This matchup saw myself and the eldar player from the games on the 5th teaming up again to take down 2000 points of dark eldar, but this time I brought my necrons instead of orks. I spent a bit of time after Saturday's write-up analyzing my list and deciding where to go right now with the models I have and can reasonably proxy while actually following the rules this time.
The Challenger:
2x Haemunculus
Duke
5x incubi w/ venom
5x wracks w/ raider
3x trueborn w/ venom
10x wyches w/ 2x hydra gauntlets, agoniser, raider
10x warriors w/ blaster
10x hellions
5-6x reavers
5x scourges
2x ravagers (one lance, one cannon)
1x razorwing fighter w/ 4 necrotoxin missiles
The Defenders:
Eldar
1x farseer w/ doom
6x howling banshees w/ wave serpent
10x dire avengers w/ wave serpent
5x pathfinders
1x wraithlord w/ EML, starcannon
1x wraithlord w/ EML, scatter laser
Necrons
2x overlords w/ res orb
4x crypteks w/ 3 eldritch lances, 1 solar pulse, 1 tremorstave, 1 harp of dissonance
4x crypteks w/ 3 eldritch lances, 1 solar pulse, 1 tremorstave, 1 harp of dissonance
10x immortals w/ tesla carbines
10x immortals w/ tesla carbines
4x scarab swarms
We rolled annihilation for game type, which was exactly what I was hoping against, and dawn of war for deployment, which was what I was exactly hoping against. Our opponent won the roll to go first and chose to, starting both of his raiders on the board, with a haemunculus inside with the wracks. I decided to go balls out and put a unit of crypteks in a piece of area terrain so they could potentially put a hole in the wych raider turn 1, while my partner chose to put on his unit of pathfinders so that they could save themselves a turn of running up the bluff.
For squads of the same type with more than one unit (i.e. immortals) I will number them from left to right. For instance, before the game begins, CS2 is the cryptek squad in the area terrain, because after our first turn, another squad walked on to the left of them.
Deployment looked like this. Our opponent put his razorwing, ravager w/ lances, hellions, scourges and reavers into real reserve while everything else was to walk on. We tried to seize and failed.
TURN 1
Dark Eldar Dude took his turn at being a cheaterbox and rolled 3D6 x 3 for night fighting, when in fact night vision confers the ability to re-roll, not extra range and has done so since 3rd Edition, but I went along with this because I was too lazy to look it up.
Everything walked on in the middle and then shot up my crypteks. The ravager with the disintegrator cannons nicked two wounds while the wych raider put a lance through another, while everything else whiffed against the crypteks, as did the venoms shooting at the pathfinders.
The squad passed morale and one of the crypteks stood up, leaving a lance and the harp.
As the turn passes to us, we walk everything we've got spread across the entire board edge for fear of necrotoxin missiles.
First up I pop a solar pulse. The wave serpent rolls on with the banshees is on the left, while the dire avengers are on the right at the far side of the table in the shot above. The banshee serpent shot at the trueborn's venom and managed a pen and a glance with its twin linked scatter laser, and while the flickerfield stopped the glance, the pen wrecked it.
The remnants of the first cryptek squad whiff against the ravager while the other squad hits with the harp and manages two penetrating hits and a glance, but its flickerfield saved all three, but leaving it at AV10. The wraithlords also shoot at the ravager, one whiffing as horribly as me though the other managed an immobilizing glance with its scatter laser. Both of my immortal squads were too far away to shoot anything, and I forgot to run them.
TURN 2
Our opponent gets his razorwing and hellions in, putting the razoring in the midfield while the hellions went long near the ruins. The hellions scattered into the ruins, and should have gotten a mishap on one of the columns but we let it slide. The warriors move out of their cover, and the wych raider scoots into blocking terrain against the crypteks.
Shooting saw the ravager put two wounds on CS2 in the bush and neither get saved, dropping the squad. The wych raider laid three disintegrator wounds on the farseer who saved them all. The trueborn shot up the banshee's wave serpent to no effect, and the venom shooting at CS1 likewise did nothing.
