PFE100: Ambush at Xia ban Nyt, 28 Jan, 42,014.

“28 Jan, 42,014. Our orders stated that we were to motor march from garrison at Camp Sumpter to Cloverleaf City via the half burnt-out town of Xia ban Nyt. We were to make best possible speed as the Bugs were massing for yet another attack and the defenders at CLC were in a bad way. Battalion Intel stated that there weren’t any Tyranids within 100 klicks of our route. Battalion Intel was wrong.” Major Antonio Caesar, XO, Lions of Ishtar SMC.

Ambush at Xia ban Nyt was a 4000 points/side Epic Armageddon battle between the Tyranids, commanded by Trent, and the Space Marines, commanded by Greg & I (Britt). While I enjoy tournament games, I thought a scenario would make a nice change of pace, so I dug out my ‘Epic 40,000 Battles Book’ and played “Battle 5: Ambush” on pg 94. The situation has one player, with 2000 points, ambush the other’s 4000 points while on a road march. The ambushers other 2000 points arrive using the ‘reserves’ rule from their baseline. 1 point each was scored for *Killing more points of units *killing twice as many * holding the last 50 cm of road leading to CLC and * holding the entire road. Trent was given the choice of being ambusher or ambushee, and chose to ambush the Space Marines.

After the Nids chose their ambush point, the Lions of Ishtar set up along the road with the 1^st Section (Britt) in the lead. It was a lovely warm spring day as the SMs daydreamed about wine, women and the chance of leave when a terrible Chitinous rasping was heard drawing closer and the bio sucking sound of ‘Nid artillery. Bugs! Hundreds of ‘em. On turn one, only the Tyranids could attack. This they did, killing Land Speeders, Land Raiders, and Whirlwinds all up and down the road, & routing several units. And if the sight of all the blood, mangled bodies, and gutted vehicles wasn’t bad enough, only one leap away stood the Bio-titan and Bio War Engines. This was not going to be a good day!

It soon became a very intense struggle. No waiting around here for something to happen. In the end, Trent won having killed more points worth of units, but we made him work for it. I very much like the concept of a scenario, and as long as the other players are OK with it, I plan to do many more.

It was a lot of fun and excitement as usual. Since the ‘action’ started on turn 1, there wasn’t a lot of time for in depth planning. More acts of desperation than anything else. What a furball! Thanks guys.

Army list

Codex Astartes (NetEA Tournament Pack 2013)
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LAND SPEEDER [200]
5 Landspeeder
LAND SPEEDER [200]
5 Landspeeder
LAND SPEEDER [200]
5 Landspeeder
LAND SPEEDER [200]
5 Landspeeder
LAND RAIDER [325]
4 Land Raiders
LAND RAIDER [325]
4 Land Raiders
LAND RAIDER [375]
4 Land Raiders, Librarian
LAND RAIDER [325]
4 Land Raiders
TACTICAL [275]
6 Tacticals
TACTICAL [275]
6 Tacticals
TACTICAL [275]
6 Tacticals
TACTICAL [275]
6 Tacticals
WHIRLWIND [300]
4 Whirlwinds
WHIRLWIND [300]
4 Whirlwinds
SCOUT [150]
4 Scouts

Hive Fleet Onachus Tyranids (NetEA v10.2 *UNDER DEVELOPMENT*)
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NEXUS SWARM [930]
1 Dominatrix, 5 Trygon, 7 Termagants, 7 Hormagants
TYRANID SWARM 1 (M) [375]
Two Tyranid Warriors, 12 Termagants, Hive Tyrant
TYRANID SWARM 2 (M) [375]
Two Tyranid Warriors, 12 Termagants, Hive Tyrant
EXOCRINE SWARM (M) [325]
6 Exocrine
LICTOR SWARM [300]
6 Lictor
TYRANID SWARM 3 (M) [375]
Two Tyranid Warriors, 12 Termagants, Hive Tyrant
HIERODULE BIO-TITAN 1 (745.M41) [350]
HIERODULE BIO-TITAN 2 (745.M41) [350]
TYRANID SWARM 4 (M) [400]
2 Two Tyranid Warriors, 12 Termagants, Zoanthrope (745.M41)
TYRANID SWARM 5 (S) [225]
Two Tyranid Warriors, 6 Termagants, Zoanthrope (745.M41)

