Time for another game! This weeks offering is a throwdown between the Kabal of the Fractured Shadow, and the Imperium's noblest heroes - the Blood Angels! I've been playing Blood Angels since I first started playing 40k, so I know the army and how it tends to play very well; but I haven't actually got all that much experience playing -against- them, and the only time I've faced them with DE has been when they were a small detachment allied to a DA army.
Dark Eldar Army (I took a 1500 point list and added more, faster than building from scratch)
Archon, Huskblade, Shadowfield, Combat Drugs, Venom Blade
Haemonculus, Shattershard
10 warriors, splinter cannon, raider with splinter racks
5 warriors, blaster, dual-cannon venom
5 warriors, blaster, dual-cannon venom
5 wyches, haywire grenades, dual-cannon venom
10 wracks, liquifier gun, raider with flickerfields
5 Incubi, Raider with night shields
5 scourges, 2 haywire blasters
3 reavers, heat lance
Talos, twin-linked liquifier gun, twin-linked splinter cannon
Razorwing, flickerfield
Razorwing, flickerfield
Blood Angels Army
Dante
5 Sanguinary Guard, Power Fist, Infernus pistol, Chapter Banner
5 assault marines, razorback with t-l lascannon
5 assault marines, razorback with t-l lascannon
5 scouts, camo cloaks, sniper rifles, missile launcher
Furioso, Frag Cannon, Magna-grapple, Drop Pod
Death Company Furioso, Magna-grapple
8 Death Company, mix of bolters/bolt pistols, thunder hammer, power fist
Chaplain
Storm Raven with twin-linked multi-melta, twin-linked lascannon, 4 bloodstrike missiles
Mission was Crusade, with 3 objectives; Deployment was Hammer and Anvil. Blood Angels warlord trait gave me -1 to my reserve rolls, Dark Eldar warlord trait was re-roll my reserve rolls. Dante hexed my Archon with his death mask (-1 to WS, I, A, and -1 wound), and I rolled splintermind as my combat drug. Blood Angels won the roll for table side and objectives, but Dark Eldar won the roll for first turn. Night fighting is in effect on turn 1.
Deployment. Green stars denote the objectives. I have a warrior venom on the left, followed by a wych venom, then the talos screening the warrior raider, which screens the incubi raider (archon and haemy both in here, handily starting with 2 pain tokens). Then the second warrior venom, and finally the wrack raider which is actually a demoted ravager with the side guns removed. Scourges are behind them, and I keep the jetbikes in reserve.
BA deployment. Both squads in razorbacks just sit back out of range and LoS - he would then infiltrate his scouts onto the central floor of the ruin, the objective turning out to be a scatterfield. His DC, Chaplain, DC dread are all in the raven, and Dante and the SG are deep-striking. He rolls to seize, and fails.
Turn 1 - Dark Eldar
Talos and Scourges hop forward into terrain, scourges failing one dangerous terrain test but passing his armour save (scourges have broken because my carry case is crap, so we're playing the 2 with bat wings as carrying the haywires for ease of identification). The right hand raider moves and disgorges the wracks onto the objective in the ruin, which is nothing of importance. I would have deployed the 5 warriors from a venom on this, but was scared of the fragioso, so went for 10 wracks instead - possibly a mistake. I also felt that they'd be better for holding off Sanguinary Guard if he came close. Everything else advances forwards, raiders bipping to the left. I can't get within line of sight and range of any tanks, so I just pour everything into the scouts - 7 splinter cannons and some dark lances; I manage to kill 4 of them despite the 2+ cover.
Turn 1 - Blood Angels
Fragioso in its pod turns up and slams down next to my two raiders, and the razorbacks advance, one to each side of the ruin. His ranged shooting knocks the dark lance off of the archon's raider, and kills a venom for First Blood. The fragioso fires its frag cannon across 2 raiders and a scourge, but despite being assault 2 doesn't manage to score anything on either raider(!); does kill the scourge though. Multi melta and magna grapple both fail to do anything. 2 surviving warriors fall back from their venom.
