Mech Eldar v2 test, and Warp Spiders

I got in a couple more tests of Mech Eldar v2.2. One round was against Jon's Guard, and the other Xardian's foot Chaos.

Vs Guard
Table Quarters, Dawn of War. (Whoops. Braindeath in memories.)

He got first turn, so...I promptly held everything in reserve. Most of it came in on round two; the rest on round three.

He was running a Manticore, a pair of two-Russ squads (one with heavy bolters, one with hull heavy flamers), some melta vets in Chimeras, Bastonne with melta-vets in a Vendetta, objective-sitter vets, and Company Command in a Chimera.

Losing all my bright lances in the space of two turns was a bit of a downer, let me tell you.

At the end of a bloody brawl, I'd thrown Yriel's Wave Serpent at the far objective and cleaned his troops mostly off it, but he'd gotten a couple of dismounted vet squads towards mine and finally slammed enough ordnance onto it, and polished 'em off with an assault.

Had it ended in turn 5, I would've eked out the win. Yriel did EXACTLY what he's meant to do; he hopped out of a Wave Serpent, moved up, drew everyone around him, and promptly detonated the Eye of Wrath. Too bad he missed one, and the Brother-Captain with a hood cut him in half with a Nemesis Force Weapon. I did manage to clear his troops off the objective, and had a Wave Serpent in position to score, except...the Brother-Captain blew it up, and the Avengers promptly pinned themselves when they spilled out the back.

Thoughts on Guard
...I hate the Manticore. It cranks out a LOT of pie. Saving Grace is that it gets four shots.

Immobilized results when Russ squads move through terrain are highly amusing when it's not your tank killing itself.

Hull Heavy Flamers on guard tanks are priceless when you need to defend yourself. My Warp Spiders survived a bit longer because of that. Infantry WILL get to your lines.

Move Move Move! cost me the game, in part, because a couple Vet squads got a guaranteed 6" run off it. Highly annoying.

the Brother-Captain is an interesting choice for the psychic hood. Cheaper, gives you a gun worth shooting and a slight surprise in assault, but is just one wound.

Versus Chaos on Foot
Xardian's army. A sorcerer w/ wings. A 10-man plague marine squad w/ fist and plasma; 3 12-man CSM squads w/ Fist, Chaos Glory (1 w/ 2x flamers, 2 w/ 2x melta). 10-man Fist/Lascannon/GLory babysitters. Daemons, and 2 4-man termie squads (3x combi-plas, one fist/heavy flamer). Havocs w/ 2x autocannons, 2x missile.

Table Quarters, Kill Points.

In the end, I won 3-2. He killed a unit of Fire Dragons and the Warp Spiders; I killed both Termie Squads and one of the units. He immobilized a Wave Serpent and a Falcon, but didn't finish 'em off.

I owe him a cookie, though, for trying a ballzy deep strike and not killing the termies. apparently the cookie strategem. They did immobilize a Wave Seprent, but out of the line of fire of the Havocs.

Yriel and the dead Fire Dragons get the cookie of honor. The Fire Dragons that survived the game hit the nearby termies 6 times...and killed three of them with some fierce 1's on the shooting. Yriel proceeded to move over and stab that last one in the face. Yriel proceeded to wander over to a nearby CSM squad, assault, and kill them all with the Eye of Wrath. Then he dodged lascannon fire.

The other Fire Dragons went down swinging. They claimed 3 termies with shooting, and killed the last one in assault. Apparently one of them got pissed off and slammed a meltabomb into the Termie's face. They then dropped a handful of Plague Marines.

I would've splatted the Plague Marines if they hadn't made so many #$*#ing cover saves. They apparently learned to dodge krak missile, pulse lasers, and bright lances.

Oh, and the Warp Spiders? Came in turn 2, forced a lot of wounds on the Havocs...didn't drop any heavy weapons. They proceeded to get caught in assault by Daemons and the HQ, pass a ld6 test, and then flub their hit 'n' run. Good job, guys.

On Chaos
I think when Xardian moves it over to two havoc squads, it'll be nastier. The problem his army has is range; the Havocs are it and the Termies tend to get splatted after getting one volley off.

On the Warp Spiders
Acetone and E-bay it is. Against infantry, they're not bad. They can dump scads of wounds onto them, and then get into melee.

Against vehicles, though? AP- is a big problem. S6 is decent enough vs. AV10-11, but in two rounds of shooting against the rear of a Chimera they managed to stun and shake it several times, knock off the multi-laser and immobilize it.

They would've died in game 1 had Jon chosen to fire on them much, or advance and torch 'em if he'd had hull heavy flamers on them in lieu of heavy bolters.

I want to like them; I really do. They just don't do enough for me.