Then the pain train arrived with four necrotoxin missile strikes against immortal squad 1 right on the hill near the pathfingers. Out of 22 or so hits and a 2+ to wound, the squad saved all but three, though the razorwing also dropped two more from its disintegrator cannons.
With nothing in their range, the hellions run up out of the ruins. My troops finish the round like champs, with three of the five in IS1 standing up and the harper getting up in cryptek squad two.
Our turn starts with the inevitable slogging up, though we did bunch our stuff up since the dark eldar hadn't any pie plates left (save for short range shredders). My partner dumps both of his wave serpents' payloads, the banshees on the edge of terrain and the avengers up on the side of the ruins on the right table edge.
Shooting for us was a barrel full of fucking shenanigans. The banshee wave serpent sets its sights on the incubi venom, nailing it with boxcar starcannon shots, but the flickerfield saves yet again (5 saves so far). Fortunately its shuricat immobilizes it, in a twist of fate. Guess they didn't think peashooters could hurt.
Both of the wraithlords try and take out the wych raider, but both whiff with two missiles, two starcannon shots and four scatter laser pewpews. The harper pens it, but flickerfield stops that as well (6), but is now sitting at AV9. The crypteks in the other squad take aim at the wrack's raider, drilling it with two pens and a glance but flickerfield stops all three (9), and the harp did not hit.
The immortal squad rounds out what was a pathetic phase by lighting up two hellions with tesla shots.
The banshees take their shot at the hellions as well and finish strong, knocking out another two with their pistols.
Assault sees the scarabs swarm the venom and land a bajillion entropic strikes, 13 or 14--it was above average at least. The venom wrecks and the incubi pile out in prime position to tie themselves up with the scarabs.
TURN 3
The ravager comes in but the reavers stay off the table, thankfully. The wracks move up in their adled raider and poop them out onto the ruins, and the warriors move up as well.
The hellions and wyches follow suit, moving in the for the kill.
Shooting starts with the vehicles going all out: the newly arrived ravager lances two wounds off the wraithlord with the scatter laser, while the other fails to scratch it. The wrack's raider similarly whiffs against the avenger's wave serpent, though the wracks themselves kill four of the avengers with their shattershard blast weapon, however their streak ends there as the liquefier gun lands five wounds that get saved and the casket of flensing gets only assault 3 and no wounds at S1 AP5.
The wych raider gets a single wound with its disintegrator cannon on the harper, but he makes his cover save. The razorwing drops the wraithlord with the starcannon by putting four wounds on its head.
Shooting continues with the hellions going wide against the banshees, though the trueborn lurking in the trees explode the wave serpent, laying three wounds on the scarabs and one on the banshees, but everyone made their saves. The warriors with a shredder instagib one base while their splinter cannon and rifles knock out another five wounds.
Assault is grizzly, with the wracks sweeping the dire avengers after winning combat two to one, consolidating backwards. The incubi rout the scarabs with fearless wounds and take no damage in return, while the hellions do the same to the banshees, though the exarch survives and successfully breaks off combat. The hellions consolidate towards the pathfinders.
Wyches win combat four to zero after the overlord sucks it up, and continues sucking wych cock by failing his leadership and rolling a number that didn't matter much, leading to the squad getting swept.
We shuffle around a bit in movement, and the banshee exarch regroups.
Shooting on our turn sees the crypteks drop six wyches with lance and tremorstaff pies, while the immortal squad kills two wracks from tesla fire. The wraithlord takes one more stab at the dark lance ravager, managing a pen but it's stopped by the flickerfield, of course (10). Our pathfinders also miss the wyches, who also pass their pinning test.
Hoping for some luck, my partner assaults the hellions with his exarch, taking one with him but receiving fatal damage in return, The hellions move a bit closer to the pathfinders.
TURN 4
Both reavers and scourges come in, but the reavers mishap on top of the wyches while the scourges mishap 11" across the wraithlord towards the far table edge. The reavers rolled a two on the table and leave play just as they were coming in. The razoring gets in position on top of the grassy knoll in the middle, while everything else shifts up for the final charge. The black ravager below actually moved to be behind the wave serpent.
