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Hey guys! I took a full Puretide Council (Shadowsun+Farsight+Bodyguard combo) in a 2500pts local tournament yesterday. It. Was. Epic.

Here is my list

Farsight
Shadowsun

Crisis (C&CN, SS, PTE, VRT, PosRe, DC, NSJ)
Crisis Suit 2x (2x Plasma, TL)
Crisis Suit 2x (2x Fusion, TL)
Crisis Suit (CIB, MP, TL)
Crisis suit (2x MP, TL)
13x Gun Drones

Stealth Suit 6x (Ui, 2x Fusion/TL, Homing, PosRe, ML, 2x Gun Drones)
Stealth Suit 6x (Ui, 2x Fusion/TL, Homing, PosRe, ML, 2x Gun Drones)

Kroot 5x10

Pathfinder 2x5
Gundrones 10x

Hammerhead (LS, Sub, SMS, DP)
Hammerhead (Sub, SMS, DP, BSF)
Hammerhead (Sub, SMS, DP, BSF)


This is a trumped up 1500pt list. I was told we only got one FOC, but everyone else showed up with 2. This was also limited by the models I have (hence no riptides), and I went with kroot as troops because (without an ethereal) there didn't seem to be a real place for Firewarriors. The main point of this army was to see how well the Puretide Council would do against some competitive armies (there are quite a few hardcore people at this store).

Game 1: Chaos Space Marines
His List (approximately)

Chaos Lord (MoN, termi armor, power axe)
Demon Prince (MoN, Wings, Black Mace)

Plague Marines 3x8 (2x Plasma, Powerfist)
Rhino 3x (dirge caster)

Heldrake 2x (baleflamer)

Havocs 5x (4x flak ML)
Obliterators 3x (MoN)
Obliterators 2x (MoN)

Aegis Defence Line (Quad Turret)

Scenario: Relic
Deployment: Dawn of War

Note the flyers. Note the lack of sky fire in my list. I aint worried though, flyers don't win games.

He gets first (this would become a pattern) and deploys pretty centrally, ready to move on the objective, leaving one side open. I have little to no idea just how much damage Heldrakes could do, so i kept the council off the table, outflanking along with 2x Kroot and pathfinders. Gun drones deepstrike. The stealth suits (with a back up unit of kroot each) deployed on either edge, one all the way in his deployment zone on the side he left open, another kroot team infiltrates into the building in my DZ in front of the objective. Hammerheads spread out in my backfield.

He wastes some shots at hammerheads first turn, second turn his Heldrakes come in, fry some stealth drones and a couple suits. Whatever, who cares, they are just there for the relay. He gets first blood off the demon prince killing some kroot. I pop 2 rhinos my first turn, second turn the Council arrives, comes in from his board edge, throws up monster hunter and shoots his prince off the table while popping the last rhino. Next turn they take out a squad of marines and weaken another, who Farsight engages in combat (they stay tied up).

We play 4 turns (slowish game, ran out of time) and I shoot the squad he has camping the relic in the middle off the map and kill his warlord and it finishes 2-1 in my favor (linebreaker/warlord kill for me and firstblood for him). Another turn or 2 and I would have wiped him off the table.

Game 2: Necrons
His List:

Special Lord (grants and takes away special rules)
Destroyer Lord
Lord (Res Orb)

Warriors 3x15
Night Scythe 3x
Immortals 2x10

Deathmarks 10x
Wraiths 6x

Stalker (blast weapon)
Annihilation Barge 2x


Scenario: Scouring
Deployment: Vanguard Strike

I get lucky and have a both 3 pt and the 4 pt objective, which i place deep in my DZ. He puts a 2 pt on each corner of his DZ and a 1 in the middle. He gets first, deploys fairly evenly near the front of his deployment zone, hoping to get a good alpha strike of 24'' fire power. I deploy just the hammerheads and pathfinders in my DZ, fairly far back. I infiltrate one set of stealth suits near my long edge, and a kroot unit stretched out in front of the Puretide Council in the no-mans-land corner on his side.

The Council weathers almost all of his army's shooting while his destroyer lord and wraiths streak towards my "backfield". The Council kills the the deathmarks, Longstrike kills the stalker (1 shot KO, it was beautiful). Second turn all 3 of his flyers come in, 1 unloads its warriors next to the Council (kills some drones), the others jet across the board and deposit their payloads near the objectives, snap shots killing most of the pathfinders. In my turn the Council and some kroot destroy the nearby warriors and a barge. In the last 2 turns, his scarabs swept the pathfinders, a stealth squad, and a hammerhead from my backfield before being brought down by the drones and a stealth team (instakilling with fusions helped, but he just rolled bad saves for his lord). I killed every single warrior on the field with hammerheads, kroot, and the Council. I took out one of the immortal squads out as well.

In the end, he had his lord, one squad of immortals, and his flyers left at the end of the game. He got 3 points for a 1 pt objective and 2 of my FA, I got 13 for all his FA, first blood, line breaker, and 3 objectives. This guy dropped out of the tournament after this game, he had thought it would be an easy win and was raging a lil bit.

