Bat Rep: Tyranids vs. Space Wolves - Road to the NOVA Open Game 1

Last weekend Chandler and I got in our first game for the Road to the NOVA Open League, Gray Bracket. Game 1 is NOVA Mission 1; Crusade with Dawn of War deployment. While last week I was debating between Sporefield and Deathleaper's Assassin Brood, I ended up running something a bit different after being challenged to run a Dimachaeron in a Tyrannocyte - full list after the bump:

I ended up going with something entirely different from my planned lists:

• CAD:
• Hive Tyrant: Warlord, Wings, 2x TL Devourers, Electroshock Grubs
• Hive Tyrant: Wings, 2x TL Devourers, Electroshock Grubs
• 2x3 Rippers: Deep Strike
• 2x1 Lictor
• Bastion: Comms
• Hive Fleet Detachment:
• Hive Tyrant: Wings, 2x TL Devourers, Electroshock Grubs
• 3x1 Mucolid Spore
• 3x1 Lictor
• Dimachaeron
• 2x Mawloc
• Tyrannocyte
• Sporefield Formation:
• 3x1 Mucolid Spores
• 2x3 Spore Mines
• 4 Spore Mines

Essentially I dropped a Mawloc, Lictor, and Tyrant Guard from the Sporefield list, along with some mines to get a Dimachaeron and Tyrannocyte. I opted to add the Dima to the Sporefield list in part so that the spore mines could act as road blocks if need be to protect the Dima from combat units that could work him over. 

Chandler brought a Terminator-heavy Space Wolf List:

• Company of the Great Wolf: 
• Rune Priest: Warlord, Level 2, Armour of Asvald Stormwrack 
• Rune Priest: Level 2, Terminator Armour 
• Rune Priest: 
• Wolf Priest: Terminator Armour
• 5 Wolf Guard: 2 TH/SS, 1 SS/Assault Cannon, 2 Pairs of Wolf Claws
• 5 Wolf Guard: Cyclone Missile Launcher, 3 TH/SS, 2 Pairs of Wolf Claws
• 5 Wolf Guard: 1 Power Axe, 1 Power Fist, TH/SS, Pair of Wolf Claws, Assault Cannon & Power Fist
• Land Raider Redeemer: Multi-Melta
• Land Raider: Multi-Melta
• Officio Assassinorum Detachment
• Vindicare Assassin

I set up the table with the normal NOVA terrain setup. For missions, I opted to score end of game, with Linebreaker, Marked for Death on the Assassin, and Destroy a Detachment (new proposed Secondary). Chandler went for End Game Primary as well, and Slay the Warlord, Linebreaker, and Last Laugh. 

I got the warlord trait that gives +1 to Seize and re-roll reserves. Chandler got a trait that allows the warlord to re-roll one save per turn. I won the roll for deployment and I chose to deploy first. I deployed the all three flyrants on my right flank, one on top of my bastion, the other two in my corner ruin. Everything else was deep striking or infiltrating. Chandler countered by deploying the two Land Raiders on his middle right (my left), with one squad of Wolf Guard and the Power Armour Rune Priest in the Redeemer. I then won the roll for Infiltrators and deployed first. I scattered the Sporefield Mucolids and Spore Mines around the board, along with three of the Lictors in the center LOS blockers, leaving only Chandler's back left in front of my flyrants as open ground. In response, Chandler infiltrated the Vindicare behind the two Land Raiders.

Turn 1 was pretty uneventful as my three flyrants swooped up into the right line of sight blocker and the mucolids and mines shifted around. In Chandler's turn, he jumped the Vindicare into the empty Land Raider and drove it up the middle, with the other land raider shifting around and taking a melta shot at a Mucolid, which made its cover save.

Turn 2 everything but the Mawlocs arrived, leaning a bit to my left flank. The flyrants surrounded the Land Raider with the assassin and after failing to do any damage with a Warp Lance, did two hull points with Haywire and got a pen which Stunned the Land Raider, and finally got another hull point from a glance when two Sporefield Mucolids charged in (though neither would return).

Forgive the pink LOS blockers I threw together the night before this game.

