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Through all the tournaments in 40k there are countless strong lists that have been created with various armies. What are strong builds that you guys have found? I would like to know what lists and units you guys run with your armies at any or all point levels. All configurations are welcome!

For sm my favorite is:

HQ: MotF

Elites: 3 ironclads in pods

Troops: 3 tac squads of your flavor in pods

Heavy support: 3 more ironclads in pods

AV 13 spam rocks!

Laughingtarch, Warp Spiders, Swooping Hawks, Wraithknight and 3 Warwalkers armed with dual scatterlasers, plus 2x3 bikes for troops. That's my core.

Its a newer one, but I have had amazing (not OP OMG Broken, incidentally) success running the Grey Knights with Space Wolf allies, so I can Drop-Pod in a combat-squad of ten Purifiers.

It legitimately makes an incredible alpha-strike against many armies, with two Cleansing Flames, plus four Incinerators all doing work on forces still likely bunched up in deployment. Against the right targets it can absolutely decimate a line, and if the Purifiers came from a Nemesis Strike Force they even get to run after all is said and done to spread out a little bit.

With good positioning/generalship and only modest luck, these guys will do WORK.

Meta supposed to be the objectively powerful armies, not your favorite ones.

Grey Knights
Nemesis Strike Force
With Librarians (for invisibility) with Terminator Balls
2 Dreadknights
Bunker with Comm Relay

Mix and match interceptors / purifiers. It's very in your face and can deep strike everyone except for purifiers and whatever unit you have manning the comms relay.

Hmmmmmm I like what I see . There seems to be quite a few GK configurations which is interesting. Awesome lists so far!

I LOVE my Grey Knights... but to be fair, there is really only the one build.

Tiggy + Cents + Drago can be a very potent deathstar, but in terms of GK builds... 2 Dreadknights, and some allied way to drop in Purifiers is really the only thing, thus far, that I would say impacted the "meta".

Plenty of other good options mind you... but that is the GREAT one.

My Necrons are
-Overlord on CCB
-D-Lord with wraiths
-Warriors in Night Scythes
-Warriors in a Ghost Ark
-Deathmarks by themselves or in Night Scythe with Despairtek
-Annihilation Barges
-Scarabs

I play with the same gaming group every week so we have our own meta. We are all competitive tournament players and always are looking for the newest thing.

One of us in particular runs AM/IG and always brings:
40 Infantry blobs + Priest
40 Infantry blobs + Priest
Sometimes they are conscripts sometimes just regular infantry but they are ALWAYS annoying to play against.

The rest of his list is usually a solo Knight (blobbed out to avoid meltas), 2 vendettas, 2 Wyverns, and the rest he plays around with.

Every week I get better at how to play around those fearless blobs, but every week he gets a little better at using it. Either way they come down to great games.

The rest of the gaming group changes their armies weekly. Chaos/Demons list, Tau list, Daemon hordes, Necrons flyers, etc, etc. The only thing we don't have is an Eldar player but we see enough of those when we go out to our LGS and tournaments.

acidlemon wrote:
Through all the tournaments in 40k there are countless strong lists that have been created with various armies. What are strong builds that you guys have found? I would like to know what lists and units you guys run with your armies at any or all point levels. All configurations are welcome!

The power army in our area is definitely still Tzeentch Flying Monsters. There isn't another list that puts the scare in me like those do.

Anything that's invisible instantly becomes a ridiculous threat. So Be'Lakor and the Forge World Space Marine guy are both serious threats.

The Culexis Assassin is a god answer

In my area, Tau still rule sadly (I play Chaos, and while I nearly always win under 1000pts, I always draw or lose over 1500pts).
Space Marines and Eldar sometimes beat them, but a few cheesed out Tau builds kill everything.
Any tips on beating competitive Tau?

My meta is full of Grey Knight players all taking the same list (there are like 3 of them) and they dominate most of the games.

SGTPozy wrote:
My meta is full of Grey Knight players all taking the same list (there are like 3 of them)

You have my deepest sympathies! That sounds boring beyond words...

I see two things a lot:

List built around Wave Serpents protected by Wraithknights

Grav Centurions with other stuff around them

Okay. Jetseer, two Serpents with FDs, two Serpents with DAs, one Serpent wit Guardians, three Warwalkers with dual scatterlasers, Wraihtknight.

