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Well you can run the Cult in a CAD to give them Ob Sec if you really wanted to, and wouldn't bar access to Canticles.

But yea its a lot of grav for cheaper, and more slots to fill it with, if you were so inclined

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Well you can run the Cult in a CAD to give them Ob Sec if you really wanted to, and wouldn't bar access to Canticles.

But yea its a lot of grav for cheaper, and more slots to fill it with, if you were so inclined

They lack an HQ no? did that change?

 Desubot wrote:

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Well you can run the Cult in a CAD to give them Ob Sec if you really wanted to, and wouldn't bar access to Canticles.

But yea its a lot of grav for cheaper, and more slots to fill it with, if you were so inclined

They lack an HQ no? did that change?

Cult Mechanicus? No they have a HQ, the Tech Priest Dominus

 Enigwolf wrote:

 gameandwatch wrote:

Ugg, just the thought of face 72 grav shots in an alpha strike from just 4 min squads...does not sound appealing hahahaha

The problem is that 4 things melt, and then nothing else. I wish GW gave a way for the Kataphrons to split-fire too, via formation. Also, I find it weird that servitors can fail morale checks and fall back... I thought these things were programmed with entire chunks of their cortex removed...

I'm glad they don't have Split Fire. That would be way too powerful. Balance means that something really strong has to have situations where it's not great, like a unit that fires 18 Grav shots baseline on durable bodies should be bad against MSU at the very least.

 Enigwolf wrote:

 gameandwatch wrote:

Ugg, just the thought of face 72 grav shots in an alpha strike from just 4 min squads...does not sound appealing hahahaha

The problem is that 4 things melt, and then nothing else. I wish GW gave a way for the Kataphrons to split-fire too, via formation. Also, I find it weird that servitors can fail morale checks and fall back... I thought these things were programmed with entire chunks of their cortex removed...

Weeeeellllllll, you could say the same about Necrons for fearless... As far as split fire goes, yeah it is a bit silly that a unit that can be 12 models, 6 shots per model, cannot split fire. As far as them only melting 4 things, remember that 4 min units is only 660 points, which means you could have 8 units for 1320 points or even just 6 for 990, which gives you enough room for a dominus and the kastelan formation. Not high in model numbers or wounds, but man that alpha or beta strike is just...so silly

Yea...grav kataphron and haywire are the way to go. Math hammer is all well and good until you bring range into the equation. 30 inches put them outside the threat range for charges from most units, puts them outside conventional shooting range for a lot of guns and also makes it much more likely to get a shot on the first turn. Same with the haywire breachers, range 36 on a haywire gun means that they can get a lot of shots in instead of basically being a sacrifice squad like the skitarii are. Combining all of this with objective secured and you have a very solid unit. 150 or 165 for the unit is a small price to pay. Now bringing in allies and the like will definitely help but outside of transports there is nothing that the mechanicus really needs to function, they cover all of the bases pretty well and have a solid amount of fire power.

Personally I am planning on taking two squads of Breachers and two squads of Destroyers just because I love the models. along with the fact that I think that they are strong unit especially with their range, toughness 5 an amount of shots they can put down range. BS3 is much less of a problem when you have that many shots, accuracy by volume.

An idea that I have been thinking of is an MSU style army of Dragoons and Iron Striders backed up by those units of Kataphrons. I know the Dune Crawlers are better than the Iron Striders by far, however I do feel they have their place. thinking of running x4 squads of 3 Dragoons and x2 squads of Iron Striders supported by Vanguard and Kataphrons. the idea with this army is to be super fast and get in your opponent's face right off the bat with your Dragoons while you have plenty of fire support in the back laying down a wall of fire softening up targets before they charge. Thoughts?

If your gonna run that many might as well run the formation. Personally I think the ironstriders. Work best as 1 or 2 man harassment units, minimal points investment but still have to be dealt with

I would still like some help on my list, please, I don't know what to do other than ditch the Breachers.

 Decay wrote:
I would still like some help on my list, please, I don't know what to do other than ditch the Breachers.

Are you expecting us to put together the rest of your list for you? I hate to be a jerk about it, but its hard for us to do that without knowing what models you have/how much more you're willing to spend, your playstyle, your local meta, etc. You're better off building a list first, and then coming here for feedback.

It has just been rumored that Drop Pods will be FAQed, and in the new SM dex only be able to carry models with a 2+ or 3+ save, so drop pod haywire may be severely nerfed.

