yukishiro1 wrote: Troupes on foot absolutely work, especially in any format where you're guaranteed good LOS-blocking terrain in the center of the board, as is now standard in most tournaments. 11 points for effectively flying infantry ob-sec with a 4+ invuln is extremely cheap, especially by eldar standards.
Nobody else has anything like flying ob-sec infantry, much less for 11 points and with a 4+ invuln standard.
Not only are they good...they're arguably one of the very best troops choices in the game. Literally every other faction in the game would kill for a troops choice that good. Skyweavers have a reputation for being the best unit in the book but IMO troupes are even better.
That said, what they aren't good for is running in a mono harlequin list, because while they are excellent, surprisingly resilient objective holders...they don't really kill all that much.
But that's true of mono quins generally, and it's why they aren't competitive on their own. They just don't have the firepower 8th edition needs to be top-tier competitive.
They posted a preview of the Deathwatch rules, which are pathetic, literally just giving them the exact same stratagems all the other chapters got, with no suggestion of any new rules or content at all. They do say there are 14 strats and they don't list all of them...but they also say they're just the same ones other chapters get. So it looks like absolutely no new content of any kind.
This seems to bode very badly for the quins rules, since we're the other faction they decided didn't deserve its own book.
On the other hand, they can't just give us junk some other faction already has but we didn't get yet, because we aren't space marines. So presumably they have to give us *something* new...I'm just resigned to the idea it's going to be very, very little.
I mean, they super are not the best troop choice in the game. I agree with you that they're better than some on here might be saying, but you can load up a harlequin with whatever melee weapon you want to give them, magically give them the ability to teleport 2" away from a unit of primaris marines and guarantee them the first turn, and the harlequins will lose that melee combat. And intercessors come with a 30" range gun...
Intercessors cost 17 points each. Obviously if you are evaluating troop quality you have to consider point cost. They also don't move as fast, don't ignore terrain, can't move over other models, can't advance and charge, can't fall back and shoot and charge, and don't have easy access to a 3++ and -1 to wound.
The whole point of my comment was they aren't actually great at killing stuff, but they shine for other reasons. You don't take them to kill stuff (though they aren't terrible at it with the wound reroll aura). 40k isn't only or even mainly a game about killing stuff. And troupes are absolutely excellent at doing what actually wins you 40k games.
I wouldn't worry too much about the Deathwatch rules being, thus far, a bit middling, once again their magic bolter ammo trick just got out-power creeped by other chapters tricks, to the point I'm not sure letting them use spec ammo with Bolter bonus' would be that bad
Harlies are in a slightly better place as they are already better than all (non spear) CWE melee and on par with wychys and inkys, so only need a few new options rather than obvious upgrades, so as long as the minion responsible for the Kabal traits in BoP is kept away should be fine
Honestly I prefer Banshees now! Piercing strike exarchs have added some serious punch to their damage capability, letting them threaten things like centurions, oblits and aggressors, which are exaclty the type of unit they want to be tying up anyway, and they were already an interesting toolbox unit.
grouchoben wrote: Honestly I prefer Banshees now! Piercing strike exarchs have added some serious punch to their damage capability, letting them threaten things like centurions, oblits and aggressors, which are exaclty the type of unit they want to be tying up anyway, and they were already an interesting toolbox unit.
I agree the Exarchs are now rather handy its just the 4 wound sponges that come with it are still mehh, yes they are fast but thats never really been an Eldar issue
I think it goes without saying that Harles are going to get very lazy treatment.
The only question is what that will be, since they can't just C&P rules onto them the way they could for Deathwatch. They have to give us *something* new.
yukishiro1 wrote: I think it goes without saying that Harles are going to get very lazy treatment.
The only question is what that will be, since they can't just C&P rules onto them the way they could for Deathwatch. They have to give us *something* new.
Or do you mean you're charging multiple different units with multiple different units of harles, all of which are threatening enough in combat to kill your harles if they strike first?
Mostly this.
If so...just don't do that? Target something else instead. Unless their whole army is combat, there should be a number of weaker, more tempting targets you'd be better going after instead.
5-man troupe squads are not deadly enough to really go toe to toe with anything in combat, whether they're striking first or not. So they shouldn't be used that way. Use them to bully stuff that doesn't want to be in combat...they're not going to do well thrown into combat specialists.
That's fair. Maybe I'm just stuck thinking of them as melee monsters like in previous editions. Back when initiative was a thing, always swinging first meant that I could throw them into lots of fights and count on surviving by virtue of removing enough of the enemy's attacks back before they swung.
These days, I can throw two squads of clowns at two different shoota boy squads and have the second squad of boyz interrupt and kill enough clowns to make it a bad trade. Against models that don't have good AP, we're basically only as durable as fire warriors or dire avengers, but we tend to cost more.
So then my followup question is: what should I be doing if I face an enemy with decent melee all over the place? Against something like orks, only charging a single clown squad per turn while the enemy lights me up with dakka or Da Jumps units into charge range seems like it surely shouldn't be the way to go. Or is it?
Well, the question isn't so much what's the best play in the abstract, the question is what do you need to do to win this particular game?
Harlequins aren't a top-tier competitive faction run mono (though they can soup with craftworlds into a top-tier list), but they especially aren't top-tier at killing stuff. If you are trying to win by tabling your opponent, it's really not a good army to pick.
If you're facing an army that will interrupt on you, it may still be the right play if charging multiple squads gets you something important even when one squad gets pasted. But if all it's getting you is that squad being killed in melee instead of on the next turn's shooting...the better play is probably to look for a way to move them somewhere they can't be shot, and ideally somewhere that will get you points while they're not being shot. This is, incidentally, the one thing quins are really good at - playing the mission through mobility.
That said, if you're in a position to trade a 5-man harle squad for a squad of ork boyz that is presumably 20+ models (does anyone take boyz squads of less than that?), that's usually a good trade to be making, because it cost your opponent at least 140 points to your ~80ish (you really shouldn't be spending more than this on a 5-man troupe).
They start on page 44, end on page 49, lol. Six pages. Same as Deathwatch got. One page for the cover, that leaves five pages for rules...which could actually be something significant, but it could also be five pages of garbage "make your own troupe" rules like genestealer cults got.
yukishiro1 wrote: They start on page 44, end on page 49, lol. Six pages. Same as Deathwatch got. One page for the cover, that leaves five pages for rules...which could actually be something significant, but it could also be five pages of garbage "make your own troupe" rules like genestealer cults got.
Well at least it can't be as bad and full of holes as the Deathwatch "update", so that's one bright side.
Amishprn86 wrote: As long as its not as bad as the Kabal custom traits i'll be fine.
One of the reasons the Kabals were bad was because they're basically a range army, were give a bunch of melee benefits, and that's about it.
Were any of the DE custom traits good? What I remember from looking at them is the overwhelming impression they were a waste of my time and I wouldn't look at them again...
Were any of the DE custom traits good? What I remember from looking at them is the overwhelming impression they were a waste of my time and I wouldn't look at them again...
There were a few combos that were solid, but GW promptly nerfed them via errata.
The kabals ones are not even fitting for them in any remote way or used to help them with that they needed.
Kabals was the EASY fix and they clearly didn't want to fix them. A few ideas that would not have been powerful, but list changing that and actual DE player could have came up with, examples:
-Splinter racks work with Splinter cannons and you get +1 to hit when using them and embarked on a transport with them -Dark lances are now assault weapons when equipped to Kabal warriors -Archon Aura effects <KABAL> units embarked in transports while the Archon is also embarked -Dark Lances when firing at a vehicle when rolling for damage now instead rolls 2D6 and pick the highest -Chain-Snares enemy non-vehicle units when choosing to fallback must roll a D6, on a 4+ that unit may fall back, otherwise it can not etc..
Sadly we got Venom spam is still good, and Talos are better than before, ok... but those were already being spammed, Splinter cannons, Raider + upgrades, Dark Lance, all not being used didn't get touched. Also i know at least 30 DE players that Email them asking to give Mercs the obsession keywords, yeah... that didn't happen
So for harlequins i would hope we can get something to give our Voidweavers and troupes a boost. What i am scared of is we will get something along the lines of Kabal a "new way to play them, but in a way that doesn't actually help them"
Some traits i would give us are: +6" to all vehicles gun range. This would make Void/Star weavers a slight advantage over Skyweavers, 30" range is huge for quins Great harlequin aura works on shooting as well Troupes always have -1 to be shot outside of 12" range Webway gate no longer has wounds or stats, it is no treated as terrain, aka lifts the placement restrictions and no longer can be destroyed Neuro pistols now have -1 to the enemies invul saves
Stratagem: A unit can shoot with as many grenades as it wants instead of 1. This works with troupes and Skyweavers, intent for the skyweavers.
Anyone tried running 12 man troupes On foot geared up for combat and had any luck? I’m designing my list and don’t want to go with soaring spite fusion boats. Planning on runnings 3x5 in Starweavers and 12-18 bikes. I quite fancy frozen stars or midnight sorrow. Just wondered if there’s any tips or tricks?
1 or 2 10-12 man troupes with fairly limited equipment (i.e. less than half with anything other than the base loadout) are very good in a soup list as an efficient way to hold the middle of the board; the ability to be on a 3++ with -1 to wound from the shadowseer aura for only 1CP, with the potential for -1 to hit and/or a 6+++, is what makes this work as a strategy, combined with all the rules they ignore as infantry that can advance/charge/fallback and effectively fly. This makes the best out of what they do well.
What foot troupes aren't very good at is going toe to toe with anything that's decent in melee - they will even struggle against stuff like intercessors, which cost the same points if you give the troupes a weapon. The basic problem is that there is no efficient weapon for killing T4 infantry with good saves, especially if they have multiple wounds - and given how much of the meta that is, they just don't work out well.
But that's the story of quins generally right now - good in soup where you can supplement them with stuff that actually has damage output and/or durability, not very good as mono.
That said, I'd wait a week or two to do anything re: quins at all, as we should get a preview by then with some idea what if anything they're getting in the WD issue. It'll probably be disappointing and change nothing, but I would wait to see before investing time and money in units that may be about to change.
Malefic666 wrote: Anyone tried running 12 man troupes On foot geared up for combat and had any luck? I’m designing my list and don’t want to go with soaring spite fusion boats. Planning on runnings 3x5 in Starweavers and 12-18 bikes. I quite fancy frozen stars or midnight sorrow. Just wondered if there’s any tips or tricks?
It depends on your loca, is there a lot of Ignore LoS weapons? DO you have a lot of LoS blocking terrain? Etc..
But you can make 1x12 work really well with stratagems and powers. You can make them -1, pseudo -2 to be hit, 3++ instead of 4++ and they can move 30" turn 1.
Move 8", Advance stratagem move 6" (14") +D6" with advance, Twilight pathways for another 8+D6, so on average its 29"
You can also take them to stop OW, now you are -2, 3++, stop overwatch, 29" movement.
It seems like the big winners here are Death Jesters, which now 100% have a place in any kind of quin list that uses any melee, and troupes, which now have a lot of great new tricks to actually kill things and keep things in melee. Stop Hitting Yourself solitaire got a nice boost as well, and troupe masters now have a new best relic weapon option (IMO at least) in the twilights fang.
I am really torn on these. On the one hand, I like the concept of new character-focused abilities, and there is some nifty stuff in there, especially for death jesters, who just went from zero to hero.
There are some great relics there too. But we're still limited to two extra relics - and still stuck paying 3CP for it - inexplicably not getting the "1CP per additional relic" strat modern codexes get. Would it really have been too hard to update that?
The strats are mostly good, but extremely CP-heavy, for an army that was already very CP-reliant. The +1 damage goes a long way to making troupes capable of taking on 2W infantry, but 2CP is a lot to pay for that.
And there's nothing to make mono quins more viable. In fact, by focusing so much on only-on-one character abilities and stratagems - also limited to once a phase - these changes only exacerbate quins as a soup detachment rather than a viable separate army.
What quins desperately needed wasn't more reasons to take them as a detachment in eldar soup - that was already very attractive and now will be almost mandatory - it was a reason to actually take them as a mono army. By ignoring base rule improvements in favor of stuff that only works on a single unit, these rule go in precisely the opposite direction.
I more like the fact that a Solitaire can become unhittable now. Combine with Suit of Knives for even more hilarity.
Also I know the Deathwatch are charged with eliminating Xenos, but I didn't think they'd go so far as to break the fourth wall to sabotage one of their stratagems.
BaconCatBug wrote: I more like the fact that a Solitaire can become unhittable now. Combine with Suit of Knives for even more hilarity.
Also I know the Deathwatch are charged with eliminating Xenos, but I didn't think they'd go so far as to break the fourth wall to sabotage one of their stratagems.
-1 from new rule thingy, -1 from lightning reflexes, -1 from veil of tears, -1 to hit on enemy unit with fog of dreams...what am I missing, that would turn a 6 into a 2.
The new shrieker relic is pretty wild. More range than curtainfall and flat 3 damage on the shrieker profile (though -1STR and can't use the +1STR strat) and flat -3AP on both. Combined with the new role, if you're shooting a unit of 6, that's going to typically be 3 S6 -3 3D hits, each of which causes another 1d3 mortal wounds for each shot that kills - that's pretty crazy for a 45 point model. Also - and I'm sure this will be FAQed - RAW the -2LD from this relic stacks with the -2LD from a normal shrieker or curtainfall (curtainfall specifically says it doesn't stack, this one says nothing about it, so RAW it does stack). Or if you run it dreaming shadow with the sniper role, that's a 48 inch range character sniping rifle that for 1CP hits twice for each hit (or three hits on a 6). That's 6D worth of shots (whether 2 3D or 6 1D) at -3AP plus the fish for mortal wounds and ignoring cover, which will statistically kill most characters without an invuln in one round, and force your opponent to play carefully even with characters that do have invulns because there's always a chance they fail that save and poof goes the character. Normally I am not a fan of snipers but for 45 points and no need to commit until you see your opponent's army I think this will see a lot of play.
The domino shroud looks potentially very powerful too, because you can activate it at the end of any phase - meaning you can actually teleport the bearer out of combat at the end of your opponent's charge phase after your opponent charges you. You can also use this at the end of your opponent's shooting phase to teleport then heroically intervene in their charge phase - it disables charging if you use it in your turn and requires you to set up 1 inch away from enemy models, but doesn't say anything about heroically intervening if you end up within 3 inches of an enemy model. You could gate out during their charge phase and then heroically intervene, but both effects happen at the end of the turn, and your opponent gets to chose the resolution order, so they can prevent you from doing that - but as long as you do it at the end of the shooting phase you're fine.
BaconCatBug wrote: I more like the fact that a Solitaire can become unhittable now. Combine with Suit of Knives for even more hilarity.
Also I know the Deathwatch are charged with eliminating Xenos, but I didn't think they'd go so far as to break the fourth wall to sabotage one of their stratagems.
-1 from new rule thingy, -1 from lightning reflexes, -1 from veil of tears, -1 to hit on enemy unit with fog of dreams...what am I missing, that would turn a 6 into a 2.
Drain from an allied Craftworlds detachment, since Drain affects the target unit and not the Solitaire itself, they suffer -1 to hit even though the Solitaire isn't Craftworlds. Also works if the enemy is dumb enough to use their Powerfist or Thunder Hammers instead of the base profile CCW.
Suit of hidden knives is situational though, the opponent isn't required to pile in so with clever casualty removal you won't inflict crap for damage unless your trying to hunt characters, an even then, not sure it's worth the investment since they had to already survive the solitaires attacks.
I will concede that it is funny in certain situations if your making Dante of Abby hit themselves, but that is so many moving parts. Three psychic powers from two factions plus 2 cp.
Personally I'd rather blitz and use murderous assault with those 2 CP and just wreck the guy, consolidate 6 (midnight sorrow) then I can either consolidate again 6" for 1cp or I can use the Domino to blink out of site.
Just him being -2 is enough for him to be really scary tho. Not only is he -2 to be hit, but a 3++ and a melee monster. Having any relic on him at that point is going to work.
Suit of Knives IMO is for sure gimmicky, but vs some units even if only 3 gets to fight it'll completely destroy that unit (DC, Genestealers or Abs, Shining Spears, etc..)
The best thing about suit of knives, and all of these changes, is that you don't have to commit to it until you know precisely what army you are facing. You don't take it (or the new -1 to hit instead of blitz) as a base choice, but it's an option there as a potential counter for certain armies.
Honestly, this is the best thing about these changes - literally everything in them can be tailored to your specific opponent and costs you nothing in terms of prior commitment. The only thing I can see that does require some prior commitment is the power sword relic - if you want to preserve the option, you have your gimp your troupe master's melee ability if you don't take it. But even that is only a loss of 1S vs the embrace he'd probably otherwise have, which is not that big a deal for the option to take a relic that turns him into an actual combat threat, something he just didn't have in his locker before.
That said, a solitaire really isn't much of a melee monster by modern standards. Being stuck at S4/5, -1/-2AP, and 1/1d3 damage really limits his ability in a world where melee units with 2+ saves and/or multiple wounds are a thing. Even with the Rose, he's very limited in the targets he can threaten compared to, say, a smash captain. Even with the rose he can't really hurt centurions, for example, or sanguinary guard.
yukishiro1 wrote: The best thing about suit of knives, and all of these changes, is that you don't have to commit to it until you know precisely what army you are facing. You don't take it (or the new -1 to hit instead of blitz) as a base choice, but it's an option there as a potential counter for certain armies.
Honestly, this is the best thing about these changes - literally everything in them can be tailored to your specific opponent and costs you nothing in terms of prior commitment. The only thing I can see that does require some prior commitment is the power sword relic - if you want to preserve the option, you have your gimp your troupe master's melee ability if you don't take it. But even that is only a loss of 1S vs the embrace he'd probably otherwise have, which is not that big a deal for the option to take a relic that turns him into an actual combat threat, something he just didn't have in his locker before.
I think there's actually an argument to be made that you take the power sword on him for that reason - if you don't take the Fang, you're still S3 AP-3 D1 reroll wounds, which isn't terrible for his 64pt cost.
There is solo the mental fight going on. They might do eveything they can to stay away from it with the Suit. So you could force your opponent to move where you want them to and to play how you want them to play.
Imagine a CWE player with 2x6 Shining Spears, there is no way he will get near that guy, hitting on 5+, not wanting to use re-rolls to hit (so no guide) could force him to stay away as he is extremely fast.
yukishiro1 wrote: The best thing about suit of knives, and all of these changes, is that you don't have to commit to it until you know precisely what army you are facing. You don't take it (or the new -1 to hit instead of blitz) as a base choice, but it's an option there as a potential counter for certain armies.
