RTT game 3 2k vs. Grey Knights with allies

MONKEYS!


Anyways, I find myself in round 3 of an RTT this saturday, on the top table taking my Tyranids against my Nemesis, the Grey Knight Henchmen spam.

I don't have a copy of his list, but it is roughly as follows:

Coteaz (warlord)
10 Strike GK in a rhino
3 henchmen with plas in a Psyback
3 melta henchmen in a psyback
5 man henchmen squad, (3 Jokaero) plus Coteaz in a Chimera
3 Psyfleman dreads
Vindicare

Primaris Psyker and 10 plasmavets in a chimera
10 melta vets in a Vendetta
Manticore

Mission: Dawn of War, Kill points (Crap!) and theres something special where the ENTIRE GAME is Night Fight! Holy bleep!

Psychic Powers:

Swarmy: Hallucination, Dominate, Haemorrhage, Warp Speed
Flyrant: Enfeeble, Endurance
Tervigon 1: Iron Arm, Warp Speed, Shockwave
Tervigon 2: Enfeeble, Life Leech, Iron Arm

I have and take first turn.

A note on the game:  My opponent informed me that "the Aegis" on his dreadnoughts reduces the Ld. by 4 when I target a unit within 12", including my own units. I check later and this is not true. However, this may have just been a mistake by my opponent, not cheating. Either way, mid to late game I start failing Psychic checks a lot. That's why.

Pre Game thoughts: Well, I'm not really sure how this will go down.  On the one hand, I'm playing against a cheesy army optimized purely for shooting. Normally I can deal with this, but it's Kill Points, the bane of my army. Normally I can deal with Kill Points, against a balanced list... this is a bad, bad combination for me. Night Fight could be my saving grace though. However, I then discover he has Searchlights on EVERYTHING. Woopsie. Through out the whole game, he basically targets a unit for no damage with a transport and then lights it up for the rest of his army. So Night Fight wont help me too much. I'm basically going to have to go right at him across open ground and hope I can get enough points to scrape a win...

Deployment Nids: Everything is in a broad deployment as far up as possible. The three MCs anchor the middle, and the Flyrant is on the far right out of most LoS. The gants are too easy kill points, I drop them in reserve, as well as the Ymgarls, who will come in a fortress looking thing in the top left. Most of my army is on cover from Ruins, plus Night Fight (note that I hadnt realized he had searchlights yet. It was on his list, I just kinda missed it.)

Deployment GK: His vehicles make a wall of pain. With ruins to the side of the Wall, I'll have to Zerg rush him sadly. Two dreads are on the fortress and one is behind the vehicle wall. The Manticore is behind the fortress, and the Vendetta is reserved. (Note that Coteaz is on the left of the Chimera/rhino wall. The vehicles are in a slight curve, (left to Right) first the two chimeras, then the Psybacks, then the Strike Rhino.

Tyranids turn one: Everything charges forward, with Psychic powers and running all over. Hive Guard blast away, I score two hull point off the not-coteaz chimera and I believe wreck the far left Psyback. First Blood, and I'm up a point.

Nids: 1 GK: 0

GK turn 1: Little movement: His shooting is surprisingly ineffective. His  Strikes move up and disembark by the Hormies, and blast away. First though, he shoots a Storm Bolter off the rhino at them and I'm suddenly looking at no cover. I lose over half the brood, but am still fearless. I lose a Hive Guard brood somewhere in there, and wounds on some MCs.

Nids: 1 GK: 1

Nids turn 2: Again, I advance while hugging cover. This puts me aiming slightly at the left side of his wall. Hormagaunts charge the Strike Knights, and we both lose several models. The Ymgarls fail to come in. Gants come in my back left corner, away from the fighting. They have no more effect on this game. Hive Guard whiff and I only get two Hull points off the strike squads rhino. The swarmlord Hallucinates the Strike squad, but it doesnt matter as theryre only pinned. The Flyrant roars up the side and finishes the job of wrecking the damaged chimera. I position one Tervigon to take the brunt of shooting and shield the others. She fails her psychic check for Iron Arm. Shit.

