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yeah love that list. as soon as i get my fingers on the last 2 skorpius i will play that. for the moment i have to settle with a drill^^

actually breacher are pretty cool against tau since tau players want to see them dead (dont know why) early on. They are a pain in the ass to shift if they sit on the objectives and tau really doesnt want to shoot at stuff that is not that big of a thread damage wise. Yet they have to.

I think they shoot them because they think that they can kill them relatively easily with Riptides. But it's a bad move. They should really be going for the tanks. Heavy Arc Rifles fare poorly against Tau compared to Icarus Arrays, Belleros, as well as plasma and lascannons in general. If you run Dakkabots, they absolutely will do stupid things to try to kill those. Because Dakkabots do AMAZING damage against any battlesuit.

EDIT - Removed & Reposted in Army Lists instead.

Left some C&C for you. But I had a case of listomania this weekend:

+Gives up only Gangbusters
+LOTS of dakka
-BS4
-Low shooting variety; all S6
-No Graia to abhor Jinx/Doom
-No Deep Strike

I think this sort of list has been what was successful in the past. It's an incredibly tough midboard gunline with lots of consistency. However, concentrating models into big units is increasingly dangerous. Eldar, Tau, and a variety of lists love shooting at such targets.

+Single Graia Servitor to abhor
+Hoplites and Dragoons for robust assault/screening/counter-charge
-Gives up Gangbusters and BGH
-Low shooting variety; all S6
-No Deep Strike

I think this is more typical of a codex favorites list. Lots of strong models, but not a lot of flexibility or meta resilience.

+Only gives up BGH
+T6-7 with RRAll and Shroudpsalm is tough and consistent
+Hoplites for robust screening/counter-charge
+Sniper rifles
+Good variety of weapons; S6-8
+Lucius Enginseer for Recon/Linebreaker/Ground Control
+Graia Vanguard for abhor
-Mars and Cawl may be an overinvestment

Actually don't have much criticism of this one. It is a modified Stolburg list.

+Only gives up BGH
+T6-7 hulls with -1 to hit are crazy tough
+Hoplites for robust screening/counter-charge
+Sniper rifles
+Good variety of weapons; S6-8
+Lucius Enginseer for Recon/Linebreaker/Ground Control
+Graia Vanguard for abhor

Actually think this is where the meta is going now that we have Daedalosus. I also think Tau and Marines are going to be our primary shooting foes. T6-7 bodies are important in this matchup.

Wow that last army is very rude

Whats your take in the Dominus on different Point levels, I always thought of him as a bit lackluster.

 0XFallen wrote:
Whats your take in the Dominus on different Point levels, I always thought of him as a bit lackluster.

I use them for the servitor detachment and to help boost my firepower as Metallica since I have no offensive buffs, but for stuff like Mars he's not very handy. The volkite is the only gun worth using, the rest of his guns are a bit meh, his melee profile is pretty weak, and he's a pain to kill until you realize he can only get a +5 invuln for some dumb reason now. He exists solely to reduce your reliance on benediction of the Omnissiah and that's about it unless you're running the Vigilus servitor detachment.

He really needs better invuln save options (you know, like he had in 7th) and better guns. The macrostubber would be good if he could fire it with his other weapons. The eradication Ray is really too swingy to be useful, and the phosphor serpents is pretty useless now that it can't tag an enemy unit and remove it's cover for allied units. I'm cool with his melee not being great, he's a nerd with a fancy looking wrench, it shouldn't be that powerful. Sadly he really just doesn't do much which is a shame for a guy that should be the scariest individual in the admech army.

A waste of time

1hq enginseer
2hq daedalosus
3hq enginseer
4hq enginseer
Dominous pips into a 5th hq but only because you cant take cawl out of mars and the manipulus sucks outside a castle)

I pretty much only take Dominus to save the RR1 Canticle, as mentioned by MrMoustaffa. I tend to use Shroudpsalm on turn 1 to weather incoming shooting and RR1 on turn 2 when all of the Deep Strike comes down. I then usually pick +1S if needed or spend 2CP to repick Shroudpsalm. Beyond that, Canticles are not too important, since the match will have mostly been decided at that point. Reminder: We can always move our units into actual cover instead of Shroudpsalming.

