Battle Report - 1000 Points - Tau vs. Chaos Space Marines

Last Saturday I had my first final. Afterwards, a classmate came over and I introduced him to 40k. He apparently has some old Dark Elves, though he's never played WHFB before. He also is an old school RPG'er, so he was able to pick up 40k pretty quickly.

I thought I could put together a decent map in Adobe Illustrator pretty quickly, but it took way too long. So enjoy the first and the last Illustrator BatRep map.


Armies:

Black Legion (Black/Grey) - Played by Vlad
A: 10x CSM (2x Plasma, Icon of Chaos Glory, AC w/Powerfist, Rhino)
B: 8x Havocs (4x Heavy Bolters, Icon of Chaos Glory)
C: Predator (All Lascannons)
D: Chaos Lord (Power Weapon) and 8x CSM (1x Plasma, Icon of Chaos Glory, AC w/Powerfist, Rhino)

Tau (Blue) - Played by me
A. 3x Piranha (Fusion Blaster) - Separate squadrons
B. 9x Firewarriors (Shash'ui w/Bonding Knife)
C. Hammerhead (Railgun)
D. 9x Firewarriors (Shash'ui w/Bonding Knife, Devilfish)
E. 5x Stealthsuits (1x Fusionblaster) Infiltrating
Not Shown: Shas'El Crisis Suit (Twin-linked Fusion Blasters, Shield Gen) - Deepstriking

Mission
Infiltrate, Deepstrike
Objective: Hold the Buildings - I chose not to use victory points. To win, you had to control more buildings than your opponent. To control a building you had to have a scoring unit within the building, with no enemy scoring units in the same building.

Chaos got first turn and began moving the havocs and the predator into Building 2. I advised that it would give the predator some protection (in the form of a hull down roll) and that it would make Building 2 into an impressive firebase. I also warned that it would expose the tank to return fire, and that it might get immobilised. After weighing the risks he decided to move in, and passed his dangerous terrain rolls. The predator managed to get a hull down shot at the hammerhead and got a Crew Shaken Result. The predator would probably survive the next turn.

The Rhino on the left rolled out towards the stealth suits, and dropped off the CSM's who rapid fired into the suits, killing all but one. On the right, the Rhino with the Lord dropped off its cargo outside of Building 3.

On my turn, the Firewarriors on the left slowly moved up in to Building 1. The Devilfish dropped off its Firewarriors inside Building 3 and they rapid fired into the CSM's. One marine died, but the FW's were easily in charge range the next turn. The Hammerhead moved out of LOS of anything. The middle and right Piranhas moved into the center to try to pop the predator. I figured it wouldn't happen since I was outside the 6" double penetration range. The first Piranha hit, rolled a 6 to penetrate, which he downgraded with a successful hull down roll. The result on the glancing table: 6 - Destroyed. Oops!

Next turn saw his havocs and my firewarriors in Building 1 moving into better positions. The Lord and his posse easily wiped out the Firewarriors in Building 3. He also managed to destroy the only weapon on my left Piranha, which I then hightailed out of the area to go hide behind a forest to capture or contest a building in the last turn (cheesy I know).

The next turn his havocs opened up on my firewarriors and killed all but 2. They ran and regrouped several turns later (thanks to bonding knives) but had no further impact. The Lord and his squad chilled in building 3 taking a potshot with a plasma at a Piranha in the center, to no avail. The two Piranha's and the Hammerhead sniped at the Havocs to try to get them below scoring.

Turn 4 saw the approach of the Marine squad on the left making its way to the building (barely). The Lord's squad was able to rapid fire a plasma gunner at one of the Piranha's destroying it, but getting hot in the process and killing the gunner. This turn also saw the arrival of my Crisis Suit Commander who showed up north of building 2 , and along with a Piranha and the Hammerhead brought the Havocs below scoring.

Turn 5 saw the crisis suit charge into the Havocs, whose Heavy Bolters had bounced off of the center Piranha. They were tied up for the rest of the game. The Hammerhead, the Devilfish and a bunch of drones who had left the safety of their ships sniped away at the Lord's squad, which had goten lucky with a side shot on the center Piranha and destroyed its fusion blaster.

In turn 6, the marines on the left firmly rooted themselves in Building 1. The Lord's squad in Building 3 was right at half strength, and tried to take out the Piranha, no luck. Going last, I moved the Piranha into Building 2 and the Hammer head into Building 3. At this point He had Building 1, I had Building 2 and Building 3 was contested. I opened up with everything at the Lord's squad and got the one casualty I needed to get them below half, thus giving me control of Building 3 and the game (what, you didn't think I was going to let him win, because it was his first time?).

We called it a minor victory since I only had 1 more building than he did. My own Tau, beating my CSM's left a bad taste in my mouth. Something wasn't right in the universe. I guess the boys in black only perform at their utmost for their true commander.

We both had a good time, while chilling with some beer. He picked up the game really quickly and had memorized the stats for his units in no time. He also knew what he needed to roll for various things. He said he's down for another game after finals, which would be cool. I enjoyed getting to play and will be spending this summer convincing him to start his own army.