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Mannahnin wrote:I just wish that units teleporting through the mono could assault (even with a caveat that they could only do so if the monolith hadn't moved before the teleport). That right there would make it well worth it.

That being said, you can still teleport shooty units through it, or move it up a flank and pull a scoring unit through it to grab an objective. Or other shenanigans.

Lord yes, that would make it fantastic. I'm hoping in the next edition even when firing Ordinance weapons, you are still allowed to fire other weapons. That would go a long ways toward improving it. Protection against deepstrike as well, for the "Heavy" skimmer would be nice as well.

"Heavy" might turn out to do something useful in 6th. Maybe make it so they can fire Ordnance + other guns?

Mannahnin wrote:"Heavy" might turn out to do something useful in 6th. Maybe make it so they can fire Ordnance + other guns?

I'm hoping so. Well, as they say, Hope for the best, plan for the worst.

Or, you know, have an old Necron army and thus own 3 Monoliths anyway, and be pleasantly surprised if they get better.

Sasori wrote:

Maelstrom808 wrote:The thing is this: Monoliths are MUCH better at killing MEQ in the open, and definately against FnP, but who in their right mind is going to leave their MEQ out in the open if they are threatened by S8 AP3 large blasts? They will mostly be in cover, and spread out as soon as the mono becomes a threat. At that point, the ABs again start to at least pull even (10 marines in cover, the 2x ABs are equal to the monolith being able to cover 6 marines with the template..any less and the ABs pull ahead)

The another thing is while yes, the monolith is a much hardier target than the ABs, you start to introduce target saturation with the ABs. If they opposition has only a few units that can deal with AV 13-14, they have to either divide that fire up (reducing their changes of doing anything to either unit) or focus it on one target (leaving the other free to cause another turn's worth of damage).

I think Monoliths have a place, but the same thing from the old dex holds true, even moreso with the loss of the old living metal: You can't take just one. You have to have a list built around taking full advantage of what the Monolith offers: rangeless teleporting, mobile LOS terrain, and provocing the "OMG must shoot the big expensive model!!!" reaction from your opponent. You don't take them for their fire support, anymore than you would take a ghost ark for it's fire support. The mono's weapons are simply a bonus to the other qualities it has. The monolith just is not going to mesh as well into most lists as other, cheaper heavy support options.

This is exactly what I've been trying to say from the start, and I agree 100% with you.

Likewise. I still love my Monoliths, but its utility is very difficult to justify its high cost nowadays. If 6th Ed. brings in something (maybe some deep strike mishap protection again, at least) to give the Monolith a little more value, then I'll being fielding 2 of 'em again. But until then, the Annihilation Barges are usually a better fit for utility and price in my armies, and I suspect most others as well.

Maelstrom808 wrote:I agree to the extent that I don't think monos fall into to the "horrible - do not take" catagory where pyrovores and sky-slashers reside. Really nothing in the Cron dex does.

Except for Flayed Ones, and maybe even Praetorians at the moment. Both cost far too much for their actual value.

Gornall wrote:

Mannahnin wrote:I just wish that units teleporting through the mono could assault (even with a caveat that they could only do so if the monolith hadn't moved before the teleport). That right there would make it well worth it.

Amen! It would actually make Lychguard and Flayed Ones legitimate assault threats!

Couldn't have said it better myself, or at the very least get rid the 'count as disembarking from a moving vehicle' part getting full 8" disembark would be great too

But hey they actually let us port C'tans now so im not going to poke too much at it.

I also was thinking that the 'heavy' vehicle rule was a nod to 6th edition hopefully it pans out and brings about something good.

6th ed looks to be full of deep striking rules and reworked weapon type rules.

I want to see a tank shock if i accidentally scatter onto an infantry unit with a "heavy" vehicle. As I said on another forum: "There is no reason a lone guardsman should be able to shrouyken my monolith and make it explode ..."

azazel the cat wrote:

Maelstrom808 wrote:I agree to the extent that I don't think monos fall into to the "horrible - do not take" catagory where pyrovores and sky-slashers reside. Really nothing in the Cron dex does.

Except for Flayed Ones, and maybe even Praetorians at the moment. Both cost far too much for their actual value.

I think you can still make both work if you setup to use them right. Are they overcosted and can you typically run something else for better effectiveness? Absolutely, but they aren't utterly worthless.

Gornall wrote:

Akaiyou wrote: Even in cover unless you are using a lot of bunkers and area terrain those MEQ that are over abundant in the metagame will only be getting a 4+ cover save or 5+.

This will do significantly more damage from a Monolith's particle whip forcing them to save on 4s or 5s than the ABs unloading and only getting 2 kills from the 3+ saves.

