Have a question on allying in a chaos knight in a super heavy auxilliary detachment. If its a tzeentch knight, we get to take it for just 1 cp ? Because we get 2 CP refunded back?
Also, if I ally in a Tzeentch chaos knight like that, what we do lose on the knight front? (I know we still keep cabalistic rituals, so for the Tsons detachment we don't seem to lose anything at all.)
We lose household bonds, but gain fell bond if its a dreadknight? I know we don't get traitorious ambitions. So, no infernal nor iconoclast ambition. We keep blessings of the gods because those are paid in points so we can just pay the points for a tzeentch blessing. We lose Harbringers I assume.
But how about strategems? And warlord? and relics ? Do we keep those? or do we lose them?
Assuming you go Duplicity the Mutalith may have some value as a distraction since you can teleport it, and you'll probably still have enough points for a Shaman.
You could drop a squad of Rubrics and pick up a Land Raider, with the AoC changes they're remarkably tough, especially if you get first turn and can buff it. Also, Ensorcelled Infusion + Malefic Maelstrom on the Land Raider isn't bad. I tend to build my Exalted out with Scrolls to insure either Facade or Twist can be cast more reliably. Or you could pick up a couple Helbrutes under the same circumstances.
Eldenfirefly wrote: Have a question on allying in a chaos knight in a super heavy auxilliary detachment. If its a tzeentch knight, we get to take it for just 1 cp ? Because we get 2 CP refunded back?
Also, if I ally in a Tzeentch chaos knight like that, what we do lose on the knight front? (I know we still keep cabalistic rituals, so for the Tsons detachment we don't seem to lose anything at all.)
We lose household bonds, but gain fell bond if its a dreadknight? I know we don't get traitorious ambitions. So, no infernal nor iconoclast ambition. We keep blessings of the gods because those are paid in points so we can just pay the points for a tzeentch blessing. We lose Harbringers I assume.
But how about strategems? And warlord? and relics ? Do we keep those? or do we lose them?
It`s not a 100% clear right now as the wording on Dreadblades rules is really wacky. Especially if it`s detachment counts as a knight detachment or not. A Dreadblade in a single detachment would be a paradox you couldn`t create.^^ Weirdly enough the Dreadblade gets a "Agent of Chaos" until the end of the battle which is a wording that`s rarely (if even) used.
GW definitely needs to FAQ this and i guess what we really can take in the end depends on if they say a Dreadblade detachment is a Chaos Knight detachment for all rules purposes or if it can be taken but after building the army does not count as one. Which would be kinda stupid but it`s kinda hard to know what GW wanted Dreadblades to have and what not.
Also there are some weird possibilities like a Dreadblade can`t get the character keyword unless you play a combat patrol soup which is technically possible.
Right now i think it`s like this:
Tzeentch Knight gets us back 2 of the 3 CP in a superheavy auxiliary so yeah, with TS it will cost 1 CP total
We keep Rituals and there are no other restrictions like you said.
No harbingers and Households, thats right.
Technically we can`t get Favours right now as a mono Dreadblade does not count as Chaos Knight detachment, but GW will hopefully fix that soon as it makes no sense that way. It´s done while creating the army so the intend is kinda clear.
We get Fell Bonds which can be used to get access to traitorous ambitions if you really want that +1 to wound surge.
As we can`t have a CK character we don`t have access to WL traits.
You could make the Dreadblade your Warlord but then you`d loose TS relics and WL traits instead but would get access to the Chaos Knight stuff instead.
If they fix the detachment mess we`ll get access to the strats as well. (Which is intended i guess as it has been this way before but who knows, maybe they want just to give acess to favours and not strats.)
Erm, I don't understand how one single chaos knight in a super heavy auxiliary detachment doesn't count as a chaos knight detachment ?
There is literally nothing else in that detachment except for a chaos knight model... From what I read of that small paragraph from war hammer community. The dreadblade gains the "agent of chaos" keyword, which is to ensure we still get to play with our cabalistic rituals. However, the dreadblade doesn't lose any keywords.
So, its a still a chaos knight and so its in a chaos knight detachment. This means we gain the strategems for chaos knights. And with the strategems, we can now use Tyranical court for 1 cp to make our Dreadblade a character and it will now gain a warlord trait. We can't get relics unless we make this Dreadblade our actual warlord, but we now at least have access to strategems for chaos knights. So we can raise shields for 2CP, etc etc.
Also, once we consider this a chaos knight detachment, then we can use spend points for favor of the dark gods.
So, my understanding is that if we don't make the dreadblade our warlord, we lose
1) harbringers
2) traitorious ambitions (infernal/iconoclast)
3) lose taking a relic on the dreadblade
We keep
1) Everything in our Tsons detachment, including cabalistic rituals
2) Chaos knights strategems, warlord trait, fallen household bond, titanic and chaos knight generic rules.
3) Favour of the dark gods (but we have to make our dreadblade tzeetch)
4) we get the shared faction bonus because both detachments areTzeentch.
Erm, I don't understand how one single chaos knight in a super heavy auxiliary detachment doesn't count as a chaos knight detachment ?
At the beginning of the Detachmenbt abilities it says Dreadblades are excluded from the models in a Chaos Knight detachment so at the point you make him a Dreadblade it would be no longer a Chaos Knight detachment.
Maybe it`s intentional to lock you out from strats and a few other things as there are things like the favours that seem to happen before.
Especially because the fallen hero rule reads like it`s supposed to start at the beginning of the battle but it`s not clearly defined.
But yeah, that Dreadblade never looses it`s Chaos Knight keyword so it`s all kinda weird.
So, its a still a chaos knight and so its in a chaos knight detachment. This means we gain the strategems for chaos knights. And with the strategems, we can now use Tyranical court for 1 cp to make our Dreadblade a character and it will now gain a warlord trait. We can't get relics unless we make this Dreadblade our actual warlord, but we now at least have access to strategems for chaos knights. So we can raise shields for 2CP, etc etc.
Tyrannical court says explicitly your Warlord must be a Chaos Knight, same for the double Warlord trait and relic strats.
I`m assuming here we want the TS Warlord because you loose the other stuff otherwise (but would keep Rituals still i guess)
We keep
1) Everything in our Tsons detachment, including cabalistic rituals
2) Chaos knights strategems, warlord trait, fallen household bond, titanic and chaos knight generic rules.
3) Favour of the dark gods (but we have to make our dreadblade tzeetch)
4) we get the shared faction bonus because both detachments areTzeentch.
1 & 4 are correct.
3 i would say correct as well, but tecnically only if you buy it before you make the Knight a Dreadblade.
2: Correct about the Titanic and generic knight rules. Strats not right now until they clean up the CK detachment mess but i guess it`s intended we get to use them.
We don`t get household bonds for sure though, as Dreadblades are locked out on those per se. Also no WL trait as the Dreadblade does not gain the Character keyword as described in the Detachment abilities.
So right now if we add a Dreadblade to TS with a TS Warlord we keep for safe:
1) All TS abilities, Rituals, etc
2) Generall Chaos Knight abilities (Ion shields, super heavy walkers)
3 Psychic Powers if the knight is a Psyker
4) 1 Fell Bond which Dreadblades explicitly get even in a auxiliary
We don`t get these for sure:
1) Harbingers (mono faction bonus)
2) Traitorous ambitions (Dreadblades are generally locked out of this, but you can get Daemonic surge via the Biomechanical Fusion Fell Bond)
3) Relic & Warlord strats as you need a Chaos Knight Warlord to get access to them
4) Household Bonds (again Dreadblades don`t get those naturally)
5) character keyword and thus acess to WL traits & relics (unless you take a Knight WL we`ll never get any of those and no heroics as well)
This stuff is unclear but if GWFAQ`s a single Dreadblade is in fact a Chaos Knight detachment we get it as well:
1) Strategems
2) Favour of the gods
3) 2 CP bonus for shared faction as you can only get the Tzeentch keyword via Strat or favour of the gods
4) Towering Foe etc. (so the basic abilities. Fallen Hero falls under this, so it`s kinda stupid.)
Maybe they had some kind of timing in their head so you could build the army and have the Agent of Chaos keyword just while the game lasts (to keep Rituals etc.) but get access to the other stuff. You could argue that you buy the favour before you make it a Agent od Chaos Dreadblade which seems a little odd.
I really hope GW clarifies this in the near future.
All of the unclear stuff seems to be intended to get, but maybe they further FAQ this so
So I'm on a kick to take Magnus to a GT and try and make him work.
Thought process - AOC gives Magnus a bit of shielding from volume of fire and the -1D keeps things a little more sane. Most lists do not have the capacity to alpha strike Magnus off the table. But he's still a big target and I need to keep him safe.
To do this I will not take large Scarab bricks that eat CP. I intent to start with 9+ CP so I always have a CP reroll available. Additionally, an Infernal Master will use Glimpse for the pocket reroll and then for his spell he'll use the Prophecy cult spell to pick up a guaranteed save with 50/50 odds. That gives me 3 potential outs against any big weapons.
With +3 to cast and +2 to deny ( reroll all ) I feel like I could control Tyranids and Ulthwe a little ( I am under no delusions that it will be a winnable fight ).
Then I have a Leviathan buddy with melta and claw that gets baby-sat by the Exalted with Oraculae ( reroll one hit, one wound, AND one damage ). That guy with his 2+ and scary gun creates a nice durable foil to Magnus to pick from. Throw in a Vindicator that will mostly get ignored, but will be difficult to remove as well. The sorcerer in the back field will drop max range blessings from safety so I don't need to chew up a spell on Magnus to keep -1 to hit up.
Secondary Vulnerabilities
Assassinate - 13 - I think this would be difficult as Magnus will be hard to bring down and the Infernal Master and Sorcerer won't likely leave the back field.
Bring It Down - 9
No Prisoners - 8
Grind - negligible, I feel - it would take a large effort to pull down multiple units in a turn when the soft stuff is not going anywhere
Abhor - 18 - this is actually a bit lower than the normal TS Abhor scoring and I feel like this would also be a bit of a trap where my rubrics, infernal master, and sorcerer ( 8 points ) will never expose so it only matters in the event of a table wipe
Secondary Strategy NO MERCY
To The Last - This would be Magnus, Levi, and a Scarab unit. I don't think I would take this except for in the early rounds against less capable opponents
Grind - viable
Wrath - viable, but requires Magnus to be alive to do the work
WARPCRAFT
Interrogate - viable by using Rubrics or Exalted and a CP to keep the Exalted casting
Mutate - similar to above with Magnus picking up late game mutates if things go well
SHADOW
Banners - good pick with lots of actions available, but I need to put something forward early to max
RND - good pick with action and shoot scarabs picking up the back field
Burn - unlikely to be viable with most infantry hanging back
SUPREMACY
Engage - not sustainable
Stranglehold - also not likely sustainable
So in the event that my opponent doesn't give me other secondary options I will go for RND, Interrogate / Mutate, and Grind.
Other Stuff
20 Tzaangors that stay hidden. When I need to pull them out I zip back with the crystal and bust them out next turn for some table control or I run over to some scarabs and redeploy them.
Magnus can go into reserves in the rare event I catch a hammerhead or Borkan.
Yea I'm building up to the SoT. Not enough painted yet.
I think I can drop the Levi and the Exalted and stick Ahriman in there for more casts and drag in helbrutes. Three days to sort my list and get it in then a week to finish painting.
Yea I'm building up to the SoT. Not enough painted yet.
I think I can drop the Levi and the Exalted and stick Ahriman in there for more casts and drag in helbrutes. Three days to sort my list and get it in then a week to finish painting.
yhea, just remember that they are planning to drop to something like 6CP at the start. its not changed yet, and it wont for a few weeks yet (my guess would be late june), but still, be aware that this is going to happen.
Daedalus81 wrote: So I'm on a kick to take Magnus to a GT and try and make him work.
Thought process - AOC gives Magnus a bit of shielding from volume of fire and the -1D keeps things a little more sane. Most lists do not have the capacity to alpha strike Magnus off the table. But he's still a big target and I need to keep him safe.
To do this I will not take large Scarab bricks that eat CP. I intent to start with 9+ CP so I always have a CP reroll available. Additionally, an Infernal Master will use Glimpse for the pocket reroll and then for his spell he'll use the Prophecy cult spell to pick up a guaranteed save with 50/50 odds. That gives me 3 potential outs against any big weapons.
Divine the Future cannot be used to replace the die of a save. Plus it can only be used by Cult of Prophecy units, which Magnus unfortunately is not.
Daedalus81 wrote: So I'm on a kick to take Magnus to a GT and try and make him work.
Thought process - AOC gives Magnus a bit of shielding from volume of fire and the -1D keeps things a little more sane. Most lists do not have the capacity to alpha strike Magnus off the table. But he's still a big target and I need to keep him safe.
To do this I will not take large Scarab bricks that eat CP. I intent to start with 9+ CP so I always have a CP reroll available. Additionally, an Infernal Master will use Glimpse for the pocket reroll and then for his spell he'll use the Prophecy cult spell to pick up a guaranteed save with 50/50 odds. That gives me 3 potential outs against any big weapons.
Divine the Future cannot be used to replace the die of a save. Plus it can only be used by Cult of Prophecy units, which Magnus unfortunately is not.
Oh balls. I appreciate the heads up as it looks like my brain got ahead of me.
Automatically Appended Next Post: So I changed it up a bunch, because models didn't arrive and paint time is short.
I opted for Time over Magic to get me what I think is a more aggressive exalted as well as a little more durability on the scarabs.
Basic sorcerer remains the buff bot. He hangs back with the 5 rubrics who will heal Magnus.
Exalted went to aggressive damage dealing with scrolls, echo, and hourglass.
The Rites Scarabs likely go on table and attempt to pop off from 30" with guidance. The Infernal Master will jump them or Tzaangors when opportunity arises.
Ardent Scarabs drop in and Perplex something on the opposite end of Magnus to turn off their cross table shooting.
Infernal Master gives the second out reroll, but switches to turning off overwatch ( if he has sight ) to whatever scary thing Magnus might want to charge.
He played way cagier than I expected. I basically never wound up engaging with Belakor or one of the GDs. My biggest mistake in this game was the choice of secondaries - something that will continue to haunt me in this tournament.
I opted for Grind, Retrieve, and Interrogate. Grind absolutely failed even though I somehow thought I could edge him out on durability with his severe lack of ranged weapons. To rub salt in the wound two of my retrieve rolls for 5 man scarabs failed...
Loss - 61 to 74
GAME 2.
Goffs, Ghaz, Wazbom and Dakkajet
This game I opted to reserve Magnus as I didn't want to risk taking both planes to the face. Little happened then I popped in with magnus on turn 2 and iced both jets. I chose banners, which wound up being a flop as well as a number of other clumsy, but not fatal mistakes. Most of his army was gone near end of the game, but enough to cause me issues.
