This game is a final farewell to the
PDF Blood Angels list and a final practice game for a fellow gamer Sam (he qualified in Heat 3 whereas I failed).
Sam wanted to have a hard game vs Tyranids to get a feel of what to expect of the new codex.
Blood AngelsGeneral: Sam
•Ch Chaplain Israfil
•DC 6 Death Company
•DR Death Company Rhino
•V1 Venerable Dreadnought
•V2 Venerable Dreadnought
•A1 5 Assault Combat Squad
•A2 5 Assault Combat Squad
•
TS 10 Tactical Squad
•TR Tactical Rhino
•TC1 5 Tactical Combat Squad
•TC2 5 Tactical Combat Squad
•
DS 5 Devastator Squad
•LS Land Speeder
TyranidsGeneral: Phil
•
SL Swarmlord
•TG 2 Tyrant Guard
•DM Doom of Malantai
•MS1 Mycetic Spore for Doom
•MS2 Mycetic Spore for Spinegaunts
•
SG 17 Spinegaunts
•T1 9 Termagants
•T2 7 Termagants
•
TP Trygon Prime
•T3 Trygon
•T4 Trygon
•Tg Tervigon with Catalyst
DeploymentWe rolled up Seize Ground (5 Objectives) and Dawn of War. Sam wins deployment and passes it over to me.
I place Spinegaunts just before the center line towards an objective, backed up by the Swarmlord and Tyrant Guard. Behind them my other Troop selection being the Tervigon.
Sam splits a Tactical Squad into two and deploys them heading for two objectives.
Turn 1 - Tyranids Start of turn - Tervigon produces a Brood of 7 Termagants that sit on the objective while the Tervigon moves round to get a shot off at the Combat Squad.
Meanwhile the Spinegaunts move very slowly into the ruins, while the Swarmlord moves more to the center.
Shooting Tervigon kills 1 Tactical Marine.
Turn 1 - Blood Angels Sam has left the Landspeeder in reserve, otherwise everything else moves on.
Combat squad moves up and shoots at the Tervigon causing 1 wound with Meltagun.
Turn 2 - Tyranids With the +1 from the Swarmlord, the Tyranids all turn up. The Tervigon spits out another 7 Termagants (but manage to roll 2,2,3 - so no more spawnings).
The Trygons drop close to the 2 Objectives on the Tyranid side, while the Doom in Mycetic Spore lands within 6" range of a Tactical Squad in Rhino and the Assault Squad.
Spinegaunts move to take ruins while the Swarmlord moves slowly forward.
Massed Trygon fire kills 2 Marines from Combat Squad and 1 Assault Marine. Meanwhile the Doom does it's magic and causes 5 wounds on the Tactical Squad but none on the Assault Squad, then fires off a Blast at the Assault Marines and scatters double 6!!
NOTE: First debate in game about how the Doom's Leech life works - Does it work against embarked Squads? Currently rule Yes.
Turn 2 - Blood Angels Landspeeder arrives and plays it safe for the moment. Death Company Rhino moves up to cover the Venerable Dreadnought, the Assault Squad shoots and kills 3 Termagants and Dreadnought puts 1 wound on Trygon Prime. On the other side Tactical Squad jumps out of Rhino and moves forward to Flamer the Spinegaunts killing 8.
In Combat the Assault Squad (A2) wipe out the Termagants but lose 1 marine. Assault Squad (A1) assaults the Doom but I manage to make all my 3+ Invulnerable saves.
Turn 3 - Tyranids Me and Sam had previously discussed that the 3rd Turn is normally the decider in any battle - someone will break through leaving the other player to scrabble for points or desperate last minute win.
This turn was going to live up to this thought.
Doom leeches 4 of the Assault Marines (A1) and kills the final one in combat.
Mycetic Spore MS1 whips 1 Tactical Marine while the Spinegaunts shoot down another.
The Termagants shot 1 Assault Marine (A2) as does a Trygon.
In combat, the Spinegaunts assault and lose 3 models but stay in the fight with the Tactical Squad (
TS), the Tyrgons rampage through the remaining Assault Squad and Combat Squads.
