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Sisters of Battle vs. Tau
I decided to jump on the Sisters band wagon since they just got their new book . My first iteration is fairly close to the older sisters list I used to play. Swapping the old celestians for the new dominion squads, and the canoness/retinue for Uriah and his DCA friends.
Sisters of Battle
HQ
St. Celestine
Uriah Jacob
9 Death Cult Assassins, rhino

Troops
10 Battle Sisters, 2 melta guns, rhino
10 Battle Sisters, 2 melta guns, rhino
10 Battle Sisters, 2 flamers, rhino
10 Battle Sisters, 2 flamers, rhino
Fast Attack
5 Dominion, 2 melta guns, combi-melta, immolator w/ multi-melta
5 Dominion, 2 melta guns, combi-melta, immolator w/ multi-melta
5 Dominion, 2 melta guns, combi-melta, immolator w/ multi-melta
Heavy Support
Exorcist
Exorcist
Exorcist

Tau
HQ
Shadowsun
Elite
2 Crisis Suits, twin-linked fusion guns, flamers
6 Stealth Suits, 2 fusion blasters, target locks, and targetting arrays
Troops
9 FIre Warriors, bonding knife
9 Fire Warriors, bonding knife, devilfish, sms, disruption pod, target array, multi-tracker
9 Fire Warriors, bonding knife
Fast Attack
5 Piranha, target array
4 Piranha, target array, fusion gun
8 Pathfinders, devilfish, sms, disruption pod, target array, multi-tracker
Heavy Support
SkyRay, burst cannons, multi-tracker
2 Broadsides

Mission: Kill Points
Deployment: Spearhead

Sisters of Battle Deployment: Everything deploys as close to the center as possible with the Exorcists on the flanks.

Tau Deployment: Not sure why but the Tau set up in the terrain fairly close to the center instead of hanging back and making me move further. Stealth suits set up close enough to go after my Exorcists on the right.
Scout moves: Dominion scout forward and pop smoke on the two outer ones. Tau fail to seize initiative.

Sisters Turn #1: Left side dominion immolator moves up 6 and disembarks it's dominion squad. Both dominion immolators on the right move up 6 but don't disembark their squads due to all the anti-infantry fire hanging out. All the rhino's move up 12 and celestine jumps up behind the central ruins. Shooting sees 2 of the exorcists completely whiff with the 3rd taking out two piranhas. The immolators account for the last piranha in the anti-tank squad. Two sisters squads move up and shoot down the stealth suits (First squad kills 1 and then he fails 5 for 5 3+ saves on the second squads shooting).
Right side

Left side

Tau Turn #1: The large piranha squad moves up to block my push on the right and the drones all get out. The broadsides destroy an Exorcist all of his shooting manages to stun the left side immolator and shake both of the right side immolators.




Sisters Turn #2: Both exorcists move up 6 and shoot and do nothing. Immolators on the right move up and disembark dominion squads. The dominion squads and an exorcist manage to take out 3 of the 5 piranha and then a dominion squad assaults through the drones to blow up a fourth. The DCA get out of their rhino and massacre the drones. Celestine jumps over the drone line and flames the fire warriors and then assaults in and kills the squad. On the left a sisters squad moves up 12 disembarks and blos up a devilfish killing 5 fire warrios in the explosion they fail morale and run.
Tau Turn #2: Celestine is too close to the falling back fire warriors and they run off the table. The last piranha runs away. The crisis suits come in but deviate away from the sisters squad they were going to flame. Shooting sees the dominion squad shot down and a rhino blown up with 2 sisters dying in the resulting explosion. The squad that blew up the devilfish takes some fire and is redduced to 5 models. His skyray opens up on celestine doing 2 wounds.