Loss - 76 to 83
GAME 3 GSC
My extreme inexperience with the new GSC on top of another bad secondary pick took me down here. He would go on to resurrect something like 500 points of models. Anyway - I chose assassinate, but that was a dud as his characters never really left their corner ( mostly due to me getting gummed up by bikes ).
Loss - 73 to 90
GAME 4
IK ( old codex ) - armigers and a valiant
I pushed Magnus into reserves, but I really didn't need to, I think. His knights did not connect at all and I pulled the armigers down really fast. Should have been a 90, but I did the math wrong on primary and opted to not bother with a second explosive. Failed a retrieve roll again.
Win - 86 to 66
GAME 5
Tau
I opted to go into reserves with Magnus again, but in retrospect I shouldn't have. He didn't have anything with extreme range and I was more worried about plasma than I should have. I also made it too easy for him to score Strangle and the backup Primary. If I had put more focus there I could have likely kept him from scoring as much. Again I opted for retrieve, which was a mistake
Another unfortunate rules issue is where he was using Kauyon beyond 12" and in melee when he shouldn't have.
LOSS - 66 to 86
CONCLUSION Not a fantastic win rate, but I scored the same battle points as 7th place and considering my total screw ups with secondaries I could have scored enough to be top 5 if I pulled out wins -- assuming Eldar and Nids don't manage to shut me out....TBD. I also think some potential rule misplays by opponents held me down so I'll be on the lookout more next tournament.
Magnus was great. People ignored him or failed to kill him. I dropped a 9MW smite once and it was glorious. On the other end of the spell scale - Baleful Devolution is just a spell that never works for me. I rolled box cars, so the result was a 15. The best possible outcome. Out of 15 dice I rolled 2 6s and then 2 MW total. What a let down every time I cast it. Overall I think I was too scared of him getting hurt and I shouldn't have been, which would have made winner a bit easier.
Exalted Sorcerer with scrolls and echo - total let down. Just once did the scrolls even get me a 9 for Firestorm and he occasionally forced me to spend 8 cabal to recast stuff with Magnus. I feel like dropping him entirely, but not sure with what.
Maulerfiend was a good distraction, but I do think I'll kick it out without a way to get it to advance and charge or to get a double move. Great distraction though. The helbrute was great. The vindicator was a champion scoring 10 damage on more than one occasion. If it hadn't bounced off a Tau commander's 1+ it would have had been an MVP in that game as well.
People that could did not take Abhor against me and in no game did more than a unit get removed ( Orks did tag some characters though ).
I am going to continue to tweak and try a version of this list - here's my next iteration ( undecided on cult ):
Daedalus81 wrote: Magnus was great. People ignored him or failed to kill him. I dropped a 9MW smite once and it was glorious. On the other end of the spell scale - Baleful Devolution is just a spell that never works for me. I rolled box cars, so the result was a 15. The best possible outcome. Out of 15 dice I rolled 2 6s and then 2 MW total. What a let down every time I cast it. Overall I think I was too scared of him getting hurt and I shouldn't have been, which would have made winner a bit easier.
I think you'll be much happier if you just have him cast Smite repeatedly, I only cast other stuff with him if I absolutely have to do so.
Maybe no one was as stupid as I, but I have been playing Rubric Marines with 5" movement since the Codex dropped and just realised they got a 6" movement.
Can anyone please tell me i wasn't the only one? ^^
Also, would you rather go for 10 + 10 or 10 + 5 + 5 Scarabs? Have a tournament upcoming in june and will be playing something like this:
Ahriman on Disk
Exalted on Disk
Infernal Master
Shaman
4 x 5 Rubrics with Soulreaper & Icon
1 x 5 Flamer Rubrics
20 Scarabs
I think you'll be much happier if you just have him cast Smite repeatedly, I only cast other stuff with him if I absolutely have to do so.
This reads to me as if you're smiting multiple times per turn with him?! You can't do that, each model may only smite once. If only he could smite 3 times per turn, he'd be absolutely nuts (well, a lot better than he is now, at least)
Grotrebel wrote: Maybe no one was as stupid as I, but I have been playing Rubric Marines with 5" movement since the Codex dropped and just realised they got a 6" movement.
Can anyone please tell me i wasn't the only one? ^^
Also, would you rather go for 10 + 10 or 10 + 5 + 5 Scarabs? Have a tournament upcoming in june and will be playing something like this:
Ahriman on Disk
Exalted on Disk
Infernal Master
Shaman
4 x 5 Rubrics with Soulreaper & Icon
1 x 5 Flamer Rubrics
20 Scarabs
Is your Shaman for psychic secondaries?
It comes down to what secondaries you want to go after and how you intend to do damage. e.g. TTL would work better with 2x10 and Ahriman, but 10 mans DO die. Those 10 man blocks will be about the only things doing real damage in the list with them chewing up 3 to 4 spells ( -1, 4++, revive, warptime/duplicity ) plus IM chant.
Personally I like 10+5+5, because you don't have to fuel two 10 man squads and you have more flexibility to exploit their back field and do other tasks like placing/removing explosives ( especially with action and shoot upgrade ).
If you run 2x10 one should sit in the back field not overly exposing itself and then it jumps forward when the other one dies. You generally don't want to give them the ability to force you to turn on -1D and then let them target the other unit ( which Tau plasma does really well ).
Honestly the best way to go about it is to just play the list you think you like more and then adjust after if it doesn't work the way you wanted it to.
Very good article clearing up what we gain and lose when we soup in a chaos knight as well as what the writer feels fits well into various factions including Tsons and DG.
Hrm. Are we sure "Tzeentch" does not count as a "faction" for the Super-Heavy Auxiliary Detachment CP refund rule? Seems like what that rule was intended for.
Twilight Pathways wrote: This reads to me as if you're smiting multiple times per turn with him?! You can't do that, each model may only smite once. If only he could smite 3 times per turn, he'd be absolutely nuts (well, a lot better than he is now, at least)
I used to think that as well, but can't find anything in the Psychic Phase section stating that.
For example, Smite:
"SMITE
Smite has a warp charge value of 5. Add 1 to the warp charge value of this psychic power for each other attempt that has been made to manifest this power by a unit from your army in this phase, whether that attempt was successful or not. If manifested, the closest enemy unit within 18" of and visible to the psyker suffers D3 mortal wounds (pg 222). If the result of the Psychic test was 11 or more, that unit suffers D6 mortal wounds instead."
Nope, not there.
Figured it might be under manifesting powers:
"When you select a PSYKER unit to manifest psychic powers, you select one psychic power that unit knows and attempt to manifest it. With the 214 exception of Smite, you cannot attempt to manifest the same psychic power more than once in the same battle round, even with different PSYKER units."
Nope, not there, specifically calls out Smite as the exception.
Anyhow, I'd love to know where that rule is if you can find it.
So I'm Judy kinda reading through here in case I get bored and decide to proxy some Thousand Sons. Is there not much incentive to run 10 man blocks of Rubrics?
Very good article clearing up what we gain and lose when we soup in a chaos knight as well as what the writer feels fits well into various factions including Tsons and DG.
I was pretty certain we lose secondaries. I'll have to read a bit more into that.
EviscerationPlague wrote: So I'm Judy kinda reading through here in case I get bored and decide to proxy some Thousand Sons. Is there not much incentive to run 10 man blocks of Rubrics?
Quite a bit of incentive, actually. Max size units get the most out of Psychic Power buffs and bonuses, and even most of the stratagems (only Unwavering Phalanx really cares about squad size). Max Rubric squads in particular are nice forward position-holders for locations you're not committing your Scarabs to, but are still too close to the enemy for comfort. They're also easier to move around with the Umbralefic Crystal or Sorcerous Facade. Max squads with Warpflamers make great use of those, especially if you give their Aspiring Sorcerer Pyric Flux and/or Temporal Surge.
Of course, a max-sized squad can only be one place at at time, and two half-sized units will net you twice the Sorcerers and extra slots for bringing more Soulripper Cannons and Icons of Flame, so tradeoffs.
(My personal flavor favorite is nine-man squads, to meet the Number of Tzeentch. I wish the Scarab Terminators got their second Soulripper and Hellfyre at 9 models instead of 10, so I can do it with them too, but ah well.)
EviscerationPlague wrote: So I'm Judy kinda reading through here in case I get bored and decide to proxy some Thousand Sons. Is there not much incentive to run 10 man blocks of Rubrics?
You may want them in a rhino if you do run them. Since they don't move and shoot like terminators they're at a disadvantage. Similarly they compete for -1D and spending 3CP to protect them is a hard sell.
With AoC you could actually run 10 mans in the Warpmeld and resurrect a model multiple units each turn ( if they're in range ).
Twilight Pathways wrote: This reads to me as if you're smiting multiple times per turn with him?! You can't do that, each model may only smite once. If only he could smite 3 times per turn, he'd be absolutely nuts (well, a lot better than he is now, at least)
I used to think that as well, but can't find anything in the Psychic Phase section stating that.
For example, Smite:
"SMITE
Smite has a warp charge value of 5. Add 1 to the warp charge value of this psychic power for each other attempt that has been made to manifest this power by a unit from your army in this phase, whether that attempt was successful or not. If manifested, the closest enemy unit within 18" of and visible to the psyker suffers D3 mortal wounds (pg 222). If the result of the Psychic test was 11 or more, that unit suffers D6 mortal wounds instead."
Nope, not there.
Figured it might be under manifesting powers:
"When you select a PSYKER unit to manifest psychic powers, you select one psychic power that unit knows and attempt to manifest it. With the 214 exception of Smite, you cannot attempt to manifest the same psychic power more than once in the same battle round, even with different PSYKER units."
Nope, not there, specifically calls out Smite as the exception.
Anyhow, I'd love to know where that rule is if you can find it.
I suspected it was out there somewhere, but hadn't dug around. I've had better luck with Desecration of Worlds honestly, it was great against Genestealers.
Yea I know it's just me latching on to precedent rather than potential. Probably the next time I cast it will be a ball buster. I've rolled up 6 MW on Firestorm once - that was fun, but then I can't get the scrolls to trigger Firestorm on my Exalted 80% of the time. It's aggravating.
Alright so this is my first iteration of a list, so bear with me. This would also be the first army I've really done with a Psyker (let alone several) so fixes are always welcome. So let's begin:
Cult of Mutation
HQ:
×1 Exalted Sorcerer
. Warlord Trait: Undying Form
. Paradigm of Change, Coniving Plate, Warpflame Pistol
. Powers to be determined
×1 Infernal Master
. Arcana: Umbralefic Crystal
. Pacts: Capering Imps, Malefic Maelstrom
. Powers to be determined
×1 Terminator Sorcerer
. High Acolyte: Aetherstride, Arcana: Exalted Mutation, Battle Psyker
. Powers: Swelled By The Warp, Temporal Surge
Heavy Support:
×1 Maulerfiend w/ Magma Cutters
×1 Maulerfiend w/ Magma Cutters
So the list should make sense on first glance. I have three main squads of Rubrics to work with for scoring on home or advancing. Depending on table, the Infernal Master can teleport himself to support the Scarabs or teleport the Flamer Rubric squad to a tastier location. Flamer Rubric squad was given Ardent to make it easier to do stuff and of course the Scarabs will just be tough suckers and deployed....however necessary.
I felt lacking on antitank so I just decided to say feth it and use the Maulerfiends to beat stuff up, and Suicide Sorcerer can help do the same. However I'm not sure if they'll be quite fast enough to do work. Spawn are just for leftover points and to bumrush whatever, but I could potentially leave them behind, but I'm not sure for what. I'm also unsure why I would make the main Exalted Sorcerer that tough when he's kinda just gonna be support.
Also still want thoughts on how to divvy up Powers. As I don't really run Psykers (the last list I ran was literally Templars) having that many powers is pretty overwhelming.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Oh yeah there would be 12 Cabal points total, forgot to include that. Not sure if that's enough for 2000 points.
OOTN wrote: Not pleased with the new CP changes making warlord traits and relics cost CP. Really cuts down on our options significantly.
Hrm. Well, -2 CP at the start of the game, for the warlord's free relic/trait.
...But also +1 CP at the start of every opponent's turn, apparently.
Really, I think it's a wash. Less up-front, more over the course of the game. It would push things less into alpha-strike vs. expensive defensive buffs and more into continued strat use over the course of the game.
Two Hammerheads - a good a test as any. I opted to put Magnus into reserves. Also, I went first....gross. Magnus didn't come on until turn 3. Spoiler - the Hammerheads missed all of their shots except for one on Magnus and he lived until the end of the game.
Oh, also - absolute hero Scarab Sorc. He did a mega smite on a Commander, rolled a 6 and then pushed an extra D3. Huge swing in my favor.
Victory 84 to 64
Game 2 - Iron Hands
Grav Drop pod, Contemptor Character, 2x Thunderstrike, Achilles w/ Ironstone support, bunch of VV. I deployed Magnus on table and also got first turn. For some reason I was really gun shy and I opted to keep Magnus back - I guess because of the drop pod. This was a fatal mistake. I was also reluctant to take the Achilles head on and spend too much time trying to take it out. Ultimately it should have died a turn earlier had I not been so skittish.
Forcing my opponent to deal with Magnus as well as my other vehicles would have either kept them alive longer or opened him up more so that I could win.
Loss 47-88
Game 3 - Thousand Sons!
2x10 Scarabs, Ahriman, 3 Helverins
I decided to go for Wrath of Magnus for fun and to see who would come out on top in this very thematic matchup. And let me tell you...Scarabs vs Scarabs...hoooollyyyy shiiiiit...NOTHING dies. I was otherwise very successful with Strangle and Wrath. I also did banners, but should have done something different.
Victory 85-66
Now it's back to the drawing board for the next CA. Overall very happy with Magnus and the flexibility of the list. Daemon Prince didn't end up doing much so I may drop him for some other support.
whembly wrote: If I'm reading his rule right, Abbadon doesn't break legion rules?
Adding Abby might be a thing in TS list, to give some CC "ooph" into the army.
What say you?
You have to take Magnus or Mortarion if you want TSons/Death Guard warlord traits/relics and secondaries.
Because otherwise Abby becomes your Warlord.
Are you sure if Abby's the WL, that I'd lose out on the TS/DG secondaries? I do see the traits/relics wouldn't have been available. (although, if I'd paid for TS relic via Dilettante, wouldn't that work?)
whembly wrote: If I'm reading his rule right, Abbadon doesn't break legion rules?
Adding Abby might be a thing in TS list, to give some CC "ooph" into the army.
What say you?
You have to take Magnus or Mortarion if you want TSons/Death Guard warlord traits/relics and secondaries.
Because otherwise Abby becomes your Warlord.
Are you sure if Abby's the WL, that I'd lose out on the TS/DG secondaries? I do see the traits/relics wouldn't have been available. (although, if I'd paid for TS relic via Dilettante, wouldn't that work?)
