Another 2000 pt Purge the Alien Tournament

So, this past Saturday, we had yet another 2000 pt Purge the Alien tournament.  I came in third overall, but I think the list that I brought had the potential to rank higher.  Alas, the dice gods left me in game 2, and I had to settle for third.  Still, I had a great time, and was pretty happy with my army's performance.

The list I brought was:
Belial with Twin claws

Terminator Squad - Apothecary, Banner, Chainfist, Cyclone, TH/SS x2, Claws x1
Terminator Squad - TH/SS x3, Claws x1, Chainfist, Cyclone
Terminator Squad - TH/SS x3, Claws x1, Chainfist, Cyclone

Landraider with Storm Bolter

Imperial Guard Company Command Squad - Officer with Plasma pistol, Plasma gun x2, Lascannon

IG Veteran Squad - Plasma Gun x3, Lascannon, Demolitions
IG Veteran squad - Meltagun x3, Demolitions

Vendetta squadron - 2 Vendettas with Twin-Linked Lascannons x3

Lemon Russ Demolisher - Lascannon in hull

So, for the first game I faced off against the Chaos player from the last tournament.  He brought a more frightening list this time, to include two units from Forge World; the Dread Claw (Daemonic Dreadnought), and a Chaos Drop Pod/Flyer.  The rest of his army included Abaddon with 4 Terminator Champions in a Land Raider, A Defiler, 5 Chaos Marines, 10 Khorne Berserkers in the Pod, and one unit of 3 Obliterators, and another of 2 Obliterators.  My opponent suffered from some pretty bad rolls early on, but he also made some (in my opinion) huge tactical errors.  For one he left an Obliterator squad off by itself on his left flank, which allowed my meltagun veterans to hunt them down when they arrived via the vendetta, without having to worry about any reprisal.  Also, he moved his other obliterators and 5 man chaos marine squad in such a way that I was able to assault them on turn 2 with my Terminator command squad and Belial coming out of the Land Raider.  The terminators easily killed the obliterators, and Belial tore apart the chaos marines.  It was an easy 2 VP (+1 more for first blood).  He also forgot to move his Daemon Prince on turn 3, which made it lose it's "Hard-to-Hit" rule, and I was able to kill it without much problem.  I made one mistake in forgetting to move one of my Terminator squads on turn 3 after it had arrived from Deep Strike, but my opponent did not capitalize on it.  By the end of the game, I had tabled my opponent, and had only lost one Terminator squad in return.  I had other casualties, but as far as full kill points, my opponent only scored 1.

Game 2 I was to face off against a speed freaks army that I had just watched dismantle the guy that had taken first in the last tournament.  It was a very tough list utilizing double FOC (which was kind of crap in my opinion, as the tournament organizer had originally said no double FOC lists, only Allies).  I am not outright opposed to double FOC, and in fact support it as it is part of 6th edition, but it just would have been nice if everyone had gotten the same opportunity.  The list included a tough unit of Nob Bikers with a Pain Boy accompanying a Warboss on a bike and Wazdakka (sic).  There were also 2 units of boyz in Trukks, and a unit of meganobz in a battlewagon led by Ghazkul.  The list was finished off with a Deffdread.  This is the game where my dice left me for every offensive action I took.  I couldn't hit worth a crap in hand to hand or shooting (11 strength 8-9 shots fired at a Trukk and only managed to glance it twice...and he didn't even have cover).  However, my saves were incredible...Belial and his unit took the entire Orc Army's shooting for two turns and only lost one terminator thanks to FNP and Belial taking wounds for the squad (and some good choices of when to take look out sir...every time I chose to take one, was when I rolled a 1, and then would make the save).  additionally, Belial's group not only assaulted the Nob Bikers, but made them run and lost no one in the assault...the Bikers lost only one bike, but both Warbosses took wounds (I really should have killed a lot more, but like I said, my dice were just not hitting...Belial's 6 attacks only hit and wounded once for example.  We were unable to finish this game and only got 3 turns in which gave my opponent a victory of 4 vs 2 (thanks to first blood and Slay the Warlord...I should have had first blood on a trukk, but just could not get penetrating hits to save my life).  However, not to take away too much from my opponent, but he got one more turn than me and had I gotten my half of the turn, I am about 90% positive I would have at least tied it or possibly even pulled ahead (he had one HP left on the Deff Dread, one HP left on a Trukk, and only 4 boyz left in one of his groups, as well as only 2 HP left on his battlewagon with a group of Terminators with a Chainfist in assault range).  Mind you, my opponent would have scored at least one more VP as he had just assaulted the Leman Russ, but like I said, I think the outcome would have been either 5-5, 6-5 in my favor had I gotten my turn.

