Ven's Necrons at Caledonian Part 2

Following on from this post where you can find games 1 - 3. So second day and 3 more games, 2 wicked, 1 made 'meh' by a single moment of stupidity from the dude I was playing.

Continue for Games 4 - 6

Game 4 Rob Simms - Necrons
Almost a mirror match, except Rob had gone for a ghost ark and added quite a few more Harbingers of Destruction (6 compared to my 3) which he paired off into teams of 2 into his Warriors.. I did like the Ghost Ark mini Missile team, but still think it is far too many points and simply inefficient.
Mission was objectives with KP as secondary and Deployment was Dawn of War.
I used my Veil squads to deploy left, drawing some of his units over to the right hand side of the table, but T2 having seen where he deployed I was able to teleport away and put some serious hurt on his far left flank.
I focussed my force on just the left and central element of his force, and had done using the mobility of all my army to remove a portion of his army from the game for at least two turns.
I tarpitted his Scarabs with Immortals - scarabs suck vs infantry in large groups..unless said Scarabs are in MASSIVE groups.. hitting on 4's and wounding on 5's with a 3+ save and 5+ RP is not cool. Don't do it people.
Rob learnt his lesson well when I counter charged all my Scarabs into his, cleared out the unit, pinned lords, busted barges and generally raped him.
This almost-mirror match came down to judging distances and actually having sound tactical and strategic options, which quite frankly, he didn't have..relying on the strength of the list to carry him through..in this case.
Venerable Victory.
Next.
No, this was may not seem a fair write up, the displayed a distinct lack of class during the game, so I fucked him.
He then went down the tables, got 2 wins and finished higher than me :(
Game 5 Rich Grint - Imperial guard
Beautiful man, lovely game.
Shame I ate him with Scarabs.
He did toast a lot with Heavy Flamers..
Mechanised IG is a very, very scary prospect facing you from across the board.
I am lucky that I am familiar enough with them having played them a lot at tournaments and that I have rigourously playtested with Bringer leading up to this event, so I am ready for Mech IG should I draw them.
I was chilled out going into this game having returned from a lovely, hot lunch from Maelstrom. Rich put be at ease throughout the game by being a cool dude and a competitive player.
It was a good game, a tight game and whilst I felt in control for some extended periods of the game, there were others I was worried.. and in the end Primary was won by me, or rather the survivors of a Necron squad on the central objective, shielded by a ruined Chimera. Said survivors numbered 1.
Yup, I shitty warrior claimed me Primary.
Draw bore was Secondary, so surprisingly we drew Secondary.
VPs went to me, but if I recall correctly, not by that much.
Fun, tough game. Nothing spectacular to report, standard competitive game.. except that I have been using Searchlights wrongly for some time! I thought they were used instead of a weapon. But as I now understand it, a vehicle equipped with them just needs to see using night fight and the target unit is automagically lit up for other units... Rich used this on his Vendetta's to get his Hydra's into the fight to great effect. A far more efficient use of resources.

Game 6 - BJ Mason - Space Wolves
Table 3 for final game. Hanging with the big dogs! BJ was running a Logan Space Wolves list, but well designed and atypical for Logan. I liked it.
BJ went first and depolyed spread across the board with a concentration of Long Fangs to the far right of the board, Logan with a unit of 6 in the centre. I deployed looking very spread across the table with barges and Annihilation barges, Scarabs on the my left and Immortals and 2 Scarab groups on the right. The idea was to draw BJ across to them and use thier superior mobility to move away and rape another element of the Wolf army.
He bombed forward with 3 rhinos, one on the left and 2 on the right - seemingly falling for my deployment trap.
I lost one Scarab from the two right hand groups to Long Fang fire.
My one I lashed out with the Scarabs and demeched the 2 right hand rhinos and with the left Scarabs I demeched the left rhino. I then used the barges to punk the 9 man unit in the let rhino, leaving just a dude or two.
I used one group of Immortals to teleport into rapid fire range on his hidden LasPlas razor in the back left of the board, but one group went back into reserve (shit, almost died!) and the other scattered, but could still get most weapons in range. They were assaulted next turn, but held them off until finally killing them and veiling away.
From this point I felt very much in control of the game, I had another turn of Night Fight and had all the mobility.
His trooops were well away from me, which meant the 8 man Combi Plasma (!!!!!) Wolf Guard unit, Rune Priest, 9 man GH squad and 2 Long Fang packs were out of the game for a turn...they killed off the Scarabs. So we leveled on KP's..but I felt that I had the advantage from here on in. I had mobility and I thought I had dealt a critical blow.
I think from here I allowed myself to get complacent. I take nothing away from BJ, who was clearly a top player and a class act, he played the game right and managed to get all of his squads into position and effectively employed.
But I think I should have really stayed focussed on the mission and forgone a couple of turns overall of shooting just to get the advantage in the late game. It is easy to state during hindsight, but I definately could have won that one if I had kept my distance, used terrain (there were two large blocking pieces I could have used to my advantage) in a more savvy fashion.
I let Logan get stuck in and frankly, that was that.. it was the only and first time I ever wanted Wraiths..
Great game, top player, class act and rightful winner - well done BJ.
I will have my revenge one day!!!! (maybe)

Overall thoughts and conclusions:
So that was that. I ended up in 11th position overall. I am thrilled with this, a cracking start to the year and quite frankly, an excellent showcase for my Necrons.
They performed outstandingly and really threw down with the big dogs.. There is very little I would change..except for Destruction Crypteks..I am really not bothered by them now, I will keep 2 in there for Solar Pulses..becuase by God, that is so good and so reliable. The difference it makes is unreal. But as for plinking away with a shot here and there..meh, stay back at the Court boys, I'll keep my Veil.
BJ Mason was kind enough to comment that the dual Veil Immortals with Gauss was the best use of them he had seen, I heard through the grapevine that Rich had commented on the use of Immortals and I know that they performed exceptionally throughout the tournament.. I can only longingly imagine the impact the second group would have had in Game 3 vs Alex West where they mishapped to death for the first time.. without my usual weight of anti infantry, I just couldnt kill all his in-my-face threats AND his final trooper...ah well, this is the risk of running that unit and I am so, so glad that's how I roll..
Warriors - yeah, they can stay in 5 man squads and stay in reserve.. until the Night Scythe kit comes out then they can make that scoring without worrying about dying.. I really wish that kit was out now..
I am now in the process of preparing my (late) list for Jolly Toys Outing. It's at 2K and I really wish I had access to the Night Scythe kit..it expands on my highly mobile Necrons so much and adds 2 - 3 (realistically) more Tesla Destructors (TL)..
Annihilation Barges are still awesoem if a little slow, positioning during deployemnt and under the cover of Night turn 1 is critical to getting the most from them.
Overlord Barges are superb. Still love them. Fly bys followed by the fast barge gunning something down, followed by a charge into a third unit is just sublime..
Anrakyr can add to this wonderfully, using his mind in the machine ability, fly bys, Barge itself, Tacyhon arrow and charge to great effect.
Mind in the Machine I find to be very situational. If the appropriate tank is not in the right position, then there is little he can do to access it. However, when it works, damn it can work..He clocks in at 245 on a Barge compared to an Overlord (Shackles, Warscythe and Weave) at 210. Got to be done really.

Wicked tournament, will be back next year and look out for the Sons' at future events this year.. it's our year bitches! We are coming for you!

Well done once again to fellow Son, Atreides for 12th and of course to fellow Son, Killswitch for his 1st place victory..