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So I finally got a chance to try out the new Necrons for the first time last night. My buddy and I played a 1500 point game with objectives. He had a predator/twin-linked lascannon with heavy bolter sponsoons, two units of Thousand Sons with Sorcerer and Rhinos, Ahriman, Defiler, eight terminators with one chainfist and a heavy flamer, and a dreadnaught with twin-llinled heavy bolters. I had Overlord in a Catacomb Command Barge, five Destroyers, two Monoliths, two squads of 10 warriors, and one 10 man unit of Immortals with gaus, seven Scrabs, and Five Cryptics with four Eldritch Lances and one Tremorstave. I of course pounded him silly, but here are the lessons I learned.

1. Warriors, I feel like I have to babysit them since they have a 4+ armor save and they don't really do a whole lot until they get close. Additionally, they are not that cheap to make them disposable.
2. Immortals, Don't need to babysit them so much do to the better armor save and they are not that more expensive than Warriors.
3. Destroyers, not sure they are worth their points as they did not manage to kill much and are really expensive. Thousand Sons have an invulnerable save so against regular MEQ they might have shown more.
4. Cryptics with Eldritch lances are awesome, but are weak to counter-fire. You can't beat an assault 36 missile launcher, but they have a 4+ armor save and only toughness four. Pray you make your Ever Living rolls or buy them a transport.
5. Lord on Catacomb Barge, really expensive, but can be awesome in the right situation. Needs to move 24 to actually hit a unit and get of danger, which causes all kinds of trouble if he gets shot sown.
6. Monoliths, Great unit. For its points you get a short range battlecannon, great AV, and the Eternity Gate. Nothing gets Cryptics out of a hot spot like bringing next to a nice vehicle than needs exploding. Also, with deepstrike you can really disrupt the enemy given the monoliths size (blocking fire lanes) and ordinance. That being said, Monoliths are super slow and the shooting effect of the Eternity Gate was so-so. Through the game I managed to kill only a single terminator with it.
7. Scarabs, They work great as everyone knows and if they catch a unmoving vehicle, kiss it goodbye. Their lack of jump movement really means they have to hug cover to get anywhere due to the plethora of 6+ strength weaponry. Wound allocation high jinks does alleviate lesser strenght hits.
8. Overlord, another great unit with the minimum of Warscythe and Mindshackle Scarabs. Both of which are awesome wargear for a cheap price. The scarabs can take a powerful model out of combat and their ability to attack himself or his own unit is just butter. Downside, explaining to your opponent multiple times that yes his model will attack himself if he is the only model left to hit in the unit. Note that even leadership 10 models have a good chance failing a 3d6 leadership test and fearlessness does not save them.
9. AP2, Necrons struggle here. Other than the Eldritch Lances, I had nothing to hit his terminators with other than to force saves, which he made mostly. Note that a poor choice of deepstriking location caused them to miss a lot of the game.
10. Reanimation Protocols, not bad actually. Did surprising well for only a 33% chance of getting back up. If they don't concentrate fire, those RP rolls start to bother your oppoenent. t Everliving was the only reason my Cryptics managed to stay around.

So overall Necrons held their own, but I felt that if my opponent had built a better army and made some other decisions, the game might have not gone so well in my favor. Especially since as a whole Necrons are kind of fragile and their high points means you don't bring a lot to the table force wise. They are not for the faint of heart.

Thanks.

Joey

Scarabs are beast gives them a 12" movement. I dont have my BRB but I am pretty sure thats a 24" threat.

mstersmith3 wrote:Scarabs are beast gives them a 12" movement. I dont have my BRB but I am pretty sure thats a 24" threat.

Beasts have a 6' Movement, D6 Fleet, and 12' Assault range.

" Would allocation high jinks does alleviate lesser strenght hits. "


I'm assuming you meant wound allocation, but how exactly would you be able to pull wound allocation "high jinks" with scarabs?

They are all identicle so you have to remove whole models when possible.

Crap your right, I was thinking I could put a wound on each model until all models had at least one. To be honest, it was my first game in while so I'm sure I made worse mistakes than that.

Joey

Warriors only make sense if in large squads and/or supported by ghost arks. Otherwise take immortals with tesla.

Destroyers are same price as before but one less shot. They are underwhelming and having 5 of them was a considerable waste at 1500 pts (a sixth of your army). Thank you GW, for screwing it up for me - I only have 20 of them!

I agree the new monoliths are decent, but they are match-specific. They would have done horrendously worse against lance weapons. That is what makes them problematic in TAC lists, especially with the proliferation of DE players with this year's new codex. The days of nigh-invulnerabilty are over. But the rules are clearer, and the points are fewer.

1. Both Warriors and Immortals (with either weapon) have their place, Warriors can get Ghost Arks and are more effective at holding an objective once you factor in a transport.

3. Destroyers are pretty terrible now. Heavy Destroyers are usable, but still eat Missiles to the face.

4. Cryteks with Lances are easily the best of the Cryptek loadouts. Not sure how you ended up having them weak to counterfire unless you aren't splitting them up and putting 1 with each of your Warrior/Immortal units (which makes a very well rounded shooting unit), they are going to be a massive target if they are in a single unit.

5. Solid option, but really is only a vehicle hunter, he gets his face smashed in by assault units.

6. Monoliths are terrible now. They weren't particularly impressive before, since didn't have much damage output and were primarily a massive movement blocker/support unit but now that they just get killed by melta like every other vehicle they really aren't that impressive.

7. Scarabs are definitely a solid unit, the internet seems to be going a bit crazy over them but they are pretty good. You can't do any kind of wound allocation tricks with them and they move as Beasts btw.