Tzeentch: Siphon magic, you are gonna be firing off up to 7 powers per turn so this gives you an extra 6WC at the end of the turn to play with (which may or may not carry over to the next phase due to RAW). Doombolt, nice simple tank killer. The spawn one (I don't know something about dedication, it's late), enemy have a character you don't like? Turn it into a spawn, job done.
Doombolt, that's the one I was forgetting. 4 out of 6 of the powers are strong.
Baleful Devolution is d6 assault Str 6 AP 2 shots. Instant death on a 6 and a chaos spawn places 2 inches from where the model was removed. Might be random but when it goes off it can make for some fun disruption in your enemies ranks.
Makes me want to run the warherd and add in some chaos spawn to sit in front and soak fire while rolling in, in front of the Tzaangors. Having Baleful Devolution go off would be gravy.
I think that relying on rolling the power you want is what leads to weak psychic phases.
In my opinion, Tzeentch is very weak. Mostly because the primaris is really really bad. Also boon sucks and breath doesn't really justify its WC cost. Doombolt, baleful devolution and treason of tzeentch are good though.
I think the sweet spot in a thousand son psychic phase is in two disciplines with excellent primaris powers: telepathy and ectomancy. Telepathy is obvious, shrouded/invis are top level spells and if you don't get them you may always swap for what is perhaps the best witchfire power in the game. The second hidden gem is Ectomancy. First of all, any TS Daemon Prince rolling on empyric shield gets instant god mode (2+ invul save rerollable). Ghostform and soulswitch can save your unit/deathstar and can even get you out of tricky combats you don't want to be in. Coruscating blaze is a nice witchfire with the potential to do great damage to clumped up enemies like zombie hordes. But as I said before, a discipline shines when it has a great primaris, so that no spell goes wasted. And Ectomancy has Warpshock. That's an assault 6, str 5, ap4 witchfire. As potent as they get, all your sorcerers can have the equivalent of two heavy bolters. This is stronger than having your horrors shooting their 2d6 powers. The reasons are plenty: Warpshock doesn't have warpflame. Thousand sons sorcerers have BS 4 or 5 (or 7 hehehe) whereas horrors have a mere 3. CSM sorcerers that are part of formations can cast warpshock on a 3+ and possibly with spell familiar rerolls, which means that they can often 1-dice it. Finally, if your sorcerers are part of a War Coven they immediately get to re-roll 1's to hit upon casting the power. The fact that warpshock is a primaris power can lead to ridiculous amount of mind bullets (an ahriman's exile pack can shoot up to 36 shots at str 5 and ap4 in a single turn, and still have plenty of spells left to go around). Scarab champions can also get it to supplement their units' shooting, even though scream is possibly better.
In other disciplines, heretech has a 50% per roll to give your sorcerer a hull point stripping ability (either 1 or d3). Geomortis can help heal your Ahriman or Magnus if they start getting in the danger zone. Also, Earthly anathema can give your units the sweet combo of ap3 and ignores cover saves, and torturer of worlds is a hidden gem that - if taken on a flying DP- can completely crush assault based armies. Sinistrum has Warp Fate, which also gives god mode status to the scarab occult terminator deathstars and Armour of Hatred is a blessing that affects multiple units and therefore can grace multiple units with a Blessing of Tzeentch in a single cast.
In a lesser extend, pyromancy can be used well against horde armies and divination always has its sweet treats (although I think that - given the war coven bonuses- divination is kind of not really needed).
Well with this army, what would you guys recommend?
Magnus
Ahriman
Exalted Sorc
Rubrics with Sorc, Reaper, 2x Flamer
Scarab Termies with Sorc, Missile and Reaper
Triple Las Pred
The reason for the small army is it's a fun 1850 for charity and I wanted to use what I got from the pre-release
I'm assuming get Psychic Screech on Ahriman for sure, right? I really like the idea of ignores cover as I expect them to be taking advantage of that. Invisibility on Magnus sounds broken as all hell, specially if he can use it to get into combat. And of course, any Blessing to get that better Inv save.
Sounds nice to me. It's also a grand coven so you get all your bonuses. I prefer my predators with auto/las, I think more shots are better against small tanks and I don't see many big tanks around nowdays. But hey, whatever rows your boat.
topaxygouroun i wrote: Sounds nice to me. It's also a grand coven so you get all your bonuses. I prefer my predators with auto/las, I think more shots are better against small tanks and I don't see many big tanks around nowdays. But hey, whatever rows your boat.
Lol fair enough, but it's already built from my glory days in the Black Legion
topaxygouroun i wrote: I think that relying on rolling the power you want is what leads to weak psychic phases.
In my opinion, Tzeentch is very weak. Mostly because the primaris is really really bad. Also boon sucks and breath doesn't really justify its WC cost. Doombolt, baleful devolution and treason of tzeentch are good though.
I think the sweet spot in a thousand son psychic phase is in two disciplines with excellent primaris powers: telepathy and ectomancy. Telepathy is obvious, shrouded/invis are top level spells and if you don't get them you may always swap for what is perhaps the best witchfire power in the game. The second hidden gem is Ectomancy. First of all, any TS Daemon Prince rolling on empyric shield gets instant god mode (2+ invul save rerollable). Ghostform and soulswitch can save your unit/deathstar and can even get you out of tricky combats you don't want to be in. Coruscating blaze is a nice witchfire with the potential to do great damage to clumped up enemies like zombie hordes. But as I said before, a discipline shines when it has a great primaris, so that no spell goes wasted. And Ectomancy has Warpshock. That's an assault 6, str 5, ap4 witchfire. As potent as they get, all your sorcerers can have the equivalent of two heavy bolters. This is stronger than having your horrors shooting their 2d6 powers. The reasons are plenty: Warpshock doesn't have warpflame. Thousand sons sorcerers have BS 4 or 5 (or 7 hehehe) whereas horrors have a mere 3. CSM sorcerers that are part of formations can cast warpshock on a 3+ and possibly with spell familiar rerolls, which means that they can often 1-dice it. Finally, if your sorcerers are part of a War Coven they immediately get to re-roll 1's to hit upon casting the power. The fact that warpshock is a primaris power can lead to ridiculous amount of mind bullets (an ahriman's exile pack can shoot up to 36 shots at str 5 and ap4 in a single turn, and still have plenty of spells left to go around). Scarab champions can also get it to supplement their units' shooting, even though scream is possibly better.
In other disciplines, heretech has a 50% per roll to give your sorcerer a hull point stripping ability (either 1 or d3). Geomortis can help heal your Ahriman or Magnus if they start getting in the danger zone. Also, Earthly anathema can give your units the sweet combo of ap3 and ignores cover saves, and torturer of worlds is a hidden gem that - if taken on a flying DP- can completely crush assault based armies. Sinistrum has Warp Fate, which also gives god mode status to the scarab occult terminator deathstars and Armour of Hatred is a blessing that affects multiple units and therefore can grace multiple units with a Blessing of Tzeentch in a single cast.
In a lesser extend, pyromancy can be used well against horde armies and divination always has its sweet treats (although I think that - given the war coven bonuses- divination is kind of not really needed).
Well yeah, everyone has to adapt their strategy to what they roll... Hoping you get the powers you want is a poor strategy.
You bring up great a great point by the primaris. Out of the armies that I have the Primaris is good. Harlies, Tyranids and I forgot the Eldar Primaris (Is it guide?) I think so. The Firestorm is something that needs to be amended. I would even take the random STR if it had an AP 4 or even 5.
What pages were the leaked photos on in the other thread? I have the book obviously, but I want to make my own dataslates so I don't miss simple rules like flying monstrous creatures, etc. However I'm at work and didn't bring my book with me like an idiot.
Lorestealer's Host:
The blue scribes
3x Blue horrors
Heralds anarchic:
3xHeralds
Heldrake Terror pack 2xHeldrakes
By my calculations that brings me around about in the 4000pt region, with upgrades. I should have in the region of 40+WC to cast with.
What relics should I take? I am going to try to fit in the astral grimoire, Seer's bane, Athaenien scroles and paradox, are there any others I should try to bring? Also how about the formations? I am not budging when it comes to Ahriman's formation and the termie formation but the rest I'll take suggestions on.
Basically I am aiming for strong midfield control and utter domination of the psychic phase. Also the two I am facing are well known for their tank gun lines (yes even the ork player) so Magnus and his gaze will be my main tank killer. When it comes to objectives I am hoping to blast my opponants off of objectives and summon new units onto them.
As I said, any input is welcome. Also, if anyone is interested, I could try to right up a battle report for it.
nintura wrote: Where can I get a list of the Ectomancy powers? Is that WoM or another book?
WoM and Traitor's Hate both have the new Heretic Astartes Powers. You can also find them in a separate card pack along with the other three disciplines.
mrhappyface wrote: So I have managed to secure a 4000pt game against two of my friends, Ork and Imperial guard each taking 2000pts vs me. Oooo the possibilities.
Here is my general list that I am working with now that I have freedom of points.
Lorestealer's Host:
The blue scribes
3x Blue horrors
Heralds anarchic:
3xHeralds
Heldrake Terror pack 2xHeldrakes
By my calculations that brings me around about in the 4000pt region, with upgrades. I should have in the region of 40+WC to cast with.
What relics should I take? I am going to try to fit in the astral grimoire, Seer's bane, Athaenien scroles and paradox, are there any others I should try to bring? Also how about the formations? I am not budging when it comes to Ahriman's formation and the termie formation but the rest I'll take suggestions on.
Basically I am aiming for strong midfield control and utter domination of the psychic phase. Also the two I am facing are well known for their tank gun lines (yes even the ork player) so Magnus and his gaze will be my main tank killer. When it comes to objectives I am hoping to blast my opponants off of objectives and summon new units onto them.
As I said, any input is welcome. Also, if anyone is interested, I could try to right up a battle report for it.
To begin with I would give discs to the Exiles. Witchfires have poor range and you will need the extra mobility. Also, +1 toughness to your big points would not go amiss. Then obviously the mandatory upgrades to the scarabs (helyfire, cannon). I would think that maybe at that high points game having some bodies and some ObSec might do you more good than having a War Coven. With Magnus and the exiles you have adequate magic damage outlets already, and if you go too heavy on that you might get diminishing returns on your values. Mind you, Magnus is going to be casting 6 powers. Supposing 1 dice for a blessing (Siphon Magic) to bless up, then 7 dice for gaze, 4 dice for the change discipline D power, 4 dice for a treason, 2 dice for a doombolt and 2 more for a bolt of change, that's 20 dice Magnus will be swallowing just for himself. The exiles can 1 dice most spells, but even if they go straight WC1 spam, you will need 9-12 dice for the exalted and 10 for Ahriman (to play safe by 2 castting his powers). That's an extra 20ish dice for the exilesm, so 40 dice for them and Magnus already. Of course Magnus with Siphon Magic should be able to generate another 4-5 and maybe you get siphon magic with other sorcerers as well. But you will probably come to a point that your war coven won't really have any dice to use.
That being said, if Magnus gets off 2 str D powers, a treason, 2 ap1 high str beams, then the exiles cast 6 screams and a couple extra witchfires you are in for a terrifying psychic phase, able to decimate any number of opponents (oh the screams against the Orks... oh the humanity).
All in all, I would swap the war coven for another auxiliary and a basic CAD, to get me more bodies and some ObSec. Also I dunno if I would play the helldrake formation, not big fan of them, especially in a Thousand Son army. I think they are best in the Night Lord detachment to benefit from all those stacking morale penalties. Maybe you can add 1 helldrake as your mandatory auxiliary for the Grand Coven and then you should have about 1000 pts available to spend on a CAD. Maybe play Be'Lakor as an extra HQ. Be'Lakor will give you extra fighting power due to his badass sword and stats, and you could have invisibility on demand for your Ahriman's Exiles. As for artifacts, I would certainly add the Seer's Bane on an exalted sorcerer from the exiles. Then I could surprise the opponent by switching from a mobile, psychic dakka focused army to a swift close combat alpha strike (magnus, be'lakor and the seer's bane exiles all charging together and decimating an unsuspecting enemy. Astral grimoire would be good if you have ObSec units because you can quickly jump to where you are needed. Perhaps I could also add some bikers or chaos spawns for the exiles to ride along.
TL,DR version: Swap the War Coven for a CAD for bodies and ObSec. Magnus and the exiles will consume 40ish dice per turn, it's enough to kill most things. Maybe also play Be'Lakor for invisibility on demand and more close combat power.
So if I take out the War Coven and replace it with a Heldrake then take out the Heldrake Terror pack and replace it with either:
CSMCAD:
Be'lakor
Cultists
Cultists
Or
Daemon CAD:
Lord of Change, impossible robes, ML3, rewards, etc.
Pink horrors (11)
Pink horrors (11)
The first CAD is cheaper so I have more points to put back into the main army or add some shooty stuff into the CSMCAD, but the second CAD adds another 7WC and the Lord of Change can be used as a 2++ re-rollable beat stick to get stuck in with Magnus and the sorcerors.
My preference is towards the second CAD but what do you think?
topaxygouroun i wrote: I think that relying on rolling the power you want is what leads to weak psychic phases.
In my opinion, Tzeentch is very weak. Mostly because the primaris is really really bad. Also boon sucks and breath doesn't really justify its WC cost. Doombolt, baleful devolution and treason of tzeentch are good though.
I think the sweet spot in a thousand son psychic phase is in two disciplines with excellent primaris powers: telepathy and ectomancy. Telepathy is obvious, shrouded/invis are top level spells and if you don't get them you may always swap for what is perhaps the best witchfire power in the game. The second hidden gem is Ectomancy. First of all, any TS Daemon Prince rolling on empyric shield gets instant god mode (2+ invul save rerollable). Ghostform and soulswitch can save your unit/deathstar and can even get you out of tricky combats you don't want to be in. Coruscating blaze is a nice witchfire with the potential to do great damage to clumped up enemies like zombie hordes. But as I said before, a discipline shines when it has a great primaris, so that no spell goes wasted. And Ectomancy has Warpshock. That's an assault 6, str 5, ap4 witchfire. As potent as they get, all your sorcerers can have the equivalent of two heavy bolters. This is stronger than having your horrors shooting their 2d6 powers. The reasons are plenty: Warpshock doesn't have warpflame. Thousand sons sorcerers have BS 4 or 5 (or 7 hehehe) whereas horrors have a mere 3. CSM sorcerers that are part of formations can cast warpshock on a 3+ and possibly with spell familiar rerolls, which means that they can often 1-dice it. Finally, if your sorcerers are part of a War Coven they immediately get to re-roll 1's to hit upon casting the power. The fact that warpshock is a primaris power can lead to ridiculous amount of mind bullets (an ahriman's exile pack can shoot up to 36 shots at str 5 and ap4 in a single turn, and still have plenty of spells left to go around). Scarab champions can also get it to supplement their units' shooting, even though scream is possibly better.
In other disciplines, heretech has a 50% per roll to give your sorcerer a hull point stripping ability (either 1 or d3). Geomortis can help heal your Ahriman or Magnus if they start getting in the danger zone. Also, Earthly anathema can give your units the sweet combo of ap3 and ignores cover saves, and torturer of worlds is a hidden gem that - if taken on a flying DP- can completely crush assault based armies. Sinistrum has Warp Fate, which also gives god mode status to the scarab occult terminator deathstars and Armour of Hatred is a blessing that affects multiple units and therefore can grace multiple units with a Blessing of Tzeentch in a single cast.
In a lesser extend, pyromancy can be used well against horde armies and divination always has its sweet treats (although I think that - given the war coven bonuses- divination is kind of not really needed).
The boon power would actually be okay if the table weren't so blasted large and therefore not reliable.
mrhappyface wrote: So if I take out the War Coven and replace it with a Heldrake then take out the Heldrake Terror pack and replace it with either:
CSMCAD:
Be'lakor
Cultists
Cultists
Or
Daemon CAD:
Lord of Change, impossible robes, ML3, rewards, etc.
Pink horrors (11)
Pink horrors (11)
The first CAD is cheaper so I have more points to put back into the main army or add some shooty stuff into the CSMCAD, but the second CAD adds another 7WC and the Lord of Change can be used as a 2++ re-rollable beat stick to get stuck in with Magnus and the sorcerors.
My preference is towards the second CAD but what do you think?
Personally I am in love with Be'lakor. He has everything. He is a winged DP with innate shrouding (jinking gets him to 2+ cover), he's a ML4 sorcerer, he has a badass weapon so he's also a beast in hth and he knows all spells from the best discipline in the game. By getting Be'lakor you automatically do not need to waste rolls trying to get invisibility on any other sorcerer and you are free to roll on disciplines like heretech or geomortis. Imagine a scenario where you are trying to roll invis for your exiles deathstar and it just doesn't happen. So you end up having scream to 4-5 different sorcerers (not that this is a bad thing, but some times the enemy has Ld 10). and then you get to hold on to stupid spells like mental fortitude, terrify or hallucinations. With Be'lakor you just choose the amount of screams you need (usually just one on Ahriman is enough) and then you can roll on your rest 9 lores available to you.
I don't know much about Lords of Change, daemons aren't really my cup of cake, but I know they can do some silly stuff and of course you can have the grimoire of true names to make your Magnus into god mode. Basically you fly with magnus, but if at the start of the turn you get your grimoire going and your baby gets 2++ rerollable, then you are free to glide him and get ready to smash faces the next turn. In that case I would skip pink horrors and go straight to the blues. I think that once enemies understand what horrors do, they are never ever touching the pinks under any circumstances. I don't think that's what you want. You want the enemy to think that he can cripple your WC pool by sending forces to the horrors. Of course he cannot, because horrors are broken. But I think with pinks, you are paying 200 pts to get the same amount of dice you were getting with the blues for 110 pts. 90 pts may not be much, but in the grand scheme of things everything counts. 90 pts could be more cultists on your cad or an extra burning chariot of tzeentch on your daemonic cad or something.
The boon power would actually be okay if the table weren't so blasted large and therefore not reliable.
The boon is awful. First of all, you have to spend WC to cast it. Then you have to take a hit. A hit that can kill you (if you are a 58 pt rubric champ), a hit that can cripple you if you are a 2 wound sorcerer, a hit that can ground you (and therefore take half your life away) if you are a swooping DP. And after all of this, you get to roll on a random table, where you get denied the best roll (Dark Apotheosis) but you could always roll for spawnhood. And even in the best of cases, what you get is something akin to +1 Ballistic Skill. Wow. This is so bad, that the thought you actually actively spend resources to do this is enough to make your opponent laugh. To put this into perspective, Magnus can become a chaos spawn because he cast a blessing on himself.
Hmmm, garanteed invis/shrouded or WC batteries + an unkillable beat stick psyker. On the one hand I can buff my big units to unkillability whilst on the other I have more WC to throw at powers which cause unkillability and I have another distraction unit. Hmmm...
I'm getting together with a friend tomorrow who has been obsessing over the Wrath of Magnus book almost as much as me, that's when I'll be actually putting the list together. I'll get some more opinions on the matter then I'll post the final list.
topaxygouroun i wrote: Then you have to take a hit. A hit that can kill you (if you are a 58 pt rubric champ), a hit that can cripple you if you are a 2 wound sorcerer, a hit that can ground you (and therefore take half your life away) if you are a swooping DP.
Disregard what I wrote prior to this edit.
Anyways... you control that hit, Topaxy. So you're never forced into fragging your own units.
topaxygouroun i wrote: Then you have to take a hit. A hit that can kill you (if you are a 58 pt rubric champ), a hit that can cripple you if you are a 2 wound sorcerer, a hit that can ground you (and therefore take half your life away) if you are a swooping DP.
Disregard what I wrote prior to this edit.
Anyways... you control that hit, Topaxy. So you're never forced into fragging your own units.
Darksider wrote: What do you guys think about the Rahati War Sect?
I want to build mine with Magnus (AOS Archaon Drogbar Model XD) with some Daemonprinces. (all ML 3 with spellfamiliar and wings)
Should i give the DPs armour? And which relics should i give them?
The armour is completely up to you, personally I wouldn't in order to deny grav weapons that your opponant may be carrying. Also, the use of cursed earth will give all your princes a 3++ re-tolling on 1s anyway.
The relics are much better on sorcerors than DP so I wouldn't bother.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Yoyoyo wrote: There was actually a whole article on that.
PA is not recommended as it makes you more vulnerable to Grav weaponry.
These guys some up the rehati nicely, I still don't think the relics are too worth it really: they make the DP a little bit better but they are a lot scarier IMO on cheap sorcerors who can defend your big units.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: The boon power would actually be okay if the table weren't so blasted large and therefore not reliable.
You need some kind of results mitigation to dodge Spawnhood and a character who benefits from most of the table.
Exalted Sorcerers are good choices, having 3W definitely helps.
--> +1 to Ranged Strength (S10 beam, or S5 pistol)
--> +1 to CC strength (S7 Force Staff, S10 with Iron Arm)
--> +1 to T (with Disc, T6)
--> +1 to Armor Save (2+ save)
--> +1 to BS (better scatter)
--> EW, Shrouded, FNP, +1W, reroll failed armor saves
--> Fleshbane, ID, +1A, Shred, Hatred, Poison, +1 WS, +1 Init --> Adamantium Will, auto-wound on Deny
--> Crusader, Fleet
Everything is pretty useful except for Stubborn and Icy Aura.
I do like the idea just wish it was str 2. I understand Tzeentch likes his jokes and all and will screw his servants if it pleases him.
If your not playing waac then go for it and maybe get something good.
What are folks thoughts on discs? They add up with 3 or more exalted sorcerers. Would you run them as a unit or solo on the board? Otherwise I am thinking of burying ones without discs in units of Rubrics and termies.
Also thinking about magnetizing Ahriman and the others to switch between discs and bases as needed for different games.
What are folks thoughts on discs? They add up with 3 or more exalted sorcerers. Would you run them as a unit or solo on the board? Otherwise I am thinking of burying ones without discs in units of Rubrics and termies.
Also thinking about magnetizing Ahriman and the others to switch between discs and bases as needed for different games.
Sorcerors with discs, run them in a single unit so you only need one blessing to get the +1 invul on all your sorcerors, although you could cast shrouded on them for a 2+ jink save, either way stick them in one unit and split them off when needed.
You got the right idea with none disc sorcerors, they can sit in a unit and throw out witchfires/blessings as needed plus the astral grimoire can give a big unit 12" movement anyway without your discs.
You are spot on with Ahrihman there, I am just going to build them all on bases and stick them on seperately built discs when needed though.
Discs offer way more stuff than just a 12" move. You can have that with the grimmoire anyways. Discs give your exalteds (and Ahriman Toughness 5, which goes a long way towards negating instant death (so few str 10 shots outside combat nowdays). Also, discs give the ability to turbo boost 24", which will ensure that your sorcerers will be always able to outrun whatever is pursuing them, will always be able to grab that objective over there or achieve "behind the enemy lines" objectives and also will be able to utilize JSJ tactics. Finally, one more attack is not nothing, considering that an exalted sorcerer has 3 attacks on profile and a pistol. With a disc, an exalted sorcerer has 6 attacks on the charge. A unit of Ahriman's exiles on discs have a total of 24 attacks at Ws 5, str 6 and ap4 before buffs. That alone is a huge amount of close combat considering WoM is all about that magic. With a Force spell cast, your 24 attacks have instant death. No matter what you are hitting, they are bound to roll a snake eye after so many attacks.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also someone said they would run a disc sorcerer in a warherd and while it won't move and charge with the herd it could still keep up like "ork boys" I think or a similiar situation with orks.
Atm it's looking like mix of SD Tzeentch powers and fishing for some haywire/hull point destroying powers. However, yes, it would be much more reliable to ally in a cult of destruction.
Sasori wrote: Has anyone come up with a good method for dealing with AV so far?
The only thing I can come up with is including the Oblit detachment.
Magnus has 2 str D shots. Also, each roll on the Heretech discipline has 50% to give you a hull point stripping power. Finally, melta bombs on your champions.
Am I missing something here? Scarab Occult Terminators do not have Aura of Dark Glory? Meaning they only have a 5++?
*EDIT: Nm. I'm an idiot. they just went around it differently.
What book is the Discipline for Change out of ? Or better yet does anyone have a pic of it? I'm in the middle of typing up my own datasheets to keep everything simplified and on a couple pages instead of a few books. It would be greatly appreciated.
Hi guys. Just some things I've been thinking about.
- An exalted priest with seer's bane could make quite an interesting beatstick. If you took ML3 and made two rolls for divination and got precognition, it would be ungodly powerful. I know that you only have a 1/3 chance of getting precog, but wow. So many rerolling instant death attacks.
- Just for non/semi competitive play, the scrolls of magnus look very fun to use on an exalted sorcerer on a disk. Not likely to be hurt from the self-inflicted hits, and gives you that little what if factor.
- The athenean scrolls only seem to stop the enemy target unit from making DtW tests - so librarians could still use psychic hoods to test in their stead, and opponents can still DtW on sixes? Admittedly the scrolls are still powerful.
- Sending Magnus into combat against any gargantuan creatures or heavy walkers is a no-no. I know he's not supposed to be about CC, but I'm still slightly underwhelmed given GW said he would be able to chop wraithknights in half. When you do the math, he isn't likely to do that (averaging about four wounds, accounting for ID, and before any 5++ saves), and the wraithknight only needs that 6 deathblow or a 6 on stomp to remove all those points. Against imperial knights he's far worse again. He's also vulnerable to tarpitts with no stomp.
- Scarab occult terminators have potentially a very nasty overwatch. It's just a shame the sorcerer can't take relics, because then you'd autotake the third eye.
- I'm overall very pleased with the release - especially that the thousand sons rules in general do not seem to be overpowered. It still seems to be a very challenging army to play, and I actually like that. Your victories mean a bit more.
I had my first battle with WoM tonight. All I have to say is, that power, mans...that power.
So it was a 2k battle. I took a Grand Cabal featuring a full unit War Coven and a las/auto predator as auxiliary + favoured of Tzeentch. So in total 4 sorcerers with spell familiars, 3 msu rubrics in rhinos, 3x5 scarab occults with cannons and helyfires and the predator. My opponent played KDK. Don't know his exact formations, but he had a big unit of hellhounds (8-10 of them approximately), 2 units of 5 raptors with meltaguns, 2 units of bikers, 1 unit of warp talons, 2-3 units of CSM in rhinos, a lord with jump pack, a las/missile hellbrute, a hellchicken and one of those awesome daemon walkers that make defilers look like a joke.
First let me aknowledge that my list was a hard counter to his in many levels. He didn't have nearly enough ap2 attacks (just the hellbrute, the meltaguns on the raptors and an ap2 melee weapon on the lord), he had a ton of 3+ armor saves and he had to reach hth which was butter on my bread. But even with those points, it was way much more one sided than I would EVER imagine. Short story, by the end of turn two all he had left on the table was the rhinos, 3 warp talons and the two walkers. Long story below.
So we rolled #3 on the Maelstorm missions, so we had the long table deployment (which ultimately favored me heavily I think). I got 5 psychic screams, 2 treasons of tzeentch (useless as he had no serious unit for me to steal), 2 baleful devolutions, prescience, invisibility, 2 doombolts and some other flashy spells (sinistrum hth blessing on the caster and sinistrum malediction that reduces invul save). He took first turn, moved all his units forward, run and turbo boosted his rhinos. Especially the hellhounds with their scout movement came just in front of my face. In my turn, I moved my units further back, but since the hounds were so close already, I decided to try my luck in shooting/ witchfiring them. So here comes the psychic phase. I roll 1 dice, leaving him with 1 dispel dice against my 22. First of all I cast a siphon magic on one of my sorcerers, followed that with the malediction to reduce hellhounds' invul save. Then came the screams. 3 screams on the hellhound unit for a total of 4 dogs dying, then a breath of chaos, followed by a couple of blessings to get the Blessing of Tzeentch going. I ended up the phase with a free prescience on a Rubric unit and invisibility on a terminator unit that marched forward. In the following shooting phase, two terminator units and the rubrics with prescience made short work of the hellhounds.
