A Few Good Mantis: Mantis Warriors vs Tyranids

Time, at last, to catch up with my long-suffering Mantis Warrior, Captain Nampo. Will he finally get his warriors back from the traitor who stole them?

Captain Nampo leaned into his bike as it roared towards the front lines. The engine throbbed, the power of its machine spirit tangible even through the thick protection of his power armour. It lusted for battle just as he did himself, he could feel it. 

"Approaching designated ambush site," Sergeant Kamakirii ordered over the vox. "Once in position, we maintain silence until the signal."

"Hai," Nampo replied, obediently, in chorus with the rest of the bike group. 

Nampo had finally caught up with his Chaptor. The Inquisitor, Helviki Zoge, had shipped him on a fast corvette, secretly dropping him in friendly territory on Gloamholt. The swarms of Hive Fleet Afanc were descending on the world fast, summoned by a cult uprising mere months before. 

Nampo felt strangely excited, infiltrating his own chapter. Zoge had updated his armour IFF to read as a brother lost in a previous engagement. He'd been able to play the part of a survivor perfectly, drawing on his own experience on Drawbridge to fill the gaps in his story convincingly enough. They all thought he was Shousha. 

Now they were deploying under orders from the Millstone of Guilt, holding in orbit in the path of the swarm. His ship. His orders, or so it was supposed. 

The bikers he was with were loyalists, that much he could tell. The other squads in the battlegroup, he was less certain of. Deployment patterns he hadn't seen in centuries, tactical gambits he didn't recognise the meaning of. A barely noticeable lack of prayerfulness during operations. Nothing he could pin down, nothing that would pass as evidence. Barely more than suspicions.

But suspicions alone were enough for him to damn these false brothers. 

They were nearly in place. An ambush to take apart a hive splinter, a rogue concentration of biomass that had split off from the seething masses to destroy a major planetary communication hub. Nampo killed his engine and let the bike roll into place, hunkering in cover at the side of a chemical cleansing vat. Peering over its lip, he could see a dense bank of smog rolling in towards the buildings on the edge of the facility. A spore cloud - the Tyranids were nearly here, and apparently non the wiser of the ambush. 

Nampo knew Tyranids all too well. Quite who was ambushing whom, he thought, was yet to be determined.

Mantis Warriors?

It's me, Pootle, in the driving seat tonight. I'm taking a nicely balanced list of all Kraken's usual Mantis suspects as shown in the picture below. Two units of Assault Intercessors and one of normal Intercessors, the Relic Terminators, some Sniper Scouts, a small Biker unit with an Assault Bike and the Leviathan Dreadnought and Vindicator for fire support. 

Leading them is a Terminator Librarian to go with the Terminators and, of course, Nampo himself, packing his usual bike and Thunder Hammer. 

But that's not all! Because Pootle doesn't quite know what he's up against, I'm giving him some extra Mantises. A full Tactical Squad in a Drop Pod (missile launcher and flamer), a Rhino with Vanguard Veterans and a Chaplain, Bladeguard led by a Judiciar, a standard Scout squad (bolters and heavy bolter) and a Land Speeder Typhoon. 

- Captain on Bike: Twin Boltgun, Thunder Hammer & Relic Shield. Enhancement: Fury of the Storm. Leading

- 3 Bikers + 1 Attack Bike: 2 Chainswords, 1 Plasma Gun, 1 Heavy Bolter; all with Twin Boltguns

- Terminator Librarian: Storm Bolter, Force Weapon. Leading Terminators

- 5 Relic Terminators: Grenade Harness, 2x Power Fist & Combi-Bolter, 1x Twin Lightning Claws, 1x Reaper Autocannon & Power Fist, Sergeant with Power Fist and Plasma Blaster

- Chaplain Leading Vanguard Veterans

- 5 Vanguard Veterans: 2 Storm Shields, 1 Inferno Pistol, 2 Bolt Pistols

- Judiciar Leading Bladeguards

- 3 Bladeguard Veterans

- 5 Assault Intercessors: Sergeant with Power Fist

- 5 Assault Intercessors: Sergeant with Plasma Pistol and Power Sword

- 5 Intercessors

- 10 Tactical Marines: Missile Launcher, Melta Gun

- 5 Scout Snipers: 4x Sniper Rifles, 1x Missile Launcher

- 5 Scouts: 3x Bolt guns, 1x Heavy Bolter, Sergeant with Bolt Pistol & Chainsword

- Leviathan Dreadnought: 3x Hunter-Killer Missiles, 2x Storm Cannon, 2x Heavy Flamers

- Vindicator: Hunter-Killer Missile, Storm Bolter, Demolisher Cannon

- Land Speeder Typhoon: Typhoon Missile Launcher, Heavy Bolter

- Rhino

- Drop Pod: Deathwind Launcher

Stormlance Task force. 2105 points

This should be a walk in the park for a simple bug hunt.

