AN ONGOING REVIEW OF THE HORUS HERESY FROM FORGE WORLD™
I am going to start this review of book 1 Betrayal with some information of the allies chart and lord of war option, the idea of this review is to help others understand the differences between the warhammer 40,000 units and the comparable HH:B ones, for example Codex: Space marines contains the "tactical squad" entry as a troops choice, while the "legion Tactical squad" is roughly comparable but with some key differences as i will show later.
The allies Matrix:
First of all don't get this mixed with the allies chart in Warhammer 40,000 (40k), the 40K one is reciprocal, so for example taking tau as the main force is no different on the chart than taking tau as allies they are still battle brothers to space marines, where as the HH:B ones are not reciprocal, taking some legions as the main army does not always mean they will be trusted as allies and vice versa.
The main use of the allies chart is to represent how the legions worked together during the great crusade and allows you to take armies and allies at this time, but due to the betrayal that happens later on in the timeline is it not a great tool to us if you plan on playing out the betrayal.
LORDS OF WAR:
This part of the review is mainly on ettiquit than on the lords of war choices themselves, i will start by saying that lords of war is not an optional rule as some believe it is, it works exactly the same way as allies but "unlocks" at certain points sizes, this in essence mean you can take a lord of war choice but your opponent does not have to.
This is where the ettiquit comes in, taking say.. a Baneblade to a standard game is not what some would call fair, but letting your opponent know before hand that you will be using the lord of war choice will allow them to use there own, no one wants a super heavy or primarch dropped on them out of the blue.
this is the real world and "knowledge is power, guard it well" doesn't apply here.
OK, so with the basics of ettiquite and the allies matrix out of the way we can get to the nity grity of this article, the units, I will start with the HQ options, specifically the rites of war (RoW) and the master of the legion (MTL) rules
MASTER OF THE LEGION;
This rule applies to Primarchs, Legion praetors and some special characters, any model with this rule can take a rite of war (see below) and Rolls twice on the same warlord traits table generating 2 separate warlord traits and choosing which to apply, any model with this rule is also limited to 1 per 1,000pts, so factor this in if you with to take a primarch (LoW) and a legion praetor, as this would mean you need to account for the primarch being no more than 25% of your total points and 1 per 1,000pts.
When rolling for warlord traits I would suggest rolling on the command traits as a lot of the others are skills that may not benefit a legion army.
Dust of a thousand worlds: this trait is amazing for any mechanised force as it gives you the move through cover universal special rule (USR), it can also be good for those foot slogging forces but they do not get as much bang for there buck.
Coordinated assault: For armies that like to assault this trait is quite good, +1 to assault distance for all friendly units within 12" , combine this with units such as World eaters (WE) Rampagers with jump packs and you can almost always guarantee the charge.
RITES OF WAR;
Rites of war is an optional rule that allows you to change the make up of you army, adding units and rules at times and at others removing some or limiting there use, i will list a few tactics and ideas for the HH:B rites of war
I will not be covering Book 2 "massacre" rites of war in this article, i will be doing another to cover the units and rules in that book at a later time.
ORBITAL ASSAULT;
This rite of war allows any unit that can take a rhino to take a legion drop pod, now this sounds great on the face of it until you realise that almost all the legion units that can take them are 10 man minimum, it also allows terminators to deep strike, deep striking terminators are quite rare in the HH books, so it could be quite a surprise for your opponent.
one of my favourite tactics for this rite is drop podding Angron with a legion command squad, since Angron is bulky he will only take up 2 slots in a transport, combine this with the 6 drop podding (WE) legion tactical squads and a smattering of other units and it can be quite a shock to have such an army in your face turn 1.
ARMOURED SPEARHEAD:
On the face of it this RoW seems like a bit of fun, it allows you take a land raider Phobos or a Proteus as a dedicated transport if you were allowed to take a Rhino as a dedicated transport, it also adds a further -1 to any tank shock ld tests,
the downside is that you must take a dedicated transport to cover all the models in the army(infantry only) so if you want 10 terminators then there must be a transport capable of taking those 10 terminators (note: however as per the FAQ this can be separate transports).
This can get really expensive really fast as the cheapest land raider is 200pts (Proteus) and 250pts respectively (Phobos) before any upgrades, I would suggest this RoW only for games of 2500 or more as otherwise you will be severely hampered by the rite of war.
The way I like to use this rite is taking breacher squads and popping them in Proteus for a mobile siege force, the AV14 wall of vehicles can be daunting to face, combined with the breachers this can be a bit of a problem to try to deal with in close combat as well.
ANGELS WRATH: This rite of war is very very fun to use and radically changes the way the army plays, probably more so than the others. Any of your jump pack equipped troops gain the Hit and run USR (HaR) and you can take storm eagles as dedicated transports if you could take a rhino, this makes an extremely mobile force with firepower that can be almost anywhere, Legion assault squads cost a premium and are cheaper the more you add to them, so this RoW encourages you take a few large units with you Praetors equipped with jump packs.
The downside is that you can ONLY take infantry that is transported by a storm eagle, jet bikes, jump infantry and skimmers are exempt from this, so it again encourages you to build a extremely fast army.
PRIDE OF THE LEGION: This is my favourite Rite of war, it allows you to take Legion terminators and legion veteran tacticals as troops choices and they must be the compulsory choices as well, as a side note it also allows your command squads to take a Phobos or Proteus as a dedicated transport.
Downsides, if they can be called that, are that if you lose all the terminators and veterans, your opponent gains another victory point (VP) and you are not allowed any allies.
My prefured tactic for this is to take the outflank USR on my veteran tacticals (VT) and put them inside a land raider Phobos, this can make for a nasty supprise for your opponent.
Well that's the Legion Rites of war covered, some legions have there own RoW and these will be covered when we get to them specifically. Now for the first unit review, the Legion Praetor
LEGION PRAETOR: (LP)
Options sums up this unit choice, you can equip this character in a myriad of ways (always making sure to match it up with any RoW you have chosen), now do not get this model mixed up with the "chapter master" option in C:sm, they are very different, the LP choice is used to edit your army to match your play style as opposed to a beat stick that the C:SM Chapter master is.
First of all you should not that the LP comes with artificer armour as standard, but does not however come with any kind of invulnerable save, these must be purchased at a premium in the case of the Iron halo, when it comes to advice for the LP all i can really suggest is playing with the large amount of options and seeing what works for you.
My personal build for the LP is a master crafted thunder hammer, cataphractii terminator armour, digital weapons and a volkite charger, relatively cheap and fun character, I use it to represent my Iron Warrior Praetor.
LEGION CENTURION (LC)
The LC has a staggering array of options and selections available to it, cheap and cheerful at 50pts each you can quickly fill out your Headquarters allowance and still have room for other things, there is a downside however, LC's only have 2 wounds, so bear this in mind when equipping them as a 200pt 2 wound character will not be a great investment.
Here is a run down of the different LC's available and keep in mind that only 1 of these choices may be made per LC model.
LEGION CHAPLAIN:
for a measly 35 points you get quite a deal here, re-rolls to hit in the first round of close combat and a power weapon, this option also does not come with limits on wargear, also note that unlike there 40k cousins legion chaplains do not have an invulnerable save as standard.
Unfortunately this option whilst good, gets overshadowed by the much better options later on.
MASTER OF THE SIGNAL:
Have you ever wanted to use those excellent models games workshop makes for the master of the signal, but the options never existed, well you can now for a steal, for 35 points you get a cognis signum (great for dissuading those deep strikers) and a Nuncio Vox (allows this models to be the line of sight for any barrage weapons), but the master of the signal gets one more bonus that marks it out as a great choice, Bombardment, don't confuse this with the chapter masters orbital bombardment, its a different beast entirely, its neither a heavy weapon nor does it require you to be stationary for the movement phase, it fires d3 str8 ap3 barrage large blasts ordinance (I know say that 10 times faster right?) it also does not scatter the full distance, you can use your full ballistic skill.
The downsides are that you cant take any of the cool equipment, no bikes of any kind, no terminator armour and no thunder hammer etc. but this model will be sitting in the backfield anyway so its not such a bad thing.
my tactic for this guy is to drop the orbital on any models manning an Aegis defence line and failing that being on the table, any models in non area terrain where the barrage shot is from its centre and can snipe them from cover, its also great for killing parking lots.
LEGION CHAMPION:
This is one of the worst choices and will usually be taken by someone who wants to represent a character such a Toageddon or Horus Aximand that do not have rules yet, great fighters but not true power houses like Loken or Abbadon, for 35pts you get +1 weapon skill (WS) and a master crafted weapon, but for a mere 15pts more for a legion praetor, you can get articifer armour the same weapon skill and a power weapon, the Legion Champion must declare challenges too, this is slightly better with 7th ed however.
VIGILATOR;
Ah now were getting to the fun choices, everyone loves snipers unless you are on the receiving end of one, step up the Vigilator, for 45pts you get a character that has access to the special issue ammunition, these alone are worth the points, you can also swap your power armour for scout armour for free, this get you 2 USR's move through cover and infiltrate, so now you can place your lovely sniper after others have placed there whole army, quite an advantage, but it gets better, you also get to sabotage your opponents army before the game starts, you pick an enemy unit (not an Independent character) and on a 2+ they take d6 str5 ap6 hits, great for taking out those units of land speeders or the rear of a rhino since it hits the weakest armour. One of the best bonuses however is the sniper ability can be used on any weapon, so volkite up for some short ranged sniping fun.
The downsides are that you cannot take any of the other armour options, nor can you take bikes and certain weapons are limited.
LEGION LIBRARIAN:
not to be confused with the dusty fellows who take care of books, well they do that as well but its just part of there daily job, legion librarians (LB) are very different from the more contemporary versions, first of all they are more powerful, able to take up to 3 mastery levels for 20pts each, not so bad when we consider that the LB gets any of the Force weapons for free, the other main difference is that the LB are more focused that the 40k versions, they must select a single discipline as opposed to rolling on several before the game begins, so this means your chosen discipline must be on the army list before you have seen your opponents force.
My favourite tactic for my LC is to take the telepathy discipline for my World eaters, i like to mess with minds and remove things such as fearless from certain units and invisibility is always fun to use on a 20 man legion tactical squad "what do mean i cant see them!!!"
FORGE LORD;
Sounds great doesn't it? however its not that good when you consider that a legion techmarine is also 50pts and already comes with the servo arm and extra gear, this choice is for those iron hands or iron warriors players, coming in at 35 points is a bit steep for the battle Smith rule and the same wargear options as a techmarine, there is one bonus to this however, an iron halo and a cyber familia will net you that rare of rare things in HH, a 3+ invunerable save.
PRIMARIS MEDICAI:
Or as I like to call him "mega medic" this is also one of those fun and good choices, for only 35pts you get Narthecium that gives him and his unit feel no pain (5+), it also has a needle pistol, but the real fun comes in when an enemy kills one of your units within 6" of the PM, on the roll of a 5+ you score a victory point, that means if your oponent is killing your units you can gain from it, add to this the other options a centurion has and the PM can be very useful for boosting those large legion units.
A favoured tactic of mine is to attach him to a 10 man Cataphractii terminator squad and have him in the same armour, this can prove very hard to deal with as they have a 2+ save, 4+ invulnerable and 5+ feel no pain, alot of points as you would expect though.
SIEGE BREAKER:
my favourite.. what? I'm an iron warriors player, what did you expect?, this upgrade is cheap for what it can bring to the table, for a mere 45pts you get access to one of the deadliest weapons in the entire game, phosphex rounds, it also comes with a nuncio vox as you would expect any artillery spotter to have, the SB can also buy itself up to 3 phosphex grenades, these are one use only and are absolutely devastating to infantry when they hit, str5 ap2 blast poison 3+ crawling fire and lingering death, now for the kicker, you can upgrade any of your legion medusas to have the large blast version of this for free and as if this was not enough any unit that the SB joins gains the wrecker and tank hunter USR's to any of its heavy weapons.
Stick this fella in a heavy support squad and watch those fortifications and tanks drop, the unit benefits from tank hunters and with a 8-10 man krak missile squad behind that, even land raiders will drop like flies.
MORIAT:
I can just see it now, the forge world execs patting each other on the backs for a job well done, a balanced and fun book for all, then "that guy" puts his hand up and makes a suggestion, we all know that guy, he is the one who came up with the Lucius drop pod and sabre platforms, well now we have the legion moriat, gunfighters, we all love them, well the LM is that pure and simple, for the crazy price of 35pts we get a model with an additional bolt pistol, rad grenades, scout, counter attack and the chain fire special rules, chain fire means that for every shooting attack that hits, you get to make another, i will will let that sink in a second, there is no limit to the shots this model can make, so equip it with 2 plasma pistols and use a LB with prescience and watch any unit in the game evaporate under a cloud of angy stares coming at you over the table, now this does come at a slight cost, the moriat can only join legion destroyer squads and cannon be the mandatory HQ, but for so little downsides its a steal.
Note; the moriat can no longer benefit from a LB powers, so deep strike him in alone and rip up a vehicle and die next turn, thankfully Salamanders can't take these as 2 inferno pistol moriats would hurt my soul.
LEGION COMMAND SQUAD:
the first thing you may notice is that this choice seems quite cheap, well don't be fooled, 100pts for a 3 man command squad is quite pricey, even with the weapon skill 5 (WS), but then you decide to delve a little deeper, this unit comes with artificer armour as standard, quite handy, then you notice that the legion standard bearer has 2 wounds, this helps a lot with those lucky precision shots, the entire squad are characters and as such can issue and accept challenges and also inflict precision shots and strikes, they also have a bolter, combat weapon and a bolt pistol, starts looking good right? but the best thing about this unit is the options, the squad has a plethora of them, ranging from the ever excellent Volkite weapons all the way to the sometimes useful power weapons, but the thing that makes this unit shine is the option to take Terminator armour at a discount compared to the terminator unit itself, so to recap, lots of options, 2 wound banner bearer, 2+ save, whats not to like.
My favourite load out for this unit is a legion praetor (required, or a primarch) cataphractii terminator armour, 4 volkite chargers, a plasma blaster and the ever fun power mauls, relatively cheap and cheerful and can pack a very heavy punch.
Now we move on the the elites, more than likely the best units in the legion force, Forge world shows its hand here and has done a very good job of making all the option viable, with a few exceptions to the legion specific elites choices they are all pretty solid.