End of turn 1
Turn 2 - Dark Eldar
Thanks to the Blood Angel warlord trait helping me out, only one razorwing comes in - I'm trying to keep one back for the storm raven. Don't want the jetbikes yet, so I let them stay out by not re-rolling their failed roll. Warrior raider advances, and the wych venom moves sideways, disgorging the wyches near the fragioso. Scourges also fly out and back, losing one to a failed dangerous terrain test. Warriors rally. The archon's raider is currently useless, so I move it sideways - I don't want to commit the incubi until I know where Dante plans on landing as I know that incubi will just chew through Sanguinary Guard. The warrior venom heads up towards the unclaimed objective (possibly overzealous), and the empty raider advances. Talos also heads towards the fragioso, as part of a cunning plan. Shooting, and I knock out the red razorback with the empty raider, and ranged shots from my venoms and the warriors in the raider kill the 5 guys that were inside (I think the warriors gain a pain token from this, but I completely forget). The haywire blasters from the scourges strip a hull point from the fragioso, and a thrown grenade from the wyches gets another. Finally, I send the Talos in first to eat the overwatch from the frag cannon, then the wyches who manage to glance it to death. Both units consolidate.
Turn 2 - Blood Angels
In a complete show of dice desertion, none of the BA reserves come in. The razorback moves back into cover, and promptly immobilises itself on terrain doing so. It and the scout, however, both have LoS to the warrior raider, and one of them blows it up, killing 3 and causing the remaining seven to flee.
End of turn 2
Turn 3 - Dark Eldar
Not entirely sure how to proceed with a battle plan when there's no enemy to fight. I get the reavers, but no razorwing. Fleeing warriors rally. I disembark the warriors from the venom onto the last objective, which turns out to be a skyfire nexus. I move and then flat-out the archon's ride to take cover behind the ruin that the wracks are in. Wyches re-embark and advance, and the talos and scourges also head forwards. Empty raider fires at the razorback, but he makes his cover. I send the current razorwing flat-out to get it off the board, and the empty venom kills the last scout. Finally, the reavers heat lance the drop pod into oblivion, and jetbike-move out of sight.
Turn 3 - Blood Angels
His reserves show up this turn. Raven hovers on and disembarks everything as he doesn't want it to die in an explosion (I thought you had to zoom on, but couldn't find the bit in the rulebook where it says that). Dante and friends deep-strike next to the 5 warriors, and blast them off the objective. The DC furioso destroys the empty raider, and shooting from the raven and razorback (through the door) destroys both my venoms, killing 2 wyches and 3 from the exposed warrior squad.
End of turn 3 - the Blood Angels have arrived in force.
Turn 4 - Dark Eldar
This is problematic... I'm down to only one transport, and 2 objectives are on the other side of the table. I take the only option open to me and send everything forward, turbo-boosting the archon's raider up to get the incubi in position for an assault next turn. Razors come on on my right flank, and the wyches, scourges and jetbikes barrel down the left; Talos plods methodically down the middle. Shooting accomplishes little other than immobilising the storm raven, so it's stuck there for the rest of the game.
Turn 4 - Blood Angels
DC and dread advance. ASM get out and sit on the objective. Dante and friends also advance on the raider. Most of his shooting comes at that, but he only succeeds in immobilising it, forcing the sanguinary guard to finish it off with an infernus pistol. They then charge in and I manage to trap Dante in a challenge with my haemonculus to stop him from butchering my squad. Annoyingly, the squad has death masks (Ld test or be reduced to WS1 for the phase) - despite my leadership 10 archon in there, I fail! I swing first, and even at WS1 the archon and incubi manage to cut down all bar the guard with the chapter banner (had I not failed the test, I'd easily have wiped the squad). Guard kills a few, and Dante easily squashes the haemy.
