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 Orock wrote:
They have the speed to catch even hideing. And str 8 doubles them out. You get a lot of hits with 6s adding two. And shroudplasm can grant 2+ cover from overwatch.

Any Tau army worth its salt carries enough markerlights and SMS to make cover saves a non-issue.

 Orock wrote:
They have the speed to catch even hideing. And str 8 doubles them out. You get a lot of hits with 6s adding two. And shroudplasm can grant 2+ cover from overwatch.

Yea but they have no AP, they're better vehicle hunters

Hmm I will consider the dragoons, but it seems tau has a lot of firepower and ways to kill them.

Also I don't know if outflanking works because all the heavy guns get interceptor, and that tends to hurt.

They're not the best against gunline armies

I'm contemplating what to add to my 1500pt war convocation to round it up to 1800 pts for a local comp with maelstrom missions and all LOW allowed.

I have a good source of haywire and Grav.



My option one is to add sevrin loth 5 scouts with snipers and another dragoon, my option 2 is to add a culexus assasin and 3 more dragoons ( rounding up to 5 in total)

Loth would give me the ability to grant invisibility on my warden ( knight ) or dragoon sqaud to ensure that I can keep it alive long enough to tie down a super heavy and to give me good odds of defeating it.

The 5 dragoons sqaud give me more board coverage and threat level- especially if ad mech get turn 1 and go for stealth and shrouded.

The assasins benefits are obvious.

What do you think?

Hey Wilson, not sure if you saw in your batrep post, but I didnt want you to cheat yourself on points.

Your haywire kataprhons are the 150 pt breachers and not being priced as Destroyers right?

I dont know how you feel about them, but I run mine with the flesh tearers detachment with drop pods

It rounds out the 1800 well as a sang priest, 5 scounts and 3 pods comes in at about 225 points

Your options arent as bad as well though

I'm planning on running Iron Hands with my war convocation, 2 squads of scouts, 2 (maybe 3 in the future) drop pods, and some marine HQ I haven't decided on yet. Maybe a Librarian? Also been considering a Jump Pack Chaplain to run with my Rust Stalkers so I can just give them a different relic or perhaps running him with the Infiltrators and not infiltrating with them.

I know it's not as efficient as running the flesh tearers detachment but I'm trying to be as fluffy as possible so I don't get too many raised eyebrows at my LGS. Still just undecided about my HQ choice.

I like coteaz for extra deny dice, as well as anti deep strike bubble. And a culexus assassin to strip annoying buffs, keep flyrants on my side of the table neutered, and deep striking psychic shenanigans to a minimum. Coteaz also ensures he can get a few more shots if necessary.

Unfortunately Coteaz does not satisfy the 1HQ requirement for taking some Space Marines. If I could just have him cover the requirement I probably would take him.

I tried a librarian last night, I don't know if it was my dice but it didn't really work out. Perils on first attempt at Divination, took a wound and lost that power. Didn't roll any other worthwhile powers, died on turn 3.

I might try him again, I just wish ML2 wasn't so expensive. 90 points for that guy seems like a lot.

I have the same problem with the tech priest dominus, I just have no clue what to even do with the guy on the battlefield. Do I have him tank wounds with his 2+ for Kataphrons?

I haven't been able to run the War Convocation yet as I just recently acquired my Dragoon and Rust Stalkers, no Knight yet. I'm just at kind of a loss at what to do with my HQ choices. If I didn't have to take a Marine HQ or a Dominus I wouldn't, none of them seems worthwhile when I could be taking more units.

A fun thing you can do with the dominus is give him the 2+ invun shield and stick him in the front or back. Then for a turn you can GtG, get 2 + on your saves, then use the fearless canticle next turn to ignore GtG. Most times though I like to use him to make enemy vehicles weaker with targeting, or if I get the awesome warlord trait that lets you identify objectives, make yours stuff like skyfire, and the enemies booby traps.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
also he can follow the knight and repair if in convocation, since he counts then as mechanicus. or stick between dunecrawlers for repairs too.

So guys, I ran the war convocation twice recently, once on Friday for the first time, and again on Saturday. Friday I lost, was still figuring out how the formation works, what a lot of things do, what to do with the Knight, etc. There were a few things that were new for me like army-wide Canticles, relics, and other rules to remember (like fear when in close combat with superheavies).

Some things I learned about War Convocation-

-Ignores cover is the bane of this army.
-We tend to be better against marine and other 3+ save armies as opposed to armies like Guard.
-Never take the War Convocation against a Sisters player, you will feel like a jerk.
-Putting Skitarii in Drop Pods is the way to go.
-The Stasis field on the Dominus is secretly broken. He will often be targeted by stuff that would normally instagib him, going to ground isn't that big of a deal as opposed to dying.
-A small squadron of 2 dragoons will allow at least 1 to get across no-mans land and charge the enemy. 1 is all you need to pop a transport vehicle per turn with the help of 6's to hit.
-Having the Dominus follow Knight around and repair it in the shooting phase is good, having the Uncreator gauntlet is even better. Even if you roll a 1, worst you will do is undo the hull point you repaired in the shooting phase. This is clutch and will win games I think. It's a better use for the Dominus than just sitting in a squad of Kataphrons giving them Cognis I think.
-If you're worried about deep striking or drop pod melta early the in the game, surround your Knight with your Sicarian Infiltrators as best you can, you can likely get 2 or 3 facings covered by Neurostatic Aura, meaning your opponents meltas, if in range for 2D6 pen, will be -1 BS.
-If anyone else is wondering which HQ to take if they aren't using Flesh Tearers for their marine ally, take a chaplain with a jump pack and put him with your infiltrators, deploy them normally. He won't get canticles, and can't scout move with them, but he can keep up, Zealot on Infiltrators is ridiculous.
-The giant melta cannon on the Errant is really freaking good. I think its my favorite variant thus far.

