Nico's Treatise on Bayonet Stabbing for 8th Edition

[Gen.Steiner]

Ahhh those figures are so beautiful! *ahem* I would suggest using vicmin's kneeling legs, sniper rifles, and Tannenburg heads to make a Praetorian sniper unit then.

[Nicodemus Doloroso]

Well, another game, another turn 3 tabling (or nearly) by the Aeldari, but I a getting better at this 8th edition thing already, and this game was more one of those flukey games where one guy's dice are insanely good and the other guy's are insanely bad. This will even-out over a few games.

We did the Relic mission, with Spearhead Assault deployment, just because I wanted to try out one of the funky new deployment types.

A quick rundown of the lists (1500 points):

Lord Inquisitor Soulis' Ordo Xenos Strikeforce

Inquisitor w/ power sword

Tempestor Prime w/ Command Rod

4 Acolytes w/ 2x melta, 1x flamer, 1x BP/CCW (in chimera with inquisitor)

6 Acolytes w/ 4x plasma, 2x bolter (in Valkyrie)

MT Scion Command Squad w/ 3x melta

3 Crusaders (in Immolator)

2 DCA (in immolator)

1 Priest (in Immolator)

5 Scions (in chimera with inquisitor)

5 Scions, 2x melta (deep strike)

5 Scions, 2x plasma (in ML Taurox Prime)

8 Scions, 2x Flamer (in gatling Taurox Prime)

Immolator w/ twin multimelta

Taurox Prime w/ gatling cannon, 2x hotshot volley guns

Taurox Prime w/ missile launcher, 2x autocannons

Valkyrie w/ multilaser, hellstrike missiles

Chimera w/ 2x heavy flamer

Hellhound

Biel-Tan Xenos Scum

Farseer

Autarch with jump-pack type thing

Night Spinner

Wave Serpent

Wave Serpent

Wave Serpent

5 Howling Banshees

6 Striking Scorpions

5 Fire Dragons

4 Dark Reapers

?? Guardians (don't know because they never got out of their Serpent)

So, here's the setup, fairly self explanatory. The Night Spinner is hidden behind a building to the left. As you look at the picture, the leftmost Serpent had the Fire Dragons and Banshees in it. The middle one had the Guardians, with the Farseer and Autarch on foot behind it. The Serpent to the right had Dark Reapers.

Another angle:

As you can imagine, he had first turn and I failed to seize the initiative.

TURN 1:

Things went really bad starting in turn one. His Serpents all moved forward. He deployed his Farseer in hiding for Doom and Guide shennanigans (although he scarcely used the rerolls as he was hitting with everything). Striking Scorpions emerged from hiding in the central ruins, and his autarch used his warp-jump-pack things to move almost 30" and grab the relic.

The Dark Reapers got out, moved, and fired using their special rule that means no negative modifiers for moving or shooting at a flier like the Valkyrie. All four hit, all four wounded, I failed saves like a heretic. He fired their Wave Serpent and rolled 11 for damage on two lance hits. Valk dead.

The Night Spinner then rolled 6 shots and combined with a lance hit from one of the Serpents, took the gatling Taurox Prime down to 2 wounds. Another wave serpent hit, wounded with both shots on the Immolator and -- yes, you guessed it -- rolled 11 for damage destroying that vehicle too.

So on my turn, I deployed via airborn insertion the Tempestor Prime, Command Squad and meltacide squad. Everyone else moved forward as much as they could.

My antitank shooting was entirely ineffectual. Even with orders and command re-roll, out of five meltaguns shooting at one serpent, I did a whopping 2 hits, 1 wound, 1 damage. The Taurox Prime Missiles and autocannon fired at the same Serpent for a whole lot of nothing -- lots of 1s and 2s rolled. The Hellhound and the Taurox with the Gatling cannon, even in its weakened 5+ BS state, made short work of the Striking Scorpions, however, who had appeared in the central ruins. Plasma acolytes despite moving forward were outside double-tap range and did maybe 1 wound to the central Serpent.

So, I managed to kill 6 Striking Scorpions and do 2 wounds to Serpents.

TURN 2

In movement, his Autarch ran away with the relic.

The crazy dice continued as my opponent deployed his Fire Dragons and Howling Banshees and continued to fire away at my stuff. The Gatling Taurox prime vanished under fire from two Fire Dragons. The remaining 3 fire dragons actually fluffed their shots at the Inquisitorial Chimera, but then -- once again -- a Serpent hit with both lances, wounded both, rolled 11 for wounds killing it.

Another serpent one-shotted the missile launcher Taurox Prime (you guessed it, two hits, two wounds, rolled 10 for damage). Remaining Serpent, Night Spinner, and Dark Reapers, killed all the Scions that deep struck save the Tempestor Prime and one meltagunner.

Once cinematic event happened, when the Inquisitorial Chimera blew up, the Scions deployed to sacrifice their bodies to protect the Inquisitor, with the acolytes and Inquisitor himself behind:

In the assault phase, those five Scions died horribly under the blades of the Howling Banshees (they killed 1 with their hotshot lasguns on the way in). Things were looking pretty grim by the time my portion of turn 2 rolled around:

I was quickly running out of troops and those who I had were dismounted. Not much chance of catching the relic already, but I figured we'd do things as the Emperor Desires and kill as many Xenos as we could. His Banshees had of course consolidated into the Inquisitorial Acolytes but they backed out of combat and I did a mix of shooting at Fire Dragons and Banshees. Didn't kill any banshees but reduced the Dragons to two between hotshot lasguns and Hellhound.