Oh really? Well, let's find out what the scanners show!

Taking You to Tarrasque

Lovely though my Mantis Warriors are, they aren't what you might see in a marine force on top tables at a tournament. Perhaps a little under-synergised, shall we say? And what they're particularly short of, with the lone exception of the Vindicator, is heavy weapons. 

So Pootle is 'excited' to learn he's up against a Tyranid Heirophant, the big bio-titan, tonight played in a rare bit of proxying by the Dungeons and Lasers Tarrasque.  

That's not the last delight in store for him tonight - I've also added a unit of Venomthropes led by a Malanthrope to guard this monster, and then changed the rules to allow their shrouding spores to work on giant Biotitans. So until he deals with them and/or runs up close to it, it's always in cover and gains Stealth. 

And I'm still not done with the surprises. 

Of course not! Tonight is very much a Kraken special, given we're trying to move Nampo towards the resolution of his long narrative arc (it started way back in August 2020).

Mission and Terrain

It's an easy enough mission. Five turns, don't let the Heirophant cross the board from long edge to long edge. It's starting twelve inches in, and with five feet to cross it can't hang about, but it's pretty fast on those Kaiju claws, and quite capable of getting there especially if it charges stuff. 

Spoiler - it's going to charge stuff. 

Then there's the added complication - Nampo knows full well that his task force is riddled with potential traitors. I've got two rules to cover that. 

• 1. Whether it's the Tyranid spores clogging their guns or that they have some other agenda than the orders they've been given, the Marines will find that their guns will only fire on a 4+ after they've declared targets. So on a 1-3, their shots are wasted. 
• 2. This first effect can be cancelled out by checking a unit's purity seals. This is done by a unit within 12" performing an action (the standard sort, declared at the end of the movement phase and stopping them doing anything else). This can be done by as many units as want to in the turn. At the end of the turn, roll a dice - 4-6, the unit is Loyal and can now fire as normal. On a 1-3, though, it isn't...

Nampo and his unit are the only guys exempt from this rule. 

To win, Pootle will need to stop the Tyranids from escaping from his board edge and kill all the traitors. He will lose if any Tyranids escape. Anything else is a draw.

Deployment

Pootle's got no say in the deployment at all - I've done it all for him. Aren't I kind? 

In fairness, that's probably chopped an hour or so from the game time ;-)

So there he is, a force set up in a multi-layered ambush to deal with the Tyranids. Only the Terminators with their Librarian and the Drop Pod with the Tactical Squad are in reserve, ready to deep strike in when called for. 

Mantis Warriors get the first turn. At least their ambush is working!

"I think I can see one, sarge."

The vox crackled, and Nampo heard his own voice crackling through the aether, broadcast from his stolen battlecruiser high overhead.

"This is Nampo. The Emperor's mercy is great indeed. Let the xenos see none. On my mark, brothers, strike!"

Now, Nampo thought. Here and now, as the Tyranid spores drifted over them, he had a chance. Whoever was pulling his Chapter's strings from on high wouldn't have full contact with the ground during this action. He had a tiny window to see if there were still enough marines loyal to make his battleground worth saving. Otherwise, Zoge was watching. Exterminatus for a planet this far down the Tyranid's gullet was always an option.

Zoge hadn't merely recoded his armour to pass as someone else. She'd also loaded it with weaponised Mechanicus code, a binary catechism she'd called it. If the recipient's armour couldn't answer the encoded purity test adequately, it would shred any IFF codes. Not instant, as he understood it, it would paralyse targeting systems and auspices while it ran, meaning even a loyalist would be left blind and defenceless. 

Better that risk than the risk of heresy.

He opened his own vox. 

"This is Captain Nampo of the Mantis Warriors. Brothers, you have been deceived! Ware treachery! Muster on me!"

Then he transmitted the code. 

Mantis Warriors Turn 1 

I decide to stay fairly static and let the Nids come to me. The Bolter-armed Scouts in the north-east creep round to get eyes on the Venomthropes but fail to shoot: are they traitors or just somewhat intimidated by what they've just seen? The Intercessors do unload into the same target but to no effect. The Scout Snipers also fail to shoot - what is it with these Scouts? Not a great start!

