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If nothing else, Elysians are fantastic for getting more flyers in your list. With Vendettas in Fast Attack and Vultures in Heavy Support, I no longer have to choose. My Elysian Veterans can deep strike, but will probably ride in the Elysian Vendettas so they can pick the appropriate time to jump out. Meanwhile, the PCS will fly in the IG Vendetta. The comms relay gives me an 89% chance of bringing my reserves in on Turn 2, or a 55% chance of delaying them to Turn 3 -- whichever I prefer. Most importantly, my artillery units provide a durable ground presence to make sure I don't get tabled on the first turn. Designating the Lord Commissar as my warlord lets me keep him well protected in the artillery units -- while also giving them LD10 for Orders and Morale checks.

I'm a little bit stumped on what to do with the Platoon Infantry Squads, but I feel they were a worthwhile investment to be able to bring Sabres and a PyroPCS squad.

EDIT: The last few replies have prompted me to revise the list, so as to address my relative inability to threaten skyfire artillery platforms. I've switched the primary and allied contingents, which saves me about 25 points on its own. I've also removed two Sabres and a Vulture, which let me purchase two additional Earthshaker cannons and an Avenger Strike Fighter. Downgrading the PIS lascannons to autocannons let me arm my Avenger with Hellfury missiles. I think it's an improvement.

Looks very crisp.

My only suggestion would be to drop the PCS bolter, and 2 of the additional crewmen for each sabre platforms, and the meltaguns.

This gives you 20 points to upgrade your PIS Autocannons to lascannons.

The bolter is unnecessary on the PCS, having a laspistol already gives you 12" range on flamers, which is "usually" enough, and being that the meltaguns are rarely going to fire, you're basically just exchanging autocannons+spare points for lascannons.

Which are obviously better here.

Upgrading autocannons to lascannons costs 10 points each. A meltagun costs 10 points each. If I'm dropping the meltaguns to bring lascannons, why do I need to make any other changes?

I think the additional crewmen are a really nice investment in this list. Each crewman gives my artillery an additional wound with a 4+ cover save. It's not free, but it's close to it. And with both a Lord Commissar and a Regimental Standard, my chances of failing the morale test are negligible. (And if anything in this list needs to be cut to save points, it's the sniper rifle in the CCS. I literally did not know what to do with those 5 points.)

Corollax wrote:
Upgrading autocannons to lascannons costs 10 points each. A meltagun costs 10 points each. If I'm dropping the meltaguns to bring lascannons, why do I need to make any other changes?

I think the additional crewmen are a really nice investment in this list. Each crewman gives my artillery an additional wound with a 4+ cover save. It's not free, but it's close to it. And with both a Lord Commissar and a Regimental Standard, my chances of failing the morale test are negligible. (And if anything in this list needs to be cut to save points, it's the sniper rifle in the CCS. I literally did not know what to do with those 5 points.)

Hah! You're totally right.

Apparently my lack of sleep is catching up to me.

But yeah, I'd definitely ditch the Meltaguns in favor of Lascannons. Blob meltaguns have the relatively niche role of deterring tankshocking (which is hilarious.) So yeah, meltaguns should be out. Lascannons should be in.

*begins chugging an energy drink in hopes of making competent posts*

Oh, and instead of a sniper rifle in the CCS, Krak grenades for a PIS wouldn't be bad. Keeps dreads from threatening you too much. IMO, probably more useful than a single sniper rifle.

I suppose you're right. The rationale behind the autocannons was that I didn't want to waste a nice weapon upgrade on a BS3 unit. But ultimately, I'm stuck paying for that unit anyway, so I might as well get a weapon that can do more than hope to strip the last hull point. And on the subject of deterring tank shocks, I could drop the sniper rifle and give the Company Commander or Lord Commissar melta bombs. What respectable commander doesn't bring high explosives "just in case"? That is, unless you genuinely think Kraks for the PCS would be a better investment.

I'll edit my original post with the revisions. Thanks.

