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I am just spitballing here, feel free to add to it and I am more than happy to hear personal experiences.

It is a 10 point difference.

Combat drugs and pain tokens can make the agonizer a waste of points against t4 and it is already a waste on t3 (but actually even gets worse as the wyches get better). T5 and above agonizer is always going to be better which matters against bikes, daemons, tmc, and the dreaded thunderwolf cavalry. Those 10 points I save can go to phantasm launcher though, which mitigates the scariest of that at least when they are charged.

Unless you get your 2 pain tokens (gaining +1S from Furious Charge) early or get the Grave Lotus drugs, you're going to be wounding on 4's at the best anyway as you're only S3 going up against S3+. Being able to always wound on 4's is a great choice.

agoniser are better. you want those wyches to lock those enemy units until backup arrives and you need that agoniser to make sure you will always get a few wounds to win the first (and second) combat. the rest of your wyches havent got a agoniser and still like to get the +1S with combat drugs or furious charge. Its never a waste and that agoniser can hurt anything...

Agreed, the agoniser is a staple of wyches. There was a comparison on here not too long ago between the venom blade, power weapon and agonizer. You should find it and look at it. It seemed that the venom blade actually was a better choice than the power weapon at some point and was another 5 points cheaper as well. The agonizer won out over total kills though, especially against T4+.

It kind of depends what you plan on attacking with the wyches. I like the venom blade because it's cheap and it helps destroy GEQ type enemies. Fairly effective against MEQ-type stuff and weak against termies and FNP stuff like plague marines, but I focus more blaster/darklance fire into tough stuff like that.

If you're only taking 1-2 wych squads, though, and want them to be effective against anything, the agonizer is probably best.

On the two wych squads in my army, one is agoniser, the other is a power weapon.

There's really nothing wrong with the power weapon considering the 10pt price point. Also, the possibility of getting it up to Str 5 with wyches....better than an agoniser against MEQ.

I see a place for both. I was 10 pts shy in my list and didnt hesitate for a second to go power weapon there.

Agonizers are very good because paired with the 4++ save, you can really tie up and kill high toughness creatures. Also, if you do get FC, you re-roll to wound I believe.

I go with PW just to save points. Works fine.

Too expensive.
They aren't poison weapons, they just wound on 4+ like poison weapons. As such, they don't get to reroll wounds on equal or greater toughness.

I like the Venom Blade. If you get FC or other +1 strength, you get to reroll against T4. Cool! So your chances of failure are even less.

Plus, by my math, against MEQ, the Venom works better or almost as good as the Agonizer.

I say venom blade. 5pts? Steal.

This is the comparison that I posted a couple of weeks ago that I think ThePhish is referring to:

Against the most common opponent stat lines, the number of unsaved wounds per 36 hits is as follows:

____________CCW__Venom__PW__Agoniser
T3; 5+_______12_____20____18____18
T3; 4+________9_____15____18____18
T4; 3+________4_____10____12____18
T4; 2+/5++____2______5_____8____16
T4; 2+/3++____2______5_____4_____8
T5; 3+________2_____10_____6____18

Basically, the venom blade is the best bet against GEQ and is generally more points effective (given power weapons cost twice as much and agonisers four times as much) but does suffer badly against termies.

Somnicide wrote:I am just spitballing here, feel free to add to it and I am more than happy to hear personal experiences.

It is a 10 point difference.

Combat drugs and pain tokens can make the agonizer a waste of points against t4 and it is already a waste on t3 (but actually even gets worse as the wyches get better). T5 and above agonizer is always going to be better which matters against bikes, daemons, tmc, and the dreaded thunderwolf cavalry. Those 10 points I save can go to phantasm launcher though, which mitigates the scariest of that at least when they are charged.

agonizers use to glance any AV on a 6 which made them the default always taken weapon. Now I dont think they are a must have as they use to be.
It REALLY depends on what you are going to be hitting. Termies and FNP BA really require at least a PW. Guard and nids you can save points with a Venom Blade.

Wyches are a volume of attack unit. The default wych gets 3 attacks on the charge. Is paying 15-30 points more worth the +1 attack and better chance to wound with 4 of the units attacks?

Honestly they really aren't all that great, in my opinion.

Against Meqs in the assault, a hekatrix gets 4 attacks on the charge, 2 hits, 1 wound with agonizers (no save) less than 1 wound with PW, and most likely about 2 savable wounds with agonizer (so less than 1 failed). It really isn't worth the upgrade in my opinion to kill 1 meq when the normal CC attacks are much cheaper (as in no upgrade at all). Wyches don't have to take sarges, unlike most armies. You don't get all that much benefit from them, so why bother? Now if you needed the LD for some reason (and LD8 is decent enough for how cheap they are) then it wouldn't hurt to pay for the upgrade, and if you have one the 5 points for a poison blade is probably worth it.

Against Geqs, wyches without any upgrades slaughter them. Adding a couple of kills from the hekatrix isn't gonig to really do all that much.

In bloodbrides... I'm undecided. The syren having 5 attacks on the charge is pretty tempting. That is better than most SM HQs after all.