Ok sorry, I was being a idiot about it. And about the drop pods, that just makes more sense. I've never used the Skitarii pod tactic anyway and I beileve that can be a great army without them.

Relatively simple 1500 point casual-ish list. Breachers are for supplemental long range AV, Dominus goes with one of the Destroyers. I could always run a War Convocation instead, but that means even moar money and points for a knight.

Primary Detachment: CAD

HQ:
Tech-Priest Dominus (155)
-Eradication Ray
-Phosphor Serpenta
-Cognis Relic

Troops:
Kataphron Destroyers (165)
-3x Heavy Grav Cannon

Kataphron Destroyers (165)
-3x Heavy Grav Cannons

Kataphron Breachers (150)
-3x Heavy Arc Rifles

Skitarii Maniple Detachment

Troops:
5x Skitarii Vanguard (125)
-2x Plasma Caliver
-Omnispex
-Refractor Field

5x Skitarii Vanguard (95)
-2x Arc Rifle
-Omnispex
-Refractor Field

6x Skitarii Rangers (111)
-Arquebus
-Omnispex
-Refractor Field

Elites:
Sicarian Infiltrators (195)
-Taser Goad/Flechette Blaster
-Conversion Field

Sicarian Ruststalkers (170)
-Conversion Field

Fast Attack:
Sydonian Dragoon (55)
-Phosphor Serpenta

Heavy Support:
Onager Dunecrawler (125)
-Icarus Array

Of course this varies on model ownership, but I'd ditch the lone dragoon, serpenta on Dominus, and ranger squad. Put the points into a second Onager and beef up Vanguard bodycount or add a third squad. That, or ditch the rangers to add two more dragoons for a squadron of them.

Does Luminagen's effect stack?

 Verviedi wrote:
Does Luminagen's effect stack?

Not having the book on me, can't say with 100% confidence. Instinct says no (if I recall the wording correctly). Omnispex + Luminagen stacks, though.

 Verviedi wrote:
Does Luminagen's effect stack?

No.

Luminagen: A unit that suffers one or more unsaved Wounds, glancing or penetrating hits caused by a weapon with this special rule counts its cover saves as being 1 point worse than normal until the end of the phase. Furthermore, units can re-roll the dice to determine their charge range against the afflicted unit until the end of the turn.

 obsidiankatana wrote:
Of course this varies on model ownership, but I'd ditch the lone dragoon, serpenta on Dominus, and ranger squad. Put the points into a second Onager and beef up Vanguard bodycount or add a third squad. That, or ditch the rangers to add two more dragoons for a squadron of them.

I'd second this. Either boost the dragoon to 2 or 3 in a squad, or ditch it completely. Dominus doesn't need a serpenta. Ranger squad is dependent on your meta. Keep your Onagers separate if only one has an Icarus Array.

Not sure if anyone else caught Frontline's stream with Reece running the War Congregation Formation last night, but was a good example of the formation's power considering he was rolling poorly and forgot half his rules.

Still won against a pretty nasty looking white scar bike list

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Not sure if anyone else caught Frontline's stream with Reece running the War Congregation Formation last night, but was a good example of the formation's power considering he was rolling poorly and forgot half his rules.

Still won against a pretty nasty looking white scar bike list

Just keep in mind that Reece and Frankie have also done similar things with daemon factory, etc. Sometimes when Reece rolls poorly and forgets rules he actually plays a lot better than when he rolls well and is confident. Sometimes they talk about rolling poorly and they do but the important rolls were actually outstandingly good. Their daemon factory test game was the best case in point of not judging a list by one game, Frankie summoned over 900 pts of daemons in ~3 turns, rolled like pants on anything not a conjuration psychic test but rolled almost impossible odds on those tests.

True, but it was one of the first big showings of that detachment in sort of a competitive format.

Here's a link to the page with the replay if you're interested in seeing it. I think it's a pretty good watch for anyone who's planning on running a War Congregation:

https://www.frontlinegaming.org/2015/06/02/live-game-tonight-on-twitch-7pm-pst-adeptus-mechancius-war-convocation-vs-white-scars/

WrentheFaceless wrote:True, but it was one of the first big showings of that detachment in sort of a competitive format.

Oh, definitely true. Additionally Reece and the gang are pretty good about trying to stay (as a group at least) pretty fair and balanced. Nothing but love for them.