LEGION VETERAN TACTICAL SQUAD:
All you 40k players will be quite familiar with this unit, as it is pretty much the same as the Tactical squad from C:SM with a few notable exceptions, the first is the options, while similar, you can take more of them, from the awesome (for iron warriors) Nuncio vox all the way to the Missile launcher with suspention fields (can move and fire with limitations) you can make a very flexible unit, a rare thing for the HH units, now we get to why you would take this unit over terminators or rapiers, veteran skills, they consist of the following, Fearless, sniper, furious charge, outflank and tank hunters, the best by far being snipers,
The best loadout for this unit is bolters pure and simple, with the sniper skill (chosen before game begins) a they gain the precision shot, rending and the ability to hurt anything on a 4+, this can be very funny if you decide to take 2 missile launchers that are suddenly rending and wound on a 4+, note even the bolt pistols have this ability.
Legion terminator squad: The base cost of legion terminator squads is higher, this is to represent there relative rarity during the great crusade, coming in at 175pts for 5 is can seem like they are cheap, until you see that its only 30pts per model after that, this means like with several other legion units it becomes cheaper the more models you add to the unit, legion terminators (LT) come with power weapons (any type) as standard and combi bolters, any Chaos space marine player will recognise this unit as its almost verbatum the same as there codex choice, but as per usual with a few key differences, the first being that in any mission that troops are scoring, so are LT, the second is that the excellent reaper autocannon is cheaper and lastly there are a few more options, such as duel lightning claws, LT are another one of those units that is up to the players preference in equipping, sons of horus will for example (if not taking justarin) will want to take advantage of the merciless fighters rule, so equip them with power mauls or lightning claws, while with world eaters you will want maximum bang for you buck in the assault phase so a few power fists and axes to make sure you wipe out that squad for the bonus. also of note is that unlike there 40k equivalent, this unit cannot deep strike with out the correct rite of war.
My personal choice for world eaters is to equip this unit with 2 chainfists, 2 axes and the veteran with a grenade harness and a power maul, fairly cheap for what it can do.
Techmarine Covenant: on the face of it this choice doesnt seem as good as the other elites choices, and you would be correct in that assumption, however thats if you look at just what the 40k techmarines can do, legion techmarines come with some good options and in groups of 1-3, the best reason to take 3 of these is a close combat army, they can have rad grenades for 10pts per TC, this inflicts -1 to the enemies Toughness untill the end of the phase, pretty nice to hit that squad and wound on 3's, other than this though I would stay away from this option as its overshadowed by the other elites.
My personal preference is a techmarine in a 20 man tactical sqaud with an apothecary and equiped with chainaxes, with a bit of luch this unit should alreay have furious charge so it will be wound marines on a 2+, not too shabby.
Apothecarion detachment: I know alot of people who shun this option as useless, i disagree, its one of the more solid choices, for 45pts you can make legion tactical squads very hard to kill, terminator command squad almost indestructable and breacher squads a real pain, able to a variety of units as the mission deems it, you can have alot of flexability in this choice, i would recomend taking 3 as you never know when you will need them.
Best loadouts vary from legion to legion, for my world eaters i go with articifer armour, power weapon (maul usually) and an augary scanner (Always take these to stop those pesky infiltrators blocking your scouting land raiders)
Legion dreadnought talon: What can i say about this selection? 125pts for a WS/BS 5 dreadnought, sure why not, it wont survive 10 seconds on the battlefield, Oh! you can take 1-3? well that mixes it up a bit. That was my initial reaction to the dreadnought talon (DT) but after more than 100 games of HH:B1 i can tell you that they are a very solid choice, i never leave home without 3 now all armed with 2 Dreanought close combat weapons (DCCW) and 2 plasma blasters, bringing it to 165 each, handy at shooting and close combat, this unit is very jack of all trades, there armour is not high enough to survive sustained anti tank, but there firepower isnt high enough to warrant the attention, since as soon as you deploy the DT they each become seperate from each other, this means in essence if you choose to you can have 9 independent Dreadnoughts running around the battlefield (what do mean thats for Iron hands?)
My favourite loadout is to take orbital assault RoW, 3 drop pods with 3 flamestorm and heavy flamer equiped dreadnoughts to thin out those legion heavy support squads.
Legion Comtemptor Talon: The contemptor talon (CT) on paper seems like a good shooting platform with 2 kheres assault cannons, this is a waste of an excellent assault platform, if you need shooting take the mortis contemptor (HH:B2), with its Armour value 13 (AV) at the front it is immune to that ever annoying krak grenade from any legion unit it attacks, taking 2 DCCW doesnt neccesarily limit its firepower either, as i find 2 plasma blastguns very usefull as well as the heavy flamers, this unit also has fleet, this alone cements it as an assault unit in my mind.
My prefured build for combat is 2 DCCW and 2 heavy flamers, this is cheap and under the magical 200pts mark, as anymore expensive and the contemptors become more of a liability due to limiting your other choices.
Legion Rapier weapons battery: Wow just wow, even the basic option for this unit is amazong, the quad heavy bolter fires an amazing 6 str5 ap4 twin linked shots per gun, thats 18 shots for 120 pts on a t7 3+ save platform, thats far too cheap in my mind, then we move to the laser destroyer itself, this weapon can kill any tank in the game with relative ease, str9 ap1 ordanance (so its rolls 2 dice and picks the highest) and twinlinked, means that it will hit and more than likely penetrate that tank, add a legion centurion with tank hunters and you are almost guarenteed to kill that tank, for only 155pts, next option is the quad gun, 12 str5 small blasts isnt anything to sniff at, but the cost of the unit and the elite choice for something i can find elsewhere doesnt justify it for me, lastly is the graviton cannon.. pretend this choice doesnt exist, they are simply not worth the 35pts. These are a must in any shooting Legion force.
OK so thats the HQ and elites sections copleted, now we move onto the Troops selections, HH:B1 makes several distionctions to this section that some may be unfamilier with, there are compulsery choices and supoport choices, to put it simply you cannot fill your compulsery choices with support squads and must take standard choices before the others are unlocked, certain RoW and legion traits do change this though.
Legion Tactical squad: This unit has nothing to do with the 40k version of the tactical squad, lacking any heavy or special weapon options this unit is just bolters, pure and simple, as a trend of the HH units it is more expensive to buy but gets cheaper the more models you add to it, the inial unit is ore expensive than the 40k equivilent and less flexible (another trend in HH), at an inial 150pts for a 10 man unit it may not seem worth the cost compared to the other troops, but there are several things that mark it out as a solid choice, the first is the option to take up to 10 additional model in the unit (20 in total) and the fury of the legion special rule, this allows the unit to fire twice in the shooting phase, but forgoes its next shooting phase or fire overwatch, add a legion apothecary to this unit and you have a very resilient objective holding unit.
the loadout i love to take is a 10 man unit in a drop pod, coming down and useing fury of the legion to take out units such as support squads or heavy weapon teams.
Legion assault squad: 250pts for a 10 man squad mean that these assault marines are a base cost of 25pts, quite pricey you say, its 15pts for any model added to the unit after that, so if you want an assault squad go big or go home, any model may take a combat shirld for 3pts each a dubious option to say the least, they can all also take melta bombs like the assault marines of yaw, but what make this unit just scrape by as useable is the ability to take power weapons for every 5 models, also on the veteran.
Im not a fan on this unit simply becuase its expensive and not suited to the troops slot, you want a unit that will hold an objective not go flying off to kill the enemy, while it can take and hold an enemy objectives i would rather spend the points on a cheaper more flexable unit. Go big or go home indeed.
Breacher siege squad: This unit is very good in my books, again iniatially expensive it more than makes up for this with its special rules and abilities, coming in at 225pts and then 10pts per model after that, this unit seems to get its bonus options for free, hardened armour (re roll blast and template weapon saves) boarding shields (6+ inv for shooting and 5+ in CC) and comes with a plethora of close quarters weaponry as befits its character, a solid troop choice that is durable alone and cheap if you add more men, add a legion apothecary to this unit and sit on the any objective and dare your oponent to charge it.
My loadout is fairly simple, 15 breachers, 3 volkite chargers, apothecary with volkite weapon, legion vexila and a power fist.
Tactical support squad: The only way to get special weapons in any meaningfull number in the troops slot, coming in at a whopping 100pts for 5 this unit is expensive right of the bat , you can upgrade to another 5 at 15pts each, this is cheaper so worth adding a few bodies, each member of the unit has a flamer as standard, they can upgrade to rota cannons (not worth the paper there printed on) volkite Calivars (excellent) plasmaguns (10 plasmas!!) or meltaguns (did someone say "dead tank") this unit gets expensive very very quickly, taking 10 plasmaguns for example clocks in at 325pts for a 10 man 3+ save unit, how hard is that to shift everyone?
My favourite option is taking a 10 man unit with an apothecary (seeing a pattern) and 10 volkite calivers, that is 20 shots str5 ap5 at 30" with the deflagrate rule, that will make a big hole in almost any unit, take note however, its a heavy weapon.
Legion reconaisance squad: This the 30k scout squad, but with power armour! this unit is expensive (as per normal support units seem to be) coming in at 125 for 5, even the added models are 15pts each, so are also expensive, swapping out power armour for scout armour (4+ save) gains you 2 USR move through cover and infiltrate for free, they can also take shotguns? combat weapons and sniper rifles, the latter makes the unit even more expensive, bearing in mind that with the correct RoW legion tactical squads are troops and can take the sniper rule for cheaper and more options. This to my mind is simply not a great choice for a troop selection, maybe Ravenguard will make it worth while, we shall wait and see.
well thats the troops done now too, a good selection and variety that any codex space marines player would love to have, well you cant, thank Guiliman for that. Next is the fast attack slots, there are some real heros here and sadly a few stinkers, unlike the troops and elites slots there are cetain units that are very expensive and dont really make up for it... other than looking cool of course.
Legion seeker squad: Anyone that plays codex space marines would be right in thinking this should be in the elites section, and they would be right, im not complaining as the very competative elites slot isnt taken up by one of the best units in the HH books, the legion seeker squad (LSS), the LSS gives us first and formost the special issue ammunition rule, these are somewhat diferent that the C:SM ones in that there are only 3 types to choose from, Scorpias rounds (str4 ap5, rending, shred) that are intended to deal with units such as breachers and terminators, also handy against riptides and wraithknights if you find yourself playing against these armies, the Kraken rounds (that all should be familier with) and finally the Tempest bolt shell, this last one is my favourite as i like to take a drop pod for this unit, they are str3 ap6 blast (3") rapid fire, this means 20 small blasts from this unit, that can shred any non spaced out unit quite handily. At 175pts for 5 this unit isnt cheap and as usual upgrading it makes it a cheaper unit in the long run, run a full squad of these in a drop pod and you will be a happy gamer.
Worth noting now as it would be a waste to do it later on, is that the Alpha legion and sons of horus have acess to the 4th round that causes ap3 hits on a 6, it is not Heavy1 like the Scorpias rounds so is will see use.
Legion outrider squad: this unit is one of the stinkers i mentioned earlier, at 30pts per model (no discount after the unit has been bought) no veteran included and very expensive options, its not worth it, the one saving grace is the scout USR that this unit comes with, 2 noteworthy options are the twin linked plasma guns and the twin linked meltaguns that replace the twin linked bolters on the bike, but these are 25pts added to the 30pt bike, thats 55pts for a twin plasma gun, this is important to note as you will see later on.
If you take this unit (as i have several times) its best to equip it with the twin meltagun option and outflank this unit, it will mitigate the low survivability of this very expensive unit.
Legion Attack bike squadron: Another great choice in the fast attack slot, 40pts per model (no discount after the first) for a heavy bolter and twin bolter, this unit is cheap and cheerful, able to take up to 5 bikes for 200pts is nothing to sniff at, then we get the weapon options, for a paltry 5pts we can have an auto cannon, 10pts gets you a multimelta, but this unit should be taking the auto cannon as 10 auto cannon shots will make short work of any tank you want to shoot, it also allows you to vastly outrange things such as Vindicators and other slow things that will kill this unit.
My favoured tactic is to sit back near the board edge and plink away with 2 units of 3 attack bike squads, taking on things such as the legion predetor squadrons to strip the odd hull point so my rapiers can finnish them. A solid choice for any legion force, very easy to convert too.
Legion Jetbike sky hunter squadron: Remeber i told you that 55pts was important to remember, well here is why, the sky hunters come in at 35pts each after the initial 135 for 3 (so a discount after the first) again no sergeant, but each has a heavy bolter, so this unit is very good at anti infantry, each comes with a bolt pistol and a CCW, so can be a dab hand in close combat if need be, the good thing about this unit is the weapon upgrades, for 10pts you get a volkite culverin (str6 heavy 4) or a plasma cannon for 15pts, 5 points cheaper than the slower outrider squad.
this unit is best used in groups of 6 with 2 plasma cannons for terminator hunting or rhino popping, the alternative is taking 6 with 2 volkite culverin and sitting at 36" to make use of the heavy bolter and the culverins range, never aproaching within shooting range of the infantry that you are killing.
Legion land speeder squadron: Any Dark angels player should recognise this unit as its somewhat similar, 1-5 speeders for the modest cost of 50pts per model, they are almost identical to the 40k versions with a few weapons that are different, they can take plasma cannons, graviton guns (avoid these) and havoc launchers in addition to the usual upgrades, they also get up to 2 hunter killer missiles per speeder. With all the high str shots flying around in the HH lists, land speeders are not what i would call great, taking units of 2 or 3 will help keep there profile low, try not to invest too much in such a vunerable platform.
I rarely use this unit, but when i do I use it to support my attack bikes with havoc launchers and heavy bolters, anything else is too rich for my blood.
Legion storm eagle gunship: Our first and only real flyer in the HH list (the others are transports and superheavies respectivly) the storm eagle is not as good as its 40k brother, and why should it be, its a different beast entirely, able to carry a respectable 20 models and still have room for alot of guns we have the storm eagle coming in at 210pts, but its not worth the fast attack slot sadly, overshadowed by the legion attack bike squadron and the seekers its best used as a dedicated transport (bear in mind you do not need to actually be embarked for this to be used), it can upgrade its tempest missiles (str6 sunder shots) to hellstrike missiles or 2 twin linked lascannons, either makes it a nice tank hunter, the nose weapon may also be upgraded, but the thing i love about this flyer is the armoured ceramite upgrade it can take, for only 20pts aswell.