The Heirophant has been declared the Oath of Moment target and I move the Land Speeder and Leviathan Dreadnought to send missiles of various types towards the big monster. The Land Speeder's krak missiles fails to wound the target but the Leviathan fires all three of its Hunter Killers in and one gets through the armour to cause the maximum 6 wounds! The Vindicator's Demolisher Cannon is out of range, but it has a HK missile too and that also punches through the armour, causing another 4 wounds. That's a great start!

I finish the turn off with the Bladeguard Vets and southernmost Assault Intercessors scanning each other. 

So tonight's main surprise is that any squad that turns out to have gone bad is going to be immediately replaced with a roughly equivalent squad of Alpha Legion. And hurrah - both of these two are really bad eggs! A squad of Possessed lead by a Master of Possession and some Legionaries sporting a Reaper Chaincannon are now right up Pootle's rear. 

Now that's what I call colour change paint.

The other Assault Intercessors scan the Vindicator (who, fortunately, is loyal) whilst Nampo scans the Rhino, which turns out to be treacherous as well (and contains a big unit of Noise Marines rather than the Vanguard Veterans I thought I'd put in there).

Exactly what you want guarding your flank as a Biotitan lurches towards you.

Preying Mantis Turn 1

Let the chaos begin!

I'm not really trying to eradicate the marines, just disrupt them and let the Heirophant do the hard work. The Vindicator is a prime target, but I don't have anything that can quite reach it. If only the Leviathan was on my side...

The Noise Marines open fire on Nampo's Bike squad (though the marine with the Blastmaster manages to knock 3 wounds off the Vindicator) and then charge in; in total they kill two bikes, and lose one of their number in return (Nampo apparently forgetting to turn his Thunder Hammer on).

The Rhino and Possessed both charge the Land Speeder. The Dreadnought hits them with overwatch fire and one takes an early bath, but the Land Speeder is scrapped in moments. 

The last action is the Legionaries who (completely ineffectively) charge into the Leviathan Dread. It might at least distract it for a bit - it'll take a while to punch through them, even if it can probably shoot them apart without much effort. 

After the Traitors, The Heirophant and his escort get a turn, advancing towards their goal. This means that the Heirophant can't fire with full effect, but nevertheless its Bioplasma Torrent is sufficient to kill three of the Intercessors lurking nearby.

Mantis Turn 2

I decide not to scan for any more traitors this turn. Partly I need all the firepower I can get to deal with current threats, and partly I really don't want any new Alphas turning up! In the event I think everyone who wanted to fire did so.

In the north both units of Scouts fire at the Venomthropes again, managing to kill two of them (the Snipers put a couple of wounds on the Malanthrope too). The brave Intercessors then charge in to see if they can take down the last Venomthrope, but they fail and are gobbled up in response. Well, at least I don't need to wonder if they were loyal - they obviously were!

The Vindicator pivots and aims its Demolisher Cannon at the Heirophant (who's the Oath of Moment target once more) and manage to drop another 5 wounds off it (taking it down to half strength), which I'm fairly pleased with.

The Assault Intercessors charge the Noise Marines, killing four of them. I'm glad they no longer shoot on death in this edition!

The Leviathan flames the Legionaries at its feet and then turns its Stormcannon on the Possessed before Nampo and his surviving Biker escort crash into them. The fire from the Dreadnought is effective, killing three of the Possessed, but Nampo whiffs once again and can only land one hit. Mental note: swap out Mallet's Mallet for an actual Thunder Hammer as soon as possible.

I decide to keep the Drop Pod in reserve for one more turn, but the Terminators teleport in and successfully charge the Legionaries who are bothering the Dreadnought. It's a quick affair and the traitors don't stand a chance.

Preying Mantis Turn 2

A short turn here: the Possessed stay in combat with the Bikers. I was ready to skip the shooting phase, but Pootle asks if the Master of Possession's psychic power happened to have the Pistol keyword. Which it does! Particularly galling for Pootle when this newly discovered "pistol" is also discovered to have Precision and goes on to take six of Nampo's seven wounds off him!

Distracted by this, Nampo fluffs his attacks once again (though the last Possessed is dispatched), before the Master of Possession kills the last Biker and injures the Attack Bike.

The ongoing combat between the Noise Marines and Assault Intercessors reduces both to a pair of marines on each side. There's clearly some quality grudge settling going on . 

After all this, the Venomthrope and its Malanthrope leader charge the Sniper Scouts, killing all but the Missile Launcher-armed marine. Turns out they're not a bad combo in melee. 

