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Whoa there. Let's be clear: AdMech did not get worse. It simply got less diverse. Shooting as a whole got better, and we have gotten a huge boost from all the nerfs to flying (which hurts Eldar and Tau's ability to shove Shining Spears and Battlesuits down our throats) and Knights.

Anyhow, I am considering more Blood Angels now. Basically, I am thinking of a beta strike list where I try to deep strike on round two and use my shooting to remove their screen before the charge.

My thinking is that the pure BA Deathball was semi-competitive before and is garbage now. Their shooting is pretty much confined to expensive and vulnerable flying vehicles. They simply just can't compete now without mixing with a shooting Imperium army to remove the screens that they now cannot charge through.

On the other hand, we need a melee component. Dragoons have a lot less reach now that we have to move them through a screen. Gallants have always had a similar problem.

So it's Custodes or BA. I think BA is the better choice because they have Scouts. Denying area on turn one is now more important than ever because you need to create space for your Kastelans. I like choppy Scouts for this purpose because they're BA and get great bonuses, and I like having the option to counter-charge with Scouts.

We bring Smash Captain and Mephiston because they are clearly heads and shoulders above everything else. And we bring a ball of Death Company, maybe with Lemartes. A second Smash Captain can bring Vitae, but with a 1 CP cap per turn, I don't think this is efficient any more. And we don't have nearly as much CP to burn as we used to. Furthermore, DC can be buffed by the Mephiston for removing enemy infantry.

Spend round one setting up positions with your Kastelans and Crawlers. Gun down threats to your army or try to create an opening for your BA. Force your opponent to play more defensively or commit to an aggressive strategy; once your Kastelans are rooted, they know they have to get rid of them or they will lose. Round two, drop your BA where they are needed. Drop them to attack their backline or flank, to counter-charge or intercept enemies, etc. Have your shooting support this beta strike.

EDIT: Here is a list. Not sure if it's any good yet, but it's along the lines of what I am thinking:

 Ideasweasel wrote:
Suzuteo, I completed my tournament.

Changed list at the last minute and went Mars dakabots for a turn 1 gut punch.

......it didn’t go well. Regretted swapping the list. The end

LOL. What went wrong? Ran out of CP? Didn't have enough dudes to screen?

 lash92 wrote:
Looks interesting indeed. I'm not quite sure about the DC though. I think the lost ability to charge / pile in over models really hurts them (you know for wrapping around a unit and so on)
Mephiston is really nice because he is a beatstick with 2 denies. Maybe I would remove Lemartes + DC and add an another Captain + a small team of Devs so you can spam some more mortal wounds? (3 x D3 MW first turn is nothing to sneeze at).

DC are still really devastating if they connect; they also have a role as anti-infantry fighting. The problem is that they're glass cannons.

Lemartes is sort of key to the beta strike though. He lets you reroll the 3D3 to guarantee the charge. Remember: Fly does not move over units when you Forlorn Fury now, so the old way of just bypassing the screen no longer works. You have to drop them in front of a target and charge.

I don't think this list needs Devastators in the shooting phase. I mean, if I really need more shooting, it will be Icarus Crawlers or something to deal with -2 to hit.

I think the Red Tide idea is very optimistic. But if you are going to do it, I think Graia and loading a full half of your army's PL into Drills (MSUs of 6x Vanguard) would be best.

 lash92 wrote:
Sure that you need Lemartes if you include DC. But what is the purpose of them? They are chaff killing with bolter and chainsword, but do you really need that with 6 Dakkabots?

There are many -2 to hit threats. Fighting bypasses that and has inherent defensive value as well. Furthermore, all BA fighting is a threat. Chainswords wound everything up to T7 on 4+ or better on the charge; 5+ to ANYTHING. And 10 DC pack 40 attacks; 50 with Unleash Rage; up to 100 if you Honour the Chapter.

Agreed. Vanguard's greatest threat is enemy melee. Even Catachans with Fix Bayonets are a problem.

 rvd1ofakind wrote:
BTW stygies is likelly to disappear from competitive completely because the "maybe leak" is that all -1 to hit subfactions are becoming "in cover" instead in CA.

