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I've been playing in a escalation league and I finally hit my 2k points list. I played my first game with it tonight (well. most of it) and it just wasn't...what I wanted? I feel like it has some huge gaps that maybe you guys can see through and help me fix.

Warpsmith - MoN

15 marines - MoN fearless banner Plasma
15 marines - MoN fearless banner Plasma
20 cultists

3 oblits - VOLTW MoN
Vindicator - daemonic possession combi weapon
Vindicator - daemonic possession combi weapon

9 bikes - 2 meltas VoTLW
2 heldrakes

1 aegis with comms relay and quad gun.

When I added the points (I could be missing a couple of upgrades it's late and I'm sleepy) but it came to something like 1998, the problem I keep having is the warpsmith didn't do ANYTHING tonight (maybe it was because I didn't have the aegis so he had to cower most of the game) the vindis got punked by warrior fire and the oblits had to carry the game. Can you guys suggest maybe some close combat units I can swap in to take a charge? Are the vindis worth their points? Would I be better taking forgefiends and having the warpsmith sit with them? Are bikes even worth taking? Mine seem to be a wound swamp and stall a bigger better close combat unit before it makes it to me. I don't have a close combat beat stick and his lychguard slowly tore into my lines and I just didn't really have any one or anything to stop it. Every time I've taken helbrutes they seem to end up eating so much fire and killing so many things that they make their points back just like the oblits. Would I be better off taking more oblits? Would I do better with maulerfiends?

You're my only hope dakka!

Well the first thing I see is that you can only take a quad gun or coms relay. Also I don't see what you are doing with the warpsmith. What is his role in this Army build? So the other question I have is what do you have in reserve? If it is only the heldrakes the coms relay is meh. Also what is the job of your 15 man marines? Are they just going to march across the board? If so they will be shot to death. You have fast bikes and slow walking marines.

mojo2742 wrote:
Well the first thing I see is that you can only take a quad gun or coms relay. Also I don't see what you are doing with the warpsmith. What is his role in this Army build? So the other question I have is what do you have in reserve? If it is only the heldrakes the coms relay is meh. Also what is the job of your 15 man marines? Are they just going to march across the board? If so they will be shot to death. You have fast bikes and slow walking marines.

The marines are just to camp objectives. I hold the oblits in reserves for deep striking along with the held rakes. I didn't realize I could only take the gun or relay (that will be fixed) and the warpsmith is to hold the vindis up, fixing them and shooting the quad gun.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

mojo2742 wrote:
Well the first thing I see is that you can only take a quad gun or coms relay. Also I don't see what you are doing with the warpsmith. What is his role in this Army build? So the other question I have is what do you have in reserve? If it is only the heldrakes the coms relay is meh. Also what is the job of your 15 man marines? Are they just going to march across the board? If so they will be shot to death. You have fast bikes and slow walking marines.

And to be honest the issue with that warpsmith has been one of the biggest problems I've had with this army. I haven't had an HQ I've been pleased with yet and I don't really know what I can do. I looked at noise Marines but they are just way to expensive :/

I agree with mojo2742, it is hard to understand what you want to do with this army. However consider that I do not have a lot of experience yet, so feel free to ignore them

Short Answer:
Decide if you want to go shooty or assault. I see you like bikes. So either you are willing to spend points on at least 2/3 very dangerous units that are able to charge at Turn 2 and build an Assault list (with some decent long range support) or you build a gunline army. Something in between becomes difficult if you don't have a clear idea of what you want.

Detailed Answer:
My first suggestion would be to decide if you want a shooty army, an assault army or something in between (which must be thought carefully). Then you can start thinking about which HQ you like and better fullfills the role you thought for him in the army. I like to start from a good HQ choice and build the list around him, but of course it is just my idea, not a rule.

As an example I think that Huron Blackheart is a good place to start from when you are uncertain: pretty solid and durable, deadly in close combat and with plenty of utilities, Master of Deceipt being the best of them. Being able to infiltrate up to 3 units is quite useful, especially if you want to be in close combat or at least within short range.

