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You can play semantics all you want, but this forum is base don the RAW. By the RAW, there's is nothing that states if an army does not include something then it's assumed to be destroyed.

If so, some armies would falter on turn one if they didn't have certain commanding characters on the board because they had been "killed".

The rules state their is an assumption the Monolith will eventually arrive. Now you could fail to roll successfully each turn for a Monolith held in reserve and the assumption is that the Necron player does indeed have a Monolith held in reserve therefore you cannot hold Necron Warriors in reserve without a Monolith.

A couple of points:

1: The Reserves rules state that units in Reserve must be deployed as soon as they become available.

2: The Monolith rules state that units deploying from a Monolith emerge as if they were disembarking from a Transport vehicle.

3: The Transport vehicle rules tell us that any models that can not disembark are considered destroyed.


SO: You would roll for the unit as normal. On the turn they become available, they MUST deploy. As they can not deploy from the Monolith entry (as it does not exist) they are destroyed.

You can play semantics all you want, but this forum is base don the RAW. By the RAW, there's is nothing that states if an army does not include something then it's assumed to be destroyed.

If so, some armies would falter on turn one if they didn't have certain commanding characters on the board because they had been "killed".

I'm not following you. You're saying that I can argue about what the statement actually means, but that this is somehow irrelevant to what the RAW says? I guess that's true, in the sense that I'm not changing the actual words in the statement, but surely our interpretation of its meaning matters. If we interpreted 'Monoliths' to mean 'Destroyers', there'd be significant ramifications for Necron armies, right? I'm arguing that the proper interpretation of the statement includes the understanding that if no Monoliths exist, then all Monoliths are destroyed. I believe this because, lacking any other guidance, I'm going to apply logic as it's applied by the vast majority of logicians, and by the vast majority of everyone else as well. Most of the time, implicit in an 'all' statement is such an understanding. Speculating about 'all of the leftovers' doesn't mean that you're assuming the existence of leftovers - if I promise all of them to you, and there are none, I haven't cheated you. I've complied with the mugger if, after he demands all of my money, I give him nothing, so long as I have no money. Of course, the only relevant uses of 'all' are going to be cases in which the speaker is ignorant of the actual size of the set, as the rules are when they speak of the number of Monoliths in the army.

I'm going to assume that you're talking about Tau Ethereals with that last comment. While I don't have the new codex, the old codex's Price of Failure rule is very different from the Necron FAQ statement. From the Tau Codex: "if a friendly Ethereal is killed..." If you don't have any Ethereals, or if the Ethereal is off board, how exactly can an Ethereal be killed? The Monolith rule doesn't actually require that a Monolith be destroyed, only that all Monoliths are. If I didn't bring any Monoliths, then (quite obviously) all of my Monoliths are destroyed, but it isn't true that a Monolith was destroyed.

Insaniak - isn't there something that specifically says that Warriors get to wait until there's a Monolith on the table?

So there is. Never mind then.

I suppose this is as good a place to any to ask this, given the topic. By my reading of the codex, if I don't have a Monolith in my army, then I can never field more than two squads of warriors, because later squads are _always_ deployed via Monolith. They can not start the game on the board, nor can they arrive from reserves by walking on. Correct?

After reading a lot of these i figured I would try and wade in.
According to the Necron CODEX

"When [warriors] arrive they must emerge from a Monolith portal. If there is no Monolith when the unit becomes availible, they will be forced to wait until a Monolith becomes availible."

and

"Any warriors not deployed by the end of the game count as having been destroyed for purposes of calculating victory points"

According to the Necron FAQ v 4.0.1

"Necron Warriors in Reserve only require a Monolith to enter when they use their special reserve rules. If they are using this rule and all availble Monoliths are destroyed they count as destroyed and may therefore trigger the phase out of the on-table portion of the army."

and

"When rolling for Reserves that include a Monolith and one or more Necron Warrior Squad using their special Reserves rule, roll for Reserves as normal. If the monolith is availible, it can enter the table normally. If any of the warrior squads are availible, one must now be deployed using the Monoliths Portal ability.

(emphasis added by me)
Thus the word in the rules we have to parse is availble.

If there is no Monolith in the army list, there are no Monoliths that are availible to allow the warriors to enter using this rule, and there are no monoliths availible to be destroyed.

