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1st turn Cult ambush

I want to make sure I am doing this right. I'm fairly certain that I am but enough people have said otherwise on the forums ect that I'm looking for conformation.

1: A unit with cult ambush and infiltrate may roll on the cult ambush chart to deploy on the first turn, otherwise any unit with this rule in reserves may cult ambush when they arrive from reserves.

2: This means all my units in my Cult uprising (which gives them all infiltrate) except my tanks/Chimeras/Goliaths may cult ambush when deploying on the first turn.

3: This also means that they may move or return to the shadows on the first turn as they "deployed" that way not arrived from reserves.

I think I saw you in the other thread.

The way I do it is they deploy during the "Infiltrate" phase of deployment, so before the first turn. Then, because they Ambushed in deployment and not on turn 1, they can RttS during turn one. Units coming out of reserve I treat the same as units coming out of Ongoing Reserve, so it's just regular old Cult Ambush.

That's the way i read the rules anyway. It needs clarification before there can be any arguments one way or the other I think, although if you only deploy them on turn 1 using Cult Ambush it prevents RttS in turn 1. They'd have to wait until turn 2.

 BBAP wrote:
I think I saw you in the other thread.

The way I do it is they deploy during the "Infiltrate" phase of deployment, so before the first turn. Then, because they Ambushed in deployment and not on turn 1, they can RttS during turn one. Units coming out of reserve I treat the same as units coming out of Ongoing Reserve, so it's just regular old Cult Ambush.

That's the way i read the rules anyway. It needs clarification before there can be any arguments one way or the other I think, although if you only deploy them on turn 1 using Cult Ambush it prevents RttS in turn 1. They'd have to wait until turn 2.

That is correct. Coming in out of reserves is easy enough, but the way I play it is that they follow the limit to infiltrate in that they can't assaukt turn 1 after infiltrating, unless they roll that six. And, remember that you can either RTTS or hold still and shoot heavy weapons like normal, unlike coming in from reserves via cult ambush.

But, there is an argument about coming in from CA and whether a 3-6 counts as moving if you have a heavy weapon...

and this is why I want things to be clear so when the next tourny comes around I don't accidentally do something wrong or build around a misinterpretation.

 jifel wrote:
That is correct. Coming in out of reserves is easy enough, but the way I play it is that they follow the limit to infiltrate in that they can't assaukt turn 1 after infiltrating, unless they roll that six.

That seems pretty cut-and-dried to me; it's modified Infiltrate/ arrive from Reserves, but that's still what the unit is doing so all the usual restrictions apply. It means you have to risk units getting chewed up to get them into the best positions, which seems reasonable to me - everyone else has to do it, why would the GSC be any different?

But, there is an argument about coming in from CA and whether a 3-6 counts as moving if you have a heavy weapon...

This seems less cut and dried, but I'd say they do, for the same reasons as above. CA modifies the deployment from Reserves but that's still what the unit is doing. Everyone else has to do it, why should the GSC be different?

That's not RAW, that's just me playing it conservative.

Not to mention GSC Heavy weapons are a bit... lacklustre in my view. MOAR Claw-Morphs is all you need. Ditch the Lasers and buy more Morphs.

Couldn't agree more! I don't like spending points on weapons, when I see two seismic cannons Id rather have five more acolytes... But for summoning, it could certainly be worth it. 20 bodies for 3 WC is golden.

Can't argue with that, although I've never had a Summoned Neophyte unit do anything but Outflank so it's never come up for me. If it did, I'd go for "moving", just because of the above. I'm not sure I see the argument for "not moving" - they're entering from reserve after all.

Now with that sort of settled the next issue is with characters other than the Primus joining a sub uprising squad.

Do they still get the 3 dice for CA that the Primus gives them or do they drop back to 1 dice?

Also what about a Primus or two added from another source such as a CAD? Do they give the 3 dice or are they back to 1 Dice since they are not part of the detachment?

Timeshadow wrote:
Now with that sort of settled the next issue is with characters other than the Primus joining a sub uprising squad.

