Craig Coffey - Dark Eldar
Baron Sathonyx
3 Kabalite Trueborn, 2 Dark Lance, Venom - 2 Splinter Cannons, Flickerfield
2x 3 Kabalite Trueborn, 2 Splinter Cannons, Venom - 2 Splinter Cannons, Flickerfield
3x 5 Kabalite Warriors, Blaster, Venom - 2 Splinter Cannons, Flickerfield
2x 5 Wyches, Venom - 2 Splinter Cannons, Flickerfield
9 Hellions
6 Reaver Jetbikes, 2 Heat Lances
3x Ravagers - 3 Dark Lances, Flickerfields
Mission:
Deployment - Dawn of War
Primary Objective Alpha (W/D/L - 10/5/0 BP) - Crusade, d3+2 objectives.
Primary Objective Beta (W/D/L - 10/5/0 BP) - Purge the Alien
Secondary Objectives (2 BP each) - Slay The Warlord, First Blood, Hold the Line (deny the enemy linebreaker).
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Craig is fairly new to the tournament scene and, by his own admission, is more of a painter than a player. His army was stunning. I wish I had some pictures of it.. Oh, well. You'll just have to believe me.
Due to the nature of our armies and the mission we were playing, I wasn't too worried going in. We rolled up objectives, and Craig managed to end up with two on his side placed centrally in separate pieces of area terrain roughly 12" apart. I had one objective on my side, 6" from my board edge, right-center, hidden out of LOS behind a "beer can" wall. With Craig's objective advantage and high number of troops, I would still have to work for Primary Objective Alpha (Crusade), though I should win on Kill Points and Secondaries fairly easily.
As Craig's entire army had inherent cover, he basically lined up his pieces along the border of the table, trying to create a shooting gallery. I was able to counter with a LOS blocking hill on my right and the can wall center-ish, so I could at least hide turn 1. Night Fight would not be in effect.
Craig won the roll-off and decided to deploy first. This was probably a mistake, as he was going to lose kill points anyway and giving me second turn pretty much gave me objectives as he had no way to kill my fliers. Basically, he set up a whole bunch of skimmers spread out across his deployment, though he slightly favored the side away from my hill.
I deployed my Wraiths out of LOS behind the hill on my right flank. My 3 Barges had cover saves behind the can wall. Typhus and Zombies setup in between the two. By refusing a flank like this, I was able to limit a lot of his firepower, or at least what it could shoot at.
On his first turn, he maneuvered a little bit to his left and shot everything he could at Typhus' squad. Typhus took 3 wounds, but managed to hold on. Baron and his Helions moved straight up the center line into cover, taking no wounds from dangerous terrain.
My turn came and everything advanced. Wraiths shot up the right flank with a solid run move and would be in range to assault a Venom next turn. Typhus trudged forward behind a forest with his eyes on a Ravager and/or Baron's squad next turn. All 3 Barges scooted over the can wall 12". Shooting started, and my plan was to tackle his Venom's with the SC Trueborn inside first as I needed my Zombies and Wraiths to survive as long as possible and those squads put out the highest of number of shots. Once those were down, I'd go after his Ravagers, removing any hopes he had of taking out my Barges/Scythes. Things started out well, I believe, as I was able to take out both a Venom and a Ravager, pinning the squad inside.
My opponent would need to make something happen here on turn 2. Fortunately, for me, it didn't happen. His Dark Lance shots bounced off my Barges futiley, only causing a hull point here or there. Venom's shot at my Wraith's and Zombies, putting a couple wounds on the former and killing ten or so of the latter as I LOS'd wounds from Typhus. Not enough. In assault, the Baron and friends assaulted a Barge, but only took off a weapon.
Turn 2 for me was basically the killing blow. 2 Scythes, both with Haywire-Tek's, and my Heldrake came on from reserves. Again, everything advanced except the Barge's, which all retreated 6". Warriors/Cryptek's spilled out and each blew up a Ravager with some help from Vector-Strikes. My Scythes/Barges focused on the Venom's, taking out another 3 I think. Heldrake shot his flamer from his rear-end, avoiding letting the Baron tank wounds, and with Daemonforge/Soul Blaze, took out all but 2 Helions. The only downside to this round of shooting was that with all of the explosions, no Tesla Arcing happened. Lots of Kabalite Warriors ended up dying in the wreckage. In assault, my Wraiths.. destroyed another Venom. Typhus failed a hail-mary charge on the Baron.
Ever the good sport, and unwilling to give up, Craig pressed on. What little shooting he had left, however, was ineffectual. In the end, Typhus was able to squash the Baron who was trying to contest my objective, and the rest of my army cleaned up what was left from the wreckage in my opponents backfield. Splitting my Destroyer Lord off from my Wraiths, and mass Tesla Arcing helped speed up the process.
The final result was a slaughter, with me easily getting full points. Craig was a really nice guy, and took it well. We talked about it a little after the game, and the sad truth is Dark Eldar just don't have any means to destroy Fliers, and even allied Eldar don't help THAT much there. Also, Dark Lances just aren't as reliable as one would think. Having said that, my opponent could have made it harder on me if he had done a better job skirting around outside of my 24" range band with his skimmers. He needed to take second turn, hide as best he could, and stay out of range taking shots were he could get them while sitting on his objective advantage. Still would've been a really tough game for him.
Victory, 26-0!