A part of me wants to cut him. Another 60 points is nice; I can downgrade the Ryza Vanguard to Rangers and bring a fourth sniper unit as an extra screw you to character-reliant armies. That or try to squeeze another Dunerider in. Or, if I cut deeper, an Assassin; the idea of a Vindicare plus 6 sniper rifles will have a lot of armies quivering in ruins dropping bricks. Also, weird tech: picking something like Culexus against Tau is counter-intuitive, but surprisingly good, not to mention hilarious. Basically drop him in with some Skitarii in enclosed ruins. Then watch them try to kill your Skitarii then your Culexus with Smart Missiles in a reasonable amount of time.

On that note, I am seriously considering downgrading the Ryza Vanguard to Rangers permanently. I lose the ability to advance, Doctrina, and still shoot at BS2, but I have found that since I shoot at T6-7 targets primarily, the math on Rifles is better than that of Carbines (2*2/6 vs. 3*1/6). Though depending on the target, it is important to point out that the Carbines have guaranteed D2, since they only wound on 6s.

It looks like carbines would actually be better, 1/3 of a wound on a rhino equivalent vs 1/4 of a wound with the rifles. Even against a +2 save, carbines get 1/6 of a wound and rifles get .13 wounds.

(This is assuming they auto-hit, of course)

Yes the d2 tend to favour rad against most t6+ targets as they are all multi wound

U02dah4 wrote:
the manipulus sucks outside a castle

Man, no way. His castle role is a bit niche if anything, imo. Helps against some specific matchups but otherwise usually not necessary.

But his movement aura is fantastic for our many units that wanna move and charge, especially paired with Stygies infiltrate for first turn charge potential

If you are running pure Stygies, Manipulus is easily the most important HQ. You can keep him in the parking lot to boost the range of the Mortars or your can move him with your assault units and Daedalosus to play a more aggressive game. Two more inches of movement per turn; your Plasma Vanguard can advance, and you can cancel out the penalty with Daedalosus. (Remember though that Daedalosus and your Hoplites do not benefit from Manipulus, so keep the latter in the transports and reroll advances occasionally if you feel like Daedalosus is falling behind.)

As a pure stygies player at the LGT I have no manipulous for a reason - its completely unimportant.

You don't want to be running a parking lot you want to be pushing forward to board control and 6-12" move + 36" range + the amount you deployed forward makes range irrelevant. What use is shooting past their backboard.

Most of the time if the vanguards 9.5" move doesnt get in range 1 inch extra wont help and it doesn't buff hoplites.

U02dah4 wrote:
As a pure stygies player at the LGT I have no manipulous for a reason - its completely unimportant.

You don't want to be running a parking lot you want to be pushing forward to board control and 6-12" move + 36" range + the amount you deployed forward makes range irrelevant. What use is shooting past their backboard.

Most of the time if the vanguards 9.5" move doesnt get in range 1 inch extra wont help and it doesn't buff hoplites.

Manipulus is your most important weapon against Tau and great in every other match up. If you want to push forward you use him for his movement buff or if you need to drop in counter chargers. Never had a game where that dude didnt deliver. He gives great flexibility. I also play Stygies. Would love to see your list though.

Well my recording is 12 - 0 vs Tau this year (3 different TAU players its a popular army in my playtest group). It's not an army we should have any problem with. There are far tougher pairings.

The movement buff doesn't make any difference to pushing forward. In most cases. If you want to drop in counter chargers they are no where near him as they are in the hole you oppened up on an objective, and he doesn't buff from deepstrike. Plus chances are if your stygies your not deepstriking those options are lucius or mars.

In the below list i have one real counter charge and thats the hoplites which typically try and ruin out of los upon the flank of the dunecrawlers or in the way of a gallant.

U02dah4 wrote:
Most of the time if the vanguards 9.5" move doesnt get in range 1 inch extra wont help and it doesn't buff hoplites.

If your movement is 9.5” with them then they’re advancing, in which case the Manipulus gives them +2”, not +1”. Plus one to move and plus one to advance, for a total of plus two.