Source: on FLG stream Reece mentioned only the -1 subfactions as "not getting the benefit from the new cover strat as they already have cover always". It's a very weird mistake to make because those subfactions are the most important subfactions from their respective armies. I called him out on it and he stopped midsentence and changed topic.

I mean it makes sense. -1 destroys all the 4+ BS armies and 6+ to hit bonus abilities. And cover affect everyone more or less equally. Finally becuase of how strong those subfactions are you rarelly see other ones.

I would be happy as a clam if they got rid of -1 to hit. That stuff is distorting the metagame in a ridiculous way. In addition to your points on 4+ and 6+, plasma is way too risky, and flamers are way too useful. I do think the infiltration nerf was some serious BS though. No tier 1 armies were infiltrating at all. Oh well.

I hope they errata the second turn stratagem to something like: "Units in cover get +1 to save; units not in cover gain cover." Basically, cover and armor saves as a generic. This way, +1 to +2 armor saves replace minus to hit. Thus AP and non-invulnerable saves become valuable again.

Wulfey wrote:
So I think this list is competitive now. The FLY charge nerfs are huge. That you can't deepstrike in your best shooting turn 1 is huge. That the best kastelan killers (castellans and smashes and dark eldar) got directly nerfed is huge. Gun castles are back in a big way.

MARS - Cawl + 2x4 dakkabots, 2x1 icarus
BLANGELS - 2x smash, 3x5 scouts
VALHALLA - 2x commanders, 3x10 guards

Icarus only got better because you know Eldar flyers will be everywhere in competitive. Dakkabots are safer than they ever have been. Sure, smash captains are nerfed, but they are still the best of the best counter charge option in the IMPERIUM. And daemon primarchs, the deadliest things against kastelons, are now much more manageable. This list is afraid of a castellan or a porphyrion, but it has the tools to wipe the screen in 1 turn and smash captains are still dangerous to castellans.

I would happily run this list against Eldar or Tau. Tau shooting is actually 36" (Riptide). Eldar can't hide their best stuff as well they used to. And dakkabots just love guard brigades. Also lol to chaos man spam. Bring it doofuses. The bloodletter bomb is nerfed and will have to deepstrike at scout screen range on turn 2. Go ahead and eat those scouts. Dakkabots will erase those swarms.

EDIT: RIP staff priests. Glad I didn't put $500 into that army.

100% in agreement with how the meta moved. 2x4 Kastelans though? I worry that might be over-investing in a unit that fundamentally has 4+ shooting. I have been thinking DC or Ballistarii.

Sigh... RIP my half-painted Drills and Fulgurites.

New list without the DC, if anyone is curious. Much more a shooty list:


Keep finding typos. Ugh.

 rvd1ofakind wrote:
The reason infiltration was removed was because they created unwinnable games for a lot of armies if you went first. Did they threw the baby out with the bathwater, though? Yes.

They could have just changed our stratagem to 1/3CP to infiltrate one or two units. 9" scout move is a joke.

Wulfey wrote:
We are almost thinking the same thing here Suzuteo. I would be with you on the rangers if i thought they did anything. When I brought them they were easy kill points. I like how they give CP, but be damned if they aren't incidental bolter fire bait. The deltas between what we are thinking are:

(1) enginseer, 3x ranger squads, 2x mortars, mephiston, and +4CP

(2) 2 more dakkabots, 1x icarus, second smashCap

I have gotten so burned bringing skitarii footmen. I like mortars for backfield board control, but they are so many drops and feed killpoints if your opponent can target them. The +4CP is good, but I think with all those infantry you don't have that many threats to spend it on. A second smash captain is more threat to bigger things than mephiston (meph has a better profile for weaker targets with his d3 damage).

How has Meph done in your games? EDIT: I could for sure see dropping my second smash cap for Meph since I am short on CP relative to your list. Also I think you are right on sticking with GS/Kurov's for the extra 5-6 CP over the course of the game.

You could be right. The list does feel a bit light on threats. Maybe I can drop the Mephiston, Enginseer, Rangers, and Mortars, add in Lemartes+DC.

