Recently there's been a revival of interest in the "Deathstar" theory of army construction (and by extension the WHFB board as a whole). I'm thinking of making a "Make the Best Deathstar list" thread, but I decided to preface it with a definition/discussion thread so I can see what page we are all on when we use this phrase.
Death Star origin
In a balanced list, the elite units and the characters do most of the heavy lifting. This will prove to be the case in battle after battle, codex after codex. The reason is simple, they are the only ones asked to do so. Common units set up the pins to get knocked down by the elite guys. That's pretty much why you spend points on elites/characters, rather than a larger # of common guys. You expect great things of them.
Everyone's had their elite unit run into some manner of buzzsaw character and get diced, Tarkins (hereafter shorthand for players who adopt a Deathstar [herafter DS] strategy) put a character in the elite unit in order to take down enemy characters. This is reasonable and commonplace, a fighting Lord choice that leads an elite unit is a centerpiece of many armies, perhaps even a majority.
In close gaming groups (where the same people play routinely), these proto DS's will clash, and the winners will become widely known. If an enemy's Lord + Elites can defeat yours, even when you get the charge, its a serious problem. Now the threat of battling their unit precludes the use/deployment of yours. Ordinary players diversify their units, perhaps adopting an MSU setup, or a gunline. Tarkins inflate the unit.
A second hero more or less equals win when faced with a one character setup on the enemy's side, as the two main guys will duel while your hero scythes down their rank and file, which permits your front rank to swing, and lets you break their unit, regardless of the outcome of the main guy's conflict. A Lord and a Hero leading an elite fighting unit is about as fierce as you can make a unit, in terms of killing power. It costs about 800 points in most dexes, once you factor in command, banners, magic items, etc, and it can beat down just about any other enemy unit, even if they get the charge.
Yet, this doesn't usually improve the Tarkin's winning percentage. The unit itself will usually perform admirably, when it gets to fight it'll just run things over. Yet the rest of the army is now fighter-less (presuming that the remaining 2 heroes are a scroll caddy and a BSB), and they can't all hide in the shadow of the DS. Further, the proto-DS still has vulnerabilities. It can be flanked, or maybe it can still run away from a bad panic test.
A typical defeat for such a list has the proto-DS standing around with minor damage, while the rest of the army is in tatters and the enemy occupies all quadrants. Maybe the DS ran over an infantry unit and some skirmishers, but it couldn't prevent the enemy from destroying its accompanying units. Once again, the Tarkin inflates.
The DS's true strength lies in points denial. By loading all the armies points into one, unstoppable, giant unit Tarkins essentially limit their enemy's ability to get value from their army's offense. With all characters the DS is made of murder, and all those points all it to have all the goodies in the army book. Shooting will never reduce it below half (its too big/protected), CC isn't an option and magic raplidly loses utility when faced with one enemy unit that shrugs magic missiles, and doesn't mind being flanked.
The final form of a Deathstar is one unit with all the characters in it and all the armies goodies. It might be led by a crazy-expensive special character, if there is one with applicable abilities. It can take a rear charge from an enemy elite unit, hold for a round, then move all the characters over and obliterate it. The army consists of the Deathstar and some minimum sized core units that try to hide and hold table quarters. Sometimes there is also a couple of units that are just "too good" to leave behind. Maybe its goblin bolt throwers, maybe its a screaming skull catapult, but they are always things that often kill their points value.
DS Components
Unit: The core unit of the DS gives you both less and more than you'd think. Fighting strength actually isn't paramount, or anywhere close to it. The majority of the combat will be done by characters. In a typical DS the only guy in the front row who isn't a character is the standard bearer. Yet, most Death Stars are composed of elite units.
This seeming contradictions is explained when we consider what a unit can add to a DS.
- Special Rules: Stubborn, ASF, what have you, the unit can add special rules to the DS.
- Standards: The unit standard is often key.
- Large max size. Clearly you want your DS to be big. insures your chars get to fight when you are flank charged, allows you to charge more enemies at once, etc. This is esp. important if you can't get ITP in there.
- Saves: Good saves are key to surviving flank charges until the chars get over there and start kicking tail. They also enable the unit to weather shooting attacks.
- Max points invested. Since the DS's real purpose is points denial it has to eat up all the points in the list that aren't devoted to the chars.
For all of these reasons, the unit itself will likely be an elite unit.
Another unit specific question is whether the unit will be cav or infantry based. In most codexes, for a variety of reasons, the Cav DS is the better way to go. Undead armies can often get away with infantry DS's (Urgency/Vanhels), but the faster you can get the DS the better, and most armies have a heavy cav unit that's suitable. The Beast Cowers is a counter-argument, however.
Challenger: This is the guy who throws up a challenge when the enemy charges in. He is most often the Lord. This guy has got to be able to stand the best of what the enemy can throw at him, then retaliate and obliterate their challenger. If the enemy feeds him a champ the Challenger has to be able to extract the max overkill. Typically the Challenger needs a Ward save, a good armor save, and a d3 wound weapon. Killing Blow is great if you can get it, as is ASF.
BSB: This guy is just here to bring the best banner in the army, or just an extra war banner if the dex doesn't have 2 good ones. It's better to get the best banner onto the unit if its possible, but sometimes points force it to be given to this guy. The BSB also cuts down enemy troops, but that isn't his primary job, he's mostly here to wave the flag and give the associated bennies.