In Chandler's half of the turn, he got both Terminator squads to arrive. One with the Warlord and Wolf Priest dropped beside his Redeemer, while the other group dropped in my backfield, staying on the board thanks to a short scatter. Shooting was fairly effective, doing a wound to one flyrant, and two to another, who failed his grounding check, but passed his feel no pain from slamming into the ground. Shooting from the redeemer also did some wounds to the Tyrannocyte that was floating along.

Turn 3 the Mawlocs remained out, and since I didn't have any Lictors close to the terminators, I chose not to reroll. Two of the flyrants flapped over to the terminators in my backfield, while the grounded flyrant jumped to the other side of the Land Raider. Everything else shuffled around, though one of my Lictors in Chandler's backfield failed his Instinctive Behavior and began to run away, choosing to run up onto the hill he was hiding behind. In the psychic phase, the grounded flyrant cast Warp Lance and then managed to miss from point blank range. In shooting he wrecked it with his haywire, forcing the assassin to disembark (Chandler skillfully hid him behind the wreckage, preventing a charge. The two other flyrants unloaded into the terminators, killing all but the Assault Cannon and Rune Priest in an impressive show of rolling 1s by Chandler. 

In the bottom of 3, Chandler moved his warlord unit up toward the Lictor on the hill. The Assassin jumped on top of the wrecked Land Raider to draw a bead on the downed Flyrant with his Exitus Pistol. In shooting, the assassin was unable to finish off the flyrant, so the sole surviving wolfguard in my backfield finished the job with his Assault Cannon. Meanwhile, the Lictor on the hill went to ground, dodging a krak missile and several bolter rounds, only taking a single wound. The Wolf Guard then unsurprisingly did not make the 12" charge. 

In turn 4, the Mawlocs bullseyed the sole Wolf Guard and Rune Priest, killing the wolf guard and wounding the priest, and both going back into Ongoing reserves. After a fusilade of fire, the Rune Priest also died. Meanwhile, in the middle, two lictors assaulted the Assassin. He dealt two wounds to one Lictor before falling to their combined weight of attacks. 

In the bottom of turn 4 the Wolf Guard and Warlord moved toward the Lictor on the hill and promptly gunned him down, while the Land Raider Redeemer killed a mucolid and continued to plink away at the Tyrannocyte. 

At the top of 5, the unguided Mawlocs aimed for the warlord and both scattered severely, one wiping out a squad of Spore Mines. Some rippers decided to eat themselves rather than run to an objective, so the Mawlocs moved to be just within distance and cut off the Wolf guard from doing the same. Meanwhile the Dimachaeron ran through a wall to contest an objective along with the Tyrannocyte, which was down to a single wound. I did a single hull point to the land raider and stunned it, forcing some snap shots. 

In the bottom of the turn, the Redeemer dealt a single wound to the Tyrannocyte, but it passed its cover save and survived, and also used Power of the Machine Spirit to fire one flamer into the Dima and indirectly into a flyrant, dealing a wound to both. The Wolf Guard assaulted both mawlocs, but a short charge meant they didn't have the move to wrap around to contest the objective. One Mawloc died gruesomely, and the other remained locked in combat, taking a couple thunder hammer swings. 

Chandler rolled to see if the game would continue and it came up a 2. Game Over. 

I maxed the Primary by holding (just barely) four objectives and holding more than Chandler,. I also achieved all of my secondaries thanks to the Sporocyst surviving and getting me linebreaker. Chandler achieved Last Laugh by killing a Mawloc, but failed to achieve his other two secondaries. Finally, on kill points, I got a point for turns 3 and 4, while Chandler scored kills in turns 3-5. 

In the end, we tallied a 17-7 Victory for the Tyranids. The Dimachaeron mostly hopped around in one of the center Line of Sight blocking Ruins, scared to get charged by the Terminators in the Land Raider (who were similarly scared of getting charged by the Dima, hence why they stayed in their safe metal box). Obviously I was pretty happy with my results and had a fun Sunday afternoon game with Chandler. Now I'm looking forward to Round 2 against Tom's Imperial Guard, who pulled out a narrow victory in Round 1 over Rick's Chaos forces. 

Thanks for checking out the bat rep, and stay tuned for some more Road to NOVA prep league games.