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What load out are people using with Grotesques?

Also, 4 haywires would average out to 2.49. Assuming only three hit(BS of 4 on Scourges).

 Sinful Hero wrote:
A penetrate still causes a hullpoint though, and my table has it listed as a Glance/Pen(so both). I just listed penetrates as seperate by themselves to illustrate where Blasters and Heatlances shine- additional damage over hullpoint stripping. Just Stunning a vehicle for a turn can be all you need to win a game.

My mistake, I didn't see the /Pen part.

I don't think the heat vs haywire will ever be resolved.
A single stun and win the game.
Having 2 scourge survive the return fire and fire again can win the game.
With heat, you're more likely to kill, and to die. With haywire, you can park 15" further away than the scourge with heat, making the chance at a 2nd volley that much higher.
Both are good.
I think the only thing you can say about scourge is that universally, blasters and lances are bad, splinter cannons wound be better serves on venoms. Heat/Haywire are both solid.

I'll post the averages of 2xHeat and Haywire, 2xHaywire and Blaster, and 2xBlaster and Heat in a couple hours if anyone's interested and no one beats me to it.

Got in a game with the Hellion Blob.
Autarch on jetbike leading the blob (with attached haemonculus for deep strike and +1 pain), landed in concert with the Dark Artisan formation (also deep struck).
It let me pour out a ton of fire, and be fairly safe in cover with a 4+ feel no pain.

Opponent tried to charge to thin me out, but the combination of over-watch and striking first at WS5 (drugs), let me absorb is throw-away charge without a loss.

On my turn 3, the hellions and artisans hit 4 units, tying up a huge swath of the opponents force.
Bottom of 3, I hit and ran out, only to pepper the survivors with more poison and hit and run back in for the kills.


Alone, hellions are a turn.
With an Autarch, they are a polished turd.
With a Cronos nearby, they become good. Not great, but Good.
I think a lot of the DE list is hard to theory hammer, because of how the units interact together.
How do you appraise the combat value of a unit with so many outside and random buffs?

If I didn't have Uriel bubbling "fear" and +1 pain in a 12" range from the safety of his stolen eldar wave serpent, the value of the wyches, reavers and hellions would have been far less.

DE just isn't a codex you can evaluate in a vacuum.

I do think that both Heat Lances and Haywire Blasters are good. Different for sure and considerably at that, but they are both good. My personal preference is Heat Lances, but that is affected by my meta.

 HawaiiMatt wrote:
DE just isn't a codex you can evaluate in a vacuum.

A very good point.

Alone, hellions are a turn.
With an Autarch, they are a polished turd.
With a Cronos nearby, they become good. Not great, but Good.
I think a lot of the DE list is hard to theory hammer, because of how the units interact together.
How do you appraise the combat value of a unit with so many outside and random buffs?

If I didn't have Uriel bubbling "fear" and +1 pain in a 12" range from the safety of his stolen eldar wave serpent, the value of the wyches, reavers and hellions would have been far less.

DE just isn't a codex you can evaluate in a vacuum.

But when you consider the cost of this combination, it remains a turd no matter what.

20 Hellions--260 points
Haemonculus with WWP, Pump--115
Autarch with Shard, Jetbike--125
Nearby Chronos--100

600 points minimum for 40 splinter shots, which ends up being about 13 wounds on just about any non-vehicle target. Add in the minimal shooting from the other units.

Compare this to 10 Scourges, which can fire 30 Splinter shots for an average of 10 wounds. Oh, and they only cost 160 points. Yes, the are less durable, but it isn't like the Hellions are the paragon of survivability, particularly for their cost.

While I appreciate trying to make bad units work, sometimes you have to call a spade a spade. Hellions don't provide anything that other units in the dex can't do better. At best, they are a generalist in a specialist army. Furthermore, I don't think that deathstar is the way to go with DE. MSU is, and has always been, their strength.

 JGrand wrote:

Alone, hellions are a turn.
With an Autarch, they are a polished turd.
With a Cronos nearby, they become good. Not great, but Good.
I think a lot of the DE list is hard to theory hammer, because of how the units interact together.
How do you appraise the combat value of a unit with so many outside and random buffs?

If I didn't have Uriel bubbling "fear" and +1 pain in a 12" range from the safety of his stolen eldar wave serpent, the value of the wyches, reavers and hellions would have been far less.

DE just isn't a codex you can evaluate in a vacuum.

But when you consider the cost of this combination, it remains a turd no matter what.