He gets the Agent of Chaos rule if he's your Warlord. You'd be fine I think
So I'll be on a 30 player tournament this weekend with this list:
Ahriman on Disk
Exalted on Disk (Scrolls & Arrogance)
Infernal Master (Crystal & Master Misinformator)
Shaman
4 x 5 Rubrics with Soulreaper & Icon
1 x 5 Rubrics
10 + 5 + 5 Scarabs (Maximum Soulreapers & Missile Racks and all of them with Surge)
3 x 1 Spawn
Had 8 practice games the last weeks with this list. 3 against Knights (won all with 93+:~50 each), 2 against Tau (both won about 80:60) and 3 against different Marines (2 wins, 1 loss).
Feeling quite confident in those matchups and the list overall works good on scoring and is quite tanky.
There will be 3 Sisters, 3 Nids, 1 GK, 2 TS and a few Eldar players though, which I don't have much experience against and I guess those will be the tough matches for me.
Any suggestions how the handle them and where I should set my priorities?
So far my go to for secondies has been:
Psychic Interrogation
Banners / RND / Stranglehold depending on map & objectives
Wrath / No Prisoners / Bring it Down / assassinate depending on opponent
Generally plan is to infiltrate the cheap Rubrics for early RND and objective grabbing. Surge on all Scarabs in combination with Duplicity and the Crystal helps a lot to keep the list mobile while my multiple units (Rubrics and Spawns) take objectives and screen out any annoying Deep strikers.
Shaman flies around interrogating characters, Exalted with Gaze & Firestorm has been sniping a lot which he is very good at with Scrolls & 2 Rituals each turn.
21 Cabal points leave enough room for undeniable interrogation, the extra CP and enough Cabal Points to spare for occasional psyching with the Exalted without LOS or getting of key powers.
Ahriman & Master work as buff machines with Weaver, Glamour, Presage & Malefic Maelstrom.
Has catched quite a few opponents offguard what amount of damage the 10 Termis can dish out. They can one-shot a Knight without problems and have been really great.
One of my favourite tricks has been to jump the Scarabs after they lost models and use the autopass on the 5th smite to get 1 dude back with the strat and make the 9" charge an 5" charge.
Been skipping the Orrey and other secondary Traits/ relics as they probably won't make the cut with the new Niphilim CP rules. Also I skipped the upgrades on Scarabs + Rehati as I found the extra points far more viable to get extra stuff on the board.
Cheaper Rubric gear, cheaper Hellbrutes, cheaper Legion Command... it's like this update was purpose-designed as a wish list for the way I want to go with the army. (Scarabs untouched, which I'm perfectly fine with.)
Heck, a Predator Annihilator suddenly looks good as a long-range tankhunter. Certainly a 5+ invul makes it bit tougher than your average bear, and 'reach way out and kill something big' is definitely one of the Thousand Sons' weaker areas.
Troops -Rubrics now get icon free, warp flamers down 3, Soul Reaper down 5, and pistols free.
Elites - Hellbrute down 10
Fast None
Heavy Land Raider down to 40 points, predator A down 15, predator D down 10, Vindicator down 10,
Magnus down 30
Add all of the Legion Command are down 5 points each.
Overall thoughts....... the reduction on the Rubric equipment is money. 5 Man backfield squad with icon and reaper are down from 125 to 110. And you can take a free pistol if you want. My 9 man Rubric flamer squad with flame pistol went from 242 to 213! Rubrics were already a solid choice and now they may be one of the better troops in the game.
The reduction on legion command is also great. I will actually make use of the reduction on hellbrutes and I field two in my list currently.
I think it is ok that the Scarabs were not reduced, I think they are perfectly costed even with AoC.
I guess it is nice that the Land Rader and Vindicaor are cheapers, but I would rather them not be and get the rules from the new CSM book for them. The new states on the Land Raider would be great for TS as we need AT weapons badly.
Magnus down 30 is cute, but personally I still think he is like 20 to 50 points to expensive.
While not necessary, I think a point reduction on the Tgors and a reduction on the Shaman would have helped, especially since Rubrics improved so much, there is really no point to Tgors, and so no point to Shaman.
Finally, this is the second point release since our new book and Enlighten are still 18 points!!!!! I would not even use them at 10 points. They are either CC unit that hits like a noodle then dies as they have no survivalablity, or they are the worst sniper unit in the game as they don't have the 6's to wound do a mortal. I mean really.
Finally I guess a new balance sheet is coming out tomorrow, so we will see what that brings.
Wow nothing in the balance sheet. Personally I think we could use a few buffs on some of the lesser used spells in our book. Guess we should be happy with the points reductions but I still don't think we will be top tier.
xeen wrote: Wow nothing in the balance sheet. Personally I think we could use a few buffs on some of the lesser used spells in our book. Guess we should be happy with the points reductions but I still don't think we will be top tier.
After seeing what they did to Warptime I'm happy to keep flying under the radar.
Well they nerfed the top armies quite a bit and while we did not get any buffs, we did not get any nerfs as well with this dateslate.
On top of that we got a few point decreases who help Rubric heavy lists and with Cabal Point generation.
Also we got some of the best secondaries right now.
Considering the (in parts) heavy nerfs to Harlies, Tau, Tyras and Aeldari we are definitely above 50% winrate right now and might be even among the top armies.
Overall it looks like the playing field is a lot more leveled at thos point.
ok, so after a foray into bolt action, i am now looking back at my tsons and trying to build up the force to 2k (finally). im considering my options for expansion, and trying to work out whats best bang for buck.
at the moment, i own:
ahirman
infernal master
10 bolter rubrics
20 tzanngors
5 scarab termies
shaman.
Rhino
all of which clocks in at just over 1k. things im considering for my 2k expansion:
warpflame rubrics: stick them in the rhino, or possibly rise them close to the enemy, watch the world burn.
more scarabs: been proxing up to 1,500 with some loyalist stand ins, and termies ROCK!
those two alone would ball-park me to 1,500, so im really looking for advice on the last 500 points.
Im seriously debating getting a Knight for pure distraction carnifex style shenanigans. something like a rampager, or Abominant, that i can throw forward to give the enemy a threat they HAVE to react to, and give me time and space to get out into the midboard. is this a good idea? or just a waste of cash and im better off getting more scarabs?
I'd go in for a third squad of Rubrics; they're absolutely clutch. Two squads with Bolters and one with flamers is a rock-solid core you can build around, and fulfill a battalion's Troops requirements- so you can add or remove the Tzaangors as you wish.
Another model for an Exalted Sorc is also great- one 'on foot' to bolster Scarabs or Rubrics while Ahriman floats around churning out Mortals, or vice-versa.
Really, I'd say more Scarabs is meta at the moment, but that's a very transient thing. I'd say branch out a bit more so you're not stuck if they nerf them. A big ten-man squad is almost always going to be useful, but the current lean towards 20-30 of them is a bit much, I think.
For Knights, I heartily recommend an Abominant. Their ability to get a 5+++ makes them tough for the distraction role, and it makes your psychic phase even more of a pain for your opponent. Tricky bit would be the CP cost- I don't know if having the Tzeentch keyword from the Pyrothrone or Mirror counts for a shared faction for CP refunds for a Super-Heavy Aux Detachment, but I don't think so.
If you want to add Knights i`d rather take Wardogs. If you want to go the distraction carnifex route i`d rather go for 2-3 Vortex beasts and do some mortals on top.
Otherwise most lists tend to run at leat 15 / 20 Scarabs and an Exalted on Disk in addition to your stuff so i would definitely go for them first. Unless you really love Rubrics and want to spam like 60 of them you should always have at least 15 Scarabs.
I mean there is not much room for list experiments as we have a limited range of units to choose from.
Ahriman, Exalted, Infernal Master, 10 Rubrics and 20 Scarabs are the (solid) core of most lists and the remaining 500 points are where you see some variation.
Shaman is a strong choice for Warpcraft Secondaries(especially with Nephilim), more Rubrics are always a good take (i`ve been running 5 x 5 a lot), Wardogs or occacional a FW bot of your liking are fine as well.
I think with the Nephelim season it`s even more important to have a few additional cheap tools for screening, backfield camping or to move stuff besides your Rubrics & Scarabs on objectives if they just need to do their thing one turn and get deleted after.
Single Spawns are a great unit for that and can be taken in squads of 5 as well to have a bit extra output. Cultists and Tzaangors do similar things but are a bit more expensive plus they give away more no prisoners points while being slower. They can do actions though. Personally i will add 1-2 squads of Enlighened after the latest point drops instead of 3 x 1 Spawn. They don`t do much damage wise but their mobility helps a lot and they might do some damage while scoring as well.
You really want to have as much mobility as possible.
With TTL & Stranglehold gone we need a good secondary plan, especially against lists that don`t give up any easy 10+ VP killing secondaries. Even more in matchups without enemy psykers as that means we give up a lot on Abhor the witch and basically need to take 2 basic secondaries as our Faction ones are either fantastic or useles depending on the opponent.
Rituals help a lot to score good on Warp Ritual or Psychic Interrogation but especially in matchups with bad Purge / No mercy objectives you need to be able to score good on primaries + get that 12 points on Shadow operation.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
RedX wrote: I'd go in for a third squad of Rubrics; they're absolutely clutch. Two squads with Bolters and one with flamers is a rock-solid core you can build around, and fulfill a battalion's Troops requirements- so you can add or remove the Tzaangors as you wish.
Another model for an Exalted Sorc is also great- one 'on foot' to bolster Scarabs or Rubrics while Ahriman floats around churning out Mortals, or vice-versa.
Really, I'd say more Scarabs is meta at the moment, but that's a very transient thing. I'd say branch out a bit more so you're not stuck if they nerf them. A big ten-man squad is almost always going to be useful, but the current lean towards 20-30 of them is a bit much, I think.
For Knights, I heartily recommend an Abominant. Their ability to get a 5+++ makes them tough for the distraction role, and it makes your psychic phase even more of a pain for your opponent. Tricky bit would be the CP cost- I don't know if having the Tzeentch keyword from the Pyrothrone or Mirror counts for a shared faction for CP refunds for a Super-Heavy Aux Detachment, but I don't think so.
Absolutely, Battalion is the way to go and it`s actually kind of an inderect buff for us as we mostly played a single battalion anyway and armies that relied on multiple detachments need to change their army composition if they want those sweet starting CP.
I would always recommend to play Ahriman & Exalted on Disk. The extra mobility can be pure gold, mostly towards the end of the game when you`re spread thin and need to be places.
Not a 100& sure about the CP cost for the Knight though. Technically the Warlords Detachment is a TS and a Tzeentch Detachment as well, so while we would consider it a TS detachment for most rules purposes it seems to fulfill the requirement to get back the CP.
Don't be quick to dump Tzaangors. They're cheap, obsec, durable, and pick up the slack on actions. And you don't have to hold rubrics back on objectives if they're around.
Agree with 'cheap' and 'action-doers' (except psychic ones), but I dunno about 'durable'. Seems like they'd naturally attract all the firepower that normally bounces off Rubrics and Scarabs; Marines have a lot of incidental bolter fire, for example, that between Armor of Contempt and All is Dust would just be bouncing off of Rubrics even in Tactical Doctrine... but would chew through Tzaangors quite nicely, with little opportunity cost to the Marine player.
And what would one be doing with Rubrics if not being on objectives? That's one of their two big roles, that they're practically designed for. (The other being 'Mobile Warpflamer Hit Squad', often seeking to knock enemies off objectives, so yeah.) They're not shock units, and they're too expensive for screening.
So I guess I can see Tzaangors for forward screening and harassment, but they're not going to be picking up objective duty except in extremis.
Hrm. I think the real question isn't 'Rubrics or Tzaangors', it's 'Spawn or Tzaangors'. Both have the same sort of mobile expendable melee harassment role.
Yeah Rubrics are fantastic per se and can tank a lot of random bolter fire and similar stuff.
I went to a tournament last weekend with my list i posted 1-2 pages back.
Ahriman on Disk, Exalted on disk, Infernal Master, Shaman
5 x 5 Rubrics
10 + 5 + 5 Scarabs
3 x 1 Spawn
The Rubrics have been doing a solid job scoring and it happened quite often 1-2 models survived and still held my objective.
I might reduce it to 4 x 5 to get a bit more other stuff but thats the lowest i want to go. While Cultists and Tzaangors are cheap and good at the beginning when most of your opponents focus tends to be on Scarabs, Rubrics and objective grabbing units they die fast if the opponent gets an angle on them or if you reach the endgame.
Cultists and Tzaangors can help if you run out of points for stuff like Wardogs or other single vehicles / bots you like to get in your list but if i have the points i guess i`ll stay with Rubrics.
Tournament was a small one with just 3 games.
(And Nachmund with no rules or point updates from the latest dataslates etc.)
First game was a Mirror Match against TS with 20 Tzaangors, 1 squad of 5 Spawns and 2 x 10 Scarabs but otherwise very similar to my list with a few less Rubrics.
I was the first to go for the midfield objective after we both started cagey which gave me the edge in Primary scoring. In the end it was a lot of denies, a lot of fun and a close 97:89 win for me.
Second game i faced a pretty standard Leviathan list with 2 Harpies, Maleceptor and the usual stuff.
He went first and i played veeery cagey which meant his Maleceptor started doing things turn 3.
Nids player used his two Harpies very aggressively so i knocked both of them down turn 1.
After that i traded my Rubrics midfield to deny him as many points as possible while holding most of my Scarabs back for turn 3-4.
As soon as he reached my deployment zone i used everything i had left for one last aggressive push, got tabled turn 5 but was able to save a very tight 62:60 win!
Awesome game but it was really really hard and there was no room for errors in that one.
Last game went against a (now) 2400 point Tau list including Longstrike, 1 Hammerhead, Shadowsun and almost 20 Crisis suits with i guess what must have been all the plasma of the entire Tau empire.
We had premade terrain layouts, which had been excellent the first two games but in mission 3 had some really mean firing angles with basicly no places to hide.
Like the games before i went second, so my units got hammered from the start without any defensive psychic powers up turn 1.
I managed to kill about 10 Crisis and a bit of his Kroot stuff but was basicly on my back foot from turn one.
In the end i got tabled turn 5 and lost 79:64 which would have been a 71:68 if my Scarabs would have made a 9" charge including Infernal Master reroll turn 4.
Overall i am still happy with the result as it basically was a 1940:2400 points game and quite close considering point difference, terrain layout and going second.
Opponent was a Team mate of mine who got 3rd with this win, so kinda sad as a win would have gotten me on the winners podium but i still got 10/24 and Nephilim nerfed 2 of my opponents armies while buffing TS so i am very optimistic for the coming weeks.
Still thinking about how to tune my list. Got 61 points from the points drop so i guess one of the Spawns will become a squad of 3 enlightened.
