With the amount of work needed to have a functional FW resin part (cleaning, mold lines, heat gun for warped parts) I hardly see how it qualifies as a premium product that we have to pay extra for. And I don't know what FW resin can do that CAD plastic cannot do, when I see the latests kits released by GW it doesn't feel like FW is more "detailed" anymore. I admit I don't know much about the intricates of the question, just my opinion. Fortunately there's not much incentive on buying FW.
Aaranis wrote: And I don't know what FW resin can do that CAD plastic cannot do
Release models with a much lower breakeven point. It is seriously expensive to make a plastic injection mold, especially when you consider something like a knight needs big frames.
Aaranis wrote: With the amount of work needed to have a functional FW resin part (cleaning, mold lines, heat gun for warped parts) I hardly see how it qualifies as a premium product that we have to pay extra for. And I don't know what FW resin can do that CAD plastic cannot do, when I see the latests kits released by GW it doesn't feel like FW is more "detailed" anymore. I admit I don't know much about the intricates of the question, just my opinion. Fortunately there's not much incentive on buying FW.
It's really a minute difference at this point as CAD design has gotten very good with a lot of automation in the software that detects plastic flow which allows the designers to really push the details rather than prioritizing flow over design. Essentially all plastic molded models need to conform to a minimum draft (angle) so that the plastic can come out of the mold. Minimum is 1.5-2%, but usually to be safe it's 3 or 4%. That means you need to design around this limitation.
However, this isn't the case with silicone molds. You can have undercuts in the mold and since the mold itself is silicone (not metal like the plastic molds), it can flex a bit and you can prioritize design over draft angle considerations. If you've gotten any forgeworld models, you'll probably notice they have noticeably fewer parts. This is because the mold can flex which allows for more flexibility in the design. The plastic models that have a ton of detail often are split into tons of pieces.
A great example is Death Korps of Krieg models. There's no way they could get the gasmasks on the troopers to work well in plastic unless they either changed the design, reduced the detail, or made the head as multiple parts. As of now, the model has a deep undercut around the collar, details inside that undercut, a breathing tube that loops onto itself. 100% impossible as 1 part in plastic.
A great easy to see example of draft on plastic parts on GW stuff are any guns that have a bunch of holes in the barrel like the multi-melta. The ones near the middle are angled correctly, but as they approach the top (the edge of the piece), their angle starts to look funny. You can see it on quite a few models on the edges if you know what you're looking for. Detail fades or warps. This is because they need to keep the draft and need to remove the detail. GW is really good at designing around it though.
There point where amount of money made by sales is higher than the the cost of the investment to make the model in the first place. Basically how many models they need to sell before they start making a profit. Due to the high startup costs of plastic, the number is much higher than with resin miniatures.
Aaranis wrote: With the amount of work needed to have a functional FW resin part (cleaning, mold lines, heat gun for warped parts) I hardly see how it qualifies as a premium product that we have to pay extra for. And I don't know what FW resin can do that CAD plastic cannot do, when I see the latests kits released by GW it doesn't feel like FW is more "detailed" anymore. I admit I don't know much about the intricates of the question, just my opinion. Fortunately there's not much incentive on buying FW.
It's really a minute difference at this point as CAD design has gotten very good with a lot of automation in the software that detects plastic flow which allows the designers to really push the details rather than prioritizing flow over design. Essentially all plastic molded models need to conform to a minimum draft (angle) so that the plastic can come out of the mold. Minimum is 1.5-2%, but usually to be safe it's 3 or 4%. That means you need to design around this limitation.
However, this isn't the case with silicone molds. You can have undercuts in the mold and since the mold itself is silicone (not metal like the plastic molds), it can flex a bit and you can prioritize design over draft angle considerations. If you've gotten any forgeworld models, you'll probably notice they have noticeably fewer parts. This is because the mold can flex which allows for more flexibility in the design. The plastic models that have a ton of detail often are split into tons of pieces.
A great example is Death Korps of Krieg models. There's no way they could get the gasmasks on the troopers to work well in plastic unless they either changed the design, reduced the detail, or made the head as multiple parts. As of now, the model has a deep undercut around the collar, details inside that undercut, a breathing tube that loops onto itself. 100% impossible as 1 part in plastic.
A great easy to see example of draft on plastic parts on GW stuff are any guns that have a bunch of holes in the barrel like the multi-melta. The ones near the middle are angled correctly, but as they approach the top (the edge of the piece), their angle starts to look funny. You can see it on quite a few models on the edges if you know what you're looking for. Detail fades or warps. This is because they need to keep the draft and need to remove the detail. GW is really good at designing around it though.
I wasn't aware of the technical issues with molding, thanks for all the info ! I don't think I understood everything though, is the draft/angle a way for the plastic to go out of the model part of the sprue to continue flowing towards another part and so on ?
There point where amount of money made by sales is higher than the the cost of the investment to make the model in the first place. Basically how many models they need to sell before they start making a profit. Due to the high startup costs of plastic, the number is much higher than with resin miniatures.
Ah I didn't know that word in English, but yes I've heard it was something like a quarter of the cost of plastic molds for a resin mold.
Aaranis wrote: Ah I didn't know that word in English, but yes I've heard it was something like a quarter of the cost of plastic molds for a resin mold.
Oh much more than 4 times. The guy that owns Dreamforge once disclosed the tooling of the plastic injection molds for the Leviathan kit - which is about knight sized - exceeded $100.000.
I wasn't aware of the technical issues with molding, thanks for all the info ! I don't think I understood everything though, is the draft/angle a way for the plastic to go out of the model part of the sprue to continue flowing towards another part and so on ?
Draft is the angle of the sides of the mold/model.
For example: imagine you have a perfect cube you want to be made into a plastic mold. In order to make a one-part mold, you'd have a sheet of metal with a perfect cube cut into it with 90 degree angles (which would be 0% draft). This would not work in a metal mold because it would get stuck when it needs to be removed. You'd need to make the angles of the sides of the cube slant outward so that the deepest recessed part of the cube is smaller than the opening. This would obviously distort the cube.
So in this example, you have a few options. Obviously, you'd at least need a 2 part mold. With this you could make it a less-perfect cube and split the cube down the center and angle those walls by 2% or so. Alternatively, you could rotate the cube 45-degrees on 2 axes so you end up with the sides being at 45-degree angles rather than 90 degree angles. Obviously the 2nd choice is better, but if this cube had other design elements on the top and bottom, it would be better to distort the cube. It's fairly simple considerations for a cube shape, but gets incrementally more complicated with more complex designs.
Those considerations can be somewhat ignored for silicone molds as long as the model is 'generally' mold friendly. Plastic 'rules' actually are a benefit to silicone molds because they prevent wear and tear during removal, thus extend the life of the mold. However, there is a lot more flexibility which lets you retain the artist's vision and prioritize it over technical requirements.
-Onagers get squadron rules
-Metallica trait affects heavy weapons minimum, ideally pistols as well
-jezzail can be taken in addition to tazer lance on Dragoons
-arquebus can now move and fire
-skitarii alpha HQ -some sort of reason for servitors to exist
-the canticle where on a 6 enemy units in combat with us take mortal wounds dies in a fire and we get something useful instead
-completely revamp our relics so I have a reason to take something other than the phosphoenix, the mask, and the pimp cane of repair
-Dominus get some sort of improved invuln option and a points decrease. If you really want to spoil me let us reroll 1's in combat as well
I'm sure there are plenty more but that's off the top of my head
I'm on my knees for the Onager squads. This. Please.
ph34r wrote: Something else good would have to happen other than just Onager Squads because they are a little bit on the pricey side though they are well rounded.
Their bases are also ridiculously enormous which I hate.
Fun fact, they're exactly the same size as the large blast template from previous editions. I guess it's nice for it's emanatus and broad spectrum auras but good Lord they're tricky to fit between terrain sometimes
ph34r wrote: Something else good would have to happen other than just Onager Squads because they are a little bit on the pricey side though they are well rounded.
Their bases are also ridiculously enormous which I hate.
Really? I like their bases. Makes it easy to defend... well, anything.
They make excellent roadblocks for our Robots. It's so funny to see a Nid player try to break through a wall of Crawler and/or Dragoon to tie up your Robots.
lash92 wrote: They make excellent roadblocks for our Robots. It's so funny to see a Nid player try to break through a wall of Crawler and/or Dragoon to tie up your Robots.
The nice thing about Crawlers is that you can move them around without any penalty to shooting. They're like moving moats for your castles.
I wasn't aware of the technical issues with molding, thanks for all the info ! I don't think I understood everything though, is the draft/angle a way for the plastic to go out of the model part of the sprue to continue flowing towards another part and so on ?
Draft is the angle of the sides of the mold/model.
For example: imagine you have a perfect cube you want to be made into a plastic mold. In order to make a one-part mold, you'd have a sheet of metal with a perfect cube cut into it with 90 degree angles (which would be 0% draft). This would not work in a metal mold because it would get stuck when it needs to be removed. You'd need to make the angles of the sides of the cube slant outward so that the deepest recessed part of the cube is smaller than the opening. This would obviously distort the cube.
So in this example, you have a few options. Obviously, you'd at least need a 2 part mold. With this you could make it a less-perfect cube and split the cube down the center and angle those walls by 2% or so. Alternatively, you could rotate the cube 45-degrees on 2 axes so you end up with the sides being at 45-degree angles rather than 90 degree angles. Obviously the 2nd choice is better, but if this cube had other design elements on the top and bottom, it would be better to distort the cube. It's fairly simple considerations for a cube shape, but gets incrementally more complicated with more complex designs.
Those considerations can be somewhat ignored for silicone molds as long as the model is 'generally' mold friendly. Plastic 'rules' actually are a benefit to silicone molds because they prevent wear and tear during removal, thus extend the life of the mold. However, there is a lot more flexibility which lets you retain the artist's vision and prioritize it over technical requirements.
Thanks for all the info, it's much clearer now.
As for Onagers, if we could have more than three I could see myself playing with 3 Beamers and 1-2 Lasers if I had the models.
lash92 wrote: They make excellent roadblocks for our Robots. It's so funny to see a Nid player try to break through a wall of Crawler and/or Dragoon to tie up your Robots.
The nice thing about Crawlers is that you can move them around without any penalty to shooting. They're like moving moats for your castles.
Yup, plus they are quite durable for their points. And I just like the Icarus loadout. It's useful against nearly every army in my local meta and if it should happen that I'm lacking dedicated targets then they are okayish at killing Infantry / Heavy in fatty due to high number of shots good strength, AP and multi dmg (except the Gatling part of course)
lash92 wrote: They make excellent roadblocks for our Robots. It's so funny to see a Nid player try to break through a wall of Crawler and/or Dragoon to tie up your Robots.
The nice thing about Crawlers is that you can move them around without any penalty to shooting. They're like moving moats for your castles.
Which would be valuable if they were good in CC or had short range weapons. However makes very little difference to a 48" gun.
Hey guys! Long time since I came to dakka, but hey happy to be back in the salt mines!
So, was browsing bell of lost souls yesterday and decided I didn't have enough carcinogenics in my diet, and read the comment section. Noticed that a lot of people are saying that mechanicus is a garbage force, which is odd because since eighth edition dropped I pretty much won every game I played with them aside from a practice one against a tourney list. Maybe it's because I bring a knight with me during every battle, but so far my mechanicus has been pulling all the weight in my games and overwhelms the enemy with firepower. Just wondering where this sentiment is coming from, as admech is fun to play against everything aside from the cheesiest of pox walker spams
Tiger9gamer wrote: Hey guys! Long time since I came to dakka, but hey happy to be back in the salt mines!
So, was browsing bell of lost souls yesterday and decided I didn't have enough carcinogenics in my diet, and read the comment section. Noticed that a lot of people are saying that mechanicus is a garbage force, which is odd because since eighth edition dropped I pretty much won every game I played with them aside from a practice one against a tourney list. Maybe it's because I bring a knight with me during every battle, but so far my mechanicus has been pulling all the weight in my games and overwhelms the enemy with firepower. Just wondering where this sentiment is coming from, as admech is fun to play against everything aside from the cheesiest of pox walker spams
Hi, welcome back to Dakka then
Well it certainly depends what kind of lists you're facing and what you're playing with. I had good success with my AdMech at first, except against some armies when more optimised (DG for example), but with the codex creep I can't keep up with my current collection.
You have to understand that online, most people seem to have only the most competitive mindset at all times to judge armies, which is logical in itself, it is in tournaments that we see the most optimised lists of each codex, used by the best players. Tournament results are an easy way to see which armies are good and which are bad, because the top players have likely done the work of Mathammering and playtesting the best combos.
In my opinion though too many people assume everyone is playing at this level, and it leads to people asking for advice for their army online just to see loads of people telling him to shelf his army for 8th because it sucks all the way, because of said tournament results. In fact it depends heavily on your local meta and the average mindset of the players you're facing.
There's also the problem of blurry frontiers between "casual" and "optimised", some might innocently want to play lots of really good units (or army as a whole) because they like the theme, visuals and gameplay of these units, and find out when playing that their list is really strong despite them wanting to play "casual". It works the other way, you want to run a full Deathwing army for its theme, and find out it's terrible against a well-written list.
I've had really hard times having fun with my AdMech and DA lately because of all these new codices that are just stronger, solely because I only have two Kastelans, which are my favourite unit fluff-wise, and because they're the best our codex has to offer. Sadly it condemns us to only a few builds if we want to offer a challenge to say T'au, Aeldari or Nurgle armies.
It comes from simply compareing units. Guard are more survivable with higher damage output than vanguard and dont come with useless/overpriced HQ taxs.
Executioner russes do more damage than neutronagas since they can fire twice. However they arn't good enough to see a lot of play.
When most players use the phrase good they mean optimised choices.
Vanguard arn"t the optimised choice so they are not good. However that doesn't mean they are terrible especially in a 3rd detatchment.
Hoplites are solid for their pts. Kastelans are not strong unless you all out buff them which doesnt leave a lot of flexabilities pts wise and priests died when you could no longer reliably deliver them.
While infiltrators and ruststalkers dont really do their job for their pts
If I had to sum up the fundamental problems with AdMech:
1) Limited model selection
2) Extremely poor internal synergy
3) Useless relics
4) Only one HQ choice that comes in three sizes
5) Cost inefficient infantry
Basically, there aren't enough choices to field a flexible and competitive 2000 point army consisting entire of AdMech. Unless you count Mechanicus Knights, I guess.
Here's hoping CA gives us more tools to use. I actually would not mind playing AdMech + solo Knight + Guard.
Tiger9gamer wrote: Hey guys! Long time since I came to dakka, but hey happy to be back in the salt mines!
So, was browsing bell of lost souls yesterday and decided I didn't have enough carcinogenics in my diet, and read the comment section. Noticed that a lot of people are saying that mechanicus is a garbage force, which is odd because since eighth edition dropped I pretty much won every game I played with them aside from a practice one against a tourney list. Maybe it's because I bring a knight with me during every battle, but so far my mechanicus has been pulling all the weight in my games and overwhelms the enemy with firepower. Just wondering where this sentiment is coming from, as admech is fun to play against everything aside from the cheesiest of pox walker spams
Hi, welcome back to Dakka then
Well it certainly depends what kind of lists you're facing and what you're playing with. I had good success with my AdMech at first, except against some armies when more optimised (DG for example), but with the codex creep I can't keep up with my current collection.
You have to understand that online, most people seem to have only the most competitive mindset at all times to judge armies, which is logical in itself, it is in tournaments that we see the most optimised lists of each codex, used by the best players. Tournament results are an easy way to see which armies are good and which are bad, because the top players have likely done the work of Mathammering and playtesting the best combos.
In my opinion though too many people assume everyone is playing at this level, and it leads to people asking for advice for their army online just to see loads of people telling him to shelf his army for 8th because it sucks all the way, because of said tournament results. In fact it depends heavily on your local meta and the average mindset of the players you're facing.
There's also the problem of blurry frontiers between "casual" and "optimised", some might innocently want to play lots of really good units (or army as a whole) because they like the theme, visuals and gameplay of these units, and find out when playing that their list is really strong despite them wanting to play "casual". It works the other way, you want to run a full Deathwing army for its theme, and find out it's terrible against a well-written list.
I've had really hard times having fun with my AdMech and DA lately because of all these new codices that are just stronger, solely because I only have two Kastelans, which are my favourite unit fluff-wise, and because they're the best our codex has to offer. Sadly it condemns us to only a few builds if we want to offer a challenge to say T'au, Aeldari or Nurgle armies.
Yea, I understand. People want to win tournaments, especially on BoLs, but I am quite happy to play local games and gave fun there! I did notice that mechanicus came in the top 10 in a tournament last week or so, which makes me a little happy. I havn't played in a few weeks, but I can definatly see the codex creep making it's presence known, as usual. Hopefully the game will even out a bit more come chapter approved, but I am excited to play none-the-less.
The comparisons to guard is rather interesting though, And I agree that guard tanks and vehicles are usually just better in terms of firepower. However, I had a lot of success running naked squads of vanguard as cannon fodder / bubble wrap, only giving them an auxpex for ignoring cover. It's a neat trick and I honestly don't expect them to do much other than die horribly to protect my guns. The only other way I run them is as a deep striking squad with tripple plasma and omni-spex, and alongside some electropriests they help kill just about whatever they look at when combined with the extra BS strategem and re-rolling one canticle It can help finish off what my neutron lasers dont kill. honestly, the basic gun on the vanguard is good on it's own in my oppinion, and works better when you have 30 shots rather than just 21.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Skitarii Vanguard should really be 7 points like Rangers are.
Should rangers then be 6? Vanguard are definitely a small cut above rangers, given their debuff aura and better weapons. Would be nice if Rangers’ rifles got something like -1AP at more than half range to make their gun worth a damn and symergise with the arquebus and their general role as snipers (though the arquebus needs D3 shots or a massive points drop).
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Skitarii Vanguard should really be 7 points like Rangers are.
Should rangers then be 6? Vanguard are definitely a small cut above rangers, given their debuff aura and better weapons. Would be nice if Rangers’ rifles got something like -1AP at more than half range to make their gun worth a damn and symergise with the arquebus and their general role as snipers (though the arquebus needs D3 shots or a massive points drop).
honestly, I can count on my fingers how many times the vanguard debuf actually worked for me. Usually because It doesn't trigger instant death like in 7th, and because I dont really have too many CCW units that can capitalize. I think they should be lower in points, but not too low as they are basically stromtroppers without the hellfire guns.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Skitarii Vanguard should really be 7 points like Rangers are.
Should rangers then be 6? Vanguard are definitely a small cut above rangers, given their debuff aura and better weapons. Would be nice if Rangers’ rifles got something like -1AP at more than half range to make their gun worth a damn and symergise with the arquebus and their general role as snipers (though the arquebus needs D3 shots or a massive points drop).
That debuff aura isn't exactly the greatest tool ever, and both weapons have their advantages.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Skitarii Vanguard should really be 7 points like Rangers are.
Should rangers then be 6? Vanguard are definitely a small cut above rangers, given their debuff aura and better weapons. Would be nice if Rangers’ rifles got something like -1AP at more than half range to make their gun worth a damn and symergise with the arquebus and their general role as snipers (though the arquebus needs D3 shots or a massive points drop).
I actually think both should be 6. You need to realize that there are very few synergies in AdMech for infantry, so a single Catachan is actually stronger than a single Skitarii when fielded alongside Straken and Mini Priest.
And this isn't even taking into account the Mortar and Bolter options. Not to mention Psyker support and much more flexibility in orders. Who in their right mind would take the Skitarii? Sergeants have FIVE S4 attacks?!
Also the order which let's you move and advance instead of shooting is so incredible powerful.
I feel like in the whole imperium there are 2 troop choices really worth taking: Guard infantry and marine scouts.
Yeah. Move Move Move is great. We have to pay 1 CP and take Stygies to get a single 9" move on turn one. I think all Skitarii should just get that for free. It would be the 7E scout move.
Honestly, thinking about how many cooler tricks we had in 7E just makes me a bit mad.
hintzy wrote: In the most recent Signals from the Front Line Reece said his AdMech army dropped in cost by three digits. Of course he wouldn't specify anything further other than to say he could afford several additional units. He didn't say which units those would be of course. He also said his army is composed of less frequently used units.
That's not terribly useful information, but at least it pertains directly to the topic.
He says he uses a lot of units that other people don't use - so that'll be Ruststalkers and Servitors - but if they become more usable units that's not so bad surely?
Pretty sure the rumours have talked about a Legio Cybernetica detachment for Vigilus, so don't get your hopes up too far.
Suzuteo wrote: Yeah. Move Move Move is great. We have to pay 1 CP and take Stygies to get a single 9" move on turn one. I think all Skitarii should just get that for free. It would be the 7E scout move.
Honestly, thinking about how many cooler tricks we had in 7E just makes me a bit mad.
Yea, I hear you. Preferred enemy, scout, worthy arc rifles, hitting on two's for every skitarii soldier for at least three turns in a row, squadron onagers, scout, higher rate of fire plasma rifles, relentless, giant bubble of hate from infiltrators, doing extra wounds to the squad your shooting at rather than just a model with rad, AP 4 galvanic rifles...
Being able to use hh 30k models in their own army instead of mechanicus with compatible rules with the hope of getting said rules in 40k maybe...
Now I'm salty.
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Tastyfish wrote: He says he uses a lot of units that other people don't use - so that'll be Ruststalkers and Servitors - but if they become more usable units that's not so bad surely?
Pretty sure the rumours have talked about a Legio Cybernetica detachment for Vigilus, so don't get your hopes up too far.
You know, didn't that black stone fortress robot have a new keyword involving robots in the imperium? Makes you think doesn't it...
Tastyfish wrote: He says he uses a lot of units that other people don't use - so that'll be Ruststalkers and Servitors - but if they become more usable units that's not so bad surely?
Could also mean Corpuscarii priests I would think, who are underrated atm anyway but whom a cost drop would help even further. Also punchy robots and arguably ironstriders.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Skitarii Vanguard should really be 7 points like Rangers are.
Should rangers then be 6? Vanguard are definitely a small cut above rangers, given their debuff aura and better weapons. Would be nice if Rangers’ rifles got something like -1AP at more than half range to make their gun worth a damn and symergise with the arquebus and their general role as snipers (though the arquebus needs D3 shots or a massive points drop).
That debuff aura isn't exactly the greatest tool ever, and both weapons have their advantages.
They really should be the same price.
The debuff you notice more if you combine with other imperial factions
U02dah4 wrote: The debuff you notice more if you combine with other imperial factions
If they change minus to hit into cover save bonuses, Skitarii + Custodes might be a thing.
Tiger9gamer wrote: Yea, I hear you. Preferred enemy, scout, worthy arc rifles, hitting on two's for every skitarii soldier for at least three turns in a row, squadron onagers, scout, higher rate of fire plasma rifles, relentless, giant bubble of hate from infiltrators, doing extra wounds to the squad your shooting at rather than just a model with rad, AP 4 galvanic rifles...
Let's not forget... WarCon. Free toys that never get hot. Funny how that wasn't not even the most OP thing in 7E.
Anyhow, I feel that AdMech lost a lot of its identity with the new codex. Hoping for some core rule changes.
Tastyfish wrote: He says he uses a lot of units that other people don't use - so that'll be Ruststalkers and Servitors - but if they become more usable units that's not so bad surely?
Could also mean Corpuscarii priests I would think, who are underrated atm anyway but whom a cost drop would help even further. Also punchy robots and arguably ironstriders.
Maybe, but think if you're looking for big savings it'll be rust stalkers and destroyers. Breachers might come down a bit (with torsion), but there's not a ton of points they could shave off the arc.
Triple figures to me means several units are coming down by 20+ points and that'd be a lot of priests - especially if chapter approved doesn't take into account the beta rules that aren't in force, so Stygies and Termites still work.
So some 5-10 points drops on priests, maybe vanguard. Big drops on Kataphrons to bring the rest in line with the still not taken Arc Breachers (hopefully a boost to the Heavy Arc, this CA has datasheets or so the rumours go) and Ruststalkers, with a smattering of other points drops elsewhere.
Nope, matched play too. Though they're paying CP to access alternative faction abilities basically from the look of the ork one (different WL trait, relic, strats etc).
Maybe some extra bonus with some units getting a double trait at the very most.
Tastyfish wrote: Nope, matched play too. Though they're paying CP to access alternative faction abilities basically from the look of the ork one (different WL trait, relic, strats etc).
Maybe some extra bonus with some units getting a double trait at the very most.
I'm less so, I imagine with "Legio Cybernetica" being the rumoured minifaction it'd be focused on taking Robots without Mars (given Stygies is the Vigilus faction).
And we've already got a few Robot strats.
For the record, Orks get roll 3D6 and pick the highest for Bonebreaker Deathrollers, embark and disembark the same turn with boyz (no charging) and double range of the shooty Gunwagon.
Relic lets Blitz brigade units reroll 1s to hit a target within 6" of the warlords target.
Trick I think would be to make it so they're not compatible with the Martian buffs.
Tastyfish wrote: I'm less so, I imagine with "Legio Cybernetica" being the rumoured minifaction it'd be focused on taking Robots without Mars (given Stygies is the Vigilus faction).
And we've already got a few Robot strats.
I wouldn't read a whole hell of a lot into the "Legio Cybernetica" as a minifaction. Rumor is there's a Kastelan Robot "Detachment", but it sounds like it's a rehash of the Cohort Cybernetica formation from 7th.
Although I would be a damned happy Stygian if we got a new character or (prayers to the Omnissiah be answered!) a Skitarii HQ.
I love how Skitarii are so very close to space Skaven.
They both love to blow stuff up indeed.
I still hope for SEVERE point reduction on the Kastelan Fists. I played a friendly 2500 pts game the other day against Night Lords where I infiltrated two Fistelans (does that sound weird ?), the Datasmith and 3 Dragoons, and got first turn. The Robots almost blew a Land Raider up by themselves (with reroll 1s to hit as Canticle) by hitting twice and the Datasmith made a hardcore show of dominance by stripping 6 wounds off a Rhino. Now afterwards I remembered about that useless Power Fist relic that would've made me inflict two more mortal wounds.
Long story short I love my berserk Datasmith and if there's point reductions on Kastelan Fists and a Cybernetica Formation with nice rules I'll be a happy man.
Honestly I would accept their points is if they gained +1 ballistic skill and weapon skill and some defense in close combat. Hitting on fours is just bizarre for someone whose HH robots hit on 2+ in shooting!
Plus, since we lost the ability to move and shoot without penalty like last edition, I would love for some more accuracy outside of a stratagem.
Servitor Maniple and Cohort Cybernetica are our two specials.
So I'm going to guess Cohort Cybernetica is at least similar to the 7th version but no idea about the Servitor Maniple, I mean Kataphron are technically battle servitors so they could be part of that as well.
Yeah I figure they mean Kataphrons if they say "Servitors". Maybe a variation of the Acquisitorius from 7th ?
Glad to see the rumours about the Cybernetics being true. These formations could prove really fun if they made significant point changes on top of that.
I should be able to have a look at both books next Tuesday, I'll keep you guys in touch if everything didn't get leaked by Youtubers un the meantime.
Aaranis wrote: Yeah I figure they mean Kataphrons if they say "Servitors". Maybe a variation of the Acquisitorius from 7th ?
Glad to see the rumours about the Cybernetics being true. These formations could prove really fun if they made significant point changes on top of that.
I should be able to have a look at both books next Tuesday, I'll keep you guys in touch if everything didn't get leaked by Youtubers un the meantime.
A cybernetica formation is just them admitting they screwed up on the synergy when they just smashed skitarii and cult mechanicus into one book without any thought whatsover as to how they would function together.
Aaranis wrote: Yeah I figure they mean Kataphrons if they say "Servitors". Maybe a variation of the Acquisitorius from 7th ?
Glad to see the rumours about the Cybernetics being true. These formations could prove really fun if they made significant point changes on top of that.
I should be able to have a look at both books next Tuesday, I'll keep you guys in touch if everything didn't get leaked by Youtubers un the meantime.
A cybernetica formation is just them admitting they screwed up on the synergy when they just smashed skitarii and cult mechanicus into one book without any thought whatsover as to how they would function together.
I don't deny they screwed up but I don't see how this is them admitting they did ?
If the Maeg's gun at least kept Shred it would be interesting. As is, it fails to fill any role. Shame because it's my favorite aesthetically speaking.
That said, if rumors are correct about the current -1 to Hit trait just becoming Cover, it might be slightly more interesting. Still wouldn't take it probably though.
45" Heavy 5 S8 AP-3 DD6, get extra attack on 6+ wound roll is way more relevant than 48" Heavy 6 S7 AP-1 DD3, get AP-3 and D3 on 6+ wound roll. Especially when you combine it with the Krast bonuses against Titans.
Suzuteo wrote: 45" Heavy 5 S8 AP-3 DD6, get extra attack on 6+ wound roll is way more relevant than 48" Heavy 6 S7 AP-1 DD3, get AP-3 and D3 on 6+ wound roll. Especially when you combine it with the Krast bonuses against Titans.
hey, how did you know what I was running I myself am partial to an archeon with the flamestorm cannon, ion bulwark and the headsman mark to get a ridiculous damage 4 flamethrower against tanks and damage 5 against titans, even at only strength 7.
So with Guardsmen going to 5 points and -1 to hit possibly being traded in for cover saves, Stygies or Graia Rangers (11 PPW) are looking pretty good compared to Guardsmen (15/7.5 PPW in RF range, without and with FRFSRF) in shooting and Mars Vanguard (22 PPW) to Catachans (23 unbuffed by Straken/Mini-Priest) in fighting now.
If Enginseers go down a bit in price, I am thinking of Mars Battalion (Cawlstar) + Stygies Battalion (Goondozer?) + Solo Knight Styrix.
Let's see how cheap Kataphrons get, maybe we can incorporate them together with Cawl and Bots..
I still think that a double Batallion would be pretty HQ tax heavy.
You can use which ever forgeworld you like. I for example have my AdMech painted as Mars and I played then as Stygies in a tournament. As long as its clear to your opponent there are no probs.
U02dah4 wrote: Stygies looks even worse if that happens i mean if your going second you have cover for 3 turns anyway an advantage on t4+ is never as good
The difference is that you effectively get shroudpsalm for every single turn of the game, get to pick all the other canticles instead and save yourself the two command points for the Turn1+2 shroudpsalm, or the 4 CP if you go second and want it for 3 turns (which also comes with the drawback that the go second strategem only works within your own deployment zone, which is bad news for any units that want to advance, even if it's only infantry moving to objectives, or Crawlers that might have to leave it to get LoS), as well as not having to rely on luck to roll for shroudpsalm on the canticle table (which can backfire even if you play Mars with Cawl and end up rolling a 1, 2 or 6) and ending up with the Litany of the Electromancer that is completely useless 99% of the time or having to burn extra CP for rerolling that roll.
