If you consider the worse case scenario the flamer is going to get of one shot before you get charged. This way you have more long range shots and that one shot of promethium before the bugs jumps on you. The cost is covered by taking missile launchers instead of lascannons as well.

[Rogue]

Being charged isn't the problem. With the volume of fire the gaunts have, they're better off shooting rather than assaulting. I like the idea of combi-flamers though.

 

At the moment, I'm considering switching out the razors for whirlwinds, and upgrading the rifle dread to an ironclad with heavy flamers (and finding a drop-pod from somewhere). Beyond that, I'm even considering dropping the devastators squads for flamer armed assault marines (and letting the tacticals play firebase. I lose a lot of anti-T6, but potentially gain a bunch of anti-horde...

[markham82]

I wouldn't get rid of my transports. You might need to go for some objectives at some point or even linebreaker(this often wins or loses games) you could even offer them as mobile cover. You could drop the las devastators and get a whirlwind and still gear your tacs with a heavybolter each. Also I wouldn't change the dreads kit. From what you're saying assault marines are gonna have a tough time getting into range of the gaunts and then they might burn the gaunts out of  assault range.

 

I've thought about the battle and it seems the gaunts were the main problem. So next time( I'm hoping that you have revenge in mind because that's how we marines roll) either focus totally on the gaunts with everything or on the synapse bugs with everything. By that I mean totally kill of a unit at a time before moving on to the next one. This might sound crazy and might be tactically wrong but try and deploy your force together, this should force him to move his force closer to each other making for better hits from the whirlwind. It will work better if you deploy second then you can choose a flank to focus on.

 

Anyway heres what I think

 

Hq

 

Libby with storm shield( to tank some shots for the devs)

 

Troops

 

2x 5man tacs with heavy bolter and razorback with assault cannons

 

Elites

 

dreadnought

2x auto cannons

 

Heavy

 

5x devs with heavy bolters

 

2xwhirlwind

 

745pts( if my quick math is correct)

 

Don't expect to see the same tyranid force next time you see him, he will probably get something to counter your units that gave him a hard time( the devs) and change units he feels didn't do well( the biovore?). 

[Phalanx Warder]

a dakka pred could work and is quite cheap too

[Rogue]

Thanks, chaps.

 

Markham82, I like that - in short, it's dropping the lascannon squad in favour of a pair of whirlwinds. Makes it all about nailing the gaunts, right? I'm keen to try out something completely different for a bit (because, variety), but if I come back towards this list at some point, I'll be giving it a go.

 

I've stuck a few ideas over here if you fancy sharing any thoughts.

[Sn4k30r]

give rhinos to your troops.... he cant open your transports, and if he charge them, you can overwatch, and kill 1st his antitank, zoanthropes, or hive guards, 

[Rogue]

He can - he usually fields a couple of zoanthropes, which cut through rhino armour like it's not there; a tyrant rolling a handful of S6 shots, which can glance a light tank to pieces in a turn; and recently, a pair of hive guard, who are geared to kill tanks too...