The monolith wins against MEQ even if it only hits 4 marines that's at the very least a draw. And with how big the large blast is you can more often than not get more than 4 guys under.

Two ABs cause 8.83 wounds against MEQ. With a 3+ save that translates to 2.94 dead Marines.

A Particle whip shot hits 6 Marines and wound 5. That is 2.5 saves from cover. So actually it takes more Marines under the whip to pull even.

A 5" template can cover 17 marines, and kill ~14.

Oh wait, That's right, I've played this game before. I don't cluster up, I spread out. At best, you'll get 3 hits as I space 1.5 to 2" between my 1" bases. So 3 hits, 2+ to kill. You average 2.5 kills against marines, standing in the open.
What was that number again for AB?
10.66 hits, 2+ to wound, 3+ armor = 2.96 kills. Wait a moment; that is not the only gun the AB can fire; better add in the 2nd weapon as well.

After seeing 3 AB and 4 night scythes in a proxied game, I'm a lot more worried about spammed Telsa then a trio of what is effectively battle cannons. I've taken on 6 battle cannons at 1850 and won, I'm not worried about 1-3 of them.



WWMD? (what would matt do).
Take a monolith, 2 dooms day arcs, and then as many night scythes as I could get. Use the threat of templates to force my opponent to spread out, then pepper them with Telsa. Force individual units to spread out tends to cut down on the space between units, making the effect of the arcs come into play. Profit?


-Matt

Yep...hence my Scythe Spam list that is just waiting on either GW models, or the Cylon raider models from Moebious in feb.

HawaiiMatt wrote:WWMD? (what would matt do).
Take a monolith, 2 dooms day arcs, and then as many night scythes as I could get. Use the threat of templates to force my opponent to spread out, then pepper them with Telsa. Force individual units to spread out tends to cut down on the space between units, making the effect of the arcs come into play. Profit?


-Matt

Definitely profit.

The target saturation is fantastic there, as well. The Night Scythes gain a ton of survivability when there are Doomsday Arks on the table. This is one of those rare lists that would make someone ignore the Monolith for a few turns, definitely long enough for the Monolith to move up 18" and start spewing out Lychguard.

Akaiyou wrote:
As for marines not coming out of their transports. well not EVERY MEQ list has their units in transports, long fangs for example are never shooting you from inside the transport. Transport rush is common place and are we assuming that we have nothing in our list that can wreck that transport??

If you ever get a Monolith in range of Long Fangs that aren't in terrain, one of three things has happened:

Your opponent is bad.
The board doesn't have enough terrain.
Your opponent rolled horribly all game.

There is simply 0 reason for Long Fangs to ever be outside of cover. When you factor in the 24" range of the Monolith, the possibility of getting within firing range of the Long Fangs becomes very small.

I gave a public warning. -Mannahnin

you know...the monolith could synchronize pretty well with a C'tan that has lord of fire. DS the monolith, hope it doesn't get pinged by AT, teleport the c'tan and watch as your opponent dedicates all of his fire power at killing them. And yelling in frustration that his meltas blew up.

It would be wiser to move the monolith up...but its not as fun


Automatically Appended Next Post:

HawaiiMatt wrote:

Gornall wrote:

Akaiyou wrote: Even in cover unless you are using a lot of bunkers and area terrain those MEQ that are over abundant in the metagame will only be getting a 4+ cover save or 5+.

This will do significantly more damage from a Monolith's particle whip forcing them to save on 4s or 5s than the ABs unloading and only getting 2 kills from the 3+ saves.

The monolith wins against MEQ even if it only hits 4 marines that's at the very least a draw. And with how big the large blast is you can more often than not get more than 4 guys under.

Two ABs cause 8.83 wounds against MEQ. With a 3+ save that translates to 2.94 dead Marines.

A Particle whip shot hits 6 Marines and wound 5. That is 2.5 saves from cover. So actually it takes more Marines under the whip to pull even.

A 5" template can cover 17 marines, and kill ~14.

Oh wait, That's right, I've played this game before. I don't cluster up, I spread out. At best, you'll get 3 hits as I space 1.5 to 2" between my 1" bases. So 3 hits, 2+ to kill. You average 2.5 kills against marines, standing in the open.
What was that number again for AB?
10.66 hits, 2+ to wound, 3+ armor = 2.96 kills. Wait a moment; that is not the only gun the AB can fire; better add in the 2nd weapon as well.

After seeing 3 AB and 4 night scythes in a proxied game, I'm a lot more worried about spammed Telsa then a trio of what is effectively battle cannons. I've taken on 6 battle cannons at 1850 and won, I'm not worried about 1-3 of them.



