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Personally, what I'd like to see (and something that will feature in my Extended codex), is an expansion on the Repentia - Sisters who are fighting for their own redemption, stripped of power armour and fighting with righteous zeal.

Being able to field an entire army of the damned appeals to me.

 MWHistorian wrote:
Howdy, new to the forum. Been playing Sisters since they first came out but haven't played in a long while. (Never played 4th or 5th and just now getting into 6th.) Read the entire thread here. Lots of good advice and interesting strategies. Also, find I must change my army for 6th ed. I have the "update." Can't really call it a codex. Did Repentia always suck or am I looking at memories through rose tinted glasses? Anyways, lots of Necron in my neck of the woods. Wraiths and flyers giving me trouble. Got the Aegis but still...
I think they're an interesting army to play but not an easy one.
Just wanted to say, thanks for all the information, opinions and advice here. Good stuff.

Welcome, welcome!

Unsure what they were like in 2nd or 3rd, but at least in 5th and 6th Repentia have been a relatively niche unit that relies on too many stars aligning to really shine. In 5th you could get them into a rhino and eventually assault from that rhino, in 6th they just kinda run across the table into overwatch with their fingers crossed. So..... probably some rose-colored glasses

Against wraith's, I've found Exorcists (S8 vs T4 = instant death for each failed save), large flamer Dominion squads (include a meltagun and/or combi-plasma for that pesky Destroyer Lord) and Seraphim worth their weight in gold... they can put out a TON of wounds and force enough failed 3++ saves to whittle the unit down before they charge. Against fliers.... Retributors with heavy bolters are probably the only option to shave off some hull points, so I highly recommend allies of some sort to grab a flier of your own. Rets and an Aegis line are good, but Rets, an Aegis line, and a Vendetta are great.

Sisters don't need buddies in the Custodes or GK or whatever. They can use the Ecclesiarchy and the Sisters, as they did originally.

edit: Okay, that sounded dismissive. I meant that there is more than enough material in the Ecclesiarchy and the existing Sisters, with a little creativity for new units, etc to make a force without having to rely on allies.

 MWHistorian wrote:
Howdy, new to the forum. Been playing Sisters since they first came out but haven't played in a long while. (Never played 4th or 5th and just now getting into 6th.) Read the entire thread here. Lots of good advice and interesting strategies. Also, find I must change my army for 6th ed. I have the "update." Can't really call it a codex. Did Repentia always suck or am I looking at memories through rose tinted glasses? Anyways, lots of Necron in my neck of the woods. Wraiths and flyers giving me trouble. Got the Aegis but still...
I think they're an interesting army to play but not an easy one.
Just wanted to say, thanks for all the information, opinions and advice here. Good stuff.

You read the entire thing? It's 90 pages from 2 different editions. That's impressive as ball. Welcome aboard. I've found Seraphim to be a good answer to wraiths, just shoot them a bunch and hope you get lucky. Exorcists can be good too. S8. Repentia got better in the update. If you're looking for a flier don't neglect the Avenger strike fighter.

I was toying with the idea of adding Custodes but it seemed like they'd just end up looking like grey knights. I thought adding Enforcers to the Battle conclave would be a good idea to get those arbites in there but, as someone else suggested, I needed to give them a better range of weapons to show them off. I think I'll hit that in round two of the edits.

All 90 pages. I've been lurking for a while.

Im not sure if this has been posted already, but i just stumbled across a new data sheet for the repressor on the forgeworld website:

http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Downloads/Product/PDF/r/RepressorFAQversion1P.pdf

Quite a bit of change there..... front armour 13??

It was posted yes. It's nice but he points increase is pretty hefty though.

Oops sorry for the repeat post.

Seems like it might make the heavy flamer retributor squad more useable but even more expensive

Totally worth the new cost though, there is something about AV13 dedicated transport that changes the game.

Totally worth the new cost though, there is something about AV13 dedicated transport that changes the game.

Maybe...People stil bring the gear hanele av13+, but a saturation of av13 can cause problems (See BA AV13 Wall lists), trouble is Sisters aren't fast so it's not difficult for your opponent to get your side/rear.

Gonna have my first game of 6th with my Sisters next week, wish me luck.

D

Thaks ofr the info re the Repressor - very interesting now its a least a different thing to the Rhino and now gives me another option for my Dminions if I want a larger squad - plus fire points .

"Fire" points.

Heh.

Anyone know of good non-gw seraphim style models I. Could use? The local GW store just keeps getting worse to the point I'm trying to never buy from them again, frankly.

