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Well, aren't there only four models with a sniper rifle at all, and three of those have sniper right? Nast...merc sniper, goblin sniper, and enforcer sniper. Only the poor rebs field commander gets marksman AFAIK. I agree that the goblin is amazing, I kind of hope they introduce another goblin unit whether it's just an extra cheap grunt or some kind of wonky specialist. Even a sneaky goblin cutter

Speaking of Rebs, I'm trying to come up with a list that's reasonably playable that gives me a concrete starting point to get painting. My goal is a finished strike team of every original race before I get my second shipment or expand any of the original teams I already have done. I won't get to play much, so I'm concentrating on things I'd like to paint, but I don't want the force to suck just in case. Of the following, which would you guys say is more playable, or are neither of them so good?

16 Commander
04 Human
04 human
06 sorak (already painted, auto include)
06 yndij (already painted, auto include)
03 survey drone
08 Kraaw (gained a couple of points in the faq)
08 Kraaw
12 Grogan with Desolator
03 Zee

^This list has more models, with killing power coming from the grogan and commander, the kraaw double team melee.


11 Yndij sgt
04 Human
04 Human
04 Human
06 Sorak
06 Yndij
03 Drone
08 Kraaw
21 Teraton
03 Zee

^Ok nevermind, the lists have the same number of models. This one gets a freaking Teraton though, but loses the grogan. The Kraaw and Teraton are going to be in charge of doing most of anything, and the Yndij Sgt will be following them to give orders out.

I'm open to suggestions for improvements or entirely different lists, I just don't want to spam anything if I can help it. Not from a gaming standpoint, but for my first batch of models I don't really want any repeats. I <3 the Teraton and commander models, but it's hard to fit too many high profile rebs into a list and hope for success. I'm locked in to the Sorak and Yndij since they're painted already, though the Yndij could cover the Sgt job instead of a baseline trooper.

Thanks

For the Rebs, there are a few things that work well.

13 points gets you a Human, an Yndij and a Drone, and with a combination of the Yndij's Agile ability and the Drone's Spotter ability, they can use fairly reliable Fire and Manoeuvre tactics. The Human and Drone BA and pin a target of the Yndij, who then Sprints (a short action thanks to Agile) and BAs, allowing the Human to move up and BA next turn.

The Terraton is amazing, teleport allows you to hit from some good and unexected angles, so try keeping it in an area where you can block it from shooting with terrain and then teleport out and hit something.

I like the Desolator simply because it's not +insert name of rule that means Shoot is a long action here+ so you can Aim and fire it. With a +1 shoot card, you've got 5 dice at AP3 if you don't move, and against most targets, if one or two hits gets through, something's dying.

Yeah, I was thinking the desolator would be brutal in a campaign if the model was given a holo sight. +2 for aiming? Now he's practically a ap3 sniper, or he can move to get a clear shot, same difference. It just seems hard to take the Teraton AND the desolator, without losing too much of everything else. It seems like if you have the hitting power of either of those units, you want a model with access to commands so you can double up on their output. It's tricky, I probably won't have just my basic rebs list for long, they may be the first faction to get reinforcements

Doesn't Recon also have the Sniper/Marksman rule? I forget, I don't have his stats right in front of me. I also need another Recon model for an alternate Sniper model. Yes, it still fits the theme I have.

My post-Kraaw-nerf Rebs lists, painting up another 4 grogans and 4 drones right now:

100 points:
* Rebel Commander (16pts) * Survey Drone (3pts) * Survey Drone (3pts) * Survey Drone (3pts) * Survey Drone (3pts) * Survey Drone (3pts) * Survey Drone (3pts) * Rebel Grogan with Desolator (12pts) * Rebel Grogan with Desolator (12pts) * Rebel Grogan with Desolator (12pts) * Rebel Grogan with Onslaught Cannon (10pts) * Rebel Grogan with Onslaught Cannon (10pts) * Rebel Grogan with Onslaught Cannon (10pts)
70 points:
* Rebel Human * Rebel Human * Rebel Sorak * Survey Drone * Survey Drone * Rebel Grogan with Desolator * Rebel Grogan with Desolator * Rebel Grogan with Desolator * Rebel Grogan with Onslaught Cannon * Zee Scavenger * Ammo
Created with BattleScribe

The idea is not to sit back and shoot the with the grogans. They will be enraged advance combat troops, looking to do stuff like move, blaze away at point-blank range, then move into melee against the suppressed model.