WWMD? (what would matt do).
Take a monolith, 2 dooms day arcs, and then as many night scythes as I could get. Use the threat of templates to force my opponent to spread out, then pepper them with Telsa. Force individual units to spread out tends to cut down on the space between units, making the effect of the arcs come into play. Profit?


-Matt

Yes. Mucho dinero. In the form of shattered power armor of courseb

CthuluIsSpy wrote:you know...the monolith could synchronize pretty well with a C'tan that has lord of fire. DS the monolith, hope it doesn't get pinged by AT, teleport the c'tan and watch as your opponent dedicates all of his fire power at killing them. And yelling in frustration that his meltas blew up.

Monolith & C'Tan with Lord of Fire and ...let's say the cheapest second ability possible; Entropic Touch: 405 points. And what effect have we bought? A fire magnet with a 1 in 6 chance of killing a single model.

I'm not saying it doesn't work; I'm just saying that it costs a very high price for essentially no return.

Have been reading this thread for the last day or so and I have to say that although the initial post made some interesting points it really doesn't go all the way at showing which is better. Over the course of the thread I have seen the following points made:

- Models will not be clumped up under templates. Against regular models you are looking at 3 hits, against multi-wound T4 you are looking at 2. Now on occasions they may get clumped due to gaming considerations but you should look at the norm and not the exceptions. As I see Akaiyou you play Nids...I'm sure you apppreciate spacing out your Genestealers to avoid large templates. Assume your opponent will do the same.

- Tesla is better as all purpose anti-infantry. Firing 2 Destructors should net you around 11 hits if I'm not mistaken since you should get 2 6's if you include average rolls making sure to take into account the re-rolls. Not so great against models with great armour saves (or even marines w/ FnP), but with the amount of high strength shots you put out models will fall. The Monolith relies on being close, and while it's no closer than the A.Barges, there is a significant investment cost attached, whereas the A.Barges are so cheap it doesn't matter as much and the psychological component of losing the model just isn't there. Granted the Monolith does better vs FnP marines but struggles just as much VS 2+ saves. Also as shown Tesla does better vs low AV too.

I'm personally not a fan of looking at units in a vacuum. You have to see how they compliment other units to see if you get redundancy as well as any little tricks or combos you may be able to pull off between multiple units. Take the Monolith for example. What kind of list needs a Monolith? What units does it support well? To be completely honest I cannot think of a competitive build that NEEDS a monolith.

If you want to shoot your range is abysmal for fire support (and you can't even go 12" to quickly get the front line either). DoW will screw you if you don't Deepstrike onto the field, which in some cases dice rolls can hurt...Having a Monolith not coming in till Turn 4/5 is a lot of wasted points.

If you want to use the Portal to pull in units to fight battles up close and personal the stuff that's already good in cc is for the most part Jump Infantry. They will be faster not using the Monolith unless they are going to a completely different part of the battlefield. Also take into account the stuff that can fight well in cc are expensive. You take a couple of Monoliths and a handful of elites and you have taken up a lot of points.

If you are using it to bring in Troops to objectives then you are relying on the Monolith surviving. Since it is a fire magnet I think that's something you would really have to carefully consider. I much prefer stocking up on Night Scythes. Huge mobility and another Tesla Destructor thrown into the bargain.

The Exile Portal is nice, but with a D6" range it is really not reliable. When trying to snipe special weapons out of squads such a variable short range (and for the most part a 33% or 50% chance of success) is not good enough.

If you want S8 there are sources elsewhere which are cheaper, with the added bonus you can throw a Solar Pulse or 2 into the mix. HoD teks also work well (from my personal experience) with multiple Tesla Destructors. I would rather have points spread throughout multiple threats than 2-3 Monoliths taking up a 3rd of my points.

Sorry for such a long winded post, but to be clear I think that putting a lot of points into a unit which has no clear function (a 24" battlecannon) and a few gimmicks (Portal of Exile and Dimensional Corridor) is not worth something that has a very clear role (anti-infantry), is cheaper, can be spammed and can help out in other situations if the need arises (light AV).

I think you missed the point there, that the monolith's role is to be a jack of all trades, a multi-purpose unit, the jack knife of the army, it can reinforce all rolls and cover ones you may be lacking.

As you mentioned during your post, the monolith comes in handy when you need units on a completely different side of the table. This can be used in two ways

#1 - You have 1st turn, and you set up your units on one end to mislead the opponent. Then use the monoliths deep striking into the other end and teleporting your units across to create a flank maneuver or to strike from the rear. I've done that a couple times and it's just so fulfilling when a strategy plays out so nicely. The usual melta guns are most likely on their way to get the forces you have on the initial deployment area so the monolith is unlikely to be seeing them in the back lines.

