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So I've recently gotten back into the game (I painted some 40k SM's in high school but never played) and have started amassing a Necron force. Tomorrow evening I'm all set up to go against a mate who is collecting Tau and we've agreed to a 1500pt limit.

HQ:
Overlord - w/ Mindshackle Scarabs, Phylactery, Resurrection Orb, Sempiternal Weave, Warscythe (290) and a Royal court that includes:
Lord - w/ Resurrection Orb, Sempiternal Weave and Staff of Light (80)
Cryptek - Harbinger of Destruction w/ Eldritch Lance (35)

Elites:
C'tan Shard - w/ Gaze of Death & Transdimensional Thunderbolt (280)
5x Lychguard - w/ Hyperphase Swords and Dispersion Sheilds (225)

Troops:
5x Immortals - w/ Tesla Carbines (85)
20x Warriors (260)
10x Warriors - w/ Ghost Arc, Dedicated Transport (245)

Fast Attack:
7x Scarab Bases (105)

Total = 1490pts

The Plan (as always, subject to change depending on deployment and terrain) is to attach the Overlord to the squad of Lychgurad, the Lord to the larger squad of warriors and the Cryptek to the Immortals. I'd then send the C'Tan down one flank with the scarabs in front of it and the Warriors with the Ghost Arc will take the other flank, followed by the immortals with their crptek. The large squad of warriors will form a phalanx and march right at the enemy supported by the Lord with his res orb and the honour gard (overlord with his lychguards) will advance with cover and try to engage the enemy at the soonest opportunity.
The last time we went against each other it was a 500pt battle where he destroyed my warriors early but then got torn apart as my lychguards and overlord (then with staff of light and only Res Orb and S/weave) moved from unit to unit destroying each per turn. I have a feeling he may have developed tactics to reduce the chances of this happening again.

Now while I have an Anihilation Barge that I am still assembling, some Destroyers on order and I'll be getting some Wraiths next week, all of the models I currently own except three scarab bases are in the list above.
I'm not entirely sure on what my opponent will be fielding but I know he has a lot of battlesuits (and tends to favour them).
Let me know what you think.

DISCLAIMER: I am no expert on Necrons, what I know is just from what I have played against.

Any model that can take a warscythe should take a warscythe, no exceptions. The overlord does not really need Phylactery unless you live in abject fear of losing slay the warlord...but you should be good enough with friends and a 4+ to return to combat. Normally a solar pulse would be good on the cryptek, but all tau suits can see in the dark and markerlights can also negate night fight, so it is of little use. The lance is nice to instakill suits, though.

Your C'tan is insanely expensive for what he can do, and against tau he will be shot down. You are best using him as a rush distraction unit as he will draw fire from every direction. Keep em cheap, shooty if you want to shoot, cheap if you want to run. As is, he is very expensive for a model that will probably just get shot down.(See: Distraction Carnifex)

The lychguard are okay, but slow to get to tau. Good if you can get in close and great with an orb. That said, I would just put your regular lord here and keep the overlord back where it is safe. They should be able to roll any unit they can catch in CC, should they get there. Again, their main job is to draw fire.

Immortals are good, shame you don't have more. Decent place for the lance though, should be a good unit if you can protect them.

The 20 warrior blob will cause headaches for your opponent so long as you can keep them strong and in cover. Tau have lots of Ap4 or less and ignoring cover, but that is a lot of models to dig through. Get em close and have them start shooting like crazy.

Scarabs add to the units rushing up the field, but they may actually get there and are quite dangerous if they do. You need them at a full ten bases so they can get into combat and start eating things alive. Scarabs are incredibly dangerous and often underestimated, and if they die big deal, but they will never run and have a lot of wounds(albeit at t3). Combined with the rest of your army, something should make it in.

Yeah, I'm a bit worried about the C'Tan shard falling early to volley fire but if I can get in close quick enough then I should be able to replenish wounds through the Gaze of Death power. And the Transdimensional Thunderbolt with it's Str 9 Ap 2 Assault1 is about as shooty as it gets for a C'Tan.
I've dropped the Phylactery on the overlord and added another base of scarabs, I figure that between the mob of 20 warriors who'll stand back up regularly (I hope) and the veritable swarm of scarabs, I should present enough targets to allow either the honour guard or C'tan to sneak into close combat where I'll do the most damage.

I know this is the wrong section of the forum but a quick rules clarification: with the C'Tan ranged weapon (TT - mentioned above) being an assult1 and the creature getting 4 attacks per turn, does that mean that it can get off four shots per shooting phase?

