So this weekend saw the first run out of my fully painted nid force (Tales of Epic gamers for photos!)
This page shows my list, and the lists I played against -
http://www.epic-uk.co.uk/ukepicachampio ... =46&aid=24Game One - Jon and his flying circus!
Oh boy..... 5 AC formations! This was the list I really didn't want to face so getting it game one was less than ideal. With no real threat Jon uses his planes well and harried the nid formations, killing one of the Harridans early on. That said I was in the game right up to the point that my Dominatrix died to a Crit followed by another 6 killing it outright. I still managed to hang on in and had a chance to make the game 3-2 but a foolish move at the end resulted in it being a 3-1 win for Jon. Fun game if I did feel a little helpless against so many fliers.
Game Two - Ryan and his bunkers.
So Siegers, the number 2 list I didn't want to face

All those dug in troops were always going to be hard to shift and being blunt I was playing for a draw unless an opportunity to break into the lines appeared. Fortunately such a break did appear and at the end of turn 4 Ryan had one activation to try and save the game by ordering his last activation to march back to contest the blitz, which his AA unit did. After 4 turns of being shelled shot and assaulting the nid's came out much worse on the countback so a winning draw to Ryan. Let the debate as to the usefulness of razor wire v nids continue

Game Three - Chris and the Flying Circus MkII
Vanaheim, my that's a lot of skimmers! This was a game that could have gone badly but I think Chris moved forward a bit too aggressively on turn one and allowed the nids to swarm in and smash formations at will in turn 2 and 3. A very bloody game that saw the nids edge it 2-0 in 3 turns.
Game Four - Mark P and the Steel legion
Mark has been scared by playtesting against nids I think, and has a bit of a mental block against them. The game was going well as I broke or destroyed all the smaller formations and harried the larger ones. I wasn't able to push for the win on turn 3 and a mistake on turn 4 when my dom shot at his Reg HQ contesting my blitz rather than assaulting them saw me not have enough activations left to push for the win. Counting back resutled in a flat draw a there was less than 150 points difference between use.
Game Five - Mike T its a mirror!
Mike had brought nids, but without a dominatrix and with a couple of big swarms to my little ones. The nids basically met in the middle of the board and saw who could smash the other the quickest. 4 turns of carnage ensued with mass casualties on both sides but neither side able to force a win. When the points were tallied there was just less than 150 in it so another flat draw.
So a great weekend of gaming and I really enjoyed playing the nids with wave after wave of bodies pushing forward. I felt I had a chance in all the games with errors on my part normally the difference, though losing the Dom in game one was big momentum changer.
Thanks to Jon, Ryan, Chris, Mark and Mike for being great opponents and Steve for running another smooth event.
I think I may stick with the nid's for a while in 2012. You never know I may get better with practice!