The BA Have Finally Fallen...

Welp, i finally suffered my first defeat to the Eldar of the Caribbean yesterday, and what a sad day it was. I met my good friend and gaming partner Pariah.Stevo at the Battle Barn yesterday to 'ave a go with his newest army, the Dark Eldar. A little on the Stevo - 


I got the Stevo into the hobby of 40k after he had watched my brother and I play a few games, and his interest in the hobby coincided with the release of an entirely new army, the 3rd Ed. Necrons. So, he built up quite a formidable phalanx and marched his silent, gauss guzzling minions onto the tables and tournament scene with considerable success. I have labeled Stevo as a strictly Xenos player, as he has always had aspirations to build a marine army, yet always ends up with a new xenos army, which keeps it interesting, that way it isn't marines on marines all the time. As 4th Ed. came to a close, He began to get entranced by the coming Green Tide, and then promptly built quite a substantial Ork army, Boss Redtoof's WAAAGH!! Since the release of 5th (and the Necron Nerf) this has been his primary tournament/casual army, which looks as good as it plays. Looking to get into a new army, he almost started a Black Templar army, going as far as picking up a box or two, but then his xenos heart saw the GW leaked Dark Eldar stuff, and quickly all marine thought vaporized. The Pointy Eared Pirates had him, and there was no turning back. 


So, over the past couple weeks, Stevo and I have been running a few games out, My BA against his DE. Now this is a Stevo with a brand new codex/army playing me with a army/codex that i have been tweaking for tournament play since the BA release, quite some time ago. So Stevo was basically throwing his High School ROTC cadets into a live fire drill against Navy SEALs. But this is the way me and Stevo like to do it, as with both my Blood Angels and my Chaos when i started out with them, i consistently played against Stevo and my buddy Kyle, veteran players with their tournament Orks and Tau lists respectively. You can quickly learn the rights, wrongs, ins and outs of a list/codex by throwing down against unforgiving, powerful, and experienced armies/players. In my personal opinion, i believe that this is not only influential to list building, but it makes you a better player as well. 


Anyways, after a few crushing defeats, with the last game being a wipe by turn 5, the Steve came in to the Barn Saturday with a brand new plan. So we roll for game and setup, getting Capture & Control and Spearhead. 
He ran- (steve correct me if i'm wrong)
-Vect
-Incubi
-Haemonculus
-Raider


-2 Raiders full of warriors w/blaster and Dark Lance


-2 Wrack Squads in venoms


-1 trueborn squad w/blasters
-venom


-20x warriors w/ 2 dark lances


-3x ravagers, 2 w/ dark lances 1 w/ disintegrator cannons.


I was running the same list that i posted 2 days ago. 


Basically, I didnt have enough shots, by turn 5 he still had 2 venoms and all three ravagers alive, allowing him to move scoring units very quickly to objectives, and being able to draw me off of mine. The Spearhead setup hurt me, as the DE are so mobile it gave them free reign to run around me if i couldn't blow up the raiders, which i didn't quickly enough. Also losing one of my 2 scoring units to a deep strike mishap really hurt me as well. At the end though, Steve had a good plan, and i didn't have the shots to stop him. Which has led me to begin thinking that i need some more shooty units in my army. May go back to using predators, maybe a Baal or two, we shall see.


All in all, though it was, as always when playing Stevo, a fun game, and a challenging one. I meant to take pics, but we were pushed for time cause he had to work, but the game has definitely got me thinking about making some changes and improvements. Well, i reckon that is enough for now, till next time...