40K: Chaos Space Marines vs Dark Eldar 11/7/2013

Again behind a bit with the blogs...

So I had a game of 40K last week at Games Workshop Dudley, it didn't go so well for me! Here's why:

Sometimes I have managed to win games by insisting that my opponent uses a smaller army. This worked quite well in Warhammer 7th Edition, where I would tell opponents I could only go up to 1500 points which would mean that they couldn't use their Lord choices, which in turn would cost them the game.

However, insisting that people go from using a 1500pt 40K army to the 600pt army I had ready to roll is taking the piss a little bit, especially on Thursday nights where you get all the tournament-style play going on. Normally I would avoid situations like that but I go into Games Workshop as and when I can, and this particular night I found myself in on a Thursday. My opponent, Craig, was all ready to play 1500pts, and I only had 600... so I had to cobble together an army out of 2 different armies that were both Chaos. On the plus side this was the first time my Khorne Bezerkers had got an outing. On the down side, they never had a chance...

My army consisted of the following:

• Chaos Lord w/ twin lightning claws, a jump pack and the Mark of Slaanesh
• 2 squads of 6 Chaos Space Marines w/ the Mark of Slaanesh, plasma guns and twin lightening claws, and an Icon of Slaanesh which gives them Feel No Pain
• 6 Raptors with 2 Melta Guns, a Plasma Pistol and the Mark of Slaanesh
• 2 squads of 8 Khorne Bezerkers with a Power Axe and a Plasma Pistol.

This brought me up to roughly 1100pts, which Craig matched.

Craig's army was built around Venoms; squads of 5 Whyches riding in 4 venoms which I'm sure is making many of you who know what that means shaking your heads in sympathy.

Not much to say about the battle really; it was The Emperor's Will game which means that there is one objective on each side, Craig won the game 4-1.  I was completely unprepared for fighting this kind of army, and my army was not geared towards tournament play. To my credit I lasted 4 turns before I was tabled, but with far too many shots coming from the splinter cannons on the venoms, I'm astonished I lasted that long. The Bezerkers got wiped out to a man very quickly, and the Raptors didn't even make it into the game, having Deep Striked off the board.

The one victory point I did manage to earn came from having my CSM squads shooting that Craig's Archon and his Incubi. I didn't take them out; 3+ is a tough armour save to get through, but I did take enough of them out to force a panic check which they failed. They also failed the subsequent check to rally, and the game was all over before I'd managed that.

So, what to do next time?

Well, I probably won't be playing a tournament-geared army unless I'm prepared for it, because it made me feel like a nut being cracked with a sledgehammer. But, with that army, the only thing I could have done differently is take my Khorne Lord rather than my Slaanesh one. Reason is, that would make the Khorne Bezerkers count as Troops and therefore scoring units, so on the off chance any of them were still alive by the time they got to the top of the board, they could in theory have taken the objective. As it was, they were Elite, so they didn't have that option.

Can't say I enjoyed that game too much! Got some more work to do before I try taking Craig on again.