My favourite loadout for this flyer is twin lascannons, a multi melta in the nose and ceramite plating, alot more reliable fire power than other units of similar cost.
Thats the fast attack options talked about, as you can see its probably the weakest slot in the book, legion specific options do not do much to sure this up but thats not really a problem when you get to the excellent heavy support choices.
Legion heavy support squad: Wow this squad is expensive.. or is it, for 135pts you get 5 heavy bolters (1 on the veteran too for those precision shots) and 20pts per man after that, if you stick with just the heavy bolters this unit can be quite cheap, as soon as you start to take any of the upgrades though it gets quite expensive very quickly, for all those Salamanders players out there you can swap the heavy bolters for heavy flamers, if you want a dedicated anti tank sqaud at say 10 men its a mighty 435pts, more than some primarchs, a hefty investment on such a fragile platform im sure you will all agree.
By far the best choice for this unit is the autocannons, for 5pts per man you can make a very versatile unit for taking out light vehicles and infantry, I usually stick to 8 man squads of autocannons as 235pts for this many autocannons seems like the right amount to me.
Legion predetor armour(ed) strike squadron: Excellent plain and simple, 1-3 predetors for 75pts each gets you av 13/11/10 and the predetor cannon (note: these are heavy 4 not 2 like the 40k versions) and for a minor cost of 25pts per predetor you also get heavy bolters, that mean for a meager 300pts you are firing 12 auto cannon shots and 18 heavy bolter shots, not bad for the cost, if you want to put your anti tank on the predetor you will notice there is no Annihilator varient, it hasnt been invented yet, the unit can take magma meltas, executioner cannons and heavy conversion beamers, also worthy of note is the flamestorm cannon for clearing out those pesky marines in a bunker. Several of the other non weapon options are viable also, such as the command tank upgrade that allows 1 weapon in the unit to be fired every turn as if it had the interceptor special rule, and the armoured ceramite rule, but as with the legion land speeder squadron its best to keep it cheap, as armoured vehicles dont have a long life expectency in the HH armies.
As I said before taking 3 predetors with heavy bolters and predetor cannons is plenty for this unit, leave the tank hunting to the rapier laser batteries, there better at it for alot less of a cost.
Legion land raider battle squadron: Single handidly the most expensive unit to invest in, even the cheapest land raider is 200pts before any upgrades, but imagine your oponents face putting down 9 av14/14/14 tanks,scary to say the least, each land raider has its pros and its cons, the proteus for example is not an assault vehicle, the land raider achilles is 300pts and does not have a thunderfire cannon, its replaced with the quad morter, a dubious exchange at best, its transport capacity is only 6 to boot, lastly the land raider phobos is the one we will all recognise, as its the same one from 40k, the only difference is the option (for 50pts no less) to scout and enhance your reserves options, again anything this unit can do is done better elsewhere for less, but not as durable, any Iron warrior or Iron hands player will be stopping here first and working an army around it. Best avoided unless playing apocalypse sized games
For 900pts I like to put angron in a land raider backed by several rampager squads, not the best way to get there, but by far the scariest, untill you see a few rapiers that is.
Legion artillery Tank squadron: Ah this as an Iron warrior player was my first stop to shop, very easy to convert from existing kits and a very very good choice too, you get 3 types to choose from, the humble whirlwind at 75pts each, the workhorse of the basilisk and the very scary Medusa siege tank. The one thing you should all take note of, none of these are open topped, thats because there crewed by space marines, secondly the BS on all the tanks is 4 and lastly the medusa is a barrage weapon now, unlike the errate'd imperial guard one, quite a boon, the unit comes in 1-3 and can be mixed as you see fit, so if you want the whirlwind can drop its template and multiple barrage in the medusa and the basilisk, the whirlwind can also upgrade to the Hyperious for free aswell, this makes for a cheap anti air unit
3 medusas, thats what i always take in any game, 3, 2 with phosphex rounds (str5 ap2, poison 3+, crawling fire, lingering death, barrage, large blast) and 1 standard str10 ap2 shot, hide them behind line of sight blocking terrain, and use the nuncio vox equiped siege breaker as line of sight so you can use your BS for the scatter, i call this my "aegis buster" unit.
Legion vindicator: what no squadrons!, ok for 120 pts you get a vindicator.. the same vindicator as 40k, now it does have some nice options, for example it can take a laser destroyer array, not that great on this platform, and all the usual upgrades that the legion vehicles can take, the best one by far is the machine spirit upgrade, for 25pts the Vindicator becomes an effective "fast vehicle" as it can fire the cannon even when moveing 12", the most notable thing however is the total lack of the siege shield.. on a siege tank, must have taken them another 10,000 years to think of that one, someone needs to tell the germans they are 29,000 years ahead of there time!
I wont gice much advice on this one, as the vindicator is functionally the same and anyone who uses it will know its a great little tanks, be wary of it!
Legion spartan assault tank: Again no squadrons? Oh i see why, ok fair enough, the spartan assault tank is one that will live in infamy for some, a very hard tank to kill and now its even harder to kill thanks to the flare shield upgrade, it makes the tank 320pts and is - 2 str to all template weapons and -1 to everything else, as this wasnt good enough you take the armoured ceramite upgrade thus making it immune to all melta etc, and cement this tank as quite likely one of the hardest things to kill in all of warhammers history, so its a good thing that this tanks doesnt have alot in the way of firepower.. oh it does, ok so its got 4 twin linked lascannon shots or 2 rapier shots, and the standard twin heavy bolter, its got a transport capacity of 25 models, nothing to sniff at to say the least and its an assault vehicle.
Drive this down your opponents throat, while singing the who and wearing sun glasses, I can think of no other way to be hated more... looks pretty though, I have 3.
Legion Caestus assault ram: This is the second flyerin the legion list, but its best not considered a flyer, because as soon as its on the table it will make a bee line towards the nastiest tank you have on the table and ram it, but its a fler.. but its a ram... what is this thing?, well its a flying ram that was desighed to smash into enemy starships haha space marines.. gota love them, it has a transport capacity of 10 models, thats 10 models of power, articifer and terminator armour, the latter losses the bulky rule while embarked, it also has a magma melta and a 5+ invunerable for any damage it takes from a ram attack, all in all worth the 305 pts if you want a force that comes at you like a screaming teenager at a justin beaber concert, and just as scary
Danger zone in the background and pulling a wheely on your segway, nothing is as cool as putting angron in one of these and firing him at the hardest unit on the table.
That finishes the Heavy support section of the article and the article itself, I will be writing another on the lords of war and the legions next.
So to summarize what we have covered with the heresy units, Legion units on the whole are less powerful than there contemporary cousins, less flexible, but also more specialised, this may lead a few to claim they are overpowered when they lose there prize hammerhead to a rapier battery or they lose a wraithguard squad to a legion tactical squads fury of the legion attack (ok that one may never happen), but on the whole these units are more balanced than the 40k armies out there, with a few exceptions on both sides (looking at you Moriat and Riptide), if you want to play 30 vs 40k feel free and dont be ashamed of bringing a legion list, the lack of Know no fear alone is a big detrement to this force, some have said the cheaper units will give you an advantage but as explained previously the legion units cost a premium to start with and if you are playing small games, it is you who will be at a disadvantage, as always use gaming etiquite and explain what does what and the force organisation chart you will be useing, if its 30k allow them to use there own superheavies (as pr the 25% rule) and if you are playing 40k dont take any lord of war choice such as the primarchs.. unless they agree of course.
Thanks to all the people that helped me fine tune the play testing on this and coming up with some cool ideas on how to use the units.
Special thanks to my brother for encouraging me to write about something I love, despite the fact my grammar is terrible and I cant spell.
Alex
Jonny
James
Chris
Thanks
Formosa
Any queries please send them to
Formosa on Dakkadakka
Formosa on Warseer
Formosa on Freebootas forum 40k radio.
Arkwilkinson83@hotmail.com
UPDATE; I'm going through all this and updating it bit by bit for 7th, hopefully to make a sticky or an article.
Just want to clarify that Praetors may roll twice on the chart, but select only one trait. Your wording was a little vague. Just to clarify for those who know nothing of how the book works.
ok I will edit and change for clarity, but it is infact 2 rolls on the same chart getting 2 warlord traits and choosing what to use, the wording is quite clear.
Really? Now I'm going to have to go check myself. That would be pretty awesome.
*Edit* Yeah, I checked. We're both right, just confused the wording. He gets to roll twice and selects which one to use of those two. So he has one trait, but has two options available.
Armoured spearhead: On the face of it this RoW seems like a bit of fun, it allows you take a land raider phobos or a proteus as a dedicated transport if you were allowed to take a Rhino as a dedicated transport, it also adds a further -1 to any tank shock ld tests,
the downside is that you must take a dedicated transport to cover all the models in the army(infantry only) so if you want 10 terminators then there must be a transport capable of taking those 10 terminators (note: however as per the FAQ this can be seperate transports).
This can get really expensive really fast as the cheapest land raider is 200pts (proteus) and 250pts respectivly (phobos) before any upgrades, I would suggest this RoW only for games of 2500 or more as otherwise you will be severly hampered by the rite of war.
The way I like to use this rite is taking breacher squads and popping them in Proteus for a mobile siege force, the AV14 wall of vehicles can be daunting to face, combined with the breachers this can be a bit of a problem to try to deal with in close combat aswell.
Angels Wrath: This rite of war is very very fun to use and radically changes the way the army plays, propbably more so than the others. Any of your jump pack equiped troops gain the Hit and run USR (HaR) and you can take storm eagles as dedicated transports if you could take a rhino, this makes an extremely mobile force with firepower that can be almost anywhere, Legion assault squads cost a premium and are cheaper the more you add to them, so this RoW encoureges you take a few large units with you Praetors equiped with jump packs.
The downside is that you can ONLY take infantry that is transported by a storm eagle, jetbikes, jump infantry and skimmers are exempt from this, so it again encoureges you to build a extremaly fast army.
Pride of the legion: This is my favourite Rite of war, it allows you to take Legion terminators and legion veteran tacticals as troops choices and they must be the compulsey choices aswell, as a side note it also allows your command squads to take a Phobos or proteus as a dedicated transport.
Dowsides, if they can be called that, are that if you lose all the terminators and veterans, your oponent gains another victory point (VP) and you are not allowed any allies.
My prefured tactic for this is to take the outflank USR on my verteran tacticals (VT) and put them inside a land raider phobos, this can make for a nasty supprise for your oponent.
Well thats the Legion Rites of war covered, some legions have there own RoW and these will be covered when we get to them specifically. Now for the first unit review, the Legion Praetor
Legion Preator: (LP) Options sums up this unit choice, you can equip this character in a myriad of ways (always making sure to match it up with any RoW you have chosen), now do not get this model mixed up with the "chapter master" option in C:sm, they are very diferent, the LP choice is used to edit your army to match your play style as opposed to a beat stick that the C:SM Chapter master is.
First of all you should not that the LP comes with articifer armour as standard, but does not however come with any kind of invunerable save, these must be purchased at a premium in the case of the Iron halo, when it comes to advice for the LP all i can really suggest is playing with the large ammount of options and seeing what works for you.
My personal build for the LP is a master crafted thunderhammer, cataphractii terminator armour, digital weapons and a volkite charger, relativly cheap and fun character, I use it to represent my Iron Warrior Praetor.
The LC has a staggering array of options and selections avaialbe to it, cheap and cheerful at 50pts each you can quickly fill out your Headquarters allowance and still have room for other things, there is a downside however, LC's only have 2 wounds, so bear this in mind when equiping them as a 200pt 2 wound character will not be a great investment.
Here is a run down of the different LC's available and keep in mind that only 1 of these choices may be made per LC model.
Legion Chaplain: for a measly 35 points you get quite a deal here, re-rolls to hit on the charge and a power weapon, this option also does not come with limits on wargear, also note that unlike there 40k cousins legion chaplains do not have an invunerable save as standard.
Unfortunately this option whilst good, gets overshadowed by the much better options later on.
Master of the signal: Have you ever wanted to use those excellent models games workshop makes for the master of the signal, but the options never existed, well you can now for a steal, for 35 points you get a cognis signum (great for disuading those deepstrikers)and a Nuncio Vox (allows this models to be the line of sight for any barrage weapons), but the master of the signal gets one more bonus that marks it out as a great choice, Bombardment, dont confuse this with the chapter masters orbital bombardment, its a different beast entirely, its niether a heavy weapon nor does it require you to be stationary for the movement phase, it fires d3 str8 ap3 barrage large blasts ordanance (i know say that 10 times faster right?) it also does not scatter the full distance, you can use your full balistic skill.
The downsides are that you cant take any of the cool equipment, no bikes of any kind, no terminator armour and no thunder hammer etc. but this model will be sitting in the backfield anyway so its not such a bad thing.
my tactic for this guy is to drop the orbital on any models manning an Aegis defence line and failing that being on the table, any models in non area terrain where cover is defined by the angle you are shooting at.
Legion champion: this is one of the worsed choices and will usually be taken by someone who wants to represent a character such a Toageddon or Horus aximand that do not have rules yet, great fighters but not true power houses like loken or Abbadon, for 35pts you get +1 weapon skill (WS) and a master crafted weapon, but for a mere 15pts more for a legion praetor you get articifer armour the same and a power weapon, and must declare challenges, avoid this choice.
Vigilator: Ah now were getting to the fun choices, everyone loves snipers unless you are on the recieving end of one, step up the Vigilator, for 45pts you get a character that has acess to the special issue ammuniton, these alone are worth the points, you can also swap your power armour for scout armour for free, this get you 2 USR's move through cover and infiltrate, so now you can place your lovely sniper after others have placed there whole army, quite an adavantage, but it gets better, you also get to sabotage your oponents army before the game starts, you pick an enemy unit (not and Independent character IC) and on a 2+ they take d6 str5 ap6 hits, great for taking out those units of land speeders or the rear of a rhino since it hits the weakest armour.
the downsides are that you cannot take any of the other armour options, nor can you take bikes and certain weapons are limited.
Legion librarian: not to be confused with the dusty fellows who take care of books, well they do that aswell but its just part of there daily job, legion librarians (LB) are very different from the more contempory versions, first of all they are more powerful, able to take up to 3 mastery levels for 20pts each, not so bad when we consider that the LB gets any of the Force weapons for free, the other main diference is that the LB are more focused that the 40k versions, they must select a single dicipline as oposed to rolling on several before the game begins, so this means your chosen dicipline must be on the army list before you have seen your oponents force.