The desolators will also be surging foward while enraged and looking to move into a position where they have a clear shot, most likely 1-2 cubes away from the enemy.

It's going to be interesting to see whether this downright insane idea is going to work or not!

What is this Kraaw nerf of which you speak? I thought you swore by them.

They got a 33% points increase in the FAQ yesterday. They're now 8 points and kinda meh for a 6+ survive model that doesn't even have brawler or agile/fast.

It got me looking at grogans again and thinking about how they might be handy as general melee/ advance troops. Tough and 5+ fight is about as good as it gets for the Rebs as far as surviving 2A's and mawbeasts goes. And the onslaught grogan can be placed on enrage without any negatives since it doesn't affect blaze away.

I am very much looking forward to pulling off crazy unexpected stuff like "command action (blaze away) > Sprint > Move card > Fight" on stuff that was hoping to melee me.

Ah, I see. Was that in response to them being too good, or was it an accidental error from the start?

Accidental error from the start.

I like the Desolator grogan since he can actually kill stuff, via aim or moving to get a clear shot, but your aggressive forward charging onslaught grogans seem pretty cool! They're almost as tough as enforcers and technically blaze away better with their firestorm guns. I wonder if there isn't some kind of melee-centric rebs list to be had with teratons, kraaw, raging onslaught grogans, and so on. Maybe pick up one of the melee friendly mercs to boot.

On your first code 13 list, is there any merit to dropping the field commander down to a Yndij Sgt who could better keep up with the advance, and free up 5 points that you could then use to upgrade some survey drones into humans (or sorak, shoot their guns first to get free pinning before BA)? It looks like you're using them just to unlock the grogan horde of course, and I have no experience to know if humans would be any more benefit though they could certainly do things the survey drones could not.

I really like this idea of suppressing the enemy and charging him, his AP only matters if he can beat your fight roll and with 5+ dice on a fight-starting enraged grogan vs a stock 1 opposing fight dice (before brawler and cards ofc)... Sounds like some unsuspecting fools are gonna get clubbed to death

The 100 point list definitely isn't optimized, it's just spammy for fun rather than game winning... I rather like the idea of sending drones shooting towards the deployment zone either to complete an Infiltrate objective or make the other player think I have one.

The grogan statline is definitely fun compared to 10-point enforcers... he's like an assault enforcer carrying a better version of the burst laser (no deliberate), survive 5+ rather than 4+, but with tough, making him better off against AP 2.. it's a fairly good jack-of-all-trades miniature, and tough and survive 5+ (and being able to be enraged) is vitally important for surviving melee attacks, almost everything else in the Rebs list just plain dies.

Yndij Sergeant is pretty worthless, definitely better off with a Sorak if you want 2-1, 5 dice blast from 12 cubes away is always fun.

As for the melee-centric list, it all depends on the sorak swordspawn and if it's a trooper or not.

I'll see how the crazy grogan spam goes anyway and report back. If it goes well, I may buy another booster and run with a 4x onslaught, 1x desolator list in 70 points (sorak and drones in troops).

I'm not good with squishy Rebs, everything just dies before I get a chance to do anything interesting with it.

Hmm sorak is OK if you can live without commands, though the yndij isn't much better than his trooper counterpart.

Hmm now I'm wondering if I'd rather have two grogan over that teraton... or maybe a berserk onslaught grogan Plus a teraton... hnm.

I find that Teraton leaves me too short on mini count for Scour/ Infiltrate/ Survive.

In 100 points, sure, 70 is a bit dicier... it can definitely kill a whole lot of stuff and is super-fun to play with, but you do have to build your list around it and make sure it is the only expensive luxury you allow yourself. The good news is you can rely on it to live and you can rely on it to totally murder anything. I got 12 successes with one in my last game (and it was a game-winning kill!) Best position for it is inside or behind an inaccessible building somewhere towards the centre, that gives you a 5x5 patch of area denial, 7x7 if you have a move card. Sit pretty, get mean and then pounce as soon as you see a nice "infinite fight chain of doom" opportunity.

Bodies on the table are always extremely helpful for Rebs, with Survive objectives you can tuck away the cheap stuff and fight with the expensive stuff since it goes by half your mini count, not half your points.

Scour and infiltrate really need a good body count as well, and I think a single Zee is pretty much mandatory for "items off the board" duty at 70 points, since 50% of the mission deck has scour in it.