20 Hellions--260 points
Haemonculus with WWP, Pump--115
Autarch with Shard, Jetbike--125
Nearby Chronos--100

600 points minimum for 40 splinter shots, which ends up being about 13 wounds on just about any non-vehicle target. Add in the minimal shooting from the other units.

Compare this to 10 Scourges, which can fire 30 Splinter shots for an average of 10 wounds. Oh, and they only cost 160 points. Yes, the are less durable, but it isn't like the Hellions are the paragon of survivability, particularly for their cost.

While I appreciate trying to make bad units work, sometimes you have to call a spade a spade. Hellions don't provide anything that other units in the dex can't do better. At best, they are a generalist in a specialist army. Furthermore, I don't think that deathstar is the way to go with DE. MSU is, and has always been, their strength.

Lol, for 600 points you could have the 5 Talos formation, which fire 30 TL Splinter shots. And are more durable. Way more durable.

Agree about MSU though

Eemmm. care to explain this unit?

The hellions can DS on their own, and still fire 40 splinter shots on their own.

Why are the Haemy, Autarch or Cronos even there? what do they ADD to the unit?




Anyways, back to scourges and their weapon choice.

I can't help but feeling that as haywire blasters are not getting enough hull points to kill a simple rhino on their own, you might as well got for the heat lance path and take advantage of the superior stopping power.

 BoomWolf wrote:


Anyways, back to scourges and their weapon choice.

I can't help but feeling that as haywire blasters are not getting enough hull points to kill a simple rhino on their own, you might as well got for the heat lance path and take advantage of the superior stopping power.

There is no "on their own". It's simply not helpful to discuss units in isolation like this. The army is perfectly capable of putting damage on a rhino before or after the scourges shoot.

 JGrand wrote:

Furthermore, I don't think that deathstar is the way to go with DE. MSU is, and has always been, their strength.

You can do both, as Deathstars are usually supported by MSU. Grotesques make for a very resilient deathstar base, and infiltrating them next to your opponent forces them to deal with the threat. All the heavy weapons that would normally be pointed towards your paper planes are forced into the Grotesques for 2 turns, while you do what you do with the rest. T5 FnP in cover is a hard unit to move, and even suffering casualties is just going to make it more likely for them to RAAAAAAMMMMPPAAAAAAGEEEEE! when they get to their target. Mostly though, the unit is relatively inexpensive (as Deathstars go) and takes a lot of pressure off the rest of your army.

Anywho, deathstars are definitely doable and possibly even competitive in the DE book. MSU will continue to be good, but there are some legit deathstars in the mix to.

@BoomWolf- Firstly, if you're using your scourges to take out rhinos you've either killed everything else (and made your points back) or your doing it wrong. The biggest advantage of haywire is that 5/6 times it hits it strips a hulpoint (before saves obviously) regardless of AV. Haywire is to glance out high AV targets that would otherwise eat a ton of your AT. Opening a rhino isn't something you need to dedicate a slot to, killing IK's/LR/WS is.

The hellion blob isn't about shooting, it's about the combat. It hits almost as hard as reavers, and it takes a charge way better than reavers.
It's stupidly faster than the Talos formation, and it's likely to land on turn 2 exactly where you want it to land.
It outshoots the BS3 talos.

If you want monstrous and hard to kill, take Dark Artisan(s).
5 talos that get a free 6" move vs 2 Talos, 2 Cronos, and 2 Haemonculus which can land exactly where you want them. (keep in mind, these guys get +1 WS +1 Init).
Hellions kill things that would bog down the Talos/Cronos.

You can do both, as Deathstars are usually supported by MSU. Grotesques make for a very resilient deathstar base, and infiltrating them next to your opponent forces them to deal with the threat. All the heavy weapons that would normally be pointed towards your paper planes are forced into the Grotesques for 2 turns, while you do what you do with the rest. T5 FnP in cover is a hard unit to move, and even suffering casualties is just going to make it more likely for them to RAAAAAAMMMMPPAAAAAAGEEEEE! when they get to their target. Mostly though, the unit is relatively inexpensive (as Deathstars go) and takes a lot of pressure off the rest of your army.

Perhaps, but you have to consider that the unit doesn't do anything extremely well except to survive. While 10 Grotesques is only 350 points, a delivery system via a Webway Portal is necessary. So is some way to make them Fearless. Finally, reserve manipulation is essential, as one cannot drop 500+ points into a unit that may not arrive until turn four (and then assault at turn five at the earliest).

