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So in the special Character section of the Necron codex there are undoubtedly some very powerful and interesting options for an army. It seems that some of Necrons most powerful units lie in the HQ section. Yet like most of the Necron codex in order to reach their full potential many of these characters need to have lists specifically built with their powers in mind. On that note more than any other special character I have heard people say Nemesor Zahndrekh is one of the harder HQs to squeeze into any old Necron list.

So my question is how would one build a list to take advantage of Nemesor Zahndrekh's abilities?

To me at least, it seems as if taking the USR away from enemy units is simply a benefit, as you can not count on that saving the day. On the other hand the granting of USR to your own units seems like it could be quite effective. I also consider the deep strike ability cute and semi useful but I'm not entirely sure how to incorporate it effectively.

Annihilation barges being Str 8 thanks to tank hunter seem to be a solid choice.
As well as Heavy Destroyers getting the bump up to Str 10 for the same reason.
Furious charge seems to moderately useful on Scarabs although the more I think about it the benefits are somewhat wasted as they are taken for their entropic strike.
Then on a unit of Warriors or Immortals Stealth seems like it could be very beneficial to keeping your troops up and on the objectives.

Also as a side note he brings a Res Orb to the party which in nice but I'm really not sure what the ideal squad to attach him to is. I'm thinking 10 Immortals with a VoD Cryptek to ensure he gets LOS to whatever he needs but this is just a thought.

Just wondering if anyone had any input or first hand experience with Nemesor Zahndrekh or an answer to any of these questions.

Well I really really like nemesor and the idea behind what he does.(I also wish he had more fluff).

i think the main problem is he lacks a warscythe and a good shooting wepon also the resorb means he will almost always be in a big blob.

The other problem is CCB lords are awesome and he competes with them I suppose i could take him and obryon and be find but they are expensive and he has to stop what hes doing even if nemesor gets charged by a grot.

I think once wraiths and spiders come out well see lists around nemmesor i personaly havent had a chance to play him yet but i probably will when my league gets to 1600.
Oww and who is a better general immoteck or nemmesor or the traveler cause they all seem like mastermind generals.

I think Nemesor actually synergizes pretty well with Lychguard. He provides them with a Res Orb and can soak shots, making them much tougher to take down.

Every once in a while I read something in one of the codex and think, what were they thinking.

I have never used Nemesor Zahndrekh and thought it might be fun to build an army with him. I thought Hit and Run on my scarabs might be cool to get some extra movement from them. For example, a 4 scrab base group assaulting into a 5 man tactical squad. I wouldn't expect to win, just use them for a some extra movement and maybe protect the scarabs from some shooting. On my assault turn, on average I'd lose 2 wounds on one scarab and the opponent would lose 1 model. If I wanted to avoid shooting, I could stay there and probably lose 1 scarab base and maybe take out one more of his but would have avoided a round of his shooting and can then go 3d6, so average of about 10" more. Now, for the cost of 1 scarab base I have moved 18" or more.

This got me excited, until I read up on Hit and Run, to do it you have to take an initiative check with an Initiative of 2! That fails 66% of the time, what were they thinking. Hit and Run is almost useless for Necrons with their low initiative.

Bummer, it was a good idea but I can't imagine it paying out.

I used him in about 5 games and cut em. His ability is nifty but you always want it on more than 1 unit and his ability to take powers is useless in many games. Also for the points a ccb lord is sooooo much better.

I had a list with him in it let me find that

185 zahn
160 obyr
195 bargelord scythe weave
120 veiltekx2
90 scythe mss rorb lord
228 dmarksx6+dmarksx6
360 shieldlychx8
153 immox9
208 warriorx10+warriorx6
100 bladesx5
200 monolith
1999

Alpha strikey list, the veiled dmarks and oby+lych+lord jump out on turn 2 when the ccb and blades reach the enemy lines with their second 24" move and hopefully the monolith drops too.
Zahn attaches to the immortals to give them some shooting defense and squats in the back pointing at stuff. His reserve rule lets you bring in a monolith that didn't come in on normal reserve rolls, dmarks with tank hunter do 11-13 armor pen on rends, tomb blades use their second boost move to screen a deepstriking unit and give a cover save which can be boosted by stealth to 3++, tomb blades hitting rear armor can get tank hunter for 10 effectively st6 shots vs normal av 10, lychguard love counter-attack or furious charge, dmarks that get assaulted get hit and run, the max number of models that can fit out of a monolith's portal is ~10 so the bigger warrior squad or zahn+immortals can join the alpha strike when the monolith hits, if the opponent has a deepstrike/outflank squad looking to get zahn off your objective they'll prolly need to assault him and that brings obyron home to clear out the threat after already having safely delivered the lyches across the board.

