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Ball and Chain is a hobby tournament run once a year. There are certain special limitations to each army which can be found at the top of the first battle report here: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/400399.page.

Here is the list I took:
Tyranid Prime – Deathspitter and Dual Boneswords
Tyranid Warriors (4) – 1 barbed Strangler, 3 deathspitters
Hormagaunts (18) – Poison and adrenal glands
Termagants (10)
Gargoyles (10)
Hive Guard (2)
Zoeys (2)

Battle 2 – Spearhead
Primary objective: Take ground (3 objectives)
Secondary Objective: annihilation

Opponent – Space Marines
Librarian
Tac Squad (razor with tl heavy bolters, 1 missile launcher)
Scouts (camo cloaks and special character, missile launcher)
Dakka predator
Dreadnaught – Plasma Cannon
Tech Priest with thunder fire cannon


(This army won second overall for painting)

Although I got first turn in this game, I wasn't looking forward to it. My opponent placed everything far away from my forces, I had a big obstacle in the middle of the board, and he had a LOT of firepower...

This is my deployment (mistake 1)



I set my garoyles to go around the right of the middle with my zoeys to put pressure on the objective in his deployment zone, positioned my termagants to come up behind the middle obstacle and sit on the objective there, whilst the rest of my force went of to the left to seize the other objective. Unfortunately due to the lack of cover, this meant my expensive super hormagaunts would be out in the open after my first turn...

He combatted his Tac squad, deploying the missile launcher, Tec Priest with thunder fire cannon, Dakka pred and dreadnaught far into his corner of the board whilst his razor with 5 Tacs and librarian positioned on my left to cover the objective I was moving towards. His scouts setup in cover over this objective, and the Tec priest reionforced the cover there giving them a 2+ cover save with their cloaks.

Turn 1 - Nids

My whole force advanced and ran towards the enemy, as nothing was in range. Tried to separate models as much as I could so I didn't take too many losses from template weapons.



Turn 1 - Marines

He positioned his Razor next to his scouts and deployed his Tac marines and then... all hell broke lose!

First, the Tac marines with the missile launcher sited my gargoyles on my right flank and let lose a storm of bolter fire and a frag missile, claiming 3 gargoyles. The thunderfire cannon then let lose a magnificent volley of fire, ripping apart the remaining gargoyles with ease (every shell hit something ...and got about 3 hits per template... ugh!) The dreadnaught, finding many of his original targets vapourised by his brothers firepower, spotted the zoanthropes and dispatched on with his plasma cannon (it had already taken a wound from one of the thunder fire rounds).

With my right flank decimated, the rest of the marines took aim at my left flank. The five tactical marines, five scouts, razor back and dakka predator all let lose on the hormagaunts who were caught out in the open. After the dust had settled from the considerable firepower, only 5 out of the 18 remained.

Turn 2 - Nids

Well... 300 points, and almost half my army was wiped out in the first turn - not good!

At this point, I just needed to see if I could have a run of good luck to get me back in the game...

With this in mind, I took my 5 remaining hormagaunts and sent them towards the scouts. The Zoey sized up the dreadnaught, whilst my warriors sized up his tac squad. I decided to take a gamble that I might be in range of his predator, and sent my Hive Guard in its direction to try and silence its significant firepower.

The hormagaunts managed to make it into his scouts, who managed to bring down 2 gaunts before they brought down two of his scouts, ending in a draw.

My warriors showered his Tac squad with their deathspitters and barbed strangler, but failed to bring a single marine down such was the protection of their beloved emperor.

My Zoey failed to have an impact on his dreadnaught, whilst my Hive guard shot at his Razor back for no result (I decided he wouldn't be in range of the predator yet).
Well, I needed some good luck this turn, but it was not to be, I gritted my teeth and awaited the marines reply...



Marines turn 2

The Librarian, seeing the young brothers in trouble, separated from the Tac squad to join the scouts in the melee.

The dreadnaught once again let forth a burst of plasma at the Zoanthrope, and took a wound off it.

The rest of the marine force once again let loose a torrent of fire, this time on my warrior squad and Prime. After the smoke cleared, only two wounded warriors remained, the other two and the Prime succumbing to the extreme firepower (and the lack of ability fo my Prime to make armour saves!) The Hive guard also took a wound in the fusillade, but I still had both of them left.

