TAU versus Necrons

Game: Warhammer 40,000 3rd edition
Opponent: Steve
Mission: Pitched battle
1st turn: Tau
Points: 1500

Tau

• Aun’El’Tau’M’yenEthereal
• Shas’Ui’Tau’Ho’Lu’Demlock - 2 Crisis battlesuits with plasma rifle, missile pod and multitracker
• Shas’Ui’Tau’Ho’Lu’Hemlock - 2 Crisisbattle suits, one with plasma rifle, missile pod and multitracker, the other with twin-linked plasma rifles and missile pod
  
• Shas’Ui’Tau’Kais’Mal’Coar - 5 stealthsuits
• Shas’La’Tau’Han’Dan- 9 Fire warriors, all with pulse rifles, Shas’ui
• Shas’La’Tau’Mont’Yr - 9 Fire warriors, all with pulse rifles, Shas’ui
• Shas’La’Tau’Mull’Kin’Tyr - 6 Fire warriors, all with pulse rifles, Shas’ui, Devilfish with Multi-tracker
• Murabla - 16 Kroot
• Shas’La’Tau’Tam’La’Mo’Town - 6 Pathfinders, Devilfish with decoy launchers, multi-tracker and two seeker missiles
• Kor’Vesa - 4 Gun drones
• Shas’Ui’Tau’Yu’Rang - 2 Broadsides with twin linked railguns, smart missile system and Multi-trackers
• Shas’La’Tau’Or’Es’Mont’Ka - Hammerhead with Ion Cannon, smart missile system, multitracker, blacksun filter, decoy launchers, seeker missile
  

Necrons

• Tooled up Lord with Resurrection Orb
• 12 Necron Warriors
• 12 Necron Warriors
• Monolith
• 2 Heavy Destroyers
• 3 Destroyers
• 10 Flayed Ones
• 6 Immortals
• 2 Wraiths

Background
I was eager to try out my Tau army again, now that the Battle Bunker is established and we have 6 foot tables to play on. I had constantly moaned about playing on 4 foot boards with my Tau, so it was time to put up and shut up!

I pretty much included everything I had to take my army up to 1500 points. I would have loved to include more Broadsides and more Firewarriors but I haven't painted them yet. Instead I had a sturdy, quite mobile list with a Hammerhead and two Devilfish, and lots of 'suits and drones.

In particular, I wanted to use the pathfinders as I was playing a larger game and their long range with the markerlights would come into play.

Terrain and Deployment
The board was quite sparse with a tall ruined building on my right, a stone circle in my centre and a ruined building on my left. There was a largish wood in the centre of the board, near the Necron deployment zone where I suspected most of the Necrons would hide behind.

I placed the Hammerhead front and forward to push back the Necron deployment and then put the Broadsides and Firewarriors in the centre, behind the rocks. It wasn't an ideal vantage point as we had already said that we couldn't shoot over or right through the stones but I controlled two long fire corridors to the left and right diagonals.

My Pathfinders deployed on my right and rushed forward to take the tall building. They wouldn't be in position until turn 2 even with their free move, but they would be in cover with excellent vantage points and be virtually guaranteed to be away from enemy assaults. The devilfish hung around behind the building, waiting for a chance to fire the seeker missiles. Crisis squad Demlock also hid behind the building.

The Necrons basically refused this flank, with only the Immortals able to threaten it. The bulk of the Necrons were behind the woods as I suspected, but Steve surprised me by putting both Warrior units out wide on my left flank. I hid the empty Devilfish from Squad Mull’Kin’Tyr, Crisis squad Hemlock and the Stealth team behind the ruined building to oppose them.

Kroot squad Murabla infiltrated forward, beyond the stone circle and near the wood. Finally, the drone squad Kor'vesa was to deep strike.

The Game
I won first turn and zoomed back with the Hammerhead, out of range of most of the Necron weapons. My objective on this flank was to kill the Immortals but after some poor rolls I only killed two, and one of those got back up. In the next turn Crisis squad Demlock, deep striking drone squad Kor'vesa and the Pathfinders joined in, and the result was the Immortals were wiped out.

The Monolith was the next closest model to my forces turning this flank and they couldn't hurt it. None of the Necrons dared move out to the flank so I had effectively captured these two table quarters by turn two.

My Kroot ran forward into the forest, close to the Monolith. I was completely unprepared for the charge by the Flayed Ones who teleported from miles behind the Monolith and straight out of the door to charge at the Kroot. The Necron Lord was leading the unit and the Kroot were duly butchered. Everyone swept forward into my Firewarrior squad Mull’Kin’Tyr, who I had cunningly placed proud of the firebase to receive charges.

Over the next two turns I shot everything I had at the Flayed Ones and killed them all. Unfortunately for me the Lord survived and killed Firewarrior squad Mull’Kin’Tyr, Firewarrior squad Shas’La’Tau’Mont’Yr, and the Broadsides. It took him a while to chew through everything though, and by then the game was over.

My Broadsides did poorly in this game. On turn one I missed with both shots, despite being twin-linked. On turn two I hit twice but rolled 2 ones to wound. On turn three I hit the Monolith twice as it pushed through the Stone Circle and immobilised it, but Steve had already rolled a one for difficult terrain so it was already immobilised. Finally they were assaulted by the Necron Lord and killed. Ho, hum.

I had one woozy moment with the Broadsides as the Monolith laid it's Ordnance blast on them. I leapt around like an idiot when it scattered 5" only to find it clip the Hammerhead and destroy it on a lucky 6. D'oh!

I was facing most of the Necron army on my left. The destroyers flitted around shooting at the Firewarrior screens until I nailed them with Crisis squad Hemlock. The heavy Destroyers ended up chasing the empty 'fish around the board and taking random pot-shots at Tau models. The Devilfish was still going at the end (minus its gun) and so were the Heavy Destroyers so they cancelled each other out.

One Necron Warrior squad made it into combat on turn six against Crisis squad Hemlock and the Stealth team but only the Stealth team ran, so that was another drawn table quarter. The other Necron squad poured through the portal but couldn't quite make it into the adjacent quarter.

Totting up the victory points the Necrons had 685 points remaining and the Tau had 600. However my units on the right had secured two table quarters for a bonus 400 points to give me an outright win.

Result: Win

Learning points

• A good, exciting game with a Tau army I hadn't played in a while. The 6 foot table makes all the difference and my Pathfinders survived the whole game unscathed.
• More Broadsides are definitely needed for a game this size. Fortunately I could use my manoeuvrability to win the game rather than just brute killing power.
• More Firewarriors would also be needed to screen more Broadsides as my screen disintegrated under fairly light and sporadic firepower. In fact my entire firebase was wiped out by the end of the game.