This time I got to play against dark eldar. I've only played against them a few times but we'll see if that experience proves sufficient. After all, the opposing army was pretty scary with their anti-infantry capabilities.
As promised, I ran krootrot again. Same list as last time.
Master shaman - Weirdboy: warphead 85
Stalkers - 10 Kommandos: Krootrot - Snikrot, 2 burnas 215
Yellow/red Carnivores - 20 Boyz: shootas, nob, powerklaw, bosspole, 2 big shootas 170
Master Shaman's Carnivores - 20 Boyz: shootas, nob, powerklaw, bosspole, 2 big shootas 170
Trukk Carnivores - 10 Boyz: shootas, nob, powerklaw, bosspole, 1 big shoota, trukk 140
Vultures - 10 Stormboyz: nob, powerklaw, bosspole 160
Krootoxen and kroot hounds - 3 Kannons 60
And the dreaded dark eldar list...
Haemunculus: venom blade
Haemunculus: venom blade
5 Trueborn cabalites: 2 dark lances
9 Wracks: liquifier, acothyst w/ agoniser, raider w/ shock prow, enhanced aether sails, flickerfield, grisly trophies
5 Cabalites: Blaster, venom w/ dual splinter cannons
20 Cabalites: 2 splinter cannons, sybarite with venom blade and phantasm grenade launcher
5 Hellions: helliarch with agoniser
Mission: Seize Ground with 4 objectives
Deployment: Pitched Battle
Dark eldar won the roll-off to see who goes first and the kroot fail to seize.
Here's how we deployed our forces. The dark eldar tried to cover their whole deployment zone with infantry in the middle and a cronos pain engine and a venom guarding the flanks. Hellions and raider filled to the brink with wracks and a haemunculus were left in reserve.
I responded by trying to cover the whole zone too but on second thoughts I realised I want to be as far away as possible from the cronos and so deployed heavily on the left flank. My krootoxen and hounds took the ruin while both carnivore squads surrounded it. The shaman was attached to the kroot on my right. The usual units were left in reserve: stalkers, vultures and trukk kroot.
Tactical assessment before game: The way I finally deployed wasn't actually that good. The sparse terrain could doom my forces from the start if I didn't run forward as fast as I could. I had to keep my forces close together or otherwise a full squad of wracks or even 5 hellions could ruin my day. Thankfully, the krootoxen had good line of sight to the cronos. Running my kroot against plethora of poisoned weapons made me feel bad about this. I hoped that my krootoxen could destroy the mobile elements while my carnivores would deal some punishment on the frail eldar. I also expected a lot more from the stalkers this game, they were my true trump card. So on to the game.
Dark Eldar turn 1: The 20 warriors made a surprising move by moving 5" up the ruins and at the same time closer to the hungry kroot. The cronos realised the kroot deployed kind of far away and ran to meet them on the field. The warriors and trueborns combined fire against my krootoxen and managed to kill 2 hounds after I failed to save against the 2 wounds inflicted. First blood! The venom shredded the yellow/red kroot a bit and three of them fell (they didn't have the advantage of cover). The krootoxen then failed leadership and fell 9" off the board, curses!
A very good first turn for the dark eldar.
Kroot Mercenaries turn 1: I followed my original plan and rushed to cover. Thanks to the warriors' elevated position I had to seek even better cover with the shaman's kroot and thus falling short from getting any. The fear of the spirit vortex of the cronos affected my moves greatly. The shaman kept his cool and gave his kroot +1 attacks. Nothing really happened this turn as I didn't take a shot at the enemy.
A bit blurry image but you can see how I stayed away from the cronos but didn't get behind the white ruins in the middle. The other kroot fared better but their flank was still vulnerable to the venom's splinter weaponry. Next turn the dark eldar would get even better shots against me.
Dark Eldar turn 2: Both reserve rolls failed (this became something of a theme for this game). The warriors moved to even better positions inside and on the ruins. Cronos got into range and missed badly with its vortex. All other fire was combined and this really showed: 9 kroot are killed from the yellow/red squad, reducing them to mere 8 kroot.
The lack of cover saves really hurt this turn. The venom stayed in the corner and shot huge amounts of dakka.
Kroot Mercenaries turn 2: My heroes, the vultures arrived on the field! They ran to get cover from the fortified firing position. The yellow/red kroot seeked revenge and burst forward to assault the trueborn snipers. The shaman tried to tap into his malicious powers and after a re-roll he gave his army a further burst of power, increasing their speed (waagh!). The only shooting consisted of the shaman's kroot trying to destroy the venom but they still had to learn that one has to hit something to cause damage. The y/r kroot rolled a 3 for difficult terrain and didn't make it! Now they were left in the open. This reminded me of something.