If you run pure Admech then saving CPs is always good because our non-Cawl HQ choices are so inefficient (you never want more than a single Enginseer and a second Dominus is more of a fun choice) and as a result you generally don't want more than a single battalion and maybe a spearhead detachment if you are not running Knights (give us Skitarii Alphas GW for the Omnissiah's sake, we even kind of had them in the 7.Ed Skitarii Codex too!). Guaranteed Shroudpsalm means you can get either a global re-roll 1s to hit buff (which means you are not forced to castle up around a Dominus or even Cawl in the case of BS 3+ units), S4 (situational but good on Dragoons, priests, infiltrators and Vanguards) or re-rolling morale test (which can keep the one or other special weapon alive in MSU units).
That's IMO a much better defensive buff than Graia, ESPECIALLY for Kastelans, Kataphrons and Crawlers (6+ FnP is extremely weak on multi-wound models if you only get to use it on the last wound), as the Graia trait only really works like FnP on 1 wound models. And Dakkabots and Crawlers is where most of our firepower comes from, so they are the things you want to keep alive. Skitarii infantry is there to protect them, until we get better ways to buff Ld or a Tau Cadre Fireblade style Skitarii Alpha HQ that buffs them, massive hordes of them can work but are worse than what say Tau can do, and those Skitarii benefit more from a 3+ armor save anyway (big time). And the Graia warlord trait... only really helps when a whole lot of your infantry ends up in close combat EXACTLY 6" away from your warlord, and staying in melee and shooting is usually worse than simply falling back and getting a chance to shoot the attackers with your big guns. Graia's psy-deny strategem is good though if you end up playing against psykers, especially if you are willing to burn a CP to re-roll.
The main issue that we pay for the best defensive FW trait and saving 2-4 CP by having a borderline useless Strategem with the units we have right now and an essentially completely useless warlord trait.
Lucius offers nerfing Ap-1 guns down to Ap-0 (which can be strong, weak or completely useless depending against which army and list you play against) AND offers the best alternative to clandestine infiltration with an affordable deepstrike strat that offer considerable flexibility and cool ways to use e.g. a big unit of Vanguard (let 10 of them with two Calivers pop up right next to some squishy backline units or cap far out objectives) and gives back most of the deployment flexibility units like Dragoons and priests lost with the last FAQ, even if the warlord trait is pretty useless if the best thing you can put it on is a Dominus (and Monitor Malovent is too good to pass up anyway). Now if we had melee centric Secutor Techpriests as a HQ choice...
Agripinaa has the VERY strong +5 overwatch that T'au has, even if it doesn't have the same flexibility that it offers when combined with Greater Good! and Fireblades. Though the warlord trait is again wasted on Enginseers or Dominii (hope that's the correct plural form, my latin is a bit rusty) and the Strategem is useless if you don't run Kataphrons (that said, if Destroyers or even Breachers get the considerable point-cut they need then having a unit of them respawn for 2 CP would be nice, especially if it's Destroyers and your Kastelans are less than 12" away from your deployment edge [so you get to activate Elimination Protocol in the same turn]).
Metalica has an amazing warlord trait that really benefits hordes of Skitarii infantry (especially when playing Vanguard and combining it with the FW trait) when facing close-combat threats, but is limited to a 6" bubble, useless against purely ranged armies and in any case you end up playing a worse version of T'au sept Firewarrior spam (something I play with good success at tournaments). And the strategem is very weak
O.f course Mars will reign supreme again, but it's the boring pick IMO, especially with Cawl, and you just end up with another shooty castle (even if Infiltrators can become really nasty with the strategem as a backup if your dakkabots end up dead or tied down... and ten infiltrators also dish out way more mortal wounds than the two castellans you get for the same points) that literally everyone will expect the moment you arrive at a table and say that you are playing Admech.
Let's see how cheap Kataphrons get, maybe we can incorporate them together with Cawl and Bots..
I still think that a double Batallion would be pretty HQ tax heavy.
Right. I was thinking of something like this, actually:
Spoiler:
Mars Battalion Detachment - 1216
HQ - 287 1x Belisarius Cawl
1x Tech-Priest Enginseer - Relic: Raiment of the Technomartyr
Fast Attack - 272 4x Sydonian Dragoon - Taser Lance
House Krast Super-Heavy Auxiliary Detachment - 500
Lord of War - 500 1x Knight Styrix - Volkite Chierovile, Hekaton Siege Claw, Twin Rad-cleanser, Graviton Crusher, Warlord: First Knight, Relic: The Headsman's Mark
Total: 2187 points 12 CP (-2)
Plenty of stuff to cut. But I really hope they bring Enginseers down to 35 points like most Guard elites.
But yeah, this might be a common skeleton. Cawlstar in Mars, some assault option in a second FW, and a Knight. Necromechanic to heal 4 wound per turn with the Tech-Adept stratagem.
U02dah4 wrote: Stygies looks even worse if that happens i mean if your going second you have cover for 3 turns anyway an advantage on t4+ is never as good
Depends on how it is phrased. If it's "count as in cover OR +1 to cover saves," then Stygies is worthwhile because 2+ saves are brutal. But Graia and Lucius would be the alternatives. I favor the former because it makes the infantry tougher to remove and also lets me spend 1 CP to Deny.
Kanluwen wrote: If Stygies loses their negative to hit trait, I'm just going to say feth it and work on a custom Forge World that can be whatever I want.
Oh boy. It looks like specialist detachments are keywords granted via stratagem. Which means Cawlstars may become even more deadly. (Unless it's Forgeworld-specific, which would suck.)
It amuses me that your breakdown above Ragnar lists the Stygies dtrat as useless but the Lucius strat as useful for Dragoons - I find the Stygies strat allows Dragoons to frequently make first turn charges, while Lucius’s strat gives fhem a sub-50% chance (even when paying extra for a command reroll) of getting a charge on turn 2. The only advantage to Lucius’s strat in this case is protecting them turn 1, but Dragoons already have a -1 to be hit so aren’t totally helpless there.
Agreed Agripinaa might become interesting if its kataphron gimmick is affordable.
Graia’s RTY trait may only activate on 1 wound models or models about to die, but when it does it’s miles better than a FNP - you only roll once, instead pf having to succeed a roll for every suffered wound. I’ve had Kastelans survive 6 damage hits from it before, when they started at 3 wounds, much less likely to happen with a FNP. But yes, it synergises best with Electropriests who become disgustingly hard to remove. Especially Corpuscarii if you put a Dominus with the Graia WT in among them, so they can overwatch-fight-shoot-fight if charged, as well as shoot-charge when on the offensive. Now if only the Doctrina Imperatives worked on them!
Stygies's strategem is more useful than Lucius's for sure. But both are probably not worth the 1 CP. Dragoons are probably better as a counter-charger and vehicle interceptor now.
The wait for CA is unbearable. I'll have my first tournament (ETC) in February and I'm already stressing about what kind of list I should write. There's a few restrictions to prevent spam but I'm sure as hell it will be useless. I mean limiting to 3 Troops doesn't prevent 90 Plaguebearers with -2 to be Hit. Meanwhile I won't be able to bring more than 2 Onagers.
Suzuteo wrote: So with Guardsmen going to 5 points and -1 to hit possibly being traded in for cover saves, Stygies or Graia Rangers (11 PPW) are looking pretty good compared to Guardsmen (15/7.5 PPW in RF range, without and with FRFSRF) in shooting and Mars Vanguard (22 PPW) to Catachans (23 unbuffed by Straken/Mini-Priest) in fighting now.
If Enginseers go down a bit in price, I am thinking of Mars Battalion (Cawlstar) + Stygies Battalion (Goondozer?) + Solo Knight Styrix.
I would love to see more of this and wish you every success if it comes to your table adventures!
Aaranis wrote: The wait for CA is unbearable. I'll have my first tournament (ETC) in February and I'm already stressing about what kind of list I should write. There's a few restrictions to prevent spam but I'm sure as hell it will be useless. I mean limiting to 3 Troops doesn't prevent 90 Plaguebearers with -2 to be Hit. Meanwhile I won't be able to bring more than 2 Onagers.
It really is, it´s demotivating me from playing, painting and buying....
As someone who had his first tournament this year I can feel your hassle. But trust me you will learn so much and if you post the restrictions we can work something out in the thread.
Thanks for the support ! Well I could but thinking about a list is impossible as so much could change (or not) with CA that it would be an exercise in futility.
However the limitations and rules are as follow:
- 1850 pts, ETC lists, Maelstrom + Eternal War missions, +10 pts if tabling
- WYSIWIG, full painted
- 2 Codices max, no Index
- 3 Detachments max
- Up to 250 pts of a single FW unit
- No Fortifications
- 1 Named character per player
- 1 LoW max (except for Codex: Imperial Knight)
- No more than 3 times the same Troop datasheet
- No more than two transports under 100 pts, authorization to double once in the following unit types: HQ, Elite, Support, Fast Attack, Flyers
- I don't know yet if the Beta Rules will be enforced
So HQ-wise I'm stuck with either Cawl + generic or Dominus + Enginseer unless I use my double, but I don't see why I would for HQs. If the Beta rules are enforced Stygies VIII might not be that interesting as my 3x Dragoons wouldn't properly alpha strike, and I'd lose Cawl + Bots. It will depend if Stygies' trait is changed to cover saves as the rumour states.
There will be almost every army out there so I don't really know what to expect. With such limitations Drukhari will be limited to 3 transports but I'm fairly certain there's a Grotesque spam coming. Probably no Berzerker rush neither. Expecting Knights but don't know how CA will affect them.
My current collection is as follows, minus the Alphas with CC gear as they won't see play in a WYSIWYG event:
I'm planning on possibly buying the new Battleforce this Christmas if budget allows, for one more Onager, 2 more Bots, 5 more Infiltrators, 10 more Skitarii and another Enginseer. If not I'll just buy another box of Kastelans.
I'll play the same FW for my whole AdMech for sake of ease on the table and HQ slots. My options are Cawl's Castle with 4 Bots, usual, for WoM, Stygies VIII for distraction Dragoon, or others, but I don't know which.
- Agripinaa could help me set up a gunline with the 5+ Overwatch but I don't know if that's enough. The strat would be only used on my 3 Destroyers and I'm not sure they'd survive a full round first.
- Lucius would just help me DS stuff, but what ? Infiltrators already DS, Vanguards are better off screening my artillery, and Dragoons are better off starting on the table.
- Graia ? I feel like I don't have enough infantry to make it work, and the stratagem never works. Remind me, when a multi-wound model is saved thanks to that it stays alive with one wound left right ?
- Metalica and Ryza are out of the question.
The only time you ever run Enginseers that I can think of is when you have a Knight or Crawlers that are going to leave Cawl's bubble, and you want to keep an Enginseer nearby for healing.
The problem with agrapinaa's strat, even if destroyers are reduced in points so they're worth using, is that they'd need to go down in power level as well as at the moment you can only bring back a unit of 3 destroyers as 6 is over the 20pl limit.
Suzuteo wrote:The only time you ever run Enginseers that I can think of is when you have a Knight or Crawlers that are going to leave Cawl's bubble, and you want to keep an Enginseer nearby for healing.
Or just fill HQ slots cheaply. Though I did once have an Enginseer sprint after my Dragoons to fix them
Octovol wrote:The problem with agrapinaa's strat, even if destroyers are reduced in points so they're worth using, is that they'd need to go down in power level as well as at the moment you can only bring back a unit of 3 destroyers as 6 is over the 20pl limit.
Well we can have a unit of 5 Destroyers, it costs the same. I think 6 models in a unit starts being too threatening, but I do have a phobia of big costly units.
So if the rumors about -1 to hit becoming +1 to cover are true what are all the ways mechanicus can abuse the canticles so that they always have cover. Obviously his is with stygies
gendoikari87 wrote: So if the rumors about -1 to hit becoming +1 to cover are true what are all the ways mechanicus can abuse the canticles so that they always have cover. Obviously his is with stygies
Depends if it's "Counts as being in cover when at 12" or more" or "+1 to save when in cover at 12" or more". For the former, this allows Stygies to use another Canticle than Shroudpsalm at first round, like Remorseless Fist so that your infiltrated CC units can reroll for their first fight, or the reroll Morale one if playing with max Skitarii units.
If it's +1 to the save when in cover, when using Shroudpsalm we're looking at 2+ Skitarii and Destroyers, and 1+ Robots, Breachers and Onagers first round, which is huge in my opinion.
Although I have no idea where this rumour comes from and I'd be surprised if this rule change came from CA. It's a change more akin to a FAQ.
gendoikari87 wrote: So if the rumors about -1 to hit becoming +1 to cover are true what are all the ways mechanicus can abuse the canticles so that they always have cover. Obviously his is with stygies
Depends if it's "Counts as being in cover when at 12" or more" or "+1 to save when in cover at 12" or more". For the former, this allows Stygies to use another Canticle than Shroudpsalm at first round, like Remorseless Fist so that your infiltrated CC units can reroll for their first fight, or the reroll Morale one if playing with max Skitarii units.
If it's +1 to the save when in cover, when using Shroudpsalm we're looking at 2+ Skitarii and Destroyers, and 1+ Robots, Breachers and Onagers first round, which is huge in my opinion.
Although I have no idea where this rumour comes from and I'd be surprised if this rule change came from CA. It's a change more akin to a FAQ.
totally agree, 2+ skitarii seem like they might kick guard off the go to spot for imperial troops
A stratagem that allows Robots to add 3" to their charge move ? I guess Lucius just made a comeback. DS Fistelans and charge 6". Hoping for a reasonable point decrease on the fists now.
Also describing a stratagem that turns their Heavy weapons to Assault but I fail to see the use, except once more for Fistelans with flamers that want to sprint towards the enemy and still burn them.
Aah, my thirst for leaks is sated a bit.
EDIT: just noticed that Cawl can't benefit from the detachment as he lacks the keywords. Fail ?
A stratagem that allows Robots to add 3" to their charge move ? I guess Lucius just made a comeback. DS Fistelans and charge 6". Hoping for a reasonable point decrease on the fists now.
Also describing a stratagem that turns their Heavy weapons to Assault but I fail to see the use, except once more for Fistelans with flamers that want to sprint towards the enemy and still burn them.
Aah, my thirst for leaks is sated a bit.
EDIT: just noticed that Cawl can't benefit from the detachment as he lacks the keywords. Fail ?
It's throwing a bone to Metallica I guess, even though our trait really should work with heavy weapons anyways.
Well, turning their guns to assault is actually pretty good if you want to move and your phosphor weapons without penalty, getting in a good position before your canticles change.
But I'm pissed off at this. could have just said imperial robots or something to give wiggle room for forge world or future releases, but no no no, has to be specifically kastellans. Jerks.
Still though, this may entice me to play a full robot list again for my Lucius, though at this point I prefer to take a knight over robots anyways because of how versatile a crusader is compared to dakka or fist bots.
A stratagem that allows Robots to add 3" to their charge move ? I guess Lucius just made a comeback. DS Fistelans and charge 6". Hoping for a reasonable point decrease on the fists now.
Also describing a stratagem that turns their Heavy weapons to Assault but I fail to see the use, except once more for Fistelans with flamers that want to sprint towards the enemy and still burn them.
Aah, my thirst for leaks is sated a bit.
EDIT: just noticed that Cawl can't benefit from the detachment as he lacks the keywords. Fail ?
The use i see for Strafing Fire Run is to use it on triple phosphor blaster kastellans so they can relocate with their 8" move to get a better angle of fire without suffering a minus 1 to hit for moving with a heavy weapon. Now this benefits Metalica armies as they can now advance and fire them with no penalty to really get a good spot to shoot and then pop Binaric Override or for Gria Warlords with Emotionless Clarity, they can now fire their guns in close combat freeing them up.
If we then add in Elimination Volley we will get 3+ to hit Kastellans who have moved and set up for Protector Protocols and getting re-roll 1's to hit from a nearby Dominus or flat re-rolls with Cawl.
To me that adds alot more flexibility to Non Mars armies, where LOS blocking terrain has forced us to move and thus hit on a 5+ (4+ if you are using Destroyers for the Elimination Volley) or even 6+ with a further -1 to hit from certain abilities. Other people's tactics may vary, but i like my Admech to be mobile.
deffrekka wrote: The use i see for Strafing Fire Run is to use it on triple phosphor blaster kastellans so they can relocate with their 8" move to get a better angle of fire without suffering a minus 1 to hit for moving with a heavy weapon. Now this benefits Metalica armies as they can now advance and fire them with no penalty to really get a good spot to shoot and then pop Binaric Override or for Gria Warlords with Emotionless Clarity, they can now fire their guns in close combat freeing them up.
If we then add in Elimination Volley we will get 3+ to hit Kastellans who have moved and set up for Protector Protocols and getting re-roll 1's to hit from a nearby Dominus or Cawl.
To me that adds alot more flexibility to Non Mars armies, where LOS blocking terrain has forced us to move and thus hit on a 5+ (4+ if you are using Destroyers for the Elimination Volley) or even 6+ with a further -1 to hit from certain abilities. Other people's tactics may vary, but i like my Admech to be mobile.
Oh, spot on for Emontionless Clarity, now I definitely see a use to this Warlord Trait. No longer will chaff stick our Bots down.
deffrekka wrote: The use i see for Strafing Fire Run is to use it on triple phosphor blaster kastellans so they can relocate with their 8" move to get a better angle of fire without suffering a minus 1 to hit for moving with a heavy weapon. Now this benefits Metalica armies as they can now advance and fire them with no penalty to really get a good spot to shoot and then pop Binaric Override or for Gria Warlords with Emotionless Clarity, they can now fire their guns in close combat freeing them up.
If we then add in Elimination Volley we will get 3+ to hit Kastellans who have moved and set up for Protector Protocols and getting re-roll 1's to hit from a nearby Dominus or Cawl.
To me that adds alot more flexibility to Non Mars armies, where LOS blocking terrain has forced us to move and thus hit on a 5+ (4+ if you are using Destroyers for the Elimination Volley) or even 6+ with a further -1 to hit from certain abilities. Other people's tactics may vary, but i like my Admech to be mobile.
Oh, spot on for Emontionless Clarity, now I definitely see a use to this Warlord Trait. No longer will chaff stick our Bots down.
I know right! i had to double check whether the warlord trait only affected infantry haha!! I know Gria doesnt have the best dogma but the stratagem and warlord trait are now quite tasty, and we can have a field commander enginseer with the Cybernetica Cohort Warlord Trait and the Autocaduceus of Arkhan Land.for that sweet reroll to repair.
May also suit a fist and flamer loadout as they can then flame into their combat during the shooting phase.
Yeah I forgot they have the 8" move. With Metallica that'll give you a pretty significant redeploy range. If the kataphrons get something similar we may be able to do what we're supposed to and be able to aggressively redeploy stuff that nobody expects.
I do worry about strategem costs though. Most of them sound like they'll be 2-3 which means with a typical admech army you're only going to get to use them for one big turn
MrMoustaffa wrote: Yeah I forgot they have the 8" move. With Metallica that'll give you a pretty significant redeploy range. If the kataphrons get something similar we may be able to do what we're supposed to and be able to aggressively redeploy stuff that nobody expects.
I do worry about strategem costs though. Most of them sound like they'll be 2-3 which means with a typical admech army you're only going to get to use them for one big turn
I just bought some. I'm traditionally a skitarii player. I never even used a cult Mechanicus unit (including tech-priests and Dominii) until 8th edition when they finally combined our books.
I've used them exactly once, boy let me tell you that opening salvo was one heck of an experience and I wasn't even using Mars
Does the Lucius Stratagem work, though?
I've just reread it and it says "more than 9" away", which means 9" is not permitted. That makes it an automatic 10" charge which means you'll have an 7" to make aka a 50% chance on 2D6 without investing more CP.
That is 3+ CP down the drain for a 50% of a charge.
Isn't it just still more effective to use Wrath of Mars/Elimination Volley for the same cost and have pretty much a guaranteed dead unit on the other side?
More than 9" is for example 9.1". Charging rules say you have to get within 1" of an enemy. So a 9 inch charge brings you 0.1" away from the enemy and is therefore a successful charge.
On a side note: You almost never want to get inside base contact when charging (except if you "take a prisoner") so you can still pull of some tricks with your pile in and consolidate.
Aaaand learned something.
A 6" charge is significantly more likely, but still about 28% chance of failure, increasing the cost to 4 CP.
Still a hefty sum for an AdMech army...
Honestly I don't know if the deep strike would be worth it to tell you guys the truth. In terms of CP draining it would be 1 to put them in orbit, 1 to increase the range, and 1 for the override and / or a data smith teleporting behind them down behind the bots. It's a pretty high CP cost in just a battalion...
Yes it's costly, but odds are you won't be playing Mars and so won't need 2 CP every turn for WoM. My most used strats are Conqueror Doctrinal and Stygies Infiltration anyway, I just use the rest for the odd stratagem like the Repair twice or rerolls that don't work anyway. At 2000 pts we should be able to work with 2 Battalions post-CA anyway.
Aaranis wrote: Yes it's costly, but odds are you won't be playing Mars and so won't need 2 CP every turn for WoM. My most used strats are Conqueror Doctrinal and Stygies Infiltration anyway, I just use the rest for the odd stratagem like the Repair twice or rerolls that don't work anyway. At 2000 pts we should be able to work with 2 Battalions post-CA anyway.
I suppose, so. I already have a fully painted Lucius army (started before the current codex. Have to say I'm very happy with my choice of FW) and I already use the heck out of the deep striking stratagem per game. Usually it's reserved for electropriests and plasma skitarii, but I guess I could split my army to get two battalions and have more than enough points. I already fill out my troop slots in my 2k lists so i guess if the points drop hard I could afford two battalions for this. Or one spearhead at least, just to offset the cost of the cohort.
Still, I don't see this beating my already planned 2k knight and admec list with what I want to play. At the very least the point drops could mean I could play even more, so we have to see next week!
Oh don't get me wrong, I'm not implying it will shake the meta or be better than X list, just that there is more possibilities thanks to this formation. We already spoke about Metalica mobile Bots, Graia emotionless bots and Lucius knock knock Bots, which is hell of a lot more than Mars Bots. I'm glad to be able to have more choices when list building.
Aaranis wrote: Oh don't get me wrong, I'm not implying it will shake the meta or be better than X list, just that there is more possibilities thanks to this formation. We already spoke about Metalica mobile Bots, Graia emotionless bots and Lucius knock knock Bots, which is hell of a lot more than Mars Bots. I'm glad to be able to have more choices when list building.
Believe me I am too! I am excited to see what the servitors do as well, I just hope it's not a copy of 7th editions servitor clade. I am hoping for increased ballistic skill on the dudes. I also wanna see what relic the bot detachment gives, as that could make or break what I want to use as well.
But, honestly this does give me a reason to play my robots again since I shelved them...
Honestly the relics are the things I'm most excited about now that we know the robot wlt is pretty trash. Our relics are absolutely awful for the most part so just about anything would be welcome to get some useful variety
72.22% chance to roll 6+ with 2D6 89.35% chance to roll 6+ with 2D6, command rerolling the lower value
So deep striking punchy, flaming Robots is viable under this plan.
We've been talking about it since a page ago but I share your enthusiasm, thanks for the maths too.
CA, bring us point decreases !
EDIT: I feel a little sad to discard Stygies VIII so easily but so far if that idiotic beta rule gets applied Lucius will fill my punchy bots needs better.
While it's cool I don't know if it really will help Fistbots. They just have so few attacks, suffer from bad WS and we have no good rerolls for them...
It's a start, really. I did the maths once and they weren't so bad, just not the best option ever, that's for sure. We really need the Warlord trait for rerolls to Hit in CC to affect all <Forge-World> instead of just infantry. Currently we just have one Canticle.
MrMoustaffa wrote: I just bought some. I'm traditionally a skitarii player. I never even used a cult Mechanicus unit (including tech-priests and Dominii) until 8th edition when they finally combined our books.
I've used them exactly once, boy let me tell you that opening salvo was one heck of an experience and I wasn't even using Mars
Yeah im a Skitari guy myself aswell. Until 8th and i bought some domitars to use as kastellans and myrmidons for kataphrons. I always go stygies and ive had a very impressive win rate with my lads since the codex.
The Assault change is big. It's basically the stratagem to get rid of the Heavy weapons penalty that we always wanted. Hopefully costs only 1 CP.
Yeah, because we’re already spending CP to get access to the strategem. Will let us hide Kastelans out of LoS during deployment then swing them out and shoot on our first turn without penalty, which is nice. But does make all that an even more expensive setup, CP-wise: 1CP for the detachment, 1 (or more) for the assault guns, 1 to switch to shooty mode, 2 for Wrath of Mars, and possibly 2 for +1 to hit with them and Kataphrons 5-7CP is an expensive single round of shooting!
Assault will be great against chargey horde armies though, in the Graia combo mentioned above.
The Assault change is big. It's basically the stratagem to get rid of the Heavy weapons penalty that we always wanted. Hopefully costs only 1 CP.
Yeah, because we’re already spending CP to get access to the strategem. Will let us hide Kastelans out of LoS during deployment then swing them out and shoot on our first turn without penalty, which is nice. But does make all that an even more expensive setup, CP-wise: 1CP for the detachment, 1 (or more) for the assault guns, 1 to switch to shooty mode, 2 for Wrath of Mars, and possibly 2 for +1 to hit with them and Kataphrons 5-7CP is an expensive single round of shooting!
Assault will be great against chargey horde armies though, in the Graia combo mentioned above.
AdMech is super swingy at times because you can just get these massive alpha strikes that blow out your opponent. They lose 800 points of models right off the bat, and they simply have no chance of winning after that. Spending 2-4 more CP than we currently do to get greater consistency with even more non-interaction is totally worth it. After all, Kastelan Robots are 3" tall and are the ideal height for hiding behind first floor ruins.
The Assault change is big. It's basically the stratagem to get rid of the Heavy weapons penalty that we always wanted. Hopefully costs only 1 CP.
I don’t really get this comment. Have you not looked at “Rage of the Machines”? We already have a strat (that’s not locked behind this detachment) that lets us ignore the heavy penalty. The only thing this new one does that is different is we can now run and shoot, which isn’t that huge of a deal.
The Assault change is big. It's basically the stratagem to get rid of the Heavy weapons penalty that we always wanted. Hopefully costs only 1 CP.
I don’t really get this comment. Have you not looked at “Rage of the Machines”? We already have a strat (that’s not locked behind this detachment) that lets us ignore the heavy penalty. The only thing this new one does that is different is we can now run and shoot, which isn’t that huge of a deal.
Should be called Rage of the MACHINE as it only affects a single vehicle. The rest of his squad look on in amazement wondering how is he doing that whilst they still suffer. Its quite a useless trait... Doesnt affect Ironstriders as you can use +2 to hit cancelling out that ignore heavy penalty for one model and the kastellans wouldnt need it as they never moved much before hand, then onagers ignore the heavy penalty to begin with.
Which brings us back to our fondamental problem: our codex was written by an octopus. It seriously looks like their manager told them "Hey we need x stratagems to fill the 3 pages" and they found some nice ones then had to fill the blanks with whatever they could.
Now for some MATHAMMER!!§!!§!
4 Kastelan Robots with Fists and HPB (460 pts), fighting against let's say a Knight (eat your invulnerable save now):
12 attacks: 10D so 20D when fighting twice or 23 pts/wound
With rerolls of 1s to hit: 11,66D so 23,32 when fighting twice or 19,73 pts/wound
4 Kastelan Robots with triple HPB (440 pts), shooting the same Knight with 5++:
72 shots with rerolls of 1s to Hit: 10,66D + 8 from WoM so 18,66D or 23,58 pts/wound
So of course it assumes we can charge a Knight at full strength and not get interrupted in the Fight phase. For the HPB I didn't factor Cawl's reroll because then it's not 440 pts it's 680 pts.
After a quick look:
- Cawl down 50 pts, so basically he is a must have now
- also nice drops on TPD and TPE
- Destroyers 15 pts base cost per model down
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also a nice drop on Dunecrawlers, I take it ;-)
Skitarii infantry didn't drop as much as I expected, but so far this looks good. I assume GW wants us to buy more servitors, so they are making them dirt cheap (unless I did my calculations wrong, breachers are going to be 90pts and destroyers 120? Don't have the codex on me)
Also, plasma calvilers got a lot cheaper, and I assume the avenger went up in points?
These discounts are huge. Infantry didn't get discounts but the weapons they carried got major drops. An arquebuses squad of 5 rangers is 65pts now, that's pretty good. Vanguard with plasma are cheaper.
Domminus dropped like 45 pts
Enginseer dropped about 15
Etc. Etc.
I think my list that is half knights got over a 100pts in discounts. I'm much more tempted to go pure admech now, these discounts really help me afford support I previously couldn't.
Need to see how this shakes out with the rest but so far it looks like we won big.
And before you ask, guardsmen are still 4ppm
Automatically Appended Next Post: Oh and no Castellan point hike. He's still same price
Tiger9gamer wrote: Skitarii infantry didn't drop as much as I expected, but so far this looks good. I assume GW wants us to buy more servitors, so they are making them dirt cheap (unless I did my calculations wrong, breachers are going to be 90pts and destroyers 120? Don't have the codex on me)
Also, plasma calvilers got a lot cheaper, and I assume the avenger went up in points?
Your latter point is what I wanted to bring up.
Skitarii didn't need to drop in price because the Special Weapons did. 10 Rangers with 3 Arqs is 115 points, and 10 Vanguard with 3 Plasma is 111. That's REALLY good and helps us make better use of our Strategems.
Breachers are 30-48 (40-58) pts now per model
Destroyers 48-55 pts (63-70). Weapon costs are still brutal on these, but its way better than the old costs.
Thairne wrote: Breachers are 30-48 (40-58) pts now per model
Destroyers 48-55 pts (63-70). Weapon costs are still brutal on these, but its way better than the old costs.
Yeah the weapons were and are more expensive than the model. I dunno if Kataphrons will become viable, it's still 150 pts for a pretty squishy unit.
The funniest thing - servitors now are useful.
With a 0 cost servo arm, you can fill an elite slot with 20 pts, making a brigade way less expensive.
Also, 15 pts for a heavy bolter, bs4, rerolling 1's/all hits? Worth it?
Thairne wrote: The funniest thing - servitors now are useful.
With a 0 cost servo arm, you can fill an elite slot with 20 pts, making a brigade way less expensive.
Also, 15 pts for a heavy bolter, bs4, rerolling 1's/all hits? Worth it?
That is a big drop, and can have some hidden objective holders that are even cheaper than rangere.. but I dont know if it is worth 50 points now for two heavy bolters?
Still, anyone know where the promised point cost of the magera knight?
