NI24 warm up game - Tau Vs Necrons

This game was played between my son and his friend as a warm up game, mostly to let them just play on their own, with as little oversight as possible, apart from the odd bit of tactical advise or suggestion. The main aim of this game was to let the boys work though the game without any prompts from me, just as they might have to in the tournament. As it happens they did very well at it, although it did take a very long time to play and was split over about 4 sessions and two days. 

There is not much I can really comment on the actual game, as I did not witness very much of it, just popping in every so often to see how they were doing but from what I could tell both lists were actually working as intended.

The Tau ended up pushing up on their right flank while the Necrons ended up pushing up on their right, circling around the canter of the board. 

As you can see, the Tau suits dropped in and tried to take on one of the necron blobs, but the reanimation tactics cause the suits a lot of problems, bringing back a number of warriors, causing the suits to take several turns to chew through all the warriors.

At the end of the day, the Tau did just enough to take the win, some unlucky draws on the cards for the necrons hurt at the end. Overall the game proved that both armies could work and that the tactics were pretty solid. Granted both armies were fairly constrained by model availability but the tournament was a good chance to stress test the armies and work towards building them in the future.

So, with all the test games done and dusted, it was on to the tournament!

 

NI24 Necrons list

The rumour mills are well and truly buzzing, humming a way with unbridled passion or rage depending upon where you sit! Personally I'm sitting in the middle at the moment, there is some good and some bad, and some very very bad (poor old scions) but, I am going to wait to give my thoughts until I have the book in hand, whenever that might be, so that I can give a full run through of everything and all my thoughts on our new codex. In the meantime, there's still plenty to share on Northern Invasion 2024!

The last army to look at is the necrons. This force was very much dictated by available models, although I have been helping to guild the boy who plays them as best I can as to which units to buy in order to form a cohesive and coherent force. The force is also very heavily character oriented, mostly to get maximum use out of the detachment ability and also because the necron seem to work best with characters buffing units, far more so than the Tau or Guard.

The list itself is fairly short but is quite complex to understand how it all goes together!

DETACHMENT: Awakened Dynasty

C'tan Shard of the Nightbringer

Chronomancer

Hexmark Destroyer: Warlord, Enhancement: Enaegic Dermal Bond

Overlord: Resurrection orb, Voidscythe

Plasmancer

Skorpekh Lord

Technomancer: Enhancement: Nether-realm Casket

Necron Warriors: 20x Gauss reaper

Necron Warriors: 20x Gauss flayer

Deathmarks

Flayed Ones

Skorpekh Destroyers: 2x Plasmacyte

Canoptek Scarab Swarms

Canoptek Scarab Swarms

Lokhust Heavy Destroyers: Gauss destructor

Lokhust Heavy Destroyers: Gauss destructor

Canoptek Wraiths

Canoptek Reanimator

Canoptek Spyders

So the basic idea of the list is a slow methodical push up the board. Centre to this are the two warrior blobs move forward, one accompanied by a Lord and plasmancer with the flayers and the chronomancer with the short range reapers. These will advance up the board on to the centre objectives to take and hold them. One of the squads will also be accompanied by the  Canoptek Reanimator to boost the Reanimation protocols and boost their resilience and staying power on the objectives. Ahead of this, mainly to cause some distraction are the flayed ones, infiltrating up on to an objective early or just acting as deep strike denial. The Wraiths, along with the Technomancer, also push up early, mostly as a distraction unit. Their firepower and combat abilities have been somewhat lacking in the test games, however, their resilience has been superb. The hexmark, deathmarks, scarabs and Spyder are pretty free floating, with the hexmark and deathmarks dropping in where needed and the scarabs and Spyder being used for deep strike denial or to be generally annoying. The Lokhust heavy destroyers will stay back and hold the line, while taking pot shots at any armour or heavy infantry that decided to show themselves. While not very powerful, with only a flat 6 damage, their reliability is very good. 

