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Hey folks! You can find my battle reports for the other games in the GT here:

Game One
Game Two: You're reading it!
Game Three
Game Four
Game Five

This weekend I made the eight hour drive to San Antonio, TX for the Alamo GT. I had originally planned on taking my Necron Wraith Wing, but my wife does the painting around here, and she was under the weather for the last two weeks and didn't get a lot of painting done, so we didn't get the Monoliths done. I don't mind going to RTTs or FLGS tournaments with unpainted models, but not traveling long distances for a Grand Tournament. Worse...I sent in the wrong Dark Eldar list! I wych cult and my kabal are both labeled "2,000 DE.xls" in different places on my desktop, and I didn't realize until I printed out my lists Friday when I was leaving work that I had sent in my Kabal "Darklight Storm." And what I had sent was a modified version of my usual Darklight Storm that I had never actually used before; I made it to playtest a slight tweak in wargear for units.

Darklight Storm
HQ: Baron Sathonyx
HQ: Haemonculi with Shattershard, Crucible of Malediction, and Animus Vitae

Troop1: 5x Warriors with 1x Blaster // Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop2: 5x Warriors with 1x Blaster // Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop3: 5x Warriors with 1x Blaster // Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop4: 5x Warriors with 1x Blaster // Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop5: 5x Warriors with 1x Blaster // Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Troop6: 9x Wyches with Haywire Grenades // Raider with Flickerfield and Torment Grenade Launcher

Elite1: 4x Trueborn with 4x Blasters // Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Elite2: 4x Trueborn with 4x Blasters // Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons
Elite3: 3x Trueborn with 3x Blasters // Venom with Dual Splinter Cannons

Fast Attack1: 3x Beastmasters, 4x Razorwing Flocks, 5x Khymerae

Heavy Support1: Ravager with 3x Dark Lances and Flickerfield
Heavy Support2: Ravager with 3x Dark Lances and Flickerfield
Heavy Support3: Ravager with 3x Dark Lances and Flickerfield

1,996 points

List Analysis
-Baron Sathonyx is actually the core of this army for his +1 to go first ability. Dark Eldar are most potent during an alpha-strike, and anything they can do to help get that alpha-strike is worth doing.
-The beast unit itself is a decent unit, but primarily exists to give the Baron a unit to hang with. The Baron is jump infantry, so can't embark on a raider or venom, and I don't want him floating around by himself getting sniped down. It works out rather well since beasts don't have grenades and couldn't use their nifty I6 and I5 if they had to assault through cover. The only decent saves in the unit are the 4++ on the Khymerae, but those are important to save for close combat power weapons. That makes the Baron's +1 cover save a perfect match for beasts! The only downside to the unit combination is their mismatched movement and assault speeds. The Baron can move 12" and assault 6", and the beasts can move 6" and assault 12". They're both fleet, but together they can only move 6" and assault 6". I've found after practice and testing that I can pretty accurately judge when to leave the Baron attached, and when to separate him so that I can get a 12" charge on the beasts.
-Each warrior venom has dual purposes. The venoms are potent anti-infantry, while the unit inside can add its own potent anti-infantry with 8 poison shots rapid-firing at 12" with a STR8 AP2 shot getting a terminator killer shot in there, or serving as a potential anti-tank addition.
-Flickerfields on Everything! Nightshields are pretty useless against almost everything that shoots at tanks, but a 5+ invulnerable save works in both close combat and ranged combat; and theoretically giving me 1/3 more vehicles! Every melta against a ravager that pings off my flickerfield is a little personal victory.
-The wyches in this army primarily exist to make this a TAC army. Lances don't work against Monoliths or Blessed Hull, so haywire grenades fill the gap against things which I don't have the ability to kill. They're a decent assault unit, but have no Agonizer. My opponents keep being surprised at that fact - but at the end of the day, I don't have 25 points to spare for it.
-The Haemonculi is there to pass a pain token on to the wyches unless the wyches get a for their drug and start with one - in which case he couldn't pass the pain token over, so he instead starts with a Trueborn unit. Don't ask about the Animus Vitae; it doesn't do anything to help him, and is only there because this wasn't a tested variant of my Darklight Storm.