#2 - If you go second and your opponent tries to use trickery by for example reserving his whole army or doing something other where you are not sure where his army will show up, the monolith can help you cover the entire table with a resilient damaging unit that threatens anything that is within it's range.

The Annhilation Barge is a dedicated attack platform and yes I know most people follow the 'offense is the best defense' doctrine when it comes to 40k, but the best is not always the wisest. The monolith is the ultimate support to any army giving you additional flexibility, I can't think of a single army list where a monolith would not help in some sort of way.

I don't quite understand where people get that it would have NO syngery with their list. There's always stuff to use eternitgy gate on, there's always SOMETHING that the monolith can attack, it has the option to deep strike if you need a bit of tactical flexibilty and it's the most durable thing we have, a monolith will not go down easy specially with the rest of the army doing what it would do if the monolith wasnt there in the first place, which is taking out the big threats.

all cc units would benefit from a monolith's eternity gate. all troop units benefit from a monolith eternity gate. dedicated ranged units benefit as well, monolith is a great way to get those gauss cannons within rapid fire range of a vehicle/infantry unit.

Where as there's 'dedicated' units in the new necron codex that do a lot of these rolls 'better' thats because they are dedicated to the roll thats what they do and they SHOULD do so better. I suppose i highly value flexbility in my army lists.

It's the reason why i hardly ever field my Biovores they are so awesome in their new rules, some of the best anti infantry units in the game IMO, cheap powerful barrage. But why waste my heavy support slot on something that the rest of my army does well already? I rather take a Trygon or something other that i can get versatily from.

I think necrons have great anti infantry power in this new codex more so than we ever did before since all our units are now cheaper. So from my point of view my 1 Annhilation Barge doesnt really do much for me, because I have 40 immortals with tesla carbines that mop the floor with infantry and just 1 AB versus vehicles isn't a good way to tank hunt.

I don't think that 1 Monolith versus vehicles is a good way to tank hunt, either. In fact, it's much worse as has been mathematically shown already.

Honestly, if the Monolith were clocking in at 180 points then I would say it's a toss-up between the 2x Annihilation Barges or the Monolith, depending on whether you need utility and support, or else a mobile firing platform. But it's not; the Monolith costs 20 points more and is a single target rather than two. And I can only benefit any time I can force my opponent to split his shooting at multiple targets.

I would love to use my two Monoliths more, but the price is too high for the little utility it actually brings. The fact of the matter is that the Monolith is too slow not to deep strike, and it is too large to deep strike without risking a mishap, or possible immobilizing itself (which may as well destroy it, given its short range). And again, given the prevalence of melta (in my gaming group, every single MEQ squad will have a meltagun), I just don't like the idea of giving up 200 points for such a short lifespan.

The Monolith just doesn't do much for me anymore. I run two Heavy/Destroyer units, so my army has a decent amount of AP3 already, everything in my army is faster than the Monolith, and I have very good target saturation (8x anti-tank threats, 6x double as infantry killers) But perhaps you play a list that truly needs the Monolith. I would legitimately like to know what list you use wherein the Monolith is such an integral part, because in the new codex, I just cannot envision it. And believe me, since the codex came out I have tried to find a home for my two Monoliths.

I do believe Azazel has the right of it. I would love to see a list that can successfully run a Monolith (or more) and be successful. For the purposes of thoroughness my list (at 1850pts) looks like:

Overlord
Warscythe
CC Barge

Royal court 1
4x HoD Crypteks w/ 1x Solar Pulse

Overlord
Warscythe
CC Barge

Royal court 2
4x HoD Crypteks w/ 1x Solar Pulse

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

10x Scarabs

Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge

As you can see the list lives on Tesla saturation with some higher strength dedicated anti-tank thrown in and armour facilitation damage from the Scarabs. A Monolith has no place in this list. Mobility is already taken care of with the Night Scythes and I have no dedicated cc units that need to get thrown around the place.

Would love to see any list that uses Monoliths and gets good results.

I'm going to have to agree with the anti-Monolith sentiment here. It's not that the Monolith is a "bad" unit, it's just that it isn't a particularly good one. At this point I think it's pretty clear that the Annihilation Barge and Tomb Spyders are the 1a and 1b choices for the Necron HS section. Tomb Spyders have been covered before and work amazingly in Ant Farm builds. Which brings us to the Barge.

Annihilation Barges have very solid duality for their points cost. They are a nice in-between of a Dakka Predator and a Rifleman Dred. Though they lack the range of those two, Necrons should always have at least one pulse and maybe even two depending on the build. Which means that they are usually firing either turn one or at worst turn two. They are amazing at light tank suppression and dole out a decent amount of wounds to most units. They also help AV13 saturation. Being that they are only 90 points, they are relatively disposable.