Thairne wrote: The funniest thing - servitors now are useful.
With a 0 cost servo arm, you can fill an elite slot with 20 pts, making a brigade way less expensive.
Also, 15 pts for a heavy bolter, bs4, rerolling 1's/all hits? Worth it?
nope, not worth it. a HEavy Weapons Team with a heavy B is 16 pts and 2 wounds. never seen the light of the day.
Damn, that's a good day to be a Tech-Priest. My collection went from 2134 to 1814 pts, 320 pts cheaper !
Big winners in my opinion are Destroyers (waves of Kataphrons from Agripinaa might become doable), Breachers at 40 pts, although they still don't have any good use, Sicarians of both flavours, special weapons for Skitarii (I might build more Arquebusiers), Onagers (why, rule of 3 ?), Ballistarii, and my boys Kastelans with a rightful cost to the Combustor and a price decrease to Fists, although I can't read if it's 15, 25 or something else, anyone have an opinion ?
Cawl getting a hefty 50 pts price drop encourages even more Kastelan castles though. Not that it's a bad thing.
Coupled with the small points drop on my Dark Angels having 2 Battalions is easier than before.
Aaranis wrote: Damn, that's a good day to be a Tech-Priest. My collection went from 2134 to 1814 pts, 320 pts cheaper !
Big winners in my opinion are Destroyers (waves of Kataphrons from Agripinaa might become doable), Breachers at 40 pts, although they still don't have any good use, Sicarians of both flavours, special weapons for Skitarii (I might build more Arquebusiers), Onagers (why, rule of 3 ?), Ballistarii, and my boys Kastelans with a rightful cost to the Combustor and a price decrease to Fists, although I can't read if it's 15, 25 or something else, anyone have an opinion ?
Cawl getting a hefty 50 pts price drop encourages even more Kastelan castles though. Not that it's a bad thing.
Coupled with the small points drop on my Dark Angels having 2 Battalions is easier than before.
The agrapinaa strat still works on power level though, so you cant bring back any more than 3 destroyers -_-
The combustor is 15pts, retina ipad screens work wonders for clarity. Interestingly the eradication beamer went up 5pts to 30, makes the cheapest onager 100pts, while the rest of them came down 20pts. The rest are still pretty blurry even with a good screen. Heavy arc rifle looks like 6pts, which we knew already, cognis stubber down to 2 pts is nice too. The lack of onager squadrons is absurd here now.
My last list i fielded has dropped 231pts but that included cawl that i dont normally field. The cheaper balistarii helps me out but i was poanning on dropping onagers for helverins, i guess now i could just leave em in as well as the helverins lol. The cheaper HQ options are my favourite, a 165pt battalion is awesome.
Went through the point costs and checked how high the point drops are for our Codex units that aren't Knights. Some numbers are extremely blurred, I marked them as such:
PC = point cost
PPM = points per model
If no point post given for weapons then were was no change
All changes compared to current point costs
HQ
Enginseer -5 base cost, -12 servo arm (free) = 17 points down
Dominus -35 base (!) = Massive 35 points down, no changes Serpenta, Stubber, Volkite, Axe, cost of Eradication Ray too hard to read but looks like nerf (double digit cost).
Cawl -50 points (!) = Autotake for Mars, for other Forge Worlds having two Volkite+Serpenta Dominii is now only 6 points over what Mars pays for Cawl (instead of 14)
Elite
Sicarian Infiltrators = -4 base cost (no change weapons PC)
Sicarian Ruststalkers = -5 to PPM base cost, another -3 points if taking transonic blades
Servitors: +3 base (2->5), -5 for multi meltas, -5 for plasma cannons, servo arm now free = 4 points cheaper if PC or MM, 11 points cheaper with servo arms
Cybernetica Datasmith: -3 points down thanks to cheaper power fist
Troops
Rangers+ Vanguard: Plasma caliver -3, Arquebus -10, possibly cheaper data-deether (PC too blurred) = at least 6 points saved if taking 2 calivers, Arquebus Ranger Snipers now 22 instead of 32 points
Kataphron Breachers: -10 base, arc claw either no change or probably buff (PC blurred)
Kataphron Destroyers: - 15 (!) base, cognis flamer buffed (blurred but single digit PC instead of 10)
Fast Attack
Ironstriders: -10 base PPM, -5 for Autocannons and -5 for lascannons = 15 points down
Heavy Support
Kastelan Robos: -6 points for Incendine Combustor, Kastelan Fists buffed (blurred, 1X cost, looks like 15 points, which would be -20 points) = Possibly 95 points with fists and combustor which would be -26 points
Onager Dunecrawler -20 points per crab, Eradication Beamer +5, Cognis Heavy Stubber -3
= -22 points with Neutron Cannon, -24 with Neutron and both Stubbers
-----
Several units and weapons are listed but without actual changes to point costs. Might be possible that some numbers are wrong as with some earlier codex leaks this edition, but I assume that even if numbers are different in the printed release then it's those numbers that are literally the same as in the codex, such as Phosphor serpentas and both Compulsarii and Fulgrite priests. EDIT: Just realized those are the changes from CA17, included so you only need to own CA18 for all changes from the original Codex release.
Still, -35 points for a Dominus with Axe, Volkite and MStubber/Serpenta, -17 points for Enginseers (who, let's face it, were at least 12 points too expensive, especially compared with Datasmiths), -20 points for Icarus Crabs and -24 points for Neutron+2xStubber Crabs are big changes and benefit pretty much every list, while Ironstriders are now IMO very good choices for 60 points with Twin Autocannons or 80 with twin lascannons, especially as you can only take 3 Dunecrawlers (which you absolutely do want to take now that a Neutron and double stubber Crab is 119 points), while Kataphron Breachers for 30 PPM and Plasma Destroyers for 38 are much better as well.
Infiltrators really needed the point drop thanks to their fragility (at 18 PPM instead of 22 I can actually feel comfortable taking them to tourneys) and while 14/15 point ruststalkers don't make for a super good counter-assault unit, they are now at least decent.
Aaranis wrote: Damn, that's a good day to be a Tech-Priest. My collection went from 2134 to 1814 pts, 320 pts cheaper !
Big winners in my opinion are Destroyers (waves of Kataphrons from Agripinaa might become doable), Breachers at 40 pts, although they still don't have any good use, Sicarians of both flavours, special weapons for Skitarii (I might build more Arquebusiers), Onagers (why, rule of 3 ?), Ballistarii, and my boys Kastelans with a rightful cost to the Combustor and a price decrease to Fists, although I can't read if it's 15, 25 or something else, anyone have an opinion ?
Cawl getting a hefty 50 pts price drop encourages even more Kastelan castles though. Not that it's a bad thing.
Coupled with the small points drop on my Dark Angels having 2 Battalions is easier than before.
The agrapinaa strat still works on power level though, so you cant bring back any more than 3 destroyers -_-
The combustor is 15pts, retina ipad screens work wonders for clarity. Interestingly the eradication beamer went up 5pts to 30, makes the cheapest onager 100pts, while the rest of them came down 20pts. The rest are still pretty blurry even with a good screen. Heavy arc rifle looks like 6pts, which we knew already, cognis stubber down to 2 pts is nice too. The lack of onager squadrons is absurd here now.
My last list i fielded has dropped 231pts but that included cawl that i dont normally field. The cheaper balistarii helps me out but i was poanning on dropping onagers for helverins, i guess now i could just leave em in as well as the helverins lol. The cheaper HQ options are my favourite, a 165pt battalion is awesome.
I've always understood that we could go to 5 Destroyers without hitting he next PL threshold. Is there an FAQ about that somewhere ? In my mind you only pay more PL when hitting the 6 unit size.
My current 1250 point tourney list with a Dominus, Enginseer, Datasmith, 5 Infiltrators, a unit of 8 Vanguard with two Calivers and teether, Lascannon Ironstrider, an Icarus and a Neutron Crab with max stubbers (as well as 15 rangers and 3 Dakkabots) just dropped by 142 points.
For the points I can take another Neutron Crab with 2 Stubbers and still have 23 points left over (that's another 3 Rangers or an Arquebus Ranger), assuming the one data-teether in my list didn't get discounted as well.
Also Transuranic Arquebus Rangers going from 32->22 points makes them much easier to include and justify.
Infantry Squads staying at 4 PPM while Chaos Cultists went up to 5 PPM is extremely hilarious though, but as a Cadia player I'm happy that Creed went down by 20 points (always played him, but at 55 he's an autotake) and both grenade launchers and flamers got point drops that jusitfy taking them over plasma guns on BS 4+ units.
Whilst this leak looks good for us and im sooo happy, just take some time to look at the rest of the leaks. A lot of armies got big drops as well (allegedly) which in the bigger picture wont change much in a competative setting. We field more, they field more. The more important things will come from the formations imo.
Aaranis wrote: I've always understood that we could go to 5 Destroyers without hitting he next PL threshold. Is there an FAQ about that somewhere ? In my mind you only pay more PL when hitting the 6 unit size.
Well, there’s no inbetween for power level costst. It doesnt say 10PL for 3 And 3.3PL for each additional. It say 10PL for 3 and +10 for up to 6. This is how battlescribe calculates it as well. For example as soon as you take that 6th ranger the squad goes to 7PL whether you take the other 4 or not.
Lago is right though, it works on a squad of 6. i remember them being 11PL at some point, 10 per 3 allows it to be used on a squad of 6 though, but does lower the value of those 3cp now theyre worth less points.
The points changes dont change my xmas purchase though, still gonna get a styrix i think. I’ll follow up with eisehorn and demonhost with acolytes at another time.
Envii wrote: Whilst this leak looks good for us and im sooo happy, just take some time to look at the rest of the leaks. A lot of armies got big drops as well (allegedly) which in the bigger picture wont change much in a competative setting. We field more, they field more. The more important things will come from the formations imo.
so basically "If everyone is super, no one is" going on right now, which is fine! I am just happy to take another onager in my base lists in general.
What he's saying is that nothing has changed because the codexes that are better than ours got points drops comparable to ours.
It's like we went from level 10 to level 20. Everyone already at level 20 went from 20 to like 27.
Not as bad as it was before I'm thinking, but still getting beaten on.
I'm specifically referring to Tyranids, Eldar, Imperial Guard.
What we are going to do better against is Dark Eldar and Orks, so there is in the end a bright side. Dark Eldar was a real struggle for me, and they didn't get any discounts at all, and lets face it Orks don't need them at this point because their codex is amazing.
IDK about you guys but I kind of laughed at the utter madness of reducing the cost of Bellisarius Cawl. Absolutely terrible call (haha) by GWIMO, and I play him for feths sake.
Servitor Maniple leaked.
Couldn’t make out the warlord trait or relic, but the two strats give a unit of servitors a 5++ for the whole game (1 CP before game starts). The other gives a servitor unit +1 to hit during shooting phase while within 6” of a TPD. (1 CP)
Just saw the Servitor Maniple and I got to say, thats pretty ing tasty.
Sure it needs quite alot of command points and a certain set-up, but if you have Destroyers set up with a Dominus and a unit of Kastelan Robots you can get an 2+ BS (which also ignores "gets hot") by popping Elimination Volley and the new strat "Mindlock"
I do not think it is better then wrath of mars, but the cool stuff about this combination is that it is also available to the other Forgeworld and not just Mars.
Spend even more CP to make those Plasma Culverins hit even harder with Ryza's strat.
It also includes pre-game strat that gives an 5++ save to an unit of Breachers or Destroyers. Set them up on a objective and enjoy a 4++ save when activating Acquisition at any cost.
That's really really interesting and makes Servitor much more appealing.
Let's discuss the best FW for that detachment:
- Mars gets Cawl & double Canticle
- Stygies -1 to hit which is really good
- Ryza and Aggripinaa both have a strong stratagem for Destroyers
lash92 wrote: That's really really interesting and makes Servitor much more appealing.
Let's discuss the best FW for that detachment:
- Mars gets Cawl & double Canticle
- Stygies -1 to hit which is really good
- Ryza and Aggripinaa both have a strong stratagem for Destroyers
I think the Cawlstar on double Battalion, featuring Martian 4xKastelans and Agripinaa 6xPlastroyers, could work. I have to calculate it yet, but if I were able to put a Gallant in SHD, I'll be happy.
I think a small patrol detachment of a Ryza Dominus and one unit of six destroyers could be absolute bonkers. 6D6 overcharged plasma shots hitting on 3's rerolling ones, ignoring "gets hot", S8 +1 to wound and 3 damage.
That is tasty and not even that CP heavy. First turn it cost you 3CP every other turn after that 2CP. Which is pretty much exactly the same CP consumption as Mars Bots and cost +/- just as much point wise (including the dominus) as 4 bots (without Cawl support).
EDIT: Did some quick math and that combination does for its points way better then Mars Bots (with no Cawl) against T7 and T8. Solo targets just melt under the rain of plasma. Against a normal Knight (with nothing special) - 6 plasma destroyers do ~22 damage - 4 Kastellan robots do ~13 damage - 4 Kastellan robots (with Cawl) do ~19 damage
Against a 4++ knight - 6 plasma destroyers do ~17 damage - 4 Kastellan robots do ~11 damage - 4 Kastellan robots (with Cawl) do ~17 damage
Against a 3++ knight - 6 plasma destroyers do ~11 damage - 4 Kastellan robots do ~9 damage - 4 Kastellan robots (with Cawl) do ~14 damage
Sure dakkabots still got the upper hand against any horde army and enough stuff with great invuls or an alternative form of wound distribution (drones) But I would argue that with this formation and the CA point drop, destroyers have become really interesting to use.
So I don’t know enough about these leaks but could you take two detachments and super size bots in a cawlstar so that you can do all this formation trickery as long as Cawl isn’t your warlord and you went double mars?
Or does taking Cawl gimp you from doing all this formation stuff?
I’ve probably read things wrong as I often do haha
You do not have to be afraid that Cawl blocks you from using this formation. He even has the option to fill out the Dominus priest slot needed for the formation and its stratagems.
Arlen wrote: Just saw the Servitor Maniple and I got to say, thats pretty ing tasty.
Sure it needs quite alot of command points and a certain set-up, but if you have Destroyers set up with a Dominus and a unit of Kastelan Robots you can get an 2+ BS (which also ignores "gets hot") by popping Elimination Volley and the new strat "Mindlock"
I do not think it is better then wrath of mars, but the cool stuff about this combination is that it is also available to the other Forgeworld and not just Mars.
Spend even more CP to make those Plasma Culverins hit even harder with Ryza's strat.
It also includes pre-game strat that gives an 5++ save to an unit of Breachers or Destroyers. Set them up on a objective and enjoy a 4++ save when activating Acquisition at any cost.
Cant watch it, could you or someone give the exact wording? Pretty please :-)
Sure
Servitor Maniple grants the Servitor Maniple keyword to all Tech-Priest Dominus, Engiseers, Kataphrons and Servitors in one detachment.
Get acces to the following WT and Relic.
WT Master of Bioslpicing, Sacrifice one servitor to regain D3 wounds on a Kataphron unit or if there are no wounded models, return one slain model.
The Genecog Corpus, Omnisiah Axe relic, deals D3 mortal wounds on a unmodified 6 to wound.
New strats.
Enhanced Bionics 1 CP Pre-game stratagem, give a 5++ to an unit of Kataphrons from the formation detachment.
Noospheric Mindlock 1 CP Add +1 to hit in the shooting phase for a single Kataphron unit within 6'' of a Dominus that is part of the formation.
Cant watch it, could you or someone give the exact wording? Pretty please :-)
Sure
Servitor Maniple grants the Servitor Maniple keyword to all Tech-Priest Dominus, Engiseers, Kataphrons and Servitors in one detachment.
Get acces to the following WT and Relic.
WT Master of Bioslpicing, Sacrifice one servitor to regain D3 wounds on a Kataphron unit or if there are no wounded models, return one slain model.
The Genecog Corpus, Omnisiah Axe relic, deals D3 mortal wounds on a unmodified 6 to wound.
New strats.
Enhanced Bionics 1 CP Pre-game stratagem, give a 5++ to an unit of Kataphrons from the formation detachment.
Noospheric Mindlock 1 CP Add +1 to hit in the shooting phase for a single Kataphron unit within 6'' of a Dominus that is part of the formation.
Here is a little scenerio Ive just thought up, if you use the "Field Commander" Stratagem on Cawl in a Servitior Maniple, will he get the Master of Biosplicing instead of the Mars one?
And then have you actual warlord be whoever you want.
Arlen wrote: You do not have to be afraid that Cawl blocks you from using this formation. He even has the option to fill out the Dominus priest slot needed for the formation and its stratagems.
deffrekka wrote: Here is a little scenerio Ive just thought up, if you use the "Field Commander" Stratagem on Cawl in a Servitior Maniple, will he get the Master of Biosplicing instead of the Mars one?
And then have you actual warlord be whoever you want.
deffrekka wrote: Here is a little scenerio Ive just thought up, if you use the "Field Commander" Stratagem on Cawl in a Servitior Maniple, will he get the Master of Biosplicing instead of the Mars one?
And then have you actual warlord be whoever you want.
good question for FAQ
they will probably make it so that named characters cant use field commander to gain the detachments warlord trait
So if you have the CP, and two separate detachments to run both the robot and servitor detachments, you could have your Kastellans and kataphrons hiding out of line of sight. Then when you're ready, move them both out, pop the assault weapon strat on the bots, pop the mindlock strat on the kataphrons, and then pop elimination volley on both to have them all hitting on 3's rerolling 1's (since you need a Dominus or Cawl there to do the mindlock anyways)
Expensive CP wise, but man that is not something I'd want to get hit by. And that's if you don't know you're going first. If you're really ballsy the kataphrons can be hitting on 2's if you keep them in the open and have them sit still.
Also that WLT is really handy if it's the 4pt servitors they're talking about that you sacrifice. Being able to bring back lost servitors is huge, and you can always use master of machines alongside it to finish healing up the model if need be. Does it say if it's once per game or is it able to be used every turn
MrMoustaffa wrote: So if you have the CP, and two separate detachments to run both the robot and servitor detachments, you could have your Kastellans and kataphrons hiding out of line of sight. Then when you're ready, move them both out, pop the assault weapon strat on the bots, pop the mindlock strat on the kataphrons, and then pop elimination volley on both to have them all hitting on 3's rerolling 1's (since you need a Dominus or Cawl there to do the mindlock anyways)
Expensive CP wise, but man that is not something I'd want to get hit by. And that's if you don't know you're going first. If you're really ballsy the kataphrons can be hitting on 2's if you keep them in the open and have them sit still.
Also that WLT is really handy if it's the 4pt servitors they're talking about that you sacrifice. Being able to bring back lost servitors is huge, and you can always use master of machines alongside it to finish healing up the model if need be. Does it say if it's once per game or is it able to be used every turn
Kataphron's can move and fire heavy weapons without taking the -1 to hit penalty. It's the "Heavy Battle Servitor" special rule that both Breachers and Destroyers have. So it's always worth hiding them out of Line of Sight during deployment in case you go second ;-).
EDIT: Ave Deus Mechanicus, I was ninja'd by a most sneaky Magos.
I think a detachment of Ryza Plasma Destroyers will become quite common for us.
Using Noospheric Mindlock, Elimination Protocols and Plasma Specialists you are getting 6d6 BS 2 shots, rerolling to hit and ignoring Gets Hot at Str 8 with a +1 to wound ap 3 and damage 3 all for 4CP and 288pts.
Then 6 24" rapid fire BS 2 reroll 1's str 5 ap 1 ignore cover shots of which we could now swap to cognis flamers that only cost 7pts so that if we get charged that 6d6 rerollable autohits at 8" range for overwatch.
deffrekka wrote: I think a detachment of Ryza Plasma Destroyers will become quite common for us.
Using Noospheric Mindlock, Elimination Protocols and Plasma Specialists you are getting 6d6 BS 2 shots, rerolling to hit and ignoring Gets Hot at Str 8 with a +1 to wound ap 3 and damage 3 all for 4CP and 288pts.
Then 6 24" rapid fire BS 2 reroll 1's str 5 ap 1 ignore cover shots of which we could now swap to cognis flamers that only cost 7pts so that if we get charged that 6d6 rerollable autohits at 8" range for overwatch.
I already had that thought, but take in mind that for Elimination Protocols your dakkabots have to be from the same Forgeworld.
Ryza could be very powerful damage wise. The problem I have with it is the survivability: It will be pretty obvious what you are trying to achieve, so everything will focus your destroyers.And they are not that hard to kill.
I want also highlight what MrMustaffa said. You can get some pretty crazy repairs with that. Maybe even combine this with Aggripinaa?
Not to mention you'll want a unit or two of chump servitors to cannibalize for repairing the kataphrons. The servitors can be sacked to bring back dead kataphrons and then you can use your master of marines to finish repairing the model if need be. 20pts for the ability to bring back dead kataphrons is pretty sweet.
Also, I like that the robot relic allows you to give a Dominus or Enginseer the ability to switch kastelan protocols in a 9" bubble around them. Can let you be less reliant on the strategem to switch their protocol and save some CP.
These are some really cool abilities, can't wait to see how this all works in practice. Between the points drops and the new abilities I feel like I have a brand new codex
lash92 wrote: Ryza could be very powerful damage wise. The problem I have with it is the survivability: It will be pretty obvious what you are trying to achieve, so everything will focus your destroyers.And they are not that hard to kill.
I want also highlight what MrMustaffa said. You can get some pretty crazy repairs with that. Maybe even combine this with Aggripinaa?
I dont think Ryza would be too bad for the Kastellans. Yeah it doesnt affect them at all but with Shroud Psalm you are still getting a 1+ save Kastellan and a 4++ turn 1. We can all agree that Stygies would be better defensively turn 1 but how often have you lost your whole unit of Robots? In every game and tournament i have played with them i have never lost a whole unit of them, especially not on turn 1. The most i have lost in any game is 3 and that was very haywire spam from harlies.
So its a considerable alternative. Simularly you could just have a maniple of just 2 Kastellans to accompany the 6 Kataphrons and these could be the punchy variant to protect the backlines from assault and help break those grinding combats our units often get stuck in.
I think there is 3 possible options at our disposal. Either 6 Rzya Destroyers and all your Dakkabots all in one list forgo the defensive Dogmas for RAW damage / take 6 Destroyers and 2 Fistbots as Ryza and still have a second maniple of Dakkabots as a different dogma but they wont receive the benefit of Elimination Protocols or / forgo Rzya entirely and use the forgeworld of your choice but loose access to Plasma Specialists.
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MrMoustaffa wrote: Not to mention you'll want a unit or two of chump servitors to cannibalize for repairing the kataphrons. The servitors can be sacked to bring back dead kataphrons and then you can use your master of marines to finish repairing the model if need be. 20pts for the ability to bring back dead kataphrons is pretty sweet.
Also, I like that the robot relic allows you to give a Dominus or Enginseer the ability to switch kastelan protocols in a 9" bubble around them. Can let you be less reliant on the strategem to switch their protocol and save some CP.
These are some really cool abilities, can't wait to see how this all works in practice. Between the points drops and the new abilities I feel like I have a brand new codex
Also the relic allows us to basically not take a Datasmith in the first place. So we save another 41pts and we gain access to repairs that affect more than just Kastellans, a reroll 1's to hit in the shooting phase aura, more durability and a self repair system. We just loose out on the sweet gamma pistol (i love that thing.... after playing Mechanicus i want it to be a weapon option for all Tech-Priests but sadly that will never happen? and the power fist which is pretty much a side grade to the omnissian axe (trading 3 str, 1 AP and d3 damage for flat 2 damage and no negatives to hit + its free).
Then our own Warlord can be a Necromechanic with the Autocaduceus of Arkhan Land, the only problem with this is we spent a CP for Field Commander to regen the Kataphrons with our new cheap servitor chaff and a further CP to give the Cohort Cybernetica Enginseer the Doctrina Foreas Servo-Skull relic.
MrMoustaffa wrote: Not to mention you'll want a unit or two of chump servitors to cannibalize for repairing the kataphrons. The servitors can be sacked to bring back dead kataphrons and then you can use your master of marines to finish repairing the model if need be. 20pts for the ability to bring back dead kataphrons is pretty sweet.
Also, I like that the robot relic allows you to give a Dominus or Enginseer the ability to switch kastelan protocols in a 9" bubble around them. Can let you be less reliant on the strategem to switch their protocol and save some CP.
These are some really cool abilities, can't wait to see how this all works in practice. Between the points drops and the new abilities I feel like I have a brand new codex
I was never a fan of using CP to switch protocols. Datasmiths offer a whole lot for the 41 points you pay for them (and I always found it funny how many points people are willing to spent for a single extra CP via detachements only to spend it and immobilize their Dakkabots so they don't have to pay the few points for the Datasmith), especially as melee blockers against chaff. And not immobilizing your shootiest and most expensive unit for the rest of the game and keeping flexibility in case you can't get LoS or range to worthwhile targets in later rounds is always worth it IMO.
I also think that Agripinaa is a very viable option for the Destroyers. Their stratagem is pretty much made for servitor units, but their Relic is also very good with the plasma, but maybe even more with the Grav cannon. Stick them near a Dominus and you got reroll 1s to-hit and reroll 1s to wound against a vehicle of your choice within 18''.
Metallica is also good for avoiding those grinding combats we lose turns in. While the Dogma is not that usefull for Destroyers, if you would run the Dakkabots in a separate detachment and give them their formation bonus, then they would ignore the -1 for advancing with their stratagem fueled assault Phosphor Blasters.
I think that Metallica might give us a very mobile gunline in combination with the Kastellan formation. Which could be very cool to play with.
Arlen wrote: I also think that Agripinaa is a very viable option for the Destroyers. Their stratagem is pretty much made for servitor units, but their Relic is also very good with the plasma, but maybe even more with the Grav cannon. Stick them near a Dominus and you got reroll 1s to-hit and reroll 1s to wound against a vehicle of your choice within 18''.
Metallica is also good for avoiding those grinding combats we lose turns in. While the Dogma is not that usefull for Destroyers, if you would run the Dakkabots in a separate detachment and give them their formation bonus, then they would ignore the -1 for advancing with their stratagem fueled assault Phosphor Blasters.
I think that Metallica might give us a very mobile gunline in combination with the Kastellan formation. Which could be very cool to play with.
We have alot of options with our Dakkabots now! The below incorpurates the benefits each Forgeworld applies strictly to the Dakkabots (including stratagems and warlord traits)
Graia: 6+++ on their final lost wound, shooting into the melee they are engaged with and more accurate shots on the move.
Metalica: Good mobility (can hide them better turn 1 now), can fallback from melee and shoot at a -1 and more accurate shots on the move.
Stygies VIII: Better Durability over 12", a 9" redeployment move and more accurate shots on the move.
Lucius: More durability vs ap1 attacks (assault cannons, heavy bolters, autocannons, lootas, etc, turn 2 deep strike if you need to keep them extra safe and more accurate shots on the move.
Agripinaa: Overwatch on 5's to hit and more accurate shots on the move.
Mars: 2 Canticles, Wrath of Mars and more accurate shots on the move with even more hits due to Cawl.
Ryza: Reroll 1's to hit in CC..... and more accurate shots on the move.
Well you might have some good fun with 19 CP ^^
I think your list is pretty match up dependent. It will stomp some enemies while struggel against some (e.g. Eldar flyer spam)
2x Graia barebones battalions for the deny
3x Gallants
1x Castellan
Comes in at 1996. 14 drops and 19CP.
Think that would be fun, reasonably strong?
What household would the Knights be from and maybe drop a Gallant and get some more support from the Admech side of things. What is in your barebones battalions? 1 dominus 3 enginseers and 6x5 man squads of rangers i assume.
Arlen wrote: I also think that Agripinaa is a very viable option for the Destroyers. Their stratagem is pretty much made for servitor units, but their Relic is also very good with the plasma, but maybe even more with the Grav cannon. Stick them near a Dominus and you got reroll 1s to-hit and reroll 1s to wound against a vehicle of your choice within 18''.
Metallica is also good for avoiding those grinding combats we lose turns in. While the Dogma is not that usefull for Destroyers, if you would run the Dakkabots in a separate detachment and give them their formation bonus, then they would ignore the -1 for advancing with their stratagem fueled assault Phosphor Blasters.
I think that Metallica might give us a very mobile gunline in combination with the Kastellan formation. Which could be very cool to play with.
We have alot of options with our Dakkabots now! The below incorpurates the benefits each Forgeworld applies strictly to the Dakkabots (including stratagems and warlord traits)
Graia: 6+++ on their final lost wound, shooting into the melee they are engaged with and more accurate shots on the move.
Metalica: Good mobility (can hide them better turn 1 now), can fallback from melee and shoot at a -1 and more accurate shots on the move.
Stygies VIII: Better Durability over 12", a 9" redeployment move and more accurate shots on the move.
Lucius: More durability vs ap1 attacks (assault cannons, heavy bolters, autocannons, lootas, etc, turn 2 deep strike if you need to keep them extra safe and more accurate shots on the move.
Agripinaa: Overwatch on 5's to hit and more accurate shots on the move.
Mars: 2 Canticles, Wrath of Mars and more accurate shots on the move with even more hits due to Cawl.
Ryza: Reroll 1's to hit in CC..... and more accurate shots on the move.
My little review
Yeah exactly, I really like how these last updates with CA en Vigilus Defiant have given us so much more option and possible synergies that other forgeworlds are also starting to become a lot more interesting.
Sure a Cawlstar is still very good, but there are some more viable options on the table and that is great.
I also am starting to think about how I could play some Fistbots with these new updates.
Lucius seems great with the ability to deepstrike them deep into the enemy zone and the +3'' on your charge range give you a great chance of pulling it off.
Stygies might also be a very good option to give them that 9'' bonus movement at the start if the game after which they just run towards the enemy line.
lash92 wrote: Well you might have some good fun with 19 CP ^^
I think your list is pretty match up dependent. It will stomp some enemies while struggel against some (e.g. Eldar flyer spam)
2x Graia barebones battalions for the deny
3x Gallants
1x Castellan
Comes in at 1996. 14 drops and 19CP.
Think that would be fun, reasonably strong?
What household would the Knights be from and maybe drop a Gallant and get some more support from the Admech side of things. What is in your barebones battalions? 1 dominus 3 enginseers and 6x5 man squads of rangers i assume.
Controversial but I’d be going for Taranis for 100 wounds of 6+ FNP and a few chances to ressurect some zombie knights
lash92 wrote: Well you might have some good fun with 19 CP ^^
I think your list is pretty match up dependent. It will stomp some enemies while struggel against some (e.g. Eldar flyer spam)
2x Graia barebones battalions for the deny
3x Gallants
1x Castellan
Comes in at 1996. 14 drops and 19CP.
Think that would be fun, reasonably strong?