On his second turn, the hellchicken entered the table. His one biker unit charged one of my rubric units. He stayed away from my invisible terminators, and instead just moved all his stuff forward, disembarked from the rhinos and got ready for a third turn assault with everything. Eventually there was no third turn at all. The hellchicken killed 2 rubrics with the baleflamer, the bikers did nothing (turns out 3++ with rerollable 1's rubrics are VERY durable). On my second turn, I moved all the terminators forward. On the psychic phase, I went all out on psychic screams. Tzeentch was heavily favouring me, because I cast 5 psychic screams, and the worst of them rolled a 12 on 3d6. I completely decimated a biker unit, a unit of 8 CSM, the two raptor units and half the lord. Needless to say, in the ensuing shooting phase what was left from his army vaporized. One of my terminator units got invisibility and prescience and charged his biker unit that was in combat with my rubrics. At that point he conceded the game. All I lost was 4 rubric marines. If I was playing safer and kept them 2" behind I would lose 2 rubric marines after 2 turns of the game. I rerolled a total of four or five 1's on my terminator armor saves. That was an immediate 4-5 terminators extra on my army list due to the favoured of Tzeentch rule.
Things that I learned:
1. Nobody can match our psychic phase. Period. It's not only the amount of warp charges. It's the plethora of spells spread among so many units, it's the spell familiars, it's the access to 10 disciplines. It is also the fact that even the mandatory tzeentch rolls will give us many decent powers now that the lore is revamped. I got two treasons of tzeentch, two doom bolts and a siphon magic just from the mandatory rolls. Our army is extremely versatile when it comes to answering threats.
2. Having 5-6 psychic screams spread on 5-6 units is devastating for the opponent. That's why I think that the scarab occults are a great unit. In this game it was almost irrelevant if I did have inferno bolts or not. I screamed my opponent 10 times in two turns. It got the job done. It would get any job done.
3. Favoured of tzeentch Scarab occult terminators cannot be killed by conventional weaponry. My opponent threw what little shooting he had in the hopes that he could kill some models, but being able to reroll 1's on a 2+ model is soooo strong. Granted, my opponent did not have many ap2 attacks in their list, but even if they did, 3++ with rerollable 1's is almost just as effective.
In the same points, the scarab occult are a GREAT unit in power level/ cost ratio. Sure 300 pts looks like a lot, but the unit overperforms in every field once you factor in favoured of tzeentch. Sinply put, you get 5 models with rerollable 2+ armor save, 3+ invul save rerolling 1's. They are practically immune to all kinds of non-ap2 shooting and they are one of the most durable units in the game against ap2 as well. They have a MUCH better protection than hammernators do, and they also have a very decent firepower, more than any other terminator unit. And if that wasn't enough, they get their ML2 caster that can take psychic scream on demand. Getting to reroll 1's to hit is just the icing on the cake, but it does turn the shooting phase from ok to good. In close quarters, 6 TLstr 4 + 4x str 5 and 2 missiles, all ap3 and rerolling 1's to hit leads to a tremendous damage output by virtue of not giving the opponent the chance to save and not missing out on many shots. Overall, a scarab occult unit is a swiss army knife in our list. If you get them with favoured of tzeentch, they bacome an absolute powerhouse. Not kidding, many armies are going to have an awful time against favoured scarab occults.
4. The War Coven is a very strong formation. Getting rerolls of 1's to hit for practically following your plan A (casting powers) is essentially equal to getting it for free, and once you figure that the shots going in aren't allowing saves, those extra hits go a long way.
5. We are really deadly in close / mid range (up to 24"). We are useless outside of it, and we are a slow army. I'm afraid the Astral grimoire is a must have item. It is really nice when you see terminators moving 12" though.
6. Managing the psychic phase is going to be a pain in the neck. We have sorcerers everywhere, each with his own spells known and we need to prioritize, check for eligibility, check for range, check if our blessings are actually in range of our target or if we messed up the movement phase. Practice it a lot and try to be fast, otherwise it can annoy the opponent who just sits and watches as you blow his stuff away and keep adding ability counters on your units.
7. The grand cabal bonuses are meh. There was no real time where I needed to cast more powers than allowed in any of my sorcerers. Also, I periled on the first turn with my warlord, rolled a 3. I was afraid to reroll that so I just took my wound and lost d3 dice. Unfortunately, my warlord was a poor 2 wound sorcerer, therefore he was crippled and I did not cast any more powers with him. Even if I had the chance to reroll my peril roll, I wasn't sure rerolling a 3 was a correct choice. It did save one of the rubric champions though by changing a 2 to a 6 At any point, the tax was only a 110 pt predator so no (much) harm done.
8. My opponent had very few things to contest my armor saves. One could argue that gravs would have a field day. It is debatable, because even against gravs I had 3++ with rerollable 1's. Also, I rolled 2 treasons of tzeentch which were useless against my opponent but would be very glad to have grav devas as their targets. In general, I believe that unless someone tailors specifically against this list (by maxing on plasmas and/or meltas), the durability of the scarabs can make enemies feel completely helpless. And unlike other terminator units which are one trick ponies, the scarabs can perform in almost all the phases of the game equally well.
Overall thoughts: The way I dominated the game really scared me. Sure, my opponent's list wasn't optimized. But that was not what killed them. 10 screams in 2 turns with above average rolls killed them, and this is something I can foresee happening time and again in the future. At least I am finished with painting Magnus.
Edit: One small thought. This list cannot lose in kill point games. Seriously. I considered removing the rhinos in order to not even give first blood to the opponent, but they help a lot with mobility and forward objective capping.
Maybe leaving out the Soulreaper Cannons? That gets you 90pts for two Rhinos and a Mastery Level on the Grimoire caddy.
Automatically Appended Next Post: I've been trying to make a TSons army that doesn't feel like a total waste for your hugely expensive Scarab and Rubrics under 2k. I was wondering on peoples thoughts on a brick of 20 Rubrics in a CAD with Ahriman to infiltrate them to mid-field, we know that their best use is basically as a tarpit so why not use them as an Obsec tarpit?
380 points gets you 20 Rubrics, all you need is the Sorcerer to cast Force and they're 3+/3++ and they're Fearless, you already have an Ahriman gunboat and you have access to Obsec Tzaangors for further Outflanking if Ahriman rolls well on his Warlord trait or just backfield objective camping.
Exalted Sorc with Seer's Bane is a beatstick, he and Ahriman go in the big Tzaangor unit to soak fire early on. I'd DS the Termies for backfield disruption and the Preds give you decent anti armour. GMC's die to Psychic Scream, Knights to Doombolt and Lascannons and you might be able to keep Deathstars tied down on your Rubrics. Thoughts?
topaxygouroun i wrote: One small thought. This list cannot lose in kill point games. Seriously. I considered removing the rhinos in order to not even give first blood to the opponent, but they help a lot with mobility and forward objective capping.
3x Rhinos would cover a fair bit of the cost of Ahriman, who could infiltrate the Rubrics.
topaxygouroun i wrote: One small thought. This list cannot lose in kill point games. Seriously. I considered removing the rhinos in order to not even give first blood to the opponent, but they help a lot with mobility and forward objective capping.
3x Rhinos would cover a fair bit of the cost of Ahriman, who could infiltrate the Rubrics.
You'd also get more psychic shriek, if needed
Yeah, but infiltrating units of 5 rubrics isn't doing much imo. Rhinos are good because they can move 18" in a single turn and -if they survive- they can capture backfield objectives and/or go for linebreaker.
I see a lot of you guys talking about using the special weapons on the occult terminators, but I feel like I'm missing the appeal.
Flamer: Short range ap3? I'd rather just have the twin linked ap 3 bolter I already paid for. If the ignores cover is what I need, I'd rather charge and not risk pushing the charge range back more. Plus, I'm liking divination a lot which has some ignores cover shooting blessings.
Soulreaper Cannon: Losing 1 point of strength and paying 10 points more than a regular assault cannon makes this hard for me to justify. Again, it gives more good 3+ armor killing power, but that's not what I need more of. I need more armor cracking power. Math wise, it only averages 2 wounds on MEQ making it hard for me to justify 30 points.
Hellfyre Missiles: These I've been liking because the cost isn't too bad and rerolling ones makes them pretty accurate. They're the only ones that seem to add something to the army that I need more of in cracking open light vehicles.
I'm liking the terminators a lot, especially in my full war cabal 1850 list, but they're already expensive and I'm struggling to spend more on them. Are you guys finding those other special weapons worth it for some purpose?
19 rubricae and an aspiring sorceror are 495 points. 150 base for the sorc and 4 golems, then 15 more at 23ppm. I have no idea how you got 380 points.
I also agree with lessthanjeff, the soulreaper cannon, while looking incredible, feels incredibly lacklustre to me. The last thing a Sons army needs is another couple of middling strength AP3 shots, and definately not at the sort of price premium you're looking at.
The hellfyres, while being half the range and having no frag option compared to a cyclone missile launcher and being still more ap3 is at least bringing high strength to the table. Unfortunately, you're now wasting the shooting of the remainder of the squad if you're firing at vehicles and 2 krak missiles doesn't strike fear into anything harder than a venom.
The flamer, while bringing some desperately needed ignores cover to the table, also just offers momre ap3 that we already have in abundance. For a squad that you're planning on deepstriking or perhaps in conjunction with an IC carrying the -2 charge range staff it might be a good choice, but lessthanjeff already said it best - if you're in range for the flamer to do work, you're in charge range where your power swords are going to be either overwhelmingly more effective than the heavy flamer or they'll just bounce off. Just like the heavy flamer.
Then you've got the issue of paying for ranged weapons when the squad is definately meant to be in CC, so if you do buy ranged options, you're either letting them hang in the breeze to anything with ap2 shooting and praying that you don't fluff your blessing and letting those nice khopesh's go to waste or you're making use of the khopesh's and then you've got up to 50 points sitting there being useless on an already expensive squad.
The more I think about it and repeatedly try and write a list that I like, the more I think that the answer is a maxed out war cabal on it's own, no aux choice to turn it into a grand coven at all.
You'd probably have to drop a ML and the AoDG on the last sorc to fit the astral grimoure in somewhere, that 12" move is just too useful. Youd have to get all your armour busting done from Heretek and you'd be reliant on a combination of shriek, smite, life leech, doombolt and whatever the new Tz power is called with the d6str 6 ap2 shots to deal with 2+ armour in conjuntion with anyone who rolled iron arm haveing a red hot go in CC. It's a lot of weight to pull, but that's why you have 4 ML3's and a trio of ML2's there. You're going to be in trouble when armies with good ranged AP2 shooting get first turn before you get your buffs up though. It does feel horribly spammy, but that's the restrictions that the codex gives us, so there's not much to do about it.
Drasius wrote: 19 rubricae and an aspiring sorceror are 495 points. 150 base for the sorc and 4 golems, then 15 more at 23ppm. I have no idea how you got 380 points.
I also agree with lessthanjeff, the soulreaper cannon, while looking incredible, feels incredibly lacklustre to me. The last thing a Sons army needs is another couple of middling strength AP3 shots, and definately not at the sort of price premium you're looking at.
The hellfyres, while being half the range and having no frag option compared to a cyclone missile launcher and being still more ap3 is at least bringing high strength to the table. Unfortunately, you're now wasting the shooting of the remainder of the squad if you're firing at vehicles and 2 krak missiles doesn't strike fear into anything harder than a venom.
The flamer, while bringing some desperately needed ignores cover to the table, also just offers momre ap3 that we already have in abundance. For a squad that you're planning on deepstriking or perhaps in conjunction with an IC carrying the -2 charge range staff it might be a good choice, but lessthanjeff already said it best - if you're in range for the flamer to do work, you're in charge range where your power swords are going to be either overwhelmingly more effective than the heavy flamer or they'll just bounce off. Just like the heavy flamer.
Then you've got the issue of paying for ranged weapons when the squad is definately meant to be in CC, so if you do buy ranged options, you're either letting them hang in the breeze to anything with ap2 shooting and praying that you don't fluff your blessing and letting those nice khopesh's go to waste or you're making use of the khopesh's and then you've got up to 50 points sitting there being useless on an already expensive squad.
The more I think about it and repeatedly try and write a list that I like, the more I think that the answer is a maxed out war cabal on it's own, no aux choice to turn it into a grand coven at all.
You'd probably have to drop a ML and the AoDG on the last sorc to fit the astral grimoure in somewhere, that 12" move is just too useful. Youd have to get all your armour busting done from Heretek and you'd be reliant on a combination of shriek, smite, life leech, doombolt and whatever the new Tz power is called with the d6str 6 ap2 shots to deal with 2+ armour in conjuntion with anyone who rolled iron arm haveing a red hot go in CC. It's a lot of weight to pull, but that's why you have 4 ML3's and a trio of ML2's there. You're going to be in trouble when armies with good ranged AP2 shooting get first turn before you get your buffs up though. It does feel horribly spammy, but that's the restrictions that the codex gives us, so there's not much to do about it.
I found that occults at 300 pts are so much better than at 250 pts while in the War Cabal. They perform the same in the psychic and hth, but in the shooting phase it just looks like rubrics. Also, due to their bolters being TL already, the Occular Guidance is getting wasted if you don't purchase the stronger weapons. If they didn't have occular guidance I would agree that there is no need to spend the extra points. But rerolling 1's gives them so much more firing potential that it's actually worth it. Also, I can't see why someone wouldn't want to add a cheap auxiliary. Sure the bonuses of the grand cabal are not that great, but if you can have them for 100ish points then why not? Of course I understand that at 1850 you have to squeeze some points to make it work.
I believe that at 1850 games I would play a basic Pandaemoniad, the Ahriman's exiles with exalted sorcs on discs + spell familiars and a basic CSM Allied detachment, perhaps with Be'Lakor as HQ. Then I would form a super unit with all the Ahriman's Exiles, give it invisibility from Be'Lakor and start flying around blasting things with mind bullets. Depending on the points I have available, I could add the seer's bane and have my uber sorc unit moonlight as a surprise swift close combatant with things like Force, Biomancy or Sinistrum buffs and prescience to increase its killing potential. At higher point games (2000-2500) I believe a maxed War Coven is where the money's at. At even higher games (2500+) big buddy Magnus can make his appearance, perhaps in a Rehati Sect with 3 daemon princes to escort him.
topaxygouroun i wrote: I had my first battle with WoM tonight. All I have to say is, that power, mans...that power.
So in total 4 sorcerers with spell familiars,
Could you explain what your 4 sorcerers were and how they got familiars? Unless I'm reading it wrong, only exalted sorcs can get them as they have access to the CSM codex.
topaxygouroun i wrote: I had my first battle with WoM tonight. All I have to say is, that power, mans...that power.
So in total 4 sorcerers with spell familiars,
Could you explain what your 4 sorcerers were and how they got familiars? Unless I'm reading it wrong, only exalted sorcs can get them as they have access to the CSM codex.
Umm, they were normal Chaos Sorcerers who had spell familiars because they have access to the CSM codex because they are from the CSM codex.
I agree with your points too about not running the whole detachment, Drasius. The list I made is just the war cabal formation as I feel what will limit my psychic phases is not the spells cast per sorc but the number of dice I have. I don't anticipate many perils either throwing one or two dice at a time at most spells.
I took a lot of melta bombs to deal with armies like a battle company that bring down rhinos and drop pods everywhere. They'll also be helpful against knights since the good invul save of the squad should mean the sorcs get several turns of bombing them back before they'd go down. I'd love to get more term armor on the other 3 sorcs but I plan on keeping them with my term squads so hopefully they won't be making many saves anyways. For armies with lots of 2+ saves I think taking axes on all the sorcs who can take them (cursed new restriction on the squad captains being forced to use staves...) and psyhic powers will be plenty.
Ok, so I understand this and not cheat anyone come Saturday, the following apply:
All sorcerers get Tzeenthc's Firestorm because they have Marks of Tzeentch according to BRB Chaos Psychic focus. Does this mean if I pick all my ML's worth in say Telepathy, I still get it's Primaris as well? Or just the Chaos Focus effect?
So an Aspiring Sorc will have the Firestorm plus 1 more on the Tzeentch table meaning they cant' get anything else?
Other sorcs like Exalted will have the Firestorm, plus one from Tzeentch for the mandatory roll, plus whatever other Disciplines I give them, correct?
Marked sorcerers must generate one power from their god list so no easy for them to get the psychic focus free primaris. Everything else looks correct.
You will not get the Telepathy primaris for free since you had to generate a power from the tzeentch table for having a MoT. You can switch one of your rolls on that table to the primaris though.
For example, my Scarab Occult Sorc is ML 2. He gets the tzeentch primaris for free, he has to roll on the tzeentch table once, and then I will usually roll on Telepathy and switch whatever I roll to Psychic Shriek. This will leave him with 4 powers in general (since he also gets force).
They get Chaos focus because they have the mark but that also requires generating at least one power from the Tzeentch list. Since one power must generate from Tzeentch (and no the chaos focus power doesn't count) there is no way to have all powers generated from the same list to gain psychic focus with any other discipline.
Gotcha. Ok, as long as I understand everything and not cheat Saturday I need all the help I can get. Turns out if you bring friends or "allies" they can buy things (this being a charity event) like orbital strikes (all the way up to Apocalypse) or even buy re-rolls for your dice (if they like you) or for your opponent, among a few other things. So this could get difficul seeing as how I'll have a whopping 19 models in my army.
I found that occults at 300 pts are so much better than at 250 pts while in the War Cabal. They perform the same in the psychic and hth, but in the shooting phase it just looks like rubrics. Also, due to their bolters being TL already, the Occular Guidance is getting wasted if you don't purchase the stronger weapons. If they didn't have occular guidance I would agree that there is no need to spend the extra points. But rerolling 1's gives them so much more firing potential that it's actually worth it. Also, I can't see why someone wouldn't want to add a cheap auxiliary. Sure the bonuses of the grand cabal are not that great, but if you can have them for 100ish points then why not? Of course I understand that at 1850 you have to squeeze some points to make it work.
I have no idea what I could drop to fit another 150 points of wargear into an 1850 list while maintaining the casting power required due to said 150 points of wargear not really helping out against the 2 biggest weaknesses of a Sons army (anti tank and no ap2). 150 points is 5 mastery levels or all 3 suits of termie armour for the sorcs and still another 3 mastery levels on top of taking away their 2+ and dropping their 3++ down to a 5++ and I would consider both of those to be unacceptable tradeoffs. The mandatory 450 points wasted on the 3x thousand sons rubricae squads is a crying shame, not only because the basic troopers of our legion are still utterly worthless but that they simply duplicate what the termies do while also being pushovers in combat while losing the ObSec they would have had in a CAD. If it had of been 2 squads each of rubrics and scarabs with 3 sorcs to get the rr1's for saves it would have been fine, but 1500 points on the dot minimum before mastery levels or wargear is just too punishing in a "normal" sized game of 40k. I could easily drop a mastery level to include a heldrake aux choice (yes, just what I need, more ap3 *sigh*) in a 2k game, but that's a rare thing where I am with 1500 or 1850 being the name of the game and wasting 10 out of 13 psycher levels on the terrible tzeentch table is out of the question for a 1500 point game now that doombolt is a 1/6 chance instead of a 1/3 chance like it used to be.
Not to mention that if I do bring an Aux choice, it's going to be the only thing with an AV value on the field, and for what? I'm still a bound army and the only thing I miss out on is the re-roll on perils results since like every thousand sons army ever, there's not much chance that I'll have so much warp charge to spend that I'll be casting 4 powers per sorceror. Hell, I'd count myself extremely lucky if I had 3 powers worth casting per sorceror let alone 4 and the dice to cast them with.
The issue with the extra 50 points of wargear is that they still can't function as reasonable AV. on average, each 300 point squad will take 2 turns (1.56 HP per turn) to hull out a 3 HP AV11 tank, be that a rhino or the side of a predator, 3 turns (1.12 HP per turn) against AV 12, be it a dreadnaught or drop pod and a staggering 4 turns against AV13. While they can technically hurt AV14, it would take 1 squad 10 turns of shooting to hull out a land raider, or in other words, 2x 300 point squads doing nothing but shooting at a single land raider for 5 turns and then they've got a 50/50 chance of destroying it. On the other hand, if you're taking them for their shooting, 10 rubricae with a cannon will out damage them against anything with a toughness value under 8 on a point for point basis. I would suggest that measuring the scarabs on the basis of their shooting is a false economy as their shooting is sub par by modern 40k standards and insufficient for their points. A ~13 - 100% increase on a negligable number is still a negligable number, which is roughly the range you're looking at for the most common targets.
I found that occults at 300 pts are so much better than at 250 pts while in the War Cabal. They perform the same in the psychic and hth, but in the shooting phase it just looks like rubrics. Also, due to their bolters being TL already, the Occular Guidance is getting wasted if you don't purchase the stronger weapons. If they didn't have occular guidance I would agree that there is no need to spend the extra points. But rerolling 1's gives them so much more firing potential that it's actually worth it. Also, I can't see why someone wouldn't want to add a cheap auxiliary. Sure the bonuses of the grand cabal are not that great, but if you can have them for 100ish points then why not? Of course I understand that at 1850 you have to squeeze some points to make it work.
I have no idea what I could drop to fit another 150 points of wargear into an 1850 list while maintaining the casting power required due to said 150 points of wargear not really helping out against the 2 biggest weaknesses of a Sons army (anti tank and no ap2). 150 points is 5 mastery levels or all 3 suits of termie armour for the sorcs and still another 3 mastery levels on top of taking away their 2+ and dropping their 3++ down to a 5++ and I would consider both of those to be unacceptable tradeoffs. The mandatory 450 points wasted on the 3x thousand sons rubricae squads is a crying shame, not only because the basic troopers of our legion are still utterly worthless but that they simply duplicate what the termies do while also being pushovers in combat while losing the ObSec they would have had in a CAD. If it had of been 2 squads each of rubrics and scarabs with 3 sorcs to get the rr1's for saves it would have been fine, but 1500 points on the dot minimum before mastery levels or wargear is just too punishing in a "normal" sized game of 40k. I could easily drop a mastery level to include a heldrake aux choice (yes, just what I need, more ap3 *sigh*) in a 2k game, but that's a rare thing where I am with 1500 or 1850 being the name of the game and wasting 10 out of 13 psycher levels on the terrible tzeentch table is out of the question for a 1500 point game now that doombolt is a 1/6 chance instead of a 1/3 chance like it used to be.
Not to mention that if I do bring an Aux choice, it's going to be the only thing with an AV value on the field, and for what? I'm still a bound army and the only thing I miss out on is the re-roll on perils results since like every thousand sons army ever, there's not much chance that I'll have so much warp charge to spend that I'll be casting 4 powers per sorceror. Hell, I'd count myself extremely lucky if I had 3 powers worth casting per sorceror let alone 4 and the dice to cast them with.
The issue with the extra 50 points of wargear is that they still can't function as reasonable AV. on average, each 300 point squad will take 2 turns (1.56 HP per turn) to hull out a 3 HP AV11 tank, be that a rhino or the side of a predator, 3 turns (1.12 HP per turn) against AV 12, be it a dreadnaught or drop pod and a staggering 4 turns against AV13. While they can technically hurt AV14, it would take 1 squad 10 turns of shooting to hull out a land raider, or in other words, 2x 300 point squads doing nothing but shooting at a single land raider for 5 turns and then they've got a 50/50 chance of destroying it. On the other hand, if you're taking them for their shooting, 10 rubricae with a cannon will out damage them against anything with a toughness value under 8 on a point for point basis. I would suggest that measuring the scarabs on the basis of their shooting is a false economy as their shooting is sub par by modern 40k standards and insufficient for their points. A ~13 - 100% increase on a negligable number is still a negligable number, which is roughly the range you're looking at for the most common targets.
The scarabs are good because they can function above average in all the phases of the game, not just shooting. They are ok in the movement phase (good if astral grimoire), above average in the psychic phase, decent/ok in the shooting phase, above average in the hth phase, way above average in saves (if favoured). Now if AV is your problem, each single roll on the Heretech power gives you a 50% chance to get a hull point stripping power, either 1 or d3. Forget about piercing AV, that ain't happening. Well, it may happen if you purchase a cult of destruction formation and use astral grimoire on them. You know, oblits moving 12", shooting twice with lascannons and multi-meltas with potential prescience and then charging with 14 attacks with powerfists and power axes. Also, practically everybody in the list can take melta bombs. But the main form of anti-AV should always be haywire powers from heretech. 10 rubrics can out-shoot 5 termies, that's true, but they are practically the same points, and rubric marines are way worse in all the other aspects (psychic, hth, saves). I'm not saying scarabs are good. I'm saying that favoured of Tzeentch Scarab Occults are stupidly tough and they can perform in multiple phases of the game with above average results, which makes them a swiss army knife. And I'm not even considering their ability to deep strike with a psychic scream or a doombolt available.
topaxygouroun i wrote: The scarabs are good because they can function above average in all the phases of the game, not just shooting. They are ok in the movement phase (good if astral grimoire), above average in the psychic phase, decent/ok in the shooting phase, above average in the hth phase, way above average in saves (if favoured). Now if AV is your problem, each single roll on the Heretech power gives you a 50% chance to get a hull point stripping power, either 1 or d3. Forget about piercing AV, that ain't happening. Well, it may happen if you purchase a cult of destruction formation and use astral grimoire on them. You know, oblits moving 12", shooting twice with lascannons and multi-meltas with potential prescience and then charging with 14 attacks with powerfists and power axes. Also, practically everybody in the list can take melta bombs. But the main form of anti-AV should always be haywire powers from heretech. 10 rubrics can out-shoot 5 termies, that's true, but they are practically the same points, and rubric marines are way worse in all the other aspects (psychic, hth, saves). I'm not saying scarabs are good. I'm saying that favoured of Tzeentch Scarab Occults are stupidly tough and they can perform in multiple phases of the game with above average results, which makes them a swiss army knife. And I'm not even considering their ability to deep strike with a psychic scream or a doombolt available.
None of that is influenced by taking their overpriced shooting options. They don't move any better in the movement phase for spending that extra 50 points, they don't do anything in the psychic phase anyway because the real sorcerors are using all the warp charge since they have familiars and more rolls on the BRB tables, their shooting is just adding more AP3 to an army with an overabundance of AP3 even when you spend those extra 50 points on extra AP3 guns instead of actual anti tank, they don't get extra CC attacks from the extra 50 points of guns and their saves don't get any better because they spent an extra 50 points on shooting more ap3. AV is always going to be a problem in a sons army, I already mentioned in my previous posts that you're always going to be forces to rely on heretek for AV and bio/telepthathy/tzeentch for your AP2 needs, you're not telling anyone anything new. Yes, you can jam in a pointless tax of the Cult instead of an Iron Warriors detatchment or 2 where they all get ObSec and yes, everyone can take melta bombs, but as orks have shown us, relying on power klaws melta bombs for anti tank is not an effective strategy.