I was also thinking about a Dreadclaw to have some options for early midboard plays without spending the 2 CP on Risen Rubricae. Otherwise Flamers look quite attractive now and i think i want to get Ardent Automata back in my list. Ether for infiltrating / Dreadclawing Flamer Rubrics just to get some early scoring while flaming or simply on the 10 man Scarab squad.
Gonna keep the 10 + 5 + 5 Scarabs as TTL is gone, the flexibility has proven to be quite amazing and i don`t want to have to use 3 CP -1dmg in Nephilim too often.
5 + 5 + 5 Scarabs would be cool as well but those 10 dudes have been doing excellent damage i don`t want to be missing out. :/
well, as it happens, the very day after i post, another player in my local group whose moving overseas and looking to downsize his collection somewhat has aggreed to sell me 20 rubrics for like £30, so thats kinda answered that question. next purchase after that will be either some scarabs, or maybe some more bolt action stuff (pak 38 and a pz III, for anyone who cares).
after that? still not sure. I'm toying with using something other than just more foot sloggers, but as you guys point out, our current meta is leaning hard towards just that. plus a all infantry army is much easier to transport for me than one with lots of tanks.
I like my tzanngor, they've given me good service, within the modest expectations i place on them. For me, i like them because their cheap enough i dont care too much if they die, and cheap enough to risk. They have obsec (and the numbers to do something with it then they get to a point), and sometimes, throwing them onto a enemy point to die contesting it can be a 5-10 point swing in the primaries. And, oddly enough, I've found them to not be *that* fragile, at least not as fragile as i though they would be (ie "die in a stiff breeze"). that t4, 5++ save actaully does some real good work for them, and if you really need to live, you can throw Weaver of Fates for a 4++. a 20 birb blob can absord a surprising amount of bolter fire, generally.
quick question to you guys: do you think that now, with armour of contempt, that the pistol/chainsword option is a better choice than the -1ap blades? i've always used the latter as i felt that -1ap on the two melee attacks was worth more than a extra str 3 ap0 pistol shot, but now im not so sure given how many units will just be ignoring the AP.
xerxeskingofking wrote: quick question to you guys: do you think that now, with armour of contempt, that the pistol/chainsword option is a better choice than the -1ap blades? i've always used the latter as i felt that -1ap on the two melee attacks was worth more than a extra str 3 ap0 pistol shot, but now im not so sure given how many units will just be ignoring the AP.
Personally i think the chainswords and pistols are the worst option. While they will do a little more damage against 1 wound T3 infantry they are worse against pretty much anything else. I`d go for the Spears for a little bit of extra punch if you want melee or for the Bows to do that occasional sniping wound after your Exalted left that one character standing with 1 last wound.
I simply play Bows most of the time as i have 9 dudes with Bows build and i like them. But overall any damage is a bonus as i think of them simply as annoying little tool to play the mission. I used to run them quite a lot in 8th, but the Bow is just too bad to think about anything more than 1-2 small skirmisher tools.
If they had twice the shots or the ability to do mortals on a 6 they might be in my lists more often.
xerxeskingofking wrote: quick question to you guys: do you think that now, with armour of contempt, that the pistol/chainsword option is a better choice than the -1ap blades? i've always used the latter as i felt that -1ap on the two melee attacks was worth more than a extra str 3 ap0 pistol shot, but now im not so sure given how many units will just be ignoring the AP.
Personally i think the chainswords and pistols are the worst option. While they will do a little more damage against 1 wound T3 infantry they are worse against pretty much anything else. I`d go for the Spears for a little bit of extra punch if you want melee or for the Bows to do that occasional sniping wound after your Exalted left that one character standing with 1 last wound.
I simply play Bows most of the time as i have 9 dudes with Bows build and i like them. But overall any damage is a bonus as i think of them simply as annoying little tool to play the mission. I used to run them quite a lot in 8th, but the Bow is just too bad to think about anything more than 1-2 small skirmisher tools.
If they had twice the shots or the ability to do mortals on a 6 they might be in my lists more often.
sorry, i was not clear in my post, i was referring to regular tzaangor on foot (claw?), not the disc mounted Enlightened.
Ah i see. Well i still would rather go for the blades AP then a pistol which you won`t use when making actions, advancing or getting whiped after you charged something to die later. When i think about my uses of Tzaangors i see more situations where the AP was helping than a few S3 shots would have.
On the other hand i wouldn`t overthink it as it won`t matter that often considering the humble Tzaangors tasks.
++Super heavy auxiliary detachment++ [Faction: Chaos knights, Questor traitoris, Iconoclast Household, Dreadblade / Agents of chaos]
+Lord of war+ Fell bond: Worthy offerings
+War dog brigand [8PL, 155pts], Diabolus heavy stubber (0 pts)+
+War dog brigand [8PL, 155pts], Diabolus heavy stubber (0 pts)+
+War dog huntsman [9PL, 145pts], Daemonbreath Meltagun (5 pts), Favour of the dark gods: Pyrothrone (25pts)
. Tzeentch, Psyker
. PSYCHIC POWER: Winds of the warp
------------------------------------------------------------
Really like the setup even when the super heavy auxiliary detachment eats a lot of Command points and leaves me only with 2 CP at the start of the game ( new CP rules..) As long as I can use defensive stratagems to protect my terminators and give them +1 to wound, I'am fine.
Normally I play Cult of time so that I can regenerate terminators but in this setup it's better to go full cult of duplicity.
Wardogs are fast and can control a particular part of the battlefield, and the huntsman can use his psychic power top get 5+ feel no pain and maybe give the other wardogs a 6+ feel no pain with a high psychic test result. Huntsmen also gives a nice counterstrike close combat punch if needed. The Fellbond bonus gives them +1 to hit against MC/vehicles/characters so hopefully that gives the deamonbreath melta a better kick. in combination with my shaman (twist of fate) that could take out an enemies invulnerable save this could really hurt.
Shaman can go for psychic interrogation. I need this to work each battle round so that I get that extra command point. Or I got to use that cabbalistic ritual command point bonus. Either way, an extra command point each round is really needed.
Spawns are great for creating small anti-deepstrike bubbles. Simply deploy them in cover and let them be a nuisance.
Grotrebel's list (similar to mine) and your list are both good lists and where the faction is if it wants to be winning.
I'm trying to add some monster/vehicles to my Grotrebel style list to lessen the No Prionsers points I give up and I do think 3 War Dogs at 3 CP are probably the best option.
I'd rather take Executioners (D3 is something we lack as well as D6+2) or Stalkers w/ daemonbreath (melee threat) over Brigands (the chaincannon is very much more of the same kind of shooting we have).
The Codex Monster/Vehicle options continue to look poor when compared to War Dogs and Volkite Contemptors, but they both cost precious CP (and the VolCons are pricey pointswise too).
I am going to try some Vindicators/Las Preds on the tabletop soon I hope in a test game, but I suspect even at 120/115 they will feel expensive.
It is also a shame the Tzaangor/Mutalith parts of the codex were ignored in the points. Tzaangors at 6, Enlightened at 12 and Mutaliths at 130 would have been nice.
Funny, I tried to reduce infantry/ psykers as well to make No Prisoners / Abhor / Assassinate harder for your opponent. But I think those 4 characters is where we wanna be right now.
You could specifically build for Mutate which is the only Warpcraft secondary that can be done by our Aspiring Sorcerers which would help to reduce Assassinate as well.
Interrogation sometimes feels like a trap tbh. As soon as your opponent denies it once you could also have gone for Ritual instead.
About vehicles: Yeah all of those feel still a bit overpriced for what they do.
I use my Forgefiend / Defiler from time to time and sometimes the Quad LasCa Contemptor but 1 CP on top of 190 points is hard to justify now. Same for the Volkite boy.
A Rhino is always a good option for mobility but won't do much dmg wise.
Tried to fit a Dreadclaw in my tournament list which meant loosing that 5th squad of Rubrics though.
I think Vindicators / Preds might be ok as they will take a bit of pressure from your Scarabs and might help with Backfield screening / camping.
I absolutely love the model of the Vortex beast but it just feels like a little bit too expensive distraction carnifex that adds a few Mortals to your list. Might be worth it with TTL & Stranglehold gone as maybe more armies need to be more aggressive.
Anyone of you had any luck building a Brigade? I really, really would love to have more fast attack slots to mix Enlightened with multiple single Spawns for lots of cheap trading units.
Maybe Rapier Carriers to fill up the last HS slots?
Oh silly me, my armylist got a combination of two different wardogs in one unit. So I'am going full brigand then..
EightFoldPath wrote:
I'd rather take Executioners (D3 is something we lack as well as D6+2) or Stalkers w/ daemonbreath (melee threat) over Brigands (the chaincannon is very much more of the same kind of shooting we have).
I don't like the executioner shooting, strength and ap to low in my opionion. I would either go full huntsmen with extra meltagun's or even Karnivores that got that extra advance, Wskill and attack if you are looking for a close combat punch. But i think brigands are better suited for the thousand sons playstyle. thousand sons want to play the mid-field in the first 2 or 3 rounds and cripple the enemy with mortal wounds and shooting before moving in. every anti-vehicle weapon is pointed at the brigand, and I like that because those weapons are not shooting at my terminators. At least the get to do some shooting of their own before the go down. The can also move all over the field and in combination with the spawns and rubric marines makes it hard for the enemy to deepstrike anything. Moving in close combat wardogs always end up exploding near each other because the got to move in the same direction to get close.
I also like the chaincannon + stubber shooting, and these days you either need decent anti-tank shooting or simply cheap S6 1 damage weapons because a lot of armies bring the ' you can only wound them on 4+' and -1 damage option. A full unit of 9 tyranid leviathan warriors takes a long time to take down with mortal wounds but those extra chaincannon shots really add up. Also no waist of damage with 1 damage weapons. I don't like to remember the times that I shot down the last wound on a Custodes jetbike with a 6 damage melta shot.
EightFoldPath wrote:
I am going to try some Vindicators/Las Preds on the tabletop soon I hope in a test game, but I suspect even at 120/115 they will feel expensive.
Yes, and those wardogs are not only fast but also objective secured and count as 5 models. Chaincannons are assault weapons so the could even move 12+d6 advance onto an objective and keep shooting.
Grotrebel wrote:Funny, I tried to reduce infantry/ psykers as well to make No Prisoners / Abhor / Assassinate harder for your opponent. But I think those 4 characters is where we wanna be right now.
Yes, and if these characters are dying then it went very wrong anyway. If a particular armylist gives you trouble then go for mutate landscape.
dreadblade wrote: The range on Executioners is super helpful though.
compared to 12 inch move + 30 inch daemonbreath spear? No, I think range is not the issue. You could make the case that they're a decent anti " toughness 6, 3 wound enemy model" killers. But with Strenght 7 I still don't like the 3+ to wound against most units. Maybe if you expect to face a lot of tyranid armies then it could be worth it. Because then you can keep them waaaaay in the back and even outside the flying hive tyrant charge range.
My armylist got the 'worthy offerings' fell bond (+1 to hit against MC/Vehicle/Characters) but I'am also considering the 'precision cruelty' fell bond. An increase in damage and ap for every 6 to wound is good for the chaincannons and stubbers but the +1 to hit is better for the spear. But that means that the chaincannon and stubbers perform better against multi wound models or vehicles/MC, damage wise.
I guess it depends what role you want them to have. I play against SW with my Chaos Knights a lot so getting War Dogs into melee with many units before softening them up isn't high on my priorities. Having them hold back objectives and provide covering fire seems like it could work.
Either way, I need to put a list together with my Desecrator as a Dreadblade to accompany my TSons...
dreadblade wrote: I guess it depends what role you want them to have. I play against SW with my Chaos Knights a lot so getting War Dogs into melee with many units before softening them up isn't high on my priorities. Having them hold back objectives and provide covering fire seems like it could work.
Yes, but most objectives are mid-field so you need to use the wardog's "objective secured + count as 5 models" ability. In the end it is all about the objectives and not about killing.
dreadblade wrote: Either way, I need to put a list together with my Desecrator as a Dreadblade to accompany my TSons...
So you would give it 'Mark of the dread knight' or 'Blessing of the dark master' (favour of the god undivided)? I think I would go for the blessing of the dark master. Completely shut down shooting reroll's is better then a 6+++ feel no pain first turn.
Also fellbond ' worthy offerings' is the best pick in combination with the desecrator laser destructor. Kill one vehicle or MC and you imediately get the favour ability. And as stated before, with chaos undivided you can use a stratagem to get the model back up with 3 wounds on a 4+ after being killed (not exploded) and use the infernal master D6 reroll if needed. With the fellbond worthy offering it keeps shooting with a 4+ against MC/vehicles so that's not bad..
mathematically, the Executioner has comparable or better damage output vs most T7 and T8 targets than the Executioner/Huntsman does. Didn't crunch numbers on the Brigand, but I wouldn't expect the gatling gun to make a significant difference.
vs a carnifex (generic, no extra strats or doctrine abilities or upgrades, etc) from 30" a trio of War Dog Executioners at full wounds will average approx. 8 damage, whereas a trio of War Dog Huntsmen (w/ meltaguns) will only average approx 5.5.
At 15" Executioners will still average 8 damage, while Huntsmen will average 10.
At 12" Executioners will still average 8 damage, while Huntsmen will average 11 (Stalker will stay at 10).
At 6" Executioners will still average 8 damage, while Huntsmen will average 11.7 (Stalker will stay at 10).
In melee, the Huntsman trio would average 8.9 damage, while Executioners would never want to get that close, so are still hanging back 30-60" away plinking out 8 damage.
So all in all the Huntsmen are only moderately better, and only once they close to a close enough range that they are within rapid fire/charge range of whatever they are shooting at and all their friends do they get marginally better. At T7 12 wounds w a 3+/5++ save, War Dogs aren't likely to survive long, at least not without getting profiled at which point their output drops about 25%-50% depending on how many wounds theyve taken.
Vs a tougher target like a hive tyrant, an Executioner trio will still average about 8 damage (HT may have better T than a fex but it doesn't have damage reduction built in), whereas a Huntsmen trio will average:
4.7 dmg @ 30"
7.3 dmg @ 15"
7.8 dmg @ 12"
8.2 dmg @ 6"
8 dmg @ melee (Strike)
that 4+ invul is a real problem for something with so few shots - a Huntsman has to close within 6-12" of a Hive Tyrant to match the damage output of an Executioner sitting in the backfield, and it can only do so if you give it the meltagun. A Stalker without the meltagun can't even match the Executioners output.
We shouldn't rely on math only, of course, because math doesn't tell the full story... but use-case gives the advantage to the Executioner, because its ability to shoot at longer range gives it an advantage in survivability by not requiring it to be in harms way to maximize its damage output. Don't know the math vs T9 targets (which I think is basically just land raiders currently?), so don't know how that skews it.
So you would give it 'Mark of the dread knight' or 'Blessing of the dark master' (favour of the god undivided)? I think I would go for the blessing of the dark master. Completely shut down shooting reroll's is better then a 6+++ feel no pain first turn.
