In what looks like it's going to be my last Dark Eldar game of 2013, I attempt to break my non-winning streak by taking on the sons of Russ in a titanic clash!
The game was a Relic mission, with Dawn of War deployment. The armies:
Dark Eldar
Archon, Huskblade, Shadowfield, Venom Blade, Combat Drugs, PGL
Haemonculus, Liquifier Gun, Shattershard, Venom Blade
10 Kabalite Warriors, Splinter Cannon, Raider with Splinter Racks
9 Wyches, Haywire Grenades, Hekatrix with Venom Blade, Raider
10 Wracks, 2 Liquifier Guns, Raider
5 Kabalite Warriors, Venom with additional Splinter Cannon
3 Trueborn, 3 Blasters, Venom with additional Splinter Cannon
4 Incubi, Klaivex, Venom with additional Splinter Cannon
5 Scourges, 2 Haywire Blasters
Razorwing Jetfighter, Flickerfield
Razorwing Jetfighter, Flickerfield
Talos, twin-linked splinter cannon, twin-linked liquifier gun
Space Wolves
Logan Grimnar
Rune Priest
Wolf Priest
5 Wolf Guard Terminators
10 Grey Hunters, 2 Plasma Guns, Wolf Banner
10 Grey Hunters, 2 Flamers, Wolf Banner
9 Wolf Guard, lots of combi-plasmas, Rhino
Longfangs, 2 lascannons, 2 heavy bolters
Longfangs, 4 Missile Launchers
Dreadnought (Storm Bolter and twin-linked lascannon)
Aegis Defence Line with Quad Gun
Pre-game:
Archon rolled Night Attacker as his warlord trait, and re-roll wounds as a combat drug. Logan rolled the re-roll reserves warlord trait, and the rune priest scored Prescience and Misfortune.
Space Wolves won the roll off for table sides, and also for first turn, but elected to give it to the Dark Eldar (likely because otherwise I'd have just bunkered down out of range on turn 1).
Dark Eldar deployment. From top to bottom it's warrior raider, incubi venom, (archon in here), blasterborn venom in that cluster at the top; then the Talos (in area terrain) screening the wrack raider, then the wych raider, and lastly my 'backup venom' containing 5 warriors - the scourges are deep striking. Red star marks the position of the relic, just on the far side of the wall. Thanks to the ADL deployment rules, even though I'm deploying first I can still counter-deploy, as I know where his forces are likely to be; I'm using LOS blockers and night-fighting to full advantage.
Space Wolf deployment. Dread in the terrain (4+ for the ruin in front of it), then the 2 longfang squads -all MLs on the left, then the las/heavy squad on the right - rune priest is here and manning the quad gun. On the other side is Logan in the squad with dual-plasma. Off to the far side is the other grey hunter squad in the rhino, and the terminators hiding behind. Wolf priest and his rhino buddies are outflanking.
Space Wolves roll to seize and fail.
Turn 1 - Dark Eldar
Everything advances forwards. The Talos rumbles out and screens the warrior venom, which moves across. Both raiders advance down the right hand side of the ruins, where they're completely screened from the wolf firepower (only bolter weapons on the right side of the table). On my left flank, the venoms and raider both move forwards. In the shooting phase, the trueborn snap-fire at the dreadnought, scoring 1 hit but nothing comes of it. The warrior raider fires its lance, but does no damage. The trueborn venom, on the other hand, scores a decent number of wounds on the left hand longfang squad, and thanks to catastrophic saves only one longfang survives the barrage. The talos tries to pick off the lone survivor but fails, but the warriors in the raider pick him off for
First Blood. The Archon's venom moves flat out, getting it behind the ruin - hidden from everything else, and getting a really good cover save against the dreadnought. Both raiders on the right flank shoot at and manage to stun the grey hunter rhino. The last venom fires and picks off one or two of the other longfangs.
Turn 1 - Space Wolves
Rune Priest presciences his own squad. Logan and friends advance, and the terminators try and move round the rhino (stunned rhino is being quite a nuisance). The dreadnought shoots at my archon's ride and gets a glance and a penetrate, I manage to jink the penetrating hit and lose 1 hull point. The quad gun annihilates my warrior raider, exploding it, but I make out like a bandit with feel no pain saves, only losing 1 warrior in the explosion, and the survivors are not pinned. The longfangs themselves take a wound off of the Talos.
End of turn 1
Turn 2 - Dark Eldar
Both Razorwings turn up, but no scourges. One comes straight on in the face of the quad gun, the other comes on at an angle from the far right hand side. Wracks disembark into the central piece of terrain, moving towards the relic. I forget to move their raider, because I'm an idiot. The warriors in the centre move out slowly, having had their ride shot from under them. The trueborn venom moves up 6", and the archon's does the same, disembarking right into the face of Logan and his friends. Wych raider moves up, and the Talos advances to a more central position. He intercepts the central razorwing with the quad gun, doing 2 hull points of damage and shaking it. The trueborn show why they're the best of the best by glancing the dreadnought. Firepower from all my venoms manages to finish the second longfang squad, and I kill the rune priest as well. Lances wreck the grey hunters' ride, and they fail their pinning test. The razorwing that isn't snap-firing dumps some missiles on Logan's squad, and kills a few guys, to compensate for my archon missing 11 bunched up space wolves with a BS7 plasma grenade (I took his gun away for a reason
). The incubi charge in and the wolves pop their wolf banner (re-roll all 1s for the duration of the assault phase) and I feed Logan the klaivex in a challenge, doing one wound before he's cut down. The archon and remaining incubi kill all but 2 of the remaining grey hunters, for the loss of 1 of their own - wolves pass morale.