Game Two Opponent: Kevin Rougas' Necrons
HQ: Necron Lord with Rez Orb, Phase Shifter, Destroyer Body, Warscythe

Troop1: 15x Necron Warriors
Troop2: 10x Necron Warriors

Fast Attack1: 5x Destroyers
Fast Attack2: 5x Destroyers
Fast Attack3: 5x Destroyers

Heavy Support1: 3x Heavy Destroyers
Heavy Support2: 3x Heavy Destroyers
Heavy Support3: 3x Heavy Destroyers

1,995 points, phase out: 12

Forward Post: Your beachhead has been established, and a forward command post set up. Your scouts, however, report that the enemy has also established a forward command post of their own nearby. Your orders are to take the enemy command post while protecting your own. Eliminate this threat to your foothold on Alamo Prime!
Objective: Capture and Control
Deployment: Spearhead
Special Rules: Rulebook Default (Reserves, Deep Strike, etc.)
Duration: Random Game Length
Secondary Objective: Secure the area surrounding the enemy forward command post. The player with the most units outside of both players deployment zones achieves the secondary objective.

History teaches us, gentlemen, that great generals remain generals by never underestimating their opposition. - Santa Anna
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Pre-Game Tactical Assessment: Kevin and I are both at maximum points coming into the second round. He's a Dakkanaut by the name of Wolf 11x. We'd talked before the tournament (meet and greet), and he plays Dark Eldar, although he brought Necrons to the Alamo. Not only that, but he's paid close attention to my Dark Eldar articles and knows my capabilities. This game can go very good, or very bad...with not much for wiggle room in the middle. The higher toughness on the destroyers doesn't concern me because poison wounds on a 4+, but taking down his units and *keeping* them down is going to be difficult because he'll never move outside of 6" of his units. Between his destroyers and heavy destroyers, he can only take out six vehicles per turn....but every vehicle he takes down is a *significant* loss in firepower. My best hopes lie in trying to merge his units together through casualties so that the damage he can cause is minimized. Three units of destroyers is almost certainly three dead vehicles per turn, but a unit of 10 destroyers and a unit of five is only two dead vehicles per turn.

If he were to name his army, I think "Death by Destroyers" would be appropriate.


We dice off for deployment option and I win! I elect to deploy and go first. I place my objective in the back corner of my deployment zone - I'm going to make him come get it.

My deployment: Trueborn in the middle, two ravagers hiding (or at least getting cover) in case he seizes, with my wyches on a corner of the spearhead - which is mathematically the shortest distance between our deployment zones.


Yes my winged former scarabs! Now is the time to pay back your oppressors for creating you without souls!!


Here's a corner shot of my deployment. I'm actually wishing that I already had the real venoms - it would let me pack in my deployment zone more tightly, and the vehicles forced to go in the rear would be able to start further ahead.


And the enemy deployment. 25...TWENTY-FIVE destroyer bodies looking for an opportunity to inflict pain and death on me. Kevin considered going full reserve and trying to alpha-strike me from the board edge, but was concerned that he would trickle in piece-meal and get taken apart piecemeal. Instead, he deployed as far back as possible.


He rolls to seize and...not quite. I saw a lot of Casino dice over the weekend, and not a single chessex die.


Dashofpepper Turn One:

My entire fleet moves 12" forward. With him back in the corner, there's no 12" move/disembark/shoot to be had, so I just move everything 12" forward and hope that everything will be in range. My wych raider shoots 24" ahead for a flat-out move in hope of getting a turn two assault. I didn't take a picture of my movement before I started shooting.

For my shooting phase, I decide to concentrate on his destroyers. Best case would be taking down two units of them, letting them WBB into a big unit, and now he can only take down one vehicle per turn with his destroyers. A bit of mathhammer:

8 Venoms with Dual Splinter Cannons generate 96 shots; That should be 63.36 hits, 31.68 wounds, and 10.45 failed saves on a 3+.
9 Dark Lances should get another 2.4 casualties after 4+ cover saves.
Statistically, I should be looking for 13 dead destroyers if everything is in range.