Also fellbond ' worthy offerings' is the best pick in combination with the desecrator laser destructor. Kill one vehicle or MC and you imediately get the favour ability. And as stated before, with chaos undivided you can use a stratagem to get the model back up with 3 wounds on a 4+ after being killed (not exploded) and use the infernal master D6 reroll if needed. With the fellbond worthy offering it keeps shooting with a 4+ against MC/vehicles so that's not bad..
I agree about Blessing of the Dark Master, but I still might go Tzeentch with the Pyrothrone to be fluffy.
chaos0xomega wrote: We shouldn't rely on math only, of course, because math doesn't tell the full story...
Indeed, the full story involves the synergy with the rest of the army and the enemy units you're most likely facing and gives you trouble.
- If I could remove the invulnerable save on that Hive tyrant then the daemonspear shoots with ap -4 and that really changes the math.
- If you want to shoot at tyranid warriors with D3 Autocannons and the pop that -1Damage then you need twice the amount of shooting to remove a single warriors and waste damage.
- Autocannons are probably better at destroying drukhari/harlequin skimmers but the brigand chaincannon/daemonspear combi is a close second and is more flexible at shooting down 1 wound models after that.
- Autocannons are also probably better against custodes jetbikes but you might waste damage when the use feel no pain. You end up removing that last single wound with a D3 shot and that is such a waste.
All kind of situations with pro's and con's but I think it's unwise to deploy these units way in the backfield when the got objective secured and count as 5 models. The need to move forward and claim the objectives because that's what it is all about. I once charged a Tyranid warrior unit with 4 models left and used the -1damage in melee stratagem. Boneswords only doing 1 wound made it possible for the wardog to survive and claim that objective. Next turn I used the "fall back and shoot/charge again" stratagem and did the same against the next enemy unit on another objecive.
Also fun assaulting with a badly wounded wardog and place it within 6 inch range of 4 enemy wardog's (played against another chaos knight player) and use the "blow up stratagem" for auto-d3 mortal wounds all around.
In conclusion:
I think I would only pick the executioner if I knew that I would be facing a lot of tyranid leviathan players, or armies with a solid invul-save and toughness lower then 7, like drukhari/harlequins or custodes.
So, in the latest chaos deamons preview, they have talked about how to mix deamons with other factions:
the short version is, you can take up to 25% of your Power Level (NOT points, intrestingly) as deamons, and all the deamon units gain AGENT OF CHAOS as a keyword, and explictly do not break "purity" requirements for faction rules. For Tsons, their is a rider that the deamons must be tnzeetch ones, and those deamons do not get access to thier own faction purity rules (ie the warp storm abilties).
I am aware that we still dont have the full rules so a considered verdict is not yet really possible, but how to people feel about this? would adding groups of screamers, horrors, or flamers to the army be a nice boost or not really?
xerxeskingofking wrote: I am aware that we still dont have the full rules so a considered verdict is not yet really possible, but how to people feel about this? would adding groups of screamers, horrors, or flamers to the army be a nice boost or not really?
Kairos may end up being better in Supreme Command than Magnus. The detachment tax really takes the shine off of this though, especially with Nephilim, but we can generally deal with the tax better than most.
Tzeentch daemons will probably be good for holding objectives as long as they don't get rushed in melee. Honestly, have a hard time seeing where I would fit this in and I think I'd rather just play my Tzeentch daemons in their own army.
dreadblade wrote: It looks like I'll be up against a 1,000pt SW army next week, and that'll include the Hounds of Morkai and a Culexus Assassin.
1) Drop the Land Raider, get more Rubrics. Land Raiders- even TS Land Raiders with the 5+ invul- are chancy even at 2,000 points; at 1,000 they're a massive point sink that dies entirely too fast to enemy anti-tank (and then takes one-sixth of its passengers with it). If you need more mobility, get some Spawn, or give your guys Temporal Surge and/or a Rhino.
2) Hit the Culexus with those Warpflamers. Gets right past the BS penalty, and has enough firepower to toast him crispy. Look for an opportunity to Sorcerous Facade-drop into a spot where the Culexus is the closest target, negating Look Out Sir, and BBQ him. Also works in Overwatch- if he's silly enough to charge your Warpflamers, you've got him (so still screen your Characters).
3) Also note that, despite his ignoring non-invul saves, a Culexus doesn't actually have a melee weapon. He punches with his STR4 fists for 1 damage a pop. Tri-point him with Rubrics or Scarabs and he can't shoot, and will die eventually to WS6 attacks for minimal losses.
4) The "Implacable Guardians" strat used to be useful against assassins like the Culexus and Hounds, but now it's just Look Out Sir over again. My recommendation is hid your characters completely behind terrain to start, then pop out and hammer the anti-Psyker units with conventional firepower while saving the powers for everything else in the army.
5) Remember Vengeance for Prospero! Re-rolling every hit and wound for your Scarabs is a great thing to spring on a Marine player that thinks your army's hatred of Space Wolves is just a fluff thing. You have special abilities for this specific matchup, don't fail to use them.
xerxeskingofking wrote: I am aware that we still dont have the full rules so a considered verdict is not yet really possible, but how to people feel about this? would adding groups of screamers, horrors, or flamers to the army be a nice boost or not really?
Kairos may end up being better in Supreme Command than Magnus. The detachment tax really takes the shine off of this though, especially with Nephilim, but we can generally deal with the tax better than most.
Tzeentch daemons will probably be good for holding objectives as long as they don't get rushed in melee. Honestly, have a hard time seeing where I would fit this in and I think I'd rather just play my Tzeentch daemons in their own army.
I think a LOC + Flamers is a pretty strong addition to Tsons.
The LOC can be either made with the -1 to hit or the extra mortal wounds, and with a 3-- against shooting and the impossible robe is very hard to take down. 3 extra casts with +2 to cast and the teleport stratagem is very strong. Flamers are also just super good and the blue horrors are the mandatory troop tax.
I would be tempted to ask the TO before taking it to a tournament, but it should clearly work.
This is the only possible restriction in the main rules text for CRs.
A unit can only benefit from a Cabbalistic Ritual if it has this ability.
This is the cast again CR.
Use this Cabbalistic Ritual when a unit from your army is selected to manifest psychic powers. Until the end of the phase, that unit can attempt to manifest one Witchfire psychic power that another PSYKER in your army has already attempted to manifest during the phase, even though the same psychic power cannot normally be attempted more than once per Psychic phase, and even if that unit does not know that psychic power.
So 2 x Bolt of Change or 2 x Infernal Gateway are both an option.
Use this Cabbalistic Ritual when a unit from your army is selected to manifest psychic powers. Until the end of the phase, that unit can attempt to manifest one Witchfire psychic power that another PSYKER in your army has already attempted to manifest during the phase, even though the same psychic power cannot normally be attempted more than once per Psychic phase, and even if that unit does not know that psychic power.
So 2 x Bolt of Change or 2 x Infernal Gateway are both an option.
dreadblade wrote: It looks like I'll be up against a 1,000pt SW army next week, and that'll include the Hounds of Morkai and a Culexus Assassin.
1) Drop the Land Raider, get more Rubrics. Land Raiders- even TS Land Raiders with the 5+ invul- are chancy even at 2,000 points; at 1,000 they're a massive point sink that dies entirely too fast to enemy anti-tank (and then takes one-sixth of its passengers with it). If you need more mobility, get some Spawn, or give your guys Temporal Surge and/or a Rhino.
2) Hit the Culexus with those Warpflamers. Gets right past the BS penalty, and has enough firepower to toast him crispy. Look for an opportunity to Sorcerous Facade-drop into a spot where the Culexus is the closest target, negating Look Out Sir, and BBQ him. Also works in Overwatch- if he's silly enough to charge your Warpflamers, you've got him (so still screen your Characters).
3) Also note that, despite his ignoring non-invul saves, a Culexus doesn't actually have a melee weapon. He punches with his STR4 fists for 1 damage a pop. Tri-point him with Rubrics or Scarabs and he can't shoot, and will die eventually to WS6 attacks for minimal losses.
4) The "Implacable Guardians" strat used to be useful against assassins like the Culexus and Hounds, but now it's just Look Out Sir over again. My recommendation is hid your characters completely behind terrain to start, then pop out and hammer the anti-Psyker units with conventional firepower while saving the powers for everything else in the army.
5) Remember Vengeance for Prospero! Re-rolling every hit and wound for your Scarabs is a great thing to spring on a Marine player that thinks your army's hatred of Space Wolves is just a fluff thing. You have special abilities for this specific matchup, don't fail to use them.
I needn't have worried...
I went first, and although the assassin was well screened in cover, I focused my attention on taking out the SW anti-tank and warlord. Ahriman was a bit exposed after that, but survived being attacked in melee then escaped using Sorcerous Facade. On turn 2 the Rubrics fried the assassin and his Thunderwolf Cavalry protectors, and it was all over by the end of my turn 3
Always pleasing to hear about the space pups being slaughtered.
But, for future games, you can't cast Facade on Ahriman or Magnus as they don't have the cult keyword. Also you can't cast it on CAVALRY units (if he wasn't on foot).
EightFoldPath wrote: Always pleasing to hear about the space pups being slaughtered.
But, for future games, you can't cast Facade on Ahriman or Magnus as they don't have the cult keyword. Also you can't cast it on CAVALRY units (if he wasn't on foot).
Yep, I realised that before I read your comment and fessed-up to my opponent
I think the only difference it would have made is that the Wolf Guard who attacked Ahriman could have chased him instead of attacking the Scarabs. As it was they did okay at that, killing 4 out of 5.
With these new allied daemon rules, I'm wondering about some good combos to take in our lists.
Pink Horrors seem a bit expensive for what they do in compared to our rubrics so I took a pass on them. Blue horrors however as cheap infantry seem like they could replace Tzaangors or cultists as the "Sit on this objective and keep your mouth shut"
The Soul Grinder seems like a pretty strong win and compares favorably to our own so-so forgefiend, but it is a bit more expensive.
Flamers are obviously huge. Huge.
So my big question is: is it worth just taking a unit of flamers for the CP tax, or should I try and work in a small patrol detachment? In which case, pink or blue horrors? Which HQ?
I know most of these questions are list dependent, but I'm just musing about what would fit in the average list at the moment.
im looking into the same questions myself, so i will put in my own 2 cents:
blue horrors seem ok, but are slightly worse than tzanngor at the "point holding" role as they are unable to get Obsec, so a single obsec model can snipe them off the point. if your taking them as the "troops tax" of a deamons detachment, then by all means use them for that, though.
Signed up for a small 3-game tournament with my Thousand Sons and I'm rather surprised about the lists I'll be up against. I've made clear a couple of times my thoughts about tournament play so tried to make a less...sweaty list with what I have available, but I think I'll have a real struggle against the other lists. I've read the Codex multiple times but have only actually played them once.
First game is against White Scars, with the following lists
Me Ahriman
Exalted Sorcerer
Daemon Prince with Wings
10x Rubrics
10x Rubrics
5x Scarabs
Helbrute w. Twin-Las
Helbrute w. Twin-Las
Defiler
Fluxmaster on Disk
10x Horrors
6x Flamers
Him Khan on Bike
Chaplain on Bike
5x Ass Interceptor
5x Incursors
5x Infiltrators
5x Aggressors
15x Vanguard Vets with Jump Packs, Lightning Claws
3x Eliminators
5x Eradicators
10x Hellblasters
I'm really thinking this'll be an uphill struggle. He'll probably try to get Turn 1 charges off, and infiltrate the Eradicators. Any suggestions?
So first game was an absolute shitshow. Pretty much couldn't get any psychic powers or shooting off due to terrain, and thanks to his Advance+Charge he was close to invulnerable thanks to breachable terrain and Fly.
Bit stumped on which secondaries I should take next game. Don't know who I'll be playing next but it could be one of the following lists:
- Grey Knights, with Draigo, numerous Interceptors and 4x Dreadknights
- Guard with 10x Russes of various types, very little infantry
- Sisters and Black Templars, overall a more casual list
- Emperor's Children, numerous small Noise Marine Squads, big Chosen squad with Black Rune
- Blood Angel Tac Marines, with the contents of the Cadia Stands box, and a Knight.
Some of those are more competitive than others, but it would be good to have an idea of which Secondaries I should be using by default, and which ones would be preferable against certain lists.
Today's Forge World FAQ updates the various CSM units that can go into Thousand Sons. In theory they couldn't be taken since the CSMFWFAQ but I guess most people ignored it.
They also added machine spirit to a bunch of stuff and some tweaks to a few rules for the FW Daemons.
I'll be looking through my codex this evening, but can anyone offer any advice on stratagems, psychic powers, relics and warlord traits to counter these worshippers of the false emperor with all their re-rolls, deny the witch abilities and FNP for MWs?
dreadblade wrote: Last week I pitted my GK against a 1,000 pt Sisters list comprising of the Sanctorum Guard from the Order of the Bloody Rose and I got totally pasted
I'm up against them again this week, but this time with my TSons:
I'll be looking through my codex this evening, but can anyone offer any advice on stratagems, psychic powers, relics and warlord traits to counter these worshipers of the false emperor with all their re-rolls, deny the witch abilities and FNPs?
Do you have a rough idea of what he's running? I ran 1k against a combined SoB/BT force a few weeks back, I found it better to just rely on your firepower rather than your psychic abilities. Bit naff, I know.
Do you have a rough idea of what he's running? I ran 1k against a combined SoB/BT force a few weeks back, I found it better to just rely on your firepower rather than your psychic abilities. Bit naff, I know.
He ran all of the models from the Sanctorum Guard box as the Order of the Valorous Heart.
dreadblade wrote: Last week I pitted my GK against a 1,000 pt Sisters list comprising of the Sanctorum Guard from the Order of the Bloody Rose and I got totally pasted
I'm up against them again this week, but this time with my TSons:
I'll be looking through my codex this evening, but can anyone offer any advice on stratagems, psychic powers, relics and warlord traits to counter these worshipers of the false emperor with all their re-rolls, deny the witch abilities and FNPs?
There's one thing to note, and that's the Vow the army might take. It'll be the Mini-Transhuman one with the 5++ or the additional move against Psykers with the reroll. I'd actually be less concerned about the first one as you're mostly AP-2, so you're not paying for stuff to run over the 3+/5++ until melee. For the latter, position just enough so it'll be harder to charge you even with their native rules.
Otherwise just mostly take utility powers because relying on offense against a 5+++ won't work out for you.
Quick question - if I have a Rubric Squad with an icon and a soulreaper cannon then I should put both of them on the same model, right? Is there any reason not to?