My favourite tactic for my LC is to take the telepathy dicipline for my dark angels, i like to mess with minds and remove things such as fearless from certain units and invisisbility is always fun to use on a 20 man legion tactical squad "what do mean i cant see them!!!"
Forge lord: Sounds great doesnt it? however its not that good when you consider that a legion techmarine is also 50pts and already comes with the servoarm and extra gear, this choice is for those iron hands or iron warriors players, coming in at 35 points is a bit steep for the battlesmith rule and the same wargear options as a techmarine, there is one bonus to this however, an iron halo and a cyber familia will net you that rare of rare things in HH, a 3+ invunverable save.
Primaris medicai: Or as I like to call him "mega medic" this is also one of those fun and good choices, for only 35pts you get Narthecium that gives him and his unit feel no pain (5+), it also has a needle pistol, but the real fun comes in when an enemy kills one of your units within 6" of the PM, on the roll of a 5+ you score a victory point, that means if your oponent is killing your units you can gain from it, add to this the other options a centurion has and the PM can be very usefull for boosting those large legion units.
A favoured tactic of mine is to attach him to a 10 man Cataphractii terminator squad and have him in the same armour, this can prove very hard to deal with as they have a 2+ save, 4+ invunerable and 5+ feel no pain, alot of points as you would expect though.
Siege breaker: my favourite.. what? im an iron warriors player, what did you expect?, this upgrade is cheap for what it can bring to the table, for a mere 45pts you get acess to one of the deadliest weapons in the entire game, phosphex rounds, it also comes with a nuncio vox as you would expect any artillery spotter to have, the SB can also buy itself up to 3 phosphex grenades, these are one use only and are aboslutely devestating to infantry when they hit, str5 ap2 blast poison 3+ crawing fire and lingering death, now for the kicker, you can upgrade any of your legion medusas to have the large blast version of this for free and as if this was not enough any unit that the SB joins gains the wrecker and tank hunter USR's to any of its heavy weapons.
Now i always put the SB in a unit of Legion Rapiers, backed up by 3 legion medusa siege tanks with phosphex rounds,very very nasty anti tank unit with str9 ap1 ordanance twin liked tank hunters, even flyers fear this.
Moriat: i can just see it now, the forge world execs patting eachother on the backs for a job well done, a ballanced and fun book for all, then "that guy" puts his hand up and makes a suggestion, we all know that guy, he is the one who came up with the lucius drop pod and sabre platforms, well now we have the legion moriat, gunfighters, we all love them, well the LM is that pure and simple, for the crazy price of 35pts we get a model with an aditional bolt pistol, rad grenades, scout, counter attack and the chain fire special rules, chain fire means that for every shooting attack that hits, you get to make another, i will will let that sink in a second, there is no limit to the shots this model can make, so equip it with 2 plasma pistols and use a LB with prescience and watch any unit in the game evaporate under a cloud of angy stares coming at you over the table, now this does come at a slight cost, the moriat can only join legion destroyer squads and cannon be the mandortory HQ, but for so little dowsides its a steal.
I'll throw in that using the Salamanders' rules, you can build the beefiest Praetor of all the legions currently available.
A fully pimped Sallies Praetor would look like this;
Praetor
-Iron Halo
-Master Crafted Thunder Hammer (only 5pts with the Sallies rules instead of 15)
-Infernus Pistol (purchase plasma pistol, swap for Infernus)
-Mantle of the Elder Drake (confers EW)
-Dragon-scale Stormshield (+1 to invuln for 3++)
-Digital lasers (for the extra attack goodness)
So, he's a 2+/3++ with EW. He has 5 attacks and an MC'd Hammer. His pistol becomes master-crafted if he takes his legions Rite of War.
Seeing as most Praetors would likely be armed with either hammers or paragon blades, ignoring instant death is huge. Oh, and he has a (most likely) MC'd S8 pistol to shoot before going into combat. Plus, he'll reliably land attacks against most targets, and have the saves to tank them, as only the Iron Hands can get a 3++ like the Sallies can. You can trade the Iron Halo for Cataphractii termi armour and jiggle the points a little, but there's no difference in the end. Whole thing clocks in at 215pts, which after you consider how awesome he is in CC, he can still select Rites of War, has the other benefits of being a Praetor (roll twice for warlord traits).
Support him with a ML3 Librarian Consul that selects Divination and you've got an awesome HQ pair for mid to high point games.
Blacksails wrote: I'll throw in that using the Salamanders' rules, you can build the beefiest Praetor of all the legions currently available.
A fully pimped Sallies Praetor would look like this;
Praetor
-Iron Halo
-Master Crafted Thunder Hammer (only 5pts with the Sallies rules instead of 15)
-Infernus Pistol (purchase plasma pistol, swap for Infernus)
-Mantle of the Elder Drake (confers EW)
-Dragon-scale Stormshield (+1 to invuln for 3++)
-Digital lasers (for the extra attack goodness)
So, he's a 2+/3++ with EW. He has 5 attacks and an MC'd Hammer. His pistol becomes master-crafted if he takes his legions Rite of War.
Seeing as most Praetors would likely be armed with either hammers or paragon blades, ignoring instant death is huge. Oh, and he has a (most likely) MC'd S8 pistol to shoot before going into combat. Plus, he'll reliably land attacks against most targets, and have the saves to tank them, as only the Iron Hands can get a 3++ like the Sallies can. You can trade the Iron Halo for Cataphractii termi armour and jiggle the points a little, but there's no difference in the end. Whole thing clocks in at 215pts, which after you consider how awesome he is in CC, he can still select Rites of War, has the other benefits of being a Praetor (roll twice for warlord traits).
Support him with a ML3 Librarian Consul that selects Divination and you've got an awesome HQ pair for mid to high point games.
thanks very much, there are is an error however, all legions have acess to a 3++, but not on a praetor, if you take the forge lord option and a iron halo with the cyber familia (+1 to inv) you get a 3++, no eternal warrior though, I will keep your post in mind when I get to the legion traits etc.
Legion command squad: the first thing you may notice is that this choice seems quite cheap, well dont be fooled, 100pts for a 3 man command squad is quite pricey, even with the weapon skill 5 (WS), but then you decide to delve a little deeper, this unit comes with articifer armour as standard, quite handy, then you notice that the legion standard bearer has 2 wounds, this helps alot with those lucky precision shots, the entire squad are characters and as such can issue and accept challenges and also inflict precision shots and strikes, they also have a bolter, combat weapon and a bolt pistol, starts looking good right? but the best thing about this unit is the options, the squad has a plethora of them, ranging from the ever exellent Volkite weapons all the way to the sometimes useful power weapons, but the thing that makes this unit shine is the option to take Terminator armour at a discount compared to the terminator unit itself, so to recap, lots of options, 2 wound banner bearer, 2+ save, whats not to like.
My favourite loadout for this unit is a legion praetor (required, or a primarch) cataphractii terminator armour, 4 volkite chargers, a plasma blaster and the ever fun power mauls, relativly cheap and cheerfull and can pack a very heavy punch.
Now we move on the the elites, more than likely the best units in the legion force, Forge world shows its hand here and has done a very good job of making all the option viable, with a few exceptions to the legion specific elites choices they are all pretty solid.
Legion veteran tactical squad: All you 40k players will be quite familier with this unit, as it is pretty much the same as the Tactical squad from C:SM with a few notable exceptions, the first is the options, while similar, you can take more of them, from the awsome (for iron warriors) Nuncio vox all the way to the Missile launcher with suspention fields (can move and fire with limitations) you can make a very flexable unit, a rare thing for the HH units, now we get to why you would take this unit over terminators or rapiers, veteran skills, they consist of the following, Fearless, sniper, furious charge, outflank and tank hunters, the best by far being snipers,
The best loadout for this unit is bolters pure and simple, with the sniper skill (chosen before game begins) a they gain the precision shot, rending and the ability to hurt anything on a 4+, this can be very funny if you decide to take 2 missile launchers that are suddenly rending and wound on a 4+, note even the bolt pistols have this ability.
Legion terminator squad: The base cost of legion terminator squads is higher, this is to represent there relative rarity during the great crusade, coming in at 175pts for 5 is can seem like they are cheap, untill you see that its only 30pts per model after that, this means like with several other legion units it becomes cheaper the more models you add to the unit, legion terminators (LT) come with power weapons (any type) as standard and combi bolters, any Chaos space marine player will recognise this unit as its almost verbatum the same as there codex choice, but as per usual with a few key diferences, the first being that in any mission that troops are scoring, so are LT, the second is that the excellent reaper autocannon is cheaper and lastly there are a few more options, such as duel lightning claws, LT are another one of those units that is up to the players preference in equiping, sons of horus will for example (if not taking justarin) will want to take advantage of the merciless fighters rule, so equip them with power mauls or lightning claws, while with world eaters you will want maxium bang for you buck in the assault phase so a few power fists and axes to make sure you wipe out that squad for the bonus. also of note is that unlike there 40k equivilient, this unit cannot deep strike with out the correct rite of war.
My personal choice for world eaters is to equip this unit with 2 chainfists, 2 axes and the veteran with a grenade harness and a power maul, fairly cheap for what it can do.
Techmarine Covenant: on the face of it this choice doesnt seem as good as the other elites choices, and you would be correct in that assumption, however thats if you look at just what the 40k techmarines can do, legion techmarines come with some good options and in groups of 1-3, the best reason to take 3 of these is a close combat army, they can have rad grenades for 10pts per TC, this inflicts -1 to the enemies Toughness untill the end of the phase, pretty nice to hit that squad and wound on 3's, other than this though I would stay away from this option as its overshadowed by the other elites.
My personal preference is a techmarine in a 20 man tactical sqaud with an apothecary and equiped with chainaxes, with a bit of luch this unit should alreay have furious charge so it will be wound marines on a 2+, not too shabby.
Apothecarion detachment: I know alot of people who shun this option as useless, i disagree, its one of the more solid choices, for 45pts you can make legion tactical squads very hard to kill, terminator command squad almost indestructable and breacher squads a real pain, able to a variety of units as the mission deems it, you can have alot of flexability in this choice, i would recomend taking 3 as you never know when you will need them.
Best loadouts vary from legion to legion, for my world eaters i go with articifer armour, power weapon (maul usually) and an augary scanner (Always take these to stop those pesky infiltrators blocking your scouting land raiders)
Legion dreadnought talon: What can i say about this selection? 125pts for a WS/BS 5 dreadnought, sure why not, it wont survive 10 seconds on the battlefield, Oh! you can take 1-3? well that mixes it up a bit. That was my initial reaction to the dreadnought talon (DT) but after more than 100 games of HH:B1 i can tell you that they are a very solid choice, i never leave home without 3 now all armed with 2 Dreanought close combat weapons (DCCW) and 2 plasma blasters, bringing it to 165 each, handy at shooting and close combat, this unit is very jack of all trades, there armour is not high enough to survive sustained anti tank, but there firepower isnt high enough to warrant the attention, since as soon as you deploy the DT they each become seperate from each other, this means in essence if you choose to you can have 9 independent Dreadnoughts running around the battlefield (what do mean thats for Iron hands?)
My favourite loadout is to take orbital assault RoW, 3 drop pods with 3 flamestorm and heavy flamer equiped dreadnoughts to thin out those legion heavy support squads.
Legion Comtemptor Talon: The contemptor talon (CT) on paper seems like a good shooting platform with 2 kheres assault cannons, this is a waste of an excellent assault platform, if you need shooting take the mortis contemptor (HH:B2), with its Armour value 13 (AV) at the front it is immune to that ever annoying krak grenade from any legion unit it attacks, taking 2 DCCW doesnt neccesarily limit its firepower either, as i find 2 plasma blastguns very usefull as well as the heavy flamers, this unit also has fleet, this alone cements it as an assault unit in my mind.
My prefured build for combat is 2 DCCW and 2 heavy flamers, this is cheap and under the magical 200pts mark, as anymore expensive and the contemptors become more of a liability due to limiting your other choices.
Legion Rapier weapons battery: Wow just wow, even the basic option for this unit is amazong, the quad heavy bolter fires an amazing 6 str5 ap4 twin linked shots per gun, thats 18 shots for 120 pts on a t7 3+ save platform, thats far too cheap in my mind, then we move to the laser destroyer itself, this weapon can kill any tank in the game with relative ease, str9 ap1 ordanance (so its rolls 2 dice and picks the highest) and twinlinked, means that it will hit and more than likely penetrate that tank, add a legion centurion with tank hunters and you are almost guarenteed to kill that tank, for only 155pts, next option is the quad gun, 12 str5 small blasts isnt anything to sniff at, but the cost of the unit and the elite choice for something i can find elsewhere doesnt justify it for me, lastly is the graviton cannon.. pretend this choice doesnt exist, they are simply not worth the 35pts. These are a must in any shooting Legion force.
OK so thats the HQ and elites sections copleted, now we move onto the Troops selections, HH:B1 makes several distionctions to this section that some may be unfamilier with, there are compulsery choices and supoport choices, to put it simply you cannot fill your compulsery choices with support squads and must take standard choices before the others are unlocked, certain RoW and legion traits do change this though.
Legion Tactical squad: This unit has nothing to do with the 40k version of the tactical squad, lacking any heavy or special weapon options this unit is just bolters, pure and simple, as a trend of the HH units it is more expensive to buy but gets cheaper the more models you add to it, the inial unit is ore expensive than the 40k equivilent and less flexible (another trend in HH), at an inial 150pts for a 10 man unit it may not seem worth the cost compared to the other troops, but there are several things that mark it out as a solid choice, the first is the option to take up to 10 additional model in the unit (20 in total) and the fury of the legion special rule, this allows the unit to fire twice in the shooting phase, but forgoes its next shooting phase or fire overwatch, add a legion apothecary to this unit and you have a very resilient objective holding unit.
the loadout i love to take is a 10 man unit in a drop pod, coming down and useing fury of the legion to take out units such as support squads or heavy weapon teams.
Legion assault squad: 250pts for a 10 man squad mean that these assault marines are a base cost of 25pts, quite pricey you say, its 15pts for any model added to the unit after that, so if you want an assault squad go big or go home, any model may take a combat shirld for 3pts each a dubious option to say the least, they can all also take melta bombs like the assault marines of yaw, but what make this unit just scrape by as useable is the ability to take power weapons for every 5 models, also on the veteran.