That just leaves the C'Tan and the Skorpekhs. Both of these are hard hitting units that will push up with the warriors, taking out anything that decides to get two close. The C'Tan is an absolute bullet sponge, with a 4+, 4++ and 5+FNP, in addition to halving damage and Reanimation protocols. The amount of firepower needed to take him down really is something. And while your shooting him, the Skorpekhs and trundling up the board to turn you in to swiss cheese. 

Overall, I think this will be a strong list, with Reanimation protocols and stratagems\abilities meaning this army is very resilient although it is very slow, with only a couple of units moving at any speed. This means that it's not really going to come through until the late game, which may be a problem in the tournament.

NI24 Tau list

So after going through the Guard list and games, I’m going to do a quick run through of the other list the boys took, starting with the Tau list. I’ll do this list, then the Necrons and then the game they played. 

Here is the Tau list; 

DETACHMENT: Mont'ka

Commander Farsight: Warlord

Darkstrider

Cadre Fireblade: 2x Shield Drone, Enhancement: Strategic Conqueror

Commander in Coldstar Battlesuit: 2x Shield Drone, Cyclic ion blaster, 2x Fusion blaster, Enhancement: Exemplar of the Mont'ka

Breacher Team: Shas'ui - Guardian Drone, Shield Drone, Support turret

Breacher Team: Shas'ui - Guardian Drone, Shield Drone, Support turret

Strike Team: Shas'ui: Guardian Drone, Shield Drone, Support turret

Pathfinder Team: 3x Rail rifle, Semi-automatic grenade launcher, Shas'ui - 2x Shield Drone, Recon drone, 

Stealth Battlesuits: Shas'vre - Battlesuit support system, Homing beacon, 2x Shield Drone, Fusion blaster

Stealth Battlesuits: Shas'vre - Battlesuit support system, Homing beacon, 2x Shield Drone, Fusion blaster

Stealth Battlesuits: Shas'vre - Battlesuit support system, Homing beacon, 2x Shield Drone, Fusion blaster

Krootox Rampagers

Broadside Battlesuits: 2x Shield Drone, Weapon support system, Heavy rail rifle, Twin plasma rifle

Broadside Battlesuits: 2x Shield Drone, Weapon support system, Heavy rail rifle, Twin plasma rifle

Crisis Sunforge Battlesuits: 3xShield Drone, 3x Gun Drone

Crisis Sunforge Battlesuits: 3xShield Drone, 3x Gun Drone

Ghostkeel Battlesuit: Battlesuit support system,  Cyclic ion raker, Twin T'au flamer

Piranha: Piranha fusion blaster, 2x Seeker missile

Piranha: Piranha fusion blaster, 2x Seeker missile

Devilfish: 2x Seeker missile, 2x Twin pulse carbine

Devilfish: 2x Seeker missile, 2x Twin pulse carbine

Devilfish: 2x Seeker missile, 2x Smart missile system

So quite a suit and vehicle heavy list. The Breachers and Strike team will go in the Devilfish, one with the Fireblade. The commander and Farsighted go with the Battle suits ready to drop in on priority targets. The Stealth suits, the Ghoatkeel and the Pathfinders will deploy up the field, ready to just on the objectives early game. The Piranhas will also push up early game, to put some pressure on the enemy and try and do some damage to key units and vehicles before being blown to kingdom come. That just leaves the Broadsides and Krootox. The broadsides, as you’d imagine, will sit at the back and hammer anything that is silly enough to poke its head out and the rampagers are the counter charge unit, ready to smash anything that tries to get to close. They can also be used to challenge weaker units on the board. 

The general idea is to push up with the stealth suits and ghostkeel, alongside the pathfinders to pressure the centre objectives early game and force the opponents to counter and push up. The Piranhas back this up by using scout moves and their good movement to push up and hit prime targets with 4 missiles and the two fusion, hopefully taking out something big before dying to a stiff breeze.

This first wave is followed up by the second wave of the three infantry squads in the devilfish and the crisis suits. Ideally the first wave will not have been wiped out completely, so the second wave will put more pressure on the enemy. The broadsides will remain back, hold objectives and alongside the rampagers help deter any enemy from deep striking behind the Tau. 