The batrep was actually really amusing on a lot of levels. The poor white scars player was just smacked across the face with new rules after new rules. He really exemplified the saying know yourself and know your enemy. He had no idea what he was facing so he full reserved against and didn't attempt a seize against an army which can gain +3 to cover saves if you don't reduce the number of units and give them a chance to declare. He could have outdistanced the majority of their shooting and moved up to shoot and charge (many of Reeces units had to come within 18" to do anything at all). That would have been a seriously different game if the white scars player was hit and running in and out of close combats and knew that reducing the number of units would also reduce the canticles effectiveness.

Enigwolf wrote:Here's a link to the page with the replay if you're interested in seeing it. I think it's a pretty good watch for anyone who's planning on running a War Congregation:

https://www.frontlinegaming.org/2015/06/02/live-game-tonight-on-twitch-7pm-pst-adeptus-mechancius-war-convocation-vs-white-scars/

It is definitely a worthwhile watch. Pretty funny and will really help people get used to the new armies on the block.

Maybe since Reece occasionally comes on here from time to time, maybe he can chime in on why he didn't go for a full shooty loadout on the Kastellans?

 ultimentra wrote:
Maybe since Reece occasionally comes on here from time to time, maybe he can chime in on why he didn't go for a full shooty loadout on the Kastellans?

I would totally love it if he did a question-and-answer thing here.

 ultimentra wrote:
Maybe since Reece occasionally comes on here from time to time, maybe he can chime in on why he didn't go for a full shooty loadout on the Kastellans?

I think he wanted a little bit of everything since he hadnt run Cult Mechanius units yet at all yet.

I ran the convocation against an eldar/white scars list last night.

I think the biggest thing that mechanicum have right now are surprise. Things like my opponent charging jetbikes into a vanguard unit where the alpha has the pater radium or underestimating the big bots in combat.

The ruststalkers are largely a useless tax unit in what is mostly an all shooty army.

Canticles meshes extremely well with doctrines. Going first is just so very strong. The mechanicum has a strong first turn alpha with massive ballistic skill buff. Then you toss on stealth and shrouding and your opponent has no real chance to return fire.

the42up wrote:
I ran the convocation against an eldar/white scars list last night.

I think the biggest thing that mechanicum have right now are surprise. Things like my opponent charging jetbikes into a vanguard unit where the alpha has the pater radium or underestimating the big bots in combat.

The ruststalkers are largely a useless tax unit in what is mostly an all shooty army.

Canticles meshes extremely well with doctrines. Going first is just so very strong. The mechanicum has a strong first turn alpha with massive ballistic skill buff. Then you toss on stealth and shrouding and your opponent has no real chance to return fire.

Well, not everyone obsessively reads rules and leaks online, wait until that element of surprise dies out

Then you'll only be winning by a moderate amount, instead of a lot

Just did a few test games/ scenarios trying the different formations and unit compositions for breachers, destroyers and kastelans.

Breachers: These guys are really REALLY good. Like stupid good. The arc cannon ones threaten basically any vehicle on the board with their extreme range, even made my buddy hesitant about what to do with his knight as they threatened it pretty much everywhere. BTW, a really fun combo with these guys is to take them in a unit of 3-5, and attach a dominus with the armor that gives them cognis... if you arent a fan of dunecrawlers, holy crap is this a fantastic pseudo option for anti air.

Now for the gun that I think is the most f-ed up but coolest fluff in the dex...the torsion cannon. At first glance the 1 shot is a real bummer. But when using the battle congregation, and even only 4 different cult mech units, you can basically give all your units BS5 twice during the game (BS 3 rerolling 1s and 2s). This makes all your units, including those with torsion cannons very accurate and mitigates the 1 shot quite a bit. I have found that this gun has 1 purpose... to annihilate any deathstar or high point cost unit on the board in absolutely brutal fashion. Threats I faced were a wolfstar, grav centstar, adamantine lance, and multiple high point superheavies. 5-6 of these guys, with an attached dominus with the scrying skull DECIMATED everything they shot at. Every single time, we both were underestimating the multiwound capability of the unit and man, when you have a 66% chance to outright kill any 2 wound model (im lookin at you cents and pups) even one of these shots getting through is terrifying. running a unit of 6, these guys killed in a single volley: 4 thunderwolves, tigirius and 2 cents, knights, drago and 3 paladins, a brass scorpion and a gargantuan squiggoth. In one test they even managed to kill a knight outright with only one shot, hit, penned for 3 HP and then 3HP for rolling a 5 for penetrating, just bonkers. Ive also found that 24" is enough as most of their targets will either be deployed close to you or be coming at you. Weakness of these guys is def LD8. Without an attached dominus I am always afraid of them running.

