RockCon Report Part 6 - Game 5 Battle Report: Iron Warriors Vs. Eldar

This was the 5th and final game of my RockCon weekend and it was a fitting end.  I was playing against a good friend of mine and someone who I have had good games against before.  We decided to go a bit bigger with this game doing 3,000 points and 2 force orgs.  I also took Guard Allies.

I decided to go more foot heavy and I took off the Warpflame Gargoyles because I thought they had been a bit lackluster in previous games.

Here is a picture of the army I fielded.  Unfortunately it is a bit blurry.  I think I may need to invest in a new digital camera.

I also took a bigger, beefier HQ choice.  I took the overall commander of my Iron Warriors, Lord Boroth.
It was a study in contrasts, with Boroth being 227 points. And the second Lord being only 115 points.

As his weaker sidekick I gave him a lesser lord to command the second detachment of Iron Warriors in this game.  A model I made a long time ago and never came up with a name for.

I also took the opportunity to take some closer pictures of my army for this game:

Here is my army list:

HQ -
Lord Boroth - terminator armor, sigil of corruption, chainfist, burning brand of skalathrax, mark of tzeentch, gift of mutation, combat familiar.

Chaos Lord - murder sword, aura of dark glory.

Company Command squad with lascannon

Elites -
Helbrute - twin-linked lascannon and missile launcher

Helbrute - missile launcher

Troops -
9 marines autocannon and plasma gun
1 champion with melta bombs


9 marines autocannon and plasma gun
1 champion with melta bombs


9 marines missile launcher and flamer
1 champion with melta bombs
in rhino with havoc launcher


9 marines missile launcher and flamer
1 champion with melta bombs
in rhino with havoc launcher


9 marines missile launcher and melta gun
1 champion with powerfist


9 marines missile launcher and melta gun
1 champion with powerfist

Imperial Guard veterans - lascannon and meltagun

Heavy Support -
Predator - autocannon and 2 lascannons

Predator - autocannon and 2 lascannons

Predator - twin-linked lascannon and 2 heavy bolters

9 Havocs with 4 autocannons
1 champion

9 Havocs with 4 lascannons
1 champion

3 Obliterators

Leman Russ Squadron - One with Battlecannon and heavy bolter sponsons, one with Exterminator Autocannon and 2 heavy bolter sponsons

I had 100 infantry models in this game and 39 heavy weapons.  I thought that sounded good on paper.

His list was approximately:

HQ -
Eldrad

Autarch

Elites -
Fire Dragons

Warp Spiders

Troops -
about 15 Guardians with bright lance


about 15 Guardians with bright lance

10 dire avengers in Wave serpent

10 dire avengers in Wave serpent

10 dire avengers in Wave serpent

Eldar Rangers

Eldar Rangers

Heavy Support - 

Falcon Grav Tank

Fire Prism

Fire Prism

WraithLord

WraithLord

We decided to roll randomly for the mission again.  We ended up with the Big Guns Never Tire and the Vanguard Strike Deployment.

Here are some pictures of our deployment.

We rolled 3 objectives and I set one in the barn and deployed a squad of marines on it.  This objective turned out to be Skyfire Nexus, which in this game with no flyers meant there would be benefit for me holding it.

He placed one in his deployment zone and placed a squad of Guardians on it.  This one was Scatterfield which would give his guardians a +1 cover save.  With a warlock in the squad and Eldrad casting powers, this squad would nigh invulnerable in the game.  They had a 4+ rerollable cover save from start to finish in this game.

We placed one in the middle as well as you can see with this overall shot of the battlefield.

Here is his final deployment.

He won first turn and began moving up the field to get his guns into range.

The Eldar begin firing on turn one and eliminate every tank of mine within their range.

Starting with a Rhino.

Then they blow up a Predator.

Before the game Boroth had deployed together with the Obliterators in the center of my deployment.  I thought It'd be a good idea.  The Fire Prisms spotted this squad and opened up on it.  When the dust settled and after a lot of successful look out sir and invulnerable save rolls, all three Obliterators were gone and Boroth was standing there alone.