Turn 2 - Space Wolves
The outflanking combi-bomb rhino comes in from my right flank, and the wolf guard disembark (wolf priest hides at the back). The terminators advance as far as possible. Snap fire from the pinned squad does nothing, the dreadnought manages to rip a splinter cannon off of the trueborn venom. The combi-squad fires 3 plasmas which take down the wych raider, but again I'm jammy with feel no pain rolls and only lose 2 wyches. They also remain unpinned. In combat, the archon enters a challenge with Logan as the incubi cut down the last members of the squad. Archon fails to get anything past Logan's armour, whilst Logan inflicts 4 wounds in return, but the archon passes all 4 shadowfield saves.
End of turn 2. Fully capable Razorwing is just out of shot to the bottom right (base is in the crater), wolf guard are parallel to the building.
Turn 3 - Dark Eldar
Still no Scourges. Warriors continue their slow plod across the table. Razorwing on 1 HP banks 90 degrees and comes after the grey hunters, one at full capacity flies across to help with the dreadnought. Blasterborn venom advances. Empty raider moves, warrior venom moves as well. Haemy and wyches advance on the wolf guard, and the Talos rumbles up past the relic - anything wolfy that tries to get near it will have to go through the Talos first. Wracks get an awful move through cover roll and can't pick it up; I'll get it next turn. Shooting sees 5 darklight weapons do precisely nothing to the dreadnought (maybe some damage, but the damned thing is still there). The haemy pops his shattershard which does nothing to the wolf guard it hits, but the wolf priest is not tough enough and dies, removing preferred enemy from the squad. Missile fire from the razorwing and splinter fire from elsewhere kill lots of the grey hunters. In combat, the Archon defeats Logan for
Slay The Warlord largely thanks to his combat drugs. The wyches and haemy charge in and win combat narrowly against the wolves, and they remain locked - I forget that they've picked up a second pain token from the wolf priest, AND that they have combat drugs >.<; so instead of wounding on 5s, I should have been wounding on 4s with a re-roll.
Turn 3 - Space Wolves
Terminators advance forwards. Wolf guard rhino moves round and the surviving grey hunters get in. I can't remember what the dreadnought does, I think it kills an incubus or something equally less than stellar. In combat, the space wolves kill a wych but are reduced to just 1.
End of turn 3. There's a venom behind the small left hand building, and the large central building.
Turn 4 - Dark Eldar
Archon and his bodyguards move forwards but can't get far due to terrain. Venom moves and disembarks the trueborn, who shoot the dreadnought in the back.... to no effect. Lots of firepower brings down all but 2 of the terminators. Scourges arrive, but mishap and are placed in my back-left corner (they take no part in the game). One razorwing flies off-table, the other can pivot and reach the rhino, and duly immobilises it. The wracks move onto the relic, whilst the wyches and haemy kill the last wolf guard and consolidate into that ruin.
Turn 4 - Space Wolves
Without their ride, the remaining 4 grey hunters pop out and fire into the wyches, including their two flamers - I make precisely enough saves to let the haemy survive on his last wound, whilst the wyches are gutted. The dreadnought shoots down the last of the archon's retinue, but fortunately the archon manages to duck the lascannon shot (closest model). The terminators charge the wracks in a last-ditch effort to remove the relic from my grasp, but eat a single AP1 shot and 3 AP2 shots from overwatching liquifiers, which kills one and bumps the second one out of charge range.
End of turn 4 - Wolves have an immobilised rhino, 4 grey hunters, 1 terminator, and a dreadnought remaining
Turn 5 - Dark Eldar
One razorwing flies off table whilst the second one comes back. Haemy moves up, Talos advances towards the last terminator, and my shooting lines itself up with the grey hunters, as the archon runs up to the quad gun. The trueborn finally kill that dreadnought, and the haemy flames the grey hunters at AP4, killing one. Venoms kill 2 more, as the flanking raider puts a lance into the back of the rhino, removing it. The Talos turns the last terminator to goo with a liquifier shot. The archon is determined to finish the game in style and draws a bead on the last grey hunter with the wolves' own quad gun, shooting him in the back!
End of the game!
The Dark Eldar have First Blood, Slay the Warlord, Linebreaker, and the Relic, for a total of 6 VPs!
The Space Wolves have been tabled, and didn't even pick up a consolation VP in the process...
Victorious Slaughter to the Dark Eldar!
Puny Space Wolves! I think this game was heavily weighted against the Space Wolves before turn 1 even began. Putting the Dark Eldar in first was probably unwise, as it meant that they could strike hard and fast against the longfangs, always the most dangerous target. On the flip side, if the Wolves had gone first, I'd have just bunkered out of line of sight and range thanks to night fighting, so would have been unlikely to lose any units first turn. The really big error was splitting forces - with a grey hunter squad and the terminators isolated, as well as the wolf guard outflanking, the Space Wolves inadvertently played the Dark Eldar game of turning it into a mobility war, and I was able to isolate a large chunk of the Space Wolf army on my right flank using comparatively few units of my own, whilst the action took place in the centre. Had the outflanking unit started out on the board, and all deployed centrally, I'd have had a much tougher time (I'd personally have deployed in/near the crater abutting the defence line, and used the rhinos as a shield wall). All that aside, it was a fun game, and good to finally win one after so long!
Subject: Dark Eldar vs Space Wolves - 1750 points 
Thu Dec 12 2013, 12:56
