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Had a tourney the other day, 2nd game against a\the top players in 40K Aaron Aleong. Also several other top players are using the "Super Friends" list.

Goes like this ( sure you have seen it if you are going to answer )
Dark Angels bikes
SM Librarian Conclave
Space wolves + Iron Priests

This ended up being like a 20 model unit since all the space wolves are characters ( wolves as characters=dumb). Unfortunately we were not using ITC rules so invisibility and the new gate spell pretty much make this unit unkillable.

What are my options here? Even using Eldar I could only kill a couple of things before it marched across the field. Assuming ITC rules are being used?

I was thinking a WraithGuard Bomb.. but would love to hear how you would deal with this mess of a list.

You forgot Azrael for 4++. Also, pray they don't get Veil >.<

Roll on Santic for Void bomb.

Warp hunters, Warp hunters, Warp hunters.

Sword and board Wraithknight with Invis.

Try to enfeeble their squad.

Ban battle brothers.

DarthDiggler wrote:
Ban battle brothers.

I allied with Codex Sock Puppet Account so I could exalt this post 50 times.

Based on my experience there are two options:

1) Take Eldar, load up on D weapons, and blast them. This only really works if you're playing ITC so you can actually shoot blast weapons at an Invisible unit, but if you can then Wraithguard and Warp Hunters (from Forgeworld) stand a chance at killing the unit. The Eldar even combine the awful Strength D rule with the almost equally awful barrage rules so you can try to snipe out essential characters.

2) Take an army full of small, Objective Secured units and try to win on scenario. Obviously a Gladius Strike Force is a good choice for that sort of army, but most armies can cobble together something similar. Don't fight the super unit, just run around and through sacrificial roadblocks in its way (which won't work too well because all of the Independent Characters can split off after different targets) while you score scenario points.

There might be other answers out there for different armies, but I imagine they'll boil down to "Be a good player and take an equally broken list." Really, tournament-level 40K is so stupid right now it's difficult to take it seriously, but it is possible to beat lists like that if you fight fire with fire.

DarthDiggler wrote:
Ban battle brothers.

Dark Angels and SW treat each other as Allies of Convenience/Desperate Allies?

This is my plan of action as guard (not eldar) but it might be of help to some people...

Take coteaz (re-roll to seize and force opponent to re-roll theirs), roll on strategic warlord traits and hope for the +1 to seize bonus to help this. Have a bunch bunch of wyverns and pray for first turn! If first turn doesn't work out, wyvern squadrons might still be able to hit the now-invisible unit by chaining blast templates together (though this hinges on there being an enemy unit relatively close by...)

Use the wyverns to snipe out as many important parts of the unit as possible. Leave any smashfether chapter masters and iron priests. Go after crucial psykers (e.g. invisibility), apothecaries, anything with hit and run and then as many of the regular bikers as possible. This will hopefully vastly reduce the hitting power of the unit.

I also run a couple of large 40-50 man blobs of conscripts at 1500-1850pts. These move up the centre of the board and engage them in CC if possible. Usually expensive characters are not points effective swinging at 3pt conscripts. Also their lasguns are only BS2 anyway, so being forced to snapfire isn't such a terrible thing. While the conscripts amuse them, focus on killing off the rest of their army and fulfil the mission objectives.

As eldar perhaps run two or three allied culexus assassins (perhaps proxy them as some kind of eldar farseer who specialises in psychic defence?) and then bring as many scatter bikes, wraithknights and D cannon batteries as possible to annihilate them when their psychic shields are down!

 Lukash_ wrote:

DarthDiggler wrote:
Ban battle brothers.

Dark Angels and SW treat each other as Allies of Convenience/Desperate Allies?

Fluff-wise, you're right. They SHOULD be begrudging allies. Alas, the rulebook RAW says all IoM armies are battle brothers.