I think you missed the point there, that the monolith's role is to be a jack of all trades, a multi-purpose unit, the jack knife of the army, it can reinforce all rolls and cover ones you may be lacking.

This statement was brought up by the OP and I think it's worth noting. Most units in the Necron army are very specialized. There are very few "jack of all trades" units. Necrons aren't Marines and cannot be played as such. An important distinction I'd like to note is duality versus trying to hamfist the notion of "jack of all trades". Duality is a good thing in the Cron list. Units like Wraiths and Annihilation Barges have duality. Units that are or try to be "jack of all trades" are going to cost and pay a premium. When I see people putting a close combat Lord with every squad of Immortals or Warriors I shake my head. These units are specialized and should be played as such.

The Monolith pays 200 points for all that it can do. However it really doesn't do anything particularly well. The ordinance blast is so-so. I have never seen blast weapons as something that effectively takes out tanks because of the scatter and prevalence of cover. Multiple shots are the key to popping vehicles, not one big shot. The flux arcs are decent but not really all that great. Definite nerf from before. The teleportation could be useful but it has taken a definite nerf as well. Pulling units into the portal is a gimmick.

Overall, I don't see any one thing the Monolith does particularly well. Maybe, maybe survivability, however there is so much melta and the potential to close fast with it that I don't consider it safe. Dark Eldar will also eat Monoliths easily as they will likely not be getting cover. It's just not going to last long.

I just don't see a reason to take a Monolith in a TAC build.

Gornall wrote:
/agree. I think the mathhammer bears out that the firepower two ABs generate puts them on par if not ahead of a Monolith. However, Monoliths compensate with better survivability against non-melta weapons and some of their other tricks. I still think ABs will fit in better in most Necron lists, but you can still build a solid Necron army utilizing Monoliths... you just have to design it specifically to use the tricks the Monolith brings to the table.

The problem is that survivability against non-melta weaponry isn't very valuable. Who doesn't depend on rending, melta, lance, or 2d6 melee? There are some armies that kill vehicles by way of S4-5 hits in melee, but it's not a primary vehicle killing tactic for anybody. The Monolith is really tough against things that people won't bother to shoot most Necron vehicles with anyway.

Mannahnin wrote:I just wish that units teleporting through the mono could assault (even with a caveat that they could only do so if the monolith hadn't moved before the teleport). That right there would make it well worth it.

That being said, you can still teleport shooty units through it, or move it up a flank and pull a scoring unit through it to grab an objective. Or other shenanigans.

If you had, say, 2-3 Monoliths and 2-3 of big infantry formations, say 20 Warriors with a Phaeron or Gauss Immortals with the same and Tesla Immortals, there would be options to be had.

HawaiiMatt wrote:

Oh wait, That's right, I've played this game before. I don't cluster up, I spread out. At best, you'll get 3 hits as I space 1.5 to 2" between my 1" bases. So 3 hits, 2+ to kill. You average 2.5 kills against marines, standing in the open.

-Matt

Interestingly, there is a set of battle reports on Dakka by an Eldar player where his late round tournament opponent clustered all his Marines in these bunkers and promptly got obliterated by Fire Prism large templates. I remember thinking, "Have you never played this game before? Do you not know what those large templates do?' You might be able to engineer clumps with Obyron's Ghostwalk Mantle. Sometimes a single consolidate won't spread out well enough. But I wouldn't want to depend on that.

They simply nerfed the Monolith too hard. Had to sell those new kits, you know! If nothing else the AP1 rule should have stayed. It makes the Whip a credible vehicle threat and that's something the Monolith really lacks.

Hopefully 2 things will happen in 6E that will make the monolith worthwhile

-Heavy Vehicles gain some DS protection

-Heavy Vehicles are assault vehicles

That is the only way I can see a mass return of the monolith is if this happens.

CthuluIsSpy wrote:Hopefully 2 things will happen in 6E that will make the monolith worthwhile

-Heavy Vehicles gain some DS protection

-Heavy Vehicles are assault vehicles

That is the only way I can see a mass return of the monolith is if this happens.

Certainly would ignite the sales for monoliths to all the new necron players who started collecting after this latest codex

Lukus83 wrote:I do believe Azazel has the right of it. I would love to see a list that can successfully run a Monolith (or more) and be successful. For the purposes of thoroughness my list (at 1850pts) looks like:

Overlord
Warscythe
CC Barge

Royal court 1
4x HoD Crypteks w/ 1x Solar Pulse

Overlord
Warscythe
CC Barge

Royal court 2
4x HoD Crypteks w/ 1x Solar Pulse

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

10x Scarabs

Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge

As you can see the list lives on Tesla saturation with some higher strength dedicated anti-tank thrown in and armour facilitation damage from the Scarabs. A Monolith has no place in this list. Mobility is already taken care of with the Night Scythes and I have no dedicated cc units that need to get thrown around the place.