As for rubrics outshooting scarabs, yes, I know they're worse at literally everything else, again, I've said as much in my previous posts, but you're the one touting the shooting prowess of the scarabs. I'm simply pointing out that the shooting afforded by the extra 50 points a squad is nothing special and in an army that is already desperately tight on points, if that's really what you're after, then rubricae do it better for cheaper.
Of course favoured scarabs are tough, 2+/3++ rr1's is a bit silly, but unless you play at greatly inflated points values compared to 95% of the community, you don't have the luxury of taking the gun options on the scarabs unless you want to sacrifice the casting or survivability of the actual sorcerors that do the vast majority of the work in your army. As for deep striking in an army with no scatter reduction (beyond a random warlord trait and the key that doesn't work properly) and is already stretched too thin for casting to rely on having scriers available for reserve manipulation and is already extremely thin on the ground for models, putting your expensive, indestructible unit into DS reserve to be left to the whims of the reserve, scatter and mishap dice is just pants on head crazy.
topaxygouroun i wrote: The scarabs are good because they can function above average in all the phases of the game, not just shooting. They are ok in the movement phase (good if astral grimoire), above average in the psychic phase, decent/ok in the shooting phase, above average in the hth phase, way above average in saves (if favoured). Now if AV is your problem, each single roll on the Heretech power gives you a 50% chance to get a hull point stripping power, either 1 or d3. Forget about piercing AV, that ain't happening. Well, it may happen if you purchase a cult of destruction formation and use astral grimoire on them. You know, oblits moving 12", shooting twice with lascannons and multi-meltas with potential prescience and then charging with 14 attacks with powerfists and power axes. Also, practically everybody in the list can take melta bombs. But the main form of anti-AV should always be haywire powers from heretech. 10 rubrics can out-shoot 5 termies, that's true, but they are practically the same points, and rubric marines are way worse in all the other aspects (psychic, hth, saves). I'm not saying scarabs are good. I'm saying that favoured of Tzeentch Scarab Occults are stupidly tough and they can perform in multiple phases of the game with above average results, which makes them a swiss army knife. And I'm not even considering their ability to deep strike with a psychic scream or a doombolt available.
None of that is influenced by taking their overpriced shooting options. They don't move any better in the movement phase for spending that extra 50 points, they don't do anything in the psychic phase anyway because the real sorcerors are using all the warp charge since they have familiars and more rolls on the BRB tables, their shooting is just adding more AP3 to an army with an overabundance of AP3 even when you spend those extra 50 points on extra AP3 guns instead of actual anti tank, they don't get extra CC attacks from the extra 50 points of guns and their saves don't get any better because they spent an extra 50 points on shooting more ap3. AV is always going to be a problem in a sons army, I already mentioned in my previous posts that you're always going to be forces to rely on heretek for AV and bio/telepthathy/tzeentch for your AP2 needs, you're not telling anyone anything new. Yes, you can jam in a pointless tax of the Cult instead of an Iron Warriors detatchment or 2 where they all get ObSec and yes, everyone can take melta bombs, but as orks have shown us, relying on power klaws melta bombs for anti tank is not an effective strategy.
As for rubrics outshooting scarabs, yes, I know they're worse at literally everything else, again, I've said as much in my previous posts, but you're the one touting the shooting prowess of the scarabs. I'm simply pointing out that the shooting afforded by the extra 50 points a squad is nothing special and in an army that is already desperately tight on points, if that's really what you're after, then rubricae do it better for cheaper.
Of course favoured scarabs are tough, 2+/3++ rr1's is a bit silly, but unless you play at greatly inflated points values compared to 95% of the community, you don't have the luxury of taking the gun options on the scarabs unless you want to sacrifice the casting or survivability of the actual sorcerors that do the vast majority of the work in your army. As for deep striking in an army with no scatter reduction (beyond a random warlord trait and the key that doesn't work properly) and is already stretched too thin for casting to rely on having scriers available for reserve manipulation and is already extremely thin on the ground for models, putting your expensive, indestructible unit into DS reserve to be left to the whims of the reserve, scatter and mishap dice is just pants on head crazy.
Let me rephrase then: Weapon upgrades are worth it in War Coven Scarabs. Perhaps not so much outside of it. When you get more hits in, you want those hits to wound, so having higher strength is actually better. A cannon acts as an extra scarab shooting in short range, as 3 extra scarabs shooting at long range, and at an upgraded strength to boot. And when most people have to pay 15 pts for a krak missile, paying 20 for two is a good purchase, and it gets even better if you get to reroll your hits. Also, I said they are decent/ok in the shooting phase. How is that me touting their shooting prowess?
I agree that the missile launcher is the only one I consider, but I'm still not in love with it. Compare it to a space marine who I think pays 20 or 25 for two missiles at the same strength, longer range, and can still shoot his bolter in addition to it. We're trading a pretty good gun in for those other two shots.
For the cost of the cannon, you practically can get another terminator in the unit which will also add to the durability and cc prowess of the unit.
lessthanjeff wrote: I agree that the missile launcher is the only one I consider, but I'm still not in love with it. Compare it to a space marine who I think pays 20 or 25 for two missiles at the same strength, longer range, and can still shoot his bolter in addition to it. We're trading a pretty good gun in for those other two shots.
For the cost of the cannon, you practically can get another terminator in the unit which will also add to the durability and cc prowess of the unit.
It has twice the range, frag and krak, costs the same. But how can they shoot their bolter too? I thought only MC/Walkers could shoot two weapons?
lessthanjeff wrote: I agree that the missile launcher is the only one I consider, but I'm still not in love with it. Compare it to a space marine who I think pays 20 or 25 for two missiles at the same strength, longer range, and can still shoot his bolter in addition to it. We're trading a pretty good gun in for those other two shots.
For the cost of the cannon, you practically can get another terminator in the unit which will also add to the durability and cc prowess of the unit.
It has twice the range, frag and krak, costs the same. But how can they shoot their bolter too? I thought only MC/Walkers could shoot two weapons?
The Cyclone Missile Launcher has it's own rule which allows the Terminator to fire both.
lessthanjeff wrote: I agree that the missile launcher is the only one I consider, but I'm still not in love with it. Compare it to a space marine who I think pays 20 or 25 for two missiles at the same strength, longer range, and can still shoot his bolter in addition to it. We're trading a pretty good gun in for those other two shots.
For the cost of the cannon, you practically can get another terminator in the unit which will also add to the durability and cc prowess of the unit.
It has twice the range, frag and krak, costs the same. But how can they shoot their bolter too? I thought only MC/Walkers could shoot two weapons?
The Cyclone Missile Launcher has it's own rule which allows the Terminator to fire both.
Of course it does. Because marines get to break all the rules.
Well if we start looking at what the SM have we are not going anywhere. The question is to see what we have and if what we have is good or not.
But just to make the view slightly brighter, we DO have 2+ rerollable terminators and we can have jump pack terminator death stars as well. Astartes can't have thet. That's not nothing I guess. Also, we can have terminators with shooting options and 3++ at the same time. Astartes can only have one so yay for us I reckon.
Of course I wouldn't mind scarab units of 3 for 170 pts, but I do seem to like them in units of five. The one thing I would really like for them is to be considered as terminators for other formations. For example if we could have a chaos warband with scarabs instead of normal terminators. Maybe they intended for them to be considered "just" terminators but they did not mention so.
Hmm would people think that a maxed War Coven would be a competitive formation if we could have scarabs in units of 3 with 1 heavy weapon option?
topaxygouroun i wrote: Well if we start looking at what the SM have we are not going anywhere. The question is to see what we have and if what we have is good or not.
But just to make the view slightly brighter, we DO have 2+ rerollable terminators and we can have jump pack terminator death stars as well. Astartes can't have thet. That's not nothing I guess. Also, we can have terminators with shooting options and 3++ at the same time. Astartes can only have one so yay for us I reckon.
Of course I wouldn't mind scarab units of 3 for 170 pts, but I do seem to like them in units of five. The one thing I would really like for them is to be considered as terminators for other formations. For example if we could have a chaos warband with scarabs instead of normal terminators. Maybe they intended for them to be considered "just" terminators but they did not mention so.
There's a difference in the argument though. Yes we CAN have 2+ re-rollable termies. But we pay for them. We BOTH have missile racks. But theirs is better for no reason other than simply because they are loyalist marines. If our marines were all the same cost but ours were better (4++) then I'd still argue the same but for their side.
Well, as I said, we don't get nowhere if we discuss Astartes and their options. Ok they are better. Still doesn't change anything on our list building. We do not build lists based on the Astartes' units and point costs, we build lists based on ours.
The not being able to fire the missiles and bolter together thing feels like an oversight to me.
Drop the 40k community guys a pm on Facebook and get it added to the faq list. The more it's raised the more likely we get a change.
(Yes they did a WoM faq already, but that was horrors only)
Of course it does. Because marines get to break all the rules.
Don't even compare the Soulreaper Cannon to your bog standard Assault Cannon.
I'd personally take the Assault Cannon any day of the week. (Worse vs 3+, better against everything else.)
Oh well, at least we're not stuck with Reaper Autocannons.
Of course it does. Because marines get to break all the rules.
Don't even compare the Soulreaper Cannon to your bog standard Assault Cannon.
I'd personally take the Assault Cannon any day of the week. (Worse vs 3+, better against everything else.)
Oh well, at least we're not stuck with Reaper Autocannons.
Nah. The soulreaper cannon is better than the assault cannon. Not 15 pts better tho.
First off, this will not be a battle report anymore; we only got to turn 2 due to my long psychic phase and my opponants long shooting phase, so this will be more of a thoughts and feelings during the game.
I posted my list above somewhere. I was facing against an IG player with 4 Leman Russes, a Hellhound, a Valkyrie, a Vendetta and a Dark Angels + Inquisitors drop pod unit, allied to an Ork player who took Buzzgob's stompa, a second stompa, 3 cannon things and 2 units of gretchin.
How did my list do? I took out a Leman Russ, dropped two tanks to 1 HP, killed some retenues of inquis, killed a lot of Gretchin and killed two Inquisitors using Magnus and an Occult Termie squad in cc. I lost two units of Terminators, two units of Horrors and Ahriman. I lost the game 5-2, I had one objective they had 1 objective, first blood and linebreaker.
The phases in more detail,
Movement phase:
Not much to say here, the discs move fast and the troops move slow.
Psychic phase:
I had 50+ WC, this went very quickly: I cast buffs for my Termies, Heralds and Sorcerors and got out several witchfires. The buffs helped a lot at keeping my units alive but 3++ means nothing when facing the volume of fire the Ork player was putting out. The witchfires were a combination of SD and Haywire/-HP, the SD powers were completely useless and bounced off the Stompa's 4++ and the Haywire/-HP powers did a lot of damage... to one tank which was in range! I did get off one Maledecation though: Treason of Tzeentch, used it on Buzzgob's stompa and did more damage to their army than the whole of my 4000pts had done. So this was a bit dissapointing
Shooting phase:
Basically just Terminators, their shots were absorbed into the Grot's massive numbers and deflected off of the DA's 3++ ss.
Assault phase:
This was Magnus + some Occult Terminators vs the drop pod unit of DA and Inquisitors. Magnus was debuffed due to Grimoire (Inquis grimoire, not true names/astral) but he still Instant Deathed an Inquisitor. The Termies vs the DA were pretty evenly matched: both having a 3++, WS4, I4 and S4, however he did fail more saves than me so I won the combat. But DA are fearless, grrrrrr!
What did I think of the Thousand Sons list? Probably great against MEQ, TEQ but against Tank + Super Heavy armies you are starting to struggle. The Termies could have definitely used re-rolling 1s so I would suggest only taking them in a filled formation, I was rolling really well and I still lost two units! Magnus was a bit of a let down and did not pull his weight in points, which is sad considering how great he looks, once you get cursed earth he is unkillable but he just doesn't put out the damage that you need him to do (also, as I found out, an elite enemy unit can easily tie him up).
I don't think I would play this army in the future: there are far too many things to keep track of in the psychic phase, those psychic powers don't always go off and those psychic powers are your only source of ranged attack.
So all in all, disappointed. If anyone has any questions feel free to ask.
Nah. The soulreaper cannon is better than the assault cannon. Not 15 pts better tho.
How do you figure?
The Soulreaper Cannon is better against 3+ saves (Due to AP3), that's it.
The Assault Cannon is better against everything else (2+,4+, 5+ and 6+ saves + AV10, 11, 12, 13 and 14), due to it having +1S, so it has a easier time wounding and penetrating armour.
It's also 10 points cheaper.
Nah. The soulreaper cannon is better than the assault cannon. Not 15 pts better tho.
How do you figure?
The Soulreaper Cannon is better against 3+ saves (Due to AP3), that's it.
The Assault Cannon is better against everything else (2+,4+, 5+ and 6+ saves + AV10, 11, 12, 13 and 14), due to it having +1S, so it has a easier time wounding and penetrating armour.
It's also 10 points cheaper.
I believe that if you made a poll on all the armies with access to assault cannons and told them to choose (without increased point cost though), most if not all would pick the soulreaper. It is worse right now, at 30 pts. It is better overall. The unit you are using it in kills infantry, it's not its job to kill tanks. You wouldn't waste all your shooting just to toss an assault cannon at a tank anyways, unless you could see its rear side. The main targets for both the cannons are infantry and MCs. I believe the soulreaper is better in both of those situations.
1. Sehkmet, War Coven would have probably been better seeing as though T5 did nothing for me and I might have been able to max out for re-rolling 1s.
2. Scream would have done nothing against this mechanised army but I did get the Gaze of Magnus off which just bounced off of their DA 3++ saves.
3. I don't think I had enough offencive powers because I was too busy buffing my units for the +1 invul across the board (probably not the best idea).
4. Ahriman was shielded by a unit of termies but my opponants hammered that unit until all that was left was one exalted sorceror. I even had invis on his unit but, you know, Orks have volume of fire.
topaxygouroun i wrote: Well if we start looking at what the SM have we are not going anywhere. The question is to see what we have and if what we have is good or not.
But just to make the view slightly brighter, we DO have 2+ rerollable terminators and we can have jump pack terminator death stars as well. Astartes can't have thet. That's not nothing I guess. Also, we can have terminators with shooting options and 3++ at the same time. Astartes can only have one so yay for us I reckon.
Of course I wouldn't mind scarab units of 3 for 170 pts, but I do seem to like them in units of five. The one thing I would really like for them is to be considered as terminators for other formations. For example if we could have a chaos warband with scarabs instead of normal terminators. Maybe they intended for them to be considered "just" terminators but they did not mention so.
Hmm would people think that a maxed War Coven would be a competitive formation if we could have scarabs in units of 3 with 1 heavy weapon option?
I'm not arguing that I think the terminators are bad if that's what you're getting from this. I love them. What I'm responding to is the value of adding the heavy weapons. We pay more for what I would consider less effective weapons than what the other armies have making it a poor return of points. Yes, your unit will be better if you have the weapons, but you're diluting the value of the unit the more points you pour into the upgrades. I think they're rock solid as is and paying those expensive weapon upgrade costs doesn't improve their output enough to make it worth it. That's just my analysis I guess though. If you're finding them worth the cost then I'm certainly not saying you can't take them. I'm just suggesting you should look to see if there are other ways you could spend the points to add more value to your army for that cost.
As a comparison, if the soul reaper cannon cost 90 points, would you take it? It still makes the unit better because now it does more damage than it would have without the weapon, but the minimal increased output is not worth that cost investment. The question is how much should it be worth for what it does. If it cost 20 I'd probably invest in it but still cautiously because a regular assault cannon has higher strength for the same cost but worse AP. If it cost 15 I'd definitely take it. At 30, I don't think it's worth the cost.
I am conflicted, on the one hand Magnus lools great, he is nigh unkillable and he can get off any psychic power you give to him. On the other hand he can only grab powers from change and Tzeentch + the gaze which can be good against big things but, in my game, it didn't go well. I wouldn't say he is an OP unit, he is unkillable once he gets his powers off but he is 650pts and can easily be ignored/tar pitted. :/
The exalted sorcerors killed one tank. This was probably due to the circumstances of the game so I can't really say much about them. Their ordanance strike didn't do much either but it's free so I'm not complaining.
mrhappyface wrote: Yeah, I got 7 of his DA, psykers, Inquisitors under it but I rolled no 6s, two 1s and he saved the rest. :(
So you're saying it could have easily done more
What about a lower cost game? Say 1850 where youre opponent might not be able to bring much to bear to try and beat him and the rest of your army combined? I see you got him into combat, did you ever think to just fly him?
Yeah, I think I'll keep him flying myself. Take vector strikes when you can get them and make sure he's out of combat for witchfires. You won't have to worry about casting many buffs on him either because the flying alone will make him survivable enough that opponents probably won't focus resources on him.
Funny info: An Exalted Sorc has 3 base attacks plus a pistol. That's 4 attacks, 5 on the charge, 6 with a disc bonus. So a seer's bane on an exalted is 6+d6 attacks on the charge. That's not funny, and can potentially decimate an entire unit in a single turn. Also remember that you wound vs the majority leadership, not the maximum in the unit.
topaxygouroun i wrote: Funny info: An Exalted Sorc has 3 base attacks plus a pistol. That's 4 attacks, 5 on the charge, 6 with a disc bonus. So a seer's bane on an exalted is 6+d6 attacks on the charge. That's not funny, and can potentially decimate an entire unit in a single turn. Also remember that you wound vs the majority leadership, not the maximum in the unit.
I.... I might have to change my. My list for tomorrow... yes. I might have to do that.
Yeah, I was sad I couldn't fit the seer's bane on an exalted sorc with disc into my full war cabal 1850 list but I did put that into my regular war cabal list. The fact that it instant deaths most models even without casting force is very nice for all the space wolf and iron hands stars I fight.
It doesn't seem worth it at all on a regular sorc though because of the lower initiative, attacks, and greater risk of being killed by the weapon and perils at only 2 wounds.
topaxygouroun i wrote: Funny info: An Exalted Sorc has 3 base attacks plus a pistol. That's 4 attacks, 5 on the charge, 6 with a disc bonus. So a seer's bane on an exalted is 6+d6 attacks on the charge. That's not funny, and can potentially decimate an entire unit in a single turn. Also remember that you wound vs the majority leadership, not the maximum in the unit.
I.... I might have to change my. My list for tomorrow... yes. I might have to do that.
I lol'd. Some more info you might find useful: Roll on Biomancy or Sinistrum on the Seer's bane holder. Biomancy for Warp Speed and endurance (Iron Arm doesn't do much to help in hth), Sinistrum for Diabolic Strength, Death Hex (to cancel the only thing that can hold back your Seer's Bane), Warp Fate if you play a deathstar and Armour of Hatred (blessing that affects all friendly units within 12" and activates multiple Blessings of Tzeentch). Have another guy with Prescience and pop in a force and just wreck faces. It will also be a surprise, because nobody will really expect to get assaulted by Thousand Sons. Imagine their surprise after the assault phase...
Also, (that's kind of a longshot to achieve but worth mentioning nonetheless), If your primary detachment is a Pandaemoniad, you get access to rerollable Tzeentchian Warpstorm Table. The most common roll on that table, #7, gives each player d3 rerolls for the turn. These rerolls can be used to negate a potential 1 on your daemonic weapon roll for the bonus attacks.
Iron Arm gives +3 strength and toughness and the Smash rule. Other than the toughness it is ONLY HTH benefit.
I see where you are going with this in that leadership is likely to be 10 and that is used for to wound rolls, but Iron Arm still had use if you end up in CC with a vehicle. I wouldn't fish for it but it has done value if you end up with it.
Still I believe that Sinistrum will provide the best bonuses in such a situation. Death's Hex will be the answer to the enemy death stars.
Meanwhile, if you play the whole Ahriman's Exiles on discs, the remaining 3 guys (other than the seer's bane dude) have an extra 18 attacks @ str 6 ap4 with force on the charge in addition to the super dude. Any kind of blanket blessing on that unit will go a long way. Too bad we can't take Sanctic Demo for hammerhand
topaxygouroun i wrote: Still I believe that Sinistrum will provide the best bonuses in such a situation. Death's Hex will be the answer to the enemy death stars.
Meanwhile, if you play the whole Ahriman's Exiles on discs, the remaining 3 guys (other than the seer's bane dude) have an extra 18 attacks @ str 6 ap4 with force on the charge in addition to the super dude. Any kind of blanket blessing on that unit will go a long way. Too bad we can't take Sanctic Demo for hammerhand
Sorcerers (non-exalted) can. You can't take them in the Exiles but you can in most of the other formations.
mrhappyface wrote: I don't think I would play this army in the future: there are far too many things to keep track of in the psychic phase, those psychic powers don't always go off and those psychic powers are your only source of ranged attack.
Thanks for the great writeup, and don't be too hard on yourself! It's a very unique army, and the psychic phase is a maze of options. I think we can learn a lot of good lessons. Which is the purpose of wargaming, in the professional sense.
This will be easier if we can break it down into bite-size pieces.
1) Tracking the psychic phase. Very complicated, especially with 50+ WC.
2) Selection and application of psychic powers.
3) Mobility.
4) Application of firepower in the shooting phase.
5) The benefits and drawbacks of assaulting.
6) Survivability, mass and attrition.
I have a question about the enemy Force composition.
Was their army more or less exclusively Gretchin, 2+/4++ Terminators, and AV14?
Thanks MrHappyFace. It was only one game and the dice are not always favorable. Try a few more games before giving in.
4000 is a lot to keep track of especially for a new army.
The book keeping in psychic phase I am not looking forward to.
"What spell did he cast, what did he have, ooof forgot that was active, how many points do I have left, did this unit get a blessing, I forget" I may have to lay off the libations so my buddies do not get frustrated with me, lol.
I have a question about the enemy Force composition.
Was their army more or less exclusively Gretchin, 2+/4++ Terminators, and AV14?
No terminators, the DA were veterans with ss alongside psykers and inquisitors. There were two units of Gretchin, some scattered retenue, scouts and the rest were tanks and SH walkers.
1) Tracking the psychic phase. Very complicated, especially with 50+ WC.
I saw on another forum suggesting taking a photo of your sorcerors, make laminated cards that you can write the spells they know on and maybe other notes
Are there any ways besides the Tzeentch warlord trait of making difficult terrain areas? If so you could have a null zone of difficult terrain in your deployement to prevent the enemy from deep striking behind your lines and/or deep striking and charging.
Skerr wrote: Thanks MrHappyFace. It was only one game and the dice are not always favorable. Try a few more games before giving in.
4000 is a lot to keep track of especially for a new army.
The book keeping in psychic phase I am not looking forward to.
"What spell did he cast, what did he have, ooof forgot that was active, how many points do I have left, did this unit get a blessing, I forget" I may have to lay off the libations so my buddies do not get frustrated with me, lol.
I have a notebook with me during games. I write down the spells each sorc knows. Next to each spell I leave 6 slots open, one for every round. Each round I mark the spells that I cast as soon as I cast them. So if my rubric marine sorc #2 (aka the unit champion from the unit of rubrics that I have designated as unit #2) casts force, I check his box for this turn in the line with the force spell. Also, when I bless or maledict a unit, I put the card with the spell right next to the unit onto the battlefield. Finally, I have glass beads of different colors to designate buffs and abilities. So if a unit gets the Blessing of Tzeentch, I put a blue glass bead next to the unit. If the unit gets "Occular Guidance", I place a white glass bead next to the unit etc. This makes the psychic phase less chaotic and lets me keep track of my progress.
The lamination might be a good idea.
Though, with that many sorcerers, and possibly horrors spawnning horrors, a table might be a better idea.
As for skyhammer answers-nothing in specific, but the fun part is that you don't NEED anything specific.
Its amusingly not quite as useful against us. can't get pinned due fearless everywhere, rubrics can't voerwatch anyways so that effect is irrelevant, the dev's heavy weapons are not very efficient against us due to invuls and the assault marines don't pack enough punch to do serius harm in CC (the charge rubrics, the rubrics tank and the aspiring swings axe, they charge scarabs...oh boy that's a bad idea.)
Come your turn, after taking some (but not all that many) casualties, you'll bombard them with AP3 bolters and make quick work of them. possibly throw some treasons around beforhand so you can get your own round of grav shooting.
Just make sure there isn't an easy shooting angle to get to any of the important sorcerers, and you'll do fine.
On another note, I'm beginning to think the ability to take ALL in the tzeentch discipline is actually a really good thing.
Rolling a few times at it an you are practically assured an AP2 witchfire
Ahriman, practically garanteed to get either siphon or doombolt-or both. and he can make good use of them.
Also, many tzeentch powers means many treasons avilable scattered all over the board. that power is a gamechanger by itself, the mere fact it EXISTS everywhere is enough to shape the way the opponent behaves.
Overall, I rate the discipline as a whole:
P-worthless junk unfortunatly. use it to throw excess warp charges after casting your important spells.
1-another "throw excess on it" rather nice for scarabs though, they are unlikely to get hurt by the stab. (1 out of 12 to get wounded. that's not that bad), anything with high T and decent saves can also make use of it. chosen scarabs can use it whilly-nilly.
2-possibly the best power in the game. forget about anti-tank, this is a range 18 S8AP1 beam on just 1WC. beams are assured hits, and if you cant get 4-5, you are doing something wrong. this is as nasty as it gets. also, beams don't need LoS. they target a point, not a unit.
3-on any other army than tzeentch, this would be junk. but between horrors and 1ksons, the amount of spells you fling will make this easily out-generate it's costs. works best in grand coven, but any psyker with a high level can make it shine.
4-its...something? Ap2 poisoned 4+ flamer isn't bad at all, but it requires getting too close for comfort. still, nice to have as a deterrent.
5-Another Ap2 attack, wouldn't mind. focused witchfire is nice as you can completely break some combos by taking out a linchpin model, and with S6Ap2 D6 hits, this delivers. odd chance of ID and spawn generation is a nice touch (about 40% of the casting at BS4, more at higher BS due to more hits.)
6-gamechanger. insanely strong
So, given that you gotta roll at least once, and your get the primaris anyway, the question remain-do you keep rolling?
With 1 true dud, 2 "meh" powers and 3 really good ones, I'd say you do.
A level 3 sorcerer is almost assured to get at least one strong power, and at the very least has the two duds and two "meh" powers of the discipline. (that requires to be insanely unlucky though to get exactly the three powers you don't want. as its 1/20)
Overall, unless you are fishing for something specific you gotta get, or you need something that you can trade for prime for (like shrike for MC hunting, or warpshock against massed light infantry), rolling all Tzeentch might be worth your while.
I mean, can you name one discipline that doesn't contain powers that 1ksons find outright useless?
If you have to get some Tzeenthc powers. might as well go balls deep, and make sure you get the good powers. because some of them are freaking amazing.
mrhappyface wrote: Are there any ways besides the Tzeentch warlord trait of making difficult terrain areas? If so you could have a null zone of difficult terrain in your deployement to prevent the enemy from deep striking behind your lines and/or deep striking and charging.
Not sure how difficult terrain would prevent people from deepstriking there but we can cover the board in difficult and/or dangerous terrain.
The dimensional key is a 12 inch radius difficult/dangerous terrain aoe after activation. There is the warlord trait you mentioned.
Every other power in geomortis causes difficult and/or dangerous terrain. Pyromancy has one power that causes dangerous.
The purge detachment turns every barrage blast into dangerous trerrain, so spam dem renegade mortars.
And vs charging there is a relic from TSons and Word bearers. That said, if you're specifically looking for difficult terrain on turn 1 there's really only torturer of worlds from geomortis.