Sisters Turn #3: I melta and kill a suit and then assault the last suit with the 5 sister battle sisters squad. The flamer sisters squad moves up and kills off the fire warriors that killed the dominion. The multi-melta immolator on the left downs the last devilfish. On the right hand side things move and run to get closer to his remaining units.
Tau Turn #3: Sisters and Suit beat on each other causing no wounds. Broadsides destroy an empty rhino.
Sisters Turn #4: Celestine assaults the last broadside doing 1 wound. Battle Sisters and suit beat on each other some more for no damage. I kill 5 of the pathfinders and the sky ray is shot and immobilized and then charged by a dominion squad that takes it out with a krak grenade

Tau Turn #4: Shadowsun comes in and stuns two rhinos. The battle sisters put a wound on the crisis suit and it runs away. Celestine fails to put a wound ont the broadside and they stay locked.
Sisters TUrn #5: Celestine puts the last wound on the broadside. I shoot down the rest of the pathfinders, shoot the last piranha. I shoot an exorcist and a full sisters squad and shadowsun and fail to kill him.
We call the game there.
Aftermath: Some unit analysis. The exorcists killed 2 piranha and a broadside the entire game, not a great body count. The dominion squads with their immolators accounted for a Devilfish, 4 piranhas, and a sky ray. Celestine acccounted for about 14 fire warriors and a broadside. The 4 sisters squads accounted for the pathfinders, stealth suits, crisis suits, and a devilfish. The kills were fairly diversified with the only thing really underperforming being the exorcists. The dca were never needed so I'm not counting the fact that all they killed was drones against them.

I would recommend placing all exorcist in the middle, in a brick. The dominions go up front, scout, and smoke to provide cover for the rest of the army. Your list looks pretty solid, though, honestly, jacobus and the ladies aren't worth it or needed. Especially, not in this list. Otherwise, your list is almost identical to mine. Sadly, the new sisters dex has no real diversity. All of my games have been brutal and skin of teeth wins.

For spearhead deployment I like to put the dominions on the edge of the deployment zone because that's the closest point to the enemy. If you put them in the middle it actually makes the further away. The exorcists were on the sides because they couldn't see over the terrain piece in the middile and I wanted to force side armor shots on the Tau vehicles.

Jacobus + DCA weren't needed against Tau, and they will not usually get their points back vs. Tau or Guard or probably Eldar, but I think they are essential against just about everything else. Since we are no longer able to tarpit stuff you have to have some sort of counter assault. Oddly enough I actually also feel I need them to counter horde armies. The switch to mm immolators for the dominion squads, and more melta in my mainline sisters squads means I have a lot less flamers on the table.

For me Celestine is the odd fit to the list. I just couldn't find a more efficient spend of 100ish pts. I'd like to use Kyrinov instead of Celestine but I can't figure out where to put him in the list (ie what unit does he join).

I think there are some intersting builds to try out but I don't think they will be as well balanced as the above.

I agree. The more I go over my games I keep coming back to a deathstar. Celestine doesnt cut it. Perhaps I should drop the fifth sisters unit and grab some stabbers. . .

Uriah Bomb is awesome. Try it; you'll love it.

Solid list; I like the DCA/Uriah deathstar.

Alright, you've sold me, I'm gonna try it out again. Now that I know where to put the unit

You might want to sprinkle a couple crusaders in there just to soak some wounds with a 3++FNP. 9 DCA will kill anything outright, 6 DCA will kill pretty much anything outright and the 3 remaining crusaders will survive the return stroke.

Not to mention that you don't want to always wipe out folks.

Also, good job keeping Uriah as far to the back as possible. The last thing he wants is to swing or get swung at.

pretre wrote:You might want to sprinkle a couple crusaders in there just to soak some wounds with a 3++FNP. 9 DCA will kill anything outright, 6 DCA will kill pretty much anything outright and the 3 remaining crusaders will survive the return stroke.

Not to mention that you don't want to always wipe out folks.

