First 40k battle in ages! Fun times.

Caught with your pants down?

Last night I had the first game of Warhammer 40k that I have had in ages - I gotta say, I didn't realise just how much I missed it :) I will include a battle report below just for the hell of it. Me and a friend teamed up with marines against another mate bringing some nasty 'nids to the table.

Forces were:
Me:
2 tactical squads, pf, ml, flam
2 dreadnoughts, asscan, hf
2 razorbacks
librarian with avenger and gate of infinity.
Ally:
10 scouts (combat squadded) with sniper rifles and a heavy bolter
10 sternguard, pf
5 vanguard with power weapons lead by a chaplain all piled in a Razorback.

Nids:
3 genestealer broods with broodlords
15 Devilgaunts
Tervigon
Trygon (Jennifer)
Trygon Prime (Reginald)
2 Hiveguard
2 Hiveguard
2 Zoanthropes
1 Big thing with a cannon that I cant remember the name of.

The marines deployed pretty much along the whole of their front line, whilst the tyranids deployed with a heavy right flank, leaving the Zoanthropes and a couple of HiveGuard on the left flank.

Turn 1:
Marines: Marines went first, and ADVANCED towards the enemy... the librarian gated a squad to the flank of the bulk of the nid horde, and the firing for the round took out the Zoanthropes and a couple of genestealers.

'Nids: Nids advanced, the guards shook the Vanguard filled Razorback but the extra armour kept it going, and the Cannon-think peeled a turret off a razorback.

Turn 2: 
Marines: The librarian squad advances on the nids flank, along with the razorback. The marines opened fire with all weapons... quite pitifully. A unit of stealers was wiped out with a single volley from the Sternguard - the rest of the shots put a few holes in the units of stealers roaming the table, and a few wounds on Jennifer..

'Nids:The tervigon pooped out 9 termagants and run out of juice. The rest of the army advanced. The devilgaunts mow down a group of scouts bar the heavy bolter and the hiveguard immobilise a dreadnought. Jennifer then charges forth into the Sternguard, killing 7 of them in exchange for a power fist wound. Reginald charges into the Librarian and Tactical squad, killing 3 and taking a wound in return from the Sarge's power fist.

Turn 3:
Marines: All hell breaks loose - the marines on the tyranid light flank start to make a move to get closer to some action, the remaining Sternguard that were fleeing regrop, and the mobile dreadnought moves up to the two Trygons who are pretty much side by side. The vanguard vets and chaplain dismount and pile in with the Trygon thats fighting the librarian and that squad, and the dreadnought opts to add its firepower to the Trygon that is not in combat since 6 blokes with power weapons charging and rerolling misses is BOUND to take that Trygons 4 wounds off right?... right? The dice decide to defect at this point. The mobile Trygon loses a single wound to the fire from two dreadnoughts and the sternguard, whilst the other one takes out most of the tactical squad save for the librarian and sargeant, and the vanguard vets pile in. 22 power weapon hits on the charge. 1 wound. That is epic fail of epic proportions. :( The chaplain and sgt flee.

'Nids:The tyranids open fire again - the immobilised dreadnought gets popped, and take out the two typhoons that have been hovering about the back doing bugger all, and the squad of marines on the nid-heavy flank take multiple casualties to the Devilgaunts fire and opt to fall back rather than take on the juiced up termagaunts and the Tervigon. Jennifer charges and kills the remaining Sternguard whilst Reginald eats the squad of Vanguard vets and the chaplain. Nom. Crunchy.

Turn 4:
Marines: Things are looking grim by this point. The librarian and Sgt keep running from Reginald, popping off an ineffective bolt-pistol shot and the intact marine squad sets up a firing line in front of Reginald - if he doesnt drop - they will. The retreating marines on the other flank regroup 3" and advance on Jennifer, setting up a firing line aswell. The dreadnought positions himself to flame them both and let loose with the assault cannon. The intact squad manage to take out Reginald who had 1 wound left, the other squad fail to hurt Jennifer, but the dreadnought lands two lucky rending shots on her, blasting her Niddy Tataas off. A chance?

'Nids:The 3rd Stealer brood finally arrives from reserve - coming onto the left flank - but they forget to run, effectively nullifying them for the battle. The hiveguard blast the remaining dreadnought to oblivion, and the Devilgaunts, and Termagaunts lay into the depleated tactical squad thats now stood in the middle of the board causing them to take a moral test: The Sgt remains and opts for a strategic retreats instead of getting charged by the blob of Xenos heading his way. (forever now known as Sgt Robenus for his Benny Hill ending to the game.).

Turn 5:
Marines: There is little the space marines can do now but try to score a crucial kill point or two whilst maintaining their own. My force consists of 1 sgt, 1 turretless razorback, and a librarian accompanied by a sgt. My ally has a full tac squad, and 5 scouts. The nids force consists of 2x2 hiveguard, 14 devilgaunts, 7 termagants, 10 Genestealers, a Pooped out Tervigon and that big bastard with the cannon who has done nadda save take a razorbacks turret. We have lost about 5 more KP than the nids put on the table at this point but have not counted them up. In an epic feat of bravery - the intact tactical squad advance on a nearby unit of hiveguard whilst the librarian and sgt Gate of Infinity right beside them (to pistol them. woot.) whilst Sgt Robenus pegs it 14" along my board edge (3" regroup, 6" move 5" run) away from the zerg of nids that want to make him have their babies. One hiveguard dies to the volley of bolter fire, the other to a fist on the charge.

'Nids:The nids cant do much but advance. They advance and attempt to mow down Sgt Robenus who takes about 15 s4 shots and a s10 template to the face, and manages to save or be tough enough to take every shot without dying (I think the back Armour on my marines is stronger than the front... tailoring to my tactics?)

Turn 6:
We take this moment to tally up the points left on the table. There is nothing within charging distance in this round for either side, and the marines cannot break even even if they were to table the remaining nids so we bow down to the might of the nids, and teleport the hell out.

Awesome battle. May have only been 2k, but it took 4 hours.