Turn 1

The following units are the reserves: HIERODULE BIO-TITAN 2, LICTOR SWARM, TYRANID SWARM 2, TYRANID SWARM 4, TYRANID SWARM 3
Tyranids move the EXOCRINE SWARM and target the end land speeder unit at the end of the column, after the smoke clears. The unit is broken and flees back down the road going around the unit that just shot it…
Tyranids then move the HIERODULE BIO-TITAN 1 moves up and it targets the whirlwind unit, so it manages to kill one whirlwind and manages to hit the land raider unit that's close by and does a kill on it with its BP attack.,
Tyranids then move the NEXUS SWARM up and shoot the land speeder in the front of the column, after the smoke clears the unit is broken and flees down the road…
Tyranids then double move TYRANID SWARM 5 down towards the one land speeder that's broken, at the back of the column. So they shoot the unit and manage to kill the lone land speeder.
Tyranids move up TYRANID SWARM 1 and do a fire fight with the Land speeder unit. this gets support from the scouts. So after the smoke clears the tyranids are the winners, but just. The tyranids rolled a double 1 and the marines rolled a 3 and a 2, so yeah kills were on their side.
Marines rally their units and remove blast markers……

Turn 2

The following units are the reserves: TYRANID SWARM 2 (didn’t make its roll at the start of the turn)
Marines go first……. about time
Marines shoot the dark green land raider unit, using sustain fire order and target the NEXUS SWARM, killing some low life bugs and putting a blast marker on them….
Marines retain the second activation and use the light green land raiders and use sustain fire order and target the NEXUS SWARM killing some low life bugs and putting a blast marker on them….
Tyranids move up the HIERODULE BIO-TITAN 1 and it targets the light green land raider unit in front of it…killing nothing, but manages to pile on blast markers on three units, from it BP attacked…..
Tyranids then do a engage move with the NEXUS SWARM and mange to engage three units, so a tactical, land raider and whirlwind unit. The marines got support from land raider and tactical unit….After lots of dice rolling the marines lose the CC and three units are wipe off the board(ouch) and the two supporting units got blast markers. the Tyranids lost two of their war engines in the unit…so received 4 blast markers….
Marines active the scout unit and shoot the TYRANID SWARM 1 and place a Blast marker on it….
Marines then do a engage action with a tactical unit and move it up to FF the HIERODULE BIO-TITAN 1 and manage to get supporting fire from a tactical, land raider and land speeder unit. After the smoke cleared there was one dead HIERODULE BIO-TITAN……
Tyranids then march move TYRANID SWARM 4, across the table to cut the marines exit off…
Tyranids then do a engage action and do a FF with three units, a scout, whirl wind and tactical…after the dice had been rolled the marines won the FF
Marines then active the land speeder unit that was way out in front and double move it back so that its been hide the NEXUS SWARM and shoots the unit claim cross fire. so two Blast markers were added….
Marine retain the activation and move the dark green land raiders up and shot the NEXUS SWARM and shoots the unit claiming cross fire again. so two Blast markers were added….Which is enough to break the unit…and flees back in to the city….
Tyranids then march move HIERODULE BIO-TITAN 2 into the city to help the fight in that sector……….
Tyranids then do a sustain fire order with the EXOCRINE SWARM and targets the scouts and manage to kill a few of them and breaks the unit, which flees into the forest that's in the corner of the board near the road(it joins the land speeder unit, that's sitting in there).
Marines try and active land speeder in the forest and fail rolling a 1 and so it stays in the forest.
Tyranids then double move TYRANID SWARM 5 down towards the whirl winds and shots, giving them a blast marker….
Tyranids retain the turn and then march move LICTOR SWARM into the city…
Marines then do a engage action with tactical unit and move it down the road to do a FF with TYRANID SWARM 5, after the smoke clears the marines win and TYRANID SWARM 5 flees down the road…..
Marines try and retain the turn and fail with the whirl wins and manages to put a blast marker on the EXOCRINE SWARM….
Tyranids then march move the TYRANID SWARM 3 into the city……
Marines try and do a marshal action with the light green land raiders and fail, so another blast marker added and so they move down the road…
Marines try and do a marshal action with the tactical unit and fail, so another blast marker added and so they move down the road…(tyranids have no more activations)
Marines try there luck again and manage to marshal the land speeders, removing two blast markers…..
Timed called, the Tyranids won.