Should we? I can see it if the FAQ for necrons changes a large amount of stuff or makes things outdated or makes other units a lot better or a giant shift in general for necrons

Let's do.
However, I'd like to ask that whoever starts it (once our FAQ is released) be able to regularly update the top post to let everyone know what page important new relevant information starts on (like jy2 did for the Tyranid tactics thread).
For example, if by some miracle we get a supplement, it'd be nice to have the title change from something like "Necron Tactica (post FAQ)" to "Necron Tactica (post FAQ): new supplement pg. 18" so new people who come looking will be able to find things easily without having to dig through every page. Would be very handy.

Ditto here.

Where/When is the new FAQ you're talking about going to be released?

Also, skoffs, did you maybe get a chance to try out that silver tide army? I would really love to hear about it.

No one knows. All we can do is just check the WH community page and their FB page to see if they announce it.

And, no, haven't tested it out, but it's not exactly something experimental. Its core is a typical Tide build, you win through numbers. Granted, it might not be able to bring the same amount of bodies as Guard/Orks/Nids, but it balances out with superior firepower and survivability. Also kinda helps that it has answers for just about everything, as well.

"The bearer of the Veil of Darkness has the Deep Strike special rule. In addition, once per game, at the start of any friendly Movement phase, the bearer can use the Veil of Darkness to remove himself and his unit from the table, even if they are locked in combat. They then immediately arrive anywhere on the board using the rules for Deep Strike."

Does that mean the bearer of the VoD can both enter play via Deepstrike AND then use it again to teleport one time?

Also, I'd like to know in a typical Reclamation Legion/D.Cult/Harvest list, do you use your Overlord or your D.Lord as a warlord and why? Also, how do you go about your warlord traits?

Yes... It could enter the board from Deepstrike Reserve. Then, at some other time later you could use the Veil's ability.

But why would you want to?

 Anpu-adom wrote:
Yes... It could enter the board from Deepstrike Reserve. Then, at some other time later you could use the Veil's ability.

But why would you want to?

I could possibly enter play on second turn without even rolling through the monolith gate, assuming it's anywhere usefull.
I could also chose to deepstrike anywhere, with a +1 roll from Zhandrekh.
But, it was just a question, I don't really have any such plans.

EDIT: I was just having some thoughts while i was toying with the idea of a Lychstar list supported by a Monolith. This was the product of my thought, if anyone's interested (it features sweet zandrekh-obyron teleports and monolith portals).

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/710651.page

I do not trust the Monolith to live long enough to teleport anything.

I'm not a big fan of deepstriking assault units, because that means that the soonest you are going to be in CC is turn 3. Most games are around 6 turns, so you are giving up at least a third of the game for the hope that you'll only take one turn of shooting. Judging from the number of recent formations with the ability to disordered charge after deep strike GW realizes it's a raw deal as well.

On the other hand Deep striking gun lines are wonderful, and I've toyed with the idea of a staff of light royal court with a unit of RoC praetorians deep striking in, and then veiling out of the inevitable CC that followed. You would of course bring a solar staff, and maybe Immotekh (I've had him forever and rarely get to use him). You could keep it fairly cheap (as royal courts go), though in all fairness I'm not sure there would be many situations where they would earn back their points. maybe use them as a beat stick to slap units off of objectives, or to catch units your opponent thought were safe.

*Edit* expanding on my idea, a royal court won't work because deep strike is not conferred. so whatever Is in the unit will need to have it already, so that leaves praetorians and destroyers. So taking my judicator list and modifying it some:

+ Core (793pts) +
····Formation: Reclamation Legion (793pts)
······Immortals [Gauss Blaster, 5x Immortal]
······Overlord [Artefact: The Veil of Darkness, Gauntlet of Fire, Phase Shifter]
······Tomb Blades
········Tomb Blade [Nebuloscope, Shield Vanes, Twin-linked Gauss Blaster]
········Tomb Blade [Nebuloscope, Shield Vanes, Twin-linked Gauss Blaster]
········Tomb Blade [Nebuloscope, Shield Vanes, Twin-linked Gauss Blaster]
······Tomb Blades
········Tomb Blade [Nebuloscope, Particle Beamer, Shield Vanes]
········Tomb Blade [Nebuloscope, Particle Beamer, Shield Vanes]
········Tomb Blade [Nebuloscope, Particle Beamer, Shield Vanes]
······Warriors [15x Necron Warrior]
······Warriors [Ghost Ark, 10x Necron Warrior]

+ Auxiliary (1055pts) +
····Formation: Destroyer Cult (510pts)
······Destroyer Lord [Artefact: The Solar Staff, Phase Shifter]
······Destroyers [Destroyer, Destroyer, Destroyer]
······Destroyers [Destroyer, Destroyer, Destroyer]
······Destroyers [Destroyer, Destroyer, Destroyer]
····Formation: Judicator Battalion (545pts)
······Triarch Praetorians [Rod of Covenant, 10x Triarch Praetorian]
······Triarch Praetorians [Rod of Covenant, 5x Triarch Praetorian]
······Triarch Stalkers
········Triarch Stalker [Heat Ray]

You can start on the board and veil into your firing position turn 1, which gives a good chance the stalker will still be up for reroll hit/wound shenanigans. You could also deep strike so as to save the veil to get out of a tarpit or for an emergency redeploy. Whichever way you go you'll get a turn with the solar staff, unit wide preferred enemy, in a unit of 10 praetorians with RoC which are scary in both CC and short range shooting. On paper it looks pretty formidable, I'll have to try it out.

 necr0n wrote:
Does that mean the bearer of the VoD can both enter play via Deepstrike AND then use it again to teleport one time?

Well, you're technically only using the Veil's ability once you're already on the table.
When you enter via deep strike you're literally only entering via deep strike, as the rule is simply conferred to the model who is equipped with the Veil. Then you can use its ability.
So yes, attach to a unit that can deep strike (preferably a shooting unit), wait for reserves to come up, enter, shoot, later turns Veil away somewhere else... though the most effective use still remains the turn one Veil (suddenly your opponent has something unexpected in his back line and must deal with it).

--In the D.Cult am I allowed to field the following?

Destroyer Lord
2 Destoryers - 1 H.Destroyer
2 Destroyers - 1 H.Destroyer
3 Destroyers

I'm asking because the restrictions are as follows:
Formation:

1 Destroyer Lord
3 units of Destroyers
0-1 Heavy Destroyers

Restrictions: Each unit of destroyers must consist of at least 3 models.

It doesn't specify what kind of models and a Destroyer unit can upgrade one Destroyer to a Heavy Destroyer.

I'm leaning towards it being legit, but I wanted your opinion.

--If Nemesor Zhandrekh is my warlord, on my first turn can I roll to see what my warlord trait is or does it have to be Eternal Madness?

Sorry for the awful lot of questions and thank you for your time!

If I were your opponent I'd be cool with the destroyers, and from a RAW perspective it seems kosher. Ask your opponent though, because I can't imagine people having an issue with it, but people occasionally get grouchy when facing crons.

The nemesor always starts with zealot and can change only after your first turn.

I've seen a lot of the Necron lists that made it to the top tables in the biggest tournaments and most of them ran deathmarks. I know they're not very widely loved but I'd just like to see what makes good generals shine with them. What would ideally be their purpose in the game? What would ideally be their target?

And on a related, rules-wise, question: Does a unit that enters play via Drop Pod count as having deepstriked or only the drop pod? (Can they be wounded on 2+?)

I'm really liking the Deathmark models, I've painted them really nicely (at least imo) and I want to play them, but I struggle to understand how to make the most out of them and in what situations.

 necr0n wrote:
I've seen a lot of the Necron lists that made it to the top tables in the biggest tournaments and most of them ran deathmarks. I know they're not very widely loved but I'd just like to see what makes good generals shine with them. What would ideally be their purpose in the game? What would ideally be their target?

And on a related, rules-wise, question: Does a unit that enters play via Drop Pod count as having deepstriked or only the drop pod? (Can they be wounded on 2+?)

I'm really liking the Deathmark models, I've painted them really nicely (at least imo) and I want to play them, but I struggle to understand how to make the most out of them and in what situations.

They're essentially the ONLY counter we have to Monstrous Creatures, and they stack tons of wounds on infantry on the drop. It isn't hard for them to take out Marines outside the Rhino and Scatterbikes when they go in.

Having a small footprint with their Deep Strike doesn't hurt either. I take 3 minimum sized squads a lot.

I'm getting seriously tilted reading Traitor Legions. What the hell are Necrons for if Death Guard are the same thing but better? Other than being slightly more reasonably priced, I can't see a reason to run Necrons over a Death Guard Vectorium.

Requizen wrote:
I'm getting seriously tilted reading Traitor Legions. What the hell are Necrons for if Death Guard are the same thing but better? Other than being slightly more reasonably priced, I can't see a reason to run Necrons over a Death Guard Vectorium.

They're going to be a serious issue, I can tell.

I mean, everyone else got buffed, but these are minor buffs and not ones we couldn't have dealt with before. 6+++ in a few Legions, one of them getting more Obliterators and the other having an Icon for 4+++? No biggie, as we can snipe the Icon out and Obliterators don't throw out enough bullets on us. Marines and Bikers getting Berserker benefits with World Eaters? Not too bad. 1000 Sons still get severely hurt once we're in cover or hide in the Ghost Ark. Alpha Legion Infiltrates some stuff? We can take some Plasma to the face and charge them, and we can win without needing to slay the Warlord. Raptors and Warp Talons still do jack gak to us with the Night Lords.

However, getting FNP everywhere reliably is a big deal. MoN was the default mark anyways in most cases, and makes it harder for us to play the objective game against them, especially in a Decurion. Outside the Decurion you can forget Necrons being great too outside Pylonstar. Relentless was a nice little bonus for Warriors, Immortals, and Deathmarks, but now they get to do the same thing: get in range to double tap and charge. Their Bikers are super dangerous now too, maybe even better than Spawn now (except in cover). Obliterators became mediocre to stupid good thanks to the update, and they're the only Mutilators that aren't garbage (OS isn't great for them when they can't have MoN with it, but Obliterators are doing okay there).

Deathmarks are going to be more necessary than they were before, and outside of that Destroyer Cult is gonna need even more Destroyers.

I might even just make a list with Destroyer Cult and seeing how to get in Deathmarks for the cheapest tax.

Toughness isn't the only thing that makes necrons unique, we are one of the few armies able to mix shooting and CC, and the only army where everybody is a threat to anything. Besides, we are still tougher. FnP is generally inferior to RP, and that and a 5+ FnP reroll ones is less awesome than a 4+ RP and often rerolling ones.

They also have a lot of taxes to get the sons of mortarion formation, specifically 15+ plague marines, which are almost twice the cost of the humble warrior, and no where near as tough or as shooty as two warriors. Hell in a shooting match their odds are worse than 50-50 when going one on one with an immortal, who are cheaper, as tough or tougher and have a better gun. Even assuming they just stick with the legion rules and pick and choose their formations, they are limited to MoN, have worse leadership than us, and are still overcost. Don't get me wrong this is a huge QoL improvement for chaos, but it won't bring them into the top 7, at least not the deathguard anyway. We will fight them how we fight everyone, tough out what they throw at us and grind them into dust, nothing they have will save them from destroyers, massed flayer fire, or getting their important units tar pitted.

Honestly I'm much more worried about the world eaters, they are all fearless, get fleet, +3 inches to charge distance for the maelstrom of gore, and get to move forward 2d6 inches after setup but before the first turn. Turn 1 charges are expected (it's like the bad old days of third), and they come bearing our kryptonite an absolutely silly number of attacks. Add in some KDK, and I think you have a list that can shake up the meta.

 Grimgold wrote:
Toughness isn't the only thing that makes necrons unique, we are one of the few armies able to mix shooting and CC, and the only army where everybody is a threat to anything. Besides, we are still tougher. FnP is generally inferior to RP, and that and a 5+ FnP reroll ones is less awesome than a 4+ RP and often rerolling ones.

They also have a lot of taxes to get the sons of mortarion formation, specifically 15+ plague marines, which are almost twice the cost of the humble warrior, and no where near as tough or as shooty as two warriors. Hell in a shooting match their odds are worse than 50-50 when going one on one with an immortal, who are cheaper, as tough or tougher and have a better gun. Even assuming they just stick with the legion rules and pick and choose their formations, they are limited to MoN, have worse leadership than us, and are still overcost. Don't get me wrong this is a huge QoL improvement for chaos, but it won't bring them into the top 7, at least not the deathguard anyway. We will fight them how we fight everyone, tough out what they throw at us and grind them into dust, nothing they have will save them from destroyers, massed flayer fire, or getting their important units tar pitted.

Honestly I'm much more worried about the world eaters, they are all fearless, get fleet, +3 inches to charge distance for the maelstrom of gore, and get to move forward 2d6 inches after setup but before the first turn. Turn 1 charges are expected (it's like the bad old days of third), and they come bearing our kryptonite an absolutely silly number of attacks. Add in some KDK, and I think you have a list that can shake up the meta.

They won't want the formation for Troops. They're going CAD outside of using Terminators and Raptors.

That terminator formation is not good enough to justify terminators, getting to shoot twice on the turn you deep strike is meh, they still don't pack enough ranged punch to make it worthwhile, and they can't get into CC their first turn. Raptors suck, they would have a hard time chewing thru warriors, especially since they don't even get bonus attacks for charging. Warp talons can bring the heat, but are freaking 34 points per model. To fill the formation It takes a minimum of three warp talons at units 180 per, plus another kitted out chaos lord. The formation could easily top 700 points for 16 models that are slightly more tough than an ultra marine. The second something like lychguard or wraiths get in on them they are dead.

You won't see that list in the winners circle, because If they brought that against wolves or another CC focused army, they would get crushed in the blink of an eye. Hell My dark angels army would send them home with a rupture.

Haven't played Necrons since the most recent codex came out. It seems like everyone is running a ton of Destroyers now and not as many Wraiths. Would it be safe to buy Destroyers right now or should I wait until FAQ?

What does a general tourney Necron list look like nowadays? I sadly don't have any Destroyers (I do have a Destroyer Lord for Wraiths) or Deathmarks.

I studied Traitor Legions quite a lot and made quite a lot of lists. Deathguard Chaos Warband is a serious problem. They pack 5+ FNP and rerolls on 1s for their entire army(as well as relentless and fearless), +1 toughness to all their models and play with a lot of marines/rhinos (lots of plasma/melta), 1 terminator suicide squad with combi-meltas and at least 3 havoc units with heavy weapons who are relentless and fearless and also gain stealth USR when being shot from over 18".

The 3 Havoc squads who are tough as nails, relentless and fearless are going to be the main issue. Tomb blades are going to be really usefull there. Charging the tomb blades into them is a good idea, imo.
Destroyers are , obviously, as mentioned stars in this match up.

Now, the problem is the chaos need chaos warband + 1 aux formation. That aux formation might be the helldrakes. If they do chose the helldrakes, they've got a field day versus any decurion and any battle company (thanks to openning rhinos/razorbacks etc with 3 ac/lc havoc relentless squads).
Which probably means, helldrakes might become a staple in their army. Which we also have no way to deal with. At this point, I think Deathguard will be a counter to Battle Company and Necron Decurion lists, especially Necron Decurions. That's because every single model in their list is also ObSec whereas we have none.(Yes, even their fuckin rhinos)

It's impossible to outshoot/outsurvive them when their entire army is fearless/relentless/fnp/reroll 1s/stealth(over 18") and helldrakes just make a fool of us. And, the objective game is even harder to win. So, all in all, I don't suggest to change arround based on Deathguard, it's a counter-list, probably not worth swapping for. Just count on tomb blades/destroyers and hope for the best.


EDIT: Posted the list for truth.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/710905.page#9074933

 Grimgold wrote:
Toughness isn't the only thing that makes necrons unique, we are one of the few armies able to mix shooting and CC, and the only army where everybody is a threat to anything. Besides, we are still tougher. FnP is generally inferior to RP, and that and a 5+ FnP reroll ones is less awesome than a 4+ RP and often rerolling ones.

While that's true, you have to take it in context. MoN gives everything +1T, which means that their basic troops are as tough as our Elites. And in the Vectorium they're Stealthed past a distance, giving them an advantage against long ranged good AP shooting, which is our bane. So while their FNP is 11% less effective than RP (though we do have the edge when it comes to ID), they're also harder to wound for everything except D and Grav, and will advance forward with an extra save against armor-ignoring weapons.

They also have a lot of taxes to get the sons of mortarion formation, specifically 15+ plague marines, which are almost twice the cost of the humble warrior, and no where near as tough or as shooty as two warriors. Hell in a shooting match their odds are worse than 50-50 when going one on one with an immortal, who are cheaper, as tough or tougher and have a better gun. Even assuming they just stick with the legion rules and pick and choose their formations, they are limited to MoN, have worse leadership than us, and are still overcost. Don't get me wrong this is a huge QoL improvement for chaos, but it won't bring them into the top 7, at least not the deathguard anyway. We will fight them how we fight everyone, tough out what they throw at us and grind them into dust, nothing they have will save them from destroyers, massed flayer fire, or getting their important units tar pitted.

They're not going sons of mortarion or CAD, they're going to be in a Vectorium with a Warband, I guarantee it. It's like a Decurion, but with ObSec on everything. You know how we hem and haw between Decurion for durability or CAD for ObSec scoring? Yeah, they don't have to make that decision.