Do they still get the 3 dice for CA that the Primus gives them or do they drop back to 1 dice?

Also what about a Primus or two added from another source such as a CAD? Do they give the 3 dice or are they back to 1 Dice since they are not part of the detachment?

This one is very easy. If you're using the GW faq, no. Attached characters from outside sources can't benefit from formation rules, only models do. So, you lose the special rules for anything that joins it, and therefore the whole squad loses the 3d6. Even if it's a Primus, you do not benefit from the special rule at all so no 3d6. Only SubUp Primus' can benefit from rules and trigger the 3d6. Of course, if you're not using the GW FAQs then yes all deployment rules for "the unit" are transferred.

So if you have an IC attached to a SubUp squad without a Primus, the squad is back down to 1D6? Seems reasonable to me. I doubt the designers intended to give Patriarchs a 33% chance to charge out of Reserve.

Can sub uprisings start in reserve? Seems like it'd be a powerful tactic

no, they must infiltrate using the cult ambush rules, but can always rtts

So, I'm looking over the new final FAQ, anyone see any gems for us? One that is overlooked is that allies never contest your own objectives, which is great for us as we often have Convenient Allies. Plus, Im hoping it will set a precedent for Allies of Convenience not counting as enemies for RTTS and CA... (and, please, Shadows in the Warp...)

I would even be happy if it were just "powers of the hive mind" that were not effected by sitw.

I haven't seen much discussion on allies here. I feel like IG could seriously round out the army. In particular some of the more aggressive Russ variety, like how about the leman russ formation where you can field I think 5 and they all get +1 BS near the command tank. That and a command from cadian detachment for an officer of the fleet could make a solid anchor for the army allowing it to reserve/RTTS turn 1 with everything else and not worry about the tabling, while also giving -2 to your opponents reserves!

Biggest issue I have with relying on only GSC is the win big lose big factor. If you try to mitigate that by playing conservative in the early turns you also give up board control turns 1-2 which in maelstrom can be the death knell. I mean I have had eldar and marine lists go up to 12 VP's turn 1 in that stupid 6 card start mission because of their mobility and obsec.

Maybe the answer is also more cathartic, simply give up the points early and go for the tabling F you top tier.

I mentioned awhile ago that the IG artillery formation seems like the peanut butter to GSC's chocolate. I haven't tried it out, myself, but a couple Wyverns and subtotal reserve denial never hurt anyone's list.

Random question. If I summon units with the psyker power, do they benefit from formation bonuses of the summoner? Or are they "unbound"?

 Red Corsair wrote:
I haven't seen much discussion on allies here. I feel like IG could seriously round out the army. In particular some of the more aggressive Russ variety, like how about the leman russ formation where you can field I think 5 and they all get +1 BS near the command tank. That and a command from cadian detachment for an officer of the fleet could make a solid anchor for the army allowing it to reserve/RTTS turn 1 with everything else and not worry about the tabling, while also giving -2 to your opponents reserves!

Can't speak to the Guard because I don't own the book and nobody I know plays them, but I tried out a two-Flyrant three-Mucolid Nids Detachment in my last game, and in all honesty I wasn't impressed. It's not that the Flyrants were bad, I just don't think they brought anything decisive to the table, and there were several points where I thought the game might've been easier if I'd brought the stuff I had to dump to fit them in (mostly MOAR SubUp Claw-Morphs and Acolytes).

Then again my usual opponents run Scatbike/ WK Eldar, Nids, an invisible IH deathstar, and a "Chambers Militant" army, so Flyers aren't a huge issue for me. Allies might shine brighter in a TAC environment with more varied opponents, but I'd definitely recommend a conservative approach to adding them. The only thing you really need Allies for is killing Flyers; the GSC Codex has got everything else covered pretty much, so make sure whatever you're adding doesn't detract from the basic awesomeness of the Cults and you should be able to build something functional.

Maybe the answer is also more cathartic, simply give up the points early and go for the tabling F you top tier.

