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Had a chance to have my first few games of 8th edition this week and played a few with my Genestealer Cults army. The army is 100% infantry and in 7th I used to start two units of Neophytes and maybe a mage or two on the table, and Cult Ambush everything else, MSU style. However, with the Matched Play rules in 8th forcing you to start with half your army on the board, I'm struggling to adapt this army to the new edition. The fact that everything can Split Fire doesn't really help with MSU either.

So how are GSC players who go Cult Ambush heavy adapting their strategies to the new edition? Ideally, I don't want to be buying loads of Leman Russes or whatever to start on the board to free up space for my infantry to ambush as one of the appeals of the army for me was the fact that I could viably go full infantry and (ironically) transport the army to games easily. However, I'm not totally against investing in some new stuff if it's the best option and, to be fair, wouldn't mind the chance to convert up some Astra Militarium stuff with the new Blood Brothers rule.

So, any advice Dakka? How do I keep the uprising going?

A gunline with AM units might be a good complement. HWT squads, infantry or conscripts as a screen, doesn't need any vehicles if you don't want them. Although with the model count that AM tends to lead to, transporting them might become an issue.

I agree. I think a swarm of Mortars could be a very useful thing to set up behind a BLOS they can provide prep fire before the GSC ambushes, just put a small gunline out front to keep them safe.

sossen wrote:
A gunline with AM units might be a good complement. HWT squads, infantry or conscripts as a screen, doesn't need any vehicles if you don't want them. Although with the model count that AM tends to lead to, transporting them might become an issue.

Thanks for the quick reply!

HWTs are a good idea. I could quite easily fit in a Spearhead Detachment with 3 HWTs and a Commissar for orders and that'd give me four units that'd definitely want to start on the board, freeing up more units for cult ambush. Would also be quite cheap points-wise and isn't a huge model/space commitment either

What heavy weapons would you recommend? I'm thinking a mix of Lascannons and Heavy Bolters/Mortars with the latter to save on points.

A mortar is really good at killing horde units like orks, GEQ, nids etc. A heavy bolter is slightly worse vs those targets but stronger against a wide range of units with good saves and higher toughness. A lascannon is the long range tank killer but might leave you disappointed, HWTs are very squishy and a lascannon is a much bigger investment than either of the former guns. I have seen people saying that armoured sentinels are superior platforms for lascannons for this reason.

I would recommend putting up at least a small screen of infantry though.

I think heavy weapons teams are the way to go. You have long range, and you can support your infiltraitors.

You can also walk towards them with cheap unit. But that is just footslogging imperial guards. If you are advancing I would recomend Chimeraes. A chimera and a unit represents 2 deployments.

I think maguses are a good buy for non-reserved units. He is a very cheap psyker, and smite can be good. Just upping the number of deployments increase your reserves a lot.

Normal Nid Jeanstealers to start on the board, GSC to ambush

Cult Sentinels are also cheap and useful units that can free up Cult Ambush slots.