As a general rule of thumb, if you want some fast close combat unit (like bikes, and 9 of them is a good threat for the opponent) then you always need to have at least 2 of 3 of them that are able to charge in the same turn. Otherwise a gunline army will just pinpoint kill your assault units one per turn, starting from the closest one. So if you want the bike (that are a solid choice, IMHO) I suggest you to either add something very killy within a Land Raider, another bike unit, chaos spawns, an infiltrated marine unit.. your call.
However a 9 bike unit alone imho will die quickly. You must have multiple threats for the opponent, so either he distributes fire evenly between them (which is what you hope for) or he targets only one, allowing the other to survive unharmed.
If you really like your bike and don't want to drop them even in a shooty army than make the unit smaller, at most 4-5 models, so the opponent's attention will be drawn by something else.

Diablix wrote:
I agree with mojo2742, it is hard to understand what you want to do with this army. However consider that I do not have a lot of experience yet, so feel free to ignore them

Short Answer:
Decide if you want to go shooty or assault. I see you like bikes. So either you are willing to spend points on at least 2/3 very dangerous units that are able to charge at Turn 2 and build an Assault list (with some decent long range support) or you build a gunline army. Something in between becomes difficult if you don't have a clear idea of what you want.

Detailed Answer:
My first suggestion would be to decide if you want a shooty army, an assault army or something in between (which must be thought carefully). Then you can start thinking about which HQ you like and better fullfills the role you thought for him in the army. I like to start from a good HQ choice and build the list around him, but of course it is just my idea, not a rule.

As an example I think that Huron Blackheart is a good place to start from when you are uncertain: pretty solid and durable, deadly in close combat and with plenty of utilities, Master of Deceipt being the best of them. Being able to infiltrate up to 3 units is quite useful, especially if you want to be in close combat or at least within short range.

As a general rule of thumb, if you want some fast close combat unit (like bikes, and 9 of them is a good threat for the opponent) then you always need to have at least 2 of 3 of them that are able to charge in the same turn. Otherwise a gunline army will just pinpoint kill your assault units one per turn, starting from the closest one. So if you want the bike (that are a solid choice, IMHO) I suggest you to either add something very killy within a Land Raider, another bike unit, chaos spawns, an infiltrated marine unit.. your call.
However a 9 bike unit alone imho will die quickly. You must have multiple threats for the opponent, so either he distributes fire evenly between them (which is what you hope for) or he targets only one, allowing the other to survive unharmed.
If you really like your bike and don't want to drop them even in a shooty army than make the unit smaller, at most 4-5 models, so the opponent's attention will be drawn by something else.

Well, the idea was a gunline army lol. The troops are all carrying bolts there's all kinds of template weapons and I really don't have that much close combat. The drakes and the oblits come down on their lines and hit primary targets while the bikes rush their front while the templates hit their lines. I just haven't really seen any HQ's I'm super excited about and I wouldn't mind an assault army but I know in 6th that whole idea took a huge hit...

If a gunline is your plan, then some Noise marines are a great answer. Take a Chaos Lord with MoS and Huron (huron as your Warlord). Infiltrate the Noise Marines with Sonic blasters so they are within the minimum distance for the Sonic blasters and salvo away. Blastmasters also work for decent light or medium anti armor. Now you have a scoring unit to draw fire from those bikes and claim any objectives they manage to shift the enemy away from. If you like, they can advance with the bikes, or they can sit back and unload 3 shots a turn. Now they need to chose between the NM at I5 next turn or the relentless rapid fire bikes next turn. Oh and give them FNP to make them last a bit longer.

Thousand sons might also work with the AP3 bolters if used properly. They will keep marines from trying to get into rapid fire range for sure or forcing them to make cover saves constantly. Granted they are truly expensive. I would avoid giving the soulblaze. Just making an expensive unit more expensive for marginal returns.

