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Alright Wolfy brothers-in-arms, I feel the new Codex adequately replicates the old 13th Company list enough to begin reformulating my army. This thread, I feel isn't so much a "rate-my-army" kind of deal, but I would hope a brainstorming session. With your help, I feel I can replicate what I loved about the EoT list.


Primer for those unfamiliar :

The 13th company, in short, got lost in the warp and had to do extreme things to survive. The scarcity of vehicles, the scavenged chaos wargear/weapons/power armor, the inability to repair large amounts of TDA, the induction/kinship of packs of Fenrisian Hounds into their ranks to supplement their irreplaceable numbers and so forth. It's very much an army list representing desperation, undying conviction to cutting down their ancient enemies, the Thousand Sons.

Here's what I believe needs to be done :

1) Canis SuperWolfStorm seems to be the bone the developers threw to us 13th company players. While not necessarily part of the original fluff, he screams "13th Company Hero". As such, he unlocks Fenrisian Hound packs as troops. This is very important for the ability of this list, despite being understaffed, to be able to cram loads of bodies down the opponent's throat. So he's in, no question.

2) Where do we get our scoring units from? I'm not advocating using all of our troop slots on Hounds (although I'm crazy enough to do it once I get 90 more doggies), but it seems like 8 point assault marines deserve special attention. They have leadership issues, but otherwise are on par for cavalry movement shock troopers. Super efficient and super awesome, who else can field dogs?
I believe this is where Logan Grimwing, great lord of the scoring terminators comes in.
I think, actually within this list, perhaps he enables three units of super veterans as troops? Something like how the old Grey Slayers were much more competent than the normal space wolf troops?

The wheels begin to grind away...


So now we have our 13th Company Champion, an "advisor" (Yes, the king of all space wolves), mountains of snarling dogs and three units of elite, scoring troops.

From there, we obviously need to fill out fast attack slots with something, some long fangs and we're just about where the old list was.

What's missing though? Wulfen obviously.

For that, I propose Thunderwolf cavalry. They occupy fast attack slots, sure, and cost a buttload but with the core of the army being 8 point dogs I think their cost can be mitigated, just how absorbing Logan's beefy pricetag for scoring elites can also be absorbed. They are beefy warriors, fit in the fast theme, give out LD buffs to our hoards of mindless dogs and seem oddly enough, ready to be converted to feral - chaos tainted/warped, and monstrous Wulfen. As much

So, the army list I propose is starting to look something like this :

HQ
Canis
Logan

Elites
Scoring Wolf Guard
Scoring Wolf Guard
Scoring Wolf Guard

Troops
Fenrisian Hounds
Fenrisian Hounds
Fenrisian Hounds
Fenrisian Hounds
Grey Slayers w/meltas
Grey Slayers w/meltas

Fast Attack
Thunderwolf Cavalry (WULFEN)
Thunderwolf Cavalry (or another unit of hounds)
Fenrisian Hounds

Heavy Support
Long Fangs
Long Fangs
Long Fangs

Now obviously, I haven't worked out the points yet - but I think I'm starting to see my old army list come together - in theme and composition.

Any thoughts?

Logan+Canis+ TWolves is alot of points. WG do make a good elite troop, though, for good greyslayers. It just depends on how many points you want to spend.

Fenrisian hounds can't score though....

TWolf cav are way to big to be the GW wulfen. Maybe the Rackham ones.

Mark of the Wulfen means you can use your Wulfen models in squads.

I too am considering a 13th Company list, mostly for modelling reasons - I love the 'looted armour' fluff and want to mix and match models from all over.

Your hound-heavy list would at least be good from a modelling perspective - as the 13th Company is in the Eye of Terror, you could use Chaos hounds with just a little conversion work.

I worry that Thunderwolf Cavalry may be overpriced, but they're certainly fluffy to fit in with your hounds. A mostly 'four legged' army would be quite original and interesting.

