Its a Bug Hunt: Eldar Vs Tyranids Battle Report

This past Wednesday I got a great game in. I squared off against Dark Future Games own Old School Terminator and his swarm of slavering Tyranids. I was using my still in development 1850 list. It turns out its pretty well suited to killing bugs. It was an objective game with 4 objectives placed in a kind of diamond on the table. Our deployment was a pitched battle.

I had first turn which was seized by old school. He was deep striking most of his army so there was a brood of termagants and some Hive Guard on the table turn one. They milled about for their turn taking some pot shots at my 2 wave serpents. When my turn one came around I concentrated fire on the hive guard with my 2 units of pathfinders which I had positioned in very nice overlapping fields of fire. I eliminated 2 out of 4 of the Guard. The Termagants tasted the web of the Night Spinner and became stuck in the terrain they were occupying.

Turn two saw one Trygon Prime come in and some Ravernors. They opted to hold back a bit as I had Wraithguard on the table and the Trygon did not want to get close. Not having the Eternal Warrior Rule really has taken the teeth out of the Tyranids.

The remaining Hive Guard took out the second Wraithguard units Wave Serpent. The unit on foot moved into one of the objectives. One of my Pathfinder units held one objective from their cover in a building. The pathfinders managed to do 4 wounds to the Trygon Prime on the table.

Turn 3 saw the Arrival of the Tervigon, second Trygon, both Genestealer broods and the Doom of Malen'tai. They moved to engage. The Doom Inflicted no wounds despite being in range of 3 of my units. The trygons unleashed a torrent of spines into Eldrad as the Ravenors moved into position to assault Eldrad and his coterie of Warlocks.

Basically this is the point the battle becomes epically fuzzy as all hell broke loose. The Ravenors were cut down to two out of six by massive amounts of fire from Eldrads unit. The night spinner had also hit them. The doom lasted a couple turns until the immobilized Wave Serpent, caused by the Hive Guard, blasted it out of existence by a krak missile. The trygons were brought down by massed fire and then the Wraithguard as their dying act. Massed scatter laser fire brought down the Tervigon. The pathfinders holding my loan objective were swarmed by Termagants and the second wiped out by Genestealers. Eldrads warlocks were picked off one by one until he alone was left in a pile of Tyranid bodies. I tank shocked a unit of Hive Guard and Termagants off the table. The Night Spinner was the real MVP as ti was shredding units and really helped the other units. When the Hive Tyrant finally came in on turn 3 and misshaped so he ended up in the opposite corner. When he finally came into the game he was blasted away by the remaining unit of Wraithguard.

In the end after 6 turns it was a tie. Turn 7 could have turned into total destruction for the Tyranids. It was back and fourth though. I had one Wave Serpent still mobile, the other Immobilized, Eldrad, one unit of Wraithguard and the Night Spinner left on the table.

All in all it was a very challenging and close game. If not for some well coordinated fire and dumb luck I could have lost. Old Schools reserve rolls were not being kind to him. The trickle of troops onto the board was a big advantage in the early stages of the game. It allowed me to concentrate my fire.

So good battle over all. Well next time we will delve into some more tactics and possibly even my initial plans for the 1850 point tournament at Adepticon.

Until then....

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!