General Duf wrote:
If a gunline is your plan, then some Noise marines are a great answer. Take a Chaos Lord with MoS and Huron (huron as your Warlord). Infiltrate the Noise Marines with Sonic blasters so they are within the minimum distance for the Sonic blasters and salvo away. Blastmasters also work for decent light or medium anti armor. Now you have a scoring unit to draw fire from those bikes and claim any objectives they manage to shift the enemy away from. If you like, they can advance with the bikes, or they can sit back and unload 3 shots a turn. Now they need to chose between the NM at I5 next turn or the relentless rapid fire bikes next turn. Oh and give them FNP to make them last a bit longer.

Thousand sons might also work with the AP3 bolters if used properly. They will keep marines from trying to get into rapid fire range for sure or forcing them to make cover saves constantly. Granted they are truly expensive. I would avoid giving the soulblaze. Just making an expensive unit more expensive for marginal returns.

So from the sounds of it I'm going to have to look at cult troops. My original list had 2 squads of noise marines but when I started looking at the cost points AND money it just got a little out of hand lol. Is there a good mix of the 2 I could find?

vindispam......ah that takes me back, nice to see the classics arn't dead.

drop nurgle marks boys before toys pump more marines into it make a proper gunline.
MoN is a bit of a crutch as it makes you comfortable with T5 units this is bad most units arent T5.

find sommin SCARY, like a flying prince or use huron to infiltrate bezerkers into your opponents face, in other words make shooting at the vindis a realy bad idea, the more their ignored the closer they get and then you can dump those canons on them.

SCARY units include
nurgle bikers, soak up bolterfire like sponges
nurgle spawn, same as above providing you camp cover, also is very good cc hammer.
prince, at 2000pts will probably be shot to bits so make him a nurgle prince and zip into cover.
juggerlord, too obvious
Landraider full of angry angry zerkers!!! (personal favorite).
Infitrated Noise marines, those guns are SCARY

also sink his tanks before they sink your vindis, terminators with combi meltas can deepstrike behind a tank and liqudate it instantly, equip with combi flamers in event of infantry heavies in cover. oblits arn't my favorite unit try tri las preds to kill his tanks quicker as they dont need to switch weapons. remember at 2000pts your force org doubles so try hit that on the head and it becomes perfectly legal to take 6 heavy supports

 Blackskull wrote:
vindispam......ah that takes me back, nice to see the classics arn't dead.

drop nurgle marks boys before toys pump more marines into it make a proper gunline.
MoN is a bit of a crutch as it makes you comfortable with T5 units this is bad most units arent T5.

find sommin SCARY, like a flying prince or use huron to infiltrate bezerkers into your opponents face, in other words make shooting at the vindis a realy bad idea, the more their ignored the closer they get and then you can dump those canons on them.

SCARY units include
nurgle bikers, soak up bolterfire like sponges
nurgle spawn, same as above providing you camp cover, also is very good cc hammer.
prince, at 2000pts will probably be shot to bits so make him a nurgle prince and zip into cover.
juggerlord, too obvious
Landraider full of angry angry zerkers!!! (personal favorite).
Infitrated Noise marines, those guns are SCARY

also sink his tanks before they sink your vindis, terminators with combi meltas can deepstrike behind a tank and liqudate it instantly, equip with combi flamers in event of infantry heavies in cover. oblits arn't my favorite unit try tri las preds to kill his tanks quicker as they dont need to switch weapons. remember at 2000pts your force org doubles so try hit that on the head and it becomes perfectly legal to take 6 heavy supports