You're also comparing Bolters to Gauss. They're not bringing just bolters. The major downside of Necron shooting is this: while we have the best basic guns in the game (unless you count Scat weaponry), the only heavy/special weapons we have are on extremely expensive and limited units. Now look at CSM, Chosen, and Havocs. All ObSec, all T5 with FNP/RR1, all with special and/or heavy weapon options. It's not a Plague Marine shooting a Bolter at an Immortal with Gauss, it's a CSM shooting a Melta Gun at an Immortal with Gauss. Only one of those is ignoring armor and reducing the special save, and it isn't ours.

And worse leadership is just straight wrong. Everything that has VotLW (so everything but Cultists and Spawn), has Fearless. LD10 is not Fearless.

 necr0n wrote:
I studied Traitor Legions quite a lot and made quite a lot of lists. Deathguard Chaos Warband is a serious problem. They pack 5+ FNP and rerolls on 1s for their entire army(as well as relentless and fearless), +1 toughness to all their models and play with a lot of marines/rhinos (lots of plasma/melta), 1 terminator suicide squad with combi-meltas and at least 3 havoc units with heavy weapons who are relentless and fearless and also gain stealth USR when being shot from over 18".

The 3 Havoc squads who are tough as nails, relentless and fearless are going to be the main issue. Tomb blades are going to be really usefull there. Charging the tomb blades into them is a good idea, imo.
Destroyers are , obviously, as mentioned stars in this match up.

Now, the problem is the chaos need chaos warband + 1 aux formation. That aux formation might be the helldrakes. If they do chose the helldrakes, they've got a field day versus any decurion and any battle company (thanks to openning rhinos/razorbacks etc with 3 ac/lc havoc relentless squads).
Which probably means, helldrakes might become a staple in their army. Which we also have no way to deal with. At this point, I think Deathguard will be a counter to Battle Company and Necron Decurion lists, especially Necron Decurions. That's because every single model in their list is also ObSec whereas we have none.(Yes, even their fuckin rhinos)

It's impossible to outshoot/outsurvive them when their entire army is fearless/relentless/fnp/reroll 1s/stealth(over 18") and helldrakes just make a fool of us. And, the objective game is even harder to win. So, all in all, I don't suggest to change arround based on Deathguard, it's a counter-list, probably not worth swapping for. Just count on tomb blades/destroyers and hope for the best.


EDIT: Posted the list for truth.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/710905.page#9074933

Yep, this is entirely right. Vectorium with Chaos Warband and Heldrakes is going to be the new hotness.


See, here's the thing:

Necrons live and die by their durability (pun somewhat intended). Our entire sticking point is that we're harder to kill, and even though our guns kinda suck for the most part, we're going to take less casualties and eventually outlast you. Even in losing games, we generally only lose by points and only have a handful of models removed (unless you're going against Tau/Eldar, in which case getting tabled is just a matter of time). Which is great - it fits the army thematically, we have one of the best designs when it comes to sticking to a theme.

But now there's an army that is, when taken as a whole, just as durable (as noted above, RP vs Fearless and higher Toughness), but also has better shooting options and has ObSec to play the objective game. There are very little options we have that are both unique and better.

I'm not saying that we're a bad army now, but it is incredibly frustrating and honestly I'm just thinking of buying some HH boxes and starting Death Guard because I know I'll win way more games with them.

Relentless havocs are wonderful, but they are still expensive devastators, and they don't have access to grav. A unit of them with missile launchers is more expensive than a unit of destroyers, and the destroyers would take their lunch money. The reason chaos has sucked up to this point isn't for lack of spiffy rules, it's because they are overcost, and while traitor legions help, they are still overcost. Polishing a turd I believe is the saying.

 Grimgold wrote:
Relentless havocs are wonderful, but they are still expensive devastators, and they don't have access to grav. A unit of them with missile launchers is more expensive than a unit of destroyers, and the destroyers would take their lunch money. The reason chaos has sucked up to this point isn't for lack of spiffy rules, it's because they are overcost, and while traitor legions help, they are still overcost. Polishing a turd I believe is the saying.

I didn't mention Havocs, because they're the one given "it sucks but you have to take it for the formation" unit.

If I had, I would say a unit of DG Havocs with Lascannons sitting in ruins are T5, have a 3+ cover save and FNP, and are longer ranged than Heavy Destroyers, and are camping an objective with ObSec. For 5 points more than 3 Heavy Destroyers (with less rerolls but an extra shot).

Like I said, our main bonus over DG is that we're better priced, but most of our stuff is just there to soak shots. Warriors have slightly better bolters... so maybe 2 units of 10 can kill a (FREE) Rhino per turn. Or maybe 2 units rapid firing can deal a wound or two to a Wraithknight. Wow. Having more bodies but no options for Plasma, Melta, or even Lascannons on anything but Heavies is the tradeoff we make.

In the current metagame, having a bunch of cheap, durable bodies isn't as good as having less cheap, but just as durable bodies with better guns, in my experience. Too many times I've gotten my entire army to midfield or even all the way across the table only to be unable to kill anything because breaking 2+ saves or high toughness 3+ is well outside our wheelhouse. It's why I run DCult in basically every list, and when I don't, I'm using the Renegade Knight instead.

Additionally, while our Deathstars suffer in the meta because they're slow as slime and have no buffing powers on the level of Invis or the like, DG can just run T6 bikes with a pimped-out Lord plus a Cyclopia Cabal to buff it up.

I'm not quitting Necrons or saying we're trash, it's just incredibly frustrating to see an army with most of our strengths (durability on every unit) and few of our weaknesses (no special/heavy weapons, power units are all extremely slow). I'm still going to work on making Necrons competitive, it just has put me further on tilt when I'm already there from playing bloody Eldar and Tau all the time.

I'll just keep pointing out how specific units are not as good as similarly priced necron equivalents, So let's stop talking hypotheticals and start talking list, what Deathguard list in specific are you talking about that is almost as tough as necrons but has better offense?

Also you don't need to work to make necrons competitive, check the ITC rankings, we are very competitive. Our average score for the top 50 ITC players per faction is third out of all armies.

 Grimgold wrote:
I'll just keep pointing out how specific units are not as good as similarly priced necron equivalents, So let's stop talking hypotheticals and start talking list, what Deathguard list in specific are you talking about that is almost as tough as necrons but has better offense?

Also you don't need to work to make necrons competitive, check the ITC rankings, we are very competitive. Our average score for the top 50 ITC players per faction is third out of all armies.

I don't know enough to build minutiae for CSM. It'll be a Vectorium with Warband, probably Heldrake Aux, reasonably sized unit of Bikes, Lord on Bike, and then options. Either Cyclopia Cabal tacked on (can't be part of DG), or allies (BB Daemons/KDK still awesome), or transports (I forsee Dreadclaws being a thing).

Overall scoring is based on events gone to. Let's see how many Necrons get into top 8 of LVO. Last year it was two - one Deathstar piloted by one of the best players in the country, and one gimmick list that I still don't understand (and I best most of his opponents didn't either). I'm betting this year it'll be zero, since Wraithstars are all but dead and gone, but hey, we'll see.

I think that Necrons are either going to need to take pylons of some flavor, or ally in a Renegade Knight or two to do some stomp action. In my games, I'm definitely feeling the lack of offensive punch.

One thing that might matter, imo:

We will see more tough marines and more rhinos/low av transports. This will shift the entire meta towards more str 7~ and ap3 weaponry, effectively bringing more plasma etc.

The way I see, I'm predicting this shift and are fielding Ghost Arks 1) to protect my warriors and 2) because anti-AV weaponry will be even more limited**. Ghost arks are already (imo, at least) at a very good status, this will probably make them staple in the necron Decurions.

On another note, although I'm not sure about that:
AV 14, STR 8(instant death to t4 huh) AP 3(marine-killing yay?) large blast Monolith might not be that bad of a choice for filling some points in the Reclamation Legion, although it really IS melta-bait.

**When 3 of the 5 competitive armies are Battle Companies/Bikers/Death Guard/Necron Decurions, I do believe people will bring less high strength weapons

I might be predicting this, because I'm currently experimenting on my Ghost Arks/Monolith/Lychstar list and I'm biased, or I could possibly have a point. I really don't know. (related list: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/710651.page;jsessionid=B097B537CAFB4347DC8997728120240F)

The Monolith blast is alright. S8 doesn't ID anything T5 or higher, which is all of Death Guard, but it'll mess up BatCo and Jetbikes something awful. Potentially Warp Spiders too, if they don't just jump away.

It's just the rest of the Monolith that's the problem. Melta, D, Grav, and Haywire don't care about AV14, and they're all relatively in the meta (Haywire less since BB Drop Pod nerf slammed Skitarii, but still there on occasion).

Decided to try out the Monolith. But, since I'm going to do it, I'm doing it the hard way, bringing two! Since, I'm bringing Monoliths, I brought units to benefit from them! Canoptek harvest is a great formation to benefit, I guess and I also brought my favorite Lychguard!

Talking about this! http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/711247.page#9080886

I'm testing it in a game versus Deathguard warband the following week!

 necr0n wrote:
Decided to try out the Monolith. But, since I'm going to do it, I'm doing it the hard way, bringing two! Since, I'm bringing Monoliths, I brought units to benefit from them! Canoptek harvest is a great formation to benefit, I guess and I also brought my favorite Lychguard!

Talking about this! http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/711247.page#9080886

I'm testing it in a game versus Deathguard warband the following week!

good luck! Let us know how double monolith works out for you

I hope that it goes well for you, but I'm also hoping not too well. See...
I've promised myself that when I do paint a Monolith, I'll need an airbrush. And if I need an airbrush, I'll need to remodel my hobby space. And if I remodel my hobby space, I'll buy an air nailer, and if I buy an airnailer, then I'll need a compressor for it. And since I'll need a big shop compressor, I might as well run lines into my hobby space (since I'll be remodeling it). Those lines will run the airbrush.
And that is how someone else's playtest causes me to take out a second morgage.

You don't need an airbrush. I painted mine by hand, back when they didn't have airbrushes.
Now, an airbrush would certainly make the job a bit faster, but if you can't use an airbrush then don't use it.

Monoliths aren't really hard to paint anyway; there are a lot of large flat areas on the model. You just need time, paint, and a big brush.

Has anyone run a CAD including the Tesseract Ark, from Forgeworld? It comes with an invuln save, though a low one, and its shooting profiles give access to longer ranged, good Strength/good AP blasts.

The Night Shroud Bombers are also interesting (and can be an expensive addition to a Decurion) but I don't think they really bring anything that Necrons need.

I'm trying to make a Necrons list with stronger guns than usual, and it stinks because we have quite a bit to choose from -- FW options, DDAs, the Monolith -- but they're all either points prohibitive or incapable of really bringing their weapons to bear. If only C'tan could choose their shooting profiles...

What sort of anti-air solutions do Necrons have?

 JNAProductions wrote:
What sort of anti-air solutions do Necrons have?

Depends on how much you hate the aircraft.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
What sort of anti-air solutions do Necrons have?

Depends on how much you hate the aircraft.

Let's say it's Magnus.

 JNAProductions wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
What sort of anti-air solutions do Necrons have?

Depends on how much you hate the aircraft.

Let's say it's Magnus.

Night Scythes spam shots that don't have AP so that the save he pays for is less valuable, and then you got Gauss Pylons for 2 TL S9 AP2 shots. And the obelisk exists, but I suggest ignoring it until we know what the firing arcs of the Tesla Spheres really are.

Isn't the Obelisk really mediocre at dealing with air though? I don't remember the spheres having skyfire, and its passive of giving a 1/6 chance of making aircraft take damage doesn't seem great.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Isn't the Obelisk really mediocre at dealing with air though? I don't remember the spheres having skyfire, and its passive of giving a 1/6 chance of making aircraft take damage doesn't seem great.

It is putting 5-10 shots out on the target on top of the AA ability.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Isn't the Obelisk really mediocre at dealing with air though? I don't remember the spheres having skyfire, and its passive of giving a 1/6 chance of making aircraft take damage doesn't seem great.

It is putting 5-10 shots out on the target on top of the AA ability.

Which are snapshots that don't benefit from Tesla. It's pretty suboptimal.

Also reminder that if you play with Death From The Skies (which no one does, but it's technically the rules), the Scythes have to shapshoot at flyers. Because reasons.

If you want to shoot down flyers, get a Riptide Wing or something.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Isn't the Obelisk really mediocre at dealing with air though? I don't remember the spheres having skyfire, and its passive of giving a 1/6 chance of making aircraft take damage doesn't seem great.

It is putting 5-10 shots out on the target on top of the AA ability.

With each having a 1/6 chance of hitting and can't proc tesla, which is what makes tesla weapons worthwhile.
As Super Heavy anti-air platforms go, its pretty terrible, imo. Not a particularly well designed unit.
I would actually put in the same category as a monolith, as it's a vehicle that's clearly designed for something, but lacks the means to do it effectively.
The monolith is meant to be a heavy transport / support vehicle, but it lacks the means of getting to where you want it to be without dying.
The Obelisk is meant to be an anti-air vehicle, but its not at all efficient at its role.

Ayone else like to field a Double annihilation Nexus just to see that wtf moment on your opponent face?

Damage can be a bit random but the board control man.

I found out it's quite good to force your opponents to diversify their lists instead of just fielding a classic counter to decurion-wraith-destroyer cult.

It is a shame about the super point hike on the Barges. They were too cheap beforehand but now they're super expensive for what they do.

yeh, the 30 point price hike was too steep, especially as they are no longer good makeshift AA like before. 10pts would have sufficient.

Like it was said many many pages ago,
Either a price increase OR a nerf.
Both and you doom it to mediocrity.

The only way GW can redeem it would be to somehow give it Skyfire... but that probably won't happen unless they decide to release a Necron supplement (very unlikely).

I realise this may be a minority view, but I don't think the Obelisk is terrible.It's certainly better than the burger van IMO. Tesla spheres are pretty awesome against armies like eldar, that are relying on lots of small units of jetbikes which the amount of shots you pump out at them is just gonna decimate. The gravity pulse ability is also pretty useful, as it is either going to begin to make your opponent start taking casualties with their movement, or force them into making suboptimal movements and mistakes.

Flyers aren't as prevalent in the current meta, but the Obelisk is a severe headache for people with two or more flyers in their force if it's sitting in the middle of the board.

Plus thunderblitz is quite a useful addition to Necrons, especially for clearing stuff away from hard to reach objectives if your force is mostly made up of slow moving warriors.

It's not the greatest superheavy in the game, but if you build tactics around it I reckon it can be a strategic unit that means you control the board to a large degree.

If you run the Obelisk, you probably want to run it in a Living Tomb list.

For example . . .

Reclamation Legion (Core)
Nemesor Zandrekh
10 Warriors
10 Warriors
6 Immortals
4 Tomb Blades: shieldvanes, nebuloscopes

Judicator Battalion
Triarch Stalker – Heat Ray
Triarch Praetorians: 6 Rods of Covenant
Triarch Praetorians: 6 Voidblade + Particle Caster

Living Tomb
Obelisk
Monolith

8 Deathmarks

8 Deathmarks


The list has a lot of mobility and a lot of reserve manipulation potential.

Yeah I've seen that list before, from the LVO?

I regularly use the Judicator Battalion, but not sure I'd go for the blade + pistol praetorians, would just take all Rods of Covenant. Love the two big Deathmark squads, super win.

As regards the living tomb - Obelisks I like, for me the jury is still out a bit on the Monoliths IMO.

The point behind the LVO list was bypassing mobility restrictions and using the monoliths, with precision deep strike (within 12"), to place the squads you need where they need them.

You'll notice, with that list, that otherwise, your warriors and immortals have to slog across the battlefield.

Granted, you could offset this loss with transports, but the whole point is to Target Denial dedicated AV on turn 1.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Supplemental:

Also, this allows for a Swiss Army knife precision tactical approach for the praets. You send the rods versus 2+ sv targets, and sword/guns versus the mulching targets. Monoliths allow you to play this game with greater detail and across the whole board.

Aside from the whole firing arc for the tesla spheres, which is more or less a solved issue at this point since the FAQ (but some still choose to argue it), s7 tesla isn't really that useful of a weapon. It's great for popping low armor vehicles, but we don't really need much help in that area. No AP means it's so so against infantry, and str 7 makes it unreliable against heavier vehicles. Heavy 5 tesla averages out to about 5 hits per sphere, so if you can get all four spheres into play it can pressure your opponent, but with 24" range it's fairly easy for units to get away from. It's also a LoW which is a huge liability in tournaments, as it takes away your ability to get a counter in the form of the Warlord traits.

Actually having no AP isn't that big a liability, because it isn't paying for the opponent just to get a lesser save in cover.

However, firing arcs is the biggest issue for them. Assuming they can point two at the same target, they're doing a good amount of damage. Otherwise, they're definitely not worth fielding.

 Grimgold wrote:
Aside from the whole firing arc for the tesla spheres, which is more or less a solved issue at this point since the FAQ (but some still choose to argue it), s7 tesla isn't really that useful of a weapon. It's great for popping low armor vehicles, but we don't really need much help in that area. No AP means it's so so against infantry, and str 7 makes it unreliable against heavier vehicles. Heavy 5 tesla averages out to about 5 hits per sphere, so if you can get all four spheres into play it can pressure your opponent, but with 24" range it's fairly easy for units to get away from. It's also a LoW which is a huge liability in tournaments, as it takes away your ability to get a counter in the form of the Warlord traits.

Agreed.

I've read a lot of positive comments about its anti flyer, as well: do not be fooled! This model is not anti flyer in any meaningful way.

