Tournament practice - Dark Eldar vs Necrons 1850pts

With a small tournament coming up in October, a friend and I decided to do a test battle learn at least the first mission and get a feel for our lists.

Hope you enjoy!

The Mission
Primary was Maelstrom: Tactical Escalation (turn number = cards in your
hands)
Secondary was The Scouring (modified - 4 numbered objectives, VPs at the
end of the game according to the number)
Tertiary was Warlord, Linebreaker and King of the Hill (1 VP for the player
with a Troop unit closest the center of the board)

Deployment is Corner vs Corner.

The objectives were deployed as follows:

1 was on my right
2 was dead center of the board
3 at the edge of my deployment zone
4 was next to the woods at my left, fairly centrally


The Lists
Due to the tournament restrictions being changed last week, with them
really clamping down on things all of a sudden (no formations, no special
detachments, no named chars, no fortifications and no LoWs) I had to change
my list a little bit, but overall this should help me as I only planed to
run Realspace Raiders for the extra slots, but now I won't face any
superheavies or super deathstars. Btw a shout out to Acolyte who really
helped me with list designing and gave so helpful strategy input prior to
this game.


Dark Eldar

Archon, WWP, Blaster => Scourges
Archon, WWP, Blaster, Shadowfield => Reavers
2x Court, 3 Medusae (proxied by Corsairs) in Venom

Gunboat, Splinter Racks, Night Shield, 1 Splinter Cannon
Venom, 1 Blaster

Blasterborn in Raider
5 Mandrakes

Razorwing, Lances
Haywire Scourges
12 Reavers, Heat Lances, Cluster Caltrops

2x Ravager, stock


Necrons

Overlord, Flamer Thing, Veil of Darkness, Rezz Orb (one of those might have
been on the Cryptek) => big warrior unit
Cryptek => big warrior unit

2x 10 Immortals
20 Warriors
10 Warriors in Ghost Ark

6 Wraiths
3 Jebikes

3 Heavy Destroyers
1 Domsday Ark



Deployment
I won the roll to set up first, which suited me fine as I wanted to spread
out over my deployment zone anyway. The reason for that was that I wanted
to turboboost to one flank in T1 and therefore concentrate all my fire on
one enemy flank (thanks Acolyte).

The Necrons just spread out, almost running out of room due to their many
warrior and immortal blobs. The Doomsday arc and the jetbikes tried to stay
as far away from me as possible.

Then my Mandrakes infiltrated on top of/behind objective 1.





Turn 1 - DE

He fails to seize and I begin. I draw objective 4, which is too close to
the silvery skeletons for my taste, and I don't feel like sacrificing a
unit for 1 Maelstrom Point just yet.

My boats all shuffle to my right, I carefully measure out the Immortals
threat range to clear of it. Some boats turbo boost - I notice that things
get a little crowded there, but that can't be helped.

I fire into the closest warrior blob, doing OK damage. I know this will
take some work, making him roll as many saves/RRPs as I can.



Turn 1 - Necrons

The Necrons move up towards my gunline as fast as their little legs will
allow it. Then my opponent informs me that he would like to use his Veil of
Darkness. OK, go ahead. He puts his Overlord right in front of all of my
boats. Then he reconsiders, and moves him even closer. I go "That's pretty
ballsy don't you think...?" Na, he goes. OK, fine by me. He rolls for
scatter, and scatters 4 inches in my direction. He can barely place his
lord, he's basically already got one of his eyes gouged out by the ram of a
Warrior Raider. Then he proceeds to place his 20man unit of Warriors. Both
of us aren't a 100% clear on deep striking deployment/mishap rules, so I
read up whilst he puts down his guys. Personally I thought that the models
that you can't place are destroyed, similar to emergency disembarking. But
oh no, as soon as you can't place one model from that unit, the whole unit
mishaps. He reads that paragraph as well, and rolls on the mishap table. He
rolls a 1. He starts beating himself up (verbally). In fact, he's so
aggravated that later, when his little daughters come back with their mom
from shopping , he tells them to smack him over the head because daddy made
a mess of things So yeah, there does his Warlord, a Cryptek, and a 20man
Warrior unit, all in all round about 500pts according to him. Whoops.
Naturally, as Dark Eldar used to stepping in and out of Webway Portals like
others would use the bus, my whole gunline breaks down in laughter. Or
tears. Because Dark Eldar are all emos, or so I heard.

