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Round 2 vs the Tau army. Yet again we field unusual lists as we try out units in combinations we haven't done before. It resulted in an exceptionally fun game with quite the spin. Much blood was shed in the name of science and narrative! I'll be trying to write a bit more fluff into this batrep than previously. Please let me know if it is any good or if it makes the report too long-winded.
C&C on my list, my tactics and the batrep itself always appreciated!

Having recovered the reconnaissance data slates from the Tau-held world and delivered them to the warped Haemonculus of the spacefaring Coven, Baron Sathonyx slipped through the webway portal leading back to his lair. He couldn't help but grin as he considered the favours he'd be able to command in exchange for the most delicious pain recently inflicted on the weakling blue-skins.
"Useful, most useful!" thought the newly-appointed Exalted Fleshwarper as he perused the information contained therein. They pinpointed the location of another Tau expeditionary force guarding power-nodes for their planetary shielding array. In an effort to expand on his master's work he had acquired Tau slaves and corpses. With their augmentations complete, it was just a matter of deployment and testing...

Coven of Lambent Hunger
HQ - Haemonculus w/Power Sword, Stinger Pistol (H)
Elites - 4 Grotesques, Raider w/FF, Sails, Trophies (G) (R)
Troops - 10 Wracks, LG, Raider w/FF, Sails, Trophies (W)
10 Wracks, LG, Raider w/FF, Sails, Trophies
10 Wracks, LG, Raider w/FF, Sails, Trophies
10 Wracks, LG, Raider w/FF, Sails, Trophies
Heavy Support - Talos Pain Engine, TL-LG (T)
Cronos Parasite Engine, Spirit Vortex (C)

Silly Tau & their Masochistic Tendencies
HQ - Commander Shadowsun [warlord] (SS)
Commander w/Iridium Suit, 2 gun drones, Command & Control node, Multi-spectrum Sensor Suite, Puretide Engram Neurochip, Vectored retro-thrusters, Drone Controller, Neuroweb System Jammer, Multi-Tracker (OP)
Elites - 3 Crisis Suits w/Target Lock, 6 Missile Pods, 4 gun drones (C)
Riptide w/TL Fusion Blaster, Ion Accelerator, Multi-Tracker
Troops - 7 Fire Warriors (F)
7 Fire Warriors
Fast Attack - Pathfinders (P)
Sun Shark Bomber (B)
Sun Shark Bomber

Music: Trollband - Samsara; Sabaton - The Art of War; Monkeyjunk - To Behold
Mission: Crusade (3 objectives)
Deployment: Dawn of War
Night Fight: Yes
Warlord Trait: DE - Master of the Vanguard (+1 run dice use highest for warlord & units within 12" )
Tau - A Ghost Who Walks Among Us (3d6" jet pack thrust moves)
First Turn: Tau

Deployment:
4'x4' table, terrain as per book. Stars are Objectives, brown rectangles are Ruins, grey squares are Impassable/BLoS, green shapes are Area terrain, blue shape is Lake.
His first objective is placed in the area/ruin top right, I place mine in front of the left ruin to force his third to be further up near midfield suspecting I'll have to walk at least one unit of Wracks.
He deploys the pathfinders in a small ruin, both units of fire warriors out of sight, and the riptide trying to hide behind the fire warriors.
Haemy goes with the Grots. I attempt to keep most of my raiders out of LoS, but cluster them forgetting that the Riptide has a 72" S9 large blast. D'oh. The Talos and Cronos are centred to prevent history repeating itself with his infiltrating Crisis Squad messing up my Raiders. Nowhere for him to infiltrate close enough to the raiders, so he deploys his Crisis Suits near his ruin.
Yet another match without me Seizing the Initiative. I'm starting to think I'm losing my touch.


Tau Turn 1 - The Tau are more prepared this time, battle-ready; their sensors detect the dimensional shiver indicative of a Dark Eldar incursion. Having escaped with her life in her damaged Suit, Shadowsun had stayed on high alert. She was certain the depraved raiders would return and determined she would be prepared.
Both upper objectives reveal a Skyfire Nexus.
The Riptide moves to get LoS on the Raiders, while the Crisis Suit squad jumps up to fire on the Coven's prized creations. Their Commander lets them use various rules, they opt for Monster Hunter. (Later turns they use tank hunter vs Raiders, etc. I didn't bother to mark which, assume they're using the options responsibly.)
Pathfinders drop a markerlight on the Talos, which the suits/drones use to +BS. The Suits split fire and open up on the Talos and Cronos. Having heard of the AP3 blast the Cronos is packing, the Tau Commander opts to lean most of his fire on the parasite engine. After a withering hail, the Cronos fails exactly enough saves to die and offer up First Blood to the Tau. Saddest of pandas. The Talos only fails 2 saves, holding with 1 wound. Mr. Riptide drops a pie plate on the vertical Raider, hitting 4. One Raider immobilized, one exploded, one weapon destroyed, and one successful Flickerfield save. I pass 3 FnP rolls out of 4, 1 wrack dies.
Crisis suits jump back a few inches to stay out of range of the Talos' LG.