Corollax wrote:
I suppose you're right. The rationale behind the autocannons was that I didn't want to waste a nice weapon upgrade on a BS3 unit. But ultimately, I'm stuck paying for that unit anyway, so I might as well get a weapon that can do more than hope to strip the last hull point. And on the subject of deterring tank shocks, I could drop the sniper rifle and give the Company Commander or Lord Commissar melta bombs. What respectable commander doesn't bring high explosives "just in case"? That is, unless you genuinely think Kraks for the PCS would be a better investment.

I'll edit my original post with the revisions. Thanks.

I think Kraks on a Platoon Infantry Squad would be the way to go, personally.

This is one list, that I would absolutely hate to play against... perfect for competetive play. xD

+1 with DrunkPhilosoph

You did manage to turn a lovely fluffy list into an awful-to-face army
It seems solid and you're not lacking in anything there

But I'd definitely say "shame on you" for giving Elysians and FW a bad rep by abusing the best choices in there (and combining it with the best from the regular IG)

Why don't you drop a couple of things from the Guard Infantry Platoon and the meltabombs from the CCS (since anti-tank is NOT lacking in your army!) to get Marbo for some SURPRISE! fun?

This is an absolutely brutal list, well done, haha.

However, what if you go against another Sabre/Hyperios line, but with a real ground presence? If your Vultures get gunned down as they fly on the board, you're very vulnerable to someone who can muscle you around on the ground.

TanKoL wrote:
You did manage to turn a lovely fluffy list into an awful-to-face army. It seems solid and you're not lacking in anything there.

But I'd definitely say "shame on you" for giving Elysians and FW a bad rep by abusing the best choices in there (and combining it with the best from the regular IG)

Truth be told, I actually wish I could use some more generic IG units instead of their Elysian counterparts. Both the Lord Commissar and Veterans cost 10 points more than their codex equivalent, and their upgrade options are less flexible. It's not a huge problem, but I am ultimately taking worse units than I would get from the IG codex. On the other hand, the IG codex doesn't have 6 Fast Attack slots in their FOC.

 Furyou Miko wrote:
Why don't you drop a couple of things from the Guard Infantry Platoon and the meltabombs from the CCS (since anti-tank is NOT lacking in your army!) to get Marbo for some SURPRISE! fun?

I would need to start cutting into my Sabre firepower to do that, and I think the lascannon will accomplish more over the course of the game. And even if I don't bring Marbo, there's no shortage of AP2 weaponry in this list.

anonymou5 wrote:
This is an absolutely brutal list, well done, haha.

However, what if you go against another Sabre/Hyperios line, but with a real ground presence? If your Vultures get gunned down as they fly on the board, you're very vulnerable to someone who can muscle you around on the ground.

First, thanks for the compliment.

As I perceive it, interceptor fire is no different than any other specialized type of firepower. If you bring only a couple tanks, you're just bringing enough to justify your opponent's anti-tank investment. Against a jinking Vendetta/Vulture, it takes 3 Sabre platforms will to strip one hull point of damage. And if they do use their interceptor rule, they won't be firing during the opponent's next shooting phase, so I get two turns to retaliate. They might shoot a few out of the air, but there's nothing preventing the survivors from targeting skyfire units, either.

If they are targeting my Vultures specifically, I should probably be thankful. That leaves my Vendettas free to retaliate against their anti-air, and my scoring units remain airborne to torch something off an objective and win the game. There's a reason why Vendettas cost more than Vultures when their passengers are accounted for.

Corollax wrote:


However, what if you go against another Sabre/Hyperios line, but with a real ground presence? If your Vultures get gunned down as they fly on the board, you're very vulnerable to someone who can muscle you around on the ground.

First, thanks for the compliment.

As I perceive it, interceptor fire is no different than any other specialized type of firepower. If you bring only a couple tanks, you're just bringing enough to justify your opponent's anti-tank investment. Against a jinking Vendetta/Vulture, it takes 3 Sabre platforms will to strip one hull point of damage. And if they do use their interceptor rule, they won't be firing during the opponent's next shooting phase, so I get two turns to retaliate. They might shoot a few out of the air, but there's nothing preventing the survivors from targeting skyfire units, either.