The librarian and the scouts dispatched my remaining hormagaunts for the loss of only 1 scout...

Nids T3

The remnants of my force now struggled in vain against the marine force (of which I had only managed to kill 2 scouts!)

The Hive Guard continued to move closer to the dakka predator, hoping to silence its big guns, whilst my warriors struggled in vain towards the tactical marines (the thunderfire cannon used the ammo that makes me move as if going through difficult terrain...)

This time my Zoey managed to immobolise his dreadnaught, and my Hive guard shot at his predator only to have their deadly ammunition fall millimeters short of their target.

My warriors shot into his Tac marines for no result, again their armour proving far to strong.



Marines T3

Without any hesitation, the marines closed in for the kill. A plasma burst from the dreadnaught felled my last Zoey, ending that flank. The remainder of his army then proceeded to chew through both of my Hive Guard and my remaining two warriors.

With only my termagants left skulking behind the bastion on an objective, I conceded at this point.


Feel free to comment on this report - as all help is welcome.

Also - stay tuned for my own thoughts on my first two battles, as well as the third battle against Imperial Guard coming up - will my Nids be pounded into the earth again by superior firepower? or will they learn the lessons from this massacre?

Awesome stuff, I attended B&C as well, and I also bought 'Nids, though mine were more stealer-heavy, and not quite as nicely painted.

Bad luck on the matchup, but upon reflection, do you reckon your left flank was the right spot for the hive guard? From my perspective, a big piece of LOS blocking terrain just demands that you advance Hive Guard behind it...

And that Thunderfire Cannon was nasty, always my no.1 priority to kill when I play my nids... By my guesstimation, the Hive Guard could've been in range to snipe it from behind the bastion, but hindsight is an entirely different matter to reality

Finally; awesome paintjob on your army, it looked even better in real life!

Did you choose first? I guess you could have always gone second and worked a refused flank and/or reserved everything to waste his guns for a turn or two

In addition to the above (Hive Guard behind LOS blocking terrain) I would probably also have put the gargoyles behind there (they can fly over! And take cover saves - depending on the Thunderfire ammo) and uses the Termagents a a screen for the Hormagaunts (or reserved).

Also - those Gargoyles didn't look spread out enough to me! (You need the whole 2" coherency going against Thundefires!)

Of course, I don't play 'Nidz.... so these are more my limited ideas than perhaps sound taktikal advice...

Your list looks a little too fluffy for a tournament. For the future I would drop the gargoyles and Hormagaunts for a large brood of genestealers (or several smaller broods). They are better in cc and a much more dangerous threat. They also give you less need for synapse, so perhaps Warriors could be turned into something a bit more useful. At 750 pts I would probably run:

Prime
Lashwhips and Bonesword
Adrenal Glands

2x Hive guard

2x Zoanthropes

6x Genestealers
6x Genestealers (you could even combine these 2 units into 1 larger one, but then your Troops choices would be really low)

10x gaunts

Trygon

This would give you something dangerous up front with some fast following support units. In a game like this a Deepstriking Trygon is your star and takes a lot of pressure off the little bugs.

But moving on from a change in lists, it looks like at 750pts nids have to refrain from using MC's too much due to cost. Your army should have been better spread out (gargoyles especially). Not much you could do though against a gunline at such a low points level with the list you had.

Lukus83 wrote:Your list looks a little too fluffy for a tournament. For the future I would drop the gargoyles and Hormagaunts for a large brood of genestealers (or several smaller broods). They are better in cc and a much more dangerous threat. They also give you less need for synapse, so perhaps Warriors could be turned into something a bit more useful. At 750 pts I would probably run:

Prime
Lashwhips and Bonesword
Adrenal Glands

2x Hive guard

2x Zoanthropes

6x Genestealers
6x Genestealers (you could even combine these 2 units into 1 larger one, but then your Troops choices would be really low)

10x gaunts

Trygon

This would give you something dangerous up front with some fast following support units. In a game like this a Deepstriking Trygon is your star and takes a lot of pressure off the little bugs.

But moving on from a change in lists, it looks like at 750pts nids have to refrain from using MC's too much due to cost. Your army should have been better spread out (gargoyles especially). Not much you could do though against a gunline at such a low points level with the list you had.

