Learning new ropes...
So today I played my first couple games with my new Necrons. I made myself wait till I had 2k painted, and do not plan to use anything else until it is painted. This will be, like my Orks, a fully painted army at all times. It's just guard and fantasy I'm a let down on :oP
My list was Trazyn, an Overlord (phaeron) with res orb warscythe and mindshackle scarabs, 2 royal courts comprising 2 veil crypteks and 3 res orb lords. 4 units of 10 warriors, 1 unit of 10 tesla immortals, 1 unit of 10 lychguard with dispersion shields and 1 Doomsday Ark. I had trazyn and the overlord making two units of warriors relentless while the other 2 squads had the crypteks. I then used the res orb lords to help the lychguard, immortals and trazyn.
First off was against Neil and his Draigo Paladin list. I started off just throwing long range fire into his on table unit trying to whittle it down, but terminator armour and FNP are a bastard to get through. My Doomsday cannon was picking off a couple a turn until it got psycannoned and exploded. Luckily with this being an objective game I could just afford to keep drifting my units out towards the 5 objectives, using relentless to keep firing and out of assault range. I lost a unit with cryptek when I tried to deep strike them behind his unit to give him a tactical dilemma and they mishapped, however the other Paladin unit and Draigo then arrived and did precisely the same thing. So we lost one unit each to deep strike mishap. Sounds fair. Ok so his unit may have been worth slightly more than mine...
With his one scoring unit being gradually whittled down and me sitting on two objectives and advancing on two others, I wasn't going to lose this one. The game ended turn 5 with a 2-1 win to me.
As this game was done in 40 minutes I had a game against Scott and his Tyranids too. This was Spearhead kill points. I deployed first so was quite central to avoid the outflank, and planned to move more to the centre, but scott surprised me by infiltrating his genestealers. With that threat axis removed I proceeded to back into the corner slowly but surely, as a veil warrior unit moved along the left flank and my lychguard my right. My relentless units and immortals created a 24" zone of death in the centre, and I tried to keep out of his potential 18" charge whilst still within my 24" firing range. This plan could only last so long of course, and a trygon popping up right in front of me caused a headache. A quick deep strike from my left flank cryptek allowed me to pick off some venomthropes that had been forming a rearguard, and the hormagaunts and carnifex found the lychguard to be a deeply unpleasant target. By turn 3 I was 4-0 up and had only lost 8 models as the reanimation protocols and res orbs performed stellar jobs.
Of course this wasn't to last as he was steadily backing me into a corner. I charged his trygon with my necron overlord, and used the minshackle scarabs. Now I was quite unlucky here as in two rounds of combat and 5 hits the big brute only caused one wound to itself, while my warscythe armed lord fluffed all his attacks. This allowed the hive tyrant to pile in and send my warrior squad and lord running. I was surprised they avoided pursuit, but with the tyranids right next to them they weren't going to rally. So that was 2kp gone. The hive guard also took out the doomsday ark at the second attempt, bringing the game close.
Trazyn and his empathic obliterator had the perfect target - a horde of low armour save identical models, and after killing one termagane managed to make another 8 explode out of sympathy for their kin. However, turn 5 is where i made an error that pretty much cost me the game.
The hive tyrant charged trazyn. I completely forgot he had mindshackle scarabs. Now the tyrant fluffed his attacks so only caused a single wound on trazyn. The hive guard added another wound. I did one back and so lost the combat by one. Now I think I would have won the combat had I remembered the scarabs, but was thinking "must remember for next round" when I failed the LD test to stay in the fight. Bugger. I then got run down. So I have the chance for Trazyn to appear elsewhere. I have a couple lords, a couple lychguard, and an overlord trapped in a fleeing unit. Guess which one he appears in? The fleeing one. He instantly kills the overlord (another kp for the enemy) and the following turn runs off the board (another 2 kp for the enemy) ANY of the other options he'd have been fine, but no he had to arrive in that one.
We rolled at the end of turn 5 and it was game over... a 6-6 draw. Should have got the victory. We played on to see what would have happened.
I managed to jump my cryptek unit about and put some more wounds on the hive guard, and being now out of synapse range they fled. I also killed the zoanthrope. However the lychguard were cut down. With the fleeing hiveguard, at the end of turn 6 I was winning 8-7... but the game continued to turn 7. He moved his trygon prime into synapse range and rallied the hiveguard. I continued my backing off and shooting tactic, but was unable to claim another point.
By the end of the game I had a single unit of warriors with cryptek, and a unit of immortals with Lord. He had a hive tyrant on 2 wounds, a hive guard on one wound, a warrior on one wound and a trygon. The kp score was 7-7 and thus a draw. With two kill points so tantalisingly close, and knowing I could have had the win if I'd remembered the scarabs (or rolled better for Trazyns substitute) I could have won this game. Oh well, at least I didn't lose, and I know I want more mindshackle scarabs... think I may drop one lychguard and give all my necron lords the upgrade...
Finally, my immortals with tesla carbines. Could barely seem to roll a 6 in 2 games... except when the tyrant cast Paroxysms on them. BS1 needing 6s to hit, 9 shots... 5 rolls of a 6. Later in the game, 8 shots. 5 rolls of a 6. It's like they knew they had been made blind so they just cranked up the juice on the things and electrocuted everything roughly in front of them. Sure it's not reliable... but it's great fun!