What is everyone's opinion on the catacomb command barge, I play in meta that gets riptides, so it gets killed often before getting to do anything.

oz of the north wrote:
What is everyone's opinion on the catacomb command barge, I play in meta that gets riptides, so it gets killed often before getting to do anything.

I brought it to a tournament a few months back. It did well, except in the game against Eldar with a Warp Hunter (because multi-shot barrage D is fair and balanced)

Being immune to most small arms fire is nice. It's also relatively compact enough to hide if you play with enough LOS blocking terrain.

Against your Tau meta, he'll be immune to all the SMS guns, any Infantry weapons, etc. The S7 blasts aren't even that scary, and the S9 ones you can Jink against as well. Just make sure it's not the only thing they can shoot at - Target saturation is the key to any army. If it's out by itself, of course it's gonna get lit up. If it's alongside Destroyers and Wraiths, then something will get across.

It should gib a Riptide with no problem. Remember the Nightmare Shroud (which you should be taking on him) will cause Fear, and the Riptides are not immune.

Stormsurges are another story. They are just really gakky for us.

It needs the sweep attacks again. I haven't used one since the new edition I think.

Requizen wrote:

oz of the north wrote:
What is everyone's opinion on the catacomb command barge, I play in meta that gets riptides, so it gets killed often before getting to do anything.

I brought it to a tournament a few months back. It did well, except in the game against Eldar with a Warp Hunter (because multi-shot barrage D is fair and balanced)

Being immune to most small arms fire is nice. It's also relatively compact enough to hide if you play with enough LOS blocking terrain.

Against your Tau meta, he'll be immune to all the SMS guns, any Infantry weapons, etc. The S7 blasts aren't even that scary, and the S9 ones you can Jink against as well. Just make sure it's not the only thing they can shoot at - Target saturation is the key to any army. If it's out by itself, of course it's gonna get lit up. If it's alongside Destroyers and Wraiths, then something will get across.

It should gib a Riptide with no problem. Remember the Nightmare Shroud (which you should be taking on him) will cause Fear, and the Riptides are not immune.

Stormsurges are another story. They are just really gakky for us.

With riptides I am afraid of marker lights and str. 9 ordinance. Which should kill a open top vehicle easily.

Honestly, I'm not a fan. I don't think its that effective, as its an fragile open topped vehicle that wants you to throw your commander into melta range. For a model that has command in its name, it doesn't seem to give command benefits.

It also looks kind of silly. The barge types already look a bit absurd, and the command barge makes it worse by having one of them standing upright. Because no one would ever shoot your army commander when he's exposed in a box, advancing towards the enemy there, right?

It doesn't look like something a machine would make to me. One of the problems I have with the newer aesthetic is they moved away from what a bunch of extremely ordered machines would design, and instead make it look too...Well, I wouldn't say human, because humans would know better than to expose the cockpit in a jet. Robots should not care if they feel the wind on their chassis.
Remember the monolith? That imposing block of metal? That's what their vehicles should like like. And of course they ruined that by giving it crew.

Yes, but some of these robots still cling to the memories of before they lost their flesh and are constantly trying to retain any elements of that culture. This includes putting seats and steering wheels in vehicles that are perfectly capable of operating themselves autonomously.
Meanwhile there are other robots who have completely forgotten they were ever mortal and simply trudge through the Universe killing everything they encounter because they think they're supposed to. They don't know why, they just do it. No silly seat vehicles for those guys.
Luckily neither example is the correct one, while both being correct.
Some people can play their 'Crons as grand dynastic conquerors. Others can play them as cold automatons. No one is wrong, here.

But even when they were fleshy that type of vehicle wouldn't make sense, as they were supposed to be obsessed with self-preservation and not dying. A race like that would not design their military vehicles in such a way that it exposes its pilots to harm, and they would automate as much as they can as to reduce casualties.

Their vehicle designs simply do not make sense, in neither the original fluff interpretation nor the newer one.
To me, its clear that GW did not base their designs on the background, but on "lol Warring senile space robot Egypt."

Why would anyone trust their safety to flimsy metal walls, when they could be protected by impenetrable* quantum shielding?

And if you're protected by impenetrable* quantum shielding, you might as well have a clear view of your enemies being vaporized by our superior** firepower?

*guarenteed to block any shot or die trying
**rumours of new technologies developed by pointy-eared younger races are unverified rumours. Our Codex claims our weapons have been the best since ever, you have no reason to doubt our propaganda!

Yeh, impenetrable until it gets penetrated. Then you're fethed.
Not that penetration matters in this meta anyway.
Its like one of those Russian army memes "you see ivanotek, no armor plating aids in seeing enemy, before we get shot through glorious invisible wall"

You'd think that a logical race obsessed with self-preservation (hence the appeal of biotransference) would put a metal wall behind the force field. But that would make sense.

Anyway, on topic, I generally prefer to use scythes to deliver my overlord into combat, if he's attached to a unit of lychguard. Otherwise he tends to stay out of combat, even if he's armed with a warscythe. Because warscythes are cool.
I used to attach the destroyer lord to wraiths, but that's a bit tricky now that they are beasts (they keep changing their unit type. First jetbikes, then jump infantry now beasts for some stupid reason. Make up your mind GW)
I guess praets are the only valid retinue now, as destroyers generally want to be shooting as much as possible. There should be a cc option for destroyers.

Hello, again, fellow Necrons. Played a game last week, in which I fielded my dreaded Tesla-Cult. (didn't manage to bring my MonoLych, due to some limitations)



I played versus Deathguard chaos warband with Helldrakes Aux and a DP. The Annihilation Barges turned out to be pretty good at killing the rhinos, while my Ghost Arks were litterally amazing, survivable units bringing a LOT of shooting. The Destroyers were not as usefull as I wanted them to be, they were very vulnerable versus the 2 Helldrakes and the ammount of plasma going arround and I couldn't get off any good shooting. Overall, the vehicles (ghost arks + anni barges) are really survivable (well, i guess depending on the opponent, but versus the deathguard they were quite hardcore). I jinked just about every time he pulled the trigger on one of my vehicles, I didn't want to get greedy. The Necron Lord was in the Wraith unit till the begining of the second turn, when he solar pulsed for the Wraiths. (Which really worked really well, since they did get in assault in Turn 3 without any casualties). I ended the game having lost all of my regular Destroyers,1 Annihilation Barge and some Wraiths. The Wraiths cleaned up quite some Marine Squads (together with the D.Lord obviously). I'll admit my Jink saves were probably better than average, but it wasn't hard at all to deny any melta shots. Some Chaos terminators with combi-melta DS'ed behind my vehicles, but Deathmarks killed one of them and I ended up surviving through Jinking and killing them next turn.
All in all, the list performed very well, exept for the Destroyers who underperformed, although it's reasonable, given how they were the only vulnerable/easy to shoot unit in my list. All in all, it seems like a good list which might catch someone off guard, given there's 5 AV 13 jinking vehicles, a quite survivable AND capable deathstar and the Destroyer wing.

This week, I'm playing some Dark Angels/Blood Angels list for a change of pace, but I'm just buying time for my Mono-Lych list to be ready (models-wise).

EDIT: Is it possible to have two Overlords with VoD? Or, have an Overlord with a VoD and a Royal Court with Obyron included. If it is possible, how would you like it in a Lychstar? A possible turn 1 blink with Obyron and then, if need be, a second one (the VoD, which can even take us out of combat in case we're stuck in a tarpit).

EDIT: Is it possible to have two Overlords with VoD?

Not in one Detachment. Edit [Correction]: The following Italics was incorrect in my post. You could ally in another Necron force and put a VoD on an Overlord in there... but that Overlord couldn't join any units in your Primary Detachment.

Or, have an Overlord with a VoD and a Royal Court with Obyron included.

Yes, you can. Obyron comes with a Ghostwalk Mantle, which while similar is not the same Artefact of the Aeons.

If it is possible, how would you like it in a Lychstar? A possible turn 1 blink with Obyron and then, if need be, a second one (the VoD, which can even take us out of combat in case we're stuck in a tarpit).

A LychStar with both Obyron and a VoD Overlord is a great (albeit expensive) unit. Bear in mind that due to how slow they are, and that you can't charge after re-DeepStriking, that means they'll only realistically be in combat for 2, possibly 3 Game Turns of the game. Accordingly, make sure the rest of your army is able to score objectives on the basis of what you're achieving with this unit.

This contrasts sharply with most other Stars in the game meta, which have combinations of 12" movement and significant one-Game Turn killing power (ensuring they are free to move on to the next target on the subsequent turn). This isn't a salty comment! It's merely to provide a suggestion on how to think about using this unit which won't be the same as other Stars you might have seen elsewhere.

sieGermans wrote:

EDIT: Is it possible to have two Overlords with VoD?

Not in one Detachment. You could ally in another Necron force and put a VoD on an Overlord in there... but that Overlord couldn't join any units in your Primary Detachment.

The underlined is incorrect. As the two Detachments would be of the same Faction, they're free to join each other.

However, your list cannot contain two of the same unique (eg. Veil)

Hey what a good starting force to start the Necrons with?

 EnsignTuna wrote:
Hey what a good starting force to start the Necrons with?

Overview: I typed up this guide when we were talking about a new thread for necrons, and it is a guide for how to start collecting a necrons army, while not necessarily buying everything at once. It's broken up into four phases, with each phase being a playable army that uses all or almost all of the models collected thus far. Where possible I place an emphasis on thrift and an eye towards building an effective army now and laying the foundations for an effective army to come.

TL; DR Collection Order Summary

Phase 1 Getting Started
1.) Start Collecting Box

Phase 2a 1k CAD
2.) Necron Codex (Digital or used)
3.) Warriors (NIB preferably) - Congratulations you have your first CAD
4.) Canoptek Wraiths
5.) Tomb Blades (you are very likely to pay retail for these)
6.) Unit of immortals
7.) Tomb Spyder - Congratulations you can make your first decurion, though you might not play it that way immediately.

Phase 2b 1k Decurion
8.) More Canoptek Wraiths

Phase 3 1500 CAD/Decurion
9.) 2 x 5 Triarch Praetorians
10.) Ghost Arc

Phase 1 - Start collecting (retail $85, ebay usually 70$ New with free shipping)
There is nothing in this box you won't use, from the warriors to the stalker to the scarabs to the overlord. It comes with it's own formation, is around 450 points, and is a significant discount from retail. A word to the wise, the stalker is an excellent candidate to magnatize it's weapon, all three of it's weapons are good against different targets, and rather than have to proxy you can magnatize it's one weapon attachment point, it's super easy, here is a good tutorial on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JbpKSUoCn8 with the added bonus of there already a hole in the place you'll need so if you use to different diameter magnets (a large one on top of the hole, and small ones attached to the weapons) you won't have to do the predrilling.

Phase 2a - 1k Combined arms detachment (retail is $225 before tax and shipping, ebay varies but as of writing it was $158 in buy it now)
Technically all you need to have a combined arms detachment (the default force org chart) is one more troop choice (warriors or immortals), but this section is a bridge from the start collecting box to your first decurion. Even if you choose to not run a decurion, having the option to run our most competitive formation is a good goal (because your opponents won't feel bad about running formations even while they throw salt at yours). Your first two purchases should be the Necron Codex (digital is cheaper, and you can use google books/readium if you don't have an I-phone), and a unit of warriors (NIB is best for this because it will come with the extra scarabs). This will put you around 700 points depending on how you kit your overlord and and stalker. Your next purchases should be a box of Canoptek wraiths (build them with whip coils) and a box of Tomb Blades (build them with gauss blasters), both of these are excellent additions to your CAD and give you mobility it was lacking up to this point. Your final Purchases for this phase are a unit of Immortals (build them with Gauss) and a Tomb Spyder (put the guns on it, you'll rarely run it this way, but it's better to have it and not need it). Your Phase 2 CAD List should look like this (999 points):

+ HQ +
····Overlord [Phase Shifter, Warscythe]

+ Elites +
····Triarch Stalkers
······Triarch Stalker [Heat Ray]

+ Troops +
····Immortals [Gauss Blaster, 5x Immortal]
····Warriors
······11x Necron Warrior [11x Gauss Flayer]
····Warriors
······12x Necron Warrior [12x Gauss Flayer]

+ Fast Attack +
····Canoptek Scarabs [6x Canoptek Scarab]
····Canoptek Wraiths x 3
······[Whip Coils]
····Tomb Blades x 3
······[Nebuloscope, Shield Vanes, Twin-linked Gauss Blaster]

+ Heavy Support +
····Canoptek Spyders [Canoptek Spyder]

Phase 2b - 1k Decurion (Retail $47, usually around $37 on ebay)
Welcome to the majors, the only addition to the 1k CAD you need to make is a three more wraiths because you'll have to leave your stalker in the box to run a decurion (don't worry he'll be back soon, and it's worth it). Decurions are quite different from cads in the way your army will be put together, instead of individual units you will take formations that consist of multiple units, so it's less flexible in which units you get to take, but it comes with advantages that more than offset that. The first formation you'll need is your reclamation legion, which will be the core of the army. You'll also need at least one auxiliary, for which we will be using the canoptek harvest. Decurions come with a grab bag of army wide special rules, relentless, move thru cover, and enhanced repair protocols (now you repair on a 4+). In addition each formation has it's own special rules, so your reclamation legion allows it's members within 12" of your overlord to reroll ones on repair protocols. Your harvest gives your wraith, scarabs, and spyder repair protocols (there are other options but they are kind of lame), which being in a decurion bumps up to a 4+. As you can imagine this is quite a bit stronger than the 1k CAD, and most armies don't get their counters to decurions until higher points, so please decurion responsibly, unless you are facing Tau, eldar, or space marines, in which case go wild because they can take the heat. Here is a sample of what your decurion should look like:

+ Core +
····Formation: Reclamation Legion
······Immortals [Gauss Blaster, 5x Immortal]
······Overlord [Gauntlet of Fire, Phase Shifter, Warscythe]
······Tomb Blades
········3x Tomb Blade [Nebuloscope, Shield Vanes, Twin-linked Gauss Blaster]
······Warriors
········12x Necron Warrior [12x Gauss Flayer]
······Warriors
········10x Necron Warrior [10x Gauss Flayer]

+ Auxiliary +
····Formation: Canoptek Harvest [Canoptek Spyder]
······Canoptek Scarabs [6x Canoptek Scarab]
······Canoptek Wraiths
········6x Canoptek Wraith [Whip Coils]

Phase 3 - 1500pt CAD/Decurion (retail $116 around $103 on ebay)
1500pts is the common points value for friendly games, it's also where most armies will hit their stride. In order to use your stalker you'll need two 5 man units of triarch Praetorians. There is alot of debate on how to equip them, I feel the void blade/pistol option is more flexible, but in an army as short on AP 2 as necrons the Rod is also very tempting, You might go with one of each if you are on the fence. The judicator battalion has one of the most insane special rules, which allows the stalker and the prats to reroll missed hits and failed wounds/armor pen rolls on a unit designated by the stalker. You'll want to make sure to get at least 25% cover on the stalker as it will draw alot of fire. With both a judicator battalion and a Canoptek harvest, you'll be a little CC heavy, so my final reccomendation is a ghost Arc, which is a great boost to your armies shooting, and is a second vehicle for your army which will also make your stalker a bit more survivable, by giving your opponents anti-vehicle units more targets. If you took all of my advice to this point here is what your list will look like:

+ Core +
····Formation: Reclamation Legion
······Immortals [Gauss Blaster, 5x Immortal]
······Overlord [Phase Shifter, Warscythe]
······Tomb Blades
········3x Tomb Blade [Nebuloscope, Shield Vanes, Twin-linked Gauss Blaster]
······Warriors
········12x Necron Warrior [12x Gauss Flayer]
······Warriors
········Ghost Ark [2x Gauss Flayer Array]
········10x Necron Warrior [10x Gauss Flayer]

+ Auxiliary +
····Formation: Canoptek Harvest [Canoptek Spyder]
······Canoptek Scarabs [6x Canoptek Scarab]
······Canoptek Wraiths
········6x Canoptek Wraith [Whip Coils]

····Formation: Judicator Battalion
······Triarch Praetorians [5x Triarch Praetorian, Voidblade & Particle Caster]
······Triarch Praetorians [Rod of Covenant, 5x Triarch Praetorian]
······Triarch Stalkers
········Triarch Stalker [Heat Ray]

Where to go next
If you've gotten this far, I imagine you'll have played a few games decided what you like and don't like, figured out what your local meta is like, and if so your well equipped to decide what units your interested in. Whichever way you go you'll have a solid base with a fairly competitive take all comers necron list. If your not planning on doing tournaments, you might add some models that are more interesting than optimized, things like Monoliths, C'tan, or deathmarks. If you are planning on doing tournaments (generally held at 1850 points) you have two paths forward, the easiest is to focus on your armies good units and get more of them, grab another unit of tomb blades, maybe another ghost arc, maybe some more prats. The other is to get our most effective formation, the destroyer cult, which will probably (but not necessarily) replace your judicator battalion.

*edit* one other thing to mentions is the necron warrior ark phalanx is a silly good bargain, you might replace your second unit of warriors with this, since it includes warriors and a ghost ark.

Man... anyone putting Anrakyr so low on their lists must be crazy. Pylon-star doesn't work without him, and its easily a top-2 Necron list in terms of competition.

Even outside that list, I feel like Pylons are wonderful if you're willing to foot the FW cost. I bought three for the Pylonstar but have since still taken at least one in any list that includes a CAD.

Pretty good write up, guys. Hopefully you'll edit them in the new tactics thread once the final codex FAQ is released for Necrons.