Funny you say that, because I seem to have trouble tabling people with my GSC. I've come close once or twice but because of how I run the army - I lose loads of models, but the opponent loses even more - I just never seem to get to turn 5+ with quite enough hitting power left to finish opponents off. Maybe something to consider; maybe just me not protecting my units properly.

Morris782 wrote:
Random question. If I summon units with the psyker power, do they benefit from formation bonuses of the summoner? Or are they "unbound"?

I play the latter - I can't see any good reason for them to benefit from formation bonuses so I don't give them to my Summons. They already get all the wargear they can carry for free, adding bonuses on top of that just seems rude.

So what is everyone's go to Summons?

I tend towards the 20 neophytes with 2 sysmic cannons 2 grenade launchers or flamers banner and kitted out Sgt. The main reason is it is more bodies and shooting is a more effective option in most cases.

My 2nd choice is 10 metamorphs with mostly claws and a few whips banner lw/bs Sgt and a few hand flamers.

I'm debating going with acolytes and rocksaws instead what do people think.

Just played a 1650 game against mechanicum taghmata (not 40k legal, I know, it was for fun). He had a castellax, unit of thallax, 2 20 man fearless thrall units, and a big blob of thanatars with a melee tech priest.

I was running the following:

Min Brood cycle, with whip metas and a flamer on each neo unit
First Curse (rolled poison, 2 crap biomancy powers, and the use his LD warlord trait, meh)
Magos with crouchling (mental onslaught, might from beyond and summoning)
Sub uprising with primus, 2 min acolytes and 3x10 claw metas with an icon each
CAD with 2 magoses (mental onslaught, 2 meh telepathy powers), a min acolyte squad and neophytes with an AC and a GL

Mission was big guns, and I let him go first. His thallax prevented me from infiltrating anything within 24" of them, so I hung back with the uprising and CAD and returned to the shadows T1 with the whole uprising. He did however kill one unit of acolytes and make a unit of claw-morphs fall back and was later killed by the castellax, so quite a chunk out of my force (I was playing it that falling back units couldn't RttS).

Turn 2 I managed to fail 4 2+ reserve rolls for my 8 units off the table, including for my first cursed and the unit with my summoning magos. Got a 6 on one unit of acolytes and one claw-morph unit, who proceeded to multi-charge the thanatars and a unit of tech-thralls. In hindsight, I should've just locked up the castellax, as next turn it proceeded to delete my other 10-man clawmorph unit with my primus in who had ambushed in behind the charging units.

The next turn the rest of my army arrived and I summoned a unit of 10 claw-morphs, who proceeded to roll a 1 and never do anything! However, a lot of the rest of my army closed down another flank and slowly whittled down the other tech thrall unit. I did then proceed to fail 10/11 5+ saves and lose my entire first cursed unit in a single turn, which was unfortunate - the price of coming in piecemeal!

A lot of my units had been rolling 1s on ambush and cycling though, so the following turn my Iconward's unit, a CAD acolyte unit and the whip-morphs multicharged the thralls and thallax to finish them off, whilst another unit of acolytes locked up his castellax, finally. Game ended on turn 5 with only 1 locked thallax, a 3 wound castellax and the deathstar unit alive, and me up 13:2 (4 objs and linebreaker VS first blood and warlord). Cycling units had enabled me to keep stuff on the back two objectives whilst also throwing more and more into the fray. I did lose over 100 models (I think) but there were still 40 or so left, and the attrition had taken its toll - he just didn't have enough units to deal with my MSU.

In terms of lessons, I now fully appreciate those of you who have been saying MSU is the way to go - both for more ambush rolls and for forcing overkill from the opponent. I also want to take another Patriarch for the fearless bubble, and am considering an aegis for a 2+ save for the whole uprising on the first turn. My new draft list looks like this:

Insurrection detachment:

Brood Cycle
Iconward
3x5 Acolytes
5 Metas w/ whips
2x10 neophytes, 2 flamers each
5 Purestrains