What household would the Knights be from and maybe drop a Gallant and get some more support from the Admech side of things. What is in your barebones battalions? 1 dominus 3 enginseers and 6x5 man squads of rangers i assume.
Controversial but I’d be going for Taranis for 100 wounds of 6+ FNP and a few chances to ressurect some zombie knights
You better be a God with all those 6's your going to have to make !!
My my it looks like AdMech got the most out of CA and Vigilus. A few observations though after viewing the full pages of Detachments:
- Cawl isn't a <Tech-Priest Dominus>, so he's out of the question concerning the Warlord trait, relics and all that concerns these Detachments overall
- The Power Surge stratagem requires a Cybernetica Datasmith within 3" to activate, so if Lucius bombing you need to pay a CP for your Datasmith as well
- The Doctrina Foreas servo-skull relic is a really handy one, it saves us 1 CP when going Protector on our turn, and allows us to disengage the Robots at the start of our turn if they get tied up. Don't forget Binharic Override forbids us to switch back for the whole game so this is huge. If Lucius bombing I'd still use Binharic Override to switch them to Conqueror after charge so that they still soak up Overwatch better with their 2+/4++, and they wouldn't need to switch after that anyway
Servitor Maniple is incredible in all the possibilities it offers us for our cheaper Kataphrons. Agripinaa becomes a very attractive FW because of how much the durability of Destroyers can be increased just with that detachment. Have a unit of 6 Destroyers, already 18 T5 4+/6++ Wounds, give them 5++, now keep 4-8 Servitors hidden nearby for resurrections. If you have a wounded, heal him to full health with an Enginseer or something, then resurrect a dead for 5 pts worth of Servitors. If your unit suffered too much casualties, burn 3 CP to bring back the whole unit.
Now don't we forget Agripinaa's trait is good, 5++ Overwatch with our amount of shots is impressive, it was just overshadowed by way better traits pre-CA/Vigilus. There's their relic, the Xi-Lecum Eye or something, that gives reroll 1s to Wound (full rerolls if Chaos) to the whole army towards an enemy Vehicle within 18" of the bearer (relatively short, I admit). Mini-Doom. You know what pairs well with this ? The damn Heavy Arc Rifles and their S6. Grav-cannons from the Destroyers. Plasma, of course. Neutron Lasers, even. Breachers shooting with +1 BS start becoming interesting at 40 pts/piece, and they're not totally useless when charged. I'm still not fan of the Torsion Cannon though. Don't forget that in a Drukhari meta, Arc weapons are actually really good, they're made to kill Drukhari vehicles, and cheap.
I won't talk too much about Destroyers as you guys already covered it all I believe, just insist a bit on the Grav-cannon which is, I believe, an overlooked weapon. With Cawl's rerolls and +1/+2 to BS we're looking at 26,66/29,16 S5 AP-3 shots, that d3D on 3+ saves. On a Knight with a basic 5++ we're having 11,84/12,96 Wounds on average. Not bad for a polyvalent weapon. It's real strength is against Elite Infantry though.
Not too sold on the Ryza detachment for the Destroyers, sure it's powerful but it's a whole detachment that is off <Forge-World>, for Servitor Maniple you need your whole detachment to be Ryza. Keep that in mind.
I believe I'm going to buy more Robots and Kataphrons.
EDIT: Having two Batallions is very easy now with our cheaper HQs, with 13 CP at 2000 pts we're set for a good Alpha/Beta strike.
Not too sold on the Ryza detachment for the Destroyers, sure it's powerful but it's a whole detachment that is off <Forge-World>, for Servitor Maniple you need your whole detachment to be Ryza. Keep that in mind.
Instead of a small detachment for Ryza I would think you should build more around their stratagem and dogma instead. The Destroyers are in this case are the powerhouse of a Ryza army, but there is more to add to such an army. An cool idea I have been toying with for a while is serveral drills with each 10 Vanguard inside of them with calivers for a shooty backline drop. Infiltrators are also good with the Ryza dogma and a lot cheaper right now. I think I might try some stuff with a full on Ryza list with Destroyers, Vanguard, Dragoons and Infiltrators. Maybe throw in a Valiant for some more close quarter action.
I already had quite a lot of Robots and Kataphrons, now I might just buy even more
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Tiger9gamer wrote: so, question! Is the servitor strat only a one time use one like data imperative strategems, or is a constant upgrade like the veteran thing?
The 5++ invul is a constant upgrade that you could aply to multiple units since it is aplied pre-game.
The +1 to hit is a strat. that you can only activate in the shooting phase.
Aaranis wrote: My my it looks like AdMech got the most out of CA and Vigilus. A few observations though after viewing the full pages of Detachments:
- Cawl isn't a <Tech-Priest Dominus>, so he's out of the question concerning the Warlord trait, relics and all that concerns these Detachments overall
- The Power Surge stratagem requires a Cybernetica Datasmith within 3" to activate, so if Lucius bombing you need to pay a CP for your Datasmith as well
- The Doctrina Foreas servo-skull relic is a really handy one, it saves us 1 CP when going Protector on our turn, and allows us to disengage the Robots at the start of our turn if they get tied up. Don't forget Binharic Override forbids us to switch back for the whole game so this is huge. If Lucius bombing I'd still use Binharic Override to switch them to Conqueror after charge so that they still soak up Overwatch better with their 2+/4++, and they wouldn't need to switch after that anyway
Servitor Maniple is incredible in all the possibilities it offers us for our cheaper Kataphrons. Agripinaa becomes a very attractive FW because of how much the durability of Destroyers can be increased just with that detachment. Have a unit of 6 Destroyers, already 18 T5 4+/6++ Wounds, give them 5++, now keep 4-8 Servitors hidden nearby for resurrections. If you have a wounded, heal him to full health with an Enginseer or something, then resurrect a dead for 5 pts worth of Servitors. If your unit suffered too much casualties, burn 3 CP to bring back the whole unit.
Now don't we forget Agripinaa's trait is good, 5++ Overwatch with our amount of shots is impressive, it was just overshadowed by way better traits pre-CA/Vigilus. There's their relic, the Xi-Lecum Eye or something, that gives reroll 1s to Wound (full rerolls if Chaos) to the whole army towards an enemy Vehicle within 18" of the bearer (relatively short, I admit). Mini-Doom. You know what pairs well with this ? The damn Heavy Arc Rifles and their S6. Grav-cannons from the Destroyers. Plasma, of course. Neutron Lasers, even. Breachers shooting with +1 BS start becoming interesting at 40 pts/piece, and they're not totally useless when charged. I'm still not fan of the Torsion Cannon though. Don't forget that in a Drukhari meta, Arc weapons are actually really good, they're made to kill Drukhari vehicles, and cheap.
I won't talk too much about Destroyers as you guys already covered it all I believe, just insist a bit on the Grav-cannon which is, I believe, an overlooked weapon. With Cawl's rerolls and +1/+2 to BS we're looking at 26,66/29,16 S5 AP-3 shots, that d3D on 3+ saves. On a Knight with a basic 5++ we're having 11,84/12,96 Wounds on average. Not bad for a polyvalent weapon. It's real strength is against Elite Infantry though.
Not too sold on the Ryza detachment for the Destroyers, sure it's powerful but it's a whole detachment that is off <Forge-World>, for Servitor Maniple you need your whole detachment to be Ryza. Keep that in mind.
I believe I'm going to buy more Robots and Kataphrons.
EDIT: Having two Batallions is very easy now with our cheaper HQs, with 13 CP at 2000 pts we're set for a good Alpha/Beta strike.
I think the problem with Agripinaa is that it doesn't boast the durability of non-kataphron units, so where as people said they wouldnt go Ryza as they loose out on the defensive dogmas of other Forge Worlds, here is the same problem. And whilst the Agripinaa relic is actually pretty sweet (to be honest i forgot that it existed!!! ) you will pretty much have to sprint that Enginseer up the field to get the benefits. Now that isnt a huge problem but he may not reach his target to relay the re'roll 1's to wound for you anti tank elements vs that target.
So i think Ryza and Agripinaa are in the same boat, both lack durability (except recycling some destroyers for Agripinaa) compared to Stygies VIII, Lucius and Graia, both may never get their Dogmas off at all (if you face another shooty list, or they have something that ignores overwatch and obliterates you so you cant get to fight back) and both have bad warlord traits in that they dont benefit their army, just themselves.
Now i do like the Xi-Lecum Eye as we are basically getting a Lieutanent vs a single unit but its a matter of getting it by your chosen enemy vehicle turn 1 onwards which may prove troublesome an a suicide mission for that character and its support squads.
I really like the servitor formations. More BS is very much needed, and since I pretty much already use destroyers in every list (and probably will be more now that they are cheaper) this is pretty much a no brainer. I can hardly wait for battle scribe to update the point values, I just want to build lists now instead of studying for the chemistry final like I should be doing.
I think my shopping list is going to be another enginseer, at least one box of kataphrons, maybe another unit of robots just so I can fill out more lists. There is so much I want to play with now...
and dammit I have to buy the campaign book now too!
Arlen wrote:Instead of a small detachment for Ryza I would think you should build more around their stratagem and dogma instead. The Destroyers are in this case are the powerhouse of a Ryza army, but there is more to add to such an army. An cool idea I have been toying with for a while is serveral drills with each 10 Vanguard inside of them with calivers for a shooty backline drop. Infiltrators are also good with the Ryza dogma and a lot cheaper right now. I think I might try some stuff with a full on Ryza list with Destroyers, Vanguard, Dragoons and Infiltrators. Maybe throw in a Valiant for some more close quarter action.
I already had quite a lot of Robots and Kataphrons, now I might just buy even more
The Drill can contain 12 models, go balls-out with 2 squads of 6 with 2 Calivers each: 8 plasma shots + 24 radium shots ! Then you try to throw your Drills in CC to occupy the dangerous stuff. I like that plan. Honestly I love Drills but I'll never buy a 100+€ model who can be banned at tournaments or nerfed to the ground because FW is as unstable as 7th edition's plasma.
I just need 2 more Dakkabots and 4 Fistybots, 3 more plasma Destroyers and I'd be set for a while.
deffrekka wrote:I think the problem with Agripinaa is that it doesn't boast the durability of non-kataphron units, so where as people said they wouldnt go Ryza as they loose out on the defensive dogmas of other Forge Worlds, here is the same problem. And whilst the Agripinaa relic is actually pretty sweet (to be honest i forgot that it existed!!! ) you will pretty much have to sprint that Enginseer up the field to get the benefits. Now that isnt a huge problem but he may not reach his target to relay the re'roll 1's to wound for you anti tank elements vs that target.
So i think Ryza and Agripinaa are in the same boat, both lack durability (except recycling some destroyers for Agripinaa) compared to Stygies VIII, Lucius and Graia, both may never get their Dogmas off at all (if you face another shooty list, or they have something that ignores overwatch and obliterates you so you cant get to fight back) and both have bad warlord traits in that they dont benefit their army, just themselves.
Now i do like the Xi-Lecum Eye as we are basically getting a Lieutanent vs a single unit but its a matter of getting it by your chosen enemy vehicle turn 1 onwards which may prove troublesome an a suicide mission for that character and its support squads.
I believe a 5++ Overwatch counts as a defensive option but I get that Stygies VIII, Graia and Lucius are more reliable and versatile. In the case where we're running Agripinaa it would be solely to build around Kataphrons, like we build Mars lists around Dakkastelans or Stygies lists around Dragoons/Fulgurites.
Ryza benefit Destroyers and Vanguard immensely with the stratagem + Servitor Maniple, but it could work as an army if building a bit around the Dogma too. What benefits the most of rerolling 1s to Wound in CC are Fulgurites and Ruststalkers, and the latter are now 15 pts/model.
Xi-Lecum's Eye would work when said Vehicles are coming your way or if playing a mobile gunline list but that's not really usual indeed.
Speaking of mobile gunlines, let us not forget that we essentially ignore Heavy penalties, with the discounts on Destroyers, Cognis Flamers and Incendine Combustors, walking in the face of the opponent short-range style might be worth thinking about. It gives more board control, and dares the opponent to charge your flamers or suffer them nonetheless in the Shooting phase. With Agripinaa who lose nothing at breaking the distance compared to Stygies this might be a valuable tactic, and increases the use of Xi-Lecum's Eye in doing so. I'll try building a list in that style for curiosity, with 6 Destroyers with flamers, Robots with Combustors and Aegis, and a few Servitors to feed the Kataphrons.
On a side note I'm glad to be back in this thread. I left for a while when it became Tactica Imperial Knights + Soup but these changes are worth the comeback.
I think this discussion is missing the fact that Onagers went down 20 points. 3x icarus onagers should be in every admech list ever. They are comically point efficient. The basic STYGIES TPD/Engi/3xRangers/3xIcarus battalion went down ~107 points.
EDIT: from my read on the leaks, I think putting knights in with majority admech is dead. There are too many good power combos in admech right now to waste payload points on knights. However, min admech battalions have now become better helpers to majority MECHANICUS knight lists than min guard battalions.
Arlen wrote:Instead of a small detachment for Ryza I would think you should build more around their stratagem and dogma instead. The Destroyers are in this case are the powerhouse of a Ryza army, but there is more to add to such an army. An cool idea I have been toying with for a while is serveral drills with each 10 Vanguard inside of them with calivers for a shooty backline drop. Infiltrators are also good with the Ryza dogma and a lot cheaper right now. I think I might try some stuff with a full on Ryza list with Destroyers, Vanguard, Dragoons and Infiltrators. Maybe throw in a Valiant for some more close quarter action.
I already had quite a lot of Robots and Kataphrons, now I might just buy even more
The Drill can contain 12 models, go balls-out with 2 squads of 6 with 2 Calivers each: 8 plasma shots + 24 radium shots ! Then you try to throw your Drills in CC to occupy the dangerous stuff. I like that plan. Honestly I love Drills but I'll never buy a 100+€ model who can be banned at tournaments or nerfed to the ground because FW is as unstable as 7th edition's plasma.
I just need 2 more Dakkabots and 4 Fistybots, 3 more plasma Destroyers and I'd be set for a while.
deffrekka wrote:I think the problem with Agripinaa is that it doesn't boast the durability of non-kataphron units, so where as people said they wouldnt go Ryza as they loose out on the defensive dogmas of other Forge Worlds, here is the same problem. And whilst the Agripinaa relic is actually pretty sweet (to be honest i forgot that it existed!!! ) you will pretty much have to sprint that Enginseer up the field to get the benefits. Now that isnt a huge problem but he may not reach his target to relay the re'roll 1's to wound for you anti tank elements vs that target.
So i think Ryza and Agripinaa are in the same boat, both lack durability (except recycling some destroyers for Agripinaa) compared to Stygies VIII, Lucius and Graia, both may never get their Dogmas off at all (if you face another shooty list, or they have something that ignores overwatch and obliterates you so you cant get to fight back) and both have bad warlord traits in that they dont benefit their army, just themselves.
Now i do like the Xi-Lecum Eye as we are basically getting a Lieutanent vs a single unit but its a matter of getting it by your chosen enemy vehicle turn 1 onwards which may prove troublesome an a suicide mission for that character and its support squads.
I believe a 5++ Overwatch counts as a defensive option but I get that Stygies VIII, Graia and Lucius are more reliable and versatile. In the case where we're running Agripinaa it would be solely to build around Kataphrons, like we build Mars lists around Dakkastelans or Stygies lists around Dragoons/Fulgurites.
Ryza benefit Destroyers and Vanguard immensely with the stratagem + Servitor Maniple, but it could work as an army if building a bit around the Dogma too. What benefits the most of rerolling 1s to Wound in CC are Fulgurites and Ruststalkers, and the latter are now 15 pts/model.
Xi-Lecum's Eye would work when said Vehicles are coming your way or if playing a mobile gunline list but that's not really usual indeed.
Speaking of mobile gunlines, let us not forget that we essentially ignore Heavy penalties, with the discounts on Destroyers, Cognis Flamers and Incendine Combustors, walking in the face of the opponent short-range style might be worth thinking about. It gives more board control, and dares the opponent to charge your flamers or suffer them nonetheless in the Shooting phase. With Agripinaa who lose nothing at breaking the distance compared to Stygies this might be a valuable tactic, and increases the use of Xi-Lecum's Eye in doing so. I'll try building a list in that style for curiosity, with 6 Destroyers with flamers, Robots with Combustors and Aegis, and a few Servitors to feed the Kataphrons.
On a side note I'm glad to be back in this thread. I left for a while when it became Tactica Imperial Knights + Soup but these changes are worth the comeback.
Haha i know the feeling! Ive been out of this thread and using Admech since May! Was going to start up with my 11 year old ork army then chapter approved spat in their face with the cost reductions other armies got. The two Admech Specialist Detachments drew me back, and the pts drops was surprising and hobby enhancing!
What i meant by having less defensive dogmas is that they can be avoided entirely and thats for both Agripinaa and Ryza. They both rely on combat to be triggered and nowadays there are alot of tricks people can pull off to mitigate the two dogmas. Things like the Vexator Mask and Angels Wing will negate over watch entirely, then there is psychic powers like mass hypnosis and others like it that do the same. Then there are pile in/consolidate moves that can avoid overwatch and lock our units in CC, all they have to do is charge say those servitors and cartwheel into the Kataphrons. And then things charging Rzya units will usually obliterate our models so we wont get to re-roll 1's to hit in CC (which is also redundant due to chant of the remorseless fist).
So yeah they are kind of Pseudo defensive traits, which the same can be said for Stygies VIII and Lucius, however chances are you will get to use both of those dogmas alot more than the previous two. In a shooting phase ruled game i think Rzya truimphs vs Agripinaa. The raw damage is better (in a strictly Destroyer sense), they wound all T7 vehicles on a 2+ then T8 on a 3+ and they loose just as many models to shooting as Agripinaa. Yes they have Flesh Converts, but im more on about there potential damage from the get go.
Now im not saying Agripinaa is worse by any means; i just think between the two, Rzya Destroyers will kill what you want dead. But where i agree with you is in the sense of heavy grav cannons and cognis flamers. As Agripinaa, these murderbots will roast and trash compact any light/medium unit they touch, like eldar and dark eldar like you said before. 30 BS 2 rerolling 1's str 5 ap 3 shots is quite good and with d3 damage vs 3+ save models they become just like dark eldar disintegrator cannons (just d3 damage instead of 2). Pushing these boys up the field like you said would be a scary prospect, and the benefit of overwatch on 5s and 6s suddenly adds up, especially with the cognis flamers too. And if tehy get depleted abit, regen then back with Flesh Converts and defend your deployment late game.
In conclusion thats where i think the two forge worlds differ, Rzya is for plasma + phoshor destroyers / Agripinaa for heavy grav + cognis flamers. Each excels massively in that field compared to other Forge Worlds.
It feels so good to be debating Admech strats with guys like you again gets my inner Magos going again!!!
On a side note I'm glad to be back in this thread. I left for a while when it became Tactica Imperial Knights + Soup but these changes are worth the comeback.
Ohw yeah, the last few pages have been a joy to add upon.
I think there is still a place for Knights in an admech list, but I am so glad that right now we got the options and synergy to build a powerfull mono-build that can can hold a lot better out on its own then ever before.
I think i'm gonna try out a brigade with the new point costs and see how far I can stretch it. Getting those 15 command points will be alot easier right now with a lot more to play around with.
Also the new chapter approved missions seem to have a lot of updated rules and throwbacks to deployment of 7th, which might also shift something in the meta or atleast the local meta if you play with them (I know I will).
Yeah they are, but over priced. They dont look like theyve been done with CA in mind. For Example: Heavy Flamer 14 / Skorcha 17. Powerfist 8-9 / Powerklaw 13. Chainfist 11 / Killsaw 15. Plasmagun 11 / rokkit launcha 12. A guardsmen with a flamer is 10pts, a vet with one is 11pts, a burna boy is 12pts and is vastly worse in comparison.
Anyway i wont go on with my laments of ork blues in a admech thread XD
Wulfey wrote: I think this discussion is missing the fact that Onagers went down 20 points. 3x icarus onagers should be in every admech list ever. They are comically point efficient. The basic STYGIES TPD/Engi/3xRangers/3xIcarus battalion went down ~107 points.
EDIT: from my read on the leaks, I think putting knights in with majority admech is dead. There are too many good power combos in admech right now to waste payload points on knights. However, min admech battalions have now become better helpers to majority MECHANICUS knight lists than min guard battalions.
oh there is no way We forgot this. In fact, the new servitor maniple made onagers even better, as now we have a more reliable "Finisher" with the servitors for when our neutron lasers fail to do major damage. sure it costs CP's,but what doesn't in 8th? line up a shot with a neutron laser or two, then shoot plasma at something until it is fully destroyed, ensuring kills wherever we need them. and now this tactic is even better, as we can heal these guys better and even bring them back at the cost of regular servitors. only downside is that the tech priests will be more important now than ever if you want to reliably put plasma where you need it.
I'm still going to be putting my knight in with my admech, especially with armigers to support and act as a counter charging unit. Knight still brings a lot of versatility, and is basically a free heavy support choice in an auxiliary without taking up room for bots or for onagers.
Wulfey wrote: I think this discussion is missing the fact that Onagers went down 20 points. 3x icarus onagers should be in every admech list ever. They are comically point efficient. The basic STYGIES TPD/Engi/3xRangers/3xIcarus battalion went down ~107 points.
EDIT: from my read on the leaks, I think putting knights in with majority admech is dead. There are too many good power combos in admech right now to waste payload points on knights. However, min admech battalions have now become better helpers to majority MECHANICUS knight lists than min guard battalions.
oh there is no way We forgot this. In fact, the new servitor maniple made onagers even better, as now we have a more reliable "Finisher" with the servitors for when our neutron lasers fail to do major damage. sure it costs CP's,but what doesn't in 8th? line up a shot with a neutron laser or two, then shoot plasma at something until it is fully destroyed, ensuring kills wherever we need them. and now this tactic is even better, as we can heal these guys better and even bring them back at the cost of regular servitors. only downside is that the tech priests will be more important now than ever if you want to reliably put plasma where you need it.
I'm still going to be putting my knight in with my admech, especially with armigers to support and act as a counter charging unit. Knight still brings a lot of versatility, and is basically a free heavy support choice in an auxiliary without taking up room for bots or for onagers.
I would personally open up with the Destroyers first. Spread out the shots vs targets as required or focus fire vs one unit, then use the Onagers vs those damaged units to finish them off. For example lets say there are 3 leman russes you want dead, split the shots into 3! 2d6 there, 2d6 here and another 2d6 for you. if each one does about 4 - 6 damage (or 3-9 damage as Ryza) those onagers will now have a much easier time atleast dealing out 6 damage or out right killing it. Although im quite lucky with my Neutronagers!!! They are famed in my group The guys say "Apples or Onagers" when they compare their AT choices vs my little crab walkers
I would personally open up with the Destroyers first. Spread out the shots vs targets as required or focus fire vs one unit, then use the Onagers vs those damaged units to finish them off. For example lets say there are 3 leman russes you want dead, split the shots into 3! 2d6 there, 2d6 here and another 2d6 for you. if each one does about 4 - 6 damage (or 3-9 damage as Ryza) those onagers will now have a much easier time atleast dealing out 6 damage or out right killing it. Although im quite lucky with my Neutronagers!!! They are famed in my group The guys say "Apples or Onagers" when they compare their AT choices vs my little crab walkers
either or works, really! I just have absolutely terrible luck with wounding (by heavens I want a lieutenant for admech. it would save me so many headaches that I have every game. I usually have to devote two to really injur a tank because my dice are bad, though there are games where they are gods (I still am proud of them for one shotting a tyranid prime) but usually I need some follow ups to them rather than the other way around. It usually works though, and they provide such great firepower!
I still like Icarus in this meta. Even tho there are knights, if you run against a knight player he will 100% rotate ion shields if you use that neutron. And if orks become a thing ... poor poor neutron. Eldar are 50%+ of the top tables right now so icarus at 110 points is really the go to.
EDIT: what I am trying to think through now is how to make a basic admech artillery line work in light of the wave of new fast melee threats (ORKS with 2d6 consolidates, etc). I think admech needs to start bringing a whole lot more bodies. Either you need to keep bringing the loyal 32 guardsmen as just more bodies or you need to buy a whole lot more boxes of rangers. If you make a list that has like 1000 points of serious servitor or kastelan firepower, all of that can be negated by terrain or fast melee and 'trapping' tricks where you consolidate into another unit and pin 1 model by basing at 3 points.
Right now a dakkabot is 110 points. An onager is 110 points. And two grav/plasma destroyers are about 102/96 points. But they need 4 point servitors for every 2 so they come out to be very similar in points.
I am kind of thinking that the MARS artillery line could actually be most of points into kataphrons and rely on CAWL's rerolls and the detachment tricks to keep the servitors healthier than they should be. Then spend the rest of the points on bodies and CP.
Wulfey wrote: I still like Icarus in this meta. Even tho there are knights, if you run against a knight player he will 100% rotate ion shields if you use that neutron. And if orks become a thing ... poor poor neutron. Eldar are 50%+ of the top tables right now so icarus at 110 points is really the go to.
EDIT: what I am trying to think through now is how to make a basic admech artillery line work in light of the wave of new fast melee threats (ORKS with 2d6 consolidates, etc). I think admech needs to start bringing a whole lot more bodies. Either you need to keep bringing the loyal 32 guardsmen as just more bodies or you need to buy a whole lot more boxes of rangers. If you make a list that has like 1000 points of serious servitor or kastelan firepower, all of that can be negated by terrain or fast melee and 'trapping' tricks where you consolidate into another unit and pin 1 model by basing at 3 points.
Right now a dakkabot is 110 points.
An onager is 110 points.
And two grav/plasma destroyers are about 102/96 points. But they need 4 point servitors for every 2 so they come out to be very similar in points.
I am kind of thinking that the MARS artillery line could actually be most of points into kataphrons and rely on CAWL's rerolls and the detachment tricks to keep the servitors healthier than they should be. Then spend the rest of the points on bodies and CP.
if there are several knights nothing is stopping you from faking out one. Target one with a neutron laser, go "oh noooooooooooo" when he rotates ion shields, then blow up another one when he cannot use the strat anymore, or target something else if there is only one knight. At best he fails all his rolls anyways for the first shot, and at worst he loses a command point. granted I am not one to talk as I made a foolish decision in a game and devoted all fire power to a magera w/ a 3++, but eh, no one is perfect. pplus, it's easier said on paper, so this tactic may not work out
The melee thing is something I didn't think up, and would require some thought to counter. I have not fought against this kind of list, so I have no comment besides "Shoot them! Shoot them faster!" and hope a knight crusader can river dance on them while skitarii provide buffers.
In case anyone missed it the Magaera went down to 380pts, which is a 60pt erduction. Still 40pts more than a styrix though and i cannot fathom why.
Until the details of that servitor maniple i had a pretty clear thought where i was going with my army next, now i’m not so sure. I must admit to being a bit confused by everyone’s statements of what can and cant do now without qualifying where this new option is coming from. There are so many nuances that until i can see everything on paper in front of me that i dont think i can fully appreciate what everyone is getting in a tiz over.
So far i’ve gathered that the maniple allows us to bring back kataphrons at the cost of a servitor with a WT (and field commander for 1cp we can give any character that trait) which is great. Except if there’s a model thats not on full wounds we cant, could be difficult to repair to full in order to use the trait to revive one; Enginseers can only repair vehicles, so that leaves tpd and cawl to do the job.
another maniple strategm allows us to give a unit of servitors +1 to hit, which combined with some nearby robots for a total of 3cp gives them +2 to hit. The only thing i dont like about this is the positional requirements of keeping all our robots and destroyers in one place paints a huge target.
Off the back of that i havent quite seen what allows us to switch robot protocol instantly without binharic override meaning we can take advantage of the metalica wt along with the vigilus strat to fallback and still fire.
Emotionless clarity with the vigilus strat kind makes that pointless though, 1cp to switch weapons to assault and then fire them all in combat we probably dont want to fall back.
I definitely feel like a i need to see everything new in one document somewhere, all the formations, wt, relics, strategms etc. Without people paraphrasing them. Without the context i find it really difficult to figure out how i would factor it into one of my lists.
You're right, we still need to be able to protect all that. Pure AdMech requires the cheapest: Rangers. I'm thinking of always going by units of 7-8 from now on to be able to take a few casualties but not get screwed too much in Morale. Always keep your Skitarii within 6" of your Onagers guys, free +1 Ld ! I wish they'd made Vanguards 7 pts as well, they're way better screeners with their better Overwatch and bonus debuff aura.
I don't see the link between Neutron and Orks, they don't have vehicles with 4++ I believe ? But yeah my Icarus got better. I used one last time against Drukhari at 1000 pts and boy did he made it a priority. Seriously hurt the Raiders and wrecked the Reavers.
Now if they could remove the rule of 3 for Onagers I could start dreaming about my Onager Death Squad of 3 Beamers, 2 Icarus and 2 Neutrons.
Speaking of that, I guess the Cognis Stubbers are auto-take now, 2 pts instead of 5 is really juicy.
If CC hordes become to much of a problem, I think metallica would be a grand solution to make sure our gunlines keep working. Additionally I just might sneak in a Hawkshroud Valiant into my list for that fantastic overwatch strat.
How cool is it to see orks charging your skitarii gunline and suddenly a knight with a flamethrower the size of a flat steps in and roasts them all.
Aaranis wrote: My best shot was 17 wounds off an Exocrine with a single Neutron Laser. Been a long time since it did something significant though.
My best was one shotting a plagueburst crawl at full health! The guy fired at me first and did about 5 wounds, i healed 4 and then returned fire back at it, and his face after it omg!!! apples and oangers people, apples and onagers (moral of the story always take oangers kids!!!)
Aaranis wrote: You're right, we still need to be able to protect all that. Pure AdMech requires the cheapest: Rangers. I'm thinking of always going by units of 7-8 from now on to be able to take a few casualties but not get screwed too much in Morale. Always keep your Skitarii within 6" of your Onagers guys, free +1 Ld !
A 60pt balistarii also conveys the same bonus if you need to spread out or your objectives are too far from your onagers
I just read the Beta Stygies Infiltration rule again and it's sadder than I thought, can't even end our move closer than 9" from the enemy. Stygies Dragoons/Fistelans are really gone. The trait have not changed though, so it still is a reliable defense and I believe I'll use my 3 Dragoons as screen turn 1, they're really large and can suffer a horde.
Also Octovol's comment made me realise Enginseers couldn't repair all AdMech units, it's disheartening. Not that mine repaired anything else than Onagers though but still, for the Servitor Maniple I'll have to employ my Dominus to fix the Destroyers.
