The Fearsome Hive - A Battle Report

[Berzul]

Hi guys!

 

So, as I mentioned in the thread on the Terminators and how to use them, I had a fight against Tyranids and I decided to report it here to tell you how it went.

 

This was a 2000 point fight, betweenmy Dark Angels and Tyranids, in a Spoils of War Maelstorm of War mission. The board was set up with 5 clusters of buildings equally distributed along the field of battle, creating a lot of LoS blocking features.

 

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Objectives where one on each corner, and two in the middle, on the edge of each of the two central buildings.

 

My army consisted of 2 Tactical Squads with Plasma and Lascannons, led by a Lieutenant. A squad of Scouts with Sniper Rifles. 2 Assault Cannon Razorbacks, with a Darkshroud for cover, and a Dreadnought for support. Then a 10 man squad of terminators, with 2 assault cannons and 3 thunder hammers, a Dark Talon, an Ancient, a Librarian, and an Interrogator-Chaplain.

 

My opponents army was 6 Neurothropes, 3 venomthropes, an Exocrin, 2 Flying Hive Tyrants, lots of Hormogaunts and Termogaunts, some of these beasts that have the cannons on the back, don't remember the name saddly (sorry), and Genestealers with a Brood Lord.

 

Deployment went to me first, and we got Dawn of War. I deployed the DW in reserve and the rest in a gunline, with the Scout up a bulding on my side. My opponent deployed right up on the edge of his zone, with his entire army save for the Hive Tyrants, ready to advance and charge.

 

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With the drops being in my favour, I got first turn.

 

TURN ONE

 

I moved the Dark Talon forward, and bombed the gaunts on the side, to try and cut some of them down. Saddly, as the tyranid deployed, he was so far on his side of the board that I had no other way to go, so I was forced to try and push my advance through this side of his forces.

 

I placed the Terminators down, using Deathwing Assault to shoot more gaunts down. As it was, I couldn't push them back that much, and only gained a couple of inches into his deployment zone from the stratagem. Wasn't the effect I was hoping for. My second squad dropped, then my shooting phase came, and I tried to cut down some of the next unit of gaunts to see if I could dwindle down his numbers to resist the incoming charges next turn.

 

My shooting went poorly, mostly because the terrain just didn't leave me much targets, and he had the venomthropes to reduce my shooting ability. WIth most of his forces still on the table, I tried the charges, and despide Master of Maneuver, I failed them all, and was forced to resist the turn on the board.

 

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My opponent then advanced all his units, brought in the hive tyrants on the side, and although AUspex Scan allowed me to take 6 wounds off of one with my Dreadnought, it certainly wasn't enough to stop him from bringing the units in.

 

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He followed this up with 7 smites, which totally wrecked my Terminators, taking out the entire Shield Squad. His shooting then blew up my Dread in one round of firing with the Exocrin, and did some heavy damage to my tactical squads with the Tyrants.

 

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We then got locked in combat. His gaunts killed the final terminator, and engaged my Warlord and Ancient. His Tyrants engaged my tactical squad and killed all but the heavy weapon.

 

At the end of the first battle round I had lost half my terminators, my dreadnought, and 9/10 marines in a tactical squad.

 

TURN TWO

 

I tried to move back and reposition a bit, but shooting went just as baddly as before, with most firing doing little damage if any at all. My Ancient and Warlord avoided combat, and rather went after nearby Objectives, as I quickly realized I was not going to be able to defeat him in combat, but that my only chance was to try and outscore my opponent.

 

The Tyranids kept advancing, and quickly overran my deployment zone.

 

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Meanwhile, the last terminators and the Dark Talon got 7 smites more, and quickly died.

 

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At the end of the turn I was left with just a tactical squad, a scout squad, a razorback, and my characters.

 

TURN THREE

 

Couldn't really do much by this point in the game, but objectives went my way, and we were about 12 to 14 objectives total, so I was only a bit behind. I decided to just hold my ground and try and survive the rest of the Tyranid onslaught, as I had nowhere to go, really. His flyers alone where enough to catch me anywhere I went.