I've gone back and forth on this one. With the feel no pain from Uriah the DCA are a lot more durable to small arms fire than a grey knights dca squad and the can survive the explosion of their rhino fairly well. If I were to have a 2nd squad or run one without Uriah it would definitely have crusaders but I just dont know if they are needed in a Uriah squad. For me the DCA also have to double as an anti-horde unit so I need all the init6 attacks I can get. Because of the way the lists have changed I have almost no flamers, where before they were everywhere, so celestine and the DCA have to handle hordes as well as close combat deathstars, them and massed bolter fire that is.

Even with taking 9 DCA and Uriah they cannot kill everything dead. If they get the charge against nobs they average about 17 wounds before saves, 9 if they get charged, thats not a squad wipe, against a large thunderwolf unit on the charge they get 15 wounds before saves, 8 if they get charged, again still not wiping the unit without help. Against a 30 boy mob on the charge you kill 20 leaving 10 to attack you back and peel a few off. Each DCA you swap out for a crusader really starts to effect the combat effectiveness of the unit.

pretre wrote:

Also, good job keeping Uriah as far to the back as possible. The last thing he wants is to swing or get swung at.

I actually keep him back for fluff reasons, how else is he supposed to yell encouragement to his battle conclave and them hear him over the sounds of the battle

9 DCA - 2 Base, 1 Extra Weapon, 1 Uriah. 4 Each, 5 Charge.

36 Attacks vs TW/Nobs hitting on 3's is 24
Vs T5, that's 8 Wounds before Saves. Vs T4, that's 12 wounds before saves.
Charge is 30, reroll 40. 13 Wounds vs T5 before saves. 20 vs T4.
Good call.


So yeah, you're right about that. FNP doesn't help in combat against PW though, keep that in mind.

So I have to ask then if you think the new sisters are broken

Thanks for posting up the battle report! It was a great read and nice to see the new sisters in action.

I believe that the new Sisters aren't broken, but have builds that will be competitive.

Sisters have never been that great in any edition, but have been good in the hands of someone who is very familiar with them. I do not think that changed with the WD dex.

pretre wrote:I believe that the new Sisters aren't broken, but have builds that will be competitive.

Sisters have never been that great in any edition, but have been good in the hands of someone who is very familiar with them. I do not think that changed with the WD dex.

I don't actually believe that the new codex is broken at all. But sarcasm and inside jokes don't translate that well in text...

I've been curious to see what other builds people have been having success with given the new codex. Warmaster's list is actually something he bounced off our gaming group for a bit, and none of us really saw any other competitive builds.

I am toying with lists right now and don't have the second half of the codex at work, but my two main lists are:

List 1 (May be a bit over 2k, still tuning)
Celestine
Jacobus with 9 Henchmen in Rhino

Repentia x5

Sister Squad - MM/Melta in Rhino
Sister Squad - MM/HF in Rhino
Sister Squad - Melta/HF in Rhino

Seraphim x 8, Inferno, Hand Flamer, Eviscerator
Dominions x 5 - 2 Flamers, CombiMelta in TL MM Immo
Dominions x 5 - 2 Flamers, CombiMelta in TL MM Immo

Exorcist
Exorcist
Retributors x 6 - 4 Heavy Bolters, Simulacrum, Storm Bolter

List 2
Celestine
Jacobus with 8 Henchmen in Rhino

Repentia x 5
Repentia x 5

Sister Squad 1 - Melta/MM in Rhino
Sister Squad 2 - Melta/Heavy Bolter in Rhino
Sister Squad 3 - Melta/Heavy Flamer in Rhino

Dominions x 5 - 2 Flamers, CombiMelta in TL MM Immo
Dominions x 5 - 2 Flamers, CombiMelta in TL MM Immo
Dominions x 5 - 2 Flamers, CombiMelta in TL MM Immo

Exorcist
Exorcist
Exorcist

Both lists are pretty similar. Dominions scout forward. Repentia hop in two rhinos and book it with Jacobus behind the Doms. HB/MM sisters sit in back or walk forward. HF ones move behind the wall.

Congrats Warmaster.

Tau player's list lacked ranged anti-mech. More Missile Pods and Broadsides are needed.