Honestly, this is the best thing about these changes - literally everything in them can be tailored to your specific opponent and costs you nothing in terms of prior commitment. The only thing I can see that does require some prior commitment is the power sword relic - if you want to preserve the option, you have your gimp your troupe master's melee ability if you don't take it. But even that is only a loss of 1S vs the embrace he'd probably otherwise have, which is not that big a deal for the option to take a relic that turns him into an actual combat threat, something he just didn't have in his locker before.
I think there's actually an argument to be made that you take the power sword on him for that reason - if you don't take the Fang, you're still S3 AP-3 D1 reroll wounds, which isn't terrible for his 64pt cost.
You definitely take the power sword on him, there's no doubt about that. The 4 points for the -3AP is well worth it, and you only end up -1S vs what you'd be with an embrace. So the commitment cost there is pretty minor too.
And with the relic, a troupe master can actually threaten elite multi-wound melee, which the solitaire just can't - -3AP 2D is massively better for taking out high-save, multi-wound infantry than anything a solitaire can do, even with the Rose.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Wow, I hadn't really looked carefully at Twilit (yay spelling) Encore - that is super powerful, because unlike the white scars version you can end your consolidate back within combat range, and you can also use it even if you're still in combat with something else - even if you're based, because it says you can end closer to either the closest model or the unit that's falling back. That's crazily powerful for 1CP. Most units are simply not going to be able to get out of combat with a troupe unit now, and the implications this has against armies like T'au are immense, especially if your troupe is silent shroud and can ignore overwatch to get in in the first place.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Honestly, the more I look at this package, the more insanely powerful it is. I am genuinely afraid of what this is likely to do to the already-very-powerful eldar soup MSU expert crafters list. I doubt some of the stuff in here - like being able to jump out of combat before they hit back, fight again, and then jump out AGAIN - is going to survive a FAQ, even if it does cost 5CP to pull off.
yukishiro1 wrote: The new shrieker relic is pretty wild. More range than curtainfall and flat 3 damage on the shrieker profile (though -1STR and can't use the +1STR strat) and flat -3AP on both. Combined with the new role, if you're shooting a unit of 6, that's going to typically be 3 S6 -3 3D hits, each of which causes another 1d3 mortal wounds for each shot that kills - that's pretty crazy for a 45 point model. Also - and I'm sure this will be FAQed - RAW the -2LD from this relic stacks with the -2LD from a normal shrieker or curtainfall (curtainfall specifically says it doesn't stack, this one says nothing about it, so RAW it does stack). Or if you run it dreaming shadow with the sniper role, that's a 48 inch range character sniping rifle that for 1CP hits twice for each hit (or three hits on a 6). That's 6D worth of shots (whether 2 3D or 6 1D) at -3AP plus the fish for mortal wounds and ignoring cover, which will statistically kill most characters without an invuln in one round, and force your opponent to play carefully even with characters that do have invulns because there's always a chance they fail that save and poof goes the character. Normally I am not a fan of snipers but for 45 points and no need to commit until you see your opponent's army I think this will see a lot of play.
The domino shroud looks potentially very powerful too, because you can activate it at the end of any phase - meaning you can actually teleport the bearer out of combat at the end of your opponent's charge phase after your opponent charges you. You can also use this at the end of your opponent's shooting phase to teleport then heroically intervene in their charge phase - it disables charging if you use it in your turn and requires you to set up 1 inch away from enemy models, but doesn't say anything about heroically intervening if you end up within 3 inches of an enemy model. You could gate out during their charge phase and then heroically intervene, but both effects happen at the end of the turn, and your opponent gets to chose the resolution order, so they can prevent you from doing that - but as long as you do it at the end of the shooting phase you're fine.
Edit. I missed the part with the role included. That is very good for a 45 point model!
Sterling191 wrote: Im genuinely enjoying the character focused nature of the update.
This is quite obvious.
Not my liking since I emphasis troupes and skyweavers.
Plenty of solid tools in there for both, tbh. The free passive ability swaps are only for characters, but most of the stratagems are amazing for troupes.
Yeah, troupes for sure got a lot better. We basically have the Genestealer stratagem combo going now that made them very scary from day one of their codex and its why to this day everyone focus's them asap still.
I can see large 10-12 man Frozen Stars Troupe units being very good against most targets when coupled with the +1 damage strat and the consolidate back into combat strat.
At least one Death Jester, preferrably two IMHO, with the relic is almost mandatory in any list that includes Harlequins now.
A souped up Troupe Master with the Twilight Fang, re-roll wounds, and the strat to add an extra Pivotal Role, such as the always wound non-monsters and vehicles on 2+, should really help deal with heavy infantry such as Centurions and Aggressors, which Harlequins can really struggle to kill quickly or efficiently in melee.
My only (slight) disappointment is that there wasn't much to buff up ranged attacks. I was hoping for at least something like +1 to wound vehicles or +1 damage when targeting a monster or vehicle with shooting.
Just out of interest, how many CPs do you guys usually run? (Mono quins @2k).
I'm running 2 battalions atm but wondering if switching to a brigade might be better to squeeze out as many CP as I can and take advantage of the new strats.
They are debatable.
I usually run three of them.
They are objective campers and blasting away.
Since they are in the backfield in the most cases, they are not top priority for the enemy and so they often live a bit longer - longer than one thinks.
There are some great relics there too. But we're still limited to two extra relics - and still stuck paying 3CP for it - inexplicably not getting the "1CP per additional relic" strat modern codexes get.
By "modern codexes" I assume you actually mean "Space marines".
I'm still leaning towards Dreaming Shadow for my eventual force as having a free Marine Ancient on everyone is awesome for full squads. Plus they will make the best use of the Relic Jester.
There are some great relics there too. But we're still limited to two extra relics - and still stuck paying 3CP for it - inexplicably not getting the "1CP per additional relic" strat modern codexes get.
By "modern codexes" I assume you actually mean "Space marines".
I would think Ynnari Quins would still get to use Pivotal Roles.
There are some great relics there too. But we're still limited to two extra relics - and still stuck paying 3CP for it - inexplicably not getting the "1CP per additional relic" strat modern codexes get.
By "modern codexes" I assume you actually mean "Space marines".
Well, no, I don't, seeing as Ynnari and Sisters also have it off the top of my head, and I wouldn't be surprised if others do too as well. It is clearly the modern approach.
There are some great relics there too. But we're still limited to two extra relics - and still stuck paying 3CP for it - inexplicably not getting the "1CP per additional relic" strat modern codexes get.
By "modern codexes" I assume you actually mean "Space marines".
Well, no, I don't, seeing as Ynnari and Sisters also have it off the top of my head, and I wouldn't be surprised if others do too as well. It is clearly the modern approach.
My point was that most of the other armies have not received this update either, so I don't see why Harlequins would.
There are some great relics there too. But we're still limited to two extra relics - and still stuck paying 3CP for it - inexplicably not getting the "1CP per additional relic" strat modern codexes get.
By "modern codexes" I assume you actually mean "Space marines".
I would think Ynnari Quins would still get to use Pivotal Roles.
I dunno actually, don't Ynnari not get exarch powers because <reasons>? If so, these seem like those.
Even if they do, you definitely wouldn't get the new strats or relics.
GW simply are allergic to consistency. Why have they given Harlequns a stratagem they can use on non-Harlequins when GW have constantly pushed away from cross faction stratagems even if they keywords match, but also keep the ability for CSM stratagems to work on Death Guard and Thousand Sons?
There are some great relics there too. But we're still limited to two extra relics - and still stuck paying 3CP for it - inexplicably not getting the "1CP per additional relic" strat modern codexes get.
By "modern codexes" I assume you actually mean "Space marines".
Well, no, I don't, seeing as Ynnari and Sisters also have it off the top of my head, and I wouldn't be surprised if others do too as well. It is clearly the modern approach.
My point was that most of the other armies have not received this update either, so I don't see why Harlequins would.
So your point was actually something different than the point you made. That's fine, thanks for clearing it up.
I agree re: other factions not getting the update either, but that is also inexplicable. There is no reason that factions with a codex released post-SM2.0 get 1 CP relics and older ones don't. It is inexplicable that they did not update this with the PA releases for each faction. It clearly isn't some intentional thing; every new release has got it. They updated bolster discipline etc - why not update this too?
Because GW want to keep the fiction alive that their books are worth buying. When the books become more errata than book, why would people bother buying them?
Changing one strat isn't exactly a big deal. They were willing to do much bigger things to every space marine faction, so I don't think that explains it. As long as you have a new book to sell people to do the errata that seems to satisfy the $$$ imperative.
Honestly I think the answer is they probably forgot/overlooked it with Phoenix Rising, which only came out a little while after SM2.0, and then decided it would be too embarrassing to have to errata PA1 if they started doing it with PA2+. If the PA release had been delayed by a couple months I think it is very likely every faction would have got 1CP relics.
Yeah, it really is. Just requiring a hit means it's pretty much 100% guaranteed - even with big -hit modifiers you're going to hit at least one of three shots with base hitting on 2s. It's an assault weapon too, so the threat range is quite good, even with the base 24 inch gun. And a 5 wound character with a 4++ is actually a pretty tough to remove delivery platform, especially considering the almost trivially low 45 point cost.
The -2 movement is a lot better than it seems at first, too. Combined with the consolidate on fall back strat, the amount of stuff you can prevent from being able to fall back out of combat with a troupes unit is deceptively large - the basic Tau shield drones, for example, and, if you can mostly surround them, even stuff like repulsors on max profile - if they have to move over or past one of your troupe models, 8 inches doesn't get them far enough that your own 6 inch consolidate can't get you back to tagging them.
It's also worth noting while on that subject that because Twilight Encore happens during the movement phase, even though it's a consolidate move, your troupes can ignore terrain and enemy models when making that move - so you can jump right over screens to follow the retreating <fly> unit, assuming there's somewhere for your model(s) to land.
DJ's are only 45 points, which means you can max out all 3 at just 135 points. That's 3 Knights that can be pinned, 3 LR tanks, ,3 squads of Fire Warriors and so on...
BaconCatBug wrote: Because GW want to keep the fiction alive that their books are worth buying. When the books become more errata than book, why would people bother buying them?
Hey if they want to release all the pointless garbage in 40$ books and all the good rules in White Dwarfs, I'm A-OK with that as a step forward.
They are debatable.
I usually run three of them.
They are objective campers and blasting away.
Since they are in the backfield in the most cases, they are not top priority for the enemy and so they often live a bit longer - longer than one thinks.
Cheers, yeh I'm thinking maybe they're not so bad after all, do you take them with haywire or prism cannons?
I would think it'd usually work out better to just take another battalion with 3x5 troupes and 2 troupe masters than go up to a brigade, because that requires not only taking three voidweavers but also splitting up your bikes into smaller units, which really isn't ideal - unless you're taking 18 bikes already I guess, but in that case, just split them into an outrider and take the CP from that for free IMO rather than paying 270 points for voidweavers to get 1 more CP.
Voidweavers just don't get there competitively. It's fine in a fluffy list but playing mono quins is gimping yourself enough already competitively without compounding it by spending nearly 300 points of your list on the only unit in the codex that is genuinely not very good.
yukishiro1 wrote: I would think it'd usually work out better to just take another battalion with 3x5 troupes and 2 troupe masters than go up to a brigade, because that requires not only taking three voidweavers but also splitting up your bikes into smaller units, which really isn't ideal - unless you're taking 18 bikes already I guess, but in that case, just split them into an outrider and take the CP from that for free IMO rather than paying 270 points for voidweavers to get 1 more CP.
Voidweavers just don't get there competitively. It's fine in a fluffy list but playing mono quins is gimping yourself enough already competitively without compounding it by spending nearly 300 points of your list on the only unit in the codex that is genuinely not very good.
For now i do agree with double battalion, but i do disagree with a Voidweaver can no be competitive, as that depends on the mission type you are playing, sometimes you just want a cheap unit with some fire power sitting in back shooting thats not taking a lot of threat. Or if you are playing super MSU with 12 vehicles.
One of my best games was 3 voidweavers and 9 starweavers (still had 12 bikes too) I got to top table in a 20 man event, lost only to first player b.c its ITC and i was giving up to many points (I hate ITC for that reason, you can't build a list like you can in GW missions, you need to build one dedicated to stopping and taking secondaries). I do much better in GW missions.
Well sure, everything is "competitive" in the sense that it's possible to win games with. Even stuff that is legitimately terrible like mutilators *can* be successful. And voidweavers certainly aren't as bad as mutilators. But when I say competitive I don't mean "is it possible to use these in a winning list," I mean "is this a compelling use of points."
No range, no durability aside from the invuln, no real shooting power, and no indirect fire is not a particularly competitive package, especially compared to all the hugely competitive choices the aeldari superfaction has in the same role. Like if you compare what 3x voidweavers do for a quins list to what taking a 3x night spinner detachment does for your army competitively...let's just say the comparison isn't pretty. Sure, the nightspinners cost a bit more, but they completely transform the way you have to play because they give you indirect ranged threat, which is totally game-changing re: how your opponent has to approach the game. Whereas the voidweavers just add a few more 24 inch range shots on an army that already has plenty of ability to kill stuff if you're that close. Or if you just want something to shoot with, there are plenty of better choices for that too in the craftworlds list - wraithlords, war walkers, falcons, vibro cannons, crimson hunter exarchs, etc. Voidweavers simply can't compete in mathhammer against stuff vs the brutal efficiency of expert crafters/masterful shots.
The basic problem is that voidweavers pay a lot of points for mobility in a list where you just don't need more mobility. And the biggest problem is that even if you're committed to playing mono quins (which is not the competitive choice to begin with), another unit of 6 bikes is usually going to do more for you than 3 voidweavers.
Voidweavers might even be decent in other superfactions, where that mobility adds something the superfaction doesn't already have. But in aeldari...there are other choices that just do what you want voidweavers to do, but better. It really can't be overstated how much the EC/MS combo changes the math re: shooting competitiveness.
I mean I am happy to be proven wrong. But I doubt you are going to see anybody using voidweavers in competitive tournament lists any time soon, certainly not while EC/MS stays unnerfed.
There is a difference in terrible and is fine, a Voidweaver is fine. Look at Venoms, 65pts vs the 90pts, thats 25pts difference and you are getting better everything other than range Its like the jump from a Raider to a Ravager in power level and point values. When looking at the big picture with all the buffs, damage, options, abilities, etc.. Voidweavers honestly are in a fine place. Do they need a little support to be worth it over Skyweavers? Sure. Are they a terrible unit? No. And i do use that mobility, quins are not suppose to stand and gun. Going up and down terrain to stop being charged, to get clear LoS, etc.. is a key part of the unit and the army.
As you said tho other things can do what they do better, but that doesn't mean they are bad. Looking at pure math and nothing else, why play quins at all then? At a certain point flavor needs to over come value. And when something works but has other better options, if it works it works.
Oh I agree, they're fine. That's a great description of them.
Maybe it's just a terminology thing, but for me, competitive is a rank above fine (and two ranks above terrible). IMO, every choice in the harlequin codex is competitive except voidweavers, which are fine (Death jesters used to also be fine, but are super competitive with the changes).
I guess i'm different, as for me DJ were very competitive even before the updates. Being able to put them behind cover for 45pts with character protection means they never die any game. They could hold points, in ITC help with recon, BEL, etc.. they help me win every game just as much as units made to kill. Not other unit for 45pts for less is as survivable objective holder that i can think of. Sure he doesn't have ObjSec, but that only come sup once every 5 games for me honestly, and its when i go after someone with my troupes when it does come up.
For me value isn't just raw damage. Its points vs usefulness.
I think it depends whether you're considering aeldari overall or committed to mono quins. I think DJs are competitive in a mono quins list even before the changes (if we assume that's even a thing), but only fine if you're picking from the whole aeldari superfaction. Obviously post-changes they are hugely competitive in soup as well.
Unit value is obviously not just about raw damage, or even mostly about raw damage. 40k is won by moving and holding more than by doing damage. IMO troupes are probably the best single unit in the whole codex for aeldari soup (yes, even better than bikes), despite being quite anemic at actually doing damage for their points cost.
The reason I don't rate voidweavers isn't that they are bad at doing damage per se; it's that they are a damage-focused unit that isn't very good at doing damage. Everything besides damage they can do is done better by something else in the same codex, much less something else in the same superfaction, but they're not particularly good at doing damage either. So that leaves them in an awkward place. They aren't downright bad, but I cannot think of any role they do better than other choices, which means they can't be considered competitive in my mind.
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vipoid wrote: Do you think a Vanguard of Death Jesters - one with each of the new abilities - would be worth it?
I think this definitely has potential as dreaming shadow. I have one in the list I've been kicking around for the last 24 hours. Right now I am running it with a second shadowseer with the -1A aura since that isn't <masque> locked, and none of the shadowseer's other powers are locked either. Though if I was only going to run one shadowseer I'd definitely take it in the main masque and take a troupe master instead.
I am not so hot on the vanguard in any other masque; at that point I'd just take 1 or maybe 2 jesters in the main battalion instead. This also assumes you're taking two bats (presumably 1 craftworlds 1 quins for the most competitive list). I think quins really need at least a double bat to function now, so I would not run a vanguard unless it's in addition to that double bat.
The other option for a vanguard I guess is that if you aren't philosophically opposed to mixing masques in a detachment, and are not running either dreaming shadow or midnight sorrow as your main masque, you can take a mixed bat with a midnight sorrow troupe master and solitaire and two dreaming shadow death jesters. They don't get the bonuses but it gives you access to the two strats (and Curtainfall, though that seems like much less of a consideration than before).
Ok thanks for the replies re voidweavers guys, that's pretty much what I was thinking, they're ok but don't really give me anything I need.
Also I totally get the comp argument for mixed lists but with these new rules I really want to see how far I can push mono harlies rn. Plus pure clowns is so much fun to play.
Will probably try out both brigade and double batt, but leaning towards the double batt atm, just know I'm going to need as many CP as I can get.
