The wrap-up... turns 4 and 5

When I began the apoc game against Justin, I had a substantial army of footslogging.  By the end of turn 3, I was down to barely 2 dozen infantry on the ground, with the rest sitting in a super heavy transport... scared to death to leave it.  My command squad still had full count, but otherwise I had ten men remaining on my left flank, with another half dozen in the center.  While this still left me with scoring units... I had mostly ignored the really important objectives.

The last two turns saw me regain my focus.  Also, by this time in the night, we had neglected to take any real pictures, which is a shame.  My apologies for the boring walls of text.

Turn 4

Tyranid Turn

This turn found the tyranid forces losing a lot of focus, they had few controlling creatures to keep the little and big guys in line.

With the game winding down, Justin gained vengeance for what little damage I had done to his Carnifex brood. In rapid succession he obliterated all six of the hellhounds without even breaking a sweat, I was an idiot in the fact that I had mistakenly combined them together (Not my brightest moment).

 His massive Hyradul and two other monsters turned toward the center to finish off the troopers.  Luckily they were unable to reach assault range this turn.  The shooting downed another lascannon team though, and brought a structure point down on the Baneblade.

Imperium Turn

My turn saw more fire then movement.

Ignoring the impending doom that was coming down the line, I turned the massive gun of the Baneblade upon a pile of gaunts that had been sitting on an objective all game.  With an explosive blast, 19 of the little beasts exploded in fire... but still seven remained.  Remaining fire from the turrets of the massive tank opened up on the incoming beasts to the side.  That fire brought a wound on the Hyradul, and another on one of the Carnifex beasts. The lone lascannon fired and failed to wound... a poor and final showing.

The two Leman Russ opened up on the same pile, finally bringing it down.  One less objective for the Tyranids.

The lone squad on the left flank fired upon and killed the last Lictor, finally clearing the area.

The Fires of Retribution opened up on what little was left, finishing off some scatterings of creatures.  This left almost no Synaps creatures on the board... which made my final turn considerably easier.

There was very little effective fire from my naval support this turn.  A few gaunts killed, but little else.  The rules of Lascannon missing or failing to wound had caught up at last.

Turn 5

Tyranid turn

The Hyradul charged home... the last two structure points from the mighty Baneblade, leaving it a wreck.  The damage had been done though... there was little left of the gaunts holding an objective in the center on his side of the board.  They had been getting picked apart throughout the last couple of turns.  Planes would no doubt eliminate them at last on my turn.

Instead, he focused on doing what damage he could. The Screamer Killer charged the remnants of the center platoon, killing every man.  Leaving only the command squad as the lone meat in the middle.

The remainder of the carnifex force that came in could not reach anyone else before the game ended... so he left them to their own devices.

Imperial Turn

The lone squad on the left ran forward to try and reach a middle objective... but missed it by easily 6 inches. Can't blame a guy for trying.  

The Pathfinders finally decided to get out of the tank, and marched to the lone objective as The Fires of Retribution turned the mega-bolters upon the Hyradul and put all power to weapons.  In a hail of gunfire the Hyradul ignored all but two of the seven wounds it recieved.  

The two thunderbolts and two vendeta gunships decided they had enough, and finished the monster off.  

Meanwhile, both Valkyries rained rocket pod fire down upon the remaining gaunts on the lone held Tyranid objective.  Despite surviving most of that fire, they finally were brought down.  

Thus, the Imperium was victorious... it just was real close.

Total Objectives in game: 6

Total Tyranid Held: 0

Total Imperial Held: 1

Conclusion... Airpower and Numerous scoring units make a differance.

I had always been a lover of the Super Heavy vehicles... but in spite of the points they were, they did not do an incredible amount of damage.  The planes on the other hand slaughtered much of the Tyranid army, with little response in kind.  Which leads me to a thought...

Everyone else has flyers galore these days... what about the Tyranids?  One flyer on his side of the board could have made a big difference, because it would have wounds instead of armor... I would have had to focus a lot on killing it.