Anywho, deathstars are definitely doable and possibly even competitive in the DE book. MSU will continue to be good, but there are some legit deathstars in the mix to.

Definitely doable. I'm just not sure about competitive. Grotesques are the main candidate, and they are essentially useless in an Imperial Knight world. What else would you consider trying to make into a deatstar?

I still don't understand the WHY of that setup. they don't need pinpoint DS and its more effiecent to get more squads than to bring an autharch

Nor at all how the cronos is even involved, at all, at the calculation there.

While I agree with everything you said, there's just one thing and that's "DE shouldn't try to Deathstar" when we had one of the most dominant death stars of 6th in our last dex



So many way, basically thinking I'm going to run 5-6 obsec Venoms, 1 squad of Scourges for nuking some real heavy AT, and just 4-5 squads of 9 Reavers, maybe supported by a bomber for some crowd control. Seems like a good way to clear out blobs and armour saves, the 2 things splinter weaponry doesn't do all that well against, not sure how relevant the Ap2 is gonna be with all those Reavers and being that taking implosion missiles is the only real reason to take a bomber, I might just do a jet instead. Any thoughts.

 JGrand wrote:

You can do both, as Deathstars are usually supported by MSU. Grotesques make for a very resilient deathstar base, and infiltrating them next to your opponent forces them to deal with the threat. All the heavy weapons that would normally be pointed towards your paper planes are forced into the Grotesques for 2 turns, while you do what you do with the rest. T5 FnP in cover is a hard unit to move, and even suffering casualties is just going to make it more likely for them to RAAAAAAMMMMPPAAAAAAGEEEEE! when they get to their target. Mostly though, the unit is relatively inexpensive (as Deathstars go) and takes a lot of pressure off the rest of your army.

Perhaps, but you have to consider that the unit doesn't do anything extremely well except to survive. While 10 Grotesques is only 350 points, a delivery system via a Webway Portal is necessary. So is some way to make them Fearless. Finally, reserve manipulation is essential, as one cannot drop 500+ points into a unit that may not arrive until turn four (and then assault at turn five at the earliest).

Anywho, deathstars are definitely doable and possibly even competitive in the DE book. MSU will continue to be good, but there are some legit deathstars in the mix to.

Definitely doable. I'm just not sure about competitive. Grotesques are the main candidate, and they are essentially useless in an Imperial Knight world. What else would you consider trying to make into a deatstar?

Wasn't talking about DS'ng them, was talking about actually infiltrating. I completely agree, that many points in a unit needs to start earning its keep immediately. Ally in Karandras or Iliac for the infiltrate. Iliac is cheaper and has shrouded, but he's Iliac so... Karandras gives you stealth, move through cover, 2+ armor, Str 8 AP2 at initiative and EW to tank Strength 10 shots with. He's super expensive and a legit beat stick himself, so no need to go all out with the grot squad. Take them from the grotesquerie formation to get extra bonuses and their own fearless (letting Karandras split off and do his thang). Really spit balling this here, but you get the idea. Could do the same thing w/out Karandras and just pray for the infiltrate WL trait, but I wouldn't.

Personally I'm doing Reaverstar. I run CWE primary, so two farseers in a squad of 12 reavers w/caltrops. Farseers let you tailor your Deathstar to the threat without changing your army list. Only thing the reavers miss out on to the seer council of old is durability, and even then not by a lot. 3+ cover base, Shrouding/invis/Fortune make them far more resilient than they should be. Serpent spam/Tau are the biggest threat, but you can fish for forewarning/fortune here as well as have your farseers out front to tank AP4 and up.

If your running DE primary, just run more reavers with a farseer/autarch. I'd go Autarch and just use the reavers to get him places, when the unit gets shot up just move the autarch to a different reaver unit.

You don't need a webway portal to deliver Grotesques, in fact why bother?

You realize you can take a 65 point Raider, leave it in reserve and with Aerosails get into the opponents deployment zone or really anywhere on the board.

Raiders a assault vehicle with a 36 inch move. Why risk a Deep Strike or waist the points. When you have that much of a move and ignore pretty much everything with that movement.

That's anywhere.

No need to deep strike, they're not going to charge when they arrive anyway.