Firstly as a rules clarification number of attacks relates only to close combat. For shooting the number following the type, in this case assault is how many dice you roll (1).

Obviously you're limited on the models you can field which is fine, unfortunately you're playing against Tau using some very expensive models which match up very poorly vs them. I can only guess at your opponents list and if he's a decent human being he won't be going all out to smash your first full sized game, but he will have a lot of str 6+ shooting which will (probably) ignore cover and will instant death your scarabs and will almost certainly kill your c'tan which is moving 6" a turn.

If your lychguard were your champs last game he will be focused on them which will give you some breathing room but there are a few things you can do which will make your game a bit more balanced (in your favour), and play to your strengths.

firstly decide if you want a melee or a shooty c'tan. Right now your boy wants to do both which doesn't work as he can't shoot and run...he's losing d6" of movement per turn. Plus the lascannon power you've picked is very expensive compared to say a cryptek. Shooty, take pyreshards and moulder of worlds (both same range makes it easier plus the large blast will intimidate a newer player). Melee you can go with gaze still then probably lord of fire (cheap and tau like fusion guns).
personally if i was using the models you have I would go

Lord, MSS, scythe, weave, res orb (160)
take your lord and play him as counts as varguard obyron (160)
1x eternity cryptek with chronometron
c'tan + gaze and lord of fire (245)

keep everything else the same (-2 warriors in the ghost ark)

adds up to 1499

put the cryptek, the lord, obyron and the lychguard all in 1 monster squad.

Your new revised plan is turn 1 teleport (deep strike rules, but you can start on the board) your killer squad as close as you dare to his army. Your chronometron lets you re-roll a bad scatter so you should be scarily close. you then run up with the rest of your scarabs and c'tan. shoot with some things! Run with your murder squad to spread and make sure your lords are tanking fire.

His turn 1...all his fire goes into your teleporting murder squad. You tank it like a champ remembering you can reroll 1 failed save/reanimation/look out sir as required...your scarabs and c'tan are ignored as he has a threat already in his face.

Turn 2. CHARGE!

Just make sure you are happy for the rules for deep strike, what your chrono lets you reroll (1 per PHASE) and make sure when you do veil in to his army that if you're in rapidfire range of his fire warriors that your saving throws are hot!

Hopefully this should mitigate the appalling speed of your assault element. Generally as you play more games you'll see that any close combat unit moving less than 12" in the move phase will never get into combat.

Good luck!

Using oby is expensive for something like that. He loses cleaving clounterblow from being in a group so the ability that makes him a beast in CC is moot if he attacks with others. If he attacks on his own, he dies in most cases. If you want a fast way to move them close to the tau, then just use a veiltek.

Plus doing that causes you to lose the resorb from your 20 man, with all that tau fire having the resorb in the 20 man is pretty big... between the ark and resorb that will be about all that is keeping him from gunning them all down.

Do you have any clue what he has access to? Will there be an ADL that he is loading up behind. Does he have access to riptides or broadsides? Any info will help, mostly so we know what to send you after.

I like @tumbleweed's concept, but I'm concerned about the effect of volume of fire from the tau, who in rapid fire range are certainly capable (depending on list) of shooting down that unit.

Ideally, you need more crypteks, which, if you built your immortals and lychguards, shouldn't be a problem. You'll have deathmark and praetorian heads left over, plus a ton of arms and staffs and general bits.

Rip the heads off a couple of warriors (possibly the backs as well, cos praetorian backs look great on homebuilt crypteks) then stick on deathmark heads (or praetorians) plus some staff looking thing (make to taste) and you can create crypteks quickly.

If you are willing to do that and create 3 crypteks, set up a unit which has:

3 despairteks, one with a veil and one with a shroud. Use this as the distraction unit because you'll have 3 AP ignores cover flamers which you can put anywhere (because of the veil). You can also Nightmare shroud a different unit to the one you flame to hopefully make a unit fail morale and fall back.

Now, to get the points for this, trim warriors/immortals to suit (maybe 1 scarab base).

To make this work, you'll need to deploy the GA way forward and use it to give the Lych cover in T1. Then, as suggested race forward and hope your distraction works!

@Tumbleweed - I've taken your suggestion and have dropped TT from the C'Tan and replaced with Lord of Fire. While I'm not sure on the exact makeup of my opponents force, I know that he has a stealth suit team where it's leader has a Fusion Cannon.
@MarkCron - I like the idea about the home-made crypteks as I do have the spares I would need but as with the Anihilation Barge, I just don't have the time to assemble the models. I will be following that Idea over the weekend so I should be able to do more next time I play.

