CarnageCon: Round Two Report

Hey all,

Busy week, finally getting around to round two. As a refresher, I went to a tournament at CarnageCon with my Deathwing. First round was against Deathwing - http://maxpowercsm.blogspot.com/2011/11/hey-everyone-so-yesterday-i-went-up-to.html - you can read the report at that link.

Round two was against Adam Morris' Tau. Adam is a good friend of mine, and the only Tau player that I'm ever worried about. He's notorious for putting the hurt on people that underestimate his army and playing ability. I have a basic idea of what his list was, perhaps he can comment if I got anything wrong.

Shas'el with plasma guns, missile pods, and shield generator, 2 bodyguard with the same loadout, two shield drones.
3 crisis suits with missile pods.
3 10 man Firewarrior teams, 2 with dedicated Devilfish.
20 Kroot with hounds.
8 Pathfinders with markerlights and railrifles, their Devilfish grabbed one of the Firewarrior squads.
2 Piranhas with fusion blasters, not in a squadron.
Hammerhead with Railgun.
2 squads of 2 Broadsides.

The mission was Dawn of War deployment.

Primary Mission Objective: Control more objectives, there was one in the center, and one in the center of each table quarter.
Secondary Mission Objective: Kill your opponent's most expensive troop unit.
Tertiary Mission Objective: Kill your opponent's most expensive HQ unit.
Tie Breaker: Killpoints.

We roll off to see who go first, and Adam wins. He chooses to deploy first. He deploys his kroot on one of the objectives, with his plasma HQ squad behind the hill. I opt to put two terminator squads out, and deepstrike the rest. Here's a picture of our deployment:



I attempt to seize the initiative, and fail. On to turn one.

Turn One - Adam

Adam brings his entire army on from the board edge, and moves to positions to get firing lanes on me. All the while, I'm confident he won't get the night fighting rolls he needs to do serious damage to me first turn. Adam then introduces me to Blacksun Filters. His army lights my two terminator squads up, killing three from one, and two from another. Not reading his list carefully enough has put me in a pretty bad spot turn one. Lesson learned.

Turn One - Max

Per the Deathwing assault rules, two of my terminator squads come in by deepstrike. I bring in the command squad, with Belial and High Chaplain Ragefuck attached. They scatter an inch away from Adam's devilfish wall. My other squad deepstrikes in the area of Adam's kroot, as I want to put pressure on his objective. Knowing I won't roll anything worthwhile for night fighting, I go flat out with my speeders to gain a cover save. My empty land raider goes twelve inches to try to get a shot on his Piranha. In the shooting phase I manage to shake a devilfish with missiles, and shake/immobilize his piranha with my land raider's assault cannon. I'm up in his face now, I just need to weather this next shooting phase, and I can start putting the hurt on him.

End of turn one picture:



Turn Two - Adam

I've presented Adam a serious problem, a giant terminator squad right in his lines. He resolves to make it disappear this turn. He moves his infantry to start taking shots on my command squad, and gets his rail guns in a good spot to take out my speeders. His plasma HQ squad moves up to take shots on my terminator squad that just came in. The shooting phase opens up with his HQ squad nuking 4 of my terminators. His hammerhead and broadsides lay into my speeders, with one exploding, the missile launchers being taken off another, and the last one being stunned. His firewarriors, devilfish, and missile pod suits pour fire into my command squad...and only succeed putting a wound on Belial.

Turn Two - Max

I roll for my final terminator squad, and it comes in. It scatters an inch from Adam's devilfish wall as well. I floor the land raider forward and pop smoke. My two man squad in the center moves up the hill onto the objective, the three man moves toward the kroot, and the lone terminator moves into assault range of the piranha. My command squad spreads out to try and get a multi-vehicle assault. Belial splits off to go play with the pathfinders. The shooting phase begins with my two center terminator squads killing both shield drones in the HQ crisis squad. My multi-melta speeder tries to take out his piranha counterpart, and misses. The newly arrived terminators have their missiles explode a devilfish. The High Chaplain takes aim with his combi-melta, and blows another devilfish sky-high. Unfortunately, the firewarriors in the devilfish lose four to the explosion, fail their morale check, and run away. No assault more my command squad. Belial charges the pathfinders, only killing two, and they stick in combat. The lone terminator charges the piranha, and wrecks it. Overall, a very productive turn.

End of turn two picture:



Turn Three - Adam

With terminator squads in his face, Adam needs to start eliminating some my ability to take objectives, and units that can contest. His broken firewarriors flee off the table. He moves the Hammerhead to take a shot on one of my speeders, his broadsides hold their position. The HQ crisis team jumps out to take shots on the three man squad, and the missile pod suits move to get shots on either my speeder or terminators. His shooting phase starts with his HQ crisis team annihilating the three man squad in front of them. His hammerhead puts a round through my immobilized speeder and wrecks it. His missile crisis suits and piranha do nothing to my speeder. His DRONES, however, immobilize it. Concentrated broadside fire takes out the two terminators on the center objective, and his DRONES kill one of my terminators. Seriously, drones? Turns out this would happen a couple more times during the game. They were by far his MVPs. His drones from the piranha assault my lone terminator, and they get croqueted of the table. Belial kills ONE pathfinder, and remains stuck in combat. What a sack of fail.

