I spent today at Dundracon, playing a 1 day tournament. This was my first completed tournament of 6th ed - Finally! So how did the Tyranid Biobomb do?
Well first up this was a 1500 point tournament, with no allies and no fortifications, I trimmed back my 1850 list into the following:
2 dakka Hive Tyrants with wings - 1 with Hive Commander and one with Preferred Enemy.
2, 3 power, Tervigons
2 10 man Gaunts
2 * 2 Zoanthropes (1 squad in a Spod)
Doom of Malantai in SPod
First name out of the hat for a table, an auspicious start? . I drew Adam, a gent from San Jose and his Space marines: Chapter Master, banner, honour guard in a Land Raider. 3*10 Tac squads in Rhinos and 2*5 man dev squads.
Mission was DOW with Primary 4 objectives and secondary First Blood, Linebreaker, Slay warlord. I was going second and nightfight came up thankfully!
Powers wise I stuck mainly with biomancy powers the stand out powers rolled were Endurance on both Flyrants, Iron arm, puppetmaster & Telekine dome on 1 Tervigon (the other one got Enfeeble and 2 crap powers). The doom took psychic shriek.
I picked sides and set up second with my Flyrants on the board hidden and the pods waiting to arrive. A guant squad outflanked with Hive Commander. And I was very pleased to find that the game was nightfight for first turn.
Adam's shooting was ineffectual due to stealth from nightfighting but he did chose to barrel his land raider forward 18" right into my face. In my turn turn he was met with a counter charge from an angry looking Tervigon who hit 3 times but just took one hull point. My hive tyrants flew forward in formation vector striking a Rhino for 2 hull points on the way and then focused their fire on obliterating a dev squad for first blood.
Turn 2
Adam had realised that the flyrants needed to be dealt with or they would cause havoc in his backfield so he shot at them heavily - almost everything missed or was saved though through some jammy dice from me.
Unfortunately the hive tyrants were just pissed off by that and they killed a Rhino and a few marines to boot.
Highlight of this turn was puppetmastering the Crusader to shoot at the honour guard mincing a couple of them but the doom also was his usual masterful self, striping out the other dev squad and 2 of the honor guard. Awesome turn all round for me.
Turn 3
This is quickly turning into a rout unfortunately for Adam, his dice are deserting him completely at this stage. He seems incapable of rolling 6's except on the dooms tests ! (the doom is max wounds now and is still eating). To add to this the tervigon's are getting in on the act too and spawning furiously!
Also in this turn the Zoanthropes (who had kept book powers) show up and blow big holes in the land Raider leaving it a smouldering wreck. The rest of the army trash the remaining Rhinos. The Flyrant nabs one of the squads in combat. Adam cleverly uses ATSKNF and auto fails to ensure they have a chance to escape, rally and shoot the flyrant but it doesn't work.
Turn 4 Adam tries the ATSKNF trick again but is caught and down to 2 models. The other marines are bravely holding the line against a wave of gaunts backed up by multiple angry monsters... Adam doffs his cap at that and wishes me the very best of luck in the rest of the tournament.
final result was 4 objectives + 3 secondaries so 15-0 VPs
====Round 2=====
Dan from the Team Zero Comp crew had been very much hoping to avoid a his hated nid match up - hoping his buddy Grant & his bike council would be taking the bullet for him. No luck though! On the plus side we were playing on a super forested table with a big river down the middle, With my bugs being brown and his biker army being green it really did look cinematic.
Dan had 28 bikes including a librararian and a chapter master. The bikers themselves were pretty well kitted out with Melta,plasma and combi plasma(very cleverly magnetised to the back of the bike). He also had bought a storm talon for some anti air duty.
Dan also has done a fantastic job painting these guys - he was one of my picks for best painted. His Librarian is below.
Primary Mission was Killpoints with Vanguard setup though so at least there was some hope right?
Dan wins side and I win first turn.
Knowing the bikes would be reliant on cover saves against the Doom (who is a huge problem for this army) I gave him, both sets of zoans and a tyrant psychic shriek. Both Tervigons picked up Iron Arm and a Tyrant and a tervigon got endurance.
The setup looked like this.
