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TLDR version:
The oddest army I've most recently fielded is an 8 model GK force.
●GMNDK x1
●GM in termie armor x3
●Brother Captain in termie armor x2
●Storm Raven x1
●Espern Lorcarno (Legends. Imperial Agents. Navigator figure from Blackstone Fortress)




This force has now been on the table twice.
●Once as 1/3 of a 3k pt team game. (3 players per side) I successfully played more of a support/scoring role. Truthfully I could do that with any force. But single model termie units with movement shenanigans were very usefull in that role.

●Then in a 1v1 match against a Dark Angel force.
I ripped the DAs apart, mostly in melee. And then I outscored them.
(This game I dedicate to Karol - who keeps claiming GK have no damage capability. My DA opponent disagrees with that claim.)

So what about the rest of you?
Have you put anything Stange on the table recently?

I haven't fielded anything oddball in the past few years because I'm not playing as much current 40k. But the goofy army I brought when I was playing more frequently was my nearly-all-Tyranid-Warriors list, which managed to do pretty well once I distributed enough Venom Cannons to handle larger targets.

Basically 60 something models, where every model had a Heavy Bolter or better for a gun, plus 3 wounds and 4 Attacks in CC. It was really fun. Neurothropes and Tyranid Primes for the HQs, back when those were available units. :/

In fact, I can't even run anything near that army anymore because "Tyranid Warriors with Ranged Weapons" aren't Battleline, and are now limited to units of 6 rather than 9. So 18 max.

F*** 10th ed.

Recently? Not a chance.

10th doesn't exactly invite creative army-building. "YOUR CHARACTER MUST JOIN ZE DESIGNATED UNIT!"


If you want to talk about prior editions, I remember fielding an amusing Corsairs list back in 7th where every single model had a Jetpack. Every. Single. Model.

It wasn't a spectacular list (Jet Packs were a bit overpriced on regular troops), but it was a hell of a lot of fun to play. I think it did okay but unfortunately our group was already winding up around the time the Corsairs book, so I only ever got in a handful of games with them.

To be honest, I seem to be a little unlucky in that I'll often have an idea for a fun army/build towards the end of an edition, only for the new edition to completely invalidate it.

In 8th edition, I was toying around with the idea of a Ynnari DE/Harlequins pairing, with the "Harlequins" being demons/Mandrakes (or something along those lines). Unfortunately, the 9th edition rules brought a swift end to that idea.

Probably less unusual but I also had an infantry-IG army in 8th, which was a hell of a lot of fun to play, as well as being vey, very effective. Alas, the 9th edition IG book bored me to sleep.

I messed around with a few ideas in 9th, though they tended to centre around unusual builds/pairings, rather than whole armies. e.g. I wanted to try out some more interesting/unusual bodyguard units for my DE HQs, in particular the Succubus. The fact that you could up her movement to 10" made me want to try her leading a pack of beasts (even though there was no mechanical benefit to her doing so). I also wanted to try an HQ with Parasite's Kiss and some Cronos as a life-leech squad. Lastly, though pure Ynnari Harlequins/DE was no longer possible, I did have some ideas for a Ynnari army. For some reason, the idea of a Seer Council, resurrecting Warlocks with Word of the Phoenix, appealed to me.

Alas, 10th arrived and killed all these ideas stone dead. And thus far, it hasn't inspired me at all in terms of unusual armies, or even mundane ones.

I used to do weird lists in 5th edition. Those were worth mentioning. And they were all Eldar. (actually in 4th I did it with Tau (every unit had a pinning weapon) and Chaos Marines (mutated hull on every vehicle, or min humans and maxed out nurgle demons, so many options)

1500pts I had a list that had.... 26 models.
Eldrad
Wraithlord
FirePrism
Fire Prism
Wave Serpent
5 Fire Dragons
10 Harlequins
3 Jetbikes
3 Jetbikes

And I faced off against some really interesting opponents. All Khorne Chaos, Mephiston led Space Marines (who killed all 10 harlequins on turn 1, which led to an epic battle with Eldrad and the Wraithlord against a terminator captain in the center of the board). and.. My last opponent fielded an 88 model, sisters of battle army. That was the only match that I was terrified of playing. In the end, I won that tournament.