I am currently trying to put together a basic Thousand Sons list but I am noticing a distinct lack of anti-tank options. Am I supposed to use Predators? It feels like those haven't been good in other armies for a long time now
Bilge Rat wrote: I am currently trying to put together a basic Thousand Sons list but I am noticing a distinct lack of anti-tank options. Am I supposed to use Predators? It feels like those haven't been good in other armies for a long time now
yhea, anti-tank is a classic problem for Tsons. The "default" answer is mortal wound spam and accept that armour is something of a bugbear for us.
that said, we have no idea how things are going to change in the new edition. Armoured vehicles are getting something of a glow-up, and psyker powers are getting major changes which radically alter our existing paradigm. I might hold off a little, at least until our faction focus article is released and we have half a clue how we operate in this new edition.
Wait and see for 10th edition, but be aware of the structural issues of the army and how GW rules writing compounds this for anit-tank.
TSons exclusive units - Wizards, Rubrics, Scarabs, Goats, Goats on Surfboards, Vortex Beasts.
None of these have historically had much good anti-tank.
Units shared with loyalist and heretic Space Marines - Dreadnoughts, Predator chasis, Land Raider chasis, FW-tank chasis, daemon engines.
In 9th there wasn't really a good anti-tank option in this list, even for CSM/DG/loyalists. The loyalists used their unique dreads and vehicles, while CSM/DG had the same anti-tank issue (somewhat fixed with their own unique units but not quite).
So, for 10th we need the shared units to be decent.
But we also need the unique "free rules" (army rule / detachment rule) to be good for TSons or for GW to use a different points setting method. What is this issue?
Well, lets look at a Defiler in 9th. 175 points in TSons, 175 points in DG, 175 points in CSM.
In Tsons it gets 0 special rules, no army wide rule, no chapter tactic.
In DG it gets a special rule, -1T when it gets close.
In CSM it gets all the rules. So a Black Legion Defiler is getting exploding 6s with Heavy turn 1, exploding 6s with melee turn 3,4 & 5, extra hits with its flamers all turns, and is also getting +1 to hit in most circumstances.
These three defilers shouldn't cost the same.
Similar example where TSons were favoured somewhat but the problem was the unit was garbage in 9th. A Predator in 9th. 115 points in DG. 115 points in TSons. 115 points in Iron Hands.
In DG it gets two bad special rules, when you drive your anti-tank unit close to the enemy, give them -1T and ignore the heavy penalty for shooting in combat.
In TS it gets a good special rule, a 5++, wee!
In Iron Hands it gets all the rules. Permanent dev doc gives rr 1s to hit on its heavy weapons, +1AP on its heavy weapons, then the chapter tactic gives 6+++ and a better degrading profile.
These three Predators shouldn't cost the same.
So, one of the early things in 10th I will do is look at a few shared units between the space marine factions and check their points to see if GW are still doing this.
If they are, then I will compare the TSons free rules to the other factions to work out which shared TSons units will be undercosted and which will be overcosted.
Then I will look at the TSons unique units and the TSons undercosted shared units as the base line for army building (and check for anti-tank as well as other basic building blocks of a functional army). Maybe an overcosted shared unit will be worth adding but history suggests not.
I really like our 10th edition rules. We basically keep old school psychic powers. And all the powers are good. The only down side, I think a few have mentioned this, is that you really need to lean hard into characters, Rubrics, and SoT. So there is very little incentive to play with Tgors or vehicles.
I mean you are going to want to throw out a doombolt every turn for 7 Cabal. Then if you want to remove armor it is another 9 (if no Ahriman or he already used his ability) so to do that each turn would be 15 cabal. My current list would generate 16. Probably not realistic for each turn, so we will probably have to pick between the two best each turn. (which is actually a good thing for the game). Also for some of the defensive stuff, like the strat ability, you need to use it at the start of the phase, not when the unit is targeted. That makes it a bit trickier to use.
I also really hope one of the characters or SoT get a psychic shooting that is an anti-tank type shot, like the old bolt of change from the 3rd edition book. We still are probably going to struggle with anti-tank (the new mutalith not withstanding) especially now that you really want to double down on characters, Rubrics, and SoT, not vehicles.
With GKs moving toward deepstrike movement being their faction ability, we are definitely on top of the psychic armies.
I do worry that the army will just fall apart in practice. We need Rubrics to be able to protect characters, and Rubrics are not particularly durable anymore with their rules leaning heavily towards offense. Hopefully the Lone Operative on disc HQ's is generous.
I suspect All is Dust will be a useful stratagem, the question will be if it's applied to a single unit for perhaps 1 CP, or if it affects all Rubrics for a phase for several CP.
While I'd prefer it be on the datasheet, at the least it will let Psyker heavy armies have a way to make us choose between using that or our Psychic Dominion strat. All speculation fo course.
Also the 5++ Invul on our troops helps, just need to see what the points wind up being.
Arachnofiend wrote: I do worry that the army will just fall apart in practice. We need Rubrics to be able to protect characters, and Rubrics are not particularly durable anymore with their rules leaning heavily towards offense. Hopefully the Lone Operative on disc HQ's is generous.
I had the same thought, but let’s wait on that. We don’t know (for example) if there’s some rule or strat that makes objectives we control generate Cabal points.
Xyxel wrote: Units in transports will generate Cabal Points?
They will need a specific rule we haven't yet seen.
As will deepstrike/reserves units.
Also, if they don't have a specific rule, the timing now will be:
Command Phase generate Cabal Points.
Movement Phase climb out of transport or arrive on battlefield.
For attaching, my theory is:
Rubrics will take:
Ahriman on Foot
Exalted on Foot
Sorcer in Power Armour
Infernal Master
Scarabs will take:
Sorcerer in Terminator Armour
Enlightened will take:
Shaman
Lone operative but with a condition (probably have to be within 3" of INFANTRY):
Ahriman on Disc
Exalted on Disc
Daemon Prince (edited this in as I forgot them)
Based on this, you would think the "new unit" TS get for the edition might be a second Terminator Armour character.
Xyxel wrote: Units in transports will generate Cabal Points?
They will need a specific rule we haven't yet seen.
As will deepstrike/reserves units.
Also, if they don't have a specific rule, the timing now will be:
Command Phase generate Cabal Points.
Movement Phase climb out of transport or arrive on battlefield.
For attaching, my theory is:
Rubrics will take:
Ahriman on Foot
Exalted on Foot
Sorcer in Power Armour
Infernal Master
Scarabs will take:
Sorcerer in Terminator Armour
Enlightened will take:
Shaman
Lone operative but with a condition (probably have to be within 3" of INFANTRY):
Ahriman on Disc
Exalted on Disc
Daemon Prince (edited this in as I forgot them)
Based on this, you would think the "new unit" TS get for the edition might be a second Terminator Armour character.
I hope that they will generate the Cabal points in a transport. Right now the wording we have is "that is on the battlefield". So that is kind of dependent if being in a transport counts as being "on the battlefield" which I am not sure if we know yea or nay on that yet. If they don't that will really hurt taking rhinos as they will probably not generate Cabal points themselves, and units in them will not either. Obviously that would really incentivize using all or mostly infantry lists, which is already going to be the push due to the fact that vehicles likely won't do anything for the Cabals.
Personally I think we are very likely to get an exhaled sorcerer in terminator armor as the one model that we will get with our codex, like two years from now. They really do need to give us a few more options like a kit with some Rubrics on discs maybe, the robots from 30k only demonized, some of the Tzeentch daemon engines that tangentially exist in the fluff. We probably need like 2 or three more options.
On another note, I have been thinking about the loss of "all is dust" and I don't think it is going to be as big a deal. We kept our 5++ which is huge, and "all is dust" really only was protection against small arms fire as it only worked on D1. Well the vast majority of small arms lost a pip of ap, there doesn't seem to be nearly the level of ap enhancement for small arms that was in 9th i.e. doctrines, and cover saves will be extremely easy to get. Now I know the cover can't take us to 2+, so that is a loss, but as long as the points are ok (we are currently 3 points more than a CSM Legionary for Rubrics) I think that trade off might work out for us, (points reduction v. all is dust). I think the only ap enhancement we have seen so far is the icon of flame and being on a tall building. Now of course if the points are out of wack then the loss is going to be felt more, but points costs have been incredibly important in 40k since the beginning making or breaking units.
I also don't think I would take any allies, as the Tzeentch daemons won't generate Cabal points, unless their data sheets are just fire.
Thousand Sons did not specialise in close combat. Why you want mele options for TS marines?
Tzaangors and Scarab Terminators were ok combat units. Maybe Maulerfiends and Defilers if including daemon-engines will be bearable with TS faction focus.
yes, but do take not that Rubrics are not psychic, only the sorcerer leading them is. I would assume the same is true for Scarabs.
the templars will be able to chew through our characters no problem, but most of our units are units are not dropping like flies to then,
the 4++ vs psychic attacks will blunt us a lot, though. MWs form doombolt etc should bypass that, at least. Also, the Mutaliths warp vortex is not Psychic, so it thiers hope for us yet.
Because this Psyker defeating tech will be fixable with points.
But it will mean that either having the Psyker keyword and Psychic on your attacks should make a unit cheaper.
Or they will have to make ANTI PSYKER 4+ or a 4++/4+++ vs Psychic units expensive enough you'll get beaten by a mirror match opponent who didn't use them.
Because this Psyker defeating tech will be fixable with points.
But it will mean that either having the Psyker keyword and Psychic on your attacks should make a unit cheaper.
Or they will have to make ANTI PSYKER 4+ or a 4++/4+++ vs Psychic units expensive enough you'll get beaten by a mirror match opponent who didn't use them.
ok, based on my reading of the leaked 10e rules, that doesnt seem to be the case.
the unit as a whole is not Psychic, only the sorcerer, so they would only gain that bonus when hes the only model they could target. the controlling player allocates wounds* anyway, so their no way to force it onto the sorcerer. By your logic, if I put a Liberian into a terminator squad, they would all get PSYHIC and be vulnerable.
I think the balence point for Psychic is going to be slightly undercosting the abilites, on the understanding that theirs plenty of extra defenses available against these attacks.
As with so much in 40K, it really comes down to point costs.
*except in case of PRECISION weapons, and even then they can't nominate the squad leader or heavy weapons guy, just any attached CHARACTER.
xerxeskingofking wrote: By your logic, if I put a Liberian into a terminator squad, they would all get PSYHIC and be vulnerable.
That is exactly what I think happens. But, I think there is enough confusion on this that it should be in an early FAQ.
For the Librarian + Terminators I think the combined unit gets Psyker and Character.
The only potential positive interaction I've seen so far is Abaddon + Terminators should get Abaddon's Khorne, Nurgle, Slaanesh and Tzeentch keywords, making the four god boosted strategems in the index detachment all work on the one unit.
The soulgrinder looks great for AT for us. Vehicles don't generate Cabal Points anyway, and it is unlikely any vehicles will get benefit from the detachment bonus.
There is a strange amount of psychic weaponry on non psyker Tzeentch daemons previewed today. So some hope for the detachment bonus to apply in strange places (like maybe the Enlightened Bows and Spears).
xeen wrote: The soulgrinder looks great for AT for us. Vehicles don't generate Cabal Points anyway, and it is unlikely any vehicles will get benefit from the detachment bonus.
Soulgrinders are chaos demon units. I
Know we can ally them in, but were you thinking of defilers?
xerxeskingofking wrote: By your logic, if I put a Liberian into a terminator squad, they would all get PSYHIC and be vulnerable.
That is exactly what I think happens. But, I think there is enough confusion on this that it should be in an early FAQ.
For the Librarian + Terminators I think the combined unit gets Psyker and Character.
The only potential positive interaction I've seen so far is Abaddon + Terminators should get Abaddon's Khorne, Nurgle, Slaanesh and Tzeentch keywords, making the four god boosted strategems in the index detachment all work on the one unit.
We know already not all models in unit have to share keyword. Tson sorcerer is psyker. Rubrics he lead aren't.
EightFoldPath wrote: You've misread the discussion. Do you think the Rubric UNIT has the Psyker keyword while the Sorcerer MODEL is alive and in the UNIT?
Just to reiterate my position:
No, the unit does not, only the sorcerer has. Any vulnerability to ANTI-PSYKER weapons only becomes relevant when the sorcerer is the only model left in the unit.
My logic is based on the fact their is no mechanism to target the (aspiring) sorcerer, as hes not a CHARACTER who could be singled out by PRECISION weapons, has no separate statline independent of his rubrics, thus any hits to the squad are done to those rubrics, who are explicitly not PSYKERS, and any wounds done to the unit would be allocated to the model the tson player chooses.
xeen wrote: The soulgrinder looks great for AT for us. Vehicles don't generate Cabal Points anyway, and it is unlikely any vehicles will get benefit from the detachment bonus.
Soulgrinders are chaos demon units. I
Know we can ally them in, but were you thinking of defilers?
That said, yes it does look good
Yea take as allies. I mean there is no difference in taking a soul grinder as ally and defiler. Neither will generate cabal and neither benefit from the detachment ability. I mean the defiler might benefit from TS strats but likely it won’t be efficient for them anyway and you could cabal the defiler with the move or save but it will probably never come up. Just raw data sheet the soul grinder looks great for AT punch unless way over costed
EightFoldPath wrote: An interesting idea. At 2,000 points you get up to 500 points of Tzeentch Daemons. If there are any good datasheets to use well worth considering.
The remove Armour Saves ritual doesn't specify you have to attack with a TSons unit either.
yea, so far the tzeentch daemon data sheets look pretty good except the screamers. Flamers are probably a bit redundant as we can take flamer rubrics (although if daemon flamers are cheaper by a wide margin that might make them more appealing as allies), but like I said the soul grinder looks great. Also, the Lord of Change, just as a one off being taken for its shooting, might also be good. Finally, if pink horrors are cheap, and Tgors are to pricey, pink horrors might be a nice back field alternative to Tgors as I am sure Tgors will not produce cabal points.
The allied system is really nice in that without having to worry about a formation, we can just take the data sheets we want, even if it is just on large unit like the LoC or Soul Grinder.
The Red Hobbit wrote: Take the store with a grain of salt, they keywords have been updated several times and not all of them make sense.
However, magnus DOES have Deep Strike now.
Theirs a lot of interesting choices in the data cards to unpick, but so far my favourite 2 are spawn are now 4+,5++,5+++ AND regeneration d3 wounds each command phase.
Also tzanngor can generate Cabal Points when on objectives
The Red Hobbit wrote: Take the store with a grain of salt, they keywords have been updated several times and not all of them make sense.
Also tzanngor can generate Cabal Points when on objectives
The play seems to be to use Rubrics to take objectives (with Bringers of Change letting you do full Wound rerolls) and Tzaangors to keep them (to generate more Cabal points).
Tzaangors have to roll a 4+ to get their cabal points too, I think it's a trap honestly, you'd have better luck getting extra cabal points from Helbrutes.