@darkdm:

Unfortunately, there's isn't many options in WD codex Sisters of Battle. Dominions, Battle Sisters, Exorcists, Saint Celestine, and Jacob w/ battle conclave are common in most Sisters of Battle army lists.

SabrX wrote:Congrats Warmaster.

Tau player's list lacked ranged anti-mech. More Missile Pods and Broadsides are needed.

I deployed all my stuff before seeing him finish pulling out all of his models. I did see the horde of piranha and assumed they all had fusion blasters. But I was surprised by the lack of heavy support, 2 broadsides and a sky ray is just really light for Tau. I actually blurted out, after he set up, something like "Wheres your anti-tank". If you think that was light anti-tank you should see my next opponents list that I'll try to write the batrep up for over the next week or so. I'm not sure who I would say had more anti-tank, probably the de player, but only by a little bit.

Have you considered swapping out the Exorcists for Retributor squads with Heavy bolters? I feel like that would work well, taking out light vehicles and putting a dent in hordes.

Very good game, its nice to see victories come with the SoB, even with their joke of. A new codex

I'm really not sold on retributor units. Honestly, they're not that solid, they're easy to kill, and they have no chance against av13-14. Exorcists all day everyday. There's enough anti horde in the rest of the army book and you desperately need long range anti tank. In every one of my games thus far the exorcists have been MVP beyond compare.

Well I think the Tau player had multiple blunders, starting with his list. At 2000 points, he had 2 broadsides, and no hammerhead? Also did his broadsides have a support system? They are required to take one. He has no kroot, and only brought 2 suits (which he deepstriked).

His deployment was terrible, blobbing everything together so they can get multi-assaulted, and deep striking his only suits. He probably could have gotten another turn of unmolested shooting if he had moved back some.

Honestly that deployment killed him. You easily pincered him, and he had no where to go. His reliance on fusion blasters was also a really poor decision.

Overall, I had this one called when I saw the pictures of deployment.

th3maninblak wrote:Have you considered swapping out the Exorcists for Retributor squads with Heavy bolters? I feel like that would work well, taking out light vehicles and putting a dent in hordes.

So here's my current problem with Retributor's. 85 pts for 4 heavy bolters is extremly cheap, however if you want them to be able to have a chance to rend vehicles the points really start to add up. First you have to add the simulacrum, but then you have 5 guys and the first casualty you take is going to hurt, so we want at least 4 more bodies to go with it, might as well take the full 10. So you are at 165 but durable. Now the only other way I would take them is if I could also add a multi-melta immolator to help out with the anti-tank, and to provide target saturation for my dominion immolators, and/or exorcists. Which puts you at 245. 2 Exorcists are only 260. I've been experimently with seeing if I could do a full up foot horde list with the retributors, but don't have anything I like yet.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

PraetorDave wrote:Well I think the Tau player had multiple blunders, starting with his list. At 2000 points, he had 2 broadsides, and no hammerhead? Also did his broadsides have a support system? They are required to take one. He has no kroot, and only brought 2 suits (which he deepstriked).

His deployment was terrible, blobbing everything together so they can get multi-assaulted, and deep striking his only suits. He probably could have gotten another turn of unmolested shooting if he had moved back some.

Honestly that deployment killed him. You easily pincered him, and he had no where to go. His reliance on fusion blasters was also a really poor decision.

Overall, I had this one called when I saw the pictures of deployment.

His list is definitly light on anti-tank, his broadsides had the sms and a.s.s. on them I just didn't list it because they never moved during the game. His biggest issue was just deploying so close, I really don't know why he didn't castle in the back corner. I don't think he realized just how close I would get to him with the scout moves on the dominion squads. Saying the dominion have scout is a big difference to actually seeing those immolators move 18-24 inch's before he gets a turn. His other issue was putting the stealth suits way too close to me. They had fusion as well, but they died the first turn because I was able to rhino up on him and double tap.

Nice batrep. I have to agree with PraetorDave though, the tau player stood no chance with a deployment like that.