3.18.2013

Post Tourney Report

So Saturday was the FLGS's monthly 40K tourney. 1500 points, and I brought the list I mentioned two posts ago. I elected to go with Typhoon Speeders.

My first game was against a Mechanized Guard/Space Wolves consortium. Lots of melta/plasma Guard vets in Rhinos, two Vendettas, a couple Grey Hunter units in Rhinos with double special weapons, a Rune Priest, Missile Fangs, Primaris Psyker (It's "pry-MARE-us" folks, not "Primus". He doesn't have a big brown beaver, nor is he goin' on down to South Park), and a Psyker Battle squad.
We played Special Ops on the Mars board I'd built last year. Several large sections of area terrain (pipes and pumps), and some LOS-blocking fuel towers. Then a railroad track down the middle with the cars scattered along the center line. Very little cover once you left your deployment zone.
I was pushing for four units in the enemy deployment zone as my primary objective, and I forget what I elected for my secondary and tertiary. I think one was table quarters with a scoring unit, and the other was...kill points?
I placed my Hyperii one in each corner of my deployment zone. The fields of fire were huge, and I made sure I could cover good sections of the board with each. The rest of my units were ranged across my zone, with the attack bikes dead center. The enemy deployed pretty much the same, everything buttoned up in a transport except the Missile Fangs.
We proceeded to shoot the hell out of one another, with my bikes hurtling forward, and the enemy holding a mechanized gun line.
When the smoke cleared, we drew on every objective, I scored one bonus point, and my opponent scored two.

Game Two was against Chaos Marines in a kill point mission with objectives as secondary and table quarters as tertiary. I think. I'm always fuzzy on that stuff after the fact.
The Chaos list was a Lord in TDA, a fistful of Traitor Terminators in a Land Raider, a Helldrake, two CSM squads in Rhinos with double plasma, and a 5 or 6 strong bike squad.
I started out with a pretty good advantage, taking out his Rhinos early and the bike squad shortly after. I shot his Helldrake out of the sky with a Hyperios as soon as it arrived (though it did Vector Strike some attack bikes). Things bogged down as we circled each other for the center of the board, and his Terminators wiped out my melta squad. I'd lost all the attack bikes early from lascannon and vector strike damage. The Land Raider was free to rampage around, but it never did. My opponent backed up with hit, instead of pressing the advantage.
In the end we split the points almost down the middle, 16-15. I had the 15.

We finished the game in an hour and 15 minutes, so I had an hour to wait. I roped Lukas into playing a game of Death Angel with me, which was awesome. I've owned the game since it was released, but have only ever gotten to play solitaire mode. It is infinitely more entertaining with other people. I'm thinking with 6 it would be a total blast. We ended up winning over the Genestealers with a hail mary roll. Success!

Game Three was against Ultramarines in an objective tagging mission. Instead of parking on objectives, you can move around and "tag" them. If the tagged unit dies, all the objectives revert to neutral. If the enemy gets to your tagged objectives and you don't have a claiming or contesting unit around, the enemy steals the tag.
The Ultramarines brought a Librarian, jump Chaplain, one 10-man Tac squad in a Rhino, one 5-man in a Lasback, five or six Hammernators in a Crusader, 5 Sternguard with combis in a pod, and a 10-man Assault Squad.
We beat the crap out of one another in this game, and I came up short. I think I landed three points in the end.

All in all, it was a good day. I had fun in all three games, and don't have a single gripe or bitch to air. I really enjoyed having 4 troops squads in my biker list, and I think I may keep it that way for a while. I'm sad that Typhoons are still the best and only-est Landspeeder option that makes sense. I really want Tornado pattern assault cannons to work, but I think I'd have lost every game without the fire from the Typhoons.
The Hyperii really didn't do much. In game one, I got a shot off on each Vendetta as it arrived, but they just bounced off. The S8 vs AV12 is a total crapshoot. Of course, I lucked out in Game Two when one failed to bother the Helldrake, but the other took it out of the sky. They spent the rest of the game potshotting at Rhinos, same as they did in Game One. With no flyers in Game Three, I used them to splatter a Sternguard model when they podded in, and then potshot at Rhinos.
I think they'd be far more useful against lower-AV flyers, but only Orks really have those. They'll likely also be good against flying or deepstriking monsters like Hive Tyrants. Twin-linking was nice on the missiles, and i didn't miss a single shot all game, IIRC.

I'm not sure what I'd replace the Hyperii with though. I've been wanting to try out some Scout Bikes for a while, so maybe I'll try that out once I'm done with the slow-as-molasses Sternguard squad. Of course, they need a drop pod, so the Scout Bikes might end up pushed even further out.

No progress on Tyranids this weekend.

6 comments:

  1. Funny, we played all the same players except for one.

    Scout Bikers are also one of those units I keep meaning to try and haven't yet. Well, I tried them a few games but never really gave them a thorough testing. With what little I did use them I found them to be effective in their role.

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    1. yeah, I can't really envision the role for Scout Bikers yet in 6th. The loss of assault after outflanking or infiltration means they're stuck either waiting around for a turn, or better focused as a shooting unit.
      Rapid fire grenade launchers is nice, but BS3 hurts a lot. Snare mines are cute, but don't do enough damage to be a real threat to the units that like to hug area terrain.
      They are probably best run in a unit of 4 or 5 now, and kitted cheaply. Run them as a harassment and annoyance unit. Low expectations are harder to not live up to, lol.

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  2. Twin-linked BS3 is basically a straight BS4 so it's not that unreliable.

    A harassment unit is exactly what I'd use them for. Keep them cheap and look for a task to give them knowing they won't be coming back from it. Scouts, in any form, are one of the few units priced low enough to not cringe when they get smoked.

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    1. Yeah, but Astartes grenade launchers aren't twin-linked ;).

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  3. I find low cost troops sometimes worthwhile in holding objectives. If your other army is built with enough pressure units they can survive and gain you easy victory points and not waste a more useful units.

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    1. If I could make Scout Bikers scoring, they'd be an auto-take. But, they can do some of the forward recon work that I end up having to have my standard Marine bikers do, which puts them at risk of being killed off, and thereby losing me a scoring unit in the process.

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