Batrep: Tyranids vs Imperial Fists, the Judge gets Judged!

 Some time ago, the Judge and I were discussing his recent decision to pick up Nids and we realized that in nearly two years of knowing one another, we had only played each other in doubles matches, never one on one. Well, with those few doubles games usually devolving into laughter and smack talk, I knew we would at least have fun, so we booked the match and jokingly called it "The Day of Judgement"

After hours of text message talk of beating one another, we finally set the table ... and my list was the following:


HQ

Prime-100

Dual Bone Swords, Toxin Sacs

Prime-100

Dual Bone Swords, Toxin Sacs

Elite

2 Hive Guard-100
2 Hive Guard-100
2 Hive Guard-100

Troops
10 Termagants-50
10 Termagants-50

Tervigon-195
Catalyst, Toxin Sacs, Adrenal Glands

Tervigon-195
Catalyst, Toxin Sacs, Adrenal Gland
17 Genestealers-238
17 Genestealers-238

Heavy Support

Carnifex-190
Dual TL-Devourers

Carnifex-190
Dual TL-Devourers

The Judge -

I am not 100% on his, but it looked like a squad of ten scouts with sniper rifles and a Hellfire heavy bolter

two squads of stearnguard in pods (one with lysander and not a damned combi-weapon at all)

Lysander

2 squads of Marines in rhinos with flamers and fists

A squad of assault Marines

A vindicator with extra armor


 All in all, his list was a little goofy, mine was a little more refined, but I know that the Judge can hang with the best most of the time, so I suspected he may have had something up his sleeve.

The two pics above are where I stood at the beginning of the shooting phase turn one. I went first, the two tervigons pooped backward, as to provide board coverage to the rear against pods coming in. The rest of the army pushed forward. The tervigons cast FnP on the stealers. Both squads of stealers pushed toward the scouts and vindi as the Hive Guard took out its gun (why you should never take one vindi). The stealers didn't make it to combat, but the vindi had been silenced and another rhino had been immobilized.

During his turn 1, he had the non-lysander stearnguard pod drop in, mishap and get placed near one of the stealer squads, he failed to fix the rhino, he tank shocked a squad of stealers to little effect and fired on another squad killing 6 of them.

My turn two, I made more babies, assaulted the stearnguard with the wounded squad of stealers, assaulted another squad with the other squad of stealers, killed the vindicator in assault with a carnifex. At this point in the game, I think we both knew how it was going to end. I normally wouldn't write a batrep on a one-sided game like this, but I think the Judge wants to start a rivalry, which should be long lasting!

My favorite part of the game was the bottom of the third, when Lysader showed up with his stearngaurd. They managed to bolter drill a tervigon, leaving it with one wound remaining ... shucks. Now Lysader was surrounded like Nids in a way normally only found in the pages of a white dwarf ...

They closed in and fired fleshborers, hive guard shot at vehicles, killing all but the pod lysander came in, one dakkafex shot a squad in the Judge's deployment xone, while the other added his fire against Lysander and friends. When the bio-smoke cleared, the squad was left with 4 Marines and a severely wounded Lysander (can you see the guy with the claw trying to get back in the pod, lol).

... and then the gaunts surged into assault. What you can't see is the other tervigon lending AG and TS support in addition to the one in the photo. 40 gaunts on the charge ... a glorious death for the Captain of the 1st Company!

Here is a photo of the game table in the bottom of the fourth. All vehicles are dead and many Marines are as well.

The last tac squad gets eaten ...

Looking at this board, you can see that I bred a little better than average this game. In fact, my two tervigons never bred lower than 8 models per turn and each bred for the full five turns. That is five turns of scoring units added to the field, shooting, assaulting, holding objectives and screening units to provide cover. It's a guants world, we're all just living in it. Vogrin asked me to roll the dice after the game to see how far the tervis would have gone. One would have bred until seven and the other until six. The odds I believe are less than 1% of that happening for two tervigons in one game.

Not a whole lot else to say, I held 2 objectives and contested one on turn five. A combination of gaps in his list and bad luck sealed the deal for the Judge. I think he played as best he could given the situation and I do have to say that his scouts were clutch in this game. For me, the army really doesn't have stars. The genestealers, when taken in mass and given FnP, are unexpectedly resilient and very killy. Guants are the mid-field killers, providing a mass of dice against any enemy, whether that be shooting or assault. Dakkafexes added a weight of mid strength fire that complimented the hive guard's ability to open tanks.

As the game wrapped up, we just had some fun, talking about the peril of tactical Marines and the ability Nids have to control the physical board space. As he builds his Nids, I hope this game gave him some idea of the things he can do with his units.

And with the close of this article, a photo of the end game.

Now, I wish I could have shown off some bad ass painted models, but that is what I am doing as I write this. I have 60 gaunts on the table receiving a blue wash and a Dryder tervigon receiving some re-paint love right now. Be on the look out for some Tyranid painting posts, tactical posts and some upcoming tourney info. Thanks for reading!