Mind you that covers a ginormous area with it's 18 inch radius. Plus it blocks run, turbo-boost and flat-outs so that's really all you'd need.
Skerr wrote: Thanks MrHappyFace. It was only one game and the dice are not always favorable. Try a few more games before giving in.
4000 is a lot to keep track of especially for a new army.
The book keeping in psychic phase I am not looking forward to.
"What spell did he cast, what did he have, ooof forgot that was active, how many points do I have left, did this unit get a blessing, I forget" I may have to lay off the libations so my buddies do not get frustrated with me, lol.
I have a notebook with me during games. I write down the spells each sorc knows. Next to each spell I leave 6 slots open, one for every round. Each round I mark the spells that I cast as soon as I cast them. So if my rubric marine sorc #2 (aka the unit champion from the unit of rubrics that I have designated as unit #2) casts force, I check his box for this turn in the line with the force spell. Also, when I bless or maledict a unit, I put the card with the spell right next to the unit onto the battlefield. Finally, I have glass beads of different colors to designate buffs and abilities. So if a unit gets the Blessing of Tzeentch, I put a blue glass bead next to the unit. If the unit gets "Occular Guidance", I place a white glass bead next to the unit etc. This makes the psychic phase less chaotic and lets me keep track of my progress.
Not sure how difficult terrain would prevent people from deepstriking there.
Deep strike can't land in difficult terrain and drop pods have to move to the closest place which isn't difficult terrain. If you could somehow get enough powers, traits, etc. you could theoretically force your opponants deep strike wherever you want to. If you're really lucky, and playing on a small board, you could potentially cover the whole board from strategically placed sorcerors on discs casting difficult terrain powers.
Not sure how difficult terrain would prevent people from deepstriking there.
Deep strike can't land in difficult terrain and drop pods have to move to the closest place which isn't difficult terrain. If you could somehow get enough powers, traits, etc. you could theoretically force your opponants deep strike wherever you want to. If you're really lucky, and playing on a small board, you could potentially cover the whole board from strategically placed sorcerors on discs casting difficult terrain powers.
? Sure you can. It's just that difficult terrain is treated as dangerous so you risk taking casualties.
That only moves them off impassable terrain (which is rather uncommon) and other models. It won't prevent deepstriking as they don't care much about having to roll a dangerous terrain test.
Skerr wrote: Tracking the psychic phase. Very complicated, especially with 50+ WC.
Ideally you'd have a whiteboard easel next to the table, where both players can clearly reference all information relating to the psychic phase. Separate the whiteboard into sections w/black electrical tape, identify discrete units w/permanent marker, and use dry-erase markers to track generated powers with WC cost, ranges and types. You should also track, by unit, the # of powers manifested in each turn. It's a bit of prep work but it will make a very big difference.
You don't need photos, but you do need a way to clearly identify your units and match them to your tracking board. It would also be smart to include related permanent details like formation bonuses, spell familiar rerolls, and total WC generation. Track the total WC as units are created or removed, so you don't have to count 50+D6WC in every player's psychic phase. Anyways, you get the idea.
mrhappyface wrote: No terminators, the DA were veterans with ss alongside psykers and inquisitors. There were two units of Gretchin, some scattered retenue, scouts and the rest were tanks and SH walkers.
Seems like there were 4 targeting issues to solve. Incidentally, Treason does not affect non-vehicle units.
1) Gretchin. You can't really hurt them, and they close off your movement towards more important targets.
2) DA Veterans + ICs. They're great targets for your shooting phase, but not with a 3++.
3) AV14 without Invul saves, hiding in the backfield.
4) 12HP Stompas with a 4++. This is the most durable target on the board.
Possible solutions :
1) --> Enfeeble and Tzeentch's Firestorm could probably clean up Gretchin blobs without much trouble. At S2 you're already wounding on 3's.
2) --> Need to remove the 3++. Either Death Hex or just work around the Storm Shields.
3) --> Magnus can solo the entire backfield from the air. Coruscating Beam can buy some time.
4) --> Death Hex, D-Weapons, Haywires, Doombolt, etc.
Some fast assault to frighten bubblewrap might be good. Spawn or Tzaangors. Also, is it feasible to leave the Stompa for last? You can hijack its weaponry with Heretech if necessary, even if Treason is not an option.
I had the though about using MAgnus at is best, you should try to get a power with another sorcerer to ignore cower like divination or geomortis and you would be fine against DA and jink et would just blast anything to dead with spells :p
mrhappyface wrote: Don't drop pods have some kind of targeting system that forces them to move to the nearest space not in difficult/dangerous/impassible terrain?
Nope, only impassible.
Best way to stop deep strikers is board control, and the best unit for board control is ... Brimstone horrors. 30 points for 10 big bases. (and a warp charge).
If only you could actually buy them,.
Automatically Appended Next Post: (well, if chaos had any interceptor, that'd be nice, but no)
I typically take a small contingent of daemons to bolster my warp charge pool.
I also tend to roll quite a lot on ectomancy because it has so much to offer (biomancy is my other 'go to' table.)
I was thinking that a great use for Brimstone horrors would be to keep a unit or two in reserve, then deep strike them in near a unit that you really wish to assault. Cast soulswitch on them with your Death Star. There you go.
I previously used mutilators for this ignoble task, but horrors are just better in every way for the job.
In the unlikely scenario that I don't get soulswitch, the horrors are still providing warp charges, objective campers, etc.
Thoughts?
I had an 1850 game using my full war cabal against a wolfstar with a full librarius conclave supported by 2 units of wulfen today.
He got invisibility but didn't get the power for rerollable saves. I rolled on a variety of tables making sure to get death hex a couple times, enfeeble, and some psychic shrieks (which didn't end up doing anything for me)
Turn 1: I had first turn and set up far enough back that his cavalry couldn't charge me. Didn't cast much this turn as there was no point. His wulfen drop podded in on his turn and the invisible cavalry moved in around them
Turn 2: I got death hex off on both wulfen units and proceeded to use doombolts and ap 3 shooting to nearly wipe both units. He made a string of lucky FNP's with one unit leaving 2 wulfen left so I charged with a terminator and rubric unit. Lost all of the terminators and rubrics but finished the last two guys off in doing so. His turn, he charged and wiped another rubric unit that I'd moved up to block him in a bit
Turn 3, I got enfeeble and one death hex off on the cavalry unit (he denied the first one). Doombolts proceeded to wreck the unit and left little standing so he conceded.
I played pretty aggressively with my psychic phase not getting many blessings off. I had to throw so many dice at important spells like death hex it didn't leave enough dice for other things I wanted like force. Would have loved the 3++ a few times, but I'm not sure it would have saved much. Giving them all hatred was rough and I basically lost every combat against his army. Having enfeeble with doombolt was clutch. I couldn't have gotten through the FNPs, multiple wounds, and invisible unit without those.
I hated still not being able to stop casts of invisibility, but we at least we can still work around it. I had fun overall although tracking everything kind of sucked. Hopefully I'll get better at that. Liked some of y'alls ideas about keeping track of who has what.
I think we both wished the other player hadn't had psykers because it slows the game down even more when you're figuring out deny attempts as much as casts.
I do wish they would go back to the old system of taking psychic tests on your leadership.
This warp charge system is rather annoying.
One thing that I do is to take all of the dice in my warp charge pool and put them in a cup. When the cup runs out of dice, I'm done.
I also made markers for each of the blessings/ makedictions and place them next to affected units.
These help a bit to speed up the bookkeeping. It is still a bit ponderous though, because I bring A LOT of psykers.
Chaos Legionnaire wrote: I do wish they would go back to the old system of taking psychic tests on your leadership.
This warp charge system is rather annoying.
One thing that I do is to take all of the dice in my warp charge pool and put them in a cup. When the cup runs out of dice, I'm done.
I also made markers for each of the blessings/ makedictions and place them next to affected units.
These help a bit to speed up the bookkeeping. It is still a bit ponderous though, because I bring A LOT of psykers.
Problem with the old system was, it was WAY too reliable, unless you were casting a witchfire/malediction, in which case it wasn't reliable at all. Almost every Psyker in the game is/was Ld10, or in the case of Tzeentch, functioned as though they were Ld10, so the odds of failing any given power roll were 1/12! Even if you were only Ld9, the odds of failing a power roll were only 1/6. (This is assuming you don't have access to any kind of reroll, like Spell Familiars.) (Also, the odds of Perils of the Warp was always 1/18.)
It was a huge problem in 6th edition, having psykers just sit back and reliably give everyone on the board every possible buff. Witchfires, on the other hand, would always be immediately shut down at least 1/6th of the time, and any kind of psychic defense doubled those odds. (Going up against a psyker with Admantium Will and a higher Mastery Level than you basically meant having to get past a 3+ save before you even got to try and fire the power.)
Does it require more bookeeping? Yeah, but it's still way better than the old system.
Chaos Legionnaire wrote: I do wish they would go back to the old system of taking psychic tests on your leadership.
This warp charge system is rather annoying.
One thing that I do is to take all of the dice in my warp charge pool and put them in a cup. When the cup runs out of dice, I'm done.
I also made markers for each of the blessings/ makedictions and place them next to affected units.
These help a bit to speed up the bookkeeping. It is still a bit ponderous though, because I bring A LOT of psykers.
Problem with the old system was, it was WAY too reliable, unless you were casting a witchfire/malediction, in which case it wasn't reliable at all. Almost every Psyker in the game is/was Ld10, or in the case of Tzeentch, functioned as though they were Ld10, so the odds of failing any given power roll were 1/12! Even if you were only Ld9, the odds of failing a power roll were only 1/6. (This is assuming you don't have access to any kind of reroll, like Spell Familiars.) (Also, the odds of Perils of the Warp was always 1/18.)
It was a huge problem in 6th edition, having psykers just sit back and reliably give everyone on the board every possible buff. Witchfires, on the other hand, would always be immediately shut down at least 1/6th of the time, and any kind of psychic defense doubled those odds. (Going up against a psyker with Admantium Will and a higher Mastery Level than you basically meant having to get past a 3+ save before you even got to try and fire the power.)
Does it require more bookeeping? Yeah, but it's still way better than the old system.
Still, the psychic phase is the most punished phase in the game. Look at shooting. Complete freedom. Look at my Ballistic Skill, look at me go. And as if that wasn't enough, they added free rerolls for all the best of the shooting fellas, the strength and ap values of the weapons have gone through the roof and every single random guardian and their mother can shoot 4 shots apiece. Thus the game has become completely shooting based and all the best lists are judged on that merit alone. Unlike shooting, hth requires that you actually come into physical contact with your opponent, and even then it takes their weapon skill into account as well. Finally, psychic is easily the most punished phase of the game. First of all, it is VERY expensive. A dude can take an assault cannon for 20 pts, a guardian can take a scatter laser for 10 points (ffs...), yet a sorcerer/psycher has to pay 25 pts and in most cases an HQ slot just to be able to get one warp charge and have a 50% chance to only successfuly cast a WC1 power. Then said power has to go through multiple layers of enemy defense, in the sense that your opponent gets to deny, then (in case of witchfires) you have to shoot on Ballistic Skill anyways just like the shooting dudes did (but they did not have to go through the first step) and even then, what are really your options for mind bullets? Str 4 ap5 novas and templates, str 5 ap4 shots and psychic scream. Witchfires have TERRIBLE range, very bad actual damage output, they cannot be spammed unless you pay 1500 pts on very specific lists etc. The old psychic test might have not been the answer, but this one is not the answer either. Overall, you don't see lists winning Nova and LVO because they had so many psychers.
What could be done is making the psychic test roll sort of like a modified ld test. The psycher should have to pass a test on a 6 + their Mastery Level. So a more powerful psycher would be more able to dominate the psychic phase, as should be the case. A ML1 psycher could cast his powers testing on a 7, while Ahriman would have to test on a 10, making him more potent and therefore more desirable. But the problem with the psychic phase is more inherent than that. There is a reason the best powers in the game are not witchfires, but instead it's powers like prescience, invisibility and perfect timing. And the reason is simply because shooting is too strong, and psychic has to accomodate itself to the supporting role of the shooting phase. And that's bollocks if you ask me.
Is there any place for decimators ina TSons list? There's a good chance you're rolling on malefic and heretech and a tzeentch decimator would be a royal pain in the ass to deal with if you can buff its invunerable to a 4++ and/or buff it with IWND or +1 AV.
Plus cursed earth would allow you to deepstrike it with no scatter. The siege claws aren't exactly amazing but at least AV13 isn't as vulnerable in melee as it is to shooting.
*edit*
Acutally never mind, I though they re-roll invulnerables, but it's only a to hit roll. May as well deepstrike a blood slaughterer instead then. Nothing say melee deterrent like a pack of blood slaughterers lol
Had 3 games in yesterday, a 200 point kill team, 1500 point with no LoW, and an 1850 with Low allowed.
The setup was different as this was a charity event featuring 6 of our players. The way it worked was, however much you raised, you got to spend in bonuses across those three games, such as:
$1/100 points of a unit, you can redeploy before battle
You can buy back a unit for $1/100 points (Always rounding up, so if your unit costs 145 pnts, then it's $2)
$2/100 points could make them veterans for a game, giving them +1 WS/BS
$12 could buy a 10" S10/AP1 blast that you can drop anywhere, at any time, on any game (this was a blast heh, and several times throughout the day everyone would gather around to watch a blast being thrown)
$5 would let you roll on an archeo-tech table that gave you some benefits, and some of these were powerful, giving a single model a 2+ inv but if you failed, you lost it and took a S10 hit, another gave you 3 mirror images that ignored the first three hits you took in a game, while another allowed you to remove the model and place a large S7 blast marker.
Allies (or viewers) could pay $.25 to make anyone re-roll any dice. (This happened a lot. Like a lot)
So anyways, in my 200 point kill team, I took a couple rubrics and a sorc vs Tau and those dirty missile pods in their troops alongside a couple stealth suits. Things were looking bad as he just outnumbered me 2:1 or more and had longer reach but the event director walked over and dropped a 10" blast which completely wiffed... so decided to buy another which killed 2 stealth suits and a guy, giving me the advantage because he hated that Tau army. I eventually tabled him after buying my sorcerer back.
In the 1500 battle, it was 1k sons vs Grey Knights in a huge Psyker showdown! This was one of the best, most fun games I've had in a long time. I remember he rolled a 6 for the first psychic phase, looks at me and announces he has 14 dice. I add all mine up, and get 19 to counter him with. Feels good.
He had two dreadknights and started them on the table since he went first, a squad of termies, purifiers in a razorback, and a couple squads of troops. I had 2 exalted sorcs, rubrics, scarabs, Ahriman, predator. 1 exalted sorc had the Grimoire which wasn't needed because his Dreadknights were in my face turn 1, and the other had a disc and Seer's Bane as a nasty surprise. One knight came up and tried to hit my termies, managed to kill one. The other tried to drop torrent flamer and heavy psycannon on my rubrics and managed to kill one.
On my turn, I Psychic Shrieked the knight in front to oblivion before the termies even got to go. Withdrew my rubrics, gave them Invisibility so they couldn't be targetted with the large blast, and shot some stuff up. Eventually the Seer's bane Sorcerer got into combat and just made a joke of the Dreadknight. I was feeling good at this point, then he bought both Dreadknights back..... oh lord.
After about 4 hours in that game, we ended up drawing. It was bloody, brutal, and Ahriman killed himself (while killing another Knight) after rolling a perils. I did manage to get a couple of the Empowered perils rolls though, that was fun.
On to the 1850, finally getting to play Magnus. I even got first roll against the Tau player again, who brought their LoW suit with the big ass cannon. I flew Maggie up 24" right into his face and unleashed both S: D powers and....managed two wounds. At this point though, I had saved all my money up to buy archeo-tech rolls and Magnus had 2++, ignore first three hits, a Vortex grenade, +d3 mastery levels and a random telepathy power (mental fortitude). I left the termies in reserves, jumped the rubrics up 12" (looooove that book), psyker phase did the damage mentioned above, buffed my units so literally everyone on my side made my opponents snapfire while getting a 3++. Pred opened up a devilfish which dropped out all 10 of the breacher firewarrios. Two warpflamers later alongside the rest of the squad and they were all dead.
Tau turn, he fired everything he had at Magnus and after 2 S: D missiles managed two wounds (this was my fault, I was thinking all S: D wounds were unsavable and he rolled a 2 on the chart). He went to set anchors on that huge suit (I swear this thing has like 5 weapons and got over 30 shots...) and passed the turn.
I managed to kill off 2 of the broadsides and their drones from a MASSIVE psychic shriek doing something like 7 wounds leaving one broadside. Ahriman used Treason of Tzeentchd on the LoW suit and used his S: D cannon to kill the last broadside while using Warpshock to hit some of the drones. Magnus had landed because of the hits he took, so he does his psyker stuff then later assaults the big suit and annihilates it. At this point, I've only lost my Rubric sorc (perils) and he has lost nearly most of his army save for his Farsight bomb which was still in reserves. Here's where it gets interesting!
So he buys back his units, re-deploys them, and as he's putting down his broadsides, one of the bystanders walks over with a pie plate and announces he's dropping it. The tau player put everything together right next to magnus so they decided it was worth using it there. Needless to say, the broadsides die again, the drones die again, Magnus makes his 2++ but the other bystander makes me re-roll. Again. Again. Again. A total of 4 or 5 times before he runs out of quarters. I reach into my pocket and give him a fistful so he makes me re-roll again and again and again till finally everyones laughing at how many dollars have been spent before Magnus fails that 2++. He eventually does, and takes the S10 hit from losing it, and makes that save. Another re-roll is bought, and another and finally Magnus takes another wound (up to 4 at the time I think).
The bystander feels sorry for the Tau player and buys back his broadsides again lol, so I drop a pie plate in response, kill the broadsides (again!) and someone else buys them back. It was an insane amount of die rolling, but everyone was laughing. Eventually Magnus takes a dangerous terrain to land in a building and Gaze of Magnus all 3 broadsides and a couple drones. It kills 2 while leaving one alive (each broadside was equipped with both sets of missile for something like 10 shots apiece!) Farsight was on the board, so I Treason the suit again and kill off 2 of his bodyguards, and at this point, I had to call it. The guy was a great sport and allowed me to see what Magnus can do. When he's flying, he's almost untouchable. It was quite a bit of fun to be had.
Overall, we raised $600+ just from the players and bystanders (the players had went out for donations a couple weeks ahead of time so thats what we got to spend for fun stuff) and even GW donated a lot! Including about 30 tech brushes, the kill team play mat, a paint set, some of the new imperial agents books, and all kinds of stuff. Our local Jimmy Johns donated 15% of all sales from 3 pm to 10pm a few days earlier and is expected to be another few hundred.
Overall I'd rate them like this:
Magnus: 7/10. He was fun. He looks great. He takes ALL the firepower and laughs. He doesn't really do much damage for 650 points. But he's effective and scares the crap out of people.
Rubrics and sorc: 6/10. They did exactly what I expected They were very hard to kill and tied up a dreadknight in combat thanks to invisibility.
Scarabs: 6/10. See above. They were very hard to kill. Their sorc was great for giving warp charges and buffing other units.
Exalted Sorc: 9/10. These guys were fantastic, specially when upgraded to ML 3 and given discs/seer's bane. I never once used their Lord of the silver tower because I kept forgetting to.
Ahriman: 8/10. He was just super versatile and powerful while moving all the time. Being able to move 12", psychich phase, then turbo 24" to get away was just busted.
Half the money is going towards local school classrooms for the new year, and the other half is going towards local domestic abuse shelters.
Yeah, it was chaotic but very fun. My descriptions don't do it justice, but since there was no overall winner to be announced, it wasn't really trying to win. So it didn't hurt when some random person dropped by to smack you with a pie plate.
And yeah, I certainly got to open up. 1k Sons are really tough, but it does hurt when you lose one. Magnus doesn't really do much damage unless you get a cherry shot, but man, does he absorb it. I honestly think the best way to beat him is to ignore him and play the objectives, not the army.
That's pretty cool the Exalted Disc Sorcs were your superstars. I think most people just looked at their price tag, the mandatory MoT power, and fainted
And way to get some traction out of the Rubric flamers!
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lessthanjeff wrote: Turn 3, I got enfeeble and one death hex off on the cavalry unit (he denied the first one). Doombolts proceeded to wreck the unit and left little standing so he conceded.
It's cool to see the MoT powers like Doombolt and Treason being decisive.
Well played, that was a very cunning way to pick apart an Invis deathstar.
Yoyoyo wrote: That's pretty cool the Exalted Disc Sorcs were your superstars. I think most people just looked at their price tag, the mandatory MoT power, and fainted
Exalted Sorc on Disc with a Seer's Bane rolling on either Biomancy or Sinistrum is the single hardest hitter IC in the game and pretty soon people are going to realize it.
Yoyoyo wrote: That's pretty cool the Exalted Disc Sorcs were your superstars. I think most people just looked at their price tag, the mandatory MoT power, and fainted
And way to get some traction out of the Rubric flamers!
Automatically Appended Next Post:
lessthanjeff wrote: Turn 3, I got enfeeble and one death hex off on the cavalry unit (he denied the first one). Doombolts proceeded to wreck the unit and left little standing so he conceded.
It's cool to see the MoT powers like Doombolt and Treason being decisive.
Well played, that was a very cunning way to pick apart an Invis deathstar.
Yeah, I will definitely say, putting a foot exalted sorc with grimoire in a rubric squad with at least 2 warpflamers is pretty effective at clearing out chaff. The 12" movement really allows you to setup for maximum damage, it's literally like having Assault marines with AP 4 flamers.
Yeah, the exalteds are expensive, but I think they do the most damage out of the army right now, they also have the most AP 2 answers. The Thousand Sons don't really have a shooting phase and what they do have is over very quickly, so you have to make that up in the Psychic phase. I remember against the Grey Knights, they had a razorback with TL Lascannon filled with Purifiers holding their one objective (mission was the one with 1 obj each) and I turbo boosted the Exalted with disc and Seer's bane to contest it. He got out and shot the Sorc but thanks to T5 and 3++, he survived while getting to Psychic Shriek them on my turn then assault at I:6! and did like 5 kills, after issuing a challenge. Got to roll on the table, but rolled Stubborn again. Playing 1K Sons with the "Hero Hammer" mindset is not far off from the truth I feel.
Huh, I just realized that Black Legion is the ONLY legion outside TSons that can take TSons units. I can't think of any advantage this would have but I found it funny lol.
Hatred isn't much of a boon for these guys, especially considering you'd loose blessing of tzeentch and seer's bane is better than anything a BL exalted sorcerer could get.
Im trying to remember where I got the extra initiative? Maybe I'm recalling it wrong, but I dont have my book with me though or maybe it was a boon because in my 1500 I purchased a roll on the table to fill out points.
Maybe but isn't it's LD a 10 as well? 9 attacks on average would mean 4-5 hits and they have Inv saves. You'd have to have some luck, but it's possible.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Question? Does Treason allow you to fire all weapons or just one? We played it as just one because it says "you may make a shooting attack"
nintura wrote: Maybe but isn't it's LD a 10 as well? 9 attacks on average would mean 4-5 hits and they have Inv saves. You'd have to have some luck, but it's possible.
You definitely want some goons around to soak return CC damage. But keep in mind a Wraithknight is only WS4, so with Oracular Guidance from Force, 9 attacks are closer to 7 hits.
Treason states "make a shooting attack... as if it were a friendly unit". So it depends on the model's own rules.
nintura wrote: Maybe but isn't it's LD a 10 as well? 9 attacks on average would mean 4-5 hits and they have Inv saves. You'd have to have some luck, but it's possible.
That's without considering buffs like warp speed, diabolic strength, prescience or debuffs like death's hex on the wraithknight, of which you should have plenty and plenty dice to cast them. Also force, which makes your attacks do d3 wounds on a wraithknight or even normal protection spells like invisibility or Wrap Fate. You are a mighty Exalted Sorcerer of Tzeentch dammit! Raw arcane power flows at your command and the earth itself splits assunder beneath your feet! The worthless worms you call your enemies will learn to fear your power! UNLIMITED POWEEEEER! Act like it!
Really, the Seer's Bane is the most imba weapon ever written and the exalted sorcerer is the perfect platform to deliver its wrath. Have faith, brother.
Not sure how Seer's Bane is really that much better than a regular Daemon Weapon It only has the LD vs LD and using LD as S v T. I mean, it's an obvious advantage, but it's not heads and shoulders better. I think for the cover of my 1k Sons notes, I'm going to print the picture of the Emperor in Star Wars yelling "Unlimited Power"
nintura wrote: pended Next Post:[/size]
Question? Does Treason allow you to fire all weapons or just one? We played it as just one because it says "you may make a shooting attack"
If i remember correctly, it's all weapon systems except for "one use" weapons.
nintura wrote: Not sure how Seer's Bane is really that much better than a regular Daemon Weapon It only has the LD vs LD and using LD as S v T. I mean, it's an obvious advantage, but it's not heads and shoulders better.
It's str 10 against toughness for instant death, and it has force for instant death nonetheless. It's ap2 on itself, while things like the black mace are only ap4 and you need a DP to make them work. It is, really really broken.
Aaaaaand he would still be leadership 10, aka you wound him on a 4+ The only power that would reduce it's leadership and therefore make you wound better, would be terrify. That makes you wound on a 3+. After that you would need leadership debuffs from other places, like formations or relics.
nintura wrote: Not sure how Seer's Bane is really that much better than a regular Daemon Weapon It only has the LD vs LD and using LD as S v T. I mean, it's an obvious advantage, but it's not heads and shoulders better.
It's str 10 against toughness for instant death, and it has force for instant death nonetheless. It's ap2 on itself, while things like the black mace are only ap4 and you need a DP to make them work. It is, really really broken.
The black mace isn't a daemon weapon is it? I thought all DW's were the same. Roll a d6 etc etc, AP 2.
nintura wrote: Not sure how Seer's Bane is really that much better than a regular Daemon Weapon It only has the LD vs LD and using LD as S v T. I mean, it's an obvious advantage, but it's not heads and shoulders better. I think for the cover of my 1k Sons notes, I'm going to print the picture of the Emperor in Star Wars yelling "Unlimited Power"
Seriously? lol It's a force weapon. That alone makes it better. But that thing is so nasty it doesn't even need force half of the time. Effective strength 10 is enough to instagib the vast majority of units.
And it's AP2 at iniative, which is otherwise reserved for a select few units and in the case of csm, khorne relics. And unlike khorne you have a 3+ re-rollable invulnerable save. It's crazy good.
Plus you can buff it easier than strength based weapons. You need psychic powers to improve the unit's strength or reduce your opponents toughness. This could even be guaranteed 2+ to wound if you bring the leadership reducing artefacts from EC and NL.
It's insanely good.
Roknar wrote: Aaaaaand he would still be leadership 10, aka you wound him on a 4+ The only power that would reduce it's leadership and therefore make you wound better, would be terrify. That makes you wound on a 3+. After that you would need leadership debuffs from other places, like formations or relics.
You wouldn't need nothing else other than a couple of blessings and/or maledictions. Take a prescience (primaris so you can definitely get it) and force. I'm giving these buffs because they are primaris and you can have them on demand and multiple times. Let's say that other than that, you rolled the worst dice ever and you have zero other useful blessings. Here's why it's enough:
You have 9 attacks on average. Hitting on a 3+ with rerolls should net you 8 hits. Wounding on 4+ should net you 4 wounds with instant death. A Wraithknight has what, 5++? So he saves one of the wounds and takes 3xd3 wounds without his feel no pain (it's instant death, baby). He is statistically dead in a single strike. And I'm not even counting the rest of the exiles who might put a wound too with their force staves. So you kill a Wraithknight past his defenses in a single turn with average dice, with no useful powers rolled and no warp charges spent on anything other than primaris powers.