A culexus assassin would be quite good, the key will be positioning so that you can have your wraithknight be invisible while his star is not. The most devious plan involves getting a sword wraithknight into combat with the star, and make it invisible (and guided+fortuned if you've got it). The turn that happens, surround the star with bikes, culexus, and any other units you have so it can't hit and run away (if it has that ability). Use your stomps to try and snipe out key characters (librarians, etc) and pound them with D-attacks. The star will be tied up and taking damage until they kill the wraithknight, who will inflict a decent amount of damage on the star before he dies.

The other plan is to take lots of bikes, and utilize your range to kite him the entire game. When he gets close, move+turboboost to the other side of the table and start over.

A mask of slannesh might help to. As far as I can remember she can simply stun the whole star.

Again the army just congo lines across the whole board, he used the scouts to scout in and the used the Space marine power to swap units, so first turn assaults. For this and some other tournies that do not properly crutch Invisibility it completely nullifies your opponent from using Template\blast weapons. We were playing a 2500 pt game and I had warp hunter, lynx, two wraithknights, D battery and several large Bike units... invis pretty much nullified half my army. Plus I was throwing 14 dice to deny it and could not as he was casting everything he had for it. Iron Priest, invisible, killed wraith knights with no issue ( I rolled terrible on my Stomp of course)

Saw that the same list only at 1850 won ATC team championships as well, many people ran this list and its just a big pain in the ass if the tourney does not use ITC rules.

*Eldar complaining about something*

*trying to find reason to care*

Simple. Concede the game. If they want to win that badly by fielding a list that requires no player involvement from his opponent other than removing models from the table...shake his hand and say: "GG" and go wander the game hall and have a drink. It's not like you'd actually be playing the game anyways...or in any capacity that would be enjoyable. It also gives the d-bag what he wants: a win in the win column and maximum points. People like this are toxic to an already broken game system. Lists like these do nothing to further the game, the hobby, or prove any sort of tactical prowess. Lists like these aren't worth the time to play against them, nor are the people worth engaging.

lol then why even show up if you are going to concede... NEVER GIVE UP!! I thought turn 3 rolling 14 denies for Invis I would get it... I was one short.

Next game was vs 3 Wraith Knights and Revanent Titan.... again... don't give up! Though he rolled a 6 five times on the D table that game... I still fought and had a great time!

DarthDiggler wrote:
Ban battle brothers.

Or simply not play the game. Playing a list like this is pointless. Just give the guy what he ultimately wants: to win the game with max points. Then go do something else that's worthwhile.

Use the new FAQs. Easiest way of turning an unkillable Deathstar into an overpriced points sink. Then all you need to do is MSU for mission/board control.

SJ

 jeffersonian000 wrote:
Use the new FAQs. Easiest way of turning an unkillable Deathstar into an overpriced points sink. Then all you need to do is MSU for mission/board control.

SJ

Not really.... ATC uses both the ITC and the new GW Faqs, Marine deathstars are still prevalent. Chapter tactics is not really necessary.

SuperFriends type lists are probably the worst thing in competitive 40k right now. If there could be some kind of ruling (from GW or other source like ITC) that limits the ability to clump characters together into wombo combo deathstars, it could only help the game. I've faced lists like these before, and its not very fun (although the people I've seen running them are not complete donkey-caves like some complain about). Some of the crazy psychic powers need to be toned down as well. A TWC-Conclave deathstar even without Ravenwing bikes OR Invis is nearly indestructible with Veil of Time. Hopefully if a new edition drops in the near future it will done down some of the craziness.

 Cult of My Boy Blue wrote:
lol then why even show up if you are going to concede... NEVER GIVE UP!! I thought turn 3 rolling 14 denies for Invis I would get it... I was one short.

Next game was vs 3 Wraith Knights and Revanent Titan.... again... don't give up! Though he rolled a 6 five times on the D table that game... I still fought and had a great time!