It’s fairly simple and should work well, as long as the enemy don’t play a similar game of their own, scouting up the board or dropping in on mass. If it works to plan, the enemy should find itself penned back in its deployment zone. Now, granted this didn’t happen in my game, mostly because I knew exactly what I needed to do, as I helped come up with the plan in the first place, plus I wanted to try out an aggressive stance for my list against a strong shooting opponent, but I think the theory is sound. Till and the tournament will tell us if I’m right to not.

NI24 Guard list

 So after three practice games I came to a final list, I think that this is a good overall list with enough Anti-infantry and anti-armour to deal with most things that I will come up against. 

So here is the final list;

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

+ FACTION KEYWORD: Imperium - Astra Militarum

+ DETACHMENT: Combined Regiment

+ TOTAL ARMY POINTS: 1995pts

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Death Korps Marshal: Power Weapon, Plasma Pistol

Death Korps Marshal: Power Weapon, Plasma Pistol

Militarum Tempestus Command Squad: Regimental Standard,  Weapon, Plasma Gun, Hot-shot Volley Gun, Grenade LauncherT, empestor Prime: Command Rod, Tempestus Dagger, Warlord, Enhancement: Grand Strategist

Primaris Psyker: Force Weapon, Laspistol, Psychic Maelstrom

Primaris Psyker: Force Weapon, Laspistol, Psychic Maelstrom

Regimental Enginseer: Archeotech Pistol, Enginseer Axe, Servo-arm

20x Death Korps of Krieg: Medi-pack, 2x Grenade Launcher, 2x Sniper Rifle, 2x Plasma Gun,2x Watchmaster: Chainsword, Plasma Pistol

20x Death Korps of Krieg: Medi-pack, 2x Flamer, 2x Meltagun, 2x Vox-caster, 2x Watchmaster: Chainsword, Plasma Pistol

Tempestus Scions: Hot-shot Volley Gun, Plasma Gun, Tempestor: Power Weapon, Plasma Pistol

Tempestus Scions: Hot-shot Volley Gun, Plasma Gun, Tempestor: Power Weapon, Plasma Pistol

Tempestus Scions: Hot-shot Volley Gun, Plasma Gun, Tempestor: Power Fist, Plasma Pistol

Tempestus Scions: Hot-shot Volley Gun, Plasma Gun, Tempestor: Power Fist, Plasma Pistol

Heavy Weapons Squad: 3x Mortar

Leman Russ Vanquisher: Vanquisher Battle Cannon, Armoured Tracks, Hunter-killer Missile, Lascannon, Heavy Stubber, 2x Heavy Flamer

Armiger Warglaive: Reaper chain-cleaver, Thermal spear, Questoris heavy stubber

Armiger Warglaive: Reaper chain-cleaver, Thermal spear, Questoris heavy stubber

Deathwatch Kill Team: 2x Astartes shield, Power weapon, Black Shield blades, 2x Deathwatch thunder hammer, 2x Infernus heavy bolter, Sgt: Xenophase blade

Deathwatch Kill Team: Frag cannon, Infernus heavy bolter, Stalker-pattern boltgun, Sgt: Combi-weapon, Xenophase blade

Imperial Rhino: Armoured tracks, Hunter-killer missile, Storm bolter

Imperial Rhino: Armoured tracks, Hunter-killer missile, Storm bolter

Inquisitor: Blessed wardings, Inquisitorial melee weapon, Combi-weapon

Watch Captain Artemis: Hellfire Extremis, Master-crafted power weapon

So the final list is pretty similar to the first list with the scions forming the final 200 odd points of the list.

The general plan remains fairly unchanged, the guard will move up to secure a couple of centre objectives while the deathwatch strike out to take on any priority targets. The Russ and Armigers will be looking to take on any vehicles or monsters. 

The guard and deathwatch elements are pretty solid I think, they have performed exactly as I wanted through the warm up games, the scions, even as a late edition have also played their part as hoped. The Russ and the Armigers however have not performed quite as well as I had hoped, mostly due to the lack of overall shots. This has partly been due to some terrible rolling, which may cause me problems during the tournament.

Overall though, I think this is a solid list, just worried about the lack of reliable anti-armour.