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Heya - new player of the game and first time poster.

I settled on a witch hunter army awhile back and have been keeping an eye on what the online community has to say about them often enough. One of the more common opinions that I see is the penitent engine is one of the witch hunter's "fluff units" - cool looking but not terribly viable for serious play.

I was going to ask if anyone had tried using them in a mechanized army, where their beeline towards the nearest enemy unit could be cut off by rhinos, immolators, etc. It seems like with the proper driving skills a player could keep a penitent engine "chained up" near the rest of the army until it's needed and that would negate a lot of criticism about them.

Welcome to Dakka

Simply put they share the same slot as the armies best ranged unit, all though very fast thanks to rage they are difficult to control because of rage, they cost alot and they're open topped.

Most players say 2 exorcists are enough, 3 being doable but sometimes excessive. That leaves 1 slot for 1-3 penitents... IF they can be made useful...

Between Holy Rage and running they can be fast. The problem I see with them is that Open topped AV 11 and squadrons can make them really fragile. The are a pretty fun unit and I think the army would have to be a very mech themed list to get them some cover saves from rhinos and the like. lastly in assault they are pretty susceptible to hidden power fists and the like with WS3 not doing them any favors.

Cheers,
~Volkan

Tri pretty much hit the nail with them.

Getting them a cover from your rhinos is going to be hard since you cant fully control where they are heading. This means you have to guide your rhinos with them and that could mean playing your entire army on your opponents terms.

Open top and AV 11 means any serious shooting army will wreck them. One alone isnt enough of a threat so you'll want to field 2 or 3. Squadron them and they get even easier to kill, not to mention that you get all the negatives of squadrons and no positive since they already have the Rampage rule. If you field them separately, you end up with even less exorcists on the board which will cripple you in the long run.

If you could out-flank them or deliver them in a drop pop, they might actual pose a tactical threat, but as they stand, they are too easy to kill at range to actually be of any real use.

Let me be more specific with my strategy proposal:

X -- Penitent Engine
= -- Mechanized Unit
* -- Enemy

1) If you were waiting for enemy to come to you the initial deployment would look something this. WH player chooses to move his penitent engine first, but since it cant pass through his own troops it ends its move.

===
= X =
-----(Table Edge or Terrain)------

2) If you wanted the penitent engine to attack a specific target it would look something like this. Penitent is closer to target A but WH player wants it to attack target B. WH player moves his mechanized first, putting a wall between target A and the penitent. WH player then moves penitent around the wall and happens to run into target B.

*B
==
*A =
==X
=

And then a drop pod lands empty behind you and they run back

That drop pod comment made me laugh. It's the sad sad truth.

The problem is that while you're trying to control your penitent engine's movement, your opponent will do the same, but only needs to dedicate one unit to doing that, while you will require several and that will be playing into his hands.

If you focus on destroying that unit of his, then you're once again dedicating the rest of your army to get your engines into combat. If penitent engines were death star quality, I could see it being worth it, but they are unfortunately not.

Personally, no matter how I look at them, they remain a beautiful model with a lot of fluff value, but have very poor strategic value.

If you want to field them, prepare for the worst or agree with your opponent ahead of time on both playing fluffy lists. That way you will both have fun.

Well said. I'll keep this all in mind.