I'll say it once more. The Seer's Bane is the best weapon written in the game so far.
nintura wrote: Not sure how Seer's Bane is really that much better than a regular Daemon Weapon It only has the LD vs LD and using LD as S v T. I mean, it's an obvious advantage, but it's not heads and shoulders better.
It's str 10 against toughness for instant death, and it has force for instant death nonetheless. It's ap2 on itself, while things like the black mace are only ap4 and you need a DP to make them work. It is, really really broken.
The black mace isn't a daemon weapon is it? I thought all DW's were the same. Roll a d6 etc etc, AP 2.
Black mace is a an ap4 dameon weapon. You only think it's ap2 becuase it sucks on everything that isn't a daemon prince, so everybody brings it on a prince, making it Ap2.
Roknar wrote: Aaaaaand he would still be leadership 10, aka you wound him on a 4+ The only power that would reduce it's leadership and therefore make you wound better, would be terrify. That makes you wound on a 3+. After that you would need leadership debuffs from other places, like formations or relics.
You wouldn't need nothing else other than a couple of blessings and/or maledictions. Take a prescience (primaris so you can definitely get it) and force. I'm giving these buffs because they are primaris and you can have them on demand and multiple times. Let's say that other than that, you rolled the worst dice ever and you have zero other useful blessings. Here's why it's enough:
You have 9 attacks on average. Hitting on a 3+ with rerolls should net you 8 hits. Wounding on 4+ should net you 4 wounds with instant death. A Wraithknight has what, 5++? So he saves one of the wounds and takes 3xd3 wounds without his feel no pain (it's instant death, baby). He is statistically dead in a single strike. And I'm not even counting the rest of the exiles who might put a wound too with their force staves. So you kill a Wraithknight past his defenses in a single turn with average dice, with no useful powers rolled and no warp charges spent on anything other than primaris powers.
I'll say it once more. The Seer's Bane is the best weapon written in the game so far.
I know it's awesome. I was just saying that no amount of psychic buffs and/ or debuffs make you wound it better. Except for terrify which is a gamble to get.
nintura wrote: Not sure how Seer's Bane is really that much better than a regular Daemon Weapon It only has the LD vs LD and using LD as S v T. I mean, it's an obvious advantage, but it's not heads and shoulders better.
It's str 10 against toughness for instant death, and it has force for instant death nonetheless. It's ap2 on itself, while things like the black mace are only ap4 and you need a DP to make them work. It is, really really broken.
The black mace isn't a daemon weapon is it? I thought all DW's were the same. Roll a d6 etc etc, AP 2.
Black mace is a daemon weapon. Daemon weapons only get the +d6 attacks/ get screwed on a 1 part. They are not ap2 by default. The black mace is for all purposes a power maul (+2 str , ap4).
nintura wrote: Not sure how Seer's Bane is really that much better than a regular Daemon Weapon It only has the LD vs LD and using LD as S v T. I mean, it's an obvious advantage, but it's not heads and shoulders better.
It's str 10 against toughness for instant death, and it has force for instant death nonetheless. It's ap2 on itself, while things like the black mace are only ap4 and you need a DP to make them work. It is, really really broken.
The black mace isn't a daemon weapon is it? I thought all DW's were the same. Roll a d6 etc etc, AP 2.
Black mace is a an ap4 dameon weapon. You only think it's ap2 becuase it sucks on everything that isn't a daemon prince, so everybody brings it on a prince, making it Ap2.
I think I'm thinking of previous versions where you could buy generic daemon weapons, they were all AP 2.
Best part? I believe 1k sons should be played like Hero Hammer. When you think about it, CSM is all about the strongest making everyone else follow them. You think Abaddon puts up with someone elses gak? Of course not. You think that Exalted Sorc is going to let an aspiring sorcerer tell him what to do? Hell nah! Homie don't share! Make him the hero he was meant to be.
Got another game in with my full cabal list against a riptide wing, double stormsurges, and small tau cad with some marker drones. I didn't get any death hexes this time and rolled a depressing 3 boon of mutations and 4 breath of chaoses...
Shrouding was my hero this game keeping my units in two tight groups so they had rerollable 2+ cover saves (reroll on a 4 because of ITC) and he couldn't fit in many markerlights to strip that. Keeping the units tight to give everyone shrouding and the +1 invul was scary with all the Str9 and Str 10 ap2 blasts he had, but I was able to weather the storm well by limiting LOS as best I could.
I got the side of the table with more objectives (playing ITC mission 2) so I was able to kind of sit on them and cast blessings to accrue points.
Wasn't able to close on the riptides with more than a couple shrieks and doombolts so I only got a few wounds on them but I did take out both stormsurges with a combo of one occult term squad, one rubric squad, and one level 3 sorc. Force and diabolic strength helped me cut through them quickly. He only got 1 stomp of a 6 though and I was able to easily look out sir that away.
Even with some of the weakest spells you pulled off victory through points and smart play? Great job and good to hear.
Do you play your opponent often?
What have been reactions from other players, guys?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Has anyone had any luck with the Silver Tower strike?
Most of the lists I have written include 3 exalted sorcerers and this attack seems best to unload on a turn 1 alpha strike unless night fighting is in effect.
My opponents have been different every time so far, but it's usually one of the same 6-8 players I'm going against. I haven't gotten to play any exalted sorcs or magnus yet unfortunately, but I'll remedy that this Friday.
My next game will probably actually be the cabal detachment with the following
Chaos Cultists [Cultist Champion , 9x Cultists, Mark of Tzeentch ]
Chaos Cultists [Cultist Champion , 9x Cultists, Mark of Tzeentch ]
+ Fast Attack +
Chaos Spawn [Mark of Tzeentch, 2x Spawn]
+ Lord of War +
Magnus the Red
Cultists camps out...
E.Sorc with super-sword goes with the TzSpawns to hunt characters and MC.
TzHeraled will probably be Maelific to summon daemons and try for cursed earth.
Fatey does what he does...
LoC is my beatstick (with Grimore... I should prolly move that to one of my TzHerald)...
Maggie does his thing.
Thoughts?
My initial inclination is you don't have nearly enough WC to support Fatey and Magnus both in this list. Either one can easily burn 10+ charges individually and I assume the goal with the Paradox herald is summoning so there goes another 5. That is 25 charges and you only guarantee 21. Of course you can choose to do less with your big models, but if you are only going to use them for small stuff why pay for the big guys?
Nobody really runs a WK with sword/shield at the top level anymore, just a bunch of Skataknights. Seersbane will rip through those and almost every non-MC characters that does not have EW in this game. The problem is TS alone doesn't really have a efficient way to run a deathstar with enough models to tank wounds in order to protect the key ICs. And TS Sorcerers has less chance to get Warp Fate.
Chaos Cultists [Cultist Champion , 9x Cultists, Mark of Tzeentch ]
Chaos Cultists [Cultist Champion , 9x Cultists, Mark of Tzeentch ]
+ Fast Attack +
Chaos Spawn [Mark of Tzeentch, 2x Spawn]
+ Lord of War +
Magnus the Red
Cultists camps out...
E.Sorc with super-sword goes with the TzSpawns to hunt characters and MC.
TzHeraled will probably be Maelific to summon daemons and try for cursed earth.
Fatey does what he does...
LoC is my beatstick (with Grimore... I should prolly move that to one of my TzHerald)...
Maggie does his thing.
Thoughts?
My initial inclination is you don't have nearly enough WC to support Fatey and Magnus both in this list. Either one can easily burn 10+ charges individually and I assume the goal with the Paradox herald is summoning so there goes another 5. That is 25 charges and you only guarantee 21. Of course you can choose to do less with your big models, but if you are only going to use them for small stuff why pay for the big guys?
I can see 10+ WC for maggie... but I almost never do that with Fatey... :shrug:
I tend to be really aggressive with MC too... so, it's not a given that Maggie + LoC is flying. (Fatey flies period)
If I need WC, I can shoot for summoning a horror squad every turn...
Hmmm...
Automatically Appended Next Post:
SonsofVulkan wrote: Nobody really runs a WK with sword/shield at the top level anymore, just a bunch of Skataknights. Seersbane will rip through those and almost every non-MC characters that does not have EW in this game. The problem is TS alone doesn't really have a efficient way to run a deathstar with enough models to tank wounds in order to protect the key ICs. And TS Sorcerers has less chance to get Warp Fate.
TS aren't necessarily best played as a deathstar, though.
They specialize in psychic shooting and judo throws. Invisible? Beam weapons. Scary shooting units? Treason of Tzeentch. Layered saves? Not for long. Multiple wounds + FNP? Try Instant Death. High toughness? Wound on LD. ICs vulnerable to shooting? Psychic shunts and 24" turbo into LOS cover. Slow-moving infantry? Lend them a 12" jump.
Honestly, it seems.... inelegant... to make Exalted Sorcerers into a second-rate Cabalstar, when they can simply Doombolt rival deathstars into oblivion straight through their puny psychic defenses.
Yoyoyo wrote: TS aren't necessarily best played as a deathstar, though.
They specialize in psychic shooting and judo throws. Invisible? Beam weapons. Scary shooting units? Treason of Tzeentch. Layered saves? Not for long. Multiple wounds + FNP? Try Instant Death. High toughness? Wound on LD. ICs vulnerable to shooting? Psychic shunts and 24" turbo into LOS cover. Slow-moving infantry? Lend them a 12" jump.
Honestly, it seems.... inelegant... to make Exalted Sorcerers into a second-rate Cabalstar, when they can simply Doombolt rival deathstars into oblivion straight through their puny psychic defenses.
Well a exalted sorcerer on disk with a seer bane, is like 250+ pt he needs to be in combat to make his it's back. If you send him up with a small unit, he's not gonna last long since any S8 will ID him.
TS is too expensive to run MSU efficiently, and there is a mobility issue. Astral grim will help one unit jump 12", but the rest of your army are foot slogging.
SM deathstars all have 3 or 4++, T5 and fnp. If they have tear of veil, you'll need to pray you roll deathhex
disk of tz only grants +1 attack and the jet bike rule
And jet bikes add +1 T. Hence why they're so expensive (cause not eldar).
I was wondering what the correct stats are for discs. My brother was telling me it was just +1 attack and jetbike USR. But I thought it was +1 T as well. I'm not a competitive daemon player, more of a casual atm.
Another neat thing about Discs is that you get that wonderful 12" move, then shoot all you want in the Psychic Phase, then turbo-boost 24" away out of reach during your shooting phase. It can be quite annoying to play against
nintura wrote: Another neat thing about Discs is that you get that wonderful 12" move, then shoot all you want in the Psychic Phase, then turbo-boost 24" away out of reach during your shooting phase. It can be quite annoying to play against
...and relentless, so you can drop your silver tower bomb without having to forgo movement.
nintura wrote: Another neat thing about Discs is that you get that wonderful 12" move, then shoot all you want in the Psychic Phase, then turbo-boost 24" away out of reach during your shooting phase. It can be quite annoying to play against
...and relentless, so you can drop your silver tower bomb without having to forgo movement.
I didnt realize you had to forgo your movement? Isn't it done in your movement phase? I dont have my book on-hand though.
nintura wrote: Another neat thing about Discs is that you get that wonderful 12" move, then shoot all you want in the Psychic Phase, then turbo-boost 24" away out of reach during your shooting phase. It can be quite annoying to play against
...and relentless, so you can drop your silver tower bomb without having to forgo movement.
I didnt realize you had to forgo your movement? Isn't it done in your movement phase? I dont have my book on-hand though.
At least. And I would recommend Seer's Bane on at least one. Im pretty sure to be the most effective, Thousand Sons needs to be built like the old Hero Hammer days. Though I did have a foot slogging one, he didn't have the disc but I gave him the astral grim so the rubrics with warpflamers could move faster and get in better flaming positions.
BoomWolf wrote: So an exalted sorcerer is basically 230 points stock as you ARE taking level 3, spell familiar and a disk.
Well, barring a point of Weapon skill he is practically a chaos lord with a 4++, a daemonic steed mount and 3 mastery levels (those cost 75 pts) so costing 230 doesn't sound too crazy to me.
I wouldn't *always* take a Disc though (prevents you from sitting in a Rhino/Land Raider, and is superfluous if you're affected by the Grimoire.)
Most of the time sure, but I'm glad they have the option to footslog.
270 pts (with Seer's Bane) is alot of points, but then a model who is both...
- Fighty (WS5, 5+D6 attacks base, Force and S10 but wounds against Ld)
- Tanky (W3, T5, 3+/4++ with easy access to 3++)
- Fast (Moves like a Jetbike.)
- Flexible (ML3 and re-rolls failed psychic-tests and BS5, and a good one-use-only shooting attack)
...should cost a fair amount of points.
Imagine that he's a special character, not that hard considering how much he brings to the table.
I'd much rather face Abaddon than that Exalted Sorcerer.
MinscS2 wrote: I wouldn't *always* take a Disc though (prevents you from sitting in a Rhino/Land Raider, and is superfluous if you're affected by the Grimoire.)
Most of the time sure, but I'm glad they have the option to footslog.
270 pts (with Seer's Bane) is alot of points, but then a model who is both...
- Fighty (WS5, 5+D6 attacks base, Force and S10 but wounds against Ld)
- Tanky (W3, T5, 3+/4++ with easy access to 3++)
- Fast (Moves like a Jetbike.)
- Flexible (ML3 and re-rolls failed psychic-tests and BS5, and a good one-use-only shooting attack)
...should cost a fair amount of points.
Imagine that he's a special character, not that hard considering how much he brings to the table.
I'd much rather face Abaddon than that Exalted Sorcerer.
Thats what I'm saying tho, its a 270 pts beat stick who can't survive on it own and has to earn his points back going after your opponents most dangerous units. A termie unit containing him and another sorcerer with astral grim is well over 700 pts, looks like a ok deathstar to me
Thats what I'm saying tho, its a 270 pts beat stick who can't survive on it own and has to earn his points back going after your opponents most dangerous units. A termie unit containing him and another sorcerer with astral grim is well over 700 pts, looks like a ok deathstar to me
I disagree. He's plenty able to survive on his own. It takes a S10 hit to kill him, and then he has a 3++ most of the time. This last weekend he was responsible (across two games) for killing a squad of grey knight termies, squad of purifiers, 2! dreadknights, and a few of the big (not riptide) tau suits. He was amazing and well worth his points.
Thats what I'm saying tho, its a 270 pts beat stick who can't survive on it own and has to earn his points back going after your opponents most dangerous units. A termie unit containing him and another sorcerer with astral grim is well over 700 pts, looks like a ok deathstar to me
I disagree. He's plenty able to survive on his own. It takes a S10 hit to kill him, and then he has a 3++ most of the time. This last weekend he was responsible (across two games) for killing a squad of grey knight termies, squad of purifiers, 2! dreadknights, and a few of the big (not riptide) tau suits. He was amazing and well worth his points.
By himself, no more than 3 units of warp spiders and/or 3 man scatter bikes will wipe him out. What if you face IK? A single IK will lock you in combat forever and D or stomp you out. In fact a single dreadnought will lock a seer bane guy and a unit of occult for majority of a game
Thats what I'm saying tho, its a 270 pts beat stick who can't survive on it own and has to earn his points back going after your opponents most dangerous units. A termie unit containing him and another sorcerer with astral grim is well over 700 pts, looks like a ok deathstar to me
I disagree. He's plenty able to survive on his own. It takes a S10 hit to kill him, and then he has a 3++ most of the time. This last weekend he was responsible (across two games) for killing a squad of grey knight termies, squad of purifiers, 2! dreadknights, and a few of the big (not riptide) tau suits. He was amazing and well worth his points.
By himself, no more than 3 units of warp spiders and/or 3 man scatter bikes will wipe him out. What if you face IK? A single IK will lock you in combat forever and D or stomp you out. In fact a single dreadnought will lock a seer bane guy and a unit of occult for majority of a game
Sooo, your opponent is the only one playing the game? What are you doing, looking around? How will the IK lock you in combat since you move the same speed but the Exalted also has turbo boost 24" ? Also, why the heck would your 230/270 pts IC be alone? What kind of warhammer is this? How on earth will a dreadnought lock your disc sorcerer in combat? And about the warp spiders or the scatterbikes, what do you do in your turn? You have a ML3 sorcerer. What do YOU do in the game? What is the rest of your list doing to fight the warp spiders? Is your army a simple observer in the game?
I'm sorry but your reasoning is very flawed. "A single IK will lock you in combat forever and D or stomp you out" This applies to 90% of the IC out there. So nobody should ever use those? And since when does an Exalted have to go into melee to earn his points back just because he holds a Seer's Bane? What about psychic screaming stuff from 18" away and then turbo boosting back behind some terrain? What about doombolt or treason of tzeentch? What about invisibilities, precognitions, biomancy buffs? Why can't my Exalted have Heretech powers against the IK and be able to strip d3 hull points per turn while dancing around? You base your comparison on the most skewed examples ever, and even then you have the Exalted sorcerer just forget that he is actually a sorcerer and go charge like a khorne lord instead. Seriously? Where is the practical example that a seer's bane exalted on disc will destroy a Wraithknight in a single round of combat? With your logic then, a Wraithknight would be a bad unit and should not be used. Or is this not good enough narrative for you and you only mention the AV units? Please, get serious.
Thats what I'm saying tho, its a 270 pts beat stick who can't survive on it own and has to earn his points back going after your opponents most dangerous units. A termie unit containing him and another sorcerer with astral grim is well over 700 pts, looks like a ok deathstar to me
I disagree. He's plenty able to survive on his own. It takes a S10 hit to kill him, and then he has a 3++ most of the time. This last weekend he was responsible (across two games) for killing a squad of grey knight termies, squad of purifiers, 2! dreadknights, and a few of the big (not riptide) tau suits. He was amazing and well worth his points.
By himself, no more than 3 units of warp spiders and/or 3 man scatter bikes will wipe him out. What if you face IK? A single IK will lock you in combat forever and D or stomp you out. In fact a single dreadnought will lock a seer bane guy and a unit of occult for majority of a game
Sooo, your opponent is the only one playing the game? What are you doing, looking around? How will the IK lock you in combat since you move the same speed but the Exalted also has turbo boost 24" ? Also, why the heck would your 230/270 pts IC be alone? What kind of warhammer is this? How on earth will a dreadnought lock your disc sorcerer in combat? And about the warp spiders or the scatterbikes, what do you do in your turn? You have a ML3 sorcerer. What do YOU do in the game? What is the rest of your list doing to fight the warp spiders? Is your army a simple observer in the game?
I'm sorry but your reasoning is very flawed. "A single IK will lock you in combat forever and D or stomp you out" This applies to 90% of the IC out there. So nobody should ever use those? And since when does an Exalted have to go into melee to earn his points back just because he holds a Seer's Bane? What about psychic screaming stuff from 18" away and then turbo boosting back behind some terrain? What about doombolt or treason of tzeentch? What about invisibilities, precognitions, biomancy buffs? Why can't my Exalted have Heretech powers against the IK and be able to strip d3 hull points per turn while dancing around? You base your comparison on the most skewed examples ever, and even then you have the Exalted sorcerer just forget that he is actually a sorcerer and go charge like a khorne lord instead. Seriously? Where is the practical example that a seer's bane exalted on disc will destroy a Wraithknight in a single round of combat? With your logic then, a Wraithknight would be a bad unit and should not be used. Or is this not good enough narrative for you and you only mention the AV units? Please, get serious.
I was stating the obvious weaknesses that TS has, sure you can roll on heretech, that will be one less dice for you to fish for Warp Fate and etc. So far after 17 pages I still haven't seen a single potential tournament worthy TS list.
If you want to talk match up sure, take a WS Gladius (w Culexus) for example which is a popular top ITC army. A crap load of razorbacks, rhinos and some drop pods and a whole lot of grav. You have what 2 maybe 3 one time use lascannons from 2-3 exalted sorcerers? Soulreaper cannon is only S5 and 24", so unless you give the occult termies a bunch of expensive hellfrye missiles, its gonna be a long day. WS scouts up 12", keeping the gun line tight knit, you might pop a couple rhinos and then you turbo boost your exalted ones to safety? Sure the WS player will just go after and wipe out the rest of your slow army (tzangors, rubrics, terminators) while racking up maelstrom points all at the same time. A single objsec drop pod landing on a objective held by rubrics, occult terms, and tzang will probably be there for most of the game lol. Your only chance to hurt a bunch of vehicles is to move up and some how get a good angle to hit multiple rhinos with doom bolt, if you keep turbo boosting away your not gonna have that kind of opportunity. I'm all about mathhammer and probabilities, its not looking good. And chances of you fishing for every psychic power you need is not that great with TS sorcerers being forced to roll 1 on tz discipline
Thats what I'm saying tho, its a 270 pts beat stick who can't survive on it own and has to earn his points back going after your opponents most dangerous units. A termie unit containing him and another sorcerer with astral grim is well over 700 pts, looks like a ok deathstar to me
I disagree. He's plenty able to survive on his own. It takes a S10 hit to kill him, and then he has a 3++ most of the time. This last weekend he was responsible (across two games) for killing a squad of grey knight termies, squad of purifiers, 2! dreadknights, and a few of the big (not riptide) tau suits. He was amazing and well worth his points.
By himself, no more than 3 units of warp spiders and/or 3 man scatter bikes will wipe him out. What if you face IK? A single IK will lock you in combat forever and D or stomp you out. In fact a single dreadnought will lock a seer bane guy and a unit of occult for majority of a game
Sooo, your opponent is the only one playing the game? What are you doing, looking around? How will the IK lock you in combat since you move the same speed but the Exalted also has turbo boost 24" ? Also, why the heck would your 230/270 pts IC be alone? What kind of warhammer is this? How on earth will a dreadnought lock your disc sorcerer in combat? And about the warp spiders or the scatterbikes, what do you do in your turn? You have a ML3 sorcerer. What do YOU do in the game? What is the rest of your list doing to fight the warp spiders? Is your army a simple observer in the game?
I'm sorry but your reasoning is very flawed. "A single IK will lock you in combat forever and D or stomp you out" This applies to 90% of the IC out there. So nobody should ever use those? And since when does an Exalted have to go into melee to earn his points back just because he holds a Seer's Bane? What about psychic screaming stuff from 18" away and then turbo boosting back behind some terrain? What about doombolt or treason of tzeentch? What about invisibilities, precognitions, biomancy buffs? Why can't my Exalted have Heretech powers against the IK and be able to strip d3 hull points per turn while dancing around? You base your comparison on the most skewed examples ever, and even then you have the Exalted sorcerer just forget that he is actually a sorcerer and go charge like a khorne lord instead. Seriously? Where is the practical example that a seer's bane exalted on disc will destroy a Wraithknight in a single round of combat? With your logic then, a Wraithknight would be a bad unit and should not be used. Or is this not good enough narrative for you and you only mention the AV units? Please, get serious.
I was stating the obvious weaknesses that TS has, sure you can roll on heretech, that will be one less dice for you to fish for Warp Fate and etc. So far after 17 pages I still haven't seen a single potential tournament worthy TS list.
If you want to talk match up sure, take a WS Gladius (w Culexus) for example which is a popular top ITC army. A crap load of razorbacks, rhinos and some drop pods and a whole lot of grav. You have what 2 maybe 3 one time use lascannons from 2-3 exalted sorcerers? Soulreaper cannon is only S5 and 24", so unless you give the occult termies a bunch of expensive hellfrye missiles, its gonna be a long day. WS scouts up 12", keeping the gun line tight knit, you might pop a couple rhinos and then you turbo boost your exalted ones to safety? Sure the WS player will just go after and wipe out the rest of your slow army (tzangors, rubrics, terminators) while racking up maelstrom points all at the same time. A single objsec drop pod landing on a objective held by rubrics, occult terms, and tzang will probably be there for most of the game lol. Your only chance to hurt a bunch of vehicles is to move up and some how get a good angle to hit multiple rhinos with doom bolt, if you keep turbo boosting away your not gonna have that kind of opportunity. I'm all about mathhammer and probabilities, its not looking good. And chances of you fishing for every psychic power you need is not that great with TS sorcerers being forced to roll 1 on tz discipline
Except that you're talking about the perfect counter. You're ALWAYS going to find X that counters Y. You're playing the "what if" game and that's pointless. A 1k Sons will always lose to an 800 free points full of transports army. It's just going to happen.
Thats what I'm saying tho, its a 270 pts beat stick who can't survive on it own and has to earn his points back going after your opponents most dangerous units. A termie unit containing him and another sorcerer with astral grim is well over 700 pts, looks like a ok deathstar to me
I disagree. He's plenty able to survive on his own. It takes a S10 hit to kill him, and then he has a 3++ most of the time. This last weekend he was responsible (across two games) for killing a squad of grey knight termies, squad of purifiers, 2! dreadknights, and a few of the big (not riptide) tau suits. He was amazing and well worth his points.
By himself, no more than 3 units of warp spiders and/or 3 man scatter bikes will wipe him out. What if you face IK? A single IK will lock you in combat forever and D or stomp you out. In fact a single dreadnought will lock a seer bane guy and a unit of occult for majority of a game
Sooo, your opponent is the only one playing the game? What are you doing, looking around? How will the IK lock you in combat since you move the same speed but the Exalted also has turbo boost 24" ? Also, why the heck would your 230/270 pts IC be alone? What kind of warhammer is this? How on earth will a dreadnought lock your disc sorcerer in combat? And about the warp spiders or the scatterbikes, what do you do in your turn? You have a ML3 sorcerer. What do YOU do in the game? What is the rest of your list doing to fight the warp spiders? Is your army a simple observer in the game?
I'm sorry but your reasoning is very flawed. "A single IK will lock you in combat forever and D or stomp you out" This applies to 90% of the IC out there. So nobody should ever use those? And since when does an Exalted have to go into melee to earn his points back just because he holds a Seer's Bane? What about psychic screaming stuff from 18" away and then turbo boosting back behind some terrain? What about doombolt or treason of tzeentch? What about invisibilities, precognitions, biomancy buffs? Why can't my Exalted have Heretech powers against the IK and be able to strip d3 hull points per turn while dancing around? You base your comparison on the most skewed examples ever, and even then you have the Exalted sorcerer just forget that he is actually a sorcerer and go charge like a khorne lord instead. Seriously? Where is the practical example that a seer's bane exalted on disc will destroy a Wraithknight in a single round of combat? With your logic then, a Wraithknight would be a bad unit and should not be used. Or is this not good enough narrative for you and you only mention the AV units? Please, get serious.
I was stating the obvious weaknesses that TS has, sure you can roll on heretech, that will be one less dice for you to fish for Warp Fate and etc. So far after 17 pages I still haven't seen a single potential tournament worthy TS list.