My second turn with absolutely zero damage done to the enemy. This could not lead into anything nice.
Dark Eldar turn 3: None of the reserves arrived again. The venom hurried forward to deal with the vultures and spewed 5 kabalites from inside it. They only killed 2 vultures and took a wound off the shaper. The cronos' shot went wide again with a scatter of 5". A bit more and it could have hit the trueborn. y/r kroot in the open got punished for their slowness and were left with just one kroot with a big shoota. He made a successful morale test.
Sorry for the blurry pic. The kroot's assault was dulled pretty badly.
Kroot Mercenaries turn 3: No reserves arrive,
wth? The shaman's kroot got ready to shoot and assault the pain engine which was threatening them. The first vulture to ever die simply from flying could never get to see the destruction of the venom and its riders. The rest of the kindred surrounded, shot and assaulted them, breaking the warriors off the board and wrecking the fast-moving venom (I got really lucky with 8 str4 attacks, immobilising the ride for the eviscerator to finish it). The shaman hid behind a ruin to ponder over his bad tactics and wounded himself in the process (he always only hurts himself). But his kroot had great success and blew the cronos from the air with just 5 wounding shots.
I always like it when the vultures are about to charge.
Because the results are often like this. The venom was wrecked.
The cronos was felled surprisingly easily. I did not want to charge the warriors because they had feel no pain and defensive grenades. And after all I couldn't have done it because the kroot's target died.
Dark Eldar turn 4: Only the wracks arrive in spite of everyone coming on a roll of 2+. The immediately set up for an assault against the vultures. The lone big shoota kroot got pasted by the raider, followed by a woeful cry. My opponent did not get a pain token from such an easy kill. Meanwhile the trueborn and warriors shot an amazing 8 kroot down (I could only get cover against the trueborn).
Check out those wonderfully converted and painted wracks. The ethereal bodyguard represented a haemonculus.
The kroot forces were rapidly decreasing in size.
Kroot Mercenaries turn 4: Finally the trukk came in but this meant that krootrot still hung around somewhere. The driver went for the rightmost objective because they couldn't add anything to the battle elsewhere. At least they were safe from the vicious dark eldar. I then assaulted the trueborn using waagh and made such a formation that only 4 kroot got to attack, in order to force a draw, which then happened.
Only after pile-in I got rest of the kroot to the fight. My plan had worked and this meant that these brave mercenaries could not be shot!
Dark Eldar turn 5:
The hellions came in automatically and instantly charged the shaman's kroot. The raider's dark lance whiffs on my trukk and nothing else happened.
This looks pretty bad for me. My nob could turn the tables and win the combat for me, if I got lucky.
Ouch, that was the end for them. My only model on board was the trukk in the distance.
Kroot Mercenaries turn 5: Yes! Finally krootrot made his presence known to the dark eldar. The following pics pretty much show what happened on my turn.
They arrived and got ready to flame the first floow. The trukk kroot were left on the objective and the trukk itself drove fast to contest.
Flamers fricking rule! My opponent made one mistake and realised even another. He had attached the haemonculus to the hellions so that they got feel no pain and left these warriors without any tokens. The other mistake was that he left the sybarite on the first floor (he would have passed the morale test regardless). This allowed me to assault him.
Snikrot whiffed badly by rolling 4 ones to-wound. This meant that all that was left was the sybarite who in the first place allowed this assault to happen. He passed his morale, rolling the required 5.
It would've been a draw but we rolled another turn to play.
Dark Eldar turn 6: The raider sailed forward and destroyed my trukk. The hellions arranged an instant counter-attack and totally obliterated by stalkers. The lone sybarite got to live which was very, very bad. He consolidated on the objective.
These hellions racked up pain tokens like no one before them. Notice how they haven't lost a model.
Kroot mercenaries turn 6 & Dark Eldar turn 7: I still had a chance to get a draw out of this game. The shaman even got out to play as he got 'ere we go and teleported just near the wracks! He hit directly and contested the objective. Meanwhile my trukk kroot failed to kill the damn sybarite.
The shaman manned up
The sybarite was there right beside the objective. We rolled the seventh turn and the game was over for me at that point. The wracks killed the already wounded shaman and hellions crushed the trukk kroot just after the raider made the shaper into mush. Wipeout!
Just before the last models got killed.
A nice and tight game right to the very end. I felt uneasy in the beginning but my opponent's mistakes with the 20-strong kabalite squad made me feel like I could have gotten a draw out of this. But as the game did not end early I lost everything.
MVP: Krootrot and his boys. Finally they get the praise they earn, they killed 19 kabalites very easily. Krootrot's ability was the key in this- wait... Only now do I remember that an enemy losing a combat against this character suffers an additional -1 modifier to the morale test. It really could have been a draw! Pffft. I have nothing more to say...
