Four, four, four games in two…

Work has kept me too busy to get much in the way of painting or photography, but I was able to get in a couple of very cool games this past Friday. Well, four games. Well, two games, but playing four different armies, only one of which was mine.

My three friends (Dan, Dennis, and Richard) and I wanted to do something a bit different, so we got the materials together to set up a second table last week, all ready for two simultaneous games. On table 1, I faced off against Dan. Table 2 had Dennis and Richard. Each of us brought a 1500-point army of our choice:

• Me: my 1500-point Khorne list
• Dan: his Salamander list: Vulkan He'stan, a Master of the Forge, two dreads w/multi-meltas, an Ironclad dread, 2 5-man Terminator squads, and 2 10-man Tactical Squads
• Dennis: his "Sampler Platter" Eldar list: basically, a Court of the Young King (Avatar plus one of squad of each of the following w/exarch: Dire Avengers, Dark Reapers, Fire Dragons, Howling Banshees, and Shining Spears), a unit of Pathfinders, a unit of Jetbike Guardians, a unit of Harlequins, and a Fire Prism
• Richard: his new Tyranid list: Swarmlord with two Tyrant Guards, a unit of Gargoyles, a small squad of Hormagaunts, a unit of Genestealers w/ a Broodlord, a Warrior Alpha with three extra Warriors, and 6 Raveners in reserve

To keep things relatively simple (which will become important in a moment), we went with Pitched Battle/Annihilation for our mission. Lists in hand and armies deployed, we each took our first turns. For Dan and I, it mostly involved a bit of movement, along with some fire from my Defiler that immobilized one of his dreads. On Dennis and Richard's table, the Eldar unleashed a fusillade of fire that wiped out the Gargoyles and the Tyrant Guards, and put three wounds on the Broodlord.

With everyone's first turn wrapped up, we then each shifted one place to the left. Our armies stayed where they were, but the players changed. I moved to the Eldar position, Dennis was now facing off against his own Eldar as the Tyranids, Richard went across the room to play as the Salamanders, and Dan took control of my Khorne Marines. Keeping things simple with the mission made it easy to pick up a new army, since the only goal was to kill your opponent's force. On our table, the second turn saw a lot of killing. The Raveners came out of reserves, but suffered a mishap and ended up burrowing from the ground at their own board edge. The Genestealers made quick work of the Shining Spears, the Hormagaunts tore into the Fire Dragons, and the Swarmlord leeched life from the Howling Banshees right before he charged into them and finished them off. In return, I sent the Avatar forward to get into a Monstrous-Creature-on-Monstrous-Creature fight with the Swarmlord, but my dice betrayed me. Two bonesaber hits later, the Avatar fell. Meanwhile, the Harlequins managed to go toe-to-toe with the Warriors and survive, at least for a little while.

On the next turn, we switched again, and now I was in the 'Nid's spot, facing off against Dan again. The Swarmlord once again tried to leech life, this time from the Jetbiker Guardian squad, but couldn't manage to land a hit. Instead, the Raveners made good use of their beastly speed to assault the jetbikers, devouring them in one turn. The Warriors managed to finish off the Harlequins, but were down to half their former numbers, and the Genestealers, stranded across the length of the table, began the steady slog to get into assault range of anything. The last Fire Dragon fell against the Hormagaunts as well. However, the Eldar began to strike back in seriousness. Bladestorming Dire Avengers cut down the Hormagaunts, and the Swarmlord fell to Pathfinder fire, including 3(!) AP1 sniper hits. The Fire Prism took fire as it could, picking off some of the Genestealers.

Turn four saw me in the Salamanders position, fighting against my own Khorne army (now in Dennis's hands). The Ironclad and the formerly-immobilized Dreadnought (repaired by the Master of the Forge) had closed into assault with the Defiler, and all three had ended immobilized, locked in combat until one side or the other was destroyed. Fortunately, on the Chaos turn, the Ironclad slammed into the Dreadnought with a Seismic Hammer, causing it to explode and clearing line-of-sight. Across the table, Vulkan was swarmed by Chaos Terminators (his own Terminators having died the turn before), but before they could close in he and the Chaos Lord slew one another. The other Dreadnought was in the combat as well and picked off one of the remaining Chaos Terminators. With the Ironclad out of assault, it took the chance on the Loyalists's turn to open fire with its hurricane bolters at one of the Berzerker squads that had just disembarked on its way to cut down the remnants of the last Tactical Squad. By the time the smoked cleared (with extra fire from the Master of the Forge and the other MM Dread), only one Berzerker remained in that squad. Back on Vulkan's side of the table, the other Berzerkers had disembarked, ready to run at the Dreadnought.

On the fifth turn, everyone was back at their original positions, and I had to make the best of what I had left. From my original force, I still had:

• Two Rhinos
• One Land Raider
• Two Terminators
• One squad of one Berzerker
• One untouched squad of Berzerkers

I ran the whole Berzerker squad up to assault the Dreadnought attacking their Terminator brothers, and the Skull Champion's power fist made short work of the metal foe (although one Berzerker did die in the resulting explosion). The lone Berzerker on the other side of the table ran up to assault the three remaining Tactical marines, killing one with bolt pistol fire. In assault, though, all were equally matched and no wounds were struck by either side. The Land Raider pulled forward and fired on one of the remaining Dreadnoughts, but failed to damage it.

Both games ended up ending on Turn 5, and the final tallies were:

• Khorne Marines v. Salamanders: Khorne wins, 5 kill points to 3
• Eldar v. Tyranids: Tyranids win, 8 kill points to 4 (the Eldar had only the Dark Reapers and the Fire Prism remaining, while the Tyranids still had their Warriors, Raveners, and Genestealers standing)

It was a really interesting and fun night. Having to suddenly jump into a new army gives you a new perspective into how that army plays and what its strengths and weaknesses are. I also really enjoyed getting a chance to see the new 'Nids in action, both as the player and as the opponent. I'm glad I'm not facing them with my Tau; they have to be one of the fastest assault armies I've ever seen, and I don't think I could do enough damage to them before they closed in and made short work of me. In the end, a good time was had by all, and I have a feeling this won't be the last time we do this. If you get a chance to try out this sort of player shuffling, I highly recommend it; it's really fun!