 MWHistorian wrote:
Did Repentia always suck or am I looking at memories through rose tinted glasses?

Depends when you played - Repentia were at their best after the WD codex but before 6th dropped. Throw them in another transport, fleet out and krump something, then fleet to whatever is next closest to krump them. They are not awful in 6th, but you need to run them behind Seraphim or vehicles, overwatch really limits their potential for second and third charges, and any kind of artillery ruins their day. The FnP nerf doesn't help at all, either. For awhile there finesse could make them great, nowadays it takes finesse to make them useful. I can still make use of them, but the reward isn't great enough that I recommend everybody else take the time to learn to use them well.

-D

So to carry on from a conversation I had earlier today, I got a chance to play against the new Eldar today with my Sisters.

It was a 2k game, and the rough makeup of the Eldar army was:

Arsumen
Eldrad
2x Dire Avengers
Wraithguard
Big squad of Fire Dragons in a Wave Serpent
2 squadrons of Vypers
Wraithguard
Warlocks
2 Crimson Hunters

I pulled a 5-1 victory (First Blood, Linebreaker, Warlord and 2 objectives to his Warlord kill...my Celestine never gets up ;p ) and here are my thoughts on how the new Eldar play.

Eldrad is a buffing machine. He can make a squad he runs with very killy and very, very hard to kill. Definitely prioritize getting rid of him, or limiting the amount of buffs he can throw out.

As I predicted, the quasi-Rending on all of the shuriken weapons is what proved to be the hardest thing to handle. Not so much on the Dire Avengers, but the Starcannon/Shruiken cannon Vypers. Those things ripped my Rhinos apart in very short order, and they can be very hard to get rid of with the upgrade that buffs their cover save.

Wraithguard and Warlocks were no issue to me. My opponent gambled on the Wraithguard's toughness to save him in turn 1. Exorcists mulch Wraithguard in a big hurry, and heavy bolter Rets cleaned up his Warlocks right after that. I'd not write them off entirely either, because my opponent used those units real poorly imo.

I thought the Crimson Hunters were going to be a pain, and they were. They can kick out a lot of lance shots, and the Sisters army has little in the way to deal with them. However, as a veteran of Dark Eldar, I know that Lances are very middle of the road options that don't quite excel the same way against armor. They are irritating, but nothing breaking. That said, be careful of Crimson Hunter Exarchs, that precision fire on their big guns can make things dangerous. Also, side note, gold star to Hero Melta girl, who blew that exarch out of the sky.

Discussing it after the battle with my opponent, he said he thought about a Wraithknight, but added that Sisters are one of the few armies that will regularly have tools to deal with them (Exorcists and heavy bolter Rets) without much trouble.

I use repentia as a counter assault unit to hold a line. It's useful. I think the new AV13 wall would be pretty cool actually.

OK. So, I have been playing Sisters of Battle now for about 6 months and have gotten familiar with how they work. I have found them to be a fairly effective army to use. However, on another thread about someone asking how to handle Celestine with Necrons, someone made a comment about how "you're going against sisters... is this joke?" This got me to thinking, what is the general consensus on how well the SOB codex holds up against the rest of the GW spectrum. I thought that Sisters can make (pretty much one) competitive list. What is the thoughts of the people reading this thread (and I know it may be slightly biased)?

I know I cannot be the only one this has happened to. I show up at a tournament and start pulling my girls out. Someone comes up and says "Wow, you're playing Sisters. That is so cool. I have so much respect for you running that army." And, while this may sound like a compliment at face value, it cannot help but make me feel like I should have a helmet on while playing and be sure to have my permission slip signed before I get on the 40K short bus.

Against any but the top-tier cheese lists I usually have a fighting chance with my pure sisters.

For instance the WD Daemons Update was quite hard to do anything against. Having Fateweaver and lots of flamers/screamers with re-rollable saves and multipile wounds.

Necron flyer spam was quite tough (since we have no AA except 1 quad-gun)

Mix in allies (usually IG) and the picture becomes different, but I usually felt I'd be better off switching to the Allies completely.

The only allies I usually use are grey knight henchmen squads with cotaez. Gives the feel of the old inquisitikn stormtroopers

 Green is Best! wrote:

I know I cannot be the only one this has happened to. I show up at a tournament and start pulling my girls out. Someone comes up and says "Wow, you're playing Sisters. That is so cool. I have so much respect for you running that army." And, while this may sound like a compliment at face value, it cannot help but make me feel like I should have a helmet on while playing and be sure to have my permission slip signed before I get on the 40K short bus.

That really depends on your environment.

The more competitive it is, the lower the sisters will preform.