Aaranis wrote: You're right, we still need to be able to protect all that. Pure AdMech requires the cheapest: Rangers. I'm thinking of always going by units of 7-8 from now on to be able to take a few casualties but not get screwed too much in Morale. Always keep your Skitarii within 6" of your Onagers guys, free +1 Ld ! I wish they'd made Vanguards 7 pts as well, they're way better screeners with their better Overwatch and bonus debuff aura.
I don't see the link between Neutron and Orks, they don't have vehicles with 4++ I believe ? But yeah my Icarus got better. I used one last time against Drukhari at 1000 pts and boy did he made it a priority. Seriously hurt the Raiders and wrecked the Reavers.
Now if they could remove the rule of 3 for Onagers I could start dreaming about my Onager Death Squad of 3 Beamers, 2 Icarus and 2 Neutrons.
Speaking of that, I guess the Cognis Stubbers are auto-take now, 2 pts instead of 5 is really juicy.
This reply goes to everyone not just you Aaranis haha I think we can chaff out our lines with 3 squads of 4 servitors. To begin with thats just 60pts barebones, then they fill out our elite slots (if your going brigade), next they help regen destroyers, they also cap points effectively (they have nothing else to do), easy to hide, still take up board space and push out deepstrikers and scout/infiltrators so give us some board control back, have LD 9 next to a Tech-Priest and finally turn 1 they have a 3+ save vs shooting. Yes they will give first blood if we go second but they are tougher to remove than 10 guardsmen and they do more for us now. Yeah they dont shoot or do anything fancy but thats there whole existance. If they shoot them that saves other infantry models in our list.
Next we have our basic skitarii troopers, yes they arent as efficient as guardsmen but they ignore cover (omnispex) have a 3+ 6++ save turn 1 and have actual good shooting, then get the same points as above.
I wouldnt be scared of a kult of speed list. 12 bikes moving 32" and then charging might sound scary but they are glass cannons. They cant avoid overwatch like other races can. And ork warbosses on bikes are fire and forget missiles, yeah they hurt alot but then hes dead after.... the wartrike is a less strong version. Use the terrain to your advantage, if hes all vehicles and bikes he cant charge the 1st floor of ruins. Create bottlenecks. Take either Graia or Metalica. 30 Da Jumped Boys wont kill 4+ kastellans and onagers. Use those 2 forge worlds if you anticipate going against fast close combat armies.
Reaver jetbikes and slaanesh armies have been a thing for a while and if you do fine vs them, youll be fine vs orkz. Advice from a veteran ork player who plays evil sunz, bad moons and deathskulls.
Wulfey wrote: I think this discussion is missing the fact that Onagers went down 20 points. 3x icarus onagers should be in every admech list ever. They are comically point efficient. The basic STYGIES TPD/Engi/3xRangers/3xIcarus battalion went down ~107 points.
EDIT: from my read on the leaks, I think putting knights in with majority admech is dead. There are too many good power combos in admech right now to waste payload points on knights. However, min admech battalions have now become better helpers to majority MECHANICUS knight lists than min guard battalions.
Too many Icarus Dunecrawlers leaves you with the issue of T8 vehicles. We have plenty of good S6 and S7 weapons in the rest of the army, but the only two non-Knight units that are inherently good at dealing with Russes and all the other heavy tanks at range are Neutron Crawlers and Lascannon Ironstrider chickens, with the latter being being pretty easy to focus down iy themselves.
Sure, you can run Knights, overcharging Destroyers or Mars mortal wound spam, but all of these have weaknesses and drawbacks or can be countered (and literally everyone will expect an Admech player to use Cawl+Dakkabot spam and pretty much everyone expects Knights).
Sure, 3x Icarus is great if you end up playing against Tau or Eldar, but what if you have to face Super Heavies (say, a Shadowsword or three) or a tank company? What if the other player has no flyers at all? I'd take at least one Neutron crab for the sake of versatility, especially because you will only be able to buff one Icarus crab with Protector Doctrina if there aren't any good fliers to shoot. Overloading those targets with dakka can work, but wounding on 5's always means that only 33% of you hits actually wound. Price is not a real issue either, a neutron crab is only 5 points more expensive than an Icarus crab with a stubber.
I plan on bringing 2 Neutron and 1 Icarus crab in my future 900+ point lists, in a pinch Dakkabots, the cheap arc rifles I like sprinkling into all my Ranger units and even a Dominus can help if someone spams too many T5/T6 vehicles.
Also Neutron Crawlers can bring two extremely cheap stubbers with them rather than one, so they do provide a good amount of long ranged anti-infantry firepower as well (and popping the Cognis Overwatch strat can do some nice damage with them).
EDIT: what I am trying to think through now is how to make a basic admech artillery line work in light of the wave of new fast melee threats (ORKS with 2d6 consolidates, etc). I think admech needs to start bringing a whole lot more bodies. Either you need to keep bringing the loyal 32 guardsmen as just more bodies or you need to buy a whole lot more boxes of rangers. If you make a list that has like 1000 points of serious servitor or kastelan firepower, all of that can be negated by terrain or fast melee and 'trapping' tricks where you consolidate into another unit and pin 1 model by basing at 3 points.
Which won't get better when Genestealers will get a Codex ;-)
But I don't think that Bodies is the way to screen tbh, because it is just so easy to trap a unit. We have many models with huge bases like Crawlers or a unit of Dragoons. Hell, you could even use the new cheap AC chicken.
In my last tournament i attended in May i went up against a full slaanesh daemons army. The guy was a very good tournament player having won previous tournaments. The whole god damn army locked me in CC turn 1, i didnt get a single full shooting phase.
Yes i lost all my infantry but my vehicles? End of turn 6 they were all still there. I had my datasmith smack heralds around like he was a pimp. Every turn he killed a herald and shot a seeker with his gamma pistol. My enginseers fought like champions, decapitating seekers and daemonettes left right and centre. My dominus hacked apart exalted chariots. Kastellans knowing they cant shoot, went full double attacks mode and went to town on daemons until they were knee deep in gore. Onagers pinched there way out of CC to throw neutron shots at other chariots and a winged daemon prince. Stray heavy stubber shots cleared 10 he-she squads off his home objectives.
I had a 5 man stubber and power sword infiltrator squad squatting in a ruin making sure a daemon prince couldnt charge and continued to pepper him to 1 wound until they fell to smites. My Dragoons charged in like demi-gods, whole sale slaughtering whole squads of seekers.
In the end after the blood was cleaned away from optical arrays and sensors, it was a draw 10-10. I had my dominus still alive at full health, 4 kastellans, 2 onagers (1 at 9 wounds the other at 2), a datasmith with 1 whole wound and 2 cheeky rangers left. He had a Daemon prince with 1 wound hiding, a keeper of secrets in the far corner and a single 10 lady squad of daemonettes. Everything else laid in bloody heeps at the feet on my army.
He won the tournament and i got 3rd place out of 32. Dont give up if your line gets compremised. We may not be a CC army, but we arent as defenceless as other gunlines, and we sure dont crawl up and die like tau.
Ive had kastellans in CC with custodes, ive had an onager on 3 wounds pinch the last wound off a shield captain on jetbike in close combat, ive had crawl steam roll a khorne daemon prince with a pair of talons and wings in CC and ate his heart infront of the shocked khorne beserkers faces.
I have seen many people give up when things dont go there way, but a bit of luck and unorthodox tactics can pull victory from defeat.
Wulfey wrote: I think this discussion is missing the fact that Onagers went down 20 points. 3x icarus onagers should be in every admech list ever. They are comically point efficient. The basic STYGIES TPD/Engi/3xRangers/3xIcarus battalion went down ~107 points.
EDIT: from my read on the leaks, I think putting knights in with majority admech is dead. There are too many good power combos in admech right now to waste payload points on knights. However, min admech battalions have now become better helpers to majority MECHANICUS knight lists than min guard battalions.
Too many Icarus Dunecrawlers leaves you with the issue of T8 vehicles. We have plenty of good S6 and S7 weapons in the rest of the army, but the only two non-Knight units that are inherently good at dealing with Russes and all the other heavy tanks at range are Neutron Crawlers and Lascannon Ironstrider chickens, with the latter being being pretty easy to focus down iy themselves.
Sure, you can run Knights, overcharging Destroyers or Mars mortal wound spam, but all of these have weaknesses and drawbacks or can be countered (and literally everyone will expect an Admech player to use Cawl+Dakkabot spam and pretty much everyone expects Knights).
Sure, 3x Icarus is great if you end up playing against Tau or Eldar, but what if you have to face Super Heavies (say, a Shadowsword or three) or a tank company? What if the other player has no flyers at all? I'd take at least one Neutron crab for the sake of versatility, especially because you will only be able to buff one Icarus crab with Protector Doctrina if there aren't any good fliers to shoot. Overloading those targets with dakka can work, but wounding on 5's always means that only 33% of you hits actually wound. Price is not a real issue either, a neutron crab is only 5 points more expensive than an Icarus crab with a stubber.
I plan on bringing 2 Neutron and 1 Icarus crab in my future 900+ point lists, in a pinch Dakkabots, the cheap arc rifles I like sprinkling into all my Ranger units and even a Dominus can help if someone spams too many T5/T6 vehicles.
Also Neutron Crawlers can bring two extremely cheap stubbers with them rather than one, so they do provide a good amount of long ranged anti-infantry firepower as well (and popping the Cognis Overwatch strat can do some nice damage with them).
I fully whole heartedly agree with you Ragnar. I have always brought 2 Neutron lasers in 8th, and sometimes 3. I have never wished to have an icarus array in any of my games, and when i did try it out, i felt like it just didnt have teeth compared to the neutron. People fear the neutron laser, its one of kind in the anti-tank world. It has a psychological aspect aswell as a damage dealing aspect. People want the damn thing dead. If they fail, its going to get healed up and get vengeance. If it strikes first, it will either serverly cripple its target or send it to the shadow realm with a bitter sweet kiss good night.
The Master of Bioslicing combos right into the Appri Strategem. You knock out the last dude in a squad, bring back one in another squad, and finally use your CP to bring back the dead squad?
Arlen wrote: If CC hordes become to much of a problem, I think metallica would be a grand solution to make sure our gunlines keep working. Additionally I just might sneak in a Hawkshroud Valiant into my list for that fantastic overwatch strat.
How cool is it to see orks charging your skitarii gunline and suddenly a knight with a flamethrower the size of a flat steps in and roasts them all.
Is it weird that I'm planning on mostly keeping my Kastelan in aegis mode and sprinting around the table? Lots of my opponents are things like eldar or Raven guard so they tend to be slippery and hide. The traditional play of slapping them in doubletap mode and breaking their legs just doesn't cut it for me much. With Metallica I can potentially move them 14" a turn to get them inside the -1 range and light them up.
With the new robot formation, my Metallica bots can sprint around being super aggressive up the midfield. I can keep the Dominus easily within 9" if I feel the need to shunt them into double tap mode and provide reroll 1's, as well as potentially run two 3 strong units of kataphrons that are spread out a bit to give me the option of an elimination volley. With 3-4 bots that I'm planning on running, they'll be hell to remove, and if you charge them big whoop, I'll just fall back my turn and shoot you again if played right. I also have a Valhallans guard army that would pair extremely well with this since their infantry can fire into friendly combat, giving me options to break robots out of tri locking if need be.
Even if I run pure Metallica though, between neutron Onagers, vastly improved destoryers, super mobile tanky Kastelan, and very aggressive plasma vanguard, I think I can make a super aggressive shooting army with some assault splashed in and have a blast. Once battlescribe has the points updated I can really start to play around with what a pure list would look like but I think I can make something really fun that would work, potentially even a triple batallion since you'll want a Dominus for both the formations and being able to spread the rerolls around let's you be more flexible with canticles. There's just so many options opened up now that I really feel like I can make an army that actually does what we're supposed to now. Heck I may even be able to finally use my infiltrators without feeling like an idiot now
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: The Master of Bioslicing combos right into the Appri Strategem. You knock out the last dude in a squad, bring back one in another squad, and finally use your CP to bring back the dead squad?
The unit still has to have 1 model remaining to use Fresh Converts.
Arlen wrote: If CC hordes become to much of a problem, I think metallica would be a grand solution to make sure our gunlines keep working. Additionally I just might sneak in a Hawkshroud Valiant into my list for that fantastic overwatch strat.
How cool is it to see orks charging your skitarii gunline and suddenly a knight with a flamethrower the size of a flat steps in and roasts them all.
Is it weird that I'm planning on mostly keeping my Kastelan in aegis mode and sprinting around the table? Lots of my opponents are things like eldar or Raven guard so they tend to be slippery and hide. The traditional play of slapping them in doubletap mode and breaking their legs just doesn't cut it for me much. With Metallica I can potentially move them 14" a turn to get them inside the -1 range and light them up.
With the new robot formation, my Metallica bots can sprint around being super aggressive up the midfield. I can keep the Dominus easily within 9" if I feel the need to shunt them into double tap mode and provide reroll 1's, as well as potentially run two 3 strong units of kataphrons that are spread out a bit to give me the option of an elimination volley. With 3-4 bots that I'm planning on running, they'll be hell to remove, and if you charge them big whoop, I'll just fall back my turn and shoot you again if played right. I also have a Valhallans guard army that would pair extremely well with this since their infantry can fire into friendly combat, giving me options to break robots out of tri locking if need be.
Even if I run pure Metallica though, between neutron Onagers, vastly improved destoryers, super mobile tanky Kastelan, and very aggressive plasma vanguard, I think I can make a super aggressive shooting army with some assault splashed in and have a blast. Once battlescribe has the points updated I can really start to play around with what a pure list would look like but I think I can make something really fun that would work, potentially even a triple batallion since you'll want a Dominus for both the formations and being able to spread the rerolls around let's you be more flexible with canticles. There's just so many options opened up now that I really feel like I can make an army that actually does what we're supposed to now. Heck I may even be able to finally use my infiltrators without feeling like an idiot now
I love your idea of Valhallans shooting into CC to free up units, i usually run my tech-thralls, i mean guardsmen.. as tallarn. This may work well on the cheaper veteran squads now, arm them with flamers, plasmas or grenade launchers and stay as the rear guard freeing up key units that have been locked up.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: The Master of Bioslicing combos right into the Appri Strategem. You knock out the last dude in a squad, bring back one in another squad, and finally use your CP to bring back the dead squad?
The unit still has to have 1 model remaining to use Fresh Converts.
Arlen wrote: If CC hordes become to much of a problem, I think metallica would be a grand solution to make sure our gunlines keep working. Additionally I just might sneak in a Hawkshroud Valiant into my list for that fantastic overwatch strat. How cool is it to see orks charging your skitarii gunline and suddenly a knight with a flamethrower the size of a flat steps in and roasts them all.
Is it weird that I'm planning on mostly keeping my Kastelan in aegis mode and sprinting around the table? Lots of my opponents are things like eldar or Raven guard so they tend to be slippery and hide. The traditional play of slapping them in doubletap mode and breaking their legs just doesn't cut it for me much. With Metallica I can potentially move them 14" a turn to get them inside the -1 range and light them up.
With the new robot formation, my Metallica bots can sprint around being super aggressive up the midfield. I can keep the Dominus easily within 9" if I feel the need to shunt them into double tap mode and provide reroll 1's, as well as potentially run two 3 strong units of kataphrons that are spread out a bit to give me the option of an elimination volley. With 3-4 bots that I'm planning on running, they'll be hell to remove, and if you charge them big whoop, I'll just fall back my turn and shoot you again if played right. I also have a Valhallans guard army that would pair extremely well with this since their infantry can fire into friendly combat, giving me options to break robots out of tri locking if need be.
Even if I run pure Metallica though, between neutron Onagers, vastly improved destoryers, super mobile tanky Kastelan, and very aggressive plasma vanguard, I think I can make a super aggressive shooting army with some assault splashed in and have a blast. Once battlescribe has the points updated I can really start to play around with what a pure list would look like but I think I can make something really fun that would work, potentially even a triple batallion since you'll want a Dominus for both the formations and being able to spread the rerolls around let's you be more flexible with canticles. There's just so many options opened up now that I really feel like I can make an army that actually does what we're supposed to now. Heck I may even be able to finally use my infiltrators without feeling like an idiot now
I love your idea of Valhallans shooting into CC to free up units, i usually run my tech-thralls, i mean guardsmen.. as tallarn. This may work well on the cheaper veteran squads now, arm them with flamers, plasmas or grenade launchers and stay as the rear guard freeing up key units that have been locked up.
THis is why I think GRAIA is actually the way to run the Servitor Sepcialist detachment. Your infantry screen can shoot the melee unit that it is engaged with if your WL is within 6". And you can also get a relic to give your rangers full rerolls to hit in combat.
Honestly I gave up robots just because Knights can river dance most units to death, and I find these posts pretty inspiring for new lists, and I like to think myself an admec veteran!
I may even pick up some stabby electropriests in the future to help round out my army list, or possibly some more fist bots. I needed to get more CCW anyways, and in leu of cyrax I think staff priests may be the best bet for that aside from hopilites.
Or you know, throw skitarii into the meat grinder and shoot whatever is left over.
Why not just run a supplementing battalion of Graia Skitarii for this purpose in mind with your Warlord. Then have the Servitor Maniple with a Field Commander Dominus to regen models and a Cohort Cybernetica Spearhead?
Correct me if i’ve missed it, but you can make a detachment more than one specialist detachment right? So one battalion could be a servitor maniple AND a cybernetica cohort?
Fresh converts is what you’d use to bring back your servitor squad when only one is left. As long as you have 1cp you can potentially bring back 3 kataphrons. The photos i’ve seen a pretty hard to read, but it’d be interesting if you can use the wt more than once at the end of the movement phase. Sacrifice 3 servitors to bring back your kataphrons then freshly convert the servitors to bring them straight back to full strength without any chance of your opponent damaging more kataphrons or servitors in between uses.
The biggest weakness there i guess is you gotta keep your servitors hidden because once they’re dead your cp usage to keep those kataphrons alive goes up drastically.
Octovol wrote: Correct me if i’ve missed it, but you can make a detachment more than one specialist detachment right? So one battalion could be a servitor maniple AND a cybernetica cohort?
Fresh converts is what you’d use to bring back your servitor squad when only one is left. As long as you have 1cp you can potentially bring back 3 kataphrons. The photos i’ve seen a pretty hard to read, but it’d be interesting if you can use the wt more than once at the end of the movement phase. Sacrifice 3 servitors to bring back your kataphrons then freshly convert the servitors to bring them straight back to full strength without any chance of your opponent damaging more kataphrons or servitors in between uses.
The biggest weakness there i guess is you gotta keep your servitors hidden because once they’re dead your cp usage to keep those kataphrons alive goes up drastically.
In the big leak video that was the first thing the guy said you couldn't do (no double special detachments in 1 detachment).
Tiger9gamer wrote: Honestly I gave up robots just because Knights can river dance most units to death, and I find these posts pretty inspiring for new lists, and I like to think myself an admec veteran!
I may even pick up some stabby electropriests in the future to help round out my army list, or possibly some more fist bots. I needed to get more CCW anyways, and in leu of cyrax I think staff priests may be the best bet for that aside from hopilites.
Or you know, throw skitarii into the meat grinder and shoot whatever is left over.
I still have a small glimmer of hope deep inside me for fires of Cyraxus..... even if it comes out in 2020 I have never actually used electropriests, not even when Admech and Skitarii first came out, i have used there models to make admech psykers.
Alright so I got impatient and edited my battlescribe roster files myself. I'm sure there's still some errors but here's my first stab at a pure Metalica list. If it wasn't for the destroyers or wanting to run 3 Onagers you can actually turn this into a triple Battalion list super easy, I just lack the HQ models I need and a squad of plasma vanguard. There would also be merit to potentially a Brigade/Battalion list, since servitors can fill in the elite slot and you want them anyways, and in fast attack you could take a couple of autocannon ballistarii to deal with light vehicles that the Kastelans don't really have time to fool with.
Seems like it'd be fun. Would start the game with 9 CP and with a little re configuring you could easily get it to 14 cp to start. Would be a crazy aggressive shooting list with a token amount of melee mixed in just to make sure you didn't get yourself in too much trouble.
The triple battalion list if you were curious used Arquebus Ranger squads as cheap but useful troops to fill out the third detachment. They're 65pts a pop (72 with the omnispex which seems like it has merit now) and I can't think of a single list where they're not going to be dangerous for something the opponent has. Spread them out in the backfield to deny deepstriking since the rest of your army wants to advance and call it a day. I'll need to play around with both and see which I like more.
MrMoustaffa wrote: Alright so I got impatient and edited my battlescribe roster files myself. I'm sure there's still some errors but here's my first stab at a pure Metalica list. If it wasn't for the destroyers or wanting to run 3 Onagers you can actually turn this into a triple Battalion list super easy, I just lack the HQ models I need and a squad of plasma vanguard. There would also be merit to potentially a Brigade/Battalion list, since servitors can fill in the elite slot and you want them anyways, and in fast attack you could take a couple of autocannon ballistarii to deal with light vehicles that the Kastelans don't really have time to fool with.
Seems like it'd be fun. Would start the game with 9 CP and with a little re configuring you could easily get it to 14 cp to start. Would be a crazy aggressive shooting list with a token amount of melee mixed in just to make sure you didn't get yourself in too much trouble.
The triple battalion list if you were curious used Arquebus Ranger squads as cheap but useful troops to fill out the third detachment. They're 65pts a pop (72 with the omnispex which seems like it has merit now) and I can't think of a single list where they're not going to be dangerous for something the opponent has. Spread them out in the backfield to deny deepstriking since the rest of your army wants to advance and call it a day. I'll need to play around with both and see which I like more.
Out of curiousity why the phosphoonix as the extra CP Relic?
I'm just used to taking it. It's helped me quite a bit in pinging the last guy or two out of a squad, especially stuff like rangers. Since I'm metallica, I can also advance and still fire on 2's, so I usually just treat it as our actual relic instead of the stupid arm
I could see an argument for not including it, especially with CP being tight in this list.
MrMoustaffa wrote: I'm just used to taking it. It's helped me quite a bit in pinging the last guy or two out of a squad, especially stuff like rangers. Since I'm metallica, I can also advance and still fire on 2's, so I usually just treat it as our actual relic instead of the stupid arm
I could see an argument for not including it, especially with CP being tight in this list.
I like playing with the Phosphoenix too, it really does feel like it doubles the anti-infantry firepower of a Dominus. Shooting all those nasty T4 and T5 units trying to get into melee with you with 6 shots that wound on 3+ or 4+, with 3 16% changes to deal a mortal wound and 3 shots having AP -3 out to 18" from what looks like a pistol is a pretty nasty surprise for most players. Probably one of the best non-Knight/Custodes weapon relics in the game. It's essentially a sawed-off, massively souped up heavy bolter with cover ignoring AP-3 rounds.
Getting Arkhan's pimp stick is pretty much a must, but I rarely have a game where I feel that paying that one extra command point for almost doubling the firepower of my Dominus for an entire game isn't a good investment.
MrMoustaffa wrote: Alright so I got impatient and edited my battlescribe roster files myself. I'm sure there's still some errors but here's my first stab at a pure Metalica list. If it wasn't for the destroyers or wanting to run 3 Onagers you can actually turn this into a triple Battalion list super easy, I just lack the HQ models I need and a squad of plasma vanguard. There would also be merit to potentially a Brigade/Battalion list, since servitors can fill in the elite slot and you want them anyways, and in fast attack you could take a couple of autocannon ballistarii to deal with light vehicles that the Kastelans don't really have time to fool with.
Seems like it'd be fun. Would start the game with 9 CP and with a little re configuring you could easily get it to 14 cp to start. Would be a crazy aggressive shooting list with a token amount of melee mixed in just to make sure you didn't get yourself in too much trouble.
The triple battalion list if you were curious used Arquebus Ranger squads as cheap but useful troops to fill out the third detachment. They're 65pts a pop (72 with the omnispex which seems like it has merit now) and I can't think of a single list where they're not going to be dangerous for something the opponent has. Spread them out in the backfield to deny deepstriking since the rest of your army wants to advance and call it a day. I'll need to play around with both and see which I like more.
I like this list, though the uneaven squads of 9 and 8 are killing me to tell you the truth. Honestly, I prefer running bare naked squads of 10 vanguard with omnispex and calling it a day. The radium carbines are pretty good in terms of a standard weapon, and the fact there is 30 shots going out at a time is good for a chaff unit. Other than that, I like the list a lot! gives you plenty of Cp's for devastating firepower!
So did the -1 to hit become a +1 to cover save? Because if not, I would still take double Mars detachments.
My only real disappointment is that they didn't really give us any good relics, again. I mean, I would have much preferred that the Servo-Skull allow us to IMMEDIATELY change Battle Protocols instead of just giving the effect 3" more range. Still, can't look a gift horse in the mouth. That 2187 point list I posted in anticipation of these changes became 1993... which is crazy.
After taking everything in, it seems for the first time that we can run pure AdMech. Or at least with only Guard or BA as an ally.
Metallica plasma callivers are just too good for me to let go of. I absolutely agree if it was any other FW but with Metallica you gotta take what you can get, and 6+d6 movement guys rocking plasma with rerolls and potentially able to hit on 1+'s is too good to pass up. Every time I leave the plasma at home I regret it. If you leave the vanguard barebones most of the time they don't do a whole lot unless you run into someone running orks or IG. With the plasma they're an actual threat which is good, I want them to draw fire most of the time. And when there's Destroyers, Kastelan, Dragoons, and Onagers running around you really don't want to put fire into them in my experience. I've been running them this way since 500pts in a league I'm in and they've done a lot of work every game since. In that I've had knights and Onagers as support and there's been times where a vanguard squad took some AT weapons to the face that could've gone to a more important target just because that plasma was too close for comfort. They still die somewhat easily don't get me wrong, but I find shroudpsalm usually keeps them alive long enough to do their job.
That said, pure vanguard riflemen would let you have a lot more guys, I just like my squads being flexible and since the plasma is only one less shot I found their anti horde doesn't really suffer and the added utility is worth it. As for why they're not 10 man squads I don't have the models or the points. The few times I've run a 10 man squad my opponent absolutely Annhilator them because I only had a couple. They'd seen what an 8 man squad with 2 could do and they weren't about to let a 10 man unit with 3 get away Scott free
MrMoustaffa wrote: Metallica plasma callivers are just too good for me to let go of. I absolutely agree if it was any other FW but with Metallica you gotta take what you can get, and 6+d6 movement guys rocking plasma with rerolls and potentially able to hit on 1+'s is too good to pass up. Every time I leave the plasma at home I regret it. If you leave the vanguard barebones most of the time they don't do a whole lot unless you run into someone running orks or IG. With the plasma they're an actual threat which is good, I want them to draw fire most of the time. And when there's Destroyers, Kastelan, Dragoons, and Onagers running around you really don't want to put fire into them in my experience. I've been running them this way since 500pts in a league I'm in and they've done a lot of work every game since. In that I've had knights and Onagers as support and there's been times where a vanguard squad took some AT weapons to the face that could've gone to a more important target just because that plasma was too close for comfort. They still die somewhat easily don't get me wrong, but I find shroudpsalm usually keeps them alive long enough to do their job.
That said, pure vanguard riflemen would let you have a lot more guys, I just like my squads being flexible and since the plasma is only one less shot I found their anti horde doesn't really suffer and the added utility is worth it. As for why they're not 10 man squads I don't have the models or the points. The few times I've run a 10 man squad my opponent absolutely Annhilator them because I only had a couple. They'd seen what an 8 man squad with 2 could do and they weren't about to let a 10 man unit with 3 get away Scott free
Fair enough! I am speaking as a lucius player who can deliver plasma where he wants unmolested, so I get what you are saying for the infantry. I personally found the intense dakka dakka of the vanguard to be good enough when combined with my armie's fire, and since I made so many of them from 7th edition I can run at least 2 squads of vanguard comfortably without any upgrades aside from the omni-spex, and at least one squad of rangers and breachers alongside them to act as defense for my big guns. maybe I should make more plasma guns some day to test out more toys over bois, but I accept your explanation!
For the record, here's the list that has served me very well so far, even if the crusader is a newer addition. My other list used an errant pre imperial knight codex, but I just like dakka so much more than a thermal and chainsword
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: The Master of Bioslicing combos right into the Appri Strategem. You knock out the last dude in a squad, bring back one in another squad, and finally use your CP to bring back the dead squad?
The unit still has to have 1 model remaining to use Fresh Converts.
Arlen wrote: If CC hordes become to much of a problem, I think metallica would be a grand solution to make sure our gunlines keep working. Additionally I just might sneak in a Hawkshroud Valiant into my list for that fantastic overwatch strat.
How cool is it to see orks charging your skitarii gunline and suddenly a knight with a flamethrower the size of a flat steps in and roasts them all.
Is it weird that I'm planning on mostly keeping my Kastelan in aegis mode and sprinting around the table? Lots of my opponents are things like eldar or Raven guard so they tend to be slippery and hide. The traditional play of slapping them in doubletap mode and breaking their legs just doesn't cut it for me much. With Metallica I can potentially move them 14" a turn to get them inside the -1 range and light them up.
With the new robot formation, my Metallica bots can sprint around being super aggressive up the midfield. I can keep the Dominus easily within 9" if I feel the need to shunt them into double tap mode and provide reroll 1's, as well as potentially run two 3 strong units of kataphrons that are spread out a bit to give me the option of an elimination volley. With 3-4 bots that I'm planning on running, they'll be hell to remove, and if you charge them big whoop, I'll just fall back my turn and shoot you again if played right. I also have a Valhallans guard army that would pair extremely well with this since their infantry can fire into friendly combat, giving me options to break robots out of tri locking if need be.
Even if I run pure Metallica though, between neutron Onagers, vastly improved destoryers, super mobile tanky Kastelan, and very aggressive plasma vanguard, I think I can make a super aggressive shooting army with some assault splashed in and have a blast. Once battlescribe has the points updated I can really start to play around with what a pure list would look like but I think I can make something really fun that would work, potentially even a triple batallion since you'll want a Dominus for both the formations and being able to spread the rerolls around let's you be more flexible with canticles. There's just so many options opened up now that I really feel like I can make an army that actually does what we're supposed to now. Heck I may even be able to finally use my infiltrators without feeling like an idiot now
I love your idea of Valhallans shooting into CC to free up units, i usually run my tech-thralls, i mean guardsmen.. as tallarn. This may work well on the cheaper veteran squads now, arm them with flamers, plasmas or grenade launchers and stay as the rear guard freeing up key units that have been locked up.
Oh.
Kill the second to last model then. Point still stands that it's gimmicky but funny.
I was considering Dragoons for the Ryza detachment, but eh, no need to go through the trouble of making charges when you can just shoot from behind a horde of infantry.
Arquebuses are also a decent option now, but I could not find the points to fit them in.
Anyhow, this means I need to paint some Servitors and dust off my Kataphrons.