Destroyers: Alright, most already know what these guys are capable of in output, grav is disgusting and simply the better of the two options as the plasma has a tendency to do less damage, just take grav... 6 shots a piece is crazy powerful. When compared to torsion cannon Breachers, the only time torsion cannons can really outplay the grav destroyers is against superheavies, but otherwise the output of fire from grav is pretty devestating. Interestingly I think the best targets for these guys are MSU armies. Marines and Bikes are their bread and butter targets, and if you take at least 4 units of them, they threaten so many targets your opponent is going to have a hard time prioritizing. THe phospur blaster actually does surprisingly come into play as even a single unsaved wound on a unit of say jetbikes, pretty much guarantees the whole unit is going to die by the grav fusilade. I'd say actually the only real weakness of these guys is return fire. They die surprisingly quickly with just a 4+ and LD8 isn't exactly stellar.

Kastelans: Alright I only ran them in the cohort formation (4 bots, 2 priests, dominus with the IWND item) so I will just talk about that. First off, I cannot emphasize enough how STUPID durable this unit is when giving the dominus the IWND item for the unit... Think res orb, 20 man unit of decurion necron warriors, with attached character and a ghost arc behind, resilient. I mean the unit just...doesn't die. With majority T7, an IC to pass wounds all over the place, FnP on the characters and sometimes the bots, the dominus giving wounds back, IWND, 3+ saves, 2+ saves, etc. etc. I mean, I struggle to think of a more resilient unit. After 2 turns of shooting at it, my opponent realized both of those turns were an utter waste of time and he should have just ignored it. They even managed to beat a wolfstar in combat (after hilariously, my dominus failed a LoS but passed his 4++ conversion field save, which proceeded to blind the wolfstar in hilarious fashion) now granted that circumstance was funny, but that was after the first round of combat where the bots managed to kill 1.5 thunderwolves before they struck, then ate 7 S10 fist wounds like they were nothing.

I though CC would be a weakness for them, but literally every single model in that unit is actually good at CC. Which brings me to the formations dominus rule for their protocols. At first I thought this rule was kinda gakky. Causing their protocol to become immediately active meant you couldn't choose the shooty one, have a turn of FnP and then sit back and blast away. Well against a CC army is where this rule shines. If you see you are about to get hit by a bunch of CC guys like a wolfstar, or some other CC units, select the conqueror protocol at the end of your turn for double base attacks and just sit back and wait. The danger to this is that your normally shooty unit now cannot shoot for a turn if your opponent decides not to charge you, but if you are using this strategy, just go after them instead!

Lastly, the ranged damage output. The firepower on this unit when enabling the rerolls canticle is just...so good. I almost always stop at least my two priest from shooting to let 2 bots split fire, but if the dominus also has nothing to do, I let all 4 bots fire at different targets. This formation is a marine and jetbike player's worst nightmare. Even without the protector protocol, each bot with 6 S6 ap3 shots threatens so many things that your opponent will always want to try and focus them, but realize that they cant and become super frustrated. That is what this formation is, a frustration formation.

It was also suggested by my buddy that I should give a priest the cognis wargear, so they could threaten air targets like FMC, of which we are going to test this weekend against a pentyrant list

Sorry for the brick of text, hope this was at least somewhat useful!

 gameandwatch wrote:
Just did a few test games/ scenarios trying the different formations and unit compositions for breachers, destroyers and kastelans.

Breachers: These guys are really REALLY good. Like stupid good. The arc cannon ones threaten basically any vehicle on the board with their extreme range, even made my buddy hesitant about what to do with his knight as they threatened it pretty much everywhere. BTW, a really fun combo with these guys is to take them in a unit of 3-5, and attach a dominus with the armor that gives them cognis... if you arent a fan of dunecrawlers, holy crap is this a fantastic pseudo option for anti air.

Now for the gun that I think is the most f-ed up but coolest fluff in the dex...the torsion cannon. At first glance the 1 shot is a real bummer. But when using the battle congregation, and even only 4 different cult mech units, you can basically give all your units BS5 twice during the game (BS 3 rerolling 1s and 2s). This makes all your units, including those with torsion cannons very accurate and mitigates the 1 shot quite a bit. I have found that this gun has 1 purpose... to annihilate any deathstar or high point cost unit on the board in absolutely brutal fashion. Threats I faced were a wolfstar, grav centstar, adamantine lance, and multiple high point superheavies. 5-6 of these guys, with an attached dominus with the scrying skull DECIMATED everything they shot at. Every single time, we both were underestimating the multiwound capability of the unit and man, when you have a 66% chance to outright kill any 2 wound model (im lookin at you cents and pups) even one of these shots getting through is terrifying. running a unit of 6, these guys killed in a single volley: 4 thunderwolves, tigirius and 2 cents, knights, drago and 3 paladins, a brass scorpion and a gargantuan squiggoth. In one test they even managed to kill a knight outright with only one shot, hit, penned for 3 HP and then 3HP for rolling a 5 for penetrating, just bonkers. Ive also found that 24" is enough as most of their targets will either be deployed close to you or be coming at you. Weakness of these guys is def LD8. Without an attached dominus I am always afraid of them running.