However, col, I'll have to disagree with you slightly on your Must Have section. Two Canoptek Harvests are nice but not absolutely necessary. A single will do nicely in many circumstances. Therefore , I might make a minor alteration-

col_impact wrote:

Spoiler:

Necron Must Haves:
20 Warriors
5 Immortals
3 Tomb Blades
3 Wraiths
1 Canoptek Spyder
6 Scarabs (should already have 6 included with 20 warriors)
9 Destroyers
1 Destroyer Lord
1 Nemesor Zandrekh

Necron Good to Have:
+3-6 Destroyers
2-3 Heavy Destroyers
+1 Spyder
+3-6 Wraiths
+3 Scarabs (for Retribution Phalanx)
+6-9 Tomb Blades
10 Praetorians
1 Triarch Stalker
5-10 Sword and Board Lychguard
1 Orikan
1 Vargard Obyron
1 Overlord/Catacomb Command Barge

Necron Optionals:
Night Scythes/Doom Scythes
Ghost Arks
1 C'tan Shard of the Nightbringer
2 Crypteks
10 Flayed Ones
5-10 Deathmarks
1 Illuminor Szeras
1 Lord
+1 Overlord

Necron Don't Need:
Annihilation Barges
Doomsday Ark
Obelisk
Monolith
Tesseract Vault
C'tan Shard of the Deceiver
Transcendant C'tan
Anrakyr
Trazyn
Imotekh

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:
Man... anyone putting Anrakyr so low on their lists must be crazy. Pylon-star doesn't work without him, and its easily a top-2 Necron list in terms of competition.

Even outside that list, I feel like Pylons are wonderful if you're willing to foot the FW cost. I bought three for the Pylonstar but have since still taken at least one in any list that includes a CAD.

Mind measuring the dimensions of a Senty Pylon when you get a chance? I've been meaning to kitbash some but don't know the sizes.

Requizen wrote:

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:
Man... anyone putting Anrakyr so low on their lists must be crazy. Pylon-star doesn't work without him, and its easily a top-2 Necron list in terms of competition.

Even outside that list, I feel like Pylons are wonderful if you're willing to foot the FW cost. I bought three for the Pylonstar but have since still taken at least one in any list that includes a CAD.

Mind measuring the dimensions of a Senty Pylon when you get a chance? I've been meaning to kitbash some but don't know the sizes.

Literally buy/build a Night-scythe, turn its "body" sideways and you have a shockingly close approximation. Put some little legs on it so its foot-print looks roughly like a 60mm base, and you're set.

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:

Requizen wrote:

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:
Man... anyone putting Anrakyr so low on their lists must be crazy. Pylon-star doesn't work without him, and its easily a top-2 Necron list in terms of competition.

Even outside that list, I feel like Pylons are wonderful if you're willing to foot the FW cost. I bought three for the Pylonstar but have since still taken at least one in any list that includes a CAD.

Mind measuring the dimensions of a Senty Pylon when you get a chance? I've been meaning to kitbash some but don't know the sizes.

Literally buy/build a Night-scythe, turn its "body" sideways and you have a shockingly close approximation. Put some little legs on it so its foot-print looks roughly like a 60mm base, and you're set.

Wow, that's a lot larger than I thought it would be. Well, I'm sure I can figure something out.

Requizen wrote:

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:

Requizen wrote:

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:
Man... anyone putting Anrakyr so low on their lists must be crazy. Pylon-star doesn't work without him, and its easily a top-2 Necron list in terms of competition.

Even outside that list, I feel like Pylons are wonderful if you're willing to foot the FW cost. I bought three for the Pylonstar but have since still taken at least one in any list that includes a CAD.

Mind measuring the dimensions of a Senty Pylon when you get a chance? I've been meaning to kitbash some but don't know the sizes.

Literally buy/build a Night-scythe, turn its "body" sideways and you have a shockingly close approximation. Put some little legs on it so its foot-print looks roughly like a 60mm base, and you're set.

Wow, that's a lot larger than I thought it would be. Well, I'm sure I can figure something out.

They're "big" but their footprint makes deep-striking them in the Pylonstar a reasonable prospect. But yeah, even outside of the one strategy you always see them used in, they're just a fun, decent unit in general. I really enjoy them, and suggest any Necron owner who is willing to make the FW leap spending-wise, own at least one or two.

Oh, and the Gauss Eliminator version is great, cheap, skyfire if your meta has to contend with flyers.

Which Pylon of the three are you referring to?

sieGermans wrote:
Which Pylon of the three are you referring to?

There's the Death-Ray version, which is terrific in the Pylonstar (obviously) and the ones I like to run as anti-air or just distractions are the Gauss Exterminator. I feel like the only awful one is the Heat Ray. Melta on an immobile artillery piece? MEH.

They're technically mobile, just not Relentless

I'm still not sure about investing in them right now. IA12 is old and 90% of it doesn't even work right after 7th and the new codex, I'm half expecting an update not too far off.

On the other hand, FW has cared about nothing but HH and Tau lately so who knows.

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:

sieGermans wrote:
Which Pylon of the three are you referring to?

There's the Death-Ray version, which is terrific in the Pylonstar (obviously) and the ones I like to run as anti-air or just distractions are the Gauss Exterminator. I feel like the only awful one is the Heat Ray. Melta on an immobile artillery piece? MEH.

Actually the mini pylons don't have the immobile rule. You can move them 2" a turn, iir.
Its the big one that can't move.

Requizen wrote:
I'm still not sure about investing in them right now. IA12 is old and 90% of it doesn't even work right after 7th and the new codex, I'm half expecting an update not too far off.

On the other hand, FW has cared about nothing but HH and Tau lately so who knows.

Horus Heresy and AoS are the testing grounds for 8th ed, Given how badly we need someone to press the reset button I say more power to them.

Obviously you guys are right... They aren't immobile per se, only de-facto. :-p You COULD move them, but you would just never want to.

I can definitely see the argument against buying into FW if you're a new Cron player, as the rest of their entries are hot garbage, but man... Pylons really are still solid as-is, and amazing when built around.

If the Gauss ones weren't Skyfire only they'd see a hell of a lot more play.

Just to clarify, there are two sizes of Pylons. Pylon and Sentry Pylon.

The Pylon is the huge one that can deepstrike in and if it lands on models, they move out of it's way.

Sentry Pylon (with death ray or Gauss) is the size people use for the Pylon-star.

https://www.forgeworld.co.uk/en-NL/Warhammer-40-000?Nu=product.repositoryId&N=102778+4294966029&qty=8&sorting=rec&view=table&categoryId=cat2140034

Sentry Pylons are Artillery, they can move 6". Adding the Royal Court just lets you re-position to a closer target or safer area.

 skoffs wrote:
If the Gauss ones weren't Skyfire only they'd see a hell of a lot more play.

I used to use them in 6th when they were essentially the ultimate transport poppers we had at range. LOVED them as my CCB and Destroyer Lord w/ Wraiths rushed forward.

Come 7th and they become significantly less attractive.

Oh God... I've been playing them wrong, haven't I? I've been playing Tau too often, but I thought Skyfire let you CHOOSE to either fire at full BS for that turn vs. Flyers, or Ground units, snap-shooting versus the other?

I apologize profusely if i've been giving advice based on my own misplays and stupidity.

Edit: Yep. Just checked BRB. I'm a moron, and my Gauss Exterminator Pylons just became significantly less sexy. :(

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:
Oh God... I've been playing them wrong, haven't I? I've been playing Tau too often, but I thought Skyfire let you CHOOSE to either fire at full BS for that turn vs. Flyers, or Ground units, snap-shooting versus the other?

I apologize profusely if i've been giving advice based on my own misplays and stupidity.

Edit: Yep. Just checked BRB. I'm a moron, and my Gauss Exterminator Pylons just became significantly less sexy. :(

Yeah, its only intercepter which allows you to choose.
Which is not a rule I'm a fan of, really. Skyfire should always let you choose, and interceptor should do exactly that, allow you to fire upon units coming from reserves.

Funnily enough, I actually thought that the mini pylons come with interceptor. I should read that book again.

In 6th edition if you had both Skyfire and Interceptor, you could fire at ground targets as normal. But that was removed in 7th edition for whatever reason and Skyfire became more of a drawback than a bonus.

Sky fire still gets full BS versus skimmers [and NOT jet bikes], though! Which is sometimes relevant, I guess?

Things that need Skyfire: Annihilation Barges
Things that don't need Skyfire: Gauss Pylons

And yet, here we are...
(fix these things, GW, and you may see an increase in their sales)

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:
Oh God... I've been playing them wrong, haven't I? I've been playing Tau too often, but I thought Skyfire let you CHOOSE to either fire at full BS for that turn vs. Flyers, or Ground units, snap-shooting versus the other?

I apologize profusely if i've been giving advice based on my own misplays and stupidity.

Edit: Yep. Just checked BRB. I'm a moron, and my Gauss Exterminator Pylons just became significantly less sexy. :(

Yeah, its only intercepter which allows you to choose.
Which is not a rule I'm a fan of, really. Skyfire should always let you choose, and interceptor should do exactly that, allow you to fire upon units coming from reserves.

Funnily enough, I actually thought that the mini pylons come with interceptor. I should read that book again.

sieGermans wrote:
Sky fire still gets full BS versus skimmers and jet bikes, though! Which is sometimes relevant, I guess?

Interceptor just lets you shoot the weapon at the end of the enemy movement phase, at something that came in from Reserve that movement phase.

Skyfire gives normal BS when shooting at Flyers, Flying Monstrous Creatures and Skimmers. Everything else, is only snap shooting, which includes Jet Bikes.

Those rules got a major overhaul in 7th, that kind of killed anything with built in skyfire on the weapon. At least they give Flyers the option to turn on or off skyfire.

Not our flyers, though...
(if you're using that supplement... which I wouldn't suggest doing... because it kinda sucks for us)

sieGermans wrote:
Sky fire still gets full BS versus skimmers and jet bikes, though! Which is sometimes relevant, I guess?

Skyfire doesn't allow you to use your normal BS against Jetbikes.

Ah, right-o. I'll correct my post!

Draco765 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:
Oh God... I've been playing them wrong, haven't I? I've been playing Tau too often, but I thought Skyfire let you CHOOSE to either fire at full BS for that turn vs. Flyers, or Ground units, snap-shooting versus the other?

I apologize profusely if i've been giving advice based on my own misplays and stupidity.

Edit: Yep. Just checked BRB. I'm a moron, and my Gauss Exterminator Pylons just became significantly less sexy. :(

Yeah, its only intercepter which allows you to choose.
Which is not a rule I'm a fan of, really. Skyfire should always let you choose, and interceptor should do exactly that, allow you to fire upon units coming from reserves.

Funnily enough, I actually thought that the mini pylons come with interceptor. I should read that book again.

sieGermans wrote:
Sky fire still gets full BS versus skimmers and jet bikes, though! Which is sometimes relevant, I guess?

Interceptor just lets you shoot the weapon at the end of the enemy movement phase, at something that came in from Reserve that movement phase.

Skyfire gives normal BS when shooting at Flyers, Flying Monstrous Creatures and Skimmers. Everything else, is only snap shooting, which includes Jet Bikes.

Those rules got a major overhaul in 7th, that kind of killed anything with built in skyfire on the weapon. At least they give Flyers the option to turn on or off skyfire.

Eh really? That's dumb.
Only fighters can choose skyfire, btw. Which necrons don't have. Because Death from the Skies is gak.
I flicked through it. The combat roles are barely developed, wings are just to make you buy more flyers, the new stats have little impact and the dogfight phase is a waste of time, little more than a convoluted version of Rock Paper Scissors.
I was not impressed. I hope 8 ed doesn't use those rules.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Draco765 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:
Oh God... I've been playing them wrong, haven't I? I've been playing Tau too often, but I thought Skyfire let you CHOOSE to either fire at full BS for that turn vs. Flyers, or Ground units, snap-shooting versus the other?

I apologize profusely if i've been giving advice based on my own misplays and stupidity.

Edit: Yep. Just checked BRB. I'm a moron, and my Gauss Exterminator Pylons just became significantly less sexy. :(

Yeah, its only intercepter which allows you to choose.
Which is not a rule I'm a fan of, really. Skyfire should always let you choose, and interceptor should do exactly that, allow you to fire upon units coming from reserves.

Funnily enough, I actually thought that the mini pylons come with interceptor. I should read that book again.

sieGermans wrote:
Sky fire still gets full BS versus skimmers and jet bikes, though! Which is sometimes relevant, I guess?

Interceptor just lets you shoot the weapon at the end of the enemy movement phase, at something that came in from Reserve that movement phase.

Skyfire gives normal BS when shooting at Flyers, Flying Monstrous Creatures and Skimmers. Everything else, is only snap shooting, which includes Jet Bikes.

Those rules got a major overhaul in 7th, that kind of killed anything with built in skyfire on the weapon. At least they give Flyers the option to turn on or off skyfire.

Eh really? That's dumb.
Only fighters can choose skyfire, btw. Which necrons don't have. Because Death from the Skies is gak.
I flicked through it. The combat roles are barely developed, wings are just to make you buy more flyers, the new stats have little impact and the dogfight phase is a waste of time, little more than a convoluted version of Rock Paper Scissors.
I was not impressed. I hope 8 ed doesn't use those rules.

Since Death from the Skies is an optional supplement, it does not have an effect in the game unless the players agree to it. Which, normally, they don't, and was not factored in with my responses.

Draco765 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Draco765 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

NewTruthNeomaxim wrote:
Oh God... I've been playing them wrong, haven't I? I've been playing Tau too often, but I thought Skyfire let you CHOOSE to either fire at full BS for that turn vs. Flyers, or Ground units, snap-shooting versus the other?

I apologize profusely if i've been giving advice based on my own misplays and stupidity.

Edit: Yep. Just checked BRB. I'm a moron, and my Gauss Exterminator Pylons just became significantly less sexy. :(

Yeah, its only intercepter which allows you to choose.
Which is not a rule I'm a fan of, really. Skyfire should always let you choose, and interceptor should do exactly that, allow you to fire upon units coming from reserves.

Funnily enough, I actually thought that the mini pylons come with interceptor. I should read that book again.

sieGermans wrote:
Sky fire still gets full BS versus skimmers and jet bikes, though! Which is sometimes relevant, I guess?

Interceptor just lets you shoot the weapon at the end of the enemy movement phase, at something that came in from Reserve that movement phase.

Skyfire gives normal BS when shooting at Flyers, Flying Monstrous Creatures and Skimmers. Everything else, is only snap shooting, which includes Jet Bikes.

Those rules got a major overhaul in 7th, that kind of killed anything with built in skyfire on the weapon. At least they give Flyers the option to turn on or off skyfire.

Eh really? That's dumb.
Only fighters can choose skyfire, btw. Which necrons don't have. Because Death from the Skies is gak.
I flicked through it. The combat roles are barely developed, wings are just to make you buy more flyers, the new stats have little impact and the dogfight phase is a waste of time, little more than a convoluted version of Rock Paper Scissors.
I was not impressed. I hope 8 ed doesn't use those rules.

Since Death from the Skies is an optional supplement, it does not have an effect in the game unless the players agree to it. Which, normally, they don't, and was not factored in with my responses.

Actually I don't think it is. In the introduction it said that its an update that replaces the rules in the BrB.
Dogfight, at least, is optional, as it clearly says your opponent doesn't have to do it. I don't think there are any drawbacks either, which makes it a bit pointless, imo.

The rules aren't optional, but if nobody owns the book...

Requizen wrote:
The rules aren't optional, but if nobody owns the book...

True. Which makes it even more stupid. If you are going to release an update like that, make it free or incorporate it into the next edition of the rule book.
GW marketing gonna GW marketing, I suppose.

Assault flyer vs. fighter is what killed death from the skies, before that if you were worried about flyers you took one. After DFTS you have to take the right kind of flyer, and the right kind of flyer can only skyfire, so they are useless if your opponent didn't bring a flyer. If it weren't for that dumbest of rulings, people would have eaten DFTS up, the formations are pretty good.

They basically altered the risk/reward profile for (aka nerfed) every flyer in the game, and didn't adjust their points or abilities. The dumb part is they reprinted the rules for every flyer in the game (save for some FW exclusives), so they had the chance to rewrite everything to be balanced around the new rules and were like "Eff it, it's too much work, throw some formations at it, nerds like formations". Then because they realized it was a giant pile, they decided to make it required, so at least TFG would buy it, and other players would have to buy it in self defense. The problem is even TFG realized what a steaming pile the book was and skipped it.

I'm especially bitter because I have flyers, and they are some of my best painted models, and I can't use them because of that stupid effing supplement. I used to see flyers weekly, now nobody in my meta runs them. If GW came out tomorrow and said "Ha ha we were just kidding both players have to agree to DFTS, our bad" they would be seriously doing their game a favor.

Cadian spoilers below:

sieGermans wrote:
Cadian spoilers below:

Spoiler:

So, the White Dwarf magazine for this month narratively describes Trazyn's new rule set as something along the lines of allowing three (3) units to deep strike in from his tesseract vaults. Has anyone seen a more concrete rule set description that we can all evaluate?

I thought we were told that it was for a special scenario.

Not I, but I'm pretty stoked we got tossed a bone in cadia. The real question is why didn't Trazyn bring his legions if he is going to throw his lot in with the imperium (and possibly anger Imhotek, who is not fond of the imperium). Guess we'll just have to wait and see

Tyazyn and Imotekh don't get along very well, not since he tried to steal Imotekh's staff for his collection.