EDIT: I just had a brilliant idea and made that Maniple a Mechanicus Soup detachment. Ryza dogma is useless, so you're only in it for the stratagems. Plus, the Enginseer is now Mars and can help repair the vehicles in the Spearhead.
Suzuteo wrote: So did the -1 to hit become a +1 to cover save? Because if not, I would still take double Mars detachments.
It's still -1 to hit.
Oh good.
I think the biggest winners that came out of this were Kataphrons and Crawlers.
The stratagem stacking on Kataphrons is abusive. I mean, seriously, +1 to hit, to wound, and damage for even non-OC plasma is pretty nuts. And let's not forget the +1 to hit for the Phosphor Blaster, which clears chaff rather well. The fact that they can move and shoot without penalty, benefit from 5++, and have access to reliable repair and resurrect also makes them very durable for a T5 W3 troop choice. Paired with Kastelans, and you pretty much can kill one and a half Knights per turn.
Icarus Crawlers were already amazingly efficient for the meta we're in. Making them 15% cheaper is not something I wished for, but I am totally going to take advantage of. They already shut down Tau and Eldar super hard. Having 2-3 seems almost mandatory.
In terms of the army design, it seems like we're definitely going to take both specialist detachments (nothing says we can't, it seems?). For pure AdMech, Ryza Maniple Battalion, Mars Cohort Spearhead, and a barebone Mars Battalion. That or a Ryza Maniple Brigade (Dragoons can actually use that fight reroll) and Mars Cohort Spearhead, maybe with an Assassin Auxiliary. For a more soupy build, Ryza Maniple Battalion, Mars Cohort Spearhead, and Catachan Battalion. You can also do the Artillery Company... but that might not be a popular discussion at the moment. Haha. Still also weighing the Emperor's Conclave detachment; maybe take a Platoon Commander for the Litanies of the Holy Sword relic; if he dies, he gives a nearby unit +1 attack and fearless.
I dislike running two Forge Worlds in lists like that mostly because the enginseers are wasted, since they can’t repair Kataphrons (not vehicles) or the Onagers and Kastelans (not the same FW), but now that Enginseers are 30 points total them being a useless slot-filler isn’t so painful.
I am really liking building Ironstriders into Cawl Castles now, given how much cheaper they are at last. But I’m torn. At least against threats like first-turn-charge Genstealer hordes, I think it might be better to ditch Cawl and use Graia in a Robot specialist detachment for the CC shooting to repel them, and then go infantry-heavy to make full use of the trait. Could even use that strat the first turn or two and move the Kastelans with a horde of Corpuscarii and then squat in the middle of the map shooting everything to bits. Could skip using the strategem to switch modes that way too, since you would know in advance which turn you wanted the switch instead of just wanting it ASAP.
Another option that is interesting: since the Maniple skills are tied to the model name and not Forge World, you can do a Mechanicus Soup detachment instead, which sacrifices the mostly useless Ryza dogma to gain access to the Graia stratagem, as well as allow the Enginseers to repair Mars.
EDIT: In fact, I am going to do just this. It's actually really clever. (Pat myself on the back.)
The problem with Ironstriders now is that they have too many things competing with them in the shooting role. I mean, +1 to wound rolls is essentially doubling strength minus one... so OC Plasma is S15. Competing with Autocannons (which seem to be the more appealing of the two now in terms of role) are the incredibly affordable Icarus Crawlers, not to mention Kastelans and even Helverins.
Thing is, with the Ork codex and the upcoming GSC codex, my gut tells me Horde will come back in the meta at full strength. I'm already more wary of hordes than Knights to be honest, only one player plays full Knights in my meta, and the 1850 pts tournament I'm going to in February counts 7 T'au lists so far, being more than double than the second most used faction. I'm glad the Icarus got cheaper because I feel like I'm going to need it.
But horde-sweeping is something we can do well, Robots, Vanguards, Infiltrators with tasers, Grav-Destroyers. Might I suggest to think about using the Incendine Combustor on Robots if you're going to play them mobile ? 12" S5 AP-1 flamers are nice and make for a meaner Overwatch. If you're not using Strafing Run it still hits without penalty, and double-shooting with those will be quite scary.
I still maintain Agripinaa to be better for durability concerning 6 Destroyers, because of Fresh Converts and Servitor Maniple. You can fix 'em, res 'em and if there's too many casualties or you run of of Servitors bring them all back for 3CP. Oh and give them a 5++ first for added survivability.
All these mobility options are great because I'm always uncomfortable having a big Bots castle who can't move. Still, I think I'm going to play that at the tournament because I'm unsure if Vigilus will be authorized. After all it got cheaper by 90 pts if playing Cawl, Bots and 2 Onagers (tournament restrictions) and even more when including the 3 Destroyers, which I will do. In fact, here's the list I was thinking about if I could have your tournament players' wisdom guys (sorry for the layout I'm copying it from Word basically):
Spoiler:
Battalion Detachment (Mars) +5 CP: - Dominus, Volkite + Macrostubber, Autocaduceus of Arkhan Land - Warlord (Necromechanic)
- Belisarius Cawl
The reason I went full Mars is to allow the Enginseer to fix the Vehicles. If I did the Spearhead with Cawl and say a Stygies Battalion my Enginseer would be useless. And for ease of play for me and my opponent, as well as full rerolls from Cawl, I prefer this way.
The plan is simple: castle up with the Bots in tight formation, with maybe the Destroyers in front, screen them all with the line of Dragoons, Vanguards and Arc rifles Rangers. Onagers on the side together for rerolling 1s for the Invulnerable save and +1 Ld to Skitarii, and Cawl somewhere in the middle to buff them all. The snipers form a chain to benefit from Cawl but are otherwise in a nice spot to pick enemy Characters. The Dominus repairs the Onagers in priority, while the Datasmith and Enginseer try to fix the Bots. Infiltrators could start on the table but I believe they'd be better DSing turn 2 to catch an objective or something.
Elimination Volley + Double shots from the WoM Bots + Cawl should be devastating in a 36" bubble. 13 Deployments looks average to have the +1 for first turn but I have no idea honestly.
Kastelan Robots [30 PL, 550pts] . Kastelan Robot: Heavy Phosphor Blaster
. . Two Heavy Phosphor Blasters: 2x Heavy Phosphor Blaster
. Kastelan Robot: Heavy Phosphor Blaster
. . Two Heavy Phosphor Blasters: 2x Heavy Phosphor Blaster
. Kastelan Robot: Heavy Phosphor Blaster
. . Two Heavy Phosphor Blasters: 2x Heavy Phosphor Blaster
. Kastelan Robot: Heavy Phosphor Blaster
. . Two Heavy Phosphor Blasters: 2x Heavy Phosphor Blaster
. Kastelan Robot: Heavy Phosphor Blaster
. . Two Heavy Phosphor Blasters: 2x Heavy Phosphor Blaster
Onager Dunecrawler [7 PL, 145pts]: Broad Spectrum Data-tether, Cognis Heavy Stubber
. Neutron Laser and Cognis Heavy Stubber: Cognis Heavy Stubber, Neutron Laser
Onager Dunecrawler [7 PL, 145pts]: Broad Spectrum Data-tether, Cognis Heavy Stubber
. Neutron Laser and Cognis Heavy Stubber: Cognis Heavy Stubber, Neutron Laser
@Suzuteo:
You can indeed take booth specialist detachments, but they have to be applied an two seperate detachments.
I actually really like the idea of Ryza Dragoons. You can use them as a screen and having reroll hits and wounds of 1 makes them pretty nasty in CQC. They also make a good distraction from your other valuable assets.
@Pomguo:
Good point on the Enginseers. I wasn´t even aware of this tbh.
@Idealweasel:
I would try to make it a Brigade if i were you
So is Ryza a must for Kataphrons or can we make them work in other Forgeworlds?
Also no Stygies love post CA? They kept their -1...
So now that servo arms are finally worth it (at 0 points, yay!) I can finally get some servitors. I really liked the idea of them but hated their forced equipment cost. However, the official GW models aren't great..
Do people have any cool conversion ideas for them? I've thought about using cultists but basically replacing the front of their torsos with the admech backpacks so they get some dials.. Any other ideas/alternate models?
PiñaColada wrote: So now that servo arms are finally worth it (at 0 points, yay!) I can finally get some servitors. I really liked the idea of them but hated their forced equipment cost. However, the official GW models aren't great..
Do people have any cool conversion ideas for them? I've thought about using cultists but basically replacing the front of their torsos with the admech backpacks so they get some dials.. Any other ideas/alternate models?
Take a guardsmen body and slap a kataphron Head and Arm on him. Done.
PiñaColada wrote: So now that servo arms are finally worth it (at 0 points, yay!) I can finally get some servitors. I really liked the idea of them but hated their forced equipment cost. However, the official GW models aren't great..
Do people have any cool conversion ideas for them? I've thought about using cultists but basically replacing the front of their torsos with the admech backpacks so they get some dials.. Any other ideas/alternate models?
Take a guardsmen body and slap a kataphron Head and Arm on him. Done.
Use the negavolt dudes from black stone fortress? thats what i will do
So is Ryza a must for Kataphrons or can we make them work in other Forgeworlds?
Also no Stygies love post CA? They kept their -1...
I think Ryza is really good for Plasma destroyers, but they would also do very well in an Agripinaa detachment. Which might be a good choice for Grav destroyers.
Stygies is still great, but right now so many great combinations opened up for the other Forgeworlds that those deserve the attention they are getting these last few pages. Because by god, did they miss out past year.
The list ive just done, with Graia and the guard i will be able to repel assaulters and have enough bodies to cap the new chapter approved missions
+++ 412th Herakli ’Rust Scorpions’ +++
“How like a God he is, that ancient Machine, primal of all his Kind, the Tempered Iron!
His mighty armaments, pulsate like the weapons of Old Night, laden with the Doom of Mankind’s bitter Foes.
He watches over us as Battle joins, and in his Shadow we shall advance upon our Enemies and defeat them.”
All these lists are awesome, though I admit the idea of combining forgeworlds in a list with the same codex is just kinda cheesy in my opinion. i may be a snob though.
Lucius is still relatively untouched by all the changes, and I am even happier to field all the new formations we have. I just play pick up games so it's a mixed bag, but thus far the only list I had trouble with was a deathguard list that featured plague marines, typhus and mortarion all rocking around, so I just gotta figure out how to counter that.
Tiger9gamer wrote: All these lists are awesome, though I admit the idea of combining forgeworlds in a list with the same codex is just kinda cheesy in my opinion. i may be a snob though.
Lucius is still relatively untouched by all the changes, and I am even happier to field all the new formations we have. I just play pick up games so it's a mixed bag, but thus far the only list I had trouble with was a deathguard list that featured plague marines, typhus and mortarion all rocking around, so I just gotta figure out how to counter that.
Tiger9gamer wrote: All these lists are awesome, though I admit the idea of combining forgeworlds in a list with the same codex is just kinda cheesy in my opinion. i may be a snob though.
Lucius is still relatively untouched by all the changes, and I am even happier to field all the new formations we have. I just play pick up games so it's a mixed bag, but thus far the only list I had trouble with was a deathguard list that featured plague marines, typhus and mortarion all rocking around, so I just gotta figure out how to counter that.
I havent mixed forgeworlds just guard allies
oh! My bad then. I cannot snob you on that as I do the same with my tech thralls
Honestly, I want to do a list that involves the servitor maniple and a knight list just because it would seem fun. I really think battlescribe should update now instead of in just a week.
I am trying to think of any other fun lists I could put together... It just all seems so good right now though.
Aaranis wrote: Thing is, with the Ork codex and the upcoming GSC codex, my gut tells me Horde will come back in the meta at full strength. I'm already more wary of hordes than Knights to be honest, only one player plays full Knights in my meta, and the 1850 pts tournament I'm going to in February counts 7 T'au lists so far, being more than double than the second most used faction. I'm glad the Icarus got cheaper because I feel like I'm going to need it.
But horde-sweeping is something we can do well, Robots, Vanguards, Infiltrators with tasers, Grav-Destroyers. Might I suggest to think about using the Incendine Combustor on Robots if you're going to play them mobile ? 12" S5 AP-1 flamers are nice and make for a meaner Overwatch. If you're not using Strafing Run it still hits without penalty, and double-shooting with those will be quite scary.
I still maintain Agripinaa to be better for durability concerning 6 Destroyers, because of Fresh Converts and Servitor Maniple. You can fix 'em, res 'em and if there's too many casualties or you run of of Servitors bring them all back for 3CP. Oh and give them a 5++ first for added survivability.
All these mobility options are great because I'm always uncomfortable having a big Bots castle who can't move. Still, I think I'm going to play that at the tournament because I'm unsure if Vigilus will be authorized. After all it got cheaper by 90 pts if playing Cawl, Bots and 2 Onagers (tournament restrictions) and even more when including the 3 Destroyers, which I will do. In fact, here's the list I was thinking about if I could have your tournament players' wisdom guys (sorry for the layout I'm copying it from Word basically):
Spoiler:
Battalion Detachment (Mars) +5 CP: - Dominus, Volkite + Macrostubber, Autocaduceus of Arkhan Land - Warlord (Necromechanic)
- Belisarius Cawl
The reason I went full Mars is to allow the Enginseer to fix the Vehicles. If I did the Spearhead with Cawl and say a Stygies Battalion my Enginseer would be useless. And for ease of play for me and my opponent, as well as full rerolls from Cawl, I prefer this way.
The plan is simple: castle up with the Bots in tight formation, with maybe the Destroyers in front, screen them all with the line of Dragoons, Vanguards and Arc rifles Rangers. Onagers on the side together for rerolling 1s for the Invulnerable save and +1 Ld to Skitarii, and Cawl somewhere in the middle to buff them all. The snipers form a chain to benefit from Cawl but are otherwise in a nice spot to pick enemy Characters. The Dominus repairs the Onagers in priority, while the Datasmith and Enginseer try to fix the Bots. Infiltrators could start on the table but I believe they'd be better DSing turn 2 to catch an objective or something.
Elimination Volley + Double shots from the WoM Bots + Cawl should be devastating in a 36" bubble. 13 Deployments looks average to have the +1 for first turn but I have no idea honestly.
Thoughts ?
We don't need to worry about Knights any more. They need to worry about us. Move and shoot 6D6 S15 AP-3 D3 that hits on 3+, RR1s, and almost never gets hot is amazing. Then you have the usual 108 shots of S6 AP-2 D1, ignores cover, that hits on 4+, exploding mortal wound on 6+ wound rolls, RRAll, and now can move and shoot too.
As for horde, bringing a small horde of your own is the best solution. I like Catachan because they can go out there and charge Tyranids and Orks while making a respectable showing. Alternatives are a big wall of Ryza Dragoons, lots of Rangers, or even 6x4 Servitors (which cost 120 for 24x S6 AP-2 D3 attacks that land on 5+!) with Rangers.
I think we would all be running Agripinaa right now if Master of Biosplicing did not exist. As it stands, it seems a lot better to use Master of Machines to repair D3, use Tech-Adept if you roll a 1 to guarantee a full heal, then use Master of Biosplicing to resurrect a Kastelan. Spending 3 CP to resurrect them all at once invites risk-taking behavior. I have found that idiot-proofing my play is very important. And even if you are running Grav Destroyers, you want those Mars to do Elimination Volley with the Robots.
The Robots don't need to move. It's like the old pike square concept. One big block of immobile troops with cavalry and skirmishers at their flanks and corners.
I still think Sicarans are too inconsistent. It doesn't matter how much they cost if their effect on the battle is essentially zero. They are glassy and really need to make that charge to make their points back.
Take Icarus over Neutron always. The meta is filled with good Icarus targets. Even if nothing flies, Icarus Crawlers do a decent job against infantry and light vehicles.
PiñaColada wrote: So now that servo arms are finally worth it (at 0 points, yay!) I can finally get some servitors. I really liked the idea of them but hated their forced equipment cost. However, the official GW models aren't great..
Do people have any cool conversion ideas for them? I've thought about using cultists but basically replacing the front of their torsos with the admech backpacks so they get some dials.. Any other ideas/alternate models?
I plan to just use the Servo-Automata that came with my Macrotek Enginseer. Never assembled them because I was only interested in the Enginseer. (The quality of these sorts of resin models are abysmal though.)
Tiger9gamer wrote: All these lists are awesome, though I admit the idea of combining forgeworlds in a list with the same codex is just kinda cheesy in my opinion. i may be a snob though.
Lucius is still relatively untouched by all the changes, and I am even happier to field all the new formations we have. I just play pick up games so it's a mixed bag, but thus far the only list I had trouble with was a deathguard list that featured plague marines, typhus and mortarion all rocking around, so I just gotta figure out how to counter that.
Haters gonna hate. Hell, I'm even combining Forge Worlds in the same detachment right now. Anyhow, since all my dudes are blue, my rule is that no single model belongs to two different Forge Worlds.
So i just re-read the cybernetica relic, the 9” change of protocol; I hate to be the one to raise this but it doesnt explciitly say the protocol changes instantly. All it says is that at the end of each movement phase you can change the protocol within 9” of the model with the relic. In other words it describes the most useless relic of our entire army. Increasing the range of the most poorly implemented mechanic we have. If you cant change the protocol so that it can actually be used then it’s worthless.
Octovol wrote: So i just re-read the cybernetica relic, the 9” change of protocol; I hate to be the one to raise this but it doesnt explciitly say the protocol changes instantly. All it says is that at the end of each movement phase you can change the protocol within 9” of the model with the relic. In other words it describes the most useless relic of our entire army. Increasing the range of the most poorly implemented mechanic we have. If you cant change the protocol so that it can actually be used then it’s worthless.
Correct. It is just a range increase.
@Aaranis
How many Ironstriders do you have? Because I thought about it, and if you want a mobile gunline, you can do something like this:
Spoiler:
Stygies VIII Brigade Detachment - 1505 Servitor Maniple (-1 CP)
House Krast Super-Heavy Auxiliary Detachment - 500
Lord of War - 500 1x Knight Styrix - Volkite Chierovile, Hekaton Siege Claw, Twin Rad-cleanser, Graviton Crusher, Warlord: First Knight (-1 CP), Relic: The Headsman's Mark (-1 CP)
Total: 2005 points 14 CP (-5)
Or some variation of that. Maybe figure out a way to use the last detachment. But the idea is to move and shoot all day. Haha.
EDIT: I miscalculated the points on Troops. So it's 5 over. But you get the idea. I don't think you need the Robots at all if you don't want to plant them.
Octovol wrote: So i just re-read the cybernetica relic, the 9” change of protocol; I hate to be the one to raise this but it doesnt explciitly say the protocol changes instantly. All it says is that at the end of each movement phase you can change the protocol within 9” of the model with the relic. In other words it describes the most useless relic of our entire army. Increasing the range of the most poorly implemented mechanic we have. If you cant change the protocol so that it can actually be used then it’s worthless.
I wouldnt say its useless, i already knew it didnt immediately change there protocols. Instead i am taking it because then i dont need to spend 37pts on a datasmith, get an extra 3" range on that ability and a dominus can heal more than just kastelans so he is a better datasmith chassis. The only other relic i would take anyway would be the autocadaeus of arhkan land, i dont rate the other relics as being good.
and Suzuteo, you can only ever have 3 squads of normal servitors, so a max of 12 servitors in your army.
deffrekka wrote: and Suzuteo, you can only ever have 3 squads of normal servitors, so a max of 12 servitors in your army.
Good catch. That would have been hilarious though. They all have mini Thunder Hammers.
I wouldnt go that far They have guard str power fists that dont have ap3. But with machine might they become str 8.... but dont bank on that
Automatically Appended Next Post: I would like to try out Corpuscarii Electro Priests as the new chapter approved missions are quite hard now to achieve, and these guys pump out shots but i have no idea how to get the within 12" without getting them murdered.
Its either a huge blob of 20 teleporting in with Lucius, 12 in a termite or advancing with Metalica. They have actual alright shooting, they just dont have resilience.
So all of a sudden we’re happy to fire half the optimal shots from robots in the first turn? I recall that being of paramount importance in as much as we cant stop people shooting them off the board turn 1.
The volume of shots is what makes them efficient. Not being able to change the protocol instantly from that relic makes it worthless as we never took datasmiths anyway so we gain nothing.
Octovol wrote: So i just re-read the cybernetica relic, the 9” change of protocol; I hate to be the one to raise this but it doesnt explciitly say the protocol changes instantly. All it says is that at the end of each movement phase you can change the protocol within 9” of the model with the relic. In other words it describes the most useless relic of our entire army. Increasing the range of the most poorly implemented mechanic we have. If you cant change the protocol so that it can actually be used then it’s worthless.
I wouldnt say its useless, i already knew it didnt immediately change there protocols. Instead i am taking it because then i dont need to spend 37pts on a datasmith, get an extra 3" range on that ability and a dominus can heal more than just kastelans so he is a better datasmith chassis. The only other relic i would take anyway would be the autocadaeus of arhkan land, i dont rate the other relics as being good.
and Suzuteo, you can only ever have 3 squads of normal servitors, so a max of 12 servitors in your army.
Yeah hes missed you can stick on an enginseer your taxed with and save a few points on the smith. Personally the omniscient mask with 3 units of hoplites works well and eye of xi lexum is great
Octovol wrote: So all of a sudden we’re happy to fire half the optimal shots from robots in the first turn? I recall that being of paramount importance in as much as we cant stop people shooting them off the board turn 1.
The volume of shots is what makes them efficient. Not being able to change the protocol instantly from that relic makes it worthless as we never took datasmiths anyway so we gain nothing.
Not every game you will get optimal lines of sight, with line of sight blocking terrain it is quite common to not even get all members of the unit firing at something worth their attention. And when it comes to the late game, being locked in place from the get go can cost you the game. Spoken from a lot of experience with my tournament matches, 75% of the time never gone straight into binaric override turn 1. It may be different for you Mars players, but i dont put all my eggs in one basket. Get locked in CC on the enemies turn, you cant retreat. The enemy is crafty and uses the terrain to his advange, suddenly you have a 440-660pt block that cant shoot as efficiently or even at all. They are one of your last things alive turn 6 and you realy need that object/linebreaker/slay the warlord/ETC mission, its not going to happen.
And i have never in all my games lost my kastelans turn 1.... I have fought against double primarchs, BA + Guard + Castellan lists, psyker spam, kraken and kronos tyranids, ultramarine gun lines, cawl stars and tau commander spam. With aegis and cover these bots are pretty damn resilient.
I use binaric override more as a backup, if something doesnt go your way. Like your whole army is locked up turn 1 and you have no hope of getting out of it or you are really uncertain if your going to kill X in your turn so you really want to wipe it out.
Like others have said, having a more mobile kastelan fire base that doesnt trade BS for moving is actually quite nice. We can hide better and then strike, we can reach around light of sight blocking terrain and attack units we couldnt otherwise hit, get a better position and hold objectives in the mid field. Binaric Override should be an OPTION to be used, not a MUST HAVE every turn 1. 8th edition has units that move crazy far, fire without line of sight, spam high and low str and ap shots, have jump shoot jump and units that ignore overwatch.
36 BS 3 (elimination protocols) re-rolling 1's .Str 6 AP 2 ignore cover shots at 36" range is still insane, especially now with a 8" move and even further with Metalica.
If you like always popping double shoot with your kastelans with BO then thats fine, it doesnt mean the new relic is trash because it doesnt suit your play style. I for one (and many people here) are happy and welcoming to the new found flexibility that the Cybernetica Cohort has opened up for us, and suddenly we are seeing the lesser used Forge Worlds coming out to be used for the first time ever.
Both of these specialist detachments have been a God send for us.
Octovol wrote: So i just re-read the cybernetica relic, the 9” change of protocol; I hate to be the one to raise this but it doesnt explciitly say the protocol changes instantly. All it says is that at the end of each movement phase you can change the protocol within 9” of the model with the relic. In other words it describes the most useless relic of our entire army. Increasing the range of the most poorly implemented mechanic we have. If you cant change the protocol so that it can actually be used then it’s worthless.
Small correction but it takes place at the start of the movement phase, not the end. Depending on how you want to use your bots this can be big.
If you know you want to park them in the open and just go into gunline mode, park them in the open and just change their protocol at the start of your movement phase. With a CP reroll you have a 3% chance to fail that, and an ~86% chance to pass it for "free" (we're ignoring the detachment and relic costs for now, but they're a valid point) This is not why people are excited for the relic and the ability it affords us though.
By not breaking the robots legs with the override and just switching them in manually, you now have options. If you get charged turn 1, you're not just stuck there and have to deal with it, you can switch back to having legs and fall back because you can switch to aegis before they have to move. If you don't like your position because someone like orks or eldar pulled reposition shenanigans after deployment was done but before first turn begins, you can react to that. If you realize you want those bots in the middle of the table parked on an objective after your turn one volley, you can do that. Heck you can even start game in aegis, start of your first turn use relic to switch them to protector for first turn volley. Next in turn 2 you switch them back to aegis, move them up to an objective or good firing position, and then use the override to put them back in protector mode at the start of your second shooting phase. Or leave them in aegis, or even go conqueror if need be, whatever.
Yes, this ability does not mathhammer as the most efficient, because you're not just sitting there double tapping, but pure math isn't always everything with this. It doesn't matter if you put out a 1,000 shots a turn if you can't see the target and can't react to it. And what are many of the defacto Staples of the meta? Fast, maneuverable armies that are hard to pin down, and with Tau getting buffs that's only getting worse in the future. Bots that just sit still all game and can't move are not going to win every game because not every table is going to have open sightlines for every objective and not every opponent is going to be braindead enough to just slug it out with you in the open. With ITC LOS rules involving ruins especially, breaking your robots legs turn 1 is really going to handicap you. We're paying the same amount of points as most knights, they need to be able to be mobile in a pinch. And if your opponent is happy to come to you great, you never lost that ability to just sit there and shoot them, it's just now turn 5 or 6 you can switch them back to aegis to go and grab an objective if you have to.
And ignoring the tactics side, breaking their legs turn 1 and making them turrets all game is boring. At least with these new abilities we'll actually see robots move again and do stuff. And since other forgeworlds lack Cawl and don't want to play Mars, this relic allows us to use our own traits to make the robots do something different. For example with Metallica I'm heavily considering running the shoulder mounted flamer now. If you are aggressive enough with them, using the relic can allow you to move them up the table onto an objective, park them there in doubletap mode, and then make the objective very difficult to cap as you can make it impossible to get within 3" of without assault, which means braving 8d6 heavy flamer shots at 12" range and some phosphor hits before trying to kill Kastellan robots in hand to hand. That sounds interesting and different, and yeah it's not as mathematically powerful as parking them in a corner with Cawl and Wrath of Mars but I don't play Mars so it's not an option for me. Yeah I don't get the mortal wounds potential and reroll all hits but I kind of like the alternative of being able to fall back from combat on demand or move my robots up to 14" a turn with no real penalties. Honestly my only real concern is how much CP it'll use but with the point decreases on all our troops and the fact that Kataphrons help fill out brigades it won't be too difficult to fun for at least a turn or two.
Just wanna say this: You can also take a Datasmith, give him arkhan land's pimp stick and even make him your warlord (if you feel like the bonus repair is needed, there is a rules argument to be had if the repair is still only limited to one model like it says in the repair special rules of Dominus/Enginseer/Cawl/Datasmiths) and use him to both save yourself from having to sacrifice the relic slot to emulate his doctrina change ability... while also saving 50 points compared to a Dominus who instead gets to buff your Dunecrawlers and other 3+ to hit units which benefit from the re-roll 1s much more (re-rolling half their misses instead of a third).
You only go for the Cybernetica Detachement if you want mobile Kastelans, e.g. with 2 Heavy Phosphors and the flamers running up the field with 20+D6 threat range on their flamers while they stay in Aegis mode (1+ armor and 4+ inv. saves are good stuff while you got shroudpsalm active). Unlike Dakkabots they are pretty hard to charge (unless you want to get hit with 3xD6 S6 AP -2 D2 flamers with 12" range) and when in a good spot you activate Protector Doctrina on turn 2. With 6"+D6" movement Datasmith is more than able to keep up with the robots within the 6" range needed, especially if you move both units and advance the datasmith first to see how far the Kastelans can advance if you end up rolling a 5 or 6.
And believe me people, paying a command point and sacrificing your relic just to save 41 points on a Datasmith is not worth it, just as much as paying a command point and crippling the movement (and thus the ability to react to units being out of range or LoS) of the 330+ point cornerstone of your army turn 1 isn't. A Datasmith does way more than just being a doctrina change tax (including being as capable as a Dominus or Enginseer at repairing Kastelans and being a great melee blocker to intercept chaff trying to tie the robots down).
Ragnar Blackmane wrote: Just wanna say this: You can also take a Datasmith, give him arkhan land's pimp stick and even make him your warlord (if you feel like the bonus repair is needed, there is a rules argument to be had if the repair is still only limited to one model like it says in the repair special rules of Dominus/Enginseer/Cawl/Datasmiths) and use him to both save yourself from having to sacrifice the relic slot to emulate his doctrina change ability... while also saving 50 points compared to a Dominus who instead gets to buff your Dunecrawlers and other 3+ to hit units which benefit from the re-roll 1s much more (re-rolling half their misses instead of a third).
You only go for the Cybernetica Detachement if you want mobile Kastelans, e.g. with 2 Heavy Phosphors and the flamers running up the field with 20+D6 threat range on their flamers while they stay in Aegis mode (1+ armor and 4+ inv. saves are good stuff while you got shroudpsalm active). Unlike Dakkabots they are pretty hard to charge (unless you want to get hit with 3xD6 S6 AP -2 D2 flamers with 12" range) and when in a good spot you activate Protector Doctrina on turn 2. With 6"+D6" movement Datasmith is more than able to keep up with the robots within the 6" range needed, especially if you move both units and advance the datasmith first to see how far the Kastelans can advance if you end up rolling a 5 or 6.
And believe me people, paying a command point and sacrificing your relic just to save 41 points on a Datasmith is not worth it, just as much as paying a command point and crippling the movement (and thus the ability to react to units being out of range or LoS) of the 330+ point cornerstone of your army turn 1 isn't. A Datasmith does way more than just being a doctrina change tax (including being as capable as a Dominus or Enginseer at repairing Kastelans and being a great melee blocker to intercept chaff trying to tie the robots down).
He can only heal kastelans....
I would rather have a dominus that can change protocols instead of having another character to do it who will barely affect the game. The dominus is tougher, heals himself without having to have the autocadaeus of arkhan land, shoots better, is more accurate in CC, heals all types of Admech models and also heals 1 wound on knights and will usually be next to your robots anyway.