DE Turn 1 - With relish the haemonculus orders his forces forward, nerves singing in anticipation of the impending slaughter and escalating horror. The Tau would suffer a repeat of history.
The blue-skinned Talos glides serenely forward as the mobile raiders push their engines to full and jet into the teeth of the enemy lines. Rolled 12", 7", and 4" for the enhanced Aethersails. Not bad! Wracks from the exploded and immobilized raiders move up, then run. Lake is hyperslime.
The talos manages to fill two gun drones with enough splinters to put them out of the fight, while the immobilized Raider puts a wound on the Riptide. All three intact Raiders turbo-boost into his back end.
The look on his face as I finalized the positions of the Raiders was more than worth the 25pts spent on Sails. Finally, Talos tanks overwatch but fails a 10" charge.


Tau Turn 2 - Shadowsun's famous callousness for forces deemed lost haunts the Tau. As precision fire forces the Dark Eldar abominations to exit their damaged skimmers, it becomes clear their warped and twisted forms were shaped from Tau prisoners and corpses. Wracks and Grotesques, the enemy called them. Horror, shock, and outrage spread through the minds of the Tau force. They were fighting their own kin!
Both Bombers arrive from reserves, dropping bombs that hit the centre and right-most raiders. One set of Interceptor Drones (D) disembarks from their flyer. Crisis Suits move back to their deployment zone to deal with the threat of Raiders. The riptide shuffles over a bit, but otherwise the Tau remain stationary.
Shooting sees all three Raiders destroyed; the grotesque boat doesn't cause damage to anything, the centre raider is wrecked harmlessly, while the explosion from the left raider takes out two Fire Warriors, a Pathfinder, and one Wrack. Unfortunately, the passengers of the two exploded raiders fail their LD tests and are pinned. THAT is a problem.
Two grots take a wound and I lose another wrack. I pass something in the realm of 8/14 FNP saves.


DE Turn 2 - The rasping laughter of the haemonculus can be heard across the battlefield. Aghast at the blue-skinned Wracks bearing the faces of their fellows, they fall in a disarray. Only the elite manage to reign in their fear and disgust enough to focus. As he ordered his flesh warped minions to engage the enemy, the Haemonculus noticed a certain reluctance, a hesitation, as though they remembered their species and were reluctant to eviscerate them. A reluctance he would have to cut and tear out of the next batch of samples.
Both units of Wracks on my end and the Talos move toward the centre of the map, spreading out to avoid the worst of the bombers' wrath. The only unpinned unit in Tau's deployment zone spreads forward. Immobile Raider snap-shots one of the Sun Sharks, netting a hit but failing to pen. Figures, eh? Talos shoots the Interceptor Drones to no effect. Haemonculus snap shots his splinter pistol, but misses. Getting within 1" of both the Riptide and the Fire Warriors, the Wracks liquify 2 of the Fire Warriors with an AP4 LG shot before declaring a multiple assault. They make it in but lose 1 Wrack to overwatch. Talos fails another 10" charge at the Drones.
Close combat sees two Wracks butcher the Fire Warriors, with the other 6 wounding but failing to get through the Riptide's armour. Riptide crushes one of the Wracks. Riptide fails his LD and is torn apart in a sweeping advance. They consolidate 6" towards the remaining Fire Warriors.
Experiencing firsthand the atrocities caused by leaving injured Tau on the field of battle, the Riptide pilot loses his nerve. Swatting aside one of the Wracks he stoops and collects his fallen brothers to carry them to safety. The Wracks seize the opportunity. They swarm the large battle suit and carve their way to the flesh and blood pilot inside. His screams invigorate the Dark Eldar, drinking in the pain they've caused as they enter a blood-frenzied state.


