Battle Report: Necrons vs. Space Marines

Pre-game Thoughts
This will be a quick and succint battle report of a game I played yesterday on Vassal. It was my second test game with the 2000 points Necron list. The first game was against Space Wolves where I got pretty lucky and tabled him. My opponent this game was running an odd but powerful Space Marines list. He had:

Vulkan
Pedro
5 scouts w/ cloaks and sniper rifles
5 scouts w/ cloaks and sniper rifles
10 sternguard, all with combi-meltas in a pod w/ locator beacon
10 sternguard, all with combi-meltas in a pod w/ locator beacon
10 sternguard, all with combi-meltas in a pod w/ locator beacon

2 speeders vulkan-style MM/HF
2 speeders MM/HF
2 speeders MM/HF

Mission was sieze ground (5 objectives); deployment was Dawn of War. The objectives were crammed together in the centre of the table.

One look and it's pretty clear to an experienced player how the list works. I suppose it could catch someone off guard if they hadn't played against this style of list. It's pretty tough and it can dish out a strong alpha strike with 36 twin-linked melta shots. I knew I couldn't let those hit my warriors.

Deployment
With this in mind I won the roll for first turn and gave it to my opponent. It meant he would get the side with more objectives but it was worth it because denying him the drop melta alpha strike was critical. He placed his scouts in cover on an objective on the left side of the board (from my perspective) with the speeders rolling on turn 1.

I deployed nothing. Scarabs would zip on turn 1 (as a bait), monoliths deep strike. Everything else in reserve.

Turn 1
He drops 2 pods, one with Vulkan + sternguard and one with Pedro + sternguard in the centre of the table, on the objectives. Notably, he didn't combat squad them. I meant to ask him why after the game but forgot. Speeders zoom in behind them.

I put my scarabs behind a hill on my right as a bait. Everything else is in reserve.

Turn 2
He plays it smart and doesn't take the bait. He drops his third pod in the middle. Vulkan's squad is on the left, pedro's is on the right and the regular sternguard are behind them. He zooms one speeder squadron down my left flank while the others stay with his vanguard.

I get both monoliths, both warrior squads, both tomb spyders, one destroyer and one immortal squad. My Monoliths deepstriked onto 2 objectives, pushing his guys out of the way. I put the destroyers and spyders in the middle of my deployment zone, and immortals on the left. Scarabs turbo-boosted forward with warriors behind them on the right. Everything had cover. Destroyers killed a speeder on the left after he passes 11 out of 12 cover saves.

Turn 3
He blasts my monoliths with melta fire, destroying one and putting 4 weapon destroyed results on the other (which hardly make a difference) and stunning it.

I get the rest of my reserves. My shooty Necrons (immortals and destroyers) are all on my left flank. My assault units (monstrous creatures) go up the middle straight for the objectives but they're still out of charge range. Scarabs move in for the assault while the warriors remain on my right flank (I'm waiting to teleport them onto the objectives). In shooting I reduce Vulkan's squad to 4 models and the Deceiver makes the regular sternguard squad run away. I also immobilize his lone speeder on the left. Scarabs assault Vulkan's squad.

Turn 4
His Sternguard squad can't regroup because my Monolith is within 6" so they keep running but not off the board. His units are out of range of my Necrons so he kills a Tomb Spyder.

I turbo-boost one Destroyer squadron towards his scouts to contest the objective next turn. I shoot Pedro's squad down to two models and they flee. The Tomb Spyder joins the Vulkan vs Scarabs assault (scarabs are almost wiped out by now). One Warrior squad on the right moves forward to capture an objective while the other moves closer to the Monolith.

Turn 5
All of his dudes regroup. One speeder squadron moves in to contest my objective, while Pedro and a Sternguard vet capture another. He shoots at the turbo-boosting destroyers, killing them. In the assault he wipes out both the Scarab squad and the Tomb Spyder.

It's the bottom of five and he has 2 objectives while I have zero. I move my Monolith towards Pedro's objective, contesting it. One Warrior squad portals through the Monolith and captures another objective. Destroyers move forward to contest the scouts' objective next turn. I shoot everything at the Speeder squadron contesting my right objective, killing both. In the assault the Deceiver wipes out Vulkan's squad but Vulkan stays alive.

I have 2 objectives and he has 1. The game continues.

Turn 6
He zooms another speeder squadron to contest my objective on the right. He has very few units left at this point. In the assault the Deceiver whiffs and misses Vulkan with all four attacks.

In shooting I kill one of his speeders but he makes tons of cover saves so the other one survives. I assault his scouts with my destroyers and tie them up.

I have 1 objective, he has 0. Game ends.

Postgame
There are several ways to defeat a Deep Striking army and reserving a large portion of your army is one method. It takes their best strength away from them (alpha strike). Going second really helps as well. In the case of sternguard, they are slow and vulnerable after they've been dropped.

My opponent played well, dropping in the middle of the board. It meant he would be out of range of my Necrons, but that's better than being slaughtered on the turn I rolled onto the board. There really wasn't much he could do without transports for his Sternguard. Drop Pod armies are not flexible so they can't adapt if faced with someone who knows how to beat them. Podding Sternguard is great on paper but doesn't hold up that well in real games.

At the end of the game I had lost:
-Scarabs
-Tomb Spyders
- Monolith
-3 Destroyers

He had lost:
-4 speeders + 1 immobilized
-about 25 Sternguard
-Vulkan