Game 3, I faced off against a Tau player with Necron allies.  I had never faced Necrons in 6th edition, so I was a bit nervous, but my opponent made the mistake of choosing to deploy and go first.  His list included 2 Broadside teams, 2 Crisis teams with O'shava (sic) and a bodyguard held in Deep strike reserve.  The necron allies were two large groups of warriors and a unit of lychguard led by a suped up Overlord.  My opponent's deployment mistake allowed me to strong side him, leaving both of his units of Warriors out of the game for the first two turns.  It also helped that I stole the initiative, but the outcome would have been the same even if this hadn't happened.  My opponent claimed that he would have scored first blood by destroying my Land Raider, but I'm not convinced this would have been the case as he only had 3 shots on it and I had cover from all three shots.  Regardless, stealing the initiative allowed me to get first blood by killing one of his Broadside teams.  I didn't really do much more on turn 1, but on turn 2 all of my reserves arrived and I was able to basically surround his lychguard and overlord and torrented them to death.  The Vendettas also were able to take out his other Broadside team.  On his turn he managed to land his Tau commander and one of the Crisis teams, but the other team mishapped and were destroyed (he gambled with all three teams on the deepstrike location, and just happened to lose his gamble).  These killed off my vets, but on my turn 3 I annihilated both groups with my terminators and overwhelming firepower.  At this point my opponent conceded.

The Speed Freaks player lost to another Orc army with Chaos Marine allies, which left first place to the Orc/Chaos player, and a three-way tie for second place between me, Himkano, and the Speed Freaks player.  Since the Speed Freaks player had already defeated both Himkano and I, he took second place and Himkano and I had to play a final game to determine third.  Himkano fielded Blood Angels with IG allies and his list was a nasty AV13-14 mech list.  It included 2 Land Raiders with small 5-man assault marine squads inside with a librarian, a Vindicator, a Leman Russ squadron with 2 Demolishers and an Executioner with plasma sponsons, 2 whirlwinds (kept out of LoS), and a squadron of 2 Vendettas carrying a group of Vets and his IG command squad.  We rolled for night fighting turn 1, which was in my benefit...I chose to deploy in a gun line with only my Vendettas carrying the melta vets in reserve.  I did not shoot on turn 1, and forced him to move towards me...he got off a couple of shots, but thanks to night fighting, I made my cover saves and no damage was done.  On my second turn, I fired everything I had at the left Land raider and blew it up (admittedly I got a lucky 6 to make it explode, but I did shoot at it with 5 Lascannons (3 twin linked) and 4 missiles.  most of the shots hit, but only the final shots from the landraider managed to penetrate and blow it up.  Had it not blown up, it still would have only had 2 HP - and with my vendettas in the area, I think it would have been toast anyways.  as it was, the death of the Land Raider allowed my Vendettas to blow his vindicator apart.  His turn he brought his vendettas on and fired at mine.  He managed to glance one of mine, but otherwise was fairly unlucky.  His land raider fired back at my Land Raider, but thanks to my cover, he did no damage.  Nothing else of his was in range, mainly because he hadn't moved (I believe this was a tactical miscalculation personally).  On my turn I put my Vendettas in hover mode and deployed my melta vets next to his other land raider.  The vets failed to do anything to the Land Raider, despite having 3 melta guns, but a lucky shot from one of the other lascannons took out the land raider (so, it made up for my bad luck with my meltas).  The vendettas also managed to damage the Executioner and kept it from shooting.  On his turn he immobilised one of my Vendettas and killed my vets, he also finally started moving his Leman Russ squadron.  My opponent conceded at the end of turn 5 (we had rolled a turn 6, but I don't think he could have caught up as I had first blood and 5 VP, while he had only scored 2 VP with prospects of only getting maybe two more VP (him not moving for the early turns allowed me to stay mostly out of range, and so he had few targets).

So, not a bad performance at all for this list.  I learned a bit more about the meta for these tournaments, and I have some tweaks to do, but for the most part, I think this list is the list to bring.  I still feel that I could have won the tournament, but I'm not too upset with third place as I more than made my money back with the prize.