Double bat + a vanguard or spearhead is only 1CP less than a brigade and usually really easy to make - especially the vanguard; if you're playing mono quins you're probably taking 5 HQ and a solitaire and DJ anyway, so at that point a vanguard only needs 1 more DJ, which seems like a solid choice after the changes anyway, so it's practically free. I guess maybe the 5th HQ depends on whether you consider Cat Lady to be violating your mono quin rule or not - I can see the argument that you only want 4 HQs in the list if you don't take her.
vipoid wrote: Do you think a Vanguard of Death Jesters - one with each of the new abilities - would be worth it?
My first thought when I saw the rules, I have a list kicking around somewhere of mixed Aeldari with a Dreaming Shadow Vanguard of
* Rose Solitaire
* Curtainfall DJ
* DJ
and I always looked sadly at the last DJ that felt underwhelming as the Curtainfall guy would receive all the strats and he would be left alone until the other one died.
Now I'd maybe drop the Solitaire for a 3rd DJ:
* Curtainfall with +12" range
* Lament with extra hits
* Regular Dude with pinning
The traits on the Relic guys are swappable depending on your preference, you get either:
- 42" Curtainfall & 36" Lament with extra hits
- 30" Curtainfall with extra hits & 48" Lament
The point anyway is that the non-Jest will be targeted by An Example Made, so one Relic gets 3x hits and the other gets 2x, and one of them gets Shrieking Doom depending on the need.
IMO neither of the DJ relics are strong enough to be autopicks, nor is the double-hit strat good enough to be used in every game - but the value is in having the options there against the lists where they are really good.
While we're on the subject, how do you folks read "An Example Made" re: when it has to be declared? It just says "during the shooting phase." I have always read it to mean you have to declare its use before you actually fire the shot...but do you think there's an argument you can wait to see what the hit roll is before triggering it?
yukishiro1 wrote: IMO neither of the DJ relics are strong enough to be autopicks, nor is the double-hit strat good enough to be used in every game - but the value is in having the options there against the lists where they are really good.
Fully agree, Curtainfall was good by itself (if not autopick) to make one DJ, but taken along Lament (and the DS strat) the value is more than the sum of the parts. It's about having options of which to boost and when.
As to when to trigger the strat, let's compare the wording with Shrieking Doom:
Shrieking Doom wrote:Use this Stratagem before a DEATH JESTER from your
army shoots a shrieker cannon or Curtainfall [...]
An Example Made wrote:Use this Stratagem in your Shooting phase. Select a
DREAMING SHADOW CHARACTER from your army. [...]
So RAI seems to point to it being when you want, however:
An Example Made wrote:Until the end of the phase, each successful hit roll [...]
ie by RAW it's pretty easy to argue that the ability applies from the moment you use the strat until the end of the phase, which means that if you declare after having hit then there are no more hit rolls happening after you using the strat, hence no bonus hits.
Command point management is going to be a nightmare now as the temptation to take extra relics and Pivotal Roles is going to be very difficult to resist.
Well, you can only take 2 extra relics thanks to them not updating that bit, so the most you can spend on it is the 3CP. I dunno if that is good news or not, especially given how strong the argument is for taking 3, even with the dumb "old codex" tax on it. IMO there are like 5 really strong choices now and another 3-4 that are competitive on a situational basis. Lots of hard choices to be made...
sweetbacon wrote:Command point management is going to be a nightmare now as the temptation to take extra relics and Pivotal Roles is going to be very difficult to resist.
Just for the record the Pivotal Roles the swap is free, it's only if you want it on top of the vanilla one that you'll need a CP which may make refraining on the splurge a bit easier. New strats will be eying for your CP as well
yukishiro1 wrote:Well, you can only take 2 extra relics thanks to them not updating that bit, so the most you can spend on it is the 3CP. I dunno if that is good news or not, especially given how strong the argument is for taking 3, even with the dumb "old codex" tax on it. IMO there are like 5 really strong choices now and another 3-4 that are competitive on a situational basis. Lots of hard choices to be made...
I know you read it as an old vs new codex, but to me when they started coming out I felt is was more of a bling vs non-bling codex - ie Marines & Sisters who may have a lot of relics whereas it's rarer in other armies. I guess future releases will tell us what the pattern is.
Previously, I'd just take the Rose and call it a day but now, I think we are positively spoiled for choice when it comes to relics. So, I think taking three plus spending one or two CP to power up a Solitaire or Troupe Master with a second Pivotal Role, will be quite common. I think triple battalion might be required to run optimized mono Quins that fully take advantage of the synergies the new strats and relics provide.
Maybe, though they gave it to Ynnari too, and I dunno why they would be "blingier" than all other Aeldari.
Re: pivotal roles, reading it again, it looks like if you swap, you have to put that on your list, not choose it before the game. So that does raise the value of the 1CP somewhat because it allows you to tech against your opponent.
Based on that understanding, I think for troupe masters and shadowseers you're pretty much always going to be leaving the base on one because both base auras are so good, with the opportunity to tech; for duplicates of either model you presumably replace.
For DJs you will want to replace with the overwatch in almost every list; if you take two DJs you *might* want to leave the base ability on the second so you can tech between the two roles. If you take three you probably replace on all three, especially given that wrapping isn't as important any more which takes most of the value out of the base ability - the only time I ever really get use out of it is in preventing someone from removing the one model you've wrapped, and even that is super rare.
Solitaire is the one I have a hardest time knowing what to do with. I am tempted to say you keep blitz and then shell out the CP if you need to, but I'm not sure if that's just because I can't figure out how useful the abilities are likely to be, rather than because there is really an argument for choosing different ones against different opponents.
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sweetbacon wrote: Previously, I'd just take the Rose and call it a day but now, I think we are positively spoiled for choice when it comes to relics. So, I think taking three will be plus spending one or two CP to power up a Solitaire or Troupe Master with a second Pivotal Role, will be quite common. I think triple battalion might be required to run optimized mono Quins that fully take advantage of the synergies the new strats and relics provide.
I don't think you need triple batt; with the ability to get reroll charges without the warlord trait, player of the twilight strikes me as almost always the best choice, and that is good for a reliable 3CP over the game, usually more. Double batt + vanguard/outrider + the trait is a reliable 17 and usually more like 19, which really ought to be plenty. I think the "+1 to charge if you already reroll charges" is mostly a trap; quins really aren't a deepstrike charging faction and that is the only place where that +1 is likely to be relevant.
Few units in all of 40k can mess with your opponent's mind like the Solitaire. The ability to have him deep strike for free with a decent chance of getting a charge off or to set up a more advantageous blitz OR blitz and then stack two or three negative hit modifiers on him if you're running suit of hidden knives may just be too good to pass up (although the second would be very situational). The six inch consolidate, which could possibly nine, and the ability to fight twice or fight on death is sure to add to your (poor) opponent's cognitive load as they worry about protecting their precious characters from a solitaire who can bounce around the board even better than before.
I don't see a whole lot of synergy between the deep strike ability and blitz, given that solitaires are typically in combat or dead, and in neither case can you blitz.
I'm also torn on the synergy between blitz and chromatic rush. I want to say it is pretty awesome to be able to blitz then pile in 6 and consolidate 6 (or a crazy 9 if midnight sorrow), but when I really think about it, given that the 6 inch advance is usually better than the +2d6 blitz move, it feels like paying 1CP for 2 extra attacks once per game that are awkward to trigger, and I'm not sure that's a great trade.
The -1 is just straight up good obviously no matter what, and I guess if you're inclined to take that, you probably want to retain blitz because otherwise you're giving up the movement potential that makes the model so scary.
Right now to me it seems to mostly come down to whether I am really going to want to use the DS one in some matchups. If I do want that option I'll probably keep blitz and tech; if I don't, I'll probably just replace it with chromatic rush and save the CP, because chromatic rush is straight-up amazing.
Yes, can't believe I forgot to mention Chromatic Rush, yes it is amazing. If you get Twilight Pathways off then there are very few places on the board your opponent's characters can hide.
Yeah, and that's what makes me question how often I'd really want to use the DS role. It just seems like you have a lot more control if you start him on the board; I don't like being at the mercy of screening and especially of just failing your charge: 3d6 discarding the lowest is still only about a 50% chance of success, or about 70% with a cp reroll. That's about 10% too low even with the CP for my comfort level.
I dunno, most of the time I think I'd rather have only chromatic rush than blitz *and* the -1, even if it *didn't* save a CP.
Maybe I'm wrong, but right now I'm thinking that if I kept blitz and added something, at least 90% of the time it'd be chromatic rush, not the -1...and that at that point, it isn't worth paying 1CP to keep blitz if you're taking chromatic rush too.
Death Jester is the clear winner here, all 3 pivotal roles are powerful and useful (worth using all) and for me pinning a unit so they can’t overwatch is just what we needed. I can’t be bothered rewriting all the tactics here as they’re all on the Harlequins reddit but there’s some seriously good stuff in these 6 pages of rules. Really small things to pick up on, for example when playing Curtain Falls on say a Solitaire you get to use your flip belt, which is huge, and if you fight twice you get to move again (obviously as it’s move inserted or consolidate or fall back) so you can move -> fight -> move -> fight -> move. Obviously you’ll need to think hard about what you declare charges against but that stratagem alone is insane. That With Cegorach’s Rose and Chromatic Rush you will be able to do some really cool stuff, Midnight Sorrow consolidating 9” and when that doesn’t work use Curtain Falls. Just so cool.
when playing Curtain Falls on say a Solitaire you get to use your flip belt, which is huge, and if you fight twice you get to move again (obviously as it’s move inserted or consolidate or fall back) so you can move -> fight -> move -> fight -> move.
That probably won't work, since moving "as if it were your Movement phase" instead of consolidating prevents you from getting within 1" of an enemy unit, so I see no legal way to fight twice if using Curtain Falls.
Hmm yes true, as it says ‘instead of consolidating’. But if you can’t move within 1” then can’t you just play the Curtain Falls strat then move, then use fight twice strat and pile in 3”/6”? As long as you declared a charge against the unit and it’s within 12” you can fight it right? I’ll admit my understanding of the rules is tested by these new Harlequins rules.
If that’s not the case then oh well, use it on bikes then. Move 16” -> advance D6” -> charge 2D6” -> move 16” back out of LOS. I am honestly in awe of how fun and imaginative these new rules are. I was always a bit in the “GW can’t write good rules” but this release has won me over.
Some random character setups since the new WD Pivotal Roles and relics. Just for fun:
Solitaire with Unnatural Acrobatics and Suit of Hidden Knives. I am operating under the assumption that the -1 from Unnatural Acrobatics means to-hit rolls of 2 become 1 and trigger the Suit ability. Just for the idea of the flailing enemy blundering onto the knives of the suit for extra lolz.
Troupe Master with Darkness' Bite and Player of the Dark for "maximum darkness" theme. Add the Veil of Tears relic for more survivability. Grinding out 2 automatic MW each time it fights even if it misses with every attack. There's no fluff saying how the Darkness' Bite ability work but I can imagine a "Omae wa mou shindeiru" (You are already dead) meme situation.
Hi all. So I’ve been trying to figure out if we can use The Curtain Falls and War Dancers. Here’s what I think we can do. I’ve also looked in the rule book regarding the fight sequence.
1. Choose any enemy units within 12’’ you want to fight and declare charge against them.
2. Those units declare and resolve overwatch.
3. Roll for charge and move units in.
4. Do pile ins and fight.
5. Instead of consolidating, play The Curtain Falls and move.
6. Use this movement to position yourself more than 1’’ away from another enemy unit.
7. Activate War Dancers and pile into any unit you declared a charge against. The rule book states ‘any unit that charged or has models within 1’’ of an enemy model can be chosen to fight in the fight phase’.
My understanding is that because my unit declared a charge against that enemy unit, it can be activated to pile in and fight again.
sweetbacon wrote: Could the second unit that use War Dancers on interrupt to swing first?
They have to use it "right after an enemy has fought" so it would be after you moved and before War Dancers. Which means most likely nothing can fight that unit as you Move in the consolidation step, and War Dancers is at the end of the fight phase.
So we Curtain Falls + Murderous Entrance + War Dancers means out Caress/Kiss troupes can murder a lot of stuff we would’ve struggled with before hand. Yeah it’s 7CPs but if that guys two key enemy units then it’s well worth it. On Frozen Stars this is just golden.
I don't see much reason you'd want to take kisses any more, now that you have the option to make the other two 2D when really needed. Kisses have always suffered from the fact that aside from space marine characters, there aren't a lot of prime targets for a 4S -1 d3 profile; most stuff with multiple wounds has good armor saves but no invuln, which really limits the effectiveness of the kiss. They're great for killing 3+/4++ stuff, but how much of that is really out there? And now if you do run into that stuff...you've got a strat to make your other weapons effective against it.
Yep. When i was still playing nids (basically until their PA, then i sold them) My turn 1 was 14CP on average, and i won most my games. Honestly Nids are not that bad its just in ITC they are bad which is not Warhammer, its a completely different game with a completely different meta as to what is good and what is bad. But nids also had Shoot twice for 2CP, 1CP to double a run distance, 1 CP to double a gant/hgant movement, +1D to a MC shooting D, makes a piece of terrain not count as cover. etc.. They are even more CP hungry than we are for sure.
So having been playing that style for 1.5 years, its really fun and we could benefit heavily from it. The biggest difference tho is Genestealers are a lot cheaper for the same damage. Granted they are a 5++ compare to out 4++. But they get 5 free powerswords per unit and everyone else has -1ap with shuriken rule.
So our troupes might be a lot easier to kill and we will need to use more tactics to get them there compare to nids just shuffling lots of bodies at you (It fits the fluff for both armies very well actually).
I am changing my list from 6 troupes in 6 Starweavers to 5 troupes in 5 starweavers and 1x12 unit of Caress. I used to take 1 unit with Kisses but idk if i will anymore as we now have +1D melee (Kisses are great vs multi wounds 4++ units where str doesn't matter, or against FnP units).
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yukishiro1 wrote: I don't see much reason you'd want to take kisses any more, now that you have the option to make the other two 2D when really needed. Kisses have always suffered from the fact that aside from space marine characters, there aren't a lot of prime targets for a 4S -1 d3 profile; most stuff with multiple wounds has good armor saves but no invuln, which really limits the effectiveness of the kiss. They're great for killing 3+/4++ stuff, but how much of that is really out there? And now if you do run into that stuff...you've got a strat to make your other weapons effective against it.
LOL I basically just said the same thing, so i fully agree with this.
Caresses are the stand out option. No arguments there however, there’s a few reasons you might run kisses.
1) they look cool and are a signature Harlequins weapon (nostalgic to those of us who played them in rogue trader days)
2) you stuck kisses on your models and don’t want to rip arms off.
3) buffed by the TM reroll to wound on S4 isn’t that bad. 2 CP on a unit to make them damage 2 is still 2 CP and as much as I hate d3 damage it does give us options against all the W2 and W3 units out there. Plus you can only play the stratagem once. I plan on running around 40-45 on foot, I can afford for some to be all caress and some all kiss, or maybe (heresy) a mix.
EDIT: we might want kisses when we see the Custodes or Death Guard PA rules. Who knows?
So what do people think about the polychromatic storm strat?
I'm thinking in reality I probably want to keep all my starweavers but deepstriking 3 troupes for 2cp and saving 240pts on transports is tempting!
Yes the chances of making the charges are a lot less but you're probably going to have another 3 troupes in weavers jumping out turn 2 as well to back them up. Could even have a prince of light troupe master give them rerolls / +1 to charge.
I'm also considering neuro disruptors, the 12" range and S4 -3ap d3 damage should at least do something even if they don't get in combat.
Or should I just save the CP and keep my weavers? So many decisions!
I think polychromatic storm is very strong. I think a mix of troupes in Starweavers and some large units on foot will work best. PS will be useful because it lets you put your units where you want them. Say you run a DJ, a unit of 12 barebones troupes and a TM. PS lets you put them right where you want them, up against your enemies key units you want to beat up or tag in combat. 12 man unit moves, advances, twilight pathways, charges. Charge something that you can beat or won’t suffer losses too. Pile in & fight, then Either consolidate into their other units or stay locked in combat. If you pin a key unit and they try to fall back and shoot you up use Twilit encore to keep them trapped in melee. If you shot this with the DJ with humbling cruelty then you’ll keep it in melee and can prob tag a whole bunch of new units too. All the other strats to aid protection like blur are optional depending on how you do it & if this is a tooled up unit with caresses etc but you want to kill as few of their unit as possible to stay in combat or to tri-point then elect to fight with S3 fists.
Polychromatic storm doesn't let you DS the three things you move for free, it just says you can put them in DS if they have the ability to do so otherwise. You could polychromatic something then webway assault, but you'd still have to pay for the webway assault, so if you want to start them in DS from the beginning I'd just do that. And it doesn't let you get around the 2 unit limit on webway assault either.
It's a good strat just like the craftworlds version is a good strat for other reasons, but it's not a free 3 units in deepstrike.
With Murderous Entrance now an option, does anyone think the oft forgotten Embrace might be worth another look instead of Kisses for the extra AP (Caresses are still the number option, IMHO)?
I've always used embraces. Mathematically they match or outperform both of the other weapons on virtually every target when you have a reroll wounds aura. The only time they really do worse is against stuff with a 4++ or better.
sweetbacon wrote:With Murderous Entrance now an option, does anyone think the oft forgotten Embrace might be worth another look instead of Kisses for the extra AP (Caresses are still the number option, IMHO)?
yukishiro1 wrote:I've always used embraces. Mathematically they match or outperform both of the other weapons on virtually every target when you have a reroll wounds aura. The only time they really do worse is against stuff with a 4++ or better.
Yep, its been shown many times that in general Embraces/Caress are better. There are for sure a few situations that a kiss was better. But with flat 2D i don't think we need Kisses for anything anymore.
yukishiro1 wrote: I don't see much reason you'd want to take kisses any more, now that you have the option to make the other two 2D when really needed. Kisses have always suffered from the fact that aside from space marine characters, there aren't a lot of prime targets for a 4S -1 d3 profile; most stuff with multiple wounds has good armor saves but no invuln, which really limits the effectiveness of the kiss. They're great for killing 3+/4++ stuff, but how much of that is really out there? And now if you do run into that stuff...you've got a strat to make your other weapons effective against it.
Psst:
They're purposefully the worst option because you can make the whole unit with them out of the box, and old harlequin models have them.
Jokes on you, GW, my Harlequins are so old they have Powerfists - I mean Caresses!
sweetbacon wrote:With Murderous Entrance now an option, does anyone think the oft forgotten Embrace might be worth another look instead of Kisses for the extra AP (Caresses are still the number option, IMHO)?
yukishiro1 wrote:I've always used embraces. Mathematically they match or outperform both of the other weapons on virtually every target when you have a reroll wounds aura. The only time they really do worse is against stuff with a 4++ or better.
