Batrep – ‘Nids vs Grey Knights 1850pts

Here’s a batrep of my latest game between my Nids and GreyLambs GKs. I say batrep – but it’s not really a batrep. It’s more a record of what can only be described as a vicious hate crime against my fluffy cuddly ‘Nids that I would rather forget – but GreyLamb has never annihilated me this badly so I should probably post it up for posterity. And also to remind him how evil his army can be next time I swamp his beloved Paladins with 100 Gants...

I should probably preface this by saying I would never normally use this list, but after what seems to be almost a year of playing Swarmlord/Tervigon/Trygon/Hive Guard combo’s – I wanted to test some different units with the new 6^th Ed rules.

‘Nids

• ·         Hive Tyrant (Armoured Shell, Hive Commander, Lash Whip & Bonesword, T/L Devourer)
• ·         2 x Tyrant Guard (Lash Whips)
• ·         Tyranid Prime (2 x Boneswords, Deathspitter, Regeneration)

• ·         3 x Tyranid Warriors (Lash Whip & Bonesword, Deathspitter)
• ·         3 x Tyranid Warriors (Lash Whip & Bonesword, Deathspitter)
• ·         19 x Hormagaunts
• ·         19 x Termagants (Devourers, Mycetic Spore)
•  
• ·         2 x Zoanthrope (Mycetic Spore with T/L Deathspitter)
• ·         2 x Zoanthrope (Mycetic Spore with T/L Deathspitter)

•  ·         2 x Carnifex (2 x T/L Devourers)

Grey Knights

• ·         Coteaz

 

• ·         3 x Acolytes (Razorback with T/L Assault Cannons & Psybolt Ammo)
• ·         3 x Acolytes (Razorback with T/L Assault Cannons & Psybolt Ammo)
• ·         3 x Acolytes (Razorback with T/L Assault Cannons & Psybolt Ammo)
• ·         3 x Acolytes (Razorback with T/L Assault Cannons & Psybolt Ammo)
• ·         3 x Acolytes (Razorback with T/L Assault Cannons & Psybolt Ammo).
• ·         3 x Acolytes (Razorback with T/L Assault Cannons & Psybolt Ammo)

 

• ·         10 x Paladins (Assorted Force Weapons and Psycannons)

 

• ·         3 x Rifleman Dreadnaughts

 

• ·         Aegis Defense Line (with Quad Autocannon)

The mission was “Big Guns Don’t Tire” with Vanguard Depoyment and 4 mysterious objectives.

Coteaz swapped his psychic powers for “Prescience” and the Hive Tyrant managed to get “Iron Arm” and “Endurance”. A Zoanthrope in each brood swapped their powers – one brood getting “Puppet Master” and “Invisibility” and the other brood getting “Psychic Shriek” and one that gave it Fearless...woot.

Coteaz’s Warlord trait gave him benefits to Reserve rolls (the GKs had no Reserves) and the Tyrant would receive FNP if holding an objective...useful.

Deployment

GK’s rolled for first turn and deployed with the Paladins encircled by the Aegis Defence Line with one objective on my left and all three Rifleman (who are scoring) with an objective in cover on my right flank. Three Razorbacks accompanied each flank.

‘Nids set up in the middle of the deployment area with one objective smack in the middle of the table within my easy reach and the other on my left flank in some cover. The Gants and Zoanthropes in pods went into Reserve. I already knew I had no chance of taking out all that mech, so the plan was to overpower one flank and hope for the best – if I could get to within 18inches, this army had quite a lot of firepower.

‘Nids tried to steal initiative and failed (the first failure of many).

Turn 1

GKs: The Paladin objective turned out to be a Grav Field (?) (the one where charge rolls are halved). The Rifleman objective was something useless to them...like Fearless.

The Chimeras all got into firing positions and everything opened up on the ‘Nids. After the smoke had cleared one Carnifex was dead (First Blood), the other down was to a single wound and more than half the Hormagaunts were bullet ridden.

‘Nids: Endurance went onto the surviving Carnifex and everything pushed forward as much as possible.

The only unit in range was the Carnifex who opened fire on the closest Razorback and easily wrecked it with a multitude of Glancing hits. It then failed its “It Will Not Die” regeneration roll.

Turn 2

GKs: Coteaz cast Prescience on the Paladins (although they didn’t move). The remaining pair of Chimeras and a Rifleman took aim at the Carnifex and took it down with weight of fire. The other Rifleman then targetted the Warrior brood on the right and despite trying to juggle around the wounds onto the T5 Prime and Warriors in cover, the brood was wiped out. The Chimeras on the left flank then decimated the other Warrior brood leaving a single Warrior left on two wounds. More Hormagaunts died to fire from the Quad Autocannon.