Reaper: The other hero is here to deal damage to rank and file. A good armor save and a great weapon is the easiest way to do this (usually 2 casualties per hero is sufficient), but with all the armies points at your disposal you can also look at giving him a ~50 point weapon and trying to get a third wound out of it. He is also necessary for denying wounds to the enemy Lord if he ducks your Challenger's challenge and tries for rank and file.
Spare: The last hero slot is most likely an extra reaper, but there are several other uses for him. You can put an invulnerable char in there (that is, deals no damage but rerolls his save or some such nonsense), if your dex has such a thing, or put a unit wide universal on him. (terror, MR, etc.)
DS Deployment
The DS's deployment is simplicity itself. Plunk it down opposite the most valuable piece of your foe's force and get ready to march. Hide your core as best you can and hope they don't have time to go contest your quarters. It's worth noting that the DS army will always finish deploying first (except vs. oddball lists like the Khazrak One Eye All-Ambushers list).
DS Formation
The big question is where the Lord goes. He needs to be in the middle if a dragon charge is in the offing (as it'll only touch 4/5 of the front rank, and may well elect not to touch the Lord if he's not centrally located), and on the appropriate corner if a flank charge threatens. It's also worthwhile to be careful about your standard bearer (typically the only R&F in the front rank). In extreme cases you might want to push him into the back and replace him with your champion, thus completely denying R&F to the enemy.
DS Movement
The Death Star needs to march towards the enemy every round, until it can charge, and even then it might prefer to march right up in their face, if flight seems imminent. It must be able to accept the enemy charging the flank or rear. Getting stuck in terrain is unacceptable as well, and the enemy target needs to be chosen with an eye towards avoiding such entanglements.
DS Magic
DS's have no magic of their own, due to lacking mages (and buying bound spells is a waste of time w/out mages to draw the dispel dice), and they tend to lack dispel dice to block the enemy's magic. MR is the saving grace of the DS, as it essentially amounts to dispel dice vs. every enemy spell. It's worthwhile to try for MR3 in a DS, many dexes have a way to get it.
DS Shooting
DS's have no time for shooting. Each round they must either march or charge. Ideally they are overruning into fresh enemies as often as possible. A good save vs. enemy shooting is a useful DS trait, as is being big enough that casualties don't force panic checks.
DS Combat
The DS is all about combat. You get charged, the challenger challenges, the reapers reap, the unit cheers and lends static res, the enemy breaks and you run them down. Losing a combat with the DS typically means losing a game, unless its a flank charge where your chars can't fight and you hold and go again next round.
DS Vp Discussion
At the end of even an ideal game with the DS you are down one quarter (whichever of the enemy's you didn't get into). Frequently they'll hunt down your core, so you'll be down Core + 3 quarters, which is enough to lose by solid victory.
In return, you are up whatever you killed. 2 units is usually enough to win a solid victory (not unusual if you are chasing the enemy down. It goes 1: March. 2: March, 3: Charge, 4: come back on board, 5: Charge, 6: turn) as standards/general make up for quarters.
EDIT: BAWTRM points out that an enemy with sacrificial units can deploy them to block/redirect your DS at very little cost. Quite true. If they are feeding the DS units of any but the smallest proportions it's likely that the game'll be a tie, as throwaway units match up with the missing quarters.
If the enemy made a concerted effort to destroy your DS the outcome of the game is determined by how that went. Even reducing it below half and killing a hero is usually too much for you to recover from, but the more common outcome is a massacre, one way or the other. If they destroyed the DS you naturally lose, and if you destroyed forces significant enough to have a shot they won't be able to make the points back up with their remnants.
DS Vs. Other gimmick armies
Vs. Gunline: This is usually defeat. You cross the board and charge something which flees, while taking pie plates and bolt throwers all game. Eventually you gobble up something, but you usually get reduced below half and that's doom. Worse is that such a list usually has a march blocker of some sort, or some other way of preventing you from getting there swiftly. You might be ok if the gunline is really a mageline, and you've got good MR.
Vs. No Blocks: This is usually your defeat again. The all-skirmisher list can usually squirm out of the way of your block behind terrain or such, and they are in all 4 quarters.
Vs. blitz list: This'll either be easy or impossible, depending on how well you can handle being double charged by their spear units. Either way, it'll be over swiftly. If you've played this game once, you've played it every time.
Vs DS: The mirror match will be determined, obviously, by who's DS is bigger/better. Usually it doesn't matter too much who gets the charge, it'll be face to face and the best unit will win.
Special rules and their value to DS's
- Regen: Crucial. It prevents much shooting damage and essentially blunts flank charges
- Always Strike First: Great, it aids in the whole "not minding if you get charged". This is esp. key as it lets your charaters get the drop on the enemy's.
- Stubborn: Meh. You shouldn't be losing.
- Immune to Psychology: Great, it's key to be immune to Fear, Terror and Panic, while the downside of not fleeing is minimized on a unit that never wants to flee.
- Unbreakable: Obviously ideal if you can get it.
- Fear/Terror: More useful for being immune to enemy's who cause them than for causing enemies to rout. You want them to fight and get run down, not flee.
- Frenzy: Unacceptable, anything that costs you control of your army is not worth it.
- Hatred: Borderline. Rerolls are nice, mandatory overrun/pursue is a problem. I come down on the side of Hatred, but its debatable.
- Stupid: Unacceptable. 4+ ward save isn't worth this on a guy in a unit that's your whole army.
