Tyranids vs. Space Marines Battle Report :When the going gets tough, the tough get catheters.

Hello everybody, marcusmarcusmarcus bringing you one of the few instances of me beating Kevin in a game and him allowing people to know about it! Glorious day!

Our recent games have all been 2,000 point NOVA open style affairs so Kevin can practice fielding his exceptionally unpleasant 20 fleeting Assault Terminators list on my precious little plastic aliens and robots in preparation for his (maybe?) voyage to Dexcon 12 in July. Today’s matchup pitted him against my ‘Stealer Shock Syllabus, who as always hit the table with an insatiable hunger for the testicles of Librarians. My list, with a few changes looked this:

Flyrant with TL Devours and Bonesword/Lashwhip, Hive Commander

2 broods of 8 Ymgarls (Purple and Blue, respectively)

3 broods of 8 ‘Stealers w/ Toxin Sacs (Red, Blue, and Turquoise)

1 brood of 8 ‘Stealers w/ Toxin and a Broodlord with ScyTal and Toxin Sacs (Purple)

1 brood of 21 Hormagaunts with Toxin Sacs

Trygon Prime with Adrenal Glands

Trygon with Adrenal Glands

And in the spirit of experimentation, the Deathleaper.

Kevins List was...
Shrike
Librarian, the avenger, gate of infinity
2x 10 assault terminators with 7 TH/SS and 3 LC's
2x10 Tactical marines, bolt pistol/CS for the sarges, flamers, missile launchers
Attack Bike w/ MM
6 Sternguard, 3x combi meltas, 2x melta guns, powerfist in a drop pod with a deathwind missile launcher
Land Raider, MM
The game was pitched battle with KP as primary, table quarters as secondary and objectives as tertiary.

I swapped my normal 2 Zoans in a spore for the Deathleaper, they’ve never done anything but disappoint me and I thought more sneakiness and beardy rules could only help my army. Plus, I’m a grown ass man with no interest in the tyranny of repetition or prevailing opinion. Also, the colors after the Genestealers are references to their armored face plate things, which I painted different colors to differentiate the otherwise identical squads.

Primary objective was killpoints, secondary was objectives, tertiary was table quarters. I lose the roll-off and am made to go first. Kevin’s deployment was simple; pack all the bodies together in the center along his table edge, and literally surround them with 20 Assault Terminators. He combat squads one of the Tactical squads, keeping five bodies in a Land Raider and deploying the missile launcher on the field, and also putting his Sternguard in his backfield leaving their Drop Pod to fall in empty. I was doing my usual null deployment nonsense, placing both the broods of Ymgarls in a smallish piece of terrain in the middle of the board, on the right side. Stealers and Hormies outflanking respectively with all the big guys deepstriking.

Turn one, his Drop pod comes in and lands right next to the Ymgarls (I’ll take my free killpoint with tartar sauce, please). Other than that, not much happened. My tummy rumbled once or twice. Also, Deathleaper reduced the Librarian’s LD by a whopping 1. Hip Hip Hooray.

Turn two, all the stars align for the Hive Mind. I get literally all my reserves in except for the Tyrant, and as if that weren’t worrisome enough for the Storm Wardens all my outflanking units (except the Hormagaunts, but who cares about them really?) arrive on the right side, right next to where the Ymgarls were hiding away. Bad news for anybody made of biomass. The two Trygons pop up side-by-side on the other side of the Ymgarls creating a large wall of Leviathan goodness on Kevin’s left flank. The Ymgarls assault and wreck the drop pod and the show is underway.

Bottom of turn two, Kevin is forced to redirect valuable small arms fire away from the advancing wall of Genestealers to deal with the Hormagaunts on the other side. He easily reduces them to under half strength, they break and run, and (spoiler alert) never regroup. Various random shooting puts three wounds on the Trygon Prime. The Libby separates from his group of Terminators to march toward the Ymgarls, along with the second group of Teminators and Shrike. The Terminators he left head straight for the sea of angry outflanking chitin in true 1^st Company fashion, and pull the Purple and Turquoise broods into assault. Meanwhile, the libby tries to nuke some tightly packed Ymgarls with The Avenger, but he’s JUST BARELY OMG IT’S JUST HIS FUCKING TOES in range of the Trygon Prime’s Shadow in the Warp, causing him to fail the test and preventing what would have been a crippling blow to my army…remember never to leave home without your psychic defense, kids. In either case, Shrike, the Libby, and seven of the Termies make it into a massive multi assault with the Ymgarls and much ballerdom is set in motion. The Ymgarls strike first, two of them being enough to fell the Librarian. Oddly enough, that was exactly how the Dewey Decimal Master of the Emperor died in his last encounter with unfriendly Genestealers. Other than that, the Ymgarls take down two Terminators and proceed to eat shit and die, forcing eight fearless saves on four bugs, which in a stunning display of luck leaves one alive to anchor the Termies and Shrike in place for a spirited counter attack next turn. Even better, the pile-in move for the Mon-Keigh move them through dangerous terrain, losing a Hammernator and putting a wound on Shrike (I really hate that bastard).  Elsewhere, the other group of Termies loses half its number before getting to swing and take down five ‘Stealers from Turquoise and two from Purple. Purple passes their morale check but Turquoise does not, and falls back…bummer.

