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This was against one of the local GW employees, using his finely painted army that he plays at GT's (gulp). I have never played Necrone before, so please forgive any rules etc. that i may mis-represent in the report

I used my regular list of:

Celestine
Flying Canoness

2 x 10 SoB in Rhinos, F, HF

5 x dominions in immolator, 4xF

8 x Seraphim 2xhF

2 x Exorcist

His list was:

Necron lord w/ destroyer body, rez orb

2 x 3 destroyers

3 x 10 Necron warriors

2 x Monolith

The mission was Annihilate, deployment was table quarters. I win the roll and choose to go first...

SoB Deployment
I use my usual rhino screen formation with the seraphim and HQ's hidden and the exorcists bringing up the rear. The scenery is set up so we both have a little cover in our deployment zones, but nothing in the middle of the board.

Necron Deployment
The three squads of necrons are deployed in a Zulu style line as far forward as possible. The Lord and Destroyers take up position on the hill behind them. The monoliths are placed at either end of the Warrior squads.

SoB Turn 1
I decide that this will be a meatgrinder of a mission and move everything i have to about 20" away from his front rank of Necrons and pop smoke on all three vehicles. Shooting from the Exorcists downs 8 Necrons.

Necron Turn 1
Seven out of eight Necrons pass their WBB roll. The 'Liths move up to get their PW's in range. Everything else stays put. Barrages and Gauss weapons manage to wreck the lead rhino, spilling out the SoB squad and killing one of their number.

SoB 0-1 Necrons

SoB Turn 2
The SoB from the wrecked rhino run into the cover of a nearby crater, whilst the Immolator moves cautiously towards the nearest 'lith. The unharmed rhino promptly immobilizes itself in a crater; that's both of my SoB squads reduced to walking speed :(. I go for a gamble and throw the Seraphim and HQ's as close to his line as possible, relying on their AoF to survive. In a moment of madness, i fire one exorcist at one of his 'liths achieving sod all. Gah. The other exorcist down 5 more warriors.

Necrons Turn 2
One 'lith moves up next to the Immolator to get the Seraphim in range of it's Gauss arc weaponry then teleports the warriors who were downed by the exorcist, making all their WBB rolls. The other 'lith stays put. His destroyers move a little forwards to get a clear shot at the Seraphim. The Seraphim pass their SotM test but to no avail as they are wiped out by the shooting of the entire necron army. To add insult to injury, the Canoness takes a wound after failing her 2++ save. The Immolator is immobilized by gauss arcs aswell.

SoB 0-2 Necrons

SoB Turn 3
The dominions spill out of their immobilized transport and are joined by the Canoness; lining up an assault on the closest Necrons. Celestine jumps towards another warrior squad ready to burn and kill. The Sob in the crater stay put, whilst the squad in the immobilized rhino sit tight and pray for a good repair roll... Which fails. Celestine kills nothing with her flamer but smashes 3 necrons to death in the ensuing assault, massacring the rest of the squad when they fail their morale check and consolidating towards the door of the nearest 'lith. The canoness and dominions assault and wipe out another warrior squad, consolidating towards the last warrior squad. Both exorcists fire at the destroyers, killing one.

Necron Turn 3
2 necrons pass their WBB rolls after being teleported through one of the 'liths (damnable rez orb) and merge with his one remaining unit of warriors. His destroyers move to get a better shot at Celestine. His remaining warriors fire into the dominions and Canoness, killing all but the VSS and putting another wound on the Canoness. One squad of destroyers blasts the Canoness who takes 1 wound and fails her third 2++ save in a row :(. The second squad of Destroyers kills Celestine; but she passes her morale check and is placed in reserve. Flux arcs manage to rip the turret off the Immolator.

SoB 2-3 Necrons

SoB Turn 4
Celestine returns to play, but scatters out of assault range of the last warrior squad. The SoB in the crater aim their boltguns at the destroyers, whilst the still mounted squad disembark and run around the side of a 'lith towards the destroyers. The lone VSS assaults the warriors, killing one before being ground into the dust by the survivors. Two more destroyers are killed by fire from the exorcists and SoB squads thanks to some horrible rolling. My empty rhino repairs itself and moves to support it's departed squad.