I've fielded nothing goofball, weird or anti-meta in 8th, 9th or 10th that did well. The closest was running something in 8th that had a chaos lord with -4 to be hit vs shooting, and a max possessed unit.... But I think at some point that became someone elses winning tournament list .

I'll be putting together a radical Ordo Xenos list that includes Kyria Draxus, Amalyn Shadowguide, 5 Eldar Rangers and a Zoat. Amallyn and the Rangers aren't formally legal, but I can run it with friends. In 9th, I could have gotten around it by fielding the Eldar models as their own detachment.

I haven't figured out what models to use as the Battleline troops- the Chamber doesn't work because the Deathwatch will not countenance the Alien, if they are in the service of an Inquisitor.

I want them to be human troops, but they need to look like they might fight alongside alien allies... Van Saar models might work.

Breachers are an easier (but far more typical) choice. On the plus side, they make Valkyries feasible, and my Inquisitor needs wings. I don't want to use a Blackstar if I'm not using Deathwatch.

There's a weird story thing here though- Amallyn and her Rangers CAN infiltrate... And you kinda want them to, because infiltrate is factored into the cost of the unit.

But the story is that Kyria has gathered her alien allies and brought them to the theatre of war, so the narrative would be that they flyin together. You could fight it as two battles- the air drop in scenario 1 and the attack on the enemy in scenario 2.

Kyria, of course, can't earn XP in a Crusade... But she's so clearly a radical that I don't want to try and kitbash another generic radical... I'd rather have a purist so I could fill both niches.

Any list with a Zoat has to be good!
Right?

Like others have said, weird lists seem to be a feature of the older editions.
Here's my tale of woe from early mid 6th.

I played in local 1850 40k RTT as part of a wargaming mini-con in Raleigh, NC.


I took my Eldar using the 4th edition codex because Codex Wave Serpents hadn't dropped. 6th introduced a bunch of dumb stuff and I was trying to find something that worked in that environment. I decided to try allies with some Tau. I know. Most most folks were using DE as allies. I didn't have any DE. I had Tau. I used the Tau to give me some more anti-flyer with broadsides, some 2+ armor shenanigans with a crisis commander, and some fire warriors to round out my troops.

The list.

Eldrad
Farseer RoWit, Stones, Fortune, Guide
20x Guardians, Scatter Laser, Spiritseer w/embolden
10x Guardians, Scatter Laser, Spiritseer w/embolden
Fire Dragons x4, plus Exarch, Firepike, Tank Hunters, Crack Shot
Bastion, Quadgun
Wraithlord, BL, EML, 2x Flamer
Wraithlord, sword, 2x Flamer
Wraithlord, sword, 2x Flamer

Shas’el, plasma rifle, missile pod, iridium armor (2+), Vectored Retrothrusters, target lock
12 firewarriors incl Shas’ui
12 firewarriors incl Shas’ui
2x broadsides, 2x shield drones, 1xBSF, 1xtargeting array

List Theory.

The guardian blob is joined by Eldrad, the Farseer, and the Shas’el. Eldrad takes book powers looking to get Forewarning (4++). The Farseer keeps his codex powers. The Shas’el tanks with his 2+ and gives Hit & Run. The guardians absorb casualties as necessary. The warlock takes embolden instead of conceal because the unit is not fearless. The two choppy wraithlords serve as assault deterrence escorts. The remainder of the army is gunline. The Fire Dragons man the quadgun. One squad goes in the bastion and the others camp out in cover.

List in Practice.

Game 1. I got the bye.
Game 2. I'm up against Pat Higgs from the 11th Company podcast. He's running Daemons and CSM.

His list was roughly:

Fateweaver
Bloodthirster
2xWinged Daemon Prince
2x plaguebearer squads
CSM Daemon Prince with black mace
10 cultists

The mission is two objectives on the diagonal line from corner to corner because the deployment was vanguard. You get 1 point each turn for each of them you hold.