The Trygon Prime assaults the Venerable Dreadnought and immobilises it but takes 4 wounds back to frenzied hits from DCW.
Swarmlord finds itself just within 6" of the Devastator Squad and wipes them out but does take a Wound.
Turn 3 - Blood Angels Now for the Blood Angels counterstrike.
Death Company jump out of the Rhino and assault a Trygon. Venerable Dradnought moves away from the Swarmlord.
Tactical Squad (
TS) kill 3 Spinegaunts but they still won't budge.
Trygon Prime penetrates the Venerable Dreadnought and in the explosion is killed.
Death Company cause 4 rending hits on Trygon, the Trygon tries to take down the Chaplain but only manages 1 wound, then another wound is caused by the Chaplain, I lose and take my Armour saves and die.
Turn 4 - Tyranids Lost 2 Trygons in the last turn but Sam is making no headway towards the Objectives.
Need to take an Instinctive Behaviour test on the Trygon and fail, it lurches towards the Death Company Rhino than the Death Company itself.
Looking at the field, I realise that the Mycetic Spore (MS2) is just in 6" of the Rhino, so I roll and manage 1 penetrating hit which explodes the vehicle, this now leaves it clear for the Trygon to go after the Death Company, Trygon kills 5 Death Company, but they cause 3 wounds back, I still win and the Chaplain has to take an Armour Save and fails - dead Chaplain.
Meanwhile Swarmlord fails to hit the Venerable Dreadnought but the Tyrant Guard manage to Immobilise it.
Tactical Squad (
TS) finally kill off the Spinegaunts but are now in combat with the Doom.
NOTE: This is when I start forgetting to do the Doom's Leech life at the start of each shooting phase - if I had remembered the Tactical Squad would have been dead much earlier).
Turn 4 - Blood Angels Now Sam realises that he needs to get rid of my last Troop units or contest to get a draw.
So Landspeeder moves 12" to flame the Termagants in the center killing 4.
Tactical Squad (
TS) does 1 wound on Doom in combat but loses 1 marine in return.
Swarmlord does better destroying 1 weapon on Venerable Dreadnought as does the Tyrant Guard.
Turn 5 - Tyranids Again need to test on the Trygon and this time pass, decide to send it south to eliminate Sam's Combat Squad.
Mycetic Spore is again within 6" of a target and lashes out causing a Shaken result on the Landspeeder.
Trygon fleets well and assaults the Combat Squad killing 3.
Turn 5 - Blood Angels With the Landspeeder shaken Sam moves it in to contest the Objective. He also drives the Rhino into the Woods to contest but fatefully rolls a 1 to be immobilised!
Otherwise Tactical Squad (
TS) wounds the Doom and makes it fail another save, it's now down to 3 wounds.
Trygon does badly only killing 1 Marine.
Turn 6 - Tyranids We roll and the game continues.
Not much happens this turn, Trygon kills the final Marine in combat and the Tervigon sits on an objective.
Turn 6 - Blood Angels Landspeeder moves round to flame the Termagants and burns out 4 of the remaining 5 but luckily for me the Swarmlord is now within 18" range and the final 1 stays.
Tactical Squad wounds the Doom again, now down to 2 wounds left...
Turn 7 - Tyranids I find that the Trygon is within 18" of the Swarmlord, so no test needed, it crashes into the Landspeeder and explodes it, luckily the final Termagant ducks and survives.
I remember to use the Doom's Leech Life and kill the final 2 Tactical Marines.
Turn 7 - Blood Angels With only an immobilised Rhino remaining for the Blood Angels, the Game is over.
2 Objectives to the Tyranids, 0 to the Blood Angels.
Except for the debate on the Doom effecting troops in vehicles; the game showed Sam a couple of pointers.
Combat Squadding doubles your scoring units but makes them less resilient in the long run.
Secondly, he spread out his force too much which allowed me to send me force in a 3 pronged attack:
1. Trygons on the left flank
2. Swarmlord up the center
3. Doom handled a whole flank on his own
Always remember what the Mission is and make sure your not just killing because you can.