Anyway, rule No. 1 when deep striking: don't push you luck! Or use a WWP.

So with his movement phase concluded he opens up with the few units that
have range on me, the Doomsday Ark and the Heavy Destroyers. Here I get
worried because the former drops a pie plate onto my current parking lot
formation, but thinking it over later he usually won't be able to hit more
than 2 vehicles, and with jink shouldn't be able to do damage to more than
one, so it's not so bad actually. So his DD Ark gets 2 hits, one on the
warrior Venom which jinks it, and the warrior Raider (upgraded with Night
Shield and Splinter Racks!) which doesn't and promptly explodes. Damn it! I
so wanted to try out that Gun Boat The explosion takes out so many of
that warriors that they decide to leg it and while they're at it, why not
straight off the board. *Grumble* But hey, at least I didn't deep strike
mishap my death star, right?!
His Heavy destroyers glance a Ravager (for some reason my Ravagers always
get targeted before the Venoms, thats why I don't like taking lances - they
always jink anyway)

He forgets to run his Wraiths or anything else for that matter.





T2 - DE

I draw another card - objective 3. That I can do.

I move my left Medusae Venom over to the objective, everything else
proceeds to slide to the right. My Razorwing comes in, as do the Scourges
(which I'm REALLY happy about, as I need to get rid of that Doomsday Ark
asap). So the Scourges deploy in the far left opposing corner, ready to
take down that pesky thing.

I start with the most important unit in this phase, the Haywire Scourges. 4
dice - my opponent declines to jink - 3 hits, 3 glances. Much to my horror
I learn that those things have 4 hull points! All right, now everything
hinges on my Archon - she hits - she pens - and she even explodes the damn
thing! Fantastic!

I then continue to whittle down the near immortal machines, mostly
targeting the already damaged warrior blob and the Wraiths which will be on
me pretty soon. The Razorwing fire all missles into the central Immortal
blob, they all scatter but still hit something, although not a lot of
wounds go through. The warrior blob is destroyed and the wraiths reduced to
4.

The Medusae run onto objective No. 3, which I then score.




T2 - Necrons

Undeterred, the machine warriors continue their advance. The wraiths get
pretty close to my Medusae on the objective, ready to charge them. The
Ghost Ark turns around, eager to lay some firepower onto my Scourges and
their Archon. The jetbikes jump over to assist if necessary.

Necron fire sees my Razorwing glanced, a Ravager exploded and a Venom
glanced as well. Oh, and all of the Scourges go down and the Archon still
has 2 HP, better than I expected!

In the assault phase the Wraiths roll a 5 and a 2, he re-rolls the 2
because of fleet/beast and rolls a 1 The medusae overwatch kills the
foremost wraith, leaveing them stranded where they were! Good job Medusae!




T3 - Dark Eldar

I draw another objective 4 and Supremacy (control all objectives), which I
could, in theory, achieve.

My Warlord comes in with a ton of Reaver Jetbikes in tow (silly that she
can't ride one, too). I ponder whether to plop them down on objective 4 to
gain Supremacy, or close to the Necron deployment edge where it'd be easier
to set them up so that the Shadowfield Archon is at the front of the unit.
Leading by 2 points in Maelstrom I decide to play it safe (or so I
thought), and put them in the latter spot. Everything else once again
shuffels to my right or stays in place, ready to mow down the Wraiths. One
of my Venoms immobilizes itself next to the Mandrakes. Eh, I could imagine
worse places for that I guess.