If they are targeting my Vultures specifically, I should probably be thankful. That leaves my Vendettas free to retaliate against their anti-air, and my scoring units remain airborne to torch something off an objective and win the game. There's a reason why Vendettas cost more than Vultures when their passengers are accounted for.

List overall looks about right. I'm not sure if it's worth making so many compromises to get 3x Vulture and 3x Vendetta (instead, of say, 2x Vendetta, 1x Vulture, 2x Avenger), but if that's your primary goal this seems like the best way to do it.

TanKoL wrote:
But I'd definitely say "shame on you" for giving Elysians and FW a bad rep by abusing the best choices in there (and combining it with the best from the regular IG)

I'm going to disagree and say "pride on you" for making a competitive yet still fluffy list!

Corollax wrote:
As I perceive it, interceptor fire is no different than any other specialized type of firepower. If you bring only a couple tanks, you're just bringing enough to justify your opponent's anti-tank investment. Against a jinking Vendetta/Vulture, it takes 3 Sabre platforms will to strip one hull point of damage. And if they do use their interceptor rule, they won't be firing during the opponent's next shooting phase, so I get two turns to retaliate. They might shoot a few out of the air, but there's nothing preventing the survivors from targeting skyfire units, either.

Think about it this way: a Vulture costs 155 points, a Vendetta with passengers costs 245 points. So if your opponent decides that AA spam and no flyers of their own is the best counter to flyers each flyer you bring is 3-5 LC Sabre guns in your opponent's army. Those 155 point Sabre guns are averaging 1.125 (Vulture) or 1.875 (Vendetta) penetrating hits if you don't evade and give up effective shooting for a turn, and with AP 2 that's a fair shot at destroying or crippling* your flyers before they even get to act. And of course your reserves aren't guaranteed, so more than one flyer-equivalent-points worth of interceptor guns is going to be focusing on each incoming flyer. Meanwhile the kind of durability that makes your own Sabre guns awesome also works against you: Vultures can't wound T7 effectively, and Vendetta LC shots are soaked up by the T7/4++ crew. Obviously you'll be killing them if you focus on them, but the surviving guns are going to get to fire multiple times and inflict even more casualties.

There is hope though, your earthshakers are really effective at wiping away AA guns. Wound on a 2+, ignore armor, ignore most cover, and laugh at Sabre gun return fire. This is what I mean about compromises to get your 3x Vulture 3x Vendetta list, with only one IG heavy support slot you can't take enough earthshakers to reliably clear the table of AA guns. You might be better off making IG the primary army, taking 2x Vendetta and 1x Vulture from IG and 1x Vendetta 1x Vulture from Elysians, then using your IG heavies to take two earthshaker batteries and an Avenger.



*On the damage table 5-6 kills a flyer, 4 locks it at 36" movement and makes it really hard to move effectively, 3 can potentially disarm it, and 2 forces an extremely dangerous "if an enemy model is 18" in front of you, you die" test. That's at least a 50% chance that any penetrating hit is going to kill or effectively kill your flyer.

This is the precisely the kind of critique I was looking for. Awesome.

I'd tried a primary IG contingent initially, but found that I wasn't able to bring an adequate number of Vultures. It hadn't struck me that I could use an Avenger as a substitute. (I had thought it was fast attack and dismissed it as irrelevant.) Good to know I was mistaken.

Unfortunately, I'm not clear on how Orders interact between the Elysian and IG codices. Can an Elysian CCS give orders to IG units? If not, that would mean designating the CCS as my warlord, which makes it much harder to protect. If I CAN use an Elysian CCS, that would actually make my life much easier. I'll make a topic on YMDC for clarification.

EDIT: Making the changes you've suggested will cost me two sabres, but seems to result in a much stronger list, overall. I've got the impression that my Avenger will get shot out of the sky before it can justify the investment, but I think that's just the nature of a 2hp flyer. Losing 2 sabres isn't good, but getting another 2 Earthshaker cannons is well worth it.

Corollax wrote:
This is the precisely the kind of critique I was looking for. Awesome.