The scourges and ravager lead in shooting by failing with their lances but just barely taking out the last wraithlord with shard carbine fire. The razorwing then puts two wounds onto the autarch, who is finished off by a lucky hex rifle shot from the wracks. The ravager behind the wave serpent explodes it, and since it had been hit with a harp twice earlier it took a glance and was stunned. (One of the harp hits didn't glance, and I forgot to write it down). Awesome.
The wyches assault into the crypteks, who pass their leadership test after failing combat zero to one. The pathfinders are routed by the hellions.
Since my partner was tabled and this game had been over since turn two, I conceded the game.
RESULTS
We lost marginally 8 to 11 KP. Of course had the game finished, we would've been tabled and had perhaps 9 KP to our opponent's 17.
This game was a blowout in favor of dark eldar. It didn't help that I was fucking up every turn starting with deployment, but 10 flickerfield saves against our anti-tank certainly didn't help. Also, we were playing like AP- counted as -1 to pen, when of course it was -1 on the damage table, for a net wash with open-topped.
So, mistakes that I can remember right now:
1) Deployed crypteks into cover against an enemy they would've been able to hit walking on turn 1 anyway
2) Deployed way too haphazardly for annihiliation
3) Forgot to use that second solar pulse top of turn 2.
4) Totally missed that wych raider encroaching on the immortals
5) Didn't shoot tesla at vehicles because I thought I couldn't pen
After being less disappointed with the crypteks, I think they are way too many points at this level. My new list sports a single court with the same config + res orb lord, but two annihilation barges and three more scarabs. Sadly that means I need to buy some barges and will lose that second solar pulse at 1000 points, but c'est la vie.
I think will try experimenting with command barges as well, I think they will be very valuable for destroying things. The FLGS is running buy two get one free next Friday, so I am going to see if I can't wrangle someone into buying me a big list of stuff while I'm in Omaha.
The Challenger:
2x Haemunculus
Duke
5x incubi w/ venom
5x wracks w/ raider
3x trueborn w/ venom
10x wyches w/ 2x hydra gauntlets, agoniser, raider
10x warriors w/ blaster
10x hellions
5-6x reavers
5x scourges
2x ravagers (one lance, one cannon)
1x razorwing fighter w/ 4 necrotoxin missiles
The Defenders:
Eldar
1x farseer w/ doom
6x howling banshees w/ wave serpent
10x dire avengers w/ wave serpent
5x pathfinders
1x wraithlord w/ EML, starcannon
1x wraithlord w/ EML, scatter laser
Necrons
2x overlords w/ res orb
4x crypteks w/ 3 eldritch lances, 1 solar pulse, 1 tremorstave, 1 harp of dissonance
4x crypteks w/ 3 eldritch lances, 1 solar pulse, 1 tremorstave, 1 harp of dissonance
10x immortals w/ tesla carbines
10x immortals w/ tesla carbines
4x scarab swarms
We rolled annihilation for game type, which was exactly what I was hoping against, and dawn of war for deployment, which was what I was exactly hoping against. Our opponent won the roll to go first and chose to, starting both of his raiders on the board, with a haemunculus inside with the wracks. I decided to go balls out and put a unit of crypteks in a piece of area terrain so they could potentially put a hole in the wych raider turn 1, while my partner chose to put on his unit of pathfinders so that they could save themselves a turn of running up the bluff.
For squads of the same type with more than one unit (i.e. immortals) I will number them from left to right. For instance, before the game begins, CS2 is the cryptek squad in the area terrain, because after our first turn, another squad walked on to the left of them.
Deployment looked like this. Our opponent put his razorwing, ravager w/ lances, hellions, scourges and reavers into real reserve while everything else was to walk on. We tried to seize and failed.
TURN 1
Dark Eldar Dude took his turn at being a cheaterbox and rolled 3D6 x 3 for night fighting, when in fact night vision confers the ability to re-roll, not extra range and has done so since 3rd Edition, but I went along with this because I was too lazy to look it up.
Everything walked on in the middle and then shot up my crypteks. The ravager with the disintegrator cannons nicked two wounds while the wych raider put a lance through another, while everything else whiffed against the crypteks, as did the venoms shooting at the pathfinders.