My list was Trazyn, an Overlord (phaeron) with res orb warscythe and mindshackle scarabs, 2 royal courts comprising 2 veil crypteks and 3 res orb lords. 4 units of 10 warriors, 1 unit of 10 tesla immortals, 1 unit of 10 lychguard with dispersion shields and 1 Doomsday Ark. I had trazyn and the overlord making two units of warriors relentless while the other 2 squads had the crypteks. I then used the res orb lords to help the lychguard, immortals and trazyn.
First off was against Neil and his Draigo Paladin list. I started off just throwing long range fire into his on table unit trying to whittle it down, but terminator armour and FNP are a bastard to get through. My Doomsday cannon was picking off a couple a turn until it got psycannoned and exploded. Luckily with this being an objective game I could just afford to keep drifting my units out towards the 5 objectives, using relentless to keep firing and out of assault range. I lost a unit with cryptek when I tried to deep strike them behind his unit to give him a tactical dilemma and they mishapped, however the other Paladin unit and Draigo then arrived and did precisely the same thing. So we lost one unit each to deep strike mishap. Sounds fair. Ok so his unit may have been worth slightly more than mine...
With his one scoring unit being gradually whittled down and me sitting on two objectives and advancing on two others, I wasn't going to lose this one. The game ended turn 5 with a 2-1 win to me.
As this game was done in 40 minutes I had a game against Scott and his Tyranids too. This was Spearhead kill points. I deployed first so was quite central to avoid the outflank, and planned to move more to the centre, but scott surprised me by infiltrating his genestealers. With that threat axis removed I proceeded to back into the corner slowly but surely, as a veil warrior unit moved along the left flank and my lychguard my right. My relentless units and immortals created a 24" zone of death in the centre, and I tried to keep out of his potential 18" charge whilst still within my 24" firing range. This plan could only last so long of course, and a trygon popping up right in front of me caused a headache. A quick deep strike from my left flank cryptek allowed me to pick off some venomthropes that had been forming a rearguard, and the hormagaunts and carnifex found the lychguard to be a deeply unpleasant target. By turn 3 I was 4-0 up and had only lost 8 models as the reanimation protocols and res orbs performed stellar jobs.
Of course this wasn't to last as he was steadily backing me into a corner. I charged his trygon with my necron overlord, and used the minshackle scarabs. Now I was quite unlucky here as in two rounds of combat and 5 hits the big brute only caused one wound to itself, while my warscythe armed lord fluffed all his attacks. This allowed the hive tyrant to pile in and send my warrior squad and lord running. I was surprised they avoided pursuit, but with the tyranids right next to them they weren't going to rally. So that was 2kp gone. The hive guard also took out the doomsday ark at the second attempt, bringing the game close.
Trazyn and his empathic obliterator had the perfect target - a horde of low armour save identical models, and after killing one termagane managed to make another 8 explode out of sympathy for their kin. However, turn 5 is where i made an error that pretty much cost me the game.
The hive tyrant charged trazyn. I completely forgot he had mindshackle scarabs. Now the tyrant fluffed his attacks so only caused a single wound on trazyn. The hive guard added another wound. I did one back and so lost the combat by one. Now I think I would have won the combat had I remembered the scarabs, but was thinking "must remember for next round" when I failed the LD test to stay in the fight. Bugger. I then got run down. So I have the chance for Trazyn to appear elsewhere. I have a couple lords, a couple lychguard, and an overlord trapped in a fleeing unit. Guess which one he appears in? The fleeing one. He instantly kills the overlord (another kp for the enemy) and the following turn runs off the board (another 2 kp for the enemy) ANY of the other options he'd have been fine, but no he had to arrive in that one.
We rolled at the end of turn 5 and it was game over... a 6-6 draw. Should have got the victory. We played on to see what would have happened.
I managed to jump my cryptek unit about and put some more wounds on the hive guard, and being now out of synapse range they fled. I also killed the zoanthrope. However the lychguard were cut down. With the fleeing hiveguard, at the end of turn 6 I was winning 8-7... but the game continued to turn 7. He moved his trygon prime into synapse range and rallied the hiveguard. I continued my backing off and shooting tactic, but was unable to claim another point.
By the end of the game I had a single unit of warriors with cryptek, and a unit of immortals with Lord. He had a hive tyrant on 2 wounds, a hive guard on one wound, a warrior on one wound and a trygon. The kp score was 7-7 and thus a draw. With two kill points so tantalisingly close, and knowing I could have had the win if I'd remembered the scarabs (or rolled better for Trazyns substitute) I could have won this game. Oh well, at least I didn't lose, and I know I want more mindshackle scarabs... think I may drop one lychguard and give all my necron lords the upgrade...
Finally, my immortals with tesla carbines. Could barely seem to roll a 6 in 2 games... except when the tyrant cast Paroxysms on them. BS1 needing 6s to hit, 9 shots... 5 rolls of a 6. Later in the game, 8 shots. 5 rolls of a 6. It's like they knew they had been made blind so they just cranked up the juice on the things and electrocuted everything roughly in front of them. Sure it's not reliable... but it's great fun!
sounds like its going quite well with the Necrons then. Been reading the necron codex a bit recently, they actually have quite a bit going for them.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed the first couple games, the tenacity of them getting back up again was infuriating for my opponents, which was fun.
ReplyDeleteI'm not gonna say they're the best ever just cos my first 2 games went well but I do thing it is a decent balanced book. Sure there some evil tricks you can do (scarab farms spring to mind) but those kind of players will those kind of things with every book won't they...