Friday 13 August 2010

Battle report: Tau Vs Blood angels

I finally got the opportunity to head to my local GW last night for a quick game of 40K. I ended up arriving just after 20:00 meaning there was only one table left and one opponent who wasn’t matched up to anyone. This was the same Blood Angels player I played last time. He was determined to get me back for the last time we played, game ended in a draw but was heavily one sided in my favour an extra turn would have seen is army wiped out.

Note, this post my contain a few rants about my opponents conduct throughout the game. You’ll understand why as you read it.

My army list was written towards 1500 points (actually 1511 as written), Given that my opponent wanted to play 2000 points, I upped my list to just over 1900 by adding some rail rifles to the pathfinders and putting in a squad of basic XV9 battlesuits plus 4 shield drones. This isn’t really fluffy in a Farsight list but what the hey. So it’s my 1900 points Vs his 2000.

My List:

Farsight
Bodyguard: 3x XV8, 3xPlasma, 3x targeting array, HW Drone controller 2x shield drones

3 x XV8, 3x TL missile pods, 3x Burst cannons, Team leader with HW Drone controller 2x Gun drones

7 firewarriors, Shas’ui (Squad x 3)

5 pathfinders, rail rifle (squad x 2)
Devilfish (flechettes, Dis pod)

3x XV9 (3 x DC, 4 x shield drone)

2x Broadside, team leader, 2 x plasma, 2 x multitracker, HWDC 2 x shield drones.

Hammerhead, Railgun, burst cannons, MT, DP, Flechette

His List:

(From memory)
Dante
Sanguinor

6x Sanguinary guard, banner, melta pistols (squad x2)
Priest with jump pack

Death company x10, 2x power weapons 2x thunder hammers.

Baal Predator TLAC, heavy bolter sponsons

Landraider

Deployment and Mission:

We rolled for deployment and mission type. I won the roll for deployment; mission was spearhead one objective in each deployment zone.

Rant 1: During deployment I was getting my army out of my case, despite the fact that I got first turn he wanted to deploy first (getting first turn) while I placed my army. He got annoyed when I said no.

Rant 2: At my local GW the standard table size is 4’x4’, he started arguing that this enabled him to deploy within 6” of the centre rather then 12” in the rulebook. Obviously being as this meant he would be able to get into combat much quicker I refused. Obvious advantage to his army. To end the argument after about 5 minutes I relented and let him deploy 9” from the centre.

Rant 3: Before deploying his army he rolled for and got steal the initiative. I couldn’t even be bothered to argue at this point. Told him it wouldn’t matter because I was going to table him anyway :-P.

Shockingly, he deployed as close to as feasibly possible.

Turn 1:

The blood angels took to the skies and landed 12” closer to me. The landraider started moving between two buildings. All the sanguinary guard were within 12” of the priest for the feel no pain. The baal predator advanced slowly peppering my normal battlesuits with assault cannon and heavy bolter fire killing the two drones and causing a wound on one of the battlesuits. The storm bolter on the libby dreadnought killed two pathfinders in one squad. The guard and associated characters ran forward. The landraider shot at my hammerhead but failed to penetrate.

I moved the devilfish to block off his landraiders advance between two buildings, mwhahaha. This would hopefully hold up his death company for a couple of turns allowing me to deal with his army in two parts. Farsight and friends jumped out from behind the building with the intention of hitting Dante and co with plasma death.
My return firing wasn’t as effective as I would have liked. The 2+ save combined with the priests feel no pain mean that the sanguinary guard and Dante survived 12 wounds from the XV9s burst cannons, the firewarriors shooting at them (I left two units in reserve), two shots from the rail rifles. Gun drones, burst cannons. All without taking taking a single casualty. Farsight and friends opened up killing 3 of the sanguinary guard with their plasma rifles, broadsides followed up by taking out the last two guard and putting a wound on Dante. My deathrains (kinda) shot at the dreadnought shaking it.

Rant 4: After taking 3 wounds on the remaining 3 models in Dantes squad my opponent went to put 2 wounds on Dante without taking a wound on one of the guard. I pointed out that he had to take a wound on each model before putting a second wound on Dante. After I explained it to him calmly, then pointed out the rule in the rulebook, then got the store manager to reiterated it to him. He spent a few minutes complaining about it and saying how he has always played it like that before finally grumbling and accepting it.

Turn 2 Onwards:
The blood angels moved onwards towards my lines taking heavy casualties from my plasma rifles. The other squad of sanguinary guard and the sanguinor died quickly enough. Dante fell to mass pulse rifle fire. However his vehicles survived lots of penetrating hits with nothing more then being stunned. 


Eventually the Librarian dreadnought took out the broadsides hiding in the building, but was taken out by a charge by farsight. The death company carried on eating through my units, which I fed to them to prevent them hitting my main line at the same time as the rest of his army. 