I'm disappointed from the new codex since they declared the 13th Co to be dead or missing or whatever.
I don't see that my original 13th Co army is reflected in the codex.#
No Rune Priest with gate, no MotW for the Wolflord, and no Grey Slayer Bikers.

As far as I can tell, Wolf Guard on bikes = grey slayer bikers, and thunder wolves can be proxied by large based wolfen. What 13co armies loose is the mass scout rule and gate.

Moreover, Wulfen ruled.
They were fast and furious.
I want them back.

jmurph wrote:Logan+Canis+ TWolves is alot of points. WG do make a good elite troop, though, for good greyslayers. It just depends on how many points you want to spend.

Fenrisian hounds can't score though....

TWolf cav are way to big to be the GW wulfen. Maybe the Rackham ones.

Mark of the Wulfen means you can use your Wulfen models in squads.

I'm going to mess around with the points, but I think the list is starting to look like how I envisioned it when I started playing 13th co. years ago. The hounds not scoring is bothersome, but Canis just means that I can play more of them. They were always shock troop/meat-shields in the old list so them not scoring isn't a big deal.

The cav are definitely way too big, but I'm just working with the stats I have in the book. I think they best represent "real" Wulfen. I think you're right though, if I can't find the inspiration to GS them I will look into the Privateer press/Rackham ones. I'm just going to call them "Greater Wulfen" or something. Should be easy to shoehorn into the fluff.

I saw the Mark "nod" in the book, and it insults me a little. Sure, it's fluffy but.... actually. I could reverse engineer the stats for a 'marked model and write up a full unit of them.

Clang wrote:I too am considering a 13th Company list, mostly for modelling reasons - I love the 'looted armour' fluff and want to mix and match models from all over.

Your hound-heavy list would at least be good from a modelling perspective - as the 13th Company is in the Eye of Terror, you could use Chaos hounds with just a little conversion work.

I worry that Thunderwolf Cavalry may be overpriced, but they're certainly fluffy to fit in with your hounds. A mostly 'four legged' army would be quite original and interesting.

Well thank you Clang. Those were very nice comments. I usually got sideways looks from my old 13th co. list. That's the main reason I chose them too, the looted equipment background and modeling freedom. They were also brutal CC killers, but that had to be demonstrated before people would believe it.

I also have huge reservations about the Thunderwolf Cavalry's pricing issues (+3@ish with Stormshield, ouch!), but for someone like myself who doesn't even plan on using any of the vehicles from the book or over half the units - I think they are a necessary evil.

Thanks again for the comments! I've always wanted to play more than 45 dogs, and now I can.

wuestenfux wrote:I'm disappointed from the new codex since they declared the 13th Co to be dead or missing or whatever.
I don't see that my original 13th Co army is reflected in the codex.#
No Rune Priest with gate, no MotW for the Wolflord, and no Grey Slayer Bikers.

Adapt the Marine power Wings or whatever to the Rune Priest, and erase other psychic power options. I think that's fair? With the Mark, on a fully powered up Lord level HQ - price it as what it was before - 30 points. I don't see any of these as hard limitations to the army. I think, the general idea is supported very well and with a little imagination I see the whole army in the book.

Sure, you can't use custom made units in tournaments, but I don't think the old army did too well to begin with. I may be a little biased though, because I don't really play in tournaments.

Durandal wrote:As far as I can tell, Wolf Guard on bikes = grey slayer bikers, and thunder wolves can be proxied by large based wolfen. What 13co armies loose is the mass scout rule and gate.

I think it would be easy enough to approximate. Even without the scout/gate abilities, I think the army would still feel right. Yeah, it definitely sucks I can't use gate or scout everything - but even in the games I can't use my custom rules I still think I'll have a lot of fun. Good to see that you're seeing possibilities though, instead of focusing on what the list doesn't have.

Sure, you can't use custom made units in tournaments, but I don't think the old army did too well to begin with. I may be a little biased though, because I don't really play in tournaments.

That's true.
The 13th Co excels against some armies but becomes a nightmare against others.