Obviously a lot of risky deepstriking, the list is more about having 2 veilteks and obyron, but it looked fun and synergistic.

I don't think anyone has found an exceptional home for him yet, but this should be an good exercise.

He doesn't really do any one thing exceptionally, he's expensive, he doesn't shore up obvious weaknesses or improve a strength you will want to be capitalizing on in a big way so he's going to be a tough guy to figure out.

On top of that he limits your ability to do the really good necron things by eating up an hq slot and not being a very good stand alone guy or having an obvious squad to hang out with.

I can see larger point games where you limit his problems by buying him a barge and giving it to obyron, but then you are still paying an awful lot for some dumb non essential abilities.

He does have a lot of dumb non essential abilities though. And most of them seem cool. How to use them is beyond me.

Nemesor is best for deep strike and veil of darkness shenanigans. Basically, he makes the Necrons the hypermobile army of the game.

You take him, Obyron, and a 2nd overlord so you can take two small courts. You then have 3 (20 man Necron Warrior) units with resorbs and veil of darknesses. Spend the rest of your points on deathmarks and other units that can deep strike, you can bring on all your units pretty early on in the game if your opponent puts anything in deep strike, otherwise enjoy playing a game with 3 units of warriors that can literally move across the table in one turn.

I thin some more options for running him will become apparent once 6th drops. I think the deep strike mechanic will be changed somewhat, making it advantageous to drop half your army during your opponents turn.

Here is a 1500 list I made around Nemesor.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/437467.page

I really want to play nemesor in my 1600pt league game but i want ccbs more and obryon just isnt worth it imho

I think Nemesor can be pretty handy. I've used him mainly for his ability to grant tank-hunters and furious charge. Take a squad of gauss immortals and a VoDtek and you can get rear armor on transports or walkers relatively easy with a lot of Str6 shots. I like the fact that it is any unit, including vehicles, so stalkers are another option. Furious charge on scarabs can be pretty interesting too depending on the target. It also helps if you don't reduce the AV enough on a vehicle when you roll for pen you have a better chance of doing something hopefully. Counter-attack could be of use if you are running a mainly foot-list. Probably best case scenario is giving a nice blob of warriors in front of another squad of anything counter-attack. Your warriors will probably lose ultimately due to I2, but at least you have a better chance of laying on some more hurt otherwise. All in all I think he works well in foot-lists where you can utilize his orb as well.

One rather unorthodox unit I've been playing with in my head is Nemie, Oby, and 20 Flayed Ones. With Nemies buffs they could take on anything short of a Pally Death Star in CC, and would be resilient as nails with 3 2+/RP 4+ Wounds, 3 2+/3++/RP4+ Wounds, and 20 4+/RP4+ wounds.

That's actually a really interesting idea. Flayed Ones are another unit that simply left me scratching my head after reading their codex entry.

I've ended up playing 2 1500pt games with Nemesor recently. First was against Tyranids list looked something like this

Alpha Warrior
3x3 Hive Guard
2x10 Termagants
2 Tervigons
Hormagaunt unit
2 Trygons

Sorry for butchering the list as I'm just going off memory. All I was really able to do was dish out furious charge to my scarabs in order to chew through the tarpit of gants. It was effective and pushed Scarabs from tar pit to actually dangerous, but really wasn't worth 185pts. The Orb came in handy and saved me a few Immortals but without any kind of CC ability it didn't feel like Nemesor really pulled his weight. There was also no USRs for me to take away from this army.

The second game was against Orks his list looked something like this.