One thing I should note is that the dire warnings about interceptor guns only really apply if your opponents go for true Sabre/Hyperios spam in response to your flyers. If you're facing a smaller amount of AA (a quad gun and a couple Hyperios platforms, for example) you don't have nearly as much to worry about and you probably don't need to change your list.

(I had thought it was fast attack and dismissed it as irrelevant.)

It's heavy support, fortunately. It can't do all the things a Vulture can, but armed with hellfury missiles it's good anti-horde, kills MEQs very efficiently, and can still hurt vehicles reasonably well. I'd take it on its own merits, and it offers an option to bring 3x Vendettas and 3x "gunship" flyers without the awkward compromises of the current list. In fact, depending on how many transports you want you could even do a 2/1/2 or 3/0/3 split between Vendettas/Vultures/Avengers with a C:IG primary army and leave your allies free for SW or whatever (with drop pod squads replacing artillery as your counter-AA).

Unfortunately, I'm not clear on how Orders interact between the Elysian and IG codices. Can an Elysian CCS give orders to IG units? If not, that would mean designating the CCS as my warlord, which makes it much harder to protect. If I CAN use an Elysian CCS, that would actually make my life much easier. I'll make a topic on YMDC for clarification.

RAW, yes, for a stupid reason. The Elysain list says "see Codex:IG", which means that you have the exact same rules as C:IG officers. That is, you can give orders to friendly units chosen from C:IG. So your Elysians can give orders to allied IG squads, but not to other Elysian units. Needless to say this is stupid.

RAI, no. The intent of the C:IG errata is that you can't give orders to allied units (or use allied IC leadership for orders, allied ICs in your units can't benefit from them, etc), so the RAI answer would be that Elysians can give orders to other Elysians but not any allied armies (and of course C:IG squads can't give orders to Elysians).

Rules-as-fluffy, yes. They're both IG regiments even if they're chosen from separate lists for rules purposes, and IG officers clearly have no problems with giving orders to units from other regiments (a Cadian CCS giving orders to Catachan veterans, for example). In a casual game you might be able to convince your opponent to allow you to give orders between the two armies.

The updated list is much scarier for me.

The Earthshakers can kill my own AA spam...plus there's enough of them that they're a serious threat to my Grey Hunters. There are still enough Sabres that I'm going to have trouble getting pods on your own Artillery (not fun losing half a squad as they disembark from a drop pod at all)...

I'm really thinking about putting my own AA spam on a Skyshield, as I think I'm only going to bring a Vulture once I finish my Sabres/Hyperios (I'm using the same kit for both, magnetizing is taking forever though), and don't really need a Comms Relay.

Do you feel that the Avenger Strike Fighter is worth it? It's both more expensive and significantly more fragile than the rest of my air force, and I'm honestly just thinking about dropping it entirely. It doesn't help that its weaponry is so schizophrenic.

I'd probably spend the leftover points on more artillery. (Likely a Medusa siege cannon and another Sabre).

I have never seen an Avenger in use, but av 10 on a flier's side armor is extremely fragile. A GH squad under prescience (who by the time turn 2 comes by will be at side armor) will average 4.8 bolter hits and 1.2 plasma hits. Which if nothing else will force a jink. So, in my opinion, you're better off with the Artillery. Pie plates are scary in general, and an additional Sabre makes my podding even riskier. I always say GHs don't care about Lascannons, but that's not so true when it kills them before they alpha strike.

IMO you already own the air, you don't need an Avenger. (Vulture beats any plane but a Stormraven in the air anyway, and vendettas can go point to point with Ravens). My initial issue was that you were weak against dominating ground armies with their own spam intercept line, more artillery helps alleviate that. A Medusa and two Earthshaker batteries is scary WITHOUT a crazy airforce involved. Using my cheese lists as an example, I run two counters to Arty. Pods and LL. You have the bodies for bubble wrapping and the Sabres to intercept pods, and too many targets for LL to do anything. So long as your big guns are mostly out of range of my Sabres/Hyperios, your list is an issue.