Necrons Turn 4
Both destroyers and a warrior pass their WBB rolls, the latter teleporting with his last squad away from Celestine and next to an exorcist. The destroyers and the other 'lith make short work of one SoB squad, whilst the lord and his cohorts wreck an exorcist with mass gauss fire. The immolator finally succumbs to glancing hits and is wrecked.

SoB 2-7 Necrons

SoB Turn 5
Things are looking bad. I have one exorcist, one rhino, a full squad of sisters and Celestine left. Celestine jumps as close as she can to the destroyers but is out of range for flame/assault. The rhino tries to tank shock the warriors but they pass their test. The SoB squad and Exorcist manage to down another destroyer.

Necron Turn 5
His warriors move up a little and manage to put a weapon destroyed and immobilized on my remaining exorcist. Despite a wealth of shooting, i only lose 2 SoB to his other shooting. The destroyers boost out of range of Celestine and hide between his 'liths.

SoB 2-8 Necrons

We roll for another turn... and get it. Oh joy.

SoB Turn 6
Not much to do here; Celestine charges back into the fight and downs a destroyer with her flamer. The SoB manage to blast three more with their bolters (Thank God for DG). The rhino kills a warrior with it's storm bolter.

Necrons Turn 6
All four Destroyers fail their WBB, with the survivor turbo boosting into a corner of the board to deny me a KP. His shooting manages to kill another SoB, wreck the exorcist, and do nothing to Celestine's shiny armour.

SoB 3-9 Necrons

We roll for the final turn.... There will be a turn 7

SoB Turn 7
I was at the point of conceding here but thought that if i was going to go down, i'd do it fighting My rhino zoomed towards the remaining necrons, killing nothing with it's storm bolter. Celestine was once again too far away to do any damage. The SoB fired one more round of DG boltshells at the warriors killing four and, putting him in danger of a phase out!

Necron Turn 7
My opponent has to make one out of four WBB rolls to avoid phase out. The dice come up as: 1,1,2,3.... His head hangs.

Quite amazingly, the SoB win the day by forcing the vile xenos scum to phase back to their repair shop.

I have to admit that i felt a little embarrassed at winning this game. I was tactically pwned from the off, and made a number of errors of judgement during the game. Going into turn 7 with only 9 models left in play and 9-3 down in the KP tally is a good reflection of how well my opponent played his army. I was constantly where he wanted me to be and should have taken a heavy loss as a result; only some poor rolls for the necrons at the very end of the game changed it into a win.

Seeing as this was my first ever outing against necrons, i don't feel i played too badly but would definitely never bother shooting at monoliths again; like spitting into a volcano IMO. Had i gone for the phase out straight away, i would have stood a far better chance of winning. Letting him go second was probably a mistake too, as it made me feel i had to take the fight to him when i would have been better served blasting away at range for a couple of turns. Still, live and learn eh?

Hope this was a fun read for y'all, C&C welcome as ever.

Great batrep! He seemed to have you on the proverbial ropes but you came back in grand fashion... Good thing you got in the two extra last turns.

G

I totally agree; i won't be that lucky again for a looooooong time. It was a fun game from start to finish; he always had the upper hand in terms of KP, but he was dangerously close to a Phase out from turn 3 onwards. I just tried my best to keep his remaining units in range ~(not easy when they can teleport all over the board :S

I do have a new-found respect for Necron armies. They are incredibly tough, and posess quite formidable firepower. I suspect only Tau can reliably bring down the 'liths. Any other army should just go for the phase out; which will play into a savvy generals hand's.

I applaud you for never giving up. Many players quite on a game that seems to be going in their opponents favor, but you have proved that perseverance and fine tactics can turn what seems like a loss into a win.

I'm not sure i used fine tactics throughout the game, but i definitely agree with the no-quitting idea. 40k is not a game where you can determine a winner from the off, whenever you roll your d6 there is a place where even the most bizarre results are possible! 'Fight to the last drop' = my motto

He failed both the original roll and a re-roll from a lith or were the destroyers too far away?

