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So, since Codex: Inquisition dropped, people have been talking about the Guard blob and the Sisters CC deathstar. All of these are nice, but face some critical weaknesses to shooting -- guard because they naturally lack a good armor save, and sisters because they're still T3, and only have 20 instead of 40-50 in their units. I've suggested adding Sevrin Loth in addition to an inquisitor, but he doesn't actually help out a Guard blob's survivability that much: FnP gets cancelled against Wave Serpents and Broadsides b/c T3, and Invisibility gets ignored anyways because it's all Ignores Cover shooting.

However, Sir Arun's great BT thread reminded me about the potential of Crusader squads. They are more survivable than Sisters squads outside of CC with half 3+ saves, and have T4, so giving Endurance to them actually increases their survivability against Wave Serpents and Broadsides. You get Relentless with Endurance, so you can take Grav-guns, plasma cannons Bolters, shoot full TL salvos, and still assault afterwards. If you go Telepathy, you don't need to take Invisibility because you already have that 3+ armor save.

As an extra benefit, your allied Red Scorpions troops already have FnP standard from their chapter tactic.

The reason it's heretical is of course because you're taking Black Templars and putting loads of psykers in their units and buffing them with your psychic powers.

How do you think this version of the Inquisitor/psyker blob stand up to the other Imperium blobs everyone's been theory-crafting about?

That's pretty clever. How big do Crusader squads get?

20 dudes. Unfortunately, half of them are scout-equivalents, so WS3 BS3 4+, but they're cheap, and Prescience + Endurance brings their survivability and shootiness up further, and Rad + Psychotroke grenades in combat means they're still able to hurt in CC.

It's 290 points for 20 T4 guys with Grav, combi-grav, and plasma-cannon, which seems pretty close to what a 20 woman Sisters blob would be all kitted out. Actually, in terms of cost, a 20 man crusader squad is exactly the same cost as 20 sisters, both with no wargear.

240 for 20 dudes? Hmm. What kind of buff characters can you get to help them out? Inq with Rad/Psyko with Div is obvious. Maybe Coteaz, what about good stuff from C:SM?

Keep in mind sisters get fearless, counter-attack, 5++ save and then priest shenanigans which make them badass. Unless the BT can get something that cool from C:SM, they are really only getting S4 T4 over sisters, which isn't that great.

How many rolls does Sevrin get to try to get Endurance?

Sevrin picks his powers - he doesn't have to roll.

I've also been trying to figure out which deathstars work best with the new C:I, and this unit also occurred to me. However, it ultimately has its own problems.
Obviously Sevrin Loth solves basically all of these, as you pointed out. So, if FW is an option, I agree that this is the most powerful Imperium blob that takes advantage of all the Hammerhands and grenades the Inquisitors bring to the table. It still has one glaring problem though- the lack of Hit and Run. A smart opponent will be able to use this against you, by assaulting the corners of your unit to keep most of your deathstar out of combat for the first fight. Obviously, the unit will overwhelm whatever came at them the following turn, but any time this unit is tied up is an enormous loss.
Also, it's crucial that you have other aggressive or long-ranged elements that are demanding your opponent's attention or they will probably be able to focus it down or avoid it.

Biggest issue I see is that they're walking. 50 Guardsmen walking is scary. A 20 man blob that's half scouts? Not so scary.

So basically, you trade the priest shenanigans, 5++, counter-attack and fearless for guaranteed biomancy, T4 and S4. Hmm.

Any good ideas for doing it without Forgeworld?

There is a slight problem with this. If you take crusade squads then one of your forces must be black templar, Loth means you must take red scorpions as an ally, and you can take =I= as special allies. All of this equals out to no AS allies or primary and =I= does not get priests as IC.

If you want a durable blobb then take DA (Azzy), IG allies (Yarrick+50 man blobb), and Inq (Coteaz+hammerhand Inq). This gives you 50+ bodies all with a 4++.

If you want better ranged damage then Loth is the man as he makes the blobb relentless. Which makes the blobb a threat on every level but makes them want to hug terrain more.