Bottom of 4, just before the SG charge
Turn 5 - Dark Eldar
Potentially the final turn. I slam everything forward - wyches, scourges both move and run, trying but failing to get into contesting range of the ruin objective; Jetbikes do get there with their turbo-boost however. The razorwings both move up and manage to wreck the dreadnought, targetted as the thing most likely to stop my contesting shenanigans. In combat, Dante gets into a challenge with the archon. I don't manage to kill the last SG with my incubi (not sure how - might even have forgotten to do that bit of combat, or just really bad rolls). Archon swings, gets 3 hits, but can't wound Dante. Dante lands a few hits of his own, but is thwarted by the shadowfield. Dante and his last friend then hit and run onto the objective.
Turn 5 - Blood Angels
Not much to be done. Dante skyfires at the razorwing and stuns it with his infernus pistol. Raven splits fire with machine spirit; I'm not 100% on what shoots where from his army but I lose 1 jetbike and both my remaining incubi, archon lives. The DC shoot at my scourges but they survive. I pass morale on my jetbikes. We roll to see if the game continues, and it does.
End of turn 5. I'm basically just swarming that objective in the corner now.
Turn 6 - Dark Eldar
Razorwings peel off and fly - one goes off-table in preparation for a last-ditch effort on turn 7 if it comes; the other due to being stunned is useless (can't get off the table in 18", and can't do anything else because it's stunned). Archon moves up, talos and warriors also advance. Wyches move into the doorway in an attempt to charge the assault marines. Scourges fly into the upper floor to contest from above; reavers fly back to contest from behind. Shooting is ineffective, killing a few DC at most. One wych dies to overwatch, leaving one alone. The archon makes it into combat, and challenges. Dante tactical precisions his way onto the pointy end of my archon's huskblade, netting the Dark Eldar Slay The Warlord. Sangy Guard is fearless with the banner, so remains locked.
Turn 6 - Blood Angels
One of my jetbikes gets shot at and dies to a lascannon, and the survivor flees. Storm raven shoots at the scourges and I hit the deck, one surviving to cling on to contesting the objective. The death company move across and charge, unsurprisingly beating my archon to death for Slay The Warlord. If the game ends now it's a draw, but it goes to turn 7!
Turn 7 - Dark Eldar
Jetbike rallies, but can't do anything useful. Talos moves up. Wych moves and runs to get into contesting range. Razorwing comes on and eyes up that last sanguinary guard. Kabalites advance - just outside linebreaker at present, but I don't care; all my contesting units also get linebreaker, and if I stop contesting I lose regardless. Razorwing sticks a wound on the sanguinary guard with a dark lance; he goes to ground and passes his cover save on a 4 (I realised after the game that he shouldn't have gone to ground being fearless, and thus should have died). Talos runs and manages to also get into contesting range.
Turn 7 - Blood Angels
DC move back across. Everything takes pot shots at my swarming contesting army. He gets the wych with the assault marines, but the scourge makes his cover save from a lascannon. The Talos takes two wounds from the storm raven, and the death company only just fail an 11" charge to try and take him down.
End of the game!
So, the results:
Dark Eldar have one objective, linebreaker, and slay the warlord for a total of 5
Blood Angels have one objective, first blood, and slay the warlord - also 5
Game is a draw! But I'm claiming a moral victory on account of that Sanguinary Guard not being able to go to ground
Got to hand it to my opponent for keeping his cool and not getting angry and frustrated - his dice in the first few turns were just abominable. The reserves not turning up actually benefited him in the end, as I didn't want to commit my forces until they'd shown up. I maybe should have committed more forces to the far corner objective, but by the time his army actually showed up almost all of my transports were dead and I didn't have much of a method to fight back with. Was a really fun game overall, and definitely a good scrap. I'm not overly happy with the list though (blasters in warrior squads suck), so there's definitely a new one on the cards for next time.
Subject: Dark Eldar vs Blood Angels - 1750 points 
Thu Dec 05 2013, 12:19
