The second battle I played during the Lyon 2009 Tournament, this time I'm facing the Ouhm's Saim-Hann Eldar army:
4000 points Eldar List:Avatar
Saim-Hann Wind-Riders Host
Doomweavers Battery
Doomweavers Battery
Nightwings Squadron
Defender Detachment (6 socles de gardiens et 3 falcons) 300 points (point de rupture : 5 ; points de victoire : 3)
Firestorm AA
Defender Host
Revenant scout Titans Detachment
Unicorn Detachment
Unicorn Detachment
Guardian host
Vampire
Vampire
Vampire
4000 Points Squat ArmyGuild Biker Company
Goliath Company
Warrior BrotherHood
Colossus
Colossus
Overlord
Overlord
Thunderfire
Observation Balloons
Tarentulas
Rhinos
Termite detachment
Terrain:
On the paper, I consider the eldar list not that great. Lots of weak guardians (but their falcon are a pain when hidden behing a cover and popuping all the game), Revenants are a pain with their holofield, hard to-hit on charge and their small template). I never faced unicorns but I know they could hurt my Colossus with their attack that ignore shields. Off course, there are some doom-weavers, that can be as devastating as ineffective. My main problem is the number of jetbikes, vypers and guardian stands. 3 vampires and 3 nightwings, that'sa lot of flyers for only 1 thunderfire detachment but I hope my thunderers and overlord will be able to destroy them. I'm confident on my army list. Another problem I'm facing: I can't pin the jetbikes/vypers with my bikes so I'll never be able to prevent them from reaching my artillery in 2nd turn.
Deployment:
I placed my forces quite the same as facing chaos:
Eldar deployment:
Turn 1:
Termite detachment stay underground.
Nightwings detachment charge an observation ballon, Thunderfire remove a flyer on snap fire. I did not suspect anything until an empty vampire (my opponent did not place guardians detachement inside the vampires) charge another observation balloon. My opponent has decided to charge my 4 observation balloons with all his fliers! Without my observation balloons, my artillery will not be able to bombard eldar artillery. I snap fire other fliers before they can reach my floaters and a lot of firepower is directed to the air. Eldar jetbikes charge quite everywhere on the table, a bike detachment charge on the left flanck and is charge by 2 motojets detachment, 10 Mj Vs 8 squat bikes, I should be able do win the CC as my CC factor is +4 vs +3 for mj but at this time, I did not thought that my bikes could be charged by guardians in falcons! Guardians charged them and now, the CC will be a real pain for me. On my right flank, Squat warriors charge in the forest to get an objective. Berserkers in rhinos charge the forest in the middle of the table to capture another objective, guardians in falcon enter the forest. Vypers charge on my left flank into ruins just in front of my thunderers.
First fire phase: Colossus on the right remove Unicorns from the table and destroy few falcons. My Goliath cannons, can see the revenant titans on my right flank, they all miss the target except one that manage to destroy a revenant wing. Overlord on the left shot a the revenant and hardly manage to hit it(lot of shots deviation on the titan template) but finally, the titan is hit and destroyed. Globally, my artillery xas ineffective but Eldar Doomweavers were terrible, the always hit something, did not deviate and my thunderer and termite detachments suffered a lot of casualties.
CC phase: at 3 versus 1, my bikes could not do anything. My opponent always used first its guardians in CC, granting bonus dice for vypers. My bikes are destroyed.
Turn 1 End phase: I'm leading at VP (do not remember the exact count) but my fast forces have been really reduced (only few bikes left), Eldar jetbikes are close to my deployment zone and I do not have enough troops to prevent them from charging my artillery...
Turn 2:
Compulsary move: Termite detachment exit on the eldar right flank, just over the objective in the eldar deployment zone. Guardians try to snap fire but miss their shots.
As expected, jet bikes charge my artillery, I can't stop them with the few trikes that were placed to pretect it. On my right flank, surviving overlord advance to be able to shot at the guardians close to objective on the eldar left flank. A Colossus recon gyrocopter charge and hide behind this objective hill. On my left flank, vypers stay in the ruins and consolidate the objective capture. In the forest in the middle of the table, guardians charge my squat berserkers and their rhinos. With the Eldar avatar entering in CC, I won't be able to keep this objective.
Overlord on my right flank that should clean the Eldar objective is engaged by nightwings but point defense are effective and wipe out eldar fliers.
Fire Fire: Colossus destroy as much falcons and guardians as possible, both Defenders Host and Guardians host are broken but do not fall back. Some motojets moving to close to Colossus are hit but point defense.
FF turn: one more time Eldar doomweavers are terrible and kill more squat troops! Overlord on my left flank is hit by Revenant Pulse lasers and is removed while the Overlord on my right flank dodge Firestorm AA fire. This overlord clean the objective on the right and no more guardians are alive on this hill, my recon gyrocopter can capture it safely. My artillery not engaged in CC is still ineffective...
CC Phase: Termite detachment easily win the CC versus guardians, this objective is mine! In the forest, squat berserkers are wiped out. I managed to kill few jet bikes awarding me the Wind Host Riders company VP.
Advance Fire: No many things happened
End Phase: I only have 3 objectives while my opponents has 5. We both reached the victory conditions and this battle is a tie but I was really close to a defeat. My colossus are still in good shape but heavy suppot in my table deployment zone are in really bad position with the jetbikes everywhere.
This was an interesting battle, Eldar strategy was really good, guardians are weak but when they grant a bonus in CC to a better unit, that's a good sacrifice
At the end of first turn, I was worrying, I thought I would have lost the battle.
I'll post tomorrow the batrep of my last battle in the tournament a 5K battle facing orks