Top of turn three, my Tyrant comes in away from the turmoil, planning on using his Synapse to regroup the ‘Gaunts, and working his way toward the squishy Powerfistless Tactical squads now left exposed and huddled against the board edge. He’s too far away from them to hit them with Paroxysm, so he unleashes it and his Devourers against the MM Attack Bike, wounding him once and leaving him at BS1. Meanwhile, the broken Genestealers continue to fall back, and the two unoccupied broods separate and move in to assist the two combats. Against the unaided Termies, they proceed to wipe them out save one, who fails his single fearless save and dies. Huzzah! The Red group consolidates into cover, the Purple group doesn’t quite make it and hangs nearby. In the center, both Trygons slither into the combat against Shrike and Co., alongside the new brood of Stealers, whose efforts prove enough to reduce them to two hammernators and Shrike, although the one brave Ymgarl is slaughtered by Shrike’s claws in the process. Oh well, life is cheap in the Hive Fleets and he served his purpose well. Combat ties.

Bottom of three, Kevin orders all available heavy weapons to level their sights at the Hive Tyrant, putting three wounds on him. The Attack Bike misses with the Multi Melta, but despite being BS1 manages to wound him with the TL Boltgun, and the Flyrant fails his armor save and dies. Marcus dies on the inside, game continues. The Sternguard risk exposing themselves to an assault by moving into open ground to blast the ‘Stealers in cover. Their gambit doesn’t pay off, as they leave three alive who proceed to pass their morale check (synapse for the winapse) and lick their chops. The Purple group is equally lucky, having most of their dudemans alive and ready to mangle. In the remnants of the crazy assault in the center of the board, the two stealers in contact with Shrike cause a wound, and the Trygons bring down the two remaining Hammernators. Do you think they have to put a security deposit down on those Crux Terminati? Shrike kills two mans, tying combat again.

Top of four, Deathleaper pops up near the smoking carcass of the Tyrant, and attempts to finish off the Attack Bike with his flesh hooks, but he whiffs royally. What a shame. Meanwhile, the unkillable Shrike (despite dying in two out of the three games Kevin has fielded him, he’s made 33 out of 37 saves…we counted) finally gets a shove off the mortal coil courtesy of the last two ‘Stealers in that combat. Trygon Prime consolidates straight towards the Tactical Squads I’ve been waiting the whole game to kill, the Trygon moves towards the Land Raider, and the two Genestealers hightail it towards cover. The Purple group with the Broodlord runs through the five man squad that disembarked from the Land Raider with absolutely no resistance at all, and the three very vengeful Genestealers from Red group sprint towards the Sternguard who just shot them up and amazingly rack up four(!) out of the six men in the squad. The survivors of this batshit insanity decide to try being nice to the Genestealers by missing all their attacks, and then passing their morale check to keep the ‘Stealers tied and safe from return fire.

Bottom of four, and Kevin looks upon the battlefield with displeasure. At this point, all the Terminators have been disemboweled, Shrike has been decapitated, the Librarian has had his nuts sautéed, and I’m dancing around like an idiot on my side of the table because of the carnage my little bugs have caused today. He brings down the Trygon Prime with all the firepower he can muster, and puts a wound on the Trygon. Too little, too late. However, the other half of the Tactical squad that Purple group slayed lays the Emperor’s justice on the Broodlord and his friends with bolter shell and Frag missile, leaving only the Broodlord with one wound remaining who passes his morale check like a boss. In assault, the Red group finishes off the two Sternguard and make for the five man squad conveniently out of cover nearby.

Top of five, and I’m literally frothing at the mouth. The Turquoise group (who rallied by passing through the late Trygon Prime’s synapse bubble) finally conclude their long journey to the objective on my back corner. The Broodlord from Purple group and the Shrike killing heroes from Blue group move onto the objective in cover in Kevin’s corner for some much needed R&R. Deathleaper moves back out of line of sight onto the objective in Kevin’s other corner. The Trygon dives headlong into the Land Raider, scoring four penetrating hits (adrenal glands are growing on me day by day) and causing it to explode six inches, hitting six marines, two genestealers, the Trygon, and the Broodlord…and nobody takes any damage aside from the Broodlord, who dies. Many lolz were had, although they were tinged with pain. The Genestealers from Red group take down a marine, and suffer no casualties in return. The marines stick.

Bottom of five, Kevin rushes the attack bike towards the Blue group stealers and unleashes the melta and TL bolter, but the ‘Stealers go to ground and avoid casualties. The ten man Tactical squad rapid fires and launches a missile at the Trygon at their doorstep, causing no wounds. We roll for the end of the game and it would go to turn six, but we decide there’s not really a point in doing so aside from satisfying my unnaturally strong urge to be a jerk that particular day. The game ends with me winning on killpoints, 8 (both groups of Termies, the Libby, Shrike, the drop pod, the Sternguard, the combat squad, and the Land Raider) to 6 (the Tyrant, both Ymgarls, Purple group, the Hormagaunts, and the Trygon Prime). A fantastic game of BasementHammer if I do say so myself.

Thoughts and strategic musings: Deathleaper was not very effectual, but he’s an assassin and a finesse character with a bucket of cool special rules that I think could prove very useful, so for the time being he stays in the list. As I get more comfortable with how he handles on the battlefield he’ll have more impact I’m sure, and I have a sneaking suspicion that 6^th will be very good to him. Not to mention I have literally run out of patience with my Zoanthropes. Fuck AV14, they’re not worth the frustration they’ve caused me every single game I’ve fielded them.

The dice were unusually good to me in this game, particularly with my reserve/outflanking rolls and my rending. Also, the fact that this entire game basically played out in a single table quarter worked to my immense advantage by allowing me to swamp his Termies in seas of bodies turn after turn.

Thanks for reading chumps, more wordfood to come on later dates. Peace in full and may each receive a basket of wooden peaches.