Regardless, if they're able to fix the worst HQ in the codex, even slightly, I'll be happy.

 skoffs wrote:
Tyazyn and Imotekh don't get along very well, not since he tried to steal Imotekh's staff for his collection.

Regardless, if they're able to fix the worst HQ in the codex, even slightly, I'll be happy.

He technically can't be the worst HQ choice due to Illuminor existing but he's definitely in the bottom three.

Huh?

Szeras is good in a CAD, exuding a RP +1 bubble and a re-roll leadership saves bubble. He buffs a unit (+1 T, +1 BS, or +1 S) and he has a gun that is arguably better than a Heavy Destroyers since it has Lance.

Trazyn does next to nothing.

Am I missing something?

col_impact wrote:
Huh?

Szeras is good in a CAD, exuding a RP +1 bubble and a re-roll leadership saves bubble. He buffs a unit (+1 T, +1 BS, or +1 S) and he has a gun that is arguably better than a Heavy Destroyers since it has Lance.

Trazyn does next to nothing.

Am I missing something?

Competitive Necrons are almost never in a CAD, the buff is completely random and only given to two types of units, and the gun is only better against AV14, and the Heavy Destroyers will be in a Cult anyway meaning rerolls.

Meanwhile, Trazyn has a much better default Warlord Trait and functions better against tarpits. He isn't good at all but between the two he's much better as a Tactical choice, and that says a LOT.

Szeras fits tactically into a gunline Necron list. In that list you are running a CAD to get a fortification (voidshield generator or skyshield) to protect your msu Heavy Destroyers and optional Judicator Stalker.

Meanwhile, Trazyn doesn't really fit into any list. Any role he could play some other HQ does it better.

The only thing he can maybe be the best at is not giving up Slay the Warlord (provided you want to play the hefty cryptek/lord tax to enable his Surrogate Hosts ability). But at that point you are better off hiding a superior HQ in a Scythe or a Bunker or the old standby of Lychguard+ Orikan to avoid giving up Slay the Warlord.

REGARDLESS, they're both bad.
Hopefully now Trazyn won't be AS bad.

col_impact wrote:
Szeras fits tactically into a gunline Necron list. In that list you are running a CAD to get a fortification (voidshield generator or skyshield) to protect your msu Heavy Destroyers and optional Judicator Stalker.

Meanwhile, Trazyn doesn't really fit into any list. Any role he could play some other HQ does it better.

The only thing he can maybe be the best at is not giving up Slay the Warlord (provided you want to play the hefty cryptek/lord tax to enable his Surrogate Hosts ability). But at that point you are better off hiding a superior HQ in a Scythe or a Bunker or the old standby of Lychguard+ Orikan to avoid giving up Slay the Warlord.

It really isn't hard to just get in a Fortification if you need one via allies. It is a bad justification.

Also via that gun line you're running Crypteks anyway and it isn't like you invest in them anyway. So there's that.

So that armored assault box came out a recently, which is making me contemplate picking up a box or more up. I don't currently own any arks. I know that some of you are lukewarm towards them and I know a new addition is coming out soon. How many would you get? The answer is probably between 0 and 2, but I wanted your thoughts before I get one. It would be delaying my purchase of wraiths and spyders in case you are wondering, but I figure those will always be available. I am also wondering how long it will be available for. If it will be out a while it might be worth waiting on a Necron made to order to save on shipping.

I'd get one to try it out.

I run two when I'm using Warriors to objective grab in a Decurion.

It's a great deal (save $25 USD), but yeah, Ghost Arks aren't so great at the moment.

 skoffs wrote:
It's a great deal (save $25 USD), but yeah, Ghost Arks aren't so great at the moment.

They reversed the ruling on passengers needing to snap shot if their transport jinked. Now if only grav wasn't in the game.

 Anpu-adom wrote:

 skoffs wrote:
It's a great deal (save $25 USD), but yeah, Ghost Arks aren't so great at the moment.

They reversed the ruling on passengers needing to snap shot if their transport jinked. Now if only grav wasn't in the game.

Grav is mostly just 24" range and limited in numbers. Assault the Devastrators/bikes with Wraiths/Tomb Blades/Lychguard and they're quite safe. Not to mention 4+ jink save on Grav shots. Jinking Ghost Arks are way more survivable than people give them credit.

Yes, we're all aware of the FAQ that lets occupants fire at full BS,
But if taking a Decurion, there are generally better things to spend the points on (unless going Silver Tide, in which case a couple of them in the list come in pretty handy).
If going CAD, on the other hand, ObSec makes them much more worth it.

Honestly I'd get it if you don't have a ghost ark and need warriors and scarabs. Ghost ark is iffy, it can jink and has 4 hull points, so it's pretty tough as long as it's getting glanced, and the fire power it brings is respectable. Since it can jink all day without affecting the passengers and is immune to small arms fire while the quantum shielding is up, it can really extend the life of a unit of warriors, while giving them a very noticeable boost in shootyness.

The problem is one penetrating hit and it's going down fast and The current meta is chock full of melta, missiles, and lances. We tend not to run many vehicles so it's likely to get a lot of attention from your opponents anti-vehicle units. Still the flying bread box list had quite a bit of following before the FAQ's first draft.

Vehicles in general are bad, unless they are free.

Why give your opponent's anti-AV something to shoot at when you could spend those points on more of our superior infantry.

You know the game is good when infantry are tankier than tanks

 skoffs wrote:
Why give your opponent's anti-AV something to shoot at when you could spend those points on more of our superior infantry.

Because how else are the Warriors going to get anywhere and contribute to the game?

Greetings, I come to this thread with a tactical question. How does everybody deal with Wraithknights?

 necr0n wrote:
Greetings, I come to this thread with a tactical question. How does everybody deal with Wraithknights?

Hahaha



Attempt to tie them up (not often viable thanks to stomp) or ignore them as best you can, then go after the other stuff on the table. Unless you're running a Deathstar of some sort that can instagib it... Unless it gets Invis.

People will say Deathmarks but you need like 20 of them landing in Rapid Fire range to have even odds of maybe killing it in one round of shooting.

Requizen wrote:
People will say Deathmarks but you need like 20 of them landing in Rapid Fire range to have even odds of maybe killing it in one round of shooting.

Your odds increase if you deep strike a Destroyer Lord with them.

Requizen wrote:

 necr0n wrote:
Greetings, I come to this thread with a tactical question. How does everybody deal with Wraithknights?

Hahaha



Attempt to tie them up (not often viable thanks to stomp) or ignore them as best you can, then go after the other stuff on the table. Unless you're running a Deathstar of some sort that can instagib it... Unless it gets Invis.

People will say Deathmarks but you need like 20 of them landing in Rapid Fire range to have even odds of maybe killing it in one round of shooting.

Ignoring them is not as easy, because they can move super fast and ignore terrain. Plus, they eat up all our infantry in close combat denying all sorts of RPs and just rendering all Decurion rules useless.

Tarpit is a good idea, but sometimes it's easier said than done, as I already mentioned he's fast, while my Lychguard for example are slow. Then again, he might eat everyone up in close combat anyway.

I struggle to understand the point about the Deathmarks, however. How would 40 sniper shots bring down a Gargantuan Creatuce that did not deepstrike that turn?( I mean, I don't see a Wraithknight ever wanting to deepstrike) They would cause 2 wounds max, the way I see it.

 necr0n wrote:
I struggle to understand the point about the Deathmarks, however. How would 40 sniper shots bring down a Gargantuan Creatuce that did not deepstrike that turn?( I mean, I don't see a Wraithknight ever wanting to deepstrike) They would cause 2 wounds max, the way I see it.

... you do know what makes Deathmarks so special, right?

 skoffs wrote:

 necr0n wrote:
I struggle to understand the point about the Deathmarks, however. How would 40 sniper shots bring down a Gargantuan Creatuce that did not deepstrike that turn?( I mean, I don't see a Wraithknight ever wanting to deepstrike) They would cause 2 wounds max, the way I see it.

... you do know what makes Deathmarks so special, right?

I was under the impression, they were not allowed the 2+ rule because of the Gargantuan Creature rule.

I think the 2+ still applies since its codex specific, and thus overrides core rules, but I'm not entirely sure.

 necr0n wrote:

Requizen wrote:

 necr0n wrote:
Greetings, I come to this thread with a tactical question. How does everybody deal with Wraithknights?

Hahaha



Attempt to tie them up (not often viable thanks to stomp) or ignore them as best you can, then go after the other stuff on the table. Unless you're running a Deathstar of some sort that can instagib it... Unless it gets Invis.

People will say Deathmarks but you need like 20 of them landing in Rapid Fire range to have even odds of maybe killing it in one round of shooting.

Ignoring them is not as easy, because they can move super fast and ignore terrain. Plus, they eat up all our infantry in close combat denying all sorts of RPs and just rendering all Decurion rules useless.

Tarpit is a good idea, but sometimes it's easier said than done, as I already mentioned he's fast, while my Lychguard for example are slow. Then again, he might eat everyone up in close combat anyway.

I struggle to understand the point about the Deathmarks, however. How would 40 sniper shots bring down a Gargantuan Creatuce that did not deepstrike that turn?( I mean, I don't see a Wraithknight ever wanting to deepstrike) They would cause 2 wounds max, the way I see it.

Yeah, preaching to the choir here. WKs are stupid. Your best bet is just to realize that even though you're Necrons, you'll probably get tabled and just try to go for points.

DL+harvest wraiths+kitted out RC will kill a WK in 2 rounds of combat. I've done it and I'm not that competitive a player. Of course the Eldar player has to let you get near his WK to begin with The cult could also put the hurt on one with all of the rerolling to wound ap3 pain.

 necron99 wrote:
DL+harvest wraiths+kitted out RC will kill a WK in 2 rounds of combat. I've done it and I'm not that competitive a player. Of course the Eldar player has to let you get near his WK to begin with The cult could also put the hurt on one with all of the rerolling to wound ap3 pain.

DL (assuming Cult) + Harvest + kitted out RC is basically your entire army as well. If your super death star never gets close enough to charge anything until T3 or T4 (WK, Warp Spiders, Jetbikes... yeah more likely than you think) then you basically have lost anyway.

It's what a reasonable amount of high level players are running but even they are moving away from it. Or at least, you don't see it at top tables much anymore.

 necr0n wrote:

 skoffs wrote:

 necr0n wrote:
I struggle to understand the point about the Deathmarks, however. How would 40 sniper shots bring down a Gargantuan Creatuce that did not deepstrike that turn?( I mean, I don't see a Wraithknight ever wanting to deepstrike) They would cause 2 wounds max, the way I see it.

... you do know what makes Deathmarks so special, right?

I was under the impression, they were not allowed the 2+ rule because of the Gargantuan Creature rule.

They get the 2+ to wound when the deathmarks deepstrike. The gargantuan creature rule applies to the sniper rule. Here is the average damage to a wraith knight with a unit of 10 deathmarks+ D.lord in the group (assuming rapid fire range).

On average
20 shots hitting on 3+ re-rolling 1s
2/3 of 20 is 13.2 with 6.8 misses 3.4 being 1s with re-roll is 2.24 more hits after re-roll
15.44 hits wounding on 2+ with re-roll 1s
5/6 of 15.44 is 12.8152 with 2.62 misses 1.31 being 1s with re-roll is 1.09 more wounds after re-roll.
14.13 wounds with 1/6 of them being ap 2 is 2.26 that go through armor.
Wraithknights have a 3+ armor save so 2/3 of 11.87 is 7.83, 4.04 wounds get through armor + 2.26 = 6.3 unsaved wounds
FNP turns 6.3 into 4.22 wounds
Staff of light might get an extra wound
This won't kill it on average but it is very close to bringing it down in a single round for less points.

The question then is,
What do you give the Destroyer Lord in this squad?
- keep him with the Staff Of Light? (AP3 might do a wound)
- just give him a Warscythe? (he'd only be able to use it the turn after)
- give him the Void Reaper? (same as above, but with much better chance to wound)
- how about the Gauntlet of the Conflagrator? (added to a Warscythe could do a wound the turn the unit drops, if they're close enough)
- perhaps the Solar Staff? (a blind Wraithknight?)

 skoffs wrote:
The question then is,
What do you give the Destroyer Lord in this squad?
- keep him with the Staff Of Light? (AP3 might do a wound)
- just give him a Warscythe? (he'd only be able to use it the turn after)
- give him the Void Reaper? (same as above, but with much better chance to wound)
- how about the Gauntlet of the Conflagrator? (added to a Warscythe could do a wound the turn the unit drops, if they're close enough)
- perhaps the Solar Staff? (a blind Wraithknight?)

I've had a good laugh of getting the blind effect off on the wraithknight with a solar staff but don't forget another thing that the solar staff can do and that is make all shooting attacks at the deathmark unit snapshots. A pretty solid way of keeping enough of them around to either finish off the wraithknight or do backline harassing for another turn.

Could also just leave him naked to free up points if needed.

A naked Destroyer Lord?
That sounds incredibly wasteful for one of the best HQs we have at our disposal...

The Destroyer Lord is too expensive to keep naked, and it isn't like it costs a lot of points to give him desirable upgrades.

How about to integrate an Imperial Knight in a Necron army?
Any experience? If so, what kind of Knight? I'd prefer the Crusader, the only one who comes with two heavy weapons.

You'd need to do a Chaos one.

Oberron wrote:

 necr0n wrote:

 skoffs wrote:

 necr0n wrote:
I struggle to understand the point about the Deathmarks, however. How would 40 sniper shots bring down a Gargantuan Creatuce that did not deepstrike that turn?( I mean, I don't see a Wraithknight ever wanting to deepstrike) They would cause 2 wounds max, the way I see it.

... you do know what makes Deathmarks so special, right?

I was under the impression, they were not allowed the 2+ rule because of the Gargantuan Creature rule.

They get the 2+ to wound when the deathmarks deepstrike. The gargantuan creature rule applies to the sniper rule. Here is the average damage to a wraith knight with a unit of 10 deathmarks+ D.lord in the group (assuming rapid fire range).

On average
20 shots hitting on 3+ re-rolling 1s
2/3 of 20 is 13.2 with 6.8 misses 3.4 being 1s with re-roll is 2.24 more hits after re-roll
15.44 hits wounding on 2+ with re-roll 1s
5/6 of 15.44 is 12.8152 with 2.62 misses 1.31 being 1s with re-roll is 1.09 more wounds after re-roll.
14.13 wounds with 1/6 of them being ap 2 is 2.26 that go through armor.
Wraithknights have a 3+ armor save so 2/3 of 11.87 is 7.83, 4.04 wounds get through armor + 2.26 = 6.3 unsaved wounds
FNP turns 6.3 into 4.22 wounds
Staff of light might get an extra wound
This won't kill it on average but it is very close to bringing it down in a single round for less points.

You left out the 5++ invul save that they almost always have. so the 2.26 that go through armor become 1.51 that get past the invul save.

col_impact wrote:

Oberron wrote:

 necr0n wrote:

 skoffs wrote:

 necr0n wrote:
I struggle to understand the point about the Deathmarks, however. How would 40 sniper shots bring down a Gargantuan Creatuce that did not deepstrike that turn?( I mean, I don't see a Wraithknight ever wanting to deepstrike) They would cause 2 wounds max, the way I see it.

... you do know what makes Deathmarks so special, right?

I was under the impression, they were not allowed the 2+ rule because of the Gargantuan Creature rule.

They get the 2+ to wound when the deathmarks deepstrike. The gargantuan creature rule applies to the sniper rule. Here is the average damage to a wraith knight with a unit of 10 deathmarks+ D.lord in the group (assuming rapid fire range).

On average
20 shots hitting on 3+ re-rolling 1s
2/3 of 20 is 13.2 with 6.8 misses 3.4 being 1s with re-roll is 2.24 more hits after re-roll
15.44 hits wounding on 2+ with re-roll 1s
5/6 of 15.44 is 12.8152 with 2.62 misses 1.31 being 1s with re-roll is 1.09 more wounds after re-roll.
14.13 wounds with 1/6 of them being ap 2 is 2.26 that go through armor.
Wraithknights have a 3+ armor save so 2/3 of 11.87 is 7.83, 4.04 wounds get through armor + 2.26 = 6.3 unsaved wounds
FNP turns 6.3 into 4.22 wounds
Staff of light might get an extra wound
This won't kill it on average but it is very close to bringing it down in a single round for less points.

You left out the 5++ invul save that they almost always have. so the 2.26 that go through armor become 1.51 that get past the invul save.

I rarely see them with the 5++ so I was just doing the basic stats but with the 5++ in mind the range goes from 3.67-4.22 depending on what the wraithknight has which is still on average more than half its health in a single shooting round by a single unit.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
The Destroyer Lord is too expensive to keep naked, and it isn't like it costs a lot of points to give him desirable upgrades.

I tried a weird thing last night:

Gave the destroyer lord the usual melee upgrades (warscythe, nightmare shroud, sempiternal weave) and put him in DS reserve with the Deathmarks. Reading Ethereal Interception, it seems the RAW allow the whole unit to "counter-Deep Strike" if an enemy arrives via DS, etc.... including the DLord? Then you get a minimal jet pack move (keeping coherency) during assault step.

Then on your turn during movement, you can split him off and go melee hunting. Seem right?

sieGermans wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
The Destroyer Lord is too expensive to keep naked, and it isn't like it costs a lot of points to give him desirable upgrades.

I tried a weird thing last night:

Gave the destroyer lord the usual melee upgrades (warscythe, nightmare shroud, sempiternal weave) and put him in DS reserve with the Deathmarks. Reading Ethereal Interception, it seems the RAW allow the whole unit to "counter-Deep Strike" if an enemy arrives via DS, etc.... including the DLord? Then you get a minimal jet pack move (keeping coherency) during assault step.