Im not a fan on this unit simply becuase its expensive and not suited to the troops slot, you want a unit that will hold an objective not go flying off to kill the enemy, while it can take and hold an enemy objectives i would rather spend the points on a cheaper more flexable unit. Go big or go home indeed.
Breacher siege squad: This unit is very good in my books, again iniatially expensive it more than makes up for this with its special rules and abilities, coming in at 225pts and then 10pts per model after that, this unit seems to get its bonus options for free, hardened armour (re roll blast and template weapon saves) boarding shields (6+ inv for shooting and 5+ in CC) and comes with a plethora of close quarters weaponry as befits its character, a solid troop choice that is durable alone and cheap if you add more men, add a legion apothecary to this unit and sit on the any objective and dare your oponent to charge it.
My loadout is fairly simple, 15 breachers, 3 volkite chargers, apothecary with volkite weapon, legion vexila and a power fist.
Tactical support squad: The only way to get special weapons in any meaningfull number in the troops slot, coming in at a whopping 100pts for 5 this unit is expensive right of the bat , you can upgrade to another 5 at 15pts each, this is cheaper so worth adding a few bodies, each member of the unit has a flamer as standard, they can upgrade to rota cannons (not worth the paper there printed on) volkite Calivars (excellent) plasmaguns (10 plasmas!!) or meltaguns (did someone say "dead tank") this unit gets expensive very very quickly, taking 10 plasmaguns for example clocks in at 325pts for a 10 man 3+ save unit, how hard is that to shift everyone?
My favourite option is taking a 10 man unit with an apothecary (seeing a pattern) and 10 volkite calivers, that is 20 shots str5 ap5 at 30" with the deflagrate rule, that will make a big hole in almost any unit, take note however, its a heavy weapon.
Legion reconaisance squad: This the 30k scout squad, but with power armour! this unit is expensive (as per normal support units seem to be) coming in at 125 for 5, even the added models are 15pts each, so are also expensive, swapping out power armour for scout armour (4+ save) gains you 2 USR move through cover and infiltrate for free, they can also take shotguns? combat weapons and sniper rifles, the latter makes the unit even more expensive, bearing in mind that with the correct RoW legion tactical squads are troops and can take the sniper rule for cheaper and more options. This to my mind is simply not a great choice for a troop selection, maybe Ravenguard will make it worth while, we shall wait and see.
well thats the troops done now too, a good selection and variety that any codex space marines player would love to have, well you cant, thank Guiliman for that. Next is the fast attack slots, there are some real heros here and sadly a few stinkers, unlike the troops and elites slots there are cetain units that are very expensive and dont really make up for it... other than looking cool of course.
Legion seeker squad: Anyone that plays codex space marines would be right in thinking this should be in the elites section, and they would be right, im not complaining as the very competative elites slot isnt taken up by one of the best units in the HH books, the legion seeker squad (LSS), the LSS gives us first and formost the special issue ammunition rule, these are somewhat diferent that the C:SM ones in that there are only 3 types to choose from, Scorpias rounds (str4 ap5, rending, shred) that are intended to deal with units such as breachers and terminators, also handy against riptides and wraithknights if you find yourself playing against these armies, the Kraken rounds (that all should be familier with) and finally the Tempest bolt shell, this last one is my favourite as i like to take a drop pod for this unit, they are str3 ap6 blast (3") rapid fire, this means 20 small blasts from this unit, that can shred any non spaced out unit quite handily. At 175pts for 5 this unit isnt cheap and as usual upgrading it makes it a cheaper unit in the long run, run a full squad of these in a drop pod and you will be a happy gamer.
Worth noting now as it would be a waste to do it later on, is that the Alpha legion and sons of horus have acess to the 4th round that causes ap3 hits on a 6, it is not Heavy1 like the Scorpias rounds so is will see use.
Legion outrider squad: this unit is one of the stinkers i mentioned earlier, at 30pts per model (no discount after the unit has been bought) no veteran included and very expensive options, its not worth it, the one saving grace is the scout USR that this unit comes with, 2 noteworthy options are the twin linked plasma guns and the twin linked meltaguns that replace the twin linked bolters on the bike, but these are 25pts added to the 30pt bike, thats 55pts for a twin plasma gun, this is important to note as you will see later on.
If you take this unit (as i have several times) its best to equip it with the twin meltagun option and outflank this unit, it will mitigate the low survivability of this very expensive unit.
Legion Attack bike squadron: Another great choice in the fast attack slot, 40pts per model (no discount after the first) for a heavy bolter and twin bolter, this unit is cheap and cheerful, able to take up to 5 bikes for 200pts is nothing to sniff at, then we get the weapon options, for a paltry 5pts we can have an auto cannon, 10pts gets you a multimelta, but this unit should be taking the auto cannon as 10 auto cannon shots will make short work of any tank you want to shoot, it also allows you to vastly outrange things such as Vindicators and other slow things that will kill this unit.
My favoured tactic is to sit back near the board edge and plink away with 2 units of 3 attack bike squads, taking on things such as the legion predetor squadrons to strip the odd hull point so my rapiers can finnish them. A solid choice for any legion force, very easy to convert too.
Legion Jetbike sky hunter squadron: Remeber i told you that 55pts was important to remember, well here is why, the sky hunters come in at 35pts each after the initial 135 for 3 (so a discount after the first) again no sergeant, but each has a heavy bolter, so this unit is very good at anti infantry, each comes with a bolt pistol and a CCW, so can be a dab hand in close combat if need be, the good thing about this unit is the weapon upgrades, for 10pts you get a volkite culverin (str6 heavy 4) or a plasma cannon for 15pts, 5 points cheaper than the slower outrider squad.
this unit is best used in groups of 6 with 2 plasma cannons for terminator hunting or rhino popping, the alternative is taking 6 with 2 volkite culverin and sitting at 36" to make use of the heavy bolter and the culverins range, never aproaching within shooting range of the infantry that you are killing.
Legion land speeder squadron: Any Dark angels player should recognise this unit as its somewhat similar, 1-5 speeders for the modest cost of 50pts per model, they are almost identical to the 40k versions with a few weapons that are different, they can take plasma cannons, graviton guns (avoid these) and havoc launchers in addition to the usual upgrades, they also get up to 2 hunter killer missiles per speeder. With all the high str shots flying around in the HH lists, land speeders are not what i would call great, taking units of 2 or 3 will help keep there profile low, try not to invest too much in such a vunerable platform.
I rarely use this unit, but when i do I use it to support my attack bikes with havoc launchers and heavy bolters, anything else is too rich for my blood.
Legion storm eagle gunship: Our first and only real flyer in the HH list (the others are transports and superheavies respectivly) the storm eagle is not as good as its 40k brother, and why should it be, its a different beast entirely, able to carry a respectable 20 models and still have room for alot of guns we have the storm eagle coming in at 210pts, but its not worth the fast attack slot sadly, overshadowed by the legion attack bike squadron and the seekers its best used as a dedicated transport (bear in mind you do not need to actually be embarked for this to be used), it can upgrade its tempest missiles (str6 sunder shots) to hellstrike missiles or 2 twin linked lascannons, either makes it a nice tank hunter, the nose weapon may also be upgraded, but the thing i love about this flyer is the armoured ceramite upgrade it can take, for only 20pts aswell.
My favourite loadout for this flyer is twin lascannons, a multi melta in the nose and ceramite plating, alot more reliable fire power than other units of similar cost.
Thats the fast attack options talked about, as you can see its probably the weakest slot in the book, legion specific options do not do much to sure this up but thats not really a problem when you get to the excellent heavy support choices.
Legion heavy support squad: Wow this squad is expensive.. or is it, for 135pts you get 5 heavy bolters (1 on the veteran too for those precision shots) and 20pts per man after that, if you stick with just the heavy bolters this unit can be quite cheap, as soon as you start to take any of the upgrades though it gets quite expensive very quickly, for all those Salamanders players out there you can swap the heavy bolters for heavy flamers, if you want a dedicated anti tank sqaud at say 10 men its a mighty 435pts, more than some primarchs, a hefty investment on such a fragile platform im sure you will all agree.
By far the best choice for this unit is the autocannons, for 5pts per man you can make a very versatile unit for taking out light vehicles and infantry, I usually stick to 8 man squads of autocannons as 235pts for this many autocannons seems like the right amount to me.
Legion predetor armour(ed) strike squadron: Excellent plain and simple, 1-3 predetors for 75pts each gets you av 13/11/10 and the predetor cannon (note: these are heavy 4 not 2 like the 40k versions) and for a minor cost of 25pts per predetor you also get heavy bolters, that mean for a meager 300pts you are firing 12 auto cannon shots and 18 heavy bolter shots, not bad for the cost, if you want to put your anti tank on the predetor you will notice there is no Annihilator varient, it hasnt been invented yet, the unit can take magma meltas, executioner cannons and heavy conversion beamers, also worthy of note is the flamestorm cannon for clearing out those pesky marines in a bunker. Several of the other non weapon options are viable also, such as the command tank upgrade that allows 1 weapon in the unit to be fired every turn as if it had the interceptor special rule, and the armoured ceramite rule, but as with the legion land speeder squadron its best to keep it cheap, as armoured vehicles dont have a long life expectency in the HH armies.
As I said before taking 3 predetors with heavy bolters and predetor cannons is plenty for this unit, leave the tank hunting to the rapier laser batteries, there better at it for alot less of a cost.
Legion land raider battle squadron: Single handidly the most expensive unit to invest in, even the cheapest land raider is 200pts before any upgrades, but imagine your oponents face putting down 9 av14/14/14 tanks,scary to say the least, each land raider has its pros and its cons, the proteus for example is not an assault vehicle, the land raider achilles is 300pts and does not have a thunderfire cannon, its replaced with the quad morter, a dubious exchange at best, its transport capacity is only 6 to boot, lastly the land raider phobos is the one we will all recognise, as its the same one from 40k, the only difference is the option (for 50pts no less) to scout and enhance your reserves options, again anything this unit can do is done better elsewhere for less, but not as durable, any Iron warrior or Iron hands player will be stopping here first and working an army around it. Best avoided unless playing apocalypse sized games
For 900pts I like to put angron in a land raider backed by several rampager squads, not the best way to get there, but by far the scariest, untill you see a few rapiers that is.
Legion artillery Tank squadron: Ah this as an Iron warrior player was my first stop to shop, very easy to convert from existing kits and a very very good choice too, you get 3 types to choose from, the humble whirlwind at 75pts each, the workhorse of the basilisk and the very scary Medusa siege tank. The one thing you should all take note of, none of these are open topped, thats because there crewed by space marines, secondly the BS on all the tanks is 4 and lastly the medusa is a barrage weapon now, unlike the errate'd imperial guard one, quite a boon, the unit comes in 1-3 and can be mixed as you see fit, so if you want the whirlwind can drop its template and multiple barrage in the medusa and the basilisk, the whirlwind can also upgrade to the Hyperious for free aswell, this makes for a cheap anti air unit
3 medusas, thats what i always take in any game, 3, 2 with phosphex rounds (str5 ap2, poison 3+, crawling fire, lingering death, barrage, large blast) and 1 standard str10 ap2 shot, hide them behind line of sight blocking terrain, and use the nuncio vox equiped siege breaker as line of sight so you can use your BS for the scatter, i call this my "aegis buster" unit.
Legion vindicator: what no squadrons!, ok for 120 pts you get a vindicator.. the same vindicator as 40k, now it does have some nice options, for example it can take a laser destroyer array, not that great on this platform, and all the usual upgrades that the legion vehicles can take, the best one by far is the machine spirit upgrade, for 25pts the Vindicator becomes an effective "fast vehicle" as it can fire the cannon even when moveing 12", the most notable thing however is the total lack of the siege shield.. on a siege tank, must have taken them another 10,000 years to think of that one, someone needs to tell the germans they are 29,000 years ahead of there time!
I wont gice much advice on this one, as the vindicator is functionally the same and anyone who uses it will know its a great little tanks, be wary of it!
Legion spartan assault tank: Again no squadrons? Oh i see why, ok fair enough, the spartan assault tank is one that will live in infamy for some, a very hard tank to kill and now its even harder to kill thanks to the flare shield upgrade, it makes the tank 320pts and is - 2 str to all template weapons and -1 to everything else, as this wasnt good enough you take the armoured ceramite upgrade thus making it immune to all melta etc, and cement this tank as quite likely one of the hardest things to kill in all of warhammers history, so its a good thing that this tanks doesnt have alot in the way of firepower.. oh it does, ok so its got 4 twin linked lascannon shots or 2 rapier shots, and the standard twin heavy bolter, its got a transport capacity of 25 models, nothing to sniff at to say the least and its an assault vehicle.
Drive this down your opponents throat, while singing the who and wearing sun glasses, I can think of no other way to be hated more... looks pretty though, I have 3.
Legion Caestus assault ram: This is the second flyerin the legion list, but its best not considered a flyer, because as soon as its on the table it will make a bee line towards the nastiest tank you have on the table and ram it, but its a fler.. but its a ram... what is this thing?, well its a flying ram that was desighed to smash into enemy starships haha space marines.. gota love them, it has a transport capacity of 10 models, thats 10 models of power, articifer and terminator armour, the latter losses the bulky rule while embarked, it also has a magma melta and a 5+ invunerable for any damage it takes from a ram attack, all in all worth the 305 pts if you want a force that comes at you like a screaming teenager at a justin beaber concert, and just as scary
Danger zone in the background and pulling a wheely on your segway, nothing is as cool as putting angron in one of these and firing him at the hardest unit on the table.
That finishes the Heavy support section of the article and the article itself, I will be writing another on the lords of war and the legions next.
So to summarize what we have covered with the heresy units, Legion units on the whole are less powerful than there contemporary cousins, less flexible, but also more specialised, this may lead a few to claim they are overpowered when they lose there prize hammerhead to a rapier battery or they lose a wraithguard squad to a legion tactical squads fury of the legion attack (ok that one may never happen), but on the whole these units are more ballanced than the 40k armies out there, with a few exceptions on both sides (looking at you Moriat and Riptide), if you want to play 30 vs 40k feel free and dont be ashamed of bringing a legion list, the lack of Know no fear alone is a big detrement to this force, some have said the cheaper units will give you an advantage but as explained previously the legion units cost a premium to start with and if you are playing small games, it is you who will be at a disadvantage, as always use gaming etiquite and explain what does what and the force organisation chart you will be useing, if its 30k allow them to use there own superheavies (as pr the 25% rule) and if you are playing 40k dont take any lord of war choice such as the primarchs.. unless they agree of course.