Tau Turn 3 - The situation was souring quickly. With her troops' morale breaking as the horrors eroded their sanity, Shadowsun had to end this quickly if she hoped to salvage the situation.
Interceptor Drones move to get LoS on both Wrack units. Fire Warriors spread for LoS as well, while the Crisis team moves in to get range and sight on everything it can. Both Bombers move up and drop their payloads on the Wracks midfield, carving a solid chunk out of them. My only poor FNP rolls this match. Fire Warriors & Drones light up the right-side Wrack squad, killing 5. Pathfinders shoot down 2 Wracks from the other unit. Crisis powerball kills 5 wracks from the near unit and two Grots. Bombers shoot out another couple wracks. Desperate to drop at least one unit, he charges the Pathfinders into the 2 Wracks. They make their charge through terrain before being torn limb-from-limb in a flurry of bloodletting, earning the Wracks a second pain token.


DE Turn 3 - Blood, pain, suffering! So much to feed the senses and empower the flesh, the Wracks and Grotesques lost all thought of the enemy force as comrades and ran in hungry for flesh. The haemonculus fed his fill, the swirling scent of pure agony filling his scent-pits. With a cry that cut to the bone, he pulled his butcher's blade from between his ribs and thumbed the power stud. Ozone mixed with burning blood filled the air.
Time to bleed the weak!
Movement sees the fearless unit of 3 Wracks launch themselves screaming towards the Crisis suits, and the unit of 2 moves to try get a charge on Shadowsun herself. Grots & Haemy move to 1" from the Fire Warriors. Talos and backfield Wracks move to get ready to pounce on objectives.
Talos shoots at the Crisis ball to no effect. The Raider, however, can just barrel squeak LoS on one of the Interceptor Drones. Darklight fire obliterates it, the other fails LD, and flees the table. Both wrack units charge the Suits, Grots hit the Fire Warriors. Overwatch sees 2 of the 3-man Wrack squad die, and with the other 2 charging through terrain things aren't looking good. I did that wrong. Haemy nearly wipes the Fire Warriors himself, power sword chewing through their ranks. They are swept. The lone Wrack acting at I4 powers through 2 Drones. The Crisis suits destroy the 2 wracks going on I1. Combat is tied, Hit & Run fails.


Tau Turn 4 - "Sun Shark units; come about for another pass at the abominations. We must prevent them from destroying the power-nodes! Crisis suits, with me; back away from the enemy and bring our armament to bear!" Tau comms crackled as Commander Shadowsun's voice powered through, tinged with loathing and, could it be? Fear?
Both bombers fly off into ongoing reserves, failing to damage the Raider on their way out. Come the assault phase, the lone Wrack puts the hurt on the drones but they pass their saves and he is mercilessly put down :(  Job well done, though, wouldn't you say? No shooting from Tau!


DE Turn 4 - Reason is lost as the hunger for suffering and souls takes over. The experiments were a success, Tau murdering Tau as unwilling flesh-puppets forced their own race to fire on them.
Surviving Wracks move up to control the objectives (3rd is grav-wave generator), spreading out to prevent losses from bombings. Grotesques move forward with the Haemonculus. Talos looms ahead intent on carnage. Liquifier gun puts a wound on a suit, Splinter pistol from Haemy does nothing. Time for mayhem!
Grots take overwatch to allow Tallos with his 1 wound to get in. 3 wounds dealt to Grots put 1 down and maim the survivor!
Talos fails his 5" charge. Grots fail their 9" charge. Frak.


Tau Turn 5 - "Exterminate with extreme prejudice! No mercy to the defilers!"
Bombers move in and drop payloads on the larger unit of Wracks and the Talos. Wracks take 3 casualties. Suits move up aggressively. They split fire, dropping the Talos and polishing off the 4 man Wrack squad with the help of the Bomber's missile pod. That's another scoring unit toast, but as long as it doesn't continue I feel like I've got this. Crisis squad JSJ up and into the ruins, contesting the objective.


DE Turn 5 - "Finish them."
So, that hurt. Grot and Haemy move up with only 1 drone being able to see the Grot. Screw Tau overwatch. Wracks clump up around a Crisis Suit.
Charges are declared; 1 drone of overwatch accomplishes nothing. Yay! Wracks make it in. Grot & Haemy FAIL THEIR 5" CHARGE.
Wracks, at least, prove to be worth their points yet again. They initiate "Blender" mode, slicing and dicing 1 Crisis Suit and 1 Drone. 1 Wrack dies on the Tau initiative as Feel No Pain kicks more Tau butt. Suits fail Hit & Run, losing combat by 2. I fail to sweep, they roll high... and fall back 1" shy of the board edge!!! I consolidate up so he can't use his movement to contest.