Then on your turn during movement, you can split him off and go melee hunting. Seem right?

Nope. The DLord doesn't get Ethereal Interception just from being attached to a unit of Deathmarks

The BRB FAQ clarified that the abilities of unit special rules do not confer to attached ICs, unless there is specific wording that would confer the ability, e.g. "a unit that contains at least one model with [Ethereal Interception]."

Nightbringer if you are lucky, one bad roll on gaze of death and it's a done deal. He also has fleshbane, and eternal warrior, so if he is kitted for ranged D instead of melee d, nightbringer can do some work on him in CC.

Judicators might also get some work done if you can keep the stalker alive for target designation, 8 out of 9 hit, 11 out of 36 wound at ap 2 so he has his 5+ invul if kitted for melee and a 5+ FNP. it's about .27 wounds per Preat, so at a min formation 2.7 before saves, and the stalker can put another (8/9 * 8/9) .79 itself if equipped with heavy gauss.

Most people use their D-Cult for this though, Extermination protocols + preferred enemy and AP 3 does work. 7/9 chance to hit, 11/36 wound, for .23 wound per shot, 18 shots per round 4.27 for all 9 of them shooting at the wraith knight. Honestly though your heavy destroyers do their best work here, 7/9 chance to hit adn 8/9 chance to wound, for .69 wounds per shot or 2 wounds for all three shooting. So a d cults shooting for one round has a decent chance of dropping a wraith knight.

If you run both a Judicator Battalion and a D-Cult odds are you have enough shooting to drop it. But that's a filthy lie because not even eldar players (who have had several editions of autopilot wins that they got to call skill) are thick enough to deploy a wraith knight without support. There will be a farseer on a jetbike near by, and possibly some warlocks to keep you from focusing down the farseer to quickly. With Invis (which he has a 73% chance of having before reroll power shenanigans), you just don't bother shooting at the wraithknight and instead focus your efforts on getting rid of the far seer. Of course it's not like his army will be standing near by leaning on shovels while you are doing this, they will inflicting a lot of damage on you while you try to focus down their big gun.

So the question becomes what to do in that case, and the answer is, just ignore him, you can't kill him and he has a limited number of people he can kill, so you just pay the butchers bill and focus on the rest of his army. He's fast so you'll have to be careful to make sure he doesn't get anything valuable, as long as you can feed the wraithknight warriors, immortals and maybe a harvest, you can still win if you crump the rest of his army.

If you know the opponent is running MCs or GMCs (ie Wraithknight) then Wraiths equipped with Beamers and an OLord/Dlord equipped with the Voidreaper also boosts the damage output significantly.

I'm all about Beamers on Wraiths simply because they'll be Relentless and it helps with the main weakness of the army.

The math on it is so so, beamers give you a 1/6 chance of ID which is a D3 wounds on a GMC, call it two, 2/3 chance to hit 1/6 chance of an average of two wounds, so 1 in 9 shots will cause two wounds or 4.5 shots to a wound. So about half as effective as a destroyers gauss weapon per round. Whip coils are much better because they allow you to strike simo which could get you an extra 3-8 attacks.

 wuestenfux wrote:
How about to integrate an Imperial Knight in a Necron army?
Any experience? If so, what kind of Knight? I'd prefer the Crusader, the only one who comes with two heavy weapons.

Staying bound you would use a Renegade Knight Forsworn Detachment.

My ideal one would be equipped as follows:

Carapace: Twin Linked Icarus Autocannon
Right arm: Avenger Gatling Cannon/Heavy Flamer
Left arm: Rapid-fire Battle cannon/Heavy stubber
Chest: Heavy Stubber

Keep him back and shooting. Anything gets close you can mess around with melee/stomps, but shooting is what this one does best.

Draco765 wrote:
Keep him back and shooting. Anything gets close you can mess around with melee/stomps, but shooting is what this one does best.

But would his shooting be more effective than our shooting for similar price?

 Grimgold wrote:
The math on it is so so, beamers give you a 1/6 chance of ID which is a D3 wounds on a GMC, call it two, 2/3 chance to hit 1/6 chance of an average of two wounds, so 1 in 9 shots will cause two wounds or 4.5 shots to a wound. So about half as effective as a destroyers gauss weapon per round. Whip coils are much better because they allow you to strike simo which could get you an extra 3-8 attacks.

I think they are better than whip coils. Whip coils are seldom if ever relevant to the tough as nails Wraiths who will almost always get their first round of attacks in. I only run Wraiths naked or with Beamers.

Against a GMC with T8 the Beamers double the damage output of the Wraiths for the fist turn. With support from a D Cult, a D Lord, and a Royal Court you can wipe a Wraithknight in 1 turn before Stomps.

Against MCs without Eternal Warrior the Beamers truly shine due to ID and circumventing FNP. Demons, Spacewolves, and Tau are in the competition scene and have juicy targets.

They also give a Necron list an answer to troops with 2+ armour. AP2 shooting is hard to come by in the Necron offerings.

The main reason for not running Beamers by default is that they are overcosted in key matchups such as vs Gladius and most often you are running Wraiths tactically as strict tarpitters. Beamers work best on a fully-decked Wraithstar unit with a Veil for jumping out of combats that aren't going your way. Wraithstars work by having lots of 'tricks' (eg Solar Staff, Veil, Orikan re-roll, PE, Zandrekh trait, NS leadership attack, Res Orb) and packing guns that have AP2 and ID is another trick in your bag.

whip coils are relevant when the opponent has str D, and can remove two or three wraiths a turn before stomps, which is in the context of how to deal with a wraithknight. They also matter against int 4 units that can hurt them (wulfen, berserkers, most bike stars). Outside of that Wraiths already have a better way of dealing with TEQ rending and a metric ton of attacks. If I could get both, I'd think about it, but until then Int is the undisputed of melee stats.

Wulfen are I5.

I literally LOL'd at the fact Berserker Marines were listed as a unit capable of hurting Wraiths.

 Grimgold wrote:
whip coils are relevant when the opponent has str D, and can remove two or three wraiths a turn before stomps, which is in the context of how to deal with a wraithknight. They also matter against int 4 units that can hurt them (wulfen, berserkers, most bike stars). Outside of that Wraiths already have a better way of dealing with TEQ rending and a metric ton of attacks. If I could get both, I'd think about it, but until then Int is the undisputed of melee stats.

Beamers attack at Initiative 11.

Also, not sure how you are doing your math but 4 attacks from a D weapon only translates to 0.63 dead Wraiths on average (due to 50% attacks hitting, D chart only auto-killing on a 6 and flubbing on a 1, and 3++ save active against the rest of the D chart which is only threatening lethal amount of wounds 66% of the time), so killing 2 Wraiths on turn 1 is not very likely at all.


Even if you disagree with me on Beamers, I hope you are beginning to see the waste of running whipcoils.

col_impact wrote:

sieGermans wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
The Destroyer Lord is too expensive to keep naked, and it isn't like it costs a lot of points to give him desirable upgrades.

I tried a weird thing last night:

Gave the destroyer lord the usual melee upgrades (warscythe, nightmare shroud, sempiternal weave) and put him in DS reserve with the Deathmarks. Reading Ethereal Interception, it seems the RAW allow the whole unit to "counter-Deep Strike" if an enemy arrives via DS, etc.... including the DLord? Then you get a minimal jet pack move (keeping coherency) during assault step.

Then on your turn during movement, you can split him off and go melee hunting. Seem right?

Nope. The DLord doesn't get Ethereal Interception just from being attached to a unit of Deathmarks

The BRB FAQ clarified that the abilities of unit special rules do not confer to attached ICs, unless there is specific wording that would confer the ability, e.g. "a unit that contains at least one model with [Ethereal Interception]."

Ah, gotcha. Thanks!

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
You'd need to do a Chaos one.

Indeed, one needs a Chaos variant which amounts to a Warden.
Any experience with an IK in a Necron army?

Oberron wrote:

 necr0n wrote:

 skoffs wrote:

 necr0n wrote:
I struggle to understand the point about the Deathmarks, however. How would 40 sniper shots bring down a Gargantuan Creatuce that did not deepstrike that turn?( I mean, I don't see a Wraithknight ever wanting to deepstrike) They would cause 2 wounds max, the way I see it.

... you do know what makes Deathmarks so special, right?

I was under the impression, they were not allowed the 2+ rule because of the Gargantuan Creature rule.

They get the 2+ to wound when the deathmarks deepstrike. The gargantuan creature rule applies to the sniper rule. Here is the average damage to a wraith knight with a unit of 10 deathmarks+ D.lord in the group (assuming rapid fire range).

On average
20 shots hitting on 3+ re-rolling 1s
2/3 of 20 is 13.2 with 6.8 misses 3.4 being 1s with re-roll is 2.24 more hits after re-roll
15.44 hits wounding on 2+ with re-roll 1s
5/6 of 15.44 is 12.8152 with 2.62 misses 1.31 being 1s with re-roll is 1.09 more wounds after re-roll.
14.13 wounds with 1/6 of them being ap 2 is 2.26 that go through armor.
Wraithknights have a 3+ armor save so 2/3 of 11.87 is 7.83, 4.04 wounds get through armor + 2.26 = 6.3 unsaved wounds
FNP turns 6.3 into 4.22 wounds
Staff of light might get an extra wound
This won't kill it on average but it is very close to bringing it down in a single round for less points.

I find it amusing that you think a large unit with no scatter reduction can be relied on. Expecting a 10 man squad with a big DLord base to land in rapid fire range any amount of time is an exercise in frustration, in my experience.

Draco765 wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:
How about to integrate an Imperial Knight in a Necron army?
Any experience? If so, what kind of Knight? I'd prefer the Crusader, the only one who comes with two heavy weapons.

Staying bound you would use a Renegade Knight Forsworn Detachment.

My ideal one would be equipped as follows:

Carapace: Twin Linked Icarus Autocannon
Right arm: Avenger Gatling Cannon/Heavy Flamer
Left arm: Rapid-fire Battle cannon/Heavy stubber
Chest: Heavy Stubber

Keep him back and shooting. Anything gets close you can mess around with melee/stomps, but shooting is what this one does best.

skoffs wrote:

Draco765 wrote:
Keep him back and shooting. Anything gets close you can mess around with melee/stomps, but shooting is what this one does best.

But would his shooting be more effective than our shooting for similar price?

wuestenfux wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
You'd need to do a Chaos one.

Indeed, one needs a Chaos variant which amounts to a Warden.
Any experience with an IK in a Necron army?

This is all pretty true, though I would urge oduble Avenger Gatling Cannons instead of the RFBC. Large Blast AP3 seems good but numerically is worse on most targets, and without ITC rulings is useless against Invis.

The Knight is pretty cool and can put out serious damage, but WILL get focused down and killed first. Stormsurge D Missiles, Eldar D weapons, drop pod meltas, T1 charge shenanigans, etc. In a tournament setting, I think I've had mine survive past Turn 3 maybe once or twice, and only in games that I would have won anyway. It's a big ol bullseye. Destroyers bring a similar amount of AP3 shooting and are more durable against most types of shooting.

But, against an opponent who can't deal with AV13, it's basically invincible, and it's actually useful in combat, so you get a tradeoff.

Grimgold wrote:whip coils are relevant when the opponent has str D, and can remove two or three wraiths a turn before stomps, which is in the context of how to deal with a wraithknight. They also matter against int 4 units that can hurt them (wulfen, berserkers, most bike stars). Outside of that Wraiths already have a better way of dealing with TEQ rending and a metric ton of attacks. If I could get both, I'd think about it, but until then Int is the undisputed of melee stats.

Remember that the Necron FAQ says that even with Whip Coils, you go at I1 when charging through cover. So... a lot of the time.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:I literally LOL'd at the fact Berserker Marines were listed as a unit capable of hurting Wraiths.

Khorne berserkers have a few issues, no AP, overcost, but if they get the charge, it's 4 attacks at str 5 per berserker (except for the champion who has 5 attacks at str 5), hitting on threes, wounding on fours. 41 attacks on a charge 14 wounds, 4 wounds make it thru and we have 2 dead wraiths. So yes they are a threat, and I mention them because I've had my wraiths roflstomped by them. Add in traitors hate for things like red rain and turn one charges, and you can see that while not a great unit berserkers can get work done even against an unarguably better unit like wraiths.

col_impact wrote:

 Grimgold wrote:
whip coils are relevant when the opponent has str D, and can remove two or three wraiths a turn before stomps, which is in the context of how to deal with a wraithknight. They also matter against int 4 units that can hurt them (wulfen, berserkers, most bike stars). Outside of that Wraiths already have a better way of dealing with TEQ rending and a metric ton of attacks. If I could get both, I'd think about it, but until then Int is the undisputed of melee stats.

Beamers attack at Initiative 11.

Also, not sure how you are doing your math but 4 attacks from a D weapon only translates to 0.63 dead Wraiths on average (due to 50% attacks hitting, D chart only auto-killing on a 6 and flubbing on a 1, and 3++ save active against the rest of the D chart which is only threatening lethal amount of wounds 66% of the time), so killing 2 Wraiths on turn 1 is not very likely at all.


Even if you disagree with me on Beamers, I hope you are beginning to see the waste of running whipcoils.

If everything was turn one your math might check out, but the flaw in your thinking is that you only get to shoot your beamers once and then you are in CC, where as whip coils affect every round of combat. Lets just walk thru this:

1st round, beamer wraiths beam have a 63% chance of getting two wounds thru, so it's pretty far from reliable, but for the sake of argument we'll say they get it. they then charge getting four attacks apiece, hitting on fours wounding on sixes. The wraith knight drops the D and gets a wraith (also 63%), so far up two wound down 4 attacks. The wraiths hit back, hitting on fours wounding on sixes, and get 1.3 wounds thru. Stomps come he gets another wraith. Down to four.

2nd round, Wraith knight gets another at I5 (He gets 2 out of 3 so he'll miss his third), so we are now down 7 attacks up two wounds compared to whip coil wraiths, 9 attacks back getting one wound thru (.78 actually), assuming he can only stomp two models and gets an average of two stomps, stomp only has a slightly better than 50-50 of removing a model a turn, but in addition it gets a wound a round thru, so on round three he stomp the life out of two wraiths, but this round he gets none with stomps.

3rd round, wraith knight whiffs, the wraiths attack getting one more wound, stomps get two wraiths.

4th round, wraith knight kills another another at I5, so we are now down ten attacks up 2 wounds, the single remaining wraith can't get a wound thru, and he'll survive stomp, just to die at the next I5 pass, leaving the final score down 13 attacks up two wounds. so how does this compare to whipcoils 13 attacks is 1.04 wounds, so in a best case scenario for the beamer it ends up 1 wound ahead for 42 points. If you are fighting something like wulfen, berserkers, bikestars (things your normal attacks work well against) you could end up a dozen wounds behind the curve fairly easily by taking the beamer over whipcoils, and you get to pay out the nose for the privilege of comparatively sucking.

Initiative is the king of melee stats, internalize that, grok it, roll it around in your noggin, because that understanding will help you win fights.

This is all pretty true, though I would urge oduble Avenger Gatling Cannons instead of the RFBC. Large Blast AP3 seems good but numerically is worse on most targets, and without ITC rulings is useless against Invis.

The Knight is pretty cool and can put out serious damage, but WILL get focused down and killed first. Stormsurge D Missiles, Eldar D weapons, drop pod meltas, T1 charge shenanigans, etc. In a tournament setting, I think I've had mine survive past Turn 3 maybe once or twice, and only in games that I would have won anyway. It's a big ol bullseye. Destroyers bring a similar amount of AP3 shooting and are more durable against most types of shooting.

But, against an opponent who can't deal with AV13, it's basically invincible, and it's actually useful in combat, so you get a tradeoff.

Indeed, an IK is a big target for the enemy as he will fear him and his ability to do serious damage.
But I guess you're right about the Destroyers. They bring more bang for the bucks to bear.

 Grimgold wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:I literally LOL'd at the fact Berserker Marines were listed as a unit capable of hurting Wraiths.

Khorne berserkers have a few issues, no AP, overcost, but if they get the charge, it's 4 attacks at str 5 per berserker (except for the champion who has 5 attacks at str 5), hitting on threes, wounding on fours. 41 attacks on a charge 14 wounds, 4 wounds make it thru and we have 2 dead wraiths. So yes they are a threat, and I mention them because I've had my wraiths roflstomped by them. Add in traitors hate for things like red rain and turn one charges, and you can see that while not a great unit berserkers can get work done even against an unarguably better unit like wraiths.

col_impact wrote:

 Grimgold wrote:
whip coils are relevant when the opponent has str D, and can remove two or three wraiths a turn before stomps, which is in the context of how to deal with a wraithknight. They also matter against int 4 units that can hurt them (wulfen, berserkers, most bike stars). Outside of that Wraiths already have a better way of dealing with TEQ rending and a metric ton of attacks. If I could get both, I'd think about it, but until then Int is the undisputed of melee stats.

Beamers attack at Initiative 11.

Also, not sure how you are doing your math but 4 attacks from a D weapon only translates to 0.63 dead Wraiths on average (due to 50% attacks hitting, D chart only auto-killing on a 6 and flubbing on a 1, and 3++ save active against the rest of the D chart which is only threatening lethal amount of wounds 66% of the time), so killing 2 Wraiths on turn 1 is not very likely at all.


Even if you disagree with me on Beamers, I hope you are beginning to see the waste of running whipcoils.