The Heirophant moves in, now firing its Biocannons and nearly wrecking the Vindicator. It's preparing a charge to finish the job when Pootle decides to Overwatch with the tank. Rolling five shots for the cannon is a good start, but rolling four out of five hits (he didn't even need the Oath of Moment reroll for that!) and then proceeding to roll well for damage reduces the biotitan to only two wounds!

Even in this damaged state, it's more than a match for the Vindicator, crushing it utterly. Fortunately the big bug has enough sense to avoid the fuel tank and spare shells so there's no explosion, which could easily have finished it off. Are there enough loyalists to do just that, though?

Mantis Turn 3

The map is slightly wrong - the Heirophant was still there at the start of the turn

I'm going to have to do some more scanning this turn. Movement first though. In the North, the Scouts head towards the Venomthrope/Malanthrope (the surviving Missile Launcher Scout falls back from combat first). They go on to charge in but in combination only cause one wound. Fortunately they don't suffer any damage in return.

The Terminators with their relic grenade harnesses move to get within range of the Heirophant. This does give the expected (and hoped-for) two mortal wounds and the bio-titan is down! Completely taking me unaware, six Tyranid Warriors pop out of its carcass (I wasn't aware that it was a transport beast too).

Oh, there's nothing that big beauty can't do! Except cross the board alive, sadly. 

The Leviathan moves towards the surviving Noise Marines and Nampo falls back from the Master of Possession, ready to run right back in again.

At the end of the phase, the Drop Pod arrives behind the Terminators and the Tac Marines disembark. I then declare that the Tactical Squad will scan the Leviathan and the Drop Pod will scan the Terminators. I really hope that both don't turn traitor, but I won't find that out until the end of the turn.

In the shooting phase the Leviathan lights up the Tyranid Warriors and it turns out his gun is perfectly designed for the task, killing three of them, then he rams the last Noise Marine and tramples it flat. Good work!

The Terminators fail their charge on the Warriors, but the surviving Assault Intercessors charge in and kill a fourth, leaving just two. Nampo finally works out how to use his Thunder Hammer and dispatches the Master of Possession, and the Leviathan charges the two Noise Marines and stamps them to death.

At the end of the turn we discover why the Terminators didn't charge; turns out they're actually Traitor Terminators led by a Terminator Chaos Lord...

Preying Mantis Turn 3

Clearly the traitor command have decided to put in an appearance! I don't have a lot to work with here, but I'm not giving back these Mantises without a fight. 

As the Rhino guns down the last Sniper Scout, the newly unmasked Terminators charge into the Leviathan (after aiming their guns behind them and dropping three Tactical Marines). 

Fortunately for Pootle, the Terminators are more suited to an anti-infantry role. Even the Lord's Chain Fist is nerfed by the Dreadnought's hide. It's proving a solid menace - this is his first appearance, so why on earth he didn't explode on contact with the table, I've no idea!

Not a lot of bugs left either now. The last Venomthrope falls to the Scouts, although the Malanthrope partially avenges his lesser kin by reducing them to their Sarge. The last Tyranid Warrior eats the Assault Intercessor Sergeant and stands on top of him, roaring, but I rather suspect he's not long for this world.

Mantis Turn 4

I think I can do this! Nampo heads towards the Malanthrope (pausing only for the Attack Bike to gun down the last Tyranid Warrior) and then charges the last bug on the board. However he's still fluffing his melee attacks and even with the assistance of Scouts charging back in the Malanthrope survives on a brace of wounds.

The Leviathan aims all its guns at the Terminators and kills another couple (tickling a third with the Heavy Flamers). Then the Tactical Marines charge in but can't quite finish the injured Terminator off. The Terminators aim all their attacks at the Dreadnought but to no avail.

I've not had the spare resource to do any scanning this turn, but at this point it's only the Scouts Tactical Marines and Drop Pod who haven't had their status confirmed.

Preying Mantis Turn 4

The Rhino drives to get ready to head home as the Terminators stay in combat and manage to put a solitary wound on the Dreadnought, losing the injured Marine for their troubles.

Nampo has (by his standards) an excellent round of combat, getting three blows past the Malanthrope's armour...though he only needed one to dispatch it. That's the Tyranids done for, but Pootle still has to scan for lurking heretics and defeat what he's found so far. And there's not much time left!

Mantis Turn 5

I can't get to the Rhino, but I can deal with the Terminators. 

Or can I? The Leviathan whiffs its shooting (killing one Terminator isn't much of a return) before Nampo charges in and is back to his previous form, not managing to get a single blow through the Chaos Lord's armour. Striking back, the Chaos Lord kills the Attack Bike but Nampo survives (on his solitary wound).