Yep, its been shown many times that in general Embraces/Caress are better. There are for sure a few situations that a kiss was better. But with flat 2D i don't think we need Kisses for anything anymore.
Very interesting. I agree that the Kiss seems to have a very niche role. I think I'll try giving Embraces to my small 5 man units and Caresses to my large 10-12 man units.
sweetbacon wrote:With Murderous Entrance now an option, does anyone think the oft forgotten Embrace might be worth another look instead of Kisses for the extra AP (Caresses are still the number option, IMHO)?
yukishiro1 wrote:I've always used embraces. Mathematically they match or outperform both of the other weapons on virtually every target when you have a reroll wounds aura. The only time they really do worse is against stuff with a 4++ or better.
Yep, its been shown many times that in general Embraces/Caress are better. There are for sure a few situations that a kiss was better. But with flat 2D i don't think we need Kisses for anything anymore.
Very interesting. I agree that the Kiss seems to have a very niche role. I think I'll try giving Embraces to my small 5 man units and Caresses to my large 10-12 man units.
I personally like Caress better, but only b.c i value Str5 more than an extra -1ap. Could be how i play and who i play tho. I can fully understand wanting more rend.
I'd actually put the caresses on the small units and embraces on the bigger one, because the bigger unit is more likely to have the reroll wound aura support which is what makes the embrace arguably better.
If you don't have reroll wounds, caresses are significantly stronger against a lot of really common profiles - basically anything T4, anything with an invuln, and anything with a 5+ or worse to begin with, which is a huge amount of stuff when you add it all together. If you have a smaller unit that's going to be far from your character support, caresses are usually going to be better - though I would think carefully about spending points on weapons at all for a squad like that unless you're also shelling out for a transport, because five-man squads without the -1W wound aura tend to get picked up so easily by anything that it's going to be a big waste of points to give the whole squad weapons they won't realistically get to use.
Automatically Appended Next Post: P.S. I changed my mind on the solitaire - you definitely want to keep blitz, for one very specific reason:
The Curtain Falls doesn't let you advance with your move (and if you're falling back you can't advance anyway). So if you curtain falls with a chromatic rush solitaire, you only get the 12" movement, whereas if you do it with a blitzing solitaire, you get 12+2d6" (or even 12+3d6 if you're midnight sorrow and you're falling back because something is still alive!). So you can blitz, assassinate something (fighting twice if needed), then jump an average 19" (22" with midnight sorrow if you're falling back) to somewhere safe so he can live to fight another turn.
IMO this makes it worth keeping blitz and paying the 1CP for chromatic rush or the -1 to hit in matchups you really need it.
yukishiro1 wrote: Polychromatic storm doesn't let you DS the three things you move for free, it just says you can put them in DS if they have the ability to do so otherwise. You could polychromatic something then webway assault, but you'd still have to pay for the webway assault, so if you want to start them in DS from the beginning I'd just do that. And it doesn't let you get around the 2 unit limit on webway assault either.
It's a good strat just like the craftworlds version is a good strat for other reasons, but it's not a free 3 units in deepstrike.
Ahh I see, it's a redeploy, my bad. Best put those starweavers back then!
BTW back to Death Jester, I've not seen it mentioned though surely some people will have spotted it, but the Shrieking Doom stratagem won't work on the new Relic as it has Wail/Shuriken profiles instead of Shrieker/Shuriken and the strat applies to the Shrieker profile. Anyway even if it was called Shuriken, you'd technically switch the damage from 3 to D3 so not worth it.
yukishiro1 wrote: Yeah, and that's what makes me question how often I'd really want to use the DS role. It just seems like you have a lot more control if you start him on the board; I don't like being at the mercy of screening and especially of just failing your charge: 3d6 discarding the lowest is still only about a 50% chance of success, or about 70% with a cp reroll. That's about 10% too low even with the CP for my comfort level.
you could always have the domino shroud as your get out of jail free card. You drop in, try to charge..fail...reroll...fail. OK, end of charge phase (or in opponent's movement phase when he thinks he's got you dead), you jump 12" away to hide
Nostro wrote: BTW back to Death Jester, I've not seen it mentioned though surely some people will have spotted it, but the Shrieking Doom stratagem won't work on the new Relic as it has Wail/Shuriken profiles instead of Shrieker/Shuriken and the strat applies to the Shrieker profile. Anyway even if it was called Shuriken, you'd technically switch the damage from 3 to D3 so not worth it.
yukishiro1 wrote: Yeah, and that's what makes me question how often I'd really want to use the DS role. It just seems like you have a lot more control if you start him on the board; I don't like being at the mercy of screening and especially of just failing your charge: 3d6 discarding the lowest is still only about a 50% chance of success, or about 70% with a cp reroll. That's about 10% too low even with the CP for my comfort level.
you could always have the domino shroud as your get out of jail free card. You drop in, try to charge..fail...reroll...fail. OK, end of charge phase (or in opponent's movement phase when he thinks he's got you dead), you jump 12" away to hide
Then you lose the ability to actually kill the target you're going after, though, because a solitaire isn't actually very good at killing anything but chaff without the rose. 8 attacks at S4 -1 D3 or S5 -2 1D isn't very scary to a lot of characters, especially without wound rerolls.
It's also way easier to screen out deep strikers than it is to avoid a solitaire on the table that has ~25" average threat range when he blitzes, or up to 44ish" if you can sling him off a seer just right (though it's usually more like a 35", because you usually can't get your seer far enough up the board to be able to move the solitaire his full movement the first time around).
Maybe there are some really weird unusual match-ups where paying the 1CP for it might be worth it, but I can't ever see replacing blitz with it in your army list, or honestly what match-up I would want to take it in.
I don't see any way you wouldn't want at least one troupe master with reroll wounds, it's a hugely powerful ability and it's hard to see why you'd ever want one of the abilities instead of it, as opposed to in addition to it.
I think that DJ is the only one that's going to regularly replace as opposed to adding. Maybe 2nd troupe masters and shadowseers.
I see myself paying 1CP for a shadowseeer with -1 wounds and the 6" range reducer every single game, paying 1CP in 75% of games for a TM with reroll charges, and maybe 50% of the time paying a CP for either chromatic rush or the -1 to hit on the solitaire.
I think I'm going to want at least two, and maybe even three Shadowseers, TMs, and DJs to build in redundancies of critical buffs like -1 to wound and re-roll wounds in close combat. If you're allying in other Aeldari, maybe not as important, but in mono-Harlequins, I feel like those abilities can win games when spread out to multiple units.
The list I'm kicking around right now has 1 quin bat, 1 craftworlds bat and a dreaming shadow vanguard. Right now it has one TM, two seers, one solitaire and 3 DJs. I would only take two DJs ideally but I needed the third to fill out the vanguard so I don't have to put the solitaire in it. If I end up deciding not to run the vanguard as a different masque I'd drop the third DJ and put the solitaire there instead.
If I was running mono quins, I'd definitely have a second TM, move the second seer into the main masque, and take Cat Lady to anchor the dreaming shadow vanguard. If for some reason you're opposed to Cat Lady I would probably give up on the vanguard and just run double bat because I'm not convinced a third TM or seer is great value for points.
I think Cat Lady is really good in mono quins though if you aren't opposed for fluff reasons.
As someone who is thinking of starting Harlequins with the new rules, what is the general game strategy in how they play?
Particularly with regards to the basic troops.
Clowns on foot accompanied by Shadowseer and Troupe Master?
Five Players and a Troupe Master in a Starweaver, trying for turn 2 charge?
So, I had my first 40k game with new 'quins yesterday. My opponent fielded a semi-competitive Ork List (he wanted to test new Ghazzie, so basically him plus 90 Boyz, 4 Meganobs, 6 Smashas, SSAG, 3 Weirdboyz, Badrukk, Painboss and Fieldmek). I played 2 Frozen Star Battallions and 1 DrukhariYnnari Battallion (mostly for CP). From the 18 CP I started with, I spent 9 before the game (3 Harlie relics, 1 Ynnari relic, 1 Ynnari WL trait, 4 pivotal roles for 2 TM, 1 SS and the Solitaire). List was composed of 3x5 FuPi clowns in Weavers, 12 Clowns on foot with a mix of 6 special CC Weapons, 2 x 5 clowns on foot, 6 Skyweavers, 2 DJs, 1 Soli, 2 SS, 2 TM, 1 Voidweaver, Archon with Relic weapon, Catwoman, 3x5 kabal warriors. Worked quite well in this setting, game ended after 3 turns due to time issues, but I was comfortably leading in points, had field control and killed all boyz (we played maelstrom CA 2019).
Lessons learned:
New DJ is just great - slowing Boyz and remove overwatch is just silly for 45 points
the combination of frozen star +1 to wound and the new +1 D stat on 12 Clowns will kill anything it affects fully (60 attacks hitting on 3, wounding on 3 or 4 w/reroll and dealing at least 2 d each... 10 primaris, 6 aggressors, statistically no problem in a single phase...)
-1 to hit on solitaire is really nice
You need tons of CP - the 9 I started with went really fast, and I had the Ynnari WL trait that let me regain some of them...
The Shadowstone is great. A shadowseer with a 9" bubble of -1 to wound (that can also work on vehicles/bikes via gem) and -6" range and probably 9" 6+++ bubble via psi is a great defensive assessment. Probably 2 mandatory CP if you happen to go second - star weavers with -1 to hit, -1 to wound and a 4++/6+++ are ridicluosly survivable for T5 6W... The drawback is that mixing Masques doesn't work so good anymore (that's why I went mono Frozen stars instead of putting the Weavers into a soaring spite detachment)
All in all, really nice buffs, but I think to get the most out of it, triple bat is almost mandatory, which limits list building quite dramatically...
Recently I have been pretty down on 5-man troupes in starweavers. They just don't seem to actually do anything most of the time. I feel like units of 10 have a much better ability to take the center of the board and force your opponent to come at you, and that that usually works out a lot better than having to try to go at the enemy with 5-man units that really struggle to either kill stuff or wrap stuff - and that probably die on your opponent's turn even if they do wrap something.
But I realize this works a lot better in soup than mono quins. Night spinners are such an amazing unit for quins and the chip threat they provide from range enables you to play defensive board control in a way that is much harder with a mono list that lacks the holy grail that is ranged indirect fire.
My current list still has one 5-man troupe in a starweaver, but its purpose isn't to engage the enemy, it's to survive to late game and then grab objectives and mop up stragglers that get separated from the enemy's main force. I might still swap it out for a third 10-man, but I have a feeling that two big units is probably the sweet spot and going to 3 is less effective.
Yeah, the voidweaver is surely a candidate for possible exchange... In game, I used the prismatic cannon, just forgot to click it in BattleScribe. I like the option of ranged d6 Damage... But other options seem also viable, e.g. 2 more Skyweavers, upgrading 5 Kabalites to Wyches and putting them in a raider together with the archon (since they are all Ynnari, the murdergirls profit from the reroll 1s of the archon), a 3rd DJ or a second large Troupe... I think more CC weapons in my existing troupes would be the least attractive option. The large Troupe murders almost everything with only 6 CC weapons, and normally you lose some models on the way to the front, so I don' recommend spending more points there. If I'm taking CC weapons in the FuPi troupes, I tend to get out of transport to charge something, which usally leads to the destruction of the troupe and, retrospectively, often seems to be the worse choice in comparison to staying embarked and just shooting another round, so I deliberately restrict the troupes to prevent making tactical unsound decisions...
I'm still not sure whether the FuPi Boats make sense as frozen stars - against a gunline army, I definitely won't be able to reach anything with them in Round one, so they have to survive two rounds of shooting if I'm going second - more tests are needed!
My best game (ITC 20man event) i had 3 Voidweavers. They are not "bad" for their points. They are cheap gun boats and play them as such. Just like everything else, they are better vs some armies and worst vs others. Against a Custodes player they did really well. 3 of them targeted a unit and did some good damage. Against nids it was nice to have more fire power than melee b.c i needed to blow away the Genestealers faster. If i would have had 270pts of Bikes or other melee units it wouldn't have worked out for that event.
Honestly I feel like fusion pistol troupes in starweavers are not that much better than voidweavers: fine, but hopelessly outclassed by craftworlds EC/MS alternatives. I do think they have a role in mono quins lists, but they're definitely not one of the stronger elements of the codex, so they're the sort of thing I wouldn't take except in a mono quins list.
Not to mention that you literally can't attack with them against another quins list with the -6" inch range, so you pretty much just auto-lose a mirror match-up.
yukishiro1 wrote: Honestly I feel like fusion pistol troupes in starweavers are not that much better than voidweavers: fine, but hopelessly outclassed by craftworlds EC/MS alternatives. I do think they have a role in mono quins lists, but they're definitely not one of the stronger elements of the codex, so they're the sort of thing I wouldn't take except in a mono quins list.
Not to mention that you literally can't attack with them against another quins list with the -6" inch range, so you pretty much just auto-lose a mirror match-up.
Yep, with 5 pistols, 3 hits on average when you look at the math. Against a T7, 3+/5++ outside of range its 5.1 wounds, inside range its 6.6 wounds. So you are only doing 1.5 more wounds to get closer could be bad for you, just keep that in mind. The total cost is 170pts. Can we do 5 wounds with something else for 170pts that has at least 10 wounds with more range than 6"? Yep, just look at almost any CWE stuff lol. There is also a lot of CC units too like Shining Spears.
Harlequins has 2 really good units, DJ and Skyweavers, everything else is slightly worst than what DE/CWE can do. We did get a nice boost to Troupes, before this update Wyches were point for point better than Troupes (more survivability and equal damage, but more models over all, key models where the 4 weapons they could lose 6 wyches to Troupes 2 and still be better). But now Troupes are finally much higher damage, survivability is also better via stratagems and new Shadowseer combos.
But we have better tricks than DE/CWEIMO, which should be the case. IMO we are not to far behind either of them, giving us 1 more solid unit option will go a very long way. HQ on bike, Flyer, Avatar, Cheaper troops/Mimes, any of those would make use a lot more equal to DE/CWE.
I am heavily considering going Battalion Quins with a Battalion CWE to get some Shining Spears, 2x6 of each bike sounds hella fun!
Automatically Appended Next Post: PS: I also want to try a back line support Spearhead Coven "Artists of the Flesh" Reaper detachment, thats 36 wounds with T7, 5++, -1D. They shoot D6 Dark Lances each basically. A little low on damage for the points, but they do more than 3 kabal DL ravagers and are way more survivable.
Or Fire Prisms, was thinking either go all out attack, or some back line range with defense.
I have also not been super happy with fusion squads in Starweavers. You really need to be within three inch range to get the most value out of them which makes them a suicide unit. If you absolutely need to kill a medium to light vehicle (T7 or below), then they have some utility, but when I've tried this build, mine have largely bounced off things such as Knights or anything they need fours to wound on (in fairness, my usual rolling with both fusion and haywire wounding is almost comically bad). Ultimately, I'd rather have more Skyweavers for mono Quins or, even, better as already noted, some hyper efficient CWEEC firepower.
In the current Space Marine and ECCWE world we live in, it is straight up criminal that we have to pay 2 CPs to re-roll 1's ONLY in close combat. Archons aren't the greatest HQs by any stretch, but at least they give their respective factions re-rolls FOR FREE.
Heck, i also play SOB, the Canoness IMO is the single best HQ in the game for effectiveness point for point, 3+/4++ better melee than the Archon, rr'1s aura, 54pts for a +2str, -3ap, D3 hero that is 4 atks base, +1atk and ap on the charge. So good..
But yes I fully agree, the GH SHOULD work on ALL 1's.
IMO troupes are the best unit in the codex and the best troops choice in the eldar superfaction, even before the changes, but certainly afterward. The value of troops isn't usually their ability to kill stuff, it's their ability to take and hold objectives, and troupes do that better than wyches because of the added mobility, and the easy access to a 3++ and -1 to wound, along with reasonable access to minus to hit modifiers and a 6+++. Troupes are incredibly effective on any table with central L ruins, which is pretty much standard these days.
Their weapons are overcosted though, especially the pistols which synergize badly with a unit that almost always wants to advance. Really quins should be able to fire pistols after advancing just as a base rule; that is what you'd need to make them worth taking aside from on the TM and maybe 1 per unit (maybe 2 in a unit of 10+) just to have something to yolo with if a model or two survives the initial combat and has a juicy target to take a pop at. I don't really rate them at all for killing vehicles, but I always take one on my TM because sometimes it just comes up trumps and blows an enemy melee character off the table at just the right time, even if most of the time it does nothing.
And yes, the lack of rerolls is the biggest, glaring weakness in the army. This is another reason why a EC/MS craftworld bat or spearhead makes an army so much stronger than staying mono quins. EC/MS Night Spinners are the best indirect fire in the game in my opinion, but they're even better for a quins-based list than they are for a craftworlds-based list.
And, as you said, therein lies Harlequins greatest weakness. Even more so than their relatively high points cost and fragility, the lack of any realistic (I don't consider GH to be a reasonable option given how CP hungry this army was BEFORE we got the new rules) re-rolls to hit in all phases is the true achilles heel of the army. Quins are so fragile and elite that they need to maximize damage every turn before attrition kicks in and no buffs to hit rolls is just really disappointing given its prevalence in the game.
EDIT: in fact that's my only real complaint with Quins rights now. I was really hoping for something akin to Dark Technomancer or Test of Skill to give them more competitive viability as a standalone faction.
Yeah, none of the changes really make mono quins competitive; the basic weaknesses are all still there.
They do make quins top-tier in eldar soup and in the process make eldar soup even more powerful, something that I'm really not sure the game needed. EC/MS CWEMSU spam isn't as bad as say Iron Hands, but it really didn't need a substantial buff, which I think this gives it. It gives an even bigger boost to the shining-spears heavy lists, but I'm not quite so worried about that because I don't think that list is as fundamentally powerful as the EC/MS spam to begin with, and it requires way more finesse to play well too.
I think with the new rules, GW has definitely taken a step in the right direction towards being more competitive. I think if Quins got some more much needed points decreases, particularly on basic Troupes and their weapon options, they'd be in a much better place overall. But I look at how much SoB improved and I'm hopeful that maybe in the next edition Quins might get the same love.
So I've just noticed that Harlequins have literally the worst Melee weapon in 40k. Congratulations!