 

So, I kept shooting, and managed to kill one of the Hive Tyrants.

 

Then my oponent charged me with the gene stealers, and wiped out 7 smites worth of models of the board.

 

I did resist the charge, but there really wasn't much more I could do by the end of turn 3.

 

TURN FOUR

 

This turn was short. Had almost nothing that could shoot, so I just went through combat and gave up the turn to my opponent, but before his psychic phase, I conceded the battle. I was behind by victory points, and with just a scout squad, half a tactical squad, and a damaged razorback on the board, so there was little point in fighting it out.

 

The battle ended halfway through battle round four, with me conceding the match.

 

 

All in all, it was a fun fight, and I enjoyed it. But even on turn one it was clear where this was going. The Alpha Strike just didn't do much, and after one round of smite, I quickly realized that I had no chance against the Tyranids. Even if they had just that, 7D3 mortal wounds a turn was just impossible to withstand. I went through the three and a half turns of the battle out of respect for my opponent, but by the end of my second turn I knew there was little to be done against this army with the list I had.

 

In just one turn I lost almost half of my army, and was left with just a few bolters and storm bolters, trapped behind LoS blocking terrain. It simply did not go my way at all this time, in every possible way.

 

I think the Alpha Strike of Terminators is good and does have merit. I actually like the list I played, and I will try it again if I can. I think it is a good list, that can do some good damage in both range and melee. But, I went in with a list that was very poorly chosen for the type of army I faced. I would never try going terminator heavy against Tyranids ever again. EVER again. It is just useless to try, against that amount of mortal wounds per turn.

 

 

[Brother Chaplain Tyranus]

Yea that's a tough one. Nice batrep. This is similar to the issues I have been facing too. I dropped the deathwing out of my lists for that reason.

[Zectz]

Don't mean to be that guy but Auspex scan stratagem says infantry unit only so you can't use it on the dread unfortunately.

 

Anyway, it seems like your army just got done over by smite shenanigans honestly. If he wasn't spamming smite or the beta rules were in use I don't think it would have been as one sided.

 

Those beasts with the cannons on their back are Biovores, yet another way to dish out mortal wounds :/

[Helycon]

Tyranids are getting their revenge from 7th edition. They're very good.

 

As stated, Auspex Scan can only be used on infantry. So one of those tyrants would have made the game even shorter...

 

I still feel the DWA stratagem is too expensive and CP's should be spent elsewhere for more effect.

 

Fun batrep though! :)

 

I feel that GW has gone overboard with mortal wounds, which is why Tyranids are this strong. It should really be just possible by Stratagems or one use abilities, to make them feel special and tactical. I honestly think that Dark Angels are pretty close to where all armies should sit with mortal wounds.

Edited December 30, 2017 by Helycon

[Berzul]

1) Oops! I made a mistake there... didn't make THAT much of a difference, but I'll apologize to my opponent. Thanks for pointing it out guys

 

2) Yeah, I think rules are needed to balance the amount of wounds you can deal with smite. I think that, really, the only thing you can do so far is to play RW and just keep at the 24 inch range

 

3) Im glad it was fun to read :D

[dtse]

Balance is coming as per beta rules. But elite armies will still not be good in this edition.

[Berzul]

Yeah. I guess that all I could do to face this army would be to go tank heavy, deploy as close to a corner as possible, and hope I can do enough damage before the psykers can get to me. Maybe add some bikes to go hunt his heavy support, with a Talon Master to ignore cover.

[Helycon]

Balance is coming as per beta rules. But elite armies will still not be good in this edition.

Balance is coming for smite, yes. I still feel mortal wounds are too abundant in some armies though, but hopefully GW will address those in the balance update in March as well :) .

 

So far, they've been very good in updating quickly and FAQ'ing where required.