Game 3: Chaos Daemons
His List:

Bloodthirster (2x Random Powers)
Bloodthirster (2x Random Powers)
Bloodthirster (2x Random Powers)
Bloodthirster (2x Random Powers)

Bloodletters 4x10

Daemon Prince (Random Power, Wings)
Daemon Prince (Random Power, Wings)
Daemon Prince (Random Power, Wings)
Daemon Prince (Wings)

Mission: Big Guns Never Tire
Deployment: Dawn of War

Table 1, here we go. This game is where my newness to the edition showed, and it made the game worthless from a tactical perspective but still had a few interesting outcomes for the Puretide Council. This guy apparently hadn't seen the FAQ for his army that says FMCs that fail a grounding test can be shot at normally, and I wasn't aware of the fix either and the rulebook made the RAW seem to keep them "swooping but assaultable" when it should knock them to gliding. So he had 8x T5/6 3+/5++ (some with 4+ FNP) FMCs flying around 24'' a turn that I could only snap shoot.

He took out almost everything on the table his second turn, then the Council came in. I made kroot loops around the unit near one board edge and decided to do a final stand, because there was no way I could beat this ridiculous (and apparently rule-bending) army.

In 3 turns of shooting, the Puretide Council and about 20 Kroot killed 3 Bloodthirsters with sheer weight of rerollable to hit AND to wound dice (with monster hunter). Not too bad considering the ridiculous misinterpretation of the rules, but I still lost hard (3-12, First Blood+HS kill from a very lucky roll that railgunned a flying Daemon Prince turn 1 and line breaker vs all 3 objectives and all 3 hammerheads).

I came in 3rd (only out of a dozen or so), despite the crushing defeat in game 3.

Take away:
The Puretide Council is amazing, carrying a suboptimal, model limited army through fights against tough and prototypical armies. It can destroy everything it touches. Every part of the unit is key to its effectiveness, but the drones really shined in this tournament. 26 twin linked 5-5 shots, ignoring cover, with access to tank/monster hunter, with 2+ cover saves when in cover. Just forces a ton of saves and a ton of durability. Put them around and behind Shadowsun/Farsight and put them out in front of the team, get the drones on the edge of some cover and laugh off shooting with automatic LOS being put on 2+ cover saves.

This unit is is not a blunt tool like most deathstars though, it will require practice and good judgement to get peak effectiveness out of it. I was constantly overkilling things (I didn't have to roll anything past drones on the Demon Prince in the first game, the rest was wasted shots with other possible targets in range). Deployment itself will be tricky, especially at higher point levels where Alpha Strikes and super fast assault deathstars (the Council is tough but is still vulnerable to certain units) become more and more numerous/common. Have to get creative with Outflank or Deepstrike to make sure you get the first word against those threats.

Also, Outflanking with Positional relays is awesome, especially since the wording says nothing about needing to be on the table a turn, so just deploy the PosRe unit within 6'' of the back edge before the Council and walk on from his side of the board, ready to tear stuff up. I was tentative in these games, I probably could have played them a little more aggressively and deployed first turn (like I did against the Necrons).

The Council also has great synergy with Kroot. Infiltrate together to make mobile cover lines (essential to withstand IG levels of firepower if you deploy first) or assault blocking kroot loops (probably an essential tactic against landraider terminators). I used bare, minimum units because, in the words of my friend Cyclonus, "Their best protection is not being worth shooting at: are you going to shoot these worthless, unarmored kroot or the 1000 point Deathstar?"

Overall, fun games and another successful field test of the Puretide Council, even at an unfavorable point value and a bit of rule mix up near the end. After all the number crunching and testing, I genuinely think this unit may be one of the most competitive aspects of our codex. Hope yall enjoyed the read and lemme know what you think!

Yeah for 1000-pt deathstars?

Interesting to see someone actually bring one to a tournament. Your daemons opponent's army was just brutal.

It behaves very differently from most Deathstars because of its range, mobility (3d6 assault move makes this unit very fast when it needs to be), and ability to shoot multiple targets. It is more like several separate units that share special rules and ablative wounds. This lets it act as a central part of the army, rather than a "fire and forget" melee unit which most deathstars are.

And yeah, the Daemon army was okay, but not nearly as scary if we had been playing according to the real rules. I took down half of it with the Council even only hitting on 6's, I bet I could have made it a very close game if we'd been doing things the correct way (where the grounding tests forced by my kroot and stealth suits would have let the Council and hammerheads shoot things.

Cheating to win, its like playing a 3.5e Chaos Marine player all over again. lol

Nice list, although I find it hard to believe both the tourney organiser and a dozen players playing against an all FMC list all didn't know how grounding tests worked, or that the player running them didn't bother to find out.






Automatically Appended Next Post:
Stealth suits though.

Asmodai Asmodean wrote:
Nice list, although I find it hard to believe both the tourney organiser and a dozen players playing against an all FMC list all didn't know how grounding tests worked, or that the player running them didn't bother to find out.

Yeah, that stuck out to me too. It would make sense for a monstrous creature player to know how to use his flying MC's. Seeing as how he didn't, one might speculate that there was some shenanigans involved...

Thanks for the reports, OP. I enjoyed reading them.

Or he could just be new to 6th and unaware of the FAQ. I find that in most tournaments, unless the TO is actually paying attention to the game itself, no one will know of the rules mistakes unless one of the participants brings it up to the attention of the TO. Mistakes like that happen more often than you think.