This is how that would look:

I feel the second Smash Captain is a lot less valuable now that you can't recycle more than 1 CP a turn. I think Mephiston or Lemartes + DC is a better choice.

Mephiston is basically a Smash Captain with Deny and lower saves. But I think he's a lot weaker now with the fly nerf. You just don't get the same flexibility with his psychic phase moves. You could pull off a lot of crazy strategies before that I doubt you can do now.

 rvd1ofakind wrote:
Eh... That still leads to first turn charge/RF range with 40 fulgs/80 cultists. The problem wasn't the number of units. It's what you could do with them when going first.

Well, the pendulum has swung way toward the other direction. We can shoot dead virtually everything in a BA list that isn't in reserves on turn one now.

Wulfey wrote:
Alright, talk me off of this for SoCal open.

MARS - Cawl, 1x6 dakkabots, 3x1 icarus onagers
BLANGELS - SmashCap, Meph, 3x5 scouts
CADIA - 2x commander, 3x10 mortarguards, 2x3 mortar teams

Grand strategist + Kurov's or Cadia Relic

My buddy convinced me that Meph is the way to go. He costs less CP and brings a different flavor of threat (-4, hits on 2s, str10). Skitarri footmen are just rotten, so no reason to bring them. THis is a flavor of lists I have run in the past, but I think the various nerfs to FLY charges and FAQs will bring this list back to glory.

Eldar? Tau? Chaos hordes? Yeah, bring it on. Eldar deepstrike is much weaker and icarus loves eldar. Icarus and dakkabots are much better against tau now that stealth suits can't hop my guardsmen. Chaos hordes? They are now slower than ever. They can't make a turn 1 charge and reach the dakkabots anymore. And I Have the firepower to rinse 60 models a turn, and icarus crawlers to meatshield swarms.

Big BUT here: this list can't quite kill a castellan knight in 1 full round of shooting. Expected dakkabot volley is 20 total wounds. I just can't shoot titanic models off the board. Smash captain needs to take down the big stuff.

My concern here is that there are few options to deal with -2 to hit, and some of this stuff really struggles against -1 to hit. In any case, there is the high possibility of running into another rogue list like we saw at BAO. Maybe an elite army like Space Wolves, Death Guard, or 1K Sons. Nobody is paying any attention at all to middle toughness elites.

 Ordana wrote:
There is no point in Kurov's Aquilla when Grand Stratagist will get you your 1 CP per round (assuming beta rules are in effect). I'd probably bring Laurels of Command instead.

You want both Kurov's Aquila and Grand Strategist for redundancy. Knights can and will snipe your Company Commander right off the board.

That being said, maybe we're just too used to worrying about this. Maybe they will start sniping other characters instead now that we can only gain a maximum of 6 CP per game.

If so, we can either do Grand Strategist + Laurels of Command + Angel Wing (1CP) or make the Smash Captain our Walord and go Artisan of War + Angel Wing + Kurov's Aquila (1CP). Hm...

Pomguo wrote:

30coins wrote:
Super stoked about the 3 drills I just spend hard $ on.

Could you use the stygies stratagem on more than one drill?

Anyway imo the Stygies infiltrate was vastly overrated for drills - if you didn’t get first turn, you just removed that drill’s ability to do a normal infiltrate and now set it up in some stupid position to keep it safe turn one, or else get it shot to bits (and pay CP for the privilege). Seemed like a typical case of the internet overrating a tactic that explodes when it works but doesn’t reliably work.

Now just infiltrate the drill using its own ability full of priests or hoplites, then use the new strategem on dragoon’s you’ve deployed on the front line - either forward to get that turn 1 charge or else to some safe and smart position to weather an enemy’s first turn.

This change has hurt us when we go first but helped us when we go second, and made for a more reliable set of strategic options rather than a risky gamble.

You got it wrong. The Drill deep strikes. It does not infiltrate. The difference being that you can disembark Fulgurites after infiltrating on turn one. If you go second, you infiltrate them aggressively anyway and force them to shoot the Drills.