First I shoot my Razorwing at the Tomb Stalker in hopes of dropping its
shield or maybe even destroy it to give my Jetbike the opportunity to
target something else. I hit, but only glance the Stalker. I then fire my
Archon at it, and she explodes it! Wow, those Archons really must have
their Blasters overcharged! With the Stalker down, the Jetbike unit, just
having revved up its Heat Lances, makes a collective sad face.

Everything else splits fire between the Wraiths and the foot slogging
Immortal unit, whitteling them down to 2 (the Immortals, not the Wraiths).

My Reavers jetbike move behind the Archon as good as possible.







T3 - Necrons

As one, the main Necron body turns around on the newcomers, the Reavers.
The Wraiths move up toward the Trueborn Raider. The Ghost Ark, being an
anti-grav unit, jumps up onto one of the little towers, giving it prime
sight and range on the newly emerged reaver unit - ugh.

After the dust has settled I'm about 4 jetbikes short, including one heat
lance/cluster caltrops. That could've gone worse I guess. Then the Necrons
assault me, too. Both the heavy destroyers and the remaining immortals make
it into combat, where I manage to cause no wounds, and he drops one
jetbike. I hit and run out of combat after confirming that hit and run is
indeed conferred to the whole unit (I still had my Archon joined up).

The wraiths wreck my Trueborn Raider

Oh, and the Scourge Archon finally dies to the Jetbikes. Aw. Took both
shooting and assault though.




T4 - Dark Eldar

My Razorwing continues its course over the battlefield. My remainig paper
boats line up the remaining wraiths. My Jetbikes line up the heavy
destroyer unit and the Immortals. My Archon detaches from the jetbikes
(reasoning at the time was that, if I break the Warriors and the Heavy
Destryoers I get 2 rolls to catch them, should I fail).

My Razorwing glances the Ghost Ark. My jetbike unit, having jinked the run
before, do no damage. The rest of my army (5 Mandrakes, 3 Venoms, 5
Warriors, 5 Trueborn, 1 Raider, 3 Medusae, 1 Ravager) throw a true
firestorm of dakka at the 3 remaining Wraiths and kill... 2. Those things
really suck! I mean, really??

I multi-assault the Heavy Destroyers and the 2 Immortals with my jetbikes,
after assaulting the Immortals with my Archon to eat overwatch. I kill one
Immortal and one Destroyer. The Necrons hold. Also, I didn't get Furious
Charge because of the multi-assault. Facepalm. On the other hand, I thought
I'd easily beat those 2 units in assault, and could therefore wipe both
out.






T4 - Necrons

The Ghost Ark move to occupy objective 4. The jetbikes turboboost to occupy
objective 2. The 2nd Immortal unit joins the melee. I lose more jetbikes,
he loses his last Immortal from one unit, and another Heavy Destroyer. I
hold! And hit & run.

No pic here? :/


T5 - Dark Eldar

My Razorwing hits the afterburner and leaves the battlefield for now. My
jetbikes moves to attack the Immortal unit. This time I'll try not to bite
off more than I can chew. My Warlord shoots its blaster at the Ghost Ark
but doesn't pen.

I shoot everything at the Wraiths (again), and another 2 drop. 1 left to
go. The Immortal unit almost buckles under the onslaught of the Cluster
Caltrops and now S4 attacks (Furious Charge). 2 Immortals left in combat.






T5 - Necrons

The Ghost Ark returns fire, laying down some 30 shots on my Warlord. Uh oh.
I save all but 2, and one of those gets saved by Feel No Pain. Phew. The
lone heavy destroyer attempts to blow up my last Ravager but I jink it.

I kill the last 2 Immortals. I have now 5 Jetbikes left, one with heat
lance / CC.

We roll to see if there is a turn 6, and there is.