The squad passed morale and one of the crypteks stood up, leaving a lance and the harp.
As the turn passes to us, we walk everything we've got spread across the entire board edge for fear of necrotoxin missiles.
First up I pop a solar pulse. The wave serpent rolls on with the banshees is on the left, while the dire avengers are on the right at the far side of the table in the shot above. The banshee serpent shot at the trueborn's venom and managed a pen and a glance with its twin linked scatter laser, and while the flickerfield stopped the glance, the pen wrecked it.
The remnants of the first cryptek squad whiff against the ravager while the other squad hits with the harp and manages two penetrating hits and a glance, but its flickerfield saved all three, but leaving it at AV10. The wraithlords also shoot at the ravager, one whiffing as horribly as me though the other managed an immobilizing glance with its scatter laser. Both of my immortal squads were too far away to shoot anything, and I forgot to run them.
TURN 2
Our opponent gets his razorwing and hellions in, putting the razoring in the midfield while the hellions went long near the ruins. The hellions scattered into the ruins, and should have gotten a mishap on one of the columns but we let it slide. The warriors move out of their cover, and the wych raider scoots into blocking terrain against the crypteks.
Shooting saw the ravager put two wounds on CS2 in the bush and neither get saved, dropping the squad. The wych raider laid three disintegrator wounds on the farseer who saved them all. The trueborn shot up the banshee's wave serpent to no effect, and the venom shooting at CS1 likewise did nothing.
Then the pain train arrived with four necrotoxin missile strikes against immortal squad 1 right on the hill near the pathfingers. Out of 22 or so hits and a 2+ to wound, the squad saved all but three, though the razorwing also dropped two more from its disintegrator cannons.
With nothing in their range, the hellions run up out of the ruins. My troops finish the round like champs, with three of the five in IS1 standing up and the harper getting up in cryptek squad two.
Our turn starts with the inevitable slogging up, though we did bunch our stuff up since the dark eldar hadn't any pie plates left (save for short range shredders). My partner dumps both of his wave serpents' payloads, the banshees on the edge of terrain and the avengers up on the side of the ruins on the right table edge.
Shooting for us was a barrel full of fucking shenanigans. The banshee wave serpent sets its sights on the incubi venom, nailing it with boxcar starcannon shots, but the flickerfield saves yet again (5 saves so far). Fortunately its shuricat immobilizes it, in a twist of fate. Guess they didn't think peashooters could hurt.
Both of the wraithlords try and take out the wych raider, but both whiff with two missiles, two starcannon shots and four scatter laser pewpews. The harper pens it, but flickerfield stops that as well (6), but is now sitting at AV9. The crypteks in the other squad take aim at the wrack's raider, drilling it with two pens and a glance but flickerfield stops all three (9), and the harp did not hit.
The immortal squad rounds out what was a pathetic phase by lighting up two hellions with tesla shots.
The banshees take their shot at the hellions as well and finish strong, knocking out another two with their pistols.
Assault sees the scarabs swarm the venom and land a bajillion entropic strikes, 13 or 14--it was above average at least. The venom wrecks and the incubi pile out in prime position to tie themselves up with the scarabs.
TURN 3
The ravager comes in but the reavers stay off the table, thankfully. The wracks move up in their adled raider and poop them out onto the ruins, and the warriors move up as well.
The hellions and wyches follow suit, moving in the for the kill.
Shooting starts with the vehicles going all out: the newly arrived ravager lances two wounds off the wraithlord with the scatter laser, while the other fails to scratch it. The wrack's raider similarly whiffs against the avenger's wave serpent, though the wracks themselves kill four of the avengers with their shattershard blast weapon, however their streak ends there as the liquefier gun lands five wounds that get saved and the casket of flensing gets only assault 3 and no wounds at S1 AP5.
The wych raider gets a single wound with its disintegrator cannon on the harper, but he makes his cover save. The razorwing drops the wraithlord with the starcannon by putting four wounds on its head.