It isnt a bad relic and those 37pts saved means you can spend it on something that wont rarely shoot, rarely be in CC and and will only change a protocol maybe once a game. The dominus should be used in conjunction with elimation protocols. That is why the cybernetica cohort opens up a whole new way of playing admech. HIGH MOBILITY AND GOOD SHOOTING.
I agree fully with MrMoustaffa on al points. I no longer see the point in taking a Datasmith. And lets be honest, there are barely any good relics for us, the new servo skull is up there with the autocadaeus, it actually adds more depth to the army.
And me dropping my Datasmith means my 2k army pre chapter approved is now 288pts cheaper. Thats a squad of 6 plasma destroyers.
+ Also wouldnt it be 3d6str 5 ap 1 flamers at 12" not str 6 ap2 damage 2? You might be confused with hellhounds there.
Ragnar Blackmane wrote: Just wanna say this: You can also take a Datasmith, give him arkhan land's pimp stick and even make him your warlord (if you feel like the bonus repair is needed, there is a rules argument to be had if the repair is still only limited to one model like it says in the repair special rules of Dominus/Enginseer/Cawl/Datasmiths) and use him to both save yourself from having to sacrifice the relic slot to emulate his doctrina change ability... while also saving 50 points compared to a Dominus who instead gets to buff your Dunecrawlers and other 3+ to hit units which benefit from the re-roll 1s much more (re-rolling half their misses instead of a third).
You only go for the Cybernetica Detachement if you want mobile Kastelans, e.g. with 2 Heavy Phosphors and the flamers running up the field with 20+D6 threat range on their flamers while they stay in Aegis mode (1+ armor and 4+ inv. saves are good stuff while you got shroudpsalm active). Unlike Dakkabots they are pretty hard to charge (unless you want to get hit with 3xD6 S6 AP -2 D2 flamers with 12" range) and when in a good spot you activate Protector Doctrina on turn 2. With 6"+D6" movement Datasmith is more than able to keep up with the robots within the 6" range needed, especially if you move both units and advance the datasmith first to see how far the Kastelans can advance if you end up rolling a 5 or 6.
And believe me people, paying a command point and sacrificing your relic just to save 41 points on a Datasmith is not worth it, just as much as paying a command point and crippling the movement (and thus the ability to react to units being out of range or LoS) of the 330+ point cornerstone of your army turn 1 isn't. A Datasmith does way more than just being a doctrina change tax (including being as capable as a Dominus or Enginseer at repairing Kastelans and being a great melee blocker to intercept chaff trying to tie the robots down).
He can only heal kastelans....
I would rather have a dominus that can change protocols instead of having another character to do it who will barely affect the game. The dominus is tougher, heals himself without having to have the autocadaeus of arkhan land, shoots better, is more accurate in CC, heals all types of Admech models and also heals 1 wound on knights and will usually be next to your robots anyway.
It isnt a bad relic and those 37pts saved means you can spend it on something that wont rarely shoot, rarely be in CC and and will only change a protocol maybe once a game. The dominus should be used in conjunction with elimation protocols. That is why the cybernetica cohort opens up a whole new way of playing admech. HIGH MOBILITY AND GOOD SHOOTING.
I agree fully with MrMoustaffa on al points. I no longer see the point in taking a Datasmith. And lets be honest, there are barely any good relics for us, the new servo skull is up there with the autocadaeus, it actually adds more depth to the army.
And me dropping my Datasmith means my 2k army pre chapter approved is now 288pts cheaper. Thats a squad of 6 plasma destroyers.
+ Also wouldnt it be 3d6str 5 ap 1 flamers at 12" not str 6 ap2 damage 2? You might be confused with hellhounds there.
But does being able to repair other units with the character babysitting the Kastelans actually matter? What are you going to do with the bunch of Enginseers you are taking that necessitates the babysitter to move away from the robots to repair anything else? Because Enginseers can literally do nothing else but repair and filling HQ slots. A Dominus and 1-2 Enginseers will always be enough to keep 3 Crawlers and even the odd Ironstrider repaired... unless the other player doesn't focus fire and just sprays his AT firepower all over at least 3-4 of your non-Kastelan vehicles in a turn, in case you are probably going to win the game because the other player doesn't know what he is doing.
And a Dominus isn't better than a Datasmith at repairing Kastelan's if either doesn't have a warlord trait (which either can take) or relic (which either can take) that boosts it. And the extra firepower comes at the cost of paying another fifty points (which isn't worth the upgrade over the gamma pistol and power fist).
I guess it comes down to how much you value Arkhan's pimp stick or your command points, but if you run pure Mechanicus then you usually don't have more than 13 at best (which means you end up with 1-3 Enginseers, an overkill because you'll never need that many for repairing). if your bring a Dominus or Cawl). It essentially comes down whether or not you are willing to take two Dominii, because what's the point in paying two CP minimum and a relic to move and shoot with the Kastelans if they are forced to stay in that one 6" shooty castle bubble that all the Crawlers and Kataphrons will sit in as well? It will be hard to get LoS that they don't already have.
Good catch on the flamers though, that's what I get for brainstorming about Hellhounds and LR Redeemers in the middle of the night.
Ragnar Blackmane wrote: Just wanna say this: You can also take a Datasmith, give him arkhan land's pimp stick and even make him your warlord (if you feel like the bonus repair is needed, there is a rules argument to be had if the repair is still only limited to one model like it says in the repair special rules of Dominus/Enginseer/Cawl/Datasmiths) and use him to both save yourself from having to sacrifice the relic slot to emulate his doctrina change ability... while also saving 50 points compared to a Dominus who instead gets to buff your Dunecrawlers and other 3+ to hit units which benefit from the re-roll 1s much more (re-rolling half their misses instead of a third).
You only go for the Cybernetica Detachement if you want mobile Kastelans, e.g. with 2 Heavy Phosphors and the flamers running up the field with 20+D6 threat range on their flamers while they stay in Aegis mode (1+ armor and 4+ inv. saves are good stuff while you got shroudpsalm active). Unlike Dakkabots they are pretty hard to charge (unless you want to get hit with 3xD6 S6 AP -2 D2 flamers with 12" range) and when in a good spot you activate Protector Doctrina on turn 2. With 6"+D6" movement Datasmith is more than able to keep up with the robots within the 6" range needed, especially if you move both units and advance the datasmith first to see how far the Kastelans can advance if you end up rolling a 5 or 6.
And believe me people, paying a command point and sacrificing your relic just to save 41 points on a Datasmith is not worth it, just as much as paying a command point and crippling the movement (and thus the ability to react to units being out of range or LoS) of the 330+ point cornerstone of your army turn 1 isn't. A Datasmith does way more than just being a doctrina change tax (including being as capable as a Dominus or Enginseer at repairing Kastelans and being a great melee blocker to intercept chaff trying to tie the robots down).
He can only heal kastelans....
I would rather have a dominus that can change protocols instead of having another character to do it who will barely affect the game. The dominus is tougher, heals himself without having to have the autocadaeus of arkhan land, shoots better, is more accurate in CC, heals all types of Admech models and also heals 1 wound on knights and will usually be next to your robots anyway.
It isnt a bad relic and those 37pts saved means you can spend it on something that wont rarely shoot, rarely be in CC and and will only change a protocol maybe once a game. The dominus should be used in conjunction with elimation protocols. That is why the cybernetica cohort opens up a whole new way of playing admech. HIGH MOBILITY AND GOOD SHOOTING.
I agree fully with MrMoustaffa on al points. I no longer see the point in taking a Datasmith. And lets be honest, there are barely any good relics for us, the new servo skull is up there with the autocadaeus, it actually adds more depth to the army.
And me dropping my Datasmith means my 2k army pre chapter approved is now 288pts cheaper. Thats a squad of 6 plasma destroyers.
+ Also wouldnt it be 3d6str 5 ap 1 flamers at 12" not str 6 ap2 damage 2? You might be confused with hellhounds there.
But does being able to repair other units with the character babysitting the Kastelans actually matter? What are you going to do with the bunch of Enginseers you are taking that necessitates the babysitter to move away from the robots to repair anything else? Because Enginseers can literally do nothing else but repair and filling HQ slots. A Dominus and 1-2 Enginseers will always be enough to keep 3 Crawlers and even the odd Ironstrider repaired... unless the other player doesn't focus fire and just sprays his AT firepower all over at least 3-4 of your non-Kastelan vehicles in a turn, in case you are probably going to win the game because the other player doesn't know what he is doing.
And a Dominus isn't better than a Datasmith at repairing Kastelan's if either doesn't have a warlord trait (which either can take) or relic (which either can take) that boosts it. And the extra firepower comes at the cost of paying another fifty points (which isn't worth the upgrade over the gamma pistol and power fist).
Good catch on the flamers though, that's what I get for brainstorming about Hellhounds and LR Redeemers in the middle of the knight
If you look at my list from a page ago i have 1 enginseer. Instead i have 2 Dominus, one for the servitor maniple and one for the cybernetica cohort. A Dominus is strictly better than a Datasmith in all fields expect healing kastelans where he is then his equal. But for 53pts you get access to 2 shooting weapons (of which the macrostubber can only be used in cc or if you forgo your volkite blasters shots), more reliable close combat, self healing without the need to get a relic for it, better synergy with the WHOLE army instead of 1 unit, repairing kataphrons, other characters, knights, onagers, kastelans, termite, dragoons and ironstriders, has a larger foot print and can block off chargers to.
However why are we using characters to block charge lines, they dont have a big enough presence on the table to stop charging all together? Thats what skitarii and guardsmen are for, they will create a line to stop enemy unit passing through. A datasmith is on a 32mm base and can easily be moved around. And in any case, who ever is charging your robots will be multi-charging everything anyway.
The relic on the datasmith is kind of crap to be honest, d3 re-rollable wounds back only for kastellans.... id rather have that on an enginseer that we are taking for a battalion. You can use the datasmith but he is no longer required for robots due to the new relic, and like i said before we only really have 2 good relics anyway. In response to the enemies anti-tank, it takes a LOT of AT weapons to kill a squad of kastellans with aegis and cover. I attend tournaments fairly reguarly against all manner of competitive lists and smart opponents and i have NEVER lost a squad of my kastellans once. There main threat is mortal wounds. They are essential immune to str 6 ap 1 and below fire, auto cannons and lootas ping off them, you need a load of lascannons to kill the whole squad and plasma weapons are either not in range turn 1 or they hit on 3s/4s and wound on 3s of which we get a 4++. You will need 3 failed wounds per robot.... Ynarri Dark Reapers will hurt but everytime i have fought against them i have gone first.
If the whole enemy army shoots all its AT weapons at dakkabots, that leaves dragoons and onagers pretty much untouched, and what damage that is done can be repaired. So as i stated before, i no longer see a need for a datasmith, and it isnt hard for us to get CP anymore, i could of have had 3 battalions if i wanted to, or a brigade and a battalion. Our army doesnt go through CP's crazy fast neither. noospheric mindlock 1cp, strafing fire run 1cp, elimination protocols 2cp, tech adept 1cp, imperatives 1cp, infoslave skull 2cp, binaric override 2cp, etc, etc. We dont have big 3cp strats or multiple 2cp strats.
For example my badmoons use 8CP turn 1..... my admech use about 3-4CP turn 1
If you're playing competitively, your best bet is to fix the Kastelans and make back their points as soon as possible. This doesn't always mean turn one, but if you can get LOS to Magnus, Mortarion, Rowboat, a Castellan, etc., you do it. Once you are set up, you should also consider that you have created wide areas of denial that make it difficult for the opponent to use their mobility. The areas that are not covered can be covered by Icarus Crawlers and the Kataphrons now; you used to use Basilisks, Crawlers, Ironstriders, and/or a Knight.
I don't bring Datasmiths because they never do what I want them to; this is a reference to a classic MTG debate (http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/article.asp?ID=7146). When you change protocols, your opponent has an entire turn to react to said change. There is NEVER a situation where you would want to manually switch protocols, but there are plenty of instances where you would Binharic Override.
Most lists are going to end up with 14 CP. 2-5 will be spent in mustering. If you are pure AdMech, you have to take the Monitor Malevolus WLT. 6 CP is too much to pass up. For the relic, I actually like Raiment a lot more than Pimp Cane. The 6+ FNP is actually nice against infantry shooting, and 16.67% more Overwatch fire is not bad when you're shooting with Kastelans (108 shots, 18 hits; 18 bonus shots, 3 bonus hits).
Smarter money is on bringing Guard though. You get Catachans, which are still some of the most efficient melee troops in the meta right now, the ever invaluable ObSec, and Kurov's Aquila.
1 is if you walk your Kastelans to the center of the board before switching modes, so that everyone is in range of them. This synergises with turning their guns to Assault, but the reason a Datasmith works here is because you know in advance when you want to switch so declaring it one turn beforehand is fine.
2 is the expensive Lucius deepstrike fist Kastelans- deepstrike the Datasmith to give them the 3” charge and even if the Datasmith fails the charge, they’re still 9” away so can switch protocols (though this will of course only come into effect next turn). This is probably the thinking behind the 9” range increase trait. It isn’t very competitive and is super expensive and gimmicky, however.
I was watching a battle report using CA 2018. Something was mentioned that seems YUGE:
1. Players roll for deployment.
2. Winner of the roll picks his deployment zone.
3. Loser of the roll deploys his entire army.
4. Winner of the roll deploys his entire army.
4. Loser of the roll determines who goes first.
=O
Which is sort of what people have been asking for all along, I guess. I hope it makes it into ITC for the coming year. Plus the change to scoring at the end of the round.
If Cawl was still 240 I'd experiment with other Forgeworlds and builds. But he's not so I'm gonna keep rocking him with some robots.
And for most games I don't think it's worth 2CP for them to avoid the -1 to hit in the first turn in the Cohort Cybernetica.
Am I missing out on the new stuff? Are the new options really better? I guess it depends what's in the rest of your army. The Kataphron Destroyers with plasma detachment might be good but I don't have any of those models.
Pomguo wrote: I can see two uses for Datasmiths atm.
1 is if you walk your Kastelans to the center of the board before switching modes, so that everyone is in range of them. This synergises with turning their guns to Assault, but the reason a Datasmith works here is because you know in advance when you want to switch so declaring it one turn beforehand is fine.
2 is the expensive Lucius deepstrike fist Kastelans- deepstrike the Datasmith to give them the 3” charge and even if the Datasmith fails the charge, they’re still 9” away so can switch protocols (though this will of course only come into effect next turn). This is probably the thinking behind the 9” range increase trait. It isn’t very competitive and is super expensive and gimmicky, however.
1) You would still benefit from immediately changing to double shoot in this situation.
2) Well, you need to bring a Datasmith for the punchy robots...
axisofentropy wrote: Am I missing out on the new stuff? Are the new options really better? I guess it depends what's in the rest of your army. The Kataphron Destroyers with plasma detachment might be good but I don't have any of those models.
The Kataphrons are still really cheap at the moment. Maybe you can get a set? I have to strip and rebuild/repaint mine. They're red from the 7E days. Sigh.
Biosplicing only works on servitors and the stratagem for robots to make their heavy weapons into assault only works in aegis Mode. So no moving and double tapping. And Yeah, that 3" relic is useless...sadly. Why are people talking about using it? You never took a datasmith in a competitive environment and that wasnt caused by their range oO
Why ryza dragoons @Suzuteo?
Suzuteo wrote: I was watching a battle report using CA 2018. Something was mentioned that seems YUGE:
1. Players roll for deployment.
2. Winner of the roll picks his deployment zone.
3. Loser of the roll deploys his entire army.
4. Winner of the roll deploys his entire army.
4. Loser of the roll determines who goes first.
=O
Which is sort of what people have been asking for all along, I guess. I hope it makes it into ITC for the coming year. Plus the change to scoring at the end of the round.
Yeah that are some really huge and imo welcomed changes!
Btw I like the list you made for Aaranis, I think I will implement something similiar for my 1750 games.
Is Plasma still better if you dont run Ryza ?
Also what´s everyones opinion on Ironstriders in a mobile gunline (no Cawl & Bots)? Laser vs Autocanon?
Also any huge changes in the allies department? I saw Mephiston go up 15 points which is a shame and we may get in trouble CP wise with all of the new pre-game stratagems. (They can´t be refunded right?)
Suzuteo wrote: @Aaranis
How many Ironstriders do you have? Because I thought about it, and if you want a mobile gunline, you can do something like this:
Spoiler:
Stygies VIII Brigade Detachment - 1505 Servitor Maniple (-1 CP)
House Krast Super-Heavy Auxiliary Detachment - 500
Lord of War - 500 1x Knight Styrix - Volkite Chierovile, Hekaton Siege Claw, Twin Rad-cleanser, Graviton Crusher, Warlord: First Knight (-1 CP), Relic: The Headsman's Mark (-1 CP)
Total: 2005 points 14 CP (-5)
Or some variation of that. Maybe figure out a way to use the last detachment. But the idea is to move and shoot all day. Haha.
EDIT: I miscalculated the points on Troops. So it's 5 over. But you get the idea. I don't think you need the Robots at all if you don't want to plant them.
Thing is, this is pretty much all my collection minus the 3 Destroyers and 2 Robots I'll buy this month I don't have Knights and I only have 3 Dragoons, no Ballistarii. Which is why I'm quite limited. Also it's 1850 pts with strict limitations on unit variety, can only have 2 of the same unit ONCE except for Troops. I used it for my Neutron and Icarus Onagers. WYSIWYG too and that's how they're built.
Lucius Robots are actually really resilient when in Aegis. If not in cover you ignore the AP-1 so you won't ever need to use the 3+, then when you're shot with AP-2 you can use the 4++ with chances of deflecting shots. This has been a problem for me sometimes with Stygies or Mars that I had to choose between a better save with 3+ or a chance to deflect some mortal wounds with the 4++.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Okay I could finally start writing that Lucius Bomb list I wanted to try and figured I had so much points left that I added a Agripinaa Servitor Maniple in the lot, combining my two favourite ideas post-CA/Vigilus. The list goes like this:
The plan is essentially to Lucius DS the Datasmith and the Robots and Power Surge them into something tasty after spraying with the combustors first. The Infiltrators may come along to shoot the screens first but I'd need a lot of room for this, which, if using Beta rules, might be problematic. The Dragoons screen at first and charge at the first occasion. My Rangers stay behind for DS denial and form a chain towards their Dominus for rerolls first turn. The Arquebuses can threaten Characters and finish the odd wounds off some vehicle, and Lucius in cover means the enemy has to either shoot a lot of AP0 or go AP-2 to pass their saves.
Meanwhile with Agripinaa I can advance up the board and take space, the Vanguards cover the Onagers, which themselves give them a Ld boost. The Destroyers could be first line alongside the Vanguards or a little more behind, but I want to be agressive with the Flamers. The Dominus follows closely, repairing a Kataphron with the Autocaduceus to be sure it's full HP before feeding them a Servitor to make another grow back. The Onagers do their thing and contribute to the anti-horde with their Stubbers.
After having used Lucius DS I still have 9 CP for the game, and can even think about giving a 5++ to my Kataphrons. If I don't have first turn and they get heavily focused I just Fresh convert them and lose 3 CP and mobility for a turn but render the opponent's previous shooting phase almost useless. I can use the other CPs to Binharic Override the Bots if I see they're going to fight a lot, give Conqueror Doctrina to the Dragoons and such.
I thought about going Monitor Malevolus on the Lucius Dominus but getting 2 CPs off the whole game (if using Beta rules) don't look that interesting, maybe I'm wrong. If I go that route however I use Field Commander for Master of Biosplicing anyway and lose another pre-game CP then. Concerning relics I'm unsure that I'd need another, the Foreas servo-skull is of no use as I'll want my Robots to be punching twice as soon as they hit the lines until their death anyway. The Eye of Xi-Loxum was another idea but as my Dominus already has a relic that I can't give the Enginseer (because he can't fix the Kataphrons), I'd have to give it to the Enginseer and I don't want it so close to the frontline. I'll have to trust my Neutrons and Destroyers to anti-tank, and the Bots of course.
Thoughts on this ? It might not be hard competitive but I believe not many people would expect this, and there's so many priority targets that there's got to be one or two combos that'll work. The Robots are very durable as well as the Kataphrons.
The number of models you can put in 2000 points is insane. With my new test list, I save 500 points.
I will run a triple Metallica battalion next weekend. You can use so many different tricks and stratagems, I love the new variety.
And you have both a strong gun line and very good protection against close combat army’s. I'm curious to see how they fight.
deffrekka wrote: Not every game you will get optimal lines of sight, with line of sight blocking terrain it is quite common to not even get all members of the unit firing at something worth their attention
Yep. Ran into this with my ork lootas yesterday. Game 1. Couldn't see 2/3 of eldar fliers without screwing up my LOS completely if I go 2nd/once flyers are dead if I go 1st. Game 2: I could basically see half the army from where I started so to see 3rd dakkajet(after taking down 2) and boyz coming my left flank needed to redeploy. Game 3 my lootas needed to relocate both turn 2 and turn 3 to see a riptide. I would have been in trouble if those lootas couldn't redeploy(which they can pretty efficiently much to the disgrunt of tau player)
At least here there's enough LOS blocking in tournaments(less so on game club nights but different places). Generally one big LOS blocker in center and in each quarters with some random terrain here and there that can cover at least to something.
Suzuteo wrote: I was watching a battle report using CA 2018. Something was mentioned that seems YUGE:
1. Players roll for deployment.
2. Winner of the roll picks his deployment zone.
3. Loser of the roll deploys his entire army.
4. Winner of the roll deploys his entire army.
4. Loser of the roll determines who goes first.
=O
Which is sort of what people have been asking for all along, I guess. I hope it makes it into ITC for the coming year. Plus the change to scoring at the end of the round.
Yeah that are some really huge and imo welcomed changes!
Btw I like the list you made for Aaranis, I think I will implement something similiar for my 1750 games.
Is Plasma still better if you dont run Ryza ?
Also what´s everyones opinion on Ironstriders in a mobile gunline (no Cawl & Bots)? Laser vs Autocanon?
Also any huge changes in the allies department? I saw Mephiston go up 15 points which is a shame and we may get in trouble CP wise with all of the new pre-game stratagems. (They can´t be refunded right?)
Was that btw for all scenarios? It was for one but not sure if all.
And drat my favourite(ork) warlord trait just went to useless half the games.
Okay I could finally start writing that Lucius Bomb list I wanted to try and figured I had so much points left that I added a Agripinaa Servitor Maniple in the lot, combining my two favourite ideas post-CA/Vigilus. The list goes like this:
That is quite a cool list, I would maybe have swapped out one Dragoon and something else to push in another 5 infiltrators, to make that turn 2 hit even harder.
Additionally I would maybe put the Dunecrawlers in the Lucius detachment since they might benefit more from that dogma bonus then the Agripinaa one. But I get why you would put them in that detachment since they mostly stay back, while the Lucius detachment seems to be all about running forward.
Okay I could finally start writing that Lucius Bomb list I wanted to try and figured I had so much points left that I added a Agripinaa Servitor Maniple in the lot, combining my two favourite ideas post-CA/Vigilus. The list goes like this:
That is quite a cool list, I would maybe have swapped out one Dragoon and something else to push in another 5 infiltrators, to make that turn 2 hit even harder.
Additionally I would maybe put the Dunecrawlers in the Lucius detachment since they might benefit more from that dogma bonus then the Agripinaa one. But I get why you would put them in that detachment since they mostly stay back, while the Lucius detachment seems to be all about running forward.
Thanks ! I see what you mean for the Infiltrators, but it's yet another unit in DS with a large footprint I have to place, and the 3 Dragoons make a better turn 1 screen. And they die so fast these days that 3 looks like the right amount.
For the Dunecrawlers I was thinking of having them move slowly with the rest of the Agripinaa detachment, to keep buffing the Vanguards and stay in the Dominus' aura. Having them in Lucius would be sensible though, but I'm one Support slot short with the Robots and 3 Crawlers. I could do another Lucius Spearhead but I'd need ANOTHER Enginseer. What I'm thinking is having the two Neutrons go with Eradication Beamers to accompany Agripinaa, they'd be cheaper, but I'd lose on reliable long-range anti-tank.
Iago40k wrote: Biosplicing only works on servitors and the stratagem for robots to make their heavy weapons into assault only works in aegis Mode. So no moving and double tapping. And Yeah, that 3" relic is useless...sadly. Why are people talking about using it? You never took a datasmith in a competitive environment and that wasnt caused by their range oO
Why ryza dragoons @Suzuteo?
It works for Robots. You need to be in Aegis during the Movement phase; you don't need to use Override until the Shooting phase.
Reroll fighting wound rolls of 1. Just thought it would be an interesting way to take advantage of the fact that you're going Ryza, which has that weird fighting and plasma combination; no unit in our entire army can truly benefit from both.
deffrekka wrote: Not every game you will get optimal lines of sight, with line of sight blocking terrain it is quite common to not even get all members of the unit firing at something worth their attention
Yep. Ran into this with my ork lootas yesterday. Game 1. Couldn't see 2/3 of eldar fliers without screwing up my LOS completely if I go 2nd/once flyers are dead if I go 1st. Game 2: I could basically see half the army from where I started so to see 3rd dakkajet(after taking down 2) and boyz coming my left flank needed to redeploy. Game 3 my lootas needed to relocate both turn 2 and turn 3 to see a riptide. I would have been in trouble if those lootas couldn't redeploy(which they can pretty efficiently much to the disgrunt of tau player)
At least here there's enough LOS blocking in tournaments(less so on game club nights but different places). Generally one big LOS blocker in center and in each quarters with some random terrain here and there that can cover at least to something.
Focus on winning board control with the Robots. Killing things is incidental to this objective.
I honestly don't think what you're describing is really a problem. If you can't see them, they can't see you. There are plenty of boards where if you plant your Robots in the right spot, the enemy pretty much can't score points without coming into range and LOS of your guns. What's he going to do? Hide behind buildings while holding 2/6 objectives forever?
tneva82 wrote: Was that btw for all scenarios? It was for one but not sure if all.
Yes. They said this was a rules change for all the new missions. Though I suppose you could play the old ones, but eh. I think ITC should adopt this right away.
Suzuteo wrote: What's he going to do? Hide behind buildings while holding 2/6 objectives forever?
Approach into assault range of your firebase immune from your shooting thanks to LOS blocking and then pounce in. If you have multiple chaff units ahead he charges into one, tri-point another and is immune to shooting and then charges into bots. If there's no chaff charge bots as well.
Or control more like 4/6 objectives while you camp in that LOS blocked area and struggle to control more than 1 without exposing some of your army to his army who used LOS blocking to get close enough
Suzuteo wrote: What's he going to do? Hide behind buildings while holding 2/6 objectives forever?
Approach into assault range of your firebase immune from your shooting thanks to LOS blocking and then pounce in. If you have multiple chaff units ahead he charges into one, tri-point another and is immune to shooting and then charges into bots. If there's no chaff charge bots as well.
Or control more like 4/6 objectives while you camp in that LOS blocked area and struggle to control more than 1 without exposing some of your army to his army who used LOS blocking to get close enough
Not realistic. For the past year, we've been doing almost nothing but make lists to make it hard to charge into your Robots. The only real threats were flying charges and hordes/tides, and one of those problems are gone now. That is why the Robot count in my lists have steadily creeped up, and now I doubt I would ever bring fewer than 5 to a table. The other 1300 or so points in my army support these Robots with either assault or mobile shooting. Before, it was a Knight, Blood Angels, and Crawlers. Now, it is Kataphrons, who may well outdamage your Robots anyway. I mean, have you seen what 3x Icarus Crawlers can do to a unit of Shining Spears, Tau Battlesuits, or Blood Angels?
Really, my worries now have to deal with all the weird new tricks armies have to get in close, to shoot from outside 36" range, and whether or not I have enough Catachans to win ObSec fights.
Meanwhile I finally had the chance to tinker on my Ryza list and came up with two that seems quite a lot of fun to play with.
2000pt Full on Ryza Brigade for 15cp Major focus ofcourse on the destroyer unit in this detachment for that plasma combination, while adding some plasma to the Vanguard as a back-up to use the Ryza strat.
Infiltrators and Dragoons to pick up the most of the Ryza Dogma and put pressure on objective grabbing. Kastellan bots to get the Destroyers to BS2+.
This list seems like a ton of fun with a lot of CP to play around with.
HQ.
- Dominus with Volkite and Macro. (Warlord)
- Engiseer
- Engiseer
Troops
- 6x Destroyers with Plasma and flamers (Enhanced Bionics -1 CP)
- 5x Rangers with 2 Arquebus
- 5x Rangers with 2 Arquebus
- 5x Rangers with 2 arc rifles
- 5x Vanguard with 2 plasma
- 10x Vanguard with 3 plasma
Elite
- 5x Infiltrators with Tasers
- 5x Infiltrators with Tasers
- 4x servitors
Fast Attack
- Dragoon
- Dragoon
- Dragoon
Heavy Support
- Onager Dunecrawler with Neutron laser and stubber
- Onager Dunecrawler with Neutron laser and stubber
- Onager Dunecrawler with Neutron laser
- 4x Kastellan Robots with heavy phosphor
1999pt Ryza Battalion with Knight detachment for 11cp Swapping out the Dunecrawlers, Dragoons and Vanguard for a Valiant and two Warglaives. The Valiant and Warglaives will put on a lot of pressure onto the enemy line and provide a lot of mid field dominance. The two infiltrators squad function the same as above, long range objective grabbers.
I love the Valiant and while this list has quite a bit less cp I also think it would be able to hit quite hard.
Suzuteo wrote: What's he going to do? Hide behind buildings while holding 2/6 objectives forever?
Approach into assault range of your firebase immune from your shooting thanks to LOS blocking and then pounce in. If you have multiple chaff units ahead he charges into one, tri-point another and is immune to shooting and then charges into bots. If there's no chaff charge bots as well.
Or control more like 4/6 objectives while you camp in that LOS blocked area and struggle to control more than 1 without exposing some of your army to his army who used LOS blocking to get close enough
Not realistic. For the past year, we've been doing almost nothing but make lists to make it hard to charge into your Robots. The only real threats were flying charges and hordes/tides, and one of those problems are gone now. That is why the Robot count in my lists have steadily creeped up, and now I doubt I would ever bring fewer than 5 to a table. The other 1300 or so points in my army support these Robots with either assault or mobile shooting. Before, it was a Knight, Blood Angels, and Crawlers. Now, it is Kataphrons, who may well outdamage your Robots anyway. I mean, have you seen what 3x Icarus Crawlers can do to a unit of Shining Spears, Tau Battlesuits, or Blood Angels?
Really, my worries now have to deal with all the weird new tricks armies have to get in close, to shoot from outside 36" range, and whether or not I have enough Catachans to win ObSec fights.