My turn One I began moving.  I slowly began advancing some of my marine squads into midfield, knowing eventually I would need to take the central objective to win, since he already got first blood.  Lord Boroth joins a different marine squad but wisely stays in the rear of the squad so he won't have to make a billion look out sir rolls like he did in the previous Eldar shooting phase.

I start shooting and blew up a Falcon, forcing the Fire Dragons to disembark.  The Wave Serpent next to it I blast off a hull point and immobilize it.  The Wraithlords are also a focus of the Iron Warriors heavy weapons, slowly stripping off wounds.

The Eldar start shifting around and continue firing, killing a few marines here and there and stripping off hull points from a few of my vehicles.  His Fire Dragons move behind the back building.

The next turn, my Infantry continues to move forward into the guns of the Eldar.  To make sure they don't get tarpitted by a Wraithlord, I focus all of my fire onto them and kill them both.

My lascannon Havocs open up and strip off a hull point and immobilize the flanking Wave Serpent, forcing my opponent to disembark his Dire Avengers so they are ready to open up on my lines.

At this point the Warp Spiders drop in with the Autarch attached to them.  They open up on the squad of marines with Boroth in them.  His Wave Serpent on my left flank then also disembarks a squad of Dire Avengers.

The Warp Spiders open up along with the Dire Avengers on the squad of marines with Boroth in them.  The other squad of marines on the other side of the bunker also get thinned downed by fire from the Eldar.  The Warp Spiders then jump back behind the bunker, thinking they are safe from my fire.

The next turn Boroth and his squad moves up and he unleashes hell of the Warp Spiders with his Burning Brand and kills em all.  

I also continue firing, blowing up two Wave Serpents and a whole squad of Dire Avengers.

In response his Autarch moves up to charge Boroth in his turn.  The objective is revealed as well, showing that it will now possibly explode every turn.

He continues to fire on my left flank and blows up another Predator and Helbrute.  He moves in close to my rhino with a Wave Serpent as well.

He then blasts away a squad down to its Champion who then falls back.

The Fire Dragons move up and fire away at Boroth's Squad to try and whittle them down before the Autarch's charge.  

The Autarch charges, challenging Boroth to a duel.  Boroth smiles inside his helmet and accepts.  With blades whirling, the Autarch attacks.  Boroth shrugs off most of his attacks, taking one wound but dealing out several.  His chainfist slices through the Autarch and ends the fight.  With the Autarch's remains glistening on Boroth's chainfist and combat blades, he screams into the air the gods of chaos smiling down on him, and Boroth's boon is nothing of note.

While the Chaos Marines had continued moving up, the Eldar begin moving to counter.

The Eldar move up and exact retribution on Boroth, his remaining marine bodyguard, and several other squads of Iron Warriors.

The next turn, Several squads of Marines move forward and re capture the central objective.  The game ends.

The Eldar Guardian squad ends the game holding their objective that they had since turn one.

The two marine squads in the middle hold the central objective.

And the marine squad in the barn at the back holds theirs as well.

At the End of the game, the Iron Warriors hold 2 objectives for 6 points plus 4 heavy supports destroyed for a total of 10 points.  The Eldar hold one objective and got first blood and slay the warlord and three heavy support destroyed for a total of 8 points.

The Iron Warriors win a close one.  

I didn't miss the Warpflame Gargoyles and the weaker lord I took did nothing.  Boroth proved to be a resilient beast, which I was hoping for.  He only died because a bunch of Fire Dragons shot the piss out of him.

Overall a cool game.  I think I overwhelmed him with the amount of infantry in my list.  This potentially shows the theory that infantry is good, but I am not sold that only infantry is good.  Tanks, in particular long-range fire battle tanks are still darn good.  And rhinos are ok, but not horrible.

Well, that wraps up my battle reports for RockCon, my next post will be my thoughts on the codex and how these games have helped inform me on what I think will work in my army and what things I want to do with it in the future.