Yeah, not giving up was good. I've won so many games because I had my opponent completely demoralized by the end of round 2 that they gave up.

@Noob: There as only one Destroyer left, which boosted as far away from my lines as possible. He failed his WBB rolls, then informed me that he would technically phase-out before he could teleport them through the 'lith. I took him at his word, as he has used this army twice in the UK GT, whereas i have never played Necrons before, much less looked through the codex.

Was it at Manchester CC store? Didn't know any of them played Necrons.

Reason Necron lists like this will struggle through tournaments is double Monoliths taking up way too many of their points. You can just concentrate firepower on those Warrior Squads and take him out of the battle before he really gets that near to you.
Should never have fired the Exorcist at the Monolith though... I always just leave them be because they usually struggle to make back their ~250pts back. Would have been better to prioritise the Destroyers straight from the off because of their risk.

It was at the Chester store. I moved here a couple of days ago .

I agree about shooting the 'liths: never would have bothered in hindsight, but it was just sooooooooo tempting. I'll be in Manchester next thursday for some games if you're about. Just look for the nicely/partially painted SoB player

Rik

Monoliths don't make their points back just from shooting at the enemy. They supplement it with getting the second WBB role, and pulling things away from nasty CC guys. Unfortunately, it doesn't help as much with current combat resolution, and the addition of run. In 4th though, I've had my monoliths more than make up their points with the number of models I managed to get standing back up after the second wbb, and shooting the CC unit that the teleporting models had been locked in with.

You managed to make back 500pts in a 1.5k game with 'Liths? The successes he made against the Warrior Squads was in combat, and as you mentioned WBB doesn't matter if the squad is taken out with sweeping advance. Only having 37 models is so so risky with phase out against most armies!

What time on Thursday will you be there? I'm at work but I could always bring my army and head in after work, but will be most likely 4-5 before i can get in. Think the store is open till around 8 though? Can get some pics and put up a SoB vs. DE report

Really interesting Battle Report. In general SoB need to move forward and advance on their enemies since they live in that 6-12" range with Flamers and rapid fire. I use a similar load out as you at 1500 except I run 2 jump canoness 1 Exorcist, 4 SoB squads and 2 Seraphim Squads. Against Necrons I have found the best thing to do is to sit back and make them walk to you. Exorcists can start shooting up the Destroyer squads which are really the only mobile part of the army and you can zoom in 12" dump off your Sisters to DG flame down most his squads while Seraphim or a Canoness jump in from the side to engage them in CC.

I definitely understand taking a shot at the Monolith, it is really tempting to try for that 6 and then 4+ to wipe it out!

One thing to remember too is while he racked up more KP you have far more to give up than he did.

Thx

I've only played a few games under the 5th edition rules. Most of my experiences is from waaaay back in 2nd edition :S Consequently i'm still trying to figure out how to best use my army but also trying to learn how the other armies work...

If i played the game again, I'd have spread out a little more in deployment and just rained missiles down on him until he was in range of the rest of my units. I think i pretty much played into his armies strengths from the start.

I agree about the Monolith temptation, although i would have needed a 5 to immobilize and a 6 to wreck it. Damnable AV14 :(

The KP situation is something I'd take more seriously if i was playing in a tournament; at the moment i just try to table my opponents Not failed to do this for 6 games now

Do you run you SoB in Rhinos, or take them on foot?

Can't you put them in immolators? Seen some scary tounry lists with immolator spam.

I have run SoB in Rhinos since 4th edition and with the strength of vehicles now they are even better. Unless I can wipe out a squad in one round of shooting I usually stay in my vehicles as well and drop flamers out of the fire points (some people will dispute if you can do this but I think it is well within the spirit of the rules).

I am not sure what your Canoness loadout is but I run mine with BoSL, Inferno Pistol, Eviscerator, Cloak of St. Aspira, Jump Pack, Mantle of Ophelia. If I run with a Blessed weapon I grab Frags as well.

I had tried Celestine in the past, but was never thrilled with her performance, although I would love to run her with HF Seraphim with a Brazier on the Superior so I can drop 4 DG templates on a squad.