The missions you really, really want are Breakthrough, Don't Stop and The Good Stuff. These are the easiest to score a win with.

Popular vote and re-education are tough, I usually opt to ditch them and re-draw since the killing power just isn't there.. and sometimes, the enemy models aren't there! I did opt to keep popular vote in my last game but that was 100 points vs. plague with loads of 2As where I knew they'd be in my face and I could score kills on them. In general though, it's the worst mission in the deck since you won't be killing the commander against a good player which leaves you needing 4 specialist kills to win.

The others are all some combination of scour, survive, kill.. bit tricky, you'll probably lose, but not worth a re-draw.

I must be in the minority, I haven't found the missions to be meaningful yet-I usually just go for exterminatus and my enemies become mulch. A game hasn't ended yet without a complete massacre, even when I played down 5-6 points. For a plague army, that's a full model down, 2 if you wanted dogs. That said, I haven't faced a S1 or Terraton yet, so perhaps I need more practice.

^ Make sure you treat the Excessive Force rule as non-optional... really, it should have been in the game right from the start.

Without it stuff like the Plague Swarm and Plague Teraton is almost unkillable via any means, and 2A's are much harder than they should be.

I must have missed "Excessive Force". What is it?

AP 3 or higher weapons count Tough as +1 armour instead, and really tough as +2 armour.

Makes heavy weapons more valuable and better at their jobs to boot.

Makes the desolator and thermal rifle pretty useful.

Good information here today, much food for thought.

Cheers, Squig. Where is the info listed? I gave a quick flick through the core rulebook and my digital nexus psi, and found nothing.

I think it was just one of Jakes insights on quirkworthy.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
http://quirkworthy.com/2013/12/27/dz-experimental-rule/

I've been working out army lists with my mate for the Nexus Psi campaign we're doing next week.

I'm going for a pretty standard Plague force to start off with, so relatively little Blast Weapon hi-jinks as he's new to the game - Imight get some as mid campaign clearances though!

2 Stage 1A's
3 Stage 2A's
3 Stage 3A HMG's
6 Stage 3A's
4 Stage 3D's

I'm not sure on a couple of things though. - Perhaps I don't have enough Stage 3A's for example (Maybe drop a stage 2 for 3 more? and an ammo crate). On the other hand, there's always 'new guys' for them.

I wasn't sure whether to go for Stage 1A's or Plague Generals to start with. I ended up going with the 1A's as I could unlock the General after the first mission and possibly afford to buy one after the first couple of games.

However, Nexus Psi comes with a few interesting twists compared to the normal campaign. - Particularly, Scenario 4 "Long Way Down" can quite possibly end up with a Stage 1 trapped in his deployment zone. Incidentally, that might make the Grenade Launcher handier than the HMG's as a starting clearance. - But are they a bit too nasty to someone on their second game, perhaps? In saying that, I'm not particularly good at the game, so am not likely to do crazy command action stuff to give them super moves.


As for my opponent, working with him, this is what we're looking at going for:

Starting Strike Force: 140 Points

Peacekeeper Captain
2 Snipers
1 Missile Launcher
2 Assault Enforcers
5 Enforcers
4 Ammo Crates

Strike Team A: 50 Points

Enforcer Sniper Tertius
Assault Enforcer Sextus
Enforcer Septimus
Enforcer Octavius
Ammo Crate 2
Cards 5


Strike Team B: 70 Points

Peacekeeper Captain Primus
Enforcer Nonus
Enforcer Decimus
Enforcer Undecimus
Assault Enforcer Sextus
Ammo Crate 1

Strike Team C: 70 Points

Enforcer Sniper Secundus
Enforcer Missile Launcher Quartus
Assault Enforcer Quintus
Enforcer Septimus
Enforcer Octavius
Enforcer Nonus
Ammo Crate 1
Cards 5


We were figuring if he was going to use a peacekeeper captain in the campaign, he'd need to get him at the start. - Unlocking the Sergeant later on if required.
We decided against an Engineer as that needs 2 Clearances to be any use.
The Missile Launcher ended up winning out over the Burst Laser or Fusion Gun (I have 1 from the warpath army set), as we might decide to use the [url=http://quirkworthy.com/2013/12/27/dz-experimental-rule/]Excessive Force[/i] rule. Additionally, the Peacekeeper Captain is basically a Walking Burst Laser.

Any thoughts?

Or have I mussed up some major rule somewhere?