Destroyers: Alright, most already know what these guys are capable of in output, grav is disgusting and simply the better of the two options as the plasma has a tendency to do less damage, just take grav... 6 shots a piece is crazy powerful. When compared to torsion cannon Breachers, the only time torsion cannons can really outplay the grav destroyers is against superheavies, but otherwise the output of fire from grav is pretty devestating. Interestingly I think the best targets for these guys are MSU armies. Marines and Bikes are their bread and butter targets, and if you take at least 4 units of them, they threaten so many targets your opponent is going to have a hard time prioritizing. THe phospur blaster actually does surprisingly come into play as even a single unsaved wound on a unit of say jetbikes, pretty much guarantees the whole unit is going to die by the grav fusilade. I'd say actually the only real weakness of these guys is return fire. They die surprisingly quickly with just a 4+ and LD8 isn't exactly stellar.

Kastelans: Alright I only ran them in the cohort formation (4 bots, 2 priests, dominus with the IWND item) so I will just talk about that. First off, I cannot emphasize enough how STUPID durable this unit is when giving the dominus the IWND item for the unit... Think res orb, 20 man unit of decurion necron warriors, with attached character and a ghost arc behind, resilient. I mean the unit just...doesn't die. With majority T7, an IC to pass wounds all over the place, FnP on the characters and sometimes the bots, the dominus giving wounds back, IWND, 3+ saves, 2+ saves, etc. etc. I mean, I struggle to think of a more resilient unit. After 2 turns of shooting at it, my opponent realized both of those turns were an utter waste of time and he should have just ignored it. They even managed to beat a wolfstar in combat (after hilariously, my dominus failed a LoS but passed his 4++ conversion field save, which proceeded to blind the wolfstar in hilarious fashion) now granted that circumstance was funny, but that was after the first round of combat where the bots managed to kill 1.5 thunderwolves before they struck, then ate 7 S10 fist wounds like they were nothing.

I though CC would be a weakness for them, but literally every single model in that unit is actually good at CC. Which brings me to the formations dominus rule for their protocols. At first I thought this rule was kinda gakky. Causing their protocol to become immediately active meant you couldn't choose the shooty one, have a turn of FnP and then sit back and blast away. Well against a CC army is where this rule shines. If you see you are about to get hit by a bunch of CC guys like a wolfstar, or some other CC units, select the conqueror protocol at the end of your turn for double base attacks and just sit back and wait. The danger to this is that your normally shooty unit now cannot shoot for a turn if your opponent decides not to charge you, but if you are using this strategy, just go after them instead!

Lastly, the ranged damage output. The firepower on this unit when enabling the rerolls canticle is just...so good. I almost always stop at least my two priest from shooting to let 2 bots split fire, but if the dominus also has nothing to do, I let all 4 bots fire at different targets. This formation is a marine and jetbike player's worst nightmare. Even without the protector protocol, each bot with 6 S6 ap3 shots threatens so many things that your opponent will always want to try and focus them, but realize that they cant and become super frustrated. That is what this formation is, a frustration formation.

It was also suggested by my buddy that I should give a priest the cognis wargear, so they could threaten air targets like FMC, of which we are going to test this weekend against a pentyrant list

Sorry for the brick of text, hope this was at least somewhat useful!

Cheers, thanks very much for the feedback. A lot of it makes sense, and confirms what I suspected. I have a soft spot for breachers, because of their 3+ armor and their ability to take 36" Heavy Arc Guns compensates for the lack of Arc Rifles (max 3) in a War Congregation because of the 1 Vanguard squad max. In what types of lists would you be taking Arc or Torsion Breachers over Destroyers? I'm thinking that the rest of a War Congregation already puts out ridiculously stupid amounts of general dakka dakka that the anti-tank/anti-LoW utility from Heavy Arc Guns has more marginal benefit.