Would love to see any list that uses Monoliths and gets good results.

Do you actually own all that? What did you convert the Night Scythe's from?

Personally I only play (create lists) with what I have in my inventory. I'm not too fond of proxying so I just buy stuff later or something if it's something Id want for my army.

With that said...what I do own his:

1 C'Tan Shard
1 Catacomb Command Barge
5 Crypteks
5 Deathmarks
9 Destroyers
20 Flayed One Pack
2 Ghost Ark
4 Heavy Destroyers
40 Immortals
2 Monolith
1 Overlord
40 Warriors

I largely have a 'footslog' necron army. Which I played with the old codex as well and I won like 80% of the time you can peep my BRs (mostly thanks to perfect use of the deceiver)

Since the vehicle heavy 5th ed took over i've noticed the clearly distinct AT disadvantage and vehicle disadvantage. Thus i bought the CCB and 2 GAs to back up my 2 Ms.

I never play just one list because i own stuff and I like to put it to use, but no matter what kind of list I make the Monolith is always handy as my jack of all trades unit. Mostly because it grants my army what it severely lacks in MOBILITY. Yours is highly mobile using the unreleased Night Scythes, which is one of those units on my 'buy em right away' list when they come out because i also think they are awesome after reading them in my codex when i got it.

Aside from bringing ghost arks my army will always lack mobility and even with the ghost ark I can ALWAYS use extra mobility in other areas of the table which the monolith provides.

Also a lot of people here claim that you are never hit by a template weapon that covers more than 3 of your models? I find that a bit hard to believe, ive played this game tons and tons of times and when your transport gets wrecked....you don't get to disembark and spread your models out so nicely. I'll snipe out a transport with the heavy destroyers and then when they are all nicely disembarked in a mob thats when I let the monolith give em a taste of large blast to the face. Even with spacing out your units the 5" blast will get more than 3 every time out of a transport. And let's face it, meta game is full of transports these days.

To sum it up any necron army that is NOT full of night scythes/ghost arks will find a monolith to be a great option in mobility for his units. Even with ghost arks and night scythes being able to quickly reploy a unit to a completely different side of hte table is invaluable when you do it at the right time. In one game I had a 5-man unit of Immortals luring a ton of black templars towards them for 2 turns separating them from the main army by abusing their RZ rule and then just when they think they'll be getting the assault bam, immortlas are gone and perfectly positioned within 3" of my objective.


How is your army going to deal with Grey Knights Draigowing?? At 1850 pts you are looking at 2 psyriflemen, a vindicare, 15 paladins and god knows what else (thats one of my 1750 GK lists by the way). The scarabs will be useless, all that psybolt ammunition will make short work of every single vehicle you have and you dont have quite enough tesla saturation to even tickle a GK army like this. You dont have any cc dedicated army that can take on terminator squads either.

If you use solar pulse thats only 2 turns and I doubt that you'll want to move in too close while the GK would just advance with no worry, you army can't really hurt it.

I really think that 40k in general is in a sense a game of rock, paper, scissors. (With terrible balance). Your list would be AWESOME against an Ork Horde, kan wall, but fail against Battlewagon Rush you have nothing for AV14

So when you say Dark Eldar due to lance rule would eat the monolith alive, I believe you. I agree lance weapons eat any AV14 alive except BT blessed hull LRs, but that to me is just part of the game, no unit no matter how good has 0 weaknesses. There's always something out there that can pwn it. It doesnt mean my Monolith isn't effective against a ton of other armies though, i'm still winning a lot even before i bought the new stuff I was winning but struggling against vehicle heavy lists (So i was running a lot of gauss to make up...gawd relying on gauss to deal with vehicles is a sad sad thing)

Harbingers of destruction are very fun anti-terminators. Shooting 6 str 8 ap 2 shots from them will thin out their numbers quick enough.

Triarch stalker will also kill them pretty well.

I killed a vindicare turn 1 with imotekh's lightning (lucky, i know, nothing to rely on but it worked).

Heavy destroyers can also catch a vindicare with his pants down if he's occupied trying to snipe IC's

To sum it up any necron army that is NOT full of night scythes/ghost arks will find a monolith to be a great option in mobility for his units.