I started shooting with my venoms in the rear, always targeting the nearest destroyer unit to them trying to make sure that if I could be in range, I'd take that shot first. Then I worked from the outside to the inside with the same principle in mind. One shooting phase later...


All fifteen destroyers went down! 50 points apiece and whoosh! 750 points of his deadliest models are gone. We're both in disbelief that it actually happened.


Enemy Turn One:

Kevin is looking for a pyrrhic victory at this point. His heavy destroyers move a couple inches closer to make sure they'll be able to range my ravagers, and his destroyer lord breaks off from the warriors to move up 12" to assault my raider if nothing else. His warriors open up on my raider and get a weapon destroyed result with two in rapid fire range and the others not.


He puts a heavy destroyer unit into it as well and wrecks it! When I eyeball the distances...his destroyer lord's movement put him far enough away from my raider that it might be possible to disembark 2" on the other side of the raider and be out of assault range. It looks close but I give it a shot. If you don't have a tactical template, you should get one! It has a 2" coherency side on it (along with a 1", 6" and 4" side), which makes disembarkation not need a tape measure, and is easy to validate with your opponent.


With the wyches potentially neutralized, his other heavy destroyers start in on my ravagers. His first heavy destroyer unit wrecks a ravager!


His other heavy destroyer unit scores a weapon destroyed and an immobilized result on a second ravager.


His destroyer Lord attempts the assault, and falls short! We double check the 2" disembarkation to make sure no one has moved too far, and then look model by model to see if he can get 6" to any of them, but he's out.


Dashofpepper Turn Two:
Time to go to work on those heavy destroyers!

Two trueborn units move up 6". His destroyer lord is close enough that I can do a 6" move to get 18" blaster shots in on him. One of my venoms immobilizes itself.


My beasts move out of cover and up midfield, and the rest of my vehicles move up 6-12" to present splinter cannons in range of his heavy destroyers.


Wyches get a full 6" move and a full 6" fleet - they're booking it! The splinter cannons and remaining dark lances do their job and all nine heavy destroyers float off the table.


Trueborn open up and the Destroyer Lord takes the requisite three wounds and goes down.


Wyches assault in!


Four Warriors go down, my wyches escape unscathed, and he passes leadership to stick around.

Enemy Turn Two:
None of his warriors get up, but his destroyer lord comes back to play.


His remaining warrior unit opens up on one of my trueborn venoms and immobilizes it.


His destroyer lord comes over to play with my beasts and doesn't get very far.


Meanwhile, my wyches kill several warriors and they attempt to flee, are caught and swept - phasing him out. We finished early, and I bought him a beer.

Post-Game Tactical Analysis:
Kevin was a great sport about it; we both play Dark Eldar and Necrons, and he was expecting what happened, just a bit slower. My wife and I took Kevin and his dad (Kevin is in college/just graduated) out to Mexican and swapped stories - we made new friends and look forward to seeing them again. The only difference might have been if he had reserved...but that probably would have been the same game played out slightly differently.

Talk about a snoozer. Should have just shook hands after the roll for 1st turn :(

I love the list! What's your oppinion on Vect?

Ouch! This just demonstrates how badly necrons need a redux. Nothing he could have really done except to go all-reserves, and even that would've only delayed the inevitable for maybe 1 or 2 turns longer.

Welcome to Ouch city

Population: Kevin

bagtagger: I don't like Vect, primarily for the 4+ to seize issue. You're obviously paying points for his wargear and special rules. Dark Eldar deploying second against a shooting heavy army is probably a mistake if there isn't good cover available, and a 50% chance to seize means that in 50% of games that you don't go first, you're going to get subjected to a brutal alpha-strike.

@jy2: Necrons can still beat face on the tabletop, but Monoliths are a vital part of making it happen. Having none is painful, doubly so when there is no terrain to block LOS to your destroyers.

That terrain/table setup was uninspiring to say the least...

Yeah, Monoliths would have helped avoid the massacre that was turn 1 by at least a bit.

Shame, I wanted to see how 'crons did in a GT setting.

3 Monoliths in place of those crappy heavy destroyer would have changed the game, as there is not much in you army that can destroy it!!

good battle report though, i experience the same issue when pitting my 1K sons against Dark Eldar, I just can't win the match up.