Because tournaments are about more than just a W/L record. However, to some people..that's all that matters. So instead of banging your head against a wall. Simply give the guy what he wants...and you can do something more productive during that time. There is no point in playing a game where you, as the opponent, have been reduced to a casual/passive observer that is essentially there only to set your army up...and remove casualties. YMMV. If you enjoy that process, who am I to tell you otherwise? You asked for advice and I gave it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
I've faced lists like these before, and its not very fun (although the people I've seen running them are not complete donkey-caves like some complain about).

I disagree. They are donkey caves because they willingly play a list like this when they know full well that it's no fun to play against...and is toxic to an already broken game system. They don't care...and never will. So they are complicit in damaging the game further...but they do it because they want to win. That's all that matters to them. So that makes them donkey caves. Fielding lists like these does nothing to advance the game, the hobby, etc. It only hurts it. Just because you can do something...doesn't mean you should.

Haha cmon guys complaining and whining is not gonna contribute anything. Besides people play it in tournaments, no one is forcing anyone to play any casual games if they don't want to. If you don't want to play against cutthroat lists, basically don't go to tourneys.

At least in ITC, the best way is hit them with d-scythes or that d-flail, the sooner you take out the libbies the better.

Just curious, has anyone actually tried running multiple culexus assassins in one list before (like two or three)? 280pts or 420pts seems like a reasonable investment on paper to screw over around 1/3 of the worst builds in the game (depending on what points you're playing to of course). Seems like it'd be a pretty decent hard counter when combined with some heavy firepower. Their grenades and animus speculums could do a reasonable amount of damage to the super friends unit too.

I agree with the Culexus. Infiltrate him, get him close and lob a Psyk-Out Grenade. Doesn't even have to hit the Psyker, as long as it hits the unit his Psykers will suffer Perils. Worst case he gains a 3+ Invuln for a turn (rather unlikely), best case he dies and takes a few of the others out. Even if the Psyk-Out fails the Culexus can cripple his psychic abilities.

I have a list of mostly assassins (two of the assassin formations), and although I haven't run into too many psyker deathstars, I can tell you that they are actually very hard to kill at range (seeing as your opponent fires at BS 1 when shooting at them), and they're easy to hide behind terrain. The main thing you have to watch out for are blasts and templates, as they're not too badly affected by the BS 1 (not snap shots). So whoever you're fighting needs to either get very lucky with a Str 8+ shot, or they're going to have to bomb them out with ordinance. Then again, if your opponent is putting that many points into a super friends unit, he might not have the appropriate firepower to take them out before your list is able to shoot the death star to pieces (hopefully).

Please note that he's probably going to easily die if they ever get him in close combat, but he could buy you a turn or two of no ivisibllity, or no anything really... (psykers can only harness the warp on 6s if they're in his bubble).

 Palleus wrote:
I have a list of mostly assassins (two of the assassin formations), and although I haven't run into too many psyker deathstars, I can tell you that they are actually very hard to kill at range (seeing as your opponent fires at BS 1 when shooting at them), and they're easy to hide behind terrain. The main thing you have to watch out for are blasts and templates, as they're not too badly affected by the BS 1 (not snap shots). So whoever you're fighting needs to either get very lucky with a Str 8+ shot, or they're going to have to bomb them out with ordinance.

If your target is invisible or you're forced to snap fire for some other reason, you can't target them with blast/template weapons or ordinance at all. You can fire at a different unit and hope the template scatters onto them, of course.

Kill the scouts and play for objectives. (So yea, ignore cover blasts work great)

If you play Tau, and I know this is blasphamy for Tau, but MSU spam with firewarriors and transports with defensive systems will way slow down that deathstar. You have the best troop gun in the game, tied with necrons, USE IT.
Speed bumps were a thing in 5th, people seem to forget that tactic when we had first turn assaults and BS nonsense like that.

Also this is why tournaments need to limit the number of formations/detachments....That is piss poor management of the game mechanics.

 Cult of My Boy Blue wrote:
Had a tourney the other day, 2nd game against a\the top players in 40K Aaron Aleong. Also several other top players are using the "Super Friends" list.

