Daemons>Tyranids>Daemons

By TheGravemind
 

I finally had a weekend free, and so I was able to make it up to Kokomo for some gaming. I got some games in against the new Daemons finally, and man what a wake up call. I had only played against them once before, but it was a Zone of Mortalis game, so not the best representation. I also witnessed just how much Daemons slow down the game.



With four of us there wanting to get games in, we decided to do a 2v2. Since we had brought 1750 lists, we just went with that. We rolled off for teams, and it ended up Daemons and IG vs Daemons and Nids. We rolled up Vangaurd deployment, and decided to do both Relic and Scouring. IG/daemons had first turn, and cast powers and started raining death down. Focused fire and high strength shots took down one of our DP first turn.

I was rolling hot on my tervigion spawns, getting double digits with out doubles from all three, every turn the entire game. I had about 70+ gaunts on the table every turn. This made up for my poor psychic power rolls, getting hemorage on everyone, warpspeed on tyrants, and enfeeble (the only good power) on two tervigons.

Vs my daemon ally, our daemon opponent was rolling hot, but when it game to me, his dice abandoned him. I grounded the first prince with my first salvo, and even with FNP and other stacks, firing 4 large gaunt squads whittled him down (after being enfeebled of course). I managed to ground the other Prince, so my ally daemons could assault him, putting some wounds on him.

The following turn, Hounds killed gaunts, and gaunts killed hounds, locking them in combat till Tervigons joined in to grind through. I had prepped 40+ gaunts to assault a Lord of change, but after enfeebling, he died to the grounding test (S9). My ally daemon's lost another prince to the vendetta, but was able to take it down the following turn with shooting in the back.

I mostly ignored the IG the first two turns, the russes put a few wounds spread out on my big guys, while also killing some gaunts (allowing me to spawn more as I had ran out). Daemons were able to take down some of the tanks, Leaving a more manageable amount for my tyrants to mop up.

The real kicker game when Doom finally showed up, Landing in between most of the daemons that were in combat with me. I had all three tervigons down to 1 wound left, and was expecting to lose at least 2 in combat. Doom killed two princes, 4 hounds, and some plaguelings, freeing up my forces from combat.

By the bottom of 4 we called it, my ymgarl were about to show up and assault their back forces, There were only a few daemon squads left from either side, and I was sitting on the 4, 2, and 1, Contesting all of theirs, and grabbing the relic. With nothing by gaunts dead, Tyranids claimed the biomass that game. With the help of some good enfeebles, and Daemon bullet shields, the game was won. Rolling up warpstorm during both shooting phases really slows down the game though.

My second game against Daemons that day was against Dodger's army. He moved away and helps run the Indy Open, so I haven't had a chance to play against him in a while, and was interested in seeing how he was running Daemons. This game went completely different, as I struggled to hold back the tide of daemons assaulting me. Didn't help I crapped out on gaunts on the first round, and he got some lucky 6s when needed, but that only hasted my doom, not caused it. I was ill prepared for what he brought to the table. So many stacking abilities and combos, and just a much more impressive stat-line.

Overall I still struggle against some daemon lists, and can easily handle others. The fact that most of their good units have +3 to their stats compared to Nids, and cost 100 points cheaper just really breaks it. With their new powers, it is harder to keep screens alive to protect the big guys. We have to rely more on our short range volume of fire and some lucky powers to pull out the battle.