‘Nids: Both Zoanthrope and the Gant broods entered from Reserve thanks to the Tyrants “Hive Commander” ability. The Zoanthropes with “Puppt Master” landed on the left of the Paladins (see where this is going???) and the Gants on their right. The other Zoanthropes landed near to the Riflemen.

Despite the Mycetic Spores being more than 12 inches away from Coteaz when they landed, the disembarking units dragged them into range of his stupid rule allowing out-of-sequence firing. The Paladins managed to first wipe out the Zoanthropes and then kill all but 4 of the Gants who then ran off the table (they were out of synapse at this point). Neither unit even had the chance to move...*sob*

The Tyrant cast Endurance on itself. The last three Hormagaunts jumped onto the nearest objective (giving them Shrouding I think) and the last Warrior and Tyrant pushed forward.

 

The Zoanthrope brood tried to Psychic Shriek the Acolytes from the wrecked Razorback and failed their psychic test due to the proximity of the Aegis reinforced Rifleman nearby (the reason I didn’t target them in the first place). The other Zoanthrope was more successful casting its Warp Blast, but it scattered about 11 inches, missing everything.

The Tyrant managed to strip two Hull Points from another nearby Razorback and the last Warrior killed two of three exposed Acolytes.

Turn 3

GKs: All of the Chimeras pushed forwards and opened fire, killing the last Warrior and a Tyrant Guard and putting a wound on another. The Rifleman turned round and blasted the Zoanthropes into oblivion at close range. The Hormagaunts were reduced to a single model.

‘Nids: Endurance went back on the Tyrant. All that was left was the Tyrant brood and a lone Hormagaunt – victory could still be ours!!!

The Hormagaunt charged the sole Acolyte - killing it, and the Tyrant brood charged the Razorback, easily removing its last Hull Point. No wounds were regenerated...

Turn 4

GKs: Chimeras pushed forwards and started taking objectives. The disembarked Acolytes from the recently wrecked Chimera shot the Hormagaunt who was now milling around in the open. Everything that could shoot targeted the Tyrant brood; killing the last Tyrant Guard and taking a wound off big momma.

‘Nids: The Tyrant was all that was left now. Victory was slipping through my fingers like the gloopy remains of my army.

The Tyrant cast Endurance on itself before charging the closest Dreadnaught. GreyLamb was happy to learn that twin-linked weapons still work in Snapshot – not that it actually helped him hit. I stupidly forgot my Hammer of Wrath attack and that I could Smash and was only able to take one Hull Point off the Dread... I did manage to regenerate the lost wound though (back to full strength!).

Turn 5

GKs: Being unable to shoot the Tyrant, the GKs moved into optimum firing positions for next turn. The Paladins left their objectives (after remembering they weren’t scoring without Draigo) and some Acolytes took their place.

I forgot my Smash attack again and the Tyrant/Rifleman combat went on (it’s pretty hard to hurt AV12 with an MC now without Smash...).

‘Nids: Endurance was popped again and there was no way I was killing the Dread this turn and risk being shot to hell in the GK turn so I opted to not Smash and combat continued.

We rolled to see if the game would end – it didn’t.

Turn 6

GKs: More shuffling in anticipation from the GKs. This time I used Smash and obliterated the Dread. It was nice.

‘Nids: Endurance again and the Tyrant legged it towards the nearest Rifleman and Smashed it in combat.

The game goes into Turn 7...

Turn 7

GKs: The Tyrant is now out in the open and in range of a Rifleman, Coteaz, ten Paladins and a few Razorbacks. Can you guess what happened? Lots of 2+ and FNP saves, that’s what! The Tyrant was taken down to 1 wound. GreyLamb was stunned at the amount of firepower a 2+save with FNP can take – I was less surprised having regularly played against Paladins...

‘Nids: Laughing in the face of all the puny firepower and high on life; the Tyrant cast Endurance on itself and charged the last Rifleman nearby. I could have shot it and then charged – but I wanted to see if it could make its twin-linked Overwatch shots under pressure and table me. It couldn’t (but I didn’t kill it in combat either...).

Conclusion

Somehow GK’s *just* managed to win 13/2 to my calculation (3 objectives, Linebreaker, First Blood, two Heavy kills – compared to my two Heavy kills).

Well my list was just to try out some rarely used units and what did I learn? Hive Guard are better than Zoanthropes, Deepstriking against Coteaz sucks and more cover is needed against a list with this much firepower. Oh and a 2+ Tyrant is freeking awesome!