First turn I spawn gaunts and press up hard to cut of easy vectors of escape for the bikes. Both Flyrants take to the sky and hit the middle squad with Psychic Shriek and lots of Dakka. Good wounding but equally good saving and the sole remaining bike legs it. The bike army then turns to the Lead flyrant and throws everything at him, hitting and wounding a few times but the flyrant weathers the storm and flaps away (I make all 3 fall to ground tests).
Turn 2
As Dan fears... the Doom arrives on que and is in range of 3 units who all lose some models. The librarian at least stops psychic shriek this time. The Psychic choir of zoanthropes also step up and take out the left most squad of bar 1. one tyrant decides to drop right in front of the Librarian and shoots him. The squad take look out sir wounds for the librarian. and go down to 4 members. the other tyrant kill all but one bike in the rearmost bike unit (top right in above picture behind the librarian/captains squad). The librarian had cast endurance which meant the tyrant felt ok about charging him I didn't challenge but I did kill the remaining 2 regular bikers. The Captain makes his saves.
Turn 3 the line continues to press up and space is getting very tight for the remaining bikers who are retreating to the corner. The Hive commander tyrant kills the final members of one squad with his brainleech worms. The other tyrant smashes and hits the captain 3 times.. but he shrugs off the attacks with his shield. The librarian fails to hit with his force axe. In Dan's turn the storm talon arrives and tries to snipe the doom but it escapes unharmed. He does however get first blood by killing a spore pod.
The Tyrant has another go at smashing the Captain, this time killing him with the first blow... the second deals with the librarian before he can swing his force weapon.
At this point Dan -who still hates the Doom - only has about 6 bikes (mostly lonely individuals) and a stormtalon remaining all of whom will be grabbed by gaunts / flyrants so we decide that a trip to the bar might be a more fun way to finish out the game. The beer was indeed delicious and the banter was great!
Final score
Tyranids 10 (warlord 1, linebreaker 1, 8 kp 8)
Marines 2 (first blood 1, 1KP 1)
=======Round 3========
Final round of the tournament and I was to play Keith and his Necrons, another one of the players who I considered for best painted with his lovely ceramic and blue necrons
His list was 2 Doomsday Arks, 30 warriors with a Lance cryptek each, Zahndrekh, a kitted out destroyer lord, 2*3 destroyers and 7 flayed ones.
Primary mission was 1 objective each for 3 points each, secondary was Slay the warlord, Line breaker and first blood (1 point each) and table quarter 2 points each.
I won first turn and table side, no night fight though but then Keith had a solar pulse so it didn't matter anyway.
Key powers this game were Endurance on the Hive commander, Drop zoans keep lance, Both Tervigons get Iron Arm again . the other Zoan squad pick up Iron arm and puppet master.
I set up on the right flank with both primary objectives targetted and Keith sets up in a block built around the doomsday arks.
Turn 1
Keith Fails to seize so both flyrants jump forward for first blood. I make a mistake and put the hive commander out front and the preferred enemy tyrant further back but 2 good volleys kill off the targeted squad of warriors - or at least so I thought... the Cryptek rolls a six and gets back up denying me first blood.
To start Keiths turn the same cryptek shoots, hits and wounds the hive commander who promptly crashes to earth with the shock and takes a second wound. Now standing in front of the entire gun line he unsurprisingly dies... giving up both First blood and Slay the warlord. Another Cryptek decides if his brother can do it he should try it also and rolls another 6 and although failing to wound him my second flyrant also crashes to the ground losing a wound. He loses 2 more wounds from remaining destroyer fire. I was somewhere between aghast and astounded at this point!!
The destroyer lord then charges the tyrant and pulls out his mindshackles ... I roll my 3 dice but am lucky enough to pass - just- the Tyrant then decides he has had enough of this upstart destroyer lord and splatters it with the help of preferred enemy. That at least puts some balance back in the fight.
Turn 2 Apparently shocked by the Hive commanders death my reserves roll three 1's - damn it there was a 5 / 6 unit doom impacting landing spot available!! Iron Arm goes off well on both.
My Zoans line up a puppetmaster strike on the nearest doomsday ark... which is pointed straight at a nice blob of warriors and Zahndrekh. But never fear I roll a 12 and take a wound!
Tervigon 1 spawns out 7. Tervigon 2 I forget to spawn with... he does however make a charge to the flayed ones and kills a couple.
The flyrant vector strikes and kills a destroyer but his follow up shooting (life leech rolls double ones twice Grr) is a wasted effort.