Not only is 11.5” a big and often crucial improvement over 9.5”, the upping of the minimum move from 7” to 9” tends to be a big deal - if you’re choosing to advance it’s typically in cases where 7” wouldn’t be good enough but 9” or 10” would be.

Plus yeah, the big improvement to dragoons and regularly deployed transports turn one for turn one charges and early board control.

U02dah4 wrote:
Well my recording is 12 - 0 vs Tau this year (3 different TAU players its a popular army in my playtest group). It's not an army we should have any problem with. There are far tougher pairings.

The movement buff doesn't make any difference to pushing forward. In most cases. If you want to drop in counter chargers they are no where near him as they are in the hole you oppened up on an objective, and he doesn't buff from deepstrike. Plus chances are if your stygies your not deepstriking those options are lucius or mars.

In the below list i have one real counter charge and thats the hoplites which typically try and ruin out of los upon the flank of the dunecrawlers or in the way of a gallant.

Spoiler:

Battalion stygies
Daedalous - monitor malevolous
Enginseer - relic - autocad...
3 x vanguard
1 x 13 hoplites
1 x 4 dragoon
1 x 2 phosphor kastellans

Spearhead stygies
Enginseer
3 x Neutron onager
3 x disintegrator energy cannon

Aux
1 x mechanicus freeblade knight crusader Thermal cannon+ spearhead

Of course you still deepstrike, be it with infiltrators or a drill oO
If you win 12 games in a row against Tau I question their skills though
Regardless, you are an advocate against the manipulus while people try to convince you yet you want to stick to it. So good for you then and all the best.

I’m not saying u02 should use one or that his list needs one. He just opened with the line that Manipulus sucks outside of a castle, which as a general statement I think is wrong. The Manipulus not only has uses beyond a castle that don’t suck, it in fact has far better uses than in a castle. The castle is one of his worse and less points-efficient uses as I see it!

Going to have to agree that Manipulus is only key against Tau for Robots and Plasma Destroyers. So Mars and Ryza lists primarily.

However, I disagree with the assertion that they are unimportant. Vanguard, Fulgurites, Dragoons, Duneriders, and Drills all benefit immensely from +1" to move/advance/charge. And the option to play defensively with 42" mortars is nice, but it is as Pomguo said, the less valuable ability in a Stygies list.

Any 3x Grator + 2-3x Crawler list, not to mention any Robots list, is favored against Tau, that's for sure. I personally am 3-1 against Tau in tournaments so far. Won against two Triptide lists, one Crisis list, and my loss is to a Taunar list; that game was pretty gross though. Personally, I am surprised you are 12-0. My Crusader is usually is a crater by the end of round one, which gives up 4 VP right off the bat. The Dragoons or Robots usually go next for another 4 points, and if I cannot bring down a Riptide by then, it's GG.

As to Tau two are mid ranking tourney players and the third runs a competative list but doesn't have the time to tourney.

I acknowledge when advancing adds 2" not the 1" however it doesn't change the point that the majority of the time it has almost no impact because your dudes are getting in range anyway or your opponent has deployed back and it still doesn't get you in range. While he doesn't function out of deepstrike or in a transport list. So its not no value what it is is less value than the alternatives (enginseer and more pts or dominous)

That kind of leaves only footslogging or castles where range might help but we are the wrong faction for footslogging and castles are not great.

In what way do drills or dragoons benefit from +1"

My experience of dragoons is I deploy them forward of the rest of my army useing the stygies steat I then move them maximum distance way beyond my HQ and charge T1 on most deployment maps. If not due to an enemy back deployment I am positioning them far enough away for a -2 to hit and the manipulous wont be their to buff them.

With a drill I don't own them but I imagine its the same thing if your deepstriking he doesn't buff so unless your holding your drills till t3 while he slowly runs up the board (behind your lines to keep him safe hes not buffing them and you really want to be landing your drills t2. Since he doesnt buff out of deepstrike or drills I'm not sure how he helps fulgurites they will be shot to death footslogging even with the stygies strat.