So according to the RAW and assuming that the senerio does not allow for reserve troops
1. Any warrior units in excess of the minimum required by the Force Org chart may begin the game in reserve.
2. These Warriors may only enter through an availible Monolith
3. If a monolith never becomes availible, they may never enter the game and count as destroyed for VP
Thus,
If a Monolith is not in your army list then a Monolith will never become availble.
If a Monolith never becomes availible then the warriors may never enter the game.
Thus, the warriors count as destroyed for VP purposes and the Necron force cannot be phased out because the reserves never came in and will never be able to come in.

To Insaniak point:

A couple of points:

1: The Reserves rules state that units in Reserve must be deployed as soon as they become available.

2: The Monolith rules state that units deploying from a Monolith emerge as if they were disembarking from a Transport vehicle.

3: The Transport vehicle rules tell us that any models that can not disembark are considered destroyed.


SO: You would roll for the unit as normal. On the turn they become available, they MUST deploy. As they can not deploy from the Monolith entry (as it does not exist) they are destroyed.

The rules state that warriors held in reserve do not have to enter until a monolith becomes availible thus your conclusion is incorrect because even if they make a successful Reserves roll they cannot enter until the monolith becomes availible and then they must immediately enter the game through the monoliths portal.

So lets sum up...
Warriors using the special Reserve rule can only enter through the monoliths portal when a monolith is availible.
If a monolith never becomes availible they cannot enter.
There is no RAW requiring a player to have a Monolith to use the special Reserve rule.
ERGO a Necron player may keep a squad of his warriors in reserve indefinately to proclude him being phased out providing he does not have a Monolith in his army list.

So, this is yet another reason why I hate those pesky metal skeletons. And please don't get me started on reserection orbs.

Sorry for the long post previous to this one. Its the joys of doing too much technical writing.

Bookwrack to your question:
You can have as many squads of warrior as the force org will allow, normally 6, the rules state you may use the special Reserve rule but do not have to. So if you choose you could deploy them normally during the deployment phase as troops.

Whats the point in this?

By keeping 1/4 of your necrons off table you dont phase out. But you do lose a large chunk of firepower. Making it easier for me to destroy everything else. And at the end of the game the off table necron's count as destroyed anyway giving me an overall easier massacre.

This has got to be one of the dumbest tactics i've encountered. Its like only bringing a 140pt army to a 1500pt game so that your opponent cant kill 1360pts of your army. You are crippling yourself for a minimal gain.

How often do you see the 'standard' necron army? (Lord w/veil and orb, unit of immortals, 2-3 units of warriors, destroyers, scarabs, and monolith.)
For the necron players, how often is this pretty close to what you field?

This phase out immunity allows a necron player to get a little bit creative. You want to field a unit of pariahs surrounded by 9 tomb spyders and backed up by scarabs? Well, now your army wont be phased out in the first round because your necron count is too low. You want 15 destroyers and 10 pariahs for a mobile shooting force? Now it can be done with out fear of phase out.

Yes this tactic comes with a price, losing at a minimum of around 200 points. If that is too big a chuck for you to handle, don't do it.

Posted By thelosttau on 03/09/2006 10:59 PM

According to the Necron FAQ v 4.0.1

"Necron Warriors in Reserve only require a Monolith to enter when they use their special reserve rules. If they are using this rule and all availble Monoliths are destroyed they count as destroyed and may therefore trigger the phase out of the on-table portion of the army."

Personally I find the word require to be much more interesting in this section.  By using the word "require" it would seem to indicate that in order to use the special reserve rule the warriors require a monolith to be part of their force if one is not included then they can not make use of this rule.  Which would imply that you could not place them in reserve in the first place. 

In my opinion wldside has hit the nail on the head. The warriors cannot even be put into reserve because they require a Monolith to enact their special reserves rule. This makes all the above moot.

Though I still hold that saying "No Monolith on the table obviously means it's been destroyed" is a ludicrous statement at best.

remember these quotes

"Tactics are not in themselves "Cheesy or Broken". Whether they are viewed as honorable is a another matter. So why don't you give us an example."  ....found one

"No, damnit!  Just no!  There is no such thing as cheese.  There is no such thing as cheap."

BAM..... right in the nose, makin it bleed like a menstral cycle.