KFF mechboy
2 Lootas units
3x20 Boys + PC Nob in each unit
9xKans

Again I might be a little off for his list but there were a lot of Orks on the table. Nemesor did a little better this game. Giving Annihilation barges tank hunter really let me tear through the units of Kans. Furious charge on the Scarabs was less impressive as the scarabs were taken out rather easily in CC. I ended up loosing this games due to a huge mistake in unit positioning limiting my firepower in turn 2. That mistake coupled with a turn of below average rolling cost me the game. Even though it was a loss it felt like Nemesor did a little better. Although units of 20 Orks + PC Nob still tear crons apart in CC even when you take away their furious charge.

All in all I'm still on the fence for him. Other than the Annihilation Barge getting tank hunter I was hard pressed to find a unit that could make effective use of the tactics. Furious charge on scarabs was nice but not that impressive. I plan on using him more and in different match-ups, but after those two games I was still looking for a way he can compete with the 180pt Surfboard Overlord.

I've started using Zahndrekh myself and i'm rather impressed with him just because the most effective way to use him is based on what you can do with your list like I was dealing with my friends space marines for example by giving a unit of lych guard furious charge and taking away tac marines counter attack I was able to cut through the squad and the chapter master with honor guard leading it pretty well they had dispersion shields which definitely helped they were able to push through in 2 turns. that and I was able to give warriors a 3+ cover as they moved up courtesy of the lych wall. but that in mind Zahndrekh is still a very situational character who isn't the best at CC and his ability heavily relies on the user thinking into adapting more than with most others.(also imagine how scary wraith's or heavy destroyer's are with tank hunters. (this is probably more to how the person I fight most is I.G.))

I tried him out in a couple of games and found the ability to give Furious Charge to Wraiths and Scarabs to be pretty valuable. S7 I3 wraiths on the charge are pretty effective. 50+ S4 attacks from Scarabs is also pretty effective. Removing counter charge or acute senses has also been handy a few times.

to bad youi cant have 3hqs like wolves cause if i want a ccb i have to take obryon and hope neemesor dosnt get hit.

I have been playing arround with obryon and neemesor combos.
I put Obryon with lychguard+ Lord wit res orb w/s. A cryptek with chromomentron for safe deepstriking and ocassional re-rollong mindshakles etc.
I stick neemesor with immortals for safety. Include Vod cyptek.
Depending on where they ed up or where the other army is i deepstrike O et al first. Either 6" infront of neemesors immortals
or accross the board for assaulting next turn. Usually do solar pulse next turn.
I have also safety pulling Ob out of assault to neemesor if things go wrong

I follow with squad of waiths for support and scarabs.

I have given Furious charge to Wraiths b/c the get str7 but 4 attacks on the charge
Night fighting to HD during Stormlord etc and dawn of war.

I haven't used phased reforcements much but I like the idea. i am still getting used to the new models and codecs etc.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
I would be interested if any one has used the cryptek with VODing squad for phased Ref?

Like Ater 367 I have mainly being playing marine or IG type armies. Where I find that Nemesor Zahndrekh seems to shine best.

Major Vandal wrote:I have been playing arround with obryon and neemesor combos.
I put Obryon with lychguard+ Lord wit res orb w/s. A cryptek with chromomentron for safe deepstriking and ocassional re-rollong mindshakles etc.
I stick neemesor with immortals for safety. Include Vod cyptek.
Depending on where they ed up or where the other army is i deepstrike O et al first. Either 6" infront of neemesors immortals
or accross the board for assaulting next turn. Usually do solar pulse next turn.
I have also safety pulling Ob out of assault to neemesor if things go wrong

I follow with squad of waiths for support and scarabs.

I have given Furious charge to Wraiths b/c the get str7 but 4 attacks on the charge
Night fighting to HD during Stormlord etc and dawn of war.

I haven't used phased reforcements much but I like the idea. i am still getting used to the new models and codecs etc.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
I would be interested if any one has used the cryptek with VODing squad for phased Ref?

Like Ater 367 I have mainly being playing marine or IG type armies. Where I find that Nemesor Zahndrekh seems to shine best.

You can't use the Chronometron for "safe deepstriking."

ater367 wrote:I've started using Zahndrekh myself and i'm rather impressed with him just because the most effective way to use him is based on what you can do with your list like I was dealing with my friends space marines for example by giving a unit of lych guard furious charge and taking away tac marines counter attack I was able to cut through the squad and the chapter master with honor guard leading it pretty well they had dispersion shields which definitely helped they were able to push through in 2 turns. that and I was able to give warriors a 3+ cover as they moved up courtesy of the lych wall. but that in mind Zahndrekh is still a very situational character who isn't the best at CC and his ability heavily relies on the user thinking into adapting more than with most others.(also imagine how scary wraith's or heavy destroyer's are with tank hunters. (this is probably more to how the person I fight most is I.G.))