Thanks to all the people that helped me fine tune the playtesting on this and coming up with some cool ideas on how to use the units.
Special thanks to my brother for encoureging me to write about something I love, despite the fact my grammar is terrible and I cant spell.
Alex
Jonny
James
Chris
Thanks
Formosa
Any queries please send them to
Formosa on Dakkadakka
Formosa on Warseer
Formosa on Freebootas forum 40k radio.
Arkwilkinson83@hotmail.com
While this is very interesting indeed, I would like to add something: the background section is absolutely amazing, way beyond the average stuff from Forgeworld, which is already pretty good.
Just wanted to point that out for all fluff lovers out there.
And by the way: thank you for this analysis, Formosa. Quite interesting.
You need to check out the FAQ as they made a number of important changes, especially on the Moritat - now psychic powers do not benefit him anymore!
Edit. Typos
It'd be good to look a bit more on the Destroyers. They seem very hit and run esque to me. Get in, cause mayhem and disappear afterwards. Seem quite expensive though. Was thinking of:
Unit of 5
Rhino
1-2 Phosphex
Rad Launcher
Morait
Rad Grenades
Sneak up the flank and unleash hell. Could see it causing some problems to the Support Squads and Aegis skulkers.
Also, White Scars and Destroyers - what do you reckon?
Since the scars don't have any rules yet I'd say no to that, if there like 40k scars then hell yes bloody good idea, destroyers seen very costly for what they bring, however they do seen to synagise with a cc army quite well, especially night Lords.
Engage unit with a throw away squad, assault after with destroyers armed with rads that's -1 t and +1 to wound, pretty beast I think, anyone else?
zedmeister wrote: It'd be good to look a bit more on the Destroyers. They seem very hit and run esque to me. Get in, cause mayhem and disappear afterwards. Seem quite expensive though. Was thinking of:
Unit of 5
Rhino
1-2 Phosphex
Rad Launcher
Morait
Rad Grenades
Sneak up the flank and unleash hell. Could see it causing some problems to the Support Squads and Aegis skulkers.
Also, White Scars and Destroyers - what do you reckon?
To work they have to be very expensive to the point where they will never earn their points back. If you wanna take rad/Phospex grab the Phospex shells on the Medusae they rule! I doubt Destroyers will be in Scars. They are typically confined to the more brutal or barbaric legions like World Eaters and Death Guard due to their unconventional way of war.
Agreed with above, scars from the book... Scars don't seem to be a scorched earth legion destroying everything to get the job done, they are (with the New fluff) more like dark angels, very disciplined and organised (in there own brotherhoods) striking like a sledge hammer and buggering off before reprisals.. Ok more like raven guard then, but dark Angel like with there warrior code.
It will be interesting to see the khans rules as he seems to think he would leave Fulgrim in the dirt should they ever fight.
Can you add [30k] as a prefix to your post Subject so I can prove definitvely to LEGO that 30k is alive and kicking on here and may deserve a mini-board?
Also Note, Tac Squads start at 150, and you can bring twenty for 250 plus whatever you give the sgt. Melta bombs at a minimum IMO.
But also note if you disembark from a drop pod, you cannot use Fury of the Legion since they moved.
Col. Dash wrote: Also Note, Tac Squads start at 150, and you can bring twenty for 250 plus whatever you give the sgt. Melta bombs at a minimum IMO.
But also note if you disembark from a drop pod, you cannot use Fury of the Legion since they moved.
A rogue Trader force would be amazingly well equipped, think Imperial Stormtroopers or Vets with Tau or Necron Weaponry.
I would so fight as a Rogue Trader because you can literally do want you want.....Baneblades as personal transports. A Warlord Titan wearing a pair of crassus armoured assault transport as "Roller Skates".
Rogue Traders are Rogues because the rules don't apply!
If you want to do Orks in 30k just use codex Orks, it will be somewhat of an uphill struggle though as legion lists tend to have alot of anti infantry gear as standard, volkite special weapon teams will quite easily kill an ork mob a turn, but on the flip side lack of know no fear means you can run down those large units of marine that you will bear in cc..except world eaters..they sometimes get angrier when you beat them in cc
The Imperial Army will be interesting. I suspect the next HH trilogy will have elements of the Imperial Army (like the frist 3 dealt with the AM) and, maybe if we're lucky, have the Battle of Tallarn...
The best thing about Legion Lists is the lack of ATSKNF. Without that rule, a Legion army plays so dramatically different that it really feels like a completely different army. Suddenly, you want to take that veteran Sergeant for his Leadership value, not his wargear options. You start looking at standards for the morale test bonus and leadership range for your Praetor (or who ever you have for your Legion Warlord). There are units that have Stubborn and Intractable, and even a couple with Fearless. It just opens up a whole new area of game play that most Space Marine players ignore as it just doesn't apply to them.
I'm really trying to push 30K in my area. The Legion List is just a better Space Marine list then C:SM. Hands down. I'm probably just saying that as a jaded and cynical Space Marine player for the last 15 years.
The problem with Legion rules is that Orks would need like 3x the Numbers to win.
My 20 man Tactical Squad, with "Fury of the Legion" would cut down an Ork Waaaghhhh in one furious blaze of Bolter fire. That is 80 Bolter Shots, with some modifiers for hitting, depending on what HQ's or elites. A Veteran Tactical Squad with "Snipers" and an apocathary is very "Rapey".
If I ran 3 x 20 man Tacticals, a destroyer Squad and a Legion Heavy Support Squad of 5 Heavy Flamers, the ORKS would need damn near 5000pts to my 2000pts to stand a chance.
The XENOS in 30k need to be at least double the points to stand a chance, I want to run 2000pts of 30k Legion troops vs 4000 pts of 40k Tyranids, it would be a bloodbath, with some of the extra's like Apocatheries in 20 man Tactical squads, and Legion specific rules for the Deathguard, Emperors Kiddies or the Iron Hands you can kerb stomp the hell out of 40k Forces whilst laughing your ass off.
Realize that 30K Heresy is supposed to be Legion vs. Legion. Not Legion vs. Xenos. I think the Tau and Eldar would be OK vs. a 30K list, but Orks, Bugs, Daemons, and even Guard would have a hard time against a 30K list.
Those people that say "Legion lists are fine against a 40K list" are just plain wrong. Or not really wrong, you just have to be very careful about how you go about it.
Tamwulf wrote: Realize that 30K Heresy is supposed to be Legion vs. Legion. Not Legion vs. Xenos. I think the Tau and Eldar would be OK vs. a 30K list, but Orks, Bugs, Daemons, and even Guard would have a hard time against a 30K list.
Those people that say "Legion lists are fine against a 40K list" are just plain wrong. Or not really wrong, you just have to be very careful about how you go about it.
Having played 30k vs 30k and 30k vs 40k extensively I can say you are mistaken, 30 on 40 works quite well and it mainly comes down to the list in question, if you go into a game with the intent to power game and take advantage of the abusable units in any codex then it's going to be rough on your opponent, this is why several times I brought up etiquette and discussing the kind of game you want before hand, for example if you were to play Orks at 1500pts to 1750 then the legion list would be at an immediate disadvantage through lack if points to put into certain crucial areas (large squads, aa etc), where as an ork army would be fine at this points cost to a certain extent.
If useing my previous example a legion support squad is taken with volkites then that is alot of points in a unit that could ve easily countered by a battlwagon or dakkajet, both of which arerrelatively few points, the loss of the legion unit would be crippling in a 1500 to 1750 game as its about 25-30% of your army, where as a battlewagon or jet would be a relatively small loss.
30k in my experience is not for competitive play even though it could be made so, the majority of the legion players I have spoken to and know are not interested in competitive play and prefer story driven missions with a gm or playing out the campaigns in the books, I applaud this attitude as I have seen 40k ruined by competitive players telling people not to use this or that as its crap or actively trying to abuse rules.
So if you want to play an ork vs legion list, do so and try to do so in a fluffy way, discuss with your opponent how you want it to work, for example I played a game where my world eaters had to survive the green tide with recycling enemy units, it was a blast and them Orks coming on from every board edge made for a cinematic game indeed.
mwnciboo wrote: The problem with Legion rules is that Orks would need like 3x the Numbers to win.
My 20 man Tactical Squad, with "Fury of the Legion" would cut down an Ork Waaaghhhh in one furious blaze of Bolter fire. That is 80 Bolter Shots, with some modifiers for hitting, depending on what HQ's or elites. A Veteran Tactical Squad with "Snipers" and an apocathary is very "Rapey".
If I ran 3 x 20 man Tacticals, a destroyer Squad and a Legion Heavy Support Squad of 5 Heavy Flamers, the ORKS would need damn near 5000pts to my 2000pts to stand a chance.
The XENOS in 30k need to be at least double the points to stand a chance, I want to run 2000pts of 30k Legion troops vs 4000 pts of 40k Tyranids, it would be a bloodbath, with some of the extra's like Apocatheries in 20 man Tactical squads, and Legion specific rules for the Deathguard, Emperors Kiddies or the Iron Hands you can kerb stomp the hell out of 40k Forces whilst laughing your ass off.
So...basically an army built to counter blobs counters blobs? Shocking!
It certainly wouldn't do very well against anything with mech, or other power armies, or shooty armies...It's so built vs blobs that it doesn't do much else.
mwnciboo wrote: The problem with Legion rules is that Orks would need like 3x the Numbers to win.
My 20 man Tactical Squad, with "Fury of the Legion" would cut down an Ork Waaaghhhh in one furious blaze of Bolter fire. That is 80 Bolter Shots, with some modifiers for hitting, depending on what HQ's or elites. A Veteran Tactical Squad with "Snipers" and an apocathary is very "Rapey".
If I ran 3 x 20 man Tacticals, a destroyer Squad and a Legion Heavy Support Squad of 5 Heavy Flamers, the ORKS would need damn near 5000pts to my 2000pts to stand a chance.
The XENOS in 30k need to be at least double the points to stand a chance, I want to run 2000pts of 30k Legion troops vs 4000 pts of 40k Tyranids, it would be a bloodbath, with some of the extra's like Apocatheries in 20 man Tactical squads, and Legion specific rules for the Deathguard, Emperors Kiddies or the Iron Hands you can kerb stomp the hell out of 40k Forces whilst laughing your ass off.
Well, I think somewhere in the designers notes for betrayal they did say one probably should discuss with a 40k opponent some tweaks to compensate for age of darkness battles. I'd say it'd be legit to hash out stuff like squadrons for vehicles, bigger blobs, some discounts here and there. Anything to make things fun and interesting, that why we do this, right?
mwnciboo wrote: The problem with Legion rules is that Orks would need like 3x the Numbers to win.
My 20 man Tactical Squad, with "Fury of the Legion" would cut down an Ork Waaaghhhh in one furious blaze of Bolter fire. That is 80 Bolter Shots, with some modifiers for hitting, depending on what HQ's or elites. A Veteran Tactical Squad with "Snipers" and an apocathary is very "Rapey".
If I ran 3 x 20 man Tacticals, a destroyer Squad and a Legion Heavy Support Squad of 5 Heavy Flamers, the ORKS would need damn near 5000pts to my 2000pts to stand a chance.
The XENOS in 30k need to be at least double the points to stand a chance, I want to run 2000pts of 30k Legion troops vs 4000 pts of 40k Tyranids, it would be a bloodbath, with some of the extra's like Apocatheries in 20 man Tactical squads, and Legion specific rules for the Deathguard, Emperors Kiddies or the Iron Hands you can kerb stomp the hell out of 40k Forces whilst laughing your ass off.
Well, I think somewhere in the designers notes for betrayal they did say one probably should discuss with a 40k opponent some tweaks to compensate for age of darkness battles. I'd say it'd be legit to hash out stuff like squadrons for vehicles, bigger blobs, some discounts here and there. Anything to make things fun and interesting, that why we do this, right?
I actually like the idea of doing 40k vs 30k games for the Xenos, but given some of the whole Legion rules (like -1S against shooting strength for Iron Hands) makes an above average Stat -line (of a standard Marine) combined with less points cost, the ability to add Apocatharies to units to give 20 man, scoring units, with FNP. Other shocker builds, are things like Spamming 10 Autocannon or 10 heavy Bolter Devastator Squads. The ability to spam three squads of 10 Missile launchers with Space Marine Stat lines just makes it difficult. I do believe some minor buffs, maybe even giving the XENOS 1.5 x as many points and 2x Warlord Traits plus maybe a few extra buffs could compensate.
I think if you were pragmatic you could make this work, I just don't think you can do it straight out of a book, without any modifiers or buffs for the Xenos. For example if I was playing 'nids - Lets call them the MEGA-ARACHNIDS from one of the HH Books. If you went toe to toe using the FW book and Tyranid Book, I would say ....
"Hey to even this out, I propose you have the same points, but two Warlord Traits, and your whole Army gets "Poisoned" claws ?" or maybe "Your entire Army is Fleet " or "Gets Rending" or whatever. For informal games you would need to compensate but there is no guarantee it would be anywhere near balanced (although I'm not sure that GW know what that is either!)
Ifurita wrote: Formosa, do you want help turning this into an article?
Some tips/suggestions/guidelines on how to play 30K vs. 40 would be nice too. That's probably be what I end up doing with my DG vs. Orks and Tyranids.
Well Orks are kinda hosed this meta anyways, what with high rates of shot (Eldar) cover ignoring (Tau).
30K is kinda like a space marine eldar force, where the basic tactical is built to shoot things very well with a bolter, against other armies this kinda fine but against a lower tier like Orks or a non-meta built Tyranids, they will suffer.
I've actually played quite a few games of 30k vs 40k, it's actually an interesting fight to say the least, like a better CSM force.
Tamwulf wrote: Realize that 30K Heresy is supposed to be Legion vs. Legion. Not Legion vs. Xenos. I think the Tau and Eldar would be OK vs. a 30K list, but Orks, Bugs, Daemons, and even Guard would have a hard time against a 30K list.
Those people that say "Legion lists are fine against a 40K list" are just plain wrong. Or not really wrong, you just have to be very careful about how you go about it.[u]
Having played 30k vs 30k and 30k vs 40k extensively I can say you are mistaken, 30 on 40 works quite well and it mainly comes down to the list in question, if you go into a game with the intent to power game and take advantage of the abusable units in any codex then it's going to be rough on your opponent, this is why several times I brought up etiquette and discussing the kind of game you want before hand, for example if you were to play Orks at 1500pts to 1750 then the legion list would be at an immediate disadvantage through lack if points to put into certain crucial areas (large squads, aa etc), where as an ork army would be fine at this points cost to a certain extent.