If you want to talk match up sure, take a WS Gladius (w Culexus) for example which is a popular top ITC army. A crap load of razorbacks, rhinos and some drop pods and a whole lot of grav. You have what 2 maybe 3 one time use lascannons from 2-3 exalted sorcerers? Soulreaper cannon is only S5 and 24", so unless you give the occult termies a bunch of expensive hellfrye missiles, its gonna be a long day. WS scouts up 12", keeping the gun line tight knit, you might pop a couple rhinos and then you turbo boost your exalted ones to safety? Sure the WS player will just go after and wipe out the rest of your slow army (tzangors, rubrics, terminators) while racking up maelstrom points all at the same time. A single objsec drop pod landing on a objective held by rubrics, occult terms, and tzang will probably be there for most of the game lol. Your only chance to hurt a bunch of vehicles is to move up and some how get a good angle to hit multiple rhinos with doom bolt, if you keep turbo boosting away your not gonna have that kind of opportunity. I'm all about mathhammer and probabilities, its not looking good. And chances of you fishing for every psychic power you need is not that great with TS sorcerers being forced to roll 1 on tz discipline
Except that you're talking about the perfect counter. You're ALWAYS going to find X that counters Y. You're playing the "what if" game and that's pointless. A 1k Sons will always lose to an 800 free points full of transports army. It's just going to happen.
Its not pointless when you look at the "probabilities" of facing top armies at a tournament. So then you will just resign to playing casual games with 1kson? Fair enough lol
A top eldar army will give a pure 1kson hard time even without a WK, scatter bike spam has a threat range of 48"+2d6 assault move to hide back behind cover. Scatterbikes and warp spiders will run around in circles taking out your army. 3++ or even 2++ will only do so much against mass S6 shooting.
How do you deal against Admech Warconvo+libby conclave? They support their gun line with the IK, you can't get near them without worrying about the IK or Tiggy casting nullzone on you.
- Attack any Rhinos with multiple Doombolts. 'Explodes' losses and Pinning checks will reduce incoming damage.
- Treason of Tzeentch the Dev Squads. Pinning chance = 24%. They will eliminate a marine squad every time they fire.
- Focus out Grav Cannons in the Tac Squads with Baleful Devolution. Use newly created Spawn to run interference.
- Scouts are good targets for AP4 Force Sticks. Exalted Sorcerers are best as they swing at I5.
- Biomancy is really good. Iron Arm on T5 will make Disc Sorcs AP2 and immune to Bolter fire.
- Astral Grimoire might let you work around the Culexus without committing a lot of resources.
- Seer's Bane will double out the Command Squad and HQs. More dangerous with Precog or a LD debuff.
You still have to deal with 40x Marines, 15x Scouts, a few assorted bikes, one Drop Pod, and 7x AV11 vehicles. That said, I don't think that's impossible. Khan, the Chaplain, and the Command Squad can't outfight Exalted Sorcerers with buffs. Scouts that approach within 18" will be wrapped up easily by AP4 in CC. Attack Bikes are exceptionally vulnerable to Psychic Shriek. Grav is not effective against 3++ layered with Endurance. You don't have important vehicles to Melta. And AV11 isn't going to hold up against Doombolt forever.
Gladius can definitely win by outscoring and outmaneuvering you. But the only unit that's anything more than an Obsec speedbump is the Culexus.
Pretty sure that most of this thread has been in agreement that pure 1ksons is not top tier and will struggle to compete with the gladius transport spam, scatbikeknights and riptidewing lists of this world...
it's doable, and it's even more doable when adding fast units like demon allies or bikes into the list.
Ericthegreen wrote: Pretty sure that most of this thread has been in agreement that pure 1ksons is not top tier and will struggle to compete with the gladius transport spam, scatbikeknights and riptidewing lists of this world...
it's doable, and it's even more doable when adding fast units like demon allies or bikes into the list.
Well some people are still a little delusional
The issue with 1Kson is that they are not cost effective, rubrics and occult termies are just too expensive and slow. Occult termies don't even make good death star companions since they can't take powerfists. Best way to run 1kson is to only bring the things that are good and ignore the rest of the book. Which incidentally is only good for a deathstar.
my list looks something like this:
TSCAD Exalted Sorc: seer bane
sorcerer: astral grim
7x Tz Termies: 4-5 combi-meltas, 4-5 PF/Chain fist
2xcultist squads
ALCAD Socerer on bike with mindveil
2x cultist
Heldrake
Basically this deathstar hits harder than a houndstar against vehicles, walkers, and MC/GMC and will kill everything it touches aside from other deathstars. Unmarked sorcerers improves your chance of fishing for those key powers that you need. Gladius can't hurt you once buffs are up, termies allow you to multi-charge and wipe out multiple rhinos/razorbacks. Only issue is you still have to deal with the culexus, so one BL sorcerer roll only on malefic in order to fish for incursion to summon screamers. If you can get a couple unit of screamers you can swoop attack the assassin. If the assassin is in a rhino, you pop the rhino with psychic powers or meltas. Still there may be a turn where you have to endure some shooting attacks with no buffs on. It's still gonna be a hard battle but hopefully good rolls on maelstroms will help out.
Against Tau gun line would be better match up if you have the right buffs up. With warpfate, Riptides can't really hurt you. If they have storm surges, Cyclopia cabal controls them and shoot d-missiles at their own riptides .
Well, if you want to just run a copy of tournament Cabalstar.
Anyway... Forgefiend + Prescience have a 73% chance of removing a Culexus in one shooting phase. You don't have to burn rolls on the Malefic table, and you don't have to Peril on a 2W model.
Semi-competitive is fine, most of us would rather win than loose.
Die-hard/WAAC-competitive is a waste of time however (imo), 40k is too unbalanced.
If you're WAAC, then Thousand Sons isn't the army for you. (Thankfully, I love my TS and would hate for them to become FotM amongst WAAC:ers.)
I have barely played with my Eldar with their latest codex for that very reason. They're so powerful they're boring to play (even if I hamstring myself), and It doesn't matter that I've played them for 13 years, people just automatically assume that you're "that guy". Such a pity tbh, I love my Eldar, but I just can't bring myself to play them...
Ericthegreen wrote: Pretty sure that most of this thread has been in agreement that pure 1ksons is not top tier and will struggle to compete with the gladius transport spam, scatbikeknights and riptidewing lists of this world...
it's doable, and it's even more doable when adding fast units like demon allies or bikes into the list.
Meh, I just beat a riptide wing with 2 stormsurges using a full war cabal list in an 1850 ITC game a couple days ago. Not saying it was easy, but I also rolled absolute crap powers. I think I could take down a gladius battleforce pretty well too.
Skerr wrote: Did not think about psychic phase. Glad I asked. Thanks!!
Yup. Occular guidance is the main reason why I believe rolling Ectomancy for the primaris (Warps-omething) on multiple sorcerers might be worth considering as our main dakka source in the war coven.
lessthanjeff wrote: Meh, I just beat a riptide wing with 2 stormsurges using a full war cabal list in an 1850 ITC game a couple days ago. Not saying it was easy, but I also rolled absolute crap powers.
I guess the nice thing is that if Tau tries to contest the objectives, they'll just get hacked up by Force weapons.
Gladius will have the same problem once they get out of their transports. They probably don't have more firepower than that Tau list.
Skerr wrote: Did not think about psychic phase. Glad I asked. Thanks!!
Yup. Occular guidance is the main reason why I believe rolling Ectomancy for the primaris (Warps-omething) on multiple sorcerers might be worth considering as our main dakka source in the war coven.
Well, it's a good source of dakka of you don't mind ap4, but if you need ap2, just rolling on tzeentch is better.
Ectomancy problem is lack of focus.
Warpshock is S5ap4 spam.
Empiric shield just gives your psyker a 2++ (due to blessing boost in 1ksons) can become nasty tanks in full cabal
Daemonshrike is an odd nova Haywire power.
Blaze is also S5ap4 spam, but less good at it than Warpshock.
Infernal claws is a decent CC blessing, but who cares?
Ghostform is amazing mobility power, for a shooty unit that benefits from it (melta units for example, not so much our war cabal)
Soulswitch is pure shenanigans, but for us does little as our units are mostly the same.
Many good powers, but some not for 1ksons and nothing is in common between them. Really odd discipline.
Skerr wrote: Did not think about psychic phase. Glad I asked. Thanks!!
Yup. Occular guidance is the main reason why I believe rolling Ectomancy for the primaris (Warps-omething) on multiple sorcerers might be worth considering as our main dakka source in the war coven.
Well, it's a good source of dakka of you don't mind ap4, but if you need ap2, just rolling on tzeentch is better.
Ectomancy problem is lack of focus.
Warpshock is S5ap4 spam.
Empiric shield just gives your psyker a 2++ (due to blessing boost in 1ksons) can become nasty tanks in full cabal
Daemonshrike is an odd nova Haywire power.
Blaze is also S5ap4 spam, but less good at it than Warpshock.
Infernal claws is a decent CC blessing, but who cares?
Ghostform is amazing mobility power, for a shooty unit that benefits from it (melta units for example, not so much our war cabal)
Soulswitch is pure shenanigans, but for us does little as our units are mostly the same.
Many good powers, but some not for 1ksons and nothing is in common between them. Really odd discipline.
Note: Thousand Sons can never get 2++ save. Mark of Tzeentch strictly forbids it. DP's of Tzeentch now rolling empyric shield can actually get 2++ rerollable.
Indeed, Ectomancy is weird, but the Warpshock is a primaris so anybody can take it. I am especially considering it for the Scarab units in a maxed war cabal. People argue (rather fairly) that 300 pts for a unit just to get an assault cannon and two missiles is not good enough. But what if that unit also had 2 heavy bolters, rerolled 1's to hit and was practically unkillable? Would a unit of 5 terminators with rerollable saves holding 2 missiles, an assault cannon, 2 heavy bolters and 3 inferno combi bolters, all rerolling 1's to hit worth it the 300 pts? Rolling ectomancy on the scarab champions can give the scarabs much needed mobility via the ghostform, it can enable shaneninaninanigans with soulswitch (and perhaps getting your sorcerers out of combat), or it can switch for 2 heavy bolters at will. Of course you may always roll on telepathy and switch to a scream, but there are some cases where 2 heavy bolters are better than 1 scream. Oh and those two heavy bolters can effectively "split fire" from the rest of the unit. Ahriman with warpshock is also funny as a part of a war cabal. 18 x TLstr 5 ap 4. Pewpewpew.
BoomWolf wrote: Mark of tzeentch can't be used to get 2++,it does not forbid getting it from other sources.
Empiric shield is 3++ base, and the 1ksons blessing rule boosts it to 2++, MoT isn't used.
No such thing as "not used" unfortunately. The unit has mark of Tzeentch, regardless of whether you use it or not, according to the wording the unit has to have a maximum invul save of 3++. No matter anyways, since empyric shield in a single unit champion or a character inside a unit doesn't make much sense anyways. Where it is really good (daemon princes) they do benefit from it.
BoomWolf wrote: Mark of tzeentch can't be used to get 2++,it does not forbid getting it from other sources.
Empiric shield is 3++ base, and the 1ksons blessing rule boosts it to 2++, MoT isn't used.
No such thing as "not used" unfortunately. The unit has mark of Tzeentch, regardless of whether you use it or not, according to the wording the unit has to have a maximum invul save of 3++. No matter anyways, since empyric shield in a single unit champion or a character inside a unit doesn't make much sense anyways. Where it is really good (daemon princes) they do benefit from it.
I'd say this is very much open to interpretation.
They way I look at MoTz is that you can never get a better invuln than 3+, if you use MoTz to boost your invuln.
You can get a 2+ invuln if you don't use MoTz in order to obtain it though, such as with Empiric Shield.
Or are you seriously suggesting that if there came out a psychic power tomorrow that gave the caster a 2+ invuln (by default), that MoTz-Sorcerers would only gain a 3++, while every other psyker in the game would gain a 2++?
If you are, you can't be serious.
The mark gives +1 to a maximum of 3+.not limit to 3+ in general.
That means that the 1+ does not apply if it would cause a 2+,not that it forbids it to be formed otherwise.
In this case, the mark is there, it's "used", it just doesn't do anything.
As for doing nothing us squads, a 2++rr tank in front of the squad is nothing to ignore. The unit is practically unkillable with it.
On a prince its just outright cheating to get that power, but you can't really get many princes in chosen 1ksons formations, and your war cabal Prince slot competes with your ahriman slot.
I am pretty serious. You can't choose to ignore a special rule on a unit by virtue of "not using it". Chaos terminators are both relentless and Slow and Purposeful. I cannot state that I "don't use the SnP rule" since relentless does the same thing anyways. And your units do not have multiple invul save instances available so they don't get to choose. You have one invul save and you can roll for it, but you have to take all the USRs into consideration. A unit with a MoT has a maximum invul save of 3++.
If such a power was created, the MoT sorcerer would in fact only benefit to a 3++ save, unless MoT was changed.
On a prince its just outright cheating to get that power, but you can't really get many princes in chosen 1ksons formations, and your war cabal Prince slot competes with your ahriman slot.
Why is cheating getting Empyric shield on a DP with MoT? He can actually get it. And you get 3 DP in the Rehati sect.
You are reading the MoT wrong based on its English.
In no place it limits your invul to a 3+, but limits the +1 it gives from going beyond 3+.
It has zero effect on other invul boosting sources.
As for the Prince, I meant cheating in the sense it's plain nasty, not that it's illegal on any level.
As for the rehati, it's not rather practical for a game of rational size.
I do not think we can choose to ignore the MoT. Its english is pretty clear. The model gets +1 to its invul save, to a maximum of 3+. Even if you have a better save than the +1 and you don't really need it, the second part of the rule is still in effect, and your maximum invul save is 3+. You can't choose not to use a rule you have. Regardless of how many sources of invul a model has, it is limited on a 3++ maximum.
Sample Rehatti list on 1850:
Magnus
3 x DP, wings, ML(3), spell familiars, 2 artifacts (black mace, arcane compulsion)
Pandaemoniad of Tzeentch
Blue scribes
3x11 blue horrors
3 x Heralds anarchic
That's 4 flying MCs, 26 warp charges, casting on 3+ with rerolls and no LoS needed, Magnus, 35 daemons on the ground with 4++ (and quite possible a 3++ if you make a herald your warlord), rerollable new warpstorm table, splitting units into brimstones.
The list is also completely immune to grav weapons except for Magnus. (Once you are done with the main targets that can trouble you, land your DP's and magnus, go to town in close combat. Rolling all powers on Ectomancy, each DP has a 33% chance to become immortal and then you don't have to fly him at all.
nintura wrote: Sorry man, but Boomwolf is right. The MoT cannot improve your INV save beyond a 3++. But if you have it from somewhere else, then it can be.
We will have to agree disagree on this one. "Elsewhere" does not mean you can choose to ignore the MoT rule. And the rule says that your maximum invul save is a 3++. Not using the +1 invul from MoT does not mean you can ignore the rest of the text.
nintura wrote: Sorry man, but Boomwolf is right. The MoT cannot improve your INV save beyond a 3++. But if you have it from somewhere else, then it can be.
We will have to agree disagree on this one. "Elsewhere" does not mean you can choose to ignore the MoT rule. And the rule says that your maximum invul save is a 3++. Not using the +1 invul from MoT does not mean you can ignore the rest of the text.
You're probably right. At least that's how it's been played for a long-long time by people who still used MoT (for some odd reason). It was also played that it only increases the initial save that hte model has. Means that if you have csm with MoT, they get 6++. If they stand on a landing pad that confers 4++, they still get 4++ cause the +1 inv is only applied to initial save - basically before the game begins. Unless it was re-worded, we should consider this too.
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nintura wrote: That's fine, you play that way. Common sense dictates otherwise. One piece of gear doesn't supersede another.
Yeah, like megaarmour. Why not get the 2+ for tanking and move as if you weren't SNP cause you obviously don't use 2+ armor to move, right?
"Models with the Mark of Tzeentch have +1 to their invulnerability save (to a maximum of 3+)"
It's the increase that caps at 3+, it wont increase it beyond that.
No where in the rules for MoT does it say that a model can't have a 2+ invulnerable save.
BoomWolf wrote: It's.... Simple English. There is nothing for GW to clarify here...
It is simple English indeed. If a model has a MoT, its maximum allowed invul save is 3++. There is no such thing as multiple invul saves therefore you don't get to pick. IF the +1 bonus is superfluous then it's ok. But you can't ignore the whole rule. The MoT model is restricted to 3++.
The hunt for the illusive 2++ has been going on for many years, and the result is always pages upon pages of people circling around rules and not reaching a definitive verdict. Let's not do this again. Let's just agree to disagree. At least we can agree that we have it on DP's , with reroll function as well.
BoomWolf wrote: It's.... Simple English. There is nothing for GW to clarify here...
It is simple English indeed. If a model has a MoT, its maximum allowed invul save is 3++. There is no such thing as multiple invul saves therefore you don't get to pick. IF the +1 bonus is superfluous then it's ok. But you can't ignore the whole rule. The MoT model is restricted to 3++.
The hunt for the illusive 2++ has been going on for many years, and the result is always pages upon pages of people circling around rules and not reaching a definitive verdict. Let's not do this again. Let's just agree to disagree. At least we can agree that we have it on DP's , with reroll function as well.
No, that's not what it says. You're fixated on that.
"Models with the Mark of Tzeentch have +1 to their invulnerability save (to a maximum of 3+)"
This is what it says. Key Part: "have +1 to their invulnerable save (to a maximum of 3+)". This is one statement. MoT adds a bonus, and that bonus is not allowed to make it better than a 3++. It's not two statements. It doesn't say maximum invuln save is 3++.
MoT adds a bonus, and that bonus is not allowed to make it better than a 3++.
That is not what the rule does. The rule gives a bonus AND has a restriction. There is nothing in the rule to state that the bonus +1 is what is limited by the restriction.
Really, please, let's drop this. We are not going to convince each other. I stand by my opinion. A model with the MoT has +1 to its invul save AND has a maximum of 3+.
I second the request to close the max invul conversation or to take it to YMDC at least.
On the tactical side, I've almost finished painting my tzaangors but I don't really see myself ever using them. I'm struggling to find a time where I'd rather use them over regular cultists (although, so far I've been getting by just using formations and not needing a CAD at all). Anyone find a good use for them?
lessthanjeff wrote: I second the request to close the max invul conversation or to take it to YMDC at least.
On the tactical side, I've almost finished painting my tzaangors but I don't really see myself ever using them. I'm struggling to find a time where I'd rather use them over regular cultists (although, so far I've been getting by just using formations and not needing a CAD at all). Anyone find a good use for them?
Woa! You got Tzaangors? How many? In my opinion, it's either forget them or get 60 of them and run 3x20 plus a sorc in the tzaangor formation. While they are very weak on their own, getting Fleet, run+charge and extra +1 WS/Str when getting high charges (which with fleet rerolls is more likely than what it seems) for free just because you bought many guys is awesome. The formation basically turns them from glorified, expensive cultists to cheap,fast,naked assault marines. Maybe add an astral grimoire for good measure. Unit of 20-30 tzaangors moves 12", runs 5" (fleet) and charges an extra 9" for a total of 25-26" of move in a single turn. not bad at all for 7 pts a body.
Were they hard to find? I've been able to get several boxes of all the new tzeentch kits easily enough. I only bought 10 because I'm not feeling them much yet so I've been getting more of the term and rubric kits instead. My local store still has more of them sitting and waiting though.
The WS bonus just means they get hit less and does't help their damage output but their save is so bad they're going to take lots of casualties anyways. For 70 points, I'd rather take 15 cultists which would do more damage and be harder to remove.
I don't see me using a grimoire move on them over occult terminators either.
lessthanjeff wrote: Were they hard to find? I've been able to get several boxes of all the new tzeentch kits easily enough. I only bought 10 because I'm not feeling them much yet so I've been getting more of the term and rubric kits instead. My local store still has more of them sitting and waiting though.
The WS bonus just means they get hit less and does't help their damage output but their save is so bad they're going to take lots of casualties anyways. For 70 points, I'd rather take 15 cultists which would do more damage and be harder to remove.
I don't see me using a grimoire move on them over occult terminators either.
In a thousand sons detachment you would get 12 cultists (they need to purchase MoT). So 10 tzaangors might be better than 12 cultists overall. In a normal CSM Cad, definitely go cultists.
godardc wrote: I never understood why some people try to play competitively a game that is not intended to be played competitively.
Why not play chess ?
Chess is boring and computers are already better at it than humans.
Yeah, they might not come out doing much more damage aside from having the pistols already so they can shoot and charge. The cultists also come with their champ for the extra leadership though so that's another 10 for the tzaangors to hit ld 8. I don't know, I'm just not seeing much of an appeal for them right now. The thing they'd be best at is tying up units in combat that you don't want out and about but I feel like rubrics already do that pretty well with fearless and a solid invul save.
lessthanjeff wrote: Yeah, they might not come out doing much more damage aside from having the pistols already so they can shoot and charge. The cultists also come with their champ for the extra leadership though so that's another 10 for the tzaangors to hit ld 8. I don't know, I'm just not seeing much of an appeal for them right now. The thing they'd be best at is tying up units in combat that you don't want out and about but I feel like rubrics already do that pretty well with fearless and a solid invul save.
The biggest problem against the tzaangors was that they were printed in the same book with blue and brimstone horrors. Should I get a unit of 11 no save guys for 77 pts or should I get a unit of 11 4++ save guys which also give me 2 warp charges and make new units as they die? Decisions, decisions...
True enough. its hard to compete with blue/brime horrors in pure spammery.
Though the blue scribes formation made me look at them again and wonder-why would any daemon player NOT take them? they are fething insane for the cost.
Otherwise with that logic, the +1 blessing bonus would be nearly useless.
Aura of Dark Glory? Nope, gives a set value of 5++.
Seems rubrics and occult termies have a 5++, shame about that useless mark of tzeentch and blessing of tzeentch, and here we all thought they could get a 3++.
Ahriman? Also stuck with a 5++.
Blessing of Tzeentch does not apply until after the unit gets affected by the blessing. So the Empyric shield gets cast, caster gets 3++ save, then the blessing of tzeentch kicks in and takes it to 2++ (or does nothing in case of MoT - evil laughter huehuhehue).
Well I got another game in with the actual detachment this time. Ran it with Ahriman on a disk, an exalted sorc on a disk with seer's bane, and the terrifying Magnus. Played against the Blood Angels Death Company detachment so not as competitive of a list this time.
Tactics wise, I'll tell you casting siphon magic on magnus and then running through all your dice with the other casters worked great. It meant I got a slew of spells off and then still had a good 15 dice to cast spells with magnus. He was cleaving through hundreds of points every turn with beams knocking out vehicles and novas shredding into combats. I even got a couple free spawn out of him and he didn't take a single wound in the game. I didn't do any of the summoning because I don't have any chariots yet, but I imagine those will make him even more efficient.
My Exalted Seer on a disc was actually a bit more disappointing for his debut because I rolled a 1 for the daemon weapon in the first combat and then I was hitting a bunch of high leadership models with invul saves so he only did a couple wounds.
I was afraid I'd need to fit in the heralds anarchic to buff my number of psychic dice, but siphon magic on a couple models is all it takes if you keep your units in close proximity to support each other.
BoomWolf wrote: Though the blue scribes formation made me look at them again and wonder-why would any daemon player NOT take them? they are fething insane for the cost.
Because they aren't IC's and give up first blood really easily?
BoomWolf wrote: Though the blue scribes formation made me look at them again and wonder-why would any daemon player NOT take them? they are fething insane for the cost.
Because they aren't IC's and give up first blood really easily?
Easily mitigated by using it's jetbike. You're never wanting to go into combat, so just use the 24" assault move to hide behind LOS blocking terrain.
16.66% --> Each player gets 3x rerolls of a D6 11.11% --> Everyone can harness on a 3+
13.88% --> Powers cost 1WC less. Fail = Perils
8.33% --> Free Brimstone Horrors
5.55% --> LD test on Enemy Psyker, fail removes Psyker and creates Herald
2.77% --> LD test on friendly Tzeentch Character, pass removes character and creates LoC
Marginal : 33.32%
13.88% --> All Flamers gain Warpflame
11.11% --> Random Warpflame Hits
8.33% --> Remove and deepstrike Tzeentch Daemon
Dangerous : 8.32%
5.55% --> All Psykers Suffer Perils on Doubles
2.77% --> Random non-Daemon character suffers D3 unsaveable wounds
As long as Magnus is in the list, seems like you could get away without a rerollable.
16.66% --> Each player gets 3x rerolls of a D6 -Not bad, but is just as good to your opponant as it is to you.
11.11% --> Everyone can harness on a 3+
-If you are running TS allied detachment alot of your important things will already have 3+ casting so it might just be benifiting your opponant.
13.88% --> Powers cost 1WC less. Fail = Perils
-When spamming lots of WC1 it isn't very helpful and it benefits your opponant too.
8.33% --> Free Brimstone Horrors
-+1ML: yay! Easy killpoint for opponant: boo.
5.55% --> LD test on Enemy Psyker, fail removes Psyker and creates Herald
-A chance to ruin your opponants day, however most psykers you want to kill are Ld10 so only a 1/11 chance to kill them.
2.77% --> LD test on friendly Tzeentch Character, pass removes character and creates LoC -Not bad on a throw away Herald or a Herald on one wound but what if the only Heralds available are ML3 or are carrying artifacts?
13.88% --> All Flamers gain Warpflame
-Toughness tests still have a 1/3 chance of failing against a MEQ, might be the fall of an expensive enemy character.
11.11% --> Random Warpflame Hits
-Same argument as above.
8.33% --> Remove and deepstrike Tzeentch Daemon
-You may have been cornered and this just saved the unit or you could DS a unit onto an objective to save the game.
5.55% --> All Psykers Suffer Perils on Doubles
-Not just you, your opponant too. Plus in an allied TS detachment you can re-roll perils and your psykers are Ld10 for any tests.
2.77% --> Random non-Daemon character suffers D3 unsaveable wounds
-And if you are running pure daemons? You could make your opponant rather unhappy.
Just trying to be a devil's advicate here to show the other side of each result.
16.66%, D3 rerolls. 13.88%, casting at -1WC. 11.11%, 3+ casting.
- While each player gets rerolls, not all rerolls are equal. Rerolling on the D table, the Boon Chart, with a Daemon Weapon, or with a variable attack like Baleful Devolution is much more influential than on a conventional weapon like a Bolter. So weight-of-fire armies won't get those benefits.
- Casting at -1WC won't benefit non-psyker armies at all. Lower cost means better mileage with Siphon Magic. Armies casting against Thousand Sons need to be careful of being denied, not simply get their powers off at minimum cost. Other psykers are limited to casting their ML. Having no WC2 or WC3 powers is unlikely, and Magnus has access to two disciplines and his WC5 power. So I think it's good overall.
- Casting on a 3+ is a big advantage for War Cabal and allies like Fateweaver. Won't affect non-psyker armies, or enemy formations that already channel on a 3+. This would suck against an enemy Cabalstar, though.
Common :
Spoiler:
~25%, Warpflame effects.
They're interesting results. I'm not 100% sure how they'd play out on the table, some playtesting would help.
Less likely :
Spoiler:
8.33%, free Brimstone Horrors. 8.33%, remove and Deepstrike. 5.55%, enemy LD check to create Herald. 5.55%, everybody Perils.
- Horrors. Fair point, though you're not always playing a KP mission. They can't possibly be worth chasing with an expensive unit if you hide them somewhere.
- Deepstrike. Good points, maybe it's better than I thought? Nice trick for Linebreaker. But it may also cost your ability to charge, or remain in CC.
- Create Herald. Fair enough! It also doesn't do anything if there are no enemy psykers. You could try playing with LD debuffs.
- Global Perils. Absolutely game-breaking versus a psychic-dependent army when you have Magnus. You are right about the benefits from Grand Coven, but it will hurt versus armies that don't depend on psykers. You can't one-dice everything. It could be awesome though -- Warpstorm activates after your psychic phase, so the enemy psykers will ALWAYS feel the pain first!