I got good powers: Forewarning, Foreboding, Prescience, and Misfortune. On turn 2 the Farseer casts fortune and guide on the guardian blob. Then it’s Eldrad’s turn. Rolls for Forewarning and gets three sixes. Uh oh. I try to remember if you can cast the same power again after a failure. I can’t remember and don’t want to spend time figuring it out. Eldrad casts Foreboding and Forewarning on the other Guardian squad. It’ll be alright.

It wasn't alright.

On Pat’s turn 2 the Bloodthirster and one of the Princes assault the Guardian blob. The warlock bravely accepts the bloodthirster’s challenge. The prince beats on the Shas’el who lets two Guardians take the wounds he was dealt. I only lose combat by 2. I roll leadership and fail. I re-roll with embolden and fail again. The blob is swept from the field. 678 points gone. The rest of the game was a blur. I may have passed out. I don't know. I think my therapist is tired of hearing about it.

I don't remember the lists all to well and they might not have been all too exotic, but I really liked playing them:

3rd edition
Infantry heavy Imperial Guard with their second codex where everything was deep striking. Small 5 men squads landing alone in the middle of nowhere blasting a single volley of overcharged plasma before being killed violently in the turn after.

4th edition
Similar to above, but now with Space Marines and everything was in a Drop Pod using the newly introduced Drop Pod assault rules that did not require a model yet (as there was none). We used freshly emptied beer bottles as DP markers. For extra funsies Tigurius was added for the AOE fear spell.

5th edition
Grey Knights, but I'm actually only using Coteaz to cosplay as Codex: Warrior Acolytes.
3 men squads loaded up with special weapons riding around in their personal Chimeras for extremely hilarious drive bys.

During a campaign we were playing, the scenarios went to the point where we would play a tau diversion attack on the space marines and the next day, may brother would play again but this time as tau holding fortications against the mechanics.

In the end, the space marine player showed up because his activities had been cancelled, so we decided that I would be the tau defending the fortications... But had only a few tau stuff left after my brother made his list.

So I declared that I would stuff 1500 point of tau leftover, IG, a deff dread, and that would be "local pro-tau groups" holding the city. We had a blast and a counter charge from the dread actually pushed the mechanics back to get this mixmatched list a draw. That was fun as heck.

●Then in a 1v1 match against a Dark Angel force.
I ripped the DAs apart, mostly in melee. And then I outscored them.
(This game I dedicate to Karol - who keeps claiming GK have no damage capability. My DA opponent disagrees with that claim.)

Good thing it wasn't against some sort of footslogging DE army or "savage orks" list. We could have been hit with a damage nerf in 6 months, for doing too much damage.

Karol wrote:

●Then in a 1v1 match against a Dark Angel force.
I ripped the DAs apart, mostly in melee. And then I outscored them.
(This game I dedicate to Karol - who keeps claiming GK have no damage capability. My DA opponent disagrees with that claim.)

Good thing it wasn't against some sort of footslogging DE army or "savage orks" list. We could have been hit with a damage nerf in 6 months, for doing too much damage.

As I don't play any sort of tournaments, I doubt GW will ever know of my victory.
So if any nerfs arrive its not my fault.

And I'm working on adding another 1k pts to the force. It'll have both utility & more firepower.

Well, I can chalk up another victory for my oddball GKs.

This time as part of a joint task force with a SM armored Co. Vs 2k worth of Hypercrypt Necons.
(1k SM + 1k GK vs 2k Necrons)
My units were the primary scoring force this time out while my partner was nearly tabled.

Though I must say that the Necrons were NOT played very well.
No real plan, poorly deployed, too focused on killing SM vehicles, too little focus on objectives, didn't really try & deal with 6/7(!) Of my models until t4.... And waaay too distracted by complaining about the mission rule card HE drew (delayed reserves).
Well, he found out what happens when you let 5 action monkeys with movement shenanigans do their thing unopposed for 3-4 rounds - you lose badly on pts....
But hey, those SM vehicles were dead!