If everything was turn one your math might check out, but the flaw in your thinking is that you only get to shoot your beamers once and then you are in CC, where as whip coils affect every round of combat. Lets just walk thru this:

1st round, beamer wraiths beam have a 63% chance of getting two wounds thru, so it's pretty far from reliable, but for the sake of argument we'll say they get it. they then charge getting four attacks apiece, hitting on fours wounding on sixes. The wraith knight drops the D and gets a wraith (also 63%), so far up two wound down 4 attacks. The wraiths hit back, hitting on fours wounding on sixes, and get 1.3 wounds thru. Stomps come he gets another wraith. Down to four.

2nd round, Wraith knight gets another at I5 (He gets 2 out of 3 so he'll miss his third), so we are now down 7 attacks up two wounds compared to whip coil wraiths, 9 attacks back getting one wound thru (.78 actually), assuming he can only stomp two models and gets an average of two stomps, stomp only has a slightly better than 50-50 of removing a model a turn, but in addition it gets a wound a round thru, so on round three he stomp the life out of two wraiths, but this round he gets none with stomps.

3rd round, wraith knight whiffs, the wraiths attack getting one more wound, stomps get two wraiths.

4th round, wraith knight kills another another at I5, so we are now down ten attacks up 2 wounds, the single remaining wraith can't get a wound thru, and he'll survive stomp, just to die at the next I5 pass, leaving the final score down 13 attacks up two wounds. so how does this compare to whipcoils 13 attacks is 1.04 wounds, so in a best case scenario for the beamer it ends up 1 wound ahead for 42 points. If you are fighting something like wulfen, berserkers, bikestars (things your normal attacks work well against) you could end up a dozen wounds behind the curve fairly easily by taking the beamer over whipcoils, and you get to pay out the nose for the privilege of comparatively sucking.

Initiative is the king of melee stats, internalize that, grok it, roll it around in your noggin, because that understanding will help you win fights.

You're not serious are you?
Berserker Marines will never get the charge on Wraiths unless you are braindead. I'm pretty sure you didn't include things like the RP probably being active in that calculation.

Berserker Marines were, if anything, made worse with the TL supplement because regular Marines will do the same job for a much lower cost.

 Grimgold wrote:


If everything was turn one your math might check out, but the flaw in your thinking is that you only get to shoot your beamers once and then you are in CC, where as whip coils affect every round of combat. Lets just walk thru this:

1st round, beamer wraiths beam have a 63% chance of getting two wounds thru, so it's pretty far from reliable, but for the sake of argument we'll say they get it. they then charge getting four attacks apiece, hitting on fours wounding on sixes. The wraith knight drops the D and gets a wraith (also 63%), so far up two wound down 4 attacks. The wraiths hit back, hitting on fours wounding on sixes, and get 1.3 wounds thru. Stomps come he gets another wraith. Down to four.

2nd round, Wraith knight gets another at I5 (He gets 2 out of 3 so he'll miss his third), so we are now down 7 attacks up two wounds compared to whip coil wraiths, 9 attacks back getting one wound thru (.78 actually), assuming he can only stomp two models and gets an average of two stomps, stomp only has a slightly better than 50-50 of removing a model a turn, but in addition it gets a wound a round thru, so on round three he stomp the life out of two wraiths, but this round he gets none with stomps.

3rd round, wraith knight whiffs, the wraiths attack getting one more wound, stomps get two wraiths.

4th round, wraith knight kills another another at I5, so we are now down ten attacks up 2 wounds, the single remaining wraith can't get a wound thru, and he'll survive stomp, just to die at the next I5 pass, leaving the final score down 13 attacks up two wounds. so how does this compare to whipcoils 13 attacks is 1.04 wounds, so in a best case scenario for the beamer it ends up 1 wound ahead for 42 points. If you are fighting something like wulfen, berserkers, bikestars (things your normal attacks work well against) you could end up a dozen wounds behind the curve fairly easily by taking the beamer over whipcoils, and you get to pay out the nose for the privilege of comparatively sucking.

Initiative is the king of melee stats, internalize that, grok it, roll it around in your noggin, because that understanding will help you win fights.

First, your math is wrong.

The D weapon is removing 0.63 Wraiths on average per turn and to resolve statistically you accumulate that number and count a kill or a wound upon crossing the threshold of a whole number.

Consider the example of a coin toss (0.50) for heads. Toss 1 (0.50) = 0 heads. Toss 2 (1.0) = 1 head total. Toss 3 (1.5) = 1 head total. Toss 4 (2) = 2 heads total. Etc.

So phase 1 [0.63] = 0 Wraiths. Phase 2 [1.26] = 1 Wraith total killed. Phase 3 [1.89] = 1 Wraith total killed. Phase 4 [2.52] = 2 Wraiths total killed. Phase 5 [3.15] = 3 Wraiths total killed. Etcetera.



Stomps fair a little better. Every 3 turns the Stomps are putting out 2 auto-kills and 0.89 wounds after 3++ and 4+++ or 1.78 wounds if the Spyder has been killed.


Second, I wasn't advocating putting Beamers on Wraiths tasked with tarpitting, but rather on Wraiths acting as Wraithstars.

The longer a combat drags on the more the initial boost of damage from the Beamers is diluted. Conversely, a combat that quickly resolves in your favor opens up more volleys of the Beamers.

So we really need to factor in Orikan (re-roll 1s on saves), Zandrekh (Zealot), a Destroyer Lord (PE, WS, 4++, Veil), an OLord (VR, 4++), and a Lord (Solar Staff).

Orikan means that only Destroyer or Stomp results of 6 will be effective. Zealot means the first assault phase will pack a punch. PE boosts that initial volley from Beamers and the 2 staves. WS and VR also speed up the demise of the WK.


Shooting Phase
Beamers = 4.666 hits = 0.8 x 2 = 1.6 wounds = 1.07 unsaved wounds (circumvents FNP)
Staves =2.33 hits+ 2.92 = 5.25 hits = 0.9 wounds = 0.4 unsaved wounds

Assault Phase 1 (Zealot active)

VR = 3.55 hits = 2.96 Wounds = 1.32 unsaved wounds
WS = 3 hits = 1 wound = 0.44 unsaved wounds
Wraiths = 24 attacks = 18 hits = 3.5 wounds = 1.56 unsaved wounds (or 1.3 if Wraith is killed I5)
Lord = 1.75 hits = 0.3 wounds = 0.07 unsaved wounds
Zandrekh = 3.55 hits = 0.59 wounds = 0.13 unsaved wounds

Result: Phase 1 = 5 wounds on WK (or 4.74 if Wraith dies on I5)

[If your Destroyers have softened up the WK by a couple of wounds you are looking at 1 dead WK before Stomps.]


Assault Phase 2 Death of WK is imminent and happens before Stomps.

Next Necron turn the Wraithstar shoots at and assaults the next biggest threat.

I'm not sure whats stuck in your craw about this, but Khorne berserkers are perfectly capable of getting the drop on wraiths. Since wraiths are up front, it's not bad positioning that puts them at risk, it's their job to intercept incoming melee units. Beyond that, if you got first turn what are you going to do hold your wraiths back for fear they might get charged? There is also the chance you failed a charge, or you wiped out the unit you were fighting on your turn, or you were stuck in combat with a different unit altogether, there are lots of ways a savvy chaos player can get the drop on wraiths. The reason I left out formations benefits out is because khorne berserkers gain so much more from the formations in traitor's hate than wraiths do from a harvest, +3" to any charge, fleet, red rain (which is get two assault phases in one turn), Adamantium will (not so useful against us but not useless), reroll failed charges, get 2d6" inch move after deployment but before movement. There are also warlord traits that allow charges in your opponent's turn, rolling 3d6 and choosing the best two for charge range, they get a lot of special rules. I don't know if they are worth their points, but they are much improved compared to how they were prior to traitors hate. Wraiths are good units, but they are far from invincible, and when you catch up to the current meta you'll realize that they are perfectly capable of hurting wraiths.

Plus, you know, if the Wraiths are already in combat with something else and the Berserkers just wander over to join in. That is a very likely scenario and would definitely not go well for the Wraiths.

 Grimgold wrote:
I'm not sure whats stuck in your craw about this, but Khorne berserkers are perfectly capable of getting the drop on wraiths. Since wraiths are up front, it's not bad positioning that puts them at risk, it's their job to intercept incoming melee units. Beyond that, if you got first turn what are you going to do hold your wraiths back for fear they might get charged? There is also the chance you failed a charge, or you wiped out the unit you were fighting on your turn, or you were stuck in combat with a different unit altogether, there are lots of ways a savvy chaos player can get the drop on wraiths. The reason I left out formations benefits out is because khorne berserkers gain so much more from the formations in traitor's hate than wraiths do from a harvest, +3" to any charge, fleet, red rain (which is get two assault phases in one turn), Adamantium will (not so useful against us but not useless), reroll failed charges, get 2d6" inch move after deployment but before movement. There are also warlord traits that allow charges in your opponent's turn, rolling 3d6 and choosing the best two for charge range, they get a lot of special rules. I don't know if they are worth their points, but they are much improved compared to how they were prior to traitors hate. Wraiths are good units, but they are far from invincible, and when you catch up to the current meta you'll realize that they are perfectly capable of hurting wraiths.

You can talk to me and everyone else in the CSM tactic thread as to why Berserker Marines are useless. The only thing they have over regular marines is WS5 and the option to buy a Chainaxe. That's literally it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 skoffs wrote:
Plus, you know, if the Wraiths are already in combat with something else and the Berserkers just wander over to join in. That is a very likely scenario and would definitely not go well for the Wraiths.

Anything can charge them at that point. That doesn't make Berserker Marines dangerous.

col_impact wrote:


First, your math is wrong.

The D weapon is removing 0.63 Wraiths on average per turn and to resolve statistically you accumulate that number and count a kill or a wound upon crossing the threshold of a whole number.

Consider the example of a coin toss (0.50) for heads. Toss 1 (0.50) = 0 heads. Toss 2 (1.0) = 1 head total. Toss 3 (1.5) = 1 head total. Toss 4 (2) = 2 heads total. Etc.

So phase 1 [0.63] = 0 Wraiths. Phase 2 [1.26] = 1 Wraith total killed. Phase 3 [1.89] = 1 Wraith total killed. Phase 4 [2.52] = 2 Wraiths total killed. Phase 5 [3.15] = 3 Wraiths total killed. Etcetera.



Stomps fair a little better. Every 3 turns the Stomps are putting out 2 auto-kills and 0.89 wounds after 3++ and 4+++ or 1.78 wounds if the Spyder has been killed.


Second, I wasn't advocating putting Beamers on Wraiths tasked with tarpitting, but rather on Wraiths acting as Wraithstars.

The longer a combat drags on the more the initial boost of damage from the Beamers is diluted. Conversely, a combat that quickly resolves in your favor opens up more volleys of the Beamers.

So we really need to factor in Orikan (re-roll 1s on saves), Zandrekh (Zealot), a Destroyer Lord (PE, WS, 4++, Veil), an OLord (VR, 4++), and a Lord (Solar Staff).

Orikan means that only Destroyer or Stomp results of 6 will be effective. Zealot means the first assault phase will pack a punch. PE boosts that initial volley from Beamers and the 2 staves. WS and VR also speed up the demise of the WK.


Shooting Phase
Beamers = 4.666 hits = 0.8 x 2 = 1.6 wounds = 1.07 unsaved wounds (circumvents FNP)
Staves =2.33 hits+ 2.92 = 5.25 hits = 0.9 wounds = 0.4 unsaved wounds

Assault Phase 1 (Zealot active)

VR = 3.55 hits = 2.96 Wounds = 1.32 unsaved wounds
WS = 3 hits = 1 wound = 0.44 unsaved wounds
Wraiths = 24 attacks = 18 hits = 3.5 wounds = 1.56 unsaved wounds (or 1.3 if Wraith is killed I5)
Lord = 1.75 hits = 0.3 wounds = 0.07 unsaved wounds
Zandrekh = 3.55 hits = 0.59 wounds = 0.13 unsaved wounds

Result: Phase 1 = 5 wounds on WK (or 4.74 if Wraith dies on I5)

[If your Destroyers have softened up the WK by a couple of wounds you are looking at 1 dead WK before Stomps.]


Assault Phase 2 Death of WK is imminent and happens before Stomps.

Next Necron turn the Wraithstar shoots at and assaults the next biggest threat.

Can you find me a single battle report where wraiths killed a wraith knight in two turns, hell where a wraithstar kitted out as you suggested killed a wraith knight in two turns? If we are adding HQ, one farseer and your plan falls apart, we have no counter to invis, so you could add an entire army to that CC and the results would still be an eldar win. You are also talking about throwing 700+ points at a 295 point target, which is a silly way to try and make a point. You should isolate variables to see which ones matter, not throw everything and the kitchen sink at the problem until you get the outcome you want and then claim it was the variable you want it to be.

Here is the crux of my argument, striking simo or ahead of your target gets you more attacks/and or less attack back, because people killed prior to their initiative phase don't make CC attacks (at least not usually). This vastly outweighs the benefit provided by the beamer for combats against opponents that have a good chance of killing wraiths. In the khorne berserker example, the wraiths with whip coils will take about 12 less attacks than a unit armed with beamers and get three more attacks in return. With Wulfen who are I5, you are still going to lose wraiths but at least those wraiths got to attack back before they die. This isn't rocket science, and if you disagree with me on the point, then it's super easy to prove me wrong, just show me a match up against a good CC unit of approximately equal cost where the beamers function better. I've shown you one, the wraithknight, but that's an edge case because wraiths are usually wounding opponents much easier than that. Outside of that, maybe units that strike at initiative 1 won't care if you have whipcoils (except if they have concussive then having whip coils matters immensely, since swift strike and concussive cancel out allowing wraiths to hit at their base initiative which is 2). For the vast majority of fights, whip coils are the better selection.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

You can talk to me and everyone else in the CSM tactic thread as to why Berserker Marines are useless. The only thing they have over regular marines is WS5 and the option to buy a Chainaxe. That's literally it.

I'm not terribly interested in joining the pity party you guys are rocking in that thread, and you haven't brought one quantifiable fact forward that shows I'm wrong. Khorne berserkers are probably not worth their points (it's iffy with all of the benefits from traitors hate) but they can be dangerous on the charge, due to number and quality of attacks. I'm not saying KBs are better than wraiths, wraiths are under cost and KBs are not, which more or less settles the matter. What I am saying is that KBs are dangerous on the charge to wraiths, and that danger is lessened by having whip coils. Are either parts of that false?

 Grimgold wrote:

col_impact wrote:


First, your math is wrong.

The D weapon is removing 0.63 Wraiths on average per turn and to resolve statistically you accumulate that number and count a kill or a wound upon crossing the threshold of a whole number.

Consider the example of a coin toss (0.50) for heads. Toss 1 (0.50) = 0 heads. Toss 2 (1.0) = 1 head total. Toss 3 (1.5) = 1 head total. Toss 4 (2) = 2 heads total. Etc.

So phase 1 [0.63] = 0 Wraiths. Phase 2 [1.26] = 1 Wraith total killed. Phase 3 [1.89] = 1 Wraith total killed. Phase 4 [2.52] = 2 Wraiths total killed. Phase 5 [3.15] = 3 Wraiths total killed. Etcetera.



Stomps fair a little better. Every 3 turns the Stomps are putting out 2 auto-kills and 0.89 wounds after 3++ and 4+++ or 1.78 wounds if the Spyder has been killed.


Second, I wasn't advocating putting Beamers on Wraiths tasked with tarpitting, but rather on Wraiths acting as Wraithstars.

The longer a combat drags on the more the initial boost of damage from the Beamers is diluted. Conversely, a combat that quickly resolves in your favor opens up more volleys of the Beamers.

So we really need to factor in Orikan (re-roll 1s on saves), Zandrekh (Zealot), a Destroyer Lord (PE, WS, 4++, Veil), an OLord (VR, 4++), and a Lord (Solar Staff).

Orikan means that only Destroyer or Stomp results of 6 will be effective. Zealot means the first assault phase will pack a punch. PE boosts that initial volley from Beamers and the 2 staves. WS and VR also speed up the demise of the WK.


Shooting Phase
Beamers = 4.666 hits = 0.8 x 2 = 1.6 wounds = 1.07 unsaved wounds (circumvents FNP)
Staves =2.33 hits+ 2.92 = 5.25 hits = 0.9 wounds = 0.4 unsaved wounds

Assault Phase 1 (Zealot active)

VR = 3.55 hits = 2.96 Wounds = 1.32 unsaved wounds
WS = 3 hits = 1 wound = 0.44 unsaved wounds
Wraiths = 24 attacks = 18 hits = 3.5 wounds = 1.56 unsaved wounds (or 1.3 if Wraith is killed I5)
Lord = 1.75 hits = 0.3 wounds = 0.07 unsaved wounds
Zandrekh = 3.55 hits = 0.59 wounds = 0.13 unsaved wounds

Result: Phase 1 = 5 wounds on WK (or 4.74 if Wraith dies on I5)

[If your Destroyers have softened up the WK by a couple of wounds you are looking at 1 dead WK before Stomps.]


Assault Phase 2 Death of WK is imminent and happens before Stomps.

Next Necron turn the Wraithstar shoots at and assaults the next biggest threat.