Which leaves vanguard and corpuscarii. Well vanguard will be more efficient most of the time if you just take more of them and corpuscarii are still not efficient enough even with daedalosus

As to 4vp from crusader part of that is that I tend to play more ETC style missions than ITC where the crusader is worth 1kp unless your unlucky on maelstrom and partly its that if they focus the crusader they get hit by evérything else and a lot of difficulty in faceing TAU is knowing your target priority which I have down so when i hit I hit the right things. Plus they really struggle with -1 to hit and the t7+ saturation

I think you are under-utilizing the potential of your Dragoons and Drills then. Another 2" of move then charge helps Dragoons to set up for combat sliding and trapping. And Drills need the 2" since they've only got 8" move. The Fugurites obviously won't come out until they are ready to charge, and the Manipulus can very easily keep up with the Drills until then if both are advancing. Remember that the Manipulus should advance into position BEFORE the other units start their moves.

Yes but how do get them in buff range

19" on dragoons places them miles away from the manipuloys

And he doesnt work unless he us already on the field for the drills

i dunno. i only got a handful of admech games under my belt and that manipulus bonus movement has been the sole reason my vanguards were all in range or made the charge way too often to say hes useless.

My vanguards are usally either a screen or on an objective I will happily charge with them but they are not an awesome melee unit that you have to get into combat even vs something squishy like guard.

U02dah4 wrote:
Yes but how do get them in buff range

What do you mean? How does Manipulus fall out of buff range with 6" range and 8+D6" advance? That is 17.5" range on average. So on average dice, it would take a Drill 6 turns of non-stop advancing to totally fall out of range.

Think about it. Let's assume Drills are at the deployment line. Infiltrate is 9". Turn 1, Manipulus moves 11.5"; in range, Drills advance 13.5" (22.5"). Turn 2, Manipulus advances 11.5" (23"); in range, Drills advance 13.5" (36"). Turn 3, Manipulus advances 11.5" (34.5"), Drills advance 13.5" (49.5").

I suppose you fall out of range for the charge boost after the first turn, but as you said, you are charging well before that, though if it's really important, you can always just infiltrate the Manipulus as well.

So 6+8 +3.5 =17.5 but possibly shorter

Dragoon = 9+10 =19"

Though gap would be slightly bigger because i would probably place my hq a bit back so he couldnt be targetted. I suppose i could drop a dragoon back a bit however practically dragoons are chargeing an avg of 26" from your closest point often 24" up. You have enough room to make thecharge in most cases especially if your second. The lists you wont are the ones that deploy as far back as you can and those you would need a 10" boost not a 1"

Sure i could stygies strat him aswell but then I have an HQ ahead of my lines just waiting to be targeted.



Oh your footslogging drills thats really slow T3 is way to late to be hitting the enemy.

T1 drill in deepstrike manipulous 11.5" please dont shoot me I have no bodyguards

T2 drill arrives drops off cargo cargo charges with command reroll manipulous 23" not in range

T3 drill and cargo if alive move to next target manipulous if alive 33.5" maybe in range however drill and cargo don't need boost as at enemy lines.

It's fine for Dragoons. You even get the charge bonus on turn one.

Uh... nobody deep strikes Drills though. People are actually surprised I can deep strike them at all. Doubly surprised when I can immediately disembark the contents.

The Drill is the bodyguard? I mean, I guess someone can try to get past your Drill to snipe the Manipulus, but then they'd just be solving your problem for you. Disembark the Fulgurites the next turn, gobble up the unit that is closer to it than your Drill.

Since the topic of bringing knights in with admech is a thing again, how come i literally never see anybody mention the preceptor? i get part of his value revolves around armigers but i like using armigers anyway (i try to avoid the aux superheavy detachment)
The other 3 gun+melee knights tend to get lumped together since there really isnt a difference other than what gun they got, but the preceptor has a unique gun and that reroll aura for armigers.
Just got my knight fully painted so im trying to figure a way to use the guy. Dont have any dragoons, robots, or kataphrons built yet so my listbuilding is kinda odd atm

For ITC purposes you only get one knight in mechanicus aux superheavy multi isnt an option for mechanicus.

A lone preceptor is less efficiant shooting than a crusader 2 guns is better than 1

In imperium soup rex is probably better as a 4th knight. Boosting armigers would be fine if they were not so mediochre