Lords of the cult
ML2 Magos with Crouchling, familiar

Lords of the cult
ML2 Patriarch, 2 familiars

Subterranean Uprising
Primus
2x5 Acolytes
3x5 Metamorphs w/ claws

Subterranean uprising
2x5 Acolytes
3x5 Metamorphs w/ claws

CAD
ML2 Patriarch, 2 familiars
ML2 Magos, 2 familiars
2x10 neophytes, AC team and 2 GLs each
Aegis with quadgun

Gives me a lot more units with a similar number of models than I had before. 4x10 man neophyte units to slap my Psykers in to protect them. Might drop some of the familiars (35pts worth) and the Quad-gun for another unit of Purestrains or maybe 5 more metas and an icon in one unit for the Primus to join.

I think Summons are situational. I have one load-out I like - 10 Morphs, all Whips, Icon, LW&BS leader - but if you need the shooty Neophytes or want the Rock Saws, you can have them instead.

What I'm trying to figure out is what would be the most efficient way of buying and modelling your Summons alongside the rest of your army. Might be worth us trying to figure out if there's a way to do it without adding 100-200 quid to the cost of the army (which is already 600+ quid at 1850pts).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Benlisted wrote:
First Curse (rolled poison, 2 crap biomancy powers, and the use his LD warlord trait, meh)

I kinda like the "use his Ld" Warlord trait for mobbed-up GSC. Forcing Morale is much, much less effective against an Ld10 army than it is against an Ld8 one, which forces your opponent to either finish off your piffling min squads with too much firepower, or move stuff out of position to deny RttS/ Reinforce. Plus it makes your spare Patriarchs much less important because the "backstop" bubbles aren't a big deal if nobody's failing Morale, so you can be a bit more aggressive with them.

In terms of lessons, I now fully appreciate those of you who have been saying MSU is the way to go - both for more ambush rolls and for forcing overkill from the opponent. I also want to take another Patriarch for the fearless bubble, and am considering an aegis for a 2+ save for the whole uprising on the first turn.

Someone mentioned Fortifications to me in another thread too - the Aegis sounds like a really good idea if you're running mass SubUps and are forced to deploy on the table, especially in ETC formats with set table layouts, none of which offer much cover. Still haven't picked up the book yet though.

Got my first tournament with genestealer cult!




Thats a brood cycle + 3 subterean uprising + tyranid cad with deathleaper and two sporefields bobs + 3 forgeworld sporebombs.

evaluation:

Damn I love this army!

First round I fought a space wolf army and I claimed so much tactical objectives that it was hard to lose. It so much fun because it's a real fight for both armies. We both lost a lot but in the end he was capable to still hold an objective that gave him an extra 3 Victory points so I won with 16-4.

Second round I fought 3 imperial knights + ravenwing bikes. I got first turn and wanted to cripple his army right away. then he seized... Mission was deathlock and the first and second turn I got so much tactical objectives I thought I could still pull this off! But 3 knights that could divide all their shots was a bit to much. In the end all 6 objectives were worth 2 Vp and he got 4 of them so that was a big lose for me.

third round

I love this pic:



Enemies army only deployed 2 razorbacks + thunderfirecannon.

The only problem is that this mission was old skool codex points. His flyers came in and their was no way i could take them down. Next time I should just deploy all my models 2 inch apart from each other to block the whole field.

What to change:

Going to lose the tyranids.. It was fun but I rather get more cult units and more psykers. Dont really need another fearless patriarch because my units either die right away or win big. Fearless is not really a big deal but iam going to keep 1 patriarch because I want to add another big unit acolytes with 2 rock saws and then its nice to have sum fearless around. I'am really missing furious charge when my iconward is not around but when I pick more psykers I can give certain units rage +1 strenght (might from beyond). Summoning can be so cool but then I do need the models to be flexible with the free upgrades.

The lesson I learned: dont try to get first turn in their face. Karma shows you will get seized.
To much trust in the cult ambush table will punish you. My big unit with primus that got 3d6 for cult ambush? 2 times I got 1-1-2 result.... Keep playing multible small units....

Nicely done, sir! I like that picture too; it's maybe not the "optimal" thing to do at deployment, but damn if it doesn't feel good to hem someone into a corner like that.