The plasma acolytes and plasma scion squads bother double-tapped the central Serpent. Went supercharged on the plasma, and all save one of the acolytes killed themselves while doing a whopping 2 damage to the serpent. The Scions didn't even hit (again, lots of 1s and 2s). Meltagun within 6 inches benefitting from the Tempestor Prime's order and a command re-roll did 1 wound to the Serpent towards the bottom. My dice were getting comical at this point especially compared to his consistent 10-12 damage each time he hit with dual lances.

In combat, the 2 surviving Crusaders and the DCA (the rest had died in the explosion due to some excellent rolling of 1s) waded in and made quick work of the Banshees. My 8 man Scion squad attempted to charge the 3 remaining Dragons. Their Exarch rolled (of course) 6 wounds with his heavy flamer. I promptly failed every single save and the charge failed.

TURN 3:

He kind of shuffled around a bit to partake of some mopping-up operations. His dragons ran away, as did his Autarch with the relic. He shot up what was remaining, so that by the end of the turn I had two crusaders locked in combat with a Wave Serpent, and the Inquisitor plus his acolytes moving around the central ruins.

In my turn, I finally rolled half-decent with the Acolytes and their meltaguns. 1 hit, 1 wound, rolled a 5 for damage and killed the central Wave Serpent. We called the game after that, however, because no one was going to be able to catch his Autarch. Just for fun we should have played the turn out, because the Guardians were inside the Serpent I blew up, so the Inquisitor and his lads would have been able to charge it. They might have wiped out those Guardians. But that would have still left 2 Serpents, the Night Spinner, and Dark Reapers to shoot them down as they tried to footslog across the table after the Autarch.

***

Another pretty lopsided game, atlhough considering how brutally he massacred me with his shooting in Turns 1 and 2, I think my troops gave a pretty good showing. This was just one of those games where the dice played such a big role in the game that it is really hard to take much away from the game. Are Eldar broken? I don't think my friend could count on rolling 11-12 damage every. single. time. he fired his twin lances like that. That was a big difference there as he was able to delete 3 vehicles every turn.

Mechdar are definitely strong again. This is a bit of a rock-paper-scissors list though ... I think that if I brought an infantry heavy list (no vehicles even) I'd brutalize him because I noticed once my vehicles were dead, his damage output went into the toilet. He actually has very few weapons in this list, and they rely on rolling well on damage. But when you have a bunch of 4 pt, 1 wound infantry, who cares. I think I will try foot Guard next game and collect some delicious xenos tears. Hopefully this will force my friend to bring a more balanced list. I usually try to bring a "take all comers" type list.

[NatBrannigan]

I suspect Gen. Steiner is going to tell you that you should have taken more troops!

[Nicodemus Doloroso]

I suspect Gen. Steiner is going to tell you that you should have taken more troops!

 

And I would agree with him.

 

As noted in my final thoughts ... I think that this "Mechdar" list my friend runs is very brutal on the vehicle-heavy lists I've brought so far because those lances do so much damage. However, he has basically nothing to deal with hordes. I think that if I bring an infantry heavy list next time I will brutalize him.

 

So I am going to redouble my efforts to get some Praetorians painted and then what I'll probably do is run a Krieg platoon and a Praetorian platoon alongside each other.

 

As for Scions I am not sure whether to deep strike or bring Taurox Primes. The Taurox Prime is definitely superior to the Chimera either way, IMO. A Gatling/hotshot Taurox pumps out a LOT of shots while being cheaper than a multilaser/heavy bolter Chimera.

[Brother Captain Ed]

 

 

I suspect Gen. Steiner is going to tell you that you should have taken more troops!

And I would agree with him.

 

As noted in my final thoughts ... I think that this "Mechdar" list my friend runs is very brutal on the vehicle-heavy lists I've brought so far because those lances do so much damage. However, he has basically nothing to deal with hordes. I think that if I bring an infantry heavy list next time I will brutalize him.

Or, you know, roll better.

[NatBrannigan]

I agree, you should just roll better. It's all in the wrist.

[Gen.Steiner]

Or in the weighted dice...

Yeah, I think infantry > tanks to a certain extent. Maybe some indirect firing artillery vehicles or a Sentinel or three (or nine) but I think infantry are the big winners of this edition when it comes to the Guard.

[Nicodemus Doloroso]

I've always liked Sentinel models. What loadout would you recommend?

[Captain_Krash]

The Auto cannon/missle launcher/lascannon ones are still effective, plasma is okay just watch out for 1s and 2s. But I think the real sentinel winners so far are the scout heavy flamers. They work great at getting up the board quickly along with deep strike denial which is never a bad thing on such a cheap platform.

 

 

Also get some heavy weapon teams Nico. Spam them, 6 lascannon, 6 mortors, autocannons/heavy bolters to taste. His elder won't know what hit them.

 

Krash

Edited July 5, 2017 by Captain_Krash

[Gen.Steiner]

I like multi-lasers and autocannons mostly, for their high S and rate of fire.

[Praesul]

I would be very tempted to run a pile of Autocannon HWTs and Mortar HWTs...oh, and more bodies!

[NatBrannigan]

The Autocannon teams are really workhorses, I'm making some Mortars soon as well.

 

Heavy Flamer Scout Sentinals look great. I have one in a box ready to make. Get ahead of my army and make it much more difficult to get that turn 1 charge with deep striking units. Also going to be making conscripts to get ahead of my main line and hold up the enemy. the ability to leg it out of combat letting the rest of your army fire at whatever charged your conscripts is great. You could even order them back into the fight for added shenanigans!

[Gen.Steiner]

I have a heavy flamer scout sentinel (just one); it's always been a bit hit-and-miss for me. It's a massive threat - or used to be - and often took loads of fire and died really early on. Problem is because it's so fragile (or was), it never soaked up enough to qualify as a distraction.

I've not used it in 8th Edition yet though.