 Araenion wrote:
Laughingtarch, Warp Spiders, Swooping Hawks, Wraithknight and 3 Warwalkers armed with dual scatterlasers, plus 2x3 bikes for troops. That's my core.

you dont find that the vehicle formations (three walkers) are to easy to destroy. I own 6 walkers and 4 FW hornets that i use on a regular basis, im constantly finding them hard to keep alive as things like a single hive tyrant with 12 s6 twin linked shots can kill the entire squad in one go. I realize that you shoot and run with the walkers, but i find them way to brittle.

GK: Two Librarians, four times five Purifiers in Rhinos, two small Termie squads, and two to three Dreadknights.

I've been seeing GK/IH do well.

GK:
Libby
10 Purifiers
5 Strikers
5 Strikers
10 Interceptors
2 DKs
Draigo

IH:
Smashfether (no bike)
5 Tac marines /Drop Pod
Centurion Devastator Squad

Give the drop pod to the Purifiers for an alpha strike, send the Cents with Draigo, Smashfether, and the libby as a deathstar, and the troops/DKs as a second line.

stopcallingmechief wrote:
you dont find that the vehicle formations (three walkers) are to easy to destroy. I own 6 walkers and 4 FW hornets that i use on a regular basis, im constantly finding them hard to keep alive as things like a single hive tyrant with 12 s6 twin linked shots can kill the entire squad in one go. I realize that you shoot and run with the walkers, but i find them way to brittle.

Well, first of all, Eldar War walker was my first 40k figure, that soon grew into a squad and I've been using it in every battle ever since. So I've hundreds of hours of experience playing with them. I've seen very, very good Eldar players fail to use them correctly. I often use them incorrectly, even with all that experience. All it takes is one mistake and the whole squad dies, full stop.

Fortunately, they have several deployment tricks that can make it very hard for your opponent to kill them. Don't forget Scout and especially Outflank. Battle-focus (with Fleet!) is just gravy. They're crazy adaptable units, you just need to know how to approach using them based on your opponent's army composition. And you only learn that through practice.

 TranSpyre wrote:
Give the drop pod to the Purifiers for an alpha strike

That's illegal.
Can't start a squad in another squads dedicated transport.

send the Cents with Draigo, Smashfether, and the libby as a deathstar,

A very slow walking Deathstar. Can't see that doing much.

Duly noted about the drop pod. I have some people to "talk" to now.

As to the Draigostar, Draigo knows Gate of Infinity. He can port them around the battlefield.

If you swapped your IH allies for Space Wolves, you could do it. They can take drop pods as a single Fast Attack force.
Non-dedicated, so battle brothers can use them.
Standard Space Marines however don't have this option.

 Talon of Anathrax wrote:
In my area, Tau still rule sadly (I play Chaos, and while I nearly always win under 1000pts, I always draw or lose over 1500pts).
Space Marines and Eldar sometimes beat them, but a few cheesed out Tau builds kill everything.
Any tips on beating competitive Tau?

Well I am an expert Tau General. I would tell you that the NUMBER one thing NOT to do against Tau is to value any turn one shooting you have against them. You need to advance en masse and say the hell with shooting. What you give up in the few casualties of note you might have caused are more than made up for by the sudden and uncomfortable proximity of the enemy.

All Tau share this in common. They crumble in the late game and if you rob them of their opportunities in the early game, the clock works against them.

A good Tau General has some ways to overcome this, but I will tell you the truth, I almost never see lists that are actually built to DO it. Most Tau Generals are so confident in their firepower superiority that they simply dont bother with a lot of the ways to handle that kind of aggression.

As a Chaos general, I have a Night Lords list and it easily manages to swamp Tau with way too many targets all at once. It would be quite an accomplishment for them to manage it. So that list, which is detailed on my blog, does very well against Tau and Eldar both. The more Wave Spam they have, the better my list likes it, because that usually means Im basically dealing mostly with Hulls and not with anything that can hurt me once I'm on top of them.

In any event, As for Tau, the key is to build the Chaos list with things that can get there turn two. Deep Strikers, Outflankers (Steeds of Slaanesh for the Chaos Lord are very useful, as are Nurgle Raptors and so on).