At a casual-ish environment, sisters is a fine army, heck its even a good army. but at a WAAC environment, they just lack the tools to match up to flying bakeries and the such.

It the same as old tau, the codex itself was falling apart, but COULD be milled to get an extra kick that would put it on the same scale of casual lists from other codices, by doing the same things that would make a tier 1 codex be overpowering and annoying to fight against, spamming the few best units.

 Green is Best! wrote:
OK. So, I have been playing Sisters of Battle now for about 6 months and have gotten familiar with how they work. I have found them to be a fairly effective army to use. However, on another thread about someone asking how to handle Celestine with Necrons, someone made a comment about how "you're going against sisters... is this joke?" This got me to thinking, what is the general consensus on how well the SOB codex holds up against the rest of the GW spectrum. I thought that Sisters can make (pretty much one) competitive list. What is the thoughts of the people reading this thread (and I know it may be slightly biased)?

I know I cannot be the only one this has happened to. I show up at a tournament and start pulling my girls out. Someone comes up and says "Wow, you're playing Sisters. That is so cool. I have so much respect for you running that army." And, while this may sound like a compliment at face value, it cannot help but make me feel like I should have a helmet on while playing and be sure to have my permission slip signed before I get on the 40K short bus.

lol ^^^

The one compettitive list is still okay, but yes, it requires abusing what other armies would become cheese by abusing, and any other list barring very minor changes is resoundingly bottom-tier.

Things such as repentia who can't stand up to overwatch fire at all, and paying a premium for a 6+ invuln on almost every model where it simply being a cheap barebones 3+ armour T3 with a bolter would be far more effective are a big pain.

A codex coming with plastic and reasonably priced models would allow the army to be sensible as the model cost in cash would be less prohibitive and allow better units.

So I'm curious. What is this 'one competitive list'. I know what I like, but I also haven't frequented the tourney scene yet.

It's usually a variant of:
Celestine

2-4 Sisters Squads (sometimes in Rhinos)

3 Dominion Squads in an Immolator
and/or Seraphim Squads

3 Exorcists and/or Retributors

That list isnt "the" competitive build, Its practically the only possible build due to the lack of choice in certain areas of the army, especially troops.

If you want to be able to perform in tournaments/competitive games where objectives are then you have to take the troops/FA/HS choices mentioned. The expense of the troops choices mean that there is little left over to spend in the elite section of the army, and as it can never score, adds kill points to the list and is generally accepted as woeful in general (although i regularly use a small unit of repentia as a counter attack unit with some effect).

Ok, thats about what I figured. The elite troops always seemed to me a waste of points for what you get.

When I build a list I find myself wishing I had more fast slots, then heavy. Glad to see i'm not totally lost.

I just wish I could use repentia or penitent engines without expecting them to get wiped without any contribution. That, and why aren't inq. henchmen squads troops in a sisters army..?.. It'll be interesting if they ever do a rewrite of the book i guess.

I find repentia work quite nicely as a small unit that sits in your own deployment zone and hide. They are great at nipping out of cover and smacking something stupid enough to land in there charge range. They are nasty, especially against vehicles or deepstriking stuff

 scrunty wrote:
I find repentia work quite nicely as a small unit that sits in your own deployment zone and hide. They are great at nipping out of cover and smacking something stupid enough to land in there charge range. They are nasty, especially against vehicles or deepstriking stuff

Hmmmm..... I may have to try this. I have been trying to find a use for anything out of the Elites section of this codex.

Since I run a lot of Seraphim, I tend to use Celestians as my Immolator-mounted troops. And I'm liking what they can do. Essentially in my force, they are troubleshooters, bringing enough melta shots (twin linked MM on the immolator and 2 in the squad) to make anything have a bad day and in a dire pinch, they can work in melee. Note, I would never make a batlteplan around them getting into melee, but if something needs to be locked up or finished off, Celestians have the armor and attacks to fend off minor stuff. Plus if you can get Fearless off on them, they can tie stuff down.

Ok, so rewriting that:
I intend to try one (or both) of these lists out - A Repentia Heavy list.
Saint Celestine 115
1x5 Seraphim w/ 1 Pair of Hand Flamers, Superior w/ Eviscerator 125
3x9 Repentia 474
2x10 BSS w/ Heavy Bolter 260
3x2 Penitent Engine 510
1484

Saint Celestine 115
1x5 Seraphim w/ 1 Pair of Hand Flamers, Superior w/ Eviscerator 125
3x9 Repentia 474
4x10 BSS w/ Heavy Bolter 520
3x3 Penitent Engine 765
1999