Nids: 2 GK: 1

GK turn 2: He opens up on my lines. Wounds all over, and I lose my other brood of Hive Guard to mass Psyfleman fire. The Tervigon I offered out as bait takes a lot of wounds but is a lot. His manticore drops the bomb on the swarmlord and a Tervi and I somehow roll two ones for my pair of  2+ cover saves. yay. In assault the Hormys and Strikes grind on, but I'm losing combat. Other shooting and the Flyrant drops on his first tes, at this point he eats plasma and dies.

Nids: 2 GK: 3

Nids turn 3: I advance more. The Tervigon whos wounded charges at the Strikes rhino but is short of the charge. (fails Warp Speed) The other Tervigon and Swarmy will be in charge range next turn but are now in cover. I hallucinate the Strikes, only for it be pinned again. (No effect on CC.) Ymgarls come in and trash the Manticore, but I lose the Hormagaunts in CC. The other Hormagaunts are advancing up the left to hit the side of the chimera wall.

Nids 3: GK: 4

GK turn 3: The coteaz chimera rumbles forward and the jokaeros switch to their Heavy flamer fingers. The Hormagaunts are cut down to 3 models in a firey hell. The plasma henchmen disembark and slay the Tervigon on the right, while the Strike squad does nothing. More fire pours in, and a psyflenaught kills a few Ymgarls, I go to ground there. At this point the Swarmy and Tervigon have 3 wounds each, and I have a few scattered Hormagaunts and two broods well in my backfield.

Nids: 3 GK: 5

Nids turn 4: Again, I advance. The Swarmlord charges the plasma vet squad and murders them (I think there's a Primaris here?), but he's in the open a bit too much, even though he's in cover. The three Hormagaunts run intio his deployment zone and way, way sideways. I get Iron Arm on the Tervigon and spawn 16 models, but Im out. The gants kill a guy off one of the 3 man henchmen squads (I only had LoS to one) and then they fall back. They roll enough to reach the board, but there are models directly in the way, and the movement around leaves them a centimeter short of death. Crap. The Tervigon fails her charge on the Chimera.

Nids: 5 GK: 5

GK turn 4: The Vendetta drops in, and shoots a wound off the Tervi. More fire drops the Swarmlord and his guard, and the Psyflemen drop the Ymgarls. Finally, those damn Jokaero flame the gants I spawned and murder them.

Nids: 5 GK: 9

Nids turn 5: I've lost and I know it, but I charge run at Coteaz' chimera anyway. My rogue Tervigon is the only thing alive and capable of doing anything at this point. Her cluster spines somehow explode Coteaz's Chimera and I charge. I issue a challenge to the Inquisitor, and kill him of course, but due to a failed Iron Arm (cough Dreadnaughts cough) he wounds the Tervigon once with a four and somehow passes his Psychic check, blowing her up.

Nids: 7 GK: 10

Gay Knights turn 5: He moves his Strike squad and runs enough to get them into my deployment zone for Line Breaker.

End Game: GREY KNIGHT VICTORY!

Ow... ow... That was bad. The final score looked close, but frankly he kicked the shit out of me. Ah well, it had to happen. As my first loss of 6th, that was brutal, and easily the most competetive list Ive played against. Although the Secondary objectives didn't determine who won, even if they had he would have won. This was a bad match up, but he really handed me my stuff. Even without that "Aegis" mistake on the dreads, it may have been a little closer, but Id have lost. If it was closer he could have targetted the gants and killed them for extra points.

I got all three secondary for the third time today, and got 6 points as a reward. (They were pointed differently as per the mission) I ended up with 6 points from the bonuses, for a total of 34 on the day.

Final look at the RTT: I came in 3rd, in a close finish. The winner was the GK player, who had 36 points, (2 wins one draw) and in second, at 35 points, was Necrons (also 2 wins one draw) My 34 points actually made me very close to doing better than my record, as 2 wins and one loss, which surprised me. I put my earnings into immediate purchases, and I picked up a Rhino and a can of Spray paint. I put these to good use and on Monday and I painted the rhino and one of my Tervigons, finally!