 Sinful Hero wrote:
Assume these are four shot at BS4.
AV...............10......11.......12......13......14
4xHaywire Blaster
Hullpoints...2.49...2.49...2.49...2.49...2.49
Pens...........0.48...0.48...0.48...0.48...0.48
4xBlaster
Hullpoints...2.49...1.98...1.50...1.50...1.50
Pens...........1.98...1.50...0.99...0.99...0.99
4xHeatlance(Inside Melta)
Hullpoints...2.73...2.58...2.16...2.16...2.16
Pens...........2.58...2.16...1.74...1.74...1.74
4xHeatlances(Outside Melta)
Hullpoints...1.50...0.99...0.48...0.48...0.48
Pens...........0.99...0.48...0.00...0.00...0.00
2xHaywire Blaster2xBlaster
Hullpoints...2.50...2.25...2.00...2.00...2.00
Pens...........1.25...1.00...0.75...0.75...0.75
2xHaywire Blaster2xHeatlance(Inside Melta)
Hullpoints...2.63...2.54...2.33...2.33...2.33
Pens...........1.54...1.33...0.92...0.92...0.92
2xHaywire Blaster2xHeatlance(Outside Melta)
Hullpoints...2.04...1.75...1.50...1.50...1.50
Pens...........0.75...0.50...0.25...0.25...0.25
2xBlaster2xHeatlance(Inside Melta)
Hullpoints...2.63...2.29...1.83...1.83...1.83
Pens...........2.29...1.83...1.50...1.50...1.50
2xBlaster2xHeatlance(Outside Melta)
Hullpoints...2.00...1.50...1.00...1.00...1.00
Pens...........1.50...1.00...0.50...0.50...0.50
Note these are just averages. It may not represent the game board, but it does compare the weapon loadouts to each other, and their strengths and weaknesses.

Hollismason wrote:
You don't need a webway portal to deliver Grotesques, in fact why bother?

You realize you can take a 65 point Raider, leave it in reserve and with Aerosails get into the opponents deployment zone or really anywhere on the board.

Raiders a assault vehicle with a 36 inch move. Why risk a Deep Strike or waist the points. When you have that much of a move and ignore pretty much everything with that movement.

That's anywhere.

No need to deep strike, they're not going to charge when they arrive anyway.

Can be done either way. The WWP makes sense in that you're going to need an IC to babysit them anyway (LD 3). So you can bring 4+IC in a raider for 265 (barebones archon), or 5 + Archon/WWP for 270. The biggest difference is how many grotesques you bring in. If you were wanting more than 4 then the WWP is definitely the route to go as the 2 raiders you would need add up to ~3 more grotesques, and you'd need another IC for the second unit too.

4 Groqs in a raider is perfectly good way to run it if you're just doing one smallish squad. For anymore the WWP is the way to go.

 HawaiiMatt wrote:

It's stupidly faster than the Talos formation, and it's likely to land on turn 2 exactly where you want it to land.
It outshoots the BS3 talos.

Talos splintercannons are twinlinked, which will outshoot the hellions. Also much better at shooting at FMC.

 Dash2021 wrote:

Hollismason wrote:
You don't need a webway portal to deliver Grotesques, in fact why bother?

You realize you can take a 65 point Raider, leave it in reserve and with Aerosails get into the opponents deployment zone or really anywhere on the board.

Raiders a assault vehicle with a 36 inch move. Why risk a Deep Strike or waist the points. When you have that much of a move and ignore pretty much everything with that movement.

That's anywhere.

No need to deep strike, they're not going to charge when they arrive anyway.

Can be done either way. The WWP makes sense in that you're going to need an IC to babysit them anyway (LD 3). So you can bring 4+IC in a raider for 265 (barebones archon), or 5 + Archon/WWP for 270. The biggest difference is how many grotesques you bring in. If you were wanting more than 4 then the WWP is definitely the route to go as the 2 raiders you would need add up to ~3 more grotesques, and you'd need another IC for the second unit too.

4 Groqs in a raider is perfectly good way to run it if you're just doing one smallish squad. For anymore the WWP is the way to go.

Why would you need more than 5 at time. Use the Coven formation, they'll be better than normal, plus they'll come in with fear and fearless if you put a Haemy in there or get them near someone that has it.They'll be charging turn 3 regardless. If you go second, which you should if you can , Turn 3 will be your opponents turn and they'll be fearless.Why would you need more than 5?I mean you could do a multi unit charge but then you are not going to get it the first turn that you charge, subsequent turns you would if you have a 10 man squad.

Basically why would you not take formations from the Coven Detachment?

Grotesquire and the Corspethief Claw are meant to be together almost, with the fact you got the Cronos , Talos and the Haemy can have a WWP.