I play very competitively and am going to have to disagree here. I run:

2 CCB with Scythe Lords and MSS
4 HoD, 2 with Pulses
4 x 7 Immortals
2 x 5 Warriors
2 x 10 Scarabs
6 Wraiths, 3 w coils
3 x Annihilation Barges

at 2k

I put the Warriors in reserve and use them for backfield objectives. The rest pushes forward. Opponents are so focused on Scarabs, Wraiths, and AV13 that they can't bother with the Immortals. If you play NoVa style objectives then all you have to do is push the middle, contest theirs, and grab your backfield objectives. No need for Monolith teleportation.

Also a lot of people here claim that you are never hit by a template weapon that covers more than 3 of your models? I find that a bit hard to believe, ive played this game tons and tons of times and when your transport gets wrecked....you don't get to disembark and spread your models out so nicely. I'll snipe out a transport with the heavy destroyers and then when they are all nicely disembarked in a mob thats when I let the monolith give em a taste of large blast to the face. Even with spacing out your units the 5" blast will get more than 3 every time out of a transport. And let's face it, meta game is full of transports these days.

Template weapons are great if you can hit disembarked models or tank shock opponents in tight. If not good opponents will spread out.

Akaiyou wrote:1. The AB is not 'much faster' it can move cruising speed that's the only difference. And if it does that it cannot shoot

if you move cruising and dont shoot for a turn to reposition you are actually inflicting less damage than if you had just moved combat speed and shot tesla destructor 2x.

Do the math.

Wait, what? Why not shoot after Cruising? Its an Open Topped skimmer. It can shoot the TL Destructor after moving 12". Now that is some speed!

Akaiyou wrote:
2. Again where is your math to prove this? Please show me how ABs have a better chance at destroying AV12. S7 against AV12 fails specially with AP -. Where as one hit from the monolith is a guaranteed pen pretty much.

Wait, what? One hit STR8, Blast(With great chances to miss) is a guaranteed pen versus av 12? at 5+?

Akaiyou wrote:
5. Are you saying that an AB immobilized in the deployment zone is ANY better than a Monolith immobilized on the same spot?? That makes no damn sense. The monolith is still superior and if you are immobilized at ur deployment zone and are playing something like capture and control or seize ground you can advance with your scoring units and then port them back to home base to recapture your objective at last minute. So that's still useful even at the deployment zone.

No way, if you have a Monolith immobilized in your deployment zone its 200 points that are useless. The barge is 90 pts that is useless. Thats a great difference. Plus, the weapons a single AB has got are far more powerful than the Monolith's whip.

Akaiyou wrote:
6. 2 ABs will never be as survivable as 1 monolith no matter how you try to dice it. You should concede this argument on survivability you and I both know the monolith is as resilient as at least 3 ABs. Proven by the lascannon theory.

I would like you to tell me how survivable it would be versus a shooty DE list with 20+ lances per turn. 3 AB's are gonna provide saturation and still gonna be just as tough as the monolith(xept for the open topped)

Lukus83 wrote:I do believe Azazel has the right of it. I would love to see a list that can successfully run a Monolith (or more) and be successful. For the purposes of thoroughness my list (at 1850pts) looks like:

Overlord
Warscythe
CC Barge

Royal court 1
4x HoD Crypteks w/ 1x Solar Pulse

Overlord
Warscythe
CC Barge

Royal court 2
4x HoD Crypteks w/ 1x Solar Pulse

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

5x Immortals
Night Scythe

10x Scarabs

Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge

As you can see the list lives on Tesla saturation with some higher strength dedicated anti-tank thrown in and armour facilitation damage from the Scarabs. A Monolith has no place in this list. Mobility is already taken care of with the Night Scythes and I have no dedicated cc units that need to get thrown around the place.

Would love to see any list that uses Monoliths and gets good results.

The irony here is that I think your list is as Monolith-friendly as I can come up with.

All those Night Scythes creates target saturation, thus drawing fire away from the Monoliths, and if any of the Night Scythes get brought down, then their cargo goes into reserve and can just walk out through the Monolith at your discretion. At 2500 I would use your list with 3x Monoliths replacing your 3x Annihilation Barges, and kick up each Immortal unit to 10x.

Cryage wrote:Harbingers of destruction are very fun anti-terminators. Shooting 6 str 8 ap 2 shots from them will thin out their numbers quick enough.

Triarch stalker will also kill them pretty well.

I killed a vindicare turn 1 with imotekh's lightning (lucky, i know, nothing to rely on but it worked).

Heavy destroyers can also catch a vindicare with his pants down if he's occupied trying to snipe IC's

Did you actually read his list? his HoD Crypteks are on foot, he has no triach stalker and he has no imotek nor any heavy destroyers.