Only problem with that is, the tourney had rules prohibiting repeating identical squads (the stealers). In addition to this, all the lists were moderated by the TO, who rejected anything he deemed too cheesy (still no idea how the double stormraven list got through...). Not that the above would have any trouble getting in, just something to bear in mind.

Personal opinion, but I reckon the way to go with Nids at 750 is a Tervi as the centerpiece of your army, so basically go horde. Worked decently well for me, I placed equal 9th out of ~50 people, but YMMV. Also; Genestealers. MVP.

Well it would be easy to drop 1 unit of stealers down to 5 then the other up to 7. But yes, stealers really perform well at all points levels so I would find a way to fit them in. A Trygon at low points levels also does really well as heavy and special weapons are lacking. Getting both in with adequate support is a problem though.

Ok, everyone has raised some great points here - so I'll address each point first and then give my own general impressions.

@Warboss Gutrip: Thanks for the comments on the paintjob It was a little bit more rushed than I would have liked due to lack of time, but overall I think it turned out well. The Hive guard were definitely way out of position this game. Although I believe behind the LOS blocking terrain would have still been just out of range from the thunder fire cannon, if I started them more centrally and moved into the area terrain on the left surrounding the bastion I probably could have shot the cannon on my second turn and still been in cover.

@Arakasi: Yes - I chose to go first. Not sure going second would have helped, as he would have just sat there and fired at me for another turn before I moved out. I also needed to bunch up in my deployment to push units forward, which would have been disastrous if I went second... Although a refused flank may have worked in turn one, I still had a lot of open ground to cross...

The gargoyles probably could have gone behind the bastion, but I have a better idea on how I should have used them... and yes, they weren't spread out nearly enough!

@Lukus83: The tournament itself was supposed to be a bit on the fluffy side, hence the list. The original list I put forward for the event actually did have a Trygon in it, but I was asked to drop it by the TO (which made me a little disappointed when I saw some of the lists that did make it through...) The supergaunts are actually quite dangerous (significantly more so than standard hormies), though still not as much as genestealers, but than they are cheaper... I will definitely be trying out genestealers more often in future games though (outflanking could have been extremely useful in this game!) And yes, I didn't spread out nearly enough...

So general thoughts?

This game really brought out my inexperience - especially given the limited time so I was making quick decisions to try and finish the game on time... I will go through my mistakes (IMHO) 1 at a time:

Deployment: Gargoyles should have deployed in a straight line from where my front hormagaunt was and out along the half way mark towards the lefthand side of my deployment with the Hormagaunts in a line immediately behind this and the warriors in a line immediately behind them. Zoeys and Hive Guard should have deployed on the right hand side behind the homragaunts. Termagants remain the same.

Turn 1: This would have allowed me to bring the focus of my force to bear on the second objective. Gargoyles could have spread out a lot more and screened my hormagaunts. Homragaunts could have also spread out a lot more. Zoeys and Hive Guard could run up behind the bastion and into the area terrain there. Termies could sit on my objective.

This would still result in my gargoyles being wiped out first turn, but should have significantly limited the casualties on my hormagaunts (so maybe have 10 left instead of 5). My Zoeys and Hive guard would also be in a much better position to target his vehicles and thunderfire cannon in my turn two.

Trun 2: My hormies should have still made it into his scouts, and probably wiped them if I had ten left (or come very close). My Zoeys would have been in position to hit his Razor (though with psychic hood, it wouldn't be a given) and the Hiveguard could have prob silenced the thunderfire cannon.

Of course, this all relies on my opponent acting in a way similar to how he did with my previous deployment, which probably isn't too far away from the truth given it was an objective mission and he would need to (eventually at least) move towards the objective in the top left.

I learnt a lot of valuable lessons this game - and felt confident that I could apply them in future games... but we'll just need to wait and see.

slice'n'dice wrote:(which made me a little disappointed when I saw some of the lists that did make it through...)

*cough*DOUBLE STORMRAVENS*cough*

Yeah, that was a bit nasty. No idea how it got through, but thems the breaks I guess...

Anyway, these are great batreps. Looking forward to the third one!

Third Batt Rep is up - Enjoy!

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/403019.page#3427206