Slann battle reports and analysis

From: Peter Ramos <primarch_at_...>
Date: Sun, 15 Oct 2000 13:52:36 -0400

Hi!

It was a fun filled Saturday night at the Comics Lair in NJ playing with
Darius and Ed. We gave the Necron a good testing. Here are the battles and
what we found.

Battle One

Tyranids versus Necrons

Darius played Tyranids for the first time as I finally got to field my
Necron in a real battle. The playing field was level due to both our
inexperience.

The game was 5000 points with three objectives, two on opposing hilltops and
one in the valley in between.

Necron

1. 2 Assault Necron companies
2. 1 Nemesis Detachment
3. 1 Frog Pod of mechs
4. 1 Dragonking titan (the big man himself makes his debut!)
5. 1 Spawnguard detachment

As you can see I took a small force of very potent troops. We needed to test
the assault necron and did so with the following rules changes: Caf is now
+4 not +5, as you'll see it is balanced this way. The cost is 750 points not
600. We also wanted to see if the Dragonking was worth 2000 points.

Tyranids

1. 2 exocrine broods
2. 2 biovore broods
3. 1 Dactylis brood
4. 3 Termagant broods
5. 2 Hormagant broods
6. 2 Genestealer broods
7. 2 Lictor broods
8. 2 Gargoyle broods
9. 3 Hive warrior broods
10. 1 Hive tyrant
11. 2 Dominatrixi

large force, the ultimate battle versus quantity and quality, needless to
say I was outnumbered at least 3 to 1!

Turn 1

The tyranids surged forth lead by their infiltrating Gargoyles and lictors,
they got near the objectives on both hills and kept their distance from the
open valley objective. One assault necron company attacked each hill
supported by one detachment of frog mechs, the dragonking held the center
with the nemesis detachment hiding behind it. The spawnguard stayed to the
extreme right and provided support.

Tyranid fire was somewhat good, downing several necron assault warriors all
but one would arise from the ashes however. Their was minimal skirmishes
between Lictors and assault necron in which the Necron gained the upper
hand, but no real damage was caused.

The dragonking made the earth shake (literally since this thing is big and
heavy!) and opened fire. It was devastating! Termagant, hive warriors and
hormagants died in a blink of an eye as the center line of the Tyranids was
decimated. The sole replay was psychic bombardment which the Dragonking
ignored with its mighty psi-protection (in retrospect Darius and I realized
while slim this attack could have destroyed the dragonking and each him
40VP's! a game breaker for sure, luckily for me it was not so).

The first turn ended with the necron ahead with 25 VP's to the Tyranids to
the tyranids zero (remember they get no points for objectives and double
points for wiping whole units out).

Turn 2

The mayhem began in earnest as the necron assault went full swing into the
tyranids in the same manner they did the same. Tyranid fire from exocrines
and biovores started to land telling blows destroying the spawnguard and
picking off the frog mechs. Retaliatory fire from the necron frogs was
fierce but paled in comparison to the dragonking fire which destroyed whole
broods of exocrine and biovores, the tyranid firebase was decimated. The
necrons were fairing no better the amount of tyranids were far to many and
the assault necron were taking casualties and both companies were broken and
in shambles. The frogs did their best holding off large broods of
termangants with mantis missiles, but one by one they were being cut down,
yet they held....

I had gone for broke this turn, hoping to end the game, I cam close with 43
Vp's to the tyranids 30, but another turn ensued.

Turn 3

I made a last ditch effort and took the objectives from the hills with the
surviving necron lords and the remaining frogs, the pitiful few stood to
receive the tyranid onslaught. The Dragonking finally made it to the
objective in the valley, their was no one left to oppose it. The tyranids
mustered their forces for the storming of the hills the Dominatrixi leading
the fray. On one hill the attack was too great and overwhelmed its
defenders, the dragonking in its furry let loose its entire barrage to the
defiant Tyranid on that hill, when the dust cleared only the Dominatrix was
left standing (that bitch!). The battle for hill two was more of a Necron
success when the Tyranid warriors just annihilated the Necron defenders
leaving but two models the counter attack however swept the Tyranid warriors
away.

A couple of Necron assault detachments made the long warp jumps to take out
the remaining biovores.

Victory was conceded to the slann at 47 to 33 since it was clear that they
still had enough to hold what they had taken in objectives and the tyranids
were too few to take them back. This was a real bloodbath since there were
literally less than 20 models left on the tabletop.