Overall SoB got a huge boost in 5th edition overall, I have tabled most of my opponents and my record is somewhere in the neighborhood of 15-1-1 since 5th came out.

Edit: You can take Immolaters for the Canoness with Celestian Retinue and then for Dominions (Fast Attack) and then for Heavy Support choices. Troops, however, can only ride in Rhinos since they have a minimum squad size of 10.

Ah yeah just checked and the immolator spam takes Inq. Storm Troopers and puts them in heavy support slots as Immolators. Along with Celestians and Dominions with Immolators as well... lol.

Good to hear a pure sisters army can hold out

Nice report J.Black. For a second I thought someone might actually post a losing report!

Brap for Chester! It's a great city!

Phase out is always a risk, especially when running two Monoliths. 37 Necrons means he phases out at 9. Killing 28 Necrons just means taking out the Warriors. In my opinion, Immortals would have been a better selection for him, instead of the 2nd Monolith. If I remember correctly, SoB have a 4+ Armor Save and 8 Immortals with Str5, AP4, 24", Assault 2 Gauss weapons could have a) caused more damage than the Monolith and b) seriously increased the Phase Out number.

However, kudos for not backing down without a fight. You never should because the battle isn't over until the fat lady sings.

Good report, congratulations on the win!

SOB are 3+

pretre wrote:SOB are 3+

Really? They wear Power Armour? I just thought they were pretty-looking Guardsmen.

My apologies.

Not for the "pretty-looking Guardsmen" comment, but for not knowing their Armour Save.

J.Black, as a Necron player I would be most wary of your Exorcists. They are the biggest threat to Destroyers which are consistent MVPs for Necrons. Since he only had 6, you could've taken them out in 1 turn of good shooting. Against his list, I would bring down the Destroyers first, Monoliths second (enough strength 8 AP 1 will do it), and then the Warriors. Take out his mobility, then durability...and all he has left is bunches of Warriors vulnerable to your AP 1 flamers.

Remember to always concentrate fire on 1 unit of Necrons until they are all down. It's a KP for you even if any get WBB because they will be part of a new unit. And if any do get the WBB and mob up with another squad, then you have just created a unit with a large footprint...which means easier to assault and sweep off the board.

I agree with most of Marshal's sentiments.

Exorcists = Dead 'Crons.

I prioritize Heavy Destroyers, Destroyers, then Immortals/Pariahs/Warriors.

I am not a fan of firing Exorcists at AV14 when I can push you quickly closer to Phase out.

My strategy for Monoliths vs Necrons with my Sisters is ignore them.

@Marshal: Thanks for the advice. I ignored the destroyers because all they did to start with was hang around at the back of the board looking scary. If i'd fired at them they'd have had a cover save and their WBB rolls, the warriors in front just had their WBB rolls (i think he made something like 16/17 WBB's in his first 2 turns).

I agree with pretre about the 'Liths though. They can be kept at arms length and by downing enough of the regular 'crons force your opponent to use the teleport rather than the whip.

It really all depends on what's happening on the table. But with only 2 units of 3 Destoyers, you could at least force them into 1 unit to wipe out later. If you get some good rolls then you could potentially take out all 6 leaving him with no chance of WBB...which is one of the worst nightmares for Necrons.

I can see your point about keeping the Monoliths on survival duty than armor hunting...I just know that when Monoliths start going down, it's the beginning of the end.

Damn SOB...ruining every machine's day...

Was his res orb always within range of his ENTIRE army (including after teleportation, movement etc as otherwise your Exorcist would be stopping WBB.

It was to begin with, but after he wiped the seraphim, the dominions and Celestine caused havoc in the assault phase and forced him to start shuffling stuff around. Unfortunately for me, this was around the time the exorcists decided to start rolling lots of '1s' :(

The guy i was playing works in the store and we had quite a few onlookers; pretty sure that if he was playing fast and loose with the WBB rule someone would have pointed it out. T'was only my fourth game after a 14 year hiatus and i still haven't bothered to look through most of the other codices to check how their special rules work

Nice,necrons are a little hard to kill.Soz.