Preying Mantis Turn 5

Given the odds, I do consider just running off in the Rhino, but that's hardly in the spirit of the thing (plus Terminators can't get in the doors). The Rhino, in fact, is hereby struck from the record as not being a dramatic enough personae for a final battle. 

So it boils down, more or less, to a final battle, the true Nampo against the fake! 

Nampo strikes first, an advantage he desperately needs given his already grevious wounds. He lands an impressive (for him) three blows on the Chaos Lord. Alas! Terminator armour didn't get where it is today by letting through a measly three Thunder Hammer hits, and the traitor is still standing. But can Nampo weather the return?

-

Nampo's armour was gone from the waist up, all bar his right shoulder. The traitor's roiling magics had melted the chestplate off like crusted dirt under a waterjet. His flesh beneath was seared an angry red, streaked with hard black starbursts where the skin had burned away. He'd thrown the helmet aside. The autosenses were useless once the power pack failed, besides which he no longer felt he needed his vox. 

He twisted the bike's steering column, back wheel tearing up the dirt as he span round his prey. 

The terminator struggled to keep face, although he moved with impressive grace given the armour's limitations. It was the only advantage Nampo had - at this range, without his armour, the traitor could finish him in seconds if he got even a second for a clean shot. 

The bike jerked suddenly - a loose rock under the front end, perhaps, or an unseen pothole. It didn't matter. The traitor's bolter snapped round instantly, the muzzle blazing into deadly life. 

Nampo was already out of the saddle, leaping high over the spiked back of the armoured heretic. It wasn't an original ruse, faking a moment's poor driving, but the traitor had bought it. He brought the weighted end of his hammer down in a perfect arc, driving at the exposed exhaust ports on the armour's rear facing. Actinic energies boomed and sparked. A killing blow. 

It should have been a killing blow. 

Nampo felt something slam into his side, hard enough that his breath was ripped out of him. No pain, his altered neurology overwrote it before it could overwhelm him. Coldness, though. A deeper, darker coldness than he'd felt in all his long lifetime. 

The terminator loomed above him, the barrels of the stormbolter dark and wide as the void before translation. 

"How?" Nampo said. 

"My armour," the traitor said, almost kindly. "An older model. Less power from the core but less volatile as a result. No meltdowns, even without the vents. Easily missed."

Nampo said, with an effort, "You have lost, all the same, traitor. Your masquerade is over."

The rest of the loyalists were already on him. Green armour, clean and bright where the traitor's scaled plate shifted mutinously on the eye. They had him disarmed and on his knees in moments. Armoured hands tore off his helmet. Gases whirled and hissed as the seals gave, hiding his face in vapour.

Nampo felt someone press a bolt pistol into his hand. Someone else sat him upright, cradling him from behind and holding up his arm so that the gun pointed unerringly at the traitor's head. 

The traitor was bald, a plain and unassuming face set with darkly charismatic eyes. Surprisingly unmarred by the usual twistings of the damned, Nampo thought. It could have belonged to anyone. 

"I never lose," the traitor said with a wry smile. "Even now. You don't even know what you were trying to stop. You can't defeat me because I wasn't fighting you."

Nampo tried to pull the trigger, but something in those dark eyes compelled him to ask one more question. 

"Why?" he rasped, his throat catching on the word. The cold was devouring him, rising up inside him like a fountain of ice. "Who are you?"

"I think we both know who I am," the Alpha Legion commander said. "The rest? You'll never know."

With his dying strength, Nampo pulled the trigger. 

Result: A draw?

Locker Room

That was everything I was hoping for! Cheers to Pootle and his ever sporting nature in taking on this mess of rules and randomness. 

What a fun game; absolutely another Kraken special. I was very lucky to take the Heirophant down with a few well placed shots early on, particularly the Vindicator's overwatch, which was crazy. 

Mind you, that luck was balanced by Nampo once again repeatedly fumbling his melee attacks (Kraken and I have both seen him do that numerous times before - feels like he's very much the author of his many misfortunes).

He's had a hard life, poor old bloke. Blown up by his own side's orbital battery, captured by Genestealer Cultists, emprisoned by the Custodes - it's not easy being green. 

Time, after four endearing years, to call a close on his exploits. Rest in peace, Captain Nampo, knowing you got the Mantis Remnant back to the good guys. And who knows - maybe there's space in that Leviathan Dreadnought for another sarcophagus!

I feel a bit guilty having supervised the death of a longterm character, but in fairness, the Nids I was driving in Nampo's first game killed him then so he's definitely used up his nine lives. Thanks for a great narrative arc Kraken! Onto the next adventure...