And my opponent messaged me this morning asking if he could include some IG allies as he doesn't think he can field a 1500pt force with just Tau. He has only been involved in the hobby a month longer than me and he says that some of his units are still in boxes. I know that he will field some fire warriors, his stealth suit team (which is a favourite of his) and he ownes seven crisis suits as well as Farsight (I think he wants to make a Farsight Enclave). The IG units he wants to take are a heavy weapon unit and some snipers.

So I played my opponent last night and he couldn't field a full 1500 points of Tau so we agreed to dial it back and ran a 1250pt game. This meant that I pretty much dropped the C'Tan shard and left the rest as is. I fared pretty well in turns 1 though 4 with my shooting phase taking out more of his troops than he did mine (after a few stood back up). Unfortunately he dropped his stealth suits in behind my advancing front and proceeded to pull the attention of my Immortals and their Destructek. I did not make a single hit with that damn lance! It was just bad luck with the dice and while I took out a stealth suit early on with the Immortals, the rest of the stealth team wittled away at the squad while I kept missing on my own shooting phase.
In turn five however, he destroyed my massive squad with their lord by hitting the unit with a markerlight and then giving his Riptide the increased BS. After that, my scarabs finally fell to a failed moral save against his Farsight and five bodyguards (though they tied them up for two rounds and even inflicted a few wounds. Turn five also saw him take out my GA and while I got to assult into combat and destroy a fire warrior unit with my Lychguards, it wasn't enough. After that he shot the remainder of the other units to pieces while my honour-guard valiantly charged the Farsight retinue and dealt some significant damage, the game ended on seven with them being the only unit of mine still standing.

Now I know that this isn't the tactics thread and I'll go look there now, but what would anyone suggest from the Necron army list for dealing with a riptide/providing ranged heavy support?
I'm likely going against him again on Saturday and I will post my revised army list up later.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
My New Army List:

HQ:
Overlord - w/ Mindshackle Scarabs, Resurrection Orb, Sempiternal Weave, Staff of Light (310) and a Royal court that includes:
Lord - w/ Resurrection Orb and Staff of Light (65)
Cryptek - Harbinger of Destruction w/ Eldritch Lance (35)
Cryptek - Harbinger of Despair w/Abyssal Staff and Veil of Darkness (60)

Elites:
C'tan Shard - w/ Gaze of Death & Lord of Fire (245)
5x Lychguard - w/ Hyperphase Swords and Dispersion Sheilds (225)

Troops:
5x Immortals - w/ Tesla Carbines (85)
17x Warriors (221)
9x Warriors - w/ Ghost Arc, Dedicated Transport (232)

Fast Attack:
6x Scarab Bases (90)

Heavy Support:
Anihilation Barge - w/Gauss Cannon and Twin-Linked Tesla Destructor (90)

Total = 1498 points

The Plan:
I plan to attach the overlord to the squad of warriors in the GA, the lord to the 17 strong unit of warriors, the destructek to the Immortals and the Veiltek to the Lychguard. I will send the C'Tan along behind the GA down one flank, the AB and the scarabs down the other, have the bolstered unit of 17 take the centre and use the veiltek to deep-strike the lychguard up to the opponents riptide.
The only models I will have in addition to the original post is that I will have assembled the AB and converted up a new cryptek. My Destroyers should be here next week and I will likely replace the lychguard with a unit of five of them, but as of last night's battle, I'm not sure whether to get a box of Wraiths or a Doomsday Arc next.
Let me know what you think.

-TameYeti

Well, it certainly sounds like it was a fun game!

Couple of things:

a) Scarabs are fearless, so can't fail morale checks.
b) with the Destructek, missing is an occupational hazard. However, I wouldn't put a Destructek with Tesla immortals as a rule. This is because Tesla Immortals are generally shooting at a different target (Normally infantry or light armour) and have a shorter range. So, I normally put the Destructeks with warriors. Ideally, you'd have two of them operating as a Royal court and you can put them in a Ghost Ark stolen from the warriors (without a warrior unit).

On your revised list:

a) Resurrection orbs generally are most effective on full squads. In this case, 20 warriors or 10 Immortals. So, I wouldn't put it with the Warriors. Instead, I'd drop a couple of warriors to get Weave and a Warscythe on the O'Lord and would chuck him into the Lych squad with the veil. This will give you a 2+ save to tank shots, plus the orb will give you more value in the Lych squad.

b) Destroyers : I'm finding that Heavy Destroyers are more effective but are more expensive. You'll have to see how you go, but S9AP2 is more likely to take down the riptide.