Back when Space Marine bikers counted as troops if your Captain was on a bike, I built a White Scars army with only bikers and aircraft... no infantry, no tanks, no transports. It was quite expensive in terms of money, and unfortunately, it wasn't a very effective army in practice (or perhaps I just wasn't good at using it). But it was a pretty impressive sight to behold. Several of my opponents were like: "Wow. That's a lot of bikes." O_o

I ended up selling it when a new edition (I think it was 9th) made the list illegal. The buyer was a dad who wanted to introduce his kid to wargaming, so my White Scars ended up becoming a new player's first army. I'm super happy about that.

.

Ordo Navis (2000 points)

Adepta Sororitas
Strike Force (2000 points)
Hallowed Martyrs

CHARACTERS
Daemonifuge (80 points)
• 1x Ephrael Stern
• Warlord

Junith Eruita

Triumph of Saint Katherine

BATTLELINE

6x Battle Sisters Squad melta

OTHER DATASHEETS

1x 10 man Celestian Sacresants halberds

Dominion Squad melta

2 man Crusader Squad

Penitent engine

Novitiate Squad

2x 10 man Repentia Squad (110 points)

5 man Repentia Squad

ALLIED UNITS

2x Imperial Navy Breachers

2x Rogue Trader Entourage

I don't think I've seen anyone use the 400 points of navis imperialis in competative - I won an RTT I have adjusted the list for my next event though takeing out the novitate Crusaders and Penitent engine making the 5 repentia a 10 man squad and adding an immolator

In our local (not very competitve) league I'm running a grot-themed ork list with Zodgrod as Warlord and only character, 60 grots, 12 Killa Bots, 8 mek guns, 3 mega tanks, 4 grot tanks and 10 flash git mercenaries/ hirelings. It's basically 20 free points for bring it down; nevertheless I managed some close wins and suffered only one major loss. Although the lack of speed is really hard to compensate...

In an older edition I fielded a 1500pt army of grots, with 2 weirdboys. I faced against Knights. Not only did I win, but I took down a knight - in the days before a 6 could wound anything. I got "lucky" by rolling perils of the warp for 3 rounds in a row with my weirdboy, and rolling the "+2 strength, roll 2d6 for armour penetration vs vehicles, get a 4++" result. Went toe-to-toe with a knight and won, over 3 rounds!

Going back a couple of decades? Saim Hann using the Craftworlds expansion Codex in…whatever edition that would’ve been. Maybe 4th?

Predominantly Jetbikes with Vyper support. I don’t recall particularly Big Wins, but my opponents found it frustrating to play against, as unless I screwed up or they were very clever? They just couldn’t pin me down. Dual Shuriken Cannon Vypers were oddly potent at plinking tanks to death with Glancing Hits. Just erode the tank down to the point of uselessness.

I think some of you have ignored a keyword in my thread title - RECENTLY.

ccs wrote:
I think some of you have ignored a keyword in my thread title - RECENTLY.

Nope. As 40k has gotten more homogenized RECENTLY it gotten harder to make oddball lists. So everyone's examples are from the wild days of yesteryear.

Plus recently is not the same for everyone depending on how often you play

I've been toying with the idea of playing an Ork list with six models in it. It's supremely dumb and would never win anything, but I'd have a lot of fun playing it.


++ Army Roster (Xenos - Orks) [1,995pts] ++

+ Character +

Mek [45pts]: Killsaw, Warlord


+ Vehicle +

Gorkanaut [280pts]

Gorkanaut [280pts]

Kill Tank [295pts]: Bursta kannon

Kill Tank [295pts]: Bursta kannon

Stompa [800pts]

++ Total: [1,995pts] ++

Could do as an allied super heavy detachment in a multiplayer game I suppose. Or should be played against knights for big armour scramble

 Maréchal des Logis Walter wrote:
Could do as an allied super heavy detachment in a multiplayer game I suppose. Or should be played against knights for big armour scramble

It would be really good fun to go smashing into some knights with the big bots.

Alternatively, this mess of a list if I wanted to run Snakebites


Or imagine, a parent and their kids taking the dogs for a walk

provided you find the money for all those squiggoths, it'll be lovely