Also, I think our Transuranic Arquebuss should be able to up their strength with the canticle that adds to the strength value of a unit. That way if we need it in a turn, we could potentially get strength 7 armorbane. But unfortunately it looks like the rule doesn't work that way. Those snipers always wounding on a 4+ always seems to screw me in some way.

Indeed that would be silly so it is a good job the strength modifier only works on the characters statline and not ranged weapons.

Never been fussed by the stasis field as it's pretty easy to score a 2 up cover with Canticles/ going to ground for at least 2 turns. Plus it's better to have a 4++ than no invuln at all - especially if it( dominus) ends up in combat.

War convocation is a solid list and extremely good, glad you're having fun with it.

 Wilson wrote:


Never been fussed by the stasis field as it's pretty easy to score a 2 up cover with Canticles/ going to ground for at least 2 turns. Plus it's better to have a 4++ than no invuln at all - especially if it( dominus) ends up in combat.

Normally yes, you would probably be right. However, my opponent loves to throw ignores cover demo charges and melta guns at me in large quantity. It helps that he constantly rolls high too while my dice roll roughly average. The amount of ignores cover insta-gibbing weapons that he throws at my dominus is ridiculous, so the stasis field ended saving his metallic bacon quite a few times.

My new(!!) Convocation list-

Adeptus Mechanicus War Convocation-

Skitarii Battle Maniple-

10x Skitarii Vanguard (100)
-Omnispex
-Skull of Elder Nikola
-3x Arc Rifle
-Arc Pistol
-Arc Maul
-Conversion Field

10x Skitarii Rangers
-Omnispex
-3x Transuranic Arquebus
-Arkhan's Divinator
-Conversion Field

5x Sicarian Ruststalkers (160)
-Prehensile Dataspike
-Omniscient Mask
-Conversion Field

5x Sicarian Infiltrators (185)
-Phosphoenix
-Conversion Field

2x Sydonian Dragoons (90)
-2x Phosphor Serpenta

Onager Dunecrawler (90)
-Neutron Laser
-Cognis Manipulator
-Mindscanner Probe
-Cognis Heavy Stubber

Cult Mechanicus Battle Congregation-

Tech-Priest Dominus (105)
-Stasis Field
-Raiment of the Technomartyr
-Eradication Ray

6x Kataphron Destroyers (330)
-Heavy Grav Cannons
-3x Cognis Flamers

3x Kataphron Breachers (150)

Oathsworn Detachment-

Knight Crusader (425)
-Stormspear Missile Launcher

You, I wanted to ask... how many skitarii squads should someone take? I feel they are squishy enough to have a lot of them, but expensive enough to only take a few squads.

Depends. What do you want to do with your list? If you're running Convocation, then you'll only be able to take a squad of Vanguard and a squad of Rangers, but if you're running pure skitarii, I recommend a 2-1 ratio of Vanguard to Rangers, with either no specials or max specials.

If you're taking just skitarii, you'll want vangaurd but without context it's hard to say! How many points, what are they fighting, what else would you take?
Before convocation I liked 2 units of 3 plasma and 2 units of 2 haywire in FT drop pods with cult mechanicus allies- kataphron breachers & destroyers at 1500.

I really like the idea of an all skitarii list with huge amounts of dragoons and scouting vangaurd.

20 dragoons ( 4 x 5)
2 x 10 vanguard with 3 plasma scopes
2 x 5 vanguard with 2 haywire
All sqauds with omniscopes
= 1500

I want an unconventional GT list and I've heard that the more dragoons you own the more chance you are to become super Saiyan

I honestly really really want to stay away from the warcon as much as I can, And I want to run a fluffy and fun list combing Cult and Skitarii with the skitarii being the real main force and cult either being a co-hort cybernetica or just the regular FOC.

Right now I have a list with x4 squads of just haywire vanguard and two onager dunecrawlers.

That's a lot of haywire! Cult & Skitarii work well but the truth is war con is the best way to run them.

So what, 4 units of vangaurd at 10 man?
You probably don't need that much haywire and might find 2 onogars overkill for a 3 game competition.

Definately get 3-5 dragoons in there, they are so cheap. It's beautiful.

Try one of the cult mech formations- either the kastalans deathstar or the destroyer ignores cover one. I would have suggested the deep striking breachers but you've got waaaay too much haywire as it is!

