Tau (Melanie) vs. Elder (Ryan) 1000 points

It was a cold and rainy day in Portland today. Earlier this week, Melanie suggested we play a game of 40K, and although I was too busy at the time, I suggested today would be a better day to play. After gathering our armies and filling our bellies, we traveled to Knightfall and started to make our lists. Knightfall was busy with several 40K players, some more annoying than others. For the most part, these players kept to themselves, but we did have to endure the occasional asinine comment throughout the afternoon.

Our lists made, Melanie and I rolled for mission and deployment. Seize Ground and Spearhead were the result. I've never particularly liked the Seize Ground mission; more often than not, the result is a draw. Still, the Tau are one of the weakest armies in the game right now in my opinion (their codex is the oldest in the game) so I had a good chance of winning even within the Seize Ground Mission. After all, if you completely annihilate your opponent's army, you win the game regardless of the mission. :-P

We rolled off for who would get to go first. Melanie won the roll and deployed her entire army. She placed some of her Crisis Suits hidden from view, but there was insufficent cover on the board to obscure her entire army. I decided I did not want to let Tau have the first chance to shoot, so I left my entire army in reserve and deep struck my Warp Spiders. This turned out to be an excellent strategy, as I was able to kill some units before they ever had the chance to shoot.

I was fortunate in that 75% of my reserves came in on the second turn, and further fortunate that my Warp Spiders landed almost exactly where I wanted them to land.

Melanie took an army that was extremely good against mech, but less prepared against units with a 3+ armor save, like the Warp Spiders. The result was that my tanks were quickly destroyed or made useless, but the Warp Spiders quickly advanced and destroyed everything in their path. Melanie decided to take two Devilfish filled with Fire Warriors for her troop choices. While the Devilfishes were useful as cover for the crisis suits, their guns suck and they were rather costly (80-100 points each, and you only get a few S5 shots). I think against Eldar Kroot might be a better choice: they're cheap, they're S4 so they can kill a tank, and they have so many deployment options (normal deployment, infiltrate, or outflank). They're vulnerable to blast templates, and can break or be pinned easily, but I like the aggressiveness of the unit; infiltrate and charge---similar to a genestealer. They are MEANT to distract the opponent's fire and die while the rest of the army moves into position and shoots.

My tanks were quickly destroyed by Melanie's crisis suits. Her suits could simply shoot too many twin-linked S7 BS 4 shots, even Armor Value 12 couldn't save me. I taught her to take this Tau configuration, which is highly effective against Rhinos, Wave Serpents, and any other vehicle with AV 12 or less. You can see Lord Fuegan in the bottom right of this picture (above). Fuegan did very little the entire game, and was hardly worth the 205 points I paid for him. I think he killed a Crisis Suit, but that was about it. Fuegan is simply a beast against Tau. He has a 2+ armor save, T4, Eternal Warrior, and Feel No Pain, and 3 wounds, all of which means he can absorb a ridiculous amount of shots before finally facing death. I made a mistake this game not simply deploying him in the center of the board. He entered the board on the right flank, and was basically out of the battle the entire game.

By the later turns of the game, Melanie had started shifting her troops toward one side of the board, and basically started moving toward "my" objective (the nickle, bottom side, above). The Warp Spiders are incredibly fast, and quickly gave chase with the intention of either killing her troops, or contesting the objective. I also started moving my own troops toward "her" objective. At the very least, this would ensure a tie. You can see Fuegan in the top right, still very far from the battle. Partly this was due to some bad luck on my "run" rolls; I rolled 1 both times. 

I don't have any great pictures of the end of the game, but I basically won because Melanie was unable to grab an objective before the end of the game. With win in hand, I agreed to play another turn "to see what would have happened." Although I still think I would have won, we determined that if Melanie played strategically and thoughtfully, she would be able to draw the game. All in all I had a really fun time, and I look forward to crushing the Tau again. Until next time readers!