The Haemonoculus or Urien ( I don't know why you would not take him other than he doesn't come with a WWP)

X5 Grotesques w/ Abberation
Raider w/ Nightshields and Aerosails

X4 Grotesques w/ Abberation
Raider w/ Nightshields and Aerosails

Urien ( who can go with a 3 man squad of Incubi)


Total 625

1 Haemy w/ WWP and whatever
Talos
Chronos

350ish

That's all you need, no one can deal with that gak in their face.

Plus, if you deep strike Grotesques, then you lose the major benefit of taking a assault vehicle and getting the 12 inch move.

This is what can happen with Grotesques Deep striking

Deep Strikes Grotesques
Opponent Runs away
or
Opponent shoots them
or
Opponent Shoots them and Runs away.

The Raider gives them mobility and extra protection that first time they come in.

It's also a crazy good formation for Eldar specifically as they have a good amount of weapons that have pinning and they get access to Psychic Shriek and Terrify.

Dark Eldar tip:

Turn four go to ground a whole lot. Because turn 5 you get fearless and everyone stands up and acts as normal.

 Exergy wrote:

 HawaiiMatt wrote:

It's stupidly faster than the Talos formation, and it's likely to land on turn 2 exactly where you want it to land.
It outshoots the BS3 talos.

Talos splintercannons are twinlinked, which will outshoot the hellions. Also much better at shooting at FMC.

Except it doesn't. Unit of 5 gets 30 shots, hitting on 4+ with re-roll. 22.5 hits on average.
Unit of 20 hellions gets 40 shots, hitting on 3+, 26.66 hits on average.
If the Talos fire on a FMC, they aren't charging anything, which is kind of a huge waste of points.
Vs flyers, Talos score 9.16 hits, Hellions score 6.66 hits. Or, the other way to look at it, Talos do 1.52 wounds, Hellions do 1.11 wounds to 3+ armor flyers, ie, they both suck at taking on FMC.

I've been kicking around the idea of WWP jet bikes. You can land with blasters/lances within 9" of a prime target, slag it, then use the 2D6" assault move to spread out and pull back.
You get a good round of shooting in before you need to jink, and you're arriving turn 2 with 5+ FnP (if you use haemonculus for delivery).
If you support correctly, on the following turn, you can have the haemonculus join whatever needs the pain.
For eldar troops, I'd run 10 avengers in a raider with night shields. 20 shuriken shots at 18" is a pretty good gun boat. Frees up the avengers wave serps to act as a battle tank.

You won't get to pull back any relevant distance, as the WWP carrier got no thrust move, and you need to keep coherency.

 BoomWolf wrote:
You won't get to pull back any relevant distance, as the WWP carrier got no thrust move, and you need to keep coherency.

Conga line that bastich... in fact, go Archon and make your opponent shoot at the 2++ saves.

 BoomWolf wrote:
You won't get to pull back any relevant distance, as the WWP carrier got no thrust move, and you need to keep coherency.

13 flying bases put down first, with 25mm base last does put the unit back a little bit. I'll have to measure it out, but I think you can pull back effectively a little over ~4 inches.
(13 bases is the 12 reavers, and the autarch/farseer on jetbike, the 25mm would be the WWP carrier).

-Matt

Whats with this autarch being pushed everywhere?
Just to arrive a bit sooner more reliably you are spending SO many points x_x

He's not that expensive for what he does.

He's great with Reavers, gives them some extra punch. Plus he comes with Assault Grenades and can be put in any squad and keep up with access to Jump Pack, Jetbike etc..

110 is a buy in for a Autarch w/ Jetbike, Banshee Mask, Laser Lance , and Fusion Gun.

That's pretty good.


Kind of curious why people who take bare bone Archons w/ Webway don't just take a Succubus for 15 points more. Succubus get's access to WWP.

 BoomWolf wrote:
Whats with this autarch being pushed everywhere?
Just to arrive a bit sooner more reliably you are spending SO many points x_x

Jetbike Autarch is 85 pts. Mandatory Troops choice in the Allied Detachment, let's say 3x unupgraded Windrider Jetbikes, is 51 pts. 136 pts. total. It's also safe to say that the Autarch's Reserve roll manipulation will benefit more than just the unit of Reavers.

For instance, I intend to use 3 Flyers in my primary list. I've been considering replacing the nerfed Ravagers with a Jetbike Autarch and something useful to ensure the Flyers arrive when I want them.