Best way to write a list is to understand what you could be facing so try a few things out first and if it doesn't work, war con is extremely fun as it lets you run a little bit of everything. I wish every army had a formation like it!

 Wilson wrote:
That's a lot of haywire! Cult & Skitarii work well but the truth is war con is the best way to run them.

So what, 4 units of vangaurd at 10 man?
You probably don't need that much haywire and might find 2 onogars overkill for a 3 game competition.

Definately get 3-5 dragoons in there, they are so cheap. It's beautiful.

Try one of the cult mech formations- either the kastalans deathstar or the destroyer ignores cover one. I would have suggested the deep striking breachers but you've got waaaay too much haywire as it is!

Best way to write a list is to understand what you could be facing so try a few things out first and if it doesn't work, war con is extremely fun as it lets you run a little bit of everything. I wish every army had a formation like it!

Well mind you I don't actually have that much haywire yet, as I only have two 10 man squads with three. I like my anti-vehicle, plus they are strong enough to hurt infantry!

I was thinking of the kastelan deathstar for my main force and warlord squad as it's so cool and punchy, but right now I'm still trying to decide what to get next. Are the dragoons really that good?

 Tiger9gamer wrote:

 Wilson wrote:
That's a lot of haywire! Cult & Skitarii work well but the truth is war con is the best way to run them.

So what, 4 units of vangaurd at 10 man?
You probably don't need that much haywire and might find 2 onogars overkill for a 3 game competition.

Definately get 3-5 dragoons in there, they are so cheap. It's beautiful.

Try one of the cult mech formations- either the kastalans deathstar or the destroyer ignores cover one. I would have suggested the deep striking breachers but you've got waaaay too much haywire as it is!

Best way to write a list is to understand what you could be facing so try a few things out first and if it doesn't work, war con is extremely fun as it lets you run a little bit of everything. I wish every army had a formation like it!

Well mind you I don't actually have that much haywire yet, as I only have two 10 man squads with three. I like my anti-vehicle, plus they are strong enough to hurt infantry!

I was thinking of the kastelan deathstar for my main force and warlord squad as it's so cool and punchy, but right now I'm still trying to decide what to get next. Are the dragoons really that good?

Dragoons are amazing and the only reason I don't have a few maximum squads of them is cost. Terminator cost for a 11 around vehicle with a 5+ cover and a crap ton of S8 attacks on the charge that is almost as fast as a bike.

Well War Convo is fluffy

Dragoons get even better with War Convo.

Agreed with Wren, honestly I see War Convo as what the Admech Book's Decurion/Gladius should have been. Admech should have been 1 book in the first place, with Knights available as LOW in-codex.

Canticles of the Omnissiah should have been on every unit in this conglomerated Admech dex, and to balance this out Skitarii units should have had access to fewer Doctrina Imperatives. Doctrina Imperatives feels rather shallow as a idea for making an army unique compared to what Canticles does in terms of unique rules, and tactical flexibility.

This is why I run War Convocation, it basically represents the single codex, Decurion/Gladius detachment that we should have had as a full fledged faction in our own right as the Admech.

 ultimentra wrote:
This is why I run War Convocation, it basically represents the single codex, Decurion/Gladius detachment that we should have had as a full fledged faction in our own right as the Admech.

I agree with this in terms of the contents of the formation but the free wargear all around does make a it a little op.

I completely agree, if I were able to have a little bit more freedom with the units I could take in the formation, like maybe bring some more Skitarii Vanguard or something in the formation in exchange for losing free wargear I would still probably take it. Army-wide canticles are what make it for me. Really brings out the theme of the faction.

I agree, but I rather put my own spin on it. also a guy at my GW is already doing this >.>

So would you say 40 vanguard is just too much? how about 4 onagers?

Max unit of Onagers is 3, unless you were going with 2 and 2

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Max unit of Onagers is 3, unless you were going with 2 and 2

Yea I was thinking of a unit of two and two both armed with neutron lasers.

I'm taking this to a local comp next week, format is maelstrom - 3 missions, 3 detachments max, no CTA, all LOW allowed. No more than 3 Knights. 1800 pts

War convocation
Grav kataphrons
Grav kataphrons
Dominus - bs2 snap shot

Vangaurd - haywire guns and pistol
Rangers - haywire guns and pistol
Rustalkers - pater
Infiltrators- phospheonix
Onogar- Icarus
Dragoons X 4 lances and serpenta( love these guys so much!)

Warden storm missile pod

Libby level 2
Scout snipers
Pod X 3

Gives the flexibility to have either Grav kataphrons OR skitarii haywire in pods to fight gmc/ SHV. Expecting revenents, warhounds and other big Titans.
Should do well, will post the summary when I'm done!

What do you guys think about a Skitarii tank company?

2000 points would look like
5x vanguard with stuff
5x vanguard with stuff

3x Onagers with Neutron Laser, Pintle CHS, mindscanner probes, cognis manipulators


3x Onagers with Neutron Laser, Pintle CHS, mindscanner probes, cognis manipulators


3x Onagers with Neutron Laser, Pintle CHS, mindscanner probes, cognis manipulators

3x Onagers with Icarus Array, Pintle CHS, mindscanner probes, cognis manipulators