We don't benefit very much from the new stratagem, given we have Shroudpsalm. They don't stack.

It wasn't just that Stygies got nerfed. Mars got buffed indirectly by all the nerfs to flying.

Anyhow, Stygies is not dead, but merely being harder to hit just doesn't cut it for us. AdMech needs a raison d'etre. Why play them over some other shooting army in competitive? There are two good reasons:
1) Kastelan Robots are still some of the best artillery around.
2) You can do Imperium Soup, which gives us access to a large variety of options to shore up our weaknesses.

If anyone is taking AdMech to a tourney, here's what I am thinking:

I think Eldar and possibly Tau will be the armies to beat. They had already been strong before, especially Eldar, but all the nerfs to Knights and flying assault will make them a lot stronger.

Mortars to clear enemy chaff, Crawlers to remove flyers, Kastelan Robots for general-purpose shooting, Mephiston and Slamguinius to help kill Knights. You can take Soul Warden over Artisan of War if you are up against Eldar to get lots of solid Denies in. For most situations, you will want to deploy aggressively in the center and castle with Guardsmen. Forward deploy or screen with Scouts, who essentially have S8 attacks with Red Thirst.

I think my math said you needed 300 points or so of BS4+ shooting to make the TPD's RR1 aura worthwhile? 700 for Cawl. (Reduce the point values of BS3+ shooting accordingly.)

Yeah, Kastelans need rerolls to be good. But if you were to take them Stygies, you can split them into smaller units and move them around with a Datasmith or two.

My inclination is to use MSUs of Kastelans wiith a Datasmith. Maybe Electro-Priests.

 lash92 wrote:
Mhh E-Priest post faq? I mean Dragoons are still good because they can move 10" but E-Priests?^^

I did say maybe. Lol.

But even before, people used them as counter-chargers. Just hide them in some ruins or behind a wall.

All very true.

I actually am wary of elite armies making a comeback. Death Guard, 1K Sons, and Space Wolves especially. The first two armies people are familiar with. The last one is recently becoming a thing. The usual strategy is to load up Wulfen or other assault units into transports, move them up the board, smoke and Eye to get the -2 to hit, then just slamming into your lines the next turn. Nobody is really prepared to fight mid-toughness at all.

In this environment, maybe screening Dragoons might make a comeback. Hm. 2x4 or 2x3 Dragoons?

Seems like a decent price if the entire thing was commission painted.

In terms of points, you're at about 1700 points. You can free up more if you cut the Dominii and some Skitarii.

Does ITC 2019 start when CA2 drops?

Kastelans aren't going to get nerfed. They still have a ton of weaknesses in their lack of mobility. GW intentionally made them this way.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
I'm strictly speaking as someone that used it for Skitarii only. Being able to beta strike that hard has made Graia awesome for me.

How are they anyway? I always feared that they would be too fragile and not mobile enough for competitive play.

 lash92 wrote:
I don't know if that would be legal in a tournament setting but I saw a really nice pictures on Facebook today, which cut help us to cut the costs for drills.

Spoiler:

LOL. Maybe I should do this... can someone make a YMDC and see what people think about tournament legality?

The chance of pulling off a Deep Strike charge suck though. They were only good because Infiltration let them move and then one-inch punch. =\

You guys should all complain to FAQ about infiltration. Maybe they will drop the rule change; it's incredible that they essentially replaced an entire stratagem with a strictly worse version.

 ultimentra wrote:
Ever thought maybe they did it because that stratagem was incredibly overpowered, especially for 1 command point and especially because you can do it more than once?

So raise the CP cost to 2. Or do 1/3. I'd pay it.


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Omnissiah's name... Green Tide is going to be insane.

At least we probably won't have to worry as much about Castellans?

I am with Slayer-Fan123. Graia models do not trigger on wounds. They trigger on death and you roll one dice per attack (because all damage is applied at once).

So if a model deals 5 damage to a Skitarii, and he refuses to yield, you roll one dice and you ignore the other 4 damage.

Why? The Skitarii strategy is essentially to erupt out of the ground, dump your troops within 12", and have them shoot plasma into the enemy's face.