I was able to prevent his characters from charging into farsights unit by blocking his move with a squad of firewarriors. They were killed by the sanguinor though. Farsight managed to take out the sanguinor with plasma rifle fire, while dante was taken out by another squad of firewarriors rapid firing at him. 


On the last turn of the game all my opponent had left was his landraider, which blasted my squad of firewarriors holding my objective. Who failed all their cover saves, they did however roll high enough to fail their morale check and run far enough to fall back of the table. So at least I was rolling about average :-P. With my last scoring squad gone, I had to take out His landraider to table him and win the game with no broadsides and no fusion blasters....


Farsight leaped onto the building, the strange looking dreadnought was discarding the remains of his Broadside like a kid throwing away an unwanted toy. The dreadnought looked at Farsight, a strange energy playing across its weapons. It charged forward with surprising speed for such a clumsy looking Gue'la machine. Farsight was ready for it though. With a quick coded command to one of his guards, a shield drone flew forward to meet the dreadnoughts heavy combat fist. There was a burst of energy as the two energy fields collided the feedback wrecked the drone but was enough to deflect the dreadnoughts blow. Farsight ignited his thrusters in a controlled burst landing his suit expertly on top of the dreadnoughts sarcophagus. With two quick blows he disarmed the dreadnought the dawnblade cutting effortlessly through the machines thick armour a third blow went straight down into the machines main body killing the occupant. Farsight jumped from the top of the falling machine, a short burst from his suits jetpack bringing him to the ground the recoil compensator's in his legs absorbing the impact without difficultly. On his left his suits sensors detected a squad of black armoured marines butchering a squad of firewarriors, the plasma rifle on his shoulder combined with those of his squad making short work of them.
He looked ahead, sprinting towards the last of the Gue'la forces. The behemoth bearing down on the remains of his forces, a landraider. Farsight jinked to the side as the sponson mounted lascannons opened fire, the heavy beams of coherent light missing him by mere inches the heat scorching the paint from his armour. Feeding power to his jetpack he launched himself into the air, the landraiders heavy bolter stitching a line through the air behind him. Farsight landed behind the landraider swinging the dawnblade to the hilt in the machines power plant his suits servo motors straining, Farsight started to draw the blade down into the landraiders vital parts. The landraider exploded, the force blowing Farsight back 15 meters. 
Picking himself up from the ground, he scanned the surroundings no more Gue'la forces were nearby. The day belonged to the Tau.

5 comments:

  1. Your opponent sucked. He broke the rules for deployment, broke the rules for sieze the initiative (whole point of rolling AFTER deployment being that you don't know if you're gonna get it when you deploy) broke the rules for wound allocation...

    He also broke the rules of his codex if you got hte 12" range on his sanguinary priest from him. It's actually 6". Plus a recent Blood Angel FAQ said it should be measured to each individual model. So if the charge carries some of them more than 6" from the priest, they don't beenfit from Furious Charge and FNP.

    Finally, he shattered the most important rule. This kind of player is precisely why I don't play down my local workshop, though I understand where you are you have little other choice. Players like this suck, and deserve to get tabled.

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  2. I had to laugh about the end, you opponent deserved everything he got.

    Also playing on only a 4'x4' gave his a huge advantage, then add in the deployment set-up advantage and rolling to seize before deployment, he should have done better, but then his list seemed like a typical newbie, full of elite expensive characters and units (it was so small for 2000 pts).

    Well done on the win.

    A couple of quick question on your list;
    What did the bodyguard have as their 3rd hardpoint (you only state plasma & targeting array) ?
    Do you ever fire the burst cannons on the crisis suits often (their probably no better than the twin-linked missile pods the suits have) ?
    Do you find the XV9 good, or were they just added in to make up the points ?

    Rathstar

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  3. Ginge: I'm getting used to playing people that don't know the rules fully at GW. Kind of ironic really. Sorry the 12" within the priest was a typo I meant 6". He at least got that right.

    Rathstar: Strange thing he was no newbie, he was probably slightly younger then me (28). The body guard were also equipped with missile pods. Although because I was mainly firing at the guard they didn't get used.
    With the burst cannons on the suit. I threw the list together last minute. Had I thought it through then I wouldn't have put the burst cannons on the suit as they wouldn't see any use at all.
    I find the XV9s fantastic normally, However being equipped with two twin linked burst cannons in this game they didn't prove much use. They put about 12 wounds on Dantes squad and they passed all their saves and FNP. Then went on to fail their morale check and get mowed down.
    Good luck with the 40K online tournament next week.

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  4. Way to go! My son plays Tau and he is figuring out that suits = win.

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  5. suits are pretty much essential in a tau army. Just a shame they are so expensive both money and points wise.

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