T6 - Dark Eldar

My Razorwing comes back on and manages to do nothing. My trueborn move
towards the now empty Medusae Venom, to jump in and speed away in case
their firepower isn't needed to bring down the last Wraith. Of course, it
is needed. As the last Canoptek contruct phases out, my deployment zone is
finally free of intruders! Actually, most likely I am the intruder here,
but let's not get caught up in details. My jetbikes move to attack his
jetbikes. My Warrior Venom speeds there as well, to claim objective 2. I
now hold 3 out of 4 objectives, and lead Maelstrom by something like 8 -
10pts.

Shooting sees the last Heavy Destroyer dropped and slain. In assault I wipe
out his jetbike unit.






T6 - Necron

Not sure what he did this turn, it was getting late and I was getting
tired.

Again we roll to see if the game continues and it does, last turn.

No pic for the nasty Crons!


T7 - Dark Eldar

I decide to attempt the "Reaver Disembark Blocking" Technique that I read
about in here, and position my Reavers as good as possible. My Razorwing
also moves next to the Ark to add its large base to the blocked area. My
Trueborn in their Venom move up to take the last 2 Hullpoints off the damn
Ghost Ark. 4 HP is a lot for an AV13/13/11 transport imo. My Archon shoots
it and fails, but my Trueborn find their mark and wreck the thing. Since I
didn't manage to encircle the Ark completely he manages to disembark
unscathed, so I hit them in assault with my jetbikes, doing little damage.
Turns out, even with Berserker from PfPain S3 attacks hit like wet
noodles

T7 - Necrons

The last Necrons and my Jetbikes continue their fight, both sides worn out
from the long battle. Neither side wants to give in, but with the end of
the game the Necrons finally phase out, presumably back to their tomb to
regroup. When they return with reinforcements my forces shall already
celebrate back in the Dark City with their spoils.



End of Game


Man! What a long game! This was actually my first 1850 pts match, as we
usually tend to play 1250 - 1500 because, well beer and pretzels I guess.
Oh and after work games need to take not as much time if possible.

So, going in I felt kinda OK, because I had a strategy and a strong list.
But also, with this being my ... 4th or 5th game vs Crons, I knew I had my
work cut out for myself. To be honest, Necrons are my least favourite
enemy. They're just no fun playing against. Because for me, fun is when my
forces kill stuff. And Necrons just won't die. Basically, everytime I shoot
a full Venom at a unit, I expect it to take its toll. With Necrons I just
focus fire until a unit is dead. I don't even count the shots or expect
anything. Which for me, make the game a little dull.

Anyway, here's the verdict: I win primary with 12 : 2 or something, win
secondary by holding 3 objectives (1, 2, 3) vs none (his Warriors were too
far away in T7), and also Tertiary having scored Warlord, Linebreaker with
my Archon, as well as King of the Hill with my Warrior-Venom right on top
of the center of the table.

Crushing victory for the Dark Kin!



That said. I would've liked to see how the game would've gone without the
Deep Strike mishap T1. I actually offered to let him place them in Ongoing
Reserves, just because I felt that I could then have learned more, because
as it was, we played 1850 vs 1350 Pts. And it still felt like an uphill
battle! Don't ask me why but everytime I play Necrons I feel like I'm going
to lose, even when I'm ahead.



Overall I felt that this was so far my best tactical game of 40K. I believe
my mistakes were few, I allocated targets and resources properly, stayed
out of threat ranges... So I did learn and practice a lot, which should
help me at the tournament.

My opponent however seemed unsure of what to do after the first blow,
forgetting to run, forgetting to declare an assault, target selection
(charging Medusae instead of an empty Venom). But then, he's not an as avid
40K tactics follower as I am, being a Dad and stuff. By the way he'll most
likely change his list around a bit and bring a Silver Tide with 2 Tomb
Stalkers - I see him doing well at the tourney! Just hopefully not against
me


Unit by unit review

Regarding my own list, I find it hard to judge at the moment. It looks
fantastic on paper, but like I said, playing against Necrons ... there was
no unit that truly was a MVP, or even strong imo.