If you want priestly death then an =I= henchmen crusader +priest squad with Hammer Hand Inquisitors and AS priests attached will dish out tons of melee death. You could get 6 3++ save guys, reroll everything assault, and 30 Str10 AP2 attacks and 9+ Str5 AP3 attacks. It is even pretty durable against shooting with the 6 3++ wounds and the small model sizes allow you to follow a land raider if needed.

pretre wrote:So basically, you trade the priest shenanigans, 5++, counter-attack and fearless for guaranteed biomancy, T4 and S4. Hmm.

Any good ideas for doing it without Forgeworld?

If you don't want to use Forgeworld, the best bet would be to ally Ultramarines and put Tigurius in instead, as he can reroll his powers, but the only power he really wants is Endurance in Biomancy, so he wants to go Telepathy + Prescience instead in the blob.

Yeah, basically you're less strong in CC without priest shenanigans, but you're S4 T4 with FnP (if Loth). You also still have ATSKNF and stubborn (Inquisitors).

ansacs wrote:There is a slight problem with this. If you take crusade squads then one of your forces must be black templar, Loth means you must take red scorpions as an ally, and you can take =I= as special allies. All of this equals out to no AS allies or primary and =I= does not get priests as IC.

If you want a durable blobb then take DA (Azzy), IG allies (Yarrick+50 man blobb), and Inq (Coteaz+hammerhand Inq). This gives you 50+ bodies all with a 4++.

If you want better ranged damage then Loth is the man as he makes the blobb relentless. Which makes the blobb a threat on every level but makes them want to hug terrain more.

If you want priestly death then an =I= henchmen crusader +priest squad with Hammer Hand Inquisitors and AS priests attached will dish out tons of melee death. You could get 6 3++ save guys, reroll everything assault, and 30 Str10 AP2 attacks and 9+ Str5 AP3 attacks. It is even pretty durable against shooting with the 6 3++ wounds and the small model sizes allow you to follow a land raider if needed.

I don't actually know the exact survivability numbers on Guardsmen vs common firepower. Basically a 4++ means that you need to kill double the guardsmen. The problem is that doing 40 wounds in one turn is normal for Wave Serpents/Broadsides, so you're still losing 20 guardsmen a turn. The whole reason people turned to a rerollable 2+/2++ is that it's capable of holding up against that many wounds.

Let's see, 40 wounds is about 13 dead if it's a 3+ save (2/3), and about 8 dead with FnP up (1/3). That's still not that survivable. Whereas 40 wounds against a Seer Council or Screamer-star would kill maybe 1-2 after the rerollable 2+ or 2++ (35/36). Nope, still very very squishy in comparison.

So yeah, A guard blob with Azrael will be effectively double the number of guardsmen, but you still bleed men very easily, and thus bleed effectiveness.Against S4 or S5 fire, you'll bleed less quickly with Crusaders than IG, and potentially Sisters as well. It seems that against S6-7 fire, you'll lose a lot of guys no matter which blob you take.

Here is the deal. The power of a IG blobb is board control. It occupies a large portion of the board and you cannot get around it unless you kill it.

Also taking 20 casualties from a 50 IG blobb is 40% of the blobb. The exact same as taking 8 out of 20...weird, huh. The IG are still more durable however as next turn the BT lost all but 2 of their 3+ saves while the IG are the exact same. Additionally if you put Yarrick in the unit it become much more durable. (and kind of hilarious)

Honestly you ignored the two "better" blobbs completely.

One which throws out 5 plasma and 5 lascannon shots a turn while moving and you could get lucky with a libby and get one of the Inv save powers or use terrain to get some cover saves.

The best of these blobbs is probably a variant of the crusader blobb as at least when it does get into combat it honestly hurts something.

My favorite version was not even listed (cause no one will like it).
Ogryn Star (994 pts)
Azrael (215pts)
Commissar Yarrick (185pts)
7 Ogryn (330pts)
Inquisitor Coteaz (100pts)
Ordo Malleus Inquisitor (164pts); Empyrean Brain Mines, Liber Heresius, Psyk-out Grenades, 3x Servo Skulls, The Tome of Vethric, Warlord, Psyker, Terminator Armour, Nemesis Daemonhammer, Psycannon

It is hilarious to see people shoot at this thing but honestly is not a great use of points.

The real problem with all of these is not necessarily their durability but their utter lack of speed or ranged output.