I hadn't even though about multiple Imperial Knights being an issue because I rarely ever see them, and when I do it's one Knight max. I suppose that's the kind of thing you need to consider at tournaments though. I think it'll be difficult to deal with them without relying on Cult Ambush, which is not good...

 BBAP wrote:
Nicely done, sir! I like that picture too; it's maybe not the "optimal" thing to do at deployment, but damn if it doesn't feel good to hem someone into a corner like that.

I hadn't even though about multiple Imperial Knights being an issue because I rarely ever see them, and when I do it's one Knight max. I suppose that's the kind of thing you need to consider at tournaments though. I think it'll be difficult to deal with them without relying on Cult Ambush, which is not good...

It was that baronial court (or sumthing like that) and the get overwatch if the stick close to each other. If he didn't seized I would have simply won because then My first assault would have taken out his bikes and then those knights would have been locked in the corner the whole game. Also a tip: Don't field all your leaders close to each other because the 'look out sir' wounds still go the nearest model.

I need sum great summoning units. I would really want the possibility to trow in 20 hybrid neophyte's or 10 acolytes with 2 rock saws.

When I want to start summoning units, what would be a optimal unit composition of 20 neophytes?

Sibuna wrote:
When I want to start summoning units, what would be a optimal unit composition of 20 neophytes?

I think optimal is 20 guys with a power pick sergeant, two grenade launchers and two Seismic Cannons. But, I like to keep two mining lasers there just in case I need them for a riptide.

Neophytes perform best against infantry. If you're summoning anti-tank/ LoW-killers you want Claw-Morphs, Stealers, or potentially Aberrants. For that reason I think the best load-out for Summoned Neophyte units is 2 Seismic Cannons, 2 Webbers, an Icon, and a Web Pistol/ Power Maul Leader.

Seismic Cannons have a high RoF, which helps to overcome BS3, and can be used as anti-tank weapons in a pinch. Web weapons will mess up Warp Spiders and Scatbikes a treat and perform reasonably well against MEQs too. Power Picks are cool, but if the Leader gets Challenged he'll probably die before he gets to swing it. The Maul is more likely to do some damage.

 BBAP wrote:
Neophytes perform best against infantry. If you're summoning anti-tank/ LoW-killers you want Claw-Morphs, Stealers, or potentially Aberrants. For that reason I think the best load-out for Summoned Neophyte units is 2 Seismic Cannons, 2 Webbers, an Icon, and a Web Pistol/ Power Maul Leader.

Seismic Cannons have a high RoF, which helps to overcome BS3, and can be used as anti-tank weapons in a pinch. Web weapons will mess up Warp Spiders and Scatbikes a treat and perform reasonably well against MEQs too. Power Picks are cool, but if the Leader gets Challenged he'll probably die before he gets to swing it. The Maul is more likely to do some damage.

Depends on what you're going for. If my army got 2x telepathic summon and I want to take down a flyer the its better to summon 2x10 neophyte units with 2 Seismic cannons + 2 grenade launchers. 8x s8 ap3 shots + 4x s6 shots will make them jink, believe me.

Or if you want to open a transport to get to the juicy stuff inside.

shogun wrote:
Depends on what you're going for. If my army got 2x telepathic summon and I want to take down a flyer the its better to summon 2x10 neophyte units with 2 Seismic cannons + 2 grenade launchers. 8x s8 ap3 shots + 4x s6 shots will make them jink, believe me.

That's not a bad idea if you want to play pure GSC, but it means landing Summons, which isn't guaranteed, and fishing for it might not be a good idea if you've got units that want Invisibility or Shrouding. I still think Allies are the best way to deal with Flyers. Hive Tyrants (kinda) work, but I proxied a Guard contingent in my last game and that seemed a bit more solid. Guard shooting isn't mega-reliable, but you get plenty of it for the same cost as a couple of Flyrants and it'll do the job it needs to. At worst, it'll syphon off some of the shooting your opponent might otherwise direct at your GSC bods.