The Razorwing was ho hum, getting a glance and a pen all game. The missles
were no use.

The Ravagers were OK I guess, but had to jink most of the time. With
lances, they wouldve been worse.

The Scourges barely blew up a Doomsday Ark, but that unit alone cost me 240
pts, and the Ark I think is 150? So that wasnt really a good deal.

The Reaver Deathstar hung around until the end, and the Warlord Archon blew
up the Stalker, but again, for 450 pts I kinda expected a little more
ooomph.

The Mandrakes at least were cost effective, sitting on an objective all
game being hard to remove.

The Medusae did nothing really astonishing, other than survive and put a
few wounds on the Wraiths.

Venoms as per usual were OK I guess, but not being in short range to fire
12 instead of 8 shots hurt them. However, I can't move them that close
because then they'll die to Gauss fire.

And finally, the Gunboat just went poof so I don't know how much it
would've done.



So, after this humongous wall of text - what do YOU think? How do you like the list? Should I change anything (keep in mind that this is a TAC list)? Maybe replace the Reavers? I could get a 5 man unit of frots in a raider including aberration with scissorhands for those points for instance. These would also be a good counter assault unit should something unexpected drop by turn1 like my opponent planned with the 20 Warrior blob.

How could I have played better? And what could I have done had his most expensive unit not mishaped and vanished?


Thank you for reading, and thank you for commenting!

Pretty thorough report there, great images btw.

I think necrons are a hard test but not one that will really show the full strength and versatility of all your units - it really becomes a kite game with how many rerolls they get. That deathstar mishap really was the killer though - with it on the board would have changed a lot.

Liked your overall strategy and wouldn't really do a lot different. From the images though, and i'm not sure if its just how the game played out or ranges, but your units do look a little too clustered. if he has a DS deathstar arriving, better to have it arrive next to one or two things then turbo boost away from it. I think your reaver deathstar could have mulched that thing though with shear weight of S6 rending hits.


That reaver deathstar i'd give it a whirl against some marines or something else before just giving up on it, and it did last the whole game while eating up a lot of shots, which was its purpose. as for having no stand out units well that's just how it goes against necrons - bastards are just so resilient.

good game and thanks for the write up!

Quote :

Venoms as per usual were OK I guess, but not being in short range to fire
12 instead of 8 shots hurt them. However, I can't move them that close
because then they'll die to Gauss fire.

Venoms have 12 shots at range 36".

good catch - the venoms are relentless and don't suffer from the salvo rule, looks like your army just got 33% more powerful without doing a thing.

Sigmaril wrote:

Quote :

Venoms as per usual were OK I guess, but not being in short range to fire
12 instead of 8 shots hurt them. However, I can't move them that close
because then they'll die to Gauss fire.

Venoms have 12 shots at range 36".

Wow that's pretty significant! Thanks a lot Sigmaril, you've just improved my Venoms by, yeah, like Acolyte said, 33%! That's fantastic!

Acolyte - thanks for the comment, I'm glad to hear you would've played it about the same. You're right about my units being very clustered especially on turn 1. When deploying I wanted to spread out as to not give away my strategy, and T1 I wanted to move aside fast but dtill fire with my units on the right flank.

Had that death star arrived I would've liked to boost away from it, but at the same time would've lost access to 2 objectives, so in this particular game at that moment, I'd have tried to shoot it down.

You're right about the jetbikes eating a lot of fire. I've still got some days left to ponder my list - I'll most likely bring them though. I've tried working in the Grots and could then even take another unit of Scourges, but for the Grots I'd like a Succubus which in turn would make me have to drop the Medusae or I'd have 3 HQ... Too complicated and too many changes then,. Plus, its always nice to have a game under your belt with the exact list you're bringing to a tourney imo.