With no endurance and only 1 wound he is a soft target and a squad of warriors shoot him out of the sky in Keiths turn.The Doomsday arks take a few wounds from the tervigon who isn't in combat and kill some gaunts. Zahndreks squad decide the idea of doomsday arks shooting them is a bad idea so kill the puppetmaster zoanthrope. The Tervigon in combat kills another pair of Flayed ones (3 left). The destroyers move up to try and put the hurt on tervigon 1 but Iron arm stymies them and I take just one wound (3 left)
Score is still 5- 0 and not only that but if this was boxing Keith would have a big lead on points!
Turn 3 The Doom & Gaunts stubbornly decide to stay off the board but the Zoanthropes do turn up and drop in front of the doomsday arks. They do hit it once but roll a 1 to pen with the lance... Gah again!!
Tervigon 1 spawns out on an 8 and tervigon 2 spawns 14 but is still going. The other gaunts shuffle around to give tervigon 1 a charge on the destroyers.
I now put a complex charge pattern in play and 3 squads of gaunts follow the tervigon into combat. Squads 1 and 2 multi charge the destroyers. The 14 man squad also charge the destroyers but also assaults Zahndrekhs unit and the flayed ones. I lose my assault bonus but I am pretty pleased with myself here as this is a really awesome multi charge! The plan works perfectly as gaunts 1 and 2 +tervigon 1 kill the destroyers, tervigon 2 and gaunt 3 kill the flayed ones and the remainder of gaunt 3 kill 2 or 3 warriors. I lose a couple of models but Zahndrekh fails his leadership and gets run down by the gaunts... who swarm around his twitching corpse spitting acid to stop him getting back up. the cryptek escapes their attention however
In one fell swoop I have taken out the heart of the necron army... Shooting in 6th ed is strong but still nothing rips an army apart like a great charge.
Keith is on the ropes now but he is not dead yet.... his doomsday arks take another wound off of tervigon 1 (down to 2 now) and the last warrior squad take another wound... the cryptek from Zahndrekhs squad takes advantage and charges into the Tervigon and avoids all the blows thrown at it.
Score now 5-4 to the necrons
Turn 4 The doom arrives and does very little... just about managing to kill the tyrant killing cryptek from turn 1 with Shriek. The gaunts also arrive and hide in a corner for the quarters.
The Zoans try and lance the nearest ark again and roll a 1 to pen yet again.
Tervigon 1 kills the cryptek and shuffles forward. tervigon 2 ploughs onto the necrons home objective, spawning gaunts as he goes.
Keith focuses his fire on tervigon 1 who succombs, inspite great cover saving, to the inevitable. The ensuing gaunt feedback is not too bad with only 6 of a possible 20 or so gaunts dying. Importanly 1 gaunt is by himself on my objective. Keith also kills the Zoans 4 wounds 4 failed saves (epic fail by them in game 3 for sure). He cleverly moves the warriors away from the zoans and towards the top left table quarter.
Score now 4 - 7 due to a solo gaunt sitting on my objective.
Turn 5. Tervigon 2 annoyed at the loss of her brood sister charges and smashes the Closest ark asunder while spawning more gaunts (10) to hold the necron home objective. Gaunts move into 7 inches of the warrior squad. Other gaunts move back to add their bodies to holding the tyranid home objective while the solo gaunt makes a run into the lower left table quadrant. The doom also moves up to beside the last remaining warrior squad ( who are about midfield and holding a quarter) Keith rolls an 18 - ouch and loses a few models, and also loses a few from shriek and shooting from the Gaunts. the Gaunts and the Doom take another 1 down.
Keith has 4 models left including an Ark and as time is nearly up decides to call the game.
Final score:
Tyranids 12 (warlord 1, linebreaker 1, 2* primary objectives 6 and 2*tertiary 4)
Necrons 2 (warlord 1, First blood 1)
============================
All done bar the counting and it turned out that myself and Grant from the zero comp crew had both gone 3-0 so it came down to VP's, I won 37 to 30 I think. I picked up a fantastic box of terrain (awesome prize) which I hope to bring home. Delighted to finish and win my first 6th ed tournament and especially to do it with Tyranids!
So that was it - Thanks to Dan Benavidez the event TO for a great day out and thanks to my 3 super opponents for making it a really fun event.
I'll leave you with a few interesting photos (apologies to the player who won best painted as I took photos but they were so poor I deleted them)