Echo that the terrain setup was.....not optimal shall we say.
The destroyers all set out though, did look great.

Dashofpepper wrote:bagtagger: I don't like Vect, primarily for the 4+ to seize issue. You're obviously paying points for his wargear and special rules. Dark Eldar deploying second against a shooting heavy army is probably a mistake if there isn't good cover available, and a 50% chance to seize means that in 50% of games that you don't go first, you're going to get subjected to a brutal alpha-strike.

Or they do like you did in the first game and dont risk a 50% seize against tons of darklight....

jy2 wrote:Ouch! This just demonstrates how badly necrons need a redux. Nothing he could have really done except to go all-reserves, and even that would've only delayed the inevitable for maybe 1 or 2 turns longer.

My train of thought exactly. Plus, I really struggle with that 4+ for reserves and WBB is unforgiving.

CT GAMER wrote:That terrain/table setup was uninspiring to say the least...

Dash, and others at the tournament, can attest that every table was about that bare. I spoke with John Bailey Friday night and he explained that this was his second year running a 40K GT. His terrain is optimized for the Fantasy tournaments he has been running for years. You do the math... In each of my games, literally every one of my opponents guns was able to shoot one of my units. There was nothing to hide behind.

Additionally, which I found mortifying, John's "Rules Judge" and I had a conversation about terrain. He feels that too much terrain makes the game "less fun" and leads to armies "skirting around one another" instead of "getting in the fight." As a Dark Eldar player (and former Wood Elf Player), I felt this merely indicated he has no idea how 40k tables are supposed to look and how games are suppose to be played. I should note this same rules judge had a conversation with myself explaining how much he loves Fantasy tournaments because of the atmosphere and whatnot. This furthers my suspicion that the Alamo GT could have used better 40k judges...

Gavo wrote:Yeah, Monoliths would have helped avoid the massacre that was turn 1 by at least a bit.

Shame, I wanted to see how 'crons did in a GT setting.

To be fair, this was my first GT. However, I did go 2-3. I won my first game against Jay Roy's Deathwing Army, which was something like:

Belial
5 Terminators - 5 TH/SS, 1 CML, Apothecary
5x5 Terminators - 4 TH/SS, 1 Chainfist, & 1 CML
3 Typhoons (individual squadrons)
5 outflanking Scouts with a Power Fist and a Drop Pod

Later, I beat my BA opponent in the 5th game:

Mephiston
Furioso Dread
2 Priests (One Foot, One Pack)
2x10 Assault Marines (2 with Meltas, 2 with Flamers)
9 Assault Marines - Land Raider
Storm Raven
2 AC/LC Predators

I lost to Dash, an absurd Mech IG army, and a beautiful Crimson Fist army. I simply could not stop that dang Land Raider. In fact, out of approximately 40 hits over 2 turns, I got one 6 to glance.

At my next GT, I plan to run this Blood Angel army. As for Necrons, I do feel they're woefully underpowered. They simply cannot engage enough targets and it is too easy to shut them down. I can't tell you how many times I've lost one Heavy and had the other 2 take off running.

@Dash - I commented repeatedly that your list is incredibly well-built and I run something somewhat similar. Dang Venoms! Glad to meet you in person!

I'm not looking to cheapen your victory, but the tables you've been playing on are truly awful. LoS Blocking terrain is an ESSENTIAL part of 5th edition and having none skews the game heavily in favor of "Alpha-Strike" armies. Necrons may not be the most solid codex in the game, but with literally one dinky piece of non-LOS-blocking Forest in his deployment zone, he had absolutely nowhere to hide. There is basically nothing he could have done to win this game except go first.

Nevertheless, I enjoyed your battle report and you played well, and certainly deserved victory. I'm looking forward to the rest of the series. By the way, did you submit a comment afterwords about the quality of the terrain at the tourney?

Ouch that was brutal, fair play to you Wolf 11x, your army looks amazing (seeing all those Destroyers deployed ) and you didnt give up, so kudos to you!
The table definitely wasn't set up to favour you (actually, either of you really), i get that it was normally set up for Fantasy, but surely it wouldn't be that difficult to ad some more scenery?