My original list had a flying prince lol one of the first models I bought XD. I was running 2 20 man squads of marines with the fearless and no mark. Hmm, I do like your idea of the prince though...the longer those vindis live the longer the damage is drawn out. Do you think forgefiends or helbrutes or termis? I saw you said termis and I have 5 with combis and a heavy flamer but the only game I played them they dropped in flamed...and died lol

thats the idea, its called termicide and it works against heavy tanks that often cost more than the squad ,strike, kill tank, and go down swinging messing up his back line and drawing fire off your better units

forgefeinds arent feasable in my opinion as BS3 lets their guns down too much and they are expensive like dental work

hellbrutes are cheap but outclassed easily by other units for infantry hunting and tank killing. invaluble aginst nids though as they can take 2 heavy flamers in powerfists allowing them to take carnifexes on the charge and incinerate carpits of bugs.

i do reccomend expanding the bikers make them nurgle, they work for scare tactics and are weird in the fact that they probably live after being shot

 Blackskull wrote:
thats the idea, its called termicide and it works against heavy tanks that often cost more than the squad ,strike, kill tank, and go down swinging messing up his back line and drawing fire off your better units.

forgefeinds arent feasable in my opinion as BS3 lets their guns down too much and they are expensive like dental work

hellbrutes are cheap but outclassed easily by other units for infantry hunting and tank killing. invaluble aginst nids though as they can take 2 heavy flamers in powerfists allowing them to take carnifexes on the charge and incinerate carpits of bugs.

i do reccomend expanding the bikers make them nurgle, they work for scare tactics and are weird in the fact that they probably live after being shot

I ran 9 bikes as nurgle last night against necrons, he just tore through them. I've been running really low number squads up until last night but the problem with them is they are just a wound swamp. There's no substance they're just a VERY expensive tarpit. Granted, they're a fast tarpit that an opponent has to sink a ton of shooting into but they just don't kill anything that a normal marine cant...

yes so they work!!!!!

your vindis and scoring units wernt being shot at as he had to sink shooting into the bikes, they dont kill things thats not what there for. what they do is defend your other units letting them get more shots off, cause when your drakes arrive then you can incinerate their infantry and if the bikes did the job then you should still have a large infantry base and tank support to capture objectives and butcher off the survivors. get termicide squad to kill vital units like skyfire platforms and hevy support, the way to win is not to make a grand masterplan, its by making sure you opponents grand masterplan doesnt work

i run this tactic at 1500 pts and often ive tabled them by turn 4 unless they run an assult list in which case i play defensive

 Blackskull wrote:
yes so they work!!!!!

your vindis and scoring units wernt being shot at as he had to sink shooting into the bikes, they dont kill things thats not what there for. what they do is defend your other units letting them get more shots off, cause when your drakes arrive then you can incinerate their infantry and if the bikes did the job then you should still have a large infantry base and tank support to capture objectives and butcher off the survivors. get termicide squad to kill vital units like skyfire platforms and hevy support, the way to win is not to make a grand masterplan, its by making sure you opponents grand masterplan doesnt work

i run this tactic at 1500 pts and often ive tabled them by turn 4 unless they run an assult list in which case i play defensive

What kind of HQ would you run in that list though? My warpsmith was anything but helpful. Would you keep the vindis in? Are raptors even wroth the look? What kind of numbers on a termicide unit?

termicide is best kept small to 5 men, the unit will probably die so dont go overboard

HQ wise your warpsmith failed as he didnt have a squad or armored retinue, the vindis want to move flat out in the first turn to get close so they arnt a good choice he just slows them down, so pick a squad and use a corresponding HQ to buff them

if the choice is bikes try a nurgle sorcerer biker, he can use bio powers to buff the squad with fnp or telepathy to make the bikes invisible, as they have jink ithis is a 2+ cover everywhere.

I think you need hard candy shells for all that nurgly chocolate melting all over the table...

I run at least three rhinos since my CSM project inception...

and lately land raiders (tau/elder)...

No problems really, but mine is fully slaaneshi

nurgles more like chewing gum, tasteless with nothing exiting but can be chewed on for hours and still be there.

problem with most nurgle lists isnt protection for your troops, its mobility and firepower they lack, hence why managing those heavy supports and fast attack matter so much.