Turn Three - Max

I'm running out of terminators. I have three scoring units left, and Adam has two. I need to make sure I remain in the lead with that count. My lone terminator sprints to the objective near my table edge. I move my command squad into assault range of his missile pod suits, and my other squad to get shots on his HQ suits. My land raider then tank shocks his kroot, and they fail their morale. They don't fall back much, but my land raider is in a position to make sure they run off the table next turn. The only shooting I have sees my terminators take out one of the suits in his command squad. Assault phase begins with my command squad wiping out his missile pod suits, and consolidating near his broadsides. Belial only kills two pathfinders, and they manage to make their morale check again.

End of turn three picture:



Turn Four - Adam

The turn begins with his kroot running off the table, and Adam being down to one troop choice. He moves his remaining troops choice to the center objective, and disembarks them. I guess the memory of my Chaplain immolating 4 of his firewarriors in their transport is still fresh! He uses his drones to block any easy asault lanes to them. His piranha moves away from my now useless speeder. Adam starts the shooting phase by wrecking my land raider with one of his broadside teams. His hammerhead tries to snipe out the lone terminator on my right corner objective, and he blocks it with his shield. His broadsides put a round through one of my command squad terminators, while his drones kill another. The assault phase finally goes my way, with Belial shredding the remaining pathfinders.

Turn Four - Max

I can see the victory at the end of the tunnel, but Adam is still in a good position to take it away from me. I resolve to swing the game in my favor permanently this turn. My center terminators move towards his firewarriors, while the command squad break off to take out broadsides, Belial and the High Chaplain forming a squad and doing the same. Shooting was minimal, I managed to frag a single firewarrior. Assault sees the combined might of my terminators annihilate his broadside suits. I now have control of two objectives, and I'm threatening two. With the next turn potentially being the last, I'm supremely confident that the game is in hand.

End of turn four picture:



Turn Five - Adam

Adam knows he needs to work on taking objectives away from me. He moves the firewarriors up to secure the center objective, and uses the drones again to block any easy assault lanes I might have. His remaining devilfish and hammerhead move back to contest the objective my command squad is on, with the hammerhead being in range to do it. His HQ suits jump onto the hill, in order to get line of site on my lone terminator in the ruins. His piranha moves back to kill my immobilized speeder. Shoot phase starts with his suits raining missiles on my lone terminator, killing it. His piranha finally wrecks the remaining speeder. His HQ suits jump back to the back side of the hill, to contest the objective, and make it one hell of a difficult terrain check to get them.

Turn Five - Max

Potentially the last turn of the game, and Adam, true to form, has managed to take the victory away from me. I'm moving desperately to try and salvage the game. My remaining two terminators near the HQ squad try to move up the hill to assault, and roll too low to make it. Belial splits off from the High Chaplain to go to the center objective, in case there is another turn. The High Chaplain joins the command squad on the hill to take out the hammerhead. My center terminator squad moves to get assault on the drones. Shooting is completely ineffectual for me. The assault phase sees my hammers dismantle the hammerhead, destroying it. My center squad kills the drones and consolidates up onto the center objective, contesting it. As it stands now, I have the victory. Adam rolls to see if the game continues, and it does.

End of turn five/start of turn six picture: We were running out of time, so Adam had to start moving his stuff while I got the picture.



Turn Six - Adam

Adam has gotten a second chance to take the game away from me. His suits move up on the hill to remove my two terminators there. His Devilfish moves onto the command squad's objective, to once again contest it. His firewarriors hold their ground and pour fire into my center terminators, only killing two. His piranha puts a melta shot into Belial, and kills him. Should have seen that coming. His HQ crisis suits reduce one of my terminators to a puddle with plasma fire, and then charge it. I'm shocked that he assaulted me, but he had no choice. His gambit pays off, as the suits kill my lone terminator before it can swing. Very well played.

Turn Six - Max

Unfortunately, Adam's shooting didn't take care of my terminators in the center. My command squad with the High Chaplain smash their way through the devilfish, claiming that objective. The two center terminators do their job, and break his firewarriors in assault, with them fleeing off the objective. At this point, I roll to see if it ends, and it does. I win the game holding two objectives.

End of turn six picture:



After game thoughts - Wow, what a great game. Adam always puts up a wicked fight, again proving that the Tau can still do damage. I was reduced to 6 terminators at the end of the game. I thought I played the game pretty well, with the squads of terminators doing what they're supposed to. If I had a chance to play this game again, I think I would have moved my speeders put the right flank, to try to help handle those damn HQ crisis suits. As I played them in this battle, they were fairly useless. Adam played the mission well, with the real game changer being his kroot failing the tank shock roll. With their cover saves, and numerous bodies, I would have had to commit more resources than I wanted to in order to take them out. The tank shock was a lucky solution to my problem.

I hope you guys liked the report. Please feel free to comment! Round three against Mike Begin's Chaos Wolves will be up around the middle of the week.

Max