Harlequins's blade does 100% nothing. Every model in the game has a base melee attack which is 1d, strength user, no rend. This is the exact profile of the H blade. The profile could be deleted and it would have zero effect on the model, and so I'm not even sure it fulfills the criteria of being a weapon at all.
What is going on there? Why no chainsword equivalent?
grouchoben wrote: So I've just noticed that Harlequins have literally the worst Melee weapon in 40k. Congratulations!
Harlequins's blade does 100% nothing. Every model in the game has a base melee attack which is 1d, strength user, no rend. This is the exact profile of the H blade. The profile could be deleted and it would have zero effect on the model, and so I'm not even sure it fulfills the criteria of being a weapon at all.
What is going on there? Why no chainsword equivalent?
Because when 8th edition released, models didn't have that melee weapon (edit: all the time). They only had it if they had no other weapon. The Harlequin blade exists because a) No model No Rules means Yes Model, Yes Rules, so they needed to have rules for the model and b) So they have something to replace with their other melee weapons rather than simply adding them.
That would just make the weapons even more over-costed - or, even worse, they'd drop the attacks down 1 and then add it back via the chainsword. It's pretty clear they didn't want 11 point troop models to have 5 attacks base.
It's weird and inconsistent, but it's better to have that extra attack on the base profile than on the weapon, so I'm happy it's done that way.
It comes down to when 8th first came out, Melee was consider "strong" they took away almost all melee buffs, +1atk from 2 CCW, +1atk for charge, fighting first every combat, and many others.
Troupes when 8th first came out was dedicated melee units just completely outright destroyed anything not dedicated melee. So giving Marines (1 attack) a weapon to give them +1atk was fine, doing so for quins would have been seen scary for hordes (which was what people played till codex's came out).
So i understand why. I just don't like having a worthless weapon. Even nids gets re-roll 1's for a basic weapon. That would have been fine for us too.
Who are they? Troupes? No they are 4, Space Marines are 1, Primaris are 2, Genestealers are 3 (but they have 2 weapons for free and free Power swords every 4 models).
1W 4A is an extremely rare profile - troupes are the only thing with it in the game AFAIK. So I think it's pretty clear the +1 attack from a chainsword/whatever was built into the base profile, which makes it a better because you don't give it up when upgrading to a better weapon.
The amount of base attacks a troupe gets is not one of their problems.
Never heard a Harlequins player complain about Harlequins Blade when it is 0 points. It's just a default weapon, well except now a TM can upgrade one to the fancy new relic.
bullyboy wrote: Never heard a Harlequins player complain about Harlequins Blade when it is 0 points. It's just a default weapon, well except now a TM can upgrade one to the fancy new relic.
B.c many other units with 3 attacks 0ap weapon gets re-rolls. We have 0 re-rolls to hit, even in melee. We also have 0 ways to get +to hit. We are one of the only armies in the game with lack of re-rolls. We get 1 re-roll wound for melee, thats it.
bullyboy wrote: Never heard a Harlequins player complain about Harlequins Blade when it is 0 points. It's just a default weapon, well except now a TM can upgrade one to the fancy new relic.
B.c many other units with 3 attacks 0ap weapon gets re-rolls. We have 0 re-rolls to hit, even in melee. We also have 0 ways to get +to hit. We are one of the only armies in the game with lack of re-rolls. We get 1 re-roll wound for melee, thats it.
It's not that great, but you can get to hit rerolls via the great harlequin stratagem... 2CP to give one TM an aura to reroll hit rolls of 1 to units within 6"
Adding rerolls to a SUser 0ap weapon isn't really going to do anything.
The lack of hit rerolls on quins is an issue but the solution isn't to put it on a weapon that doesn't kill anything but trash anyway.
The basic problem is there aren't enough HQ units in the list - just like there aren't enough units period. The two existing HQ units already have excellent auras, and with only two, there's just not any room for a hit reroll aura. Great Harlequin is a bit of a joke at 2CP, but there's no obvious solution without a lieutenant-level HQ choice.
The biggest missed opportunity in the codex IMO is a chaplain-like character with "lines" or "songs" or "plays" he can recite that give chaplain-style buffs. It fits the fluff perfectly and fills one of the big gaps in the roster. And it would be a natural place to put a 6" reroll hit aura, just like it is in the SM roster. Call him a Shadowsinger or something like that. You could even use pivotal roles for the extra songs, with the base song being a reroll hits aura, which you could swap out for 3 other choices or it plus one of the others for the extra CP.
Or at least a Psychic power that could be cast on a unit to reroll 1s to hit.
Great Harlequin is awful for the fact that it's 2CP, only rerolls 1s, and only in the Fight Phase. That's bonkers awful.
Yes, I have no idea why it is 2cp not 1. I can see why they didn't want to give full hit and wound rerolls on a single model - that was a disaster on Guilliman - but it doesn't make any sense to charge 2cp for something so anemic.
I'm not very experienced in the game but I feel that harlequins have the tools they need to kill quite a lot.
If frozen stars and within the TM aura, a troupe of 12 players or a unit of 6 skyweavers with zephyrglaives hit very hard... they'll force 30 and 12 saves at dmg 1 and -2 dmg 2 respectively assuming they wound on 4+. If necessary, the damage of their melee weapons can be increased by one via stratagem.
Add the possibility of fighting twice, giving the players S5 weapons, increasing their save to 3++, giving them +1 to wound, hitting & running without retaliation with the curtain falls, charging without being overwatched thanks to the new DJ ability... not to mention flip belts and rising crescendo
I feel that 12-player frozen stars troupes could deal with meta units such as possessed bomb, GK paladins, IH infantry near Feirros and with 5+++, etc
bullyboy wrote: Never heard a Harlequins player complain about Harlequins Blade when it is 0 points. It's just a default weapon, well except now a TM can upgrade one to the fancy new relic.
Its useful if you think about ablative wounds in a Troupe.
So I was thinking about what meta lists we've improved against and which ones we're still going to struggle with.
I think we've improved against a lot of gunline/shooty lists to include Tau, Shooty Orks, Guard, Ad Mech, IK, and non-flying vehicle SM gunlines:
I think mon-Quins will still have a hard matchup against things like 5++/5+++ Intercessor spam, Paladin bombs, new Dark Angels, multiple Sanginuary Guard bombs, and Implusor spam, which can just sit in the middle of the board being hard to remove due to lots of wounds, have good invlunerable saves with the otpion to get FNP with certain buffs, have very accurate high volume of strengh 4/5 shooting, can hit hard in combat, and can win the war of attrition better due to having a lot more bodies.
I think allying in CWE or DE helps deal with some of the problems these builds can present, however.
Of course this is all just theory at this point. It could turn out that things such as new Tau Farsight Enclave and upcoming Admech, IK, etc., will drive some of these builds out of the meta which would be ultimately be a net win for us.
I'm in a bit of a dichotomy at the moment as my current quins are mostly Soaring Spite based, and with the recent points drops....not even close to a full force. I have 3 boats filled with 3 fusion/caress, kiss, embrace. 6 skyweavers, 1 voidweaver (lol), and characters. I have 2x5 troupe and 2 boats still on sprues.
However, I'm seeing the usefulness of large foot units (which many people said could never work), but Soaring Spite for them is pointless. Frozen Stars is obvious, although Midnight Sorrow for movement shenanigans and trapping seems like a good deal too. Downside to mixed Masques is the auras though, meaning I have to double up on each character (no big deal really). Either that, or I just bottle up and stick with one masque and try out the various ones until I find the one that I like the playstyle.
As for previous comments on relics, I'm currently leaning toward Lament, fang and Domino Shroud on Solitaire to try out the new ones, but don't completely want to give up on the Rose (so good) and Starmist (in case you lose the Jester).
The Rose stays at the top of the relics list IMO not because it's the best in the abstract, but because without it a Solitaire struggles to actually do anything in combat. If I was going to seriously plan around not taking the Rose for most matches, I would probably just drop the Solitaire from my list entirely, because at that point the only thing he's really good for is scaring people who don't realize how gimp he actually is without the relic.
The Stone is the other relic that stands out as almost always being super useful and that will probably see play in most games. A 9" bubble is more than double the size of a 6" bubble, and the extra range on every psychic power is also extremely useful on basically all the powers you regularly take, and even makes mirror of minds arguably useful in some match-ups, since it becomes 27" range and therefore becomes one of the only psychic powers in the game that can do mortal wounds to another psyker outside that psyker's deny range.
Starmist I am still going to be taking in some comps, but probably less than half the time now that a DJ can also mitigate overwatch.
Domino Shroud seems extremely cool and I would definitely like to mess around with it if quins had unlimited 1CP relics, but it feels a big ask to give up the more powerful relics for something that is more nifty than anything else. Someone will probably come up with some great combo for it.
The Lament, and Fang fall into the same category as Curtainfall IMO - very good, but not good enough to displace the others, so unlikely to see a lot of play unless you're facing a match-up where one of your standard relics is wasted (e.g. the Rose against a pure knights list). They'd see play if we could take relics for 1CP, but I don't think paying 2CP is worth it most of the time.
Post-PA, Dark Angels can run a mass of -1 to hit, 4++/5++FNP Intercessors and Aggressors kicking out upwards of 200 AP-1 bolter shots from Turns 2-3 on with full re-rolls to hit. Additionally, they can deepstrike 10 Deathwing Knights with TH/SS six inches away that can deliver 55 TH attacks that hit on 2's and re-roll 1's with the right character support. And this squad can be Transhumaned with an additional -1 to wound AND still have a 5+++ FNP. And iin a 2000 point list a player could bring 2 of these and still have plenty of room for the shooty stuff.
Dark Angels are definitely better now than people give credit for, though. And Warded deserves a mention too as it is pretty clearly the best warlord trait in the whole game by some distance.
Dark Angels are definitely better now than people give credit for, though. And Warded deserves a mention too as it is pretty clearly the best warlord trait in the whole game by some distance.
Ah, thanks for clarifying.
Is Warded their auto-deny one psychic power once per game?
I got the name wrong, it's Watched. But yes, unlimited range once a game automatic deny. The only limitation is you can't use it on a power that's been cast with that strat that doesn't allow it to be denied, but otherwise it just works, period.
They also have that bonkers psychic power that gives rerolls of all hits *and* wounds in melee on a unit.
There's a couple things like that in Dark Angels that would probably not be ok in any other book but that they got away with because the codex was so weak overall.
Yeah, that's insanely good. I think once quarantine is over and people start playing again, Dark Angels are going to catch a lot of people by surprise. Particularly in ITC missions where controlling the mid-board is so critical.
Dark Angels are definitely better now than people give credit for, though. And Warded deserves a mention too as it is pretty clearly the best warlord trait in the whole game by some distance.
As a mostly Loyalist Scum player I can tell you that you shouldn't be afraid of them.
eparedes0785 wrote: I'm not very experienced in the game but I feel that harlequins have the tools they need to kill quite a lot.
If frozen stars and within the TM aura, a troupe of 12 players or a unit of 6 skyweavers with zephyrglaives hit very hard... they'll force 30 and 12 saves at dmg 1 and -2 dmg 2 respectively assuming they wound on 4+. If necessary, the damage of their melee weapons can be increased by one via stratagem.
Add the possibility of fighting twice, giving the players S5 weapons, increasing their save to 3++, giving them +1 to wound, hitting & running without retaliation with the curtain falls, charging without being overwatched thanks to the new DJ ability... not to mention flip belts and rising crescendo
I feel that 12-player frozen stars troupes could deal with meta units such as possessed bomb, GK paladins, IH infantry near Feirros and with 5+++, etc
Delivery has always been a problem. Can't walk them up the board, which means they have to DS and get lucky on a big charge. If you fail that charge, the squad is going to suffer immense losses.
You don't want to be delivering troupes anywhere, by and large. They just don't hit hard enough to be that kind of unit - largely because they don't buff up well the way lots of assault units do - posssessed bomb, sang guard, death company, etc all get extensive buff interactions that make them so dangerous. Troupes have virtually none of this.
What troupes are excellent at is existing on a board with cover. If you play on open boards, don't play harlequins period - but especially don't play troupes. But if you play on open boards I kinda question why you play 40k at all.
On boards with decent terrain troupes have no problem taking and holding the middle of the board. In fact, 11 points for a 4++ with -to wound and easy access to a 6+++ and/or hit modifiers is an extremely points efficient way to hold ground with a unit that your opponent doesn't really want to get in charge range of, but that also isn't so deadly (and therefore expensive) that your opponent won't come into it. Which is what you want them to do.
People have this misconception that if you play quins you should be charging straight up the enemy's grill and that is a sure-fire way to lose. You just don't have the durability for it. The way to win with quins is to take the middle of the board and then use your mobility to hold+hold more every turn while tempting your opponent into an engagement in the middle that they aren't favored on.
I admit I'm not a seasoned player, but... delivering a 12-player unit doesn't seem very complicated imo.
The unit has a 8 + D6 + 8 + D6 (or 6" straight for 1CP) + 2D6 threat range if you cast twilight pathways on them and would get its rerolls to wound via a TM delivered by means of virtuosos of the webway strat. If said TM had player of the light, prince of the light or both, it would reroll charges (with +1 to the roll if both). You can use the same character and technique but put the unit on the webway instead. You can't make them 3++ if you do so... unless you take casualties on overwatch and use isha's weeping
That'd be 60A that hit on 3+ at S5 rerolling to wound at dmg 1. You can give them +1 to wound and +1dmg via strat too. TM would also join the party. DJ with humbling cruelty would prevent the assaulted unit from overwatching and reduce their movement by 2" so that you can use twilit encore on the following turn if you don't kill the unit and don't wrap or enemy has fly to stay in combat.
That unit could be supported by a solitaire or sth if needed too
Automatically Appended Next Post: That unit is just 216 points approximately.
I normally run my melee quins in transports, but spread all over the table. Turn one my characters jump out of their transport and move forward (normally near the center) and all my other transports, bikes, and voidweaver roll into a single flank. Turn two the troupes jump out of their transports for an 11 inch movement towards their line while their transports rush up to provide a buffer from anything on the other side of the table and to make the initial charge rolls to eat overwatch.
I run with the great harlequin strategem and falling stars, so when I hit that line with the 5 man teams they are ~80 attacks hitting on twos and there's re-rolling ones to hit and all failed wound rolls.
Normally I can clear a whole table side with that hammer. If the opponent applies too much pressure, I'll hop back into my transports and scoot to where they're thinned out and punch there too.
The new death next rules make me a super happy camper. Normally I have 4-5 of them to mitigate deepstrike and to harass things. Making them better at tackling horses of better snipers will make them even better at their jobs.
Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote: I normally run my melee quins in transports, but spread all over the table. Turn one my characters jump out of their transport and move forward (normally near the center) and all my other transports, bikes, and voidweaver roll into a single flank. Turn two the troupes jump out of their transports for an 11 inch movement towards their line while their transports rush up to provide a buffer from anything on the other side of the table and to make the initial charge rolls to eat overwatch.
I run with the great harlequin strategem and falling stars, so when I hit that line with the 5 man teams they are ~80 attacks hitting on twos and there's re-rolling ones to hit and all failed wound rolls.
Normally I can clear a whole table side with that hammer. If the opponent applies too much pressure, I'll hop back into my transports and scoot to where they're thinned out and punch there too.
The new death next rules make me a super happy camper. Normally I have 4-5 of them to mitigate deepstrike and to harass things. Making them better at tackling horses of better snipers will make them even better at their jobs.
How are you hitting on twos with your Troupe squads?
I think he meant multiple squads of 5-mans, but I'm not sure where the hitting on 2s comes from either. I mean Ynnari, but then he couldn't use great harlequin nor could he be frozen stars, so that doesn't check out.
Sorry, my phone autocorrected "threes" to "there's".
I still run my masque with last editions force org chart in mind, so three troupes with three troupe masters who are spread around the combat to make sure everyone in an almost 3 foot chunk of table is re-rolling wounds in melee with the great harlequin in the middle.
Also, everyone advances when they leave the transport and normally there is at least one shadowseers that gets shunted up there to help mitigate damage in return. (Normally it's the one who causes negatives to hit with it's powers that gets pathways to get them up there.) So hopefully they give -1 to hit whichever troupe is strongest at the time, and their strongest fighters are at a -1 to hit with my center being harder to wound.
What are people's thoughts on the best warlord traits? Given how starved this army will be for CP, I think Player of Twilight is probably still the best in general, although I can see using Player of Light to set up re-rollable 8 inch charges with a Troupe Master's new Pivotal Role also being extremely useful.
sweetbacon wrote: What are people's thoughts on the best warlord traits? Given how starved this army will be for CP, I think Player of Twilight is probably still the best in general, although I can see using Player of Light to set up re-rollable 8 inch charges with a Troupe Master's new Pivotal Role also being extremely useful.
Depends on your list and you
Attempting long or DSing charges ? Player of the Light. This is great with Prince of Light
Want more CP and a better WL? Player of the Twilight. I like this on my Shadowseer, i'd go with 1CP to keep -1w and take Veil of Illusions.
Want a Super fast tricky HQ? A Foot in the Future. This is really fun with Twilight Fang relic, or even Starmist Raiment
I've always really like Twilight and A Foot in the Future and most likely will stay with either of them.
Player of the Light got a lot less attractive due to the Pivotal Role letting you get the same effect for 1cp. The stacking there seems like a trap to me most of the time. The +1 to charge is only really super useful coming out of DS and quins really aren't set up to do that well anyway. Meanwhile Twilight's CP generation is even more valuable than before, and it was already the best of the CP generation traits. It's good for a reliable 3CP a game, and often significantly more than that. I think it would be very rare that you'd want to take anything else, and if you were going to it would be because you wanted to turn your TM into an assassin, in which case Foot in the Future is just straight-up better. I don't see many situations where you're going to be charging out of deepstrike with a different unit but within 6" of a TM. Though I guess there may be some combos with Virtuosos of the Webway that could make this more attractive, +1 just seems small; if it was +2 that might really open some stuff up.
I agree on the twilight warlord trait. The free cp are useful, and that one reroll to keep your warlord alive can be clutch. Basically giving you a free command point and then letting you get extra.
(Helps that my warlord from last edition was twilight too, I didn't have to change anything!)
Great write up and really enjoyed it. One minor quibble is I think it's premature call for toning down any of the new stuff. Yes, the new rules are good and definitely boost the army, but Harlequins weren't exactly setting the meta on fire before and although they're certainly better, I still don't foresee them winning a lot of events, as they still have plenty of bad match ups (just slightly fewer than before).