Great report Dash, shame the game wasn't a little bit closer though

The terrain (although still aweful) was better than the last report

yea- tough call- but I think reserving would've been the better option. All his firepower is mobile- a good reserve roll and he could've had a chance.

Haha another barren table- I really hope the GTs I bought tickets to don't completely disregard the importance of balanced terrain...

Great reports so far Dash! There must have been some very bad rolls for armour saves and WBB, still the amount of splinter cannons you had would have done it eventually.

Perkustin wrote:Great reports so far Dash! There must have been some very bad rolls for armour saves and WBB, still the amount of splinter cannons you had would have done it eventually.

I had fairly average armor saves. I did not get to roll any WBB though.

Hmmm am i being silly? Do destroyers not have WBB?

Perkustin wrote:Hmmm am i being silly? Do destroyers not have WBB?

They were all destroyed in one turn, so no WBB rolls are allowed. (you must have a model of the same type within a certain distance IIRC)

Now that's a shooting phase. Makes me want to play dark eldar.

Those destroyers are beautiful.

With the lack of BLOS terrain, I doubt even a 3 mono wraithwing list will do much better due to the lack models and fire power, they will phase out sooner. The best hope would be camping the mono on the objective and hide your troops and hopefully not get phase out and end the game in a tie.

All-reserve could have been very ugly, though - there are more than enough DE vehicles to close off the board edge, leaving the foot warriors no way to enter. Turn 2 rolls around, and there's a decent chance Wolf 11x loses 10-25 of his Necrons.

Dashofpepper wrote:I saw a lot of Casino dice over the weekend, and not a single chessex die.

I actually had 3 of my 5 opponents comment on my dice. My response: My dice only cost $35 for the set of 18. If I'm going to pay over $600 for a 2000 point army, I want dice I'm happy with. I had phenomenal rolling all weekend.

thehod wrote:Welcome to Ouch city

Population: Kevin

Janthkin wrote:All-reserve could have been very ugly, though - there are more than enough DE vehicles to close off the board edge, leaving the foot warriors no way to enter. Turn 2 rolls around, and there's a decent chance Wolf 11x loses 10-25 of his Necrons.

Let's be real. The outcome was inevitable.

Unless I missed it, the Batrep doesn't point out when the Destroyer Lord got back up and slew the Haemonculus. Moral victory!

The tournaments I have attended usually have the coolest looking table as 'Table 1', and that is where the two top players will face each other in the final round of the tournament. It's also the table that has the most terrain, as it really is the terrain that makes a table look bad@ss. At my local store, that table is the city fight table, and it would certainly mess with certain army builds that rely on plentiful firing lanes. I'm sad to see such a poor showing of terrain at any tournament, much less a GT.

Oaka wrote:The tournaments I have attended usually have the coolest looking table as 'Table 1', and that is where the two top players will face each other in the final round of the tournament. It's also the table that has the most terrain, as it really is the terrain that makes a table look bad@ss. At my local store, that table is the city fight table, and it would certainly mess with certain army builds that rely on plentiful firing lanes. I'm sad to see such a poor showing of terrain at any tournament, much less a GT.

One of the best things about Adepticon is the random table assignments. You never know where you are in the overall standings, because you're off playing on table 73, while the "second" table is on table 22. And all the terrain is great, while being very variable.

Adepticon will always hold a special place since it's the first tournament that had terrain that made infiltrating a unit of 17 genestealers at 12" possible

Dashofpepper wrote:
HQ: Haemonculi with Shattershard, Crucible of Malediction, and Animus Vitae

Thought you could only take up to 2 of that type of wargear?

Dashofpepper wrote:HQ: Haemonculi with Shattershard, Crucible of Malediction, and Animus Vitae

Isn't this illegal. You are only allowed 2 of those war-gear. Without Animus you are at 1991, where would you spent the last 9 pts or 14 pts if you get rid of Talismans on wyche raider

Revenent Reiko wrote:

Perkustin wrote:Hmmm am i being silly? Do destroyers not have WBB?

They were all destroyed in one turn, so no WBB rolls are allowed. (you must have a model of the same type within a certain distance IIRC)

Weren't they within 6" of the Res orb, though?