The SoT look really solid. Being wounded on 4+ and 3+ instead of 3+ and 2+ could be huge. I also like the dreadnoughts, I use them as I have the old Forgeworld thousand sons specific ones, and generating cabal points will be nice. All of the characters look pretty solid, Ahriman still looks the best though, and no longer really any reason to take on a disc as the movement is wasted and you only get 1 wound, unless it is extremely cheap. The Infernal Master also looks pretty solid on a larger group of Rubrics.
Wait, Magnus doesn't get his Crimson King ability if he comes in from Deep Strike right? He'll miss the "start of battle round" timing because he isn't on the table.
Arachnofiend wrote: Wait, Magnus doesn't get his Crimson King ability if he comes in from Deep Strike right? He'll miss the "start of battle round" timing because he isn't on the table.
That would have been case in 9e. Trying to find rule in 10e but so far no luck. Transport has but that's for embarked.
(for record in aos off board is fine unless ability etc says in battlefield. Transports meanwhile have contents be in battlefield>
I actually kind of like how each of the Heldrakes have a different ability for each faction, both the 1k Sons and WE look quite nice. Same for Forgefiends which have fun abilities for each.
Infernal Master is also looking quite strong. Ahriman is surprising, retaining the same powers and abilities while on the Disc, compared to the Eldar Farseer who switches on the Bike.
The Red Hobbit wrote: I actually kind of like how each of the Heldrakes have a different ability for each faction, both the 1k Sons and WE look quite nice. Same for Forgefiends which have fun abilities for each.
Infernal Master is also looking quite strong. Ahriman is surprising, retaining the same powers and abilities while on the Disc, compared to the Eldar Farseer who switches on the Bike.
Yea I like that as well. Yea Ahriman is surprising, especially since the exhaled on disk is different than foot. Guess just saving points on not using the disc with him.
Also I am not sure if like an exhalted or infernal master more for a big 10 man unit of rubrics. Both seem excellent.
I'm taking Magnus - 100%. He seems like he can be made very durable. One damage 0 from 'Destined' and then two pocket rerolls - one from Magnus and a second from a nearby Sorc with 'Lord of Forbidden Lore' ( and get refunded two Cabal with a sneaky helbrute ). Combine with the fact that he can get cover and has a -1D ability...good luck!
There also seems to be very few duds? I even like Tzaangors ( points aside ). The lowly sorcerer has a great damage spell and support, too.
Ahriman appears to be the only valid buffer for Warpflamers, but you could run them without and just get psychic on them to push DW.
Part of me feels like MSU is viable? It's going to be really hard to pick losing units unless the points are horrible.
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xeen wrote: Also I am not sure if like an exhalted or infernal master more for a big 10 man unit of rubrics. Both seem excellent.
I'm keen on the Infernal to get the +1S +1D relic and then using his ability to push an extra 6 for DW. A couple 5 mans with standard sorcerers could also put out a lot of hurt. Each 6 is 4 hits and with DW it should do really well if you spike just a handful of 6s.
Ah yes another of about million times this has come up.
3 options.
A) rule glossary(which we haven't seen yet) covers it
B) gw errataes fast. They have doee this about 5-6 times,
C) gw broke 10th ed so bad 2++ rerollable of 7th ed looks nice period
So, a few more effects and tricks I have seen being discussed elsewhere:
One of our strats, ensorcelled infusion, gives all infernal bolters (plus the assorted combi bolters, pistols, etc) str 5 and [PSYCHIC]. The latter is particularly interesting as it then qualifies the unit for our detachment bonuses like [lethal hits], [sustained hits] and [devastating wounds]. Combined with the strat "warp sight ", we can [ignore cover] and [indirect fire] on that squad as well.
Granted, its CP hungry I'm a edition with little CP, but it's a cool trick
Ahriman appears to be the only valid buffer for Warpflamers, but you could run them without and just get psychic on them to push DW.
ensorcelled infusion only works on bolters
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xerxeskingofking wrote: So, a few more effects and tricks I have seen being discussed elsewhere:
One of our strats, ensorcelled infusion, gives all infernal bolters (plus the assorted combi bolters, pistols, etc) str 5 and [PSYCHIC]. The latter is particularly interesting as it then qualifies the unit for our detachment bonuses like [lethal hits], [sustained hits] and [devastating wounds]. Combined with the strat "warp sight ", we can [ignore cover] and [indirect fire] on that squad as well.
Granted, its CP hungry I'm a edition with little CP, but it's a cool trick
can we use multiple strats on one unit in the same phase t his edition?
Just finished my first readthrough of our index. I feel like we're actually in a really solid place?
I get the impression our anti-tank options got a lot better. So while we might not be able to reliably psychic things to death, it seems like we have more options for dealing with vehicles and at longer range (provided you're okay with fielding some vehicles/monsters).
I like all of our troops. Rubrics seem like they can do some okay damage and are very well supported by our characters. Cultists are useful regardless of whether they're killing or dying, and giving them a scout move is a neat choice. Tzaangor will need to be to be worth it, but using them as Cabal Point batteries is a fun gimmick. Seems like they *might* be reasonably durable if you take them with a shaman; probably as an outflanking unit.
Magnus feels slightly more tame but still good. My gut says he's in a decent place.
Footprinces are interesting in that their special abilities are buffs for infantry. So they're a beatstick unit, but their special rules focus on helping rubricae shoot and survive rather than helping the princes themselves get into combat or do damage.
Vortex beasts seem pretty scary?
The only unit I don't see myself taking are the Tzaangor enlightened; they just don't seem to contribute enough offensively compared to other options, but maybe they'll be inexpensive.
But yeah. Seems like we made out okay. Dare I say we might even be in a better place than 'nids?
Wyldhunt wrote: Tzaangor will need to be to be worth it, but using them as Cabal Point batteries is a fun gimmick. Seems like they *might* be reasonably durable if you take them with a shaman; probably as an outflanking unit.
As tneva mentioned earlier in the thread I think these are a trap, only a 50% chance to gain a Cabal point; they'd have to be very points efficient to be worthwhile imo.
But yeah. Seems like we made out okay. Dare I say we might even be in a better place than 'nids?
Easily, of all the armies previewed so far 1k Sons are in the top 10 if not top 5. Well, assuming points don't drastically change from 9e. I like the Tyranid units previewed but they don't seem as strong or well synergized as 1k Sons.
I keep wishing Fatecaster Greatbows were made into some sort of magic anti-tank/monster weapon, its really the only way IMO that a unit like Tzaangor Enlightened can find a viable niche in the codex, for several editions now they basically just kind of exist without a clearly defined role or purpose.
Fatecaster greatbows might be useful to pick off characters in units since it's one of 10th's big thing. Especially with 30" range on 10" fly units. Still need to see if it's worth it to stick in a shaman for the Cabal points and bonuses.
MVBs look pretty good at last. But I'm pretty conflicted about them definitely loosing their fun random mechanic. All our sorcerer's seem to be doing something unique to their squad and have their own role. Really want to fit in as much of them as possible.
TS are definitely the faction I'm most exited about with CSM.
Hell, I even want to try out the Defiler ! Too bad I find the kit so ugly
ok, so my quikmaff says a squad of 6 Enlightened with greatbows, led by a Shaman, can kill a 4w, t4, 3+/4++ character, like a chaplain, LT, or Librarian with reasonable chances of success.
points dependant, it MIGHT be a ok unit for use sniping out support characters like that. Currently such a unit is 168 pts, and i cant see it being much different (the demonstration games have general model counts that are roughly equivilent to late 9th, so its a useful enough measure, at least until tomorrow when the new points drop)
Yes, but do you *need* a unit of Enlightened in order to accomplish that? I feel like theres probably better options that can do roughly the same thing. Ahriman and Thousand Sons DPs both bring the army precision anti-character tech while also providing other capabilities to the army, especially the DP, whereas the Enlgihted seem kind of like a one-trick pony.
But yes, the MVB I would say had the biggest glow-up in the codex. My only concern with it is whether or not its resilient enough to survive the attention its likely to attract from your opponent.
Also pretty sure the TS Defiler has a typo on it - lascannon listed as S9, every other Defiler card for the other chaos factions lists it as S12.
Enlightened have never really been good. They have always been super fragile and are actually more fragile now as they are down to a 6++, so you really need to run them with a shaman or they will just get deleted quickly, which adds to the points investment. I love the models so I will probably use them a few times, but I don't think they will be shaking the meta. Also they have always costed to much, and their points in 9th were laughable, probably the worst value in the game, so if the points are similar they are dead on arrival.
Depending on points if you can get a shaman and a 10 man of Tgors for about the price of 5 Rubrics it might be a nice back field objective camper that can generate an extra cabal point, and have a bit of punch against light targets getting into the back field. Currently I believe 10 Tgor and a shaman is 130 points, while 5 Rubrics with a soulreaper is 110, so close. The rubrics would be a bit more survivable likely, and a bit more punchy likely, but if those points are similar or even more tilted to Tgors and Shaman (say 110 for them and 110 for Rubrics) it could be a good option.
Hell, I even want to try out the Defiler ! Too bad I find the kit so ugly
You need to embrace the crab
If had more time I'd definitely buy one just to sculpt some new heads/arms/weapons in greenstuff and magnetize all of it. The crabby parts are actually the only thing I like about the model By the by, anyone noticed that the new datacard of the infernal master implies that he tosses his baby screamers at his opponents
On the serious side, I noticed that the Hellbrute's aura isn't limited to once per phase or by model. So if you stack three next to each other and next to a bunch of character it can get bonkers pretty quickly no ? Especially if you picked the enhancement that allows to use one cabal ability twice.
I assumed the Knight will have a 4+ save after our ap-1.
Is the outcome disappointing for such an expensive combo? Hard to say. I know Eldar players can do Heavy wraithcannon + Strands of Fate and easily kill Magnus with auto-devastating-mortal-wounds in one volley at 36'' (the Wraithknight has 2d3 shots if he takes two Heavy wraithcannons) and we will not be able to use our Destined by Fate stratagem (Aeldari being the masters of fate...).
Back to us, whatever the target, if you can wound on a 4+ and can negate all its saving throws with Twist of fate Cabal,
you do 35 wounds with Double rerolls + Sustained (= 40 shots)
and 42,8 wounds with Double rerolls + Sustained + Leader with Lethal (= 44 shots).
With Precision from the Deamon Prince, even without some Rapid fire shots, you can snipe and kill three characters even if they have a 4++.
dreadblade wrote: What do we think of the DP now? Once per game buffs Rubrics or Scarabs with PRECISION and has 14 attacks in melee...
Foot-DP looks viable, time to remove the dust from my old metallic 3.5 DP.
Doesn't the Stealth-aura affect himself as well? And yeah, those 14 attacks don't look like that much initially, but since they're [psychic] we can do some fun with them.
As for the Winged-DP however, I don't see myself using with these rules.
Against an Imperial Knight, the output of a Dæmon prince (Strat + faction + Arcane Vortex)
meaning Double rerolls + Sustained hits (which is here very slightly better than Devastating)
is 10,4 wounds, which means in fact 8 or 12, which is a standard vehicle or half a Knight.
The Dæmon Prince may survive one fight phase with the help of save reroll Cabal and Fate Strat.
After reading trough the pointcosts my impression is "fair enough".
It looks mostly fine or "good enough".
Magnus be a bit on the cheap side given how resilient you can make him (since technically it's possible to give him 3 rerolls and 2 wounds that can be turned into damage 0 per turn), and MVB's might be slightly underpriced.
On the flipside, Vindicators of all flavours seems slightly overpriced, and I can't see myself using the Wing DP (not sure what the point of him is).
In the end, nothing too extreme on either end. Looking forward to dust off (pun not intended) my Thousand Sons now in 10th.
xeen wrote: Enlightened have never really been good. They have always been super fragile and are actually more fragile now as they are down to a 6++, so you really need to run them with a shaman or they will just get deleted quickly, which adds to the points investment. I love the models so I will probably use them a few times, but I don't think they will be shaking the meta. Also they have always costed to much, and their points in 9th were laughable, probably the worst value in the game, so if the points are similar they are dead on arrival.
Depending on points if you can get a shaman and a 10 man of Tgors for about the price of 5 Rubrics it might be a nice back field objective camper that can generate an extra cabal point, and have a bit of punch against light targets getting into the back field. Currently I believe 10 Tgor and a shaman is 130 points, while 5 Rubrics with a soulreaper is 110, so close. The rubrics would be a bit more survivable likely, and a bit more punchy likely, but if those points are similar or even more tilted to Tgors and Shaman (say 110 for them and 110 for Rubrics) it could be a good option.
Enlightened are 45pts/3 so i'd say theyre gonna be pretty useful as skirmishers that snipe characters.
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chaos0xomega wrote: I'm waiting for them to release a new defiler kit. I love the design of it (for the most part), think it looks great, but its showing its age.
it's the worst GW kit in my opinion.
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RenegadeKorps wrote: Just noticed the Winged Prince is T9 while the foot version is T10.
How do you feel about Pink and Blue Horrors? Are they good?
I don't know if its gonna be good, but i want to bring 6 squads of blues and infiltrate all of them right in my opponent's face to block them in.
ok, so running the quickmath on my existing collection, about ~1750 points is now 1525. basically everything has gotten cheaper. Im guessing this is to partially offset our new vulnerability to [anti-psychic] we now have (its been clarifed that [anti-x] effects kick in if ANY model in the unit has the relevant keyword, which is not what i thought it would be, but apparently i was wrong)
which...is nice. now i need to buy more to make up for it!
EightFoldPath wrote: MSU Rubrics + at least one 10 man of Scarabs seems to be the base build again.
Tzaangors stay on the shelf.
Mutaliths look cheap, but before I buy and build three I'd be worried they would get +20/40 points in six months time.
Free upgrades is as stupid as you would expect it to be.
so, i have something of a soft spot for my birdbois, and at 6.5 points a pop, the same as cultists, Im happy to run them, at least in the local club. I Don't expect great things form them and they generally meet my modest expectations.
EightFoldPath wrote: MSU Rubrics + at least one 10 man of Scarabs seems to be the base build again.
Tzaangors stay on the shelf.
Mutaliths look cheap, but before I buy and build three I'd be worried they would get +20/40 points in six months time.
Free upgrades is as stupid as you would expect it to be.
so, i have something of a soft spot for my birdbois, and at 6.5 points a pop, the same as cultists, Im happy to run them, at least in the local club. I Don't expect great things form them and they generally meet my modest expectations.
My birdbois are definitely happier in AOS land Do we start a new thread for 10th now that we have everything we need to play ?
Played a game of 10th yesterday and first I love it other than devastating wounds being ridiculously overpowered. The lethality is way way down, other than if you can spam mortals (which we can). Cover and reduced ap made a huge impact, especially for 3+ 2+ saves.
If thousand sons are not in the top tier I would hate to see what its. Here are my impressions:
My list
Ahriman on foot leading
9x Flamer Rubrics (I don't own 10)
Exhalted Sor with crystal on foot leading
10x Rubrics with bolters, soul reaper etc.