Unlikely:
Spoiler:
2.77%, friendly LD check to create LOC. 2.77%, D3 Wounds.
Any newly conjured unit can include a Character, if you're prepared to roll on Malefic. Or just build your list to proof it against a LOC roll. As for the wounds, nice sometimes but it's gonna suck when you get tagged for 3W on a character like Ahriman or an Exalted Sorc. It's pretty improbable at least.
Just horde and smash into enemy lines as a distraction while preparing your beams
Can you get hammer of Wrath by utilizing the charge ability that jump confers? HOW on unit from the warherd might be fun, especially if you sorcerer cast misfortune on the unit your charging.
Ahriman on a disk has been a hero in the games I've used him. I usually pick one role I really need him to fill and roll his spells into the appropriate school. If I'm light on anti armor, I roll heretech till I get one of the spells I want and then he singlehandedly solves that problems by multicasting the spell. So far, I've used him to deal with invisible units (doombolt), high armor values (heretech), and MSU units in cover (psychic scream). If you're playing on tables with even a little bit of LOS terrain, he'll be easy to run solo and boost back to safety after casting. I do recommend having him attached to rubrics or something at the start of the game for alpha strikes even if you currently have first turn before the seize the initiative roll.
While I know that Tzaangors are not all that great, I still feel like my Thousand Sons list could use the mass of bodies for possible tarpits and "extra" wounds for a Sorc if he is in with a unit and I'd like to keep the list as Daemon free as possible (Baring a price, perhaps but not really a fan of how the models look, but Tzaangors look pretty awesome to me. *shrug*). So I'm going to run a Warherd with a War Cabal and I'm trying to decide to go with either 3 untis with pistols and CCW, or 4 units of two CCW.
CaptainSomas wrote: While I know that Tzaangors are not all that great, I still feel like my Thousand Sons list could use the mass of bodies for possible tarpits and "extra" wounds for a Sorc if he is in with a unit and I'd like to keep the list as Daemon free as possible (Baring a price, perhaps but not really a fan of how the models look, but Tzaangors look pretty awesome to me. *shrug*). So I'm going to run a Warherd with a War Cabal and I'm trying to decide to go with either 3 untis with pistols and CCW, or 4 units of two CCW.
If you're in range to fire the pistols, you're in range to charge and really, how much damage to you expect to get out of the pistols? I'd keep your ablative wounds as cheap as possible since 1) They're ablative wounds, 2) You're running an expensive army in Thousand Sons and 3) One of the Benefits of the War Herd is that they can Run and Charge and that means not firing your pistols.
If you want to keep your list free of deamons, that's fine, but horrors bring so much more for a minimal extra points outlay that they really should be considered. 7ppm for what's basically a T4 cultist just doesn't set my world on fire. Think about this - Unless you get some sort of buff like forewarning or Fire Shield on the Tzaangors, rubricae are almost as durable against non-AP3 shooting as Tzaangors per point, though to be fair, that metric swings heavily to the Tzaangors favour as soon as cover is introduced, but with all the ignores cover flying around these days, that's not saying much.
Also, being only Ld7 and not fearless without an Exalted Sorc to babysit them, they're a pretty shoddy tarpit.
Out of curiosity, would a Daemon Prince of Tzeentch, in this detachment, suffer Perils on any doubles from Daemonology? If not, might be cool doing a little summoning while flying around and shooting mind bullets.
Also a Prince would seem to benefit nicely from The Staff of Arcane Compulsion. Basicaly for 10 pts, you're getting a Str 8, Ap2, concussive, anti charge, Force weapon. There might be something to that.
Bach wrote: Out of curisosity, would a Daemon Prince of Tzeentch, in this detachment, suffer Perils on any doubles from Daemonology? If not, might be cool doing a little summoning while flying around and shooting mind bullets.
Also a Prince would seem to benefit nicely from The Staff of Arcane Compulsion. Basicaly for 10 pts, you're getting a Str 8, Ap2, concussive, anti charge, Force weapon. There might be something to that.
Daemon Princes only suffer perils on double 6s when using Malefic Daemonology. They're daemons.
Bach wrote: Out of curiosity, would a Daemon Prince of Tzeentch, in this detachment, suffer Perils on any doubles from Daemonology? If not, might be cool doing a little summoning while flying around and shooting mind bullets.
Also a Prince would seem to benefit nicely from The Staff of Arcane Compulsion. Basicaly for 10 pts, you're getting a Str 8, Ap2, concussive, anti charge, Force weapon. There might be something to that.
As astro_nomicon said, no, they only peril on double 6's because they're a daemon. Having said that however, you're still forced to waste a roll on the Tz table, so you've lost a level there, then you roll on maelific and unlesss you roll cursed earth or incursion, then you swap to the primaris and that's nother level gone (possibly both if you roll cursed earth) so now you've only got 1 roll left which basically means you're taking shriek. Better hope that your enemy doesn't have any reall AA because now you're a T5 model with no buffs (apart from maybe CE). A typical Sons detatchment/army is usually criminally low on WC too, so I don't know where you're going to get the dice to summon reliably and fire mind bullets.
Also, yes, a prince would benefit greatly from the staff. It's basically a better boomstick compared to the Tz daemons lesser reward weapon. I think it's an under-represented gem of a weapon even for sorcs, that -2 to charge combined with terrain is great for units that typically want to avoid combat, or at least get it on their own terms.
1. How are TS lists criminally low on WC? We do have scarabs and sorc formations now you know. My lists never have less than 20 WC, even with zero demons inside.
2. Why are people so crazy about summoning? It is a very bad use of dice. Even with a spell familiar, you need 5+ dice to reliably create a unit that will give you back 5 dice over a course of a 6 turn game... so what's the deal anyways? Why not focus on mind bullets to begin with? Why is a summoning + 2 screams better than 5 screams?
A tricked-out Sorcerer casting on a 3+ can manifest WC2 on 3 dice, with a 93% success rate. If anyone within 18" has Siphon up, the net cost is 2 dice.
One-dicing WC1 is likewise reliable (89%), with a net cost of zero dice under Siphon.
I don't know if spamming the cheapest WC in the game is actually optimal. Especially with Siphon. To make an analogy : maybe we will get further if we have better mileage, rather than a larger gas tank.
Yoyoyo wrote: A tricked-out Sorcerer casting on a 3+ can manifest WC2 on 3 dice, with a 93% success rate. If anyone within 18" has Siphon up, the net cost is 2 dice.
One-dicing WC1 is likewise reliable (89%), with a net cost of zero dice under Siphon.
I don't know if spamming the cheapest WC in the game is actually optimal. Especially with Siphon. To make an analogy : maybe we will get further if we have better mileage, rather than a larger gas tank.
We do have great mind bullets, and when we bring Magnus on the field we have access to all of them and a standard siphon to begin with. But I will agree about having better mileage rather than a gas tank. In my games so far, there are often turns where I end my psychic phase and I have 7-8 WC left and unused, mostly because Witchfires are out of range and I have already buffed everything in my side. I believe amassing 30+ warp charges may be too points and options constricting and maybe a nice ceiling would be the 17-20 WC range. This way we could save some points to invest in some anti AV or utility overall. I really love an Iron Warrior Cult of Destruction with obliterators + Astral grimoire from another sorcerer. You can play it as Thousand Sons and get better survivability, plus the blessing of tzeentch, but with Iron Warriors the Cult is unmarked and about 60 pts cheaper, plus they gain Tank hunter. We can play a naked warpsmith, 3+1+1 of oblits and join the warpsmith to the 3 man oblit unit. This way we get a unit that gets to double up on everything. Double movement due to grimoire, double shooting with every weapon available due to Cult, serious hth potential with 3 powerfists and a poweraxe in the unit, plus Tank Hunter for free. Also we get an extra 2 obliterators that can deep strike with multimeltas.
Has anyone played around with using brimstone horrors or heralds odd tzeentch as their battery? Two ml2 heralds and six brimstone units come in around 400 points, give ten warp charge, and give you some rolls on malefic or divination. It's not as durable as 44 pink horrors would be, but it's a lot less headache and gives better powers.
topaxygouroun i wrote: 1. How are TS lists criminally low on WC? We do have scarabs and sorc formations now you know. My lists never have less than 20 WC, even with zero demons inside.
2. Why are people so crazy about summoning? It is a very bad use of dice. Even with a spell familiar, you need 5+ dice to reliably create a unit that will give you back 5 dice over a course of a 6 turn game... so what's the deal anyways? Why not focus on mind bullets to begin with? Why is a summoning + 2 screams better than 5 screams?
Well TS is typically a low model count army and is relatively slow. In a mission where there are a lot of objectives you have to rely on incursion/summoning for units of screamers/daemonettes to hold or contest objs
Lansirill wrote: Has anyone played around with using brimstone horrors or heralds odd tzeentch as their battery? Two ml2 heralds and six brimstone units come in around 400 points, give ten warp charge, and give you some rolls on malefic or divination. It's not as durable as 44 pink horrors would be, but it's a lot less headache and gives better powers.
Α basic pandaemoniad nets at 381 pts, Lorestealer's host with 3x11 blue horrors and 3xML1 heralds anarchic. You get 12 WC, 37 bodies with a 4++ save. Bodies also break into new bodies upon dying. If you make them into your primary detachment, you also get a rerollable Tzeentch warpstorm table with some sick results and one of the best warlord trait tables ever printed (possibility to have your daemons on a 3++ save before any buffs at all).
topaxygouroun i wrote:1. How are TS lists criminally low on WC? We do have scarabs and sorc formations now you know. My lists never have less than 20 WC, even with zero demons inside.
2. Why are people so crazy about summoning? It is a very bad use of dice. Even with a spell familiar, you need 5+ dice to reliably create a unit that will give you back 5 dice over a course of a 6 turn game... so what's the deal anyways? Why not focus on mind bullets to begin with? Why is a summoning + 2 screams better than 5 screams?
Because the Sons rely on their psychic phase very heavily for almost all their answers to Anti tank, anti MC, anti hoarde and anti TEQ in addition to cover busting and to a lesser degree now we have the astral grimoure, movement speed. That's a lot of stuff and a limited amount of dice. In case you havene't noticed, Scarabs are still very expensive at 125 points per warp charge when the ideal for a WC generating model is ~50 points per charge if you're not just a WC battery like heralds or horrors. 20 dice for sons isn't really that much considering how often they would like to cast.
As for summoning, if you don't understand the advantages of creating units that fit specific battlefield needs on the fly for free, I'm not sure how we can help you. It's not about summoning horrors for WC, it's about summoning daemonettes to rend things to death, putting a Burning Chariot down for cover busting, plopping a bunch of bloodcrushers down where they can charge something important next turn or dropping a bunch of screamers down and then turbo boosting 24" to claim linebreaker or to slashing attack something like a culexus who you're struggle to hurt normally and puts a major crimp in your plans otherwise. Summoning is a fantastic toolbox, just like choosing what schools to roll on before the game but after seeing your opponents army.
Yoyoyo wrote:To make an analogy : maybe we will get further if we have better mileage, rather than a larger gas tank.
Ideally both, but yes, it's a good analogy. Unfortunately, our milage enhancers are quite costly (beyond spell familiars) while the increased tank size is relatively cheap.
topaxygouroun i wrote:We do have great mind bullets, and when we bring Magnus on the field we have access to all of them and a standard siphon to begin with. But I will agree about having better mileage rather than a gas tank. In my games so far, there are often turns where I end my psychic phase and I have 7-8 WC left and unused, mostly because Witchfires are out of range and I have already buffed everything in my side. I believe amassing 30+ warp charges may be too points and options constricting and maybe a nice ceiling would be the 17-20 WC range. This way we could save some points to invest in some anti AV or utility overall. I really love an Iron Warrior Cult of Destruction with obliterators + Astral grimoire from another sorcerer. You can play it as Thousand Sons and get better survivability, plus the blessing of tzeentch, but with Iron Warriors the Cult is unmarked and about 60 pts cheaper, plus they gain Tank hunter. We can play a naked warpsmith, 3+1+1 of oblits and join the warpsmith to the 3 man oblit unit. This way we get a unit that gets to double up on everything. Double movement due to grimoire, double shooting with every weapon available due to Cult, serious hth potential with 3 powerfists and a poweraxe in the unit, plus Tank Hunter for free. Also we get an extra 2 obliterators that can deep strike with multimeltas.
I don't know how you're ending phases with spare WC in a 17-20 range list. Even when I bring 20 dice, I never run out of dice before I run out of spells.
As for the Cult, while it's nice and it fills a need for anti tank (as well as a bit of CC punch), it's also expensive at 460 points for 5 oblits and the warpsmith and many of us can't find that many points while maintaining an effective Sons portion of our lists. May I ask what the normal range of points you play at? I'm coming from a base of playing 1500-1850 and in those ranges, the Sons are at quite the disadvantage.
Lansirill wrote: Has anyone played around with using brimstone horrors or heralds odd tzeentch as their battery? Two ml2 heralds and six brimstone units come in around 400 points, give ten warp charge, and give you some rolls on malefic or divination. It's not as durable as 44 pink horrors would be, but it's a lot less headache and gives better powers.
Α basic pandaemoniad nets at 381 pts, Lorestealer's host with 3x11 blue horrors and 3xML1 heralds anarchic. You get 12 WC, 37 bodies with a 4++ save. Bodies also break into new bodies upon dying. If you make them into your primary detachment, you also get a rerollable Tzeentch warpstorm table with some sick results and one of the best warlord trait tables ever printed (possibility to have your daemons on a 3++ save before any buffs at all).
I think the Lorestealer's Host is going to be the bread 'N butter detachment for just about any TS detachment.
I wonder if this list would be effective:
Spoiler:
+++ New Roster (Warhammer 40,000 7th Edition v2016) (1846pts) +++
++ CSM Thousand Sons Grand Coven (Chaos Space Marines: Codex (2012) v2010) (1440pts) ++
Rules: Lord of Fallen Prospero, Masters of Arcane Knowledge
+ Uncategorised +
········Force Options (Supplement options here) [Thousand Sons]
········Rules: Blessing of Tzeentch, Blood Feud, Fear
+ Core +
········War Cabal
············Rubric Marines [4x Rubric Marine]
················Aspiring Sorcerer [Force Staff, Inferno Bolt Pistol]
············Scarab Occult Terminators [Scarab Occult Sorcerer, 4x Scarab Occult Terminator]
············Sorcerer [ML1, Mark of Tzeentch, Power Armour, Seer's Bane, Veterans of the Long War]
············Sorcerer [ML1, Astral Grimoire, Mark of Tzeentch, Power Armour, Veterans of the Long War]
········Lorestealer Host [The Blue Scribes]
············Blue Horrors [11x Blue Horrors]
············Blue Horrors [11x Blue Horrors]
············Blue Horrors [11x Blue Horrors]
················The Blue Scribes
+ Auxiliary +
········Heralds Anarchic (160pts)
········Rules: Warp Conduits
············Herald of Tzeentch (70pts) [Paradox, Psyker Level 1]
············Herald of Tzeentch (45pts) [Psyker Level 1]
············Herald of Tzeentch (45pts) [Psyker Level 1]
There's 22+D6 Warpcharges in this list.
The TS Grand Coven allows psykers to cast additional powers... so, Maggie potentially is casting 6x per turn.
The Astral Sorc and Seer Sorc hangs with the Scarab to be a general nuisance.
Kinda fluffy...
Also, would it be better for Lorestealer Host to be primary detachment to use the new TzWarpStorm? Or allow the TS detachment be primary and make Maggie the WL (for his 12" dangerous terrain bubble trait)??
- Blue Horrors are S2/T2 models that lack shooting, lack Obsec and that will get run over by any other troop in the game.
- Brimstone Horrors are S1, even with bonus attacks their damage output is close to inconsequential. What cute lil' guys though!
- Nothing shoots, everything is hopeless in CC, everything except Paradox is terribly inefficient with WC.
End of Turn. Tzaangors remaining = 6. Brimstone bases remaining = 7.
As for the Heralds -- 160pts for Paradox + 6 WC is good. Alternatively, I could get a WB Sorcerer with ML3/Tome/Familiar for 135pts, that manifests summoning at 96% on 5 dice, can fish for four powers on the Malefic table, and then spend the remaining 25pts on a ML elsewhere.
I think we could get more synergy from different units. Lorestealer is a great WC battery for Magnus, but it may not pull its weight in some other respects. Just a little bit of Obsec would go a long way.
Blue Horrors should be run in a CAD, unless you're trying some funky shenanigans involving using them to man Plasma Obliterators or something funky like that. The bonuses to the Lorestealer are fairly inconsequential in that regard. Being T2 matters relatively little when most enemy firepower is about optimizing S5 or Grav or other such shots. Plus you get your invulnerables, split, rerolls to invuls.
And if they assault you? It's a 55-point unit you can space out as expendable chaff.
Seriously. For the cost of 4 units of Rubric Marines, you're looking at a Herald, 4 units of 11 Blue Horrors, and 3 Heralds Anarchic. 15 WC vs 4, and a Primaris that's actually decent. Or you always have the option to skip the CAD altogether and run the Heralds on Discs as troubleshooters/poor Chaos analogues to Landspeeders.
So I got my first game in against GSC. Now, neither of us were min maxxing / optimized lists, nor are we phenomenal players. He wanted to learn his rules better, and I wanted to give Magnus a spin. So we just put models on the table and tried to kill each other.
He had the first curse formation (20 genestealers with a Patriarch), a cult ambush formation I think, and then some sentinels and acolytes in a chimera.
I had Magnus, 2 5 man squads of Rubrics, 1 10 man squad of Rubrics, and 5 Scarab Occult Terminators with 1 soulreaper cannon. Aspiring sorcerers had force axes and 2 had melta bombs.
1500 points each. Like I said, nowhere near tuned, just wanted to get them on the table. He also allowed me to run some of the special rules from whatever formation gives a bonus to invuln saves. I don't have the book yet.
My thoughts so far:
Rubrics are surprisingly sturdy. I would concentrate them though to maximize the effectiveness of the AP 3 bolters to wipe out whatever you are shooting at each turn. Playing GSC I knew he would be infiltrating right to me, so I bunched up, and was only outnumbered 5 to 4 first turn. Double tapping bolters into min squads of metamorphs or acolytes made short work of them.
Scarab Occult Terminators. Not quite amazing. They took out maybe 10 genestealers in 2 turns shooting, then I assaulted the patriarch and his unit to tarpit them. This was probably a mistake as they don't have the number and quality of attacks to deal with GS effectively in my opinion. I used Magnus to finish off the unit and Patriarch. I think the SOC would be most effective being a bully unit on the flanks. 1 wound, 2 attacks, S&P really hurt them. Getting Endurance on them would be amazing.
Magnus, the boss hog. I probably played him horribly. I need to get a comprehensive list of his powers. Like I said, I don't have the book. I used a website for the new Lore of TZ powers. I think Siphon Magic is a trap. WC 1 is so easy to deny, and throwing 3 dice on it, harnessing on a 2+... you're just going to come out even with 3 dice siphoned. I'm sure I could maximize my dice and powers cast, but it just didn't seem worth it.
Magnus did seem to do fairly well blasting out 2-3 witchfires. 1 doombolt wrecked a sentinel, and then the TZ blast power from the CSM book did a number on some Genestealers. I would probably just use him like this, flying around, hitting vulnerable backfield units. I doubt he'll ever really make his points back. I dropped him down into CC to deal with the GS Patriarch, and he was quite underwhelming. I'm sure he'll wreck face against a unit of fire warriors, but against any unit suited to CC, he'll be lack luster. The staff's special rules with creating a new Spawn came into effect 1 time.....
Overall, I think we're a very elite army to play. I need to get the book and really tackle what powers are available to us, and then the best way to start squeezing in support powers via Biomancy or Diviniation.
You're going to need more WC in your army to run Magnus effectively. Siphon can work, but not in the way you used it. And Scarab Terminators are not Slow and Purposeful. At least according to their datasheet, intentional or otherwise.
Well... there's Bolters, Lasguns, Autopistols, Flamers, Frag Grenades, HoW, and CC attacks, to name just a few. The latter is the most important, as Daemonic Instability sidesteps their Invul saves.
Horrors are perfect for being a backfield objective-sitter who contributes Warp Charge, but on offense they can't dislodge 50pts of IG infantry. That's limited. It's also a very expensive job to give to Rubrics or Scarabs. Look at Flickering Fire against IG in cover. Say you spend 6 dice, 2 on each squad of Horrors, and manifest 2 times, failing 1. Average of 2D6 is 7. 14x shots at BS3, resulting in 7 hits, 6 wounds, depending on cover saves you'd probably kill 2-4 Guardsmen. A 5pt Flamer would do more damage, haha. Though we didn't include Warpflame and Soulblaze.
Without considering those special rules -- the Blue Horrors generated no dice, killed 10-20pts of models, and cost 175pts of your list. Sneaking on the extra WC for 5pts is cool, but Brimstone Horrors cost about same, give you more maneuver units on the board, supply the same WC, and supply a greater # of Wounds. Maybe I'm missing something amazing about Split. Otherwise I don't get it.
has anyone tried using rubric marines as wraithguard in a serp? 5man with flamers rhino.
you would almost be able to afford 2 for every 1 wraith unit and yes it has less utility since no D flamer but it can still clear troops/hordes and they have invulns etc
You can't even overwatch unlike scythe-guards. Also, you can do nothing vs vehicles and more or less tough stuff. D-guards are used cause they DELETE whatever non-invisible you point them at.
If you want to clear troops, just go for spells or a heldrake. Cheaper, tougher, more reliable damage, won't give your opponent fnp. Not on board turn 1 though.
koooaei wrote: You can't even overwatch unlike scythe-guards. Also, you can do nothing vs vehicles and more or less tough stuff. D-guards are used cause they DELETE whatever non-invisible you point them at.
If you want to clear troops, just go for spells or a heldrake. Cheaper, tougher, more reliable damage, won't give your opponent fnp. Not on board turn 1 though.
i guess 1k sons have trouble with armor so it would be more of the same huh. I'm trying too hard to like the rubric marines a bit. I'm bias
topaxygouroun i wrote:1. How are TS lists criminally low on WC? We do have scarabs and sorc formations now you know. My lists never have less than 20 WC, even with zero demons inside.
2. Why are people so crazy about summoning? It is a very bad use of dice. Even with a spell familiar, you need 5+ dice to reliably create a unit that will give you back 5 dice over a course of a 6 turn game... so what's the deal anyways? Why not focus on mind bullets to begin with? Why is a summoning + 2 screams better than 5 screams?
Because the Sons rely on their psychic phase very heavily for almost all their answers to Anti tank, anti MC, anti hoarde and anti TEQ in addition to cover busting and to a lesser degree now we have the astral grimoure, movement speed. That's a lot of stuff and a limited amount of dice. In case you havene't noticed, Scarabs are still very expensive at 125 points per warp charge when the ideal for a WC generating model is ~50 points per charge if you're not just a WC battery like heralds or horrors. 20 dice for sons isn't really that much considering how often they would like to cast.
As for summoning, if you don't understand the advantages of creating units that fit specific battlefield needs on the fly for free, I'm not sure how we can help you. It's not about summoning horrors for WC, it's about summoning daemonettes to rend things to death, putting a Burning Chariot down for cover busting, plopping a bunch of bloodcrushers down where they can charge something important next turn or dropping a bunch of screamers down and then turbo boosting 24" to claim linebreaker or to slashing attack something like a culexus who you're struggle to hurt normally and puts a major crimp in your plans otherwise. Summoning is a fantastic toolbox, just like choosing what schools to roll on before the game but after seeing your opponents army.
Yoyoyo wrote:To make an analogy : maybe we will get further if we have better mileage, rather than a larger gas tank.
Ideally both, but yes, it's a good analogy. Unfortunately, our milage enhancers are quite costly (beyond spell familiars) while the increased tank size is relatively cheap.
topaxygouroun i wrote:We do have great mind bullets, and when we bring Magnus on the field we have access to all of them and a standard siphon to begin with. But I will agree about having better mileage rather than a gas tank. In my games so far, there are often turns where I end my psychic phase and I have 7-8 WC left and unused, mostly because Witchfires are out of range and I have already buffed everything in my side. I believe amassing 30+ warp charges may be too points and options constricting and maybe a nice ceiling would be the 17-20 WC range. This way we could save some points to invest in some anti AV or utility overall. I really love an Iron Warrior Cult of Destruction with obliterators + Astral grimoire from another sorcerer. You can play it as Thousand Sons and get better survivability, plus the blessing of tzeentch, but with Iron Warriors the Cult is unmarked and about 60 pts cheaper, plus they gain Tank hunter. We can play a naked warpsmith, 3+1+1 of oblits and join the warpsmith to the 3 man oblit unit. This way we get a unit that gets to double up on everything. Double movement due to grimoire, double shooting with every weapon available due to Cult, serious hth potential with 3 powerfists and a poweraxe in the unit, plus Tank Hunter for free. Also we get an extra 2 obliterators that can deep strike with multimeltas.
I don't know how you're ending phases with spare WC in a 17-20 range list. Even when I bring 20 dice, I never run out of dice before I run out of spells.
As for the Cult, while it's nice and it fills a need for anti tank (as well as a bit of CC punch), it's also expensive at 460 points for 5 oblits and the warpsmith and many of us can't find that many points while maintaining an effective Sons portion of our lists. May I ask what the normal range of points you play at? I'm coming from a base of playing 1500-1850 and in those ranges, the Sons are at quite the disadvantage.
I play 1850-2400 games so it's kind of easier for me. Also, I do actually run out of dice in 17-20 WC lists, but usually whatever I need get done is done at that point. I usually have dice left on 30ish WC lists, that's why I propose that cutting some fat off might be better. (Yes, this means I played games with 30+ WC lists). Maybe with Magnus you are starved for any amount of WC but I have not played with the boss yet.
Now we do rely on our psychic for most things, but thankfully we have ways to make the most out of it. Spell familiars and any formation that casts on a 3+ lets us 1-dice spam most of our WC1 spells. We don't even need the expensive ones like Rehatti or Exiles, we can have 4x ML3 Athenean Cult Sorcerers with spell fams for 560 pts, get 12 dice out of it, split them into 4 units and have 4 psychic screams cast on a 3+ rerollable. That's crazy efficiency and deadly power at the same time.
Scarabs are indeed expensive, but they are not just a WC battery. We have pandaemoniad for that. Scarabs are a solid unit normally. They are slightly less survivable than hammernators, slightly less punchy than normal terminators and slightly more shooty than most other terminator options. I believe they are a surplus units in all but one of our lists. Then comes the maxed War Cabal. Until you field a maxed war cabal on the table you can't understand what true resilience means. Scarab Occults in a maxed War Cabal are simply immune to 70-80% of the game. Scatterbikes? Sure whatever. Tau missile fire? Bring it on. And when you get to cast a blessing, they easily become the toughest.unit.in.the.game.period. I actually tested this against an optimized Ad-mech list filled with ap2 and ap1 shooting. In a Maxed War Cabal scarabs are not just a unit any more. They overperform in every level, especially in higher point games where you can have their weapon upgrades as well.
