Today brings us battle #2 of the low points bracket 'Iron Hand' Straken vs Yriel of the eldar. Now this one is a strange fight in that Straken, unlike any other character replaces the commander in a company command squad meaning he isnt alone he comes with 4 friends and also unlike nealry any character all are potentially upgradable. In essence if I bring him out as I should do, then he would have 2 extra bodyguards, feel no pain and 4 melta guns in the squad, which is a little unfair to say the least, especially when even with most of those upgrades he still doesnt really fit into the top bracket.
As such I will be running him with his bodyguards but not any weapon upgrades, so thats a good 6 extra wounds but no wiping someone out with melta right from the go. So what else does Straken bring us, well he's really the one and only combat monster of the Imperial guard, featured in nearly all guard blob armies due to his aura of furious charge and counter attack plus a s6 power weapon, whats not to love.
Yriel himself has an unimpressive statline however his wargear is excellent, He has a power weapon that always wounds on a 2, combine that with I7 makes him deadly in combat, it seems more a battle between Straken's bodyguards and Yriel's 4++ save.
Battle 2 Straken vs Yriel
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Fight 1 Straken's Charge
Straken has a Plasma pistol (yeah i know it looks like a shotgun, he has that too) as his standard wargear to has a chance to end this very quickly, he shoots, hits but gets a 1 on his wound roll, into combat they go. Yriel being far far more ninja of course goes first with 4 attacks. He hits twice and wounds twice killing 2 bodyguards. Hits back 4 veterans charging needing 4's to hit and 3s to wound, they end up with 3 wounds which Yriel saves 2 of. Then straken goes, 5 attacks but only 2 hit and then 2 wound, yriel then saves them both with his inv save. Straken loses combat by 1 but they easily pass their morale test.
Next round Yriel goes again this time 3 hits 3 wounds and 3 dead veterans, 1 strikes back missing and then straken hits out however this time with 4 attacks but only 1 of them hits the mark! he then wounds and yriel goes to make his save... its a 4 and so the combat goes on however straken has lost again and barely passes his LD test.
Round 3 yriel hits 3 times and wounds twice, killing the last of straken's men and taking a wound off the man himself, onto straken who hits 3 times and wounds 3 times, with 2 failed saves unfortunately this is it for the price and down he goes to the super strength of straken.
Fight 2 Yriel's charge
Yriel appears to have no weapon so straight into combat he goes with 5 attacks, he hits 3 times, wounds 3 times and kills 3 troops, 3 bodyguards strike back wounding 4 times taking 1 wound off yriel. Straken then goes hitting twice wounding twice and yriel fails a save killing him off, this one is over pretty quick as yriel's inv save fails him this time.
So there we have it, the fight is over, 2-0 to straken and his boys. Is straken too cheesy with his extra wounds? can anyone beat him? personally i think as soon as he hits someone as good as yriel but with toughness 4 then he will struggle.
Next time we will see The Eldar psyker Ulthan vs Blood Angels Seth. Also as requested here is the fixture list of coming matches -
| Astaroth | vs | The Avatar of Khaine |
| Straken | vs | Yriel |
| Eldrad Ulthan | vs | Seth |
| Cannis Wolfborn | vs | Fabius Bile |
| Darnath Lysander | vs | Kharne |
| Captain Sicarius | vs | Death Company Tycho |
| Vulkan He'stan | vs | Yarrick |
| Elite round 1 | ||
| NightBringer | vs | Dante |
| Deciever | vs | Typhus |
| Fateweaver | vs | Ghazghkkull Thraka |
| Ku'Gath | vs | Librarian Tugurius |
| Scarbrand | vs | Mephiston |
| The Swarmlord | vs | Ahriman |
| Njal Stormcaller | vs | Ragnar Blackmane |
| Logan Grimnar | vs | Marneus Calgar |
| Abbadon The Despoiler | vs | Sanguinor |
Following these we will see a knockout stage with the winner of the top games against the winner of the bottom in the list and so on.
