Battle Report: 2,000 Points Marines vs. Dark Eldar

Hey all,

Robin and I played a game last week with me trying out a Vulkan list against his Dark Eldar. I had taken pictures of the games as it progressed but a) all my angles sucked, and you can't see half of the table, and b) most of the pictures were blurry. Lesson learned. The game was Seize Ground with Spearhead deployment.

Vulkan list:

Vulkan He'stan
Librarian with Nullzone and the Avenger
5 Thunderhammer/Stormshield Terminators
2x Ironclad Dreadnought with Melta/Heavy Flamer in a Drop Pod
10 man Tactical Squad with Melta/Missile Launcher, Sergeant with Combi-Melta/Powerfist in a Rhino
10 man Tactical Squad with Melta/Missile Launcher, Sergeant with Combi-Melta/Powerfist in a Drop Pod
5 Scouts with Sniper Rifles
3x Land Speeder with Multi-Melta/Typhoon Missile Launcher
Land Raider Crusader with Multi-Melta, Extra Armor

Dark Eldar List

Vect
2x5 Trueborn with 4 Blasters in a Venom with extra Splinter Cannon
5 Trueborn with 2 Splinter Cannons in a Venom with extra Splinter Cannon
2x10 Wyches with 2 Hydra Gauntlets, Hekatrix with Agonizer in a Raider with Flickerfields
9 Wyches, Hekatrix with Agonizer in a Raider with Flickerfields
2x5 Warriors with Blaster in a Raider with Flickerfields
3x Ravager with Flickerfields, Nightshields



Robin wins the roll to go first, and deploys defensively, but with good angles to shoot me.

My deployment saw me putting the Land Raider as far forward as I could, and trying to take advantage of meager cover.

I try to seize the initiative and fail. On to turn one!

Robin Turn One:

Robin moves forward with most of his stuff, leaving Vect to hang back and act as a counter unit. He spends the turn shooting at my speeders and rhino, and I waste all of my luck making cover saves for them. Last shot of the turn he wrecks my Land Raider. I fail my pinning check for Vulkan and friends. Off to a good start.

Max Turn One:

With Vulkan's unit pinned, I'm starting in a bad place. I figure this needs to be the turn where my shooting puts him on the back foot, or I'm not going to recover. My Dreadnoughts come down near his cluster of Ravagers, waiting to inflict harm. I pop smoke on my rhino and start shooting. With my speeders I manage to wreck a Raider with Warriors, and explode a Raider with Wyches inside, killing 4. He passes morale for the Wyches and pinning for both. My Dreadnoughts take aim against his Ravagers, and fail miserably. First dreadnought gets a penetrating hit against a Ravager, which Robin makes his Flickerfield save against. My second Dreadnought rolls a miss, and then another miss with twin-linked. I am fucked. Severely.

Robin Turn Two:

Robin decides to back up and let his shooting do the heavy lifting this turn. Venoms with blasters move up and nuke my Terminators, killing 3. Blasters from his Warrior squads manage to do nothing against a Dreadnought. His dark lances take down two of my Land Speeders, and shake the other dreadnought. Assault phase sees the now 6 man Wych squad charge my Dreadnought to no effect, while he passes his invulnerable save against me. Locked in combat.

Max Turn Two:

I roll my my reserves, and my Tactical marines don't bother coming in. I move my rhino up towards the warriors that are out in the open. They get out and rapid fire the the unit, and Robin makes all but one cover save. The rest of my shooting is completely ineffectual. Assault phase sees Vulkan and his squad charge the two Venoms, destroying them both. Dreadnought assaults one of the Ravagers, and misses all of it's attacks. Things are looking grim.

Robin's Turn Three:

He has me against the ropes, now it's time to finish me off. He moves forward to take advantage of all of his shooting, and brings a Wych squad forward to take on my Tactical squad. He moves a Ravager behind the Dreadnought that tried to assault it, and wrecks it. Further shooting destroys my final Land Speeder. Mass blaster and splinter cannon fire kills the rest of my Terminator squad - including Vulkan and the Librarian. The assault phase sees his Wyches finally get my Dreadnought with haywire grenades, and the Wyches take out most of the Tactical marines. At this point, I call the game. All I have left is the scout squad, the Tactical Squad coming in from reserve, and two immobile Drop Pods. It's clear to me I can't squeak a win out of this, and my dice don't want to cooperate.

End of game thoughts: I'll admit I'm pretty inexperienced with a drop pod list, and my dice weren't helping me at all. Robin played it perfectly against me too; he was content to sit back and shoot me until he was able to swoop in and fight on his terms. That's crucial for Dark Eldar, as you don't want to fight fair. Oh, and his ability to roll 6s is unreal :-P. I think I'll probably get rid of Vulkan in favor of Pedro. I'm also not crazy about the Dreadnoughts, so I'll probably stick with Sternguard. The jury is still out as to whether or not I want to continue using Drop Pods or stick with my normal Rhino rush list. Ultimately, I'm not practiced enough to bring this army to a tournament, so I'll be using my Deathwing for event until I get comfortable with it.

Hopefully you guys enjoy this format, as I'll be doing battle reports for my games at CarnageCon. With better pictures, I swear. Feel free to comment, we'd love to have some discussion.

Max