Can you find me a single battle report where wraiths killed a wraith knight in two turns, hell where a wraithstar kitted out as you suggested killed a wraith knight in two turns? If we are adding HQ, one farseer and your plan falls apart, we have no counter to invis, so you could add an entire army to that CC and the results would still be an eldar win. You are also talking about throwing 700+ points at a 295 point target, which is a silly way to try and make a point. You should isolate variables to see which ones matter, not throw everything and the kitchen sink at the problem until you get the outcome you want and then claim it was the variable you want it to be.

Here is the crux of my argument, striking simo or ahead of your target gets you more attacks/and or less attack back, because people killed prior to their initiative phase don't make CC attacks (at least not usually). This vastly outweighs the benefit provided by the beamer for combats against opponents that have a good chance of killing wraiths. In the khorne berserker example, the wraiths with whip coils will take about 12 less attacks than a unit armed with beamers and get three more attacks in return. With Wulfen who are I5, you are still going to lose wraiths but at least those wraiths got to attack back before they die. This isn't rocket science, and if you disagree with me on the point, then it's super easy to prove me wrong, just show me a match up against a good CC unit of approximately equal cost where the beamers function better. I've shown you one, the wraithknight, but that's an edge case because wraiths are usually wounding opponents much easier than that. Outside of that, maybe units that strike at initiative 1 won't care if you have whipcoils (except if they have concussive then having whip coils matters immensely, since swift strike and concussive cancel out allowing wraiths to hit at their base initiative which is 2). For the vast majority of fights, whip coils are the better selection.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

You can talk to me and everyone else in the CSM tactic thread as to why Berserker Marines are useless. The only thing they have over regular marines is WS5 and the option to buy a Chainaxe. That's literally it.

I'm not terribly interested in joining the pity party you guys are rocking in that thread, and you haven't brought one quantifiable fact forward that shows I'm wrong. Khorne berserkers are probably not worth their points (it's iffy with all of the benefits from traitors hate) but they can be dangerous on the charge, due to number and quality of attacks. I'm not saying KBs are better than wraiths, wraiths are under cost and KBs are not, which more or less settles the matter. What I am saying is that KBs are dangerous on the charge to wraiths, and that danger is lessened by having whip coils. Are either parts of that false?

It isn't a pity party; we are trying to use the tools that the new supplement has given us, and many will agree Berserker Marines are trash. From the supplement, all they get is AW and then gimmicky formations for them. For comparison:
10 Berserker Marines is 200 points
10 MoK Marines with extra CCW's and two Melta Guns is 198 points
The only thing they have is WS5 and the option to buy a Chainaxe. Any other advantage they use to have (Furious Charge) is standard for World Eater Marines.

So are you right in that Whip Coils can lessen danger. However, you are wrong in them being dangerous if they charge. It takes a minimum of 18 attacks average to inflict 2 wounds. That takes more points in Berserker Marines than Wraiths. So please quit touting them as though they were a danger because they aren't.

 Grimgold wrote:


Can you find me a single battle report where wraiths killed a wraith knight in two turns, hell where a wraithstar kitted out as you suggested killed a wraith knight in two turns? If we are adding HQ, one farseer and your plan falls apart, we have no counter to invis, so you could add an entire army to that CC and the results would still be an eldar win. You are also talking about throwing 700+ points at a 295 point target, which is a silly way to try and make a point. You should isolate variables to see which ones matter, not throw everything and the kitchen sink at the problem until you get the outcome you want and then claim it was the variable you want it to be.

Here is the crux of my argument, striking simo or ahead of your target gets you more attacks/and or less attack back, because people killed prior to their initiative phase don't make CC attacks (at least not usually). This vastly outweighs the benefit provided by the beamer for combats against opponents that have a good chance of killing wraiths. In the khorne berserker example, the wraiths with whip coils will take about 12 less attacks than a unit armed with beamers and get three more attacks in return. With Wulfen who are I5, you are still going to lose wraiths but at least those wraiths got to attack back before they die. This isn't rocket science, and if you disagree with me on the point, then it's super easy to prove me wrong, just show me a match up against a good CC unit of approximately equal cost where the beamers function better. I've shown you one, the wraithknight, but that's an edge case because wraiths are usually wounding opponents much easier than that. Outside of that, maybe units that strike at initiative 1 won't care if you have whipcoils (except if they have concussive then having whip coils matters immensely, since swift strike and concussive cancel out allowing wraiths to hit at their base initiative which is 2). For the vast majority of fights, whip coils are the better selection.

I understand what you are saying. I think you are failing to understand that there are two top Necron lists in the ITC right now: Wraithstar and Pylonstar.

My example of Wraithstar is entirely on point for competitive play. Let's stick to examples that are relevant for competitive play.

Beamers have a definite place in a Wraithstar list since you are adding a buff to a buffed up unit that is designed to mulch through targets. Wraithstar lists are my favorite lists to run and they mulch through WKs and Knights because they are designed to do just that. Beamers are a 60 point upgrade that frontloads a chunk of damage onto the enemy unit which is exactly what you want to do with a Wraithstar list. A Wraithstar isn't a tarpit. You want to break the enemy unit in two assault phases or less. You have a Veil to pop out of a combat that is grinding on. And you don' want a combat with a Stomper to grind on since you have ICs in the Wraithstar.

Invisibility isn't that game-wrecking in ITC since you are still hitting on 5+ in combat. If you can, you take out the Farseer first and go after the targets that aren't invisible before engaging the WK. Eldar is the top list in the ITC so you need to play tight and play the 'tricks' in your Wraithstar to maximum advantage.

The only list that gives my Wraithstar list serious problems is Dogstar and only if that list does really well for itself while rolling Psychic powers. Even so I can often grind out wins against Dogstar even when it gets all the psychic goods since a Wraithstar can take 4 solid turns for it chomp through. Meanwhile the rest of my list has been rocketing ahead on the Secondary and can often block the Dogstar from winning even though it has late game superior numbers.

Whether or not I equip my Wraithstar with Beamers is entirely a meta choice. If I expect a field of juicy targets for the AP2 and/or the ID then I run it. If I don't, I run more TBs.

Ok Pop quiz, how many other 200 point units can kill two wraiths on a charge? My wager paid for in affirmations is less than 5. Also you are way underselling WS 5; for example against WS 4 (which is almost everyone they will fight) that means a 24% increase in the number of hits. When you are slinging 41 attacks it's about 7 extra hits. They are quantifiably gak after the charge, but on the charge they are a top ten melee threat.

So Math says you are wrong, could we please stop this senseless bickering. I proved I was right like two post ago, I'm not even sure why we are still doing this.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ok so blood of kittens time,

5th at LVO
No pylons, wraith star for sure, whipcoils.

7th overall at LVO
No wraiths or pylons

13th at adepticon
Lychstar, no pylons or wraiths

1st wetcoast
Whip coils no pylons

1st overall dbm brawl
Hey we found pylons finally, but it's more of a chaos zombie list with pylons as fire support. Lychguard no wraiths.

Please believe me when I say that I am data obsessed, it's my job, and it's my hobby. I am very familiar with the current necron meta, and you are wrong, Demonstrably so.

"Oh, you think math is your ally. But you merely adopted the the min maxing; I was born in it, moulded by it. I didn't see a fluffy list until I was already a man, by then it was nothing to me but BLINDING! The math betrays you, because they belong to me!" or something like that.

Requizen wrote:

Oberron wrote:

 necr0n wrote:

 skoffs wrote:

 necr0n wrote:
I struggle to understand the point about the Deathmarks, however. How would 40 sniper shots bring down a Gargantuan Creatuce that did not deepstrike that turn?( I mean, I don't see a Wraithknight ever wanting to deepstrike) They would cause 2 wounds max, the way I see it.

... you do know what makes Deathmarks so special, right?

I was under the impression, they were not allowed the 2+ rule because of the Gargantuan Creature rule.

They get the 2+ to wound when the deathmarks deepstrike. The gargantuan creature rule applies to the sniper rule. Here is the average damage to a wraith knight with a unit of 10 deathmarks+ D.lord in the group (assuming rapid fire range).

On average
20 shots hitting on 3+ re-rolling 1s
2/3 of 20 is 13.2 with 6.8 misses 3.4 being 1s with re-roll is 2.24 more hits after re-roll
15.44 hits wounding on 2+ with re-roll 1s
5/6 of 15.44 is 12.8152 with 2.62 misses 1.31 being 1s with re-roll is 1.09 more wounds after re-roll.
14.13 wounds with 1/6 of them being ap 2 is 2.26 that go through armor.
Wraithknights have a 3+ armor save so 2/3 of 11.87 is 7.83, 4.04 wounds get through armor + 2.26 = 6.3 unsaved wounds
FNP turns 6.3 into 4.22 wounds
Staff of light might get an extra wound
This won't kill it on average but it is very close to bringing it down in a single round for less points.

I find it amusing that you think a large unit with no scatter reduction can be relied on. Expecting a 10 man squad with a big DLord base to land in rapid fire range any amount of time is an exercise in frustration, in my experience.
.

The math hammer checks out and an 11 man squad isn't that hard to deeps trike in even with the dlord base being one of them. And you don't use the dlord as the deep strike marker model you use one of the deathmarks, you can place the dlord at any time when you deepstrike. Ideally you set your mark roughly 8 inches away from the wraithknight, you now have greater than 50% chance of being in rapid fire range terrain permitting. On average you will scatter roughly 6 inches, any arrow direction forward 180 degrees and you have all the death marks in rapid-fire range, as well as a decent amount for going to either side to still be in rapid range I'll need to do the measurements again but I think only the exact rear 65 degree cone is the largest section where if you scatter around average you won't be in rapid fire. And then of course if you land perfectly you are in rapidfire.

But aside from that point, how often do you deepstrike 25mm based units? It sounds like you have bad rolls or bad placement or worse case situations.

 Grimgold wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:I literally LOL'd at the fact Berserker Marines were listed as a unit capable of hurting Wraiths.

Khorne berserkers have a few issues, no AP, overcost, but if they get the charge, it's 4 attacks at str 5 per berserker (except for the champion who has 5 attacks at str 5), hitting on threes, wounding on fours. 41 attacks on a charge 14 wounds, 4 wounds make it thru and we have 2 dead wraiths. So yes they are a threat, and I mention them because I've had my wraiths roflstomped by them. Add in traitors hate for things like red rain and turn one charges, and you can see that while not a great unit berserkers can get work done even against an unarguably better unit like wraiths.

Your math doesn't factor in RP. 2.333 wounds make it to the Wraiths and you assign 1 wound to 1 Wraith in b2b and another wound to another Wraith in b2b. No dead wraiths on the charge.

Also, you are smoking a pipe if you think you can get the charge off on a unit with Wraithflight.

 Grimgold wrote:
Ok Pop quiz, how many other 200 point units can kill two wraiths on a charge? My wager paid for in affirmations is less than 5. Also you are way underselling WS 5; for example against WS 4 (which is almost everyone they will fight) that means a 24% increase in the number of hits. When you are slinging 41 attacks it's about 7 extra hits. They are quantifiably gak after the charge, but on the charge they are a top ten melee threat.

So Math says you are wrong, could we please stop this senseless bickering. I proved I was right like two post ago, I'm not even sure why we are still doing this.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ok so blood of kittens time,

5th at LVO
No pylons, wraith star for sure, whipcoils.

7th overall at LVO
No wraiths or pylons

13th at adepticon
Lychstar, no pylons or wraiths

1st wetcoast
Whip coils no pylons

1st overall dbm brawl
Hey we found pylons finally, but it's more of a chaos zombie list with pylons as fire support. Lychguard no wraiths.

Please believe me when I say that I am data obsessed, it's my job, and it's my hobby. I am very familiar with the current necron meta, and you are wrong, Demonstrably so.

"Oh, you think math is your ally. But you merely adopted the the min maxing; I was born in it, moulded by it. I didn't see a fluffy list until I was already a man, by then it was nothing to me but BLINDING! The math betrays you, because they belong to me!" or something like that.

...They're definitely not part of the top 10 most dangerous units on the charge. You're not actually serious are you?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Like, I showed the math...

Ok care to name 10 units that get more and better attacks on the charge, I can think of TWC, Wulfen, wraiths(-ish), bikestars and then I'm struggling. Certainly if we restrict it to the 200 point range I can't think of much.

Oberron wrote:


The math hammer checks out and an 11 man squad isn't that hard to deeps trike in even with the doors base being one of them. And you don't use the door as the deep strike marker model you use one of the deathmarks, you can place the doors at any time when you deepstrike. Ideally you set your mark roughly 8 inches away from the wraithknight, you now have greater than 50% chance of being in rapid fire range terrain permitting. On average you will scatter roughly 6 inches, any arrow direction forward 180 degrees and you have all the death marks in rapid-fire range, as well as a decent amount for going to either side to still be in rapid range I'll need to do the measurements again but I think only the exact rear 65 degree cone is the largest section where if you scatter around average you won't be in rapid fire. And then of course if you land perfectly you are in rapidfire.

But aside from that point, how often do you deepstrike 25mm based units? It sounds like you have bad rolls or bad placement or worse case situations.

I deep strike aggressively. You want to be within 1.25" of the WK if you don't scatter. The bell curve works in your favor. If you scatter directly toward the WK, chances are you will wind up landing comfortably behind the WK. This way, you wind up in rapidfire range almost always. If you mishap, you can go back and arrive via Deep Strike next turn on a roll of a 4-6.

It's the best way to deep strike. If you have never done it, definitely try it out!

 Grimgold wrote:
Ok care to name 10 units that get more and better attacks on the charge, I can think of TWC, Wulfen, wraiths(-ish), bikestars and then I'm struggling. Certainly if we restrict it to the 200 point range I can't think of much.

Most Genestealer Cult units have plenty of attacks on the charge.

Another option could be Necron Flayed Ones.

Ork boys? they have a lot of attacks for cheap.

Also Murderhorde Flesh Hounds

 Grimgold wrote:
Ok care to name 10 units that get more and better attacks on the charge, I can think of TWC, Wulfen, wraiths(-ish), bikestars and then I'm struggling. Certainly if we restrict it to the 200 point range I can't think of much.

Either loadouts of Lychguard, Flayed Ones, Flesh Hounds, Praetorians (though iffy), Honour Guard (though it'll depend on the Chapter Tactics used but the Banner is more important), Chaos Terminators definitely (depending on the Legion, it gets VERY gruesome), Black and deathwing Knights (I don't know how the latter is getting the charge but you wanted name dropping), and the new and improved Vanguard.

Trust me when I say I'm not afraid of Berserker Marines, and if anything I feel more comfortable when they're around.

Ork slugga boys are great on the charge.

200 points gets you 29 slugga boys and a nob boss with a bosspole and a big Choppa.

They have furious charge on the charge.

29 X 4 = 116 attacks at str 4. 58 hits. 19.33 wounds 3.22 unsaved wounds (3++ and RP).
5 attacks at str 7 = 2.5 hits. = 2.08 wounds = 0.347 wounds

ork boys = 3.57 unsaved wounds

bezerkers = 2.33 unsaved wounds

orks win!

col_impact wrote:

 Grimgold wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:I literally LOL'd at the fact Berserker Marines were listed as a unit capable of hurting Wraiths.

Khorne berserkers have a few issues, no AP, overcost, but if they get the charge, it's 4 attacks at str 5 per berserker (except for the champion who has 5 attacks at str 5), hitting on threes, wounding on fours. 41 attacks on a charge 14 wounds, 4 wounds make it thru and we have 2 dead wraiths. So yes they are a threat, and I mention them because I've had my wraiths roflstomped by them. Add in traitors hate for things like red rain and turn one charges, and you can see that while not a great unit berserkers can get work done even against an unarguably better unit like wraiths.

Your math doesn't factor in RP. 2.333 wounds make it to the Wraiths and you assign 1 wound to 1 Wraith in b2b and another wound to another Wraith in b2b. No dead wraiths on the charge.

Also, you are smoking a pipe if you think you can get the charge off on a unit with Wraithflight.

FYI, page 446 states you have to keep assigning wounds to the same model (assuming it's in b2b with the same attacking model).

sieGermans wrote:


FYI, page 446 states you have to keep assigning wounds to the same model (assuming it's in b2b with the same attacking model).

My mistake. You can assign wounds to a different model in b2b contact when it becomes a different wound pool. But that is not the case being described. Thanks for the correction.

Q: Do Canoptek Wraiths and C’tan suffer the Initiative penalty
when charging through terrain, despite their special rules which
allow them to treat other models and terrain as if they were open
ground when moving?
A: No.
Q: Do the Wraithflight and Immune to Natural Law rules work
only in the movement phase or do they work during any kind of
movement, such as Run, charge and Consolidation moves?
A: The Wraithflight and Immune to Natural Law rules
take effect any time the model moves in any phase.

Turns out Whip Coils are pretty king.

Good, I'm glad they reverted that.

Other things of note:

-You can't reembark in a Night Scythe once on the board. This was always sorta in contention, just glad to have it cleared up.

-Obelisk does not force Dangerous Terrain on FMCs. So, making it more useless.

-Deathmarks 2+ against GMC is official now, so that's not bad.

-Tesla Spheres on the Obelisk have 180 degree firing arcs, which is actually quite good despite my earlier remark.

-Retribution Phalanx cannot charge when it comes back. The answer also says "use the rules for deep strike when they come back" (paraphrased), so do they need to cluster in a ball as Deep Strikers normally do?

-Still didn't answer if Praetorians can start in their own Night Scythes since they're Jump. But at least the Scythes get access to the Judicator Battalion's rerolls.

So what do you think?

Time to start a new thread?

[edit] started a new thread-

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/715040.page#9149518

Probably not a bad idea. Something like "Post-FAQ Pre-8th Necron Tactica"

Done.