Well we play on different types of boards then. I just know that for example yesterday if lootas were forced to sit in place they would have struggled to shoot any meaningful targets with 48" range guns without giving easy access lines for opponents. And unless I camp myself to like one corner as tight as possible(making easy tri-point locking) they would also be able to shoot and assault other parts and I wouldn't have more than 1 or 2 objectives to control with. Easy recipe for defeat. Only way I would get more than 1-2 objectives would be use 3 objectives I get to place on one dz area and then HOPE I win 50-50 roll to be able to take that. If I don't...well then I might be lucky to have ONE objective to control...
As said. I had to use da jump to chase down LOS against riptide. There was no way I could draw LOS to riptides at will and there was no real way I could avoid riptides targeting at will my units from safety without giving up objectives completely. Or much of chance of any damage output as he would quickly redeploy everything out of LOS of lootas.
tneva82 wrote: Well we play on different types of boards then. I just know that for example yesterday if lootas were forced to sit in place they would have struggled to shoot any meaningful targets with 48" range guns without giving easy access lines for opponents. And unless I camp myself to like one corner as tight as possible(making easy tri-point locking) they would also be able to shoot and assault other parts and I wouldn't have more than 1 or 2 objectives to control with. Easy recipe for defeat. Only way I would get more than 1-2 objectives would be use 3 objectives I get to place on one dz area and then HOPE I win 50-50 roll to be able to take that. If I don't...well then I might be lucky to have ONE objective to control...
As said. I had to use da jump to chase down LOS against riptide. There was no way I could draw LOS to riptides at will and there was no real way I could avoid riptides targeting at will my units from safety without giving up objectives completely. Or much of chance of any damage output as he would quickly redeploy everything out of LOS of lootas.
We aren't playing with Lootas. We aren't nearly as afraid of HBCs given the army is almost entirely T7 2+/5++.
Just stay in Aegis shooting until you are ready to Override. If they don't come out, don't Override, simple as that. Against Tau, most of the enemy focus is probably going to be on Crawlers anyway, actually. Another annoyance is them sniping Guardsmen with Smart Missiles. I guess my Kataphrons would also not like that.
Unless I am fighting a horde, I would never anchor on a table edge. I also would never intentionally place objectives in an asymmetrical fashion like that. I actually would try to place them in as accessible and visible a place as possible.
Also ironic is that the quote on the Riptide page is almost literally what I said before: "Launch an ambush not to slay, but rather to seize the initiative and thereby win the war." The key is board control, not just mindlessly killing things.
Suzuteo wrote: What's he going to do? Hide behind buildings while holding 2/6 objectives forever?
Approach into assault range of your firebase immune from your shooting thanks to LOS blocking and then pounce in. If you have multiple chaff units ahead he charges into one, tri-point another and is immune to shooting and then charges into bots. If there's no chaff charge bots as well.
Or control more like 4/6 objectives while you camp in that LOS blocked area and struggle to control more than 1 without exposing some of your army to his army who used LOS blocking to get close enough
Not realistic. For the past year, we've been doing almost nothing but make lists to make it hard to charge into your Robots. The only real threats were flying charges and hordes/tides, and one of those problems are gone now. That is why the Robot count in my lists have steadily creeped up, and now I doubt I would ever bring fewer than 5 to a table. The other 1300 or so points in my army support these Robots with either assault or mobile shooting. Before, it was a Knight, Blood Angels, and Crawlers. Now, it is Kataphrons, who may well outdamage your Robots anyway. I mean, have you seen what 3x Icarus Crawlers can do to a unit of Shining Spears, Tau Battlesuits, or Blood Angels?
Really, my worries now have to deal with all the weird new tricks armies have to get in close, to shoot from outside 36" range, and whether or not I have enough Catachans to win ObSec fights.
Well we play on different types of boards then. I just know that for example yesterday if lootas were forced to sit in place they would have struggled to shoot any meaningful targets with 48" range guns without giving easy access lines for opponents. And unless I camp myself to like one corner as tight as possible(making easy tri-point locking) they would also be able to shoot and assault other parts and I wouldn't have more than 1 or 2 objectives to control with. Easy recipe for defeat. Only way I would get more than 1-2 objectives would be use 3 objectives I get to place on one dz area and then HOPE I win 50-50 roll to be able to take that. If I don't...well then I might be lucky to have ONE objective to control...
As said. I had to use da jump to chase down LOS against riptide. There was no way I could draw LOS to riptides at will and there was no real way I could avoid riptides targeting at will my units from safety without giving up objectives completely. Or much of chance of any damage output as he would quickly redeploy everything out of LOS of lootas.
For once and the first time ever, i actually agree with Tneva! Line of sight are such key things with my games. The ground floor of ruins are all blocked meaning you cant see through them and we reguarily use a huge piece of line of sight blocking terrain big enough to obscure knights and wraight knights. Well yes we arent afraid of HBC Riptides like Orkz, Tneva is right in saying that mobility is huge for the lootastar. Having Da Jump allows them to always get line of sight when they need it, you should always be moving in this game. As for objectives, from looking at the new chapter approved missions, they are already pre-placed. One in each centre of a table corner, one in the middle that gets smaller each turn, etc, etc. We wont have the luxury of placing objectives in optimal posistions to sit and castle with double tap mode.
Usually i wouldnt have bothered with many infantry and fast elements, but now more than ever we need these aspects in our lists. Double tapping isnt just a must do thing turn 1 anymore. I have a match later on tonight vs my friends kabal and coven list and i will be using a new chapter approved mission, i will let you guys know how it goes.
MrMoustaffa wrote: By not breaking the robots legs with the override and just switching them in manually, you now have options. If you get charged turn 1, you're not just stuck there and have to deal with it, you can switch back to having legs and fall back because you can switch to aegis before they have to move. If you don't like your position because someone like orks or eldar pulled reposition shenanigans after deployment was done but before first turn begins, you can react to that. If you realize you want those bots in the middle of the table parked on an objective after your turn one volley, you can do that. Heck you can even start game in aegis, start of your first turn use relic to switch them to protector for first turn volley. Next in turn 2 you switch them back to aegis, move them up to an objective or good firing position, and then use the override to put them back in protector mode at the start of your second shooting phase. Or leave them in aegis, or even go conqueror if need be, whatever.
Aren't the protocols change activated in the next movement phase though? Because, while switching it on and off surely makes repositioning viable, it doesn't really make viable choice of Falling Back, as it would take 3 turns to shoot (1- being charged and switch, 2- Fall Back, 3- able to shoot; assuming we're not playing Metallica/Graia with a WL around). The "switch to Aegis and move turn 2" wouldn't be able as well, as until turn 2 switching it to Protector wouldn't even happen if you declared the switch turn 1.
What do you guys think of Ruststalkers right now? As they are now 14p with blades I was thinking of running a squad of 7 as a bodyguard and countercharge unit for my kastelans. What about a Dragoons? They have amazing synergy with +2 to hit, but I only own one, so I guess Ruststalkers do more pointswise although the +1 to LD might help my vanguards
lash92 wrote: Dragoons all the way. They have an in build -1 and will flood the enemy with S8 attacks due to exploding hits on 4+. Easily my favorite unit!
You mean other than to buy, build and paint I assume?
I own four, would love to have more but I hate evrything about them up until the point they're actually on the table haha. They look amazing and play great but getting there is a chore.
I'd rather chop off one of my fingers than build six chicken walkers ever again. Worst part was losing them in a fire, so that's all that hard work gone too.
I haven't lost a child but I imagine that's what it feels like.
WrentheFaceless wrote: Seems of the 2 Vigilus detachments, the one that may actually see some use is the Servitor one.
Yes the Servitor Maniple is safer and boosts more directly our main strength: ranged heavy firepower. It brings lots of durability and opens quite a lot of new options besides Mars Castle.
But I'm sure the Cohort Cybernetica is great too, just for the mobility it presents for ranged options, and that a Lucius bomb of 4+ Robots with combustors and Fists can ruin the day of most lists. Alternatively, Stygies' Infiltration is still interesting in its Beta form, as you start on the board and are not delayed to turn 2.
I made a list in the previous page that combined both detachments but we're all so eager to post lists that we don't read them all :p
0XFallen wrote: What do you guys think of Ruststalkers right now? As they are now 14p with blades I was thinking of running a squad of 7 as a bodyguard and countercharge unit for my kastelans. What about a Dragoons? They have amazing synergy with +2 to hit, but I only own one, so I guess Ruststalkers do more pointswise although the +1 to LD might help my vanguards
Ruststalkers are still bad for the same reasons they were before we have other melee options dragoons hoplites infiltrators priests all better in their own ways
WrentheFaceless wrote: Seems of the 2 Vigilus detachments, the one that may actually see some use is the Servitor one.
Yes the Servitor Maniple is safer and boosts more directly our main strength: ranged heavy firepower. It brings lots of durability and opens quite a lot of new options besides Mars Castle.
But I'm sure the Cohort Cybernetica is great too, just for the mobility it presents for ranged options, and that a Lucius bomb of 4+ Robots with combustors and Fists can ruin the day of most lists. Alternatively, Stygies' Infiltration is still interesting in its Beta form, as you start on the board and are not delayed to turn 2.
I made a list in the previous page that combined both detachments but we're all so eager to post lists that we don't read them all :p
I like the idea of running the heavy duty kataphron destroyer builds as LUCIUS. Deepstriking them and keeping them off the board until turn 2 against some armies is huge and guarantees they get their shot off and should have LOS. A 2man robot group could also be easily used to provide another +1 to hit. I am not convinced that the AGRIPPINA servitor maniple provides enough durability to make the big kataprhon blobs actually survive going second against another shooting list. They remain just as juicy of a target as devastators/darkReapers/Lootas but have a 4+ save and cost a lot of points. I could maybe by a STYGIES kataphron gunline as viable, but then dark reapers and lootas exist that ignore STYGIES.
lash92 wrote: Dragoons all the way. They have an in build -1 and will flood the enemy with S8 attacks due to exploding hits on 4+. Easily my favorite unit!
Technically, S9 because of the Canticle.
PiñaColada wrote: You mean other than to buy, build and paint I assume?
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: I'd rather chop off one of my fingers than build six chicken walkers ever again. Worst part was losing them in a fire, so that's all that hard work gone too.
I haven't lost a child but I imagine that's what it feels like.
Yeah, I have 8, and I dread even having to build one more. Some of my early ones don't even look that great, but there's no way I am going to be able to strip them and repaint them without subassemblies. Sigh.
So can someone clarify this Doctrina Foreas Servo Skull to me? Does it allow Kastelans to change their protocol, effective immediately, so I can take shots 1a with a better save and then in my turn 1b change to double shots and fire?
Or, reading it differently, is the only effect of the relic that it can turn a tech-priest into a counts as datasmith with 9” range??
deffrekka wrote: For once and the first time ever, i actually agree with Tneva! Line of sight are such key things with my games. The ground floor of ruins are all blocked meaning you cant see through them and we reguarily use a huge piece of line of sight blocking terrain big enough to obscure knights and wraight knights. Well yes we arent afraid of HBC Riptides like Orkz, Tneva is right in saying that mobility is huge for the lootastar. Having Da Jump allows them to always get line of sight when they need it, you should always be moving in this game. As for objectives, from looking at the new chapter approved missions, they are already pre-placed. One in each centre of a table corner, one in the middle that gets smaller each turn, etc, etc. We wont have the luxury of placing objectives in optimal posistions to sit and castle with double tap mode.
Usually i wouldnt have bothered with many infantry and fast elements, but now more than ever we need these aspects in our lists. Double tapping isnt just a must do thing turn 1 anymore. I have a match later on tonight vs my friends kabal and coven list and i will be using a new chapter approved mission, i will let you guys know how it goes.
To be clear, I am not saying LOS and mobility are unimportant. I am saying that there comes a moment early on in every game where you can strike a blow so hard and in a place so crucial that giving up the ability to move is an easy call. Robots have a role to play, and you have to be willing to make a decision to allow them to make an impact. This is not always turn one, but it often is. Killing their Magnus, Castellan, or two Riptides turn one usually spells doom.
I actually find Lootastars to be very vulnerable without their Grots to protect them. If they do Da Jump, they are very vulnerable to return fire.
0XFallen wrote: What do you guys think of Ruststalkers right now? As they are now 14p with blades I was thinking of running a squad of 7 as a bodyguard and countercharge unit for my kastelans. What about a Dragoons? They have amazing synergy with +2 to hit, but I only own one, so I guess Ruststalkers do more pointswise although the +1 to LD might help my vanguards
I still don't like Sicarans because no matter how cheap they are, they are useless if they don't manage to actually do anything. Infiltrators have fewer problems than Ruststalkers, but even then, I would run something else as Lucius.
Wulfey wrote: I like the idea of running the heavy duty kataphron destroyer builds as LUCIUS. Deepstriking them and keeping them off the board until turn 2 against some armies is huge and guarantees they get their shot off and should have LOS. A 2man robot group could also be easily used to provide another +1 to hit. I am not convinced that the AGRIPPINA servitor maniple provides enough durability to make the big kataprhon blobs actually survive going second against another shooting list. They remain just as juicy of a target as devastators/darkReapers/Lootas but have a 4+ save and cost a lot of points. I could maybe by a STYGIES kataphron gunline as viable, but then dark reapers and lootas exist that ignore STYGIES.
Not sure about the 2x Robot unit. I agree that hiding them in reserves can be nice, but how are we going to get the TPD and Servitors within 6" of them? Seems to me that we're best off hiding them inside a magic bunker. They are infantry, after all. Very fat infantry...
Therion wrote: So can someone clarify this Doctrina Foreas Servo Skull to me? Does it allow Kastelans to change their protocol, effective immediately, so I can take shots 1a with a better save and then in my turn 1b change to double shots and fire?
Or, reading it differently, is the only effect of the relic that it can turn a tech-priest into a counts as datasmith with 9” range??
Therion wrote: So can someone clarify this Doctrina Foreas Servo Skull to me? Does it allow Kastelans to change their protocol, effective immediately, so I can take shots 1a with a better save and then in my turn 1b change to double shots and fire?
Or, reading it differently, is the only effect of the relic that it can turn a tech-priest into a counts as datasmith with 9” range??
I think that, while RAW might be turned by some lawyer around, the RAI is clear - it is meant to increase the range and make any TPD or TPE a Datasmith effectively. So the protocl change is in effect as the Kastelan rule states - at the beginning of the next round.
Therion wrote: So can someone clarify this Doctrina Foreas Servo Skull to me? Does it allow Kastelans to change their protocol, effective immediately, so I can take shots 1a with a better save and then in my turn 1b change to double shots and fire?
Or, reading it differently, is the only effect of the relic that it can turn a tech-priest into a counts as datasmith with 9” range??
It allows a Dominus or Enginseer to replace the Datasmith for the protocol change, (so protocol change at beginning of your movement change, works on 2+) and it has a 3" higher range than a Datasmith has. Nothing else.
The wording isn't that great, but it will 100% be confirmed in the next FAQ, RAI is clear, and you'll have a hard time to convince anyone that the RAW meaning is different.
Usually i wouldnt have bothered with many infantry and fast elements, but now more than ever we need these aspects in our lists. Double tapping isnt just a must do thing turn 1 anymore. I have a match later on tonight vs my friends kabal and coven list and i will be using a new chapter approved mission, i will let you guys know how it goes.
To be clear, I am not saying LOS and mobility are unimportant. I am saying that there comes a moment early on in every game where you can strike a blow so hard and in a place so crucial that giving up the ability to move is an easy call. Robots have a role to play, and you have to be willing to make a decision to allow them to make an impact. This is not always turn one, but it often is. Killing their Magnus, Castellan, or two Riptides turn one usually spells doom.
The thing is that you never now what your opponent will bring and how the table will look like.
If you end up playing on a dense urban table with lots of LoS blocking (no LoS through ground floor tourney rules usually are enough to really make LoS a massive issue if present) and you play with the new CA18 deployment rules that might force you to deploy your entire army and then the other player gets to place theirs and counter the placement of your units then the usual "binaric override turn one, kill everything, done" strategy will have a hard time. Because you'll either be forced to fire your Kastelans at half (or less without the new strat) effectiveness while moving for one or two turns OR get full firepower on the first turn and then potentially deal with leaving your robots stranded without good targets or LoS. And we all know how much the full firepower of Dakkabots is needed turn 1 most of the time. Right now you can just hold back on deploying the Kastelans until you see where the other player is deploying his good stuff, in the future you won't have that luxury 50% of the time statistically speaking. And if you play the usual 4-6 Kastelan unit with Cawl support then the other player can essentially make up 40% or more of your army borderline useless on the first turn by placing his valuable units elsewhere or behind LoS blockers if he gets second deployment (and e.g. winged daemon princes and Custodes Jetbike characters can do this easily while also being able to get to you quickly).
Having a Datasmith or Dominus (or even Enginseer in a pinch) with the doctrina servo-skull allows you to e.g. do a Stygies scout move to salvage your deployment if the other player got to deploy second, then you can change into turret mode turn 1 and murder valuable targets you now see, then change back to Aegis doctrina turn two, move and fire and change back to turret mode turn 3 for the mop-up.
The other thing with Binaric Override is that if anything, literally ANYTHING with a minimum of survivability gets into close combat with your Kastelans then it's game over. They'll do pitful damage, can't fall back and can't even change to the "attack twice in CC" doctrina. Half your army effectively neutralized by something as cheap as some fast 70ish or less points fodder unit. Very fast melee armies like Custodes and DE or tyranids are a thing and methinks this massive weakness is one of the reasons why Cawlstar builds, despite their massive damage potential, have been underperforming on the international tournament scene. If you survive that first round of melee, you can at least fall back with a doctrina change and in the case of Metalica even shoot.
In the end it's the old "flexibility vs. min-maxing" debate, but to me it looks like being able to be adaptable and flexible will be much more important in the future. Especially if that flexibility can be as cheap as an already mandatory 30 point dude with an extra relic (not a big loss for Admech) or 41 point dude without one.
I really hate the way they word that battle protocol ability, I see where you're coming from now. I still feel I can make that work but I do agree that it takes a lot of the spontaneous flexibility away. I'll play around with it a bit and let people know how it goes.
I don't expect it to make too much difference, if I know I need that firepower turn 1 I can still do so, doesn't take away from that. The way I'm seeing it going down on average is
-Turn 1 have the robots prepare to be protector in turn 2, move them up to a key area and prepare to lock it down
-turn 2 take a look at the board and get a feel for what's about to happen. Expect to be charged, go ahead and swap back to aegis, if not stay in protector and just rinse/repeat.
Binharic Override becomes the emergency button, say if you get caught in a turn 1 charge or know you need it. Its still there ready to go but you no longer rely on it. Heck if there's games where you know you're just going to park turn 1 and double tap the whole game you don't even have to take the relic, you can just leave it at home and run them as normal.
Yes, Imperial Bunker(s) is plan A to make the kataphrons work. Or a skyshield landing pad that gets you the 5++ and better line of sight and some assault resistance using body blocks without having to spend CP (though you 'spend' a detachment for it). Either way, I don't think just plopping kataphrons on the board actually works against another shooting army. You need to do something that lets you have a chance against a Tau/Eldar/Knights player that goes first. Yikes would Cawl's wrath make a mess out of a kataphron list.
Tho ... in ITC ... kataphrons are INFANTRY and can really use that first floor LOS block / embarking trick.
Wulfey wrote: Tho ... in ITC ... kataphrons are INFANTRY and can really use that first floor LOS block / embarking trick.
Right, when I say Magic Bunker, I refer to the fact that since they are infantry, they can move through the walls of the first floor of ruins, and these walls are as good as solid adamantium.
Ragnar Blackmane wrote: The thing is that you never now what your opponent will bring and how the table will look like.
If you end up playing on a dense urban table with lots of LoS blocking (no LoS through ground floor tourney rules usually are enough to really make LoS a massive issue if present) and you play with the new CA18 deployment rules that might force you to deploy your entire army and then the other player gets to place theirs and counter the placement of your units then the usual "binaric override turn one, kill everything, done" strategy will have a hard time. Because you'll either be forced to fire your Kastelans at half (or less without the new strat) effectiveness while moving for one or two turns OR get full firepower on the first turn and then potentially deal with leaving your robots stranded without good targets or LoS. And we all know how much the full firepower of Dakkabots is needed turn 1 most of the time. Right now you can just hold back on deploying the Kastelans until you see where the other player is deploying his good stuff, in the future you won't have that luxury 50% of the time statistically speaking. And if you play the usual 4-6 Kastelan unit with Cawl support then the other player can essentially make up 40% or more of your army borderline useless on the first turn by placing his valuable units elsewhere or behind LoS blockers if he gets second deployment (and e.g. winged daemon princes and Custodes Jetbike characters can do this easily while also being able to get to you quickly).
...
The other thing with Binaric Override is that if anything, literally ANYTHING with a minimum of survivability gets into close combat with your Kastelans then it's game over. They'll do pitful damage, can't fall back and can't even change to the "attack twice in CC" doctrina. Half your army effectively neutralized by something as cheap as some fast 70ish or less points fodder unit. Very fast melee armies like Custodes and DE or tyranids are a thing and methinks this massive weakness is one of the reasons why Cawlstar builds, despite their massive damage potential, have been underperforming on the international tournament scene. If you survive that first round of melee, you can at least fall back with a doctrina change and in the case of Metalica even shoot.
In the end it's the old "flexibility vs. min-maxing" debate, but to it me the future looks like being able to be adaptable and flexible will be much more important. Especially if that flexibility can be as cheap as an already mandatory 30 point dude with an extra relic (not a big loss for Admech) or 41 point dude without one.
This has always been true. But really, I think we're missing out on the essence of the argument, which is that bringing a Datasmith is a waste of points. If you want the option to change protocols, take the Cohort relic on an Enginseer instead, but in my opinion, every time you change protocols manually, you're misplaying. The Cohort made this MORE the case, not less; you can now move and shoot every turn without a penalty; you can ADVANCE with a -1 to hit penalty. Really, Kastelans in Aegis mode are like mini-Knights with an AGC-like weapon.
Override is of paramount importance, but don't use it if it's not worth it. If I can get a shot off on Magnus, Mortarion, a Castellan, or two Riptides on turn one, you bet I am going to get into the best position possible for area denial, Override, and shoot them dead. Sure beats waiting for them to shoot me.
Honestly, if anyone is struggling to protect their Robots, bring more infantry. My lists have 2x5 Rangers and 4x10 Catachans, and I still think this is light. I am thinking 5x5 Rangers and 4x10 Catachans at this point. Also, if something does get stuck in with your Robots, it's not as if you can't use them ever again. Counter-chargers and Heroic Intervention can reduce your Robots stuck time to one turn.
You can use stratagems that affect units that are shooting in the Shooting Phase, I believe.
1CP - PLASMA SPECIALISTS
Ryza Stratagem
Use this Stratagem before a RYZA unit from your army attacks in the Shooting phase. Add 1 to the wound rolls made for all of that unit’s plasma weapons and increase the damage inflicted by any plasma weapon by 1. For the purposes of this Stratagem, a plasma weapon is any weapon profile whose name includes the word ‘plasma’ (e.g. plasma cannon, plasma caliver, plasma culverin).
Note the phrasing. Most stratagems of this sort do not "target" (for lack of a better word) embarked units. They simply can be used when a condition is triggered. In this case, when a unit shoots. Bunkers allow embarked units to shoot. Thus, embarked units can trigger the conditions to use this stratagem.
So here is what I am toying with right now based on my initial read of CA.
MARS battalion [cohort cybernetica] Cawl Enginseer 1x6 Dakkabots 1x10 infiltrators 2x1 Neutron Onagers (+2 hit strat makes these good AA) 2x7 rangers 1x7 vanguard
STYGIES aux 1x5 dragoons [screen for robots, draw fire]
CADIA battalion 1x Creed (Grand Strat WLT, +2CP if WL) 1x Commander (kurovs i guess) 3x10 guards
This gives me enough CP to wrath of mars every turn. I think the infiltrators are now starting to get good at 18 points a piece. They provide me something else to put WRATH onto if the robots are in trouble or can't get into position.
I think we will be seeing a lot more CREED battalions in the future. Why spend 180 points for 5CP when you can spend 205 for 7CP!
EDIT: I reworked the above, I don't that many CP. Rather have a few more guys and flexibility in cohort Relic.
Wulfey wrote: So here is what I am toying with right now based on my initial read of CA.
MARS battalion [cohort cybernetica]
Cawl
Enginseer
1x6 Dakkabots
1x10 infiltrators
2x1 Neutron Onagers (+2 hit strat makes these good AA)
2x7 rangers
1x7 vanguard
STYGIES aux
1x5 dragoons [screen for robots, draw fire]
CADIA battalion
1x Creed (Grand Strat WLT, +2CP if WL)
1x Commander (kurovs i guess)
3x10 guards
This gives me enough CP to wrath of mars every turn. I think the infiltrators are now starting to get good at 18 points a piece. They provide me something else to put WRATH onto if the robots are in trouble or can't get into position.
I think we will be seeing a lot more CREED battalions in the future. Why spend 180 points for 5CP when you can spend 205 for 7CP!
EDIT: I reworked the above, I don't that many CP. Rather have a few more guys and flexibility in cohort Relic.
Looks alright, maybe too many chickens. I'd also take one Icarus Crawler, so your actual Neutron Crabs can focus on busting tanks while the Icarus crab gets a native 2+ to hit against most flying units without you having to use Protector Doctrina on it.
Creed is a Cadian named character, so he has to take the Superior Tactical Training warlord trait. It's a great trait, but pretty wasted on only 3 naked infantry squads, it shines when you got 4-5 decked out units including special weapons, heavy weapon teams and heavy weapon squads.
But I assume you are only taking the guard detachement for soup CP farming, so... yeah. Creed could do some serious work for you, but you'd have to put some more points into it than the minimum amount.
Lol nvm at creed. Yeah that is much worse than grand strategist. Looks like I got another 25 points.
EDIT: the weapons on the skitarii foot troops are a lot cheaper now and they have me thinking about really maximizing the power of Cawl's aura. 15 point arquebuses are pretty good when you are getting full rerolls to hit. There are a lot of character spam lists that assume that no one ever has 6 of those things. The 11 point plasma calivers are super efficient if you have the aura and the target is in range. But the range is pretty sad. The 30 point enginseer really makes double battalion admech play into something viable.
ph34r wrote: Is Grand Strategist good still? Maximum 6 CP refunded over a game, right?
Not sure really. Monitor Malevelos is almost as good. The admech price buffs actually have me looking at running an actual 100% admech list at LVO. I would be running Cawl + 1x6 dakkabots as the core, with other admech grafted on as necessary. I still think bots and cawl are the way to go. But damn if those infantry aren't efficient now. I need to go look at that facebook spreadsheet again to see how the plasma calivers are doing now.
Suzuteo wrote: Problem with Calivers is that you have to run them Lucius. That or bring a ton of Drills...
Why not bring Kataphrons? Too worried about durability?
I have them sitting on the shelf, but they still cost either 48 for plasma or 51 for grav assuming the phosphor blaster. A neutron with 2x stubber is now 119. Kataphrons are now for sure more damage than dakkabots point for point. But it all comes down to their terrible saves and how good of a shooting target they are. Even with AGRIPINNA and the servitor farm, you can lose kataphrons to stray mortar fire. Their saves are bad on a very pricey unit that can't natively deepstrike and instantly dies in combat. A RAVEN castellan could kill an easy 5 bases with Cawls wrath, 2 from the volcano lance, 1.5 from the shoulder guns, and 1 from the shieldbreaker missile. I haven't run the mathhammer yet but my instinct says that the castellan could kill 8 bases or 400 points a turn. 600 points of plasmaphrons should take 12-14 wounds off of a castellan. But then it still shoots at full strength and strips bases off the board every time you fail a 5++ (assuming the detachment).
How do you think kataphrons should be run? I can't figure it out.
Suzuteo wrote: Unless I am fighting a horde, I would never anchor on a table edge. I also would never intentionally place objectives in an asymmetrical fashion like that. I actually would try to place them in as accessible and visible a place as possible.
Also ironic is that the quote on the Riptide page is almost literally what I said before: "Launch an ambush not to slay, but rather to seize the initiative and thereby win the war." The key is board control, not just mindlessly killing things.
And opponent is unlikely to deploy his objectives so that you can easily see them. Add to that terrain and the fact you have to put 12" gap from those and again: If you put your bots into immobile you would be lucky to see more than 2 objectives. Or maybe you see them but enemy can get within 3" and still be out of LOS.
So your immobile bots are guarding 1, maybe 2 objectives and opponent can use LOS blockers to deal with rest of army. If all are around bots...Well then neither is killing anything unless he wants to open action while he controls 4-5 objectives. Good luck.
Precisely because game isn't about mindlessly killing things being immobile is bad. If it was just mindlessly killing things sure lock up, shoot and mindlessly kill things with your immobile bots. Others meanwhile move and control objectives.
lash92 wrote: Dragoons all the way. They have an in build -1 and will flood the enemy with S8 attacks due to exploding hits on 4+. Easily my favorite unit!
Yeah I second the chicken love. I even enjoy them in my mars lists.
ph34r wrote: Is Grand Strategist good still? Maximum 6 CP refunded over a game, right?
Not sure really. Monitor Malevelos is almost as good. The admech price buffs actually have me looking at running an actual 100% admech list at LVO. I would be running Cawl + 1x6 dakkabots as the core, with other admech grafted on as necessary. I still think bots and cawl are the way to go. But damn if those infantry aren't efficient now. I need to go look at that facebook spreadsheet again to see how the plasma calivers are doing now.
Are you leaning towards 2 or 3 detachments in a pure Admech list?
What are people’s consensus on 3x battalions. Too much of a tax or with engineer reductions acceptable now?
I think two Battalions is comfortable enough to fit it most combos, if thinking smaller three could work too. Thing is, if you want to run Servitor Maniple or Cohort Cybernetica you'll want your detachment filled with either Kataphrons or Robots and that costs points. You could definitely use 15 CP base though, these detachments and the other stratagems to make them work are pricey. Your third Battalion would mostly consist of 3x5 Rangers and a Dominus + Enginseer, or even 2 Enginseer depending on points left. Just be sure that your Enginseer are the same FW that of your vehicles so that they're still useful.
I wonder if you guys are counting Enhanced Bionics in your calculations or not for the Kataphrons' survivability. 1 CP to give them a 5++ forever is cheap, and couple with Agripinaa your opponent HAVE to destroy it all in a single turn or you're bringing them all back next turn, which will have wasted his shooting phase. Maybe I'm too naive and/or not experienced enough with the meta but ignoring 2/6 instead of 1/6 of wounds received is huge.
I myself am partial to an archeon with the flamestorm cannon, ion bulwark and the headsman mark to get a ridiculous damage 4 flamethrower against tanks and damage 5 against titans, even at only strength 7.
ing tasty.