Some of the stuff probably will be toned down because of its interactions with CWE; I don't think mono quins is suddenly going to become top tier, but CWE is already top-tier and some of this stuff may push them over the top. I wouldn't be surprised if like the overwatch suppression gets nerfed the way jinx did, so it only stops the target from shooting at quins, not at CWE/DE, for example.
Then there's the stuff like the new relic shrieker stacking with itself and with the base weapon/curtainfall, meaning you can stack -6LD just from the relic and another -2 from another DJ, which seems like they just didn't proofread their rules carefully enough. I guarantee you they did not intend to let two DJs stack -8LD on a unit.
I also wouldn't be surprised to see The Curtain Falls limited to once per phase, to stop the "I fight twice, you fight no times, AND I escape" interaction that feels pretty problematic even for 5CP.
I agree that they almost certainly did not intend for the DJ leadership modifiers to stack. The DJ overwatch suppression is fine either way, so I'm not too bothered if they change that.
I don't really see any issue with Curtain Falls because for 5 CP, it's likely only something you can do with one unit, once per game. It's good, but it is the kind of tricky feat that Harlequins need in order to compete in the current meta.
It may turn out to be fine. It just feels like the sort of problematic, unanticipated interaction that has caused broken lists in the past - broviathan relied on a similarly unanticipated way of stacking stratagems to make a unit invulnerable, for example. Obviously they aren't the same - broviathan was really cheap in CP expenditure to make something invincible, whereas this is super expensive - but I am always instinctively wary of super powerful interactions like this one. We've never had a strat that a whole army can use to fight and then escape before being hit back, and we've certainly never had a strat combo that allows you to do that twice in a single fight phase. It's really uncharted territory, and I think we'll have to see how abusive it ends up being.
I'd like to see it in widespread use first before declaring if it's too good. I still think the general CP hungriness of Quins means unless you're using this combo on turn one, you probably won't have enough CP for it, as pre-game CP expenditures can easily reach 5-6 CP now.
Well i'm taking 2 bats and a vanguard, in total thats 14CP. 6 Pre-game CP means i have 8CP left, thats 1 turn for Skyweavers to be super tanky and the rest for melee combos. We are for sure way to CP hungry, so taking Twilight i feel is a must. And a 3rd mono quins Bat isn't worth it, nor is a brigade.
Optional, i only take 2 relics over 3 (meaning my Solitaire doesn't get 1) and i don't take 3 Pivotal + base rules. This will only be 3 pre-game CP.
In the end i think that is what top lists are going to do.
SOARING SPITE BATALLION -- 1130pts
TM (caress, fusion pistol); SS (TP, webway dance)
5 naked players; 5 players (4 with fusion pistols); 5 players (4 with fusion pistols and caresses)
2 units of 6 skyweavers (6 with haywire and 5 with glaives)
2 starweavers
FROZEN STARS BATALLION -- 629pts
TM (warlord, player of the light, prince of light -1CP to keep wound rerolls, caress), SS (TP, veil of tears)
12 players (2 with blades, 10 caresses), 12 players (3 with blades, 9 caresses), 5 naked players
MIXED VANGUARD -- 255pts
FS TM with kiss
2 x DJ (cegorach's lament, harvester of torment / humbling cruelty) (dreaming shadow), Solitaire with rose and blitz (midnight sorrow)
Undecided whether the 2nd relic is worth it... probably twilight fang on the FS FM in the vanguard detachment
Thoughts? 2,014pts... will drop a couple weapons or the kiss in the TM if I'm taking the twilight fang or whatever
It's 3 + 5 + 5 + 1 - 1CP (prince of light) - 1CP (additional relic, rose) = 12CP... if going second against certain enemies both units of skyweavers may go on the webway... one or two units of 12 FS players otherwise
I'm for sure taking Fang on a TM, Shadowstone on my WL Shadowseer with Twilight WL trait. I've been and will still be running Soaring spite for most my list then a DJ vanguard. IDK what my 2nd battalion will be now that the new Shadowseer is 9" bubble with -1w and -6" to shooting against you. I might just go all Soaring Spite for aura management and the Vanguard detachment as something else (like Dreaming). Also i might just go Soaring for DJ's too b.c i can move farther and still shoot well. I value speed and placement over everything else. If i have the ability to reposition mid game and hit a flank you was not ready for, i 100% will do that.
Also i might just do a Mix detachment of vanguard something like FS TM/10man Troupe, Dreaming DJ, soaring DJ, Silent Solitaire.
I'm not sure there's much point to a Solitaire without the Rose. I mean I can see not taking the Rose in some specific matchups, but if your general plan is not to take it, I'm not sure taking the Solitaire at all makes a lot of sense. Without the Rose he has less than a 50% chance to kill a T4/5W character with a 4++ even when blitzing (compared to a ~85% chance with the Rose), and at that point, you're paying 100 points for a model that is fast but not actually threatening.
A FS Troupe Master with Twilight Fang might replace the Solitaire in my lists going forward if points are tight and I can only afford one, as he can get close to the same number of attacks that wound most targets easier and with better AP. ideally, I'd take both to have two decent character hunters, though.
sweetbacon wrote: A FS Troupe Master with Twilight Fang might replace the Solitaire in my lists going forward if points are tight and I can only afford one, as he can get close to the same number of attacks that wound most targets easier and with better AP. ideally, I'd take both to have two decent character hunters, though.
The problem I have with that is that the Troupe Master isn't really a combat monster even with a Relic Weapon. A Solitaire already has that purpose and the Rose makes him that much better. A Troupe Master with a supporting relic would be far more useful.
A TM with the 2 mortal wound pivotal role added and the Fang relic does more damage than a blitzing Solitaire with the Rose against almost every target in the game, even from turn 1, and the disparity only gets worse from there as the turns go higher. The Solitaire comes out slightly ahead against infantry with a 4++ or better until turn 3, when the TM goes ahead. Models with very good FNP might mess with these stats slightly as that has more effect on the TM than the Solitaire, but for 99% of targets in the game, the TM is doing more damage from turn 3 at the latest.
The downside is it costs an extra CP, and the TM lacks the movement and the 3++ of the Solitaire.
sweetbacon wrote: A FS Troupe Master with Twilight Fang might replace the Solitaire in my lists going forward if points are tight and I can only afford one, as he can get close to the same number of attacks that wound most targets easier and with better AP. ideally, I'd take both to have two decent character hunters, though.
The problem I have with that is that the Troupe Master isn't really a combat monster even with a Relic Weapon. A Solitaire already has that purpose and the Rose makes him that much better. A Troupe Master with a supporting relic would be far more useful.
I don't know much about harlequins, but I want to learn more about their combinations and lists so I am asking this out of ignorance, but why isn't the troupe master with the new relic blade a combat monster similar to the solitaire? He has good strength, ap and dmg, re rolls wounds and gets more attacks the longer the game goes. Isn't that very similar to the solitaire?
yukishiro1 wrote: I'm not sure there's much point to a Solitaire without the Rose. I mean I can see not taking the Rose in some specific matchups, but if your general plan is not to take it, I'm not sure taking the Solitaire at all makes a lot of sense. Without the Rose he has less than a 50% chance to kill a T4/5W character with a 4++ even when blitzing (compared to a ~85% chance with the Rose), and at that point, you're paying 100 points for a model that is fast but not actually threatening.
He is still a very fast character able to kill small units off of objectives, and even if he can not reliably 1 round a character he still can scare them
If you want to play a solitaire, regardless of how he compares to the troupe master with the new relic blade, would you play him with cegorachs rose or is a combination of suits of hidden knives and his new -1 to hit pivotal role viable? With the -1 to hit stratagem and psychic powers from the shadow seer he could be potentially -4 to hit.
Is that more of a gimmik, or a viable strategy, because I find the idea rather appealing.
Also if you were to do this, I think the 1cp spent to keep blitz along his - 1 pivotal role would be well spent, would it not?
Edit: in this case a troupe master with the new relic blade could be your character killer and the solitaire with the suit could be your horde blender. Or rather the horde blends itself.
Usually more of a gimmick against a good opponent, who's going to make it very difficult for you to deliver your Solitaire into melee with anything they care about dying to the debuff with a big enough -to hit to make it actually dangerous. It basically requires putting all your eggs into a very fragile and gimmicky basket and hoping your opponent lets you do it.
It's really only good against low quality, damage 1 attacks - anything else will kill you pretty fast anyway - and that's exactly the sort of thing your opponent probably isn't going to care much about losing, and that is probably going to kill your solitaire anyway if they really want to.
There are some very niche match-ups where it might make sense, but it isn't something you want to plan around.
yukishiro1 wrote: Usually more of a gimmick against a good opponent, who's going to make it very difficult for you to deliver your Solitaire into melee with anything they care about dying to the debuff with a big enough -to hit to make it actually dangerous. It basically requires putting all your eggs into a very fragile and gimmicky basket and hoping your opponent lets you do it.
It's really only good against low quality, damage 1 attacks - anything else will kill you pretty fast anyway - and that's exactly the sort of thing your opponent probably isn't going to care much about losing, and that is probably going to kill your solitaire anyway if they really want to.
There are some very niche match-ups where it might make sense, but it isn't something you want to plan around.
Weight of attacks is the way to go though, and the Solitaire having that small investment isn't the worst idea in the world, but it's still meh.
yukishiro1 wrote: Usually more of a gimmick against a good opponent, who's going to make it very difficult for you to deliver your Solitaire into melee with anything they care about dying to the debuff with a big enough -to hit to make it actually dangerous. It basically requires putting all your eggs into a very fragile and gimmicky basket and hoping your opponent lets you do it.
It's really only good against low quality, damage 1 attacks - anything else will kill you pretty fast anyway - and that's exactly the sort of thing your opponent probably isn't going to care much about losing, and that is probably going to kill your solitaire anyway if they really want to.
There are some very niche match-ups where it might make sense, but it isn't something you want to plan around.
I don't know it seems pretty solid against more than a few good units. Against a gunline obviously not so much, but against any kind of elite/semi-elite melee unit it seems like it'd be a pretty a pretty good trade. And the Solitaire is nimble enough that it shouldn't be too hard to dictate what you want to charge. The goonhammer harlies review has a nice breakdown on it. He advocates forgetting about any further negs to hit and just relying on the -1 to hit from his role and an additional -1 from lightning reflexes. Charge in do some damage, then ~50% of your opponents retaliation turns in to mortal wounds. Sure you most likely die but if its against the right kind of target you just significantly traded up for your Solitaire. I'm thinking this works against, possessed, paladins, sang guard, death guard, maybe even opposing shining spears, etc.
I'm taking a solitaire every game, period. By far my favourite model in the book. I won't replace Blitz, but may add on depending on opponent. Relics will be optional, with Rose being top choice, although still going to play around with other ones (Domino shroud for example).
Only downside is that I want 4 relics in my list, not 3....going to be some tough choices.
Twilight Fang
Cegorach's Lament
Shadowstone
Cegorach's Rose
I don't know it seems pretty solid against more than a few good units. Against a gunline obviously not so much, but against any kind of elite/semi-elite melee unit it seems like it'd be a pretty a pretty good trade. And the Solitaire is nimble enough that it shouldn't be too hard to dictate what you want to charge. The goonhammer harlies review has a nice breakdown on it. He advocates forgetting about any further negs to hit and just relying on the -1 to hit from his role and an additional -1 from lightning reflexes. Charge in do some damage, then ~50% of your opponents retaliation turns in to mortal wounds. Sure you most likely die but if its against the right kind of target you just significantly traded up for your Solitaire. I'm thinking this works against, possessed, paladins, sang guard, death guard, maybe even opposing shining spears, etc.
This is actually a good illustration of why it's not really all that awesome. Take sang guard, for example. Blood angels have easy access to hit rerolls on sang guards - they have the built in bad kind when near a warlord, and any chaplain can give them the good kind. They also have access to a +1 to hit from Astorath, and from quake bolts. They probably won't be able to get quake bolts onto you, but the +1 from Astorath is very possible.
Even without any + to hit, they're still hitting on 5s rerolls, which is a 54% hit rate, with your chance of doing a mortal wound back at around 37% (I just eyeballed this math, it might be off by a few %). Each hit wounds on a 2+ and does 1d3. Taking into account the 3++, assuming each sang guard has 4 attacks, you're taking about 1.2 damage on average from each sang guard, and doing 1.5 mortal wounds back in return. Four models worth of attacks on average kills the solitaire even if he's full health going in, and you've done back 6 mortal wounds, killing 3 of them - though it's more likely only 2 because they probably have the 5+++ banner close, but let's ignore that to give the best realistic scenario. That's not terrible - it's 84 points worth of models you traded your solitaire for, plus one more assuming you get the charge and fight first (solitaire is terrible at killing sang guard because of the 2+ armor save). So you end up trading 2CP, a 98 point solitaire, and a relic for...112 points. And that's really your best-case realistic scenario (you are very unlikely to get at them without hit rerolls). Doesn't seem like a great trade, does it?
We could do the math for other stuff you mentioned, but I suspect it comes out similarly, or maybe even worse.
Basically the tl;dr is if you can get him into a unit without hit rerolls or access to + to hit he can do some work...but there aren't many elite combat units that applies to in 8th. Ironically, other quins are probably some of your best targets.
Seer council only gets 2 attacks each (maybe 3 on an objective if they took the list with shining spears too), and can access a + to hit (not usually taken, but obviously it could be if they know what you're planning). Even without it, they're on 32mm bases, so you're unlikely to be able to force them to fight you with more than 2-3 models unless they really mess up their movement phase. At which point you're looking at like 2-3MW from the relic assuming -2 to hit, less if fortune is up, after which they can just fall back and easily pick up your Solitaire with smite and/or shuriken. If I am playing seer council, I am very happy if you want to trade 2CP, your solitaire and a relic for 1 seer council skyrunner, maybe 2 if you're lucky. The thing that scares you about a solitaire with seer council isn't that they'll use it against your council, it's that they'll goon out one of your farseers.
Same basic deal with the spears, except that they also have no defenses in melee, so they're going to be a lot more afraid of the offensive potential of a solitaire than of hitting themselves to death on him.
Against repentia, they'll just hit you with their base profile; they get full rerolls, so they're again hitting you 54% of the time, MWing themselves 37% of the time, wounding on 3s with hits, though only 1 damage. The innate 5++ mitigates a lot of your suit output. They're also cheap as chips - less than 120 points total - so again if worse comes to worst they trade that 117 points for your solitaire, 2CP and the relic...it's not a bad trade usually, especially since repentia are not very good against quins period so they're not going to care that much about throwing them away
I want to like the idea as much as the next guy, and I'm not trying to ruin anyone's fun. But if we are talking competitiveness, it just doesn't get there most of the time.
Having used suit of Knifed in 3 events. I can tell you it works more than you are giving it credit for. Tho i only had a -2 at most (never tried for for and never wanted too), the opponent has to space 2" apart every model in the unit or you are tagging 5+ every time to force them to fight, this includes Shining spears and alike (also they can't re-roll the modifiers don't forget that).
Why did i play with it do much? B.c my character is actively being avoided, i can protect sections of the board from melee threats. No one is going to charge up when a hidden Suit of Knives if near. I used it to harass and it was fun.
Can't reroll modifiers is the old rerolls. New rerolls let you reroll everything. Repentia, chaplain, etc all have new rerolls. And models only need to be spaced 1.01 inch apart to avoid you tagging them with the solitaire; only models within 1 inch of the solitaire or within 1 inch of a model within 1 inch can/must fight. As a matter of geometry, if 32mm models are 1.01 inches apart from every other model, it is not physically possible to tag more than 5 with a 25mm model, and that is only if they are placed in a perfect pentagon and you can place your model exactly in the middle of that pentagon. More likely, you're looking at 3, even if you're charging from point blank range and distance isn't an issue.
But I don't want to argue any more about it. If you're having success that's great, I'm happy for you. My advice to the person who asked is that it's a gimmick, but if you disagree, that's useful information for him to have too. And whether it's a gimmick or not, I don't disagree that it can do a number on someone who doesn't realize what it is and doesn't take the care necessary to mitigate it.
It depends the on wording, re-roll all dice vs re-roll hits/misses. A lot of the re-rolls are still old wording for auras. But yes some of the new units you do need to watch out for that. (Edit: missing a word)
I never run the suit of knives, and only ran the rose once or twice My solitaire will rush towards the center and hold it as a threat/speed bump to keep the enemy at bay while I clear a table quarter, then he rushes in alongside my troupmaster and the rest of them for the cleanup action turns 3+. Letting him reroll 1s to hit and all wounds really makes his blitz ability worthwhile (though honestly the speed boost and already having 8 attacks means I'll probably be taking the -1 to hit from now on).
So when he slams into their line, he is normally backed up by at least 2 TM, normally all 3 shadowseers, around 10-12 troupe players, and a couple bikes and transports. Usually my voidweaver is still bopping around claiming objectives, and now my Death Jesters can effectively target characters or shut down overwatch.
To be honest, the solitaire isn't really a unit you want to take on other heavy hitters or big squads. They're a bully unit. They should be taking down scout teams on objectives, or heavy weapon teams mid-late game once you've pushed their screen back. If it takes down two objective campers and allows the rest of your force time to deal with other threats, it's points well spent.
wannabmoy wrote: Thanks for the feedback everyone. You're all right that it's probably a bit premature to say they need to be toned down.
So far in our playtesting, The Curtain Falls is just so dominant.
Harlequins are in such a great position right now, and the soup list I've been playtesting has been neigh unstoppable (so far).
I fully expect armies to tech against a lot of the new goodies we got as best they can. Super cool to see how the meta shifts based on these updates.
I've really been enjoying GFDC's content. You guys have really been stepping it up lately which is much needed during quarantine. Any chance you'll post some written or video batreps to document how you've been doing with your new Harlequins so far?
karandrasss wrote: Reading a few pages back - wait, what? Troupes aren't killy anymore? Can someone fill me in? Been out of the loop.
They are even more killy, idk who said they aren't, they got better stratagems now. +1D, move after melee (and able to melee again) etc..
A few pages back, people saying they are comparable to Wyches, valued more for holding objectives rather than killing etc. Always thought they were infantry blenders.