I think AdMech best utilizes lone Knights to kill the things that Kastelan Robots struggle against. This usually means other Knights, minus to hit elites, and tanks. So...

Krast Styrix
Raven Castellan
Taranis Gallant
Raven Crusader

Styrix is a hidden gem for AdMech in my opinion. Knight vs. Knight matchups devolve into who has more Knights on the board and who can kill the other's Knights first. You can run Styrix as a lone Knight without any problem, since he has built-in defensive relics and WLT, so you can invest in Titan-killing power, and a mostly redundant Tradition. The Volkite deals comparable damage to the Volcano Cannon, but the Styrix much stronger at CC and anti-elite shooting.

lash92 wrote:The Stryx looks interesting, but I'll have to do the math on it. I suppose you give him Krast relic + WLT?
Also claw or sword?

Ideasweasel wrote:I believe your best taking the claw.

Right. Lone Styrix with Krast WLT, Krast Relic, and Claw. No need for the Tradition; you are paying a lot for Armigers to get the CP and to change RR1s to RRFs; though if you plan to take them anyway, sure, why not.

Also, don't forget the Krast stratagem. 2x melee hits on hit rolls of 6; 3x for Chaos units.

I think the right play now is to beta strike with Drills.

I would stick to 2x4 Dragoons. They do have drawbacks, so overinvestment is not a great idea. Units of 4 are a good size for flexibility.

Consider Icarus Crawlers and Ballistarii?

 lash92 wrote:
They have got 18" guns, which is more then enough most of the time.

Depends on what is happening. If the enemy is holding an objective you want to deploy closer and attempt to charge to grab it.

Paradoxically, if your enemy specializes in melee, you should also deploy closer and charge them. Not only because you might as well attack first if they are going to charge you the next turn anyway. But because it will be much, much worse if they get to choose how to pile in and consolidate. If you charge them and go base to base, they can no longer do any combat sliding. (Because you can only pile in and consolidate closer to the closest enemy model. If you are at 0" away, they literally cannot be closer and thus cannot make those CC moves.)

That being said, 9" charges are tough to pull off. 27.78% chance; 52.3% chance with a command reroll.

tneva82 wrote:
OTOH that is giving extra round of attacks to the enemy which could also mean death of your unit so lose 2 for price of 1.

Also I think your math on charge is off. Command reroll allows rerolling single dice. Not both. If you roll 6 and 1 you can roll the 1. If you roll 1 and 1 you are screwed.

Assuming the enemy is going to kill your unit anyway, there are two scenarios:
1a) You move and charge them. You attack first. They attack you with reduced numbers (maybe). Your troops die. They move next turn into the space your unit previously occupied.
1b) You move and charge them. You attack first. They attack you with reduced numbers (maybe). Your troops survive. They fight the next turn to finish them off.
2) You do nothing. They move and charge. They attack first. Your troops die.

Obviously, if you're backed up against your Robots, don't do #1. But in almost all other circumstances, it is best for your screening units to charge the enemy instead of waiting for them to come to you.

Please do the calculation yourself and tell me what the chance is then.

EDIT: Okay, sorry, that was a bit passive-aggressive. My educational background is in applied mathematics, especially stochastic math and computing, and I have been having a bad day.

There are 36 possible 2D6 rolls.

10/36 of these rolls are 9+

Of the remaining 26 failures:

1/36 have higher roll of 1, 0/6 chance to reroll 8+
3/36 have higher roll of 2, 0/6 chance to reroll 7+
5/36 have higher roll of 3, 1/6 chance to reroll 6+
7/36 have higher roll of 4, 2/6 chance to reroll 5+
6/36 have higher roll of 5, 3/6 chance to reroll 4+
4/36 have higher roll of 6, 4/6 chance to reroll 3+

So:

10/36+1/36*0+3/36*0+5/36*1/6+7/36*2/6+6/36*3/6+4/36*4/6 = 0.52314814814

Also, just saying, IMO, you never reroll a 3 or 4 when you want to make 9. AdMech is nice because you don't need to memorize that many odds for your Psychic table.