Sor in Terminator Armor leading
5 x Scarab Occult fully loaded
5 x 5 x Scarab Occult fully loaded
5 x Scarab Occult fully loaded
5x Rubrics with bolters, soul reaper etc.
5x Rubrics with bolters, soul reaper etc.
Dreadnought with LC and ML Dreadnought with LC and ML DP with wings
play against a nid list with big brick of carnifexes, lots of gaunts, psychic bugs, and some big monsters, so a real mix.
Cabals:
These are awesome. One of the best faction abilities and I used every one of them multiple times in the game. Doombolt is vicious especially with the winged DP (discussed below). It is not a shooting attack so it can't be countered with strats that give feel no pain. The remove armor is straight broken. It will be used multiple times in probably every game. Move again had real utility allowing me to capture an objective and put my flamers close enough where there was no escape. The strat one was used to get the psychic shooting attacks with the bolters, which with devastating wounds it silly good. And even the little re-roll save one was clutch in allowing me to convert 2 of 3 4++ saves for my terminators. We got really lucky with our faction ability.
Detachment:
As I will explain with the psychic shooting/melee below this ability is both meha and AWESOME at the same time.
Units
Ahriman and the flamers: yea these do exactly what they are billed to do. The +1 to wound is incredible, and being able to use overwatch with these is straight broken. Then you use the cabal to remove armor and this things are back to 9th level lethality. In this game they took down the remainder of the carnifexes (2) after I removed their armor despite only wounding on 5+. They also BBQed a squad of little bugs in overwatch and in my shooting. So what you can do with these guys is if you want to shoot two units with them is you aggressively move them within like 2" of the enemy units (cabal if you have two) then flame one of them. Then the other unit, if it does not have enough movement to get out of the 12" range has to either not move or charge or you will get to shoot that unit too. Obvioulsy a bit situational, but it proved decisive in my game allowing me to get both of his big gaunt units with my flamers before he could really make a charge. oh and re-rolling wounds against units on a objective with this unit is just straight gross. This unit is a must take.
Exhalted with Rubrics: this unit was good. I did not get to use the crystal believe it or not as there was never a good time. The Rubrics did their damage, but the lower ap and cover could really be felt. I also did not not get the chance to resurrect anyone. I probably need a few games to get a better read.
5 Man Rubrics: Did their job and sat on objectives and the soulreaper cannons plinked off a wound or two with Devastating wounds. All is dust was missed, but with how much lower lethality is the Rubrics were doing ok, and quite frankly All is dust would probably be quite broken in the new environment. I understand why 3+ armor does not go to 2+ against ap0, it would be busted.
5 man terminators: holy cow these guys are freaking great. the new rule with -1 to would against S that is higher than T is sooooooooooooo much better than all is dust on these guys. All is dust only worked on D1 weapons so only mattered really against small arms. Small arms are no doing much against these guys with the new T5, 2+ and cover being everywhere (my opponent and I believe cover saves were taken on over 2/3 of the shooting attacks). I was keeping track most of the game and the -1 converting 3s to wound to 4s to wound (no 2s to wound due to T5) and it cost him 17 wounds and we ended the game at the top of turn 5. It is incredible and combined with the 4++ even large guns will struggle to take down SoT (unless mortal wounds due to devastating, but those are going to wipe almost anything). Again must bring unit (although we don't have many alternative anyway)
The terminator sorceror: He was cool. I kept forgetting about the lethal hits he hands out so I probably did not get the best read on him. The re-roll 1's to hit was my only to hit re-roll, and it was kind of meha. His psychic shooting was ok, did a few mortals to a big monster but nothing meta shaking.
Dreadnoughts: they were ok, much tougher to take down even despite losing -1d. the shooting was ok, the LC was good against the big stuff but swing-y with the one shot. The special ability with the cabal points only came up once, so not all that crutial. That was because these were shooting Dreadnoughts so were more in the backfield. CC ones might get more use out of that ability.
DP with wings: Great. His ability to go to deepstrike reserves at the end of the opponent's turn is soooooo good. You can put him anywhere you need, and now he has a pretty good shooting attack, so it is not just about hail mary 9 inch charges. Also, unless the opponent is heavily screening, his ability allows you to put a Doombolt Cabal into basically anything on the battlefield at will. I know people are liking the stealth, but this guy might be better, and he is cheaper.
Psychic Shooting (normal)
It was pretty meha to be honest. It kind of felt like an ok round of smites from 9th, doing a couple mortals here or there with one or two more failed saves. It is nice to have, sustained hits kind of helps the output, but overall it is just more of a nice to have, rather than the main thrust of damage (Magnus probably would change this a bit).
Psychic Shooting (Strat)
The turning the bolters to psychic shoots is really good. Devastating wounds is just so effective in mass, but I also used sustained hits with this one turn 1 against some smaller bugs and it was good. This is probably not broken (like below) but is definitely going to be a staple in TS armies. I did not have a ten man SoT squad to use it on either, so that might be crazy.
Psychic melee
Straight up broken as hell. The moment our army is in mass combats switch to devastating wounds and watch the mortals fly. Ahriman and the DP (whose CC is psychic) with the flat 3 damage becoming 3 mortals is outrageous. In one combat the two of them put out 15 mortal wounds, with just them. That is better than all but the best psychic phases I had in 9th. And that doesn't include the handful of other mortal wounds put out by the Aspiring Sorcerers. The devastating wounds allows us to punch up against many units especially with our characters. Personally I think devastating wounds is a real problem for the game at a game design level, with our CC being a great example of how it can get out of control when it is spam-able. But for now enjoy the sheer carnage.
Noticed you had 2 dreads. Maybe moot point but were you gaining 1 or 2 cabal points if 2 were in range? Just checking you noticed as aura's don"t stack(i know i was planning trio to farm them>
tneva82 wrote: Noticed you had 2 dreads. Maybe moot point but were you gaining 1 or 2 cabal points if 2 were in range? Just checking you noticed as aura's don"t stack(i know i was planning trio to farm them>
(at least that'smy intepretation>
I would not have stacked them but it never came up
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also think about this. Daemon prince with the enhancement for +1 damage on his attacks. In CC use the strat to re-roll psychic attacks. Fish for sixes. Each one is four mortal wounds. That could get crazy.
tneva82 wrote: Noticed you had 2 dreads. Maybe moot point but were you gaining 1 or 2 cabal points if 2 were in range? Just checking you noticed as aura's don"t stack(i know i was planning trio to farm them>
(at least that'smy intepretation>
They don't stack ? I don't see where in the rule it specifies that.
Thanks for the report Xeen !
How good was the winged DP in melee ? Was he able to hold on his own ?
That's my interpretation. Multiple same named aura's(and the ability is aura) don"t stack as per core rules. Don't see how hellbrute ability would ignore that restriction.
tneva82 wrote: That's my interpretation. Multiple same named aura's(and the ability is aura) don"t stack as per core rules. Don't see how hellbrute ability would ignore that restriction.
I agree with this interpretation. Would be kinda busted if they stacked and you could theoretically get 3 Cabal Points-back every time you did a ritual.
Let's say you generate 12 CaP.
Weaver of Fates would in effect gain you a CaP (use it twice with LoFL), so now you're at 14 CaP.
Surge is essentially 2 CaP, Echoes is 3 CaP, Doombolt is 4 CaP and Twist is 6 CaP.
You can easily make a regular list where you'd be able to get more or less every ritual off every turn at 2000 pts (or Twist twice).
so, just a reminder to those who haven't clocked onto this yet, but the same mechanics that allow [anti-psychic] to work on rubrics due to their leaders being psychic also apply to [anti-fly] as well. So, all those "icarus" weapons the primaris have on various dreds and vehicles are at increased effectiveness against a squad with a attached character on disk.
on the flip side, if you can get the helldrake into melee with jump infantry it will be doing 2 mortals on 2+ to wound. Its now nasty into things like van vets, sang guard or crisis suits.
So if you put a disc in a squad and they gain the fly keyword, they should be able to make a fly move right? That seems odd. Also why bother having the psychic keyword separate out if it will just apply to the whole squad? Maybe in some circumstances kill the sorcerer first?
15 mortal wounds. So you rolled five 6s to wound. I think you were lucky. But yes, it seems strong.
Your post was helpful, thanks !
Psychic melee
Straight up broken as hell. The moment our army is in mass combats switch to devastating wounds and watch the mortals fly. Ahriman and the DP (whose CC is psychic) with the flat 3 damage becoming 3 mortals is outrageous. In one combat the two of them put out 15 mortal wounds, with just them. That is better than all but the best psychic phases I had in 9th. And that doesn't include the handful of other mortal wounds put out by the Aspiring Sorcerers. The devastating wounds allows us to punch up against many units especially with our characters. Personally I think devastating wounds is a real problem for the game at a game design level, with our CC being a great example of how it can get out of control when it is spam-able. But for now enjoy the sheer carnage.
xeen wrote: So if you put a disc in a squad and they gain the fly keyword, they should be able to make a fly move right? That seems odd. Also why bother having the psychic keyword separate out if it will just apply to the whole squad? Maybe in some circumstances kill the sorcerer first?
The unit gains the fly keyword, but not every model. When moving the model must have the fly keyword to use flying
xeen wrote: So if you put a disc in a squad and they gain the fly keyword, they should be able to make a fly move right? That seems odd. Also why bother having the psychic keyword separate out if it will just apply to the whole squad? Maybe in some circumstances kill the sorcerer first?
alas no. While the "unit" (separate form its constituent models) has the FLY keyword, the models within it dont gain it and are bound by their individual keywords (ie INFANTRY). Its a one-way inheritance.
bear in mind that until the wounds allocation phase of an attack, your attacking "the unit" as a collective, rather than a specific model in that unit.
and yes, in theory you might consider loosing the sorcerer to remove a vulnerability to [anti psychic], though by doing so you loose the cabal point & his warpsmite attack. Generally I dont think its worth it, and we've had significant points drops to a lot of units to compensate for this extensive weakness, which should help. Bolter rubrics are now 2PPM cheaper, and flamer rubrics are 5PPM cheaper, most characters are are cheaper (ahriman is like 50 points cheaper!).
1st game down. Vs drukhari. Magnus, ahrimann plus 10 flamer, exalted w/5 flamer and teleport, inferernal master&disc exalted leading 5 bolter marine, 5 bolter, 10+5 terminators. Basically all i have bar 5 terminators without allies.
Holy cow. T2 i launch attack and delete stuff. He kills couple random dudes and nothing vs magnus. T3 i delete huge chunk of army though wracks kept big terminator blob useless. Forgot doombolt but blessing in disguise as was able to keep cabals for defense and this kept magnus alive after whiffing 10/14 inv saves vs incubi.
R4 i deleted even more objectives and magnus with 1w at the start of round was still standing. He had no army left to speak off, i have unsurmoutable lead and 3/4 objectives.
Magnus silly strong vs dark lances and if you burn cabals and command points to keep him alive it's just silly. Surviving round with 1w left wasn't even lucky...
[Not sure if anyone is going to start an official 10th edition thread. If not I will create one next time I post]
Second game in with the TS.
My list
Ahriman on foot leading
10x Flamer Rubrics
Sor in Terminator Armor with the crystal leading
5 x Scarab Occult fully loaded
5 x 5 x Scarab Occult fully loaded
5 x Scarab Occult fully loaded
5x Rubrics with bolters, soul reaper etc.
5x Rubrics with bolters, soul reaper etc.
Landradier
We only played 1500 and the list I played against was weird as my buddy only has 1500 points of guard. He had a Baneblade, two tank commanders, a Dorn, and one squad of storm troopers with some kind of leader. As tanks seems to be our weakness I was curious about how this was going to go.
We played the book mission (which sucks, it needs an objective in the center as well as the two placed ones otherwise just sit back and do nothing)
Units
Ahriman w/10x Flamer Rubrics: Once again this unit shows why it is a must take. They rolled up and removed armor on a command tank then proceeded to kill it in one round of shooting (he was on an objective so full re-rolls to wound). This is so good it will be in every TS list.
SoT: Again these guys are really hard to take down. The -1 to wound tanked 12 wound rolls. Using the strat to make their shooting psychic with devastating wounds is really good as it helped me finish off the other command tank. I can't image that on a full unit of 10.
Terminator Sor: The crystal was good to get the slower SoT into position. The lethal hits was very helpful in hurting vehicles, but not as much as you would think do to the high saves and only -1 on the bolter (which was mostly negated by cover). His shooting is still only kind of meha, but he does add a bit of a CC punch. I think next time I am going to try him with a large squad of 10.
5x Rubrics: Well due to the crappy mission they just sat behind LOS blocking cover the whole game. Sticky objectives would have been helpful here. The book mission is just so bad.
Landrander: I really liked this unit. between the high T and the 2+, using the smoke screen it tanked two full rounds of baneblade shooting, three rounds of the main gun on the Dorn, one round of command tank shooting (demolisher LCPC) and two more demolisher shots from the baneblade. Only lost 8 wounds. Weaver of fates on a nearby sorcerer is really helpful as is smokescreen. It was a good way to deliver the terminators. I am not sure it is a must take/top unit in TS though as it doesn't generate cabal, and none of our rules help it at all (unlike CSM with the lethal or sustained hits, it might be a must taken in that army).
At the end of the game he only had the baneblade and a serious injured Dorn left. And he hid the Dorn.
I am definitely taking Magnus next game. Hope this was helpful.
Lorex wrote: Hey all.
I just started 1k-sons as my project for 2023.
My first goal is 1000pts this is the list
1 sorc ( done )
1 sorc in terminator
20 rubrics ( 10 is done with bolters )
5 SoC ( done )
1 hellbrut
I dont know what the next 10 rubric shall have bolters or flamers.
Do any of you have a good idé.
/Dennis
If you want to be competitive, I would take a unit of 9 flamers with one soul reaper cannon (this is a good idea now as flamers aren't assault) with Arhiman. Also I have been thinking that the forgefiends might be good with their suppression rule, which will really hurt BS4 armies like Tau and Guard. also you probably want a ten man SoT squad or at least two five man ones.
Lorex wrote: Hey all.
I just started 1k-sons as my project for 2023.
My first goal is 1000pts this is the list
1 sorc ( done )
1 sorc in terminator
20 rubrics ( 10 is done with bolters )
5 SoC ( done )
1 hellbrut
I dont know what the next 10 rubric shall have bolters or flamers.
Do any of you have a good idé.
/Dennis
Hey ! Welcome to the hobby !
Traditionally the bolter vs flamer dilemma was about points. With warpflamers being the more expensive option. But since all wargear is now free, it threw a bit of a wrench into that Now it's mostly about what is the role of this particular squad of Rubrics. If they stand back on points, the soulreaper/bolters are better. If you are sending them ahead close and personal flamers are better.
Personally, I prefer to magnetize them so I can swap them around. It's pretty easy to do when you know how to and there are some nice tutorials on Youtube on how to do it.