I also prefer Nurgle for the most part because the one thing you really do benefit a lot from is toughness, when facing Tau.

Dunno if that helps but there ya go.

I have been tromping around with a deamon army, winning more tournaments then not since 7th ED came out. FMC are the gak. Our meta is owned by daemons and necrons at the moment. though we have a few good players that do well with whatever they bring.

And about chaos vs tau, Litterally take 2-3 daemon princes with full telepathy rolls. (Belakor is god here) That will just tromp all over those silly fish... works every time. Screamer stars with 2++ rerollable also shuts them down... just plop in right in front of their firebase and start summoning daemonettes.

OneMeanDuck wrote:
I have been tromping around with a deamon army, winning more tournaments then not since 7th ED came out. FMC are the gak. Our meta is owned by daemons and necrons at the moment. though we have a few good players that do well with whatever they bring.

And about chaos vs tau, Litterally take 2-3 daemon princes with full telepathy rolls. (Belakor is god here) That will just tromp all over those silly fish... works every time.

Flying Monstrous Creature lists (slannesh in particular) are literally the least fun lists to play against and I literally hate them.

I had to fight one at top table last night and I just sigh'd and felt like saying "lets just not play, go have a Pepsi and watch the other games". Really. It is the biggest "F you" army out there that I can think of.

So it doesnt surprise me. the entire army is hit on 6's, if lucky, re-rolls this and that, fires off like 4D6 high STR and ap4 shots per dude if you want, Psychic screams you if LD is low and so on. It's really really an unpleasant army to even deploy against. Most of the players who use the army get quite arrogant and act like the game is a formality. Every now and again they get too cocky and lose, or dice screw them but the dice pretty much HAVE to screw them in order to beat them so. Meh.

Don't play that army if you like having friends. But if you like winning: play that army. Like, yesterday.

Sounds like you hate the army to the point your going to be unpleasent everytime you play vs it.

2 types of players i have noticed with it, the cool guys that try and do from time to time crush the daemons.... and the donkey-caves who soon as they see the daemon army revert to arguement mode relaziing they have no chance so they are going to make the daemon player as misserable as possible...

Stop bitching about daemons and get better...

I had a tau player yesterady pull that exact example... argued every little rule, made excuses about his tau army, and then acted like the irritated daemon player was just a Dick... so fustrating... Im just glad i wasnt the only one who complained about said tau...sounds like some other people from his LFS couldnt stand him either....

OneMeanDuck wrote:


I have been tromping around with a deamon army, winning more tournaments then not since 7th ED came out. FMC are the gak.

And about chaos vs tau, Litterally take 2-3 daemon princes with full telepathy rolls. (Belakor is god here) That will just tromp all over those silly fish... works every time. Screamer stars with 2++ rerollable also shuts them down... just plop in right in front of their firebase and start summoning daemonettes.

I'm sorry. This was your quote was it not? No offense but uh... This illustrates my point.

Duck, I know I saw you actually break Jancoran's models three times over the course of your game. And bringing 3 FMC's to a Highlander by allying Chaos Demons to Chaos Marines, and making one of them Fateweaver, AND bringing the screamerstar IS a dick move. I'm not saying you didn't earn your win, but it is a dick move. I also saw you actually throw his list back at him two times. I'm looking forward to you and Jancoran playing a normal game at 1850.

I wasnt going to bring that up but yeah, and thanks for not stepping on them. Lol. I think OneMeanDuck/John-Paul was my last FMC Flying circus opponent and those models and the list thing defiitely contributed to my demeanor. It wasn't JUST the army as you could see, but the army isn't my favorite as I said. Who really looks forward to a 1500 point Highlander tournament where the final round is essentially Daemon Prince spam, in a non spam tournament? Hehehe. Totally legal list, sadly.

But his own comments say it all. He's basically agreeing with me. According to him it works every time and is no fun for the guy on the receiving end. He's absolutely right. It's not. So...

The original poster acidlemon should know that the army is highly effective, as John-Paul has said. He should also know the down side.

As for the models, I bought glue while I was up there and so I will fix those models hopefully soon. They were my nicer painted and based Kroot and those things are a bear to put together right. Im dreading it.