This leaves me with 1 Objective and Linebreaker vs Tau's First Blood. 4-1 for the Dark Eldar!
And then I remember we roll for continuation. D'oh.

Tau Turn 6 - Their belief in the Greater Good helping them hold fast in the face of certain defeat, Tau forces rally and return fire.
Suits rally. Interceptor Drones from the other Sun Shark bomber (which I had totally forgotten about!) disembark and move in on my Wracks. Snap-firing from the Suits, Missile pods from the Bombers and Interceptor Drones force enough failed FNP rolls to wipe out the remaining Wracks, and my hopes of securing a victory with them. Drones assault move onto the objective to add insult to injury.


DE Turn 6 - Seeing an opportunity for yet more feeding and pain, the Haemonculus and Grotesque attempt to encircle their prey. High on death, the Haemonculus fears not this body's demise as he knows his consciousness will seek out a clone should he fall. Revelling in the bloody play at hand, he dashes under the bulky suit's armament and slams his glowing butcher's blade into the chest of a suit. The powerfield buzzes as it ploughs through flimsy Suit armour and into soft living flesh. Laughing wildly, the Haemonculus pulls his blade from the screaming Tau and chops it into the dying warrior's skull. Shadowsun, the Commander and the surviving Crisis pilot can't stomach the carnage and refuse to go near the insane Fleshwarper.
I split the Haemy and Grot; 2 pain tokens go with the Haemy to bump him up to S4. Splinter pistol again accomplishes nothing. Need some serious AP adjustment on that thing. Or maybe I should have squeezed in a shattershard, eh? Grot soaks overwatch and dies. Haemy charges in, thankfully passing his 3" charge distance. Haemy challenges, Shadowsun declines. 2 successful power cleaver wounds later and another Crisis Suit bites the dust. After the pile-in, no enemies are in base contact and I therefore evade punishment. Bad luck rolls my way as the Tau finally pass a Hit & Run test and jump out of combat, escaping the potential death of a Morale test. If it ends, it ties up with First Blood vs Linebreaker.


Much to my dismay, it continues!!!

Tau Turn 7 - Shadowsun gives in to her anger and despair, firing her guns again and again at the monster twisted enough to cause this much torment. His body reduced to glowing ashes, the Tau mournfully turn to the task of reclaiming their dead and wounded. It has been a sad day for the Empire.
Needless to say, shooting put down the Haemonculus. I still had the Raider left, surviving on flickerfield saves. I conceded after letting him shoot down my Warlord, making it a Tau victory with Warlord and First Blood.

What a game! Both of us enjoyed ourselves immensely, and aside from failing a whole bunch of critical charges I feel the dice were rolling fairly across the board. If you ignore me passing > 2/3 of my FNP rolls. I kinda claim the moral victory for coming this close to wiping the Tau entirely in CC.

In hindsight; early turns should see the Talos running not shooting. And if I'm going to be aggressive with 70% of my army, I have to be aggressive with 100% to secure victory; the footslogging Wracks shouldn't have hugged terrain, they should have charged straight up as fast as possible. Furious Charge mixed with poison weapons is a lethal combination, unfortunately 4+ armour is decent enough to blunt it when you don't have the numbers. Lastly, I need to stop failing charges.

Thoughts? What is there to learn from this match, our lists (aside from "If you're Tau, don't waste points on Sun Shark Bombers?), and the ensuing slaughter?

Cheers for reading!

Edit: We just clued in now that Shadowsun can't infiltrate with the Crisis suits since they themselves aren't infiltrators. Now we know for next time.

Edit: We just clued in now that Shadowsun can't infiltrate with the Crisis suits since they themselves aren't infiltrators. Now we know for next time.

Actually that is not so. Some rather convoluted reasoning went round a little while ago and somehow convinced a lot of people that RAW, it didn't work. But actually the reasoning was flawed. This is one of those rare instances where GW actually manage to write RAW that align with RAI.

Anyway, my response to someone else who argued that is here: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/533350/6270436.page


That out of the way, I just wanted to congratulate you on such a well-written and atmospheric battle report. Sounds like it was a good match. I especially like the old school maps and diagrams. They remind me of the old battle reports in ancient White Dwarfs, where Andy Chambers would routinely drive Jervis Johnson into the ground. Ah, happy days.