Analysis

The assault necron worked fine at a CAF of +4, this will be their new CAF
and the cost per company is 750 points. It was obvious that a higher CAF or
lower cost would make these units too good. The units are very good at what
they do, but suffer casualties fast, against a highly shooty army they will
fair poorly.

Tyranids fair poor against the likes of the dragonking or Imperator, they
don't have enough firepower to take them down without a lot of luck. They
need biovores to "distract" such a unit so the rest of the army could do
their job. The Necrons one due to his unit. Its worth its 2000 points, but
it is clearly not the equal of the Imperator.

One pattern is clear for the Necron and slann, they need to develop a lead
early in the game, since otherwise attrition will make them lose in the
later turns. they don't have much staying power, but one hell of a first
turn punch.

Battle 2

Imperial guard versus Slann

I had a pretty good idea going in that I could pull out a victory, not
because of any genius on my part but due to the fact that I was playing a
well known army versus an army that we are all learning about. This means I
would use well known tricks, while the slann needed to react to them.

On the surface this may seem like an unfair test for the slann, but actually
it is a valid one in the since if the slann are unbalanced they will make it
difficult for me to win or even win themselves when they are at a
disadvantage.

The battle was 4500 points per side

Imperials
1. Tactical mole company
2. Heavy company
3. Assault company
4. Artillery company
5. Roughrider company
6. Shadowsword company
7. Knight paladin company
8. Lancer knights

Slann
1. Exodus company
2. Frog pod
3. Slann mage mech
4. 2 Kroxigor detachments
5. 2 gravguard detachments
6. 2 Spawngiard detachments
7. 2 skink detachments
8. 1 frog tank detachment

The board was similar to the previous battle with a couple of buildings
added.

Numerically I vastly outnumbered the slann. My plan was simple the mole
company would surface around the center and hill objectives and overwhelm
the opposition by numbers. This ploy is difficult to counter especially if
you have not played against it. I knew the slann would have a rough time
countering it, but if they did so too easily, this would tell me something
about the balance too. The mole company would be supported by the knights
paladin. The remaining hill was attacked by rough riders and the assault
company with the shadow swords and lancers in support.

Turn 1

Everything went according to plan, the mole company appeared and immediately
engaged the slann units, the end result was the decimation of the frog pod
and exodus company, good ranged firing from the shadow swords destroyed the
slann mage mech and harried the remaining frog mechs.

In truth the game was pretty much won on the first turn although the second
turn inflicted numerous casualties on the IG. However the initial plan
worked so well that the slann had no effective attacking force, it could
only defend and shoot.

Turn 2

Pretty much was all massive close combats with some good shooting, but the
battle had been decided and we didn't play any further. It ended 48 to 33

Analysis

I'm glad to say the slann are balanced, the battle turned out as it did
solely on tactical ground, we all learned something that day and now know
better slann tactics.

One important thing that was discussed and changed was the warp jump rules,
I found them counter intuitive and too dicey. They are now simplified as
follows:

When a mech or infantry that is jump capable makes a jump it rolls once (and
only once) on the following table while adding any appropriate modifiers:

Modified die roll
zero or less- Models sucked into the warp and destroyed

1-2- partially successful jump, but model is displaced and confused, scatter
3d6cm and model may not fire, may be fired at normally

3-4- successful jump, model makes the jump and may act normally, no snap
fire can be taken, but first fire unit may fire

5-6- Perfect jump, model lands precisely and by surprise, enemy models may
not snap fire or first fire against a unit with a perfect jump.

A standard "safe" jump is 40cm, note there is NO chance of falling into the
warp with a safe jump. For every additional 10cm beyond 40cm their is a -1
penalty to the roll on the table. If a jump of 60cm is attempted a roll of 2
or 1 results in destruction and a perfect jump can never be achieved. Their
is no upper limit restriction to the jump, but it doesn't need one, after
jumping 30cm over the safe 40cm it becomes not very feasible to do so since
the -3 makes death a 50% probability and the best you can hope for is a
successful jump.

Vanguard/slann magi that accompany the pod make it unnecessary to make the
roll IF the jump is within 40cm, if longer they require a roll but they add
+1 bonus for their presence, this means they can jump farther and safer, to
a point of course, the penalties for range still apply. This means if you
jump an additional 20cm, the penalty is -2 to the roll but would be -1 since
the vanguard adds +1 bonus.

Peter
Received on Sun Oct 15 2000 - 17:52:36 UTC