Still not convinced about summoning. Getting 10 daemonettes out by wasting 5-7 dice to do what? It's T3 5++ wounds that cannot charge the same turn, they are just begging to give up a kill point and/or a first blood. And it's not like you are going to choke your opponent in models. In daemon lists, you can have your 80+ models normally so any summoning hurts because it adds more bodies with the same defensive profile. But when you have your 30 model Thousand Son list, adding 10 daemonettes means little-to-nothing. Especially when the rest of the lsit has a different profile so the enemy can now split their fire more efficiently. I can see the point of summoning a burning chariot, I have two of them and I will be bringing them along when I play Magnus, but that's mostly because I can fly with Magnus and then bring the chariot down in a critical area. I don't see how backfield blue horrors summoning a burning chariot would help.
I will later add some battle reports. For now here are some insight I learned by playing different units.
1. Blue horrors / pandaemoniad. They are still very weak to shooting, 4++ or not. I even had my warlord trait giving them a 3++ and they were still dying. By letting simple bolters wound you on a 2+, you have to save so many wounds that even a 3++ is not enough. Where they shine though is tarpitting. HtH never has the same amount of attacks as shooting does. In my game, I used the grimoire on them and then charged a big SMHtH unit (2 characters plus some sort of command squad with couple of fists). My blues had 3++, which weathered most of the storm, and the summoned brimstones also charged in and also enjoyed a 3++ save. That unit never bothered me again for the rest of the game. I initially placed the blue horrors way in the back and the thousand sons in front. I can see now that it is meant to be the other way.
2. We have to be VERY careful when rolling for spells. Some disciplines, regardless if they are good or not, are a no-go for most of our lists. Divination might be great, and prescience is (usually) a great spell, but we lack units like grav devastators so there is little point in rolling for it. In a War Cabal, an occular guidance is almsot as good. Telepathy does have invisibility and scream, but all the other spells are VERY weak in our list. So having 2-3 rolls for the hope of invis and getting 3 screams otherwise is nice, but maybe 8+ rolls on invis is wasted potential. On the other hand, Tzeentch has 4 spells to deal with 2+ armor, with 3 of them being actually useful (doombolt, baleful devolution and treason) and one being situational (breath of chaos). Spell Siphon is also a great spell and that makes 5/6 rolls actually useful, so Tzeentch is a great discipline to roll on, which is surprising to me because initially I thought it was going to be crappy. In War Cabal lists, Occular guidance goes great with Warpshock (ectomancy primaris), so maybe a couple of rolls on ectomancy can make up for the lackluster shooting phase we have. In fact I believe that Warpshock is the best WC1 dakka power along with psy scream. Scream has a higher damage potential and is sick against MC's, Warpshock is much more consistent against blobs and infantry. Biomancy and Sinistrum can be good in deathstar and Seer's bane/ disc of tzeentch lists, not so much after that. Overall, what I say is that our power selection should be based on both our opponent's and our list.
3. We also need to be very careful with our movement phase, we need to keep track of the powers each sorcerer knows and move them accordingly to get in range of our targets. (How much better would it be if the Grand Coven bonus gave us +6" range on our powers instead of casting an extra one).
4. I know I said this before, but a maxed war cabal is a stupidly durable list. Really really annoying for the opponent. And no, grav is not "the bane of this list". A full relentless grav devastator unit can come out of the drop pod, shoot at a blessed scarab unit with all it's devastator doctrines activated and it will still only kill 4 of the terminators in the unit. The sorc will survive and that's all I need. On my turn I'm going to Treason your gravs at least once , quite possibly more times, I'm going to kill the rest of your list and then I will proceed to kill your devastators as well.
5. Melta Bombs on everything is one of the wisest upgrades in our armies. My maxed war cabal has msu rubric units in rhinos with melta bombs and 2 warp flamers. Yes I know it is an expensive and bad unit, but it is my tax to get immortal terminators and with this setup my tax units become little jacks of all trades being able to move fast (flat-out 18"), split into 2 units for objectives, deal with blobs with their flamers and also go for suicidal charges on imperial Knights with actually decent chances to tarpit and/or kill it eventually.
I play 1850-2400 games so it's kind of easier for me. Also, I do actually run out of dice in 17-20 WC lists, but usually whatever I need get done is done at that point. I usually have dice left on 30ish WC lists, that's why I propose that cutting some fat off might be better. (Yes, this means I played games with 30+ WC lists). Maybe with Magnus you are starved for any amount of WC but I have not played with the boss yet.
Now we do rely on our psychic for most things, but thankfully we have ways to make the most out of it. Spell familiars and any formation that casts on a 3+ lets us 1-dice spam most of our WC1 spells. We don't even need the expensive ones like Rehatti or Exiles, we can have 4x ML3 Athenean Cult Sorcerers with spell fams for 560 pts, get 12 dice out of it, split them into 4 units and have 4 psychic screams cast on a 3+ rerollable. That's crazy efficiency and deadly power at the same time.
Scarabs are indeed expensive, but they are not just a WC battery. We have pandaemoniad for that. Scarabs are a solid unit normally. They are slightly less survivable than hammernators, slightly less punchy than normal terminators and slightly more shooty than most other terminator options. I believe they are a surplus units in all but one of our lists. Then comes the maxed War Cabal. Until you field a maxed war cabal on the table you can't understand what true resilience means. Scarab Occults in a maxed War Cabal are simply immune to 70-80% of the game. Scatterbikes? Sure whatever. Tau missile fire? Bring it on. And when you get to cast a blessing, they easily become the toughest.unit.in.the.game.period. I actually tested this against an optimized Ad-mech list filled with ap2 and ap1 shooting. In a Maxed War Cabal scarabs are not just a unit any more. They overperform in every level, especially in higher point games where you can have their weapon upgrades as well.
Still not convinced about summoning. Getting 10 daemonettes out by wasting 5-7 dice to do what? It's T3 5++ wounds that cannot charge the same turn, they are just begging to give up a kill point and/or a first blood. And it's not like you are going to choke your opponent in models. In daemon lists, you can have your 80+ models normally so any summoning hurts because it adds more bodies with the same defensive profile. But when you have your 30 model Thousand Son list, adding 10 daemonettes means little-to-nothing. Especially when the rest of the lsit has a different profile so the enemy can now split their fire more efficiently. I can see the point of summoning a burning chariot, I have two of them and I will be bringing them along when I play Magnus, but that's mostly because I can fly with Magnus and then bring the chariot down in a critical area. I don't see how backfield blue horrors summoning a burning chariot would help.
I will later add some battle reports. For now here are some insight I learned by playing different units.
1. Blue horrors / pandaemoniad. They are still very weak to shooting, 4++ or not. I even had my warlord trait giving them a 3++ and they were still dying. By letting simple bolters wound you on a 2+, you have to save so many wounds that even a 3++ is not enough. Where they shine though is tarpitting. HtH never has the same amount of attacks as shooting does. In my game, I used the grimoire on them and then charged a big SMHtH unit (2 characters plus some sort of command squad with couple of fists). My blues had 3++, which weathered most of the storm, and the summoned brimstones also charged in and also enjoyed a 3++ save. That unit never bothered me again for the rest of the game. I initially placed the blue horrors way in the back and the thousand sons in front. I can see now that it is meant to be the other way.
2. We have to be VERY careful when rolling for spells. Some disciplines, regardless if they are good or not, are a no-go for most of our lists. Divination might be great, and prescience is (usually) a great spell, but we lack units like grav devastators so there is little point in rolling for it. In a War Cabal, an occular guidance is almsot as good. Telepathy does have invisibility and scream, but all the other spells are VERY weak in our list. So having 2-3 rolls for the hope of invis and getting 3 screams otherwise is nice, but maybe 8+ rolls on invis is wasted potential. On the other hand, Tzeentch has 4 spells to deal with 2+ armor, with 3 of them being actually useful (doombolt, baleful devolution and treason) and one being situational (breath of chaos). Spell Siphon is also a great spell and that makes 5/6 rolls actually useful, so Tzeentch is a great discipline to roll on, which is surprising to me because initially I thought it was going to be crappy. In War Cabal lists, Occular guidance goes great with Warpshock (ectomancy primaris), so maybe a couple of rolls on ectomancy can make up for the lackluster shooting phase we have. In fact I believe that Warpshock is the best WC1 dakka power along with psy scream. Scream has a higher damage potential and is sick against MC's, Warpshock is much more consistent against blobs and infantry. Biomancy and Sinistrum can be good in deathstar and Seer's bane/ disc of tzeentch lists, not so much after that. Overall, what I say is that our power selection should be based on both our opponent's and our list.
3. We also need to be very careful with our movement phase, we need to keep track of the powers each sorcerer knows and move them accordingly to get in range of our targets. (How much better would it be if the Grand Coven bonus gave us +6" range on our powers instead of casting an extra one).
4. I know I said this before, but a maxed war cabal is a stupidly durable list. Really really annoying for the opponent. And no, grav is not "the bane of this list". A full relentless grav devastator unit can come out of the drop pod, shoot at a blessed scarab unit with all it's devastator doctrines activated and it will still only kill 4 of the terminators in the unit. The sorc will survive and that's all I need. On my turn I'm going to Treason your gravs at least once , quite possibly more times, I'm going to kill the rest of your list and then I will proceed to kill your devastators as well.
5. Melta Bombs on everything is one of the wisest upgrades in our armies. My maxed war cabal has msu rubric units in rhinos with melta bombs and 2 warp flamers. Yes I know it is an expensive and bad unit, but it is my tax to get immortal terminators and with this setup my tax units become little jacks of all trades being able to move fast (flat-out 18"), split into 2 units for objectives, deal with blobs with their flamers and also go for suicidal charges on imperial Knights with actually decent chances to tarpit and/or kill it eventually.
What do you recommend running for the HQ (including optimal psyker powers)?
EDIT - Also, what formation is the "Athenean Cult"? I can't seem to find its rules.
topaxygouroun i wrote: I play 1850-2400 games so it's kind of easier for me. Also, I do actually run out of dice in 17-20 WC lists, but usually whatever I need get done is done at that point. I usually have dice left on 30ish WC lists, that's why I propose that cutting some fat off might be better. (Yes, this means I played games with 30+ WC lists). Maybe with Magnus you are starved for any amount of WC but I have not played with the boss yet.
Now we do rely on our psychic for most things, but thankfully we have ways to make the most out of it. Spell familiars and any formation that casts on a 3+ lets us 1-dice spam most of our WC1 spells. We don't even need the expensive ones like Rehatti or Exiles, we can have 4x ML3 Athenean Cult Sorcerers with spell fams for 560 pts, get 12 dice out of it, split them into 4 units and have 4 psychic screams cast on a 3+ rerollable. That's crazy efficiency and deadly power at the same time.
Scarabs are indeed expensive, but they are not just a WC battery. We have pandaemoniad for that. Scarabs are a solid unit normally. They are slightly less survivable than hammernators, slightly less punchy than normal terminators and slightly more shooty than most other terminator options. I believe they are a surplus units in all but one of our lists. Then comes the maxed War Cabal. Until you field a maxed war cabal on the table you can't understand what true resilience means. Scarab Occults in a maxed War Cabal are simply immune to 70-80% of the game. Scatterbikes? Sure whatever. Tau missile fire? Bring it on. And when you get to cast a blessing, they easily become the toughest.unit.in.the.game.period. I actually tested this against an optimized Ad-mech list filled with ap2 and ap1 shooting. In a Maxed War Cabal scarabs are not just a unit any more. They overperform in every level, especially in higher point games where you can have their weapon upgrades as well.
Still not convinced about summoning. Getting 10 daemonettes out by wasting 5-7 dice to do what? It's T3 5++ wounds that cannot charge the same turn, they are just begging to give up a kill point and/or a first blood. And it's not like you are going to choke your opponent in models. In daemon lists, you can have your 80+ models normally so any summoning hurts because it adds more bodies with the same defensive profile. But when you have your 30 model Thousand Son list, adding 10 daemonettes means little-to-nothing. Especially when the rest of the lsit has a different profile so the enemy can now split their fire more efficiently. I can see the point of summoning a burning chariot, I have two of them and I will be bringing them along when I play Magnus, but that's mostly because I can fly with Magnus and then bring the chariot down in a critical area. I don't see how backfield blue horrors summoning a burning chariot would help.
I will later add some battle reports. For now here are some insight I learned by playing different units.
1. Blue horrors / pandaemoniad. They are still very weak to shooting, 4++ or not. I even had my warlord trait giving them a 3++ and they were still dying. By letting simple bolters wound you on a 2+, you have to save so many wounds that even a 3++ is not enough. Where they shine though is tarpitting. HtH never has the same amount of attacks as shooting does. In my game, I used the grimoire on them and then charged a big SMHtH unit (2 characters plus some sort of command squad with couple of fists). My blues had 3++, which weathered most of the storm, and the summoned brimstones also charged in and also enjoyed a 3++ save. That unit never bothered me again for the rest of the game. I initially placed the blue horrors way in the back and the thousand sons in front. I can see now that it is meant to be the other way.
2. We have to be VERY careful when rolling for spells. Some disciplines, regardless if they are good or not, are a no-go for most of our lists. Divination might be great, and prescience is (usually) a great spell, but we lack units like grav devastators so there is little point in rolling for it. In a War Cabal, an occular guidance is almsot as good. Telepathy does have invisibility and scream, but all the other spells are VERY weak in our list. So having 2-3 rolls for the hope of invis and getting 3 screams otherwise is nice, but maybe 8+ rolls on invis is wasted potential. On the other hand, Tzeentch has 4 spells to deal with 2+ armor, with 3 of them being actually useful (doombolt, baleful devolution and treason) and one being situational (breath of chaos). Spell Siphon is also a great spell and that makes 5/6 rolls actually useful, so Tzeentch is a great discipline to roll on, which is surprising to me because initially I thought it was going to be crappy. In War Cabal lists, Occular guidance goes great with Warpshock (ectomancy primaris), so maybe a couple of rolls on ectomancy can make up for the lackluster shooting phase we have. In fact I believe that Warpshock is the best WC1 dakka power along with psy scream. Scream has a higher damage potential and is sick against MC's, Warpshock is much more consistent against blobs and infantry. Biomancy and Sinistrum can be good in deathstar and Seer's bane/ disc of tzeentch lists, not so much after that. Overall, what I say is that our power selection should be based on both our opponent's and our list.
3. We also need to be very careful with our movement phase, we need to keep track of the powers each sorcerer knows and move them accordingly to get in range of our targets. (How much better would it be if the Grand Coven bonus gave us +6" range on our powers instead of casting an extra one).
4. I know I said this before, but a maxed war cabal is a stupidly durable list. Really really annoying for the opponent. And no, grav is not "the bane of this list". A full relentless grav devastator unit can come out of the drop pod, shoot at a blessed scarab unit with all it's devastator doctrines activated and it will still only kill 4 of the terminators in the unit. The sorc will survive and that's all I need. On my turn I'm going to Treason your gravs at least once , quite possibly more times, I'm going to kill the rest of your list and then I will proceed to kill your devastators as well.
5. Melta Bombs on everything is one of the wisest upgrades in our armies. My maxed war cabal has msu rubric units in rhinos with melta bombs and 2 warp flamers. Yes I know it is an expensive and bad unit, but it is my tax to get immortal terminators and with this setup my tax units become little jacks of all trades being able to move fast (flat-out 18"), split into 2 units for objectives, deal with blobs with their flamers and also go for suicidal charges on imperial Knights with actually decent chances to tarpit and/or kill it eventually.
I can't comment on the reliabililty of the Sons above 1850, but if you're playing at 2k or above, there's a lot more wiggle room in the lists for adding luxuries once the cabal has been filled out. The issue I have with the War Coven is that I really can't find room for 560 points, nor the need for 4 more psychers. If it had've been 2 or 3, I could probably squeeze them in, but 4 is just too many on top of the 2-4 from the war cabal, especially when a group of Heralds Anarchic is such a great battery for so few points when you're already short on WC.
The problem I have with the scarabs is that they aren't a battery, they aren't anywhere near as punchy as loyalist termies and their shooting ability is mediocre at best, all for a significant points premium. 40 points for a 2+/4++ with 1 wound just doesn't cut it IMHO, just look at loyalist termies who're cheaper and come with power fists. True, a blessed squad might survive a round of grav fire if there's no doctrines involved, but drop pods come down turn 1 and if they go first, even without a doctrine, they'll pop a unit of scarabs and there's not really anything you can do about it other than hiding them in a corner where their poor mobility will effectively put them out of the game or stick them in reserves and try to DS them where they're at the whims of the reserve rolls and scatter dice. Again, don't get me wrong, in a maxed cabal they're basically invulnerable to non-ap2 fire. I'm currently waiting on 2 more units of SOT's to turn up and once they're built, that'll be a full cabal for me. There's still the matter of the 450 point rubricae tax and that they're all but useless against 2+ armour or T5+ which is in every melee unit in spades, so they're easily tarpitted.
As for summoning, if you're not convinced, you're not convinced, but many people find it to be a fantastic toolbox that can solve many problems.
I'm still not convinced by Tzeentch being worthwhile to roll anything more than the absolute minimum required amount on. You're already making 10 rolls for a full cabal, you should be able to utilise that for whatever you need because in my experience, doombolt is not really that great against vehicles, being a single powerfist hit, often on front armour. You're glancing preds/hammerheads/ironclads etc on a 5+ which is never going to be a replacement or even much of an augmentation to your anti tank firepower. Devolution can be good against MC's, but again, you're getting 3.5 shots, still rolling to hit, half wound, then any cover or invulnerable they have. With a BS4 rr1's model against a T6 MC with a 5+ cover or invulnerable, that's less than 1 wound on average (0.907). Better than doombolt, but not by much and it's WC2. The only saving grace is 6's to wound are instant death, the spawn being relatively inconsequential compared to having popped something important. You're not wrong that picking disciplines is important though, especially at lower points where the lack of anti tank means 2 sorcs are pretty much devoted to Heretek, leaving very little room for many rolls for invis. I think that having the Scarab sarges rolling telepathy is probably the best outcome, with them either lucking into invis or taking shriek, leaving the rest of your sorcs free to go after other things to plug your shortcomings.
Movement is probably one of the easier ones to take care of, especially now with the grimoure, but the fact that rubricae and scarabs both want to be midfield, also allowing pretty much all of your non-nova powers be in range, is one of the few synergies that we have.
I think Rubrics are in a much better place than they were but are still obviously pretty trashy. The Tzeentch discipline only has two truly useless powers for them and with Blessing of Tzeentch they can now always fall back on Force just to get a unit-wide 3+ invulnerable save.
I'm mixed on Scarab Occult, they shoot better than average Terminators but that's not saying much. In combat they aren't *terrible* like some people suggest, they will still bowl over MEQ and worse equivalents with little difficulty, the problem is that outside of the Sorcerer's psychic powers they have zero AP2 capabilities which is not great for a unit that is so expensive, and they are decent but overall lacking when it comes to anti-tank. Still, if you account for what a normal Sorcerer equipped like an Occult Sorcerer costs, the Terminators themselves are fairly priced in the minimum unit size - they work out to be around 31-32 points each if I'm not mistaken which is pretty good seeing as Tzeentch Terminators gain access to different Power Weapons but are more expensive per model (accounting for the basic 5 man unit discount the Scarabs get) and lack Inferno Bolts. If adding additional members to the unit was that cheap, I think they'd be rated higher by most. The key thing here though is that unlike the Aspiring Sorcerer, the Occult Sorcerer has access to all the same disciplines a normal Sorcerer does - though he trades Sanctic for Divination - meaning he can easily roll on Heretek/Telepathy to give the unit ranged AP2 or anti-vehicle attacks.
Ahriman is hit and miss. No Spell Familiar means that taking one of the formations to give him 3+ to cast on his chosen discipline is key which is good as he's part of some very strong formations. He has a very useful Warlord Trait for Thousand Sons and the optional Disk improves him a lot as he won't fear random Power Fists any more and can move about, sling numerous deadly Witchfires then Turbo Boost and hide out of sight. He's also incredibly expensive and has decent but hardly special combat capabilities, basically he's only really worth it if you want his Warlord Trait and the ability to throw out three Doombolts/Psychic Shrieks/Haywire powers a turn. Overall I think he's a really good Warlord for a Thousand Sons army but not so great as just another character.
Magnus is awesome, hands down. With Force activated he reliably kills Wraithknights in combat before they strike, his Destroyer Beam alone is terrifying on a flying monstrous creature - not to mention Doombolt and the other Destroyer shot he gets - and he's super difficult to kill. You have to build your list around him and make sure to keep him away from viable threats - don't risk failing a grounding test near an Imperial Knight or getting alpha-struck before he can take off by teleporting/'Drop Podding grav. I've seen people keep him in Reserves which is a risky proposition on its own given that a model that expensive being off the table for one to three turns is going to be super painful, but it's well worth it if it means you'll be keeping him alive.
I think super competitive Thousand Sons will ditch the unique units, take the bare minimum to support Magnus and spend all their points elsewhere; basically, screw the fluff. For people that actually care about that stuff but still wanna win games, Magnus is still a priority but using Tzeentch Daemons to supplement a core of Rubricae/Scarab Occult/Sorcerers/etc is ideal, Thousand Sons have good formations filled with mediocre to bad units, you can actually sorta make their units work if you play your cards right and get decent psychic power rolls. Psychic spam is the way to go with this army for sure, but the question becomes how do you maximise your psychic phase...you need at least 20 warp charges for 1000-1500 point army lists I think, you probably want at least some Daemons for that. Spell Familiars are mandatory for whoever can use them. Do you then use the Grand Coven/formations to emphasise quality over quantity and make your psykers better individually or just grab as many warp charges as possible? I'm leaning towards the former personally but am interested to see what others think.
Honestly those mandatory Tzeentch rolls aren't nearly as much of a tax as they used to be. Aspiring Sorcerers now have a good chance to get a useful power and thus not be entirely useless in a game, rather than just praying for Doombolt specifically.
On that note, I have a question regarding Ahriman's Warlord Trait in light of the recent FAQ...
If I roll a 1 on the D3, I can't Infiltrate both an Exalted Sorcerer and a Rubric Marine unit together can I? I have to also give the Infiltrate to Independent Characters right? Just double checking.
See, it's that alone that makes me view 1k Sons themselves as such a tragic release. When the best way to run Magnus is to not bother with his actual Legion, something has gone wrong. Heck, for the same points cost as buying Mark of Tzeentch for 50 Cultists or equivalent (or 38 and 2 HQs), you can get a full VSG. If you keep Magnus flanking stuff and acting like a crazy rook, darting to and from ongoing reserve after casting stuff, you really don't *need* Blessing of Tzeentch to make the most of him. Just bring Typhus and some Zombies and call it a day, adding support elements as you will. With the ability to summon Burning Chariots, you also arguably don't need Heldrakes either.
It tends to run at least 1850 to 2000 points without even adding a lot of upgrades. At that point level my opponents, who tend to run Tau, or Knights, or Admech bring ALOT of firepower.
Knowing that they only need to destroy a single unit to remove my 'reroll saves of one' rule, they essentially will focus their entire army on a single unit of Rubric Marines. They are tough, but not that tough.
Once the reroll bonus is gone, the cabal is considerably easier to defeat.
I have actually had better luck running the Sekhmet Conclaclave and going for Warp Fate ( which I always manage to get, since I roll on sinistrum until I get it thrice.) As a result, I also tend to get death hex and other useful stuff into the bargain. After I get what I want from Sinistrum, I move on to Biomancy. As you might have guessed, I take a lot of sorcerers and dont bother allying in daemons.
Knowing that they only need to destroy a single unit to remove my 'reroll saves of one' rule, they essentially will focus their entire army on a single unit of Rubric Marines. They are tough, but not that tough.
Once the reroll bonus is gone, the cabal is considerably easier to defeat.
The re-roll doesn't go when a unit is destroyed, you get it for the whole game after buying the maximum number of units.
I’m toying around with which is better, the Exalted Sorcerer or the Sorcerer?
I was curious on the difference in survivability between a Sorcerer on a disc vs an Exalted Sorcerer on a disc. I guess that I am placing a lot of value on this due to the low model count of this army. If you recall, Sorcerers can take a Sigil of Corruption which is 4++ while an Exalted Sorcerer is given the Aura of Dark Glory at 5++. Add in the MoT and Sorcerers go to 3++ and Exalted Sorcerer’s 4++, respectively. Assuming each can cast a blessing and get it off, their invulnerable saves go to 2++ for the Sorcerer and 3++ for the Exalted Sorcerer. Assuming each is on a disc they would both be T5. Sorcerer has 2 wounds while the Exalted Sorcerer has 3. So if I wanted to run each solo on a disc, which one has more survivability and by how much?
Vs bolters (or equivalent) at BS 4
Sorceror-
58 bolter shots X .66 = 38.28 hits X .33 = 12.6324 wounds X .16 = 2.02 unsaved wounds
Exalted Sorcerer -
42 bolters shots X .66 = 27.72 hits X .33 =9.1476 wounds X .33 = 3.01 unsaved wounds
Vs Plasma Gun (or Str 7 equivalent) at BS4
Sorcerer-
23 plasma shots X .66 =15.18 hits X .83 = 12.5994 wounds X .16 = 2.01 unsaved wounds
Exalted Sorcerer -
17 plasma shots X .66 = 11.22 hits X .83 =9.3126 wounds X .33 = 3.07 unsaved wounds
Vs Str 10 (Instant Death) at BS4
Sorcerer-
12 Str 10 shots X .66 =7.92 hits X .83 = 6.5736 wounds X .16 = 1.05 unsaved wounds
Exalted Sorcerer -
6 Str 10 shots X .66 = 3.96 hits X .83 =3.2868 wounds X .33 = 1.08 unsaved wounds
As you can see, the additional wound on the Exalted Sorcerer doesn’t make up for the loss of being able to take the Sigil of Corruption. In fact, it’s not even close and that’s kind of a big deal.
The real Pros for the Exalted Sorcerer over the Sorcerer:
- Better Initiative and WS for CC
- Can cast one time las cannon shot (with blast and lance)
- Can take Divination
The real Cons for the Exalted Sorcerer over the Sorcerer:
- No choice in force weapons, staff only.
- Dies much more easily than the Sorcerer due to no Sigil of Corruption option
- Base cost is 40-60 points more than a Sorcerer similarly upgraded to ML2 and Aura of Dark Glory
You've missed something in your comparison there: mark of Tzeentch cannot be used to increase your invul behond a 3++, so both of them will have the same invul and the exalted sorceror is more survivable due to 3 wounds.
With regards to sorceror vs exalted I would go with Exalted sorcerors for carrying relics, especially the cc relics, and have regular sorcerors fill up any other slots.
It is directly under the entry for the Mark of Tzeentch on pg30 of the CSM codex:
"Models with the Mark of Tzeentch have +1 to their invulnerable save (to a maximum of 3+)."
Automatically Appended Next Post: The mark is still used to bring it over 3++ so it is capped. This is discussed, at length, in other threads. I wouldn't want to start that discussion again.
@mrhappyface: The trouble is, the rule states that you only get the bonus as long as you have the max number of units. It doesn't say that you get the bonus for beginning with the max number of units. ( I wish it did.)
For this reason, literally no one in my gaming circle interprets the rule any other way, including Thousand Sons players.
Now if GW were to FAQ it ( dare to dream) and it turned out the way you said, is that would make me very happy indeed.
For what it's worth, I believe that your interpretation was the desired intent, just not worded so well.
You will find that the consensu is that you can't get to a 2++ while using the MoT, so your analysis is flawed.
Edit: Beaten like a red headed, red skinned, one eyed, arrogant stepchild - That'll learn me to open a bunch of tabs and take forever to reply to some of them.
I just like the mental image that gives 
