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If deploying first: Centrally, as far back as possible, behind some cover.

Against Drop Pods; as spread out as possible, along your table edge.

If deploying second; if you can pick one side to bully one of your opponent's flanks while staying out of range of as many anti-tank guns as possible, do that. If not, stay back, in cover, and as far away from CC threats as possible.

If going against alpha strike armies that can seriously hurt you on turn 1 (either by fire power alone, or combined with lack of LoS blocking terrain), don't be afraid of reserving a good amount of your Serpents. Especially when playing Vanguard or Dawn of War deployments.


That's the main rules of thumb, anyway.

Well, the Serpents in a spam list should be equipped with tl scatterlaser, shuricannon, and holofield.
You need to get within 24'' of the target to fully exploit the weapons.
Take this into account when you deploy your army. Play aggressively. Everything else will fail.

 extremefreak17 wrote:
People....please stop all the flame and hate.

Quite.

If you have nothing constructive to add with regards to this particular thread -- and posts about how this or that build are overpowered, cheese etc etc are not relevant -- then you don't need to add anything.

Deploy them however you want, but unless you play against BT with 5 LRC's your opponent can simply surrender and save himself the trouble
Jokes aside, stay in cover with them to maximize the dmg. You don't want to jink and then snapfire everything

Ignore the whiners here. Some points from me:

- If you can't stay in cover remember that some of your wave serpents can give others cover and then the exposed position can be changed over the turns. If you use the gaps between two terrain pieces one WS can give 2 or three others behind it cover. You could even decide to jink with the one in the front, making sure that either way your WS get cover saves.
- If you are forced to Jink by a sufficient threat (e.g. a S10 AP1 shot or spammed shots) consider to use that WS to shoot at flyers. The scatter laser is twin linked anyway and if only one hit at 6 is scored the serpent shied and the shuriken cannon are also twin linked with laser lock. This means that even with snap shots you have a 30% chance to hit. Sometimes this is making a virtue out of necessity if you manage to get down a flyer or hurt a FMC.
- Contrary to the whine you're getting here a lot people attune to WS lists, as stated, and bring high AV. So if you really spam WS you might want to bring one or two with bright lances instead of a scatter laser to break the pattern.

Kholzerino wrote:
Remember Necron mech is open topped so your wraithknight is +3 to the damage table. Good luck and happy gaming.

I believe it is only a +2 on the damage table...

AP 2 = +1
Open Topped = +1

Where is the other +1 coming from?

ThatSwellFella wrote:
Deploy them however you want, but unless you play against BT with 5 LRC's your opponent can simply surrender and save himself the trouble
Jokes aside, stay in cover with them to maximize the dmg. You don't want to jink and then snapfire everything

No. Jink is not a problem with the right weapons. TL scatterlaser and on a hit, tl shuricannon and shield.

 Gangrel767 wrote:

Kholzerino wrote:
Remember Necron mech is open topped so your wraithknight is +3 to the damage table. Good luck and happy gaming.

I believe it is only a +2 on the damage table...

AP 2 = +1
Open Topped = +1

Where is the other +1 coming from?

I guess he thought Heavy Wraithcannons are AP1 .

Protect the rear of the vehicles, especially if facing drop pods.

In the Capture and Control (1 objective in each deployment zone), I tend to leave a couple DA squads (or Guardians) in reserve, but leave the tanks on the table. I place the objective to where it is out of LOS and close to my table edge so my DAs can come from reserve and hide on the objective.

A lot also depends on the local terrain and how I equip my WS. If I'm running massed WS and there are multiple ruins with bases, I tend to also run Ghostwalk Matrix so they can maximize cover without having to jink and not worry about dangerous terrain tests. If terrain is an unknown or a bit less, I tend to forgo the GWM and utilize Jink.

What I dont' want my opponent to do is gain board control so I also have to take into account target priority when I place Wave Serpents.

I just want to think all of you who have given thoughtful advice. It is a refreshing change from the hate I was getting earlier.

They aren't an auto-win button. Definitely not. I play Eldar with no Serpents or with just 1 (not playing Council either and I use a single WK) and have regularly blown Serpent spam off the table from T2 onwards. Marines have one of the best armies out there to deal with Serpents. WS or IH biker spam will melt 'pents in CC, unless the list is more balanced. Which the OP is actually going for.

It's hard to say how to deploy, because there are so many, many different combinations of armies out there and sometimes, it's definitely worthwhile to reserve them or spread them out, but usually, keeping them together and "wolf-pack" a single flank with overwhelming firepower does the trick.

It IS true that it's your opponent who needs to be asking this question, because deploying smart against a Serpent-spam is the only way to beat it.