Nice batrep, love non video batreps, as you can usually see the entire battlefield positioning better.

Well done, just FYI you do not get to avoid morale w/ hit and run which would have given you the game I think.

I usually only read reps w/ pics but this one was very engaging

Thanks for the praise folks! I like the diagrams vs pictures because this way you can actually see everything at once and get a better idea of the flow of the battle, as blaktoof said.

knas ser - We've read the articles, debates, and flame wars, and our group/meta is deciding to interpret and play it where they can't infiltrate. But thanks for the link and the props!

calypso2ts, we've been unable to determine morale vs hit & run one way or the other; would you happen to have a page# or reference for that?
Started a thread in YMDC asking for clarity after searching revealed nothing.

I like your list and it's pretty similar to the one I run at 1500pts, except I run 5x10 man wrack units in raiders and two squads of reavers instead of the engines, wracks are by far the best troops for de imo.

How many reavers with what kit?

 Laughingcarp wrote:
How many reavers with what kit?

2x6 with 2 heat lances in each for av hunting. Plus with their ability to snipe out dudes with bladevines and turbo all the way across the board to grab/contest objectives last turn, they've become an auto include in all my lists now.

Plus they synergize really well with the type of list we run cause you can turbo all the wrack boats right up to the enemys face first turn and form a wall that you can place the reavers behind.

Clever, I like it. Quick barrage of questions if you don't mind.
Do you include the Grots? What about Liquifier Guns? And your HQs, just one Haemy? What's he run with?
This is my first time ever trying a list like this, and I'm hoping to play it more.

 Laughingcarp wrote:
Clever, I like it. Quick barrage of questions if you don't mind.
Do you include the Grots? What about Liquifier Guns? And your HQs, just one Haemy? What's he run with?
This is my first time ever trying a list like this, and I'm hoping to play it more.

I don't have any grots in my list, not that they wouldnt be good in the list I just personally prefer to have more wracks, and yes I always have max liquifier guns in the wrack squads. For the hq I just run one haemie usually just bare bones, as I usually have him camping in the rear with a small squad of wracks behind an adl. My list at 1500 usually looks like this:

HQ

Haemie w/ hexrifle

Troops

5x10 wracks - 2 liquifier guns each all in raiders w/ enhanced aethersails

4 wracks - venom w/ 2 SC's

Fast attack

2x6 reavers w/ 2 HL's each

Fortification

ADL w/ quad-gun

Sometimes I have a squad of haywyches in a venom instead of one less wrack squad, and I dont usually have a hexrifle on the haemie, but just added it for some flava, but thats the general gist.

Tactics wise as discussed earlier I usually turbo my entire army up turn 1, but I may sometimes hang back a little while depending on the matchup. Usually I'll give the haemies pain token to one of he reaver squads or larger wrack squads at the beginning, then he just camps with the 4 wracks on the adl and pops flyers, which I will add has saved my bacon numerous times espeially against cron air lists, and I dont think theres been a game yet that it didnt make back it's points in wrecked flyers, however it your meta isnt very flyer heavy you can always drop that and spice the army up a little bit, perhaps with Urien instead of a normal haemie?

Ayways that's the list I've been mostly running in 6th with certain variations here and there and imho it is quite competitive when used correctly.

Groovy, thanks for the info!
Definitely going to give your list a spin.
Urien is one of my all-time favs, so that will be happening when I don't have to worry about air.

How would you have played my list given his deployment?

I probably would have played it pretty close to how you did. Riptide would of been my top priority since his large blast could be a serious problem for the wracks. The only thing I probably would have changed is deploying the engines on the far right to so they could avoid the crisis suits and hopefully draw fire from the riptide, so the wracks could clean up the rest of the army, and I probably would of split the raiders so there was two on the left and right of your deployment and not all bunched up on the right, but other than some deployment changes I think you ran your list very well, and probably would have won if you didn't lose two of your transports at the very beginning.

Yeah that's why I boosted to make sure the Riptide was effectively cornered.
I deployed the engines on the left deliberately to draw fire from the suits, didn't think through the whole "pile of shots" vs "single large blast" thing. But the idea was, since the suits were infiltrating 'cause we didn't know better, that the engines would prevent even more raiders from being blown up. Thx for the tip, I'll try it differently next time. And definitely going to split up the raiders next time as well!
Cheers mate.

Cheers!