Troupes really aren't killy, not properly so. They're mid-tier combat infantry, and they perform like it. They're not the sort of unit that will wipe pretty much whatever it collides with, the way, say, repentia, sanguinary guards, death company, buffed possessed, etc etc will. In particular, troupes struggle against T4, 2W, 3+ save models...which, as we all know, is a big chunk of the game right now. The basic problem is troupes have no efficient weapons for killing 2W models. If kisses were flat D2 it would change things significantly, but they aren't, and the result is that they are actually the worst weapon of all at killing primaris, which is just weird. Troupes also struggle badly against T8 unless armed with caresses and TM wound rerolls, which is usually not so much of an issue, but is another contrast with higher-tier combat units.
The other way they come up a bit short compared to dedicated combat infantry is that they suffer from not having good access to hit rerolls or modifiers. Almost all dedicated combat infantry either gets hits rerolls or adds at least +1 to hit, and troupes get neither (great harlequin is terrible, it doesn't count). Hitting only 66% of your attacks as opposed to well over 80% for most top-tier combat units is a huge loss of damage.
All of this is totally fine - troupes have a ton of other things going for them. The new stratagems ramp this up even further; making them a real contender for best troops choice in the game, IMO. Games of 40k aren't won by killing stuff, and troupes do the things that do win you games better than almost anything else.
Now the +1D stratagem does allow you to make one troupe unit a turn good at killing 2W models, albeit at a steep CP cost.
I see this "40k is a game of movement" everywhere recently, but what are you all playing? ITC? Unfortunately my meta is still mostly in the dark ages of Eternal War.
I disagree with troupes struggling to kill T4 2W 3+ models... It's quite the opposite in fact. With frozen stars and caresses, each have 5A that wound on 3+ at AP -2.
Let's say you are running a 12 player unit and you buy caresses for 10 of them. We'll ignore the 2 players with swords to simplify the calculations... that's 50A hitting on 3's and wounding on 3's... and most likely rerolling wounds... that's about 20 wounds on average... or 10 primaris SM... without even using any of the strats.
Automatically Appended Next Post: And yes, they can't hit better than on 3's... and I don't understand what the big deal is there... they have 5A each without strats, powers or whatever wadnot... just a subfaction... at 18 points a model.
Automatically Appended Next Post: With regards to the solitaire and the suit, I personally don't think it's worth it.
A 10-man frozen stars squad with every man with caresses kills slightly over 7 primaris average, or 9.5 with reroll wounds, assuming they have no invuln or FNP. Meanwhile, 9 repentia, which cost 60 points less, kill 12 primaris even with zero buffs - with the passives they typically have, they kill an absolutely absurd 23 primaris. Making them more than twice as deadly as troupes. Repentia are extreme, but you get similar results for other top-tier combat units.
That same 10-man primaris intercessor squad, despite not being an assault-focused squad, kills virtually the same number of troupes as the troupes kill of it, if it fights first (6.89 vs 7.11), even with zero buffs and no chapter trait (i.e. not apples to apples). Blood angels and space wolf intercessors trade better than frozen stars troupes armed with caresses, even if they aren't in assault doctrine, and even if they have absolutely zero buffs aside from their chapter tactic. And cost less points, and have much better ranged shooting.
It's not that troupes are bad at killing stuff. They aren't. They're pretty good at killing stuff. They just aren't a top-tier combat unit - which, again, is fine.
yukishiro1 wrote: A 10-man frozen stars squad with every man with caresses kills slightly over 7 primaris average, or 9.5 with reroll wounds, assuming they have no invuln or FNP. Meanwhile, 9 repentia, which cost 60 points less, kill 12 primaris even with zero buffs - with the passives they typically have, they kill an absolutely absurd 23 primaris. Making them more than twice as deadly as troupes. Repentia are extreme, but you get similar results for other top-tier combat units.
That same 10-man primaris intercessor squad, despite not being an assault-focused squad, kills virtually the same number of troupes as the troupes kill of it, if it fights first (6.89 vs 7.11), even with zero buffs and no chapter trait (i.e. not apples to apples). Blood angels and space wolf intercessors trade better than frozen stars troupes armed with caresses, even if they aren't in assault doctrine, and even if they have absolutely zero buffs aside from their chapter tactic. And cost less points, and have much better ranged shooting.
It's not that troupes are bad at killing stuff. They aren't. They're pretty good at killing stuff. They just aren't a top-tier combat unit - which, again, is fine.
True they are not A tier at damage, but with Invuls, advance and charge, flip belts, etc.. they do things that those other units can not.
Troupes are B-tier combat units, but they're A or arguably even S-tier when it comes to board control and utility.
That's also why you never see the 10 or 12 man unit with everyone equipped with weapons in competitive lists. If you take a 12 or 10 man it's for board control, so you take them with 3-6 weapons per squad, not 10-12.
I'm not disputing whether they are tier A, B, etc. I'm disputing that they struggle to kill primaris SM or similar units. Also, you have to compare alike things, you explained how many troupes the intercessors would kill but did not say how many repentia they would.
eparedes0785 wrote: I'm not disputing whether they are tier A, B, etc. I'm disputing that they struggle to kill primaris SM or similar units. Also, you have to compare alike things, you explained how many troupes the intercessors would kill but did not say how many repentia they would.
I don't think how many repentia intercessors kill is all that directly relevant, but FWIW, on base profile they kill 7.59; with the passives they usually have, it goes down to 4.59, compared to 5.17 for troupes with their usual passive -1 to wound. They're both not durable in combat. The difference is that repentia, while costing substantially less, will obliterate anything they charge, whereas troupes will not.
I mean maybe this is just a matter of terminology. When I say they struggle, I don't mean they find it objectively difficult to kill primaris, I mean they do not do so efficiently.
Also i am the one that talked about Troupes vs Wyches. But the point was to show before PA Troupes didn't have a good melee role like in DE Wyches, Wyches are more deadly to many things in melee (specially given the new PA rules) But Troupes are a "Jack of All from a close distance" unit they are not dedicated melee and should not been seen as dedicated, but htey are able to fill that role. I've always been mad about this as we are paying high in points for a unit that is "OK" at everything but not amazing at anything, we are always portrayed as this scary force when we get there, and i just get mad b.c we "are" kinda but not really b.c we don't have the tools everyone else has, we are literally missing essential tools. So going back to Wyches, they are not missing tools, they are cheaper and they can hang with us b.c they have some of those tools. If you just gave us RR1's to hit we would be significantly better
karandrasss wrote: I guess the proliferation of multi-wound infantry changed everything. Maybe they should have gotten 2D on 6s to wound instead of the +1D strat.
Yes there are a lot of multi wound units. But there are still a lot of 1w ones too. Troupes might be rough to kill 5 Primaris vs others, but if you can for sure kill them, does it matter if you over kill them or not? When have you seen 10man Primaris units anyways lol. I just use the maths to show we should be giving a small buff, but i have never had any problems actually killing 5man Primaris and 10man gants/IG. But when it comes to 3w and more elite units thats when we struggle for sure (Custodes, DG, etc..) or extremely hordes (But we might be better at that now with PA). My Troupes normally die moreso to shooting and MW's, or if i have to charge a high toughness high wound unit and OFC it wont kill it, but i was able to deal 10 wounds out of 18-28 giving me a change to kill it later.
karandrasss wrote: 9th edition killed my White Dwarf excitement anyway. Back to waiting...maybe the killer clowns are killer in 9th.
PA rules are being used in 9th.
Yes but we don't know how much our strategies will change, what with vehicles now shooting in combat yet allegedly a better assault phase.
Nothing changes until we get a new book. CP and stratagems are here to stay, this is confirmed. When 9th comes out we will not have a new codex (most likely only SM, Necrons, and Chaos will get the first new books in the first 6months). Yes vehicles "can" shoot in combat, but we have literally no idea "when" they can, or "how" they can, we know nothing so far. For all we also don't know if all vehicles can shoot into any combat, or just who they are in combat with.
More importantly, melee might work like shooting, you are a "OW for melee" but only melee on your turn, if that is going to be added (Just rumors) and f they can only shoot who they are in combat with, but not into other combats, then that is a buff for us and armies with fasting moving sacrifice units. Imagine a DJ stopping OW of a Leman Russ with a BC (new anti-infantry rules coming, i see these are popular again), stopping OW, it can't fallback b.c to many tanks on the table, can't die from crappy melee, and then now he HAS to shoot his BC at the DJ, which has a 50/50 chance not to even hurt it. This is as likely of an outcome b.c we don't know the rules yet.
Let's be serious... a 12-player troupe of the frozen stars masque form does have the tools to be really good in melee.
It has tremendous mobility and can be delivered into combat quite easily... 8" movement infantry, advance and charge / fall back and charge integrated, auto-advance 6" with 1CP, advance again in the psychic phase using a warp charge value 6 power (shadowseer casting it doesn't even have to be the same masque as the troupe and you'll be running multiple SS if playing mono-clowns), can even reuse the autoadvance 6" stratagem (different phases, TP wording)... that translates into a 16" + 2D6 (could be converted into 12 for 2CP) + 2D6" threat range (20" to 40"... average is 30")... they of course have flip belts, so they can move over terrain, enemy models, etc.
They also have a 72% chance of making it to combat out of deepstrike if you take a player of the light (re-roll failed charges) FS TM warlord with prince of light (+1 to charge rolls if coupled with PotL) and are willing to use tactical reroll if appropriate. I admit you'll be making your warlord a player of the twilight instead most of the times, but since the choice is only made after you know your opponent and mission in ITC, you have that option.
Decent damage output... while troupes don't have access to decent to hit roll bonuses, they don't really need them... they get an additional attack on the charge, meaning they have 5 attacks each, hitting on 3+. Large units will be equipped with caresses (S5 AP-2 Dmg1) and will typically be accompanied by a troupe master that grants them to wound re-rolls (troupe can either trail with naked players to be within the TM bubble or the TM can be delivered where needed using a relic (domino shroud) or a 1CP stratagem (virtuosos of the webway, webway ambush). If needed, their caresses can be turned into a Dmg 2 weapon at a cost of 2CPs. They also have a 2CP strat to add +1 to their wound rolls against infantry, beasts or bikers although I reckon you won't be using it often. More importantly, they can be chosen to fight again at the end of the fight phase for 3CP's (it works as long as you are within 3" of an enemy unit for them). Being in 25mm bases does also help
Not as fragile as they seem... while they are T3, if within range of a SS, they are -1 to wound and, more importantly, their 4++ can be turned into a 3++ very easily for just 1CP. Option is there to make them -1 to hit (veil of tears psychic power, WCV of 6) or make the unit attacking them - to hit (fog of dreams, WCV of 6). You could even attempt to cast both... o try webway dance to get a 6+++. They aren't super difficult to hide either and you will not easily fall back from them and shoot them to death now that they can make a 6" consolidate move towards the unit that felt back from them for 1CP (twilight encore). Last, if you fear retaliation, you can use the curtain falls to ball back / move instead of consolidating after having fought. And one more thing, enemy units with 24" and 30" rapid fire weapons only tap twice if within 6" and 9" respectively if your unit is in aura range of a SS with veil of illusion.
If what I've explained it's not a good melee unit, reasonable costed (around 200pts) and with multiple tools at its disposal, then I'm totally lost.
As for killing T8 models... well, skyweavers do fulfill that role very well.
PD: forgot to mention that they also have tools for charging without being overwatched (starmist raiment relic, DJ pivotal role humbling cruelty).
Its all CP based. Want a reliable DS? CP and Heroes, want a reliable change? CP and heroes, want to reliably not die turn 1? CP and heroes. We should relay a little on heroes. But being able to kill lots of infantry we should not. A FS 5man troupe with embraces only kills a8 IG without a TS. It doesn't even kill all 10... that to me is bad. They ncan't even relay on their pistols before meleeing Guardsmen b.c on average its 1.5 dead..... with a TM near yes you can kill 12 IG. WHY do i need a TM to kill a throwaway IG unit?
Turnip Jedi wrote: Fingers crossed the soup tax isnt too high as dropping an in a cwe / de airwing or spearhead(?) seems rather popular
Huge assumption. I think it'll be high enough to not want to do it with 3 factions, but low enough to be viable for 2 detachments. It just makes sense from a financial and balance perspective.
Well, the whole game revolves around auras and stratagems for the most part. With regards to the 10-man IG unit... you are better off not killing all models
eparedes0785 wrote: Well, the whole game revolves around auras and stratagems for the most part. With regards to the 10-man IG unit... you are better off not killing all models
Not having access to hit rerolls or bonuses is a massive issue. It is the main reason troupes underperform relative to actual specialist melee units. Losing 33% of your damage right off the bat is brutal on the overall efficiency of the unit.
If troupes had the ability to reroll hits and/or hit on 2s the way most specialist melee does, they would be legitimately good, top-tier combat units instead of just merely decent. They'd still suffer from not having a good weapon for killing 2W models and not having good ways to threaten T7 and especially T8, but they'd be very good at killing everything else.
5 attacks was a big number when the codex came out. It's not so great in a world where even blood angel scouts can easily have 5 attacks too, wounding T3 on 2s, or where repentia have 4 STR 8 -4 D2 attacks, or where possessed bomb obliterates anything when buffed up, etc.
More importantly, melee might work like shooting, you are a "OW for melee" but only melee on your turn, if that is going to be added (Just rumors) and f they can only shoot who they are in combat with, but not into other combats, then that is a buff for us and armies with fasting moving sacrifice units. Imagine a DJ stopping OW of a Leman Russ with a BC (new anti-infantry rules coming, i see these are popular again), stopping OW, it can't fallback b.c to many tanks on the table, can't die from crappy melee, and then now he HAS to shoot his BC at the DJ, which has a 50/50 chance not to even hurt it. This is as likely of an outcome b.c we don't know the rules yet.
The tanks can shoot in melee thing...I listened that part and conversation went roughly like this:
"many have complained about grots charging into tanks rendering them useless"
"that doesn't work like that anymore"
"the tank will kill them in melee"
AT which point another said "and shoot other stuff"
So it sounded you can shoot FROM melee but nothing about shooting INTO melee. I doubt they will give tanks special ability to target INTO melee. So I expect it to be "can shoot even if you are in melee but have to target unit not in melee".
So in theory if you get all your units into melee and they can't fall back with anything you would still be safe from shooting. They can shoot FROM melee but wouldn't have anything to shoot AT.
Mind you this is just guess based on what they said which might or might not have been fully accurate.
I suspect it'll be something more complicated than that. As dumb as charging a grot into a tank to prevent it from shooting is, it's just as dumb for a tank to be charging into a blob of grots to protect itself from shots.
I suspect it will either go both ways - i.e. tanks that are in combat can shoot from combat but can also be shot by others while in combat - or it'll be something that doesn't just outright allow you to shoot from combat, but maybe instead lets you ram, which pushes enemy infantry to just beyond 1" from your model, and allows you to shoot afterwards since it doesn't count as falling back.
More importantly, melee might work like shooting, you are a "OW for melee" but only melee on your turn, if that is going to be added (Just rumors) and f they can only shoot who they are in combat with, but not into other combats, then that is a buff for us and armies with fasting moving sacrifice units. Imagine a DJ stopping OW of a Leman Russ with a BC (new anti-infantry rules coming, i see these are popular again), stopping OW, it can't fallback b.c to many tanks on the table, can't die from crappy melee, and then now he HAS to shoot his BC at the DJ, which has a 50/50 chance not to even hurt it. This is as likely of an outcome b.c we don't know the rules yet.
The tanks can shoot in melee thing...I listened that part and conversation went roughly like this:
"many have complained about grots charging into tanks rendering them useless"
"that doesn't work like that anymore"
"the tank will kill them in melee"
AT which point another said "and shoot other stuff"
So it sounded you can shoot FROM melee but nothing about shooting INTO melee. I doubt they will give tanks special ability to target INTO melee. So I expect it to be "can shoot even if you are in melee but have to target unit not in melee".
So in theory if you get all your units into melee and they can't fall back with anything you would still be safe from shooting. They can shoot FROM melee but wouldn't have anything to shoot AT.
Mind you this is just guess based on what they said which might or might not have been fully accurate.
Yes i listen to it too and the purpose of my post is, we don't know anything yet.
eparedes0785 wrote: Again, it's not the troupes role to kill vehicles. And they do have fusion pistols to murder high toughness monsters.
Not fully true tho. Many times over many editions infantry became dedicated AT roles. Example, at one point Wyches were dedicated Anti-tank. Not saying we will or should have Troupes tank hunting, just saying in the future that could be a thing given new rules and math.
ALso we don't know if vehicles will have its own keywords and works like Apoc were only certain weapons can really effect vehicles.
I never said no infantry can kill vehicles in the whole game. I only meant to say that, in a solo harlequins army, that role is fulfilled by skyweavers at the moment (I'm not talking about 9ed as we don't know the rules yet)
eparedes0785 wrote: I never said no infantry can kill vehicles in the whole game. I only meant to say that, in a solo harlequins army, that role is fulfilled by skyweavers at the moment (I'm not talking about 9ed as we don't know the rules yet)
Yeah i agree with that. Especially after running FP boats 50+ times, with no re-rolls of any kinda and Invuls, they just don't do much at all.
Yeah, there's a reason fusion pistols only cost 7 points. I think it's usually worth taking one on a troupe master and 1 per troupe squad (maybe 2 in a 10 or 12 man, maybe) just because it occasionally comes up trumps, but it's not something to build around.
Nothing changes until we get a new book. CP and stratagems are here to stay, this is confirmed. When 9th comes out we will not have a new codex (most likely only SM, Necrons, and Chaos will get the first new books in the first 6months). Yes vehicles "can" shoot in combat, but we have literally no idea "when" they can, or "how" they can, we know nothing so far. For all we also don't know if all vehicles can shoot into any combat, or just who they are in combat with.
Vehicles able to shoot into combat will make the new edition even more shooty.
Avoid close combat is a new doctrine which will render cc Harlies useless.
There’s literally no point trying to guess 9th rules. Saying melee is over because tanks can shoot into melee is nonsense until we know what the rules interaction is. I could just say, ‘well new cover rules are going to make shooting less effective’ but do I really know that? Nope.
8th ed Harlequins, if you’re not bringing 12-18 haywire bikes to deal with vehicles then you’re doing something wrong imo.
People arguing whether troupe are top tier melee, does it matter? It’s not like we have an alternative choice when playing mono. They have 4-5 x S5 AP2 D1 (or whatever other variable you equip them with) attacks each and are troops,therefore helping to generate the CPs they need to punch way above their weight. I think epardes gets it when he points out that troupes are frigging boss and better than lots of elites in other armies. Of course they’re not the best out there or the top tier of whatever classification you want to give them but for Harlequins they work damn well.