If useing my previous example a legion support squad is taken with volkites then that is alot of points in a unit that could ve easily countered by a battlwagon or dakkajet, both of which arerrelatively few points, the loss of the legion unit would be crippling in a 1500 to 1750 game as its about 25-30% of your army, where as a battlewagon or jet would be a relatively small loss.
30k in my experience is not for competitive play even though it could be made so, the majority of the legion players I have spoken to and know are not interested in competitive play and prefer story driven missions with a gm or playing out the campaigns in the books, I applaud this attitude as I have seen 40k ruined by competitive players telling people not to use this or that as its crap or actively trying to abuse rules.
So if you want to play an ork vs legion list, do so and try to do so in a fluffy way, discuss with your opponent how you want it to work, for example I played a game where my world eaters had to survive the green tide with recycling enemy units, it was a blast and them Orks coming on from every board edge made for a cinematic game indeed.
Please read the bolded and underlined part of my quote again. You are doing exactly what I said- you are careful and discuss the game with your opponent before you play to prevent really bad match ups. You're not going to head to the game store on a Saturday night with your Legion list and play a quick pick up game. Not going to happen.
There are some seriously sick combo's that can readily be abused by any Legion player. I am very happy that you and your game group are having nothing but pleasant, fun games of 30K, for I have not. Then again, I regularly play against Cron Air, Riptide Spam, and six Wave Serpents/Warlock/Farseer Bike Spam and my favorite, Vandetta Spam (nine of them!). If I don't "cheese out" my list, I'd lose every single game, and ya know what? It's not fun to lose every game you play.
Ifurita wrote: Formosa, do you want help turning this into an article?
Some tips/suggestions/guidelines on how to play 30K vs. 40 would be nice too. That's probably be what I end up doing with my DG vs. Orks and Tyranids.
Yeah that would be great thanks, I'm nearly done testing the last legion unit for my next part of the review, I HAD finished but then book 2 came out haha, thank God I got it done before book 3.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Derp; forgot to say, if you all notice any mistakes or want to add tactics or ideas, let the rest of us know ya selfish gits.
Formosa.... You sir. You are a gentlemen and a scholar. I am currently starting my Night Lords army and this review is pretty spot on. The Moritat and the Spartan I agree are the two most broken things in the game. Yet they are still able to be dealt with. 30k I have found plays well against 40kSM against Eldar its all or nothing. Seem like one side gets tabled no matter what.
Anyways great review. You sir deserve a medal.
Would it be inappropriate to ask to kiss you? Curze is amazing.
Terror squads.... I'm still figuring them out. I don't know if outflanking is better then drop podding them in.
Night Raptors I have found they need to be a deathstar of sorts. Like 13-15 of them with a praetor and centurion medicae.
Opportunists, that is the night lords way, and the Legion traits show this beautifully, built around the legion army list like everyone else you could be fooled into thinking that all legion lists look the same, well..with there Night Lords legion this could not be further from the truth. There are several ways to take advantage of the stellar Night Lords (NL) legion traits but I will come to that later in the article, first I will cover the traits themselves.
Legions Astartes; We should all he familiar with this by now since I covered it in my previous review, but to recap, you can always regroup if under 25% without need for an independent character, an there is no and they shall know no fear, so you can be run down, keep this in mind as stubborn or fearless units are at a premium in Horus heresy.
A TALENT FOR MURDER.
This trait is very very good, if you outnumber your opponent you get +1 to wound, that is reason enough to take a few large tactical squads with close combat weapons or large assault squads, add in a Moriat with rad grenades and your wounding marines on a 2+, also worth noting that this is also based on if the model is bulky or very bulky, being with 2 and 3 models respectively, this means a 6/7 man terminator squad would outnumber a 10 man tactical squad.
NOSTRAMAN BLOOD
Night Lords are in it for themselves, whilst not cowardly they generally care nothing for there comrades and will always try to live to fight another day, well this trait show that in spades, +1 to fleeing distance and if pinned can also choose to run, the latter part is not that useful in 7th as pinning weapons are very rare, snipers lost the rule and barrage in 30K will likely kill a lot of the unit anyway, but this could be used to fall back away from an unfavourable assault, situational at best.
NIGHT VISION;
Night Lords have night vision??? I know shocked aren't you, this rule isn't very useful in 7th as night fighting is just stealth now, but its a free upgrade so not too shabby.
FROM THE SHADOWS;
All legions Astartes (Night Lords) so not any of your vehicles, gain a 6+ cover save on the first turn (But lose this if a higher cover save is available) and its stackable with stealth from night fighting, this leads me to believe that forge world intended the NL to be an infantry army backed by a few contemptors possibly, large squads with an apothecary attached could prove somewhat durable in the open on the first turn, but not too reliable.
SEEDS OF DISSENT;
If your warlord dies then all your army needs to take a LD test, as like I said before the NL are all about themselves and will run away to fight another day, now bear in mind that unlike normal lords of war (Most at least) Curze can be your warlord and good luck killing him to trigger this rule, that fella is bat-gak crazy!
Now to the part I love to talk about, legion specific wargear, this is some added oomf to make each legion even more unique.
NOSTRAMAN CHAINGLAIVE;
10 pts for this? Wow that's a steal, if it wasn't 2 handed it would be grossly undercosted as it stands now its just bloody good for its cost, 10pts for rending alone is a steal on a 2+ save model (Cos you ARE taking that 2+ save on your Sarges yes?) Add in ap3 and +1 str I'd expect to pay the 15pts each that the world eaters pay for their substandard caedre weapons. Take this on all you assault squads and you can even leave the melts bombs at home…maybe.
TELEPORTATION TRANSPONDER
Remember me saying that deep striking terminators are rare in 30k, well the night lords get it for the relatively low price of 15 points for a legion command squad or terminator squad, independent characters get it for 10pts, terminators are a premium unit in 30k, and most of the time they must walk or use a very expensive transport but its still not something I use a lot, all my mates use apothecaries with augary scanners and each time I tried this I got punished, still it takes the pressure of my advancing assault units. But all in all it can be a nasty surprise for your opponents.
TROPHIES OF JUDGEMENT;
Take this every time, unlike 40k where fear is a laughable joke as most things ignore it or just re roll the result, 30k almost nothing is immune, yes there is a small chance of it working but for 5pts on many IC its a small price to pay, I take it on all IC I use when using NL, as it can swing a combat heavily in your favour, it also gels well with curzes special rules, but more on that later.
The unique right of war for the night lords is a strange one, in 6th it was fairly good, in 7th its kind of men, I'll go through it now and cover the strengths and weakness.
TERROR ASSAULT;
This RoW allows you to extend night fighting after the first turn, not bad when it was used in 6th (to which is was designed for) but NF took a nerf bat to the face and now its just plain old stealth, while it can be useful to move up under the cover of darkness it is not reliable, this part of the RoW allows effectively a 2nd roll to see if the 1st turn is night fighting (in most missions) and to see if it carries into turn 2 and 3. Do not rely on this TERROR TACTICS;
Terror squads as compulsory troops, yes please, terror squads are pretty damn good form the cost and as troops they are even better, they may still occupy their standard chart as normal but may also be taken as further troop choices so its possible to have up to 9! In your army.
CLAW ASSAULT;
Dreadclaws as dedicated transports..meh, had it been standard pods this would have solidified this as a good RoW, but dreadclaws are not that great for the cost, avoid this unless you like dreadclaws.
Downsides for this RoW are that you can only take a single consul as one of your hq's, no fortifications (Men) an additional troop choice and only 1 of the excellent heavy support choices, see I told you they want the Night Lords to be infantry heavy.
All in all I'd say avoid this right of war, if you want lots of terror squads take them but not as troops, everything this right of war does is outstripped by the angels wrath RoW, hit and run etc. For night Lords fits the theme quite well, and most NL players will probably have assault squads out the ying yang.
Thats me done for now, next is the night lords units review and the eagerly awaited first primarch review, and its a doozy… Till then…fear the shadows my good people.
I've been playing 30k legion (mostly Iron Hands, but a little bit of Iron Warriors) against my buddies Orks pretty much every week for the last 3 months or so, and we've had pretty even win rates.
Most of the time you're not going to be in range to Fury - you cant move, and because of how Charge works it's very rare for them to end their turn within 12 inches of you and not be meleeing your face.
Volkite Culverins are insane against footslogging ork armies, but footslog is rare (and awful) for orks.
We do Maelstrom missions a lot, and orcs are vastly better at splitting off some dinky little boyz/gretchin squad to grab an objective. SM big troop blobs need to be in someones face earning their points back every turn, you cant afford that kind of action economy loss.
Praetors have a pretty rough time with power armor+klaw Warbosses. It's extremely hard to get Eternal Warrior in 30k, and the +1 strength from a Paragon Blade only gives you even odds of wounding so you need on average 12 swings to down him, where as if you fail one invuln save to that claw you poof.
Bigass melee-geared Tac squads with an Apothecary and a Chaplain-Consul are very solid aginst charging boy squads, but are also ~twice the cost for a very similar number of bodies. Unless you chew through them in one round you've effectively tarpitted yourself.
On the whole I have had fun, and not seen anything especially "broken" or "cheesy" with mixing 30k into 40k. I suppose I've avoided some of the more absurd builds (Jetbike Primus Medicae). Maybe I'll give those a go and report back. : )
It can be a little frustrating keeping track of the small changes though. Contemptors are bs5 instead of 4, Fire Raptors come stock with some dinky little s6 missile instead of Stormstrikes, etc.
I've been playing 30k legion (mostly Iron Hands, but a little bit of Iron Warriors) against my buddies Orks pretty much every week for the last 3 months or so, and we've had pretty even win rates.
Most of the time you're not going to be in range to Fury - you cant move, and because of how Charge works it's very rare for them to end their turn within 12 inches of you and not be meleeing your face.
Volkite Culverins are insane against footslogging ork armies, but footslog is rare (and awful) for orks.
We do Maelstrom missions a lot, and orcs are vastly better at splitting off some dinky little boyz/gretchin squad to grab an objective. SM big troop blobs need to be in someones face earning their points back every turn, you cant afford that kind of action economy loss.
Praetors have a pretty rough time with power armor+klaw Warbosses. It's extremely hard to get Eternal Warrior in 30k, and the +1 strength from a Paragon Blade only gives you even odds of wounding so you need on average 12 swings to down him, where as if you fail one invuln save to that claw you poof.
Bigass melee-geared Tac squads with an Apothecary and a Chaplain-Consul are very solid aginst charging boy squads, but are also ~twice the cost for a very similar number of bodies. Unless you chew through them in one round you've effectively tarpitted yourself.
On the whole I have had fun, and not seen anything especially "broken" or "cheesy" with mixing 30k into 40k. I suppose I've avoided some of the more absurd builds (Jetbike Primus Medicae). Maybe I'll give those a go and report back. : )
It can be a little frustrating keeping track of the small changes though. Contemptors are bs5 instead of 4, Fire Raptors come stock with some dinky little s6 missile instead of Stormstrikes, etc.
I cannot exalt this post enough, An intelligently written post that demonstrates that 30K does not just immediately roflstomp all over 40K, even against 40K armies that are not the Eldar or Tau.
Pfft, that's cause no one is using the Invincible Salamander Praetor of Death Incarnate.
Dude is EW, MC Thunderhammer, MC Melta Pistol, 2+/3++, and an extra attack.
I'm just curious to see if or when some sort of Xenos get introduced as a Great Crusade supplement or what-not. That would make, in my eyes, 30k much more appealing than anything 'normal' 40k.
yeah I agree with that, but if they do that 40k will start to lose a lot of sales as people move from an incompetent design studio and broken game to 30k that doesn't suffer these things near as badly.
Formosa wrote: yeah I agree with that, but if they do that 40k will start to lose a lot of sales as people move from an incompetent design studio and broken game to 30k that doesn't suffer these things near as badly.
Blacksails wrote: Pfft, that's cause no one is using the Invincible Salamander Praetor of Death Incarnate.
Dude is EW, MC Thunderhammer, MC Melta Pistol, 2+/3++, and an extra attack.
I'm just curious to see if or when some sort of Xenos get introduced as a Great Crusade supplement or what-not. That would make, in my eyes, 30k much more appealing than anything 'normal' 40k.
Why the Thunderhammer over the Paragon Blade?
Though we'll likely start to see evil daemon magos stuff soon enough.
Thunder hammer to id those characters that cannot id you, short of kharn on the charge or sigismund, there is little that can eat the salamander if doom
Blacksails wrote: Pfft, that's cause no one is using the Invincible Salamander Praetor of Death Incarnate.
Dude is EW, MC Thunderhammer, MC Melta Pistol, 2+/3++, and an extra attack.
I'm just curious to see if or when some sort of Xenos get introduced as a Great Crusade supplement or what-not. That would make, in my eyes, 30k much more appealing than anything 'normal' 40k.
Why the Thunderhammer over the Paragon Blade?
Though we'll likely start to see evil daemon magos stuff soon enough.
Formosa wrote:Thunder hammer to id those characters that cannot id you, short of kharn on the charge or sigismund, there is little that can eat the salamander if doom
This.
Paragon Blade is nice, don't get me wrong, but S8 is more versatile, and seeing as the Praetor is 2+/3++ and EW, I wouldn't be worried about swinging last.
That and hammers are fluffier for Sallies anyways. Not to mention more badass looking.
Exactly why all my apothecary and sarges have caedre weapons, looks badass, plays like ass haha.
Paragon blade seems like the go to for everyone's praetor, but I much prefure my praetor cheap and choppy, don't care if he dies and I usually have 2 other centurions running around hacking stuff up.
My praetor
power weapon (sword or axe)
Digital weapons
refractor field.
If I want to go mad and uber choppy I take bezerker assault and
Praetor
dual sword caedre weapons (forgot the name aaaaaah)
digital weapons
Iron halo
that gets me 4 basic attacks, + 2 on charge, +1 for 2ccw and +1 for sword special rule all rending and furious charge
Formosa wrote: Thunder hammer to id those characters that cannot id you, short of kharn on the charge or sigismund, there is little that can eat the salamander if doom
Para blade can also ID those of the T6+ Category, which is handy when fighting mechanicus.