Shooting continues with the hellions going wide against the banshees, though the trueborn lurking in the trees explode the wave serpent, laying three wounds on the scarabs and one on the banshees, but everyone made their saves. The warriors with a shredder instagib one base while their splinter cannon and rifles knock out another five wounds.
Assault is grizzly, with the wracks sweeping the dire avengers after winning combat two to one, consolidating backwards. The incubi rout the scarabs with fearless wounds and take no damage in return, while the hellions do the same to the banshees, though the exarch survives and successfully breaks off combat. The hellions consolidate towards the pathfinders.
Wyches win combat four to zero after the overlord sucks it up, and continues sucking wych cock by failing his leadership and rolling a number that didn't matter much, leading to the squad getting swept.
We shuffle around a bit in movement, and the banshee exarch regroups.
Shooting on our turn sees the crypteks drop six wyches with lance and tremorstaff pies, while the immortal squad kills two wracks from tesla fire. The wraithlord takes one more stab at the dark lance ravager, managing a pen but it's stopped by the flickerfield, of course (10). Our pathfinders also miss the wyches, who also pass their pinning test.
Hoping for some luck, my partner assaults the hellions with his exarch, taking one with him but receiving fatal damage in return, The hellions move a bit closer to the pathfinders.
TURN 4
Both reavers and scourges come in, but the reavers mishap on top of the wyches while the scourges mishap 11" across the wraithlord towards the far table edge. The reavers rolled a two on the table and leave play just as they were coming in. The razoring gets in position on top of the grassy knoll in the middle, while everything else shifts up for the final charge. The black ravager below actually moved to be behind the wave serpent.
The scourges and ravager lead in shooting by failing with their lances but just barely taking out the last wraithlord with shard carbine fire. The razorwing then puts two wounds onto the autarch, who is finished off by a lucky hex rifle shot from the wracks. The ravager behind the wave serpent explodes it, and since it had been hit with a harp twice earlier it took a glance and was stunned. (One of the harp hits didn't glance, and I forgot to write it down). Awesome.
The wyches assault into the crypteks, who pass their leadership test after failing combat zero to one. The pathfinders are routed by the hellions.
Since my partner was tabled and this game had been over since turn two, I conceded the game.
RESULTS
We lost marginally 8 to 11 KP. Of course had the game finished, we would've been tabled and had perhaps 9 KP to our opponent's 17.
This game was a blowout in favor of dark eldar. It didn't help that I was fucking up every turn starting with deployment, but 10 flickerfield saves against our anti-tank certainly didn't help. Also, we were playing like AP- counted as -1 to pen, when of course it was -1 on the damage table, for a net wash with open-topped.
So, mistakes that I can remember right now:
1) Deployed crypteks into cover against an enemy they would've been able to hit walking on turn 1 anyway
2) Deployed way too haphazardly for annihiliation
3) Forgot to use that second solar pulse top of turn 2.
4) Totally missed that wych raider encroaching on the immortals
5) Didn't shoot tesla at vehicles because I thought I couldn't pen
After being less disappointed with the crypteks, I think they are way too many points at this level. My new list sports a single court with the same config + res orb lord, but two annihilation barges and three more scarabs. Sadly that means I need to buy some barges and will lose that second solar pulse at 1000 points, but c'est la vie.
I think will try experimenting with command barges as well, I think they will be very valuable for destroying things. The FLGS is running buy two get one free next Friday, so I am going to see if I can't wrangle someone into buying me a big list of stuff while I'm in Omaha.
This is the first Necron battle report I've read. Is there a reason you were fielding the Crypteks together instead of split off into squads where they can't be singled out?
ReplyDeleteostensibly, distribution of fire. crypteks pop transport, immortals shoot the squishy guts. that didn't happen because my opponent was a lucksack, and points permitting it's a lot harder to field 8 crypteks embedded into squads of immortals than it is for warriors, but i just don't like warriors. my 1250 list swaps out the extra lances and harps and loses the scarabs for CCB's for two overlords with warscythes and two tesla barges.
ReplyDeletethis nets me two troops choices with two solar pulses, two TLAC dreadnoughts, and two chainfists that attack during the movement phase.