SCARAB GT: Day 1, Game 2 - Tyranids vs. Imperial Guard with Inquisitor and Space Wolves

After my loss to Josh in Game 1, my second game was against Talon and his Imperial Guard. The mission was The Scouring primary and Purge the Alien secondary on Hammer and Anvil deployment. Talon's list had an Inquisitor warlord and Space Wolf allies with two rune priests and some grey hunters in a pod:

Inquisitor
Guard Command Squad - Lascannon
Guard Platoon Command Squad, 4 Flamers
Guard Platoon Command Squad, 4 Flamers
Guard Blob - 4 Lascannons
Guad Blob - 4 Lascannons
2 Valkyries (carrying platoon command squads)
2x Manticore
Rune Priest
Rune Priest
10 Grey Hunters in Drop Pod - 2 flamers

To start, we rolled for Warlord Traits. Talon's Inquisitor rolled on his Inquisitorial table and was able to choose to pass or fail all leadership tests. My Flyrant got the trait that forced all enemy units within 12" to use their lowest leadership rather than their highest. Talon won the roll to deploy first and deployed his blobs across the board, with the HQ command squad surrounded by one blob, and manticores in back. I deployed my two flyrants fairly aggressively forward but out of sight of most of the lascannons. The hive guard were set to run up behind the central LOS blocker while my tervigons were a little more hidden.

I seized the initiative and took full advantage. My Flyrants flew up the right side while everything else advanced. The non-warlord flyrant did several wounds to the guard blob, and then the biovores dealt a bunch more, enough to force a morale check. The warlord flyrant opted to run into the ruin to get within 12" of the surviving guardsmen, who promptly failed their morale and ran off the board, taking one rune priest with them. In the bottom of the turn, the Grey Hunters dropped in front of the building with my tervigon and shot a few spawned termagants, whittling them down. The surviving guard blob turned out to be holding a skyfire nexus. The Inquisitor joined them, conferring his special anti-psyker shooting on the unit, who promptly shot down the flyrant in the open. Finally the manticores fired on the biovores, but scattered and only kill a couple gants.

In turn two, I opt to be aggressive with my Warlord and fly him over toward the manticores. The Mawloc burst up under both manticores and the surviving rune priest. The Manticores are only shifted, but the Rune Priest takes a wound. In the shooting phase the termagants in the back kill some grey hunters, the flyrant destroys a Manticore, and the Biovores hit the command squad and blob squad, forcing the surviving command squad members to flee to within an inch of the bard edge. Some termagants assault the grey hunters, who kill enough to get them out of synapse (blunder on my part), who are then promptly run down. In Talon's turn, the Grey Hunters move to engage the devilgants. One Valkyrie arrives and flies for one of the tervigons. In this shooting phase, Talon's dice turn on him, starting with the BS10 Skyfire blob dealing only a single wound to the Flyrant and not grounding him. The Valkyrie followed this up by failing to cause a wound on the tervigon. Finally, the grey hunters kill a couple devilgants, but then fail a 4" charge.

In turn 3, Doom arrives but scatters a country mile from the guard blob. The flyrant vector strikes the command squad, wiping them out, then destroys the remaining manticore. The hive guard manage a single hit, which stuns the Valkyrie, while termagant shooting wipes out the remaining grey hunters. The Mawloc then charges the guard blob and promptly kills the rune priest before being inundated in guard bodies. In Talon's turn, he flies the stunned Valkyrie off the board and the other arrives in the same spot, and then repeats its mate's performance by failing to do significant damage to the tervigon. In combat, the Mawloc kills some guardsmen while the Inquisitor deals a wound or two.

In my turn 4, the Doom moves to reach the 6" bubble to the guard blob and rolls poorly on his difficult terrain test, falling well short. Fire from the Hive Guard shakes the second valkyrie. Finally, the Flyrant charges the blob and does some wounds, as does the Mawloc. The Inquisitor stikes back, bringing the Mawloc down to 1 remaining. The Flyrant ends up out of the combat because he killed everyone on his side of the Mawloc. Finally, a Tervigon destroyed the drop pod. In Talon's turn, the second Valkyrie arrives and flies on the opposite side of the central LOS blocker. The shaken Valkyrie goes into hover and the guardsmen inside disembark. Both Valkyries fail to do much damage to either Tervigon. In combat, the Mawloc is killed by the Inquisitor.

In the top of 5, the Flyrant wipes out the Inquisitor and remaining guardsmen with devourer fire. The hive guard manage to take down both Valkyries, and at this point, the game is called, with a 10-0 victory for my Tyranids.

This game was largely about Lady Luck. I seized and the game turned on that roll, with me removing a large portion of his army off the bat. Then, Talon's dice rolls went ice cold in turn 2 and never really recovered.