Right gents, I'm in the process of updating this as we speak, I'm looking for comments and opinions on the best ways yo use certain units, combined with legions traits, rites etc., the best ones will make it into my articles and you will of course be credited.
Submissions to my pm box or
Arkwilkinson83@hotmail.com
saithor wrote: You going to do the other armies such as Militia and Cults, or just the Legion? Because I can probably right some stuff up for the millitia.
Tamwulf wrote: Realize that 30K Heresy is supposed to be Legion vs. Legion. Not Legion vs. Xenos. I think the Tau and Eldar would be OK vs. a 30K list, but Orks, Bugs, Daemons, and even Guard would have a hard time against a 30K list.
Those people that say "Legion lists are fine against a 40K list" are just plain wrong. Or not really wrong, you just have to be very careful about how you go about it.
Not at all. I've yet to lose a game against 30K with daemons- none of the legions (and especially not the Mechanicum) have a real answer to Daemon death-stars.
What people tend to forget is that 30K units are overcosted. At less than 2000 points they can't put as much firepower on the board as 40K lists.
Deamons are there own faction in hh now with the 2 lords of the ruin storm, we just decided to drop the pretense of them being just allies and allowed them, and tell you what, they are very nasty against legion units, fear actually affects them, they can be run down, but most of all its bloody cool having angron face off against a bloodthirster, yeah he kills it most of the time, but it's looks cool and I could imagine the thirster going "dude, you crazy" as it's head butted to death.
On topic expect an update to op, on the whole it will be mostly similar just with new tips and changes in line with 7th, also feedback and opinions from other players.
I'd like to know if, Rites of War and Special Characters put to the side, people prefer using Praetors or Centurions as their HQ in smaller points games. I'm getting started with an HH army, and I don't see much of a reason to even bring a Praetor except to unlock Rites of War, whereas all the different upgrades to the base Centurion seem very juicy.
My main HQ so far is a Master of the Signal, because I've had a long-standing envy of Space Marine orbital bombardment attacks. Don't even have 1000 points painted up yet, so I'm not too worried about an expansive HQ selection at the moment, but I am starting to mull over whether I should do a couple more Centurion options, or just go ahead and do up a Praetor.
Long term, I totally intend to have several different versions of a Praetor+Command Squad (one with jumppacks, one with bikes, jetbike, TA, PA, etc)
jasper76 wrote: I'd like to know if, Rites of War and Special Characters put to the side, people prefer using Praetors or Centurions as their HQ in smaller points games. I'm getting started with an HH army, and I don't see much of a reason to even bring a Praetor except to unlock Rites of War, whereas all the different upgrades to the base Centurion seem very juicy.
My main HQ so far is a Master of the Signal, because I've had a long-standing envy of Space Marine orbital bombardment attacks. Don't even have 1000 points painted up yet, so I'm not too worried about an expansive HQ selection at the moment, but I am starting to mull over whether I should do a couple more Centurion options, or just go ahead and do up a Praetor.
Long term, I totally intend to have several different versions of a Praetor+Command Squad (one with jumppacks, one with bikes, jetbike, TA, PA, etc)
I
With centurions it's picking your poison, what legion are you using ?
I am doing a Second Legion army with homebrew rules. Won't bore you with extensive details, as I know homebrew rules aren't everone's cup of tea, but briefly my Legion Special Rules are:
1. 6+ Cover Save unless natural Cover Save is better.
2. Models with nucio-vox can purchase an upgraded powerpack that gives the unit Stealth (I use the Grey Knights teleport-y powerpacks to model this)
Other than that, I'm drawing rules and units from the cross-legion Crusade Army List.
Not sure if that helps with what Centurion options would be best for my army. I started with Master of Signal mostly because I've always wanted to have an orbital-bombardment-type rule (after getting hammered by 40k Chapter Master pie plates oh so many times), but also figured his wargear would be particularly useful for buffing Heavy Support Squads and the like.
jasper76 wrote: I'd like to know if, Rites of War and Special Characters put to the side, people prefer using Praetors or Centurions as their HQ in smaller points games. I'm getting started with an HH army, and I don't see much of a reason to even bring a Praetor except to unlock Rites of War, whereas all the different upgrades to the base Centurion seem very juicy.
My main HQ so far is a Master of the Signal, because I've had a long-standing envy of Space Marine orbital bombardment attacks. Don't even have 1000 points painted up yet, so I'm not too worried about an expansive HQ selection at the moment, but I am starting to mull over whether I should do a couple more Centurion options, or just go ahead and do up a Praetor.
Long term, I totally intend to have several different versions of a Praetor+Command Squad (one with jumppacks, one with bikes, jetbike, TA, PA, etc)
Other than Rites of War and better wargear options, there is one other thing Praetors get: the ability to roll twice on the Warlord Traits chart and pick the result they want.
Also, given your preference for the Master of Signal, you may want to take note of this excerpt from the HHFAQ:
Legion Support Officer (HH1 – page 191; CAL – page 17)
A Consul of this type may not be used as a compulsory HQ choice for the army unless
specifically exempted by a particular Legiones Astartes rule or Rite of War.
- This special rule is added to the Master of Signal, Librarian and Primus Medicae
Consul types.
Also, given your preference for the Master of Signal, you may want to take note of this excerpt from the HHFAQ:
Legion Support Officer (HH1 – page 191; CAL – page 17)
A Consul of this type may not be used as a compulsory HQ choice for the army unless
specifically exempted by a particular Legiones Astartes rule or Rite of War.
- This special rule is added to the Master of Signal, Librarian and Primus Medicae
Consul types.
Yikes, that FAQ certainly makes my list illegal, but I'm already playing an illegal army, so I'll just specifically exempt my Legion from this special rule for the time being. Once I get more HQ choices painted up, I may fall in line with this rule, but I think its kind of dumb...I guess they're thinking these Consul-types would be too busy performing their specialized functions to act as the primary leader on the battlefield.
Blacksails wrote: Pfft, that's cause no one is using the Invincible Salamander Praetor of Death Incarnate.
Dude is EW, MC Thunderhammer, MC Melta Pistol, 2+/3++, and an extra attack.
I'm just curious to see if or when some sort of Xenos get introduced as a Great Crusade supplement or what-not. That would make, in my eyes, 30k much more appealing than anything 'normal' 40k.
And how many points is that?
For a combat character I'd rather have Armillus Dynat who provides most of what you're boasting about here, (except EW and a 3++), but provides significantly more in the way of force multipliers.
@OP if you're interested, I have a thread on alterations to units in the Heresy here, including Orks: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/656878.page Good work overall! I like a lot of your analysis, though Librarians are sadly limited to Level 2 now.
Also, I'd love to help provide some thoughts on the Alpha Legion.
Librarians are given the psyker rule, as per brb and psyker not given a mastery level (your not) is automatically mastery level 1, you are then given permission to purchase 2 more, so as per raw, you can only be mastery 2-3, needs a faq.
Librarian definitely needs FAQd . I can interpret it at least two ways, and I don't know which one is correct.
Psychic powers seem intentionally weak in 30k...even Word Bearers don't seem that impressive to me. I'd be interested in reading over any material as to how to best use Psykers in a 30k list.
Excellent review, most helpful. Consider me subscribed
I have a correction to add though. I noticed under the "Apothecarian detachment" you say they can take a power weapon and you suggest a maul. Unfortunately, they may only take a sword as per the rules (unless the errata has been updated and I haven't noticed).
Ed
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also, the legion tactical support squad only has 9 special weapons at full strength-the sergeant does not have a flamer to start with and can't take a different special weapon. He can have a combi-weapon though.
Col. Dash wrote: Unless that's a change, they all carry special weapons starting with a flamer from the get go according to my book.
In the wargear part of the unit entry it has "flamer (space marine only)". The sergeant has a separate stat line to the ordinary space marines in the squad so only the marines, and not the sergeant, have flamers. The sergeant has a combat blade/chain sword instead with the option to take a bolter or combi weapon etc. in addition to his normal wargear. If he had a flamer too, it would be pointless having the option to equip him with a combi weapon.
Also, the legion tactical support squad only has 9 special weapons at full strength-the sergeant does not have a flamer to start with and can't take a different special weapon. He can have a combi-weapon though.
I'll check when I get home, but I think this is incorrect.
I remember it saying "All members of the squad" can upgrade to a special weapon instead of a flamer, and "Alternatively, the Squad Sergeant can exchange his flamer for..."
I have a correction to add though. I noticed under the "Apothecarian detachment" you say they can take a power weapon and you suggest a maul. Unfortunately, they may only take a sword as per the rules (unless the errata has been updated and I haven't noticed).
Pretty sure this is incorrect, as well, and that it says Power Weapon...maybe you have an old copy??
Also, the legion tactical support squad only has 9 special weapons at full strength-the sergeant does not have a flamer to start with and can't take a different special weapon. He can have a combi-weapon though.
I'll check when I get home, but I think this is incorrect.
I remember it saying "All members of the squad" can upgrade to a special weapon instead of a flamer, and "Alternatively, the Squad Sergeant can exchange his flamer for..."
I have a correction to add though. I noticed under the "Apothecarian detachment" you say they can take a power weapon and you suggest a maul. Unfortunately, they may only take a sword as per the rules (unless the errata has been updated and I haven't noticed).
Pretty sure this is incorrect, as well, and that it says Power Weapon...maybe you have an old copy??
I guess it could be possible that I have an old copy but it definitely says that in the book I have (I'm looking at it right now).
Fair enough, I could be wrong, as well. I do remember their being some kind of difference between searges for Tactical Support Squads and Heavy Support Squads, and maybe that's what it was. I'll check my book when I get home to see if we have any differences. I know there were some changes between HH Book 1 and the Redbook...like sergeant's weren't originally listed as Characters, for example.
OK, so there are some differences between my redbook Crusade Army List and the HH 1 Crusade Army List as pertains to Tac Support Squads.
Book 1 of the Horus Heresy lists Tac Support Squads exactly as you have described. The rules have since been updated (when, I don't know, but the Redbook has different rules for Tac Support squads than HH1)
1. There is no separation between base wargear listings for a Legion Space Marine and a Legion Seargeant....they both have flamers.
2. All of the models in the squad (including the sergeant) can upgrade to a special weapon choice. Again, no differentiation between a Legion Space Marine and a Legion Sergeant.
3. As discussed earlier, HH1 does not list Legion Sergeants as Charachters, but they are listed as Characters in the red Crusade Army List book.
4. In the redbook, Sergeants have the option to upgrade to a Heavy Chainsword.
5. In the redbook, Sergeants do not come equipped by default with a CCW.
You were right about Apothecaries...they can only upgrade to a Power Sword (vs." Power Weapon").
jasper76 wrote: OK, so there are some differences between my redbook Crusade Army List and the HH 1 Crusade Army List as pertains to Tac Support Squads.
Book 1 of the Horus Heresy lists Tac Support Squads exactly as you have described. The rules have since been updated (when, I don't know, but the Redbook has different rules for Tac Support squads than HH1)
1. There is no separation between base wargear listings for a Legion Space Marine and a Legion Seargeant....they both have flamers.
2. All of the models in the squad (including the sergeant) can upgrade to a special weapon choice. Again, no differentiation between a Legion Space Marine and a Legion Sergeant.
3. As discussed earlier, HH1 does not list Legion Sergeants as Charachters, but they are listed as Characters in the red Crusade Army List book.
4. In the redbook, Sergeants have the option to upgrade to a Heavy Chainsword.
5. In the redbook, Sergeants do not come equipped by default with a CCW.
You were right about Apothecaries...they can only upgrade to a Power Sword (vs." Power Weapon").
Fair enough. I don't have the red books yet (I only own books 1, 2, and 3). I assume the red ones would take priority over the other books?
It is also worth noting that 'power weapon' in the Legion lists excludes the power lance as mentioned in the wargear section, and so far to my knowledge only Palatine Blades are able to take power lances, which is mentioned as a separate option to power weapons. I expect White Scars will also have access to power lances.
Fair enough. I don't have the red books yet (I only own books 1, 2, and 3). I assume the red ones would take priority over the other books?
I guess so??? I don't really know the answer to that.
I certainly wouldn't expect my buddies to adjust an army they built using HH1 to a "redbook legal" army or anything like that if their army wasn't completely compliant with the redbook updates. Hell, my army is so illegal, they'd just laugh in my face if I even brought it up.
Fair enough. I don't have the red books yet (I only own books 1, 2, and 3). I assume the red ones would take priority over the other books?
I guess so??? I don't really know the answer to that.
I certainly wouldn't expect my buddies to adjust an army they built using HH1 to a "redbook legal" army or anything like that if their army wasn't completely compliant with the redbook updates. Hell, my army is so illegal, they'd just laugh in my face if I even brought it up.
The red books made several "stealth" updates to the lists. Offhand, I can't think of anything that was actually taken away, but quite a few things were added in, like Tactical Support Squad Sergeants also getting the special weapons, Palatine Blades being able to go up to a 10 man squad, and so on. So, not using the red books actually means you're losing options rather than gaining.
I trade in the flamer for a bolter + AS for plasma squads (with Apothecary for some FNP), keep the sarge with a flamer in melta squads, and give the sarge a combi-melta or maybe combi-plasma in flamer squads.
Fair enough. I don't have the red books yet (I only own books 1, 2, and 3). I assume the red ones would take priority over the other books?
I guess so??? I don't really know the answer to that.
I certainly wouldn't expect my buddies to adjust an army they built using HH1 to a "redbook legal" army or anything like that if their army wasn't completely compliant with the redbook updates. Hell, my army is so illegal, they'd just laugh in my face if I even brought it up.
The red books made several "stealth" updates to the lists. Offhand, I can't think of anything that was actually taken away, but quite a few things were added in, like Tactical Support Squad Sergeants also getting the special weapons, Palatine Blades being able to go up to a 10 man squad, and so on. So, not using the red books actually means you're losing options rather than gaining.
Jetbikes going to a 2+ save was one of them, IIRC. I'm going to be trying a full unit with a Primus Medicae attached. I think it'll be interesting against some stuff, but obviously vulnerable to the wrong pie plate.
Ugh, I have nine scimitar jetbikes for my EC, and when I fielded all nine in a squad, they formed a rather large and unwieldy unit due to the massive footprint nine of those flight bases create. A cool looking unit, to be sure, but, ye gods, the table space they take up...
