After recording the wargaming podcast with Nockergeek and That Damn Punk, I got all motivated about getting my Warhammer 40K army on the table.  It had been a while since I have even read the rulebook and to be honest I had not really played a game of 40K since I was in college back in the early 90′s.  The following Saturday Nockergeek, That Damn Punk, and some of our other friends were getting together to play some 40k.  I convinced 8one6 that we should go watch some games so that we could get a handle on the rules and off we went.

When we arrived there were two games going.  One featured Nockergeek’s Tau fighting Space Marines and the other matching up more Space Marines with the Eldar.  As we watched the battles unfold, I decided that I really needed to get in on the action as soon as possible.  Since Hooligan had already assembled a chunk of my army,  I figured  to be ready in a couple of weeks.  That would also give me time to read up on the rules.  Turns out that I would not be waiting very long at all.

After the Space Marine vs Eldar battle finished with an Eldar victory, a discussion ensued that resulted in my borrowing an Eldar army and taking  the field against Slacker’s Tyranid horde.  As I have so often said, the best way to learn the rules is to play the game.  In this case, however, I was concerned about my ability to manage an army whose Codex I have only glanced through.  I have a pretty good idea what my chosen army can do ,but having not played in years, I really am not too sure about the other army choices.  I figured the worst that could possibly happen is some plastic and metal Eldar would be slaughtered by the Tyranids and I would get some actual play time with the Warhammer 40K rules.  I quickly tried to familiarize myself with my army list and went over the rules with Slacker.  For the record, Slacker was really awesome about the whole process from beginning to the bitter end.  Like the Beatles said, I get by with a little help from my friends.  Then we rolled for scenario (Dawn Of War) and for who would go first.  Slacker elected to let me go first and we started setting up our troops. 

Turn1 began with my bringing the rest of my army onto my side of the table.  Based off of Slacker’s set up and the fact that Tyranids are all about close combat, I tried to concentrate as much firepower on his units in the middle of the table.  The first turn of the Dawn Of War scenario uses a special visibility rule that resulted in most of my troops not being able to see the enemy due to my poor dice results.  My shooting phase was thus largely uneventful.  When Slacker took his turn he managed to engage one of my units in close combat.  Fortunately for me the combat turned out to be a draw and would continue next turn.  This concerned me because there were quite a few more Tyranids in that unit than there were Eldar left in mine.  At the end of the turn, things were looking pretty good for Slacker and I was concerned that I might have made some as yet to be determined mistake.

My plan for turn 2 was to put as much fire as I could on his advance units and to get my Howling Banshees into action.  Banshees are fantastic close combat troops and would be able to keep one of his huge units of Termagant off of my troops that needed to be shooting.  The visibility rule that hampered my first turn was no longer in play and my shooting went in the exact opposite of the first turn.  Rockets and sniper rifles took out the Tyranids HQ unit and the large unit of  Termagants that had not engaged yet broke and ran.  While my rolls for shooting were solid but not spectacular, Slacker managed some extremely poor rolls on his saves which resulted in my terrific shooting phase.  In the assault phase, my Banshees were not able to get into close combat due to the Termagant unit running.  The combat that was carried over from the first turn went my way as well, once again due to some unfortunate die rolling on Slacker’s part.  That unit of Tyranids broke and ran as well.  They made their leadership test, so I didn’t wipe them out .  Honestly, running away was fine with me.

Slacker’s second turn began with him rallying his large unit of Tyranids and continuing to remove his remaining units across the table.  One of his reserve units of Genestealers arrived from the side of the table and engaged one of my Viper jetbikes.  In his shooting phase, he succeeded in killing two of my Howling Banshees.  The Genestealers managed to destroy all the weapons on the Viper they had attacked. At the end of turn two, momentum had definitely shifted my direction.  All I had to do was take advantage of it.  The next turn could decide the game.

The first thing I did during turn 3 was to move a unit into cover to try and make it hard for the Genestealers to charge them once my Viper was destroyed.  After that I closed on Slacker’s rallied unit of Termagants with my Howling Banshees in preparation to close into assault with them.  My hope for the shooting phase was to be able to take out the rest of his HQ units and thinning out his Hormagaunt unit moving towards my snipers and missle launcher troops.  Once again my shooting phase was very successful.  I managed to take down all his remaining HQ units and unfortunately for me the Termagants ran again.  The other running unit was reduced to only one member.  Since the Termagants ran, my Banshees couldn’t do anything in the assault phase yet again.  This was a bummer, but overall I managed a very successful turn.

With things going very badly for the Tyranids, Slacker decided to see if his other reserve unit of Genestealers would show up on this turn.  Once more Slacker suffered from unfortunate die rolling.  Since it was a friendly game and victory was out of reach barring a miracle, Slacker chose to concede the game.

I found that I was able to pick up the rules quite easily and the game proceeded at a decent pace after a bit of an awkward start.  Most importantly fun was had by all involved.  I certainly would have had a blast even if the outcome had been different.  I would have to say that it was a triumphant return to wargaming table and I look forward to future battles.