I thought the Avenger was a bit of a liability. It's good to hear that I'm not the only one to draw that conclusion. I'll get better volume of anti-tank by dropping the Avenger, as well. And having an S10 pie plate goes a long way to mitigating issues with Nob bikers, Chaos Spawn, and Grotesques.

My only real complaint is being forced to rely upon an Elysian Company Command Squad for my orders. If it becomes an issue, though, I can always swap HQ selections. It only costs 5 points to do so, after all. The only real issue is that it makes my warlord so much more vulnerable.

Corollax wrote:
Do you feel that the Avenger Strike Fighter is worth it? It's both more expensive and significantly more fragile than the rest of my air force, and I'm honestly just thinking about dropping it entirely.

The Avenger is very good. Yes, 2 HP and AV 10 side armor is a weakness, but it hits hard on the turn it arrives and still has AV 12 on the front. It's one of those deceptively good units, my first impression was the same as yours, that it was too fragile to be useful. But once I used it a few times I realized that the extremely efficient firepower makes up for it.

It doesn't help that its weaponry is so schizophrenic.

Not really. Against everything but heavy tanks (which you aren't killing effectively anyway and shouldn't be shooting at) its weapons actually work very well together.

Against vehicles you're usually in side or rear armor, so 2 BS 4 LC shots and 7 STR 6 shots is doing pretty good damage. The LCs are obviously effective, and the pile of STR 6 dice can quickly strip away HPs if you don't get an "explodes" result.

Against elite infantry you've got 9 BS 4 shots with AP 2/3 wounding on a 2+, averaging 5 dead MEQs per turn. Against even basic tactical marines with no upgrades you're killing the Avenger's point cost in two turns of shooting.

Against hordes you've got 8 BS 4 shots wounding on a 2+ and ignoring armor, and two large blast flamer shots.

Against artillery you have the high-strength/low-AP shots to effectively kill the gun, but still have enough volume of fire (unlike the Vendetta) to kill a quad gun despite a cover save, or clear Sabre crew out of the way.

The only real weapons that don't always fit properly are the hellfury missiles, but you're taking those as an insurance policy that your anti-vehicle/marine flyer is still effective against hordes, not as a primary weapon.

I'm really more concerned about interceptor firepower. The Avenger is well armed -- I'm just not convinced it will ever survive long enough to actually do anything. When my movement phase is over and the enemy is deciding where he wants to allocate his interceptor fire, it seems like the Avenger is a pretty obvious choice.

Corollax wrote:
I'm really more concerned about interceptor firepower. The Avenger is well armed -- I'm just not convinced it will ever survive long enough to actually do anything. When my movement phase is over and the enemy is deciding where he wants to allocate his interceptor fire, it seems like the Avenger is a pretty obvious choice.

But think about it this way: if you bring one less flyer there's still an obvious target (probably a Vendetta) but now there are more interceptor guns per flyer to shoot at you. Having only 2 HP is a drawback if you're comparing it to another flyer that it would replace, but once you've made the decision to take fewer Vultures/Vendettas 2 HP is better than 0 HP.

Of course there are benefits to having your third heavy support slot back (as you said, STR 10 AP 2 can be very useful), but purely in terms of aircraft vs. interceptor guns the Avenger is a very good choice.

That is most certainly true. Having the Avenger as an "obvious" target would probably save one of the other fliers from soaking up those hits. This is basically the strategy of the first list, where the Elysians were the primary contingent. I was hoping that sheer target saturation would address any issues I might have with interceptor firepower.

However, by sacrificing that 6th flier, I can get a stronger presence on the board and wipe out those threats before they can target my fliers in the first place. The additional sabre, for example, will help knock out enemy flyers before they can threaten my own. And while a Medusa is probably less effective against cover-based artillery than a Basilisk, it solves specific issues that the rest of my list can't readily address.

Oddly enough, we're now arguing opposite sides of the original argument. (Which is probably just an effect of you taking the Devil's Advocate position and making me think, irrelevant of the choice I make.) As you so accurately pointed out earlier, the flyers themselves aren't particularly efficient choices for destroying anti-aircraft artillery. The Avenger might be better at it, but that's only relevant if it doesn't get shot down in the first wave of interceptor fire.