Vehicles able to shoot into combat will make the new edition even more shooty.
Avoid close combat is a new doctrine which will render cc Harlies useless.
That assumes vehicles can shoot INTO combat.
There's difference from being able to shoot FROM combat to shoot INTO combat. The video indicated FROM rather than TO. Aka your land raider can shoot at stuff not in melee even if it's in melee(or has ability to get out of melee and shoot at least) but they didn't say can shoot into melee. Well one said to that effect but then the rule guy interrupted and said "and shoot other stuff"
Before making too big assumptions maybe good idea to wait to see what the rule REALLY is. ATM it's more likely you can shoot FROM than INTO based on video and considering it's more logical on top of that.
Vehicles able to shoot into combat will make the new edition even more shooty.
Avoid close combat is a new doctrine which will render cc Harlies useless.
That assumes vehicles can shoot INTO combat.
There's difference from being able to shoot FROM combat to shoot INTO combat. The video indicated FROM rather than TO. Aka your land raider can shoot at stuff not in melee even if it's in melee(or has ability to get out of melee and shoot at least) but they didn't say can shoot into melee. Well one said to that effect but then the rule guy interrupted and said "and shoot other stuff"
Before making too big assumptions maybe good idea to wait to see what the rule REALLY is. ATM it's more likely you can shoot FROM than INTO based on video and considering it's more logical on top of that.
Seconded.
Well, I'll put all intended purchases on hold until we know more about the new ed.
karandrasss wrote: I guess the proliferation of multi-wound infantry changed everything. Maybe they should have gotten 2D on 6s to wound instead of the +1D strat.
Yes there are a lot of multi wound units. But there are still a lot of 1w ones too. Troupes might be rough to kill 5 Primaris vs others, but if you can for sure kill them, does it matter if you over kill them or not? When have you seen 10man Primaris units anyways lol. I just use the maths to show we should be giving a small buff, but i have never had any problems actually killing 5man Primaris and 10man gants/IG. But when it comes to 3w and more elite units thats when we struggle for sure (Custodes, DG, etc..) or extremely hordes (But we might be better at that now with PA). My Troupes normally die moreso to shooting and MW's, or if i have to charge a high toughness high wound unit and OFC it wont kill it, but i was able to deal 10 wounds out of 18-28 giving me a change to kill it later.
karandrasss wrote: 9th edition killed my White Dwarf excitement anyway. Back to waiting...maybe the killer clowns are killer in 9th.
PA rules are being used in 9th.
Yes but we don't know how much our strategies will change, what with vehicles now shooting in combat yet allegedly a better assault phase.
Nothing changes until we get a new book. CP and stratagems are here to stay, this is confirmed. When 9th comes out we will not have a new codex (most likely only SM, Necrons, and Chaos will get the first new books in the first 6months). Yes vehicles "can" shoot in combat, but we have literally no idea "when" they can, or "how" they can, we know nothing so far. For all we also don't know if all vehicles can shoot into any combat, or just who they are in combat with.
More importantly, melee might work like shooting, you are a "OW for melee" but only melee on your turn, if that is going to be added (Just rumors) and f they can only shoot who they are in combat with, but not into other combats, then that is a buff for us and armies with fasting moving sacrifice units. Imagine a DJ stopping OW of a Leman Russ with a BC (new anti-infantry rules coming, i see these are popular again), stopping OW, it can't fallback b.c to many tanks on the table, can't die from crappy melee, and then now he HAS to shoot his BC at the DJ, which has a 50/50 chance not to even hurt it. This is as likely of an outcome b.c we don't know the rules yet.
So I have a more general question of thought. With apparently all armies getting the same CP start based on points and using multiple detachments/factions supposedly lowering it, do you think that makes Quins more viable on their own?
My own thought is that yes and it will provide a big boost for us because of just how CP hungry the army is.
mightymconeshot wrote: So I have a more general question of thought. With apparently all armies getting the same CP start based on points and using multiple detachments/factions supposedly lowering it, do you think that makes Quins more viable on their own?
My own thought is that yes and it will provide a big boost for us because of just how CP hungry the army is.
Some BIG ifs here. But if you pay CP to access detachments (with Brigade being say 0CP and battalion costing say a few CP up to vanguards, spearheads, and allied detachments costing a fair few) then maybe yes. But I know lots of other armies that would benefit, Custodes being one that stands out in particular. We’ll just have to wait and see how many more CP it ends up giving Harlequins, mono we’re pretty good as dual battalion or brigade now so currently we can easily get 13-18CPs which while still not enough for all those shiny relics and strats is pretty decent.
I’m personally hoping that CPs and detachments are one of the first new details that GW leak us.
We don't know if each detachment cost points, they only said allied detachment costs. We also don't know if we have to start with a battalion or what. SO its hard to say anything at this time.
Well, let's hope that Harlies are not doomed in the new edition.
Small factions with almost no variety could have a hard time when the basic rules change.
E.g., we had editions with a 4+ cover save (almost everywhere) such that a 4+ inv. save was less worth the points.
wuestenfux wrote: Well, let's hope that Harlies are not doomed in the new edition.
Small factions with almost no variety could have a hard time when the basic rules change.
E.g., we had editions with a 4+ cover save (almost everywhere) such that a 4+ inv. save was less worth the points.
Or +cover gives +invuls and we become OP b.c our new PA +Cover aura. Its just to early to say anything right now.
If they really move to punish soup that will hurt quins competitively because quins are too limited as a faction to be viable as mono. Any competitive list will be taking at least a craftworlds detachment, and sometimes even a DE detachment as well. The book is just too limited to be a fully-fledged army - too few unit choices, but more importantly lacking in too many key roles. An army with no vehicles over T5/5W, no ranged firepower beyond 24 inches, no indirect fire, no flyers, and only a single troops choice and a single elite multi-unit choice (bikes) is not a full army. It just isn't. Compare it to literally any other codex in the game and it becomes completely obvious that Harlequins are not a complete army on their own.
If they are really going to go to a place where armies are supposed to be taken mono, quins will either need a huge expansion to become a real, full army, or they'll need some kind of recognition that they are in fact *not* a complete army - like assassins or sisters of silence or inquisition - and therefore a way to take a detachment of them in another army without a big penalty.
yukishiro1 wrote: A 10-man frozen stars squad with every man with caresses kills slightly over 7 primaris average, or 9.5 with reroll wounds, assuming they have no invuln or FNP. Meanwhile, 9 repentia, which cost 60 points less, kill 12 primaris even with zero buffs - with the passives they typically have, they kill an absolutely absurd 23 primaris. Making them more than twice as deadly as troupes. Repentia are extreme, but you get similar results for other top-tier combat units.
That same 10-man primaris intercessor squad, despite not being an assault-focused squad, kills virtually the same number of troupes as the troupes kill of it, if it fights first (6.89 vs 7.11), even with zero buffs and no chapter trait (i.e. not apples to apples). Blood angels and space wolf intercessors trade better than frozen stars troupes armed with caresses, even if they aren't in assault doctrine, and even if they have absolutely zero buffs aside from their chapter tactic. And cost less points, and have much better ranged shooting.
It's not that troupes are bad at killing stuff. They aren't. They're pretty good at killing stuff. They just aren't a top-tier combat unit - which, again, is fine.
Repentia are also not a Troupe choice (hah I'm funny) and significantly slower.
I think I was very clear in my prior posts that I think Troupes are an exceptionally good unit, and one of the best troops choices in the game. They're fantastic for all sorts of reasons.
The discussion was about killing power, however. And Troupes are not particularly good at deleting stuff in combat. They're not *bad* at it by any means, but they're not particularly good either. One of the big weaknesses of the quins Codex is that there is no actual specialist combat unit choice that *is* capable of deleting stuff in combat. So you end up with a lot of decent combat units, but none that are actually elite.
Automatically Appended Next Post: BTW, they just let slip in the Q&A that modifiers in 9th can never be more than +1 or -1, so suit of hidden knives is now undoubtedly a big gimmick. It also a pretty big nerf to eldar generally, and especially to quins bikes and boats.
Tbh the -1/+1 isn’t a huge surprise. It’s got silly with -4/-5 out there. Personally I think -2 is prob a fair limit but we don’t know if it could get worse by your own actions too (eg. moving your heavy weapons). I think we’ll have wait and see but I definitely see -1 hit and -1 wound being central to us. We can keep our bikes at -1 hit fairly easily (even if the opponent has +1) so it will be very interesting to see how cover works, will Gloomwake be a sleeper ability? I’d hate to see our 4++ become less useful so who knows?
Edit. I agree that Suit Of Hidden Knives is prob done now as a relic. Tbh I’m fine with that as now I can take Shadowstone, Cegorach’s Lament & Curtianfall / Twilight Fang every game. Maybe Cegorach’s Rose if fighting lots of W3.
The reroll wounds part of the Rose is as good or better than the flat 3D a lot of the time. Without the Rose a Solitaire really struggles to do much of anything out there on his own. Can't reliably kill even a non-primaris space marine character with the standard 4++, which is kinda sad.
Sure, but the solitaire is a very points-inefficient way to attack something close to the rest of your army. There are match-ups where you may end up doing that just because you have nothing better to do with him, but if my general plan was that my solitaire would get wound rerolls from a TM, I just wouldn't take him.
Yeah, I do find most people either know little about Harlequins or are the sort that ran into a -4 to hit suit Solitaire. I tend to over-suggest his lethality.
According to the new article, it costs 3CP to take a battalion that your warlord isn't part of. Lol.
Quins back to being terrible competitively, it looks like. Mono quins don't get there because the codex just isn't remotely complete, and now you get punished harshly for taking the stuff you need to take to supplement the incomplete codex.
Don’t soup
Don’t tag tanks
Don’t stack hit modifiers
Don’t use your fallback ability or get punished by any large unit you were engaged with - the new strat was supposed to help us right?
The new Strat isn’t rubbish. If your troupe, TM, solitaire is in melee with say 30 Plaguebearers, gaunts, boyz, cultists, etc. and wants to fall back and charge a tastier target (or just wants to be out of this combat, maybe to grab an objective) you’re taking on average 5 mortal wounds. That’s pretty brutal on a relatively small model count army that relies on its manoeuvrability and invulnerable saves.
Malefic666 wrote: The new Strat isn’t rubbish. If your troupe, TM, solitaire is in melee with say 30 Plaguebearers, gaunts, boyz, cultists, etc. and wants to fall back and charge a tastier target (or just wants to be out of this combat, maybe to grab an objective) you’re taking on average 5 mortal wounds
Don't forget they have to be in Engagement Range to do the wounds. We don't know what that range is yet, but if it stays the same as it currently is then at least lone characters should be safe from the whole unit rolling against them
Malefic666 wrote: The new Strat isn’t rubbish. If your troupe, TM, solitaire is in melee with say 30 Plaguebearers, gaunts, boyz, cultists, etc. and wants to fall back and charge a tastier target (or just wants to be out of this combat, maybe to grab an objective) you’re taking on average 5 mortal wounds. That’s pretty brutal on a relatively small model count army that relies on its manoeuvrability and invulnerable saves.
So far things aren’t looking too great.
Eh how you plan to get 30 boyz into contact with solitaire and then have solitaire whiff everything and not kill single ork?
Just how big base solitaire is? As on 32mm base it's physically impossible to get 30 into combat with him.
Eh how you plan to get 30 boyz into contact with solitaire and then have solitaire whiff everything and not kill single ork?
Just how big base solitaire is? As on 32mm base it's physically impossible to get 30 into combat with him.
Real average is more like 2-3
This is now too far in the *other* direction. Unless there are only 2-3 Orks left alive, it won't be 2-3. If the engagement rules stay the same as they are now, 10+ Orks should be able to do it. Just not the whole unit.
Malefic666 wrote: The new Strat isn’t rubbish. If your troupe, TM, solitaire is in melee with say 30 Plaguebearers, gaunts, boyz, cultists, etc. and wants to fall back and charge a tastier target (or just wants to be out of this combat, maybe to grab an objective) you’re taking on average 5 mortal wounds. That’s pretty brutal on a relatively small model count army that relies on its manoeuvrability and invulnerable saves.
So far things aren’t looking too great.
If you are falling back from 30 mans you are playing poorly. My 5-6 Troupes wont be charging 30mans either, i'll make sure 15 of them die first from shooting, and if they are charging me, no matter what, 5 Troupes are going to die vs ANY horde 30man unit in the game and i left them there on purpose to be charged.
So yes the strat is bad. It only helps Hordes fight super elites that can take the hits that wants to fallback, which is very little.
How are Custodes, Marines, Quins, CWE, DE, all the "elite" armies going to use this? So you spend 1CP to deal 1 MW... cool, ok they still fellback, they still out of combat, they still have wounds left, they still going to shoot you. And at times where they WANT to fallback just to get out of combat, if you spend 1cp to kill off the last guy, well cool you kill 1 guy and wasted 1CP, but now they can shoot you anyways, or you could have just shot them with a pistol later and not use the CP.
It should have been a core rule (without the CP, just everyone got it like a OW for melee). But If fallbacks, OW, and other rules change to make it harder to use or are penalized then sure i can see it being a stratagem.
But as of right now, i'm never going to use it as a Quins player.
Wow. I never said I’d use it as a Harlequins player, all I said was it wasn’t rubbish as large units can possibly put out quite a few mortal wounds on elite units and mortal wounds hurt Harlequins because they negate our invul save.
Engagement range I assume is within 2” of a model in base to base, 20-30 is easy for Ork boyz, cultists, gaunts, etc. to do against a reasonably sized unit as most horde models are on 25mm bases and even 32mm bases should get 12-18 in this range. Of course the Harlequin unit should kill whatever horde we’re taking about but there are times we can end up consolidating into a unit to avoid shooting or find ourselves in melee unexpectedly. I’m not arguing examples in a vacuum, I’m just saying this strat could situationally be nasty against us. This is why I dislike this forum now, you have a different point of view and all of a sudden you’re ‘playing badly’. There’s loads of reasons one might want to fall back from a combat and giving specific examples is neither helpful or realistic. I’ve been in loads of positions where I needed to do something out of the ordinary to win hold more or even just hold in an ITC game.
Anyway. My opinion is it isn’t necessarily a bad strat and I’ll reserve judgement until I see all of 9th rules. Will I use it with my DG, Custodes, or Harlequins.... nope unlikely.
If your troupe is in combat with a big unit at the start of your turn and not ALREADY dead or effectively dead, something really weird happened. I mean how did that unit of 30 ork boyz get 30 models into attack range of your troupe and yet not attack it? Because if they did attack it, it'd be gone already.
There are definitely situations you can come up with where the strat would be worth using. They're just super rare and niche.
True but I’m not arguing the situational use, I’m just saying a strat that causes mortal wounds for falling back is not necessarily rubbish It’s rubbish for us sure as there aren’t many times we will fall back (but I’d argue we can’t say we never will need that option), and it’s nasty against elite armies (if and when they want to fall back which I concede is unlikely) because it bypasses invulnerable saves. Maybe the OP should’ve said, the strat is not particularly useful for us and likely to have a limited use but when it does it could be nasty?
You'd much rather have most blast weapons shooting at troupes of 6-10 than literally anything else in the army.
I do think that the skyweavers maybe go down to 5, because 6 model is the worst possible unit size. If you can't get up to 10, it may not be worth going above 5. I think that depends mainly on how many people actually take blast weapons. I have a feeling this is going to turn out to be a big bust - the points cost of blast weapons will go up to account for the blast characteristic, and nobody is going to want to them because nobody wants to pay points to make what are mostly anti-tank weapons better at killing big units that few people are taking anyway. I think the only blast stuff people are reliably going to take is indirect fire, and very few indirect fire weapons actually get any significant benefit at all from the 6-10 size bracket with blast, so it's going to be a very minor impact.
But I certainly wouldn't decide I can't take a 10-man troupe because a couple weapons that don't want to be shooting them anyway may get an average one extra shot each. Like if somebody is silly enough to shoot at my 10-man troupe with, say, an earthshaker cannon instead of at bikes or starweavers...I am all for that. That's a trap I'll happily set. And if I come up against a big indirect list, that's going to mess up my plans bad whether I'm facing a total of 40 average indirect shots a turn against 5 man troupes or 44 average shots against 10 man troupes. The difference doesn't really change anything. But having a 10-man squad that can get double benefit from a strat - that makes a huge difference.
The threats to troupes are volume of fire weapons, not blast weapons. Hurricane bolters are point for point way, way more threatening than anything that is going to have the blast characteristic. If I see my opponent's army and it's full of blast weapons instead of volume of fire weapons...I'm rubbing my hands together, that's a good game for me, not a bad one. Whether my troupes are 5 mans or 10 mans.
yukishiro1 wrote: The penalty for going from 5 to 10 is almost irrelevant; at most, it's 1 more shot on average, and never more than 2.
The penalty from going from 10 to 11, however, is massive. You will definitely never see a 12 man squad again.
16% increase to firepower assuming it's roll of 3 and not result of 3(and note this assumption goes flat out against warhammer community post that says blast weapons will always have minimum 3 attacks vs 6-10 models...). If it's result then it's 50% boost(d3, 1 or 2 is less than 3 so 3...). About same as if troupes would suddenly go 13 pts per model. Irrelevant change? Even more to the point as shown in WHC it's 50% increase...
Automatically Appended Next Post:
yukishiro1 wrote: You'd much rather have most blast weapons shooting at troupes of 6-10 than literally anything else in the army.
I do think that the skyweavers maybe go down to 5, because 6 model is the worst possible unit size. If you can't get up to 10, it may not be worth going above 5. I think that depends mainly on how many people actually take blast weapons. I have a feeling this is going to turn out to be a big bust - the points cost of blast weapons will go up to account for the blast characteristic, and nobody is going to want to them because nobody wants to pay points to make what are mostly anti-tank weapons better at killing big units that few people are taking anyway. I think the only blast stuff people are reliably going to take is indirect fire, and very few indirect fire weapons actually get any significant benefit at all from the 6-10 size bracket with blast, so it's going to be a very minor impact.
Eh many of the blast weapons are already good at dealing with non-horde targets so are taken already. And funny optimism for points. GW wants you to take them so that people make damned sure they don't bring hordes.
For AT you want multi shot weapons rather than some stupid heavy 1 weapon.