Goes like this ( sure you have seen it if you are going to answer )
Dark Angels bikes
SM Librarian Conclave
Space wolves + Iron Priests

This ended up being like a 20 model unit since all the space wolves are characters ( wolves as characters=dumb). Unfortunately we were not using ITC rules so invisibility and the new gate spell pretty much make this unit unkillable.

What are my options here? Even using Eldar I could only kill a couple of things before it marched across the field. Assuming ITC rules are being used?

I was thinking a WraithGuard Bomb.. but would love to hear how you would deal with this mess of a list.

So... I've played against deathstars, specifically Twolfstars multiple times. I'm about 50/50 W/L against them.

If you can't kill them before they power up (Invis, veil), DO NOT TRY TO KILL THEM AFTER THEY POWER UP

The best thing that you can do to win the game is ignore them and play to the mission. Do not play their game. Do not attack them, certainly do not charge them unless you have a guarantee unit that can stand in assault to them and a guaranteed way to block hit and run. This is is extremely difficult by the way. You cannot just surround them. There has to be a very specific circumstance to block HnR which would take a whole thread to try to explain. An experienced Wolfstar player will 99 times out of 100 avoid that situation. So, ignore them and play to the mission.

Play to the mission. And while you are playing the mission, use damage mitigation to make the star the least potent it can be.

Damage mitigation can be done by the following tactics:
- movement blocking - use a (preferrably) fast, cheap, large unit to roadblock them from getting at your other units. Do not charge them to try to movement block, your unit will only die letting them gain more movement, or their unit will Hit and Run which will let them gain a lot more movement.
- distraction - Use a valuable unit to lure the star into a corner of the board. The purpose of this is to bait the star player into attacking the valuable distraction unit in the corner of the board so that it will keep the wolfstar out of position for a turn or two
- split the focus of the star - make the star player decide to focus on only a part of your army or split up his star. Do this by splitting up your forces into different areas of the board.
- play where the star isn't - Play the areas of the board where the star is not physically located. Aim for the objectives that the star doesn't have the ability to threaten.

If you can use some of these, it can help you play to the mission. Which is the biggest piece of advice against stars. Play to the mission. Do not play the star's game. You will lose. You have to choose which part of the mission you are able to achieve over the star and go full force for it. Most of the damage mitigation requires your army to be extremely fast and for units to operate independently. For 95% of armies, this is just not possible. This is why deathstars are winning most events. Armies just can't avoid the star nor can they beat the star.

There is also a great frontline gaming commentary on this you can find here: https://www.frontlinegaming.org/2016/05/23/signals-from-the-frontline-435-defeating-deathstars/ they reiterate a lot of the tactics I've stated here.

TL;DR Don't try to destroy the star once it is powered up. Pick and choose what aspects of the mission you can win and go full force for them. Use damage mitigation techniques to make the star the least potent it can be. Even using these tactics, the wolfstar player will still have the advantage in most missions.

Fluff wise the Wolves' and Angels' Feud was resolved while their Primarchs were still around, after that they became more like rivals who actually work really well together because they try to out-do each other.

In Apocalypse games they hold the status 'Come the Apocalypse'.

Back on track, push for community comp games, Community Comp points system is constantly being worked on and balanced.
http://www.communitycomp.org/files/CommunityComp.pdf

So what happens when a superfriends list comes up against a superfriends list?

 Ifurita wrote:
So what happens when a superfriends list comes up against a superfriends list?

They either break into smaller chuncks to play the mission or 5 turns of slapfighting. Someone would have to do the math on it but I would bet that a IH Star with Veil and the +1T power(stops S10 ID) against a big bark bark star with no h&r would do so little to each other that you would just do the psychic phase every turn and that's it. Did you deny/fail invis, veil, +1T, Endurance, Sanctuary, w/e? No? Cool now your opponent goes.

 Ifurita wrote:
So what happens when a superfriends list comes up against a superfriends list?

They flip a coin and then find another PUG.