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Well, here is the EC army that I used in the RTT on Saturday.
By the way I won it.

2x DP w/ wings, MoS, lash

10 Termies w/ power fist (x2), heavy flamer (x2), IoGC

5 NM + 1 AC w/ doom siren, Rhino

5 NM + 1 AC w/ doom siren, Rhino

8 NM w/ sonic blaster (x8)

Landraider

2x2 Obliterators

The army worked quite well.

In the 1st game vs. Toby's Necrons (Lord, 4x10 Warriors, 2 Monolith, 4 Destroyers, 1 Heavy Destroyer), the Necrons were phased out in round 5.

In the 2nd game vs. Erik's Crimson Fists (Kantor, Librarian, 5 Termies, 2 Tactical Rhino squads, Whirlwind, Devastators) with 4 objectives, I held 3 and Eric, my friend, held 1.

In the final vs. Martin's Ultramarines (Chaplain, Techmarine, 10 Assault Marines in Landraider, Vindicator, 10 Scouts, Dread in Drop Pod, 10 Tactical Marines w/ Razorback, 10 Tactical Marines w/ Drop Pod, 2 Speeders w/ multimeltas), it was a draw. My troops were stuck in the melee vs. the Assault Marines and his Drop Podders arriving late were able to contest.

Summary: The small number of troops is a drawback of this army and the Termies are not as good as the SM Termies. But the army can handle any MEQ army.

Those 5 man noise squads are really waste of point, because sonic blasters are what makes NM different from other troops although you won (but still sonic blasters on NMs always) so who cares what I have to say.

illuknisaa wrote:Those 5 man noise squads are really waste of point, because sonic blasters are what makes NM different from other troops although you won (but still sonic blasters on NMs always) so who cares what I have to say.

Well, the Rhino squads consisted of 6 Noise Marines including AC.

You seem to like your TEQs.

yeah the doom siren + initiative 5 on those 6 guys makes them different than other troops. Doom sirens are nasty. sonic blasters are overpriced for the extra shot but to each his own.

lambadomy wrote:yeah the doom siren + initiative 5 on those 6 guys makes them different than other troops. Doom sirens are nasty. sonic blasters are overpriced for the extra shot but to each his own.

Next time I might replace the Noise Marine squad with sonic blasters by some other troop unit.
Suggestions?

I like small (5-man) + blastmaster units for holding objectives. An extra S8/AP3 template cannot be a bad thing.

As for chaos termies, they're not as good as loyalist termies, unless you dedicate them to a god. I also think they need to be kitted out for CC, because combi-bolters just don't do it. In my EC army, if I run termies, it's 4 w/ lightning claws, 1 w/ chainfist+HF, and Icon of Slaanesh (of course). And I tend to put them in a land raider.

I run my terms in nearly the same way as redbeard, though I put a combi melta on the one with a chainfist as I struggle the most with mech lists. troops never cause me problems(except assault termies with storm shields, but that is what lash is for ).

I don't have the same opinion of blastmasters, but that is more playstyle than effectiveness based.

Meph

It isn't that I think blastmasters are great, but in Capture&Control missions, someone needs to stay behind and hold your objective. If the rest of your force is aggressive in nature (doom sirens in rhinos, daemon princes, etc), then the unit that you want sitting on your objective had better have the range and tools to do something useful besides sit there.

In an Emperor's Children army, that pretty much leaves you with either a CSM squad of some nature, or a noise marine squad with a blastmaster. And the blastmaster is cheaper than the full 10 man CSM squad that allows you the long-range gun.

So, they hang back with the Obliterators and guard the fort, while the princes & rhinos and termies go out and try to dislodge the opponent.

True, I just run my lists as almost all assault, so I ignore objectives in my wake and try to roll everything on the way to the ones on their side, usually when I win I have two or three of 5 and they have zero or one of five(unless they are a mech skimmer list, that always changes things up in terms of objective grabbing).

So for me it's not that I don't think they can be useful, I just don't run my list like that. Assault termies have made my tactic less and less effective though ... now that squads of 8 storm shield terms a chaplain and vulcan have started appearing even two full squads of zerkers barely make a dent(not a very useful comparison when talking about EC, but it illustrates how I might have to be changing my tactics). So I might have to try some blastmasters and see where that gets me. I usually do pretty good against most armies, including nob bikers, etc but the storm shield termies have been throwing me ties in almost every match up where they are spammed with vulcan. Clsoe combat jsut doesnt cut it with them, so I might have to go pure EC one of these times and test the waters wit ha different style list.

Meph

Well, small blastmaster units can be quite ineffective during the game. Therefore, I don't consider them. But I admit that they can be used to hold objectives in the backfield.

My tactics is similar to that of Mephistoles, rolling forward and clearing objectives. Assault Termies need special attention with this tactics, but also outflankers that appear rather late on the board and then are able to occupy an objective in your home zone.
EC is ideal to counter this as it excels at mid-range fire fights.

wuestenfux wrote:Well, small blastmaster units can be quite ineffective during the game.

It's 140 points. In my experience, this unit usually makes its points back, and that's not even considering their role within the objective game. With the number of deep-striking enemy armies (daemons, drop pods), a high-strength, low ap blast template is not going to be a bad thing. With a 48" range, there should never be a turn that it cannot find a target. I don't see how it would be ineffective. Even if the rest of your army is rolling forwards. But, if it doesn't fit your style, that's cool.

But, if it doesn't fit your style, that's cool.

That's the point.

While the army is rolling forward, they baby-sit one blastmaster. If the blast scatters and it will in 2/3 of the cases, then it might become rather ineffective.