Punctuation is everybody's friend.

You can't use the chronometron for rerolling the scatter distance, you can use it to reroll on the mishap table or a dangerous terrain test which makes for safer deepstriking.

Actinium wrote:You can't use the chronometron for rerolling the scatter distance, you can use it to reroll on the mishap table or a dangerous terrain test which makes for safer deepstriking.

I don't know about that. It seems you would still be allowed to reroll one of the d6s on the scatter distance. Pg. 2 of the BRB states that you usually have to reroll all dice unless a specific rule states otherwise. This is one of those rules where you can. In addition to that, the scatter roll would also be considered as belonging to the unit so I see no problem in being allowed to reroll one of the d6s. Unless you know of a different rule somewhere in the BRB that says otherwise, I would say it is ok to do this.

You cannot reroll mindshackle scarab tests or DS's with the Chrono - this was discussed at length in YMDC.

WhiteWolf01 wrote:

Actinium wrote:You can't use the chronometron for rerolling the scatter distance, you can use it to reroll on the mishap table or a dangerous terrain test which makes for safer deepstriking.

I don't know about that. It seems you would still be allowed to reroll one of the d6s on the scatter distance. Pg. 2 of the BRB states that you usually have to reroll all dice unless a specific rule states otherwise. This is one of those rules where you can. In addition to that, the scatter roll would also be considered as belonging to the unit so I see no problem in being allowed to reroll one of the d6s. Unless you know of a different rule somewhere in the BRB that says otherwise, I would say it is ok to do this.

as Calypso said, this was discussed at very long length in YDMC. Not only does the chrono entry not specify that you can re-roll part of anything, but it says D6 rolls, not 2d6 rolls which is what a scatter roll is. The difference is made clear in the BRB.

Yikes, just read that thread and I am not going to start a new hobby of kicking hornet nests. Though I do see the logic in not being able to roll one of those dice in your scatter distance after reading most of it. Perhaps GW did intend it (chrono rules) to be like that, perhaps not. Maybe eventually they might update FAQs again and it will be more obvious. Though it wouldn't surprise me if they decided to change it to "any d6, including rolls requiring multiple die". Until then I suppose I'll just play it safe and limit the chrono's use to stand alone d6 rolls. It definitely won't kill anyone's strategy anyway. The only time you would be able to use it that way would be for scatter distance, leadership tests, and the xd6 line weapons so it doesn't seem like too huge a loss.

Dave-c runs a pretty unique and fun list with Zandrekh and Obyron. I've had a really tough time playing against it, don't think I've managed to pull a true win out against it yet.

While Zandrekh is neat, his buffs are only situationally useful. s6 immortal shots versus vees are not bad, furious charging Obyron for s8 instant death is not bad, and furious scarabs for munching hordes is not bad.

That said, immortals already supress light armor, Obyron is a beast without s8, and scarabs in large numbers still munch hordes. Instant gibbing nobs is about all you gain.

If Zandrekh was a phaeron he would be fine, as that way he could apply both his orb and a relentless buff to a block of immortals or warriors. Without phaeron, you are limited to tesla immortals, which do not gain as much.

Thanks guys i think rolling 1 dice is a good compromise.

He is hurt so much from not having Phaeron.

In addition, the Necron netlists he doesn't really do anything for at all.

His best units to accompany are the red-headed stepchildren of the codex; Warscythe Lychguard or a mob of Flayed Ones.

Orikan is generally a more favourable reserve modifier, Szeras is better for Warrior Blobs, Anrakyr Immortals.

It feels like you have to design the perfect list to maximize everything he does to make him work.

I think one of the best uses for the Nemesor is a game that consists of him, Obyron and Imotekh.

Imotekh calls lightening down, and Nemesor takes Night Vision from the shooty enemy units (eg Long Fangs) and gives them to one of your own (eg Heavy Destroyers or Doomsday Ark)

IhateNids, this is true, but its pretty costly. You need about 2000 points for there to be enough support elements.