Monday 4 January 2010

Tale of Four Gamers: Games!

As month 2 of ToFG included a bonus point for getting a game in at 1000 points, I decided it was time to introduce myself at the local GW for a Tuesday night session.

I used the same 1000Pts list for both games.

Shas’el: Plasma gun, TL missile pod, HW multitracker, HW Drone controller 2 shield drones, bonding knife

Crisis suits x 2, TL Missile pod and plasma gun

Crisis suits x 3, TL Missile pod and flamer, Team leader with HW DC 2 gun drones, Bonded.

8 x firewarriors, leader bonding knife
Devilfish, disruption pods flechettes

8 x firewarriors, leader bonding knife
Devilfish, disruption pods flechettes

Hammerhead, rail gun, burst cannons, multi-tracker, disruption pods, flechette discharges.

First Game:

The first game I played, (ever with my tau) was against a space wolves player.
From what I remember of his list:

3 x greyhunter squads (2 in rhinos 1 in drop pod)
Rune priest. (In with grey hunters)
Landspeeder tornado (MM + HF)
Wolf riders.

We played on a 4’x4’ table dominated by a fortress of redemption. (this would severely hamper my ability to add long distance support to my units) Dawn of war set-up he gets first turn. Capture and control.

My first mistake was keeping everything except my commander in reserve, I should have deployed nothing on the table to start with and brought it all on first turn. However as it was my army came on piecemeal and was taken apart in the same manner. I did do numerous things wrong in this game though. For instance, after the hammerhead blew up the first rhino, I should have retreated my battlesuits to the top of the building, admittedly a difficult terrain test, but would have prevented them getting charged and killed by the rune priest and friends.

If I had brought everything on in the first turn. Then I could have dealt with the squad that drop podded onto my objective straight away. Leaving me free to chase the rest of his army.

But hey ho, live and learn. Highlight for me had to be the flechette dischargers on the hammerhead wounding two of the wolf riders, then killing one on its death. Fun, although my opponent might disagree. Also the dinner plates of doom from the fish managed to successfully block the wolf riders advance for two turns. Died in the process. But still fun.

Game result: Space wolves 1 objective, 1 contested.


Second Game:

The second game I played was against an ork player.
From what I remember:

2 deff dreads.
2 Buggies (TL Missile)
Looted wagon, with Gazkull and nobs (7 total I think)
Small squad of grots
Shoota boy squad (15 IIRC)
Slugga boys (9+nob IIRC)

Table quarters deployment. Multi objective, I got first turn through seizing the initiative.

To start with we deployed at the same time (due to time constraints) which took away my primary advantage. So I attempted to seize the initiative with success. From 5 turns of raining TL missile pods into dreads, I successfully blew one of the arms off, and stunned it. (fantastic rolling eh!) The big fortress blocked most of my shooting and the hammer head scattering by an average of 6 inches a turn. Coupled with appalling rolls for armour penetration meant the ork lines reached mine without many casualties. (1 buggy, couple of grots, 9 boys killed with 5 turns of shooting). Crap eh?

Game ended in a draw though. I managed to keep enough models between my FW and gazkull to stop him reaching my objective. And we both contested a third objective.

Have to keep practicing.

4 comments:

  1. The TLMP/PR crisis suit is a Deathrain/Fireknife variant I haven't seen before. How is it working for you so far?

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  2. It seems you were so unlucky in your games. Some tactical errors, as you pointed out, but you'll learn with more games! Tau are possibly the hardest army to get right, but when you do get it right it feels oh so good.

    I've been reading a fair bit of Tau blogs lately, and it makes me want to start a Tau army up again :(

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  3. Soundwave, Get back in the regiment, front and centre! You maggot!

    Good to get some games in Ken, I'm sure with some more experience you'll get better with them. Hopefully you'll get some more games in before the mini tournament.

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  4. On paper the TL MP + PR suit looks pretty good. If expensive. The missile pods (should) work out pretty good for anti light vehicle duty, while the plasma rifle should be good against the marines. I think I'll try them in a few more games before coming to a firm conclusion though.

    The Tau do seem like a hard race to master, so could keep me busy for a while. However I was quite unlucky in those games. With the fortress in the middle of the table I couldn't bring much firepower to bear before being caught in combat, my unlucky rolls fo armour penetration and then why I did glance/penetrate ones and twos ensured that the orks didn't lose out on any mobility. And when 6 nobs with gazkull jump into your face it hurts.

    It was quite nice to play with the Tau, I think in the first game I played I was nervous, new store, with a new army, against a new opponent and I'm still not fast with fifth edition. Contributed to my mistake.

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