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Hello Dakka!

I'm thinking about adding death cultists to my Space Marine army, of course together with an Inquisitor. The point is, this is just a "whoa, those are some cool close combat chicks, I bet they can beat up my Tau and IG enemies real hard"-idea at the moment, and....

...well, while I'm sure they're great once they are in CC, I have some problems getting them there. They don't have fleet, they can't use transports, they can't join squads for ablative wounds...and although +5 invuln save due to fething lighting reflexes is super cool, it's not that much when you need to charge an enemy gunline.

So, how do you use your death cultists? Do you use them at all?

I think about if it may possible to advance them in full cover of a rhino chassis, running every round till they're there, but that doesn't need to work....

Come on, don't tell me nobody uses death cultists! Are they that bad?

They're not "awful", at worst they'll give your Marines an extra Initiative level in CC (which is useful for wound allocation) and they can Infiltrate (and therefore Outflank), but they need to be taken in 3s to be worth using. And even then the Callidus and Eversor will easily outperform them.

You pretty much listed why you shouldn't use them. 5+Inv, no fleet, can't join squads, can't use transports.

Bolters will kill them. Lasguns will kill them. Even Grot Blastas will kill them.

They can't stand up to any kind of shooting, period. Take a Vindicare or Callidus Assassin instead.

meat shields.

"Tactics to use death cultists?"

You see that big thing over there? Walk towards it until it dies.

my bad i realized my mistake as soon as i posted. i thought we were talking about chaos cultists...

Chaos can't HAVE cultists.....

Meat shield indeed. They all act independently even if you get three to a unit so if a firing line uses up a shot to take one of them out then that was a cost effective waste of shots.. maybe?

If they are not taken out right away then they are decent enough to maybe disrupt your opponent with some close combat.

They are surely not game breaking but at least they are interesting in my opinion.

Thanks for the answers!

After looking at the stats for temple assassins, I, too, came to the conclusion that the death cult assassins lack some survivability and punch compared to them, however, three of them are still in the same price range as a callidus assassin...well, it's a shame you can't take them as an inquisitors retinue like it is described in the "Grey Knight" novel. I guess I'll have to think about this...maybe they could work on maps with lots of LOS-blocking terrain, where they can infiltrate and pose a threat to any enemy trying to move in their direction. Hm. Hm, hm, hm.

I think that adding death cultists sounds like a good idea. You should give it a try.

superprism2 wrote:I think that adding death cultists sounds like a good idea. You should give it a try.

Care to give a reason to?

They have no fleet (so running is useless), no save other than a 4+ invulnerable, cannot use transports, cannot join units, have no ranged attack, and are toughness 3.

The other Assassins are so much better it isn't funny.

did they in an older dex?

If you are playing space marines, there are plenty of space marine assault units that function much better, and stick with your theme. Plus, you have to burn FoC slots at least to take the death cultists.

Cheese Elemental wrote:no save other than a 4+ invulnerable,

The DCAs are 5++, worsening the fail. All they have going for them is that they're cheap, but even that sucks because three of the four Temple Assassins will do more hurting than any number of DCAs. The Culexus not so much >_<