Mission: Deep Jungle
Battlefield: Long and Thin
Points: 1500 plus handicap (175 for Chaos)
In one of the longest and most enjoyable battles fought for a long time, the psychic prowess of the Eldar (11 warp charges) finally met its match in the form of Tzeentch's finest (24).
The Eldar, having misread the rules for Deep Jungle (and believing that the forces of Chaos might bring CSM tanks to contest a single objective), chose to field an army comprising armour, assault infantry and the obligatory embiked Psyker Council.
They were therefore somewhat perturbed to find out a) that there were 6 scoring objectives to contest, and b) that they were facing a Chaos Daemon army of Tzeentch.
This did not put the Eldar off their game, however - and a protracted struggle began.
The Daemons got things moving by summoning in 2 additional Pink Horror units, and despatching these plus its Screamerstar (as we shall see, a healthy antidote to the Eldar Council) to seize the objectives in the middle of the board.
The Eldar responded in predictable fashion, decimating the Pink Horrors and winning control of one of the middle objectives (whilst also scoring First Blood). Crucially, however, to take the objective, the Eldar had to advance the Council - leaving it exposed to Daemonic counter-measures.
These were duly provided. The Daemons launched an all-out assault on the Council, engaging it with a Daemon Prince (using its wings to simulate a jump Pack) and rushing the Screamerstar across the board to add weight to the fray. Although the terms of engagement initially favoured the Eldar (as the Screamerstar could only engage a small portion of its forces, dues to terrain and other units), in the desperate war of attrition that developed the Council found itself over-manned and out-psyked. While the Daemons were able to maintain a consistently strong defence, the Eldar were unable to deploy all of their usual powers - thereby leaving themselves with higher than usual saves (and only intermittent recourse to rerolls).
This war of attrition in the middle of the board dominated the game, but it did not define it. The Eldar tanks maintained a continual bombardment of the Daemon forces on the board; but the Daemons were always able to summon in replacements for the Horrors that were slain. Meanwhile, the Daemon warlord - Kairos Fateweaver - began to fly down the board, thereby allowing the Daemons to deploy summoned reserves into the heart of the Eldar position.
The Council was able to kill the Daemon Prince, but it could not make significant progress against the Screamerstar. After 4 rounds of attrition, the Eldar Council and Warlord were slain, and final phases of the battle were joined.
By this time, the Daemons had managed to eke out a small lead in points scored. Desperately, the Eldar hurled their remaining resources forward in the hope of securing a late (and typically Eldar) turnaround. Now, however, fate conspired against them.- or rather, the dice. In several crucial engagements, the Eldar either failed to land blows (one combat saw 6d6 fail to yield a single 3+ and therefore any hits on 3 Horrors; another saw 3 Horrors make 3 5++ saves). By this time, Kairos' luck had also run out (he killed himself with the third Perils rolled in the game), but he had done enough - bringing Pink Horrors into the Eldar deployment zone and freeing one of the objectives at the Eldar end of the board for other units to secure.
A final attempt by the Eldar in Turn 6 to tie the scores was repulsed, and although the game could have proceeded into another turn the Eldar graciously conceded that, with further summonings imminent, their chances had gone.
Result: Eldar conceded end of Turn 6 with the scores 25-23, but the Daemons already holding 4 objectives and with the probability of being to secure at least 3 in the final analysis.
Eldar scored First Blood, Slay the Warlord, Linbreaker
Daemons scored Slay the Warlord, Linebreaker
Comments:
As already said, this was a classic - it could have gone either way. Martin quite rightly pointed out that it may have gone some way to exploding the myth that the Eldar are unbeatable/unplayable; the Daemons certainly have the ability to 'rock the Psychic Phase' and bring in quantity to counter quality (whilst not being without the latter themselves).
It was also longer in duration than some Apocalyspse battles (or at least it felt like it!); deployment started at 10 and the game ended at 4.25. Being able to summon in 10-20 models per turn doesn't half lengthen proceedings; so too does a psychic phase where at least one side has 19+ charges every turn, and is able to replenish some lost points through further summonings. This was to some extent ameliorated by the absence of a Daemon shooting phase - but then one has to remember things like the Warp Storm and other Chaos shenanigans.
Players fighting Chaos Daemons might wish to consider agreeing before the game starts to end at Turn 5 (if they want to see home before daylight).
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