The crypteks won't survive long and wont kill many paladins otherwise draigowing armies would not be top tier.

Like i said it's rock paper scissors i used his list as an example to show this, we can spend all day looking for units that counter each other from one codex to the next. It doesn't help anything.


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necr0n wrote:

Akaiyou wrote:1. The AB is not 'much faster' it can move cruising speed that's the only difference. And if it does that it cannot shoot

if you move cruising and dont shoot for a turn to reposition you are actually inflicting less damage than if you had just moved combat speed and shot tesla destructor 2x.

Do the math.

Wait, what? Why not shoot after Cruising? Its an Open Topped skimmer. It can shoot the TL Destructor after moving 12". Now that is some speed!

Akaiyou wrote:
2. Again where is your math to prove this? Please show me how ABs have a better chance at destroying AV12. S7 against AV12 fails specially with AP -. Where as one hit from the monolith is a guaranteed pen pretty much.

Wait, what? One hit STR8, Blast(With great chances to miss) is a guaranteed pen versus av 12? at 5+?

Akaiyou wrote:
5. Are you saying that an AB immobilized in the deployment zone is ANY better than a Monolith immobilized on the same spot?? That makes no damn sense. The monolith is still superior and if you are immobilized at ur deployment zone and are playing something like capture and control or seize ground you can advance with your scoring units and then port them back to home base to recapture your objective at last minute. So that's still useful even at the deployment zone.

No way, if you have a Monolith immobilized in your deployment zone its 200 points that are useless. The barge is 90 pts that is useless. Thats a great difference. Plus, the weapons a single AB has got are far more powerful than the Monolith's whip.

Akaiyou wrote:
6. 2 ABs will never be as survivable as 1 monolith no matter how you try to dice it. You should concede this argument on survivability you and I both know the monolith is as resilient as at least 3 ABs. Proven by the lascannon theory.

I would like you to tell me how survivable it would be versus a shooty DE list with 20+ lances per turn. 3 AB's are gonna provide saturation and still gonna be just as tough as the monolith(xept for the open topped)

Dude open-topped does not mean you can move 12" and shoot all your guns

and 2 ABs are not more survivable than 1 monolith.

I already made the point in comparing a list with a monolith versus a DE list...rock paper scissors...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

azazel the cat wrote:
The irony here is that I think your list is as Monolith-friendly as I can come up with.

All those Night Scythes creates target saturation, thus drawing fire away from the Monoliths, and if any of the Night Scythes get brought down, then their cargo goes into reserve and can just walk out through the Monolith at your discretion. At 2500 I would use your list with 3x Monoliths replacing your 3x Annihilation Barges, and kick up each Immortal unit to 10x.

I actually agree his list is quite monolith friendly and would actually help him versus GK since they'd have to assault to take down AV14 and models trying to assault can be hit with portal of exile

Originally the list only had 2 Crypteks, but I went up to 8 after I decided I needed some stuff to deal with multi-wound T4 models (namely Paladins). At 1850pts I really doubt a Paladin list would give me any trouble (though I haven't played them yet...only 1 guy in our group uses them and even then his staple army is Purifiers). If they put points into a full 10 man unit, Draigo and a Librarian (for Shrouding) they are looking at well over 1k in 12 models. Sure it would be tough to kill but 8 lances out range them and can either be hidden in Immortal squads or put into units of 4 lances. All my tesla can also consistently whittle wounds away. Any support units the Paladins have would be nullified by the 2 Solar pulses giving me a chance to knock down Paladins without too much retaliation. If I went up to 2k I would probably replace 2 A. Barges with Doom Scythes since that's the threshold at which Paladins get all the support they need.

I can see how my list looks Monoith friendly at first glance, but it's not just vehicle saturation I am providing, it's Tesla. Adding a Monolith takes my vehicle count down from 9 to 8 and I lose 2 Tesla Destructors in the process (which was shown before to be superior to a single large blast). Most of the time my guys are on foot with 2 Crypteks per unit. They use the Night Scythes to re-manoeuvre if things look tight, and with a potential 6" plus 12" move not many assault units can keep up with them, least of all Paladins. And If I have to I can screen with 12"/36" moving Scythes to block assaults. If there is cargo inside and the vehicle is destroyed then they enter reserve and are free to come in from another side of the table and get more turns of shooting. The list is in fact very carefully thought out and though it looks just like a Tesla beat stick there are so many subtle things you can do to swiftly turn the game back around.

And no I don't own any Scythe conversions. Am currently proxying with vendettas. I am actually proxying a lot: 2 units of Immortals, Scarabs and Crypteks, but today I get all of this. Am trying (for once) to assemble and paint. So far it's going well.