If you are going to put them in, I would take out the C'Tan and not the Lych. The destroyers will support the Lych better than the C'Tan, because they are quicker.

As a note, if you are thinking of heavy destroyers, don't get the GW heavy destroyer kit - it's horrible - I just combined 2 guns into 1, but I had 2 boxes to play with. I converted 2 of the rest into Destroyer lords using heads and scythes from the Praetorian box. Destroyer Lords are good to lead Destroyer squads (better with wraiths) because they come with a 2+ save.

Re your Plan : I suggest Overlord + Veiltek with Lych, Cryptek with 9 Warriors in GA, Lord with Warriors. If you end up with less than 14 warriors, drop the number to 10, Proxy your Lord as an overlord (Warscythe and Weave) and put that with the Lych squad too.

In terms of your next purchase, I suggest you get another Anni Barge. They are seriously that good. Also, that will give you another overlord model.

Re wraiths, you really need more than 3. That gets expensive. Wraiths are good - but are massive targets so expect to lose some before they get to CC.

I'd actually suggest getting more scarab bases from EBay first, because they are good value for the points. Then I'd buy a couple of Spyders to go with them.

Alternatively, get a Night Scythe.

Doomsday Ark is very situational and the utility drops a lot once it moves - which generally it will have to do. Considering you can get almost 2 Anni Barges for the price, take Anni Barges every time. It might have use in higher point games where you can bubble wrap it with warriors or some such and also have the points to take a stalker.

Re the riptide, I'd ignore it for as long as possible. It is hard to wound and really hard to catch for CC. If you kill his troops, you win.

Edit: to fix oopsies.

Here is what I would do

 tameyeti wrote:

My New Army List:

HQ:
Overlord - w/ Mindshackle Scarabs, Resurrection Orb, Sempiternal Weave, Staff of Light (150)
Royal court that includes:
Lord - w/ Resurrection Orb, Sempiternal Weave and Warscythe (90)
(2x) Cryptek - Harbinger of Destruction w/ Eldritch Lance (70)

Elites:
C'tan Shard - w/ Gaze of Death & Pyreshards (240)
5x Lychguard - w/ Hyperphase Swords and Dispersion Sheilds (225)

Troops:
20x Warriors, dedicated GA (375)
(2x) 5x Warriors - (130)

Fast Attack:
10x Scarab Bases (135)

Heavy Support:
Anihilation Barge - w/Tesla Cannon and Twin-Linked Tesla Destructor (90)

Total = 1515 points (slightly over points, drop a scarab if its a problem)

My Plan:
- Overlord + 20-man blob w/ GA backup march across the board, Res-ing on 4+ and having actual casualties replaced.
- Annibarge zips about shooting things(12" move = always Snapshots. Tesla + 6s to hit = profit)
- Scarabs follow Annibarge. opponent will be focussed on the AV13 thing throwing out more hits than shots it has, allowing your Scarabs to get in close and munch away.
- C'tan Shard follows the Scarabs. May make a stop to sweep clean the Stealth Team, before beating the hell out of the Riptide.
- you have 2 5-man Warrior squads with Lances to sit back and take Potshots, holding objectives
- lychguard + Lord walk with the main blob, running. opponent decides: stop the wall of advancing guns, or stop to blur of S/T5 Power Weapons? These make good interceptors to a Farsight bomb. if you keep them centralised, the bomb will be in assault range the next turn, or it is forced to land in a sub-optimal place.

As for what to do next, Id say a Triarch stalker to TL some of your Firepower. a Squad of Heavy Destroyers or a DDA works well with this, 3x TL "Lascannons" on Jump Pack infantry or a Tl S9AP1 Pieplate. a Monolith works as well when paired with a Stalker, if you don't mind ignoring 95% of the internet that tells you they are crap in 6th and are willing to try it.

EDIT: Colours messing with my head...

colours messing with our heads too! That light blue is less than optimal.

Nice plan though. Not convinced about the 12"moves for the AB all the time though - I see why it would make sense here because it is basically mobile cover for the scarabs etc.

Yeah, I just find they work quite well. Fast moving targets that don't sacrifice that much of their power by moving fast, Its a win-win to me.

And ill change the colour again...

Colour is much better!

I can see where you are coming from - Tesla means that assuming you hit at all you get a min of 3 hits and TL means that you should get at least 1 hit.

Except my dice hate me at the moment

my dice hate me all the time, I usually get 3 S7 hits off